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junio-julio 2017 18 Hoy, la consagración y la expansión de la propiedad privada ha llevado al olvido a muchos métodos de gobernar recursos que no están basados en la exclusividad. Frecuentemente se escucha hablar de la propiedad como un derecho de dominio absoluto, algo inviolable que no conlleva obligaciones. Sin embargo, desde los inicios de la historia jurídica podemos observar que los derechos de propiedad han estado habitualmente acompañados de obligaciones y limitaciones, además de un mandato moral solicitando que el manejo de la propiedad sea en vista al bien común. La masiva negligencia entre los administradores de propiedad en cumplir con estas expectativas sociales y su enorme efecto negativo en el bienestar de los ciudadanos han creado un gran descontento con el sistema de derechos exclusivos, ya sea la propiedad privada o la estatal, en especial en áreas vitales para la supervivencia humana. Un área en el que podemos observar los mayores descontentos es el de la apropiación de recursos genéticos, dificultando el acceso a la biodiversidad y así poniendo en peligro el futuro abastecimiento de la población con alimentos adecuados y variados. Para que la agricultura sea capaz de alimentar el actual y futuro número de personas en el mundo es fundamental tener acceso a semillas mejoradas y/o variadas, lo que demanda un amplio acceso a la agrobiodiversidad. Un sistema de propiedad privada dificulta el acceso a dicha diversidad. Como se trata de un sistema basado en la exclusividad, éste permite bloquear el acceso a ciertas variedades o hacerlo condicional a altísimos precios. Al crear una nueva variedad utilizando diversos recursos genéticos y así fomentando la biodiversidad, se está obligado a negociar con un gran número de propietarios, algo que lleva al encarecimiento, y muchas veces estancamiento, del proceso de mejoramiento. Cualquier administrador de derechos exclusivos, al darse cuenta de que su propia contribución es imprescindible para un producto final, puede bloquear la salida al mercado demandando condiciones inaceptables. O simplemente impedir la venta del producto para poder así vender mejor productos similares. Este resultado es conocido como la tragedia de los anticomunes, algo que ha creado un gran descontento entre científicos, fitomejoradores y agricultores. El prescindir completamente de derechos de propiedad, estableciendo un régimen de acceso abierto universal no es una opción fiable –por lo menos no a corto plazo– en un mundo donde las grandes empresas de semillas ejercen un enorme lobby internacional. Para que puedan coexistir regímenes de derechos alternativos sobre recursos genéticos con regímenes de propiedad privada, los primeros necesitan un sistema para impedir que los recursos terminen en manos privadas. Importantes innovaciones legales con fuertes raíces en la informática han surgido hace casi dos décadas para este propósito, y se han ido desarrollando y expandiendo notablemente en otras áreas; hablamos de las licencias creative commons. El lector estará seguramente familiarizado con uno de los mayores usuarios de este tipo de licencias: la enciclopedia digital Wikipedia. Estas licencias distinguen entre los derechos de propiedad una serie de derechos secundarios, entre ellos, los derechos de atribución (de autoría), de crear productos derivados, de uso comercial y de compartir de igual manera (en inglés share alike). EsCristian Timmermann Ton Duc Thang University Correo-e: [email protected] egistro de variedades según el modelo de creative commons R Mercado huichol junio-julio 2017 19 tas licencias permiten a inventores y mejoradores hacer uso de solo los derechos que deseen y facilitar las libertades que consideren importantes. Por ejemplo, obligar a dar crédito por la autoría, a favorecer o prohibir la mejora, a hacer el uso comercial condicional a pago, y a asegurar que los que crean productos derivados compartan éstos de la misma manera en que fue compartido el producto original. En el marco de la agricultura, varios grupos independientes han desarrollado una serie de licencias inspiradas en la idea de los creative commons. El descontento de pequeños campesinos y grupos de fitomejoradores con las actuales políticas agrarias ha impulsado a diversos grupos a experimentar con este tipo de licencias, consolidando una notable participación en Estados Unidos y en la India. Para sus licencias, la Open Source Seed Initiative, por ejemplo, ha optado por no enfocarse en el uso cotidiano de un extenso documento legal, sino en una versión compacta y fácil de visualizar de apenas un par de líneas. Esta iniciativa prefirió no concentrarse tanto en establecer una certeza legal para así desafiar a las grandes multinacionales en diversas cortes. Su meta es más bien implementar y expandir masivamente un compromiso moral entre campesinos y fitomejoradores para fomentar la conservación de derechos tradicionales de campesinos, particularmente los de compartir, mejorar e intercambiar semillas. Actualmente, esta iniciativa ya cuenta con más de 370 variedades que están disponibles bajo estas licencias y su éxito está inspirando a organizaciones campesinas en varios otros países. Idealmente, estos movimientos reproducirán el mismo efecto que han tenido los productos de libre acceso en la informática desde la década de los noventa. La libre disponibilidad de variedades de calidad dificultará que las grandes empresas dominen a largo plazo el mercado a través de poderes de monopolio y las obligará a invertir más recursos en ofrecer productos de mejor calidad, variedad y eficacia para así competir con los productos del dominio público. La disponibilidad de este tipo de licencias consiste en un bien común de cuatro dimensiones: a) facilitando el libre acceso a semillas, b) creando mayor libertad de elección sobre los derechos que fitomejoradores y campesinos quieran conservar y renunciar, c) incrementando la competencia en los mercados, y d) reduciendo los costos para acceder a una mayor diversidad de recursos genéticos para el cultivo y la mejora de vegetales. En tiempos de enormes monocultivos, de un rápido descenso de la agrobiodiversidad y de una fuerte pérdida de la soberanía alimentaria, estamos ante la obligación moral de aprender a usar y explorar las oportunidades que este nuevo tipo de licencias conlleva. Variedades de calabacita

How A-theoretic Deprivationists Should Respond to Lucretius Natalja Deng (Journal of the American Philosophical Association 1/3: 417-432. Please cite published version, available at https://doi.org/10.1017/apa.2015.1) Abstract: What, if anything, makes death bad for the deceased themselves? Deprivationists hold that death is bad for the deceased iff it deprives them of intrinsic goods they would have enjoyed had they lived longer. This view faces the problem that birth too seems to deprive one of goods one would have enjoyed had one been born earlier, so that it too should be bad for one. There are two main approaches to the problem. In this paper, I explore the second approach, by Anthony Brueckner and John Martin Fischer, and suggest that it can be developed so as to meet deprivationists' needs. On the resulting view, metaphysical differences between the future and the past give rise to a corresponding axiological difference in the intrinsic value of future and past experiences. As experiences move into the past, they lose their intrinsic value for the person. Keywords: A-theories, death, deprivationism, symmetry problem Introduction The aim of this paper is to address a certain puzzle that arises in the philosophy of death, using resources from contemporary metaphysics of time. Most contemporary philosophers hold that Epicurus was wrong to think that death is never bad for the deceased. Instead they claim that death is bad for the deceased iff, and to the extent that, it deprives them of goods they would have enjoyed had they lived longer (deprivationism). The deprivationist faces a so-called symmetry problem (based on remarks by Lucretius), which is that birth (or prenatal nonexistence) too seems to deprive one of goods that one would have enjoyed had one been born earlier, and therefore it too should be bad for one. 2 There are two main approaches to the problem in the literature, neither of which is unproblematic. A good number of deprivationists now bite the bullet and accept that in the relevant sense, there is an evil of birth as well as an evil of death. In this paper, I explore the second approach to solving the problem, the one put forth by Brueckner and Fischer, and argue that it can be developed so as to meet deprivationists' needs. I start by outlining some preliminaries (section 1) and then explain deprivationism (section 2) and why it faces a symmetry problem (section 3). I then briefly discuss the first solution (section 4), before turning to the second, by Brueckner and Fischer (section 5). Next, I develop what I take to be the most promising version of their solution (section 6). Finally, I respond to a number of objections (section 7). 1. Preliminaries The question at issue between a deprivationist and his or her Epicurean opponent is whether (and if so, why) death can be bad for the one who dies. I'll construe Epicureanism as a position about the badness (or lack thereof) of death, rather than about whether we should fear death. I don't know to what extent this is a faithful construal of Epicurus's actual writings. Clearly, he at least also held a view on whether we should fear death (see Warren 2004). I'll assume that in this context, 'bad', 'evil', and 'harm' can be used interchangeably. The question might thus also be expressed as whether (and if so, why) death can be an evil for the deceased, or whether death can harm the deceased. I'll mostly speak of 'badness'. The badness in question is person-relative: the question is whether death can be bad for the person who dies, not whether it can be bad simpliciter or bad for the world as a whole. Note that neither the deprivationist nor his or her opponent denies that someone's death can be, and often is, bad for others. Also note that deprivationists don't hold that death is always bad for the one who dies, but only that there are cases in which it is. Their Epicurean opponent holds the correspondingly strong position that death is never bad for the one who dies. The term 'death' is somewhat ambiguous in that it could mean at least any of the following: (a) the dying process, (b) the event this process culminates in, (c) the state (if it is one) of nonexistence that follows, or (d) the fact that we're mortal. I'll suppose that of these four, only (b) is at issue. That is, we're concerned with the (dis-)value of the event that marks the end of life. Alternatively, I'll speak of the badness of the state of affairs of someone's death 3 occurring. I'll briefly reconsider the relevance of (c) when we get to the symmetry argument, below. I'll further assume that death marks the end of a person's existence. That excludes, on the one hand, views on which we continue to exist as immortal souls or Cartesian egos and, on the other hand, views on which we continue to exist as (dead) bodies (e.g., because we're animals, and animals continue to exist as dead animals after their death). Incidentally, it would also exclude any view of time on which persons (and other seemingly temporary existents) 'exist permanently', if 'existence' is here used in its ordinary sense. But I take it that neither the minimal A-theory (Sullivan 2012) nor the B-theory as usually understood (e.g., Sider 2011: ch. 11), nor even the B-theory as understood by Le Poidevin in 1996: ch. 10 has this implication. Finally, note that the question of death's badness is not directly a question about which attitudes we have or should have toward our death. So whether we should, for example, fear death is a related, but distinct question. 2. Deprivationism Few anti-Epicureans hold that the event of death is intrinsically bad for the deceased. (I'll take intrinsic bads to be things that are bad not just in virtue of leading to something else that's bad or preventing something good.) In fact, the most widely accepted anti-Epicurean view can accommodate hedonism, the view that the only intrinsic goods are pleasures and the only intrinsic bads are pains. This is deprivationism. It says that an event is (extrinsically) bad for someone iff, and to the extent that, that person would have been intrinsically better off if the event hadn't occurred. In particular, deprivationism says that death is bad for the one who dies iff, and to the extent that, it deprives that person of intrinsic goods he or she would have enjoyed had the person not died. What is meant here by 'had the person not died'-had the person died of a different cause or had he or she died at a slightly different time, or had he or she been immortal, or something else? According to the deprivationist, that depends on which counterfactual comparison is conversationally salient. Suppose we interpret the counterfactual involved in terms of possible worlds. Then to say that had someone's death not occurred that person would have enjoyed more intrinsic goods is to say that in the closest possible world in which the death doesn't occur, the person enjoys more intrinsic goods than in the actual world. But whether the closest world is 4 one where the person dies of a different cause, or a millisecond later, or not at all, depends on the conversational context. If death is an evil of deprivation, then it's bad for the one who dies in a quite specific way. It isn't intrinsically bad for that person nor does it cause something intrinsically bad to happen to him or her. Rather, the badness of death consists in its preventing something. Death is thus comparable, in terms of the kind (though not, typically, the extent) of badness it involves, to never receiving baseball tickets meant for one, for example, and never finding out about it (Bradley 2009: 178). The harm consists in not being as well off as one would have been had one gone to the game. 3. The Symmetry Problem There are actually several symmetry problems based on, or inspired by, Lucretius's writings. The one that will occupy me here, namely the one specifically aimed at deprivationism, can be put as follows. 1: If deprivationism is right, then birth too is bad (for some), since by its lateness it deprives one of intrinsic goods one would have enjoyed had one been born earlier (Note that strictly speaking it's the event of one's coming into existence in the womb that's in question, rather than birth). 2: But it isn't, so 3: deprivationism is mistaken. Often, the problem is instead formulated as a problem about prenatal nonexistence. If deprivationism is right, then prenatal nonexistence too is bad (for some), since it deprives one of intrinsic goods one would have enjoyed had one been born earlier. But it isn't, so deprivationism is mistaken (see Johansson 2005: 107). One reason to formulate the argument this way is that it's closer to what Lucretius actually said. But then what Lucretius actually said was clearly not specifically aimed at deprivationism, and we're concerned with the version of the argument that is (rather than, say, one about our attitudes toward past and future nonexistence). Deprivationists typically evaluate not future nonexistence, that is, the state (if it is one) of being dead, but rather the event that leads to it, namely, the event of death. Nor is this emphasis on the event of death rather than on post-mortem nonexistence accidental. Rather, it corresponds to the conviction 5 that an Epicureanism which says merely that being dead is not in any way bad for one, is 'of academic interest only' (Olson 2013). In order to be interesting, so goes the conviction, Epicureanism has to hold also that the event of death is not bad for one. That's what deprivationists deny. They hold that the event of (early) death is bad because the intrinsic value of one's life in the actual world is less than it is in the closest world where the event doesn't take place. By parity of reasoning, then, it should be the event of (late) birth whose value is in question. Therefore, I'll stick to the first formulation. Why might one hold that (late) birth typically deprives one of intrinsic goods? That is, why think that one would have enjoyed more intrinsic goods had one's actual birth not taken place? Clearly, a proponent of the argument has a particular counterfactual comparison in mind, and that particular comparison may not be the most salient in any ordinary context. It's natural to make a comparison with a world in which one isn't born at all, and of course on that interpretation one's birth doesn't deprive one, on the contrary. But the intended comparison is with a world in which one is born earlier, namely, by as much as one would have lived longer had one not died. Moreover, the world in question is supposed to be one in which one's death date is the same as in the actual world. So if I live from 1981 to 2046 and I would have lived until 2056 had I not died, the world in question is one in which I live from 1971 to 2046. The same extra time is added to my life, but at the beginning instead of at the end. Typically (for example, if one wasn't born right after a major war that would have overshadowed much of one's childhood had one witnessed it), that extra time would have involved as much pleasure as the extra time at the end, and thus, typically, birth too deprives one. In fact, given this particular counterfactual comparison, late birth is typically as bad as early death. Thus, deprivationism as it stands implies that birth too is typically bad for one. Should we then become more distressed about the fact that we were born when we were, rather than earlier? At this point, deprivationists usually insist on a substantial divide between what's bad for one and what it's all-things-considered rational to feel distressed about. Your late birth merits bad feelings, but all things considered, you shouldn't feel bad about it. Similarly, world poverty merits bad feelings, but one can't be miserable all the time, so one shouldn't feel bad about it. I admit that this may be the right result. But I think it's still worth exploring other avenues. Prima facie, world poverty seems bad (simpliciter) in a way that one's late birth doesn't seem bad (for one). 6 Johansson offers the following explanation of why we don't see that it's bad for us to have been born when we were. Usually, things that are bad for us are things we have reason to try to prevent. So we're misled into thinking that all things that are bad for us are things we have reason to try to prevent. But we don't have reason to try to prevent being born late, because we can't. So we mistakenly infer that being born late isn't bad for us. It seems true that there are things that are bad for us that we can't affect, and if we have no reason to try to prevent those, then there are things that are bad for us that we have no reason to try to prevent. But even on reflection, late birth doesn't seem to be one of them. The bad things we are powerless to affect, and hence have no reason to try to prevent, are still things we have reason to want to, or wish we could, prevent. To use one of Johansson's own examples, supposing God doesn't exist and supposing that that fact is bad for (some of) us, we may have no reason to try to prevent God's nonexistence because we can't, but we still have some reason to regret it. It's not clear that one's late birth (or even the lateness of one's birth) is like that. 4. First Solution: Impossibility Let me briefly pause to mention a solution to the symmetry problem that I'll set aside (I take these problems from the literature, especially Johansson 2005, 2008, 2013). The solution says that a given person couldn't have been born (much) earlier than he or she was; that is, the solution says that one's time of birth, but not one's time of death, is essential to one. This idea is originally due to Nagel (who later expressed doubts about it); another version of it was then developed by Kaufman. I'll briefly note the main problems with Kaufman's version (see Kaufman 1996). The first problem is that it's not clear that deprivationism requires genuine possibility for its counterfactual comparisons even if it's often expressed in terms of possible worlds. What it says is that something is bad for you iff you would have been intrinsically better off without it, not that you could have been without it. The second problem is that Kaufman hasn't made a convincing case that one couldn't have been born earlier. He tries to establish this by showing that we are 'thick' (rather than 'thin') persons, namely, persons with particular psychologies, projects, values, and so on. But, as Johansson argues, he hasn't shown why it should follow from this that we couldn't have very different psychologies (i), nor why it should follow from that that we couldn't have been born earlier (ii). 7 As for (i): Suppose you had a close shave with a car accident as a toddler. If you'd been injured, you'd have had a very different psychology. As for (ii): Even if it's the case that had you been born earlier, you would have had a different psychology, it doesn't follow that you couldn't have been born earlier and still have the same psychology. It's just that none of those worlds is (in an ordinary context) the closest world in which you are born earlier. 5. Second Solution: Bias toward the Future I'll now turn to Brueckner and Fischer (henceforth B&F). They respond to the symmetry argument using the Parfitian idea of a 'bias towards the future' (Parfit 1984: p. 160). Consider Parfit's thought experiment in My Past or Future Operation (Parfit 1984: 165–66). A person wakes up in a hospital and is told that either they already underwent a long and painful operation and have now forgotten it, or they are still to undergo a shorter and less painful operation, which they will subsequently be made to forget. The person naturally hopes the operation is already over and done with. So they even prefer to undergo more pain overall, if the pain is in the past rather than the future.1 In general, the idea is that we have temporally asymmetric attitudes toward our experiences: we care more about those that lie in our future. This is not a claim about our attitudes toward the fact that our life contains such and such experiences. I may regret the fact that I had such a painful operation just as much as I regretted (or was distressed) that I would have to have it. The asymmetry lies in our attitudes toward the experiences themselves: I am much more distressed at having yet to undergo the painful experience than I am at having already undergone it. Similarly, I am much happier about being about to undergo a pleasurable experience than I am at having already undergone it. How does this help with the symmetry problem? Here is B&F's original suggestion: 1 One might worry that it's the anticipation of future pain that drives the asymmetry (Brink 2011), but it seems the asymmetry is robust even if one removes such factors (Caruso et al . 2008; Suhler and Callender 2012). 8 Death is a bad insofar as it is a deprivation of the good things in life. . . . If death occurs in the future, then it is a deprivation of something to which we look forward and about which we care-future experienced goods. But prenatal nonexistence is a deprivation of past experienced goods, goods to which we are indifferent. Death deprives us of something we care about, whereas prenatal nonexistence deprives us of something to which we are indifferent. (Brueckner and Fischer 1986: 219) Note that this suggestion involves something stronger than a bias, namely, complete indifference toward past experiences. I'll return to this point in objection 4. There has been much discussion of B&F's position, including a lively recent debate as to what the position amounts to in more detail. Both Feldman and (especially) Johansson have considered and criticized a number of different interpretations of the proposal (Feldman 2013; Johansson 2005, 2013, 2014a, 2014b). In one of B&F's replies to Johansson, it emerges that they would, among other things, be sympathetic to a reading on which they are actually biting the bullet on the symmetry problem: The Brueckner/Fischer approach to replying to Lucretius is completely compatible with the contention that one's 'late' birth can be a bad thing for an individual. Our point would then be that it is a bad thing to which it is rational to have a different sort of attitude, when situated at a specific point in time, than towards the prospect of our early death. (Brueckner and Fischer 2014a: 9) The idea is that, given a clear survival benefit of caring especially about (present and) future experiences, the general temporal asymmetry in our attitudes is rational; thus, since the asymmetry in our concern about (early) death and (late) birth is a special case of the general asymmetry, it too is rational (Fischer 2006). Again, I'm not sure that deprivationists should be content with biting this bullet. For one thing, unless B&F are right to speak of complete indifference (as opposed to a bias), the rationality of our attitudes can at most justify caring less about late birth. For another, in a broader sense of 'rational' it's still entirely rational to feel just as distressed about late birth. Late birth still merits great distress. B&F are also sympathetic to a different reading of their view: BF*(dd)*(D): When death is bad for an individual X, it is bad for X because it is rational for X, from the perspective of certain times during his life, to care about having pleasant experiences after t (where t is the time of his death), and his death deprives him of 9 having pleasant experiences after t (whereas prenatal nonexistence is not bad for a person, because, even though it deprives him of having had pleasant experiences before t* [where t* is the time at which he came into existence], it is not rational for him, from the perspective of those times during his life, to care about having had pleasant experiences before t*). (Brueckner and Fischer 2014c: 329) However, Johansson has pointed out the following problem with this. If the rationality of one's attitudes makes a difference to how intrinsically well off one is, it makes a difference to how intrinsically well off one is in the world in which the attitudes are rational. Specifically, it can't make one better off in a world in which one is born earlier than in the actual world, that in the actual world it's not rational for one to care about pleasures before one's (actual) birth (Johansson 2013, 2014a, 2014b). B&F's response, as I understand it, is to maintain that the point is irrelevant, because in that other world, too, it's not rational for one to care about past pleasures, including the extra ones one has thanks to the earlier birth. The reason B&F say this is that they hold the present time constant in comparing worlds, and note that in the world in which one is born earlier, too, those pleasures lie in the past. Thus, even though one did experience them in that other world, it's (now) rational for one to be indifferent to them. To suppose, as Johansson does, that in that world, it is rational for one to care about those pleasures, is to illicitly shift the time back to when those pleasurable experiences took place or else to inappropriately take up an atemporal perspective (Brueckner and Fischer 2014a, 2014b, 2014c). But why hold the present time constant in comparing worlds? According to Johansson, the only good reason to do so would be to posit time-relative value, that is, to maintain that the disvalue of death holds relative to times. Although B&F are unsympathetic to this idea, Johansson is right that it's the only way to make sense of the insistence to hold the present time constant when comparing worlds. Johansson has also criticized such a time-relative conception, concluding that B&F's approach is a nonstarter. In what follows, I'll motivate and develop a time-relative conception of the disvalue of death on the basis of A-theoretic approaches to time. I then turn to criticisms of this kind of view, arguing that contrary to Johansson and others, it's defensible and doesn't have any clearly absurd consequences. 6. An A-theoretic Answer 10 To start with a concrete example of a deprivation theory, consider Feldman's version (Feldman 1991). (Nothing hangs on this choice; the basic idea is applicable to all versions.) Feldman assumes a very simple hedonistic axiology for the purpose of his argument, according to which pleasure is the only intrinsic good and pain is the only intrinsic bad. He defines the intrinsic value of a world w for a person s to be the amount of pleasure experienced by him or her during his or her lifetime in that world, minus the amount of pain experienced by the person in that world: V(w, s). (I'm following Feldman in assuming for simplicity that it makes sense to speak of amounts here and to represent them numerically. Feldman notes that in interesting cases, it won't be possible to calculate the value of a world for a person.) The overall (extrinsic plus intrinsic) value of a state of affairs p for s is then the intrinsic value, for s, of the closest p-world, minus the intrinsic value, for s, of the closest not p-world. Accordingly, the overall value of the state of affairs of s dying at t, for s, is the difference in the intrinsic value, for s, of two different possible worlds: the closest world in which s dies at t, and the closest world in which s doesn't die at t. That value may be negative in many cases; in these cases, s's death is bad for the person. How might one modify this account along B&F's lines? A natural first thought would be to relativize the intrinsic value of worlds not only to persons, but also times. One might take the intrinsic value at a time t of a world w for a given person s, W(s, w, t), to be the amount of pleasure experienced by s in w at times that are present or future at t, minus the amount of pain experienced by s at those times. Accordingly, we would then speak of the overall value for s, of a state of affairs p, at a given time t: (4) The overall value for s, at t, of a state of affairs p = the intrinsic value for s, at t, of the closest p-world, minus the intrinsic value for s, at t, of the closest not p-world. (Note that I'm assuming it makes sense to speak of the same time in different worlds, just as the original account assumes it makes sense to speak of the same person in different worlds.) One might worry whether it really makes sense to relativize intrinsic value to times as well as to persons. While it's easy to think of a world containing both more intrinsic goods than bads for one person and more intrinsic bads than goods for another, it's a bit harder to imagine the temporal analogue. After all, a given world contains all the pains and pleasures a person undergoes during his or her lifetime. How can a given pleasure/pain be intrinsically good/bad for the person relative to one time of evaluation, and not intrinsically good or bad for them 11 relative to another time of evaluation? How can it be both intrinsically valuable and not intrinsically valuable, even relative to different times? Consider the A-theoretic conviction that the passage of time is a robust metaphysical change. Atheoretic views of time are those that metaphysically privilege the present in some way, for example, by taking it to be all that exists or the latest time that exists or by taking events to move from the future into the spotlight of the present and then into the past. B-theorists, by contrast, don't think there is anything metaphysically fundamental about the perspective of the present; every time is 'present' relative to itself. Intuitively at least, this allows A-theorists to give a metaphysically robust account of the passing of time. B-theorists can point to nothing more than the succession of one time by another, while A-theorists can point to a change in what exists or in which time is present. (Elsewhere I have argued that this view of the debate is unfair to Btheorists, but I won't insist on that here; I'll also sidestep the question of whether the various challenges A-theoretic views face can be met.) A process that is as metaphysically fundamental as A-theoretic passage is usually thought to be might be expected to have axiological effects as well. It could obliterate the intrinsic value of experiences as one after another relentlessly moves into the past, never to be experienced again. As I see it, (4) isn't sufficiently congenial to this A-theoretic picture yet. After all, it could easily be reformulated without any mention of A-properties (pastness, presentness, or futurity). Just let W'(s, w, t) be the amount of pleasure experienced by s in w at times that are simultaneous with or later than t, minus the amount of pain experienced by s at those times. The following formulation improves on (4) in this respect. It's still a time-relative conception of value, but the time of evaluation doesn't function as an explicit parameter. Rather, let the (current) intrinsic value of a world w for s, Y(w, s), be the amount of present or future pleasure s experiences in that world, minus the amount of present or future pain s experiences in that world. (5) The (current) overall value for s, of a state of affairs p = the (current) intrinsic value for s of the closest p-world, minus the (current) intrinsic value for s of the closest not p-world. 12 (5) equates intrinsic and overall value with current intrinsic and current overall value, respectively. It thereby mirrors the A-theoretic privileging of the present. According to Atheorists, there is something metaphysically important about the present, and time's passing involves a fundamental metaphysical change, for example, in which time is present. Why not think that this metaphysical change gives rise to a corresponding axiological one? Before I turn to objections to this view, let's look at how it deals with the symmetry problem. Suppose I am thinking of taking a flight across the Atlantic, and I am slightly worried about dying en route. Suppose I think dying en route would be bad for me. Whether this is so depends on how the (current) intrinsic value for me of the closest world in which I do die en route compares to the (current) intrinsic value for me of the closest world in which I do not. In the closest world in which I die en route, I have only a few more pleasures and pains (including some terminal pain) ahead of me because I die in the near future. Let's suppose that world is now worth +100 to me; +100 is the result of subtracting the amount of pain still coming up from the amount of pleasure still coming up. Suppose that in the closest world in which I do not die en route, I have many happy years still to come, so that that world is now worth rather more to me: +1000, say. Thus (5) implies that my death en route is now such that it would be very bad for me: it has a value of -900. But the same is not true of a possible earlier birth that I might have had, which also would have resulted in many extra happy years. In this case, the relevant comparison is between the intrinsic value for me of the following two worlds: the closest world in which I was born earlier than I was actually born (and in which I die at the time I actually die), and the closest world in which that is not the case (i.e., in which I am born and I die at the actual times). For a fair comparison, we may suppose that the amounts of future pleasures and pains in these two worlds do not differ. The significant difference is that in the first world, I experience many extra pleasures that I don't experience in the second. But because these pleasures all lie in the past, they don't affect the (current) intrinsic value for me of either world. That is why the (current) intrinsic values for me of the two worlds are the same, so that my late birth is not now bad for me. 7. Objections and Replies 13 Objection 1: The proposed view delivers a value asymmetry between birth and death, but only during one's lifetime and for a little while after that. Reply: True. Before one's birth, both (late) birth and (early) death are evils. During one's life, only (early) death is. And as soon as one has died, or rather as soon as it's not the case that one would still have present or future intrinsic goods to enjoy if one hadn't died, neither is an evil anymore. I don't think that's such a bad result. But perhaps the objection is rather to specific elements of the result. Take for instance the evil of death; on this view, it obtains before one is born. Isn't that odd? Maybe. But suppose one is moved towards an A-theoretic view partly because one is impressed by various asymmetries between the past and the future. These asymmetries may give one reason to think that what is still to come is metaphysically significant. Perhaps what makes someone's death an evil for someone before they are born is that it and the possible pleasures it makes them miss are still future, and the future matters, metaphysically speaking. Similarly for the evil of birth. Of course, one could insist that a satisfactory solution has to do away with the evil of birth entirely, rather than relegating it to before one is born. I admit that that would be preferable. But note that on one interpretation of the view that deprivative evils obtain 'eternally' (held by Feldman himself, for example), they obtain at all times. On that view, it's also the case that birth and death are evils before birth-it's just that they stay evils thereafter. A deprivationist might also claim for independent reasons that things can only be bad for a person s if there has been a time at which s existed. I leave aside here the question of whether such a requirement is admissible. Just note that if it is posited, then one consequence will be that neither birth nor death is bad for anyone before they are born. If deprivationism is then modified along the lines of (5), the problem disappears. The result is then that birth is never bad for one, while death is bad for one during one's lifetime and for a little while after that. During that time, there is a real value asymmetry between birth and death. Note also that it's not the case that all the important work is now being done by the existence requirement. That requirement, on the original deprivation account, still entails that for anyone now alive or dead, (late) birth is bad. 14 Objection 2 (Johansson 2005,:ch. 5, 2013, 2014a, 2014b): As Moore said, intrinsic value depends only on intrinsic features (Moore 1922: 260). Futurity is not an intrinsic feature, so intrinsic value can't depend on futurity. Moreover, it can't depend partly on futurity and partly on the experience's hedonic quality, that is, on how it feels; after all, these never obtain simultaneously. Reply: Let's start with the second point. Johansson anticipates the reply that future pleasures exist timelessly, as pleasures. He says that this would only help if futurity was also had timelessly, which it isn't, of course. But why think that? Suppose futurity characterizes the experience not timelessly but currently, and pleasantness characterizes the experience timelessly (even if it doesn't feel like anything except when one undergoes it). Can't its intrinsic value then depend on both? If partial grounds have to obtain simultaneously (do they?), isn't it enough that when the experience is future, it is also pleasant? There have been many challenges to the Moorean principle, but I won't enter that debate here (see e.g. Kagan 1998). Suppose the principle holds. Does it then follow that intrinsic value can't depend on futurity? Only if futurity must be regarded as extrinsic. Johansson just assumes this ('something's being future depends on its relations to present events'). But it's not clear that futurity must be regarded as extrinsic, especially by A-theorists. In fact, it's more congenial to Atheories to regard futurity (and pastness for that matter) as intrinsic in the relevant sense. Futurity accrues to an event not just from the perspective of the present, but simpliciter, because the present perspective is the only perspective. Even on an eternalist A-theory like the moving spotlight view, futurity is likely to be seen as a monadic, nonrelational property of events (and in this context 'intrinsic' is often equated with 'nonrelational'). Objection 3 (Johansson 2005: ch. 5, 2013, 2014a, 2014b,;Bradley 2009: chs. 1, 3; Bykvist 2007): Feldman calls V(w, s) not only 'the intrinsic value of w for s', but also s's welfare level at w. That's because V measures how much pleasure and pain s experiences in w. It's how well off s is in w. That suggests that Y(w, s), the (current) intrinsic value of w for s, should be understood as s's current welfare level in w; in other words, it should be taken to reflect how well off s is currently in w. But that's absurd. How well off s is currently in w can't depend on what will happen to s in w. Suppose Al and Bob have experienced exactly the same intrinsic goods and bads so far, but Bob will continue to do so, while Al has only intrinsic bads in his future. Surely we want to say that the two have been, and are, exactly equally well off. Or just consider Al's life up to now. Suppose 15 every day involved exactly the same intrinsic goods. Surely he wasn't worse and worse off, at each of those times, just because he had fewer and fewer goods still to come? Reply: Granted that deprivationism is concerned with how intrinsically well off one would have been, so that a time-relative version of the view must concern one's current level of well-being in worlds. But there are different ways of thinking of the latter notion. One is to think of it as the intrinsic value of the present time in that world (for one), another is to take it to be the current intrinsic value of that world (for one)-where future, not just present, experiences make a difference to that latter value. The intrinsic value of (previously) present time(s) for Al and Bob has been the same (in this world), and the intrinsic value of the present time is the same for both (in this world). But there is more to be said about their situations. The intrinsic value of the world for Al has been decreasing steadily, just like for the rest of us, merely by virtue of time's passing. Time's passage diminishes our store of yet-to-come pleasures and thereby diminishes the intrinsic value of the world for us. The intrinsic value of the world for Al has differed from the intrinsic value of the world for Bob by virtue of the different futures in store for them. Objection 4: Still, the idea of passage-induced loss of value is highly counterintuitive. Consider a painful experience you underwent as a child. Isn't it still intrinsically bad for you even though it's in the past? If not, why should you still feel bad about it (see Belshaw 2000a, 2000b)? Reply: Recall that B&F make the very strong claim that we're indifferent toward past pains and pleasures. The first point I'd like to make is that I think that when properly understood, the claim is actually less implausible than it sounds. Keep in mind that what's at issue is our attitudes toward the experiences, not toward the fact that we underwent them. Thus, the claim is compatible with still feeling badly or feeling glad about the fact that one underwent a particular experience, that is, about the fact that one's life story includes such an experience. What I take B&F to claim is just that we're indifferent toward past experiences qua experiences. And aren't we? After all, we'll never have them again. But suppose B&F are wrong, and we're not indifferent toward past experiences. One might still think that such past-directed emotions should actually provide some support for (5), just like they have been thought to provide support for A-theories (the locus classicus is Prior 1959). 16 However, this style of argument is problematic for at least two reasons. One is the obvious complexity of our past-directed emotions. It's not so clear which of these actually supports Atheoretic ideas such as the nonexistence of the past. Perhaps relief (which Prior focused on), regret and even nostalgia do provide such support. But bitterness or satisfaction, for example, prima facie pull in the other direction. The second reason for caution is that it seems doubtful that ontology will do much explanatory work here. There are better evolutionary explanations available (Maclaurin and Dyke 2002; Suhler and Callender 2012). Thus, our past-directed emotions are unlikely to lend much support to the idea of passageinduced loss of value. However, I think the idea gains some support directly from an A-theoretic metaphysics. If one thinks that the passage of time is a deep and fundamental process, a process that may even continually make the difference between existence and nonexistence, then why not also think it makes an axiological difference? One can think that without claiming that our attitudes neatly track that difference. The resulting view is not as counterintuitive as it may seem. It still allows one to acknowledge that the past experience had (intrinsic) value. The situation here is somewhat similar to the situation with respect to the passage of time. Only one time is present, but past times were present. That claim is commonly formulated with the help of tense operators: the NOW is located at t and WAS (the NOW is located at a time earlier than t). Similarly, a given past pain P has no intrinsic value but WAS (P has negative intrinsic value), namely at all times leading up to, and in particular, at the time it was suffered. Naturally, this doesn't change the result (which is, after all, as intended) that the pain (now) lacks negative value for the subject. But it does to an extent make it broadly rational to still feel resentment over a past pain as well as joy over a past pleasure: in remembering the experience, one is remembering a time that was once present and at which the pain had (negative or positive) value for one. Which specific kind of A-theoretic view can lend support to (5)? Admittedly, the view that would ontologically mirror a complete loss of value, namely, the shrinking block view, which says that the past doesn't exist but the present and future do, is rarely defended (for a recent defense, see Casati and Torrengo 2011). However, it's not clear that the proposal requires there to be an ontological difference between the future and the past, as opposed to another metaphysically fundamental difference. Consider an eternalist A-theory, like the moving spotlight view. Intuitively, the view is that future experiences are continuously moving 'toward' the spotlight of the present, while past experiences are forever out of that spotlight and moving continuously 17 'away' from it. This difference, too, provides a rationale for assigning objective intrinsic value only to present and future experiences. Those are the experiences still to come, the ones that we rightly still look forward to or dread. The passage of time, the moving of the spotlight, annihilates this intrinsic value even though it doesn't annihilate the events themselves. Similarly, consider a 'thinning tree' view according to which the passage of time consists in the dropping off of unactualised branches. As a branch loses its alternatives (or shortly after that), it becomes part of the immutable past; why not think that this same process results in a loss of intrinsic value of any experiences that lie on that branch? After all, these experiences are not now and can never again be had, that is, experienced. Finally, it should be noted that the idea of passage-induced value loss is in principle independent of the claim that past experiences have no intrinsic value for the subject. Weaker versions might discount the intrinsic value of past experiences by a constant amount or, alternatively, by an amount proportional to the pastness of the experience. On the first view, one's (late) birth would still be bad for one, but much less bad than one's (early) death. On the second view, the badness of one's birth would decrease over time. Objection 5 (Johansson 2005: ch. 5, 2013): It's strategically undesirable to give up on straightforward hedonism to answer Lucretius (and Epicurus). Reply: Agreed. But note that this is nowhere near as big a deviation from straightforward hedonism as is involved in paradigmatic nonhedonistic answers to Epicurus. The latter involve claims like that death is bad for one in the way nasty rumors of which one doesn't learn, or the failure of one's projects, can be bad for one. On the view proposed here, it's not the case that one's well-being depends on things that happen outside of one's lifetime. Conclusion I've explored a view on which metaphysical differences between the future and the past give rise to a corresponding axiological difference in the intrinsic value of (present or) future and past experiences. As experiences move into the past, they lose their intrinsic value for the person. As a result, deprivationism no longer has the counterintuitive consequence that there is an evil of 18 birth as well as an evil of death: it no longer implies that one's (late) birth is bad for one in the same way that one's (early) death is. During one's lifetime, and for a little while after that, one's (early) death is bad for one, but one's (late) birth is neither good nor bad for one. There is a real value asymmetry between birth and death. I've also suggested that this is the only deprivationist view still in the running on which late birth is not bad for one. It may be that biting the bullet is preferable. Perhaps being born later rather than earlier really is bad for one in just the same way that dying sooner rather than later is, as long as one would have had more happy times overall. But, a proponent of the symmetry argument might then insist, is that really all there is to the badness of death? And if it is, is death really bad for one? Maybe it's just less good, like having been born in 1971 is less good than having been born in 1961 (given a death in 2057), a view that is defended in Smuts (2012). Maybe Epicurus was right after all. References Belshaw, C. (2000a) 'Later Death/Earlier Birth'. Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 24/1, 69–83. Belshaw, C. (2000b) 'Death, Pain and Time'. Philosophical Studies, 97/3, 317–41. Bradley, B. (2009) Well-being and Death. Oxford University Press. Brink, D. (2011) 'Prospects for temporal neutrality'. In Craig Callender (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Time (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 353–81. Brueckner, A., and J. M. Fischer. (1986) ‚Why is death bad?'. Philosophical Studies, 50/2, 213-221. Brueckner, A., and J. M. Fischer. (2013) 'The Evil of Death and the Lucretian Symmetry: A Reply to Feldman'. Philosophical Studies, 163/3, 783–89. Brueckner, A., and J. M. Fischer. (2014a) 'Prenatal and Posthumous Existence: A Reply to Johansson'. Journal of Ethics, 18/1, 1–9. Brueckner, A., and J .M. Fischer. (2014b) 'Accommodating Counterfactual Attitudes: A Further Reply to Johansson'. Journal of Ethics, 18/1, 19–21. Brueckner, A., and J. M. Fischer. (2014c) 'The Mirror-image Argument: An Additional Reply to Johansson'. Journal of Ethics, 18/4, 325–30. Bykvist, K. (2007) 'Comments on Dennis McKerlie's "Rational Choice, Changes in Values over Time, and Well-being'''. Utilitas, 19/1, 73–77. 19 Caruso, E. M., D. T. Gilbert, and , T. D. Wilson. (2008) 'A Wrinkle in Time: Asymmetric Valuation of Past and Future Events'. Psychological Science, 19 (8), 796–801. Casati, R., and G. Torrengo. (2011) 'The Not so Incredible Shrinking Future'. Analysis, 71/2, 240–44. Feldman, F. (1991) 'Some Puzzles about the Evil of Death'. Philosophical Review, 100/2, 205–27. Feldman, F. (2013) 'Brueckner and Fischer on the Evil of Death'. Philosophical Studies, 162/2, 309–17. Fischer, J. M. (2006) 'Earlier Birth and Later Death: Symmetry through Thick and Thin'. In Kris McDaniel, Jason Raibley, Richard Feldman, and Michael Zimmerman (eds.), The Good, the Right, Life and Death (Aldershot, England: Ashgate Publishing). Reprinted in John Martin Fischer (2009), Our Stories: Essays on Life, Death and Free Will (Oxford University Press). Johansson, J. (2005) Mortal Beings: On the Metaphysics and Value of Death. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International. Johansson, J. (2008) 'Kaufman's Response to Lucretius'. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 89/4, 470– 85. Johansson, J. (2013) 'Past and Future Nonexistence'. Journal of Ethics, 17/1–2, 51–64. Johansson, J. (2014a) 'Actual and Counterfactual Attitudes: Reply to Brueckner and Fischer'. Journal of Ethics, 18/1, 11–18. Johansson, J. (2014b) 'More on the Mirror: Reply to Brueckner and Fischer'. Journal of Ethics, 18/4, 341–51. Kagan, S. (1998) 'Rethinking Intrinsic Value'. Journal of Ethics, 2, 277–97. Kaufman, F. (1996) 'Death and Deprivation; Or, Why Lucretius's Symmetry Argument Fails'. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 74/2, 305–12. Le Poidevin, R. (1996) Arguing for Atheism. New York: Routledge. Maclaurin, J., and H. Dyke. (2002) '"Thank Goodness That's Over": The Evolutionary Story'. Ratio, 15/3, 276–92. Moore, G. E. (1922) Philosophical Studies. London: Routledge. Olson, E. (2013) 'The Epicurean View of Death'. Journal of Ethics, 17/1–2, 65–78. Parfit, D. (1984) Reasons and Persons. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Prior, A. (1959) 'Thank Goodness that's Over'. Philosophy, 34/128, 12–17. Sider, T. (2011) Writing the Book of the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Silverstein, H. (2000) 'The Evil of Death Re-visited'. Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 24/1, 116–134. Smuts, A. (2012) 'Less Good but not Bad: In Defense of Epicureanism about Death'. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 93/2, 197–227. 20 Suhler, C., and C. Callender. (2012) 'Thank Goodness that Argument is Over: Explaining the Temporal Value Asymmetry'. Philosophers' Imprint, 12/15, 1–16. Sullivan, M. (2012) 'The Minimal A-theory'. Philosophical Studies, 158/2, 149–74. Warren, J. (2004) Facing Death: Epicurus and His Critics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

? Chemins Philosophiques VRIN B o y e rK a s s e m Qu'est-ce que T h o m a s T h o m a s B o y e rK a ss e m – Q u 'e st -c e q u e la m é c a n iq u e q u a n ti q u e ? V R IN Qu'est-ce que la mécanique quantique ? – Pourquoi une théorie physique comme la mécanique quantique a-t-elle besoin d'être interprétée ? – Quelles sont les différentes images du monde quantique qui ont été proposées ? – Pourquoi n'y a-t-il pas de consensus sur ce qu'est la bonne interprétation quantique ? – Qu'est-ce que le théorème de Bell, et qu'interdit-il exactement ? Commentaire "Localité, non-localité et intrication" David Z. Albert et Rivka Galchen « Menace quantique sur la relativité restreinte », Pour la Science, mai 2009. "L'article d'EPR et le théorème de Bell" David N. Mermin « La Lune est-elle là lorsque personne ne regarde ? Réalité et théorie quantique », Physics Today, avril 1985. Cette collection s'adresse aux étudiants des universités et des classes préparatoires, mais aussi au grand public cultivé attendant un traitement direct et clair de questions de philosophie générale. Auteur Thomas Boyer-Kassem, ancien élève de l'ÉNS de Cachan, agrégé de physique et docteur en philosophie de l'Université Paris 1 PanthéonSorbonne, est chercheur post-doctorant aux Archives H. Poincaré à Nancy (CNRS et Université de Lorraine). la mécanique quantique ,!7IC7B1-gcgcbc! ISBN 978-2-7116-2621-2 8,50 Euro Illustration de couverture : © Fliegende Blätter, München. www.vrin.fr Couv. Boyer Kassem QSQ Mecanique Quantique 12/03/15 11:07 Page 1 Introduction La mécanique quantique intrigue. Cette théorie physique contemporaine est réputée pour ses défis au sens commun et ses paradoxes. Ne dit-elle pas que certains chats sont à la fois morts et vivants, qu'il existe des univers parallèles au nôtre, ou que, lorsqu'un objet quantique se rend d'un point A à un point B, il est parfois impossible de dire qu'il est simplement passé quelque part ? Au-delà de ces invraisemblances, peut-on donner un sens à la mécanique quantique ? La mécanique quantique divise. On ne peut pas dire aujourd'hui que les physiciens soient vraiment d'accord entre eux sur la façon de résoudre ces paradoxes et de donner un sens clair à la théorie. Les philosophes, qui n'ont pas manqué de s'atteler à la question, ne parviennent pas à un meilleur consensus. Comment savoir qui a raison ? Enfin, la mécanique quantique est mathématique, complexe, aride. Jusqu'où est-il nécessaire d'apprendre ces mathématiques pour l'appréhender ? Faut-il forcément plusieurs années d'étude de physique pour commencer à entrevoir les problèmes philosophiques qu'elle soulève ? Ce livre fait le pari que non. Certaines questions, comme celle de savoir ce qui existe dans ce monde selon la mécanique quantique, peuvent être abordées sans qu'une grande dose de mathématique ne soit requise. Dans cet esprit, les lecteurs novices en mathématiques et en physique trouveront ici une introduction aux débats philosophiques concernant la mécanique quantique, sans qu'aucune connaissance scientifique particulière ne soit présupposée. De leur côté, les lecteurs scientifiques pourront voir la mécanique quantique sous un jour nouveau, en découvrant la richesse des débats philosophiques dont elle est l'objet. À la question posée plus haut, « peut-on donner un sens à la mécanique quantique ? », cet ouvrage répond en montrant que non pas une, mais plusieurs façons de donner un sens ont été proposées depuis près d'un siècle. Trois de ces « interprétations » de la théorie de la mécanique quantique, parmi les plus populaires, sont présentées ici. Ces différentes interprétations conduisent toutes à un excellent accord de la théorie avec l'expérience, et ne semblent pas pouvoir être départagées de cette façon. Quant à la question de savoir laquelle de ces interprétations le lecteur devrait adopter, et de savoir qui a raison dans les débats contemporains, cet ouvrage s'abstient délibérément d'y répondre. L'auteur considère en effet que la priorité aujourd'hui, dans un ouvrage d'introduction à destination d'un public large, n'est pas de défendre l'une ou l'autre des interprétations de la théorie, alors même que les spécialistes ne s'accordent pas entre eux. La priorité est plutôt de faire connaître au lecteur l'existence d'une pluralité d'interprétations de la mécanique quantique et de lui donner des outils pour se repérer dans les débats contemporains. Libre à lui ensuite de poursuivre son chemin vers une interprétation particulière, à travers un ouvrage prenant parti. Dans cet ouvrage, nous commençons par introduire la théorie de la mécanique quantique (chap. 1), avant de discuter plus en détail ce qu'on appelle l' « interprétation » d'une théorie (chap. 2). Nous sommes alors armés pour étudier en détail trois interprétations majeures de la mécanique quantique : l'interprétation dite orthodoxe, qui est depuis longtemps la plus répandue chez les scientifiques (chap. 3), l'interprétation de Bohm (chap. 4) et l'interprétation des mondes multiples (chap. 5). Nous terminons par une comparaison critique de ces interprétations (chap. 6). Dans la seconde partie de l'ouvrage, sont commentés deux extraits d'articles qui traitent de la possibilité d'interaction instantanée à distance et de variables cachées, autour d'un résultat théorique célèbre, le théorème de Bell. 2 Partie 1 – Qu'est-ce que la Mécanique Quantique ? Chapitre 1 – L'image quantique du monde À quoi ressemble le monde de l'infiniment petit ? Quelles sont les entités qui le peuplent et les lois qui en règlent le cours ? Il existe une théorie physique qui permet de répondre à ces questions – ou du moins, qui propose plusieurs réponses possibles. Cette théorie, conçue il y a près d'un siècle, est la mécanique quantique. Ce chapitre en fait une présentation introductive. 1. La mécanique quantique a. Le monde des atomes Si on prend un microscope pour observer comment est constitué notre corps, on peut apercevoir des cellules, à une échelle d'environ un centième de millimètre – c'est là le domaine des théories de la biologie. Si on zoome davantage, environ dix mille fois plus, on arrive à l'échelle des atomes – c'est là le domaine de la mécanique quantique. Ces atomes sont comme les briques que la Nature utilise pour bâtir tous les corps matériels. En assemblant plusieurs atomes, on obtient une molécule. Par exemple, une molécule d'eau se compose d'un atome d'oxygène et deux atomes d'hydrogène ; il faut un milliard de milliards de molécules d'eau pour donner une seule gouttelette de brouillard. Un atome lui-même n'est pas un bloc indistinct ; même si on le représente parfois comme une petite sphère dure, il est essentiellement composé de vide. L'essentiel de la matière est dans un tout petit noyau chargé positivement, qui est entouré d'électrons chargés négativement, comparativement bien plus légers, et qui restent à proximité de ce noyau. Ni les atomes, ni les électrons, ni quoi que ce soit à cette échelle ne se comportent comme le font les corps plus gros auxquels nous sommes habitués. Les phénomènes très originaux qui ont lieu à l'échelle de l'atome sont ceux qu'étudie la mécanique quantique. En énonçant les lois qui régissent ce monde microscopique, elle parvient à prédire et à expliquer les phénomènes atomiques. Par exemple, la mécanique quantique peut expliquer pourquoi certains matériaux en fer peuvent être des aimants naturels, et pourquoi un morceau de bois ne sera jamais attiré par un aimant. Elle explique pourquoi on n'a jamais vu aucun atome d'hydrogène émettre de lumière jaune ou verte, et pourquoi la lumière qui nous vient du soleil comporte pratiquement toutes les couleurs de l'arc-en-ciel. Elle explique pourquoi le cuivre conduit très bien l'électricité et la chaleur, et pourquoi le verre est transparent à la lumière. En apprivoisant les lois quantiques du comportement de la matière, les physiciens sont parvenus à mettre au jour de nouveaux phénomènes et à tirer de nombreuses applications de la mécanique quantique. Par exemple, cette théorie a permis la création des lasers, dont la technologie fait aujourd'hui un grand usage (lecteur CD/DVD, communication par fibre optique, opérations chirurgicales, etc.). La mécanique quantique a également permis de concevoir et d'explorer les propriétés des matériaux dits « semi-conducteurs », à la base de toute l'électronique moderne (transistors, LED, microprocesseurs, etc.). En médecine, le fonctionnement des appareils d'IRM repose sur l'utilisation d'une propriété typiquement quantique des atomes, appelée le « spin ». Une autre application récente de la mécanique quantique, réservée pour le moment aux laboratoires de recherche, est la microscopie à effet tunnel, qui permet d'observer et de manipuler les atomes un à un. 3 b. Une théorie fondamentale L'importance de la mécanique quantique ne se limite pas à son très vaste champ d'application. Il s'agit également d'une théorie fondamentale pour les physiciens, au sens où elle fait partie des quelques théories physiques qui ne peuvent pas être dérivées, même en principe, à partir d'autres théories. Pour mieux comprendre ce que cela signifie, prenons à l'inverse le cas de la théorie de l'optique géométrique, qui explique par exemple comment se forment les images à travers des verres de lunettes ou des jumelles. Cette théorie, qui rend compte du comportement de la lumière en la considérant comme composée de rayons lumineux, est en fait un cas particulier de la théorie de l'optique ondulatoire, qui considère la lumière comme étant composée d'ondes. Aussi, l'optique géométrique n'est pas fondamentale parce qu'on peut l'obtenir ou la dériver à partir de l'optique ondulatoire, lorsque les ondes ont des comportements approchant ceux des rayons. Le fait que la mécanique quantique soit une théorie fondamentale de la physique lui donne une importance de premier ordre. Elle se trouve à la base de la connaissance de la Nature que les scientifiques ont développée. Aussi, comprendre ce qu'elle peut dire (ou ne pas dire) du monde, sur ce qui existe ou n'existe pas, s'annonce d'une importance capitale1. c. Aperçu historique Afin de mieux comprendre la situation actuelle de la mécanique quantique, il est utile de commencer par un aperçu de l'histoire de son élaboration2. Jusqu'au début du XXe siècle, l'idée que la matière soit ultimement constituée d'atomes (ces éléments « indivisibles », selon l'origine grecque du mot) reste une position controversée essentiellement philosophique, en faveur de laquelle les arguments scientifiques restent faibles. L'avènement de la mécanique quantique va contribuer à accréditer cette idée. De façon analogue au fait que la matière soit constituée de ces briques séparables et ne consiste pas en une substance continue, la mécanique quantique va développer l'idée que certaines quantités physiques ne peuvent pas prendre n'importe quelle valeur de façon continue, mais seulement quelques valeurs particulières, appelées « discrètes » ou « discontinues ». C'est un peu comme si, au lieu de tracer une ligne avec un seul trait de crayon, on la traçait seulement avec des points bien distincts, en nombre limités. Une première étape conceptuelle a lieu autour de 1900, lorsque le physicien allemand Planck, travaillant à rendre compte théoriquement de la lumière émise par un certain corps (dit « corps noir »), finit par renoncer mathématiquement à une description continue pour introduire un élément discret. Cette discontinuité mathématique est ensuite réinterprétée par Einstein comme renvoyant à un échange discret d'énergie, c'est-à-dire au fait que l'énergie ne s'échange pas selon n'importe quelle quantité, mais nécessairement par multiples d'une unité élémentaire (un « quantum ») qui ne peut être divisée – un atome de lumière, pour ainsi dire. Ce quantum d'énergie prendra le nom de « photon », et on s'aperçoit bientôt qu'il a des comportements à la fois de particule (il peut être localisé en un point de l'espace) et d'onde (il peut entrer en résonance, comme une onde sonore dans un instrument de musique par exemple). Cette quantification, qui concerne l'énergie, va ensuite être proposée pour la structure même de l'atome. Un des problèmes des années 1910 est d'expliquer comment un atome parvient à être stable au cours du temps, sans que ses électrons ne viennent s'écraser sur son noyau. Bohr, un physicien danois, développe 1 Cet ouvrage se limite à la mécanique quantique non-relativiste, c'est-à-dire dans laquelle les effets de la relativité ne sont pas pris en compte. La théorie qui les prend en compte est la théorie quantique des champs. 2 La référence sur l'histoire de la mécanique quantique est M. Jammer, The Conceptual Development of Quantum Mechanics, New York, McGraw-Hill, 1966. Pour une genèse simplifiée de la mécanique quantique, on peut consulter O. Darrigol, « A simplified genesis of quantum mechanics », Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics (40), 2009, p. 151-166. 4 à partir des années 1910 ce qui s'appellera le « modèle de Bohr » de l'atome. Il fait l'hypothèse qu'il existe, pour les électrons de l'atome, certaines trajectoires fixes autour du noyau (comme si les planètes tournant autour du soleil ne pouvaient se trouver qu'à des distances bien précises). Le passage d'un de ces états stationnaires à un autre est aléatoire et s'accompagne de l'émission ou de l'absorption d'un quantum d'énergie lumineuse, c'est-à-dire d'un photon. Ce modèle attire rapidement l'attention de la communauté des physiciens qui l'enrichissent et le testent expérimentalement. Autour de ce modèle de Bohr, se développe ainsi une « théorie des quanta ». À partir de 1925, deux développements indépendants vont conduire à l'abandon de cette théorie des quanta, qui rencontre un certain nombre de difficultés, au profit de la théorie quantique moderne. D'un côté, Heisenberg est un des principaux protagonistes à abandonner la représentation de l'atome de Bohr pour s'engager dans une abstraction plus mathématique. En utilisant des tableaux de nombres (appelés « matrices »), il parvient à relier directement certaines quantités mesurables, en faisant fi des représentations traditionnelles telles que la position, l'orbite, la vitesse. Il élabore ainsi une « mécanique matricielle ». D'un autre côté, de Broglie défend l'idée que le caractère à la fois ondulatoire et corpusculaire de la lumière s'étend à la matière, où des ondes doivent être associées aux particules, par exemple aux électrons. Schrödinger développe cette idée en établissant une équation pour ces ondes. Quelques années plus tard, le physicien et mathématicien von Neumann parvient à donner un cadre théorique mathématique commun pour ces deux approches, qui se sont montrées fécondes. Il reformule la théorie en la faisant découler de quelques axiomes ou principes placés à la base. Les grandes lignes de la mécanique quantique, telle qu'elle est enseignée aujourd'hui, sont alors en place. Une caractéristique principale de la mécanique quantique est qu'il s'agit d'une théorie probabiliste. Lorsqu'un phénomène est étudié ou une expérience réalisée, la mécanique quantique ne prédit généralement pas quel sera le résultat de la mesure. Elle prédit seulement que plusieurs résultats peuvent être obtenus, et donne la probabilité correspondante pour chacun. Par exemple, tel résultat a 80 % de chances d'être obtenu, tandis que tel autre 20 %. Peut-on espérer améliorer la théorie ou les expériences et parvenir à une prédiction certaine – autrement dit, la mécanique quantique peut-elle être complétée ? Cette question a été, à partir de 1935, à l'origine d'une célèbre controverse entre Bohr et Einstein. Contrairement aux espoirs de ce dernier, la réponse est non : il s'avère être impossible d'améliorer la mécanique quantique pour avoir une théorie qui serait capable de donner des prédictions certaines1. Cette caractéristique unique fait de la mécanique quantique une théorie probabiliste en un sens profond. Notre théorie de l'infiniment petit est donc condamnée à être probabiliste. d. Controverses interprétatives Si la mécanique quantique est rapidement acceptée pour ses qualités prédictives dès les années 1930, des questions ou des réserves quant à son interprétation parsèment son histoire jusqu'à nos jours. La formulation de Heisenberg insistait sur le caractère discontinu des phénomènes et sur le concept de particule, tandis que la formulation de Schrödinger considérait les phénomènes quantiques sous forme d'ondes. La controverse Bohr-Einstein autour de l'incomplétude de la mécanique quantique est une autre illustration précoce des débats qui entourent l'interprétation de la théorie. Néanmoins, les positions défendues par Bohr, Heisenberg et Born, notamment, s'imposent rapidement chez la plupart des physiciens. Selon eux, la Nature est le siège d'un hasard fondamental, et le monde quantique requiert un radical changement dans l'usage des concepts auquel l'être humain est familier. Cette façon de donner un sens à la mécanique quantique est bientôt qualifiée d' « interprétation2 de Copenhague », en référence à la capitale danoise où Bohr a travaillé. Elle est à l'origine de l'interprétation utilisée 1 À ce sujet, cf. le texte 2 et son commentaire, p. 36 et suivantes. 2 Ce qu'est une « interprétation » d'une théorie est discuté en détail dans le chapitre suivant. 5 aujourd'hui dans la quasi-totalité des manuels universitaires. Cette interprétation orthodoxe est présentée au chap. 3. Même si cette interprétation s'impose majoritairement dans la communauté physicienne dès les années 30, certains physiciens vont tenter de faire entendre une voix discordante. En 1952, reprenant une idée de de Broglie, Bohm propose de compléter la théorie de la mécanique quantique avec d'autres variables – tout en obtenant, ni plus ni moins, les prédictions de la mécanique quantique. La nouveauté est surtout que la théorie peut recevoir une interprétation déterministe : il n'existe pas de hasard fondamental dans le monde, bien que la théorie ne nous permette de faire que des prédictions probabilistes. Cette interprétation bohmienne est présentée au chapitre 4. Une autre interprétation va être développée à la suite des travaux d'Everett en 1957. Selon cette interprétation, notre univers est quantique en ce qu'il se compose d'une infinité de mondes. De nouveaux mondes naissent constamment, de sorte que tous les résultats possibles des interactions ou des expériences sont réalisés, chacun dans un monde. Cette interprétation, appelée « des mondes multiples », fait l'objet du chapitre 5. D'autres interprétations ont été proposées dans les dernières décennies : interprétation des histoires décohérentes (Griffiths), interprétation relationnelle (Rovelli), interprétation informationnelle, interprétation modale, etc. Ainsi, il existe maintenant toute une gamme d'interprétations quantiques très différentes. Mais celles-ci sont toutes empiriquement équivalentes, au sens où on ne peut pas les départager par l'expérience. Si des physiciens adoptent des interprétations quantiques différentes, ils s'accordent au moins sur les prédictions expérimentales1. Parmi les chercheurs spécialistes de mécanique quantique, les diverses interprétations sont de popularité variable et aucun consensus clair ne se dessine, et les philosophes de la physique sont tout aussi divisés sur la question ; chaque interprétation a ses défenseurs célèbres, scientifiques et philosophes. Ainsi coexiste une pluralité d'interprétations de la mécanique quantique. Alors que les physiciens ont longtemps estimé que les débats interprétatifs avaient été tranchés par les pères fondateurs, on peut considérer que depuis les années 80 environ, l'intérêt pour les interprétations quantiques et le débat sur la question se sont renforcés. 2. Représentation scientifique et image du monde a. L'image du monde Replaçons ces interprétations de la théorie dans un contexte plus large. Plusieurs buts peuvent être attribués à la science et à ses théories. On peut considérer que l'objectif est d'énoncer des lois générales sur le monde (par exemple, que l'énergie se conserve). Ce sont ces régularités valables en tout temps et en tout lieu qui ont un intérêt, davantage que le simple catalogage de faits isolés (l'énergie s'est conservée dans telle circonstance). On peut soutenir que la science doit plutôt permettre de prédire correctement les phénomènes qui peuvent être observés, naturellement ou en laboratoire. C'est un objectif qui est qualifié d'instrumentaliste, au sens où les théories sont un simple instrument permettant de faire des prédictions. Ou encore, on peut considérer que le but d'une théorie scientifique est de dire ce qui existe et de quoi est fait la Nature (l'énergie existe-t-elle au même sens que des objets existent ?). Dans ce cas, une théorie scientifique a pour fonction de représenter le monde, notamment à l'aide d'outils mathématiques, et cela permet d'en tirer une image de la Nature. Dans cet ouvrage, nous faisons le choix de nous concentrer sur ce dernier but, qui consiste à dire de quoi est fait le monde (en l'occurrence : qu'est-ce qui existe dans le monde quantique ?), parce que, 1 Cette affirmation doit être précisée pour être vraiment exacte ; cela est fait au chap. 6. 6 pour la mécanique quantique, c'est le point le plus controversé2 et le plus intéressant philosophiquement. En effet, plusieurs images du monde, compatibles avec la mécanique quantique, ont été proposées à travers les différentes « interprétations » de la théorie évoquées précédemment. Et l'essentiel des discussions philosophiques sur la mécanique quantique a trait aujourd'hui à ces interprétations. b. (Anti-)réalisme Si l'un des buts d'une théorie est de proposer une image de la Nature, comment doit-on considérer cette image ? Doit-elle être prise au sérieux comme décrivant la réalité, ou faut-il la considérer comme un simple habillage des mathématiques abstraites qui ne correspond à rien de réel ? Plusieurs attitudes sont ici possibles. La première est le réalisme, qui est certainement la plus naturelle et la plus commune, et qui consiste à prendre la théorie au sérieux et au pied de la lettre. Si la théorie fait l'hypothèse qu'il existe certaines entités, par exemple des électrons, alors un réaliste croit qu'il existe réellement ces entités dans le monde. Pour lui, il existe une réalité indépendante de notre esprit, et c'est en interprétant littéralement les théories scientifiques qu'on peut parvenir à une connaissance de cette réalité – par exemple, qu'elle est composée d'électrons. Une autre attitude possible est l'anti-réalisme, qui consiste à prendre le contre-pied du réalisme, en n'interprétant pas littéralement la théorie. Un anti-réaliste peut considérer par exemple que les électrons n'existent pas, car ils ne sont pas observables comme, disons, ce livre que vous pouvez voir directement. Un électron est alors considéré comme une entité théorique qui n'a rien de réel. La théorie se comprend selon le mode du « comme si » : dire que cette théorie est vraie signifie que la Nature se comporte comme si il y avait des électrons, mais cela ne veut pas dire pour autant qu'ils existent réellement. Pour l'anti-réaliste, le but de la science n'est pas la vérité mais seulement l'adéquation empirique. Cette division entre réalistes et anti-réalistes en science a une longue histoire, et se retrouve naturellement concernant l'interprétation de la mécanique quantique. Cet ouvrage fait droit à des interprétations réalistes et anti-réalistes de la mécanique quantique. L'interprétation orthodoxe (chap. 3) est une interprétation qui nie l'existence d'une réalité indépendante du sujet connaissant, et peut être qualifiée d'anti-réaliste. Les interprétations de Bohm (chap. 4) et des mondes multiples (chap. 5) proposent de considérer certaines entités comme réelles et indépendantes de notre esprit, et sont généralement adoptées par des réalistes. 3. Des problèmes philosophiques ? Comme nous l'avons indiqué précédemment, les physiciens quantiques sont plutôt divisés sur l'interprétation quantique à adopter. Mais nous avons dit aussi que toutes ces interprétations sont empiriquement équivalentes, ce qui signifie que les physiciens ne sont pas en désaccord sur les prédictions expérimentales – ces interprétations ne sont pas des théories concurrentes en un sens fort. Un autre aspect qui tend à atténuer la division de la communauté scientifique est le fait que tous les physiciens s'accordent sur la façon d'utiliser la mécanique quantique. Autrement dit, le fait de préférer une interprétation plutôt qu'une autre ne change pas, dans la pratique, la manière dont les physiciens font leurs calculs. Et leurs prédictions s'avèrent extrêmement bien vérifiées par l'expérience. En revanche, les interprétations proposent des images quantiques du monde radicalement différentes. En quoi cette pluralité d'interprétations et d'images du monde est-elle un problème philosophique ? Elle 2 La mécanique quantique s'acquitte parfaitement bien de l'autre but qui consiste à prédire les phénomènes observés, sans que cela ne suscite particulièrement de débat. 7 l'est pour tout projet métaphysique, qui s'attache à dire quels sont les objets, les catégories, les propriétés de notre monde. Par exemple : existe-t-il plusieurs mondes parallèles ? La Nature est-elle régie par du hasard ? Car si plusieurs propositions sont faites, il semble légitime de vouloir trancher. Devrions-nous renoncer à savoir si le monde est déterministe ou indéterministe, si le hasard a un rôle fondamental ou non ? Par ailleurs, cette pluralité d'interprétations est aussi un problème concernant les explications que la théorie peut fournir car, comme nous le verrons plus loin, les interprétations quantiques peuvent fournir des explications différentes d'un même phénomène. Devrait-on renoncer à l'idée qu'une explication puisse être la meilleure ? En revanche, cette pluralité d'interprétations n'est pas un problème pour un philosophe pragmatique. Dès lors que les diverses interprétations de la théorie conduisent aux mêmes prédictions empiriques, il peut les considérer comme autant d'outils de prédiction adéquats, sans soucis des images du monde qu'on peut former à partir d'elles. Si on écarte le projet métaphysique consistant à dire de quoi est fait le monde, et que l'on s'intéresse seulement aux avancées empiriques de la recherche, alors la pluralité des interprétations peut être considérée comme un avantage : les chercheurs peuvent adopter l'interprétation qu'ils préfèrent, et avoir d'autant plus d'idées dans leur travail. Au-delà de ce débat, et puisqu'une pluralité d'interprétations de la mécanique quantique existe, il apparaît important de parvenir à comprendre comment il est possible que des interprétations si différentes puissent convenir à une même théorie, tout en étant expérimentalement équivalentes. Cette interrogation est le fil conducteur du présent ouvrage. Pour cela, la notion d'interprétation et d'image du monde est approfondie dans le chapitre suivant. 8 Chapitre 2 – Qu'est-ce qu'interpréter une théorie physique ? Le chapitre précédent a indiqué qu'il existe plusieurs interprétations de la mécanique quantique, qui proposent différentes images du monde quantique. Avant de présenter dans les chapitres suivants quelques-unes de ces interprétations, il est nécessaire d'approfondir l'analyse de ce concept d' « interprétation » de façon générale (des exemples seront pris dans d'autres théories physiques). Qu'est-ce exactement qu'une interprétation d'une théorie ? À quoi sert-elle, et est-elle vraiment nécessaire, notamment si l'on n'est pas philosophe ? 1. L'interprétation d'un énoncé Pour aborder la notion d'interprétation d'une théorie physique, il est utile de faire préalablement un détour par la logique, où la notion d'interprétation d'une théorie trouve une expression rigoureuse. En logique, interpréter prend un sens sémantique : à ce qui n'est d'abord que des symboles (par exemple « x » ou « Jean »), il s'agit d'associer des référents dans le monde. Par un exemple la phrase « Mathurin est plus grand que Philibert » décrit une situation qui peut être vraie ou fausse, si tant est qu'il existe deux personnes prénommées Mathurin et Philibert. Cette phrase peut être réécrite de façon formelle comme « x R y ». Pour que le sens de la phrase originale soit conservé, il faut intuitivement exiger que x désigne la personne prénommée « Mathurin », y celle prénommée « Philibert » et que R soit la relation « être plus grand que ». Interpréter l'énoncé « x R y », c'est indiquer les référents des différents symboles. Considérons maintenant l'énoncé « x R y » en tant que tel, sans faire référence à la phrase initiale. Tant que l'on n'indique pas à quoi chacun des symboles x, y et R renvoie, cet énoncé ne signifie rien et il n'est ni vrai ni faux (il n'a pas de contenu empirique). Il peut d'ailleurs être interprété différemment du cas précédent : en indiquant que x désigne Alice, y désigne Bob et R désigne « être la soeur de », l'énoncé prend un sens tout à fait différent, et il peut être vrai ou faux indépendamment du premier cas. Il s'agit là de deux interprétations différentes d'un même énoncé formel. 2. L'interprétation d'une théorie physique La notion d'interprétation logique qui vient d'être présentée est la base sur laquelle peut se comprendre l'interprétation en physique. Néanmoins, nous allons voir que cette conception ne suffit pas à définir l'interprétation et le contenu empirique des théories physiques. a. Limites de la conception logique de l'interprétation Considérons par exemple la théorie de la mécanique classique (qui permet de rendre compte du mouvement et de la dynamique des corps à notre échelle, comme le lancer d'une balle ou la solidité d'un pont), et notamment un de ses principes : « Principe fondamental de la dynamique : dans un référentiel galiléen, la somme des forces qui s'exercent sur un point matériel est égale au produit de sa masse par son accélération, soit F = m a. » Cet énoncé utilise des variables telles que m, F ou a et des termes tels que « point matériel », « référentiel », « galiléen », sans compter les termes associés aux précédentes variables (force, masse, ...). Considéré d'un point de vue purement syntaxique, cet énoncé n'est ni vrai ni faux : si les variables et les termes ne sont pas interprétés, la théorie n'a aucun contenu empirique. Dans le sens logique vu précédemment, proposer une interprétation de cette théorie suppose de dire par exemple à quoi correspondent F ou m. Notons que le simple fait d'affirmer qu'ils correspondent à une 9 « force » ou à une « masse » ne répond pas particulièrement au problème, si l'on ne précise pas ce qu'est une « force » ou « masse », ou comment on les identifie dans le monde. Cette difficulté vient du fait que les théories physiques considèrent de nouveaux objets ou de nouvelles entités par rapport au sens commun et à la vie courante. Ces nouvelles entités ne sont pas identifiables de manière simple et directe, par exemple pas comme une personne, ou une chaise – on ne peut pas pointer du doigt une force. De plus, les entités que les théories physiques utilisent sont définies dans leur relation à d'autres entités elles-mêmes théoriques, de sorte qu'il y a une certaine circularité. Par exemple, le concept de référentiel galiléen intervient dans un autre principe de la mécanique, celui de force dans deux autres, etc. Ainsi, c'est plutôt « en bloc » que la théorie doit être interprétée et reliée à l'expérience dans le monde. L'interprétation d'une théorie physique et de ses énoncés nécessite plus que la simple notion logique d'interprétation. b. À quoi sert une interprétation ? Pour mieux comprendre les enjeux de l'interprétation d'une théorie physique, précisons le rôle ou la fonction qu'elle assure. Il semble qu'on puisse en distinguer trois. Tout d'abord, l'interprétation donne un contenu empirique à la théorie. En effet, une théorie noninterprétée n'est qu'un ensemble de symboles formels qui n'a pas de valeur de vérité, et ne donne aucune prédiction expérimentale. L'interprétation remédie à cela, en indiquant le lien entre les éléments formels et les données expérimentales. C'est pourquoi l'interprétation d'une théorie est parfois qualifiée d' « empirique ». Pour reprendre l'exemple de la mécanique classique, interpréter m consiste à dire qu'il s'agit d'une masse mesurable dans certaines conditions par une balance, elle-même étalonnée par rapport à une masse de référence conservée au Bureau International des Poids et Mesures, à Sèvres. Un autre rôle pour l'interprétation consiste à dire de quoi est (ou pourrait être) composé le monde selon la théorie. Cela peut être rapproché du sens de l'interprétation sémantique présentée préalablement : on indique les référents qui composent le monde dans lequel la théorie est vraie. On décrit ainsi comment peut être le monde si la théorie scientifique est vraie1. Une interprétation de la mécanique newtonienne dit par exemple que le monde se compose de points matériels massifs et de forces. Comme de nombreuses interprétations différentes peuvent rendre la théorie vraie, une interprétation particulière dit seulement comment pourrait être le monde. Le troisième rôle de l'interprétation d'une théorie physique est d'apporter une certaine compréhension, ou bien du monde et de ses phénomènes (par exemple, du « monde des atomes » pour la mécanique quantique), ou bien de la théorie elle-même et de ses mathématiques arides. Dans les deux cas, cela sous-entend que le premier aspect de l'interprétation, à savoir donner un contenu empirique à la théorie formelle, ne suffit pas à donner une compréhension. Autrement dit, savoir prédire adéquatement un phénomène empirique ne signifie pas le comprendre2. En disant de quoi pourrait être composé le monde, l'interprétation peut proposer une histoire sur « ce qui se passe vraiment » sous les phénomènes, et ainsi apporter une compréhension. c. Définition de l'interprétation : aperçu historique Qu'est-ce exactement que l'interprétation d'une théorie physique ? Sur cette question, les philosophes, dont une des tâches est de définir et d'analyser les concepts, ne s'accordent pas vraiment. Voici les principales conceptions rivales qui ont été défendues3. 1 La donnée de ce qui compose le monde n'est pas forcément à prendre en un sens réaliste. 2 C'est par exemple une position défendue par R. I. G. Hughes, The Structure and Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, Cambridge (MA) et London, Harvard University Press, 1989 (cf. notamment p. 155). 3 Pour une présentation des différentes conceptions des théories scientifiques, cf. par exemple C. U. Moulines, La Philosophie des Sciences. L'Invention d'une Discipline, Paris, Éditions Rue d'Ulm, 2006. 10 La conception syntaxique des théories Une première conception de l'interprétation repose sur ce qui a été appelé la « conception syntaxique » des théories scientifiques, défendue par le courant de l'empirisme logique et des auteurs tels que Carnap, Hempel ou Nagel. Leur idée-force est que le sens d'un terme scientifique est donné (en tout et pour tout) par l'expérience : par exemple, le terme « électron » ne signifie rien de plus que « ce qui fait telle trace dans une chambre à bulle », et « est dévié de telle façon par un champ électrique», etc. ; un « électron » n'a alors rien d'une entité métaphysique. Leur analyse est, schématiquement, la suivante. On distingue dans le langage de la théorie deux types de termes, les termes observationnels (comme « chambre à bulle ») et les termes théoriques (comme « électron »). Les premiers sont directement interprétés comme référant à des objets physiques observables (une chambre à bulle). Les seconds n'ont pas de lien direct à l'empirique : ils ont seulement un lien indirect, à travers des « règles de correspondance », qui définissent les termes théoriques à partir de termes observationnels (« ce qui fait.. », « est dévié... », etc.). Interpréter une théorie signifie alors donner des règles de correspondance pour ses termes théoriques, de façon à ce qu'ils réfèrent in fine à des entités observables. Cette conception syntaxique a fait l'objet de divers raffinements. Par exemple pour Bridgman, la signification d'un terme provient de la façon dont on mesure la grandeur. Le sens de « longueur » est donné, par exemple, par l'utilisation de règles graduées ou par la mesure du temps de propagation de la lumière. Interpréter un terme d'une théorie revient ainsi à en donner une définition opérationnelle au moyen d'opérations ou de manipulations réalisables en laboratoire1. La position de Bridgman a été critiquée pour diverses raisons. L'une d'elles est qu'une définition opérationnelle d'un concept ne recouvre pas la totalité du sens que les scientifiques lui attribuent ; ce qui rend intéressant un concept théorique est précisément le fait qu'il ne se limite pas aux situations et applications connues. Une autre critique porte sur le fait que tous les concepts théoriques ne peuvent pas faire l'objet d'une définition opérationnelle, ainsi que Bridgman l'a lui-même reconnu dans certains cas. La conception sémantique des théories Une autre définition de ce qu'est l'interprétation d'une théorie s'appuie sur une conception dite « sémantique » des théories. Cette position a été défendue par des philosophes comme Giere, Suppe, Suppes ou van Fraassen. Elle recourt au concept de modèle, qui est à peu près le suivant. Considérons un énoncé formel ou une théorie, par exemple « F = m a ». Un modèle de cette théorie est une certaine interprétation des symboles qui rend vraie la théorie. Par exemple, le modèle peut consister en la donnée de la force qu'exerce un athlète sur son javelot, de la masse et de l'accélération de ce javelot. Une théorie est alors définie par la classe des modèles qui la rendent vraie. Par exemple, « F = m a » est définie par tous les modèles d'athlètes et de javelots, mais aussi d'athlètes et de marteaux, d'enfants et de jouets, de planètes entre elles, etc. (et la liste est infinie) de tous les cas dans lesquels la théorie est vraie. Dans cette conception, la théorie n'est pas définie par une formulation particulière ou un langage particulier, mais seulement par la donnée des situations dans lesquelles elle est vraie. De cette façon, les règles de correspondance ne font plus l'objet de définitions explicites. Interpréter une théorie, c'est pour la conception sémantique répondre aux questions « Sous quelles conditions cette théorie est-elle vraie ? À quoi dit-elle que le monde ressemble ? »2. L'interprétation fournit des entités, avec leurs propriétés, qui composent ce monde. 1 Cet opérationnalisme est revendiqué par certains courants interprétatifs de la mécanique quantique, cf. par exemple A. Peres, Quantum Theory: Concepts and Methods, New York, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1993. 2 B. C. Van Fraassen, Quantum Mechanics. An Empiricist View, New York, Oxford University Press, 1991, p. 242. 11 Bilan Que retenir des différentes conceptions de ce qu'est une interprétation ? Notons que ce terme est à géométrie variable, notamment en fonction de la conception de ce qu'est une théorie scientifique ellemême. Il peut en résulter certaines confusions, puisque tous les auteurs ne référeront pas à la même chose avec un même terme. En dépit des divergences philosophiques que nous venons de voir sur la façon de concevoir une interprétation (et une théorie scientifique), les ouvrages et articles font bel et bien référence à ces « interprétations de la mécanique quantique », ce qui suggère qu'elles ont des caractéristiques qui dépassent les clivages philosophiques. Aussi, une définition de travail de l'interprétation, qui se veut consensuelle, est proposée ci-après. d. Une définition de travail de l'interprétation La définition proposée est : « l'interprétation d'une théorie fournit l'image d'un monde dans lequel la théorie est vraie, c'est-àdire qu'elle précise les types d'entités et de propriétés que comporte ce monde. » Cette définition se rapproche de l'interprétation logico-mathématique : pour une théorie exprimée dans un langage formel L, une interprétation consiste en un domaine D des individus qui servent de référents aux variables de la théorie. Interpréter une théorie, c'est donner un ensemble d'entités auquel la théorie se rapporte, et c'est dire ce qui peut composer le monde, si la théorie est vraie. Aussi, quand il est dit que la théorie est vraie dans le monde proposé par l'interprétation, c'est dans ce sens sémantique (ses axiomes sont satisfaits dans ce monde) et non pas nécessairement dans un sens réaliste (ces entités existent véritablement). La définition proposée rejoint la position de Sellars selon laquelle les sciences, qui font l'hypothèse de certaines entités, contribuent à proposer une « image scientifique »1 du monde (par opposition à une image manifeste, plus naturelle à l'homme, par laquelle il est conscient de lui-même et du monde). Pour Sellars, cette image scientifique est caractérisée notamment par les types d'objets et de propriétés de base qui sont invoqués. C'est cette expression de Sellars que van Fraassen reprend à son compte pour le titre d'un ouvrage2 sur la représentation scientifique. Et Hughes, qui adopte la conception sémantique des théories dans son ouvrage de philosophie de la mécanique quantique (op. cit.), estime que l'interprétation doit fournir un « schéma conceptuel », c'est-à-dire spécifier les types d'objets et de propriétés, comme le demande Sellars. e. Une théorie physique a-t-elle vraiment besoin d'une interprétation ? Pour conclure, il nous faut considérer l'objection suivante : une théorie scientifique n'a en fait pas besoin d'interprétation. On distingue deux types d'arguments en faveur d'une telle idée. Le premier argument est qu'il suffit de savoir comment appliquer une théorie et la comparer à l'expérience ; et une interprétation qui, en plus de cela, viendrait spécifier les entités dont se compose le monde, est inutile. C'est par exemple à peu près la teneur de l'article de Fuchs et Peres (2000), intitulé justement « La Mécanique Quantique n'a pas besoin d'Interprétation »3. Cette position, on l'aura compris, s'apparente à un instrumentalisme : les théories ne servent qu'à prédire des résultats expérimentaux et n'ont pas à proposer une image du monde. Mais une telle position suppose que l'interprétation empirique de la théorie puisse être indépendante de l'interprétation au sens d'une image du monde. Or il semble que cela ne soit pas possible, car pour pouvoir seulement appliquer la théorie 1 W. Sellars, « Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man », dans R. Colodny (ed.), Frontiers of Science and Philosophy, Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press, 1962, p. 35-78. 2 B. C. Van Fraassen, The Scientific Image, New-York, Oxford University Press, 1980. 3 Physics Today, (53) mars 2000, p. 70-71. 12 empiriquement, il est nécessaire de préciser ce qui est susceptible de faire l'objet de prédictions, et cela revient à prendre parti, au moins implicitement, sur ce qui peut composer le monde. Ce point sera développé au chapitre 6. Un autre type d'argument, qui trouve un certain écho aujourd'hui en mécanique quantique1, est qu'une théorie ne doit pas être simplement interprétée, mais plutôt reconstruite à partir de principes physiques. Cette position s'appuie explicitement sur une distinction d'Einstein entre les théories constructives et les théories à principes, en arguant que le premier type de théorie doit recevoir une interprétation, tandis que le second n'en a pas besoin. Mais les principes sur lesquelles les théories reconstruites s'appuient ne fournissent-elles pas implicitement une image du monde ? Il semble bien que si : comme ils sont censés être des « principes physiques », c'est-à-dire porter directement sur le monde et avoir une signification physique claire, ils reviennent à prendre position sur les objets qui composent le monde et encadrent l'image possible du monde. Les théories à principes fournissent donc bel et bien une interprétation au sens d'une image d'un monde dans lequel la théorie serait vraie. Comment faut-il alors comprendre le slogan « reconstruire, ne pas interpréter » ? Il faut l'entendre, semble-t-il, comme une invitation à loger les éléments interprétatifs au coeur de la formulation axiomatique de la théorie, plutôt que de se contenter d'ajouter après coup une interprétation à une formulation de la théorie. Ainsi, ceux qui prétendent se passer de l'interprétation d'une théorie ne tiennent pas leurs promesses de façon littérale : une interprétation telle que proposée dans la définition de travail est nécessaire à toute théorie scientifique pour qu'elle ait un contenu empirique. 1 Cf. par exemple R. Clifton, J. Bub, et H. Halvorson, « Characterizing Quantum Theory in Terms of InformationTheoretic Constraints », Foundations of Physics, 33 (11), 2003, p. 1561-91 ; A. Grinbaum, « Reconstructing Instead of Interpreting Quantum Theory », Philosophy of Science, 74 (5), 2007, p. 761-774 ; L. Hardy, « Quantum Theory from Five Reasonable Axioms », 2001, arXiv:quant-ph/0101012 ; C. Rovelli, « Relational Quantum Mechanics », International Journal of Theoretical Physics, 35, 1996, p. 1637-1678. 13 Chapitre 3 – L'interprétation orthodoxe Après que le chapitre précédent a éclairci ce qu'est l'interprétation d'une théorie physique, les chapitres 3 à 5 présentent quelques interprétations de la mécanique quantique. Parmi toutes celles qui existent, lesquelles choisir ? Ce livre se restreint aux trois interprétations qui sont les plus populaires aujourd'hui chez les physiciens et les philosophes de la physique. Ce choix ne reflète pas tant les préférences de l'auteur que l'état de fait de la communauté des spécialistes. Ce chapitre présente l'interprétation que l'on trouve, au moins implicitement, dans la très grande majorité des manuels universitaires contemporains de mécanique quantique1, et qui est enseignée presque partout dans le monde. Pour cette raison, on l'appelle généralement l'interprétation « orthodoxe ». Précisons qu'il s'agit bien ici de l'interprétation contemporaine des manuels, et non pas de l'interprétation historique dite « de Copenhague » de Bohr et alii, qui en est l'origine historique et que les ouvrages philosophiques préfèrent généralement discuter2. 1. Formulation de la théorie a. L'état d'un système quantique La mécanique quantique requiert que soit précisé tout d'abord le système physique considéré, par exemple un électron, un photon, un ensemble de trois atomes, etc. La théorie attribue à ce système un certain état mathématique, appelé aussi fonction d'onde3. Le rôle de cet état est simple : c'est lui qui doit permettre de répondre à toutes les questions expérimentales qui peuvent être adressées au système, autrement dit de prédire le résultat d'une expérience au moyen d'un calcul théorique. On dit parfois que l'état quantique « contient toutes les informations qu'il est possible d'obtenir sur le corpuscule »4. C'est grâce à cet état que la mécanique quantique peut satisfaire un des buts essentiels d'une théorie scientifique : faire des prédictions expérimentales. Les prédictions qui sont obtenues à partir de cet état quantique ont la particularité d'être probabilistes : la théorie donne seulement la chance que tel ou tel résultat soit obtenu, et il n'y a que dans certains cas que la prédiction fournie est certaine. À la question : « quelle sera la position de l'atome à tel moment ? », la mécanique quantique pourra répondre par exemple qu'il y a 2 chances sur 3 qu'il se trouve ici et 1 chance sur 3 qu'il se trouve là. 1 Les principaux manuels contemporains sur lesquels ce chapitre s'appuie sont C. Cohen-Tannoudji, B. Diu, et F. Laloë, Mécanique Quantique, Tome 1, Paris, Hermann, 1973/1998 ; K. Gottfried, et T.-M. Yan, Quantum Mechanics: Fundamentals, New-York, Springer-Verlag, 2003 ; D. J. Griffiths, Introduction to Quantum Mechanics, London, Pearson Prentice Hall, 2004, seconde édition ; R. Shankar, Principles of Quantum Mechanics, New-York, Plenum Press, 1994, seconde édition. Dans cet ouvrage, chaque interprétation est présentée dans une version qu'on peut qualifier de médiane, parmi toutes les versions qui en ont été proposées, et qui ne correspond pas forcément à celle défendue par tel physicien ou tel philosophe. 2 Concernant l'interprétation historique de Copenhague, on peut consulter M. Beller, Quantum Dialogue: the Making of a Revolution, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1999 ; J. Faye, « Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics », dans E. N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/qm-copenhagen/, 2008 ; D. Howard, « Who Invented the 'Copenhagen Interpretation'? A Study in Mythology », Philosophy of Science 71 (5), 2004, p. 669-682 ; H. Krips, « Measurement in Quantum Theory », dans E. N. Zalta, op. cit., http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2013/entries/qtmeasurement/, 2013. 3 L'utilisation d'un état n'est pas, en tant que tel, propre à la mécanique quantique ; il est par exemple déjà utilisé en mécanique classique, où il est donné par la position et le moment cinétique (la masse multipliée par la vitesse) de la particule, et où il permet de calculer les grandeurs qui concernent la particule, comme son énergie, la force qu'exerce sur elle telle autre particule, etc. 4 Cohen-Tannoudji et al, op. cit. p. 19. 14 Mathématiquement, un état quantique est un vecteur, qu'on peut représenter comme étant une flèche qui va d'un point à un autre. Il existe des vecteurs de différents types : certains peuvent être représentés à 2 dimensions sur une feuille de papier, d'autres à 3 dimensions dans l'espace auquel nous sommes habitués ; les mathématiciens définissent aussi des vecteurs à 4, 5, ... ou une infinité de dimensions. Les états quantiques appartiennent à ces espaces de différentes dimensions, selon les cas1. Pour indiquer qu'il s'agit d'un vecteur, un état quantique est traditionnellement noté entre les symboles « | » et « > », comme par exemple « | ψ > » (avec la lettre grecque ψ, souvent utilisée pour les états quantiques). Un état qui décrit un atome qui se trouve à un certain endroit (ici) sera par exemple noté « | ici > ». Deux flèches peuvent être mises bout à bout pour définir une nouvelle flèche. De même, une somme de deux états définit un nouvel état, comme par exemple l'état2 | ici > + | là >. On parle alors d'état superposé, et celui-ci tient à la fois de l'un et de l'autre des deux états. b. Résultat d'une mesure et probabilités Si on mesure en laboratoire l'énergie de l'électron qui se trouve dans un atome d'hydrogène, on peut obtenir – 13,6 ou – 3,4 eV3, mais jamais de valeur entre – 13,6 et – 3,4. De façon générale, les valeurs des mesures quantiques peuvent être représentées par des points distincts (on dit que les valeurs sont discrètes), et non par des lignes ou des intervalles continus. La théorie de la mécanique quantique, et c'est l'un de ses principaux mérites, rend compte de ce caractère discret en fournissant pour chaque système et chaque grandeur physique la gamme possible des résultats de mesure. Si on demande quel résultat on obtiendra si on mesure l'énergie de notre électron de l'atome d'hydrogène, la mécanique quantique répondra dans certains cas « – 13,6 eV, avec 100 % de chances ». L'état de l'électron sera alors noté « | – 13,6 eV > ». Dans d'autres cas, la mécanique quantique répondra : « 50 % de chances d'obtenir – 13,6 eV et 50 % de chances d'obtenir – 3,4 eV ». Nous avons déjà signalé, en effet, qu'une caractéristique des prédictions quantiques est d'être probabilistes. Dans ce dernier cas, l'état attribué à l'électron sera superposé, et s'écrira « | – 13,6 eV > + | – 3,4 eV > ». Le lien entre superposition et probabilités est réciproque4. Si un état n'est pas superposé (on parle alors d' « état propre »), comme par exemple l'état | ici >, la mécanique quantique prédit avec une probabilité de 100 % que la mesure de la position du système donnera le résultat « ici ». Si l'état est superposé, comme par exemple l'état | ici > + | là >, la mécanique quantique donne des prédictions probabilistes, en l'occurrence elle dit que la mesure de la position donnera « ici » avec 50 % de chances, et « là » avec 50 % de chances5. Ces probabilités sont à entendre comme un reflet d'un hasard absolu. C'est ce que signifie le fait pour un système d'être dans un état superposé : si la grandeur en question est mesurée, elle donnera une réponse ou une autre, et la mécanique quantique attribue des probabilités à chacune des réponses. c. Évolution de l'état L'état d'un système dépend du temps. Comment évolue-t-il, selon quelles lois ? La mécanique 1 Mathématiquement, ces espaces sont en fait définis sur les nombres complexes. Ceux-ci comprennent les nombres usuels à virgule, dits réels (comme – 12,76 ; 5 ou π), et aussi les nombres qui mettent en jeu le nombre imaginaire i, défini par i2 = – 1 (comme 3 – 2i). 2 Pour simplifier, on ne tient pas compte ici du fait que la norme du vecteur (la longueur de la flèche) doive valoir 1 ; les constantes de normalisation ne sont donc pas notées. 3 L'électron-volt, noté « eV », est une unité d'énergie, comme la calorie ou le joule. 4 Les états mixtes, qui ajoutent aux états purs de la mécanique quantique des éléments d'ignorance de notre part, sont exclus de cette discussion. 5 Au lieu de 50-50, des états superposés peuvent attribuer par exemple 10 % de chances à un résultat et 90 % à un autre. Leur expression mathématique étant plus compliquée, nous nous limitons ici aux exemples 50-50. 15 quantique orthodoxe reconnaît deux lois d'évolution bien distinctes, selon qu'une mesure est ou non effectuée sur le système1. En-dehors d'une mesure Si aucune mesure n'est effectuée, l'état du système évolue sans à-coup particulier, selon une équation dite « de Schrödinger ». Cette équation énonce comment l'état à un instant t est modifié en fonction des forces qui agissent sur le système à cet instant. Connaissant l'état initial du système et les interactions qu'il subit au cours du temps, le physicien peut résoudre l'équation et connaître l'état à chaque instant. Une analogie peut être ici utile. Supposons que l'état soit un vecteur à 3 dimensions ; il peut être représenté par une flèche dans l'espace ; rendons cette flèche matérielle en disant qu'elle est un mince bâton, qui pointe selon une certaine direction. L'équation de Schrödinger dit comment ce bâton évolue ou pivote au cours du temps en fonction de sa position initiale et des interactions que le système reçoit. Lors d'une mesure Si une mesure est effectuée, l'état du système peut changer brusquement lors de cette mesure. En fonction du résultat obtenu lors de la mesure, un nouvel état est attribué au système. Avec l'analogie utilisée plus haut, un nouveau bâton est substitué à l'ancien bâton, pointant éventuellement dans une nouvelle direction. Considérons tout d'abord le cas simple d'un état propre (non superposé), par exemple un atome d'hydrogène dont l'état est | – 13,6 eV >. La mécanique quantique prédit avec certitude qu'une mesure de l'énergie donnera pour résultat – 13,6 eV, ainsi que nous l'avons vu. Quel sera l'état juste après la mesure ? Il ne change pas et vaut toujours | – 13,6 eV >. De façon générale, un état propre n'est pas modifié par une mesure de la quantité correspondante. Considérons un autre atome d'hydrogène dans l'état superposé | – 13,6 eV > + | – 3,4 eV >. La mécanique quantique prédit que, si on mesure son énergie, il y a une chance sur deux qu'on obtienne – 13,6 eV, et une chance sur deux qu'on obtienne – 3,4 eV. Supposons que, la mesure étant effectuée, on obtienne pour résultat – 13,6 eV. Dans ce cas, le nouvel état que la mécanique quantique attribue au système est juste | – 13,6 eV >, c'est-à-dire la partie de l'état correspondant à la valeur obtenue. On parle de « réduction » ou de « projection » de l'état lors de la mesure, parce que de deux termes on passe à un. Pour un système dans un état superposé, le fait de procéder à une mesure change l'état du système. L'interprétation orthodoxe considère donc, de façon générale, qu'une mesure ne révéle pas seulement l'état du système, mais le modifie, et ce de façon aléatoire. 2. L'image orthodoxe du monde a. Entités et propriétés De quoi se compose le monde ? Précisons maintenant l'image du monde selon l'interprétation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique. Tout d'abord, l'état du système, ou la fonction d'onde (le bâton), n'est pas considéré comme une entité du monde, ou comme référant ou correspondant à un objet du monde. Il est seulement considéré comme un outil prédictif, qui permet de calculer les différentes probabilités de mesure. Ce ne sont pas les états des systèmes, mais les systèmes quantiques eux-mêmes qui ont le statut d'entités, au sens où ils composent l'image du monde et peuvent recevoir des propriétés. Par exemple, le monde orthodoxe se compose d'électrons, de photons ou de molécules – ce qui peut sembler aller de soi. 1 Déterminer quand une interaction doit être considérée comme une mesure est un problème abordé p. 19. 16 Lorsque des propriétés ne sont pas définies Une autre caractéristique du monde orthodoxe est certainement moins naturelle : on considère qu'un système n'a pas toujours de propriété ; par exemple, dans de nombreux cas, l'interprétation orthodoxe n'attribue pas de position, de vitesse ou d'énergie à un atome – ou elle dit que ces propriétés ne sont pas définies. Plus précisément, un système est considéré comme ayant une propriété lorsque le résultat de mesure peut être prédit avec certitude. Cela correspond au cas où son état n'est pas dans une superposition de différents résultats pour cette grandeur. Par exemple, on dit que le système dans l'état | ici > a une position parce que, si on la mesure, on peut prédire avec certitude qu'il sera trouvé ici. A contrario, on dit que le système avec l'état | ici > + | là > n'a pas de position, parce que la prédiction quantique n'est pas certaine. L'interprétation orthodoxe est ici en accord avec l'opérationnalisme1, qui considère que le sens d'un concept théorique (par exemple : « position d'un système quantique ») provient de la façon dont il peut être mesuré ; et si le résultat de sa mesure n'est pas assuré, alors il n'a pas de sens et il n'est pas défini. Il existe un cas où un système a une propriété à coup sûr : il s'agit du moment juste après une mesure. En effet, la mesure a réduit l'état du système sur un état propre, correspondant au résultat de la mesure. Par exemple, l'état | ici > + | là > a été réduit sur l'état | là >. À un tel état propre, la mécanique quantique associe une propriété, en l'occurrence ici la position, avec la valeur « là ». Cela est cohérent : juste après une mesure où le système a été trouvé là, on peut encore dire qu'il est là. Par quel(s) trou(s) est passé l'électron ? On doit donc considérer qu'un système ne possède pas, de manière générale, de propriété vis-à-vis de sa position ou de sa vitesse. Considérons un autre exemple, avec l'expérience dite des trous d'Young. Cette expérience célèbre consiste à diriger un faisceau d'électrons (initialement, l'expérience concernait un faisceau de lumière) vers une plaque qui n'est percée que de deux petits trous rapprochés ; on détecte les électrons à bonne distance derrière la plaque, sur un écran. Lorsque seulement l'un des trous est ouvert, on observe une certaine figure sur l'écran ; lorsque les deux trous sont ouverts simultanément, la figure observée n'est pas la somme des deux figures lorsqu'un seul trou est ouvert : c'est ce qu'on appelle une figure d'interférences. La mécanique quantique permet de rendre parfaitement compte de cela, et les calculs montrent que, pour la position finale d'un électron, il faut tenir compte du fait que les deux trous sont ouverts. Cela veut-il dire que l'électron se dédouble, qu'il ne passe pas vraiment par un des deux trous, ou qu'il passe par un des trous sans qu'on puisse le savoir ? La réponse de l'interprétation orthodoxe est la suivante : il n'est pas vrai qu'un électron emprunte l'un ou l'autre des trous ; plutôt, le concept de position ou de trajectoire ne s'applique pas au niveau de la plaque (car l'électron n'est pas dans un état propre de position). Ainsi, l'interprétation orthodoxe n'attribue pas de trajectoire à l'électron entre son émission en amont et sa réception en aval de la plaque percée, et refuse de répondre à la question « par quel trou l'électron est-il passé ? ». On note que l'interprétation orthodoxe est assez minimaliste par certains aspects : elle n'attribue pas de propriété à un système en toute occasion, et ne cherche donc pas à décrire une réalité à chaque instant. Elle se contente de rendre compte des résultats de mesures, qui sont de rares moments après lesquels les systèmes ont des propriétés. Ce faisant, l'interprétation orthodoxe présente certains traits de l'instrumentalisme : elle fait de la mécanique quantique un simple instrument pour prédire des phénomènes observables, les résultats de mesures. Elle ne se prononce pas beaucoup plus que cela sur l'image du monde. 1 Cf. chap. 2. 17 b. Faits expérimentaux Dans l'image orthodoxe du monde, les faits concernent des résultats de mesures existants, ou qui peuvent être prédits avec certitude – un peu comme les propriétés concernent des résultats qui peuvent être prédits avec certitude. Considérons par exemple l'expérience suivante, qui est décrite dans les termes du langage courant. L'expérience comprend un atome radioactif, qui est un atome susceptible de se désintégrer au fil du temps, placé devant un compteur Geiger, c'est-à-dire un appareil détectant les désintégrations des atomes radioactifs. Au bout d'un certain temps (au temps t), le compteur émet un « clic », indiquant que l'atome s'est désintégré. Selon l'interprétation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique, il existe un fait à propos de la désintégration de l'atome au temps t, comme on l'exprime dans le langage courant. En l'occurrence, l'expérience montre que la désintégration a eu lieu. L'interprétation orthodoxe fournit donc l'image d'un monde dans lequel l'atome est désintégré. Ces remarques peuvent sembler triviales, mais elles méritent d'être précisées car d'autres interprétations quantiques ne les partagent pas. c. Un monde indéterministe Comment doit-on comprendre les probabilités qui sont au coeur des prédictions de la mécanique quantique ? Selon l'interprétation orthodoxe, ces probabilités sont le signe d'un hasard fondamental ou, pour le dire autrement, le monde est indéterministe. Le hasard survient lors d'une mesure, au moment de la réduction que subit l'état du système. Cette réduction est aléatoire : rien, au sein du système quantique lui-même ou de l'appareil de mesure, ne pré-détermine le résultat de la mesure et la projection de l'état suivant tel ou tel nouvel état. Ce qui est fixé, en revanche, c'est la régularité statistique avec laquelle les différents résultats sont obtenus, pour un état donné. Par exemple, pour l'état | – 13,6 eV > + | – 3,4 eV >, on obtient effectivement lors des expériences 50 % de résultats à – 13,6 eV et 50 % de résultats à – 3,4 eV. Comme le résultat de la mesure n'est déterminé par rien (mis à part par cette régularité statistique), on dit que les probabilités employées dans les prédictions de la théorie sont à interpréter objectivement, c'est-à-dire qu'elles représentent un hasard objectif, réel. Dieu joue vraiment aux dés, pour ainsi dire. Même lui ne peut dire, avant le résultat de mesure, si, dans un état | ici > + | là >, le système va effectivement être trouvé ici ou là. Les probabilités quantiques ne reflètent donc pas une ignorance de notre part1, et l'état quantique décrit complètement le système. C'est en ce sens que les probabilités quantiques représentent, selon l'interprétation orthodoxe, un hasard fondamental et inhérent à notre monde. Ce hasard se traduit par la perturbation fondamentale et incontrôlable qui provient de la mesure (ou de l'appareil de mesure) sur le système quantique. Il est important de noter que ce caractère indéterministe ne concerne qu'une seule partie de la dynamique des systèmes quantiques : la réduction de l'état lors d'une mesure. L'équation de Schrödinger qui régit l'évolution temporelle de l'état, hors mesure, est quant à elle tout à fait déterministe. Il n'y a aucun hasard dans l'évolution de l'état entre deux mesures. d. Monde quantique, monde classique L'existence de deux règles d'évolution distinctes (réduction de l'état, équation de Schrödinger) suppose la distinction entre les interactions qui sont à considérer comme des mesures et celles qui n'en sont pas. Cela suppose par conséquent de distinguer d'une part ce qui joue le rôle d'un appareil de mesure, responsable des premières, et d'autre part tout le reste du monde, traité quantiquement, responsable des secondes. Cette séparation entre un appareil de mesure classique et un monde quantique est au coeur de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe, qui ne peut traiter tout le monde quantiquement : une partie du 1 Cf. note 4 p. 15. 18 monde doit être classique pour pouvoir interagir avec le système quantique et être à même d'enregistrer un résultat de mesure. Même si cette séparation peut changer en fonction de l'expérience1, son existence est indispensable pour l'interprétation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique. L'image orthodoxe du monde est toujours divisée en deux, l'une classique, l'autre quantique. Une autre caractéristique du monde quantique orthodoxe, la non-localité, est discutée en détail dans la seconde partie de l'ouvrage. 3. Le problème de la mesure L'interprétation orthodoxe est très largement acceptée dans la communauté scientifique en dépit d'un problème conceptuel, appelé traditionnellement « problème de la mesure », qui ronge cette interprétation depuis ses débuts, sous différentes versions2. Par problème conceptuel, il faut entendre l'existence d'un problème de cohérence interne concernant la formulation de la théorie et son interprétation. Cependant, ce problème n'empêche absolument pas la théorie d'être utilisée et appliquée avec succès par les physiciens. Selon une formule célèbre de Bell, à propos de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe : « à toutes fins pratiques, tout va bien »3. C'est d'ailleurs pour cette raison que le problème de la mesure est souvent ignoré par des physiciens ayant une approche pragmatique. Il n'en reste pas moins qu'un problème existe concernant la formulation précise de la théorie. Le problème de la mesure naît de l'existence de deux règles d'évolution pour l'état du système, l'équation de Schrödinger et la réduction de l'état. Ces lois sont incompatibles et ne peuvent s'appliquer simultanément : la première est déterministe et continue, la seconde est indéterministe et discontinue. Le problème est le suivant : la théorie ne définit pas les circonstances dans lesquelles les deux règles différentes s'appliquent. Autrement dit, le terme de « mesure », qui est au coeur des axiomes de la théorie, n'est pas défini. La mécanique quantique orthodoxe ne donne pas de limite à ce qui vaut comme mesure. Elle est, selon les termes de Bell, « ambiguë par principe »4. Cette frontière peut changer au gré des utilisations de la théorie, lui donnant un regrettable « caractère fuyant »5. Certaines tentatives de résolution du problème ont été proposées, mais elles n'améliorent pas le flou initial : il en va ainsi des prescriptions selon lesquelles l'appareil de mesure doit être « macroscopique », présenter un comportement « irréversible », être lié à un « observateur », etc. Ces concepts ne sont pas particulièrement mieux définis que celui de « mesure » qui figure dans la formulation orthodoxe de la théorie. Répétons-le : le problème est d'ordre conceptuel et non pas d'ordre empirique. Les physiciens n'ont aucune difficulté à se servir de la théorie pour en tirer des prédictions, et ils savent d'expérience comment délimiter l'appareil de mesure et le système quantique afin d'obtenir la précision requise. La mécanique quantique est parfaitement convenable d'un point de vue pragmatique. Le problème est seulement d'énoncer la théorie clairement, de façon cohérente et sans ambiguïté. Ce problème a été appelé « problème de la mesure » à cause de la formulation qu'il a prise initialement dans le cadre de l'interprétation orthodoxe : il porte sur la définition de ce qu'est une mesure. De façon 1 La limite entre les parties classique et quantique du monde n'est pas définitive ; par exemple, ce qui était considéré comme un appareil de mesure peut être ensuite traité quantiquement, dès lors qu'une autre partie du monde est considérée classiquement, et joue le rôle d'un autre appareil de mesure. 2 Parmi les références classiques sur ce sujet, citons D. Z. Albert, Quantum Mechanics and Experience, Cambridge (MA) et London, Harvard University Press, 1992, chap. 4 ; J. S. Bell, « Against 'measurement' », Physics World, août 1990, p. 33-40 ; H. Krips, op. cit. ; D. Wallace, « The Quantum Measurement Problem: State of Play », dans D. Rickles (ed.), The Ashgate Companion to Contemporary Philosophy of Physics, Aldershot, Ashgate Publishing, 2008, p. 16-98, disponible en prépublication à http://arxiv.org/abs/0712.0149. 3 « [IT] IS JUST FINE FOR ALL PRACTICAL PURPOSES », J. S. Bell, op. cit., p. 33. 4 J. S. Bell, op. cit., p. 35. 5 J. S. Bell, Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1987, p. 188. 19 plus générale, le problème de la mesure consiste à proposer une interprétation satisfaisante de la mécanique quantique (et, éventuellement, une nouvelle formulation de la théorie), qui soit en accord avec les résultats empiriques. Puisque l'interprétation orthodoxe souffre d'un problème conceptuel, il apparaît légitime d'avancer d'autres interprétations de la théorie. Aussi le problème de la mesure est-il généralement tenu pour l'origine de la diversité des interprétations quantiques. 20 Chapitre 4 – L'interprétation de Bohm Parmi les interprétations alternatives à l'interprétation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique, celle de de Broglie-Bohm est peut-être la plus ancienne qui continue d'être considérée favorablement aujourd'hui. Elle a été proposée par Louis de Broglie en 1927, puis redécouverte indépendamment en 1952 par David Bohm, qui en a développé les bases mathématiques. Ce chapitre présente cette interprétation qu'on appelle aussi la « mécanique bohmienne »1. 1. Présentation générale Dans la mécanique quantique orthodoxe, les prédictions probabilistes sont interprétées de façon objective, comme reflétant un indéterminisme fondamental, et on considère que l'état quantique, ou fonction d'onde, fournit une description complète des systèmes quantiques. Une telle interprétation a longtemps rencontré des résistances. N'est-il pas possible de dépasser le caractère probabiliste des prédictions, et d'être capable de prédire assurément le résultat d'une mesure ? Dans ce but, ne peut-on pas compléter l'état de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe par d'autres variables « cachées », qui détermineraient ce résultat ? Alors, les probabilités quantiques seraient seulement le reflet de notre ignorance vis-à-vis du détail de ces variables additionnelles. L'interprétation de Bohm peut être considérée comme le résultat d'une tentative de compléter la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. En plus de la fonction d'onde, elle décrit un système quantique avec des « variables cachées », en l'occurrence les positions des particules. Celles-ci ont toujours une valeur précise à chaque instant et elles déterminent le résultat d'une mesure. La mécanique bohmienne est ainsi déterministe et les probabilités des prédictions théoriques ne sont que le reflet d'une ignorance de notre part vis-à-vis de ces variables cachées. Néanmoins, l'arrangement théorique de ces variables cachées est tel que les prédictions de la mécanique bohmienne sont exactement les mêmes que celles de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. Ainsi, compléter la théorie avec certaines variables en décrivant une histoire en-dessous du formalisme orthodoxe, et parvenir à améliorer les prédictions empiriques, sont deux choses distinctes ; la mécanique bohmienne fait la première, mais pas la seconde. 2. La formulation de la mécanique bohmienne La formulation naturelle de la mécanique bohmienne est différente de celle de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe, notamment à cause des variables supplémentaires qui sont introduites2. Elle s'énonce ainsi :  un système de n particules est décrit par deux quantités : une fonction d'onde3 | ψ > et les positions q1, q2... qn des n particules ;  la fonction d'onde évolue selon l'équation de Schrödinger ;  les positions qi des particules évoluent selon une équation dite « pilote » ;  un postulat dit de l'équilibre quantique indique les conditions initiales concernant la position des particules. 1 Ce chapitre s'appuie notamment sur D. Z. Albert, op. cit., chap. 7 ; D. Bohm, « A Suggested Interpretation of Quantum Theory in terms of 'Hidden' Variables », Physical Review, 85, 1952, p. 166-193 ; D. Dürr et S. Teufel, Bohmian Mechanics: The Physics and Mathematics of Quantum Theory, Berlin et Heidelberg, Springer-Verlag, 2009 ; S. Goldstein, « Bohmian Mechanics », dans E. N. Zalta, op. cit., http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2009/entries/qmbohm/, 2009 ; D. Wallace, op. cit., sec. 6. 2 Aussi, certains auteurs, adeptes d'une conception syntaxique des théories, préfèrent parler de « théorie » plutôt que d' « interprétation » de Bohm. 3 L'interprétation bohmienne préfère le terme de « fonction d'onde » à celui d' « état » (qui étaient jusqu'à présent synonymes) parce qu'elle complète justement l'état du système avec de nouvelles variables. 21 Ces postulats méritent quelques commentaires. En mécanique bohmienne, on retrouve tout d'abord la fonction d'onde | ψ >, comme en mécanique quantique orthodoxe. La différence est qu'elle évolue ici toujours selon l'équation de Schrödinger, n'étant pas sujette à un postulat de réduction. Après une mesure, aura-t-elle alors une valeur différente par rapport à la fonction d'onde orthodoxe ? Il est possible de montrer que non, au sens suivant : pour les calculs et les prédictions que l'on peut faire sur un système après qu'il ait subi une mesure, il est équivalent de considérer en mécanique bohmienne que la fonction d'onde n'a pas subi de réduction ou qu'elle en a subi une1. Aussi, à toutes fins pratiques et calculatoires, on peut considérer que la fonction d'onde bohmienne évolue en fait de la même façon que celle de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. Cela est à l'origine de l'équivalence empirique entre des deux interprétations2. En plus de la fonction d'onde, la mécanique bohmienne introduit des variables supplémentaires : les positions des particules qi, qui sont les fameuses « variables cachées »3. Ces variables sont définies à chaque instant t, donc les particules bohmiennes ont toujours une position et une trajectoire, contrairement à la conception orthodoxe. Ne pourrait-on pas mettre en place des mesures pour déterminer ces positions ? On pourrait alors formuler des prédictions précises, en dépassant les probabilités orthodoxes. Mais cela n'est malheureusement pas possible : quelle que soit la mesure envisagée, les équations bohmiennes elles-mêmes empêchent que ces positions ne soient déterminées précisément4. Les positions qi sont définies théoriquement par la mécanique bohmienne, mais elles ne peuvent être connues que de façon statistique. Aussi, d'un point de vue prédictif, elles n'apportent en fait rien de nouveau par rapport à la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. Comment évolue la position des particules ? Une nouvelle équation affirme que c'est la fonction d'onde et elle seule qui guide les particules, d'où son appellation d' « onde-pilote » (troisième postulat). Si la fonction d'onde influe sur la position des particules, l'inverse n'est pas vrai : la fonction d'onde évolue seulement selon l'équation de Schrödinger. Enfin, le dernier postulat précise la position initiale des particules, d'une façon telle que la mécanique bohmienne donne des prédictions identiques à celles de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. 3. L'image bohmienne du monde a. Entités et propriétés Précisons en quoi consiste l'image du monde selon l'interprétation bohmienne, et tout d'abord ce que sont les entités qu'elle considère. Il en existe deux types : la fonction d'onde d'une part, et les particules d'autre part. La fonction d'onde, tout d'abord, est considérée dans sa dimension spatiale seulement, c'est-à-dire comme une fonction qui associe à chaque point de l'espace un nombre, à un instant donné (un peu comme on peut attribuer à chaque point de l'espace une température) ; on appelle cela un « champ » . Cette fonction d'onde, ou ce champ, est considérée comme une entité authentiquement physique ; ces nombres en chaque point de l'espace renvoient à quelque chose de réel et d'objectif, qui existe bel et bien. La fonction d'onde bohmienne n'a donc rien à voir avec la simple représentation mathématique, utile dans les calculs, de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. Les particules constituent la seconde sorte d'entités que l'interprétation bohmienne considère. Selon un 1 Cf. par exemple D. Z. Albert, op. cit., p. 157-158. 2 La question de l'équivalence des prédictions sera approfondie au chap. 6. 3 Pour une critique de ce terme, cf. par exemple J. S. Bell, op. cit., p. 201-202. 4 Il existe une limite de principe à la statistique qu'il est possible de connaître expérimentalement, ou « incertitude absolue » ; cf. D. Dürr, S. Goldstein, et N. Zanghì, « Quantum Equilibrium and the Origin of Absolute Uncertainty », Journal of Statistical Physics, 67, 1992, p .843-907. 22 manuel de mécanique bohmienne, « chaque fois que vous dites 'particule', pensez-le vraiment ! »1. Cela signifie notamment qu'il faut prendre le terme en un sens traditionnel et classique, comme référant à un objet qui a toujours une position précise, à chaque instant. Ces particules sont fondamentales en mécanique quantique bohmienne dans la mesure où toutes les autres grandeurs mesurables – vitesse ou impulsion, énergie... – peuvent s'exprimer au moyen de la position des particules. En effet, les bohmiens insistent sur le fait que toute mesure se ramène toujours in fine à la détermination de positions : position d'une aiguille d'un instrument, position d'un atome en sortie d'un appareil de mesure, position d'un photon sur notre rétine, etc. Lors de la mesure d'une grandeur quelconque, il existe toujours un fait à propos des positions de ces particules ; par conséquent, il existe aussi un fait à propos des résultats de mesures de grandeurs quelconques. b. Des résultats contextuels Dans la mécanique bohmienne, les résultats des mesures sont contextuels : selon qu'une grandeur physique est mesurée dans un contexte expérimental ou dans un autre, le résultat de la mesure peut être différent. Autrement dit, le dispositif expérimental influence les propriétés mesurées ; une mesure ne révèle pas simplement des propriétés préexistantes du système. Illustrons cette caractéristique sur un exemple, la mesure du spin d'un électron. Le spin est une propriété typiquement quantique, c'est-à-dire qu'elle ne ressemble à rien de connu dans d'autres théories. Pour se faire une idée de ce qu'est le spin, le mieux est de regarder comment fonctionne un appareil qui le mesure. L'appareil consiste en un espace où règne un champ magnétique orienté dans une direction précise, par exemple vers le haut. Lorsqu'un électron traverse cet appareil, le champ magnétique va dévier l'électron verticalement, et on enregistre sa position de sortie. On observe expérimentalement seulement deux positions de sortie : ou bien l'électron est dévié dans le sens du champ magnétique (on dira que l'électron possède un spin « + », et on notera son état « | + > ») ou bien dans le sens contraire du champ magnétique (on dira que l'électron possède un spin « – », et on notera son état « | – > »). Les électrons dont l'état est | + > ressortent toujours dans le sens du champ magnétique, ici vers le haut, et ceux dont l'état est | – > toujours dans le sens contraire. Considérons maintenant un électron dont l'état est une superposition entre ces deux états, comme | + > + | – >2. Une telle superposition signifie que la mécanique quantique fait la prédiction suivante : le spin sera mesuré « + » avec une probabilité de 50 % et « – » avec une probabilité de 50 %. Cela est valable que la mécanique quantique soit interprétée de façon orthodoxe ou bohmienne ; cependant les deux interprétations diffèrent sur ce qu'on peut dire au-delà de ces probabilités. Pour l'interprétation orthodoxe, il n'y a rien à dire de plus, au sens où il n'y a rien qui détermine le résultat « + » ou « – ». Pour l'interprétation bohmienne, en revanche, le fait que l'électron ait une position précise avant d'entrer dans l'appareil (même si nous ne la connaissons pas) va déterminer sa trajectoire dans l'appareil et donc le résultat de la mesure du spin. Par exemple, les équations bohmiennes indiquent qu'un électron positionné initialement dans la partie supérieure de l'appareil (même très légèrement) aura une trajectoire vers le haut, donc ici dans le même sens que le champ magnétique, et sera mesuré « + », tandis qu'un électron positionné initialement dans la partie inférieure aura une trajectoire vers le bas et sera mesuré « – ». Le caractère contextuel de cette mesure vient du fait que ces trajectoires ne dépendent pas de l'orientation de l'appareil, tandis que le qualificatif de « + » ou « – », pour les résultats, dépendent de l'orientation de l'appareil. Par exemple, un électron positionné initialement dans la partie supérieure de l'appareil aura toujours une trajectoire vers le haut. Avec un appareil dont le champ magnétique est 1 D. Dürr et S. Teufel, op. cit. p. v et 7. 2 On peut l'obtenir à partir d'un électron sortant d'un autre appareil mesurant le spin, tourné de 90° autour de son axe. 23 orienté vers le haut, un tel électron sera qualifié de « + » ; mais avec un appareil dont le champ magnétique pointe vers le bas, le spin sera qualifié de « – ». Ainsi, le résultat de la mesure du spin dépend de l'orientation de l'appareil, c'est-à-dire du contexte expérimental. De façon générale, l'interprétation bohmienne ne permet pas de dire qu'un électron a en soi un spin « + » ou « – » ; attribuer une propriété de spin n'a de sens qu'une fois le contexte de la mesure précisé. Le résultat de la mesure est déterminé à l'avance (il n'est pas « indéterminé » ou « indéfini »), mais il dépend du contexte exact de l'expérience menée. c. Un monde déterministe L'image bohmienne du monde est déterministe. D'une part, la fonction d'onde évolue selon l'équation de Schrödinger, dont on a dit qu'elle est déterministe ; aucun hasard n'entre en compte, et la fonction d'onde ne subit jamais de projection aléatoire. D'autre part, la position des particules est donnée par une équation qui fait intervenir seulement la fonction d'onde, sans aucune notion de hasard non plus. En revanche, le monde bohmien nous apparaît indéterministe, car nous n'avons pas accès aux positions des particules. Sans connaissance de la valeur de ces variables qi, nous ne pouvons dire ni où se trouvent exactement les particules, ni où elles se trouveront à un instant ultérieur. Cependant, nous ne sommes pas complètement démunis. La fonction d'onde, tout d'abord, peut être connue précisément. Par ailleurs, la théorie permet d'affirmer (à partir du postulat de l'équilibre quantique) que la densité de particules dans l'espace dépend directement de la fonction d'onde. Autrement dit, si la fonction d'onde est nulle ici, alors il ne peut pas y avoir de particules, et si elle a une grande valeur là, alors il y aura plus de chance d'y trouver des particules. Aussi, les probabilités de la mécanique quantique prennent avec l'interprétation bohmienne un tout autre sens qu'avec l'interprétation orthodoxe. Les probabilités reflètent seulement une ignorance de notre part vis-à-vis d'une histoire sous-jacente qui détermine le cours des événements. Ne connaissant que la densité moyenne des particules, nous sommes réduits à fournir des prédictions moyennes. Comme les probabilités reflètent ici non pas un hasard objectif, mais une méconnaissance de notre part, on dit qu'elles sont à interpréter de façon épistémique. C'est une situation semblable à l'usage de statistiques dans la vie courante, par exemple avec des catégories socio-professionnelles : si vous savez que 30 % des ouvriers ont voté dernièrement pour le parti A, et que vous rencontrez un ouvrier, vous pouvez prédire avec 30 % de chances qu'il a voté pour le parti A. La probabilité que vous attribuez à son vote reflète simplement la connaissance limitée que vous avez de cette personne, plutôt qu'une propriété fondamentale de cette personne elle-même (qui, cela est sûr, a voté ou non pour ce parti A, et le sait à 100 %). Il y a cependant une différence : alors que vous pouvez améliorer votre prédiction sur le vote de cet ouvrier (par exemple en lui demandant son avis sur un autre parti B, ou en lui demandant ce qu'il a voté), vous ne pouvez pas améliorer votre prédiction quantique en connaissant plus précisément les positions des particules1. L'interprétation bohmienne esquisse une histoire déterministe sous-jacente aux probabilités, mais ne dit pas complètement comment celle-ci se déroule. Une autre caractéristique du monde selon l'interprétation bohmienne, la non-localité, est discutée en détail dans la seconde partie de l'ouvrage. 1 Cf. note 38, p. 22. 24 Chapitre 5 – L'interprétation des mondes multiples Une autre interprétation de la mécanique quantique a les faveurs de nombreux physiciens et philosophes des sciences. Il s'agit de l'interprétation proposée par Everett en 1957 et qui est aussi appelée l'interprétation des mondes multiples (cette dénomination est prise ici pour synonyme d' « interprétation d'Everett »)1. 1. Présentation et formulation de la mécanique quantique everettienne a. L'équation de Schrödinger comme seule loi d'évolution Reprenons la formulation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique (cf. chap. 3). Celle-ci donne deux lois d'évolution pour l'état ou la fonction d'onde d'un système quantique : en-dehors d'une mesure, l'état du système suit l'équation de Schrödinger, tandis que lors d'une mesure, il suit le postulat de projection. Or rien ne définit précisément dans la théorie ce qui constitue une mesure et les circonstances dans lesquelles l'une ou l'autre de ces deux lois doit s'appliquer. Tel est le problème de la mesure, qui ronge l'interprétation orthodoxe2. L'interprétation des mondes multiples propose la solution suivante à ce problème : supprimer le postulat de réduction de la fonction d'onde, et ne garder que l'équation de Schrödinger. Cette dernière est la seule et vraie équation du mouvement, à laquelle obéit tout état quantique. Il n'y a plus d'ambiguïté dans l'application des lois quantiques, ni dans la définition de ce qu'est une « mesure ». b. Mesure et superpositions Si une telle solution peut sembler attirante, car elle résout effectivement le problème indiqué, elle soulève d'autres difficultés qui la rendent inacceptable en tant que telle. Voyons ce que sont ces nouvelles difficultés à travers un exemple. Hormis le postulat de projection, nous utilisons ici tout le reste de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe. Considérons un électron qui entre dans un appareil capable de mesurer son spin. Comme nous l'avons vu au chapitre précédent, le résultat de la mesure de ce spin peut être « + » ou « – ». Le système quantique que nous considérons désormais n'est pas constitué de l'électron, mais de l'électron et de cet appareil mesurant le spin. Dès lors, l'état quantique qui est attribué au système concerne à la fois l'électron et l'appareil. Par exemple, si un électron ressort de l'appareil en position « + », et que l'appareil a enregistré le résultat « + », l'état du système électron-appareil pourra s'écrire | l'électron est + et l'appareil a mesuré « + » >, ce qu'on abrégera, en convenant de noter d'abord ce qui concerne l'électron et ensuite le résultat de l'appareil, en | + ; + >, ou encore, en séparant l'état du système en deux états, un pour l'électron et l'autre pour l'appareil : | + >| + >. Avant que l'appareil ne mesure un spin, il n'a encore rien enregistré ; on supposera qu'il est dans un état de disponibilité noté « | prêt > ». L'appareil est supposé mesurer le spin correctement, c'est-à-dire de la 1 Ce chapitre s'appuie notamment sur D. Z. Albert, op. cit., chap. 6 ; J. Barrett, « Everett's Relative-State Formulation of Quantum Mechanics », dans E. N. Zalta, op. cit., http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2011/entries/qm-everett/, 2011 ; H. Everett, « 'Relative State' Formulation of Quantum Mechanics », Reviews of Modern Physics, 29, 1957, p. 454-462 ; L. Vaidman, « Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics », in E. N. Zalta, op. cit., http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/qm-manyworlds/, 2008 ; D. Wallace, op. cit., sec. 4. 2 Cf. p. 19. 25 façon idéale suivante : s'il est prêt et que l'électron est dans un état | + >, alors l'appareil identifie correctement l'état | + > et l'état de l'électron n'est pas modifié, et est encore dans un état | + >. On note cela : | + >|prêt > →(mesure)→ | + >| + >. (éq. 1) De même pour un état | – > : | – >|prêt > →(mesure)→ | – >| – >. (éq. 2) Considérons un électron dans un état superposé | + > + | – >, et un appareil dans l'état | prêt >. Puisque nous notons l'état de l'électron avant celui de l'appareil, l'état initial du système électron-appareil est (| + > + |– >)|prêt > ou | + >| prêt > + |– >|prêt >. Que se passe-t-il lorsque cet électron entre dans l'appareil et que son spin est mesuré ? Chacun des termes de l'état précédent est simplement transformé selon les équations 1 et 2 ci-dessus : | + >| prêt > + |– >|prêt > →(mesure)→ | + >| + > + | – >| – >. (éq. 3) Autrement dit, le système composé de l'électron et de l'appareil est finalement dans un état superposé. c. Une autre version du problème de la mesure Ainsi que nous l'avons vu, la mécanique quantique orthodoxe ne s'arrête pas à cet état final | + >| + > + | – >| – >, et dit qu'il doit encore être réduit selon le résultat de la mesure. Par exemple, si c'est le résultat « + » qui est observé, alors seul le premier terme est conservé par la réduction, et l'état final du système s'écrit | + >| + >. Cet état a une signification claire : l'électron a un spin « + », et l'appareil a enregistré le résultat « + ». Mais si, comme cela a été envisagé plus tôt, on retire le postulat de projection, alors l'état final | + >| + > + | – >| – > est conservé en entier. Quelle est sa signification ? Que veut dire le fait que l'électron et l'appareil soient dans un état superposé ? Rappelons que, de façon orthodoxe, cet état signifie qu'il n'existe aucun fait à propos du spin de l'électron, ni aucun fait à propos du résultat qu'indique l'appareil1. Autrement dit, il n'existe pas de résultat concernant la mesure. Un objet macroscopique tel que l'appareil de mesure de spin peut être en état de superposition avec un électron, sans propriété définie. Or les physiciens constatent au laboratoire qu'il existe bel et bien un résultat, « + » ou « – ». L'électron ressort ou bien en haut ou bien en bas de l'appareil, mais il ressort, et l'appareil de mesure de spin affiche un résultat. Il y a donc une contradiction flagrante entre l'état final | + >| + > + | – >| – > tel qu'on l'interprète ici et les résultats expérimentaux. D'où vient ce problème ? Il a pour origine la suppression pure et simple du postulat de projection. Celui-ci avait un rôle central, puisqu'il revenait à opérer une sélection d'un des deux termes | + >| + > ou | – >| – >, de sorte qu'il existe un fait à propos du résultat. Sans ce postulat de projection, le problème initial de la mesure disparaît, mais un autre réapparaît. On considère généralement ce nouveau problème, qu'on appelle la superposition d'objets macroscopiques, comme étant une autre version du problème de la mesure2. Si l'on veut poursuivre dans cette voie qui rejette le postulat de projection, il est donc nécessaire de donner un autre sens à une superposition telle que | + >| + > + | – >| – >, de sorte à ce qu'elle soit 1 En effet, mis à part le postulat de projection, nous n'avons pas renoncé aux autres aspects de l'interprétation orthodoxe. Notamment, il existe un fait à propos d'une propriété seulement si elle peut être prédite avec une probabilité de 100 %. Or l'état considéré ici s'interprète comme 50 % de chances que le résultat soit « + » et 50 % qu'il soit « – ». 2 D'autres expressions de ce problème sont devenues célèbres. Le rôle de l'appareil de mesure du spin peut être tenu par un chat qui, au lieu de finir dans un état « + » ou « – », se retrouve dans un état « mort » ou « vivant ». On obtient finalement une superposition d'un chat dans un état mort et vivant : c'est le célèbre « chat de Schrödinger ». 26 compatible avec les observations empiriques. Autrement dit, il est nécessaire de modifier d'autres aspects de l'interprétation orthodoxe. L'interprétation des mondes multiples s'engage sur ce chemin. d. La solution everettienne Une multiplicité de mondes Sa solution consiste à abandonner, en plus du postulat de projection, la lecture orthodoxe concernant la superposition des états. Elle propose d'interpréter l'état final | + >| + > + | – >| – > non pas comme une superposition de deux états d'un système électron-appareil, mais comme renvoyant à plusieurs systèmes électron-appareil, qui vivent dans plusieurs mondes. Plus précisément, on considère que chaque terme de la superposition correspond à des mondes différents : le terme | + >| + > décrit un monde dans lequel le spin de l'électron est « + » et que l'appareil a mesuré « + » , tandis que le terme | – >| – > décrit un monde dans lequel le spin de l'électron est « – » et que l'appareil a mesuré « – ». Le fait qu'il y ait la superposition de ces termes signifie que les deux mondes en question existent. Pour désigner l'ensemble de ces deux mondes, nous parlerons de l'« univers »1. Quel sens lui donner ? Mais, objectera-t-on, un seul monde existe – le nôtre – et un seul résultat est observé ! Que signifie cette multitude de mondes ? Pour répondre à cette question, considérons ce qu'il se passe si un physicien vient observer l'électron et la machine dans l'état | + >| + > + | – >| – >. Que voit-il ? Le physicien peut être conçu comme faisant une mesure sur l'appareil au même sens que l'appareil mesurant le spin : d'un état « prêt » à observer, il enregistre un résultat, « + » ou « – », selon le cas ; on peut ainsi noter | + >| + >|prêt > →(observation)→ | + >| + >| + >. (éq. 4) Pour le système électron-appareil-physicien, on note successivement les états de l'électron, de l'appareil et du physicien. L'état final ci-dessus signifie : l'électron est ressorti dans un état « + », l'appareil a enregistré « + », et le physicien a vu le résultat « + ». De même, on aura | – >| – >|prêt > →(observation)→ | – >| – >| – >. (éq. 5) Si maintenant le physicien vient observer l'état | + >| + > + | – >| – >, l'état initial sera (| + >| + > + | – >| – >)|prêt >, c'est-à-dire | + >| + >|prêt > + | – >| – >|prêt >. En utilisant les éq. 4 et 5 ci-dessus, cet état devient après l'observation par le physicien | + >| + >|prêt > + | – >| – >|prêt > →(observation)→ | + >| + >| + > + | – >| – >| – >. (éq. 6) L'interprétation everettienne de cet état final est la suivante : chaque terme correspond à un monde ; dans le premier, l'électron est ressorti dans un état « + », l'appareil a enregistré « + », et le physicien a vu le résultat « + » ; dans le second, l'électron est ressorti dans un état « – », l'appareil a enregistré « – », et le physicien a vu le résultat « – ». Il y a donc finalement deux physiciens, vivant dans des mondes différents, visualisant chacun des résultats différents. Mais ce qui est rassurant, c'est que chaque monde est cohérent : le résultat du physicien correspond au spin de l'électron, dans le monde en question. Ces deux mondes ne se voient pas, ils sont en quelque sorte parallèles. Tous les deux sont aussi « réels » l'un que l'autre. Il n'y en a pas un plus « vrai » que l'autre. Ainsi, l'interprétation des mondes multiples rend compte du fait qu'on ne puisse pas observer de façon extérieure une superposition de mondes : dès qu'un observateur interagit avec un système superposé, il se superpose lui-même et se dissocie dans les deux mondes. Tout observateur a donc toujours l'impression de vivre dans un seul monde. L'expérience psychologique d'un physicien qui lui fait dire 1 La terminologie à ce sujet dépend des auteurs. Certains parlent d'« univers » pour ce qui est ici appelé « monde » et de « multivers », pour ce qui est appelé « univers ». 27 « je vois le résultat « + » » correspond en fait seulement à un de ces deux mondes ; ce physicien voit le résultat « – » dans un autre monde. Définition des mondes Qu'est-ce qui définit précisément la naissance de nouveaux mondes ? Deux mondes sont distingués lorsqu'il devient impossible, ou extrêmement improbable, qu'ils puissent à nouveau interagir. On dit aussi qu'ils ne sont plus cohérents ; c'est le phénomène de décohérence. Cela se produit spontanément et très facilement. Par exemple, lorsque l'électron interagit avec l'appareil de mesure de spin, le fait que quelques atomes de l'appareil voient leur état changer suffit à distinguer deux mondes. En effet, pour que les atomes dans ces deux mondes interagissent à nouveau, la mécanique quantique exige que leurs états soient rigoureusement identiques, et cela est très difficile à réaliser. Dès que le nombre des atomes est un tant soit peu élevé (et un appareil, même petit, en contient des milliards de milliards de milliards), on comprend qu'il devient très rapidement quasiment impossible de conserver ces deux mondes cohérents. Aussi, dès qu'un objet composé de quelques atomes interagit avec un système dans un état superposé, on peut souvent considérer que deux mondes sont nés, qui évolueront ensuite indépendamment. Quelles prédictions ? Selon l'interprétation des mondes multiples, tous les résultats possibles d'une mesure sont toujours obtenus, chacun dans un monde1. Dans notre exemple de la mesure du spin, le résultat « + » est obtenu dans un monde et le résultat « – » dans un autre ; et aucun de ces deux mondes n'est plus vrai que l'autre. Ainsi, il n'y a pas lieu de poser la question : « quel résultat va être obtenu ? » ou « avec quelle probabilité ? ». En revanche, après la mesure et la séparation en plusieurs mondes, l'observateur dans un monde donné ne voit qu'un seul résultat. S'il a parié sur un résultat particulier, il peut être content ou déçu du résultat (et dans l'autre monde, il est réciproquement déçu ou content). Dans ces paris, l'individu peut faire usage de probabilités, par exemple « je suis prêt à parier à 4 contre 1 pour tel résultat » ou « je parie à 80 % sur ce résultat ». Selon les développements récents de l'interprétation des mondes multiples, c'est selon cette idée qu'on peut comprendre l'attribution de probabilités aux différents résultats quantiques. Même si un individu sait que tous les résultats seront observés par un de ses descendants (dans un des mondes), il peut parier comme si un événement de hasard allait survenir, en fonction de ce dont il se soucie dans les mondes futurs. On montre alors que, si l'individu est rationnel, il devrait parier selon des probabilités qui se trouvent être exactement les mêmes que les prédictions de la mécanique quantique orthodoxe2. Cela permet de s'assurer de l'équivalence entre les deux interprétations3. 2. L'image everettienne du monde Reprenons les caractéristiques de l'image du monde, ou plutôt de l'univers, selon l'interprétation des mondes multiples. 1 Une plaisanterie courante parmi les everettiens est d'ailleurs de dire que « dans un autre monde, Everett n'a pas proposé son interprétation », ou que « dans un autre monde, François Hollande n'a pas été élu », etc. 2 Cette démonstration, qui est technique et dont nous admettrons ici le résultat, est controversée. Cf. S. Saunders, J. Barrett, A. Kent, et D. Wallace (eds.), Many Worlds? Everett, Quantum Theory, and Reality, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2010, ou D. Wallace, op. cit., sec. 4.6 pour une bibliographie. 3 L'équivalence empirique entre les interprétations est étudiée au chapitre suivant. 28 a. Entités et propriétés Il existe une seule entité fondamentale, l'état ou la fonction d'onde (de tout l'univers). L'objet mathématique | ψ > est interprété comme une entité physique putative. C'est l'univers lui-même, en tant qu'il est une fonction d'onde, qui évolue selon l'équation de Schrödinger. L'univers se décompose en des mondes. Il existe un nombre extraordinairement grand de mondes, avec un processus d'embranchement qui multiplie à chaque instant ce nombre de mondes. Ce qui existe pour un everettien, c'est donc une myriade de mondes. Dans chacun de ces mondes, les grandeurs ont toujours des valeurs ; ces mondes sont donc d'apparence classique, et ils se composent d'objets (macroscopiques) qui sont dans des états définis. Les différents mondes évoluent indépendamment les uns des autres. En particulier, les autres mondes sont inobservables depuis un monde particulier, ce qui explique pourquoi nous avons toujours l'impression qu'il n'existe qu'un seul monde. b. Des faits et des états relatifs Pour un état tel que | + >| + >| + > + | – >| – >| – >, l'interprétation des mondes multiples reconnaît (comme le fait l'interprétation orthodoxe) qu'il n'y a pas de fait à propos du résultat de la mesure du spin, pour l'univers dans son ensemble. Ainsi, l'interprétation d'Everett ne reconnaît généralement pas l'existence de fait pour l'univers dans son ensemble. Cependant, si l'on considère un seul des deux termes de la somme, alors on peut affirmer qu'il existe un résultat de mesure bien défini, par exemple « + » pour le terme | + >| + >| + >. Autrement dit, si on se restreint à un monde particulier, il existe des faits. Comme ces résultats dépendent du monde auquel on se restreint, cela conduit à définir les états ou les faits relativement à un observateur – d'où le nom de « formulation de l'état relatif » initialement donné par Everett. Si on parle parfois du résultat d'une mesure, c'est en fait par abus de langage, en omettant de préciser que cela se comprend relativement à un monde particulier. c. Un univers déterministe L'univers everettien est déterministe. En effet, la fonction d'onde de l'univers obéit à l'équation de Schrödinger, dont on a dit qu'elle est une équation déterministe. L'avenir n'est pas incertain, puisque tous les résultats de mesures possibles se produiront toujours. En revanche, les individus dans les différents mondes ont des expériences psychologiques différentes. Le cours du monde leur apparaît indéterministe, dans la mesure où ils n'ont accès qu'à un seul monde. Pour l'interprétation des mondes multiples, les probabilités associées aux résultats correspondent aux paris que peuvent faire les individus. Comme elles n'expriment pas une connaissance incomplète de leur part, elles ne sont pas subjectives, mais objectives1. d. Absence de séparation classique/quantique L'interprétation d'Everett permet à la mécanique quantique de s'appliquer à l'ensemble de l'univers. Contrairement à l'interprétation orthodoxe, elle ne suppose pas de division entre un « système », distingué d'un « observateur » qui constate les résultats de mesures. L'univers everettien n'est pas séparé entre une partie classique et une partie quantique. Une autre caractéristique de l'image de l'univers everettien, sa localité, est discutée en détail dans la seconde partie de l'ouvrage. 1 Elles expriment des contraintes auxquelles sont soumises tous les agents rationnels. Cf. par exemple D. Wallace, op. cit., sec. 4.6. 29 Chapitre 6 – Synthèse comparative des interprétations Les trois interprétations de la mécanique quantique présentées dans les précédents chapitres ont de quoi susciter de grandes interrogations. Comment est-il simplement possible que des images du monde si différentes puissent être faites à partir de la même théorie ? Par ailleurs, pourquoi les spécialistes sontils toujours divisés aujourd'hui sur la bonne interprétation, plusieurs décennies après les premiers débats ? L'une d'entre elles n'est-elle pas objectivement meilleure que les autres ? Ce dernier chapitre propose de répondre à ces questions, à travers une comparaison critique des interprétations quantiques présentées. 1. Des interprétations quantiques si différentes, mais équivalentes a. Synthèse des caractéristiques des interprétations quantiques Avant d'étudier l'équivalence entre les interprétations quantiques, synthétisons leurs caractéristiques respectives en un tableau. Caractéristique Interprétation orthodoxe Interprétation bohmienne Interprétation des mondes multiples Formulation mathématique de la théorie équation de Schrödinger et postulat de projection équation de Schrödinger et équation-pilote équation de Schrödinger Entités composant le monde systèmes quantiques et objets macroscopiques fonction d'onde et positions des particules fonction d'onde, avec mondes quasi-classiques Objet des prédictions de la théorie résultats de mesures (toute grandeur physique) positions des particules paris des agents Interprétation des probabilités objective subjective objective Déterminisme du monde ? indéterministe déterministe déterministe b. Des faits différents Certaines différences fondamentales entre les interprétations quantiques doivent être soulignées. Tout d'abord, elles ne reconnaissent pas les mêmes faits dans le monde, au sujet d'une même expérience. Lorsque l'une considère qu'il y a un résultat à la mesure de telle quantité, il peut arriver qu'une autre dise qu'il n'existe pas de fait à propos du résultat ! Illustrons cela avec la mesure du spin d'un électron par un appareil approprié (cf. chap. 4). Supposons qu'un électron entre dans l'appareil avec un état de spin | + > + | – > (c'est-à-dire que les probabilités de mesurer « + » ou « – » sont chacune de 50 %), et supposons que le résultat de la mesure s'avère être « + ». Selon l'interprétation orthodoxe, il existe un fait à propos du résultat de mesure : dans l'image du monde orthodoxe, il existe un résultat, qui, en l'occurrence, vaut « + ». L'interprétation bohmienne considère aussi qu'il existe un fait à propos de ce résultat, étant donné qu'il existe une position finale de l'électron. Mais selon l'interprétation des mondes multiples, il n'existe pas de fait à propos du résultat de la mesure. En effet, l'ensemble constitué de l'électron et de l'appareil est décrit par une superposition des deux résultats, | + >| + > + | – >| – >. L'univers everettien comprend à la fois un monde dans lequel le résultat est « + » et un autre dans lequel le résultat est « – ». Pour l'univers dans son ensemble, il n'existe pas un seul résultat et en ce sens il n'existe pas de fait à propos du résultat. Ainsi, contrairement au sens commun, un everettien peut affirmer devant un physicien qui observe un appareil de mesure 30 « il n'existe pas de fait à propos de ce résultat ». En revanche, l'interprétation des mondes multiples ne nie pas qu'il existe des faits relativement à un monde particulier. En l'occurrence, dans le monde décrit ici, le résultat de mesure est « + ». Ainsi, les interprétations quantiques ne reconnaissent pas les mêmes faits au sein d'une même expérience. Il faut prendre la mesure de la nouveauté de cette caractéristique des interprétations de la mécanique quantique : jamais, dans aucune autre théorie physique, les images du mondes proposées pour une même théorie n'ont été aussi différentes entre elles. S'il existe des interprétations multiples d'autres théories, elles s'accordent au moins sur l'existence de faits expérimentaux. Par exemple, la mécanique classique admet plusieurs interprétations, l'une décrivant un monde où existent des forces (interprétation newtonienne), une autre un monde où existe de l'énergie (interprétation hamiltonienne). Néanmoins, toutes deux sont d'accord, par exemple, sur le fait qu'une particule est arrivée au temps t à la position x avec la vitesse v. Le seul désaccord est qu'elles emploient naturellement des variables différentes pour noter ce fait. En mécanique quantique, en revanche, il n'y a pas d'accord sur des faits bruts ou des données brutes que la théorie devrait prédire ou interpréter. Ce qu'une interprétation considère comme une donnée brute, par exemple le résultat d'une mesure selon l'interprétation orthodoxe, n'est pour une autre qu'une illusion qui mérite d'être expliquée, par exemple à partir de l'existence d'une multiplicité de mondes. Les interprétations quantiques ne sont pas simplement des images du monde qui viennent rendre compte de certaines apparences empiriques données. Les faits dont chaque interprétation rend compte sont propres à elle et définis par elle. c. Des prédictions différentes, sans neutralité possible Une autre caractéristique particulière des interprétations quantiques est que leurs prédictions ne portent pas sur les mêmes objets, ainsi que le rappelle le tableau p. 30. Autrement dit, les probabilités prédites par la théorie ne réfèrent pas aux mêmes choses dans le monde, selon l'interprétation adoptée. Pour poursuivre avec l'exemple de la mesure du spin de l'électron, la prédiction de la théorie porte ou bien sur la valeur du spin (selon l'interprétation orthodoxe), ou bien sur la position de sortie de l'électron (selon l'interprétation de Bohm), ou bien encore sur les paris qu'un agent rationnel fera devant une telle expérience (selon l'interprétation des mondes multiples). Comme les faits reconnus (et prédits) par la théorie dépendent de l'interprétation adoptée, il n'existe pas de façon neutre de décrire ce sur quoi portent les prédictions de la théorie ou ce que sont les données empiriques auxquelles elles seront comparées. Il n'y a ni faits expérimentaux neutres, ni prédictions neutres, vis-à-vis des interprétations quantiques. Il n'est pas possible d'appliquer empiriquement la mécanique quantique sans faire un choix interprétatif concernant l'objet des prédictions et ce qui constitue un fait expérimental. Ce choix interprétatif peut entrer en contradiction avec des positions défendues par l'une ou l'autre des interprétations. Par exemple, le simple fait de dire, comme on peut le faire couramment, que « le résultat de la mesure est X », peut être en contradiction avec l'interprétation everettienne. d. Néanmoins, une équivalence empirique Les interprétations de la mécanique quantique ont été présentées comme étant équivalentes empiriquement. Mais quel sens peut-on exactement donner à cette équivalence empirique, quand leurs prédictions sont aussi différentes ? Commençons par noter que, si les probabilités portent sur des objets différents, leurs valeurs sont toujours mathématiquement identiques. Par exemple, pour un électron avec un état de spin | + > + | – >, toutes les interprétations quantiques donneront les probabilités 50 % et 50 % à la mesure de ce qui 31 correspond au « + » et au « – »1. Comment ces prédictions, qui portent sur des faits différents selon les interprétations, peuvent-elles ensuite être comparées ? Cette question difficile ne semble pas avoir reçu de réponse consensuelle parmi les spécialistes. Un accord existe cependant : les interprétations quantiques sont équivalentes au sens où aucune expérience n'est capable de mettre en défaut l'une de ces interprétations plutôt qu'une autre2. 2. Pour ou contre ? Quelques arguments en (dé)faveur de ces interprétations La mécanique quantique est une théorie physique qui admet plusieurs interprétations, lesquelles dessinent des images du monde radicalement différentes, mais ne peuvent être distinguées empiriquement. Cela signifie qu'aucune expérience réalisable ne permettra jamais de trancher entre, par exemple, l'idée d'un monde déterministe à la Bohm, dans lequel aucun hasard n'intervient dans le cours des événements, ou l'idée d'un monde indéterministe, comme le veut l'interprétation orthodoxe, au sein duquel un hasard fondamental joue un rôle presque à chaque instant. Contrairement à une idée commune, l'expérience ne permettra jamais de trancher la question de savoir si le hasard pur existe ou non dans notre monde (si on prend au sérieux l'image du monde quantique). Si l'expérience, méthode reine des sciences modernes, ne permet pas de trancher entre les diverses interprétations quantiques, quels sont alors les critères appropriés pour choisir la « bonne » interprétation ? Mais y a-t-il encore seulement une « bonne » interprétation quantique, ou toutes se valent-elles ? Cette dernière section veut apporter un éclairage à ces questions en étudiant les arguments qui ont été avancés3. a. Cohérence Les physiciens et les philosophes avancent souvent qu'un critère selon lequel une interprétation quantique devrait être jugé est celui de la cohérence. Cette cohérence peut prendre plusieurs aspects : cohérence interne de l'interprétation elle-même (comme cela a été noté pour l'interprétation orthodoxe, avec le « problème de la mesure »)4, ou cohérence externe vis-à-vis d'autres théories ou d'autres positions. Par exemple, les bohmiens insistent sur le fait que l'interprétation bohmienne, qui attribue des positions à chaque instant à toutes les particules, est en accord sur ce point avec l'image classique du monde, qui provient des autres théories de la physique, ou avec l'image commune du monde, que nous avons intuitivement vis-à-vis du monde qui nous entoure. A contrario, l'interprétation orthodoxe est en conflit avec ces images du monde, puisqu'elle n'attribue pas de position à une particule à chaque instant. Certains choisissent une interprétation parce qu'elle s'accorde avec certains croyances ou certaines positions philosophiques. Plutôt que réviser certaines de leurs croyances à l'aune d'une interprétation 1 La périphrase un peu floue de « ce qui correspond à... » est utilisée pour désigner un résultat de mesure, puisque les différentes interprétations ne font justement pas porter leurs prédictions sur les mêmes choses. 2 Précisons que cela est vrai pour toutes les expériences réalisables, mais pas pour toutes les expériences imaginables. Concernant la démonstration de l'équivalence entre interprétations, une piste envisagée est que les prédictions des interprétations orthodoxes et bohmiennes soient réduites aux prédictions de l'interprétation des mondes multiples, en employant le langage des paris des individus. 3 Certains physiciens préfèrent ne pas se prononcer sur l'image du monde, et affirment refuser de choisir entre les interprétations quantiques. Toutefois, une interprétation de la théorie est bien nécessaire (cf. chap. 2), et une neutralité interprétative n'est pas possible, puisque toute prédiction revient à prendre une position interprétative au moins implicitement (cf. la section précédente de ce chapitre). 4 Cf. p. 19. 32 quantique, ils préfèrent choisir l'interprétation qui s'accorde avec leurs croyances initiales. Par exemple, un partisan de l'indéterminisme dans le monde peut récuser l'interprétation bohmienne sur la base de son déterminisme. Ou un adepte de la métaphysique des mondes possibles (leibnizien ou lewisien) peut se sentir plus proche de l'interprétation des mondes multiples. b. Simplicité La simplicité est un autre critère généralement évoqué dans l'argumentation concernant les interprétations quantiques. Par exemple, on remarque que l'interprétation de Bohm repose sur deux équations de base (équations de Schrödinger et pilote), tandis que l'interprétation d'Everett ne se réfère qu'à la première des deux, ce qui la rend plus simple. Mais certains reprochent à l'interprétation d'Everett l'infinité du nombre des mondes qu'elle invoque, ce qui va à l'encontre d'une image simple. L'interprétation d'Everett est-elle finalement plus simple ? Nous pouvons dire en tout cas que l'application d'un critère de choix n'est pas chose aisée. c. Étendue Certains reprochent à l'interprétation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique son manque d'étendue : comme l'interprétation orthodoxe requiert la définition d'un « système » et d'un « observateur » qui lui soit extérieur, le système ne peut pas englober la totalité de l'univers. Ainsi, il n'est pas possible d'étudier l'univers et son évolution avec une lecture orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique. Cela explique certainement pourquoi peu de cosmologistes1 sont partisans de l'interprétation orthodoxe. À l'inverse, les interprétations bohmienne et everettienne permettent d'appliquer la mécanique quantique à tout l'univers. d. Fécondité Dans leur défense d'une interprétation quantique, d'autres préfèrent insister sur sa fécondité, c'est-à-dire sa capacité à susciter de nouvelles découvertes et à étendre la théorie. L'idée sous-jacente est qu'utiliser une autre image du monde, ou employer certaines équations ou paramètres, peut susciter de nouveaux développements, théoriques ou expérimentaux. C'est notamment l'argument initial de Bohm et d'Everett, lorsqu'ils ont proposé leurs interprétations dans les années 1950. Toutefois, ce critère de fécondité est un critère pragmatique, qui concerne les développements futurs de la théorie, et n'intéressera pas celui qui souhaite seulement choisir une image du monde d'après la théorie actuelle. e. Conclusion Ces quelques exemples montrent que les critères qui interviennent dans les discussions concernant la meilleure interprétation sont notamment la cohérence, la simplicité, l'étendue, et la fécondité. Ces critères sont justement ceux qui sont généralement utilisés lorsque les scientifiques font des choix à propos des théories, selon l'historien et le philosophe des sciences Kuhn2. On peut donc ajouter par rapport à Kuhn que le choix entre des interprétations d'une même théorie, qui sont empiriquement équivalentes, semble se faire selon les mêmes critères que ceux qui président au choix entre des théories différentes. 1 Les cosmologistes sont les physiciens qui étudient l'histoire de l'univers depuis son origine. 2 Au sujet de ces critères, cf. par exemple T. S. Kuhn, The Essential Tension, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1977, trad. fra. M. Biezunski et al, La Tension Essentielle, Paris, Gallimard, 1990, p. 426-427. 33 Textes et commentaire TEXTE 1 – David Z. ALBERT et Rivka GALCHEN, « Menace quantique sur la relativité restreinte », Pour la Science, mai 2009, p. 50-51. Notre intuition nous dit que pour déplacer, mettons, une pierre, nous devons la toucher ; ou toucher un bâton qui touche la pierre ; ou donner un ordre qui se propage par les vibrations de l'air jusqu'à l'oreille d'une personne qui tient un bâton, qui peut alors pousser la pierre ; et ainsi de suite. Plus généralement, l'intuition nous dit que les objets physiques ne peuvent influer sur d'autres que s'ils les jouxtent, dans l'espace comme dans le temps. Si A influe sur B sans lui être immédiatement voisin, alors l'effet en question doit être indirect – l'effet doit se transmettre par une chaîne d'événements dont chacun fait apparaître directement le suivant, en parcourant continûment la distance de A à B. Chaque fois que nous pensons tomber sur une exception à cette intuition, par exemple lorsqu'on appuie sur un bouton qui allume les réverbères de la rue ou lorsqu'on écoute une émission de radio, il s'avère que nous n'avons, en fait, pas trouvé d'exception (on s'aperçoit que l'allumage se fait via des fils électriques, que des ondes radio se propagent dans l'air, etc.). Cette intuition née de notre expérience quotidienne du monde est celle de la « localité ». Or elle est mise en question par la mécanique quantique. Celle-ci a bouleversé de nombreuses intuitions, mais aucune plus profondément que la localité. [...] Revenons un peu en arrière. Avant l'avènement de la mécanique quantique, et en fait dès les débuts de l'exploration scientifique de la nature, les savants croyaient que l'on pourrait en principe expliquer le monde physique en décrivant un à un ses constituants les plus petits et les plus élémentaires. L'histoire complète du monde pourrait alors être comprise comme la somme des histoires de ses constituants. La mécanique quantique entre en conflit avec cette conviction. Les caractéristiques physiques réelles et mesurables d'un ensemble de particules peuvent être très différentes de la somme des caractéristiques des particules prises une à une. Prenons un exemple. D'après la mécanique quantique, on peut préparer une paire de particules de telle sorte qu'elles soient précisément à un mètre l'une de l'autre sans que pour autant aucune des deux n'ait de position définie. L'interprétation usuelle de la physique quantique, l'interprétation dite de Copenhague (due au physicien danois Niels Bohr au début du siècle dernier et transmise de professeurs à étudiants depuis plusieurs générations), souligne que le problème n'est pas que nous ignorions les positions exactes de chacune des deux particules, mais que tout simplement ces propriétés n'existent pas. Se demander quelle est la position d'une des deux particules serait aussi vide de sens que, par exemple, se demander quel est le statut marital du nombre cinq. Le problème n'est pas d'ordre épistémologique (concernant ce que nous savons), mais ontologique (concernant ce qui est). Les physiciens disent que les particules ainsi reliées sont quantiquement intriquées l'une avec l'autre. La propriété faisant l'objet d'une intrication n'est pas nécessairement la position : deux particules pourraient tourner sur elles-mêmes dans des sens opposés, sans que, avant la mesure, on puisse déterminer laquelle tourne dans le sens des aiguilles d'une montre. Ou encore, on pourrait avoir l'une des deux particules dans un état excité, sans que l'état de chacune soit déterminé. L'intrication peut relier des particules indépendamment de l'endroit où elles se trouvent, de leur nature, des forces qu'elles exercent l'une sur l'autre : en principe, elle pourrait porter sur un électron et un neutron1 situés de part et d'autre de notre galaxie. Ainsi, l'intrication fait apparaître une 1 Un neutron est une particule qu'on trouve dans les atomes, comme l'électron [Note de l'auteur]. 34 forme inattendue d'intimité au sein de la matière. [...] Mais l'intrication semble aussi impliquer la non-localité, un phénomène étrange et contre-intuitif : la possibilité d'influer physiquement sur un objet sans y toucher ou sans toucher une succession d'entités nous reliant à lui. [...] 35 TEXTE 2 – David N. MERMIN, « La Lune est-elle là lorsque personne ne regarde ? Réalité et théorie quantique », Physics Today, avril 1985, p. 38-44. La mécanique quantique, c'est magique1. En mai 1935, Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky et Nathan Rosen publièrent2 un argument selon lequel la mécanique quantique échoue à fournir une description complète de la réalité physique. Aujourd'hui, 50 ans plus tard, l'article d'EPR et les travaux théoriques et expérimentaux qu'il a inspirés demeurent remarquables pour avoir fourni une illustration saisissante d'un des plus étranges aspects du monde que nous a révélés la théorie quantique. [...] L'article d'EPR décrit une situation habilement imaginée pour forcer la théorie quantique à affirmer que des propriétés dans une région spatio-temporelle B sont le résultat d'un acte de mesure dans une autre région spatio-temporelle A, si éloignée de B qu'il n'y a aucune possibilité que la mesure de A exerce une influence sur la région B par aucun mécanisme dynamique connu. Dans ces conditions, Einstein maintenait que les propriétés [en B]* devaient avoir existé depuis le début. Des actions à distance fantomatiques [...] Einstein écrit : « Ce qui existe vraiment en B ne devrait [...] pas dépendre du genre de mesure qui est effectué dans la partie spatiale A ; cela devrait également être indépendant du fait qu'une mesure soit effectuée tout court dans l'espace A. Si on adhère à ce programme, on peut difficilement considérer la description de la théorie quantique comme une représentation complète de ce qui est physiquement réel. Si l'on essaie de le faire en dépit de cela, on doit supposer que ce qui est physiquement réel en B souffre d'un changement brutal par suite de la mesure en A. Mon instinct pour la physique se hérisse à cette idée. » [Ou encore :] « Je ne peux pas croire sérieusement en [la théorie quantique] parce qu'elle ne peut être réconciliée avec l'idée que la physique devrait représenter une réalité dans le temps et l'espace, sans avoir recours à des actions à distance fantomatiques. » Les « actions à distance fantomatiques » (spukhafte Fernwirkungen) sont l'acquisition, pour une propriété, d'une valeur définie** par le système dans la région B en vertu de la mesure réalisée dans la région A. [...] Un fait est découvert La réponse théorique [...] a été donnée en 1964 par John S. Bell, dans un article3 célèbre paru dans l'éphémère journal Physics. En utilisant une expérience de pensée inventée4 par David Bohm, dans laquelle « les propriétés dont on ne peut rien savoir » (les valeurs simultanées du spin d'une particule selon des directions distinctes) sont requises d'exister par une argumentation à la EPR, Bell a montré 1 Daniel Greenberger, remarque lors de discussions au Symposium « Fundamental Questions in Quantum Mechanics », SUNY, Albany, États-Unis, avril 1984. 2 A. Einstein, B. Podolsky, et N. Rosen, « Can Quantum-Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete ? », Physical Review, vol. 47, 1935, p. 777-780. * L'article original indique « en A », vraisemblablement par erreur. L'argument peut cependant s'appliquer ensuite sur A comme sur B [NdT]. * * Une valeur définie est une valeur qui peut être prédite avec la probabilité 1 [NdT]. 3 J. S., Bell, « On the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox », Physics, 1 (3), 1964, p. 195-200. 4 D. Bohm, Quantum Theory, Englewood Cliffs (NJ), Prentice Hall, 1951, p. 614-615. 36 que la non-existence de ces propriétés est une conséquence directe des prédictions numériques quantitatives de la théorie quantique (c'est le « théorème de Bell »). La conclusion est tout à fait indépendante de la croyance selon laquelle la théorie quantique offre une description complète de la réalité physique. Si les données d'une telle expérience sont en accord avec les prédictions numériques de la théorie quantique, alors la position philosophique d'Einstein doit être fausse [et les actions à distance fantomatiques existent]. Ces dernières années, dans une belle série d'expériences, Alain Aspect et ses collaborateurs à l'Institut d'Optique Théorique et Appliquée à Orsay ont apporté1 la réponse expérimentale au défi posé par Einstein en réalisant une version de l'expérience d'EPR dans des conditions dans lesquelles une analyse à la Bell s'applique. Ils ont montré que les prédictions de la théorie quantique étaient effectivement vérifiées. Trente ans après le défi d'Einstein, un fait – et non une doctrine métaphysique – était présenté pour le réfuter. [...] Une démonstration par la pensée Je vais décrire, avec un vocabulaire de « boîte noire », une version très simple de l'expérience de pensée de Bell [...]. L'appareillage se compose de trois éléments. Deux d'entre eux (A et B) sont des détecteurs. Ils sont très éloignés l'un de l'autre (dans les expériences analogues d'Aspect, de plus de 10 mètres). Chaque détecteur possède un bouton qui peut être réglé sur trois positions différentes ; chaque détecteur répond à un événement en émettant brièvement une lumière, rouge ou verte. La troisième pièce (C), située au milieu entre A et B, fonctionne comme une source (cf. figure 1). Figure 1 – Un appareil EPR. [...] Il n'y a aucune connexion entre les éléments, ni mécanique, ni électromagnétique, ni d'aucun autre type connu [...]. Les détecteurs sont ainsi dans l'incapacité d'envoyer des signaux entre eux ou à la source, par aucun mécanisme connu, et, à l'exception des « particules » décrites plus bas, la source n'a aucun moyen d'envoyer des signaux aux détecteurs. La démonstration procède de la façon suivante : Le bouton de chaque détecteur est placé dans l'une des trois positions de façon indépendante et aléatoire ; peu après cela, chaque détecteur émet brièvement une lumière rouge ou verte. Les 1 A. Aspect, P. Grangier et G. Roger, « Experimental Tests of Realistic Local Theories via Bell's Theorem », Physical Review Letters, 47, 1981, p. 460-463. A. Aspect, P. Grangier et G. Roger, « Experimental Realization of EinsteinPodolsky-Rosen-Bohm Gedankenexperiment: A New Violation of Bell's Inequalities », Physical Review Letters, 49, 1982, p. 91-94. A. Aspect, J. Dalibard et G. Roger, « Experimental Test of Bell's Inequalities Using Time-Varying Analyzers », Physical Review Letters, 49, 1982, p. 1804-1807. 37 paramètres des boutons et les couleurs des lumières sont enregistrés, et l'exécution est répétée un grand nombre de fois. Les données consistent en une paire de nombres et une paire de couleurs, pour chaque exécution. Par exemple, une exécution dans laquelle A est fixée à 3, B à 2, A émet une lumière rouge [« red », en anglais, NdT] et B une lumière verte [« green »], serait enregistrée comme « 32RG ». Parce qu'aucune connexion n'a été mise en place entre la source C et les détecteurs A et B, le lien entre le fait de presser le bouton [en C] et le fait qu'une lumière s'allume sur un détecteur ne peut être obtenu que par le passage de quelque chose (que nous appellerons une « particule », bien que vous puissiez l'appeler comme il vous plaît) entre la source et ce détecteur. Cela peut être facilement testé, par exemple en mettant une brique entre la source et un détecteur. Dans les exécutions suivantes, la lumière de ce détecteur ne s'allumera pas. Lorsque la brique est retirée, tout marche de nouveau comme avant. 31GR 13RG 31RR 33GG 33RR 12GR 33GG 21GR 21RR 22RR 33GG 11GG [...] Figure 2 – Fragment des données produites par l'appareil de la figure 1. [...] Des données typiques issues d'un grand nombre d'exécutions sont indiquées dans la figure 2. Seules les deux caractéristiques suivantes sont pertinentes : ► Si on examine seulement les exécutions dans lesquelles les boutons ont la même configuration, on trouve que les lumières émises sont toujours de la même couleur. ► Si on examine toutes les exécutions, quelle que soit la configuration des boutons, on trouve que le motif des couleurs est complètement aléatoire. Notamment, les lumières émises sont la moitié du temps de la même couleur, et la moitié du temps de couleurs différentes. Voilà tout ce qu'il y a dans l'expérience de pensée. [...] Comment cela pourrait-il marcher ? Considérons seulement les exécutions dans lesquelles les boutons avaient la même position lorsque les particules sont arrivées dans les détecteurs. Dans toutes ces exécutions, les détecteurs émettent des lumières de même couleur. S'ils pouvaient communiquer, ce serait un jeu d'enfant de faire que les détecteurs émettent des lumières de même couleur lorsque leurs boutons ont le même réglage, mais ils n'ont pas la moindre connexion entre eux. Ils ne peuvent pas non plus avoir été pré-programmés pour émettre toujours des lumières de même couleur, sans tenir compte de ce qui se passe, car on observe que les détecteurs émettent des lumières de couleurs différentes au moins pour certaines exécutions dans lesquelles leurs boutons sont réglés différemment, et car les réglages des boutons sont des événements aléatoires indépendants. Comment, dès lors, pouvons-nous rendre compte de la première caractéristique des données ? Aucun problème. [...] Dans notre cas, les détecteurs sont déclenchés par des particules ayant une origine commune en la source C. Il est alors facile d'inventer toutes sortes d'explications pour la première caractéristique des données. [...] On pourrait imaginer que les particules existent en huit variétés : cubes, sphères, tétraèdres, ... Tous les réglages produisent R lorsqu'un cube est détecté, une sphère donne un R pour les réglages 1 et 2, et G pour le réglage 3, etc. On peut ainsi rendre compte de la première caractéristique des données si les deux particules produites par la source dans chaque exécution sont toujours de la même variété. Ce qui est commun à toutes ces explications est l'exigence que chaque particule doit, d'une façon ou d'une autre, apporter à son détecteur un jeu d'instructions concernant la lumière à émettre dans chacune des trois configurations possibles des boutons, et que pour chaque exécution de l'expérience, les deux particules doivent apporter le même jeu d'instructions : 38 ► Un jeu d'instructions qui couvre chacun des trois réglages possibles est nécessaire parce qu'il n'y a pas d'autre communication entre la source et les détecteurs que les particules elles-mêmes. Pour les exécutions dans lesquelles les boutons ont le même réglage, les particules ne peuvent pas savoir si ce réglage sera 11, 22, ou 33. Pour que les détecteurs émettent toujours une lumière de la même couleur quand les boutons ont le même réglage, les particules doivent transporter des instructions qui indiquent la couleur pour chacune des trois possibilités. ► L'absence de communication entre la source et les détecteurs requiert que les particules transportent de tels jeux d'instruction pour chaque exécution de l'expérience – même ceux pour lesquels les boutons ont finalement des réglages différents – parce que les particules doivent toujours être prêtes : pour n'importe quelle exécution, les boutons peuvent finalement s'avérer avoir le même réglage. [...] Hélas ! Cette explication – la seule, selon moi, que quelqu'un qui n'est pas imprégné de mécanique quantique puisse proposer (bien que ce soit un jeu divertissant de mettre quelqu'un au défi d'essayer) – n'est pas tenable. Elle n'est pas cohérente avec la seconde caractéristique des données : on ne peut pas concevoir de façon d'assigner de tels jeux d'instructions aux particules d'une exécution à l'autre qui rende compte du fait que, pour toutes les exécutions prises ensembles, et quelles que soient les positions des boutons, des lumières de même couleur apparaissent la moitié du temps. [...] Voici l'argument. Considérons un jeu particulier d'instructions, par exemple RRG. Si les deux particules reçoivent le jeu d'instructions RRG, alors les détecteurs émettront des lumières de même couleur quand les boutons seront réglés à 11, 22, 33, 12 ou 21, et de couleurs différentes pour 13, 31, 23 ou 32. Parce que les boutons de chaque détecteur sont réglés aléatoirement et indépendamment, chacun de ces neuf cas est tout autant probable, donc le jeu d'instructions RRG donnera lieu à des lumières de même couleur 5/9 du temps. La même conclusion est évidemment obtenue pour les jeux RGR, GRR, GGR, GRG et RGG, car l'argument utilise seulement le fait qu'une couleur apparaît deux fois et l'autre une seule. Ces six jeux d'instructions donnent aussi des lumières de même couleur 5/9 du temps. Mais les seuls jeux d'instructions restants sont RRR et GGG, entraînant chacun une émission de lumières toujours de la même couleur. Par conséquent, si les jeux d'instructions existent, les mêmes couleurs apparaîtront dans au moins 5/9 des exécutions, quelle que soit la distribution des jeux d'instructions d'une fois sur l'autre. Ceci est le théorème de Bell (aussi connu sous le nom d'inégalité de Bell). Mais dans l'expérience de pensée réelle, les mêmes couleurs sont émises seulement la moitié du temps. Les données décrites plus haut violent cette inégalité de Bell, et par conséquent il ne peut exister de jeu d'instructions. [...] 39 Commentaire 1. Introduction Le premier texte est extrait d'un article paru initialement dans Scientific American, revue scientifique américaine de vulgarisation, dont l'édition française est Pour la science. L'un de ses auteurs est D. Z. Albert, philosophe de la mécanique quantique mondialement reconnu. L'extrait présente les concepts de localité et de non-localité qui sont en jeu en mécanique quantique, ainsi que celui d'intrication quantique qui permet justement cette non-localité1. Le second texte provient d'un article paru dans Physics Today, revue éditée par une société savante américaine de physique. L'auteur, N. D. Mermin, est un physicien américain reconnu, auteur de manuels de physique utilisés dans de nombreuses universités dans le monde. L'article offre une présentation non-technique d'un résultat théorique ardu de la mécanique quantique, le théorème de Bell. Paru en 1985, l'article de Mermin est resté célèbre pour avoir proposé une version simple et illustrée de l'expérience en question, avec une preuve courte du théorème de Bell, sans formules mathématiques. Il s'agit donc d'un article de vulgarisation scientifique; quelques éléments d'analyse philosophique sont présents dans cet article, mais cela n'en constitue pas le coeur. Les arguments d'EPR et de Bell font appel au concept de non-localité dont il est question dans le premier texte. Dans ce commentaire, nous allons revenir sur l'argument d'EPR, analyser l'argument de Bell et ses conséquences, et enfin indiquer ce que les différentes interprétations de la mécanique quantique ont à dire de ce résultat2, 3. 2. L'article d'EPR a. Contexte et motivations Avant les années 1930, alors que la mécanique quantique n'a que quelques années d'existence, une interprétation de la théorie s'est déjà imposée parmi les physiciens : celle défendue par Bohr, Born ou Heisenberg, qu'on appellera bientôt l'interprétation de Copenhague et qui est l'origine directe de l'interprétation orthodoxe4. Selon elle, les systèmes quantiques n'ont pas toujours de propriétés bien définies lorsqu'ils ne sont pas mesurés. C'est seulement lors de la mesure, ou juste après, qu'ils ont certaines propriétés. D'une certaine façon, c'est notre mesure qui crée ces propriétés. Einstein fait partie des quelques voix dissidentes qui sont insatisfaites de cette interprétation. 1 Le but de l'article est de discuter le possible conflit entre la non-localité quantique et la relativité ; cette préoccupation dépasse le cadre de cet ouvrage, et seule l'introduction de l'article nous intéresse ici. 2 Cette partie s'appuie notamment sur D. Z. Albert, op. cit., chap. 3, A. Fine, « The Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Argument in Quantum Theory », dans E. N. Zalta, op. cit., http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-epr/, 2009 ; S. Goldstein, T., Norsen, D. V. Tausk et N. Zanghì, « Bell's Theorem », Scholarpedia, 6 (10), 2011, 8378, http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Bell %27s_theorem ; R. I. G. Hughes, The Structure and Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, Cambridge (MA) et London, Harvard University Press, 1989, chap. 6 et 8 ; M. Redhead, Incompleteness, Nonlocality and Realism, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1987, chap. 3 et 4 ; B. C. van Fraassen, op. cit. 3 Afin de simplifier le commentaire, nous supposerons – sauf lorsque l'inverse est explicitement mentionné – qu'il existe toujours des faits ou des résultats lorsque des expériences sont réalisées, comme le veut le sens commun. Autrement dit, le commentaire se fait par défaut sans adopter l'interprétation des mondes multiples, et celle-ci est discutée à part (p. 53). Cette simplification a pour but d'éviter de rajouter à chaque phrase une précision du type « dès lors qu'il existe un fait à propos de ... ». Par conséquent, un certain nombre de phrases du commentaire, prises hors contexte, seraient fausses dans le cadre de l'interprétation des mondes multiples, mais elles sont corrigées plus loin. 4 Cf. chap. 1 et 3. 40 Convaincu qu'il y a en-dehors de l'homme une réalité physique objective existant indépendamment de lui, Einstein estime que le but des théories physiques est de décrire cette réalité physique, de façon précise et complète. Par « complète », il faut comprendre que tout ce qui est vrai à propos de ce monde extérieur doit figurer dans la théorie physique ; par exemple, il ne faudrait pas que des éléments soient passés sous silence simplement parce que nous ne sommes pas en train de les mesurer. Si les systèmes dans le monde ont des propriétés bien définies à chaque instant, mais que la mécanique quantique ne décrit pas complètement ces propriétés et cette réalité physique, alors elle est incomplète. En l'occurrence, Einstein estime que le fait que les systèmes n'aient pas toujours de propriétés (en-dehors d'une mesure) est un signe de non-complétude de la mécanique quantique. La position d'Einstein est en désaccord avec une position instrumentaliste, qui considère que le but d'une théorie physique est de prédire correctement les observations, sans s'inquiéter de décrire complètement tout ce qui existe dans cette « réalité physique », dont l'existence reste une hypothèse discutable (et par ailleurs, comment savoir quand notre description est « complète » ?). b. L'argument d'EPR De fait, Einstein peinait à convaincre les autres physiciens que l'interprétation de Copenhague était insatisfaisante et que la mécanique quantique était incomplète. Et à supposer qu'on accordât à Einstein que l'objectif d'une théorie physique est de décrire complètement la réalité, peut-être après tout n'existet-il rien que la mécanique quantique omette de décrire ? Peut-être les propriétés des systèmes quantiques n'existent-elles pas toujours (que cela nous plaise ou non) ? C'est contre ces possibles objections qu'Einstein vient opposer un argument, dans l'article co-écrit avec Poldosky et Rosen (appelé « EPR », selon leurs initiales), évoqué par Mermin. Leur objectif est de démontrer que la mécanique quantique est incomplète, en présentant quelque chose (en l'occurrence, une certaine propriété d'un certain système dans une certaine configuration) qui devrait être décrit par une théorie quantique complète, mais qui ne l'est pas par la mécanique quantique actuelle. Pour argumenter ainsi, il est évidemment nécessaire pour EPR de justifier pourquoi ce quelque chose devrait être décrit par la théorie. Autrement dit, ils doivent commencer par donner un critère de ce qu'est précisément une théorie complète, avant de montrer que la mécanique quantique ne remplit pas ce critère. Leur caractérisation est la suivante : « dans une théorie complète, il existe un élément correspondant à chaque élément de réalité » (p. 777)1. Autrement dit, tous les éléments de la réalité physique doivent figurer dans la description de la théorie. Par contraposée, cela équivaut à dire que si un élément de réalité n'a pas de correspondant dans une théorie, alors cette théorie n'est pas complète. EPR doivent maintenant définir plus précisément ce qu'est un « élément de réalité », puisque ce concept joue un rôle central. Ils écrivent : « si, sans perturber aucunement un système, on peut prédire avec certitude (i. e. avec une probabilité égale à l'unité) la valeur d'une quantité physique, alors il existe un élément de la réalité physique correspondant à cette quantité physique ». Nous avons déjà rencontré un cas analogue2 : l'interprétation orthodoxe de la mécanique quantique considère qu'une propriété d'un système existe lorsque cette propriété peut être prédite avec une probabilité 1 ; ici, EPR adoptent en quelque sorte ce critère mais, au lieu de parler simplement de l'existence d'une propriété, ils préfèrent parler de l'existence d'un élément de réalité auquel correspond la propriété. Ils prennent néanmoins la précaution de préciser, et cela jouera un rôle clé plus loin, que la prédiction doit être faite « sans perturber aucunement le système », car ils veulent que l'existence de l'élément de réalité ne dépende pas de notre interaction avec lui. Par leur définition d'un « élément de réalité », EPR veulent simplement 1 On peut considérer cette citation comme une reformulation de la position einsteinienne exposée précédemment. 2 Cf. p. 16. 41 capturer ce qu'on entend habituellement par « la réalité physique » et donner un critère (suffisant) pour caractériser ses éléments ; en cela, leur définition ne se veut pas particulièrement polémique. Grâce à ce critère, s'ils parviennent à montrer qu'il existe quelque chose qui peut être prédit avec certitude (donc qui est un élément de réalité) mais qui n'a pas de correspondant dans la mécanique quantique, alors ils auront prouvé que la mécanique quantique n'est pas complète. Leur argument est à peu près le suivant1. Considérons deux détecteurs en A et B, qui reçoivent chacun une particule issue de l'émetteur C (ces particules n'interagissent plus après avoir quitté C). Lorsque les détecteurs reçoivent une particule, ils émettent brièvement une lumière, rouge ou verte. On suppose ici que les détecteurs ont les mêmes réglages, par exemple avec leur bouton en position 1. Pour le couple de particules considéré par EPR, la mécanique quantique prédit qu'en A et B ce seront toujours des lumières de même couleur qui s'allumeront (ou bien rouges toutes les deux, ou bien vertes toutes les deux), quels que soient les réglages (dès lors qu'ils sont identiques en A et B). Mise à part cette corrélation, la mécanique quantique ne prédit pas avec certitude la lumière qui s'allumera, mais avec 50 % de chances que les lumières seront toutes deux vertes, et avec 50 % qu'elles seront toutes deux rouges. Considérons maintenant une exécution particulière avec ce couple de particules, partant de C. Supposons que le détecteur A soit plus près que le détecteur B de l'émetteur C, de sorte que l'arrivée de la particule en A se produise avant l'arrivée de l'autre particule en B. À l'instant t, le détecteur en A reçoit une particule et émet brièvement une lumière (par exemple verte). Comme la mécanique quantique prédit que les couleurs seront identiques en A et B pour ce couple de particules, on peut, dès l'instant t, prédire avec une probabilité 1 qu'on observera en B une lumière verte. Et cela, sans avoir perturbé la particule qui va arriver en B, puisqu'elle n'interagit plus avec la particule qui est arrivée en A. Ainsi, continuent EPR, on peut prédire avec certitude la couleur de la lumière qui s'allumera en B lorsque la particule y arrivera, sans avoir perturbé aucunement cette particule. Par conséquent, cette couleur en B correspond à un élément de réalité selon la définition d'EPR. Précisons qu'elle est un élément de réalité non seulement après l'instant t où la lumière est observée en A, mais également avant, puisque l'instant t n'est pas un instant particulier pour la particule qui se dirige vers B (rappelons en effet qu'elle n'a, par hypothèse, aucune interaction avec l'autre particule). Notamment, selon EPR, cela doit être le cas avant que les particules ne partent de C : dès la configuration initiale, la couleur en B doit être un élément de réalité2. Or, comme cela a déjà été dit, la mécanique quantique ne prédit initialement pas avec certitude qu'une couleur particulière sera observée en B, mais elle donne seulement une probabilité de 50 % pour chaque couleur, rouge ou verte. Autrement dit, la mécanique quantique ne décrit pas l'élément de réalité identifié par EPR, et elle est, en concluent-ils, une théorie incomplète. c. Structure et conséquences de l'argument Bien qu'on ait reproché à l'article d'EPR un certain manque de clarté, il est possible d'en extraire un argument logiquement valide, dans le sens où si ses prémisses sont vraies, alors la conclusion (selon laquelle la mécanique quantique est incomplète) doit nécessairement être vraie elle aussi3. Deux prémisses sont essentielles dans l'argument d'EPR. La première est le fait que les prédictions de 1 L'argument est ici simplifié et reformulé dans les termes de l'expérience présentée par Mermin. Pour une analyse plus approfondie de l'argument original d'EPR, ainsi que des versions ultérieures de l'argument, notamment par Einstein, cf. A. Fine, op. cit. La version présentée ici est proche de celle due à D. Bohm, op. cit. 2 Elle est déjà un élément de réalité à ce moment car, même si on ne prédit pas encore la couleur en B avec une probabilité 1, on peut se mettre en condition de la prédire sans perturber la particule correspondante – en l'occurrence, en mesurant la couleur en A. 3 Indiquons dès à présent que l'une des hypothèses d'EPR s'avère être fausse. Mais l'argument d'EPR demeure logiquement valide, au sens spécifié. 42 la mécanique quantique soient correctes. Autrement dit, EPR ont besoin que la mécanique quantique soit empiriquement adéquate sur le genre d'expériences considérées. La seconde prémisse, implicite dans l'article, peut être qualifiée d' « hypothèse de localité ». Elle consiste à supposer que, lorsqu'une mesure est effectuée en A, rien n'est modifié en B (i. e. aucune propriété du système en B n'est altérée), parce qu'aucune interaction physique d'aucune sorte n'intervient1. Il s'agit là d'une hypothèse sur le monde lui-même, disant qu'il est local, c'est-à-dire que les interactions se propagent de proche en proche, ainsi que le premier texte l'a présenté (pour déplacer une pierre, il faut la toucher, ou toucher un bâton qui touche cette pierre, etc.). C'est cette hypothèse de localité qui permet à EPR d'aller plus loin que ce que prédit la mécanique quantique et d'affirmer que la couleur en B est un élément de réalité depuis le début. Avec l'argument d'EPR, Einstein atteint son but : montrer que la mécanique quantique est incomplète. Autrement dit, il peut conclure que la couleur observée en B était en fait prédéterminée, bien que la mécanique quantique ne soit pas capable de la donner. Le prix à payer pour ne pas aboutir à cette conclusion est élevé : il faut ou bien nier que les prédictions expérimentales de la mécanique quantique soient correctes, ou bien reconnaître une certaine non-localité dans le monde, c'est-à-dire admettre l'existence des « actions à distance fantomatiques ». Autrement dit, l'argument d'EPR doit faire admettre aux partisans de l'interprétation de Copenhague l'existence d'une action à distance2. Einstein, qui ne veut pas de telles actions, préfère considérer que la mécanique quantique est incomplète. C'est ainsi qu'il faut comprendre la première citation rapportée par Mermin, p. 36. 3. L'argument de Bell a. Introduction Le débat sur l'incomplétude de la mécanique quantique prend un nouveau tournant lorsque Bell publie son article de 19643. En 1952, il a pris connaissance avec intérêt de la mécanique bohmienne. Cette interprétation de la mécanique quantique ajoute de nouvelles variables (souvent appelées « variables cachées ») par rapport à la formulation orthodoxe de la théorie, à savoir les positions q des particules (cf. chap. 4). Autrement dit, la mécanique bohmienne est une façon de compléter la mécanique quantique. Or, depuis les années 1930, ont été établis plusieurs théorèmes qui prétendent démontrer l'impossibilité des théories quantiques à variables cachées (par von Neumann, Gleason, Jauch et Piron notamment). Le fait que l'interprétation de Bohm existe semble être un contre-exemple à ces théorèmes, c'est-à-dire une preuve que ceux-ci n'excluent en fait pas ce qu'on pensait qu'ils excluaient. Bell veut chercher à comprendre ce qui ne va pas dans ces théorèmes, c'est-à-dire quelles sont les hypothèses (implicites) de ces théorèmes que l'interprétation de Bohm ne vérifie pas, et qui lui permettent d'échapper à leurs conclusions4. 1 Pour s'en assurer, on pourrait imaginer prendre toutes sortes de précautions : mettre une grande distance entre les deux régions A et B, construire d'épais murs blindés tout autour de A et de B, positionner d'autres détecteurs pour repérer un éventuel signal se propageant entre A et B, etc., comme l'indique D. Z. Albert, op. cit., p. 64. 2 L'interprétation orthodoxe contemporaine reconnaît le caractère non-local du monde. En 1935, son ancêtre, l'interprétation de Copenhague, était implicitement considérée comme locale (cf. A. Fine, op. cit., sec. 2). 3 Pour les aspects historiques du résultat de Bell, cf. notamment O. Jr. Freire, « The Historical Roots of "Foundations of Quantum Physics" as a Field of Research (1950-1970) », Foundations of Physics, 34 (11), novembre 2004, p. 17411760 ; O. Jr. Freire, « Philosophy Enters the Optics Laboratory: Bell's Theorem and its First Experimental Tests (19651982) », Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics, vol. 37, 2006, p. 577-616, et M. Jammer, op. cit., chap. 9, sec. 9.1. 4 Un théorème d'impossibilité énonce que certaines théories à variables cachées ne peuvent exister. Sa démonstration repose sur le fait que ces théories ont certaines caractéristiques. Ces caractéristiques sont parfois énoncées explicitement, mais peuvent aussi rester implicites et être cependant utilisées dans la preuve du théorème, à l'insu de 43 Or l'interprétation de Bohm décrit un monde non-local, dans lequel il existe une certaine « action fantomatique à distance »1. Cette non-localité ne passe pas inaperçue. Comme Bell remarque que les théorèmes d'impossibilité des variables cachées ne l'interdisent pas, il en vient à se demander si toutes les théories à variables cachées doivent nécessairement être non-locales pour échapper aux théorèmes d'impossibilité2. La réponse qui va être apportée par le « théorème de Bell », est : effectivement, les théories à variables cachées locales ne sont pas permises, c'est-à-dire que la non-localité est obligatoire pour toute théorie qui entend compléter la mécanique quantique. Mais il prouve aussi bien plus, comme nous allons l'analyser plus loin. b. Une présentation sous forme de « boîte noire » Avant de reprendre l'argument de Bell, arrêtons-nous tout d'abord sur le fait que Mermin entende le décrire avec un vocabulaire de « boîte noire », selon ses propres mots. Cette expression de « boîte noire » fait référence à quelque chose dont on ne cherche pas à connaître le mécanisme interne (i. e. on n'ouvre pas la boîte pour regarder comment elle fonctionne), mais dont on étudie plutôt le comportement en fonction de la configuration dans laquelle elle se trouve. Ici, on ne trouve pas une description théorique du fonctionnement de l'expérience, ce qui supposerait d'emblée l'adoption du cadre de la mécanique quantique et de son langage mathématique, mais une description avec les mots du langage courant, en-dehors du cadre de la mécanique quantique, avec des mots tels « détecteur », « bouton », « lumière rouge ou verte », etc. Une conséquence de cette approche est que Mermin, plutôt que de présenter les résultats de l'expérience à partir de calculs théoriques, indique directement quelles sont les observations qui ont été réalisées (les « 31RR », etc.). Cette présentation en « boîte noire » présente un double avantage. Tout d'abord, elle permet à un lecteur qui ne connaîtrait pas le formalisme de la mécanique quantique de pouvoir tout de même comprendre facilement l'expérience (ce qui est un bon point pour un article de vulgarisation). Ensuite, comme la présentation n'adopte pas le cadre théorique de la mécanique quantique, cela évite à ceux qui connaîtraient déjà la mécanique quantique de conceptualiser directement l'expérience dans les termes de cette théorie, avec des schémas conceptuels et des pré-supposés interprétatifs implicites. Le but de Mermin est plutôt de confronter le lecteur au théorème de Bell à partir d'une vision du sens commun, pour qu'il soit dérangé par ce résultat étrange et réfléchisse avec lui à une (impossible) explication des résultats de l'expérience. c. Structure de l'article L'argument de Bell, tel qu'il est présenté par Mermin, comprend trois étapes : i. Une première étape présente la situation expérimentale considérée et les résultats obtenus, avec les deux caractéristiques des données expérimentales. Cette étape correspond à la section intitulée « Une démonstration par la pensée ». ii. Une seconde étape analyse la première caractéristique des données, et en cherche une explication possible. Cette étape correspond au début de la section « Comment cela pourrait-il marcher ? », en allant jusqu'à la fin du paragraphe « les boutons peuvent finalement s'avérer avoir le même réglage. [...] ». tous. Dès lors, si une théorie à variables cachées est possible, et n'est pas interdite pas le théorème en question, on peut être sûr qu'elle n'a pas au moins une des caractéristiques requises (même implicitement) par le théorème. C'est le cas de la mécanique de Bohm : la question pour Bell est d'identifier la ou les hypothèses implicites des théorèmes d'impossibilité qu'elle ne satisfait pas. 1 Cet aspect est développé p. 52. 2 J. S. Bell, « On the Problem of Hidden Variables in Quantum Mechanics », Review of Modern Physics, 38, 1966, p. 447-452. Bien que publié après l'article de 1964, il a été écrit avant. 44 iii. Une troisième étape, allant de « Hélas ! » jusqu'à la fin du texte, analyse la compatibilité entre les conclusions de l'étape précédente et la seconde caractéristique des données. Reprenons plus en détail le contenu de chacune de ces étapes. L'expérience de Bell, présentée dans l'étape (i), peut être considérée comme une extension de l'expérience d'EPR (dans notre version présentée p. 42). On note que le dispositif est le même : un émetteur est placé en C, deux récepteurs en A et B, lesquels ont des boutons de réglage et émettent une lumière rouge ou verte lorsqu'une particule venue de C les atteint. EPR considèrent (seulement) les exécutions dans lesquelles les boutons en A et B ont les mêmes réglages ; ils obtiennent donc (seulement) la première caractéristique des données indiquées par Mermin, celle énonçant que les lumières émises en A et B sont toujours de la même couleur1. De son côté, Bell considère ces exécutions et aussi celles dans lesquelles les boutons ont des réglages différents et aléatoires. Cela lui permet d'obtenir alors en plus la deuxième caractéristique des données, qui dit qu'autant de lumières vertes que rouges sont observées lorsque les réglages des boutons sont aléatoires. On remarque donc que Bell reprend l'expérience d'EPR, et en exploite aussi d'autres données, c'est-à-dire d'autres prédictions de la mécanique quantique ; c'est cela qui permettra à son argument d'aller plus loin qu'EPR. Mermin précise qu'il n'y a dans l'expérience « aucune connexion entre les éléments, ni mécanique, ni électromagnétique, ni d'aucun autre type connu [...]. Les détecteurs sont ainsi dans l'incapacité d'envoyer des signaux entre eux ou à la source, par aucun mécanisme connu ». Cette condition correspond à la condition de localité d'EPR disant que, lorsqu'une mesure est effectuée en A, rien n'est modifié en B parce qu'aucune interaction physique ne se produit entre A et B. Bell reprend ainsi, en la rendant explicite, l'hypothèse de localité d'EPR2. En résumé, la situation expérimentale considérée par Bell reprend celle d'EPR, en ajoutant des observations supplémentaires. Indiquons enfin que, en présentant l'expérience comme déjà réalisée et ayant fourni des résultats, Mermin modifie légèrement l'argument de Bell. Car en 1964, l'expérience en question n'a pas encore été réalisée. Bell ne peut donc s'appuyer que sur les prédictions théoriques que peut fournir la mécanique quantique. Le fait que ces prédictions quantiques soient correctes est pour lui une hypothèse sur laquelle son argument repose3. Après avoir présenté l'expérience, Mermin retrace l'argumentation de Bell concernant la première caractéristique des données (étape ii). Cette caractéristique, qui énonce que les lumières émises sont toujours de la même couleur lorsque les boutons ont les mêmes réglages, est celle qui a été étudiée par EPR. Mermin analyse la façon dont on peut rendre compte de cette caractéristique, et pour cela fait appel aux idées du sens commun – sans se placer dans le cadre théorique de la mécanique quantique, poursuivant en cela son approche de type « boîte noire ». Mermin montre qu'une explication de la première caractéristique doit être de la forme suivante : chaque particule emmène avec elle un ensemble d'instructions indiquant, pour tous les couples de réglages possibles des boutons des deux détecteurs, quelle lumière s'allumera. Cette conclusion n'est rien d'autre qu'une reformulation de la conclusion d'EPR, selon laquelle il existe des « variables cachées » qui déterminent les couleurs qui vont apparaître, ce qui est le rôle tenu par les ensembles d'instructions4. Que Mermin arrive ici à la 1 Il existe en fait une différence entre l'expérience d'EPR et de Bell sur ce point : EPR ne considèrent que deux réglages possibles aux boutons des récepteurs, quand Bell en considère trois. 2 Dans son article de 1964, Bell énonce la condition de localité ainsi : « si les deux mesures sont faites à des endroits éloignés l'un de l'autre, l'orientation d'un aimant [ici : le réglage du bouton d'un détecteur] n'influence pas le résultat [ici : la couleur] obtenu[e] avec l'autre [détecteur]. » (p. 15). 3 La possibilité d'un désaccord théorie-expérience est étudiée p. 47. 4 Si Mermin préfère cette formulation à celle affirmant que la mécanique quantique doit être complétée, c'est seulement parce qu'il a fait le choix de ne pas présenter l'expérience avec le point de vue de la théorie de la mécanique quantique. 45 conclusion d'EPR n'est pas étonnant, car c'est aussi en analysant la première caractéristique des données qu'ils sont parvenus à leur conclusion ; l'argumentation de Mermin dans cette étape (ii) est en fait une reformulation de celle d'EPR. Ainsi, l'argument de Bell comprend, dans un premier temps, l'argument d'EPR1. Mermin s'intéresse ensuite (étape iii) aux conséquences de cette existence d'ensembles d'instructions transportés par les particules. Il montre alors, avec un raisonnement simple de dénombrement, que cela entraîne certaines statistiques concernant les couleurs des lumières qui s'allument. En l'occurrence, lorsque les réglages des boutons sont aléatoires, les lumières doivent être de même couleur davantage que 5/9 du temps. Ce résultat, qui est le propre de la contribution de Bell, est souvent appelé le « théorème de Bell », ou aussi « inégalité de Bell » parce qu'il affirme qu'une statistique doit être supérieure à une certaine valeur. D'autres résultats similaires, plus généraux, ont été montrés ultérieurement, et sont souvent appelés des inégalités « de type Bell ». Il est important de noter que la démonstration du théorème de Bell ne requiert aucun élément de la théorie de la mécanique quantique, qu'il s'agisse du formalisme ou de l'interprétation ; il est obtenu par un simple calcul sur les configurations possibles des boutons de réglage2. Autrement dit, le théorème de Bell est indépendant de la vérité ou de la fausseté de la mécanique quantique. Ayant énoncé le théorème de Bell, Mermin peut ensuite comparer son résultat avec la seconde caractéristique des données observées, selon laquelle des couleurs identiques sont observées la moitié du temps. Comme 1/2 est strictement plus petit que 5/9, cela signifie que la seconde caractéristique des données ne respecte pas l'inégalité de Bell, et il y a une contradiction. Autrement dit, ce que requiert la première caractéristique des données est interdit par la seconde. d. Analyse de l'argument L'argument de Bell est globalement un raisonnement par l'absurde : partant de certaines hypothèses, il parvient à une contradiction. Cela suppose donc logiquement qu'au moins une des hypothèses soit fausse. Celles-ci, nous l'avons dit, sont celles d'EPR, au nombre de deux : l'hypothèse de localité et l'hypothèse selon laquelle les prédictions théoriques de la mécanique quantique sont correctes sur ce genre d'expérience. Dès lors, s'il s'avère que la mécanique quantique est empiriquement adéquate, alors le monde doit être non-local, contrairement à ce que voudrait le sens commun et contrairement aux attentes d'Einstein (cf. p. 40). Aussi, suite à la parution de l'article de Bell, des physiciens se sont donné comme objectif de réaliser une expérience de type EPR-Bell afin de tester la validité des prédictions de la mécanique quantique3. Que le résultat de Bell puisse démontrer le caractère non-local du monde est un point qui ne fut pas tout de suite remarqué – et il faut reconnaître que l'article de Bell ne le mentionne pas explicitement. Les lecteurs de l'article de Bell se sont souvent limités au seul théorème et à sa conclusion : la contradiction avec les prédictions de la mécanique quantique. Autrement dit, ils n'ont pas inclus l'argument d'EPR préliminaire. Pour ces lecteurs, la conclusion est alors : ou bien l'hypothèse du théorème lui-même est fausse, c'est-à-dire les variables cachées locales sont impossibles, ou bien les prédictions de la mécanique quantique sont incorrectes. Donc si les prédictions de la mécanique quantique sont justes, Dans l'article original de Bell, la conclusion d'EPR est reprise à l'identique, et les « variables cachées » prennent la forme d'un paramètre inconnu, λ. 1 Bell cite explicitement l'argument d'EPR dans son article et s'appuie sur leur conclusion pour poursuivre son raisonnement. Il suppose donc, à raison, que l'argument d'EPR est valide (cf. p. 42). 2 Dans l'article de Bell, le raisonnement employé est plus compliqué que le simple dénombrement des 9 configurations possibles présenté par Mermin, mais il ne met pour autant pas en jeu la théorie de la mécanique quantique. 3 Cet aspect est développé p. 47. 46 c'est que les théories à variables cachées locales sont interdites. Aussi, dans une telle lecture, le résultat de Bell est souvent connu comme proscrivant (seulement) les théories à variables cachées locales. Or, comme nous l'avons dit précédemment, l'argument de Bell dit davantage que cela : combiné avec l'argument d'EPR, il permet d'interroger l'hypothèse de localité en toute généralité. Si les prédictions empiriques de la mécanique quantique sont valides, la conclusion est que le monde lui-même est nonlocal. Autrement dit, pour rendre compte du genre d'expérience considérée, toute théorie (et pas seulement celles à variables cachées) doit être non-locale1. Étant donné son importance, l'hypothèse de localité a naturellement attiré l'attention des physiciens et des philosophes. En l'analysant plus en détail, ils l'ont décomposée en plusieurs sous-hypothèses. L'intérêt d'une telle décomposition est qu'il suffit qu'une de ces sous-hypothèses soit fausse (et non pas que toutes soient fausses) pour que le théorème de Bell soit bloqué, et la contradiction évitée. Ont été distinguées par exemple une hypothèse de séparabilité (les deux particules partant de l'émetteur C peuvent être considérés comme formant deux systèmes distincts, et non pas comme un seul système) et différentes versions de l'hypothèse de localité (selon ce que la mesure effectuée en A ne peut pas modifier en B)2. Cela permet à certains d'affirmer que le résultat de Bell montre qu'un système (tel que les deux particules) doit parfois être considéré comme un tout inséparable, et ne peut être analysé comme étant composé de deux systèmes distincts, tandis que d'autres peuvent plutôt affirmer qu'un certain type de localité est interdit. Les discussions sur ce sujet mettent en jeu un certain niveau de technicité, et la communauté des spécialistes n'a pas tout à fait atteint de consensus. e. Le verdict expérimental Et si les prédictions de la mécanique quantique étaient fausses ? Considéré globalement, l'argument de Bell part de deux hypothèses, la localité et la validité des prédictions de la mécanique quantique, pour aboutir à une contradiction. L'une des façons d'échapper à la contradiction est donc que les prédictions de la mécanique quantique concernant l'expérience en question soient erronées. Si elles s'avèrent au contraire correctes, alors il faut se résoudre à ce que le monde soit non-local. Lorsque Bell publie son article, les prédictions de la mécanique quantique se sont montrées jusque-là en excellent accord avec toutes sortes d'expériences, mais le type d'expérience considéré par EPR ou Bell n'a jamais encore été réalisé. Il est donc possible que la mécanique quantique soit correcte partout, sauf justement sur ce type d'expérience. Et comme cela doit permettre de se prononcer sur les théories à variables cachées et sur la localité, on comprend que la réalisation de l'expérience en question puisse apparaître comme étant d'une importance cruciale. Cependant, après la parution de l'article de Bell, seuls quelques physiciens sont sensibles à cette importance, et les recherches correspondantes souffriront d'un manque de reconnaissance de la communauté physicienne pendant un certain nombre d'années. Au cours des années 70, quelques équipes américaines mènent les premières expériences qui testent, quoique imparfaitement, l'inégalité de Bell, donnant globalement raison à la mécanique quantique. L'expérience considérée aujourd'hui comme véritablement probante3 est réalisée en 1982 par l'équipe d'Aspect. Les résultats obtenus sont en 1 Rappelons la remarque faite à la note 60 p. 40 : nous supposons ici qu'il existe des faits à propos des résultats de mesure, contrairement à l'interprétation des mondes multiples. 2 Le détail des distinctions ou des appellations varie selon les auteurs. Cf. par exemple G. Grasshoff, S. Portmann et A. Wüthrich, « Minimal Assumption Derivation of a Bell-type Inequality », The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 56, 2005, p. 663-680 ; M. Redhead, op. cit. ; B. C. van Fraassen, op. cit. 3 Cette expérience est la première à incorporer une caractéristique importante de l'expérience considérée par Bell : la position du bouton des détecteurs en A et B peut être réglée même lorsque les deux électrons sont déjà partis de C et sont en chemin vers les détecteurs. En effet, si les boutons sont déjà réglés depuis un certain temps, on ne peut pas exclure que des signaux soient échangés entre les détecteurs, ce qui est proscrit par l'hypothèse de localité. 47 excellent accord avec les prédictions de la mécanique quantique, et correspondent à ceux indiqués dans l'article de Mermin (caractéristiques 1 et 2) : l'inégalité de Bell est violée. D'autres expériences ont ensuite confirmé plus amplement ces résultats, en s'approchant toujours plus des conditions idéales exigées par Bell ; les détecteurs ont été par exemple séparés d'une dizaine de kilomètres de la source1. Ainsi, il semble bien que l'une des hypothèses de Bell soit hors de cause : les prédictions de la mécanique quantique concernant l'expérience sont correctes. Puisque cette hypothèse n'est pas fausse, c'est celle de localité qui doit l'être. L'argument de Bell, épaulé par les expériences correspondantes, conduit ainsi à conclure que le monde lui-même est non-local. Revenant à l'argument d'EPR lui-même (cf. p. 40), on peut affirmer là aussi que c'est l'hypothèse de localité qui est fautive. Celle-là même qui demeurait implicite dans l'article, et semblait si raisonnable aux yeux d'Einstein, est en fait une hypothèse erronée. L'argument d'EPR, bien que logiquement valide, repose en fait sur une prémisse fausse. Nous devons nous résoudre à l'existence d' « actions fantomatiques à distance ». Malheureusement, Einstein s'éteignit peu avant la parution de l'article de Bell, et personne ne peut dire exactement quelle aurait été sa réaction à cet argument. De la métaphysique à l'expérience L'argument d'EPR a déclenché en son temps des discussions théoriques. À la question : « la mécanique quantique est-elle complète ? », les protagonistes ont opposé des arguments philosophiques, ou ayant trait à la bonne interprétation de la théorie. À aucun moment l'expérience n'a été, ou n'aurait pu être, d'un quelconque secours. L'argument de Bell a eu le mérite de changer cette situation. En faisant un lien entre l'hypothèse de l'exactitude des prédictions quantiques et l'hypothèse de localité, il permet aux physiciens qui testent en laboratoire la première hypothèse de conclure quelque chose concernant la seconde. Ainsi, le débat qui était jusque là philosophique est désormais scientifique et relève de l'expérience. L'historien des sciences Freire a ainsi intitulé un de ses articles « Lorsque la philosophie entre dans le laboratoire d'optique »2. C'est également ce que Mermin veut dire avec la phrase : « un fait – et non une doctrine métaphysique – était présenté pour réfuter [Einstein] ». Certains parleront aussi de « métaphysique expérimentale ». f. La non-localité Non-localité et communication En quoi consiste concrètement la non-localité dont est caractérisée le monde ? Voici une présentation qu'en fait A. Aspect : « Un observateur assis derrière [un des récepteurs, en A,] voit seulement une série apparemment aléatoire de [lumières rouges ou vertes], et en faisant ainsi des mesures uniquement de son côté il ne peut s'apercevoir qu'un opérateur distant [en B] vient de changer [le réglage du bouton de l'autre détecteur]. Dès lors, devrions-nous conclure qu'il n'y a rien de particulièrement remarquable dans cette expérience ? Pour convaincre le lecteur du contraire, je suggère que nous prenions le point de vue d'un observateur externe, qui rassemble les données provenant des deux [récepteurs, distants de plusieurs kilomètres,] et qui compare les deux séries de résultats. [...] En étudiant les données a posteriori, on trouve que la corrélation [entre les lumières émises par les deux récepteurs pour une même exécution de l'expérience] change aussitôt que [le réglage du bouton d'un des détecteurs] est modifié, dans un délai qui ne permet pas la propagation d'un signal : cela reflète la non-séparabilité quantique. »3 Aspect insiste sur le fait que la non-localité (qu'il appelle « non-séparabilité ») apparaît seulement 1 Cf. par exemple A. Aspect, « Bell's Inequality Test: More Ideal Than Ever », Nature, vol. 398, mars 1999, p. 189-190. 2 Freire, op. cit. 3 Aspect, op. cit., p. 190. La citation est ici reformulée pour concerner la situation expérimentale considérée par Mermin. 48 lorsqu'on compare deux résultats de mesures, effectuées l'une en A et l'autre en B ; si on considère uniquement les résultats obtenus en A, la non-localité n'apparaît pas. En effet, quel que soit le réglage du bouton du détecteur en B (et même si on place une brique devant le détecteur B de sorte que la particule n'y arrive pas), les données obtenues en A ont toujours les mêmes caractéristiques, vues de A : statistiquement, la lumière qui s'allume est une fois sur deux verte, une fois sur deux rouge. En moyenne, il n'y a pas plus de vert ou plus de rouge parce qu'en B le réglage du bouton a été placé sur une autre position. Vu de A, il n'y a aucun moyen de savoir quoi que ce soit sur le réglage fait en B. Cela signifie que, si deux personnes sont placées l'une en A et l'autre en B, le réglage du détecteur fait par la personne en B, ou le fait qu'une mesure soit effectuée tout court, ne peut être connu de la personne en A à partir des couleurs qui s'allument devant elle (dès lors qu'elle n'a accès à rien d'autre qu'à cela). Ainsi, l'expérience de Bell ne peut servir en tant que telle à envoyer des messages entre deux personnes, et la non-localité ne permet pas de communication directe. Une interaction instantanée Voyons une autre caractéristique de la non-localité dont parle A. Aspect. Supposons que les particules partent de C alors que les réglages des boutons sont différents, mais que, avant qu'elles n'atteignent les récepteurs en A et B, un changement soit parfois effectué (un des boutons est tourné, de sorte que les deux boutons aient maintenant même orientation). Ce qu'on observe expérimentalement est conforme aux caractéristiques présentées par Mermin : lorsque ce changement n'est pas effectué, les lumières observées en A et B ne sont pas toujours les mêmes ; lorsque le changement est effectué, les lumières en A et B sont strictement corrélées, toujours de la même couleur. Le fait que les résultats changent ainsi traduit une interaction non-locale entre A et B, qui permet aux particules de « savoir » si elles doivent indiquer des couleurs corrélées. Et ce qui est important est que les expériences montrent que ces caractéristiques sont valables quel que soit le moment auquel le bouton est tourné (même s'il s'agit du dernier moment avant que les particules n'entrent dans les récepteurs), et quelle que soit la distance qui sépare les récepteurs. Il n'est donc pas possible de prendre de court la Nature sur ces statistiques. L'interaction non-locale qui corrèle les couleurs n'est limitée par aucune vitesse de propagation ; elle est instantanée et agit à distance. Cet état de fait est parfaitement original. Albert et Galchen nous ont rappelé que, dans notre expérience quotidienne, tous les événements semblent se produire avec une caractéristique de localité, conformément à l'intuition que nous avons. Pour toutes les autres interactions physiques connues, la Nature ne procède jamais de façon non-locale. Toutes les forces entre les particules se propagent de proche en proche, progressivement au cours du temps. Même si leur propagation peut être très rapide, à la vitesse de la lumière (300 000 kilomètres par seconde, soit une distance comme le tour de la Terre en près d'un dixième de seconde), elle n'est jamais instantanée. Jusqu'à la mécanique quantique, les théories scientifiques ont proscrit l'action instantanée à distance. La gravitation, qui était une force instantanée dans la théorie de Newton, a par exemple été remplacée, dans la théorie de la relativité générale, par une interaction qui se propage dans l'espace et le temps. On considère généralement que les lois de la physique, à travers la théorie de la relativité restreinte, énoncent que la vitesse de propagation des signaux physiques a une borne maximum, qui est la vitesse de la lumière. Lorsqu'Aspect écrit : « la corrélation [...] change [...] dans un délai qui ne permet pas la propagation d'un signal », il veut justement dire que la vitesse de l'interaction non-locale est supérieure à la vitesse de la lumière. Cela est l'occasion de poser la question d'un possible conflit entre la nonlocalité et la théorie de la relativité : le fait que l'interaction non-locale se propage instantanément n'estil pas contradictoire avec l'existence d'une vitesse limite imposée la relativité ? Une réponse brève est : il n'y a pas de conflit sur ce point, parce que la vitesse limite en relativité concerne la propagation de signaux, or l'interaction non-locale ne permet justement pas de transmettre des signaux, ainsi que nous 49 l'avons vu ci-dessus1. Une interaction spécifique et non atténuée Une autre caractéristique de l'interaction quantique à distance est qu'elle est spécifique : elle ne relie que les deux particules issues de C, et ne concerne pas les autres particules alentour (il s'agit d'un « arrangement privé »2, ou d'une « forme d'intimité », selon Albert et Galchen). Cette caractéristique aussi est en opposition avec les caractéristiques de toutes les autres forces physiques connues. La force de gravitation, par exemple, est universelle : la Terre attire tous les corps (la chaise ici, l'arbre là, le satellite au-dessus, le Soleil, etc.) et réciproquement. Notons que l'interaction quantique non-locale existe entre les deux particules de l'expérience seulement parce que celles-ci ont été préparées dans la source d'une certaine façon. Il est impossible, par exemple, de créer arbitrairement et spontanément une interaction non-locale entre deux particules éloignées. L'interaction non-locale peut affecter tout type de particules (électrons, neutrons, photons, atomes, etc.) ; ce qui compte n'est pas la nature des particules elles-mêmes, mais la préparation adéquate de celles-ci dans une source. Enfin, la non-localité est insensible à la distance entre les deux particules. Si les premières expériences séparaient les particules de quelques mètres, elles le font aujourd'hui d'une dizaine de kilomètres, et rien n'interdit en principe de les séparer de la distance d'une galaxie. Cette caractéristique est là encore en opposition avec celles de toutes les autres interactions physiques connues, pour lesquelles la force s'atténue avec la distance. L'interaction non-locale est également insensible au type de matériau qui se trouve entre les deux particules. 4. L'expérience de Bell et les interprétations quantiques La non-localité du monde n'est pas, nous l'avons souligné dans la section précédente, un résultat tributaire de la théorie de la mécanique quantique. L'argument de Bell (qui ne suppose pas la théorie de la mécanique quantique) associé aux données expérimentales obtenues par Aspect et ses collaborateurs, suffisent à démontrer l'existence d'influences non-locales dans la Nature. Dès lors qu'on reconnaît l'existence de résultats de mesure3, la preuve de l'existence de cette non-localité ne dépend pas de la mécanique quantique, et donc pas plus de son interprétation. C'est la Nature elle-même qui est nonlocale, indépendamment de notre théorie quantique actuelle. Néanmoins, puisque la théorie de la mécanique quantique entend rendre compte d'un monde non-local, elle doit elle-même refléter cette non-localité. Cette section étudie comment chaque interprétation quantique exprime cette non-localité, et explique les résultats de l'expérience de Bell. a. Selon l'interprétation orthodoxe Mermin affirme dans son article que, pour rendre compte des données observées dans l'expérience de Bell, il n'existe pas d'explication classique, c'est-à-dire d'explication en dehors de la mécanique quantique. Si la Nature ne donne pas d'ensemble d'instructions aux particules, comment procède-t-elle ? 1 Le conflit entre mécanique quantique et relativité est en réalité plus subtil et complexe que cela. Cf. par exemple la suite de l'article d'Albert et Galchen commenté ici ; cf. également J. Berkovitz, « Action at a Distance in Quantum Mechanics », dans Zalta, op. cit., http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2013/entries/qm-action-distance/, 2013 ; T. Maudlin, Quantum Non-Locality and Relativity, Malden (MA) et Oxford, Blackwell, 2002, seconde édition. Une autre théorie plus générale que la mécanique quantique, la théorie quantique des champs, prend en compte les effets de la relativité. 2 Maudlin, op. cit., p. 23. 3 Cf. note 61, p. 40. 50 Le système quantique Utiliser la mécanique quantique orthodoxe requiert de commencer par spécifier un système1. Dans l'expérience de Bell, le système comprend les deux particules produites par la source C, considérées ensemble. Le fait que, dans la théorie, les deux particules constituent un seul et même système provient du fait qu'elles ont été physiquement préparées ensemble et qu'elles ont été liées d'une façon particulière. On peut définir globalement un état pour les deux particules, mais pas un état individuel pour chaque particule. L'état initial des particules Pour expliquer l'expérience de Bell, commençons par quelques considérations préliminaires. Imaginons une autre expérience, dans laquelle il n'existe qu'une seule particule qui est envoyée vers le détecteur A. Si la particule est préparée de telle sorte à toujours faire allumer la lumière « rouge », alors on note son état « | rouge >A » (l'indice A signifie que cela concerne le détecteur A). Des états plus compliqués ont été étudiés au chap. 3 : si la particule donne une fois sur deux « rouge » et une fois sur deux « vert », on dit que la particule est dans un état superposé entre « rouge » et « vert », noté | rouge >A + | vert >A. (éq. 7) Considérons maintenant deux particules, qui se dirigent l'une vers A et l'autre vers B, et qui sont chacune dans l'état superposé de l'éq. 7. Pour le système constitué de ces deux particules, l'état global s'obtient en juxtaposant simplement les deux états : ( rouge >A + | vert >A) ( rouge >B + | vert >B). (éq. 8) Dans cette expression, ce qui concerne la particule allant vers A est séparé de ce qui concerne la particule allant vers B, avec des parenthèses distinctes. Revenons à présent à l'expérience de Bell, en supposant par exemple que les réglages des deux boutons sont identiques, en position 1. Ici, l'état pour les deux particules n'est pas simplement celui de l'éq. 8. Il est davantage mélangé et s'écrit : | rouge >A | rouge >B + | vert >A | vert >B. (éq. 9) La différence avec l'éq. 8 est que dans cet état, les deux termes de chaque côté du « + » ont chacun quelque chose qui concerne A (en indice) et quelque chose qui concerne B. Cela signifie qu'on ne peut pas séparer les états des deux particules, qui sont intimement mêlés2 – on dit que les états sont « intriqués ». C'est de ce genre d'états dont parlent Albert et Galchen dans le premier texte ; les propriétés quantiques qu'on attribue concernent le système des deux particules dans son ensemble (par exemple : l'écart entre les particules est de deux mètres) et non uniquement telle ou telle particule (par exemple : telle particule a telle position). On ne peut attribuer individuellement de propriété à une particule seule, car les probabilités pour une particule dépendent étroitement de ce qu'il advient de l'autre particule. Cette non-séparabilité conceptuelle est le germe de la non-localité qui va se manifester dans l'expérience de Bell. Lorsque les lumières s'allument Lorsque les particules arrivent dans leur détecteur respectif, une opération de « mesure » se produit. Durant cette mesure, l'état est projeté ou réduit3. Supposons par exemple que la particule A arrive dans son détecteur un peu avant la particule B dans le sien. Pour A, l'état intriqué (éq. 9) indique qu'il y a une chance sur deux que la lumière verte s'allume, 1 Cf. p. 14 2 En essayant de réécrire l'expression, on ne peut pas mettre d'un côté ce qui relève de A et de l'autre ce qui relève de B, comme dans l'éq. 8. 3 Cf. p. 15. 51 et une chance sur deux que la lumière rouge s'allume. Supposons par exemple que ce soit la lumière rouge qui s'allume ; quel est l'état après la mesure ? Comme c'est la lumière rouge qui s'est allumée pour A, c'est en quelque sorte le terme « | rouge >A » de « | rouge >A | rouge >B » qui a gagné (dans l'éq. 9) sur le terme « | vert >A » de « | vert >A | vert >B ». Aussi, la mécanique quantique énonce que l'état est réduit sur le premier terme, et vaut donc après la mesure : | rouge >A | rouge >B. (éq. 10) Avec un tel état, la mécanique quantique prédit avec certitude du rouge en A (ce qui vient d'être observé) et du rouge en B (ce qui sûr à 100 % d'être observé). Récapitulons : après que du rouge a été observé en A (avec 50 % de chances), la théorie quantique permet de prédire assurément du rouge en B. De façon analogue, si du vert avait été observé en A, la théorie aurait prédit du vert en B1. Autrement dit, l'état de l'éq. 9 est l'objet théorique au moyen duquel la mécanique quantique fournit des prédictions correctes, et c'est lui qui fournit l'explication orthodoxe de l'expérience de Bell. Ainsi, la mécanique quantique orthodoxe a rempli l'objectif attendu, sans faire transporter d'instructions aux particules. La non-localité orthodoxe En quoi exactement cette solution orthodoxe est-elle non-locale ? Deux caractéristiques sont essentielles : tout d'abord, l'existence d'un état intriqué comme celui de l'éq. 9, qui associe étroitement les deux particules au point qu'on ne puisse pas définir indépendamment un état pour chaque particule ; ensuite, la règle de projection de l'état lors d'une mesure, qui permet une modification instantanée de l'état du système (il s'agit d'une des deux règles d'évolution de l'état, l'autre étant l'équation de Schrödinger). La projection agissant sur un système dans un état intriqué a des conséquences particulières : alors que la mesure concerne seulement la particule qui est arrivée en A, la projection agit sur l'état de tout le système, composé ici des deux particules. C'est ainsi qu'une mesure sur une particule en A peut modifier les probabilités qui concernent l'autre particule, arrivant en B. De plus, cette projection a lieu de façon instantanée et s'applique sans atténuation aucune quelle que soit la distance entre les deux particules (ou les deux détecteurs). On peut donc considérer qu'elle est une forme d'action instantanée à distance (« fantomatique »), et en cela, elle viole la condition de localité d'EPR. Dans la mécanique quantique orthodoxe, la non-localité réside ainsi dans la règle de projection (ou de réduction) de l'état, agissant sur un état intriqué. b. Selon l'interprétation de Bohm L'interprétation de Bohm propose une lecture radicalement différente de l'origine de la non-localité. Notons que cela doit être évidemment le cas, puisque l'interprétation de Bohm ne reconnaît pas la règle de projection par laquelle se manifeste la non-localité orthodoxe. Ce qui remplace cette règle, dans la mécanique bohmienne, est l'équation-pilote, qui détermine les positions des particules à partir de la fonction d'onde2. Ce qui est important dans cette équation est que la position d'une particule dépend des positions des autres particules, de façon instantanée et à distance. Ainsi, si une particule subit certaines interactions (par exemple avec un appareil de mesure), et se déplace en conséquence, l'équation-pilote pourra entraîner des modifications de la trajectoire de l'autre particule. Autrement dit, dans le cas de l'expérience de Bell, si une mesure est effectuée en A sur une des particules, la trajectoire de l'autre particule est affectée instantanément. On pourrait objecter que modifier la position ou la trajectoire d'une particule n'est pas la même chose 1 Nous nous sommes restreints ici au cas où les réglages des boutons des détecteurs sont identiques. S'ils sont différents, l'état considéré dans l'éq. 9 permet aussi de prédire les statistiques correctes. 2 Cf. chap. 4. 52 que modifier sa couleur, qui est la quantité mesurée dans l'expérience de Bell. La réponse à cette objection est que la mesure d'une quantité physique quelconque peut toujours se réduire à (ou s'exprimer en fonction de) la mesure de positions des particules bohmiennes1. Aussi, mesurer la couleur d'une particule (« rouge » ou « verte ») revient à mesurer sa position, ce qui influe sur la fonction d'onde du système, donc modifie la position de l'autre particule, et finalement modifie les probabilités que celle-ci ait telle ou telle couleur. Cela se fait instantanément, quelle que soit la distance entre les deux particules. C'est ainsi que, à partir de l'équation-pilote, l'interprétation de Bohm rend compte de la non-localité. c. Selon l'interprétation des mondes multiples L'interprétation des mondes multiples a jusqu'à présent été écartée des discussions sur la non-localité2, en raison de son statut particulier : contrairement au sens commun, elle nie en général l'existence de faits ou de résultats de mesure. Par exemple, si une mesure de couleur est effectuée sur la particule en A, l'interprétation des mondes multiples considère qu'il n'y a pas de résultat concernant la couleur. Elle considère que dans un monde, la couleur « rouge » a été obtenue, tandis que dans un autre monde, la couleur « verte » a été obtenue. Et aucun des deux mondes n'est plus réel ou plus légitime que l'autre. Les arguments d'EPR et de Bell Aussi, il est assez facile de comprendre que la plupart des arguments habituels, qui supposent implicitement l'existence de résultats de mesure, ne peuvent plus être utilisés avec l'interprétation des mondes multiples. Reprenons tout d'abord l'argument d'EPR présenté p. 41. Une des phrases de l'argumentation reconstruite est : « À l'instant t, le détecteur en A reçoit une particule et émet brièvement une lumière (par exemple, verte) ». Autrement dit, EPR supposent qu'il existe bien au temps t un résultat de mesure, par exemple une lumière verte. Il s'agit là d'une hypothèse implicite que ne reconnaît pas l'interprétation des mondes multiples. Celle-ci considère en effet qu'il n'y a pas un résultat de mesure, puisque les lumières verte et rouge sont obtenues chacun dans un monde. Par conséquent, l'argument d'EPR ne peut plus s'appliquer si on adopte l'interprétation des mondes multiples, et la conclusion d'incomplétude n'en découle plus. Il en va de même pour l'argument de Bell, qui prolonge l'argument d'EPR, et qui suppose également l'existence de résultats de mesure. Par conséquent, l'argument de Bell ne peut plus s'appliquer avec l'interprétation des mondes multiples, et il ne permet plus d'en déduire que le monde est non-local. Effectivement, l'interprétation des mondes multiples décrit un monde ou un univers local. Il n'existe aucune sorte d'interaction instantanée à distance ; l'évolution de la fonction d'onde est locale et continue, selon l'équation de Schrödinger. Rappelons que la non-localité dans l'interprétation orthodoxe vient de la réduction de la fonction d'onde, qui est ici absente ; dans celle de Bohm, la position des particules ponctuelles rentrent en jeu, mais elles n'existent pas ici. Ainsi, la mécanique quantique everettienne conserve une caractéristique de notre monde habituel – même si la multiplicité de mondes, quant à elle, l'en éloigne de façon décisive. Explication de l'expérience de Bell Comment l'interprétation des mondes multiples explique-t-elle les résultats de l'expérience de Bell, dans un univers local ? Considérons pour cela l'état des deux particules à leur sortie de l'émetteur C, décrit par l'éq. 9 (cf. ci-dessus), | rouge >A | rouge >B + | vert >A | vert >B. Lorsqu'une mesure est 1 Cf. p. 22. 2 Cf. note 61, p. 40. 53 effectuée en A, ce qui était initialement un seul monde se sépare en deux mondes1 : dans l'un, le détecteur en A a émis une lumière rouge, dans l'autre une lumière verte. Puis, le détecteur en B reçoit l'autre particule, et là le résultat dépend du monde considéré : dans l'un, une lumière rouge, dans l'autre, une verte. Et le point crucial est le suivant : à cause de l'état particulier dans lequel se trouvent les particules, le monde dans lequel du rouge a été obtenu en B est le même que celui dans lequel du rouge a été obtenu en A. Si les résultats obtenus en A et B sont comparés, on note un accord, quel que soit le monde considéré : rouge-rouge, ou vert-vert. Bien que l'interprétation des mondes multiples ne reconnaisse pas de fait à propos d'une mesure particulière, elle reconnaît ici qu'il existe un fait à propos de l'accord entre les deux mesures en A et en B. d. Conclusion Ainsi, chaque interprétation quantique parvient à rendre compte des résultats de l'expérience de Bell d'une façon qui lui est propre. Alors que l'interprétation orthodoxe et l'interprétation bohmienne décrivent un monde non-local, l'interprétation des mondes multiples maintient une localité dans le monde – ou plutôt dans les mondes. Même sur l'explication de la violation de l'inégalité de Bell, les différentes interprétations de la mécanique quantique ne s'accordent pas. 1 Avant la mesure, il s'agit ici encore d'un seul monde, dans lequel il y a un état superposé. Puis l'interaction physique entre l'appareil de mesure et la particule qui arrive en A entraîne une décohérence de l'état décrivant les deux particules, ce qui se traduit par une bifurcation de mondes. 54 Table des matières Introduction ................................................................................................................................................3 Chapitre 1 – L'image quantique du monde ................................................................................................4 1 . La mécanique quantique ...................................................................................................................4 a . Le monde des atomes ...................................................................................................................4 b . Une théorie fondamentale ............................................................................................................4 c . Aperçu historique .........................................................................................................................5 d . Controverses interprétatives ........................................................................................................6 2 . Représentation scientifique et image du monde ...............................................................................7 a . L'image du monde ........................................................................................................................7 b . (Anti-)réalisme .............................................................................................................................7 3 . Des problèmes philosophiques ? ......................................................................................................8 Chapitre 2 – Qu'est-ce qu'interpréter une théorie physique ? ...................................................................10 1 . L'interprétation d'un énoncé ...........................................................................................................10 2 . L'interprétation d'une théorie physique ..........................................................................................10 a . Limites de la conception logique de l'interprétation ..................................................................10 b . À quoi sert une interprétation ? ..................................................................................................11 c . Définition de l'interprétation : aperçu historique .......................................................................11 La conception syntaxique des théories .......................................................................................11 La conception sémantique des théories ......................................................................................12 Bilan ...........................................................................................................................................12 d . Une définition de travail de l'interprétation ...............................................................................13 e . Une théorie physique a-t-elle vraiment besoin d'une interprétation ? .......................................13 Chapitre 3 – L'interprétation orthodoxe ...................................................................................................15 1 . Formulation de la théorie ...............................................................................................................15 a . L'état d'un système quantique ....................................................................................................15 b . Résultat d'une mesure et probabilités ........................................................................................16 c . Évolution de l'état ......................................................................................................................16 En-dehors d'une mesure .............................................................................................................17 Lors d'une mesure ......................................................................................................................17 2 . L'image orthodoxe du monde .........................................................................................................17 a . Entités et propriétés ....................................................................................................................17 De quoi se compose le monde ? .................................................................................................17 Lorsque des propriétés ne sont pas définies ...............................................................................17 Par quel(s) trou(s) est passé l'électron ? .....................................................................................18 b . Faits expérimentaux ...................................................................................................................18 c . Un monde indéterministe ...........................................................................................................19 d . Monde quantique, monde classique ...........................................................................................19 3 . Le problème de la mesure ..............................................................................................................20 Chapitre 4 – L'interprétation de Bohm .....................................................................................................21 1 . Présentation générale ......................................................................................................................21 2 . La formulation de la mécanique bohmienne ..................................................................................21 3 . L'image bohmienne du monde .......................................................................................................22 a . Entités et propriétés ....................................................................................................................22 b . Des résultats contextuels ............................................................................................................23 55 c . Un monde déterministe ..............................................................................................................24 Chapitre 5 – L'interprétation des mondes multiples .................................................................................25 1 . Présentation et formulation de la mécanique quantique everettienne ............................................25 a . L'équation de Schrödinger comme seule loi d'évolution ...........................................................25 b . Mesure et superpositions ...........................................................................................................25 c . Une autre version du problème de la mesure .............................................................................26 d . La solution everettienne .............................................................................................................27 Une multiplicité de mondes .......................................................................................................27 Quel sens lui donner ? ................................................................................................................27 Définition des mondes ...............................................................................................................27 Quelles prédictions ? ..................................................................................................................28 2 . L'image everettienne du monde ......................................................................................................28 a . Entités et propriétés ....................................................................................................................28 b . Des faits et des états relatifs .......................................................................................................29 c . Un univers déterministe .............................................................................................................29 d . Absence de séparation classique/quantique ...............................................................................29 Chapitre 6 – Synthèse comparative des interprétations ...........................................................................30 1 . Des interprétations quantiques si différentes, mais équivalentes ...................................................30 a . Synthèse des caractéristiques des interprétations quantiques ....................................................30 b . Des faits différents .....................................................................................................................30 c . Des prédictions différentes, sans neutralité possible .................................................................31 d . Néanmoins, une équivalence empirique ....................................................................................31 2 . Pour ou contre ? Quelques arguments en (dé)faveur de ces interprétations ...................................32 a . Cohérence ..................................................................................................................................32 b . Simplicité ...................................................................................................................................32 c . Étendue ......................................................................................................................................33 d . Fécondité ....................................................................................................................................33 e . Conclusion .................................................................................................................................33 TEXTE 1 – David Z. Albert et Rivka Galchen, « Une menace quantique pour la relativité restreinte ? », Scientific American, mars 2009, p. 32-34. ...............................................................................................34 TEXTE 2 – David N. Mermin, « La Lune est-elle là lorsque personne ne regarde ? Réalité et théorie quantique », Physics Today, avril 1985, p. 38-44. ...................................................................................36 Commentaire ............................................................................................................................................40 1 . Introduction ....................................................................................................................................40 2 . L'article d'EPR ................................................................................................................................40 a . Contexte et motivations .............................................................................................................40 b . L'argument d'EPR ......................................................................................................................41 c . Structure et conséquences de l'argument ...................................................................................42 3 . L'argument de Bell .........................................................................................................................43 a . Introduction ................................................................................................................................43 b . Une présentation sous forme de « boîte noire » ........................................................................44 c . Structure de l'article ...................................................................................................................44 d . Analyse de l'argument ................................................................................................................46 e . Le verdict expérimental .............................................................................................................47 Et si les prédictions de la mécanique quantique étaient fausses ? .............................................47 De la métaphysique à l'expérience .............................................................................................48 f . La non-localité ............................................................................................................................48 56 Non-localité et communication ..................................................................................................48 Une interaction instantanée ........................................................................................................49 Une interaction spécifique et non atténuée ................................................................................49 4 . L'expérience de Bell et les interprétations quantiques ...................................................................50 a . Selon l'interprétation orthodoxe .................................................................................................50 Le système quantique .................................................................................................................50 L'état initial des particules .........................................................................................................50 Lorsque les lumières s'allument .................................................................................................51 La non-localité orthodoxe ..........................................................................................................51 b . Selon l'interprétation de Bohm ..................................................................................................52 c . Selon l'interprétation des mondes multiples ..............................................................................52 Les arguments d'EPR et de Bell .................................................................................................52 Explication de l'expérience de Bell ............................................................................................53 d . Conclusion .................................................................................................................................53

Who is the more Pragmatic Daoist – Laozi or Zhuangzi? In recent years, a philosophical position that was introduced in the late nineteenth century – known as pragmatism – has again become the vogue. In the world of academic philosophy, thinkers such as Richard Bernstein, James Conant, Hilary Putnam and Richard Rorty have brought it back into the mainstream of American thought. In the popular media, the word has been used with increasing frequency, especially in reference to President Barack Obama (albeit in a sense at which many professional philosophers might balk). Simply put, pragmatism has become a buzz word, and this rise in its popularity may help explain yet another increase – viz. in the number of philosophers outside of the United States, and from disparate schools of thought, who are being labeled "pragmatic" in recent scholarship. The area of philosophy which focuses on east-west comparison has seen such an increase, as well. Respected professionals like Roger Ames, Richard Shusterman, and Chad Hansen (among others) have given well researched and reasonable accounts of how various Chinese philosophies resonate with pragmatic themes. Interestingly, much of this work tends to focus on the Confucian tradition more than the school of thought known as Daoism. In what follows, I should like to offer a heuristic for this type of (admittedly anachronistic) consideration within the philosophies of the two most prominent daoist sages – Laozi and Zhuangzi. When applying the term pragmatism to thinkers who, like Laozi and Zhuangzi, are far removed from it in time and space, it is vitally important to make clear what is meant by 'pragmatism.' Like any "-ism," pragmatism has been so overused that it has been rendered nearly vacuous in contemporary discourse. Pragmatism has traversed a 2 rougher road than most, though, as it has been used, on occasion, to identify seemingly contradictory positions. 1 Moreover, in public consciousness, pragmatism has taken on a separate, non-technical meaning that is almost completely antithetical to its technical uses. Clearly, pragmatism seems to resist attempts at succinct definition, however, one angle of attack might be a delineation of the features that set pragmatism apart from other schools of thought. Thus, before turning our attention to which Daoist should be considered more pragmatic, some clean-up work is in order. Pragmatism grew up in a tumultuous time in American history, when thinkers were grasping at theoretical straws, hoping to find a way to make sense of the political and intellectual turmoil. It is often referred to as the only school of thought native to American soil. The commonly told story names Cambridge as its birthplace, where a group of young Harvard intellectuals (including C.S. Peirce, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and William James) met to discuss philosophy and science. Peirce is credited with coining the term pragmatism, Holmes with applying it to the law, James with popularizing its philosophical tenets and John Dewey – a student of Peirce and correspondent of James – with correcting many of its initial shortcomings. But, this account is simplistic and somewhat inaccurate, as pragmatism did not arise ex nihilo (springing up out of the ground) but instead brought together aspects of many other schools of thought, many of them just as "American" in origin. Hilary Putnam, for one, has argued that pragmatism can be distinguished by four basic theses: 1) antiskepticism, 2) fallibilism, 3) distrust of the fact/value distinction, and 1 Cf. the uses of pragmatism by contemporary thinkers like Richard Rorty and Susan Haack, or A.O. Lovejoy's famous polemic of "The Thirteen Pragmatisms" 3 4) an assertion that "practice is primary in philosophy." 2 Yet, it should be noted that pragmatism shares an emphasis on philosophical practicality with one of its precursors, transcendentalism, which came into its own with Emerson's 1836 essay "Nature." This fact has sometimes been overlooked in the literature but is significant nonetheless because transcendentalism laid the groundwork for pragmatism in several ways. With the appearance of Emerson's Phi Beta Kappa Address entitled "The American Scholar," transcendentalism made the first declaration of American intellectual independence. Many of the transcendentalists – most notably Thoreau and Margaret Fuller – published tracts on social and political issues of the day in addition to their philosophical offerings. Perhaps most importantly, the transcendentalists had a strong influence on the childhood of both Peirce and James, whose fathers were active in the social circles of the transcendentalist movement. Pragmatism also shares its antiskepticism and mistrust of the fact/value distinction with another American movement known as naturalism. While many pragmatists adopted some form of naturalist sentiments, the two lines of thought remain distinguishable. Naturalism, as the term was used during that time, was primarily an ontological view, whereas pragmatism was seen as more of an epistemological position. Historically, there have been self-identified naturalists who were not pragmatists (George Santayana) just as there have been pragmatists who did not subscribe to naturalism (Josiah Royce). Thus, the only one of Putnam's four theses that might be unique to pragmatism is its fallibilism, and though it certainly is a feature of other philosophies, pragmatism offers perhaps the only systematic treatment of the idea – viz. Peirce's notion of inquiry, which 2 Putnam, Hilary. "Pragmatism and Moral Objectivity." In Words and Life. Ed. by J. Conant (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994) pg. 152 4 was later expounded upon by Dewey. In a nutshell, their view drew heavily upon philosophical realizations about the scientific method. As Peirce put it, "In sciences in which men come to agreement, when a theory has been broached it is considered to be on probation until this agreement is reached." 3 Dewey echoed this sentiment, years later, with his instrumentalist view, which called for philosophers to give up their hopeless "quest for certainty." 4 On their view, the search for knowledge was a ceaseless endeavor, and, as such, those who took it up were required to continuously revise and adjust their beliefs. It would seem that while Putnam's four theses are necessary conditions in calling a particular view pragmatic, a robust fallibilism might be the only one that is sufficient as well. In the very least it seems to be the deciding factor for determining if any particular thinker can properly be called pragmatic. Therefore, using Putnam's work as a heuristic device, we might better discern which daoist sage offered the more pragmatic vision. I will begin my analysis of pragmatism and the dào with Laozi, who is traditionally believed to be Zhuangzi's predecessor. 5 According to legend, when Laozi was asked to put his ideas on paper by a border official in exchange for passage, he penned the Dàodéjīng [道德經]. A collection of 81 chapters in verse form, the Dàodéjīng (or "Classic of the Way and Virtue") is considered the most important text in the Daoist canon. The main topics of the text are the metaphysics of dào [道], or "the way," and how these notions can be applied in moral life to attain "virtue," i.e. dé [德]. Commentators have disagreed about which of these two components is the main focus of the text. Those 3 Peirce, C.S. "The Rules of Philosophy," from Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce. ed. by Charles Hartshorne and Paul Weiss. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1934) pgs 156-158 4 cf. Dewey, John. The Quest for Certainty – The Collected Works of John Dewey, 1882-1953. 37 volumes. (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1967-1987) LW 4 5 Although the accuracy of this claim has been called into question more recently, my objective is to analyze the philosophical notions only, and therefore I will follow the canonical account throughout the remainder of this essay. 5 who give primacy to the former, typically interpret the Dàodéjīng as a mystical document, whereas their opponents usually view it as a moral treatise. Evidence of this debate can be found in the various translations of the first line of the text, which reads (in the Hanyu Pinyin romanization) dào kě dào fēi cháng dào 6 , which is most often translated along the lines of, "The way that can be spoken of is not the constant Way." 7 This may be seen as a declaration of the ineffability of dào, and ipso facto, evidence for a mystical reading. However, another way to read this first line might be, "The path worth following is not an unchanging one." This would render the text not as an endorsement of ineffability, but rather as advancing a normative principle intended to show that the best course (or dào) of action is one that is open to revision, which would seem to be the epitome of fallibilism. For now, I will leave this issue aside in order to focus on other passages from the text that seem to relate to pragmatist precepts. The most obvious feature that the Dàodéjīng shares in common with pragmatism is the dissolution of the fact/value distinction, i.e. the separation of descriptive from prescriptive claims. Chinese philosophy, in general, tends to be far less dualistic than its Western counterpart, and Daoism is perhaps the most holistic of all the major Chinese schools of thought. The theme permeates the Dàodéjīng. For example, in chapter 42, we are told that living organisms are the embodiment of nature's generative forces (yīn and yáng) and thus doing violence against them inevitably leads to an unnatural end. However, the passage that is most indicative of Laozi's aversion to an "is-ought" dichotomy is found in Chapter 51, which reads, "the way is revered and virtue honored 6 Literally: "Way worthy of Way, not unchanging Way." 7 Laozi, Tao Te Ching. Tr. by D.C. Lau (New York: Penguin, 1963) Chpt. 1 6 not because this is decreed by any authority but because it is natural for them to be treated so." 8 Laozi's emphasis on the practicality of ideas is nearly as obvious. As chapter 8 states, "In a home it is the site that matters; In quality of mind it is depth that matters; In an ally it is benevolence that matters; In speech it is good faith that matters; In government it is order that matters; In affairs it is ability that matters; In action it is timeliness that matters." 9 Here Laozi offers a view of practicality that is not based on utility alone but rather one that seeks a firm foundation. To put this into the language of the pragmatist, particularly that of Peirce and of Dewey, the usefulness of an idea is not based upon the "cash value" it holds for an individual but for the directive, i.e. the "laboratory habit," that presents itself to others as a repeatable experiment. In the eleventh chapter of the Daodejing, we find a passage that could have just as easily come from the writings of Peirce or Dewey. It reads, Thirty spokes share one hub. Adapt the nothing therein to the purpose in hand, and you will have the use of the cart. Knead clay in order to make a vessel. Adapt the nothing therein to the purpose in hand, and you will have the use of the vessel. Cut out doors and windows in order to make a room. Adapt the nothing therein to the purpose in hand, and you will have the use of the room. Thus what we gain is Something, yet it is by virtue of Nothing that this can be put to use. 10 The similarities between this passage and Dewey's notion of the "indeterminate situation" are striking. As Dewey put it, What is designated by the word "situation" is not a single object or event or set of objects and events. For we never experience nor form judgments about objects and events in isolation, but only in connection with a contextual whole...an object or event is always a special part, phase, or aspect, of an environing experienced world – a situation. 11 8 Ibid. Chpt. 51 9 Ibid. Chpt. 8 10 Ibid. Chpt. 11 11 Dewey, John. Logic: The Theory of Inquiry – The Collected Works of John Dewey, 1882-1953. 37 volumes. (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1967-1987) LW 12:72 [Dewey's emphasis] 7 Laozi tells us that the use of some object comes from somewhere (or, more properly, from nowhere) outside of it. Though not mentioned explicitly in this passage, we are likely meant to understand this "Nothing" as representative of dào. According to Dewey, we move from an indeterminate situation to a "determinate" one when we discover the directive that gets us back into the flow of life-experience. Coincidentally or not, Laozi's use of similar metaphors for dào (comparing it to water) elicits a picture of it as a malleable and dynamic principle. In order to answer whether or not the Dàodéjīng shares pragmatism's rejection of skepticism, we must revisit our dilemma concerning how to read Laozi, whether as a mystic or as a fallibilist. The reason for this is that the pragmatists saw fallibilism as the only viable alternative between skepticism and dogmatism. If Laozi is to be considered a mystic, then his view of knowledge would fall into the latter camp. Thinkers from ages past (Kant for one) also sought a via media between these epistemological extremes, yet the American thinkers who cultivated pragmatism had one advantage – Darwin's theory of evolution. 12 As a mathematician and scientist, Peirce saw the similarities between Darwin's idea and his own work on probability theory and "the law of errors." In the 1870s he began to apply the upshots of evolution in his philosophical writings, as well. James (who as a young man was the research assistant of the leading American creationist, Louis Aggassiz) seemed less affected by Darwin in his early career, but would later apply the principle to his work in psychology. Dewey, however, was perhaps the greatest advocate of Darwinism among the major American 12 When the Origin of the Species appeared in 1859, Peirce was twenty years old, Holmes was eighteen, James seventeen, and Dewey was still an infant. 8 pragmatists, as his essay, "The Influence of Darwinism on Philosophy," reveals. He wrote, In laying hands upon the sacred ark of absolute permanency, in treating the forms that had been regarded as types of fixity and perfection as originating and passing away, the Origin of Species introduced a mode of thinking that in the end was bound to transform the logic of knowledge, and hence the treatment of morals, politics and religion. 13 The mode of thinking to which Dewey alluded is fallibilism. The pragmatists realized that even though human inquiry cannot attain absolute certainty, we need not resign ourselves to a position of blind doubt. Accordingly, we can know some things, tentatively speaking, simply by looking around and trying ideas out. Furthermore, because we have a faculty called memory, the lessons we learn in trying ideas out are cumulative. The ideas that worked in the past for our forbears come down to us through culture and tradition. When the environment changes, and we are faced with new conditions, those old ideas often have to be revised or even rejected. If we discover a new directive that brings us back into harmony with our surroundings, then we survive, if we cannot find such a rule, then we die. In their view, that was how knowledge worked; that was fallibilism. Though it is obvious that the ancient Chinese did not have the benefit of reading Darwin, there is evidence from the text that could be suggestive of a link between Daoist cosmology and a few of the natural principles upon which evolution is based, particularly an organic change among creatures and an emergent order in absentia of a divine creator. For instance, in the first chapter, we see Laozi's version of an origin story, "The nameless was the beginning of heaven and earth; The named was the mother of the myriad 13 Dewey, John. "The Influence of Darwinism on Philosophy" – The Collected Works of John Dewey, 1882-1953. 37 volumes. (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1967-1987) MW 4:3 9 creatures." 14 Later, in chapter 25 we are told that "the nameless" is only called dào because its name escapes us, There is a thing confusedly formed, Born before heaven and earth. Silent and void, It stands alone and does not change, Goes round and does not weary. It is capable of being the mother of the world. I know not its name, So I style it 'the way'." 15 Interestingly, Lau's translation of the rest of this chapter ends with, "Man models himself on earth, Earth on heaven, Heaven on the way, And the way on that which is naturally so." 16 The Chinese for the last line is, dào făn zì rán (literally: the way on self thus) and could readily be translated in a manner that invokes the principle of self-causation, instead. It would seem we are again stuck between an interpretive rock and a hard place. If we choose Lau's interpretation, then a comparison between the dào and evolutionary sentiments may get off the ground. If we read it in the alternate fashion, the text seems irrevocably mystical. Unfortunately, it seems that once the interpretive choice has been made, the remainder of the text can be read consistently in the preferred tone. Zhuangzi Misunderstood? Like Laozi, Zhuangzi's work seems largely open to interpretation. Comparatively speaking, there have been few Eastern commentaries on Zhuangzi's work because most Chinese literati after the 5 th century considered his ideas either dangerous or unintelligible. 17 Therefore, most recent interpretations have come from Western scholarship. In fact, in the early twentieth century, Zhuangzi's writings influenced the 14 Laozi, Tao Te Ching. Tr. by D.C. Lau (New York: Penguin, 1963) Chpt. 1 15 Ibid. Chpt. 25 16 Ibid. [my emphasis] 17 Cf. Chan, Wing-Tsit. The Source Book of Chinese Philosophy. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973) 10 work of thinkers such as Buber and Heidegger. Since then, many American thinkers (B. Watson, T. Cleary, V. Mair and P. Ivanhoe to mention only a few) have offered differing interpretations of his work that paint Zhuangzi as one or more of the following: a mystic, a quietist, a skeptic or a relativist. As mentioned, these characterizations hang on an interpretive choice, and in what follows I will offer a way to interpret Zhuangzi as a proto-pragmatist of sorts (as R. Ames and D. Hall have done) that is based on the very passages of the text from which these other characterizations are typically drawn. Many Westerners who read the Zhuangzi see the poetic and mythological elements of his prose as a rejection of rational ways of thinking. His depictions of giant fish that transform into birds, of turtles that are thousands of years old, and of men who drink the dew, ride the clouds, and drive a team of dragons are the main causes for the characterization of Zhuangzi as a mystic. While these stories are certainly fantastical, they do not necessarily lead to a mystical outlook. The dào, on Zhuangzi's view, does not occupy some higher plane of existence, nor does Zhuangzi advocate the sloughing off of this realm in favor of another (two concepts that are typically hallmarks of mysticism). Instead, Zhuangzi's tone is one of awe in the face of nature's wonders and his characterization of the dào is one of immanence, of a world hidden within the world, rather than one of transcendence. When Zhuangzi is asked where the dào exists, he replies, "There is nowhere that it doesn't exist...It is in the tiles and shards...It is in the piss and shit." 18 Zhuangzi's man of the dào (which he called the "true man" or zhēnrén) was not someone with his head in the clouds, but rather someone who was attuned to the natural world around him. As he put it, 18 Zhuangzi. The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu. Tr. by Burton Watson (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002.) pg. 241 11 The True Man of ancient times knew nothing of loving life, knew nothing of hating death. He emerged without delight; he went back in without a fuss. He came briskly, he went briskly, and that was all. He didn't forget where he began; he didn't try to find out where he would end. He received something and took pleasure in it; he forgot about it and handed it back again. This is what I call not using the mind to repel the Way, not using man to help out [Nature]. This is what I call the True Man. 19 This seems to suggest that Zhuangzi was a more of a naturalist than he was a mystic, and such a reading is supported by a line following the quoted passage, which states, "When man and [Nature] do not defeat each other, then we may be said to have the True Man." 20 The passage that is most often quoted in relation to Zhuangzi's quietism appears in chapter 17. In that story, when officials approached Zhuangzi with an offer from the ruler of Qu to join his court, Zhuangzi compared himself to a turtle, explaining that he would rather be alive and dragging his tail in the mud than be dead and venerated. 21 However, it is unlikely that Zhuangzi meant to advocate a hermit lifestyle with this passage, but rather one of not lowering one's standards for the sake of esteem. This becomes more evident in the subsequent parable wherein Hui Tzu is concerned about rumors that Zhuangzi may supplant him as prime minister of Liang. Upon his arrival, Zhuangzi says, In the south there is a bird called the Yuan-ch'u I wonder if you've ever heard of it? The Yuan-ch'u rises up from the South Sea and flies to the North Sea, and it will rest on nothing but the Wu-t'ung tree, eat nothing but the fruit of the Lien, and drink only from springs of sweet water. Once there was an owl who had gotten hold of a half-rotten old rat, and as the Yuan-ch'u passed by, it raised its head, looked up at the Yuan-ch'u, and said, 'Shoo!' Now that you have this Liang state of yours, are you trying to shoo me? 22 This could lead one to view Zhuangzi as a relativist, since what is good for the owl was not good for Yuan-ch'u. I believe such an interpretation is specious. Some scholars see relativism in passages such as, "A road is made by people walking on it; 19 Ibid. pg. 78 Watson translates the Chinese tiān as "Heaven," although the meaning in ancient China was more akin to "Nature." 20 Ibid. pg. 80 21 Ibid. pg. 187 22 Ibid. pg. 188 12 things are so because they are called so. What makes them so? Making them so makes them so," 23 as well as the story of the beauties Mao-Ch'iang and Lady Li (considered attractive by men but frightening to fish, birds and deer) which Zhuangzi concludes with, Of these four, which knows how to fix the standard of beauty for the world? The way I see it, the rules of benevolence and righteousness and the paths of right and wrong are all hopelessly snarled and jumbled" 24 Taken in isolation, these passages do seem to suggest a relativistic bent, however, when read in conjunction with other passages, such as, "If you want to nourish a bird with what nourishes a bird, then you should let it roost in the deep forest... concepts of right should be founded on what is suitable. This is what it means to have command of reason," it seems that Zhuangzi is not advocating relativism but rather reminding us to look for principles that are appropriate to the natural world.25 It seems Western readers have a tendency to conflate Zhuangzi's assertion that it is often difficult to distinguish right from wrong with the claim that both points of view are equally valid. Perhaps the most recognized passage from Zhuangzi's work is also the one that most commentators cite as evidence of Zhuangzi's skepticism. It recounts the story of Zhuangzi's dream that he was a butterfly. Upon waking, as the text explains, "he didn't know if he was Chuang Chou who had dreamt he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming he was Chuang Chou." 26 Many Western commentators see this as a precursor to Cartesian doubt. Yet, the passage continues with, "Between Chuang Chou and a butterfly there must be some distinction! This is called the Transformation of Things." 27 This last line shows that the point of the story is not to illustrate the limits of knowledge but to 23 Ibid. pg. 40 24 Ibid. pg. 25 Ibid. pgs. 194-195 26 Ibid. pg. 49 27 Ibid. 13 illustrate the metaphysical holism of the dào. The distinctions between the "myriad things," such as people and butterflies, indicate the dynamic nature of a universe in flux. As Roger Ames has written, "the myriad things are perturbations of hylozoistic energies that coordinate themselves to constitute the harmonious regularity that is dào." 28 This is best illustrated in the beginning of the second chapter, wherein it is explained that the pipings of earth, man, and Nature (tīan) resonate from the blowing of the same wind. As the last remark of that passage reads, "When blown, all of these openings sound differently, and each shows attunement in its own way; in each case the tune chooses itself, but who does the blowing?" 29 Because Zhuangzi's view of the dào is one of "an emergent, 'bottom-up' order rather than something imposed, any interpretation of dào that would reduce it to preexisting laws or principles that discipline the natural world in some necessary way would be problematic." 30 Simply put, on Zhuangzi's view, the dào is the emerging fixed order, or principle of continuity, that arises out of the flux of reality. Accordingly, the zhēnrén reflects a native vitality, or "spontaneity," that has a tendency to be lost in society at large by conventionality. The best way to recover that verve, according to Zhuangzi, would be through attunement with nature. By this, he did not mean for us merely to become more conscientious of our natural environment, though this was certainly a key element in his thought, but rather he hoped that a respect for the nature of all existents (the myriad things) could be fostered. The zhēnrén uses spontaneity and a "command of reason" to harmonize with the world around him. This objective is at one with that of pragmatic inquiry. 28 Ames, Wandering at Ease in the Zhuangzi. (New York, NY: SUNY Press, 1998) pg. 5 29 Zhuangzi, Chapter 2 [my translation] 30 Ames, pg. 7 14 As Zhuangzi would tell us, such harmony often requires innovation, not convention. Throughout his text, there are stories of physically deformed figures, particularly crippled men and crooked trees, that exhibit the highest virtue because they rest at ease within their own nature. For example, in the fourth chapter, a woodsman has a large holy-tree appear to him in a dream (after earlier rejecting it as useless). The tree says to him, "If I had been of some use, would I ever have grown this large?" The woodsman awakes and admits to his disciples that by judging this tree by conventional standards he was "way off." 31 Later in the same chapter another large, useless tree is likened to the sage insofar as neither can be exploited. In the fifth chapter, the story is told of a crippled man by the name of Shu who pays a visit to Confucius, but because of his awkward appearance, receives an unkind welcome. Later, when Laozi asks him if Confucius can be freed from the shackles of his doctrines, the crippled man responds, "When Heaven has punished him, how can you set him free?" 32 Of course, Zhuangzi did not advocate unqualified innovation. For unreflective innovation can be more dangerous than the most stifling conventionality. This is where his emphasis on self-transformation must be noted. On his view, the creative vitality of spontaneity must always reflect back upon itself, correcting past mistakes and cumulatively building in complexity. This is the key element in becoming a zhēnrén. If we take this interpretation of Zhuangzi's dào seriously, then he is clearly not a mystic. If Zhuangzi's "true man" is to be understood as someone who applies reason in a manner that is suitable to his environment, then it would seem appropriate to read Zhuangzi as a naturalistic fallibilist. If this is so, then the charges of skepticism, quietism, 31 Watson, pgs. 64-65 32 Ibid. pg. 72 15 and relativism are rendered moot and Zhuangzi can consistently be called a pragmatist philosopher. The case for Laozi is a more difficult one. Because his writings are so terse, there is insufficient textual evidence to build an argument that is not open to criticism. If one chose to adopt the alternative historical account of Laozi, wherein he is seen as a fictional figure conjured up by followers of Zhuangzi to lend legitimacy to their school of thought, perhaps then a case for calling him a pragmatist would be stronger. However, such a topic would require more attention than this analysis will permit.

translation copyright © 2017 by David Forman "Apokatastasis panton" (1715)1 by G. W. Leibniz, translated by David Forman (2017/7/31) Ἀποκατάστασις πάντων2 One can determine the number of all possible books of a given size composed of meaningful and meaningless words. I call a book of a "given size" that which consists of a given number of letters. For example, a folio consisting of 10,000 pages, with 100 lines a page and 100 letters a line, would be a book of 100,000,000 letters. Now the number of all the books of this length, or which can be formed from 100 million letters of the alphabet, is finite. And this number can be obtained from the calculus of combinations, which would be N. It is also clear that all possible shorter books are contained in these longer ones. Suppose, moreover, that a public annual history of the earth can be sufficiently related in a book of this length, which would contain 100 million letters: it is also clear that the number of possible public histories of the earth differing among themselves is limited; for any different history would produce a new book. Hence it follows that if we imagine that humanity lasts long enough in the state it is in now, past public histories must return. For if we assume a number of years equal to the number N, I say that during these N years, in any year it is always the case that either new histories come to pass that differ from any preceding ones from these years included in N, or else the history of some prior year among them repeats. If the second happens, then we have what was sought. Otherwise, that is, if the annual history is always new, it follows that all possible public histories are exhausted in this number of years and that in the following years the past ones would return. Q.E.D. And so it is necessary that our Leopold and Louis and William and George would return with all their deeds within this time span.3 1 LBr. 705 Bl. 72. The Latin text is transcribed in M. Fichant (ed.), De l' Horizon de la Doctrine Humaine (1693); Ἀποκατάστασις πάντων (La Restitution universelle) (1715), (Paris: J. Vrin, 1991), pp.60–66. Fichant provides a French translation, which I have consulted in preparing the present translation. 2 This title, meaning "restitution of all," derives from Acts 3:21. See Theodicy §17 and §156, where Leibniz uses the Greek expression to refer to J. W. Petersen's Μυστήριον ἀποκατάστασεως πάντων, das ist, das Geheimniss der Wiederbringung aller Dinge (1700). Leibniz published an (anonymous) review of this work in the April 1701 issue of the Monatlicher Auszug. For a discussion of Leibniz's interest Petersen's work, see M. Antognazza and H. Hotson, Alsted and Leibniz: on God, the Magistrate, and the Millennium (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1999), pp. 170–198. 3 Leibniz is presumably referring here to recent and current reigning monarchs: Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I (reigned 1658–1705), King William III of England (reigned 1689–1702), King Louis XIV of France (reigned 1643–1715), and King George I of Great Britain (reigned 1714–1727). 62 60 2 translation copyright © 2017 by David Forman But it is clear that this is the same if we descend to private history, the only difference being that the work will be conceived with a longer book and more years; for a book of a size sufficient to relate all the smallest details of what humans have done on all the earth within a year is certainly possible. Imagine that there are a thousand million humans on earth (a number from which humanity is most distantly removed), and that a book the size we granted to the public annual histories, thus of 100 million letters, is assigned to each human to relate a single year of his life down to the smallest details. For even if 10,000 hours4 are granted to a year, a sheet of 10,000 letters,5 that is, a page of 100 lines each with 100 letters, would still surpass what is needed to describe each hour of a human. Thus, for a work containing the annual history of the whole of humanity down to the smallest details, it would be sufficient to have a number of letters that would reach a hundred thousand million millionions,6 if 'millionion' were to mean a million millions. Now the number of possible works of this size differing among themselves in some measure is finite, and indeed can be obtained from the number of combinations. Let this number be called Q.7 Hence it follows: if humanity endured long enough in its current state, a time would arrive when the same life of individuals would return, bit by bit, through the very same circumstances. I myself, for example, would be living in a city called Hannover located on the Leine river, occupied with the history of Brunswick, and writing letters to the same friends with the same meaning. For the same demonstration can be applied to the number Q8 that we established above applied to the number N, seeing that nothing would be different except for the size. But these [returns will happen] not just once, but many more times,9 and indeed a greater number of times than can be assigned, should humanity endure long enough. And the ancients seem to have had such [returns] in mind, which were called 'the revolutions of the great platonic year,'10 although the reasons for their opinion have not been transmitted to posterity, but which is clear from what they say. 4 Reading '10000 horae' in place of '1000 horae.' 5 Reading 'plagula superforet 10000 literarum' in place of 'plagula superforent 10000 literarae.' (Fichant instead suggests striking 'plagula' and making 'literae' the subject of the clause.) 6 Leibniz writes 'centies mille milliones Millionionum' (1023), forgetting to strike the 'milliones' as he shifts to his neologism for orders of large numbers. The corrected text would read either 'centies mille milliones millionum' or rather, with Leibniz's neologism, 'centies mille millioniones,' that is, 'a hundred thousand millionion' (1017). 7 Leibniz first wrote 'P.' 8 Following Fichant's correction of 'Q' for 'P.' 9 Reading 'saepius' for 'saepies.' 10 Plato's Timaeus presents the idea of a "complete" or "perfect" year that is achieved when all eight celestial revolutions or periods return to their starting points (39c–d). 64 3 translation copyright © 2017 by David Forman Finally, even if humanity did not always endure, assuming11 that there always exist minds that know and seek the truth, it follows that minds will someday reach the point where it would be necessary to repeat truths that are independent of the authority of the senses, that is, demonstrable theorems that have been discovered and that do not exceed a given size (for example, a page if they are written); and [this follows] all the more for concise statements that can be written in [a few] words. Moreover, new theorems to be discovered would have to grow in size to infinity. But if that were to happen, it would be necessary that minds also could become capable of grasping such long theorems. But sensible truths, that is, those based not on reason, but rather on experience, are able to vary to infinity even if they do not become lengthier, since the senses consist in confused perception, which can be varied in infinite ways while preserving conciseness; for there can be infinite kinds of liveliness, senses, and sensible objects; which is quite otherwise than with theorems, that is, with truths that can be known through adequate or perfect demonstration. 11 Following Fichant, who strikes out the 'quia' at the beginning of this clause.

The nature of intuitive justification Elijah Chudnoff
Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010 Abstract In this paper I articulate and defend a view that I call phenomenal dogmatism about intuitive justification. It is dogmatic because it includes the thesis: if it intuitively seems to you that p, then you thereby have some prima facie justification for believing that p. It is phenomenalist because it includes the thesis: intuitions justify us in believing their contents in virtue of their phenomenology- and in particular their presentational phenomenology. I explore the nature of presentational phenomenology as it occurs perception, and I make a case for thinking that it is present in a wide variety of logical, mathematical, and philosophical intuitions. Keywords Intuition
Epistemology
Phenomenology
Dogmatism
Justification 1 Introduction By ''intuitive justification'' I mean justification that you possess for believing something because of an intuition that you have had. This stipulation is likely to raise at least three questions. (1) What are intuitions? (2) Do our intuitions really justify us in believing anything? (3) And if so, in virtue of what do our intuitions justify us in believing things? My main target in this paper is question (3). By an account of the nature of intuitive justification I mean an account that says what it is in virtue of which our Thanks to Yuval Avnur, Selim Berker, Sinan Dogramaci, Ned Hall, Charles Parsons, Jim Pryor, Susanna Siegel, and Alison Simmons for helpful discussion of earlier versions of this work. E. Chudnoff (&) University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA e-mail: [email protected] 123 Philos Stud DOI 10.1007/s11098-010-9495-2 intuitions justify us in believing things. What I will argue is that our intuitions justify us in believing things in virtue of their phenomenology. For reasons I will explain below, I will call this view phenomenal dogmatism about intuitive justification. While defending phenomenal dogmatism about intuitive justification is my main aim here, I will also take up a number of points that bear on questions (1) and (2). I will provide some prima facie motivation for thinking that the answer to (2) is positive. And my answer to question (3) should both strengthen and deepen the case for thinking that intuitions do justify us in believing things. I will also touch on question (1). In order to defend phenomenal dogmatism about intuition I will have to say something about what intuitions are, and specifically about what intuitions feel like. The plan for the paper is this. In the next two sections I will focus on perceptual justification. I will develop a phenomenal dogmatist view about perceptual justification according to which perceptual experiences prima facie justify us in believing their contents, and do so in virtue of their phenomenology, and in particular their presentational phenomenology. In Sect. 4 I will argue that we should endorse phenomenal dogmatism about intuitive justification because intuition experiences also possess the relevant presentational phenomenology. In Sects. 5, 6, and 7 I will strengthen the argument for phenomenal dogmatism about intuitive justification by considering how it applies to intuitions of various kinds. In the last section I will locate the project pursued here with respect to some other issues that arise in thinking about intuition. 2 Perceptual justification In this section I want to discuss dogmatism about perceptual justification. Here is a formulation of the view: (DPJ) If it perceptually seems to you that p, then you thereby possess some prima facie justification for believing that p. The literature contains a number of helpful discussions of DPJ, but it will be useful to set out three important clarifications here.1 First, ''it perceptually seems to you that p'' should be understood so that it perceptually seems to you that p just in case you have a perceptual experience part of whose representational content is that p. Suppose you have a perceptual experience that inclines you to believe that p. Then in some sense it seems to you that p, and it does so because of your perceptual experience. But still it might not perceptually seem to you that p: your perceptual experience itself might not represent that p. Suppose you have a perceptual experience that represents that p, 1 See in particular Huemer (2001) and Pryor (2004). Huemer defends a more comprehensive view that he calls phenomenal conservatism: (PC) If it seems to S that P, then S thereby has at least prima facie justification for believing that P (Huemer 2001, p. 99). DPJ is equivalent to phenomenal conservatism restricted to perceptual seemings. E. Chudnoff 123 but that you are not inclined to believe that p. Then, again, in some sense it does not seem to you that p, and your perceptual experience doesn't change that. But still it does perceptually seem to you that p: your perceptual experience does represent that p. Second, the significance of the ''thereby'' is this: the justification DPJ says you possess when it perceptually seems to you that p depends on your perceptual experience alone. Your perceptual experience itself suffices to give you that justification. You need not possess background beliefs about your perceptual experience in order to have this bit of justification. Of course, you might have some other justification for believing that p, which does depends on things other than your perceptual experience, but DPJ is silent about this other justification. Third, the justification that DPJ says you possess when it perceptually seems to you that p is ''prima facie.'' What this means is that it can be defeated or undermined. If it perceptually seems to you that p, but you have good reason to believe that not-p, then all things considered you might not be justified in believing that p. This is compatible with DPJ. Similarly, if it perceptually seems to you that p, but you have good reason to think that your perceptual experience is untrustworthy, then all things considered you might not be justified in believing that p. This too is compatible with DPJ. So much for what dogmatism about perceptual justification is. Let me now distinguish two questions one might ask about DPJ: (1) Why think that DPJ is true? (2) Supposing DPJ is true, in virtue of what is it true? Questions (1) and (2) are distinct. Question (1) asks for reasons to think that DPJ is true. These reasons for thinking DPJ is true need not shed light on why it is true- though they might. Question (2) asks for an account of what it is that explains why DPJ is true. An answer to question (2) need not satisfy the dialectical conditions on being a good reason to think that DPJ is true-for example it need not be nonquestion-begging. My main aim here is to take up question (2). But let me review some of the answers that have been given to question (1). One reason to believe DPJ is that it just seems plausible on initial reflection. I know that my bicycle is red. How? I can see that it is. When I look at my bicycle, I have a visual experience that represents it as being red. This visual experience justifies me in thinking that my bicycle is red. And, on the face of it, it justifies me in thinking that my bicycle is red all on its own-without any epistemic support from background beliefs or additional experiences. Another reason to believe DPJ is that it contains the resources to meet the most natural worries one might have about it-so that its initial plausibility isn't diminished by further reflection. Pryor and Huemer have addressed many potential worries about DPJ.2 Instead of reproducing their efforts, let me consider a recent worry that Peter Markie has developed.3 He describes the following case: 2 See Huemer (2001) and Pryor (2004). 3 See Markie (2005). The nature of intuitive justification 123 Suppose we are prospecting for gold. You have learned to identify a gold nugget on sight but I have no such knowledge. As the water washes out of my pan, we both look at a pebble, which is in fact a gold nugget. My desire to discover gold makes it seem to me as if the pebble is gold; your learned identification skills make it seem to you that way. Markie's worry is that DPJ entails that both observers possess prima facie justification for believing that the pebble is gold, but in fact only the observer with the learned identification skills does. Markie's example is underspecified. Does Markie's desire to discover gold make it seem to him that the pebble is gold because (A) he has a perceptual experience whose representational content is neutral with respect to whether the nugget is gold, but which-because of his desire-he interprets as being of some gold, or (B) he has a perceptual experience whose representational content-because of his desire-is in part that the nugget is gold. If (A), then Markie's belief might not possess prima facie justification, but DPJ does not entail that it does. If (B), then there are two options that proponents of DPJ might pursue. The first is to agree that DPJ entails that Markie's belief has prima facie justification, and to argue that this is the correct result. If Markie becomes aware of the role his desire is playing in causing his perceptual experience, then his prima facie justification will be undermined-and DPJ accommodates this possibility. But so long as Markie remains unaware of the role his desire is playing, then, according to this first option, he does possess some prima facie justification for thinking that the pebble is gold. The second option is to argue that the proper scope of DPJ is restricted so that it does not entail that Markie's belief has prima facie justification. Pryor, for example, argues that there is a class of ''perceptually basic'' propositions that our perceptual experiences ''basically represent,'' and that DPJ should range only over these propositions.4 Perhaps, then, Markie's perceptual experience does represent that the nugget is gold, but it does not basically represent that the nugget is gold. Both options seem workable to me. The second, however, requires a more principled understanding of the difference between basic perceptual representation and non-basic perceptual representation. I will develop such an understanding below. One last reason to believe DPJ is that it provides the basis for a modest response to skepticism about our knowledge of the external world. Both Pryor and Huemer develop this reason in more detail.5 Here I just mention it as one of the considerations that render DPJ attractive. Assuming, then, that DPJ is true, what is it about perceptual experience that explains why it is true? While there are a number of answers that one might give to this question, I want to consider just two. The first is a reliabilist answer, and the second is a phenomenalist answer. (Reliabilism) DPJ is true because perceptual experiences are reliable. 4 See Pryor (2004). 5 Again, see, Huemer (2001) and Pryor (2004). E. Chudnoff 123 According to Reliabilism, if it perceptually seems to you that p, then you thereby have some prima facie justification for believing that p because: generally, it perceptually seems to you that p only if p. Goldman does not endorse DPJ: he finds Markie's worry compelling.6 But he does develop an account of why in some cases, if it perceptually seems to you that p, then you thereby have some prima facie justification for believing that p, and his account bears a family resemblance to Reliabilism. A natural proponent of Reliabilism would be someone with Goldman's reliabilist sympathies who was not moved by Markie's or other worries about DPJ. I lack Goldman's reliabilist sympathies. This is not the place, however, to take up arguments for and against reliabilism, or epistemic externalism more generally. In this paper I will assume that the following phenomenalist view is the correct view about what it is in virtue of which DPJ is true: (Phenomenalism) DPJ is true because perceptual experiences have a certain phenomenal character. Pryor endorses a version of Phenomenalism. According to him ''there's a distinctive phenomenology: the feeling of seeming to ascertain that a given proposition is true'' and it is because perceptual experiences have this phenomenology that they prima facie justify us in believing what they represent.7 I think that Pryor's account is correct so far as it goes, but that it does not go far enough. We need a fuller account of the nature of the phenomenology that perceptual experiences possess and in virtue of which DPJ is true of them. There are at least four reasons why. First, a fuller understanding of the relevant phenomenology will provide us with a basis for exploring whether other kinds of experience-in particular intuition experiences-possess it. Second, a fuller understanding of the relevant phenomenology will help to prevent confusion: one major source of resistance to Phenomenalism is confusion of the relevant phenomenology with other, irrelevant phenomenology. Third, a fuller understanding of the relevant phenomenology-at least as I will develop it-will also provide a deeper understanding of the distinction between those propositions that a perceptual experience basically represents and those propositions that a perceptual experience non-basically represents. Fourth, a fuller understanding of the relevant phenomenology will strengthen the cases for both DPJ and Phenomenalism: once we better appreciate what phenomenology it is in virtue of which perceptual experiences are supposed to give us prima facie justification, that they do so and that they do so in virtue of their phenomenology will seem more compelling. 3 Phenomenology and justification The aims of this section are to pick out and describe a kind of phenomenology, and to make it plausible that this kind of phenomenology can explain the epistemic 6 See Goldman (2008). 7 See Pryor (2000, 2004). The nature of intuitive justification 123 powers of perceptual experience. I will call the kind of phenomenology presentational phenomenology. The descriptive thesis that I will defend is that what it is for a perceptual experience to have presentational phenomenology is for it to have two other kinds of phenomenal property that are appropriately correlated. What I must do, then, is introduce these two other kinds of phenomenal property. The best way to introduce them, however, is by first introducing two kinds of non-phenomenal property, and this is how I will begin. The two kinds of non-phenomenal property are properties of being sensorily item-aware of an item and properties of fact-perceiving that something is the case.8 This distinction generalizes a distinction between two kinds of visual property- properties of seeing-x and the properties of seeing-that-p. Contrast the following two perceptual reports: (1) Albert sees the rocket. (2) Albert sees that the rocket has launched. These perceptual reports attribute two different properties to Albert. (1) Attributes the property of seeing the rocket, and (2) attributes the property of seeing that the rocket has launched. These are different properties because Albert might see the rocket but fail to see that it has launched, and Albert might see that the rocket has launched but fail to see the rocket-because, say, it is hidden by its exhaust cloud. This example illustrates the difference between being visually itemaware of an item-in this case a rocket-and visually fact-perceiving that something is the case-in this case that the rocket has launched. The distinction between being sensorily item-aware of an item and fact-perceiving that something is the case generalizes this distinction to other sensory modalities. Properties of being sensorily item-aware of an item and fact-perceiving that something is the case are non-phenomenal properties. The reason why is that it is not sufficient to have one of these properties that you have an experience with a certain phenomenal character. In order to be visually item-aware of a rocket, for example, there must exist a rocket and you must stand in some relation to it. Further, in order to visually fact-perceive that the rocket has launched, it must be true that the rocket has launched and you must stand in some relation to this truth. So being sensorily item-aware of an item and fact-perceiving that something is the case are properties whose instantiation depends on the satisfaction of non-phenomenal conditions, such as the existence of rockets and the truth of propositions about rockets. That is why they are non-phenomenal properties. Even though they are non-phenomenal properties, in instantiating them we do instantiate phenomenal properties. In being visually item-aware of a rocket, for example, you have a visual experience and this experience has a phenomenal character. There are many different visual experiences with different phenomenal characters that one might have in being visually item-aware of a rocket: the rocket 8 Classic discussions of the distinction between item-awareness and fact-perception include Chisholm (1957), Warnock (1965) and Dretske (1969); for more recent discussion see Dretske (1995) and Johnston (2006). E. Chudnoff 123 might look different ways, and perhaps not even look like a rocket at all-it might just look like a far off speck on the horizon. In some cases, then, while you are visually item-aware of a rocket, you do not seem to be, or feel as if you are, visually item-aware of a rocket. In other cases, however, you are visually item-aware of a rocket, and you also seem to be, or feel as if you are, visually item-aware of a rocket. Take this phenomenal property: seeming to be visually item-aware of a rocket. This is an instance of a general kind of visual phenomenal property: seeming to be visually item-aware of an item. And there is an even more general kind of sensory phenomenal property: seeming to be sensorily item-aware of an item. Properties of the kind, seeming to be sensorily item-aware of an item, are phenomenal properties because in order to instantiate them all you have to do is have an experience with the right phenomenal character. You might, for example, seem to be visually item-aware of a rocket just by having a visual experience with a certain phenomenal character, even if there is no rocket around for you to genuinely see. Properties of seeming to be sensorily item-aware of an item are one of the two kinds of phenomenal property that I believe are necessary for a perceptual experience to have presentational phenomenology. The other kind of phenomenal property is that of seeming to fact-perceive that something is the case. The property of seeming to fact-perceive that p is identical to the property of having a perceptual experience representing that p, or the property of having it perceptually seem to you that p. A visual example is the property of seeming to visually fact-perceive that the rocket has launched-i.e. the property of having a visual experience representing that the rocket has launched. This property is a phenomenal property: all you have to do is have a visual experience with a certain phenomenal character in order to have it; it need not be the case that there is a rocket that has in fact launched.9 To fix ideas, contrast the following two perceptual reports: (1) Albert seems to be visually item-aware of a rocket. (2) Albert seems to fact-perceive that the rocket has launched. These perceptual reports attribute different properties. Albert might seem to be visually item-aware of a rocket without seeming to fact-perceive that the rocket has launched. Further, Albert might seem to fact-perceive that the rocket has launched without seeming to be visually item-aware of a rocket-because, say, he only seems to be visually item-aware of its exhaust cloud. Perhaps there is some deep analysis of properties of seeming to be sensorily item-aware of an item in terms of properties of seeming to fact-perceive that something is the case, or vice versa. I will neither assume that there is, nor assume that there isn't. My aim is to explore some of the 9 I am assuming that the phenomenal character of a visual experience can fix at least some of its intentional content, i.e., that there is such as thing as phenomenal intentionality. For some defenses of phenomenal intentionality see: Siewert (1998), Loar (2003), Horgan and Tiensen (2002), and Chalmers (2002). For the purposes of this paper the assumption that there is phenomenal intentionality plays a simplifying role: it is possible to relax it at the cost of added complexity. For example, without the assumption of phenomenal intentionality, I would have to reformulate the footnoted sentence thus: all you have to do is have a visual experience with a certain phenomenal character and intentional content in order to have it; it need not be the case that there is a rocket that has in fact launched. The nature of intuitive justification 123 ways these two sorts of property come together in perceptual experiences that do not presuppose either their identity or their distinctness. One such connection is this: it is impossible to seem to fact-perceive that something is the case without seeming to be sensorily item-aware of some items in your environment. All perceptual experiences involve seeming sensory itemawareness. The connection between seeming fact-perception and seeming sensory item-awareness runs deeper than this, however. Suppose you seem to fact-perceive that your friend is smiling. In this experience you will also seem to be sensorily item-aware of some items in your environment. Suppose one of these items is your friend's smile. In this case you have an experience in which you seem to fact-perceive that p-that your friend is smiling- and in which you seem to be sensorily item aware of an item-your friend's smile- that makes it the case that p. The item-the smile-that you seem to be aware of makes true the proposition-that your friend is smiling-that you seem to perceive to be the case.10 Presentational phenomenology just is this correlation between two kinds of phenomenal property: a perceptual experience possesses presentational phenomenology when in it you both seem to fact-perceive that p and seem to be sensorily item-aware of an item that makes it the case that p. While it is plausible that all perceptual experiences possess some presentational phenomenology, it is not plausible that every perceptual experience possesses presentational phenomenology with respect to every proposition you seem to factperceive to be the case in it.11 Suppose-continuing with the same experience-you seem to fact-perceive that your friend is happy. Because you seem to be visually item-aware of your friend's smile, you seem to be aware of an item that counts as evidence that your friend is happy, but this is quite different from seeming to be aware of an item that makes it the case that-that is a truth-maker for the proposition that-your friend is happy. Here, then, we have a proposition-the proposition that your friend is happy-with respect to which your experience does not possess presentational phenomenology, even though there is another proposition-that your friend is smiling-with respect to which it does possess presentational phenomenology. Now that I've said what presentational phenomenology is, I want to consider what role it might play in a phenomenal dogmatist view of perceptual justification. Specifically, I want to assess the following thesis: (PresentationalismP) DPJ is true because perceptual experiences have presentational phenomenology. 10 Suppose you are hallucinating: there is no smiling friend before you. In this case there is no smile that makes true the proposition that your friend is smiling. Still, you seem to see an item-a smile-that can make true, or is of the sort to make true the proposition-that your friend is smiling-that you seem to perceive to be the case. I will generally ignore such niceties in the interests of readability. 11 I should point out that the claim that all perceptual experiences possess some presentational phenomenology is compatible with what Adam Pautz argues in Pautz (2007): Pautz argues against the metaphysical claim that all perceptual experiences involve item-awareness; I am endorsing the phenomenological claim that all perceptual experiences involve seeming item-awareness. E. Chudnoff 123 I will count PresentationalismP a success if it fulfills the motivations for pursuing a fuller understanding of the phenomenology that perceptual experiences possess and in virtue of which DPJ is true of them, which I set out toward the end of the last section. The first motivation was to have a basis for exploring whether other kinds of experience-in particular intuition experiences-possess the relevant kind of phenomenology. The account of presentational phenomenology that I have developed provides such a basis. Intuition experiences possess presentational phenomenology just in case they are experiences in which we both represent that p, say, and seem to be aware of an item that makes it the case that p. In the next section I will explore whether this is what intuition experiences are like. The second motivation was to prevent confusion. This is particularly important in the case of intuition experiences. A phenomenal dogmatist about intuitive justification shouldn't say that you are prima facie justified in believing whatever proposition pops into mind. The view should be more discriminating about how you must represent a proposition. Requiring that you represent it in an experience with presentational phenomenology renders the view appropriately discriminating. The third motivation was to illuminate the distinction between propositions that are basically represented in a perceptual experience and propositions that are nonbasically represented in a perceptual experience. I believe that this distinction should be identified with the distinction between propositions with respect to which a perceptual experience has presentational phenomenology and propositions with respect to which a perceptual experience lacks presentational phenomenology. This identification provides a setting within which to fill out the second of the two replies to Markie's worry about DPJ. This reply is that Markie is correct to think that one needs some justification for background beliefs about the look of gold, or what Markie calls ''learned identification skills,'' in order to tell by sight whether a nugget is gold, but that this does not refute DPJ because our visual representation of a nugget as being gold is non-basic. Now we can add: it is non-basic because we are not, and do not even seem to be, visually item-aware of the hidden molecular structure in virtue of which the nugget is gold. I have remained neutral about whether dogmatists should adopt this line of response to Markie's worry. Whether to adopt it is bound up with a more general question facing proponents of PresentationalismP. This is the question of whether to endorse unrestricted DPJ-as does Huemer-or restricted DPJR-as does Pryor: (DPJR) If it basically perceptually seems to you that p, then you thereby have some prima facie justification for believing that p. PresentationalismP is compatible with both DPJ and DPJ R. The fan of DPJ might argue that because perceptual experiences have presentational phenomenology with respect to some of their propositional content, they prima facie justify believing all of their propositional content. The fan of DPJR might argue that if it is the presentational phenomenology of perceptual experiences that explains why they give prima facie justification, then they only give prima facie justification for believing those propositions with respect to which they have presentational phenomenology. The debate here is about what propositions a perceptual experience The nature of intuitive justification 123 prima facie justifies on its own-without the help of other justification or Markie's ''learned identification skills.'' Someone who accepts DPJR can agree that your visual experience representing something as a nugget of gold prima facie justifies you in believing that it is a nugget of gold, but-assuming you are not visually itemaware of what makes it the case that it is a nugget of gold-they must argue that your visual experience prima facie justifies your belief in part because of justification you have for beliefs about what gold looks like, or because of ''learned identification skills.'' It is not obvious which view to adopt. I think it depends on the overall theoretical setting for understanding our knowledge of the external world each view provides. This is a topic well beyond the scope of my present inquiry, and so here I will remain neutral. The fourth motivation for pursing the phenomenological investigations of the present section was to bolster the initial attraction of DPJ. PresentationalismP seems to me to do this: I find it compelling that if you have an experience that not only represents your environment as being a certain way, but that is one in which you also seem to be aware of the very items in your environment in virtue of which it is the case that your environment is that way, then you thereby have some prima facie justification for believing that your environment is the way it appears to you to be. 4 Intuitive justification Dogmatism about intuitive justification is the following view: (DIJ) If it intuitively seems to you that p, then you thereby possess some prima facie justification for believing that p. DIJ, like DPJ, is plausible on initial reflection. Suppose Albert considers the proposition: every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. It neither seems true nor seems false to him, and he neither has justification for believing it nor has justification for doubting it. Suppose Albert reflects on the matter. What he does is he illustrates the relevant kind of mapping from concave to convex figures to himself by imagining a concrete example: Imagining such a concrete example gives Albert an improved grip on what the proposition is about, and in light of this improved grip it now seems to him to be true. It does not perceptually seem to him to be true. Rather, it intuitively seems to him to be true: he has an intuition experience whose representational content is that every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. Further, Albert now has some prima facie justification for believing that every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. On the face of it, he now has this prima E. Chudnoff 123 facie justification for believing the proposition precisely because it now intuitively seems true to him. Examples similar to this one can be multiplied. They render DIJ plausible in just the way that analogous examples render DPJ plausible. In virtue of what is DIJ true of intuition experiences? The answer that I will defend is that DIJ is true because intuition experiences have a certain phenomenology, and in particular because intuition experiences have presentational phenomenology: (PresentationalismI) DIJ is true because intuition experiences have presentational phenomenology. Just as with the presentational phenomenology of perceptual experiences, the presentational phenomenology of intuition experiences is a correlation between two kinds of phenomenal property: an intuition experience possesses presentational phenomenology when in it you both seem to fact-intuit that p and seem to be intellectually item-aware of an item that makes it the case that p. The structure of the presentational phenomenology is the same. What differs in intuition experiences is that the seeming is intuitive, not perceptual, and the awareness is intellectual, not sensory. The two main tasks that arise in defending PresentationalismI are showing that intuition experiences possess presentational phenomenology and showing that their presentational phenomenology can explain why DIJ is true of them. Further reflection on Albert should help in pursing both tasks. Albert's intuition experience is an experience in which it seems to him that every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. He does not seem to perceive, remember, receive testimony, or infer that this proposition is true. Rather, he seems to intuit that it is. The main line of resistance to the claim that Albert's intuition experience is an experience in which a proposition intuitively seems to him to be true derives from views according to which intuitions are just conscious beliefs or conscious inclinations to believe. I think that these views are mistaken. The main motivation for them that their proponents have given is that when they peek into their streams of consciousness while having an intuition they do not find anything other than a conscious belief or a conscious inclination to believe.12 I have criticized this line of argument elsewhere.13 In this paper, however, I will be more concessive. Suppose intuition experiences are experiences in which you consciously believe or are consciously inclined to believe a proposition. Still, such experiences might possess presentational phenomenology: they will if they are also experiences in which you seem to be aware of an item in virtue of which the proposition you believe or are inclined to believe is true. I will continue to talk about intuitive seemings; but what I say should be translatable into talk about conscious beliefs or conscious inclinations to believe. If Albert's experience has presentational phenomenology, then it must be an experience in which he seems to be aware of an item in virtue of which every 12 See, for example, Williamson (2008, p. 217). 13 Chudnoff (unpublished a). The nature of intuitive justification 123 concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. First, what item might that be? A plausible candidate is a manymany mapping from concave figures to convex figures that associates each concave figure with those convex figures that bound a greater area in a smaller perimeter. I will assume that something like this item is a truth-maker for the proposition Albert seems to intuit. Second, what in the story suggests that Albert seems to be aware of this item? The part of the story that suggests this is the part where Albert seems to gain an improved grip on what the proposition he is considering is about. This is not a semantic achievement: it is not as if he now grasps a proposition that he did not grasp before, as the relevant proposition is already the content of one of his propositional attitudes, his attitude of entertaining it. The achievement is more substantive: what he now grasps better than he did before is the subject matter of the proposition he is considering; he makes the items it is about and on which its truth hinges present to mind. Third, and finally, in what does Albert's seeming itemawareness of the mapping that is a truth-maker for the proposition he seems to intuit consist? It consists in his imaginative endeavor. He imagines rounding out a concave figure into a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. In the context of his overall experience of reflecting on the proposition that every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter, however, this imaginative endeavor amounts to more than merely imagining one such transformation. His imaginative endeavor presents him with an instance recognized as an instance of a type, and it thereby assumes a greater import: in it, Albert does not just idly play around with figures in his mind's eye; rather, in it, Albert renders an infinite, abstract mapping present to mind by visualizing a partial, concrete realization of it.14 The forgoing reflections on Albert support the claim that his intuition experience has presentational phenomenology.15 What further considerations support thinking that this presentational phenomenology explains why his experience gives him some prima facie justification? One consideration is an analogy with perception. The presentational phenomenology of perceptual experiences explains why they prima facie justify believing their contents. Albert's intuition experience prima facie justifies him in believing its content, and it has presentational phenomenology. So, arguing by analogy, its presentational phenomenology should be able to explain why it prima facie justifies Albert' in believing its content. The claim that Albert's intuition experience prima facie justifies him in believing its content in virtue of its presentational phenomenology is not just attractive because it is similar to analogous claims 14 Here I am aligning myself with the universal-in-the-particular tradition, according to which it is possible to be aware of a universal by being aware of a particular. See, for example, Kant (1999) on the construction of mathematical objects in pure intuition, Parson's (1980, 2005, 2007) elaboration of Kant's view, Husserl (1975) on the grasping of essences though imaginative variation, and Tieszen's (1989, 2005) elaboration of Husserl's view. The claim I am making here is relatively modest since my claim is a phenomenological claim about seeming awareness, not a metaphysical claim about genuine awareness. 15 The idea that intuitions involve both itemand fact-presentation-presentational phenomenology in the sense that I have articulated-can be found in: Gödel (1947), Husserl (1975), Parsons (1980, 2007), Russell (1992), and Tieszen (1989) among others in the rationalist, Kantian, early analytic, and phenomenological traditions. E. Chudnoff 123 about perceptual experiences. It is also attractive on its own. Just focusing on the phenomenology of Albert's experience, I find it plausible that an experience that feels like that should prima facie justify one in believing what it presents as being true. So far I've been focusing on Albert's experience. The considerations reviewed support thinking that his intuition experience possesses presentational phenomenology and that its presentational phenomenology explains why Albert gains prima facie justification for believing its content. One might worry, however, that Albert's intuition experience is special in ways that render reflection on it unlikely to illuminate the phenomenology and epistemology of intuition experiences more generally. In the next few sections I want to strengthen the case for PresentationalismI by exploring intuitions that differ from Albert's in various ways. 5 Imagination, reflection, and inference One worry is that the example I have been discussing is a special case because it is a case of geometrical intuition and involves the use of visual imagery. This worry can be met by presenting a case that is not a case of geometrical intuition and that does not involve the use of visual imagery. Suppose Albert considers the proposition: the bigger of two numbers is the average of their sum and difference-max (m, n) = [(m ? n) ? |m n|]/2. It neither seems true nor seems false to him, and he neither has justification for believing it nor has justification for doubting it. So he reflects on the matter. Here is a bit of interior monologue: (m ? n) is the bigger number plus the smaller number, and |m n| is the difference by which the smaller number falls short of the bigger number, so (m ? n) ? |m n| is twice the bigger number, and halving that gives you the bigger number; clearly then max (m, n) = [(m ? n) ? |m n|]/2-the bigger of two numbers is the average of their sum and difference. That is the story. Now here is some commentary, which I will defend below. In this example Albert comes to have an intuition experience representing that the bigger of two numbers is the average of their sum and difference. This is an algebraic truth about numbers, not a geometrical truth about shapes, and the reflections whereby he comes to appreciate it do not involve the use of visual imagery. Albert's intuition experience possesses presentational phenomenology. He seems to be aware of an item-the arithmetical operation of averaging the sum of and difference between two numbers. In this example his seeming awareness does not consist in an imaginative endeavor. Rather, it consists in a cognitive endeavor- his making clearer to himself in stages just what it is to average the sum of and difference between two numbers. Further, Albert's intuition experience prima facie justifies him in believing that the bigger of two number is the average of their sum and difference, and it does so because it is an experience in which he seems to be aware of the very item, the arithmetical operation, in virtue of which this proposition is true. According to my commentary the phenomenal structure of Albert's intuition experience representing that the bigger of two numbers is the average of their sum The nature of intuitive justification 123 and difference is similar to that of his intuition experience representing that every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. There is, however, a worry. The worry is that Albert does not have an intuition experience representing that the bigger of two number is the average of their sum and difference, but, rather, simply infers that this is so from some premises that his reflections bring to light. This is an important worry, and in the balance of this section I will sketch a response to it. There are two competing theses about Albert: (1) He has an intuition experience; (2) He makes a conscious inference. In order to adjudicate between them, we require an understanding of the difference between intuition and inference. One difference might be epistemic: one's intuitively justified beliefs have immediate justification that is independent of one's justification for other beliefs, and one's inferentially justified beliefs have mediate justification that is dependent on one's justification for other beliefs. This is, perhaps, a difference, but even if it is, it will not help to adjudicate between theses (1) and (2).16 This is because it is no easier to adjudicate between thesis (3) Albert's justification is immediate and thesis (4) Albert's justification is mediate than it is to adjudicate between thesis (1) and thesis (2).17 There is, however, a more helpful difference. There is a phenomenal difference between intuition experiences and conscious inferences. It might seem obvious what that difference is: intuition experiences just involve representing one proposition, and conscious inferences involve representing many propositions.18 But I think that this is mistaken. Both intuition experiences and conscious inferences can be grounded in reflections that involve representing many different propositions. The difference between them is in the nature of those reflections. There are at least two kinds of reflection on a proposition p: one kind brings to light propositions that are distinct from p and that lend p some support; the other kind brings to light the items that p is about and on which the truth of p hinges. If it seems true to you that p because of reflections of the first kind, then it seems true to you that p because of your appreciation of the force of an argument, and you have made a conscious inference. If it seems true to you that p because of reflections of the second kind, then it seems true to you that p because of your awareness of a truth-maker for p, and you have had an intuition experience. It is not always obvious from a description of some bit of reflection which kind it is. But there is a felt difference between the two kinds of reflection, which is manifest from a first person perspective. This felt difference is just the difference between an experience that possesses and an experience that lacks presentational phenomenology. That is, the phenomenal difference between intuitions and inferences consists in this: intuitions 16 I add ''perhaps'' for reasons that emerge below, in the Sect. 7. Just as theoretical considerations might favor thinking some perceptual justification is mediate, similar theoretical considerations might favor thinking some intuitive justification is mediate. 17 Arguing that Albert has justification for thinking the bigger of two numbers is the average of their sum and difference only if he has justification for believing that |m n| is the difference by which the smaller number falls short of the bigger number, say, does not settle the matter. The reason why is that Albert might have one common justification-his awareness of the arithmetical operation-that justifies believing both claims, if it justifies either. 18 Cf. Descartes's (1985) discussion of intuition and demonstration in the Rules. E. Chudnoff 123 have presentational phenomenology, and inferences lack presentational phenomenology.19 My claim about Albert is that if you imagine yourself in his shoes, you will find that the reflections he engages in do not merely turn up premises from which he concludes that the bigger of two numbers is the average of their sum and difference, but, rather, force this proposition on him as being true by rendering the abstract subject matter that makes it true present to his mind.20 This is what makes his experience an intuition experience, not a conscious inference. Given these considerations and the absence of a compelling argument that Albert's experience is really a case of conscious inference, not intuition, I think it is reasonable to accept my initial commentary. And that should deflect the worry that the account of intuitive justification proposed in the last section only applies to geometrical intuitions that involve visual imagery. 6 Unreflective intuitions Both examples I have discussed are examples in which Albert begins by neither seeming to intuit that a proposition is true nor seeming to intuit that it is false. In order to have an intuition experience Albert must reflect, and it is the reflections that he engages in that both make the proposition intuitively apparent and give him a sense of being aware of an item that makes the proposition true. But some propositions are immediately intuitively obvious: you do not have to reflect in order to have an experience in which such a proposition intuitively seem to you to be true. Call these unreflective intuition experiences. Here are some propositions one might unreflectively intuit: if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1; 2 [ 1. Here, now, is a worry. When we have an intuition experience whose content is one of these propositions it gives us prima facie justification for believing it. But our intuition experience seems too minimal to have presentational phenomenology. If it does not have presentational phenomenology, then something else must account for its epistemic properties. And if there is something else in this sort of case, then that suggests there is something else in other cases, casting doubt on PresentationalismI. First, take the proposition that if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1. You need not engage in reflections aimed at making the [ relation, 1, or 2 present to mind in order to tell by intuition that if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1. All you have to do is entertain the proposition and hold it in mind-whereupon it will intuitively strike you as being true. Still, I claim, your intuition experience has presentational phenomenology. What item do you seem to be intellectually aware of? Plausibly, it is the proposition itself, or one of its intrinsic properties such as its form. While propositions are the contents of seeming fact-intuition, they can also be the objects of seeming intellectual item-awareness. Merely entertaining or holding in mind the proposition that if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1 is not enough to make you aware of the [ relation, 1, or 2; it is enough, however, to make you aware of the proposition that if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1 itself, or one of its 19 I elaborate on these claims and explore the difference between intuition and inference further in Chudnoff (unpublished b). 20 The phrase ''force this proposition on him as being true'' derives from Gödel. The nature of intuitive justification 123 intrinsic properties such as its form. And because the proposition that if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1 is a logical truth, it is plausible that it or its form is a truth-maker for itself.21 For one type of unreflective intuition, then: you merely entertain and hold in mind the proposition that p, and this is enough to have an intuition experience possessing presentational phenomenology with respect to p because you seem to be item-aware of the proposition that p itself, or one of its intrinsic properties, such as its form.22 Second, take the proposition that 2 [ 1. I will assume that this proposition is made true by some state of affairs involving 1, 2, and the [ relation-not by itself or one of its intrinsic properties, such as its form. Merely entertaining and holding in mind the proposition that 2 [ 1 will not make you intellectually item-aware of the numbers 1 or 2, or the [ relation. Still, however, all most of us need to in order to have an intuition experience presenting the proposition that 2 [ 1 as true is to entertain and hold it in mind. The reason why, I suggest, is that most of us are already intellectually item-aware of the numbers 1 and 2, and the [ relation, and when we consider the proposition that 2 [ 1 our pre-existing item-awareness of these items renders it intuitively obvious. There are a few points connected with this suggestion that require spelling out. First, just as there is a distinction between item-awareness and fact-perception, or item-awareness and fact-intuition, there is a distinction between item-recollection and fact-recollection. Contrast the following reports: (1) Albert recalls the rocket. (2) Albert recalls that the rocket has launched. (1) Does not entail (2): Albert might recall the rocket, without recalling that it has launched. And (2) does not entail (1): Albert might recall that the rocket has launched-he might summon up this bit of knowledge-but fail to recall the rocket-he might not be able to summon up the rocket itself, and bring it before his mind's eye. There is, again similar to the cases of perception and intuition, also distinction between seeming item-recollection-which one might experience in the absence of genuine past awareness-and seeming fact-recollection-which one might experience in the absence of genuine stored knowledge. Second, just as you might seem to recall a concrete item on the basis of retained-or seemingly retained-past sensory item-awareness of it, you might seem to recall an abstract item on the basis of retained-or seemingly retained- past intellectual item-awareness of it. There is no reason to think that the scope of what items we can recollect-or seem to recollect-is limited to those items that we have sensed-or seemed to have sensed. Third, an experience in which you seem to recall that p and in which you seem to recollect an item, or some items, that make it true that p possesses presentational 21 If one proposition can have more than one truth-maker, then this claim is compatible with the claim that if 2 [ 1, then 2 [ 1 is made true by the fact that 2 [ 1. Further, the claim that logical truths or their forms are truth-makers for themselves does not warrant drawing the logical positivist conclusion that logical truths are not about the world, or that they lack factual content. 22 It might be possible to extend this account to immediate intuitions of analytic truths, such as the truth that bachelors are unmarried or that vixens are female foxes. I must leave exploring this development to another occasion. E. Chudnoff 123 phenomenology with respect to p. That is, recollective experiences can possess presentational phenomenology, just as perceptual experience and intuition experiences can possess presentational phenomenology.23 Fourth, and finally, it is possible for you to have an experience in which you seem to intuit that p and in which you seem to recollect an item, or some items, that make it true that p. You already know that 2 [ 1 and so you might recall this. But suppose you do not. Suppose that instead you intuit that 2 [ 1, and that you do not spend any time reflecting on 1, 2, or [ relation, but, rather, rely on your retained intellectual item-awareness of these items. This is an experience in which you seem to intuit that 2 [ 1 and in which you seem to recollect items that make it true that 2 [ 1.24 Intuiting that p while recollecting items that make it true that p is different from recollecting that p while recollecting items that make it true that p. Both, however, possess presentational phenomenology, since both are experiences in which you seem to be aware of an item, or some items, that make it true that p. So, for this second type of unreflective intuition that I've been discussing: you merely entertain and hold in mind the proposition that p, and while you do not engage in any present reflections that endow your experience with presentational phenomenology with respect to p, your experience does have presentational phenomenology with respect to p because it is partly based on retained-or seemingly retained-intellectual item-awareness of an item or items that make it true that p. 7 Philosophical intuitions All of the examples so far have been logical or mathematical. There are also philosophical intuitions. In this section I want to review some considerations that suggest philosophical intuitions are rather like logical and mathematical intuitions, just different in their subject matter. Take mereological intuitions. When I have intuition experiences representing certain mereological propositions, such as the proposition that nothing can have only one proper part, for example, my experiences seem to me similar in their structure to Albert's experience representing that every concave figure can be rounded out to a convex figure that bounds a greater area in a smaller perimeter. In this case, what I do is I imagine an arbitrary object and I imagine removing an arbitrary proper part of it, leaving behind at least one other proper part. When I do this it both intuitively seems to me that no object can have only one proper part, and 23 It is important to distinguish between two properties an experience might have: the first is that of possessing presentational phenomenology, and the second is that of representing something as present, i.e., here and now. Recollective experiences can possess the first even if not the second. 24 It is a difference between intuition and perception that there are no perceptual experiences in which you seem to perceive that p and in which you seem to recollect an item, or some items, that make it true that p. Perception is presentational in the sense that I have been discussing, and it is also an experience as of the presence-in the sense of the being here and now-of the items presented in it. The nature of intuitive justification 123 I seem to be intellectually aware of an operation of removing an arbitrary proper part from an arbitrary object in virtue of which this is true.25 Other of my intuition experiences representing philosophical propositions seem to me similar in their structure to the intuition experience representing that 2 [ 1 discussed in the previous section. That is, in them I seem to intuit a proposition, and an item, or some items, that make that proposition true seem present to mind in the manner of retained intellectual item-awareness. For a trivial example, just take the proposition that, pace Keats, beauty isn't truth. The most widely discussed philosophical intuitions are thought experiment intuitions. Take a classic thought experiment-Gettier's thought experiment involving Smith, Jones, and the proposition, P, that the man who will get the job has ten coins in his pocket. There is some controversy over just what becomes intuitively apparent in reflecting on Gettier's case.26 Here are some candidates: (1) In the story: Smith has a justified true belief that P, but does not know that P. (2) Possibly: One can have a justified true belief that P, but not know that P. (3) If a thinker were related to P as Smith is according to Gettier's text, he/she would have a justified true belief that P, but not know that P. (4) Necessarily: if every element in the Gettier story is true, then someone has a justified true belief that p, but does not know that p. Claim (1) is about what is true in a story. Claim (2) is a modal claim about possibility. Claim (3) is a counterfactual. According to Williamson, what we intuitively judge in reflecting on Gettier's case is something like (3), which then plays a role in a bit of reasoning supporting (2). Williamson argues further that because (3) is the content of our intuitive judgment, this judgment does not amount to a priori knowledge.27 Ichikawa and Jarvis find this result alarming. They argue that (4)-a modal claim about necessity-more accurately reflects the content of what intuitively seems true in reflecting on Gettier's case than Williamson's (3). Williamson's argument that our intuitive judgment does not amount to a priori knowledge fails if (4) is its content.28 My own view is that all of (1) through (4)-and more-can seem intuitively true in reflecting on Gettier's case. Only some of these propositions, however, are basically intuitively apparent. The distinction between what basically and what nonbasically perceptually seems to be the case can be extended to intuition. It basically intuitively seems to you that p if your intuition experience representing that p has presentational phenomenology with respect to p-that is, is an experience in which you seem to be aware of an item, or some items, that make it true that p. It nonbasically intuitively seems to you that p if your intuition experience representing that p lacks presentational phenomenology with respect to p-that is, is an experience in which you do not seem to be aware of an item, or some items, that 25 This need not be genuine removal, such as physical detachment. The operation might just consist of isolating the part in thought. 26 See, for example, Williamson (2008) and Ichikawa and Jarvis (2009). 27 See Williamson (2008). 28 See Ichikawa and Jarvis (2009). E. Chudnoff 123 make it true that p. When (3) intuitively seems true to me, it seems so non-basically: I do not seem to be intellectually item-aware of an item that makes (3) true. When (1) intuitively seems true to me, however, it seems so basically: I do seem to be intellectually item-aware of an item-the fictional scenario-in virtue of which (1) is true.29 Even though all of (1) through (4) might intuitively seem true to someone reflecting on Gettier's case, then, there might be differences among them with respect to whether they basically or non-basically intuitively seem true. Given this distinction between basic and non-basic intuitive seeming, one might accept everything I have said here and also accept Williamson's plausible contention that intuitive knowledge that (3) is true is not a priori. Recall the choice advocates of PresentationalismP had between unrestricted DPJ and restricted DPJR. Advocates of PresentationalismI face a similar choice between unrestricted DIJ and restricted DIJR: (DIJR) If it basically intuitively seems to you that p, then you thereby have some prima facie justification for believing that p. Suppose there is a good argument that proponents of PresentationalismI should adopt DIJR. Further suppose, as is plausible, that in general intuition experiences representing (3) as true do so non-basically. It follows that even though (3) intuitively seems true, one's justification for believing (3) depends in part on something other than one's intuition experience. Suppose it depends on background skills in evaluating the relevant kinds of counterfactuals, which background skills depend on one's having had some appropriate range of sensory experiences. Then one might agree with Williamson that if one comes to know (3) by intuition, this intuitive knowledge is not a priori. That said-even given the relevant suppositions-it does not follow that our intuitive knowledge of (1) isn't a priori. Nor does it follow that our intuitive knowledge of (2) or of (4) isn't a priori. I will not attempt to decide between DIJ and DIJR here. Whichever turns out to be preferable, it should be clear that the presentationalist view of intuitive justification that I initially defended for geometrical intuition, applies naturally to other sorts of mathematical intuition, logical intuition, and also various sorts of philosophical intuition. 8 Concluding point In this paper I've been defending an answer to the question: ''In virtue of what do our intuitions justify us in believing things?'' I have already pointed out some of the relations that hold among this question and two others: ''What are intuitions?'' ''Do intuitions justify us in believing things?'' There are additional questions that I have not discussed, but that will occur to anyone familiar with the philosophical literature bearing on intuition. For example: 29 This claim is compatible with a range of views about what exactly fictional scenarios are. Further, one might even deny that there are such things, but still accept the phenomenological claim that I am making-that in having an intuition presenting (1) as true, I seem to be aware of a fictional scenario. The nature of intuitive justification 123 ''What metaphysical picture should we have of how intuition works, given that its target domain is abstract?'' ''How should fans of intuition respond to skeptics-and in particular skeptics that appeal to recent experimental studies that purport to embarrass intuition in various ways?'' The main point that I want to make here is that it is possible to pursue issues about the nature of intuitive justification, the metaphysics of intuition, and skeptical challenges to intuition relatively autonomously. An account of the nature of intuitive justification presupposes that there is a coherent metaphysical picture of intuition and that the skeptical challenges can be met. 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Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 Emergency care research ethics in lowincome and middle-income countries Joseph Millum, 1,2 Blythe Beecroft,2 Timothy Craig Hardcastle,3 Jon Mark Hirshon,4 Adnan A. Hyder,5 Jennifer A. Newberry,6 Carla Saenz7 Analysis To cite: Millum J, Beecroft B, Hardcastle TC, et al. Emergency care research ethics in lowincome and middle-income countries. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/ bmjgh-2018-001260 Handling editor Seye Abimbola Received 1 November 2018 Revised 4 January 2019 Accepted 12 January 2019 1Department of Bioethics, Clinical Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA 2Fogarty International Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA 3Nelson R Mandela School of Clinical Medicine, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa 4University of Maryland School of Medicine, University of Maryland, Baltimore, MD, United States 5Milken Institute School of Public Health, George Washington University, Washington, DC, USA 6Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA 7Regional Program on Bioethics, Department of Health Systems and Services, Pan American Health Organization, Washington, DC, United States Correspondence to Dr Joseph Millum; millumj@ cc. nih. gov © Pan American Health Organization 2019. Licensee BMJ. Summary box ► Conducting high-quality, ethical emergency care research in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) is possible and it is essential for global health. ► LMIC regulations vary but most would permit a substantial amount of emergency care research. ► International and country-specific guidelines could assist researchers and research ethics committees navigate ethical and regulatory issues distinctive of emergency care research. ► Challenging ethical questions remain concerning risk assessment, involving sick patients in decision-making, and the role of families. AbSTrACT A large proportion of the total global burden of disease is caused by emergency medical conditions. Emergency care research is essential to improving emergency medicine but this research can raise some distinctive ethical challenges, especially with regard to (1) standard of care and risk–benefit assessment; (2) blurring of the roles of clinician and researcher; (3) enrolment of populations with intersecting vulnerabilities; (4) fair participant selection; (5) quality of consent; and (6) community engagement. Despite the importance of research to improve emergency care in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) and the widely acknowledged ethical challenges, very little has been written on the ethics of emergency care research in LMICs. This paper examines the ethical and regulatory challenges to conducting emergency care research with human participants in LMICs. We outline key challenges, present potential solutions or frameworks for addressing these challenges, and identify gaps. Despite the ethical and regulatory challenges, conducting high-quality, ethical emergency care research in LMICs is possible and it is essential for global health. InTroduCTIon A large proportion of the total global burden of disease is caused by emergency medical conditions, including asthma, severe diarrhoea, maternal haemorrhage, myocardial infarction, sepsis, stroke, and trauma.1 The majority of this burden is in lowand middle-income countries (LMICs).2 Emergency care research-defined as research conducted on diseases, syndromes and systems of care for patients with acute, potentially life-threatening or disabling illness or injury-is essential to improving emergency medicine. However, emergency care research in LMICs has received low priority and is underfunded relative to disease burden.3 Consequently, there is a shortage of good quality data for improving emergency care and health systems.4 Research conducted in any emergency care setting can raise ethical challenges. For example, potential participants may face high baseline levels of risk following an unexpected change in their health. Their capacity to give informed consent is often compromised, and the need for rapid decisions about treatment or research may put further pressure on obtaining fully informed and voluntary consent from patients or families. Such challenges can be intensified in LMICs due to higher patient volumes, overworked providers, weak hospital and health system infrastructure, lack of research infrastructure, over-crowded emergency departments, and more vulnerable patient populations. Despite the research gaps and the widely acknowledged ethical challenges, very little has been written on the ethics of emergency care research in LMICs. A search of the PubMed/ MEDLINE database on keywords related to ethics and clinical research in emergency or acute care settings identified just three articles,5–7 and snowball methods identified two more.8 9 Instead, the bioethics literature has predominantly addressed issues relevant to high-income countries (HICs), particularly the USA. LMIC emergency care researchers and the research ethics committees (RECs) that review their work lack specific guidance that is sensitive to the contexts in which they work. This paper examines ethical and regulatory challenges to conducting emergency care research with human participants in LMICs. We outline key challenges, present proposed on 29 July 2019 by guest. P rotected by copyright. http://gh.bm j.com / B M J G lob H ealth: first published as 10.1136/bm jgh-2018-001260 on 29 July 2019. D ow nloaded from 2 Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 BMJ Global Health Table 1 Ethical regulations regarding emergency care research and consent Country Regulations specific to emergency care research Provision for surrogate consent Provision for waiver of consent Bangladesh ✗ ✓ ✓ Brazil ✗ ✓ ✓ China ✓ ✓ ✓ DR Congo ✗ ✓ ✗ Egypt ✗ ✓ ✗ Ethiopia ✓ ✓ ✓ India ✗ ✓ ✓ Indonesia ✗ ✓ ✓ Nigeria ✗ ✓ ✓ Pakistan ✗ ✓ ✓ Russia ✓ ✓ ✓ South Africa ✓ ✓ ✓ solutions to address these challenges, and identify gaps. We focus on the conditions under which research studies should be permitted; thus, we hope to inform the deliberations of national and local ethics committees. We do not address other important ethical questions, such as how to set priorities for research. Our main message is that despite the ethical and regulatory challenges, conducting high-quality, ethical emergency care research in LMICs is possible and it is essential for global health. dISTInCTIve feATureS of emergenCy CAre reSeArCH All research with human participants must meet ethical criteria, including respect for participants, fair participant selection, an acceptable risk–benefit profile and sufficient social value.10 Research in LMICs sometimes raises further ethical challenges, such as regarding standards of care, ancillary care responsibilities, post-trial access, building local research capacity and responsiveness to local needs. These ethical considerations are important for emergency care research in LMICs just as for other human subjects research. We do not repeat here the important work that has been done elsewhere on these topics. We focus instead on regulatory and ethical issues that result from distinctive features of the emergency care context with particular attention to how they arise in LMIC settings. This means that our primary focus is on issues that result from the fact that research is being conducted on an acute condition, where interventions occur within a limited time window, and the consequences for patients without effective intervention are expected to be severe. regulATIonS And guIdelIneS Most countries have regulations that govern research with human participants and processes for review by local RECs.11 In order to cover the distinctive features of emergency care research, regulations and guidelines need to include: (1) conditions for permitting a waiver of consent to research participation and (2) conditions for permitting surrogate consent to research participation and criteria to identify surrogates. In addition, the regulations must not have blanket exclusions; for example, if a country's regulations prohibit all research with 'vulnerable populations', then it may be impossible to enrol patients with many conditions requiring emergency care. We examined regulations for human subjects research in the ten LMICs with the highest disease burden caused by emergency medical conditions plus Egypt and South Africa (table 1). The relevant regulations vary widely between countries.12 A few high-burden LMICs have regulations that specifically refer to and permit emergency care research, including China, Ethiopia, Russia and South Africa. All the high-burden LMICs have provisions for surrogate consent, which appears to be typical globally. We are aware of a very small number of exceptions; for example, Chile's regulations prohibit the participation in research of persons with mental or intellectual disability who cannot express their will.13 Of the high-burden LMICs, 10 allow a waiver of the informed consent requirement under specified conditions. In general, there are stringent restrictions on the level of risk allowed for studies where informed consent is not obtained. Regulations specific to emergency care research in LMICs and in high-income jurisdictions, like the European Union and USA, permit this research only when it has the potential to directly benefit individual participants.14–18 Outside of regulations tailored to emergency care research, a waiver of consent is frequently permitted only for minimal risk research. Additional requirements also apply. For example, the South African guidelines pertaining to emergency medical research additionally require that 'reasonable steps are being taken to ascertain the participant's religious and cultural sensitivities' and 'the patient and the patient's next of on 29 July 2019 by guest. P rotected by copyright. http://gh.bm j.com / B M J G lob H ealth: first published as 10.1136/bm jgh-2018-001260 on 29 July 2019. D ow nloaded from Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 3 BMJ Global Health kin or legal representatives will be informed as soon as is reasonably possible of the patient's inclusion in the study and of the option to withdraw from the research project at any time'.16 The Chinese regulations for emergency care research allow research without consent only if the treatment in the study has a prospect of helping the participant recover or relieve their pain, which may be quite restrictive.19 The World Medical Association's Declaration of Helsinki (Helsinki) and the Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences' International Ethical Guidelines for Health-related Research Involving Humans (CIOMS) both speak to emergency research.10 20 Helsinki states: Research involving subjects who are physically or mentally incapable of giving consent, for example, unconscious patients, may be done only if the physical or mental condition that prevents giving informed consent is a necessary characteristic of the research group. In such circumstances the physician must seek informed consent from the legally authorised representative. If no such representative is available and if the research cannot be delayed, the study may proceed without informed consent provided that the specific reasons for involving subjects with a condition that renders them unable to give informed consent have been stated in the research protocol and the study has been approved by a research ethics committee. Consent to remain in the research must be obtained as soon as possible from the subject or a legally authorised representative. (Article 30) CIOMS lists similar conditions, plus a requirement for community engagement: If there is no opportunity to solicit informed consent of participants while fully capable of informed consent, plans to conduct emergency care research with incapacitated persons must be publicised within the community in which it will be carried out, where feasible. In the design and conduct of the research, the research ethics committee, the researchers and the sponsors must be responsive to the concerns of the community. (Guideline 16) It is important to remain aware of potential mismatches between what is on paper and what occurs in practice. Regulatory requirements may be vague, in tension with other regulations, and open to interpretation. Other than one small survey that asked about the approvability of a hypothetical study,12 we did not identify any literature that examined the practice of REC review of emergency care research in LMICs. Nevertheless, REC capacity in LMICs remains limited.21 RECs struggle with shortages of funding, staff, institutional support and training.22 Insofar as emergency care research is scientifically or ethically complex, these gaps in capacity are likely to impact its review. These caveats notwithstanding, we draw two key lessons from the regulations and guidelines. First, all countries whose regulations we examined permit research with individuals who cannot consent and most allow for a waiver of consent. While this is not the case for all countries and particularly not all LMICs, we believe this is true of most countries that have regulations for human subjects research and a functioning ethics review system. Many LMICs are also transitioning to include provisions for waiver of consent in their regulations. Consequently, a substantial amount of emergency care research could be approved by RECs in LMICs. Second, there is a lack of consistency across countries regarding emergency care research. Variation and vagueness-for example, regarding exactly what conditions must be met for a waiver of consent to be approved-is likely to impede important research within and across countries, as well as providing patchy protections for participants. THe eTHICS of emergenCy CAre reSeArCH Certain ethical concerns are particularly salient in the context of emergency care research in LMICs. These include: (1) risk–benefit assessment and standards of care for participants with elevated baseline risk; (2) blurring of the roles of clinician and researcher; (3) populations with intersecting vulnerabilities; (4) fair participant selection; (5) quality of consent and (6) community engagement. It is worth mentioning two types of emergency care research that rarely give rise to these ethical issues- observational research and health systems research. Observational and health systems research that relates to emergency care will typically be no different ethically from other observational research or health systems research. For example, registry research that looks at patients admitted through emergency departments will generally be eligible for a waiver of informed consent for the use of de-identified data under the same conditions as other registry research. Health systems research may have its own challenges relating to informed consent.23 For example, cluster-randomised designs in which patients cannot opt out of the research remain hard to justify from the perspective of individual informed consent.24 But again, this is no different for emergency care systems research. risk–benefit assessment and standards of care Participants in emergency care research often face elevated baseline risks as a result of an urgent condition. That is, without rapid, effective intervention they are likely to be seriously harmed. In LMICs, these baseline risks may be even greater, since patients may reach care later and have more underlying vulnerabilities, such as malnutrition or comorbidities. Consequently, first, priority should be given to measures that may protect participants from the serious sequelae of their acute condition. In some non-emergency care research, it may be acceptable to delay intervention or not to intervene, since the immediate consequences would not be severe. In the emergency care settings with which we are concerned that is usually not the case. Second, in some cases, there may be reasons not to provide the current globally best care to participants on 29 July 2019 by guest. P rotected by copyright. http://gh.bm j.com / B M J G lob H ealth: first published as 10.1136/bm jgh-2018-001260 on 29 July 2019. D ow nloaded from 4 Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 BMJ Global Health because of local resource and personnel constraints. Raising the standard of care for patients within a study might make it impossible to draw scientifically valid conclusions or might render the study results irrelevant to the local context. For example, the global standard of care for cardiogenic pulmonary oedema may include intravenous nitroglycerin and non-invasive positive pressure ventilation.25 However, both treatments are expensive and are not widely available in many LMICs. Researchers might want to conduct a study that investigates the best approach to acute pulmonary oedema in a low-resource setting using available medications and modalities. Studies in which participants would not receive the globally best possible care require careful case-by-case analysis. Where the baseline risk of harm is great, at least the following conditions should be met: (1) the lower standard of care is scientifically necessary; (2) participants are not deprived of treatment that they would otherwise receive and (3) the research is intended to produce data of considerable value for the local population.10 26 Policymakers and administrators should be included early on in study design so that the results of locally relevant research can be adopted and standards of care raised. Third, though emergency care patients may face an elevated baseline risk of mortality or serious morbidity, risk–benefit assessments should focus on the incremental risks that the research adds. An observational study that simply requires a few additional blood draws would still be minimal risk, even if carried out with an acutely ill population. How to assess the risk level in other research designs is debatable. Consider a comparative effectiveness study of oral amoxicillin versus co-trimoxazole for community-acquired pneumonia in otherwise healthy children, where there is uncertainty about which is superior.27 This might be considered minimal risk because clinicians are in equipoise about the best treatment. But if there is considerable uncertainty about one or other of the interventions and the condition is potentially fatal, it might be argued that the risk is not minimal despite the apparent equipoise.28 29 blurring of roles When researchers also provide clinical care, the line between clinician and researcher can easily become blurred for both patient–participants and clinician– researchers.30 In other clinical contexts, there may be time to clearly differentiate these roles. In busy LMIC emergency departments, where decisions about care and research participation must be made rapidly, this may not be practical or responsible. Ideally, the person obtaining research consent should be different from the person with primary responsibility for the patient's care.10 When that is not possible, additional safeguards should be instituted. For example, the consent process can be witnessed by an independent third party. For some protocols, it can help to have a third party clinician confirm ongoing consent for research participation after the point of time-sensitive interventions. Independent clinicians also play an important role in ensuring that patients are not enrolled in studies that are excessively risky for them, or inappropriately kept on protocols against their wishes or interests. Intersecting vulnerabilities It is widely agreed that 'vulnerable' research populations-such as children, refugees and institutionalised individuals-should be provided with additional protections. We accept a broad conception of vulnerable: 'an identifiably increased likelihood of incurring additional or greater wrong'.31 Thus, someone might be vulnerable-within a specific context-because she is more easily exploited, at increased risk of harm, or lacks the ability to make her own decisions. Research participants in LMICs may be vulnerable by virtue of poverty, inadequate access to healthcare, lack of power (as when gender norms restrict female autonomy) or through local legal or regulatory barriers (as for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender/Transsexual and other sexual and gender minority community members in some countries). Participants in emergency care research are often vulnerable by virtue of having no or impaired decision-making capacity and by virtue of the risk posed by their acute condition. The cause of someone needing emergency care can also be a source of vulnerability. This may apply, for example, to victims of violence, drug users who have overdosed or patients with stigmatised health conditions-such as schizophrenia. These sources of vulnerability intersect in emergency care research in LMICs. Protections should be tailored to the ways in which the specific populations from which participants are drawn are at risk of being wronged. For example, some potential participants may be at increased risk if information about them is spread to third parties (eg, HIV-positive participants whose HIV status might be noted by family members). RECs may therefore need to pay special attention to how researchers plan to maintain privacy and confidentiality, which can be challenging in busy, crowded emergency departments in LMICs. Researchers and RECs should also be mindful of legal frameworks that are invoked in special circumstances or for specific vulnerable populations, such as regarding criminal suspects, which would override standard confidentiality protections and make it harder to protect participants. fair participant selection Emergency care research is sometimes seen in LMICs as if it were motivated by the desire to take advantage of potential research subjects that suddenly find themselves in an emergency care setting and thus as intrinsically abusive. But the fact that a population is vulnerable does not entail that research with that population should be avoided. Exclusion sometimes deprives participants of potential benefits, for example, where a trial provides potentially life-saving interventions or free clinical care on 29 July 2019 by guest. P rotected by copyright. http://gh.bm j.com / B M J G lob H ealth: first published as 10.1136/bm jgh-2018-001260 on 29 July 2019. D ow nloaded from Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 5 BMJ Global Health that would not be available in the public healthcare system. Further, if vulnerable populations are excluded, the data gathered in clinical trials loses generalisability. For example, consider a trial of an experimental treatment for traumatic brain injury. If patients who lack the capacity to consent are excluded, this will bias recruitment against the most severe trauma cases and may give a misleading impression of how effective the treatment is. Moreover, the populations that are excluded because they are vulnerable are likely to be those for whom we most need research. Protections for potential research participants should be balanced against the value of knowledge to be gained for the populations from which those participants are drawn: truly 'protecting' this population-as a group-is about infusing future care with better evidence. Quality of consent Informed consent allows competent individuals to protect their interests and respects their right to make their own decisions. The context of emergency care research often poses challenges to the quality of informed consent. This is a consequence of: (1) the conditions that lead to a need for emergency care, which frequently impair patient decision-making capacity; (2) the need for rapid treatment and research decisions to be made, which may reduce the amount of information that can be conveyed, put pressure on decision-making and make it harder to identify appropriate surrogate decision-makers; and (3) the fact that the need for emergency care results from unexpected events, so potential participants are likely to have limited understanding of their health situation. Where possible, patients who cannot give their own consent should be represented by surrogate decision-makers (legally authorised representatives). A surrogate may be designated by the patient while capable or, failing that, may be a next-of-kin surrogate or a non-research clinician, according to the local regulatory regime or facility policy. Surrogates are expected to make decisions consistent with the values and preferences of the patient, where known, and otherwise based on the patient's interests.32 In emergency care research, when an enrolment decision must be made quickly for a potential participant who lacks consent capacity, it may not be possible to identify a suitable surrogate in time. In such cases, it may be appropriate to waive the informed consent requirement. Such waivers for emergency research are controversial, at least for interventional studies (scientifically necessary waivers are much less controversial in registry or surveillance research). RECs may consider approving such waivers only if: (1) a waiver is scientifically necessary, such that the research could not otherwise be carried out; (2) the net risk to participants is minimal or the research is judged to be potentially in participants' interests; and (3) consent is obtained as soon as possible from the participants or surrogates. As discussed above, some regulations and guidelines also require additional protections, such as community engagement. One condition on waiving informed consent is that consent to continued research participation should be obtained as soon as possible. Note that consent obtained after research participation has begun is only ever prospective consent to remain in research (and to have one's data included). Consent to interventions that have already been given is not possible. In this regard, the use of terms such as 'deferred', 'retrospective',33 'implied'34 and delayed'35 consent can be unhelpful and inappropriate euphemisms.36 Even when a patient is conscious or a surrogate is available, obtaining fully informed, voluntary consent in the emergency setting may be hard. Patients may be disoriented and in pain; they may have cognitive or communication impairments and decisions may need to be made rapidly. In many LMIC settings, health literacy and knowledge of research may be very limited. These are not reasons to abandon informed consent, but researchers and RECs should carefully consider the context in which enrolment decisions will occur. Even if a full consent process is not possible, the opportunity to refuse participation (dissent) can be offered. For example, someone who is cognitively impaired as a result of a stroke may still be able to express clear preferences about how she does or does not want to be treated. Even if not every aspect of the study can be fully explained, a simplified process can be used and continuing consent to study enrolment obtained at intervals. Even if consent to the overall study cannot be obtained at enrolment, consent to the procedures and use of data that are not imminent can be delayed.37 In sum, challenges to an ideal consent process do not make the case for no consent process. The Fluid Expansion as Supportive Therapy study provides an example of how a consent process can be appropriately modified. This randomised controlled trial examined the practice of fluid resuscitation in the treatment of children with shock and life-threatening infections in sub-Saharan Africa.38 It was imperative that the trial included children who were severely ill, to ensure the findings could be generalised to the appropriate patient population. But children in this situation are often accompanied by parents or guardians in distress who may struggle to understand the information they are given.39 The study sought written prior informed consent whenever possible, but modified the consent process if a potential participant (1) was preterminal, (2) needed immediate resuscitation or had other life-threatening complications like seizures, hypoglycaemia or hypoxia, and (3) the parent or guardian was unavailable or unable to receive or understand information. In such cases, brief information about the study was given and verbal parental or guardian assent was sought before enrolment. Afterwards, parents and guardians were approached for full, written informed consent. In the event of a child participant's death, parents or guardians were not approached afterwards for the full, written informed consent. on 29 July 2019 by guest. P rotected by copyright. http://gh.bm j.com / B M J G lob H ealth: first published as 10.1136/bm jgh-2018-001260 on 29 July 2019. D ow nloaded from 6 Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 BMJ Global Health In the LMIC emergency care setting, it is also particularly important to be aware of the power dynamics between clinicians and patients or their surrogates. The recommendations of clinicians may carry undue weight by virtue of their perceived expertise and authority.40 This influence is likely to be at its greatest when time is short and patients and families are extremely vulnerable and looking for guidance. In many LMICs, families play a more active role in healthcare than they typically do in HICs. Family members may need to provide some of the care, buy medical supplies and provide food for inpatients.41 Moreover, cultural expectations may be such that people other than the patient are expected to make decisions on his or her behalf.40 Family members or clinicians might even prefer to keep important information, such as a diagnosis, from the patient. In other cases, the person who arrives with the patient may not have, or may not feel they have, the authority to make decisions about research participation. For example, Molyneux et al describe a paediatric emergency fluids trial where mothers were usually the parent bringing their child to the hospital. Some mothers were reluctant to give consent without the permission of the child's father.42 How researchers should deal with these complicated culturally specific considerations has received little rigorous analysis from ethicists. Community engagement In the absence of an ideal individual or surrogate consent, other protections may be necessary. Prior REC review and independent monitoring are two common additional procedural protections. In emergency care research and for research in LMICs more generally, involving community members in research design and implementation and in the dissemination of results helps protect and respect potential participants and others, as well as improve the relevance of the research and its acceptance by the community.10 43 For example, a successful community-based emergency first aid responder (EFAR) system was developed in Manenberg township in the Western Cape of South Africa through multiple stages of community engagement. Prior to the start of the project, a survey was conducted to determine the feelings of the community regarding emergencies and local emergency response. Pre-training and post-training surveys were administered to participants trained as EFARs. Community members also provided input to develop the implementation strategy, which went through rounds of modification to achieve consensus. Ultimately, the community-based system was low cost and able to deliver prehospital emergency care and transport for patients.44 45 Sometimes, community engagement activities also provide an opportunity for potential participants to opt out. If the details of a facility-level study are well publicised then patients or their families could opt out by going to a facility that was not taking part. Whether this is possible will depend on the research study and the context of receiving care-not everyone has a choice about where they get treatment. Though community engagement is frequently valuable, a few cautionary points are in order. First, it is not always obvious what constitutes the community or who can speak for the community.46 For example, a substantial proportion of people in LMICs live in cities that are diverse and multicultural. Communities defined in cultural terms may be inappropriate for studies in these cities. Second, community engagement should not be conflated with 'community consent'. Even if community leaders must give permission for researchers to enter a community, individual consent-where possible-is still required.10 Third, community engagement can be a laborious process and may not always be needed. In emergency care research, the greater the incremental risk of study participation, and the harder it is to obtain individual informed consent, the greater the efforts that should be put into community engagement.47 ConCluSIonS An enormous amount of valuable emergency care research can be ethically and legally carried out in LMICs. Gaps remain regarding: (1) guidelines and regulations; (2) ethical analysis; and (3) best practices. There are no internationally accepted guidelines for the ethical review of emergency care research. More detailed guidance would help researchers and RECs struggling with unfamiliar study designs and vulnerable populations. Such guidance can serve an educational function regarding the science, show how to apply the principles of research ethics and reassure reviewers that appropriately designed emergency care research can be conducted ethically. Variation in regulations and health systems means that country-specific guidelines may also be helpful.20 These could build on lessons learnt-good and bad-from not only US and European regulatory experiences but also within LMICs. They could provide clarity on exactly what emergency care research is legally permitted and under what conditions. As a first step, an international conference could bring together policymakers and researchers to set an agenda for harmonising emergency care research ethics practice. There are outstanding challenges relating to risk– benefit analysis for studies in LMIC contexts where access to clinical care is limited. Strategies are needed for addressing participant vulnerabilities that are tailored to their particular situation and do not simply involve exclusion. Outstanding challenges regarding consent include the justification of exceptions from consent requirements, the identification of appropriate surrogates, the involvement of patients in decision-making when an ideal consent process is impossible and the protection of patient autonomy in contexts where clinicians need to be responsive to expectations about the role of the family. Very little literature from LMICs addresses the ethics of emergency care research. More work-especially on 29 July 2019 by guest. P rotected by copyright. http://gh.bm j.com / B M J G lob H ealth: first published as 10.1136/bm jgh-2018-001260 on 29 July 2019. D ow nloaded from Millum J, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2019;4:e001260. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001260 7 BMJ Global Health defining and describing best practices-would provide models for researchers facing similar contexts. The shortage of published information also means that we do not know exactly what researchers and RECs lack. A needs assessment of clinical researchers working in emergency care settings and the RECs that oversee them could identify the specific ethical and regulatory issues they face. Similarly, more data on public and patient perspectives on emergency care research in LMICs would help to inform research design. For example, further research could examine country-specific and community-specific views on research without prior consent or with modified consent processes. Emergency care research can be ethically challenging, particularly when it involves enrolling critically ill patients under time-sensitive conditions. But the very severity of emergency medical conditions is reason to encourage their study. Conducting high-quality, ethical emergency care research in LMICs is both possible and important. Acknowledgements The authors thank Junaid Razzak, Tex Kissoon and Neal Dickert for comments on earlier drafts of the manuscript. Contributors All authors were part of the conception of the paper. JM and BB compiled the regulations. JM drafted the paper. BB, TCH, JMH, AH, JAN and CS provided technical and regulatory information, case studies and revised the paper. funding This work was partly supported by the intramural program of the Fogarty International Center, National Institutes of Health, USA. disclaimer The ideas and opinions expressed are the authors' own. They do not necessarily represent any official position or policy of the US National Institutes of Health, the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Pan American Health Organization, the WHO or any other institutions with which authors are affiliated. Competing interests JMH is Vice President of the American College of Emergency Physicians. The authors otherwise declare no competing interests. Patient consent Not required. Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed. data sharing statement No additional data are available. open access This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non commercial IGO License (https:// creativecommons. org/ licenses/ bync/ 3. 0/ igo/), which permits use, distribution, and reproduction for non-commercial purposes in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. 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Knowledge of Grammar and Concept Possession Edison Barrios ABSTRACT This paper deals with the cognitive relationship between a speaker and her internal grammar. In particular, it takes issue with the view that such a relationship is one of belief or knowledge (I call this view the 'Propositional Attitude View', or PAV). I first argue that PAV entails that all ordinary speakers (tacitly) possess technical concepts belonging to syntactic theory, and second, that most ordinary speakers do not in fact possess such concepts. Thus, it is concluded that speakers do not literally 'know' or 'believe' much of the contents of their grammars, and moreover, that these contents can only be attributed at a subpersonal level. 1. The Propositional Attitude View (PAV) of Linguistic Competence How do speakers manage to be competent at speaking and understanding their native languages? How is it possible for linguists to obtain evidence from them, in the form of linguistic judgments? If we are to believe contemporary linguistics,1 any answer to these questions must relate speakers to their grammars, where a grammar is understood as a cognitive structure instantiated by an individual speaker.2 But how is the speaker related to such a grammar so that she can exploit it in the course of language use and linguistic judgment? The characteristics of human linguistic competence strongly suggest that speakers stand in some sort of cognitive relation R to their grammars (see Chomsky [1986]; Isac and Reiss [2008]). The question is: how can we further characterize R? One appealing answer is that R constitutes a kind of propositional attitude, such as belief or knowledge. This seems to vindicate everyday talk of people 'knowing English (German/Tagalog, 1 Although the term 'linguistics' designates a broad range of scientific activities, in this paper I will deal exclusively with theories in syntax, which is the most representative area of the Chomskyan school of linguistics, even though (or precisely because) philosophers have traditionally paid considerable less attention to syntax than to other areas of linguistic inquiry, such as semantics and pragmatics. Also, for stylistic reasons, I will frequently use the term 'Generative Grammar', or simply 'linguistics', to designate the research program in which I am interested. In doing so (and unless otherwise noted), I will be referring to Chomskyan, Generative Transformational syntax, and, in particular, to theories within the Principles and Parameters approach (see Chomsky, [1986]). 2 This mental structure is frequently referred to as 'I-language', as opposed to 'E-language', where the letter 'I' is supposed to highlight that this structure: (a) belongs to an individual, not a collective or community, (b) is internal to the subject, a part of her mind/brain, not some independent external entity that the speaker more or less imperfectly grasps, and last (c) is intensional: the grammar is intended to be the characterization in intension of a function that maps sounds and meanings, not some extensionally characterized set of sentences, utterances or inscriptions (see Chomsky, [1986] ch. 2). 2 etc.)', while also providing an account of the informativeness of linguistic judgments (Graves et al, [1973]; Dwyer and Pietroski [1996]; Higginbotham [1987]) as well as of the distinction between linguistic competence and performance (Dwyer and Pietroski, [1996]; Knowles [2000]).3 Let us call this position the 'Propositional Attitude View' of linguistic competence (PAV).4 According to PAV, speakers are able to use and reflect on their languages partly by virtue of knowing or believing the grammatical principles or rules of their grammars, such as those described (or postulated) by linguistic theory. This enabling knowledge, as PAV authors are quick to point out, is not of the typical, explicit sort, such as our knowledge that 1+2 = 3 or that Alberto Contador won the 2009 Tour de France. Rather, it is a kind of implicit or tacit knowledge, that is, knowledge that is unavailable to conscious reflection, even though it is exploited in language-related cognition.5 PAV has intuitive appeal and is not devoid of explanatory potential. But for all its initial attractiveness it brings along perplexities that threaten its plausibility. For instance, a cursory glance at a linguistics journal, or even at a textbook in the Principles and Parameters tradition, reveals 3For instance, one way of characterizing the distinction between competence and performance is by saying that the former is the (tacit) knowledge a speaker has of her grammar, whereas the latter is the manifestation of that knowledge in the course of language use. Linguistics, then, studies the first, not the second. Likewise, one possible strategy for justifying the use of intuitions/judgments as evidence about competence is by arguing that they are reliable manifestations of the speaker's grammatical knowledge or beliefs. 4 Dwyer and Pietroski ([1996]); Graves et al ([1973]); Higginbotham ([1987]) and Knowles ([2000]), among others, support PAV in one way or another with respect to grammar (for a similar view with respect to semantics, see Lepore ([1986]); Larson and Segal ([1995])). For instance, Dwyer and Pietroski ([1996], p. 338, emphasis mine), propose that generalizations of linguistic theory 'serve to ascribe beliefs to humans', whereas Knowles' thesis is that 'knowledge of grammatical principles may be seen as what philosophers call a variety of propositional attitude' (Knowles ([2000] p. 326), emphasis in the original), moreover, he attributes this view to Chomsky. George ([1990], p. 91) claims that the grammar of a speaker is 'the object of that speaker's knowledge'. The analogy with knowledge of numbers that he offers later in the text makes it quite plausible to assume that what he means by 'knowledge' is a propositional attitude. Likewise, for Larson and Segal ([1995], p.10, italics mine) '[...] to view the subject matter of semantics as linguistic knowledge is to locate semantic theory within the general enterprise initiated by Noam Chomsky ([1965], [1975], [1986a]), for whom linguistic theory is a theory of the real knowledge of speakers'. Fodor ([1983], p. 7) quite confidently attributes to Chomsky a view that is very close to PAV, if not PAV itself: [...] when Chomsky says that there is an innately specified 'language organ' what he means is that [...]there are innately specified propositional contents [... and that ...] the ontogeny of linguistic capacities is the unfolding of the deductive consequences of the innate beliefs in interaction with perceptual data' (Fodor [1983], italics mine). Whether Fodor's is a faithful characterization of Chomsky's position is another issue, but it certainly is a sign of the appeal of PAV. This paper is not concerned with the particular views that each PAV author holds, but rather on what they share, which is a basic commitment to PAV. 5 The terms 'tacit' or 'implicit' are widely used in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science literature, frequently with different meanings. However, I will assume the following notion: a content C is explicit if it is accessible to consciousness, implicit otherwise. How would such a conscious accessibility manifest itself? C will be explicit to the extent that the subject can report, verbalize or reflect on propositions containing C. This is the way in which 'tacit' is usually employed in cognitive psychology, for instance, in the study of memory and learning. See Davies ([2001]); Schacter ([1996]). 3 grammatical generalizations and descriptions of sentence structure that involve specialized, technical concepts. Moreover, PAV seems to be committed to the claim that every competent speaker, just by virtue of her competence, knows these rules and thus possesses those concepts. I will discuss this claim soon, but first I will illustrate its consequences with an example drawn from (a somewhat dated version of) Binding Theory (see Chomsky [1981]), one of the central components of the Principles and Parameters tradition in generative linguistics. Take Principle A, for instance: (Principle A) An anaphor must be bound in its local domain. This principle explicitly contains concepts such as BINDING and LOCAL DOMAIN, and since BINDING, under this theory, essentially involves concepts such as C-COMMAND and INDEX, these concepts are thereby also encompassed within the principle. Thus, if we adopt PAV we get the following picture. Suppose that a speaker S is competent in the production and understanding of anaphoric expressions in English. Moreover, as a manifestation of her competence, S also has a series of intuitive judgments about the linguistic status of expressions containing anaphors. For instance, she would find (1) acceptable but (2) unacceptable. (1) John likes himself (2) *John's mother likes himself 6 A linguist would naturally interpret S's judgments as evidence that (1) is grammatical in S's idiolect, but (2) is not. This difference can be captured in terms of Principle A of Binding Theory. The explanation of the ungrammaticality of (2) is that it violates Principle A, because 'himself' is not bound in its local domain, as neither of the potential binders actually binds the reflexive.7 Now, the PAV theorist would explain S's judgments, and in general S's competence, by attributing to S (tacit) knowledge of Principle A. Hence, she is committed to ascribing to S the concepts that the principle contains, so that S must possess the concepts ANAPHOR, BINDING, and LOCAL DOMAIN. Moreover, since knowledge of Principle A involves knowledge of the definition of BINDING, PAV is also committed to attributing to S the concepts COINDEXED (A, B) and CCOMMANDS <A, B>, which entail a further set of notions pertaining to the geometry of syntactic trees, such as DOMINANCE, NODE, etc. Some authors are open about this commitment; for instance, Higginbotham ([1998], pp.195-6, italics mine) says that: 6 Asterisks are commonly used in linguistics to indicate that a sentence is ungrammatical or unacceptable. 7 'John's mother' c-commands 'himself', but cannot be coindexed with it, due to lack of gender agreement. Likewise, 'John' does not c-command 'himself', because there is at least one node that dominates the first but not the second, namely the one occupied by the determiner phrase (DP) 'John's mother'. 4 The concept C-COMMAND is [...] deployed by speakers and hearers in determining the possibilities for pronominal cross-reference, in English and other languages, with differences from language to language that are the subject of active research. Pathologies apart, speakers and hearers not only have the concept, but also have an adequate conception of it, even in the absence of any conscious view. From this it can be gathered that every competent speaker possesses the concept CCOMMAND, with the qualification that she does so tacitly. 2. The Argument from Concept Possession 2.1 Motivation Understanding the notions involved in contemporary linguistic theory requires a non-trivial degree of intellectual sophistication and capacity for abstract thought, yet some individuals who seem to lack the indispensable cognitive wherewithal are nonetheless competent speakers.8 Good examples of this are normal elementary school children, as well as adults in whom severe cognitive impairments coexist with relatively intact linguistic abilities.9 Considerations like these prompt doubts about the attribution of grammatical concepts, and such doubts are the starting point for an argument against PAV. 2.2 The Argument Let us call the argument against PAV that is based on this intuition the Argument from Concept Possession.10 To get us started we need a premise that makes concept possession a necessary condition 8 See, in this respect, the discussion in Wright ([1986], p. 218-22) and in Davies ([2001]). 9 See Smith and Tsimpli ([1995]) for the remarkable case of Christopher, a linguistic savant. Another striking example is that of children with Williams Syndrome, whose scores on full scale IQ tests are typically in the range of 50–70, but who are nonetheless able to recognize and have accurate judgments about whether a sentence conforms to the locality requirement in Principle A (Zukowski [unpublished]), and whose performance on complex morphosyntactic phenomena such as reversible passives, reflexive anaphors, and regular past tense inflection is not impaired (Clahsen and Almazan [1998]). 10 Devitt ([2006a], [2000b], [2000c]) attacks a position that is essentially the same as 'PAV', and which he labels the 'Representational Thesis' (RT). RT, along with what he calls the 'Voice of Competence' (VoC) view of linguistic intuitions, forms what Devitt understands as the Standard Chomskyan (and Chomsky's) interpretation of linguistics. Devitt argues that there is no evidence for the view that speakers represent the principles of grammar in their language faculty, or indeed for the thesis they stand in a propositional attitude relation to their grammars. Collins ([2004], [2006], [2007], [2008]) is another critic of PAV. He points out that the expression 'knowledge of language' is a collocation peculiar to the English language, not the description of an epistemological condition that philosophers should strive to accommodate. Furthermore, the picture of the language faculty 5 for holding propositional attitudes. Such a premise could be: (Premise 1) For a subject S to have a propositional attitude towards a proposition P, S must possess the concepts that appear in P. Premise 1 presupposes that believing a proposition requires possessing its component concepts. This fits with the view that thoughts or propositions11 are structured entities, composed by concepts.12 Thus, I will treat concepts as thought components. Before we proceed further I would like to make some comments about my formulation of the Argument from Concept Possession: First, it is framed in terms of belief, though its conclusions can be extended to knowledge, provided knowledge entails belief. I chose to use 'belief' instead of 'knowledge' for no other reason than to avoid issues about factiveness and justification.13 Second, in this paper, 'linguistic proposition' designates those propositions containing grammatical concepts such as BINDING, CCOMMAND and the like. 'Grammatical' or 'syntactic' concepts (I am using these terms interchangeably, for the purposes of this paper) are the concepts-of linguistic objects, properties and relations-that figure essentially in the substantive generalizations of theories in the Principles and Parameters tradition.14 Third, I take concepts, explicit or otherwise, to be a kind of mental content. Section 4 aims to identify the features that set concepts apart from other species of content. offered by the Principles and Parameters approach militates against epistemic construals of linguistic competence. Unlike both Collins and Devitt I will make no assertions about whether Chomsky ever held PAV, if only because I wish to stay away from Chomsky exegesis (I take it that the elucidation of his views, especially earlier ones, is still an contentious issue. See Devitt ([2006]) and Collins ([2004]), for conflicting interpretations of certain key passages). Also, I will make no claims as to whether PAV is the view that most working linguists assume, since I suspect that many of them have few or no settled commitments in this respect. Nevertheless, I do hold that PAV has been sufficiently attested in the literature (see note 4), so as to merit discussion, independently of what Chomsky's views actually are. Finally, whereas Devitt's wider project is an attempt to undermine the (mainstream) view that linguistics is a branch of cognitive psychology, my criticism of PAV will be framed within the context of that view. 11 I am using 'proposition' and 'thought' indistinctly and in an ontologically neutral way, just to make reference to whatever it is that constitutes the contents of propositional attitudes. 12 There are several ways of filling out the details of this schematic picture, some Platonic, some psychologistic, etc., but to anchor the rest of the discussion, let us assume that concepts are (or are represented by/correlate with) mental items which combine in structured ways to form thoughts (or representations thereof). 13 There are defenses of the notion of knowledge of language-though not necessarily of grammar-that do not involve belief (see Smith [2006a], [2000b]; Matthews [2006]). However, since, those views do not require the relevant states to be propositional attitudes, I will not discuss them here. 14 This is meant to exclude, on one side, mere notational conventions and matters of representational technology, and on the other, extragrammatical or clearly non-syntactic concepts, such as those in the domain of pragmatics. Again, I'm taking syntax as the central case, so my conclusions are meant to apply to syntactic concepts first and foremost. The extent to which they can be applied to semantics and phonology is an interesting topic that will have to be taken up elsewhere. 6 So here's the argument: (Argument from Concept Possession) 1. If S believes linguistic proposition P then S possesses linguistic concept C (which appears essentially in P). 2. S does not possess C. 3. S does not believe P (from 1 and 2). 4. If PAV is true then S believes P. 5. So, PAV is false (from 3 and 4). The objective of this paper is to defend the argument above. In section 3 I briefly discuss Premise 1, as well as some constraints on concept possession. The bulk of this essay, though, is devoted to the justification of Premise 2. More specifically, in section 4 I propose a criterion of concept attribution aimed at settling controversial claims about implicit concept possession. I arrive at this criterion by surveying the kind of evidence typically relied on to attribute concepts, and then focusing on a collection of cognitive dispositions that bear crucially on concept ascription. These dispositions turn out to share the property of being manifestations of 'domain crossing', where a content crosses domains iff it can be applied to, or is able to exert direct influence over, a plurality of cognitive domains. This forms the basis for what I call the Domain Crossing Criterion of concept possession, which, in a nutshell, says that S possesses concept C only if C crosses domains in S's cognitive economy. I argue that grammatical concepts do not satisfy this condition in the case of naïve speakers. Hence, naïve speakers do not possess such concepts. 3. Premise 1: Concepts, Thoughts and Persons The view according to which concepts are components of thoughts is the orthodoxy at least within the Fregean tradition in the philosophy of thought, and is also an essential part of the Language of Thought hypothesis.15 This view has been characterized and defended elsewhere,16 so I will devote the rest of this section to what I consider a fundamental constraint on concept attribution. The constraint I am proposing is that concepts must be attributed at the personal level. One 15 According to Peacocke, for example, concepts are 'constituents of complete contents which are evaluable as true or as false' ([1996], p. 407), and for Fodor ([1998], p. 25) concepts are 'constituents of thoughts, and, in indefinitely many cases, of one another'. 16 See Evans ([1981]); Fodor and Pylyshyn, ([1988]); Crane, ([1992]), among others. 7 clue as to why this should be so is that concepts find a natural place in the context of a certain kind of content-involving explanation, namely, rationalizing explanations. Rationalizing explanations of action seek to render an agent's action x intelligible in the light of her reasons to do x. The background assumption is that the agent whose actions are to be explained is rational, and that her action will become understandable once we set it against the background of the contents of her beliefs and desires, as well as her inferential capacities.17 Thus, rationalizing explanations function at the personal level,18 as they involve the personal level ascription of propositional attitudes and their contents, that is, thoughts. In its turn, the attribution of a thought requires the attribution of its components, which we take to be concepts. Concepts, then, must be understood vis-à-vis their role in attributions of personal states, such as believing, desiring or intending. Crucially, just as we require attributions of propositional attitudes towards thoughts to be personal, we also require that the concepts constituting those thoughts be personal. The notion of concept is, then, part of a suite of notions that co-occur in personal-level rationalizing explanations, and which has the notions of belief, desire, intention and the like among its members. In what remains of this essay I will assume that concept attributions, in the context of rationalizing explanations, are pitched at the personal level. I will not provide an argument for it here because I wish to devote my efforts in this paper to the discussion of the second premise, and so a defense of that assumption will have to be taken up elsewhere. So, if you wish, you may understand the conclusions in this paper as being conditional on the assumption of the personal-level character of concept attribution: if one assumed that concept attribution is personal then PAV is false. However, I do think that it is a reasonable hypothesis to assume, given certain plausible suppositions about the role of concepts and propositional attitude attributions in the context of rationalizing explanation.19 In consequence, once we accept the prima facie plausibility of this assumption, we place the burden of refutation on the skeptic's shoulders. In view of this, PAV's competence-based explanation of language capacities turns out to be an instance of rationalizing explanation,20 and so the attribution of the pertinent concepts must 17 See Lepore ([1996]) for a discussion of rationalizing explanations of semantic competence. 18 The present usage of 'personal' and 'sub-personal' states or levels originates with Dennett ([1969]). 19 Two of these assumptions have already been mentioned or hinted at, namely: (a) that rationalizing explanations involve the ascription, at the personal level, of propositional attitudes and thoughts (the contents of the attitudes) to an agent, and (b) that the attribution of a thought involves in its turn the attribution of its immediate components. 20 Thus, the sketch for an explanation of a speaker's choice of pronoun in a particular occasion could go like this: (a) S wants to communicate in English a thought of the form Loves <x, x>, where x is John, and she wants to express it with a sentence in which 'John' is the subject and where a pronoun is in the direct object position. Now, since: (b) S believes that any pronoun that indicates the object of John's love will be (i) c-commanded by 8 satisfy the personal-level constraint.21 Another distinction worth mentioning, which is intimately related to the personal/subpersonal dimension, is that between doxastic and subdoxastic cognitive states. Doxastic states, such as belief, are inferentially integrated, i.e. they can combine with further contentful states to yield consequences. In Stich's words ([1978], p. 507), beliefs are 'inferentially promiscuous'.22 Subdoxastic states, on the other hand, are 'largely inferentially isolated from the large body of inferentially integrated beliefs to which a subject has access'. What best defines subdoxastic states, then, is their comparatively poor potential for inferences. Beliefs, which are personal states, are doxastic as well as conceptual. Concepts, then, are typically associated with doxastic states. Typical examples of non-personal states, such as those occurring at the early stages of perception, are also standard examples of subdoxastic states.23 4. Premise 2: Naïve Speakers Lack the Required Concepts 4.1 The search for a criterion of tacit concept attribution A defense of premise 2 involves finding reasons for denying possession of grammatical concepts to naïve speakers. Both sides in the debate agree that the core evidence for the postulation of C-COMMAND in 'John' (because of its position in the structure), and (ii) co-indexed with 'John' (given that she wants to convey that John's love is self-directed); and since: (c) S believes condition A of Binding Theory, then (d) she forms an intention to utter the sentence: 'John loves himself'. 21 There is textual evidence for the claim that PAV's competence-based explanation of language capacities turns out to be an instance of rationalizing explanation, or at least that it involves propositional attitudes and inference. For instance, Graves et al ([1974], p. 325), claim that speaker's judgments about the grammatical properties of sentences are the result of 'a tacit deduction from tacitly known principles'. According to Dwyer and Pietroski ([1996], p.340) their view (if true) offers a significant empirical constraint on doxastic theories. Moreover, they assume that beliefs are, among other things, 'mental states', and that they 'figure in folk psychological explanations of behavior and inference' ([1996], p.340, emphasis mine). Since this is a constraint on beliefs in general, the one must suppose that it is a constraint on 'linguistic beliefs' as well, but folk-psychological explanations are commonly thought to be personal level and rationalizing. As for the modus operandi of linguistic explanation, they say that, on their view, 'the linguist explains a hearer's grammaticality judgments as the result of an inference based on genuinely intentional states' ([1996], p. 342). 22 'Provided with a suitable set of supplementary beliefs, almost any belief can play a role in the inference to any other [...] it is in this sense that a person's beliefs are inferentially integrated' (Stich, [1978], p. 506). 23 Nevertheless, the distinctions are not necessarily coextensional. Perceptual experience is mainly personal (pain and other sensations are one of Dennett's ([1969]) main examples of personal states), but it is sometimes construed as subdoxastic and nonconceptual (see Bermúdez and Cahen ([2010]); Crane ([1992])). Presumably, there are no doxastic subpersonal states, and so doxastic states would be a proper subset of personal states (though see Schiffer ([1998]), where he discusses 'subpersonal propositional attitudes'). In this paper I assume that personal and doxastic states can come in both conscious and non-conscious varieties, whereas subdoxastic and subpersonal states are invariably unconscious. 9 linguistic theory is constituted by the speaker's competence in her native language;24 they part company, however, on the issue of whether such evidence is sufficient for ascribing C-COMMAND to the speaker. To adjudicate the issue, it seems, we should agree on a suitable criterion of concept attribution. This criterion should provide at least a necessary condition for concept possession, thus allowing us to discriminate between cases of tacit conceptual content and nonconceptual content. Besides this initial characterization, the criterion must meet further conditions. The first one is that is must be neither so restrictive that it leaves out cases of genuine concept possession, nor so lax that includes cases that do not involve concept possession. Second, for the criterion to be informative it must be empirically discriminative, that is, it should afford us a specification of the sorts of evidence that support or undermine the hypothesis of tacit concept possession. An example of a criterion that would be theoretically plausible but not empirically discriminative would be: 'A possesses concept C only if A can entertain thoughts (have attitudes with contents) that include C as a constituent'. This criterion would only be useful if, given a body of evidence, thought attribution were considerably easier or less controversial or more basic than the attribution of concepts. But this does not seem to be the case, and in consequence such a criterion does not make our task any less complicated. A more helpful criterion would be empirically discriminative: it would give us guidance as to what kinds of (say) cognitive dispositions are symptoms of implicit concept possession (i.e. what sorts of inferences, learning outcomes and different cognitive activities, etc.) Thus, the chosen criterion must be pitched in terms abstract enough to cover a broad range of cases of conceptual possession, yet concrete enough to have empirically discernible implications. Also -and ideally- this criterion would follow straightforwardly from a plausible theory of implicit concept possession. However, it is unlikely that this will happen, for at least two reasons: first, although the philosophical literature on concepts is abundant-in fact too vast to receive a fair treatment here-work on implicit concepts is relatively scarce.25 Thus, we must draw resources from related areas, such as theories of concepts (simpliciter) and theories of implicit (doxastic, personal) content. I won't explore theories of concepts in depth, because the main philosophical proposals about concepts stand at a considerable remove from the empirical details of concept attribution, 24 I will use C-COMMAND as a representative example of the kinds of concepts I am discussing, but the same considerations can be applied to other theoretical concepts in Generative Grammar, such as BOUNDING NODE, CASE, SPECIFIER, and so on. 25 Though see Peacocke ([1998]) and the rest of the articles contained in that issue, which was entirely devoted to Peacocke's work on implicit conceptions. On the general topic of concepts, see Peacocke ([1992]) and Fodor ([1998]) for statements of views that have steered much of the debate. 10 and dispute can arise as to how to apply them to concrete cases. Thus, they are unlikely to yield the empirically discriminative criterion we are interested in.26 Another theoretical source is the rich literature devoted to related doxastic notions, such as tacit 'knowledge' and 'belief'.27 In particular, theories of tacit propositional attitudes are worth paying attention to, given that concept and attitude attributions intertwine with each other. Among these theories, Crimmins' ([1992]) 'virtual belief' account of tacit belief is both pertinent and plausible, and I will use it as a model for my discussion. My reasons for endorsing Crimmins' approach are twofold: the first has to do with the theory's merits per se. It has at least the same explanatory power as more traditional alternatives,28 while being immune to most of the challenges on which theories of tacit attitudes have foundered (see Lycan, 1986; Crimmins, 1992). The second reason for preferring Crimmins' view is that it fits my purposes better than other theories. This is because that it provides a general view about the ascription of tacit doxastic states, which can be easily and naturally extended to concepts, and so it suggests a strategy for seeking a criterion. I will take it Crimmins approach, then, as a starting point. 26 Evans' ([1981], [1982]) Generality Constraint (GC) is a condition on concept possession, and as such it is potentially relevant to our discussion. According to Evans, having a concept involves being able to single it out and grasp the range of its combinatorial possibilities. A thinker who possesses the concept FAT will not only be able to contemplate the thought that Albert is fat, but also that Bill is fat, that Godzilla is fat, and so on for other individuals. So, the question is: are C-COMMAND and the like fully recombinable in a naïve competent speaker's mind? The answer to this question will depend on the range of thoughts involving C-COMMAND that such a speaker can form. The answer will depend on the range of C-COMMANDinvolving thoughts that such a speaker can form. This, in its turn, will require us to use the evidence to determine, for a specific series of thoughts, whether the speaker can have them. However, there is no reason to think that whether a speaker can entertain a given thought of the form x c-commands y will be any less controversial (or more basic) than the issue of whether that speaker possesses the concept C-COMMAND. Thus, trying to answer the kind of questions the GC makes available doesn't get us any closer to overcoming the impasse between attributers and nonattributers. As I explain below in the text, we need an "empirically discriminative" criterion, and the GC by itself does not seem to be able to provide this. 27 A prima facie relevant line of work goes under the heading 'tacit linguistic knowledge', and constitutes an elaborate response to Wittgensteinian and Quinean skepticism about knowledge of semantic rules. Among its contributors are Evans ([1981]), Davies ([1987], [1989]), Wright ([1986]), and Peacocke ([1986]), who have advanced views on the nature of tacit knowledge of language, though almost always dealing with semantics, rather than syntax. However, these authors tend to characterize 'tacit knowledge' as 'subdoxastic', that is, as belonging to a class of states that, although content-bearing, do not qualify as fully-fledged propositional attitudes (Davies [1987]; [1989]; Evans ([1981]), Evans ([1982]); Stich ([1978]). See also the previous discussion of subdoxasticity in the text.). For these authors linguistic content occurs at a subdoxastic level, and so is not the basis for genuine propositional attitudes and their conceptual constituents. So, states thus characterized fail to meet the personal level/doxastic constraint on concepts set above. These theories are then (for our purposes) clear nonstarters. Other nonstarters (albeit for diverse reasons that for lack of space I will not discuss here) are earlier criteria of tacit knowledge put forward by Fodor ([1968]), Nagel ([1969]) and Graves et al ([1973]). 28 Such as dispositional accounts (De Sousa [1971]; Maloney [1990]), or what Lycan ([1986]) calls 'simpleconsequence' views, such as Field, ([1978]) and Dennett ([1978]). 11 4.2 Tacit Attitudes, Tacit Concepts and Cognitive Dispositions According to Crimmins, tacit belief attribution is dependent, at least evidentially, on explicit attribution: instances of tacit ascription are legitimate only to the extent that they resemble – to a certain degree and in certain relevant respects – corresponding cases of ascription of explicit beliefs. What drives the ascription of tacit attitudes, then, is similarity with a case of explicit possession. This is the condition on tacit attribution that Crimmins proposes: A at-least-tacitly believes p just in case it is as if A has an explicit belief in p. So, according to this view we can only attribute to (e.g.) a small child the belief that red objects are square if it is as if the child has such a belief, even if he is incapable of reflecting or reporting its contents. At the base of tacit attitude attribution, then, there is an implicit comparison between A's cognitive situation and another situation in which someone-perhaps A herself in a hypothetical scenario-has the corresponding explicit attitude. In the example above, the reference situation (of explicit possession) may be that of a cognitively normal adult who has the explicit belief that red objects are square. For this criterion to be informative it is necessary to specify the respects in which tacit states must resemble explicit states. For Crimmins ([1992] p. 249) this resemblance -the 'being as if' - is cashed out in terms of cognitive dispositions, that is, dispositions towards 'forming beliefs and intentions and to attempt actions'. Thus we arrive at the final formulation of Crimmins' criterion: A at-least-tacitly believes p just in case A's cognitive dispositions are relevantly as if A has an explicit belief in p. The dispositions in question need not be construed at a very fine-grained level, and there is no need to look for detailed similarities at the level of cognitive processes. Instead, we focus on the 'broad upshots' of those processes, such as decisions, conclusions reached and emotions had. Second, similarities in higher-order attitudes (such as higher-order beliefs, desires, as well as mental acts like reflecting, introspecting and the like) do not play any part in the comparison, because if those were to obtain in A's actual situation, then the belief in question would not be tacit, but explicit. The application of this view to the case at hand is quite natural, and by replacing 'belief' with 12 'concept' we obtain a first stab at a criterion for tacit concept attribution: A at-least-tacitly possesses concept C just in case A's cognitive dispositions are relevantly as if A had concept C explicitly. A formulation of this kind would probably be acceptable as it stands if we were merely interested in giving a general account of the nature of tacit possession, which is was Crimmins was trying to do in the case of belief - and so it was appropriate for him to leave questions of empirical applicability unanswered. However, since we are aiming at an empirically discriminative criterion, we must be more specific, since cognitive dispositions can resemble each other in innumerable ways, and not all of them are relevant for our purposes. 4.3 Domain Crossing And Its Manifestations So, in which ways must cognitive dispositions resemble those of the explicit case? As an answer to this question I propose what I call the 'Domain Crossing Hypothesis', namely, that the cognitive dispositions in the implicit case must manifest 'domain-crossing', just as those in the explicit case do. Domain crossing is a property of concepts (qua contents), which I characterize thus: (Domain Crossing) A given content crosses domains iff it can be directly applied to or is able to exert direct influence over a plurality of cognitive domains or spheres (a discussion of this will come later). Domains, in this case, can be subject matters, theories, conceptual structures, or even tasks or situations associated with particular conceptual demands. So, a concept crosses domains when it is deployed in context y, though it has been acquired, or is standardly used in a different domain x. The following is a hypothetical but illustrative example of domain crossing. Consider the concept PARABOLA, as possessed by Mary, an engineer and overall versatile person. She can apply the concept in solving abstract mathematical problems, as well as problems about (say) the trajectory of projectiles. Deployment of the concept can also help her understand the principles behind the design of the wire strand cables of the Golden Gate Bridge, and may also guide her in designing antennas of radio telescopes. She also recruits the concept to teach her son the notion of 13 a conic section, or to play a competitive game in which one must run in what is intuitively a parabolic trajectory. She also uses it in thinking metaphorically about the life course of a historical figure whose fortunes progressively rise and then fall. In this case, PARABOLA seems to be directly pressed into service by many different cognitive processes, for the fulfillment of sundry cognitive tasks. This includes general problem solving, analogy making, metaphor production and understanding, and many others. It is also applied in thinking about a wide variety of objects, from mathematical objects to artifacts human lives. It also occurs in the fulfillment of tasks of quite diverse nature, such as mathematical reasoning, spatial reasoning and motor control, for instance. Thus, in Mary's case we are quite confident that PARABOLA crosses domains. For the notion of domain crossing to fulfill its role in an empirically discriminative criterion we must determine which kinds of cognitive dispositions constitute evidence of domain crossing. As illustrated by the example above, flexible deployment in discrimination and reasoning in heterogeneous tasks is a clear indication of domain crossing. For instance, a domain-crossing content can figure in premises used in the agent's reasoning, such as 'If x is a parabola then Q', where x and Q can stand (respectively) for a variety of objects and propositions that participate in different antecedents of action and belief, in different cognitive contexts and tasks. Another kind of cognitive disposition that evidences domain crossing is what we can call "nonliteral applications". These go beyond the standard applications we have mentioned so far and come into play in devices such as metaphor and metonymy, in jokes, and in games or other activities that involve pretense. In these cases we find the possibility of cross-categorial applications, that is, of deployment of the concept in ways that depart from its standard categorial profile (e.g. treating numbers as if they were animates; Mary's thought that Napoleon's existence was a parabola, etc.), and where this does not come about through mistaken beliefs about the objects in question. Last, there is a related group of dispositions and outcomes that allow a content to be manifested, albeit in an indirect way, which I call 'cognitive transfers'. An example is the facilitation (or hindrance) of cognitive outcomes-such as learning or reasoning-in one domain by contents in another domain. This is most obviously exemplified by analogical reasoning, and is conspicuously present in cases of scientific discovery and (successful) school learning, where knowledge in one area can be a natural springboard for acquisition, learning or reasoning in another. Thus, we have identified three kinds of dispositions that are prima facie indicators of domain crossing: use in discrimination and reasoning, non-literal applications and cognitive transfers (of course, this list is by no means exhaustive). 14 The notion of domain crossing-and in consequence the criterion-contains a crucial notion that needs clarification: the distinction between direct and indirect application (or influence). This contrast is needed to rule out cases that at a first glance look like domain crossing but which are not, as illustrated in the following example. Suppose that Al sees Beth for the first time. In the course of processing Beth's facial features, Al's perceptual system (which we take to be subpersonal) tacitly computes and registers, say, a measure of the symmetry of Beth's facial features. Let us call this measure, which is representational in character, s. The content of s (tacitly) contributes to Al's intuitive appraisal of Beth's overall attractiveness, and thus to Al's belief that Beth is physically attractive. Beth's perceived attractiveness is in its turn one the factors that enter Al's (personal-level) deliberation as to whether he should approach Beth for conversation, along with e.g., Al's fear of rejection, self-image, likelihood of success, etc. So, s has cognitive influence over Al's decision to approach Beth, as it contributes to an overall impression of attractiveness at a personal level. However, the influence of s on his decision is indirect, as it is not directly applied or adverted to in the deliberation process that leads to Al's choice. This is because it is unlikely that s itself-as opposed to the predicate 'x is attractive'-is a component of one of the premises in Al's deliberation, or one of the relevant personal-level considerations behind his choice. Thus, the fact that s has some degree of cognitive influence beyond its original domain (face perception) does not support the view that s crosses domains, and a fortiori does not support the view that s is conceptual. Beth's perceived attractiveness, on the other hand (or the corresponding concept) is a better candidate for playing a direct role in Al's personal-level considerations and thus for being directly applied in the processes leading to his choice. Analogously, as Mary's example was described, it is plausible that in her case PARABOLA did make a direct contribution to her thought processes qua agent. 4.4 The Domain Crossing Criterion Recapitulating, we had proposed that A at-least-tacitly possesses concept C just in case A's cognitive dispositions are relevantly as if A had concept C explicitly. And since we just hypothesized that A's cognitive dispositions are relevantly as if A had concept C explicitly just in case A's cognitive dispositions with respect to C - "C-involving dispositions", for short - manifest domain crossing, we arrive at the following proposal: Domain Crossing Criterion. 15 A at-least-tacitly possesses concept C just in case A's C-involving dispositions manifest domain crossing. This criterion satisfies the main requirements set above, namely, its formulation abstract enough to cover a broad range of cases of conceptual possession, yet concrete enough to have empirically discernible implications. Now the question is whether the criterion works. To argue for its plausibility, it must be shown that instances of tacit concept possession in general exhibit domain crossing (minus those aspects that depend on explicitness, of course). Crucially, we must also show that the criterion is not too liberal, by showing that cases of content ascription that are not conceptual do not show domain crossing. In the following section, I identify cases of attribution of tacit contents that are reasonably thought of as conceptual in nature, and will argue that, although lacking explicitness, they nonetheless feature domain crossing. 4.5 Domain Crossing and Tacit Concepts Peacocke ([1998], pp. 48-51) mentions an interesting example of tacit concept possession in his discussion of Newton and Leibniz's 'grappling with the notion of the limit of a series', a fundamental notion for the explication of the differential calculus. These authors lacked the resources to provide an explicit characterization of the concept LIMIT OF A SERIES; however, it would be unfair to say that they lacked the concept, because, among other things, they were able to differentiate particular functions, and they had no difficulty in saying what the limit of a particular series of ratios was, and the best explanation for this is that they were implicitly deploying the notion. So we could say that Newton and Leibniz possessed LIMIT OF A SERIES implicitly (Peacocke speaks instead of 'implicit conceptions', which are slightly different from 'implicit concepts', though the distinction does not concern us here). Moreover, the application of the concept was not in their case stereotypically or mechanically tied to just one kind of problem, but also influenced other areas of research, such as metaphysics (Leibniz), and physics (Newton). There are other examples of what we could plausibly think of as tacit concepts. Some of them (unlike LIMIT) are acquired independently of formal education or special talent, as is the case with basic notions such as ANIMATE, AGENT, CAUSE, OBJECT and NUMBER, among others. These inform the functioning and development of vast areas of cognition and perception, are 16 attributable to both preschool children and adults,29 and are typically assigned conceptual status by researchers.30 In the discussion that follows I will focus on a particular member of this class: ANIMATE. Preschool children typically lack an explicit conception of ANIMATE, as they are unable to report on its contents, or to explicate them, or to perform any task that depends on these abilities. However, just as explicit possessors, preschoolers are adept at discriminating animates from inanimates, and they can use the notion for reasoning in a broad variety of areas. For instance, on the basis of the animate-inanimate distinction they are able to judge, from an array of objects, which of them can possess biological properties and undergo biological processes, such as growth, healing, reproduction, inheritance, illness, contagion and death (Gutheil, Vera, & Keil, [1998]). Furthermore, they are able to combine the implicit content of the concept with various explicit contents so as to yield novel inferences. Thus, Opfer & Siegler, ([2004]) taught a group of preschoolers, who were unaware of plant motion, that plants can move in goal-directed ways. They immediately inferred that plants-like animals-are living things, too, deriving from this an array of animacy-related consequences. The concept can also be put to use in more abstract tasks, such as judgments of categorial appropriateness, as shown by a study reported by Keil ([1979]), where 4-year-olds were able to recognize the inappropriateness of applying animate-appropriate predicates to artifacts (e.g., 'The chair is asleep' was judged as 'silly'). Preschool children are also capable of non-literal applications of ANIMATE: they can deploy the notion in games and in metaphor, both in production and in comprehension. Pretense-play provides a good example: a child may assign animate-like properties to a doll, which she knows to be inanimate. Five year olds also show competence at understanding metaphors that depend on animacy (Gottfried, [1997]). Last, it can be argued that animate can perform a role in cognition that is analogous to that of cognitive transfer, as the notion is at the center of a vast cluster of conceptual distinctions that enable several aspects of cognitive development. Among these are the acquisition of word meaning and syntax, the understanding of metaphor, the causal interpretations of action, the attribution of mental states and the attribution of biological processes, among others (see Gelman and Opfer, [2002]; Rakison and Poulin-Dubois [2001]; Carey [1985], chapter 1). These can be 29There is evidence that the distinction between animate and inanimate entities (first applied to people and later to animals) is well in place very early in infancy, and it has also been proposed that it is already in its stable, robust form by the end of the preschool years, if not earlier (see Gelman and Opfer [2002]). 30 See Poulin-Dubois, Lepage and Ferland ([1996]); Shutts, Markson and Spelke ([2009]), for example. ANIMACY gets recruited in infants' conceptual understanding of the world (as measured by, for example, emotional responses, imitation, generalization, or causal attributions) (Gelman and Opfer, [2002], pp. 152-55). 17 understood as very deep cases of cognitive transfer. This role manifests itself in the course of development, and so is unlikely to have a close counterpart in the situation of the cognitively mature explicit possessor that we described earlier. We can see then, that the relevant cognitive dispositions exhibited by tacit possessors of the concept ANIMATE-preschool children in this case- show clear signs of domain crossing, in the form of discriminative abilities, usability in problem solving and reasoning, especially in areas different from the canonical or learning situation, as well as non-literal applications. As a more tentative observation, we also included cognitive effects. To sharpen the contrast we must find out whether domain-crossing dispositions are missing in cases where concept attribution would clearly be illegitimate. For this purpose we can consider those concepts that appear in computational theories operating at the sub-personal level. Examples can be found in computational theories of early vision, in the tradition of Marr ([1982]). Let us consider, for example, the algorithm for detecting edges, via zero-crossings, which uses Fourier transforms (Marr [1982], pp. 54-7). I take it that it would be wildly implausible to say that a perceiver, just in virtue of her ability to detect edges in the environment, possesses the concepts ZERO-CROSSING or FOURIER TRANSFORM, not only because people with no training in mathematics are as competent at visual tasks as someone who has explicit mastery of those notions, but also because, since the visual systems of other mammals are similar to the humans', we expect monkeys, dogs, and cats-who are also proficient at detecting edges-to implement a similar computational procedure. So, this is definitely not a case of tacit concept possession. Correspondingly, we have reason to think that domain crossing-indicating dispositions (or at least most of them) do not obtain for ZERO-CROSSING or FOURIER TRANSFORM in the case of mathematically naïve subjects. Certainly, a competent perceiver under appropriate conditions would give plenty of evidence of being able to (implicitly) discriminate edges from non-edges. Nevertheless, he would not be able to apply the concepts in question to a wide range of problems, outside of the mechanical, encapsulated process of detecting edges. Likewise, these concepts seem unavailable for deployment in metaphor, pretense, humor or other non-literal applications, for example. Cognitive transfers are also absent, given that being able to detect edges does not facilitate learning or problem solving in (e.g.) any areas of mathematics or physics, which would be obvious areas of application. Other clear examples can be found in the study of motor skills. For instance, it has been 18 found that successful ball fielders run 'at a speed that kept the acceleration of the tangent of the angle of elevation of gaze to the ball at 0' (McLeod and Dienes, [1996], p. 531); see also the discussion in Devitt ([2006a], p. 50). This is not, however, grounds for attributing TANGENT OF AN ANGLE to the players: its applications are quite circumscribed to the area of ball-catching, and being a competent fielder typically does not influence learning and performance in trigonometry or in any other applications that depart significantly from fielding. The above considerations clearly suggest that domain crossing is found in cases of concept attribution- whether explicit or implicit- whereas it is absent in cases of nonconceptual content postulation. Thus, they provide support for the domain-crossing criterion. Having established the criterion's worth, we must put it to work for the purpose it was intended. This will be done in the next section. 4.6 Domain crossing and Grammatical Concepts We finally get to the payoff: do naïve speakers possess C-COMMAND? In the light o the proposed criterion, the question becomes: does a grammatical notion, such as C-COMMAND, meet the Domain Crossing criterion with respect to naïve speakers? It seems unlikely, since it shows few - if any-of the hallmarks of domain crossing. Sure enough, if we take a set of sentences whose grammaticality depends in some way on a rule involving C-COMMAND, a competent speaker would typically be able to classify them in terms of acceptability. However, we do not expect the speaker to use the concept in solving problems in non-linguistic domains, and she will not instantiate any cognitive transfers involving C-COMMAND (such as learning or reasoning enhancement, or analogical reasoning. The case of Bloggs, discussed below, is relevant to this issue). The use of the concept in general reasoning appears rather limited, and seems unavailable for non-literal applications, as well, as its involvement seems circumscribed to the linguistic domain. In consequence, C-COMMAND fails the Domain Crossing Criterion in naïve speakers. Thus: (a) the naïve speaker's cognitive dispositions towards C-COMMAND are different enough from those of the explicit possessor to discourage ascription of the concept, and (b) instead, the cognitive profile of C-COMMAND seems to fit non-conceptual explanations - such as those in the field of early vision -better. 4.5 Summing up 19 In this section I started by articulating and defending a proposal for the ascription of tacit concepts, based on existing theories of tacit attitude attribution (i.e. Crimmins', [1992]). The resulting criterion identified domain crossing as a condition for conceptual status. Next, I proposed certain kinds of cognitive processes and dispositions (discrimination and reasoning, nonliteral applications, cognitive transfers, etc.) as crucial manifestations of domain crossing. Upon examination, these signs of crossing were found missing in the c-command-involving dispositions of speakers, strongly suggesting that they do not possess the concept, and thus supporting premise 2 of the Argument from Concept Possession. Since we have taken C-COMMAND as representative of grammatical concepts in general this claim can be extended to them. Premise 2, when combined with premise 1 -namely that if S believes linguistic proposition P then S possesses linguistic concept C (which appears essentially in P) - entails that S does not believe P (premise 3). Thus, PAV is false. 5.0 Objections 5.1 Grammatical concepts cross domains One line of argument against PAV is that the putative beliefs or knowledge states carrying grammatical information are inferentially isolated, and so cannot be propositional attitudes. See Stich ([1978]). See also Dwyer and Pietroski ([1996]), Higginbotham ([1987]) and Knowles ([1996]) for discussion and criticism of this kind of argument. The Argument from Concept Possession is somewhat different, as it is couched in terms of concepts and concept possession, rather than belief. However, the notions of inferential integration and domain crossing are closely` related. So, supposing that C is a class of concepts, and that a D is a class of cognitive states whose contents essentially feature concepts of the kind C, then showing that D's are inferentially integrated (and thus doxastic) goes a long way towards establishing that C's are domain-crossing. Dwyer and Pietroski ([1996]) argue that grammatical states (what they call L-beliefs) are inferentially integrated; thus their objection, if successful, would be a serious challenge to Premise 2 of the Argument from Concept Possession. Their argument starts with the following scenario (see Dwyer and Pietroski [1996], 357-58): an individual named Bloggs (a naïve English speaker) is watching an experiment in which a subject is presented with two boxes. Bloggs eventually arrives at the following generalization: whenever the 20 experimenter utters a grammatical sentence,31 the left box contains ten dollars and the right box is empty. Otherwise, when the experimenter utters an ungrammatical sentence, the left box is empty and the right box contains the money. Now suppose that the experimenter utters the sentence: (3) *John and Bill think that Mary wants pictures of each other. Then he asks Bloggs to pick a box. Since Bloggs is competent in English he rules (3) ungrammatical, thus arriving at the belief that the money is in the right box. According to Dwyer and Pietroski, the explanation for Bloggs' choice involves his belief that (3) is ungrammatical, which depends inferentially on his putative L-belief that anaphors must be bound in their local domain. Thus, Bloggs' L-beliefs can influence, and be integrated with, beliefs and desires involved in decision making in a non-linguistic domain (a choice between two boxes, in this case). We may reconstruct Bloggs' reasoning thus: Argument 1 (i) Sentence (3) is ungrammatical. (ii) If a sentence is ungrammatical, then the right box contains 10 $. (iii) Therefore, the right box contains 10 $. Presumably, (i) - (iii) all describe the contents of Bloggs' explicit beliefs. Premise (i) is a straightforward linguistic judgment. Premise (ii) is crucial, because it links L-beliefs with nonlinguistic content. The content of (iii), together with some additional practical reasoning taking into account Bloggs' desires, eventuates in his choice of the right box. Now, for the Bloggs scenario to do its work, L-beliefs and their components (i.e. grammatical concepts) must bear on this chain of reasoning as part of the grounds for (i). Thus, an argument such as the following should provide a (rational) basis for Bloggs' acceptance of (i): Argument 2 (iv) In (3) 'each other' is an anaphor. (v) In (3) 'each other' is locally free.32 31 From Bloggs' point of view we should probably formulate the generalization in terms of acceptability, or of a sentence being 'ok'. This is because grammaticality is a theory-internal notion (i.e. what status a grammar G assigns to a sentence S), which we be should cautious in attributing to naïve subjects (see Schütze [(1996)], chapter 3). However, to remain as faithful as possible to Dwyer and Pietroski's own exposition I use the term 'grammatical' throughout this discussion. 32 'Each other' is an anaphoric term, and so it must be bound by a local antecedent. There are two candidates for this role: 'John and Bill' and 'Mary'. 'Mary'-which is local with respect to 'each other'-is ruled out because of lack of number agreement, and 'John and Bill', which does agree with 'each other', is outside of its 21 (vi) If in a sentence S an anaphor is locally free, then S is ungrammatical. (vii) Therefore, (3) is ungrammatical. Where (vii) = (i) and premises (iv)-(vi) designate Bloggs' implicit L-beliefs. Thus, if the speaker instantiated something like Argument 2, together with Argument 1, that would entail that notions such as BINDING and ANAPHOR are domain crossing, since they are recruited in a piece of reasoning leading to an extra-linguistic conclusion (iii). 33 Nevertheless, I think that this picture fails to show that grammatical concepts have crossed domains, for two reasons: (a) Accepting Bloggs' scenario as sufficient grounds for attributing something like Argument 2 to Bloggs would result in over-attribution of concepts. (b) There is an alternative, plausible way of accounting for Bloggs' actions that does not postulate domain crossing, since it does not rely on ascribing Argument 2 to Bloggs. A) Over-attribution Consider this scenario, analogous to Dwyer and Pietroski's: an individual called Ploggs is watching an experiment. This one, like Bloggs', has two boxes, but the task is different, as it is a visual experiment. The generalization discovered by Ploggs is the following: whenever the experimenter shows the subject a circle, the left box contains ten dollars and the right box is empty, and when the experimenter produces a square the opposite obtains. The experimenter shows Ploggs the following figure and tells him to choose a box (see fig. 1): Ploggs recognizes it as a square, and thus comes to believe that the money is in the right box. We can postulate that Ploggs' belief that the figure is a square is based on the information that it has edges, which finds in its turn a causal antecedent in the outputs of certain states that implement an algorithm for edge detection, based (say) on zero crossings. Since Ploggs' and Bloggs' examples are strictly parallel, we should be able to conclude the following: that the states of the early vision system contribute inferentially to other non-visual tasks, and in consequence, that the intervening concepts cross domains. This would in its turn lend support to the attribution of the concept of ZERO local domain. 33 Higginbotham ([1987], p. 124-7) offers a group of related examples aimed at showing that linguistic knowledge is cognitive integrated. These focus on its role in the offline monitoring of speech and on general reasoning of language, including the repair of 'garden-path sentences'. My answer to Higginbotham's cases is along the same lines as my answer to Dwyer and Pietroski's. 22 CROSSING, for example, to Ploggs (who, by assumption, has never been exposed to vision science). But this conclusion is intuitively unacceptable. Furthermore, contents such as those of the early vision systems are the paradigm of subdoxastic, subpersonal states, which given their modular character are prevented from crossing domains (see Fodor, [1983]; Pylyshyn, [1999], Pylyshyn [2003]). Thus Dwyer and Pietroski's interpretation of Bloggs' case would imply too liberal a view of concept attribution, since we could multiply parallel scenarios which, by parity of reasons, would allow us to attribute to individuals concepts that they clearly lack. B) An alternative picture The alternative picture is that whatever contents are handled by the visual faculty in the detection of edges (let us call them V-contents, in analogy to Dwyer and Pietroski's L-beliefs), they can only be directly engaged by early vision processes. States, such as beliefs, desires and intentions are directly involved in decision-making, and V-contents would form part of the causal chain leading to these states. However, the influence that V-contents exert on Ploggs' choice is not direct. Rather, V-states contribute to the output that the visual system (the product of a black box, as far as personal-level considerations are concerned), sends to the central systems involved in belief-fixation. Analogously, Bloggs' scenario does nothing to discredit a corresponding view of the role of grammatical contents. In such a view, their direct influence extends to the linguistic domain exclusively, thus failing to cross domains. In consequence, their influence on central, personal level states is indirect, in their capacity as contributors to the outputs of the language faculty, which are then consumed by other areas of cognition (such as those leading to linguistic judgment).34 Considerations (A) and (B) together strongly suggest that Dwyer and Pietroski's argument fails to establish the crossing of domains for grammatical states. 5.2 Objection: Concept talk is pleonastic Barber ([1996]) contains a criticism of arguments against linguistic belief-such as the argument I am proposing-that are based on lack of conceptual resources. He starts by laying out a plausible 'necessary and sufficient condition' for possession of a given concept C, (A is any cognitive propositional attitude, P is a proposition, and C appears in P): 34 In the end, however, the issue of what contents and processes are actually involved in acceptability judgments must be settled by appealing to empirical psychological research. For discussion see Devitt ([2006b]); Fitzgerald ([2009]); Culbertson and Gross ([2009]); and Schütze ([1996]), among others. 23 (4) S possesses C is a necessary condition for S A's that P But, as Barber observes, any claim of the form 'p is necessary for q' is equivalent to a claim of the form 'q is sufficient for p'. Thus, from (4) he gets (5), which is a sufficient condition for concept possession: (5) S A's that P is a sufficient condition for S possesses C. So, if we have reasons to attribute to a speaker the tacit belief that, in a given sentence, phrase X c-commands phrase Y, then-given (5)-we have a (defeasible) reason for attributing the concept C-COMMAND to the speaker. Furthermore, to deny that the speaker has the belief in question, just on the claim that she does not possess C-COMMAND, would be question-begging.35 Thus, (6) 'S believes that phrase X c-commands phrase Y'. implies: (7) 'S possesses the concept C-COMMAND', and the evidence (according to Barber) for (6) is at least as good the reasons against (7). The Argument from Concept Possession is thus rendered ineffectual, because at most it forces a stalemate between the opponents. There is a temptation to resist (5) by saying that having just one C-involving belief is not enough for the possession of concept C.36 The basis for this is the strong intuition that possession of C requires that C be deployed in a variety of beliefs (among other things; this was the point of singling out domain crossing as a key property). Barber replies that this does not contradict his thesis, since the need for more than one propositional attitude involving a concept in order to have even one is 'if true, a fact about propositional attitude attribution, not about concept possession' (Barber [1996], p. 58). This answer is instructive, for it shows why Barber's argument is ineffective against premise 2. Barber's view entails the hypothetical claim that if S holds the belief that P, then, ipso facto, S possesses the concept C. He also endorses the epistemic claim that if we have good reasons for attributing P to S, then we automatically have good reasons to attribute C to S. However, Barber's proposal is silent about the antecedent of the second (epistemic) conditional, namely, the categorical claim that we have good reasons to attribute P to S. This is because Barber's theory does nothing to address the matter that is most pressing for us here: the evidential or epistemic issue of the conditions of attribution, which drove us in the first place to search for an empirically discriminative 35 Barber ([1996], p. 57) writes: [...] if we have a defeasible reason for thinking that an agent believes some proposition, then this reason cannot be defeated solely by the claim that the agent does not possess some concept involved in the allegedly believed proposition, because any reason for belief attribution is ipso facto a reason for concept possession ascription (italics mine). 36 Or more correctly, that having evidence for ascribing just one C-involving belief is not enough evidence for attributing concept C. I'll address this point shortly. 24 criterion.37 So, even if we accept (4) and (5) as descriptive of the belief-concept relation, this does not preclude the possibility that the reasons for withholding attribution of grammatical beliefs (and thus grammatical concepts) will be on the whole weightier than the reasons for attributing them. In fact, this is what the argument for premise 2 shows, and if so, then the reasons for attributing CCOMMAND are defeated, and it is not question-begging to deny PAV on the basis of lack of concept possession. 6.0 Conclusion This paper dealt with the cognitive relationship between speakers and their internal grammars, in the light of contemporary linguistic theory. It did so by stating and criticizing an initially attractive position on the nature of this relationship: the Propositional Attitude View (PAV). The particular objection against PAV explored here was the Argument from Concept Possession. I focused on the second premise of Argument from Concept Possession, namely, that many competent speakers do not possess the concepts they should possess in order to believe the principles and rules of their grammars. To this end I proposed a criterion of concept possession, the goal of which was to help us settle disputes regarding concept possession. The criterion is based on a property of contents that I called 'domain crossing', and it postulates the capacity for crossing domains as a necessary condition for concept possession. I then argued that grammatical concepts, such as C-COMMAND, fail the domain-crossing criterion in the case of naïve speakers. If this is correct, then typical speakers do not possess grammatical concepts, and so premise 2 of the Argument from Concept Possession is justified. Consequently, PAV should be rejected: speakers do not literally 'know' or 'believe' the contents of their grammars. Some comments on the scope of this conclusion: here I have discussed propositional attitudes toward the highly abstract generalizations and constraints posited by generative grammarians. There are other kinds of linguistic items, however, that are candidates to be implicitly believed by untutored speakers. Examples of these are that: (a) 'I went there yesterday' is acceptable in English whereas 'I yesterday went there' is not; (b) that in 'Bill suspects that John hates himself', 'John', but not 'Bill', can be the object of John's hatred; or (c) that 'Tonight Carla Bruni will talk about sex with Nicolas 37 Barber's view is that talk about concepts is pleonastic, in the sense of being a linguistic epiphenomenon that emerges out of talk about beliefs. This clearly isn't the picture of beliefs and concepts that I am adopting here, where talk about concepts is not a mere epiphenomenon but deals with the actual constituents of the thoughts or propositions towards which thinkers have attitudes. In their role as components, they are invoked to explain crucial characteristics of thought, such as systematicity, as well as the inferential capabilities of individuals. The pleonastic theory, as Barber points out, is not incompatible with these phenomena, but it does nothing to advance of our understanding of them, either. 25 Sarkozy' can be understood in more than one way, etc. All of these constitute more or less superficial facts about particular sentences, which are available to speakers in general. But this does not detract from the overall significance of the conclusion, for my target was the rather more interesting (and controversial) claim that speakers' knowledge extends beyond these humdrum facts, to encompass the highly abstract principles of their grammars.38 Other theories of grammar abandon the highly abstract, formal analyses that characterize work in the generative tradition, and so their generalizations do not advert to the syntactic concepts discussed here.39 Perhaps PAV would fare better if it were formulated in terms of these theories; however, here I have restricted myself to the most widely accepted theory, which is also the one most influential for philosophers. The goals of this paper are mainly critical, or negative. Such goals are justified because progress can be achieved by ruling out attractive but inadequate views. That being said, I am aware that much remains to be done, such as spelling out the way in which a subpersonal psychological theory would account for the personal-level phenomena (such as linguistic judgments) that are usually cited as motivations for PAV, or determining the pertinence and implications of the analogy between linguistic theories and theories of vision. Indeed, we need a picture of how the speaker is related with her linguistic states, but these questions will have to be addressed in future work. Acknowledgements I would like to thank Tom McKay, Ishani Maitra, Jeff Glick, Jordan Dodd, Jaklin Kornfilt and David Braun for useful discussions of the material. I am particularly grateful to Michael Devitt and two anonymous reviewers, whose input led to significant improvements with respects to previous versions of the paper (though any mistake found here is of my own harvest). Philosophy Department Syracuse University 38 It may also be that certain less abstract grammatical notions are within the speaker's purview, such as grammatical relations like 'subject' and 'object'. However, these are not notions that appear in the generalizations of the theories we are interested in, in part because they can be defined in terms of sentence structure; that is, they give way to more basic notions. 39 One example of this is Radical Construction Grammar (Croft [2001]), where the notion of construction (such as the passive, ditransitive, etc.) is taken to be basic. 26 541 Hall of Languages Syracuse, NY, 13244 USA [email protected] References Barber, A. [1998]: 'The Pleonasticity of Talk about Concepts', Philosophical Studies, 89, pp. 53–86. Bermúdez, J. and Cahen, A. [2010]: 'Nonconceptual Mental Content', in E. Zalta (ed.) Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, <plato.stanford.edu>. Carey, S. [1985]: Conceptual Change in Childhood, Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. 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Proceedings of SALT 29: XXXXXX, 2019 ©2019 Szabolcsi Unconditionals and free choice unified* Anna Szabolcsi New York University Abstract Rawlins (2013: 160) observes that both unconditionals and more classical free choice can be meta-characterized using orthogonality, but does not actually unify the two. One reason may be that in English, different expressions serve in these roles. By contrast, in Hungarian, AKÁR expressions serve as NPIs, FCIs, and unconditional adjuncts, but not as interrogatives or free relatives. This paper offers a unified account of the Hungarian data, extending Chierchia 2013 and Dayal 2013. The account produces the same unconditional meanings that Rawlins derives from an interrogative basis. This result highlights the fact that sets of alternatives arise from different morpho-syntactic sources and are utilized by the grammar in different ways, but the results may fully converge. Keywords: unconditional, free choice, fluctuation, scope, focus, Hungarian 1 Introduction Rawlins's (2013) seminal analysis of the English unconditional is based on the insight that the adjunct in the construction is a question, which presents a set of alternatives and feeds each alternative as an antecedent to a conditional, whose consequent is the main clause. A silent universal quantifier that tops off the logical form ensures that each antecedent, consequent pair is true. (1) a. Whoever shows up, the party will be fun. b. Whether Alonso or Josephine shows up, the party will be fun. Rawlins's work inspired the investigation of unconditionals in a number of languages in which the adjunct has a somewhat different morpho-syntax than in English.1 The Hungarian pattern differs from all of them in that the adjuncts in (2) are neither questions, nor free relatives. * I thank Veneeta Dayal, Yimei Xiang, Rahul Balusu, Tamás Halm, and the semantics groups at Rutgers, NYU, and Budapest for helpful discussion. 1 Haspelmath & König 1998, Quer & Vicente 2009, Rubinstein & Doron 2014, Balusu 2017b, Caponigro & Fălăuş 2018, Lohiniva 2019, and so on. Some of the authors adopted and others modified Rawlins's analysis. Szabolcsi Outside unconditionals (2), AKÁR expressions are dedicated universal free choice (3) and negative polarity items (4). (2) a. Akárki telefonált, elbeszélgettünk. UNC.ADJ AKÁR-who called chatted.we 'Whoever called, we chatted' b. Akár Kati (telefonált), akár Mari telefonált, elbeszélgettünk. AKÁR K called AKÁR M called chatted.we 'Whether K or M called, we chatted' (3) a. Akárki telefonálhat. -FCI AKÁR-who call.may 'Anyone may call' b. Akár Kati (telefonálhat), akár Mari telefonálhat. AKÁR K call.may AKÁR M call.may 'Either K or M may call' (4) a. Nem hiszem, hogy akárki telefonált. 2 NPI not think-I that AKÁR-who called 'I don't think that anyone called' b. Nem hiszem, hogy akár K (telefonált), akár M telefonált. not think-I that AKÁR K called AKÁR M called 'I don't think that either K or M called' They are unacceptable in non-licensing environments, e.g. (5). (5) a. * Akárki telefonált. AKÁR-who called b. * Akár Kati (telefonált), akár Mari telefonált. AKÁR K called AKÁR M called Our fundamental assumption is that a compositional analysis must take into account the fullest possible distribution of the expressions involved.3 In that spirit, the AKÁR paradigm above calls for an approach that can place NPIs, FCIs, and UNC.ADJs under the same umbrella. First, we need a theory that brings negative polarity and free choice together. Next, we extend the treatment of universal free choice to unconditionals with minimal modifications; most crucially, by swapping 2 AKÁR expressions are positive polarity items: they are anti-licensed by clause-mate negation. Their role as NPIs is optionally disambiguated by the particle is 'too/even' (not indicated here). 3 But we must set aside how akár teams up with other particles to build scalar akár (csak) Kati is that serves as an NPI and an -FCI, but not in unconditionals (Abrusán 2007, Szabolcsi 2017). Unconditionals and free choice unified the modal in the former for a conditional in the latter. Universal force and existential presupposition will carry over. Additional elements of the analysis are supplied by independent properties of the language, e.g. identificational focus. The following derivation of (2a,b) anticipates the main aspects of our analysis. (6) { Akárki / akár K akár M } telefonált, elbeszélgettünk. '{Whoever / Whether K or M} called, we chatted' w,e [call(k)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]  w,e [call(m)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)] strengthening P[P(w,e. call(k)(w,e))  P(w,e. call(m)(w,e))] (r[ w,e[r(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]]) = w,e [call(k)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]  w,e [call(m)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)] quantifying-in P[P(w,e. call(k)(w,e))  P(w,e. call(m)(w,e))] r[if (r) (w,e. chat(w,e))] = r[w,e[r(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]] -lift lift to consequent { akárki telefonált / akár K akár M telefonált } elbeszélgettünk p[p=w,e. call(k)(w,e)  p=w,e. call(m) (w,e)] w,e. chat(w,e) Fluctuation presupposition q [q  p[p=w,e. call(k)(w,e)  p=w,e. call(m)(w,e)]] [w,e. q(w,e)  w,e.q(w,e)] The structure of the discussion will be as follows. Section 2 takes a closer look at clauses with the particle akár, including morpho-syntactic composition, interpretation, and scope taking in overt syntax. Section 3 briefly recaps Chierchia's (2013) theory of negative polarity and universal free choice that serves as the background for our analysis. Section 4 introduces Dayal's (2013) Viability condition and modifies it somewhat (i) in view of an exhaustification problem caused by symmetrical predicates, and (ii) in anticipation of the needs of unconditionals. Section 5 applies the free choice analysis to the unconditional case. It comments on some technical details of (6), and compares them with Rawlins 2013. Sections 6-7 discuss speaker ignorance and the role of identificational focus. Section 8 asks why English uses wh-ever and whether_or in unconditionals, instead of any-items. Szabolcsi 2 The composition and scope behavior of AKÁR expressions Hungarian interrogatives employ bare indeterminate pronouns (ki 'who,' mi 'what,' etc.). Relative pronouns have a prefixed definite marker (aki 'who, rel.' and ami 'what, relative'). Unlike ever, the particle akár does not combine with ki/mi or aki/ami to form interrogative or relative pronouns. This section provides some background on the morpho-syntactic and semantic composition of AKÁR expressions that the rest of the paper will assume. For a detailed description, see Szabolcsi 2018. Akár belongs to a family of particles that build quantifier words from indeterminate pronoun bases or, alternatively, reiterate at the left edge of each proposition in a Junction Phrase, JP (den Dikken 2006). Each JP may contain two or more propositions. Besides akár, the members of the particle family are mind 'all,' vala/vagy 'some/or,' and sem 'n-or,' a strict NCI.4 For example, (7) a. Minden-ki telefonált. all-who called 'Everyone called' b. Mind Kati (telefonált), mind Mari telefonált. all K called all M called 'Each of K and M called' c. Mind a nap kisütött, mind a szél elállt. all the sun came.out all the wind stopped 'Each of {the sun came out, the wind stopped} is true' It is possible to elide a segment under identity, as in (2b, 3b, 4b, 7b); the propositions may also be fully distinct, as in (7c). The same holds for JPs with akár and the other particles. In the spirit of Beghelli & Stowell 1997 and Kratzer & Shimoyama 2002, the overt particles are taken to be meaningless and to merely check features with higher, silent quantifiers, interpreted as  (akár, vala/vagy, sem) or  (mind). B&S and K&S do not discuss reiterations such as (2b, 3b, 4b) and (7b,c) but, with the assumption of propositional quantification, their analyses suit reiterations particularly well. The "hosts" are full propositions, and the identical particles at the left edges cannot all be true quantifiers with the same meaning, so it is natural to attribute the semantic action to a higher, silent quantifier. 4 All Hungarian quantifier words are built in this way. The concessive particle bár also builds universal free choice items (bárki, etc.). Unlike the other particles mentioned in the text, bár does not reiterate but has a life as a connective. Bár will not be discussed in this paper, but see Halm 2016. Halm analyzes free choice in terms of Giannakidou 2001, and also makes important observations about what we call unconditionals. Unconditionals and free choice unified (8) QP Q JP [iMind],  [iVagy],  J [iAkár],  mind/vagy/akár/sem Host [iSem],  [uMind], etc. J mind/vagy/akár/sem Host [uMind], etc. (9) () = the proposition that is true when some p is true (10) () = the proposition that is true when all p are true The sets of propositions  that  and  quantify over are defined with the help of an indeterminate ("wh") pronoun, or by enumeration. JP is understood to do nothing more than enumerate the members of such a set; in and of itself it is neither a conjunction nor a disjunction (Winter 1995, Szabolcsi 2015). (11) a.  = { p: x[human(x)  p=w.called(x)(w)] } b.  = { w.called(kati)(w), w.called(mari)(w) } c.  = { w.out(sun)(w), w.stopped(wind)(w) } It may be good to underscore that (11a,b,c) are not "question meanings," although they would figure in the interpretation of questions. They are just sets of propositions, waiting to be used in one way or another. In the case of negative polarity, free choice, and unconditionals, they will serve as sets of alternatives that undergo exhaustification. K&S use Hamblin semantics to define the set in (11a) by projecting alternatives from indeterminate pronouns. Instead, we assume that (11a) is defined as in Karttunen 1977, by shifting a single proposition to a set of propositions and quantifying the indeterminate pronoun into that set using function composition.5 The Karttunen-style definition of (11a) is especially appropriate for our data. In Hungarian, the scopes of both interrogative wh-phrases and QPs are largely encoded by overt movement. For a quick overview of the clause-internal overt scope facts and their treatment along the lines of Beghelli & Stowell, see Szabolcsi 2010: 121-129 and 180-185. On that approach, the scope positions of QPs are specifiers of silent functional heads interpreted as  or . In the context of the present paper, it is important to add that Hungarian QPs can also move to scope positions in a higher clause, observing the same island 5 Charlow 2018 shows how the island-free scope of in-situ indefinites that often motivates the use of Hamblin semantics can be replicated employing type-shifters with a Karttunen-style semantics. Szabolcsi constraints as overt wh-movement. In (12), mindenkitől overtly moves to the matrix clause, to a position next to the silent  that performs distributive quantification. The landing site of mindenkitől corresponds to the scope of the Karttunenstyle existential quantifier that defines the set of alternatives to be quantified over, cf. (11a). (12) Mindenkitőli más-más zsűritag akarta, everyone-from other-other juror wanted hogy levonjunk egy pontot __i. that deduct.subj.1pl one point-acc 'For everyone x, a different juror wanted that we deduct a point from x' Similarly, AKÁR expressions can acquire the desired scope by overtly moving out of their own clause, next to a silent . (13) illustrates the case of an unconditional, (14) of universal free choice, and (15) of negative polarity. The desired meanings would not be available if akárkivel stayed in its source clause. (13) Akárkiveli kérték, hogy táncolj __i, nemet mondtál. AKÁR-who-with asked.3pl that dance.imp.2sg no-acc said.2sg 'Whoever they asked that you dance with, you said no' (14) Akármelyik pohárbai lehet, hogy mérget tettek __i. AKÁR-which glass-into possible that poison-acc put.past.3pl 'Any of the glasses can be such that they put poison into it' (Lit. into any of the glasses it is possible that they put poison) (15) Nem hiszem, hogy akárkiveli kérték, hogy táncolj __i. not think.1sg that AKÁR-who-with asked.3pl that dance.imp.2sg 'I don't think that anyone is such that they asked that you dance with him' The same works for reiterations (akár Kati, akár Mari), with a more complex syntax including across-the-board movement and ellipsis; not illustrated. The overt scope-taking of AKÁR expressions is significant in comparison with English. Why is it that anyone is an NPI and a -FCI, but in unconditional adjuncts, it gives way to whoever? We conjecture that the reason lies in the inability of any-items to scope high and piped pipe alternatives over the antecedent of a conditional  something that English whoever and Hungarian akárki can do. 3 Recap: Chierchia 2013 on negative polarity and universal free choice Our goal is to unify Hungarian unconditionals, universal free choice and negative polarity, as demanded by the identity of AKÁR expressions in these roles. UnUnconditionals and free choice unified conditionals and free choice could be unified in various attractive ways, but not all of them offer a natural connection to polarity. English any and Hungarian akár are rather common in serving both in free choice and in (some subset of) polarity items. Chierchia 2013 is a theory that brings them together. Presupposing familiarity with it, this section merely recaps some of the assumptions without arguing for them. Chierchia 2013 proposes that negative polarity items and free choice items are existentials/disjunctions with grammaticized, active alternatives that must be exhaustified. The alternatives may be sub-domain or scalar alternatives. The exhaustifier relevant to us is the silent operator O[nly], which negates alternatives not entailed by the literal assertion. Let a proposition with an NPI schematically assert pq; its sub-domain alternatives are p and q. Exhaustification yields a contradiction: O(pq) = pq  p  q. Contradiction is averted if pq is originally within the immediate scope a decreasing operator . In that case (pq) entails the sub-domain alternatives p and q, and so O does not get to negate them: O(pq) = (pq). See Chierchia 2013: Ch 1 for details. Existential and universal FCIs both come with pre-exhaustified sub-domain alternatives, so an application of O to the whole proposition will amount to recursive exhaustification in the sense of Fox 2007. -FCIs (irgendein NP and un NP qualsiasi) occur within the scope of a modal: >, so the assertion is (pq). Now O(pq) negates both the preexhaustified subdomain alternatives and the scalar alternative, and yields p  q  (pq). See Chierchia 2013: Ch 5. -FCIs (any NP and qualsiasi NP) scope immediately above a possibility modal: >, so the assertion is pq. First consider just exhaustification with respect to the pre-exhaustified sub-domain alternatives Op and Oq. The conjunction of pq with Op = (pq) and Oq = (qp) yields pq. See Chierchia 2013: Ch 6. We just strengthened disjunction to conjunction (an existential to a universal). The result is the Universal Free Choice implicature. It will be referred to as Universal Force below, so as to remain agnostic regarding implicatures. -FCIs however are not universals, although they have Universal Force. They have another crucial property that Dayal 2009 called Fluctuation: the realized options cannot be kept constant across worlds. Chierchia recasts Fluctuation by utilizing the stronger, scalar alternative, here pq. The negation of the scalar alternative is conjoined with the result of exhaustifying the domain alternatives (as is done in the case of -FC). But now the resulting p  q  (pq) is a contradiction  unless, Chierchia points out, the modal bases used in the two computations are different. If modal base SC  modal base FC, there need not be a conSzabolcsi tradiction. He refers to that subset relation as Modal Containment, MC. See Chierchia 2013: 316-317 for discussion of the two modal bases SC and FC. Hungarian AKÁR expressions are NPIs and -FCIs, so Chierchia's treatment of English any NP can be adopted for them. We add, as a reminder, that while English either_or is not a dedicated NPI or FCI, Hungarian reiterated akár_akár has the same behavior as the combination of akár with an indeterminate pronoun. Those reiterations are also subsumed. 4 More on Fluctuation Dayal (2013) adopts Chierchia's derivation of universal force via strengthening, but proposes to eliminate reference to a scalar implicature. Instead, she reinstates the intuition behind Fluctuation. The new constraint, called Viability, is a presupposition: (16) Viability constraint [...FCI...] is felicitous iff there exists a model M, a world w, and a conversational background g(w) such that each exhaustified alternative is true at w, with respect to to some subset of g(w). See Dayal 2013 for the working and the advantages of Viability, which we find convincing. However, the formulation of Viability encounters a problem, versions of which had haunted the free choice literature. We add symmetrical predicates to the problem cases. The requirement for each exhaustified alternative to be true in some world is analogous to the requirement in certain theories of donkey anaphora for there to be a minimal situation that provides a unique antecedent for the donkey pronoun. It is well-known that such a requirement may fail to be satisfiable. (17) If a bishop meets a bishop, he blesses him.  'Every minimal situation with a bishop meeting a bishop extends to one where the unique bishop in the situation ...' (Elbourne 2005) (18) Any bishop may meet a bishop.  presupp. 'There exists a world in which only bishop A meets a bishop' The  affixed to an interpretation expresses that the linguistic example is perfect, but the proposed interpretation is not satisfiable, and so it cannot be correct. Elbourne's (2005) solution to the unique antecedent problem with predicates that are truth-conditionally, but not syntactically, symmetrical is to import syntactic prominence into the semantics; effectively, he uses structured propositions. On the other hand, Chierchia's proposal with SCFC, which does not require the truth of exhaustified alternatives, works fine for symmetrical predicates: Unconditionals and free choice unified (19) w[ACC-FC(w*, w) & x[bishop-A meets bishop-x in w] & w'[ACC-FC(w*, w') & x[bishop-B meets bishop-x in w'] & ( w''[ACC-SC(w*, w'') & x[bishop-A meets bishop-x in w''] & w'''[ACC-SC(w*, w''') & x[bishop-B meets bishop-x in w'''] ) Suppose FC={w1, w2, w3, w4} and SC={w4}. Bishops meet other bishops in w1, w2, and w3, but not in w4. To have our cake and eat it too, we combine the two proposals in a way that is intuitively closer to Dayal's and technically to Chierchia's. We trade reference to the truth of exhaustified alternatives for truth not being uniform across worlds. (20) Revised Viability presupposition [... FCI ...] is felicitous if each alternative is true in some world and false in some world. Reading "true in some world and false in some world" as "true in some but not all worlds," (20) may even be regarded as negating a scalar alternative of some sort. Rather than closing the discussion here, let us introduce a further modification that will be critical in the extension of universal free choice to unconditionals. It is stated with reference to AKÁR. (21) Fluctuation presupposition for AKÁR, a second revision of Viability A free choice reading involving AKÁR is felicitous if each alternative described by the bare AKÁR clause is true in some but not all worlds [or events, in unconditionals]. (22) The bare AKÁR-clause is one that does not yet contain a modal [or conditional, in unconditional adjuncts]. In the case of (3a), each alternative described by the bare AKÁR clause is an element of  as defined in (11a), i.e. has the form w.call(a)(w), for some individual a. AKÁR() scopes over the modal to yield the schematic assertion pq. (3) a. Akár-ki telefonál-hat. akár-who call-may 'Anyone may call' To summarize, Universal Force is computed for the whole sentence, strengthening pq to pq (as in the literature). But Fluctuation will be directly tied to the invariant segment that the AKÁR expression builds on its various uses.6 The 6 Fluctuation is not observed in NPIs. If Fluctuation were a scalar implicature, it would not arise in a decreasing context, explaining why that is so. But at least the "each alternative is true in some Szabolcsi bifurcation does not make a difference for traditional universal free choice, where a possibility modal is involved either way. It will make a big difference in the case of unconditionals, where the bare AKÁR clause is the adjunct. 5 Unconditionals as a special case of universal free choice To take stock, we assume that the NPI and -FCI readings of AKÁR expressions are accounted for along the lines of Chierchia 2013, with some modification regarding the implementation of Fluctuation, given in (21)-(22). We are now ready to turn to unconditionals. The basic idea is this. In universal free choice, the existential/disjunction scopes over a possibility modal; in unconditionals, it scopes over the "if" of a conditional. Strengthening and Fluctuation carry over, accounting for most of the properties that Rawlins 2013 derives for unconditionals. Partition effects do not follow, but we will argue that only some Hungarian unconditionals exhibit them and that they correlate with identificational focus. Apart from the fact that Rawlins takes the unconditional adjunct to be a question and we do not, there is an overall technical difference between his derivation and ours. Rawlins uses pointwise Hamblinian composition both in building the adjunct and in combining the adjunct with the main clause. In contrast, we use a scope taking mechanism in both cases, following Karttunen 1977 and Charlow 2018. Over and beyond other advantages, thinking about universal free choice and unconditionals in terms of scope makes it easy to see the central parallelism: AKÁR expressions scope over a possibility modal in the former case, and over "if" in the latter. 5.1 Overview of the derivation With this in mind, consider the derivation of (2a,b), given in (6) and repeated on the next page as (23). Working from bottom up, akárki telefonált 'whoever called' and akár K (telefonált) akár M telefonált 'whether K (called) or M called' are composed and interpreted as sets of propositions, as was detailed in Section 2. Note that if Kati and Mari are the only relevant individuals, both are based on the same set of propositions, {^Kati called, ^Mari called}. The elements of this set of propositions are the alternatives whose truth the presupposition associated with AKÁR requires to fluctuate, cf. (21)-(22). The (world, event) pairs will be motivated in Section 6. world" part is thought to impose a stronger, presuppositional requirement. We leave open the question of how to extend Fluctuation to AKÁR NPIs. Unconditionals and free choice unified (23) { Akárki / akár K akár M } telefonált, elbeszélgettünk. '{Whoever / Whether K or M} called, we chatted' w,e [call(k)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]  w,e [call(m)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)] strengthening P[P(w,e. call(k)(w,e))  P(w,e. call(m)(w,e))] (r[ w,e[r(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]]) = w,e [call(k)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]  w,e [call(m)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)] quantifying-in P[P(w,e. call(k)(w,e))  P(w,e. call(m)(w,e))] r[if (r) (w,e. chat(w,e))] = r[w,e[r(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]] -lift lift to consequent { akárki telefonált / akár K akár M telefonált } elbeszélgettünk p[p=w,e. call(k)(w,e)  p=w,e. call(m) (w,e)] w,e. chat(w,e) Fluctuation presupposition q [q  p[p=w,e. call(k)(w,e)  p=w,e. call(m)(w,e)]] [w,e. q(w,e)  w,e.q(w,e)] The step labeled -lift existentially quantifies over the above set, spelling out the truth-conditional contribution of the silent AKÁR discussed in Section 2, and lifts the result to a generalized quantifier over propositions, prepping it for getting quantified into the conditional antecedent. Elbeszélgettünk 'we chatted' morphs into the consequent of a conditional looking for an antecedent via lift to consequent. The fact that propositional variable r in the restriction of the universal that interprets the conditional is immediately abstracted over facilitates the quantifying-in of the AKÁR clause. Given these preparations, quantification in the next step is just functional application. Finally, the step strengthening corresponds to recursive exhaustification of the sub-domain alternatives of the whole sentence, endowing it with Universal Force, following Chierchia 2013 on -FCIs, cf. Section 3. Naturally, -lift and lift to consequent could be broken into multiple steps, but the compressed presentation makes the tree more legible. For full disclosure, akár is etymologically related to akar 'want,' but we have found no role for this fact in the analysis. In the rest of this section and in Sections 6 and 7 we comment on and flesh out Szabolcsi details of the derivation, adding brief pointers to Rawlins 2013 for English.7 5.2 The locus of quantifying-in The AKÁR clause is quantified into the conditional right above "if," to obtain the same scope configuration as the famous (24): (24) If a relative of mine dies, I inherit a house. Charlow 2018 develops a Karttunen-inspired, scope-based method of alternative management, with the specific aim of catering to in-situ indefinites. His Fig. 6 spells out the derivation of (24) with alternative percolation out of a scope island, without movement out of the island. The indefinite shifts into a scope-taker, moves to the edge of the island, then pied-pipes the island to a scope position over the conditional. Our derivation in (23) performs the exact same tasks, but much of it is overt, given the properties of Hungarian summarized in Section 2. Recall that Hungarian akárki moves to, and the reiterating particle akár is attached to, the left edge of their clauses (and invoke silent  propositional quantifiers right above). They take scope overtly and are in a canonical position to pied-pipe. The quantifying-in step feeds each alternative into the antecedent of a separate conditional. In sum, the scope-taking analysis is well-motivated and can be accomplished with or without overt movement, depending on the language or on the expressions involved; compare a relative of mine with whichever relative of mine in English. 5.3 Universal force Unconditionals present the alternatives in the adjunct as antecedents of separate conditionals, with the main clause as the consequent. Strikingly, each of these conditionals is claimed to be true. On our account, Universal Force in unconditionals comes about in the same way as in universal free choice. We adopted Chierchia's theory that strengthens the original disjunctive/existential semantics of the whole sentence that comes from the wide-scoping AKÁR expression, to a 7 For reference, Rawlins (2013: 172) summarizes his derivation for English as follows: (i) Disjunction or a wh-ever item introduces alternatives into the composition. (ii) The question operator introduces exhaustiveness and mutual exclusivity presuppositions. (iii) Alternatives compose pointwise with the main clause via Hamblin pointwise functional application – one modal claim for each alternative. (iv) A conditional adjunct (whatever its content) restricts the domain of a main clause modal. (v) The modal imposes an existence presupposition or entailment on its domain, leading to a distribution effect. (vi) A default Hamblin universal operator collects alternatives. Unconditionals and free choice unified conjunctive / universal one, via recursive exhaustification. But any other theory of free choice that also subsumes negative polarity would do. Rawlins achieves universality in unconditionals by postulating a silent universal quantifier on top of the logical form, which is not known from elsewhere in the grammar. The free choice analysis does not require a stipulated universal.8 5.4 Fluctuation: its benefits and the size of the unit that it pertains to Moving from vanilla universal free choice with a possibility modal to unconditionals highlights an important point regarding the size of the unit that Fluctuation pertains to. Chierchia 2013 and Dayal 2013 implement Fluctuation differently but, on both accounts, Fluctuation pertains to the same domain as the recursive exhaustification that produces Universal Force: the whole sentence. This leads to a conflict unless the sets of worlds that bear out universality and fluctuation are carefully managed. However, if we wish to subsume unconditionals under the umbrella of universal free choice, it seems that keeping the two domains identical just will not do. Consider: (25) Akár Kati, akár Mari telefonált, elbeszélgettünk. 'Whether Kati or Mari called, we chatted' Intuitively, fluctuation does not consist in there being worlds where Kati called and we didn't chat. Even if the sets of worlds are managed in such a way that this does not contradict universality, it does not seem right. What we want is for there to be worlds where Kati called and others where Kati didn't call. This can be achieved if Fluctuation is restricted to the bare AKÁR-clause (here, the adjunct). Big thanks are due to Y. Xiang for pointing out problems and to V. Dayal for offering the solution. So, (26) a. By presupposed Fluctuation q [q  p[p=w,e. call(k)(w,e)  p=w,e. call(m)(w,e)]] [w,e. q(w,e)  w,e.q(w,e)] b. By strengthening to Universal Force w,e [call(k)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)]  w,e [call(m)(w,e)] [chat(w,e)] Suppose Mari calls at (w1,e1) but not at (w2,e2), and Kati calls at (w2,e2) but not at (w1,e1). Fluctuation is satisfied, and this state of affairs is entirely compatible 8 Simplification of disjunctive antecedents would naturally derive universality (cf. Alonso-Ovalle 2004) but it offers no link to negative polarity. It also would not predict the presupposition that each disjunct in the antecedent is true somewhere; see Section 5.4. Szabolcsi with Universal Force, i.e. that at every (w,e) pair where Mari called, we chatted, and at every (w,e) pair where Kati called, we chatted. As Dayal 2013 explains, Anyone called without a modal is unacceptable, because we have only a single accessible world, so fluctuation is not possible. When the FCI scopes over a possibility modal, the modal provides a space of worlds for fluctuation. When akár Kati, akár Mari telefonált scopes over a conditional, we have the same benefit: each of Kati telefonált and Mari telefonált gets a chance to be true in some worlds and false in others. Restricting fluctuation to the bare AKÁR-clause that serves as the adjunct furthermore has the benefit of deriving properties of unconditionals pointed out by Rawlins. Each alternative in the unconditional adjunct must be true at some event or, in the case of ignorance, in some epistemically accessible world. This is one of the things that distinguishes (27) from (28), a conditional with a flat disjunction in its antecedent: (27) Whether Kate or Mary or Sue calls, we'll chat. (28) If Kate or Mary or Sue calls, we'll chat. Fluctuation also plays a role in accounting for speaker ignorance in unconditionals pertaining to a single event; see the discussion of flavors in Section 6. It is desirable to apply Fluctuation uniformly in unconditionals and traditional universal free choice. Therefore, in Section 4, anticipating the present discussion, we proposed that Fluctuation originates with AKÁR (or, in general, with particles responsible for free choice) and always pertains to what we called the bare AKÁR clause, cf. (21)-(22). This does not seem to make a big difference for traditional free choice; it only affects where the existential quantifier over worlds comes from: the possibility modal in the scope of the FCI, or the Fluctuation constraint. 5.5 The unmarked (if-less) conditional A mysterious property of unconditionals is their conditional semantics in the absence of the usual morpho-syntactic flags of conditionals. The literature is generally silent on where the conditional meaning is anchored. We also wave our hands. (23) stipulates that elbeszélgettünk 'we chatted' morphs into the main clause of a conditional. Another option would be for the bare AKÁR clause to morph into the antecedent of a conditional. According to Haspelmath 1997 and Haspelmath & König 1998, in one type of languages, free-choice indefinites as well as scalar, alternative, and universal concessive conditionals are formed with the particles IF + EVEN (see Telugu [n]aa and Malayalam engil-um in Balusu 2017a,b, 2019 and Sarath Chandran & Balusu 2019). A further, dynamic semantic connection is what Klinedinst & Rothschild (2012) call the non-truth-tabular use of and (here, silent), which is equivalent to a conditional: Mary calls, we'll chat. Unconditionals and free choice unified 6 Unconditional flavors and (world, event) pairs Rawlins 2013 recognizes three modal flavors in English unconditionals: circumstantial, epistemic, and totally realistic. Hungarian unconditionals exhibit the same flavors, which makes the data directly comparable. Below, the characterization in modal terms and the remarks on indifference and ignorance come from Rawlins. The multiple-event and single-event labels are our own, as are the English and Hungarian examples that illustrate what we consider felicitous uses. (29) Multiple events, circumstantial modal base, at-issue relational indifference { Whoever / whether K or M } entered, we chatted. { Akárki / akár K akár M } jött be, elbeszélgettünk. (30) Single event, epistemic modal base, presupposed speaker ignorance 9 { Whoever / whether K or M } entered a minute ago, I didn't recognize her. { Akárki (is) / akár K akár M } jött be az imént, nem ismertem meg. (31) Material unconditional [ totally realistic modal base, empty ordering source], multiple events, no ignorance or indifference effects { Whoever / whether K or M } entered, the floor squeaked. { Akárki / akár K akár M } be jött, nyikorgott a padló. Rawlins (2013: 163) observes that "the presence of ignorance implications in unconditionals and free relatives obeys a constraint discovered by Giannakidou and Cheng (2006) and Reynolds (2007) for free relatives. In particular, in both constructions ignorance implications fail to appear in non-episodic contexts. (The inverse is not fully true: in episodic contexts, unconditionals must have an ignorance reading, but FRs may alternatively have a FR-indifference reading, depending on the details of the context and sentence.)." But Rawlins states that the tie between ignorance and episodicity remains beyond the scope of his analysis. In the labels attached to (29)-(30)-(31), we distinguished multiple-event and single-event cases. The intuition that unconditionals with a circumstantial modal flavor pertain to multiple events is very strong. The adjunct is readily (perhaps not accurately) paraphrased using whenever, and the main clause pertains to the same event or a related event. So it seems that events should play a role in the semantics, over and beyond a circumstantial, "as far as the facts are concerned" modal base. (Material unconditionals also involve multiple events; the difference between (29) and (31) is taken up in Section 7.) In contrast, we propose that the key property of episodicity is that the sentence pertains to a single event. This promises to tie together single-event cases and speaker ignorance. Informally, Fluctua- 9 The optional particle is seems to correlate with the ignorance reading, with some cross-speaker variation. This paper will not attempt to address this role of is. Szabolcsi tion requires that each proposition in the set  for the bare AKÁR clause (here: the adjunct) be true "somewhere" and false "somewhere (else)". This entails that there must be at least two instances of "somewhere" under consideration.10 In (23), we used quantification over (world, event) pairs. The intuition is that unconditionals primarily look for multiple events to satisfy Fluctuation. If the sentence clearly pertains to a single event, then multiple ways of viewing that event are invoked. That is, if the event component of (w,e) is firmly fixed, the world component must vary. The primacy of events may be reinforced by the fact that in Tamil and Telugu, unconditionals do not have ignorance readings (R. Balusu, p.c.). If those unconditionals are syntactically based on free relatives, then this may tie in with the finding in Šimík 2018 that "ever free relatives" in many languages are purely quantificational and lack the ignorance and indifference readings that they exhibit in English. Šimík proposes to factor modality out of the basic account of ever free relatives. Our formalization in terms of quantification over (w,e) pairs is preliminary and heavy-handed, but here we will leave it at that, and refrain from engaging with the complications of epistemic modality and alternating modal bases. To match, we formalize the conditional as universal quantification over (w,e) pairs, without a silent modal. 7 Are the alternatives mutually exclusive? If yes, what is the source? It is a well-established intuition that unconditionals present mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive alternatives. Rawlins 2013 postulates a Q operator with partition semantics in the derivation of unconditional meanings.11 Hungarian unconditionals only exhibit mutual exclusivity effects in the circumstantial and the epistemic flavors (29)-(30). The reason why we can safely distinguish these from the material unconditional flavor (31) is that, given the appropriate choice of the verb, they differ in word order. In Sections 1 through 5, we used the prefixless verb telefonál 'call', so as to abstract away from this issue. In (29)-(30)-(31), however, it was replaced with the prefixed verb be-jön 'enter, lit. in-come', so as to make the flavors trackable. Now notice that in (29)-(30), the order is Verb Prefix (jött be), whereas in (31), it is Prefix Verb (bejött). The significance of the word order difference is that it unambiguously signals that akárki (likewise, Kati / Mari) is in identificational focus in (29)-(30) but not in (31). 10 Hirsch 2016 derives ignorance from the partition semantics for questions and the non-triviality presupposition pertaining to the epistemic modal base. While we do not use these ingredients, our intuition seems to be similar to his. 11 In recent years the partition semantics for questions has been abandoned, so even if unconditionals are based on questions, the availability of a partitional Q operator is not automatic. Unconditionals and free choice unified When a Hungarian sentence has identificational focus (É. Kiss 1998), the focus-accented phrase occurs in an immediately preverbal position. Remarkably, when the verb has a prefix, identificational focus triggers prefix/verb inversion (be jött > jött be). According to Horvath 2010, the syntactic representation is as in (32). EI-Op is a null operator in complementary distribution with csak 'only' that associates with a focus-accented phrase and drags it to the specifier of the clauselevel EI0 head (EI for Exclusion-by-Identification). (32) [EI-P EI-Op MARI [EI0 [TP come+Tpast [MARI come in ]]]] What is important for us is that identificational focus is easily made visible and it has both presuppositional and truth-conditional impact (Szabolcsi 1994). (33) a. MARI jött be M came in ca. 'It was Mari who entered (in the contextually relevant set)' b. x[entered(x) & y[entered(y)  y<x]] = mari When akárki functions as an NPI or FCI, it is never in identificational focus; but in unconditionals with a circumstantial/epistemic flavor, it must be.12 So maybe a partitional operator in unconditionals forces identificational focus? That cannot be correct, because in material unconditionals such as (31), there is no identificational focus. The reason why we know that (31) is indeed an unconditional and not a plain conditional that for some reason lacks ha 'if' is that (31) exhibits the existential presupposition that is characteristic of unconditionals but is absent from plain conditionals. Below, (34)=(31). (34) {Akárki / akár Kati akár Mari} bejött, nyikorgott a padló. cf. (27) '{Whoever / whether K or M} entered, the floor squeaked' (35) Ha {akárki / akár Kati akár Mari} bejött, nyikorgott a padló. cf. (28) 'If {anyone / either K or M} entered, the floor squeaked' Corresponding to the presence of identificational focus, (29)-(30) only consider mutually exclusive alternatives. Situations in which Kati and Mari entered together are not under consideration. This is straightforwardly accounted for by the fact that identificational focus in the adjunct creates exclusive alternatives: (36) { w.x[entered(x)(w) & y[entered(y)(w)  y<x]] = kati, w.x[entered(x)(w) & y[entered(y)(w)  y<x]] = mari } In contrast, given the absence of identificational focus, (31) says that there was 12 Halm 2016 makes the same observations about bárki, cf. fn. 5. Note that the focus facts are always the same, the use of a prefixed verb merely makes them visible in a written sentence. Szabolcsi coming and going by individuals, alone or in arbitrary combinations. This jibes with Dayal's observations about universal free choice. "It is sometimes thought that English sentences like [Bill may read any of these books] do not have a reading in which the permission extends to the full set of books. I believe this is incorrect. If one utters [that sentence] and Bill reads all the books, he has not exceeded his mandate. The present account allows for this" (Dayal 2013). It appears, therefore, that unconditionals do not have a partition semantics per se. When the adjuncts have identificational focus, we have exclusivity effects, and when they do not, we do not. What explains the correlation (traceable in Hungarian) between the "modal" unconditionals and focus? We conjecture that identity is under discussion in those cases (and the unconditional states that it should not matter). Identificational focus is not only exclusive, it is also identificational; probably that is the reason why it is employed in these cases. It is possible that a similar division exists in other languages that do not make identificational focus as visible as Hungarian does, and so unconditionals whose alternatives are not mutually exclusive (like our (31)) escape attention. The joint exhaustivity aspect of partition semantics is more difficult to check, because questions, unconditionals, focus, etc. are all subject to contextual domain restriction. 8 Why is the territory of Hungarian AKÁR divided between any and and wh-ever in English? This paper does not undertake the analysis of unconditionals in any language other than Hungarian. However, it is reasonable to wonder why English does not use any in unconditionals. At the end of Section 2, we conjectured that the reason lies in the inability of any-items to scope high and piped pipe alternatives over the antecedent of a conditional  something that English whoever and Hungarian akárki can do. Outside the normative register, English any can form unconditionals. Here the any-item is obligatorily fronted, and some speakers can add that. 13,14 (37) a. Anything Pat did, Kim questioned it. b. Anything that Pat did, Kim questioned it. These syntactic traits, together with the fact that the ignorance reading is absent, suggest that (37) belongs to the class of purely quantificational free relatives (Šimík 2018)  unlike the Hungarian AKÁR-clauses investigated in this paper. 13 If the any-item is not fronted, it is just an NPI: You drink any more tequila, (and) you'll pass out (Klinedinst & Rothschild 2012: (16)). 14 We thank the version with that to A. Warstadt, who also finds it in COCA and BNC. Unconditionals and free choice unified References Abrusán, Márta. 2007. EVEN and free choice ANY in Hungarian. In Estela PuigWaldmüller (ed.), Sinn und Bedeutung 11, 1-15. Barcelona: Universitat Pompeu Fabra. https://semanticsarchive.net/Archive/TVkNTE2O/sub11proc.pdf. Alonso-Ovalle, Luis. 2004. Simplification of disjunctive antecedents. 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ARROGANCE AND DEEP DISAGREEMENT ANDREW ABERDEIN∗ I intend to bring recent work applying virtue theory to the study of argument to bear on a much older problem, that of disagreements that resist rational resolution, sometimes termed "deep disagreements". Just as some virtue epistemologists have lately shifted focus onto epistemic vices, I shall argue that a renewed focus on the vices of argument can help to illuminate deep disagreements. In particular, I address the role of arrogance, both as a factor in the diagnosis of deep disagreements and as an obstacle to their mutually acceptable resolution. Arrogant arguers are likely to make any disagreements to which they are party seem deeper than they really are and arrogance impedes the strategies that we might adopt to resolve deep disagreements. As a case in point, since arrogant or otherwise vicious arguers cannot be trusted not to exploit such strategies for untoward ends, any policy for deep disagreement amelioration must require particularly close attention to the vices of argument, lest they be exploited by the unscrupulous. 1. The Second Highest Mountain Alice: Everyone knows Mount Everest is the world's highest mountain, but what's the second highest? Bob: Isn't it Kanchenjunga? That rings a bell. Alice: I'm not sure-that doesn't sound right. Alice and Bob are in disagreement. Bob thinks Kanchenjunga is the world's second highest mountain; Alice is not sure. Of course, there are easy remedies for disagreements of that sort: Bob: O.K., let's look it up. World's highest mountains. . . here we go, "Everest 29,029 ft, 8,848 m; K2 28,251 ft, 8,611 m; Kanchenjunga 28,169 ft, 8,586 m". So I was wrong-it's not Kanchenjunga, it's K2. Funny name. Disagreement solved! Thank you Google and Wikipedia. But wait... Alice: Hang on, doesn't Everest have two peaks? I'm sure I read that somewhere. Where's the other peak on the list? Bob: I don't see it. Maybe it's much shorter than the main peak? Alice: Let's check. South Summit of Everest. . . "28,704 ft, 8,749 m". That's weird-it's higher than Kanchenjunga or K2! Why's it not on the list? Bob: One peak per mountain maybe? Alice: No, that can't be right! Look at Gasherbrum! It's got four summits in the top twenty. It must be a mistake. More fool me to trust Wikipedia. Bob: No, Wikipedia isn't perfect, but this is the sort of stuff it gets right. We must be overlooking something. Now we have a disagreement that is not so easily remedied, at least with the resources available to Alice and Bob. Perhaps they consult Charley, a mountaineer: Charley: I see the confusion. Everest does have two peaks and they're both higher than K2. But the South Peak doesn't count in lists of highest peaks because ∗School of Arts & Communication, Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne FL. Date: January 29, 2020. 1 2 ANDREW ABERDEIN it's not prominent enough. Prominence measures how much a mountain sticks up-how far down you would have to climb before you could start climbing anything taller. For K2 that's thousands of feet; but for the South Peak it's only thirty feet or so. It's little more than a pimple off the side of Everest. Indeed the standard route up Everest runs over the top of the South Peak. Lists of highest peaks have prominence thresholds. Even the most inclusive, with millions of included peaks, require a hundred feet or so of prominence, more than three times the prominence of the South Peak. Bob: I get it. The Wikipedia list is right after all! Alice: Not so fast! The South Peak is a peak, however small, and it's higher than everything on Earth except the main peak. It should be in second place, whatever the geographers say! Alice and Bob are now disagreeing more profoundly. They are not just disagreeing over their different beliefs or the sources of those beliefs, they are disagreeing over the process by which those beliefs can be confirmed or falsified. It's not clear what the best way forward at this point may be. This could be an example of what has come to be known as a deep disagreement. 2. Deep Disagreement Deep disagreements have attracted substantial attention recently within both epistemology and informal logic. Michael Lynch proposes the following helpful definition of a deep disagreement, as requiring four conditions: (1) Commonality: The parties to the disagreement share common epistemic goal(s). (2) Competition: If the parties affirm distinct principles with regard to a given domain, those principles (a) pronounce different methods to be the most reliable in a given domain; and (b) these methods are capable of producing incompatible beliefs about that domain. (3) Non-arbitration: There is no further epistemic principle, accepted by both parties, which would settle the disagreement. (4) Mutual Circularity: The epistemic principle(s) in question can be justified only by means of an epistemically circular argument (Lynch, 2010, 265). Returning to Alice and Bob's disagreement, we may see that they satisfy Commonality, at least assuming they are both sincere in their desire to identify the world's second highest mountain. Alice's insistence on absolute height in contrast with Bob's deference to the geographers' prominence threshold criterion may be seen as a difference of principle consistent with Competition. If Alice is not prepared to accept Charley's account (or that of any other such expert), the disagreement would also meet the Non-arbitration criterion. We have not yet seen enough of Alice and Bob's epistemic principles to determine whether they exhibit Mutual Circularity, but things do seem to be headed that way. The literature on deep disagreement begins with Robert Fogelin. Fogelin does not maintain that deep disagreements are common, nor that all tough disagreements must be deep. For Fogelin, a deep disagreement necessarily involves "a clash in underlying principles", "framework propositions", or worldviews (Fogelin, 1985, 5). So epistemic principles satisfying Lynch's Non-arbitration and Mutual Circularity criteria would be grounded in rival worldviews. Fogelin does explicitly invoke what we may identify as argumentational virtues-being "unbiased, free of prejudice, consistent, coherent, precise and rigorous" (Fogelin, 1985, ARROGANCE AND DEEP DISAGREEMENT 3 5). However, he does so to reject the prospect that they may prevent deep disagreements: parties exhibiting such qualities may "still disagree . . . profoundly, not just marginally" (ibid.). Strictly speaking, Fogelin is not committed to there being no relationship between the disputants' characters and deep disagreement, since he leaves open the possibility that argumentational vice could still make deep disagreements worse, even if argumentational virtue would not make them better. But Fogelin is careful to distinguish the depth of a disagreement from its emotional intensity, the strength of feeling with which the disputants maintain their positions. Indeed, deep disagreements can be debated dispassionately, even if they are more often rancourous. John Stuart Mill helps to explain why some such disagreements, at least, are so often linked to strong feelings: So long as an opinion is strongly rooted in the feelings, it gains rather than loses in stability by having a preponderating weight of argument against it. For if it were accepted as a result of argument, the refutation of the argument might shake the solidity of the conviction; but when it rests solely on feeling, the worse it fares in argumentative contest, the more persuaded its adherents are that their feeling must have some deeper ground, which the arguments do not reach: and while the feeling remains, it is always throwing up fresh intrenchments of argument to repair any breach made in the old (Mill, 1977 [1869], 261). Although Fogelin is concerned with cases where disagreement really does proceed from "deeper ground", for Mill the appeal to conflicting worldviews may be illusory or insincere. Nonetheless, intensity of emotion is to be expected in either case. Much more recently, Michael Hannon has argued that many apparent disagreements are illusory, perhaps especially those disagreements most associated with political polarization (Hannon, 2019, 2020). Hannon draws on empirical studies which suggest that polling data usually taken to indicate sharp disagreement may be better understood as "expressive responding", intended primarily to signal the respondents' allegiance (Schaffner and Luks, 2018). As Hannon notes, not only does this suggest that there are fewer disagreements than meet the eye, deep or otherwise, but also that there are fewer agreements: apparent agreements can also be illusory.1 What can we do about deep disagreements? Or, as Fogelin asks, "what rational procedures can be used for their resolution?" (Fogelin, 1985, 5). His answer is pessimistic: "The drift of this discussion leads to the answer: NONE" (ibid.). That does not mean that deep disagreements cannot be resolved but it does suggest that the resolution procedure may not be entirely rational. Fogelin quotes Wittgenstein's On Certainty: "I said I would 'combat' the other man-but wouldn't I give him reasons? Certainly; but how far do they go? At the end of reasons comes persuasion. (Think what happens when missionaries convert natives.)" (Wittgenstein, 1972, ¶612). This is a somewhat sinister analogy for persuasion without reasons. Maybe a resolution could be found if one side succeeded in persuading the other, but such "persuasion" might be a higher price than we wish to pay. More recent authors have not all been so pessimistic. Scott Aikin has compiled this invaluable survey (Aikin, 2019, 421): PESSIMISM: In deep disagreement, argument is impossible. Non-engagement: In deep disagreements, one should not try to engage (Campolo, 2005, 2019). 1This echoes the "Abilene paradox" of deceptive agreement: in the eponymous example, a family of four talk themselves into a long, unpleasant drive in a Texas summer because each believes the others are in agreement that it is a good idea (Harvey, 1974). 4 ANDREW ABERDEIN Polemical: In deep disagreements, one should use nonargumentative or alternative argumentative techniques (Kraus, 2012; Barris, 2015; Duran, 2016). OPTIMISM: In deep disagreements, argument is possible and can be effective. Prudential: One can discern deep disagreements only if one continues to argue; so one's defaults should be set on arguing (Adams, 2005). Practical: Argument in deep disagreements prevents worse options (Lynch, 2010, 2012; Kappel, 2012; Jønch-Clausen and Kappel, 2015). Arbitrational: Some deep disagreement cases can be resolved by an impartial third party (Memedi, 2007). Supplemental: Argument in deep disagreement can produce or uncover shared reasons (Davson-Galle, 1992; Goodwin, 2005; Godden and Brenner, 2010). Internal: Internal argument is still possible in deep disagreements (Finocchiaro, 2011; Zarefsky, 2012).2 Theoretical: Absolutely deep disagreements are impossible, since insofar as one can identify an other as one with whom one disagrees, one must see that other as one with whom one can argue (Feldman, 2005; Phillips, 2008; Siegel, 2014). As we have seen, Fogelin is inclined to pessimism. I shall also pay most attention to the pessimistic response, although I note an ambiguity in what Aikin terms the polemical position: "alternative argumentative techniques" covers both alternatives to argumentation and alternative forms of argumentation. 3. Prominence and Depth I shall suggest that some of the puzzles presented by deep disagreement can be at least clarified by a diversion into physical geography-specifically, the concept of "prominence", which Charley introduced in §1.3 Here are two more technical (but equivalent) definitions of prominence: (1) The minimum vertical distance one must descend from a point in order to reach a higher point. (2) The difference between the elevation of a point, and the elevation of the lowest contour line that contains it and no higher point (Kirmse and de Ferranti, 2017, 788). As we saw in §1, prominence explains why the world's second highest mountain is K2, not the South Peak of Everest, even though the latter is further above sea level than the former: lists of highest peaks have prominence thresholds.4 Prominence provides a measure of depth: how far down you have to climb before you can start climbing back up. Consider three peaks on an island, as in Fig. 1. The prominence of the highest peak is its height above sea level, since you would have to leave the island to find anything higher. The prominence of the second highest peak is its height above the highest col it shares with the highest peak and 2Finocchiaro defines an internal argument as one "in which one derives a conclusion not acceptable to an opponent from claims acceptable to him" (Finocchiaro, 2011, 32). In other words, it is Lockean ad hominem, or argument ex concessis, to which I will return in §5. 3The following account is based on that presented in (Aberdein, 2020). 4Traditionally, 100, 300, or 2000 ft: worldwide more than seven million peaks meet the first threshold, over 250 times as many as meet the last (Kirmse and de Ferranti, 2017, 800). ARROGANCE AND DEEP DISAGREEMENT 5 the prominence of the lowest peak is its height above the highest col it shares with the second highest peak. Hence the prominence of the lowest peak represents a lower bound on how far down individuals on the two lower peaks would need to climb in order to be on the same level. It is only a lower bound because the peaks may differ significantly in height. More generally, we might define the relative prominence of one peak with respect to some higher peak as its prominence ignoring all peaks of intermediate height. Thus, for any pair of peaks, the relative prominence of the lower peak is a lower bound on how far down individuals on each peak would need to climb to attain the same level. 17/2/2018 21:36Prominence definition Page 1 of 1file:///Users/aberdein/Documents/Prominence+.svg Figure 1. An island with three peaks: the vertical lines indicate the prominence of each peak; the horizontal lines the lowest contour line encircling it but no higher summit. (Adapted from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topographic_prominence.) In order to draw an analogy with deep disagreement, we need an analogue for disagreement depth in terms of physical height. Some superficially plausible analogues for height ay be ruled out. For example, it can't just be a measure of emotional intensity: as we have seen, deep disagreements are often heated, but not necessarily so. Nor can it be a measure on revision of belief sets: the proportion of each disputant's beliefs that would need to be suspended or revised in order for common ground to be reached. Although deeply disagreeing parties may disagree about many things, the scope of their disagreement need not be all that great. (Notoriously so, in some cases: the "narcissism of minor differences" (Freud, 1961, 68).) A more plausible candidate would be a measure on how deeply entrenched are the points of contention (or the principles upon which they depend) within each disputant's belief set (see Gärdenfors, 1988, 86 ff.). Only disagreements that reach the worldview of at least one of the disputants will count as deep. So, just as lists of peaks have prominence thresholds, we may now reserve "deep" for disagreements that exceed this threshold. To summarize this topographic analogy, two disputants who at least suspend (dis)belief on the matters at issue for the duration of their argument are on shared level ground. Insofar as they sincerely disagree, either or both disputants stand on a summit from which they would need to climb down to reach level ground. For most disagreements, that is easy to do; but for deep disagreements, the descent will be an arduous endeavour, requiring substantial (and risky) restructuring of worldviews to accommodate revised epistemic principles. The contours of the terrain represent objective features of the disagreement. However, the disputants (or any other observer) may be mistaken as to where they stand: some 6 ANDREW ABERDEIN cols are not as deep as they seem; others much deeper. Many disputants arrive at their summits by chance, others by choice. Notably, Mill's emotive arguers, whose disagreement "rests solely on feeling", purposefully avoid the level ground on which honest debate may take place by racing up (what they take to be) the highest available peak and refusing to descend. 4. Arguing Virtuously or Viciously For the last decade or so, I have been one of several people making the case for a virtue theory of argumentation. Virtue theories and argumentation are as old as philosophy itself, perhaps older, but the explicit application of the former to the latter is a much more recent development. Most philosophical studies of argument emphasize technical aspects of argument success or failure, but they pay much less attention to the broader context of arguing, and generally ignore how the character of the people who take part in arguments bears on that success or failure. Virtue theories of argument seek to redress the balance, shifting the perspective away from arguments as products and onto arguers as people. One way to explore the character of arguers is to look at their virtues and vices. Many instances of the traditional fallacies that logicians and argumentation theorists have been discussing since Aristotle can be analysed in terms of the vices of the arguer who employs them or the audience that falls for them (Aberdein, 2016). But arguers can exhibit other vices that lead arguments to malfunction in other ways. Some of these vices may correspond pretty closely to those familiar from ethical contexts: we may be cowardly in not defending a position we believe to be right, contemptuous of our opponent, or unfair in how we present an opposing position. Other vices may be unique to argumentation, such as unwillingness to revise our own position or unwillingness to engage in argument in the first place. A fuller inventory of the vices of argument promises to help explain how even the arguments that succeed by traditional lights can seem so unsatisfactory. Conversely, cultivation of the corresponding virtues of argument should improve the conduct and outcome of our arguments. In virtue epistemology, a standard distinction is drawn between reliabilist (broadly externalist) and responsibilist (broadly internalist) conceptions of virtue (Axtell, 1997, 3). Heather Battaly helpfully reframes this as a distinction between virtues as requiring good ends and virtues as requiring good motives respectively (Battaly, 2015, 9). Of course, ideally, we would want virtuous activity both to be well-motivated and to bring about a good end. But we don't always get what we want: so Battaly argues that we should accept as virtues dispositions which only regularly meet one of these criteria. As an apposite example, consider the virtue of being willing to listen to others. An arguer might act in this way for ulterior motives, perhaps to receive a good grade in a speech class, or because their interlocutor told some good jokes. Nonetheless, their attentive listening might inadvertently lead them to contribute to a virtuous argument. Conversely, a wellmotivated arguer could be unselfishly willing to listen to others, but consistently unlucky in their choice of interlocutors, none of whom ever put forward an argument worth listening to, such that no good end ever came from the arguer's good motives. Obviously we hope to get both good ends and good motives, but we need to consider the cases where only one of these is to be had. Daniel Cohen has been making the case for a virtue theory of argumentation as long as anyone. He proposes a set of negative exemplars: the deaf dogmatist, who won't listen to the arguments of others; the concessionaire, who loses arguments by being too ready to modify their own position, conceding things ARROGANCE AND DEEP DISAGREEMENT 7 that weren't actually at issue; the eager believer, a forthright advocate for whatever position they heard last; the unassuring assurer, who seeks to reassure other parties who would not otherwise need reassurance-the "Not involved in human trafficking" T-shirt wearer of argumentation (Ginn, 2013); and the argument provocateur, who launches into arguments at the slightest opportunity, with or without regard to circumstances (Cohen, 2005, 61 ff.). Cohen characterizes some of these figures as tragic heroes rather than exemplars of vice: they are heroic, since there are important things they get right, but tragic, since their arguments seldom work out for the best. For example, the argument provocateur is at least willing to argue, even on sensitive matters where many others are unhelpfully reticent; the problem is that he is always willing to argue. What I will term Cohen's cardinal virtues of argument may be seen as means, each situated between a pair of negative exemplars that represent the corresponding vices of excess and deficiency. He distinguishes four such virtues: willingness to listen to others, willingness to modify your own position, willingness to question the obvious, and willingness to engage in serious argument. It is possible, but unnecessary for present purposes, to subdivide each of his cardinal virtues and their corresponding vices to include many other intellectual virtues and vices relevant to argumentation (for details, see Aberdein, 2016, 415 f.). 5. Arrogance I now wish to turn to the vice of arrogance, that I will maintain is particularly relevant to a discussion of deep disagreement. Alessandra Tanesini draws a useful distinction "between haughtiness and arrogance. The first is manifested as disrespect toward other speakers; the second is an unwillingness to submit oneself to the norms governing ordinary conversation and rational debate" (Tanesini, 2016, 85). While these two attitudes are often found together, they are conceptually distinct, and it is arrogance that is the more revealing object of study. Tanesini proposes the following account of arrogance: "The speaker does not wish to imply that his mere saying so makes the content of the assertion true, but he is convinced that the mere fact that the assertion is his somehow secures its correctness" (Tanesini, 2016, 84). The idea is that the arrogant person treats his views as requiring a special sort of deference. There may be circumstances in which this makes sense-Tanesini suggests the umpire whose decisions are binding in a game (ibid.). Such an attitude is fine in that context, but few arguers are in that context. In general, anyone adopting this attitude will be disposed to insulate many (all?) of his beliefs from revision-a comprehensive failure of willingness to modify. Elsewhere Tanesini draws explicit implications for argumentation, or at least debate, from her account of intellectual arrogance (Tanesini, 2018, 222 ff.). The arrogant participant disregards the expected norms for the conduct of debate. Specifically, the arrogant arguer makes claims that lack the expected level of justification and ignores or dismisses calls to back up such claims; conversely an arrogant respondent may treat the arguer's claims as requiring an exceptional level of justification or dismiss them out of hand. I wish to connect Tanesini's account of the arrogant arguer to two related approaches to arrogance. Firstly, Maura Priest has proposed an anti-asshole account of humility; she's defined humility as not being an asshole, which has an attractively blunt simplicity to it. She builds on Aaron James's definition: "a person counts as an asshole when, and only when, he systematically allows himself to enjoy special advantages in interpersonal relations out of an entrenched sense of entitlement that immunizes him against the complaints of other people" (James, 8 ANDREW ABERDEIN 2012, 4 f.). This has clear affinities with Tanesini's account of arrogance. Priest's intellectually humble person is thus someone who doesn't do that; someone who • Respects the intellect of others as his own, and so rarely feels immune to their complaints and criticisms. • Systematically declines intellectual advantages in interpersonal relations because he feels no sense of entitlement (Priest, 2017, 469). She goes on to link arrogance to disregard for intellectual autonomy. This makes the arrogant person someone who cannot be trusted to use persuasion wisely: "Behaviors commonly associated with this disregard include deception and manipulation" (Priest, 2017, 474). Such actions undermine intellectual autonomy by manipulating persons into holding beliefs regardless of evidence or their own intellectual process. Secondly, Nancy Potter, in defending a virtue account of trustworthiness, stresses the virtue of uptake: To give uptake rightly, then, it is not enough simply to receive another's speech act with the conventional understanding. One must appreciate and respond to the spirit in which something is expressed, and one must take seriously what the speaker is trying to say and the speaker's reasons for saying it. One must have the appropriate emotional and intellectual responses, engaging one's whole heart. Furthermore, one must recognize the responsibility attending social and political privilege. Indeed, giving uptake properly is partly constitutive of the kind of person one is-it requires cultivation of a certain kind of character (Potter, 2002, 152). Ultimately this idea is drawn from J. L. Austin, although it has mutated a fair bit en route (Austin, 1962, 116): unlike Austin, Potter characterizes uptake itself as a virtue. As such, uptake coincides closely with what Cohen and I call willingness to listen to others. It requires a suitable level of appreciative listening (cf. Rice, 2011). This seems like an antithesis of arrogance and, I suggest, the sort of virtue that is required in order to safely deploy tactics of persuasion that may resolve deep disagreements. How does all this connect to deep disagreement? Firstly, any disagreement with an arrogant individual is more than likely to feel like deep disagreement, even in cases where there is an easily accessible resolution. The phenomenology of disagreeing with an arrogant person and of being in deep disagreement may be similarly frustrating, even though their ultimate cause is quite different. The origin of the arrogant arguer's unwillingness to back down and indifference to the assertions of others lies in his character, not in the subject matter of the dispute. Chris Campolo has expressed the worry that attempting to reason one's way out of a deep disagreement may do more harm than good (Campolo, 2019, 721). It can give rise to a misleading sense of common ground. In terms of my topographical analogy, such disagreements are concealed crevasses: the disputants believe that they are addressing their differences when they are really ignoring them. Any apparent resolution that may follow is likely to give way unexpectedly. Disagreements with arrogant arguers can present a converse problem: what may initially present as depth may be no more than intransigence. In topographical terms, this may be thought of as an invisible bridge: despite outward appearances, there is a safe path to common ground (even if some parties will be strongly resistant to using it). ARROGANCE AND DEEP DISAGREEMENT 9 Secondly, but perhaps more seriously, the arrogant individual is a risk factor for some of the most promising strategies for resolution of deep disagreements. Specifically, it is precisely the behaviour of the arrogant arguer that gives rise to Wittgenstein's worries about the missionaries and the natives. Strategies that might find some way forward out of deep disagreement will, at the very least, go up to the edge of what counts as rational argument. Such strategies require particular care and attention. They are analogous to operating dangerous equipment with all the safety protocols turned off: the operator needs to be constantly vigilant about the associated risks. The arrogant person is entirely indifferent to those risks, at least so far as they impact others. Hence he will be the sort of person who gives persuasion a bad name, because, in so far as he has these techniques at his disposal, he will use them to twist others to his view. Conversely, the operation of the same techniques in conjunction with virtues that mitigate against these risks, such as willingness to listen to others, potentially represents a moral and practical way forward from deep disagreement. As an example of a risky persuasion strategy consider "moral reframing". Recent social psychological research finds that "moral messages framed in a manner consistent with the moral values of those already supporting the political stance were less persuasive than moral arguments reframed to appeal to the values of the intended audience-those who typically oppose the political position that the messenger is arguing in favor of" (Feinberg and Willer, 2015, 1676). The empirical research suggests that if you present an argument from your own moral frame of reference then people who don't share that frame of reference may be unpersuaded, whereas if you reframe it in terms of your interlocutor's frame of reference then there is a greater chance of success. Of course, the empirical research is only concerned with determining if moral reframing is a successful technique, not whether it is a virtuous technique. One concern about moral reframing is that it is ad hominem, albeit in the least malign sense: Lockean ad hominem, or arguing from the concessions of the other party; "internal argument" as it was termed in §2. Even so, as Gary Jason observes of such arguments, "If I try to convince you of C by citing P where you believe P, but I don't, I am being illogical. I am persuading you, not by sound argument, but by what I believe to be unsound argument" (Jason, 1984, 185). I would not be arguing unsoundly if, instead of arguing for C on the basis of P, I were to argue for "If P then C", which I believe to be true, and leave you to infer C from your (mistaken, by my lights) belief that P. Nonetheless, I would still be reconciling myself to your coming to believe C on the basis of what I take to be an unsound argument. This may seem a somewhat recondite concern, but if you judge your opponents' values to be intrinsically reprehensible, then employing them in argument, however hypothetically, would be inconsistent with your own values. For example, Sherman Clark considers a critic of a new subway line, whose own opposition is grounded in economic arguments, but who is tempted to persuade others with "a subtle appeal to race-based fear-perhaps by hinting at or subtly evoking visions of 'thugs' from the other side of town having easier access to good neighborhoods" (Clark, 2011, 852). As Clark observes "you might also quite sensibly realize that by making that sort of argument, even and perhaps especially if you did so indirectly and subtly, you would not just be appealing to but also helping to construct and reinforce fear and prejudice" (ibid.). So that sort of moral reframing would be not only vicious, but a cause of vice in others. Nonetheless, Clark is not denouncing moral reframing; on the contrary, he elsewhere states that "if we hope to be persuasive, we have no choice but to navigate the worldviews of those we hope to persuade", but he also proposes that if we "truly engage with those we hope to reach, we might 10 ANDREW ABERDEIN find that many people would respond as well or better to nobler appeals" (Clark, 2003, 73 f.). Used judiciously, moral reframing has the potential to be a constructive strategy for dealing with deep disagreement. But its associated risks show the importance of close attention to argumentative virtues in its deployment. 6. Conclusion The dialogue in §1 may end in more than one way. Alice and Bob could continue to sketch out competing worldviews without getting any closer together: a classic deep disagreement. Alternatively, it might become clear that one of them is refusing to back down from arrogance, not epistemic principle. In that case, the disagreement need not be deep, although it may prove just as hard to resolve. Or, in either of these cases, Alice or Bob may succeed in persuading the other. Such persuasion may involve techniques that go beyond argumentation, at least as narrowly defined. If either of them succumbs to arrogance, such persuasion may be no more than browbeating. Winning the argument on these terms provides no reason to think the winner is in the right epistemically (and good reason to think they're in the wrong ethically). But, if such persuasion is conducted with humility, and the other attendant virtues of argument, it may lead the other party to a sincere shift of worldview. 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Vol.:(0123456789) Synthese https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-019-02134-8 1 S.I.: PLURALISTIC PERSPECTIVES ON LOGIC Limiting logical pluralism Suki Finn1 Received: 30 June 2018 / Accepted: 8 February 2019 © The Author(s) 2019 Abstract In this paper I argue that pluralism at the level of logical systems requires a certain monism at the meta-logical level, and so, in a sense, there cannot be pluralism all the way down. The adequate alternative logical systems bottom out in a shared basic meta-logic, and as such, logical pluralism is limited. I argue that the content of this basic meta-logic must include the analogue of logical rules Modus Ponens (MP) and Universal Instantiation (UI). I show this through a detailed analysis of the 'adoption problem', which manifests something special about MP and UI. It appears that MP and UI underwrite the very nature of a logical rule of inference, due to all rules of inference being conditional and universal in their structure. As such, all logical rules presuppose MP and UI, making MP and UI self-governing, basic, unadoptable, and (most relevantly to logical pluralism) required in the meta-logic for the adequacy of any logical system. Keywords Adoption problem * Logical pluralism * Logical rules * Inference 1 Introduction According to a metaphysical reading of logical pluralism, there is a plurality of correct logics (as opposed to only one, as the logical monist says). A more epistemic reading of logical pluralism, however, can be dated back to Carnap: ... in logic there are no morals. Everyone is at liberty to build up his own logic, i.e., his own form of language, as he wishes.1 This is otherwise known as Carnap's Principle of Tolerance: ... let any postulates and rules of inference be chosen arbitrarily; then this choice, whatever it may be, will determine what meaning is to be assigned to * Suki Finn [email protected] 1 University of Southampton, Avenue Campus, Highfield, Southampton SO17 1BF, UK 1 Carnap (1937), pp. 51–52. Synthese 1 3 the fundamental logical symbols... The standpoint we have suggested -we will call it the Principle of Tolerance... - relates not only to mathematics, but to all questions of logic.2 In order for this Principle to make sense, there must be a plurality of logics for us to be tolerant towards that are equally worthy of being chosen. A metaphysical reading of logical pluralism thus seems to be entailed by the epistemic Principle of Tolerance, and requires that there be alternative logics to be pluralistic about. I will speak of logical systems to describe formal systems with rules of inference, and take logical pluralism to be a thesis about these logical systems. So what qualifies something as a logical system such that there could be many different (but relatively similar in order to class as) instances of them that are equally true? This is related to the opening of Beall and Restall's paper 'Logical Pluralism': Anyone acquainted with contemporary Logic knows that there are many socalled logics. But are these logics rightly so-called? Are any of the menagerie of non-classical logics, such as relevant logics, intuitionistic logic, paraconsistent logics or quantum logics, as deserving of the title 'logic' as classical logic? On the other hand, is classical logic really as deserving of the title 'logic' as relevant logic (or any of the other non-classical logics)?3 Rather than answering whether these logics are 'rightly so-called', I tackle a more epistemological question as to whether they are equally worthy of being chosen. I answer that they are not, due to the metaphysical reason that some logics are not as adequate as others, where inadequacy is due to deviance from what I argue is a core, basic, meta-logic.4 Without certain meta-logical content, the logic is useless and thus not as equally worthy of being chosen.5 I show that pluralism at the level of logical systems requires a certain monism at the level of meta-logic, and so, in a sense, there cannot be pluralism all the way down. This is not just the claim that there must be some unifying feature to all of the logics that qualifies them as being pluralistic tokens of a monistic type. Of course, to be pluralist about x, the different x1...xn need to be a kind of x, giving an uninteresting case of how pluralism bottoms out in monism regarding what the pluralist is a pluralist about. So, I am not simply stating that pluralism about logical systems bottoms out in monism about logic just due to the logical systems having a shared subject matter of logic. Instead, I argue that adequate logical systems bottom out in shared meta-logical content, and as such logical pluralism is limited. The pluralism is limited at the level of logic due to the 2 Carnap (1937), p. xv. 3 Beall and Restall (2000), p. 475. 'Logic' (capital L) for the discipline; 'logic' for a system. 4 I do not use the term 'adequacy' for the conjunction of the soundness and completeness of a system (yet perhaps the limits I highlight pertain to meta-logical adequacy in this sense). 5 One might argue that I am making an epistemological argument against a metaphysical thesis of logical pluralism. I thank a reviewer for this. But in so far as, say, Carroll's (1895) problem reveals an important constraint on logic despite its epistemological flavour, so can my argument here be taken to reveal an important limitation on logical pluralism, be it epistemic or not. My result can also be seen as meta-meta-logical, given that the adequacy of a logical system depends on certain constraints on the meta-logic behind it. 1 3 Synthese requirements at the level of meta-logic, and the plurality of adequate alternative logical systems is limited to those that share a certain meta-logic. I use the term 'meta-logic' to pick out a meta-level M of rules that underwrite the rules of inference at the level of a logical system L. Standardly (yet disputed), M is taken to contain analogues of all the rules of L, such that the meta-language of M has the same logic as the object-language of L.6 But I argue that for every adequate L, M must include analogues of the following basic logical rules of inference: Modus Ponens (hereon MP); and Universal Instantiation (hereon UI). I argue that there is something special about MP and UI that give them this privileged status at the meta-level. I will demonstrate what I take this special feature to be through an examination of their vulnerability to Kripke and Padró's 'adoption problem', which argues (against Carnapian logical pluralism) that adopting any logic is impossible: ... the Carnapian tradition about logic maintained that one can adopt any kind of laws for the logical connectives that one pleases. This is a principle of tolerance... Now, here we already have the notion of adopting a logic... As I said [last time], I don't think you can adopt a logic.7 Somewhere between the Carnapian and Kripkean extremes, I argue that there can only be alternative logical systems up to a point, but we cannot do (or have) logic without UI and MP-this is the limit to logical pluralism. For the same reason that UI and MP are unadoptable, they are also basic and required at the meta-level M. 2 The adoption problem In order to see what I see is special about MP and UI, we must take a (de)tour via Kripke and Padró's adoption problem (hereon AP), which can be outlined as such: Certain basic logical principles cannot be adopted, because, if a subject already infers in accordance with them, no adoption is needed, and if the subject does not infer in accordance with them, no adoption is possible.8 Utilizing the AP, I show that there are only some logical rules that cannot be adopted, in that they cannot be rationally accepted and utilized to guide inferences. I argue that these rules are the most basic of our logical rules, and the reason why they cannot be adopted is due to them being what I diagnose as 'self-governing'. I describe a rule as being self-governing when it is of the very structure that it itself governs, which results in it presupposing and applying to itself. The only rules that 6 See Dummett (1991) and Williamson (2017) for opposing views on the sensitivity of L to M. My stance is not that M need match L, but that UI and MP are needed in M for all L. 7 Kripke [Princeton Seminar, quote found in Padró (2015), p. 113]. 8 Padró (2015), p. 42. Padró speaks of logical principles here but she and Kripke argue that the adoption problem holds also for logical rules of inference. I will only speak of logical rules, but I take what I say in this paper to apply straightforwardly to logical principles. I also do not enter into the debate regarding the distinction between rules of inference and rules that state what follows from what-for a discussion of this, see Harman (1986). Synthese 1 3 I consider as self-governing in this way are UI and MP. On my analysis, the reason why such rules cannot be adopted is the same reason why I take those rules to be basic and required at the meta-level for any adequate alternative logical system: namely, because they govern all logical rules of inference, including themselves. To demonstrate the self-governance of UI and MP and the relevance of this to logical pluralism, I will first need to dissect the AP as follows. In Sect. 2.1, I will describe the type of subject who would be directly affected by the AP-namely those who lack the relevant practice of inferring in a certain way. In Sect. 2.2, I will clarify the notion of adoption and what exactly in the process of adoption causes difficulties for such a subject-namely when it comes to inferring in accordance with the rule in virtue of accepting that rule. In Sect. 2.3, most of the exegesis stops and my analysis begins, as I will discuss which logical rules I take to be affected and what it is about them that makes them unadoptable-namely the most basic rules of inference, UI and MP. Then, in Sect. 3, I will show that such basic rules encounter a kind of self-governance by being of the very structure that the rule itself aims to govern, and it is this feature that I argue prevents them from being adoptable. As such, I use the AP to manifest the self-governing nature of the basic logical rules of inference. I dissect the problem with adoption by clarifying the problematic adopter (the type of subject), adoption (the part of the process), and adopted (the rules affected), and I use this to provide my own account for what it is that makes a logical rule basic: by being self-governing. Finally, in Sect. 4, I argue that these basic rules provide the necessary meta-logic for all adequate logics, as all logical rules (including UI and MP) will presuppose them. 2.1 The adopter The AP is best described with an example. So let me introduce Padró's case of Harry and Kripke's situation of John the raven.9 Harry is what I describe as a 'novice', where to be a novice is to have no experience of a certain thing, in this case with the rule of inference called Universal Instantiation (UI). UI tells us that from any universal statement each particular instance follows. Harry is a UI novice because he has never heard of, nor inferred in accordance with, the UI rule, and so he has no familiarity with either the rule or the practice. The AP arises when we invite such a novice to pick up the practice of inferring according to a specific rule of inference, by means of accepting that rule itself. So suppose we want Harry to adopt the UI rule, so that he can use it to infer the colour of John, a particular raven that he cannot see, from the universal statement that the colour of all ravens are black. Kripke and Padró claim that telling Harry the UI rule would not help him make the inference about John's colour.10 Harry would already need to be able to make UI inferences to grasp that the UI rule applies to the case of ravens, namely to the universal statement about their colour. Yet Harry cannot apply it to this case of ravens, since to do 9 See Padró (2015). Harry is, of course, fictional, as is John the raven. 10 Kripke and Padró state that someone who sometimes but not always infers according to UI may be helped by stating the rule for them. This shows the significance of novice status. 1 3 Synthese so presupposes a move from a general rule to a particular case-a move that Harry has never performed. In a sense, Harry's 'novice' status paralyses him, since without the corresponding inferential practice in place (or as I take it, UI in the meta-logic), Harry cannot know how or when to apply the rule. Given this set up, a worry is whether such novices who cannot adopt certain rules are even possible: it may be the case that we are not like Harry, and also it may be that there never has been and never will be anyone quite like Harry. Without any such novice subjects though, there would be nobody for the AP to directly apply to. But such an objection seems to miss the point. Harry's novice status highlights that the inferential practice is prior to the acceptance of the inference rule, and this tells us something general that applies to us all. Regardless of their reality, considering novices like Harry provides us with counterexamples to accounts of rule-following and the nature of inference (specifically, accounts that require a prior acceptance of the rule and that give such rules a guiding role). Therefore the worry is not whether we could be in Harry's position or whether such novices exist, but what hypothesizing about such novices will tell us about the possibility of rule-following and the nature of inference, and of greater interest here, the limits of logical pluralism. I will argue that the difficulty Harry faces due to being a novice shows us something significant about the inference rules that he tries and fails to adopt. Harry's novice status serves to bring out a feature of those rules that I will call 'self-governing', which on my analysis is what prevents them from being used on the basis of rational acceptance only. Next I will clarify what I take to be the most important element of adoption to understand what in the process is so problematic. 2.2 The adoption Padró characterizes the notion of adoption as such: Adoption of a logical rule = acceptance of the rule + practice of inferring in accordance with that rule in virtue of the acceptance of that rule.11 So, to adopt a rule is to come to infer in accordance with it because one accepts it. Under this characterization, there cannot be any use-less adoption. The practice of inferring is a necessary part of the adoption process; it is built into the notion of adoption by definition. If you accept a rule but fail to infer in accordance with it as a result, then you fail to adopt the rule. Thus 'acceptance' is not 'adoption'. So adoption is useful or impossible, (where to be useful is to generate the practice), and 11 Padró (2015), p. 32. To make sense, adoption, acceptance, and practice, must be distinct. Synthese 1 3 Padró and Kripke aim to show that it cannot be useful and so it's impossible.12 With adoption defined, we can identify three elements of the adoption process: (A) The acceptance of an inference rule R (B) The practice of inferring in accordance with that rule R (C) Doing B in virtue of A In order to successfully adopt, 'A', 'B', and 'C' need to occur, as their combination is simply what adoption is by definition. Kripke and Padró argue that Harry fails to adopt, and so Harry must be failing to do at least 'A', 'B', or 'C', but which is it? Let's start with 'A'. Padró equates acceptance with belief: "acceptance of the rule [is] understood as an explicit or implicit belief that the rule is correct."13 I, however, take acceptance to be identified with only explicit belief since implicit belief may be taken as a disposition to act in a certain way that blurs the distinction between 'A' and 'B' (and we should keep them distinct). It is built into the example of Harry that he does explicitly believe and accept UI, as Kripke describes the case: "I say to [Harry], 'consider the hypothesis that from each universal statement, each instance follows', and he believes me."14 At this point then it cannot be failure of acceptance of a rule that makes adoption impossible, as the AP is set up on the assumption that belief, and thus acceptance, occurs in Harry's case. So, moving on to 'B'. Whether the practice of inferring in accordance with a rule is problematic depends on how we interpret the 'in accordance with' notion: as either conformity or rule-following.15 Harry may accidently conform to UI by uttering 'All ravens are black, therefore John the raven is black', as a sequence of words or thoughts can happen to conform to a rule. If such conformity were all that is required for inferring in accordance with a rule, then Harry would be said to infer in that scenario. Inferring would be simply the movement from one thought to another, as it is easy enough to conjure up a rule that it conforms to.16 But an issue that the 12 It should be emphasized that Padró's 'adoption' is a technical term, where others may use the word differently in a less technical way in the literature. Indeed, Kripke complains that noone in the literature explains what they mean by 'adoption', yet it is used as if there were a standard procedure that adoption consisted in. One should be careful when engaging in this AP to ensure that they are talking of the same kind of 'adoption'. Even Kripke has used the word in a way that is incompatible with Padró's definition: "if we did adopt [a rule], it would have done us absolutely no good." (Quote found in Padró (2015), p. 112). To do 'no good' is to be useless, and so Kripke must mean that the acceptance does 'no good'. Kripke does not define what he takes adoption to be, since he complains that he simply does not understand what it could mean. (See Padró (2015), fn. 42, p. 31). Yet Padró's characterization is meant to capture the way Kripke uses the word, so I work only with Padró's definition. 13 Padró (2015), p. 190. Adoption is considered only from the first person perspective. 14 Quote found in Padró (2015), p. 35. Padró (2015), p. 62 says acceptance may be problematic: "It could be argued that neither Harry nor [the Tortoise] have either accepted or understood the rules we gave them." This was first raised in connection with Carroll by Black (1970), p. 21: "The form of words 'understanding and accepting premises of the form p and if p then q, but not accepting the corresponding position of the form q' describes nothing at all." Padró thinks Black is correct but misses the point: in this situation, the AP repeats itself, as the reason why Harry could not accept is the same reason why he could not adopt. I argue this demonstrates something special about the logical rules UI and MP. 15 The distinction is widely debated in the literature. See Miller and Wright (2002). 16 Boghossian (2008), p. 9 notes there are infinitely many rules that our behaviour accords to. 1 3 Synthese AP forces upon us is whether inferring is conforming, or, on the other hand, if it is a case of rule-following. If inferring is a rule-governed practice, then the distinction between 'B' and 'C' is blurred (which we should keep sharp), as the practice occurring in 'B' is already in virtue of the rule at hand. The 'in accordance with' in 'B' needs to be interpreted in a non-rule-guided way, as otherwise 'in accordance with' in 'B' seems to do the same work as 'in virtue of' in 'C' (as it is natural, though contestable, that rule-following consists of 'B' in virtue of 'A'). Such a conflation would prevent us from locating the specific problem in adoption. Part 'C' of the process ensures that 'A' is prior to 'B', since 'C' demands that the practice in 'B' is developed in virtue of the acceptance in 'A', where the acceptance comes before the practice. It is this requirement from 'C' that makes the practice of inferring a rule-governed process, which begins in and is explained by acceptance of a rule of inference. 'C' is a relation between 'A' and 'B', namely, doing 'B' in virtue of 'A'. I call this 'in virtue of' relation the 'utility' of a rule, as it intends to give the rule a use.17 Without 'C' supplementing 'B' (or being built into 'B' via a loaded understanding of what it means to infer in accordance with a rule), we accord to a rule by mere conformance, and the rule plays no guiding role. What 'C' adds is the rule being the reason for the conformance, so that the rule is followed. Whether we can understand rule-following without 'C', and inferring without rule-following, is what the AP invites us to explore.18 If it is 'C' that transforms the inferring in 'B' from accidental conforming to guided rule-following, then the AP challenges the possibility of rule-following, and if the inferring in 'B' cannot be understood as rule-following, then the AP challenges the nature of inferring. This specifies Padró's target of the AP as accounts of rule-following and inference where rules have utility. But why is it that rules cannot play a guiding role? This is where Kripke and Padró's analysis ends, and mine really takes off. My explanation for the lack of utility in the rules is due to the nature of the rules in question. On my analysis, there is something special about such rules that make them unadoptable, as there is a feature of them that requires one not to be a novice precisely in order to be able to adopt them. This special feature is the topic of the next sections and provides the reason why such rules are needed at the meta-level of all adequate logical systems. 2.3 The adopted Kripke argues that in general, logic cannot be adopted. Yet, in Padró's articulation of the AP she restricts the unadoptable rules to only some basic ones, as such: 17 This 'in virtue of' relation (utility of a rule in 'C') is similar to what Kripke (1982) calls 'internalizing' a rule, and is captured by Boghossian's 'Taking Condition' (2014, p. 4) which specifies the relation between a conclusion and the premises we take it to follow from, and it distinguishes inferences from mere sequences of thoughts. What all these notions refer to is the act of inferring being done because of the rule. But this is not a causal connection, as Padró (2015), p. 42 describes. Rather it treats the rule as being the reason for the inference due to the rule guiding the inference, and can be said to ground it in some way. 18 For debates of this sort see the exchange between Boghossian (2014) and Wright (2014). Synthese 1 3 The adoption problem is only supposed to affect some basic logical principles or rules, like Universal Instantiation or Modus Ponens... Kripke mentions two other principles as being affected... adjunction and non-contradiction (the list, however, wasn't intended to be exhaustive).19 The rules that I, like Padró,20 will focus on are MP and UI. Padró thinks that the AP "would be interesting even if it only worked with MP and UI",21 and so she clearly allows the AP to have limited scope. Padró does not say much about the similarity between MP and UI, yet claims that "there is something special about these [unadoptable] principles: they have a self-supporting character that appears to run deep."22 Kripke also claims that there is something unique about these rules, but Kripke and Padró are "a bit more cautious and reserve judgment on the matter of uniqueness".23 I (with less caution) attempt to fill in these gaps in the analysis, and provide a fuller account of what it is that qualifies rules as being basic that prevents them from being adopted and requires them in the meta-logic of adequate systems. Others describe what makes a rule basic is them being 'underived', 'fundamental', 'primitive', 'unjustified' (as we will discuss in more detail later in Sect. 3.4) or even 'blind' when it comes to the following of such rules.24 Boghossian also exercises caution when it comes to answering the question as to what makes rules basic or the following of them blind (without intentional or explicit acceptance): You want to know which inference patterns are permitted to be blind? These ones: Modus Ponens, Non-Contradiction, and a few others. Don't ask why it is precisely these inference patterns that are sanctioned. There is no deep answer to that question; there is just the list.25 I disagree that there is just a list, as I argue there is something the entries on the list have in common, which provides a 'deep answer' to the question of what counts as being a basic logical rule of inference: namely, they are self-supporting due to exhibiting what I call self-governance.26 These rules govern such basic and fundamental patterns of inference that they underwrite the application of any logical rule, including themselves. As such, they govern their own application. It is in virtue of these basic rules being self-governing that they cannot be utilized or adopted, and thus I diagnose the AP as being due to self-governance. I will give my own analysis 19 Padró (2015), fn. 52, p. 37. Padró says these are directly affected (private correspondance). 20 Padró (2015), fn. 52, p. 37: "I will only talk about UI and MP. The former is Kripke's preferred example and the latter is Carroll's own example (and also the case that is most widely discussed in the literature), but of course it would be interesting to see which other principles are directly affected by this argument. That task, however, falls outside the scope of what I set out to do." I somewhat take on that task so as to show the limits of pluralism. 21 Padró (2015), fn. 52, p. 37. 22 Padró (2015), p. 14. 23 Padró (2015), fn. 63, p. 49. Emphasis in original. 24 See, for example, Boghossian (2000). 25 Boghossian and Williamson (2003), p. 239. 26 I thank Conor McHugh (private correspondence) for suggesting this terminology to me. 1 3 Synthese by looking at the general structure of all logical rules of inference, to demonstrate how such structure presupposes (and thus requires) both MP and UI. 3 Self‐governance 3.1 General structure of rules Logical rules of inference are, very generally speaking, universal and conditional in their structure. To be of a universal structure is to apply in all cases of a certain kind. To be conditional in structure is to say what to do if one is in a case of a certain kind. Logical rules of inference take us from premises to a conclusion via a conditional, and are universal meaning that they apply in all cases when the antecedent of that conditional is satisfied.27 The antecedent of the conditional will name a situation when the rule is applicable, and the consequent of the conditional will name what one should do when faced with an instance of that situation. It is therefore written in to the very nature of what it is to be a logical rule of inference that it is universal and conditional in its structure. I thus take the general structure (GS) of logical rules of inference to be universal and conditional, so that all logical rules are of the structure GS, which I formulate (somewhat crudely) as follows: (GS) If the premises are an instance of structure X then infer conclusion Y. Roughly, GS describes how logical rules of inference are universal (by applying in all cases of structure X) and conditional (by moving from X to conclusion Y). The truth of GS is not easy to prove, however it does find support in the literature. For example, Boghossian similarly notes that logical rules have "general content" and "conditional content" by telling us "to always perform some action, if I am in a particular kind of circumstance."28 This can easily be rewritten as equivalent to GS, where the 'particular kind of circumstance' is 'structure X' and 'some action' is 'conclusion Y'. Furthermore, Boghossian states that inferring is "both general and productive"29 where the 'general' here indicates what I call being 'universal' and the 'productive' indicates what I call being 'conditional'. Boghossian also notes Kripke's preferred construal of rules as being general imperatives of this form: 'If C, do A!' where 'C' names a type of situation and 'A' a type of action. On this construal, rules are general contents that prescribe certain types of behavior under certain kinds of condition.30 This again has similarities to GS, where 'C' names a type of situation by describing its structure X, and 'A' is the action of inferring conclusion Y. Once more, we 28 Boghossian (2008), p. 21. 29 Boghossian (2014), p. 12. 30 Boghossian (2008), p. 475. It is, however, beyond the scope of this paper to argue whether rules should be of imperative form or put in normative, permissive, or propositional terms. 27 This will not cover inferences where there are no premises and only a conclusion. Synthese 1 3 see what I call the universal and conditional structures being alluded to in 'If C, do A!'. GS is also similar to Wright's 'Modus Ponens Model' of rule-following where we are presented with a conditional rule, a premise about the situation we are in satisfying the antecedent of the rule, and then a conclusion about what we infer when we apply the rule to that situation, giving us the consequent of the rule: The rule is stated in the form of a general conditional. A minor premise states that, in the circumstances in question, the condition articulated in the antecedent of the rule is met. The conclusion derives the mandate, prohibition, or permission concerned.31 To reframe this according to GS, we need only see the 'minor premise' as 'structure X', and 'the conclusion' as 'conclusion Y', such that the rule's 'form of a general conditional' is articulated by GS. Despite the similarities, Wright's 'Modus Ponens Model' and my GS are different since GS applies to the rule that is embedded into the first step of Wright's model, and articulates that rule as being broken up into the antecedent ('structure X') and the consequent ('conclusion Y'). I take GS to be the general structure of the logical rules themselves, whereas Wright's model is the general structure of rule-following. And as I aim to show, simply accepting the rule is not enough to follow it, as one must also know how and where the rule applies, by seeing that the antecedent is satisfied and by having the practice already in place to apply the rule to that case. 3.2 Modus Ponens and Universal Instantiation MP tells us: when faced with a conditional and its antecedent (structure X), infer the consequent (conclusion Y). UI tells us: when faced with a universal (structure X), infer an instance (conclusion Y). MP is a rule that governs conditionals; UI is a rule that governs universals. But MP and UI are conditionals and universals themselves, in virtue of all logical rules being of conditional and universal structure, as GS shows.32 So given that all logical rules of inference are of the form GS, which is itself a universal and conditional, then those rules that govern or describe how to deal with universal or conditional structures will face problems by being of the structure that they themselves govern. Thus UI and MP will unavoidably govern themselves, due to always being logical rules which have the structure given by GS, which is the same as the structure X that they themselves govern. On my analysis, it is self-governance that prevents a logical rule from being adoptable, and (as I 31 Wright (2007), p. 490. 32 I take GS to be a conditional of the sort that MP governs. MP usually applies to material conditionals, or those rendered false by the conjunction of the antecedent and negation of the consequent. GS is not explicitly written in these terms, but since it tells us if in structure X then infer conclusion Y, we can see that it is a conditional in the required way. So, if MP both governs and is structured as a material conditional, then MP is unadoptable. All thats required is a match between what is presupposed at GS and the rule that governs it. 1 3 Synthese will argue) explains its necessary inclusion as a basic logical rule of inference at the meta-level of any adequate logical system. We find further support for my claims when we look at the related cases of Harry and Lewis Carroll's Tortoise33 who battle with UI and MP respectively. I claim that both their problems arise due to those rules being self-governing. As for Harry, he cannot infer the colour of the particular raven by being told the colour of all ravens and the UI rule, since he cannot apply UI to the case of ravens. Harry cannot infer that the universal statement about all ravens is one that the UI rule applies to, as that presupposes that he can infer from the universal rule of UI to the particular universal about ravens. This is due to UI itself being of universal form, and as such being of the structure X that it governs. Since Harry does not know what to do in a case of structure X, giving him a rule that governs structure X that is itself in the form of structure X is not going to help him. He does not infer instances from universals, and so will not infer from the applicability of the universal rule UI to the instance of the particular universal case of the ravens. He needs to apply UI to the case in order to then apply it in the case, and as such needs to apply it twice to infer the colour of that raven. This is why UI is required in the meta-logic and the practice needs to be prior to acceptance, as otherwise UI is impossible to utilize. As for Carroll's Tortoise, she refuses to accept that the sides of the triangle are 'equal to each other' when they are 'equal to the same', having been told that if the sides are equal to the same then they are equal to each other, and being told the MP rule which she challenges. I claim that this is due to MP being of conditional form-the very form that the Tortoise refuses to infer in accordance with. Since she does not respond to structure X, giving her a rule that dictates how to respond to X that is itself in the form of X is not going to move her to infer. These self-governing rules are, as Kripke says, "completely useless"34 for getting someone to infer, due to such rules presupposing themselves which makes them unadoptable. If UI and MP are not present at the meta-level then, no rule of inference in any logical system can be adopted, which leads to a significant limitation to logical pluralism. One might object that UI and MP do not have to be stated as generalizations or conditionals. But I take it that the specific formulation of UI and MP makes no difference to their self-governance and thus their status as being unadoptable. Padró likewise argues "variations as to how to construe these rules won't affect the argument."35 So the AP holds for such logical rules regardless of how they are stated. It does not matter how exactly UI and MP are formulated, as they will still be logical rules of inference and as such will still have the general form of such rules as shown by GS which utilize both a universal and conditional structure. UI need not be explicitly formulated using a universal, as the problem is that the rule (like all 33 Carroll (1895). Harry and Tortoise are different, but they show UI and MP to be similar. 34 "The law of universal instantiation is completely useless... There are certain rules which you just couldn't adopt: you couldn't tell them to yourself, because if you told them to yourself without already using them, they would be useless; so they either don't help you or they were superfluous anyway. UI has this character." Quotes found in Padró (2015), p. 112. 35 Padró (2015), fn. 70, p. 58. Synthese 1 3 logical rules) is general. Thus UI will apply to all cases of universals, making it self-governing, even when it is not referred to explicitly. Likewise, MP need not be explicitly formulated using a conditional, as the problem arises that the rule (like all logical rules) is conditional. MP, like all other logical rules, features a conclusion that is detached and in need of being arrived at through an inference which will itself be of a conditional structure. Therefore, UI and MP will always be of the structure X that they themselves govern due to GS. Regardless of how UI and MP are specifically formulated, it is just due to the fact that they are rules that have the general structure of being universal and conditional (like all rules do), that they selfgovern by governing how to deal with universal or conditional contents. We also cannot prevent UI and MP from being self-governing by taking a syntactic statement of the rules using logically equivalent components36 to avoid making use of ∀ or →. They then won't explicitly refer to the logical component they govern, but still cannot help but be of the structure that they govern, and so will be self-governing and unadoptable. For example, we may state MP as: from P&(P → Q) infer Q.37 If we rewrite this so that it does not make use of the conditional P → Q and formulate it with a logically equivalent ~ (P&~Q), we get: from P&(~(P&~Q)), infer Q. Yet this would still be unadoptable since its application still involves the use of an MP inference.38 A subject still needs to understand that the antecedent situation P&(~(P&~Q)) holds and that when it holds they should infer Q. Rewriting MP without the conditional does not make it adoptable. Likewise with UI, which we may understand as: from ∀xFx, infer Fa. This may be rewritten without explicit reference to the universal ∀x and instead using a logically equivalent ~ (∃x) ~ to create this rule: from ~ (∃x) ~ Fx, infer Fa. This would still be unadoptable, just like in its original formulation, due to being self-governing as its application involves the use of an UI inference pattern. A subject would still need to somehow understand that a particular instance of the antecedent situation ~ (∃x) ~ Fx holds and that whenever there is such an instance they should infer Fa.39 This is because, regardless of the rule in question, one needs a grasp of how to deal with universals and conditionals due to GS showing us that all rules are of universal and conditional structure. So, however we formulate UI and MP, they always presuppose an understanding of, or inference in accordance with, UI and MP, due to GS. UI and MP will always be unadoptable because of this, and will always be basic rules required at the meta-level in order to understand rules at the level of logical systems. 36 Interdefinability only holds on classical frameworks and so cannot be my method to show formulation doesn't matter. But it is not–my method uses GS to show the form rules have. 37 We learn from Carroll (1895) to resist writing rules of inference for a theory as single sentences of that theory, so we ascend to the meta-language and write: 'From P and (P → Q), infer Q'. My point is replacing P → Q with ~ (P&~Q) wont help as it only prevents MP from using a conditional in part of the rule but the whole rule will still be a conditional. 38 Padró (2015), fn. 56: "We could express [MP] as ((¬p∨q)∧p) → q. But again, its application will involve use of an MP inference pattern." This is as GS presupposes MP. 39 Padró (2015), fn. 56, p. 43 argues: "Suppose we try to get Harry to adopt the following more complex principle: 'if there doesn't exist something for which a predicate F does not hold, then F holds for any particular instance.' ... It is clear that any other principle or rule we might suggest to Harry will have to be general and so their application will presuppose UI.". 1 3 Synthese UI and MP needn't be stated in any particular way, they just need to be logical rules that govern universal and conditional structures. 3.3 Adjunction and the law of non‐contradiction Kripke and Padró claimed that adjunction (AD) and the law of non-contradiction (LNC) were also potential candidates for being unadoptable, and Boghossian took LNC to be basic and followed blindly. As we will see, Priest also takes there to be something special about AD. We will look at LNC first, and then at AD. (Note that analyzing LNC in terms of my GS is a bit more complicated, as LNC is not strictly a rule of inference.) Anyway, this is Padró's argument for LNC's unadoptability: If we try to get someone who doesn't reason in accordance with it to adopt it, the problem is that the subject could hold the law of non-contradiction itself to be both true and false.40 But this strikes me not as unadoptable in the way that we have been describing, but more like a paradox, that in taking LNC to be true and false it ends up only being false. One simply could not accept LNC and its negation, for to do so would be selfdefeating if LNC is true. But this has nothing to do with adoptability or basicness. Here, the problem with LNC does not derive from the 'in virtue of' relation, as one could keep their practice of inferring in accordance with LNC in virtue of accepting it, even when they also accepted its negation. One could demonstrate acceptance of LNC by inferring according to reductio ad absurdum (RAA), where one can reject an assumption in light of a derived contradiction (to show a rejection of the contradiction, and thus an acceptance of LNC). But RAA seems to be adoptable, since GS is not of the form of a reductio, and one needn't already have experience of denying assumptions in light of contradictions in order to practice RAA, nor is RAA needed at the meta-level. As long as some of our practice includes rejecting contradictions due to taking LNC as true, LNC is adoptable. LNC may have special traits, but being unadoptable and basic is a specific trait that I classify as being self-governing, which LNC does not exhibit. Therefore LNC is not a required rule for adequate logical systems, thus it need not feature at the meta-level and logical pluralism is not limited by it. Now let us turn to the rule AD. Priest claims that AD is always valid: I think it just false that all principles of inference fail in some situation. For example, any situation in which a conjunction holds, the conjuncts hold, simply in virtue of the meaning of ∧.41 So, does this show us something special about AD regarding its basicness, unadoptability and required inclusion at a meta-level of adequate logical systems? Let us look to its structure for answers. The structure X that AD governs is of two 40 Padró (2015), fn. 52, p. 37. 41 Priest (2006), pp. 202–203. Synthese 1 3 separate conjuncts coming together as one, introducing the logical component 'and' to conjoin them. Not all logical rules contain separate conjuncts (as they do not all contain multiple premises), and so GS is not itself of the structure of a conjunction (as conjunction is not part of the general structure of all of the logical rules). So, AD will not be self-governing in virtue of GS being of the structure X that AD governs. However, one may argue that AD is self-governing because structure X is described using the logical component that X governs. If the AD rule were stated as 'If 'P' and 'Q' then infer 'P&Q'', then the antecedent explicitly refers to the logical component, 'and', that AD governs. As Padró describes: If we accept that 'P' is true and accept that 'Q' is true, then adjunction is needed to conclude that one has accepted that 'P is true and Q is true'.42 This means that whenever there is more than one premise to an argument, in order to conjoin them as a singularity one will need to list them as a plurality to take each as true. But this method presupposes AD as it requires us to be able to individuate multiple premises, thus all multi-premise inferences would presuppose an inference according to, AD. Importantly, MP is a multi-premise inference pattern, since one uses it to infer from a situation of P and P → Q to a conclusion Q. Yet we have argued that MP is unadoptable due to being presupposed by GS. So if GS presupposes MP and MP presupposes AD, then GS presupposes AD. Furthermore, AD itself is a multi-premise inference pattern, and so AD presupposes itself, thus it seems to have the self-governing feature that prevents it from being adoptable. Yet I do not agree with Padró that AD is unadoptable. This is because, on my analysis, what generates unadoptability is the general structure of logical rules (GS) being itself of the structure that the rule governs (structure X), and since GS is not itself a conjunction then AD need not be a conjunction itself. On a classical framework, all multi-premise rules can be reformulated as a single-premise rule, conjoining the premises with something that is logically equivalent to P&Q, such as ~ (~Pv~Q). Therefore, AD can be rewritten with one premise, moving from ~ (~Pv~Q) to the conclusion P&Q (rather than from two premises, P, and Q). This shows that it is not necessary for any logical rule to presuppose AD, as adjunction is not required when all inferences can be understood using a single premise by conjoining multiple premises with logically equivalent terms. MP, AD, and all other multi-premise rules need not presuppose AD since they can bypass the need for adjunction by rewriting into a singular premise, which at least on a classical framework is done via interdefinability. This emphasizes the importance of GS, since it is this that cannot be avoided. We can rewrite rules in ways that avoid explicit reference to the components they govern, but we cannot avoid that they are rules, and so we cannot avoid that they are universal and conditional in structure due to being general and having a detached conclusion, as shown by GS. But since logical rules are not always of the structure of adjunction, on my analysis AD is not self-governing in the required way to be unadoptable or needed at the meta-level.43 42 Padró (2015), fn. 52, p. 37. Seemingly a grasp of meta-logical conjunction is required. 43 This assumes a way of identifying rules that may be contentious (but no room to discuss). 1 3 Synthese 3.4 Justification and basicness The self-governing nature of MP and UI is not only problematic for adoption of those rules, but also for justification of those rules. The problem of justifying a logical rule by means of the very same rule is called 'Rule-Circularity' in the literature.44 The problem of Rule-Circularity is roughly that the justification of any logical rule will have to appeal to the basic logical rules, and so the justification of the basic logical rules will appeal to themselves. They will do this by taking one step in their justification that makes use of a basic logical rule. Naturally, if the basic logical rules already appeal to themselves in their formulation, then they will appeal to themselves for justification, just as they do in application. This circularity, which I take to be caused by self-governance, is particularly clear in the case of MP when attempting to justify it syntactically, as Boghossian describes: It is tempting to suppose that we can give an a priori justification for MP on the basis of our knowledge of the truth-table for 'if, then'. Suppose that p is true and that 'if p, then q' is also true. By the truth-table for 'if, then', if p is true and if 'if p, then q' is true, then q is true. So q must be true, too. As is clear, however, this justification for MP must itself take at least one step in accord with MP.45 The AP therefore seems to be just another manifestation of this Rule-Circularity problem, both problems being caused by the self-governance of some logical rules. Yet what the AP shows us is that Rule-Circularity arises at a more fundamental level than justification, and what my analysis shows us is that at each level this is due to self-governance. So not only can we not justify MP and UI unless by means of themselves but we also cannot utilize them, due to their self-governing nature. So far then I have argued that for a logical rule to be unadoptable is for it to be self-governing due to the general structure of logical rules presupposing the rule in question. I have shown the connection between the AP and Rule-Circularity, in that self-governance causes not only problems for the utility but also the justification of logical rules of inference. But since the AP and Rule-Circularity are put forward as affecting only the basic rules, I now suggest that my analysis provides an understanding of what basicness is, what causes it, and what it causes. UI and MP are self-governing in that all logical rules are of conditional and universal structure, such that they unavoidably presuppose an understanding of UI and MP. Therefore, all logical rules require one to already know how and when to apply UI and MP, and this is what makes UI and MP basic, since all other logical rules presuppose them. Many describe 'basic' as meaning 'underived'. If all other rules 'derive' from the basic rules, then any problem with the basic rules impacts on the other rules. This is due to the basic rules being essential for what a logical rule is, so that if a novice cannot grasp basic rules then they cannot grasp logical rules at all. It thus seems the non-basic rules are not derived from UI and MP, but rather they are 44 See Boghossian (2000) on rule-circularity; Dummett (1975) on justifying deduction. 45 Boghossian (2000), p. 231. Synthese 1 3 governed by UI and MP. This is in line with a passing comment from Kripke about basicness that captures my analysis of the AP, as Padró notes: Maybe this is what Kripke has in mind when he says that sometimes the more basic principles are 'built into' the other ones in a disguised way.46 I develop Kripke's passing comment by arguing that UI and MP are built into the other rules due to self-governance, in virtue of the general structure of all logical rules being both universal and conditional. Logical rules seem to presuppose that we can make sense of instructions of the form 'if...then', and recognise instances as instances of general forms. Therefore a grasp of UI and MP is central to the notion of a logical rule of inference, and that is what makes them basic, unadoptable, and required at the meta-level for any adequate logical system. Without UI and MP, there is no way to make sense of, or apply, any other logical rules, since all of the logical rules depend on UI and MP to govern them. If we do not have UI and MP at the meta-level, then we will not have the instruction or guidance to move from a universal rule to a particular instance of structure X, nor to derive conclusion Y if in an instance of structure X. This is why UI and MP are basic! Without them in the meta-logic, the logical systems and their rules are useless, and thus, inadequate. 4 Implications for logical pluralism Logical pluralism, in particular from the Carnapian tradition, requires there to be multiple true logical systems that are equally worthy of being chosen. What I have argued is that the worthy systems are limited to those that abide by a meta-logic which contains analogues of UI and MP, otherwise the system is inadequate. This is because whatever rules you have at the level of logical systems, for any logical system, one will require UI and MP at the meta-level to govern those rules. A metalogic without UI and MP will itself be inadequate to play the role that meta-logics are required to play for logical systems. As such, adequate logical systems are limited to those with adequate meta-logics, where the meta-logics must include UI and MP. Thus logical pluralism is limited, as I provide an extra constraint on the logical systems that are worthy of being chosen via constraining the meta-logic. The appeal to logical systems to motivate pluralism is, Kripke says, 'misleading': What has given people the very misleading impression that there can be alternative logics in the same way there are alternative geometries is the existence of alternative formal systems. You see, one might think, 'Look, logic's got to be different from geometry, because we need to use logic to draw conclusions from any hypothesis whatsoever.' Well, now, this is supposed to have been answered with the notion of a formal system. Formal systems can be followed blindly; a machine can check the proof; you don't have to do anything at all; etcetera, etcetera... Nothing is more erroneous. Of course, a machine can be 46 Padró (2015), p. 43: "he mentions this in passing and doesn't want to get into the issue.". 1 3 Synthese programmed to check the proof. ... But anyway, we are not machines in the sense of not using reasoning to understand what we are told, what formal system this is. We are given a set of directions, that is, any statement of the following form is an axiom: if these premises are accepted any conclusion of this form must be accepted. These directions themselves use logical particles, as Quine has rightly pointed out. Because of this use of logical particles, understanding what follows in a certain formal system itself presupposes a certain understanding of logic in advance, and cannot be done blindly.47 What this suggests, as I have argued and demonstrated, is that appealing to the alternative logical systems that logical pluralism permits does not escape a certain monism at the meta-level of logic. UI and MP are presupposed in understanding what those formal systems entail and how the rules from those systems can be understood. Without UI and MP, we cannot derive anything from our plurality of logical systems, or even comprehend the rules of inference at play in those systems. We cannot use the existence of multiple alternative logical systems and their practical usage in various domains to prove the truth of logical pluralism, since beneath those systems there is a fundamental meta-logic that is required to make sense of them. This is further supported by the following quote from Kripke: There is no bedrock in the notion of a formal system which we can choose somehow to adopt or reject at will and then tailor one's logic to it. One has to first use reasoning in order to even see what is provable in a formal system. Formal systems don't say anything as they are; they are just formal objects... If one then gives them an interpretation, one can check, using the reasoning that we always did (and what other reasoning do we have? None, as I'm trying to say) whether under this interpretation they are (a) sound and (b) complete.48 It is this sort of argument that is often cited to motivate the dis-analogy between logic and geometry. Geometry (like formal logical systems) depends upon a certain logic in order to derive anything from it. But there is no place else to go when deriving things from logic itself, and it cannot be done independently of itself.49 Logic is needed to reason about anything, including formal logical systems and geometry.50 In logic we say that a meta-logic is required (whereas for geometry no meta-geometry is required), and what I have argued is that this meta-logic must include UI and MP given their importance in underwriting the nature of what logical rules of 47 Kripke [quote found in Padró (2015), p. 82]. 48 Kripke [Pittsburgh Lecture, quote found in Padró (2015), p. 14]. 49 This point is also motivated by Kripke: "Logic, even if one tried to throw intuition to the wind, cannot be like geometry, because one cannot adopt the logical laws as hypothesis and draw their consequences. You need logic in order to draw these consequences. There can be no neutral ground in which to discuss the drawing of consequences independently of logic itself. If there were it would be some special kind, called 'ur-logic,' and that would be what was really logic." Kripke [Pittsburgh Lecture, quote found in Padró (2015), p. 140]. 50 For further support of this claim, see Field (1996), p. 369, for example. Synthese 1 3 inference are, what they do, and how they work. Even those who defend the analogy between logic and geometry, like Priest, appreciate this idea: The articulation of a logical system requires the employment of a metalogic (normally an informal one, and not necessarily classical), whereas the articulation of a geometric system does not require the employment of a metageometry.51 I conclude that logical pluralism is limited due to the required employment of UI and MP in the meta-logic, which itself is due to the self-governing nature of UI and MP. I develop, rather than repeat, ideas from the AP and Kripke, by restricting the AP to UI and MP, diagnosing self-governance, formulating GS, defining basicness, and most importantly in this paper, explicitly relating to limiting logical pluralism. 5 Conclusion The morals that one can draw from this paper are: Logical novices cannot adopt basic logical rules. Why? Because they are not able to utilize such rules, in that they are not able to infer in accordance with them in virtue of accepting them. Why? Because such inference presupposes the very same rule they are accepting. Why? Because basic logical rules are self-governing as they are of the structure of the logical component that they themselves govern. What does this mean for logical pluralism? It shows logical pluralism is limited, given that these basic logical rules underwrite all the other rules, meaning they will be required at the meta-level for any adequate logical system. This leaves us with a kind of monism (or at least another restricted pluralism52) at the meta-level, given that we cannot escape the meta-logic that we use to reason about (and derive things from) logical systems. Furthermore, the content of that required meta-logic must include UI and MP, as the reason why UI and MP are unadoptable is the same reason why they are basic and presupposed at the meta-level-namely, self-governance. Acknowledgements Special thanks goes to Romina Padró, Michael Devitt, Mary Leng, Tom Stoneham, Conor McHugh, Jonathan Way, Francesco Berto, Sophie Keeling, and Ben Neeser for their very helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper, and to Saul Kripke for his support of my writing this paper. Also many thanks to the audiences of the Logic and Metaphysics workshop at the City University of New York Graduate Center, the Dublin Philosophy Research Network Philosophy of Language workshop at Trinity College Dublin, the Logic as Science conference at the University of Bergen, the Research Day at the University of Southampton, and the Mind and Reason group at the University of York, where I presented ideas that derive from this paper. This paper was completed during a project that has received 51 Priest (2003), p. 443. 52 I thank a reviewer for pointing out that my arguments for a 'kind of monism' at the meta-level may also be understood as arguments for a form of 'global pluralism' at the meta-level, as described in Haack (1978), whereby there are multiple logical systems that are compatible in the sense that they all conform to a general structure of inference. This point can be made due to noticing that GS is valid on multiple logical systems. However, my arguments aim to show that those logical systems are only adequate when their meta-level includes MP and UI, not just when GS is valid. As such, I stand by my 'kind of monism'. 1 3 Synthese funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under grant agreement number 679586. Compliance with ethical standards Conflict of interest I declare that there is no conflict of interest. Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creat iveco mmons .org/licen ses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. References Beall, J., & Restall, G. (2000). Logical pluralism. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 78, 475–493. Black, M. (1970). The justification of logical axioms. In M. Black (Ed.), Margins of precision. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Boghossian, P. (2000). Knowledge of logic. In P. Boghossian & C. Peacocke (Eds.), New essays on the a priori (pp. 229–254). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Boghossian, P. (2008). Epistemic rules. Journal of Philosophy, 105(9), 472–500. Boghossian, P. (2014). What Is inference? Philosophical Studies, 169, 1–18. Boghossian, P., & Williamson, T. (2003). Blind reasoning. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary, 77(1), 225–248. Carnap, R. (1937). The logical syntax of language. London: Kegan Paul. Carroll, L. (1895). What the tortoise said to achilles. Mind, 4(14), 278–280. Devitt, M. (manuscript). The adoption problem in logic: A Quinean picture. Dummett, M. (1975). The justification of deduction. Proceedings of the British Academy, 59, 201–232. Dummett, M. (1991). The logical basis of metaphysics. London: Duckworth. Field, H. (1996). The a prioricity of logic. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 96, 359–379. Haack, S. (1978). Philosophy of logics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Harman, G. (1986). Change in view. Cambridge: The MIT Press. Kripke, S. (1974a). Princeton lectures on the nature of logic. Transcription of tapes. Kripke, S. (1974b). The question of logic. Transcription of a lecture given at the University of Pittsburg. Kripke, S. (1982). Wittgenstein on rules and private language. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Miller, A., & Wright, C. (Eds.). (2002). Rule following and meaning. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press. Padró, R. (2015). What the tortoise said to Kripke: The adoption problem and the epistemology of logic. CUNY Academic Works. PhD Thesis available online. http://acade micwo rks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/603. Accessed Feb 2016. Priest, G. (2003). On alternative geometries, arithmetics, and logics: A tribute to Lukasiewicz. Studia Logica, 74(3), 441–468. Priest, G. (2006). Doubt truth to be a liar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Williamson, T. (2017). Dummett on the relation between logics and metalogics. In M. Frauchiger (Ed.), Truth, meaning, justification, and reality: Themes from Dummett (pp. 153–176). Berlin: De Gruyter. Wright, C. (2007). Rule following without reasons: Wittgenstein's quietism and the constitutive question. Ratio, 20(4), 481–502. Wright, C. (2014). Comment on Paul Boghossian: What is inference. Philosophical Studies, 169, 27–37.

Handbuch Philosophie der Kindheit Reproduktionstechnologien und Bionormative Familienkonzeptionen Ezio Di Nucci, 13.08.2018 Die neuen Reproduktionstechnologien in der heutigen Zeit sind dabei Familien zu verändern – sowohl in der Theorie als auch in der Praxis (Alghrani 2016, Balayla 2016, Cavaliere et al 2018, Cutas 2011). Das wirft wichtige und interessante philosophische Fragen auf, wie zum Beispiel: 1. Was ist die Natur von Familienbeziehungen? (Di Nucci forthcoming, Di Nucci 2018, Haslanger 2009, Murray 1996, Velleman 2005); 2. Worin besteht die Rolle der biologischen Verbindungen zwischen Mitgliedern innerhalb einer Familie? (Di Nucci 2016, Di Nucci 2016b, Di Nucci 2016c, Roache 2016). Das sind Beispiele allgemeiner philosophischen Fragen; Es gibt aber auch konkretere ethische Fragen, die beantwortet werden müssen; zum Beispiel, welche Reproduktionstechnologien erlaubt und welche verboten werden sollten; hieraus ergeben sich dann eine Menge spezifischer Fragen über unterschiedliche Technologien. Der Einführungscharakter dieses Beitrages erlaubt es uns nicht, allen relevanten Fragen nachzugehen. Unser Fokus liegt daher auf der Beantwortung der folgenden Frage: 2 Was können wir von den neuen Reproduktionstechnologien über die Natur der Familienbeziehungen lernen und inwieweit sind die entsprechenden Erkenntnisse moralisch relevant? Wir fangen mit ein paar Begrifflichkeiten an: um neutral zu bleiben werden wir als „Reproduktionstechnologien" alle mögliche Methoden verstehen, die Elternschaft ermöglichen. Das hat folgende Konsequenzen: Sex und Adoption werden, hinsichtlich folgender Bedingungen, auch als Reproduktionstechnologien zählen müssen. Auf wie viele verschiedene Arten kann man dann, heutzutage, Mutter oder Vater werden? 1) Sex entweder mit dem anderen zukünftigen Elternteil immer noch die häufigste Methode – oder mit jemanden, der oder die nicht erziehungsberechtigt sein wird; 2) Leihmutterschaft; zum Beispiel, wenn eine Frau ihren Uterus spendet oder gegen Bezahlung verleiht, damit ein gleichgeschlechtliches Paar ein Kind bekommen kann; 3) Samenspende; zum Beispiel, wenn ein Mann sein genetisches Erbgut spendet oder gegen Bezahlung verkauft, damit eine Frau oder eine unfruchtbares Paar ein Kind bekommen kann; 4) Eizellspende; ähnlich wie (3), zum Beispiel, wenn eine Frau ihr genetisches Erbgut spendet oder gegen Bezahlung verkauft, damit ein unfruchtbares Paar ein Kind bekommen kann; 5) Künstliche Befruchtung; kann zusammen mit (2), (3), oder (4) stattfinden; es ist auch möglich, dass eine Frau mit dem genetischen Gut ihres Partners befruchtet wird; 3 6) Adoption; hier ist – wichtig für unsere Diskussion das Kind nicht mit den Eltern biologisch verwandt; 7) Es gibt eine Reihe experimenteller Möglichkeiten, die wir hier vernachlässigen müssen, wie zum Beispiel sogenannte mitochondrial replacements (Mitochondrien-Austauschtherapie) oder Uterustransplantationen (Lotz 2016, Wilkinson et al 2016). Zwei weitere Bemerkungen sind hier notwendig: (i) Erstens ist es so, dass sich diese verschiedenen Methoden nicht notwendigerweise wechselseitig ausschliessen, so dass zum Beispiel Samenspende und Künstliche Befruchtung oft zusammen verwendet werden; Das Gleiche gilt auch für Leihmutterschaft zusammen mit (3) und (4): das kann, muss aber nicht der Fall sein; diese Unterschiede könnten auch moralisch relevant werden. (ii) Es könnte gegen die oben gemachten Differenzierungen eingewendet werden, dass Sex keine Technologie ist. Dieser Einwand ist plausibel aber nicht selbverständlich: erstens, müssten wir dann uns auf eine Definition von Technologie festlegen, die Sex als nichttechnologische Methode verstehen würde, was wir jedoch im Folgenden aus Platzgründen unterlassen. Auch wenn wir für eine solche Definition argumentieren könnten, hätten wir das Problem, dass man sehr vorsichtig sein muss, zwischen natürlichen und nicht natürlichen Methoden zu unterscheiden, da man sonst auf normativer Ebene recht schnell nicht mehr neutral wäre. 4 Was bedeuten alle diese verschiedenen Möglichkeiten und Methoden für Familien? Hier müssen wir zwischen der empirischen Analyse von Änderungen in der Praxis des Familienlebens und den philosophischen Fragen, die solche neuen Möglichkeiten aufwerfen, unterscheiden. Nur zweiteres ist Gegenstand dieses Beitrages. Die Frage ist also nicht, was diese verschiedenen Methoden für Familien bedeuten; die Frage ist viel mehr – hier – was das alles für unseren Familienbegriff bedeutet. Was können wir also über bestehende und sich verändernde Familienkonzeptionen lernen, wenn wir Reproduktionstechnologien untersuchen? In der wissenschaftlichen Debatte über diese Fragen spielt ein Aspekt sicherlich eine zentrale Rolle: die Bedeutung der biologischen Verwandtschaft. Hier sollte man zwischen einer stärkeren und schwächeren These unterscheiden: (A) Ist biologische Verwandtschaft notwendig? Müssen also die Mitglieder ein und derselben Familie auch biologisch mit einander verbunden sein? (B) Ist biologische Verwandtschaft der nicht-biologischen Verwandtschaft vorzuziehen? Ein Beispiel dieses zweiten Falles ist die letztlich empirisch zu beantwortende Frage, ob es für Kinder besser ist, mit ihren biologischen Eltern aufzuwachsen. Da (B) eine empirische und nicht eiär primör philosophische Fragestellung zu Grunde liegt, ist dessen Beantwortung nicht etwas, das wir hier leisten können. Gleichzeitig könnte man denken, dass die Beantwortung von (A) sehr einfach ist: Nein, biologische Verwandtschaft ist klarerweise nicht notwendig, da es genügend Beispiele glücklicher und erfolgreicher nicht biologischer Familien gibt. 5 Das ist aber zu kurz gegriffen. Erstens weil die Tatsache, dass es viele glückliche nicht biologische Familien gibt, eher ein Argument für eine negative Antwort zu (B) wäre, aber nicht (A), weil (A) eine begriffliche Frage ist – so das man einfach antworten könnte, dass eine nicht-biologische Familie glücklich und erfolgreich sein mag, es aber trotzdem keine richtige Familie wäre, da eben die biologische Verwandtschaft fehlen würde. Kurz gesagt: Begriffliche Auseinandersetzungen lassen sich nicht allein durch Rekurs auf die relevante Empirie beilegen. Eine positive Antwort auf Frage (A) liefe auf eine sog. "Bionormative Familienkonzeption" hinaus. Da die wissenschaftliche Auseinandersetzung hier etwas komplexer wird, werden wir damit anfangen, in dem wir vier verschiedene Möglichkeiten festlegen. Das hat auch damit zu tun, dass in der Debatte zwei unterschiedliche Arten biologische Verwandtschaft identifiziert worden sind: Genetische Verwandtschaft; und gestationale Verwandtschaft (wer die Schwangerschaft austrägt). In den meisten Fällen ist die genetische Mutter auch die, die die Schwangerschaft austrägt; aber das ist nicht immer der Fall; und dann darf man auch die Väter nicht vergessen: Sie sind oft die genetischen, jedoch nie gestationale Eltern. Deswegen ist diese weitere Unterscheidung hier notwendig. Also gibt es vier Möglichkeiten, um (A) auszupacken: A1) genetische Verwandtschaft ist notwendig; A2) genetische Verwandtschaft ist hinreichend; A3) gestationale Verwandtschaft ist notwendig; A4) gestationale Verwandtschaft ist hinreichend; 6 Wir werden jetzt die Plausibilität dieser vier Möglichkeiten prüfen. Davor ist aber noch ein weiterer Schritt notwendig: Es ist wichtig zu verstehen, in wie vielen verschiedenen Rollen Menschen Reproduktionstechnologien erleben können; damit wir danach besser beurteilen können, ob und inwiefern Elternschaft oder Verwandtschaft zugeschrieben werden kann. i) Es gibt den Fall des heterosexuellen Paares, das miteinander Sex hat; hier würden wir dann normalerweise von Mutter und Vater sprechen; wobei es nicht selten der Fall ist, dass Männer schon nach der Befruchtung verschwinden – und dann stellt sich die Frage, in wieweit man von `Vätern in solchen Fällen sprechen kann – möglicherweise gar nicht. Wichtig ist hier auch anzumerken, dass, auch wenn die Männer nicht verschwinden, Ihnen kaum gestationale Verwandtschaft zugeschrieben werden kann– auf jeden Fall nicht in engerem biologischen oder körperlichen Sinn (Di Nucci 2014); ii) Es gibt das unfruchtbare heterosexuelle Paar, welches männliches oder weibliches genetisches Erbgut kauft oder sich spenden lässt, um durch künstliche Befruchtung ein Kind zu bekommen; iii) Es gibt die alleinstehende Frau – homosexuell oder heterosexuell – welche männliches genetisches Erbgut kauft oder sich spenden lässt, um durch künstliche Befruchtung schwanger zu werden; iv) Es gibt den alleinstehenden Mann – homosexuell oder heterosexuell – der eine Leihmutter befruchtet oder künstlich befruchten lässt, um Vater zu werden; 7 v) Es gibt das männliche oder weibliche gleichgeschlechtliche Paar, welches durch verschiedene Kombinationen der schon erwähnten Methoden versucht, Eltern zu werden; in der Tat können hier alle Methoden von (1) bis zu (7) in unterschiedlichen Konstellationen zur Anwendung kommen; hier ist es zum Beispiel häufig der Fall, dass nur einer der beiden gleichgeschlechtlichen Partner genetisch mit dem Kind verbunden sein wird, wenn überhaupt. Eine Ausnahme ist das sogenannte ROPA, wo eine lesbische Frau mit dem genetischen Gut ihrer Partnerin befruchtet wird, so dass man möglicherweise sagen kann, dass beide Frauen mit dem Kind biologisch verwandt sind, die eine durch Genetik und die andere durch die Schwangerschaft (Macedo 2015, Machin 2014, Marina et al 2010, Pelka 2009, Pennings 2016, Yeshua et al 2015, Zeiler 2014); Jetzt ist hoffentlich klar, warum wir die vier Möglichkeiten A1 bis A4 eingeführt haben: die verschiedenen Reproduktionstechnologien resultieren in sehr vielen unterschiedlichen möglichen Verwandtschaften, bei denen sich die Frage stellt, ob und was für Elternschaft notwendig und hinreichend ist. Was sollen wir zum Beispiel über Männer sagen, die schon nach der Befruchtung verschwinden? Sind es überhaupt Väter? Sind es zwar genetische Väter aber keine richtigen Väter? Auf der einen Seite würde man Ihnen gerne die Vaterschaft aberkennen – weil sie sowohl Frau als auch Kind im Stich gelassen haben – aber sollte man sie nicht auch durch Anerkennung der (genetischen) Vaterschaft zur Verantwortung ziehen – zum Beispiel den Unterhalt betreffend? Die schwierigere Frage hätten wir trotzdem nicht beantwortet: wenn das keine richtigen Väter sind, was sind die notwendigen Bedingungen für Elternschaft, die diese Männer nicht erfüllt haben? 8 Wenn wir uns A1 bis A4 anschauen, wird schnell offensichtlich, dass Männer als solche A3 und A4 einfach als Männer nicht erfüllen können; genetische Verwandtschaft ist andererseits erfüllt; wenn wir aber sagen, dass solche Männer keine richtigen Väter sind, bedeutet das wohl, das A2 falsch ist, sonst wären solche Männer doch richtige `Väter . Nehmen wir aber die optimistischere Version von Fall (i) – in der Männer nach der Befruchtung nicht verschwinden – und es wird schnell klar, dass auch A3 falsch sein muss; auch diese Männer können nicht – als Männer – A3 erfüllen. Das darf jedoch kein Grund sein, Ihnen ihre Vaterschaft abzuerkennen. Hier ist es nun vielleicht interessant anzumerken, dass A3 der ursprüngliche Grund sein könnte, warum Müttern seit jeher eine besondere Beziehung zu ihren Kindern zugesprochen worden ist – welcher gleichzeitig sicherlich auch vom Patriarchat instrumentalisiert wurde, um Frauen zu unterdrücken (Di Nucci 2016, Di Nucci 2016b, Di Nucci 2016c, Sherwin 1987). Wir machen endlich Vorschritte: gerade haben wir gezeigt, dass beide, A2 und A3, falsch sind. Ein weiteres Argument gegen A2 könnte übrigens das Spenden oder Verkaufen biologischen Gutes sein: die Spender oder Verkäufer können kaum als Eltern betrachtet werden. Was ist aber mit A1 und A4? A1 ist auch schnell erledigt: man möge einfach nur an Adoptiveltern denken – oder an ein homosexuelles Paar, welches fremdes genetisches Erbgut verwendet; wenn wir an A1 festhalten würden, wären solche Menschen keine richtige Eltern – und das ist wohl unplausibel. Die einzige bionormative Familienkonzeption, die übrig bleibt, ist A4; und das ist auch der schwierigere Fall. Wie können wir einer Frau die Mutterschaft aberkennen, die eine Schwangerschaft ausgetragen hat? Jetzt ist vielleicht eine gute Gelegenheit um zu erklären, dass eine Kritik an bionormativen Familienkonzeptionen nicht bedeutet, dass die meisten Eltern – die durchaus biologische Eltern sind 9 – keine richtigen Eltern sind. Der Punkt ist viel mehr, dass eine solche Kritik in Frage stellt, warum die meisten Eltern richtige Eltern sind; nämlich nicht, weil sie biologische Eltern sind. Es ist wichtig diesen Punkt hier nicht zu vergessen, um nicht den Eindruck zu erwecken, es ginge hier nur um Minderheiten und Ausnahmefälle: Tatsächlich geht es hier aber um alle Eltern und um Elternschaft als Ganzes. Zurück zu A4: der relevante Fall ist hier wohl Leihmutterschaft. Wenn A4 wahr ist, sind Leihmütter richtige Mütter; wenn A4 falsch ist, dann sind Leihmütter nicht allein durch ihre Leihmutterschaft richtige Mütter. Diese Frage ist nicht so schnell zu beantworten: es hängt zum Beispiel mit den moralischen oder ethischen Bedingungen für Leihmutterschaftsverträge zusammen. Soll es zum Beispiel für die Leihmutter immer möglich sein, das Kind doch zu behalten? Wenn wir bereit wären, eine solche Bedingung zu akzeptieren, würden wir möglicherweise von einer bionormativen Familienkonzeption ähnlich wie A4 motiviert sein. Aber wäre ein solches Vetorecht gegenüber den Paaren fair oder gerecht, welche Leihmutterschaft benutzen und – oft – benötigen? Und wie sähen dann die Gründe aus, die Leihmütter berechtigt, einen solchen Anspruch geltend zu machen? Anders gesagt, was spricht überhaupt für A4? Die körperliche Unversehrtheit der Frau wäre ein möglicher Grund: während der Schwangerschaft ist das Kind ein Teil des Körpers der Frau, die das Kind austrägt: daher kann es nicht legitim sein, dass andere Menschen Ansprüche oder Rechte auf den Körper einer anderen Person zugeschrieben werden, mit oder ohne Vertrag. Das hat aber mit Elternschaft wenig zu tun und würde als Konsequenz haben, dass eine Leihmutter diesen besonderen Anspruch nur bis zur Geburt und nicht mehr danach haben würde: aber wenn A4 stimmt und die Leihmutter die richtige Mutter ist, dann gäbe es keinen Grund, den Anspruch nur bis zur Geburt anzuerkennen. 10 Das sind sehr schwierige Fragen: glücklicherweise müssen wir hier nur die Fragen stellen und die möglichen Antworten und Alternativen skizzieren; es ist nicht unsere Aufgabe, uns auf eine Antwort festzulegen. Wichtig war die Implikationen von A4 zu verstehen und die Relevanz von Leihmutterschaft für bionormative Familienkonzeptionen zu erklären. Zusammenfassend können wir sagen, dass wir vier verschiedene bionormative Familienkonzeptionen dargestellt und analysiert haben: wir haben gesehen, dass drei davon wenig plausibel sind; aber auch, dass die Idee, die so genannte gestationale Verwandtschaft könnte hinreichend sein, nicht so schnell von der Hand zu weisen ist. Eine Frage bleibt: wenn bionormative Familienkonzeptionen wenig plausibel sind, welche – bessere – Alternativen haben wir? Ausführlicher gesagt: welche nicht-bionormativen notwendigen und hinreichenden Bedingungen für Elternschaft sind plausibler als die verschiedenen bionormativen Varianten, die wir hier analysiert haben? Eine Möglichkeit ist die sogenannte ultra-liberale oder voluntaristische Familienkonzeption: wir brauchen keine genau notwendige und hinreichende Bedingungen, weil nach diese Auffassung Eltern zu sein eine rein freie Entscheidung sein soll. Das scheint jedoch wenig plausible zu sein; weil Elternschaft nicht nur eine Frage von Rechten, sondern auch von Pflichten ist; und auch weil ultra-liberale Familienkonzeptionen das Problem haben, dass man sich nicht bei einem Elternwunsch freizügig das Kind aussuchen darf – auch Adoption ist streng reglementiert. Also haben wir auf der einen Seite wenig plausible bionormative Konzeptionen und auf der anderen Seite möglicherweise noch weniger plausible ultra-liberale oder voluntaristische Konzeptionen: gibt es etwas Überzeugenderes dazwischen? Hier müssen wir zwischen der Elternschaft und den Pflichten von Erzeugern unterscheiden: als Erzeuger verursachen wir etwas – ein Leben – und wir sind dafür – normalerweise – auch 11 verantwortlich. Diese Verantwortung muss aber nicht als Elternschaft verstanden werden: das ist das Problem sowohl der bionormativen als auch ultra-liberalen Familienkonzeptionen. Wenn wir aber die Unterscheidung zwischen unserer Verantwortung als Erzeuger menschlichen Lebens und Elternschaft richtig verstehen, lässt das Spielraum zwischen diesen zwei extremen Positionen. Um Erzeuger verantwortlich zu machen müssen wir Ihnen nicht notwendigerweise die Elternschaft zuerkennen. Somit müsste ein Mann, der sofort nach der Befruchtung verschwindet, Unterhalt zahlen, ohne dass ihn das Geld automatisch zum Vater macht. Wenn wir ein System haben, welches Erzeuger in die Verantwortung nimmt, dann erscheint eine voluntaristische Familienkonzeption auch plausibler: Das, was uns zu Eltern macht, ist dann also nicht die Genetik und auch nicht die Biologie, sondern unser gelebter Einsatz (Engagement, Selbstverpflichtung, Bekenntnis, commitment) für die Kinder. 12 Bibliographie Alghrani A. 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Journal of Medical Ethics blog 2018 https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-ethics/2018/06/11/guest-post-biological-children-an-innocent-wish/ Di Nucci E. I love my children: am I racist? On the wish to be biologically related to one's children. Journal of Medical Ethics (forthcoming). Haslanger S. Family, Ancestry and Self: What is the Moral Significance of Biological Ties? Adoption & Culture 2009;2.1. Lotz M. Commentary on Nicola Williams and Stephen Wilkinson: 'Should Uterus Transplants Be Publicly Funded?' J Med Ethics 2016;42:570-71. Macedo S. Just Married. Princeton University Press 2015. 13 Machin R. Sharing motherhood in lesbian reproductive practices. Biosocieties2014;9:42–59. Marina S, Marina D, Marina F, et al. Sharing motherhood: biological lesbian co-mothers, a new IVF indication. Hum Reprod 2010;25:938–41. Murray TH. The Worth of a Child. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. Pelka S. Sharing motherhood: maternal jealousy among lesbian co-mothers. J Homosex 2009;56:195–217. Pennings G. Having a child together in lesbian families: combining gestation and genetics J Med Ethics 2016 doi:10.1136/medethics-2015-103007 Roache R. The value of being biologically related to one's family. J Med Ethics 2016;42:755-756. Sherwin S. Feminist Ethics and In Vitro Fertilization. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Supplementary Volume 1987;13:276–284. Velleman JD. Family History. Philosophical Papers 2005;34:357-378. Wilkinson S, Williams NJ. Should uterus transplants be publicly funded? J Med Ethics 2016;42:559-565. Yeshua A, Lee JA, Witkin G, et al. Female couples undergoing IVF with partner eggs (co-IVF): pathways to parenthood. LGBT Health 2015;2:135–9. Zeiler K, Malmquist A. Lesbian shared biological motherhood: the ethics of IVF with reception of oocytes from partner. Med Health Care Philos 2014;17:347–55.

Global Research Report – South and East Asia Jonathan Adams, David Pendlebury, Gordon Rogers & Dr Martin Szomszor Institute for Scientific Information Web of Science Group ISBN 978-1-9160868-5-2 2019 Global Research Report – South and East Asia Professor Jonathan Adams, David Pendlebury, Gordon Rogers & Dr Martin Szomszor 2 Author biographies Jonathan Adams is Director of the Institute for Scientific Information, a part of the Web of Science Group. He is also a Visiting Professor at King's College London, Policy Institute, and was awarded an Honorary D.Sc. in 2017 by the University of Exeter, for his work in higher education and research policy. Gordon Rogers is a Senior Data Scientist at the Institute for Scientific Information He has worked in the fields of bibliometrics and data analysis for the past 10 years, supporting clients around the world in evaluating their research portfolio and strategy. Martin Szomszor is Head of Research Analytics at the Institute for Scientific Information. He joined from Digital Science where, as Chief Data Scientist he applied his extensive knowledge of machine learning, data integration and visualization techniques to found the Global Research Identifier Database. He was named a 2015 top50 UK Information Age data leader for his work in creating the REF2014 impact case studies database for the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). David Pendlebury is Head of Research Analysis at the Institute for Scientific Information, a part of Clarivate Analytics. Since 1983 he has used Web of Science data to study the structure and dynamics of research. He worked for many years with ISI founder Eugene Garfield. With Henry Small, David developed ISI's Essential Science Indicators. Foundational past, visionary future The Institute for Scientific Information ISI builds on the work of Dr. Eugene Garfield – the original founder and a pioneer of information science. Named after the company he founded – the forerunner of the Web of Science Group – ISI was re-established in 2018 and serves as a home for analytic expertise, guided by his legacy and adapted to respond to technological advancements. Our global team of industryrecognized experts focus on the development of existing and new bibliometric and analytical approaches, whilst fostering collaborations with partners and academic colleagues across the global research community. ISBN 978-1-9160868-5-2 Cover image: Jantar Mantar, Jaipur, India Today, as the 'university' of the Web of Science Group, ISI both: • Maintains the foundational knowledge and editorial rigor upon which the Web of Science index and its related products and services are built. Our robust evaluation and curation have been informed by research use and objective analysis for almost half a century. Selective, structured and complete data in the Web of Science provide rich insights into the contribution and value of the world's most impactful scientific and research journals. These expert insights enable researchers, publishers, editors, librarians and funders to explore the key drivers of a journal's value for diverse audiences, making better use of the wide body of data and metrics available. • Carries out research to sustain, extend and improve the knowledge base and disseminates that knowledge to our colleagues, partners and all those who deal with research in academia, corporations, funders, publishers and governments via our reports and publications and at events and conferences. 3 Global Research Report – S&E Asia In the development of our series of Global Research Reports, it has been our intention for some time to describe the state of the research base in Asia beyond the growing and well researched Asia-Pacific group that covers China, Japan and South Korea. This Global Research Report surveys an area described as South and East Asia (S&E Asia), which includes the ASEAN group of nations and extends to a wider network. The 14 countries examined here, from West to East, are: Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh plus the ASEAN states of Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, and the Philippines. The ASEAN regional forum includes 27 member states, including the EU and the USA, which are partners with but not embedded in the region. We recognize that definitions of regions differ and change and apologize to those who find ours unduly restrictive or too broad. S&E Asia countries differ markedly in geographical size, in population and in their economies. They nonetheless form an evident global region. They have historical relationships with former colonial powers in the European Union (EU) and contemporary alliances with states further North and South in the Pacific. They have deep roots in learning, culture and technology over millennia – Singapore has been recognized for 200 years as a crossroads in commerce and in ideas between the Indian and Pacific oceans. For some of the S&E Asia region, it is evident that many recent research achievements have been dependent on international links. Now, these countries are in an increasingly strong position to benefit from their own potential to grow through their national investments, through the emergence of a regional network and through their collaboration with partners in neighbouring regions. This report looks at all these characteristics. These countries are in an increasingly strong position to benefit from their own potential to grow Map 1. The South and East Asia countries under examination. 4 There have been few in-depth bibliometric studies of national activity and performance in S&E Asia. Papers published over the past decade have focused on the ASEAN members as a group or individual ASEAN member nations in specific research areas. Individual scientists from countries in S&E Asia have made significant contributions to research – but often while working in other countries. Historical levels of research investment have generally been lower than in Europe and the relative size of the researcher workforce has been small. In fact, the economic potential of the region is massive and could underpin a research network with global impact. India has been spoken of as a 'sleeping giant' of research and the opportunities that might be realized in Indonesia are also huge, as it too turns towards building greater capacity and improving quality in higher education and research. Already at hand, Singapore (with two of the world's 50 leading research universities) and Malaysia have well established research economies and Pakistan, Thailand and Vietnam already have rapidly growing research profiles. (Table 1) It is important to note data for Category-Normalised Citation Impact (CNCI) in Table 1. This is an index that reflects a publication's academic impact using the number of times it is subsequently cited by later work. Because citation counts rise over time at a rate that is discipline-dependent, these counts are 'normalised' for the appropriate subject category and year of publication, and then an average is taken. The world average, as a reference benchmark, is always 1.0. Two figures are quoted in Table 1: CNCI-gross and CNCIdomestic. CNCI-gross refers to all the publications with at least one national address while CNCI-domestic is the data pool from which all publications with international co-authorship have been removed. This enables a comparison for the research impact of a country in its partnerships and standing alone. All countries, including the G7, have higher collaborative than domestic impact. For the S&E Asia nations, with the exception of Singapore, the impact gained through international collaboration is very substantial and it is this activity that lifts their average citation impact above world average. Moed (Moed and Halevi, 2015; Moed, 2016) has drawn attention to the need to interpret national scientometric indicators in the context of their evolving research development. This region contains very different stages of research development. For Singapore, international collaboration is just a part of national strategy: the outcome of researchers elsewhere collaborating with scientists in world leading institutions. For the smaller ASEAN nations, international collaboration forms the bulk of their high-performance research activity as their domestic research base builds up. Table 1. Descriptive statistics by country, ranked by annual publication output. CNCI is an index of research publication impact (where world average = 1.0, see text) and is expressed as gross (for the country as a whole) and domestic (for publications with only national authors) Source World Bank 2017 UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2017 Web of Science average for 2014-18 Population Thousands GDP current $US million GERD as % GDP Researchers per million population Publication output CNCI gross CNCI domestic Laos 7,169 18,131 0.04 16 1 179 1.23 0.44 Myanmar 54,045 71,215 0.16 15 203 2.13 0.61 Brunei 433 13,567 0.04 283 1 207 1.30 0.67 Cambodia 16,486 24,572 0.12 30 300 1.34 0.45 Sri Lanka 21,323 88,901 0.11 107 931 1.86 0.44 Philippines 108,117 330,910 0.14 188 1 1,438 1.46 0.39 Bangladesh 163,046 274,025 n/a n/a 2,092 1.27 0.55 Indonesia 270,626 1,042,173 0.08 89 1 2,462 1.19 0.52 Vietnam 96,462 244,948 0.44 672 3,766 1.20 0.67 Thailand 69,626 504,993 0.78 1,210 8,261 0.95 0.56 Pakistan 216,565 312,570 0.25 294 10,112 1.03 0.56 Malaysia 31,950 354,348 1.30 2,274 11,924 1.06 0.76 Singapore 5,804 364,157 2.16 6,730 13,916 1.64 1.28 India 1,366,420 2,726,323 0.62 216 66,400 0.86 0.68 GDP = gross domestic product, GERD = gross expenditure on research and development CNCI = average category normalised citation impact 1 = Researcher data for these countries is from sources more than five years old 5 Research capacity Research activity in South and East Asia has grown rapidly since 2000. From an annual regional total of about 12,000 papers (articles and reviews), output has risen ten-fold and now accounts for more than 8% of global publications every year. 120,000 90,000 60,000 30,000 8.0% 6.0% 4.0% 2.0% 19 81 19 83 19 85 19 87 19 89 19 91 19 93 19 95 19 97 19 99 20 01 20 03 20 05 20 07 20 09 20 11 20 13 20 15 20 17 20 19 Regional share of world output (%) Annual count of papers for region Figure 1. Regional growth of research in S&E Asia in numbers of publications (articles and reviews) and share of world output. Vietnam has increased its indexed publication volume more than five-fold since 2009 This regional growth is reflected at national level and it is pervasive. The region might best be considered as three groups plus India. The major research producers are India (around 75,000 papers per year) plus Singapore, Pakistan, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam (more than 5,000 papers per year). These countries have roughly doubled in research output over the last decade. By far the fastest rate of growth in this group is that of Vietnam which has increased its indexed publication volume more than five-fold since 2009 and shows every sign of continuing expansion. Research growth for Thailand, which has the second largest economy in this group, has slowed compared to the others. (Figure 2) 6 The medium-sized research economies are Indonesia, Bangladesh, the Philippines and Sri Lanka, with 1,000-5,000 papers per year. The four nations with fewer than 500 papers per year are Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Brunei. The indicators for the smaller research economies remain very dependent on their involvement in international collaborations, but they too are expanding and all of these countries have more than doubled its output since 2009, which is a welcome sign. Myanmar which had been producing very little earlier in the 2000s demonstrates the fastest rate of growth. Indonesia – which surely has the resource capacity to become a major research nation – has increased its output nearly four-fold in ten years. Its location, increasing economic power and vast human resources give it the potential to become a significant regional research and technology hub.It is not by chance that the ASEAN group headquarters was established in Jakarta. These data demonstrate the extent of research development across the region but the disparities between population, wealth and research intensity shown in Table 1 also reflect unrealised potential for further development in many areas. That development must drive the infra-structure for higher education and research that is expected to lead to sustained growth in national knowledge capacity, reduce dependency on international partnerships and underpin technology innovation and economic competitiveness. Data later in this report will demonstrate that such dependency remains a worrying factor in some instances. Further development will require some re-iteration of research already performed elsewhere, in order to build training, understanding and capability. This may appear redundant, but without this recapitulation it will not be feasible to realise latent capacity and build a useful technological infrastructure for wholly independent research in the future. India -annual count of papers 15,000 10,000 5,000 75,000 50,000 25,000 O th er c ou nt rie s a nn ua l c ou nt o f p ap er s 19 81 19 83 19 85 19 87 19 89 19 91 19 93 19 95 19 97 19 99 20 01 20 03 20 05 20 07 20 09 20 11 20 13 20 15 20 17 Vietnam Thailand Malaysia Pakistan Singapore India India -annual count of papers 15,000 10,000 5,000 75,000 50,000 25,000 O th er c ou nt rie s a nn ua l c ou nt o f p ap er s 19 81 19 83 19 85 19 87 19 89 19 91 19 93 19 95 19 97 19 99 20 01 20 03 20 05 20 07 20 09 20 11 20 13 20 15 20 17 Vietnam Thailand Malaysia Pakistan Singapore India 3,000 2,000 1,000A nn ua l c ou nt o f p ap er s 19 81 19 83 19 85 19 87 19 89 19 91 19 93 19 95 19 97 19 99 20 01 20 03 20 05 20 07 20 09 20 11 20 13 20 15 20 17 Laos Brunei Myanmar Philippines Bangladesh Indonesia Cambodia Sri Lanka 3,000 2,000 1,000A nn ua l c ou nt o f p ap er s 19 81 19 83 19 85 19 87 19 89 19 91 19 93 19 95 19 97 19 99 20 01 20 03 20 05 20 07 20 09 20 11 20 13 20 15 20 17 Laos Brunei Myanmar Philippines Bangladesh Indonesia Cambodia Sri Lanka Figure 2. Annual publication output (articles and reviews) for major research producers in S&E Asia. Figure 3. Annual publication output (articles and reviews) for medium-sized and smaller research producers in S&E Asia. 7 International collaboration To visualize the regional collaboration network, we present two complementary views of the data that illustrate the strongest ties between nations, both within S&E Asia countries, and beyond. Collaboration is measured as the percentage of co-authored research papers (articles and reviews) indexed in the Web of Science, 2009-18 and is shown in two forms: as a collaboration network (Figure 4), and as a collaboration heat-map (Figure 5). The network gives an overall sense of the topology, with key external collaborators (USA, China and the UK) in the centre, linking the smaller nations to the largest research producing countries (India, Singapore, Malaysia and Pakistan) in the outer ring. The heat-map supplies more granular information and highlights similarities and differences in the collaboration patterns. For example, by looking at rows (countries that collaborate with S&E Asia) it is possible to identify that the UK and Australia have similar profiles, and that China and Japan are collaborating with different groups. Two S&E Asia countries stand apart from the main group in terms of their collaboration profile: India • India (left column, Figure 5) produces far fewer papers with international collaborators as a percentage of its total research output when compared to others. Sri Lanka • Sri Lanka (right column, Figure 5) has a much higher percentage of collaboration with many partners. This is due to a large number of massively co-authored papers published in High Energy Physics through participation in the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) detector collaboration and international groups that utilise data from the ATLAS project at CERN's Large Hadron Collider. Given Sri Lanka's total research output is relatively small otherwise, these publications have a substantial impact on the overall collaboration profile. International research links have become rich and complex. The research base in some S&E Asia countries has a long history of association with former colonial economies. They established higher education systems in the region and remain prominent research partners today. Examples are the UK's links to Malaysia, the Netherlands' links to Indonesia, and France's links to Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. The growth of collaboration is driven partly by the opportunity to use information networks and travel more easily to international conferences, partly by the number of international programmes and major international projects – notably in health, the environment and natural resources, and physics – and partly by the nature of contemporary research challenges that need to draw on global intellectual resources. A consequence of international collaboration is that the average domestic CNCI is less, and in these cases often much less, than the apparent national average CNCI (Table 1). A particular problem arises where there are highly multinational papers, such as epidemiology studies in medicine and fundamental particle physics. Authorship can run across dozens of countries in these instances as well as including scientists and practitioners in S&E Asia. There is as yet only limited evidence to demonstrate the regional network. The UK and Germany are linked to many of the countries and are at the centre of the network while the USA has very strong ties to all the larger research economies, though somewhat less to India than might be expected. A key feature is the role of neighbouring regional partners of which China is most central and where Australia, Japan and South Korea are evidently playing an important role. This suggests that a broader network combining S&E Asia, Asia-Pacific and Australasia is emerging. This will be a powerful counter-balance to the transAtlantic axis which has dominated global research for centuries. A broader network combining S&E Asia, Asia-Pacific and Australasia is emerging. This will be a powerful counterbalance to the trans-Atlantic axis 8 Figure 4. Network diagram of most frequent research collaborations for countries and regions in S&E Asia. Collaboration is indexed by the number of co-authored research papers (articles and reviews) indexed in the Web of Science, 2009-18. Each node represents a country and node size is proportional to the number of publications. Edges joining these nodes link a country to its ten most frequent collaborators. Edge thickness is proportional to the percentage of publications co-authored by the two countries. No data are shown for four small research economies (Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Brunei). Colors are used to group countries by region, as described in the figure legend. IT AU NL IN IR SA MY PK TR ID CA SG FR BD GB TH PH CN LK KR DEVN JP RU TW US South and East Asia Bangladesh (BD), India (IN), Indonesia (ID), Malaysia (MY), Pakistan (PK), Philippines (PH), Sri Lanka (LK), Singapore (SG), Thailand (TH), Vietnam (VN) Continental Europe France (FR), Germany (DE), Italy (IT), Netherlands (NL), Russia (RU), Turkey (TR), United Kingdom (GB) Asia and Pacific Australia (AU), China Mainland (CN), Japan (JP), South Korea (KR), Taiwan (TW) North America Canada (CA), USA (US) Arab States Iran (IR), Saudi, Arabia (SA) 9 Figure 5. Heat-map of research collaboration for countries or regions in S&E Asia highlighting most frequent bilateral co-authorship for papers (articles and reviews) indexed in the Web of Science, 2009-18. The horizontal axis is ordered by publication output of the country in the region. The most frequent collaborators are listed on the vertical axis and ordered by volume of their total collaboration with countries in the region. Values in each cell display the percentage of papers for which there is co-authorship for the two relevant countries or regions. 1 1 2 2 2 2 4 93 3 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 73 0 0 0 1 1 1 0 2 72 4 0 0 5 1 0 1 1 82 1 1 3 2 2 2 4 4 52 2 0 2 1 2 9 2 4 31 4 0 2 2 2 4 0 7 81 4 0 0 3 1 1 3 1 90 0 1 0 4 1 1 3 1 59 1 0 1 2 0 5 2 6 91 4 1 3 2 4 5 1 5 83 9 0 3 5 3 3 5 7 133 3 0 1 0 3 11 9 6 104 2 2 3 2 3 5 6 7 105 11 2 3 2 4 8 4 7 104 7 1 3 5 10 20 14 14 81 11 1 7 6 5 14 9 11 162 9 1 23 5 6 5 5 11 1312 8 2 8 8 8 9 10 9 217 8 7 18 6 17 14 19 24 229 13USA United Kingdom China Mainland Australia Japan Germany South Korea Malaysia India France Thailand Saudi Arabia Pakistan Taiwan Netherlands Canada Iran Russia Turkey Italy Si ng ap or e M ala ys ia Pa kis tsa n Th ail an d Vi et na m In do ne sia Ba ng lad es h Ph ilip pi ne s Sr i L an ka In di a 10 Impact Profiles Research activity needs to be seen in the light of research quality. A widely-used indicator of research quality has been the CNCI index (Table 1). This is a quick reference guideline but, like all simple metrics, it necessarily absorbs and hides a great deal of information. To reveal that information we use Impact Profiles (see page 16, GRRI:Profiles, not metrics). Impact Profiles display the distribution of CNCI values of journal papers (here, for the ten-year window 2009-18). Papers are assigned to categories as either uncited, or cited less often than world average (down to half, less than half to one-quarter and so on), or cited more often (up to 2 times, 2-4 times and so on) than world average (Adams et al., 2007). In Figures 6 below, the uncited papers are shown as blocks and the cited papers as a smoothed curve from low to highly cited. Each country's data are shown in three curves plus a table. The three curves track: • The Impact Profile for all papers with at least one national address • The Impact Profile for the purely domestic papers with only national authors • The Impact Profile for those papers with one or more international co-authors. The table summarizes the numbers of papers used to calculate the curves and the total for the most recent full year. The average CNCI across the period and the CNCI for 2018 are also given for each set of papers. Figure 6. Impact Profiles for papers (articles and reviews) published during 2009-2018 by countries in S&E Asia. Papers in each analysis have at least one author address for the given country and are shown as national totals, papers with only national authors and papers with an international co-author. In reviewing an Impact Profile, attention should be paid to: the proportion of papers that remain uncited (even by their authors); the balance of papers cited less often than world average; the height and position of the peak of the curve; the balance of papers cited more often than world average; and the proportion of papers that are in the most highly-cited categories more than four and more than eight times world average. For detailed methodology see text. Impact Profiles display the distribution of CNCI values of journal papers 11 25% 20% 15% 10% 0 India Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI India Total India Domestic India International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 565,873 73,951 0.82 0.85 429,967 53,577 0.67 0.68 135,907 20,375 1.30 1.32 24 28 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Singapore Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Singapore Total Singapore Domestic Singapore International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 120,185 14,918 1.61 1.59 43,946 4,153 1.29 1.26 76,239 10,765 1.80 1.72 63 72 India Singapore 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Pakistan Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Pakistan Total Pakistan Domestic Pakistan International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 77,527 13,393 0.89 1.04 38,004 5,246 0.51 0.60 39,523 8,147 1.28 1.32 51 61 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Malaysia Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Malaysia Total Malaysia Domestic Malaysia International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 97,152 12,193 0.94 1.04 46,867 4,848 0.74 0.66 50,285 7,345 1.12 1.28 52 60 Pakistan Malaysia 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Thailand Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Thailand Total Thailand Domestic Thailand International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 70,937 9,448 0.93 0.94 34,162 4,356 0.62 0.53 36,775 5,092 1.23 1.29 52 54 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Vietnam Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Vietnam Total Vietnam Domestic Vietnam International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 26,742 5,457 1.09 1.09 5,859 1,155 0.62 0.68 20,883 4,302 1.22 1.19 78 79 Thailand Vietnam 12 45% 40% 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Philippines Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Philippines Total Philippines Domestic Philippines International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 11,964 1,622 1.31 1.40 3,432 413 0.38 0.44 8,532 1,209 1.69 1.73 71 75 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Cambodia Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Cambodia Total Cambodia Domestic Cambodia International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 2,351 350 1.38 0.93 106 12 0.56 0.00 2,245 338 1.42 0.97 95 97 45% 40% 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Indonesia Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Indonesia Total Indonesia Domestic Indonesia International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 18,625 3,350 1.11 0.87 3,411 791 0.52 0.45 15,214 2,559 1.23 1.00 82 76 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Sri Lanka Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Sri Lanka Total Sri Lanka Domestic Sri Lanka International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 7,178 1,132 1.49 1.20 2,216 306 0.43 0.42 4,962 826 1.96 1.49 69 73 Myanmar Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Myanmar Total Myanmar Domestic Myanmar International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 1,292 337 1.45 1.22 48 9 0.58 0.39 1,244 328 1.48 1.24 96 97 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Bangladesh Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Bangladesh Total Bangladesh Domestic Bangladesh International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 16,477 2,559 1.06 1.06 4,221 531 0.50 0.48 12,256 2,028 1.25 1.21 74 79 Philippines Cambodia Indonesia Sri Lanka Myanmar Bangladesh Brunei Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Brunei Total Brunei Domestic Brunei International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 1,376 218 1.04 1.60 294 37 0.55 1.00 1,082 181 1.19 1.72 79 83 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 40% 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0 Laos Uncited 0 <&< = 0.125 0.125 <& < = 0.25 0.25 <& < = 0.50 0.5 <& < = 1 1 <& < = 2 2 <& < = 4 4 <& < = 8 8 < World average CNCI Laos Total Laos Domestic Laos International International as a % Total papers 2018 papers Average CNCI 2018 CNCI 1,493 204 1.12 0.90 36 6 0.38 0.62 1,457 198 1.14 0.91 98 97 Brunei Laos 13 Research activity and performance data are skewed, exhibiting many low and only a few high values. The benefits of Impact Profiles are that they show the distribution underpinning the average values and explain the balance between uncited, less well cited and more highly cited outputs. With the exception of India, (where about one-quarter of papers have an international co-author,) every other country in S&E Asia has at least 50% international co-authorship. For Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos this is over 95%. By separating the domestic and international components, we can see how reliant each country is on its partnerships for its overall profile as well as its capacity. Singapore stands out. Singapore National University, Nanyang Technological University and the National Research Foundation's A* research agency are recognised as world-leading institutions. Its Impact Profile peak is above world average and it has a substantial percentage of publications in the highest two categories. India is notable for a strong domestic research base but despite its volume it has yet to sustain high citation impact across the breadth of its research portfolio and its international collaborative output is visibly more highly-cited than the domestic output. The other larger research economies (see Figure 2) have domestic profiles that broadly overlap with their overall profile (including international papers) and while left-shifted (towards lower impact) are similarly bell-shaped. For the four medium-sized economies (see figure 3), the domestic Impact Profile is less symmetrical and is more evidently shifted towards low impact categories and a relatively high proportion of uncited papers. The domestic pattern for the four smallest economies loses the standard 'bell-shape' and the overall Impact Profile is clearly driven primarily by international collaboration. As noted earlier, it is a universal truth that international collaboration boosts the citation rates for research publications. In the case of the smaller research economies, the total and international Impact Profiles are almost indistinguishable because the innate domestic research capacity remains small. The Impact Profiles demonstrate that – whatever the average CNCI – there are excellent research papers produced by researchers in all these countries. What is less immediately evident is the research base tackling research that addresses local and regional policy and economic concerns. This is often because such research is close to application and transferred directly to users or published in non-journal formats not indexed in the Web of Science. Regional citation indexes that capture this local research are now making the information available to regional researchers. These include the Malaysian Citation Index (http:// www.mycite.my/) established by the Ministry of Education in 2011 and the Thai Journal Citation Index (http:// www.kmutt.ac.th/jif/public_html/). Indonesia does not have its own citation database but it lists and tiers journals for assessment (http:// sinta2.ristekdikti.go.id/journals). Impact Profiles demonstrate that there are excellent research papers produced by researchers in all these countries. 14 Summary Historically, Asia is recognized as having contributed to the foundation of much of the world's understanding of science. However, S&E Asia has generally featured less prominently during the modern era, with the exception of some outstanding individuals and the exceptional performance of Singapore's universities and research institutions, built on the vision of Lee Kuan Yew. The data reported here show a region where research generally still lags significantly on its European associates and more established Asian neighbours (China, Japan, South Korea) but which is nonetheless growing steadily. There are three essential ingredients that would address the gap in performance and the development. • Human capital is the first of these. The relative number of researchers in the workforce is still very small for many S&E Asia countries and that must be linked to the funding and development of higher education. • A research environment strongly promoted through universities free to pursue their own programs of thought and innovation will be critical to change in this regard. • The resources that the region could deploy are enormous and the potential for achievement and innovation is vast. If only to keep pace with others prospering through expanding their knowledge economies, S&E Asia nations cannot afford to underinvest in scientific and technology education and research. The analysis in this report presents a complex picture, and contrasts are marked. Some nations have experienced very rapid growth. Conversely these are continuing low levels of research activity and output elsewhere. The possibility of a truly effective regional network of collaborative endeavour is not yet fully realized, because there is simply insufficient capacity in some countries to engage even locally. Levels of collaboration are, for most of the region, substantial but there is much still to be put in place in translating this into the growth of domestic capacity. Partnerships are a route to development – not only regional partnerships but links to the rest of the world. This need not be about diffuse aid – an issue of concern – because the rest of the world should be able to identify emerging centres of excellence. Although national average citation impact may lag behind world averages, the Impact Profiles demonstrate a growing volume of excellence that will hopefully enable further growth of high-quality capacity. It is difficult, and perhaps unnecessary, to provide any simple summary of the current state of the research environment across S&E Asia. Institutional growth and development will surely turn emerging strengths into a new reality. It is essential that this should not only deliver top-end research but also create more robust educational and social transformation through human resource capacity. How widespread that change becomes and how it translates into different research fields will be an interesting narrative to follow. Given the rich human capacity and available resources, as well as the clear evidence of improvement presented here, one may hope to see further advances in science and technology for the region in the future. Institutional growth and development will surely turn emerging strengths into a new reality 15 References and background reading Adams J, Gurney K A and Marshall S. (2007). Profiling citation impact: a new methodology. Scientometrics, 72, 325-344 Adams J, King, C and Singh V. (2009). Global Research Report: India. Research and collaboration in the new geography of science. Evidence, a Thomson Reuters company, Leeds UK. ISBN 1-904431-21-6 Arunachalam S and Doss M J. (2000). Mapping international collaboration in science in Asia through coauthorship analysis. Current Science, 79, 621-628 Barrot J S. (2017). Research impact and productivity of Southeast Asian countries in language and linguistics. Scientometrics, 110, 1-15 Hassan S U, Haddawy P, Kuinkel P, Degelsegger A and Blasy C. (2012). A bibliometric study of research activity in ASEAN related to the EU in FP7 priority areas. Scientometrics, 91, 1035-1051 Hew J J, Lee V H, Ooi K B and Lin B S. (2019). Computer science in ASEAN: a ten-year bibliometric analysis (2009-2018). Journal of Computer Information, DOI: 10.1080/08874417.2019.1601538 Ho Y S, Lim L B L and Monge-Najera J. (2018). Brunei publications in the Science Citation Index Expanded (1973-2016): bibliometrics and comparison with other tropical countries. Revista de Biologia Tropical, 66, 1090-1100 Kimura F, Wong P K and Ambashi M. (2019). Innovation for ASEAN 2040. In Kimura F, Anbumozhi and Nishimura H, (eds.), Transforming and deepening the ASEAN community, Jakarta: ERIA, 24-49 Kumar S, Rohani V A and Ratnavelu K. (2014). International research collaborations of ASEAN Nations in economics, 1979-2010. Scientometrics, 101, 847-867 Mahbuba D and Rousseau R. (2010). Scientific research in the Indian subcontinent: selected trends and indicators, 1973-2007, comparing Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka with India, the local giant. Scientometrics, 84, 403-420 Moed H F. (2016). Iran's scientific dominance and the emergence of South-East Asian countries as scientific collaborators in the Persian Gulf Region. Scientometrics, 108, 305-314 Moed H F and Halevi G. (2015). Multidimensional assessment of scholarly research impact. Journal of the American Society for Information wce and Technology, 66, 1988-2002 Nguyen T V, Ho-Le T P and Le U V. (2017). International collaboration in scientific research in Vietnam: an analysis of patterns and impact. Scientometrics, 110, 1035-1051 Nguyen T V and Pham L T. (2011). Scientific output and its relationship to knowledge economy: an analysis of ASEAN countries. Scientometrics, 89, 107-117 Payumo J G and Sutton T C. (2015). A bibliometric assessment of ASEAN collaboration in plant biotechnology. Scientometrics, 103, 1043-1059 Phuong T T, Duong H B and McLean G N. (2015). Faculty development in Southeast Asian higher education: a review of literature. Asia Pacific Education Review, 16, 107-117 Rodriguez V and Soeparwata A. (2012). ASEAN benchmarking in terms of science, technology, and innovation from 1999 to 2009. Scientometrics, 92, 549-573 Surjandari I, Dhini A, Lumbantobing E W I, Widari A T and Prawiradinata I. (2015). Big data analysis of Indonesian scholars' publications: a research theme mapping. International Journal of Technology, 6, 650-658 UNESCO Institute for Statistics. (2014). Higher education in Asia: Expanding out, expanding up. The rise of graduate education and university research. Montreal: UNESCO Institute for Statistics ISBN: 978-92-9189-147-4 Vinluan L R. (2012). Research productivity in education and psychology in the Philippines and comparison with ASEAN countries. Scientometrics, 91, 277-294 Vuong Q H. (2019). The harsh world of publishing in emerging regions and implications for editors and publishers: The case of Vietnam. Learned Publishing, DOI: 10.1002/leap.1255 Yi Y, Qi W and Wu D D. (2013). Are CIVETS the next BRICs? A comparative analysis from scientometrics perspective. Scientometrics, 94, 615-

BECAUSE I SAID SO: PRACTICAL AUTHORITY IN PLATO'S CRITO We are free and tolerant in our private lives, but in public affairs we keep to the law. This is because the law commands our deep respect. Pericles "Funeral Oration" Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War [Simonides] perceived that a good man, an honorable man, often forces himself to love and praise someone utterly different from himself, one's alienated father perhaps, or mother, or country...good men conceal the trouble and force themselves to give praise, and if they are angry because their parents or country wronged them, they calm themselves down and reconcile themselves to it, and they force themselves to love and praise their own people. Socrates Plato Protagoras Abstract: This essay is an analysis of the central arguments in Plato's Crito. I begin by showing how the dialogue presents a variety of ways that the opinion of another person can have practical relevance in one's deliberations about what to do – e.g. as an argument, as a piece of expert advice, as a threat. Especially important among these forms of practical relevance is the relevance of authoritative commands. In the dialogue, the Laws of Athens argue that Socrates must accept his sentence of death, because he must regard the court's verdict as a command from a practical authority – the city. I show how the Laws' arguments rely on special features of authority-reasons that many commentators have overlooked. I also explain why the Law's arguments are unsuccessful. Finally, I argue that Socrates' description of "the many" suggests that the city lacks the deliberative capacity necessary for possessing practical authority. 1. Introduction: Practical Deliberation and Practical Authority In Crito we encounter Socrates awaiting execution in prison, having been condemned to death by the Athenian jurors. Socrates' friend Crito has come to persuade him to escape, and the discussion between them concerns whether or not Socrates should do so.1 At the heart of their 2 deliberation is the question of what practical relevance Socrates (and in a secondary sense, Crito) should give to the jury's decision. The city has spoken in the form of a verdict: it has said that Socrates is guilty and is to be executed. What, then, is the deliberative significance of what the city has said? In particular, does the verdict provide Socrates with a conclusive reason to accept his sentence and stay? In the second half of the dialogue, Socrates gives a speech in the voice of the Laws of the city, and the Laws argue that the verdict does indeed give Socrates conclusive reason to stay.2 According to the Laws, the verdict amounts to an order, an authoritative command, issued to Socrates by the city. And the Laws argue that the city possesses practical authority over its citizens, similar to the authority possessed by parents over children or military leaders over subordinates. Since the city is a practical authority over Socrates, its command has a special kind of practical relevance: it is an authority reason, or a reason to obey. Thus the specific question of whether Socrates should escape leads to the central philosophical issue in Crito, which is the nature of the city's practical authority over its citizens, including the city's capacity to provide citizens with reasons of authority through its laws and decisions. To obey the speech of another person as an authoritative command requires that one accord that speech a special kind of practical relevance in one's deliberations. When obeying a command, the fact of the command serves as a conclusive reason for acting. A command provides a distinctive sort of practical reason that pre-empts other reasons, and obedience to authoritative commands requires one to surrender, to some extent, one's own judgment about what to do. In this respect, treating what someone says as an authoritative command differs from treating it as counsel or argument. In Crito, the arguments of the Laws depend upon this special kind of deliberative relevance that belongs to authoritative commands. However, the distinctive 3 features of authority reasons are largely left implicit in the Laws' speech. Thus many commentators have failed to appreciate the significance of these features for the Laws' arguments, and therefore have failed to characterize and critique those arguments correctly.3 In this essay, I examine some of the distinctive features of practical authority and authoritative commands, and I consider the Laws' central arguments in light of those features.4 In so doing, I hope to provide two things: 1) a more accurate and compelling presentation of the arguments of the Laws, including a better sense on what is true in the Laws' speech, and 2) a clearer understanding of why, ultimately, the Laws' arguments fail to establish that the court's judgment gives Socrates a decisive reason to stay and accept his punishment. Moreover, while the nature of authoritative commands is of central importance in Crito, the dialogue is also sensitive to other ways that the speech of another person might have practical relevance, and in particular, to ways the speech of the many might be relevant. In fact, the issue of how we might pay attention to the views of others is a thread that runs through the dialogue – from the opening interchange (44b-d), to Socrates' programmatic statements about his own way of deliberating (46b-e), to the discussion of the soul expert (47a-48b), and finally the speech of the Laws (esp 50c-53e). In the second (next) section of this essay, I consider the dialogue's treatment of four distinct ways that one might regard the views of another as having significance for one's own practical deliberations. In recent years there have been interesting philosophical reassessments of Crito, but to my knowledge no one has spelled out the types of practical relevance as I do here. Looking at Crito through this lens reveals a thematic unity among the dialogue's different sections.5 Furthermore, it brings into shaper relief what is distinctive about the Laws' claim that the city-citizen relation is one of practical authority. 4 In the third section, I examine the Laws' argument that it would be wrong for Socrates to disobey the city's command by escaping. I argue that even if the city possesses practical authority over its citizens, the Laws fail to demonstrate that the verdict provides Socrates a decisive reason to stay and accept his sentence. The Laws' argument appeals to the special preemptive nature of authority reasons, and connects this feature to the idea of violence against this city. This argument fails, however, because it wrongly conflates a true feature of authority reasons – their pre-emptive character – with the false idea that all practical authority is absolute. From the fact that (a) when I act in obedience to an authoritative command, it serves to pre-empt my other reasons, it does not follow that (b) I should obey every well-formed command from a legitimate authority and allow it to pre-empt my other reasons in determining what I shall do. In the final section, I return to Crito's initial discussion of "the many" to highlight one of the central puzzles of the dialogue: how can Socrates be so disparaging of the deliberative capacities of the many, while simultaneously argue (in the voice of the Laws) that the verdict of the court which is populated by the many has practical authority? I argue that Socrates' description of the Athenian people at the beginning of the dialogue gives further grounds for doubting the city's claim that its verdict possesses practical authority. Socrates characterizes the many (οἱ πολλοὶ) as lacking practical understanding and acting at random (44d, 47e-48a). However, a necessary condition for possessing practical authority is the capacity to deliberative well in practical matters. Thus there is reason to think that the city – guided by the reasoning of the many – does not have the deliberative capacity necessary to possess the practical authority that it claims for itself, if Socrates' earlier description of the many is true. This illustrates and important point about democratic constitutions: if the people are to rule with authority, we must 5 suppose that the people have the deliberative capacity necessary to carry out the duties of authoritative offices and legal roles (e.g., legislators, jurors, voters). One of the major questions for interpreters Crito is whether the speech of the Laws is meant to reflect Socrates' own outlook. While that issue is not my focus here, what I have to say is relevant to it. For the upshot of my interpretation is that the Laws' key argument rests on a mistake about practical authority (section 3.2), that Socrates could not consistently enter into the agreement the Laws describe (section 3.3), and that there is a serious tension between Socrates' description of the many and the Laws' notion that the city of Athens has practical authority over its citizens (section 4). Each of these points suggests, I believe, that Socrates own outlook should not be equated with the view of the Laws. 2. Varieties of Practical Relevance: Argument, Reputation, Force, and Expert Advice Early in the dialogue, Socrates and Crito have a disagreement over whether or not one should pay attention to the opinion of the many (τῆς τῶν πολλῶν δόζης πέλει). Crito points out that if Socrates does not escape, the many will think he failed to do so because Crito and others were not willing to spend the money to bribe the Athenian officials. In this way Crito will acquire a bad reputation among the many if Socrates remains to be executed. Crito offers this is a reason for Socrates to escape, but Socrates resists the idea that avoiding a bad reputation among the many provides such a reason: "Good Crito, why should we care so much about the opinion of the many?" (44c)6 In response, Crito counters: "You see that it is necessary, Socrates, to care about the opinion of the many. The things now coming to pass make clear that the many can inflict not the least of evils but nearly the greatest if one has been slandered among them." (44cd) But Socrates rejects this point as well: "Would that the many could inflict the greatest evils, 6 Crito, so that they could also work the greatest goods, and that would be well. But now they cannot do either. They are unable to make a man either wise or foolish, but they act haphazardly." (44d) As Verity Harte points out, this disagreement over the ability of the many to inflict evil is based on a difference between Socrates' and Crito's respective conceptions of harm. Crito is thinking of the many's ability to inflict physical harm, as seen in their ability to sentence Socrates to death. Socrates, in contrast, is thinking of harm as the internal harm that comes to a soul through its own foolishness and wrongdoing. And this difference over harm is part of a more general disagreement over value: Whereas Crito is concerned about external goods, such as reputation, Socrates cares about internal goods, such as justice and wisdom.7 However, in addition to this disagreement over value, it becomes clear that Socrates and Crito also have in mind different ways in which one might care about the opinion of another person.8 A little later in the dialogue, Socrates describes his own approach to practical deliberation: "We must therefore examine whether we should act in this way or not, as not only now but at all times I am the kind of man who listens to nothing within me but the argument (λογῳ) that on reflection seems best to me." (46b, Grube)9 Now, the idea of an argument directing one toward an action suggests one way that the opinion of others can be relevant to practical deliberation – other people can provide us with such arguments, or counsel, as to how we should proceed. In attending to the opinions of others as arguments, we look to the content of their opinions as indicating something that would justify us in acting on way or another. The other person suggests to us something good or valuable about acting a certain way, some consideration that we should attend to, and which would provide us with grounds for acting one way or another. And we can attend to another person's opinions in this way even if she is not 7 advising us directly. For instance, in listening to two people deliberate about what to do, we can treat the considerations they put forth as potential reasons for us in similar situations. Or if we are trying to learn a craft, we may ask a craftsperson why she acts as she does, and the explanation she gives will be relevant for figuring out what we should do. But in treating the opinion of others as counsel, we attend to their opinions in a different way than Crito has in mind in his opening arguments with Socrates. In fact, Crito appeals to two different ways in which the opinions of others can be practically significant for us. The first of these is reputation as such. Here, the views of others about us are relevant to our deliberations as external goods or evils to be pursued or avoided. If others think well of us (= if we have a good reputation among them), then their opinion is a good for us. If others think badly of us (= if we have a bad reputation among them), then their opinion is an evil for us. Moreover, the opinion of others about us can be a good or evil for us regardless of whether or not their opinion is wellinformed or based in knowledge of our actions and character. It is clear that this is how Crito conceives the value of reputation, for the misfortune Crito imagines includes a bad reputation among people who don't know him or Socrates very well and who won't believe the truth about Socrates' execution, should he accept his sentence. Whereas Crito initially appeals to reputation as such, his point about the many inflicting the greatest evils shifts to a different way in which the opinion of others can be practically relevant. Crito here regards the many as a force to be reckoned with, and the opinion of the many is relevant as an aspect of that force. When we attend to the opinions of others this way, we are not looking to the content of the opinion as a guide to what is actually good to do. Nor are we thinking of their opinions about us as goods or evils in themselves. Rather we are interested in the opinion as a guide for predicting what the other person is likely to do, so that we may then 8 adjust our actions accordingly. In such cases, the relevance of the other's opinion does not rest in the merit of the considerations on which he acts, but simply the fact that he accepts those considerations (even if he should not) – a fact that we must deal with if his views will lead him to act in ways that impact us. For example, I may be concerned to know what a bully thinks of me, not because the content of his opinions provide an accurate appraisal of my character, but because if he doesn't like me he'll try to beat me up. Being concerned about the opinion of others as force is a limit case of interacting with others as rational agents, since in this case I am regarding the other person as something similar to a non-rational force of nature. For example, suppose that I see a celebrity in a restaurant.10 I want to take his picture, but I know that he holds the view that anyone who tries to take his picture should be punched in the face. I may care about his view merely for predicting what he will do, and my concern might cause me to refrain from taking his picture. In that case, my interaction with the celebrity is like my "interaction" with a mousetrap. I don't put my finger in the trap, because I predict that doing so will cause something painful to happen and I want to avoid pain. The celebrity's opinion, like the physical features of the mousetrap, is relevant to my deliberation simply because of its place in a causal chain that I want to anticipate. After describing his approach to decision-making, Socrates returns to the relevance that the opinion of the many should have in their deliberation: "How should we examine the matter most reasonably? Would it be by taking up first your argument about the opinions of men, whether it is sound in every case that one should pay attention to some opinions, but not to others?" (46c-d, Grube) Socrates goes on to offer an argument for the conclusion that they ought not be concerned about the opinion of the many, but instead the opinion of the person who understands justice and truth. (48a) And what matters about the opinion of this person is that he 9 has knowledge of things relating to the just and unjust, shameful and beautiful, good and bad. It is clear, then, that Socrates is thinking of being concerned about the opinion of another person as a source of knowledge about how to act well. This, however, is not the sense of being concerned Crito evidently had in mind at when he suggested at 44d that they should care about the opinion of the many. Crito did not suppose that the many should be listened to on the merits of what they were saying, as if the content of their advice would lead one to the truth of how to act well. Instead he was conceiving of their opinion as a force whose consequences must be considered. However, there is an additional twist to Socrates' argument that runs from 47a to 48a. For Socrates imagines following the opinion of a person in matters of justice and goodness as one would follow the opinion of a physical trainer in matters of physical health. The idea is of a trainer who knows what diet and activity are required for physical excellence, and who, on the basis of this knowledge, gives directions to the person in athletic training. The person in training does not know what the trainer knows, which is why he turns to the trainer for advice. And here we encounter a fourth way that we might attend to the opinions of another – as expert advice. In attending to an opinion as expert advice, we are not concerned about what the expert says merely as a way to predict what the expert will do. The expert is not just a force with which we must reckon. Nor are we interested in the expert's opinion of us as such, regardless of how well-informed it is. To the extent that we care about the expert's opinion of us (qua expert), we do so because we think that opinion is a reliable guide for how we are doing. In following an athletic trainer's advice, we are interested in the content of his directions and we believe those directions will lead us to do the right thing, where "right" is determined by what is required for excellence in the athletic activity. A trainer (or other such expert) need not explain the grounds for his specific directions to the person in training (or other such advice-recipient). Of course the 10 trainer has knowledge of what is required for physical excellence, and this knowledge is the source of his directions. So he does not advise at random. Rather he has grounds for the advice he dispenses, and he could, in principle, offer those grounds to a person in training. But in his role as a trainer, it is not necessary for him to do this. And for the person to accept the advice of the trainer, he does not need to know the trainer's own reasons for his directions. This is a difference between attending to the opinion of another as expert advice as opposed to argument. In giving an argument, a person gives us considerations that can serve as the grounds for acting one way or another. We turn to an expert, in contrast, because we take the expert to have knowledge of the grounds in a way that we do not, and in treating his speech as expert advice, we need not ask for his grounds. The trainee can say to the trainer: "I'll take your word for it."11 Thus before the Laws make an appearance, the dialogue presents us with: (a) a specific practical decision to be made, (b) practical deliberation as a topic for philosophical reflection, and (c) four distinct ways that the opinions of others can be relevant to our deliberations. These are: 1) as argument 2) as reputation 3) as force 4) as expert advice. In the arguments of the Laws, we encounter a fifth distinctive form of practical relevance – authoritative commands. Before turning to authoritative commands, I want to note briefly an additional way in which the views of others might have practical relevance for us. We might be concerned about the views of another for the sake of that person's good. In their discussion, Socrates and Crito agree that the most valuable part of the person (i.e. the soul) is benefited by being just, and corrupted by injustice. (47d). And whether or not one lives justly depends on one's views about the importance of justice and what justice requires. If one has the view that justice does not matter, or wrong opinions about which actions are just, then one will not live a just life. So one's opinions about matters of justice (and virtue in general) are crucial for one's own good. Thus, a 11 person might well be concerned about another's views for the sake of the other person – you want them to have correct views about justice and virtue because you want them to act and live well, to have an uncorrupted soul, to have a life worth living. This type of concern with the opinions of others contrasts in an interesting way with concern for reputation. In the case of reputation, I care about your views because they are good or bad for me. In the other case, I care about your views because they are good or bad for you. In the Apology, Socrates appeals to this second type of concern to explain why he questions his fellow Athenians about virtue, acting as gadfly to the city of Athens (Ap 29-31). So even though it is not said explicitly, it is plausible to suppose that this same sort of concern motivates Socrates to engage Crito in their discussion about what is just to do. 3. The Authority of the City 3.1. The City and its Commands At 48a Socrates considers the fact that the many are able to put others to death. Here Socrates finally addresses the kind of practical relevance Crito evidently had in mind all along in his concern for the opinion of the many – a force to be reckoned with. Socrates, however, rejects the notion that their decision should be guided by this sort of concern with the opinion of the many. He argues that what matters is not mere life but the good life, and that one could never have reason, all things considered, to do what is unjust (47d-48c). Thus the thing he and Crito must consider is whether or not escaping from prison would be just (δικιαον), and hence the power of the many to inflict death is irrelevant to their practical deliberation. If upon reflection they conclude that it would be just for Socrates to escape, then they will try to do so. But if they conclude that it would be unjust to attempt such a thing, then no other considerations will matter: 12 "If it appears that we shall be acting unjustly, then we have no need at all to take into account whether we shall have to die if we stay here and keep quiet, or suffer in another way, rather than do wrong." (48d, Grube) Socrates then goes on to argue that one must never return a wrong (ἀνταδικεῖν) for a wrong, nor treat another badly in return (ἀντικακουργεὶν) for being badly treated.12 He notes that in rejecting retaliation he holds a position that puts him at odds with most people. He also characterizes this rejection of retaliation as the basis of his current deliberation with Crito (49d). Socrates next lays down the principle that if one has made a just agreement with someone, then one should keep the agreement and not break it. Thus Socrates establishes two points that spell out what justice will require in the present situation: 1) that they not wrong others, even in return for being wronged and 2) that they not break just agreements. And since he and Crito have already agreed that they must do whatever is just, the question of what they should do is now focused on these two requirements. As Socrates says: "if we leave here without the city's permission, are we mistreating people whom we should least mistreat? And are we sticking to a just agreement, or not?" (49e-50a, Grube) After focusing the deliberative question in this way, Socrates offers a long speech on behalf of the Laws of the city. The Laws claim that Socrates would be mistreating them – indeed, attempting to destroy the laws and the city – if he were to flaunt the verdict and attempt to escape. They also claim that he would be breaking a just agreement. The Laws hold that by choosing to remain in Athens, Socrates has thereby agreed to obey whatever the city and country commands (ἃ ἂν κελεύῃ ἡ πόλις καὶ ἡ πατρίς) (51b10). According to the Laws, the citizen has two options for acting well with respect to the city: he must either persuade it or obey its commands. Since Socrates has failed to persuade the city to acquit him, he must obey its 13 command that he be sentenced to death. In this respect, Socrates is like a citizen-soldier. The citizen may attempt to persuade the city not to fight a war. But once ordered into battle by the city, the citizen must obey: "You must either persuade it or do what it commands, and suffer quietly whatever it instructs you to suffer, whether blows or bonds, whether you are led to war to be wounded or killed, these things must be done. This is right (τὸ δίκιαον), never to give way nor retreat nor abandon one's post, but in war and in law courts and everywhere, one must do what one's city and country commands, or persuade it as to the nature of justice."13 (51b4-c1) In holding that the citizen must "persuade or obey," the Laws claim that a command of the city amounts to a conclusive reason for the citizen to do what is commanded. A command fixes what must be done (ποιητέον) and thus in order to act well, the citizen must pay attention to the city's commands – the commands of the city have inescapable practical relevance for the citizen's deliberation. However, to pay attention to something as a command is to accord it a distinct type of practical relevance. In the case of obedience to a command, I have reason to do something because the authority figure tells me to do so, and my grounds for acting are not independent of the command itself. Rather, the command itself is what is practically relevant. To obey something as a command is to recognize the fact that I have been commanded as a decisive reason to act. In this respect, obeying a command is different from following counsel or argument. Counsel presents me with some good-making feature of a course of action. And I cannot pay attention to someone's counsel without trying to understand the good-making feature – without trying to grasp the reason they are calling to my attention. In contrast, a command need not point to some good-making feature of a course of action. If I am a soldier, my commanding officer need not explain to me why crossing a particular mountain is a good idea; he can simply 14 order me to do so. And in obeying the command I treat the fact of the command as itself sufficient to make the action good to do.14 Acting out of obedience to a command shares something with following expert advice. In each case I can take a course of action simply because I have been told to do so, without knowing why the commander or expert has issued the command or instruction. However, I grant a piece of advice practical importance only insofar as I trust that this advice is based on good grounds. I assume that, if pressed, the expert could offer some adequate justification for his advice, and it is the assumed goodness of the expert's own grounds that is the basis of my following his advice. If on a particular occasion I have good reason to believe that an expert's advice is not justified, then I lose my reason for following that advice. For example, suppose that my doctor directs me to take penicillin for an infection. But when I come home, I remember that I am highly allergic to penicillin and that I forgot to mention this to the doctor. In this case, the fact that the doctor told me to take penicillin does not give me reason to do so. I have reason to follow the doctor's advice only insofar as I have reason to think it good advice – something justified with all the relevant information.15 In contrast, I can have reason to obey a command even when I disagree with the justification or content of the command – even when I think that the best course of action, considered independently from the command, would be to do something other than what is commanded. Suppose I am a soldier and my commanding officer directs me to take a certain path. I am convinced (correctly) that another path would be better, because less risky and more comfortable. Even so, I can still have decisive reason to take the path I am commanded to take. The fact that I have been commanded is my reason for action; I take the path because my officer has directed me to. In so doing, I do not "take his word for it" that this really is the best path. I 15 might do that in the case of a trail-expert, whose reasoning I couldn't fully grasp at the time of the advice. But with the commander, I do it "because he said so."16 The distinction between following advice and obeying orders shows what is wrong with David Bostock's suggestion that the Laws are to be identified with the moral expert discussed earlier in the dialogue. Bostock suggests that the Laws are a repository of wisdom in moral matters, and hence "their advice must always be treated with the greatest respect."17 However, if the Laws are to be listened to as an expert, then the citizen is only required to follow their instructions as one follows expert advice, and doing this is not the same as doing what the Laws explicitly demand: obeying their directives as commands. And the difference is highly relevant to Socrates' situation. For clearly Socrates does not think that the city has come to the right decision on this particular occasion. He says nothing to suggest that the city is following the best argument in condemning him to death, or that the city sentences him on the basis of good grounds.18 So if the city's instruction had relevance only as expert advice, then Socrates would in this case have reason to act against the advice, since he is convinced that the city is not acting for good reasons in condemning him. Socrates would be like the person who has good reason to believe that the doctor has given bad advice on a particular occasion, though perhaps the doctor is knowledgeable of the craft of medicine. In fact, however, the Laws argue that the situation is different. Socrates is required to obey the city's commands, regardless of whether or not the course of action could be judged best by grounds independent from the command itself. 3.2. Public Authority and Private Judgment At 51b, the Laws claim that citizens must do what the city commands in war and in law courts and everywhere (ἐν πολέμῳ και ἐν δικαστηρίῳ και πανταχοῦ ποιητέον ἃ ἂν κελεύῃ ἡ 16 πόλις καὶ ἡ πατρίς). At 50b-c, Socrates speaks as if the there is a particular law that he would be breaking by leaving – the law that "judgments rendered judicially be authoritative" (Allen)19. (τούτου τοῦ νόμου ἀπολλυμένου ὃς τὰς δίκας τὰς δικασθείσας προστάττει κυρίας εῖναι). Now, there is something odd about the idea of a specific law to establish that official judgments are authoritative. For it is part of their status as official verdicts that they have authority over the individuals in the case. If that we not so, there would be no point in law courts. And thus there is no need for a further law to grant authority to official judgments. So perhaps the point of saying this is simply to emphasize that these courts issue official judgments, and not merely the advice of a third-party councilor. In any case, it is clear that the city claims to have the capacity to provide citizens – in its laws and judgments and official directions – with a distinctive sort of practical reason: a reason of authority. So why does the city possess this practical authority? What is the nature of the citycitizen relation such that the city's judgments must be obeyed as commands, and not merely listened to as arguments or expert advice, nor regarded merely as force or reputation? And what, if anything, are the limits to this authority? In their speech, the Laws make multiple arguments for the city's authority over its citizens. The first of these arguments is quite compressed. At the beginning of the their speech, the Laws say: "Tell us, Socrates, what you have in mind to do. Are you not, by this deed you are attempting, intending to destroy us the Laws, and the whole city, as far as you are concerned? Or do you think it is possible for a city to continue to be a city and not be destroyed, in which legal judgments are without force, but instead are made unauthoritative and corrupted by private individuals?" These rhetorical questions by the Laws build on the point just noted – that authority belongs to the form of official judgments, and is constitutive of them as official 17 judgments. Because of this, the Laws claim, the whole system of official judgments will be destroyed if those who are subject to the judgments do not regard them as providing reasons of authority. If every time a verdict was rendered the subject parties regarded it as an open question what they should do – or if they regarded the verdict as merely one more reason among others in deciding what to do – then they would not be regarding the verdict as practically authoritative. However, legal institutions are constitutive of a city. If a city is to exist at all, it must have authoritative officials and courts. Thus, the Laws claim, for Socrates to refuse to give authority to the city's verdict is to attempt to destroy the city, or to destroy the city as far as he is concerned. This line of thought, developed from the Laws' rhetorical questions, does not yet amount to an argument that Socrates must obey the court's verdict as an authoritative command. For why must Socrates always avoid actions that are destructive of the city? Especially in his present circumstances, this question requires an answer, since someone might argue that the city is unfairly attempting to destroy him through its verdict. So even if disobeying the verdict would be destructive of the city, such disobedience might seem either justified retaliation for the city's aggression against him, or justified self-defense.20 As we have seen, Socrates holds that it is never proper to retaliate. This is the very basis for his deliberation with Crito (49d), so we can be sure that he will not accept disobedience to the city's verdict on grounds of justified retaliation. Furthermore, the Laws go on to argue that it is impious and wrong ever to attempt violence against one's city, or to do anything that would destroy it. (50e-51c) To support this claim, the Laws offer an analogy between the city-citizen relationship and the parent-child relationship.21 A child stands in an asymmetrical relationship to his parents, owing them reverence and submission to their authority. A child does not have a right to retaliate against his parents, and it is impious (οὐχ ὃσιον, 51c1) to use violence against 18 them. In just the same way, a citizen must revere and obey his city, and a citizen has no right of retaliation against his city. (50c-51a) The analogy is apt, the Laws argue, because the city does things for the citizen that a parent does for a child, and even more: it gives birth to him, nurtures him and educates him. In fact, a city is even more holy and worthy of reverence than one's parents and ancestors. (51b1-2) Combining the parent-child analogy with the earlier points about a city's legal institutions, we can see the Laws as making the following argument to Socrates: 1) If there is to be a city at all, then people like you (= its citizens) must respect its judgments in official matters as authoritative commands. 2) To respect a judgment as authoritative requires that you regard the fact of the verdict as conclusive reason to act and that you do not exercise further private judgment about what to do. 3) Thus, to fail to regard the fact of a verdict as conclusive reason is to undermine the very possibility of a city – i.e., to contribute to the city's destruction and attempt violence against it. 4) It is wrong and impious to contribute to the city's destruction, or to attempt violence against the city, no matter what it has done to you. 5) Therefore, it is wrong to fail to regard the fact of a verdict as conclusive reason, and you must respect the city's verdicts as authoritative rather than proceeding by private judgment in official matters. In its second premise, this argument draws on a feature of commands discussed in the last section – that obeying something as a command means regarding the fact of the command as a conclusive reason for acting. Thus obedience to authoritative commands requires one to 19 surrender, to some extent, one's own judgment on the matter at hand. In obeying a command, I allow the command to serve as a reason for action that pre-empts or "silences" other reasons I may have. If I go over a particular mountain because my officer orders me, then it does not matter if I think that, considered independently of the command, this is all-things-considered the best thing for me to do. Likewise, it does not matter if I have additional reasons for doing this – e.g. this will be good exercise for me. The Laws' argument combines this point about the pre-emptive nature of authority reasons (premise 2) with the idea, expressed in the Laws' rhetorical questions, that a city's institutions can only exist if citizens regard official verdicts as authoritative commands (premise 1). Putting these two ideas together, the Laws claim that any exercise of private judgment in official matters amounts to an act of destruction against the city (premise 3). Since an act of disobedience to an official verdict is, ipso facto, an exercise of private judgment that denies authority to the verdict, for Socrates to disobey the court's decision and escape would be an act of violence against the city, which is impious and wrong.22 Perhaps the most obvious objection to the Laws' argument is as follows: "The city is not, as a matter of fact, going to be destroyed by Socrates' disobedience. If Socrates were to disregard the verdict and escape, surely Athens and its legal institutions would not disintegrate. Whereas a father might be killed by a single strike from his son, the city will certainly survive this 'attack' by Socrates. So it is not plausible to construe Socrates' disobedience as an act of 'violence' against the city, analogous to physical violence against one's parents. The first premise of the Laws' argument is false, because while citizens must in general regard official judgments as authoritative for the city to exist, it is not true that they must always do so. A city can absorb a 20 certain amount of disobedience to its commands without being harmed, and thus an isolated act of disobedience does not amount to a real attack on the city." A defender of the Laws' argument can reply to this objection by insisting that while individual acts of disobedience to legal authority need not obliterate the city's institutions, they are as such corrosive of those institutions. Consider an analogous case in which we are playing baseball. Of course, our game can go on with a certain amount of rule-breaking, even rulebreaking which is not noticed by the umpire. But if in the middle of the game, everyone decided to disregard the rules, then we would no longer be playing baseball at all. We would have destroyed our game of baseball, or destroyed baseball "so far as we are concerned." This is because our game of baseball is constituted by actions performed in recognition of the authority of the rules of the game. So to the extent that I choose to break a rule on any particular occasion, I reject the authority of the rule and set myself against it. Thus insofar as I disregard the rules, I am to that extent bringing about the end of our baseball game. Put another way: qua baseballplayer, I am someone who recognizes the rules of the game as authoritative for determining which actions are legitimate options for me. And because the game is constituted by the activity of players who respect the rules, qua rule-breaker I am not a player of baseball but a destroyer of baseball. In the same way, the city's institutions are constituted by the citizens' actions in recognition of the authority of official verdicts. So insofar as I disregard that authority, I am to that extent bringing about the end of those civic institutions. Qua person who exercises private judgment in such matters, I am not a citizen but a destroyer of the city. And that is something piety forbids me to be. The initial objection challenges the notion that a single act of disobedience counts as "violence" against the city, on the grounds that, as a matter of fact, the city will continue 21 unharmed. The reply insists that a single act of disobedience is indeed violence, because qua act of disobedience it does harm to the city. As a counter-reply, the objector might then reject the Laws' claim that all acts of violence against the city are prohibited on grounds of impiety (premise 4). This claim about violence (the objector argues) sounded plausible when we were thinking of serious damage done to the city's institutions. But now that "violence" has been construed so broadly as to include any act of disobedience to the city's commands, no matter how serious its effects, we have no reason to accept a prohibition on all such acts. Consider an analogous case between parent and child. Suppose I am walking on the road with my father and a reckless chariot is racing toward me. My father does not realize what is happening and so refuses to move over. The only way for me to avoid being crushed by the chariot is to push my father off the road. Pushing my father might be called "violence," but given how little he is harmed and how serious the risk to myself, is such "violence" really to be ruled out on grounds of impiety? Likewise, given the comparatively little harm that will come the city through Socrates' disobedience, and the high cost to Socrates of obeying, whatever small damage his leaving will inflict on the city does not amount to objectionable impiety. This counter-reply concedes that an act of disobedience to the court's verdict will be a form of violence against the city, but argues that not all forms of violence against a superior are impious and wrong. Whatever the merits of this counter-reply, I want to pursue an even deeper problem with the Laws' argument. The Laws claim that the judgments of the city's courts have the practical relevance of authoritative commands, like the commands of a parent, master, or military leader. However, the Laws' argument wrongly assimilates a true feature of authority reasons – that they are pre-emptive and content-neutral – with the false notion that all practical authority is absolute. When we properly distinguish these two points, we can see that not every 22 instance of refusing to obey an authoritative command amounts to an attack upon the authority of the commander. And thus the Laws are unjustified in claiming that an act of disobedience by Socrates would be an assault on the city. In saying that a practical authority is absolute, I do not means that its commands have unlimited scope. I mean rather that the authority's commands should always be obeyed if they have been properly formed. To see the distinction between absolute authority and the preemptive nature of authority reasons, consider the following situation: I am a student in a college class. I recognize that the teacher is a practical authority in this class. Her authority is not unlimited in the scope of things she may command – e.g. she does not have the authority to order her students to marry one another. But for a certain range of potential activities, she is the authority, and her commands pre-empt other reasons for action I might have. If she orders me not to chew gum in class, then I have conclusive reason not to chew gum, independent of whether I enjoy gum-chewing or agree with her gum-chewing policy. Now, suppose that one day she passes out a test and directs us to take out pencils and begin answering the questions. But I happen to know that someone has poisoned the pencils in this class, and if students begin to write with them a deadly gas will be released. So I refuse to write and a instruct others not to. The teacher thinks this is tomfoolery and commands me to be quiet and write. What should I do? I think it is clear that I should disobey the teacher's command. I should not regard the fact of her command as a conclusive reason to do as she instructs me. I should not allow it to preempt my other reasons for acting. (Remember: I know that the pencils are poisoned.) In this way, I should refuse to acknowledge her authority as absolute. However, it is consistent with this refusal, and with disobedience to her particular command, that I continue to regard her as having practical authority in the classroom. I do not disobey her command on the grounds that she lacks 23 the capacity to provide her students with conclusive reasons for acting through her directives. Moreover, I need not think that her specific act of commanding was malformed in any way. She is not commanding while drunk, or blind with rage. And the object of her command (=our writing with pencils) is within the range of her legitimate authority. My exercising private judgment in a given case – indeed, disobeying an command – is consistent with my recognizing the commander as a legitimate practical authority whose exercise of her authority is not malformed in this case. My disobedience does not alter my relation to her practical authority, as if I formerly recognized her authority but not reject it. Rather the authority she possesses has never been absolute. When we reflect on the pre-emptive nature of authority reasons, what I have just said might seem impossible. For isn't the essence of an authority reason that the subordinate does not exercise private judgment? And if in a single case the fact of an authority's command doesn't settle the matter of what you must do, how can you suppose that the authority's commands will settle the matter for you on any other occasion? To disobey a command on a given occasion thus seems to amount to denying practical authority to the commander. What this overlooks, however, is that the acceptance of authority structures takes place against a background understanding that standardly includes: a) a conception of the goods served by the authority, and b) a conception of the persons within the authority structure. Likewise, a particular choice to obey – to regard a particular command as authoritative – takes place against a background understanding of the commander, the act of the commanding, and the situation. This background understanding includes, for example, the belief that it is the actual commander, and not an imposter, who is issuing the command. It also includes the understanding that this command is well-formed along a number of dimensions – e.g. not given in a state of mind 24 clouded by narcotics or brain-washing. And it includes a general grasp of the situation and the likely effects of acting in various ways. To see this last point, consider another example. Suppose I am a soldier and my commanding officer orders me to lead my platoon on a certain route around a mountain. I learn that taking this route will have disastrous consequences, resulting in the pointless destruction of the whole army and the loss of the city. My officer, however, is unable to grasp this because he doesn't have access to the relevant information. Even though I try to explain matters to him, he repeats his command and insists I take the disastrous path. But I know that following his command will destroy the army and the city. So I decide to disobey, and the army and city are saved. Here again, disobedience is justified. For the point of authority-relations in the army is to enable the army's success in fighting, and the point of fighting is to protect the city, so it would be self-defeating to obey my officer when I know that doing so will lead to the destruction of the city. Moreover, my act of disobedience need not involve my rejection of the standing authority of my commander. Disobeying a particular order is consistent with recognizing military authority as legitimate. It is also consistent with recognizing that this particular officer, whom I disobey here and now, has the standing authority to issue authoritative commands. Thus in disobeying a particular order, I do not challenge the military's authority structure or attempt to overthrow it "so far as I am concerned." It is true is that insofar as one acts in obedience to an authoritative command, one foregoes private judgment; one regards the fact of the command as a conclusive reason to act that pre-empts other reasons one has independent of the command itself. It is also true that disobedience to commands could not be the standard case, for then there would be no point in having the authority structure, and indeed the authority structure would dissolve. What this 25 reveals is that the kind of extraordinary cases I have imagined could not be the standard case. However, it does not show that to recognize a practical authority is to recognize its authority as absolute, in the sense that every well-formed command from a legitimate authority should be obeyed. Thus the refusal to obey a given command by a standing practical authority need not be a rejection of the commander's practical authority. And hence disobedience as such need not amount to an act of violence against the authority, or as something that is harmful and corrosive to the authority qua authority. Since respect for a practical authority does not require obedience to all of the authority's well-formed commands, further argument is required to show that Socrates' disobedience to the verdict of the court amounts to a rejection of the city's authority and an act of violence against the city's institutions. (Put in terms of the Laws' argument sketched above, while premises 1 and 2 are true, premise 3 does not follow from them). Of course, the Laws might claim that the city's authority is absolute and citizens are never justified in disobeying a command of the city. It might then be an act of violence were a citizen ever to disobey. But to claim that the city's authority is absolute would just be a new assertion by the Laws, not an argument based on the special character of authority reasons and the city's institutions. 3.3. The Agreement between City and Citizen We saw earlier that Socrates and Crito agree that justice requires a) that they not mistreat anyone whom they should not mistreat, and b) that they stick to just agreements. (49e-50a). In the last section, I considered an argument by the Laws that corresponds to the first of these requirements of justice, which attempted to show (unsuccessfully) that for Socrates to leave would be mistreating the city and perpetuating violence against it. The Laws also make an 26 argument for their authority that corresponds to the second requirement. The Laws argue that Socrates has agreed to stand in an authority-relation to the city. The city does not prevent a citizen from leaving, and anyone who sees how the city is run and chooses to remain "has in fact come to an agreement with us to obey our instructions." (51e) To disobey a command of the city, then, is to break a just agreement. 23 How convincing is the Laws' appeal to an agreement between city and citizen? To begin, it is far from clear that Socrates has in fact made the specific agreement that the Laws claim he has made. Even if we grant that by staying in Athens, Socrates has agreed to give the city some authority, why suppose that he has given the city the kind of far-reaching authority implied by the "persuade or obey" formulation? It seems just as reasonable to claim that he has agreed to only a more qualified form of authority, such as: "persuade or obey, except in cases when obedience would require injustice or result in unnecessary, undeserved, and grievous harm to oneself or others." This sort of agreement would give the city considerable authority over the actions of the citizens. For example, it could justify sending them into harm's way for a necessary war. However, it would limit the city's authority in other cases, including perhaps cases like Socrates' conviction and sentencing. I am not saying that the city and its citizens have reached an agreement of this limited sort. Rather my point is just that the Laws' speech says nothing to close off this possibility or show what is wrong with alternative understandings of the agreement between city and citizen.24 And we can go further than this. For there are also reasons for thinking that Socrates could not consistently enter into the specific agreement that the Laws describe, since it conflicts with his core practical principles. There are two potential sources of this conflict, and the second is more serious than the first. The first concerns Socrates' commitment to directing his life by 27 reasoned deliberation. Some have claimed that this commitment to reason conflicts with any agreement that turns over the control for one's decisions to an outside authority. This supposed conflict has been emphasized by Roslyn Weiss.25 Socrates, Weiss stresses, conducts his life according to his own convictions about what is best to do. As we have seen, Socrates emphasizes earlier in the Crito that his policy is to do whatever the arguments seem to say – arguments, of course, that he and his interlocutor are able to work out for themselves. Weiss emphasizes that Socrates conducts himself as someone "ultimately free to determine for himself what he ought to do."26 For Weiss, this seems to mean that Socrates could never obey the Laws, or any other practical authority: "In the absence of a moral expert, Socrates may obey nothing but his own carefully considered judgment; for him to sign on in advance to 'whatever judgments the city reaches in trials' is for him to relinquish his ultimate authority – and duty – to judge."27 To agree to persuade or obey, then, would be agreeing to live in a manner unworthy of Socratic principles: "The Laws regard the citizen as their slave; Socrates will do nothing unsuitable to a free man."28 The force of Weiss's argument, however, is substantially reduced when we recognize that: 1) it is Socrates himself who is giving the speech of the Laws, and 2) that the speech gives an argument to justify the authority of the Laws and the city. The speech of the Laws aims to convince Socrates that he ought to accept the commands of the city. The speech itself, however, is an argument and not a command. When the Laws speak, they do not simply order Socrates: "Obey!" Rather, they offer him considerations to show why he would be correct to accept the city as having practical authority, and hence correct to obey its commands in his own case. In this speech, then, we have Socrates (in the voice of the Laws) laying out grounds for accepting the city's authority.29 And the fact that Socrates and Crito are able to understand these grounds significantly transforms their relation to that authority. For it is now open to Socrates to submit 28 to the authority of the city in light of his own acceptance of the reasons given for the legitimacy of that authority. Thus if Socrates now accepts these arguments and submits to the city's authority, he obeys in a way that is different from how a young child obeying its parents. For a young child does not give or accept a reasoned justification of parental authority.30 But a reasoned justification for their authority is precisely what the speech of the Laws aims to provide. So the dialogue itself suggests the way that Socrates could submit to the authority of the Laws without thereby compromising his commitment to reason and conscience – by investigating and understanding the grounds of the authority to which he submits. Weiss' contrast between the life of reason and submission to authority seems to overlook the possibility of a critical acceptance of authority, as if all submission was slavish or unthinking. However, there is a second, stronger reason for thinking that Socrates' principles are inconsistent with the "persuade or obey" agreement: Such an agreement would require Socrates to do an injustice if the city were to command an unjust act, whereas Socrates is committed to never doing an injustice. Thus Socrates could not consistently agree to give the city the sort of unlimited authority the Laws claim for it. This point has also been stressed by Weiss, as well as Harte and Bostock.31 However, Brickhouse and Smith have defended the consistency of Socrates' commitment to the "persuade or obey" agreement, on the grounds that if the city possesses genuine authority, then a citizen cannot act unjustly in obeying its commands or laws, whether or not those commands or laws are just.32 As they say: [F]or when the Laws announce the "persuade or obey" doctrine, the Laws insist that their requirements are justly imposed upon citizens. Moreover, the analogies the Laws provide – in which the authority of the state over the citizen is likened to that of masters over slaves and parents over children – seem to depict a kind of authority in which the 29 responsibility for what is commanded by the authority is wholly the authority's own. By this analogy, then, it would be just for a citizen to obey an unjust law, and the problem that has so exercised scholars would simply vanish.33 Thus Socrates' agreement with the city is not inconsistent with his commitment to justice, because acting in obedience absolves him from acting unjustly. Contrary to this suggestion by Brickhouse and Smith, it is highly implausible to hold that a person always acts justly in obeying an unjust command or law, just so long as the political authority issuing the law possesses general authority for commands and laws. While it might be possible for obedience to absolve a person from injustice in certain instances, it is not true that obedience guarantees one to be free of injustice. Suppose that the city possesses practical authority, but then commands Socrates to participate in the massacre of an innocent town. Ought we to say that in such a case Socrates would be acting justly, simply because he acts in obedience to a command from a legitimate authority? Rather, the case shows the opposite – one may act in obedience to a command from a generally legitimate authority but still act unjustly.34 In fact, the Apology provides an example of Socrates disobeying a command of the city's authorities, precisely because the act was commanded was unjust. Socrates says that, during the rule of the Thirty, he was ordered to bring in Leon of Salamis to be put to death. Socrates refused, however, on the grounds that doing so would have been unjust and impious. (Ap 32d). Brickhouse and Smith claim that this example does not actually show Socrates' willingness to violate a directive from a legal authority, since the rule of the Thirty is not an instance of valid legal authority.35 However, in the Apology Socrates does not claim that the rule of the Thirty was illegitimate, and he does not give that as the grounds of his disobedience to their order. If that was the decisive factor for his disobedience, we would have expected him to mention this. 30 Instead the reason he gives for disobeying the command is that the action he was commanded to do was unjust and impious. Moreover, suppose that the legitimate authorities in Athens had commanded Socrates to commit some atrocity, such as putting many innocent people to death. It is hard to accept that Socrates would have been free from injustice in obeying, or that he would have seen himself as obligated to obey in such a case.36 So the problem remains: If the citizen's agreement is to "persuade or obey" whatever is commanded, then the agreement could require an unjust action, contingent upon the direction the City takes in a given situation. And thus the agreement is inconsistent with the Socratic commitment to act justly in every situation, in which case there is reason to think Socrates did not – or at least should not – make such an agreement. 4. Reason, Authority, and Democracy The Laws never claim that Socrates' conviction and sentencing was based on good grounds, or on proper considerations of truth and justice. They point out that if Socrates escapes, those who convicted him will take this as confirmation that they were correct to think he corrupted the young and ignorant. But the Laws do not say that those who convicted him were correct. In fact, the Laws suggest the opposite when they say to Socrates, "As it is, you depart, if you depart, after being wronged not by us, the laws, but by men" (54b, Grube). Presumably those who have wronged Socrates are his accusers and those jurors who voted against him. In allowing that Socrates is being wronged by these men, the Laws suggest that the arguments brought forth against him were bad arguments, and that his conviction was not based on proper considerations. For if it was based on good grounds and the proper decision was reached, how 31 could Socrates claim to have gotten something other than what he deserved? And if those who convicted him gave him what he deserved, how could Socrates claim to have been wronged?37 In fact, the Laws' admission that the correct decision was not reached in Socrates' case is precisely what leads to the city's appeal to its own practical authority. For the Laws recognize that the natural protest by someone in Socrates' position is to say: "The City wronged us, and it did not make the correct judgment." (50c, Grube) The discussion of authority, including the parent analogy and the persuade or obey agreement, comes in response to this protest. The Laws' argumentative strategy is to separate the question of the city's practical authority from the question of the merits of the case against Socrates. Their claim is that even if Socrates is correct to think that the wrong decision was reached in his own case, he should nevertheless submit to the decision as a command of the city. The Laws' argumentative strategy depends on an important feature of practical authority that we discussed earlier in contrasting commands with expert advice – namely, that a person under authority can have decisive reason to obey a command even if he recognizes that apart from the command he has best reason to do something other than what he has been commanded to do. If I am a soldier and I have been ordered to take a certain route, I may have decisive reason to take that route, even if I know that my commander has not chosen the best route and that, apart from the command, there is good reason for me to take a different route. A subordinate does not lose his obligation to obey – and conversely, an authority does not lose his right to be obeyed – simply because a command is incorrect in this way.38 So it might be the case that even though Socrates' case was decided wrongly, the decision nevertheless has the status of an authoritative command of the city, and thus it gives Socrates a reason to accept his sentence. 32 As we have seen, the Laws' defense of the city's authority depends upon comparing the city to human authorities such as parents or military commanders. The "persuade or obey" requirement implies that citizens can persuade the city, and thus the city is represented as able to understand arguments that citizens bring forth. Parents or military commanders issue directives on the basis of their understanding of the situation. Likewise, the city commands its citizens in light of arguments, including arguments about the justice of a proposed action (51b-c). Now, there are certain conditions that must be in place if a person (or entity) is able to possess the standing authority to issue authoritative commands. Prominent among these conditions is that the would-be-commander has the deliberate capacity to grasp the relevant reasons for and against various courses of action, and to command on the basis of them. Socrates' description of "the many," however, gives us reason to think that the city lacks such deliberative capacity, and hence cannot possess the authority it claims. So if Socrates earlier description of the many is accurate, he has reason to reject the authority of the city's commands. Before the speech of the Laws, Socrates claims that when the many act, as in the case of Socrates' trial, they act haphazardly, or at random (ποιοῦσι δὲ τοῦτο ὃτι ἂν τύχωσι 44d) It is clear that, in Socrates' view, the many do not possess a proper understanding of what is good or just or beautiful. That is why he and Crito should not listen to the opinions of the many in reasoning about what to do. The decisions of the many, then, are not likely to be based on proper considerations. Given their lack of understanding, there is no reason to think that they many will judge correctly and choose the best course in a situation. However – and this is the key point – what is true of the many is relevant to the city considered as an entity that gives authoritative directives to its citizens. For clearly the image of the city as deliberating and issuing commands is a way of talking about what happens when some or all of the citizens of Athens come to a 33 decision. And Athens is a democracy, so in cases such as Socrates' trail, this deliberation and decision-making is done by the many. The city can be represented as "persuadable", and as acting on the basis of argument, precisely because those who make the decision do so on the basis of debate and discussion prior to a collective decision. In Socrates own case, this debate and discussion was obviously the trial itself, including the speeches by the prosecution and by Socrates, and the votes of the jurors. It is the many, then, who determined the course of the city in Socrates' case.39 So a command of the city is based on deliberation by the many. Since the many act without an understanding of the good, this means that the city acts without a proper understanding of the good – at least on occasions when the city's decisions are determined by the many, as in Socrates' trial. The city, then, issues commands haphazardly, and there is no reason to think that the city's decisions will be based on good grounds.40 Thus it is doubtful that the city, guided as it is by the many, has the deliberative capacity necessary to possess the practical authority it claims to possess. Of course a parent or military leader might be fallible, but it would make no sense to recognize the authority of a person who did not standardly issue commands in light of good reasons. That is why if a parent loses this deliberative capacity – e.g. by going insane – he also loses his practical authority over his children. Likewise a military commander who is unable to issue commands on the good reasons has become "unfit for command." However, just such an inability to decide well is implied by Socrates' earlier description of the many as lacking understanding and acting at random.41 To see the problem for the authority of court's verdict, consider an analogy. Suppose Socrates' jury had been comprised of 4-year olds. Such jurors could not possess practical authority in a law court, and the decisions of such a jury could not be authoritative. This is 34 because 4-year olds do not possess the capacity to understand the relevant information and to deliberate toward a proper judgment. According to Socrates, however, the same is true of the many, at least in matters of justice. The issue I am raising here is separate from the distinction between "procedural justice" and "substantive justice." It might be suggested that even though substantive justice was not achieved in Socrates case (=he was declared guilty even though he was in fact innocent), nevertheless procedural justice was achieved, insofar as he was given a fair trial, with a chance to offer a defense, the jurors were not bribed, etc. And it might be further argued that Socrates should accept the verdict as the legitimate outcome of procedural justice. However, the problem of deliberative capacity is prior to such a point about procedural justice. For just procedures and institutions depend upon the ability of those who participate in them to reason well and arrive at correct decisions. Thus we would not care about the procedural justice of trials if judges and jurors did not standardly have the capacity to evaluate evidence properly, to apply the law, and to reach correct decisions about guilt and innocence. More generally, the point is that if the institutions of a democracy are to have practical authority over citizens, then the citizens who make decisions within those institutions must have the capacity to deliberate well. For in a democracy, the authority of the city's institutions is realized in the rule of citizens over one another. To the extent that the many lack capacity for good deliberation, one of the background conditions for legitimate democratic rule is eroded. This raises serious interpretive questions. Does Plato intend for his readers to recognize the tension between Socrates' description of the many and the idea that Athens has practical authority over its citizens? If so, are we meant to side with Socrates? Does Crito cast doubt on the idea that any democracy could have practical authority? I hope to have shown how these 35 questions arise from a careful reading of the dialogue. Addressing them, however, is beyond the scope of this essay. 1 As Michael Stokes has emphasized, the Crito is the one case in Plato's dialogues where we find Socrates "deliberating jointly with his interlocutor whether or not to perform a particular specific single action." Dialectic in Action: An Examination of Plato's Crito (The Classical Press of Wales: 2005) 15. 2 When referring to the Laws as a personified orator in the dialogue, I capitalize "Laws." 3 See, for example, the arguments of Bostock and Weiss discussed below. Another recent commentator who fails to appreciate the role of authoritative commands in the argument of the Laws, and hence misses much of what is true in the Laws speech, is Kyle Scott, "Lessons from the Crito", Polis Vol. 26, No. 1 (2009) 31-52. 4 I focus here on what I take to be the most important arguments in the Laws' speech. The Laws make other points that I will not address. 5 I am not aiming to give an exhaustive taxonomy of the ways that others' opinions can be practically relevant for us, or even to address all the forms of practical relevance in Crito. 6 I have relied on several English translations of Crito, along with the Greek text. If unattributed, the translations are mine. 7 Verity Harte "Conflicting Values in Plato's Crito" in Plato's Euthyphro, Apology, and Crito: Critical Essays ed. Rachana Kamtekar (Rowman and Littlefield: Oxford, 2005) 229-259. See esp. 240-241. 8 Here and elsewhere, I use the term "opinion" to mean simply a person's beliefs or views, regardless of whether or not those views are an expression of knowledge. By "opinion" I do not mean "mere opinion" where that contrasts with knowledge or understanding. 9 Crito translated by G.M.A. Grube, in Plato: Complete Works ed. John Cooper (Indiana: Hackett, 1997) pgs. 37-48. 10 I thank Agnes Callard for this example, along with helpful discussion of this point. 36 11 The relationship to the trainer is similar to what Elizabeth Anscombe's describes as "believing someone" for the truth, which contrasts with seeing the truth for yourself on the basis of reasons. See "What Is It to Believe Someone?" in Faith in Hard Ground eds. Mary Geach and Luke Gormally (Exeter, UK: Imprint Academic, 2008) 1-10. Anscombe points out that the teacher of philosophy does not want her students to believe her, but to see for themselves. The point of philosophy is frustrated if the student says, "OK. You tell me Descartes' argument is flawed. I'll take your word for it. I believe its flawed." In contrast, a teacher of history might be happy to have the students accept a historical fact on the basis of her testimony – e.g. to believe that there was a race riot in Chicago in 1919 because she tells them so in her lecture. In that case, the students believe her for the truth. 12 Considered as an argument against retaliation, Socrates' reasoning is inadequate. He argues that 1) one must never to do wrong, and 2) inflicting wrong in return for a wrong (=retaliation) is wrongdoing, and thus 3) one must never inflict wrong in return for wrong (=one must not retaliate). The defender of retaliation, however, can agree with #1 but reject premise #2, insisting that while retaliating might involving harming the offender, it does not involve wronging him, in the sense of treating him unfairly or failing to give him his due. Thus, as an argument for the conclusion that retaliation is wrongdoing in the sense of injustice, the argument assumes in premise #2 what needs to be proved. 13 I agree with Bostock, who argues that "persuade or obey" cannot be satisfied merely by attempting to persuade, even if one was unsuccessful. See David Bostock, "An Interpretation of Plato's Crito", Phronesis vol. XXXV no. 1 (1990), 1-20, esp. 14-16. 14 Cf. Joseph Raz who, following H.L.A. Hart, describes authoritative utterances as "contentindependent" utterances: "A reason is content-independent if there is no direct connection between the reason and the action for which it is a reason. The reason is in the apparently 'extraneous' fact that someone in authority has said so, and within certain limits his saying so would be reason for any number of action, including (in typical cases) for contradictory ones. A certain authority may command me to 37 leave the room or to say in it. Either way, its command will be a reason." The Morality of Freedom (Oxford: OUP, 1986) 35. 15 This reveals that the authority of expert opinion is really theoretical authority, rather than practical authority. The expert is better positioned to say what is the case, or what reason for belief there are, and thus he may have a legitimate claim to be believed for the truth. 16 In the way that it differs from following expert advice, treating something as a command shares something with treating it as force/threat. In both cases, it is the fact that the other person thinks or says something that gives me a reason to act in a certain way. In the case of a command, however, the relevance of the command is not simply as a means of predicting what the other person will do. 17 Bostock, "An Intepretation" 20. 18 The Apology also makes it clear that Socrates does not think there are good grounds for his conviction. 19 Crito translator R.E. Allen in The Dialogues of Plato: Volume I (New Haven, Yale: 1989). 20 At 50c1-2, Socrates considers a reply to the Laws' opening questions that prepares the way for such justifications of disobedience : "Shall we say in answer, 'The city wronged me, and its decision was not right.' Shall we say that, or what?" (Grube) 21 The Laws also appeal to the master-slave relationship (51a1), though this is less emphasized, presumably because Socrates does not have a master. 22 Charles Young rightly emphasizes that the Laws main argument depends on the idea that doing violence to the city is wrong. However, Young does not consider what I think is the key question: why suppose that Socrates' disobedience would count as violence against the city? To understand the Laws' answer to that question, we need to recognize the special nature of practical authority and authority reasons. See Charles Young, "Plato's Crito On the Obligation to Obey the Law" Philosophical Inquiry Vol XXVIII, No 1-2 (2006) 79-89. 23 There is a superficial tension between the agreement argument and the parent-child analogy. One does not agree to enter into an authority-relation with one's parents. So the reverence and obedience owed to 38 parents, it seems, is not the result of agreement. A family is not an all-volunteer army. Thus if the city has its authority by agreement, it seems it must be a different kind of authority from a parent's authority. So probably the parent-child argument is meant only to give us a picture of a relationship with similar features to the relationship between city and citizen. The analogy presents the possibility of authorityrelations and suggests some their features, beginning with a central and non-controversial case. It highlights the fact that we already understand and accept such a relation in the case of our parents. A citizen's relationship to one's city is not exactly like a relationship one's parents, since in the parent case there is no need for an agreement. Having been birthed, nurtured and educated by Athens, the citizen owes the city reverence. This reverence is consistent with choosing to leave Athens once one is grown. But if one chooses to remain, then one agrees to "persuade or obey" the city and its commands. The situation, then, is perhaps similar to an adult child choosing to live in his parent's home. The adult child owes reverence to the parents simply as his parents. And in addition, by choosing to stay in their home, the adult child agrees to "live by the rules" that his parents set down for their home. 24 For an interesting discussion of the process of becoming a citizen in Athens, and the idea of an implicit agreement between city and citizens, see Richard Kraut "Dokimasia, Satisfaction, and Agreement" in Plato's Euthyphro, Apology, and Crito: Critical Essays ed. Rachana Kamtekar (Oxford, UK: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005) 175-209. Kraut's main focus in this essay in on the manner by which a citizen of Athens committed himself to the authority of the city. Nothing Kraut says, I think, satisfies the worry I am raising in this paragraph about the content of that commitment. 25 Roslyn Weiss, Socrates Dissatisfied: An Analysis of Plato's Crito (Oxford: OUP, 1998). 26 Ibid., 93. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid., 112. 29 In saying this, I am not claiming that the Laws are voicing Socrates own views. 39 30 In discussing the Laws' parent-child analogy, it is worth noting that Socrates earlier says that he and Crito must not be frightened by the threats of the many in the way that children are frightened by bogey. The implication, I take it, is that the physical harms the many can inflict are not true harms to be feared, or at least not the sort of harms that should be of consequence to adult practical reasoners in Socrates' situation. Also, Socrates suggests that they would be like children if they did not take seriously their earlier discussions about justice (49b) 31 Weiss Socrates, 109; Harte "Conflicting Values" 235-238; Bostock, "An Interpretation" 20. 32 Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith Philosophy Compass 1/6 (2006): 564-570 33 Ibid., 568. 34 I say "generally" legitimate authority to preserve the point that in this case with this command, the authority in question does not hold: the city does not provide decisive reason to do this. But this does not mean that the city does not have other, and perhaps far reaching, practical authority over its citizens. 35 Ibid. 36 For similar criticisms of Brickhouse and Smith, see Young "Plato's Crito" 82-84. 37 It is possible, of course, for a trial to be fairly conducted, and for the judge and jury to do their jobs properly, and nevertheless for an innocent person to be wrongly convicted – e.g. if a man was cleverly framed by another person, but the judge and jury had no way of knowing this. In that case, the jurors might act on good grounds ( = the best available evidence and reasoning) but still not reach the proper decision ( = they declare someone guilty who is in fact innocent). In a case like this, perhaps we would say that the innocent person suffered a wrong as the result of the jury's decision, but the jurors did not wrong him. Or perhaps we would say that the jurors wronged him, but not culpably. In any event, I think the situation with Socrates jurors is clearly not of this type. 38 Note that this point is consistent with the idea, argued for in 3.2, that a subordinate may sometimes have good reason to disobey a well-formed command from a legitimate practical authority. 40 39 "In proportion to their population, the Athenians must have spent more man-hours in judging than any other people in history. Not for nothing did the juror become a symbol of Athens in comic cross-talk. In Aristophanes's Clouds, for example: 'Look, this is Athens.' 'What? I don't believe it; I can't see any jurors sitting'...All this made it easy to identify a jury with the whole population. An Athenian jury was the Athenian people. When a speaker addressing a jury wishes to refer to the Athenian state, his word for it is the pronoun 'you.' And since in democratic Athens the people was supreme, a decision by a jury was final. There could be no appeal." Douglas M. MacDowell The Law in Classical Athens (Ithica, NY: Cornell University Press: 1978) 40. 40 Although Scott (2009) does not discuss the concepts of deliberative capacity and practical authority, he pursues a related line of thought about democracy and the judgments of "the many." 41 Of course a parent who was acting entirely haphazardly could not fulfill that distinctive role or perform its characteristic activities – raising, educating, protecting, etc. How, then, was the city able to act as a parent, given that the city is governed by the many and the many act at random? Socrates' description of the many casts doubt, it seems, on the Laws' claim that the city has done these things.

La società degli individui, n. 7, anno III, 2000/1 Nietzsche: il misticismo del dolore Federica Montevecchi Nessuna argomentazione critica nei confronti della filosofia hegeliana, e più in generale dell'astratta, fredda, impersonale ragione lontana dagli uomini concreti e dal dolore e disagio delle loro esistenze, fu efficace quanto l'irrompere nella storia della filosofia – attraverso l'opera di Nietzsche, o quelle di Schopenhauer e Kierkegaard di ciò che con Hegel si era soliti ritenere extrafilosofico, vale a dire della vita nelle diverse forme dell'esperienza individuale, della biografia interiore. Nietzsche in seinen Werken di Lou Andreas Salomé, la prima analisi critica di rilievo sull'opera di Nietzsche, sembra mostrare esemplarmente questo evento della storia del pensiero, questa involontaria tendenza critica eleggendola a chiave di lettura. Pubblicata nel 1894, quando Nietzsche era ancora in vita sebbene avvolto nelle spire della follia, l'opera di Andreas Salomé, fu subito accolta favorevolmente dalla critica, poi ebbe, nonostante il suo valore, un destino di oblio. In Italia a venti anni di distanza dalla prima e da tempo introvabile traduzione, gli Editori Riuniti la ripropongono, nella cura di Enrico Donaggio e Domenico M. Fazio, con il titolo, piuttosto riduttivo e fuorviante, di Vita di Nietzsche. La caratterizzazione di Nietzsche proposta da Andreas Salomé si articola in tre momenti. Anzitutto è definita la natura del filosofo, segue l'analisi delle sue trasformazioni e, infine, del suo "sistema". La premessa da cui l'autrice muove è proprio che un corretto approccio a Nietzsche non può prescindere dalla considerazione del nesso vita e pensiero, che in lui si presenta indissolubile. Andreas Salomé discusse tale premessa, così come la prima parte del volume e alcune sezioni della seconda, con Nietzsche stesso. In una lettera del 1882, che quest'ultimo scrisse all'amica e che fa da prologo al saggio, "l'idea di una riduzione dei sistemi filosofici ai documenti personali dei loro autori" è definita come "il pensiero di una mente sorella". Nietzsche riproporrà la stessa idea in Al di là del bene e del male con le seguenti parole: "Mi si è chiarito poco per volta che cosa è stata fino ad ora ogni grande filosofia: l'autoconfessione, cioè, del suo autore, nonché una specie di non volute e inavvertite mémoires". Il nesso inscindibile di vita e pensiero, a parere di Andreas Salomé, si mostra in parti164 colare nel caso di Nietzsche, poiché egli "descriveva soltanto se stesso, volgeva in pensieri il proprio io". Il valore del suo pensiero, infatti, non risiederebbe tanto o soltanto nell'originalità teoretica quanto e soprattutto nella personalità, nella forza interiore in cui tale pensiero è esperito e da cui scaturisce. La dote filosofica è dunque espressione dell'interiorità. Quest'ultima è sì forza vitale ma, anche e soprattutto nel caso di Nietzsche, fonte intellettuale, in cui volontà ragione e sentimento sono indistinti, e insieme fonte mistico-religiosa. Tanto che Andreas Salomé giunge all'affermazione che "le diverse filosofie sono per Nietzsche altrettanti surrogati di Dio che lo devono aiutare a fare a meno di un ideale mistico di Dio al di fuori di se stesso". Coerentemente con la sua premessa, Andreas Salomé sostiene che il fondo su cui poggia lo sviluppo intellettuale e la filosofia di Nietzsche è l'immagine della sua natura i cui segni caratteristici, solitudine e dolore, sono interpretati alla luce della categoria dell'anelito religioso. La storia dello spirito, dell'opera e anche della follia di Nietzsche sarebbe riconducibile alla "morte di Dio", alla perdita di fede religiosa da parte del filosofo e si mostrerebbe come il tentativo continuo "di trovare nelle forme più diverse della divinizzazione di se stesso un surrogato per il Dio perduto". Perduto Dio, infatti, Nietzsche, cui rimase una sorta di nostalgia religiosa e metafisica, avrebbe rivolto l'anelito religioso al proprio interno, autoisolandosi e relazionandosi soltanto con se stesso, anziché con una potenza esterna, mosso dalla volontà di eternare sé, quindi l'individuo in generale, e di affermare una vita integra. Di fatto, però, scrive Andreas Salomé, egli ottenne il contrario di ciò cui aspirava: "non una più alta unità del suo essere, ma la sua più intima scissione, non la fusione di tutti i sentimenti e gli istinti in un individuo indiviso, ma il loro dissidio in un dividuo". Con la "morte di Dio", l'interiorità di Nietzsche, non avendo più una via semplice e obbligata di manifestazione e conciliazione dei propri conflitti in una potenza esterna, si consacra alla conoscenza, conservando in se stessa ogni conflitto e votandosi così alla scissione permanente. La forza creatrice e intellettuale di Nietzsche dipendeva dalla contraddittorietà degli impulsi del suo io e il raggiungimento dell'autoaffermazione era condizionato in lui dalla sofferenza fisica e psichica e , al tempo stesso, aveva necessità del dolore, di esperirlo per poterlo continuamente superare. Tanto che il suo sviluppo intellettuale è letto da Andreas Salomé come un continuo ammalarsi e guarire del pensiero. Il dolore, dunque, come mezzo di conoscenza, che fa vedere per un istante ciò che gli altri non possono vedere, un'esperienza sì emarginante, ma che permette di avere consapevolezza della duplice natura delle cose. La filosofia come estrema trasfigurazione del dolore, come maschera sempre cangiante, 165 sempre inadeguata e superficiale, di indicibili sofferenze, di un'interiorità divisa e inconoscibile non a caso la dedica posta da Andreas Salomé al suo lavoro recita: a uno sconosciuto, in fedele ricordo. Le trasformazioni della filosofia di Nietzsche dovrebbero allora essere considerate alla luce della lotta infinita che avveniva, nella sua interiorità, fra autoapoteosi e sacrificio di sé, fra bisogno di conoscenza e sazietà per ogni chiarezza raggiunta. Andreas Salomé, premettendo che il pensiero di Nietzsche ha uno sviluppo circolare che sempre ritorna su se stesso e non giunge mai ad un punto di arresto, individua tre trasformazioni fondamentali del suo itinerario speculativo. Esse corrispondono alle tre fasi caratteristiche, acquisite ormai come canoniche dalla critica nietzscheana, in base alle quali a un primo periodo comprendente La nascita della tragedia e le quattro Considerazioni inattuali in cui la filosofia di Nietzsche ha un carattere schopenhaueriano e wagneriano, subentra il periodo cosiddetto positivistico, comprendente gli scritti che vanno da Umano troppo umano a La gaia scienza. È questa la fase in cui avviene la rottura dell'amicizia con Wagner, l'inaugurazione dello stile aforistico e di un nuovo metodo filosofico. L'ultima fase, infine, è quella in cui si rivela, a parere di Andreas Salomé, il tratto caratteristico della personalità di Nietzsche, ossia l'anelito religioso. In questi anni in cui furono composti gli scritti che vanno da Così parlò Zarathustra ai frammenti scritti in vista de La volontà di potenza Nietzsche scivolerebbe "dentro il mondo della mistica" e contemporaneamente inizierebbe a sviluppare il suo sistema. La parte del saggio di Andreas Salomé relativa al "sistema Nietzsche" è la più chiara per quanto riguarda la precisazione dell'anelito religioso di Nietzsche come anelito mistico, ma al tempo stesso la più forzata per quanto concerne la tesi che la filosofia di Nietzsche, volta a soddisfare l'anelito mistico-religioso da cui è mossa e a ricomporre la spaccatura interiore che tale anelito ha originato, costituirebbe una teoria della conoscenza destinata a divenire sistema. In verità, l'esito della lotta di Nietzsche per la conoscenza non pare essere una teoria, quanto un'esperienza, quella dell'eterno ritorno in cui la scissione interiore si ricompose, ma non con il raggiungimento di un'integrità individuale, bensì attraverso il superamento dei limiti dell'individuazione, grazie alla coincidenza fra volontà di eternarsi e vita in generale che sempre muta ripetendosi all'infinito. Questo è l'enigma, l'ultima terribile conoscenza in cui Nietzsche s'immerse e si perse. L'interpretazione di Andreas Salomé pare evocare alcuni motivi fondamentali della cultura greca, in particolare di quella arcaica, che tanta parte ebbe nella formazione intellettuale e nel pensiero di Nietzsche. Secondo questa cultura enigma e follia sono i segni distintivi 166 della conoscenza misterica, o meglio di quella sapienza dionisiaca che per sua natura non può tradursi in parola, in logos in quanto è conoscenza non comunicabile a tutti. È in questa prospettiva che la categoria interpretativa dell'anelito mistico-religioso, adottata da Andreas Salomé, sembra potersi intendere nel suo significato preciso. Vale a dire nel suo significato originario non ancora screditato dalla polemica moderna, che oppone il razionalismo al misticismo, o da indebiti accostamenti alla religione cristiana. Il misticismo è, nella cultura greca, l'espressione di una vita interiore, di uno thymós che non può comunicarsi in una maniera accessibile a chiunque poiché fra di esso e ogni sua possibile rappresentazione permane uno scarto incolmabile. Soltanto chi partecipa di quella vita interiore, o di una affine, può ricevere una corretta comunicazione di essa. E forse non è un caso che l'opera di Andreas Salomé sia il risultato di chi ha sfiorato, o ha tentato di partecipare, alla vita interiore di Nietzsche. Nietzsche in seinen Werken è un libro importante per diverse ragioni. Innanzitutto esso rende giustizia al valore intellettuale di Andreas Salomé, ricordata, invece, quasi esclusivamente, per essere stata la donna che si legò sentimentalmente a personalità importanti, come Freud e Rilke. Inoltre, questo saggio, essendo basato sulla conoscenza diretta di Nietzsche e sull'assenso che egli diede a buona parte di esso riconoscendovisi, ha il pregio della testimonianza. Infine, Nietzsche in seinen Werken presenta un'analisi psicologica illuminante e alcune importanti intuizioni e argomentazioni critiche che, sviluppate in direzioni diverse, si ritrovano in noti interpreti successivi che non sempre hanno riconosciuto in maniera adeguata il loro debito nei confronti del lavoro di Andreas Salomé. Ancora oggi si potrebbero usare le parole di Karl Löwith il quale, nel 1956, affermò che nei cinquant'anni successivi all'opera di Andreas Salomé non "fu pubblicata nessuna interpretazione più centrata di questa, ma anche nessuna che al giorno d'oggi venga tenuta in minor conto". LOU ANDREAS SALOMÉ, Vita di Nietzsche, Editori Riuniti, Roma 1998, pp. 253, L. 28.000.

Resumen Es una opinión extendida que la tolerancia, en cuanto práctica política, tiene valor meramente instrumental. El objetivo de este artículo es defender, por el contrario, que ella tiene valor político en sí. Específicamente, defenderé que es valiosa en sí misma a causa de su relación intrínseca con la democracia. La tolerancia es un constituyente de la democracia en cuanto es necesaria para que pueda existir una administración democrática del poder político. Mostraré que esa relación de constitución existe porque la tolerancia, mediante la protección de espacios de contestación al poder político, contribuye a la resolución de una tensión interna de la democracia en su implementación práctica. Palabras clave: tolerancia, democracia, poder, valor intrínseco. Abstract It is a widespread opinion that toleration, as a political practice, has merely instrumental value. The aim of this paper is to defend, on the contrary, that toleration has political value in itself. In more specific terms, I will claim that it is valuable in itself in virtue of its intrinsic relationship with democracy. Toleration is a constituent of democracy inasmuch as it is necessary for the existence of a democratic administration of political power. I will show that that relation of constitution holds because toleration, through the protection of spaces of contestation to the political power, contributes to solving democracy's inner tension resulting from its practical implementation. Keywords: toleration, democracy, power, intrinsic value. 1 Doctorando en Filosofía. Universidad de los Andes, Instituto de Filosofía. San Carlos de Apoquindo 2.200, 7620001, Santiago, Región Metropolitana, Chile. Universidad Bernardo O Higgins, Departamento de Ciencias del Derecho. General Gana 1702, Metro Rondizzoni, Santiago, Chile. E-mail: [email protected]. This paper is part of the project Fondecyt 1130493 "John Owen y John Locke. Concepciones rivales de la tolerancia en la escolástica protestante y el temprano liberalismo". It was written while the author was receiving funding from CONICYT-PCHA/Doctorado Nacional/2014. The author wants to thank Manfred Svensson and Eduardo Galaz for their valuable insights. La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia Democracy and the political value of toleration Eduardo Fuentes1 Universidad de los Andes Universidad Bernardo O Higgins New version with errata published on June 17, 2016. Filosofia Unisinos 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Unisinos – doi: 10.4013/fsu.2015.162.05 This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits reproduction, adaptation, and distribution provided the original author and source are credited. 165 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia Introducción Independientemente de sus consecuencias, la tolerancia tiene valor en sí. Es decir, vivir en un régimen de tolerancia, en el que las estructuras políticas están organizadas de tal forma que se asegura la práctica de la tolerancia en la sociedad tiene, valor en sí mismo. De manera importante, la tolerancia es valiosa en sí a pesar de que el contenido de los actos de tolerancia específicos no sea normativamente valioso. Esa es la tesis central de este artículo: la estructura formal de la tolerancia tiene valor en sí. La razón que aduciré es que la democracia tiene valor en sí, y la tolerancia es un bien constitutivo de ella. La principal consecuencia práctica que derivaré de ella es que hay una fuerte presión normativa para fomentar un régimen de tolerancia y que, por ende, cualquier acto que vaya en contra éste debe contar con una justificación poderosa. Al defender esa tesis me opongo a gran parte de las personas trabajando en la filosofía de la tolerancia, quienes o ven en ella valor meramente instrumental o la valoran intrínsecamente sólo si su contenido, más allá de su estructura formal, es normativamente valioso. Antes de entrar en el cuerpo del artículo, algunas clarificaciones son necesarias. Primero, asumo un concepto mínimo de la tolerancia, puramente descriptivo. Se diferencia de otros conceptos normativamente cargados, como el que relaciona la tolerancia con el reconocimiento (Galeotti, 2002) o con la mutualidad (Creppell, 2008). Igualmente el concepto que empleo se diferencia del defendido por autores como Rawls (2005) o Forst (2013), quienes restringen las razones aceptables dentro del concepto de tolerancia a aquellas de tipo moral o razonable. Prefiero el concepto mínimo porque me parece captar mejor el fenómeno histórico asociado a la tolerancia que sus versiones más comprometidas normativamente –véase en este respecto Kaplan (2007), donde se analiza la práctica de la tolerancia religiosa durante la Modernidad temprana entendiéndola en términos puramente descriptivos–; asimismo, siguiendo a Balint (2014), sostengo que el concepto descriptivo es particularmente ajustado para el análisis de las situaciones políticas en las que querríamos emplear el marco teórico de la tolerancia. Este concepto de tolerancia corresponde a un acto que sigue determinada estructura formal de razones en la deliberación del sujeto de la tolerancia. Este concepto tiene cinco componentes (Newey, 1999, c. 1; Cohen, 2004). Primero, el componente de la objeción. S tolera la práctica p del sujeto T sólo si S objeta la realización de p por T.2 Segundo, el componente de interferencia. S tolera la práctica p de T sólo si S tiene razones que justifican el interferir con dicha práctica. Tercero, el componente de la aceptación. S tolera la práctica p de T sólo si S tiene razones que justifican el aceptar la ocurrencia de p por T. Cuarto, el componente del poder. S tolera la práctica p de T sólo si S cree tener el poder para interferir con ella. Estos cuatro componentes determinan la estructura de razones. Para que el acto de no interferencia de S sea un acto de tolerancia debe conformarse a esa estructura. Luego, el quinto componente es el de comportamiento. S tolera la práctica p de T sólo si S no interfiere con ella a causa de una decisión que es el resultado de su deliberación acerca de los cuatro componentes anteriores y su relación entre sí. En este sentido, la tolerancia es, siguiendo a Newey (2001, p. 317), ejecutiva. Es decir, requiere de una ejecución razonada de manera específica. La segunda clarificación es que este artículo trata sobre el valor intrínseco de la práctica de la tolerancia, no de la virtud correspondiente. El concepto que 2 En adelante utilizaré "práctica" para referirme a cualquiera sea el objeto de la tolerancia. Nótese que puede ser que S objete sólo la realización de p por T, en lugar de objetar p simpliciter. Véase Newey (1999, c. 1). 166 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes empleo no supone que un acto deba provenir de una disposición virtuosa hacia la tolerancia para ser un acto tolerante. Tampoco asumo que la práctica de la tolerancia debe estar respaldada por la virtud de la tolerancia si ha de perdurar en el tiempo. La tercera clarificación versa sobre el tipo de valor intrínseco. Es plausible pensar que hay distintos tipos de valor intrínseco. Algo puede ser intrínsecamente valioso porque es bello, o moralmente bueno, o políticamente adecuado, o amable, etcétera. Al preguntarme por su valor intrínseco busco determinar si hay algún valor en vivir en un régimen tolerante. Es decir, el valor que busco es un valor político. Por ende, mi pregunta es si la tolerancia es valorable (querible) políticamente por sí misma. A causa de esto, lo que digo no implica –ni niega– que la tolerancia tenga valor moral, ya que no identifico valor político con valor moral. Por lo tanto, me limito a defender la superioridad política de vivir en un régimen de tolerancia sin pronunciarme acerca de su superioridad moral.3 ¿Qué es valorar algo políticamente? Fundamentalmente, es valorarlo en cuanto parte de la esfera política. No es lo mismo que valorarlo en cuanto, digamos, objeto moral y por eso valorar su presencia en la esfera política. Es preguntarnos qué cosas tienen valor desde la perspectiva de lo propiamente político. Valorar políticamente implica reconocer que la política tiene estándares normativos propios.4 Por "esfera política" entiendo el espacio social en el que se delibera y se toman decisiones acerca de la organización de la sociedad (cf. Newey, 2013, c. 2). Tener valor político es ser querible en cuanto componente de ese espacio. Ahora bien, x es valioso políticamente sólo si es querible en ese espacio concretamente. En mi concepción de valor político, x no puede tenerlo si sólo es querible una vez abstraídas las condiciones prácticas concretas de la esfera política. Especialmente, la forma en que se desenvuelve x en la práctica política impacta en su valoración. No niego la necesidad de cierta idealización, siempre y cuando no implique evaluar a x desde una sociedad ideal –para una defensa y aplicación de este enfoque véase Fuentes (2016).5 Aunque mi argumento tiene consecuencias con respecto a la justificación de la tolerancia, al igual que Scheffler (2010) distingo entre la pregunta que abordo acá –sobre el valor intrínseco de la tolerancia– y la pregunta por su justificación. Con todo, mostrar que ella es valiosa intrínsecamente sin duda contribuye a la tarea de justificarla. Asimismo, mostrar que no lo es contribuye a declararla injustificada. Finalmente, no atacaré directamente la tesis según la que la tolerancia tiene valor meramente instrumental. Obviamente, si mi argumento es exitoso, entonces dicha tesis es falsa. Ella ha sido defendida por varias personas y también muchas han señalado sus problemas. Como muestra, véase Cohen (2014, c. 7) para la defensa, y Scheffler (2010) para indicaciones de sus problemas. El artículo sigue así. Parto presentando el esqueleto de mi argumento central y defiendo sus tres primeras premisas. Explico qué es la democracia, qué significa que tenga valor en sí y cómo sus constituyentes "heredan" ese valor. La parte principal de este artículo corresponde a la tercera sección. Allí defiendo la cuarta premisa del 3 De ahora en adelante, a menos que el contexto claramente indique lo contrario, "valor" refiere al valor político. 4 En este artículo asumo las tesis de la denominada "corriente realista" en la filosofía política, que plantea la independencia de la esfera política con respecto a la esfera moral y otras esferas normativas –sin otorgarle superioridad absoluta–. Véase, entre otros, Rossi y Sleat (2014). 5 Como es claro, mi concepción difiere sustancialmente de la sostenida por Rawls (2005). Aunque en Liberalismo Político no hay una definición explícita de "valor político", se desprende que se refiere a valores cuyo alcance está restringido a la esfera política y que no suponen alguna teoría comprehensiva. Son los valores que fluyen de una concepción política (en su sentido de freestanding y sin alcance comprehensivo) de la justicia. Esta concepción es moral, por lo que los valores políticos son morales (calificados apropiadamente) (cf. Rawls, 2005, p. 11). Pienso que mi concepción es más útil en tanto no está comprometida con ninguna teoría política sustantiva, sea el liberalismo político u otra; nos permite así evaluar el valor político de la tolerancia de manera más general. 167 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia argumento y explico la inferencia a la quinta premisa. Argumento que la tolerancia es una forma de administrar el poder político que realiza la forma democrática de administración de dicho poder. Muestro por qué ella es un requisito de esa administración del político, y por qué eso la vuelve un constituyente de la democracia. Finalmente, la quinta sección concluye analizando qué significa que la tolerancia tenga valor en sí, y la diferencia de atribuirle valor final. Administración democrática y valor en sí Esta es la estructura general del argumento: (1) La democracia tiene valor en sí. (2) Si x es un constituyente de algo que tenga valor en sí en el aspecto adecuado, entonces x tiene valor en sí. (3) La democracia es el régimen de administración igualitaria del poder político. (4) La tolerancia es una administración del poder político que, en condiciones de diversidad, se requiere para realizar una administración igualitaria del poder político. (5) Luego, en condiciones de diversidad, la tolerancia en cuanto administración del poder constituye a la democracia en cuanto régimen de administración del poder (3, 4). (6) Luego, en condiciones de diversidad, la tolerancia tiene valor en sí (1, 2, 5). Esta sección está dedicada a las tres primeras premisas. Puesto que ya he introducido la noción de valor político, partiré por la premisa (1). Seguiré con la premisa (3), explicando qué entiendo por poder político, y por qué entiendo así a la democracia. Cierro la sección con la premisa (2), donde aprovecho de distinguir mi defensa del valor intrínseco y, en cierto sentido, instrumental de la tolerancia de la de su valor meramente instrumental. Definición y valor en sí de la democracia Por razones de espacio simplemente asumiré que la democracia tiene valor en sí.6 No obstante, es útil especificar en virtud de qué característica lo tiene. Ello servirá para entender el razonamiento detrás de las inferencias de mi argumento. En el nivel más básico, la democracia es una manera igualitaria de tomar decisiones colectivas (cf. Christiano, 2015). Mecanismos como la decisión por voto mayoritario se entienden por referencia a ello. Empero, el concepto de democracia no se agota en esos mecanismos. Siguiendo a Dahl (2006, p. 8-10), podemos enumerar las siguientes características que una democracia ideal otorga a la ciudadanía: (a) participación efectiva en la discusión política (b) igualdad al votar (c) capacidad de conocer las políticas a discutir y sus consecuencias (d) control final de la agenda política (e) inclusión de todo ciudadano en los aspectos anteriores (f) derechos fundamentales derivados de las anteriores características. Todas ellas se fundan en la idea de la igualdad política y tienen como corolario mecanismos como el voto mayoritario. La democracia es el sistema político que personifica el ideal de la igualdad política (cf. Dahl, 2006, p. 6). ¿Qué significa ser iguales políticamente? Mi propuesta es que prácticamente todas las anteriores características, y similares, se derivan de la igualdad política 6 Para defensas de esta tesis y defensas de su mero valor instrumental véase Christiano (2003). 168 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes siempre y cuando ésta sea entendida como igualdad en la posesión de poder político (cf. Fuentes, 2016). Luego, la democracia es el ordenamiento político que tiene como fundamento la igual repartición del poder político entre la ciudadanía. Debido a esto asumo que es en virtud de esta igualdad que la democracia tiene valor en sí. Entiendo la igualdad de poder político de forma similar a como Verba (2001) lo hace. A saber, como la igual capacidad de participación política. Pero a diferencia de Verba, no me refiero con ella a la capacidad de los ciudadanos de tener voz en las decisiones gubernamentales. Para que mi concepto de igualdad de poder político implique esa consecuencia se requieren premisas empíricas específicas, como indicaré más adelante. Obviamente, para entender dicho concepto he primero de explicar qué entiendo por "poder político". "Poder" refiere a la capacidad de realizar algo. Según el tipo de actividad a realizar, habrá un distinto tipo de poder. El poder de levantar objetos del suelo es la capacidad de realizar esa acción. Toda capacidad es una propiedad disposicional, por lo que tener el poder de x es tener la propiedad disposicional cuya manifestación es o constituye x (cf. Molnar, 2003). Entre las acciones posibles están las acciones políticas. Ellas son cualquier acción que ocurre dentro de la esfera política. Así, vestirse de determinada manera puede ser una acción política si está inmersa dentro de este espacio de deliberación y toma de decisiones. Una acción está inmersa allí si y sólo si su ocurrencia afecta (ya sea modificando o reforzando) el contenido o estructura de dicho espacio. El poder político es la capacidad de realizar este tipo de acciones. Si una persona tiene ese poder, entonces tiene la correspondiente propiedad disposicional.7 De la descripción anterior se sigue mi rechazo a la forma de Verba de entender la participación política. No es esencial a una acción política el que se dirija directa o indirectamente a las decisiones gubernamentales. Lo político de una acción es anterior a ello. Las acciones son políticas porque afectan el trasfondo desde donde toda acción gubernamental (o toda decisión pública en general) se realiza. Por esto la manera de vestirse puede ser una acción política, pues ella puede configurar este trasfondo, manteniendo o modificando (aunque sea mínimamente) el espacio de posibilidades de cualquier decisión pública. Este punto es central a mi argumento en favor del valor intrínseco de la tolerancia. El poder político es una especie de poder social, puesto que la esfera política es parte de la esfera social. Una acción social no es simplemente una que implique estructuras sociales. Parece plausible que robar dinero es una acción que no entra en la esfera social (de ahí que a los criminales se les suela llamar "antisociales"), aunque presuponga la institución social del dinero.8 Pero ahora uno puede preguntarse por qué no es una acción social. Todavía más, uno puede preguntarse qué hace que una acción entre en las dimensiones social o política. No hay nada en una acción en sí que la haga social (o política) en este sentido. Ella lo será dependiendo de la relación noumenal que establezca con nosotros. Básicamente, la configuración de la esfera social o política depende de que consideremos que dicha acción está justificada social o políticamente. Juzgarla justificada no implica que la consideremos o que efectivamente sea una buena justificación. Basta 7 Nótese que esto implica que la esfera política en cuanto espacio de deliberación no se compone sólo de actos de deliberación estricta, esto es, actos lingüísticos que afirmen o pongan en duda posiciones políticas. Un acto es deliberativo en mi sentido si expresa una toma de posición con respecto al contenido o estructura de esta esfera. 8 Yerra entonces Pansardi (2012) cuando dice que todo poder-para es un poder-sobre porque se requieren relaciones sociales. Yo puedo realizar acciones como firmar un cheque o robar, que son correctamente descritas sólo si se incluyen las relaciones sociales, sino que eso implique que tengo poder social. El poder social es un poder de razones. 169 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia con que se considere que hay razones para esa acción, porque entra en el "espacio de razones".9 El poder social (y político) es la capacidad de realizar acciones así consideradas. De forma relevante, una acción puede juzgarse justificada simplemente porque se realiza por medio de determinada capacidad. Se podría considerar el rayar un muro una acción social porque se realiza por medio de la capacidad racional. También es posible que la posesión por una persona o grupo específico de cierta capacidad, en lugar de la capacidad misma, sea lo que justifique en este sentido la acción por ella realizada. La historia nos da tristes ejemplos de esto: hay quienes se desnudaban frente a sus esclavos sin pudor, sólo porque creían que el acto de estos de mirarlos no constituía una acción social (si acaso humana); eran objetos, y sus acciones meros movimientos naturales. La capacidad de ver no justificaba esa acción como social, porque no pertenecían al grupo privilegiado. Aunque corresponde a otro lugar, creo interesante señalar que muchas de las luchas políticas y sociales pueden entenderse como luchas por el reconocimiento del carácter justificante de la posesión de determinada capacidad.10 Vale notar que a diferencia de Forst no pienso que el poder social (y a fortiori político) consiste en tener la capacidad "to influence, use, determine, occupy, or even seal off the space of reasons for others" (Forst, 2015, p. 116). No enfatizo la capacidad de modificar el espacio de razones que constituye la esfera social, porque alguien podría sólo ocuparlo sin poder cambiarlo, ni, y esto es lo importante, la capacidad de motivar a otras personas. Alguien podría meramente reforzar la configuración de la esfera social, dependiendo de otros para que la modifiquen; también podría no ser capaz de motivar a otras personas a realizar acciones aunque sus propias acciones se consideren justificadas. Esta clarificación será relevante más adelante.11 El poder social (de ahora en adelante, "poder") es entonces una propiedad disposicional extrínseca.12 Es decir, ninguna persona tiene esa capacidad por sí misma, sino en virtud de sus relaciones. En específico, en virtud de estar en una relación con el resto de la sociedad tal que esas otras personas consideren que ella puede realizar acciones pertenecientes a la esfera social. Mutatis mutandis para el poder político. La democracia es precisamente el sistema político que pone a todo ciudadano en esa relación. Esta es la igualdad política que funda todo lo demás. Me parece plausible suponer que es el ponernos a todos en esta relación lo que hace a la democracia valiosa en sí. La democracia como administración del poder político Para tener poder político, a causa de ser una propiedad extrínseca, se requiere estar en cierta relación noumenal. No es necesario que existe una sistema formal para que ella exista. Basta que las personas componentes de la sociedad consideren que la persona x puede realizar acciones políticas. Sin embargo, una vez que tal relación existe se va constituyendo un sistema al menos informal de administración del poder. Con ello 9 Véase Forst (2015). Esta descripción del poder político se basa en lo allí dicho. 10 Esto es distinto a decir que las luchas de los grupos marginados son luchas con el fin de que su derecho a la justificación les sea respetado, como sostiene Forst (2011). 11 Pace Forst, su definición de poder es poder-sobre. No tengo el espacio acá para detallar esto, pero me parece que al centrarse en el poder sobre otras personas, para modificar sus motivaciones, se da una imagen del poder inmanentista. Es decir, se lo entiende como el poder de hacer actuar de determinada manera a otras personas, siendo así esencialmente dominante, a pesar de las intenciones de Forst. Mas el poder es trascendente, es poder para actuar en el mundo, incluyendo para actuar sobre personas. Hemos de enfatizar su carácter de poder-para. Sólo así se pueden entender las demandas de poder como demandas potencialmente liberadoras en sentido estricto. Para un análisis interesante (aunque negando la oposición que he supuesto aquí) de la relación entre poder-para y poder-sobre véase Pansardi (2102). 12 Véase McKitrick (2003) para una defensa de la posibilidad (y actualidad) de este tipo de propiedades. 170 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes me refiero a un sistema que norma el espacio político de razones, es decir, que norma qué acciones (y por quiénes) están justificadas políticamente y, entonces, entran en la esfera política. La democracia es uno de esos sistemas administrativos. Como sistema político la democracia es un conjunto de arreglos institucionales (tanto mecanismos de decisión como establecimiento de derechos fundamentales, entre otros) fundados en la igualdad política. En cuanto administración del poder, este conjunto tiene el sentido de fomentar y mantener esta relación noumenal. La votación mayoritaria, el voto secreto, los derechos fundamentales, la transparencia pública, entre otros, son arreglos institucionales que ayudan a que se den (y en algunos casos crean) estas relaciones. Sin duda, esto es un ideal. No todos los arreglos institucionales particulares de las democracias concretas se orientan a promover la igualdad de poder político. Mas en esto fallan en cuanto democracias. El compromiso con la democracia implica el compromiso de administrar el poder de forma igualitaria. Es decir, de tener instituciones que respalden y fomenten el que cada ciudadana tenga el mismo poder político que cualquier otra. Ahora, puesto que el poder político es noumenal, un arreglo institucional dará poder político a alguien si y sólo si éste influye en el espacio político de razones de forma que la sociedad juzgue justificadas políticamente al menos algunas acciones de esta persona. No es necesario que alguien intencionalmente considere que se da esa influencia. Como bien señala Forst, las estructuras sociales tienen la capacidad de producir y reproducir "constelaciones de poder noumenal" (Forst, 2015, p. 120). En otras palabras, la mera existencia de una estructura social (como un mecanismo político democrático) puede influir en el espacio de razones, determinando lo que es concebido como justificable. La democracia nos compromete con estructuras políticas que influyan en el espacio político de razones de forma tal que a todas las personas se les otorgue el mismo poder político, independientemente de si esta influencia es intencional o no (mientras sea verificable). El argumento de este artículo supone este punto, como se verá más adelante. Como dije anteriormente, las acciones políticas no restringen a las decisiones gubernamentales o a influir en ellas. Luego, el poder político tampoco se restringe a ello. Por ende, a lo dicho en el párrafo anterior se suma lo siguiente: estas estructuras políticas no se restringen a aquellas que dan el poder político específico de influir en las decisiones gubernamentales. Volveré a este punto más adelante. Puesto que dije que la democracia era valiosa en virtud de colocar a las personas en igualdad de poder político, y dado que ello requiere de una manera de administrar el poder político a través de un arreglo institucional particular que conlleve ese fin, concluyo que la democracia es valiosa en virtud de esa forma específica de administración. Constituyendo a la democracia Recuérdese la segunda premisa. ¿Cuál es ese aspecto adecuado que menciona? Aquello en virtud del que ella tiene valor en sí. Esto es, en el caso de la democracia, la forma de administrar el poder político por medio de un arreglo institucional determinado. Luego, si algo constituye a la democracia en ese aspecto, tendrá valor en sí. Entenderé que x constituye a y si y sólo si (i) x es una parte esencial de y (ii) y no tiene ninguna parte esencial z tal que x es parte de z. Con "parte esencial" me refiero a una parte tal que necesariamente si y existe entonces x es parte de y. De la segunda condición se sigue que x compone directamente a y. Aplicando esto a la democracia, x la constituye si y sólo si esta administración tiene a x como parte esencial y x la compone directamente. Dicho eso, veamos por qué la premisa 2 es verdadera. Supongo acuerdo en esto: x tiene valor instrumental si contribuye a la ocurrencia de la democracia, que es valiosa 171 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia en sí. Niego que la tolerancia tiene valor meramente instrumental. Ese es el valor que se tiene cuando la contribución es puramente causal. Dice que la tolerancia traería cierto estado de cosas, debido a ciertos procesos causales que fomenta (o que impide). Pero algo puede contribuir composicionalmente en lugar de causalmente. Es decir, algo puede contribuir a la ocurrencia de algo valioso como parte suya. Este tipo de valor instrumental ha sido denominado "valor constitutivo" (cf. Carter, 1995; Moss, 2009).13 A diferencia de Moss, pero con Carter, no creo que por tener valor constitutivo algo tenga valor intrínseco. x podría tener valor en cuanto parte de y sin que en sí x fuese valioso. Podría ser valorable sólo como medio pero no en sí. Para pasar del valor constitutivo al intrínseco falta algo: las dos condiciones de la constitución mencionadas arriba. Si x es una parte esencial de y, entonces compone a y en virtud de lo que x es en sí. De otro modo la necesidad de tener a x como parte sería una casualidad metafísica. Una parte no esencial a puede componer a y en una situación posible y no en otra. No es por lo que a es que es parte de y, sino por relaciones accidentales. Luego, ¿por qué habría a de ser valorado intrínsecamente? En segundo lugar, supóngase que x es una parte esencial de y por ser parte de z. Entonces, aunque es parte de y por sí mismo, su contribución a y está mediada. Incluso si z tiene valor en sí por tener valor constitutivo a causa de componer algo con valor intrínseco como y, no se sigue que x deba tenerlo también. A menos que uno asuma transitividad, lo que no parece evidente. Después de todo, si la democracia tiene valor en sí y, supongamos, la tolerancia la constituye, teniendo valor constitutivo y eo ipso intrínseco, ¿por qué lo que constituye a la tolerancia, como el componente de objeción, tendría que "heredar" el valor intrínseco? Es muy plausible que objetar no tenga valor en sí, aunque sea parte esencial de un régimen democrático. La, por ponerlo así, distancia mereológica puede afectar la "transferencia" de valor. Si se cumplen esas dos condiciones, y x constituye a la democracia en cuanto forma igualitaria de administración del poder político, entonces por sí mismo x compone directamente aquello por lo que la democracia es valiosa en sí. Entonces cuando valoramos a la democracia estamos valorando (en parte) directamente a x en sí mismo. Luego, x tiene valor en sí. En lo que sigue argumentaré que la tolerancia constituye a la democracia, por lo que tiene valor en sí. Pero, según he dicho, mi defensa no implica que ella no tenga valor instrumental. Esto puede sonar extraño, porque se suele oponer el valor intrínseco al instrumental. Mas eso es un error porque, como convincentemente argumenta Korsgaard (1983), el valor intrínseco se opone al extrínseco y el instrumental al final. El que algo sea querido en sí mismo no implica que sea querido como fin. No es un punto menor este, porque, como señalaré después, del valor intrínseco de la tolerancia y de su valor final se siguen consecuencias políticas distintas. Paso ahora a examinar la cuarta premisa. La tolerancia y el poder La tolerancia como administración del poder político La tolerancia tiene una relación tanto interna como externa con el poder. Internamente se relaciona con el poder debido al cuarto componente del concepto 13 Se podría objetar mi empleo de "instrumental" para referirme al valor constitutivo. De hecho, los autores referidos explícitamente lo caracterizan como valor no instrumental. Sin embargo, en tanto "instrumental" refiere al valor que se tiene por ser el medio (sea causal o constitutivo) a algo, me parece apropiado mi uso. De todos modos, de nominibus non est disputandum. 172 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes mínimo. Según éste sólo se puede tolerar si el sujeto tolerador tiene (o cree tener) el poder para interferir con la práctica objetada. En caso contrario nos encontramos algo más parecido al padecimiento (cf. Newey, 2013, c. 8). Acá la que me interesa es la relación externa. Básicamente, la tolerancia se relaciona externamente con el poder al ser una forma de administrar el poder político. Ella en cuanto práctica política configura el espacio de razones de la esfera política. Esto es patente en la historia de la tolerancia, como bien muestra Forst (2013). Los regímenes de tolerancia han servido en reiteradas ocasiones para mantener a raya a ciertos grupos, subordinándolos a la mayoría al meramente tolerarlos (cf. Brown, 2008). La tolerancia responde a las relaciones de poder presentes en la sociedad. Como práctica política sus componentes obtienen su contenido desde la esfera política. Cuando decimos que en un acto de tolerancia es necesario que S objete p, suponemos indiferente quién es S y qué es p. Pero un acto sólo puede ser políticamente reconocido como un caso de la práctica de tolerancia si la objeción de S entra en la esfera política. El esclavo no podría tolerar el comportamiento de su amo, incluso si tuviese el poder de interferir con él, porque su objeción a ese comportamiento no es una acción política. No digo que como filósofos no podamos juzgar ese acto correctamente como un caso de tolerancia. Digo que en la sociedad esclavista no es posible juzgar que ese acto corresponda a una acción política de tolerancia. Así, un régimen de tolerancia en esa sociedad no incluye ese acto como uno de los que tiene que asegurar. Pasa lo mismo con los demás componentes. Particularmente, quién tenga poder político para interferir con p dependerá de la forma que tome la esfera política (Brown y Forst, 2014). No sólo responde a ellas, sino que la tolerancia también crea relaciones de poder. Toda práctica política de la tolerancia, materializada en un régimen de tolerancia, determina qué tipos de acciones están políticamente justificadas y cuáles no. Un régimen que tolere a un grupo e se arregla institucionalmente de forma tal que configura cierto entendimiento político de e. Wendy Brown, por ejemplo, estudia el modo por el que el discurso y práctica de la tolerancia hacia los judíos en la Europa del siglo XIX cambia la manera de entender lo judío: desde una nación a una raza (Brown, 2008, p. 50s.). En mis términos, el único trato políticamente justificado hacia los judíos estaba basado en la raza. La tolerancia normaliza ciertos usos del poder (e.g., como no toleramos la pedofilia, podemos interferir con ella justificadamente), impide otros (e.g., si toleramos a un grupo e, interferir con él podría no contar como una acción política), determina qué objeciones están políticamente justificadas (el racismo no es una posición política, sino una patología), qué razones para interferir y permitir son válidas, etcétera. También, como nota Brown (2008, p. 149-205), la tolerancia tiene la función discursiva de distinguir entre quienes son tolerantes y quienes no, quienes son "civilizados" y quienes son "bárbaros". De forma importante, debido al componente de poder la tolerancia reafirma la posición de poder del grupo que ejerce la tolerancia por sobre quienes son tolerados. Un régimen en el que se tolera a e es uno donde objetar y prevenir a e está justificado políticamente y donde se tiene el poder de hacerlo. Dada la suposición plausible de que en el espacio de razones de e tales cosas no están justificadas, se sigue que el régimen de tolerancia lo que hace es reforzar lo que la mayoría cree que está justificado políticamente. Rainer Forst no está de acuerdo. Forst (2013) distingue entre las concepciones de la tolerancia de permiso y de respeto. En la primera, la mayoría tiene "the power and opportunity to intervene and to coerce the minority into (at least external) conformity, 'puts up with' their difference and refrains from intervening, while the minority is forced to accept the authority's position of power" (Forst, 2013, p. 28). En la concepción de respeto, por otro lado, "[t]he tolerating parties 173 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia respect one another as autonomous persons or as equally entitled members of a political community constituted under the rule of law" (Forst, 2013, p. 29). Nótese que, mientras que en la primera se enfatiza el poder de la mayoría, en la segunda se refiere al respeto recíproco y la ley. Forst piensa que la concepción de respeto supera la subordinación a la mayoría esencial a la concepción de permiso, puesto que reemplaza el poder de intervención con el respeto mutuo. En cualquier caso, ahora quiero sólo señalar que un régimen de tolerancia según la concepción de respeto también estará configurando la esfera política, otorgando poder político para objetar ciertas cosas y otras no, para dar ciertos argumentos y otros no, etcétera. Aunque no se haga mención de él, no hay concepción de tolerancia que no implique determinadas relaciones de poder. Como muestra, Forst (2008, p. 27) afirma que objeciones ni mínimamente "razonables" no son legítimas. Eso implica que quienes así objetan carecen el poder político de tolerar. Pace Brown, esta relación con el poder no es esencialmente negativa. Sin duda la tolerancia ha sido frecuentemente utilizada para perpetuar iniquidades (Brown, 2008, p. 46-47), pero ese uso no es intrínseco al concepto mismo. Responde a las maneras en que tal concepto ha sido empleado en la discusión pública. Obviamente no podemos ignorar tal uso, así como la posibilidad siempre dada de que la tolerancia perpetúe un uso represivo e injusto del poder político. Pero también puede haber un uso justo y liberador de tal poder, como ocurriría cuando un grupo al ser tolerado pasa a ser reconocido socialmente por lo que efectivamente es. De lo anterior se sigue que la tolerancia es una forma de administrar el poder político. Todo régimen de tolerancia incluye estructuras políticas tanto formales como informales (leyes, comisiones, autonomías sectoriales, políticas públicas, reglas de argumentación pública, etcétera) que dan contenido a los componentes del concepto mínimo, y esos mismos mecanismos configuran el poder político y así la esfera política misma. Esta administración se refleja en las leyes que castigan conductas consideradas como intolerables (e.g., sacrificios humanos), en políticas que desincentivan cierta práctica pero la permiten (consumo de drogas, prostitución, etc.), entre otros casos. Es irrelevante si se hace referencia explícita a la tolerancia, pues basta que el concepto esté siendo utilizado de hecho. La tolerancia como constituyente de la democracia Recordemos la cuarta premisa del argumento: La tolerancia es una administración del poder político que, en condiciones de diversidad, se requiere para realizar una administración igualitaria del poder político. Habiendo ya explicado por qué la tolerancia es una administración del poder político, me queda por defender el resto de la premisa. En cuanto administración del poder político la tolerancia tiene una peculiaridad. Ella "abre" el espacio de razones que conforma la esfera política. Esa esfera se vuelve heterogénea porque distintos tipos de justificación política pasan a ser parte suya. La práctica de la tolerancia lo que hace es permitir que convivan razones que consideran como justificadas políticamente prácticas contrarias. Las estructuras políticas que componen el arreglo institucional de un régimen de tolerancia influyen en la esfera política al heterogeneizar el espacio político de razones. Tómese el Edicto de Nantes. Mediante él Enrique IV declaraba (limitada) tolerancia a los protestantes franceses. Entre otras medidas, se les permitía libertad de opinión, organizar sus sínodos, acceder a cargos de responsabilidad pública y libertad de culto en ciertos lugares. ¿En qué sentido el Edicto de Nantes heterogeneizó el espacio político de razones? Él reafirmaba el carácter católico de Francia, con lo que reafirmaba ese espacio de razones que daba poder político a los católicos en tanto 174 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes católicos y que juzgaba la práctica del catolicismo como una acción política. Pero al mismo tiempo, por medio de la tolerancia a las prácticas protestantes, se permitían prácticas que suponían un espacio de razones diferente. Según el cual el catolicismo no hablaba (o no debía hablar) por Francia, donde éste perdía su carácter político o era considerado como mala política, donde nadie tenía poder político en virtud de ser católico. Luego, el espacio de razones que conforma la esfera política se componía de dos espacios de razones distintos. En consecuencia, la esfera política misma se complejizaba. Cierto, el catolicismo seguía siendo la religión oficial, y la tolerancia al protestantismo era limitada, por lo que la complejidad de la esfera política no implicaba una igualdad entre los dos espacios políticos de razones. Pero eso no niega que la pregunta por qué está justificado políticamente ya no podía ser respondida simplemente apelando a lo que el catolicismo creía así justificado. Por lo tanto, el reparto y uso del poder político se vio complejizado a causa de la promulgación del edicto. Al exponer la naturaleza noumenal del poder político y su relación con las instituciones dije que era irrelevante si una institución estaba expresamente diseñada para tener cierto efecto en la esfera política. Lo relevante es si de hecho influye en el espacio político de razones y así en el contenido o estructura de la esfera política. Igualmente ocurre acá. Un régimen de tolerancia vuelve más heterogéneo el espacio político de razones por medio de su arreglo institucional aunque nadie tenga esa intención. Enrique IV probablemente no pensó que al promulgar el Edicto de Nantes estaba introduciendo una cuña en la relación noumenal que determinaba el poder político. Se aprecia más claramente esto cuando miramos un régimen de intolerancia. A éste lo caracteriza un arreglo institucional que no permite aquellas prácticas que son objetadas por la mayoría (o quienes tienen el poder político, en caso de ser una élite dominante), dado que ese arreglo responde a lo que la mayoría cree justificado políticamente. Es posible que la mayoría no piense que el fin del arreglo institucional es interferir con las prácticas que ella objete, ni que de hecho lo haga. Mas eso no salva al régimen de ser de intolerancia. Porque basta que las estructuras políticas que componen su arreglo institucional influyan en el espacio político de razones de forma tal que no se permitan (en el sentido amplio de no estar políticamente justificadas, no necesariamente que no se permitan legalmente) dichas prácticas. La razón es que muchas veces, como ya es sabido, las personas son ciegas a las relaciones de poder presentes en la sociedad, suponiendo que la configuración de la sociedad es un hecho natural. Una objeción. Uso como ejemplo el Edicto de Nantes, representante paradigmático de la concepción de permiso de Forst. ¿Abre el espacio de razones la tolerancia como permiso de la mayoría? Forst afirma que este tipo de tolerancia lo que hace es marcar a los sujetos tolerados como "dependent and prisoners of their situation" (Forst, 2013, p. 61). Esta tolerancia disciplina a las minorías. Podría decirse que esta tolerancia busca homogeneizar el espacio de razones mediante la ilusión de apertura, una vez que este espacio ya se está heterogeneizando. La tolerancia sería un mecanismo de control en situaciones adversas a la mayoría. Así, el Edicto de Nantes lo que hace es reforzar la unidad de la esfera política francesa mediante concesiones insustanciales políticamente a los protestantes.14 A lo más, mi argumentación se aplicaría a la concepción de respeto. Esta objeción es importante porque ilumina un punto esencial. No niego que se pueda disciplinar a través de la tolerancia ni que haya ocurrido frecuentemente. 14 En este línea Brown afirma que "[p]ractices of tolerance are tacit acknowledgments that the Other remains politically outside a norm of citizenship, that the Other remains politically other, that it has not been fully incorporated by a liberal discourse of equality and cannot be managed through a division of labor suffused with the terms of its subordination" (Brown, 2008, p. 75). 175 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia Niego sí que al tolerar (incluso en la concepción de permiso) el poder político de la mayoría pueda ser absoluto, esto es, que todo el espacio político de razones sea captado por ella. Porque al tolerar a un grupo minoritario (o sus prácticas) se reconoce su existencia y con ella, la existencia de su espacio político de razones propio. No es posible hacerlo sin proteger en alguna medida ese espacio, sin integrarlo (aunque sea mínimamente) en la configuración de la esfera política. Incluso si se usa la tolerancia para controlar a un grupo, su uso (como la cita de Brown descubre) denota ya la fragmentación del espacio político de razones. Si la mayoría estuviese en condiciones de ejercer poder absoluto, entonces no tendría que tolerar. Tolerar determinadas prácticas de un grupo implica dotarlo de cierto lugar en sociedad (Forst, 2013, p. 62), y por ende dotar de protección (por pequeña que sea) a un espacio físico (como un gueto) o simbólico (como al permitir cierta libertad de culto) donde se disputa la forma que la mayoría da a la esfera política. Ahora el paso a la democracia. Un régimen de tolerancia al heterogeneizar el espacio político de razones complejiza la esfera política, otorgando así poder político (al menos mínimo) a los grupos minoritarios. Nada de esto implica que se logra la igualdad política, pero sí que se avanza a ella. Porque, como dije antes, la igualdad política es igualdad de poder político. Es decir, igual capacidad de realizar acciones políticas, reforzando o modificando la esfera política. La democracia es el régimen de la igualdad política, esto es, establece (al menos aspira a establecer) una relación noumenal según la que todos los ciudadanos tienen igual poder político. Por ende, hay cierta relación entre la tolerancia y la democracia. La primera nos acerca en parte a la segunda. Pero lo que dice la cuarta premisa es más fuerte. Dice que, en condiciones de diversidad, sólo la tolerancia compone esencial y directamente a la democracia en cuanto administración igualitaria del poder político. Por condiciones de diversidad entiendo no sólo el hecho del pluralismo que describe Rawls (2005), sino ampliamente cualquier condición social en la que las personas puedan llegar a conclusiones diversas acerca de lo que está políticamente justificado. Ese escenario se da, en mayor o menor grado, siempre. Incluso en sociedades que comparten una misma visión comprensiva. Por lo tanto, una democracia siempre tiene lugar en condiciones de diversidad. Claro, en principio es posible que en una democracia todas las personas siempre estén de acuerdo en sus conclusiones. Pero un mundo donde esa posibilidad se actualizara sería un mundo donde la democracia ya no es un régimen político, sino meramente técnico. Tal mundo sería difícilmente reconocible, y por lo tanto lo excluyo. El ejercicio democrático implica, entonces, diferencia en estas conclusiones políticas. Además de las minorías preexistentes, como bien lo desarrolla Ceva (2015), la decisión mayoritaria misma crea minorías democráticas disidentes; minorías que disienten del resultado de la decisión tomada por la mayoría, sin disentir necesariamente del proceso mismo, e independientemente de sus motivaciones para disentir. Mi argumento sólo requiere este tipo de diversidad, aunque obviamente se ve reforzado por el pluralismo de concepciones de justicia y mundo. Entonces, en una democracia siempre habrá grupos que disientan de las decisiones de la mayoría. Puesto que esas decisiones dan forma a la esfera política, quienes disienten de ellas no tienen el mismo poder político que la mayoría. Si ella decide que comer carne es legal, entonces en principio las minorías disidentes no podrán políticamente justificadas impedir que se abran locales carnívoros. Su acto será un acto criminal. Cierto, puede objetarse que las decisiones mayoritarias no agotan el espacio político de razones. Solemos creer que lo políticamente justificado es más amplio que lo votado por mayoría; eso explica que sancionemos como políticas algunas campañas para revertir una decisión mayoritaria. Sin embargo, el tener el poder de realizar una acción política para cambiar una decisión no implica 176 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes el tener el poder de realizar acciones políticas que la decisión prohíbe. Las minorías siguen careciendo del poder político, en este sentido, que la mayoría posee. El juicio anterior es posible porque el poder político no se mide esencialmente de forma cuantitativa. Es decir, S no tiene más poder político que R porque S pueda realizar más acciones políticas que R. S podría tener más poder político aunque ambas pudieran realizar la misma cantidad de acciones políticas, siempre y cuando el espacio político de razones fuese determinado por S en lugar de R. Arriba, criticando a Forst (2015), dije que alguien podría tener poder político aunque no pudiese modificar el espacio político de razones y, luego, la esfera política. Debido a esto, aunque las leyes sean de aplicación general15 no se sigue que no otorguen mayor poder político a la mayoría. El que todas las personas tengan poder político no implica igualdad política, ni por lo tanto, liberación. En efecto, los regímenes de opresión muchas veces otorgan poder político a las minorías sin permitirles modificar la esfera política. Esta es una de las dimensiones en que el poder puede disciplinar, pues calma a las minorías con la promesa de poder político y, por ende, participación política, mientras se les dictaminan las reglas del juego. Nos encontramos con una tensión al interior de la democracia. Ella aspira a la igualdad política de la ciudadanía; por consiguiente, a un arreglo institucional que otorgue igual poder político. Es ese tipo de administración del poder político. No obstante, los mismos procedimientos para tomar decisiones de forma democrática, como el voto igualitario universal, terminan, en condiciones de diversidad, constituyendo minorías disidentes. Por lo tanto, en condiciones de diversidad, la aspiración democrática choca con su realización práctica. Obviamente, ningún sistema político es inmune a la complejidad del mundo real. Luego, el que la democracia no pueda cumplir en su totalidad en nuestro mundo lo que promete desde el mundo ideal no es motivo para descartarla. Pero sí indica que hemos de hallar una manera de corregir, en la medida de lo posible, ese problema. Le podemos perdonar que el paso desde el mundo ideal al real le dificulte cumplir sus promesas totalmente. Pero no podemos perdonarle el que se contente con triunfar en otro mundo que no sea este que vivimos. Pues dejaría de ser el régimen político que aspira a la igualdad política. Acá es donde entra la tolerancia. Como dije, ella complejiza la esfera política al heterogeneizar el espacio político de razones. Un régimen de tolerancia hace esto al proteger, mediante de su arreglo institucional, espacios donde el poder político de la mayoría es contestado.16 Porque la contestación al espacio político de razones de la mayoría implica contestar su poder político. No necesariamente en el sentido de disputar el número o tipo de acciones políticas que pueda realizar, sino fundamentalmente oponiéndose a que sea ella la que determine la forma de la esfera política. A esto me refería cuando dije que la tolerancia otorga poder político a las minorías toleradas, porque les otorga espacios desde donde contestar a la construcción de la esfera política, incluyendo en ella (al menos en parte) su propio espacio político de razones. Es decir, la tolerancia permite a las minorías que participen en la definición de la esfera política. Esta participación no implica participación en las decisiones gubernamentales, puesto que el poder político no implica poder gubernamental. Pero no por eso se 15 La expresión "leyes de aplicación general" es empleada por el juez Scalia en la opinión mayoritaria de la Corte Suprema de Estados Unidos en el connotado caso Employment Division vs. Smith 494 U.S. 872 (1990). 16 La idea de espacios de contestación se la debo a Ceva (2015). A pesar de las similitudes con su trabajo, tenemos diferencias importantes. La principal es que ella emplea la idea como parte de un argumento en contra de la adecuación de la tolerancia para lidiar con la relación entre mayoría y minorías. No es este el espacio para responder a sus argumentos, por lo que me conformaré con señalar que ella sólo considera las teorías de Jeremy Waldron, Anna Galeotti y Iris Young. Ninguna de ellas enlaza la tolerancia con la administración del poder político en el sentido en que lo hago acá. Véase también Ceva y Zuolo (2013). 177 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia trata de participación irrelevante. Al contrario, la tolerancia al permitir la existencia de estos espacios de contestación permite una participación mucho más profunda. A saber, participación en la definición noumenal del poder político. Sin duda, el que sea más profunda no implica que sea suficiente, por lo que no se sigue que se haga innecesaria la participación a nivel gubernamental. Mas dicha participación sin cuotas de poder político para modificar la esfera política es poca ganancia. Tampoco implica, por otra parte, que la participación sea consciente o reconocida como tal públicamente (de nuevo, tampoco se sigue que no sea necesario el carácter consciente o el reconocimiento). Como mencioné antes, el arreglo institucional puede otorgar poder político y, con él, participación política, siempre que influya en el espacio político de razones. Influencia que no tiene que ser intencional, como ya dije. Este punto es importante porque es mi impresión que en gran parte de los casos la complejización de la esfera política, con todo lo que implica, no es algo buscado o siquiera explícitamente reconocido en el momento. ¿Pero cómo llegamos a la igualdad política? En un sentido, no llegamos. No hay nada en un régimen de tolerancia que haga que estos espacios de contestación automáticamente tengan la consecuencia de que se iguale el poder político. Mientras existan las condiciones de diversidad, ese ideal democrático seguirá siendo in stricto sensu un ideal. Ciertamente, al dar las condiciones para que las minorías obtengan el poder político relevante, un régimen de tolerancia nos acerca a él. Pero acercar no es llegar, y querríamos una corrección a la democracia que sí lo fuese. Sin embargo, hay un sentido en que la tolerancia sí permite realizar la igualdad política. A saber, dinámicamente. Un régimen de tolerancia, al proteger los espacios de contestación a la manera en que el poder político se entiende en la sociedad, complejiza la esfera política de forma que se abre la posibilidad de modificar, desde dichos espacios, la esfera política según las concepciones de las minorías. Al ser más compleja la esfera política, la pregunta por la justificación política no recibe una respuesta inmediatamente derivada del espacio de razones de la mayoría. Esto ocurre incluso en la concepción de permiso, pues se integran (aunque sea en parte) las razones de la minoría. Sin duda, se integran subordinadas y filtradas por las razones de la mayoría. Con todo, se integran. Lo importante de un régimen de tolerancia, a diferencia de un régimen que meramente permita el pluralismo, es que los diversos arreglos institucionales protegen estos espacios de contestación. Por lo tanto, permiten que las minorías puedan conservar su propio espacio político de razones (sus propias razones para juzgar algo justificado políticamente) y al mismo tiempo lo introducen en el espacio político de razones de la sociedad toda. Esto posibilita que las minorías toleradas puedan disputar la forma de la esfera política, acercándola hacia ellas. Dicho acercamiento es distinto al acercamiento "automático" que incluso instituciones de tolerancia como el Edicto de Nantes conllevan. Es dinámico en el sentido que da a las minorías importantes herramientas y condiciones para, en los procesos políticos, contestar y modificar la esfera política. Es decir, da a las minorías la oportunidad de tener igual poder político con respecto a la determinación de la esfera política. La igualdad política que ofrece la tolerancia es una promesa. Mas no una promesa puramente formal, ni se ofrece con las manos vacías. Un régimen de tolerancia lo es porque su arreglo institucional, no la mera voluntad arbitraria del gobernante, hace esta promesa y dota a las minorías de la capacidad de hacerla cumplir.17 17 Reitero que nada de esto implica que este sea la intención de la mayoría al tolerar, ni que las instituciones estén diseñadas para eso. Tampoco se debe asumir que los procesos políticos en los que las minorías pueden modificar la esfera política son formales, aunque pueden serlo. 178 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes La tolerancia es una administración del poder político. Recién mostré que ella permite, en condiciones de diversidad, una administración igualitaria de dicho poder. Por supuesto, la permite en un sentido dinámico. Pero, dada la realidad no ideal de nuestro mundo, no me parece que eso deba llevarnos a pensar que no se permite realmente dicha administración igualitaria. Mostré que la tolerancia la permite, pero falta mostrar que la requiere, que es lo que dice la cuarta premisa. Por supuesto, un régimen de tolerancia no es suficiente para un régimen democrático. Nada de lo dicho aquí implica que esa administración no requiere nada más. No es suficiente, pero es necesario. Para probar su necesidad hay que mostrar que (a) el problema que resuelve es esencial a la democracia y (b) no hay otra práctica política que pueda reemplazarla. Debido a lo dicho anteriormente, concluyo que el primero punto fue suficientemente establecido, cuando se restringe a condiciones de diversidad. Este problema es aquella tensión entre la aspiración de igualdad política de la democracia y su realización práctica. Resta probar el segundo punto. Nótese que no digo que la tolerancia sea suficiente para la administración igualitaria del poder. Por lo tanto, al descartar como su reemplazo a alguna práctica política no niego que esa misma práctica pueda también ser necesaria. En la literatura hay básicamente dos alternativas a la tolerancia: la neutralidad y el reconocimiento. Tomemos la neutralidad. Si bien hay quienes, como Jones (2007), que sostienen no sólo la compatibilidad, sino la posible implicación de una por la otra, también hay quienes argumentan que compiten. Meckled-Garcia (2001), por ejemplo, sostiene su incompatibilidad. Básicamente, el argumento para mostrar su incompatibilidad es este. La tolerancia supone un componente de objeción, pero la neutralidad exige no objetar ninguna práctica dentro de cierto rango. Por lo tanto, un régimen de tolerancia implicaría que se objetase alguna práctica p que es tolerada, mientras que un régimen de neutralidad impediría que se objetase p si se encuentra dentro del rango adecuado. Plausiblemente, dice Meckled-Garcia, el rango de neutralidad coincidirá con el rango de lo tolerable, porque si p es tolerable entonces es parte de una concepción de mundo razonable. Si así es, entonces un régimen de neutralidad la incluye entre las concepciones sobre las que es neutral. Luego, son coextensivos y por ende incompatibles en la práctica. Por si no fuese poco la supuesta incompatibilidad, un régimen de neutralidad podría contribuir mejor a la administración igualitaria del poder político porque al no permitirse las objeciones no habría minorías cuyas prácticas fuesen rechazadas. Así, no verían disminuido su poder político. Por causa del limitado espacio, sólo dos breves precisiones. Primero, ese tipo de argumentos es problema para la tolerancia sólo si es posible un régimen de neutralidad con el mismo rango que uno de tolerancia. Pero es dudoso que lo sea. Principalmente porque, en condiciones de diversidad, ocurrirá lo ya mencionado, a saber, que las decisiones democráticas configuren minorías disidentes. Aunque las objeciones de esas minorías caigan dentro del rango de concepciones razonables y, por lo tanto, en el rango de neutralidad, un régimen democrático no puede ser neutral con respecto a sus propias decisiones. Ha de favorecerlas obligatoriamente. Pero es perfectamente posible que el mismo régimen tolere prácticas que vayan en contra de lo decidido. En efecto, indiqué por qué hacerlo contribuye a la administración igualitaria del poder político. Ese argumento no prueba que la neutralidad pueda reemplazar a la tolerancia. Segundo, se repite la situación. Un régimen de neutralidad no impedirá que las decisiones democráticas tensionen la aspiración igualitaria de la democracia. Luego, no impedirá la disminución del poder político de las minorías que ello acarrea. Resumiendo, la neutralidad no puede resolver esta tensión enteramente sin apelar a la tolerancia. Entonces, se cumple la condición b en su caso. ¿Se cumple 179 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia también con el reconocimiento? Un régimen de reconocimiento sería uno en el que las diferentes prácticas serían reconocidas como igualmente valiosas. Por lo tanto, en ese régimen las objeciones dejarían de estar políticamente justificadas. Este es, básicamente, la propuesta de Galeotti (2002), aunque ella de hecho piensa que está modificando el concepto de tolerancia liberal por tolerancia como reconocimiento.18 Independientemente de la viabilidad del reconocimiento como práctica política en sí misma, cae presa del mismo problema que la neutralidad. Un régimen democrático no puede reconocer el mismo valor a las prácticas que han sido decididas democráticamente y a las prácticas que esas decisiones impiden o dificultan. Por lo tanto, no ofrece las herramientas conceptuales para igualar el poder político que las minorías pierden al perder en los procesos democráticos. Si reconociésemos igual valor a la decisión tomada por la mayoría y la rechazada, entonces no estaríamos dotando de igual poder político a la mayoría y la minoría. Cada persona de la minoría tendría más poder que alguien de la mayoría. A menos, obviamente, que el reconocimiento no implique ninguna acción concreta, sino una mera actitud. Mas si así fuese, no estaríamos hablando de una práctica política. Por consiguiente, el reconocimiento no puede reemplazar a la tolerancia. Concluyendo, la tolerancia no es reemplazable ni por la neutralidad ni por el reconocimiento y puesto que el problema que contribuye a resolver es esencial a la democracia, se sigue que ella es requerida para, en condiciones de diversidad, administrar el poder político igualitariamente. Es decir, se sigue que la cuarta premisa es verdadera. La quinta premisa (en condiciones de diversidad, la tolerancia en cuanto administración del poder constituye a la democracia en cuanto régimen de administración del poder) se sigue de la tercera y la cuarta. Este paso es válido porque asumí que, si la tolerancia en cuanto administración del poder es requerida para administrar igualitariamente el poder político, entonces ella constituye esta administración igualitaria. La conjunción de este condicional implícito con la premisa tres y cuatro implica la premisa cinco. En lo que resta de esta sección defenderé esta inferencia. El que la tolerancia sea requerida, en condiciones de diversidad, por la administración igualitaria del poder político significa que la última implica la primera. Pero la implica no como un accidente necesario, sino en tanto ella ayuda a corregir la aplicación de esta administración en el mundo no ideal. Por lo tanto, la implica porque la tolerancia contribuye a que, en condiciones de diversidad, la administración igualitaria del poder político pueda ser efectivamente eso. Entonces, la tolerancia es requerida a causa de la estructura interna de aquella, en nuestras condiciones. En consecuencia, se la requiere como un componente de la administración igualitaria del poder político. Al detallar mi concepto de constitución señalé que tenía dos condiciones: la composición esencial y la composición directa. De ser requerida por esta administración del poder político se sigue que es una parte esencial suya, por lo que la primera condición se cumple. Un régimen con instituciones democráticas más las propias a un régimen de tolerancia cumple con el ideal de administración igualitaria del poder político en virtud de incluir también estas segundas instituciones. Por lo tanto, el régimen que incluye al régimen de tolerancia es el que califica como un régimen donde el poder se administra de esa forma. Por eso la tolerancia compone a esta administración. Ahora bien, no hay ninguna otra parte de ella de la que la tolerancia sea parte. Ya que compone a la administración igualitaria del poder político en virtud de lo que un régimen de tolerancia es. Si no lo compusiese directamente, entonces sería 18 Newey (2006) argumenta convincentemente que Galeotti no está hablando realmente de la tolerancia, a pesar de su insistencia. En su lugar, ella defiende un régimen de reconocimiento igualitarista. 180 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes parte suya en virtud de componer algo más. Puesto que no es así, concluyo que la tolerancia compone directamente la mencionada administración. Con esto se cumple la segunda condición. Entonces, resulta que la tolerancia constituye dicha administración del poder político. Se explica, así, el paso que permite inferir la premisa cinco. Al haber explicado por qué cada premisa es verdadera, y mostrado por qué de ellas se sigue la conclusión, termino concluyendo que la tolerancia, en condiciones de diversidad, tiene valor en sí. Que es lo que buscaba demostrar. El valor en sí de la tolerancia El valor en sí de la tolerancia es importante por varios motivos. Entre otros, ello nos da serias razones para creer que la búsqueda e implementación de un régimen de tolerancia está justificada políticamente. De manera significativa, implica que un régimen de tolerancia es valioso incluso en circunstancias donde el régimen del cual es parte no es un régimen democrático, o no lo es suficientemente. Porque a diferencia del valor meramente instrumental, el valor constitutivo no depende de la ocurrencia de una relación causal. La mera presencia de un régimen de tolerancia implica la presencia en parte de un régimen democrático. Debido al valor intrínseco de éste, esa presencia tiene valor en sí también. Puesto que valoramos intrínsecamente la democracia, no queda otra opción sino considerar a la tolerancia como prima facie justificada. No es cosa menor concluir que el mayor peso de la prueba lo tienen quienes intentan impulsar medidas que son incompatibles con la tolerancia. Antes mencioné que mi argumento no implica que la tolerancia tiene valor final. Remarco eso, porque para la práctica política no es lo mismo considerarla como fin que como bien en sí misma. Si tuviese valor final, tendríamos que orientar nuestra práctica política al menos en parte a obtener un régimen de tolerancia. Pero esto implicaría subordinar nuestros otros objetivos políticos a lograr esta meta, porque el fin buscado determina las prioridades. No es lo mismo tener a la tolerancia como prioridad que considerarla como algo que es bueno tener en virtud de lo que es en sí. Incluso si eso implica la necesidad de buscarla, no implica buscar como la meta a la cual llegar. Menciono un caso donde la diferencia es relevante. Supóngase que según el régimen de tolerancia e la práctica p ha de ser tolerada. Si valoramos la tolerancia en sí, entonces hay una justificación para tolerar p, porque hay una justificación seria para implementar e. Pero de allí no se sigue que debamos tolerar p, porque no se sigue que debamos implementar e pase lo que pase. En cambio, si la tolerancia tuviese valor final, p tendría que ser tolerada. Pues la existencia cabal de e sería el fin al que apuntaríamos como actores políticos. Piénsese en las solicitudes de tolerancia que se suelen hacer con respecto a leyes de aplicación general. Un régimen de tolerancia podría ser tal que incluya un arreglo institucional que permita tolerar mediante excepciones a ese tipo de leyes. Valorar a la tolerancia como fin implicaría la obligación política de dar siempre las excepciones. Mientras que valorarla como un bien en sí mismo sólo implica que tenemos una justificación para otorgarla, mas podríamos no hacerlo si las circunstancias no fuesen propicias. Existen personas que desconfían de la tolerancia porque la consideran peligrosa. Al permitir los males estaríamos arriesgándonos a convertir a la sociedad al mal. Existen quienes desconfían de ella porque la consideran insuficiente. Al permitir la mayoría aquello que considera malo, no estaría sino imponiendo su poder político sobre la minoría. Las primeras niegan el valor intrínseco de la tolerancia porque significaría que es intrínsecamente bueno el correr ese riesgo; las segundas, porque significaría que es intrínsecamente bueno este uso disciplinador del poder político. Ambas posiciones yerran, aunque a medias. Es cierto que la tolerancia implica que 181 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 La democracia y el valor político de la tolerancia la mayoría logra imponer sus objeciones, y por lo tanto logra tener mayor poder político. Pero la tolerancia también da herramientas a las minorías para contestar a ese poder, disputar la configuración de la esfera política. Luego, valorar intrínsecamente a la tolerancia no implica valorar el uso disciplinador del poder político. Por el contrario, implica valorar la capacidad que ella tiene de otorgar espacios de contestación, de resistencia a ese poder. A causa de esto, aciertan quienes ven peligro en la tolerancia. Un régimen de tolerancia promete con una mano a las minorías el camino de la disputa del poder político, al mismo tiempo que con la otra amenaza la hegemonía de la mayoría. Pero yerran al suponer que lo bueno radica en la mano amenazante. Si bien no se puede separar la amenaza de la promesa, es esta última la que fundamenta el valor intrínseco de la tolerancia. Por lo que el carácter peligroso, subversivo, de la tolerancia se ve morigerado. En principio nada de lo aquí dicho justifica un ataque a la hegemonía de la mayoría en sí. Distinto sería si la tolerancia tuviese valor final. Su carácter amenazante sería mucho más difícil de controlar. Pero como buscamos el fin de la democracia con la tolerancia, no es necesario seguir la implementación completa del régimen de tolerancia. A veces los otros componentes de la democracia, como podría serlo la neutralidad, limitarán la aplicación de la tolerancia. De cualquier modo, el tener valor intrínseco hace de la tolerancia algo a lo que se puede aspirar pase lo que pase, aunque no se pueda tenerla como prioridad. Referencias BALINT, P. 2014. Acts of Tolerance: A Political and Descriptive Account. European Journal of Political Theory, 13(3):264-281. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1474885113492729 BROWN, W. 2008. Regulating Aversion: Tolerance in the Age of Identity and Empire. 3a ed., Princeton, Princeton University Press, 288 p. BROWN, W.; FORST, R. 2014. The Power of Tolerance: A Debate. New York, Columbia University Press, 107 p. CARTER, I. 1995. The Independent Value of Freedom. Ethics, 105(4):819-845. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/293754 CEVA, E. 2015. Why Toleration Is Not the Appropriate Response to Dissenting Minorities' Claims. European Journal of Philosophy, 23(3):633-651. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0378.2012.00563.x CEVA, E.; ZUOLO, F. 2013. A Matter of Respect: On Majority-Minority Relations in a Liberal Democracy. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 30(3):239-253. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/japp.12021 CHRISTIANO, T. (ed.) 2003. Philosophy and Democracy: An Anthology. New York, Oxford University Press, 376 p. CHRISTIANO, T. 2015. Democracy. In: E.N. ZALTA (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Disponible en: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2015/entries/ democracy/. Accedido en: Marzo 27, 2015. COHEN, A. 2004. What Toleration Is. Ethics, 115(1):68-95. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/421982 COHEN, A. 2014. Toleration. Cambridge, Polity Press, 200 p. CREPPELL, I. 2008. Toleration, Politics and the Role of Mutuality. In: M. WILLIAMS; J. WALDRON (eds.), Toleration and Its Limits. New York University Press, p. 315-359. DAHL, R. 2006. On Political Equality. New Haven & London, Yale University Press, 142 p. FORST, R. 2008. The Limits of Toleration. In: I. CREPPELL; R. HARDIN; S. MACEDO (eds.), Toleration on Trial. Lanham, MD, Lexington Books, p. 17-30. FORST, R. 2011. The Right of Justification: Elements of a Constructivist Theory of Justice. 2a ed., New York, Columbia University Press, 352 p. FORST, R. 2013. Toleration in Conflict. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 662 p. FORST, R. 2015. Noumenal Power. The Journal of Political Philosophy, 23(2):111-127. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jopp.12046 FUENTES, E. 2016. La tolerancia arbitral y la descripción de los conflictos políticos. Ideas y Valores, 160. [En prensa]. 182 Filosofia Unisinos, 16(2):164-182, may/aug 2015 Eduardo Fuentes GALEOTTI, A. 2002. Toleration as Recognition. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 242 p. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511487392 JONES, P. 2007. Making Sense of Political Toleration. British Journal of Political Science, 37(3):383-402. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S000712340700021X KAPLAN, B. 2007. Divided by Faith: Religious Conflict and the Practice of Toleration in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge/London, Harvard University Press, 415 p. http://dx.doi.org/10.4159/9780674039308 KORSGAARD, C. 1983. Two Distinctions in Goodness. The Philosophical Review, 92(2):169-195. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/2184924 McKITRICK, J. 2003. A Case for Extrinsic Dispositions. 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Hate and Punishment Antti Kauppinen Trinity College Dublin Final draft, June 4, 2014 For The Journal of Interpersonal Violence Special issue on hate crime, edited by Christian Munthe and David Brax. According to the view I will call Legal Expressivism (LE), neither crime nor punishment consists merely in intentionally imposing some kind of harm on another. Both also have an expressive aspect. In terms I will be using, they are what they are in part because they enact attitudes towards others – in the case of crime, some kind of disrespect, at least, and in the case of punishment, society's condemnation or reprobation. Indeed, punishment is justified, at least in part, because (and when) it uniquely expresses fitting condemnation or other retributive attitude. Hate or bias crimes dramatize the expressive aspect of crime, since they typically, and sometimes by design, send a message of inferiority to the victim's group and society at large. Treating the enactment of contempt and denigration towards a historically underprivileged group as an aggravating factor in sentencing may be an appropriate way to counter this message, since it reaffirms and indeed realizes the fundamental equality of all members of a democratic community. Elements of Legal Expressivism can be found in the work of many legal thinkers.1 Yet virtually every aspect of the story has been called into question by critics. In this paper, I will refine the LE account and respond to some of the criticisms. I will begin with the notion of an attitude and its relation to emotion, and argue that the two should not be assimilated. 1 See in particular Joel Feinberg (1965), Jeffrie Murphy & Jean Hampton (1988), Jean Hampton (1992), Martha Nussbaum & Dan Kahan (1996), Dan Kahan (1996, 2001), Elizabeth Anderson & Richard Pildes (2000), Antony Duff (2001), and Christopher Bennett (2006). 2 I'll also distinguish between two ways of expressing attitudes: enactment and symbolic expression. Hate crimes, in these terms, are crimes that enact hate, contempt, or disgust towards someone on account of identity-defining group membership. How can expressing such attitudes justify enhanced punishment? I begin by discussing appeal to a special kind of harm caused by hate crime and expressing attitudes in general, and argue that no kind of additional harm suffices to provide a rationale for enhanced punishment for hate crime. Instead, we need to turn to the LE framework. On this picture, wrongdoing is not merely about causing harm, but is rather a function of attitudes towards others (or, equivalently, the valuations) that our actions embody. Punishment manifests reactive attitudes, and is justified in terms of countering the evaluation implicit in the criminal's behaviour. I take up various criticisms of LE, and argue that they fail to damage the most plausible version, which appeals to the conceptual link between punishment and protecting the status of inviolability that all citizens have in a democratic community in justifying legal condemnation. This is a kind of mixed theory of punishment, since it has both backward-looking elements (punishment expresses reactive attitudes) and forward-looking ones (reactive attitudes are fitting because of their role in protecting the inviolable status of the victim). Given this understanding of crime and punishment in general, we can see the proper place of hate crime legislation. Hate crime is a greater wrong than the parallel crime, because it enacts attitudes that pose a graver threat to the inviolability of all members of the target group. In response, the right kind of hate crime legislation reaffirms the equality of all citizens as a fundamental democratic value. It expresses the determination on the part of members of the democratic community not to allow anyone to be treated as an object of disgust, contempt, or disdain, as a lower kind of being merely in virtue of belonging to a 3 group that is for some reason disvalued. In so doing, it preserves the equal status of all citizens, since such status supervenes on enacting reactive attitudes towards violations. 1. Attitudes and Their Manifestations I will begin with the notion of an attitude or sentiment, since it is crucial to any LE account. Though the term is sometimes used loosely, an attitude is distinct from an emotion or passion or affect. Rather, an attitude is a way of relating to someone or something that disposes one to have different emotions in different situations, to want certain things, to focus attention on certain things, to deliberate in certain ways, and possibly to make use of evidence in certain ways (cf. Anderson & Pildes 2000, 1509). My attitudes show how much I value someone or something. Thus, if I love someone, I will feel joy when she thrives and sadness if she suffers, I want her to do well for her own sake and am committed to doing things that further her good, I notice things that are opportunities or threats for her, I take those opportunities and threats into account in practical deliberation as reasons for action, and may be more likely to believe that she is excellent at her job than the evidence warrants. Perhaps there is a distinct feeling of love that goes with the attitude, but love itself is more than that feeling. Moreover, in the case of an attitude like love, I welcome or endorse the reactions associated with the sentiment, rather than being in their grip. In one sense of the word, I can identify with the pattern of passive responses. Only once I do so, the attitude will be genuinely mine. This doesn't mean that the attitude is under direct voluntary control, but neither is it purely passive, as it is sometimes portrayed. In fact, there is plausibly an asymmetry between our control over loving someone and not loving them. We can't will love into existence, but we may be able to will it out of existence. That is, if thoughts about 4 someone give rise to no positive feeling or spontaneously focus our attention, there's nothing we can directly do to change that. That's the problem with some arranged marriages. In contrast, if I'm already in a relationship and find myself spontaneously attracted to a coworker, say, I may well be able to deliberately set aside the feelings and refocus my attention on something else, and catch myself before falling in love. Hate, as I understand it, is in many ways the mirror image of love. If I hate someone, I want her to do badly, whether or not it is of instrumental benefit for me. I feel bad if she does well, get easily angry with her, and may be delighted if misfortune befalls her. I tend to notice things that are opportunities or threats, and take those as reasons for action – though obviously in the opposite way to the case of love. In full-blown hate, I don't regard these dispositions as something I want to get rid of, but embrace them, perhaps even take pride in them. Again, I may not be able to will hate into existence, but still able to will it out of existence. Perhaps I realize that I'm responding to Jewish people in the same negative way, regardless of their individual qualities. Insofar as I refuse the allow these feelings and thoughts to influence my deliberation and action, I am not a full-blown anti-semite – though of course, I'm not quite innocent either, until and unless the passive responses cease. I don't want to exaggerate the similarities between hate and love, however. One important difference between them is that hate may be entirely impersonal, as Thomas Brudholm (2010, 295) emphasizes – the individual characteristics of the hated person need not matter, if she is hated on account of belonging to a group. Relatedly, unlike resentment or indignation, hate does not essentially seek punishment of its target for what she's done. There doesn't have to be a wrong that should or could be repaid or forgiven, although hate may of course be triggered by wrongdoing as well. As Brudholm observes, even when it is a 5 kind of personal reactive attitude, hate targets the character of the person rather than particular actions (ibid., 306–307). One important consequence of the general picture of attitudes I have introduced is that unlike occurrent emotions, attitudes are not transparent. It may be that you can't be mistaken about whether you feel joy or sadness or rage right now, but you can be mistaken about whether you love someone – or whether you hate someone. When having an attitude goes against social norms, false belief about it may even be the normal condition. In many circles, anti-semitism, for example, is very disreputable, so people who are prejudiced towards Jews may sincerely but falsely believe that they are not. Other people can be better judges of our attitudes than we are ourselves. We can manifest or express our attitudes in two different ways. We can do so by way of using language or some other convention-based system of signs that is designed to convey our stance to others. I can express my love to my wife by telling her that I love her or by making her something she likes. As I use the term, the expression relation is non-causal, non-factive, and not necessarily intentional. Speech and symbols can express psychological states we don't actually have, as happens when we're insincere. They can also express attitudes we're not aware of having or don't mean to express. Otherwise psychoanalysts would go out of business. The other way of expressing attitudes is acting in a way that is best made sense of by attributing the attitude to the agent. I'll talk about enacting the attitude in this case to contrast it with symbolic expression. For example, I enact my love for someone by going out of my way to comfort her when she is in need, whether or not I say anything about my feelings. I just express the love by performing the actions that it motivates me to do. Now, as I've defined enacting, it is also potentially non-factive. It may be that what makes best sense of 6 my behaviour is an attitude I don't actually have. It may be that what I do and the way I do it is such that any reasonable person, well-versed in my cultural context would conclude that I love someone, were they the examine my behaviour, when in fact I am entirely indifferent. Still, on my view, I have enacted love, and people who attributed the attitude to me would be justified in doing so, though mistaken about my mental states. Or, to put it differently, they would be mistaken about my actual attitudes, but not about the attitude embodied by my behaviour. It is a common mistake in this context to liken or assimilate this kind of expression to linguistic meaning (see e.g. Hampton 1992, Adler 2000). In enactment, convention plays at best an indirect role, and its pragmatic effects are very different. My view belongs to what we may call the externalist family, since according to it the meaning of an action isn't determined by what goes on inside the agent's (or any particular interpreter's) mind. Instead, "to grasp the expressive meaning of an act, we try to make sense of it by fitting it into an interpretive context ... [A] proposed interpretation must make sense in light of the community's other practices, its history, and shared meanings." (Anderson & Pildes 2000, 1525). Think about a case of everyday jealousy. A friend of mine is a very good singer and musician. Recently, he went to a wedding party with his wife, who urged him to grab an acoustic guitar lying around. When he reluctantly did so, some twenty-something girls gathered around him, showering him with requests and adulation. He complied with the requests and welcomed the adulation, with the result that his wife subsequently accused him of flirting with the girls. My friend felt unfairly judged, since he wasn't in fact interested in the young women (or so he says). However, his wife had a point, too: his behaviour did reasonably express an interest. Without going too deep into what makes for a reasonable interpretation, a good starting point is asking oneself about the goals that an informed and rational agent in the relevant cultural context would pursue by engaging in the observed kind 7 of behaviour. There will inevitably be indeterminacy here, but that is the kind of fact of life that must often be acknowledged in the context of law. One relevant issue in this area will be whether groups of people, such as legislatures or courts, can have or express attitudes above and beyond the attitudes of the individuals that comprise them. The philosophical pendulum has swung in the direction of the legitimacy of attributing group attitudes (see e.g. Tuomela 2007; List & Pettit 2011). Following this tradition, I will take it as given that the attitudes of a collective (such as a state) are determined by the goals, assumptions, and inferences that enough of its relevant members jointly accept as the basis of collective action. As members of a group, people can take as given premises that they wouldn't make use of in their personal practical or theoretical reasoning, which means that we can attribute to a group goals or beliefs that a minority of members, or no one, has. For example, military planners might agree to design an armament program starting from the assumption that the Chinese will have a new fighter plane in 2016, even if few of them personally think they will be ready yet. Which attitudes should be ascribe to a group, then? I will take Blackburn's Credibility principle as a starting point: A group may be said to have been committed to a belief (goal, principle) if there is no way – no credible way – that the group could rationally sustain their open affirmations were they not also prepared to stand by the belief (goal, principle). (2010, 81) The most straightforward way a group can commit to a goal is announcing, after going through the procedures its members consider as authoritative, that it has decided to do suchand-such. Thus, the European Central Bank may make it known that it will lend money to Greece. But Credibility also leaves room for groups having beliefs and goals (and indeed attitudes) that are not directly affirmed by any of the relevant spokespeople. The ECB might be committed to preferring a rise in unemployment to a rise in inflation, if it couldn't 8 credibly deny such a preference, given the pattern of past and present decisions, even if it is never openly affirmed by anyone. 2. Hate Crime and the Varieties of Harm No one, I think, would deny that some of the attitudes we have, such as hate or bias, are morally inappropriate. But should having or manifesting such attitudes be the business of the law, as advocates of hate crime and hate speech legislation want? Isn't law concerned with our external behaviour rather than motives, as Kant, among others, argued? Is it right to punish one offender more strictly than another, if the only difference between them is in the quality of their motives? The commonly accepted starting point for answering these questions is the principle of proportionality: deserved punishment for a crime is a function of both the degree of wrongdoing and the degree of culpability or responsibility (see e.g. Al-Hakim and Dimmock 2012, 579ff). If hate crimes deserve a stricter punishment, they must either amount to a greater wrong or involve greater culpability. The latter, plausibly, is primarily determined by factors such as intentionality, presence of coercion or invincible ignorance, negligence, and so on. With respect to them, there is unlikely to be a systematic difference between hate crimes and parallel crimes. Much of the discussion about hate crime, including this paper, thus focuses on the difference in wrongdoing. What determines the degree of wrongdoing? One simple answer is that wrongdoing is at least in part a function of the degree of harm to others that an action causes. Perhaps rape is worse than sexual harassment, because it is more harmful to the victim. Along this line, some have defended stricter punishment for hate crimes on the grounds that they cause greater harm to the victim (Lawrence 1999; Iganski 2001; Wisconsin v. Mitchell, 508 U.S. 9 476 (1993)). For example, there is some evidence that the psychological and physical harms of hate crime are likely to be more serious or more widespread than those of parallel crimes. However, Heidi Hurd and Michael Moore (2004) argue convincingly that enhanced punishment for hate crime cannot in fact be defended on the grounds that such crimes cause greater physical, psychological, collateral, or social harm than otherwise motivated crimes. This, they rightly point out, is a contingent matter. If a greed-motivated crime, say, causes the same harm, why should it be punished more lightly? Motivation here is only a poor proxy for what really makes for the degree of seriousness of crime, namely harm (Hurd & Moore 2004, 1086).2 Similarly, if it is morally worse to harm someone who is in a vulnerable position than someone who isn't, this doesn't justify differential treatment of a perpetrator who targets someone vulnerable because of her race, for example – it's the vulnerability rather than the sort of characteristics that hate crime legislation involves that justifies the difference (ibid., 1097). Conversely, as Anderson and Pildes (2000) point out, thick-skinned victims of hate crime may be psychologically unaffected by the hate aspect. This leads to the ridiculous consequence that "only the thin-skinned and psychologically fragile are entitled to be treated with dignity" (Anderson & Pildes 2000, 1543). So it's no good to appeal to greater conventional harm to justify enhanced punishment for hate crime. Many defenders of hate crime legislation recognize the difficulties with appealing to ordinary kinds of harm, and consequently introduce a new concept of distinctive expressive harm. This, then, provides a rationale for enhanced punishment. As Dan Kahan puts it, "By imposing greater punishment on [hate] offenders, hate crime laws say that society regards 2 A reviewer for this journal pointed out that one could nevertheless defend hate crime legislation on grounds of posing a risk of greater harm, parallel to drunk driving, for example. I think there is something to this suggestion. But I believe that the reason why merely imposing a risk on others (even when no harm actually results) can be legally punishable wrongdoing is ultimately that doing so expresses an inappropriate attitude towards them. Thus the wrongdoing involved in imposing risks is not to be understood in terms of harm but rather the Expressive Wrongdoing view sketched in Section 3 below. 10 the harms they impose as different from and worse than the harms inflicted by those who assault or kill for other reasons." (Kahan 2001, 182) Kahan does not do much to explicate the different kind of harm – indeed, his considered view is better construed as a version of the Wrong Valuation account I discuss below. For a full discussion of what makes for expressive harm, we need to turn to Elizabeth Anderson and Richard Pildes (2000). Anderson and Pildes' argument proceeds as follows. They begin with the claim that "A person suffers expressive harm when she is treated according to principles that express negative or inappropriate attitudes toward her." (Anderson & Pildes 2000, 1527) This definition does not by itself say what makes expression of inappropriate attitudes a nonpsychological harm for a person. Their answer draws on a link between expression of attitudes and social relationships: "The communication of attitudes creates social relationships by establishing shared understandings of the attitudes that will govern the interactions of the parties." (1528) Given this, "Communications can expressively harm people by creating or changing the social relationships in which the addressees stand to the communicator" (1529), where these social relationships include "friendship and enmity, collegiality and rivalry, and superior and inferior caste status" (1530). So the argument seems to have three premises: 1) Social relationships supervene on a shared understanding of the attitudes that govern mutual interactions. 2) Shared understandings of interaction-governing attitudes result from actions that express attitudes. 3) Standing in certain social relationships is bad for a person, regardless of how they feel about it. 4) Hence, actions that express attitudes can harm a person via changing the relationships in which they stand to others. The first premise concerns the nature of social relationships. It says that what makes us colleagues, for example, is that we mutually understand that we are to relate to each other in 11 certain ways, and, perhaps, not in other ways – for example, we share an understanding that we won't hate or love each other. (If we do, we don't do so qua colleagues.) The second premise says that the shared understandings are created by expressing attitudes. To be sure, the understanding that governs our relations may not be the result of anything you and I specifically did. In most cases, we inherit the conception of what goes with what role from our cultural and historical background. But our expressive actions reaffirm and possibly shape the understanding we have, and perhaps the way we acquire the tradition is by way of expressive action. At least, this is not wholly implausible. The last bit, then, is that some social relationships are as such bad for us to stand in. Which relationships? Anderson and Pildes don't say, but their example, not of hate crime but of expressive harm of state action, illustrates what they mean: Racial segregation sends the message that blacks are untouchable, a kind of social pollutant from which "pure" whites must be protected. For the communicative goal to be realized, its meaning must be acknowledged. This does not mean that the addressees must believe, approve of, or accept the message. They simply have to understand it. Once people share an understanding that segregation laws express contempt for blacks, these laws constitute blacks as an "untouchable," stigmatized caste. (Anderson & Pildes 2000, 1528) So on this view, the expressive harm of hate crime, independently of its psychological effect on people, consists in its manifesting attitudes toward the victim that place the offender and the victim in an undesirable and harmful relationship in which one dominates the other. If that is the case, enhanced punishment is justified on the basis of greater wrongdoing than in the parallel crime. As Section 4 will show, I find much that is congenial about this picture. However, I don't believe it will quite suffice. Some social relationships may be all about how we feel about each other: what makes us lovers is that we love each other. But other relationships involve more than a shared understanding of interaction-governing attitudes, and some of those are highly relevant in the context of hate crime. Relationships of domination and 12 subordination and oppression, in particular, may exist in the absence of such understanding. I may think that I am the social or legal equal of someone above me in a hierarchy – and in some cases, they may think the same way – but sadly, that isn't sufficient to make us equals. Relationships of relative power do not reduce to how we understand. The problem for Anderson and Pildes is that to claim that simply understanding that the behaviour of others expresses contempt towards me as a disabled person, for example, while nevertheless not accepting that it is in any way merited, suffices to make me stigmatized or disadvantaged makes little sense. Instead, being dominated or subordinated is a status that one may have. As I will argue in the next section, status does not supervise just on attitudes that others express towards me, but on how society, and the law in particular, responds to those attitudes. What matters for status is not just symbolic communication but concrete enactment through punishment. 3. Punishment, Expression, and Inviolability If the arguments of the previous section are correct, it is not greater or different kind of harm that makes hate crime deserve enhanced punishment. A different understanding of both crime and punishment is called for. This is what Legal Expressivism promises. Proponents of this type of view emphasize that both crime and punishment have an attitudinal or communicative dimension. It is common for proponents to begin with the observation that merely causing harm or loss to another, even if done intentionally, does not suffice for punishable crime. Instead, we need to look at the attitudes expressed by the perpetrator. Many emphasize that these attitudes embody a mistaken evaluation of the victim's worth. As Dan Kahan puts it, what moves us to condemn an actor for harming another isn't the simple perception that her actions have diminished another person's welfare, but rather the judgment 13 that her actions express too low a valuation of the other person's worth relative to the actor's own ends. (Kahan 2001, 181; cf. Kahan and Nussbaum 1996, 351–2) Kahan draws on the work of Jean Hampton, who argues that treating someone in a way that is precluded by her value or represents her as less valuable than it is "diminishes" her value, and simultaneously represents the agent as elevated with respect to the victim (Hampton 1992, 1672–7; cf. Murphy & Hampton 1988, 44-5, 124). Note that this is not the same as the victim feeling demeaned or insulted, or losing self-respect. Nor does it require that the perpetrator intends to diminish the value of the victim – that's not what a pickpocket has in mind. The wrongdoing involved in crime is a function of the valuation it expresses rather than harm alone. Call this the Wrong Valuation account of wrongdoing. Let me be explicit that on this view, wrongdoing is a matter of the attitude enacted by the action, or what some call its social meaning. Since I've endorsed an externalist construal of social meaning, this view is a target of the following objection raised by Hurd and Moore: [Externalist] construals of social meaning ... would make a defendant more blameworthy (and thus deserving of greater punishment) not because of any fact about him or his deed; rather, he would be subjected to increased punishment because of the appearance of there being a fact about him, namely, the appearance that he possessed a hateful or bigoted motivation for his crime (regardless of whether he in fact possessed such a motivation). (Hurd & Moore 2004, 1107) Hurd and Moore argue that such appearance could not possibly justify punishment, especially when false. However, their reading misconstrues the externalist view. There is a fact about the deed – for example, that it is disrespectful of someone. This fact is nothing other than the fact that it would be reasonably taken to be so by someone aware of the features of the action and context. Blameworthiness is a separate issue. For Legal Expressivism, what makes the action as potential reason for blame in the first place is that it (objectively) expresses bad attitude or wrong valuation.3 Someone who performs a hateful 3 Hampton holds a similar view: "[T]he message of the action and the actuality of what it accomplishes is not only something that we understand apart from the victim's reaction to it, but also 14 act, for example, without realizing it is such (and thus not acting out of hate) may be excused on ordinary grounds – the act wasn't intentional under the description, the agent was invincibly ignorant of the social meaning of the act, and so on. The next step is that punishment expresses what Peter Strawson (1962) labeled reactive attitudes – attitudes towards the attitudes or quality of the will that the agent has expressed by his action. Such attitudes can meaningfully be attributed to groups on the basis of goals and assumptions that their representatives could not credibly disavow, given their behaviour. In the case of punishment, the reactive attitudes are those of the community through authoritative representatives. A classic formulation is given by Joel Feinberg's definition of punishment, though Feinberg gives it a more conventionalist twist than necessary: Punishment is a conventional device for the expression of attitudes of resentment and indignation, and of judgments of disapproval and reprobation, either on the part of the punishing authority himself or of those "in whose name" the punishment is inflicted. (Feinberg 1965, 400) For Legal Expressivists, expressing reactive attitudes is what makes something a punishment. In Antony Duff's words, punishment is "a mode of moral communication with offenders that seeks to persuade them to repent their crimes, to reform themselves, and to reconcile themselves with those they have wronged." (2001, 116) Some critics argue that expressing public condemnation is not a sufficient account of punishment, since punishment necessarily involves hard treatment, and resentment can be expressed without it. Nathan Hanna, for example, argues that we might express our condemnation by requiring payment of court costs or compensation (Hanna 2008, 137) or by confining people in a way comparable to involuntary psychiatric treatment, and thus without intending to cause something that we "read off of" the action regardless of the psychological peculiarities of a wrongdoer's psychology that led him to commit the wrong." (Hampton 1992, 1684) 15 suffering (Hanna 2009, 242).4 Call this the Enactment Problem: Why does the condemnation have to be enacted by hard treatment rather than merely symbolically expressed? Putting the Enactment Problem aside for now, the expressive account of punishment, as such, leaves open the question of whether and how punishment is justified. The traditional justifications for punishment appeal either to the intrinsic value of the perpetrator's suffering and the perpetrator's deserving pain (retributivism) or to the benefits of hard treatment, such as the good social consequences of deterrence or incapacitation (consequentialism). An expressivist understanding of crime and punishment need not appeal to a new kind of justification altogether, but may instead provide a different insight into existing models (Kahan 1996, 601). Jean Hampton's take on retributivism is a good example of this. For her, crime sends a message, and punishment counters or contradicts it with its own message. Hampton's case for this draws on the Wrong Valuation account of wrongdoing. The criminal's action makes a false moral claim and denies moral reality. Retributive punishment is "the defeat of the wrongdoer at the hands of the victim ... that symbolizes the correct relative value of wrongdoer and victim" (Murphy & Hampton 1988, 125). It need not involve the infliction of pain (though that's often part of it), but rather mastering the would-be master himself in order to "deny the wrongdoer's false claim to superiority and to assert the victim's equal value" (ibid., 126). Thus, punishment can "annul the message" (ibid., 131) sent by the crime. Similarly, Kahan says, "The proper retributive punishment is the one that appropriately expresses condemnation and reaffirms the values that the wrongdoer denies." (1996, 602) 4 One argument, put forward by Christopher Bennett, is that reactive attitudes as such involve "commitment to retribution, to the thought that it is non-contingently a good thing that those who have done wrong should undergo certain forms of suffering" (Bennett 2002, 147). For Bennett, this suffering that reactive attitudes seek is of two main varieties: the pain of social isolation, and the pain of guilt. Hanna denies this analysis of reactive attitudes. My sympathies are on Bennett's side, but I lack the space for proper discussion here. 16 I believe Hampton's view is on the right track. But it places too much weight on communicating a message about the relative value of the criminal and the victim, and the "evidence" that such a message supposedly provides (Hampton 1992, 1676). There is more than mere communication at stake, or so I will argue. Further, instead of Hampton's Wrong Valuation account of wrongdoing, I adopt the more general Expressive Wrongdoing view: wronging others is a matter of enacting inappropriate or unfitting attitudes towards them (where inappropriateness need not be understood in terms of value). Punishment and Inviolability To find an expressive rationale for punishment, we need not just look at what punishment says about the perpetrator, but also what it says about the victim. After all, punishment also sends a message to the victim: we, the community, will not let others enact disrespect towards you with impunity; we'll stand up for you. This is also suggested, but not fully developed, by Hampton, who notes that "whatever one's theory of human worth is, I am suggesting that societal punishment practices should be seen as created and designed to protect it" (Murphy & Hampton 1988, 141). What is at issue is a special kind of value, which I'll call inviolability. Inviolability is a deontic status that something may have. To be inviolable is to be such that there are certain things others are not permitted to do to you. I will take it for granted that human beings are by default de jure inviolable: it is morally wrong to do certain things to them. For example, other things being equal, it is wrong to hurt someone against her will. If someone is treated in an impermissible way, then, other things being equal, it is de jure fitting to impose some kind of negative sanction on the agent. This is a conceptual truth: what it is to have a certain status is for sanctions for certain violations to be appropriate (and conversely, for sanctions for certain behaviours to be inappropriate – part of what it is to have the status of being the 17 owner of something is for it to be inappropriate for others to interfere with your using it). Normative status and fittingness (or unfittingness) of sanctions are simply two sides of the same coin. Calling something impermissible and then saying that no sanction is fitting amounts to contradicting oneself, unless there is an excuse or exemption for the agent. Our inviolability confers us a kind of dignity or worth that is good for us independently of our actually being harmed. This is something that Thomas Nagel emphasizes when he says that "not only is it an evil for a person to be harmed in certain ways, but for it to be permissible to harm the person in those ways is an additional and independent evil." (Nagel 2002, 38) In a similar spirit, Frances Kamm (2005) talks about the importance of our inviolability over and above the importance of not being actually violated. Moral inviolability is something that we can't lose as a result of the action of others, but we can meaningfully speak of a kind of de facto inviolability that we may or may not possess. What strips us of our de facto inviolability is not merely that someone harms us or wrongs or disrespects us. But if others can disrespect me with impunity or with a mere slap on the wrist, I will have little dignity left. Our de facto inviolability is thus constituted not by the fact that others treat us as rational and autonomous agents or fail to do so, but by the fact that others must, on pain of external sanction, treat us as such. This is the sense in which law can confer on us a social standing that befits an equal member of a democratic community. It can't stop others from engaging in a disrespectful behaviour such as stealing or assault, but it can penalize such behaviour and thereby manifest respect for everyone. If, conversely, the law didn't penalize such behaviour against a particular group, leaving them open to attack with impunity, that would amount to denying them equal respect and thereby constituting them as having a lower standing than others, even if no one ever actually attacked them. 18 So victim-focused LE says that enacting retributive attitudes is justified, because it is the only way to maintain or establish the victim's de facto status as inviolable – to guarantee that the victim de facto has the inviolability she already has de jure. Merely symbolically expressing censure of the perpetrator or respect for the victim does not suffice to establish the status. I emphasize that this is not a psychological but, as it were, a logical matter: to have a certain status is for it to be the case that behaviours inconsistent with it are sanctioned. To be inviolable is to be someone towards whom no one can violate without punishment – if someone enacts disrespect toward you, the state will enact condemnation of the perpetrator. Inviolability is a matter of degree, and as Hampton points out in her parallel discussion (1988, 141), historically certain groups of people – rich, white, male – have enjoyed higher de facto inviolability, since punishment for disrespecting them has been surer and harder. From this perspective, the Enactment Problem turns on a normative question: whether hard treatment is a proper expression of societal reactive attitudes depends on how inviolable the victims should be treated as, since inflicting suffering on a perpetrator is a way of expressing respect for the victim. Let us turn to potential challenges to this account. First, Matthew Adler considers something like victim-focused LE in his discussion of Hampton. On his reading, Hampton says that wrongdoing "has led the community to believe that the victim has lesser moral worth" (2000, 1424), and punishment is necessary to reverse this status harm. He then has an easy time showing that punishment may not be the best or only way to change community norms and beliefs. But this misses the point altogether. The problem isn't that wrongdoing results in false beliefs about the victim's status, but that enacting disrespectful attitudes, if not countered, actually changes the (de facto) status itself. 19 Second, victim-focused justification of expressive punishment also avoids what I'll call the Illiberality Challenge. This challenge is that if punishment condemns the moral quality of the perpetrator's attitudes-expressed-in-action, it oversteps the boundaries of political liberalism, which requires moral neutrality. Bennett, for example, justifies state denunciation by appeal to "a model of the responsible or virtuous citizen, a model that represents an individual with concerns and attitudes consonant with the defining authoritative values of the polity", and says that "criminal law therefore enjoins people to live up to this model" (2006, 301). Though Bennett believes this is consistent with Kantian liberalism, the perfectionist worries of critics like Hurd (2001) are understandable. The victim-focused view, in contrast, does not need to appeal to moral improvement of the perpetrator as justification. The state must condemn crime in order to enact respect for the victim as an inviolable member of the community. There could hardly be a more liberal rationale for punishment. 4. Responding to Hate In the previous section, I defended an Expressive Wrongdoing account of crime and a victim-focused Legal Expressivist account of the nature and justification of punishment in general. I will now argue that it provides the most promising framework for thinking about hate crime legislation. On the Expressive Wrongdoing view, what makes something a crime is that it enacts attitudes that are incompatible with the legal status the victim enjoys as a citizen or occupant of a particular role. Unless society in turn expresses its rejection of such attitudes, the victim's status really is lowered: she is someone to whom it is (legally) acceptable to do such things. On victim-focused LE, this is what justifies punishment, in proportion to the victim's 20 status and the seriousness of the violation. Ordinary crime, motivated typically by perception of self-interest or a personal grudge, poses a threat to the victim's inviolability only as a side effect, however. The victim's status is no part of the criminal's concern.5 Hate crime is different. The attitudes it enacts – contempt, hate, disgust – contain an evaluation of the victim, by virtue of who she is (and hence everyone else who shares the relevant characteristic), as inferior. Contempt, for example, presents its object as ranking low in worth as a person, by the lights of some ideal the contemner (perhaps wrongly) endorses, in Michelle Mason's apt formulation (Mason 2003, 241).6 In that sense, at least, these attitudes aim at lowering the status of the victim and those like her. And if those who are in positions of authority in the society do not respond to this appropriately, they do succeed. It does not suffice to reject the disrespect towards the victim that all crimes manifest to cancel out the hate and contempt. Indeed, failing to respond to this aspect of the crime leaves other members of the society complicit with it. So my main argument for hate crime legislation goes as follows: 1. Committing a base crime against someone as an interchangeable member of a group regardless of personal profit or pre-existing personal relationship manifests an attitude of disgust, contempt, hostility, or hate, for short rejection as an equal member of a democratic community, toward all members of the victim's group. 2. A criminal justice system that fails to impose an additional sanction for a crime that manifests rejection as an equal itself manifests indifference on the part of the public toward the rejection. 3. Social or legal status is in part constituted by dispositions to sanction manifestations of attitudes. 4. So, manifesting public indifference to rejection as an equal constitutes the status of all members of the victim's group as inferior, making the public complicit in the hate aspect of the crime. 5 As a reviewer for this journal pointed out, this is not true of all non-hate crimes. I accept that my argument generalizes to some non-hate crimes, but lack the space to explore the implications here. 6 Mason believes that contempt can be morally justified, if the ideal of the person is justified, and if the object really does fall short of it. I take it as a given that these conditions are not met in the case of hate crime. 21 5. Having an inferior status is in itself bad for a person, regardless of other physical or psychological harm. 6. So, equal respect for persons requires an additional sanction for the hate element of a crime. The first premise delineates some of the grounds for concluding that a crime expresses a demeaning or degrading attitude toward a group in addition to whatever disrespect or disregard the base crime already manifests. If you burn my house because it's in the way of a new development you want to build, you disrespect me; if you burn my house because you don't want my kind to live in the neighbourhood, you also show contempt and disgust toward me and my people. The second premise points to the link between imposing sanctions and the attitudes of the public this manifests. The third one links sanctions to status, as discussed above. The fourth premise draws the preliminary conclusion that the public's attitudes manifested by the failure to sanction the hate aspect constitute the victim's group as inferior to others. This is a strong claim, of course. But it seems to parallel the case with disrespect: again, if we do nothing (or react only verbally) while someone is being assaulted, for example, or adopt norms that fail to direct us to do anything, we are thereby making the victim into someone de facto insignificant. If we do nothing to react to the hate or contempt aspect manifested by the hate crime, we acquiesce with the treatment of the victim as less significant than others, thereby lowering her de facto status. The fifth premise says that an inferior status is bad in itself. In the real world, having such a status and being aware of it is of course also psychologically harmful. If you realize that no one is going to do anything if you are raped or beaten, this will have effects beyond the rape and beating itself. But as Nagel and Kamm pointed out, lacking inviolability is bad in itself. To put the point differently, it amounts to being dominated by another. As Philip Pettit (1997) has famously argued, even a slave who is never actually interfered with is 22 worse off than a free person, since the owner is always in a position to interfere with the slave's life on arbitrary grounds. The conclusion, then, is that equal respect for persons, the kind of attitude that any legitimate liberal state is required to manifest toward all citizens, requires that crimes that embody hate or prejudice are punished more seriously than parallel crimes that do not embody the same attitudes. Contrary to a claim popular with critics, this is not punishment for having an attitude, but for enacting it, and furthermore enacting it in a way that is independently disrespectful of others in a way that merits state intervention (and thus should be criminalized in any case). Again, wrongdoing doesn't consist merely in harming others, but doing so in a way that embodies a devaluing attitude. Laws such as the Wisconsin Hate Crime Statute (Wis. Stat. § 939.645) that prescribe increased penalties for intentional selection of the victim on the basis of perception of protected characteristics seem to target the right thing. 5. Conclusion In this paper, I have argued in defence of the view that both crime and punishment should be understood in expressive terms in general. Part of this defence was distinguishing the different ways in which attitudes can be expressed, symbolic expression and enactment. I have argued that although attitudes of hate or bias are in themselves beyond the rightful scope of legislation, those who manifest them by way of performing actions that are independently wrong and are reasonably interpreted as aiming to lower the status of their victims are morally liable to suffer enhanced punishment in order to protect the equal status 23 of the victim's group.7 In order for us all to live in a society of equals, we must express our rejection of the rejection of equality that hate crime enacts by more than just words. References Adler, M. (2000). Expressive theories of law: A sceptical overview. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 148, 1363–1502. Al-Hakim, M. & Dimock, S. (2012). Hate as an aggravating factor in sentencing. New Criminal Law Review, 15 (4), 572–611. Anderson, E. (1993). Value in ethics and economics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Anderson, E. & Pildes, R. (2000). Expressive theories of law: A general restatement. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 148 (5), 1503–1575. Bennett, C. (2002). The varieties of retributive experience. Philosophical Quarterly, 52, 145–163. Bennett, C. (2006). State denunciation of crime. Journal of Moral Philosophy, 3 (3), 288– 304. Blackburn, S. (2010). Group minds and expressive harm. In Practical tortoise raising. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 64-89. Brudholm, T. (2010). Hatred as an attitude. Philosophical Papers, 39 (3), 289–313. Duff, A. (2001). Punishment, communication, and community. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Feinberg, J. (1965). The expressive function of punishment. The Monist, 49 (3), 397–423. Hampton, J. (1992). Correcting harms versus righting wrongs: The goal of retribution. UCLA Law Review, 39, 1659–1702. Hanna, N. (2008). Say what? A critique of expressive retributivism. Law and Philosophy, 27 (2), 123–150. Hanna, N. (2009). The passions of punishment. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 90 (2), 232–250. 7 I have not said anything about symbolic expression of hate. I do not believe that the argument I have made can be extended to support hate speech legislation. It seems to me that the fact that others are free to say unpleasant things about my group does not undermine my status as inviolable in the way that selectively targeting me without punishment does, as long as I am similarly free to talk back or turn my back to it. 24 Hurd, H. M. (2001). Why liberals should hate "hate crime legislation". Law and Philosophy, 20, 215–232. Hurd, H. M. & Moore, M. (2004). Punishing hatred and prejudice. Stanford Law Review, 56 (5), 1081–1146. Iganski, P. (2001). Hate crimes hurt more. American Behavioral Scientist, 45 (4), 626–638. Kahan, D.M. (1996). What do alternative sanctions mean? University of Chicago Law Review, 63 (2), 591–653. Kahan, D. M. (2001). Two liberal fallacies in the hate crime debate. Law and Philosophy 20, 175–193. Kahan, D. M. & Nussbaum, M. (1996). Two conceptions of emotion in criminal law. Columbia Law Review, 96 (2), 269–374. Kamm, F. (2005). Intricate ethics. New York: Oxford University Press. Lawrence, F. (1999). Punishing hate. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. List, C. & Pettit, P. (2011), Group agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mason, M. (2003). Contempt as a moral attitude. Ethics, 113 (2), 234–272. Nagel, T. (2002). Concealment and exposure and other essays. New York: Oxford University Press. Pettit, P. (1997). Republicanism: A theory of freedom and government. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Strawson, P. (1962). Freedom and resentment. Proceedings of the British Academy, 48, 1– 25. Tuomela, R. (2007). The philosophy of sociality. New York: Oxford University Press.

Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 955 Article Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems Richard L. Amoroso *1 1 Noetic Advanced Studies Institute, California, USA Abstract Delineating the framework for a fundamental model of long-range coherence in biological systems is said to rely on principles beyond parameters addressed by current physical science. Just as phenomena of quantum mechanics lay beyond tools of classical Newtonian mechanics we must now enter a 3 rd regime of unified field, UF mechanics. In this paper we present a battery of nine empirical protocols for manipulating long-range coherence in complex self-organized living systems (SOLS) in a manner surmounting the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum uncertainty (space-quantization) thereby allowing empirical access to underlying coherent biophysical principles driving self-organization. Interestingly, while the UF is not indicative of a 5 th fundamental force in the usual phenomenal sense of quantal transfer during field interactions; it does however provide an inherent 'force of coherence' in an energyless ontological sense by a process called 'topological switching' of higher dimensional (HD) brane dynamics. It is this putative inherent property that produces long-range coherence and leads to the possibility of its direct experimental mediation. Keywords: long-range coherence, quantum uncertainty principle, complex systems, selforganization, unified field mechanics. 1. Introduction Summary of Purpose A panoply of theoretical insight related to a new anthropic noetic cosmology occurring during the past two decades [1-38] has facilitated design of rigorous empirical protocols for isolating and manipulating fundamental parameters related to long-range coherence in biological systems putatively solving the ancient mind-body problem. Our key premise is that the so-called Planck scale stochastic regime is not fundamental and need no longer be a barrier to the study coherent phenomena in biological systems. Since Heisenberg's 1927 discovery, the quantum uncertainty principle (four dimensional, 4D) has been by empirical definition a barrier to accessing certain kinds of complementary biophysical information. As will be shown, the simple solution is Do something else! That is, use a different fundamental basis for biophysical 'measurement' criteria by utilizing additional degrees of freedom inherent in a noetic cosmological paradigm. Nine experimental protocols are outlined for testing postulates of the model; which if successful will lead to a standardized biophysical research platform and a new class of biosensors for studying the mind-body interface.. * Correspondence: Prof. Richard L. Amoroso, Director of Physics Lab., Noetic Advanced Studies Institute, California, USA. http://www.noeticadvancedstudies.us E-mail: [email protected] Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 956 Noetic cosmology makes correspondence to 11D M-Theoretic dual Calabi-Yau mirror symmetry, 10 4 6M M K  [39-41] albeit with the addition of a twelfth dimension to incorporate Unified Field, UF dynamics, 12 4 8 4 4 4 M M K M       [1,23]. String Theory has struggled to discover one unique vacuum compactification from the googolplex, googol10 or infinite potentia provided by additional dimensions, with Standard Model Minkowski space, M4 as the sought resultant [39-41]. Noetic cosmology is different All dimensionalities from 12D to 0D are cycled through continuously defined as a 'Continuous-state spin exchange dimensional reduction compactification process' that led to discovery of a unique string vacuum [1,37]. Note: The 'continuous-state' is radically different than a Big Bang singularity [1,14,33,34]. Summary of salient theoretical postulates:  The Unified Field, UF provides an evolutionary 'force of coherence' guiding evolution in biological systems.  The HD UF regime is accessible by surmounting the uncertainty principle (limitation imposed by space-quantization parameters of the Copenhagen Interpretation) by manipulating new cosmological parameters described by additional degrees of freedom related to a Large-Scale Additional Dimensionality (LSXD) version of M-Theory [37].  Utilizing UF parameters provides a new action principle with an inherent force of coherence acting like a 'super-quantum potential' or pilot wave [1,42-44] guiding the 'continuous-state' spin-exchange dimensional reduction compactification process of spacetime and evolution of complexity in the Self-Organized Living Systems (SOLS) it pervades [2].  The putative unique 12D M-Theoretic regime of UF action correlates parameters of Calabi-Yau mirror symmetry [42-44] with heretofore generally ignored properties of de Broglie-Bohm Causal and Cramer Transactional interpretations of quantum theory [4245] and their higher dimensional (HD) extensions utilized in the new paradigm of noetic cosmology [1,37].  This unique string vacuum forms a conformal scale-invariant covariant polarized DiracEinstein energy dependent spacetime metric, 4 4M  [1,46-48] which by nature of its inherent continuous-state dimensional reduction process [1] acts as a Feynman 'synchronization backbone' [49] facilitating/simplifying empirical accessibility.  This empirical mediation of the LSXD polarized Dirac-Einstein metric, 4 4M  (12D) [1,3,37,46-48] can be performed by a specialized incursive form of rf-modulated Sagnac Effect resonant interference hierarchy able to surmount the uncertainty principle [1,4]. Since 1993 the so-called Elitzur-Vaidman Interaction-Free Measurement (IFM) paradigm [5058], a procedure for detecting the quantum state of an object without a phenomenological interaction occurring with the measuring device that ordinarily collapses the quantum wave function,  provides an indicia of our model suggesting it may be possible in general, as proposed here, to completely override the quantum uncertainty principle with probability, p 1 through utility of additional degrees of freedom inherent in the supersymmetric regime of string/brane theory. Note: in Newtonian mechanics the universe was 3D, Einstein introduced a Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 957 4D cosmology; now the next step seems to require 12D as the minimal dimensionality for producing causal separation from 4M . The disadvantages of the IFM model is that in order to improve probability towards certainty more and more Mach-Zehnder interferometers and more and more cycles through the apparatus are required [51-53]; while our apparatus acts with a single cycle because it represents a true and complete overriding of the quantum uncertainty principle by utilization UF dynamics [1,4]. We emphasize our position that it is impossible to violate the uncertainty principle in 4D (by empirical fact) which the IFM method is limited to. This duality in the Quantum Zeno Paradox as experimentally implemented in IFM protocols suggests a duality between the regular phenomenological quantum theory and a completed unified or ontological model beyond the formalism of the standard Copenhagen Interpretation as proposed here [59-63]. Utilizing extended theoretical elements a putative empirical protocol for producing IFM with probability p 1 is introduced in a direct causal violation or absolute surmount of the methodology of the current 4D Copenhagen quantum Uncertainty Principle. 2. Insight into the Measurement Problem In order to surmount quantum uncertainty and empirically access the hidden 3 rd regime of reality (ClassicalQuantumUnified) new physics is required. The physical concept of fundamental interactions regards phenomenological properties of matter (Fermions) mediated by transfer of an energy-momentum field (Bosons) as described by the Galilean, or Lorentz-Poincaré groups of transformations. An interaction is defined as any action, generally a force, mediated by an energetic exchange particle such as the photon in electromagnetic interactions. Kwiat said: "There has been some controversy and misunderstanding of the IFM system concerning what is meant by 'interaction' in the context of 'interaction-free' measurements. In particular, we stress that there must be a coupling (interaction) term in any Hamiltonian description [63]". Here we introduce a new ontological type of homeomorphic transformation (a holomorphicantiholomorphic duality) that Toffoli calls a 'topological switching' [64] of what Stein calls 'topological charge' [65,66] that we propose as an empirical basis for the Micromagnetics of spacetime/matter information exchange without usual phenomenological exchange quanta. Mediation occurs instead as an 'ontological becoming' or 'being' by operation of an energyless coherently controlled resonant hierarchy of the topology of LSXD brane interactions [1,37] which is not a local Hamiltonian phenomenon but perhaps a new form of ontological UF Lagrangian topology. Topological switching can be represented metaphorically as the perceptual switching of the central vertices of a Necker Cube when stared at. The uncertainty principle, / 2xx p   or / 2xE t   by empirical definition is impossible to violate within the framework of Copenhagen phenomenology arising from operation of a 'Heisenberg Microscope'. The Stern-Gerlach experiment demonstrated this fundamental empirical fact of space-quantization produced along the z-axis by continuous application of a non-uniform magnetic field to atomic spin structure [67], or by Young's double-slit experiment Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 958 for example. The Elitzur-Vaidman bomb-test experiment first demonstrated experimentally in 1994 [51] using a Mach-Zehnder interferometer bent this immutable law soon leading to two improved procedures: 1) Multiple recycled Measurements and 2) Multiple Interferometers improving IFM from 25% to 80%. The Mach-Zehnder interferometer uses pairs of correlated photons produced by spontaneous parametric-down conversion from a molecular crystal such as LiIO3. (Photons are not entangled for a local observer unless produced by simultaneous emission) Initially in the first experiments for a 50-50 beam splitter for a one time measurement cycle the IFM probability was 25% according to Eq. (1) [51]; but for repeated measurements and/or various forms of multiple interferometers the IFM probability can be arbitrarily increased toward unity as in Fig. 1, ( 1) ( 2) ( ) P Det P Det P Bomb    . (1) IFM probability occurs in powers of / 2N by 2 2[1 1/ 2( / 2 ) ...] NIFMP N   where N is the number of beam splitters in the Mach-Zehnder interferometer. Elitzur's seminal thought experiment suggested a maximum IFM of 50%. The model was improved to 80% by a method developed by Kwiat's team with 2 21 ( / 4 ) (1/ )IFMP N O N   where in this case N is the number of photon cycles through the apparatus [51]. Elitzur and Vaidmann explained their model by the 'Many-Worlds' interpretation; whereby Cramer proposed, "they suggest that the information indicating the presence of the opaque object can be considered to come from an interaction that occurs in a separate Everett-Wheeler (EW) universe and to be transferred to our universe through the absence of interference" [68]. Cramer's suggestion is an interesting attempt at preservation of a perceived 'inviolate law' but we believe not indicative of physical reality; the EW interpretation only provides another indicia that more physics exists in a 3 rd unified field arena beyond the regime of the Copenhagen Interpretation. A wonderful door opens here [37] because at first glimpse LSXD Calabi-Yau symmetry might appear erroneously like an EW hall of parallel universe mirror images. For example imagine a usual 4D qubit or quantum particle in a box. In our noetic interpretation the LSXD Calabi-Yau mirror symmetric regime contains a hierarchy of conformal scaleinvariant 'copies' of the original 4D quantum state not independent EW parallels [37,68-70]. Then in way of simplistic introduction in terms of our new operationally completed interpretation of quantum theory the 'mirror image of the mirror image is causally free' of the underlying uncertain 4D quantum state and is accessible by manipulating the resonance hierarchy of our empirical protocol! Many physicists have been reluctant to embrace HD or LSXD physics. We suspect success of our protocol could begin to ease this philosophical conundrum. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 959 Figure 1. IFM probability arbitrarily increases toward unity by repeated cycles or multiple Mach-Zehnder interferometers. Figure adapted from [51]. In this paper a putative protocol is delineated not for another sophisticated improvement of the varied stepwise degrees of reducing the uncertainty relation by the several extant IFM protocols; but for completely surmounting the uncertainty relation directly, in a straight forward manner, for any and every single action of the experiment with probability, p 1 . In an unexpected way our model has similarities to IFM but by using extended theory fully completes the task of uncertainty violation. One could say the new noetic protocol turns the IFM methodology upside down and inside out. The LSXD regime of the noetic protocol accesses the complete "hall of mirrors" simultaneously (ontologically) because the whole battery of IFM interferometers and multiple cycling routines is inherent in the conformal scale-invariance mirror symmetry of the LSXD regime, such that only one 'measurement' is required to achieve probability, p 1 when resonance is properly coupled and timed with the inherent continuous-state mirror symmetric synchronization backbone. The methodology of this new empirical protocol is fully ontological (rather than the usual phenomenology of field interactions) because action in the LSXD regime is in causal violation of Copenhagen phenomenology not in an Everett 'many-worlds' sense but in a manner that extends to completion the de Broglie-Bohm-Vigier causal interpretation of quantum theory [1,37]. In summary the ontological basis is realized utilizing the additional degrees of freedom of a unique 12D iteration of M-Theory [1,37] along with the key supposition of conformal scale-invariance pertaining to the physicality of the dual mirror symmetric state of LSXD quantum information [37]. While considerations of the vacuum backcloth are of paramount concern for string theory, much of its putative essential parameters are ignored in the avid exploration of other details. The p 1 model relies heavily on the existence of an Einstein energy dependent covariant Dirac polarized vacuum [46-48] for which the Casimir effect is the best evidence, along with the Zeeman, Aharonov-Bohm and Sagnac effects and pair production as secondary evidences. Of primary concern is the basis for inclusion of extended electromagnetic theory that a polarized Dirac vacuum [71,72] supplies as a key for resonantly manipulating LSXD spacetime. In Fig. 2a the suggestion is that the central translucent cube (bottom right) represents the region Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 960 of a Cavity-QED or 3D quantum 'particle in a box' that through conformal scale-invariance remains physically real when the metaphor is carried to 12D where the 'mirror copy' becomes like a 'mirror image of a mirror image' and in that sense is causally free of the E3 quantum state thereby open to ontological information transfer in violation of Copenhagen uncertainty. A 5D hypercube would unfold into a cross of 4D hypercubes and so on to 12D. Beyond 4D mirror symmetry adds a complexity in that the unfolding (Fig. 2b) has a knot or Dirac twist (not shown) that is part of the gating mechanism insulating quantum mechanics form unified field mechanics [37]. In Copenhagen the 'handcuffs' are on but during the LSXD cycle the handcuffs are periodically off and thus accessible resonantly. Figure 2. a) Top left, 3D cube collapses into 6 planar 2D squares. Bottom, 4D hypercube unfolds into 3D cross of 8 cubes. b) Right. Dimensional reduction process from 4D to 1D. 3. New Physics from Anthropic Cosmology Issues of the nature of the fundamental cosmological background continue to be debated with disparate views jockeying for philosophical supremacy; a scenario remaining tenable because experimental avenues for testing physics beyond the standard model have remained elusive until now. For the scientific perspective to evolve beyond the usual Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum theory requires a new cosmological paradigm. Full delineation of the new cosmology is not beyond the scope of this paper, but detailed in [1-3,37]. In summary we axiomatically introduce pertinent concepts. The new noetic cosmology is required to explain, utilize and design experimental access to the new UF regime where physical parameters for biophysical-bridging reside.  The Planck scale can no longer be considered the most fundamental level of reality. Three regimes of reality must be addressed: Classical Quantum Unified Field; all of Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 961 which cycle continuously [1-3,37].  No 'mental' quantum state reduction exists in the usual sense of wave function collapse [2]; in terms of the de Broglie-Bohm and extended Cramer interpretations of quantum theory [42-45] a continuous evolution exists instead [1-3]. Collapse of the wavefunction reduces a quantum state to a classical state, which does not generally happen in the nonlocal flux of qualia as the locus of awareness; especially since now more pertinently qualia are not quantum phenomena per se but unified field phenomena. Quale interface with the quantum regime as part of the sensory transduction apparatus.  The Planck scale is not an impenetrable barrier [1,4,37] even though considered so as an empirical fact demonstrated by the quantum uncertainty principle. This is a main problem with utilizing a Darwinian naturalistic Big Bang cosmology originating from a putative singularity in time as the basis for cognitive theory. In an anthropic multiverse cosmology utilizing extended quantum theory and M-Theory the answer is simply: 'do something else!' which opens physical investigation into a new UF realm of large scale additional dimensions (LSXD) [37,73]. The anthropic multiverse is closed and finite in time, i.e. the 14.7 billion light year Hubble radius, HR, but open and infinite in atemporal eternity [1,37]. 'Worlds without number, like grains of sand at the seashore' [74] the multiverse has room for an infinite number of nested Hubble spheres each with their own fine-tuned laws of physics [1]. Fourteen empirical protocols have been proposed [37] (9 reviewed here) for demonstrating, gaining access to and leading to a variety of experimental platforms for first hand investigation of awareness (qualia) breaking down the 1 st person 3 rd person barrier as called for by Nagel [75]. String theory only has one parameter, string tension, TS fraught with the dilemma of a Googolplex (10 googol ) or infinite number of vacuum possibilities. Utilizing the Eddington, Dirac, and Wheeler large number hypothesis [1] we derived an alternative derivation of TS leading to one unique string vacuum and what we call the 'continuous-state hypothesis' an alternative to the expansion/inflation parameters of Big Bang cosmology [1,37]. Simplistically the perceived inflation energy of Big Bang cosmology postulated as a Doppler expansion from a primordial ex nihilo temporal singularity, instead according to the noetic continuous-state hypothesis, is localized in an 'eternal present' as if in permanent 'gravitational free-fall'[1,37]. Since we are relativistically embedded in and made out of matter this condition means that all objects (in our 3D virtual reality) exist (in HD) as if they were in gravitational 'free-fall'. This is better explained by two other interpretations of quantum theory generally ignored by the physics community because they are myopically considered to add nothing. That of the de Broglie-Bohm Causal Interpretation [42-44] and the Cramer Transactional Interpretation [45]; where spacetime and the matter within it (all matter is made of de Broglie waves) are created-annihilated and recreated over and over as part of the perceived arrow of time and creation of our 3D reality as a resultant from HD infinite potentia as a 'standing-wave' (Fig. 3) [1,37]. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 962 Figure 3. a) Conceptualized structure of a Cramer transaction (present state or event) where the present (simplistically) is a standing-wave of future-past potential elements. A point is not a rigid singularity (although still discrete) as in the classical sense, but has a complex structure like a mini-wormhole where R1 & R2 (like the frets holding the wire of a stringed instrument) represent opposite ends of its diameter. b) How observed (virtual) 3D reality arises from the infinite potentia of HD space (like a macroscopic transaction). The 'standing-wave-like' (retarded-advanced future-past) mirror symmetric elements C 4+ / C 4- (where C 4 signifies 4D potentia of complex space distinguished from the realized 3D of visible space) of continuous-state spacetime show a central observed Euclidian, E3, Minkowski, M4 space resultant. Least Cosmological Units (LCU) governing evolution of the 'points' of 3D reality are represented by circles. The Advanced-Retarded future-past 3-cubes in HD space guide the evolution of the central cube (our virtual reality) that emerges from elements of HD space. Figure 4. Conceptualization of the cosmological Least-Unit (LCU) tessellating space which like quark confinement cannot exist alone. a) Current view of a so-called point particle or metric x,y,z vertex. The three large circles are an LCU array slice. It is a form of close-packed spheres forming a 3-torus; missing from the illustration are an upper and bottom layer covering the x,y,z vertex and completing one fundamental element of an LCU complex. The field lines emanating from one circle to another represent the de Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 963 Broglie-Bohm concept of a quantum 'pilot wave or potential' governing evolution. b) Similar to a) but drawn with a central 'Witten string vertex' [76] and relativistic quantum field potentials (lines) guiding its evolution in spacetime. The Witten vertex is not a closed singularity and because of its open structure provides a key element to the continuous-state process and rotation of the Riemann sphere cyclically from zero to infinity which represents rotational elements of the HD exciplex brane topology. The problem has to do with the nature of a point or 3D vertex in physical theory [37]. What extended versions of de Broglie-Bohm and Cramer bring to the table is a basis for defining a fundamental 'point' that instead of being rigidly fixed classically (Fig. 4a) is continuously transmutable (Fig. 4b) as in string theory. This represents in essence the elevation of the socalled wave-particle duality for quanta to a Principle of continuous-state cosmology. What this does is cancel the troubling infinites in the standard model of particle physics in a natural way rather than by use of a mathematical gimmick called renormalization. We also build the continuous-state hypothesis around an object in string theory called the Witten Vertex [76] (Fig. 4b after noted M-Theorist David Witten). This means that when certain parameters (compactification, dimensional reduction etc.) associated with the Riemann sphere reach a zeropoint; the Riemann sphere relativistically rotates back to infinity and so on continuously (Reminiscent of how water waves operate). The HD branes of so-called Calabi-Yau mirror symmetry are forms of Riemann 3-spheres or Kahler manifolds [41]. Instead of the insurmountable Plank foam, the gate keeper in this cosmology is an array of least cosmological units (LCU) [1,9,77] of which part (like the tip of an iceberg) resides in our virtual 4-space and the other part resides in the HD (12D) regime of M-Theory. These LCU exciplex gates govern mediation of the UF in the coherent ordering of the life principle of SOLS embedded in localized spacetime. 3.1. Spacetime Exciplex UF Noeon Mediator The spacetime exiplex or 'excited complex' of least cosmological units (LCU) is key to mediation of the UF life principle of consciousness. In the usual 4D interpretation of quantum theory limited by the uncertainty principle, virtual quanta in the zero point field wink in and out of existence limited to the Planck time, 10 -43 s. For the noetic spacetime exiplex the situation is radically different. The duality of its HD structure (i.e. living in both local 4-space and nonlocal 8-space) allows it to remain in an excited state in 4-space never fully coupling with the Planckscale ground state. This holophote interaction emits a noeon (exchange unit of the UF) into every point (and thus atom) in spacetime (providing the life principle) and interaction with brain dendrons etc. for example as the flow of qualia as a form of superradiance. Kowalski discovered that photon emission occurs only after electrons complete full Bohr orbits [78,79]. We apply this as a general principle for emission during rotation of the complex CalabiYau Riemann sphere which acts like a pinwheel-like scoop bringing in the next topologically switched hysteresis loop of psychon-brain interaction energy. The exciplex concept as defined in engineering parlance is an 'excited complex' or form of excimer short for excited dimer in chemistry nomenclature used to describe an excited, Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 964 transient, combined state, of two different atomic species (like XeCl) that dissociate back into the constituent atoms rather than reversion to some ground state after photon emission. An excimer is a short-lived dimeric or heterodimeric molecule formed from two species, at least one of which is in an electronic excited state. Excimers are often diatomic and are formed between two atoms or molecules that would not bond if both were in the ground state. The lifetime of an excimer is very short, on the order of nanoseconds. Binding a larger number of excited atoms form Rydberg clusters extending the lifetime which can exceed many seconds. An Exciplex is also defined as an electronically excited complex, 'non-bonding' in the ground state. For example, a complex formed by the interaction of an excited molecular entity with a ground state counterpart of a different structure. When it hits ground a photon or quasiparticle soliton is emitted. In Noetic Cosmology we have adapted the exciplex concept as a tool to describe the LCU gating mechanism between the quantum regime and the regime of the UF. The exciplex LCU gate is key to understanding interaction of the life principle with SOLS and the basis for developing empirical tests. The general equations for a putative spacetime exciplex are: * * * * * * * * * * * ; emission G G Z Z m X X m Z or G X m Z or G            (1) where as seen in Fig. 5a G is the ZPF ground state, Z intermediate cavity excited states and X the spacetime C-QED (Cavity-Quantum Electrodynamics) exciplex coupling. The numerous configurations plus the large variety of photon frequencies absorbed allow for a full absorptionemission equilibrium spectrum. We believe the spacetime exciplex model also has sufficient parameters to allow for the spontaneous emission of protons by a process similar to the photoelectric effect but from HD spacetime C-QED brane spallation rather than from a charged metallic surface. Not having a sufficient spacetime vacuum proton creation mechanism led to the downfall of Steady-State cosmology. Figure 5. a) The geometry of the 'spacetime exciplex' (excited complex), a configuration of spacetime LCUs that act like a holophote laser pumping mechanism of UF noeon energy and also how coherence of the UF interacts with 3D compactified states in dendrons or microtubules for example. Locally the exciplex acts like an oscillating 'cootie catcher' [80]. b) Geometric representation of the Noetic Unified Field Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 965 Equation, F (N) = E/R for an array of cosmological LCUs. Solid lines represent extension, dotted lines field. Where F(N) is the anthropic or coherent force of the UF driving self-organization, total E equals the c) hysteresis loop energy of the hypervolume, R is the scale-invariant rotational radius of the action and the domain wall (curves) string tension, 0T . The new UF basis centers on defining what is called a Least Cosmological Unit (LCU) [1,37,77] tiling the spacetime backcloth. An LCU (Fig. 4) conceptually parallels the unit cell that builds up crystal structure. The LCU entails the next evolutionary step for the basis of a point particle [37] and has two main functions; It is the raster from which matter arises, and is a central mechanism that mediates the syntropic gating of life principle parameters of the UF. Syntropy is the negentropy process of expelling entropy by the teleological action of SOLS. The LCU change from the current concept of a fixed Planck scale point (Fig. 4a) to what is called a Witten string vertex [76] (Fig. 4b) is a form of Riemann sphere (model of the extended complex-plane with points at zero and infinity for stereographic projection to the Euclidean plane) cyclically opening into the LSXD regime of the UF. Behind the current view of (Planck's constant) as a barrier of stochastic foam is a coherent topology with the symmetry of a spin raster comprised of LCUs [1,37]. 3.2. Quantum Phenomenology Versus Noetic Field Ontology There is a major conceptual change from Quantum Mechanics to Unified Field Mechanics. The 'energy' of the UF is not quantized and thus is radically different from other known fields. Here is what troubled Nobelist Richard Feynman: "...maybe nature is trying to tell us something new here, maybe we should not try to quantize gravity... Is it possible that gravity is not quantized and all the rest of the world is?" [81]. It turns out that not only is gravity not quantized but neither is the noeon energy of the UF which is a step deeper than gravity. Here is one way to explain it. In a usual field like electromagnetism, easiest for us to understand because we have the most experience with it, field lines connect to adjacent point charges. The quanta of the fields force is exchanged along those field lines (in this case photons). We perceive this as occurring in 4-space (4D). It is phenomenological. This is the phenomenon of fields. For topological charge as in the UF with properties related to consciousness; the situation is vastly different. The fields are still coupled and there is tension between them but no phenomenological energy (i.e. field quanta) is exchanged. This is the situation in the ontological case. The adjacent branes "become" each other as they overlap by a process called 'topological switching'. This is not possible for the 4-space field because they are quantized resultants of the HD topological field components. The HD 'units' (noeons) are free to "mix" ontologically as they are not resolved into points. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 966 Figure 6. a) 2D view of the LCU tiling of the spacetime backcloth (Fig. 4). b) Projective geometry topologically giving rise to higher dimensionality (here the Fig. 4a 2D view extended to 3D). The triangles with tails represent the trefoil knots in Fig. 7 and the naked triangles the resultant cyclic point or fermionic vertex quantum state in 3-space (Spheres in Fig. 3b). The metric still has points, or it might be better to say coordinates; but in HD super space they are unrestricted and free to interact by topological switching which is not the case for an "event" in 4-space. Whereas this singular quality (basis of our perceived reality) does not exist in the HD regime (UF) of infinite potentia! So if the UF is not quantized how can there be a force which is mediated by the exchange of quanta? Firstly the UF does not provide a 5 th force as one might initially assume; instead the ontological 'presence' of the UF provides a 'force of coherence' which is based on 'topological charge'. It helps to consider this in terms of perception. If one looks along parallel railroad tracks they recede into a point in the distance, a property of time and space. For the unitary evolution of consciousness [2] this would break the requirement of coherence. For the UF which is outside of local time and space, a cyclical restoring force is applied to our res extensa putting it in a res cogitans mode. The exciplex mechanism [37] guides rotation of the Witten vertex Riemann spheres to maintain a consistent level of periodic coherence (parallelism). It is a relativistic UF process. The railroad tracks do not recede into a point. The Riemann sphere flips (our perception) beforehand. The UF provides an inherent force of coherence just by its cyclical presence. This means that it is ontological in its propagation or 'interaction'. The railroad tracks remain parallel and do not recede to a point as in the 3-D phenomenological realm where forces are mediated by a quantal energy exchange. Another way of looking at this is that the 3-D observer can only look at one page of a book at a time while the HD observer (Godlike) can see all pages continuously (timelike). The LCU space-time exciplex is a mechanism allowing both worlds to interact nonlocally. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 967 Figure 7. Complex HD Calabi-Yau mirror symmetric 3-forms, C4 become embedded in Minkowski space, M4 and the UF energy of this resultant is projected into brain dendrons as a continuous stream of evolving (evanescing) superradiant qualia. This represents the lower portion only that embeds in local spacetime; there is an additional duality above this projection embedded in the infinite potentia of the UF from which it arises (Fig.9). Most are familiar with the 3D Necker cube (center of Fig. 2b is like a Necker cube) that when stared at central vertices topologically reverse. This is called topological switching. There is another paper child's toy called a 'cootie catcher' [80] that fits over the fingers and can switch positions. What the cootie catcher has over the Necker cube is that it has an easier to visualize a defined center or vertex switching point. So in the LCU exiplex spacetime background we have this topological switching which represents the frame that houses the gate which is the lighthouse with the rotating light on top. Figure 8. Locus of nonlocal HD mirror symmetric Calabi-Yau 3-tori (here technically depicted quaternionic trefoil knots) spinning relativistically and evolving in time. Nodes in the cycle are sometimes chaotic and sometimes periodically couple into resultant (faces of a cube) quantum states in 3-space depicted in the diagram as Riemann Bloch spheres. An animated version of Fig.7. Now inside the structure there is also a 'baton passing'. The baton is like the lens that the light shines through but only at the moment of transfer (or coupling). In the HD UF regime the 'light' is always on omni-directionally but only 'shines' into 3-space when the gate is open during the moment of baton passing. In addition to baton passing there is also a form of 'leap-frogging'. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 968 The leap-frogging represents wave-particle duality (remember we elevated it to a principle of cosmology). The leaping moment represents the wave, and the crouched person being leapt over is the particulate moment. The particle moment acts like a domain wall and no light passes when its orientation is aligned towards the 3-D world resultant. This is also an important aspect of the gating mechanism. This is of course a relativistic process such that the 'beat frequency' keeps SOLS well lit with the teleological anthropic 'light of life'. The trefoil knot (in Fig. 8 drawn as a Planck scale quaternion vertices) is holomorphic to the circle. Since energy is conserved we may ignore the complexity of the HD symmetries and use the area of the circle for the noeon hysteresis loop (Fig. 5c), in this case a 2D resultant as a 2sphere quantum state as the coupling area of one psychon to a dendron. This idea is further conceptualized in Fig. 6 illustrating how a 3D object emerges from close-packed spacetime LCUs. Figure 9. Completion of Figs. 7 & 8 illustrating full extension to an HD relativistic quantum state in continuous-state dual Calabi-Yau mirror symmetric HAM cosmology with Dodecahedral involute properties, as well as the continuous-state exciplex 'hysteresis loop' of noeon injection (not shown) as far as currently understood. The Bloch 2-sphere representation is also replaced with an extended Riemann 4-sphere resultant with sufficient parameters to surmount the uncertainty principle representing a Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 969 unique M-Theoretic model of 'Continuous-State' UF dynamics as it relates to NFT and its putative exchange quanta of the UF the noeon. 4. Empirical Tests of Noetic Cosmology Summarized: Long-Range Coherence Viable experimentation will lead to new consciousness research platforms for studying fundamental syntropic properties of living systems. We have proposed fourteen tests of NFT; in this paper we summarize the main experimental protocol to test the noetic teleological 'lifeprinciple' hypotheses. Note: Not all of the experiments relate directly to mediation of the life principle; but since the life-principle is putatively an aspect of the UF, all of the experiments manipulate the new physical regime of the UF or importantly mediate the 'gating mechanism' by which access is gained, thus facilitating mind-body research in addition to M-Theory and nuclear physics. 4.1 Summary of Experimental Protocols If experimentation proves viable a new class of biophysical research platform for studying fundamental properties of the spacetime vacuum as it relates to long-range coherence in living systems. We summarize eight derivatives of the main experimental protocol to test the LSXD continuous-state Long-Range Coherence hypotheses: 1. Basic Experiment Fundamental test that the concatenation of new NFT UF principles is theoretically sound. A laser oscillated rf-pulsed vacuum resonance hierarchy is set up to interfere with the periodic (continuous-state) structure of the inherent 'beat frequency' of a Dirac polarized spacetime vacuum exciplex to detect the new coherence principle associated with a cyclical holophote entry of the UF into 4-space. This experiment 'pokes a hole in spacetime' in order to bring the energy of the UF into a detector. The remaining protocols are variations of the parameters of this experiment. See Figs. 10 & 11. 2. Bulk Quantum Computing Utilizing protocol (1) Bulk Scalable Universal QC can be achieved by superseding the quantum uncertainty principle. (see [1,4,37] for details) Programming and data I/O are performed without decoherence by utilizing the inherent mirror symmetry properties that act like a 'synchronization backbone' [1,37,49] whereby 'LSXD copies' of the local 3-space quantum state are causally free (measureable without decoherence) at a specific resonance node in the continuous-state conformal Calabi-Yau symmetry cycle hierarchy. 3. Protein Conformation - (similar to discussion in [38]). Utilizing more macroscopic aspects of protocols (1 & 2) dual Hadamard quantum logic gates are set as a Cavity-QED spacetime cellular automata [1,38] experiment to facilitate conformational propagation in the prion protein from normal cellular form, PrP C to the pathological, PrP Sc form by noeon bombardment with the 'force of coherence' of the UF. 4. Manipulating a special case of the Lorentz Transformation [37,78,79] Aspects of a spacetime exciplex model [2,10] in terms of restrictions imposed by Cramer's Transactional Interpretation [45] on mirror symmetry can be used for the putative detection of virtual tachyon-tardyon interactions in zitterbewegun [30]. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 970 5. Extended Quantum Theory Test of causal properties of de Broglie-Bohm-Vigier quantum theory by utility of the UF holophote effect (protocol 1 parameters) as a 'super quantum potential' to summate by constructive interference the density of de Broglie matter waves [1]. 6. Coherent Control of Quantum Phase Additional test of the de Broglie-Bohm interpretation for existence of a nonlocal 'pilot wave quantum potential' for manipulating the phase 'space quantization' in the double slit experiment by controlling which slit quanta passes through. Application to quantum measurement and transistor lithography refinement. 7. Manipulating Spacetime LCU Structure - (similar to protocol 6) Test of conformal scaleinvariant properties of the putative Dirac conformal polarized vacuum, a possible 'continuous-state' property related to an arrow of time [27,37] (Also similar to basic experiment, but more advanced). 8. Testing for and Manipulating Tight Bound States (TBS) - (similar to protocol 4) Vigier [10] has proposed TBS below the 1 st Bohr orbit in the Hydrogen atom. Utilizing tenets of the original hadronic form of string theory [37] such as a variable string tension, TS where the Planck constant, is replaced with a version of the original Stoney, [1,37] where is an asymptote never reached and instead oscillates from virtual Planck to the Larmor radius of the hydrogen atom, i.e. the so-called Planck scale is a restriction imposed by the limitations of the Copenhagen Interpretation and is not a fundamental physical barrier. LSXD exist putatively behind the barrier of uncertainty and the oscillation of the Planck constant is part of the exciplex gating mechanism [37]. Key to operation of this experiment is what we have termed a 'couple-punch'. Utilizing relativistic quantum field theory (RQFT) at the moment of spin-spin coupling or spin-orbit coupling an rf pulse is kicked at various nodes harmonically set to coincide with putative phases in the cycle between local and LSXD TBS properties. [37] 9. Test for the noetic Unique String Vacuum Until now the structure of matter has been explored by building ever bigger supercolliders like the CERN LHC. If the LSXD access model in terms of a Dirac covariant polarized energy dependent vacuum proves correct utilizing the inherent conformal scale-invariant mirror symmetry properties of de Broglie matter waves will allow examining various cross sections in the structure of matter in symmetry interactions during cyclic continuous-state future-past annihilation-creation modes of matter in the LCU tessellated spacetime metric without the need for supercolliders. There are a number of very specific postulated cosmological properties required in order to perform these experiments [1,37]. 4.2. Review of Key Experimental Details To empirically gain access to the UF, regime one must pass through the so-called Planck scale stochastic barrier. In order to do this one must violate the heretofore sacrosanct quantum uncertainty principle. Since by definition the standard methods of quantum theory produce the uncertainty principle; the simple solution is to do something else! Because of the great success of gauge theory physicists have ignored the existence of a Dirac polarized vacuum because they Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 971 believe its existence would violate gauge principles. The methods of gauge theory however are only an approximation suggesting that there is additional new physics. Next we outline the general method for accessing the higher dimensional superspace of the UF. Technical details can be found in references [1,4,37]. Postulates introduced in this paper are utilized; in general the de Broglie-Bohm and Cramer (TI) interpretations of quantum theory, the Dirac polarized vacuum, the Sagnac affect [1,42-49], the unique string vacuum derived from HAM cosmology and the special class of Calabi-Yau mirror symmetry conditions. Figure 10. The Dirac polarized vacuum has hyperspherical symmetry. a) Top left, metaphor for TI standing-wave present showing future-past elements, 1 2,R R , eleven of twelve dimensions suppressed for simplicity. b) Bottom left, top view of a) 2D spherical standing-wave; c) Bottom left right portion, manipulating the relative quantum/brane phase of oscillations creates nodes of destructive and constructive interference. d) Right, Four numerical simulations of the phase space trajectory of the Dubois superposed incursive oscillator based on coordinates and velocities 1/ 2[ (1) (2)]n n nx x x  1/2[ (1) (2)]n n nv v v  is shown in the figure for values of t   equal to 0.1, 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5. Initial conditions are 0 0 01, 0& 0     with total simulation time 8t    . Figure 10b adapted from [82]. Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 972 Figure 11. a) Design elements of the Noetic Interferometer postulated to constructively-destructively interfere with the topology of the spacetime manifold to manipulate the unified field. The first three tiers set the stage for the critically important 4 th tier which by way of an incursive oscillator punches a hole in the fabric of spacetime creating a holophote or lighthouse effect of the UF into the experimental apparatus momentarily missing its usual coupling node into a biological system. b) Conceptualized Witten vertex Riemann sphere cavity-QED multi-level Sagnac effect interferometer designed to 'penetrate' space-time to emit the 'eternity wave,  ' of the unified field. Experimental access to vacuum structure or for surmounting the uncertainty principle can be done by two similar methods. One is to utilize an atomic resonance hierarchy and the other a spacetime resonance hierarchy. The spheroid is a 2D representation of a HD complex Riemann sphere able to spin-flip from zero to infinity continuously. It is important to recall one of our main proposals concerning the wave structure of matter and that space-time is created, annihilated and recreated continuously. If one throws a stone in a pool of water concentric ripples occur. If one drops two stones into the water, regions of constructive and destructive interference occur. This is essentially how our resonant hierarchy operates as shown in Fig. 10c. The basic idea of the radio frequency or rf-modulated resonance hierarchy is as follows: in the first tier (Fig. 11a) a radio frequency is chosen to oscillate the electrons in the atom or molecule chosen in such a way that the nucleons will resonate. This is related to the principles of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). This couples electrons to the magnetic moment of the nucleons in tier 2. By the principles of relativistic quantum field theory (RQFT) tiers one and two undergo resonant coupling to the beat frequency of the fabric of space-time. The multitier cumulative interaction of tears 1, 2 and 3 by application of the incursive oscillator can be set to destructively or constructively interfere with the annihilation or creation operators of space-time. A final essential component of the vacuum interferometer is called an incursive oscillator [82] which acts as a feedback loop on the arrow of time [37]. Parameters of the Dubois incursive oscillator are also required for aligning the interferometer hierarchy with the beat frequency of Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research | November 2013 | Vol. 4 | Issue 9 | pp. 955-976 Amoroso, R. L., Empirical Protocols for Mediating Long-Range Coherence in Biological Systems ISSN: 2153-8212 Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research QuantumDream, Inc. www.JCER.com 973 spacetime by ( ) ( )x t t v t t  . Critically the size of t correlates with the size of the 'hole' to be punched in spacetime which also correlates with the wavelength,  of the rf-resonance pulse. References [1] AMOROSO, R. L.. & Rauscher, E. A. (2009) The Holographic Anthropic Multiverse Formalizing the Complex Geometry of Reality, London: World Scientific. [2] AMOROSO, R. L.. (2009) (ed.) The Complementarity of Mind and Body: Realizing the Dream of Descartes, Einstein and Eccles, New York: Nova Science Publishers. [3] Rauscher, E. A., & AMOROSO, R. L. (2011) Orbiting the Moons of Pluto: Complex Solutions to the Einstein, Maxwell, Schrödinger, and Dirac Equations (Vol. 45) London: World Scientific Publishing Company. [4] AMOROSO, R. L. 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The Validity of Aquinas'Third Wry BY REM B. ED\TARDS [Reprinted f.rom The l{eu Scholosticism, XLV, l, Winter, 1971.] I i I, DISCUSSION ARTICLE III: The Validity of Aquinas'Third Way by Rem B. Edvards In a recent ltind article,l I attempted to show that the basic argument in Aquinas' "third lraI " was not logically failacious, however questionable the truth of some of its premises uright be. Even more recentlv, Thomas Mautner 2 has attempted to show that I faiied to demonstrate the validity of the basic pattern of reasoning which I believe to be involved in this proof. I think that he has not succeeded, though he may have shown that in proclucing what I believe to be a logically valid version of the cosmological argument, I was more original than I had at first thought myself to be. Since his treatment of my positiou is very brief, I shaIl quote what he has to say and then try to give an appropriate response. (A) Suppose that we have an argument of the form P therefore C, and that this argument is invalid.-It could always be said that P, therefore C, is valid-although-enthymematic: the suppressed premiss being Q, where Q entails P I C. This would. be to say that there are no logical fallacies. (At worst, an argument would be enthymematic!)B This is an interesting problem, not just for mv treatment of the " third" wayr" but for logicians and" writers of introductory logic textbooks in general. Philo."ophers do have a problem of agreeing upon criteria to be used for " sameuess of argument." \1'e can makc these criteria very strict and insist upon evaluating each argument simply on the basis of what is explicitly given, just as it is given. \Yith such strict criteria we shall not find verv many good arguments outside of the conlines of textbooks on logic where we are told in advance to treat certain arguments as enthymemes and l Rem B. Ed.rvard.s, " Composition and the Cosmological Argument," Mi,nd, LXXVII, 115-17. 2 Thomas Mautner, " Aquinas's Third W'ay," Americom Philosophiaal Quorterly, 6, 298-304. 8 lbid,.,30t-302. 117 118 Rent, B. Ed,ward,s otirers as invalid or vaiicl, and ttre suspicion of manv unclelgraduates will ber c,onfirmed that logic is useless once l{e get outsicle thc confines of the contrived exercises at the end of the chalrter'. Mautner seems to be opting fol the Scylla oll such srrict criteria for " samertess of argument," fearing the Charv]-rdis of the r-rpposite extrerneitavinq to regarcl every " invalic1" argnmerrt as an enthyrneme. I1.: i*s quite coruect in maintaining that urittr the addition of just thc right premises, an.y invalid argurnent rna-v be converted into ir ralicl argument; so there is this rlanger to be ctrrearlecj as wcll. Elow shatrl we ever fincl examples oll invalid argriments to give as exercises in our logic textbooks if we gc this far ? ldorrever, ther:c i-q also the peril of having to rluit writins ancl talking about enthyrnemes altogr:thei', and this we mav also want to resist. Most professional 1rhilo.;ophers do not believe tirat recognizing some argurnents, n hiclr ar.'e othelwise invalicl, as enthvmernes rrnd supplying arllitional lrremises to boi.qter them ul) commits thern to the extreme view tliat, ail invalid argurnents are valitl enthymunes. Thi*q mav hrr on1.y because they do not -qee the end of the road however. ancl l:[arttner may be quite correci, in insisting that thi-q is w]rat it finall;.' conx:s to. Certainlv there are iuescapable element-q of subjectivitl, in ascertaining what an olisiual ar:guer might irave liad " in thrr back of his rnind " or: that he " u'oulrl have accepte cl if askecl " i'r " r,r,ould have accepterj it he hacl lefiecterl enoush " or the 1ike. M_v o\\'11 inclination woukl be to appl.y very genel.olls cr:iteria for 'l sanrn,rnss of algumcr)t." l{ tiris fina1lv implios that all invaiicl alguments are enthl,msmes, I think that rre should jrist harre to live with it. There are methodological considerations uncler'lying such generosity, holrever. Aside t'rom wanting logic to ire applicable beyonr[ the artificial exelcists sir.cn in logic textbooks, I also do rrot think that a philcsopher can talie any great p::ide in refuting his opponent at his weal<est. Eut i{ it is possibie to clo him in after givina hjm the benefit of the dolbt, then this is a significant lrhilosophicai achiei,ement. If at its strongest a philosophical position will not bear up nncler e,xamination, then we have the best of rr.asons for rejecting it. (ts) C'lor:rectlvr Edwards draws attention to the faet that although in g'eneral argurnents of the form: tr all parts of W are F; therefore \\r is l'," are invalid, some arg;uments r:f this form rnav still be valid, not in yirtue of having that forrn, but in virtue of some other feature.a 4 lbid., 302. The Valid,ity of Aquhws' Th,ird, Wo'y 119 Aithough l agree that al,l arguments of the suggested form are invalid,, I explicitly denu tha,t " sailLe arguments of this form may still be valicl." If I helcl such a position 1 rvould, be contradicting myself, and this I have not clone. Arguments from part tolvhole may he valicl b1, 1,11i1r. of having so111e other folm, but pot br riltue of having just tltat form. I also do not hold that such argrrments are "in general" invaUd. Tn the .qomeryhat technical and precise sense in rvlrich logicians 1ls€r the terms " valid " and " invalic'lr" tliele is no such thing as " in general " r.alidit"v or invalidity. If an arsument folm is srich that it is possible in only one instancc for all its premises to l:e true and its conclusions false, that form is sint,ltll1 invalicl, not just rareLq valicl but tm genernl invalici. trIaving ac.lmittetl that ail argriments o{ the form " aii parts of \V a::e 1'; therefore W i-* I"'are invalid, I rnust now point out that this is not the form of the argument which tr used in my re-wording oI Aquinas" " thircl w&-y." The form which I used rvas perfectly r.alid, having no possible substitution instances rvith ali true premises and a false conclusion. 'I'he form which I used was: " If rrll parts of W are L', tiLen \Y i.. .tr'; and, all parts of \Y are F; If follows tho.t \Y is lr." Argument-" of the form "If p, then q; and p; therefore q " are perfectlv valicl, though they may have false premises ancl for this reason fail to be sound. It is the latter form only which figures in rny ti'eatment of the cosmologieal argument. Since oul concern of ihe moment is rvith the validitv of the form of the argriment, not with its soiintlness, consider once more the farrn of each of the following ver.qions of the co,qmological argument. The,*e arguments have the .qame form as each of my examples in my earlier article. (1) If ea,ch of the parts of nature is contingent, the whole of nature is contingent. Each of the parts of nature is contingent. Therefore, the rvhole of nature is conting'ent. (2) If each of the parts of nature did not always exist, then the v;hole of nature did not always exist. Each of the parts of nature did not always exist. Therefore. the whole of nature did not ah,vays exist. If it is too enthymematic to attribute (1) and (2) to St. Thomas himself, then let us evaluatc them on their own merits. Whether 120 Rern B. Ed,wards he saitl it or not, we certainiy have aalid cosmological arguments here, even if we are unable to identify them a.s sou,nd due to the presencc of false or questionable premises. But lldwards has not given any convincing reason why the Third \Ya-v shoukl be regarded as a special case. The reason he offer:s is that the lirst premiss above (which he takes Aquinas to have tacitly assumed) is true in experience. r'Experience does not show us a whole which aluaEs existed even though eaeh of its parts did not always exist." Certainly, experience does not shorv us of any whole that it alwags existed. Corrsequently, statements about such wholes cannot be empiricaily confirmed or disconfirmed. But surely the absence of diseoufiruration eannot be taken as confirmation in a ease like this ! 5 \\'e should carefully note that rve are no longer deilating the question of the aalidity of the argument-forms offered", and" have tnrnerl to the question of the trutlt, of the premises. I mad.e no attempt to defend the second premises of my cosmological arguments in my earlier article, though I hoped to stimulate others more knowledgeable than I about such matters to debate tire issue. Ilowever, I did commit myself to the claim that experience seems to confirm the truth of the flrst premises as I stated them. }[autrrer's rejoinder is that such premises are not empirical, being neither verifiable nor falsifiable. Let us no'iv turn to such matters. 'Ihere are many Thomistic scholars who suspect that St. Thomas made a mistake in introclucing the " time " argument as an integral part of his " contingency " argument, for (2) begins to look like a philosophical proof for the creation of the spatio-temporal universe er nih,ilo, a proof which elsewhere he declines to give on the grounds that reason cannot tlisprove the Aristotelian doctrine of the aeveternity of the world (the co-existence of some ingredient or state of the world with God throrighout an infinite past). That is, he usually doubted that u'e could establish the truth of the second premise of (2) abor.e, though he seems to argue for its truth in the " thircl way " on the ground.s that in an infinite amount o{ time, all possibilities, including the one expressed in the second premise of (2) above, would be actualized. Ilowever, he also insi,qted that his proof of the contingency of the world of nature as a whole is sound even if that world is in some sense everlasting. In other words, he held that both premises of argument (1) are 6 lbdd. 'l'ha Validity of Aquinas' Third Woy LzL true and cau be known to be true even if the truth of the second premise of argument (2) cannot be demonstrated by reason, and must be believed only on the basis of reveiation. I am also suspicious in some ways about (2), and, am inciined to regard (1) as a logically independent version of the cosmological argument the soundness of which is highly defensible. I did say in my earlier article that I regarded- " If all the parts of a whole did not always exist, then the whole itseif did not alwavs exist " as true becuusa erTterience does not present us rvith any 'whoies which always existed even though each of its parts did noi aiways exist; " that is, because experience presents us with no instances in r,vhich the antecedent of this hypothetical assertion is true and the consequent is false. trn the context of the " third way," another way of saying the same thing is that " if all of the parts of nature at some time did not exist, then the whole of nature at some time dicl not exist." Again f would hold that we are conlironted in experience with no cases in rvhich the antecedent is true and the consequent is false. But the reason for this, as Nlautner iusists, may be that neither the antecedent nor the consequent is an empirical assertion, subject to confirmation or disconfirmation by experience. And there are two quite distinct charges involverl here, first that the assertions are not empir.ical at all, and seconclh' that experience fails to show them to be true, that the assertions ar:e rreither verifiable or falsifiable nor verifled or faisified. Concerning the scope of the concept of the 'empiricalr" even the experts are not inclined to agree; but f suspect that serious difficulties rv'oulcI ensue if one classifles as " non-empirical t' uoy statement whose contradictory, or contrary can be confirmed. or clisconfirmetl by experience. The time factor becomes important in a few specially interesting c&ses, because our t'three score years antl ten " vill not allow us to be around long enough to confirm or disconfirm them, though it often cloes permit us to confirm or" disconfirm their contraclictories or contraries. For example, most of us would regard " some men are not mortal " as empirical despite the fact that we would have to be arouncl forever to confirm it, ancl we generally regard it as false because experience seems universally to confirm its contradictory, " a1l men are mortal " and io clisconfirm its contrarv ('f{o men are mortal." Mautner maintains that my first premise in (2) is non-empirical, i. e., neither confirmable nor confirmed, because t'experience cloes 122 Rem, B. Edwards rrot show us of any whole that it alwuys existecl." I submit that this is not because the expression is non-empirical. This expressioti is equivalent in meaning to " l{o whole ahvays existed," ancl thi-" ri.ould be contraclicterl by " Sorne whole has alwalrs existeil," which stiil looks non-empirical, in the same deceptive way in which " Some men are notmortal" at lirst mav strike us as non-empilical. lt has as its contlary " ail ryholes have trlwavs existedr" rvhich is contlaclicted by " Some u'holes haye not ahval's existedr" and thie is clearlv confirmahle and al,qo well coniirme,.l in e:rperience. Thei't: is birth and cleath, .seneration arrrl coruuptiorr. This implies the falsity of " a.11 wholes har.e always existed." 'Ihe problem is, can the contrary of arr obviou.sly ernpirical proposition llajl to be an empilical proposition ? \\'l,at it there is overwhelining empiricai eviclence for the contraly ? I\'hat if everv rvhole gir.en to us in experience has not ahvays existecl, i. e., has come into being at some definite point in the past ? Th:ls certainly seems to be the case. Somethints YerY much like this ruaY be the ca.qe u,ith the antecedent of " If all the parts o{ naiure at some lime did not exist, then the whole of nature at scme time c1ic1 not exist." l,trre certainlv have uot expericncecl a pai-t of nature which at sorle time ciid not exist. This is not becau."e the assertion is non-empirical. Rather it is because the assertion that " all the parts of natrile at some time diil not e-xist " is not onl;. gsrlirmable but al-"o js so u,e1i confirmecl in experience-in sonrething like the wa_y in rvhich " all men are rnortal " is cc.nfirmable and well conlirmed in experience. True, we have not litcrallv experiencecl all tlie parts of natru'e, but we have not litela1.lv expelienced all men either. \,rerv few universal affirmntir.e propositions of this scope are susceptible l,o conclusi,ua confirmation. .\1i we can sav is that as far as erperierrce tal<es us, this seems to be the case, ancl rve have no goocl reason for expecting otheryise. ,\t least 'r,r,-c kno.u, that experience is relevant and that all of it seems to be on one sicle rather than the other of this issue. '.1'o sav that we have not, experienced a part of rrature t'hich at some tinre diri not exist is not to sav that experience can neither confirm nor disconfirm rvhat we sav. Ilather, it is to claim, correctlv, that experience universally confirms the contradictorv assertion that all the parts of nature at some time clid not exist, to -rav notiring of the subalternate claim that some parts of nature at some time ditl not erist. Erperience fails to confirm the contrarv assertion that uo part of natnre at some time dicl not exist. To put the 'l'h,e trrulidit'y of Aqu,i,nas' Third Wuy 723 point another rvay, the claim that " some part of nature alwa;'s êxisted " is experientially false becarlse expef ience so universally con{irms the coutradictorv ciaim that " }Io part of nature always existedr" or thc, equivalent claim that " each part of nature did not always erist." \,[e have experiencecl no part of nature which always e:iistecl preciselv because every part of nature u'hich 'we have experiencecl has not ahvays existed but has conie into being at some definite point in tirne. .\-c St. Thomus -\quinas t,eli. I<uer, , e:rperietrce sliows Lls that many things are sul-rject to l.rirth arrci deathg-enelation ancl col'Luption. Ilorses, lrren, planets, solar svsfsmg-all are exampleri as far i1s we can tell. hr otlttr words, erxperience well confirrns the proposition " Sorne parts of nature have not always exjsted." Tire trutir of this propo.rition implies the falsitv of the contradictory claim " AIl parts of nature have always existetl." This universal proposition i,s, in tuln., the contrary of " .'do part of nature ha-q alwavs existed;" and even though its truth value is undetermined. on the basis of logic alone, it is not ttndeterminecl on the basis of experience. No experiencecl parts of rrature have alwal.s existecl, anc'[ we have experienceil marrv, many sucrir parts of nature. t\11 men are moltal, antl experience htrs agaiu ancl again conflnned it. All pai't-s of rrature Jrave corne into being at some clefinite time in the past, and experience has again and again confirmed it-not concltisively. to be sure, for we hat,e not experienced literallv all the parts of nature aD). more than we hat-e experienced ali men. But it is about as well conlirmed as a universtrl affirmative propositiorr of this scope ever gets. " Some rneu are not rnortal " iacks conflrmation because its contradictorf is so 'n'e11 confirmecl, though not conclusively confinned. So it is at..o with " Sorne parts of uaturrr have alwtrvs existetl." T thus conchicle tlrat experietrce plovicles us rvith every gooci leasorl to believe that if e ach of the parts of nature clid not alwal s erist, theii the rvhole of nature clid not alwavs exist. Grantecl that our experience is limited, it is nevertheless about all that rvu have to go on in .*uch matters. r\s far as it will take us, experiencc rloes show that each of the parts of nature did not ahva_ys exist. anc-[ it further shows us that if an5' r,vhole is composed of parts which originated ai some point in time. then the whole itself oliginatecl at some point in time. Thus we cannot find a whole which always existed, but each of whose parts did not alwavs exist. 124 Rem B. Dd,ward,s Y.ry similar consideratious apply when we turn to 1), the contingency argument. I regard this as the strongest version of the cosmological argument. for it does not depend for its sounchress upon the uon-existence of nature at sorne point in the finite past and thus may avoicl the paradox of " a time when there was no time." Experience does seem to show ihat if each of the parts cf any whole is contingeut, the whole is itseif contingent. To claim at ihis point that nature as a whole is an exception to this would be merely to beg the question, and as far as experience takes us ii d.oes seem that each of the parts of nature is eontingent. fn saying that they are contingent, we mean that they are capable of nonexistence aucl depencl upon something other than themselves for their existcnce. Contingent things might or might not be, and if they are at all, their being is not a self-sufficient form of being. r\gain, all the things given to us in experience cio seem to be contingent in just this sense. " Ail the parts of nature are contingent," is well confirmed" as far as experience will take us. Once more, we clo not have much else besides experience to go on iu such matters. even if conclusive confirrnation is lacking. Certainly the contrary assertion that " No part of nature is contingent " is falsified, for experience conflrms its contradictory " Some part of nature is contingent." Remember again our encorlnters with birth and death, generation and" corruption. Experience fails, to conflrm " Some part of naiure is not contingent," not becau-qe this is not an empirical proposition, but because its contradictorv " AII parts of nature are continsent " is so 'well confirmed. In the same sense, experience fails to confi.rm tt Some men are not mortalr" not becausc it is not an empirical proposition, but because its contradictory " r\II men are mortal " is so rveli confirmed. ff experience does not acquaint us with an,r' non-mortal humans. this is because ir does acqttaint us with so very many mortal humans. Similariy, if experience fails to acquaint us with some part of nature which is not contingent, it is because it cloes acquaint us with so very manv parts of nature which are contingent. Where shall we {incl an exceptiori ? Furthermore, experience also shows that if any whole is composecl entirely of corrtingent parts, then the whole itself is contingent. As far as experience will talre us, we thus have every good reason to believe that if nature as a whole is composecl entirel-v of eontingent parts, it is itself contingent. Tn one sense, of course, we clo not know that there are no necessary parts of natnre, for wc 'l'he Valid,ity of Aqui'nas' Third, WoA 125 have not experienced. them all. " Al1 parts of nature are con' tingent " is not conclusi,aely verifled. Some philosophers, such as the Greek atomists, were confldent that some parts of nature (tht: atoms) were necessary, i. e., incapable of not existing and possessing' a self-sufficient form of existence. Since there is now no good reasor for thinking that such claims are non-empirical, even modern claJ' philosophers might profitably turn to the question of whether they are true. What light cloes the splitting of the atom shed upon -*uch problems ? I hope that someone more knorvledgeable than I about such matters will take up the issue and enlighten us. W'here shall we turn in the macrocosm or microcosm to find a part o.t nature which is not contingent ? I suspect that we have not founri and will not find one, and that the proposition " a1l of the parts of nature are contingent " is tme. As to wholes which exist permanently (relatively), experience, on the contrary, d,oes show us tha,t their parts need not exist permanentll'. Take for in-qtanee rouncl-the-eloek pop-music broadcasts.B I must say that I fail completely to see the relevance of this final remark unless it is here being assumed that even if an argument does not commit the faliacy of composition, at least it must commii the fallacy of division. Nowhere do I even hint at the suggestion that each part of some whole must possess the properties possessed by that whole, and I certainly clo not argue that each of the parts of nature must be permanent since the whole of nature is perrnanent. Arguments from whole to part, commonly recognized. as t'divi- ,qion " argument, D&y also be treated as enthymemes however, having a perfectly valid argument form. They may be regarded as havius the form tt lf a whoie possesses a certain property, then cach of its parts possesses that property; and a whole possesses a certain property; therefore each of it parts possesses that property." 'Ihere may actually be sound, argumcnts of this form, if some such arguments have all true premises as well as a valid form. What then would be wrons with the following argument ? " If a whole concert is (relatively) permanent, then eacir of its parts is (relativeiy) permanent; and the whole concert is (relatively) p.rmanentl therefore each of its parts is (relatively) permanent. 6 rbid. 126 Rem B. Edwards (\\re might produce an analogous argument suffering from none of the ambiguities of " is [relatively] permanent " by substiiuting " lasts exactly one hour " lyherever this appears. ) This argument is perfectiy vaiitl in form, but it oloviously does not prove the trutir of its conclusion. Why not ? Because this valid argument has at least one false premise. Ilxperience cloes shoru us many cases rvhere th,-: antecerlent of the first prcmise is tme and the consequent is false. Since Mautner gives us no clues for clistinguishing premises frorn conclusion in his exarnple, perhaps he does want the argument to nin the otiier rvay after all, i. e., from parts to 'whole, and thus be a " cornposition " argument. 'Ireatetl as an eniliymeme, this woulcl be: " If each of the parts of a concert is impermanerit (or lasts one hour), then the rvhole concert is imperrnanent (or lasts one hour) ; nncl each of the par"ts of a concert is impermanent (or lasts one hour) ; t'h,erafore the wirole concert is impermanent (or iasts one hour)." Now this is again a perfectly valicl argument. Its only fault :ls that its fir.st l,remise is false, since we do find. in experience that tire parts of <-rur concert last an hour each antl that the whole lasts all night, or howet er long pop concerts usually run. Uni,uersitg of Terunessee, Kno a oill, e, T enn es s e e.

Events, agents, and settling whether and how one intervenes Jason D. Runyan forthcoming in Philosophical Studies Abstract: Event-causal libertarians maintain that an agent's settling of whether certain states-of-affairs obtain on a particular occasion can be reduced to the causing of events (e.g., bodily motions, coming to a resolution) by certain mental events or states, such as certain desires, beliefs and/or intentions. Agent-causal libertarians disagree. A common critique against event-causal libertarian accounts is that the agent's role of settling matters is left unfilled and the agent "disappears" from such accounts-a problem known as the disappearing agent problem. Recently, Christopher Franklin (2014) has argued that an "enriched" event-causal account can overcome this problem. Franklin, however, doesn't consider whether, as Derk Pereboom (2015) argues, the agent as decider of "torn decisions" disappears from even enriched accounts. As I show here, Franklin's enriched account takes some modifying if it is to overcome Pereboom's torn decision problem-a special case of the disappearing agent problem. However, as I also show, there is a more fundamental problem facing event-causal libertarian accounts. It is implausible that an agent qua event or state simultaneously settles whether and how she intervenes. The upshot is that events and/or states lack an ability essential to completely fulfilling an agent's role qua settler. This isn't a problem for agent-causal accounts like the one offered by Helen Steward (2012) because in as much as an agent qua substance settles whether her body moves in certain ways on certain occasions she simultaneously settles whether and how she intervenes. As a consequence, event-causal libertarians face a dilemma, or rather several, that agent-causal libertarians do not. This may ultimately be explained by the irreducibility of causation by agents to causation by events. 2 1. Two libertarian accounts of agent settling Both event-causal and agent-causal libertarians agree that exercising free will requires being able to settle whether certain states-of-affairs obtain on a particular occasion. They, further, agree that those matters settled by exercising free will are left undetermined by antecedent causal conditions. They, however, disagree on exactly who or what exercises free will and thereby settles certain matters. According to agent-causal libertarians, an agent as a self-moving, persisting substance settles whether certain states-of-affairs obtain (e.g., whether her body moves in certain ways) on particular occasions (cf. Pereboom 2015). As Helen Steward has recently put it, the kinds of things "up to" the agent qua substance, and which she settles "by acting", are whether she Vs,1 when she Vs, how she Vs and where she Vs (Steward 2012, 36-8). An agent's action "just is" a matter of it being the settling of "at least one from a range of possible other things that are up to the agent" (36). And, at the moment of Ving purposively or intentionally, an agent can settle multiple matters at once (37). For example, a person might settle whether, when, where and how they buy a train ticket to London by buying a ticket at 10:36am on January 26th, 2015 using a credit card. Notice that, according to such accounts, what the agent settles is not her action.2 Rather, in cases like the buying of a train ticket, an agent's actions are "bodily movings" or, that is, the causing of certain bodily motions, and the causing of certain other changes as a result, by her at a certain point in time (33-35; cf. von Wright 1963, 39-41; Hornsby 1980, 3; Hyman 2006).3 The resulting changes, including the resulting motion of her body, are effects caused by her when she moves her body at that time. In this way, an agent settles whether certain events or states-of-affairs obtain by acting in a certain way. "[B]y acting"-and, thus, by causing change-an agent "close[s] off all possibilities 1 I use V in place of a verb. 2 While there have been versions of agent-causalism wherein agents cause their actions these versions have grown less popular as there are a number of problems facing this idea (for e.g., see O'Connor 1995, 182; Alvarez and Hyman 1998; Steward 2012, 37-8). 3 For simplicity sake, and because it is given the most attention in the relevant literature, I will focus on what might be called productive action-action that involves bringing about, effecting, producing or causing some change. This isn't to imply that there aren't other kinds of action, such as sustaining action (action that involves sustaining or maintaining something as it is) or preventing action (action that involves preventing change or keeping change at bay; for e.g., see von Wright 1974, 40). 3 except one" (39). And she can do this pertaining to multiple matters at once, with one action that has "a variety of descriptions, at least one of which will generally be a description in terms of the agent's moving of her own body or part of it" (34; cf. Anscombe 1957; Davidson 1971). She, thus, settles "the answers to a variety of questions whose answers are (therefore) not already settled". To return to my example, one's buying of a train ticket may appropriately be described in terms of one's causing of one's arm and hand to move. It may equally be described in terms of one's settling of whether one's body moves as well as one's settling of when, how and where one's body moves. So according to agent-causalists like Steward, at least in a broad number of cases, an agent's action is her causing of certain changes and thereby her settling of multiple matters. According to event-causal libertarians, an agent's settling of whether certain states-of-affairs obtain should be understood in terms of, or reduced to, the causing of events (e.g., bodily motions, coming to a resolution) by certain mental events or states, such as certain desires, beliefs and/or intentions (see for e.g. Velleman 1992, 2000; Ekstrom 1993, 1999; Kane 1996, 1999). In short, the causal relation that, according to agent-causalists like Steward, holds between substances and certain motions and/or other changes should be understood in terms of the causal relation between events and/or states. However, a common critique of event-causal libertarian accounts is that the agent's role of settling matters is left unfilled and the agent "disappears" from such accounts (e.g., Pereboom 2004; 2015; Griffith 2010; O'Connor 2000). This problem is often referred to as the disappearing agent problem. In what follows, I review the disappearing agent problem before discussing similar attempts by J. David Velleman (1992; 2000) and Christopher Franklin (2014) at providing, what Franklin calls, an "enriched" event-causal libertarian account of agent settling that overcomes this problem. As we will see with the help of Derk Pereboom (2015), both of these accounts face a special case of the disappearing agent problem. In both, it seems that the settler of "torn decisions"-or that is, roughly put, decisions made when an individual finds each alternative equally appealing-disappears. But, as we will also see, a slightly modified form of Franklin's account seems able to overcome this problem. However, there is a more fundamental problem facing event-causal 4 libertarianism. Events and states lack an ability essential to completely fulfilling an agent's role qua settler. Specifically, it is implausible that an agent qua event or state simultaneously settles whether and how she intervenes. This isn't a problem for agentcausal accounts like the one offered by Steward because, granted an agent qua substance settles whether her body moves in certain ways on a given occasion, she simultaneously settles whether and how she intervenes. As a consequence, event-causal libertarians face a dilemma, or rather several dilemmas, which agent-causal libertarians do not. 2. The disappearing agent problem Since the pivotal work of Donald Davidson (1963), event-causalists have traditionally maintained that our role as agents is exhausted by the role(s) played by certain antecedent mental events and/or states (e.g., beliefs, desires and/or intentions). And libertarians maintain that the occurrence of our free actions4 are left undetermined, and thus not settled, by antecedent causal conditions, which include mental events or states relevant to the occurrence of our actions. So it would seem that, to be consistent, event-causal libertarians must maintain that nothing about us settles whether our free actions occur. As Pereboom illustrates: Consider a decision that occurs in a context in which the agent's moral motivations favor that decision, and her prudential motivations favor her refraining from making it, and the strengths of these motivations are in equipoise. On an event-causal libertarian picture, the relevant causal conditions antecedent to the decision, i.e., the occurrence of certain agent-involving events, do not settle whether the decision will occur, but only render the occurrence of the decision about 50% probable. In fact, because no occurrence of antecedent events settles whether the decision will occur, and only antecedent events are causally relevant, nothing settles whether the decision will occur. Thus it can't be that the agent or anything about the agent settles whether 4 For simplicity sake, and in keeping with a common practice in the relevant literature, by "action" I mean the exercise of any agential ability (cf. Franklin 2014, 414). 5 the decision will occur, and she therefore will lack the control required for moral responsibility for it. (Pereboom 2004; cf. O'Connor 2008) In short, if antecedent mental events and/or states do not settle whether our free actions or decisions occur, and our role as agents is exhausted by causal roles played by these events or states, there is nothing about us that settles whether certain states-of-affairs obtain on a particular occasion. Our agential role qua settler is nowhere to be found in event-causal libertarian accounts-or so the argument goes. The agent qua settler disappears. As a consequence, whether our free actions occur seems to be out of our hands. Doing all we can leaves whether our free actions occur unsettled, out of our control and a matter of luck (Pereboom 2004; Griffith 2010; Franklin 2014). Thus, we aren't morally responsible for their occurrence. And this is the disappearing agent problem for event-causal libertarianism. 3. Pereboom's torn decision problem: a special case of the disappearing agent problem In response to the disappearing agent problem, a number of theorists have argued that an event-causal libertarian can consistently uphold the idea an agent settles whether certain states-of-affairs obtain on a particular occasion by upholding that the agent, in her functional role of settling the matter, can plausibly be identified with-or are plausibly identical to-a certain mental state that settles the matter (e.g., Velleman 1992; Ekstrom 2000, 2003). As Velleman maintains: Although the agent must possess an identity apart from the substantive motives competing for influence over his behavior, he needn't possess an identity apart from the attitude that animates the activity of judging such competitions. If there is such an attitude, then its contribution to the competition's outcome can qualify as his–not because he identifies with it but rather because it is functionally identical to him. (Velleman 1992, 480) 6 So, according to Velleman, an agent's functional role of settling matters could be fulfilled by a certain attitude with which the agent is "functionally identical", and this would "qualify" as the agent's fulfillment of this role. Velleman, further, thinks the desire to behave in accordance with what one holds to be the best reasons (1992, 478-9; 2000, 14, n. 20; 2009)-which he thinks of as an enduring attitudinal state-fits the bill. As he states: We say that the agent turns his thoughts to the various motives that give him reason to act; but in fact, the agent's thoughts are turned in this direction by the desire to act in accordance with reasons. We say that the agent calculates the relative strengths of the reasons before him; but in fact, these calculations are driven by his desire to act in accordance with reasons. We say that the agent throws his weight behind the motives that provide the strongest reason; but what is thrown behind those motives, in fact, is the additional motivating force of the desire to act in accordance with reasons. For when a desire appears to provide the strongest reason for acting, then the desire to act in accordance with reasons becomes a motive to act on that desire, and the desire's motivational influence is consequently reinforced. The agent is moved to his action, not only by his original motive for it, but also by his desire to act on the original motive, because of its superior rational force. This latter contribution to the agent's behavior is the contribution of an attitude that performs the functions definitive of agency; it is therefore, functionally speaking, the agent's contribution to the causal order. (Velleman 2000, 141) Given Velleman's view, while there are no antecedent conditions that settle whether our free actions occur, the occurrence of these actions are settled by us at the moment they are settled by an attitude with which we are functionally identical. Pereboom (2015) has recently argued that proposals of the kind put forth by Velleman aren't able to account for cases where an agent makes a decision between alternatives despite having equal desires for, or attitudes in favor of or preferences toward, each alternative. That is, such proposals can't account for "torn decisions"; or decisions made when a person is in what Pereboom calls "motivational equipoise". Pereboom 7 argues that if we maintain that an agent's role qua settler is exclusively played by her desire to behave in accordance with what she takes to be the best reasons-as Velleman proposes-there can be nothing about a person that settles which alternative she chooses when torn equally between alternatives (i.e., while having equal desires for, or attitudes in favor of or preferences toward, either alternative). Accordingly, the agent qua settler of torn decisions-decisions made while in motivational equipoise-disappears given accounts like Velleman's wherein an agent's role qua settler is fulfilled by a desire, attitude or preference in favor of one alternative.5 To illustrate the problem, Pereboom draws upon an example developed by Mark Balaguer: Ralph is deciding whether to stay in Mayberry or move to New York. Favoring the move to New York are his desire to play for the Giants, and his desire to star on Broadway. Favoring staying in Mayberry are his desire to marry Robbi Anna, and his desire to manage the local Der Weinerschnitzel. Suppose Ralph makes the torn decision to move to New York-he just decides to move to New York. (2009, 72) In this example, Ralph simply decides to move to New York-he just chooses this alternative-without having any desire, preference or attitude tipping the scales, so to speak, toward the move. That is, he makes the torn decision to move to New York. Ralph makes this decision despite experiencing motivational equipoise. And we typically think people can make these kinds of torn decisions. The problem-according to Pereboom-is, given event-causal libertarian accounts of the kind proposed by Velleman, when a person is in motivational equipoise concerning her alternatives she is on the fence about, and out of resources for settling, what to do. There is no desire, attitude or 5 Pereboom presents the same case against Laura Ekstrom's (1993; 2000; 2003) account. Ekstrom proposes that certain general preferences in favor of certain alternatives-namely, those an agent forms and maintains as a result of her non-coerced and undetermined deliberations, thought processes and other agential conduct-might be functionally identified with the agent and fulfill her role of settler. But, as Pereboom (2015) argues, if we maintain that an agent's role qua settler is exclusively played by a general preference for a certain alternative-as Ekstrom proposes-there can be nothing about a person that settles how she behaves when torn equally between alternatives (i.e., while having equal desires for, or attitudes in favor of or preferences toward, either alternative). Thus, the agent qua decider of torn decisions disappears given Ekstrom's account. 8 preference in favor of one alternative to settle what she does. Thus, given accounts like Velleman's wherein a person's role qua settler is fulfilled by a desire, attitude or preference in favor of one alternative, how a person behaves whenever equally torn between her alternatives is left unsettled by her, out of her control and a matter of luck. In short, Velleman's proposal doesn't seem able to account for the making of torn decisions. Rather, the disappearance of the agent qua settler of torn decisions presents a special case of the disappearing agent problem for proposals wherein a person's role qua settler is fulfilled by a desire, attitude or preference in favor of one alternative. 4. Franklin's enriched event-causal libertarian account Recently, Franklin (2014) has argued that, what he calls, an "enriched" event-causal libertarian account can avoid the disappearing agent problem. However, as will become apparent in this section, Velleman's account is an example of the kind of account Franklin has in mind. And in keeping with observations made above concerning Velleman's account, as we will eventually see in section 5, accounts enriched in the way Franklin has in mind are susceptible to Pereboom's special case of the disappearing agent problem: i.e.-the torn decision problem. To see this, let's start by summarizing Franklin's argument. As a first approximation, Franklin maintains that an event-causal account of an agent settling whether certain states-of-affairs obtain on a particular occasion can be given if it is enriched by the inclusion of an event or state that not only "plays [the agent's] functional role" qua settler but "in so doing counts as his playing his functional role" (2014, 418); or, that is, "amounts to his playing his functional role" (419). Franklin, further, argues that the playing of a functional role by an event or state amounts to the agent playing her functional role as long as the agent is (a) identical to this event or state or (b) is identified with this event or state (419), which he argues is plausible. Franklin develops his position by, first, drawing a lesson from well-known responses to the causal exclusion argument. To glean this lesson we need only sketch out this argument here. In very general terms, according to the causal exclusion argument, 9 given we accept certain premises about the physical world and that mental causes depend upon physical causes-for example, that they supervene on physical causes (Kim 2005, ch. 8)-at every point in time that there is a mental cause for some physical effect there is also a physical cause in competition with the mental cause for causing the effect (cf. Franklin 2014, 418-19). The upshot is that mental causes seem to be excluded from having any physical effects. There are, however, two well-known approaches to resolving the exclusion problem: the identity solution and the inheritance solution. According to the identity solution, mental causes are identical to certain physical causes (e.g., see Block and Salnaker 1999; Kim 2005). There, thus, only appears to be competition between mental and physical causes. According to the inheritance solution, mental causes are so intimately connected with certain physical causes-for instance, mental causes are constituted (Pereboom 2002) or realized (Shoemaker 2003a, b) by physical causes-they inherit their causal powers (cf. Robb and Heil 2008). In this case, the causing of certain events by certain physical causes counts as the causing of certain events by certain mental causes. The lesson Franklin wants us to draw from the identity and inheritance solutions to the exclusion argument is that certain events or states could plausibly fulfill an agent's functional role qua settler, and by doing so count as the agent fulfilling her functional role, if the agent is either: (a) identical to certain events or states analogous to the way mental causes have been postulated to be identical with physical causes, or is (b) identified with certain events or states analogous to the way mental causes have been postulated to be constituted or realized by physical causes. That is, if either (a) or (b) is the case, a reductive account of an agent settling whether certain states-of-affairs obtain on a particular occasion is plausible. Here, it should be noted that Franklin favors and develops the theory that agents are identified with, rather 10 than identical to, certain events or states since this allows the sidelining of questions about the nature of the agent in question (e.g., we need not come to a position concerning whether agents are substances or bundles of mental states; Franklin 2014, 420). Given it is plausible we are identified with (or identical to) certain events or states that fulfill our functional role qua settler, the next natural question is which events or states might both we be identified with and fulfill this role. Franklin notes that eventcausalists have put forth a number of proposals. As he points out: The early Frankfurt (1988) argued that we are identified with our higher-order desires, while the later Frankfurt (1999), joined by Shoemaker (2003a) and Jaworska (2007), argued that we are identified with (a special subset of) our cares. Bratman (2007a) has argued that we are identified with our self-governing policies and Watson (1975; cf. Stump 1988; Ekstrom 1993) that we are identified with our system of evaluative beliefs. (420) Franklin thinks the various kinds of proposals he mentions "have merit" (420), and he doesn't want to saddle his enriched reductive account of agent settling with any specific view concerning the events or states with which we might be identified. Nevertheless, as a "working hypothesis", which he offers as a way to "give more flesh to" his account, Franklin favors Velleman's proposal that our "desire to act for what [we take] to be [our] strongest reasons" fulfills our role of settling matters and that its doing so counts as our fulfillment of this role (421; cf. Velleman 2000, 14n.20). To illustrate his working hypothesis, Franklin has us suppose that a thief has reasons for stealing and for refraining from stealing, and "whichever choice he makes will be caused, in the appropriate way, by the relevant set of desires and beliefs" (423). This thief: comes to view his desire to refrain as providing the strongest reason for action. In this case, the motivational force of the thief's desire and beliefs that favor refraining will be supplemented with the thief's motivational force in the form of his desire to act for what he takes to be the best reasons and, in this way, the desire introduces a new 11 causal influence. The thief plays a causal role over and above the causal role played by his desires and beliefs for action, and this supplementation amounts to his "throwing his weight" behind the desires and beliefs that led to action. (423) According to Franklin's proposal, it is the supplementary "motivational force" of the thief's desire to behave for what he sees as the best reasons that settles whether he steals or refrains from stealing on the occasion in question. And the thief can be identified with this desire. Thus, the desire's settling of whether the thief steals or refrains from stealing counts as the thief's settling of this matter. Franklin is careful to note that, given event-causal libertarianism, the thief's refraining is "undetermined" (423). It, thus, isn't settled in advance by any of the thief's mental events or states, anything having to do with the thief, or by anything else. So on the occasion in question, though the thief refrained from stealing, he may have stolen despite his "judgment about what he had the most reason to do". The motivational force of the thief's desire to behave for what he takes to be the best reasons may have not been supplied on the occasion in question. Thus, according to Franklin, the thief could have not "intervened" and not played "a causal role over and above the causal role played by his specific desires and beliefs for action" (426). And, if the thief hadn't intervened (i.e., if the motivational force of his desire to behave for what he takes to be the best reasons had not been supplied), the thief would have, on this occasion, left whether he stole or refrained from stealing unsettled. He may, in this case, have stolen or he may have, nevertheless, refrained from stealing on the occasion in question; but, either way, he would not have settled whether he stole or refrained. The reason: "there would be no attitude among the causes of his deciding to steal both that he is identified with and plays his functional role" (423). I should clarify that Franklin is not claiming that whether an agent intervenes is contingent upon the occurrence of a mental state or event that is sometimes present and sometimes not. Rather, in line with Velleman's view, Franklin maintains that whether an agent intervenes depends on whether the motivational force of a certain kind of desire, conceived of as an enduring attitudinal state, is supplied.6 And, since he is offering a 6 I thank an anonymous reviewer for highlighting the importance of this point. 12 libertarian account, whether the motivational force of this desire is supplied on any occasion must be left undetermined, and, thus, unsettled, by antecedent causal conditions if the desire is to fulfill the role of the agent qua settler by supplying motivational force. Finally, I should also point out that Franklin is careful to note that-breaking with traditional event-causal theories-given his enriched theory, the supplying of a motivational force by the desire to act for what one takes to be the best reasons shouldn't be thought of as an antecedent to the agent's settling of matters. Rather, in keeping with Velleman's account (see section 3), Franklin maintains that the settling of a matter by this desire constitutes the agent's settling of a matter (425-9). So the moment this desire settles a matter by supplying the requisite motivational force is also the moment the agent settles the matter (425). And the idea that the settling of a matter by a mental state or event constitutes the settling of the matter by an agent, and thus that both occur simultaneously, is at the crux of an enriched event-causal libertarian account as laid out by Franklin (426). 5. Problems for enriched event-causal libertarian accounts At this point, the contours of Franklin's position have been sufficiently outlined for us to recognize two problems facing it. One problem is particular to the theory-Velleman's theory-which Franklin uses "to give more flesh to" his underlying enriched event-causal libertarian account of agent settling. The other is a more fundamental problem for all such accounts. Let's start with the first. (1) Borrowing from Velleman's account, Franklin theorizes that the settling of a matter by an agent's desire to behave for what she takes to be the best reasons counts as the agent's settling of a matter (420). As a result, Franklin's theory-like Velleman's- seems unable to meet Pereboom's torn decision challenge. Recall that-as we saw in section 3-Pereboom has us consider cases where an agent is in motivational equipoise concerning her alternatives. She is on the fence about what to do. In such cases, the desire to behave for what one sees to be the best reasons- the state Franklin, like Velleman, theorizes as being the one that fulfills our role qua 13 settler-will be of no help in settling whether certain states-of-affairs obtain. The reason is simple: in motivational equipoise one doesn't see any of one's alternatives as being more reasonable, and so the desire to behave for the best reasons won't provide motivational force to tip the scales toward any of them. Thus, if our desire to behave for what we see to be the best reasons is the only mental state or event to fulfill our role qua settler, we are unable to settle whether certain states-of-affairs obtain when, in our eyes, we have equal reasons for behaving in alternative ways. So it would seem that the agent qua settler of torn decisions disappears given Franklin's theory. We must, however, remember that Franklin is open to the idea that there are other mental states or events with which we can be functionally identified that fulfill our role of settling matters. And, given this, there does seem to be a way of modifying Franklin's theory to provide an enriched event-causal libertarian account that meets Pereboom's torn decision challenge. In addition to postulating that the settling of a matter by an agent's desire to behave for what she sees to be the best reasons can amount to the agent settling a matter, we might also postulate that the settling of a matter by an agent's desire to just go for one alternative-rather than remain in a state of indecision-can, likewise, amount to the agent settling a matter. In this case, our desire to just go for one alternative could provide the motivational force to settle a matter even when we are in motivational equipoise concerning our alternatives; and, thus, when the desire to behave for the best reasons can't provide this motivational force. So we could settle what we do even when facing torn decisions. This at least seems a plausible way to proceed. (2) There is, however, another, more fundamental, problem for enriched accounts as Franklin conceives of them. As observed in section 4, according to such accounts, when an agent "intervenes" and thereby settles a matter not already settled (423), she does so "in virtue of the power of" a certain state or event, with which she is identified (426). When this state or event doesn't supply the "motivational force" to supplement an agent's desires and beliefs that favor a certain way of behaving, she doesn't "intervene" and leaves whether she behaves in this way or some other way unsettled (423). So, in general terms, given an enriched account: 14 (i) an agent settles matters, which are not already settled, via a certain state or event, with which she is identified, supplying motivational force. Further, as also observed in section 4, given event-causal libertarianism: (ii) on any given occasion, whether the force by which an agent settles matters is supplied is undetermined and, thus, not settled in advance (423). And here is where a problem arises. Given (i) and (ii), we are faced with a dilemma: either we accept an infinite regress or an agent doesn't control whether she "intervenes" and thereby settles a matter on any given occasion.7 Given (i), an agent settles a matter via a motivational force being supplied by a certain state or event. But additionally, given (i), if the agent is to settle whether this motivational force is supplied-and whether she intervenes-on a certain occasion, a certain state or event with which she is identified needs to supply a secondary motivational force that fulfills the agent's functional role of settling that the primary motivational force is supplied on this occasion. The reason is-according to (i)-agents settle matters via a state or event supplying motivational force. The problem is to settle whether this primary motivational force is supplied on a certain occasion, the agent will also need to settle that this secondary motivational force is supplied on that occasion. The reason is the agent settles whether this primary force is supplied via this secondary force. Thus, if she doesn't settle whether this secondary force is supplied on the occasion in question, she equally doesn't settle whether this primary force is supplied. In this case, again given (i), if the agent is to settle that this primary force is supplied, and, thus, that she intervenes, on a certain occasion, in addition to a secondary motivational force, a tertiary motivational force will need to be supplied-this one settling that the secondary motivational force is supplied. However, for the same reasons this tertiary force is needed, a motivational force is needed to settle that this tertiary force is supplied; and the same goes for this force and every subsequent force in this ensuing series, ad infinitum, if 7 Here, it should be kept in mind that an agent may settle a matter on a certain occasion without aiming to settle this matter at a certain point in time. For example, a person may settle that she buys a train ticket on January 26th, 2015 at 10:36am without aiming to do so at this specific time. 15 the agent is to settle that the primary motivational force is supplied, and, thus, that she settles whether she intervenes and settles a matter, on a certain occasion. Thus, given enriched event-causal libertarianism, if an agent is to settle whether she intervenes on a certain occasion, a certain state or event with which she is identified needs to supply a series of motivational forces, and the supplying of each needs to count as the agent's settling of whether the subsequent motivational force is supplied, ad infinitum; thereby settling she intervenes on a certain occasion. As this is implausible, an agent can't settle whether she intervenes and settles a matter on a certain occasion. And if an agent can't settle whether she intervenes on a certain occasion, given (ii), even when doing all she can, an agent leaves whether she intervenes on a particular occasion unsettled and a matter of luck. Whether she intervenes on any given occasion is out of her control. An agent may, at times, settle certain matters but she can't control on which occasions she does this settling. So, given the account in question, for an agent to have control over whether she settles a matter on any given occasion, motivational forces must be supplied in an endless series, which is implausible. We are, thus, left with the conclusion that an agent, while doing all she can, leaves whether she intervenes and settles a matter unsettled and up to something or someone else. She never controls whether she intervenes. The problem is if we never control whether we intervene, we are never morally responsible for not intervening, or for our behavior while not intervening. We, for instance, can't justifiably hold an agent morally responsible for not intervening to stop a pickpocket, for not intervening to blow the whistle on corporate corruption, or for not intervening to warn others of impending danger. Whether individuals intervene and settle whether they do these things, or anything else, on any given occasion is out of their hands. In this case, though we regularly hold individuals morally responsible for not intervening when we think they should have, we wrongly do so. To provide one more illustration of the problem at hand, I will return to Franklin's thief example. Given enriched event-causal libertarianism, if a thief settles whether he refrains from stealing, a supplementary motivational force must be supplied by a certain state or event (i.e., one that fulfills the thief's functional role of settling the matter and by doing so amounts to him settling the matter; 423). However, given such an account, on 16 any occasion that a thief settles that he refrains, the thief might instead either steal or refrain without this force being supplied; and thus while having left whether he steals or refrains from stealing unsettled (424). In the latter case, the thief's behavior would be settled by something or someone else. Further, as we have just seen, given enriched event-causal libertarianism, the only way for the thief to control whether such a force is supplied on a given occasion is for an endless series of motivational forces to be supplied by a certain state or event thereby endlessly fulfilling his role qua settler. As this is implausible, the thief can't plausibly control whether he "intervenes" and settles whether he refrains from stealing on any given occasion. While, on certain occasions, he may settle whether he refrains from stealing, the thief can't control on which occasions these may be. As a result, at no time does he exercise control over whether or not he intervenes and settles that he refrains (and, when he doesn't intervene, he may either steal or refrain). He is, thus, never morally responsible for whether he intervenes and settles this matter, or, then, for not intervening-or for his behavior (whether stealing or refraining) when not intervening. The reason he can't be morally responsible for his behavior when not intervening is because, not only can he not control whether he intervenes, when he doesn't intervene whether he steals or refrains is left unsettled by him and a matter of luck. This is a problem since we often hold people morally responsible for not intervening, and, thus, for their behavior while not intervening.8 8 Franklin doesn't address the issue I raise above, which shouldn't be confused with whether his enriched account is consistent with the idea agents have "plural voluntary control", an issue he does address (423-4). As Franklin notes, according to Robert Kane (1996; 2011), when given the choice between two alternatives, people are said to have plural voluntary control when they "have the power to make either choice be or not be at the time, voluntarily, on purpose and for reasons, and merely by accident" (2011, 397). Franklin claims that, given his account, agents can have this power. Using his thief example to illustrate, he maintains that, regardless of whether (a) the thief (by virtue of the power of his desire to do what he thinks he has the best reasons for doing) settles that he refrains from stealing (what he thinks he has the best reasons for doing) or (b) the thief doesn't settle this matter and steals, the thief's behavior is voluntary "on purpose and for reasons, and not merely by accident". So, without offering any real argument for this claim, Franklin maintains that, given event-causal libertarianism, behaving "voluntarily, on purpose and for reasons, and not merely by accident" isn't contingent upon settling how one behaves (424). However, given event-causal libertarian commitments, on occasions when a person doesn't settle whether she behaves in a certain way, whether she behaves in that way is a matter of luck (see section 2). And it seems contentious to maintain that behavior that occurs by luck is voluntary, engaged in "on purpose and for reasons" and doesn't occur "merely by accident" (but see note 10). Regardless, the issue I have raised above doesn't have to do with whether, given event-causal libertarian commitments, exercising voluntary control is contingent on settling how one behaves; or whether an enriched account is consistent with plural voluntary control. Rather, the issue I have raised has to do with whether, given an enriched account, an agent ever settles whether she settles a matter. 17 I can see one way an enriched event-causal libertarian account might be modified in order to avoid facing the dilemma, illustrated above, concerning an agent's ability to settle and thereby control whether she intervenes. It might be postulated that-rather than settling matters via a certain state or event supplying motivational force-an agent settles matters via one of various states or events, with which the agent is identified, supplying motivational force thereby fulfilling the agent's functional role qua settler. It might, further, be postulated that, on any given occasion, whether an agent behaves in a certain way depends on which of these states or events supplies this motivational force. Upholding these two postulations would allow the event-causal libertarian to uphold the plausible position that-as is often thought to be the case for many abilities9-the ability to settle whether a certain state-of-affairs obtains on a particular occasion is an ability exercised whenever the opportunity arises.10 So, quite simply, an agent settles a matter, in one way or another, every opportunity she gets. There is never a question about whether an agent settles a matter given she has the opportunity to do so. Taking this modified position seems, at least prima facie, a plausible way for event-causal libertarians to deny they must face the dilemma concerning an agent's ability to control whether she intervenes-a dilemma that, as we saw above, faces them if, with Franklin, they accept premises (i) and (ii) as stated above. The problem, however, is if we take this modified position we are faced with a different dilemma. This time concerning an agent's ability to settle and thereby control how she intervenes. According to the modified account that I laid out above: (i') an agent settles matters, which are not already settled, via one of various states or events, with which she is identified, supplying motivational force. And given event-causal libertarianism: 9 For example, those who accept a conditional analysis of abilities maintain that abilities are exercised whenever the opportunity arises (e.g., Ryle 1949; Molnar 2003, ch. 4; Bird 2007, ch. 2). 10 Upholding these two propositions also provides a way of avoiding the contentious issue as to whether, given Franklin's unmodified account, agents have "plural voluntary control" (see note 8). It avoids this issue since, given these propositions, an agent settles that she Vs or that she doesn't V whenever she has an opportunity to settle that she Vs. 18 (ii') on any given occasion, which state or event supplies the force by which an agent settles matters is undetermined and, thus, not settled in advance. The problem, now, becomes that, given (i'), if we are to settle how we settle a matter, one or more of various states or events with which we are identified needs to supply a series of motivational forces, and the supplying of each needs to count as our settling of which subsequent motivational force is supplied, ad infinitum; thereby settling the means by which we settle a matter. This is implausible. So we are left to conclude that we can't settle the means by which we settle a matter. And since we can't settle the means by which we settle a matter, given (ii'), even when we do all we can, the means by which we settle a matter and thereby intervene is left unsettled by us and a matter of luck. It is out of our control. We are, thus, not morally responsible for how we intervene. To return once more to Franklin's thief example-given (i')-while we can maintain that a thief settles whether he steals or refrains from stealing, and that he can do so in virtue of the "motivational force" supplied by (a) the desire to act for what he sees to be the best reasons, or, for instance, (b) the desire to just go for one alternative, we can't plausibly maintain that the thief settles how he comes to either steal or refrain from stealing as this would require an endless series of forces being supplied. As a result- given (ii')-we must conclude that the thief, doing all he can, leaves how he intervenes and comes to either steal or refrain from stealing unsettled and a matter of luck. In this case, we can't justifiably hold the thief morally responsible for how he intervenes and comes to either steal or refrain from stealing. The problem is we regularly hold people morally responsible for how they come to do something. For example, we generally hold people morally responsible for whether they come to do something out of wanting what is best or wanting what they desire most. Therefore, it seems that postulating that whenever an agent has an opportunity to settle a matter, she settles the matter by virtue of "the power of" one of various states or events amounts to kicking the can-or the dilemma as it were-down the road. It may, perhaps, provide a way of avoiding the dilemma facing event-causal libertarians who maintain that an agent settles matters via a certain state or event supplying motivational force-a dilemma concerning an agent's ability to control whether she settles a matter. 19 But this dilemma is replaced with another dilemma concerning an agent's ability to control how she intervenes and comes to do something. For, as observed in the preceding paragraphs, if we hypothesize that whenever an agent has an opportunity to settle a matter she settles the matter by virtue of "the power of" one of various states or events, either her ability to control how she intervenes disappears (one horn of the dilemma) or we must accept an infinite regress (the other horn). 6. An underlying issue for event-causal libertarian accounts If the observations made in section 5 are correct, postulating that an agent's role qua settler is fulfilled by a state or event with which the agent can be identified leads to a dilemma concerning either: (a) an agent's ability to control whether she intervenes (if we postulate that the ability to settle matters isn't exercised every time the opportunity arises), or (b) an agent's ability to control how she intervenes (if we postulate that the ability to settle matters is an ability exercised every time the opportunity arises). These dilemmas arise independent of the content of the mental state or event postulated to fulfill an agent's role of agent settler. And which of the above dilemmas to face presents a second-order dilemma for event-causal libertarians. I believe these dilemmas point toward an issue inextricably linked to event-causal libertarian accounts of agent settling. These dilemmas arise as a result of how, according to event-causal accounts, an agent intervenes. Given libertarian accounts wherein our intervening and settling of matters is explained in terms of the supplying of a force by certain states or events, if we postulate that the ability to settle matters isn't exercised every time the opportunity arises (as Franklin does), we must either postulate that certain 20 forces are supplied in an endless series or conclude that whether an agent intervenes on any given occasion is outside of her control. On the other hand, if we postulate that the ability to settle matters is an ability exercised whenever the opportunity arises, we must, similarly, postulate that certain forces are supplied in an endless series or conclude that how an agent intervenes on any given occasion is outside of her control. At this point, we might ask whether agent-causal libertarians face the same, or similar, dilemmas, and whether what I have identified here is a general problem for libertarians. In response, it will be helpful to return to some initial observations we made about agent-causal libertarianism in section 1. As observed at the outset with Steward's help, given agent-causal libertarianism, an agent qua substance, or self-mover, can settle matters by moving her body or part of it (Steward 2012, 32-6). An agent performs actions that may appropriately be described as her moving of her body-and as her causing of her body to move-in certain ways at a certain point in time; and, equally, as her settling that her body moves in certain ways on this occasion (34-6). These actions can also be described in multiple other ways (34; cf. Anscombe 1957; von Wright 1963). As a result, unlike what is the case for states and events, given an agent qua substance can settle matters by moving her body in certain ways-as agent-causal libertarians maintain-she can settle whether her body moves in certain ways on a particular occasion, whether she intervenes and settles a matter on a particular occasion, and how she intervenes, at once, with one fell swoop. The reason is a single action performed by the agent at a certain point in time may appropriately be described as her settling of these various matters at that time. The upshot is that by moving her body or part of it in a certain way-and at the instance of moving her body in this way-an agent settles whether her body moves in certain ways, whether she intervenes at a certain point in time, and whether she does so by certain means. The agent supplies force once thereby accomplishing all of these things. To borrow Steward's words, she settles "the answers to a variety of questions whose answers are (therefore) not already settled" pertaining to what obtains at a certain point in time (39). So, by moving her body in a certain way at a certain point in time, an agent doesn't leave whether her body moves in certain ways, or whether she intervenes in a certain way, to luck. Rather, in as much as she settles whether her body moves on any 21 given occasion she equally settles whether and how she intervenes on that occasion. Thus, once we-along with the agent-causal libertarian-admit an agent qua substance settles whether her body moves we also admit she settles whether and how she intervenes. To illustrate, an agent qua substance may settle whether she intervenes to settle a dispute-as well as whether she does so by appealing to a common interest shared by the disputing parties-at a certain point in the argument (and in time), at the moment she moves parts of her body in certain ways (e.g., lips, mouth, larynx) and shares her perspective with the disputing parties. Let me provide one more illustration by returning to an example I used at the outset. An agent's action of reaching into her pocket, pulling out her credit card, extending her hand and placing it into the hands of a train conductor on January 26th, 2015 at 10:36am (if, indeed, this is all one action) may appropriately be described in terms of the agent's moving of her body in certain ways at this time, in terms of the agent's buying of a train ticket by credit card at this time, and in terms of the agent's intervening in a certain state-of-affairs at this time such that she now has a train ticket. Thus, given agent-causal libertarianism, at the moment of performing this action, which may appropriately be described in multiple ways, the agent settles whether her arms and hands move in certain ways as well as whether and how she intervenes. Her action may appropriately be described as her settling of any of these matters on a particular occasion. The pivotal difference between agent-causal and event-causal accounts is that, according to the first, when an agent acts the relevant causal relations exist between a substance and certain bodily motion and/or other changes. An agent qua substance causes or brings about these events. However, according to the second, the relevant causal relations exist between events and/or states. An agent qua event and/or state supplies a force thereby causing, or bringing about, other events and/or states. And upholding this second view along with libertarian commitments leads to a serious problem not faced by libertarians who uphold the first view. On the one hand, according to event-causal libertarians, an agent settles matters via events or states supplying forces that cause certain other events (e.g., the movement of her body). The consequence, as we have seen, is that if an agent is to control whether such a force is supplied (and whether she intervenes)-or which force is supplied (and 22 how she intervenes)-on a certain occasion, events or states must supply an endless series of such forces, each settling that the prior force in the series is supplied on that occasion. On the other hand, according to agent-causal libertarians, an agent qua substance causes change and thereby settles matters. Whether and how an agent qua substance settles a matter on a particular occasion is settled by the agent when she performs an act that may appropriately be described in multiple ways, including in terms of her moving of her body in certain ways, as well as in terms of her interfering in certain states-ofaffairs in a certain way, on that occasion. By acting, the agent causes certain bodily motions as well as other changes; and, when she does, she settles multiple matters that had up to that point not been settled (including whether and how she would intervene at that point in time). Thus, while impossible for an agent qua state or event, an agent qua substance can simultaneously settle whether she intervenes, and how she does so, on a particular occasion. In this case, given an agent-causal account, an agent has an ability a state or event can't plausibly have: the ability to simultaneously settle whether and how she intervenes. Exercising this ability is, thus, a role a state or event can't fulfill. It, of course, might be argued that there is no substance in existence that actually fulfills the role of exercising this ability; or that it isn't even conceivable that there would be an agent qua substance, or settler qua substance. However, as we've seen, once we admit an agent qua substance settles whether her body moves we also admit she settles whether and how she intervenes. So an argument against agent-causal libertarianism would need to be an argument against the very existence or conceivability of substances qua settlers. And it would be up to the agent-causalist to counter this argument. But, regardless, what we have seen here is that it is implausible that states or events fulfill the role of an agent qua settler of both whether and how she intervenes on a particular occasion. It, thus, seems a kind of agent does after all disappear in event-causal libertarian accounts; namely-an agent who simultaneously settles, and thereby controls, whether and how she intervenes. The upshot is event-causal libertarians face several dilemmas that agent-causal libertarians 23 don't; and, in order to plausibly maintain that agents simultaneously control whether and how they intervene, libertarians need to be agent-causalists. So it would seem that eventcausal libertarianism affords less and is far less appealing than agent-causal varieties. Event-causal libertarianism even seems implausible. And-in keeping with Steward's and likeminded incompatibilist analyses of action-this implausibility may ultimately be explained by the irreducibility of causation by agents to causation by events. References Alvarez, M., Hyman, J. (1998) Agents and their actions. Philosophy 73, 219-45. Anscombe, G. E. M. (1957). Intentions. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. Balaguer, M. (2009). 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http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 1 ichikawa "Virtue, Intuition, and Philosophical Methodology" Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa [email protected] Arché Philosophical Research Centre Draft Manuscript 29 August, 2011 To Appear in Virtuous Thoughts: Essays on the Philosophy of Ernest Sosa, ed. John Turri, Springer Publishing Abstract. This chapter considers Ernest Sosa's contributions to philosophical methodology. In Section 1, Sosa's approach to the role of intuitions in the epistemology of philosophy is considered and related to his broader virtue--‐ theoretic epistemological framework. Of particular focus is the question whether false or unjustified intuitions may justify. Section 2 considers Sosa's response to sceptical challenges about intuitions, especially those deriving from experimental philosophy. I argue that Sosa's attempt to attribute apparent disagreement in survey data to difference in meaning fails, but that some of his other, more general, responses to experimentalist sceptics succeed. Historically, one of the central motivating questions in the epistemology of philosophy concerns the role of intuitions. It is said that philosophers often make use of intuitions, and theorists consider what it is about intuitions that could justify such a practice, or whether it is a mistake for philosophers to continue to use intuitions in the way that they do. These questions define a significant subfield in metaphilosophy. Ernest Sosa's is among the most influential work in this tradition; he accepts the premise of the dialectic, that intuitions do play an important role in philosophy as practiced, and argues in favour of such practice, by offering a theory of the epistemic role of intuitions, and by defending the practice of appeal to intuition from critics. These two elements of Sosa's work-the positive story about intuitions, and the defensive responses to critiques of intuitions-are the focus of the present contribution. We consider each in turn. 1. The role of intuitions in the epistemology of philosophy If, as is generally assumed, intuitions play some role in justifying certain beliefs, it is correct for us theorists to inquire into how and why this is so. 1.1. What are intuitions? Invocation of 'intuition' in philosophical discussion generally can be rather diverse. Some theorists intend the word to apply to beliefs-perhaps of a certain kind, or perhaps even unrestrictedly. Kirk Ludwig considers a factive sense of 'intuition' amounting to judgments with a particular rational etiology1; George Bealer considers intuition to comprise a sui generis propositional attitude with a 1 Ludwig (2007). http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 2 ichikawa distinctive phenomenology.2 Sosa's own approach to intuitions falls somewhere between these latter approaches. Like Bealer, Sosa considers intuitions to be a certain kind of felt attraction toward judgment; unlike Bealer, he relents from strong claims about a distinctive phenomenology, or intuition's sui generis status. Like Ludwig, Sosa considers the etiology of a particular mental state to be central in establishing it as an intuition-Sosa's 'intuitions' are attractions that derive only from the entertaining of their particular contents. But where Ludwig requires that intuitions derive from conceptual competence, Sosa allows for intuitions that reflect rational errors or biases, so long as they stem from the entertaining of the intuited content. I take it that questions such as these admit of a significant degree of stipulation. I see little point in appealing to pretheoretic intuitions about 'intuition' to settle the question of how we ought to use the term, and I suspect that Sosa will share my attitude here. Let us therefore accept Sosa's terminology, and allow that intuitions are certain kinds of attractions to judge, where [w]hat is distinctive of intuitive justification is ... its being the entertaining itself of that specific content that exerts the attraction. So, intuitions are attractions of a certain sort, with no rational basis beyond the conscious grasp of its specific propositional content.3 (We may pause to note that Sosa's use of 'intuition' has not always fit this account; Sosa (1998), for instance, articulates a notion of intuition that relates it closely to counterfactual belief. However, his recent work does seem to have converged on the approach described above, and so it will be our focus in what follows.) So we now have a (stipulative) account of what intuitions are. What epistemological role can they play? 1.2. Perceptual models Here is one natural idea: intuitions should be understood by analogy to perceptual experiences. Just as my sensory experiences play a role in determining what contents I am justified in coming perceptually to believe, so do my intuitive experiences play a role in determining what contents I am justified intellectually to believe. As Sosa characterizes this approach, intuitive seemings play a mediating role between beliefs in a priori propositions, and those contents themselves.4 Sosa offers three arguments against the perceptual model of intuition. First, intuitions, unlike perceptual experiences, are epistemically evaluable. Sosa points out that "[a] reason can be assigned the wrong weight, as it attracts one's assent too much, or too little."5 Sosa discusses cases of pernicious bias and 2 Bealer (1992), (1998). 3 Sosa (2007a) p. 54, emphasis in original. 4 Ibid. p. 47. 5 Ibid. p. 49. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 3 ichikawa enculturation, whereby the consideration of a certain propositional content attracts one's assent to an inappropriate degree; from wherever it may derive- cultural bias or elsewhere-I think the phenomenon is familiar enough; a standard form of philosophical debate disputes the proper weighting of various particular intuitions. The second reason Sosa suggests that intuitions are not able to stand as analogues of perceptual experience is that visual experiences play a role in perceptual justification that enjoys no correlate in the case of intuitive judgment. Sosa writes: What intuitive justification lacks is any correlate of the visual sensory experience beyond one's conscious entertaining of the propositional content, something that distinctively exerts a thereby justified attraction to assent. No such state of awareness, beyond the conscious entertaining itself, can be found in intuitive attraction.6 Intuitive belief, Sosa says, like introspective belief, but unlike perceptual belief, involves no such intermediate stage. The third reason Sosa cites to distinguish the role of perceptual experience from that of intuition is that the former is, in typical cases, causally and counterfactually connected to both the resultant belief and its content itself. The sun causes in me the visual experience as if it is sunny; this in turn causes my belief to the same effect. By contrast, "many truths known intuitively lie outside the causal order, unable to cause experience--‐like intuitions, even if there were such intuitions. Nor can such truths be tracked, not if tracking requires sensitivity. What are we to make of the claim that if it were not so that 1+1=2, one would not believe it to be so? Hard to say, but that is what tracking it with "sensitivity" would require."7 Let us consider these apparent differences. Sosa makes much of the fact that intuitions are epistemically evaluable. There are good and bad dispositions to assent. Some intuitions, for example, derive from unreliable sources, like wishful thinking or unreliable enculturation; such are negatively rationally evaluable, and any belief based on such an intuition is thereby deficient. On this point, there can be little doubt that Sosa is correct. Plausibly, there is yet another way in which intuitions are rationally evaluable, beyond the question of how much the intuition that p ought to attract assent that p. Perhaps there is also room to evaluate the intuition itself. We will see below that Sosa is committed to such evaluability. Well--‐functioning, virtuous epistemic agents are attracted to a certain class of truths; such attractions are a credit to 6 Ibid. p. 55. 7 Sosa (2007b), p. 51. For subjects to 'track' a proposition in the relevant sense is approximately for their beliefs to be counterfactually sensitive to the truth of that proposition; if a subject's belief tracks the fact that p, then, were p not the case, the subject would not believe that p. See e.g. Nozick (1981), p. 185. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 4 ichikawa their subjects. Almost everyone finds it intuitive that 4 > 3; if someone had an intuitive repulsion from this truth, instead of the usual attraction, this would reflect badly on him as an epistemic agent, at least with respect to arithmetic. The point is not limited to such simple contents; if someone has studied logic and finds DeMorgan's Laws intuitive, then she is, epistemically speaking, with respect to logic, better off than her peers who have no particular attraction to assent, and better off still than those who find the equivalence counterintuitive. The phenomenon in question is a general one, extending well beyond philosophical questions. Expert poker players make much more reliable intuitive poker judgments than do novices; this even though, in some cases, they are unable, without confabulation, to articulate the considerations that led them to their judgments. Professional outfielders make excellent immediate judgments as to which direction to run in order to catch the ball, but few could tell you how they know. (McBeath et al (1995) argues that the best available data indicates that fielders, while running, seek to maintain a linear optical trajectory with monotonic increases in optical ball height.) We are all, in our small ways, Ramanujans. But does this represent a disanaology with perceptual experience? One might think that, just as there is room to evaluate the degree to which one is attracted by intuition to assent to a given proposition, so is there room to evaluate the degree to which one is attracted by perceptual experience to a given proposition. Indeed, on one natural reading, the central epistemic tradition of engagement with skepticism is a dialectic with regards to this question: to what degree ought my perceptual experience attract me to assent to the proposition that I have hands? However, this line of thought neglects Sosa's particular ontological approach to intuitions. Intuitions, for Sosa, are not experiences that lead us to develop attractions to assent; they are the attractions themselves. Experiences, by contrast, are, in Sosa's framework, passive and non--‐rational. (Sosa here commits to a certain approach to nonconceptual content: they are non--‐rational precisely because they do not involve concept application.) This is why Sosa argues that experience is not rationally evaluable in the way that intuition is. Since the argument here relies on his particular identification of intuitions with attractions to assent, it is worth noting that it leaves open the question of whether there is such a thing as 'intuitive experience' that plays a role parallel to perceptual experience in the epistemology of the a priori. Sosa clearly thinks there is no such experience-and perhaps he is right to think not-but the argument here only establishes that intuitions, as he understands them, are not such experiences. This last point relates rather directly to Sosa's second disanalogy between intuition and perceptual experience, the apparent lack of an intermediate state standing between fact and judgment. It is not clear to me how to go about evaluating whether it is correct. Sosa thinks that in the case of perception we do have an intermediating state playing such a role, but that in the cases of http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 5 ichikawa introspection and intuition, we do not. In the introspective case, Sosa suggests that it is the introspected fact itself that directly justifies the introspective judgment. We will see below that he prefers a different story about intuition, but he agrees that it is no intermediate mental experience between fact and belief. I do not see in Sosa any straightforward argument to this effect; it is just a claim made at various points as if he considers it obvious. But introspective access to claims such as these is a tricky business. It is worth noting, for instance, that some philosophers have denied that the state of sensory experience plays such a mediating role in the case of perception; I don't know how to tell, short of constructing and selecting between the relevant theories, whether this is so. Likewise, I see no obvious reason to reject the suggestion that introspective judgments, as of headaches, proceed on the basis of an intermediary experience, one giving rise to the seeming as if there is a headache. So as far as this point goes, I don't see that Sosa has established, so much as claimed, that intuition is unlike perception with respect to the role of an intermediary state. Sosa's third argument, though, does seem to have more traction against the perceptual model of intuition: the causal connection between fact and perceptual experience is obviously not applicable in the case of intuition. This does seem a plausible candidate for an essential feature of a perceptual model. We may add one more reason not to prefer a perceptual model of intuition: it fails to respect the sense in which the constraints of rationality are objective. According to the perceptual model of intuition, intuitions play a justifying role analogous to that enjoyed by sensory experience. But there is an intuitive disanalogy concerning the rationality of intuitive and perceptual judgments: in the latter case, but not in the former, the rationality of the judgments in question seems contingent on having the particular experiences that allegedly underwrite it. I would suffer no rational pressure to form a perceptual belief, absent the sensory experience in question; someone who is blind, or in a totally dark room, faces no reason to believe that the walls are red. By contrast, someone who, upon considering the proposition that 2 + 2 = 4, does not undergo any intuitive experience to the effect that it is true, thereby demonstrates a rational deficiency-a deviation from ideal rationality. She, unlike her blind counterpart, does suffer rational pressure to believe that content, even if her intuitions are not helping her to appreciate it. 1.3. Factive models As Sosa sees it, the failure of the perceptual model of intuition prima facie motivates a Cartesian, factive model of intuitions that emphasizes a similarity between intuition and introspection. Sosa writes: In explaining what it is to perceive clearly and distinctly, Descartes does not turn simply to logic, or arithmetic, or geometry. In his most prominent explanation of the notion, he appeals rather to introspection. Even if our awareness that we suffer a pain has some clarity in it, we fall short of clear and distinct perception until we separate the hypothesis as to the origin of our feeling of pain from the perception that we have that feeling. It is the perception of the feeling, so detached, that attains both clarity and http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 6 ichikawa distinctness. So, Descartes' model of a kind of intuitive justification and knowledge is introspection, not perception. ... According to this model, a propositional content about a present state of consciousness can attract assent through its sheer truth (though presumably it needs to be simple enough as well). Analogously, what properly draws your assent to propositional contents about simple arithmetic, geometry, and logic, is again their truth. And the corresponding belief may then be said, by extension, to be intuitively and even foundationally justified. One is justified intuitively by grasping a fact directly.8 As indicated in the previous section, I do not consider it obvious that introspection works the way here supposed. Given the possibility of errors in introspective judgment, I see no obvious objection to the suggestion that introspection of a headache involves sensitivity to an intermediate quasi--‐ perceptual state that is, in typical instances, caused by the headache itself. It is also not obvious to me that there is such an intermediate state, so I do not intend here exactly to be objecting to Sosa (or Descartes, according to Sosa's reading); I mean only to highlight the assumption as a substantive one, both to clarify the suggestion, and to point to an opportunity for a dissenter to object. For now, let us follow Sosa in supposing that introspection is direct; our introspective beliefs proceed by direct appreciation of internal facts. Can the same be said about intuition? One immediate worry carries over rather directly from the worries for the perceptual model: since logical, arithmetical, and philosophical facts do not in general enter into causal relations with human beings, their truth cannot in any literal sense 'draw your assent,' since drawing is a causal notion. Perhaps the occurrent consideration of such truths draws assent, but this still seems a significant disanalogy with introspection, just as it is with perception. (In the latter cases, we don't think that consideration of introspected or perceived facts causes attraction to assent; we think the facts themselves do.) Headaches cause judgments of headaches; modal facts don't cause anything. Sosa does not, so far as I can tell, consider this particular worry for the introspective model of intuition.9 Dialectically, from his point of view, this omission is perhaps permissible, as he tends to develop a different objection to the introspective model-namely, that the truth of the intuited judgments cannot directly draw assent, because there are false intuitions that justify in just the same way as true ones do. Sosa's favorite examples here concern paradoxes: cases in which each of several propositions is intuitively justified, but where philosophical investigation demonstrates that they cannot possibly all be right. Consider for example, a formulation of a sorites paradox: 8 Sosa (2007a) pp. 56--‐57. 9 The central places in which Sosa considers views of this sort are his (2007a) pp. 56--‐60 and (2007b). http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 7 ichikawa 1. A man with no hairs on his head is bald. 2. For all n, if a man with exactly n hairs on his head is bald, then a man with exactly n+1 hairs on his head is bald. 3. A man with that much hair on his head [here indicating Ernest Sosa] is not bald.10 According to the standard treatment of the paradox, each premise is intuitively plausible, but philosophical investigation-in this case, a bit of relatively trivial reasoning-reveals that at least one must be false. But prior to this investigation, the naïve theorist is, Sosa suggests, justified in each premise, and justified intuitively. Since we know that at least one premise is false, it cannot be that in general, the truth of an intuitive claim accounts for its justificatory status. We will consider an objection to this line of reasoning in §1.5 below. For now, we turn to the positive view Sosa takes this failure to motivate. 1.4. Competence models Sosa's own favored view of the role of intuition in the epistemology of the a priori is a particular application of virtue epistemology. (It is not, as we shall see, the only way to apply virtue epistemology to the epistemology of the a priori.) In general, a virtue--‐theoretic approach to epistemology associates epistemic justification with virtuous epistemic performance. Agents may have better or worse epistemic dispositions. An epistemically good disposition is an epistemic virtue; an epistemically bad disposition is an epistemic vice. Sosa's brand of virtue epistemology ties virtue closely to reliability: an epistemic virtue (as he often puts it: a competence) is a disposition to form judgments in a way that reliably yields true belief and avoids false belief. Dispositions do not always manifest; one can be generally disposed to judge well, and yet judge poorly in an instance-such would be a generally virtuous agent acting viciously in the moment. Of course, even the exercise of virtue does not guarantee truth; one may judge reliably and yet go wrong through no fault of one's own. Such is the plight of subjects with beliefs that are justified but false. One may even judge virtuously and come to believe a truth, where so correctly believing nevertheless fails to manifest virtue-the belief was only luckily true. Such, Sosa thinks, is the proper diagnosis of Gettier cases. Sosa has often made use of an analogy to an archer;11 we may find it useful as well. An archer may be more or less skilled-her skill may be understood as approximately a propensity to hit the target (and avoid missing it). Being a good archer in general is analogous to being epistemically virtuous in general. A good archer will tend to release adroit shots-these are shots that manifest the archer's skill; they are well--‐aimed, etc. An adroit shot corresponds to a justified 10 We may interpret (3) as a de re judgment about the amount of hair that Ernest Sosa has; thus do we make plausible that the justification here is intuitive. The judgment that Ernest Sosa is not bald is plausibly a perceptual one. 11 E.g. Sosa (2007a) pp. 22--‐23. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 8 ichikawa belief. A successful shot hits the target-as a successful belief 'hits' the truth. An adroit shot is more likely than a bad one to be successful, but sometimes adroit shots miss (as when a gust of wind intervenes) and sometimes bad shots hit (when they are lucky). Likewise, an adroit shot may succeed only luckily, as when a gust of wind sends it off course, and another lucky one directs it again to the target; such are the Gettier cases of marksmanship. So stated, the generalized version of Sosa's virtue epistemology relates justification and knowledge to judgment, and its connection to virtuous-viz., reliable-dispositions to judge. How do intuitions fit into the picture? Sosa treats them very much like judgments: as justified or unjustified, depending on whether they are the result of an epistemic competence. ...[T]he intuitions immediately delivered by our rational competences are preponderantly true, even if occasionally false. This is why those rational mechanisms are intellectual competences, because they systematically lead us aright. All seemings delivered by such competences are thereby epistemically justified.12 So intuitions, like judgments generally, can be good or bad; like judgments generally, they are good when they are produced by competences-i.e., when they are produced by reliable mechanisms-and bad otherwise. Thus, according to Sosa, can mistaken intuitions justify, as in the cases of paradoxes. Although they are false intuitions, having gone wrong in the cases in question, they are nevertheless produced by competences, which typically produce true intuitions. Of course, as epistemologists, we are not only, or even primarily, interested in the circumstances under which intuitions are justified. Indeed, we rarely use the language of justification and unjustification for intuitions at all. Instead, or at least in addition, we want to know about the justification conditions for intuitive belief. What is the relationship between justified intuition and justified belief? Prima facie, it is not obvious that there should be any straightforward relationship here. Intuitions are attractions to believe; it does not follow that intuitive beliefs are only virtuous when based on intuitions that are themselves virtuous. Compare the various attractions one might have to shoot arrows- thinking it'd be fun, having energy to spare, hoping for some game to eat, trying to impress a lover-none of these have any straightforward bearing on whether the resultant shot is an adroit one. One can shoot well, even having been attracted by a bad reason. Sosa, however, sees a tighter connection here, writing, for instance, that if an intuition is epistemically faulty (i.e., not produced by a competence-produced, perhaps, by vicious enculturation), then "it could hardly provide epistemic justification to any belief founded upon it. Only competently derived intuitive seemings could do so."13 What could justify such a stance? Sosa's remark here would be vindicated if it turned out that only a belief founded upon a virtuous 12 Sosa (2007a) p. 60. 13 Sosa (2007a) p. 62. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 9 ichikawa intuition could itself be virtuous. Whether this is so turns upon questions about how to individuate belief--‐forming dispositions. The question is a version of the generality problem for process reliabilism.14 Suppose someone has the intuition that p, and on this basis, forms the belief that p. Is her resultant belief justified? In particular, we wonder whether the justification of her belief rests in important part on the justification of the relevant intuition. Suppose we considered her to be employing a disposition to believe everything she finds intuitive, and to suspend judgment on everything she finds neither intuitive, nor counterintuitive, if no other evidence presents itself. By stipulation, she believes without regard to the virtue of the intuition; nevertheless, plausibly, her preponderance of true intuitions to false ones will be high, and so her belief--‐forming dispositions will be at least reasonably virtuous. If this is how we think of her competence, then there is no requirement that intuitions be themselves well--‐founded in order to justify. Of course, someone with the dispositions just described will be far from ideally virtuous; a more reliable tendency would involve the exercise of due diligence to ensure that beliefs be made on the basis of only those intuitions that are well--‐ founded. While we should not expect people in general to be able to distinguish all of their good intuitions from all of their bad ones, it is very plausible that steps can be made to improve reliability here: we can trust our intuitions to a greater extent when in more favorable circumstances for thinking clearly, and we can be particularly cautious with the sorts of intuitions that could easily be the product of irresponsible bias. So perhaps Sosa's thought here is that to be reliable enough to constitute virtuous performance, subjects must exhibit sensitivity to the virtue of the intuitions in question. This is plausible enough, but it still does not yield the strong connection between good intuition and good belief suggested. Perhaps good belief demands that one exhibit some selectivity about one's intuitions; this is not to say that the selection in question must be infallible. Suppose an intuition is unjustified-it is formed via an unreliable process, rather than by a competence-but in a way that defies detection as such by the usual sorts of introspective processes by which a subject recognizes many untrustworthy intuitions. In such a case, a subject might exhibit belief--‐forming competence by treating the intuition critically, then going on virtuously to base judgment on what is in fact an unvirtuous intuition. It is not clear what, on Sosa's view, could prevent a subject from coming to justified belief in this way. So we see a tension between elements of Sosa's approach to intuitions. He wants, on the one hand, to render intuitions epistemically evaluable, in a way closely analogous to beliefs, and to judge them as justified or not via his virtue--‐theoretic framework; on the other hand, he is careful to emphasize that intuitions are not themselves judgments but merely attractions to judge. By thus separating intuition and judgment, it becomes possible, on the virtue framework, to evaluate them independently, even in the case when a judgment rests on an 14 For an overview, see Conee & Feldman (1998). http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 10 ichikawa intuition. As a result, there is no obvious way to derive another result Sosa claims: that intuitive belief is justified only if it is based on a justified intuition. 1.5. Mistaken intuitions justifying Although Sosa wants to rule out the possibility of unjustified intuitions justifying belief, he does allow for false intuitions to justify belief. So he commits to the possibility of false justified intuitions-again, false premises in paradoxes provide the paradigms. As he observes, however, there could be reason to doubt that false intuitions could justify in this way. Here is a line of thought that Sosa attributes to Descartes: Suppose that, apart from having drawn it as a deductive conclusion, someone has no reason whatsoever for believing a certain proposition, one that can be known not directly but only through reasoning. If the reasoning is grossly fallacious, it cannot really justify the subject in believing that conclusion. When we work our way back through the reasoning we eventually hit the fallacy; let it be an affirming of the consequent. At that point it must have seemed intuitive to the reasoner to think something of the following form: that, necessarily, if q, and p  q, then p. In making that immediate inference, the thinker makes manifest his intuitive attraction to its corresponding conditional. But he cannot really be justified in being thus attracted to that conditional, nor in any corresponding belief. Whatever sort of epistemic justification he lacks for assenting to the conclusion is one he must also lack for attraction and assent to that unfortunate conditional. This reveals an advantage of the Cartesian [factive] account of intuition: that it explains our verdict about the fallacious intuition. Descartes suggests that the intuition at work in the fallacy is apparent intuition (merely apparent intuition), whereas only real intuition justifies. For him, all real intuition must be true, so the corresponding conditional of affirming the consequent cannot really be intuited. What is not a fact, on his view, is just not there to be intuited.15 As we have seen, Sosa is committed to resisting this line of reasoning, since it is his view that at least sometimes, as in the case of paradoxes, subjects have justified intuitive beliefs that are false. And since Sosa says that only virtuous intuitions can justify, he thereby commits to false virtuous intuitions with these contents as well. What, then, distinguishes justified false intuitions, as in the cases of paradoxes, from unjustified ones, as in the case of an intuition that would license affirming the consequent? It cannot be merely that the latter constitutes fallacious reasoning, for false premises in paradox would license fallacious reasoning just as much as the affirming--‐the--‐consequent intuition would. (For example, supposing the iterative principle to be the false premise in the sorites paradoxes, it seems to license fallacious reasoning from the baldness of Stephen Stich to the baldness of Ernest Sosa.) 15 Sosa (2007a) p. 58. See Sosa (2007b) pp. 53--‐54, for effectively the same point, developed a bit more thoroughly. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 11 ichikawa Sosa's answer is that the key difference turns on whether the false intuition derives from "some avoidably defective way"; such errors constitute "faults, individual flaws, or defects."16 Sosa thinks this is what is going on when somebody follows her strong inclination to affirm the consequent, inferring from q and (if p, q) to p. By contrast, "the false intuitions involved in deep paradoxes are not so clearly faults, individual flaws, or defects. For example, it may be that they derive from our basic make--‐up, shared among humans generally, a make--‐up that serves us well in an environment such as ours on the surface of our planet." So Sosa's line is that false intuitions do not justify when they derive from faults, flaws, and defects, but do justify when they derive from our basic make--‐up and are generally shared among humans. But does the distinction hold up to scrutiny? In a sense, of course, one illustrates a flaw or defect by virtue of falling short of the highest ideals of rationality; this, of course, cannot be what Sosa here has in mind. Instead, he seems to be imagining flaws as deviations from some sort of imperfect but generally effective strategy for getting around in the world. This is, perhaps, the more ordinary sense of a defect. My computer, even when it is working properly, will occasionally crash; a tendency to crash constitutes a defect only when it is not working properly. And maybe there is a good reason why humans ought to have tendencies to accept, for instance, naive set theory, or threshold principles for vague predicates. But does this distinguish paradoxical premises, which Sosa thinks will involve justified intuitions, from the kinds of fallacious moves he is concerned to rule out? The problem for this line is that there is also plausibly sound reason for humans to have tendencies to commit such errors as affirming the consequent. Given the environments we face, having a tendency to affirm the consequent will help us to recognize patterns and confirm hypotheses; inductive reasoning generally looks a bit like affirming the consequent. This sort of pattern is less exception than rule. A great many well--‐documented human rational errors derive from the application of generally reliable heuristics; such heuristics are, in typical cases, deeply engrained in human psychology, and present in humans generally-even experts who ought obviously to know better.17 So we face a dilemma for upholding Sosa's distinction. Do we say that these errors-these false judgments arising from generally good heuristics- constitute defects or not? If not, then they are relevantly like Sosa thinks the intuitive premises involved in deep paradoxes are. If so, what makes them so, and why should they not apply also to the cases of the paradoxes? The ordinary reasoner-your average philosopher, say-looks down on the fallacious reasoner Sosa describes, and identifies his intuition as the vicious result of carelessness. But imagine the perspective of an extraordinary 16 Sosa (2007b), p. 54. 17 For a useful overview, see Tversky & Kahneman (1974), especially pp. 1124 (for the connection to generally reliable heuristics) and 1130 (for the prevalence of these rational errors even among experts). http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 12 ichikawa reasoner-an über--‐rational being who rates much higher on the scales of rationality. Her attitude toward the ordinary reasoner is much the same as his attitude toward the fallacious reasoner. She describes both as defective-as failing to live up to the standards of rationality. Although she can see that the ordinary reasoner is not tempted by one particular error-affirming the consequent-she points to another error that he regularly makes-some complicated fallacy that we ordinary reasoners do not recognize as such-and that he also has some attraction to more fallacies-the necessarily false premises of paradoxes. From this perspective, it appears difficult to justify Sosa's attitude that the error of the ordinary reasoner is importantly different from that of the fallacious reasoner; the ordinary reasoner is fallacious himself in his own way. The fallacious reasoner demonstrates epistemic defects. This, even though there is typically a psychological story to be told about the genesis of the defective judgments in which they arise from generally reliable dispositions. According to Sosa, the ordinary errors-like accepting the premises of paradoxes-are fundamentally different. They do not reflect defects, but instead demonstrate mere tendencies to affirm falsehoods that derive from general human nature. Our über--‐rational superior, however, thinks of the ordinary reasoner as defective in just the same way as the fallacious reasoner, but to a lesser degree. I do not see what resources Sosa has to reject her opinion on the matter. 1.6. Virtue without intuition? Let us take stock. Sosa has attempted to apply his attractive general virtue theoretic epistemology to the case of intuitive justification. But we have seen two respects into which Sosa's treatment of intuitions fits awkwardly into this general picture. First, although it is plausible enough to evaluate intuitions as justified or unjustified, by extension of the virtue--‐theoretic treatment of belief, it is not at all clear why it should turn out, as Sosa wants, that there is an intimate connection between justified intuition and justified belief. Second, considerations involving fallacious reasoning were taken prima facie to motivate a requirement that only true intuitions can justify; Sosa's attempt to diffuse this motivation was, I suggested, unconvincing. False rational intuitions always constitute a rational failure. I rather suspect that the error here lies more with in treatment of intuitions than with the virtue epistemology. Here, briefly, is a competing approach to the epistemology of the a priori, motivated by a kindred general approach to epistemology, that may bring these features of Sosa's view into clearer relief. It is not, of course, anything like the only competing view available, but it is one that may provide an instructive foil. If the problem is that intuitions fit oddly into the epistemology of intuitive judgment, we can consider telling a story of the latter that does not afford a central role to intuitions themselves. We may admit that there are such things as intuitions-attractions to assent of a certain sort-while denying that they play any fundamental role in justifying assent. Our story of justified assent can be the straightforward virtue--‐theoretic one: a judgment is justified just in case it is the http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 13 ichikawa product of an epistemic competence-this, whether or not it is in any sense grounded in an intuition, or, if it is, whether or not that intuition itself is justified. The reason it's useful to have justified intuitions is that justified intuitions tend to attract assent in the direction of truth. What intuitions a subject has will causally affect her dispositions to judge. So they have a psychological role to play in the establishing of competence, and hence virtuous performance. But the epistemological action is at the level of competence generally; the role of intuitions is exhausted in helping to fix the competences. On such an approach, we will not have any general constraint on what kinds of intuitions can enter into justified beliefs; a belief is justified if it is the product of a disposition that is a competence-whether or not an unjustified intuition played some role in influencing that disposition. And since on this approach intuitions do not themselves justify, but only play a causal role in establishing the dispositions that underwrite justification, we need not say as Sosa does that some false intuitions justify and are justified, while others do not; we say only that intuitions are part of the psychological story underwriting justification. And we can maintain the Cartesian idea that in the realm of the a priori, false intuitions are always in some sense defective: they always in some sense pull us away from the truth. But of course, we may and should overcome them and believe virtuously anyway. It is even possible that a subject could judge virtuously in a way intimately and essentially involving a vicious intuition; suppose one is so calibrated as to reliably intuit wrongly in a certain kind of domain. One knows of oneself that he has a strong tendency to be pulled away from the truth with respect to a certain kind of question. Such a subject could in some circumstances judge that p precisely because of his intuition that not--‐p; the judgment might be virtuous, and the intuitive vicious. (This is, of course, a very unusual sort of case.) I tentatively suggest, then, that the epistemic role of intuitions may be exaggerated. One can have a virtue--‐theoretic approach to the epistemology of intuitive judgment that is broadly in Sosa's spirit without affording a central role to intuitions themselves. I have suggested a few respects in which this may be preferable. 2. Challenges to intuition We turn now from Sosa's positive articulation of the epistemic role that intuitions may play, to his defensive response to recent attacks on the use of intuition in philosophy. These attacks are, for the most part, somewhat general. That is to say, although Sosa's particular positive account of the role of intuitions in philosophy is among those potentially impugned by these critiques, they are not distinctive to it. Even philosophers who do not accept Sosa's approach to intuitions ought to reckon with at least some of these critiques. And Sosa's defenses of intuition do not, on the whole, depend substantially on the specifics of his own positive view. So the material of this section should be of interest to anyone interested in methodological questions about philosophy, whether or not she accepts Sosa's views articulated in the previous section. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 14 ichikawa 2.1. Calibration One critique of the use of intuitions in philosophy concerns our ability to discern whether intuitions are reliable; the canonical presentation of this worry is Cummins (1998). Cummins is concerned with the apparent fact that we lack independent means of verifying the reliability of our intuitions; since, Cummins says, within realms such as logic, mathematics, and the a priori parts of philosophy, our only access to the domains in question comes via intuition, if our intuitions were systematically misleading, then we would have no way to correct the error. We lack independent grounds on which we can calibrate intuitions. In response, Sosa points out that the case against intuition here appears to be no stronger than an analogous case for radical skepticism. The calibration objection, if effective against intuitions will prove a skeptical quicksand that engulfs all knowledge, not just the intuitive. No source will then survive, since none can be calibrated without eventual self--‐dependence. That is so at least for sources broadly enough conceived: as, say, memory, introspection, and perception. None of these can be defended epistemically as reliable unless allowed to yield some of the data to be used in its own defense.18 And if, Sosa goes on to point out, one attempts to defend perception by, say, corroborating sight with sound, or one person's perception with another's, it is entirely plausible that the same defense may well apply to the case of intuition. In general, the assimilation of skeptical worries about intuition into general skeptical worries to which all nonskeptics are committed to denying is a powerful and effective move characteristic of Sosa's work on intuition. For an application of the strategy to another set of worries, see Sosa (1998) pp. 266--‐68. 2.2. Experimentalist critiques More recently, experimental philosophers have mounted an empirically based challenge to the use of intuitions in philosophy. For example, Weinberg, Nichols, and Stich (2001) surveyed Rutgers undergraduate students about various epistemological thought experiments, and found not only that some students did not agree with the standard intuitions epistemologists typically rely upon, but also that in some cases, ethnic background correlated with epistemic judgment. For example, students with an East Asian ethnic background tended to be more likely than Western--‐descended students to describe subjects in Gettier cases as 'really knowing' the contents in question. According to experimentalist critics, experiments like this one-and others that followed it-cast significant doubt on the propriety of the use of intuitions in philosophy. Ernest Sosa has engaged extensively with these experimentalist critiques. One of his significant contributions involves the interpretation of survey data involving thought experiments; we needn't assume, Sosa suggests, that they reflect genuine disagreement. Another, which comes out in some of his 18 Sosa (2007a) pp. 63--‐64. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 15 ichikawa exchanges with Stephen Stich, concerns the normative significance of philosophical analysis. Let us consider these in turn. 2.3. Do Survey Results Reflect Disagreement? Epistemologists typically think that subjects in Gettier cases lack knowledge. Weinberg et. al. take themselves to have demonstrated that a surprising number of people-a majority of American undergraduates of East Asian descent- disagree. But is it clear that there is genuine disagreement here? Only on the assumption that, when the survey subjects say 'the subject knows,' the word 'knows' in this sentence refers to the same relation epistemologists are interested in. Sosa writes: And the disagreement may now perhaps be explained in a way that casts no doubt on intuition as a source of epistemic justification or even knowledge. Why not explain the disagreement as merely verbal? Why not say that across the divide we find somewhat different concepts picked out by terminology that is either ambiguous or at least contextually divergent? On the EA [East Asian] side, the more valuable status that a belief might attain is one that necessarily involves communitarian factors of one or another sort, factors that are absent or minimized in the status picked out by Ws [Westerners] as necessary for "knowledge." If there is such divergence in meaning as we cross the relevant divides, then once again we fail to have disagreement on the very same propositions. In saying that the subject does not know, the EAs are saying something about lack of some relevant communitarian status. In saying that the subject does know, the Ws are not denying that; they are simply focusing on a different status, one that they regard as desirable even if it does not meet the high communitarian requirements important to the EAs. So again we avoid any real disagreement on the very same propositions. The proposition affirmed by the EAs as intuitively true is not the very same as the proposition denied by the Ws as intuitively false.19 Sosa's suggestion here is this: maybe there's no real disagreement here; some group of subjects say that such and such 'is a case of knowledge,' while philosophers and other subjects say that such and such is not a case of knowledge, and there's no genuine disagreement, because the former subjects don't mean knowledge by 'knowledge'. The suggestion does of course correspond to a genuine possibility; there is nothing incoherent about the idea that a superficially similar language could in fact be divided into two distinct, subtly different languages-perhaps we'd rather say idiolects-where some words take slightly different meanings. British English and American English plausibly stand in this sort of relationship, and competent speakers may sometimes fall into accidental verbal disagreement in discussions about eating 'biscuits' or 'grilling' vegetables. 19 Sosa (2009) p. 108. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 16 ichikawa I doubt, however, that the possibility Sosa raises will ultimately prove a very plausible one in this instance. As Sosa notes, verbal confusions of the kind at issue here comprise cases where disquotation fails: a. S says "There is a bank nearby." b. S says that there is a bank nearby. To move from a to b is to disquote. The move is enthymematic, and requires some such assumption as this: In saying "There is a bank nearby" S means that there is a bank nearby. In asserting b, I must mean something specific: for example, I cannot mean both financial institution and river bank.20 So disquotation is legitimate only when the terms are used univocally. Consequently, Sosa's suggestion about the subjects of East Asian descent who wanted to say "the subject knows"-that they in fact are expressing no disagreement with traditional epistemologists' commitment to the truth of our sentence "the subject does not know"-entails that this is a case where disquotation fails. In other words, it is inconsistent with Sosa's strategy that it is correct to report the survey reports by saying that a majority of subjects of East Asian descent thought that the Gettier cases were cases of knowledge. This is, however, (I submit) a fairly radical suggestion. It is extremely natural to describe the experiment as one in which subjects expressed judgments about whether fictional characters had knowledge. Absent any particular reason to think otherwise, pointing out the possibility that they might not does not have much dialectical force. The point is, of course, closely analogous to the one Tyler Burge makes in his classic (1979): Oscar believes he has arthritis, and he expresses the belief with the sentence "I have arthritis," so his word "arthritis" means the same thing as his doctor's (viz., arthritis). Furthermore, supposing that the reason the survey reports did not express beliefs about knowledge is that quite generally, these subjects mean something other than what we mean by the word "knows," it would follow quite generally that disquotation fails with respect to these subjects' "knowledge" sentences. Suppose I overhear one of my students asking a classmate, "do you know what time it is?" If Sosa's suggestion is correct, and my student is of East Asian ethnic descent, then it would be incorrect for me to describe my student as having asked if her classmate knew what time it was. This is somewhat incredible. My objection to Sosa's suggestion is not the main one that has been advanced by experimental philosophers, although it does enjoy certain affinities with it. As I do, they challenge Sosa with having done little more than showing a way for it to be possible that intuitions are not challenged by the experimental data; he does not go at all far toward showing that they are not in fact challenged.21 A central 20 Sosa (2010a), p. 419. 21 E.g. Stich (2009) p. 233. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 17 ichikawa characteristic of the debate at this stage seems to involve argumentative attempts to shift the burden of proof between the defender and the skeptic about intuition; I do not have much of substantive evaluation to offer at this juncture, so I merely point to the debate and move on. One difference between my worry for Sosa's line here and the sort often presented by experimentalists-as, for instance, by Stich (2009)-is that my challenge is framed at a relatively intuitive level. Certain disquotational moves are intuitively permissible, but cannot be permissible if there is the kind of meaning divergence Sosa suggests; so positing such divergence has a high intuitive cost. The extant debates about Sosa's suggestion often end up involving questions about concept individuation. This is in my view at best a distraction. The question is ultimately one about meaning and reference: what does the word 'knowledge' refer to in a given subject's mouth? Perhaps one can involve concepts if one likes: word meanings are concepts; the concepts are different; so the word is ambiguous. But what, if anything, does this 'conceptual ascent' contribute? Steve Stich's response to Sosa emphasizes concepts in a way that looks to me largely irrelevant: There is a vast literature on concepts in philosophy and in psychology..., and the question of how to individuate concepts is one of the most hotly debated issues in that literature. While it is widely agreed that for two concept tokens to be of the same type they must have the same content, there is a wide diversity of views on what is required for this condition to be met. On some theories, the sort of covert ambiguity that Sosa is betting on can be expected to be fairly common, while on others covert ambiguity is much harder to generate. For Fodor, for example, the fact that an East Asian pays more attention to communitarian factors while a Westerner emphasizes individualistic factors in applying the term 'knowledge' would be no reason at all to think that the concepts linked to their use of the term 'knowledge' have different contents. To this Sosa replies, reasonably enough, that articulating and defending a theory of concept individuation is a lot to ask of a theorist looking to diagnose a verbal dispute.22 It is entirely possible, in many cases, to recognize verbal disputes at the intuitive level. I agree about the methodological claim, even if, as indicated above, I disagree about its verdict in particular instances. Sosa cites, in favor of his suggestion, the famous example of William James: That example is interesting when juxtaposed with one due to William James, worth quoting in full. ... SOME YEARS AGO, being with a camping party in the mountains, I returned from a solitary ramble to find every one engaged in a ferocious metaphysical dispute. The corpus of the dispute was a squirrel – a live squirrel supposed to be clinging to one side of a tree--‐trunk; while over 22 Sosa (2010a). http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 18 ichikawa against the tree's opposite side a human being was imagined to stand. This human witness tries to get sight of the squirrel by moving rapidly round the tree, but no matter how fast he goes, the squirrel moves as fast in the opposite direction, and always keeps the tree between himself and the man, so that never a glimpse of him is caught. The resultant metaphysical problem now is this: Does the man go round the squirrel or not? He goes round the tree, sure enough, and the squirrel is on the tree; but does he go round the squirrel? In the unlimited leisure of the wilderness, discussion had been worn threadbare. Every one had taken sides, and was obstinate; and the numbers on both sides were even. Each side, when I appeared therefore appealed to me to make it a majority. Mindful of the scholastic adage that whenever you meet a contradiction you must make a distinction, I immediately sought and found one, as follows: "Which party is right," I said, "depends on what you practically mean by 'going round' the squirrel. If you mean passing from the north of him to the east, then to the south, then to the west, and then to the north of him again, obviously the man does go round him, for he occupies these successive positions. But if on the contrary you mean being first in front of him, then on the right of him, then behind him, then on his left, and finally in front again, it is quite as obvious that the man fails to go round him, for by the compensating movements the squirrel makes, he keeps his belly turned towards the man all the time, and his back turned away. Make the distinction, and there is no occasion for any farther dispute. You are both right and both wrong according as you conceive the verb 'to go round' in one practical fashion or the other." Here James appeals to no serious theory of content. He just offers two distinct things that can be meant in perfectly good English by the same words, such that if the words mean one thing then the target sentence is obviously true, while if they mean the other then it is obviously false. Dissolving this disagreement requires no theory of content.23 I agree with Sosa that diagnosing the situation needn't involve going very deeply into a theory of content. And perhaps there is a sense in which the debate between James's two parties is 'merely verbal'. But it is not such a sense that licenses the move Sosa suggests in response to the experimentalist survey data-we have not managed to "avoid any real disagreement on the very same propositions." There is genuine disagreement with respect to the proposition that the man goes round the squirrel.24 So Sosa considers the most central skeptical worries raised by experimental philosophers to be closely related to general worries that arise from 23 Sosa (2010a), pp. 421--‐22. 24 Chalmers (forthcoming) offers an approach to verbal disagreement that classifies James's case as merely verbal, but points out that it is not plausibly regarded as one in which the participants are fail to disagree about any particular proposition. Chalmers is noncommittal about whether disputes about knowledge like the ones Sosa discusses are candidates for treatment as mere verbal disputes. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 19 ichikawa disagreement about philosophical matters. The challenge, as Sosa often interprets it, is: what reason have we to think that our philosophical intuitions are right, since, surveys reveal, so many others think otherwise?25 As Sosa points out, so understood, many of the particular challenges one faces here arise independently of experimentalist surveys; we know from our engagement with our philosophical colleagues that many of our philosophical judgments are controversial.26 2.4. Defeaters There are, however, other kinds of skeptical challenges that arise from this and related experimental work. Some articulations of the skeptical worries for traditional armchair philosophy emphasize that the experimental results demonstrate particular biases or errors to which we are vulnerable; this is thought to undermine our rational confidence in relying upon them.27 Sosa provides the same response here that he offered to the calibration--‐based objection discussed in §2.1: that there are potential sources of error and bias affecting intuition no more undermines the use of intuition in generality than do the corresponding errors in perceptual judgment mandate skepticism about the external world. As in the case of perception, our propensity for intuitive errors provides us with reason to engage carefully with intuition, not to abandon intuition altogether.28 2.5. Arbitrariness A final way of presenting experimentalist worries involves the extent to which intuitions may be used to demonstrate anything of normative interest. For example, Stich (1993) argues that intuitions, being the product of our cultural upbringings, are fundamentally arbitrary in a way inconsistent for settling value matters, particularly in epistemology. Insofar as epistemology is a normative enterprise, to describe a state as knowledge is to commend it in a normatively significant kind of way. Of course Sosa the virtue epistemologist will have no quarrel here-see Sosa (2010b)-but, Stich continues, if we theorize about knowledge by consulting our intuitions, we proceed arbitrarily in a way inconsistent with knowledge's alleged value. We could easily, Stich says, have been brought up in a culture which promotes different intuitions, in which case we would end up valuing differently; it is 'xenophobic' to privilege our actual values to these hypothetical ones. Weinberg et. al. (2001) connects this critique explicitly to cross--‐cultural survey results. Sosa's response here, like his response to the disagreement data, is pluralist: perhaps it is so that different cultures end up embracing subtly different 25 See e.g. Sosa (2007c), p. 102. 26 Sosa (2007b) pp. 68--‐69. 27 E.g. Swain, Alexander, and Weinberg (2008). 28 Sosa (2007c) p. 105. Weinberg (2007) argues that this move is not available, because philosophical intuition is fallible in a way importantly worse than perceptual experience is; however, Ichikawa (forthcoming 1) argues to the contrary. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 20 ichikawa epistemic values. We need not quarrel with them. Indeed, in many cases, we can and should share their values as well. (Knowledge is good; so is justified true belief.) Here, unlike in the analogous case regarding interpretation of survey data, Sosa's pluralist response strikes me as wholly correct. Although Stich argues otherwise in his (2009), I do consider Sosa's arguments on this score rather more compelling. For a Sosa--‐sympathetic rehearsal of the dialectic between Stich and Sosa, see Ichikawa (forthcoming 2).29 Bibliography Bealer, G. (1992). The Incoherence of Empiricism. Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 66:99--‐138. Bealer, G. (1998) Intuition and the Autonomy of Philosophy. In Rethinking Intuition: The Psychology Of Intuition And Its Role In Philosophical Inquiry. Eds. Michael DePaul and William Ramsey. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. 201– 39. Burge, T. (1979) Individualism and the Mental. Midwest Studies in Philosophy 4: 73--‐121. Chalmers, D. (forthcoming) Verbal Disputes. Philosophical Review. Conee, E. and Feldman, R. (1998) The Generality Problem for Reliabilism. Philosophical Studies (89)1:1--‐29. Cummins, R. (1998). Reflection on Reflective Equilibrium. In Michael R. DePaul and William Ramsey, eds., Rethinking Intuition, Pp. 113--‐27. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Ichikawa, J. (forthcoming 1). Experimentalist Pressure Against Traditional Methodology. Philosophical Psychology. Ichikawa, J. (forthcoming 2). Who Needs Intuitions? Two Experimentalist Critiques. In T. Booth and D. Rowbottom, eds., Intuitions. Oxford University Press. Ludwig, K. (2007). The Epistemology of Thought Experiments: First Person versus Third Person Approaches. Midwest Studies in Philosophy 31:128--‐159. McBeath, K., Shaffer, D., and Kaiser, M. (1995). How Baseball Outfielders Determine Where to run to Catch Fly Balls. Science 28(268): 569--‐573. Nozick, R. (1981). Philosophical Explanations. Harvard University Press. 29 Thanks to Carrie Ichikawa Jenkins, Ernest Sosa, and John Turri for helpful comments. http://jonathanichikawa.net/papers/vipm.pdf vipm 21 ichikawa Sosa, Ernest (1998). Minimal Intuition. In Michael R. DePaul and William Ramsey, eds., Rethinking Intuition, Pp. 257--‐70. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Sosa, E. (2007a). A Virtue Epistemology. New York: Oxford University Press. Sosa, E. (2007b). Intuitions: Their Nature and Epistemic Efficacy. Grazer Philosophische Studien. Sosa, E. (2007c) Experimental Philosophy and Philosophical Intuition. Philosophical Studies 132(1): 99--‐107. Sosa, E. (2009) A Defense of the Use of Intuitions in Philosophy. In D. Murphy and M. Bishop, eds., Stich And His Critics, Blackwell. Sosa, E. (2010a) Intuitions and Meaning Divergence. Philosophical Psychology 23(4): 419--‐26. Sosa, E. (2010b) Value Matters in Epistemology. Journal of Philosophy 107(4). Stich, S. (1993) The Fragmentation of Reason, MIT Press. Stich, S. (2009) Replies to Critics. In D. Murphy and M. Bishop, eds., Stich And His Critics, Blackwell. Swain, S., Alexander, J., and Weinberg, J. (2008) The Instability of Philosophical Intuitions: Running Hot and Cold on Truetemp. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 76 (1):138–155. Tversky, A. & Kahneman, D. (1974) Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases. Science 185(4157):1124--‐1131. Weinberg, J. How to Challenge Intuitions without Risking Skepticism, Midwest Studies in Philosophy 31. Weinberg, J., Nichols, S., and Stich, S. (2001). Normativity and Epistemic Intuitions, Philosophical Topics, 29 (1--‐2):429--‐460.

philinq II, 1-2014 ISSN (print) 2281-8618-ETS Metacognitive Feelings, Self-Ascriptions and Mental Actions Santiago Arango-Muñoz Abstract: The main aim of this paper is to clarify the relation between epistemic feelings, mental action, and self-ascription. Acting mentally and/or thinking about one's mental states are two possible outcomes of epistemic or metacognitive feelings. Our mental actions are often guided by our E-feelings, such as when we check what we just saw based on a feeling of visual uncertainty; but thought about our own perceptual states and capacities can also be triggered by the same E-feelings. The first section of the paper presents Dokic's argument for the insufficiency of the "ascent routine" to account for non-transparent cases of self-ascription, as well as his account of E-feelings. The second section then presents a two-level model of metacognition that builds on Dokic's account and my own view of the issue. The two-level model links E-feelings to a mindreading capacity in order to account for non-transparent self-ascriptions. Finally, the third section develops a deeper characterization of the relation among E-feelings, mental action, and self-ascription of mental states based on epistemic rules. In the context of self-knowledge, these remarks suggest the existence of means of forming self-ascriptions other than the ascent routine. 1. Introduction Our bodily as well as our mental behavior is caused not only by cognitive mental states, such as beliefs and desires, but also by phenomenal experiences, such as emotions and feelings. We often act guided by our feelings, such as when we check what we just saw based on a feeling of visual uncertainty; but we can also start thinking about our own perceptual states and capacities based on the same feelings. Mentally acting and/or thinking about one's mental states are two possible outcomes of epistemic or metacognitive feelings (henceforth E-feelings), but they need not always go together: sometimes, we act mentally without thinking about it, and sometimes we think about our cognitive processes without acting upon them (see §3). E-feelings are phenomenal experiences that point towards mental capacities, processes, and dispositions of the subject, such as knowledge, ignorance, or uncertainty (de Sousa, 2008; Dokic 2012; Arango-Muñoz, 2013a). 146 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz The following are some instances of E-feelings: the feeling of knowing (henceforth FOK; reder, 1987, 1996; Koriat 1993, 2000), the feeling of confidence (Koriat, 2008; Brewer and Sampaio, 2012), the feeling of error (Arango-Muñoz et al. in preparation), the feeling of forgetting (Henceforth FOF; Halamish et al. 2011), and the tip-of-the tongue experience (Henceforth TOT; Schwartz, 2002).1 These feelings tell the subject something about her own mind and motivate her to perform certain mental actions, such as retrieving information from her memory when she has a feeling of knowing, or endorsing retrieved information when she feels certain about it, but they also motivate self-reflection and/or introspective self-ascriptions. The main aim of this paper will be to clarify the relation between E-feelings, mental actions, and self-ascriptions. The first section presents Dokic's argument for the insufficiency of the "ascent routine" to account for non-transparent cases of self-ascription, and his account of E-feelings. Then, the second section presents a two-level model of metacognition that builds on Dokic's account of E-feelings and my own view of the issue. The two-level model of metacognition links E-feelings to a mindreading capacity to account for nontransparent self-ascriptions. Finally, the third section develops a deeper characterization of the relation among E-feelings, mental action, and self-ascription of mental states based on epistemic rules. The main idea is to determine how epistemic or metacognitive feelings motivate mental action and/or thought about one's own mental states. 2. Dokic on the Ascent Routine and E-Feelings When it comes to accounting for our capacity to self-ascribe metal states and properties, some philosophers seem inclined for versions of the so-called "ascent routine" (e.g., gordon 1995, 2007; Moran 2001; Byrne 2005, 2011a, 2011b, 2011c). The main idea of the ascent routine was originally proposed by gareth Evans (1982); according to his account, one can derive a self-ascription about an internal mental state from a judgment about the external world: "I get myself in position to answer the question whether I believe that p by putting into operation whatever procedure I have for answering the question whether p" (Evans, 1982: 225). The classic example proposed by Evans concerned the way one finds out whether one believes that there will be a third world war; in order to determine this, one only needs to consider the external factors that would determine a third world war. richard Moran (2001) synthe1 For a more comprehensive list, see "Epistemic feelings, epistemic emotions: review and introduction to the focus section", in this issue. METAcOgnITIvE FEElIngS, SElF-AScrIpTIOnS AnD MEnTAl AcTIOnS 147 sizes the idea in the following way: "In ordinary circumstances a claim concerning one's attitudes counts as a claim about their objects, about the world one's attitudes are directed on" (Moran 2001: 92). In other words, in order to determine whether one believes that p one just needs to judge whether p. In a recent paper, Jérôme Dokic (2012) presents a simple but convincing argument demonstrating the insufficiency of the "ascent routine" to account for cases of non-transparent self-ascription; i.e., when a subject self-ascribes a mental state without having access to its intentional content. This happens mainly when the mental state in question is a disposition, a non-occurrent belief, or a mental capacity. Dokic's strategy is to show that one can only resort to the "ascent routine" to obtain a self-ascription from a judgment about the external world if one focus on yes-no or polar questions like (Q1) "Is lima the capital of peru?" or (Q2) "Do you believe that lima is the capital of peru?". Although Q1 concerns the external world and Q2 concerns an internal belief of the addressee, the answer to Q2 can be derived from the answer to Q1. This is the core of the ascent routine: one derives a self-ascription from a judgment about the world. In contrast, the same does not follow if one focus on nonpolar questions like (Q3) "What's the capital of peru?" or (Q4) "Do you know what the capital of peru is?" where there is not a complete proposition that can be judged true or false. As Dokic points out, "the addressee can answer Q4 (by saying 'yes [I know the answer]') without being in a position to answer Q3 (by saying 'lima'). In fact, she can answer Q4 without having any city in mind" (Dokic, 2012: 304; bracketed phrase added). That is, the subject is able to answer a question about her mind without being in a position to answer the corresponding question about the world. In cases like this, one can answer a question about one's mind without being able to answer a question about the external world. In what follows, I will call such cases of self-ascription "nontransparent", because the subject is able to self-ascribe a mental state without having access to its intentional content, such as when a subject self-ascribes the capacity to solve a reasoning problem before solving it, or when she selfascribes the capacity to recall some information from her memory before actually retrieving it: One can say that success in doing a cognitive task hangs on possessing beliefs or pieces of information that are not immediately transparent in the subject's situation. For instance, solving the bat-and-ball puzzle is a cognitive task because it requires that one work out the correct answer (even at the implicit level), which is not immediately given in the puzzle itself (Dokic, 2012: 316). So, how does one perform this trick? In other words, how can a subject make a self-ascription about her own mental capacities and mental states if 148 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz she has no access to their intentional content? Dokic's answer appeals to Efeelings. One can answer Q4 (without having an answer to Q3) by relying in one's FOK, i.e., the affective experience that points to one's capacity of answering the question before one is actually able to do it. The classic example of this phenomenon is the TOT. In the TOT state, a subject is confronted with a question to which she does not have an immediate answer, although she feels that she knows the answer. The subject has not retrieved the answer to the question, yet she self-ascribes the proposition "I know the answer" based on a metacognitive feeling (Schwartz, 2002; Schwartz & Metcalfe, 2010). Asher Koriat presents this case in an insightful way: Although clearly the TOT represents a state of awareness, the awareness is about something that the person does not (yet) know (...). In a sense, the TOT phenomenon illustrates a dissociation between subjective and objective indexes of knowing-between the subjective conviction that one "knows" the sought-after name, and the actual inability to produce it (Koriat 2000: 151; italics added). As Koriat remarks, to acknowledge the existence of E-feelings among the constituents of the mind stresses the diversity of ways one comes to know one's own mental states. One may realize that one knows the answer to a question or the solution to a problem by retrieving it (as happens in the ascent routine), but one can also get to know this via a subjective E-feeling. The content of one's mental states can be opaque (as in the TOT case), or it can simply be absent (as when one feels that one is forgetting something); in these cases it is by the way one feels that one gets to know about it. Moreover, the content of a mental state itself does not tell one anything about its correctness or wrongness. It is by the way one feels about that content that one knows how to epistemically stand towards it (Mangan 1993, 2000; see also Dokic this volume). In the same paper, Dokic (2012) proposes an embodied account of Efeelings that he calls "the water diviner model". According to his view, these feelings are "first and foremost bodily experiences" (Dokic, 2012: 307), i.e., experiences about bodily states. They are "diffuse affective states registering internal physiological conditions and events". But in the same way that water diviner's bodily sensations reliably co-vary with physical conditions, namely the presence of underground water, E-feelings reliably co-vary with mental conditions. For example, the feeling of knowing – which is mainly a bodily feeling according to this view – reliably co-varies with the fact that a given piece of information can be retrieved from the subject's memory. This is why, according to Dokic, self-ascribing mental states based on such E-feelings leads to self-knowledge. METAcOgnITIvE FEElIngS, SElF-AScrIpTIOnS AnD MEnTAl AcTIOnS 149 It is worth highlighting that, although Dokic stresses the fact that E-feelings are "first and foremost bodily experiences", i.e., they have intrinsic bodily content, he also acknowledges that E-feelings have derived intentional content that goes beyond the body. He calls his own account of the derived content of E-feelings "the competence view". According to this view, the derived content of E-feelings is about one's own cognitive competence at a given cognitive task and has the form "I can [or cannot] do this" (or "this can [or cannot] be done") (Dokic, 2012: 316; bracketed text added), where "this" refers to the cognitive task at hand. Dokic's criticism of the ascent routine and his account of E-feelings provides a novel perspective on the way one comes to know mental capacities, mental processes, and dispositions. However, his account falls short when it comes to explaining the relation between E-feelings and self-ascriptions. According to Dokic's account, learned heuristics mediate the transition from an E-feeling to a self-ascription or second-order judgment so that we are able to "move spontaneously from our feelings to judgments concerning the task at hand [... and/or], her own mental states" (Dokic, 2012: 308, 309, bracketed text added). However, given the paucity of the intentional content of E-feelings (which, on Dokic's view, points only to the competence of the subject), it remains unexplained how a subject can derive a self-ascription about a particular mental state from a mere feeling. In other words, given that E-feelings are bodily sensations and given that bodily sensations take place at many times and in many contexts, there are many possible ways of interpreting those bodily feelings; so we need to describe the mental mechanism that does the job and specify more fully the "learned heuristics" or the "epistemic rules" (see §3) that it uses to infer a self-ascription from an E-feeling. In a nutshell, there is an explanatory gap between the E-feeling one has and the judgment that one forms about one's mind. The following sections will propose a model that aims to close this gap. 3. A Two-Level Model of Non-Transparent Self-Ascriptions Dokic's considerations on self-ascription and E-feelings direct our attention to an important, yet often neglected, question that any model of self-ascriptions and self-knowledge should answer: how can a subject make a non-transparent self-ascription about her own mental capacities, mental processes and dispositions based only on a mere E-feeling? As we saw in previous section, this is not an easy task. To this end, I will propose a two-level model of metacognition (Koriat, 2000; Thompson, 2009; Koriat & Ackerman, 2010; Arango-Munoz, 2011) that links E-feelings with the mindreading capacity. 150 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz The two-level model of metacognition that I want to defend claims that, in cases of non-transparent self-ascriptions, two elements are at play: low-level Metacognition: E-feelings are elicited by metacognitive monitoring mechanisms according to heuristics and the relevant cognitive task. High-level Metacognition: The mindreading mechanism interprets the E-feelings according to their valence and the context, and then produces self-ascriptions of mental states. The idea of two levels of metacognition is similar to nichols and Stich's model of self-knowledge (2003) which also includes two independent – but interactive – mechanisms: a monitoring mechanism and a mindreading mechanism. The main difference between their account and mine concerns the way we understand the monitoring mechanism. Whereas, for them, the monitoring mechanism is a subpersonal mechanism (or a set of mental mechanisms) that scans mental states in a "Belief Box" and whose main function is to detect mental states and their contents, for me (following the psychological tradition of metacognition research; e.g., reder, 1987, 1996; Koriat 1993, 2000), the main function of low-level metacognition is to elicit E-feelings and control mental action based on cues and heuristics (see "Epistemic feelings, epistemic emotions: review and introduction to the focus section"). In other words, the monitoring mechanism does not actually scan mental states. 3.1. low-level Metacognition: E-Feelings as Signals of Absent Objects The two-level model of metacognition claims that, in cases where the object of one's mental attitude is not transparent, as in answering Q4 by saying 'yes, I know the answer' when no answer is yet available to the subject, two elements are responsible for the formation of self-ascriptions: E-feelings elicited by a monitoring mechanism according to certain heuristics (and the cognitive task that the subject confronts), and the mindreading mechanism. In this section, I will compare Dokic's view of E-feelings with my own view. Following Dokic's account, I understand E-feelings as involving two ingredients: a bodily component, and an intentional content that points towards mental conditions (see also goldie, 2002). However, there are two important differences between our views. First, according to Dokic, the intentional content of E-feelings has the form "I can [or cannot] do this" (or "this can [or cannot] be done") (Dokic, 2012: 316; bracketed text added). Though I agree with the general idea, I consider that it is more accurate to describe their content as representing "value by means of positive or negative valence" (Arango-Muñoz, METAcOgnITIvE FEElIngS, SElF-AScrIpTIOnS AnD MEnTAl AcTIOnS 151 2013a: 4). That is, by feeling a positive or negative affect, the subject becomes aware of whether she can or cannot do it, i.e., the implicit metacognitive evaluations of the cognitive task.2 In this respect, Dokic and I both take the content of the feeling to refer to the competence of the subject, but it is subjectively experienced as a positive or negative affect directed towards a mental state, process, or disposition. The second difference between our views is that I accept – but Dokic does not – that E-feelings have richer intentional content; that is, that they can also refer to the specific piece of information that the subject is aiming for, though this intentional content is non-transparent3 (see also Mangan, 1993, 2000, 2001; norman, price and Duff, 2010). For example, in the case of the TOT, the content is (A) a positive affect that points to the possibility of retrieving whatever the subject wants to retrieve (in Dokic terms "I can retrieve it" or "this can be retrieved"), and (B) the specific intentional content that the subject is looking for. The reason for conceiving the content in this twofold way is that subjects are often able to discriminate the target of their feeling among different possible objects. In many cases (e.g., FOK, TOT, and FOF), the intentional content of the feeling (B) is somehow absent – because it has not yet been retrieved, in the FOK and TOT, or it has been lost, in the case of FOF. As Koriat remarks, E-feelings are often caused by contentless cues and heuristics4 (Koriat 2000), but the feelings themselves can also (and often do) condense implicit knowledge or information, as Mangan (1993, 2000, 2001) and norman et al. (2010) have proposed. This becomes even clearer when one consider cases of E-feelings where the subject is aware of their intentional content. For example, the feeling of rightness, the feeling of certainty, the feeling of uncertainty, and the feeling of error, among others, point towards an explicit content ("x is bigger than y", "lima is the capital of peru", etc.) and evaluate the content as correct or incorrect. given these cases, it is clear that the subject feels a positive or negative affect towards a given content, not only about her mental competence. In a nutshell, in my view, E-feelings are implicit assessments of value – positive or negative – concerning a given cognitive or mental task. They indicate 2 This does not mean that she is aware of the metacognitive evaluations as such. She is only aware of the positive or negative valence concerning the cognitive task she is confronting. 3 To say that it is non-transparent is another way of saying that it is unconscious but present. I claim that the content is present because subjects' behavior exhibits intelligence that would not be possible without intentional content (see Arango-Muñoz 2013a). 4 For example, E-feelings are triggered by sensory cues such as the frequency of encounter with a stimulus (reder 1996; paynter, reder & Kieffaber 2009), its perceptual fluency (Whittlesea 1993; Whittlesea & Williams, 2001), or the fluency of the processing of a stimulus (Koriat 2000). 152 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz or point towards a non-transparent and/or transparent object and, at the same time, motivate certain types of bodily and/or mental behavior (Arango-Muñoz, 2013a, 2013b). 3.2. High-level Metacognition: Mindreading mechanism interprets E-feelings According to some theorists, the mindreading mechanism is an inferential mechanism provided with (A) a theory of mind (TOM) and (B) a set of psychological concepts that, given a behavioral or perceptual input, generates a self-ascription as output (carruthers 2009, 2011; gopnik 1993; Wegner 2002; Bogdan, 2010; Flavell 2000). On the one hand, (A) the theory of mind can be understood as a broad sketch of how the mind works and how it causes behavior. Subjects rely on such a theory to understand others' behavior. On the other hand, (B) psychological concepts are concepts referring to propositional attitudes such as perceptions, feelings, intentions, knowledge, beliefs and expectations, among others. Subjects use and combine this type of concept to ascribe mental states to other people and to themselves. The mindreading mechanism has evolved to interpret others' behaviors, but it can also be turned upon oneself (carruthers 2009, 2011).5 So, the idea is that in cases of non-transparent self-ascription, the subject relies on E-feelings in order to self-ascribe mental properties using her mindreading capacity. The reason why the subject has to resort to her mindreading capacity is that, in non-transparent cases of self-ascription (e.g., when the mental state in question is a disposition, a non-occurrent belief or emotion, or a mental capacity), she is in a epistemic position with respect to her own mind similar to the position that she is in when she evaluates and interprets others' minds. That is, she only has access to cues and indirect evidence about her own mental states. In these cases, the content is opaque or absent, and therefore she self-ascribes a mental state based only on her E-feelings without having any access to the intentional content of the ascribed mental state. Thus, in non-transparent self-ascription, the mindreading capacity takes as input the E-feeling elicited by low-level metacognitive monitoring, contextual factors and knowledge (such as the kind of cognitive task the subject is confronting and the kind of possible mental states related to that task), and then generates a positive or negative self-ascription according to the valence of the feeling. A positive E-feeling motivates a positive self-ascription concerning a 5 I do not want to commit myself to the claim that subjects only understand others' minds by means of a theory. There may be cases where they resort to mental simulations. However, it seems unlikely that they use mental simulations to understand and get self-knowledge of their own mind, as is acknowledged even by simulation theorists (e.g., goldman 2006). METAcOgnITIvE FEElIngS, SElF-AScrIpTIOnS AnD MEnTAl AcTIOnS 153 mental capacity, whereas a negative E-feeling motivates a negative self-ascription. So, if a subject is confronted with a question to which she does not have an immediate answer, she may rely on her intuitive E-feeling to generate a selfascription concerning her knowledge or ignorance of the answer (see Figure 1). For instance, if a subject had a negative feeling when confronted with a memory task, the mindreading mechanism might self-ascribe the concept of uncertainty or forgetting (see below §3). In this way, the puzzle of how a subject self-ascribes a non-transparent mental property, one to which she does not have yet conscious access, is solved. 4. E-Feelings, Mental Action and Self-Ascriptions The previous considerations broadly describe how the mindreading mechanism forms non-transparent self-ascriptions based on E-feelings. However, describing the mechanism is not sufficient; one should also describe the "learned heuristics" (as Dokic [2012] called them) or "epistemic rules" (as I call them, following Byrne [2005, 2011a]) that govern the functioning of the mindreading mechanism.6 This section will provide a deeper characterization of the relation among E-feelings, mental action and self-ascriptions of mental states based on epistemic rules. 4.1. rule-following considerations Some philosophers have found appealing the idea that rule-following considerations can explain the formation of self-ascriptions (Byrne, 2005, 2011a, 2011b, 2011c; peacocke, 2008: 206; goldie 2002). According to this strategy, a subject follows a more or less implicit rule of the sort "if p, then believe that you believe p" (Byrne, 2005, 2011) whenever she makes a self-ascription of a mental state. Although I broadly follow Byrne's idea of epistemic rules for selfascriptions, the rules that I posit here are quite different in character: they are neither transparent nor neutral, in contrast to the rules proposed by him (see §3.3). Moreover, in my view they are not only for reasoning about one's own mental states, but also for directing mental action. In the following, I will talk as if subject followed rules for self-ascribing mental states, but this should be taken just as an approximate metaphor that 6 Although I'm adopting Byrne's concept, there are important difference between his view and my own view. The main disagreement is that he claims that epistemic rules are applied and followed by subjects themselves, whereas I claim that they are applied or followed by the mindreading mechanism – something Byrne wouldn't accept. But this disagreement is not really relevant here, since we are trying to explain different kinds of self-ascription. 154 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz describes the cognitive processes that guide subjects' behavior and self-ascriptions. In other words, even if the subject does not actually follow a rule (after all, she does not have a clear understanding of the rule, and she is not even able to articulate it), her behavior can be characterized as embodying or displaying some epistemic rules or heuristics. That is, although these rules and heuristics can be inferred by observing subjects' behavior and are useful for predicting it, more research is needed before we can commit to their actual existence. To begin with, let us assume that a subject employs two different epistemic rules when confronted with E-feelings; she does not need to employ both rules on every occasion. A rule can be understood as a reference that one (or the cognitive system – the mindreading mechanism in this particular case) invokes each time that one needs to determine something. In simpler terms, when confronted with an E-feeling, a subject needs to know what to do, and epistemic rules tell her roughly what to do; as we will see, two rules are the links among E-feelings, mental action and self-ascriptions. On the one hand, epistemic rules for action (r1) are those one invokes for determining which mental action to perform given an E-feeling. On the other hand, epistemic rules for self-ascription (r2) are those we invoke for determining what to believe about one's self, one's mental states, and one's dispositions given an E-feeling. let me briefly introduce both rules. The next three sections will analyze and explain them in detail. Epistemic rule for mental action (r1): If E-feeling Y arises, then do mental action X. Example: If FOK, then "try to remember". Epistemic rule for self-ascriptions (r2): If E-feeling Y arises, then you are entitled to form a second-order belief about your mental activities, dispositions or capacities according to the valence of your E-feeling: a positive judgment if a positive E-feeling and vice versa. Example: If FOK, then form the belief "I can remember". 4.2. Epistemic rule for mental action (r1) At first glance, r1 seems to be a practical rather than an epistemic rule since the term "epistemic" is often exclusively associated with belief formation, as in r2. r1 is about what to do instead of what to believe. However, r1 should be considered epistemic since any mental action, which can be roughly defined as a directed change in the mind (see proust 2001, 2009a), necessarily entails METAcOgnITIvE FEElIngS, SElF-AScrIpTIOnS AnD MEnTAl AcTIOnS 155 epistemic changes, e.g., perceptual or informational improvements and/or relapses. Some theorists may criticize this account by suggesting that the action in the former clause implies the second-order belief suggested by the latter: "to do X mental action" or "to try to remember" implies the second-order belief that "you believe that you can do X (or remember)", since you cannot try to remember without believing that you can do it. But, as I will show, r1 does not imply r2, and applying r1 does not require applying r2 (see §3.4). The first argument for the dissociation between r1 and r2 is the phenomenological observation that prima facie one performs many mental actions such as remembering, calculating, or reasoning just by attending to those actions, and without any need to make second order judgments about one's self (vierkant, 2012; proust, 2007, 2012). Furthermore, the fact that some non-human animals and infants may grasp r1 but do not reach r2 also supports the distinction. These agents are able to engage in information-acquiring acts although they are unable to form metarepresentations, stricto sensu (carruthers 2008, 2009, 2011; Bermúdez 2009), i.e., second-order thoughts that involves the deployment of psychological concepts and a self-concept. For example, rhesus monkey and young children are able to monitor and control their cognitive performance in memory and perception tasks, allowing them to attain an accurate performance similar to human behavior in perception and memory (Hampton 2001; Balcomb & gerken 2008; see Smith 2009 for a review). A plausible explanation of their ability to monitor and control their mental capacities without resorting to metarepresentation is that their behavior is guided by metacognitive feelings (proust 2009b; Arango-Muñoz, 2011; Dokic, 2012). Thus, r1 concerns the relationship between E-feelings and mental action, and can be possessed and applied even by beings lacking the possibility of forming second-order beliefs about themselves, i.e., introspective self-ascriptions. Thus, according to r1, E-feelings can motivate and guide action directly (i.e., without passing through the reflective process of self-ascription), and the subject can cite them to account for a given action: "I have done X because I had Y feeling". Similarly, we can cite these kinds of mental states to interpret the behavior of others: "The subject acted in a given way because she had that E-feeling". 4.3. Epistemic rule for self-ascriptions (r2) r2 determines the relation between feelings and introspective self-ascriptions or second-order beliefs; in particular, it determines when to form a second-order belief about oneself. In other words, it dictates the formation 156 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz of self-ascriptions based on E-feelings. Based on the particular experience of easiness or difficulty of carrying out a cognitive task, the subject constructs a semantically articulated self-ascription that involves the deployment of psychological concepts (KnOWIng, InTEnDIng, etc.) and the concept of the self. Thus, an E-feeling gives prima facie reason to a subject to form the self-ascription that she has or lacks a piece of information (peacocke, 2008; proust 2009a). notice that, in contrast to ascent routine (discussed in §1), the content selfascribed by following r2 is not already present in the antecedent part of the conditional rule, i.e., it is not transparent. The conditional rule used in the ascent routine says "If p, believe that you believe p" (Byrne 2005, 2011a). So, the self-ascribed content is typically already present in the reasoning process; this is why it can be considered to be a transparent procedure. r2, in contrast, Figure 1: Schema of the two-level model of metacognition. Each time a subject is confronted with a cognitive problem, low-level Metacognition evaluates it based on some heuristics and elicits positive or negative E-feelings (see 2.1). There are two possible outcomes of E-feelings: Mentally acting (object level – below horizontal line) and thinking about one's mental states (meta-level – above horizontal line). The dotted line pointing downwards depicts the way E-feelings directly modulate mental actions (see §3.2); this can happen following r1, which is an epistemic rule for mental action. The dotted line pointing upwards depicts the way E-feelings influence high-level metacognition (see §3.3): selfascriptions based on E-feelings are produced by high-level metacognition following r2, which is an epistemic rule for self-ascription. METAcOgnITIvE FEElIngS, SElF-AScrIpTIOnS AnD MEnTAl AcTIOnS 157 derives the content of the self-ascription from the valence of the E-feeling, the context, and related information about the task. Thus, the procedure of forming self-ascriptions based on r2 has the advantage of providing the subject with new information that was not already contained in subject's representational state, as in the ascent routine. Another feature of r2 is that it is not "neutral", as are the rules proposed by Byrne (2005, 2011a). According to Byrne's (2005, 2011a) account of selfknowledge, an epistemic rule is neutral if "the antecedent condition c of an epistemic rule r is not specified in terms of the rule follower's mental states" (Byrne 2005: 94; 2011a). In contrast, according to r2, the antecedent part of the conditional is specified in terms of rule follower's mental states, mainly by E-feelings and beliefs about the context and the task.7 Because of these features, r2 has a "relative disadvantage" with respect to Byrne's model of self-ascriptions: self-ascriptions following r2 are not self-verifying, in contrast to those provided by Byrne's version of the ascent routine. Because of the interpretative character of r2, it leaves open the possibility of misattribution and introspective error. This would be a disadvantage if one wanted to hold that introspection is infallible. But, in my view, this feature of r2 is in fact an advantage because it helps to explain misattribution of mental states and confabulations, two common phenomena in introspective reports (see carruthers, 2009, 2011). 4.4. Differences between r1 and r2 A key difference between the two kinds of epistemic rules is the way we determine their quality: r1 is a good rule if it leads to successful mental actions, whereas r2 is a good rule if it leads to the formation of reliable beliefs about one's own mental dispositions. Moreover, the first is an imperative to act mentally, to do something, whereas the second is merely a suggestion to form a second-order belief, which can be dissociated from action. Thus, r2 permits a reflective distance that is not allowed by r1; the subject can contemplate the content of her self-ascription without engaging in action. This suggests that the content of r1 is imperative, whereas the content of r2 is merely descriptive or propositional (see Boghossian, 2008). What counts as possession and application of r1 is successfully dealing with mental uncertainty, that is, the ability to accurately predict and retrospectively 7 Dokic proposes (personal communication) that we could preserve the neutrality of rules by granting that E-feelings are mainly bodily experiences: "If I am in bodily state B, then believe that...". Although I agree that E-feelings have a bodily component, I don't accept the identification of the former with the latter; E-feelings have properties that bodily experiences lack. 158 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz correct cognitive outputs. This is a recurrent activity that involves a subject's sensitivity to her mental activity and her capacity to control it: an ability to exploit E-feelings (also called "mental affordances" by proust 2009b, 2007). In contrast, what counts as the possession and application of r2 is the explicit formation of conceptual self-ascriptions that may be true or false. This is an occasional act of intellect and conceptual understanding that may facilitate the correction of behavior in terms of social rules or theories of how the mind works. A subject would not be able to check whether she is mentally acting according to a given social rule unless she is able to make a self-ascription that allows her to contrast what she is doing with what the rule suggests (Flavell, 1998). E-feelings need not cause both action and second-order belief every time they occur. The subject may act without forming the second-order belief, and she may form a second-order belief without acting. The first case is illustrated by our daily behavior: we perform many mental actions, we remember, calculate, reason, and we execute all of these actions in a very precise and controlled way guided by E-feelings without making second-order judgments about each action (vierkant, 2012; proust, 2007, 2012; Arango-Muñoz, 2013a). That may be one of the reasons why we are often unaware of how we carry out all the mental processes we routinely carry out. The second case is illustrated by cases in which an E-feeling motivates a second-order belief but we fail to act on it. A FOF makes a subject believe that she is forgetting something, but the subject, due to hurry, stress, or simply neglect, may be unable to do anything about it: she fails to check what she is forgetting. 5. Concluding remarks As I said at the outset, we often mentally act guided by our E-feelings, such as when we check what we just saw based on a feeling of visual uncertainty; but we can also start thinking about our own perceptual states and capacities based on the same E-feeling. E-feelings are phenomenal experiences that point towards mental capacities, processes and dispositions of the subject such as knowledge, ignorance, or uncertainty. The main aim of this paper was to clarify the relation between E-feelings, mental actions and self-ascriptions. As I have shown, mentally acting and/or thinking about one's mental states are two possible outcomes of E-feelings, but they need not always go together: sometimes we mentally act without thinking about, and sometimes we think about our cognitive processes without acting upon them. The take-home idea, then, is that, in non-transparent cases, E-feelings guide mental action and/or self-ascriptions. 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(eds.), Mental actions and agency, Oxford university press, Oxford: 253-279. proust, Joëlle, 2009b, "The representational basis of brute metacognition: A proposal", in lurz, r. (ed.), The philosophy of animal minds, cambridge university press, 165-183. proust, Joëlle, 2012, "Metacognition and Mindreading, one or two Functions", in Beran, M., Brandl, J., perner, J. and proust, J., (eds.), Foundations of Metacognition, Oxford university press, Oxford: 234-251. proust, Joëlle (forthcoming). Philosophy of Metacognition, Mental Agency and Mental Awareness. Oxford: Oxford university press. Schwartz, Bennett, 2002, Tip-of-the-Tongue States, Phenomenology, mechanisms and lexical retrieval, lawrence Erlbaum Associates, publishers, london. Thompson, valerie A., 2009, "Dual-process theories: a metacognitive perspective", in Evans, J., and Frankish, K., (eds.), In two minds: Dual processes and beyond. Oxford university press, Oxford. 162 SAnTIAgO ArAngO-MuñOz vierkant, Tillmann, 2012, "What Metarepresentation is For", in Beran, M., Brandl, J., perner, J. and proust, J., (eds.), Foundations of Metacognition, Oxford university press, Oxford: 279-288. Whittlesea, Bruce W. A., 1993, "Illusion of familiarity", in Journal of experimental psychology, 19.6: 1235-1253. Whittlesea, Bruce W. A., and Williams, lisa, 2001, "Source of the feeling of familiarity: the discrepancy-attribution hypothesis", in Journal of experimental psychology, 26.3: 547-565.

Bedeutsamkeiten absurder Existenz Über lebensbejahende und lebensverneinende Weltmythen in Wolfgang Herrndorfs „Arbeit und Struktur" Masterarbeit im Fach Deutsch der Philosophischen Fakultät der Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel vorgelegt von Maximilian Runge Kiel, im Juni 2017 Abstract: Does a nihilist who kills himself betray his own beliefs? An unreflected answer would probably turn out positive, because a nihilist may be defined as a person who embraces all aspects of life and pain itself. But someone who escapes his sorrowful existence by committing suicide seems not to accept his own human condition and therefore cannot die as a nihilist. If this argumentation is right, human life would not be possible outside cultural contexts, for the particularity of nihilism is its large distance to and independence of culture and collectivity. In his autobiographical work "Arbeit und Struktur" Wolfgang Herrndorf portrays his three and a half years of living with brain cancer. At the same time he shows us how his originally humanistic nihilism turns into a more pessimistic one while coping with his disease. Herrndorf, in a manner of speaking, writes his own "myth to live" without being able to rely on the shelter of culture, without a "myth of collectivity". In the face of this, we must assume Herrndorf's ideological transformation from a cooperative nihilism to a pessimistic nihilism, which justifies his own death, was his sole opportunity to mentally survive the three and a half years of pain and dissolution. From this perspective, the example of Wolfgang Herrndorf and his "Arbeit und Struktur" would reveal mankind's absolute dependency on metaphysical significance and its need for individual myths to live. Despite regarding himself as a modern, secular and rationalistic human being, Herrndorf cannot overcome the necessity of the iconological translation of "reality to world". Therefore, the intent of this master's thesis is to show that all living human beings are captives of icons and their metaphysical representation, and that the endless effort of translating whole reality into a single myth to live is part of our conditio humana. Keywords: nihilism, the absurd, autobiography, cancer, suicide, existential philosophy, hermeneutics, myth, narrativity, rationality, writing & literature, personal identity, atheism, faith, religion, spirituality Schlüsselwörter: Nihilismus, das Absurde, Autobiografie, Krebs, Suizid, Existenzphilosophie, Hermeneutik, Mythos, Narrativität, Rationalität, Schreiben & Literatur, Identität, Atheismus, Glaube, Religion, Spiritualität Inhaltsverzeichnis I Einleitung: Die Fragilität des Willens zur Lebendigkeit...................................................................1 II Narrative Identität und Bedeutsamkeit.............................................................................................5 1) Personale Identität und Narrativität.............................................................................................5 2) Erzählung, Mythos und Bedeutsamkeit....................................................................................10 3) „Arbeit und Struktur" als Tagebuch, Weblog und Roman........................................................16 III Die nihilistische Verengung – Zum Bewusstsein absurder Existenz............................................21 4) Nietzsche: Kritik der Tradition..................................................................................................21 5) Dostojewski: Kritik des Glaubens.............................................................................................26 6) Camus: Kritik des Sinnhaften...................................................................................................31 IV Weltmythen in „Arbeit und Struktur"...........................................................................................36 7) Bejahung des Lebens.................................................................................................................36 7.1) Das begreifbare Absurde...................................................................................................36 7.2) Gegenwärtigkeit und Erfüllung.........................................................................................41 7.3) Die Ambivalenz des Sozialen............................................................................................45 7.4) Der Wille zum Nicht-Wissen.............................................................................................49 7.5) Vom Versuch, sich „fortzuschreiben" – Sprache als Bedeutsamkeit.................................52 7.5.1) Epileptisches Erleben und die Auflösung von Welt, Logik und Sprache..................52 7.5.2) Die Anstrengung, zu sein – Weltmythos und Weltikon.............................................56 8) Bejahung des Suizids................................................................................................................62 8.1) Gleichgültigkeit und die Verflachung des Lebensgefühls.................................................62 8.2) Die Bewahrung der eigenen Autonomie...........................................................................65 8.3) Radikaler Nihilismus und der Wille zum Nichts...............................................................70 8.3.1) Die Nichtigkeit des Seienden und der Zeit................................................................70 8.3.2) Die Welt als „nihilistische Wüste" – Exkurs zu „Sand"............................................74 8.3.3) Sterbenwollen als Bedeutsamkeit..............................................................................79 V Letzte Zeilen – Zeugnisse des Suizids...........................................................................................82 9) Zu einer Narratologie des Abschiedsbriefs...............................................................................82 10) „Arbeit und Struktur" – Ein Abschiedsbrief?..........................................................................87 VI Schlussbetrachtung: Im Gefängnis des Zeichens..........................................................................90 VII Siglenverzeichnis.........................................................................................................................95 VIII Literaturund Quellenverzeichnis..............................................................................................96 I Einleitung: Die Fragilität des Willens zur Lebendigkeit Wolfgang Herrndorf hat es gemacht, wie es zu machen ist. Am Montag, den 26. August [2013, M.R.] gegen 23:15 schoss er sich am Ufer des Hohenzollernkanals mit einem Revolver in den Kopf. Er zielte durch den Mund auf das Stammhirn. Das Kaliber der Waffe entsprach etwa 9 mm. Herrndorfs Persönlichkeit hatte sich durch die Krankheit nicht verändert, aber seine Koordination und räumliche Orientierung waren gegen Ende beeinträchtigt. Es dürfte einer der letzten Tage gewesen sein, an denen er noch zu der Tat imstande war.1 Mit dieser nüchternen Passage lassen Marcus Gärtner und Kathrin Passig, enge Freunde von Herrndorf sowie Herausgeber der Buchausgabe von Arbeit und Struktur, ganz im Sinne des Autors ihr kurzes Nachwort und damit das gesamte Buch enden. Dass Herrndorf diese Sätze nicht selbst hätte schreiben können, weist auf ein erstes bedeutendes Problem bei der Auseinandersetzung mit dem Werk hin: Über Arbeit und Struktur lässt sich nicht reden, wenn man es nicht von seinem Ende her bedenkt und den biografischen Kontext des Autors unberücksichtigt lässt. Herrndorf hatte sich zwar strikt dagegen ausgesprochen, dass seine biografische Situation irgendetwas mit seiner Literatur zu tun habe (AuS 276f.), jedoch lässt sich im Falle von Arbeit und Struktur nicht leugnen, dass der Suizid2 des Autors eine nicht unerhebliche Rolle spielt. Herrndorf beginnt daran zu schreiben, nachdem im Februar 2010 ein Glioblastom, ein maligner und bislang nicht heilbarer Hirntumor, bei ihm diagnostiziert wurde. Zunächst als digitales Informationsmedium für seine Freunde gedacht, veröffentlicht er die laufend aktualisierten Einträge ab September in einem Blog und stellt sie so einem grösseren Publikum zur Verfügung. Neben der Arbeit an zwei Romanen – Tschick (2010) und Sand (2013) – sowie dem Fragment gebliebenen Bilder deiner grossen Liebe (2014) nimmt Arbeit und Struktur die Gestalt eines langjährigen Schreibprojektes an, in dem Herrndorf sein Leben mit der Krankheit protokolliert und darüber reflektiert. Dreieinhalb Jahre lang hält er es mit dem Krebs und den dadurch verursachten Symptomen aus, bevor er dem passiven Tod mit dem Revolver zuvorkommt und durch den aktiven selbstgewählten Tod ersetzt. Wer jetzt jedoch anhand dieser knappen Darstellung, die „Krankheit" und „Suizid" in einem Atemzug nennt, von der Möglichkeit des Suizids als Reaktion auf eine tödliche Krankheit gleich auf die Krankhaftigkeit des Suizids als solchen schliesst, der lässt sich von der unheilvollen Verbindung dieser beiden 1 Wolfgang HERRNDORF: Arbeit und Struktur. Reinbek bei Hamburg 2015, S. 445, im Folgenden mit der Sigle AuS abgekürzt. 2 Da der aus der christlichen Tradition stammende Begriff des „Selbstmordes" stark wertend ist und der Begriff des „Freitodes" eine nicht immer legitimierbare Freiheit von Zwängen propagiert, werde ich die neutraleren Begriffe „Suizid" oder „Selbsttötung" vorziehen. Zum normativen Gehalt und der Geschichte des reli giösen Selbstmordverbotes vgl. Peter MÖSGEN: Selbstmord oder Freitod? Das Phänomen des Suizides aus christlich-philosophischer Sicht. Eichstätt 1999, S. 71–80. 1 Begriffe zu schnell täuschen und verwehrt sich den Zugang dazu, wofür Arbeit und Struktur einsteht. Es stimmt zwar, dass 70 % aller SuizidantInnen zum Zeitpunkt ihres Todes eine diagnostizierbare psychische Erkrankung oder Störung aufweisen3 (der Anteil steigt auf bis zu 90 %, wenn man die gesamte Lebensspanne betrachtet)4 und sich bei Krebsbetroffenen das Risiko, durch Suizid zu sterben, im Vergleich zur Allgemeinbevölkerung verdoppelt5 – aber das sind keine hinreichenden Gründe dafür, dass der Suizid nicht eben auch die freie, legitime Entscheidung eines selbstbestimmten Individuums darstellen kann. Nimmt man Herrndorfs Äusserungen in Arbeit und Struktur und seine Beteuerungen ernst, es handle sich bei seinen Überlegungen zum Suizid zunächst um reine „Psychohygiene" (AuS 50) – und als seine Leserschaft haben wir keinen Grund, das nicht zu tun – so ist man zu der Schlussfolgerung genötigt, Herrndorf habe sich zwar vor dem Hintergrund und im Kontext, aber eben nicht wegen seiner Erkrankung erschossen. Die Frage nach dem Warum, die sich nur den Lebenden stellt, bleibt damit gleichwohl ungelöst. Blickt man auf die 439 Seiten von Arbeit und Struktur, kann man zugleich nicht unbedingt darauf hoffen, dass ihr Studium dieses Warum in irgendeiner Weise erhellt – denn der Text ist Herrndorfs Antwort darauf, sie hat nur ihn selbst zufriedenstellen sollen und niemanden sonst. Dass das Werk als ein Teil dessen, was von Wolfgang Herrndorf bleibt, dennoch für eine Konsultation zur Verfügung steht, lässt uns freilich nicht mit dem gewaltigen und nebulösen Warum überhaupt? zurück, sondern impliziert spezieller die Frage: Warum er? Diese Frage nun wäre für jemanden, der dem eigenen Lebendigsein kaum einen Wert zuspricht, nicht weiter problematisch – für jemanden jedoch, dem das Nichts eine bedeutende Idee ist und der sich dem Nihilismus und Absurden nahe fühlt, dafür umso mehr. Nihilismus ist ein grosses und häufig missverstandenes Wort. Der umgangssprachliche Gebrauch unterstellt dem Nihilisten eine radikale Lebensabgewandtheit, die aus der Prämisse einer als allgemeingültig erkannten Sinnlosigkeit alles Seienden resultiert. Aber dieser Gebrauch verwechselt pragmatische Sinnlosigkeit mit tatsächlicher Sinnlosigkeit: Der Nihilismus stuft nicht das menschliche Leben als nichtig ein, sondern lediglich die zahlreichen und häufig irrationalen Versuche, es in den Griff zu bekommen; er verneint zwar alle möglichen Formen des Umgangs mit Leben, aber er kann sich selbst bis zu einer radikalen Lebensbeja3 Die häufigsten Störungen bilden dabei Depression, Alkoholismus und Schizophrenie, vgl. Tilo HELD: Suizid als Krankheit. Gegenübertragungen der Medizin bei Tod und Suizidalität. In: Gerd BRUDERMÜLLER u.a. (Hg.): Suizid und Sterbehilfe. Würzburg 2003, S. 165–172, 165. 4 Vgl. Marion SCHENK: Suizid, Suizidalität und Trauer. Gewaltsamer Tod und Nachsterbewunsch in der Begleitung. Göttingen 2014, S. 14. 5 Mit absoluten Selbsttötungsraten von 0,04 % bei Frauen und 0,19 % bei Männern ist die Suizidalität von Krebspatienten gleichwohl gering. Bei einer zeitgleichen Depression steigt das Suizidrisiko allerdings rasant an, vgl. Michael KUSCH u.a.: Klinische Psychoonkologie. Berlin/ Heidelberg 2013, S. 20f. 2 hung aufschwingen. In Arbeit und Struktur lassen sich zahlreiche Stellen ausmachen, die auf das nihilistische und von der Erfahrung des Absurden geprägte Weltbild Herrndorfs hinweisen. Sollte sich dabei zuletzt dieselbe radikale Lebensbejahung wiederfinden lassen, wie sie etwa in den nihilistischen Überlegungen von Nietzsche, Dostojewski und Camus auftaucht, so muss konstatiert werden, dass Herrndorfs Suizid dieser Auffassung, nach der alles Leben Leiden ist und dennoch gelebt zu werden hat,6 fundamental widerspricht. Man könnte nun einerseits an der blossen Feststellung dieser Widersprüchlichkeit festhalten und Herrndorfs Suizid gegen die absurden Narrative verteidigen. Freilich würde man damit unterstellen, dass Herrndorf den Halt, den das Absurde ihm verspricht, ab einem gewissen Punkt verliert oder dieser im Verlauf der Krankheit zumindest schwächer wird. Angesichts des radikalen Nihilismus jedoch, der sich in der zweiten Hälfte von Arbeit und Struktur offenbart, erweist sich diese Unterstellung als nicht haltbar. Es empfiehlt sich daher die Alternative, Herrndorfs Willen zum Leben und seinen Willen zum Suizid nicht als Antipoden, sondern als Konsequenzen ein und desselben weltanschaulichen Paradigmas zu begreifen, das bis zuletzt seine Geltung behält: Lebensbejahung und Lebensverneinung bilden dann in Arbeit und Struktur kein Entweder-Oder, sondern bis zum Ende von Leben und Werk eine unzertrennbare Einheit. In dieser Perspektive schliesslich stellte das Absurde eine Selbstund Lebenserzählung bereit, die Herrndorf erst das Leben mit dem Krebs ermöglicht, während sie ihm zugleich die Legitimation dafür gibt, sich im äussersten Falle selbst zu töten. Nicht mehr die Erkrankung erscheint dann als entscheidender Faktor seines Suizids, sondern gerade die Vorstellung und Erzählung davon, wie er sich selbst sieht, sein Selbstbild, seine Identität. Ob dieser Sachverhalt zutrifft oder nicht, ist der zentrale Gegenstand meiner Untersuchung. Um mich Arbeit und Struktur demgemäss als einer explizierten Selbsterzählung nähern zu können, werde ich zunächst darstellen, inwiefern individuelle und kollektive Erzählungen als konstitutiv für menschliche Identität gelten können (1). Mit Bezugnahme auf anthropologische und kulturphilosophische Überlegungen zum Mythos erläutere ich dann, dass bestimmte Erzählungen sowohl einen kulturellen Kollektivzusammenhang als auch einen metaphysischen Weltzusammenhang herstellen, von denen der letztere – mit Hans Blumenberg gesprochen – als bedeutsam zu erachten ist (2). Da eine narratologische Untersuchung, die nach den in einem biografischen Text durchscheinenden Selbsterzählungen eines Schriftstellers fragt, sich darauf verlassen muss, dass der Text trotz aller literarischen Bearbeitung Aussagen auf die wirkliche Person „hinter" dem Werk zulässt, diskutiere ich anschliessend, in welchem Masse Arbeit und Struktur einerseits als Blog und Tagebuch, andererseits als Roman zu erach6 Vgl. Albert CAMUS: Der Mythos des Sisyphos. Reinbek bei Hamburg 142012, S. 67f. 3 ten ist (3). Mithilfe von Nietzsche, Dostojewski und Camus werde ich daraufhin näher auf die weltanschaulichen Narrative des Nihilismus eingehen und ausführen, dass sich das nihilistische bzw. absurde Bewusstsein von kollektiven Erzählungen weitgehend distanziert und die Souveränität des Individuums hervorhebt (4), durch seinen Atheismus eine fundamentale Kritik des religiösen Glaubens betreibt (5) sowie in der Anerkennung von existenzieller Kontingenz die Kategorien von Sinn und Sinnhaftigkeit radikal in Frage stellt (6). In meiner Analyse von Arbeit und Struktur werde ich vor diesem weltanschaulichen Hintergrund dann zunächst diejenigen Weltmythen ausfindig zu machen versuchen, die für die Bejahung des Lebens eintreten und Herrndorf in metaphysischer Hinsicht einen Ort in der Welt garantieren (7), bevor ich mich jenen Narrativen und Umständen zuwende, die seinen Willen zur Lebendigkeit schmälern und seinen Suizid bejahen (8). Da es sich bei Arbeit und Struktur – bedauernswerterweise, wie man fast zu sagen geneigt ist – nicht ausschliesslich um ein literarisches Werk handelt, sondern unbestritten auch um einen Text, der die tatsächliche Selbsttötung seines Autors bezeugt, werde ich Herrndorfs Blog abschliessend in die Gattung des Abschiedsbriefes einordnen und diskutieren, anhand welcher Kriterien Abschiedsbriefe im Allgemeinen beschrieben werden können (9) und ob sich diese Kriterien auf Arbeit und Struktur übertragen lassen (10). Da mein Interesse an Herrndorf nicht primär seinem Suizid gilt, sondern der Frage, wie er selbst diesen vor dem Hintergrund seiner absurden Weltauffassung legitimiert, werde ich soziologische und psychopathologische Perspektiven auf suizidales Verhalten nicht näher thematisieren.7 Auch dann, wenn die „Freiheit" zum Freitod sehr selten gegeben ist, sollte Herrndorfs selbstgewähltes Lebensende als ein Ereignis betrachtet werden, das sich ausserhalb kollektiver und pathologischer Zusammenhänge vollzieht und in das Selbstbestimmungsstreben einer Vielzahl von Personen vor ihm einreiht.8 Zuletzt zwingt der vollendete Suizid eines Menschen uns Lebende zu einer einzigen Wahl: Entweder anzunehmen, dass die Verstorbenen zum Zeitpunkt ihres Todes unfrei und unglücklich waren – oder aber vollends mit ihrem Selbstbild im Einklang standen und durch den tödlichen Akt einlösten, wer sie sein wollten und gewesen sind. 7 Ich verweise lediglich in diesem Zusammenhang auf Émile Durkheim, der mit seinem 1897 erschienenen Le suicide eine der ersten Sozialstudien zum Suizid sowie ein Schlüsselwerk der modernen Soziologie vorgelegt hat, vgl. Ursula BAUMANN: Selbsttötung und die moralische Krise der Moderne. Durkheim und seine Zeitgenossen. In: Andreas BÄHR/ Hans MEDICK (Hg.): Sterben von eigener Hand. Selbsttötung als kulturelle Praxis. Köln u.a. 2005, S. 115–136, 117ff. 8 Vgl. etwa Jean AMÉRY: Hand an sich legen. Diskurs über den Freitod. Stuttgart 1976. 4 II Narrative Identität und Bedeutsamkeit 1) Personale Identität und Narrativität Wer im Alltag auf den Begriff der „Identität" zu sprechen kommt, gebraucht ihn heutzutage überwiegend für die – neutrale wie auch wertende – Beschreibung von menschlichen Individuen und Gemeinschaften, bezieht sich also in erster Linie auf den Aspekt der Identität einer Person innerhalb eines spezifischen kulturellen Kontextes. Bemerkenswerterweise setzt unser Alltagsverständnis von personaler Identität dabei voraus, dass eine Person nicht ständig mit sich gleich bleiben muss, damit sie von anderen noch als dieselbe erkannt wird – dass Mitsich-selbst-identisch-sein folglich weniger für einen Aussenstehenden, sondern nur für mich selbst eine Geltung besitzt. Vor diesem Hintergrund lässt sich personale Identität zunächst als eine Menge von mannigfaltigen Selbstzuschreibungen auffassen, die mit der Zeit veränderbar ist und mithilfe derer ich mich als jene Person definiere, die ich bin.9 Die Tatsache, dass wir in manchen Zusammenhängen auch von „Identitätskrisen" sprechen können, zeigt an, dass Identität unserer kulturellen Vorstellung nach keine ständige Eigenschaft einer Person ist, sondern unter Umständen auch fraglich und in Zweifel gezogen werden kann. So intuitiv einleuchtend uns diese Verwendungsweise gegenwärtig vorkommen mag, so unverständlich und überraschend erscheint sie, wenn man einen Blick in die Philosophiegeschichte wagt, in der das Nachdenken über Identität seinen Ursprung hat. Seit der griechischen Antike ist Identität in wenigstens zweierlei Hinsicht problematisiert worden. Zum einen wurden ontologische Überlegungen darüber angestellt, auf welche Weise ein Objekt überhaupt als ein konkretes Einzelnes identifizierbar wird. Aristoteles hatte dazu drei Kategorien möglicher Identitätsverhältnisse eingeführt, um die konkrete Einmaligkeit eines Dinges mit Bezug auf seine materielle Anzahl („numerisch"), sein Wesen („eidetisch") und seine Gattungszugehörigkeit („generisch") bestimmen zu können.10 Wichtig ist hierbei, dass einem Ding nur insoweit Identität zukommen kann, als es mit der Allgemeinheit identisch und durch sie typisierbar ist, sich also nicht wesensmässig von ihr unterscheidet: „Ist etwas ein Einzelnes, so ist ihm Identität zuzusprechen. Es hat keinen Sinn zu sagen, dass es Identität er9 In diesem Sinne lässt sich auch kollektive Identität als veränderbare Menge von Selbstzuschreibungen begreifen, mit dem einzigen Unterschied, dass durch die jeweilige kulturelle oder religiöse Tradition eine In stanz mitzudenken ist, die wesentlich das Moment des Gleichbleibens forciert und daher mit Prozessen der Veränderung in einer radikal anderen Weise verfährt als personale Identität. Bei meiner Diskussion des Mythos im nächsten Abschnitt sowie der Auseinandersetzung mit Nietzsches Geschichtsund Traditionskritik in Abschnitt 4 werde ich etwas näher darauf eingehen können. 10 Vgl. Niko STROBACH: tauton [Art.]. In: Christoph HORN/ Christof RAPP (Hg.): Wörterbuch der antiken Philosophie. München 22008, S. 422. 5 wirbt oder verliert."11 Ein paradigmatisches Beispiel für diesen Begriff der Identität bildet etwa die Klassifizierung von Lebewesen innerhalb der Biologie, wodurch ein erster Hinweis darauf gegeben ist, dass personale und kollektive Identität im heutigen Verständnis niemals nur durch Selbstzuschreibung, sondern immer auch schon durch die – teils zutreffende, teils durch Vorurteile belastete – Fremdzuschreibung von spezifischen Eigenschaften und den Konsequenzen daraus („Die sind so und so, deshalb gehören die nicht zu uns") konstituiert ist. Identität in diesem Sinne als Identifizierbarkeit von konkreten Entitäten aufzufassen, führt fast zwingend zu der Frage, unter welchen Bedingungen bestimmte Objekte oder Lebewesen mit Rücksicht auf räumliche und zeitliche Veränderungen als ein und dasselbe erkennbar bleiben. Das Problem der Persistenz diachroner Identität, also das Fortdauern von identifizierbarer „Selbigkeit" durch die Zeit, bildet daher den zweiten wichtigen Gegenstand des philosophischen Identitäts-Diskurses seit der Antike und dauert bis heute an.12 Die traditionelle philosophische Verwendung des Begriffes hebt also vor allem die Bedeutungsebenen von „objektiver Bestimmbarkeit" und „zeitlicher Kontinuität" hervor – der Aspekt der subjektiven Selbstzuschreibung aber, der für die moderne Auffassung von Identität so bezeichnend ist, fehlt. Eine erste Annäherung an den heute üblichen Wortgebrauch taucht im Jahre 1690 auf, als John Locke seinen Versuch über den menschlichen Verstand veröffentlicht.13 Darin versucht Locke aufzuzeigen, dass die subjektive Identifikation mit dem religio-kulturellen Kontext, in den ich hineingeboren bin, sich nicht durch eine einmal gesetzte Starrheit auszeichnet, sondern in aufklärerischer Absicht modifiziert werden kann, indem ich mich selbst von diesem ursprünglichen Kontext entferne und mir eine neue, mich selbst definierende Selbstbeschreibung zulege. Von Charles Taylor stammt diesbezüglich der Begriff des „punktförmigen Selbst", worunter die eigene radikale „Demontage" zu verstehen ist, die in die vernünftige „Neumontage unseres Weltbilds" münden soll.14 Locke zufolge können und müssen wir unser 11 Dieter HENRICH: ,Identität – Begriffe, Probleme, Grenzen. In: Odo MARQUARD/ Karlheinz STIERLE (Hg.): Identität (Poetik und Hermeneutik VIII). München 1979, S. 133–186, 135. 12 Einen ersten Überblick über den gegenwärtigen Diskussionsstand bietet Eric T. OLSON: Personal Identity [Art.]. In: Edward N. ZALTA (ed.): The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2016 Edition), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2016/entries/identity-personal/> (01.02.2017). Zu formalen, semantischen und prädikatenlogischen Überlegungen zum Identitätsbegriff vgl. HENRICH: ,Identität , S. 141–174. 13 Das massgebende Kapitel Über Identität und Verschiedenheit wird allerdings erst in der zweiten Auflage von 1694 publiziert, vgl. die redaktionelle Anmerkung bei John LOCKE: Versuch über den menschlichen Verstand, Bd. 1. Hrsg. von Reinhard BRANDT. Hamburg 2006, S. 410. René Descartes hatte zwar schon vor Locke über die Bedingungen von „Selbstbewusstsein" nachgedacht, aber bei ihm haben „Person" und „Identität" noch keine so prominente Bedeutung, vgl. Benjamin JÖRISSEN: Identität und Selbst. Systematische, begriffsgeschichtliche und kritische Aspekte. Berlin 2000, S. 30ff. Erst Locke zieht die beiden Begriffe zum neuzeitlichen Problem personaler Identität zusammen, vgl. Dieter TEICHERT: Personen und Identitäten. Berlin/ New York 2000, S. 130–142. 14 Charles TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst. Die Entstehung der neuzeitlichen Identität. Frankfurt a.M. 82012, S. 302. 6 Selbst soweit umgestalten, dass wir der Zufälligkeit unserer religio-kulturellen Prägung entkommen und sie keine Macht mehr über uns besitzt – die jeweiligen Beschreibungen der eigenen Selbstauffassung gewinnen damit ein grundsätzlich dynamisches Moment. In diesem Sinne ist Lockes Selbstbegriff dem modernen Identitätsbegriff schon sehr ähnlich, obgleich in seiner Theorie der Aspekt der Fremdzuschreibung weitgehend unberücksichtigt bleibt. Während in der Romantik und dem Deutschen Idealismus „Identität" noch überwiegend im Kontext des rationalen und empfindsamen Subjektivismus thematisiert wird,15 kann sie erst mit dem Aufkommen der modernen Soziologie – beispielsweise durch Émile Durkheim und Max Weber – unter gesellschaftlichen Fragestellungen diskutiert werden, sodass mit dem Begriff immer mehr ein unauflösliches Geflecht von Selbstund Fremdzuschreibungen erfasst wird. Besonderen Einfluss übt dabei die sozialpsychologische Theorie von George Herbert Mead aus, für den „unter ,Identität dasjenige konstante Muster von Verhalten und Selbstinterpretationen dieses Verhaltens verstanden werden kann, welches das definitive Resultat der Entwicklung sprachfähiger Wesen"16 in der entsprechenden Sprachgemeinschaft ist. Anders als der philosophische Begriff, der Identität dem einzelnen Ding oder Lebewesen immer schon zuspricht, verweist der soziologische somit auf den Umstand, dass personale und kollektive Identitäten zuallererst erworben und ausgebildet werden. Wenn wir heute von „Identität" in dem Sinne sprechen, den ich eingangs paraphrasiert habe, dann beziehen wir uns überwiegend auf diesen sozialpsychologischen und soziologischen Hintergrund. Da neben derjenigen von Mead viele weitere Theorien personale Identität als das Ergebnis langwieriger komplexer Prozesse hervorheben (z.B. Erikson, Habermas und Loevinger), setzt sich in den 90er Jahren schliesslich der Gedanke durch, Identität gerade aufgrund ihrer jeweiligen Vorläufigkeit und Unabgeschlossenheit selbst als diesen Prozess zu begreifen.17 Diese Entwicklung von einem punktuellen Identitätsbegriff hin zu einem durchgängig „transitorischen" ist durch jene Ansätze begünstigt worden, die sich auf die variablen Aspekte des Er15 Vgl. hierzu TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 619–679. In diesem Zusammenhang ist auch auf den weitläufigen Diskurs über „Selbstbewusstsein" und „Selbstverständnis" hinzuweisen, vgl. etwa Claus LANGBEHN: Vom Selbstbewusstsein zum Selbstverständnis. Kant und die Philosophie der Wahrnehmung. Paderborn 2012. 16 HENRICH: ,Identität , S. 134. Zusammen mit Henrich macht Odo Marquard darauf aufmerksam, dass der ursprünglich von Mead verwendete Terminus „self" durch den Einfluss von Eriksons Modell der psychosozialen Entwicklung im deutschen Sprachraum zunächst irreführend als „Identität" übersetzt wird, vgl. Odo MARQUARD: Identität: Schwundtelos und Mini-Essenz – Bemerkungen zu einer Genealogie einer aktuellen Diskussion. In: MARQUARD/ STIERLE: Identität, S. 347–369, 349. Das Beispiel von Erikson zeigt dabei, wie der Identitätsbegriff als „Ich-Identität" aus der psychoanalytisch geprägten Psychologie langsam in den soziologischen Diskurs eingeht und dort unter gesellschaftstheoretischen Gesichtspunkten weiterentwickelt wird. 17 Vgl. Joachim RENN/ Jürgen STRAUB: Transitorische Identität. Der Prozesscharakter moderner personaler Selbstverhältnisse, in: dies. (Hg.): Transitorische Identität. Der Prozesscharakter des modernen Selbst. Frankfurt a.M. 2002, S. 10–31, 13. 7 zählens beziehen und deshalb unter dem Schlagwort der narrativen Identitätstheorien zusammengefasst werden können. Die Kategorien des Narrativen und der Narrativität werden etwa seit den 80er Jahren in vielen humanund geisteswissenschaftlichen Disziplinen verstärkt diskutiert und sind heute Bestandteil eines weit verzweigten interdisziplinären Diskurses. „Erzählungen" referieren seitdem nicht mehr nur ausschliesslich auf den Bereich der Literatur, sondern haben in das feste Analyserepertoire empirisch-biografischer sowie theoretischer Identitätsforschung Eingang gefunden.18 Für meine anstehende Auseinandersetzung mit Herrndorfs Arbeit und Struktur sind primär diejenigen Ansätze von Interesse, die personale Identität im Lockeschen Sinne als Selbstauslegung begreifen und dabei das erzählende Moment in den Vordergrund stellen. Vor allem Alasdair MacIntyre, Paul Ricoeur und Charles Taylor haben diese im weitesten Sinne hermeneutische Auffassung narrativer Identität vertreten, die ich im Folgenden umreisse.19 Dass personale Identität überhaupt etwas mit Erzählen zu tun hat, wird bereits an der Wiedergabe der eigenen Lebensgeschichte deutlich: Wenn wir auf biografische Fragen antworten, manifestiert sich unser biografisches Gedächtnis stets in einer Erzählung, die gerade aufgrund ihrer strukturellen Offenheit sowohl darstellen kann, wer wir zu bestimmten Zeitpunkten waren, als auch, wer wir heute sind. Dass wir dabei nicht immer alles vollständig wiedergeben, sondern umgekehrt stark selektiv und adressatenorientiert vorgehen, ist nach wie vor ein bedeutendes Problem des biografischen Interviews: „Wer (von) sich selbst erzählt, tut (beinahe immer) mehr und (meistens) anderes, als in reflexiver Einstellung belastbare Beschreibungen und Erklärungen seines Lebens zu liefern."20 In ihrer Aufbereitung für einen Zuhörer ist Lebensgeschichte also oftmals eine Sache der nachträglichen Interpretation, die neben der Artikulation der eigenen Identität auch der interessengeleiteten Selbstinszenierung dienen kann.21 Als aktuale Interpretation von Lebensumständen hingegen kann die Umformulierung der eigenen Lebensgeschichte dabei helfen, schwer einzuordnende Ereignisse und Krisensituatio18 Vgl. beispielsweise Wolfgang KRAUS: Das erzählte Selbst. Die narrative Konstruktion von Identität in der Spätmoderne. Pfaffenweiler 1996, S. 159–246. 19 Ein ähnlicher Ansatz, Narrativität als Grundkategorie der personalen Selbstauffassung herauszustellen, findet sich bei Wilhelm Schapp, der bereits in den 1950er Jahren versucht hatte, das unhintergehbare „Verstricktsein" in Geschichten als Gegenbegriff zum damals noch vorherrschenden Begriff der Identität als fertiges Resultat zu etablieren, vgl. Stefanie HAAS: Kein Selbst ohne Geschichten. Wilhelm Schapps Geschichtenphilosophie und Paul Ricoeurs Überlegungen zur narrativen Identität. Hildesheim u.a. 2002, S. 17–60. 20 Jürgen STRAUB: Kann ich mich selbst erzählen – und dabei erkennen? Prinzipien und Perspektiven einer Psychologie des Homo narrator. In: Alexandra STROHMAIER (Hg.): Kultur – Wissen – Narration. Perspektiven transdisziplinärer Erzählforschung für die Kulturwissenschaften. Bielefeld 2013, S. 75–144, 108. Vgl. dazu auch Gabriele ROSENTHAL: Reconstruction of Life Stories. Principles of Selection in Generating Stories for Narrative Biographical Interviews. In: Ruthellen JOSSELSON/ Amia LIEBLICH (ed.): The Narrative Study of Lives, Volume 1. Newbury Park 1993, pp. 59–91. 21 Vgl. Ramón REICHERT: ,Biografiearbeit und ,Selbstnarration in den Sozialen Medien des Web 2.0. In: STROHMAIER: Kultur – Wissen – Narration, S. 511–535, 514f. 8 nen in den bisherigen Erfahrungshorizont zu integrieren und somit ihrer existenziellen Wucht zu berauben. Die narrative und in diesem Sinne flexible Auslegung der eigenen Identität hat dann einen grossen Anteil daran, Brüche und Zäsuren als Kontinuitäten zu erfahren und auf diese Weise aushaltbar werden zu lassen, was sonst nicht auszuhalten ist: „Personale Identität scheint in keinem anderen Medium ,besser zum Ausdruck zu gelangen als eben in derartigen, womöglich bis zum erwarteten oder bevorstehenden Lebensende fortlaufenden und dabei kontinuierlich revidierbaren und tatsächlich oft genug revisionsbedürftigen Narrativen."22 Identität lässt sich so als ein einziges Bollwerk gegen die Gefahr existenzieller Kontingenz (wie Leid, Krankheit und Tod) auffassen, das Unverständlichkeiten durch die Einbindung in den „Lebensplot" neutralisiert und beständig neue (Selbst-)Verständlichkeiten hervorbringt.23 Bisher habe ich versucht, die Narrativität personaler Identität unabhängig von derjenigen kollektiver Identität darzustellen, aber in Bezug zur Kontingenzbewältigung lassen sich individuelle Erzählmechanismen zunächst nicht ohne die gleichzeitige Berücksichtigung des kulturellen Kontextes nachvollziehen. Festzuhalten bleibt, dass die narrative Auffassung einer Prozess-Identität gegenüber der „klassischen" Resultat-Identität zwei entscheidende Vorteile hat: Durch ihren erzähltheoretischen Hintergrund kann sie einerseits die Problematik der lebensgeschichtlichen Kontinuität (sich stets als dieselbe Person zu begreifen) sowie der lebensweltlichen Kohärenz (die Frage nach der „Stimmigkeit" biografischer Erzählungen mit den gesellschaftlichen Rahmenerzählungen) in differenzierter Weise lösen,24 während sie andererseits mit textund erzählanalytischen Verfahren operieren kann, um – mit einem fast schon kanonisch gewordenen Herrndorf-Zitat – „dem Leben wie einem Roman zu Leibe zu rücken" (AuS 292). Da in meiner Beschäftigung mit Arbeit und Struktur nun aber nicht primär die Kategorie der Erzählung, sondern – wie es der Titel bereits ankündigt – der wesensverwandte Mythos im Vordergrund steht, wende ich mich jetzt den Gemeinsamkeiten von narrativen Identitätstheorien und kulturanthropologischen Theorien über kollektive Mythen zu. 22 STRAUB: Kann ich mich selbst erzählen, S. 102. 23 Vgl. Ralf KONERSMANN: Die Unruhe der Welt. Frankfurt a.M. 42015, S. 298. 24 Vgl. Heribert TOMMEK/ Christian STELTZ: Vom Ich erzählen. Identitätsnarrative in der Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts. In: dies. (Hg.): Vom Ich erzählen. Identitätsnarrative in der Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts. Frankfurt a.M. u.a. 2016, S. 7–26, 17, sowie Vera NÜNNING: Erzählen und Identität. Die Bedeutung des Erzählens im Schnittfeld zwischen kulturwissenschaftlicher Narratologie und Psychologie. In: STROHMAIER: Kultur – Wissen – Narration, S. 145–169, 157–163. 9 2) Erzählung, Mythos und Bedeutsamkeit Im vorigen Abschnitt habe ich herauszustellen versucht, inwiefern „Selbst-Geschichten"25 für die eigene personale Identität unabdingbar sind. Dass Erzählungen darüber hinaus aber auch für die kollektive Identität ein konstitutives Element bilden, scheint für die modernen Kulturwissenschaften eine noch vergleichsweise junge Einsicht zu sein26 – das vielfältige Nachdenken über den Mythos hat sich diese Erkenntnis hingegen schon früh zu eigen gemacht. Tatsächlich kann es überraschen, wie wenig man sich im Umfeld der narrativen Identitätstheorien bisher mit dem Mythos-Diskurs des 20. Jahrhunderts auseinandergesetzt hat – zumal die Hinweise auf die Narrativität des Mythos ja hinreichend gegeben sind.27 In seiner griechischen Urspungsbedeutung zunächst noch zusammen mit λόγος (lógos) das „Wort" bezeichnend, wird der μῦθος durch die griechische Philosophie zunehmend als „unwahre Erzählung"28 aufgefasst und durch den diskursiven Logos kontrastiert. Diese Konnotation als „Irrglaube" oder „Hirngespinst" setzt sich bis in unseren heutigen alltagssprachlichen Gebrauch fort29 und weist neben der Vielzahl an theoretischen Vereinnahmungen auf die Notwendigkeit eines Definitionsversuches hin, damit sich überhaupt noch mit der Worthülse „Mythos" arbeiten lässt. Als terminus technicus gehört der Begriff primär ins feste Vokabular der Ethnologie. In kulturanthropologischen Zusammenhängen beschreibt der Mythos dabei zunächst eine „wichtige Dimension der Lebenswelt"30 bestimmter indigener und – in einen historischen Kontext versetzt – auch vormoderner, „archaischer" Kulturen, für die es weder möglich noch notwendig war, in ihrer Weltdeutung auf naturwissenschaftliche Verfahren zurückzugreifen. Die Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften bildet nämlich zugleich die Geschichte der tiefgreifenden Transformation mythischer Zusammenhänge,31 welche die Mythenforschung bis etwa 1950 einseitig als Entwicklung „vom Mythos zum Logos" (Wilhelm Nestle) ausgelegt hatte. Die Lossagung von der eurozentrischen Geringschätzung „primitiver" Mythologien führt an25 STRAUB: Kann ich mich selbst erzählen, S. 102. 26 Vgl. Ansgar NÜNNING: Wie Erzählungen Kulturen erzeugen. Prämissen, Konzepte und Perspektiven für eine kulturwissenschaftliche Narratologie. In: STROHMAIER: Kultur – Wissen – Narration, S. 15–53, 15f. 27 Vgl. etwa Jürgen MOHN: Mythostheorien. Eine religionswissenschaftliche Untersuchung zu Mythos und Interkulturalität. München 1998, S. 135–158, der sich dort auch mit Schapp befasst, sowie Robert A. SEGAL: Mythos. Eine kleine Einführung. Stuttgart 2007, S. 11f. 28 Vgl. Christoph JAMME: Einführung in die Philosophie des Mythos. Neuzeit und Gegenwart, Bd. 2. Darmstadt 1991, S. 1. 29 Vgl. SEGAL: Mythos, S. 13f. 30 Elke MADER: Anthropologie der Mythen. Wien 2008, S. 8. 31 Taucht der Mythos in archaischen Gesellschaften noch überwiegend in Form von Naturmythen auf, so entwickeln sich etwa ab 4000 v. Chr. zeitgleich zu den Hochmythologien Mesopotamiens und Ägyptens auch die Anfänge naturwissenschaftlich-analytischen Denkens, vgl. Olaf BREIDBACH: Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften. Die Antike, Bd. 1. Heidelberg 2015, S. 29–83. 10 schliessend dazu, dass man sich von der diskriminierenden Begrifflichkeit verabschiedet und Mythen sukzessive auch im Herzen der Moderne ausmacht und analysiert.32 Konkret manifestiert sich der archaische Mythos in Form von mündlich überlieferten Erzählungen, die die verschiedensten Bereiche des kulturellen (beispielsweise der Ertrag einer Ernte oder die Wahl eines neuen Oberhauptes) und des natürlichen Lebens (wie etwa Geburt und Tod von Stammesangehörigen sowie die jahreszeitlichen Veränderungen der Natur) unter die Obhut von Gottheiten stellen, welche durch die ihnen gewidmeten Rituale „bei Laune" zu halten sind. Für die Auseinandersetzung mit modernen Mythen hatte vor allem Roland Barthes den Mythos als „ein System der Kommunikation" fruchtbar gemacht, das „im Hinblick auf eine entsprechende Botschaft schon bearbeitet ist."33 Mit Hans Blumenberg lässt sich diese „Botschaft" der frühen Mythologien vornehmlich darin erblicken, dass man die Gewalt der Götter nicht zu fürchten braucht, weil sie sich durch aufrichtige Demut und Opfergaben besänftigen lassen können: „Der Mythos ist eine Ausdrucksform dafür, dass der Welt und den in ihr waltenden Mächten die reine Willkür nicht überlassen ist."34 Auf die modernen Mythen postindustrieller Gesellschaften übertragen, lässt sich Blumenbergs These aber auch für die Gegenwart verifizieren: So hatte etwa Jean Baudrillard herausgestellt, dass die Logik der kapitalistischen Ökonomie in ihrer Konsequenz auf Kontrolle und Aufschub des Todes abzielt, um sich an ihrer eigenen, die Naturbeherrschung vollendenden Macht zu ergötzen.35 Doch worin besteht nun die lebensweltliche Besonderheit des Mythos? Eine solche Frage kann nicht allein auf den Inhalt einzelner Mythen abzielen, sondern sucht eher die Funktion und den pragmatischen Kontext zu bestimmen, in dem das Mythische zu finden ist. Als früheste Form einer ganzheitlichen Weltdeutung (Ernst Cassirer hat diesbezüglich den Begriff der „symbolischen Form" geprägt) dient der Mythos insbesondere zwei Dingen: Der Herstellung eines sozialen Kontextes und der Konstitution von konkreter, erfahrbarer Wirklichkeit. Im Hinblick auf seinen kulturellen Aspekt übernimmt der Mythos sowohl hierarchisierende, normative als auch emotionenbildende Funktionen, die in ihrer Gesamtheit den Zusammenhalt und das Wir-Gefühl der Gruppe stärken.36 Spätestens an dieser Stelle können menschliche Kollektive als „Erzählgemeinschaften"37 begriffen werden, die sich durch ihre jeweils eigenen Narrative von anderen Gemeinschaften unterscheiden. Es lässt sich deshalb durchaus sagen, 32 Vgl. die französische Erstausgabe (1957) von Roland BARTHES: Mythen des Alltags. Berlin 2012. 33 BARTHES: Mythen des Alltags, S. 251ff. 34 Hans BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos. Frankfurt a.M. 2006, S. 50. 35 Vgl. Jean BAUDRILLARD: Der symbolische Tausch und der Tod. Berlin 2011, S. 64–91. 36 Anton GRABNER-HAIDER: Strukturen des Mythos. Theorie einer Lebenswelt. Frankfurt a.M. u.a. 1989, S. 294ff. 37 Wolfgang MÜLLER-FUNK: Die Kultur und ihre Narrative. Eine Einführung. Wien/ New York 22008, S. 14. 11 dass man nicht nur in eine bestimmte Kultur, sondern auch in einen bestimmten Kollektivmythos – also die diese Kultur definierenden Narrative – „hineingeboren" wird und, wie MacIntyre es formuliert, ihn „ererbt".38 Neben der Garantie dafür, dass Handlungen anderer Personen durch die jeweilige narrative Kontextualisierung verständlich bleiben,39 umfasst der Kollektivmythos dabei auch die Gesamtheit aller zulässigen biografischen Skripte und Erzählungen, die von den durch ihn definierten Individuen realisiert werden können. Anders gesagt: Der Kollektivmythos einer Gesellschaft bestimmt alle überhaupt möglichen Ausprägungen personaler Identität. Solange der kollektivmythische Rahmen dabei weitgehend intakt ist, habe ich keinen lebensweltlichen Grund, an der Stimmigkeit meiner Identität oder meines Selbst zu zweifeln.40 Die Diagnosen des „Identitätsverlustes" und der damit verbundenen „Sinnsuche" werden, wie eingangs erwähnt, vielmehr erst durch die Moderne und der mit ihr verbundenen Auflösung der grossen metaphysischen Narrative zu einem greifbaren Problem.41 Mit dem Hinweis auf die Brüchigkeit moderner Selbstund Weltkonzepte gelange ich schliesslich zur zweiten wichtigen Funktion des Mythos. Es wurde zuvor bereits angemerkt, dass archaische Mythen die empirisch beobachtbaren Abläufe im kulturellen Zusammenleben und der Natur unter einer variablen Menge von Gottheiten aufteilen, um diese getrennt voneinander ansprechen zu können. Das Vorhandensein eines polytheistischen Pantheons ist nun selbst aber nur die Konsequenz eines Mechanismus, der dieser Projektion von Wünschen und Hoffnungen auf verschiedene Gottheiten vorgelagert ist: Denn der Götterkanon selbst ist bereits eine Ordnungsleistung, die aus roher, chaotischer Wirklichkeit überhaupt erst eine ansprechbare Welt erschafft und beispielsweise in den jeweiligen Schöpfungsmythen artikuliert wird. Im Gegensatz zum Unförmigen des „Absolutismus der Wirklichkeit"42 – so Blumenbergs berühmte Formel – ist selbst noch dessen Verformung zu einer blutrünstigen Gottheit, der alles obliegt und deren Macht später auf viele Götter verteilt wird,43 eine legitime Überlebensstrategie: Der Mythos nimmt den Dingen ihren Schrecken, indem er eine Geschichte davon erzählt, wie sie zu ihrem Ort gekommen sind. Diese Fähigkeit, das kontingent Unvorhersehbare auf 38 Vgl. Alasdair MACINTYRE: Der Verlust der Tugend. Zur moralischen Krise der Gegenwart. Frankfurt a.M. 62014, S. 295f. 39 Vgl. MACINTYRE: Verlust der Tugend, S. 275–281. MacIntyre führt dort aus, inwiefern die soziale Passung und Verständlichkeit einer Handlung stets das Vorhandensein von Rahmenund Binnenerzählungen voraussetzt, wodurch die zutreffende Interpretation einer Absicht wesentlich vom Handlungskontext abhängig ist. 40 Descartes setzt zu seinen Meditationes nicht aus lebensweltlichen, sondern aus theoretisch begründeten Zweifeln an. In seinen Schriften gelangt daher nicht primär eine Existenzkrise, sondern vornehmlich eine Erkenntniskrise zum Ausdruck, vgl. TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 263f. 41 Vgl. ebd., S. 42f. 42 Vgl. BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 9–39. 43 Zur chthonischen Muttergöttin vgl. Ken WILBER: Halbzeit der Evolution. Der Mensch auf dem Weg vom animalischen zum kosmischen Bewusstsein. Frankfurt a.M. 2009, S. 152ff. 12 Distanz zu halten bzw. immer schon zu Formen verarbeitet und versprachlicht zu haben, die sich bewältigen lassen, bezeichnet Blumenberg schliesslich als Bedeutsamkeit.44 Kollektive Mythen ordnen also nicht nur das soziale Leben einer Gemeinschaft, sondern sorgen durch ihre ontologische Entscheidungskraft auch und zuallererst für die Verfügbarkeit von „Welt". In genau diesem Sinne stellen sie keine fabulierten Unwahrheiten dar, deren Falschheit durch die modernen Naturwissenschaften bewiesen werden müsste, sondern sind für diejenigen, die sie erzählen, ein wesentlicher und notwendiger Bestandteil der eigenen kollektiven wie individuellen Lebensgeschichte. Dieser Aspekt wird auch in dem von Jürgen Mohn unternommenen und an Mircea Eliade angelehnten Definitionsversuch deutlich: Ein Phänomen kann Mythos genannt werden, wenn es kreativ und narrativ eine Welt konstituiert [...], deren ontologischer Aufbau Weltorientierung leistet [...], es durch seine Kenntnis in pädagogischen Prozessen vermittelt wird, so dass es handlungsleitend eine existentielle Notwendigkeit für den Menschen darstellt.45 Die Affirmation mythischer Weltgarantien fordert andererseits natürlich die Frage heraus, wann Mythen wichtig sind und Beachtung verdienen, und wann sie aufgrund gefährlicher Komponenten widerlegt gehören.46 Meine These lautet nun – und die Analyse von Arbeit und Struktur soll diese These stützen –, dass überall dort, wo es um die Konstitution und Aufrechterhaltung der konkreten individuellen Existenz geht, Mythos in einem radikalen Sinne unabkömmlich ist. Denn während wir vorübergehend oder auch längerfristig das Fehlen kollektiver Zusammenhänge (und damit das Fehlen eines konkreten Ortes anderer Personen) aushalten können, stellt der ständige Verlust unseres eigenen weltlichen Ortes einen Mangel dar, der in keiner Weise mehr ertragbar ist. Aus diesem Grund läuft meine These darauf hinaus, dass wir unter Umständen zwar auf den Kollektivmythos verzichten können, nicht aber auf den Weltmythos, der davon erzählt, wie wir selbst zu unserem jeweiligen Platz in der „Welt" gekommen sind und der daher wesentlich mit unserer eigenen Selbstbeschreibung und Identität zu tun hat. Hervorzuheben ist, dass das weltkonstituierende Moment des Mythos – bedingt durch die Dialektik kultureller Transformationsprozesse – dabei zunächst nur durch den ererbten Kollektivbezug gegeben ist, Bedeutsamkeit also einstweilen immer nur als Bestandteil von kollektiver Identität erfahren werden kann. Da individuelle Selbstbestimmung jedoch die „Distanz zur eigenen primären Selbstinterpretation"47 voraussetzt, wird diese Distanzierung für 44 Vgl. BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 68–126. 45 MOHN: Mythostheorien, S. 84f. 46 Die Unvereinbarkeit mancher politischer Mythen und Mythologien (beispielsweise des Nationalsozialismus) mit humanistischen und demokratischen Werten hat dazu beigetragen, dem Mythos insgesamt sehr kritisch gegenüberzustehen, sodass der Diskurs auch diesbezüglich lange undifferenziert geführt worden ist, vgl. JAMME: Einführung, S. 110. 47 HENRICH: ,Identität , S. 181. 13 die Einzelne umso schwieriger sein, je zwingender und ausschliesslicher sich der Kollektivmythos darstellt und je weniger er es erlaubt, die Garantie von Welt ausserhalb seiner Grenzen zu erfahren. Dass die Vorstellung einer gewissen sozialen Entfernung (selbst eine Nachbarin kann heutzutage die Rolle einer „Fremden" einnehmen) für uns keine Schwierigkeiten mehr bereitet, hängt damit zusammen, dass sich die gültigen Selbsterzählungen innerhalb der westlichen Erzählgemeinschaft vor allem seit der Aufklärung verändert haben und das Konzept zunehmender Individualisierung mittlerweile selbst zu einem Teil des Kollektivmythos moderner komplexer Gesellschaften geworden ist: „Individualisierung beruht nicht auf einer freien Entscheidung der Subjekte, sondern ist ein in sich widersprüchlicher Zwang zur vermehrten Selbstreflexion und biografischen Selbstinszenierung."48 Die Erfahrung der eigenen Individualität und Besonderheit gaukelt uns dabei vor, dass wir den Kollektivmythos ja schon längst verlassen haben müssen, obwohl wir seinen Imperativen doch eigentlich noch immer Folge leisten und nach wie vor unter dem Schutz seiner „Kontingenzbegrenzung" stehen.49 Die Heranbildung einer kritischen und moralisch-authentischen Selbstbeschreibung ist deshalb nur mit wachsendem Abstand zum ererbten Kollektivzusammenhang möglich,50 der zugleich die Entwicklung eigener Umgangsstrategien mit existenzieller Kontingenz erforderlich macht. Genau diese Distanzierung vom kollektiven Dogma kann nun durch die Einnahme einer existenziell absurden Position begünstigt werden (bzw. findet darin einen Endpunkt), die ich im weiteren Verlauf nicht nur Nietzsche, Dostojewski und Camus, sondern auch Herrndorf zuschreiben werde. 48 REICHERT: ,Biografiearbeit , S. 531. 49 Vgl. Michael MAKROPOULOS: Modernität als Kontingenzkultur. Konturen eines Konzepts. In: Gerhart v. GRAEVENITZ/ Odo MARQUARD (Hg.): Kontingenz (Poetik und Hermeneutik XVII). München 1998, S. 55–79, 71. Zur Simulation von Individualität und der „kleinsten marginalen Differenz" vgl. Jean BAUDRILLARD: Die Konsumgesellschaft. Ihre Mythen, ihre Strukturen. Berlin 2015, S. 125–142. 50 Rorty spricht diesbezüglich auch von der kulturellen sowie traditionellen Heimatund „Wurzellosigkeit" der liberalen ironischen Identität, vgl. Richard RORTY: Kontingenz, Ironie und Solidarität. Frankfurt a.M. 1989, S. 130. Unter postmodernen Fragestellungen spitzt sich diese kollektivmythische Heimatlosigkeit noch weiter zu, da sich das Subjekt – bedingt durch die Tendenzen der strukturellen Auflösung und Medialisierung, die alles zu „kommunikativem Text" werden lassen – sowohl zugleich innerhalb als auch ausserhalb eines konkreten Kollektivmythos befindet, vgl. Kurt RÖTTGERS: Identität als Ereignis. Zur Neufindung eines Begriffs. Bielefeld 2016, S. 11f. Röttgers Vorschlag, die postmoderne und „pluralisierte" Identität auf Heideggers Spuren als „Ereignis" und demgemäss als Bruch mit Kontinuitäten aufzufassen, entkommt zwar den Gefahren religio-kultureller und nationalistischer Indoktrination (vgl. S. 348ff.), kann aber aufgrund der immer schon bestehenden Öffnung für „das Fremde und den Fremden" nicht mehr erklären, wie es zum Eigenen kommt. Wenn Ich-Identität von Anfang an in der grösstmöglichen Wir-Identität besteht, dann haben zwar inhumane Traditionen und Fundamentalismen keinen Einfluss mehr – aber zugleich fehlt damit auch jedes Fundament für die Entwicklung einer Ich-Identität, weil diese das Vorhandensein eines intakten Kollektivmythos voraussetzt. Die Postmoderne selbst ist dafür ungeeignet, da ihr wesentliches Programm darauf abzielt, jedweden Kollektivmythos – und damit auch sich selbst – immer schon entkonkretisiert und entmachtet zu haben. Der Ansatz von Röttgers impliziert, dass man von Geburt an eine mündige Person sein kann und ist – und unterschlägt so den ganzen mühsamen Weg, der erst in die Mündigkeit führt. Ich muss aber erst jemand werden, bevor ich niemand sein kann und damit schliesslich zu jedermann geworden bin. 14 Im Gegensatz zum soziologischen Narrativ-Begriff, der Kontingenz überwiegend im Sinne der sich mehrenden Kontingenzproduktion unter modernen bis postmodernen Bedingungen betrachtet,51 umfasst der kulturanthropologische Mythos-Begriff immer auch schon die Semantik ihrer apriorischen Bewältigung. Da Kontingenz durch den kollektiven Weltmythos immer schon sprachlich und lebensweltlich bearbeitet ist, wird sie von den kulturell vorgegebenen Selbstnarrationen abgefangen und im besten Falle gar nicht erst als solche wahrgenommen: „Identitäten existieren nicht in Form beliebiger Modellierungen und Verfügbarkeiten [...]. Sie dürfen nicht selbst als kontingent erscheinen, sondern müssen glaubhaft machen können, mehr-als-kontingent zu sein: Erwiderungen auf die Erfahrungen von Kontingenz."52 Wenn man die Ungewissheit der eigenen Sterblichkeit als äusserste Form existenzieller Kontingenz auffasst, dann lässt sich die weltmythisch bereitgestellte Bedeutsamkeit mit Blumenberg als Fristaufschub begreifen, der sich „gegen die Unerträglichkeit der Indifferenz von Raum und Zeit"53 richtet. Zugleich ergibt sich durch den Hinweis auf die Verarbeitung von indifferenter „Weltzeit" zu erinnerter „Lebenszeit" eine Anschlussmöglichkeit an Ricoeurs narratologische Überlegungen, inwiefern „Zeit in dem Masse zur menschlichen wird, wie sie erzählerisch artikuliert wird."54 Wolfgang Herrndorf hat am eigenen Leib zu spüren bekommen, wie gleichgültig die Weltzeit gegenüber der hart zu erringenden Lebenszeit sein kann. Das Zusammenspiel seiner Lebensauffassung und seiner Erkrankung haben ihn dazu genötigt, Formen von Bedeutsamkeit zu entwickeln, die grösstenteils nicht mehr durch die Bezugnahme auf kollektive Mythen gedeckt sind. Die eingehende Untersuchung dieser spezifischen, von Herrndorf letztlich als hilfreich erachteten Formen kann eine Antwort darauf geben, inwiefern sich individuelle Weltmythen und die durch sie begründeten Bedeutsamkeiten von kollektiven unterscheiden. Die bisher angestellten narratologischen und mythentheoretischen Betrachtungen kulminieren diesbezüglich in der These, dass wir solange noch sind, wie wir erzählen – ein Befund, der nicht ganz unwichtig erscheint, wenn man sich Arbeit und Struktur zunächst aus einer gattungstheoretischen Perspektive nähert. 51 Vgl. MARQUARD: Schwundtelos und Mini-Essenz, S. 364f.; REICHERT: ,Biografiearbeit , S. 518, sowie KRAUS: Das erzählte Selbst, S. 173. 52 KONERSMANN: Unruhe, S. 297f. 53 BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 110. Vgl. hierzu auch Asha DE: Widerspruch und Widerständigkeit. Zur Darstellung und Prägung räumlicher Vollzüge personaler Identität. Berlin/ New York 2005, S. 385. 54 HAAS: Kein Selbst ohne Geschichten, S. 66. Ein von Blumenberg ausführlich behandeltes Problem besteht darin, dass sowohl durch zunehmende Technials auch Modernisierung die weltliche und die menschlich überhaupt erfahrbare Zeit immer weiter auseinanderdriften, vgl. Hans BLUMENBERG: Lebenszeit und Weltzeit. Frankfurt a.M. 1986, S. 72f. Zu Ricoeur und Blumenberg vgl. auch Philipp STOELLGER: Geschichten aus der Lebenswelt. Zum Woher und Wozu von ,Geschichte in theologischer Perspektive. In: Volker DEPKAT u.a. (Hg.): Wozu Geschichte(n)? Geschichtswissenschaft und Geschichtsphilosophie im Widerstreit. Wiesbaden 2004, S. 49–88, 66–72. 15 3) „Arbeit und Struktur" als Tagebuch, Weblog und Roman In der bisher noch überschaubaren Forschungsliteratur zu Arbeit und Struktur wurden bereits einige Überlegungen zu der aussergewöhnlichen Form und Formenvielfalt angestellt, die durch die stufenweise Internetund anschliessende Buchveröffentlichung von Herrndorfs Text entstanden ist und durch die Verarbeitung biografischer Erlebnisse noch zusätzlich verstärkt wird. Allen voran die beiden Aufsätze von Maximilian Burk und Elisabeth Michelbach55 diskutieren wesentliche Aspekte der formalen Gestaltung, deren Vielschichtigkeit das Sprechen über die Person Herrndorf vor dem Hintergrund von Arbeit und Struktur erschwert. Dass es sich bei den mit Datum versehenen Einträgen um laufend aktualisierte Notizen handelt, die als Tagebucheinträge wahrgenommen werden wollen und daher durchgängig autobiografisch zu lesen sind, ist zunächst die Vermutung einer unvoreingenommenen, naiven Rezeptionshaltung. Auf den ersten Blick könnte man daher meinen, Arbeit und Struktur berichtet episodisch und „wahrheitsgemäss" von Herrndorfs Erlebnissen zwischen dem 8. März 2010 und dem 20. August 2013 (jeweils erster und letzter datierter Eintrag), und wird sechs Tage später durch seinen Suizid am 26. August beschlossen. In diesem Sinne als autobiografischer Text aufgefasst, unterliegen jedoch alle drei Veröffentlichungsformate – zu Beginn als digitales Tagebuch und passwortgeschützte „Mitteilungsveranstaltung für Freunde und Bekannte in Echtzeit" (AuS 405), ab September 2010 als regulär einsehbares Weblog56 und schliesslich im Dezember 2013 als Buch – dem in der Forschung viel diskutierten Antagonismus von Fakt und Fiktion: Eine Autobiografie kann nämlich niemals nur die reine Wiedergabe von Lebensfakten sein, sondern unterliegt neben narrativ-biografischen auch ästhetischen Selektionsmechanismen, die sich im Widerstreit mit dem autobiografisch geäusserten Anspruch auf Faktizität befinden.57 Autobiografische Texte sind also immer auch künstlerisch geformt und verar55 Vgl. Maximilian BURK: ,dem Leben wie einem Roman zu Leibe rücken . Wolfgang Herrndorfs Blog Arbeit und Struktur. In: Annina KLAPPERT (Hg.): Wolfgang Herrndorf. Weimar 2015, S. 85–99, sowie Elisabeth MICHELBACH: ,Dem Leben wie einem Roman zu Leibe rücken . Wolfgang Herrndorfs Blog und Buch Arbeit und Struktur zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk. In: Innokentij KREKNIN/ Chantal MARQUARDT (Hg.): Das digitalisierte Subjekt. Grenzbereiche zwischen Fiktion und Alltagswirklichkeit. Sonderausgabe # 1 von Textpraxis. Digitales Journal für Philologie 13 (2/2016), S. 107–129, URL = <http://www.uni-muenster.de/textpraxis/elisabeth-michelbach-wolfgang-herrndorfs-arbeit-und-struktur>, DOI : http://dx.doi.org/10.17879/34279487622 (14.02.2017). 56 Als Web-Log („Internet-Tagebuch") bezeichnet man Online-Journale, die im weitesten Sinne private Inhalte behandeln und der Öffentlichkeit digital zur Verfügung stehen. In den 1990er Jahren entstanden, ist das Bloggen heutzutage Bestandteil einer international vernetzten Szene und zu einer wichtigen Schreibund Kommunikationspraxis avanciert, vgl. Elisabeth AUGUSTIN: BlogLife. Zur Bewältigung von Lebensereignissen in Weblogs. Bielefeld 2015, S. 75–124. 57 Vgl. Ingrid AICHINGER: Probleme der Autobiographie als Sprachkunstwerk. In: Günter NIGGL (Hg.): Die Autobiographie. Zu Form und Geschichte einer literarischen Gattung. Darmstadt 1989, S. 170–199, 186f. 16 beitet, sie leben von der Spannung zwischen historischem Dokument und literarischem Erzeugnis – und zwar umso mehr, je stärker sie selbst als Literatur beabsichtigt sind. Dass Herrndorf Arbeit und Struktur tatsächlich als literarisches Werk für die Öffentlichkeit konzipiert und nicht lediglich als „Taktgeber seines Alltags, Ort der Selbstreflexion und Sammelstelle für Informationen und Rechercheergebnisse"58 (also als „Gebrauchstext") gesehen hat, wird an verschiedenen Stellen deutlich. So unterbrechen etwa die ungefähr im September 2010 entstandenen und unter dem Titel „Rückblende" zusammengefassten Passagen (AuS 97– 149) den tagebuchartigen Rhythmus der sonstigen Einträge und erhalten durch ein einleitendes Freud-Zitat und zwei Postskripta den Charakter einer zusammenhängenden Darstellung. Auch die im Buchanhang veröffentlichten Fragmente sprechen Michelbach zufolge dafür, dass „Herrndorf die Texte entwarf und überarbeitete, bevor er sie online stellte."59 Die 42 Kapitel korrelieren zudem mit den 42 Monaten, die Herrndorf nach seiner Diagnose noch gelebt hat. Ein weiterer Hinweis auf die Absicht literarischer Bearbeitung ist durch die Kontextualisierung von Arbeit und Struktur in das Umfeld der Krebsund Sterbeliteratur gegeben: Dreimal listet Herrndorf einschlägige Titel auf (AuS 47, 314 & 408), wobei sein eigenes Werk jeweils den Endund in gewisser Weise auch einen Kontrapunkt markiert, da es sich durch seine intendierte Nüchternheit deutlich von den anderen, eher emotional orientierten Texten unterscheidet. In seinem Versuch, sich in die Reihe von Leidensgenossen einzuordnen und zugleich von ihnen abzugrenzen, begreift Herrndorf seinen eigenen Beitrag als Ort der Inszenierung, mit der er sich als „starke Persönlichkeit" profiliert, die „sich mit dem eigenen Sterben schonungslos auseinandersetzt."60 An einer anderen Stelle unternimmt Herrndorf durch die Auflistung von Büchern, die „mich in verschiedenen Phasen meines Lebens aus unterschiedlichen Gründen am stärksten geprägt haben" (AuS 44), durch die Referenz auf Theodor Storm, Charlotte Brontë, Stendhal und Dostojewski eine Rubrizierung seines eigenen Schaffens in die Tradition des literarischen Realismus. Insgesamt zeigen laut Michelbach die „auf ganz unterschiedlichen Ebenen angesiedelten Beispiele [...], wie Herrndorf sich als Autor-Figur in seinem Text inszeniert, sich selbst im Kreis kanonischer Autoren verortet und so eine Wahrnehmung seiner Selbst als renommierte Autorenpersönlichkeit vorbereitet."61 Durch diese interessengeleitete 58 MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 107. 59 Ebd., S. 121, Anmerkung 85. 60 Ebd., S. 124. Vgl. auch BURK: Arbeit und Struktur, S. 86. 61 MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 125. Diese Inszenierungstendenzen reichen allerdings nicht bis zur Autofiktion, da sich Herrndorf als Autor nicht selbst als Teil einer Fiktionalisierung begreift, sondern seine Autorschaft lediglich durch eine starke Steuerung „in Form" bringt, vgl. Martina WAGNER-EGELHAAF: Was ist Auto(r)fiktion? In: dies. (Hg.): Auto(r)fiktion. Literarische Verfahren der Selbstkonstruktion. Bielefeld 2013, S. 7–22, 11f. 17 Gestaltung erscheint Arbeit und Struktur mithin weder als klassisches Tagebuch – da sowohl die unverstellte Intimität als auch die biografische Scham fehlen62 – noch als typisches Blog, da Herrndorf die für dieses Veröffentlichungsformat wesentliche Interaktionsmöglichkeit zwischen Usern und Autor nicht wahrnimmt.63 In Übereinstimmung mit Michelbach lässt sich daher festhalten, dass der Text in seiner Prozessualität eher den Charakter eines als Protokoll geführten Blogs, in seiner Finalität jedoch denjenigen eines abgeschlossenen literarischen Werkes inhäriert.64 Zusammengefasst resultiert aus den künstlerischen Intentionen Herrndorfs die Problematik eines korrespondenztheoretisch insuffizienten Raumes, innerhalb dessen man nicht ohne Weiteres auf die reale Person „hinter" dem Werk referieren kann. Anders als es die auf dessen Authentizität pochende Werbeund Verkaufsstrategie des Verlages unterstellt,65 lässt sich Arbeit und Struktur als zur Veröffentlichung bestimmter Text daher nicht naiv als privates Tagebuch lesen. Zu diesem Schluss gelangt auch Michelbach: „Anstelle privater Erlebnisse und intimer Gedanken dominiert die Beschreibung der Arbeit in Herrndorfs Krankheitstagebuch. Arbeit und Struktur ist das Selbstporträt des Autors als Workaholic."66 Herrndorf selbst versucht, dieser Aporie zwischen biografischem und künstlerischem Anspruch zuvorzukommen, indem er seine Bearbeitungsstrategie für die Lesenden einsehbar macht und so zumindest den Verdacht des fingierenden Schreibens von sich weist: Ich erfinde nichts, ist alles, was ich sagen kann. Ich sammle, ich ordne, ich lasse aus. Im Überschwang spontaner Selbstdramatisierung erkennbar falsch und ungenau Beschriebenes wird oft erst im Nachhinein neu beschrieben, Adjektive werden ausgetauscht, neu Erinnertes kommt hinzu. Aber nichts wird erfunden. (AuS 292) Der als Erzähler-Ich und Protagonist zum Ausdruck gelangende Wolfgang Herrndorf in Arbeit und Struktur ist also nicht zur Gänze mit dem realen Wolfgang Herrndorf deckungsgleich, aber es gibt Überschneidungen zwischen beiden Instanzen, die den Übergang von der Werkspersona zur lebendigen Person wenigstens nicht verunmöglichen. 62 Vgl. BURK: Arbeit und Struktur, S. 88, sowie Wendy J. WIENER/ George C. ROSENWALD: A Moment's Monument. The Psychology of Keeping a Diary. In: JOSSELSON/ LIEBLICH: The Narrative Study of Lives, pp. 30–58, 34. 63 Vgl. MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 117f. In ihren weiteren Ausführungen zeigt Michelbach auf, dass Herrndorf dennoch über „Mailinglisten und Foren für Hirntumorpatienten und -angehörige" in Kontakt mit seinem Publikum steht und das kommentarlose Blog auf diese Weise „keineswegs eine kommunikative Einbahnstrasse" bleibt. 64 Vgl. ebd., S. 121f. 65 Vgl. BURK: Arbeit und Struktur, S. 93. In Bezug auf die Werbemassnahmen für den im September 2010 veröffentlichten Roman Tschick echauffiert sich Herrndorf darüber, dass der Verlag ohne sein Einverständnis „Bloglink mit Psychiatrisierungseintrag als Werbemittel rumschickt" (AuS 96). Darüber hinaus übt er an anderer Stelle durch ein Zitat des Medienwissenschaftlers Harun Maye Kritik an der schon länger beobachtbaren Tendenz des Literaturbetriebs, sich vornehmlich an Persönlichkeiten und nicht mehr am Gegenstand der Literatur zu orientieren (vgl. AuS 279f.). 66 MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 123. 18 Eine vielversprechende Möglichkeit, dieses schon durch Goethes „Dichtung und Wahrheit" aufgeworfene Referenzproblem zu umgehen und der literarischen Gemachtheit des Textes Rechnung zu tragen, besteht darin, ihn als Roman aufzufassen – eine Alternative, auf die Herrndorf mit seiner Poetologie des „Zu-Leibe-Rückens" ja selbst zu sprechen kommt. Sowohl Burk als auch Michelbach halten diese Lesart für plausibel, da mehrere Aspekte auf den romanhaften Charakter von Arbeit und Struktur hinweisen: So macht Burk etwa auf die Stilisierung des Erlebten zum Romanplot sowie das Kürzel „tbc – to be continued" aufmerksam, das „in der aktiven Phase des Blogs stets unter dem aktuellsten Eintrag zu lesen ist" und dieses als eine Art Fortsetzungsroman markiert.67 Ausserdem, so schreiben Gärtner und Passig in ihrem Nachwort, habe Herrndorf das Blog als Romanersatz begriffen, falls „die Lebenszeit für einen Roman nicht mehr reichen sollte" (AuS 444). Zuletzt wird es Herrndorf durch die Gestaltung seiner biografischen Situation als Roman möglich, über seine eigene, der gnadenlosen Logik des Lebens ausgesetzten Lebensgeschichte wie über diejenige einer seiner Romanfiguren zu verfügen.68 In dieser Perspektive schliesslich erscheint Arbeit und Struktur nicht mehr nur als freiwillig entworfenes und autonomes Kunstwerk, sondern als Bestandteil einer umfassenden und unerlässlichen Coping-Strategie, die durch den Umgang mit einem „kritischen Lebensereignis"69 – also das, was ich oben als existenzielle Kontingenz bezeichnet habe – herausgefordert wird. Bemerkenswert dabei ist, dass es gerade die fiktionale Komponente des Romans zu sein scheint und nicht so sehr die faktische des Tagebuchs, die es Herrndorf erlaubt, das mitunter kräftezehrende Schreiben des Blogs, die „mühsame Verschriftlichung meiner peinlichen Existenz" (AuS 405), als hilfreiches Therapeutikum seiner Grenzsituation zu begreifen.70 Wie die bisherigen Ausführungen gezeigt haben sollten, ist die Diskussion der Gattungszugehörigkeit von Arbeit und Struktur eng mit der Frage verbunden, welche Distanz dem Autor in 67 BURK: Arbeit und Struktur, S. 86ff. & 94. 68 Vgl. MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 126, sowie BURK: Arbeit und Struktur, S. 92. 69 Der Fachbegriff des kritischen Lebensereignisses gehört in die Entwicklungssowie die Klinische Psychologie und bildet etwa seit den 1970er Jahren eine massgebliche Kategorie der empirischen und theoretischen Forschung, vgl. AUGUSTIN: BlogLife, S. 9f. 70 Bei Kafka, dessen Tagebuchpraxis grosse Parallelen zu Herrndorfs Blog aufweist, scheint das Umgekehrte der Fall zu sein: Wie Jürgen Daiber erläutert, ist dieser in seinen Tagebüchern eher auf die Faktizität radikaler Introspektion angewiesen, um „eine schonungslose Analyse der eigenen seelischen und körperlichen Befindlichkeit durch die Prozedur des Schreibens in immer neuen und sehr häufig quälenden Anläufen vorzunehmen" und sich selbst „über den performativen Akt des Erzählens das Gewand einer halbwegs stabilen personalen Identität überzustreifen", vgl. Jürgen DAIBER: ,Das Ich und sein innerer Lärm – Kafka als Tagebuchschreiber. In: TOMMEK/ STELTZ: Vom Ich erzählen, S. 85–103, 85. Mit Ricoeur wird in diesem Zusammenhang die stimmige Narration von Identität abermals als Aufgabe und Praxis von Individuen greifbar, deren versuchsweise Konstitution und Aufrechterhaltung sich gut an autobiografischen Texten nachvollziehen lassen, vgl. Paul RICOEUR: Zeit und Erzählung, Bd. 3: Die erzählte Zeit. München 1991, S. 395–400. 19 Bezug zu seinem Werk zugestanden wird. Während die naive Rezeption als Tagebuch eine weitgehende Kongruenz von Autor und Erzähler erkennen möchte, unterstellt das der Literarizität bewusste Lesen den Einfluss künstlerischer Verfahrensweisen, die genau diese Kongruenz entkräften; nimmt man hingegen Herrndorfs explizierte Poetologie ernst, rückt man wie er gleichsam wieder näher an die Verflechtung von Leben und Roman heran. Zuletzt läuft diese unauflösbare Ambivalenz darauf hinaus, dass Arbeit und Struktur als Mischform zwischen Tagebuch und Roman vor allem Ausdruck einer schöpferischen Selbstermächtigung ist – und damit selber eine Form von Bedeutsamkeit darstellt. Dieser Umstand nun erleichtert eine existenzphilosophisch ausgerichtete Interpretation eher, da die Auffassung des Ich-Erzählers als eine separate fiktionale Figur nicht Gefahr laufen kann, die reale Person des Autors zu psychologisieren. In methodischer Hinsicht werde ich mich daher primär mit einer Romanfigur namens Wolfgang Herrndorf und deren Weltmythen auseinandersetzen, während ich zugleich berücksichtige, dass diese Figur auf einer realen Person basiert. Umgekehrt hat mein mythenhermeneutisches Vorhaben gerade zur Voraussetzung, dass die dort auftauchende Figur auf den realen Wolfgang Herrndorf zurückführbar ist und Arbeit und Struktur daher kein bloss erdachtes, sondern ein wirkliches Ringen um Bedeutsamkeit beschreibt. Als Vorbild meiner Untersuchung kann Blumenbergs bemerkenswerte Auseinandersetzung mit Goethe dienen, den Blumenberg zuerst in Arbeit am Mythos und später in einer Fragment gebliebenen eigenständigen Publikation zum Gegenstand seines Denkens gemacht hatte.71 Lebensgeschichtliche Anekdoten und die Rhetorik „mythischer Verwicklungen"72 bilden den analytischen Fundus, mit dem Blumenberg den zugrundeliegenden Mechanismen von Goethes Weltund Selbstverständnis nachzugehen versucht. Was diesbezüglich an Herrndorf reizt, ist die sich in Arbeit und Struktur ausdrückende Verschriftlichung eines Bewusstseins, das einerseits durch die absurden Erfahrungen der Moderne geprägt und so weit wie nur irgend möglich von kollektiven Weltmythen entfernt ist – andererseits aber für sich entschieden hat, dass es nicht auf die Hilfe von Göttern oder sonstigen überlieferten Garanten zählen kann. An einer leiblichen „Krankheit zum Tode" erkrankt, muss Herrndorf demzufolge die Bürgschaft seines weltlichen Daseins weitgehend aus sich selbst erbringen – eine Kraftanstrengung, die kaum zu überschätzen ist und ihn im Zusammenwirken mit seiner absurden Grundauffassung zu einem existenziell individualisierten Weltverhältnis zwingt, das ich im Folgenden an Nietzsche, Dostojewski und Camus erläutern möchte. 71 Vgl. BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 435–604, sowie Hans BLUMENBERG: Goethe zum Beispiel. Frankfurt a.M./ Leipzig 1999. 72 BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 470. Für Blumenberg spielen hierbei vor allem der griechische Prometheus-Mythos und dessen durch Goethe unternommene Aktualisierungen eine wesentliche Rolle. 20 III Die nihilistische Verengung – Zum Bewusstsein absurder Existenz 4) Nietzsche: Kritik der Tradition In den vorangegangenen Abschnitten habe ich darzustellen versucht, inwiefern kulturelle Narrative unsere kollektive wie individuelle Identität konstituieren und welche Dialektik sich in Bezug auf Gemeinschaftlichkeit und Weltvorhandenheit aus diesen Narrativen ergibt. Die Unvorhersehbarkeit existenzieller Kontingenz und der daraus resultierenden kritischen Lebensereignisse wurden in diesem Zusammenhang als ein Moment charakterisiert, das die lebensweltliche Membran kollektiver Mythen brüchig werden lässt und die Erzählbarkeit individueller Weltmythen so zuallererst ermöglicht. Daran anschliessend habe ich Herrndorfs Arbeit und Struktur als ein literarisches Werk beschrieben, in dem sich der konstruktive und die eigene Lebenszeit verlängernde Umgang mit seiner Erkrankung ausdrückt und das somit selbst als eine Form narrativer Bedeutsamkeit erscheint. Das Bedeutsame nun kann ebenso wenig beliebig sein wie die individuellen oder kulturellen Selbsterzählungen, die es stützen soll. Weil der kollektive Rahmen bestimmt, welche Identitäten jeweils zulässig sind, trifft er zugleich eine Auswahl darüber, welche Bedeutsamkeiten der gesellschaftlichen sowie der persönlichen Anerkennung überhaupt würdig sind.73 Personale Identität und Bedeutsamkeit sind also einander zu Kohärenz verpflichtet, und daher müssen auch die in Arbeit und Struktur zur Sprache kommenden Bedeutsamkeiten einem Rahmen entspringen, dem Herrndorf sich zugehörig fühlt und den er ohne Weiteres akzeptieren kann. Dieser Rahmen wird durch die zweimalige Nennung von Schopenhauer und Nietzsche (vgl. AuS 77 & 232)74 sowie insgesamt neun Referenzen auf Dostojewski abgesteckt und verweist auf weltanschauliche Narrative, die dem modernen Nachdenken über das Problem des Nihilismus entstammen. Bevor ich mich der Analyse von Herrndorfs Text zuwenden kann, wird darzustellen sein, wodurch sich eine spezifisch durch Nihilismus und das Absurde geprägte Identität auszeichnet bzw. welche Narrative typischerweise für ein absurdes Bewusstsein bedeutsam sind. Mein Augenmerk gilt dabei der Kulturund Traditionskritik bei Nietzsche, der Glaubenskritik bei Dostojewski und dem Begriff des Absurden bei Camus. 73 Für den christlichen Kollektivmythos beispielsweise stellt das Prinzip der trinitarischen Personalität Gottes eine zentrale Bedeutsamkeit dar, weshalb Ansätze, die Göttlichkeit nicht personal, sondern holistisch denken (wie etwa Buddhismus oder Daoismus), häufig zu einer grundsätzlichen Kritik herausfordern. Im sogenannten Pantheismusstreit um Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi findet diese Ereiferung gegen eine inkompatible Bedeutsamkeit ein einprägsames geistesgeschichtliches Beispiel, vgl. BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 445–466. 74 Herrndorf hat im August 2011 durch eine rigorose Vernichtungsaktion von Diarien und durchgearbeiteten Büchern dafür gesorgt, dass keinerlei Lektürenotizen von ihm für eine Auseinandersetzung mit Nietzsche und Schopenhauer – neben diesen beiden erwähnt Herrndorf auch Adorno – herangezogen werden können. 21 Nietzsche, dessen frühe Verehrung für Schopenhauer ab den 1880er Jahren in eine scharfe Kritik des Schopenhauerischen Pessimismus umgeschlagen ist, hat in seiner Beschäftigung mit dem Nihilismusproblem viele wesentliche Facetten der Moderne vorweggenommen und gilt nicht zuletzt wegen seiner berühmt gewordenen, aber häufig missverstandenen These vom Tode Gottes als einer der einflussreichsten Theoretiker des „säkularen Zeitalters" (Taylor). Als Wort seit 1733 überliefert, wird der Begriff des Nihilismus dabei um 1800 als philosophische Fachvokabel in polemischer Absicht auf den Deutschen Idealismus angewandt, um diesen als spekulativ und rationalistisch zu diskreditieren und von den realistischen Ansätzen abzugrenzen.75 Die zunehmende Rezeption indischer Religion und Philosophie, zu der auch Schopenhauer beigetragen hat, führt dann im 19. Jahrhundert dazu, dass man vor allem den Buddhismus als ein grundlegend nihilistisches Konzept interpretiert, das nach der radikalen Auflösung weltlicher und logischer Strukturen trachtet.76 Diesen metaphysischen Nihilismus diskutiert Nietzsche in Verbindung mit den politischen und revolutionären Konnotationen, durch die der Begriff besonders in Frankreich und Russland geprägt ist, und gelangt so schliesslich zu einer Auffassung, die den Nihilismus als Diagnose und Zustandsbeschreibung der gesamten abendländischen Kultur begreift. Nietzsches weitgefasste Lesart der Problematik hat dabei zur Folge, dass er den Nihilismus unter zwei zusammenhängenden Fragestellungen betrachten muss, nämlich einmal, wodurch die westliche Kultur überhaupt zu einer nihilistischen Kultur hat werden können, und zweitens, was dieser Nihilismus für das einzelne Subjekt konkret bedeutet und mit welchen Auswirkungen er es konfrontiert. Der erste Punkt lässt sich nur im Zusammenhang mit der Frage verstehen, warum das Christentum für Nietzsche ein so vehementes Ärgernis darstellt. Eines der wichtigsten Motive, an dem er sich in seiner Polemik ereifert, findet sich dabei im dominium terrae aus Gen 1,28 und besteht im göttlichen Diktum, sich die Erde „untertan" zu machen – eine Idee, die als technologische Naturbeherrschung noch bis in die Gegenwart hinein spürbar ist und nichts von ihrer zivilisatorischen Geltung eingebüsst hat. Während für die christliche Theologie die Unterwerfung der leiblichen Natur unter den Geist bzw. die Abhängigkeit der weltlichen phýsis vom göttlichen lógos einen wichtigen Lehrsatz darstellt,77 erscheint bereits bei Schopenhauer die Natur als rohe, blinde, ungezügelte und irrationale Kraft, die von der göttlichen Kontrolle ent75 Ausführlicher zur Begriffsgeschichte des Nihilismus vgl. Wolfgang MÜLLER-LAUTER: Philosophische Probleme des Idealismus und des neuzeitlichen Nihilismus. Hrsg. von Elke AXMACHER. Berlin 2011, S. 19–29. 76 Diese Tendenz zur beinahe mystischen Auflösung ist tief in Schopenhauers Denken verwurzelt und für ihn eng mit dem buddhistischen Nirwana verbunden, vgl. Karen GLOY: Zwischen Glück und Tragik. Philosophische Daseinsdeutungen. München 2014, S. 170ff. 77 Die diesbezüglich oftmals konstatierte Leibfeindlichkeit des Christentums geht vornehmlich auf die frühen Einflüsse des Platonismus und der Stoa zurück und wird durch die Gnosis wieder akzentuiert, vgl. Günter FRÖHLICH: Platon und die Grundlagen der Philosophie. Göttingen 2015, S. 99f. 22 koppelt ist bzw. genauer: die selber diese göttliche Allmacht, der kosmische Wille ist. Aus Schopenhauers Begriff einer gewalttätigen und gnadenlosen Natur macht Nietzsche schliesslich ein grosses „Reservoir amoralischer Kräfte, zu dem wir die Verbindung nicht verlieren dürfen",78 da der Mensch als Lebewesen aus ebendieser Kraftquelle zehrt. Mit ihrer Idee der Beherrschung und Unterdrückung von Natur beschneidet die christliche Tradition jedoch dieses Vermögen und drosselt in der Folge die dem Menschen mögliche Potenz von Leib und Geist. Die Geschichte der christlichen Moralität, die vor allem in Bezug auf die körperlichen und animalischen Aspekte menschlichen Lebens ein hartes Regelwerk aufgestellt hat, erscheint Nietzsche deshalb als „eine Abfolge dramatischer Schwächungen des Menschen"79, die endgültig durchbrochen und unwirksam gemacht werden muss: „Noch in eurer Thorheit und Verachtung, ihr Verächter des Leibes, dient ihr eurem Selbst. Ich sage euch: euer Selbst selber will sterben und kehrt sich vom Leben ab. [...] Und darum zürnt ihr nun dem Leben und der Erde. [...] Ich gehe nicht euren Weg, ihr Verächter des Leibes!"80 Aus der Logik dieser Leibverachtung resultiert für Nietzsche die Erkenntnis, dass das Christentum die Einzelne und ihr Schicksal nur deshalb ins Zentrum seiner Gnadenlehre rücken konnte,81 weil es im Gegenzug die Bejahung einer bloss halbierten und zerstückelten, einer zutiefst unvollständigen Natur in Kauf nimmt.82 Die Tendenz, sowohl die Natur als auch die Menschheit – und damit zuletzt seine eigenen metaphysischen und moralischen Werte – zu „entwerten", wohnt dem Christentum (und dessen Ursprung im Judentum) von Anfang an inne, bildet deren logische Konsequenz und wird von Nietzsche schliesslich als Nihilismus bezeichnet.83 In kultureller Hinsicht ist das Auftauchen des Nihilismus für Nietzsche also zunächst ein geschichtlicher Prozess, der das Ende der Vorherrschaft christlicher Kollektivmythen bedeutet. Die wichtigste Begleiterscheinung dieses Hegemonieverlustes besteht dabei darin, dass christliche Narrative fragwürdig und zum Ziel radikaler Kritik gemacht werden können. In diesem Sinne bezeichnet der Nihilismus ganz konkret die dekadente Doppelmoral und Lebensfeind78 TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 772. 79 Susanne MÖBUSS: Existenzphilosophie. Von Augustinus bis Nietzsche, Bd. 1. Freiburg/ München 2015, S. 250. 80 Friedrich NIETZSCHE: Also sprach Zarathustra. Ein Buch für Alle und Keinen (Kritische Studienausgabe Bd. 4). Hrsg. von Giorgio COLLI und Mazzino MONTINARI. München 132011, S. 40f. 81 Vgl. hierzu Edith DÜSING: Nietzsches Denkweg. Theologie – Darwinismus – Nihilismus. München 22007, S. 511. Damit ist gemeint, dass ein Individuum im antiken Verständnis nur einen Wert besitzt, insofern es ein Teil der gesamten kosmischen (oder eben, als Mitglied der Polis, ein Teil der politischen) Ordnung ist – wohingegen die christliche Auffassung den Gedanken einer dem Individuum zuteil werdenden persönlichen Liebe und Wertschätzung durch Gott in den Vordergrund stellt, vgl. dazu das Augustinus-Kapitel bei TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 235–261. 82 Vgl. Eike BROCK: Nietzsche und der Nihilismus. Berlin u.a. 2015, S. 258ff. 83 Zur nihilistischen Entwertung vgl. ausführlicher Claudia RUMP: Das Problem des Nihilismus als Konsequenz der Divergenz von Wahrheitsanspruch und Wahrheitswert im Werk Friedrich Nietzsches . Dissertation Berlin 2010, S. 12–20. 23 lichkeit – bei Kierkegaard analog die spirituelle Verarmung und Entleertheit – des öffentlichen und von den Kirchen repräsentierten Christentums im Europa des 19. Jahrhunderts, gegen das Nietzsche sich empört. Seine Beschäftigung mit dem Nihilismus weist also einen stark kulturkritisch geprägten Impetus auf, und seine kritischen Absichten machen es erforderlich, dass er nicht nur die alten Werte in ihrer Unhaltbarkeit entlarvt, sondern zugleich auch neue Werte formuliert. Diese „Umwertung"84 erfolgt durch die Betonung des „dionysischen" – also des ungezügelten und chaotischen – Charakters des natürlichen Lebens und der sich daraus ergebenden Affirmation des gesamten Spektrums erfahrbarer Lebendigkeit, das neben Freude und Geburt eben auch Sexualität, ekstatischen Rausch, Krankheit und radikale Vergänglichkeit umfasst. Während sich Nietzsches Attacken gegen die christliche Tradition jedoch noch überwiegend auf den kulturgeschichtlichen Hintergrund des Nihilismus beziehen, verweist die aus seiner Kritik erwachsende Anerkennung der dionysischen Natur – oder eben des „Willens zur Macht" – bereits auf die Konsequenzen, mit denen der Nihilismus das Individuum konfrontiert. Die bisherigen Ausführungen definieren den Nihilismus im Sinne Nietzsches als logische Endstufe der abendländischen Geschichte, die durch das Zutagetreten des metaphysischen und lebensfeindlichen Logozentrismus die Unzumutbarkeit ihrer allereigensten Werte offenbart. Wenn dieser Nihilismus nun aber tatsächlich die Selbstentwertung und damit die fortschreitende Unnutzbarmachung kollektivmythischer Inhalte bedeutet, dann brechen die durch diese Werte aufrecht gehaltenen religio-kulturellen Selbstverständlichkeiten weg, dann gibt es – selbst für einen Christen – kein Heilsversprechen mehr, keine Gnade und schliesslich: keinen Gott. Entgegen der säkularistischen Intuition stellt sich dieser Verlust der lebensweltlichen Bezugsgrössen jedoch dabei zunächst nicht als Befreiung von einem unmenschlichen Tyrannen dar, sondern wird zutiefst als metaphysischer Schock empfunden und als existenzielle Krise durchlebt. Nietzsches Wort vom Tode Gottes bildet daher nicht die emphatisch gemeinte Äusserung eines aggressiven Atheismus – sondern diagnostiziert den kulturgeschichtlichen Augenblick, in dem und ab dem sich das moderne Selbst ausserhalb christlicher Weltmythen zurecht finden muss.85 Der Austritt – oder drastischer: der Rauswurf – aus der tradierten Le84 Vgl. MÖBUSS: Existenzphilosophie, S. 247–253. Mit dem Programm der „Umwertung aller Werte" sind zugleich jene Aspekte von Nietzsches Denken verbunden, die in ihrer martialischen Prophetie den europäischen Aktivismus anzustacheln halfen und Nietzsche zuletzt für die faschistischen und nationalsozialistischen Tendenzen des 20. Jahrhunderts haben missbrauchbar werden lassen, vgl. Klaus von BEYME: Geschichte der politischen Theorien in Deutschland 1300–2000. Wiesbaden 2009, S. 378–391. 85 Vgl. DÜSING: Nietzsches Denkweg, S. 473–495. Das Topos des gestorbenen Gottes ist schon vom frühen Hegel im Kontext der Auferstehungslehre diskutiert worden, vgl. ebd., S. 495–505. Während für Hegel dabei ausser Frage steht, dass das Göttliche nach Jesu Kreuzigung wieder in Erscheinung tritt, überwiegt bei Nietzsche der nihilistische Gedanke, dass Gottes Sohn nicht wieder aufersteht, sondern tot bleibt. 24 benswelt wiegt dabei umso schwerer, da ein Individuum niemals mehr auf demselben Weg zurück in die naive Unbeschwertheit gelangen kann, die es einstmals durch die Sozialisation innerhalb eines spezifischen Kollektivmythos erlangt hatte. Auf diese Weise macht der Nihilismus den Verlust kultureller Erzählungen weitgehend endgültig und irreversibel. Mit der schmerzlichen und intensiven Erfahrung radikaler „Entwirklichung"86 (denn Wirklichkeit ist ja zunächst nur durch die Präsenz kollektiver Mythen gegeben) geht allerdings auch der eher konstruktiv zu bewertende Umstand einher, dass das dogmatische Insistieren auf die eigene kulturelle Herkunft oder religiös legitimierte Abkunft an Bedeutung verliert. Denn wer aus seiner ursprünglichen kulturellen Lebenswelt herausfällt, der wird für die „nihilistischen Evidenzen"87 des Lebens und den kontingenten Anfang aller Lebenswelten frei; die „eine" Wahrheit, deren absolute Gültigkeit um jeden Preis durchgerungen werden muss, gibt es dann nicht mehr. Die daraus resultierende Relativität und Gleichwertigkeit aller Weltmythen entlarvt vielmehr jede Vorstellung einer zwingenden einsehbaren Wahrheit als Schein und gehört zu Nietzsches bedeutendsten Einsichten.88 Auch wenn Nietzsche mit seinem Lob der Vorsokratiker vor die Ursprünge der abendländischen Tradition zurückwollte89 – die Überwindung der von ihm diagnostizierten nihilistischen Aporie kann in seinen Augen weniger von einer Tradition übernommen werden als vielmehr von einem neuen Typus Mensch, der den abendländischen Nihilismus zu Ende führt und ihn dergestalt überwindet. Nur das starke Individuum – worunter Nietzsche einerseits die kommende Figur des Übermenschen, andererseits sich selbst versteht90 – kann den Nihilismus ausserhalb der „Herde" in der Abwesenheit der Überlieferung aushalten und entkommt der Gefahr, durch „den Zudrang äusserer Einflüsse [sich] selbst fremd zu werden."91 Was Nietzsche betreibt, ist fundamentale Kollektivkritik – und nicht der durch die Fehlinterpretation vom Tode Gottes unterstellte Versuch, jedweden metaphysischen Garant auf Dasein und Welt zu vernichten.92 Dem christlichen Kollektivmythos stellt er so den Mythos vom Übermenschen entgegen, der nicht mehr nur dem dogmatischen Zusammenhalt, sondern hauptsächlich der Garantie von kollektiv-unabhängiger Weltvorhandenheit und Handlungsfreiheit dient. 86 Vgl. Fritz LEIST: Existenz im Nichts. Versuch einer Analyse des Nihilismus. München 1961, S. 63. 87 BROCK: Nietzsche und der Nihilismus, S. 17. 88 Vgl. dazu Jutta GEORG: Existenzielle Bewegung. Scheinwelten, Rauschwelten, Tanzwelten. In: Renate RESCHKE (Hg.): Wirklich. Wirklichkeit. Wirklichkeiten. Nietzsche über ,wahre und ,scheinbare Welten (Nietzscheforschung. Jahrbuch der Nietzschegesellschaft, Bd. 20). Berlin 2013, S. 91–102, 94f., sowie MÜLLER-LAUTER: Probleme des Idealismus, S. 298ff. 89 Vgl. etwa DÜSING: Nietzsches Denkweg, S. 237–245. 90 Vgl. MÖBUSS: Existenzphilosophie, S. 260. 91 KONERSMANN: Unruhe, S. 291. 92 Die „letzte Form des Nihilismus, die den ,Unglauben an eine metaphysische Welt in sich schliesst ", ist lediglich eine Zwischenstufe auf dem Weg zu einem „dionysisch sprühenden Jasage[n], Geniesse[n] und Gutheisse[n] der gesamten Welt des Werdens", vgl. DÜSING: Nietzsches Denkweg, S. 521. 25 5) Dostojewski: Kritik des Glaubens Während Nietzsche durch die Rede vom tot bleibenden Gott ein kulturelles Panorama entwirft, in dem blosser Glaube nichts mehr nützt, weil der dazugehörige Adressat fehlt, begreift Dostojewski den Nihilismus als eine Art Prüfung, aus der ein authentischer „eigentlicher" Glaube zuallererst hervorgehen kann. Ähnlich wie Kierkegaard sah sich auch Dostojewski einer zeitgenössischen Christenheit gegenübergestellt, die sich vom ursprünglichen Vorbild und der spirituellen Praxis Jesu Christi entfremdet hatte und sich nur noch durch das folgenlose Wiederholen von intellektualistischen und religiösen Lehrsätzen auszeichnete.93 In ihrer komplexen Vielstimmigkeit unternimmt Dostojewskis Prosa daher in immer wieder neuen Anläufen den Versuch, den Nihilismus seiner Zeit mit den Mitteln des Schriftstellers zu fassen, zu radikalisieren und zuletzt – zu widerlegen. Dem Romanhaften gemäss zählt dabei nicht das bessere und widerstandsfähigere Argument, sondern die Praktikabilität von weltanschaulichen Ideen, denen Dostojewski durch seine Figuren eine bis in die letzten Konsequenzen durchdachte Lebendigkeit zukommen lässt. In Die Dämonen (von Swetlana Geier treffender mit „Böse Geister" übersetzt), wofür Herrndorf in der Rückblende eine Empfehlung ausspricht (AuS 137), tauchen mit Nikolai Stawrogin, Alexei Kirillow, Iwan Schatow und Pjotr Werchowenskij gleich vier prototypische nihilistische Charaktere auf, deren Nihilismus sich jeweils unterschiedlich äussert: Stawrogin, dem das Leben flach geworden ist und der sich ausserhalb von Gut und Böse bewegt, um dieser Flachheit zu entkommen; Kirillow, der den Atheismus radikalisiert, sich damit unter der Beweislast sieht, selber Gott zu sein und demzufolge vollkommen frei seinen eigenen Tod wollen zu können; Schatow, der in der Nation den neuen Gott erblickt, jedoch zugleich den Verlust des alten Gottes nicht erträgt; und zuletzt Werchowenskij, für den andere Personen nur einen Wert besitzen, insofern sie seinen eigenen „revolutionären" Absichten dienen. Zusammengenommen symbolisieren diese vier Figuren die ethischen, metaphysischen, religiösen und politischen Konsequenzen, die für Dostojewski aus dem zügellosen Walten des Nihilismus zu entspringen 93 Vgl. Walter NIGG: Prophetische Denker. Zürich 1957, S. 409f., sowie Hans KÜNG: Religion im Widerstreit der Religionslosigkeit. In: Walter JENS/ Hans KÜNG: Dichtung und Religion. München 1985, S. 244–266, 246. Mit Gianni Vattimo und Thomas Metzinger begreife ich Religion als den Zustand eines noch vollständig bestehenden Durchdrungenseins mit kollektiv-dogmatischen Mythen, während Glaube (Vattimo) bzw. Spiritualität (Metzinger) eine weitgehend entdogmatisierte, entmythisierte und „intellektuell redliche" Ausprägung einer Weltanschauung oder Tradition beschreibt. Spirituell ist daher nicht nur, wer sich, seiner eigenen kulturellen Kontingenz bewusst, intentional für eine Tradition entscheidet, sondern auch, wer als säkular eingestellte Person die inhärente Vernunft und das rationale Potenzial von religiösen Traditionen anerkennt, vgl. Gianni VATTIMO: Glauben – Philosophieren. Stuttgart 2007, 32–39, sowie Thomas METZINGER: Der Ego-Tunnel. Eine neue Philosophie des Selbst: Von der Hirnforschung zur Bewusstseinsethik. München/ Zürich 2014, S. 373–412. 26 drohen, und es ist überaus bezeichnend für seine Position, dass die beschriebenen vier nicht Vorbilder, sondern allesamt Figuren des Scheiterns sind: Stawrogin und Kirillow töten sich selbst, Schatow wird ermordet und Werchowenskijs beabsichtigte Revolution läuft ins Leere. Der sich in Die Dämonen zeigende Nihilismus ist eng um die mysteriöse Person Nikolai Stawrogins versammelt, der sich bei einem mehrjährigen Auslandsaufenthalt mit dem Ingenieur Kirillow, dem Studenten Schatow sowie Pjotr Werchowenskij, dem Sohn seines Hauslehrers, bekannt gemacht hat. In dieser Zeit unterliegen die drei Figuren dem weltanschaulichen Einfluss Stawrogins und führen nach ihrer Rückkehr zu Ende, was dieser in ihnen „wachgerufen" hat.94 Es ist dabei gerade die Schwere seines eigenen Glaubenskonfliktes zwischen Tradition und Atheismus, die seine Gedankenwelt als so überaus ansteckend erweist und Stawrogin zu den tiefsten Figuren zählen lässt, an denen Dostojewski gearbeitet hat. Ausgelöst ist dieser Konflikt durch Stawrogins Unfähigkeit, sich weder ganz für Gott noch gegen ihn zu entscheiden – allerdings nicht durch die Schwäche seines Geistes, sondern durch diejenige seiner Empfindungen: Er will Christ sein, kann es aber nicht, weil er jene Intensität von Glück und Leid nicht zu erfahren vermag, die ihn sich lebendig fühlen liesse. Da er sein „Herz, in dem der Glauben seinen Sitz hat, [...] nicht durch den Verstand zum Glauben überführen"95 kann, versucht er, in sich selbst durch immer radikalere Reize eine emotional erfahrbare Tiefe zu erzeugen. Auf dem Höhepunkt seiner Amoralität, bei dem er sich an der minderjährigen Matrjoscha vergreift und diese in den Suizid treibt, muss Stawrogin sich jedoch eingestehen, dass selbst diese extreme Tat keine nennenswerte lebendige Regung in ihm hervorruft, wie MüllerLauter formuliert: „Was immer er wünscht, kann er nicht stark genug wünschen, um es wahrhaft zu wollen. Seine Gefühle und Empfindungen bleiben schal."96 Lässt ihn – in den Augen von Schatow, Kirillow und Werchowenskij – sein Ausserhalbsein von Gut und Böse als unnahbaren Übermenschen und Ehrfurcht gebietende, dämonische Persönlichkeit erscheinen, so verunmöglicht gerade diese in ihm wuchernde Gleich-Gültigkeit aller moralischen Werte die Ergreifung dessen, was Taylor als „starke Wertungen" bezeichnet hat.97 Auf diese Weise unfähig, innerhalb des christlichen Kollektivmythos zu leben, scheitert Stawrogin durch den Mangel an empathischem Nachvollzug seiner Einsichten ebenfalls daran, einen ihn langfristig konstituierenden Weltmythos zu formulieren98 und scheidet – seiner hehren Erscheinung ganz 94 Vgl. Ina FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus. Philosophische Analysen zu F.M. Dostojewskijs Werk ,Die Dämonen . München 1987, S. 185. 95 FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus, S. 108. 96 MÜLLER-LAUTER: Probleme des Idealismus, S. 259. 97 TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 17. 98 Vgl. hierzu Reinhard LAUTH: Dostojewskis Dämonen als homoiothetische Explikation des Nihilismus. In: Helmut GIRNDT/ Klaus HAMMACHER (Hg.): Fichte und die Literatur (Fichte-Studien Bd. 19). Amsterdam/ New York 2002, S. 199–212, 210. 27 entgegengesetzt – durch die Spiegelung von Matrjoschas Tod, die sich den Strick gab, „schmählich"99 aus dem Leben. Die emotionale Intensität, an der es Stawrogin mangelt und die letztlich seinen Untergang bedeutet, wird durch Lisaweta Tuschina sowie Schatow aufgefangen und pervertiert bei Letzterem zu einem von seinem Mentor übernommenen Nationalismus, dessen Verquickung mit einem leidenschaftlichen Fanatismus Stawrogin fremd vorkommen muss.100 In der Forschung ist Schatow dabei häufig als eine Negativschablone begriffen worden, mit der Dostojewski die nationalistischen Tendenzen seiner Zeit kritisieren und zugleich seine eigene ambivalente Haltung zum Slawophilismus zum Ausdruck bringen konnte.101 Schatows Nihilismus besteht darin, dass sein quasireligiöser Glaube an das Vaterland die verloren gegangene Zuversicht in die Existenz Gottes einerseits ersetzen, andererseits aber auch evozieren soll. In Kapitel I,7 des zweiten Teiles antwortet er auf die Frage Stawrogins hin, ob er an Gott glaube, dass er an Gott glauben werde, sobald sich „die neue Leibwerdung in Russland" (Übersetzung von Rahsin) vollzogen haben wird. Kurz vor seinem Tod erlangt Schatow dann tatsächlich einen authentischen und aufrichtigen Glauben – aber nicht durch die Einlösung seiner nationalistischen Fantasien, sondern durch die Geburt des unehelichen Kindes von seiner Frau Marja und Stawrogin, das er adoptieren will.102 Da sein Glaube und seine neu gewonnene Moralität den Zielen der sozialistischen Revolution im Wege stehen, für die sich Schatow einstmals ereifert hat, lässt Werchowenskij ihn auf dem Gipfel seines Glückes umbringen. Über Irrund Umwege war Schatow endlich zu der Transformation gelangt, die er sich erhofft hatte, allein sie kommt zu spät – sein Dämon sucht ihn heim: Nachdem er bereits sein eigenes Leben an das Schicksal verloren hat, sterben auch noch seine Frau, die vergeblich nach ihm suchte, und das Kind. Findet also Schatow erst am Ende seiner schwerwiegenden Verirrungen und auch nur für kurze Zeit zu einem authentischen Glauben, so verwehrt sich Kirillow von vornherein dieser Möglichkeit und zieht aus seiner radikalen Gottesleugnung einen nicht minder radikalen Schluss. Wenn Gott und mit ihm seine Allmacht nicht existiert, so Kirillows Argumentation, dann ist jeder Mensch prinzipiell ein Gott, der absolute Macht über sich selbst besitzt und daher vollständig über sich selbst verfügt (Iwan Karamasow macht aus dieser Selbstverfügung später ein rigoroses „Alles ist erlaubt"). Der Respekt vor Gott aber hat dazu geführt, dass der Mensch Angst vor dieser Selbstermächtigung hat – wodurch nicht zuletzt der Selbstmord ein gesellschaftliches Verdikt darstellt. Wenn das jedoch zutrifft, muss der Beweis angetreten wer99 FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus, S. 165. 100 Vgl. ebd., S. 127 & 188. 101 Vgl. MÜLLER-LAUTER: Probleme des Idealismus, S. 224ff.; NIGG: Prophetische Denker, S. 409f., sowie FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus, S. 172ff. 102 Vgl. FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus, S. 194ff. 28 den, dass man sich ohne jeden äusseren Zwang vollkommen frei zum Suizid entschliessen kann – und diesen Beweis will Kirillow liefern. Dabei ist nicht seine blosse freiwillige Bereitschaft zum Suizid als Nihilismus zu bewerten – die lässt sich mit Blumenberg noch eher als Konkretion der neuzeitlichen „Selbstbehauptung" lesen, in der der Mensch ohne die durch Gott gewährten Sicherheiten auszukommen versucht103 –, sondern vor allem sein damit verbundenes Anliegen, Gott mit den äussersten Mitteln zu übertrumpfen und diesem die Verfügungsgewalt über die Menschheit zu entziehen. Kirillow ist also, wie Fuchs ausführt, „bereit, sich zu töten, nur um seinen Eigenwillen, seine Macht zu beweisen. Daran gemessen ist ihm das Leben nichts."104 Paradoxerweise eröffnet er in einem kurzen, aber aufschlussreichen Gespräch (Kapitel V,5 des dritten Teils) mit Schatow eine Sichtweise, deren inhärente Mystik nicht zu übersehen ist: „Es gibt Sekunden, es sind im ganzen nur fünf oder sechs auf einmal, und plötzlich fühlt man die Gegenwart der ewigen Harmonie, der vollkommen erreichten. Das ist nicht irdisch; ich rede nicht davon, ob es himmlisch ist, sondern ich will nur sagen, dass ein Mensch in irdischer Gestalt das nicht aushalten kann. Man muss sich physisch verändern oder sterben." Kirillows Nihilismus – und die groteske Tragik seiner Figur105 – resultieren also daraus, dass er aus einem transzendenten, nach Selbstauflösung verlangenden Gedanken den falschen Schluss zieht und den mystischen Tod, der lediglich die Grenzen der eigenen Selbstbeschreibung aufhebt, mit dem faktischen Tod des Bewusstseins verwechselt. Bei Werchowenskij schliesslich ist die durch den Nihilismus eingeleitete Zersetzung von religiösen Gehalten so weit vorangetrieben, dass Gott und die christliche Tradition keinerlei Bedeutung mehr für ihn haben. Alles, worum es ihm geht, besteht in seinem Eigenwohl und der sozialistisch-anarchistischen Revolution, die im Zweifel mit Gewalt und Manipulation herbeizuführen ist. Der radikale Subjektivismus Werchowenskijs, der aus der Destruktion des kulturellen (christlichen) Primärkontextes hervorgeht, kann jedoch nicht aus sich selbst heraus neue kollektive Mythen hervorbringen, weshalb er für die Begründung einer neuen gesellschaftlichen Verbindlichkeit ungeeignet ist. Um die narrative Leere zu füllen, die die Revolution hinterlassen wird, hofft Werchowenskij daher auf die Mithilfe Stawrogins, den er zu einem dämonischen Heros und Führer stilisieren will, der überall seine Augen hat, aber nirgends zu finden ist.106 Da Stawrogin sich jedoch bis zuletzt seiner ihm zugedachten Rolle verweigert, bleibt Werchowenskijs gewalttätiges Vorhaben ohne eine nennenswerte gesellschaftliche Konsequenz und versickert in der Bedeutungslosigkeit des öffentlichen Tratschs. 103 Vgl. Hans BLUMENBERG: Die Legitimität der Neuzeit. Frankfurt a.M. 1996, S. 11–260. 104 FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus, S. 235. Vgl. hierzu auch Ralph HARPER: The Seventh Solitude. Man s Isolation in Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, and Nietzsche. Baltimore, Maryland 1965, S. 65–70. 105 Vgl. FUCHS: Die Herausforderung des Nihilismus, S. 236f. 106 Vgl. ebd., S. 116f. 29 Im Gesamt von Dostojewskis Romanen betrachtet, dienen diese vier tief und präzise gezeichneten Protagonisten (neben Iwan Karamasow und Rodion Raskolnikow) dazu, die existenziellen Implikationen des modernen Nihilismus ernstzunehmen und ihn als Gegenspieler einer aufrichtig glaubenden Position stark zu machen.107 Denn obwohl ihr Atheismus sie von der christlichen Gemeinschaft entfremdet hat, finden sich in Die Dämonen mit Stawrogin, Kirillow und Schatow gleichwohl drei Metaphysiker, die sich je auf ihre Weise mit der Tradition zu arrangieren versuchen. Stawrogin lebt dabei in der Negation, weil er ausserhalb der gesellschaftlichen und moralisch sanktionierten Zusammenhänge handelt; Kirillow, als „victim of another man s metaphysical game",108 existiert während der Negation, in der er seine eigene metaphysische Unabhängigkeit von Gott erfährt; und Schatow schliesslich gelangt durch die Negation zu einem authentischen Glauben. Durch ihr Hadern und Zweifeln mit der Tradition verlassen zwar alle drei den von ihr gewährten metaphysischen Schutzraum, aber sie verändern diese auch zugleich und modifizieren so die überlieferte Glaubenspraxis. Die nihilistischen Charaktere Dostojewskis bilden damit einen Übergang zu jenen Figuren – wie etwa Fürst Myschkin, Aljoscha Karamasow und Starez Sossima –, die als positive Beispiele eines wahrhaftigen und aufgeklärten Glaubens erscheinen.109 Nietzsches im vorherigen Abschnitt dargestellte Auffassung lässt sich daher gut um Dostojewskis literarische Charakterstudien ergänzen: Der existenziell erfahrbare Nihilismus ist niemals nur Entfernung vom ursprünglichen religio-kulturellen Kontext, sondern liefert durch die Autonomisierung des Individuums zugleich die Möglichkeit einer Weiterentwicklung dieser Tradition unter rationalen Gesichtspunkten. Nur wer durch die Hölle des Nihilismus geht, kann den kollektiven Dogmen entkommen und die kulturellen Narrative, auf denen das eigene kollektive Selbstverständnis fusst, erfolgreich dekonstruieren und neu beschreiben. Für die westlich geprägten Traditionen entpuppt sich dergestalt die neuzeitliche Erfahrung des Nichtigseins, ja die Moderne überhaupt als zwingende Durchgangsstufe auf dem Weg zu einem „integralen Menschen",110 der sowohl aufgeklärt säkular als auch aufgeklärt gläubig sein kann. Für Dostojewski freilich steht ausser Frage, dass dieser neue, sich noch entfaltende Charaktertypus definitiv christlich sein wird: Denn als existenziell individualisierter Christ betreibt er selber keine Religionskritik, sondern – wie vor ihm schon Kierkegaard – eine fundamentale und nicht immer widerspruchsfreie Glaubenskritik der christlichen Tradition.111 107 Vgl. etwa Walter NIGG: Dostojewskij. Die religiöse Überwindung des Nihilismus. Hamburg 1951, S. 34ff. 108 HARPER: The Seventh Solitude, S. 54. 109 Vgl. KÜNG: Religion im Widerstreit, S. 253 & 260, sowie NIGG: Prophetische Denker, S. 419ff. 110 NIGG: Prophetische Denker, S. 420. Vgl. auch BROCK: Nietzsche und der Nihilismus, S. 19, sowie TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 783ff. 111 Vgl. hierzu MÜLLER-LAUTER: Probleme des Idealismus, S. 229–232. 30 6) Camus: Kritik des Sinnhaften Nachdem ich mit Nietzsche und Dostojewski die nihilistische Kritik an Tradition und Glauben des Christentums beschrieben habe, möchte ich zum Abschluss dieser theoretischen Hinführung mit Albert Camus erläutern, was die Hölle des Nihilismus für jemanden bedeutet, der sich bereits weit vom theistischen Ursprung unserer Kultur entfernt hat. In seinem Denken greift Camus den das Sinnhafte negierenden Charakter nihilistischer Erfahrungen auf und entwickelt ihn zu einem systematischen Begriff des Absurden, dessen Präsenz er als Ausgangspunkt der menschlichen Existenz betrachtet. Was sich in literarischer Hinsicht besonders in den Romanen Der Fremde (1942) und Die Pest (1947) ausdrückt, wird in argumentativer Hinsicht von den Essays Der Mythos des Sisyphos (1942) und Der Mensch in der Revolte (1951) übernommen. Der Sisyphos-Text (durch Sartres Einfluss lange Zeit als blosser Kommentar zu Der Fremde gelesen)112 stellt dabei eingehender das Bewusstsein des Absurden und seine Implikationen dar, während die spätere Schrift eröffnet, welche Antwortmöglichkeiten der Mensch Camus zufolge auf diese Situation besitzt. Herrndorfs Bezugnahmen auf Camus indes sind, anders als die expliziten Erwähnungen Dostojewskis, zwar viel leiser und latenter, werden aber dennoch von Literaturkritik und Forschung wahrgenommen,113 weshalb sich Camus gut als eine weitere Referenz aus dem Spektrum nihilistischen und absurden Nachdenkens eignet. Camus definiert das Absurde zu Beginn des Sisyphos als Gefühl der „Entzweiung zwischen dem Menschen und seinem Leben, zwischen dem Handelnden und seinem Rahmen."114 Existenzielle Absurdität besteht also grundsätzlich in einer Verhältnisbestimmung zwischen dem erlebenden Subjekt und der Welt, auf die es trifft – und dieses Verhältnis kann, wie weiter oben schon verschiedentlich anklang, in bestimmten Fällen problematisch werden. Ursprünglich steht alles, was „Welt" ist und um mich herum geschieht, im Einklang mit der Vielfalt an möglichen Erzählsträngen, die mein Kollektivmythos dieser eingeschrieben hat; in der Kongruenz von eigenem Lebensplot und Weltplot gibt es keine Überraschungen, auch keine bösartigen.115 Je mehr ich aber sich Ereignendes zu etwas mache, das mir geschieht, umso grösser wird die Wahrscheinlichkeit, dass meine Erlebnisse von den alltäglichen Skripten abweichen 112 Vgl. GLOY: Zwischen Glück und Tragik, S. 186. 113 Vgl. Iris RADISCH: Und Engel gibt es doch. In: Die Zeit 39 (2014), S. 52, sowie Sonja ARNOLD: Der ,Aufbewahrungsort des Falschen – Fehler und Zufälle in Wolfgang Herrndorfs Roman Sand am Beispiel des Homonyms Mine. In: Pandaemonium Germanicum 16 (21/2013), S. 25–47, 30, URL = <http://www.scielo/b r/pdf/pg/v16n21/03.pdf> (21.03.2017). 114 CAMUS: Mythos des Sisyphos, S. 18. 115 Dieser natürliche Aspekt der mythischen Lebenswelt ist in unserer Kultur mittlerweile zum wissenschaftlichen Fetisch der Prognose ausgeartet, vgl. MACINTYRE: Verlust der Tugend, S. 111–148. 31 und in eine Diskrepanz mit ihnen geraten: Während der Tod einer Fremden mich kaum betroffen macht, kann der Tod einer Bekannten, einer Freundin, eines Familienmitglieds mich in tiefe Trauer stürzen. Der krasse Unterschied zwischen diesen Fällen erklärt sich für Camus daraus, dass die kollektivmythische Naivität nicht mit dem eigenen Tod (oder dem der Allernächsten) rechnet: „Alle leben so, als ob niemand ,wüsste "116 – die moderne Lebenswelt sieht lediglich den Tod der anderen vor, aber nicht den eigenen. Die von einer Grenzsituation ausgelöste Überforderung kann nun zur Folge haben, dass sich die ehemalige Übereinkunft des Subjektes mit seinen Narrativen schliesslich zu einem unversöhnlichen Gegeneinander von ihm und der Welt, die es nicht mehr nachzuvollziehen vermag, entkoppelt. Lebensweltlich gesehen ist das Absurde also die Konsequenz aus der Erfahrung existenzieller Kontingenz, die mit unseren kulturell geprägten Wünschen, Sehnsüchten und Hoffnungen im Widerstreit steht, während es in erkenntnistheoretischer Hinsicht „das Resultat einer nicht aufzuhebenden Spannung zwischen dem menschlichen Bedürfnis nach Einheit und Transparenz und der Vielfalt und Undurchsichtigkeit der Welt"117 darstellt – es springt mich an, wenn ich mein Erleben in keiner für mich selbst sinnhaften Erzählung mehr unterbringen kann. Die Absurdität, um die es Camus geht, besteht also nur dann, wenn durch Prozesse fundamentalen Unverständlichwerdens das nach Sinn verlangende Subjekt und die diesen Sinn zugleich negierende Welt aneinandergeraten. Hat es sich jedoch erst einmal offenbart, gibt es für Camus keinen aufrichtigen Weg mehr, dem Absurden zu entkommen; denn ihm zu entkommen würde bedeuten, dass man auf illegitime Weise den einen Term (sich selbst) oder aber den anderen (die Welt) aus der Gleichung streicht. Illegitim in diesem Sinne sind der physische Selbstmord, der dem absurden Leben aus Feigheit entrinnen will,118 sowie der von Camus geprägte philosophische Selbstmord, bei dem ich entweder eine die Welt vollkommen enträtselnde Methode zu haben behaupte oder mir aber „durch den Sprung in eine vermeintlich sichere Transzendenz [...] die Fiktion einer Rettung"119 konstruiere. Diese Form des intellektuellen Selbstmordes hat Camus einer ganzen Reihe von historischen und zeitgenössischen Denkern vorgeworfen – zu nennen sind etwa Kierkegaard, Jaspers und Heidegger –, und an seinen diesbezüglich hervorgebrachten einseitigen Interpretationen ist seit jeher starke Kritik geübt worden.120 Gleichwohl weist Camus strenges Verdikt jedweder Form des Selbstmordes auf 116 Vgl. CAMUS: Mythos des Sisyphos, S. 27. 117 Maurice WEYEMBERGH: Überwindung des Absurden? Der Ansatz Camus in der Diskussion. In: Annemarie PIEPER (Hg.): Die Gegenwart des Absurden. Studien zu Albert Camus. Tübingen/ Basel 1994, S. 69–85, 70. 118 Vgl. CAMUS: Mythos des Sisyphos, S. 66ff. 119 Walter LESCH: ,Ein Mensch ist immer das Opfer seiner Wahrheiten . Der philosophische Selbstmord. In: PIEPER: Gegenwart des Absurden, S. 17–36, 19. 120 Vgl. GLOY: Zwischen Glück und Tragik, S. 187, sowie MÜLLER-LAUTER: Probleme des Idealismus, S. 264. 32 die Anerkennung des ganzen Lebens, auf einen, wie Taylor sagen würde, „Heroismus" des Erduldens hin,121 der mit dem Lob des Dionysischen schon bei Nietzsche zu finden ist. Die absurde Situation, in der das existenziell individualisierte Subjekt gefangen ist, lässt sich Camus zufolge daher nicht mehr überwinden – wie es noch die Hoffnung Nietzsches und Dostojewskis betreffs des Nihilismus war –, sondern nur noch aushalten, indem man sich, Sisyphos gleich, dem Widersinnigen beständig widersetzt: „Der Mensch muss, um Mensch sein zu können, an seinem Absolutheitsanspruch festhalten, obwohl er weiss, dass ihm nie Erfüllung beschieden sein wird. Jedoch ist die Aufrechterhaltung des Absurden für den Menschen die einzige Möglichkeit, Mensch sein und bleiben zu können."122 Lässt Camus im Mythos des Sisyphos noch unbedingt gelten, dass an den metaphysischen Bedingungen des Absurden nicht gerüttelt werden darf, so erfährt dieses Diktum in den späteren Jahren eine Revision, wie Müller-Lauter bemerkt.123 Aus der blossen Annahme der absurden Situation folgt nämlich nicht zwingend (denken wir an Stawrogin und Schatow zurück), dass sich das der Absurdität bewusste Individuum auch ethisch verhält – ein Problem, dem sich Camus noch in Der Mensch in der Revolte stellen muss.124 Ethische Auswirkungen kann das Absurde nur dann haben, wenn ich gegen den absurden Zustand der Welt, gegen das sinnlose Leiden aufbegehre, dessen ich Zeuge bin – und daher an allen anderen lebenden Personen, mithin am grösstmöglichen rationalen Wir Anteil nehme: In der Erfahrung des Absurden ist das Leid individuell. Von der Bewegung der Revolte ausgehend, wird ihm bewusst, kollektiver Natur zu sein; es ist das Abenteuer aller. Der erste Fortschritt eines von der Befremdung befallenen Geistes ist demnach, zu erkennen, dass er diese Befremdung mit allen Menschen teilt und dass die menschliche Realität in ihrer Ganzheit an dieser Distanz zu sich selbst und zur Welt leidet. Das Übel, welches ein Einzelner erlitt, wird zur kollektiven Pest.125 Die Dialektik des Absurden, die die existenziell Vereinsamte zunächst ins kollektivmythische Exil gezwungen und sie ihrer metaphysischen Wurzeln beraubt hat, eröffnet so zuletzt die Möglichkeit einer neuen Verankerung in der gesamtmenschlichen Gemeinschaft, ohne jedoch besonders stark von einem spezifischen Kollektivmythos und dessen potenziellen Pathologien vereinnahmt zu sein. Das Durchleben absurder und widersinniger Erfahrungen kann also – über den Umweg einer vorübergehenden und qualvollen Abkapselung, die Camus 1942 mit 121 Vgl. TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 705. 122 Annemarie PIEPER: Camus Verständnis des Absurden in Der Mythos von Sisyphos. In: PIEPER: Gegenwart des Absurden, S. 1–15, 7. 123 Vgl. MÜLLER-LAUTER: Probleme des Idealismus, S. 273ff. 124 Vgl. den Abschnitt zum nihilistischen Mord in Albert CAMUS: Der Mensch in der Revolte. Reinbek bei Hamburg 312016, S. 369–373. Vgl. auch WEYEMBERGH: Überwindung des Absurden, S. 73f. 125 CAMUS: Der Mensch in der Revolte, S. 38. Vgl. diesbezüglich auch RORTY: Kontingenz, S. 158, der dort davon spricht, dass wir „nur durch Schmerzempfindlichkeit mit der übrigen Spezies humana verbunden [sind], besonders durch die Empfindlichkeit für die Art Schmerz, die die Tiere nicht mit den Menschen teilen – Demütigung." Die sich ähnelnden Ansätze von Camus und Rorty diskutiert Avi SAGI: Albert Camus and the Philosophy of the Absurd. Amsterdam/ New York 2002, S. 117–130. 33 den Charaktermasken des Liebhabers, des Schauspielers und des Eroberers noch als masochistische Wonne beschreibt126 – direkt in die Annahme eines reinen, von kollektiven Dogmen unbelasteten Weltmythos aufgehen, dessen Bedeutsamkeit das absurde Bewusstsein in gewissem Sinne zu einem säkularen „Glaubensritter" werden lässt.127 Prägnanter formuliert: Die nihilistische Verengung der eigenen Identität ermöglicht durch intensiveres Leiden zugleich ihre Ausweitung auf die übrige Menschheit – aus der anfänglichen Grenzsituation entsteht ein kultivierter Humanismus. Da diese dem Absurden entspringende Haltung nun aber selbst wieder mit Grenzsituationen konfrontiert werden kann, muss sie das ständige Bewusstsein und die kontinuierliche Antizipation nicht nur von eigenem, sondern auch von fremdem Leid voraussetzen. Das blosse Leben selbst – mit einer schwächeren Variante des Schopenhauerischen Pessimismus – zwar nicht ausschliesslich, aber eben teilweise als von Krankheit, Schmerz und Tod durchdrungen aufzufassen und in stetiger Erwartung von existenziellen Kontingenzen zu sein, die mich selbst oder andere mit absoluter Sinnlosigkeit konfrontieren, ist jedoch keine Fähigkeit, die schlagartig mit der Einsicht kommt – sondern etwas, das in immer wieder neuen Auseinandersetzungen mit dem Absurden erprobt und eingeübt werden muss.128 Die Ethik des absurden Bewusstseins ruft also, radikaler gefasst, dazu auf, den Anderen zu lieben, indem ich selbst zu leiden lerne – eine Schlussfolgerung, die an Schopenhauers aus dem Buddhismus übernommene Ethik des Mitleids erinnert.129 Solange ich daher die Möglichkeit habe, am globalmenschlichen Gemeinwohl zu partizipieren und es zu fördern, kann ich den durch das Absurde obsolet gewordenen „Sinn", verstanden als Maximalbestimmung meiner eigenen Existenz, im Anderen wiederfinden. Da das absurde Bewusstsein aber zugleich damit rechnet, dass die nächste existenzielle Krise nicht sonderlich weit weg sein kann, erweist es sich als besonders widerstandsund leidensfähig – ein Befund, der umso interessanter wird, je mehr sich das antizipierte, in seiner blossen Möglichkeit noch abstrakt bleibende Leid lebensweltlich konkretisiert: Dann nämlich entscheidet sich, ob der absurde Weltmythos konsistent genug ist, um die 126 Vgl. CAMUS: Mythos des Sisyphos, S. 83–109. 127 „Glaubensritter" ist Kierkegaards Bezeichnung für einen authentisch Glaubenden, der – ähnlich wie bei Dostojewski – durch die Dialektik existenzieller Verzweiflung hindurchgegangen ist, vgl. Søren KIERKEGAARD: Furcht und Zittern. In: ders.: Die Krankheit zum Tode (et al.). Hrsg. von Hermann DIEM und Walter REST. München 42012, S. 179–326, 215–219, sowie Konstantinos PATRINOS: Kierkegaards Sorge um die Welt. Zur soziopolitischen Dimension der ,Verzweiflung und des ,Glaubens . Berlin 2016, S. 93f. 128 Auf den Sisyphos-Mythos übertragen vgl. PIEPER: Camus Verständnis des Absurden, S. 13f. 129 Vgl. hierzu GLOY: Zwischen Glück und Tragik, S. 168ff., sowie MÖBUSS: Existenzphilosophie, S. 163–167. Wichtiger als das Mitleid ist im Buddhismus allerdings die Fähigkeit zum Mitgefühl (karuṇā), das mich am Schmerz anderer Wesen Anteil haben lässt, ohne jedoch mich selbst durch eigenes Leiden betroffen zu machen und zu schwächen. Das Ausbauen der eigenen Leidensfähigkeit und das daraus resultierende Mitgefühl sind daher im Buddhismus eng miteinander verwoben, vgl. Ulrich LUZ/ Axel MICHAELS: Jesus oder Buddha. Leben und Lehre im Vergleich. München 2002, S. 100f., sowie Oliver FREIBERGER/ Christoph KLEINE: Buddhismus. Handbuch und kritische Einführung. Göttingen 22015, S. 211. 34 neu hervorbrechenden Kontingenzen zu verarbeiten und sie in die bedeutsame, den Willen zum Leben fundierende Selbsterzählung einzuflechten. Sollte Wolfgang Herrndorf nun tatsächlich eine absurde Perspektive auf sein eigenes Leben und die Welt zugeschrieben werden können – das zu untersuchen wird Aufgabe des ersten Teils der nachfolgenden Analyse sein –, dann ist in Anbetracht seiner Situation zu vermuten, dass sich dieses Ringen mit der abermals konkret gewordenen Sinnlosigkeit, dieser Kampf gegen die Kontingenz mit absurden Mitteln, in Arbeit und Struktur beobachten und nachvollziehen lässt. Bemerkenswert daran ist, dass dieselben absurden Narrative, die Herrndorf sich dreieinhalb Jahre lang jeden Morgen aufs Neue für das Leben mit der Erkrankung haben entschliessen lassen, ebenfalls die Ursache für die allmähliche Bejahung seines Suizids zu sein scheinen. Wenn das jedoch zutrifft, dann verlangt der sich stetig weiterentwickelnde Suizidgedanke besondere Aufmerksamkeit, da er dem absurden Grundparadigma, das fernab von Tradition, Glaube und Sinn nur noch an der uneingeschränkten Liebe fürs Leben festhalten kann, zu widersprechen scheint.130 Blosses Überleben würde in diesem Zusammenhang dann nichts mehr mit der gross diskutierten Frage nach dem „Sinn" gemein haben – die hat sich durch das Zugeständnis ans Absurde ja erübrigt –, sondern als ein Zustand erscheinen, in dem die Anwesenheit von Bedeutsamkeit als Minimalbedingung menschlicher Lebendigkeit garantiert sein muss. Um dieser Vermutung nachzugehen, werde ich die sich in Arbeit und Struktur zeigenden bedeutsamen Weltmythen daraufhin analysieren, wie gut sie sich mit den Narrativen eines absurden Standpunktes vereinbaren lassen. Sind alle darin enthaltenen Weltmythen, die Herrndorfs Willen zum Leben mit der Krankheit bestärken, absurder Natur? Halten selbst jene, die die Bejahung des Suizids erkennen lassen, die absurde Bedeutsamkeit aufrecht oder zerstören sie diese? Und zuletzt: Nimmt Herrndorf sich das Leben, weil er im Angesicht seiner tödlichen Erkrankung sowohl Sinn als auch Bedeutsamkeit verloren hat – oder weil er vielleicht paradoxerweise gerade durch seinen Suizid eine letzte Form von Bedeutsamkeit ergreifen konnte? 130 Auch wenn aus den meisten existenzphilosophischen Positionen die Konsequenz einer weitgehenden subjektiven Freiheit folgt – die säkular gesprochen vor dem menschlichen Anderen (Nietzsche, Sartre und Camus), religiös gesprochen vor dem göttlichen Anderen zu enden hat (Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard, Dostojewski und Jaspers) –, so ist sich das absurde Bewusstsein dieser Freiheit, die den Suizid mit einschliesst, zwar bewusst, versucht ja aber gerade aufgrund der absoluten Lebensbejahung, diese Freiheit nicht zu gebrauchen. Der vor allem durch die Stoiker stark gemachte Gedanke, den Suizid im Falle einer unheilbaren Krankheit zu bejahen, ist dem absurden Bewusstsein daher zunächst fremd, vgl. BROCK: Nietzsche und der Nihilismus, S. 123–128. 35 IV Weltmythen in „Arbeit und Struktur" 7) Bejahung des Lebens 7.1) Das begreifbare Absurde Ich schaute in die Sterne mit ihrer unbegreiflichen Unendlichkeit, und ich war irgendwie erschrocken. Ich war gerührt und erschrocken gleichzeitig. Ich dachte über die Insekten nach, die jetzt fast sichtbar wurden auf ihrer kleinen, flimmernden Galaxie, und dann drehte ich mich zu Tschick, und er guckte mich an und guckte mir in die Augen und sagte, dass das alles ein Wahnsinn wäre, und das stimmte auch. Es war wirklich ein Wahnsinn.131 Das zeitgleiche Ergriffensein und Zurückschrecken, von dem Maik Klingenberg, der Ich-Erzähler in Tschick, hier berichtet, ist beim Betrachten der Nachtgestirne eine fast prototypische Erfahrung. Angesichts seiner logischen Unermesslichkeit kann der Blick in den Sternenhimmel verängstigen, doch kann er auch, wenn man in ihm etwas unabhängig von uns Existierendes und stets anwesend Seiendes erkennt, Trost bedeuten. Von Anfang an ein häufig verklärtes Mysterium, sind die Sterne seit ihrer astronomischen Erforschung ein prägnantes Beispiel dafür, dass mit den modernen Naturwissenschaften auch ein spezifisches Gefühl für das Absurde aufkommt: Der teleskopische Blick ins Universum eröffnet dem neuzeitlich-säkularen Denken eine Tür, hinter der „es in Ehrfurcht einer Unermesslichkeit begegnet, die dem menschlichen Leben völlig gleichgültig gegenüberzustehen scheint."132 Absurd in diesem Sinne ist die Unwahrscheinlichkeit, mit der es auf der Erde überhaupt zu Leben gekommen ist – aber eben auch die Unwahrscheinlichkeit, mit der man selbst geboren ist und trotz der empirischen Gewissheit des Todes am Leben festhält: „Der Tod ist schliesslich nichts anderes als die Mitteilung des Universums an das Individuum, nicht geliebt zu werden, nicht gebraucht zu werden, dieser Welt egal zu sein" (AuS 131). Anders als Camus, der im Mythos des Sisyphos für diesen Gedanken keinen Trost zulässt und später einen intellektuellen, indirekten Trost höchstens darin findet, dass sich Leid und Freude die Waage halten, diese Welt eine „ausgeglichene" sei,133 ist sich Herrndorf auch seiner eigenen säkularen Trostbedürftigkeit bewusst, die er durch das Schreiben „über das Weltall" (AuS 55) und das Lesen von literarischen Werken stillt, in denen 131 Wolfgang HERRNDORF: Tschick. Reinbek bei Hamburg 222013, S. 122, im Folgenden mit der Sigle T abgekürzt. 132 TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 613. Auch Blumenberg hat sich ausgiebig mit der modernen Astronomie befasst und, wie Franz Josef Wetz erläutert, ebenfalls die Gleichgültigkeit der Sterne gegen das menschliche Leben herausgestellt: „Mit der Verwissenschaftlichung des Weltalls hat der ,Kosmos aufgehört zu existieren. Das Universum ist stumm geworden auf die Frage, was es im Letzten mit ihm selbst und dem Menschen darin auf sich hat", Franz Josef WETZ: Sterne. In: Robert BUCH/ Daniel WEIDNER (Hg.): Blumenberg lesen. Ein Glossar. Berlin 2014, S. 306–322, 321. 133 Vgl. Albert CAMUS: Tagebücher 1935 – 1951. Reinbek bei Hamburg 1997, S. 271f. 36 man teilhat an einem Dasein und an Menschen und am Bewusstsein von Menschen, an etwas, worüber man sonst im Leben zu erfahren nicht viel Gelegenheit hat, selbst, um ehrlich zu sein, in Gesprächen mit Freunden nur selten und noch seltener in Filmen, und dass es einen Unterschied gibt zwischen Kunst und Scheisse. Einen Unterschied zwischen dem existentiellen Trost einer grossen Erzählung und dem Müll, von dem ich zuletzt eindeutig zu viel gelesen habe [...]. (AuS 104) Der sich hier ausdrückende Wunsch, Anteil an einem grösstmöglichen menschlichen Wir zu haben, geht mit dem konform, was Camus 1951 als die soziale Konsequenz der Revolte beschreibt: „Ich empöre mich, also sind wir."134 Die Empörung wider das Absurde resultiert in einer echten Empathie mit dem menschlich Anderen, weil dieser Andere ebenso durch sein Bewusstsein leidet wie ich selbst. Wenn eine absurde Welthaltung daher nicht ausschliesslich Zynismus sein will, dann muss sie immer wieder aufrichtigen Kontakt zu anderen Menschen suchen. Jemandem wirklich nahezukommen – und zwar auch dann, wenn man selbst dieser Jemand ist –, ist so nur über die existenzielle (oder nihilistische) Verengung möglich.135 Der säkular begründete Trost, den Herrndorf für sich in Anspruch nimmt, kann nicht auf die „Gewissheiten" des Glaubens zurückgreifen, sondern hat überhaupt erst zur Voraussetzung, dass er den religiös bereitgestellten Trost verwirft. In einem Eintrag über den Briefwechsel Helmuth James Graf von Moltkes,136 der „kurz vor seiner Hinrichtung spekuliert, vielleicht ,gleichzeitig mit seiner Frau im Jenseits anzukommen", schreibt Herrndorf: Die Frage, die ich mir auch als Kind schon immer gestellt habe, seit ich bei unseren Nachbarn zum ersten Mal religiösen Vorstellungen begegnete: Ob es diese armen Irren leichter haben am Ende. Offensichtlich nicht. Moltke geht es nicht gut, und man weiss nicht, warum, wo ihm doch nichts Entsetzlicheres bevorsteht als das ewige Leben. (AuS 175) Hinter der ironischen Pointe verbirgt sich ein Sarkasmus, der in einem einzigen Nebensatz die gesamte abrahamitische Tradition attackiert und den christlichen Trost als wenig hilfreich für den Augenblick unmittelbar vor dem Tod begreift. Unmittelbar vor dem Tod zu sein, heisst noch zu leben, und wenn ein Weltbild nicht das Leben, nicht das Jetzt erleichtert, so notiert Herrndorf etwa fünf Monate vor seinem eigenen Tod (vgl. AuS 432), dann taugt es nichts. In einem weiteren bissigen Kommentar vom März 2010, der sich auf Dorothea Bucks Vermutung eines Zusammenhangs zwischen Schizophrenie und religiösem Erleben bezieht137 und 134 CAMUS: Der Mensch in der Revolte, S. 38. 135 Wie diese synthetische Tendenz des Absurden mit dem Umstand zusammenpasst, dass sich das absurde Bewusstsein zugleich von Kollektiv und Tradition entfernt hat und eine gewisse Abscheu vor dem sozialen Raum entwickeln kann, werde ich in Abschnitt 7.3 ausführlicher erläutern. 136 Moltke agierte im Widerstand gegen den Nationalsozialismus und war Begründer des sogenannten „Kreisauer Kreises", der engen Kontakt zur Widerstandsgruppe um Graf von Stauffenberg pflegte. Er wurde 1944 von der Gestapo verhaftet und 1945 im Gefängnis Berlin-Plötzensee hingerichtet. 137 Vgl. Dorothea S. BUCK-ZERCHIN: Auf der Spur des Morgensterns. Psychose als Selbstfindung. Neumünster 2005. Trotz Herrndorfs eingeschränkter Sichtweise ist Bucks Hypothese nicht leichtfertig von der Hand zu weisen: Tatsächlich haben sich im Rahmen kognitionspsychologischer und neurobiologischer Forschung Hinweise auf einen Zusammenhang zwischen religiösen Vorstellungen und bestimmten Gehirnarealen ergeben, die etwa auch bei epileptischen Anfällen aktiv sind. Daran anknüpfend wird gegenwärtig die Frage diskutiert, ob sich Religiosität als Verhaltensweise zumindest eines Teils der Menschheit durchsetzen konnte, weil sie einen entscheidenden evolutionären Vorteil gegenüber nicht religiösen Gesellschaften mit sich 37 - „Psychoseinhalte als religiöse Erfahrungen verstanden wissen will", kehrt Herrndorf Bucks These um und bezeichnet diese Erfahrungen entschieden als Wahnvorstellungen, die vollständig verschwinden würden, wenn nur die Medikamente für alle genügten (vgl. AuS 28). Was Religion und ihre Hoffnungen angeht, ist Herrndorf also weitgehend militant und unversöhnlich; er verschreibt sich vielmehr ganz dem säkularen Pragmatismus, der Linderung stets nur momentan und niemals endgültig verspricht, und seine Ablehnung von „Rudolf Steiner und extravaganten Ahnungen fremder, unbegreiflich tröstlicher Welten" (AuS 191) sowie sein Zynismus in der Theodizee-Frage (vgl. AuS 278f.)138 zeugen von Herrndorfs Willen, unter keinen Umständen von seinem säkular-absurden Grundparadigma abzulassen. Wenn nun aber religiöse Konzepte nicht zur Verfügung stehen, um stets neue Kraft für den täglichen Kampf gegen die tödliche Erkrankung zu schöpfen, dann müssen andere Strategien herhalten, mit denen sich dieser ertragen lässt. Dass es sich dabei auch für Herrndorf um einen „Kampf" handelt, lässt sich der Rückblende entnehmen. Dort findet sich ein Hinweis darauf, dass Herrndorf die veränderte Qualität „der kompletten Sinnlosigkeit des eigenen Lebens" (AuS 105) wahrnimmt und seinen Leidensdruck als Konkretion der zuvor nur antizipierbaren Möglichkeit zu leiden und zu sterben bestimmt: „Schlimme Konzentrationsstörungen. Wenn ich lese, ergänzt mein Gehirn jeden Satz: Lee Harvey Oswald ging die Strasse entlang, und du wirst sterben. Er sah die Autos, und du wirst sterben. [...] C. legt ihren Arm um meine Schulter: Tod. Sie lächelt: Tod" (AuS 108). Gerade die anfängliche Unausweichlichkeit des Gedankens an den eigenen Tod, den Herrndorf erst nach einer Weile punktuell in den Hintergrund zu drängen vermag (vgl. AuS 240), empfindet er als belastend – obwohl die Vergänglichkeit in der absurden Perspektive ja eine stets gegenwärtige Grösse darstellt. Entlastung von diesem quälenden Gedanken findet Herrndorf nun nicht, indem er sich, wie etwa der biblische Hiob in der Interpretation Kants, eines Urteils im Rahmen der Theodizee enthält und sein von Gott auferlegtes Schicksal annimmt139, sondern indem er seine Situation auf physikalische Kategorien zurückführt und so zu ihrer Anerkennung gelangt: brachte, vgl. Georg NORTHOFF: Religion und Gehirn – Wer beeinflusst wen? In: Lars CHARBONNIER u.a. (Hg.): Religion und Gefühl. Praktisch-theologische Perspektiven einer Theorie der Emotionen. Göttingen 2013, S. 141–154, 144ff. 138 Sehr eindrücklich dargestellt durch den „Hamster im Schraubstock", eine Karikatur Herrndorfs, die 2015 im Rahmen einer Ausstellung des Berliner Literaturhauses zu sehen war und digital als Teil einer Bilderserie abgerufen werden kann, vgl. Oliver Maria SCHMITT: Was mich interessiert, kann ich nicht malen. In: Die Zeit 24 (2015), URL = <http://www.zeit.de/2015/24/wolfgang-herrndorf-tod-titanic-satire> (04.04.2017). Schmitt war von 1995 bis 2000 Chefredakteur der Satirezeitschrift Titanic, in der Herrndorf viele seiner Comics und Zeichnungen hat unterbringen können. 139 Vgl. Immanuel KANT: Über das Misslingen aller Versuche in der Theodizee. In: Wilhelm WEISCHEDEL (Hg.): Werkausgabe in 12 Bänden, Bd. XI. Frankfurt a.M. 172014, S. 103–124, 116ff. 38 Eine ganz andere Frage, die sich Krebskranke angeblich häufiger stellen, die Frage ,Warum ich? , ist mir dagegen noch nicht gekommen. Ohne gehässig sein zu wollen, vermute ich, dass diese Frage sich hauptsächlich Leuten aufdrängt, die, wenn sie Langzeitüberlebende werden, Yoga, grünen Tee, Gott und ihr Reiki dafür verantwortlich machen. Warum ich? Warum denn nicht ich? Willkommen in der biochemischen Lotterie. (AuS 181) Besonders augenfällig ist hierbei das Wort der „Lotterie", das das semantische Feld des Kontingenten aufruft und sich gut in die oben bereits erläuterte Auffassung einfügt, die das Leben als Spielfeld von Zufällen und Unvorhersehbarkeiten begreift. Auf diese Weise erscheint die konkret gewordene Kontingenz von Herrndorfs Tumor als „Niete", die durch den Habitus des spielerischen „Pech gehabt" nicht unbedingt zum sofortigen Aufhören aufruft, sondern im Gegenteil noch konstruktiv gewendet werden kann: Wer davon ausgeht, dass wir alle schon verloren haben, wenn wir nur am Leben teilnehmen – der kann überhaupt nur gewinnen, je länger er dabei mitmacht.140 In Herrndorfs Fall erwächst aus der Affirmation des eigenen „biochemischen Loses" der durchs Absurde begünstigte Wille weiterzumachen – ein Schluss, der auch der Glaubenden noch möglich ist, wenn sie der Logik des Warum entsagen kann. Solange eine Anerkennung des wahrhaft Unveränderlichen erwirkt wird – und die Erkenntnis dessen, was noch veränderbar bleibt –, ist daher sowohl die säkulare als auch die glaubende Perspektive zu begrüssen und Herrndorfs oftmals harsche Religionskritik (vgl. etwa AuS 250 & 406) zurückzuweisen. Nicht die Frage nach dem Warum macht die Differenz aus – sondern lediglich die Vorstellung, wohin man geht. Herrndorfs eigene „Eschatologie" freilich fällt der absurden Tönung gemäss sehr trist aus. Besonders interessant ist hierbei der Eintrag vom 5. März 2013 (AuS 394), in dem Herrndorf eine längere Passage aus dem apokryphen Buch der Weisheit zitiert: „Die Frevler [...] aber sagen: Kurz und traurig ist unser Leben; für das Ende der Menschen gibt es keine Arznei und man kennt keinen, der aus der Welt des Todes befreit. Durch Zufall sind wir geworden und danach werden wir sein, als wären wir nie gewesen" (Weish 1,16–2,2). Dieses Zitat könnte auch von Dostojewski stammen: Die vielen Schlagworte aus dem absurden und nihilistischen Spektrum verblüffen zwar, werden aber zugleich als verfehlt dargestellt – denn der christlichen Position geht es ja darum, als Glaubende vom Gegenteil auszugehen. Gerade weil ihn der Vorwurf des Frevlerischen jedoch kalt lässt, macht sich Herrndorf bereitwillig in den Augen der Tradition selbst zum „Frevler" und wendet sie gegen sich selbst: Er zieht, wie es den Offenbarungsreligionen zu eigen ist, Bedeutsamkeit aus einem religiösen Text – aber gerade nicht als Glaubender, sondern als Skeptiker. 140 Camus gelangt aus ähnlichen Überlegungen zur absurden Freiheit zu einem Begriff der Quantifizierung des Lebens, bei der es darum geht, so lange und „so viel wie möglich [zu] leben", vgl. CAMUS: Mythos des Sisyphos, S. 74. 39 Dieser Skeptizismus, der auf die radikale Desillusionierung aus ist, wird auch in einem der undatierten Fragmente deutlich, in dem Herrndorf über seine Begeisterung für Wach-Operationen berichtet: Wann hat man schon einmal Gelegenheit, in das reinzugucken, was man eigentlich im Innern ist, ein Klumpen Blut und Fleisch, nichts Besonderes, ich denke mir das genauso gross und wahnsinnig, wie als Astronaut vom Mond aus die Erde zu sehen, Staub im Nichts, eine notwendige Kalibrierungsmassnahme für das menschliche Ego. (AuS 429) Insgesamt stellt sich Arbeit und Struktur – zusammen mit Sand, auf das ich später noch zu sprechen komme – als ein literarisches Bollwerk dar, das eine ständige Erinnerung daran ist, wie nichtig und wie klein die menschliche Existenz in kosmischen Massstäben erscheint, was „das hier ist und was es bedeutet: nichts. Und insbesondere: nichts Gerechtes" (AuS 389). Herrndorfs Pessimismus ist dabei häufig durchmischt mit Sarkasmus und groteskem Humor: „Unter der Brücke loht ein haushohes Feuer, wahrscheinlich die Baustelle. Sattes Orange vom warmen Blaulicht bedrängt und gelöscht, Naturalismus, frühes 19. Jh., Turner vielleicht, dann schwarzes Quadrat auf schwarzem Grund" (AuS 384). Lakonisch bezieht er die aus dem Brand resultierende Zerstörung auf sich selbst und ergänzt: „Demnächst an dieser Stelle: Nichts vor Nichts (o. Abb.)." In dieser visuellen Tautologie, die keine Konturen kennt und keinen Unterschied mehr macht zwischen dem Zustand des Lebendigseins und dem des Totseins, gelangt nicht nur Herrndorfs mittlerweile gereifte Akzeptanz des eigenen Todes zum Ausdruck (der Eintrag ist sechs Monate zuvor geschrieben), sondern kündigt sich auch bereits das Motiv der eigenmächtigen „Nihilisierung" an, das im zweiten Teil meiner Analyse noch wichtig werden wird. 40 7.2) Gegenwärtigkeit und Erfüllung Nachdem er im August 2011 den Dorotheenstädtischen Friedhof besucht hatte, auf dem nun selbst seine Gebeine liegen, reflektiert Herrndorf über eine mögliche Grabinschrift: „Was ich vermutlich gut fände: Starb in Erfüllung seiner Pflicht" (AuS 235). Die Ellipse erlaubt, sowohl den absurden Selbstzwang zu leben, als auch die biologische Pflicht zu sterben mitzudenken – in Bezug zu Herrndorfs absurden Narrativen beides legitime Ergänzungen. Lebendigsein erscheint in dieser Hinsicht nicht als Vorbereitung auf das Nicht-mehr-Lebendigsein, sondern als eine freiwillige Plagerei, die gerade durch das Zugeständnis ihrer Freiwilligkeit das eigene Dasein in voller Tiefe zu erleben versucht: Maximal schnell zurück und Usain Bolt gucken. Die unglaubliche Freude, das seltsamste Wesen auf dem Planeten bei Höchstleistungen in Bereichen, für die es nicht ausgelegt ist, sich abmühen zu sehen, als ginge es um Leben und Tod, worum es wahrscheinlich auch geht – die gleiche Freude, [...] Teil dieser der Evolution längst entglittenen und auf dem Weg ins Ungewisse befindlichen Art und ihres auf verschlungenen Pfaden geführten Kampfes gegen den zweiten Hauptsatz der Thermodynamik und den immer wieder und in jedem Moment übermächtigen Impuls zur Selbstauslöschung zu sein – ich reisse die Arme hoch, Bolt reisst die Arme hoch, der schnellste Mann auf dem Planeten, Sieg! Sieg für Bolt! Sieg für uns alle! (AuS 349f.) Die absurde Ironie kann es nicht verschleiern: Trotz der durch sie bewirkten Brechung drückt sich in diesen Zeilen eine aufrichtige Euphorie, eine unverhohlene Zufriedenheit aus, die mit Herrndorfs sonstigem Pessimismus schwer vereinbar scheint. Lassen sich diese beiden Extreme sinnvoll miteinander in Verbindung bringen? Worin überhaupt kann ein absurdes Bewusstsein noch so etwas wie „Erfüllung" finden? Ein erster Hinweis darauf findet sich im Eintrag vom 28. März 2011, in dem Herrndorf ein Resümee nach einem Jahr seit der Diagnose zieht: Bilanz eines Jahres: Hirn-OP, zweimal Klapse, Strahlen, Temodal. I 3/4 Romane, erster grosser Urlaub, viele Freunde, viel geschwommen, kaum gelesen. Ein Jahr in der Hölle, aber auch ein tolles Jahr. Im Schnitt kaum glücklicher oder unglücklicher als vor der Diagnose, nur die Ausschläge nach beiden Seiten grösser. Insgesamt vielleicht sogar ein ein bisschen glücklicher als früher, weil ich so lebe, wie ich immer hätte leben sollen. Und es nie getan habe, ausser vielleicht als Kind. (AuS 196f.) So schwierig sich das Zurechtkommen mit der Krankheit gestaltet hat, so wenig hat sie ihm offensichtlich seine Lebensfreude genommen; die existenzielle Ausnahmesituation hat Herrndorfs eigenes Erleben nicht – wie etwa bei Nikolai Stawrogin – eingeebnet, sondern im Gegenteil intensiviert. In Arbeit und Struktur finden sich genügend Beispiele, in denen diese Intensität und das freudige Festhalten am Leben – und zwar auch bis kurz vor seinem Suizid (vgl. AuS 420f.) – deutlich wird und mit denen Herrndorfs Vorstellung von „Glück" und „Lebensqualität"141 näher bestimmt werden kann. 141 Zur Diskussion dieses Begriffes als medizinische Kategorie vgl. Norbert R. KRISCHKE: Lebensqualität und Krebs. München 1996, S. 45–61. 41 Eine erste Annäherung daran lässt sich in den folgenden Sätzen erkennen, die Herrndorf an einem warmen Juninachmittag notiert: „Neben mir ins Gras setzen sich vier junge Männer. Sie unterhalten sich über die Begriffe Zweck und Absicht bei Kant und Hegel, und es ist eine grauenvolle Unterhaltung, ein grauenvoll verfehltes, sinnloses Leben, während um sie herum alles in schönster Blüte steht" (AuS 64). Was die hier von Herrndorf gemeinten Personen ihr Leben „verfehlen" lässt, besteht seiner Auffassung nach in dem Umstand, dass sie sich in der philosophischen Reflexion nicht beim gegenwärtigen Naturschönen, sondern in der (unnützen) Vergangenheit der Geistesgeschichte aufhalten und somit die Lebenszeit vergeuden, die ihnen zur Verfügung steht. Für Herrndorf stellt sich Glück dergestalt als glücklicher Moment dar, und zwar als ein Moment der vollkommenen Vergegenwärtigung des wahrnehmbaren Naturgeschehens, in dem sowohl Vergangenheit als auch Zukunft keine Rolle mehr spielen: „Baden im [...] See. Fische treiben kieloben, Hirntumore verschwinden, durch Herbstlaub scheint die Sonne" (AuS 359). Mit dieser Vorstellung eines radikalen Gegenwärtigseins nähert sich Herrndorf schliesslich der klassischen Definition des sogenannten „Flow-Erlebens" nach Mihály Csíkszentmihályi an: Im flow-Zustand folgt Handlung auf Handlung, und zwar nach einer inneren Logik, welche kein bewusstes Eingreifen von Seiten des Handelnden zu erfordern scheint. Er erlebt den Prozess als ein einheitliches ,Fliessen von einem Augenblick zum nächsten, wobei er [...] kaum eine Trennung zwischen sich und der Umwelt [...] oder zwischen Vergangenheit, Gegenwart und Zukunft verspürt.142 Dieses Aufgehen in Natur und Gegenwart bildet dabei keinen Widerspruch zu der sich bereits im Titel von Arbeit und Struktur ankündigenden Arbeitspraxis und -abhängigkeit: Schreiben ist hier über-leben, aber das eigentliche Leben geschieht eben nicht am Schreibtisch, sondern jenseits davon. Herrndorfs ständiger Bezug zum Meer ist ebenfalls hervorstechend. Als begeisterter Hobbyschwimmer verbringt er viel Zeit am und im Wasser und sieht darin einen wesentlichen Ruhepol: „Gewohnt schwerer Abschied vom Meer. Jede Nacht bei offenem Fenster gelegen, das Rauschen gehört, die Wellen gesehen" (AuS 194). Zugleich dienen die Panoramen aus Strand und Ozean als einprägsame Projektionsfläche seiner Euphorie: Der zwölfte August in meinem Kalender ist eingekastet, grabsteinförmig, mein Todestag, errechnet in der Woche nach der OP aufgrund der ersten von Passig runtergeladenen Statistiken, siebzehn Komma irgendwas Monate. Der Nachmittag vergeht mit einem langen Strandspaziergang im Regen nach Sellin runter und zweimaligem Baden im 15 Grad kalten Wasser. Herrliche Wellen, herrlich alles. (AuS 226) Wenn diesen Augenblicken in irgendeiner Weise eine „heilende" Wirkung anhaftet, dann ist sie darin zu suchen, dass Herrndorf den durchs Absurde und seine Erkrankung ständig präsenten Imperativ des Vergehens zeitweilig zu vergessen vermag: „Auf der Terrasse im Dämmer142 Mihály CSÍKSZENTMIHÁLYI: Das flow-Erlebnis. Jenseits von Angst und Langeweile: im Tun aufgehen. Hrsg. von Hans Aebli. Stuttgart 112010, S. 59. 42 licht, im Haus meiner Jugend, umgeben von Sauberkeit, blühendem Phlox und alten Gerüchen, kann ich mir nicht vorstellen, sterblich zu sein" (AuS 213). Auf der anderen Seite kann die bewusste Ausblendung des noch Bevorstehenden den mühevollen Alltag mit der Krankheit erleichtern; Herrndorfs Fokussierung auf die Gegenwart bewegt sich damit zwischen Lebenslust und Selbstschutz, sie erringt einen Freiraum, indem sie das tödliche Zukünftige negiert: „Die Zukunft ist abgeschafft, ich plane nichts, ich hoffe nichts, ich freue mich auf nichts ausser den heutigen Tag" (AuS 218).143 Soweit diese zweite Form des Gegenwartsbezuges intendiert ist und nicht lediglich als Teil eines Flow-Erlebnisses erscheint, verliert die hierdurch empfundene Freude ihre Unbeschwertheit und gerät mit dem unauslöschlichen Wissen um das Absurde in einen unauflöslichen Widerspruch: „Glück" erscheint nunmehr als Genuss, der sich des eigenen Privilegs bewusst ist, vom Zufall begünstigt zu sein – im gleichzeitigen Wissen darum, dass andere von diesem Privileg ausgeschlossen bleiben und die eigene Privilegierung jederzeit aufgehoben werden kann. Was damit gemeint ist, kann durch einen Eintrag verdeutlicht werden, in dem Herrndorf mit einem an den Erzähler aus Tschick erinnernden gleichzeitigen Staunen und Entsetzen von der Unfassbarkeit spricht, „in genau dieser Sekunde zu leben, während andere nicht leben" (AuS 227). Je ausgiebiger und intensiver man dabei in dieser zeitlichen Verdichtung, in dieser „Gegenwartssekunde" (AuS 347) verweilt, umso weniger Furcht muss man haben, dass sie endet. Im Zusammenhang mit dieser Kompression des Zeitgefühls sind auch Herrndorfs leicht manische Episoden zu sehen, in denen er „ungefähr dreimal so schnell wie sonst, und zehnmal so viel" denkt und schreibt (AuS 10). Nachdem er im März 2011 einen uneindeutigen Befund erhält, schreibt er: „Die Unsicherheit und die Beschäftigung mit dem, was kommen wird, führt, wie auch schon zuvor, zu leichter Hypomanie. Gedanken schnell und leicht, auch das Arbeiten geht wieder leichter. Irgendwas scheint da bei mir falsch verschaltet zu sein" (AuS 197). Indem es gerade die Ungewissheit, die Kontingenz des Erwartbaren als Antrieb verwendet und damit das definitive Wissen um den (möglicherweise bevorstehenden) Tod in den Hintergrund drängt, entkommt das Hypomanische der drohenden Angststarre und wendet die existenzielle Gewalt der absurden Situation gegen sich selbst, macht sie fruchtund nutzbar: Aktivität nicht trotz, sondern aufgrund der spürbaren Bedrohung, die zur Bedeutsamkeit wird. Solange diese Bedrohung für ein absurdes Bewusstsein spürbar bleibt, oder mit Camus gesprochen: solange 143 Vgl. dazu auch den Eintrag vom 9. Oktober 2011: „Die Zeitspanne, in der ich in die Zukunft denke, oft keine zehn Sekunden mehr, teilweise regrediert auf den Gemütszustand eines Fünfjährigen. Und nicht nur den Zustand, auch das Benehmen. Da fahre ich mit dem Fahrrad das Nordufer entlang und freue mich wie wahnsinnig über Bäume und Autos und Licht. Dann taucht am Ende der Strasse eine Kreuzung auf – und dann? Oh, ein neuer Weg! Neue Bäume, neue Autos, neues Licht, welche Freude! Weitere zehn Sekunden bis zur BEHALA Westhafen – und dann? Was kommt dann? Und so geht das Schritt für Schritt" (AuS 259). 43 der Tod als eine mir fremde Macht einen Grund zur Empörung darstellt,144 solange wird auch die dadurch generierte Bedeutsamkeit erhalten bleiben. Angesichts dieses „Seins zum Tode" muss daher auch bei Herrndorf die absurde Identität lernen, ohne tröstende Illusionen oder Projektionen mit der Logik des Lebens zurechtzukommen: „Man kann nicht leben ohne Hoffnung, schrieb ich hier vor einiger Zeit, ich habe mich geirrt. Es macht nur nicht so viel Spass" (AuS 344). Die daraus folgende Agitation und Auflehnung gegen den Tod führt in Herrndorfs Fall gleichwohl zu Hoffnungen reinster Lebensbejahung, die der Präsenz des Absurden widersprechen. Im Juli 2012, dreizehn Monate vor seinem Suizid, schreibt er: „Gib mir noch einen Tag. Und dann noch einen und dann noch einen" (AuS 348). Und sechs Monate später, unter dem Eindruck eines noch sehr winterlichen März, notiert er: „Im Deichgraf alle der Meinung, es müsse mit Winter nun auch mal ein Ende haben, sei doch scheisse, Joachim will im Trockenen joggen. Flocken vor dem Fenster. Find ich nicht, ich find s toll. Der Schnee ist toll, es soll weiter schneien, immer weiter, der Winter soll nie enden" (AuS 397). Diese zweite Notiz gewinnt an Gewicht, wenn man ihr den Eintrag vom sechsten Februar gegenüberstellt, in dem Herrndorf festhält, dass er „im Winter sterben [will]. Das haben die letzten Sommer gezeigt, im Sommer geht es nicht. Im Winter ist es leicht" (AuS 384). Zusammen machen beide Stellen die Präsenz des Winters als eben jene „Gegenwartssekunde" begreifbar, die in Herrndorfs Augen ein Leben versinnbildlicht, das über das reine Überleben hinausgeht und daher in vollem Sinne „lebenswert" wird – nämlich als eine momentane Ewigkeit, in der Bedeutsamkeit und Erfüllung zugleich gegeben sind. Herrndorfs Äusserungen bilden so das Fundament einer Lebenspraxis, die ihr oberstes Ziel nicht in einem hedonistisch gewendeten carpe diem sucht – das Genuss nur deshalb einen Wert beimisst, weil er vergänglich ist –, sondern auf die Übung verpflichtet, mental vollständig in der Gegenwart zu bleiben, um der übrigen Menschheit den eigenen, durch die Logik des Absurden geprägten Verstand (etwa in Form des Eintretens für die Sterbehilfe, vgl. AuS 63 & 369ff.) zur Verfügung zu stellen. 144 Vgl. CAMUS: Mythos des Sisyphos, S. 106, sowie Pieper: Camus Verständnis des Absurden, S. 8. 44 7.3) Die Ambivalenz des Sozialen In der Gegenwart, so wurde gesagt, lässt sich für das absurde Bewusstsein eine Form der Erfüllung finden. Diese Bewegung in die Gegenwart hinein und das dortige Verbleiben ist allerdings nicht naiv und sorglos, sondern wird durch das Wissen ums Absurde gebrochen – denn in der Gegenwart geschieht das von Menschen gemachte Absurde. Auf die Erfahrung dieses spezifisch menschlichen Absurden – im Gegensatz zum physikalisch-kosmischen, zu dem auch der Tod gehört – wird häufig mit jener zunehmenden Distanznahme zum ursprünglichen Kollektivmythos reagiert, für die Nietzsches Traditionskritik beispielhaft ist. Dass auch Herrndorf sich von bedeutenden westlichen Kollektivmythen weitestgehend distanziert, wird an verschiedenen Stellen deutlich. Unter dem Eindruck der Ereignisse in Fukushima etwa schreibt er: „Das ganze gegen die Natur und den Todesgedanken aufwendig aufgebaute Bollwerk der Zivilisation, der Technik, der Architektur und der angenehmen Dinge von einer riesigen Welle fortgeschwemmt zu sehen, ist nicht beunruhigend" (AuS 194). Herrndorf verwebt hier den aus dem Odysseus-Kapitel der Dialektik der Aufklärung stammenden Gedanken, dass alles Kulturelle lediglich Mittel zur Vereitelung des Todes sei,145 mit der Nietzscheanischen Vorstellung der dionysischen Natur, die sich ihr Vorrecht auf Geburt und Vergänglichkeit notfalls mit brachialer Gewalt zurückerobert. In dieser Perspektive erscheint die „Kulturtechnik" der Technologisierung als etwas, das den biologischen Zwang zum Tode und damit das Absurde aufheben will – wodurch sie paradoxerweise selbst zur Ursache einer neuen Absurdität wird, die die Biologie zu umgehen hofft. Die absurde Genugtuung über das Scheitern kultureller Projekte bezieht sich dabei nicht nur auf den kulturkritischen Topos der Naturherrschaft, sondern überhaupt auf jedwede Form von sozial ausgeübter Hierarchie. Zu Anfang der zweiten Rückblende, in der Herrndorf über eine frühe Episode berichtet, bei der er von einer Lebenserwartung von ein bis drei Monaten ausgeht, notiert er deshalb: „Was könnte man noch machen? Der Gedanke, den Diktator einer Bananenrepublik zu erschiessen, drängt sich als sinnvollste Möglichkeit in den Vordergrund, viel besser lässt sich das Leben nicht nutzen" (AuS 107f.). Besonders greifbar wird Herrndorfs Vorstellung von kollektivmythischen Zusammenhängen und seine eigene Entfernung zu ihnen jedoch dann, wenn er (in einem undatierten Fragment) über Nahtod-Erfahrungen schreibt: Ich hatte mich hier früher schon mal über Nahtod-Erfahrungen verbreitet, die ich eklig finde. Dass ich die eklig finde, ist natürlich falsch ausgedrückt. Nicht die Erfahrung ist eklig. Eklig ist die Interpretati145 Vgl. Max HORKHEIMER/ Theodor W. ADORNO: Dialektik der Aufklärung. Philosophische Fragmente. Frankfurt a.M. 212013, S. 66 & 84. 45 on. Da sitzen dann erwachsene Menschen in Talkshows und schreiben Bücher darüber. Dass sie drüben waren, dass sie jetzt mit Gewissheit sagen können: Es gibt das Jenseits, denn sie waren da, sie haben es gesehen, und dann kommt da dieses helle Licht, wobei die Interpretation abhängig ist vom kulturellen Hintergrund, alle sehen immer das, wovon sie schon geträumt oder von dem sie sich erhofft haben, es käme dann nach dem Tod, Gott, Allah, christlich grundiertes Paradies oder was auch immer man in sie hineingefüllt hat als Kind und woran sie nie mehr gedacht haben, whatever [...]. Ich hatte nie ein Nahtoderlebnis, und ich fürchte, mein Leben hätte es nicht auf den Kopf gestellt. (AuS 434) Indem er die nachträglichen und stets kulturrelativen Interpretationsversuche solcher Erfahrungen kritisiert,146 offenbart Herrndorf, dass er sich über seinen eigenen „kulturellen Hintergrund" und seine Positionierung dazu im Klaren ist. Die angehängte und auf sich selbst bezogene Äusserung gibt zudem darüber Auskunft, wie Herrndorf aller Wahrscheinlichkeit nach auf ein solches Erlebnis reagiert hätte: Nämlich mit Zurückhaltung statt mit metaphysischer Euphorie. Was in Nahtod-Erfahrungen überwiegend durchlebt wird, scheint lediglich die luzide Projektion der jeweilig eigenen kulturellen Narrative zu sein,147 die zuletzt genauso zufällig sind wie die ererbte individuelle Zugehörigkeit zu diesen Narrativen. Die absurde Distanzierung vom primären Kollektivmythos führt dazu, dass die ausschliessliche Identifikation mit dem ursprünglichen Kulturkontext aufgegeben wird und in eine Identifikation mit dem grösstmöglichen rationalen Kollektiv mündet. So selbstverständlich Herrndorf seinen Verstand dabei in den Dienst der Menschheit und der Fürsprache ihrer inhärenten Vernunft stellt, so wenig vollzieht er angesichts seiner temporären Wahnanfälle die dafür nötige „Entindividualisierung" auf intellektueller Ebene freiwillig: Sowohl im Nachhinein als auch insbesondere währenddessen sehr bedrückender Gedanke: dass man als Individuum auf diese Belastung nicht individuell reagiert, sondern superkonventionell, mit geradezu normiertem verrücktem Verhalten, das hunderttausend andere Verrückte an dieser Stelle auch schon vorgeführt haben, und also gar kein Individuum, keine psychisch autonome Einheit mehr ist. Das ist das tatsächlich Furchteinflössendste, während man drinsteckt: Man steckt auf einmal nicht mehr drin in etwas, was man bis dahin als Selbst wahrzunehmen gewohnt war, als Ich [...], und dann löst es sich auf in das unpersönliche Agieren eines vom Evolutionsprozess sehr sinnvoll und zugleich schwachsinnig an die Härten der Welt angepassten durchschnittlich durchgedrehten Vertreters der Art. (AuS 149) Da diskursive Rationalität an die Autorität der eigenen Einsicht gekoppelt ist und das Vorhandensein eines Selbst oder Ich voraussetzt, kommt die sich in diesen Zeilen ausdrückende Auflösung des Selbst dem Verlust der Vernunftbefähigung gleich, die für Herrndorf eine wesentliche Bedeutsamkeit darstellt. Zugleich ruft die eigene Grenzsituation einen Mechanismus hervor, der die subjektive Besonderheit in ein überindividuelles Programm von Bewältigungsstrategien aufgehen lässt: Man ist Teil einer Gemeinschaft, von der man sich zwar kraft seiner eigenen Vernunft unterscheidet – aber aufgrund der Ähnlichkeit im Umgang mit existenzieller 146 In seiner ausführlichen ethnologischen Untersuchung macht Duerr darauf aufmerksam, dass ausserkörperliche Erfahrungen weit häufiger während Ekstasen oder „Zuständen extrem niedriger emotionaler Erregung" erlebt werden als bei Operationen oder Unfällen und die Bezeichnung der „Nahtod-Erfahrung" daher letztlich irreführend ist, vgl. Hans Peter DUERR: Die dunkle Nacht der Seele. Nahtod-Erfahrungen und Jenseitsreisen. Berlin 2015, S. 14f. 147 Zur Stereotypie von Erlebnisberichten vgl. DUERR: Die dunkle Nacht der Seele, S. 271–286. 46 Kontingenz gleicht. Bemerkenswerterweise endet Herrndorfs Empathie dabei nicht bei menschlichem Leben, sondern geht über den absurden Humanismus hinaus und in den pathozentrischen Bereich der Tiere über: Seit geraumer Zeit schon läuft meine Empathie auf seltsamer Spur. [...] Ich kann kein Käferlein mehr im Hausflur entdecken, ohne es auf den Finger zu nehmen und draussen auf einen Grashalm zu setzen. Zur gleichen Zeit durchströmt mich diffuses Glücksgefühl, wenn eine Boulevardschlagzeile den Tod eines im Eis ertrunkenen Zweijährigen vermeldet. Es dauert ein paar Sekunden, bis mir einfällt, wie schlimm es für die Eltern ist. Aber für das Kind ist es das Beste. (Aus 180f.) Wenn auch der konkrete westliche Kulturzusammenhang, in dem er lebt, für Herrndorf an Bedeutung verloren hat – dazu sind seine Gesellschaftskritik und sein Kulturrelativismus zu stark ausgeprägt –, so heisst das gleichwohl nicht, dass ihm sein direktes soziales Umfeld gleichgültig wäre. Zwar schreibt er, dass er bereits zu Studienzeiten ein „inexistentes Sozialleben" (AuS 156) besass; aber entgegen der Intuition, die der absurden Perspektive den sozialen Pflichten zu entkommen unterstellt, sieht Herrndorf diese nicht als kräftezehrend, sondern -spendend an: „Was mich aufrecht hält, ist das Soziale. Die vom Wesen der Gesellschaft an einen herangetragene Anforderung, sich zu benehmen, vernünftig zu sein, am Tisch zu sitzen und den Gesprächen zu lauschen, auch wenn sie nicht die interessantesten sind, während man schreiend in die Grube will" (AuS 160).148 Der soziale Rückhalt von Familie, Freunden und Bekannten wird im Verlauf seiner letzten Lebensjahre immer wichtiger (vgl. etwa AuS 103, 251, 322 & 370), obgleich seine „Asozialität in der zwanghaften Arbeitsfixierung, das Gestöhne vor dem Rechner den ganzen Tag und mein von mir selbst offenbar nicht bemerktes Desinteresse an allen anderen" (AuS 283) dieser Bedeutsamkeit häufig im Wege steht. In Abschnitt 8.3.3 werde ich näher erläutern können, inwiefern Herrndorfs stärker werdende Beeinträchtigungen den Zugang zu dieser Bedeutsamkeit gänzlich unterbinden und sich zu einem starken Anlass für seinen Suizid entwickeln. Die „Freundlichkeit der Welt" (AuS 94), die Herrndorf als wichtigen lebensbejahenden Wert hervorhebt, kann auf der anderen Seite aber auch zu einer übermässigen Nähe führen, die ihm vor dem Hintergrund seiner Erkrankung unangenehm ist. Während er den „ganz neuen Zugang zum Sozialen" als befreiend empfindet, den er durch sein eigenes „Verrücktsein" und die Nichtbeachtung von Konventionen erlebt, nimmt er eine zu grosse Anteilnahme an seiner Situation als bedrückend wahr: „Allein die Vorstellung, Freunde oder Bekannte von mir könnten in der Strassenbahn sitzen, die da gerade an mir vorbeifährt, und mich in meinem nach aussen hin vermutlich jämmerlich verwirrt wirkenden Zustand erkennen und zu Unrecht Mitleid 148 Tatsächlich ist die soziale Eingebundenheit des Patienten ein nicht unwesentlicher Aspekt beim Genesungsprozess von Krebserkrankungen, vgl. Millard WALTZ/ Dieter BRÜHL: Das soziale Umfeld von Krebskranken und dessen stützende Funktion. In: Wolfgang FICHTEN/ Peter GOTTWALD (Hg.): Sinnfindung und Lebensqualität. Diskussionsbeiträge zur Bewältigung der Krebserkrankung. Oldenburg 1994, S. 59–90. 47 empfinden, beunruhigt mich" (AuS 125).149 Ausführlich beschreibt Herrndorf eine psychotische Episode, in der es ihm auf das schriftliche Fixieren des folgenden Satzes ankommt: „Ich bin besorgt, dass die anderen besorgt sind" (AuS 127). Die weiteren Ausführungen über diese nachträglich referierte und auf den 6. März 2010 datierbare Episode – also ein paar Wochen nach dem Ausbruch der ersten Symptome – lassen die Deutung zu, dass Herrndorf zu intensives Mitgefühl deshalb beunruhigt, weil er sich davor fürchtet, dass sein soziales Umfeld nicht aus Sympathie und Zuneigung, sondern allein aus Mitleid weiteren Kontakt zu ihm hält (vgl. AuS 129). Mit dieser Wahrnehmung von zu starker Anteilnahme (beispielhaft hierfür das HaShem-Kapitel in der Rückblende, vgl. AuS 118ff.) steht Herrndorf jedoch nicht alleine dar, sondern teilt sie mit vielen Krebsbetroffenen, wie Krischke erläutert: Krebspatienten können durch ihre krankheitsbedingten körperlichen Einschränkungen nicht mehr ihre gewohnten sozialen Rollen [...] wahrnehmen. Die starke Abhängigkeit von der Hilfe anderer Menschen ist für sich genommen belastend und reduziert die Selbstachtung. [...] Adäquate Zuneigung und Intimität sind sehr wichtig für das psychische Wohlbefinden und die soziale Integration sowie für das Ausmass an psychischen Belastungen.150 Nun steht bei Herrndorf nicht unbedingt die Selbstachtung, sondern das Gefühl auf dem Spiel, die „Fäden in der Hand zu halten" (AuS 292). Wenn die gelebte individuelle Autonomie als ein bedeutsamer Wert erachtet wird (vgl. dazu Abschnitt 8.2), dann werden soziale Abhängigkeiten ab einer bestimmten Stärke als nicht mehr hinnehmbarer Verlust der persönlichen Eigenständigkeit wahrgenommen.151 Gegen diese von ihm selbst als unnötig erlebten Abhängigkeiten wehrt sich Herrndorf so lange er kann, wodurch sein Suizid nicht zuletzt als Konsequenz einer Selbstauffassung lesbar ist, die bis zum Ende an der Bedeutsamkeit der eigenen Souveränität festhält. 149 Markierung von mir, M.R. 150 KRISCHKE: Lebensqualität und Krebs, S. 34. 151 Vgl. Alasdair MACINTYRE: Die Anerkennung der Abhängigkeit. Über menschliche Tugenden. Hamburg 2001, S. 18f. 48 7.4) Der Wille zum Nicht-Wissen Dass man bei einer schwerwiegenden Erkrankung, wie sie ein Tumor darstellt, einen erhöhten Informationsbedarf über Verlauf und Heilungsaussichten entwickelt, ist nicht schwer nachzuvollziehen. Auch Herrndorf recherchiert vor allem zu Krankheitsbeginn nach vielen Überlebensstatistiken und hält sich über neue Therapiemöglichkeiten auf dem Laufenden. Soweit seine Nachforschungen medizinisch und pharmakologisch relevantes Wissen betreffen, ist diese Informationsbeschaffungspraxis im Kontext von Krebserkrankungen nicht unüblich.152 Was freilich ins Auge springt, sind die vielen Stellen, an denen eine Übersättigung an neuen Informationen deutlich wird und die häufig mit dem Abbruch von Herrndorfs Recherchen enden. Für die Auseinandersetzung mit seiner Diagnose ist faktisches Wissen „in Zahlen, in Prozenten, in Wahrscheinlichkeit und Wirkungsgrad" (AuS 23) für Herrndorf von grosser Bedeutung und bleibt es, bis er keine Prognose mehr findet, die auf ihn zutrifft: „Nach drei OPs, zwei Bestrahlungen, drei verschiedenen Chemos ist man seine eigene Statistik" (AuS 402). Als prototypischer „informierter Patient" hat er dabei bereits vor seiner Krebserkrankung regulär über Krankheiten im Internet recherchiert: „Ich kann mich nicht erinnern, schon mal krank gewesen zu sein bei gleichzeitigem Ausfall des Computers: Selbstdiagnose ohne Wikipedia unmöglich" (AuS 97).153 Bevor Herrndorf nach etwa zweieinhalb Jahren seit Krankheitsbeginn schreibt, man könne auch ohne Hoffnung leben (vgl. AuS 344), besänftigt das statistische Wissen nichtsdestoweniger seine Unsicherheit und liefert häufig ausreichend Gründe für Zuversicht: Mit der Diagnose leben geht, Leben ohne Hoffnung nicht. [...] Deshalb jetzt noch mal das in Deutschland nicht zugelassene Avastin gegoogelt, das mit Sonderantrag bei der Krankenkasse bei rezidivierendem Glioblastom zum Einsatz kommt. Eine komplette Remission des Tumors gelingt Avastin bei 1,2 Prozent, zusammen mit Irinotecan bei 2,4 Prozent. 2,4 Prozent! Wusste ich gar nicht. Das ist jedenfalls nicht null. (AuS 178)154 152 Vgl. etwa Elke BRENNE-KEUPER: Krebs – eine Konfrontation mit dem Leben. Ein Erfahrungsbericht. In: Peter MÖHRING (Hg.): Mit Krebs leben. Maligne Erkrankungen aus therapeutischer und persönlicher Perspektive. Berlin u.a. 1988, S. 62–78, 70. 153 Vgl. hierzu Heinz EBNER: Macht Wissen gesund? Über die Bedeutung und Funktion der Patienteninformation im Zeitalter der Informationsgesellschaft. In: Oskar MEGGENEDER/ Walter HENGL (Hg.): Der informierte Patient – Anspruch und Wirklichkeit. Linz 2002, S. 153–169. 154 Herrndorf hat die Therapie mit Avastin mehrmals zu beantragen versucht, aber auch die Anträge von Juli und November 2012 sind abgelehnt worden. Im Januar 2013 übernimmt er dann die monatlichen Kosten in Höhe von 7000 €, um sich mit Avastin behandeln zu lassen (vgl. AuS 378). Ein weiterer Antrag wurde nach einem Wechsel der Krankenkasse zwei Wochen nach seinem Tod bewilligt (vgl. AuS 441, Anmerkung 18). Am teuren Avastin häuft sich in der letzten Zeit Kritik, da durch den opiumähnlichen Wirkstoff Methadon womöglich eine günstigere Alternative für die Behandlung von Krebserkrankungen gegeben ist, vgl. aufgrund der schlechten Quellenlage Anette DOWIDEIT: Vorsicht, Arzt! Wie unser Gesundheitssystem uns krank und andere reich macht. Kulmbach 2016, S. 168ff. 49 Zugleich machen viele Einträge auf ein empfindliches Gleichgewicht des persönlichen Wissensstandes aufmerksam, das durch ungünstige neue Informationen stark beeinträchtigt werden kann: „Je länger man googelt, desto sicherer sinkt die Wahrscheinlichkeit, ein Jahr zu überleben, unter 50 Prozent" (AuS 35). Herrndorf erlebt dann den Input von Wissen als deprimierend und bricht ab (vgl. AuS 38), sich häufig darüber ärgernd, dass er überhaupt mit der Internetrecherche angefangen hat: „Leukenzephalopathie noch mal gegoogelt, Tag versaut, arbeitsunfähig" (AuS 326), notiert er Anfang Mai 2012, und ein paar Wochen danach fügt er den Appell hinzu: „Thou shalt not google" (AuS 332). Nochmal ein knappes Jahr später, Ende März 2013, schildert Herrndorf retrospektiv, wie er gelegentlich bewusst auf das Einholen bestimmter Informationen verzichtete: Aber jeden Morgen, wenn ich Brötchen holen ging, hockte in meiner Ausfahrt in der Novalisstrasse eine Krähe (ein Kolkrabe?), wahrscheinlich immer die gleiche, und ich fragte mich, wie lange lebt so ein Tier eigentlich? Überhaupt noch länger als siebzehn Komma eins Monate? Ich hätte es googeln können, ich tat es nicht, ich wollte es gar nicht wissen. (AuS 437f.) All diese Stellen deuten darauf hin, dass Herrndorf die Aneignung von neuem Wissen genau dann problematisch erscheint, wenn es im Widerstreit zu seinen Weltmythen steht und an den Fundamenten seiner Bedeutsamkeiten zerrt. Die Abwehr von weltmythischen Bedrohungen führt zu der Empfehlung an sein Umfeld, man solle neben der bereits erwähnten „übertriebenen Empathie" auch „medizinische Informationen" aussparen, die „von den Informationen, die ich bisher habe und mit denen ich umgehen kann, abweichen" (AuS 123f.). In diesem Zusammenhang haben selbst Äusserungen der Zuversicht eine destabilisierende Wirkung, wenn sie zu einem für Herrndorf falschen Zeitpunkt hervorgebracht werden: „Während die radioaktive Lösung in mich reinläuft, macht die Ärztin mir Hoffnungen. Ich wedle imaginäre Insekten von mir fort, nichts Hoffnungsmachendes, bitte, ich verliere sonst das Gleichgewicht" (AuS 260). Die freiwillige Leugnung von widerstrebendem Wissen, mitunter auch von unerwünschten Fakten, die sich hier ausdrückt, hat Blumenberg einmal in einem kurzen Satz zusammengefasst: „Was die Menschen mit Vergnügen akzeptieren, kann nicht Wahrheit sein."155 Bedeutsame Narrative und deren Verteidigung sind wichtig, weil sie gerade durch die Illusion einer mir zugeneigten Welt ertragen lassen, was „in Wahrheit" nicht zu ertragen wäre. Auch das absurde Bewusstsein braucht dieses Jenseits von Wahrheit, braucht Illusion, um am Leben zu bleiben, wie Herrndorf zugesteht: „Ich weiss selbst, dass ich mich mit positivem Denken, mit Sport und Lächeln und Arbeiten über etwas Bodenloses hinwegtäusche, aber wenn ich auf den letzten Metern noch derart infantil werden sollte, zu vergessen, dass es sich dabei um Selbsttäu155 Hans BLUMENBERG: Rigorismus der Wahrheit. ,Moses der Ägypter' und weitere Texte zu Freud und Arendt . Hg. v. Ahlrich MEYER. Berlin 2015, S. 92. 50 schung handelt, erschiesse man mich bitte" (AuS 198). Ein prägnantes Beispiel für diese Selbsttäuschung findet sich ein paar Seiten zuvor, wo Herrndorf auf die Kenntnisnahme einer Studie, „die mich sofort in Panik geraten liess", mit einer umfangreichen Recherche reagiert, bis „ich die gegenteilige Studie gefunden hatte" (AuS 195). Welche von beiden Studien dabei die geringere Falsifizierbarkeit aufweist, ist für die bedeutsamkeitsstiftende Wirkung nicht von Belang: Herrndorfs Bedürfnis nach Sicherheit gibt der zweiten Studie zwangsläufig mehr Gewicht, ganz gleich, wie gut sie der ersten Studie widerspricht. Dieses Informationsverhalten kann als eine Strategie zur Bewahrung einer Balance von bewusstem Wissen und NichtWissen betrachtet werden, aus dem sich erst eine bedeutsame Selbsterzählung zusammensetzt. Herrndorf selbst spricht im September 2010 noch von der „Ungewissheit [...], die man braucht, um zu leben" (AuS 107) – 14 Monate später, nach zwei erlebten Jahren zu grosser Ungewissheit, schreibt er: Die populäre, akademische, theologische und auch im Science-Fiction gern und oft gestellte und immer wieder mit Nein beantwortete Frage, ob die Kenntnis des eigenen Todeszeitpunkts wünschenswert sei: Doch. Würde ich sagen. Doch, ist wünschenswert. Segensreich. Eine Belastung, aber eher ein Segen. Nicht für Kinder natürlich. Aber wenn machbar und mit Erreichen der Volljährigkeit: Besuch im Genlabor, dann ungefähr ausrechnen, dann planen, dann leben. Könnte man sich viel Quatsch ersparen. (AuS 286) Was sich durch das Wissen um die eigene Frist „ersparen" lässt, ist das Ringen gegen die vom Absurden beschworene Desillusionierung, ist das Ergreifen von zwar vorübergehend hilfreichen, aber letztlich doch betrügerischen Hoffnungen, da kein Hoffen – weder das religiöse noch das absurde – an der Unumstösslichkeit dieser Frist etwas ändert. In einem fundamentalen Sinne am Leben zu bleiben, ist daher nur durch einen radikalen Selbstbetrug möglich, der die eigenen Bedeutsamkeiten stets vor Augen hält und die Wahrnehmung der Todesfrist dadurch immer weiter nach hinten schiebt, sie verzögert, auf einen „Umweg" schickt.156 Obwohl er gerne auf ihn verzichten würde, ist sich Herrndorf der Notwendigkeit dieses Selbstbetrugs bewusst und entkommt damit der kollektiv-dogmatischen Gefahr, die in jeder Weltsicht angelegt ist. Was er besitzt, ist nicht Wahrheit, sondern Unwahrheit, die ihm gleichwohl das Leben mit der tödlichen Wahrheit des Tumors ermöglicht. Wenn nun dieser Umgang mit Überzeugungen einen nicht nur für Herrndorf spezifischen, sondern verallgemeinerbaren menschlichen Reflex darstellen sollte, dann lässt sich der Ursache des Festhaltens an diesem freiwilligen Irrationalismus nicht näher kommen, indem man seine offen eingestandene Unvernunft beweist – sondern vielmehr durch die Frage, weshalb es für jemanden wichtig ist, in genau diesem augenblicklichen Moment von etwas Bestimmtem überzeugt zu sein. 156 Vgl. Rüdiger ZILL: Überlebensthemen. Vom Umgang mit der Sterblichkeit des Menschen bei Hans Blumenberg. In: Falko SCHMIEDER (Hg.): Überleben. Historische und aktuelle Konstellationen. München 2011, S. 265–280, 275. 51 7.5) Vom Versuch, sich „fortzuschreiben" – Sprache als Bedeutsamkeit 7.5.1) Epileptisches Erleben und die Auflösung von Welt, Logik und Sprache Die Frage nach der Relevanz momentaner Überzeugungen kann verständlicher werden, wenn man sie in einen Kontext stellt, der das Brüchigwerden von sicher geglaubten und „selbstverständlichen" Strukturen impliziert. Im Alltag stösst man sich gewöhnlicherweise selten daran, dass bestimmte Konzepte wie „Welt", „Gedanken" und „Sprache" überhaupt existieren – man hat Umgang mit ihnen, weil sie immer schon ,da sind , und der Gedanke, dass sie einmal fehlen könnten, scheint unvorstellbar. Genau solche Symptome aber – das Verschwinden von Sprache und logischem Denken – können bei einigen epileptischen Anfällen auftauchen, die Herrndorf seit August 2011, also etwa eineinhalb Jahre nach Krankheitsbeginn, in zunehmend stärkerem Masse bis zu seinem Tode erlebt. Epilepsien gehören mit einer Prävalenz (Anteil der Erkrankten an der Bevölkerung) von 2,7 bis 8 auf 1000 und einer Inzidenz (Neuerkrankungen pro Jahr) von 24 bis 70 auf 100 000 Personen157 zu den häufigsten neurologischen Erkrankungen und können sowohl genetische als auch zerebrale Ursachen haben. 20 bis 40 % aller epileptischen Syndrome sind symptomatische Folgeerkrankungen aufgrund von Gehirnschädigungen,158 weshalb bei der Erstdiagnose das Vorhandensein eines Hirntumors ausgeschlossen werden muss.159 Hirntumore selbst lösen – je nach Art und Lage des Tumors – relativ häufig Epilepsien aus, wobei gutartige häufiger dafür ursächlich sind als bösartige; bei Glioblastomen liegt die Wahrscheinlichkeit für epileptische Anfälle etwa zwischen 30 und 60 %.160 Konkret definiert sich ein epileptischer Anfall als eine pathologische Reaktion von Nervenzellen und kann daher noch am einfachsten als eine komplexe Störung neuronaler Prozesse beschrieben werden.161 Die Anfälle werden nach betroffenen Gehirnarealen – „fokal" oder „partiell" bei lokal begrenztem Ausmass innerhalb einer Gehirnhälfte, „generalisiert" bei unbegrenztem Ausmass und Beteiligung beider Hemisphären – sowie nach der Beeinträchtigung des Bewusstseins klassifiziert. Während generalisierte Anfälle überwiegend mit Absencen verbunden sind – „abrupt beginnend[e] und unvermittelt endend[e] kurz[e] Bewusstseinsstö157 Vgl. Andreas HUFNAGEL: Epidemiologie der Epilepsien. In: Walter FRÖSCHER u.a. (Hg.): Die Epilepsien. Grundlagen, Klinik, Behandlung. Stuttgart 22004, S. 23–28, 23f. 158 Vgl. HUFNAGEL: Epidemiologie der Epilepsien, S. 25. 159 Vgl. Rolf DEGEN: Epilepsien und epileptische Syndrome im Kinderund Erwachsenenalter. Elektroenzephalographie. Berlin u.a. 1999, S. 589. 160 Vgl. Günter KRÄMER: Epilepsie von A bis Z. Medizinische Fachwörter verstehen. Stuttgart 42005, S. 207f. 161 Vgl. Ansgar MATTHES/ Hansjörg SCHNEBLE: Epilepsien. Diagnostik und Therapie für Klinik und Praxis. Stuttgart/ New York 61999, S. 2f. 52 rung[en] von durchschnittlich 5–10 Sekunden Dauer"162 – und häufig mit tonischen (verkrampfenden) oder klonischen (zuckenden) körperlichen Reaktionen einhergehen können, treten bei fokaler Ursache nur bei den sogenannten komplex-fokalen Anfällen Bewusstseinsstörungen auf. Einfache fokale Anfälle verlaufen zwar ohne Trübung des Bewusstseins, haben aber den Kontrollausfall über motorische, sensorische, vegetative, in seltenen Fällen auch über psychische Fähigkeiten zur Folge.163 Jeder fokale Anfall kann zu einem generalisierten Anfall werden (man spricht dann von „sekundärer" Generalisierung), wenn sich die epileptische Aktivität auf die andere Gehirnhälfte ausbreitet. Bei Hirntumorpatienten sind die fokalen Anfälle häufiger zu beobachten als die generalisierten.164 Da Herrndorf in den Schilderungen seiner Anfälle über Stimmenhören (AuS 229), Derealisation (232), Aphasie (240), Sichtfeldausfall (247), Halluzinationen (269), Depersonalisation (272f.) sowie Orientierungsverlust (351) und nicht ein Mal über eine Absence (höchstens über eine „Teilamnesie", vgl. 229) berichtet, spricht Vieles dafür, dass er ebenfalls fokale Anfälle durchlebt.165 Epileptische Syndrome lassen sich mit Medikamenten mittlerweile gut behandeln, in etwa 60 bis 70 % aller Fälle schlägt die Medikation an und wird ohne Nebenwirkungen vertragen.166 Auch die von Herrndorf erwähnten Medikamente Levetiracetam, Frisium und Lamotrigin (vgl. AuS 225 & 274) sind für ihre weitgehende Verträglichkeit bekannt, können unter Umständen jedoch zu Beeinträchtigungen des Sehund Sprachvermögens führen.167 Des Weiteren können durch den strukturellen Hirnumbau sowohl Erkrankungen des Gehirns als auch epileptische Syndrome eine Vielzahl an psychischen Störungen verursachen168 – Herrndorf selbst erwähnt diesbezüglich einen immer wiederkehrenden Putzzwang, der bereits „nach meiner Erstdiagnose und in Verbindung mit meiner Manie" auftrat (AuS 350). Um das Leben mit Epilepsien zu vereinfachen und epileptischen Anfällen vorzubeugen, wird Betroffenen nicht zuletzt empfohlen, auf eine geregelte Tagesstruktur zu achten;169 Herrndorfs titelgebendes Programm bildet also – wenn er die Möglichkeit findet diesem nachzukommen – nicht nur den Versuch, ein Leben mit dem Krebs zu führen, sondern ist auch im Sinne der Präventi on von weiteren Anfällen hilfreich. 162 MATTHES/ SCHNEBLE: Epilepsien, S. 36. 163 Vgl. ebd., S. 76–83. 164 Vgl. DEGEN: Epilepsien und epileptische Syndrome, S. 590. 165 Zu den typischen Symptomen einfacher fokaler Anfälle vgl. Gerhard BAUER: Klinik der epileptischen Anfälle und der Epilepsiesyndrome. In: FRÖSCHER u.a.: Die Epilepsien, S. 96–104. 166 Vgl. KRÄMER: Epilepsie von A bis Z, S. 11. 167 Vgl. Christoph GERHARD: Praxiswissen Palliativmedizin. Konzepte für unterschiedlichste palliative Versorgungssituationen. Stuttgart/ New York 2015, S. 80f. Zu Antiepileptika vgl. ausführlicher MATTHES/ SCHNEBLE: Epilepsien, S. 224–269. 168 Vgl. MATTHES/ SCHNEBLE: Epilepsien, S. 280ff. 169 Vgl. ebd. S. 269f. 53 Im subjektiven Erleben können sich epileptische Anfälle durch die sogenannte „Aura" ankündigen, mit der man Veränderungen der Wahrnehmung unmittelbar vor einem Anfall bezeichnet und deren etymologischer und mythologischer Zusammenhang Herrndorf fasziniert: „Aura, Aurora, wusste ich gar nicht, dass das zusammenhängt. Die Göttin der Morgenbrise, der Hauch, der Windhauch. Schwer zu beschreiben. Hauch ist schon nicht ganz falsch, ein Windhauch im sich zusammenkrampfenden Gehirn" (AuS 272). Da die Aura für viele Epilepsiepatienten eine äusserst ungewöhnliche und verwirrende Erfahrung darstellt, deren Versprachlichung sich als schwierig erweist, greifen viele Betroffene in ihren Beschreibungen auf Metaphern zurück.170 Auch Herrndorf versucht, sein eigenes Erleben während der Anfälle, und zwar vor allem in Bezug auf die Erfahrungen personaler und lebensweltlicher Auflösung, durch Metaphorisierung zu verarbeiten: Weht der Wind zu lange, folgen Depersonalisation und Derealisation, dann schwindet alles dahin. Kein Ich, kein Ding, kein Gefühl [...]. Seit zwei Wochen suche ich nach besseren Worten, vergeblich. Vielleicht, weil im zu beschreibenden Moment kein Beschreiber mit dabei ist. Man steht am Eingang zur Hölle, sieht Feuer und Flammen, spürt keine Wärme und kratzt sich am Kopf. (AuS 272f.) Depersonalisation und die darunter subsumierte Derealisation können sowohl durch organische Hirnschäden als auch durch Epilepsien begünstigt werden und sind in der medizinischen Fachliteratur als „ein Gefühl der Entfremdung gegenüber dem eigenen Körper und dem personalen Selbst" sowie „gegenüber der Umwelt" definiert, bei dem „das Realitätsurteil aber intakt" bleibt: In einer Depersonalisation fühlt sich das Individuum vollständig verändert im Vergleich zu dem, was es vorher war. Diese Veränderung ist gegenwärtig im Selbst wie auch in seiner Aussenwelt. Seine Handlungen erscheinen ihm als automatisch. Er [sic] beobachtet seine Handlungen und sein Verhalten vom Standpunkt eines äusseren Betrachters. Die Aussenwelt ist ihm fremd und neu und nicht so wirklich wie zuvor. [...] Der Kontakt zur Umwelt erscheint verloren, ohne die übliche affektive Konnotation, sondern vielmehr emotional unbeteiligt, traumhaft entrückt, flach [...].171 So weit sich die Einträge über seine epileptischen Anfälle überblicken lassen, werden diese Symptome bei Herrndorf häufig zunächst von sogenannten „auditiven Halluzinationen"172 angekündigt: „Draussen läuft Musik, Seventies, ein Hall auf der Chorstimme. Der Hall liegt plötzlich auch auf meiner Stimme. Ich will die anderen fragen, ob sie das auch hören, kann aber vor Angst nicht sprechen. Maximal eine Silbe, dann Hall, dann Abbruch" (AuS 229, vgl. auch 311). Diese veränderte Sprachwahrnehmung während eines Anfalls wirkt sich ebenfalls auf Herrndorfs Sprachverständnis aus: 170 Vgl. Volker SURMANN: Anfallsbilder. Metaphorische Konzepte im Sprechen anfallskranker Menschen. Würzburg 2005, S. 116–122. 171 Hans-Peter KAPFHAMMER: Dissoziative Störungen und Konversionsstörungen. In: Hanfried HELMCHEN u.a. (Hg.): Erlebensund Verhaltensstörungen, Abhängigkeit und Suizid (Psychiatrie der Gegenwart, Bd. 6). Heidelberg 42000, S. 149–186, 156. 172 BAUER: Klinik der epileptischen Anfälle, S. 100. 54 Pantomimisch deute ich an, dass ich ein Notizheft und einen Stift brauche. Auf den eilig herbeigeholten Block schreibe ich: ,Ich habe einen epileptischen Anfall habe ich den einen bekommen. Du musst dich nichts damit angekommen. Letzten Mal war es 20–30 minuten. Ich kann nicht sprechen an. Grammatik zerschossen, Schriftbild normal. (AuS 229) Mit dem Verlust von Grammatik und Sprache schliesslich geht der Verlust der Welt einher: Wieder höre ich Stimmen in meiner Strasse, wieder brauche ich lange, um festzustellen, dass ich allein auf der Strasse bin. Der nächste Passant hundert Meter weit weg. Diesmal alles auf Englisch. Keine richtigen Sätze, kann mir nichts merken, verstehe die Struktur nicht. Hall ferner Lieder. Setze mich mit dem Rücken gegen ein Haus und warte, bis es vorbei ist. Die Welt löst sich auf. (AuS 232) Bis zu Herrndorfs Tod wird die Beeinträchtigung durch seine Epilepsie und der daraus resultierende „dramatische Sprachverfall" (AuS 410) stetig stärker, bis für ihn zuletzt „zwischen innerer Stimme und Epilepsie [...] kaum noch ein Unterschied" besteht (AuS 366). Da nun Sprache und Identität, wie ich zuvor gezeigt habe, wesentlich zusammenhängende und kollektiv bestimmte Kategorien sind, hat der temporäre Verlust beider die Unnutzbarmachung und Auflösung jedweden kollektivmythischen Zusammenhangs zur Folge. Das erkennt auch Herrndorf, wenn er, nachdem er die kulturelle Relativität von Nahtoderfahrungen herausgestellt hat, schreibt: „Die Erfahrung der Depersonalisation ist, soweit ich weiss, nicht im Geringsten abhängig von meiner Kultur. Depersonalisation ist für jeden scheisse, egal, ob Christ, Moslem, andere oder für Leute wie mich, egalweg scheisse, Ich-Verlust, Inexistenz, Nichts: kontextfreie Hölle" (AuS 435).173 Mit dem lebensweltlichen Kontext schwinden zugleich das die eigene Identität begründende Erzählmuster sowie die bändigende Kraft des durch den kollektiven Mythos Benannten.174 Eine Welt aber, die keinen Widerstand, keinen Gegenstand mehr bietet, wird nicht mehr als Welt, sondern nur noch als reine Weltlosigkeit wahrgenommen: „Häuser, Bäume, Landschaften. Lange nachgedacht, wie man das formulieren soll. Die Durchscheinigkeit der Dinge und das durch die Dinge durchscheinende Nichts. So ungefähr. Kein ganz neues Gefühl, aber eingekleidet in neue optische Varianten" (AuS 224). In diesem Gefühl schliesslich, in diesem Sich-selbst-überlassen-Sein vor dem Nichtseienden sind die üblichen Träger von Bedeutsamkeiten (das Dasein mit der Welt, der Mythos mit der Sprache, die Ratio mit dem Logos) kaum mehr anwesend. Da sich aber Depersonalisation und das Ergreifen von Bedeutsamkeiten offensichtlich nicht ausschliessen, stellt sich die Frage, woher Herrndorf die noch anwesende Bedeutsamkeit bezieht. 173 Dem ist nur insoweit zuzustimmen, wenn mit Phänomenen der Selbstauflösung der radikale, schmerzliche und vor allem unwillkürliche Verlust von Kontext und Lebenswelt verbunden sind. Für intendierte Zustände der Depersonalisation, insbesondere für meditative und kontemplative Praktiken, die eine Auflösung von egozentrischen Selbstanteilen anstreben, gilt das nicht, da es hier vornehmlich um die Erweiterung des schon bestehenden Kontextes geht, vgl. METZINGER: Der Ego-Tunnel, S. 412. 174 Für Blumenberg besteht eine der wesentlichen Ordnungsleistungen des Mythos darin, dass er die Dinge und Wesen der Welt vergegenständlicht, indem er sie benennt, vgl. BLUMENBERG: Arbeit am Mythos, S. 40–67. Herrndorf greift diesen Gedanken in veränderter Form auf, wenn er die gewaltige Evidenzkraft der menschlichen Namensgebung aufruft: „Unser Name im Telefonbuch, Beweis unserer Existenz" (AuS 172). 55 7.5.2) Die Anstrengung, zu sein – Weltmythos und Weltikon Es wurde zu Anfang bereits festgehalten, dass Herrndorfs Poetik des „dem Leben wie einem Roman zu Leibe rücken" eine zentrale Vorgehensweise von Arbeit und Struktur darstellt. Bisher habe ich die entsprechende Textstelle jedoch noch nicht vollständig wiedergegeben. Die ganze Passage lautet: [...] Aber nichts wird erfunden. Das Gefasel von der Unzuverlässigkeit des Gedächtnisses und der Unzulänglichkeit der Sprache spare ich mir, allein der berufsbedingt ununterdrückbare Impuls, dem Leben wie einem Roman zu Leibe zu rücken, die sich im Akt des Schreibens immer wieder einstellende, das Weiterleben enorm erleichternde, falsche und nur im Text richtige Vorstellung, die Fäden in der Hand zu halten und das seit langem bekannte und im Kopf ständig schon vorund ausformulierte Ende selbst bestimmen und den tragischen Helden mit wohlgesetzten, naturnotwendigen, fröhlichen Worten in den Abgrund stürzen zu dürfen wie gewohnt – (AuS 292) Neben dem methodischen Zugeständnis, welches verdeutlicht, dass sich Herrndorf der Probleme biografischen Schreibens durchaus bewusst ist,175 kommt hier in aller Klarheit zum Ausdruck, dass er selbst in den Angelegenheiten des „realen" Lebens nicht davon abrücken kann, sich seiner Situation mit der „berufsbedingten" Herangehensweise des Schriftstellers zu nähern. Die Übertragung schriftstellerischer Mittel auf die Gegebenheiten und den Plot des eigenen Lebens führt so schliesslich zu der zwar illusorischen, aber lindernd wirkenden Empfindung grösserer Einflussnahme und zu einer Selbstermächtigung sondergleichen, wie Michelbach ausführt: Herrndorf bestimmt [sein Ende] als autonomer Autor und widersetzt sich damit der ,strukturellen Offenheit zum Ende hin , die jeder autobiographischen Erzählung aus der Unmöglichkeit heraus eignet, den eigenen Tod zu schildern. Als Autor der Geschichte, deren Hauptfigur er zugleich ist, entwirft Herrndorf ihren Ausgang. Der Tod widerfährt dem Subjekt Herrndorf nicht, sondern ist der Endpunkt einer durch den Autor Herrndorf geschriebenen Geschichte, die das Subjekt bloss in die Tat umsetzt.176 Solange die Tat aber noch nicht umgesetzt ist, solange Herrndorf durch die bloss gedankliche Vorwegnahme seines Suizids noch ein Leben mit der Krankheit führt, dient dieses „Schreiben zum Tode"177 dem Fortschreiben und Weitererzählen des eigenen Lebens. Die nahezu tägliche Arbeit an Blog und Romanvorhaben, die erzwungene Disziplin zum regelmässigen Schreiben übernimmt damit klar die existenzkonstituierende Aufgabe der Bedeutsamkeit, wie sie auch in ähnlicher Form bei Kafka zu beobachten ist.178 Herrndorfs Abhängigkeit von dieser intensiven Schreibpraxis geht dabei so weit, dass er selbst zugunsten seiner Gemütsverfassung nicht mehr auf sie verzichten kann: „Standardisierter Absturz, wenn ich eine Weile nicht gearbeitet habe" (AuS 155). Die rigorose Vernichtung von Notizbüchern im August 2011 und Gemälden im Juni 2012 lässt sich diesbezüglich dahingehend deuten, dass alles im Umkreis seiner Wahr175 Vgl. Günter NIGGL: Studien zur Autobiographie. Berlin 2012, S. 42ff. 176 MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 126. 177 BURK: Arbeit und Struktur, S. 95. 178 Vgl. ebd., S. 91f. 56 nehmung beseitigt werden muss, was seinen Arbeitseifer aufzuhalten und zu stören droht: „Ein staubverkrustetes Triptychon, das D. darstellt und das sie haben wollte, postfertig eingepackt, aus den Augen, belastet mich, weg damit, weg mit allem, freies Schussfeld, ich muss weiterarbeiten" (AuS 336). In den sieben Monaten vor seinem Tod werden die zunehmend als Belastung empfundenen sowie sporadisch und kürzer geschriebenen Einträge gleichwohl zu einer der wichtigsten lebenserhaltenden Tätigkeiten Herrndorfs, ja sogar zu dem Garant, überhaupt noch etwas zu tun zu haben: Würde die Arbeit am Blog am liebsten einstellen. Das Blog nur noch der fortgesetzte, mich immer mehr deprimierende Versuch, mir eine Krise nach der anderen vom Hals zu schaffen, es hängt mir am Hals wie mein Leben wie ein Mühlstein. Ich weiss aber nicht, was ich sonst machen soll. Die Arbeit an ,Isa tritt auf der Stelle. (AuS 392) Die Alternative hätte nur in der sofortigen Negation seines Lebens bestehen können, das für ihn zu diesem Zeitpunkt bereits überwiegend ein erzwungenes zu sein scheint. Wenn das zutrifft, dann muss er im Versuch, sich selbst fortzuschreiben, gegen die schon bestehende Tendenz arbeiten, nicht mehr sein zu wollen; die Fortsetzung des Lebens ist dann reine Arbeit gegen das ungehemmte Nichts, die sich Bedeutsamkeit, den eigenen Mühlstein weiterdrehend, unter grössten Mühen erkämpfen muss. Dass sich, nach drei Jahren in der Erwartung des bald eintretenden Todes, für Herrndorf die Frage nach dem „Was tun?" zuletzt in der Wahl einlöst, entweder einer quälenden Tätigkeit oder aber gar keiner – nicht mal der des blossen Lebens – nachzugehen, zeigt, wie gross die Demütigung sein kann, wenn man nichts zu tun hat, das man selbst als bedeutsam erachtet (vgl. AuS 275).179 Einen Weltmythos zu haben, der dem eigenen Dasein Herkunft, Ort und Richtung zuweist, scheint also tatsächlich handlungsleitend zu sein,180 scheint Bedingung dafür zu sein, dass menschliches Leben trotz der Einsicht in die Aussicht auf den Tod den Antrieb hat, diesem nicht zuvorzukommen und das Leben weiterhin zu wagen. Herrndorfs Bemühen, durch die Poetik des Sich-selbst-Fortschreibens die drohende Frist stetig in den Hintergrund zu drängen, kann nur in jenen Momenten gelingen, in denen er tatsächlich konzipiert und schreibt und in Gedanken bei dem Protagonisten ist, den er selbst darzustellen hofft. In den Episoden jedoch, in denen er mit den Phänomenen der Entsprachlichung, Entwirklichung und Depersonalisierung zu kämpfen hat, stehen Herrndorf sprachliche Struk179 Eine Forschungsgruppe um den Sozialpsychologen Timothy Wilson hat 2014 eine Studie durchgeführt, bei der sich Versuchspersonen 10–20 Minuten in einem reizarmen Raum aufhalten sollten und sich entweder bei der Reflexion beobachten oder aber sich selbst durch einen Elektroschock extern stimulieren konnten. Tatsächlich haben sich insbesondere die männlichen Probanden diesem externen Stimulus zugewandt (71 % der Männer, 26 % der Frauen), um der aus der reizarmen Umgebung resultierenden Langeweile – die für jene also nicht bedeutsam war – zuvorzukommen, vgl. Timothy WILSON et al.: Just think. The challenges of the disengaged mind. In: Science Volume 345 Issue 6192 (2014), pp. 75–77, URL = <http://wjh-www.harvard.edu/~dtg/WILSON%20ET%20AL%202014.pdf> (29.04.2017). 180 Vgl. MOHN: Mythostheorien, S. 84f. 57 turen weitgehend nicht zur Verfügung, und ohne sie ist der Weltmythos unmöglich. Was möglich bleibt, ist die Bedeutsamkeit von Konzepten, die auch ohne einen Erzählzusammenhang unmittelbar funktionieren, ist das Ergreifen von Bildern, Ideen oder Metaphern, die Weltmythen in verdichteter, noch nicht narrativierter Gestalt beherbergen.181 Dass diese Formen ebenfalls eine beruhigende und festigende Wirkung entfalten können, hat Herrndorf bereits zu Anfang seiner Krankheitsgeschichte erfahren, als der Umgang mit dem Schrecken des jederzeit bevorstehenden Todes noch ein grosses Problem für ihn darstellt: In einem Diagramm skizziere ich die Verhältnisse in meinem Kopf. Unter der Rubrik ,Vorstellungen liste ich Bilder und Gedanken auf, die ich hilfreich gefunden habe im Kampf mit der Todesangst, und immer, wenn ich vor Panik nicht mehr denken kann, schaue ich jetzt in mein Büchlein und gehe ein paar Bilder durch. Meistens reichen zwei oder drei, um mich zu beruhigen. Die, die sich als besonders effektiv erweisen, versuche ich selten zu benutzen und mir für die grösseren Krisen aufzusparen. (AuS 116)182 Beispiele hierfür sind „eine sehr plastisch vorgestellte Walther PPK" (AuS 118), die auf störende Gedanken zielt sowie später eine als Souveränin über alle inneren Vorgänge gedachte Instanz, eine „Königin, Neue Regentin genannt, die als endgültig externalisiertes Über-Ich über allem Stimmengewirr thront und sich als noch durchschlagender als die Walther entpuppt [...]" (AuS 147). Diese Weltikone haben für Herrndorf dieselbe Funktion wie der Weltmythos: Sie bringen in das ursprüngliche Chaos der übermächtigen Wirklichkeit Struktur und formen einen Raum, der das Wirkliche nicht nur erlebbar, sondern auch bewältigbar macht, sie halten das Gefährliche und Bedrohliche auf Distanz, indem sie ihm selbst wie auch den „guten" und den „bösen" Mächten einen Ort zuweisen und Herrndorf zuletzt Handlungsfreiheit gewähren. Die Handlungen, die aufgrund bedeutsamer Ikone und Mythen vollzogen werden, scheinen diese Gefahren aber nicht abzuwenden, indem sie das Walten unerwünschter Mächte verhindern, sondern die im Individuum vorhandenen metaphysischen Bedingungen von Dasein überhaupt erst ermöglichen und aufrechterhalten. Bedeutsamkeit hat also einen vor allem konstruierenden Charakter, sie kann nicht im Modus reiner Negation verwendet werden. Sie zerstört nicht, sondern hält entgegen: Der Versuch, den immer wiederkehrenden vierzehntägigen Zyklus aus Freiund Chemowoche tabellarisch zu untersuchen [...], hat sich als vergeblich erwiesen. Gearbeitet werden konnte praktisch immer, Wachheit und Stimmung korrelieren, wenn überhaupt, mit dem Erfolg der Arbeit, nicht mit der Einnahme der Medikamente, und gegen Arbeitsmüdigkeit hilft Arbeit. Arbeit, Arbeit, Arbeit. Was einerseits schön ist. Andererseits scheint auch die Aura arbeitsgebunden. (AuS 310) Je intensiver Herrndorf seine Bedeutsamkeit durch die Tätigkeit des Fortschreibens erlangt, umso näher kommt er dem kontingenten Moment, in dem Aura, Epilepsie und Depersonalisa181 Zum Zusammenhang von Bild, Sprache und Erzählung vgl. Axel MÜLLER: Wie Bilder Sinn erzeugen. Plädoyer für eine andere Bildgeschichte. In: Stefan MAJETSCHAK (Hg.): Bild-Zeichen. Perspektiven einer Wissenschaft vom Bild. München 2005, S. 77–96, bes. 92. 182 Bei dem erwähnten Büchlein handelt es sich um ein Notizbuch, das sich Herrndorf am 3. März 2010, etwa zwei Wochen nach der ersten Operation, zulegt. 58 tion auf ihn warten. Als Ausdruck beständiger Selbstschöpfung korreliert seine Arbeitswut dabei mit der Verfügbarkeit der ikonischen Bedeutsamkeit: Herrndorf ergreift Weltikone, indem er sie sich selbst und seinen eigenen Weltmythos fortschreibend „erdichtend" erschliesst, er reiht Zeichen an Zeichen und lässt so die festigende Kraft seiner Narrative nicht versiegen. Analog kann Herrndorf während seiner epileptischen Anfälle einzelne Ikone ergreifen – wie etwa die versuchsweise Rezitation des Gedichts In der Heimat Georg von der Vrings (vgl. AuS 223f. & 240f.) –, die er später wieder zu einer Reihe von Ikonen, zu einem Mythos narrativiert. Wenn sich keine Geschichte mehr erzählen lässt, die sich für das eigene Dasein in der Welt verbürgt, dann kann immer noch ein Zeichen oder Bild beschworen werden, das durch die Gegenwart des Dargestellten die eigene Gegenwart beweist. Arbeit am Mythos also, als nicht zu umgehende Arbeit an der Bedeutsamkeit und ihren Ikonen, ist Ausdruck des Nichtaufgelöst-sein-Wollens, das den Prozess der Auflösung zwar nicht unterbinden kann, aber dafür sorgt, dass sie wenigstens jetzt nicht geschieht (vgl. AuS 432). Insofern für Herrndorf das Sich-selbst-Fortschreiben damit einhergeht, der Gestaltung von Sprache die Verfügbarkeit aller momentanen Bedeutsamkeiten zu überantworten,183 bedeutet die Evidenz seiner Kunstwerke, nicht nur im kollektiven Gedächtnis zu überleben, sondern überhaupt noch leben zu können und sich dem stetig stärker werdenden Wunsch nach selbst induzierter Auflösung nicht anheimzugeben. Soweit er aufgrund von Depersonalisation den Schrecken des Nichtmehrseins erfahren hat, sprechen Herrndorfs Schilderungen für diesen Sachverhalt. Denn bemerkenswerterweise erachtet er nicht den Prozess der Auflösung als eigentliche Anstrengung, sondern das darauffolgende erneute Zusammenfügen als Person: „Anstrengend ist das anschliessende Sich-wiedermaterialisieren-Müssen, der graue Geschmack der Baumwipfel am Abend" (AuS 272). Nicht das Niedergehen, das Übergehen ins Nichts wird von ihm als mühevoll erlebt, sondern das erneute Heraufkommen als lebendiges Sein aus dem Tal der Materie, das sein eigenes Gleichbleiben, seine Identität der kosmischen Indifferenz noch abzuringen hat. An dieser Stelle schliesslich drängt sich Blumenbergs These auf, nach der es „nicht selbstverständlich [ist], dass der Mensch existieren kann"184 – und zwar deshalb nicht, weil sich vor dem Hintergrund des Absurden und der Symptomatik des Nicht-mehr-Person-seins nur erahnen lässt, welch gewaltige Kraftanstrengung es darstellt, ein menschliches Bewusstsein sein und bleiben zu kön183 Vgl. die Schlussfolgerung von Michelbach über Herrndorfs Vernichtung privater Tagebücher und Gemälde: „Was von ihm bleibt, so könnte man Herrndorfs Nachlasspolitik zusammenfassen, ist nichts als seine Kunst", MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 127. 184 Hans BLUMENBERG: Anthropologische Annäherung an die Aktualität der Rhetorik. In: ders.: Wirklichkeiten in denen wir leben. Stuttgart 2009, S. 104–136, 114. 59 nen.185 Auch Herrndorf entdeckt diesen Zusammenhang, wenn er im Dezember 2011 notiert: „In meinen Mails fehlt hier und da das Wort ,ich , auch in Mails von anderen übersehe ich die drei fatalen Buchstaben immer mal. Keine Ahnung, was mein Gehirn da weiter rausmeldet. Ich hab s ja begriffen. Test, eins, zwei, drei, ich" (AuS 290). Die vorgeschobene Zahlenreihenfolge korreliert dabei mit Herrndorfs Hang zur abstrakten Logik (vgl. AuS 33, 102 & 331) sowie mit den zahlreichen in Arbeit und Struktur vorzufindenden Listen, von denen die Auflistung möglicher Titel von Sand in diesem Zusammenhang sicherlich die bemerkenswerteste ist (vgl. AuS 185ff.). Denn auch in Sand wird am Beispiel des zunächst namen-, geschichtsund identitätslosen Protagonisten deutlich, wie wichtig, beschwerlich und letztlich vergeblich Konstitution und Kontinuität der „Einheit des menschlichen Lebens"186 sind. Nicht nur Herrndorf, sondern Dasein als solches scheint in der Konfrontation mit dem sich aufdrängenden Tod – mag er sich schon ankündigen oder noch verborgen sein – auf eine Struktur angewiesen, die eine konstruierte Vorstellung des eigenen Lebenkönnens gegen die Mächte des natürlichen Verfalls setzt187 und als internalisiertes Konglomerat aus ikonischen und weltmythischen Bedeutsamkeiten stets zur Verfügung steht. Endet die Struktur, so endet alles. Aus diesem Grund kann einmal ergriffene Bedeutsamkeit nicht über einen beliebigen Zeitraum festgehalten werden, sondern muss in einem stetigen Akt der Neuaneignung immer wieder neu vergegenwärtigt werden. Dieser endlosen Arbeit am Zeichen wird Herrndorf zweimal Zeuge, nämlich einmal im Kontext der „Jana-Episode" innerhalb des HaShem-Kapitels und ein weiteres Mal während einer manischen Episode, in der er die Weltformel gefunden zu haben glaubt. Bei dem ersten Beispiel handelt es sich um einen tobsuchtartigen Anfall, der durch die von Mitleid „belegte" Stimme einer Freundin am Telefonat ausgelöst wird: „In ihrer Empathie schwingt etwas mit, das ich nicht verarbeiten kann, eine Mitteilung über meinen wahren, traurigen Zustand, eine Information, die ich mittlerweile erfolgreich verdrängt habe" (AuS 120). Mit der Vergegenwärtigung verdrängter Inhalte geht das plötzliche Gewahren des jederzeit kurz bevorstehenden Todes einher: „Jeder weitere Gedanke an Jana generiert sofort Todesangst" (121). Dann bemerkt Herrndorf, dass auch seine anderen Freunde langsam mit Tod und Auflösung konnotiert werden: 185 Für eine neurobiologische Perspektive auf diesen Sachverhalt, den Schritt „vom leiblichen Selbst zum wissenden Selbst" vgl. METZINGER: Der Ego-Tunnel, S. 153–158, 156. 186 MACINTYRE: Verlust der Tugend, S. 273. 187 Innerhalb der soziologischen Theoriebildung haben Peter Ludwig Berger und Thomas Luckmann für eine solche metaphysische Konstruktion den Begriff der „symbolischen Sinnwelt" geprägt, vgl. Frank SCHIEFER: Die vielen Tode. Individualisierung und Privatisierung im Kontext von Sterben, Tod und Trauer in der Moderne. Berlin 2007, S. 57f. 60 Das kann ich noch eben so verhindern. Aber was ich nicht mehr kann, ist Janas Namen schreiben. [...] Sobald ich es versuche, fliegen meine Arme von der Tastatur, in meinem Kopf knallt und zuckt es, und ich fange an zu lachen, denn komisch ist das ja auch: Ich kann ihren von Todesangst kontaminierten Namen nicht mehr schreiben. (AuS 121) Nachdem die erprobte Bewältigungsstrategie der vorgestellten Pistole keine Wirkung zeigt, kommt Herrndorf auf die Idee, ihren Namen durch das hebräische Wort HaShem, eine im Judentum gebräuchliche Bezeichnung für Gott, zu ersetzen. Er schafft es, drei Sätze zu schreiben, aber „mehr geht auch nicht. Rasch nimmt der neue Signifikant die Eigenschaften des Signifikats an, und ich muss HaShem umbenennen in Manitou und immer so weiter" (122). In der zweiten relevanten Episode geht es um den manischen Versuch Herrndorfs, einer alles erklärenden Weltformel auf die Spur zu kommen und diese schriftlich zu notieren. Ob der schieren Unmöglichkeit der selbst gestellten Aufgabe verhakt sich sein Denken: [...] ein Narzisst findet die Weltformel, du wirst berühmt, das kann nicht sein, du hast die Weltformel vermutlich nicht gefunden, vermutlich alles sinnlos etc. Während ich ,vermutlich alles sinnlos denke, fühle ich, dass ich sterbe. Ich [...] sacke zu Boden und stelle fest: Es tut nicht weh, es geht mir sogar gut. Ich sacke ins Nichts, und das Nichts hat einen PVC-Boden, interessant – und was passiert jetzt? Oha! Es geht weiter. Und wie geht es weiter? Ist das das Jenseits? Nein, ich stehe schon wieder in meiner Küche. Und es geht wieder von vorne los, da ist er wieder, der erste Satz, es wiederholt sich alles, das ist also der Tod! Ich habe die Weltformel gefunden, furchtbar, die Weltformel ist ein Zirkelschluss, wir kreisen ewig in einer Schleife, Hölle, und jetzt kommt der Text schon wieder, mein Text, der grosse Text. Aber vielleicht ist es ein literarischer Text? Ja, natürlich, das ist die Rettung: Ich bin in meinem eigenen Text, deshalb tauchen auch dauernd Versatzstücke meiner anderen Texte auf, ich kann ihn aufschreiben, ich habe ihn schon aufgeschrieben, er steht in meinem Kopf [...]. (AuS 135ff.) Herrndorfs Gedanken kreisen weiter um die Frage, wie er die Weltformel gedanklich arretieren und wie sie überhaupt kommunizieren kann, bis er zu der Erkenntnis gelangt: „Ich habe die Weltformel vielleicht nicht gefunden, aber diese Endlosschleife, diesen Roman in Form einer Endlosschleife, diesen Text, der mich so glücklich und verzweifelt macht und der sich selbst und alles andere und die ganze Welt erklärt, also vielleicht doch die Weltformel –" (139). Die „Endlosschleife", auf die Herrndorf dabei gestossen ist, scheint die unumgängliche Anwesenheit von sich ständig – und zwar nicht beliebig, sondern der Notwendigkeit kultureller Kontingenz entsprechend – auswechselnden Bedeutsamkeiten zu sein. Denn in beiden Fällen entzünden sich seine Krisenzustände an der Ikonizität des Weltzugriffs, sind damit wesentlich Zeichenkrisen, und doch kann Herrndorf beide Male nicht vom Zeichenhaften ablassen, bleibt weiterhin auf die weltvermittelnde Funktion von Zeichen angewiesen. Nur die kontinuierliche Fluktuation von Weltikonen, die ununterbrochene Aneinanderreihung von immer wieder neuen Zeichen, die für den metaphysischen Ort der Welt und seiner selbst garantieren, verschafft ihm Abhilfe und schützt ihn so gegen den Absolutismus der Wirklichkeit und die durch jenen spürbar werdende Tendenz zur Auflösung. 61 8) Bejahung des Suizids 8.1) Gleichgültigkeit und die Verflachung des Lebensgefühls Nachdem ich in den letzten Abschnitten den in Arbeit und Struktur enthaltenen Weltmythen der Lebensbejahung nachgespürt habe, wende ich mich jetzt den Narrativen zu, die im Verlauf der Zeit allmählich die selbst herbeigeführte Beendigung des Lebens bejahen. Ein erster Ansatzpunkt ergibt sich dabei wiederum aus Herrndorfs Gespür für das Absurde, das diesmal jedoch nicht für die Wertschätzung auch der chaotischen, dionysischen Anteile des Lebens bürgt, sondern die Intensität des Lebendigseins vollständig einzuebnen droht und damit das absurde „Dennoch" seinem inhärenten Willen zum Widerstand beraubt. Dieses zunehmend fehlende Widerstehenwollen drückt sich insbesondere an jenen Stellen aus, bei denen Herrndorfs Einsicht in die Gleichgültigkeit des Universums nicht nur intellektueller, sondern vor allem emotionaler Art ist und in eine Gleichgültigkeit sich selbst und dem eigenen Leben gegenüber resultiert. Einen besonders radikalen Eintrag notiert er bereits in einer Mainacht 2010, als er durch den Lärm einer Party wach gehalten wird und ins Grübeln gerät: „Ich döse mit meiner Wärmflasche unter der Decke und bin vollkommen ruhig und gelassen und gleichgültig. Ich könnte jetzt gehen, wenn ich wollte, es ist mir egal" (AuS 57f.). Dass Herrndorf es nicht tut, zeigt, dass er es nicht will, aber die Notiz kündigt doch zumindest von einer latenten Bereitschaft dazu. „Alle, die gesagt haben Jetzt sterbe ich, lebten noch, als sie es sagen konnten",188 und dennoch lässt der rhetorische Akt die Hürde, es zu tun, stark sinken. Dass Herrndorf freilich meint, was er schreibt, wird durch die Äusserung seines zuweilen auftretenden Gefühls bekräftigt, als „wäre ich schon nicht mehr hier, schon auf der anderen Seite" (AuS 54). Die Häufung von Momenten, in denen eine „riesengrosse Gleichgültigkeit" (AuS 64) sich seiner ermächtigt, geht mit einer starken Antriebslosigkeit einher, die nicht nur Herrndorfs Lebensmut, sondern auch und sogar die Bedeutsamkeit des Schreibens zu beeinträchtigen droht: „Ich muss den Krimi nicht mehr schreiben. Ich muss gar nichts mehr schreiben. Alles sinnlos" (AuS 71). Auf der anderen Seite führt die Antizipation seiner durch den Tumor radikal verkürzten Lebensfrist dazu, dass er seiner eigenen absurden Situation mit Galgenhumor189 begegnet und sie dadurch in einer ambivalenten Weise verarbeitet: „Nie im Leben einen Pfennig Schulden ge188 Hans BLUMENBERG: Matthäuspassion. Frankfurt a.M. 31991, S. 132. 189 Zu dieser Sonderform des rhetorischen Sarkasmus, die typischerweise ein letztes ironisches Aufbegehren gegen das Unabänderliche darstellt, vgl. Michael HELLENTHAL: Schwarzer Humor. Theorie und Definition. Essen 1989, S. 39. 62 habt, durch ,Tschick Geld wie Heu auf dem Konto, aber kein Einkommensnachweis. Ohne Bürgschaft meiner Eltern käme ich an keine Wohnung ran. Auch insofern vorteilhaft, sie nicht zu überleben" (AuS 157). Die von Herrndorf selbst gewahrte, ja ihn beinahe kränkende Absurdität wird noch zusätzlich dadurch verstärkt, dass er sich seit der Veröffentlichung von Tschick auf dem Höhepunkt seiner Rezeption als Autor befindet, die daraus erwachsenden möglichen Annehmlichkeiten ihn jedoch weitgehend kalt lassen: Gerade werden die Filmrechte verhandelt. Und das ist vielleicht der Punkt, wo ich dann doch so eine Art von Ressentiment empfinde: 25 Jahre am Existenzminimum rumgekrebst und gehofft, einmal eine 2-Zimmer-Wohnung mit Ausblick zu haben. Jetzt könnte ich sechsstellige Summen verdienen, und es gibt nichts, was mir egaler wäre. (AuS 182) Solange Herrndorfs Wahrnehmung seiner eigenen Gleichgültigkeit noch von Regungen des Erschreckens und der Betroffenheit begleitet ist, sprechen diese Einträge im Augenblick ihrer Niederschrift für die Anwesenheit des Willens zum Leben. Am 23. Dezember 2012, ein paar Wochen nach der Veröffentlichung von Sand, notiert er etwa: „Zwei Stunden im Regen spazieren gegangen. Glasmoorstrasse, Hofweg, Grüner Weg, wo ich vor 26 Jahren ging, in einer ähnlichen Nacht, Strommasten und Mond über mir, schreiend. Egal, alles entsetzlich egal" (AuS 293). Das verstärkende „entsetzlich" kann hierbei, wortwörtlich gelesen, Ausdruck der Bestürzung darüber sein, dass Herrndorfs absurde Bejahung des Lebens unter dem Gewicht seiner heiklen Situation schwächelt. In der Gleichgültigkeit verliert die Welt, verlieren die Dinge, ja selbst Nacht und Mond ihren Widerstand und geben in ihrer „Durchscheinigkeit" die Tür zum Nichts frei – allein, was Herrndorf in diesem Augenblick nicht egal ist, ist die Äusserung, ist die Verschriftlichung jener Mitteilung, die seine Gleichgültigkeit zum Inhalt hat. Ihre Funktion jedoch liegt wiederum in der temporären Übernahme von ikonischer Bedeutsamkeit, mit deren Hilfe Herrndorf der „entsetzlichen" Gleichgültigkeit zu entrinnen vermag. Die hier beschriebene emotionale Distanznahme zur eigenen Situation, die bei Herrndorf auch ganz konkret, etwa im Umfeld von wichtigen Untersuchungen (vgl. AuS 66), beobachtbar ist, unterscheidet sich deutlich von der absurden Gleichgültigkeit, die jedem Seienden denselben und damit nichts einen Wert zuspricht. In der Perspektive des Absurden gewinne ich überhaupt erst einen Wert – einen „Lebenswert", der mein eigenes Dasein vor mir selbst rechtfertigt –, indem ich mich selbst und die Autorität meiner eigenen Vernunft dem Tod entgegenhalte, gerade bleiben will, wo ich bin, wohingegen Herrndorfs egalisierende Gleichgültigkeit zum Teil mit der eigenen Auslöschung kokettiert. Er schildert eine Gratwanderung zwischen emotionaler Teilnahmslosigkeit, die den durch das Absurde begründeten Eigenwert unberührt lässt, und einer existenziell-metaphysischen Indifferenz, die der offensichtlich gewordenen 63 Tendenz zum körperlichen Verfall nachzugeben droht und die sofortige Selbstauslöschung nach sich zöge. Auf der anderen Seite kann das rechte Mass an Gleichgültigkeit eine Möglichkeit darstellen, mit ungewöhnlichen Veränderungen umzugehen und eine potenzielle Überforderung abzuwenden: „Nachmittags lege ich mich müde hin. Als ich wieder aufstehen will, ist die Welt weg oder verschwommen. Linkes Auge, rechtes Auge: verschwommen. Ich gerate nicht in Panik, ich habe keine Angst, es ist nur riesengrosse Gleichgültigkeit: So geht das also los" (AuS 64). Die Veränderungen, die Herrndorf über die Jahre und insbesondere in seinem letzten Lebensjahr durchmacht, scheinen freilich zu radikal zu sein, als dass er sich auf Dauer mit ihnen anfreunden könnte. Irreversibel greift die Erkrankung seine Lebensfreude an: Baden im morgens baumgrünen, nachmittags blaugrünen Plötzensee. Fast keine Leute mehr. Gerutscht im Wechsel mit einem fünfjährigen Mädchen, das beim Ersteigen der Aluleiter weniger Probleme hat als ich. Vier Meter Schwerelosigkeit, Wasser in der Nase und ein Spass, der hauptsächlich die Erinnerung an Spass ist. (AuS 356) Die Verflachung der Intensität von Erlebtem führt allmählich dazu, dass Herrndorf nicht nur dem Konzept „Zukunft" immer weniger Wert beimisst, sondern auch zunehmend weniger Zukunft für sich selber sieht: Ich lerne nichts Neues mehr. Weil ich nicht will. Es ist, wie mir Bücher zu schenken: Erinnert mich an den Tod. Neues braucht man für später, Bücher liest man in der Zukunft. Das Wort hat für mich keine Bedeutung. Ich kann den heutigen Abend in Gedanken berühren, dahinter ist nichts. (AuS 386)190 In den letzten Monaten wird Herrndorfs Gemütszustand zunehmend wechselhafter, er ist hinund hergerissen zwischen manischen Hochgefühlen und solchen, die ihn an die Schwelle zur Lebensverneinung führen. Vor diesem Hintergrund schliesslich bemerkt er zunehmend, in welchem Masse seine Situation nicht nur für ihn, sondern auch für sein allernächstes soziales Umfeld eine Belastung bedeutet: „Ein Irrsinn jeder Tag. Gleichgültigkeit, Manie, Angst, Freude, Arbeit, Begeisterung wechseln im Minutentakt. Ausnahmsweise hat C. die ganze Nacht einen Panikanfall, und ich mache, was C. sonst macht: nichts, ruhig sein" (AuS 413).191 Für jemanden jedoch, der seine Bedeutsamkeit aus den Kategorien der Autonomie und Unabhängigkeit bezieht, kann es eine ungeheure Kränkung darstellen, jemand anderem zur Last zu fallen. 190 Dabei scheint das Vorhaben, so gut wie möglich in der Gegenwart zu leben und die Zukunft weitgehend auszublenden, für Krebsbetroffene und Patienten von schwerwiegenden Erkrankungen insgesamt eine hilfreiche Bewältigungsund Überlebensstrategie zu sein, vgl. BRENNE-KEUPER: Krebs – eine Konfrontation mit dem Leben, S. 77. 191 Herrndorfs Schilderungen scheinen auf eine geringfügig ausgeprägte Depression hinzuweisen, was jedoch eher unwahrscheinlich ist, da er selbst nicht das Gefühl hat, depressiv zu sein (vgl. AuS 408). Wahrscheinli cher scheint eine Anpassungsstörung oder -problematik in geringem Ausmass, da sich deren Symptome klinisch gesehen mit denen bipolarer Syndrome ähneln, aber bei Krebspatienten häufiger festzustellen sind (etwa 33 %) als eine klinisch diagnostizierbare Major Depression (etwa 6 %), vgl. Walter KÖNIG: Psychosoziale Onkologie in der Praxis. Ziele der psychosozialen Onkologie. In: ders. (Hg.): Krebs – Ein Handbuch für Betroffene, Angehörige und Betreuer. Wien/ New York 21998, S. 9–23, 12. 64 8.2) Die Bewahrung der eigenen Autonomie Alle Formen von Bedeutsamkeit, die ich bisher in Arbeit und Struktur ausgemacht habe – das Absurde, die Beschränkung auf die Gegenwart, das soziale Umfeld, die selektive Wahrnehmung von Informationen, das Sich-selbst-Fortschreiben – sind Bestandteile grundsätzlich lebensbejahender Weltmythen und dienen direkt dem Erhalt von Herrndorfs Lebenswillen. Während die ersten drei Punkte dabei Bedeutsamkeiten darstellen, die auch vor Herrndorfs Erkrankung schon bedeutsam für ihn waren, können insbesondere die beiden letztgenannten als krisenspezifische Verhaltensweisen erachtet werden, die auf die veränderte Wahrnehmbarkeit des durch den Tumor verkörperten Todes reagieren. Eine weitere wichtige Bewältigungsstrategie, auf die ich bisher noch nicht explizit eingegangen bin und die zu Anfang tatsächlich der Bewältigung seiner Grenzsituation, also dem Überleben, dient, ist Herrndorfs lange währende Auseinandersetzung mit dem Suizid. Gedanklich bereits „zu Zeiten der Manie" – also etwa in der ersten Märzhälfte – aufgetaucht, verschriftlicht Herrndorf seine Überlegungen zum ersten Mal am 30. April 2010 und spricht von einer „Exitstrategie" rein hypothetischen Charakters: Weil, ich wollte ja nicht sterben, zu keinem Zeitpunkt, und ich will es auch jetzt nicht. Aber die Gewissheit, es selbst in der Hand zu haben, war von Anfang an notwendiger Bestandteil meiner Psychohygiene. [...] Ob ich die Disziplin habe, es am Ende auch zu tun, ist noch eine ganz andere Frage. Aber es geht, wie gesagt, um Psychohygiene. Ich muss wissen, dass ich Herr im eigenen Haus bin. Weiter nichts. (AuS 50) Als von ihm selbst bestimmter Ausweg bietet die vorerst nur gedanklich präsente Selbsttötung Herrndorf die Gewähr, den Bereich des Lebendigen zu seinen eigenen Bedingungen zu verlassen, und zwar im Vollbesitz seiner körperlichen und geistigen Fähigkeiten sowie in der Gewissheit, dass er als derjenige geht, der er ist. Ein kurzes Gedicht von Anfang März, das Herrndorf in der Rückblende erstmals publiziert und fünf Wochen vor seinem Tod erneut wiederholt, stellt das eindrücklich dar: Niemand kommt an mich heran bis an die Stunde meines Todes. Und auch dann wird niemand kommen. Nichts wird kommen, und es ist in meiner Hand. (AuS 111 & 420) Das Konstrukt des jederzeit möglichen Suizids antwortet damit auf eine der grössten Ängste Herrndorfs, nämlich im Verlauf der Krankheit irgendwann als „Gemüse" zu enden, „zu keiner Äusserung mehr fähig" (AuS 100). Weshalb er diesen potenziellen Ausgang seiner Erkrankung so sehr fürchtet, erläutert Herrndorf eineinhalb Jahre nach der Diagnose, wenige Tage, nachdem er seinen ersten epileptischen Anfall erlebt: 65 Dieser Scherbenhaufen im Innern bei gleichzeitiger Unfähigkeit zu sprechen, das ist nicht meine Welt. Auch wenn man da möglicherweise noch zwei Gemüsestufen über dem Apalliker rangiert, das geht nicht. Menschliches Leben endet, wo die Kommunikation endet, und das darf nie passieren. Das darf nie ein Zustand sein. Das ist meine grösste Angst. (AuS 224) Nicht also das Nicht-sprechen-Können, sondern die radikale Unfähigkeit zu sozialer Interaktion fürchtet er, und er ist sich früh im Klaren darüber, dass er jedem Szenario den Vorzug gibt, in dem er nicht mehr ist, als ein „Leben" zu erdulden, das keine Kommunikation mehr zulässt. Der Suizidgedanke entfaltet seine heilsame und lebensbejahende Kraft also zunächst als eine rein abstrakte Vorstellung und dient als bedeutsames Weltikon den Zwecken der selbst induzierten Beruhigung und des Am-Leben-bleiben-Könnens. Später, wenn sich die Symptome wegfallender Sprache verdichten und jene Herrndorfs Zugang zur Bedeutsamkeit der Kommunikation zusehends verunmöglichen, wird aus dieser blossen Vorstellung eine konkrete Handlungsmöglichkeit erwachsen, die nicht mehr auf deren Eigenschaft als Weltikon, sondern als wohl letzter, überhaupt noch möglicher Weltmythos fusst. Damit die Vorstellung des Suizids jedoch zunächst als Mittel der „Psychohygiene" wirksam ist, bei der es für ihn darum geht, die Souveränität über die eigene Lebenssituation zu spüren,192 muss sich Herrndorf ihrer potenziellen Umsetzbarkeit vergewissern können. Ging er anfänglich davon aus, dass „es nur eine Waffe sein könne" – aus „dem einfachen Grund, dass ich herumging und mich prüfte und spürte, die Sache nicht in einem Moment der Verzweiflung, sondern der Euphorie hinter mich bringen zu können" (AuS 50) –, probiert sich Herrndorf vorübergehend an der Vorstellung, durch einen Medikamentencocktail zu sterben (vgl. AuS 70). Da ihm aber vonseiten seiner behandelnden Ärzte verwehrt wird, mit schnell wirkenden Substanzen versorgt zu werden (Paracetamol, das bei Überdosis eine toxische Wirkung auf die Leber entfaltet, schliesst er aufgrund der zu erwartenden Nebenwirkungen aus),193 lässt Herrndorf diese Methode schnell wieder fallen und findet zur Pistole zurück: „Auf dem Rückweg stellt sich sofort das Bild der Waffe wieder ein, und gleich geht es mir besser. Das ganze Gespritze war eh ein Irrweg" (AuS 75). Im August 2010 schliesslich verfestigen sich Herrndorfs Überlegungen: Er legt sich einen Revolver zu, gibt die Munition zur Aufbewahrung einer Vertrauensperson und nimmt explizit Bezug auf den öffentlich geführten Diskurs über die Beihilfe zur Selbsttötung, der ihn noch einige Male beschäftigen wird: „Die mittlerweile gelöste Frage der Exitstrategie hat eine so durchschlagend beruhigende Wirkung auf mich, dass unklar ist, warum das nicht die Krankenkasse zahlt. Globuli ja, Bazooka nein. 192 Zu den verwandten und etwas moderneren Konzepten der Salutogenese und der Resilienz, unter denen ebenfalls Strategien der Widerstandsfähigkeit im Kontext von belastenden Situationen betrachtet werden, vgl. Klaus FRÖHLICH-GILDHOFF/ Maike RÖNNAU-BÖSE: Resilienz. München/ Basel 42015, S. 9f. 193 Vgl. auch Kathrin PASSIG: Mein Wille geschehe. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung 49 (2013), URL = <http://sz-magazin.sueddeutsche.de/texte/anzeigen/41273/Mein-Wille-geschehe> (05.05.2017). 66 Schwachköpfe" (AuS 79). Zwei Wochen später, am 25. August, ist der Entscheidungsprozess abgeschlossen, und Herrndorf notiert: „Ich habe mich damit abgefunden, dass ich mich erschiesse. Ich könnte mich nicht damit abfinden, vom Tumor zerlegt zu werden, aber ich kann mich damit abfinden, mich zu erschiessen. Das ist der ganze Trick" (AuS 86). Erst ab diesem Zeitpunkt beginnt der Suizid, ein reales Vorhaben von Herrndorf zu werden, das gleichwohl dem Zweck des Weiterlebens dient. Dreizehn Monate nach Kauf des Revolvers notiert er: „Ich schlafe mit der Waffe in der Faust, ein sicherer Halt, als habe jemand einen Griff an die Realität geschraubt. Das Gewicht, das feine Holz, das brünierte Metall. Mit dem Mac-Book zusammen der schönste Gegenstand, den ich in meinem Leben besessen habe" (AuS 247).194 Die Arbeit und Leben ermöglichende Wirkung des stets zur Verfügung stehenden Todeswerkzeugs bleibt dabei – auch, wenn sie nicht immer hervorgerufen werden kann (vgl. 303) – bis zuletzt bestehen: „Lange war alles ruhig, jetzt brauche ich zum Arbeiten wieder die Magnum neben mir auf dem Tisch" (AuS 372). Als Teil der Psychohygiene kann ebenfalls erachtet werden, dass die Idee des Suizids nicht nur für Herrndorfs Souveränität über sich selbst, sondern auch für die Integrität seiner Selbstauffassung bürgt. Da er es auf keinen Fall zu ertragen scheint, dass „mein Hirn sich auflöst und meine Persönlichkeit sich unkontrollierbar verändert" (AuS 142), kommt die von Herrndorf formulierte Notlösung der Bedeutsamkeit der eigenen Identität entgegen. Er selbst zu sein und zugleich der einzige Souverän über sich selbst zu sein, gehören so untrennbar zu einem Komplex von Bedeutsamkeiten, die Herrndorf unter keinen Umständen aufzugeben bereit ist. Selbst dann noch, als im Frühjahr 2012 seine Orientierungsschwierigkeiten zunehmend gravierender werden, ist Herrndorf gewillt, neu auftauchende Probleme alleine zu lösen und auf Hilfe weitgehend zu verzichten: Je schwärzer die Nacht, umso sehnlicher der Wunsch, die Situation selbst zu meistern, auch als Vergewisserung, die Eigenschaften, die ich einmal besass, noch nicht komplett verloren zu haben, darunter die Fähigkeit, Ich zu sein und zu sagen. Und dieses Ich verdammt noch mal im Raum zu orientieren. Herrndorf, der Logiker, der Mathematiker, der geborene Navigator, das war ich doch einmal. Und deshalb bin ich das heute noch. (AuS 331) Herrndorfs Wille, bis zum Ende der zu bleiben, der er ist, ist durch und durch von der Auffassung durchdrungen, dass er das nur schafft, indem er solange wie möglich an seinen Fähigkeiten festhält und tut, was ihn auszeichnet. In manchen Situationen führt dieser Anspruch dazu, dass Herrndorf sich über seine Erkrankung hinwegsetzt und Gefahren für sein Leben bewusst ignoriert; er handelt irrational, um sich seiner rationalen Macht über den Absolutismus der 194 Im Blog fehlt dieser Eintrag vom 17.09.11, vgl. http://www.wolfgang-herrndorf.de/2011/08/neunzehn/ (02.06.2017). Offenbar war sich Herrndorf der möglicherweise beunruhigenden Wirkung im Klaren, die diese Sätze bei seiner Leserschaft hätten auslösen können. 67 Wirklichkeit zu vergewissern: „Dann baden, scheiss auf den Anfall. Mein Leben" (AuS 231).195 Die Freiheit, alles selbst machen zu können, wird von ihm dabei umso stärker ergriffen, je intensiver er sich mit der Debatte um westliche Sterbekultur und der Sterbebegleitung auseinandersetzt. Nachdem er etwa den Film Choosing To Die gesehen hat, in dem der 2015 verstorbene Terry Pratchett einen ALS-Patienten bei dessen assistiertem Suizid in der Schweiz begleitet, und den Verlauf des Geschehens über zweieinhalb Seiten minutiös darstellt, notiert Herrndorf: „So will ich nicht sterben, so kann ich nicht sterben, so werde ich nicht sterben. Nur über meine Leiche" (AuS 310). Da Herrndorf zuletzt nur noch leben zu können scheint, weil er den Suizid statt des biologischen Todes an sein Lebensende setzt, nimmt er grossen Anteil an der öffentlichen Diskussion und übt scharfe Kritik an den Widerständen, auf die er während seiner Recherche und Planung stösst. Im Kontext der „Themenwoche Sterben auf der ARD" äussert er sich polemisch zu einer Talkrunde und setzt sich für das absolute Recht, freiwillig zu sterben, ein: Nicht geladen wie immer einer, der das Naheliegende erklärt, nämlich dass in einem zivilisierten Staat wie Deutschland einem sterbewilligen Volljährigen in jeder Apotheke ein Medikamentenpäckchen aus 2 Gramm Thiopental und 20 mg Pancuronium ohne ärztliche Untersuchung, ohne bürokratische Hürden und vor allem ohne Psychologengespräch – als sei ein Erwachsener, der sterben will, ein quasi Verrückter, dessen Geist und Wille der Begutachtung bedürfen – jederzeit zur Verfügung stehen muss. (AuS 369) So radikal und kritikbedürftig Herrndorfs Ansicht auch erscheint – sie ist, neben ihrer Herkunft aus einer existenziell absurden Perspektive, für die allein schon der vernünftig geäusserte Wille eines Individuums eine Bedeutsamkeit darstellt, vor allem die Konsequenz eines Bemühens, das durch viele Hindernisse beeinträchtigt worden ist: Denen, die gehen wollen, wird es auch gegenwärtig nicht einfach gemacht (vgl. AuS 371).196 Der spezielle Umgang der Gesellschaft mit Suizid ist für Herrndorf dabei ein symptomatischer Ausdruck des Umgangs mit dem Sterben allgemein, der den Fokus wiederum auf das Leben zurücklenkt. Der im öffentlichen Raum oftmals anzutreffenden Forderung nach Respekt vor der Privatsphäre sterbender Personen setzt Herrndorf eine absurd geprägte Auffassung entgegen, die das Sterben als ein negatives Wunder – als Wunder der Negation – betrachtet und es als solches ins Zentrum der öffentlichen Wahrnehmung rücken will: Das Wort Pietät für mich immer eine ähnliche Leerstelle gewesen wie Ehre oder Seele. Im Zusammenhang mit dem Tod sowieso absurd. Auf die Gefühle der Angehörigen muss Rücksicht genommen werden, klar, und sonst? Ist der Vorgang nicht mindestens genauso interessant wie das umgekehrt oft so genannte Wunder des Lebens? [...] Und Pietät mein Arsch. Wenn mit Lebenden einmal so pietätvoll um195 Obwohl sportliche Betätigung bei der Behandlung von epileptischen Syndromen unterstützend wirken kann, wird Epileptikern im Allgemeinen dringend davon abgeraten, schwimmen zu gehen, da durch potenzielle Absencen die Gefahr des Ertrinkens besteht, vgl. MATTHES/ SCHNEBLE: Epilepsien, S. 308. 196 Zu einem vielschichtigen und interdisziplinären Blick auf das Thema vgl. den kürzlich erschienenen Sammelband von Gian Domenico BORASIO u.a. (Hg.): Assistierter Suizid. Der Stand der Wissenschaft. Berlin/ Heidelberg 2017. 68 gegangen würde wie mit Toten oder Sterbenden oder wenigstens ein vergleichbares Gewese drum gemacht würde. (AuS 255) Wie die angehängten Zeilen zeigen, gilt Herrndorfs Anteilnahme dabei nicht nur denen, die, aus welchen Gründen auch immer, wie er zu sterben sich entschlossen haben, sondern auch denen, die ihre Lebensfrist im Kontext absurder und demütigender Gesellschaftsstrukturen verbringen müssen, gefangen in der Unzumutbarkeit eines gesellschaftlichen Systems, das sich in seinen Augen um die Belange der Sterbenden mehr zu kümmern scheint als um die Belange der Lebenden (vgl. AuS 255f.). Mit der öffentlichen Thematisierung nicht nur seines Lebens mit dem Krebs, sondern auch seines lange feststehenden Suizidvorhabens setzt Arbeit und Struktur die von Herrndorf während der Verschriftlichung erarbeitete Forderung um und lässt die politische Dimension spürbar werden – von Georg Diez in seinem Plädoyer für die Selbsttötung mit Recht herausgestellt197 –, die diesem „Tagebuch zum Tode" innewohnt. Zwar ist Arbeit und Struktur weit davon entfernt, ein politisch gemeinter Beitrag sein zu wollen, aber Herrndorfs absurde Narrative zwingen ihn dazu, zu gesellschaftlichen Themen Stellung zu beziehen und sich in öffentliche Angelegenheiten einzumischen, die ihn zumal selbst betreffen. Sein Wille indes, sich selbst ein Ende zu setzen, ist spätestens ab Oktober 2012 unabänderlich, als er sich auf die Suche „nach einem guten Ort" begibt (AuS 365). Um sich selbst in seinem Vorhaben zu bestärken und die Abschiedsnahme von der Welt zu erleichtern, nehmen seine absurden Weltmythen immer mehr die Gestalt eines metaphysischen Nihilismus an, der umso radikaler wird, je länger Herrndorf mit dem Tumor lebt. 197 Vgl. Georg DIEZ: Die letzte Freiheit. Vom Recht, sein Ende selbst zu bestimmen. Berlin 2015, S. 32f. & 75ff. 69 8.3) Radikaler Nihilismus und der Wille zum Nichts 8.3.1) Die Nichtigkeit des Seienden und der Zeit In den theoretischen Ausführungen zu Nihilismus und dem Absurden habe ich festgehalten, dass das Moment des ersteren dazu verleitet, das Wesen des eigenen Daseins, der Welt und des Kollektivmythos radikal in Frage zu stellen, während zweiteres im Zugeständnis dieser Fragwürdigkeiten eine zwar desillusionierte, aber gleichwohl Zukunft zulassende Perspektive zu erblicken erlaubt. Der Antrieb des absurden Bewusstseins nährt sich davon, dass es den menschlichen Kampf gegen die Welt als unbedingt sinnlos darstellt, so doch dieser Sinnlosigkeit nicht den endgültigen Sieg und die absolute Deutungshoheit über den Zweck seines eigenen Lebens zugesteht. In gewisser Hinsicht lässt sich also sagen, dass die Narrative des Absurden selbst schon eine Überwindung des jede Qualität negierenden Nihilismus darstellen,198 wie er etwa in Gestalt des Nikolai Stawrogin erscheint. Wenn ich im Folgenden erläutere, wie sich Herrndorfs absurde Weltmythen allmählich wieder einem radikalen Nihilismus nähern, so soll das nicht bedeuten, dass er während seiner letzten Jahre doch noch zu einer ganz neuen Sicht auf die Dinge gelangt wäre – sondern lediglich die, die er schon hat, wieder stärker mit nihilistischen Narrativen belehnt: Ich hatte nie ein Nahtoderlebnis, und ich fürchte, mein Leben hätte es nicht auf den Kopf gestellt. Aber ich hatte Depersonalisation in Einheit mit Derealisation. Das hat mein Leben auch nicht direkt auf den Kopf gestellt. Ich musste mein Weltbild nicht komplett umdrehen. Es hat mich nur vom Atheisten zum Nihilisten gemacht. Wo ich früher an nichts Metaphysisches innerhalb, ausser oder über der Welt geglaubt habe, glaube ich jetzt selbst an diese Welt oder ihre Existenz nicht mehr. Da habe ich nicht viel verloren. (AuS 434) Wie kommt es zu dieser Radikalisierung der nihilistischen Tendenzen in Herrndorfs Weltauffassung? Der ausschlaggebende Zeitraum ist eng mit seinem Aufenthalt in der Psychiatrie verbunden, mit dessen Darstellung Arbeit und Struktur beginnt. Am 14. Mai 2010 notiert Herrndorf dann zum ersten Mal, was „ich in den letzten Wochen herausgefunden habe: dass dieses Universum nicht existiert. Oder nur in diesem Bruchteil dieser Sekunde" (AuS 57). In dieser Form, durch den angehängten Nachsatz, geht seine These noch mit der Bedeutsamkeit der Gegenwärtigkeit konform, die ich zuvor beschrieben habe und mit der Herrndorf das in der Zukunft Liegende weitgehend ausblenden und ertragen kann. Doch die nächste Formulierung schon, die Herrndorf etwa drei Monate später aufschreibt, macht deutlich, dass es sich um einen gänzlich anderen Gedanken handelt: „Wiederholt habe ich jetzt schon meine in der Psychiatrie gewonnene und seitdem relativ unverändert mit mir herumgeschleppte Ansicht ge198 Vgl. WEYEMBERGH: Überwindung des Absurden, S. 74. 70 äussert, wir existierten nicht, nichts existiere [...]" (AuS 83). Ausführlich berichtet der entsprechende Eintrag vom Versuch, seine Erkenntnis in Worte zu fassen sowie von den Einwänden, die vonseiten seiner Freunde hervorgebracht werden. Die folgenden Zeilen sehen dabei am meisten nach einem Argument aus, werden von Herrndorf jedoch zugleich ihrer argumentierenden Kraft beraubt: Meine derzeitige Ansicht ist (und ich kann sie logisch nicht begründen, ich befinde mich für mich selbst überraschend jetzt auch ausserhalb der Klapse auf einer religiösen ,Ich fühle aber so -Argumentationslinie), dass der winzige Bruchteil der Sekunde, in dem ich zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft zu Bewusstsein komme, im Vergleich zur Unendlichkeit dieses Universums auf ein Nichts zusammenschrumpft, auf mathematisch null. Ein Wimpernschlag, und der Wimpernschlag ist vergangen. Ein Wimpernschlag, und 12,5 Milliarden Jahre sind vergangen. Was sich ändert, existiert nicht. (AuS 84) Weil Herrndorf es logisch nicht begründen kann, will er selbst es nicht als Argument bezeichnen. Aber ihm geht es hier ja auch offen eingestanden gar nicht um die schlüssige Darlegung einer Einsicht in das Wesen des Kosmos, sondern um die selbst als bedeutsam erachtete Mitteilung – Taylor würde sagen: um die Expression199 – einer Bedeutsamkeit. In diesen Sätzen spricht Herrndorf nicht als Philosoph von einem systematischen Gedankengang, sondern als Schriftsteller von einer subjektiv bedeutsamen Erkenntnis, die er mit künstlerischen Mitteln ausdrückt. Diez ist daher zu widersprechen, wenn er schreibt, Arbeit und Struktur käme ganz ohne Metaphysik aus;200 in der Verarbeitung seiner Grenzsituation ist Herrndorf vielmehr notgedrungen auf sie als bedeutsames Wissen darüber angewiesen, was noch da ist und wo es steht. Herrndorfs Überlegungen sind dabei offenkundig nicht dogmatischen und kollektivmythischen Charakters – worauf Diez richtigerweise abzielt –, sondern eben weltmythischen Charakters, sie bezwecken nicht die Überzeugung anderer, sondern dienen allein der Bewältigung des akuten Krisenzustandes. Dass es sich bei Herrndorfs erstarkendem Nihilismus um eine gleichermassen bedeutsame wie künstlerische Einsicht handelt, verdeutlicht dabei vor allem das folgende Gedicht, das den bereits zitierten Passus ergänzt: Am Ende, wenn die Welt vergeht Und kein Gedicht weiss, wer wir waren, Wenn kein Atom mehr von uns steht Seit zwölf Milliarden Jahren, Wenn schweigend still das All zerstiebt Und mit ihm auch die letzten Fragen, Wird es die Welt, die s nicht mehr gibt, Niemals gegeben haben. (AuS 84) So pessimistisch auch das apokalyptische Panorama erscheint, das Herrndorf in diesen acht Versen entwirft: Der weit entfernte Fatalismus kann Trost verheissen. Dass irgendwann – und mit den Augen der Ewigkeit gesehen, meint das: schon sehr bald – auch das Universum endet, 199 Vgl. TAYLOR: Quellen des Selbst, S. 651. 200 Vgl. DIEZ: Die letzte Freiheit, S. 79. 71 heisst, dass man nichts verpasst, sobald man gegangen ist. Wenn das Schicksal aller Dinge in der Zeit darauf lautet, dass sie irgendwann nicht mehr sein werden, dann sind sie, aus der Perspektive der Zeitlosigkeit, bereits nicht mehr. Das absurde Bewusstsein kann also guten Gewissens und ohne Reue die Tür hinter sich schliessen, denn es verliert nichts, was es vorher nicht auch schon verloren hätte; die Frage nach der Qualität dieses Bewusstseins – die Welt bezeugend oder sie verschlafend – ist dann nur noch eine Nebensächlichkeit. Herrndorfs Überlegungen können auf der anderen Seite aber auch zum umgekehrten Schluss führen: Nicht darauf verweisend, dass ich bereits nicht mehr bin, weil ich eines Tages nicht mehr sein werde, sondern dass ich gerade und insbesondere nur in diesem jetzigen Moment bin, der zugleich auch von der Ewigkeit berührt wird – eine Lesart, die in den Erlösungsvorstellungen vieler mystisch geprägter Traditionen vorzufinden ist und von Thomas Metzinger folgendermassen zusammengefasst wird: Es sieht im Moment so aus, als ob Befreiung immer nur innerweltliche Befreiung sein kann und Erlösung immer nur innerweltliche Erlösung. Es geht dann nicht mehr um ein Jenseits oder eine mögliche Belohnung in der Zukunft, sondern immer nur um den gelebten Augenblick der Achtsamkeit, den Moment des Mitgefühls, um das aktuelle Jetzt. Wenn es so etwas überhaupt noch gibt, dann ist der eigent lich sakrale Raum immer nur das bewusst erlebte Jetzt.201 Auch wenn dieser Ansatz stark an die Ermöglichung des Glücklichseins durch Gegenwartsbezug erinnert, wäre Herrndorf mit dieser Interpretation sicherlich nicht einverstanden gewesen. Ein absurdes Bewusstsein kann nie endgültig Erlösung finden, weil es nie zur Ruhe kommen darf – es existiert nur solange, wie es den natürlichen Tendenzen zur Selbstauflösung widersteht, existiert nur aufgrund dieses Widerstandes. Im Absurden gibt es keine Sakralität ausser derjenigen, die anderen Lebewesen zugesprochen wird, aber diese Sakralität ist nicht Freude, sondern Schmerz. Das eigene absurde Dasein unter dem Stern der Ewigkeit zu interpretieren, heisst zu erkennen, dass das eigene und das fremde Leiden nicht von Dauer sein wird, da kein Seiendes von Dauer ist – und was nicht ist, das leidet auch nicht mehr. Es widerspricht Herrndorfs absurden Narrativen, den Fokus rein auf die Gegenwart zu richten, in der man, zusammen mit der Ewigkeit, ewig wäre, denn dieses Dasein wäre ein ewiges Sein im Leiden. Und deshalb sieht er keine andere Möglichkeit, als den Fokus auf die Zukunft, auf die Präsenz einer anderen Gegenwart zu verschieben, in der er selbst und sein Leiden nicht mehr sind: „Es gibt uns nicht. Wir sind schon vergangen" (AuS 421). Damit aber findet Herrndorf ebenfalls zu einer Vorstellung von Erlösung, die ihm sein eigenes Sterben – es sei an seine sarkastischen Äusserungen zu von Moltke erinnert (vgl. AuS 174) – erleichtert: Eine Erlösung zwar, die ihm die Freude theistischer Paradiesvorstellungen versagt, aber durch die „Möglichkeit, sich jederzeit und ohne Mühe aus einem Nichts ins Nichts hineinzukatapultieren" (AuS 436), 201 METZINGER: Der Ego-Tunnel, S. 401. 72 die Negation seines Leides gewiss sein lässt. Zugleich steht die Antizipation dieser zukünftigen Gegenwart, in der alles nicht mehr sein wird noch je gewesen ist, nicht mit seinem absurden Humanismus im Widerspruch: Dass es die Menschheit und die Welt irgendwann nicht mehr gibt, ist kein hinreichender Grund, mit der weitestmöglichen Verbesserung von Lebensbedingungen auf der Erde aufzuhören. Dennoch zeigt das ähnliche Gewicht, mit dem sowohl Herrndorf als auch Metzinger die Idee der Gegenwart beladen, wie nahe manche kritisch gemeinten Überlegungen aus dem absurden Spektrum jenen kommen können, die in religiösen Traditionen angestellt werden. Auch wenn Herrndorfs radikaler Nihilismus im Umfeld seines Aufenthaltes in der Psychiatrie auftaucht und dadurch verstärkt wird, wäre es in höchstem Masse verfehlt und unangemessen, diesen als ein blosses Wahnsystem abzutun. Zwar ist sich auch Herrndorf selbst den Umständen seiner Überzeugungsfindung bewusst, aber er findet noch die Bereitschaft, ironisch über sie zu reflektieren: Als ich nach meiner Entlassung die Überzeugung, diese Welt existiere nicht, äusserte und stirnrunzelnd beibehielt, erklärte der Waffenverkäufer bei einer Tasse Tee, dass eine in den Räumen der Psychiatrie gewonnene Weltanschauung makelbehaftet erscheinen und der Ort ihrer Auffindung wenig vertrauenbildend wirken könne. So ähnlich drückte er sich aus. Fand ich lustig und stimmte zu. (AuS 436) Neben der offen zur Schau gestellten Komponente, die mit den Topoi von Psychiatrie und Wahn kokettiert, kritisiert Herrndorf hier wenig überraschend diejenigen, die im Kontext von Grenzsituationen zu einer gänzlich neuen Weltanschauung, oder für den Atheisten noch schlimmer: zum Glauben finden. Durch den Umstand, dass es sich bei seinem Nihilismus nicht um ein radikal neues Konzept, sondern lediglich um eine Modifikation seiner bereits bestehenden Überzeugungen handelt, meint Herrndorf – erkennbar an der ironisierenden Affirmation der Aussage des Waffenhändlers – dieser Anschuldigung erhaben zu sein; die vehemente Zurückweisung dieses Vorwurfs ist also für ihn selbst bedeutsam. Dass es sich aber bei der Neuformulierung und -ergreifung von Weltmythen während einer Grenzsituation – und zwar auch von solchen, die den Bedeutsamkeiten vor der Krise nicht entsprechen – überhaupt um ein fragwürdiges Verhalten handelt, ist stark zu bezweifeln. Alles, was auf der Ebene der Bedeutsamkeit dazu dient, eine Grenzsituation durchzustehen, muss als unmittelbare Reaktion für den Erhalt der eigenen Identität erlaubt sein.202 202 Herrndorfs Ablehnung von Religiosität selbst dann, wenn sie als Bewältigungsstrategie dient (vgl. etwa AuS 54: „Priester sind mit Waffengewalt von mir fernzuhalten."), erinnert zuweilen an die immer noch anhaltende Marginalisierung der Religion innerhalb der psychiatrischen Disziplin, weshalb die Bedeutung von religiösen Überzeugungen bei psychiatrischen Erkrankungen bzw. religiöser Copingstrategien im Kontext psychiatrischer Behandlungsaufenthalte unzureichend erforscht ist. Eine wegweisende Studie diesbezüglich ist Peter KAISER: Religion in der Psychiatrie. Eine (un)bewusste Verdrängung? Göttingen 2007, S. 408–421. 73 8.3.2) Die Welt als „nihilistische Wüste" – Exkurs zu „Sand" Zu sagen, dass sowohl absurde als auch nihilistische Vorstellungen für Herrndorf als Person bedeutsam sind, wirkt sich teilweise auf das Licht aus, in dem sein literarisches Schaffen seit 2010, hierbei insbesondere der durch und durch pessimistische Roman Sand, erscheint. Damit soll freilich nicht gesagt sein, dass Herrndorfs „Wüstenroman" (AuS 27) ausschliesslich vor dem Hintergrund seiner Erkrankung zu interpretieren sei. Das wäre nicht nur anachronistisch, sondern würde dem Roman als eigenständiges Kunstwerk nicht gerecht – Aussagen über Romane müssen auch weiterhin Aussagen über Romane bleiben dürfen. Es soll lediglich heissen, dass Herrndorf durch den Verschriftlichungsprozess von Sand die Möglichkeit dazu hatte, die sich in seinem Nihilismus ausdrückende Bedeutsamkeit zu aktualisieren und diese in der Gestalt seines Romans kommunizierbar zu machen. Von Belang ist also nicht die rein auf den Inhalt bezogene und zweifelhafte Frage, inwiefern die Person des Autors in dessen Roman durchscheint, sondern diejenige nach der Funktion des Romans für das Überleben seines Schöpfers. Am einleuchtendsten wird diese funktionale Komponente dort, wo sich Herrndorf selbst zu Sand und der Arbeit daran äussert. Obwohl sich die Verschriftlichung angesichts der Komplexität des Plots als schwierig gestaltet und Herrndorf aufgrund der Materialfülle auf die Mithilfe von Kathrin Passig angewiesen ist (vgl. AuS 70 & 82f.), sorgt das Projekt nichtsdestoweniger für ein beachtliches Mass an Beschäftigung: „Ich drehe schon wieder am Rad, 16 Stunden Arbeit am Tag" (AuS 87). Dass die Niederschrift des Romans für Herrndorf dabei nicht nur von Bedeutung, sondern im strengen Sinne auch bedeutsam ist, verdeutlicht eine Art Wette, die er vor dem Hintergrund eines kritischen Befundes mit sich selbst abschliesst: „Für anschliessend zwei Pläne: Wenn kein Tumorwachstum, setz ich mich an den Wüstenroman und hau ihn bis zum nächsten MRT zusammen" (AuS 93). Da der Befund zu Herrndorfs Erleichterung negativ ausfällt, „folgt: Der Wüstenroman" (AuS 94). Weil Herrndorfs Entschluss, den Tod nicht zu erleiden, sondern selbst herbeizuführen, zu diesem Zeitpunkt bereits feststeht, kann sein Vorhaben, Sand fortund zu Ende zu schreiben, als eine starke Selbsterzählung aufgefasst werden, die erkennbar seinem Lebenswillen dient und die Frist des Sterbenwollens deutlich verzögert. Über ein Jahr lang ist das Romanprojekt strukturgebendes Element in Herrndorfs auf der Schwelle verweilendem Leben, ist Antrieb zu tagtäglicher Arbeit, der erlischt, als Sand beendet und veröffentlicht ist: „Und was machen Sie jetzt?, fragt Dr. Vier, dem ich ,Sand mitgebracht habe. Nichts. Was ich machen wollte, habe ich gemacht. Zwei 74 Romane fertig, zwei weitere Romanruinen bleiben liegen" (AuS 289). Wenn der Kunstwerkcharakter von Sand es daher verbietet, den Roman auf inhaltlicher Ebene als Form der Krisenbewältigung zu betrachten, dann ist das zumindest für den Akt seiner Verschriftlichung möglich (vgl. auch AuS 219). Was der fertiggestellte Text nicht mehr bereitstellen kann, wird schliesslich vom Blog und über Umwege von der im Sommer 2011 begonnen Fortsetzung von Tschick – 13 Monate nach Herrndorfs Tod als Bilder deiner grossen Liebe veröffentlicht – übernommen: Die Arbeit am im November gestarteten Science-Fiction aus Kompliziertheitsgründen seit langem abgebrochen. Stattdessen ,Isa , Roadmovie zu Fuss. Mit etwas Rumprobieren einen Ton gefunden, schreibt sich wie von selbst. Und praktisch: kein Aufbau. Man kann Szene an Szene stricken, irgendwo einbauen, irgendwo streichen, irgendwo aufhören. (AuS 316) Neben diesem pragmatischen, rein auf den Herstellungsprozess von Sand fokussierten Aspekt kann der Roman aber auch auf inhaltlicher Ebene Aufschluss darüber geben, inwiefern die Arbeit am Pessimismus für Herrndorf eine Arbeit an der Bedeutsamkeit darstellt. Diese Fragestellung ist deshalb zulässig, weil sich der in Sand zum Vorschein kommende Nihilismus mit demjenigen in Arbeit und Struktur vergleichen lässt. Der pessimistische Anteil des Romans hat dabei viel mit dem Zufälligen und Kontingenten zu tun, das der gedächtnislosen Hauptfigur – aus pragmatischen Gründen nach einem Herrenausstatter Carl genannt203 – mit einer fast schon perfiden Hartnäckigkeit im Wege steht und alles mit Bedeutung Versehene vereitelt. Als Carl sich gerade aus seiner anfänglichen Misere befreit hat und auf die Hilfe zweier vorbeifahrender junger Männer hofft, kann er – hier noch ohne Ersatznamen – nur hilflos zusehen, wie die beiden Fremden seinen Ausweis, den letzten Hinweis auf seine Identität, anzünden und unter Gelächter davonfahren. Carl versucht zu retten, was zu retten ist: Mit einem Sprung hechtete er nach dem letzten, glimmenden Fetzen rötlichen Ausweispapiers, ein winziges Stück, von dem zitternd Aschefetzen abfielen. Er hielt es zwischen den Fingernägeln von Daumen und Zeigefinger, und als sei in der Willkür des Zufalls doch etwas wie Logik und Bosheit enthalten, war es das Stück Papier, auf dem ,Nom: stand. Name, Doppelpunkt und ein Viertelbuchstabe, ein Schnörkel nur noch. (Sa 112) Seiner eigenen Lebensgeschichte materiell sehr nah, in lebensweltlicher Hinsicht jedoch zugleich weit davon entfernt, spielt ihm die Kontingenz lediglich einen Orakelspruch in Form eines Buchstabenschnörkels zu, an dessen Deutung sich Carl auf über 200 Seiten abmüht. Ironie des Schicksals, könnte man meinen, aber gegen diese Formel weiss der Erzähler einen Einwand vorzutragen. Nachdem Carl bereits eine ganze Karriere als Opfer von hanebüchenen Zufällen durchlaufen hat (bei denen er die ominöse Bleistiftmine, die zu beschaffen ihn der Anführer einer Hehlerbande genötigt hatte, zunächst in einem Tumult verloren glaubt und wiederfindet, dann in der Wüste tatsächlich verliert und wiederfindet, nur um sie wiederum an 203 Vgl. Wolfgang HERRNDORF: Sand. Reinbek bei Hamburg 122013, S. 166, im Folgenden mit der Sigle Sa abgekürzt. 75 ein paar Schulkinder endgültig zu verlieren), wird der Umstand, dass Carl durch eine besonders hastige Autofahrt seine Verfolger auf sich aufmerksam macht, mit den folgenden Worten kommentiert: „Vielleicht war es nur einer jener Zufälle, die man in Romanen nicht überstrapazieren sollte und die im richtigen Leben zur Erfindung des Begriffs Schicksal beigetragen haben" (Sa 362). Im Roman ist jeder Zufall eine Konstruktion des Autors, die dem Fortlauf der Handlung dient und auf Figurenebene den Anschein von Fatalität erweckt;204 aber wenn der Roman, die Fiktion schon nicht die Möglichkeit von Schicksal zulässt, dann kann es erst recht nicht im realen Leben existieren. Der Begriff des Schicksals ist also selbst bereits eine Copingstrategie, eine kulturelle Konstruktion,205 die das Ertragen von existenzieller Kontingenz als undurchschaubare Aneinanderreihung von Zufällen, in der wir uns wiederfinden und mit der wir umzugehen haben, zu erleichtern hofft. Nicht von ungefähr erinnert dieser Schluss an die Formel der „biochemischen Lotterie", die Herrndorf in Arbeit und Struktur der schicksalsbezogenen Frage des „Warum Ich?" entgegenhält und mit der er die Konstruiertheit aller Vorstellungen von Schicksal hervorhebt (vgl. AuS 181). In Sand freilich ist die Kette der unglücklichen Zufälle, die Carl immer grösseres Leid einbringen und ihn zuletzt – durch die Gestalt eines Hüttenbewohners, der Carl ironischerweise mit den Personen verwechselt, die beide, ihn selbst und Carl, misshandelt haben – nach erfolgreicher Flucht aus seinem Folterversteck in den Tod führen, für den Erzähler überwiegend die Konsequenz einer voreilig gezogenen „falschen logischen Schlussfolgerung", nämlich der Glaube „an die Unschuld eines Schuldigen" (Sa 452). Bevor Carl Gedächtnis und Identität verliert, hatte er als Polizeibeamter Polidorio weitere Untersuchungen in einem Mordfall in einer Kommune angestellt, weil er den Hauptverdächtigen und tatsächlichen Delinquenten nicht für den Schuldigen hielt – und konnte erst dadurch überhaupt vom schwedischen Agenten Lundgren als Mittelsmann für die Übergabe von geheimen Bauplänen verwechselt werden, was Carls gesamte Leidensgeschichte nach sich zieht.206 Carl selbst tritt also sein eigenes „Schicksal" los, weil er, statt sich eines Urteils zu enthalten, über die Identität einer anderen Person nicht zutreffend urteilt, seine Konstruktion der Identität des Verdächtigen nicht mit der Wirklichkeit übereinstimmt. Zugleich hätte sich Polidorio in dieser Angelegenheit nie eines Urteils enthalten können, denn die Zuweisung von Eigenschaften und Identitäten innerhalb 204 Vgl. hierzu auch Klaus-Detlef MÜLLER: Der Zufall im Roman. Anmerkungen zur erzähltechnischen Bedeutung der Kontingenz. In: Germanisch-Romanische Monatsschrift 59 (1978), S. 265–290, 266f. 205 Vgl. dazu die Ausführungen über „Schicksal" als absolute Metapher im Sinne Blumenbergs bei Franziska REHLINGHAUS: Die Semantik des Schicksals. Zur Relevanz des Unverfügbaren zwischen Aufklärung und Erstem Weltkrieg. Göttingen 2015, S. 22–25. 206 Zum Nachvollzug der verwirrend erscheinenden, aber feingliedrig konstruierten Handlung vgl. Michael MAAR: ,Er hat s mir gestanden . Überlegungen zu Wolfgang Herrndorfs ,Sand . In: Merkur 755 (2012), S. 333–340, 334f. 76 des kontingenten Lebens-Raumes ist bereits eine Ordnungsleistung, die auf die ursprüngliche Strukturlosigkeit des Wirklichen reagiert – ein Aspekt, der auch in Bezug zur klar durchstrukturierten Darstellung der chaotisch anmutenden Erzählweise von Sand ausgemacht werden kann.207 Um als Polizist handlungsfähig, ja sogar als Person überhaupt erst lebensfähig zu sein, hat Polidorio über die Identitäten innerhalb seiner (fiktiven) Lebenswelt immer schon geurteilt, ist immer schon ein Simulant, der „von seiner eigenen Simulation nichts ahn[t]" (Sa 340) – und zwar schon selbst dann, bevor er überhaupt sein Gedächtnis verliert. Unter den Symptomen der Amnesie schliesslich muss er als Carl notwendig seine lebensweltlichen Erfahrungen und Erinnerungen mit der Wirklichkeit verwechseln, weil er ansonsten überhaupt keine Lebenswelt mehr hätte.208 Sand lässt sich auf diese Weise als Niedergang eines Mannes lesen, der gezwungen ist, seine eigene Konstruktion der Wirklichkeit als verbindlich anzusehen und somit den wahrscheinlichen und selbstverständlicheren Antworten auf lebensweltliche Probleme den Vorzug gibt – dabei jedoch ausser Acht lassen muss, dass „das Wirkliche manchmal genau das Unwahrscheinlichste ist."209 Als Mensch ohne Geschichte, als Person ohne Identität kann Carl dem Nichts reiner „Virtualität"210 daher nur entkommen, indem er das gleichzeitige Bestehen zahlreicher Möglichkeiten durch die Einwilligung in die schlüssigsten Weltmythen eingrenzt211 und dadurch immer mehr den zynischen Ausgang seiner eigenen Lebenserzählung besiegelt. Er scheitert, weil er sich nicht nach dem absurden Appell weltanschaulicher Enthaltung richtet, sondern – und darin besteht die gesamte Perfidität des Romans – bei der Suche nach der eigenen historischen Identität auf die Anwesenheit irgendeines Mythos angewiesen bleibt und die Fiktionalität der eigenen Wirklichkeit vergisst.212 Mit Sand hat Herrndorf einen Roman geschrieben, in dem fast alles „die schlimmstmögliche Wendung"213 nimmt, nur um den Protagonisten für sein erkenntnistheoretisches Vergehen zu bestrafen und letztlich „aus dem Buch zu schreiben" (AuS 196) – lediglich Michelle, die passionierte Tarotkartenlegerin, blickt einer freudigen Zukunft entgegen, weil sie ihre eigene esoterische Illusion freiwillig mit der Wirklichkeit verwechselt (AuS 414f.). Der offenkundige, an 207 Vgl. MAAR: ,Er hat s mir gestanden , S. 336. 208 Zur Bedeutung von rudimentär vorhandenen, mitunter auch falschen Gedächtnisinhalten bei der Therapie von Amnesien vgl. Hans J. MARKOWITSCH/ Angelica STANILOIU: Neuropsychologie und Hirnbildgebung des mnestischen Blockadesyndroms. In: Carl Eduard SCHEIDT u.a. (Hg.): Narrative Bewältigung von Trauma und Verlust. Stuttgart 2015, S. 52–63, 56f. 209 Annina KLAPPERT: Vergessen im Virtuellen. Wolfgang Herrndorfs Sand. In: dies.: Wolfgang Herrndorf, S. 101–115, 109. 210 Vgl. KLAPPERT: Vergessen im Virtuellen, S. 111f. 211 Vgl. etwa Sonja Arnolds Ausführungen zum Homonym der Mine in ARNOLD: Der ,Aufbewahrungsort des Falschen , S. 39–44. 212 Vgl. dazu auch Maximilian BURK/ Christof HAMANN: ,There is no conflict ? Zur Konstruktion und Irritation binärer Strukturen in Wolfgang Herrndorfs Sand. In: Gabriele DÜRBECK/ Axel DUNKER (Hg.): Postkoloniale Germanistik. Bestandsaufnahme, theoretische Perspektiven, Lektüren. Bielefeld 2014, S. 330–354, 354. 213 MAAR: ,Er hat s mir gestanden , S. 339. 77 manchen Stellen ins Groteske übergehende Pessimismus (wie etwa dann, als Carl während seiner Folter ein Witz über die Foltermethoden von CIA, KGB und der Stasi erzählt wird, vgl. Sa 400f.), der Mitleid und Empathie als letzten Ausweg aus der Aporie anerkennt,214 ist dabei weitgehend mit dem Standpunkt des Absurden vereinbar und bildet daher zu den absurden Narrativen in Arbeit und Struktur, die für das Leben sprechen, keinen Widerspruch, sondern eine Kontinuität. Obwohl Herrndorf die ersten Arbeiten an Sand bereits in der zweiten Hälfte des Jahres 2006 aufgenommen und den Roman „schon damals als bewusste[n] Gegenpol zu ,Tschick und seiner Freundlichkeit", als „nihilistische Wüste" konzipiert hatte (AuS 206), ist der Roman in seinem Schopenhauerischen Pessimismus kein Plädoyer für die Aufgabe von Existenz, sondern vielmehr eine Aufforderung, mehr und intensiver den lebendigen Schmerz zu wagen, den sie mit sich bringt. Als „Aufbewahrungsort des Falschen" (AuS 254) konserviert der Roman den falschen radikalen und „gegen Ende völlig aus dem Ruder laufende[n] deprimierende[n]" Nihilismus (AuS 237), damit in der Realität eben derjenige ermöglicht werden kann, für den alle Wahrheit nur relativ weil kollektivmythisch ist. Dennoch findet sich in Sand wenigstens eine Textstelle, die eindringlich das reine Nichts des Nicht-mehr-da-Seins beschwört und durch Carl hindurch auf den Herrndorf von Arbeit und Struktur verweist, der mit den Symptomen der Depersonalisation zu kämpfen hat: Weiss einer, wie es ist, die Nacht in der Wüste zu erleben, allein? Wer gewohnt ist, seine Nächte in ei nem Bett zu verbringen, in einem Haus, umgeben von anderen Häusern und Menschen, macht sich davon nur schwer eine Vorstellung. Und noch schwerer macht man sich eine Vorstellung davon, wie die Schwärze und Finsternis der Metaphysik an einem Geiste zerren kann, der in sich selbst seit Tagen nichts weiter zu erkennen vermag als ein unbeschriebenes Blatt Papier. (Sa 308) Ob es sich bei dieser Passage um eine intuitive Vorwegnahme oder um eine nachträgliche Ergänzung handelt, wird wohl nur eine historisch-kritische Edition klären können. In jedem Fall lassen diese Sätze, denen ein Zitat von Percy Bysshe Shelley über die Vergeblichkeit und Müdigkeit des Daseins vorangestellt ist („Art thou pale for weariness/ Of climbing heaven and gazing on the earth ..."), erahnen, dass mancher Geist sich nicht erholen kann, wenn das Gewicht des Nichts zu schwer an ihm hängt. Es geht „den Hügel hinab" (Sa 475), in Betrachtung der „Finsternis der Metaphysik" ist Hoffnung weder für Carl noch für Herrndorf eine Option, sondern nur Illusion, und darum auch kann das Leiden beider, das da Leben heisst, nur ein Ende durch den Tod finden: Bei dem einen durch die Bösartigkeit des Zufalls, bei dem anderen durch den selbstbestimmten Akt der eigenen Hand. 214 Vgl. MAAR: ,Er hat s mir gestanden , S. 340. 78 8.3.3) Sterbenwollen als Bedeutsamkeit Ruft man sich alles bisher Gesagte über die lebensbejahenden Weltmythen in Arbeit und Struktur in Erinnerung, dann fällt auf, dass – für einen Schriftsteller wenig überraschend – Sprache eine Art Kernbedeutsamkeit für Herrndorf darstellt, von der der Zugriff auf weitere Bedeutsamkeiten, wie etwa diejenige der Kommunikation, des Soziallebens, des Fortschreibens und der Autonomie, abhängig ist. Zweieinhalb Jahre lang hindert ihn das Geschwür in seinem Schädel nicht daran, auf diese miteinander verwachsenen Bedeutsamkeiten zurückzugreifen und lässt ihm so die Möglichkeit, sein Leben mit dem Krebs weiterhin als bedeutsam zu erfahren. Mit zunehmendem Krankheitsverlauf jedoch, vor allem ab den Sommermonaten 2012, werden Herrndorfs Beeinträchtigungen stetig grösser, wodurch er immer mehr den Kontakt zu diesen lebensbejahenden Bedeutsamkeiten verliert. Die Chronik der Verschlechterung seiner Lebensqualität beginnt mit einem Eintrag vom 7. Juli, der auf eine erste Gefährdung der bedeutsamen Selbstbestimmtheit Herrndorfs verweist: „Kaum beherrschbares Down angesichts der Tatsache, dass ich mit links den Strohhalm nicht mehr in den Mund stecken kann, und angesichts des Folgegedankens, den Lauf wahrscheinlich nicht mehr durch den Mund aufs Stammhirn richten zu können" (AuS 342). Ab Oktober häufen sich die Intensität und das Auftreten von epileptischen Anfällen, die Herrndorf eine geregelte Schreibpraxis zunehmend verwehren: „Sehr epileptischer Tag. Jedes Geräusch hallt als Wort und Brei aus Silben wider in meinem Hirn, das vergeblich den Sinn darin enträtseln will. Arbeit unmöglich" (AuS 360). Im Februar 2013 berichtet er von einem „dünnen epileptischen Firnis", der sich über seinen Alltag gelegt habe, wenn auch die Wucht der Metapher durch den schwarzen Humor des Folgesatzes gebrochen erscheint: „Und Selbstmord doch nicht so schwierig, wie ich lange dachte. Es reicht, die Föhrer Strasse bei Grün zu überqueren" (AuS 385). Immer seltener trifft sich Herrndorf mit seinem Freundeskreis, unter seinem sich verschlechternden Gesundheitszustand leidet seine gesellschaftliche Teilhabe: „Überstürzte Verabredung im Deichgraf. Drei Freunde, die ich ewig nicht gesehen habe, vier. Seit Wochen kein Sozialleben gehabt. Ausser C., Ärzten und Supermarktkassiererinnen niemanden gesehen" (AuS 390). Ab Ende Juni verschärfen sich die Sprachstörungen, sodass sich Herrndorf kaum noch „sinnvoll" unterhalten (vgl. AuS 417) und nicht einmal mehr mit Lektüre beschäftigen kann: „Seit Tagen kann ich nichts lesen, schon lange nichts, Bücher nicht, Mails mit Mühe, längere Sätze eine Qual. Hypotaxen meiner eigenen Bücher und Blogsätze nur, wenn ich sie laut lese. Allein kann ich nicht oft laut lesen. Manchmal bei Tagesform" 79 - (AuS 419). Anfang August, drei Wochen vor seinem Tod, schreibt er: „Ich kann nichts schreiben, nichts lesen, kein Wort. [...] Stundenlang Epilepsie, den Namen von C. vergessen. Die anderen in ihrer Wohnung kenne ich auch nicht, weil ich sie nicht angesehen habe, aus Angst, auch ihre Namen nicht zu wissen" (AuS 424). Zusammen mit der adäquaten Partizipation an Sprache, Kommunikation und sozialen Kontakten schwinden weitgehend alle lebensbejahenden Bedeutsamkeiten, deren Abwesenheit Herrndorfs Suizidvorhaben schliesslich in vollem Masse Gestalt annehmen lässt. Der Bereich des Bedeutsamen an sich scheint sich dabei allerdings nicht einfach aufzulösen, wie man zunächst annehmen könnte, sondern in sein Gegenteil zu verkehren: Wo zuvor Bedeutsamkeiten für das intendierte Leben eingestanden haben, stehen nun Bedeutsamkeiten für den intendierten Tod. Am deutlichsten wird dieser Sachverhalt bei einem Eintrag, den Herrndorf elfeinhalb Monate vor seinem Suizid dem Blog anvertraut: Schlechter Tag, keine Arbeit. Müde, schlapp, ich bestehe nur noch aus einem einzigen Gedanken. Ich erzähle C. davon, weil wir das Abkommen haben, alles zu erzählen, und dass ich mich, wenn ich wie durch ein Wunder geheilt würde, dennoch erschiessen würde. Ich kann nicht zurück. Ich stehe schon zu lange hier. (AuS 355) Herrndorfs Wille zum Suizid ist nicht einfach der Verlust von Bedeutsamkeit, sondern deren Substitution mit anderem Vorzeichen. Der drastische Abbau sprachlicher und kommunikativer Fähigkeiten während seiner letzten Monate lässt die Präsenz von lebensbejahenden Weltmythen immer weniger zu und zwingt ihn daher, die metaphysische Garantie der Anwesenheit von Welt – oder mit Herrndorfs ontologischem Nihilismus gesprochen eben ihrer Abwesenheit – aus anderen Quellen zu beziehen. Als Mythos zum Tode hilft sein Nihilismus ihm zwar dabei, sich leichter vom Leben zu verabschieden – „aus einem Nichts ins Nichts" –, aber Herrndorf plant seinen Suizid ja nicht, weil er als Nichts, sondern als jemand sterben will. Trotz seiner Vorstellung also, dass nichts, weder er noch etwas Anderes noch die Welt existiere, benötigt Herrndorf weiterhin einen Weltmythos, der für die Tatsache bürgt, dass er, Wolfgang Herrndorf, es ist, der seinen Tod verursacht, und eben nicht der Tumor. Der Wille, als jemand zu sterben, als genau die Person, als die er sich sieht, führt schliesslich dazu, dass Herrndorf sich selbst töten muss – aber nicht aus Wahn oder pathologischen Überlegungen, sondern weil ihn das Ringen um Bedeutsamkeit dazu treibt, weil er im Akt seines Suizids genau die Bedeutsamkeit erfährt, die ihm durch das passive Warten auf den Tod vorenthalten wird (vgl. AuS 401 & 404). Wenn ich mir der „Welt" nicht sicher sein kann, indem ich meiner eigenen Vergangenheit, Gegenwart oder Zukunft einen Platz in ihr zuweise, dann kann ich mich ihrer immer noch vergewissern, indem ich den Ort bestimme, von dem aus ich sie verlasse. Drei Wochen vor seinem Tod, in einem Eintrag, in dem er laut redaktioneller Anmerkung über den 80 - „von ihm ausgewählte[n] Sterbeort am Hohenzollernkanal" spricht (AuS 442), formuliert das Herrndorf so: „Ich will spazieren. Wo will ich hin. Den ganzen Winter habe ich s gefunden" (AuS 424). Ab dem Moment, ab dem Herrndorf nicht mehr in ausreichendem Masse auf die Bedeutsamkeiten der Sprache, der Kommunikation und des Fortschreibens zurückgreifen kann, lebt er zu einem Grossteil nur noch, weil er sterben will – der Suizid ist zu seiner letzten, im Trümmerfeld des Bedeutsamen noch übriggebliebenen Bedeutsamkeit geworden: „Ich bin nicht der Mann, der ich einmal war. Meine Freunde reden mit einem Zombie, es kränkt mich, ich bin traurig, ich will weg. Ich will niemanden mehr sehen" (AuS 418). Radikaler gefasst bedeutet das, dass Herrndorfs Vorhaben, sich zu töten, paradoxerweise dazu dient, sein eigenes Selbst, seine eigene Identität zu erhalten, um im Moment seines Todes als er selbst weiterleben zu können; eine Selbsterhaltung um jeden Preis, der selbst das Leben nicht zu teuer ist. Gerade in dem Augenblick, in dem er alles daran setzt, sich aus der Existenz zu befreien, existiert Wolfgang Herrndorf als der, der er sein will, und verrät dennoch nicht seinen Nihilismus. Noch während seines Sterbens, noch in der Ausführung seines Willens zum Tode ist er auf Identität und Bedeutsamkeit, bleibt er auf Weltvermittlung durch Ikon und Mythos angewiesen. Am Leben zu bleiben scheint daher manchmal zu heissen, sich selber zu vernichten.215 Hier schliesslich offenbart sich das Bedeutsame als ein strukturierendes Moment, dem es nicht unbedingt an der Zukunft, an der Projektion der Gegenwart in die Zeit hinein gelegen ist – sondern vor allem um die Gewährleistung der gegenwärtigen Existenz. In ihrer Funktion als metaphysische Schablone kann Bedeutsamkeit weder absolut garantieren, dass ich meinen Lebenswillen, dessen ich mir in genau diesem Augenblick sicher bin, in der nächsten Sekunde nicht verlieren werde, noch kann sie gewährleisten, dass sie in der nächsten Sekunde zugegen sein wird so wie jetzt. Anwesende Bedeutsamkeit bürgt weder für Zukunft noch für nachfolgende Bedeutsamkeit. Sie garantiert nur, dass ich jetzt, in diesem Moment, eine Gegenwart habe und als ein Gegenwärtiges bin – und zwar auch dann, wenn nichts anderes mehr ausser dieser Gegenwart von Bedeutung ist: Es hilft einem nichts, was in Zukunft ist, wenn man selbst nicht ist. Was hilft s? Man spürt es nicht. [...] Man hat davon nur was, wenn man dabei ist. Unwichtig, was die Leute von einem sagen, die ihrerseits mitsamt ihren Gedanken in der nächsten Sekunde nur noch Staub sind. Warum einen Gedanken an all dies verschwenden? Was hilft es, in den Untiefen der Zeit und des Nichts? Wozu darüber nachdenken, ob man einen schönen Platz neben dem Gestrüpp vor den Spundwänden mit Blick auf den Berlin-Spandauer Schifffahrtskanal hat in der vergänglichen Ewigkeit? Wozu, fragt der Pragmatiker, was hilft es einem in der Zukunft? Es hilft in der Zukunft nichts. Aber es hilft jetzt. Der Mensch lebt in seiner Vorstel lung, und nur dort. Unmöglich, ohne den durch die Evolution im Hirn verankerten Irrationalismus leben zu wollen, und den fragwürdigen Irrationalismus verlangt es nach einem aus zwei T-Schienen stümperhaft zusammengeschweissten Metallkreuz mit Blick aufs Wasser, dort, wo ich starb. (AuS 431f.) 215 Vgl. dazu auch Jörn AHRENS: Selbstmord. Die Geste des illegitimen Todes. München 2001, S. 243f. 81 V Letzte Zeilen – Zeugnisse des Suizids 9) Zu einer Narratologie des Abschiedsbriefs Geht man von den Ausführungen zur Gattungszugehörigkeit in Abschnitt 3 aus, dann habe ich in meiner Untersuchung von Arbeit und Struktur bisher so getan, als ob es sich bei Herrndorfs Suizid um ein ästhetisch geplantes Element innerhalb eines semi-fiktionalen Textes handelt, das als Ende der Romanhandlung vom Autor intendiert ist. Dadurch allerdings gewinnt der suizidale Akt ebenfalls den Charakter eines rein fiktiven Ereignisses, das der Faktizität von Herrndorfs Lebensende fundamental widerspricht. Zugleich habe ich mich mit den Kategorien des Weltmythos und der Bedeutsamkeit ja immer schon auf die wirkliche Person Herrndorfs bezogen, die in den Blogeinträgen durchscheint und Arbeit und Struktur zuallererst konstituiert. Anders, als ich es eingangs vorschlug, habe ich das Werk also nicht nur als tagebuchartiges Protokoll und als Roman interpretiert, sondern ebenfalls als einen Abschiedsbrief, der die letzten Angelegenheiten eines Suizidanten thematisiert. Diese Lesart freilich setzt voraus, dass Herrndorf seinen Text über den Gebrauch als Blog hinaus zumindest in Teilen als Abschiedsbrief entworfen hat. Die Klärung dieses Sachverhaltes wiederum setzt die Frage voraus: Was überhaupt konstituiert einen Abschiedsbrief? Lassen sich beispielsweise in von SuizidantInnen hinterlassenen Dokumenten wiederkehrende Elemente ausmachen, die trotz der Individualität dieser Textzeugen verallgemeinerbar sind? Gibt es so etwas wie eine „Erzähltheorie" des Abschiedsbriefs? Die wissenschaftliche Beschäftigung mit Abschiedsbriefen ist heutzutage eine Subdisziplin der modernen Suizidologie, die in den späten 1940er Jahren durch die Forschung von Erwin Ringel und Edwin Shneidman begründet worden ist. Da sich die Suizidologie mit dem Erklären suizidalen Verhaltens und dessen Prävention befasst, sind Abschiedsbriefe mittlerweile gut in psychiatrischen und soziologischen Kontexten, aber noch kaum in einer genuin narratologischen Hinsicht erforscht. Erste empirische Studien zu Abschiedsbriefen werden Ende der 50er Jahre veröffentlicht und beschäftigen sich unter anderem mit Wortwahl, Motivation sowie den Unterschieden zwischen authentischen und simulierten Abschiedsbriefen.216 Die im Englischen eindeutiger bezeichneten suicide notes werden gewöhnlicherweise handschriftlich 216 Vgl. dazu Edwin S. SHNEIDMAN/ Norman L. FARBEROW: Some Comparisons between Genuine and Simulated Suicide Notes in Terms of Mowrer's Concepts of Discomfort and Relief. In: The Journal of General Psychology 56 (2/1957), pp. 251–256; Charles E. OSGOOD/ Evelyn G. WALKER: Motivation and Language Behavior. A Content Analysis of Suicide Notes. In: Journal of Abnormal Psychology 59 (1/1959), pp. 58–67; sowie Louis A. GOTTSCHALK/ Goldine C. GLESER: An analysis of the verbal content of suicide Notes. In: British Journal of Medical Psychology 33 (3/1960), pp. 195–204. 82 auf Textzeugen aus Papier hinterlassen (Eisenwort u.a. berichten von 90 %, der übrige Anteil besteht aus digitalen Textzeugen wie E-Mail und SMS)217 und variieren je nach zugrunde gelegtem Textkorpus deutlich in der Länge, von wenigen Zeilen bis zu einer Seite.218 Obwohl die suizidologische Erschliessung von Abschiedsbriefen immer noch stark durch das psychiatrische Vorurteil, bei suizidalem Verhalten handle es sich ausschliesslich um ein pathologisches Verhalten,219 geprägt ist, können die Studien aus diesem Umfeld (ich werde mich weiterhin auf Eisenwort u.a. und Aşicioğlu beziehen) einen ersten Aufschluss über die Themen und Erzählbestandteile geben, die in Abschiedsbriefen zu finden sind. In ihrer 2007 veröffentlichten Studie haben Eisenwort u.a. 53 Abschiedsbriefe von 30 Personen, die sich zwischen Mai 2002 und April 2005 in Österreich getötet haben, thematisch ausgewertet und den fünf Themenbereichen a) Hinterlassenschaft, b) Krankheit, c) Biografie, d) soziale Umgebung und e) Gefühle zugeordnet. Sie konnten dabei zeigen, dass zwischen den Themen eines Abschiedsbriefs und dem jeweiligen Motiv der Selbsttötung ein enger Zusammenhang besteht: „Bei psychischen Problemen als Suizidmotiv wurde gehäuft über Gefühle geschrieben, bei Krankheit als Motiv über Krankheit und Hinterlassenschaft und bei finanziellen Motiven gehäuft über die Umgebung."220 Darüber hinaus habe sich die Themenwahl ebenfalls als vom Adressaten abhängig erwiesen: „Dem Freund mehr über Gefühle zu schreiben und an die Familie oder Allgemeinheit mehr zur Hinterlassenschaft, bildet die unterschiedlichen Beziehungsqualitäten auch im Abschiedsbrief ein letztes Mal ab."221 Bei seinem 32 Abschiedsbriefe umfassenden Korpus von türkischen SuizidantInnen gelangt Aşicioğlu aufgrund einer anderen thematischen Kategorisierung zu dem Ergebnis, dass Begründungen, Entschuldigungen, Abschiedsnahme sowie existenzielle Überforderung die am häufigsten behandelten Themen sind.222 Aşicioğlu spezifiziert, dass die Hervorhebung der Eigenmächtigkeit oftmals dazu dient, Angehörige vor einer möglichen Verdächtigung in Schutz zu nehmen oder sie von moralischer Schuld freizusprechen, woran erkennbar werden kann, dass SuizidantInnen häufig nicht nur ausschliesslich um sich selbst besorgt sind, sondern sich ebenfalls um das Wohl ihrer Angehörigen Gedanken machen.223 217 Vgl. Brigitte EISENWORT u.a.: Suizidologie. Abschiedsbriefe und ihrer Themen. In: Nervenarzt 78 (6/2007), S. 672–678, 676f. 218 Vgl. etwa Faruk AŞICIOĞLU: Contents and medico-legal aspects of suicide notes. Turkey sample. In: Suicidology Online 8 (2017), pp. 118–128, 120, URL = <http://www.suicidology-online.com/pdf/SOL-2017-8-118128.pdf> (24.05.2017). 219 Vgl. Gabriele DIETZE (Hg.): Todeszeichen. Freitod in Selbstzeugnissen. Frankfurt a.M. 1989, S. 10. 220 EISENWORT u.a.: Suizidologie, S. 676. 221 Ebd., S. 677. 222 Vgl. AŞICIOĞLU: Contents and medico-legal aspects, p. 121. 223 Vgl. ebd., pp. 122 & 125f. 83 Nach diesem kurzen und noch sehr abstrakten Abriss möchte ich die bei Abschiedsbriefen beobachtbare narrative Form anhand einiger Beispiele konkretisieren. Ich wähle dazu drei authentische224 und anonyme Texte, die Roger Willemsen in seiner 1986 erschienenen Anthologie zum Selbstmord herausgegeben und einer bereits 1945 erschienenen Textsammlung entnommen hatte.225 Die übrigen von Willemsen versammelten und überwiegend von bekannten AutorInnen stammenden Texte eignen sich indes kaum für die Darstellung echt suizidaler Erzählweisen, da sich bei ihnen – ähnlich wie bei Arbeit und Struktur – nicht zwischen authentisch-biografischer und künstlerischer Darstellung unterscheiden lässt. Die Kontextualisierung von Herrndorfs Blog innerhalb des Abschiedsbrief-Genres soll ja gerade dazu dienen, von dessen Literarizität zu abstrahieren und den am Ende von Arbeit und Struktur nur erahnbaren Suizid in den vom Kunstwerk uneinholbaren Realitätsbereich zurückzuholen. Der narrativen Beweisführung drängt sich dabei zunächst die Frage auf, ob Abschiedsbriefe überhaupt etwas erzählen. Dazu ein kurzes Beispiel: „Du ich versuche also, tapfer zu sein, ob es mir gelingen wird? Es wird mir so schwer, es Dir zu sagen, aber ich habe seit meiner Jugendzeit immer ein Bedürfnis nach der grossen Ruhe in mir herumgetr ..."226 Was der abgebrochene Satz unterstellt, ist offensichtlich. Sein abruptes Ende verweist auf das Ergreifen einer Eigenschaft, auf ein Etwasoder Jemand-anderes-sein-Wollen, das sich im Moment des Sterbens erfüllt. Viel bemerkenswerter als diese Beschwörung „heroischer" Tapferkeit zur Selbsttötung ist allerdings, dass der Rückbezug auf die Jugend, damit auf die eigene Biografie für die anonyme Person eine grosse Rolle zu spielen scheint. Die temporale Angabe verdichtet die (vermutlich) lange Zeitspanne zwischen Damals und Jetzt und legitimiert den tödlichen Akt, der im nächsten Augenblick verwirklicht wird. Bedingt durch diese ihm eingeschriebene Intention, zwar nicht ausführlich, aber dennoch rudimentär darzustellen, wer diese Person war und wer sie unmittelbar vor dem Suizid sein oder nicht mehr sein wollte, greift der Abschiedsbrief schliesslich notwendig auf einen narrativen Kontext zurück, wenn weiterhin gilt, dass personale Identität nur in der Vergewisserung einer kohärenten Selbsterzählung erfahren werden kann. Der enge Zusammenhang zwischen biografischer Erzählung und Suizid scheint der suizidologi224 Ein „authentischer" Abschiedsbrief soll hier als ein Dokument verstanden werden, nach dessen Verschriftlichung zeitnah ein vollendeter Suizid erfolgte. Abschiedsbriefe, die im Vorfeld eines Parasuizids (Suizidversuch oder selbstzerstörerisches Verhalten) geschrieben worden sind, können sich zuweilen stark von diesen unterscheiden, etwa wenn die endgültige Tötungsabsicht fehlt, vgl. Bijou YANG/ David LESTER: The Presentation of the Self. An Hypothesis about Suicide Notes. In: Suicidology Online 2 (2011), S. 75–79, 77, URL = <http://www.suicidology-online.com/pdf/SOL-2011-2-75-79.pdf> (25.05.2017). 225 Vgl. Roger WILLEMSEN (Hg.): Der Selbstmord in Berichten, Briefen, Manifesten, Dokumenten und literarischen Texten. Köln 1986, S. 75, 137 & 315, ursprünglich publiziert in Walter MORGENTHALER/ Marianne STEINBERG: Letzte Aufzeichnungen von Selbstmördern (Beiheft zur Schweizerischen Zeitschrift für Psychologie und ihre Anwendung, Nr. 1). Bern 1945. 226 WILLEMSEN: Der Selbstmord, S. 137. 84 schen Forschung dabei überraschenderweise nicht von Anfang an eingeleuchtet zu haben; erst etwa seit den 80er Jahren werden Abschiedsbriefe mehrheitlich vor dem Hintergrund der individuellen Lebensgeschichte suizidaler Personen ausgewertet.227 Sollten Abschiedsbriefe nun tatsächlich Ausschnitte aus biografischen Erzählungen sein, dann unterliegen sie damit ebenfalls den Regeln biografischen Erzählens. Eine authentische suicide note ist demnach zwar nicht in künstlerisch-literarischer Hinsicht bearbeitet, zeigt sich aber dennoch von den narrativen Eigenheiten der lebensgeschichtlichen Selektion und Selbstinszenierung beeinflusst.228 Ein weiterer Brief aus Willemsens Anthologie kann das verdeutlichen: Verzeih mir bitte, dass ich dich allein lasse, ich wäre so gerne noch bei Dir geblieben, aber so geht es ja nicht mehr weiter. Ich bin ja für Dich nur noch eine Belastung und das kann ich nicht ertragen. [...] Der Entschluss ist mir sehr schwer gefallen mein Leben und meine ganze Liebe gehörte Dir und den Kindern. Ich habe schreckliche Angst vor dem Wasser, aber es muss sein. [...] Mein Leben war schwer von Anfang bis Ende, so war es bestimmt. Die glücklichen Stunden waren sehr sehr selten und bin ich froh, wenn alles vorüber ist.229 Im Gegensatz zum biografischen Interview oder Fragebogen, wo seitens der Befragten stets die Verführbarkeit zur Beschönigung gegeben ist,230 tendiert die Selbstdarstellung in diesem Abschiedsbrief jedoch zur Negativierung des eigenen Charakters: Das gelebte Leben und dessen Umstände werden nicht ins bessere, sondern ins schlechtere Licht gerückt. Die zitierten Sätze rufen nur auf, was den Suizid rechtfertigt, ja ihn nahezu erzwingt, und selbst der durchbrechende Zweifel scheint noch der Bedeutsamkeit des Dahinscheidens zuträglich zu sein; die Dinge hingegen, die das Leben noch bejahen könnten (hier das Soziale), werden, da sie nicht mehr bedeutsam sind, in ihrer Lebensbejahung ausgeblendet und als ein weiterer zwingender Grund zu sterben angeführt. In seiner vollkommenen Absorption von ehemals affirmierenden Bedeutsamkeiten wird der Abschiedsbrief auf diese Weise selbst zu einem Konvolut reiner, diesmal jedoch lebensverneinender Bedeutsamkeit, oder genauer: zum explizierten letzten Weltmythos einer Person, die sich zu sterben entschlossen hat.231 227 Vgl. EISENWORT u.a.: Suizidologie, S. 672. 228 Vgl. auch YANG/ LESTER: The Presentation of the Self, S. 76f. 229 WILLEMSEN: Der Selbstmord, S. 463. 230 Vgl. Hans Dieter MUMMENDEY/ Ina GRAU: Die Fragebogen-Methode. Grundlagen und Anwendung in Persönlichkeits-, Einstellungsund Selbstkonzeptforschung. Göttingen u.a. 62014, S. 192–201. 231 Es ist zwar auch denkbar, dass eine suizidale Person ihren eigenen Abschiedsbrief weder als besonders bedeutend noch besonders bedeutsam erfährt, sondern diesen einfach aus einem gewissen Pflichtgefühl den Angehörigen gegenüber verfasst. Da auf der anderen Seite allerdings davon ausgegangen werden kann, dass von allen SuizidantInnen nur etwa 30 % einen Abschiedsbrief hinterlassen (vgl. AŞICIOĞLU: Contents and medico-legal aspects, p. 122), ist bei denjenigen, die eine suicide note schreiben, gewissermassen ein Überschuss an Bedeutsamkeit zu vermuten, aufgrund dessen sie tatsächlich ihre letzten Worte notieren und den Angehörigen oder der Nachwelt überlassen. 85 Für umfangreichere Textzeugen wie etwa Tagebücher232 mag dieser Zusammenhang augenscheinlicher sein als für die zuweilen sehr kurzen Abschiedsbriefe. Da aufgrund deren Individualität jedoch eine rein auf die sprachliche Form ausgerichtete Analyse kaum möglich noch wirklich angemessen sein wird,233 bleibt für das Programm einer Erzähltheorie oder richtiger: einer Weltmythentheorie des Abschiedsbrief-Genres nur die Bezugnahme auf die darin jeweilig auftauchenden Bedeutsamkeiten legitim. Dazu zwei abschliessende Beispiele: Liebe Erna und Fritz. Danke Euch beiden für Eure Güte, Geduld und Sorge. Ich stehe meine Nervosität nicht mehr aus. [...] Bitte verzeiht mir, was ich Euch allen getan habe. [...] Behaltet mich nicht todt im Hause thut mich sogleich in eine Morgue oder wo Ihr wollt. Grämt euch nicht ich bins nicht wert. Gott möge mir vergeben ich kann es nicht mehr ausstehen. Auf Wiedersehen im Jenseitigen.234 Meine Lieben. Zürnet mir nicht aber ich muss aus dem Leben scheiden ich bin krank und kannte meine Krankheit nicht bis letzten Herbst [...], nun ist es zu spät und Ihr alle seit vielleicht auch krank. Es ist schrecklich für mich wie auch für Euch Alle, das ich soviel unheil angestiftet habe aber ich bin nicht al lein Schuld, warum sagt man mir nicht an was ich leide [...]. Ihr werdet mich alle verachten aber Ihr habt recht ich bin nicht mehr wert.235 Zeichnet sich der erste Brief im direkten Vergleich insbesondere durch die zum Ausdruck kommende Dankbarkeit und die Bitte um Entschuldigung aus, der zweite hingegen durch die Abund Zuweisung von Schuld, sind sich beide in der Hervorhebung der eigenen existenziellen Wertlosigkeit ähnlich. Hierbei handelt es sich jedoch nicht um die durchs Absurde begründete Einsicht in die relative, sondern um die rechtfertigende Äusserung einer faktischen und absoluten Wertlosigkeit, die in ihrer den Suizid erleichternden Wirkung Herrndorfs spätem Nihilismus ähnelt. In diesem Zusammenhang könnte eine genuin narratologische Analyse von Abschiedsbriefen bestätigen oder verwerfen, ob das, was ich mit Bezug zu Herrndorf als „Poetik des Fortschreibens" deklariert habe, auch in anderweitigen Zeugnissen suizidaler Personen wirkt und jene dabei unterstützt, den eigenen sich selbst negierenden Weltmythos weiterzuerzählen, an ihm durch den Akt des Schreibens festzuhalten und letztlich in die suizidale Tat umzusetzen. Zwar weisen Abschiedsbriefe dem noch zu sagen Übriggebliebenen einen Ort zu, aber sie tun das schliesslich in einer höchst unkommunikativen Art und Weise, da auf sie nicht mehr reagiert werden kann und sie sich einer Antwort verwehren; sie laden nicht zum Dialog ein, sondern bedeuten seine endgültige Aufkündigung. Freilich scheint es, als ob gerade diese Endgültigkeit des Kommunikationsund Existenzabbruchs die Aussprache jener stetig wiederkehrenden Topoi herausfordert, die, so individuell der Suizid zuletzt auch sein mag,236 für Abschiedsbriefe mehr oder weniger als „typisch" anzusehen sind. 232 Seit Mitte der 90er Jahre werden neben Abschiedsbriefen auch zunehmend Tagebücher von suizidalen Personen Gegenstand suizidologischer Forschung, vgl. James R. ROGERS/ David LESTER: Understanding Suicide. Why We Don t and How We Might. Göttingen u.a. 2010, S. 159. 233 Vgl. dazu den Einwand bei WILLEMSEN: Der Selbstmord, S. 47f. 234 Ebd., S. 75. 235 Ebd., S. 315. 236 Vgl. DIETZE: Todeszeichen, S. 15. 86 10) „Arbeit und Struktur" – Ein Abschiedsbrief? Auch wenn die formalen Unterschiede zwischen einem Tagebuch und einem Abschiedsbrief zunächst frappant zu sein scheinen, lassen sich mithilfe der Überlegungen aus dem vorigen Kapitel gleichwohl Kriterien formulieren, mit denen sich der Grad des Abschiedsbriefcharakters von Arbeit und Struktur bestimmen lässt. In Anlehnung an die Forschung und meine eigenen Ausführungen können der Ausdruck von Dankbarkeit, Entschuldigung und Abschiedsnahme, Instruktionen zu Nachlassoder Erbangelegenheiten sowie die Abgeschlossenheit der Kommunikation als besonders auffällige Kategorien hervorgehoben werden. Je mehr von diesen Kriterien auf Arbeit und Struktur zutreffen, umso eher erweist sich das Werk als ein faktischer Abschiedsbrief. Da Herrndorf ab einem gewissen Punkt auf seinen Suizid zu schreibt, scheint das Vorhandensein von Passagen des Abschieds zunächst trivial zu sein. Bemerkenswert ist jedoch, dass Herrndorf seine Abschiedsnahme nicht schlagartig forciert – wie etwa im Bewusstsein, bald sei die Zeit gekommen –, sondern das Gewicht des Gehenwollens bereits seit November 2010 mit sich herumträgt: „Der Wille zu leben längst nicht mehr so stark wie der Wunsch, sich zu verabschieden" (AuS 158). Dieser Wunsch aber wird erst zwei Jahre später, im Juli 2012, konkret, als Herrndorf sich mit einem Freund trifft, zu dem er unregelmässigen Kontakt zu haben scheint: „Besuch von Calvin, der zufällig in Deutschland ist. Ich hatte grosse Angst vor einer Begegnung, wollte erst nicht. War dann aber doch gut. Mein ältester Freund. Mach s gut" (AuS 348). Da Herrndorf bereits seit September 2010 um eine Kontaktaufnahme mit sich ringt (vgl. AuS 90) und seinen Freund mindestens seit der Diagnose im Februar nicht mehr gesehen zu haben scheint, antizipiert er die Unwahrscheinlichkeit eines erneuten Treffens und vermerkt in Arbeit und Struktur zum ersten Mal Sätze des Abschieds. Neben dieser situativen Initiation fallen zwei weitere Zeiträume auf, in denen Herrndorf auf das Thema fokussiert: Einmal zwischen Januar und März 2013, wo er zunächst noch über den Prozess des Abschiednehmens reflektiert, sowie des Weiteren ab Juli, in dem er sich ganz konkret von Freunden und Familie zu verabschieden beginnt. Herrndorfs Abschiedsstimmung, die in den nächsten beiden Zitaten deutlich zutage tritt, scheint hierbei vornehmlich durch den Winter heraufbeschworen zu werden: Leichter Schneefall, herrlicher Tag. Eine Aufregung wie als Kind. Mit vier hatte ich meine ersten Schlittschuhe. Seitdem immer gelaufen, jeden Winter, jeden Tag, wenn Eis war [...], bis Arthrose beide Knie auflöste und mich für lange Jahre zum Fussgänger machte. Aber zwanzig Jahre habe ich immer Schlittschuhe und Rollschuhe bei jedem Umzug mitgeschleppt. Alles andere weggeschmissen, meine Bilder, Möbel, Bücher, Papiere, alles. Die Schuhe nicht. Nun sitze ich mit getapeten Knien am Rand des Plötzensees, schnüre die Eishockeystiefel und weiss, es ist das letzte Mal. (AuS 381f.) 87 Der Eintrag korrespondiert zwar mit der elf Tage später geschriebenen Notiz, im Winter sterben zu wollen (vgl. AuS 384), wird jedoch zugleich durch eine Art naiver und kindlicher Lebenslust kontrastiert, die auch im nächsten Zitat deutlich hervorbricht: Und es schneit. [...] Ich trample über die aufgetürmten Seitenränder, ich nehme jede Abkürzung, rutsche über die Uferböschung hinab, ich stapfe durch die grössten Wehen wie ein Fünfjähriger, Gedanke immer: Es ist vielleicht das letzte Mal, das letzte Mal, vielleicht ist es das letzte Mal. Das habe ich bei den Schuhen allerdings auch schon gedacht. Die letzten Schuhe, die letzte Hose, die letzten Johannisbeeren. (AuS 397f.) Je mehr Herrndorf den Gedanken, dass er alles zum letzten Mal erlebt, zulässt und bei ihm verweilt, umso intensiver scheint er zu erleben. In der Intensität seiner je momentan erlebten Lebensfreude kündigt sich so paradoxerweise bereits an, dass es nach diesem Winter keinen weiteren mehr für ihn geben wird. Drei Monate später gewinnt das Wann, über das er all die Jahre keine Kontrolle hatte ausüben können (vgl. AuS 198), eine endgültige Kontur: „Ich habe eine woher auch immer sich speisende recht genaue Vorstellung von meiner verbleibenden Zeit, die sich von Zeit zu Zeit ändert. Gerade ist es dieses Jahr. Es kann aber auch in zwei, drei oder fünf Jahren sein, das ist möglich, sage ich zu C., um sie zu belügen, als hätte ich noch Hoffnung" (AuS 416). Sechs Wochen vor seinem Tod schreibt Herrndorf dann: „Mit Caroline, Susann und 13 oder 14 anderen im Deichgraf. Ich sitze allein an einem Tisch. Die Sprache seit Tagen kaputt. Ab und zu kommen Einzelne und sprechen mit dem Stammelnden. Für sie ist es kein Abschied" (AuS 418). Es folgen Einträge über den Abschied von seiner Frau und seinen Eltern, und schliesslich, als fünftletzter Eintrag überhaupt, die Notiz: „August, September, Oktober, November, Dezember, Schnee. Jeder Morgen, jeder Abend. Ich bin sehr zu viel" (AuS 425). Mit dem angehängten kurzen Satz wählt Herrndorf eine Formel, die in Abschiedsbriefen vergleichsweise häufig anzutreffen ist,237 und da der Eintrag im Blog auftaucht, ist davon auszugehen, dass Herrndorf seine Leserschaft ebenfalls als Adressaten dieser Abschiedsnahme berücksichtigt hat. Dem Zu-viel-Sein folgt 15 Tage später dann das Nicht-mehr-Sein. Neben der Kategorie des Abschieds, die Arbeit und Struktur damit deutlich erfüllt, können noch mindestens zwei weitere Kriterien bestätigt werden, die den Blog in die Nähe eines Abschiedsbriefes rücken. Im vorigen Kapitel habe ich erläutert, dass authentischen suicide notes durch ihre Endgültigkeit der Charakter einer Aufkündigung von Dialogbereitschaft inhäriert. Bedenkt man nun, dass sich Herrndorf mit der Ausschaltung der Kommentarfunktion in seinem Blog gegen die gängige Kommunikationsform zwischen Autor und Lesenden entscheidet, und beachtet zugleich, dass er sich im Umfeld der Blogveröffentlichung verstärkt mit seinem Suizid abzufinden versucht (vgl. AuS 86 & 151), dann eröffnet sich eine Perspektive, 237 Vgl. WILLEMSEN: Der Selbstmord, S. 48. 88 nach der sich Arbeit und Struktur bereits ab September 2010 – und damit direkt ab dem Zeitpunkt seiner digitalen Zugänglichmachung – als Suizidtagebuch, als vor dem Hintergrund einer geplanten Selbsttötung geschriebener Text lesen lässt. Zwar steht Herrndorf, etwa durch das Lesen entsprechender Foren, immer noch indirekt mit seiner Leserschaft in Kontakt,238 aber diese mittelbare Bezugnahme hebt die kommunikative Einseitigkeit nicht zur Gänze auf. Das Monologische des Blogs, die Zielgerichtetheit der Arbeit daran bleibt gleichwohl bestehen und wird zum Ende hin immer deutlicher, bis Arbeit und Struktur mit einem eindeutigen Verweis auf die Musikerin Almut Klotz, die zehn Tage vor Herrndorfs Tod ihrem eigenen Krebsleiden erliegt, verstummt. Ein letzter Punkt, der zumindest teilweise für den Abschiedsbriefcharakter von Arbeit und Struktur spricht, besteht im Zur-Sprache-Bringen der Herausgabe von Herrndorfs Nachlass, der sich derzeit aus der Buchpublikation des Blogs und dem Isa-Fragment zusammensetzt. Dass Zweiteres als Bilder deiner grossen Liebe überhaupt veröffentlicht worden ist, ist insofern bemerkenswert, als dass Herrndorf noch am 1. Juli testamentarisch verfügt hatte, Fragmente seien unter keinen Umständen herauszugeben.239 Dass Isa dennoch veröffentlicht werden soll, entscheidet sich erst eine Woche vor Herrndorfs Tod, da das Manuskript seitens seiner Freunde viel Zuspruch erhält und für „machbar" gehalten wird (AuS 425). Drei Wochen zuvor hatte er bereits die Veröffentlichung des Blogs abgesegnet (vgl. AuS 423). Indem Herrndorf in seinen letzten Einträgen auf diese anderweitig geäusserten Instruktionen Bezug nimmt, wird Arbeit und Struktur gewissermassen zu einem literarischen Testament, das sowohl als Abschiedsbrief als auch als Kunstwerk in Erscheinung tritt. Der doppelte Charakter als Dokument eines Suizidanten und Erzeugnis eines Schriftstellers legitimiert schliesslich, Arbeit und Struktur als einen Text, eine Erzählung, einen explizierten Weltmythos anzusprechen, der das einmalige vergängliche Leben und Sterben von Wolfgang Herrndorf bezeugt und ihm gleichzeitig erlaubt, als genau die Person in seinem Werk konserviert zu werden, als die er in Erinnerung behalten werden möchte. 238 Vgl. MICHELBACH: Zwischen digitalem Gebrauchstext und literarischem Werk, S. 119. 239 Vgl. das Nachwort zu Wolfgang HERRNDORF: Bilder deiner grossen Liebe. Ein unvollendeter Roman. Reinbek bei Hamburg 2015, S. 136. 89 VI Schlussbetrachtung: Im Gefängnis des Zeichens Wie weit reicht unsere Abhängigkeit vom Bedeutsamen? Die auf die inhärenten Weltmythen ausgerichtete Analyse von Arbeit und Struktur hatte den Zweck, genau diese Frage zu beantworten. Ausgehend von der Beobachtung, dass Herrndorf in der 42 Monate abdeckenden Protokollierung seines Lebens mit dem Krebs zwar keine Philosophie des Absurden, zumindest aber eine absurde Weltauffassung entfaltet, wurde untersucht, wie sich sein zunächst latenter und dann langsam erstarkender Suizidwunsch mit den Weltmythen des Absurden verträgt. Dabei hat sich herausgestellt, dass die ihn als Person konstituierende absurde Bedeutsamkeit nicht einfach verschwindet, sondern sich sozusagen in einen weiterhin lebensbejahenden Weltmythos und eine parallel dazu laufende Selbsterzählung aufteilt, die das eigenhändige Auslöschen zur Bedingung der Aufrechterhaltung seiner Identität macht. Diese Selbsterzählung, die durch Arbeit und Struktur zu einer literarischen Form gefunden hat und mit dem Suizid des Autors endet, fängt im Verlauf der Krankheit immer mehr von den schwindenden Bedeutsamkeiten der Lebensbejahung auf und wird so zuletzt selbst zu einem Weltmythos, der das Gelingen von Herrndorfs Vorhaben in metaphysischer Hinsicht garantiert. Aufs Leben zu verzichten kann, ebenso wenig wie es fortzuführen, nicht durch eine leere Erzählung errungen werden, die den Ort von Ich und Welt unausgefüllt bleiben lässt. Wer auf ihr verbleiben oder aber sie verlassen will, der muss sich, wie Herrndorf es getan hat, selbst davon erzählen oder wenigstens ein Bild davon gemacht, ein Weltikon ergriffen haben; die Welt jedoch ohne Zeichen und ohne jede Vermittlung anzusehen und sich ihrer zu vergewissern, ist unmöglich, denn ein Sehen ohne Aspekt würde auf die absolute Wirklichkeit blicken, nicht aber auf die Welt.240 Dieses Angewiesensein auf einen Blickwinkel, auf die Einnahme eines weltanschaulichen Standpunktes, von dem aus alles relativ und zugleich bedeutsam erscheint, stellt für die absurde Vernunft offenkundig ein Ärgernis dar, das jedoch auch durch sie nicht beseitigt werden kann. Was Herrndorf als absurde Revolte noch möglich bleibt, ist der Ausdruck radikalen Nichteinverstandenseins, während er dem evolutionären „Irrationalismus" (AuS 432) und dem Zwang zur Bedeutsamkeit Folge leistet. Obgleich sich das nihilistisch geprägte Denken vor allem durch seine gnadenlose Zeichenund Mythenkritik sowie die grösstmögliche Distanznahme zu kollektiv-dogmatischen Mythen auszeichnet, ist es also nicht einmal dem Nihilismus und seiner radikalen Vernunft möglich, den Zeichen, Symbolen, Bildern, Metaphern, den Ikonen und Mythen zu entkommen. Herrndorfs Ringen um Bedeutsamkeit in 240 Vgl. hierzu Ludwig WITTGENSTEIN: Philosophische Untersuchungen. Werkausgabe, Bd. 1. Frankfurt a.M. 2006, S. 518–577. 90 Arbeit und Struktur zeigt, dass sich Dasein nicht beliebig von seinen als bedeutsam erachteten Überzeugungen und seiner individuellen Selbsterzählung lossagen kann, ja mehr noch: Dass wir solange, wie wir rationale Personen sein und nicht in den kollektiven Dogmatismus zurückfallen wollen, notwendig auf Weltvermittlung durch existenziell individualisierte Ikone und Mythen angewiesen bleiben. Diese Schlussfolgerung wirkt sich darauf aus, wie Prozesse religio-kultureller Veränderung und das transformative Potenzial von Gesellschaftsund Kulturkritik überhaupt zu denken sind. Denn sollte personale Identität durch Bedeutsamkeit tatsächlich das wirksamste Mittel darstellen, sich gegen die zermalmenden Kräfte existenzieller Kontingenz zu schützen, dann muss eine rationale Gesellschaftskritik den individuellen Bedeutsamkeiten der Kritisierten unbedingt Beachtung schenken und diese unberührt lassen. Das jedoch wirft die Frage auf, welche Überzeugungen überhaupt als bedeutsam, also als lebensermöglichend im hier vorgestellten radikalen Sinne, anzusehen sind und welche nicht. Mit Arbeit und Struktur hat Herrndorf eine Antwort darauf formuliert: Es ist die individuelle Vorstellung, in der und durch die man lebt (vgl. AuS 432), es ist der jeweils eigene Weltmythos, der letztlich erzählt, woher man kommt, wohin man geht, wie lange man bleibt – und damit eben nicht der Kollektivmythos. Alles, was mir dabei hilft, in genau diesem Moment am Leben zu bleiben, ist für mich bedeutsam, aber diese Bedeutsamkeit ist genauer betrachtet eine metaphysische und eben keine kulturelle Kategorie. Dass auf der anderen Seite Erfüllung – gewissermassen als oberer „Grenzwert" des Lebendigseins verstanden – überwiegend in kollektiven Kontexten erfahrbar zu werden scheint bzw. das Vorhandensein eines sozialen Kontextes voraussetzt,241 widerspricht dieser Zuordnung in den Bereich der Metaphysik nicht: Denn wer überleben will, hat zunächst ganz andere Sorgen, als sich um seine persönliche Erfüllung zu kümmern. Bedeutsamkeiten garantieren nicht die sofortige Einlösung eines Heilsversprechens, sondern die Bedingungen des eigenen Überlebenkönnens – und die lassen sich, wie Herrndorfs Beispiel zeigt, auch dann noch aufrechterhalten, wenn man sich weitgehend ausserhalb eines konkreten kollektiven Kontextes bewegt. Vernünftigerweise darf also die Kritik der eigenen Kultur alle Überzeugungen, die sich durch ein hohes Mass an kollektivmythischer Kontamination auszeichnen, zurecht in ihrem Dogmatismus und ihrer Unangemessenheit entlarven, während sie zugleich das Gewicht von bedeutsamen Überzeugungen anerkennen muss. Eine Bedeutsamkeit kann allerdings nur dann als Argument geltend gemacht werden, wenn sie kaum mehr etwas mit dem Dogma des Kollek241 Vgl. dazu Wolfram KURZ: Glück und sinnvolles Leben. Der Mensch in der Differenz von Essenz und Existenz. In: Hermes Andres KICK (Hg.): Glück. Ethische Perspektiven – aktuelle Glückskonzepte. Berlin 2008, S. 17–31, 26f. 91 tivmythos zu tun hat, wenn sie also nicht von einem Wir, sondern von einem existenziell individualisierten Ich hervorgebracht wird, das für die diskursive Relevanz dieser Bedeutsamkeit bürgt. Der Akt des Suizids und die damit verwandte Frage nach der Sterbehilfe, für die Herrndorf sich in Arbeit und Struktur leidenschaftlich einsetzt, ist genau so eine Bedeutsamkeit. Sein ausführlich durchdachter und von ihm selbst als notwendig erachteter Entschluss, noch „im Tod sein eigenes Leben zu behaupten",242 muss sich zwingend über alle Argumente hinwegsetzen, die etwa seitens der Kirchen gegen die moralische Zulässigkeit der Selbsttötung ins Feld geführt werden243 – und zwar selbst dann, wenn er sie mit seiner absurden Vernunft als vollkommen schlüssig und unwiderlegbar befunden hätte.244 Gesteht man Herrndorf – als Vertreter eines modernen und demokratischen Atheismus – das Recht zu, Gegenargumente aufgrund seiner Abhängigkeit von der Bedeutsamkeit des Suizids für sich selbst in polemischer Weise als ungültig zu erklären (vgl. AuS 369ff.), so muss man ihm auf der anderen Seite das Recht absprechen, gläubige Personen, für die der Glaube unter Umständen ja auch zu einer Bedeutsamkeit werden kann, als „offensichtlich Irre" zu diskreditieren (AuS 406). Unter der Bedrohung durch die überall und jederzeit erfahrbar werdende Kontingenz bedeutet der Wille, auch den nächsten Augenblick noch zu erleben, das Im-Spiel-Lassen von kollektiven Antwortmöglichkeiten, deren Gültigkeit man für das eigene Leben erproben kann. Auch Atheismus und Nihilismus haben eine Geschichte, auch sie sind nur Versuche aus einer langen Testreihe von Bedeutsamkeiten, mit denen man die Spanne zwischen Geburt und Sterben durchzustehen hofft. Nicht die Erschaffung von Weltmythen ist daher zuletzt das Originäre am absurden und säkularen Bewusstsein, sondern das gleichzeitige Zulassen von allen Weltmythen, die noch möglich sind.245 Ebenso wie Nietzsche und Camus erreicht Herrndorf diesen Punkt, indem er mithilfe des Absurden in ausreichender Distanz zu kollektiven Mythen verweilt und sich der Wahl eines konkreten Kollektivs beharrlich enthält, wodurch er schliesslich das gesamte metaphysische Gewicht des Am-Leben-Bleibens seinem eigenen Weltmythos überlassen muss. Entscheidet man sich im Angesicht des Absurden dennoch dazu, eine konkrete Tradition, Religion, Gemeinschaft zu wählen – wie das etwa bei Dostojewski der Fall ist – so verliert die 242 DIEZ: Die letzte Freiheit, S. 33. 243 Vgl. beispielsweise Heinrich BEDFORD-STROHM: Leben dürfen – Leben müssen. Argumente gegen die Sterbehilfe. München 2015. 244 Das soll nicht heissen, dass sozialethische, theologische und spirituelle Argumente gegen den Suizid nicht ernst zu nehmen seien. Ich möchte lediglich darauf hinweisen, dass die Kategorie der Schlüssigkeit bei Bedeutsamkeiten, die als ein Argument in den öffentlichen Diskurs eingeführt werden, keine nennenswerte Rolle spielt. 245 Derselbe Sachverhalt hatte Blumenberg an Goethe fasziniert, vgl. Eva GEULEN: Goethe. In: BUCH/ WEIDNER: Blumenberg lesen, S. 101–114, 105f. 92 Einsicht in die Relativität von Weltmythen nicht an Gültigkeit, sondern kann aktiv in das kollektive Selbstverständnis eingebracht werden. Dass ich durch meine Geburt einem bestimmten Kollektivmythos angehöre und diese ursprüngliche Zugehörigkeit Zeit meines Lebens nicht abschütteln kann, entzieht sich meiner Verantwortung. Aber sobald ich mich bewusst dazu entschliesse, die Welt durch ebendiesen oder einen anderen Kollektivmythos zu sehen, hafte ich zusammen mit meiner Erzählgemeinschaft für die rationale Integrität dieses kulturellen Narrativs, bin ich für seine Humanität und interkulturelle Verträglichkeit, für seine rationality of tradition246 verantwortlich. Seine Anerkennung erfolgt nur reziprok: Damit andere Erzählgemeinschaften meinen Kollektivmythos und meine daraus abgeleiteten Bedeutsamkeiten als legitim anerkennen, muss ich im Gegenzug jeden Kollektivmythos als legitim erachten, der von einer existenziell individualisierten Person gewählt wurde. Interkultureller Dialog glückt, wenn sich über Bedeutsamkeiten verständigt und (religiöse) Identität frei ausgelebt werden kann, solange sie niemandem schadet247 – er misslingt, wenn der öffentliche Diskurs als Spielwiese des kollektiven Dogmatismus missbraucht wird. Überall dort, wo ein Wir spricht und die existenzielle Individualisierung seiner Angehörigen unterbindet, ist die Pathologie kollektiver Mythen am Werk. Das Ablassen vom blossen Dogma jedoch öffnet das kollektive Selbstverständnis notwendig für die gesamte Menschheit und gibt der Wahl entweder eines neuen oder aber gar keines Kollektivmythos Raum. Was kollektive Identität ist, bestimmt daher zuletzt nicht das Kollektiv, sondern die Einzelne. Gemeinschaften und Individuen, die sich gezielt von der übrigen Menschheit abgrenzen und auf die Unveränderbarkeit ihres Wir beharren, handeln und argumentieren nicht vernünftig, sondern haben das Stadium diskursiver Vernunft überhaupt noch nicht erreicht. Das nihilistische Bewusstsein, das Leben im Absurden kann ein Motor dafür sein, der noch fehlenden Ratio auf der Welt zu ihrem Recht zu verhelfen. Weil es selbst durch Leid und Schmerz, durch Erfahrungen existenzieller Kontingenz angeregt und bekräftigt wird, geht es davon aus, dass das eigene Leben und dasjenige anderer ein einziger Prozess des Leidens ist, dem nur mit radikaler Empathie begegnet werden kann. Der Kampf gegen Schmerz, Krankheit und Tod, die Anstrengung, sich gegen diese Widersacher am und im Leben zu halten, 246 Vgl. Alasdair MACINTYRE: Whose Justice? Which Rationality? Notre Dame, Ind. 1988, pp. 349–369. 247 Das betrifft etwa den Ausdruck religiöser Zugehörigkeit und das Durchführen entsprechender (Gebets-)Rituale in schulischen Institutionen, aber beispielsweise auch das religiös begründete Tragen von Kopftüchern in Gerichtssälen. „Die Freiheit zur öffentlichen Kundgabe der eigenen Religionszugehörigkeit ist Bestandteil der Religionsfreiheit selbst. Der Staat darf niemanden daran hindern", Burkhard Josef BERKMANN: Freiheit der Religionszugehörigkeit, Menschenrechte und Laizität des Staates. In: Libero GEROSA/ Ludger MÜLLER (Hg.): Politik ohne Religion? Laizität des Staates, Religionszugehörigkeit und Rechtsordnung. Paderborn 2014, S. 69–94, 81. Vgl. auch Alexander THOMAS: Bedingungen zum interkulturellen Dialog. In: ders. (Hg.): Psychologie des interkulturellen Dialogs. Göttingen 2008, S. 14–32. 93 kann auf der anderen Seite nur mit einer metaphysischen, von Ikonen und Mythen geleisteten Vermittlung erkauft werden, die immer nur einen Teil der Wirklichkeit als Welt, niemals jedoch die ganze Wirklichkeit ins Auge fassen kann. Als rationale Personen bleiben wir Gefangene des Zeichens, und zwar selbst dann, wenn wir uns wie Herrndorf bewusst zu sterben entschlössen. In diesem Zusammenhang wäre es lohnenswert zu untersuchen, ob etwa mystische Ansätze, die die diskursive und wissenschaftliche Vernunft gleichwohl beibehalten,248 Bedeutsamkeiten bereitstellen, die auf die Vermittlungsarbeit von Zeichen verzichten können. Von besonderem Interesse wäre hierbei die Frage, ob Mystik durch das Ergreifen des grösstmöglichen kollektiven, eben „kosmischen" Selbstverständnisses die Anwesenheit selbst noch eines individuellen Weltmythos obsolet werden lässt, da ja gerade der unvergängliche Kosmos als Garant für das eigene Dasein einstehen kann. Wer am Leben sein, wer jemand sein will, braucht ein Fundament. Existieren ist eine Tätigkeit, die im Laufe der Evolution gut zu verschleiern gelernt hat, wie vieler Ressourcen sie tatsächlich bedarf – wer mitspielt, bemerkt nicht einmal, dass er bereits sein Einverständnis gegeben hat. Lebendigsein ist ein Recht, das mir durch meine Geburt zukommt, aber niemand ausser mir selbst kann mich dazu verpflichten. Solange ich noch die Möglichkeit zur Übernahme der Verantwortung gegenüber der gesamten Menschheit oder eines kleineren Teils von ihr sehe, kann ich einwilligen, am Leben zu bleiben – die Pflicht zu leben gibt es daher entweder nur im religiösen Dogma, das das Seiende ob seiner göttlichen Herkunft heilig spricht, oder aber im absurden Bewusstsein, das sich selbst, der Menschheit und dem Lebendigen zu dienen bereit ist. Wolfgang Herrndorf diente, solange er konnte. Er hinterlässt mit Arbeit und Struktur ein Zeugnis, das von einem Menschen erzählt, der bis zuletzt er selbst sein und bleiben will, und dafür sogar sein Leben hergibt. An seinem Lebensende bekämpft er den Tod nicht, sondern macht ihn zu seiner letzten Bedeutsamkeit. Unter dem existenziellen Schmerz seines Daseins winkt er uns versöhnlich zu: Ich kann kein Instrument spielen. Ich kann keine Fremdsprache. Ich habe den Vermeer in Wien nie gesehen. Ich habe nie einen Toten gesehen. Ich habe nie geglaubt. Ich war nie in Amerika. Ich stand auf keiner Bergspitze. Ich hatte nie einen Beruf. Ich hatte nie ein Auto. Ich bin nie fremdgegangen. Fünf von sieben Frauen, in die ich in meinem Leben verliebt war, haben es nicht erfahren. Ich war fast immer allein. Die letzten drei Jahre waren die besten. (AuS 438) 248 Vgl. dazu Hubertus MYNAREK: Mystik und Vernunft. Münster 22001, S. 217–254. 94 VII Siglenverzeichnis AuS = HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Arbeit und Struktur. Reinbek bei Hamburg 2015. Sa = HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Sand. Reinbek bei Hamburg 122013. T = HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Tschick. Reinbek bei Hamburg 222013. 95 VIII Literaturund Quellenverzeichnis Primärliteratur HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Arbeit und Struktur. Reinbek bei Hamburg 2015. HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Bilder deiner grossen Liebe. Ein unvollendeter Roman. Reinbek bei Hamburg 2015. HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Sand. Reinbek bei Hamburg 122013. HERRNDORF, Wolfgang: Tschick. Reinbek bei Hamburg 222013. Sekundärliteratur AHRENS, Jörn: Selbstmord. Die Geste des illegitimen Todes. 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[T] Indexical Sinn: Fregeanism versus Millianism Sinn Indexical: Fregeanismo versus Millianismo João Branquinho PhD, professor at Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon Portugal, e-mail: [email protected] Abstract This paper discusses two notational variance views with respect to indexical singular reference and content: the view that certain forms of Millianism are at bottom notational variants of a Fregean theory of reference, the Fregean Notational Variance Claim; and the view that certain forms of Fregeanism are at bottom notational variants of a direct reference theory, the Millian Notational Variance Claim. While the former claim rests on the supposition that a direct reference theory could be easily turned into a particular version of a neo-Fregean one by showing that it is bound to acknowledge certain senselike entities, the latter claim is based upon the supposition that a neo-Fregean theory could be easily turned into a particular version of a Millian one by showing that De Re senses are theoretically superfluous and hence eliminable. The question how many accounts of singular reference and content are we confronted with here - two different (and mutually antagonistic) theories? Or just two versions of what is in essence the same theory? - is surely of importance to anyone interested in the topic. And this question should be answered by means of a cûareful assessment of the soundness of each of the above claims. Before trying to adjudicate between the two accounts, one would naturally want to know whether or not there are indeed two substantially disparate accounts. Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 DOI: 10.7213/aurora.26.039.DS01 ISSN 0104-4443 Licenciado sob uma Licença Creative Commons Grosso modo, if the Fregean Claim were sound then we would have a single general conception of singular reference to deal with, viz. Fregeanism; likewise, if the Millian Claim were sound we would be facing a single general conception of singular reference, viz. Millianism. My view is that both the Fregean Notational Variance Claim and its Millian counterpart are wrong, though naturally on different grounds. I have argued elsewhere that the Fregean Notational Variance Claim - considered in its application to the semantics of propositional-attitude reports involving proper names - is unsound. I intend to supplement in this paper such a result by trying to show that the Millian Claim - taken in its application to the semantics of indexical expressions - should also be rated as incorrect. I focus on a certain set of arguments for the Millian Claim, arguments which I take as adequately representing the general outlook of the Millian theorist with respect to neo-Fregeanism about indexicals and which involve issues about the cognitive significance of sentences containing indexical terms. Keywords: Sense. Indexicals. Direct reference. Propositional attitudes. Cognitive value. Resumo Neste ensaio discutem-se dois pontos de vista sobre a variação notacional com respeito à referência e ao conteúdo singular indexical: o ponto de vista de que certas formas de Millianismo são no fundo variantes notacionais de uma teoria fregeana da referência, sendo esta a concepção fregeana da variação notacional; e o ponto de vista de que certas formas de Fregeanismo são no fundo variantes notacionais de uma teoria da referência directa, sendo esta a concepção milliana da variação notacional. Enquanto a primeira concepção assenta na suposição de que uma teoria da referência directa poderia ser facilmente convertida numa versão particular de uma teoria neo-fregeana, mostrando que ela está obrigada a reconhecer certas entidades próximas de sentidos fregeanos, a segunda concepção está baseada na suposição de que uma teoria neo-fregeana poderia ser facilmente convertida numa versão particular de uma teoria milliana, mostrando que sentidos De Re são teoricamente supérfluos e logo elimináveis. A questão de saber com quantas teorias da referência e do conteúdo singular estamos aqui confrontados - duas teorias diferentes (e mutuamente antagónicas)? Ou apenas duas versões daquilo que é em essência a mesma teoria? - é uma questão seguramente importante para quem se interesse pelo tópico. E essa questão deve ser respondida através de um exame cuidadoso da plausibilidade de cada uma das concepções Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.466 acima mencionadas. Antes de tentarmos escolher entre as teorias em questão, quereríamos naturalmente saber se há ou não de facto duas teorias substancialmente díspares. Grosso modo, se a concepção fregeana da variação notacional fosse correcta, então teríamos de lidar com apenas uma teoria geral da referência singular, viz. o fregeanismo; analogamente, se a concepção milliana da variação notacional fosse correcta, estaríamos confrontados com uma única teoria geral da referência singular, viz. o millianismo. Pensamos que, quer a concepção fregeana da variação notacional, quer a sua contraparte milliana, são incorrectas, embora por razões diferentes (naturalmente). Argumentamos noutro lado que a concepção fregeana da variação notacional - considerada na sua aplicação à semântica de relatos de atitudes proposicionais que contêm nomes próprios - é incorrecta. Tencionamos neste ensaio suplementar esse resultado com uma tentativa de mostrar que a concepção milliana da variação notacional - tomada na sua aplicação à semântica de expressões indexicais - deve ser também vista como incorrecta. Concentramos a nossa atenção num conjunto de argumentos a favor da concepção milliana, argumentos esses que tomamos como adequadamente representativos do ponto de vista geral do teórico milliano sobre o neo-fregeanismo acerca de indexicais e que envolvem questões relativas ao significado cognitivo de frases que contêm termos indexicais. Palavras-chave: Sentido. Indexicais. Referência directa. Atitudes proposicionais. Valor cognitivo. Our starting point and motivation is nicely illustrated by considering the following claim made by John Hawthorne and David Manley in their recent book The Reference Book: At any rate, surely anyone who claims that "Now is now" expresses the same proposition as "Now is Tuesday" must acknowledge at least the need for the explanation of the vast difference in cognitive payoff between the two ways of accessing that proposition (HAWTHORNE; MANLEY, 2012, p. 68). On the neo-Fregean side, the charge has often been made against Millian theories of singular reference and singular content that they necessarily end up with the admission of theoretical entities which Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 467 are apparently indistinguishable from Fregean senses1. Such a countenance of sense-like entities is normally taken by the neo-Fregean theorist as an almost inevitable result of any attempts on the part of the Millian theorist to deal with certain aspects of the problem of singular content. The aspects in question consist mainly in issues about the cognitive significance of our use of sentences containing syntactically simple and unquoted singular terms. In trying to accommodate such problems within a directly referential approach, the Millian theorist is apparently led to introduce a conceptual apparatus which, according to his Fregean opponent, would not significantly differ from a framework of modes of presentation. The general upshot of the Fregean criticism is that one could hardly expect to be offered a satisfactory account of singular content which would qualify as being purely Millian, i.e. an account on which the propositional value of a singular term (as used in a certain context) is exhausted by its referent (relative to the context). Putative genuinely Millian theories, it is claimed, do not provide us with a real alternative to Fregeanism since a careful analysis will reveal them to be mere terminological variants of an essentially Fregean account. Indeed, the sense-like entities that such theories are allegedly forced to posit - e.g. Nathan Salmon's singular guises (SALMON, 1986) or John Perry's ways of apprehending individuals (PERRY, 1979) - would in some way or other play an intermediate semantic role between the singular terms, on the one hand, and their referents, on the other; and this would presumably preclude the theories in question from being purely Millian (in the above sense). More surprising is the fact that the converse claim has also been advanced, though perhaps not so often, on the Millian side. In effect, the view has been put forward2 that certain versions of a Fregean ac1 For example, Evans argues that John Perry's account of indexical belief might be seen as a notational variant of a Fregean account, Perry's ways of apprehending objects being equated with Fregean indexical senses; see G. Evans (1981, p. 317-318). Graeme Forbes (1989b, p. 474-475) makes a similar claim in his article. 2 E.g. by Scott Soames (1989, p. 153-156). Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.468 count of singular reference, especially those versions whose distinctive feature is a De Re construal of singular Sinne, on which singular modes of presentation are object dependent, might in the end be counted as being mere terminological variants of a direct reference theory. A typical pattern of reasoning used by the Millian theorist to reach such a conclusion might be synoptically described as follows. Once subjected to a close scrutiny, putative De Re senses attached by speakers to singular terms in the language, besides being obscure or illdefined, turn out to be spurious or redundant. And the general reason usually adduced to establish this redundancy is that every substantive semantic role which could be reasonably assigned to the postulated singular senses could apparently be entirely carried out by, or naturally passed on to, either the referents of the singular terms or other theoretical entities available in the conceptual machinery of a direct reference theory (e.g. David Kaplan's characters or Perry's belief states). Hence, by applying Ockham's razor, it seems that one would be in a position to eliminate De Re Sinne from the ontology of a neo-Fregean theory of reference, in which case such a (reconstructed) theory would indeed dissolve into a Millian theory. Therefore, if the arguments given for the eliminability of De Re singular senses on the basis of their alleged semantic vacuity were sound, then neo-Fregean accounts resting upon them would not constitute a serious alternative to Millianism. I shall label as follows the two conflicting general views, both grounded on "notational variance" considerations, sketched above. I shall call the view that certain forms of Millianism are (in the sense mentioned) notational variants of a Fregean theory of reference, the Fregean Notational Variance Claim; and I shall call the view that certain forms of Fregeanism are (in the sense mentioned) notational variants of a direct reference theory, the Millian Notational Variance Claim. To sum up, while the former claim rests on the supposition that a direct reference theory could be easily turned into a particular version of a neo-Fregean one by showing that it is bound to acknowledge certain sense-like entities, the latter claim is based upon the supposition that a neo-Fregean theory could be easily turned into a particular version of a Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 469 Millian one by showing that De Re senses are theoretically superfluous and hence eliminable. Now the question how many accounts of singular reference and content are we confronted with here - two different (and mutually antagonistic) theories? Or just two versions of what is in essence the same theory? - is surely of importance to anyone interested in the topic. And this question should be answered by means of a careful assessment of the soundness of each of the above claims. Before trying to adjudicate between the two accounts, one would naturally want to know whether or not there are indeed two substantially disparate accounts. Grosso modo, if the Fregean Claim were sound then we would have a single general conception of singular reference to deal with, viz. Fregeanism; likewise, if the Millian Claim were sound we would be facing a single general conception of singular reference, viz. Millianism. And, while not intending to neglect other reference theories - even those theories about the impossibility, in principle, of setting up a systematical account of singular reference (perhaps following a Wittgensteinian model or the model of Schiffer's "No-Theory Theory of Meaning"3) - it appears that the contemporary dispute in the field turns mainly around the two sorts of approach under consideration. My view is that both the Fregean Notational Variance Claim and its Millian counterpart are wrong, though naturally on different grounds. I think that they are clearly wrong if one takes them literally; notice that, in this case, they are very strong claims indeed since they involve very strong assumptions concerning the two theories, e.g. their full inter-translatability and the strict identity of their logical consequences. Moreover, I am inclined to think that they are also wrong if one weakens them in a certain way and construes them as claims which are only approximately true (in a sense to be introduced when particular proposals are considered). On the other hand, such negative results about the two notational variance claims have to be independently established. For, at least given the way in which they have been represented, it is clear that the 3 SCHIFFER, 1989. Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.470 unsoundness of either of them would not entail either the unsoundness of the other (this one might still hold) or its soundness (they might both be false). Indeed, what we seem to have here are two claims each having the following conjunctive form. The Fregean claim is to the effect that the Millian theory - subjected to certain modifications which would not affect it in a substantial way - is a notational variant of a neo-Fregean account, and that the equivalent theories should eventually be regarded as two-level theories of semantic (singular) content. And the Millian claim is to the effect that the neo-Fregean theory - subjected to certain modifications which would not affect it in a substantial way - is a notational variant of a directly referential account, and that the equivalent theories should eventually be regarded as onelevel theories of semantic (singular) content. I have argued elsewhere4 that the Fregean Notational Variance Claim - considered in its application to the semantics of propositional-attitude reports involving proper names - is unsound. I intend now to supplement such a result by trying to show that the Millian Claim - taken in its application to the semantics of indexical expressions - should also be rated as incorrect. I focus on a certain set of arguments for the Millian Claim, arguments which I take as adequately representing the general outlook of the Millian theorist with respect to neo-Fregeanism about indexicals. One might summarize as follows the main line of criticism developed by the Millian theorist. It is argued that neo-Fregean theories about De Re senses for indexical expressions are bound to face the following dilemma. Either they can be reconstructed as notational variants of direct reference theories, De Re indexical senses having no clear explanatory function and being thus wholly dispensable in favour of a Millian semantics for indexicals; or they yield results which are unacceptable in the light of our intuitions about the use of indexicals in the ascription of attitudes. In what follows, my concern is basically with the first horn of the above putative dilemma. 4 BRANQUINHO, 1990. Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 471 For convenience, I take the target of the Millian notational variance arguments to be some such a neo-Fregean account of indexicality as the one expounded by Evans (1981); although the arguments in question are such that they apply to virtually any Fregean theory using the notion of a De Re indexical mode of presentation, e.g. Peacocke's (1981) account. It is a curious thing to notice that Evans draws on translation considerations to attack John Perry's directly referential account of indexicals, which he charges with being a terminological variant of a Fregean theory. Furthermore, the sort of argumentative strategy employed is prima facie very much similar to the one used by the Millian theorist; indeed, the general pattern of reasoning seems to consist in trying, in both cases, to establish the following kind of disjunction (taken as constituting an inescapable dilemma for the rival account): either the opposite view is shown to conflict with some aspects of our ordinary practice of attitude-ascription (e.g. Perry's "P-Thoughts" - i.e. sequences of objects and senses of predicative expressions - are taken by Evans as utterly inadequate to serve as the objects of propositional attitudes), or it is shown to be a mere notational variant of the favoured approach. As noticed, the direct reference theorist is likely to argue from the dispensability of indexical senses to the Millian Notational Variance Claim. And there is no immediate reason to think that such a move might not be a valid one, provided that it is at the same time shown that the conceptual machinery of a direct reference theory for indexicals is able to do everything which the allegedly superfluous senses were supposed to do. Let me then outline the central arguments which could be mounted in order to support the premise of the above move. The Millian strategy might be characterized as follows. First, we are given some enumeration of certain fundamental semantic roles which are standardly assigned to singular senses, such roles being normally regarded by the Fregean theorist as providing us with conclusive reasons for the introduction of Sinne. Then it is claimed that either De Re indexical senses are not really needed to carry out any of the listed semantic functions - these could be arguably transferred to theoretical entities Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.472 already available within a Millian framework - or they turn out to be simply inadequate to fulfil the semantic roles in question (or both). I select the following two semantic properties of senses, both related to cognitive significance, as those which are more relevant for our general purpose; I refer to them as roles (a) and (b) of indexical senses. Role (a) of indexical senses is that they are meant to account for potential differences in informativeness, relative to a fully competent speaker, between utterances of sentences constructed out of co-referential indexicals (with respect to given contexts of use). Let S(i) and S(i') be sentences which contain occurrences of indexicals i and i' and which are used in contexts c and c' (where one might have c = c', as well as i = i'). And let the referent of i in c be the same as the referent of i' in c'. Then there surely exist conceivable circumstances under which S(i) and S(i') might differ in informative value for a speaker (not necessarily the utterer) who understands both sentences. A familiar example is given in the pair of sentences "He is being attacked" and "I am being attacked" taken in a context in which I utter the former intending to refer to someone else, while what actually happens is that I do not recognize myself as the person whom I see - in a mirror I take to be a glass - being attacked. My knowledge would clearly be extended by my acquiring the information contained in the latter sentence, relative to the sort of knowledge I obtain from the former sentence in the same context. In general, the Fregean theorist would appeal to a difference in sense between i in c and i' in c' in order to explain possible differences in informativeness between sentences S(i) and S(i') (where i and i' are as indicated); concerning our example, there would be a difference between the types of ways of thinking of myself which I employ in thought - the third-person type versus the first-person type - and which I attach to the tokens of "he" and "I" in the envisaged situation. Role (b) of indexical senses is given in the property they possess of accounting for possible failures of substitutivity of co-referential indexicals in attitude-attributions, as well as blocking other apparently problematic results involving attitudes, particularly the possibility of a rational subject's having contradictory indexical beliefs at a given time (or, without changing her mind, at different times). Indeed, a Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 473 difference in (customary) sense between indexicals i and i' in contexts c and c' (again, possibly c = c' and i = i') is usually postulated to block in general inferences from ascriptions of the form x V's that S(i) to ascriptions of the form x V's that S(i'); here V stands for a propositional-attitude verb, the (customary) referents of i and i' in contexts c and c' coincide, and the ascriptions are to be given their De Dicto readings. For instance, the invalidity of the move from "I believe that he is being attacked" to "I believe that I am being attacked" - taken with respect to the above sort of circumstances - would be explained in terms of a difference in the modes of presentation of myself referred to by the occurrences of the indexicals "he" and "I" within the "that"-clauses. And when, under such circumstances, I believe both that he (the man in question) is being attacked and that I am not being attacked, I cannot not be described as holding at the same time mutually contradictory indexical beliefs about myself; for, according to Fregeanism, the contents of my beliefs are a certain Fregean thought and the negation of a distinct Fregean thought. Now the Millian theorist might argue to the effect that indexical senses are not needed to account for informative value. She might claim that there are notions available from a direct reference theory which are perfectly adequate for the purpose and which are more unproblematic than the Fregean notion of indexical sense. One might summarize this line of reasoning by means of the following thesis: Thesis 1: De Re indexical senses are not needed to explain potential differences in informativeness. The Millian philosopher might take the informative value of an indexical i, i.e. the contribution of i to the informative value of sentences in which it might occur, as being the character (or linguistic meaning) of i5. If one assumes that the conventional rules associated with indexicals as their characters are explicitly or implicitly known by fully competent speakers of the language, then a difference in character between 5 See D.Kaplan (1988a). It is worth noticing that meanwhile Kaplan has given up this view; in his paper (1988b), he suggests that differences in informative value might be explained in syntactical (and not semantical) terms, by means of certain syntactic properties assigned to the words employed (Cf. p. 598-599). Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.474 co-referential indexicals i and i' in contexts c and c' might be exploited to account for a possible difference in informative value (for a certain speaker) between utterances of sentences S(i) and S(i') in c and c'. Thus, in our previous example, the difference in informativeness between "He is being attacked" and "I am being attacked" might be explained in terms of the different characters attached to the indexicals "he" and "I"; the character of the former could be given in the rule according to which a token of "he" (used in a given context) refers to the demonstrated male, while the character of the latter will determine the referent of a token of "I" in a context (which happens to be the same person in the envisaged situation) as being the speaker or writer. And Frege's puzzle about informative identities - as applied to indexicals - could be (apparently) accommodated by letting S(i) be i = i and S(i') be i = i', and by taking the different characters associated with i and i' as explaining the potential informativeness of utterances of sentences of the latter form (e.g. "I am he") as opposed to the uninformativeness (in general) of utterances of sentences of the former form (e.g. "I am I"). On the other hand, concerning role (b), let me mention a second line of reasoning the Millian theorist might pursue to reach the same general result about the semantic redundancy of indexical senses. I take such a line of reasoning as represented in the following thesis and its supporting argument6: Thesis 2: De Re indexical senses are not needed to explain apparent failures of substitutivity of co-referential indexicals in attitudeascriptions, or to block certain apparently problematic results about attitudes. If sound, this claim would constitute a serious objection to any Fregean account of indexicality, since what is taken to be the privileged role of senses, and what is often proposed as the crucial rationale for their introduction, consists precisely in their status as theoretical entities postulated to explain why co-referential singular terms are not in 6 See S.Soames (1989, p. 154-155). Although Soames's arguments are mainly directed against Evans's particular version of Fregeanism, they could be easily generalized to other neo-Fregean approaches. Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 475 general interchangeable salva veritate when occurring in the embedded sentences of propositional-attitude constructions. The Millian argument for Thesis 2 runs as follows. Clearly, a necessary condition for inferences falling under the general pattern x V's that S(i), i = i' ∴ x V's that S(i') to be rated as invalid by the proponent of a Fregean theory is that such a theory must provide us with a criterion for sameness of indexical sense; that is, it should state clearly under what conditions an indexical i used in a context c has the same sense as an indexical i' used in a context c'. And, since sameness of reference is thought of as being necessary for sameness of sense, one should expect such a test to be given in particular for the case in which the referent of i in c is identical to the referent of i' in c'. Yet, the Fregean theory does not contain a uniform criterion for the sameness of indexical sense, i.e. a means of decision capable of being applied to the different categories of indexicals, such as personal pronouns like "I" and "he", demonstratives like "this" and "that", temporal indexicals like "now" and "today", etc. Therefore, it is in general unclear how an appeal to senses might even account for failures of substitutivity (assuming for the sake of argument the anti-Millian thesis that co-referential indexicals are not interchangeable salva veritate in attitude contexts). The Millian critic would discern a certain tension in the neo-Fregean account, a tension which reflects the alleged absence of a clear and uniform means of individuating indexical senses. On the one hand, the Fregean treatment of temporal indexicals, spatial indexicals, and perceptual demonstratives allows utterances of sentences containing different but co-referential indexicals of these kinds, as used in distinct contexts, to express the same (token) Fregean thought; hence, it allows the possibility of the same particular mode of presentation being associated with different indexicals in different contexts of use. As a result, substitutivity and other problematic results about attitude-ascriptions would apparently be forthcoming in a neo-Fregean account of such categories of indexicals. On the other hand, the Fregean treatment of personal pronouns precludes utterances of sentences containing distinct but co-referential indexicals (used in possibly different contexts) from expressing the same (token) Fregean thought; hence, it disallows the Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.476 possibility of the same particular sense being attached to different indexicals of that sort (in possibly different contexts). As a result, substitutivity and other problematic results about attitude-ascriptions would be blocked in a neo-Fregean account of such a category of indexicals. The consequences the Millian theorist urges us to draw from the adoption of such allegedly disparate verdicts on sameness of indexical sense are as follows. If indexical expressions are treated along the lines suggested above for temporal indexicals etc., then the resulting theory will no longer be Fregean in nature; it will be simply a notational variant of a direct reference theory, redundant De Re indexical senses being eliminable and the referents of indexicals in given contexts doing all the relevant semantic work. If, on the other hand, indexicals are to be treated on the model of personal pronouns, then the resulting theory, though presumably Fregean in nature, will be implausible since some of its consequences are incompatible with the way we intuitively use indexicals in attitude-ascriptions. The implication is, of course, that we should generalize in the former direction, i.e. from temporal indexicals to other indexicals, in which case the Millian Notational Variance Claim would be warranted. However, if one restricts the Millian claim supporting Thesis 2 to substitutivity results involving temporal indexicals, spatial indexicals, and perceptual demonstratives, then such a claim seems to be misplaced; for the simple reason that, as far as I can see, one could hardly find any cases of genuine interchangeability salva veritate of indexicals of those sorts in attitude-attributions (assuming that these are given their De Dicto readings). Take the case of temporal indexicals. Consider the sentence-type (1) Today is fine, as uttered on a particular day, say d, and the sentence-type (2) Yesterday was fine, as uttered on d+1, so that the referents of "today" on d and "yesterday" on d+1 coincide. Evans and other neo-Fregean theorists, following Frege, hold that under certain conditions the particular Fregean thought expressed by (1) on d may be the same as the one expressed by (2) on d+1; hence, the sense a speaker may attach to "today" on d, i.e. Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 477 the particular way of thinking of d she entertains on d, is allowed to be identical to the sense attached to "yesterday" on d+1, i.e. the particular way of thinking of d she entertains on d+1. Thus, here we have different indexicals, same reference, different contexts of use (the times are distinct), and (possibly) the same sense. The Millian theorist would typically claim that this amounts to admitting that the referents of "today" and "yesterday" on d, d+1 fully determine the senses these indexicals may express on these occasions, in the sense that sameness of reference seems to be employed to individuate and equate the senses in question, determining the thoughts expressed as being one and the same on both occasions. It apparently follows that the putative De Re senses associated with the indexicals are entirely irrelevant for the semantic purpose of fixing the propositional contents of utterances of (1) and (2); the referents of "today" and "yesterday" on d, d+1 - taken as fixed by their associated characters - are clearly sufficient to the effect. Furthermore, it is held that an appeal to indexical senses to block substitutivity results would be useless here, since the neo-Fregean account would be in fact committed to such results. Yet, this appears to be wrong; for it turns out that the envisaged cases are not cases of substitutivity at all. Suppose that, on the 28th October 1989, Jones sincerely and reflectively assents to (an utterance) of (1). Thus, the belief-ascription (3) Jones believes that today is fine, as uttered on that day, would naturally be counted as true. Yet, in the light of neo-Fregeanism, the belief-report (4) Jones believes that yesterday was fine, as uttered on the 29th October 1989, might also - under certain conditions7 - be counted as true (provided that meanwhile Jones has not changed his beliefs about the weather on the previous day); indeed, ex hypothesi, the embedded sentences in (3) and (4) may denote the same proposition: under certain circumstances, Jones could not believe the 7 Such conditions for belief-retention are discussed in Branquinho (2008). Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.478 Fregean thought referred to by the "that"-clause in (3) without believing the Fregean thought referred to by the "that"-clause in (4). However, transitions such as the one from (3) to (4) - which are indeed licensed by the neo-Fregean account (as well as, on different grounds, by any Millian account) - are obviously not instances of substitutivity salva veritate of co-referential indexicals within the subordinate clauses of attitude-ascriptions; because the times of Jones's believings in (3) and (4) are clearly different. And it is very likely that one come across the same sort of situation in dealing with spatial indexicals and perceptual demonstratives (where the times at which the attitudes are held are relevant in a similar way). Therefore, one should deem wrong the Millian claim that, since in this area of indexicality there are no failures of substitutivity for senses to explain (substitutivity being in fact licensed by neo-Fregeanism), senses would not be needed to explain failures of substitutivity; in effect, it simply turns out that no substitutivity results of the intended kind are forthcoming in the area. Let me finish the exposition of what I take to be the Millian argument for Thesis 2 by briefly contrasting the foregoing account of temporal indexicals, etc., with the standard Fregean view on personal pronouns. Consider the sentence-type (5) I am ugly, as uttered by Jones at a time t, and the sentence-type (6) You are ugly, as uttered at t' (possibly t = t') by someone, say Ralph, addressing Jones. Thus, given such contexts of use, the referent of "I" in (5) is the same as the referent of "you" in (6), viz. Jones. Now Evans and other Fregean theorists, again following Frege, hold that the thought expressed by Jones when he utters (5) is necessarily distinct from the thought expressed by Ralph when he utters (6). Accordingly, the senses attached by Jones and Ralph to "I" and "you" must diverge, i.e. the particular way of thinking of himself Jones entertains in (5) is necessarily different from the particular way of thinking of him entertained by Ralph in (6). Hence, we have here the mentioned asymmetry between the treatment given to temporal indexicals, etc., and the treatment given to personal pronouns; with respect to the latter, in contrast with the former, it is Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 Indexical Sinn 479 impossible for tokens of distinct personal pronouns used in contexts in which they are co-referential to express the same particular sense. The Millian theorist would take the reason for such an asymmetry to lie mainly in the Fregean doctrine that each person attaches a sense to "I" which is not entertainable or graspable by anyone else. Thus, only Jones is in a position to think of himself by employing the first-person way of thinking, and such thoughts are only accessible to him. Ralph can only think of Jones by employing the second-person (or the third-person) way of thinking, and he might do this by uttering a sentence such as (6). According to Millianism, this conception of logically private modes of presentation is incompatible with our current practices in ascribing propositional-attitudes. For instance, it is said to imply that only I could be in a position to report e.g. the belief that I am ugly: it would be impossible for someone else to say about me "He believes that he is ugly", for the ascriber would have to entertain my particular way of thinking about myself (which ex hypothesi cannot be the case). In addition to this, I could not be in a position to report propositional attitudes someone else, e.g. Ralph, takes about me; for example, it would be impossible for me to say "Ralph believes that I am ugly" for I would have to suppose that my particular way of thinking about myself is accessible to Ralph (which again cannot be the case). Again, the upshot is that, given the apparent implausibility of such consequences, the Fregean should treat personal pronouns on the model proposed for temporal indexicals, etc.; but then the resulting semantic theory could allegedly be shown to be a notational variant of a directly referential account. Having in mind our general purpose, I will not tackle the first- -person issue here. But let me just mention that the Millian criticism might be countered by appealing to the distinction between using a sense in thought and mentioning a sense (Cf. PEACOCKE, 1981, p. 191-193). Roughly, the idea is that in order for a thinker to grasp or entertain a thought containing a certain mode of presentation it is surely necessary that she be able to refer to, or to think of, that mode of presentation; but it is not at all necessary that she be able to employ in thought the mode Rev. Filos., Aurora, Curitiba, v. 26, n. 39, p. 465-486, jul./dez. 2014 BRANQUINHO, J.480 of presentation in question, or to think the thought in question herself. Hence, it is certainly possible for someone else to grasp or entertain e.g. the thought that I am ugly; for when Jones thinks about me "He thinks that he is ugly", he is not employing in thought my first-person way of thinking, or thinking the thought that I am ugly himself: he is referring to my first-person way of thinking. 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International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 Original Paper From No-signaling to Spontaneous Localization Theories: Remembering GianCarlo Ghirardi Valia Allori Department of Philosophy, Northern Illinois University. Zulauf Hall 915, DeKalb, IL 60115. USA E-mail: [email protected] Received: 30 October 2018 / Accepted: 15 December 2018 / Published online: 30 December 2018 1. Life and Achievements GianCarlo Ghirardi passed away on June 1st, 201. He would have turned 83 on October 28, 2018. He was without any doubt one of the most prominent theoretical physicists working on the foundation and the philosophy of quantum mechanics. He was born and raised in Milan, where he earned his Ph.D. in theoretical physics in 1959. After four years he moved to Trieste, where he later became Full Professor. He has been director of the department of theoretical physics there and he was president of "Consorzio per la Fisica", also in Trieste. Moreover, he contributed to found and to develop the Italian Society for the Foundation of Physics, and he actively contributed to the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, first as a researcher, then as a professor, and finally as the head of its Associateships and Federation Scheme. Among the honors he received, one can count the "Sigillo d'argento" from the province of Trieste, awarded in 2014, for his research and teaching activities, for his devotion in promoting physics, and for his dissemination activity. Moreover, just recently he received the 'Spirit of Salam Award' for supporting scientists from developing countries. In his life, he wrote more than 200 scholarly articles and two books: "Symmetry Principles in Quantum Physics", together with Luciano Fonda (Fonda and Ghirardi 1970), and "Un'occhiata alle carte di Dio" (Ghirardi 1997), which has sold 20,000 copies and later was translated by Princeton University Press under the title "Sneaking a Look at God's Cards" (Ghirardi 2005). GianCarlo was known first and foremost for his contribution to the foundation of quantum mechanics. 2 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 2. Nonlocality, No-signaling and No-cloning GianCarlo arrived to quantum foundations after some years spent working on nuclear physics during which he established, together with his friend Alberto Rimini from the University of Pavia, and other collaborators including his colleague Tullio Weber, some important results on the number of possible bound states for a given interaction (Ghirardi and Rimini 1965). Presumably, this work on different levels of description, as well as some new readings which included Bernard d'Espagant's book (1965), led GianCarlo to gain interest in the foundations of quantum mechanics. Not surprisingly, his distinctive enthusiasm managed to convince Rimini and Weber to work with him on that. His first important contributions to this field are connected with quantum nonlocality and the possibility of superluminal signals. Indeed, it is somewhat ironic that GianCarlo was born in 1935 and spent all his life working on the foundation of quantum mechanics and on its compatibility with relativity theory. In fact this was the year in which Albert Einstein, Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen (EPR) published their famous paper (Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen 1935) and during the same year Schrödinger published the paper in which he describes his famous "Schrödinger's cat paradox", also known as the measurement problem (Schrödinger 1935), to which GianCarlo proposed a solution, as discussed in the next section. Be that as it may, EPR proved that if quantum mechanics were complete, then the world must be nonlocal. Take two particles in a spin singlet state emitted in opposite direction by a source. Two experimenters take spin measurements at each side, and it turns out that the results at both ends are perfectly anti-correlated. EPR asked for the origin of such anti-correlations: they are either the product of 'pre-existing' anti-correlations at the source, or they are the result of 'instantaneous' communication between the two particles once detected. They regarded the second, nonlocal, option as unacceptable because incompatible with relativity since it implies the existence of an instantaneous interaction between two (space-like) separated places. Because of this, they concluded that the particles had anti-correlated properties before the measurements. If so, quantum mechanics is incomplete because the theory does not specify these properties, which nonetheless exist. However, as later was shown by John Stuart Bell (Bell 1964), the locality assumption in EPR's reasoning, namely the assumption that the behavior of something does not affect the behavior of something else spatially separated from it, was to blame. As a consequence, nothing could be concluded on whether quantum theory was complete or not. Bell started from the conclusion of EPR that there are 'pre-existing' properties and went to compute some measurable consequences of a theory which would specify such properties. It came out that the empirical predictions were at odds with the ones of quantum mechanics and thus one could perform a sort of crucial test. This was in fact done (Freedman and Clauser 1972, Aspect et al. 1981, 1982), and it falsified local theories as the ones envisioned by Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen. That is, any empirically adequate theory 3 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 would have to be nonlocal. So the problem was then how to reconcile quantum nonlocality with relativity. At the time, it was even more problematic because some had argued that quantum mechanics would permit superluminal signaling: that is, not only there are nonlocal influences, but they could be used to transmit information. In 1980, however, GianCarlo, together with Rimini and Weber, proved that quantum nonlocality cannot be used to send information faster than light (Ghirardi, Rimini and Weber 1980). This theorem is now called no-signaling theorem. Moreover, in 1981 GianCarlo was refereeing a paper in which the authors were trying to prove that quantum mechanics would allow superluminal signaling, and he proved in his referee report what is now known as the no-cloning theorem, proving that it is impossible to create an identical copy of an arbitrary unknown quantum state. GianCarlo's proof in the referee report was one year earlier than the papers that are usually regarded as the ones discovering the theorem (Dieks 1982, Wootters and Zurek 1982), considered one of the milestones of quantum information theory, even if it was published later (Ghirardi and Weber 1983). 3. The Measurement Problem and Spontaneous Localization Theories After working on nonlocality and no-signaling, in 1986, together with Rimini and Weber, GianCarlo proposes a theory which is now known as the Ghirardi–Rimini–Weber (GRW) theory (Ghirardi, Rimini and Weber 1986) as the solution of the (infamous) Schrödinger cat paradox, also known as the measurement problem. This is, without any doubt, GianCarlo's main contribution to the foundations of quantum mechanics. The measurement problem has been around since 1935: if every physical system is completely described by an object, the wavefunction, which evolves according to Schrödinger's equation, then because of the linearity of this equation we should observe macroscopic superpositions. Since we do not observe them, quantum mechanics needs to be revised. In the 1950s some solutions to this problem were proposed, most notably Bohmian mechanics (Bohm 1952) and the Many-Worlds theory (Everett 1957), which respectively are taken to 'add' something to the description provided by the wavefunction, and to make sense of macroscopic superpositions by stipulating they suitably exist in other undetectable worlds. On top of this, GianCarlo, together with Rimini and Weber, proposed his solution to this problem, namely the GRW theory. It is also called spontaneous collapse or spontaneous localization theory because the wavefunction does not evolve according to the Schrödinger equation but it randomly collapses into one of the terms of the superpositions and thus localizes in a small region of space. Presumably, one of the problems that led GianCarlo to his theory was to reconcile the (classical) exponential decay law with quantum theory. In their 1976 paper, GianCarlo and his collaborators Luciano Fonda and Alberto Rimini provided a theory of unstable systems, and 4 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 this led them to consider localization procedures (Fonda, Ghirardi and Rimini 1978). In their work, the wavefunction of the decay fragments underwent random localization processes at random times. In these papers the reduction processes were due to the interaction of the system with its environment. However these proposals can be seen as precursors of the GRW mechanism, in which the wavefunction localization is instead spontaneous and fundamental. Around the same dates, Philip Pearle (1976, 1979), Nicolas Gisin (1984), Lajos Diosi (1986) and others developed models to account of the wavefunction collapse in terms of a stochastic modification of the Schrödinger equation. However, they were not able to provide a general account, independent of the type of measurement performed. Also, there was the trigger problem (Pearle 1989): it was not clear how to make the localization effective for macroscopic objects but not for microscopic ones. The breakthrough happened in 1986, when GianCarlo, together with Rimini and Weber, published their spontaneous localization theory which would allow for a 'unified dynamics of microscopic and macroscopic system'. In the GRW theory the wavefunction does not evolve according to the Schrödinger equation but stochastically localizes so that macroscopic objects are never found in macroscopic superpositions. The existence of such a theory was not obvious, because it has been shown (see, e.g. Gisin 1989) that nonlinear modifications of the Schrödinger equation without stochasticity lead to superluminal signaling, and thus are unacceptable. Therefore the proposal was received with great enthusiasm, especially by John Stuart Bell, who contributed to making the theory well known in the community (Bell 1987). The authors refer to their model as QMSL (Quantum Mechanics with Spontaneous Localizations), in which every physical system is subject at random times to random and spontaneous localization processes, which they called 'hittings'. This is, roughly, how it works: when a hitting occurs, the wavefunction (as a function of position) is instantaneously multiplied by an appropriately normalized Gaussian function of width d, which represents the localization accuracy. The localization center is random with probability given by the squared norm of the localized wavefunction (as to reproduce the quantum predictions). Also, it is assumed that the hittings occur at randomly distributed times, according to a Poisson distribution, with mean frequency f . In between hittings, the wavefunction evolves linearly according to the Schrödinger dynamics. This theory does not suffer from the trigger problem because the localization of one of the constituents of a macroscopic object amounts to the localization of the object itself. In fact the wavefunction of a macroscopic object can be thought as the product of the wavefunctions of its microscopic constituents, which are not zero only in one of the terms of the superposition. So that if one of the microscopic system undergoes localization near a give point, all the macroscopic superposition will also localize around the same point. The localization accuracy d = 10−5 cm and the frequency f = 10−16s−1 were chosen so that macroscopic systems would undergo localization on average every hundred million years, while a macroscopic systems would undergo localization every 10−7seconds. The original 5 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 GRW proposal worked only for nonidentical particles. However, the idea can be generalized in the framework of the so-called Continuous Spontaneous Localization models, or CSL (Pearle 1989; Ghirardi, Pearle, and Rimini 1990) in which the discontinuous jumps are replaced by a continuous stochastic evolution in the Hilbert space. Notice that these theories are empirically distinguishable from ordinary quantum mechanics, so that one expects to find effect in superconducting devices, as well as loss of coherence in diffraction experiments with macromolecules and in opto-mechanical interferometers, and spontaneous X-ray emission from Germanium. For a review of the experimental work connected to the GRW theory and CSL models, see e.g. (Bassi and Ghirardi 2003), (Adler 2007), and (Bassi et al. 2013). In the years that followed until his death, GianCarlo continued to develop and extend his theory, solving conceptual problems connected to it and working towards a relativistic model. 4. The Mass Density Field and Relativistic GRW Theories I was never GianCarlo's student. I came to know of him for the first time because I read his book. At the time "Sneaking a Look at God's Cards" was first published, I had just graduated from University of Milan. I ended up defending a dissertation in nuclear physics because my idea of doing theoretical physics has been shattered after taking a class on quantum mechanics. In fact, in the class I was taught that observers create reality, scientific realism is impossible, and particles can have contradictory properties such as being 'here' and 'there' at the same time. At the time I was doing a master course in scientific communication at the University of Milan, the purpose of which was to learn how to explain complex scientific concepts clearly. An assignment had to do with quantum mechanics, so I remembers hopelessly wandering towards the University bookstore to get some distraction. And there it was! Close to the "The Fabric of Reality" by David Deutsch (1995), I found GianCarlo's book "Sneaking a Look at God's Cards". I bought them both and devoured them. They contributed to my rethinking of quantum mechanics, and ultimately were determinant in reshaping my career path. In fact, I realized that the questions I has been asking all along, while sitting in the class on quantum mechanics, were not stupid and they actually had answers. So I decided to pursue theoretical physics again. I am sure GianCarlo's work has inspired many others as well, students and not. I went on doing a Ph.D. in physics at the University of Genova with Nino Zanghì, partly because I came to know his work by being mentioned in GianCarlo's book. I finally had the privilege of meeting GianCarlo for the first time during a conference in Ischia in 1999, when I was a first year graduate student. I met him again at another conference in Urbino in 2004 and his enthusiasm about the discipline of quantum foundations was even more contagious. We became friends since then, and had regular correspondence and exchange of ideas until GianCarlo died. On a personal level, I was particularly impressed by how GianCarlo 6 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 was very laid back, so that one would not be afraid to be judged when talking to him. He was very modest and sweet, always willing to receive feedback and constructive exchange of ideas. Unfortunately, not many in physics were like him and this consideration was among the factors that made me decide to switch to philosophy. I therefore went to Rutgers, where other people mentioned in GianCarlo's book were working, including Tim Maudlin and Sheldon Goldstein. Aside from proposing the GRW theory, I think that the most significant philosophical insight of GianCarlo was his introduction of the mass density field. Indeed, my philosophy Ph.D. thesis was on the structure of quantum theories, and I was most influenced by GianCarlo's work on the role of the mass density field in spontaneous localization theories. In fact, GianCarlo in 1995 published an article, together with Renata Grassi and Fabio Benatti (Ghirardi, Benatti and Grassi 1995), in which he argued that one would need to supplement the description provided by the GRW collapse mechanism by the specification of a (threedimensional) mass density field, defined in terms of the wavefunction. GianCarlo and his collaborators contended that if the wavefunction correctly represented physical systems, then the distance in Hilbert space would be able to capture how states as represented by wavefunctions are physically different. However, this is not the case. Take, for instance the following three states: |h > , |h∗ > and |t > , where |h > and |t > represent different macroscopic properties of an object, such as being localized 'here' and 'there', while |h∗ > is a state identical to |h >, but for one particle being in a state orthogonal to the corresponding particle in |h >. Then, macroscopically, |h >, and |h∗ > are indistinguishable and different from |t >. Despite of this, however, the Hilbert space distance between |h > and |h∗ > is equal to that between |h > and |t > . As a consequence, GianCarlo and his collaborators concluded that macroscopic systems would be better represented by something other than the wavefunction, and they proposed a material field in three-dimensional space, dubbed the mass density field. The reasoning behind this proposal is connected to what is now called the configuration space problem: if the wavefunction represents physical objects, then physical space is configuration space, and we need to understand how we seem to live in threedimensional space. GianCarlo argued that the wavefunction is not the right kind of mathematical object to represent physical entities, and that we need some stuff in threedimensional space to ground any theory, like for instance the mass density field. If we follow this advice, the configuration space problem never arises and the one is left to investigate the (true) open problems with the GRW theory, namely its extension to the relativistic domain, or the origin of the spontaneous collapse. I was heavily influenced by this part of GianCarlo's work, which contributed to my understating and developing the ideas behind the so-called primitive ontology approach to quantum theories. In this framework, physical entities are 'made up' by three-dimensional fundamental constituents, dubbed the primitive ontology of the theory, the mass density in GRW being one. Before the introduction of the mass density field, GRW seemed to be a theory 7 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 about the behavior of the wavefunction. That is, in GRW matter was taken to be 'made of' wavefunctions. However, in GianCarlo's mass density interpretation of his own theory, this is no longer true: matter is 'made of' the mass density field. Therefore there is a sense in which also in the GRW theory, as in Bohmian mechanics, we are 'adding' something to the description provided by the wavefunction. As a consequence, one can see how Bohmian mechanics and the GRW theory actually share a common structure: there is matter, represented by some stuff in three-dimensional space, namely the primitive ontology; and then there is the wavefunction. Following this lead, the nature of the wavefunction needs to be revised: if it does not directly represent physical objects, what is it? This is part of my current research project, which has obviously been influenced, inspired and informed by GianCarlo's insights, which however did not have a definite opinion about it. Be that as it may, understanding theories in terms of their primitive ontology is particularly relevant when considering how to extend a physical theory outside its domain of validity. In the case of GRW, considering different primitive ontologies has led to different models of wavefunction spontaneous localization theories. The first relativistic invariant GRW model was proposed by Roderich Tumulka (2006). It is a theory for N non-interacting distinguishable particles, based on a multi-time wavefunction evolving according to Dirac-like equations. However the theory is not about the behavior of the wavefunction but rather is about the distribution of the locations of wavefunction collapse, dubbed 'flashes,' which therefore are the primitive ontology, as suggested by Bell (1987). Moreover, GianCarlo, developing some of his earlier ideas (Ghirardi 2000), and collaborating with Daniel Bedingham, Detlef Dürr, Sheldon Goldstein, Roderich Tumulka and Nino Zanghì (2014), has proposed a relativistic invariant GRW theory for a mass density primitive ontology. GianCarlo, at the time of his unexpected death, was still scientifically active and he had just finished a book on the importance of symmetries not only in science but also in art and music. He will be greatly missed. References  [Adler 2007] Adler, Stephen: 2007. "Lower and Upper Bounds on CSL Parameters from Latent Image Formation and IGM Heating". Journal of Physics, A40: 2935.  [Aspect et al. 1981] Aspect, Alain; Philippe Grangier; Gérard Roger: 1981. "Experimental Tests of Realistic Local Theories via Bell's Theorem". Physical Review Letters 47 (7): 460–3.  [Aspect et al. 1982] Aspect, Alain; Philippe Grangier; Gérard Roger: 1982. "Experimental Test of Bell's Inequalities Using Time-Varying Analyzers". Physical Review Letters 49 (25): 1804– 7.  [Bassi and Ghirardi 2003] Bassi, Angelo, and GianCarlo Ghirardi: 2003. "Dynamical Reduction Models". Physics Reports, 379: 257. 8 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10  [Bassi et al 2013] Bassi, Angelo, Kinjalk Lochan, Seema Satin, Tejinder P. Singh, and Hendrik Ulbricht: 2013. "Models of Wave-function Collapse, Underlying Theories, and Experimental Tests." Review of Modern Physics 85: 47141.  [Bedingham et al 2014] Bedingham, Daniel, Detlef Dürr, GianCarlo Ghirardi, Sheldon Goldstein, Roderich Tumulka, and Nino Zanghì: 2014. "Matter Density and Relativistic Models of Wave Function Collapse". Journal of Statistical Physics, 154: 623.  [Bell 1964] Bell, John S.: 1964. "On the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox." Physics 1: 195– 200  [Bell 1987] Bell, John S.: 1987. "Are There Quantum Jumps?" In C.W. Kilmister (ed.) Schrödinger-Centenary Celebration of a Polymath. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.  [Bohm 1952] Bohm, David: 1952. "A Suggested Interpretation of the Quantum Theory in Terms of 'Hidden' Variables, I and II". Physical Review 85(2): 166–193.  [d'Espagnat 1965] d'Espagnat, Bernard: 1965. Conceptions de la Physique Contemporaine: les Interprétations de la Mécanique Quantique et de la Mesure. Paris: Hermann.  [Dieks 1982] Dieks, Dennis: 1982. "Communication by EPR Devices". Physics Letters A 92 (6): 271–272.  [Deutsch 1997] Deutsch, David: 1997. The Fabric of Reality: The Science of Parallel Universes-and Its Implications. Penguin Books.  [Diosi 1986] Díosi, Lajos: 1986. "A Quantum-stochastic Gravitation Model and the Reduction of the Wavefunction." Thesis, 1986.  [Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen 1935] Einstein, Albert; Boris Podolsky, and Nathan Rosen: 1935. "Can Quantum-mechanical Description of Physical Reality be Considered Complete?" Physical Review 47: 777-80.  [Everett 1957] Everett, Hugh III: 1957. "Relative State Formulation of Quantum Mechanics". Reviews of Modern Physics 29 (3): 454–462.  [Fonda and Ghirardi 1970] Fonda, Luciano, GianCarlo Ghirardi: 1970. Symmetry Principles in Quantum Theories. M. Dekker: New York.  [Fonda, Ghirardi and Rimini 1978] Fonda, Luciano, GianCarlo Ghirardi and Alberto Rimini: 1978. "Decay Theory of Unstable Quantum Qystems". Reports on Progress in Physics, 41(4): 587–631.  [Freedman and Clauser 1972] Freedman, Stuart J. and John F. Clauser: 1972. "Experimental test of local hidden-variable theories". Physical Review Letters 28 (938): 938–941.  [Ghirardi 2000] Ghirardi, GianCarlo: 2000. "Local Measurements of Nonlocal Observables and The Relativistic Reduction Process". Foundations of Physics, 30: 1337.  [Ghiraddi, Pearle and Rimini 1990] Ghirardi, GianCarlo, Philip Pearle, and Alberto Rimini: 1990. "Markov-processes in Hilbert-space and Continuous Spontaneous Localization of Systems of Identical Particles". Physical Review, A42: 78. 9 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10  [Ghirardi and Weber 1979] Ghirardi, GianCarlo, Tullio Weber: 1979. "On Some Recent Suggestions of Superluminal Communication through the Collapse of the Wave Function", Lettere Nuovo Cimento 26: 599 (1979).  [Ghirardi, Rimini and Weber 1980] Ghirardi, GianCarlo, Alberto Rimini and Tullio Weber: 1980. "A General Argument against Superluminal Transmission through the Quantum Mechanical Measurement Process", Lettere Nuovo Cimento 27: 293.  [Ghirardi 1997] Ghirardi, GianCarlo: 1997. Un'occhiata alle carte di Dio. Il Saggiatore: Milano.  [Ghirardi 2005] Ghirardi, GianCarlo: 2005. Sneaking a Look at God' Cards. Princeton University Press.  [Ghirardi Benatti Grassi 1995] Ghirardi, GianCarlo, Renata Grassi, Fabio Benatti: 1995. "Describing the Macroscopic World: Closing the Circle within the Dynamical Reduction Program". Foundation of Physics 35: 5.  [Ghirardi and Rimini 1965] Ghirardi, GianCarlo, Alberto Rimini: 1965. "On the Number of Bound States of a Given Interaction". Journal of Mathematical Physics 6: 40.  [Ghirardi, Rimini and Weber 1986] Ghirardi, GianCarlo, Alberto Rimini and Tulio Weber:1986. "Unified Dynamics for Microscopic and Macroscopic Systems". Physical Review 34D: 470.  [Ghirardi and Weber 1983] Ghirardi, GianCarlo and Tullio Weber: 1983. "Quantum Mechanics and Faster-than-light Communication: Methodological Considerations". Il Nuovo Cimento B Series 11, 78(1): 9–20.  [Gisin 1984] Gisin, Nicolas: 1984. "Quantum Measurements and Stochastic Processes". Physical Review Letters, 52(19), 1657–1660.  [Gisin 1989] Gisin, Nicolas: 1989. "Stochastic Quantum Dynamics and Relativity". Helvetica Physica Acta, 62: 363.  [Pearle 1976] Pearle, Philip: 1976. "Reduction of Statevector by a Nonlinear Schrödinger equation." Physical Review, D13: 857.  [Pearle 1979] Pearle, Philip: 1979. "Toward Explaining Why Events Occur." International Journal of Theoretical Physics, 18: 489.  [Pearle 1989] Pearle, Philip: 1989. "Combining Stochastic Dynamical State-vector Reduction with Spontaneous Localization". Physical Review, A39: 2277.  [Schrödinger 1935] Schrödinger, Erwin: 1935. "Die gegenwärtige Situation in der Quantenmechanik". Naturwissenschaften 23 (48): 823807–828812.  [Tumulka 2006] Tumulka, Roderich: 2006. "A Relativistic Version of the Ghirardi-RiminiWeber Model". Journal of Statistical Physics, 125: 821.  [Wootters and Zurek 1982] Wootters, William and Wojciech Zurek: 1982. "A Single Quantum Cannot be Cloned". Nature 299: 802–803. 10 International Journal of Quantum Foundations 5 (2019) 1 10 Copyright © 2019 by Valia Allori. This article is an Open Access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction, provided the original work is properly cited.

REVIEWS THOMAS NAGEL. Equality and Partiality. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991. 186 pp. In this book, Thomas Nagel offers a fresh approach to the perennial unsolved problem of developing a justified political theory. He maintains that we do not now possess an acceptable political ideal because no one has solved the problem of how to reconcile the impersonal standpoint of collectivity with the personal standpoint of the individual. Nagel addresses this as a question of each individual's relation to himself or herself (p. 3). All persons have within themselves a division, and potential conflicts, between these two standpoints. We do not yet know how to design political institutions that do justice both to the equal importance of all persons recognized and required by the impersonal standpoint in us, and to the importance of individual interests and personal allegiances to family, friends, particular communities, etc. involved in the personal standpoint in us. Ideal political institutions would satisfy both of these standpoints in every divided self, but Nagel repeatedly expresses doubts that this ideal can be satisfied at all because the standpoints pull in different directions (pp. 3-20). Nagel condemns "utopian" political ideals precisely because, by definition, individuals cannot be motivated to live by them (pp. 6, 21). "What is right must be possible, even if our understanding of what is possible can be partly transformed by arguments about what is right" (p. 26). The ideal of the classless society has failed because it does not do justice to the personal standpoint, and because "Altruism appears to be just as scarce in socialist as in capitalist societies, and the employment of strong-arm methods to make up the deficit has not been a success" (pp. 27, 28). Nagel proposes that a justified or, as he prefers, a "legitimate" political system would be one to which all persons unanimously consent, provided that they are "reasonable and committed within reason to modifying their claims, requirements and motives in a direction which makes a common framework of justification possible" (pp. 3 3-34). To gain unanimous consent, a political system must satisfy the requirements of both the impartial and individual standpoints in each person. That would be difficult, perhaps impossible (Ch. 4). Nagel examines a number of political theories-those of Hobbes, Bentham, Hume, Rousseau, modern liberalism-and argues that they all fail because in one or way or another they do not do justice to one or the other of the two standpoints in us. Both Egalitarianism (Ch. 7) and Utilitarianism (pp. 44, 77-80) fail adequately to affirm the personal standpoint and require sacrifices of the well 137 off to which they could not reasonably consent. Kant's categorical imperative seems to do no better, since there may be no moral maxims that everyone else can will that everyone else adopt as maxims (pp. 47-52). The position which Nagel calls "the guaranteed minimum" seems attractive, at least initially, because it does not require great sacrifices from the well to do, who might be just impartial enough to accept it. Here, it is not well being in general, only basic goods, that impartiality commends, i.e. such things as "personal rights and liberties, . . . certain conditions of security, self respect, and fulfillment of basic material needs" (p. 77). The "fatal mistake" of this position is that it assumes that the worse off could not reject the guaranteed minimum, i.e. that they would be content with such a minimum while those better off enjoy benefits well above the minimum at their expense (p. 81-84). No currently conceivable political systems seem legitimate, i.e. command universal rational consent, according to Nagel. Yet, when he considers practical options, he finally favors what he takes to be the best workable nonutopian approximation to legitimacy. It is something very close to the "guaranteed minimum" view-provided that there be "a high social minimum, with healthy, comfortable, decent conditions of life and self-respect for everyone. This would be in addition to fair equality of opportunity... (p. 124). In discussing "Rights" (Ch. 13), Nagel makes it clear that basic rights that protect the personal standpoint would also be included. "This (minimalist position) is hardly an unworthy goal, and it may be that nothing beyond it can be seriously pursued until this much has been achieved and has become so well entrenched that it is considered the natural order of things: Then it will be time to complain that it is not yet good enough" (p. 125). Nagel's most problematic chapter is on "Inequality." There he tries to justify the "frankly inegalitarian element" of taxation to support science, scholarship and the arts (p. 132). He argues that reasonable persons could be expected to agree on the general principle that "there are things good in themselves, . . . even if they do not agree about what those things are (p. 134)," and that "everyone has reason to want the state to identify and encourage excellence, and this will require a method of selection which will inevitably leave some people unsatisfied with the result, even though they can accept the claim" (p. 134). Jesse Helms (who thinks he is rational), and the thousands that he represents, doubtless would not give their consent to any general procedures for selecting and sponsoring excellence which generate in practice what they believe to be degeneracy. Public support for excellency in general cannot be translated into public support for excellency in particular as easily as Nagel assumes. Probably no scholar or artist supported by public funds can justify his or her own existence through a theory of legitimacy as unanimous consent. REM B. EDWARDS 1 3

A C T A U N I V E R S I T A T I S L O D Z I E N S I S FOLIA GERMANICA 5, 2009 K atarzyna Sikorska* ZUR SPRACHE DER DEUTSCHEN COM EDY-SHOW Betrachtet man den komischen Kommunikationsvorgang in seiner ganzen Komplexität, so steht er von Vornherein im Zeichen des Wandels, denn selbst die blosse Neuausstrahlung einer Comedystaffel unterscheidet sich von der Originalsendung mindestens durch einen kommunikativ fundamentalen Fakt, Wiederholung zu sein. Vielleicht ist sie im Übergang vom Original zu Wiederholung sogar zum Kult geworden (Brock 2006). Die heutige Welt, von den elektronischen Medien überflutet, versteht die sprachliche Kommunikation schon ganz anders als noch vor 10 Jahren, sowohl diese geschriebene als auch die gesprochene. In dieser Sprache dominieren kurze, kompakte Aussagen, man bedient sich der sprachökonomischen Äusserungen, um möglichst viel mit möglichst wenig M itteln zum Ausdruck zu bringen. Einerseits verliert die Sprache als Kommunikationsmittel an Bedeutung, andererseits aber übernimmt sie alles Neue aus anderen Sprachsystemen, mit denen sie auf verschiedenen Ebenen in K ontakt kommt. Zweifelsohne spielen dabei nicht nur die Kulturunterschiede und die mit ihnen verbundenen Fragen der Mentalität, der Stereotypen, sondern auch verschiedene Rezeption des Alltags, unter anderem auch die Unterschiede in der Auffassung des Begriffs des Humors, eine wichtige Rolle. Der Ausgangspunkt für die Forschung in diesem Bereich ist nicht nur eine Disziplin, sondern es ist ein interdisziplinäres Thema, das mit der Psychologie, Soziologie, Biologie, Physiologie und mit der Sprachwissenschaft zusammenhängt (vgl. Wulf 2007).1 * Dr. Katarzyna Sikorska, Lehrstuhl für deutsche und angewandte Sprachwissenschaft, Universität Łódź. 1 Humor wird verschieden definiert. In Duden findet man folgende Erklärung dieses Begriffs: „Hu|mor, der; -s, -e <P1. selten > [älter engl, humour = literarische Stilgattung des Komischen, eigtl. = Stimmung, Laune < afrz. humour > lat. (h)umores- (Temperament u. Charakter bestimmende) Körpersäfte, zu: (h)umor= Feuchtigkeit, Flüssigkeit]: 1. co .P l. > Gabe eines Menschen, der Unzulänglichkeit der Welt u. der Menschen, den Schwierigkeiten u. Missgeschicken des Alltags mit heiterer Gelassenheit zu begegnen: er hat, besitzt einen unverwüstlichen, goldenen H.; etw. mit H. nehmen, tragen; ein Mensch ohne H.; zwischen sehr tiefem Emst, überwallendcr Verzagtheit und bitterem H. (Geissler, Wunschhüllein 15); er hat keinen H. (reagiert sehr leicht verärgert, ist nicht in der Lage, etw. gelassen auf-, hinzunehmen); Eine äusserst interessante Sache scheint demzufolge ein Versuch der Analyse der ausgewählten deutschen Comedy-Show2 zu sein, die im deutschen Fernsehen in den Jahren 2001-2005 lief, und das Hinweisen auf die Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede zwischen dem sog. typisch deutschen Sinn für Hum or:3 Dieter Hallervorden spottet: „Deutscher Hum or ist ein echter Schlankmacher. Man muss meilenweit laufen, bis man ihn trifft." Das stimmt so nicht. Die Deutschen sind humorvoller als ihr Ruf. Sie amüsieren sich eben nur über andere Dinge als Briten, Iren oder Neuseeländer. Diese mögen Witze mit W ortspielen. Amerikaner und Kanadier lachen am liebsten über Scherze auf Kosten anderer. Deutsche finden Zoten komisch, wie „Geht eine Frau in einen Gemüseladen und verlangt eine Gurke. Sagt der Verkäufer" Nehmen Sie doch zwei, dann können Sie eine essen! {Humorstrategien 2008). und der deutschen Sendung Was guckst du?, die von einem in Deutschland aufgewachsenen Ausländer mit türkisch-arabischer Abstammung Kaya Yanar produziert und moderiert wird. Yanar, M itautor und M oderator der Show, ist zweifellos das beste Beispiel dafür, dass der vorher erwähnte typisch deutsche Sinn für Humor sich grundsätzlich davon unterscheidet, was in Was guckst du? präsentiert wird. Diese Sendung gibt die Möglichkeit, die Sprache einer Show zu analysieren, die sich vor allem auf die arabische K ultur beruft und auf alle mit ihr verbundenen Erscheinungen und die ausserdem auch die Probleme der Ausländer aus diesem Kulturbereich mit der deutschen Sprache zeigt. Wenn m an demzufolge den kulturellen Hinterfür seine Unverschämtheiten habe ich keinen H. [mehr] (sie missfallen mir zu sehr); er hat keinen Sinn für H. (ihm fehlt der Humor, er ist humorlos); R du hast, er hat [ja vielleicht] H.! (was denkst du dir, denkt er sich eigentlich!); Spr H. ist, wenn man trotzdem lacht. 2. sprachliche, künstlerische o.ä. Äusserung einer von Humor (1) bestimmten Geisteshaltung, Wesensart: der rheinische, der Kölner H.; gezeichneter H. (Humor in der Kunstform der Karikatur o.Ä.); schwarzer (das Grauen, Grauenhafte einbeziehender) H.; Ein tolles Stück (=Theaterstück). Angefüllt mit schwarzen -en und brillanten Pointen (MM 27.1. 68, 68). 3. < o .P l.> gute Laune, fröhliche Stimmung: den H. [nicht] verlieren, behalten; Typen wie dieser... bringen mich um jeglichen H. (Frisch, Stiller 295). 4. Laune, Stimmung, Gefühlslage: Dies gab mir den allerschlimmsten H., besonders da ich den Übungsort selbst ganz unerträglich fand (Goethe, Dichtung u. Wahrheit 4)." © 2000 Dudenverlag 2 „Co|me|dy ['], die; -, -s [engl, comedy < (a)frz. comtdie, Comédie] (bes. Ferns.):(oft als Serie produzierte) humoristische Sendung." © 2000 Dudenverlag Dieser Begriff umfasst zahlreiche Formen der Bühnenprogramme, für die der humoristische Charakter gemeinsam ist. Man unterscheidet des weiteren zwischen den Stand-Up-Programmen, Mixed-Shows, TV-Sitcoms, TV-Sketchshows, TV-Panelshows, Radio-Comedy, Trick-Comedy und Impro-Comedy. Man weist dabei darauf hin, dass Comedy mit dem Kabarett verwandt ist, aber ohne tiefer gehende politische Diskussion und Kritik. 3 Dieter Hallervorden (geb. 1935) ist ein deutscher Komiker, Moderator, Kabarettist, Schauspieler und Sänger. grund einer lustigen Sendung zu analysieren versucht, darf man nicht ausser acht lassen, dass es unterschiedlich sein kann, je nachdem, welche Nation und deren M entalität angesprochen werden. K otthoff (2008) weist darauf hin: Grundsätzlich sind die kulturellen Gemeinsamkeiten beim Hum or stärker ausgeprägt als die Unterschiede. Letztere sind schwer festzumachen, wenn auch manchmal spürbar und empirisch nachweisbar. So variiert etwa der Umgang mit Ironie, wenngleich es dieses Stilmittel in allen Kulturen gibt. [...] Je nach Region verlagern sich auch die Tabugrenzen. So arbeitet englischer Hum or eher mit Ekel als der deutsche. Die Briten machen auch öfter den Tod zum witzigen Gegenstand als Deutsche. Besonders gut sind solche Differenzen auch hinsichtlich der Beziehung von Hum or und Religion erkennbar: in der christlichen und vor allem in der jüdischen Kultur etwa haben Witze über G o tt eine lange Tradition; in der muslimischen Kultur gibt es sie nicht. Witze über religiöse Inhalte und muslimische Geistliche dagegen schon. Die in dem genannten Programm von verschiedensprachigen Figuren (u.a. türkischer Türsteher Hakan, Italiener Francesco, türkischer Fahrlehrer Yildirim, russische Hellseherin Olga, arabischer Journalist Tarek ab del Kalek, Ranjid) präsentierte deutsche Sprache kann als Hybridesprache eingestuft werden, da sie eine Mischsprache aus Deutsch und anderen Sprachen ist (Türkisch, Arabisch, Russisch, Italienisch). Zu den M erkmalen dieser Sprache gehören u.a. spezifische Gram m atik, die sich in ihrer reduzierten Struktur zeigt, was mit der gebrochenen oder sogar reduzierten Flexion, mit den Verstössen gegen die syntaktischen Regeln oder aber m it der Einschränkung im Gebrauch bestimmter Tempusund M odusformen zusammenhängt: Eine wesentlich durch Mischsprachen geprägte interkulturelle Kommunikation, verstanden als öffentliches Gespräch unter Angehörigen verschiedener Szenen oder Subkulturen mit unterschiedlichen Soziolekten, ist zumindest in komplexeren (Sprach-)Kulturen etwas durchaus Normales. Nicht verbale Signale ergänzen in der Regel die Wirkung einer Mischsprache (Körpersprache, Gestik, Mimik, Blickund Distanzverhalten, Stimme und Sprechweise, Kleidung usw (Hübner 2006). In Bezug auf die Lexik und ihre praktische Anwendung bedeutet das, dass man für die Zwecke der Comedy-show unter anderem die Erscheinung der Mehrdeutigkeit der W örter ausnutzt, um zu zeigen, dass deren Unkenntnis zu komischen Situationen führen kann, z.B.:4 4 Alle zitierten Szenen entstammen den privaten Aufnahmen der TV-Sendung Was guckst du? 2001-2005. (1) Ein Türke geht einem Polizisten entgegen. Wenn sie schon aneinander Vorbeigehen, fragt der Polizist Können Sie sich bitte ausweisen? Die A ntwort des Türken lautet - Wieso sollte ich? Ich lebe gerne in Deutschland. Das Komische wird dadurch erreicht, dass man mit der Polysemie des Verbs ausweüen5 spielt. In Was guckst du? stehen nach den W orten von Yanar (Wittner 2008) die Sprachen im Zentrum. Sprachen haben Charaktereigenschaften [...] Eine Sprache kann ja auch ein Lebensgefühl rüberbringen. Das Wort „M erde" heisst auf Deutsch „Scheisse" , aber wie hört sich das an: Scheisse! [...] Aber Merde könnte auch, wenn man kein Französisch kann, eine Vorspeise sein. Interessant ist natürlich dabei die fremde Aussprache, gebrochenes Deutsch, das jedoch von Yanar als nichts Negatives betrachtet werde, da es ihn an seinen Vater erinnere (Neumayer 2006). 5 „aus|wei|sen <st.V.; hat> : 1. des Landes verweisen, jmdm. nicht länger den Aufenthalt in einem bestimmten Land gestatten: einen Staatenlosen a.; jmdn. als unerwünschte Person a. 2. [mithilfe eines Ausweises (1)] seine, jmds. Identität nachweiscn: bitte weisen Sie sich aus!; die Dokumente haben ihn als Unterhändler ausgewiesen; Ü der (= ein Anglist) zwar hochschulpolitisch noch kaum hervorgetreten, aber als Mitglied des Bundes Freiheit der Wissenschaft eindeutig ausgewiesen war (Nuissl, Hochschulreform 67). 3. a) < a . + sich > sich erweisen: sich als guter/(selten:) guten Geschäftsmann a.; wenn man in der Gruppe eine Aktionsform zu sehen bereit ist, die sich an Erfolgen auszuweisen vermag (Hofstätter, Gruppendynamik 21); b) unter Beweis stellen: sein Talent a.; Dieses Ansehen hat er sich mehr noch als durch sein ausgewiesenes Können durch die Furchtlosigkeit... erworben (Böll, Und sagte 152 [Nachwort]); c) < a . + sich> (Schweiz.) (Kenntnisse, Fähigkeiten) nachweisen: Der Bewerber muss sich über eine abgeschlossene handwerkliche Berufslehre a. können (Basler Zeitung 9.10.85, 50); d) < a. + sich > (schweiz.) beweisen (2): Weltrekordhalter Bubka wies sich über Nervenstärke aus (N ZZ 31.8.86, 33); der Platzklub ... wies sich auch über eine gute Raumaufteilung aus (N ZZ 2.9.86, 37). 4. rechnerisch nachweisen, zeigen: wie die Statistik ausweist; amtliche Register wiesen aus, dass sie an diesem Tage in Paris geweilt hatten (Mostar, Unschuldig 25); ausgewiesene Überschüsse. 5. (Bauw.) für einen bestimmten Zweck vorsehen, zur Verfügung stellen: Zu den noch verfügbaren Flächen wurden schon neue Gebiete ausgewiesen, die in fünf bis zehn Jahren verkauft werden können (Hamburger Abendblatt 23.5.85, 23); obwohl auch hier der Bebauungsplan ... eine ganz andere Bebauung auswies (Stuttg. Zeitung 14.10.89, 34). 6. a) offiziell als etw. bezeichnen, zu etw. erklären, deklarieren: Auch das Saarland unterstützt eine Initiative des Bundesrats, wonach der Ausbau der A8 ... als Bedarf ausgewiesen wird (Saarbr. Zeitung 28.12.79, 24); Die einen erhoffen sich Entschädigungen, die anderen ein Gutachten, das ihre Häuser als einsturzgefährdet ausweist und staatliche Mittel verheisst (Fest, Im Gegenlicht 246); b) kennzeichnen, angeben: mit der Angabe der Verbraucherfrist, sie wird seit November 1986 generell ausgewiesen, kommen wir den Wünschen der Kunden entgegen (Freie Presse 17.11.83, 3); die Kosten für Eltern und Kinder werden nicht separat ausgewiesen (a&r 9, 1998, 136)." © 2000 Dudenverlag (2) Eine Szene in der Fahrschule von einem türkischen Fahrlehrer Yildirim. Ein Gespräch zwischen dem Lehrer und seinem deutschen Schüler Manfred Winter Yildirim: Wenn du wilki Auto fahren lernen wie ein Türke, du musst anfangen türkisch zu denken. Sonst kriegst du Durchfall. Die Autoren bedienen sich ganz geschickt der falschen Wortfolge und des Sich-Versprechens, das erstens auf die Schwierigkeiten mit der deutschen Sprache, zweitens auch auf die Unkenntnis der Unterschiede zwischen dem deutschen Verb durchfallen zurückgeht, das polysem ist6 und dem Substantiv Durchfall, das in Verbindung einen Durchfall erleben die erwünschte und gemeinte Bedeutung von ,nicht gelingen" hat, aber schon in der Wortgruppe Durchfall kriegen1 weit entfernt von dem beabsichtigten Sinn steht. Eine der Witzfiguren von Was guckst du?, gespielt auch von Kaya Yanar, ist Tarek ab del Kalek, der als Journalist von Dubai TV u.a. die Neuigkeiten von der Modemesse in Düsseldorf darstellen soll, ln solchen Fällen wird von den Autoren absichtlich die arabische Sprache gebraucht, die dem Deutschen gegenübergestellt wird. Viele Sachen werden in der Originalsprache gedreht, aber die Szenen werden dann mit den Untertiteln versehen, wo der gesprochene Text übersetzt wird und auf diese Weise erfahren wir, ohne Arabisch oder Türkisch zu können, wo der Witz steckt. (3a) Modemesse in Düsseldorf. Arabischer Journalist hat vor, ein paar Interviews zu führen. M it ihm zusammen ist da M urat, sein Kameramann. Tarek versucht ein Gespräch mit einem Modell durchzuführen T arek: You speak Deutsch? Allemange, anything you come, Spanish? How is it to play in Germania, to make the fashion-show in the..., here? Model: Its good! 6 „durch|fal|len <st.V.; ist > [2: urspr. Studentenspr.; geht auf den ша. Schwank vom Schreiber im Korbe zurück, in dem ein Mädchen seinen Liebhaber zum Fenster hochzieht, um ihn dann durch den schadhaften Boden fallen zu lassen]: 1. durch eine Öffnung hindurch nach unten fallen: die kleinen Steine fallen [durch den Rost] durch. 2. (ugs.) a) (von einem Theaterstück o.Ä.) keinen Erfolg haben: die Aufführung ist [beim Publikum] durchgefallen; Schon 167 v. Chr. fielen während der Triumphalspiele griechische Flötenspieler bei den Zuhörern durch (Thiess, Reich 355f.); b) (eine Prüfung) nicht bestehen: er ist [im Examen] durchgefallen; bei der Fahrprüfung d.; er ist mit Glanz durchgefallen (ugs.; hat in der Prüfung vollständig versagt); c) (bei einer Wahl) verlieren, nicht gewählt werden: der neu aufgestellte Kandidat ist bei der Wahl durchgefallen. 3. (Fliegerspr.) durchsacken: die Maschine... fiel eine Strecke weit durch wie ein Stein (Gaiser, Jagd 92)." © 2000 Dudenverlag 7 „Durch|fall, der; -[e]s, ...fälle [2: zu durchfallen (2)]: 1. [Krankheit, die gekennzeichnet ist durch die häufige] Ausscheidung von dünnflüssigem Stuhl; Diarrhö: D. bekommen, haben; eine mit schweren Durchfällen einhergehende Krankheit. 2. (ugs.) a) (von der Aufführung eines Theaterstücks o.Ä.) Misserfolg: das Stück wurde ein D.; Meine Komödie befremdete, missfiel. Es war ein D. (K. Mann, Wendepunkt 187); b) das Versagen, Nichtbestehen (bei einer Prüfung): jpgross ist die Panne ja nicht, die es zu beraten gilt, ein D. in der Schule (Frisch, Gantenbein - 477); er hat beim Examen einen D. erlebt." © 2000 Dudenverlag Tarek: Is good? Model: Jeah! Tarek: Is ist different from Spain? Model: I've never modelled in Spain Tarek: Are you from Spain? Model: No, Kolumbien. Tarek: Oh, Kolumbien! How is it to model in Kolumbien? Model: h e never modeled in Kolumbien. Tarek: Are you model? Model: Yes! Wieder fällt hier der Mangel an Sprachkenntnissen auf, diesmal geht es um das Englische. Es wird gebrochenes Englisch gesprochen, die Lexik ist auch beschränkt auf einige Wörter, die Figur wiederholt nur die ihr bekannte Lexik. (3b) Tarek schaut sich um, er besucht einige Ausstellungsstände. Tarek: Auf dieser Messe sind Firmen aus der ganzen Welt vertreten. Dahinten Frankreich, hier Italien. Nur Dubai ist nicht duhei, dabei, duba, duba, du, dabei. In dieser Szene fällt das Zusammenstellen lautlich ähnlicher W örter auf, also Paronomasic. Nicht weniger wichtig für die Zwecke der Darstellung der fehlenden sprachlichen Kompetenz bei einem Ausländer ist das Wortspiel mit den hom ophonen8 und mehrdeutigen Substantiven. (3c) A uf der Messe gibt es auch die Vertretung der Firma Kwark. Der Name selbst ist hom ophon zum deutschen Quark. Tarek spricht mit dem Vertreter dieser Firma. Tarek: Ist das hier alles Quark/Kwark? Vertreter: Ja, das ist... Tarek: Alles Quark! Also Frauen ziehen gern Quark an. Und für Männer ist es wahrscheinlich Quark, oder? Die Erscheinung der Hom ophonie wird hier m eisterhaft ausgenutzt in dem Gespräch mit dem Vertreter der Firma Kwark. Das Komische wird in dieser Szene dadurch erreicht, dass man die saloppe Bedeutung von 8 „ho|mo|phon <A dj. > [griech. homóphonos - gleich klingend, übereinstimmend]: 1. (Musik) in der Kompositionsart der Homophonie, wobei die Melodiestimme durch Akkorde gestützt wird u. die Stimmen weitgehend im gleichen Rhythmus verlaufen: eine Komposition in -em Satz, -er Schreibweise. 2. (Sprachw.) (von Wörtern od. Wortsilben) gleich lautend: die vier -en Wortsilben in zweieinhalb Zeilen verletzen... das... Sprachgefühl (Deschner, Talente 334)." © 2000 Dudenverlag Quark in der Wendung Quark sein9 in Bezug auf den Firmnennamen gebraucht. (3d) Szene im Studio. Kaya Yanar beruft sieb auf das gezeigte Filmmaterial von der Modemesse in Düsseldorf. E r zeigt dem Publikum einen Dubai-TV-Presseausweis und liest laut vor, was drin geschrieben steht Kaya: Wenn Sie an so exklusiver Veranstaltung wie diese Modeschau teilnehmen würden, brauchen Sie auch das hier. Oder, besser gesagt DAS hier (in diesem Moment zeigt er dem Publikum im Studio einen rosa Presseausweis) den originellen Dubai TV Presseausweis. Den bekommen Sie auf unserer Homepage www.wasguckstdu.de. Und der Inhaber dieses Ausweises Lit befugt (liest vor) Arabisch zu sprechen, auch wenn er es nicht kann Seinen Kameramann zu beschimpfen Überall unangemeldet hereinzuplatzen Sämtliche Gratisveranstaltungen kostenlos zu besuchen In jeder erreichbaren Nase nach Öl zu suchen Ich verspreche Ihnen, mit diesem Presseausweis kommen Sie wirklich überall rein, bestimmt auch bei der Schachweltmeisterschaft. Der M oderator geht jetzt zum weiteren Punkt der Sendung über und wir bekommen eine Szene von den Schachweltmeisterschaften zu sehen. In diesem Fall wird mit der Sprache so gespielt, dass die Homophonie des Wortes Schach und Schah10 mitberücksichtigt und somit das Komische erzeugt wird. (4) Schachweltmeisterschaft. Schiedsrichter: Ich begrüsse die beiden Spieler im Finale der Schachweltmeisterschaft und eröffne damit offiziell die Partie. Weiss beginnt. Spieler: He? Wer jetzt? Als Zuschauer weiss man gar nicht, wie die Pointe sein wird. Dem Richter ging es um die Figurfarben, es erweist sich jedoch, dass einer der Spieler schwarz ist, daraus resultiert das Missverständnis und die damit verbundene Witzigkeit. Hum or und Witzigkeit (vgl. K otthoff 1998), die in der besprochenen Sendung zu sehen sind, entstehen deswegen, weil die Szenerie, in der alles 9 „Quark, der; -s [spätmhd. quarc, quarg, twarc, aus dem Slaw.; vgl. poln. twaróg]: 1. aus saurer Milch hergestelltes, weisses, breiiges Nahrungsmittel: vollfetter, fettarmer, 40%igcr Q.; Spr getretener Q. wird breit, nicht stark (etw. ohne inhaltliche Tiefe wird auch durch noch so grossen Aufwand nicht auf ein höheres Niveau gebracht; Goethe, Westöstlicher Diwan). 2. (salopp abwertend) Unsinn, Unfug, dummes Zeug: so ein Q.!; was soll der Q.?; der Film war ein absoluter Q.; red nicht solchen Q.!; sich über jeden Q. (über jede noch so belanglose Kleinigkeit) aufregen; *einen Q. (ugs.; gar nichts; in keiner Weise): das interessiert mich einen Q.; das geht dich einen Q. an." © 2000 Dudenverlag 10 „Schah, der; -s, -s [pers. sah= König]: a) <o.P l. > Titel, Würde des [persischen] Herrschers; b) Träger des Titels Schah (a)." © 2000 Dudenverlag Lustige erzählt wird, kreativ von dem Zuschauer rezipiert wird. Der gesagte Text und das gezeigte Bild werden schnell assoziiert und der Gesamtkontext richtig verstanden, d.h. das Komische wird erzeugt. Es muss betont werden, dass für die Scherzkommunikation die M itproduktion weiterer Kontexte charakteristisch ist, weil sich der Zuschauer oder Hörer weiter darum bemühen will, den Witztext richtig zu verstehen. Verschiedene Assoziationen und die Herstellung der nicht vorauszusehenden Zusammenhänge sind Zeichen für die Scherzkommunikation als ganzen und kreativen Prozess. In einer Comedy-Sendung hat man es in erster Linie mit dem konversationeilen Hum or zu tun. Wenn m an im Falle eines Sachwitzes mit den lustigen Situationen Geschichten erzählt, die voll von Witzfiguren, lustigen Gags und untypischen Verhaltensweisen sind, versucht man dagegen mit einem Sprachwitz das breite Spektrum der Sprache auszunutzen, indem man auf die Polysemie, Homonymie, Homophonie der deutschen Lexik zurückgreift. Komische Effekte entstehen auch beim Übertreiben im Gebrauch falscher oder gebrochener Flexionsformen oder bei der Aussprache, in der ein fremder Akzent auch das Lustige erzeugen kann. In Was guckst du? hat man es also mit beiden Typen des Witzes zu tun dem Sachwitz und dem sprachlichen Witz. Nicht weniger wichtig sind natürlich auch die Körpersprache aller von Yanar und seinem Team gespielten Figuren, ihre Kleidung und Verhaltensweise, die der jeweiligen, in einer konkreten Szene und im ganzen Sketch angesprochenen Nation und deren M entalität entsprechen sollen. LITERATURVERZEICHNIS Bachmeier H. (2007), Lachen macht stark Humorstrategien, Göttingen. Best O. F. (1989), Der Witz als Erkenntniskraft und Formprinzip, Darmstadt. Böhler M., Die verborgene Tendenz des Witzes. Zur Soziodynamik des Komischen. In: Deutsche Vierteljahresschrift, Bd. 55, S. 351-387. Brock A. (2006), Was wandelt sich am Komischen? Formate unter Veränderungszwang, Abstract des Referats, Kasseler Komik Kolloquium 21. bis 26. Februar, Kassel. Bussmann H. (1983), Lexikon der Sprachwissenschaft, Stuttgart. Duden (2000), Das grosse Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, CD-Rom, Mannheim. Freud S. (1905/1985), Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewussten, Frankfurt. Freud S. (1927/1982), Der Humor. Studienausgabe, Bd. 4, Frankfurt. Glück H. (Hrsg.), (1993), Lexikon Sprache, Stuttgart. Hübner K. (2006), Mehrsprachigkeit und Identität. „He Aider, hassu Ei-Pott bei?", GoetheInstitut , Die Macht der Sprache Mehrsprachigkeit, online-Rodaktion, www.goethe.de Humorstrategien (2008), Das wäre doch gelacht, www.schrotundkorn.de Kotthoff H. (Hrsg.) (1996), Scherzkommunikation. Beiträge aus der empirischen Gesprächsforschung, Opladen. Kotthoff H. (1998), Spass verstehen. Zur Pragmatik von konversationellem Humor, Tübingen. KottholT H. (2008), Interview. Die Humorforscherin: Lachen, theoretisch, www.fudder.de Legman G. (1970), Der unanständige Witz, Hamburg. Lixfeld H. (1984), Witz und soziale Wirklichkeit. Bemerkungen zur interdisziplinären Witzforschung. In: Fabula. Zeitschrift für Erzählforschung, Bd. 25, H. 3/4, S. 183-213. Neumayer I. (2006), Interview, Kaya Yanar. GALORE, Vol. 21, S. 55-61. Röhrich L. (1977), Der Witz. Figuren, Formen, Funktionen, Stuttgart. Wittner J. (2008), Interview Kaya Yanar. Merde in Germany, www.stern.de/unterhaltung. Wulf J.-P. (2007), Wissenschaft am Objekt Spass, Interview mit Humorforscherin Eva Ullmann, www.medi-learn.de/mlz-nachschlag Katarzyna Sikorska JĘZYK NIEMIECKICH PROGRAMÓW KOMEDIOWYCH (Streszczenie) Współczesny świat, zdominowany przez elektroniczne środki przekazu, to już zupełnie inne pojmowanie komunikacji językowej, zarówno tej w formie pisanej, jak i mówionej. Dominują w nim skrótowe i kompaktowe wypowiedzi; język z jednej strony traci na znaczeniu, z drugiej zaś chłonie nowinki z innych systemów językowych, z którymi wchodzi w interakcje na różnych płaszczyznach. Niewątpliwe ogromną rolę odgrywają w tym procesie różnice kulturowe i związane z tym nie tylko kwestie mentalności, stereotypy, lecz także odmienne pojmowanie zjawisk dnia codziennego, w tym również sposób definiowania poczucia humoru. Ciekawą rzeczą jest więc próba wskazania na podobieństwa oraz różnice między tzw. „typowo niemieckim" poczuciem humoru a niemieckim programem komediowym Was guckst du?, produkowanym i prowadzonym przez obcokrajowca. Kaya Yanar, autor i gospodarz tego programu, jest niewątpliwie najlepszym przykładem na to, że wymienione wcześniej „typowo niemieckie" poczucie humoru odbiega w znacznym stopniu od rodzaju żartu, proponowanego właśnie przez Yanara. Was guckst du? daje możliwość zanalizowania języka audycji komediowej, odwołującej się głównie do kultury świata arabskiego i wszelkich zjawisk z nią związanych, kwestii opanowania i posługiwania się językiem niemieckim właśnie przez obcokrajowców z tego kręgu kulturowego. W przełożeniu na leksykę i jej użycie w praktyce oznacza to wykorzystanie w programie zjawiska wieloznaczności, wynikających z braku znajomości języka, jako źródła sytuacji komediowych, które w połączeniu z niezwykle barwną osobą prowadzącego, odpowiednim obrazem, charakterem postaci oraz motywami muzycznymi, jest punktem wyjścia do całościowej analizy tegoż programu.

This is the final draft of an article published in the European Journal of Philosophy 23 (2015), 87-110. Please cite the published version, available at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ejop.12064/abstract, which differs in the standard ways (formatting, pagination, small grammatical corrections, etc.) from the draft. KANT AND THE DISCIPLINE OF REASON Brian A. Chance Abstract: Kant's notion of 'discipline' has received considerable attention from scholars of his philosophy of education, but its role in his theoretical philosophy has been largely ignored. This omission is surprising since his discussion of discipline in the first Critique is not only more extensive and expansive in scope than his other discussions but also predates them. The goal of this essay is to provide a comprehensive reading of the Discipline that emphasizes its systematic importance in the first Critique. I argue that its goal is to establish a set of rules for the use of pure reason that, if followed, will mitigate and perhaps even eliminate our tendency to make judgments about supersensible objects. Since Kant's justification for these rules relies crucially on claims he has defended in the Doctrine of Elements, I argue further that, far from being a dispensable part of the Critique as commentators have tended to claim, the Discipline is in fact the culmination of Kant's critique of metaphysics. Kant's notion of discipline has been frequently discussed in connection with his views on education, but it has seldom been noted that this notion also plays an important role in his theoretical philosophy.1 This omission is surprising, not only because Kant's discussion of discipline in the Critique of Pure Reason is extensive but also because it predates his discussions of discipline the Lectures on Pedagogy as well as his more scattered remarks about discipline in the Collins and Vigilantius lectures on moral philosophy, Critique of the Power of Judgment, Metaphysics of Morals, and Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View. Indeed, if we are to give priority to any of Kant's discussions of discipline, it should be to his discussion in the first Critique, which covers nearly one hundred pages of the Academy Edition and ranges over topics as diverse as philosophical and mathematical cognition, freedom of speech, education, skepticism, the legitimate use of hypotheses, and the method of proof underlying Kant's celebrated arguments in the Doctrine of Elements. This discussion comprises the first chapter of the Doctrine of Method, 'The Discipline of Pure Reason'.2 2 The goal of this essay is to provide a comprehensive reading of the Discipline that emphasizes its systematic importance in the first Critique. In doing so, I shall be cutting against the grain of Kant interpretation which from Kemp Smith onwards has tended to regard the Doctrine of Method and, hence, the Discipline as a dispensable part of the Critique.3 In brief, the reading I will defend is that the goal of the Discipline is to establish a set of rules for the use of pure reason that, if followed, will mitigate and perhaps even eliminate our tendency to make judgments about supersensible objects. Like Descartes' Regulae, then, the Discipline introduces us to a number of habits of mind that Kant believes are advantageous to inquiry. But while Descartes believes that his rules constitute a method for discovering truth, Kant believes that his are merely a means for avoiding a certain kind of error, namely the error or 'deception' associated with transcendental illusion. Further, since Kant's justification for these rules relies crucially on claims he has defended in the Doctrine of Elements, I argue that, far from being a dispensable part of the Critique, the Discipline is the culmination of Kant's critique of metaphysics. After introducing Kant's notion of transcendental illusion and, following Michelle Grier, elaborating on the distinction between this illusion and the deception associated with it, I proceed to examine some of the textual evidence for my primary interpretative claim: that the goal of the Discipline is to provide us with a set of rules to mitigate or eliminate this deception (section one).4 Having provided a general defense of this claim, I then formulate the specific rules Kant endorses in the Discipline, sketch his arguments for them, and indicate the ways in which these arguments rely on the results of the Doctrine of Elements (sections two and three). Finally, I briefly summarize the results of my analysis and elaborate on the reasons it should lead us to regard the Discipline as the culmination of Kant's critique of metaphysics (section four). 3 1. ILLUSION AND DECEPTION Kant introduces transcendental illusion by means of a comparison between it and two more mundane forms of illusion: empirical (or optical) illusion and logical illusion. The former are things like straight oars that look bent in the water, square towers that look round in the distance, and the change in the apparent size of the moon when it moves from the horizon upward in the night sky. The latter, which Kant also characterizes as a 'mere imitation of the form of inference', are simply mistakes in logical reasoning (A296/B353). The source of empirical illusion is external, certain facts about our environment and visual system, while the source of logical illusion is internal, our failure to follow logical rules. Further, while logical illusion can be eliminated by exercising care in judgment, empirical illusion is, in a certain sense, ineliminable. Try though we might, we cannot make the stick look straight, although we may succeed in not judging it to be so. Transcendental illusion combines elements of these other two forms of illusion. Like logical illusion, its origin is within our own minds, and in particular in the confusion of the subjective principle that reason must seek the 'unconditioned for conditioned cognitions of the understanding' with the objective principle that the unconditioned is given (A307/B365).5 The former is a claim about the nature of reason and, indeed, one that describes what Kant regards as its principal activity, while the latter is a claim about the existence of objects that allow reason to complete or fully realize this activity. But like empirical illusion, transcendental illusion is ineliminable. Just as one can learn the cause of the moon illusion without thereby eliminating the illusion itself, transcendental illusion 'does not cease even though it is uncovered and its nullity is clearly seen into by transcendental critique' (A297/B353). Further, transcendental illusion is both the origin of special metaphysics (the part of Wolffian metaphysics that deals with the 4 objects: God, the soul, and the world), insofar as it constitutes the subjective source of our ideas of these objects as well as our tendency to make knowledge claims about them, and of the regulative principles of reason, such as the principle of parsimony, that allow us to systematize our empirical knowledge of the world.6 Thus, it is fortunate that Kant consistently draws a distinction between transcendental illusion and the deception associated with it. The former, with many details omitted, is the confusion of subjective and objective principles described in the previous paragraph, while the latter is any attempt to make knowledge claims about the objects of special metaphysics, the ideas of which are a result of this confusion. Kant describes the goal of the Dialectic as an attempt to uncover 'the illusion in transcendental judgments, while at the same time protecting us from being deceived by it' (A297/B354). And when he begins his discussion of the regulative use of the ideas of reason, he emphasizes that the 'illusion' arising from this use is one that 'can be prevented from deceiving' (A644/B672). Transcendental illusion can thus be ineliminable and a source of positive regulative principles without undermining the success of Kant's critique of metaphysics, for eliminating the deception, not the illusion itself, is what is essential to this critique. How, then, is this deception supposed to be eliminated? There can be no doubt that part of the work is done by the analysis of the dialectical inferences of reason in Book Two of the Dialectic, for it is here that Kant identifies the mistakes that give the arguments of German special metaphysics the appearance of legitimacy. But this task cannot be completed in the Dialectic since Kant makes clear that merely identifying the cause of transcendental illusion is not enough to prevent us from being deceived by it. The 'natural and unavoidable dialectic of pure reason,' he emphasizes, is such that 'even after we have exposed the mirage it will not cease 5 to lead our reason on with false hopes, continually propelling it into momentary aberrations that always need to be removed' (A297/B354).7 Thus, even if we accept the Dialectic's analysis of the cause of transcendental illusion, we will still find ourselves tempted to make precisely the kinds of claims about supersensible objects that constitute the most celebrated part of the metaphysical view Kant means to overturn. It is the Discipline that, I suggest, completes the work of eliminating transcendental deception begun in the Dialectic. Kant begins the Discipline with a general description of what he calls 'negative judgments'. These are judgments about the limitations of our cognitive abilities, and Kant emphasizes that their sole purpose is to prevent error (A709/B737). In contexts where error is unlikely, negative judgments are moot, 'like the proposition of the scholastic orator that Alexander could not have conquered any lands without an army' (A709/B737). But in contexts where error is likely, these judgments are not only important but more important than judgments that increase our knowledge. And the need for negative judgments is particularly acute in the field of metaphysics: [...] where the limits of our possible cognition are very narrow, where the temptation to judge is great, where the illusion that presents itself is very deceptive, and where the disadvantage of error is very serious, there the negative in instruction, which serves merely to defend us from errors, is more important than many a positive teaching by means of which our cognition could be augmented. (A709/B737) Since sole purpose of negative judgments is to prevent error, the task of the Discipline can only be to eliminate the deception associated with transcendental illusion. Kant's subsequent characterization of discipline only bolsters this conclusion. Discipline is the 'compulsion through which the constant propensity to stray from certain rules is limited and finally eradicated' (A709/B737). This is a general characterization and can certainly be applied to things other than reason.8 But if we take it as a characterization of the discipline of reason, as Kant encourages us to do, the 'certain rules' referred to can only be the prohibition 6 against the use of the categories to cognize the supersensible that Kant attempts to establish in the Doctrine of Elements, and the 'constant propensity' to stray from these rules can only be the temptation to use the categories in this prohibited way brought about by transcendental illusion.9 To limit or eliminate this propensity, then, is equivalent to limiting or eliminating transcendental deception. But as I have already suggested, the fact that eliminating transcendental deception is the primary goal of the Discipline does not imply that the other parts of the Critique make no contribution to this goal. Indeed, Kant emphasizes that the Doctrine of Elements has already disciplined pure reason with regard to its 'content' and that the task of the Discipline is to discipline pure reason with regard to its 'method' (A712/B740). Disciplining the content of pure reason, I suggest, amounts to establishing that pure reason is not a source of speculative cognition at all or, as Kant puts it in the opening of the Canon, that it 'accomplishes nothing in its pure use' (A795/B823). Understood in this way, Kant's comment suggests that one way the Doctrine of Elements contributes to the elimination of transcendental deception is that each of its parts (the Aesthetic, Analytic, and Dialectic) helps to establish this claim. In the next section of this essay, I will argue that another way the Doctrine of Elements contributes to the elimination of transcendental deception is that Kant appeals to its results in order to justify the rules restricting the use of pure reason he introduces in the Discipline. For the moment, however, I want to establish that this strategy of appealing to the prior results of the Critique to justify rules for the use of reason is consistent with the goal of the Method. This goal, as Kant describes it, is to 'accomplish, in a transcendental respect, that which, under the name of practical logic [...] the schools sought but accomplished only badly' (A708/B735). Just as the Doctrine of Elements is intended to provide the transcendental counterpart to general logic, then, 7 Kant intends the Doctrine of Method to provide the transcendental counterpart to practical logic.10 According to the tradition of logic with which Kant was familiar, practical logic is the aspect of logic that addresses 'the particular ways in which the rules of learned cognition and learned presentation are applied' (17:72-3).11 The goal of the Method is thus to apply the main results of the Doctrine of Elements, and combating transcendental deception, what I have argued is the goal of the Discipline, is one natural way to apply these results.12 2. RULES FOR THE DISCIPLINE OF PURE REASON Armed with an understanding of the goal of the Discipline, we can now ask how Kant goes about accomplishing it. In the remainder of this section, I hope to show that Kant's strategy is to provide a defense of four rules for the use of pure reason that, if followed, will mitigate and potentially eliminate the misuse of reason brought about by transcendental illusion. They are: 1. Pure reason should not use the mathematical method because philosophy does not contain the elements required for this method: definitions, axioms, and demonstrations. 2. Pure reason has no legitimate skeptical use. That is, it should not be used to eliminate metaphysical conflicts simply by opposing arguments to each other or by showing that particular attempts at rational cognition fail. 3. Hypotheses about supersensible objects should not be used as explanatory devices in science or common sense judgments about the world, and their only permissible use is as a means to undermine dogmatic claims about supersensible objects. 4. Any attempt to establish rational cognition of supersensible objects must adhere to the rules of transcendental proof. And when these rules are understood, we learn that there can be no such cognition. Kant never formulates these rules as explicitly as I have done, but each expresses the main conclusion of one of the four sections of the Discipline. And as we proceed, I will quote the places in the text where Kant's formulations come closest to the ones I have provided. Since Kant's defense of the second rule is more difficult to piece together than the other three, I will 8 postpone discussion of it until the next section. In the remainder of this section, I will examine his defenses of rules 1, 3 and 4, indicating the ways in which they rely on the results of the Doctrine of Elements. Rule 1: Kant begins the first section of the Discipline, 'The discipline of pure reason in dogmatic use', by returning to the main issue of the Dialectic, the possibility of rational cognition of supersensible objects, and introducing a new explanation of our belief that such cognition is possible. Instead of emphasizing transcendental illusion's role in the formation of this belief as he did in the Dialectic, Kant now suggests that the success of mathematics gives us another reason to think that, contrary to the results of the Doctrine of Elements, cognition of supersensible objects may be possible. Specifically, Kant suggests that our ability to determine mathematical truths with certainty leads us to hope that reason can apply the method of mathematics with equal success to the questions of special metaphysics: Mathematics gives the most resplendent example of pure reason happily expanding itself without assistance from experience. Examples are contagious, especially for the same faculty, which naturally flatters itself that it will have the same good fortune in other cases that it has had in one. Hence pure reason hopes to be able to expand itself in as happy and well grounded a way in its transcendental use as it succeeded in doing in its mathematical use, by applying the same method in the former case that was of such evident certainty in the latter. It is therefore very important for us to know whether the method for obtaining apodictic certainty that one calls mathematical in the latter science is identical with that by means of which one seeks the same certainty in philosophy, and that would there have to be called dogmatic. (A713/B741) The belief that the mathematical method could be successfully applied in philosophy was, of course, a central tenet of German rationalism.13 So Kant's argument that it cannot addresses a natural response to his criticisms of traditional metaphysics in the Critique.14 After formulating the problem he will address, Kant next elaborates on the differences between philosophical and mathematical cognition. The former is 'rational cognition from concepts', while the latter is rational cognition 'from the construction of concepts' 9 (A713/B741). Further, to construct a concept according to Kant is 'to exhibit a priori the intuition corresponding to it' or, in slightly less Kantian terms, to construct a figure in intuition that expresses the content of the concept (ibid).15 Both philosophical and mathematical cognition are rational in the sense that each is guided by reason, both in its capacity as the faculty of mediate inference as in its regulative use.16 However, despite the fact that the phrase 'rational cognition from concepts' might lead one to believe that Kant is describing philosophical cognition sensu his rationalist opponents, Kant is clear that this distinction is to be understood as one within his own theory of cognition. In a subsequent passage, he emphasizes that both mathematical and philosophical cognition have an essential relation to intuition.17 It is thus the suitability of the mathematical method to Kant's own account of philosophical cognition that is at issue in the first section of the Discipline. The distinction between philosophical and mathematical cognition, for which I have provided only the barest of sketches, sets the stage for the main argument in section one, namely that the mathematical method is not suited for philosophical investigation and, in particular, for the investigations into supersensible objects that claim to proceed by means of pure reason alone. That is, although Kant frames his argument in terms of philosophical cognition in general, his primary aim is to show that the mathematical method is not suited to the kinds of arguments examined in the Dialectic. Thus, he comments that his argument is necessary because pure reason hopes that 'it can stave off having to give up entirely the effort to get beyond the bounds of experience into the charming regions of the intellectual' despite Kant's previous efforts to determine its bounds (A726/B754). Further, at the close of the argument I am about to consider, Kant emphasizes that it shows the mathematical method is not suited to philosophy and that this is especially true 'in the field of pure reason' (A735/B763). Given that the goal of the Discipline 10 is, as I have argued, to provide us with restrictions on the use of pure reason that have the potential to eliminate transcendental deception, this emphasis on the consequences of Kant's argument for pure reason is exactly what we should expect. Kant's argument proceeds in four steps. Since the mathematical method asks us to prove propositions by using definitions, axioms, and demonstrations, Kant will show that 'none of these elements, in the sense in which the mathematician takes them, can be achieved or imitated by philosophy' (steps 1-3) and that philosophy therefore cannot use the mathematical method (step 4) (A727/B755). Although Kant has previously discussed definitions in the Analytic, his characterization of definition in the Discipline bears little resemblance to his earlier treatment and is largely independent of his claims about the differences between mathematical and philosophical cognition.18 But his characterizations of mathematical axioms and demonstrations rely heavily on these differences as well as the distinction between mathematical and dynamical principles of pure understanding introduced in the second chapter of the Analytic of Principles. As a result, the conclusions of the second and third steps of Kant's argument follow without much argument from the initial characterizations Kant gives. Given that the task of the Doctrine of Method is to apply the results of the Doctrine of Elements, this too is exactly what we should expect. To define according to Kant is 'to exhibit originally the exhaustive concept of a thing within its boundaries' (A727/B755). 'Exhaustive' (ausführlich) is a term from Wolffian logic. A concept is exhaustive when it contains enough marks or predicates for us to always recognize the objects that fall under it and never confuse them with others. Meier illustrates this distinction in the following way. The concept of the color red is an exhaustive concept since someone possessing it will always be able to identify instances of red and not confuse them with instances 11 of other colors, say blue. But if we can only taste that a wine is red but not that it is a cabernet, merlot or some other kind of red wine, then our concepts of these kinds of wines are not exhaustive.19 Kant's own use of 'exhaustive' varies slightly from Meier's. But he means to characterize definitions as exhaustive in Meier's sense when he writes that '[e]xhaustiveness signifies the clarity and sufficiency of marks' and that 'boundaries [signify] the precision [of marks], that is, that there are no more of these than are required for the exhaustive concept' (ibid). What makes a definition 'original', however, is that the determination of the marks that make it exhaustive 'is not derived from anywhere else and thus [not] in need of proof' (ibid). A definition is thus a particular kind of exhaustive concept, namely one in which it is in some sense self-evident that the marks it contains are sufficient for identifying the objects that are supposed to fall under it. Kant's (and my) gloss on the originality of a concept is, admittedly, somewhat thin. But his argument that philosophy has no definitions in the mathematical sense does not rely on their originality but on their exhaustiveness.20 Suppose that I know the definition of something and you want to know it as well. Suppose also that I am not willing to simply tell you the definition but only to tell you whether a particular mark is part of it or not. While you would surely be able to identify a number of the marks in the definition and could, in principle, identify all of them, you would have no guarantee that you had identified them all without knowing how many marks were in the definition to begin with. At best, you could say that it was highly probable but not certain that you had identified them all. Kant believes we are in a similar situation with regard to all concepts that are 'given a priori' (A728/B756).21 Although these concepts are given to us a priori, they are given 'confusedly'. That is, we are aware of them and able to apply them but do not have a distinct 12 conception of all their constituent marks. And while we can make these concepts more distinct by identifying objects that fall under them and asking ourselves in virtue of what properties they do, we can never be certain that we have identified all of the marks of the concept, much less that we have identified all and only those marks that would allow us to always identify the objects falling under it. As a result, the most we can say is that it is highly probable but not certain that we have identified the marks that would make our concept exhaustive and thus, apart from the question of its originality, capable of being a definition. Kant puts this argument in the following way: For I can never be certain that the distinct representation of a (still confusedly) given concept has been exhaustively developed unless I know that it is adequate to the object. But since the concept of the latter, as it [i.e. the concept] is given, can contain many obscure representations, which we pass by in our analysis though we always use them in application, the exhaustiveness of the analysis of my concept is always doubtful, and by many appropriate examples can only be made probable but never apodictically certain. (A728/B756) In order to emphasize the possibility that our analysis of an a priori concept may always be incomplete, Kant prefers to call this analysis the exposition of concepts rather than the definition. I now turn to Kant's characterizations of axioms and demonstrations, the second and third steps of his argument. The first are 'immediately certain' synthetic a priori principles, and the second are 'intuitive' apodictic proofs (A732-4/B760-2). The idea of a principle that is both synthetic a priori and immediate or of a proof that is intuitive might be thought to point to an obvious explanation of why axioms and demonstrations so understood are not part of philosophy. In particular, it might seem that axioms and demonstrations as Kant here characterizes them are inconsistent with the dependency of our cognition on concepts and intuitions. Since Kant is operating within the confines of his account of cognition, however, this explanation cannot be the right one. Rather, Kant is tacitly invoking the distinction between mathematical and dynamical principles introduced in the second chapter of the Analytic. Here he distinguishes 13 between mathematical principles that pertain 'merely to intuition' and dynamical principles that pertain 'to the existence of an appearance in general' (A160/B199). While both kinds of principles are necessary, Kant claims that mathematical principles are 'unconditionally necessary' and thus 'apodictic' but that dynamical principles are necessary 'only under the condition of empirical thinking in experience' and thus 'only mediately and indirectly' (ibid). Moreover, mathematical principles are capable of 'intuitive certainty', while dynamical principles are 'capable only of a discursive certainty' (A162/B201). Axioms and demonstrations cannot be part of philosophy, then, because philosophical cognition does not have the immediacy and intuitive certainty that characterizes mathematical cognition. Having argued that definitions, axioms, and demonstrations cannot be found in philosophy, Kant concludes his justification for Rule 1 as follows: Now from all of this it follows that it is not suited to the nature of philosophy, especially in the field of pure reason, to strut about with a dogmatic gait and to decorate itself with the titles and ribbons of mathematics, to whose ranks philosophy does not belong, although it has every cause to hope for a sisterly union with it. (A735/B763, my emphasis) As I have suggested, Kant's emphasis on the implications of his argument for pure reason is consistent with the Discipline's aim of providing us with a set of rules to limit or eliminate transcendental deception. Rule 3: Kant begins section three of the Discipline, 'The discipline of pure reason with regard to hypotheses', with a rhetorical question. If we accept the main results of the Critique and agree that pure reason is capable of no cognition whatsoever in its speculative use, does it not follow that we can at least hypothesize the existence of supersensible objects as a means to explain certain facts about the world or lend support to our theories of nature (A769/B797)? As one might expect, Kant's answer to this question is 'no'. The details of this answer constitute his 14 defense of the third of the four rules outlined at the beginning of this section. And like his defense of Rule 1, his defense of Rule 3 draws on important arguments from the Doctrine of Elements, in this case, the distinction between real and logical possibility introduced in the second and third chapter of the Analytic of Principles.22 Kant begins by outlining two criteria for a hypothesis, which he understands as the supposition of the existence of some entity whose actual existence is not known. The first is that the object, the entity whose existence is hypothesized, is possible. The second is that the object 'be connected as a ground of explanation with that which is already given' (A770/B798). The first of these criteria is necessary to distinguish ideas created 'under the strict oversight of reason' from mere creations of the imagination and the second to emphasize that the value of a hypothesis is its ability to provide an explanation for something that is unknown or not sufficiently understood. But the conception of possibility Kant has in mind is not logical possibility or the mere absence of contradiction in the concept of the object whose existence one would hypothesize but real possibility or the agreement of the concept 'with the formal conditions of experience in general' (A220/B268). In order for an object to be a real possibility, then, it must be an object of possible experience; that is, it must be an object in space and time with an extensive and intensive magnitude that is subject to the Analogies of Experience. As Kant puts it: 'In a word: it is only possible for our reason to use the conditions of possible experience as conditions of the possibility of things' (A771/B799). On the basis of this initial characterization of a hypothesis, Kant then argues that there can be no legitimate 'transcendental hypotheses' or suppositions about the existence of supersensible objects. Since we have no knowledge whatsoever of supersensible objects, no supposition of the existence of such an object will be able to provide a 'ground of explanation' 15 for something 'already given' in experience. And without being able to fill this explanatory role even in principle, such a supposition would fail to be a genuine hypothesis. As Kant puts it: A transcendental hypothesis, in which a mere idea of reason would be used for the explanation of things in nature, would thus be no explanation at all, since that which one does not adequately understand on the basis of known empirical principles would be explained by means of something about which one understands nothing at all. (A772/B800) But in addition to not being genuine hypotheses that help us understand nature, Kant argues that transcendental hypotheses are also harmful to the development of our knowledge. In particular, he argues that they discourage inquiry by giving those who resort to them the mistaken impression that they have actually understood the phenomenon they are investigating. And it is for both of these reasons that Kant concludes: 'Transcendental hypotheses of the speculative use of reason and a freedom to make good the lack of physical grounds of explanation by using all sorts of hyperphysical ones can never be permitted at all' (A773/B801). Despite the fact that they cannot be used to establish any claim, transcendental hypotheses do have what Kant calls a 'polemical' or 'defensive' use (A776/B804). That is, they can be used to argue against dogmatic claims about supersensible objects by showing that anyone making these claims is unable to exclude various possibilities that are incompatible with their claims. Thus, if someone asserts dogmatically that the soul cannot be immaterial because 'experience seems to prove that the elevation and derangement of our mental powers are merely different modifications of our organs', Kant suggests that we could weaken this argument by hypothesizing 'that our body is nothing but the fundamental appearance to which the entire faculty of sensibility and therewith all thinking are related, as their condition, in our present state (of life)' and that '[s]eparation from our body would be the end of this sensible use [...] and the beginning of the intellectual' (A778/B806). Of course, this hypothesis is not something that 16 could be proven or even something that Kant, when he is being more precise, would want to call a genuine hypothesis. But it undermines the dogmatic assertion that the soul is material because it presents a logical possibility that, because no one is really in a position to know anything about the soul, the person making this dogmatic claim cannot exclude. This polemical use of transcendental hypotheses could just as easily be used to undermine dogmatic assertions of the claims of special metaphysics as to undermine their denials. But it is the use of reason to combat the latter that is Kant's focus. Thus, in his elaboration on the polemical use of reason, he emphasizes that this use of reason will frustrate 'the opponent's illusory insights, which would demolish our own asserted propositions' (A776/B804). What are these propositions that Kant suggests both he and his reader assert? They cannot be the denials of the claims of special metaphysics, but neither can they be the assertions of these claims since our ability to assert both has been undermined by the arguments of the Doctrine of Elements. Rather, Kant suggests that they are the assertions of these claims on practical grounds. After commenting that speculative reason favors neither the assertion nor the denial of these claims, he gestures toward the arguments of the Canon: In will be shown in what follows, however, that in regard to its practical use reason still has the right to assume something which it would in no way be warranted in presupposing in the field of mere speculation without sufficient grounds of proof; for all such presuppositions injure the perfection of speculation, about which, however, the practical interest does not trouble itself at all. (A776/B804) And it is in defense of these claims that Kant believes the polemical use of transcendental hypotheses has its greatest use. The passage continues as follows: There it thus has a possession the legitimacy of which need not be proved, and the proof of which it could not in fact give. The opponent should therefore prove. But since he no more knows something about the object that is doubted that would establish its non-being than does the former, who asserts its actuality, here an advantage on the side of he who asserts something as a practically necessary proposition (melior est condition possidentis) is revealed. He is, namely, free to use, as it were in an emergency, the very same means 17 for his good cause as his opponent would use against it, i.e. to use the hypotheses that do not serve to strengthen the proof of it but serve only to show that the opponent understands far too little about the object of the dispute to be able to flatter himself with an advantage in speculative insight over us. (A776-7/B804-5) The polemical use of reason can therefore play an important role in defending the practical claims of reason by reminding us that any speculative denial of those claims is on shaky ground. For this reason, Kant ends his discussion of the practical claims of reason with the clearest formulation of Rule 3 found in this section: 'Hypotheses are therefore allowed in the field of pure reason only as weapons of war, not for grounding a right but only for defending it' (A777/B805). Rule 4: The fourth section of the Discipline, 'The discipline of pure reason in regard to its proofs', explicitly formulates the rules for the proofs of synthetic a priori philosophical propositions that Kant has used implicitly throughout the Critique and evaluates pure reason's ability to use these 'transcendental proofs' to gain knowledge of supersensible objects.23 More specifically, Kant argues that any attempt to cognize objects through pure reason should follow these rules but that actually attempting to do so reveals quite quickly that this kind of cognition is impossible. The final section of the Discipline is thus the counterpart to Kant's discussion of the mathematical method in section one. Just as he there argued that the mathematical method could not be used to acquire knowledge of the objects of special metaphysics because the differences between mathematical and philosophical cognition make the use of this method in philosophy impossible, Kant here argues that the method he believes actually underlies philosophical cognition and has tacitly supposed throughout the Critique cannot be used to acquire this kind of knowledge either. As a result, pure reason is left without any method for its speculative use. And this is perhaps the best argument of all that its legitimate uses can only be regulative and practical. 18 According to Kant, the method of transcendental proof has three rules. The first is that one should not attempt to prove a synthetic a priori proposition 'without having first considered whence one can justifiably derive the principles on which one intends to build and with what right one can expect success in inferences from them' (A786/B814). The second is that there can be only one proof for each synthetic a priori proposition (A787/B815). And the third is that these proofs must be direct or 'ostensive' and not indirect or 'apagogic' (A789/B817). The result of a sincere attempt to use these rules to guide our attempts to acquire cognition through pure reason is, Kant believes, the realization that this cognition is impossible. Consider the first of these rules. Determining 'whence one can justifiably derive the principles' one wants and the right to expect successful inferences when using them amounts to determining the source of the principles one wants to use in the proof and their proper domain of application. But Kant has already shown in the Analytic that the principles of the understanding-the Axioms, Anticipations, Analogies, and Postulates-are valid only for objects of possible experience and thus that these principles cannot ground any synthetic a priori cognition through pure reason. And he has shown in the Dialectic that the ideas of reason have no objective validity at all, so they are equally unsuited to ground any cognition through pure reason (A786/B814). Hence, there is no source in either reason or the understanding for principles that would support claims about supersensible objects and thus no basis for a transcendental proof from pure reason. The situation is similar with the second and third rules of transcendental proof. Regarding the second rule, Kant does not attempt to show that there cannot be just one proof for any putative synthetic a priori proposition from pure reason. Instead, he merely comments that those 19 who claim that there are in fact proofs of such principles typically offer many proofs for each principle: Where reason would conduct its business through pure concepts, only a single proof is possible if any proof is possible at all. Thus if one sees the dogmatist step forth with ten proofs, one can be sure that he has none at all. For if he had one that proved apodictically (as must be the case in matters of pure reason), for what would he need the rest? His intention is only that of every parliamentary advocate: one argument for this one, another for that, in order to take advantage of the weakness of his judges who [...] just grasp the first argument that occurs to them and decide accordingly. (A789/B817) Kant need not argue that the second of the three rules of transcendental proof cannot be used for proofs of pure reason, then, because his opponents have consistently failed to adhere to it.24 And regarding the third rule, he argues that any attempt to prove a pure rational principle directly will fail because, as we saw in the previous paragraph, the only principles that are objectively valid at all and thus suitable for inclusion in a proof are the principles of the understanding, and they are valid only for objects of possible experience. Consequently, any attempt to give a direct proof of any claim of special metaphysics will serve only to reveal 'dogmatic illusion, and compel pure reason to surrender its exaggerated pretensions in its speculative use, and to draw back within the boundaries of its proper territory, namely practical principles' (A794/B822). 3. THE 'SKEPTICAL USE' OF PURE REASON As I suggested at the beginning of the previous section, Kant's defense of the claim that pure reason has no skeptical use is more difficult to piece together than his defenses of the other rules established in the Discipline. This difficulty arises in part because Kant is not clear about what the 'skeptical use' of pure reason is and in part because he presents his argument that there is no such use in the context of an explicit critique of David Hume. What begins as an attempt to accomplish the fairly circumscribed task of establishing Rule 2 quickly turns into an extended comparison of Hume's approach to the critique of metaphysics with Kant's own.25 20 As Kant initially describes it, the skeptical use of reason is identical to an approach to the critique of metaphysics that combats our tendency to make claims about supersensible objects by identifying equally compelling arguments for contradictory claims about these objects, which Kant elsewhere calls the 'skeptical method' (A424/B451). As I have argued elsewhere, Kant associates this method with Hume and even endorsed its use during a period in the 1770's before deciding that it could play only a preparatory role in his mature critique of metaphysics.26 When Kant illustrates Hume's reliance on the skeptical use of reason, however, it is Hume's account of causation not the skeptical method that is his focus. Thus, what Kant conceives of as the skeptical use of reason appears to be a general approach to the elimination of our tendency to make claims about supersensible objects that includes the skeptical method as a component but is also exemplified by at least some aspects of Hume's account of causation. The skeptical use of pure reason is not the only subject Kant addresses in the second section of the Discipline, however. As its title suggests, Kant begins this section by discussing the 'polemical' use of pure reason. This use, which Kant describes as 'the defense of its [i.e. reason's] propositions against dogmatic denials of them' is essentially the same as the polemical or defensive use of hypotheses discussed in the previous section. In contrast to his treatment of the polemical use of hypotheses in section three of the Discipline, however, Kant here suggests that all dogmatic claims and not just those that would pose a threat to the claims of the Canon should be treated polemically. Kant encourages freedom in the polemical use of reason because he believes that questioning all dogmatic claims is an essential part of the development of reason (A744/B772).27 But in a separately titled part of section two, 'On the impossibility of a skeptical satisfaction of pure reason that it is divided against itself', Kant also distinguishes the polemical use of reason from its skeptical use. And it is here that he attempts to justify his claim, 21 announced at the close of the first part of this section, that there is 'no permissible skeptical use of pure reason' (A756/B784). Kant's initial description of the skeptical use of reason makes clear that the skeptical method is an example of this use. In his initial discussion of it, Kant describes this method as 'the method of watching or even occasioning disputes, not in order to decide it to the advantage of one party or another, but to investigate whether the object of the dispute is not perhaps a mere mirage at which each would snatch in vain' (A422/B451). Similarly, the skeptical use of reason asks us to 'set the boasting of one side against another, which stands on the same rights' (A757/B785). And like the skeptical method, Kant believes that the skeptical use of reason can play a preparatory role in the critical philosophy by, as it were, softening our dogmatic inclinations and making us more receptive to critique. But in the same passage in which he acknowledges that the skeptical use of reason can 'shock reason [...] into raising some doubt about its pretensions and giving a hearing to the critique', he also insists: But for reason to leave just these doubts standing, and to set out to recommend the conviction and confession of its ignorance, not merely as a cure for dogmatic self-conceit but also as the way in which to end the conflict of reason with itself, is an entirely vain attempt, by no means suitable for arranging a peaceful retirement for reason; rather it is at best only a means for awaking it from its sweet dogmatic dreams in order to undertake a more careful examination of its condition. (A757/B785) When he claims that there is 'no permissible skeptical use of pure reason', then, at least one thing Kant means is that letting reason use the skeptical method to examine conflicting claims about supersensible objects is an ineffective way to end these conflicts. Merely reflecting on the fact that there are equally compelling arguments for conflicting claims in the field of speculative philosophy or on the individual arguments themselves is not enough to show us that supersensible objects cannot be objects of cognition and therefore not enough to persuade us to 22 limit our reflections to the narrow bounds that Kant outlines in the Doctrine of Elements. In the above passage, then, Kant is explicitly contrasting his approach to the elimination of these conflicts, the discipline of reason, with the skeptical method. But since there are many philosophers-most notably Hume-who believe that 'this skeptical manner of withdrawing from a tedious quarrel of reason' is a shortcut 'for arriving at an enduring philosophical tranquility', Kant introduces his discussion of the impossibility of a 'skeptical satisfaction of pure reason' by commenting that the popularity of the skeptical approach makes it 'necessary to exhibit this manner of thought in its true light' (A757/B785). But as I have said, the focus of Kant's explicit discussion of Hume's views is his account of causation. And it is this account that he connects with Hume's attempt to eliminate the deception brought about by transcendental illusion: The famous David Hume was one of these geographers of human reason, who took himself to have satisfactorily disposed of these questions [of pure reason] by having expelled them outside the horizon of human reason, which however he could not determine. He dwelt primarily on the principle of causality, and quite rightly remarked about that that one could not base its truth (indeed not even the objective validity of the concept of an efficient cause in general) on any insight at all, i.e. a priori cognition, and thus that the authority of this law is not constituted in the least by its necessity, but only by its merely general usefulness in the course of experience and a subjective necessity arising therefrom, which he called custom. Now from the incapacity of reason in general to make use of this principle that goes beyond all experience, he inferred the nullity of all pretensions of reason in general to go beyond the empirical. (A760/B789) In this passage, Kant directly links Hume's argument that reason is not the source of our causal inferences with the elimination of the claims about supersensible objects that reason forces on us and thus with the elimination of transcendental deception. In particular, he suggests that this argument allows Hume to conclude that reason can give us no knowledge of anything beyond the bounds of experience and thus no knowledge of any supersensible object. In his subsequent discussion, Kant then elaborates on why, despite these conclusions, Hume's argument fails to 23 eliminate this deception. And it is here that he presents one of two arguments against the skeptical use of reason. Kant describes Hume's attempt to eliminate transcendental deception as the 'censorship of reason' or the process of 'subjecting the facta of reason to examination and where necessary to blame' (A760/B780). The choice of the term 'facta' is somewhat puzzling, but the most plausible way to interpret Kant's reference to the 'facta of reason' is as reference to the activities of reason or, more precisely, to individual attempts to cognize objects through reason. This interpretation is not only compatible with the literal meaning of facta but also with Kant's discussion of the censorship of reason in the introduction to the Discipline, the only other place the topic is addressed in the Critique.28 There he writes that the 'individual errors [of reason] can be eliminated through censure' but that their causes can only be eliminated 'through critique' (A711/B739). Kant's characterization of Hume's approach as the censorship of reason in the passage from A760/B780 thus implicitly contrasts this approach with the approach of the Critique. This implicit contrast is quickly made explicit. For while Kant says that it is 'beyond doubt' that the censorship of reason 'inevitably leads to doubt about all transcendent use of principles', he insists that only a critique of pure reason can conclusively establish the illegitimacy of all transcendent use of principles. Such a critique does not subject the facta of reason to examination but 'reason itself, as concerns its entire capacity and suitability for pure a priori cognitions', and only it is capable of establishing our ignorance 'in regard to all possible questions of a certain sort' as opposed to merely establishing the inadequacy of particular answers to particular questions concerning the existence or nature of some supersensible object (A761/B789). In the most detailed discussion of Hume found in either edition of the Critique, 24 then, Kant suggests that his entire critique of the faculty of reason, including the arguments of the Discipline, is an attempt to end the conflicts of metaphysics that Hume could not. But what exactly is the nature of Kant's criticism? Why is examining the facta of reason not enough to eliminate transcendental deception? Kant's answer is remarkably Humean in spirit. For what he claims is that examining individual attempts to cognize supersensible objects through reason cannot warrant the conclusion that reason can never be the source of such cognition. As Kant puts it: All failed dogmatic attempts of reason are facta, which it is always useful to subject to censure. But this cannot decide anything about reason's expectations of hoping for better success in its future efforts and making claims to that; mere censure can therefore never bring to an end the controversy about what is lawful in human reason. (A764/B792) What Kant has done, then, is turn the nub of Hume's problem of induction against him. Just as Hume insists that our knowledge of causal relations cannot be founded on reason because we can provide no non-circular argument for the principle that the future will resemble the past, Kant insists that our knowledge-however extensive-of reason's past inability to cognize supersensible objects does not warrant the conclusion that reason's future attempts will be equally unsuccessful. And without this assurance that reason's future actions will resemble its past ones, '[Hume] is doubted, for his objections rest only on facta, which are contingent, but not on principles that could effect a necessary renunciation of the right to dogmatic assertions' (A767-8/B795-6). This is all Kant says about Hume's examination of the facta of reason. And one wishes he had said more. To be sure, Hume does argue in a manner like that suggested by Kant in the first part of Section IV of the Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding when he attempts to show that experience not reason is the source of our knowledge of causal relationships. For Hume's strategy there is to ask us to imagine various cases (e.g. the biblical Adam's first 25 encounter with water or fire) in which experience not reason is the source of our knowledge of the causal properties of particular objects. But it is more difficult to understand why Hume's examination of the problem of induction should be thought of as an examination of the facta of reason since it attempts to show that reason is not the source of our conclusions from experience not by examining individual actions of reason but by establishing the general claim that there is no non-circular argument for the claim that the future will resemble the past. And since the conclusion of the problem of induction makes room for the development of Hume's alternative account of the concept of cause in Section VII and this account is key to his resolution of the metaphysical conflicts he considers in Sections VIII, X, and XI, we should have reservations about the force of Kant's criticism as an indictment of Hume's reliance on the skeptical use of reason.29 Fortunately, Kant also has a more general line of criticism. In particular, he argues that no merely empirical account of cognition can eliminate transcendental deception because no such account can establish that we necessarily cannot cognize any supersensible objects. This criticism is at the outset of Kant's discussion of the skeptical use of reason. And although Kant does not explicitly mention Hume here, he does develop a contrast between determining the limits of knowledge and determining their boundary that he later uses to illustrate the differences between his critique of reason and Hume's censorship of it.30 So it is safe to assume that Kant also has Hume in mind in these earlier passages. Kant begins his evaluation of the skeptical use of reason with the following claim: 'The consciousness of my ignorance (if this is not at the same time known to be necessary) should not end my enquiries, but is rather the proper cause to arouse them' (A758/B786). Here Kant states what he believes is a necessary condition for any successful attempt to eliminate transcendental 26 deception. It is not enough to show that some or all of our past or current attempts to cognize supersensible objects have failed. Rather, we must show that these objects are necessarily beyond our cognitive grasp. And one cannot establish this stronger claim empirically but only by providing a critique of reason: But that my ignorance is absolutely necessary and hence absolves me from all further investigation can never be made out empirically, from observation, but only critically by getting to the bottom of the primary sources of our cognition. Thus the determination of the boundaries of our reason can only take place in accordance with a priori grounds; its limitation, however which is a merely indeterminate cognition of an ignorance that is never completely to be lifted, can also be cognized a posteriori, through what which always remains to be known even with all knowledge. The former cognition of ignorance, which is possible only by means of the critique of reason itself, is thus science, the latter is nothing but perception, about which one cannot see how far the inference from it might reach. (A758/B786) In this passage, Kant introduces the distinction between the empirical determination of limits and the critical determination of boundaries and claims that only the latter can justify an end to our attempts to cognize supersensible objects because only the latter can show that our ignorance of objects is necessary. Kant then proceeds to illustrate the determination of limits by asking us to imagine the surface of the earth as a flat surface. If we conceive the earth in this way, we have no way to determine its size. Rather, all we can say is that wherever we go, we see a space in which we could move farther (A759/B786). For all we know, the earth might be unlimited in size, or it might end on the other side of an unexplored hill that is presently beyond our perception. All we can determine about the size of a flat earth, then, is the extent of our actual knowledge of it, and this is an example of what Kant calls the determination of limits. The determination of our actual knowledge of the earth is empirical and does not support any conclusion about how much more of the earth is or is not out there waiting to be discovered. Consequently, it cannot be used to justify an end to our investigation. 27 But if we instead imagine the surface of the earth as a sphere, we will be able to calculate the size of the entire earth from the length of even the smallest arc of this sphere. And Kant thinks of this calculation as a determination of the earth's boundary. Because it involves the use of geometry, this determination proceeds according to a priori principles. More importantly, because it assigns the earth a determinate size, determining the earth's boundary also allows us to determine the extent of our possible knowledge of the earth and in turn to show in a principled way that and where our investigations of the earth must necessarily end. As he puts it: But if I have gotten as far as knowing that the earth is a sphere and its surface the surface of a sphere, then from a small part of the latter, e.g. from the magnitude of one degree, I can cognize its diameter and, by means of this, the complete boundary, i.e. the surface of the sphere, determinately and in accordance with a priori principles; although I am ignorant in regard to the objects that this surface might contain, I am not ignorant in regard to the magnitude and limits of the domain that contains them. (A759/B787) Determining the earth's boundary is thus similar to the critique of pure reason in two important respects. Just as the former uses the a priori principles of geometry to determine the extent of our possible knowledge of the earth, the latter uses the a priori principles of the Aesthetic and Analytic to determine the extent of our possible knowledge in general. And just as the former is able to determine the proper objects of geographical inquiry, the latter is able to determine the proper objects of inquiry in general. But Hume's empirical account of cognition determines limits not boundaries. As Kant puts it, Hume 'merely limits our understanding without drawing boundaries for it' (A767/B795). In contrast to the geographer of the flat world Kant has just imagined, however, these limits are negative not positive. They are represented by claims about what we do not know and not what we do. But because they are based on empirical principles, they bring about only 'a general distrust' and 'no determinate knowledge of the ignorance that is unavoidable for us'(ibid). And as a result, Hume is unable to 'effect a necessary renunciation of the right to 28 dogmatic assertions' and the skeptical use of reason his argument embodies must be rejected (A768/B796). 4. CONCLUDING REMARKS Such, at least in outline, are the arguments by which Kant seeks to establish the four rules for the use of pure reason set out in section two of this essay. Each is an example of the 'negative in instruction' that characterizes discipline for Kant, insofar as each identifies an illegitimate use of reason and enjoins us to refrain from that use (A709/B737). Reason may not apply the mathematical method to philosophical questions in the manner of Wolff and his followers, posit supersensible entities as ultimate explanatory grounds except in a 'polemical' attempt to combat dogmatic claims about supersensible objects (especially when these consist of the denials of the claims for which Kant will provide practical arguments in the Canon), use the method of transcendental proof to cognize supersensible objects, or deploy either the skeptical method or the tactic of merely identifying the failure of particular attempts to cognize supersensible objects through pure reason as a means to combat transcendental deception. Further, since providing us with the tools to limit or eliminate this deception is what motivates Kant to introduce the rules of the Discipline, we should regard this section of the Critique as the culmination of Kant's critique of metaphysics. It is the Discipline that provides us with the tools not merely to understand the limits of knowledge outlined in the Critique but to integrate them into our thinking about ourselves and the world, and this integration is necessary if we are to complete the revolution in philosophy that Kant has started. Without them, we are left only with the account of the limits of knowledge itself and the Dialectic's analysis of the sources of transcendental illusion, and Kant is clear that these are not sufficient to prevent us from periodically falling back into dogmatism and retarding the progress of metaphysics. 29 Far from being dispensable, then, the Discipline is an essential part of Kant's attempt to achieve one of the central goals of the Critique. Of course, the Discipline cannot achieve its goal without relying on much of what has come before in the Critique. Kant directly appeals to the distinction between mathematical and dynamical principles of the pure understanding, the distinction between logical and real possibility, and the general conclusions of the Analytic and Dialectic in the course of his arguments. In fact, if the Discipline is, as I have argued, Kant's attempt to provide us with the tools to combat transcendental deception, its task presupposes the analyses of the Aesthetic, Analytic, and Dialectic. But this, I suggest, should be welcome news since it reveals systematic connections between the two most fundamental divisions of the Critique, connections that many of Kant's readers have had difficulty seeing. Finally, my analysis has revealed what for some is an unexpected connection between Kant's concerns in the Discipline and his response to Hume. The locus of this response is traditionally thought to be the Second Analogy and Kant's account of causation.31 But the contrast Kant draws in the Discipline between his 'critique' of reason and Hume's 'censor' of it suggests that the traditional view should be modified in two ways. First, it suggests that Kant's primary interest in Hume's account of causation was not in its consequences for our judgments about empirical objects but rather in its ability to undermine the kinds of metaphysical views that Kant himself targeted.32 Second, it suggests that Kant regarded the entire Critique, or at least those parts of it that are relevant to his critique of metaphysics, as part of his response to Hume since it is here that Kant attempts to make good on the project that, in Kant's view, he and Hume share while avoiding the pitfalls of Hume's own attempt. These claims require more defense than I can give them here, but they serve to underscore the importance of Kant's comments in the Discipline to an understanding of his ambitions in the Critique.33 30 Brian A. Chance Department of Philosophy University of Oklahoma USA [email protected] NOTES 1 Citations from the Critique of Pure Reason use the standard A/B format to refer to the pages of the first (A) and second (B) editions. Citations from Kant's other works use the volume number and pagination of Kant 1900-. Quotations from the Critique are taken from Kant 1997. All other translations are my own. Scholars who discuss the notion of discipline as it applies to Kant's views on education include Weisskopf 1970, Funke 1974, Munzel 1991, Louden 2000, Munzel 2003, and Wilson 2006. 2 In what follows, 'Discipline' will refer to this portion of the Critique and 'discipline' to the notion discussed therein. 3 Kemp Smith (1918: 563) writes that the 'entire teaching' of the Method 'has already been more or less exhaustively expounded in the earlier divisions of the Critique', and his discussion of the Discipline omits section three entirely and devotes only one sentence to section two. Similarly, Bird (2006: 739) writes that the Method merely 'summarizes' the work of the Doctrine of Elements and limits his discussion of the Discipline to section one. And apart from the Canon, Moore (2010: 311) regards Kant's discussion of transcendental proof as the 'really significant' contribution of the Method, which at least suggests that its other contributions are incidental. 31 Gehrhart 1998 is a notable exception to the tendency to downplay the significance of the Method. 4 See Grier 2001, Introduction, esp. 8-11 and Chapter 4, esp. 111-6 and 128-30. Note, however, that my terminology differs from Grier's. She uses the phrase 'judgmental error' to refer to the deception associated with transcendental illusion, which I will generally refer to as 'transcendental deception' or simply 'deception'. It seems to me that this terminological choice represents less of a departure from Kant's own language, since he frequently distinguishes illusion (Schein, Illusion) from deception (Betrug), but it does not reflect a departure from the substance of Grier's view on this issue. 5 Cf. A297/B353. For more discussion of reason and its search for the unconditioned, see Grier 2001: 101-142, Allison 2004: 307-332, and Rohlf 2010. I concur with Rohlf's criticisms of Allison's reconstruction of Kant's argument for transcendental illusion. 6 The dual role of transcendental illusion is emphasized by Grier (2001: 101-39, 263-301). See A652-4/B680-2 for Kant's discussion of parsimony. 7 Additional 'negative' evidence for this claim can be found at A308-9/B365-6 and A703/B731, passages that discuss the aims of the Dialectic and make no reference to transcendental deception. 8 Indeed, Kant gives similar characterizations of discipline in the Lectures on Pedagogy at 9:442 and 9:452. 9 On this reading, Kant's suggestion that our propensity to stray from these rules can be 'eliminated' appears to be in tension with his comment at A297/B354, quoted previously, that transcendental illusion 'continually' propels us into 'momentary aberrations that always need to be removed'. Perhaps the latter comment is true only of the individual whose reason has not been 32 disciplined according to the rules of the Discipline, or perhaps this tension reflects an uncertainty on Kant's part about whether transcendental deception can be eliminated or merely limited. In any event, it is clear that Kant believes transcendental illusion can at least be limited, and this is sufficient for the reading of the Discipline I am proposing. 10 For the parallel comment in the Doctrine of Elements, see A55/B80. 11 See Meier 1752. Meier's book was a standard textbook in Wolffian logic and the book Kant used in his logic lectures for over forty years. It is reprinted along with Kant's notes in volume seventeen of the Academy Edition, from which I quote. 12 This is not to say that combating transcendental deception is the only way to apply the results of the Doctrine of Elements, however. The Canon, Architectonic, and History can each be understood as applying these results in certain ways. See Rauscher 2010 for discussion of the Canon and Höffe 1998 for discussion of the Architectonic and the History. 13 See, for example, Christian Wolff 1963: §139. 14 Kant develops a second argument for this claim at A736-8/B764-6 that I will not consider. Following the suggestion of the previous quotation, this argument identifies the mathematical method with the dogmatic method and argues that pure reason contains no dogma and that reason's use of the dogmatic method is therefore per se inappropriate. 15 For a more detailed discussion of the constructability of mathematical concepts, see Lisa Shabel 2006. 16 Kant introduces the former capacity at A303/B360 and the latter at A644/B672. 17 See A720/B748. 18 For this discussion, see A240-6/B300-3. There Kant's argument is that none of the categories can be defined 'without immediately descending to the conditions of sensibility' (A241/B300). 33 In contrast, his view in the Discipline is that, even if we descend to the 'conditions of sensibility', no a priori concepts (including but not limited to the categories) can be defined. 19 See Meier 1752: §132. Cf. Wolff 2003: 129. 20 I will here ignore Kant's argument that empirical and arbitrary concepts cannot be defined in the same sense that mathematical concepts can. These arguments are interesting, but they are only of secondary importance to the conclusion this section draws about the use of pure reason. 21 The adverb 'given' is meant to contrast these a priori concepts with the a priori constructed concepts of mathematics. 22 Kant first discusses real possibility, although not under this name, in the Postulates of Empirical Thinking in General, but his explicit contrast between logical and real possibility occurs in the chapter on phenomena and noumena. In the A edition of this chapter, Kant uses the terminology of 'logical' and 'transcendental' possibility as opposed to 'logical' and 'real', but the distinction itself is the same in both editions. See A220-4/B267-72 and A244/B302. Kant also briefly mentions the distinction in the footnote at Bxxvi. 23 Kant's views in this section of the Discipline have been explored by interpreters interested in providing a characterization of transcendental arguments. See Gram 1984, Moore 2010, and the literature cited therein. 24 Admittedly, this is a weak argument since the fact that rationalist philosophers have not yet reached a consensus on the best argument for each of the cardinal doctrines of special metaphysics does not mean that they will not do so in the future. Indeed, we will see in the next section that one of Kant's criticisms of Hume turns on a similar argument. But since Kant's position is that each of these rules is necessary for a successful transcendental proof, his argument that proofs from pure reason cannot adhere to the first is already sufficient to show that 34 the transcendental method of the Critique cannot be used to establish rational knowledge of the objects of special metaphysics. 25 Kant makes clear that he regards Hume's project as first and foremost a critique of (broadly rationalist) metaphysics in a number places, among them A764/B792, 5:12-3, and the footnote at 4:259. For discussion of these and other passages, see Chance 2011. 26 See Chance 2012. 27 It is at here that Kant launches into the discussion of freedom of speech and education that I referred to in the introduction of this essay. 28 Factum means act or deed, and facta is its accusative plural. Watkins (2005: 377-8) provides a similar reading of these passages. 29 Two questions should be distinguished here. The first is whether Kant's discussion of the facta of reason is meant to be an argument against the skeptical use of reason as a means to eliminate transcendental deception. The second is whether Hume's arguments in the Enquiry and, in particular, in Section IV can be accurately characterized as 'subjecting the facta of reason to examination' (A760/B780). I am expressing doubts about the latter not the former. 30 This contrast is picked up again in the Prolegomena, where Kant's final discussion of Hume occurs in a section titled 'On Determining the Boundary of Pure Reason' (4:350-65). 31 Watkins (2005: 363-388) has recently questioned this view. I discuss Watkins' views in Chance 2013 32 I defend this claim in Chance 2012. 33 I am grateful to Richard Aquila, Scott Edgar, and Andrew Roche for comments on earlier versions of this paper. 35 REFERENCES Allison, H. (2004), Kant's Transcendental Idealism: An Interpretation and Defense, revised and enlarged edition. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Bird, G. (2006), The Revolutionary Kant: A Commentary on the Critique of Pure Reason Chicago: Open Court. Chance, B. 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(1991), Kant's Conception of Moral Character: The 'Critical' Link of Morality, Anthropology, and Reflective Judgment. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. -- (2003), 'Kant on Moral Education or "Enlightenment" and the Liberal Arts', Review of Metaphysics 57: 43-73. Rauscher, F. (2010) 'The Appendix to the Dialectic and the Canon of Pure Reason', in P. Guyer (ed) Cambridge Companion to Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason'. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rohlf, M. 'The Ideas of Pure Reason', in P. Guyer (ed) Cambridge Companion to Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason'. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shabel, L. (2006), 'Kant's philosophy of mathematics', in P. Guyer (ed) Cambridge Companion to Kant and Modern Philosophy. New York: Cambridge University Press. Weisskopf, T. (1970), Immanuel Kant und die Pädagogik: Beiträge zu einer Monographie Zürich: Editio Academica Watkins, E. (2005), Kant and the Metaphysics of Causality. New York: Cambridge University Press. Wilson, H. (2006), Kant's Pragmatic Anthropology: Its Origin, Meaning, and Critical Significance. Albany: State University of New York Press. Wolff, C. (1963), Preliminary Discourse on Philosophy in General, trans. Richard J. Blackwell. New York: Bobbs-Merrill. -- (2003), Vernünftige Gedanken von den Kräften des menschlichen Verstandes und ihrem richtigen Gebrauche in Erkenntnis der Wahrheit. Hildesheim: Georg Olms. 37 1 Citations from the Critique of Pure Reason use the standard A/B format to refer to the pages of the first (A) and second (B) editions. Citations from Kant's other works use the volume number and pagination of Kant 1900-. Quotations from the Critique are taken from Kant 1997. All other translations are my own. Scholars who discuss the notion of discipline as it applies to Kant's views on education include Weisskopf 1970, Funke 1974, Munzel 1991, Louden 2000, Munzel 2003, and Wilson 2006. 2 In what follows, 'Discipline' will refer to this portion of the Critique and 'discipline' to the notion discussed therein. 3 Kemp Smith (1918: 563) writes that the 'entire teaching' of the Method 'has already been more or less exhaustively expounded in the earlier divisions of the Critique', and his discussion of the Discipline omits section three entirely and devotes only one sentence to section two. Similarly, Bird (2006: 739) writes that the Method merely 'summarizes' the work of the Doctrine of Elements and limits his discussion of the Discipline to section one. And apart from the Canon, Moore (2010: 311) regards Kant's discussion of transcendental proof as the 'really significant' contribution of the Method, which at least suggests that its other contributions are incidental. Gehrhart 1998 is a notable exception to the tendency to downplay the significance of the Method. 4 See Grier 2001, Introduction, esp. 8-11 and Chapter 4, esp. 111-6 and 128-30. Note, however, that my terminology differs from Grier's. She uses the phrase 'judgmental error' to refer to the deception associated with transcendental illusion, which I will generally refer to as 'transcendental deception' or simply 'deception'. It seems to me that this terminological choice represents less of a departure from Kant's own language, since he frequently distinguishes illusion (Schein, Illusion) from deception (Betrug), but it does not reflect a departure from the substance of Grier's view on this issue. 5 Cf. A297/B353. For more discussion of reason and its search for the unconditioned, see Grier 2001: 101-142, Allison 2004: 307-332, and Rohlf 2010. I concur with Rohlf's criticisms of Allison's reconstruction of Kant's argument for transcendental illusion. 6 The dual role of transcendental illusion is emphasized by Grier (2001: 101-39, 263-301). See A652-4/B680-2 for Kant's discussion of parsimony. 7 Additional 'negative' evidence for this claim can be found at A308-9/B365-6 and A703/B731, passages that discuss the aims of the Dialectic and make no reference to transcendental deception. 8 Indeed, Kant gives similar characterizations of discipline in the Lectures on Pedagogy at 9:442 and 9:452. 9 On this reading, Kant's suggestion that our propensity to stray from these rules can be 'eliminated' appears to be in tension with his comment at A297/B354, quoted previously, that transcendental illusion 'continually' propels us into 'momentary aberrations that always need to be removed'. Perhaps the latter comment is true only of the individual whose reason has not been disciplined according to the rules of the Discipline, or perhaps this tension reflects an uncertainty on Kant's part about whether transcendental deception can be eliminated or merely limited. In any event, it is clear that Kant believes transcendental illusion can at least be limited, and this is sufficient for the reading of the Discipline I am proposing. 10 For the parallel comment in the Doctrine of Elements, see A55/B80. 11 See Meier 1752. Meier's book was a standard textbook in Wolffian logic and the book Kant used in his logic lectures for over forty years. It is reprinted along with Kant's notes in volume seventeen of the Academy Edition, from which I quote. 12 This is not to say that combating transcendental deception is the only way to apply the results of the Doctrine of Elements, however. The Canon, Architectonic, and History can each be understood as applying these results in certain ways. See Rauscher 2010 for discussion of the Canon and Höffe 1998 for discussion of the Architectonic and the History. 13 See, for example, Christian Wolff 1963: §139. 14 Kant develops a second argument for this claim at A736-8/B764-6 that I will not consider. Following the suggestion of the previous quotation, this argument identifies the mathematical method with the dogmatic method and argues that pure reason contains no dogma and that reason's use of the dogmatic method is therefore per se inappropriate. 15 For a more detailed discussion of the constructability of mathematical concepts, see Lisa Shabel 2006. 16 Kant introduces the former capacity at A303/B360 and the latter at A644/B672. 17 See A720/B748. 18 For this discussion, see A240-6/B300-3. There Kant's argument is that none of the categories can be defined 'without immediately descending to the conditions of sensibility' (A241/B300). In contrast, his view in the Discipline is that, even if we descend to the 'conditions of sensibility', no a priori concepts (including but not limited to the categories) can be defined. 38 19 See Meier 1752: §132. Cf. Wolff 2003: 129. 20 I will here ignore Kant's argument that empirical and arbitrary concepts cannot be defined in the same sense that mathematical concepts can. These arguments are interesting, but they are only of secondary importance to the conclusion this section draws about the use of pure reason. 21 The adverb 'given' is meant to contrast these a priori concepts with the a priori constructed concepts of mathematics. 22 Kant first discusses real possibility, although not under this name, in the Postulates of Empirical Thinking in General, but his explicit contrast between logical and real possibility occurs in the chapter on phenomena and noumena. In the A edition of this chapter, Kant uses the terminology of 'logical' and 'transcendental' possibility as opposed to 'logical' and 'real', but the distinction itself is the same in both editions. See A220-4/B267-72 and A244/B302. Kant also briefly mentions the distinction in the footnote at Bxxvi. 23 Kant's views in this section of the Discipline have been explored by interpreters interested in providing a characterization of transcendental arguments. See Gram 1984, Moore 2010, and the literature cited therein. 24 Admittedly, this is a weak argument since the fact that rationalist philosophers have not yet reached a consensus on the best argument for each of the cardinal doctrines of special metaphysics does not mean that they will not do so in the future. Indeed, we will see in the next section that one of Kant's criticisms of Hume turns on a similar argument. But since Kant's position is that each of these rules is necessary for a successful transcendental proof, his argument that proofs from pure reason cannot adhere to the first is already sufficient to show that the transcendental method of the Critique cannot be used to establish rational knowledge of the objects of special metaphysics. 25 Kant makes clear that he regards Hume's project as first and foremost a critique of (broadly rationalist) metaphysics in a number places, among them A764/B792, 5:12-3, and the footnote at 4:259. For discussion of these and other passages, see Chance 2011. 26 See Chance 2012. 27 It is at here that Kant launches into the discussion of freedom of speech and education that I referred to in the introduction of this essay. 28 Factum means act or deed, and facta is its accusative plural. Watkins (2005: 377-8) provides a similar reading of these passages. 29 Two questions should be distinguished here. The first is whether Kant's discussion of the facta of reason is meant to be an argument against the skeptical use of reason as a means to eliminate transcendental deception. The second is whether Hume's arguments in the Enquiry and, in particular, in Section IV can be accurately characterized as 'subjecting the facta of reason to examination' (A760/B780). I am expressing doubts about the latter not the former. 30 This contrast is picked up again in the Prolegomena, where Kant's final discussion of Hume occurs in a section titled 'On Determining the Boundary of Pure Reason' (4:350-65). 31 Watkins (2005: 363-388) has recently questioned this view. I discuss Watkins' views in Chance 2013 32 I defend this claim in Chance 2012. 33 I am grateful to Richard Aquila, Scott Edgar, and Andrew Roche for comments on earlier versions of this paper.

MAREK PIECHOWIAK Solidarność w poszukiwaniu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii konstytucyjnej I. Uwagi wstępne Celem tego opracowania jest identyfikacja i prezentacja ideowej tradycji, do której należy konstytucyjna kategoria „solidarność". Za taką tradycję uznaję tu refleksję wyrastającą z filozofii klasycznej przebiegającą od Platona, Arystotelesa i Tomasza z Akwinu do katolickiej nauki społecznej; określam ją jako tradycję klasyczną. Opracowanie otwiera uzasadnienie wyboru tradycji klasycznej jako istotnej i naj- ważniejszej z tradycji ideowych, do których należy konstytucyjna kategoria „solidar- ność". Następnie krótko porządkuję sprawy terminologiczne; jest to tym ważniejsze, że kategoria „solidarność" wkracza do refleksji nad państwem i prawem stosukowo późno, toteż przy poszukiwaniu tradycji ideowej trzeba się kierować nie tyle wystę- powaniem danego terminu, ile jego współczesnym znaczeniem. Za najistotniejsze elementy treści tej kategorii uznane jest bezinteresowne działanie na rzecz innych, a w perspektywie podstaw państwa i prawa jest to działanie na rzecz dobra wspól- nego. Przegląd stanowisk obejmuje filozofię Platona, Arystotelesa, Tomasza z Akwi- nu i katolicką naukę społeczną. Analiza tych stanowisk prowadzi do wniosku, że w całej tej tradycji działanie na rzecz innych było uznawane za istotny, a nawet za najistotniejszy typ działania przyczyniający się do rozwoju i szczęścia działającego podmiotu. Uznanie solidarności uniwersalnej nie jest czymś specyficznym dla filo- zofii czy teologii chrześcijańskiej. Zasadniczą nowością w refleksji chrześcijańskiej nad człowiekiem i w konsekwencji nad tym, co nazywamy dziś solidarnością, jest wypracowanie filozoficznych podstaw uzasadnienia wartościowości tego, co m a- terialne i jednostkowe, oraz wypracowanie i zastosowanie kategorii „osoba", za której pomocą do centrum refleksji nad człowiekiem została wprowadzona refleksja nad wolnością i indywidualnością jako zasadniczymi doskonałościami człowieka. Analiza klasycznej tradycji pojm owania solidarności jest nie tylko próbą prze- śledzenia rozwoju samej idei, analizą tego, co kulturowe, ile uznając, że kultura jest narzędziem „oswajania świata" opracowanie jest próbą przybliżenia nie tylko historii „narzędzi" poznania i rozum ienia człowieka, ale także tego, czego ujęciu narzędzia te służyły i mogą służyć. W takiej perspektywie zostaną sformułowa- ne wnioski dotyczące autonomicznej treści konstytucyjnej kategorii „solidarność". Kategoria ta służy wyrażeniu uznania bezinteresownego działania na rzecz innych 146 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK za istotną dla porządku prawnego „daną antropologiczną", za właściwość człowie- ka, której nie m ożna nie brać pod uwagę porządkując życie społeczne w sposób sprzyjający rozwojowi człowieka. Kategoria „solidarność" służy także wyrażeniu zasady, że obowiązek pom ocy innym potencjalnie odnosi się do każdego wobec każdego, także na płaszczyźnie podm iotów o charakterze społecznym. II. Wybór tradycji W ybór tradycji klasycznej nie jest arbitralny. Prowadzone analizy są prowadzo- ne m ożna powiedzieć na użytek interpretacji Konstytucji RP z 2 kwietnia 1997 r. W Konstytucji tej kategoria „solidarność" pojawia się w zakończeniu wstępu: „Wszystkich, którzy dla dobra Trzeciej Rzeczypospolitej tę Konstytucję będą stosowali, wzywamy, aby czynili to, dbając o zachowanie przyrodzonej god- ności człowieka, jego prawa do wolności i obowiązku solidarności z innymi, a po - szanowanie tych zasad mieli za niewzruszoną podstawę Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej" oraz w art. 20: „Społeczna gospodarka rynkowa oparta na wolności działalności go- spodarczej, własności prywatnej oraz solidarności, dialogu i współpracy partnerów społecznych stanowi podstawę ustroju gospodarczego Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej". Ponieważ opracowanie to dotyczy spraw fundamentalnych, analizy prowadzone są w kontekście postanowień wstępu Konstytucji, gdyż to one umieszczają solidarność u podstaw całego porządku konstytucyjnego1. Nauczanie społeczne Kościoła katolickiego, zwieńczające analizowaną tradycję, było ideowym zapleczem ruchu społecznego „Solidarność" i w zakresie problemowym będącym tu przedmiotem zainteresowania było ideowym zapleczem sił politycznych i społecznych, które doprowadziły do transformacji ustrojowej w Polsce2, której przy- 1 „Porządek konstytucyjny" pojmuję tu w sposób szeroki, obejmujący nie tylko porządek znajdu- jących oparcie w konstytucji obowiązujących norm prawnych, ale także wszystkie znajdujące oparcie w konstytucji elementy porządkujące życie społeczne. T. Chauvin, J. Winczorek, P. Winczorek, Wpro- wadzenie klauzuli państwa prawnego do porządku konstytucyjnego Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej, w: Zasada demokratycznego państwa prawnego w Konstytucji RP, red. S. Wronkowska, Warszawa 2006, s. 1-20 (9-48). 2 Teza ta jest szeroko akceptowana, zob. np. H. Brunkhorst, Solidarity: From Civic Friendship to a Global Legal Community, przeł. J. Flynn, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. 2005, s. 3. Wprost do encykliki Laborem exercens z 14 września 1981 r. („Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 73 [1981], 577-647) odwołano się w Uchwale Programowej I Krajowego Zjazdu Delegatów NSZZ Solidarność; zob. E. Ciżewska, Filo- zofia publiczna Solidarności. Solidarność 1980-1981 z perspektywy republikańskiej tradycji politycznej, Narodowe Centrum Kultury, Warszawa 2010, s. 322. Jednym z elementów kształtowania świadomości społecznej dotyczącej pojmowania solidarności była twórczość Józefa Tischnera, przede wszystkim jego Etyka solidarności, w której czytamy np.: „Kościół próbuje wypracować metody walki bez użycia przemocy. Zakładają one nieustanne budzenie poczucia społecznej odpowiedzialności za los własny i los narodu. Wymagają czujności i cierpliwości. W ten sposób Kościół przygotowuje grunt pod szeroki ruch społeczny znany pod nazwą »Solidarności«" (J. Tischner, Etyka solidarności oraz Homo soviéticas, Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 147 pieczętowaniem stała się Konstytucja z 1997 r. Również w samej katolickiej nauce spo- łecznej wskazywane są wprost jej powiązania z ruchem „Solidarność" w Polsce. Z jednej strony katolicka nauka społeczna stanowiła istotne zaplecze ideowe przemian lat 80., z drugiej doświadczenie tych przemian oddziaływało zwrotnie na tę naukę społecz- ną, prowadząc do dookreślenia przyjętej w niej koncepcji solidarności3. W encyklice Znak, Kraków 1992, s. 145); zob. E. Ciżewska, Filozofia..., op.cit., s. 322. Jako filozof J. Tischner był zdeklarowanym adwersarzem filozofii klasycznej, pamiętać jednak trzeba, że teksty, które złożyły się na Etykę solidarności, powstawały przede wszystkim jako kazania (pierwsze z nich wygłoszone zostało do przywódców NSZZ Solidarność na Wawelu 19 października 1980 r.), a nie rozprawki filozoficz- ne i jak wskazuje przytoczony wyżej cytat sam Tischner uznawał nauczanie społeczne Kościoła katolickiego za zasadniczą ideową podstawę pojmowania solidarności. Niemniej jednak zasługuje na dokładniejszą analizę obecność w samej katolickiej nauce społecznej i oddziaływanie na pojmowanie solidarności w Polsce (i na Jana Pawła II) elementów typowych dla reprezentowanej przez Tischnera filozofii dialogu czy filozofii spotkania. Jan Paweł II, który w istotny sposób współtworzył współczes- ną katolicką naukę społeczną, jednoznacznie opowiadał się za opartą na myśli Tomasza z Akwinu filo- zofią bytu jako myślą filozoficzną podstawową dla refleksji nad ludzkim działaniem, postrzegając inne nurty filozoficzne należące do filozofii podmiotu jako ważne dopełnienie, które jednak powinno być przyswajane przy założeniu teoretycznego fundamentu wyznaczonego filozofią bytu; zob. Jan Paweł II, Pamięć i tożsamość. Rozmowy na przełomie tysiącleci, Znak, Kraków 2005, s. 21: „Jeżeli sensownie chce- my mówić o dobru i złu, musimy wrócić do św. Tomasza z Akwinu, to jest do filozofii bytu"; zob. tamże, s. 16-18; zob. tenże, Fides et ratio (14 września 1998), „Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 91 (1999), 5-88, nr 43. Na temat stosunku Jana Pawła II do filozofii współczesnej zob. Jan Paweł II, Przekroczyć próg nadziei (1994), Wyd. KUL, Lublin 2010, nr 5, 31. E. Ciżewska w powołanej wyżej monografii dostrzega oddzia- ływanie nauki społecznej Kościoła na ideowy wymiar ruchu Solidarność (np. s. 322), akcentuje jednak to oddziaływanie przede wszystkim przy omawianiu religijnych czy moralnych aspektów tego ruchu (s. 37-42), natomiast w zasadzie nie analizuje filozofii politycznej zawartej w katolickiej nauce społecz- nej stanowiącej na gruncie polskim podstawowy teoretyczny i ideowy punkt odniesienia; znamienne, że w paragrafie „'Solidarność jako społeczeństwo obywatelskie" (s. 46-54), zawierającym szereg odnie- sień do tradycji istotnych, zdaniem autorki, dla kształtu ideowego wymiaru „Solidarności", za pośred- nictwem prac A. Araty, Z. Pełczyńskiego i I. Krzemińskiego sięga się do filozofii Antonio Gramsciego, Hegla czy Marksa, a w ogóle brak jest nawiązań do tradycji klasycznej czy katolickiej nauki społecznej. Perspektywę badawczą przyjętą przez autorkę wyznaczają współczesne prace myślicieli tradycji anglo- saskiej, w której idee republikańskie kształtowały się w opozycji do pewnych odmian liberalizmu; nie można zapominać o tym, że podstawy filozofii anglosaskiej kształtowały się przy wyraźnym zerwaniu z tradycją klasyczną, w szczególności w zerwaniu z myślą powiązaną z Kościołem katolickim; przypo- mnieć warto, że rozwijane i głoszone przez J. Lockea postulaty tolerancji nie obejmowały katolików. Natomiast polski republikanizm i obecne w nim idee solidarności czy solidaryzmu kształtowały się w opozycji do ideologii państwa totalitarnego naznaczonej filozofią Marksa i Hegla. Również wcześ- niejsza nowożytna polska tradycja myśli politycznej była wyraźnie odmienna od tradycji dominującej w innych państwach; gdy w Europie dominowało zakorzenione w myśli N. Machiavellego uznanie racji stanu pojętej jako dobro państwa za pierwszą wartość polityczną, Konstytucja 3 Maja, niewątpliwie istotna dla myślenia o kształcie państwa w okresie przemian ustrojowych lat 80., pozostaje w tradycji klasycznego myślenia o dobru wspólnym jako pierwszej wartości życia politycznego, pojętym jako to, co służy każdemu członkowi wspólnoty politycznej; por. A. Rzegocki, Racja stanu a polska tradycja myślenia o polityce, Ośrodek Myśli Politycznej, Kraków 2008, zwł. s. 16-33. 1 Por. Z. Stawrowski, jan Paweł II a solidarność, w: idem, Solidarność znaczy więź, Instytut Myśli Józefa Tischnera, Kraków 2010, s. 121 (pierwotnie: „Teologia Polityczna" 2005-2006, n r 3). 148 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK Centesimus annus z 11 maja 1991 r.4, jednym z najważniejszych dokumentów zawiera- jących naukę społeczną Kościoła katolickiego, Jan Paweł II pisał: „Nie można zapomi- nać, że zasadniczy kryzys ustrojów, które chcą uchodzić za formę rządów czy wręcz za dyktaturę robotników, rozpoczął się wielką akcją protestu podjętą w Polsce w imię so- lidarności. Rzesze robotników pozbawiły prawomocności ideologię, która chce prze- mawiać w ich imieniu, a czerpiąc z własnego trudnego doświadczenia pracy i ucisku odnalazły czy niejako odkryły na nowo pojęcia i zasady nauki społecznej Kościoła"5. Nauka społeczna Kościoła katolickiego wyznaczała także zasadniczy kontekst teoretyczny myśleniu o aksjologicznych podstawach społeczeństwa i państwa śro- dowisk, którym bliska była kategoria solidarności obecna w debacie publicznej w okresie prac nad konstytucją. Z pewnością była takim kontekstem dla twórców projektu konstytucji przygotowanego przez Komisję Konstytucyjną Senatu I ka- dencji6 i tzw. projektu obywatelskiego przygotowanego przez środowisko związa- ne z NSZZ „Solidarność"7. Prom otorzy tych projektów uczestniczyli w pracach Komisji Konstytucyjnej Zgromadzenia Narodowego8, która przygotowała projekt Konstytucji z 1997 r. Katolicka nauka społeczna była także naturalnym zasadni- czym teoretycznym punktem odniesienia dla głównego autora preambuły Konsty- tucji z 1997 r. Tadeusza Mazowieckiego, m.in. współtwórcy środowiska „Więzi". Za poświęceniem szczególnej uwagi tradycji klasycznej przemawia także szcze- gólna, typowa dla niej, ale przede wszystkim typowa dla katolickiej nauki spo- łecznej konfiguracja fundam entalnych wartości i zasad przyjętych w Konstytucji 1997 r.9 solidarność występuje w niej obok dobra wspólnego, godności, .wolności i praw człowieka, zasad sprawiedliwości społecznej i zasady pomocniczości. W analizowanej tu tradycji elementem definiującym solidarność jest kategoria „dobro wspólne". Okazuje się, że poszukując podstawowego, paradygmatycznego rozumienia klauzuli dobra wspólnego zawartej w przepisie art. 1 Konstytucji RP z 1997 r. nie sposób nie sięgnąć do społecznej nauki Kościoła katolickiego i tradycji, z której ona wyrasta. W obliczu takich trudności, jak brak definicji legalnej, idioma4 „Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 83 (1991), 793-867. 5 Centesimus annus, n r 23. Zob. Z. Stawrowski, Jan Paweł II a solidarność, op.cit., s. 148-163. 6 Komisja Konstytucyjna Zgromadzenia Narodowego, Projekty Konstytucji Rzeczypospolitej Pol- skiej 1993, Wyd. Sejmowe, Warszawa 1993, s. 3-22. 7 Konstytucja Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej. Projekt Obywatelski NSZZ Solidarność, „Co Tydzień Soli- darność" nr 12 (63), 30 czerwca 1994 (wydanie specjalne), s. 1-13. 8 Jeśli chodzi o projekt senacki, to najaktywniejsza była senator Alicja Grześkowiak, a w przy- padku projektu obywatelskiego Michał Drozdek reprezentujący Mariana Krzaklewskiego będącego pełnomocnikiem zgłaszających projekt. O związkach z katolicką nauką społeczną świadczy np. wy- powiedź A. Grześkowiak na forum Zgromadzenia Narodowego, Sprawozdanie stenograficzne z 3. po- siedzenia Zgromadzenia Narodowego, kad. 2, dzień 1 (24 lutego 1997); wypowiedź M. Drozdka na forum Komisji Konstytucyjnej ZN dnia 27 stycznia 1995 r„ „Biuletyn KKZN", nr 12 (1995), s. 89. 9 Analiza kontekstu aksjologicznego przyjętego w Konstytucji 1997 r. zob. M. Piechowiak, A k- sjologiczne podstawy polskiego prawa, w: Prawo polskie próba syntezy, red. T. Guz, J. Głuchowski i M. Pałubska, C.H. Beck, Warszawa 2009, s. 85-122. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 149 tyczny charakter samej klauzuli, skromny dorobek doktryny, brak ciągłości z trady- cją konstytucjonalizmu międzywojnia, brak analogicznych formuł w konstytucjach innych państw10, podstawowego dookreślenia znaczenia pojęcia „dobro wspólne" trzeba poszukiwać w pracach przygotowawczych. Wyjaśniając znaczenie formuły z art. 1 sięgnięto wprost do katolickiej nauki społecznej, „która mówi o dobru wspól- nym jako o sumie tych warunków życia społecznego, dzięki którym jednostki, rodzi- ny i zrzeszenia mogą pełniej i łatwiej osiągnąć swoją własną doskonałość. Polega to przede wszystkim na poszanowaniu przyrodzonych praw oraz obowiązków osoby ludzkiej"11. Tradycja klasyczna w pojmowaniu dobra wspólnego jest też tradycją fun- damentalną z punktu widzenia historii filozofii, gdyż Tomasz z Akwinu jest uważany za tego, którego koncepcja dobra wspólnego stała się zasadniczym punktem odnie- sienia dla późniejszych dyskusji nad tą kategorią12. Na potrzebę sięgnięcia do tradycji klasycznej wskazuje też kontekst, w jakim ka- tegoria „solidarność" znajduje się w preambule Konstytucji. W tym samym zdaniu mowa jest także o godności i wolności13. Mając na uwadze, że term in „solidarność" jest term inem bliskoznacznym z term inem „braterstwo"14, nietrudno dostrzec analogię 10 Szerzej na ten temat M. Piechowiak, Konstytucyjna zasada dobra wspólnego w poszukiwa- niu kontekstu interpretacji, w: Dobro wspólne. Problemy konstytucyjnoprawne i aksjologiczne, red. W. Wołpiuk, Warszawa 2008, s. 130-134. 11 Stenogram 3. posiedzenia Zgromadzenia Narodowego, dzień 1,24.02.1997. Zawarte w cytowanej wypowiedzi określenie dobra wspólnego jest oparte na dwóch dokumentach: dobro wspólne „obejmuje sumę tych warunków życia społecznego, dzięki którym jednostki, rodziny i zrzeszenia mogą pełniej i łatwiej osiągnąć swoją własną doskonałość" Sobór Watykański II, Konstytucja duszpasterska o Koś- ciele w świecie współczesnym. Gaudium et spes (7 grudnia 1965) [dalej: Konstytucja Gaudium et spes], nr 74 (w: Sobór Watykański II, Konstytucje, dekrety, deklaracje, tekst łacińsko-polski, Poznań 1967, s. 830-987); „polega [ono] przede wszystkim na poszanowaniu praw i obowiązków osoby ludzkiej" Jan XXIII, Pacem in terris (11 kwietnia 1963), „Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 55 (1963), 257-304, II. 5; przekład w: Jan XXIII, Paweł VI, Jan Paweł II, Encykliki, PAX, Warszawa 1981, s. 49-80. Zob. także połączenie obu formuł w Deklaracji o wolności religijnej Dignitatis humanae z 4 grudnia 1963 r., nr 6: „wspólne dobro społeczeństwa, będące ogółem takich warunków życia społecznego, w których ludzie mogą pełniej i łatwiej osiągać własną doskonałość, polega głównie na przestrzeganiu praw i obowiąz- ków osoby ludzkiej", w: Sobór Watykański II, Konstytucje..., op.cit., s. 645 (629-659). 12 Gemeinwohl I, w: Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, red. J. Ritter i in., t. 3, Schwabe Verlag, Basel 1974, s. 249. 13 Zob. M. Piechowiak, Aksjologiczne podstawy polskiego prawa, op.cit., s. 106-107. 14 Podczas prac przygotowawczych nad Konwencję o prawach dziecka z 20 listopada 1989 r. w tekście preambuły zrezygnowano z terminu „braterstwo" na rzecz „solidarność"; za Tłie United Nations Convention on the Rights o f the Child: A Guide to the „Travaux Préparatoires", s. 111. Motyw siódmy preambuły brzmi następująco: „uważając, że dziecko powinno być w pełni przygotowane do życia w społeczeństwie jako indywidualnie ukształtowana jednostka wychowana w duchu ideałów zawartych w Karcie Narodów Zjednoczonych, a w szczególności w duchu pokoju, godności, tolerancji, wolności, równości i solidarności", przekład za: Dz.U. 1991, nr 120, poz. 526. Sama Karta Narodów Zjednoczonych z 26 czerwca 1945 r. (Dz.U. 1947, n r 23, poz. 90 ze zm.) nie zawiera ani term inu „bra- terstwo", ani „solidarność"; należy uznać, że punktem odniesienia określającym ideały Karty, jest Powszechna deklaracja praw człowieka z 10 grudnia 1948 r. 150 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK między formułą konstytucyjną a formułą zawartą w art. 1 Powszechnej deklaracji praw człowieka z 10 grudnia 1948 r.15, określającym aksjologiczne podstawy praw człowieka: „Wszystkie istoty ludzkie rodzą się wolne i równe w godności i prawach, są one obdarzone rozumem i sumieniem oraz powinny postępować wobec siebie w duchu braterstwa". Formuła ta nawiązuje do haseł Rewolucji Francuskiej: wolność, równość, braterstwo, niemniej jednak wskazane są dodatkowe elementy godność (uznana w Międzynarodowych paktach praw człowieka z 16 grudnia 1966 r.16 za źródło wszystkich praw człowieka, podobnie jak w art. 30 Konstytucji) oraz rozum - ność i sumienie17. Formuła taka wskazuje, a szczegółowe badania to potwierdzają, na istotne różnice między oświeceniową tradycją refleksji nad prawami człowieka a tradycją stanowiącą oparcie dla ideowych fundamentów współczesnej międzyna- rodowej ochrony praw człowieka na poziomie uniwersalnym, których wyrazem jest Powszechna deklaracja praw człowieka. Fundamenty te zgodne są raczej z tradycją klasyczną niż oświeceniową czy z nawiązującą do niej tradycją liberalną i są także akceptowane w katolickiej nauce społecznej18. Warto tu zauważyć, że art. 1 Powszechnej deklaracji praw człowieka określa fun- dam enty czy jak mówił René Cassin zasady19, na których opierają się prawa człowieka sformułowane w tekście tej deklaracji. Artykuł ten formułuje twierdzenia dotyczące tego, jaki jest człowiek, wskazując na to, co istotne z punktu widzenia 15 Rezolucja Zgromadzenia Ogólnego NZ nr 217 A (III). 16 Rezolucja Zgromadzenia Ogólnego NZ nr 2200 A (XXI), Międzynarodowy pakt praw gospo- darczych społecznych i kulturalnych, Dz.U. 1977, nr 38, poz. 169; Międzynarodowy pakt praw osobi- stych i politycznych, Dz.U. 1977, nr 38, poz. 167; motyw 2 w preambułach obu paktów. 17 Podobnym szlakiem podąża, późniejsza od Konstytucji, Karta praw podstawowych Unii Eu- ropejskiej proklamowana 7 grudnia 2000 r„ która w motywie drugim preambuły głosi: „Świadoma swego duchowo-religijnego i moralnego dziedzictwa, Unia założona jest na niepodzielnych i po - wszechnych wartościach godności ludzkiej, wolności, równości i solidarności", Ojjicial Journal o f the European Communities, C 364 (18.12.2000); przekład za wersją dostosowaną do Traktatu z Lizbony, „Dziennik Urzędowy Unii Europejskiej", C 303 (14.12.2007). Zob. M. Piechowiak, Aksjologiczne pod- stawy „Karty praw podstawowych Unii Europejskiej", „Studia Prawnicze" (2003) n r 1, s. 16 (5-29); M. Łyszkowski, Zasada solidarności w Traktacie ustanawiającym konstytucję dla Europy, „Przegląd Sejmowy" 14 (2006), nr 6 (77), s. 33-52. 18 Zob. M. Piechowiak, Powszechność między uniformizacją a relatywizmem. Wokół metaaksjologicznych założeń Powszechnej Deklaracji Praty Człowieka, w: Współczesne problemy praw czło- wieka i międzynarodowego prawa humanitarnego, red. T. Jasudowicz, M. Balcerzak i J. Kapelańska- -Pręgowska, Toruń 2009, s. 177-193. Zob. Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis (30 grudnia 1987), „Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 80 (1988), 513-586; polski przekład: Jan Paweł II, Encykliki Ojca Świętego Jana Pawła II, Znak, Kraków 1996, s. 433-508, nr 26; tenże, Centesimas annus (1 maja 1991), „Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 83 (1991), 793-867; polski przekład: Jan Paweł II, Encykliki Ojca Świętego Jana Pawła II, Znak, Kraków 1996, s. 617-702, n r 8-9, 21. Szeroko na temat tradycji klasycznej jako pod- stawy współczesnej ochrony praw człowieka na poziomie uniwersalnym zob. M. Piechowiak, Filozo- fia praw człowieka. Prawa człowieka w świetle ich międzynarodowej ochrony, TN KUL, Lublin 1999. 19 T. Lindholm, Article 1, w: The Universal Declaration o f Human Rights: A Commentary, red. A. Eide i in., Oslo 1992, s. 44. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 151 konceptualizacji praw. Obowiązek postępowania w duchu braterstwa może być, a potwierdza to analizowana niżej tradycja, uznany za pewną właściwość człowie- ka jako działającego podm iotu, jako „dana antropologiczna" określająca to, czego człowiek potrzebuje, aby się w pełni rozwijać czy mówiąc nieco innym językiem dążyć do szczęścia; człowiek rozwija się nie tylko dzięki temu, że inni traktują go w duchu braterstwa, ale przede wszystkim dzięki temu, że on innych tak traktuje. Postawienie we wstępie Konstytucji obowiązku solidarności obok godności i wol- ności sugeruje analogiczne zaplecze ideowe jako najbardziej adekwatne do zasadni- czych treści kategorii „solidarność". Poszukując innych tradycji ideowych istotnych dla podjętego zagadnienia, na- leży zwrócić uwagę także na komunitaryzm. Niemniej jednak z punktu widzenia polskiej Konstytucji komunitaryzm trzeba uznać za należący do tradycji dalszej od wskazanej. Komunitaryzm został rozwinięty na gruncie filozofii anglosaskiej, która powstawała przy świadomym zerwaniu z filozofią scholastyczną czy szerzej: z filo- zofią istotną dla rozwoju teologii katolickiej. Toteż tradycja ta nie jest, jak sądzę, najdogodniejszym punktem wyjścia do interpretacji kategorii, które na gruncie polskim w sposób istotny są powiązane z katolicką nauką społeczną. Pod uwagę trzeba wziąć także to, że o ile idee leżące u podstaw Konstytucji z 1997 r., m.in. idea solidarności, kształtowały się w imię praw człowieka w sporze z ideologią m ar- ksistowską i ideologią państwa totalitarnego, o tyle kom unitaryzm kształtował się w wyraźnej opozycji do liberalizmu występującego pod sztandarami praw człowie- ka. W polskiej tradycji, prawa człowieka nie są, zasadniczo rzecz biorąc, pojm owa- ne w opozycji do tego, co społeczne. Na gruncie Konstytucji RP z 1997 r. pojawia się jeszcze dodatkowy problem z przyjęciem kom unitaryzm u czy szerzej perspektywy typowej dla filozofii anglosaskiej jako wyznaczających zasadniczy kontekst interpretacyjny podstaw o- wych kategorii konstytucyjnych. Elementem charakterystycznym dla tej perspek- tywy jest traktowanie dobra wspólnego jako przeciwwagi dla praw człowieka poj- mowanych jako prawa jednostki. Przyjmując taką perspektywę rozum ienia dobra wspólnego i mając na uwadze pozycję dobra wspólnego w Konstytucji RP rzeczą jak sądzę niewykonalną byłoby uzasadnienie idei służebności państwa wobec jednostki jako naczelnej idei Konstytucji20. Trzeba zauważyć, że uznane w poniższych analizach za centralne dla tradycji kla- sycznej elementy pojmowania solidarności, takie jak działanie dla dobra innych jako istotny element pełnego rozwoju człowieka czy powszechna odpowiedzialność za in - nych, nie są specyficzne dla tej tradycji. Są one obecne także w innych nurtach reflek- sji, zarówno o charakterze teistycznym, np. w filozofii dialogu i filozofii spotkania, 20 Zob. M. Piechowiak, Służebność państwa wobec człowieka i jego praw jako naczelna idea Kon- stytucji RP z 2 kwietnia 1997 roku osiągnięcie czy zadanie? „Przegląd Sejmowy" 15 (2007), n r 4 (81), s. 65-91. 152 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK jak i o nastawieniu ateistycznym czy w refleksji zmierzającej do propozycji nieza- leżnych od rozstrzygnięć w kwestii uznania istnienia Boga. Wydaje się, że polska refleksja etyczna jest szczególnie bogata na tle innych krajów. Nie m ożna nie wspo- mnieć należącej do refleksji typu teistycznego etyki solidarności Józefa Tischnera21 czy pretendującej do niezależności w kwestiach religijnych Cżesława Znamierow- skiego koncepcji powszechnej życzliwości, Tadeusza Kotarbińskiego koncepcji spo- legliwego opiekuństwa, Mariana Przełęckiego „wezwania do samozatraty" jako fun- damentalnego postulatu moralnego czy Zygmunta Baumana ponowoczesnej etyki opartej na odpowiedzialności za drugiego. Zbieżność tez uzyskanych w odmiennej tradycji z jednej strony wzmacnia analogiczne tezy innej tradycji, z drugiej zaś jest argumentem na rzecz uznania różnych koncepcji za narzędzia ujmowania tej samej rzeczywistości ludzkiej, a nie jedynie za narzędzia kreacji rzeczywistości społecznej. Analiza wskazanych tu koncepcji jest z pewnością pożyteczna w kontekście rozu- mienia solidarności, niemniej jednak z punktu widzenia poszukiwania podstawowej tradycji pojmowania konstytucyjnej kategorii „solidarność" pierwszeństwo wypada przyznać tradycji klasycznej z uwagi na przytoczone wyżej argumenty i trudność ze sformułowaniem podobnych argumentów na rzecz powiązania z konstytucją innych wskazanych wyżej tradycji czy koncepcji. III. Solidarność znaczenie słownikowe i etymologia, określenie podstawowe Słownik języka polskiego P W N podaje dwa określenia solidarności. W myśl pierw- szego z nich solidarność to „Wzajemne wspieranie się, współdziałanie, współodpo- wiedzialność; zgodność z kimś w poglądach, dążeniach, postępowaniu; jednomyśl- ność". W takim znaczeniu m ożna mówić o solidarności rodzinnej, obywatelskiej, zawodowej; solidarności z przyjaciółmi; solidarności rodziców w postępowaniu z dziećmi. W myśl drugiego określenia (słownik ten wskazuje na jego prawniczą genezę) solidarność to „odpowiedzialność zbiorowa i indywidualna (w określonej grupie osób) za całość wspólnego zobowiązania, mogąca występować zarówno w odniesieniu do dłużników, jak i wierzycieli"22. Solidarność ma zawsze wymiar praktyczny i przejawia się w relacjach między podm iotam i ze względu na wsparcie, którego potrzebują lub mogą potrzebować. Relacje oparte na solidarności są przeciwieństwem relacji opartych na konflikcie. Podmiotami tymi mogą być osoby, można jednak mówić także o solidarności m ię- dzy państwami czy innego typu społecznościami. Może ona mieć oparty na wza- jem ności charakter symetryczny („jeden za wszystkich, wszyscy za jednego") lub 21 Zob. przyp. 2. 22 Słownik języka polskiego, red. M. Szymczak, PWN, Warszawa 1989, t. 3, s. 273. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 153 asymetryczny, gdy wzajemności jest brak. Może mieć charakter partykularny, gdy obejmuje członków pewnej grupy, lub uniwersalny, gdy obejmuje wszystkich. Polski term in (podobnie jak jego odpowiedniki w wielu innych językach: angiel- ski solidarity, francuski solidarité, niemiecki Solidarität, włoski solidarietä) pochodzi od terminów łacińskich. Klasyczna ładna nie zna term inu odpowiadającego polskie- m u „solidarność", choć istnieje łaciński neologizm solidaritas23. W klasycznej łaci- nie istnieje czasownik solidare, który obejmuje dwa kręgi znaczeniowe. Po pierwsze, znaczy utrwalić, umocnić; po drugie scalić, spoić, połączyć. Odpowiednio przy- m iotnik solidus znaczy: mocny, pełny, trwały, twardy oraz cały, zupełny, całkowity24. Termin „solidarność" używany w znaczeniu społecznym lub politycznym pochodzi od term inu stosowanego w prawie rzymskim in solidum, przede wszystkim w kon- tekście zobowiązań i odpowiedzialności. Do dyskursu na tematy społeczne i poli- tyczne term in „solidarność" trafia stosunkowo późno, bo dopiero w drugiej połowie XVIII w. we Francji25; do katolickiej nauki społecznej w drugiej połowie XX w., przede wszystkim za sprawą koncepcji solidaryzmu katolickiego rozwijanego przez niemieckich jezuitów Heinricha Pescha, Oswalda von Nell-Breuninga współpracu- jącego z papieżem Piusem XI w przygotowaniu encykliki społecznej Quadragesimo anno z 15 maja 193126 czy Gustava Gundlacha, który był bliskim współpracowni- kiem papieży Piusa XI i Piusa XII27. W polskim przekładzie encykliki Jana XXIII Pacem in tenis z 1963 r., w której znalazło się wiele wątków dotyczących solidarności w wymiarze międzynarodowym, „solidarności duchowej" odpowiada łacińskie „anim arum coniunctio"28; w polskim przekładzie, w części trzeciej znajdziemy podtytuł „Czynna solidarność"29, którego nie ma w pierwotnym tekście łacińskim, a w następującym po nim akapicie użyty jest zwrot „czynne połączenie sił i umysłów", w języku łacińskim actuosa virium animorumąue coniunctione, co włoska wersja opublikowana tego samego dnia co wersja łacińska (11 kwietnia 1963 r.) oddaje zwrotem opérante solidarietä30. Również w in - nych encyklikach społecznych pojawiają się określenia opisowe. W łacińskich wer- sjach encykliki Jana Pawła II Sollicitudo rei socialis (1987), pracy fundamentalnej dla problematyki solidarności w katolickiej nauce społecznej, znaleźć można: officium coniunctionis (nr 13), m utua necessitudo (nr 33), exercitum consensionis (nr 39), 23 A. Wildt, Solidarität, w: Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, red. J. Ritter i in., t. 9, Schwabe Verlag, Basel 1995. 24 Słownik łacińsko-polski, red. M. Plezia, PWN, Warszawa 1999, t. 5, s. 170. 25 A. Wildt, Solidarität, op.cit. 26 „Acta Apostolicae Sedis" 23 (1931), 177-228. 27 Por. Z. Stawrowski, O zapomnianej solidarności, w: idem, Solidarność znaczy więź, Instytut Myśli Józefa Tischnera, Kraków 2010, s. 88 (87-96). 28 Jan XXIII, Pacem in terris, op.cit., III. 1. 29 Ibid., III.5; przed słowami Quoniam mutuae civitatum necessitudines. 30 Wersja włoska n r 54; http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_xxiii/encydicals/documents/ hf_j-xxiii_enc_11041963_pacem_it.html (dostęp: VII 2010). 154 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK solida hominum coniunctio (nr 40)31. W zasadniczym, cytowanym w kolejnym aka- picie, tekście określającym podstawowy sposób rozumienia solidarności użyty jest rzeczownik consensio, który jest w zasadzie synonimem consensus zgoda, jedno- myślność; zgodność, harmonia; a także zmowa, spisek32. Porównując te rzeczow- niki, można dostrzec, że consensus jest rodzaju męskiego, consensio żeńskiego, co odpowiada rodzajowi w języku polskim; consensio m a także dodatkowe znaczenie w medycynie, którego nie posiada term in consensus33. Katolicka nauka społeczna w aspekcie rozumienia solidarności jest „punktem dojścia" tradycji klasycznej, wyraża współczesną „samoświadomość" tej tradycji. Zgodnie z podstawowym określeniem solidarności w głównym dokumencie na ten temat, którym jest wspomniana encyklika Sollicitudo rei socialis, solidarność to pewna postawa m oralna i społeczna określona jako „mocna i trwała wola angażo- wania się na rzecz dobra wspólnego, czyli dobra wszystkich i każdego"34. Z punktu widzenia problematyki podstaw państwa i prawa, w której na pierwszym planie nie jest kształtowanie cech charakteru („mocnej i trwałej woli"), ale określonych działań, podstawową kategorią definiującą solidarność jest kategoria „dobro wspólne"35 i ją też trzeba postawić w centrum dalszych analiz. IV. Platon 1. Dobro wspólne jako cel prawa i państwa W analizowanej tradycji podstawową kategorią w refleksji nad państwem (społe- czeństwem) i prawem jest „dobro wspólne" określające zasadniczy cel państwa i p ra- wa. W sposób teoretyczny kategoria ta została opracowana przez Tomasza z Akwinu i u niego nabrała technicznego znaczenia. Platon używa, co prawda, terminów, które m ożna przełożyć jako „wspólne dobro"36, jednak badając podstawy pojmowania państwa i prawa przez Platona, powinno się pytać przede wszystkim o to, co jest w jego koncepcji uznane za cel państwa i prawa. Odpowiedzi na to pytanie Platon 31 Zob. W. Kerber, Solidaritätsprinzip, w: Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, red. J. Ritter i in., t. 9, Schwabe Verlag, Basel 1995. 32 Słownik łacińsko-polski, red. M. Plezia, t. 1, PWN, Warszawa 1998, s. 699. 33 „Schorzenie współczulne (...) zachodzące, gdy schorzenie jednego organu powoduje analo- giczne schorzenie drugiego", ibid. 34 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 38. 35 Zob. część historyczną w monografii: M. Piechowiak, Dobro wspólne jako podstawa polskiego porządku konstytucyjnego, Wydawnictwa Trybunału Konstytucyjnego, Warszawa 2011 (w druku). 36 to KOivfj oupfepov dosłownie: to, co pożyteczne dla wspólnoty; w dialogu Gorgiasz Platon stwierdza, że wiedza na temat sprawiedliwości to „wspólne dobro dla nas wszystkich" koivöv yap äyaBov anaa i, 505e; Platonis Opera, red. John Burnet, Oxford 1903; Platon, Gorgiasz, przeł. W. Witwicki , w: Platon, Dialogi, Kęty 1999, t. 1, s. 333-452; Gorgias, przeł. P. Siwek, w: Platon, Gorgias, Menon, Warszawa 1991, s. 1-132. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 155 udziela wprost: „Podstawowym założeniem i celem naszych praw jest to, żeby oby- watele byli jak najszczęśliwsi i zespoleni ze sobą najserdeczniejszą przyjaźnią"37. Zauważyć trzeba przede wszystkim, że głównym celem prawa nie jest dobro państwa państwo jest służebne wobec obywateli (i nie tylko obywateli). W żad- nym razie istnienie państwa nie jest najwyższym dobrem w społeczeństwie - wbrew rozpowszechnionym przez Karla Poppera poglądom na tem at koncepcji Platona38. Jeśli państwo nie służy poszczególnym jednostkom , to lepiej, aby „roz- padło się w gruzy", lepiej „pójść na wygnanie": „To zaś, na co zgodziliśm y się ze sobą, sprow adza się do jednej zasadniczej rzeczy: w jakikolw iek sposób stać się m ożna zacnym m ężem i osiągnąć tę doskonałość duszy, k tó ra daje się osiągnąć przez upraw ianie jakiegoś zajęcia, dzięki jakim ś cechom charak- teru czy posiadaniu czegoś, dzięki jakim ś pragn ien iom lub poglądom lub przysw ojeniu sobie jakichś nauk, każdy w naszym państw ie dążyć m usi do jej osiągnięcia, m ężczyzna czy kobieta, stary czy m łody, i dążyć z najw iększym natężen iem sił przez całe życie. Nikt niczego, co stoi temu na przeszkodzie, przenosić nie m oże ponad to, nawet własnego państwa, jeżeliby doszło do takiej ostateczności, że m iałoby rozpaść się w gruzy, ażeby nie poddać się p o d jarzm o panow ania gorszych albo trzeba by było opuścić swój kraj i pójść na w ygnanie. Bo w szystko raczej w ytrzym ać i wycierpieć należy, niż dopuścić do zm iany ustro ju na taki, k tó ry czyni ludzi gorszym i. (...) ze w zględu na (...) p rzyw odze- nie do cnoty i odw odzenie od tego, co jest jej przeciw ne, chwalcie i gańcie nasze prawa. G ańcie te z nich, k tóre nie nadają się do tego, a te, k tóre się nadają, pow itajcie przyjaźnie i przyjąwszy życzliwie, żyjcie w edług nich. W szelkie zaś inne poczynania, zm ierzające do innych tak zwanych dóbr, porzucić w am przyjdzie i pożegnać się z n im i raz n a zawsze"39. Dążenie do szczęścia jest dążeniem do rozwoju jednostki w tym, co dla niej jest najważniejsze. Bycie szczęśliwym jest równoznaczne z byciem dobrym 40. Platon uważał, że rozwój polega na nabywaniu cnót. Dzisiejszym językiem m ożna powie- dzieć, że chodzi o rozwój osobowy. 2. Szczęście i sprawiedliwość Pierwszą i najważniejszą cnotą jest sprawiedliwość. Aby zrozumieć Platońską naukę o sprawiedliwości, niezbędne jest sięgnięcie do jego ontologii41. Tym, co uznaje on 37 Platon, Prawa, 743 c, przeł. M. Maykowska, PWN, Warszawa 1966. r]piv Se r) xtóv vópcov Ú7tó0E0ic évxaüOa ePXetiev, ónwc, coc eñóaipovÉaxaxoL Eaovxai Kai o n páXiaxa áXXrjXoic cpíXoi; Platonis Opera, op.cit.; owo „zespoleni ze sobą najserdeczniejszą przyjaźnią" w dosłownym tłumaczeniu można by oddać: „jak bardzo to tylko możliwe, żeby byli sobie wzajemnie przyjaciółmi". 38 Zob. K.R. Popper, Społeczeństwo otwarte i jego wrogowie, t. 1: Platon, przeł. H. Krahelska, PWN, Warszawa 1993. 39 Platon, Prawa, 770 c-e, op.cit., podkreślenie M. P. 40 Zob. np. Platon, Prawa, 743 c, op.cit. 41 Zob. M. Piechowiak, Do Platona po naukę o prawach człowieka, w: Księga jubileuszowa profesora Tadeusza Jasudowicza, red. J. Białocerkiewicz, M. Balcerzak, A. Czeczko-Durlak, Toruń 2004, s. 333-352. 156 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK za w pełni realne, jest świat idei, do którego należą także ludzkie dusze, a świat do- świadczany jest jedynie jego odbiciem, jego naśladownictwem. Najwyższą ideą jest idea dobra, która jest jednocześnie ideą jedności. Platon przyrównuje ją do życiodaj- nego Słońca. Do natury idei dobra należy to, że udziela się jak tylko może, a udziela- jąc się daje istnienie, którego fundamentem jest jedność, zgodnie z prostą intuicją, że aby w ogóle być, trzeba być jednością, przy tym im bardziej jest się jednością (im bar- dziej jest się wewnętrznie zwartym), tym mocniej się istnieje, a im mniejsza jedność, tym łatwiej o rozproszenie elementów i ostatecznie rozpad bytu. W Platońskiej ontologii intensywność jedności bytu w sposób istotny powiązana jest z siłą, inten- sywnością bycia, z byciem dobrem i z udzielaniem się polegającym na dawaniu ist- nienia innym, na wspieraniu innych. Im bardziej coś jest jednością, tym bardziej po prostu jest, tym bardziej jest dobrem i tym bardziej się udziela innym. Ta koncepcja ontologiczna znajduje zastosowanie w problematyce sprawiedliwo- ści42. Z jednej strony mamy do czynienia z aspektem czysto podmiotowym, „wew- nętrznym" cnotą sprawiedliwości, która polega na wewnętrznym ładzie i wewnę- trznej harmonii, które decydują o wewnętrznej jedności człowieka: im większy ład i harmonia, tym większa jedność. A im bardziej podm iot jest jednością, tym bardziej jest, tym mocniej istnieje. Z drugiej strony ta właściwość ściśle moralna, podm ioto- wa, znajduje realizację w działaniu. Zdaniem Platona w żadnym wypadku nie wolno nikom u szkodzić: „nigdy sprawiedliwość nikomu szkody nie wyrządza"43. Funda- mentalna jest zatem zasada nieszkodzenia, dziś powiedzielibyśmy the harm principle . Towarzyszy jej zasada bezinteresownego działania na rzecz innych czynienia tego, co pożyteczne, co odpowiada innym. Zasady te obejmują także nieprzyjaciół. Z perspektywy ontologicznej nie może być inaczej: na ile ktoś jest sprawiedliwy, na tyle jest jednością, na tyle jest dobry i na tyle udziela się innym, zabiegając o to, aby w możliwie najwyższym stopniu byli. Zauważyć trzeba, że na pierwszym miejscu jest działanie na rzecz innych podm iotów44 i to dobro konkretnych podm iotów jest racją działania wspólnoty jako całości. Poszukując zatem fundamentów solidarności uniwersalnej, należy sięgnąć do Platona koncepcji sprawiedliwości. To ona wyraża podstawowe idee powszechnie wiązane z chrześcijańskim orędziem miłości. Często jest to dziś niedostrzegane, a jedną z zasadniczych przyczyn tego stanu rzeczy jest poszukiwanie antycypacji 42 Szeroko na ten temat zob. M. Piechowiak, Do Platona po naukę..., op.cit., s. 333-352. 43 Platon, Państwo, 335 e, przeł. W. Witwicki, w: idem, Państwo, Prawa, przeł. W. Witwicki, Kęty 1997, s. 11-338; podobnie: „Więc ani zbrodnią odpłacać nie trzeba, ani źle robić nikomu, nawet gdy- byś nie wiadomo czego od ludzi doświadczył" Kriton, 49 c, przeł. W. Witwicki, w: Platon, Dialogi, Kęty 1999, t. I, s. 585-609; „Nie jest rzeczą człowieka sprawiedliwego szkodzić komukolwiek; ani przyjacielowi, ani nikomu innemu; to jest sprawa jego przeciwieństwa: człowieka niesprawiedliwego". Platon, Państwo, 335 d, op.cit. 44 Zob. M. Piechowiak, Sokrates sam ze sobą rozmawia o sprawiedliwości, w: Kolokwia Platońskie Gorgias, red. A. Pacewicz, Instytut Filozofii Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, Wrocław 2009, s. 71-92; idem, Do Platona po naukę o prawach człowieka, op.cit. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 157 chrześcijańskiego pojmowania miłości w Platońskiej nauce o miłości (zawartej prze- de wszystkim w dialogu Uczta), a nie co bardziej zasadne w jego nauce o spra- wiedliwości. Dopełnienie i rozwinięcie Platońska koncepcja sprawiedliwości znajdu- je w ujęciu przyjaźni jako warunku pełnego szczęścia i celu prawa45. 3. Przyjaźń i równość Zastanawiające jest uznanie przyjaźni za główny, obok szczęścia, cel prawa i pań- stwa. Mając na uwadze np. ujęcie celu prawa i państwa w cytowanym wyżej dłuż- szym fragmencie z Praw, w którym jest mowa o doskonaleniu poszczególnych jednostek, praktykowanie przyjaźni m ożna zasadnie traktować jako nieodzowny element doskonałości jednostek i istotny element życia społecznego tych, którzy są szczęśliwi, element konieczny dla pełnego szczęścia. Analiza szerszego kontekstu potwierdza takie przypuszczenie. Podejmując problematykę przyjaźni, Platon czerpie z tradycji greckiej i przy- wołuje przysłowie: „Równość wywołuje przyjaźń"46. Nabiera jednak ono specyficz- nego znaczenia ze względu na kontekst systemowy, w którym funkcjonuje. Jeśli m iarą i podstawą własnej sprawiedliwości jest to, na ile m ożna udzielać się innym, to naturalną granicą możliwości udzielania się jest to, co inni są w stanie przyjąć. Człowiek, który osiągnął pełnię rozwoju, a myśląc o kimś takim Platon m iał zapewne na uwadze nie tylko tego, kto osiągnął cnotę sprawiedliwości, ale i centralną w greckim myśleniu o człowieku cnotę opisującą doskonałego Greka p£Ya ko\|/uyia, tj. wielkoduszność47, może mieć problem. Czy Platon może spełnić się jako podm iot rozwoju, jeśli nie ma słuchacza zdolnego pojąć jego naukę? Zatem dla osiągnięcia pełni indywidualnego dobra i sprawiedliwości niezbędni są odpo- wiedni partnerzy. Ponieważ są oni także sprawiedliwi, w przyjaźni jest wzajemne obdarowywanie, dzięki którem u każdy staje się jeszcze bogatszy i zdolny do więk- szego obdarowywania. Podkreślić przy tym trzeba, że celem nie jest zdobycie jak największych zasobów, lecz działanie polegające na możliwie dużym dawaniu tego, co się posiada. Podm iot udzielając się innym traci coś z tego, co m a ryzykuje, że w efekcie może mieć mniej; jednak zawsze zyskuje w aspekcie egzystencjalnym, gdyż bardziej staje się jednością i bardziej jest, choć może mniej ma. W realiach 45 M. Hoelzl (powołuje się on na prace H. Brunkhorsta Solidarität. Von der Bürgerfreundschaft zur globalen Rechtsgenossenschaft, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt a. M. 2002; idem, Solidarität unter Frem- den, Fischer, Frankfurt a. M. 1997) nie dostrzega w starożytności antycypacji idei solidarności uniwersalnej, gdyż poszukuje jej przede wszystkim w Arystotelesa koncepcji przyjaźni (M. Hoelzl, Recognizing the Sacrificial Victim: The Problem o f Solidarity fo r Critical Social Theory, „Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory", 6.1, December 2004, s. 55), nie poświęcając należytej uwagi kon- cepcji Platona. 46 Platon, Prawa, 757 a, op.cit. 47 Zob. np. P. Paczkowski, Klasyczna filozofia grecka wobec problemu wolności i wolnej woli, „Studia Philosophica Wratislaviensia" vol. IV, fase. 4 (2009), s. 82. 158 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK konkretnego państwa taka przyjaźń dająca pełnię możliwa jest tylko między n ie- którym i obywatelami. Pamiętać jednak trzeba, że przyjaźń wskazana jest jako cel prawa i opartego na nim państwa. Nie chodzi zatem jedynie o to, aby wyszukiwać równych sobie i z nim i praktykować przyjaźń. Trzeba swym działaniem zmierzać do tego, aby inni członkowie społeczeństwa byli możliwie dobrzy, czyli sprawiedliwi, i stawali się równymi umożliwiając praktykowanie przyjaźni. W perspektywie jednego ludzkie- go życia owa równość i powszechna przyjaźń jest nieosiągalna, lecz pozostaje celem do osiągnięcia, celem możliwym z uwagi na metempsychozę48. Z punktu widzenia potrzeby zabiegania o czyjeś dobro każdy powinien być brany pod uwagę. Platon znowu może tu zadziwić współczesnego czytelnika, gdy pisze: „Bo to, że ktoś w głę- bi duszy i szczerze, a nie obłudnie, czci sprawiedliwość i rzeczywiście nienawidzi niesprawiedliwości, pokazuje się wyraźnie w jego postępowaniu wobec tych, któ- rym łatwo może wyrządzić krzywdę. Ten więc, kto w stosunku do niewolników tak zachowywać się będzie i postępować z nim i w taki sposób, że nie splami się nigdy żadną niegodziwością ani bezprawiem, prędzej niż ktoś inny posieje ziarno, z któ- rego wzejść może piękny plon cnoty. To samo można powiedzieć, i słusznie powie- dzieć, o zwierzchniku, o panującym i każdym, kto nad kimś posiada jakąś władzę, w związku z jego stosunkiem do słabszych od niego"49. Myśl ta nie znalazła miejsca w koncepcji Arystotelesa, ale szeroko podjęli ją stoicy uznający fundam entalną równość istot rozumnych będących kosm opolita- m i obywatelami jednego państwa ogarniającego cały kosmos, rządzonego jed- nym prawem. Podstawą sprawiedliwości nie jest oddawanie wszystkim równych zaszczytów czy zasobów według formuły „każdemu po równo"; tego typu równość Platon określa jako opartą na „mierze, wadze i liczbie"50, którą łatwo dostrzec i wprowadzać w życie, która nie jest jednak fundamentem sprawiedliwości: „bo niewolnicy i panowie n i- gdy się nie mogą stać przyjaciółmi ani ludzie poważni i typy liche, chociaż się im odda równie zaszczytne tytuły. Dla ludzi nierównych zrównanie mogłoby się stać nierów- nością, gdyby w nim miary nie było"51. Istotą sprawiedliwości jest równość polegająca na zgodności tego, co dawane, z adresatem, z jego naturą i potrzebami; równość ta „człowiekowi większemu przydziela więcej, a mniejszemu mniej. Jednemu i drugiemu 48 H. Brunkhorst pisze: „The Greek philosophers also had a concept of the unified essence of man, but as we have seen, Plato and the pre-Christian humanists were of the opinion that this essence could and should be perfectly represented only by a few" (H. Brunkhorst, Solidarity, op.cit., s. 26). Ma on w odniesieniu do koncepcji Platona o tyle rację, o ile pozostaje się na płaszczyźnie tego, co możliwe do realizacji w jednym ludzkim życiu; powszechna przyjaźń wraz z równością pozostaje jednak celem do osiągnięcia i ze względu na ten cel powinny być podejmowane działania tu i teraz, które w możliwie najlepszym stopniu przyczynią się do jego realizacji. 49 Platon, Prawa, 777 d-e, op.cit. 50 Platon, Prawa, 757 a, op.cit. 51 Platon, Prawa, 757 a, op.cit. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 159 daje w sam raz w stosunku do natury jednego i drugiego"52. Jest to równość, którą jedynie „sam Zeus (...) ocenia w całej pełni"53. Określana jest zwykle jako równość proporcjonalna czy geometryczna, natomiast ta oparta na mierze i liczbie określana jest jako arytmetyczna. Filozofia Platona ze względu na swój kontekst systemowy m a charakter uniwersalistyczny w znacznie większym stopniu niż filozofia jego najznakomitszego ucznia Arystotelesa. Arystoteles, uznając za jedyną realną rzeczywistość rzeczywistość ziemską, konsekwentnie uznaje, że realizacja jednostki dokonuje się jedynie tu i teraz, zatem w konkretnych warunkach społeczno-politycznych. Obca jest m u typowa dla Platona perspektywa uniwersalna, w której każdem u przystoi doświad- czać tego, co służy jego rozwojowi, w której z punktu widzenia troski o rozwój każ- dego nie są istotne różnice płci ani tym bardziej różnice w statusie społeczno- -politycznym. Dusza, która jest właściwym podm iotem rozwoju, nie m a ani płci, ani obywatelstwa; cechy te są przygodne, związane z danym, jednym z wielu żyć na ziemi, nie konstytuują tożsamości. Ostatecznie wzorem sprawiedliwości jest bóg-Demiurg, o którym Platon pisze: „ponieważ dusza sprzęgnięta z ciałem to z tym, to z innym ulega wciąż najprzeróżniejszym przem ianom spowodowa- nym bądź przez nią samą, bądź przez inną duszę, pozostaje (...) tem u naszemu jak gdyby w warcaby grającemu bogu przesuwać na lepsze miejsce tę duszę, która wy- pracowała w sobie lepsze cechy charakteru, a na gorsze tę, która nabyła gorszych skłonności, ażeby każda według tego, czego jej doznać przystoi, otrzymała należną sobie dolę"54. 4. Platon w perspektywie współczesnej Przedstawiane tu stanowisko Platona może się wydawać „zbyt metafizyczne", zbyt abstrakcyjne, jednak stanowisko to nawet w epoce antymetafizycznej (choć warto się zastanowić nad tym, czy filozofia porzucająca metafizykę nie rezygnuje z podjęcia spraw, które są dla człowieka najistotniejsze) zasługuje na uwagę, i to przynajmniej z dwóch względów. Po pierwsze, jest wyrazem doświadczenia, które m a człowiek, uwyraźnia je i pyta o jego wyjaśnienie. Filozofia Platona jest świade- ctwem ciągłości pewnego typu doświadczeń i problemów. Po drugie, filozofia ta, dostarczając pewnej siatki pojęciowej, pozwala porządkować myślenie i daje spo- sobność do refleksji nad czymś, czemu bez niej człowiek współczesny uwagi by nie poświęcił. Wskazując na konkretne wątki platońskie obecne we współczesnej refleksji nad człowiekiem i prawem, m ożna zauważyć, że intuicja każąca powiązać wewnętrzną 52 Platon, Prawa, 757 b -c , op.cit. Zob. także M. Piechowiak, Sokrates..., op.cit., passim. 53 Platon, Prawa, 757 b, op.cit.-, Platon Prawa (VII ksiąg), w: tenże, Państwo, Prawa, op.cit., s. 339-502. 54 Platon, Prawa, 903 e, op.cit. 160 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK jedność z doskonałością, szlachetnością osoby znajduje wyraz językowy np. w angielskim słowie integrity. Niezależnie od metafizycznego zaplecza, Platon wyznaczył pew ną strukturę myślenia o jednostce w prawie i państwie, zgodnie z którą prawo i państwo m ają charakter służebny wobec jednostek i ich szczęścia. Działanie dla pożytku innych uznał za pewien „m om ent antropologiczny", za coś ugruntowanego w samej naturze podm iotu jako rozwijające, realizujące i uszczęś- liwiające ten podm iot. To już za Platonem, a nie dopiero za Gabrielem Marcelem m ożna powiedzieć, że takie działanie sprawia, iż podm iot bardziej jest, choć może mniej ma. W perspektywie platońskiej uznawany niekiedy za centralny dla filozoficznej problematyki solidarności problem przejścia od uznania solidarności partykularnej solidarności między przyjaciółmi, do uznania solidarności powszechnej solidar- ności z obcymi55 podejmowany jest na płaszczyźnie bardzo podstawowej. Celem do osiągnięcia nie jest solidarność z obcymi, ale uczynienie wszystkich przyjaciółmi lub choćby sprawienie, aby nie byli obcymi. Bezinteresowne działanie dla ich dobra, toż- same z działaniem sprawiedliwym, jest środkiem do osiągnięcia tego celu. V. Arystoteles 1. Dobro wspólne i cel prawa Arystoteles w swej refleksji nad omawianymi wyżej zagadnieniam i dotyczącymi prawa i sprawiedliwości podąża za Platonem. U Arystotelesa zasadniczym celem państwa również jest szczęście obywateli: „Nie ulega tedy wątpliwości, że najlep- szym ustrojem jest z konieczności taki, w którego ram ach każdy bez wyjątku naj- lepiej się czuje i szczęśliwie żyje"56. Arystoteles, mając nastawienie bardziej em pi- ryczne, bardziej niż Platon zwraca uwagę na elementy subiektywne. Środkiem do osiągnięcia tak określonego celu jest zapewnienie tego, co poży- teczne, czego potrzebują członkowie społeczności: „Wspólnota zaś państwowa doszła, jak się zdaje, do skutku i utrzymuje się ze względu na pożytek; on bowiem jest właśnie celem prawodawców, którzy jako sprawiedliwe określają to, co przynosi wspólny wszystkim pożytek ( t o Koivtj oup9epov)"57. Powyższe cytaty pozwalają wprowadzić rozróżnienie między dobrem wspólnym pojętym podmiotowo jest nim szczęście poszczególnych członków społeczności, a dobrem pojętym przedmiotowo jest nim to, co służy członkom społeczności 55 M. Hoelzl, Recognizing the Sacrificial Victim, op.cit., s. 54. s" Arystoteles, Polityka, 1324 a (ks. VII, r. 22, 1), przeł. L. Piotrowicz, PWN, Warszawa 1964. 57 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1160 a, przeł. D. Gromska, w: idem, Dzieła wszystkie, t. 5, PWN, Warszawa 1996, s. 77-300. Ostatnią część zdania można, jak sądzę, trafniej przełożyć: „to, co sprawiedliwe, określane jest jako dobro wspólne". Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 161 w osiągnięciu szczęścia. Ten drugi aspekt dominuje w katolickiej nauce społecznej i w pracach przygotowawczych Konstytucji RP z 1997 r. 2. Sprawiedliwość Pojmowanie sprawiedliwości jako podstawowej doskonałości urządzeń państw o- wych jest wyznaczone szczęściem jako celem prawa i państwa: „Nazywamy spra- wiedliwym to, co we wspólnocie państwowej jest źródłem szczęśliwości i przyczy- nia się do jej utrzym ania i do utrzym ania wszystkiego, co się na nią składa"58. Podobnie jak Platon, Arystoteles uznaje sprawiedliwość za najznamienitszą z cnót59. Sprawiedliwość w szerokim znaczeniu obejmuje wszystkie inne cnoty50. Arystoteles pisze: „Co więcej, sprawiedliwość jest identyczna z doskonałością etycz- ną w pełnym tego słowa znaczeniu, ponieważ jest stosowaniem w praktyce dosko- nałości etycznej; jest zaś identyczna z doskonałością, bo kto ją posiadł, może ją wy- konywać nie tylko w stosunku do siebie samego, lecz także w stosunku do drugich; wielu bowiem ludzi umie postępować we własnych sprawach w myśl nakazów dziel- ności etycznej, ale nie umie tego czynić w stosunku do bliźnich (itpôç ërepov)"61. Podobnie jak u Platona, najważniejszym rysem sprawiedliwości jako pełnej do- skonałości człowieka jest działanie dla dobra innych: „Sprawiedliwość, jedyna spo- między cnót, zdaje się być »cudzym dobrem«, ponieważ obejmuje też stosunek do innych osób, jako że czyni to, co jest pożyteczne dla innych: bądź dla władcy, bądź dla współobywateli. Najgorszy jest więc ten, kto postępuje źle nie tylko wobec sie- bie samego, lecz i wobec przyjaciół; najlepszy zaś nie człowiek, który objawia swą dzielność etyczną w stosunku do siebie samego, lecz ten, kto czyni to w stosunku do innych; to bowiem jest trudnym zadaniem. Tak pojęta sprawiedliwość nie jest 58 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1129 b, op.cit. Por.: „Pozostaje nam odpowiedzieć na py- tanie, czy szczęście każdego człowieka i szczęście państwa należy uznać za to samo, czy też nie. Nie może tu jednak być wątpliwości, bo wszyscy chyba zgodzą się na to, że to jest to samo" Polityka, 1324 a (ks. VII, r. 22, 1), op.cit. 59 „Często sprawiedliwość uważana jest za najznamienitszą wśród cnót i że »ni gwiazda wieczorna, ni poranna tak podziwu jest godna« (cytat z zaginionej tragedii Eurypidesa Melanippe, A. Nauck, Tragicorum Graecorum fragmenta, Georg Olms, Hildesheim 1964, frg. 486); i przysłowie powiada: »W spra- wiedliwości zawarte są wszystkie cnoty« (Teognis, 147)", Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1129 b, przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 60 U Arystotelesa tezę o tym, że sprawiedliwość obejmuje inne cnoty, można inaczej niż u Platona rozumieć dosłownie: sprawiedliwość jest sumą cnót praktykowanych wobec siebie i in - nych. Uzasadniając tę tezę, Arystoteles odwołuje się do konkretnego prawa: „Otóż prawo nakazuje dokonywać zarówno aktów męstwa (np. nie opuszczać szeregu, nie uciekać, nie porzucać broni), jak aktów umiarkowania (np. nie cudzołożyć, nie dopuszczać się gwałtów), jak aktów łagodności (np. nie bić i nie lżyć) i podobnie w odniesieniu do innych zalet i wad etycznych, pierwsze nakazując, drugich zabraniając" Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1129 b, przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. W ujęciu Platona inne cnoty są warunkiem osiągnięcia sprawiedliwości, ta ostatnia jest jednak czymś istotnie od nich różnym wewnętrzną jednością opartą na harmonii i porządku. 61 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1129 b, przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 162 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK częścią dzielności etycznej, lecz jest całą tą dzielnością; podobnie przeciwna tej spra- wiedliwości niesprawiedliwość nie jest częścią niegodziwości, lecz całą niegodziwością . Czym zaś się różni dzielność etyczna od sprawiedliwości w tym znaczeniu, to wynika z powyższych wywodów; jest to ta sama trwała dyspozycja, ale występująca pod inną postacią: rozważana ze względu na stosunek do bliźnich (rtpóc; £tepov), jest sprawiedliwością, rozważana zaś w znaczeniu bezwzględnym, jest dzielnością etyczną"62. W innym miejscu stwierdza krótko: „Wyświadczanie dobrodziejstw jest cechą człowieka dobrego i dzielności etycznej"63. Zwrócić tu trzeba uwagę, że Ary- stoteles pisząc o tych, którym czyni się dobro nie ogranicza perspektywy do przyja- ciół używa określenia ó srepoę bliźni, drugi, inny. W określeniu, co jest sprawiedliwe, Arystoteles ponownie podąża za Platonem, za jego koncepcją równości proporcjonalnej. Koncepcja ta, przybrana w szatę Ary- stotelesa, jest dobrze znaną z podręczników koncepcją złotego środka, będącego środkiem nie ze względu na przedmiot, opartym jak powiedziałby Platon na mierze i liczbie, ale „ze względu na nas"; mówiąc słowami Arystotelesa: „Ze względu na nas jest środkiem to, co nie jest ani nadmiarem, ani niedostatkiem; tym zaś nie jest ani jedna, ani ta sama rzecz dla wszystkich"64. Podstawą określenia takiego środ- ka jest odpowiedniość między czymś a kimś, bycie pożytecznym dla kogoś65, zatem podstawą jego określenia jest równość proporcjonalna, którą Platon uznał za istotę sprawiedliwego działania. Sprawiedliwość jest pewną wewnętrzną dyspozycją do pewnego typu działań, jednak jeśli mowa jest o sprawiedliwości jako o tym, co prowadzi do szczęścia, ak- cent położony jest na działanie: „Czynne życie jest najlepsze zarówno dla każdego państwa jako wspólnoty, jak i dla każdej jednostki. (...) Bo celem życia jest owocna działalność"66. Zauważyć trzeba, że w kwestii szczęścia Arystoteles, bardziej niż Pla- ton, trzyma się doświadczenia: aby być w pełni szczęśliwym, nie wystarczy wypraco- wanie w sobie pewnych cnót czy doskonałości, gdyż zależy to także od okoliczności życia, na które sami często nie mamy wpływu67. 62 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1130 a, przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 63 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1169 b, przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 64 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1106 a; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 65 „Środek natomiast ze względu na nas określić należy inaczej. Jeśli bowiem zjeść dziesięć min jest dla kogoś za dużo, dwie zaś miny za mało, to kierownik ćwiczeń atletycznych nie każe mu zjadać sześciu min; bo i ta ilość może być dla tego, kto ją otrzyma, zbyt wielka albo niedostateczna". Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1106 b; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 66 Arystoteles, Polityka 1325 b, przeł. L. Piotrowicz, op.cit. 67 Np. „nie jest bowiem jak się zdaje rzeczą nie do pomyślenia, by ktoś, komu nie brak dziel- ności, przespał całe życie lub spędził je bezczynnie, a ponadto dotknięty był najgorszymi cierpieniami i nieszczęściami. Człowieka, któremu takie życie przypadło w udziale, nikt nie nazwie szczęśliwym, chyba ktoś, kto by za wszelką cenę upierał się przy [tym] paradoksie." Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachej- ska, 1095 b-1096 a; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. W innym miejscu powie, że człowiek szczęśliwy ze względu na swą dzielność moralną „nie może wprawdzie nigdy stać się nieszczęśliwym, ale i najwyż- szej szczęśliwości nie zazna, o ile spotka go los Priama". Ibid., 1101 a. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 163 3. Przyjaźń Problematyka działania na rzecz innych jako tego, co daje szczęście, dochodzi wyraźnie do głosu w podejmowanej przez Arystotelesa problematyce przyjaźni68. Pisze on, że przyjaźń „jest czymś dla życia najkonieczniejszym; bo bez przyjaciół nikt nie mógłby pragnąć żyć, chociażby posiadał wszystkie inne dobra; wszak i ci, którzy mają bogactwa, stanowisko i władzę, zdają się najbardziej potrzebować przyjaciół; jakaż bowiem korzyść z takiej pomyślności; jeśli się jest pozbawionym [możności] wyświadczania przysług drugim, z której przede wszystkim i w sposób najchwalebniejszy korzysta się wobec przyjaciół? I w jaki sposób m ożna by p o - myślności tej ustrzec i uchować ją, nie mając przyjaciół?"69 W świetle ostatniego zdania przytoczonego cytatu przyjaźń jest cenna, ponieważ umożliwia utrzymanie własnej pomyślności. Jest to jednak niewątpliwie wtórna czy dodatkowa racja praktykowania przyjaźni. Prezentowane w tym fragmencie spojrze- nie na przyjaźń nadal pozostaje w zasadniczej perspektywie wyznaczonej przez Pla- tona. Tym, co nadaje sens pomyślności i posiadaniu dóbr, jest możliwość wyświad- czania przysług drugim 70. Stwierdzenie to m a charakter uniwersalistyczny dotyczy wszystkich. Arystoteles wskazuje na przyjaciół jako na tych, wobec których przede wszystkim „w sposób najchwalebniejszy" może być praktykowane działanie na rzecz innych. W tym punkcie Stagiryta m a zapewne na uwadze najlepszą przyjaźń w węż- szym sensie, która zakłada równość między tymi, którzy się przyjaźnią; jako równi są zdolni przyjąć w pełni (co obejmuje docenienie wartości daru) więcej niż inni. Podobnie jak u Platona, przyjaźń jest celem do osiągnięcia osiąganym poprzez bezinteresowne działanie dla dobra innych. Jednym z przykładów takiego działa- nia, który daje Arystoteles, jest miłość matki do dziecka71. Dzięki działaniom tego typu bezinteresownym w relacjach asymetrycznych pozbawionych wzajemno- ści, zwłaszcza gdy towarzyszy im kom ponent emocjonalny, „ludzie nierówni sobie mogą stać się przyjaciółmi, jako że mogą zrównać się ze sobą"72. Cechą charakterystyczną przyjaźni jest odniesienie do konkretnego człowieka. Człowiek przyjacielem staje się wtedy, kiedy jest dobry dla drugiego w sposób czyn- ny73. Arystoteles widzi tutaj podstawę dla ograniczoności kręgu przyjaciół: „na prze- szkodzie stoi czynna miłość, nie można bowiem czynnym być w stosunku do wielu 68 Szeroko na temat Arystotelesa koncepcji przyjaźni z nawiązaniem do tradycji judaistycznej, zob. J. Nawrot, Przyjaźń w Etykach Arystotelesa, w pismach mądrościowych Septuaginty oraz w Nowym Testamencie, Wyd. Naukowe UAM, Poznań 2005. 69 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1155 a; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 70 Gdzie indziej Arystoteles pisze wprost o przyjaźni, że „polega ona raczej na kochaniu aniżeli na byciu kochanym"; Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1159 a; przel. D. Gromska, op.cit. 71 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1159 a; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 72 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1159 b; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 73 Zob. Arystoteles, Etyka eudemejska, 1238 a; przeł. W. Wróblewski, w: idem, Dzieła wszystkie, t. 5, PWN, Warszawa 1996, s. 385-493. 164 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK równocześnie"74. Przyjaźń m a miejsce tam, gdzie jest wzajemność i jej świadomość75. Jej cechą charakterystyczną jest także stałość i sprawdza się w czasach niepowodzeń76. W Arystotelesa nauce o przyjaźni pojęcie „przyjaźń" m a wiele znaczeń i wystę- puje na różnych poziomach. Przyjaźń między równymi, i to równymi w doskona- łości moralnej, będzie czymś, co najbardziej spełnia człowieka77, lecz m ożna m ó- wić o przyjaźni także między nierównymi. W spólne różnym odm ianom przyjaźni jest obdarowywanie się, odnoszenie wzajemnych korzyści lub wspólne posiadanie czegoś78, a typy korzyści odnoszonych przez każdą ze stron mogą być bardzo róż- ne79. Różne typy przyjaźni m ożna wyróżnić ze względu na bliskość relacji zacho- dzących między jej podm iotam i80 oraz ze względu na różne wspólnoty, w których ramach przyjaźń występuje81, o czym niżej. O d typu czy intensywności przyjaźni zależne są wymagania sprawiedliwości: „wymagania sprawiedliwości rosną w m ia- rę zacieśniania się przyjaźni"82. Podkreślić jednak trzeba, że w ujęciu Arystotelesa kierującego się tym, co do- świadczalne, i uznającego doczesność za jedyny wymiar człowieka niektórzy ludzie nie tylko nie są, ale nie mogą stać się równymi niektórzy ze względu na swe ułom - ności są niewolnikami z samej swojej natury83. 4. Wspólnoty i dobro wspólne W porównaniu z Platonem, Arystoteles wprowadza nowe wątki w kwestii tworze- nia wspólnot i ich doniosłości dla pojmowania prawa i sprawiedliwości. Są to za- gadnienia fundamentalne dla pojmowania dobra wspólnego. Chodzi o ujmowanie tworzenia wspólnot jako procesu naturalnego, procesu znajdującego zwieńczenie w utworzeniu państwa. Ludzie łączą się we wspólnoty ze względu na pożytek, który z tego płynie i którego sami osiągnąć nie mogą. Pierwszą wspólnotą jest rodzina; rodziny łączą się w gminy wiejskie, a te w państwo, które jest kresem tworzenia wspólnot, gdyż w jego ramach m ożna zaspokoić wszelkie potrzeby: „Pełna w końcu 74 Ibid. 75 „Człowiek przyjacielem staje się dopiero wtedy, kiedy odwzajemnia się przyjaźnią i obaj zdają sobie z tego sprawę", ibid., 1236 a. 76 Ibid., 1235 b, 1238 a. 77 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1157 a, op.cit. 78 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1159 b, op.cit. 79 Np. Arystoteles pisze: „Przyjaźń podyktowana względami na korzyść rodzi się najłatwiej mię- dzy osobami, które mają cechy przeciwne, więc między ubogim a bogaczem lub między nieukiem a człowiekiem światłym; dążąc bowiem do tego, czego mu samemu właśnie brak, ze swej strony od- płaca czymś innym". Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1159 b; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 80 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1159 b -1160 a, op.cit. 81 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1160 a; przeł. D. Gromska, op.cit. 82 Ibid. 83 Arystoteles, Polityka, 1254 a, op.cit. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 165 wspólnota stworzona z większej ilości gmin wiejskich, która niejako już osiągnęła kres wszechstronnej samowystarczalności, jest państwem; powstaje ono dla um oż- liwienia życia, a istnieje, aby życie było dobre. Każde państwo powstaje zatem na drodze naturalnego rozwoju, podobnie jak i pierwsze wspólnoty. Jest bowiem celem, do którego one zmierzają, natura zaś jest właśnie osiągnięciem celu. Właściwość bo- wiem, jaką każdy twór osiąga u kresu procesu swego powstawania, nazywamy jego naturą; tak jest w odniesieniu i do człowieka, i do konia, i do rodziny. Osiągnięcie celu (do którego się dąży) jest zdobyciem pełnej doskonałości, samowystarczalność zaś jest osiągnięciem i celu, i pełnej doskonałości"84. Państwo jest określane jako wspólnota doskonała przede wszystkim ze względu na to, że jest samowystarczalna, autarkiczna. Trzeba o tym pamiętać zwłaszcza przy lekturze arystotelików łacińskich, m.in. Tomasza z Akwinu, którzy określając pań- stwo mianem communitas perfecta, wcale nie mieli na myśli tego, że państwo nie ma żadnych braków czy wad, ale określali je tak ze względu na uznanie jego autarkicz- nego charakteru. Poza rodziną i gminą mogą funkcjonować też inne wspólnoty, które zmierzają do częściowego pożytku. Arystoteles daje przykład wspólnot tworzonych na p o - trzeby morskiej wyprawy i wyprawy wojennej, wspólnot religijnych i klubów, któ- rych celem jest składanie ofiar czy rozwijanie stosunków towarzyskich85. Każda wspólnota odnosi właściwy sobie wspólny pożytek dobro wspólne, dla którego realizacji powstała. Dobro wspólne najpełniej realizuje państwo i ono wyznacza perspektywę pojmowania dobra wspólnego par excellence. W świetle takiej nauki o wspólnotach i dobru wspólnym racją działania na rzecz dobra wspólnego jest pożytek,' który się osiąga, tj. własna korzyść i pomyślność. W przypadku państwa chodzi o „korzyść obejmującą całe życie"86, w przypadku in - nych wspólnot pożytek jest cząstkowy, chwilowy. Przestrzeń realizowania działań 0 takiej motywacji jest zakreślona przez wspólnotę autarkiczną, poza którą jednostka nie m a swoich interesów. Przez stulecia za taką wspólnotę uważano państwo; dziś jest nią społeczność globalna. Zatem podążając również tym tropem, dochodzi się do uzasadnienia solidarności w wymiarze uniwersalnym. Niemniej jednak taka motywacja podejmowania działań wspólnototwórczych 1 działań na rzecz innych nie wyklucza, aby podejmowane były bezinteresownie, ze względu na realizację sprawiedliwości i przyjaźni. Ta ostatnia postrzegana jest przez Arystotelesa także jako istotny czynnik spójności państwa, która jest warunkiem podstawowym, by mogło ono spełniać właściwe m u funkcje związane z zapewnia- niem tego, co pożyteczne dla jego obywateli. Stagiryta dostrzega, że w faktycznie ist- niejących państwach spójność jest uważana za cechę tak istotną, że niekiedy ustępuje 84 Polityka, 1252 b -i253 a, przeł. L. Piotrowicz, op.cit. 85 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1160 a, op.cit. 86 Ibid. 166 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK jej sprawiedliwość: „Wydaje się też, że istotą węzłów łączących państwa jest przyjaźń i że prawodawcy bardziej się o nią troszczą niż o sprawiedliwość; bo zgoda zdaje się być podobna do przyjaźni"87. 5. Arystoteles a Platon Zbieżność poglądów Platona i Arystotelesa w wielu kwestiach dotyczących prawa i sprawiedliwości jest bardzo duża. Choć Arystoteles w zasadzie odrzuca Platoń- ską naukę o ideach, to m ożna powiedzieć, że Arystoteles niejako ściągnął idee z nieba i umieścił je w konkretnej rzeczywistości. Niemniej jednak przy podobnie brzmiących tezach nierzadko istotnie różni się ich uzasadnienie. Uznając za je- dyną rzeczywistość otaczający świat, Arystoteles odwołuje się raczej do doświad- czenia niż do analiz systemowych (powoduje to niekiedy problem y in terpreta- cyjne związane z trudnością oddzielenia wątków opisowych od normatywnych). W istotny sposób zm ieniona jest perspektywa ontologiczna dla Arystotelesa w pełni realny nie jest świat idei i dusza, która jak chciał Platon przecho- dzi przez kolejne wcielenia; w pełni realny jest dla niego świat, w którym żyje- my, w pełni realny jest człowiek z krwi i kości realizujący się w życiu doczesnym. U Platona działanie na rzecz innych znajduje uzasadnienie w ontologii wszyst- ko, co istnieje, na ile istnieje jest dobrem i jako takie nie może się nie udzielać; człowiek czy raczej dusza spełnia się poprzez udzielanie się innym ze względu na to, że w ogóle istnieje, a nie dlatego, że jest człowiekiem czy istotą rozumną. Bycie istotą rozum ną jest istotne z punktu widzenia sposobu istnienia i sposobu udzie- lania się innym (sposób ten może być doskonalszy, zatem i sposób istnienia jest doskonalszy). U Arystotelesa jest inaczej. Przyjmuje on inną niż Platon koncepcję dobra. U tego ostatniego akcent położony jest na dobro jako właściwość podm io- tu działającego: bezinteresowne działanie tego podm iotu stanowi uzew nętrznie- nie jego dobra. U Arystotelesa akcent położony jest na dobro jako przedm iot, do którego dąży podm iot działający dobrem jest coś ze względu na to, że jest celem dla innych, a racją działania jest pewien brak w działającym (potencjalność), do którego wypełnienia potrzebne jest dobro będące celem działania. Stąd u A rysto- telesa racji działania na rzecz innych trzeba poszukiwać przede wszystkim w spe- cyficznej naturze człowieka, w którą „wpisane" jest działanie dla dobra innych jako to, co spełnia człowieka (evTeA.exeia). W perspektywie Arystotelesa tru d - niej uzasadnić solidarność w pełni uniwersalną i asymetryczną. Niemniej jednak u obu myślicieli racja dla bezinteresownego działania na rzecz innych znajduje się w podm iocie działającym i jest czymś, co jest niezbędne dla pełnego rozwoju i szczęścia tego podm iotu. 87 Arystoteles, Etyka nikomachejska, 1155 a, op.cit.; por. P. Śpiewak, W stronę dobra wspólnego, Aletheia, Warszawa 1998, s. 101. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 167 VI. Tomasz z Akwinu 1. Tomasz wobec tradycji antycznej Tomasz z Akwinu wpisuje się w zarysowaną tradycję. Przy prezentacji poglądów Tomasza z Akwinu trzeba pamiętać, że przez większą część średniowiecza łaciń- skiego, aż do XIII wieku, dom inuje filozofia typu platońskiego (oczywiście ten typ filozofii dom inuje także w greckim średniowiecznym Bizancjum), zwykle za p o - średnictwem neoplatońskich pism wybitnych myślicieli chrześcijańskich. Chociaż Tomasz z Akwinu uważany jest za arystotelika, i z pewnością był nim , zwłaszcza na tle innych myślicieli średniowiecza, to nie m ożna zapominać o typowo platońskich czy neoplatońskich kom ponentach jego filozofii dotyczących także tak kluczowe- go zagadnienia, jak pojmowanie dobra. Nie m ożna także nie doceniać drugiego, obok platonizmu, wielkiego nurtu filozofii starożytnej obecnego w średniowiecz- nej filozofii znacznie dłużej od arystotelizmu, mianowicie filozofii stoickiej z idea- mi powszechnego, kosmicznego państwa, którego obywatelami są wszystkie isto- ty rozum ne88 (przede wszystkim chodzi tu o prace Cycerona, na których Europa uczyła się także łaciny, oraz Seneki i Epikteta). W takiej perspektywie nie m ożna przeceniać znaczenia arystotelizmu dla Tomaszowego ujęcia podstaw solidarno- ści i pojmowania dobra wspólnego, i nie m ożna przypisywać dopiero chrześcijań- stwu autorstwa idei kluczowych dla współczesnej koncepcji solidarności, np. idei powszechnej miłości, również miłości do nieprzyjaciół, czy naturalnej równości wszystkich ludzi z punktu widzenia troski o ich szczęście. Istotna rola arystoteli- zmu polegała przede wszystkim na generalnej przebudowie perspektywy ontologicznej uznaniu za w pełni realne tego co cielesne i jednostkowe, realizujące się w świecie materialnym, choć samemu Arystotelesowi nie udało się jeszcze wypra- cować teoretycznych podstaw uznania wartości tego, co cielesne i indywidualne. 2. Dobro wspólne Kategorię dobra wspólnego Akwinata umieszcza wprost w swojej definicji p ra- wa (lex). Prawo „nie jest niczym innym niż jakimś rozporządzeniem rozum u dla dobra wspólnego, wydanym przez tego, kto m a pieczę nad wspólnotą, publicznie ogłoszonym"89. 88 Na temat podejmowanej tu problematyki zob. M. Schofield, The Stoic idea o f the city, The Uni- versity of Chicago Press, Chicago-London 1999; zob. także J. Gajda, Gdy rozpadły się ściany świata. Teorie wartości w filozofii hellenistycznej, Wyd. Uwr, Wrocław 1995; M. Piechowiak, Dobro wspólne jako podstawa polskiego porządku konstytucyjnego, op.cit., II.5. 89 „Nihil est aliud quam quaedam rationis ordinatio ad bonum commune, ab eo qui curam communitatis habet, promulgata", Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, I-II, q. 90, a. 4, co. Cytaty łacińskie za: Thomae Aquinatis Opera Omnia cum hypertextibus in CD-ROM, red. R. Busa, wyd. 2, Stuttgart 1996; przekłady, jeżeli nie jest zaznaczone inaczej, są przekładami własnymi. 168 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK Dobro wspólne jest wyraźnie wskazane jako cel prawa. W analizowanej trady- cji cel jest uważany za przyczynę przyczyn (causa causarum), gdyż to cel sprawia, że w ogóle się działa i ze względu na cel nadaje się działaniu kształt. Dobro wspól- ne jako cel określa wszystkie materialne warunki dobrego prawa, pozostałe trzy warunki wskazane w cytowanej definicji mają charakter formalny. Jeśli weźmie się pod uwagę, że w Summa contra gentiles Akwinata określa prawo jako rację działania i uznaje jednocześnie, że wszelka zasada działania zawarta jest w celu90, to dobro wspólne trzeba uznać za pierwszą „zasadę" całego porządku prawnego. Umieszcza- jąc dobro wspólne w art. 1 Konstytucji RP z 1997 r., polski ustrojodawca wyraźnie wpisał się w omawianą tu tradycję. W zgodzie z nauką Platona i Arystotelesa za cel prawa, zatem i za dobro wspól- ne, Tomasz uznaje szczęście człowieka: „Pierwszą zaś zasadą w działaniu, które podlega rozumowi praktycznemu, jest cel ostateczny. Celem ostatecznym życia ludzkiego jest zaś szczęście lub szczęśliwość (...). Z tego wynika, że prawo przede wszystkim powinno mieć na względzie porządek, który kieruje ku szczęśliwości"91. Państwo jest zdaniem Akwinaty wspólnotą doskonałą92; doskonałą w sensie, w jakim państwo jest doskonałe w ujęciu Arystotelesa, zatem jako wspólnota sa- mowystarczalna, autarkiczna. Państwo jako taka wspólnota, obejmująca wszystkie wspólnoty zapewniające cząstkowe i chwilowe korzyści, jak by powiedział Arystote- les, jest odpowiednią przestrzenią społeczną do uwzględniania i zestrajania ze sobą potrzeb wszystkich członków społeczności93. Toteż szczęście jednostkowe musi być skorelowane i w takim sensie podporządkowane szczęściu powszechnemu94. Jednostka nie jest jednak „wchłonięta" przez państwo, bycie dobrym obywa- telem nie jest równoznaczne z byciem dobrym człowiekiem (przypom nijm y - u Arystotelesa sprawiedliwość, na której straży stoi prawo pozytywne, obejmowała wszystkie cnoty): „człowiek nie jest przyporządkowany do wspólnoty politycznej całym sobą ani wszystkim tym, co jest jego" mówi Akwinata95. 90 „Lex nihil aliud sit quam ratio operis; cuiuslibet autem operis ratio a fine sum itur", Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa contra gentiles, lib. III, cap. 114, n. 5. 91 Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, 1-2, q. 90, a. 2, co. 92 Ibid. 93 „Każda pojedyncza osoba tak ma się do wspólnoty jak część do całości", Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, 2-2, q. 64, a. 2 co. 94 „Ponieważ każda część jest przyporządkowana całości tak jak niedoskonałe do doskonałego, a jeden człowiek jest częścią wspólnoty zupełnej, dlatego konieczne jest, aby prawo szczególnie miało na względzie przyporządkowanie do wspólnej szczęśliwości", Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, 1-2, q. 90, a. 2, co. 95 „Homo non ordinatur ad communitatem politicam secundum se totum, et secundum omnia sua", Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, 1-2, q. 21, a. 4, ad 3. Akwinata jest tu wyrazicielem starszej i szerszej tradycji filozofii i teologii chrześcijańskiej; Orygenes pisał: „Zaprzeczamy jednak, że wszystkie sprawy ziemskie zostały dane królowi i że wszystko, co otrzymujemy w [tym] życiu, otrzymujemy od króla" (Contra Celsum, ks. VIII, 67). Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 169 3. Racje działania dla dobra wspólnego Wskazując na motywację działania dla dobra wspólnego, Akwinata także wierny jest Arystotelesowi chodzi o własny pożytek: „Kto zabiega o dobro wspólne ja - kiejś społeczności, tym samym zabiega także o swoje własne dobro"96. Niemniej jednak przyjęta przez Tomasza koncepcja dobra łączy ujęcie Arystote- lesa, w której dobro pojmowane jest jako cel wypełniający braki, realizujący potencjalności tych, którzy do niego dążą97, z perspektywą Platońską, w której dobro jest czymś, co ze swej natury udziela się i jest przede wszystkim właściwością działają- cego podmiotu. Akwinata wielokrotnie przytacza neoplatońską formułę bonum est diffusivum sui (dobro udziela się z samej swej natury) jako wyrażającą powszech- nie akceptowany pogląd. Udzielanie się innym jest dla Akwinaty, podobnie jak dla Platona, znamieniem doskonałości i to doskonałości w aspekcie egzystencjalnym, w aspekcie bycia. Tym bardziej, tym mocniej, tym doskonalej się jest, im pełniej się udziela. Podobnie jak u Platona, byt absolutny, najdoskonalszy, którym jest Bóg, musi w całej pełni udzielać swą doskonałość, inaczej nie byłby doskonały. Tomasz w pełni zdaje sobie też sprawę z problemu, jakim dla dającego są ograniczone m oż- liwości przyjmowania udzielanych doskonałości przez adresata działania, gdyż aby dawać, trzeba mieć adresata zdolnego przyjąć to, co dawane. Łącząc tradycję Pla- tońską z Arystotelesowską, Tomasz formułuje zasadę: „dobro udziela siebie na spo- sób celu"98 m ożna udzielić jedynie tyle doskonałości, ile jest celem dla adresata udzielania się. Jedną z oczywistych konsekwencji jest to, że właściwym kontekstem pełnej realizacji osób są inne osoby zdolne do przyjęcia tego, co jest specyficznie osobowe. Dochodzi w tym punkcie do swoistego styku filozofii z teologią i to teologią w sensie wąskim jako refleksją zakładającą prawdziwość Objawienia. Okazuje się przy tym, że kluczowe dla uzasadnienia solidarności opartej na bezinteresownym działaniu na rzecz drugiego nie jest przede wszystkim znajdujące oparcie religij- ne przykazanie miłości, również miłości do nieprzyjaciół w swej istocie nieobce 96 „Ille qui quaerit bonum commune multitudinis ex consequenti etiam quaerit bonum suum, propter duo. Primo quidem, quia bonum proprium non potest esse sine bono communi vel familiae vel civitatis aut regni. (...) Secundo quia, cum homo sit pars domus et civitatis, oportet quod homo consideret quid sit sibi bonum ex hoc quod est prudens circa bonum multitudinis, bona enim dispositio partis accipitur secundum habitudinem ad totum", Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, 2-2, q. 47, a. 10, ad 2. 97 „Ratio vero boni est ex hoc quod est appetibile. Quod est finis", idem, Summa contra gentiles, lib. I, cap. 37, 5; podobnie np. idem, Summa theologiae, t , q. 5, a. 1, co.: „Ratio enim boni in hoc consistit, quod sit aliquid appetibile. (...) bonum et ens sunt idem secundum rem, sed bonum dicit rationem appetibilis, quam non dicit ens". 98 „Bonum est diffusivum sui esse, eo m odo quo finis dicitur movere", idem, Summa theolo- giae, 1, q. 5, a. 4, ad 2; zob. także idem, De veritate, q. 21, a. 1, ad 4; idem, In 1 Sent., dist. 34, q. 2, a. 1, ad 4. 170 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK Platonowi. Pomoc ze strony doktryny chrześcijańskiej przyszła na płaszczyźnie 011 tologicznych podstaw działania na rzecz innych. Teologia chrześcijańska podsuwa rozwiązanie jednego z zasadniczych problemów dotyczących możliwości pogodze- nia platonizmu, ważnego dla uznania solidarności uniwersalnej, z uznaniem wolno- ści Boga w stwarzaniu świata, istotnej dla docenienia tego, co cielesne i zmysłowe. W perspektywie Platońskiej, rozwiniętej w neoplatonizmie, skoro dobro z natury swej się udziela, to Bóg będąc pełnią dobra musi się udzielać i jak się zdawało - musi stwarzać świat, musi stwarzać, co tylko się da, aby w pełni wyczerpywać swą twórczą siłę. Przyniesiona wraz z chrześcijaństwem idea troistości jednego Boga po- zwala rozwiązać ten problem: pełne dawanie „rozgrywa" się między osobami Bo- żymi; adresatem tego, co absolutne, jest sam Bóg-Absolut zdolny do przyjęcia tego, co absolutne. Rozwiązanie problemu konieczności stwarzania świata przez Boga, przy jednoczesnym uznaniu Platońskiej koncepcji dobra, „otwiera" wolność Boga na stworzenie świata materialnego, który może być uznany zgodnie z Księgę ro- dzaju za dobry, a nawet za bardzo dobry. Historycznie rzecz ujmując, otworzyło to refleksję nie tylko teologiczną, ale i filozoficzną na problematykę wartościowo- ści tego, co materialne i cielesne. Pozwoliło także na budowę filozoficznej koncepcji człowieka, którego istotnym i dobrym elementem jest cielesność. Przede wszystkim w tym właśnie punkcie chrześcijaństwo wniosło nowe idee w koncepcji bytu istotne dla trwania i rozwoju idei solidarności uniwersalnej. Poszukując zatem odpowiedzi na pytanie o fundamenty solidarności, wypada uznać, że Tomasz z Akwinu nie wychodzi poza zasadnicze rozwiązania zarysowane przez Platona i Arystotelesa. Z jednej strony racją działania jest spodziewana ko- rzyść, uzyskanie określonych dóbr, z drugiej racją tą jest „wpisana" w podm iot dy- namika bezinteresownego udzielania się innym, tym większa im bardziej podm iot sam jest dobry. Akwinata w swych poglądach w tym zakresie bliższy jest Platonowi niż Arystotelesowi: skłonność do takiego działania znajduje ugruntowanie nie tyle w potencjalnościach natury człowieka jako takiego w jego aspekcie treściowym, ile raczej jest związana ze sposobem istnienia. Podobnie jak Platon i Arystoteles, Akwi- nata uznaje służebną rolę państwa i prawa wobec człowieka, gdyż'to państwo i pra- wo są dla człowieka, a nie człowiek dla państwa czy prawa. 4. Człowiek jako osoba dowartościowanie wolności Istotne novum w filozoficznej refleksji Akwinaty nie dotyczy racji zaistnienia działania na rzecz innych, dotyczy zaś podstaw determ inacji kształtu tego działa- nia. Kształt ten, na co zgadzają się wszyscy trzej omawiani tu myśliciele, wyznacza adresat działania. W łaśnie w sposobie pojm owania człowieka jako adresata dzia- łania Tomasz dokonał, w porów naniu z Arystotelesem czy Platonem, kroku wręcz rewolucyjnego. Opracował bowiem, w czym nie był w średniow ieczu odosob- niony, filozoficzną koncepcję osoby ludzkiej; starożytność przedchrześcijańska Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 171 filozoficznej kategorii osoby w ogóle nie znała. Racją bycia osoby jest zdaniem Tomasza godność". Specyfika godności człowieka leży przede wszystkim w d o - skonalszym sposobie istnienia istnienia jako cel sam w sobie100. Nie m ożna p o - wiedzieć, że myślenie o człowieku jako o celu samym w sobie nie miało anty- cypacji w filozofii Platona czy Arystotelesa. Na przykład Platon uznał człowieka za cel stworzenia świata widzialnego101, a Arystoteles za istotny element wolności uznał nie tylko swobodne podążanie za rozpoznanym dobrem , ale także sam o- dzielne określanie swoich celów102. Jednak to dopiero w koncepcji Tomaszowej swoje systemowe uzasadnienie znajduje wartość indywidualności i wolności, wol- ności, która w koncepcji Akwinaty staje się istotnym elem entem konstytuującym doskonałość człowieka, a konsekwencji staje się elementem współkonstytuującym treść dobra dla człowieka. Ostateczną racją indywidualności nie będzie element niedoskonały, „m ożnościowy" jak Arystotelesowska m ateria, ale najdoskonal- szy element bytu, którym jest istnienie. I to sposób istnienia, nieoddzielalnego w żaden sposób od bytu (zatem przyrodzonego i niezbywalnego), jest najwięk- szą „naturalną" (niezależną od uzasadnień teologicznych) doskonałością osoby. Człowiek jako osoba przestaje być pojm owany jedynie jako egzemplarz gatunku, którego pełnia rozwoju byłaby określona jego naturą wspólnym wszystkim lu - dziom człowieczeństwem, jak chciał Arystoteles; jako osoba każdy człowiek ma swój własny indywidualny cel współokreślany własnymi wyborami. To wolność, a nie rozumność, staje się doskonałością będącą racją uznania godności i bezpo- średnio tę godność realizującą. Niemniej jednak godność ma podstawę w przyrodzonym sposobie istnienia człowieka, a nie jak w koncepcji Arystotelesa w aktualnej zdolności do pew- nego typu działania. W swojej filozoficznej koncepcji człowieka Tomasz zdecy- dowanie odrzucił Arystotelesowską koncepcję niewolnictwa z natury, opartą na wrodzonych różnicach w sprawności intelektualnej103 i uznał naturalną równość 99 Zob. Tomasz z Akwinu, Summa theologiae, I, q. 29, a. 1 co. {De definitione personae). 100 Przedstawiona tu krótko Tomaszowa koncepcja została szerzej opracowana w: M. Piechowiak, Tomasza z Akwinu koncepcja godności osoby ludzkiej jako podstawy prawa. Komentarz do rozdziałów 111-113 księgi III. Tomasza z Akwinu Summa contra gentiles, „Poznańskie Studia Teologiczne" vol. 14, 2003, s. 219-242; idem, A ufder Suche nach einerphilosophischen Begriindung der Witrde des Menschen bei Thomas von Aąuin und Immanuel Kant, w: Würde dignitć godność dignity. Die Menschenwiirde im internationalen Vergleich, red. Ch. Baumbach i P. Kunzmann, München 2010, s. 289-319; idem, Filozofia praw człowieka, op.cit., s. 265-341; idem, Tomasza z Akwinu egzystencjalna koncepcja 'osoby i jej godności. Komentarz do Summa theologiae, I, q. 29, a. 1, corpus, w: Szkice o godności człowieka, red. Marek Piechowiak, Zielona Góra 2010. 101 Platon, Timaios, 77 a-c, przeł. W. Witwicki, w: Platon, Dialogi, Kęty 1999, t. 2, 657-743; Timajos , przeł. P. Siwek, w: Platon, Timajos, Kritias albo Atlantyk, Warszawa 1986, s. 1-128. 102 Arystoteles, Metafizyka, 982 b, przeł. K. Leśniak, PWN, Warszawa 1983. 103 „Żaden człowiek nie jest ze swej natury przyporządkowany do innego jako do celu", Tomasz z Akwinu, In 2 Sent., dist. 44, q. 1, a. 3, ad 1. 172 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK wolności wszystkich ludzi104. Koncepcja osoby pozwoli katolickiej nauce społecz- nej nawiązać dialog z podstawowymi dla współczesnej kultury ideami dotyczą- cymi organizacji społeczeństwa i zintegrować w swym nauczaniu problematykę dobra wspólnego z problem atyką praw człowieka, obejmującą uznanie wolności i fundamentalnej równości wszystkich ludzi105. VIL Katolicka nauka społeczna 1. Nawiązanie do tradycji Problematykę solidarności rozwinął przede wszystkim Jan Paweł II. Wskazał on wprost na powiązania nauki społecznej Kościoła w kwestii solidarności z przed- stawioną wyżej tradycją filozofii klasycznej: „zasada, którą dziś nazywamy zasa- dą solidarności, (...) jawi się jako jedna z fundam entalnych zasad chrześcijańskiej koncepcji organizacji społecznej i politycznej. Mówi o niej wielokrotnie Leon XIII, nazywając ją podobnie jak filozofia grecka - »przyjaźnią«; Pius XI używa tu nie mniej znamiennego określenia: »miłość społeczna«, zaś Paweł VI, włączając do tego pojęcia wielorakie współczesne wym iary kwestii społecznej, mówi o »cywilizacji miłości«"106. W encyklice Dives in misericordia z 30 listopada 1980 r. Jan Paweł II pisał: „Świa- domość, że jesteśmy zwykle wzajemnie wobec siebie dłużnikami, idzie w parze z wezwaniem do tej braterskiej solidarności, której św. Paweł dał wyraz w zwięzłym wezwaniu: »Jeden drugiego brzemiona noście« (Gał. 6 ,2)"107. Solidarność jest działa- niem na rzecz innych konkretnych ludzi, mającym na celu przezwyciężanie czy łago- dzenie trudności, z którymi się zmagają. W encyklice Laborem exercens z 14 wrześ- nia 1981 r. w wydaniu polskim nr 8 zatytułowany był Solidarność ludzi pracy108, nie zawierał jednak wprost dookreślenia sposobu pojmowania solidarności109. Mowa jest o solidarności w dziedzinie pracy ludzkiej, a pojmowana jest ona jako odpowiedź 104 „Z natury wszyscy ludzie są jednakowo wolni", idem, In 2 Sent., dist. 44, q. 1, a. 3, ad 1. 105 Na tem at filozofii klasycznej jako uzasadniającej prawa człowieka zob. M. Piechowiak, Filozofia praw człowieka. Prawa człowieka w świetle ich międzynarodowej ochrony, Lublin 1999, s. 265-341. 106 Jan Paweł II, Centesimus annus, op.cit., n r 10. Por. Katechizm Kościoła Katolickiego, Pallotinum , Poznań 1994, n r 1939: „Zasada solidarności, nazywana także »przyjaźnią« lub »miłością spo- łeczną«, jest bezpośrednim wymaganiem braterstwa ludzkiego i chrześcijańskiego". 107 Jan Paweł II, Dives in misericordia, „Acta Apostołicae Sedis" 72 (1980), 1177-1232, nr 14. Zob. Z. Stawrowski, Jan Paweł II a solidarność, op.cit., s. 130-131. 108 Np. Encykliki Ojca Świętego Jana Pawła II, Znak, Kraków 1996, s. 141-213. W oficjalnym łaciń- skim wydaniu poszczególne numery nie posiadają tytułów, „Acta Apostołicae Sedis" 73 (1981), s. 594. 109 Próby pośredniego dookreślenia zob. Z. Stawrowski, Jan Paweł II a solidarność, op.cit., s. 132-134. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 173 przede wszystkim na rażącą niesprawiedliwość dotykającą robotników, na narusza- nie ich praw (wprost wskazane są: klęska bezrobocia, zaniżanie wartości pracy, na- ruszenie prawa do sprawiedliwej płacy, do zabezpieczenia osoby pracownika i jego rodziny) prowadzące do społecznej degradacji podm iotu pracy, wyzysku pracują- cych i rosnących obszarów nędzy, także głodu. Solidarność ludzi pracy i solidar- ność z ludźmi pracy zmierza do realizacji sprawiedliwości społecznej. Jako warunek jej praktykowania wskazana jest otwartość na dialog i na współpracę z innym i110. Problematyka solidarności w kontekście pracy znalazła rozwinięcie w przem ó- wieniu Jana Pawła II wygłoszonym 15 czerwca 1982 r. w Genewie, w siedzibie Mię- dzynarodowej Organizacji Pracy: „Prawdziwa solidarność m a na celu walkę o spra- wiedliwy ład społeczny, który by mógł wchłonąć wszystkie napięcia i w którym konflikty tak na szczeblu grup społecznych, jak i narodów mogłyby łatwiej zna- leźć rozwiązanie. Aby zbudować świat sprawiedliwości i pokoju, solidarność musi obalić podstawy nienawiści, egoizmu i niesprawiedliwości, zbyt często wynoszone do godności zasad ideologicznych czy też zasadniczych praw życia społecznego. W ramach tej samej wspólnoty pracy solidarność prowadzi raczej do odkrycia wy- mogów jedności tkwiących w naturze pracy niż tendencji do dzielenia i przeciwsta- wiania. Solidarność sprzeciwia się pojmowaniu społeczeństwa w kategoriach walki 'przeciw', stosunków społecznych zaś w kategoriach bezkompromisowego przeciw- stawiania klas. Solidarność, która swój początek i swoją siłę bierze z natury pracy ludzkiej, a więc z prym atu osoby ludzkiej nad rzeczami, będzie umiała tworzyć na- rzędzie dialogu i współpracy, pozwalające rozwiązywać sprzeczności bez dążenia do zniszczenia przeciwnika".111 Istotnym rysem pojmowania solidarności jest jej poko- jowy charakter i dążenie do współdziałania, a nie dzielenia. Pojawia się tu typowe dla tradycji klasycznej uznanie uniwersalności postulatu działania na rzecz innych - dążenie do przezwyciężenia konkretnych trudności pewnych grup społecznych nie może się odbywać kosztem zniszczenia czy krzywdzenia innych. Przede wszystkim na ujęciu solidarności opracowanym w związku z problem a- tyką pracy oparte jest przyjęte w Katechizmie Kościoła Katolickiego określenie za- sadniczych przejawów solidarności: „Solidarność przejawia się przede wszystkim w podziale dóbr i w wynagrodzeniu za pracę. Zakłada ona również wysiłek na rzecz bardziej sprawiedliwego porządku społecznego, w którym napięcia będą m o- gły być łatwiej likwidowane i łatwiej będzie m ożna znaleźć rozwiązanie konfliktów na drodze negocjacji"112. 110 Jan Paweł II, Laborem exercens, op.cit., n r 8. 111 Jan Paweł II, Przemówienie w siedzibie Międzynarodowej Organizacji Pracy, Genewa 15 czerwca 1982, w: idem, Przemówienia i homilie Ojca Świętego Jana Pawła 11, wyd. 2, Znak, Kraków 2008, s. 239- -255, nr 9. Cytowany tu fragment tego przemówienia został przytoczony w przemówieniu Jana Pawła II do Konferencji Episkopatu Polski, 19 czerwca 1983 r„ Jan Paweł II, Pokój tobie, Polsko! Ojczyzno moja! Znów na polskiej ziemi, Wyd. Kurii Biskupiej, Lublin 1984, s. 113 (104-114). 112 Katechizm Kościoła Katolickiego, n r 1940. 174 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK 2. Podstawy pojmowania solidarności a. Rozwinięcie koncepcji solidarności w encyklice Sollicitudo rei socialis Zasadnicze opracowanie zagadnienia solidarności pojmowanej w znacznie szer- szej perspektywie niż tej wyznaczonej problem atyką pracy znajduje się w en- cyklice Jana Pawła II Sollicitudo rei socialis z 30 grudnia 1987 r., stanowiącej rozwinięcie nauczania społecznego Pawła VI zawartego w encyklice Populorum progressio z 26 marca 1967 r.U3, a dotyczącego przede wszystkim rozwoju i niedorozwoju ludów114. W tej ostatniej encyklice solidarność pojawia się w kontekście problema- tyki stosunków międzynarodowych, gdyż zdaniem Pawła VI tzw. kwestia społeczna nabrała także wymiaru światowego, obok wymiaru lokalnego czy narodowego115. Obowiązek solidarności określił Paweł VI jako obowiązek „niesienia przez narody bogatsze pom ocy tym ludom, które zdążają dopiero do rozwoju"116. Pomoc ta ma prowadzić do umożliwienia ludom samostanowienia o sobie117. Można zatem p o - wiedzieć, że właściwa solidarności pomoc kierowana jest zasadą pomocniczości. b. Kontekst Jana Pawła II rozwinięcie nauki o solidarności miało miejsce w kontekście wielo- rakich zagrożeń rozwoju, których przezwyciężeniu solidarność ma służyć. Zwraca on uwagę na dwa zasadnicze fakty o charakterze pozytywnym, które mogą stać się podstawą solidarności. Pierwszym z nich jest często występująca „pełna świadomość własnej godności i godności każdej istoty ludzkiej"118, która „wyraża się na przykład poprzez ożywiającą się wszędzie troskę o poszanowanie ludzkich praw i bardzo zde- cydowane odrzucenie ich gwałcenia"119. Brak poszanowania tych praw jest podsta- wową przeszkodą w integralnym rozwoju jednostek i ludów. Drugim faktem jest co- raz powszechniejsze przekonanie o radykalnej współzależności wszystkich w skali globalnej120 i to on zostaje uznany za bezpośrednią podstawę solidarności121, mającej uzasadnienie także w zasadzie powszechnego przeznaczenia dóbr122. Świadomość współzależności dotyczy także poszanowania praw człowieka i m a wymiar moralny: „Fakt, że ludzie w różnych częściach świata odczuwają jako 113 „Acta Apostołicae Sedis" 59 (1967), 257-299. 114 Zdaniem Jana Pawła II encyklika Populorum progressio stanowi „zastosowanie" do specyficz- nego problemu rozwoju i niedorozwoju ludów, nauczania soborowego zawartego przede wszystkim w Konstytucji Gaudium et spes, z 7 grudnia 1965, op.cit. 115 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 9. 116 Paweł VI, Populorum progressio, op.cit., nr 44. 117 Ibid., n r 65. 118 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., n r 26, podkr. w tekście. Na temat godności zob. przede wszystkim Sobór Watykański II, Konstytucja Gaudium et spes, op.cit., n r 12-22. 119 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 26, podkr. w tekście. 120 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 26. 121 Ibid., nr 38. 122 Ibid., nr 39, 42. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 175 coś, co dotyka ich samych, różne formy niesprawiedliwości i gwałcenie praw ludz- kich dokonujące się w odległych krajach, których być może nigdy nie odwiedzą, jest dalszym znakiem pewnej rzeczywistej przem iany sumień, przem iany mającej znaczenie moralne"123. Powszechna staje się świadomość odpowiedzialności za po - szanowanie praw człowieka i rozwój wszystkich124. c. Podstawowe rozumienie solidarności i podstawowe je j cechy Właściwą odpowiedzią na zagrożenia praw człowieka i rozwoju jest więc solidarność pojmowana jako postawa moralna i społeczna, jako cnota w tradycyjnym znaczeniu. Solidarność „jest to mocna i trwała wola angażowania się na rzecz dobra wspólnego, czyli dobra wszystkich i każdego, wszyscy bowiem jesteśmy naprawdę odpowiedzial- ni za wszystkich"125. Chodzi przy tym o dobro „całego człowieka"126. Przyjęte jest tu rozumienie dobra wspólnego powszechnie przyjmowane we wcześniejszych wypowiedziach należących do nauczania społecznego Kościoła, czy- li jako sumy warunków życia społecznego, w których ludzie mogą pełniej i łatwiej osiągać własną doskonałość, a warunki te są określone przede wszystkim prawami i obowiązkami osoby ludzkiej127. Jest to kontynuacja tradycji klasycznej w pojm o- waniu dobra wspólnego. Na pierwszym planie jest przy tym dobro wspólne w sensie przedmiotowym chodzi o warunki rozwoju, a nie o sam rozwój. Dobro wspólne w sensie podm iotow ym jest celem i racją bycia dobra wspólnego w sensie przed- miotowym. To przesunięcie akcentu jest zrozum iałe w perspektywie uznania wolności za konstytutywny element rozwoju osoby pełen rozwój może być dzie- łem samego podm iotu i nie może być wymuszony prawem ani innymi instrum en- tam i porządkowania życia społecznego. Podkreślić trzeba, że zgodnie z tradycją klasyczną dobrem wspólnym nie jest dobro zbiorowości jako takiej, ale dobro kon- kretnych osób do niej należących. W paradygmacie pojmowania dobra wspólne- go w katolickiej nauce społecznej w pełni zrozumiałe jest powiązanie solidarnoś- ci z respektowaniem praw człowieka. Solidarność m a na celu dobro konkret- nych jednostek i w tym sensie m a charakter indywidualny. W katolickiej nauce społecznej nie ma przeciwstawienia dobra wspólnego pełnem u rozwojowi p o - szczególnych jednostek128. 12.3 Ibid., nr 38. 124 Zob. ibid., n r 29. 125 Ibid., nr 38; por. tamże nr 29. 126 Ibid., nr 38; por. Paweł VI, Populorum progressio, op.cit., nr 42. 127 Sobór Watykański II, Deklaracja o wolności religijnej Dignitatis humanae z 4 grudnia 1963 r., op.cit., nr 6; zob. przyp. 11. 128 Inaczej sprawa wygląda z punktu widzenia kolektywistycznych ujęć dobra wspólnego, toteż H. Brunkhorst pisze: „If the classic republican formula of the common good refers to an objectively recognizable collective good, 'solidarity' has from the start an individualistic quality", H. Brunkhorst, Solidarity, op.cit., s. 3. W całej tradycji klasycznej wymiar indywidualny jest fundamentalny, a wraz z koncepcją osoby indywidualność pojmowana jest w ścisłym powiązaniu z wolnością. 176 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK Zaangażowaniu właściwemu solidarności towarzyszy wyrzeczenie się własnego egoizmu129, gotowość „ewangelicznego »zatracenia siebie« na rzecz drugiego zamiast wyzyskania go, »służenia mu« zamiast uciskania go dla własnej korzyści"130. Soli- darność jest postawą przeciwną żądzy zysku i władzy dia samej władzy131 władzy, której istotą jest narzucanie innym własnej woli132. Żądza zysku i żądza władzy idą zwykle z sobą w parze; postawy te jako przeciwstawne solidarności charakteryzuje absolutyzacja dążenie do celu „za wszelką cenę"; mogą je przejawiać zarówno jed- nostki, jak i społeczności, narody i rejony świata - „bloki"133. Solidarność wymaga wzajemnego uznawania się za osoby. Pomagający muszą brać pod uwagę wolę tych, którym się pomaga; nie mogą „za wszelką cenę" narzucać własnej woli. Natomiast przyjmujący pom oc także muszą przyjmować postawę ak- tywną, a nie bierną i aktywnie, na miarę możliwości współdziałać dla dobra wspól- nego i nie niszczyć „tkanki społecznej"134, gdyż ich trudne położenie nie usprawied- liwia działań niszczących. Ta aktywna postawa zakłada „odkrywanie i docenianie własnych możliwości"135, identyfikowanie swoich potrzeb i określanie własnych prio- rytetów, inicjatywę w podejmowaniu działań136. Na poziomie społeczności jest to możliwe jedynie dzięki dobrowolnemu i odpowiedzialnemu uczestniczeniu wszyst- kich w sprawach publicznych137. Ogólniej m ożna powiedzieć, że solidarność zakłada nieinstrum entalne trakto- wanie jednostek, ludów, narodów 138 czy szerzej społeczności i uznanie ich p od- miotowości. Przejawem takiego nieinstrum entalnego traktowania jest branie pod uwagę indywidualnych celów jednostek czy celów specyficznych dla danej spo- łeczności i będących wyrazem tego, co stanowi o ich tożsam ości139. Kluczowe znaczenie m a respekt dla wolności: „Aby rozwój był pełny, winien urżeczywistniać się w ramach solidarności i wolności, bez poświęcania pod jakim - kolwiek pozorem jednej czy drugiej"140. Mowa jest także o respektowaniu autono- mii polegającej na swobodnym dysponowaniu sobą przez jednostki i społeczności (stowarzyszenia)141. Dotyczy to zarówno tych, którym się pomaga, jak i pomagających. 129 Zob. Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., n r 26. 130 Ibid., n r 38. 131 Ibid. 132 Ibid., nr 37. 133 Ibid. 134 Ibid., nr 39. 135 Ibid., n r 45. 136 Ibid., ńr 44. 137 Ibid. 138 Ibid., nr 39. 139 Ibid., nr 33. 140 Ibid. Por. H. Brunkhorst, Solidarity, op.cit., s. 3: Solidarność „is nothing but the democratic realization of individual freedom". 141 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., n r 45. Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 177 W perspektywie solidarności czynnikiem prowadzącym do rozwoju nie jest znisz- czenie przeciwnika, który identyfikowany jest w ramach przeciwieństw lub sprzeczno- ści społecznych, politycznych czy gospodarczych142. Walka z przeciwnikiem wymaga kształtowania postawy wrogości czy wręcz nienawiści. W perspektywie solidarności zaś chodzi o wspólne osiąganie celów, czyli o działanie razem, a nie przeciwko komuś. Zgodnie z całą tradycją klasyczną kluczowe są relacje oparte na przyjaźni czy co charakterystyczne dla chrześcijaństwa miłości, a nie na wrogości czy nienawiści. Poszanowanie autonom ii wszystkich i odejście od konceptualizowania celów w kategoriach wrogości, nienawiści czy walki przeciwko komuś jest skorelowane z postulatem walki bez przemocy. Odejście od przem ocy w relacjach między ludź- mi i grupam i społecznymi należy do najbardziej typowych rysów całej katolickiej nauki społecznej, począwszy od uchodzącej za kam ień węgielny tej nauki encykli- ki Leona XIII Rerum novarum z 15 maja 1891 r.143 Solidarność jest alternatywną wobec przemocy, odpowiedzią na niesprawiedliwość144. Solidarność w ujęciu katolickiej nauki społecznej obejmuje tzw. opcję na rzecz ubogich, zwaną także „miłością preferencyjną" na rzecz ubogich145, polegającą na tym, że służba czy miłość wobec innych powinna być przede wszystkim kierowana ku najuboższym146, przy tym ubóstwo pojęte jest nie tylko jako brak podstaw o- wych środków materialnych, ale także jako brak możliwości korzystania z innych podstawowych praw i wolności (w szczególności wolności religijnej i prawa do in i- cjatywy gospodarczej)147. 3. Solidarność wobec byłych krajów komunistycznych. Racje praktykowania solidarności Okres kształtowania się katolickiej nauki społecznej dotyczącej solidarności przypa- da na lata, w których nastąpiła emancypacja państw Europy Środkowej i W schod- niej, której istotnym czynnikiem był społeczny ruch pod hasłami solidarności w Polsce. W kontekście trudności gospodarczych przeżywanych przez kraje postko- munistyczne, w encyklice Centesimus annus z 1991 r. Jan Paweł II pisał: „W obecnej trudnej sytuacji inne narody powinny solidarnie wspierać byłe kraje komunistyczne. Oczywiście, one same muszą się stać pierwszymi twórcami własnego rozwoju; trzeba jednak im to w sposób racjonalny umożliwić, co z kolei wymaga pom ocy innych krajów. Zresztą aktualne trudności i niedostatek są skutkiem historycznego procesu, 142 Por. Jan Paweł II, Centesimus annus, op.cit., nr 18; por. Leon XIII, Pacem in tenis, op.cit., III. 143 Leonis XIII P.M. Acta, XI, Romae 1892, 97-144; przekład: „Znak" 34 (1982), nr 7-9 (332-334), s. 644-679; zob. Jan Paweł II, Centesimus annus, op.cit., nr 17; idem, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 10. 144 Zob. Jan Paweł II, Centesimus annus, op.cit., nr 23. 145 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 42. 146 Ibid., n r 46. 147 Ibid., nr 42. 178 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK w którym kraje te były często przedmiotem, a nie podm iotem, a zatem ich sytua- cja nie jest wynikiem wolnego wyboru czy popełnionych błędów, lecz narzuconego przemocą ciągu tragicznych wydarzeń historycznych, które uniemożliwiły im pój- ście drogą gospodarczego i obywatelskiego rozwoju. Pomoc ze strony innych krajów, zwłaszcza europejskich, które uczestniczyły w tej samej historii i ponoszą za nią od- powiedzialność, jest wymogiem sprawiedliwości. Leży to również w interesie Europy i służy jej ogólnemu dobru. Europa bowiem nie będzie mogła żyć w pokoju, jeśli pojawiające się jako następstwo przeszłości różnego rodzaju konflikty zaostrzą się na skutek gospodarczego chaosu, duchowego niedosytu i rozpaczy"148. W cytowanym fragmencie znajduje się kilka elementów istotnych dla pojmowa- nia solidarności. Solidarność pojawia się w kontekście zasady pomocniczości. Po- magając nie wolno przekreślać podmiotowości tego, komu się pomaga; jego rozwój powinien być jego własnym dziełem. We fragmencie tym znajdują się uwagi doty- czące ugruntowania postulatu solidarnej pomocy. Po pierwsze, jest on ugruntowany moralnie jest wymogiem sprawiedliwości niezależnym od wszelkich możliwych korzyści płynących dla udzielającego pomocy. Wymóg ten jest tym mocniejszy, że ci, którzy pomocy potrzebują, znaleźli się w trudnej sytuacji nie z własnej winy, nie w wyniku działań, których byliby świadomymi i wolnymi sprawcami. Po drugie, wy- móg solidarnej pom ocy ugruntowany jest pragmatycznie udzielona pomoc leży w interesie pomagającego, gdyż tworzy warunki pokoju. 4. Teologiczne dopełnienie uzasadnienia solidarności W katolickiej nauce społecznej solidarność pojm owana jest przede wszystkim na płaszczyźnie naturalnej, niezależnej od przekonań religijnych. Niemniej jednak nauka o solidarności m a także, dodatkowo, uzasadnienie teologiczne w ścisłym tego słowa znaczeniu, zatem takie, które dla swej konkluzywności zakłada uznanie Objawienia chrześcijańskiego. Uzasadnienie to sięga do tezy teologicznej o stwo- rzeniu człowieka na obraz i podobieństwo Boga oraz do tez dotyczących troistości osób Boga i miłości polegającej na wzajemnym obdarowywaniu się jako na zasad- niczym sposobie bycia i wewnętrznym życiu Boga. Teza o byciu obrazem Boga ma wymiar normatywny: człowiek, zmierzając do swej samorealizacji, powinien rozwijać się tak, aby coraz bardziej do Boga się upodabniać. Człowiek tym bar- dziej upodabnia się do Boga, w im większym stopniu tworzy wspólnotę (jedność) z innymi opartą na działaniu na ich rzecz, działaniu całkowicie bezinteresownym, opartym na przebaczeniu i pojednaniu149. Teologiczne uzasadnienie znajduje tu platońska koncepcja sprawiedliwości obejmująca tezę, że człowiek tym bardziej jest, im bardziej poświęca się dla innych; mówiąc językiem konstytucji Soboru 148 Jan Paweł II, Centesimus annus, op.cit., nr 28. 149 Jan Paweł II, Sollicitudo rei socialis, op.cit., nr 40. Solidarność w poszuk iw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 179 Watykańskiego II Gaudium et spes: „człowiek (...) nie może odnaleźć się w pełni inaczej jak tylko poprzez bezinteresowny dar z siebie samego"150. Na gruncie polskim szczególnie istotne jest odwołanie do wezwania „Jeden drugiego brzem iona noście" z Listu św. Pawła Apostoła do Galatówl5\ przyjętego przez Józefa Tischnera na określenie istoty solidarności, w kazaniu do przywód- ców NSZZ „Solidarność" wygłoszonym 19 października 1980 r., inaugurującym cykl rozważań opublikowanych jako Etyka solidarności. Wezwanie to wraz z ewan- gelicznym hasłem „Nie dajcie się zwyciężyć złu, lecz zło dobrem zwyciężajcie" sta- nowiły fundam ent ideowej tożsamości ruchu „Solidarność"152. VIII. Uwagi podsumowujące 1. Tradycja ideowa Mając na uwadze filozofię Platona, inaczej musimy postrzegać rolę chrześcijaństwa w historii idei solidarności. To dziełem nie dopiero chrześcijaństwa jest podniesienie bezinteresownego działania (miłości) dla dobra innych, także nieprzyjaciół, do rangi istotnego wymiaru rozwoju człowieka stanowiącego ugruntowanie idei solidarności uniwersalnej. Z punktu widzenia pojmowania solidarności wizja historii idei, w której dopiero chrześcijaństwo pozwala na przezwyciężenie jakoby powszechnie uznanych partykularyzmów typowych dla Arystotelesa (obejmujących ograniczenia w pojm o- waniu przyjaźni, uznanie niewolnictwa z natury)153, także jest fałszywa. W problema- tyce solidarności filozofia chrześcijańska ponownie eksponuje elementy zapoznane czy może jedynie mniej eksponowane przez Arystotelesa, ale obecne w filozofii Platona, którego zdaniem działanie dla pożytku innych jest ugruntowane w dążeniu do uzyska- nia pierwszej i fundamentalnej doskonałości cnoty, którą jest sprawiedliwość. Istotną nowość mającą konsekwencje nie tyle dla uzasadnienia samego praktyko- wania solidarności, ile raczej dla określania jej kształtu przynosi wypracowana przez filozofię chrześcijańską koncepcja osoby, która daje teoretyczne podstawy do dowar- tościowania tego, co indywidualne i do dowartościowania wolności. Osoba zostaje pojęta jako byt posiadający godność istniejący jako cel sam w sobie, jako byt, który spełnia się przez realizację nie tego, co powszechne, gatunkowe, ale tego, co indywi- dualne. Otwiera to drogę do wyeksponowania w refleksji nad działaniem dla dobra innych autonomii zarówno jednostek, jak i tworzonych przez nie społeczności. Przeprowadzona wyżej analiza tradycji klasycznej potwierdza trafność traktowa- nia koncepcji filozoficznych czy tradycji ideowych jako narzędzi służących ujm o- 150 Sobór Watykański II, Konstytucja Gaudium et spes, op.cit., nr 24. 151 Gal. 6,2. J. Tischner nawiązał tu zapewne do cytowanej wyżej encykliki Jana Pawła II Dives in misericordia, n r 14. Zob. Z. Stawrowski, Jan Paweł II a solidarność, op.cit., s. 130-131. 152 Z. Stawrowski, Jan Paweł II a solidarność, op.cit., s. 131. 153 Tak M. Hoełzl, op.cit., s. 53. 180 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK waniu i wyrażaniu istotnych elementów ludzkiego doświadczenia; jeśli elementy te zostaną na płaszczyźnie refleksji teoretycznej zapoznane, teorie czy koncepcje są modyfikowane. Jest to także argument na rzecz tezy, że relacje o charakterze nor- matywnym nie są jedynie wtórne wobec procesów kulturowych. Nie jest tak, że to kultura jest jedynym źródłem normatywnego charakteru relacji społecznych, ale są przesłanki do uznania źródeł przyrodzonych, niezależnych od kultury, choć konceptualizowanych dzięki kulturze. Poprzez zasadę solidarności, niejako bocznymi drzwiami, wchodzi centralny element klasycznej koncepcji sprawiedliwości obejmującej postulat czynienia tego, co pożyteczne dla innych (nawet dla wrogów). Z czasem był on zapoznawany i zo- stał uznany za dom enę wyłączoną z prawa stanowionego. Można postawić h ipo- tezę, że nie bez znaczenia było uznanie tego elem entu za ugruntowany religijnie, a wraz z sekularyzacją utracił status uniwersalny, ponadkonfesyjny. 2. Działanie dla innych warunkiem samorealizacji i dwie racje praktykowania solidarności W tradycji klasycznej wskazywane są dwie zasadnicze racje praktykowania soli- darności. Są to: racja par excellence moralna: pom agam i tracę to, co mam, ale za to bardziej jestem; racja utylitarna (instrum entalna) oparta na wzajemności gwarancji pomocy: ja pom agam (my pomagamy) „licząc" na to, że jeśli znajdziemy się w potrzebie, inni nam pomogą, „odwdzięczając się", doceniając naszą wcześniejszą życzli- wość; co istotne, niekoniecznie owa pom oc oczekiwana jest od tych, którym się wcześniej pomagało. W ramach problematyki konstytucyjnej trzeba zauważyć, że w tradycji kla- sycznej solidarność, zarówno jako postawa, jak i pewnego typu działanie, znajduje ugruntowanie we wspólnej wszystkim ludziom, przyrodzonej im właściwości po - legającej na tym, że działanie dla dobra innych jest istotnym, wręcz nieodzownym elementem pełnego rozwoju osobowego; właściwość ta może wyjaśniać akty solidar- ności asymetrycznej, z oddaniem swojego życia włącznie (aby uniknąć założeń ontologicznych dotyczących właściwości człowieka, wystarczy tu uznanie powszechnego znajdującego wyraz w kulturze doświadczenia wskazującego na istotną zależność między rozwojem człowieka a bezinteresownym działaniem na rzecz innych). Wniosek ten pozwala odczytywać art. 1 Powszechnej deklaracji praw człowieka mówiący o braterstwie, jak i mówiące o solidarności ostatnie zdanie wstępu do Konstytucji RP jako na wskazujące istotną właściwość człowieka, której prawo - mające służyć integralnemu rozwojowi osoby nie może ignorować. Obowiązek solidarności, obok godności i wolności, staje się jedną z fundamentalnych wartości antropologicznych porządku konstytucyjnego. Podobnie jak godność i wolność, Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 181 tak też obowiązek solidarności powinien być postrzegany jako właściwość specy- ficznie ludzka, która wymaga ochrony i tworzenia warunków dla jej rozwoju. O bok tego podstawowego, moralnego uzasadnienia praktykowania solidar- ności jest także uzasadnienie typu pragmatycznego, oparte na dążeniu do włas- nej korzyści. Ma to miejsce w państwie, w którym występuje szereg wzajemnych zależności. Ponieważ współcześnie nie m a wspólnot autarkicznych, powodzenie jednych członków „globalnej wioski" leży w dobrze pojętym interesie wszystkich innych. Brak samowystarczalności jakiejkolwiek wspólnoty, poza wspólnotą glo- balną, powoduje, że jesteśmy od siebie zależni i dla naszego własnego powodzenia potrzebna jest wzajemna gotowość niesienia pomocy. 3. Poza (ponad) sprawiedliwością wymienną i rozdzielczą. Przedmiot pomocy Choć w odniesieniu do solidarności motywowanej utylitarnie można mówić o wza- jemności lub choćby o oczekiwaniu wzajemności, to wzajemność ta dotyczy samego procesu pomagania. Wielkości udzielanej pomocy nie mierzy się w odwołaniu do za- sady ekwiwalentności dóbr. Miarą wielkości pomocy nie są zasady sprawiedliwości wymiennej. Od adresata pomocy lub od tych, którzy będą w imię solidarności pom a- gać nam, gdy my znajdziemy się w potrzebie, nie wymaga się ani nie oczekuje zwrotu równowartości środków. Jeśli nawet oczekuje się pomocy, gdy w przyszłości samemu znajdzie się w potrzebie, to nie oczekuje się, że wielkość dóbr, które będą przedmiotem pomocy, zostanie określona na zasadzie ekwiwalentu pomocy wcześniej udzielonej. Podobnie określanie wielkości pom ocy udzielanej w odwołaniu do zasady soli- darności nie opiera się na zasadach sprawiedliwości rozdzielczej. W przypadku so- lidarności wewnątrzgrupowej zachodzi sytuacja bardzo podobna do tych sytuacji, w których za podstawową uznaje się zasadę proporcjonalności, centralną dla reali- zacji sprawiedliwości rozdzielczej: są wspólne zasoby, z których rozdziela się dobra członkom społeczności. Jednak w przypadkach typowych dla solidarności miarą udzielanej pomocy nie jest proporcjonalność wielkości pomocy do wielkości wkładu dokonanego przez tych, którym się pomaga, ale ich potrzeby; klasycznym przykła- dem jest tu ubezpieczenie zdrowotne. Oczywiście pod uwagę trzeba brać wielkość zasobów i zasada proporcjonalności dochodzi do głosu w tym, że zasoby udzielane są proporcjonalnie do potrzeb i przy zachowaniu zasady równej pom ocy w sytua- cji równych potrzeb. Niemniej jednak miarą nie jest wielkość wkładu dokonanego przez tych, którzy są w potrzebie. M iarą są z jednej strony potrzeby adresata pomocy, a z drugiej możliwości tego, kto pomaga. Jak się zdaje, nie można stworzyć uniwersalnego katalogu takich p o - trzeb i odpowiadających im dóbr służących ich zaspokojeniu. Aby w grę wchodziła solidarność, trzeba uwzględnić nie tylko rodzaj potrzeb, ale także stopień ich rea- lizacji. Nie chodzi bowiem o maksymalizowanie zaspokojenia potrzeby, ale o takie 182 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK jej zaspokojenie, które prowadzi do pełnego upodmiotowienia adresata pomocy, tj. doprowadzenie do stanu, w którym on sam będzie zdolny do pozyskania środków i tworzenia warunków wolnego rozwoju. Z tego punktu widzenia nadm ierna pomoc może być szkodliwa. Respekt dla podmiotowości adresata pom ocy wymaga także, aby udzielając pom ocy brać pod uwagę jego zgodę na udzielenie pomocy. Ogólnie m ożna powiedzieć, że chodzi o zapewnienie dobra wspólnego w sensie przyjętym w klasycznej refleksji nad dobrem wspólnym, czyli o zapewnienie społecznych wa- runków umożliwiających lub ułatwiających rozwój w aspekcie indywidualnym lub wspólnotowym (społecznym). Przede wszystkim chodzi o zapewnienie dóbr okreś- lonych prawami człowieka.' Z uwagi na zmienność okoliczności i konieczność brania pod uwagę woli adre- satów pom ocy solidarne działanie w sposób ogólny może być charakteryzowa- ne nie tyle poprzez wskazanie dóbr będących przedm iotem pomocy, ile przede wszystkim celu, jakiem u te dobra mają służyć, którym jest umożliwienie adresato- wi pom ocy osobowego rozwoju w danych warunkach społecznych, a jeśli to tylko możliwe, samodzielności w zaspokajaniu swych potrzeb. Zwrócić też trzeba uwagę na dynamiczny charakter determ inacji treści dóbr uwarunkowany stopniem roz- woju społecznego. 4. Solidarność a zasada pomocniczości W sytuacji pomocy, w której pomagającym jest jakaś grupa a adresatem jednostki lub podm ioty niższego rzędu (słabsze), w grę wchodzi klasyczna zasada pom ocni- czości. Podobnie jak w działaniach regulowanych zasadą pomocniczości działania oparte na zasadzie solidarności dotyczą jakiejś konkretnej „sprawy", podobnie także cel działania można określić jako „pomoc dla samopomocy". Solidarność może być praktykowana także między jednostkami, a adresatem po- mocy może być nawet jednostka wyższego rzędu. Zasada solidarności nakazująca solidarne działania m a zatem szerszy zakres stosowania niż zasada pomocniczości, której klasyczne sformułowanie wskazuje, iż reguluje ona pomoc udzielaną przez jed- nostki (zbiorowości) wyższego rzędu jednostkom (zbiorowościom) niższego rzędu. Charakterystyczną cechą solidarnego działania jest także to, że podmioty działań pomocowych mogą być jednocześnie adresatami tej pomocy. Z taką sytuacją mieliśmy do czynienia w Polsce w ruchu społecznym „Solidarność". Wspólne działanie szeregu jednostek i grup społecznych, obejmujące realizację szeregu celów pośrednich, zmie- rzało do zmiany społecznych warunków życia tych, którzy działanie podjęli. 5. Solidarność a nieposłuszeństwo obywatelskie Polskie doświadczenia solidarności wskazują na to, że m ożna ją praktykować w ra- mach nieposłuszeństwa obywatelskiego. Nie wchodząc w szczegółowe rozważania Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 183 dotyczące wzajemnych relacji między solidarnością a nieposłuszeństwem obywa- telskim, podkreślić trzeba jedną z cech solidarnego działania: jego cel, którym jest zmiana warunków społecznych, może być osiągnięty nie tylko poprzez pozytywne działanie polegające na świadczeniu pomocy jednych podmiotów na rzecz drugich, ale także poprzez wspólne (solidarne) zaniechanie pewnych działań, w tym także niekorzystanie z własnych uprawnień lub kompetencji. Solidarne zaniechanie może także poprawiać warunki życia innych podmiotów np. przez to, że nie będą one m u- siały wykonywać pewnych świadczeń. 6. Trzy płaszczyzny solidarności: doskonałość moralna (cnota) - praktykowanie solidarności zasada solidarności Korzystając z przedstawionej tradycji i chcąc uporządkować dyskurs nad solidar- nością, odróżnić m ożna trzy jego płaszczyzny pozwalające na wyróżnienie trzech różnych znaczeń pojęcia „solidarność". Po pierwsze, solidarność to pewna doskonałość moralna, pozytywnie kwalifiko- wana sprawność do pewnego typu działania, tradycyjnie zwana cnotą. Aby unik- nąć nieporozumień, o czym orzekamy mówiąc o solidarności w tym właśnie sensie, można mówić o cnocie solidarności. W kontekście problematyki państwa i prawa jest to jedna z cnót obywatelskich, której posiadanie jest pożądane z punktu widze- nia realizowania dobra wspólnego. Po drugie, solidarność to pewnego typu działanie lub częściej zespół pewne- go typu działań pozytywnie kwalifikowanych. Solidarność to praktykowanie solidar- ności jako cnoty. Dla uniknięcia nieporozumień można używać takich określeń, jak „solidarne działanie" lub „praktyka solidarności". Zarówno w przypadku cnoty solidarności, jak i solidarnego działania mamy do czynienia z pewnymi stanami rzeczy, które w omówionej tradycji są pozytywnie oceniane. Analogicznie do wyróżnionych typów racji działania dyktowanego zasadą solidarności, racji praktykowania solidarności, m ożna wyróżnić kryteria ocenne o charakterze czysto moralnym (nieinstrumentalnym; na przykład: jestem solidarny, praktykuję solidarność ze względu na obowiązki moralne) oraz o charakterze utyli- tarnym (instrumentalnym; jestem solidarny, praktykuję solidarność ze względu na to, że jest to korzystne dla mnie, dla wspólnoty politycznej itp.). W omówionej tra - dycji „solidarność" jako kategoria desygnująca pewną sprawność działania (pewną postawę) lub działanie pewnego typu, jest kategorią o charakterze normatywnym, a nie opisowym. Można powiedzieć, że zarówno cnota solidarności, jak i praktyko- wanie solidarności są wartościami lub dobrami. Specyfika solidarności jako cnoty jest wyznaczona sposobem pojmowania prak- tyki solidarności, gdyż specyficzne elementy solidarności jako postawy są wyznaczo- ne charakterystyką działania, w którym postawa ta się ujawnia i ze względu na które jest postulowana. 184 / MAREK PIECHOW IAK Po trzecie, solidarność może być pojm owana jako pewnego typu dyrektywa nakazująca realizować solidarność w jednym z dwóch wyżej wskazanych znaczeń. W artość solidarności stanowiłaby jej uzasadnienie aksjologiczne. Przedmiotem takiej dyrektywy może być wprost wartość solidarności lub warunki sprzyjające realizacji tej wartości. W przypadku cnoty solidarności dyrektywa nakazująca jej realizację może mieć jedynie charakter m oralny i być adresowana do potencjalnego podm iotu spraw- ności moralnej. Jednak ponieważ w grę wchodzi cnota obywatelska, to może ona stanowić uzasadnienie dyrektyw, także prawnych, nakazujących kształtowanie wa- runków sprzyjających rozwojowi określonych postaw (np. w tak różnych sferach, jak edukacja czy system podatkowy). Najogólniejsza dyrektywa, m ożna ją określić jako zasadę solidarności, byłaby dyrektywą nakazującą realizację solidarności jako pewnego typu działania. Ponie- waż jej aksjologiczne uzasadnienie stanowi solidarność jako wartość, trzeba się li- czyć z tym, że w niektórych kontekstach m ianem „zasada solidarności" zostanie określona sama ta wartość, a nie dyrektywa. Można także mówić o zasadach solidarności; byłyby to podstawowe dyrektywy dotyczące sposobu determinacji konkretnych działań (formułowania norm ) skła- dających się na praktykę solidarności. Byłaby to np. zasada głosząca, że adresatem obowiązków mogą być podm ioty zarówno indywidualne, jak i zbiorowe, lub zasa- da, że wielkość świadczeń nie jest określana na podstawie zasady ekwiwalentności świadczeń, ale ze względu na potrzeby i stojące do dyspozycji zasoby. Racją użycia tu określenia „zasada" jest to, że formułowana dyrektywa staje się podstawą formuło- wania dyrektyw (norm) bardziej szczegółowych. Podejmując problematykę solidarności z perspektywy Ronalda Dworkina kon- cepcji zasad i reguł, nie m ożna sformułowanej wyżej zasady solidarności jedno- znacznie kwalifikować jako zasady w sensie Dworkina. W zależności od okoliczno- ści, dyrektywa nakazująca praktykowanie solidarności może mieć charakter zasady lub reguły. Solidarne działanie dotyczy jakiejś konkretnej „sprawy" i ponieważ jego zasadniczym celem jest „pomoc dla samopomocy", zatem określone, ograniczone zasoby mogą być wystarczające dla osiągnięcia tego celu; wówczas norm y nakazu- jące solidarność mogą mieć charakter reguł; przy zasobach niewystarczających nor- my będą miały charakter optymalizacyjny (będą nakazywały realizację określonego stanu rzeczy w możliwie największym stopniu) i będą nabierały charakteru zasad w sensie Dworkina. 7. Solidarność w znaczeniu podstawowym Powyższe analizy wskazują, że podstawowe znaczenie pojęcia „solidarność", deter- minujące jego znaczenia pochodne, powinno być modelowane w odniesieniu do solidarności jako pewnego zespołu działań. Mając na uwadze wcześniejsze analizy, Solidarność w poszukiw an iu ideowej tradycji interpretacji tej kategorii... / 185 można zaproponować następujące określenie: solidarność to zespół działań po - dejmowanych w jakiejś społeczności, zmierzających do tworzenia (zachowania) określonego poziom u społecznych w arunków rozwoju osobowego w wymiarze indywidualnym lub społecznym, do których należą przede wszystkim prawa czło- wieka, czyli jest ona zespołem działań na rzecz dobra wspólnego w tradycyjnym rozumieniu; bezpośrednim przedm iotem działań są dobra, których wielkość jest określana ze względu na cel i stojące do dyspozycji zasoby, a nie równość (ekwiwa- lentność) świadczeń z odnoszonym i korzyściami. Celowe jest zwrócenie uwagi na następujące elementy: dla m odelowania pojęcia „solidarność" kluczowe okazują się pojęcia „dobro wspólne" oraz „godność", „wolność" i „autonomia" podm iotów pomagających i beneficjentów; celem solidarności jest dobro konkretnych ludzi, ich rozwój w wymiarze indy- widualnym i społecznym, a nie dobro społeczności jako takich; warunki życia społecznego czy dobro społeczności są przedmiotem solidarności ze względu na jednostki, których rozwojowi mają służyć; solidarność jest charakteryzowana przez przyjęcie opcji na rzecz słabszych, społecznie wykluczonych, znajdujących się w sytuacji, w której niemożliwe lub utrudnione jest korzystanie z podstawowych praw czy wolności; obowiązek solidarności może być adresowany do każdego typu podm iotów życia społecznego; podm ioty podejmujące działania, jak i te, którym działania mają służyć, mogą być ze sobą tożsame; mogą mieć charakter indywidualny lub zbiorowy; solidarność jako działanie na rzecz dobra wspólnego zakłada, że podm ioty po - magające, jak i korzystające z pom ocy tworzą jakąś społeczność, że łączą je jakieś więzi; działania mogą być działaniami w sensie pozytywnym i mieć charakter świad- czeń lub mogą być zaniechaniami polegającymi m.in. na nieczynieniu użytku z przysługujących uprawnień lub kompetencji. W poszukiwaniu nowych form solidaryzmu społecznego tom I Idea solidaryzmu we współczesnej filozofii prawa i polityki pod redakcją Anny Łabno WYDAWNICTWO SEJMOWE Warszawa 2012 Publikacja wykonana w ramach projektu badawczego „Zasada solidaryzmu w polskich rozwiązaniach ustrojowych. W poszukiwaniu nowych form solidaryzmu społecznego", nr NN 110 186436 Projekt okładki i stron tytułowych Agnieszka Szwed Redaktor Jerzy S. Kugler Redaktor techniczny Jolanta Cibor Korekta Katarzyna Chrzanowska Recenzja wydawnicza Prof. dr hab. Jerzy Oniszczuk © Copyright by Kancelaria Sejmu Warszawa 2012 ISBN 978-83-7666-145-2 (całość) 978-83-7666-146-9 (tom I) KANCELARIA SEJMU Wydawnictwo Sejmowe Wydanie pierwsze Warszawa 2012 http://wydawnictwo.sejm.gov.pl e-mail: [email protected] Druk i oprawa: NokPol Spis treści W stęp (Anna Ł abno)................................................................................................... 7 Antonio M. Hespanha, Korzenie idei solidarności we współczesnej teorii prawa (w końcu XIX i na początku XX w iek u ).............................................. 9 Lidia Rodak, Solidaryzm i/jako o b iek ty w izm ..................................................... 23 Jerzy Zajadło, Idea solidarności we współczesnej filozofii prawa i filozofii p o lity k i..................................................................................................................... 46 Adam Czarnota, Prawo a współczesne odm iany solidaryzm u społecznego 58 Jerzy Zajadło, Zasada solidarności w kierunku nowej filozofii prawa m iędzynarodow ego.............................................................................................. 74 Sławomir Tkacz, Aleksandra Wentkowska, O naturze teoretyczno-prawnej i uwikłaniach pojęcia „solidaryzm" .................................................................. 105 Marek Piechowiak, Solidarność w poszukiw aniu ideowej tradycji interpretacyjnej tej kategorii konsty tucyjnej................................................... 145 Agnieszka Bielska-Brodziak, Iwona Bogucka, Solidarność jako term in prawny i jego funkcjonowanie w praktyce orzeczniczej................................................

Quality Issues and the Ban on Selected Musical Video Broadcasting in Nigeria: A Defence for National Broadcasting Commission (2014) Nigerian Theatre Journal.13.2: Pp 172-183. (ISSN 0189-9562) By Stanislaus Iyorza (Ph.D) University of Calabar, Calabar, Cross River State Abstract This paper investigates the recurrent music ban on musical video broadcasting and the issues of quality of musical contents that have warranted such a phenomenon by the National Broadcasting Commission in Nigeria. The major contention was the justification or otherwise of the ban. The paper employed observational and analytical methodologies to examine the causes of the bans on musical videos in Nigeria by NBC, the reactions of the affected artistes and their fans and the negative effects of erotic lyrics, nudity and suggestive dance steps by minors, ladydancers and the musicians on the youths and other categories of musical video audiences. The paper submits that the NBC's gestures are commendable and should be sustained while quality assurance efforts should be intensified through promotion of quality musical videos produced more for the purpose of entertainment than education or information. The paper also calls for collaborative efforts among all stakeholders in the music industry to achieve quality in the musical videos produced for general public consumption. This paper encourages musicians to invite creativity into the musical industry in Nigeria by coming out with songs and performances that reflect the cultural values of the country rather than mere entertainment songs and acts that have a greater tendency to corrupt younger minds. Key words: Quality Assurance, Musical Video, Broadcasting. 2 Introduction The falling standards experienced in the world of arts and the humanities have raised concerns for systematic measurement, comparison with a standard, monitoring of processes and an associated feedback loop that confers error prevention. Quality Assurance includes management of the quality of raw materials that are produced for consumption by the consumers. The quality of every product and service is designed to meet the needs of the target population; however some products offer dysfunctional effects that constitute more harm than good to the consumers. In Nigeria, the National Broadcasting Commission reportedly banned a number of new music videos from being broadcast anywhere in the country in 2013 (Ohai, 2013). The banned musical videos include: i) Tillaman ft vector in Koma Roll ii) Wande Coal – Go Low iii) D'Prince – Take Banana iv) Flavour – Shake v) Goldie Ski Bobo vi) Chuddy K – Brazilian Hair vii) Timaya Shake Your Bum Bum viii) Psquare – Alingo The musical videos were said to be banned because of the quality and contents of the songs and videos respectively. Tillaman's Koma Roll was accused of erotic contents and suggestive dance steps, Wande Coal's Go Low contained scenes of nudity in the video while D'Prince's Take Banana contained erotic, vulgar words and suggestive dance styles. Flavour's Shake contained vulgar and suggestive dance steps, Goldie's Ski Bobo featured a minor with 3 suggestive and immoral dance steps while Chuddy J's Brazilian Hair was banned for featuring children and ladies with suggestive and erotic dance steps. Timaya's Shake Your Bum Bum was banned for containing erotic and suggestive dance steps with vulgar Lyrics while Psquare's Alingo was accused of containing erotic scenes at the end of the musical videos. As a major regulatory body, the NBC keeps close watch on the contents of music videos and audio CDs broadcast by Nigerian television and radio stations. In the past, the body had officially kick out Afrobeat musician, Femi Kuti's wave making song Bang Bang Bang and Konga's Baby Konga from the air space. Quite recently, the commission, in addition to the above list, had to flex its muscles when DJ Zeez's Body Language fell short of its expectations. The irony of the quality assurance checks is that the NBC does not regulate what is broadcast on cable channels such as MTV Base, Soundcity, Trace and Channel O, as well as internet platforms like YouTube and Vimeo. The basic quality assurance questions begging for answers include: should the NBC uphold and continue to exert ban on musical videos with questionable contents at the expense of the entertainment values of the viewing publics? If musical videos are checked by NBC to ensure quality assurance on Nigerian television stations, who regulates the broadcast of the same musical videos on cable channels that are mostly watched today without restrictions? Do the musical videos so qualified as 'unfit' for the Nigerian airwaves contain any entertainment, informative or edutainment values to deserve pardon? The thrust of this paper is to defend and justify the actions of the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission's incessant ban on musical videos in Nigeria with a view to promote quality assurance. The objective of this paper is to justify the ban of Musical Video Broadcasting in NBC's quality assurance plans. 4 Musicological Appraisal and Analysis of Two of the Banned Musical Video P-square's Alingo P-square's lyrics open with one of the musicians' reaction to a lady's dance movement. The song is single greater hits for p-square recorded in 2012. The song is an Afropop genre. The music became popular due to its somewhat controversial dance steps which makes it quite complicated for a lot of people to copy. However the dance steps of the musicians and some ladies in the video suggest sexual activities. In the rhythm, the musical lines suggest that the dance moves sends them (p-square) crazy and makes them "bark like bingo", thus "the way that she's dancing" she's getting higher. She's makin' me bark like a bingo & I come dey try 2 dey sing eh & d way dat she's dancin' I don dey, I don dey, I don dey She's makin me bark like a bingo & I come dey try 2 dey sing oh & d way dat she's dacin' I don dey... The chorus describes P-square's feelings as the girls "move their wings" "bursting my brain" "whining and grinding face to face". In verse two, the P-square says he likes the way the ladies in the video dance but the dances all depict sexual activity. The verse reads: Ey ey ey ey, p-square we back again Ey ey ey ey,this girl dey craze oh She come dey do like say she bless o She whinin' and grindin' and whinin' and burn dis place oh She no dey play oh Na face to face oh As she dey go low, go low The erotic video pictures made the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) to place a ban on the music video stating "erotic dance scene at the end of the musical video". P-square reacts to the ban thus: "we heard about the ban, but when they (NBC) ban a particular song, they 5 are indeed helping to promote that song...if they ban a song from being broadcast on Nigerian stations, will they stop Channel O, Sound City and other cable networks from playing the same song? It's not possible." Timaya's "Shake your bum bum" Timaya's music video "Shake your bum bum" is a true reflection of eroticism while the musical rhythm and dance steps by the choreographers suggest sexual activities. The opening of the song is a call on the dancing ladies to shake their bum bum (their bottom) irrespective of their sizes or a place of origin because the act gives him pleasure and causes an arousal of his libido. In verse 1, the Timaya expresses his sexual attractiveness that makes ladies to call his phone without relenting, following her on twitter and calling for a relationship. Timaya expresses positive responds on the condition that the lady shakes her "bum bum". This implies that shaking of a lady's "bum bum" as in the musical video is a way of attracting men's attention. The extract reads: Onor nor nor this girl she are calling my phone number ye onor nor nor nor This girl she don't let me go May be then she follow me for twitter Then say she want make I ping her ha She want me to answer Every thing she want make I ring her But if you shake your bum bum (shake up your bum bum your bum bum) Baby shake up your bum bum bum bum, bum bum yeyeye In verse 2, Timaya confesses that he is reacting positively to the way the lady "rolls" her "behind" which can cause him "to go blind". In verse 3, Timaya reveals that even though his body is there, his mind is imagining he will "give it" to the lady since he knows what the lady want. All these are depicted in the musical video. He concludes in verse 4 that he likes the way he makes love to the lady and likes the way the lady screams dances and jumps up during love 6 making. He calls it "kerewa" which is the kind of dance that makes men want to collect the lady's numbers. The verse reads: Everybody wanna dance hey hein wanna dance hey shake up your bum bum cause your bum bum this song is on your bum bum listing up now the way that you want it, I want it too the way that you love it, am loving it too the way that you screaming, dancing and jumping baby girl me I be they want you too See as she don they dance kerewa She don they put man for big whahala See anything way she are dancing her dancing the men go want collect her number The demonstrations in the video are exact demonstrations of the rhythm which suggest sexual act, which certainly invited the NBC's hammer. Reactions to the Ban of Selected Musical Video Broadcasting in Nigeria The first school of thought views the ban of musical videos as a right step in the right direction because of the negative contents they have. Based on the social learning theory of Albert Bandura, Dorothea Ross and Sheila Ross, scholars in this school of thought are convinced that sexually related content in musical videos created for adults also reach the children and corrupt them easily. The sexually related words and images within the context of the musical videos carry meanings which may be less interesting than the mode of expression. These words and images certainly have negative effects on the viewing and listening audience. The second school of thought holds everything against the ban of musical videos in Nigeria. It is a school of thought that supports edutainment as an avenue for using entertainment to educate the audience. To this school of thought, the use of nudity, erotic and suggestive dance steps are entertainment images behind the real message of the musicals. The musical videos have their original messages and stories which nevertheless cannot be overlooked by what may be considered as the 'distortions" of erotic visuals. When the NBC banned over eight musical videos from being broadcast on the Nigerian airwaves in early 2013, the trend triggered different reactions from the musicians and the general public. 7 The spokesman for Psquare, Bayo Adetu, described the ban as "as unnecessary and unjustifiable action". Psquare, Wande Coal, Timaya, Flavour, D'Prince, Chuddy K and Tillaman who were all affected artistes condemned the action. The Acting Public Relations Officer of the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission, Maimuna Jimada, said the commission was not aware of the ban and was not in charge of banning musical videos. She explained that the commission was solely responsible for ensuring that the musical videos and audios made for the public consumption were safe (Abiodun). Thus, if a music video or audio has content that is not suitable for broadcast, such video and audio are tagged "not to be put on air". Ordinarily, Mrs. Jimada also explained that if a video is tagged as not to be aired, its producers could still reproduce them with better content for broadcast. Corroborating the commission's stance, the Deputy Director and Head of Corporate Affairs, National Films and Video Censors Board, Mr. Yunusa Tanko, disclosed that the board was unaware of such ban, and was in charge of censoring the content of musical video. He however complained that the artistes fail to bring their works to the board for proper check before broadcast. While media survey indicates that some of the artistes were calling for dialogue between the NBC and stakeholders in the entertainment sector, another survey indicated that most musical video fans were not happy about the ban (Abiodun). Issues of Quality in Nigerian Musical Videos Quality assurance refers to the processes and procedures that systematically monitor different aspects of service process or facility to detect correct and ensure that quality standards are being met (Bucki, 1999). The quality of any material refers to the substance and characteristics that define such work. Music is naturally characterized by form and content. In Nigerian Musical Videos, issues emanate from the content of the material. As outlined earlier, the basic issues that have emanated from Nigerian musical video include; 8 i) Issue of erotic content in words and pictures ii) Issue of nudity iii) Issue of suggestive dance steps iv) Issue of featuring minors with immoral dance steps v) Issue of vulgar lyrics The contents of Nigerian musical videos ordinarily would not pose any threat but the perceived tendency to corrupt the viewing audience has made it an issue. The audiences are at the receiving end and the theory of Social Learning by Bandura states that "the audiences learn and derive knowledge from what they view on television and film" (Ike, 2005: 201). If this theory is assumed to hold water, the content of most Nigerian musical videos that are banned can constitute social vices in the society and corrupt the morals of the audience, especially children who are often considered as the future of tomorrow. Some theories of edutainment do not perceive entertainment materials as being intended to corrupt the audience but primarily to educate, inform and entertain the audience through a single work of art. The theory of edutainment has been supported by scholars in the humanities. With regards the Social Learning Theory, music, when wrongly interpreted and appreciated will lead to erroneous conclusions and adoptions (Doki, 2006). In support of the edutainment theory, and with reference to the ban of musical video in Nigeria, Doki writes; Most interjections into lyrical submissions are aesthetics meant to garnish the song. We must be careful in wholistically analyzing the total world of song to be able to fashion out meaning and sense in such song. Zule-zo for instance combines acting, dance and music to blend harmony and this, create some unique and fascinating pictures that must be explained in unison simultaneously. Misconception it was, that caused the ban on Zule-zo when they first sang "Kelewa". The Nigerian Broadcasting Cooperation claimed the demonstration by Zule-zo of how the woman was made love to was pornographic (Doki, 2006:8). The author in the above paragraph wrote a conclusion in defense of Zule-zo's song "Ikpongo Tswar" and opined that a curious listener of Zule-zo's Kelewa" should rather busy his 9 or herself with the theme of the song which is unfaithfulness by an adulterous woman, and not the contextual display of the act. To the author, the act of unfaithfulness by an adulterous woman is shameful and must be condemned, which is what the music track was concerned with. The contextual display in the content of the song "Kelewa" is mere aesthetics and should be appreciated as such. The above submission justifies the theory of edutainment against the social learning theory. The Edutainment theory is based on a solid blend of core communication theories and fundamental entertainment pedagogy that guides the development of all interpretive programming. Infact, the social learning theory is a departure from the edutainment theory. It posits that people learn by observing others and the consequences of their behaviour. If the persons so choose, they then emulate the behaviour by rehearsing the action, taking action and comparing their experiences to the experiences of others, and then adopting the new behaviour. However, the theory of Reasoned Action dwells on the effect that one (an audience) should perceive before adopting behaviour. The concept of eroticism relates to the wider meanings and connotations of the term, in that it clearly situates eroticism as a form of pleasure drawing on sexual sources but detached not only from the primary reproductive purpose of sex but from its more socialized functions such as creating relationships. Eroticism implies a conscious and deliberate concern with the subsidiary aspects of the sexual drive. Eroticism is often associated with heightening pleasures. Eroticism, put simply is a tool for human sex drive (libido). Nudity on the other hand is qualified as either exposed buttocks, or genitalia or general lack of clothing. Suggestive dance steps include movements of the body that depict sexual activity. 10 Considering the nature of eroticism, nudity and suggestive dance steps, it is evident to state that the selected societies in Africa like the Nigerian society consider acts that depict, promote or suggest sexual activities as inimical to the values of their people. To this end, the inclusion of eroticism, nudity and suggestive dance steps constitute an issue that is capable of inviting bans on musical videos in a country like Nigeria. The ban of musical videos for featuring minors with immoral dance steps and vulgar lyrics appears to be an action that expresses concern for children and adolescents who are considered a future generation. To the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), it is a step in a right direction targeted at safeguarding the Nigerian values. Negative Effects of Corrupt Musical Video Watching on Youth Behaviour Nigerian youths today spend more time watching videos than doing anything else. The watching of music videos has a great impact on the behaviour of teens in many ways on a daily basis. The effects of this are mostly negative. The negative effects of video watching and listening on teens are: the indecent way they dress and view their bodies, their language and accepted words and the way they want to try to live their lives (Lopez, 2012). The extensive watching of videos has greatly affected the demeanor of dressing in female and male teens. For example, teenage girls flaunt around their bosoms with rumps hanging out of their clothing just because it is in the music videos, so they portray the same body image thinking that this is the trend. In addition, teenage males strut around with their pants sagging below their derriere and wear many chains around their necks trying to resemble a rap artiste. Music videos obviously give young male teens the illusion that having this particular image will bring them women galore. 11 Secondly, music video watching affects teens' language and their acceptance of it. As it is today, girls are accepting being called a "bitch" (a female dog) by the same or opposite sex because they see video women shaking and groaning in the video while being called that. The teenage girls little understand that the world bitch belittles them (which it does), so they smile while hearing someone say, "yeah, that's my bitch". Furthermore, music videos give male teens the impression that it is okay to disrespect women by calling them out of their name, because when the artist does it in the video, women don't object to it. Thirdly, suggestive dance steps, nudity and erotic words and images do incite young men and women into sexual acts. It reveals to them the motion picture of sexual activity and creates an urge for sex in the youths, especially those who are feeble. Finally, the use of minors in musical videos is only problematic when they are given roles of undertaking erotic and suggestive dance steps. First it corrupts the child in question and second, it portrays the child as a model to other children who will certainly emulate what they see and hear. Children copy what they see and hear faster than the adults and they easily become inclined to such things. Survey of children's parties in Calabar, Cross River State between 2004 and 2005 indicated that children easily sang and dance Zule-zo's Kelewa music with ease – a song that was later banned from broadcasting due to erotic lyrics and suggestive dance steps. In America, more than one-thousand scientific studies and reviews conclude that significant exposure to musical video images and erotic lyrical content increase the risk of vulgar behavior in certain children and adolescents (American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Public Education, 2013:342). 12 Conclusion Quality assurance has remained a contemporary concern in most disciplines and the arts are not an exception. Practice in the work of arts demands immediate attention, not because standards are falling per se, but because of the dysfunctional roles they play in the society. Artistes, musical performers and singers must come together with all stakeholders in the musical industry to chat a way forward for achieving quality assurance. The incessant ban on broadcast of some musical videos in Nigeria by the National Broadcasting Commission is real. The ban has been occasioned by factors ranging inclusion of erotic lyrics and nudity to the use of minors and suggestive dance steps that are capable of corrupting the values and moral standing of the audience. This study establishes that there exist a strong influence of musical contents and lyrical context on the behaviour of the children, youths and other categories of audience even though such dysfunctional effects may not be intended by the musicians who are at the heart of the event. This study therefore confirms the efficacy of Bandura, Ross and Ross's Social Learning Theory at the expense of other edutainment theories. The reactions of the artistes who condemn the ban of their musical videos from broadcast on Nigerian television and radio stations should be expected. This is certainly because the Nigerian musicians whose works are banned by the NBC do not believe that their erotic lyrics and suggestive dance steps with females as well as nudity factors corrupt the values of the viewing and listening audience. Most times, they expect that the theme of their musicals and the meanings embedded in the oral expressions should be cherished the more. The fact remains that there is more to what the eye sees and what the ear hears that what the mind thinks as far is music videos are concerned. Musical lyrics may not intend to offend the moral taste of the audience, yet the images thereof may do worse. 13 The NBC's actions are not out of place as far as this paper considers quality of the contents of Nigerian musical videos as issues to be given attention. The NBC is a regulatory body saddled with the responsibility of preventing "corrupt" musical videos from going on air on Nigerian Television and Radio Stations. If the relevance of the NBC was nothing to write home about, the commission would not have been in existence. Whereas the ban on selected musical video broadcasting may question the quality of works of musicians in the country and their intention thereof, the ban on broadcast of such works on television and radio stations in the country would invite a respectable measure of sanity in the moral standing of the Nigerian children, youths and other categories of audience. It is the humble submission of this paper that the ban on broadcast of musical videos with nudity and suggestive dance steps on the Nigerian airwaves is quite commendable and should be sustained. The grievances expressed by the affected musicians and their fans over the banned musical video broadcasting should be addressed with caution. The freedom to broadcast such musical videos on satellite stations is an opportunity for the artistes to reach out to their fans because such platforms cannot be controlled by NBC. However, parents should intensify their policing strategies to keep watch over what musical videos their children are exposed to in other to stop them from the ones that can corrupt them. The NBC and National Film and Video Censorship Board (NFVCB) should work together with the Nigerian artistes to avoid production of "provocative" musical videos. Works Cited Abiodun, Christabel. "NBC Denies Banning Select Nigerian Music Videos" Premium Times. 1st February 2013, http://www.premiumtimesng.com Retrieved 28th April, 2013. America Academy of Pediatrics. Committee on Public Education Pediatrics. 1999. 104; 1999; 341.http://pediatrics.aappublications.org. Retrieved 28th April, 2013. 14 Buki, James. Definition of Quality Assurance. 2013. http://operationsech.com. Retrieved 28th April, 2013. Doki, Gowon. '"Ikpongo Tswar" Rather than the Actual Music: A Defense for Zule-zo and the "Bad Bell" Track'. Makurdi Journal of Arts and Culture (MAJAC). Gowon Doki (ed). Makurdi: Cherry Brooks. 2006: 1 -8. Ike, Ndidi. Dictionary of Mass Communication. Owerri: Book – Konzult. 2005. Irek, N. E., & Adura, C. (2012). Folk Music and Songs in a Recessed Economy: A Survivalist Proposal Irek, N. E., & Charles, E. (2012). Developing the Arts Industry through the Theatre Profession Lopez, Darcy. Do Watching and Listening to Music Videos Have a Negative Effect on Teens? 27 December, 2012. http://www.worldmusic.net Retrieved 28th April, 2013. Ohia, Chux. "NBC Bans Timaya, Psquare's Videos." Punch 25 January, 2013. http://www.punchng.com Retrieved 28th April, 2013. Appendixes 15 Figure I: Excerpt from Timaya's Shake Your Bum Bum Figure II: Excerpt from Tillaman's Koma Roll Figure III: Excerpt from PSquare's Alingo 16 Figure IV: Excerpt from Flavour's Shake Figure V: Excerpt from Wandecoal's Go Down Low Figure VI: Chuddy's Brazilian Hair

To appear in Alan Hájek and Christopher Hitchcock (eds.) Oxford Handbook of Probability and Philosophy. Probability and Randomness Antony Eagle Random outcomes, in ordinary parlance, are those that occur haphazardly, unpredictably, or by chance. Even without further clarification, these glosses suggest an interesting connection between randomness and probability, in some of its guises. But we need to be more precise, about both probability and randomness, to understand the relationship between the two subjects of our title. It is a commonplace that there are many sorts of probability; and of each, we may ask after its connection with randomness. There is little systematic to say about randomness and credence; even rational degrees of belief may be certain about a random outcome, and uncertain about a non-random one. More of substance can be said about connections between randomness and evidential probability – particularly according to Solomonoff's version of objective Bayesianism, which uses Kolmogorov complexity (§2.2) to define a privileged prior algorithmic probability (Solomonoff, 1964; see also Li and Vitanyi, 2008; Rathmanner and Hutter, 2011). For reasons both of concision and focus, in the present chapter I set those issues aside, to concentrate on randomness and physical probability, or chance: probability as a physical feature of certain worldly processes.1 A number of philosophers have proposed an intimate connection between randomness and chance, perhaps even amounting to a reduction of one to the other. I explore, with mostly negative results, the prospects for such views; and discuss some weaker but still interesting ways in which randomness bears on chance. I begin by clarifying and distinguishing a number of kinds of randomness. 1 For more on the nature of chance, see the entries by Frigg, Gillies, La Caze, and Schwarz in the present volume. 2 1. Different kinds of randomness: product and process The paradigm sort of case that might involve randomness is a series of tosses of a fair coin, or similar chance device. A typical example of such a series will be a disorderly and patternless sequence of outcomes (Heads and Tails, or 0s and 1s), because it will have been produced by a genuinely chancy process. However, it is at least conceivable that a chancy process could produce an orderly series of outcomes – a lucky series of coin tosses may land all heads. It is similarly conceivable that a disorderly series of outcomes could have been produced by a nonchancy process. It seems arbitrary to believe that, in the more typical case, it is really just one of these features that is responsible for the presence of randomness. Hence we might find it useful to regiment our terminology, distinguishing different sorts of randomness in virtue of the different features that can prompt ascriptions of randomness. A sequence of 100 consecutive Heads is prima facie not random, even if produced by fair tosses of a fair coin. Yet a sequence of 100 mixed Heads and Tails from the same fair coin with no discernable pattern is prima facie random. The difference here in the prima facie appearances cannot be grounded in the underlying chances, which are the same in both cases (each has chance 1/2!""). The appearance is grounded rather in the intrinsic disorderliness (or otherwise) of the outcome sequences themselves. Let's say that a random product is a series of outcomes of some repeated process that is disorderly and irregular, regardless of how it was produced. Moreover, let's say that a random process is one involving genuine chance, in which some of the possible outcomes of the process have non-trivial objective chances of coming to pass. There is precedent for this regimentation, assuming that 'probabilistic laws' support objective chances: I group random with stochastic or chancy, taking a random process to be one which does not operate wholly capriciously or haphazardly but in accord with stochastic or probabilistic laws. (Earman, 1986: 137; my italics) This proposed regimentation diverges to a certain extent from intuition, in some cases where the chances are nearly 1 or nearly 0. An exercise of a quite reliable skill, like catching a ball, can be a random process, if there is some genuine chance of failing to catch the ball. It is awkward to characterize the occurrence of the – entirely expected – outcome of such a process as random. In the case of human action, perhaps our judgments are being confounded by the fact that, while my catching a ball is partly a matter of chance, it is not solely due to chance. So instead we should say: a process 3 is random if at least some of its outcomes are purely a matter of chance – they happen not just 'in accord with' probabilistic laws, but are adequately explained by citing probabilistic laws. Even refined in this way, the regimentation classifies some highly probable outcomes as random – any event which is best explained by citing a chancy law of nature. Suppose we consider the outcomes of this repeated chance process: roll two fair dice, record '1' if double six comes up, and '0' otherwise. In the long run, the frequency of 1s in the outcome sequence will be (close to) 1/36. Because of this, the outcome sequence will be quite orderly: it will be almost all 0s, with a few 1s scattered here and there. Yet this process is purely chancy (assuming that dice rolls are), and so is random. Ordinary intuition appears to be split on such cases. On the one hand, the outcomes are quite regular, and even predictable (if you always bet on '0', you'd be almost always right). On the other, the best opinion to have about a given outcome is simply to set your credence in line with the chances, and the best explanation of why some outcome came up in a particular case just cites the chances. Once we make the distinction between product and process randomness, we can vindicate both these intuitive judgments: this scenario involves a random process, but produces something non-random. Those who would refuse to call biased chance processes 'random' are – I venture – letting views about the randomness of the product drive their opinion of randomness of the process. We have a more useful taxonomy if we keep these two categories apart. On my suggested regimentation, there is a definitional link between process randomness and physical probability. The relationship between product randomness and physical probability is less clear. The typical outcome of a repeated random process will be a random product; but it is conceivable both that some random products are not produced by chance, and, that some repeated trials of random processes don't yield random products. Having regimented our vocabulary so as to be able to make such distinctions, it is clear that we can neither define randomness of a product in terms of randomness of the process generating it, nor vice versa. But for all that, it may be that we can reduce one to the other, finding some metaphysical account which either grounds the randomness of a sequence in the randomness of some process, or conversely. This converse reduction of process randomness to product randomness is the characteristic idea behind the frequentist account of chance (von Mises, 1957; La Caze, this volume). Von Mises claims, in effect, that a process is chancy iff it would produce a random sequence of outcomes which exhibit stable frequencies; those frequencies are to be identified with the chances of those outcomes. Frequentists often proposed a definitional link between 4 chance and frequencies. They needn't have; they need only claim that frequencies in random sequences actually realize the chances. I begin the rest of this chapter by exploring proposals in the vicinity of frequentism in this respect: proposals that attempt to ground process randomness – at least in part – in facts about product randomness. That task involves giving a theory of product randomness that makes no reference to chance or probability, a theory that characterises disorderliness of a sequence directly. In §2, I discuss first von Mises' attempt to provide such a theory, then related theories due to Martin-Löf and Kolmogorov. In §3, I examine whether there is any viable prospect of using randomness of sequences to ground facts about chance. My conclusions are largely negative. At the end of §3, I discuss the weaker claim that product random sequences can be good evidence for chances. Above, I noted our ability to distinguish orderly and disorderly sequences, independently of the randomness or otherwise of the underlying process. If we can come up with a sensible account of product randomness, we may be able to use the existence of a product random sequence as evidence for the existence of a random process. It seems that if the outcome sequence is product random, it will be unpredictable; and accordingly it will be epistemically irrational to seek certainty in advance concerning future outcomes. In such a situation, probabilistic theories look particularly attractive, providing reliable information about the future when certainty cannot be had. Given familiar difficulties concerning the epistemology of chance, the possibility that product randomness is evidentially significant for chance is a good reason to explore product randomness more deeply. * * * The distinction between process and product randomness doesn't exhaust the theoretically useful categories in this vicinity. Typically, random processes yield unpredictable outcomes, in the sense that gathering additional information concerning already observed outcomes doesn't generally improve predictive accuracy compared to estimates based solely on the underlying chances. Likewise, a random product involves unpredictable outcomes, in that information about earlier outcomes in the sequence doesn't provide information about later outcomes in the sequence – for if it did, that would be a pattern (perhaps somewhat subtle) in what is supposed to be a disorderly sequence. (We might be mystified by the process involved, but a sequence of coin tosses which reliably came up heads every prime-numbered toss would be at least partially predictable.) So both product and process randomness 5 tend to lead to unpredictability. 2 But the converse isn't true. A process may be unpredictable because we can't figure out how to model it, even though it is perfectly deterministic and non-chancy. (Some examples like this are discussed in §3.2 below.) Likewise, a product may be unpredictable, even though there is an underlying pattern or order, because that pattern is too difficult to discern. Elsewhere, I've argued that it would be theoretically elegant to identify randomness with unpredictability, on the grounds that only such a liberal identification would capture all cases of randomness (Eagle, 2005). My basic argument was that product and process randomness are each too narrow to apply to everything characterised as random by the various special sciences. The notion of unpredictability I offered was, however, explicated just in terms of credence, and didn't say much about how these 'random' phenomena justify our subjective probability assignments. In focussing on the connections between randomness and physical probability in this chapter, I will discuss some outcomes that are unpredictable because they are process and/or product random. But I will neglect the class of unpredictable outcomes more generally, because there is little both systematic and true that can be said about the relationship between unpredictability and physical probability. I also largely set aside another interesting notion in the vicinity: pseudorandomness. Like product randomness, pseudorandomness is a property of sequences. Informally, a sequence is pseudorandom if it looks disorderly. More precisely, a sequence will be pseudorandom if it passes sufficiently good tests for randomness, in that 'no efficient algorithm can distinguish [pseudorandom] output from a truly random sequence' (Vadhan 2012: §1.1). So a pseudorandom sequence is not product random, because there exists some pattern underlying the sequence. But that pattern is not able to be efficiently exploited – so for all practical purposes, the sequence is as good as random. The interest of pseudorandomness lies in the question as to whether the use 2 The same sorts of worries about the randomness of outcomes of very high and very low chance arise again here. It is very plausible to think that if your best estimate of whether an outcome will happen is no better than chance, then you are not able to predict that outcome. But nearly-extreme-chance outcomes certainly appear predictable; and indeed, it is often possible to know propositions that have high but not extreme chance (Hawthorne and Lasonen-Aarnio, 2009). So it can turn out (i) that the best credence to have in a high chance outcome is just equal to its chance, which makes that outcome unpredictable; but (ii) that for all practical purposes simply assuming that it will occur is the best strategy; and (iii) it may even be that, though unpredictable, one can know the outcome will occur. This is one more nice illustration of the sometimes uncomfortable fit between traditional and Bayesian epistemology. 6 of pseudorandom sequences might replace the use of random sequences in many applications, for example in cryptography. But since pseudorandom sequences are, by construction, neither produced by chance nor genuinely patternless, they are not random in the core sense that concerns us here. 2. Algorithmic Randomness Laplace observed that, when tossing a coin, if heads comes up a hundred times in a row, then this appears to us extraordinary, because the almost infinite number of combinations that can arise in a hundred throws are divided in regular sequences, or those in which we observe a rule that is easy to grasp, and in irregular sequences, that are incomparably more numerous. (Laplace, 1951: 16–7) Modern theories of product randomness take up two themes from Laplace – first, that random sequences are not governed by a rule (whether or not 'easy to grasp'); second, that random sequences are more numerous than non-random ones. Following the literature on algorithmic randomness, we will restrict our attention to binary sequences of outcomes, like sequences of outcomes of tosses of a fair coin. The mathematical literature on random sequences is extensive; for further details, see Eagle 2013; Dasgupta 2011; Li and Vitanyi 2008; Nies 2009; and references therein. As mentioned above, von Mises' version of frequentism required, to avoid circularity, a characterisation of product randomness that did not involve an antecedently given probability function. The characterisation he offered applies only to infinite sequences, and it is convenient to begin by considering these. In fact, we will confine our attention to infinite binary sequences (sequences of 0s and 1s), the sort that might model an infinite series of coin tosses. The set of all infinite binary sequences we call the Cantor space. 2.1 Infinite Random Sequences: Von Mises' Approach Von Mises' approach illustrates one of the Laplacean themes: the unruliness of random sequences. Considering his example of regular milestones spaced along a road, of which a probabilistic account would be inappropriate, he claims that the essential difference between the sequence of the results obtained by casting dice and the regular sequence of large and small milestones consists in the possibility of devising a method of selecting the elements 7 so as to produce a fundamental change in the relative frequencies. (von Mises, 1957: 24) The rule governing a non-random sequence can be exploited to construct a method to select a biased partial sequence from the original sequence: for example, the rule select every element which occurs after nine small stones can be used to select a partial sequence of the milestones in which the limit relative frequency of large stones is 1, even though we never use that attribute directly in selecting outcomes for the subsequence. However, in a random sequence, claims von Mises, we are unable to use such a method – the only way to obtain a biased partial sequence of outcomes is to chose outcomes based on their attributes directly. Accordingly, he offers a characterisation of random sequences as those in which the limiting frequencies are invariant in partial sequences: these limiting values must remain the same in all partial sequences which may be selected from the original one in an arbitrary way. Of course, only such partial sequences can be taken into consideration as can be extended indefinitely, in the same way as the original sequence itself. Examples of this kind are, for instance, the partial sequences formed by all odd members of the original sequence, or by all members for which the place number in the sequence is the square of an integer, or a prime number, or a number selected according to some other rule, whatever it may be. The only essential condition is that the question whether or not a certain member of the original sequence belongs to the selected partial sequence should be settled independently of the result of the corresponding observation, i.e., before anything is known about this result. We shall call a selection of this kind a place selection. The limiting values of the relative frequencies in a collective must be independent of all possible place selections. By place selection we mean the selection of a partial sequence in such a way that we decide whether an element should or should not be included without making use of the attribute of the element, i.e., the result of our game of chance. (von Mises, 1957: 24– 5) It is trivial to observe that – without further restrictions on what kind of place selections are admissible – there will be no random sequences, because no limit frequencies are invariant under arbitrary place selections. For if a place selection is 8 just any function f from natural numbers into {0,1},3 then there will be a place selection that selects a biased subsequence, since any increasing sequence of natural numbers n! < n! < ⋯ defines a corresponding selection rule, ... given an arbitrary sequence of 0s and 1s ... there is among the selection rules the one which selects the 1s of the given sequence, so the limit frequency is changed (Martin-Löf, 1969a: 27) Von Mises does implicitly place restrictions on appropriate place selections. The empirical basis for von Mises' claim that there exist sequences which are appropriate for probabilistic treatment lies in the principle of the impossibility of a gambling system (von Mises, 1957: 25): in some systems, there is no recipe for deciding when to bet on outcomes that ensures more successes than chance alone. (The 'gambler's fallacy' is an unusually simple gambling system, but its lack of success is entirely representative.) The 'recipe' bet only on 1s does exist, in some abstract mathematical sense, but it is not one that can be followed by anyone. So von Mises' implicit restriction is to those place selections that can be genuinely implemented by a prospective gambler, making use only of information in the gambler's possession (information about previous outcomes). Von Mises made his original proposal before Turing and others made the notion of an algorithm precise, but it was very natural to retrospectively read into his work a restriction to computable place selections: To a player who would beat the wheel at roulette a system is unusable which corresponds to a mathematical function known to exist but not given by explicit definition; and even the explicit definition is of no use unless it provides a means of calculating the particular values of the function. ... Thus a [place selection] should be represented mathematically, not as a function, or even as a definition of a function, but as an effective algorithm for the calculation of the values of a function. (Church, 1940: 133) Where x is some infinite sequence, let 'x⨡i' denote the initial segment of x of length i. Church proposes that an implementable place selection is an effectively computable function φ ∶ x⨡ i − 1 , i ↦ 0,1 that takes the value 1 infinitely many times (so always selects an infinite partial sequence from an infinite sequence). Let x[φ] be the infinite partial sequence consisting of any x! such that φ(x⨡(j − 1), j) = 1. According to Church's reconstruction of von Mises, a sequence is random iff for every effectively computable place selection φ, the limiting frequency of every outcome in x[φ] equals 3 I.e., if f n = 1, then and only then select the nth member of the original sequence to belong to the partial sequence. 9 the limiting frequency of that outcome in x. More informally: there exists no effective method for choosing a subsequence of a random sequence that is biased with respect to the original frequencies. The random sequences in this sense are immune to gambling systems: there are no followable rules that enable even fallible and unreliable prediction of patterns of outcomes in a random sequence, or any partial sequence derived from it, except strictly in accordance with the statistical predictions of its probabilistic laws. The question of whether there are any random sequences in this revised sense still needs to be addressed. As there are many fewer effectively computable functions than functions, it is easier to satisfy the requirement of invariance of limit frequencies under all computable place selections. In fact, there do exist infinite random sequences in this refined von Mises/Church sense. Indeed almost all infinite binary sequences have the feature of being frequency-invariant under computable place selections. More precisely, the set of von Mises/Church random sequences forms a measure one subset of the Cantor space. This follows quickly from a result due to Wald (1938), that any countable set of arbitrary place selections (whether computable or not) defines a set of von Mises random sequences which is measure one, given that there are only countably many computable place selections. Pursuing the unruly behaviour of random sequences has now led us to the other aspect of random sequences Laplace noted: the von Mises/Church random sequences are much more numerous than the even partially rule-governed sequences. 2.2 Infinite Random Sequences: The Typicality Approach What if we had started instead from Laplace's other claim: that irregular sequences are more numerous than regular sequences? Suppose we know that a fair coin is to be tossed repeatedly; what sort of outcome sequence should we expect? Well, we ought to expect that heads should occur about as often as tails; that strings of heads and tails of equal length should occur about as frequently as each other; and so on. These are features that are typical of sequences generated by this sort of chance setup. Even if we have very little confidence in any specific sequence of outcomes occurring, we should be confident that some typical sequence will occur. This confidence derives ultimately from the fact that typical sequences are much more common than atypical ones. This last claim needs to be handled with some care. Given an uncountably infinite set, like the Cantor space, there are many ways of measuring the size of its subsets. We want the typical sequences to form a measure one set of sequences, but under which measure? This is particularly important when we consider biased binary processes. The typical outcome of a series of flips of a coin biased to heads will be a decidedly 10 atypical product of a series of fair coin flips. The standard way of approaching this issue is to let the probability function associated with the underlying binary process determine a measure over the Cantor set; thus typicality of a sequence is relative to a probability function (Martin-Löf, 1966; Gaifman and Snir, 1982). Obviously, and in contrast to the von Mises/Church account, such approaches to randomness rely on antecedent probabilities, and thus are generally unsuited to the reductive project we're considering. But there is a special case, where we define a measure not from an underlying chance, but from symmetries in the Cantor space itself. The measure thus produced is a very natural one over the Cantor space: the Lebesgue measure λ. The key idea is that the set of all sequences which begin with a given initial subsequence x! of length n has Lebesgue measure 1/2!. (So the set of sequences beginning with a 1 has measure 1/2, the set of sequences beginning 010 has measure 1/8, etc.) Every particular infinite sequence x ∈ X has Lebesgue measure zero (it must have measure smaller than any set of sequences sharing an initial subsequence with it, and lim!→! ! !! = 0). So indeed does any countable set of infinite binary sequences. The set of von Mises/Church random sequences has Lebesgue measure one, because its complement – the set of effectively computable binary sequences – is countable, connected as it is with the countable set of effectively computable functions, and thus has Lebesgue measure zero. The von Mises/Church random sequences are typical with respect to the Lebesgue measure over the Cantor space. (Henceforth, I will simply say they are typical.) A typical sequence has some measure one property: one that is shared by almost all the sequences. But there are lots of distinct measure one properties. For example, the property of having 0 and 1 occur equally frequently is a property of almost all sequences. It is also, intuitively, a property that a random sequence should have. Intuitively, a random sequence should have the stronger property of Borel normality (Borel, 1909): every string of 1s and 0s of length n occurs equally often in x. (So 010 occurs as often as 101 and 111, etc.) Borel normality is also a measure one property. Indeed, every measure one property that has been explicitly considered is one that, intuitively, random sequences have. Generalising from this, Ville (1939) proposed that a random sequence should be a member of all measure one sets of sequences – the random sequences are typical in every respect. The typicality approach, in this crude form, cannot work. For each individual sequence has measure zero, so its complement with respect to the Cantor space has measure one and excludes it; so the intersection of all sets of measure one is the empty set. No sequence is typical in every respect. 11 This is reminiscent of the way in which consideration of arbitrary functions trivialised von Mises' original theory of place selections. Martin-Löf (1966) proposed a analogous solution: rather than considering arbitrary measure one sets, he suggests that the random sequences should satisfy all effective measure one properties. A set has Lebesgue measure zero if there is a sequence of sets which converge to it, such that the measures of the sets converge to zero. If that sequence of sets is effectively computable (so that there is a computable function which computes what each member of the sequence is), then the set has effective measure zero. A sequence is Martin-Löf random iff it is not a member of any effective measure zero set – i.e., has all effective measure one properties. The Martin-Löf random sequences are typical in every effectively determinable respect. (More precisely: they are not effectively determinable to be atypical.) All the properties we have considered so far – Borel normality, non-computability, and the property of symmetric oscillation considered at the end of this section – are effective measure one. Martin-Löf was led to this idea by considering significance tests in statistics. An experimental outcome prompts a hypothesis to be rejected at a significance level α if the outcome falls into a previously specified critical region. A sequence which falls into an effective measure zero set is one that would effectively yield a statistically significant result at arbitrarily high levels of significance. That is, it would prompt us to reject the null hypothesis that the sequence is random with arbitrarily high significance, and so must really be non-random. In this reformulation, Martin-Löf's proposal is that a sequence is random iff it passes all recursive statistical tests for randomness. To show that there are Martin-Löf random sequences, Martin-Löf proves first that there is a universal significance test: there exists an effectively specifiable sequence of sets U = U!,..., such that for any other significance test G = G!,..., there exists a constant c such that for all i, G!!! ⊆ U!. If a sequence is rejected by some test at some significance level, it will also be rejected by U at some related significance level. Since the non-random sequences are those which, for any significance level, are rejected by some test, they will all be rejected by the universal test too. This universal test thus directly establishes that the set of Martin-Löf non-random sequences has effective measure zero; so Martin-Löf random sequences exist and collectively have effective measure one. * * * What is the relationship between von Mises' approach and the typicality approach? Let's begin by considering another way to think about random sequences. Each 12 random sequence x corresponds to a random walk on a line, in which the walker begins at some starting point, and moves one unit left at stage i if the i-th element of x is 0, and moves to the right otherwise. The behaviour of this trajectory can be used to illustrate properties of random sequences. For example, the typical random walk ends up back at the starting point, since it will have moved left exactly as often as right. This corresponds to an infinite binary sequence having a limit relative frequency of 1/2 for 0 and 1. Intuitively, a genuinely random walk should also cross the starting point often enough so that it spends as much time, in the long run, on the left of its starting point as the right.4 A walk that never spent any time to the left of the starting point has too much structure to be truly random. Happily for Martin-Löf's theory, this property of symmetric oscillation does have effective measure one (Dasgupta, 2011: §3.4). But Ville showed there exist infinite binary sequences which are von Mises/Church random, and yet have biased initial segments: while the limit frequency of 1s in the sequence and all infinite subsequences is 1/2, the limit is approached 'from above', and the frequency of 1s in every finite initial subsequence is ≥ 1/2 (Ville, 1939; see also Lieb et al., 2006; van Lambalgen, 1987). Such sequences have the same limit as the genuinely random sequences, but are not random in how they approach that limit. So there is a property that, intuitively, random sequences have (and that Martin-Löf random sequences have, in agreement with intuition), that some von Mises/Church random sequences lack. So while von Mises/Church randomness is necessary for Martin-Löf randomness, it is not sufficient (see also van Lambalgen, 1987: §4). 2.3 Finite Random Sequences A major difficulty facing Martin-Löf's proposal is that it cannot accommodate random finite sequences, or strings. Every string can be effectively produced by some Turing machine (even if not particularly efficiently), so no string can be even von Mises/Church random. But while the contrast between sequences exhibiting effectively exploitable patterns and 'completely lawless' random sequences does not apply to finite sequences, a related contrast does apply: between those strings which can be efficiently described, 4 Not only should a random sequence have a limit relative frequency of 1s equal to 1/2; it should approach this limit by having equally as many finite initial subsequences in which the relative frequency is below 1/2 as those in which the relative frequency is above 1/2. The idea that random processes should spend equal time in all equally sized outcome states (the states here are being on the left of the origin and being on the right) is related to ergodicity and its relatives, discussed in §3.2 below. 13 and those cannot. This leads us to the idea that finite random sequences, like their infinite cousins, are patternless, or disorderly, and cannot be predicted (or exploited) by a simple rule. Kolmogorov was the first to connect this idea of disorder with incompressibility (Kolmogorov, 1963; Kolmogorov and Uspensky, 1988). The informal idea is that a pattern in a string can lead to a short description of its contents, while disorderly strings cannot be described more effectively than by stating their contents. So while the string consisting of 1000 alternating 1s and 0s can be simply specified (I just specified it in nine words), some string consisting of 1000 1s and 0s with no pattern is most effectively presented by just listing the 1000 digits comprising it. This can be made more precise by thinking about compressibility. If f is a computable encoding function from strings to strings, we say that a string δ is an f-description of a string σ iff f(σ) = δ. A string σ is compressed by f if there is an f-description δ of σ such that |δ| < |σ|, where '|φ|' denotes the length of the string φ. We may define the f-complexity of a string σ, C!(σ), as the length of the shortest string δ that f-describes σ. A string σ is random relative to f iff it is f-incompressible, that is, if the f-complexity of σ is roughly equal to |σ|. This gives us randomness relative to a fixed algorithm f. It is in the spirit of the Laplacean ideas with which we began; since strings random relative to f are incompressible, they obey no rule – at least, no rule that f can exploit to describe them compactly. The random strings are also more numerous. Assuming that a useful encoding f will produce an f-description of a string σ that is a least j ≥ 1 shorter than σ, very few strings usefully compress: a proportion of at most 2!! strings of a given length. Even with the most pitiful amount of compression, j = 1, we see that at most half the strings of a given length can be compressed by any algorithm f; and the compressible (non-random) strings are sparser the more compression we demand. An encoding f is at least as good as g iff there is some constant k! such that for any string σ, C!(σ) ≤ C!(σ) + k!, so that the f-complexity of any string is within k! of the gcomplexity (where k! is independent of σ). Kolmorogorov showed that there is an encoding algorithm f which is at least as good, in this sense, as any other algorithm (Kolmogorov, 1965; Chaitin, 1966; Martin-Löf, 1969b). Kolmogorov called such an algorithm asymptotically optimal, because, since k! is fixed independently of σ, it becomes asymptotically negligible as |σ| increases. Fixing on an asymptotically optimal function u, we define complexity simpliciter: C σ = C! σ . Since u is optimal, it is at least as good as the identity function; it 14 follows that there exists a constant k such that C σ ≤ σ + k. On the other hand, we also know that the proportion of strings of a given length for which C σ ≤ σ − k is at most 2!!. As the length of the strings increases, k remains constant; so there is a length such that for all strings of at least that length, C(σ) ≈ |σ| ± k. Even if k is quite large, it is fixed, and for any fixed k, almost all strings are longer than k. So almost all strings are not noticeably compressible when compared to their initial length, and almost all strings have complexity of approximately their length. The typical finite string is incompressible. Implicitly following Laplace, Kolmogorov proposes that incompressible strings, being both unruly and typical, are the random ones: a string σ is C-random iff C(σ) ≈ |σ|. As we have placed no constraints on which descriptions are permissible descriptions, a carefully designed compression algorithm could encode more information than is in the content of the description itself: an efficient decoding might begin its operation by scanning all of δ to determine its length, only then to read the contents of δ bit for bit. In this way, the information δ is really worth δ + log |δ| bits, so it is clear that we have been cheating in calling |δ| the complexity of σ. (van Lambalgen, 1987: 736, notation altered) To exclude this possibility, we follow Chaitin and Levin and restrict the permissible descriptions to those which are prefix-free with respect to u (Chaitin, 1966; Levin, 1976). An algorithm f is prefix-free iff no two f-descriptions are such that one is an initial segment of the other. (Think telephone numbers:5 no well-formed phone number is such that appending further digits to it yields another well-formed phone number.) With a prefix-free encoding, a decompression algorithm can begin processing the description while reading it, and recognise the end of the description without having to be explicitly told that it has ended. Accordingly, such algorithms only make use of |δ| bits in decoding a string. We can define the prefix-free f-complexity of a string as the length of the shortest prefix-free f-description that generates the string, and then define the prefix-free complexity of a sequence K σ = K!∗(σ) for some fixed prefixfree asymptotically optimal u∗ (which do exist: see Downey and Hirschfeldt, 2010: ch. 3). The requirement that descriptions be prefix-free reduces the number of permissible descriptions, and thus in general increases the complexity of sequences: C σ ≤ K σ (the relation between C and K is discussed in Downey and Hirschfeldt, 2010: ch. 4). 5 Or sentences of properly bracketed formal logic (Shapiro 2013: §2, Theorem 5). 15 But then the prefix-free incompressible sequences are even more numerous than the C-random sequences, and so play the functional role of random sequences even better. Accordingly, call a string Kolmogorov random iff K(σ) ⪆ |σ|. * * * This inefficiency in K is actually of benefit, for it allows us to extend the definition of Kolmogorov randomness to infinite sequences. We can define an infinite sequence x as prefix-free Kolmogorov random iff every finite initial subsequence x⨡i is prefixfree Kolmogorov random. (This definition fails for the original measure of complexity C, as C is subject to the phenomenon of complexity oscillation, where any sufficiently long string has non-C-random initial segments: Li and Vitanyi, 2008: §2.5.) So defined, the class of infinite Kolmogorov random sequences can be shown to be non-empty. In fact, a striking result due to Schnorr shows that it is a familiar class: the set of infinite Kolmogorov random sequences is precisely the set of Martin-Löf random sequences (Schnorr, 1971). This result shows a happy convergence between our two discussions of randomness. It is some evidence that we have captured the intuitive notion of randomness in a precise formal notion. Some claim Schnorr's result is good evidence for a 'Martin-LöfChaitin thesis' (Delahaye, 1993) that identifies the intuitive notion of randomness (for infinite sequences at least) with the precise notion of Kolmogorov/Martin-Löf (KML) randomness – analogous to Church's thesis identifying the intuitive notion of effective procedure with Turing machine/recursive function. In the case of Church's thesis, every precise account that is even close to intuitively plausible turns out to be equivalent (Turing machines, recursive functions, abacus machines, ...). This is not true of randomness, where there are many distinct extensionally inequivalent yet precise accounts of randomness that more or less agree with intuition: from those relatively closely associated with KML randomness (like Schnorr randomness and von Mises randomness), to other proposals of more distant pedigree, such as epistemic accounts (Eagle, 2005) or accounts based on indeterminism (Hellman, 1978). The dispute over whether there is a single precise notion of randomness that answers perfectly to our intuitions about random sequences can be largely sidestepped for present purposes (but see Porter 2012). KML randomness is a reasonable and representative exemplar of the algorithmic approach to randomness, and it is adopted here as a useful working definition of randomness for sequences. None of the difficulties we're about to discuss concerning the connection between randomness and chance turn on the details of which 16 particular sequences get counted as random – most arise from the mismatch between intuitions about chance, and features common to all accounts of product randomness. 3. Chance and Randomness The question before us now is this: what role can product randomness play in the theory of chance? Does chance require the existence – or potential existence – of random sequences, as orthodox frequentism supposes? Does the existence of a random sequence entail the existence of chance? I address both questions below. 3.1 Chance without randomness Random sequences are, if the foregoing is correct, the kinds of outputs that are typical of a certain sort of chance process: independent, identically distributed (i.i.d.) trials of a process with two outcomes (a so-called Bernoulli process). But many chance processes don't have these features, and their characteristic outputs are not product random. Frequentism gives a central role to randomness. Probabilities only exist in those mass phenomena that can be idealised to a random sequence of outcomes, namely collectives: 'we shall not speak of probability until a collective has been defined' (von Mises 1957: 18). But this approach prioritises the overall sequence over the individual outcomes; and interesting chance phenomena that arise at the level of individual trials of the repeated processes –single case chances – are overlooked (Hájek, 2009; Jeffrey, 1992). The thrust of the literature surrounding frequentism has been that single-case chance must be part of any satisfactory account of physical probability. The upshot for randomness is that, unless the single case chances satisfy some significant constraints, the resulting outcome sequences need not be, and typically will not be, random. Consider physically realistic chance processes in which the outcomes are not independent. One might consider the sequence of states of weather on successive days: the chance of a sunny day, given a sunny day yesterday, is higher than the unconditional chance of a sunny day. Sequences of non-independent outcomes are susceptible to gambling systems (e.g., bet on a sunny day tomorrow when it's been sunny today), and are thus non-random. Such a sequence cannot be idealised to a random collective, and so is not a suitable example of the mass phenomena that von Mises' takes as the proper subject matter of the theory of probability. If we are to understand the chances involved in weather patterns, they cannot be extracted from sequences of weather outcomes. One might reasonably ask, whence do these chances derive? For there is no necessity that, whenever there is a sequence of 17 dependent trials, there must also be some sequence of independent trials; but that is exactly what von Mises' approach demands.6 This illustrates a major problem facing any theory of chance which, like frequentism, makes the existence of random sequences partly constitutive of chance: namely, that many chance processes don't give rise to random sequences in the sense developed in §2. For another example, consider biased processes. These were not a problem for von Mises' original theory of randomness, because invariance of frequencies under place selections is independent of what the frequency is. But if we accept the conclusions of §2, that von Mises' theory is intuitively inadequate, and that a typicality approach is more successful, then we face the problem that such approaches need a probability measure with respect to which sequences are typical. Perhaps it is acceptable to appeal to the Lebesgue measure in a purely mathematical account of randomness, as it is an a priori symmetry of the space of sequences. But biased chances are not a priori features of the space of outcomes, but contingent and a posteriori features of a particular chance device. If randomness is partly constitutive of chance, most chance devices – any other than fair coins – don't usually produce random outcomes, because they usually produce outcomes that are atypical with respect to the Lebesgue measure. Given that, it is extremely hard to see how such chance devices end up involving chances at all, except by offering some reduction of unequal apparent chances to some combination of basic outcomes which are equally likely. Ultimately, then, such views will end up being a version of the classical theory of probability,7 because such views require that a priori symmetries in the outcome space underlie all random sequences, and thus all genuine chances. Because frequentism gives randomness such a significant role in the foundations of chance, many cases with which frequentism has difficulty are also cases in which there is chance without randomness. Consider Hájek's problem of ordering: 'Limiting relative frequency depends on the order of trials, whereas probability does not' (Hájek 2009: 219; see also Hellman 1978). The same is true of randomness: whether a 6 Actual weather supervenes on some underlying mosaic of more localized outcomes, and perhaps in the actual case the frequentist can find some sequence which can be idealized to a random collective. But it is surely possible that there be a situation in which there is a pattern in the underlying mosaic that suggests probabilistic dependence between those outcomes. The frequentist, shackled with attempting to fit all probabilistic phenomena into the Procrustean bed of collectives, cannot handle such a case, while more liberal theories may accommodate it – even other Humean theories which ground probability ultimately in patterns of outcomes (Lewis 1994; Loewer 2004). 7 'The theory of chance consists in reducing all the outcomes of the same kind to a certain number of cases equally possible, that is to say, to such as we may be equally undecided about in regard to their existence, and in determining the number of cases favorable to the outcome whose probability is sought.' (Laplace, 1951: 6–7). See also Zabell, this volume. 18 sequence is random depends on the order of the outcomes, and randomness is not necessarily preserved under permutation of outcome order. However, whether the outcomes are the product of a chancy or random process is invariant under permutation; so here we have cases in which there is process randomness without product randomness. The preceding examples show a systematic disconnection between certain sorts of chance process and the existence of random outcome sequences. But, given the existence of single-case chances, cases of chance without randomness arise even in the most favourable circumstances for the idea that chance requires randomness. For any particular chance process could yield an unrepresentative outcome sequence, which doesn't reflect the underlying chances, and in which frequencies are not good evidence for the values of the chances. Those sequences will not be typical with respect to the underlying chances, and hence non-random. Such cases show don't show any systematic failure – they are, by construction, atypical of their underlying chances. But everyone except the frequentist accepts that atypical outcomes can happen. 3.2 Randomness without chance Consider short sequences: they are not compressible, since in general a prefix-free encoding of a short sequence will be about as long as the sequence itself. Accordingly, all short sequences are (KML) random. But not all short sequences involve a random process. Since some short sequences are essentially short, consisting of unrepeatable or seldom repeatable outcomes, there are some random sequences that are essentially random despite not being chancy. So it cannot be a necessary condition on randomness that it require chance. Perhaps we might respond by denying that all short sequences are random, treating them as a degenerate case of incompressibility and restricting randomness to non-degenerately incompressible sequences. But then all short sequences turn out to be non-random; and if there is an unrepeatable chance event, there will be chance without randomness. If we consider the outcomes alone, either all short sequences are random or none of them are. But as some unrepeatable outcomes are chancy, and some are not, whichever way we opt to go with respect to randomness of the singleton sequences of such outcomes we will discover cases in which we have random processes without random products, or vice versa. Other cases of randomness without chance arise from some of the more exotic possibilities of classical physics. One sort of possibility arises from classical indeterminism. It is well known that classical Newtonian particle mechanics is indeterministic: that specifying the positions and momenta of all particles at a time, 19 together with the laws, does not suffice to determine the future evolution of the system (Earman, 1986; Norton, 2008). But this classical indeterminism does not involve chance; nothing in the physics requires a probability distribution over these undetermined outcomes, rather than simply holding that such outcomes are nomologically possible. We could revise classical mechanics by adding a measure over outcomes (though which one?). But ordinary unrevised classical mechanics isn't incomplete just because it does not provide chances for our credences to reflect. This phenomenon may yield cases of product randomness without chance. By preparing a system repeatedly in a given state that does not determine its future state, and classifying the possible outcomes into two classes, '0' and '1', it is physically possible that we obtain a random binary sequence as the system evolves over time. But we then have randomness without a chance distribution over the outcomes. The possibility of randomness requires only two distinguishable possible outcomes and the ability to produce arbitrary sequences of such outcomes. Chance requires in addition that some measure be ascribable to each outcome. Chance is a sort of quantitative physical possibility; since a physical theory can be indeterministic without having a probability distribution over the different possible outcomes, we can produce a random sequence by an indeterministic but non-chancy process. These sorts of cases may induce us to query our initial regimentation in §1, which identified process randomness with chanciness.8 But splitting chance and process randomness further undermines any putative connection between product randomness and chance. Another interesting possibility permitted by classical physics is chaotic dynamics. A (discrete) dynamical system can be characterised by four parameters: a set of basic states X, a σ-algebra Σ on X (intuitively, the possible outcomes in the system, corresponding to regions of the basic space X), some measure μ such that μ X = 1, and a deterministic evolution map T from X onto X, which captures the lawlike evolution of states over one time step (Berkovitz and Frigg, 2006). Following Werndl (2009), a dynamical system is chaotic iff it is mixing: for all A,B ∈ Σ (where 'T!' denotes applying T n times): lim ! → !! μ T! B ∩ A = μ B μ A . Suppose B is the region in which our system was found n time steps ago; a system is mixing if, in the limit as n increases, the system's having been in B becomes independent of its now being in A (Berkovitz and Frigg, 2006: 676). In the limit, such 8 That is, we may consider these sorts of case as involving process randomness because of the presence of indeterminism, even if they do not involve chance. 20 systems are maximally unpredictable (in the sense of Eagle, 2005: 775), because states of the distant past are increasingly credentially irrelevant for future states, assuming one sets prior credences in accordance with the μ-measure of the system (though that is consistent with the system being quite predictable in the short run). A system is Bernoulli when the states of the system are independent of all past (and future) states: μ T!! B ∩ A = μ A μ B . The trajectory through the state space of a Bernoulli system is just like a sequence of fair coin tosses: the past states of the system are independent of future states, and credence in them is equal to their μ-measure. Obviously all Bernoulli systems are mixing. What's of interest for us is that chaotic systems do not require indeterminism: the evolution map T is a one-one function, and so the time evolution is deterministic. Given the additional but widely believed premise that chance requires indeterminism (Lewis, 1986; Schaffer, 2007: 120), this entails that chaos does not require chance or random processes. The motivation for saying that these systems are not process random is that the underlying classical non-probabilistic dynamics provides a physically complete account of the behaviour of any particular system – i.e., sufficient to predict, and causally explain, the behaviour of the system without need of additional supplementation. But a Bernoulli system can generate a random sequence of outcomes, because the macroscopically-described trajectory of a chaotic system through the state space (its macroscopic history) provides resources too meagre to predict its future macroscopic behaviour. These sequences can be random: they are certainly at least Borel normal, since any complex pattern of successive states A will be an element of Σ, the limit frequency with which such patterns occur will be equal to μ(A), and the frequency with which one pattern follows any other will also be μ(A). Sampled infrequently, even mixing systems can give rise to random sequences of outcomes. Some non-Bernoulli systems of great physical interest, such as the Lorenz model of atmospheric convection (Smith, 1998: §1.4), display rapid mixing (Luzzatto et al., 2005). Sampled at ordinary enough intervals, therefore, such systems can provide physical plausible examples of deterministic, and arguably non-chancy, random outcomes. 21 In such cases, admittedly, measures that look rather like chances are involved. The measure μ is formally like a probability measure, and moreover seems to be used to regulate credences about which macrostates the system will be in – reminiscent of the way chance regulates credence (Lewis, 1986). This has prompted some to deny the additional premise that chance requires indeterminism, and argue that measures over the state space in statistical mechanics, and other dynamical theories, should be understood as chances (Clark, 1987; Loewer, 2001; Meacham, 2005). There are also general arguments aiming to show that chance and determinism are compatible (Eagle, 2011; Glynn 2010). If these arguments are successful, these random sequences will after all be associated with a chance distribution. However, it is fair to say that not everyone is convinced that deterministic chance is possible – the received view remains that the measures involved in deterministic dynamical systems are ignorance measures over ensembles of macroscopically indiscriminable microstates, and so not objective chances after all. (And if there is deterministic chance, we open up the prospect of yet further examples of chance without randomness: cases where the deterministic laws coexist with chances, but in which sequences of outcomes generated in accordance with those laws is predictable and exploitable by a gambling system). An example of randomness in a deterministic setting (though not that of classical physics) which does not make any appeal to a measure is given by Humphreys. Adapting the theorem of Ville's mentioned in §2, he proves that there exists 'a theory which is deterministic in the sense of Montague and which has as a model a sequence which is random in the sense of von Mises/Church' (Humphreys, 1978: appendix). This isn't quite KML randomness, but it is a suggestive result. The theorem exploits the fact that the standard Montague-Earman definition of determinism requires that the evolution map of a dynamical system be a function (Earman, 1986; Montague, 1974); but it does not require that it be computable. Here, given the explicit construction of the evolution function, it is difficult to accept that the limit frequency in the resulting sequence can play the chance role; so we have a case, albeit rather artificial, of randomness without chance. 3.3 Randomness as evidence for chance We've seen plausible examples in which chancy processes do not produce random sequences – either by chance, in the case of Bernoulli processes, or because the family of chancy processes includes many whose typical outcomes do not show the hallmarks of random sequences. We've also seen examples of randomness without chance. Some of these examples, such as the statistical mechanical cases, may fail to persuade, because we needed to 22 use objective probability measures that behave in many ways like chances; and these, it may be argued, play the chance role well enough to deserve the name. Even so, some examples of randomness without chance remain, and support the claim that chancy processes are unnecessary for random products. Together, the examples in §§3.1–3.2 make the case that the distinctions drawn in §1 between product and process randomness mark genuine metaphysical distinctions, and neither is plausibly reducible to the other. Nothing in my discussion undermines the sensible position that randomness of some sequences of outcomes is good evidence for the involvement of a chancy process. The appearance of a series of outcomes typical of a sequence of independent and identically distributed trials is generally good evidence that there was such a sequence of trials. Conversely, seeing a sequence of outcomes governed by a recognisable law will disconfirm any probabilistic hypothesis – not conclusively, but substantially. Since the typical outcomes of repeated equiprobable i.i.d. trials are random sequences, we ought sensibly expect such processes to produce a random sequence of outcomes. Accordingly, Hellman says: The link, then, between mathematical and physical randomness is epistemic and only that. Observations of mathematically non-random sequences can be used to decide when further explanation in terms of as yet undiscovered causal factors is wanting. But, in no sense is any notion of mathematical randomness serving as an explication for 'ultimate physical randomness', whatever that might be. (Hellman, 1978: 86) Taking 'mathematical' and 'physical' to mean product and process randomness respectively, this conclusion seems inescapable. Predictably, this epistemic connection between randomness and chance resembles that between frequencies and chance. Relative frequencies are good evidence for the chances; known chances should lead us to expect certain frequencies; and extreme frequencies might prompt us to look for non-chance hypotheses. But though frequency evidence is good evidence for chance hypotheses – and though successful accounts of chance must explain why it's such good evidence – frequentism is implausible as a reductive account of chance, and any proposed reduction of chance to randomness is equally implausible. By definition, the Kolmogorov complexity function K cannot be a recursive function. Hence there is no effective positive conclusive test for randomness even of finite sequences. Even if our evidence is in fact a random sequence of outcomes, the 23 proposition that the sequence is random will not generally be in our evidence, as (for all we know) there may be a short description of the sequence that we are unaware of. That an evidence sequence is random is no less a theoretical hypotheses about it than the hypothesis that it was produced by a chance process. In that light, it seems sensible to neglect randomness, and focus directly on how likely a chance process is to have been involved in the production of a given sequence, conditional on the contents of that evidence sequence.9 * * * That said, more sophisticated descendants of frequentism, such as Lewis' best systems analysis of chance (Lewis 1994; Schwartz, this volume), might enable us to make more precise claims about the bearing of randomness on chance. One application of randomness in a Humean metaphysics of chance might be in analysing Lewis' notion of fit: namely, the proposal that a probability function fits some outcomes just when those outcomes are random with respect to that function (§2.2; see also Elga 2004). Another application might be in understanding when to invoke chances, given an austere fundamental ontology of only the 'spatiotemporal arrangement of local qualities throughout all of history, past and present and future' (Lewis, 1994: 474). One attractive suggestion might be that we ought to adopt a probabilistic description as best balancing strength and simplicity when that underlying arrangement of local qualities is complex, in the precise sense of being Kolmogorov incompressible (§2.3). For complex sequences of outcomes preclude there being simple non-probabilistic descriptions that are strong enough to carry useful content about the outcome sequence. Yet even if randomness can play these important roles in a Humean metaphysics of chance, that falls short of the kind of reduction originally envisaged by von Mises. Acknowledgements For helpful comments on earlier versions of this chapter, I'd like to thank Al Hájek, an audience at a session of the Paris-Diderot Philosophy of Math Seminar on algorithmic randomness, particularly Chris Porter and Sean Walsh, students in my Oxford graduate seminar on philosophy of probability, Wo Schwartz and others in a session of the ANU philosophy of 9 We are generally in a better position to know that a process is chancy when we draw that conclusion on the basis of consideration of its physical characteristics, than when we draw that conclusion by performing a double abduction, first inferring that a sequence of outcomes is in fact random from the fact that it seems random, and then inferring that the process behind that random sequence is chancy. 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DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 1 The Descent of Preferences David Spurrett (UKZN) - [email protected] - 2018 Abstract More attention has been devoted to providing evolutionary scenarios accounting for the development of beliefs, or belief-like states, than for desires or preferences. Here I articulate and defend an evolutionary rationale for the development of psychologically real preference states. Preferences token or represent the expected values of discriminated states, available actions, or action-state pairings. The argument is an application the 'environmental complexity thesis' found in Godfrey-Smith and Sterelny, although my conclusions differ from Sterelny's. I argue that tokening expected utilities can, under specified general conditions, be a powerful design solution to the problem of allocating the capacities of an agent in an efficient way. Preferences are for efficient action selection, and are a 'fuel for success' in the sense urged by Godfrey-Smith for true beliefs. They will tend to be favoured by selection when environments are complex in ways that matter to an organism, and when organisms have rich behavioural repertoires with heterogenous returns and costs. The rationale suggested here is conditional, especially on contingencies in what design options are available to selection and on trade-offs associated with the costs of generating and processing representations of value. The unqualified efficiency rationale for preferences suggests that organisms should represent expected utilities in a comprehensive and consistent way, but none of them do. In the final stages of the paper I consider some of the ways in which design trade-offs compromise the implementation of preferences in organisms that have them. Keywords: Preferences; Environmental Complexity Thesis; Action Selection; Evolution of Cognition; Common Currency DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 2 1. Introduction What are preferences for? Or, a little more narrowly, why should we expect some natural, biologically evolved, agents to have preferences? The heart of the answer that I'll defend is that preferences enable efficient action selection,1 which is to say the deployment of the relatively flexible capacities of the agent in fitness-favouring ways. I use the term 'preference' to refer to a psychological or cognitive state. To have preferences is not merely to exhibit them in behaviour that more or less consistently maximises something, as in strictly behaviourist 'revealed preference theory' (Samuelson 1938).2 Preference-revealing behaviour is relevant here, but my primary focus is the function and development of a psychological capacity. An agent that has preferences produces and processes states that somehow represent the expected values of local world-states or outcomes that it can detect or anticipate, or actions that it can perform.3 A few preliminary clarifications about what I mean by having preferences may be helpful. First, I'm more interested in the usefulness of having a set or a system of preferences than with the functionality of individual preferences. For an agent that has some system of preferences, it is easy enough to pick one and consider whether or when it is advantageous. My concern is with the question why agents might be expected to have the general capacity to represent some outcomes or actions as more or less valuable than others, and to focus on that I'll mostly assume that the specific rankings are advantageous. Second, a natural agent can have preferences more or less completely, in the sense of covering all or only some of the outcomes it can distinguish or actions it can perform. (For example, a creature might have richly detailed preferences over what it eats, but switch between foraging and other activities in ways not mediated by preferences.) It can also have them more or less consistently in the sense that the ordering may or may not respect transitivity, be stable over time, or otherwise respect requirements typically found in normative theories of preference. For much of what follows I'll write as though preferences are fairly well-behaved but this is for expository simplicity. My initial aim (§3 and §4) is to identify an ideal towards which selection could sometimes be expected to move were other constraints not relevant. Other constraints, though, are always relevant and after articulating the primary argument I spend some time considering them (see §5). Third, and finally, my target here, having preferences, is different from - and more modest than - having desires. Although there are various theories of desire to choose between, most 1 I understand 'action' here in an inclusive way largely interchangeable with 'behaviour', and covering any functional allocation of the relatively short-term capacities of an organism. (See §3.) 2 Samuelson (1938) sought to "develop the theory of consumer's behaviour freed from any vestigial traces of the utility concept" and although economists ended up retaining the term 'utility' it was generally understood to be cognitively noncommittal. 3 I'll assume, but not defend, Shea's 'varitel semantics' account of sub-personal representation (Shea 2018). Key advantages of his view include relaxing the teleosemantic requirement of determinate consumers (at best an DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 3 agree that desires are personal states, often conscious, that can - in partnership with beliefs - feature in rationalisation of intentional action. Preferences, on the other hand, are subpersonal. They're not paradigmatically conscious (although they might be consciously accessible to some agents) and to do their work they need not feature in deliberation, or reason-giving explanation. This means that my project of naturalistic explanation is different from that of Sterelny (2003) to the extent that he attempts to provide plausible evolutionary rationales for the development of states approximately corresponding to the folkpsychological categories of belief and desire.4 In the sense at issue here, many non-human animals, including some insects and invertebrates, plausibly have preferences (see §6). There are is another set of questions about preference and evolution that I'm not directly concerned with here. It concerns how preferences developed in the actual history of life and cognition, including whether they were 'invented' once (like hearts) or many times (like eyes). I'll say a little about these matters, mostly in (§6), but my primary aims here are to characterise the capacity I'm calling having preferences, and to specify fairly general conditions under which that capacity would be beneficial to an organism. I take it for granted for now that there is a genuine explanandum here: some real organisms do represent the values of some of the options open to them, i.e. that they have preferences. There's room to argue over how many types of organism do this, as well as over what else some of them might have. Although some of what follows below may be relevant to human cognition and choice, I'm not directly concerned with humans, which raise additional complications. It's probably better to have rats and insects in mind than people. 2. Evolution, Cognition and Complexity The argument of the following sections is an application of a traditional approach, more recently articulated by Peter Godfrey-Smith (1996, 2002) under the label of the 'Environmental Complexity Thesis' or ECT. This is a view about the function of cognition in general, and so should be expected to apply to the restricted cognitive capacity of having preferences. In its shortest statement, the ECT says that "...the function of cognition is to enable the agent to deal with environmental complexity" (2002, p225). The ECT proposes, that is, that organisms capable of cognition can respond more effectively to significant heterogeneity ('complexity that matters') in their environments, and that at least sometimes investment in these capacities can pay their way. Consider, for example, the predicament of a nesting reed-warbler, sometimes exploited by cuckoo brood-parasitism. The difference between an egg laid by the reed-warbler and one laid by a cuckoo is highly significant from an evolutionary point of view. This is a vivid example of idealisation when applied to real neural processes), and openness to a variety of etiological content stabilising processes. 4 Matters are complicated by the fact that Sterelny (2003, and 2001) sometimes uses 'desire' and 'preferences' interchangeably. But it's clear that he's considering states that represent the goals of action, which is more than I require preferences to do (see Spurrett 2015). DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 4 environmental heterogeneity. Despite its importance, the difference isn't a trivial one to detect because cuckoo eggs can closely resemble those of the birds they exploit. Cognitive mechanisms can - nobody says that they must - play a role in responding to this, for example by making a reed-warbler more likely to reject an egg in its nest if it has not yet laid any in that season itself, or if it has recently seen cuckoos nearby.5 Cognitive mechanisms can, that is, operate to make the contingencies in what behaviours are produced (and when) more appropriately sensitive to such heterogeneity in the environment as an organism can detect. 'Dealing with' environmental complexity, then, is largely a matter of doing the right thing, from a repertoire which itself might change, at the right time, or doing so more often than otherwise. That is to say that Godfrey-Smith's view shares with others, including Dennett, the feature that cognition functions to help answer the question implicitly faced by any organism able to produce behaviour or action, 'Now what do I do?' (Dennett 1991, p177).6 In some expositions of the ECT, the design and control architecture of the organism's body is taken largely for granted, and the contribution of cognition described in terms of determining what to do with that body given the (changing) state of the external world. In contrast some, including Fred Keijzer (e.g. Keijzer 2015; Keijzer, van Duijn & Lyon 2013) have argued that the earliest job of neurons, and at least some of what deserves to be called cognition, is in coordinating the physical capacities of an organism independent of the state of the external world, and even in the absence of any sensory transducers. According to the 'Skin Brain Thesis' (SBT) contractile tissues pose a control problem, and almost without exception organisms with muscles also have neurons. The precursors of brains, Keijzer argues, arose to deal with making use of bodies with contractile tissues before external sense and environmental complexity were significant factors. The ECT and SBT are not, I think, most usefully thought of as mutually exclusive competitors, but rather as differences of emphasis that can be seen as special cases of a more general view. In recent work Godfrey-Smith and Keijzer have collaborated to sketch an 'option space' for early neural evolution in just this way (Jékely, Keijzer & Godfrey-Smith 2015). I don't, therefore, need to take sides. In what follows the demands of controlling the body and the demands of dealing with the external environment, both of which can be complex, will feature in explaining the function and evolution of preferences. To make this explicit, I propose to work with the following gloss of the general function of cognition: "The function of cognition is to enable the agent to co-ordinate its (possibly complex) capacities, which can include co-ordinating those capacities with environmental complexity." 5 This example is used in Sterelny (2003, Chapter 2). Darwin discussed cuckoo brood parasitism in Chapter 8 of the Origin of Species to illustrate how natural selection might impact on behaviour. Over half of the world's bird obligate brood parasites are species of cuckoo (a little under half of the species of cuckoo are brood parasites). Cuckoo brood parasitism evolved independently three times (Payne 2005) and there is significant variation in the details of the various arms races between host and parasite species. 6 See also Dennett (1984) for an earlier discussion of the importance of 'producing future'. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 5 I think of this as a friendly amendment of the ECT, standard treatments of which might have said relatively little about the demands of controlling the body (e.g. Godfrey-Smith 1996, Sterelny 2003), focusing rather on the organisation of behaviour in relation to external contingencies, but which nonetheless don't deny that these demands are important. The function of cognition is still dealing with complexity. I merely emphasise that some of the complexity might be in the agent itself. Although I argue that it makes sense that preferences would have evolved (under conditions to be outlined below), the case is largely agnostic between some accounts of evolutionary advantage. In particular I think it is a matter of taste for the reader whether she interprets this in terms of fitness advantage, or as a type of 'viability explanation' (Wouters 1995).7 3. The Basic Efficiency Rationale for Preferences (ERP) The core of my proposal, as noted, is that preferences are for enabling efficient action selection. The answer to the question why preferences evolved is: (ERP1) Preferences enable efficient action selection. Before defending this claim, let me clarify how it is to be understood. 'Action' is any functional activity that the agent produces, that is any deployment of its relatively transient 'degrees of freedom', whether muscles, glands or other kind of effector, individually or in concert.8 This is a deliberately broad and inclusive use of 'action', more in keeping with practice in artificial intelligence than in some philosophical traditions where action is reserved for a specific class of intentional activity. The term behaviour is used in varied ways by psychologists, ethologists and others. If we restrict behaviour to cases of functional activity (Millikan 1993a, 1993b), action 'action' here is interchangeable with 'behaviour'. I'll use 'activity' to include deployments of degrees of freedom irrespective of whether they're functional. Not all activity is action. There are few hard boundaries to be had in the ragged and gradual world of living things. Just as growing and reproducing may not always be strictly distinguishable, for example in the case of plants that send out runners, so it is for behaving and developing.9 While some plant activities, such as the closing of a Venus fly trap, satisfy fairly straightforward criteria for 'behaviour', some recent discoveries in plant cognition focus on instances of what could be called discriminating development. Findings, such as that growth can be sensitive to histories 7 Wouters argues persuasively that traits can be explained by reference to their contribution to viability, rather than comparative advantage. Okasha (2018) argues that it isn't generally or necessarily true that natural selection will tend to optimise fitness, and concludes that justifications for adaptationism must be empirical. 8 At least sometimes, this includes not activating some capacity. (Keeping still is a perfectly good instance of behaviour.) It's also worth noting that the capacities activated need not be within the organism's own body. (Phenotypes are sometimes extended.) I'll focus mostly on within body capacities here. 9 Godfrey-Smith (2002) contains a useful discussion of some of the difficulties here. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 6 of exposure to conditions that are not themselves intrinsically beneficial or harmful, but were correlated with ones that were, are sometimes described in terms of 'learning' or 'conditioning' (Gagliano et al. 2016).10 I acknowledge these difficulties, but will largely be able to ignore them here because the argument about the function of preferences concerns the paradigmatic animal actions of behavioural ecology: moving about, foraging, fighting, nesting. Given this, action selection is a placeholder for whatever it is that determines which degrees of freedom are activated or not, and to what extent to produce behaviour. This determination needn't always be cognitive, let alone richly so. Some capacities can be quite directly triggered by local - external or internal - conditions, independent of what is happening with the rest of the organism. Saying that there is such a thing as action selection is not yet to take any view about how, or by what mixture of means, it is achieved. (Action selection is distinct from, although perhaps not independent from, action production, where production is making action from capacities.) Finally, action selection is efficient in proportion to goal satisfaction achieved and in inverse proportion to costs expended. For my purposes it doesn't matter much how you conceive of the goals of an organism, as long as we're agreed that the overall goal or goals can be pursued directly or via intermediate or contributing goals. So, whether you're inclined to suppose that an organism has the single goal of reproductive success, or some mixture of survival and reproduction, or the possibly conflicted net effect of the reproductive goals of its genes, effective pursuit of that will involve pursuit, over smaller time-scales, of some mixture of calorie intake, hydration, rest, mating, avoiding being eaten by a tiger, and so forth. These goals needn't, and generally won't, be represented as goals for or in the agent, even though some agents might sometimes represent some of them. Greater efficiency in selecting actions given some goals is an obvious kind of advantage over anything with the same goals. Given similar goals and capacities, an organism that allocates the capacities to more efficiently achieve the goals is doing better. The presumption that meaningful standards of efficiency can be determined, and used to interpret observed behaviour, is essential to most empirical behavioural ecology. Not only that, in some areas - for instance foraging - living organisms have been shown to be extraordinarily efficient in their patterns of behaviour. To make the basic argument for (ERP1) I defend two claims. The first is that achieving efficient action selection can often be difficult. The second is that having preferences is a plausible way of dealing with these difficulties. The main reason that achieving efficient action selection can be difficult is that actions generally have varying (and multi-modal) costs, and varying (and multi-modal) returns. The costs include direct expenditure of energy, the depletion of specific 'fuels' or resources such as water and salt, as well as time spent, exposure to various risks such as predation in the course 10 Gagliano and colleagues set up a Y-maze task, and found that a neutral cue predicting of light was associated with discriminating growth. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 7 of the action, and the opportunity cost of forgone actions available at the same time. The returns can be as varied as the needs of the organism and include hydration, nutrition (itself potentially further varied, and sometimes including feeding dependent young), rest, access to mating opportunities, acquisition of nesting materials or control of a nesting site, and so forth. The detectable state of the world can indicate, to varying extents, and sometimes subject to the hostile deception that Sterelny (2003) says makes some environments informationally opaque, likely costs and returns: the visible scene might include both watering-hole and predator threat, for example, or no food in the immediate vicinity, but two different patches of green in the distance. The detectable state of the organism itself can in turn indicate what needs are most urgent, or what costs can be most easily sustained. Sterelny (2003) argues that internal environments - being parts of an agent with united and consistent interests - will tend to be devoid of conflict, and hence that internal signals of need and capacity will tend to be highly reliable. This is, I think, over-optimistic in underestimating the importance of internal conflict, and the complexity of the task of tracking needs and resources. On the first point, it's not generally true even that the genes in a single individual have precisely the same interests (Haig 2002, Burt & Trivers 2006).11 In addition, almost any organism large enough is itself the habitat for other organisms, with their own possibly hostile interests of their own. Internal signals, that is, can sometimes be subject to conflict and manipulation. That aside, though, and turning to the second point, even honest internal signalling has to reckon with the complexity of tracking needs and resources. As Sterelny says, an environment is informationally translucent to organisms when states that matter to it "map in complex, one to many ways onto the cues they can detect" (Sterelny 2003, p. 21). These conditions can be satisfied in hostility-free internal environments, in several ways. One way is because of constraints on what can easily be transduced or detected. Just as in the external case, not all internal states have unique signatures that cost-effective transducers can specialise in detecting. Non-nutritive sweeteners, for example, trigger transducers whose 'proper function' is to respond to sugars that can be digested. The responses of salt receptors, depending on the action of ion channels, are also sensitive to the ambient sodium concentration in the organism, so the resulting neural signals can be highly ambiguous (e.g. Bertino, Beauchamp & Engelman 1982). Another way is because motivationally relevant states can depend on multiple cues. Information about temperature in humans, for example, is drawn from multiple receptors of different types that are distributed non-uniformly across the surface of the body. As Akins notes, even on the human face the ratio of cold to warm receptors varies from about 8:1 on the nose, 4:1 on the cheeks and chin, while the lips have almost no cold receptors (Akins 1996, p. 346). Any 'net' signal that might drive behaviour - to seek more or less warmth - will require these signals to be integrated in some way. More generally, bodily states can span multiple organs and tissue types, with 11 Both Haig and Trivers have suggested that this intragenomic conflict predicts intrapersonal conflict, a proposal that I assess in Spurrett (2016). DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 8 varying speeds of signalling, and latencies in responding to actions that affect them. In the language of Sterelny (2003) some internal states themselves require 'robust tracking'. Even if internal signalling was both honest and consistently accurate, the problem of matching the fluctuating needs and capacities of the organism to the varying profile of opportunities and risks in the detectable environment can itself be complex. Doing 'the right thing at the right time' is a trade-off problem with varying and fluctuating parameters. Behaviours, as noted, have varying returns (in calories, specific nutrients, hydration, mating opportunities, acquisition of nest-building materials, etc.) all of them uncertain to varying degrees, and their execution carries varying costs (in calories, hydration, exposure to predation, the possible returns of behaviours foregone, etc.). Some decisions involve options with the same dimensions, for example patch switching when foraging is understood as a problem of comparing actions with different expected rates of calorie intake. Others involve options or bundles with at least some dimensions that aren't shared, such as when choosing between pursuing hydration at a site with low predator risk and eating somewhere with risks and possible gains in social rank or mating opportunities. Making action selection efficient involves dealing with these many and varied mappings. The discussion so far has focused on selection between actions. But I noted earlier than action selection and action production need not be independent. Not only that, production involves efficiency problems of its own. If behaviour is functional activity (or inactivity) then not all activity will amount to behaviour, because some will be noise or otherwise non-functional.12 Making functional activity out of a collection of degrees of freedom is not generally a trivial matter. This is so because many behaviours require multiple degrees of freedom to be coordinated. They may require multiple muscles or joints to act compatibly to produce the behaviour, and also require that these ones aren't thwarted by inappropriate activation of others not directly involved. The mappings from the many degrees of freedom in a whole body to what is needed to produce even simple behaviours like pecking at a stationary key can be highly complex. The selection of one action over another often carries an opportunity cost not merely in other allocations of the same degrees of freedom as are directly involved, but also in others whose execution have to be transiently suppressed to produce the selected one. The facts of the matter about what behaviours might be possible are not, furthermore, unchanging. The orientation of the body, and its disposition with respect to various surfaces, can determine whether jumping is an option (you can't generally do that lying down), or what combination of muscle loading across the joints of an arm is required to put something into one's mouth, or push it away. While some actions can be achieved by modulating the activity of one or a few isolated degrees of freedom, as in the case of blinking, or releasing fluid from a tear duct, many 12 Functional needn't mean 'successful' here. (On this I follow Millikan, e.g. 1984). DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 9 cannot. Consider a complex bit of animal anatomy with multiple degrees of freedom such as a primate forelimb with shoulder, elbow and a set of digits. Some combinations of allocations of the effectors, such as simultaneously flexing and relaxing the same muscle, or flexing those that would move a segment in one direction around a joint while not relaxing those that would move it in the opposite direction, are at least incompatible and could even be harmful if attempted with high intensity. For a movement comprising components around more than one joint at once, along a single limb or several - as in reaching on toe-tip for something on a high shelf - many such combinations of contraction and co-operative relaxation may be required. In many natural brains, part of this complexity is handled by means of what Sherrington called 'final common paths'. He argued that upstream of the specific effectors (in what he called the 'afferent arc') competing allocations ('reflexes') converged in a final common path, where only one reflex (as opposed to some combination or sum) would gain control of the effectors downstream (e.g. Sherrington 1906, pp. 117-118). The general idea of a final common path is a good and useful one, but I'm not suggesting we be strictly Sherringtonian about them. We needn't suppose that all final common paths are anatomically local, or unique (both redundancy and distribution are allowed). In addition we should grant that many of the patterns of activation and inhibition required for various behaviours are learned, and likely involve what Clark (1997) called 'soft assembly': control solutions dependent on and mediated by the structure and properties of the behaving body and its environment. That said, Sherrington's insight provides a useful corrective to the tradition, going back at least to Brooks (1991) that regards almost any convergence in a control system as a symptom of allegiance to muddled models of intelligence and cognition. Not all bottlenecks are bad. The point I'm emphasising is that the problem of making behaviours out of combinations of capacities is itself one that involves trade-offs, between other possible allocations of individual capacities and combinations of them, over and above whatever the metabolic and other direct costs of this or that action might be. Motor control, that is, is not generally independent from the problem of selection, even if many accounts elide this by taking as their starting point the already selected behaviour or movement. Besides the more obvious efficiency issues relating to getting something done without excess noise, energy expenditure, etc., is the efficiency problem of competing allocations of the same capacities. I've argued that making action selection efficient is a trade-off problem, involving coordinating the varied and multi-modal needs and capacities of the body, some of which constrain one another, given the also multi-modal risks and opportunities in a changing environment. Suppose that this is right. Then the argument that having preferences is a way of dealing with these difficulties can be made fairly simply. Preferences are states that attach values to possible actions or detectable world states. If those values are appropriately responsive to whatever the overall goals of the organism are, as well as its changing needs and opportunities, then they could be exploited to make action selection more efficient. If you think organisms are in the fitness business, preferences can represent expected returns in DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 10 fitness, or predictors of it. Then the members of some set of available actions would be associated with states that reflect their relative contribution to overall goals, and the processes of action selection could use these states to choose better actions.13 Preferences just are representations of the values of actions given states (or world or organism). Preferences, that is, are situation-specific rankings of available actions. So, for example, in a dehydrated organism actions that likely lead to water consumption should be valued more. In an animal that has just detected a predator, actions from the its defensive repertoire should come to be valued more, and so forth. (They could also be updated in the light of experience of the gains and costs of actions given detectable cues, although preferences are not necessarily associated with learning.) And the advantage comes from having a system of them that is appropriately responsive to changing conditions. Making action selection efficient is a real problem, and having preferences is a possible solution. This shouldn't be surprising, because venerable tradition has it that effective agents will act as if they assign subjective probabilities to current and future states of the world (including the states that may follow available actions), and select actions that maximise expected utility (Ramsey 1931, Savage 1954). A more contemporary version of this idea suggests that effective agents should implement (and evolve to implement) some form of Bayesian rationality, including conditionalization as a mechanism of belief updating (Okasha 2018, Chapter 6). That preferences 'could' enable efficient action selection is all I am after. Some argue that efficiency 'must' have recourse to preferences. Shizgal and Conover, for example, reporting on rat subjects that traded off mutually exclusive rewards in the form of trains of brain stimulation reward (BSR) and sugar solution, put it like this: "In natural settings, the goals competing for behavior are complex, multidimensional objects and outcomes. Yet, for orderly choice to be possible, the utility of all competing resources must be represented on a single, common dimension." (Shizgal & Conover 1996) Shizgal and Conover's rats showed flexible sensitivity to the opportunity cost of foregone rewards, including in cases where one reward was a bundle including both BSR and sugar solution. Their hunch is that pulling off such tracking without preferences would be mysterious, or maybe - if we take the 'must' seriously - impossible. This is a stronger claim than I want to defend for now. I just need 'having preferences' to be a viable way of enabling more efficient action selection. 13 It doesn't matter here whether the better of two, or best of more, action is selected always, or merely more often. Simply doing a better thing more often than otherwise is sufficient as a notion of advantage. (A variety of final outcome determination processes might respond to preferences in different ways. See §6.) DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 11 4. The Refined ERP As defended above, the Evolutionary Rationale for Preferences is vulnerable to some standard objections and worries. Here I outline and briefly address the main ones. Some of them concern scenarios in which an organism might do without preferences, and involve differing views about how effective or successful such an organism might be. Others focus on how expensive building and operating a system of preferences might be in comparison to other options. It certainly isn't the case that having preferences is the only way to deal with action selection. Also, no reasonable approach to efficiency can ignore the costs of the means used to make other processes efficient. The upshot of thinking through the objections is a qualified restatement of the ERP. Preferences in the sense at issue here are usefully understood as a kind of sub-personal representation. They are produced or modulated by systems tracking the changing needs of the organism, and by systems tracking the local opportunity space, in some cases also updated in the light of the history of consequences of actions performed in various conditions. And they have effects in systems arbitrating between mutually exclusive allocations of the scarce means, primarily bodily degrees of freedom, at the disposal of the organism. I'm not going to defend the claim that they're representational here - there are competing accounts of what it is to represent, and conflict tangential to my purposes over whether representations are good or bad things at all.14 I don't think it matters much if my representation talk is replaced with reference to 'tracking' or some other notion, as long as the tracking function is discharged. One likely objection, nonetheless, is provided by the strands of anti-representationalist thinking found in artificial intelligence and robotics. On those views, representations are unnecessary, because the world can serve as 'its own best representation' (Brooks 1991), and inefficient, because the demands of processing them will create a congested 'bottleneck' leading to paralysis or unacceptable delays (Clark 1997)15. The denial of preference representations here is a by-product of any general rejection of representations, and these often occur - as in Brooks - without explicit reference to preferences or utilities. Neither alleged problem is decisive here. It is undoubtedly correct that degrees of freedom can be yoked to discriminators or transducers fairly directly, and hence be controlled by processes that are representational only according to notions of representation so inclusive as to be suspect. An automobile air-bag triggered by an accelerometer need not have any connections with other control systems. (Even if we do interpret the signal from accelerometer to air-bag as a representation, it 14 I'm persuaded by Nick Shea's argument that reward prediction errors are meta-representational (Shea 2014). And what they meta-represent, reward predictions, are one version of what I'm calling preferences. See §6. (Not all preferences need be meta-represented by prediction errors.) 15 Andy Clark wrote of Brooks that it is 'conceivable that much of human intelligence is based on similar environment-specific tricks and strategies' (1997, p31). Clark's (1997) discussion of Brooks is so influential that it's led many to write as though Brooks (1991) includes the expression "representational bottleneck", which it doesn't. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 12 doesn't encode a value, and isn't compared with anything else, so isn't a preference.) Direct linking of transduction and activation of this kind can be combined in various ways, including some hierarchies, leading to whole agents that have been variously described as 'subsumption architectures' (Brooks 1991), and 'detection agents' (Sterelny 2003). We can think of the individual linkings as the parts of 'layers', or as 'detection systems', or 'reflexes', etc. Let's allow that such agents are both possible and actual. The issue is how efficient they are. While it might be true that the occurrent, local environment can guide behaviour without having to be duplicated in a model, what preferences are supposed to represent aren't facts contained in the external environment at all, but rather facts about the needs and priorities of the agent itself, and facts about the (net) values of available actions conditional on those needs. Even if the world and body can 'represent themselves', they won't automatically represent the returns (in what matters to the organism) on actions. Similarly, the complaints about representational bottlenecks are at their most effective in original application, which was cases where courses of action were selected by consulting richly detailed world-models, constructed 'after' perception, drawing on a stored model, and 'before' action was executed. But the value representations that preferences consist of just aren't 'world models' in that sense at all. They can be very sparse representationally speaking either consisting of an additional layer or component of the existing motor or sensorimotor resources used to control an action, or monitor a metabolic need or state. Here is an empirical example: neuroeconomic research detected neural correlates of relative expected return from choices expressed through eye movements in the motor circuits producing the eye movements themselves (Platt & Glimcher 1999, Dorris & Glimcher 2004, Glimcher 2011). Eye movements were selected for this research partly because the relationship between neural activity and produced movement is comparatively simple and tractable (when the head is held stationary). It had been known since Shadlen & Newsome (1996) that activity levels in LIP neurons predict impending saccades. What this research showed was that the differing levels of neural activity for two mutually exclusive actions, prior to one being produced, stood in a regular relationship to the varying returns on each action. The only 'bottleneck' here is the Sherringtonian final common path blocking mechanically inconsistent eye movements, and the processing of preferences actually exploits it. Preferences, then, needn't generally involve additional bottlenecks, or impose an excessive representational burden. While the world might 'represent' the saccadic targets well enough, it won't itself represent the varying consequences of selection relative to the appetite of the animal. This won't satisfy everyone. Producing and processing preferences still isn't free, and might be prohibitively expensive, at least compared to some alternative. A leading general idea, embracing several variants, about what to do instead, is for behaviours, activities or goals to be arranged in some kind of hierarchy of trumping relationships that don't depend on encoding values. What 'subsumption architecture' originally meant, recall, was that under certain conditions the activity of one 'layer' of a control system would simply over-ride ('subsume') that of another. A natural example is provided by sea-slugs, that are indiscriminate DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 13 omnivores and would eat the eggs that they had laid themselves if it wasn't that during egglaying they released a hormone that inhibited eating behaviour (Davis, et al 1977). The value of eating their own eggs isn't represented as low or negative. The one behaviour simply suppresses the other. Sterelny (2003) has argued that in most creatures there's no need for the development of preference states because internal environments will tend to be 'transparent' in the sense of being characterised by highly reliable signals, unlike external environments which are prone to pollution from the conflicting interests of other organisms. In these transparent internal environments, he suggests, some kind of relatively fixed motivational hierarchy, perhaps of 'drives', can be a sufficiently effective mechanism of action selection. As noted in (§1) Sterelny is partly talking about a somewhat different topic to me, even though he sometimes uses the term 'preferences', since the project in his (2003) is to develop a plausible natural history of cognitive states approximately corresponding to folk-psychological beliefs and desires. The goal-representing proto-desire states he's concerned with are fit partners for proto-beliefs, perhaps enjoying some degree of accessibility to the agent that has them. Preferences in the sense at issue here are more modest states. That said, let me address the two lines of argument in Sterelny (2003). First, as noted in (§3), while it may be approximately true that internal environments contain less hostility than external ones, it doesn't follow that tracking the needs of an organism is a trivial or simple matter, let alone that the state of the organism can be treated as 'its own best representation'. The needs of an organism vary in many dimensions, including over various time-scales, may involve quantities that aren't or can't be tracked in any way that is both cheap and reliable, and can vary in their urgency, either because of their own values or in interaction with other factors.16 The needs of an organism can be many-dimensional, independently varying, and opaque. Second, it is possible that the view defended here and Sterelny's is more compatible (in some respects) that may superficially appear. If 'drives' represent the strength of needs, or the strength of motivation for certain behaviours, then they're doing the same general thing that I'm saying preferences do, and we're just using different terms for (at least roughly) the same target. I'd like to think that is at least partly true, and that the appearance of disagreement is because Sterelny is using 'preference' some of the time as a stylistic variant for desire-like state, and aiming to provide a natural history of cognitive capacities approximately like folkpsychological beliefs and desires, where a key part of what desires do is represent goals. Subpersonally representing values of action-state pairings, though, needn't involve representing goals. 16 McFarland & Sibly (1975) has an instructive discussion of the challenges of constructing an idealised 'command space' representing the behavioural relevance of the changing needs of an organism (see also Houston & McFarland 1981). DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 14 Matters are complicated because drive talk is far from univocal, the term having been used to name various theoretical constructs in motivational psychology, most of which have been superseded and displaced by reward-based concepts more compatible with preferences (Berridge 2004). Not only that, behavioural ecologists sometimes use drive talk in ways that are agnostic about cognitive mechanism, referring to variation in the tendency to behave in some way. Sterelny doesn't explicitly endorse any of the models of drives that were rejected along the way. Still, he's undoubtedly suggesting that a lot could be achieved in behaviour selection by means of motivational states more modest than desires, which includes that they don't represent goals, but may represent urgency or strength of motivation in some way integrating bodily needs and detected opportunities. Subject to keeping a close eye on what words we use when, I don't think we're substantially at odds here. This leaves one outstanding matter: Sterelny's explicit endorsement of an idea of 'fixed motivational hierarchies', which I take to mean that some needs or priorities can - under specific conditions - 'trump' others in ways that circumvent any need for representations of their relative values to be processed. The proposal here is a version of the family of views - already noted - including subsumption architectures and other non-representational trumping hierarchies. And it is undoubtedly true that complicated organisational matters of various kinds can be made simpler and more tractable by switching between distinct 'modes' of activity within which a sub-set of the total behavioural options are in play, and the mix of 'internal' and 'external' information gathering is tailored to the current mode. Not only that, many animals arguably do something like this switching between territory-defending mode, mate competition mode, etc. This doesn't dissolve the argument for preferences for several reasons. First, preferences have a role to play within modes. Consider an animal in foraging mode. Its options have varying consequences, even if its sole aim is chasing some superficially simple target such as net rate of calorie intake. Herring gulls exhibit preferences over which eggs to brood, and are sensitive to dimensions including size, shape, position, colour, visual texture (Baerends & Kruijt 1971, McFarland & Sibly 1975). Second, having a set of modes means having the problem of when to be in which. The question of whether or not to switch mode - say from foraging to dealing with a threat - is itself an economic problem, involving costs and benefits. Preferences could have a role mediating between modes. Finally, fixed motivational hierarchies have the property that they 'leave money on the table'. That is, at least if 'fixed' is interpreted to mean exhibiting - which may not involve representing - a lexical preference.17 If any amount of some good, no matter how small, is worth more to you than any amount of another, no matter how large, you're unable to make trade-offs, or secure available marginal returns. Lexical ordering might make some hard choices more tractable, but it carries a cost. 17 In Rawls (1971) a lexical ordering is a strict ranking, where one criterion (in his case a principle of justice) has to be completely satisfied before another can be applied at all. ( DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 15 I've been saying that preferences represent values. The right way to think of this, is that they represent a kind of subjective utility, which is to say a value that is abstract compared to any of the specific modalities of both cost and return which matter to the agent. It might seem as though there's one more way of resisting my position, or diluting it, which is to say that something less abstract could serve as the 'common currency' here, for example calories. This line of thinking might be encouraged by the influence of models of foraging behaviour, in which net rate of calorie intake feature prominently. But the point doesn't generalise. The reason for this is that there isn't one concrete quantity that is generally the salient limiting resource that determines what allocation of means is efficient. Sometimes it is calories, sometimes it is hydration or some other specific nutrient, sometimes it might be time, or something else entirely. The limiting resource when people who aren't poor buy groceries is more likely to be time than money. (See McFarland & Bösser 1993: pp48-49) More generally, the opportunity cost, composed of the varied costs and returns of actions foregone, provides the right standard of comparison. So to do their work well, preferences have to be 'in' a quantity more abstract than any of the dimensions in which choices can vary, some of which don't feature in all options, i.e. utility. The upshot of the preceding discussion, I argue, is that no decisive objection to the ERP has been found, although various good reasons to qualify or refine it have. The following formulation is the result: (ERP2a) Preferences enable efficient action selection for degrees of freedom with alternative uses in non-transparent environments. (ERP2b) Preferences will be selected when the gains outweigh the costs, and design options are accessible to selection. The stipulation about degrees of freedom with alternative uses exempts truly single-use capacities the control of which can be entirely independent of any other control system (the biological equivalent of an air-bag). The restriction to non-transparent environments (in the sense used in Sterelny 2003) is to allow that in an environment where behaviour could be efficient while being entirely cue-bound, perhaps preferences would have no work to do (especially if the demands of internal environments are set aside). Thus far I've not discussed preferences in relation to learning. This is deliberate. The benefits of preferences - in efficient allocation of behavioural capacities - could in principle be realised in an agent incapable of learning. This would be analogous to a reinforcement learning system tuned by 'evolutionary methods' (Sutton & Barto 1998). Although such a system might solve a 'reinforcement learning problem' the individual system itself does no learning, but its properties are found by comparing the success levels of many variant systems. Such a system would still, in the language of reinforcement learning, have a 'policy' that matched states to actions, and ranked multiple available actions, which is close enough to having preferences. I don't know if any real biological agents have this property of having some kind of preference implementation while themselves lacking the capacity to learn. On DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 16 the other hand, at least some important kinds of learning, in particular operant or rewardbased learning, are impossible without preferences. Reward-based learning involves tuning the agent's tendencies to perform various actions on the basis of the history of the consequences of performing them in various conditions. This is very explicit in the computational literature: the 'policy' is associated with expected rewards, and the behaviours associated with actual rewards, which are compared in various ways, so that - when there is a mis-match - the policy can be updated. And the rewards are quantitative signals. To the extent that living systems approximate this kind of functionality, signals encoding expected rewards, and actual rewards, and capable of comparing them (preferences) must be implemented somehow. The ERP as defended here seems to imply that selection will drive some organisms (where the gains outweigh the cost, and where the design of the agent includes multi-use degrees of freedom, etc.) towards consistently tracking the costs and returns of actions and environmental states in a highly efficient way. But we know very well that living agents mostly don't do this, and behavioural economics and behavioural psychology have produced a long catalogue of systematic deviations from strict economic efficiency, as well as a few candidate general theories under which most of the deviations turn out to be special cases. (e.g. Kahneman & Tvesky 1979, Ainslie 2017). Whatever general theory, if any, is correct, a part of the explanatory story about the deviations will likely concern design and computational constraints. In the following section I briefly outline a few that seem especially important, and that can be expected to result in real preference implementations being compromised in various ways. 5. Design Constraints and Trade-offs One response to the ways in which living agents apparently deviate from the norms of efficient agency (sometimes called 'rationality') is to argue either that there's something wrong with the data, perhaps because it was acquired in contexts that were ecologically bizarre, or that we're mistaken about what the rights norms of efficient agency are. Okasha, for example, critically discusses several ingenious responses to the phenomenon of intransitive choice, involving scenarios in which it is arguably optimal to violate transitivity including by exhibiting inter-temporal inconsistency (Okasha 2018, pp185f). Okasha's approach focuses on comparing the predictions and consequences of theories of fitness optimising behaviour and rational choice, largely independent of considerations of cognitive implementation. That isn't the approach I take here. I've defended a prediction about cognitive design innovation in the history of living organisms. Consequently specifically cognitive design factors, insofar as they bear on the implementation of preferences, are directly relevant. I emphasise three broad groups of factors. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 17 The first is efficient coding. As noted in passing above in connection with the responses of salt receptors (§3), psychophysical processes aren't consistently perfect. More generally the neural encoding of physical facts doesn't 'attempt' to represent objective magnitudes, but rather compresses transduced variation into a baseline-dependent encoding, where the baseline itself is variable (Barlow, 1961). Even before the encoding, the processes of transduction themselves abandon information about objective magnitudes. Retinal cells, for example, respond relative to a transient average intensity (Burns & Baylor 2001). Measures like this are a pretty good way of making effective use of communication channels with fixed and often low bandwidth, and are found in psychophysical processes quite generally. If the most raw data about magnitudes in the world has this property, then - barring the action of some specialised system of correction and recalibration18 - any represented magnitude that combines, integrates or compares those will inherit that property, and perhaps repeat the 'efficient coding' leading to further deviations from tracking of objective magnitudes. There is no reason to suppose that representations of value would be immune to this process, and some evidence that it exhibits it (e.g. Tremblay & Schultz 1999; Tobler, Fiorillo & Schultz 2005). Not only that, if we suppose that they exhibit it, then we find plausible explanations for several well-documented deviations from norms of efficiency. Among these are the specific inter-temporal inconsistency observed in many living organisms, sometimes referred to as their 'hyperbolic discounting' of delayed rewards (e.g. Gibbon 1977). If delays are 'efficiently' encoded in the psychophysical sense, then the ranking of options at different delays may fail to remain stable in the absence of new information. Another is the effect of irrelevant alternatives, since efficient coding including additional low-value options reduces the represented difference between others (Glimcher 2011, p242f). The second is also related to efficiency, and concerns chunking and hierarchies. Bandwidth and processing constraints often favour 'chunking' and simplifying heuristics including decisions by 'trumping'. Chunking refers to grouping several things together to reduce the number of options that have to be dealt with (Miller 1956). In a decision case this might involve selecting first between, say, foraging and resting, and only after that selecting between different foraging actions. Switching between categories needn't involve comparison of any, let alone all, of the sub-elements of each. So, for example, switching from foraging to flight (because of predation risk) might be handled by a process that simply invokes flight behaviour when the detected 18 Trained experts in highly scaffolded environments (including systems of financial mathematics and computers) can, for example, far more closely approximate economic rationality than lone living agents. (Conversely some environment, like shopping malls, are densely scaffolded to exploit unwary agents.) DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 18 risk passes some threshold, and remaining in flight mode until some later discrimination of sufficient safety. As argued above, these transitions needn't be devoid of sensitivity to economic factors: very hungry animals often tolerate foraging risks that more sated individuals would avoid. But this sensitivity doesn't establish that a single system of preferences is being applied to every alternative behaviour that is is in play. A patchwork of incomplete and variously chunked comparisons might be the most that time and specifically cognitive capacities allow. In addition, some behaviours might be sufficiently urgent or important that it makes evolutionary sense to make their execution under certain conditions effectively unconditional, or reflex. The basic initial actions required of dependant infants to secure nutrition might fall into this category. Doing anything else would be a terrible way of getting the export-explore trade-off wrong! If they are, then those allocations may bypass evaluation against available alternatives entirely. Third, and finally, is distributed and embodied cognition. In (§4) I had reason to reject some of the more radical claims made on behalf of embodied or situated cognition. But this rejection was quite narrow in scope, limited to defending some kinds of bottlenecks, and one specific kind of representation. Not only that, the argument in favour of preferences made above is prima facie consistent with the idea that the implementation or representation of preferences - like all cognition - is a distinct stage in between sensation and action. That is to say, the argument for preferences might seem encourage a centralised and disembodied conception of cognition. I count myself among those who are pretty sure that this is not the right general picture of natural cognition, or a particularly helpful model for much artificial cognition. Real brains exhibit considerable parallelism in their architecture, fail strictly to segregate sensory from motor processes, and operate with 'incomplete' encodings that take for granted - and cannot function without - aspects of the structure of the bodies they control or sense with, or the environments in which they live. In addition many processes operate in quick and dirty ways, often not engaging in much communication with other systems. This picture is not at all to congenial to the idea of a single, central register of preferences against which available courses of action and their possible consequences (whether or not 'chunked' in line with the preceding paragraph) are judged. It is more plausible that preference implementation is widely distributed, with cues and candidate actions having preference relevant processing early, and with evaluation distributed and duplicated in various ways.19 One neurally specific model of 19 Attentional processes, for example, would be quicker if they had their own local, perhaps abbreviated or simplified, 'copies' of the preferences instead of having to consult head office. Redundancy brings risks of DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 19 this is Cisek's 'Affordance Competition Hypothesis' (Cisek 2007). Cisek rejects 'classical sandwich' models of cognition (the term is due to Hurley 1998), proposing that "the processes of action selection and specification occur simultaneously" (2007, p1586) and argues that sensory information selectively informs the generation of multiple incompletely specified behaviours, which may be released into execution prior to full specification. Reading his account of parallel, incomplete, competing behaviour specification processes with Dennett in mind, it is tempting to call it a 'multiple drafts' model of affordance competition: "From this perspective, behaviour is viewed as a constant competition between internal representations of the potential actions which Gibson (1979) termed 'affordances'" (Cisek 2007, p1586). My point here doesn't depend on endorsing Cisek's specific, though promising and interesting, proposal. What matters is that preference functionality does not depend on clear segregation of input and output, or serial ordering of decision processes. It is more likely that preference implementation is pervasive and interleaved in all processes from sensory transduction to activation of degrees of freedom Together these suggest that in natural agents the implementation of preferences, when found, will be objectively inaccurate because of efficient coding, sometimes subject to chunking and other simplifications, sometimes bypassed entirely, and distributed around the brain in ways that introduce additional scope for volatility and even conflict. Because of the cognitive costs of implementing preferences, they may be found in ways that are limited in scope for example an omnivorous creature with an otherwise simple lifestyle might have relatively finegrained ranking of food types, accompanied by less flexible and cost-sensitive systems selecting between foraging and other behaviours. What real preferences have to do is represent, accurately enough, the returns on available behaviours so that (often enough) better one can be selected than would be otherwise. Like any cognitive system, they're expensive, and additional increments of accuracy drive up the expense. This is, furthermore, what we find in nature, as I argue below. 6. Preferences and Real Brains Although including occasional real biological illustrations, my argument so far has been largely theoretical. One way of seeing it is as a prediction: given certain factors, evolution can conflict, though, such as cases where the abstinent addict still orients towards predictors of the target of their addiction. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 20 be expected to invent a preference-like capacity. A fair question is whether or not this prediction is correct. Here I briefly defend the position that, although the available evidence contains substantial gaps, it is correct: Many natural organisms have preferences. This evidence is perhaps most comprehensive in the case of humans, but I'll begin with monkeys. Final common paths provide a natural architectural or functional 'place' for the operation of preferences. Circuits specialised for filtering out mechanically incompatible actions might allow competition between options that are not ruled out to be expressed. And if preferences are to influence allocation, they are the last place for them to do so. Some key early experiments in neuroeconomics depended on this very line of thinking to generate empirical hypotheses or to interpret their results (e.g. Platt & Glimcher 1999, Dorris & Glimcher 2004). As discussed in (§4), Monkey subjects were trained to express choices through saccades to different targets. Saccades are a convenient behaviour precisely because they're controlled by small networks of muscles with their own series of neural topographic maps, corresponding to a two-dimensional 'dart board' of skull-relative fixation targets. These maps are, in part, a final common path that prevents the eyes from attempting conflicted movements like simultaneously turning up and down. They're also a bottleneck for competition between fixation targets. In the interval preceding choice levels of activity in regions of the topographic maps corresponding to the saccadic targets under study varied with the expected return on that movement. Platt and Glimcher's monkeys were 'paid' in juice, while Dorris and Glimcher's subjects played an inspection game with returns in water, but in both cases local neural activity and (relative) expected subjective utility from the corresponding target were correlated. In later work Klein, Deaner and Platt (2008) found that activity in neurons specialised for saccades reflected values of both social and fluid rewards, so this isn't merely a fact about saccades for fluid rewards. This isn't, furthermore, merely something about monkeys, or restricted to saccadic movements. In neuroeonomic study of human choices, correlates of utility are usually sought further 'upstream' of anatomically detailed final common paths, because electrode recordings are rarely used in human neuroeconomic experiments, and choices expressed by button presses and other hand movements don't correspond to somatotopic maps that are as conveniently tractable as those for eye movements (Glimcher 2011). Even so, the evidence is rather compelling. Levy and Glimcher (2012) survey relevant experimental work up to 2012. First they detail studies showing that activity in the ventral striatum was positively associated DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 21 with, among other things, monetary gains and losses, cumulative monetary rewards, anticipation of varying monetary rewards, expected values of uncertain monetary rewards, and discounted value of delayed monetary rewards. Second, they consider studies with at least one incentive other than money, including consumer goods, gustatory rewards (water, juice, food), physical pain, social reputation, again finding consistent correlations. Whether or not Shizgal and Conover were correct to say that orderly choice means that there "must" be value representations in a common scale, the work of some neuroeconomists suggests that there is in fact one for a wide range of choice types. Comparative neuroeconomics is a small field, but approximately analogous results have been found in other vertebrates and some invertebrates with indications that the neural systems across phyla share structural similarities, and similar functional roles for dopamine or related molecules.20 Capacity for reinforcement learning is diagnostic of having preferences. That is, although preferences need not be exploited in learning, reward learning requires both sensitivity to rewards and updating behavioural dispositions in light of reward-based consequences of earlier behaviour. Besides humans, monkeys, and other widely studied chordates (especially rodents and bird) reward sensitivity and capacity for reinforcement learning or operant conditioning has been found in insects (including bees, flies, cockroaches and ants), crustaceans (crabs, crayfish, lobsters) and cephalopod molluscs (Perry, Baron & Cheng 2013). In addition, dopamine or similar molecules play functionally similar roles in modulation of behaviour towards reward (Barron, Søvik & Cornish 2010). The fact that in some species apparently incapable of reinforcement learning, such as nematodes, dopamine plays a role modulating motor activity (Barron, Søvik & Cornish 2010) encourages the thought that the earliest steps towards implementing preferences were elaborations of motor control systems. That is, that final common paths paying their way in helping with the problem of producing behaviour out of capacities for activity provided the initial platform for the development of processes prioritising between available behaviours. 6. Conclusion I have argued that psychologically real preference states can play a valuable role in prioritising the allocation of the capacities of living agents, and that this plausibly explains their evolution. The states I've focused on, preferences, are more cognitively modest than 20 [I'm working on selecting appropriate additional references for this paragraph.] DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 22 desires on most accounts of desires. The argument I've offered is a version of the Environmental Complexity Thesis. Whereas standard expositions of that tend to focus on the development of world-representing states, whether understood as decoupled representations, or proto-beliefs, I've focused primarily on the role of value representations in dealing with the problem of matching the capacities of an agent to the changing contingencies of the world around it. That problem is often complex, involving mappings from varied capacities to action, given changing needs and changing external contingencies, with costs and benefits of multiple types and magnitudes. Doing better at dealing with this problem means deploying the available behavioural repertoire more effectively. This is an obvious kind of advantage, especially if the goals more efficiently achieved are understood in terms of fitness. In an unqualified form, the argument suggests something that we don't find. Real organisms aren't that efficient, and their deviations from efficiency exhibit some patterns. Many of these are the result of cognitive design limitations and trade-offs. Real preference implementations are compromises. Nonetheless, they are widely though not universally found in real organisms with nervous systems, and appear to have deep evolutionary roots. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 23 References Ainslie, G. (2017) De Gustibus Disputare: Hyperbolic delay discounting integrates five approaches to impulsive choice. Journal of Economic Methodology, 24:2, 166-189. Barlow, H. B. (1961) The coding of sensory messages. In: Thorpe and Zangwill (eds.), Current Problems in Animal Behaviour. New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 330-360. Barron, A.B., Søvik, E., & Cornish, J.L. (2010) The roles of dopamine and related compounds in reward-seeking behaviour across animal phyla. Frontiers in Behavioural Neuroscience, 4(163). Brooks, R.A. (1991) Intelligence without representation, Artificial Intelligence, 47: 139–159. Burns, M.E., and Baylor, D.A. (2001) Activation, deactivation, and adaptation in vertebrate photoreceptor cells. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 24: 779-805. Burt A, Trivers R (2006) Genes in Conflict: The biology of selfish genetic elements Bellknap/Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. Clark, A. (1997) Being There, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Davis, W. J., Mpitsos, G. J., Pinneo, J. M., & Ram, J. L. (1977) Modification of the behavioral hierarchy of Pleurobranchaea. I. Satiation and feeding motivation, Journal of Computational Physiology. 117: 99-125. Dennett, D.C. (1991), Consciousness Explained, Boston, Little, Brown. Dennett, D.C. (1996), Kinds of minds, New York, Basic Books. Dennett, D.C. (2017), From Bacteria to Bach and Back, New York, Norton. Dennett, D.C. (2018), 'Reflections on Peter Godfrey-Smith', in Huebner, B. (ed) The Philosophy of Daniel Dennett, Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 250-253. Gagliano, M., Vyazovskiy, V.V., Borbély, A.A., Gromonprez, M. & Depczynski, M. (2016) Learning by Association in Plants. Scientific Reports, 6, 38427. Gibbon, J. (1977) Scalar expectancy theory and Weber's law in animal timing. Psychological Review, 84: 279–325. Glimcher, P. (2011) Foundations of Neuroeconomic Analysis, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Godfrey-Smith, P. 1996. Complexity and the Function of Mind in Nature, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Godfrey-Smith, P. 2002. Environmental Complexity and the Evolution of Cognition. In R. Sternberg and J. Kaufman (eds.) The Evolution of Intelligence. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum, pp. 233-249. Godfrey-Smith, P. (2018), 'Towers and Trees in Cognitive Evolution', in Huebner, B. (ed) The Philosophy of Daniel Dennett, Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 225-249. Haig D (2002) Genomic Imprinting and Kinship. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick. Hurley, S. (1998) Consciousness in Action. London: Harvard University Press. J_ékely, G., Keijzer, F., Godfrey-Smith, P. (2015) An option space for early neural evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 370(1684), 1-10. Kahneman, D., and Tversky, A. (1979). Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk. Econometrica, 47(2): 263-291. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 24 Keijzer, F. (2015) Moving and Sensing Without Input or Output: Early Nervous Systems and the Origins of the Animal Sensorimotor Organization. Biology & Philosophy, 30, pp311-331. Keijzer, F., van Duijn, M. & Lyon, P. (2013) What nervous systems do: early evolution, inputoutput, and the skin brain thesis. Adaptive Behavior, 21, 67-85. (doi:10.1177/1059712312465330) Klein, J.T., Deaner, R.O., & Platt, M.L. (2008), 'Neural correlates of social target value in macaque parietal cortex' Current Biology, vol. 18, pp. 419-424. Levy, D.J. & Glimcher, P.W. (2012), 'The root of all value: a neural common currency for choice', Current Opinion in Neurobiology, vol. 22, pp. 1027-1038. McFarland, D.J. and Sibly, R.M. (1975) The behavioural final common path, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences, 270(907), 265-293. McFarland, D. and Bösser, T. (1993) Intelligent Behaviour in Animals and Robots. Cambridge, Mass: Bradford Books. McNamara, J.M. and Houston, A.I. (1986) The Common Currency for Behavioral Decisions, The American Naturalist, 127(3), pp358-378. Millikan, R. (1984) Language, Thought and Other Biological Categories. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Millikan, R. (1993) What is Behavior? A Philosophical Essay on Ethology and Individualism in Psychology, Part 1. In White Queen Psychology and Other Essays for Alice. Cambridge, Mass: Bradford Books. (135-150) Millikan, R.G. (2017), Beyond Concepts, Oxford, Oxford University Press. Okasha, S. (2018) Agents and Goals in Evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Payne, R.B. (2005) The Cuckoos, Oxford University Press. Perry, C.J., Barron, A. & Cheng, K. (2013), 'Invertebrate learning and cognition: relating phenomena to neural substrate', Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Cognitive Science, vol. 4, pp. 5610582. Platt, M.L., & Glimcher, P.W., (1999), 'Neural correlates of decision variables in parietal cortex', Nature, vol. 400, pp. 233-238. Rawls, J. (1971) A Theory of Justice. Bellknap Press. Samuelson, P. (1938) A Note on the Pure Theory of Consumer's Behaviour. Economica, 5(17), pp. 61-71. Shadlen, M. N., and Newsome,W. T. ( 1996). Motion perception: Seeing and deciding. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 93: 628-633. Shea, N. (2014) Reward Prediction Error Signals are Meta-Representational, Noûs, 48(2), pp. 314–341. Shea, N. (2018) Representation in Cognitive Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Spurrett, D. (2014), 'Philosophers Should Be Interested in 'Common Currency' Claims in the Cognitive and Behavioural Sciences'. South African Journal of Philosophy, vol. 33. pp. 211-221. Spurrett, D. (2016) Does Intragenomic conflict predict Intrapersonal conflict? Biology and Philosophy, 31(3), pp313-333. Spurrett, D. (2015) The Natural History of Desire, South African Journal of Philosophy, 34(3), pp304-313. Sterelny, K. (2003). Thought in a Hostile World, Oxford: Blackwell. DRAFT VERSION – COMMENTS WELCOME 25 Sutton, R.S. & Barto, A.G. (1998) Reinforcement Learning. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Tobler, P.N., Fiorillo, C.D., & Schultz, W, (2005) Adaptive coding of reward value by dopamine neurons. Science, 307:1642-1645. Tremblay, L, and Schultz, W. (1999) Relative reward preference in primate orbitofrontal cortex. Nature, 398: 704-708. Wouters, A. (1995) Viability Explanation. Biology & Philosophy, 10, pp435-457. Acknowledgments I've hawked a succession of versions of this contraption at conferences and seminars over several years. I thank audiences at conferences in Durban (A Highly Desirable Symposium 2016), Tartu (ESPP 2015), Hertfordshire (ESPP 2017), Wollongong (Naturally Evolving Minds 2018) and Darwin (Evolving Minds 2018), as well as departmental colloquia at UKZN, Warwick, Bochum and Macquarie for their engagement. I'd also especially like to single out helpful discussions with Nicholas Shea, Paul Griffiths, Peter Godfrey-Smith, David Papineau, Kim Sterelny and Ruth Millikan.

Explanation and Cognition edited by Frank C. Keil and Robert A. Wilson © 2000 Massachusetts Institute of Technology All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher. This book was set in Bembo by Best-set Typesetter Ltd., Hong Kong and was printed and bound in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Explanation and cognition / edited by Frank C. Keil and Robert A. Wilson. p. cm. "A Bradford book." Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-262-11249-3 (alk. paper) 1. Cognition. 2. Explanation. I. Keil, Frank C., 1952– II. Wilson, Robert A. (Robert Andrew) BF311 .E886 2000 153-dc21 99-087946 Preface From very different vantage points both of us have had longstanding interests in the relations between cognition and explanation.When the opportunity arose through the kind invitation of Jim Fetzer, editor of Minds and Machines, to put together a special issue on the topic, we eagerly agreed and assembled a series of seven papers that formed an exciting and provocative collection. But even before that issue appeared, it was obvious that we needed a more extensive and broader treatment of the topic. We therefore approached The MIT Press and suggested the current volume, containing revised versions of the seven original papers plus seven new papers. All of these chapters have been extensively reviewed by both of us as well as by other authors in this volume. There have been many revisions resulting from discussions among the authors and editors such that this collection now forms a broad and integrated treatment of explanation and cognition across much of cognitive science.We hope that it will help foster a new set of discussions of how the ways we come to understand the world and convey those understandings to others is linked to foundational issues in cognitive science. We acknowledge thanks to the staff at The MIT Press for help in shepherding this collection of papers through the various stages of production. Many thanks also to Trey Billings for helping in manuscript processing and preparation and to Marissa Greif and Nany Kim for preparing the index. Frank Keil also acknowledges support by NIH grant R01HD23922 for support of the research-related aspects of this project.

The Meaning of Killing by Nicolas Delon Why do we consider killing and letting someone die to be two different things? Why do we believe that a doctor who refuses to treat a terminally ill patient is doing anything less than administering a lethal substance? After all, the consequences are the same, and perhaps the moral status of these acts should be judged accordingly. Reviewed: Jonathan Glover, Questions de vie ou de mort (Causing Death and Saving Lives), translated into French and introduced by Benoît Basse, Genève, Labor et Fides, 2017, 386 pp. Jonathan Glover, a British philosopher, is the author of several major works of moral philosophy, notably What Kind of People Should There Be? (1984) and Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century (1999). In his classic book Causing Death and Saving Lives published in 1977 and recently translated into French, he explores the range of moral questions raised by death, killing and letting die. The book came out of a class that Glover gave in Oxford with Derek Parfit and James Griffin in the years from 1967. It influenced a number of students who attended the class, including Peter Singer and John Harris. Readers familiar with Parfit's work can also identify some of his major philosophical themes in Glover's book, such as issues of identity, population ethics, future generations, procreation and impersonal reasons. Causing Death and Saving Lives is not a book about the metaphysics of death. Glover does not ponder the nature of death in order to address what makes it bad (or good), and what makes it right (or wrong) to cause death, to allow it to happen, or to fail to bring into existence. There are few issues that Glover does not touch on, except for animals, a topic he does not believe he can do justice to in the book. He covers abortion, contraception and infanticide; suicide and high-risk behaviours; euthanasia and medical assistance programmes; 2 capital punishment, murder and terrorism; wars and revolutions. These issues of applied ethics are dealt with in the third part of the book and are preceded by a section on moral methodology and a theoretical section on the respective value of life and death and on a range of factors whose normative relevance to matters of life and death Glover calls into question, such as the identity of people, certainty, distance, numbers, etc. Why is killing wrong? The book has three main goals, all of which are revisions of common morality. First, Glover aims to provide tools with which to revise our moral beliefs about killing, particularly the traditional doctrine of the sanctity of life. He seeks to give a more accurate account of a whole range of life and death issues that are of moral importance: up to what point and under what circumstances is it permissible to have an abortion? What wars and acts of war can be justified? What makes a life worth living? Do some deaths matter more than others? Glover's central theory is that the badness of death, and therefore the wrongness of killing (or allowing someone to die), depends on three principles. The first is the value of a life worth living for the person who dies. Glover holds that a life only has value to the extent that it is conscious; and that the fact of being conscious itself only has value by virtue of the positive experiences it enables. This has major implications, for instance with respect to life support for foetuses, anencephalic newborns or patients in a permanent vegetative state. The two other principles are: respect for the autonomy, and therefore preferences, of the individual, even contrary to the opinion of disinterested third parties; and the relevance of the overall consequences of our choices. With these three principles, Glover is then able to defend conclusions that are often nuanced and moderate. For example, given that killing in war does not belong to a distinctive category, Glover maintains that one can neither justify every possible act of war nor defend unconditional pacifism. Other conclusions are more radical, such as his claim that the death of foetuses and newborns is wrong primarily in virtue of its "side-effects," that is, effects that do not directly concern the foetus or newborn as the object of the action but rather, for example, the parents or society. Doing the right thing may demand that we ignore our intuitions urging us to disapprove of direct killing more strongly than allowing people to die, particularly in a distant, anonymous way, and condemn murders making the headlines more strongly than those taking place on the battlefield, or to mourn the death of identifiable victims more strongly than that of "statistical" victims. 3 Matters of distinction The second major revision is based on two questionings. First, Glover opposes the very widespread idea that there is a morally relevant difference between the act of killing and the act of letting die. Second, he challenges two doctrines shared by common morality and the majority of deontological theories: the distinction between acts and omissions and the doubleeffect doctrine. The former holds that we have stronger reasons not to cause harm through our own acts (drowning a child) than to prevent a comparable harm (allowing a child to die of hunger.) The latter maintains that causing harmful side effects is permissible if they result from actions aimed at a good end, sufficiently so in proportion to the harm, and it foreseen (or foreseeable) but not intended either as ends or as means. For example, the bombing of military facilities aimed at bringing down an enemy, with the consequence of killing a number of civilians, may be justified according to this doctrine if their deaths are merely foreseen and not intended either as an end or a means to the good that is intended in so acting. These doctrines imply in particular an ability to distinguish non-arbitrarily between acts and omissions, and between intended consequences and merely foreseeable ones. However, as Glover shows, this is often difficult. Why do we consider that a doctor who refuses further care for a terminally ill patient in order to relieve suffering is doing anything different from directly administering a lethal substance? There is no difference between the respective intentions and consequences of the two actions. In both cases we can describe what the doctor does intentionally as having the same purpose and consequences. The difference, if any, seems to be more closely related to the distance between the agent and the consequences than to the quality of the action. According to Glover, the mere fact that in one case the doctor allows the patient to die while actively causing death in the other case does not constitute a relevant difference. Glover shows that, once these distinctions are set aside, some of our moral beliefs collapse, considerably altering the moral structure of life-and-death issues. If these differences matter less than we think, perhaps we should in fact be equally concerned by the deaths we cause directly and those to which we pay no attention (deliberately or through ignorance): poverty, tropical diseases, pollution or road accidents cause far more deaths than more dramatic intentional acts. Matters of method One of the strengths of Causing Death and Saving Lives is its focus on similarities and differences between practical cases – which also makes the book controversial. I just discussed how for Glover some of our usual distinctions are arbitrary, vague or porous: this applies to 4 the differences we establish between the developmental stages of foetus, actions and omissions, assisted suicide and passive euthanasia, or even the near and the far (both across space and time.) This does not imply that such distinctions are never justified for practical, legal and political purposes. But they do not have the basic moral importance we give them. For example, once we give up on the sanctity of life doctrine, if contraception is allowed and if acts and omissions are morally equivalent, then abortion would be permitted in many circumstances, particularly in the case of serious disability; likewise, medical anomalies for which abortion is permissible could justify infanticide in exceptional cases1. According to Glover, it is precisely by taking account of these continuities that one can address them coherently and rationally, even if that means overturning some of our basic convictions. Finally, Glover tries to challenge our way of reflecting on all these questions. To his mind, they need to be addressed in a more humane and contextual way, rather than taking the absolutist and legalist approach that is prompted by the idea that life is sacred, by the doctrine of acts and omissions and by the attachment to rigid, context-insensitive principles. The morality of our choices depends on the consequences they have for those affected by them, rather than on any such principles. Glover finds justification for his revisionism in the fact that these conventional ideas cause a great deal of suffering and pointless, avoidable deaths. One of the main themes of his line of argument is the focus on the side-effects (near or far, intentional or not) of our actions, common practices and the policies we implement. These effects are no less relevant to moral evaluation than the intrinsic qualities of our actions. They include the suffering caused to a victim's family, the indirect damage caused to others, the loss for society, the influences of an act or a rule on the majority of moral agents, etc. Glover is therefore a consequentialist: in other words, he considers that the moral status of an act or rule should be evaluated primarily, if not exclusively, according to its consequences. The appropriate thing is that which promotes – in this case, maximises – that which is good. However, Glover does not presuppose consequentialism. He takes as a point of departure a number of principles and intuitions whose implications he reveals and which he invites the reader to question; he grounds his arguments on the most solid foundations of common morality, of which he then goes on to reject some key elements. The principles that enable him to achieve this are, of course, themselves subject to dispute, but Glover convincingly shows that it can sometimes be difficult for his opponents not to attach some importance to consequences, lest they run into implausible or incoherent views. Glover advocates a form of rule utilitarianism, where the rightness of actions derives from the rules, conveyed by social policies, which, if they were generally followed, would have the best consequences, and which take into account the behaviours and attitudes of all individuals concerned. 1 Glover exercises caution on this issue, and calls for the adoption of clear and detailed social policies that do justice to the complexity of situations (foreseeable quality of life for newborns, parental autonomy, side-effects for the family and society, etc.) 5 It is worth noting that Glover takes into account the limitations of our psychology, which are somewhat likely to undergo gradual change, but are nonetheless real, particularly because moral rules reflecting these profound limitations are more likely to produce the best consequences. The problem is that these limitations are lacking in direct normative relevance. For example, we are far more concerned by the rescue of a single miner trapped in a mineshaft than we are by safety measures that might save many lives, but our response is primarily psychological. Moreover, this kind of response often relates not to the intrinsic properties of acts but to their side effects; they should therefore be contingent and not form the basis for an unconditional judgment. Many of the issues discussed are thus intentionally left without a clear answer, because they require further empirical examination. Glover, both honest and modest, simply aims to provide us with the tools we need to advance in our consideration of these questions. Showing remarkable argumentative clarity, Causing Death and Saving Lives is written in a style that dispenses with unnecessary jargon and overabundant references and notes. The reader will also appreciate the author's efforts to respond to problems without conceding much to common sense or any particular moral theory, as well as his concern with documenting the examination of each question in the light of specific cases, real people, the social sciences, medicine, history and literature, especially considering that his attention to empirical details is also accompanied by an acknowledgment of our fallibility regarding the value of different lives. The French translation is not always perfect, far from it, but the choices of terminology are overall consistent and correct. Benoît Basse does justice to the clarity and accessibility of Glover's writing. Finally, it is striking to see how the issues raised in 1977 are still relevant and how people's attitudes, disagreements and unsolved questions continue to structure debates on euthanasia, just war and, perhaps less so in France, abortion and the death penalty. Philosophers, the general public, students and teachers alike will benefit greatly from (re)discovering this classic book forty years after its original publication. Published in laviedesidees.fr, 5 July 2017. Translated from the French by Susannah Dale with the support of the Institut Français. Published in Books&Ideas, 22 March 2018.

Social Sciences Indexed International SOCIAL MENTALITY AND RESEARCHER THINKERS JOURNAL Open Access Refereed E-Journal & Refereed & Indexed SMARTjournal (ISSN:2630-631X) Architecture, Culture, Economics and Administration, Educational Sciences, Engineering, Fine Arts, History, Language, Literature, Pedagogy, Psychology, Religion, Sociology, Tourism and Tourism Management & Other Disciplines in Social Sciences 2019 Vol:5, Issue:22 pp.1210-1218 www.smartofjournal.com [email protected] ETHICS SURROUNDING HUMAN EMBRYONIC STEM CELL RESEARCH Joseph Nkang OGAR Department of Philosophy, University of Calabar, Cross River, Nigeria. Samuel Akpan BASSEY Department of Philosophy, University of Calabar, Cross River, Nigeria. Article Arrival Date : 10.06.2019 Article Published Date : 05.09.2019 Article Type : Research Article Doi Number : http://dx.doi.org/10.31576/smryj.332 Reference : Ogar, J.N. & Bassey, S.A. (2019). "Ethics Surrounding Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research", International Social Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal, (Issn:2630-631X) 5(22): 1210-1218 ABSTRACT Since their discovery in the early 1990s, Stem Cell has brought the prospect of radically improving treatments for a host of diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's disease, cancers and many among other diseases that currently render patients and scientists helpless to combat. With the advent of medical and scientific research, comes the inevitable emergence of ethical controversy that often accompanied major scientific and medical development. The use of Stem Cell is no different. Those who seek to curtail the use of certain stem cell lines, revert to the argument that has defied many medical debates over the previous decades. The destruction of human life to create life is one of the key philosophical points that all anti-stem cell advocates attempt to make. However, the purpose of this paper is to analysis the various aspects of ethical debate concerning the use of stem cells in medical research. Keywords: Ethics, Stem Cells, Medical Research, Human Embryo. 1. INTRODUCTION Scientific research comes down to a moral-philosophical-religious connotation that has perplexed the minds of theologians and philosophers since the dawn of time "When does life begin"? However, this answer has yet to be determined, either from a purely religious or scientific perspective. The answer to this question will ultimately define this debate and conclusively provide the closure and resolution both sides have been searching for. Until this question is answered, the greatest extent possible, then the debate over the proper use of stem cells is destined to continue in its veracity. The purpose of this discussion is to engage in an analysis of the various aspects of the ethical debate concerning the use of stem cells in medical research. This issue is not as simple as right versus wrong and black versus right, rather; there are complexities involving human suffering balanced to the taking of human life that is in the form of an embryo. Implicit in this debate is a myriad of philosophical, ethical, scientific and religious logical constructs that integrate themselves into this debate which makes the debate over usage of stem cells one of the hottest debates currently produced in modern society. This discussion will introduce this debate by outlining the science underlying stem cells. Furthermore, the various types of stem cells will be discussed along with the general concepts of Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1211 biochemistry, biology and other chemical properties of these cells will be examined in order to provide a working construct that serves to frame the debate and provide a context in order to understand the nature of stem cells and how effective they are. In addition to the scientific discourse, the philosophical undertones of this debate from a wide variety of philosophical maxims inherently contained in it them will be analyzed within the framework of the stem cell debate. Lastly, this discussion will conclude with an overall review of the main tenants of the ethical, moral, religious aspects of this debate. This essay will not judge the prongs of each approach to the ethical ramifications of stem cells in medical research. 2. SCIENTIFIC PREMISE OF STEM CELLS Stem cells are akin to "blank slates" in terms of their genetic development and principles. Stem cells possess two unique qualities that separate them from other cells in the human body. First, Stem Cells are undifferentiated at their outset, and this means that a stem cell has the ability to develop into any cell type in the body. A stem cell can be produced in the red bone marrow and then be placed into a pietri dish with cardiac cells (Ardaillou et al. 987). Eventually, the stem cell will adapt the properties of those surrounding cardiac cells and develop into another cardiac celltaking with it all the qualities and characteristics of the cardiac cell they are introduced to. This differentiation principle allows stem cells to repair damaged tissues and organ systems. There have been many studies that demonstrate infusion of stem cells into damaged muscle tissue following trauma can increase the likelihood of a patient having a positive recovery, minimizing damage to internal organs or tissues. This principle is highly valuable to scientists seeking to harness this differentiation principle to direct stem cells in their quest to cure certain diseases. There are two distinct types of stem cells that researchers have used. Embryonic and Adult. The more potent stem cell lines that are used in medical research are derived from frozen human embryos, these Human Embryonic Stem Cells possess the greatest capacity to develop and foster immense possibilities in dealing with diseases. These stem cells are derived from those embryos that have been frozen and are waiting for fertilization from a male gamete. However, there are some instances in which these embryonic stem cells are not fertilized; therefore they are set to be discarded. Rather than have these embryos destroyed, they are used for scientific research to harvest their DNA and used in clinical treatments or academic research to investigate the impact of certain proposed treatments. In recent years, scientists have been able to identify highly specialized conditions that allow a cell to be "reprogrammed" and revert back to its stem cell state; allowing it to exhibit the main principles of a stem cell-differentiation and tissue repair. These cells are referred to as "Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells" or (IPSC's) (Committee for Advanced Therapies, 5). All three categories of stem cells: embryonic, adult and IPSC all posses the potential to radically alter the course of modern medicine and unlock the full impact of cell-based regenerative therapies to treat diseases such as diabetes, myocardial infarctions along with Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Despite the inherent similarities between these various cell lines, there are differences that must be addressed. The first difference is that each cell line inherently contains various levels of differentiation abilities. For example, Human Embryonic Stem Cells (hESC's) posses the highest level of differentiated ability in that they can be programmed to form any type of cell in the human body. Adult stem cells exhibit a more limited capacity for differentiation. Adult stem cells are limited to differentiating into additional cells from their tissue of origin. Specifically, an adult stem cell from a calf muscle cannot be introduced into the spinal column in order to regenerate damaged nerve tissue. Another critical difference between the two cell lines involves their generation. Embryonic stem cells are more readily produced in culture. Adult stem cells, in contrast, are rarely found in mature tissue; therefore the process of isolating these cells is increasingly difficult. A related distinction is the ability of tissues derived from these cell lines to be rejected after Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1212 transplantation. Currently, there is little data involving the tissues derived from Human Embryonic Stem Cells given the Food and Drug Administration has only recently given approval to allow human testing in Phase-1 clinical trials that involve transplanting tissues generated from Human Embryonic Stem Cells. Conversely, there is ample data to suggest that those tissues created from Adult stem cells are less likely to be rejected during transplantation. The science behind this principle is relatively straightforward; the patient's own cells are utilized in creating this newly formed tissue, therefore the incidents rates and probability of the patient's own T-Cells and B-Cells creating a histological reaction to "self" is increasingly unlikely. IPSC's or "Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells" are the latest stem cells to be developed by research scientists (Wilson and Joseph, 1614). As defined earlier, these stem cells are not an individual stem cell line, like Embryonic or Adult; they are more akin to a "sub-division". These are cells that have been genetically reprogrammed through a variety of recombinant DNA and RNA technologies that have allowed these cells to revert to their stem cell phase, hence the word "Induced"these cells are "induced" into becoming stem cells. Two types of IPSC's were developed, mice (2006) and humans (2007). Each of these cell lines exhibited qualities important to the foundation of pluripotent stem cells. Bot mouse and human IPSC's were able to form tumor necrosing cells, exhibit numerous cell markers and differentiate into a variety of tissues once injected into mice. Even though these stem cells are only a few years old, they possess limitless potential in terms of clinical research. Specifically, scientists are focusing their potential uses in transplant medicine in order to significantly reduce the level of both infections and overall organ rejection in organ transplant surgery. The potential for using stem cells is of huge medical and clinical importance. These cells could potentially allow scientists to learn what occurs at the cellular and molecular levels of human development and use this information to identify certain molecular pathways that contribute to a variety of conditions. Furthermore, using these stem cells could also allow scientists to discover the genes that are triggered in response to certain cellular conditions that cause rapid, unchecked cell growth or irregular cellular patterns. Additionally, using stem cells to discover certain genetic conditions will lend immense amount of information to the scientists and afford researchers the opportunity to enhance their understanding of various disorders caused by genetics. However, despite this growing potential there are obstacles associated with the utilization of these cell lines in the pursuit of medical advancement. 3. LEGAL, ETHICAL, MORAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL ISSUES REGARDING STEM CELLS The use of stem cells comes attached with a variety of legal, ethical, moral and philosophical issues. The remainder of this discussion will focus on these issues. Those who assert that killing human embryos is morally reprehensible usually assert the maxim that all individuals were once embryos, deserving of all the respect that other human beings are accustomed to. This argument blends the ethical, religious and philosophical elements of the concept of the commencement of human life. This maxim has two main branches: (1) The embryo is the earliest stage of development in the existence of a human being and (2) Human beings have the similar moral standing at all stages of development and growth, including the embryonic stage). These two branches are inherently philosophical in nature in that it portends to make distinctions regarding human nature. These maxims seem mismatched with the moral reasons used to validate treating individuals in unreliable manners dependent on their nature. If an individual was once an embryo it would logically follow that that individual's nature was different. Therefore, it would permissible to treat you in a manner that would be inappropriate as this individual became older. It appears implausible to assume that radical changes in an individual's nature can never affect that individual's moral status. Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1213 The major counterpoint to the religiosity of the anti-stem cell research argument is to posit the question, Are six-day old embryos human organisms?. Although modern science has not clarified or lent any assistance in determining if a six day embryo is a human being, there is certainly room to create reasonable doubt. There are two competing attitudes regarding what happens once conception occurs. The first constructs assumes that subsequent cell division is but the first steps in the life span of a single individual possessing differentiating characteristics that will make up their essential self and allow the individual to develop into a rational adult. The second construct does not treat the combination of the female and male gamete as a human organism. With respect to the first premise, although it is true that all the cells are in a single unitthey are held together by a singly cellular membrane it is difficult to determine what makes all these various cells parts of an individual. This logical premise leads yet to another question, or requirement, in order to determine what makes these cells a single human individual, there must be the determination about what, exactly, a human organism is-a "first principles" approach to examining this question. Human organisms are entities with human genes that compose living organs that function together in harmonious concert; however these organs in and of themselves do not constitute living organisms. The second construct regarding what occurs after the combination of male and female gametes holds that this combination and the inevitable delegation of cells does not constitute a human organism. According to this philosophical premise, once this single cell begins to divide, only the constituent make components of the cells remain. When the first cell divides, it ceases to exist, although its offspring is two daughter cells. Similarly, when these cells divide they cease to exist leaving in its wake the offspring cells. Therefore there is not a single individual that remains throughout the transformation. Only when there is a substantial differentiation in cellular function, position and structure that the claim about integrating components of an organismic structure being present. Scientifically, this type of distinctive presentation is not present until roughly two weeks after fertilization it seems logical this is the period where human beings are said to exist. Those who seek to assert that the very first levels of embryonic development constitute a valid human life, worthy of the highest levels of protection bear a foreseeable objection that lead to yet another philosophical question that must be addressed when considering the ethical issues that would have to be resolved to allow embryonic stem cell research . The issue of cellular specialization appears to be a vital piece of those that seek to say the embryo is a human life. However, the question that must be answered is, at the time these individuals claim an embryo represents a human life; does the embryo at this time represent a higher order of life? This question ventures from the purely biological to the metaphysical. If the minimal degree of cellular interaction is to be determined as the beginning of human life, then brain death should not be considered both the legal, ethical and biological standard of when a person cease to live. Brain death is compatible with the essential premise of cell-based interaction between neural cells and other tissues and cells within the human body (Humber, 2004). However, modern science and for that matter all relevant practicality has defined this state as a state wherein individuals have ceased to livein a more philosophical sense they have lost all essential self qualities and have simply become an amalgamation of different cells, tissues and organ systemsin almost all cases; those individuals in this predicament are sustained by artificial means, i.e. life support. Even the most ardent defender of the rights of an embryo would be hard pressed to define an individual possessing the same level of cellular interactions and operations as that of a six day embryo as a viable, living human being. The arguments underlying the need for human embryonic stem cell research incorporate various philosophical and metaphysical principles to establish the maxim that embryos are not individuals based on the logical premise that although the embryo is a collection of cells working in concert at a level higher than they would exhibit in singularity; their concerted effort does not lend itself to Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1214 define the embryo as a "higher order of life"-a human being, therefore this leads to the logical conclusion that if the embryo is not an individual by not being a "higher order of life" then the embryo is not deserving of any additional protection or the equivalent protections afforded to traditional human beings. The arguments against embryonic stem cell research are deeply rooted in ethical, moral and religious grounds and theories. All forming an overarching construct that will serve to bolster their premise that embryos represent the most innocent of human life and needed to be afforded the maximum amount of protection under the law. The arguments against embryonic stem cell research begin from the proposition that the embryo is undoubtedly the most complex entity known to man. The argument acknowledges that the embryo does not even closely resemble in the slightest bit the makings of a human being, in the traditional sense. However, the fact that all human beings start as embryos brings into context the gravity of each and every individuals origins and the need to value those origins as sacred human life. The embryo commands a certain level of respect and it is imperative that this respect is maintained. The main philosophical tenant of this argument is the fertilization of a female gamete by a male gamete represents the union of a man and a woman to foster the development of a human life. Therefore, the embryo is a human life in its most basic of forms. According to this purview the embryo is not just a compilation of cells but rather a unified unit working together in concert to perform those essential functions that render human life in existence. This argument seeks to remedy the position taken by those who argue in favor of stem cell research regarding the distinguishing characteristics between a fully developed human being and a gesticulation phase embryo. Accordingly, an individual is an individual regardless of the stages of development. All human's are afforded the basic protections of their morality and dignity regardless of their stage of development or level of distinguishing characteristics. The more serious aspects of this logical construct deals with individuality, potentiality and "special respect". Those who seek to impart a moral supremacy to the embryo counter the "14" day mark by asserting that the innate genetic conditions that quintessentially define what it means to be a human being are present at the first moment of conception (Taymor et al, 163). Therefore, nothing happens after that bestows upon the embryo the degree of "humanness" necessary to trigger the moral protection of a human embryo. In deed those taking this line of reasoning find agreement in the ancient text of Aristotle that discusses the "handedness" of a thing, in that the essential qualities are present even if a thing lacks traditional structures and qualities. The morality and ethical constructs that are present within the logical premises that form the underlying foundation of the arguments against stem cell research inevitably circle back to the concept that the aura surrounding the embryo is one of intense mystery). The mere existence of the embryo demonstrates the very essence of human history-given that all individuals started out as a fertilized egg.; adding the rubric of preserving this state of being through enhanced moral and ethical protections renders their use in scientific research nearly impossible. This maxim flows into the overtly religious aspect of the argument, the aspect of protecting the weakest among you; similar to Jesus' words "When you did so for the least amongst you, you have done so for me". This religious connotation is firmly demonstrated in the arguments used by those individuals and groups seeking to curtail stem cell research. The very existence of the human embryo and its use in scientific research, according to this group, goes to the very heart of what it means to treat all individuals with the same level of equality-although one could very easily argue that the turbulent history of the United States has certainly contained some contradictory events to this very fundamental precept. For those seeking to limit the use of embryonic stem cells in laboratories, the issue boils down to two simple absolutes. Which are that the embryo is the weakest form of humanity and society must maintain consistency with its moral justifications to ensure that all Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1215 individuals regardless of background or stage of development are entitled to equal protections under the law and morality. These truths lead to an examination of the societal aspects of this argument. Those who argue the moral and religious connotations in relation to embryonic stem cell research hold that this form of scientific inquiry represents the crossing of several moral and ethical boundaries. Using embryonic stem cells for the sole purpose of their destruction creates a sort of instrumentality of human life. This argument makes the distinction that those embryos that were set for destruction did not lose their moral authority if those embryos were used for medical research. However, the moral justification for limiting stem cell research calls out those cells that are "programmed" to revert to their stem cell state and are in turn used for the sole purpose of being destroyed. These "re-programmed" cells, referred to as IPSC's lose all moral equivalencies and therefore should not be generated for the singular purpose of destruction (Clayton et al). When this logical paradigm is viewed through the perspective of the fate of the embryo itself, the distinction-morally speaking-between an embryo destined for destruction and creating a stem cell through inducement may be insignificant. However, when viewing this tension through the lens of how it affects the very moral fabric of our society the issue becomes more complex. Those who portend the embryo is a representation of the earliest forms of humanity contend that once using embryos for the singular purpose of genetic and medical research begins it will be increasingly difficult to arrive at a natural stopping point. This, according to this logic, would lead to the very real possibility of further moral hazards being encountered, excused and accepted. The logical conclusion of this argument is that a society that readily excuses the destruction of the unborn fetus' within the second and third trimester will not be morally outraged by the deliberate use of an embryo for clinical research into genetic conditions that spur the onset of a specific disease. At their core, those arguing the moral relativism against stem cell research find themselves asserting the doctrine of "personhood and the right to life". This was a maxim first expressed in the Supreme Court's decision in the landmark case Roe v. Wade (Farr, 167). In this opinion, the court did concede some ground to those in the moral camp by asserting that the embryo did on some level represent a degree of humanity with the inherent characteristics and qualities other humans have and enjoy. The court even references the concept of "potential people" and states that there is something not just imprudent but also immoral about the willful and wanton destruction of "potential people"; however, the court went on to say that this right does not trump the woman's right to terminate the pregnancy. This bellies the point that the US Supreme Court on some level did acknowledge that "potential people" do exist and are deserving of certain rights (Farr, 167). Therefore those that claim that stem cell research is predicated on a disregard for the basic of all human rights, the right to life finds comfort in a legal opinion, which at its logical conclusion, opted for the right of the human over the "potential person". Within the ideological construct of opposing stem cell research because it would destroy life there is a growing subset of those who feel it is appropriate to conduct research on aborted fetuses. The underlying logic of this premise is that an aborted fetus is already dead and that if modern science and engage in nuclear transfusion to clone embryos then they would be capable of utilizing an already deceased fetus to engage in stem cell research. If the expansion of destructive research on IVF embryos and the initiation of cloning for research are allowed to go ahead, this will generate further moral problems concerning the issue of complicity in these activities. It is morally wrong not only to destroy human beings, but also to commission or authorize their destruction. Cloning and stem cell research create serious problems of conscience for doctors, patients, researchers and those asked to donate material to produce embryos for research. For example, a patient who supplies a cell for the purpose of creating a clone would be intending the destruction of the clone for the sake of harvesting its cells. Complicity problems are not limited to cases where one intends the wrongdoing of others. Even those who do not intend an act of injustice can act wrongly themselves by giving the impression Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1216 they condone it, if what they do is closely linked to such an act. Thus a patient might be acting wrongly if he or she accepted a stem cell treatment even one which did not itself destroy embryos if that treatment had been developed by means of the destruction of embryos. If the only treatment developed for a serious medical condition is one that involves, or has involved, the creation and destruction of embryos, this will condemn conscientious physicians and patients to endure a cruel trial. Unless they act against their conscience and do what they consider inhumane and barbaric patients will suffer without hope of treatment and doctors will be unable to offer any alternative. This situation would be intolerable. Embryonic stem cell research is morally problematic because an evil means is used to secure a good end. In essence, accepting embryonic stem cells obtained through elective abortion makes one an accomplice to a crime after the fact. Unlike adult organ donations, the death of the embryo is intentionally caused. This is hardly the same as when organs are recovered from someone killed in a tragic accident. Consider the case of a hospital that becomes the beneficiary of a gang of killers who supply it with fresh cadavers. Surely one could question the moral appropriateness of the hospital's continuing cooperation with the suppliers 4. CONCLUSION Stem cell research has been at the forefront of biotechnological advances because of the potential curative uses of the cells. Research into stem cells and how they divide can help provide answers about how cells divide and, it is hoped, ultimately teach researchers how improper cell division occurs in cancer and birth defects. Once the scientists learn the process of cell division in these, the hope is that they can then develop cures. Research into stem cells can lead to improvements in the efficiency of drugs for the treatment of a variety of illness. In addition, many researchers believe that stem cell research can help them develop cures for diabetes, cardiovascular and other diseases by helping scientists develop processes for creating new body organs or repairing existing body organs that have become diseased. Stem cells are cells that have the ability to divide indefinitely and to differentiate into any type of cell, including organ, skin or any other type of cell. Stem cells are created as part of the fertilized egg or zygote that is created in the first few days after an egg is fertilized. As the zygote divides into more cells, it becomes an embryo. Human stem cells are generally isolated from either the embryo (known as embryonic stem cells) or from fetal tissue (known as embryonic germ cells). The "human" status of an embryo, if any, is complicated and arguably non-existent under the law. Zygotes are the first combination of cells that grow into the embryo, shortly after fertilization. An embryo develops after the initial fertilization and from the zygotes. At the point of fertilization, the zygote (and thus the embryo) has the potential to become a "born" human being. It possesses all the chromosomes necessary to become a distinct, unique human being, although it is not sentient. Embryonic stem cells grow after the initial fertilization and before the embryonic cells differentiate into brain cells, tissue cells, and other specific cells of the body. As noted above, the law treats the stem cells as property (as noted above) that can be patented. Zygotes are also treated as property; the next question is the law's treatment of embryos: are they persons or property? The ethical issues are as thorny and complicated as the legal issues. There is also no final arbiter to determine how the moral issue should be resolved. The legal analysis at least demonstrated the courts' stance on the human rights of embryos. From a moral perspective, if the stem cells are merely cells, i.e. property, and the stem cells are not persons, then the ethical issue is different than if the stem cells, zygotes and/or embryos are persons. A brief summary of key ethical theories follows: Immanuel Kant's key moral principle is the concept of goodwill. The goodwill exists beyond intelligence, power, wealth, and happiness. Although intelligence, power, wealth, and happiness can be evidence of a good will, these qualities are not intrinsically good will because they can be Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1217 perverted (Okpe and Bassey, 375). It is a good "character" which helps to determine whether someone's actions are moral or not. Duty is the objective manifestation of goodwill and action is moral if it is done because of this duty, regardless of consequences. The ultimate good in Kant's eyes is the individual's decision to act consistently with the principles that help to obtain the ultimate goal, a good will, which is valuable in and of itself. A key maxim for Kant's philosophy is the categorical imperative: "Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only" (Udoudom et al, 30). How does Kant's analysis apply here? The key would be to determine whether there were any duties to stem cells, zygotes or embryos. One could argue, although Kant seemed to support scientific inquiry, that whether stem cell research was valid depended on whether zygotes would be treated as human. Since they are parts of nature, perhaps one could argue that the application of a Kantian analysis results in a prohibition against the treatment of zygotes as a means to an end, rather than as human beings. This would be independent of a determination of whether the zygotes or embryos were human or not. One could also use Kant's analysis to support a position that the duties would be to those who are currently existing, e.g. that the duty to permit individuals to procreate (or not) is a higher duty. Utilitarian philosophy requires analyzing an action or a principle to determine whether that action maximizes the good for society (Ogar, Nwoye, and Bassey, 27). Jeremy Bentham and his student, John Stuart Mill, defined the principle of utility as relating to the issue of maximizing the pleasure or good for the individual and thus for society. The principle of utility focuses on determining whether an action is moral or right based on the consequences. As Bentham explained, "By utility is meant that property in any object, whereby it tends to produce benefits, advantage, pleasure, good or happiness. . . or. . . to prevent the happening of mischief, pain, evil or unhappiness to the party whose interest is considered: if that party be the community in general, then the happiness of the community; if a particular individual, then the happiness of that individual" (Broome, 3). Under this philosophy, actions or concepts that will bring pleasure may be instrumentally good, i.e. because they help to accomplish the ultimate good-pleasure. There are no true intrinsic goods except the maximum of happiness. WORKS CITED Ardaillou, Raymond, Bruno Jarry, and Jean François Stoltz. "Transition to an Industrial Scale of Human Stem Cell Production for Therapeutic Use." Bulletin de l'Academie Nationale de Medecine 201.7–9 (2017): 983–1018. Print. Broome, John. "'Utility.'" Economics and Philosophy 7.1 (1991): 1–12. Web. Clayton, Kalum et al. "Langerhans Cells-Programmed by the Epidermis." Frontiers in Immunology 2017. Web. Committee for Advanced Therapies. "Reflection Paper on Stem Cell-Based Medicinal Products Reflection Paper on Stem Cell-Based Medicinal Products." European Medicines Agency 44.January (2011): 1–11. Print. Farr, Kathryn Ann. "Shaping Policy Through Litigation: Abortion Law in the United States." Crime & Delinquency 39.2 (1993): 167–183. Web. Ogar, Joseph N., Nwoye Leonard, and Samuel Akpan Bassey. "Issues Related to Infertility in Africa: An Ethical Scan." Research & Reviews: A Journal of Biotechnology 8.3 (2019): 26-32. OKPE, Timothy Adie, and Samuel Akpan BASSEY. "Environmental Problems and the Question of Intergenerational Justice from the Kantian Perspective." Budapest International Research and Critics Institute (BIRCI-Journal): Humanities and Social Sciences 1.3 (2018): 373-382. Social, Mentality and Researcher Thinkers Journal 2019 (Vol:5 Issue:22) smartofjournal.com / [email protected] / Open Access Refereed / E-Journal / Refereed / Indexed 1218 Taymor, Melvin L. et al. "In Vitro Fertilization and Embryo Transfer: An Individualized Approach to Ovulation Induction." Journal of In Vitro Fertilization and Embryo Transfer 2.3 (1985): 162– 165. Web. Udoudom, Mfonobong David, et al. "Kantian and Utilitarian Ethics on Capital Punishment." Budapest International Research and Critics Institute (BIRCI-Journal): Humanities and Social Sciences 2.2 (2019): 28-35. Wilson, Kitchener D, and Joseph C Wu. "Induced Pluripotent Stem CellsInduced Pluripotent Stem CellsInduced Pluripotent Stem Cells." JAMA 313.16 (2015): 1613–1614. Web.

напрями психотерапевтичні та інші методики Форма втручання на ін ди ві ду ал ьн ом у рі вн і встановлення контакту з людиною, а не з симптомами; допомогу клієнту трима- ти зв'язок із реальністю; надання психологічної підтримки/все- лення надії; допомогу у відновленні соц. функціону вання клієнта; сприяння нормалізації життя клієнта; підвищення соц. ком- петентності; включення у планування догляду; включення у процес реабілітації; відновлення практичних, соц. навичок; оптимізацію поведінки; віднов- лення працездатності; допомогу взяти контроль над своїм особистим життям; допомогу в змінах стилю життя ег опс их ол ог ія , ко гн іт ив ни й пі дх ід , бі хе ві ор ис тс ьк ий п ід хі д его-підтримувальна стратегія (ego-sup - portive strategy); его-модіфікуюча стратегія (ego-modi fying strategy); когнітивна терапія А. Бека; раціонально-емотивна тера- пія А. Елліса; робота з голосами; ме- тод систематичної десенсибілізації, парадоксальна інтенція, техніки по- зитивного/негативного підкріплення; техніки моделювання поведінки, тех- ніки вирішення проблем (problem-solving therapies); техніки формування навичок копінгу (coping skills thera- pies); тренінг асертивності індивідуальне кон сультування ; індиві- дуальна психотера- пія; групова соціаль- на робота; групова психотерапія; тренінги на р ів ні с ім 'ї супровід/допомогу сім'ї та її окремим членам узгодити їхні адаптивні проце- си до ситуації психічної хвороби родича; роботу з почуттями членам сім'ї; зі стра- тегіями управління; роботу з неадап- тивними патернами комунікацій/взає модій у сім'ї к ог ні ти вн ий , бі хе ві ор ис тс ьк ий ; тр ан са кт ни й пі дх ід освітні програми (psychoeducation); модель Андерсон; сімейні сесії вдома індивідуальне кон- сультування; сімейна групова ро- бота; групи «рівний– рівному» («peers»); сімейна індивідуальна та групова психотерапія, групи родичів Бондаренко Н. 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Bondarenko THE HUMANISTIC PARADIGM AND bIO-PSYHCO-SOCIAL APPROACH AS A bASIS OF SOCIAL SUPPORT FOR PEOPLE wITH MENTAL HEALTH PRObLEMS The article discusses the actual problem of social support for people with mental health problems, which has an important place in the study field of social psychology and social work.The article also deals with the definition of the concept of "mental health", the problem of introducing the term "mental health problems" as a way to avoid stigmatization, and the spread of a humanistic attitude to persons with a psychiatric diagnosis. It also discussed modern theoretical approaches that offer an understanding of the contribution of biological, social, and psychological factors into the cause of mental health problems. The problem of mental illness is common to all countries of the world, as WHO data evidenced the number of people with mental disorders among the world's population, ranging from 4–5 %. According to researchers P. Voloshin and N. Maruta, the spread of mental and behavioral disorders in Ukraine is characterized by a slow increase of about 2.9 % in every 10 years. Researchers argue that in subsequent years, according to the prognostic data, there will be an increase in these indicators. The issue of providing social support to people with PDS in Ukrainian society is very relevant, which is complicated by their social isolation in the process of recovery after the treatment. The results of scientific research in the context of different cultures and relatively diverse life events (hospitalization, mental illness, unemployment, old age) generally confirm the positive results of using social support to promote mental and physical health. Instead, there are no studies in Ukrainian science related to the phenomenon of social support of people with mental health problems. It is important to define the concepts of "mental health" and "mental health problems" in the process of studying the features of social support for people with mental health problems. The term "mental health" combines the medical and psychological fields of science and practice, but modern psychology offers a comprehensive approach to assessing the psychological health of a person, the psychological norm, its limits, taking into account the criteria of mental health. The description of the mental health given by the Psychological Dictionary points out the components of awareness and the sense of continuity, continuity and identity of their physical and mental "I"; sense of continuity and identity of experiences in similar situations; critical to yourself and your mental activity and its results; the adequacy of psychic reactions of force and frequency of environmental influences; the ability to manage their behavior in accordance with social norms; planning personal activities and implementing them; changing the way of behavior depending on the changing circumstances of life. The concept of "mental health problem" was taken as a term that denotes all the symptoms classified in ICD-10 and DSM-IV, which are recommended by experts to clients for appropriate treatment and care. Scientists and mental health practitioners point out that mental health problems can affect the way an individual thinks, feels, and behaves; affects self-service, fulfills professional duties, social, family roles, and household behavior, which is usually deeply affected by the quality of life of the individual. Numerous results of the research show that there are specific psychological and personality factors apart from the biological causes of mental disorders (genetic factors that contribute to the imbalance of chemicals in the brain) that make people vulnerable to occurrences of the mental health problems. Several modern theoretical approaches offer an understanding of the contribution of biological, social, and psychological factors to the induction of mental health problems: the traditional medical model, the rehabilitation model, the interface model, the social model, and the biopsychosocial approach. Only biopsychosocial and social models are consistent with the definition of WHO disability and emphasize the impact social aspects of mental health and the quality of life of people with mental health problems. Брик О. М., Кочаровський М. С. Влада, сила й відповідальність як передумови прийняття рішень і відображення стилю... 15 Individuals with PPP, as a social community, have specific needs that differentiate them from other members of society, one of which is the need for constant socio-psychological support. So, the contribution of psychology and social work to the quality of life of people with mental disorder lies in the application of professional approaches and methods based on the biopsychosocial (social) model, which emphasize the need for socio-psychological support. An example of such a technique is the model of modern social work practice "people-in-environment", which serves as a guiding principle of social work and emphasizes the importance of understanding the persons with disorder and their behavior in the light of the multiple context of the social environment in which these persons live and act. Specialists of social work and psycho logy make interventions at three levels: individual, at the family level, and at the community level, by means of intensifying the support of the environment within the cognitive-behavioral and other approaches, which contribute to the process of reintegrating people with mental health problems into community. Keywords: social community, people with mental disorder, biopsychosocial model, people-in-environment. Матеріал надійшов 11.03.2018 УДК 159 Брик О. М., Кочаровський М. С. влаДа, сила й віДповіДальність яК переДУмови прийняття рішень і віДображення стилю Керівництва У менеДжменті Статтю присвячено теоретичному дослідженню актуальних аспектів у співвідношенні застосування влади, сили та відповідальності в менеджменті та підходів до питання розуміння їхнього впливу на прийняття управлінських рішень і загалом на стиль керівництва трудовим колективом. Ключові слова: прийняття рішень, влада, відповідальність, лідерство, менеджмент, трудовий ко лектив, управлінський процес, стиль керівництва. організацією виробничого процесу, як-от взаємо- дія робітників, міжособистісні взаємини, за яких ця взаємодія реалізується, зв'язок цих аспектів діяльності колективу власне з трудовим проце- сом тощо, відіграє саме керівництво колективом, а точніше, стиль керівництва колективом, що са ме їх і регулює. Адже від цього значною мірою за лежить взагалі ефективність управлінської взаємо- дії, оскільки уміле використання влади є важли- вою передумовою досягнення поставлених цілей у будь-якій діяльності [1]. Зважаючи на це, вида- ється цікавим та актуальним проведення аналі- тичного теоретичного оглядового дослідження © Брик О. М., Кочаровський М. С., 2018 постановка проблеми у загальному вигляді та обґрунтування актуальності теми. В су часну епоху науково-технічної революції та надшвидких суспільно-економічних змін питання оптимізації керівництва трудовими колектива- ми в усьому світі набуло особливої важливості й гостроти. Сучасні компанії та підприємства ма ють складну й часто інноваційну організаційну структуру, відповідно змінюється та ускладню- ється і соціально-психологічна структура тру дової взаємодії. При цьому вирішальну роль у за без печенні високоефективного розв'язання всього комплексу питань, пов'язаних із досконалою

A B S TR A C T h i s t o r i c a l p e r s p e c t i v e Holograms The Story of a Word and Its Cultural Uses S e A n J o H n S T o n The hologram is an unusual invention: an innocuous optical device that carries within it the ability to generate threedimensional imagery. But since its conception after World War II, the form, meaning and symbolic associations of this visual technology have been repeatedly recast and extended. The hologram made its public debut in the 1960s as an aweinspiring, three-dimensional imaging medium that was reinterpreted by new adopters. Engineers, artists, hippies and hobbyists played with-and dreamed about-holograms. For growing audiences, this perplexing phenomenon was portrayed as the essence of modernity. But just as compellingly, the hologram captured popular imagination as technological sorcery. It evoked the ancient attractions of magic and the mysterious. Simultaneously representing the future and the past, the hologram became a symbol of latent potential. For the subsequent generation, what could be called "faux holograms" became associated with video games, entertainment spectacles and forthcoming device displays. New viewers, in fresh settings, invested the term "hologram" with expanded meanings, having little connection to the realworld technology. This article examines cultural engagement with holograms, how this connection was conditioned by prior experiences and how understandings and usage have evolved over more than half a century to shape our notional futures. CHAnneling MAgiC They say "You won't believe it after you've seen it." Holography is a new extension of photographic methods made possible by the use of lasers. . . . One can move his head from side to side (or up and down) and actually see behind objects in the foreground. If you are interested in the vanguard of science this will be (the) program for you [1]. For the first 20 years after their creation, holograms weren't seen much by the public. Invented at the British ThomsonHouston Company in 1947 by Hungarian engineer Dennis Gabor as a means of improving electron microscopes, holograms went underground until the early 1960s. At Willow Run Labs, a postwar contract facility at the University of Michigan, engineers developing the concept for military image processing found that, with newly available lasers, holograms could act as windows that generated phenomenally realistic three-dimensional images. Working concurrently, in even greater isolation, Yuri Denisyuk at the Vavilov Optical Institute in Leningrad independently invented a distinct variant that behaved like a magic mirror to reveal threedimensional objects behind it. Many of the engineers' peers and successive researchers inhabited similarly covert environments around the world [2]. Once revealed, however, the miracle of holograms proved difficult to express to a wider public. Through the rest of the decade, holograms were witnessed mainly by engineers and reporters at conferences or private demonstrations. As a result, these interpreters were important in framing the nature of the new invention for larger audiences. And the easiest fit for the interpretation of a hologram was the ancient lure of magic. Holograms had baffling qualities that evoked the novelty of childhood experiences and the appeal of sorcery. Emmett ©2017 ISAST doi:10.1162/LEON_a_01329 LEONARDO, Vol. 50, No. 5, pp. 493–499, 2017 493 Sean Johnston (educator), University of Glasgow, Rutherford-McCowan Bldg, Bankend Road, Dumfries DG1 4ZL. Scotland. Email: <[email protected]>. See <www.mitpressjournals.org/toc/leon/50/5> for supplemental files associated with this issue. Holograms reached popular consciousness during the 1960s and have since left audiences alternately fascinated, bemused or inspired. Their impact was conditioned by earlier cultural associations and successive reimaginings by wider publics. Attaining peak public visibility during the 1980s, holograms have been found more in our pockets (as identity documents) and in our minds (as video-gaming fantasies and "faux hologram" performers) than in front of our eyes. The most enduring, popular interpretations of the word "hologram" evoke the traditional allure of magic and galvanize hopeful technological dreams. This article explores the mutating cultural uses of the term "hologram" as markers of magic, modernity and optimism. 494 Johnston, Holograms Leith, the principal contributor at Willow Run, framed their miraculous results as a mystifying conjuring trick: It was most fascinating, because here you had a piece of film that had nothing but garbage on it . . . and then you looked downstream where they came to a focus, and there you saw a real, nice, sharp image, and there was nothing producing it-there was an image but no optical elements-kind of like a grin without a cat by Lewis Carroll's analogy [3]. Even when that enchantment was more drily reported to peers in their first conference paper, the American Institute of Physics repackaged their technique with an evocative label, "lensless photography," which shaped public understanding over the next two years [4]. Newspaper stories struggled to categorize this new scientific black art, in which a "camera without a lens" could clarify a smudged or blurry negative, or even magnify hidden details [5]. Like a magic show, the disorientation, surprise and charm of viewing holograms reduced even experts to a state of unsophisticated wonder: "It is the most startling thing I have seen," said a nuclear scientist from the Argonne National laboratory. A navy captain said, "It's fantastic. I don't see how it can be done." Many of those who viewed the picture asked to touch the photographic plate to assure themselves that it was indeed flat [6]. The General in Washington thought he saw a chessboard. He reached out to touch one of the pieces. But the board was not really there. He was seeing a three-dimensional projection of the chessboard produced by the astonishing new technique of "holography" [7]. Experiences of apparent dematerialization were accompanied by other magical qualities. Holograms were liminal objects: featureless panes of glass which, when lit by a laser, transformed into a window onto another world. These modern crystal balls remained clouded for those without a magician's skills. The first newspaper article to describe the hologram plate recounted it as "a transparency that looks to the eye like a buttermilk sky" [8]. An even more intriguing quality of holograms was communicated almost exclusively secondhand-becoming, in fact, a contemporary legend that was applied indiscriminately to all holograms. It expressed not a conjurer's trick but a deeper metaphysical riddle: A small part of a hologram is able to reproduce the whole scene. The earliest reports of holograms recounted this extraordinary characteristic as the strongest confirmation of magic: The whole or any part of it contains the entire picture. Tear it up and any fragment of it will reveal the total picture under laser light [9]. But for many observers, the most compelling attraction was the viewer's ability to bob and weave, to interact with a hologram scene. This property of parallax was mystifying for audiences familiar with Victorian stereoscopes and 1950s 3D motion pictures. As reporters enthused, The scene in the Michigan lab was real 3D-without special glasses. By lifting my head, I could look down on a toy tank's turret; when I stooped, I was level with the treads. I could move my head and look around things. And the closer I got to the window, the wider my field of view became [10]. The realism was strengthened by a subtler, but equally novel, property: exactly like a real scene, holograms required viewers' eyes to focus at different depths as they examined the scene [11]. Such properties mapped onto a conjuring act. Holograms generated visual confusion, reproducing stage levitation routines, séances and vanishing tricks-seemingly hanging in space, being revealed as ethereal when sought with a hand or disappearing instantly when the laser was turned off. The stage magicians of vaudeville and contemporary variety television had trained generations to appreciate these tricks as entertainment to be enjoyed but not analyzed [12]. Ironically, the first mass exposure to what many viewers thought were holograms opened at Disneyland in 1969. Based merely on reflections from glass plates, the Haunted Mansion attraction yielded ghostly floating images- consolidating the connection between spectral magic and modern science for thousands of visitors [13]. To the chagrin of hologram creators, the trickery, a Victorian stage illusion known as "Pepper's Ghost," was to become the most common technology to masquerade as holograms over the following decades [14]. Other audiences stretched the concept of the hologram further. Holograms were appropriated by counterculture artisans during the early 1970s, attracted by their transcendent implications and ability to generate paradoxical and entrancing imagery. The tropes of the magic show gave way to associations with mysticism and higher consciousness. As Rolling Stone magazine put it: The hologram is as likely as anything technological to push your subliminal awe and wonder button and leave an ancient message flashing somewhere below the surface of consciousness: Here we have some Powerful Magic [15]. exTending ModeRniTy Holograms also tapped into cultural understandings of the future and its reliance on the applications of modern science. They exemplified the hallmarks of modernity: the attraction of inventive novelty and faith in the ever-advancing products of technology. Lasers, from which holograms sprang, provided their own cachet of technological magic: Their beams remained pencilthin over incredible distances and, demonstrated for public consumption, could perform spectacular tricks like transmitting telephone conversations, selectively bursting colored balloons or piercing razor blades [16]. In Goldfinger (1964), James Bond was threatened by a fictional high-powered laser beam, linking scientific advances, black ops and adventure [17]. Indeed, the first newspaper report on the Michigan Johnston, Holograms 495 holograms was subtitled "Death Ray in Laboratory" [18]. The quality of laser light itself was enchanting; so-called "laser speckle" made surfaces shimmer with scintillating sparkles of light that moved along with the viewer. Lasers and holograms were the products of a new kind of scientific laboratory, no longer inhabited by the lone mad scientists, electrical machines and jumping sparks common in 1930s films [19]. Media representations of mid-century labs transmuted lasers and holograms into new stereotypical forms that combined the dedication and secrecy of an alchemist with the powers of a magician but were devoted to inventing the future. For the most technology-savvy observers, holograms could be linked to earlier inventions in a way that suggested the inexorable progress of the modern world and the benefits to follow. This faith demanded that holograms be fit into a conceptual schema. But-as suggested by the fleeting currency of the "lensless photography" label-holograms resisted familiarization. Waves of science writers strained to categorize and explain the technology, falling back on a series of metaphors that highlighted the unintuitive, mysterious properties of holograms. This tension between rational understanding and magical properties has been a persistent attribute of holograms. A subset of artists who worked with holograms also submitted to the modernist spell, suggesting that-like fine-art photographs, graphic arts and creative video-holograms would inevitably become embedded in mass culture. Art holograms were first exhibited in 1968 and subsequently found increasing visibility in large public exhibitions. This generated exponentially bigger audiences through the early 1980s, reaching hundreds of thousands of viewers at the major shows around the world [20]. These exhibitions expanded popular understandings. For people seeing their first holograms, exhibition promoters increasingly selected the most spectacular imagery, replicating an approach adopted by earlier visual technologies. Exhibition holograms favored visual novelty and shock, such as images appearing in front of-or even through-the hologram plate, simple forms of animation and bright, spectral colors [21]. Holographic artists consequently found their art diluted by practitioners and works that focused on technological spectacle. As early as the mid-1970s, postmodernist critics disparaged the medium as an unimaginative form of technological propaganda [22]. For technologists and entrepreneurs, modernist faith nevertheless remained compelling. Understanding how holograms were like earlier technologies would allow them to be marketed with confidence, reassuring investors, developers and consumers. So, besides the analogy of holograms as improved photographs, further associations were proffered [23]. Early descriptions conceptualized holograms as upgraded video technology for remote viewing: The train wasn't really there at all. But if you stood in exactly the right place and looked into a piece of equipment you would have seen it, real as life [24]. At the National Electronics Conference (NEC) in Chicago, October 1965, long lines of scientists saw a chessboard with five men, a toy railroad scene and a model of an army tank. The objects were really back at the university's laboratory in Ann Arbor [25]. The disconcerting spectacle was thereby tamed: The baffling science could be reimagined as akin to television or, even more conventionally, as trickery with mirrors. A more stretching metaphor conflated the ideas of freezing light with what was later dubbed, in the age of video recorders, time shifting: Basic to holography is the idea of freezing light interference patterns in a moment of travel; then, at any convenient time, freeing them to continue their journey. As they are released from the hologram, the light waves recreate the scene just as it existed, although the objects have been removed [26]. This concept struck familiar cultural chords; for 60 years, the public had been buying sound recordings to play back musical entertainment at home. For the past 15 years, tape recorders had personalized this power to capture and release sound, and within the same decade, stereophonic technologies were beginning to recreate life-like soundscapes via long-play recordings and FM radio. Holograms were particularly well placed to exemplify progress. Illustrating the power of science to change the world, holograms were a spectacular example of the products of rational science and technological advances. By the late 1960s, consumers were being tempted to imagine the nearterm promise of holograms. While opportunities to directly experience holograms remained limited, accounts of them multiplied in the popular media. Mass-media forecasts about the progress of holograms-unconstrained by reality-began to suffuse modern culture. Thus early holograms captivated public imagination and spawned enduring popular interest. Cultural appropriations multiplied, democratizing holograms and multiplying their meanings. Hinting at both magicians' tricks and reassuringly familiar technologies, growing audiences suggested a cultural place-and a consumer future-for holograms. CAnning THe UnCAnny As opportunities to witness holograms grew, popular understanding evolved to fit a narrative of consumer benefits. The century-old appeal of three-dimensional imagery had been satisfied successively by stereoscopes, 3D movies and children's anaglyphic (two-color stereoscopic) comic books. Prewar audiences had anticipated that television would rapidly extend to the third dimension [27], and their postwar counterparts were seduced by similar extrapolations [28]. The first companies to seek investors for holograms cynically seeded dreams of their potential. The most brazen of the promoters, Kip Siegel of the Conductron 496 Johnston, Holograms Corporation in Ann Arbor, MI, argued for a headlong leap toward the future: We are doing major work in 3-dimensional television and towards 3-dimensional home movies. . . . I am hoping that by the year 1976 that the United States will have, as far as new products are concerned, only three-dimensional television and three-dimensional movies on the market. . . . I don't think people will buy things that are antiquated [29]. Such imagined futures conjured up ancillary technological magic: pulsed lasers to capture holographic moving images of outdoor scenes and living people. The task would demand intense pulsed lasers-impossibly powerful and dangerously bright, in fact. As Gary Cochran, the manager responsible for the work recalled, Conductron's working culture was "an imaginary Disneyworld of scientists" [30]. Despite the company recognizing the impossibility of these claims, Siegel's predictions carried the ring of insider authority. Like falling dominoes, prediction triggered prediction in an unstoppable cascade. A Life magazine article, for example, suggested that within 15 years home viewers would enjoy "an 8-foot John Wayne in 3-D . . . and even walk around him" [31]. The combination of commercial hype and disorienting magic made the wider public easy prey to the first corporations that were exploiting the technology, most of which had gained their foothold in the field via research and development contracts with the American military, NASA and the National Science Foundation. FoCUSing dReAMS While public interest in holograms was rising during the late 1970s and early 1980s via exhibitions and consumer products, a second and distinctive perception began to extend the meaning of the word. Its source was science fiction, whose initial notions were inherited from optimistic technologists' forecasts of the previous decade. But imagined holograms also evoked other associations: older technologies, contemporary folklore, corporate rumors and-just as significantly -myth and magic. As early as 1968, a John Brunner novel described a "holocam" for recording three-dimensional images, "lit by LazeeLaser monochrome lamps" [32]. The first science fiction story to focus its plot on holograms appeared four years later, casting them as a form of three-dimensional, interactive television. The imagined technology was a recognizable echo of the predictions disseminated by the Conductron Corporation six years earlier: "to actually participate, to star in your own favorite holovision shows, right in the comfort and convenience of your own home" [33]. First introduced to fiction by Larry Niven, the abbreviation holo and the prefix holowere rapidly consolidated in readers' minds [34]. Other science fiction writers picked up on and expanded the tropes as nuanced elements of their own imagined futures. For John Varley, "holomist" was a form of advertising that hounded prospective customers, playing "breath-catching tricks with perspective" [35]. For Philip K. Dick, a "holo-cube" was a computer-generated immersive environment that could be called up, entered and collapsed at will [36]. Arthur C. Clark conceived a "holopad," a medical monitor with a three-dimensional display [37]. Set in the indefinite future, William Gibson's meticulously detailed fictional worlds invested holograms with qualities that have become familiar in subsequent science fiction stories. Inventing holographic novelties of the future-and just as rapidly jumping beyond them-he has imagined "Disney technicians . . . employed to weave animated holograms of Egyptian hieroglyphs into the fabric of your jeans"; "peeling chrome over plastic, blurry holograms that gave you a headache if you tried to make them out"; and, "a defective hologram in the window, METRO HOLOGRAFIX, over a display of dead flies wearing fur coats of gray dust" [38]. Gibson's cyberpunk world-a run-down and cynically peopled urban environment that he dubbed "the sprawl"- provided both a contemporary judgment and futuristic prediction for holograms. He predicted that their powers to entertain the public would wither: Holography went too, and the block-wide Fuller domes that had been the holo temples of Parker's childhood became multilevel supermarkets, or housed dusty amusement arcades where you still might find the old consoles [39]. For more optimistic audiences, science fiction portrayed holograms as elements of a visually exciting technological world. Contemporary cinema, television and video games illustrated what the fiction writers had described. Their visual properties were envisioned compellingly with the release of Star Wars (1977) [40]. The cinematic depiction of a hologram, combining a cone of light from R2-D2's projector, a juddering blue-cast image evocative of a badly tuned black-and-white television set and-most influential of all-the beaming of this specter into empty space, made the vision memorable for film audiences and created a link between holograms and electronic media for the viewing public. The Star Wars sequels visualized further uses for holograms as static displays and improved image playback devices. Like the examples in Gibson's imagined worlds, cinematic holograms were conventionally stuttering, run-down and imperfect. Ironically, this flawed visual image was conducive to the public engagement with later "faux hologram" entertainers, such as those introduced by CNN's election-night reporter in 2008 [41] and that of Tupac at Coachella in 2012 [42]. Star Wars and its sequels were followed by a wave of holographic fantasy characters. The British comedy television series Red Dwarf (1988–1999), set on board a spaceship in the distant future, extended the attributes of fictional holograms to mythical, animated creatures. One of the characters in the series, Rimmer, is a hologram calculated in real time by the spaceship's computer. His three-dimensional image, melded seamlessly with an AI personality, evokes a comically updated version of Frankenstein's monster [43]. Similar illusions were part of the second Star Trek television series, The Next Generation (1987–1994), with its depicJohnston, Holograms 497 tions of a "holodeck," in which an interactive environment was calculated and displayed by a computer [44]. In Deep Space Nine (1993–1999), the technology became commercialized, with "holosuites" rented out for private use [45]. And in the subsequent Voyager series (1995–2001), these technologies were used to implement an Emergency Medical Hologram, or virtual doctor [46]. Such sentient computer programs embodied in a hologram became part of the ontology of subsequent near-future fiction, too. In an episode of the 2014 television series Perception, for example, the abilities of a modern-day AI and hologram researcher were embodied in a holographic double; when the professor was murdered, his doppelganger helped to solve the crime [47]. For a younger generation, the animated television series Jem and the Holograms (1985–1988) imagined holograms as a technology of self-empowerment. The plot centered on a holographic computer and projection device, Synergy, that had characteristics akin to Red Dwarf 's protagonist and Star Trek's holodeck. With the holographic computer, the principal character, Jem, was able to transform her local environment and cloak her identity. The result was alternately an "entertainment synthesizer" and a shape-shifting device for adventures [48]. It is notable that the term "shape shifting," which sprouted in popular fiction from the 1970s, is an ancient motif traditionally linked to magic and sorcery. Thus fantasy holograms, like their real-world counterparts, were enriched by folklore and conjuring. Beginning in the 1990s, video games began to portray such visions of modern magic to increasingly wider audiences. Some games extended real-world engineering claims, while others rehearsed the metaphors that had been introduced in science fiction cinema and television. But-as with other media representations-video games also added additional attributes to holograms. The most influential notion, depicted in video games dedicated to battlefield simulations, was of the hologram as a synthetic mirage. In Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2 (2000), "mirage tanks" project holograms to masquerade as trees [49]. Similarly, in Halo (2000), holograms create decoys or cloak facilities [50]. Gameplay holograms mix and match properties promiscuously. In Crysis 2 (2011), a "holographic decoy" is a weapon attachment that can spawn a replica soldier to attract gunfire [51]. In an even more dynamic role, Duke Nukem 3D (1996) includes a "HoloDuke" device, which projects a holographic mirage that can battle [52]. Flourishing subcultures of gamers could invest their simulated worlds with complex perspectives drawn from real life; however, less worldly fans increasingly confused the imaginable with the feasible, and even the inevitable. As for the earlier generation of gullible investors and consumers, these immersive fantasies-many of them drawing on the allure of magic and the mysterious-became so compelling that they escaped the gaming world to blur with reality. When multiplayer games allowed real-time cooperative gameplay, Internet discussion groups and other social media encouraged lengthier dialogue. Holograms and their enigmatic properties have been liberated by online fantasy. Owing to the enculturation provided by video games and the wildfire mutation of online information, this compelling mixture of mystery and high technology has become a democratic art: Mass audiences play a role in actively constructing the cultural identity of holograms. A popular myth that the U.S. military is developing, or has even perfected, holographic "projections" to frighten or confuse the enemy have become an Internet meme, originating from a combination of institutional musings and video gaming [53]. Since the late 1990s, online forums have elaborated the tale into an advanced covert project aimed at deceiving foreign or domestic audiences ("Project Blue Beam," ostensibly under the aegis of either NASA, the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency [DARPA] or the United Nations). Holograms satisfy the distinct attractions of hidden science, magical portrayals and conspiracy theories. Thus optimism and credulity, in equal measure, have dogged the imagined holograms of the 21st century [54]. Experienced vicariously through news stories, online dialogues and video games, it is notable that most cultural exposure to holograms is typically secondor third-hand. Not coincidentally, the broader cultural meanings of the term have flourished in contexts devoted to entertainment: adventure movies, theme parks and gameplay. Mediated representations have swamped direct experience. Consequently, the notion of the hologram has evolved over half a century to label impossibly diverse combinations of modern sorcery and technical wonder. While holographers may prefer to distinguish their products from "faux" or "misidentified" technologies, the current usage of the term "hologram" has irretrievably broadened to label any glassesfree imaging technology that can astonish, disorient and entertain. Technology fertilizes dreams and aspirations, some of which are endemic in human cultures. For various audiences, the hologram has represented mythical magic, modernist dreams (or their decline), a forthcoming mass medium or the secretive tool of a militaristic state. In various guises, it has come to inhabit most of our imagined futures. Holograms did not merely create new aspirations; their special power has lain in channeling the expression and realization of long-familiar themes. The greatest impact of holograms, consequently, has been in our minds. Holograms have had their most enduring influence as an expression of the magical and as a metaphor for the future. This expanded meaning has given the term "hologram" a cultural life beyond the reach of its creators. 498 Johnston, Holograms Acknowledgments I am grateful for a grant from the Carnegie Trust supporting this work and also for valuable conversations with Samuel B. Johnston. References and Notes 1 "Holography-photography in three dimensions at Indiana Institute of Technology," The Announcer 7, Vol. 2 (1966) p. 1. 2 S.F. Johnston, "Der parallaktische Blick: Der militärische Ursprung der Holographie" ("The Parallax View: The Military Foundations of Holography"), in Das holografische Wissen (Dortmund, Germany: Diaphane, 2009) pp. 33–57. 3 E.N. Leith, "Interview with S.F. Johnston" (de Montfort University holography archives, Leicester, U.K., 2003). 4 American Institute of Physics, press release: "Objects behind others now visible in 3-D pictures made by new method," 25 October 1964; J. Ross, "Press release: Jonathan Ross presents LANDSCAPES & METAMORPHOSES: An Exhibition of Work By Jeffrey Robb," London: 1993. 5 "Lensless Photography Uses Laser Beams to Enlarge Negatives, Microscope Slides," Wall Street Journal, 5 December 1963. 6 "Photo Shows Work of New Optic System: Viewers Call Exhibit Startling, Fantastic," Chicago Tribune, 27 October 1965. 7 J. Davy, "3-D pictures in the round," Observer, 15 May 1966. 8 W.W. Lutz, "New discoveries at Michigan universities," The Detroit News-The Passing Show, 23 February 1964. 9 Lutz [8] p. 1. 10 C.P. Gilmore, "Those incredible holograms: Amazing 'frozen light waves' give first true 3D pictures," Popular Science 189, No. 1 (July 1966) pp. 78–91, 174–175. 11 C.W. Smith, "3-D or not 3-D," New Scientist, No. 1407 (1984) pp. 40–44. 12 J.R. Berry, "Holography: 3D Magic in Mid-Air," Popular Mechanics 129, No. 3, 104–107, 206 (1968). 13 Other examples include Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean attraction (updated in 2006 to include projection of video images onto a curtain of mist), The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (Universal, Orlando, opened 2010), the Hatsuni Miku "virtual star" in Japan (2010) and the Tupac "hologram" (Coachella Festival, 2012), the latter three using a metallized Mylar screen as a reflector. After the Coachella event in particular, popular identification of virtual stage performances as "holograms" dominated Web traffic. 14 On the disputed origins of the invention, see J.H. Pepper, The True History of the Ghost: And all about metempsychosis (London: Cassell, 1890). 15 "Do-it-yourself holography," Rolling Stone 18 (1973) p. 4. 16 R. Slayton, "From death rays to light sabers: making laser weapons surgically precise," Technology and Culture 52, 45–74 (2011). 17 Goldfinger, directed by G. Hamilton (United Artists, 1964). 18 Lutz [8] p. 1. 19 C. Frayling, Mad, Bad or Dangerous? The Scientist and the Cinema (London: Reaktion, 2005). 20 Among the largest exhibitions were Holography '75 (New York, 1975); Holografi: Der Drei Dimensionella Mediet (Stockholm, 1976); Whole Message (Vancouver, 1976); Light Fantastic and Light Fantastic 2 (London, 1977 and 1978); Alice in the Light World (Tokyo, 1978); Holographie Dreidimensionale Bilder (Berlin, 1979); Olografia (Rome, 1979); Hololight '79 (Groningen, 1979); Space-Light (Sydney, Australia, 1982); Light Dimensions (Bath, UK, 1983); Licht-Blicke (Deutsches Filmmuseum, Frankfurt, Germany, 1984); Images in Time and Space (Montreal, 1987). 21 These varieties were dubbed image plane holograms, integral (or multiplex) holograms and rainbow holograms. 22 A.G. Artner, "Rhetoric, not results, at holography show," Chicago Tribune, 12 June 1977; T.B. Hess, "Hocus-pocus and hocus-focus," New York 8, No. 33, 70–71 (1975); H. Kramer, "Holography: a technical stunt," New York Times, 20 July 1975, D1–D2. 23 S.F. Johnston, "Absorbing New Subjects: Holography As an Analog of Photography," Physics in Perspective 8 (2006) pp. 164–188. 24 G.V. Novotny, "The Little Train That Wasn't," Electronics 37, No. 3, pp. 86–89 (1964). 25 Chicago Tribune [6]. 26 J. Reinert, "The Picture That Hangs in Midair," Science Digest 60 (1966) pp. 30–34. 27 "Forthcoming Inventions: Television in Three Dimensions," Modern Mechanics and Inventions 2 (1931) p. 67. 28 A. Radebaugh, "Closer Than We Think: Pop-out TV Programs," New York Times, 21 December 1958. 29 K.M. Siegel, "Speech to Conductron Missouri employees" (C. Charnetski Collection, 1966). 30 G.D. Cochran, "Interview with SFJ" (SFJ collection, 2003). 31 H. Groskinski, "Cassette TV: The Good Revolution," Life 69, No. 16, 46–53 (1970). 32 J. Brunner, Stand on Zanzibar (London: Doubleday, 1968). 33 E. Bryant, "The Poet in the Hologram in the Middle of Prime Time," in Nova 2: Original Science Fiction Stories (London: Sphere Books, 1972) pp. 116–132. 34 L. Niven, Ringworld (New York: Ballantine, 1970). 35 J. Varley, The Ophiuchi Hotline (New York: Dial Press, 1977). 36 P.K. Dick, A Scanner Darkly (New York: Doubleday, 1977). 37 A.C. Clark, The Fountains of Paradise (New York: Ballantine, 1978). 38 W. Gibson, Burning Chrome (New York: Ace Books, 1987). 39 W. Gibson, "Fragments of a hologram rose," in Burning Chrome (New York: Ace Books, 1987) pp. 31–39. 40 Star Wars, directed by G. Lucas (20th Century Fox, 1977). 41 J. Yellin, "Election coverage 'via hologram' " (CNN, 2008). 42 AV Concepts, "Tupac hologram" (Coachella Festival, 2012). 43 G. Naylor, Red Dwarf (BBC Two, 1988–1999). 44 Paramount Domestic Television, Star Trek: The Next Generation (CBS, 1987–1994). Johnston, Holograms 499 45 Paramount Domestic Television, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (CBS, 1993–1999). 46 Paramount Domestic Television, Star Trek: Voyager (CBS, 1995– 2001). 47 ABC Studios, "Eternity," Perception, Series 3, Episode 5 (TNT, 2014). 48 Hasbro, Jem and the Holograms (Claster Television, 1985–1988). 49 Westwood Pacific, Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2 video game (Microsoft, 2000). 50 Bungie, Halo video game (Microsoft, 2000). 51 Crytek, Crysis 2 video game (Electronic Arts, 2011). 52 3D Realms, Duke Nukem 3D video game (3D Realms, 1996). 53 W.M. Arkin, "When Seeing and Hearing Isn't Believing," Washington Post, 1 February 1999; J. Engel, Gene Roddenberry: The Myth and the Man Behind Star Trek (New York: Hyperion, 1994). 54 Since 1996, the phrase "holographic projection" has tripled in usage in English-language publications. See <https://books.google.com /ngrams/graph?content=holographic+projection>, retrieved 29 April 2014. Manuscript received 7 November 2014. Sean JohnSton is Professor of Science, Technology and Society at the University of Glasgow, with training in physics and in the history of science and technology. His research explores how new technologies and social groups develop hand in hand. Current interests focus on the grassroots activities and influences of amateur scientists, crowd-sourcing and "maker" communities. Art and Atoms leonardo eBook Edited by Tami I. Spector, Art and Atoms explores the cutting edge of the chemical sciences, art and aesthetics. Tracking chemistry through the 40 years of Leonardo's archives reveals a chronological transformation in the manifestations of "chemistry and art." In general, the earliest papers, from the 1960s and 1970s, concern themselves with the development of new chemicals and chemically based methods for creating art. Many of the more recent papers have a theoretical slant, with the most recent emphasizing nanoscience. Based on changing trends in the field since the 1960s, the articles in this ebook fall naturally into the following four topic areas: • Chemical Materiality and Art • Atomic and Molecular Representations • Chemical Concepts, Analogy and Metaphor • Nanoscience The ebook was produced by Leonardo/ISAST and MIT Press for the Leonardo eBook Series (<www.leonardo.info/ebook-series>). See <www.amazon.com/Art-and-Atoms-ebook/dp/B00A9Y3ZCW>. A N N O U N C I N G

ISLAMISM REVISITED: A LACANIAN DISCOURSE CRITIQUE Andrea Mura In recent years a number of studies have integrated a psychoanalytical account of the subject within the 'constructivist' interest in the formation of identity. For instance, in response to the 'modernist' attempt to describe how symbols, values and meanings are articulated in the 'construction' of national narratives, Stavrakakis and Chrysoloras have stressed the need to understand the psychoanalytical factors accounting for the salience, 'depth and longevity of national identifications' (Stavrakakis and Chrysoloras, 2006, p. 147)1. Despite the increasing interest in psychoanalysis as a theoretical tool in the interpretation of political phenomena, this approach has remained substantially unexplored in the context of Islamic issues in general, and Islamism as a specific ideological formation. In addition, a longstanding suspicion of psychoanalysis has been manifest within Islamic settings. Much of the scepticism seems to derive from the common assumption that psychoanalysis propagates secularism. A case in point is Malik Babikir Badri, an Islamic therapist writing on the popular website Islam Online. According to him, while religion teaches that humans have souls, 'Freud demolished this conception and denied the existence of God, the soul, the here-after and human free will' (Badri 2002). The precise aim of this article is to make the case for including psychoanalysis within the space of a social and political analysis of contemporary Islamist discourses, enriching the limited number of studies which have examined Islam from Summary: The aim of this article is to highlight the relevance of Lacanian psychoanalysis for an understanding of Islamism, unfolding its discursive-ideological complexity. In an attempt to reply to Fethi Benslama's recent exploration of the function of the father in Islam, I suggest that Benslama's argument about the 'delusional' character of Islamism and the link he envisages between the emergence of Islamism and the crisis of 'traditional' authoritative systems, should be further investigated so as to avoid potential risks of essentialism. A different reading of Islamism is proposed, which valorizes 'creative' attempts by Islamist groups to re-organize the social imaginary within the realm of a symbolic economy, thereby positivising the desedimenting effects of the real in different ways. Notions such as capitonage, fantasy, desire, and jouissance are essential for us to understand how Islamist trajectories diversify as distinct discursive formations, thereby revealing the psychoanalytical significance of Islam as a master signifier. Key words: Islam – Lacan – Discourse – Father Master signifier – Jouissance 1 The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013) / ERC grant agreement n° 249379. a psychoanalytic perspective (Benslama 2002; !i"ek 2006a, 2006b; Hirt 1996; Pratt Ewing 1997; Jöttkandt and Copjec 2009). To do this, I will draw on Lacanian psychoanalysis to focus upon those factors that may enlighten our understanding of how Islamism is constructed as a complex discursive formation. The broad argument underlying this article is that Islamism, as a discursive universe, is sustained by the master signifier 'Islam', which figures as the element around which a 'variety' of Islamist discourses are articulated. Looking beyond this semiotic and discursive stratum, the master signifier 'Islam' also retains a strong psychoanalytical focus, functioning as the signifying image of the subject upon which the self-representation of believers is constructed. This representation is essential for the diversification of the different modalities through which the cathectic investments of adherents are mobilized. In the following pages, a psychoanalytical inquiry into Islamism will take as its point of departure Fethi Benslama's account of the function of the father in Islam (Benslama, 2010). I contend that Benslama's reading of Islamism should be further investigated so as to avoid potential risks of essentialism. Benslama asserts that Islamism constitutes a 'delusional' and 'melancholic' attempt to 'restore' the shield of religious illusion against the crisis of the traditional authoritative system. I will argue instead for the importance of highlighting the way in which a number of Islamist discourses, creatively, assertively or in a non-melancholic way, re-organize symbolic economy around the master signifier Islam, thereby reflecting the complexity of the Islamist discursive universe. The last part of the article will examine the different modalities through which several Islamist trajectories positivize the encounter with the real, mobilising jouissance for the purposes of the cathectic investment required to sustain each discursive-ideological configuration. The Structuration of Islamist Discourses Contemporary Islamism can be considered a revivalist trend whose constitutive features may be found in its intrinsic political 'projectuality' – that is, its tendency to translate its discursive universe into effective political projects. Islamism not only endeavours to 're-vive' religious feelings by ascribing them a substantial role in providing believers' lives with meaning and a sense of horizon. The peculiarity of this revivalist trend is that 'Islam' itself becomes the cornerstone of the political and social order. A major question arises, however, when one starts tackling Islamism empirically. How to approach this complex universe made up of ideas, pamphlets, organisational and legislative provisions, as well as single adherents, social moveEuropean Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 108 ments, institutions, parties, etc.? The notion of 'discourse' offers here a useful analytical tool able to account for the inherent complexity of this religious and socio-political phenomenon. In Ernesto Laclau's terms, a 'discourse' is a 'structured totality articulating both linguistic and non-linguistic elements', i.e. ideas as well as organisations, documents, etc. (Laclau 2006, p. 13). As he puts it elsewhere: the basic hypothesis of a discursive approach is that the very possibility of perception, thought and action depends on the structuration of a certain meaningful field which pre-exists any factual immediacy (Laclau 1993, p. 431). To conceive of Islamism as a discourse is to uncover the structuring of the discursive field from which a range of social phenomena receive their particular meaning, and through which their very possibility is conferred. If we start with reference to 'Islam' itself, what does it then mean for Islamism to be considered as the discourse that primarily poses 'Islam' as the cornerstone of the political and social order? In answer to this question, Bobby S. Sayyid assigned to Islam the discursive role of a master signifier. As Sayyid pointed out, it might be said that Islam functions as a central element in a plurality of discourses, i.e. fiqh (jurisprudence of Islamic law), Islamic theology, etc. (Sayyid 1997, p. 47). As the central element of a discourse, Islam assumes the universal function of the nodal point or quilting point, organising 'retroactively and prospectively' the range of signifiers that condense into that discourse (Lacan 1955–56/1993, p. 267). Such a mode of discursive organisation offers the illusion of a referent, temporarily freezing the fluctuation of signifiers and making a process of signification possible. A nodal point might also aspire to assume the universal position of a whole social and discursive system, conferring a fictional and provisional sense of closure to that system by way of a unique signifying gesture. This means suturing temporarily a definite social space, representing its discursive totality. The universal position that a nodal point covers here can best be grasped through the expression master signifier, which highlights the ability of the nodal point to 'order' a chain of signifiers, giving meaning to all the elements that compose it. This expression is particularly useful when considering the attempt of a nodal point to face a process of social and discursive desedimentation, representing the whole society, and therein allowing signification within its provisional frontiers. As !i"ek puts it: 'Let us imagine a confused situation of social disintegration, in which the cohesive power of ideology loses its efficiency: in such a situation, the Master is the one who invents a new signifier, the famous 'quilting point,' which stabilizes the situation again and makes it readable' (!i"ek 2006c, p. 37). In achieving this stabilization, the master signifier provides all identities circulating in that space with both a common discursive horizon and the signifying image upon which their self-representation is constructA. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 109 ed. !i"ek defines the master-signifier as the sound – as !i"ek says – that holds the community together; 'the Thing', which ontologically constitutes a community because subjects 'believe' in 'it' (!i"ek 1990, p. 53). It is here that Islamism emerges as the discursive universe aimed at hegemonising a whole social horizon, transforming 'Islam' into the master signifier of the community. A Psychoanalytical Reading of Islamist Articulations In the light of a discourse-centred perspective, Islamism stands then as a unified yet 'complex' discursive universe. That is, one should acknowledge the 'plurality' of discursive manifestations in which the Islamist vision is expressed, each one aspiring to assume a universal position through a particular way of mobilising the master signifier 'Islam'. For each Islamist discourse, this means organising a particular manner of eliciting passions and identifications, thereby arousing a degree of affective investment. It is here that the analytical relationship between psychoanalysis and religion becomes crucial. By taking Freud's analysis of religion as a useful point of departure, I will now examine those psychoanalytical aspects that best sustain the force of the Islamist imaginary, allowing for a differentiation among key Islamist articulations. According to Freud, religion grounds its 'inner force' and 'efficacy' in its capacity for illusion. Illusion is a force immanently related to desire and the actuality of imaginary formations (Freud 1927). It is the force of an energetic denial of reality through which a tutelary power modelled around the figure of the father is established to protect the subject from the anxiety of loss. Freud's analysis of religion offers an interesting starting point from which to posit a Lacanian reading of Islamism. The Freudian illusion of a tutelary power of God at the base of religious representations promises to satisfy what Lacan described as the impossible task of fulfilling subjective lack. In this sense, the Islamist 'illusion' acts in the same way as any other discourse. Master signifiers always require the production of a specific idea of 'closure and fullness', functioning as '(impossible) ideals' around which a society is organized and centred (Howarth and Stavrakakis 2000, p. 8). Given this impossibility, an inquiry into Islamist discourses should highlight the particular link established between their master signifier and the imaginary structure to which they refer. An examination should therefore be undertaken of the particular status that the figure of the father enjoys within religious representations, so as to address questions of origin and authority. In the attempt to tackle such issues, Fethi Benslama has linked the emergence of Islamism to the progressive erosion of the traditional imaginary that followed European Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 110 Islam's encounter with western modernity (Benslama 2002). Benslama identifies two major demands that his generation of Muslims articulated in the Tunisia of the 1960s. Firstly, the desire of being another – where 'the other' from the perspective of post-colonial populations was the West – materialising either in the direct replacement or in the re-articulation of Islamic tradition with modern language. Secondly, Benslama recognizes an emerging demand for authenticity, or as he puts it, the desperation of being a self. What is advocated and asserted is a return to origin; that is, the attempt to restore the truth of Islamic law and tradition, thereby restoring the imaginary tutelary coordinates of religion: The torment of origin is a symptom of the undoing of the traditional solidarity between truth and law (haqiqa and sharia), leaving the subject with an excess of the real and jouissance, which horrifies him because he cannot find anything within his imaginary universe and antique symbolism to block its release. The appeal to origin reflects the hope of restoring the shield of religious illusion. (Benslama, 2002, p. 23). In the above passage, the 'real' stands in opposition to the imaginary-symbolic as 'the domain of whatever subsists outside symbolisation' (Lacan 1966, p. 65). It is this mysterious, traumatic force, the 'nightmarish apparition' that always exceeds the symbolic of language, that reminds us of the very impossibility of mastering the constitutive lack of human experience (!i"ek 2002, p. 19). In addition, at the centre of Benslama's argument is the particular relation that the symbolic structure establishes with jouissance, the unlimited 'enjoyment' that we need to renounce once we enter the symbolic order. Here a basic distinction should be made between jouissance as the force sustaining the structure of desire and its symbolic economy (phallic jouissance) and feminine jouissance. On the one hand, jouissance stands as a 'painful pleasure' which is always excessive for the physical survival of the subject (Lacan, 1959–60, p. 184). This means that a homeostatic limit is imposed on bodily pleasure in order for it to be bearable to the subject, thus producing prohibition and the very desire to transgress it. Jouissance consequently appears as intimately related to the structure of human desire. But in seminar XX Lacan identifies another form of jouissance that is not phallic, and which escapes localisation, symbolisation, knowledge, and desire. It figures as a bodily substance which relates to the body proper as singular experience, and which cannot be shared or limited: it is 'the substance of the body, on the condition that it is defined only as that which enjoys itself (se jouit)' (Lacan, 1972, p.23). This type of jouissance should be conceived as an 'other jouissance' or 'feminine jouissance' which escapes the symbolic function epitomized by the phallus and figures as an excessive and singular jouissance of the Other. By examining mystical figures such as Saint John of the Cross and Saint Teresa, Lacan paradigmatically relates such feminine jouissance to God. A. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 111 European Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 112 From this perspective, it is justifiable to claim that Islam initially preserved the 'real' excess of God as feminine jouissance. In this way, God was maintained in the domain of the impossible-real, the jouissance of the Other beyond the symbolic function of the father. In contrast, Judaism and Christianity can be described as early attempts to progressively subsume this impossibility within the stabilising frontiers of symbolisation. 'God' was linked to a paternal and familial logic to the extent that Judaism could be defined as the 'religion of the Father', and Christianity as the 'religion of the Son' (Hirt 1984, p. 11). This patriarchal order found institutional representation in the genealogical lineage of Abraham's son Isaac, who was born of the marriage between Abraham and his wife Sarah the Hebrew, and was allowed to claim full inheritance of Abraham (Genesis 21:10–12; Gal 4:30). In the Bible, it is Isaac whom God chooses to establish the Covenant with Abraham's descendants, and who gives birth to Jewish genealogy (Genesis 17:19–21). The relation with Isaac that God institutionalizes with the Covenant and through circumcision and obedience to the Law, allows the Jews to assume Abraham as the symbolic father of the community (Name-of-the-Father). Hence Abraham, thanks to the relation with his son Isaac, becomes the 'phallic solution of the paternal symbolic authority, of the official symbolic lineage' (!i"ek 2006a). In Judaism and Christianity, the relation between man and God reflects a paternal logic of filiation. The impossibility that God expresses thus becomes an impossible-real to be subjected to symbolic appropriation. In contrast, Islamic tradition celebrates the link with Ishmael, the son that Abraham procreated with Sarah's Egyptian servant Hagar. Following a request from Sarah, Abraham 'abandoned' Hagar and her son Ishmael in the desert, thereby thwarting this son's right of inheritance. Although God promised Hagar to make Ishmael the founder of a great nation (a promise that Muslims see realized with Muhammad's foundation of the Islamic community), Ishmael's abandonment and exclusion from Abraham's inheritance creates an obstacle to Abraham's symbolic role as a father. A biological dimension alone remains to link Ishmael with Abraham, who is now reduced to the role of biological procreator. What needs to be emphasized, therefore, is the original absence of the function of the father in Islam, best exemplified by Ishmael's biblical 'abandonment' in the desert. A similar destiny is reserved for the founder of Islam, Muhammad, who was an 'orphan'. In contrast, a central role in Islam is originally played by female figures such as Hagar, the non-Hebrew. In Benslama's recently translated essay, Psychoanalysis and the Challenge of Islam (2002), Hagar epitomizes the ancestral mother of Islam, the 'female foreigner' who made the Islamic community possible by giving birth to Ishmael. In Islamic tradition, Hagar incarnates pure feminine jouissance both because she has knowledge of otherness (Other jouissance) and fully expresses bodily substance. Paul, for instance, recalls that Hagar can see and speak with God without dying. She knows him, names him, and, bodily speaking, expresses a perverse, seductive and fertile force, allowing progeny beyond symbolic castration and so accessing 'that which is hidden' (ibid, p. 111). Therefore, in the face of the phallic function ascribed to Abraham, which grounds the god-father relationship at the core of Jewish and Christian symbolism, Islam was grounded in the excessive force epitomized by the Other jouissance of Hagar in her direct relation to God. God is therefore retained in the domain of the Impossible, since no phallic solution existed to organize the relation between man and God on the grounds of paternal symbolic authority. The Koran claims that Allah is not the father, for the uniqueness of God excludes any notion of divine procreation, filiation and genealogy, even symbolically: Say: He is God, (the) One; the Self-Sufficient Master, Whom all creatures need; He has begotten no one, nor is He begotten; and there is no one comparable to Him. (Qur'an 112:1). With the passing of time, however, God's sovereignty was gradually transposed into a symbolic representation aimed at doubling God's absolute identity in the dual relation between the Man-Father and the son. In this regard, Benslama notes that although Islam was initially exposed to the generative and excessive energy of Other jouissance, the subversive power of femininity became increasingly subordinated to an ethical, juridical and theological order (Law and truth) structured through a phallic organisation of the signifying universe. This passage entailed the 'obliteration of the ancestral mother' and her reduction to a mere intermediary serving as the 'physical conduit for routing the form of the father to that of the son' (Benslama 2002, p. 109). The eradication of the ancestral mother was the attempt to master the excessive power of feminine jouissance by reducing Other jouissance to the symbolic economy of sexual enjoyment. A system of laws was then established on the basis of male sovereignty. But, in this reading, elusive female power resists phallic symbolisation and the symbolic mission of eradication never succeeds in mastering this excessive force. The 'spectre of the woman' that was obliterated has haunted Islamic thought up to the present day. The encounter with modernity and the challenge to traditional imaginary enacted a new, horrifying exposure to the excess of Other jouissance, thereby unleashing the 'traumatic-subversive-creative-explosive power of feminine subjectivity' (!i"ek 2006a). For Benslama, Islamism figures as the symptom of 'the profound disturbance in the ever precarious relation between the real and symbolic structures', a disturbance Islamists have tried to solve with their 'delusional appeal to origin' (Benslama 2002, p. 214). A. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 113 The Decline of the Oedipus Benslama's account of a dislocation of the traditional symbolic authority of the father which modernity would produce, thereby engendering a horrifying release of the real, strongly resonates with a recent debate about a paradigmatic change that is occurring in our contemporary era (Tort 2007). Here, the idea is that post-modernity, rather than modernity, would be responsible for what has been called the 'decline of the Oedipus, when the paradigmatic mode of subjectivity is no longer the subject integrated into the paternal Law through symbolic castration' (!i"ek 2000, p. 248). Naturally, a major consequence of this view is the crisis of desire. Once castration is suspended, 'desire' ceases to be a key manifestation of the subject of the unconscious, and is faced with a sort of 'nihilistic obliteration' which gives rise to the birth of a new type a subject: the 'Man without Unconscious' (Recalcati 2010, p. X). In his recent essay on the clinics of new symptoms, Lacanian theorist Massimo Recalcati, sees anorexia, panic disorders and somatisation as the signs of a potential abrogation of the unconscious. Two increasingly widespread tendencies would be indicative of such an abrogation: 'a narcissistic reinforcement of the ego, producing solid identifications, which petrify sterilely subjective identity' [emphasis mine]; and an 'urgent need to enjoy, which bypasses any principle of symbolic mediation so as to stand as an absolute as well as deadly injunction' (ibid.). In this scenario, religious fundamentalist attachment to integrity and purity is thus interpreted as a mode of solid identification, chasing the paranoiac dream of an uncorrupted and uncontaminated self protected against the threats of otherness. The risk here is that the complexity of the Islamist galaxy is reduced to a pure, nostalgic fundamentalist manifestation, acting from beyond the death of desire. Benslama's reading of Islamism seems to embrace such a possibility, depicting Islamism as the ultimate attempt to 'restore' the shield of illusion in a time when the 'traditional' symbolic authority of the father has been disrupted by the exposure to modernity and the release of jouissance. Thus, a traditionalist and nostalgic character is ascribed to Islamism, which is exemplified by its 'desperate appeal to origin'. Needless to say, this can result in the deployment of 'neo-orientalist' forms of essentialism about Islamism (Almond 2007). 'Traditionalist' and 'nostalgic' attitudes are thus emphasized, while compromising and creative engagements with modernity are neglected, thereby promoting modernist depictions of 'political Islamism' as 'nothing but one of the subjectivated names of today's obscurantism' (Badiou 2006, p. 68). Against this backdrop, I contend that a variety of approaches mark the discursive responses that the Islamist galaxy actualizes when confronting social European Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 114 desedimentation and symbolic instability. I argue that Islamism does not manifest itself as an undifferentiated demand for authenticity, unwilling to find compromise with modernity. By emphasising the multiplicity of the discursive variants informing the Islamist galaxy, Benslama's contribution could be enriched with a higher degree of complexity. From this perspective, the decline of the Oedipus might be associated with the desedimenting effects of globalisation and the emergence of postmodernity as a discursive horizon challenging the role of logocentric modern representations (Mura 2012b). Whether this decline is acknowledged or not, however, very much depends on which horizon (e.g., tradition, modernity, postmodernity) we use to 'read' social reality and the type of discourse we are considering. !i"ek, for instance, emphasizes the contemporary overlapping of modernity and postmodernity, desire and perversion, rather than their mutual replacement: e.g., the modern discourse of democracy, which manifests a hysterical structure and values the central function of desire on the one hand, and the post-modern discourse of late capitalism, with its perverse injunction to enjoy, on the other (!i"ek 2000, p. 248). From this perspective, there is nothing particularly epochal on the current trouble of the symbolic that Benslama describes, for the 'symbolic' is always in trouble and disturbed by contingent events that challenge temporary fixation of meanings, enacting new hegemonic competitions among discourses. While 'events' such as colonialism or globalisation produce violent reconfigurations of our imaginaries, engendering what Benslama sees as the 'undoing of the traditional solidarity between truth and law (haqiqa and sharia)', the encounter with the real that such events entail might not necessarily produce the 'torment of origin' or the 'horrifying', 'delusional', 'desperate' attitude that Benslama suggests for Islamists. Indeed, by trying to exploit the desedimenting process of social and discursive dislocation, Islamism functions in the same way as any other discursive formation, re-signifying the social universe through hegemonic conflict. Therefore, to use the 'creative' and 'traumatic' force of the real to reconfigure the borders of symbolic organisation entails stabilising a situation of social disintegration, by assuming 'a new master signifier which makes that situation 'readable'' (!i"ek 2006c, p. 37). I propose that instead of seeing Islamism as a form of solid identification marking the death of desire and the nostalgic attempt to 'restore' the illusion of religion, Islamist discourses should be read as distinct attempts to confront desedimentation creatively – in other words, as different ways of mobilising the productive force of the real within the realm of a symbolic economy. Central to this approach is the idea that Islamism does not necessarily attempt to 'restore' symbolic economy on the ground of anti-imperialist acts of resistance advocating preA. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 115 colonial 'authenticity'. Even in the early history of Islamist movements, groups such as the Muslim Brothers simply strived to re-articulate or re-invent symbolic coordinates by adopting the very 'modern' language of the colonialist (Lia, 1998; Mura, 2012a). Far from displaying melancholic or rigid attitudes towards change, many groups continue to preserve the central function of desire, 'positivizing' the very encounter with the real that Benslama preserves as horrifying. Given the limits of this article, it is not possible to describe in detail how such a process occurs for each Islamist discourse. Nonetheless, in the following pages, I explore briefly a few examples of the way in which such a positivisation of the real can occur, giving a taste of how some Islamist discourses resort to a creative mobilisation of jouissance. Fantasy, Desire, jouissance and the Discourses of Islam As I mentioned above, any evaluation of the way in which Islamism organizes the relations among fantasy, desire and jouissance should stress the positive determination of the real. This is a notion of jouissance which allows the real to be manifested. The real here is not only the negative and traumatic moment of disruption of the symbolic, but the excessive energy that emanates from the very idealisation of a fulfilment of the lack (Glynos and Stavrakakis 2004). It discloses a paradoxical situation by demonstrating the inability of the symbolic to master social lack while enacting, at the same time, the very illusion of a final fulfilment. It is here that fantasy and desire best reveal their potential for the cathectic investment of Islamist 'illusions'. Faced with the loss of jouissance that the subject experiences, desire represents a relation to lack that promises to recapture the object sacrificed. Lacan deploys the notion of object petit a to conceive of the unattainable object which 'causes' and sets desire in motion through the representation of partial objects. As a cause-object of desire, object petit a represents a desirous and phantasmatic feature that can reside in any object. From this perspective, it functions as a sort of formal frame through which desire maintains ontological consistency despite the positive object that is encountered. At a deeper level, however, object petit a mediates between desire and enjoyment, functioning as a stand in for the real within any symbolic representation. Here, object petit a can be seen as 'an empty space on which the subject projects the fantasies that support his desire, a surplus of the real that propels us to narrate again and again our first traumatic encounter with jouissance' (!i"ek 1991, p. 133). The object petit a reflects, then, the residual accumulation of a form of enjoyment in the symbolic, which fantasy strives to mobilize bringing it within acceptable limits (that is, tempering its excessive force by translating it into bodily pleasure). From this perEuropean Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 116 spective, fantasy stands as the 'little scenario of imaginarily fixed signifiers circling around the ultimate object of desire' (Kesel 2009, p. 31). It is the fundamental relation between the master signifier and the object petit a that needs to be uncovered so as to explain the ability of Islamist articulations to stimulate, produce and appropriate the cathectic investments of a discourse. By examining a wide variety of case studies, Yannis Stavrakakis has highlighted this ability of desire and fantasy to unleash libidinal investment, which could be seen in terms of an 'enjoyment structured in fantasies' (Stavrakakis 2006, p. 200). From this perspective, any discourse (nationalism, socialism, etc.) presents its master signifier (the Nation, The Socialist Society, etc.) as an 'empty signifier' that symbolizes both the essential lack and the exciting promise of its fulfilment. It is this very excitement that discourses try to capture and mobilize for political purposes, and that reveals the positive characterisation of the real. In the discursive universe of Islamism, 'Islam' incarnates the object somehow 'lacking': all problems deriving from its very loss, its being 'missing', and this lack being conceived of as an intimate deprivation. A common characteristic of Islamic revivalist groups is the claim that 'Islam', their empty signifier, is absent in the every-day life of regular Muslims, because it is 'lying dormant within their souls' (al-Banna 1935). This 'absence' is then taken as the primary cause of social injustice and individual malaise. The negative absence of the 'object' is, at the same time, positivized by fantasy. Once 'Islam' returns fully through the 'Islamisation of society' in the fantasy of a harmonious and balanced state, all problems will be solved. It is at this point that fantasy projects the possibility of solution by promising a 'revival' of Islam and the perspective of a peaceful settlement of all human problems: hence, the very popular Islamist slogan: Islam is the solution. But what makes fantasy 'appealing' is that something exceeds the order of language in which fantasy and desire are inscribed and connects the symbolic with the real as the pre-symbolic energy of the subject. Since fantasy works through visualisation, each discursive articulation will display the partial object of desire differently. The fantasy of a Muslim society, for example, very often takes the form either of a stylisation of the Past or a utopian visualisation of the Future. Although these tendencies are common to all Islamist discourses, each articulation tends to emphasize one tendency more than the other. In any case, they reveal different attempts to face both the encounter with the real that social and discursive desedimentation has enacted (either as an effect of colonialism or globalisation) and the endeavour to capture and mobilize jouissance in order to sustain their ideological platform. So-called salafi trajectories (the word refers literally to the 'pious ancestors'), for instance, focus on the 'Golden Age' of early Islam when the Islamic community was incarnated by the image of the Prophet and his Companions. The A. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 117 exaltation of 'origin' that Benslama envisages reflects here the idyllic view of Islamic past. The powerful nostalgia at work here precludes any possibility of developing a utopian project, for nothing in the future will ever reach the ultimate perfection of the Islamic golden age. As mentioned earlier, this attitude has often been considered to be somehow intrinsic to fundamentalist and Islamist tendencies within the Sunni galaxy. Benslama, for instance, argues that, aside from terror, 'melancholy becomes the only stance to assume while waiting for the last judgment. The Islamist movement should be considered as a reversal of messianism: antimessianism as despair over time' (Benslama, 2002, p. 28). In contrast, the messianic expectation of Shiite factions is said to entail a more open attitude towards utopian prospects, projecting the ideal of the Islamic community directly into the future. As can be seen from these two contrasting attitudes, Islamist articulations are highly differentiated in the way that they fantasize about the Islamic community, and engage with notions of origin and change. It is certainly true that some articulations among the Sunni universe reveal nostalgia for the past. This is observable in those groups that privilege a literalist reading of holy texts, with a strict adherence to the timeless model of early Islam. Conservative trajectories such as the Taliban and the Tablighi, for instance, channel the libidinal investment of adherents towards a representation of the Islamic society where the idealized image of the past is even translated into the concrete adoption of a strict code of mimetic dressing and behaviour. Selfhood is reduced to a homogeneous kit of norms and codes that, being deculturized and based only on the tenets of Islam, can be deployed in every cultural and geographical environment in a similar way. In referring to these groups, French sociologist Olivier Roy uses the illuminating concept of 'neo-fundamentalism' (Roy 2004). However, other Sunni trajectories adopt a more 'creative' and 'optimistic' attitude towards the future, creatively adding new elements to the depiction of the Islamic society. Their advocacy of 'origin' is here instrumental to political and social change, rather than reflecting the nostalgic aspiration to access the past. This is particularly evident in those groups where a more reformist attitude is at work. The past here becomes a pool from which resources can be drawn to sanction a future promise. Groups such as the Muslim Brothers or Hamas, for instance, have largely drawn upon early experiences of the Islamic community, such as the shura (consultation) or the waqf (religious endowments), to legitimize parliamentary practices or Islamize a modern concept of national territory (Mandaville 2011). Other articulations may instead reveal a utopian attitude. Although the past stands as a glorious image of greatness and civilisation, an assertive focus on change marks the Islamic call. This tendency characterizes, for instance, the assertive transterritorial militancy of Qutb's Milestones, where Islamic society is described as 'not just an entity of the past, to be studied in history' but 'a demand European Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 118 of the present and a hope of the future' (Qutb 1964, p. 103). If Qutb's optimistic slant may here cover a rhetorical function in the face of his generally more pessimistic evaluation of the present, other articulations reveal an unequivocal demand for change that strongly contrasts with the image of Islamism as a movement irremediably condemned to the melancholy of the past. A case in point is Shabbir Akhtar's advocacy of an Islamic 'theology of liberation', calling for the enfranchisement of the Muslim masses in a politics that can raise them up from poverty, oppression and injustice in a similar way to the political experience of Christian priests in Latin America. While the political dimension of Islam constitutes the premises of such a stance, what is set in motion here is a direct reference to Qutb's activism. Far from denoting a melancholic attitude, cathectic investment is here explicitly directed towards the aim of conquering power for political and emancipatory purposes. Our pursuit of power is as natural and instinctive as the sex drive. The real question concerns its regulation. For all ideologies survive by courtesy of power. That is why there is a fraud, if a pious one, in the claim that authentically religious ambition can [...] afford to disown 'the things of Caesar' (Akhtar 1991, p. 84). Finally, within a 'transterritorial' horizon, other articulations turn their focus away from the past and direct their imaginative effort towards the visualisation of a substantially new future object of desire, a new Islamic era. This horizon is well illustrated in those discourses that fantasize about the emergence of a new eummah transcending geographical and physical frontiers, (hence their potential qualification as trans-territorial). It should be noted that, besides the articulation of the signifier 'Islamic society', which is taken here to incarnate the empty signifier Islam as such, another key signifier in this type of discourses is 'virtuality'. This term can be used with a different connotation to that of its usual sense. A common attitude among conservative groups resonating with the more radical aspects of Qutb's vision, such as Hizb ut-Tahrir and al-Muhajiroun for instance, is to consider the ignorance of divine guidance (jahiliyyah) as embracing all contemporary societies. Hence the ummah is assumed as a 'virtual' object; that is, as a mental promise. 'Virtuality' implies the idea that something is missing from the physical reality of the subject. The 'virtual' functions as a phantasmic projection of reality based on a notion of absence. An essential element for this kind of discourse is the 'normative self ', the so-called 'true believer', with his/her quest for salvation. The virtual ummah of 'true believers' is neither an entity to be maintained, nor a goal to be realized in a material world where unbelievers seem to dominate, regardless of whether they call themselves Muslims or otherwise. As the official website of Hizb ut-Tahrir puts it, the 'Islamic world' is currently steeped in the dimension of kufr (here standing for unbelief), which means that the ummah is transposed to an A. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 119 ideal plane: 'With regard to determining whether a household is Islamic or not, this is not dependent on whether its inhabitants are Muslims or not, but rather on what is implemented in terms of rules [...] The fact that the current existing states in the Islamic world are states of kufr is evident and does not require explanation' (Hizb-ut-Tahrir, n.d.). The ummah here works therefore as a pure ideal, the articulation of a notion of 'beyond' (thereafter) upon which to fantasize so as to stimulate affective attachment and political mobilisation. In other cases, presence rather than absence can be valorized, and virtuality can be conceived of as a sort of 'illusion of presence' that reproduces physical reality through artificial and mechanical simulation. Virtual communities require the disappearance of the very difference between 'true life' and its mechanical simulation; between objective reality and our false (illusory) perception of it; between my fleeting affects, feelings, attitudes, and so on, and the remaining hard core of my Self (!i"ek 1997, p. 133). In this scenario, there are Islamist trajectories that translate the virtual ummah into a positive and feasible project. Complex networks of websites, chat forums, newsletters, blogs, bulletin boards etc., give voice to an extraordinary exchange of opinions and information about every aspect of a Muslim's life, paving the way for the establishment of new forms of community ties. Here, the 'desirability' and 'visibility' of a new 'virtual' infrastructural space overcome the practical obstacles posed by the territorial displacement of globalisation, working as an immediate plan of action. It is within this context that different kinds of contemporary phenomena such as Muxlim can be observed (Teti and Mura 2009). Muxlim – a virtual world made of digital towns, cities, buildings, parks, etc. – providing an Islamic alterative to secular British or US virtual-world developers (e.g., Second Life) and allowing Muslim 'virtual citizens' to create a new virtual community through the interaction of movable avatars. Novelties of this kind, however, require some emphasis being placed on the imaginary that virtual reality sets in motion. André Nusselder notices that virtual reality best exemplifies the phantasmically-mediated process leading to identity formation. Virtual reality enables the avatar to offer a consistent self-image of the user producing the same effects of fascination that the virtual 'image' of a mirror engenders in the uncoordinated and fragmented body of an infant (Nusselder 2009, p.144). This is pivotal to understanding the fascination that the virtual ummah elicits from those Muslims who are more absorbed in the virtual reality, and more drawn to exploring the potential of virtual worlds and communities. The libidinal force of this kind of fascination lies in the ability of virtual reality to capture the user in the phantasmic projection of its imaginary universe. The tension that characterizes the relation between ideal images and the real is replaced here by a narcissistic stupor and total absorption in the unity of the virtual image. The Muslim European Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 120 fantasy about an 'un-fragmented' ummah becomes here the microworld where the new cyber-self experiences the dream of absolute unity and the ultimate aspiration to overcome traditional divisions within the ummah. The attempt on behalf of fantasy and desire to capture and mobilize cathectic investment can be observed from other perspectives. As Stavrakakis puts it: apart from the promise of fantasy, what sustains desire, what drives our identification acts, are at least two further dimensions: our ability to go through limit-experiences related to a jouissance of the body, and the fact that desiring itself entails a jouissance of its own - an enjoyment beyond the anticipation of fantasmatic fullness (Stavrakakis 2005, p. 69). Enjoyment, in fact, may intervene on another level, as a partial experience through which 'desire' is enjoyed. This requires some form of anticipation of the joy that is promised with the future achievement of the desired object. More precisely, it is this anticipation that sustains the promise of the object. In the Islamist context, for instance, Islamist articulation presents a rich and highly diversified portfolio of 'experiences'. These experiences stimulate an enjoyment of the body, undertaking the essential function of sustaining desire by offering morsels of anticipation of the promised object. From religious collective festivities in the case of Ramadan, to the partial integration of some of the 'ecstatic' rituals of Sufism, and collective funeral processions that are often charged with political significance, as in the case of the killing of 'martyrs', religious and cultural celebrations offer important venues to mobilize enjoyment among groups (Pratt Ewing 1997). In emphasising the affinity between nationalist movements and groups such as Hamas, Hizbollah or, earlier, the Muslim Brotherhood, scholars have often highlighted the importance given here to hymns and paramilitary parades (Lia 1998; Kepel 2002; Ruthven 2004). All these celebrations fortify the sense of cohesion of their adherents providing them with a certain release of enjoyment which functions precisely as a form of partial experience. Similarly, more 'conservative' trends may attempt to anticipate some of the benefits that are promised in the ideal of an ummah of true believers. It is within this context that the creation of 'Islamic neighbourhoods' should be interpreted. I refer here to local communities of 'true believers' whose substantial 'insulation' from the rest of the world keeps them apart from impiety and corruption and in doing so, offers them a foretaste of the kingdom of virtue and salvation they aspire to. Another interesting phenomenon is the creation of 'Islamic' tourist facilities (holiday villages, hotels, and so on) where the true believer can 'enjoy' the benefits of a holiday reflecting their ideal of a pure 'Islamic' life. As a conservative religious concept, it [Islamic Tourism] aims at the adjustment of the tourist industries to the fundamental interpretations of Islam, including genA. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 121 der-segregated and alcohol-free venues as well as 'Islamically' financed and organized tourism (Dabrowska 2004). Other discourses might involve an enjoyment of experience drawing upon a plurality of more 'ludic events'; from the actual gathering of believers in the virtual world of Muxlim to the artistic 'events' of transterritorial cultural phenomena such as Islam-Punk and Islam hip hop. Hip hop may be regarded as one of the most important forms of protest against social and political discrimination. Spreading beyond its original African-American context, Muslim rappers have been using music to spread the faith, bridging the gaps between Muslim communities, and creating a global 'hip hop ummah' (Alim 2005). 'Islamic Punk' is another trend encompassing punk, hard rock, and hip hop influences. A wide range of intellectual activities and music groups inspired by Islamic punk have given rise to several forums, blogs and Islam-punk virtual communities (Teti and Mura 2009). Another important area of analysis of the way in which enjoyment is mobilized within the realm of a symbolic economy can be located in what !i"ek calls the theft of enjoyment, which involves the constitution of an enemy here taken to represent the principal obstacle to the realisation of the promise. As !i"ek puts it: We always impute to the 'other' an excessive enjoyment; s/he wants to steal our enjoyment (by ruining our way of life) and/or has access to some secret, perverse enjoyment (!i"ek 1990, p. 54). While fantasy and desire elicit the 'partial' satisfaction of an illusory fullness, such a narrative is disrupted by the emergence of a paranoiac's fantasy in which aggressiveness and violence find their place. As a result, enjoyment irrupts in the obscene construction of the Other as a traumatic Intruder, someone whose different way of life (or, rather, way of jouissance materialized in its social practices and rituals) disturbs us, throw off the rails the balance of our way of life. (!i"ek 2006b). There is therefore a common tendency among more nationalized trajectories à la Muslim Brotherhood to project a modern binary scheme when defining the 'other' that hampers the full realisation of Islam. This can be seen in the adoption of an Occidentalist narrative through which a negative dialectic is enacted. Islam here becomes the place of 'glory and fortitude, truth, strength, blessing, integrity, stability, virtue, and nobility' as against 'the path of Europe', which is replete with 'enticement and glamour, pleasures and luxuries, laxity and license, and comforts that captivate the soul' (al-Banna 1936). In following a classic orientalist pattern, the enemy is maintained as a 'necessary' outside against which the specificity of a Muslim-Self can be construed. The same dialectical mindset that informed the colonial discourse is therefore reproduced, even though this mindset is now reversed through an anti-imperialist perspective. European Journal of Psychoanalysis – n. 1 2014 122 On the other hand, contemporary transterritorial trajectories within the Islamist universe appear to reflect a classical post-modern tendency to become disentangled from binary representations. That is not to deny that some sort of radical contra-position is performed in the visualisation of the enemy. When considering conservative movements such as Hizb ut-Tahrir and al-Muhajiroun, for instance, it is true that these groups rely on the ultimate distinction between true believers and non-true believers. Nonetheless, the realm of the enemy (jahiliyyah) is considered to be a dominant space that leaves no margins for the affirmation of any individual self. Although a clash of civilisation seems to inform the opposition between the Islamic vanguard of God and the global realm of unbelievers, these two terms are not posed on the same plane. While the enemy maintains absolute control over social reality, the realisation of a pious self will necessarily be achieved as a virtual accomplishment in the hereafter. As Roy puts it when describing neo-fundamentalism: 'glancing over his shoulder the mujahid sees nothing but kafir (unbelievers) in the lands that he is supposed to protect. [...] They are besieged in a fortress they do not inhabit' (Roy 2004, p. 288). The outside does not defer to an inside, and the self will not defer to an immediate other. The very construction of the enemy requires that any antagonism be transposed upon a plane of virtuality and transcendence. Less conservative tendencies tend instead to celebrate pluralism and diversity, dispersing the enemy in a multiplicity of instances. The enemy can be variously located in the form of religious dogmatism or capitalist materialism. A phenomenon such as Islamic punk, for instance, is said by Michael Muhammad Knight – a Muslim convert whose novel, The Taqwacores, represents a manifesto for the Muslim punk movement – to unite Islam and punk within a holistic philosophy of life 'smashing' any kind of 'idols', materialism and religious orthodoxy included (Muhammad Knight 2004). If enjoyment here is stolen or prevented by the very existence of an enemy, the thief does not assume the form of an absolute opposite, an irreducible 'antagonist' against which the specificity of a Muslim selfhood can be delineated. Rather, the representation of the enemy seems to be informed by the very definition of an 'agonistic' frame. Here aggression is dispersed into a plurality of competing and diverging moments which define the condition of possibility for the theft of enjoyment. Conclusion In this article, I have framed the theoretical terrain upon which a psychoanalytical perspective could be posited in the analysis of contemporary Islamist disA. Mura – Islamism Revisited: A Lacanian Discourse Critique 123 courses. In the first part, I highlighted the contribution that the Lacanian conceptualisation of capitonage offers to the study of Islamism. I then focused on a psychoanalytical inquiry into Islamism and how it impinges upon problems of 'origin', 'authority' and 'truth'. By taking Benslama's investigation of Islam as a point of departure, I broadened the approach to emphasize the complexity involved in an inquiry into Islamism that touches upon the different imaginaries produced by distinct discursive articulations. By doing this, I drew attention to the essentialist risk of over-emphasising the 'delusional' character of Islamism, and of disregarding its internal differences. I then proceeded to highlight the way in which some Islamist discourses creatively respond to social desedimentation, thereby reconfiguring the symbolic through a positivisation of the real. This approach served as a superior means of differentiating the way in which Islamism organizes and mobilizes fantasy, desire and enjoyment, thereby sustaining the function of the master signifier Islam. Naturally the hegemonic ability of a discourse to suture social space – allowing its master signifier to become universal for a given time – offers no criteria of progressive assurance. 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Relativist Stances, Virtues and Vices Martin Kusch Department of Philosophy University of Vienna Universitätsstrasse 7 1010 Wien Austria [email protected] Abstract. This paper comments on Maria Baghramian's 'The Virtues of Relativism'. We agree that some relativist positions are naturally couched as 'stances' and that it is fruitful to connect relativism to virtue epistemology. But I find Baghramian's preferred rendering of relativism uncharitable. I Introduction. Maria Baghramian's paper, 'The Virtues of Relativism', contains a wealth of original observations and arguments. I will only be able to offer a few marginalia in response. II Debates and Wars. There are many debates over relativism. Some of them – for instance the controversy over 'new-age' semantic relativism – are conducted like most other philosophical disputes: scholarly, esoterically, and respectfully. Other debates surrounding relativism are different: they are 'wars'. It is customary to speak of 'wars' either when intellectual exchanges become acrimonious ('science wars') or when one launches an intellectual campaign ('war on cancer'). I submit that some discussions of relativism have the feel of 'relativism wars' or 'wars on relativism' (e.g. Boghossian 2006; Williamson 2015). The relativism wars share the following features. First, they primarily concern forms of ontological or epistemic relativism. Second, contributors aim to reach a wider audience in academia and beyond. Third, the disputes are strikingly one-sided in that the critics of relativism vastly outnumber its proponents. Relativism is 'refuted' over and over again, but only rarely defended. Fourth, the critics regularly link relativism to various social and political ills, for instance, to climate-change scepticism or Holocaust denials, to 'post-truth politics' or the 'Taliban'. Relativists are portrayed as opening the floodgates to irrationality, while the critics fashion themselves as noble fighters for decency and reason. Fifth and finally, the relativistic positions under attack in these campaigns are not carefully distilled from a large corpus of philosophical writings; more typically, the critics construct what relativists had better be saying if they are to make any sense at all. This dismissive and patronizing attitude is helped by the fact that the alleged or card-carrying relativists either are not philosophers (e.g. David Bloor, Stanley Fish, or Barbara Herrnstein 2 Smith) or outwith the Anglophone philosophical mainstream (e.g. Lorraine Code, Jacques Derrida, Paul Feyerabend, Michel Foucault, Bruno Latour, Francois Lyotard, or Richard Rorty). I find the relativism wars and the war on relativism deeply problematic. Whenever they take for granted that reason is exclusively on their side, and that they need to reach the public, academics are prone to allow themselves dubious intellectual shortcuts. They feel entitled to dispense with detailed and charitable reconstructions of their opponents' positions and arguments; justified in giving more weight to moral signalling than to meticulous scholarship; and obliged to ignore their own allies' sloppy interpretations and poor reasoning. Applied to relativism: the urgency of the political goals of confronting and defeating climate-change scepticism and Holocaust denials is no excuse for suspending established canons of careful reading and arguing. Quick and dirty reflections directed at relativistic scarecrows do little to undermine politically unsavoury opponents. On the contrary, such reflections lower intellectual standards and enable the prophets of post-truth to dismiss philosophical reasoning as superficial propaganda. It is to Baghramian's credit that in her writings on relativism she has generally kept off the war-on-relativism band-wagon. Although critical of almost all versions of relativism, Baghramian has done her best to do justice to relativist positions by focusing on their apparent strengths as much as on their weaknesses. III Equal Validity. I shall now turn to the central issue on which Baghramian and I differ. Proponents and opponents of epistemic relativism tend to agree that the following five conditions have to be met for a position to qualify as relativistic: (1) DEPENDENCE: Judgements attributing an epistemic status to a person or belief (= 'E-judgements') are relative to epistemic standards. Sets of such standards form epistemic frameworks. (2) NON-ABSOLUTISM: None of these standards or frameworks is absolutely correct.1 (3) PLURALITY: There is (or has been, or could be) more than one such framework. (4) CONFLICT: E-judgements of different epistemic frameworks can conflict. (5) NON-NEUTRALITY: When E-judgements (licensed by different standards of different frameworks) conflict, there are – at least in some important cases – no framework-independent, neutral ways of adjudication. While this much is generally agreed, many friends and foes of relativism do, however, disagree over a sixth condition: (6) EQUAL VALIDITY: The different epistemic frameworks (their standards and the judgements they license) are all equally valid. 3 Almost all card-carrying epistemic relativists deny being committed to EQUAL VALIDITY. And yet, anti-relativists invariably regard EQUAL VALIDITY as the very heart of relativism. Baghramian is a case in point2, writing for instance that: ... the relativist is committed to ... the 'equal validity' thesis – the claim that there can be more than one equally correct or true, but mutually incompatible, judgement on a given topic ... (p. 2) The relativist ... gives equal credence to the truth (rational acceptability, justificatory standards) of differing positions and beliefs ... (p. 9) In Baghramian's case this is all the more surprising since she also notes in passing (p. 7) that three paradigmatic card-carrying relativists – the sociologist of knowledge David Bloor, the feminist epistemologist Lorraine Code, and the epistemological anarchist Paul Feyerabend – deny any commitment to EQUAL VALIDITY. In the case of Bloor, Baghramian quotes his denial herself (Bloor 2011, p. 452): Bloor ... objects to Boghossian's characterization of his brand of relativism as an equal validity, rather he thinks that the relativists of the Edinburgh School treat all theses with equal curiosity. (p. 7) Note that this has been Bloor's position since 1982: Our ... postulate ... is not that all beliefs are equally true or equally false, but that ... all beliefs without exception call[..] for empirical investigation and must be accounted for by finding the specific, local causes of [their] credibility (Barnes and Bloor 1982, p. 23). Bloor even ridicules the idea that relativism is committed to EQUAL VALIDITY. He does so while praising the alethic relativism of the physicist-philosopher Philipp Frank, of Vienna-Circle fame. Reflecting on Frank's 1952-book Wahrheit: Relativ oder Absolut?, Bloor poses this question about EQUAL VALIDITY: What is 'equal validity'? According to this idea, the physics of Aristotle would, presumably, have 'equal validity' with the physics of Einstein. Now recall the theoretical physicist Philipp Frank. Ask yourself: Would the scientist and relativist who took over Einstein's chair really believe such a thing? (2011, p. 452) In her paper 'Must a Feminist Be a Relativist After All?' (1995), Code takes issue with Sandra Harding's suggestion that, for the relativist, 'no reasonable standards can or could in principle [...] adjudicate between one culture's claim that the earth is flat and another culture's claim that the earth is round' (Harding 1991, p. 139; Code 1995, p. 202). Code rejects this suggestion with reference to Ivan Karamazov's 'If god does not exist, everything is permitted'. Code points out that we today no longer draw this conclusion. And she suggests that we are able to do likewise concerning 4 our standards: from the fact that there are no absolute standards, it does not follow that there are no standards at all (1995, p. 203). In Feyerabend's case, the picture is more complex. In Against Method he regards as sceptical rather than anarchist-relativist the idea that 'every view [is] equally good, or [is] equally bad' (1975, p. 189). And he happily acknowledges that '[we] can say today that Galileo was on the right track ...' (1975, p. 6) Such judgements are not absolute of course, but relative to our epistemic practice. So far from committing to EQUAL VALIDITY, Against Method is willing to accept only the following equality: to make progress, every system of thought sometimes needs 'irrational means such as propaganda, emotion, ad-hoc hypotheses, and appeal to prejudices of all kinds' (1975, p. 154). In later writings, Feyerabend distinguishes between forms of relativism he rejects, and forms of relativism he accepts. Interestingly enough, only the rejected forms involve EQUAL VALIDITY. Thus in Science in a Free Society (1978) Feyerabend distinguishes his own 'political relativism', that treats all cultures as politically equal, from so-called 'philosophical relativism, that is, the thesis that all traditions [and] theories ... are equally true or equally false ...' (1978, pp. 82-84) Conquest of Abundance rails against versions of relativism that treat cultures as 'equally truthful messengers of reality' or as 'equally successful' (1999, p. 122). Against all such views Feyerabend insists that 'not all approaches to 'reality' are successful' and that the success of cultures is 'a matter of empirical record, not of philosophical definitions' (1999, p. 215). The 'new' relativism of Conquest of Abundance is primarily ontological. Its core is the idea that 'Ultimate Reality ... is ineffable' and that the theoretical posits of religion and science – be they elementary particles, be they Gods – are so many attempts to cope in one's natural and social environment (1999, p. 145). But there is no suggestion here that all these theoretical posits are equally valid. What shall we do in light of this textual evidence? Shall we say that Bloor, Code and Feyerabend are not relativists after all, on the grounds that they reject EQUAL VALIDITY? That would be a problematic move. After all, these three authors are amongst our central exemplars for relativism. Not to forget that other key cardcarrying relativists across the humanities – from Barbara Herrnstein Smith (2018: p. 26) all the way to Hartry Field (2009: pp. 255-6) – also go to great lengths to distance their position from EQUAL VALIDITY. Note also that Christopher Herbert, the author of an extended study of 'Victorian Relativity', concludes a lengthy discussion of the issue with the remark: 'Nowhere does any "relativist", to my knowledge, assert that all views are equally valid ...' (Herbert 2001, loc. 440). Of course, if we want to break the link between relativism and EQUAL VALIDITY, we need to first understand why this link can seem natural. I submit the absolutists' underlying thought is as follows. The relativist says that all E-judgements are relative to epistemic frameworks. Assume that two such E-judgments, J1 and J2, based on two different epistemic frameworks, F1 and F2 respectively, contradict one another. The relativist endorses the following claim (*) concerning such situation: (*) J1 and J2 can, at best, be 'relatively right,' that is, right relative to their respective frameworks, F1 and F2. F1 and F2 in turn can also only be 'relatively 5 right': there is no way to evaluate them other than by using F1 and F2, or same other framework; and none of these frameworks is absolutely correct. Some absolutists think that to call J1, J2, F1 and F2 merely 'relatively right' is in fact to maintain that they are not right at all. And this makes it natural to claim that J1, J2, F1 and F2 are equally valid: they are equally valid in not being valid. From the absolutist's perspective this reading of the relativist's position makes sense. But it does beg the argument against the relativist: for the relativist, the denial of absolute correctness is no denial of correctness per se. Other absolutists reason differently. They focus on the fact that relativists see the structure of justification of J1 and J2 as parallel: J1 is justified in light of F1, and J2 is justified in light of F2. Likewise for F1 and F2: both can be justified internally, F1 from within F1, F2 from within F2, in parallel ways, say, by considerations of coherence, or based on intuition. As the absolutists see it, if the relativists take the structure of justification to be parallel in this way, then the relativists must also think of J1 and J2 on the one hand, and F1 and F2 on the other hand, as equally valid. Still, the relativist will demur here too: claims concerning the equal validity of epistemic frameworks presuppose a perspective beyond epistemic frameworks. But this is precisely the sort of perspective the relativist denies. All assessments of epistemic frameworks are framework-bound. And whether or not two epistemic frameworks are regarded as equally valid depends upon the standards of the evaluating framework. Absolutists will not be satisfied with this answer. They will pose a further question: What can the relativist say about a situation in which her own epistemic framework, say F1, embodies epistemic relativism? Is the relativist not forced to accept F2 as equally valid? No. The relativist is committed to denying that her own – or indeed any other – framework is absolutely valid. But again, to insist that 'not absolutely valid' implies 'equally valid' just begs the question. IV Dogmas and Stances. In The Empirical Stance (2002), Bas van Fraassen suggests that at least some philosophical positions are primarily not 'doctrines' but 'stances', that is, bundles or systems of values, emotions, policies and preferences. This is not to deny that doctrines or beliefs can also be part and parcel of stances. And yet, within a stance, beliefs take second seat, and can be replaced without changing the commitments to values, emotions, policies and preferences. van Fraassen claims that empiricism and materialism are best understood as stances in this sense. In two forthcoming book chapters (Kusch 2019a; 2019b) I have argued – without knowledge of Baghramian's paper – that at least some forms of relativism are best rendered as stances. My cases in point are Bloor's 'Sociology of Scientific Knowledge' and Feyerabend's 'epistemological anarchism'. I shall not repeat these interpretations here. I mention them only in order to underline the depth of my agreement with Baghramian's main thesis. Still, in the spirit of fostering debate over the strengths and weaknesses of our proposals, I shall highlight three quibbles concerning Baghramian's take. 6 First, I think there is reason to prefer van Fraassen's distinction between 'doctrine' and 'stance' over Baghramian's opposition between the 'problems-ofphilosophy approach' and the 'philosophy-of-life approach'. On the problems-ofphilosophy approach, philosophy is 'seen as the study of the most abstract and fundamental questions'; on the philosophy-of-life approach 'the role of philosophy is to provide a framework and set of tools for thinking and living better' (p. 3). This foregrounds a difference between fundamental and abstract questions on the one hand, and policies for research and living on the other hand. This makes it sound as if the former approach were concerned with deep and the latter with superficial issues. I am also unhappy with the very term 'philosophy-of-life approach'. At least the German term 'Lebensphilosophie' is historically tainted because of its close association with forms of irrationalism, biologism and racism in late nineteenth-andearly-twentieth century German-speaking philosophy, including the Nazi period. Of course, a good many philosophers think that relativism is tantamount to irrationalism – but we should not decide this issue by the choice of our terms. Second, it is worth pointing out that characterizing relativism as a stance has often played a negative role. That is to say, absolutists have often portrayed relativism as a deeply problematic and dangerous 'stance' or 'attitude' towards politics, science, and rational conversation. Simon Blackburn for example, calls relativists 'abusers of their mind and enemies of ours' (2005, p. 139), 'dehumanising' (2005, p. 69), featuring a 'soggy, tolerant, happy-clappy attitude' (2005, p. xvi), 'monster[s]' (2005, p. 68), or advocates of intellectual 'perversions' (2005, p. 137): The relativist reflection is dehumanising. Its attitude, including its light irony, is the stance of someone above the fray, someone who has seen through the debates and engagements of ordinary participants. But this stance is demeaning and impoverished ... (Blackburn 2007, no page numbers). Or think of Zac, the muddle-headed relativist of Timothy Williamson's Tetralogue (2015) who proclaims: 'Sarah, you're trying to reduce relativism to a formula. It's more like an attitude to life.' (2015, loc. 504-5) The core of this attitude is tolerance. Williamson lets Zac's interlocutors trash this idea; one interlocutor gets to compare Zac's stance to that of a rapist (2015, loc. 1429), another to that of a dishonest car salesman (2015, loc. 2190). Call this the 'negative use of the stance-idea'. Baghramian and I concur in trying out the opposite path, a 'positive use'. We both choose the largely overlooked option of presenting relativism as a plausible stance of sorts and in a more positive light. But we should not forget that there is a further option in the neighbourhood of our efforts: the option of interpreting absolutism or anti-relativism as stances.3 Absolutists too can believe that 'the role of philosophy is to provide a framework and set of tools for thinking and living better'. They often put a high value on protecting the sciences and morality from social ills; they frequently commit to the idea of an unlimited undivided community of rational beings; they characteristically are fearful of anything that might seem to undermine the rule of reason; and they often oppose naturalism and empiricism. Right or wrong – first and foremost these are values, emotions, policies and preferences. 7 My third and final comment on stances concerns not whether relativism or absolutism are stances, but whether taking all philosophical positions to be stances commits one to meta-philosophical relativism. Baghramian takes this to be obvious (p. 5). But it seems to me that it all depends on the degree to which one takes rationality to be internal to stances and variable from one stance to the next.4 van Fraassen himself ties the stance-idea to his 'epistemic voluntarism', a minimalist but absolutist conception of what rationality demands: logical consistency and probabilistic coherence. Elsewhere (Kusch 2019a; 2019b) I have urged a more radical version of epistemic voluntarism according to which consistency and coherence too are values that can vary in importance from stance to stance. The resulting position is obviously more radically relativist than van Fraassen's. Be this as it may, it is worth mentioning that philosophers who have tried out the stance-idea have typically ended up accepting something of a relativistic stand-off between philosophical positions (cf. Chakravartty 2017; Dilthey 1911; Simmel 1900). V Virtues and Vices. I now turn to discussing Baghramian's intriguing comments on the relationship between epistemic relativism on the one hand, and epistemic virtues or vices on the other hand. Baghramian starts from the observation that card-carrying relativists like Bloor, Code, Feyerabend, or Hans Kelsen (1948), frequently make the following two claims: first, that relativism motivates, or even embodies, certain epistemic virtues that everyone – relativist and absolutist – finds desirable; and, second, that absolutism tends to motivate, or even embody, certain epistemic vices that everyone finds undesirable. (pp. 6-10) On Baghramian's reading of these paradigmatic relativists, they take absolutism to be an 'obvious vice' that is best countered by relativism (p. 7). Relativists' belief that 'absolutism is an obvious vice' is, as Baghramian sees it, underwritten by the idea that 'political', 'religious' and 'philosophical absolutisms' are closely intertwined. Baghramian supports her view with a passage from Kelsen: [Political absolutism] has in fact the unmistakable tendency to use [philosophical absolutism] as an ideological instrument. ... [Moreover] almost all outstanding representatives of a relativistic philosophy were politically in favour of democracy, whereas followers of philosophical Absolutism, the great metaphysicians, were in favour of political absolutism and against democracy. (Kelsen 1948, pp. 909-911) Baghramian is not convinced. In her view the philosophical absolutisms of, say, Frege and Hegel are not vicious. She also reminds us that many progressive thinkers (like Chomsky) have been anti-relativists, and that some fascists (like Mussolini) called themselves 'relativists' (p. 8). Relativists might regroup and focus less on the alleged vice of absolutism, and more on specific epistemic virtues. Baghramian notes that Code and Feyerabend in particular present tolerance, open-mindedness and fair-mindedness as virtues that come natural to the relativist. Baghramian sums up the relativist's train of thought as follows: 8 What better way to give at least some credence to the ideas and beliefs of other people ... than by accepting them as true or warranted relative to differing but equally legitimate contexts of assessment? (p. 9) Some relativist authors also claim to be the true champions of 'intellectual curiosity' or the true opponents of 'intellectual rigidity'. Again this is so because 'the relativist gives equal credence to the truth (rational acceptability, justificatory standards) of differing positions and beliefs' (p. 9). Arguments in favour of a close link between relativism on the one hand, and 'intellectual humility and modesty' on the other hand, take an analogous route. Baghramian even considers the possibility that relativists might claim to be ideally placed to combat testimonial injustice: 'the relativist stance, in the sense of equal validity, ... will give credence to all testimony' and thereby hear the voices of the marginalized (p. 11). Baghramian rejects all of these proposals concerning a natural affinity between epistemic virtues and relativism. Relativism does not lead to open-mindedness since, for the relativist, her own beliefs are true 'for herself', and the points of views of others are true for them: 'to each according her own epistemic stance' (p. 10). This leaves everyone with their respective truths, and there is no need to ever transcend one's own stance. To make matters worse, relativists tend to champion 'incommensurability'; and once incommensurability is accepted, communication between different frameworks becomes impossible. (p. 10-1) Baghramian suggests a similar argument against a natural fit between humility and relativism. EQUAL VALIDITY means not only that my viewpoint is no better than any other; it also means that my viewpoint is no worse. It is easy to see that this line of thinking must end up very far from humility. No-one has anything to learn from occupants of other frameworks. And what goes for humility also applies to curiosity (pp. 11). As if all this was not bad enough, Baghramian goes further by insisting that relativism is prone to encourage epistemic vices. In suggesting that many unresolvable disagreements are faultless, relativists undermine the ability to 'discriminate between good and bad, right and wrong, better and worse alternatives' (p. 12). Relativists tend to lack conviction, to be irresolute, and to slide into 'epistemic insouciance'. The last-mentioned category has been introduced by Quassim Cassam (2018). He defines it as 'a casual lack of concern about whether one's beliefs have any basis in reality or are adequately supported by the best available evidence' (2018: 1). Cassam links this vice to 'post-truth politics' and Harry Frankfurt's little classic On Bullshit (2005). The bullshitter 'is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. ... He does not care whether the things he says describe reality correctly' (Frankfurt 2005: 55-6; Cassam 2018: 4). Needless to say, it is all too easy to find this personality type in our current political world. VI Replies. I now turn to some comments. I welcome reflection on the relationship between epistemic relativism and virtue epistemology, and Baghramian deserves credit for having opened up this interesting new testing ground for relativism and its 9 opponents. I also think it an excellent idea to connect the conception of philosophical positions as stances to the notion of virtues. Going beyond Baghramian's paper, one might ask whether the clash between two epistemic frameworks is not often best rendered as a confrontation between different sets of epistemic virtues – rather than as a conflict between epistemic norms or beliefs. Consider for instance the standard test-case of relativism-debates, the conflict between Galileo Galilei and Cardinal Bellarmine. Paul Boghossian describes their differences by saying that Bellarmine accepted, while Galileo rejected, an epistemic principle to the effect that Biblical revelation gives us knowledge about the heavens (Boghossian 2006). The virtue-theoretical alternative would focus instead on the different epistemic virtues and vices Galileo and Bellarmine valued or detested most. It seems plausible to say that for Bellarmine ethical and religious virtues (like faith, hope, and love) interacted closely with epistemic values, and made him give special weight to intellectual humility in astronomical and biblical matters (Broderick 1961). Galileo was also deeply religious but in studying the natural world he put great emphasis on the epistemic virtues of curiosity, freedom from preconceptions, boldness and courage (Blackwell 1991). Of course, Bellarmine and Galileo ultimately also differed in their beliefs about the heavens, but perhaps these differing beliefs were the result of the exercise of conflicting virtues. Or perhaps the two men were stuck in a regress of sorts: they were unable to agree on facts since they disagreed on epistemic virtues; and they were unable to agree on epistemic virtues since they disagreed on the facts.5 I am also in Baghramian's camp as concerns the links between philosophical relativism or absolutism on the one hand, and progressive, conservative, or dictatorial regimes on the other hand. It would be an interesting exercise to try to quantify the political allegiances of relativists and absolutists, but in the absence of such a study there is good reason to suspend judgment on this matter. Turning from areas of agreement to more contentious issues, I struggle to concur with Baghramian's comments on Hegel and Frege. She refers to these two philosophers as evidence for the claim that not all forms of absolutism can easily be characterized as vicious (p. 8). I shall discuss the two men in turn, and begin with Hegel. Needless to say, I will only have space here to make an initial case for further investigation of the issue. I am a bit at a loss as to what would count as 'vicious' for Baghramian in this context. But the following count as vicious in my book: Hegel sought to legitimize the repressive Prussian monarchy by declaring Prussia to be the most developed state in world history; his conception of world-history naturally lent itself to a justification of colonialism; he declared women to be naturally subordinate to men; and he compared women to plants, governed by feeling, not reason. The fact that Hegel presented these views as part of a philosophical system capturing the absolute no doubt helped in giving them considerable political and intellectual weight (Hegel 1970; 1971; 1991). As far as Frege is concerned, I shall leave aside his notorious 1924 diary with its extreme right-wing political, misogynist and anti-Semitic views (Gabriel and Kienzler 1996). Truth be told, I find it difficult to connect these views to Frege's work in logic. But this does not let Frege escape scot-free. After all, there are first-rate logicians 10 who find Frege's logical absolutism deeply problematic. For instance, in his intriguing paper 'Logic and Reasoning' (2008), Johan van Benthem describes Frege's absolutist understanding of logic in this way: ... logical consequence is an eternal relationship between propositions, firmly cleansed from any mud or blood stains, smells, or sounds that human inferences might have ... in some eternal realm where the sun of Pure Reason never sets ... (2008, p. 68) van Benthem goes on to argue that Fregean logical absolutism stood and stands in the way of logicians addressing a range of important topics that require a close interaction between logic, psychology and the social sciences. For van Benthem, and contrary to Frege, logic is the study of situational reasoning, often involving multiagent interaction and group phenomena. Interestingly enough, there is a strong pluralism – if not relativism – in van Benthem's position: My view is that there remains one logic, but not in any particular definition of logical consequence, or any favoured logical system. The unity of logic, like that of other creative disciplines, resides in the mentality of its practitioners, and their modus operandi. (2008, p. 82) Of course, van Benthem is just one of many influential voices in logic today. But it is noteworthy that logicians disagree over the question whether Frege's absolutism is unproblematic. Moving on from absolutism in general to epistemic virtues and vices, I am struck that in investigating the links between relativism, virtues and vices, Baghramian restricts her attention only to the most implausible versions of relativism, that is, versions committed to EQUAL VALIDITY and other unsavoury ideas. Moreover, I do not believe that relativism or absolutism can be distinguished in terms of virtues or vices like open-mindedness, tolerance, courage, steadfastness, or insouciance. There are many absolutists who display these virtues and vices, and many absolutists who do not. And the same is true for relativists. Neither absolutism nor relativism has a special claim to these virtues, and neither absolutism nor relativism is guilty of fostering these vices.6 This is a big claim, and I will be able to offer only scant evidence. Consider tolerance for example. Surely the absolutist can make it a matter of absolute principle to tolerate other people's views that contradict her own, and she can do so even while taking her own respective beliefs to be absolutely true. Or the absolutist might be a fallibilist or 'gradualist' by assuming that the beliefs of humankind will be absolutely true only in the long run. Even an absolutist skepticism might underwrite tolerance. The absolutist skeptic denies that we can ever discover the absolute truths that are 'there anyway'. Relativism too can give support to tolerance, and without any appeal to EQUAL VALIDITY. Relativist tolerance might simply be motivated by the thoughts, first, that one's own beliefs are true or justified only relative to a framework of standards, virtues or values, and second, that similar such frameworks – especially those in the sciences – have frequently been overthrown in the past. Honestly facing up to the 11 existing problems in her own web of beliefs, and system of standards, the relativist might well have good reason to learn from others and even when their webs and systems are incompatible with her own. Not even a commitment to incommensurability need undermine relativist tolerance, at least not if we understand incommensurability with Kuhn, Feyerabend and van Fraassen not as something which makes communication impossible but merely as a phenomenon that makes communication difficult and challenging. As we saw above, Baghramian goes out of her way to show that relativism undermines rather than supports open-mindedness. Her central premise in so arguing is that, for the relativist, all his views are true-for-him, and all others' views are true-for-them. And yet, if the relativist's views are already true-for-him, he has no reason to pay attention to what others believe. And thus there is no need for the relativist to ever transcend his own framework, there is no need for the relativist to be open-minded. The argument is valid, but the premise is too uncharitable for comfort. Baghramian ties the relativist to an implausible principle of self-vindication: (SELF-VINDICATION) For every framework, all beliefs held by people using this framework are true relative to this framework. At one stage she even commits relativism to a relativistic form of infallibilism (p.11): (INFALLIBILISM) S's believing that p guarantees that p is true for S. Did any relativist ever hold this view? Perhaps Protagoras did, but I cannot think of anyone doing so in the realm of epistemology ever since. Sensible relativists surely allow that one may be mistaken in one's judgement that a given belief is justified (by one's standards). Sensible relativists leave room for learning and for recognizing that their standards are inconsistent either with each other or with one of their beliefs, preferences or desires. Sensible relativists are thus ready to replace standards, and to incorporate standards or beliefs from other frameworks. Of course, in so doing, the relativist's epistemic actions are guided by (some) of her current standards. It follows that, just like the absolutist, so also the relativist can be open-minded, and ready to 'transcend her own standpoint', if that means coming to realize – using one's own standpoint – that this standpoint does not work as well as one would like it to work. To make it a matter of definition that relativists cannot do so, is to deny that self-proclaimed relativists like Bloor, Code, Feyerabend or Field really deserve to be called 'relativists'. But again, if these authors do not qualify, who does? Baghramian's case against relativistic humility and curiosity has the same problematic structure as her discussion of relativistic open-mindedness. Again the relativist is committed to EQUAL VALIDITY and SELF-VINDICATION, and again the conclusion is that the relativist has no reason to pay attention to the views of others. Baghramian's attempts to show that relativism lacks epistemic virtues all assume that relativism is epistemologically vicious: a fully relativistic viewpoint has to be intolerant, close-minded, and rigid. As if this was not bad enough, Baghramian also ties relativism to other, further epistemic vices such as lack of conviction or epistemic insouciance. One might wonder whether she does not overshoot the target here: after all, she ends up committing the relativist to character-dispositions 12 that are incompatible. Thus when rejecting the relativists' claim to openmindedness, she paints them as rigid, close-minded, and inflexible. But later, when reflecting on epistemic vices, she faults relativists for lacking conviction altogether. Perhaps these tensions do not worry Baghramian. Perhaps she can simply respond by saying: 'So much the worse for relativists! They cannot even develop a coherent set of dispositions.' Baghramian is not alone of course in linking relativism to phenomena of 'posttruth', 'post-fact', or 'truth decay' in contemporary political culture, and especially in the U.S. Her main focus is on 'epistemic insouciance'. Her thought seems to be that since the relativist does not believe in absolute truth, he must end up thinking that 'anything goes'. And the person believing that anything goes naturally concludes that there is little point in finding out how things really are, little point to believe in facts, little point to rationally argue, and little point to relying on scientific experts' testimony. Instead, there is every reason to do and say whatever one feels like, and whatever serves one's short-term political or other interests. In other words, for Baghramian relativism is the raison d'être of politicians like Boris Johnson and Donald Trump. Or, as Daniel Dennett puts it in a memorable phrase: relativists should finally own up to the 'evil' they have caused (Cadwalladr 2017). There is no denying that this analysis has become a familiar trope in much contemporary critique of post-truth politics. But is it true? The key question seems to be how we get from relativism to 'anything goes'. This could be discussed again in terms of EQUAL VALIDITY, but here I want to focus on a different aspect. The shortest route from relativism to 'anything goes' is to add a further element to relativism, namely ARBITRARY CHOICE: (ARBITRARY CHOICE) Assume an epistemic subject S, information I, known to S, and a belief B that S would like to hold. S is epistemically blameless if S picks such epistemic standards E as make holding B epistemically rational. The choice of E is unconstrained by other epistemic standards. Paul Boghossian and Crispin Wright see ARBITRARY CHOICE as an essential element in epistemic relativism (Boghossian 2001, pp. 30-1; Wright 2008, p. 388). And if relativists are committed to ARBITRARY CHOICE then it is natural for them to slide into insouciance. If you can make anything come out rational, all efforts to rationalize our beliefs will seem superfluous and silly. One might as well make it all up. All true – but, it seems to me irrelevant to the assessment of, say, the relativistic views of Bloor, Code, Feyerabend, Field (or my own). None of these authors accepts ARBITRARY CHOICE, not even Feyerabend. Feyerabend's slogan 'anything goes' does not say: do whatever you like, it's all justifiable; it says that all principles of scientific rationality have exceptions, such that it is sometimes rationally defensible – in order to achieve scientific progress – to intentionally go against them. Bloor is not guilty of ARBITRARY CHOICE either, though he defends a principle that, read superficially, looks similar (Barnes and Bloor 1982): (CONTINGENT CHOICE) Assume an epistemic subject S, and information I, known to S. Which beliefs S will take to be rationally permissible or obligatory will depend upon two interrelated sets of contingencies: the locally, socially and 13 historically entrenched and available epistemic standards E and the locally operative goals, values and interests of S and others in S's community. This is not an epistemic principle telling epistemic subjects how to act; it is a descriptive claim and causal hypothesis about how epistemic communities function. It does not give us a licence to rationalize whatever we want to rationalize. It tells us how we reason when trying to convince one another. Reflecting on CONTINGENT CHOICE can help us understand what is wrong about epistemic insouciance: the bullshitter follows the absolutist critics of relativism in conflating contingency with arbitrariness. He thinks that unless there are absolutes and metaphysical necessities, nothing really matters. If there are no absolutes, everything is permitted. It's Karamazov all over again. What can relativists do to defend our societies against the bullshitters? Should they go back to absolutism? Of course, relativists will answer 'no'. To go back to absolutism in order to defeat bullshitters would itself be to operate on the basis of ARBITRARY CHOICE. And this is not how epistemology functions in most of our philosophical traditions. Epistemology is not the slave of our political aspirations. We cannot pick our epistemic positions so as to defeat Johnson and Trump. This is not how we think about knowledge. CONTINGENT CHOICE directs our attention elsewhere: we need to bring together and defend anew hard-won, but entrenched standards of virtuous epistemic conduct; we need to remind each other how and why these standards have proven useful in our past; and we need to update these standards in light of our current intellectual challenges. And, most of all, we need to understand the changes in our social fabric: the increasing polarisations (economic, political, ethnic) in our Western societies, the (at least initially) unintended blurring of the divide between opinion and fact in old and new media, or the decline in respect for, and trust in, politicians or the press (Kavanagh and Rich 2018). To defeat the bullshitters we need to dig deeper and deeper into these contingencies, these local and variable structures and values. VII Conclusion. In this paper I have tried to comment on central themes of Baghramian's 'The Virtues of Relativism'. I have focused on EQUAL VALIDITY, stances, epistemic virtues and vices. I am only too aware that I have no more than scratched the surface of these complex issues. But I hope to have said enough to motivate further – and perhaps even a little more charitable – reflections on the relativist position.7 REFERENCES Baghramian, Maria 2004: Relativism. London, New York: Routledge. Barnes, Barry and David Bloor 1982: 'Relativism, Rationalism and the Sociology of Knowledge'. In: In Martin Hollis and Steven Lukes (eds.) Rationality and Relativism, pp. 21-47. Oxford: Blackwell. Blackburn, Simon 2001: 2005: Truth: A Guide. Oxford: OUP. 14 ---------2007: 'Outlooks on Enlightenment'. New Humanist, https://newhumanist.org.uk/articles/490/outlooks-on-enlightenment Blackwell, Richard J. 1991: Galileo, Bellarmine, and the Bible. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press. Bloor, David 1991: Knowledge and Social Imagery Chicago, Ill.: Chicago UP. ---------2007: 'Epistemic Grace: Antirelativism as Theology in Disguise'. Common Knowledge, 13/2-3, pp. 250-80. ---------2011: 'Relativism and the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge'. In: Steven Hales (ed.) The Oxford Companion to Relativism, pp. 433-55. Oxford: WileyBlackwell. Boghossian, Paul 2001: 'How are Objective Epistemic Reasons Possible?' Philosophical Studies, 106, pp. 1–40. ---------2006: Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Broderick, James 1961: Robert Bellarmine: Saint and Scholar. Westminster, MD.: Newman Press. Cadwalladr, C. 2017: 'Daniel Dennett: "I Begrudge Every Hour I have to Spend Worrying about Politics"'. The Observer, February 12th, 2017. Cassam, Quassim 2018: 'Epistemic Insouciance'. Journal of Philosophical Research, forthcoming. Quoted from http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/97658/ Chakravartty, Anjan 2017: Scientific Ontology: Integrating Naturalized Metaphysics and Voluntarist Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Code, Lorraine 1995: 'Must a Feminist Be a Relativist After All?' In: Code, Rhetorical Spaces: Essays on Gendered Locations, pp. 185-207. New York: Routledge. Dilthey, Wilhelm 1911: Die Typen der Weltanschauung und ihre Ausbildung in den Metaphysischen Systemen. Berlin: Reichl. Feyerabend, Paul 1975: Against Method: Outline of an Anarchistic Theory of Knowledge. London: New Left Books. ---------1978: Science in a Free Society. London: New Left Books. ---------1999: Conquest of Abundance. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Frank , Phillip 1952: Wahrheit: relativ oder absolut? Zürich: Pan-Verlag. Field, Hartry 2009: 'Epistemology Without Metaphysics'. Philosophical Studies, 143: pp. 249-90. Frankfurt, Harry 2005: On Bullshit, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton UP. Gabriel, Gottfried and Wolfgang Kienzler (eds.) 1994: 'Diary: Written by Professor Dr Gottlob Frege in the Time from 10 March to 9 April 1924'. Inquiry, 39, pp. 303-342. Harding, S. 1991: Whose Science? Whose Knowledge? Thinking from Women's Lives, Ithaca. N.Y.: Cornell University Press. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 1970: Philosophy of Nature (Part Two of the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences). Transl. by John Petry, London: George Allen and Unwin. ---------1971: Philosophy of Mind (Part Three of the Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences). Transl. by William Wallace, Oxford: Clarendon Press. ---------1991: The Encyclopaedia Logic (Part One of the Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences). Transl. by. Theodore F. Geraets, Wal Suchting, and Henry Silton Harris, Indianapolis: Hackett. 15 Herbert, Christopher 2001: Victorian Relativity: Radical Thought and Scientific Discovery. Chicago, Ill.: Chicago University Press, Kindle-version. Herrnstein Smith, Barbara 2018: Practicing Relativism in the Anthropocene: Science, Belief and the Humanities. London: Open Humanities Press. Kavanah, Jennifer and Michael D. Rich 2018: Truth Decay: An Initial Exploration of the Diminishing Role of Facts and Analysis in American Public Life. Santa Monica, Cal.: RAND. Kelsen, Hans 1948: 'Absolutism and Relativism in Philosophy and Politics'. American Political Science Review, 42(5), pp. 906-14. Kusch, Martin 2019a: 'Epistemological Anarchism Meets Epistemic Voluntarism: Feyerabend's Against Method and van Fraassen's The Empirical Stance'. Forthcoming in a volume on Feyerabend ed. by Bschir Karim and Jamie Shaw, and published by CUP. ---------2019b: 'Stances, Voluntarism, Relativism'. Forthcoming in: Dominik Finkelde and Paul Livingston. New Essays on Objectivity. Berlin, New York: DeGruyter. Simmel, George 1900: Philosophie des Geldes. Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot. van Benthem, Johan 2008: 'Logic and Reasoning: Do the Facts Matter?' Studia Logica, 88, pp. 67-84. van Fraassen, Bas 2002: The Empirical Stance. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Williamson, Timothy 2015: Tetralogue: I'm Right, You're Wrong. Oxford: OUP, Kindle-version. Wright, Crispin 2008: 'Fear of Relativism?' Philosophical Studies, 141, pp. 379–390. Footnote 1 David Bloor and Barry Barnes flesh this out as follows: 'For the relativist there is no sense attached to the idea that some standards or beliefs are really rational as distinct from merely locally accepted as such. ... he thinks that there are no contextfree or super-cultural norms of rationality ...' (Barnes and Bloor 1982: 27). Barnes and Bloor's 'really rational' is another expression for my 'absolutely correct.' 2 As we shall see below, very strong forms of EQUAL VALIDITY play an essential role in Baghramian's argument against the virtues of relativism. 3 Baghramian's discussion of the virtues of absolutism seem to commit her to this view, even though she never states it explicitly. 4 Put differently, the absolutist and relativist differ on the question of the extent to which there are neutral modes of assessment of stances. As well shall see later, Baghramian assumes that there are stance-neutral standards of virtue that allow us to adjudicate between the relativist and absolutist stances. The relativist insists that virtues too can only be understood and assessed relative to frameworks or stances. 5 It is exactly such regress that Baghramian seems to ignore. She assumes that virtues form a neutral background for assessing relativism and absolutism. 16 6 I take this to be a disagreement between Baghramian and me. I take her to align relativism with epistemic vices, and to reject the suggestion that a relativist could do embody epistemic virtues. 7 For comments I am grateful to Delia Belleri and Guy Longworth. -Work on this paper was supported by ERC Advanced Grant #339382.

LOGOS & EPISTEME X, 3 (2019): 245-261 INNER SPEECH AND METACOGNITION: A DEFENSE OF THE COMMITMENT-BASED APPROACH Víctor FERNÁNDEZ CASTRO ABSTRACT: A widespread view in philosophy claims that inner speech is closely tied to human metacognitive capacities. This so-called format view of inner speech considers that talking to oneself allows humans to gain access to their own mental states by forming metarepresentation states through the rehearsal of inner utterances (section 2). The aim of this paper is to present two problems to this view (section 3) and offer an alternative view to the connection between inner speech and metacognition (section 4). According to this alternative, inner speech (meta)cognitive functions derivate from the set of commitments we mobilize in our communicative exchanges. After presenting this commitment-based approach, I address two possible objections (section 5). KEYWORDS: inner speech, metacognition, commitments 1. Introduction: Talking to Oneself Metacognition or thinking about thinking is a fundamental human cognitive capacity.1 This capacity is devoted to evaluating, predicting or modifying our cognitive performances, so it endows us with a unique cognitive and behavioral flexibility and adaptability. Several authors have claimed that there is a constitutive connection between these metacognitive capacities and the linguistic ability of talking to oneself,2 so humans are able to flexibly modify, regulate and access their cognitive processes because they are able to structure their own mental states in a linguistic format through self-directed talk. This so-called format view of inner speech3 claims that capturing our mental states in linguistic format allows 1 Michael T. Cox, Anita Raja, and Eric Horvitz, eds., Metareasoning. Thinking about Thinking (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2011); John Dunlosky and Janet Metcalfe, eds. Metacognition (Los Angeles: SAGE Publications, 2019). 2 Daniel C. Dennett, Consciousness Explained (London: The Penguin Press, 1991); Ray Jackendoff, The architecture of the language faculty (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1997); Andy Clark, Being there (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1997); Jose Luis Bermudez, Thinking without words (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). 3 Fernando Martínez-Manrique and Agustín Vicente, "The activity view of inner speech," Frontiers in psychology 6 (2015): 232. Víctor Fernández Castro 246 us to acquire the metarepresentational capacities underlying the unique human metacognitive competence of modifying and accessing our own mental states The aim of this paper is to defend an alternative to the format view as a theory of the connection between inner speech and metacognition. The alternative I put forward is based on a Commitment-Based approach to communication and inner speech according to which the main purpose of communication is to establish commitments and entitlements to coordinate agents; so, the cognitive function of inner speech derivate from this social function of outer speech. The structure of the papers goes as follows: Firstly, I present the format view along with two objections (section 2 and 3). These objections challenge two central ideas of the format view: (1) the notion of metacognition as access, and (2) the idea that metacognition requires metarepresentations. In section 4 and 5, I introduce the commitment-based view and how it can account for the different cognitive functions associated with metacognition. Finally, in section 6, I address two possible objections to the alternative. 2. The Format View of Inner Speech Inner speech is often defined as the phenomenon we experience when talking silently to ourselves. The contemporary interest on the phenomenon starts with the publication in English of the work of the Soviet psychologist Lev Vygotsky who, after realizing that children systematically talk to themselves out loud (private speech), started to study the role of private and inner speech in the development of high cognitive capacities.4 In contemporary psychology, the research on private and inner speech has resulted into different studies that connect inner speech with different cognitive capacities, including conscious control, working memory and attention.5 Besides this empirical evidence, there are different debates on the format, nature, and function of inner speech.6 The fundamental question underlying those 4 Lev S. Vygotsky, Thought and language (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1984, Original work published 1934). 5 Rafale Diaz and Laura Berk, eds. Private speech: From social interaction to self-regulation (Hillsdale, N.J.: L. Erlbaum, 1992); Daniel Gregory "Inner speech, imagined speech, and auditory verbal hallucinations,"Review of Philosophy and Psychology 7,3 (2016): 653–673; Adam Winsler, Charles Fernyhough and Ignacio Montero, eds. Private speech, executive functioning, and the development of verbal self-regulation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 6 Martínez-Manrique and Vicente, "What the...! The role of inner speech in conscious thought,"Journal of Consciousness Studies 17 (2010): 141–167; Keith Frankish,"Evolving the linguistic mind,"Linguistic and Philosophical Investigation 9 (2010): 206–214;Peter LanglandHassan, "Inner speech and metacognition: in search of a connection,"Mind & Language29 (2014): Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 247 debates is why do we talk to ourselves? A widespread answer in philosophy of mind maintains that we talk to ourselves in order to display metacognitive abilities, that is, we talk to ourselves to consciously access our own thoughts.7 This so-called format view of inner speech associates the function of our self-talk to some structural features of the linguistic format. The main thesis is that language, in virtue of these features, is the only representational vehicle that allows codifying mental states in a way that can be objects of further thoughts. In other words, language facilitates what Clark calls second-order dynamics. Language codifies thoughts that can be brought into working memory in a way that attention can be directed to them, and thus, be objects of conscious access. Although these authors share the perspective of inner speech as a metacognitive facilitator, they differ about which properties make language appropriate for such function. In this sense, for instance, Clark argues that the features of language that allows us to recruit it for cognitive purposes are its context-dependency and neutral modality.8 On the other hand, Bermudez considers that, given that all conscious access must be carried out on perceptual modality, language is the only representational vehicle that allows personal level conscious access and is, at the same time, a structured vehicle. Contrary to other personal vehicles as images, language is structured and compositional. Contrary to other structured vehicles as mentalese inner speech is a vehicle we can consciously access.9 Thus, inner speech is the only representational format that facilitates second-order dynamics to conceptually structured thoughts. This picture on inner speech face several problems related with some of its fundamental theses.10 However, the aim of this paper is to reveal the problems of the view regarding two fundamental assumptions; namely, how the model assigns a central role to metarepresentations in metacognitive capacities, and how metacognition is understood in terms of access to mental states or processes. First, according to the format view, when an agent experiences an episode of inner 511– 533; Peter Langland-Hassan and Agustin Vicente, eds. Inner Speech: New Voices (USA: Oxford University Press,2018). 7 Jose Luis Bermudez, Thinking without words; Andy Clark, Being there; Daniel C. Dennett, Consciousness Explained; Jackendoff, The architecture of the language faculty. 8 Clark, Being there, 178. 9 Jerry Fodor, The language of thought (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard university press, 1975) 10 Apart from Martínez-Manrique and Vicente, "The activity view of inner speech," the problems of the format view has been emphasized by Marta Jorba and Agustin Vicente, "Cognitive phenomenology, access to contents, and inner speech," Journal of Consciousness Studies 21, 9-10 (2014): 74-99; Víctor Fernández Castro, "Inner Speech in Action," Pragmatics & Cognition 23, 2 (2016): 238-258; or Bart Geurts, "Making sense of self talk," Review of Philosophy and Psychology 9, 2 (2018): 271-285. Víctor Fernández Castro 248 speech, for instance when someone utters silently a sentence such as 'the unemployment in Europe have decreased at the expense of worker's rights,' she can access her own mental state because, through the access of this internal episode, she can infer the state that she believes that the unemployment in Europe have decreased at the expense of worker's rights. So, metacognition requires forming representations about that mental state in order to perform other actions as controlling or regulating the state in question. This metacognitive capacity can be understood as a device that takes the content of an inner speech episode as an input and produce a metarepresentational state of the form 'I believe (desire, imagine) that P' as an output. Likewise, inner speech episodes allow us to access to our mental states as far as facilitates the generation of metarepresentations with the form 'S verbs P.' Understanding metacognition in metarepresentational terms is not new. As Proust has shown, considering that metacognitive capacities rely upon the ability to form metarepresentation is widely shared assumption in cognitive sciences and philosophy.11 The innovation of the format view, then, is connecting these metarepresentational capacities to inner speech and the capacity of putting thoughts in a linguistic format. Second, the format view is strongly committed to a particular notion of metacognition as access.12 Again, as Proust argues, most of the philosophical approaches to metacognition in philosophy and cognitive sciences assume that the second-order regulation and control of cognitive processes require the subject to be able to access, either through introspection or inference, to the contents of the first level processes and states. So, humans could not regulate, evaluate and modify their first-order mental processes and states without having access to such processes and states. In the format view, capturing our thoughts through inner episodes allow us 11 Joëlle Proust has examined this and other aspects the standard view of metacognition (see Joëlle Proust, "Metacognition," Philosophy Compass 5, 11 (2010): 989-998; The philosophy of metacognition: Mental agency and self-awareness (Oxford UK: Oxford University Press, 2013). She mentions as proponents of such standard view to John Flavell, "Metacognition and Cognitive Monitoring: A New Area of CognitiveDevelopmental Inquiry," American Psychologist 34 (1979): 906–911; Alan Leslie, "Pretense and Representation: The Origins of Theory of Mind,'' Psychological Review 94 (1987): 412–26; Josef Perner, Understanding the Representational Mind (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1991); Alison Gopnik, "How We Know Our Minds: The Illusion of First-Person Knowledge of Intentionality," Behavioral and Brain Sciences 16, 1 (1993): 1–15; Peter Carruthers, "Meta-cognition in Animals: A Skeptical Look," Mind and Language 23 (2008): 58–89; "How Do We Know Our Own Minds: The Relationship between Mindreading and Metacognition." Behavioral and Brain Sciences 32 (2009): 121–82 12 Joëlle Proust,"Metacognition and metarepresentation: is a self-directed theory of mind a precondition for metacognition?," Synthese 159, 2 (2007): 271-295. Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 249 to access our mental states and processes because we can self-ascribe such states by forming metarepresentation of the form 'I verb P.' So, inner speech episodes facilitate the second-order access our metacognitive capacities consist in. 3. Telepaths and the Young Rich Communist This section brings into focus two objections of the format view, which lay on the two aforementioned assumptions. That is, the idea that metacognition must be understood in terms of access and the idea that metacognition is carried out in a metarepresentational format. These two objections prepare the ground for defending the commitment-based approach I characterize in the next section. The first problem to the format view lies on the restricted power of the notion of metacognition as access to account for how inner speech make a difference for explaining the cognitive and behavioral flexibility associated to metacognition. In principle, the explanandum of a theory of this type must be to explain how inner speech, as long as it endows linguistic creatures with certain metacognitive capacities, can account for some of the patterns of actions and mental skills associated with thinking about thinking, for instance, cognitive flexibility or the capacity to evaluate and regulate actions. However, the format view seems to fail to achieve this objective. Although the format view gives a reasonable explanation of how a creature can access to her mental states, it is hardpressed to explain how this access is translated into certain special cognitive abilities. For instance, why the metacognitive capacities associated with inner speech facilitate the rise of cognitive regulation or flexibility. Part of the obstacle a defender of the format view must address is that, although the position claims that inner speech brings certain mental states into consciousness, it does not explain how this 'bringing mental states into consciousness' plays a role in regulating or evaluating firstorder processes. As McGeer argues, having access to our own mental states would play a role analogous to the role of a telepath that could read our mind, seeing our mental states and processes, but could not exercise any type of power to modify or regulate them.13 If the format theory aims to explain which function the inner speech plays in the acquisition of metacognitive capacities, the theory should not only explain how certain distinctive mental states or processes are produced, but also how accessing those states and processes make a difference for the type of abilities we usually associate with metacognition (control of attention, regulation, cognitive flexibility).14 In other words, monitoring our 13 Victoria McGeer, "The Moral Development of First‐Person Authority," European Journal of Philosophy 16, 1 (2007): 81-108. 14 See Proust, The philosophy of metacognition, 29-78. Víctor Fernández Castro 250 mental states is not sufficient for explaining the cognitive and behavioral flexibility associated with metacognition, and thus, the format view must be regarded as incomplete. A possible way out to this problem may appeal to the notion of metarepresentation. The defender of the format view could argue that the metarepresentational states that inner speech produces could modify certain pattern of behavior and cognition in a flexible way. For instance, image a physicist on the way home to finish an article that the editors of a journal have been waiting for. At the moment, she is entering her house, an utterance crosses her mind 'the dinner!' Suddenly, she remembers she has invited some friends for dinner and the fridge is empty. 'I gotta go to the grocery store.' The physicist changes her route and stops at the grocery store before going home. According to the format view, inner speech episodes could allow the agent to access her mental states (remembering that she has organized a dinner, the belief that the fridge is empty and the belief that she must go to the grocery store) in a way that she can abort her action of going home and trigger the action of walking toward the store. However, this solution does not solve the problem. Notice that explaining how behavioral and cognitive flexibility derivate from inner speech does not seem to necessarily rely on metarepresentational states. In principle, the physicist's cognitive processes can be carried out by first-order processes. The appropriate behavioral pattern can be triggered by bringing out the appropriate information without a self-ascription of the given mental states; for instance, bringing out the information that she should go to the store and that she has a dinner tonight rather than the self-attribution of such mental states. It is the mental states per se and not the self-attribution of these states what seems to play a role in the realization of the action. As Jorba and Vicenteargue, if the function of inner speech is to put on a propositional content in a format that allows our 'inner eye' to access the content, then the format theory explains how we can produce a metarepresentational state, e.g. 'I believe that P,' from an utterance with the content P.15 However, if the outcome of the cognitive processes involving inner speech episodes are secondorder states, it is difficult to see how they can affect the first order states that, after all, are the producers of the behavior at stake. As Marti nez-Manrique and Vicente say: [T]he model they propose seems to only be able to explain how IS gives us knowledge of what and how we think. Let's say that by using sentences of our language, we are able to have some kind of object before our minds. What do we 15 Jorba and Vicente, "Cognitive phenomenology, access to contents, and inner speech;" see also, Martínez-Manrique and Vicente, "The Activity View of Inner Speech." Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 251 gain with that? Presumably, we only gain knowledge about what we are thinking. We "see" the sentence, get its meaning, and reach the conclusion "ok, I'm thinking that p." This knowledge about what and how we are thinking may be very useful, of course, but we would say that this is only a use of IS, among many others. The account, in any case, does not explain how thought-contents are made access-conscious.16 That is to say, gaining access to our mental states by producing a selfascribed metarepresentational state does not account for how our actions or the first-order mechanism are monitored, evaluated or regulated. Furthermore, the format view does not seem to respect the way we experience the inner speech episodes. When our physicist talks to herself 'the dinner!' or 'I should go to the grocery store,' she is encouraging herself to perform the action in the same way she would do it when directing these sentences to someone else. In this sense, the type of experience associated with the inner speech act is analogous to the external speech act but it does not seem to bear any resemblance with our ascriptions of mental states as the emphasis on the metarepresentational aspects suggests. In this sense, the format view does not respect our intuitions regarding how we experience inner speech episodes. Certainly, the defenders of the format view could exploit other argumentative strategy. For instance, defending that the inner speech episodes that lead to self-ascriptions of the type 'I believe that P' or 'I desire that P' play a decisive role for a special kind of metacognition: future directed self-control. Future directed self-control requires evaluating our mental states and explore the type of genuine actions and processes that derivate from these ascriptions. In this sense, the defender of the format view could attribute to inner speech some kind of cognitive control over the behavioral consequences of their past, present and future mental states. Vierkant has illustrated this move through an example of Parfit where a young communist wins the lottery.17 The young communist knows that rich people uses to be conservative, so he considers that if he does not get rid of the money (donating), he will become someone who does not want to be in the future, a conservative. So, the young communist is in the difficult position of donating the money and stick her ideals, or enjoying a comfortable life but becoming someone that he now would detest. The kind of mental skills the young communist engages in his considerations require self-ascribing mental states to 16 Martínez-Manrique and Vicente, "The Activity View of Inner Speech," 4-5. 17 See Tillman Vierkant, "What metarepresentation is for," in The foundations of metacognition, eds. Michael Beran, Johannes Brandl, Josef Perner, and Joëlle Proust (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012). The example appears in Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984). Víctor Fernández Castro 252 himself and his future self, that is, metarepresentations. In this view, the defenders of the format view can embrace the idea that inner speech, as a producer of metarepresentations, will allow the young communist to attribute mental states to himself and his future self in order to evaluate which pattern of action to follow in the present given his attributions. This and analogous cases, where metacognitive capacities involve self-ascriptions, seem to be a plausible way for resisting the onslaughts against the format view. This brings me to the second objection. Notice that the rationale for the format view is that inner speech facilitates the detection of underlying mental states that, after being metarepresented, we can manipulate. This idea assumes that our inner speech episodes voice or express the causally efficacious mental states that compose our first-order processes. However, this idea conflicts with empirical evidence regarding the phenomena of confabulation.18 These studies show that humans are not always aware of the real causes of their actions, and in fact, they systematically provide ad hoc reasons to rationalize them. For instance, in the classic experiments carried out by Nisbett and Wilson, several subjects were asked which pair of panties they prefer and why. The panties were distributed on a table in a way that the subjects chose them by the distribution but they appeal to aspects such as the elasticity and the quality even though the panties were the same. These and other studies speak in favor of the idea that our reasons often are an instance of confabulation. Following this reasoning, it expectable to assume that our inner speech episodes do not necessarily voice our real mental states, and thus, it would be problematic to assume that the mental states the young communist attribute to his present self really reflect his mental states. Likewise, it is not clear how the mental states he ascribes to himself were real descriptions of his current mental states, and thus, played a causal role to modify his behavior for non-ending up being a conservative old person.19 Furthermore, even accepting the format view as an accurate explanation of this kind of metacognitive control, the explanatory power of the theory is too 18 Richard Nisbett and Timothy D. Wilson, "Telling more than we can know: Verbal reports on mental processes," Psychological review 84, 3 (1977): 231; Michael Gazzaniga, The mind's past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998); Timothy D. Wilson, Strangers to ourselves (Cambridge: Belknap. 2002); Thalia Wheatley, "Everyday confabulation," In Confabulation: views from neuroscience, psychiatry, psychology, and philosophy, ed. William Hirstein (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009). 19 Admittedly, not all versions of metacognition as access necessarily have troubles for explaining confabulation. An instance of this is Peter Carruthers, The opacity of mind: an integrative theory of self-knowledge (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011). However, they still would have to answer the telepath argument. Thanks to Tobias Störzinger for bringing my attention to this. Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 253 restricted. Although the cognitive function the young communist exercises could be accurately captured by the format view, the explanatory power of the theory is restricted to the cases involving metarepresentations, leaving aside cases where we directly control our first-order processes and behavior without such metarepresentations. As a conclusion, the format view cannot give a satisfactory explanation of how inner speech, as facilitator of second-order access, provides the acquisition of metacognitive capacities that regulate, modify or evaluate our cognition and behavior. 4. A Commitment-Based Approach to Inner Speech In the previous section, I offered several arguments against the format view of inner speech. The aim of this section is to provide an alternative to the format view. This alternative, known as commitment-based approach, has been recently proposed by Geurts as an appropriate understanding of the cognitive functions of inner speech.20 For the purpose of this article, I concentrate on how this approach can convincingly account for the role of inner speech in metacognition. The commitment-based approach starts from the idea that the functions of inner speech derivate from the functions that speech acts play in coordinating agents in social interactions.21 One way to capture how speech acts facilitate coordination between agents is by attending to how they modify the normative statuses of the speakers and her audience in terms of the commitments, duties and enabling conditions the speaker and audience undertake.22 For instance, Geurts presents the idea as follows: "Commitment is a sine qua non for action coordination: social agents must rely on each other to act in some ways and refrain from acting in others. Commitments are coordination devices, and the main purpose of communication is to establish commitments."23 Similarly, Kukla and Lance understand speech acts in terms of pragmatic input and outputs, where the 20 Geurts, "Making sense of self talk." 21 The idea that the function of inner speech derivates from the social function of outer speech is often traced back to Lev S. Vygotsky, Thought and language. For contemporary versions of these idea see Martínez-Manrique and Vicente, "The activity view of inner speech;" Jorba and Vicente, "Cognitive phenomenology, access to contents, and inner speech,"Fernández Castro, "Inner Speech in Action;" or Geurts, "Making sense of self talk." 22 Robert Brandom, Making it explicit: Reasoning, representing, and discursive commitment (Cambridge: Harvard university press, 1998); Rebecca Kukla and Mark Norris Lance, 'Yo!'and'Lo!': The Pragmatic Topography of the Space of Reasons (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009), Bart Geurts, "Communication as commitment sharing: speech acts, implicatures, common ground," Theoretical linguistics(2019). 23 Geurts, "Making sense of self talk," 8. Víctor Fernández Castro 254 inputs are a set of enabling conditions and the outputs are a set of commitments, duties and entitlement the speaker and the audience undertake when recognizing the force and content of the speech act. In these views, the commitments we undertook when performing a speech act can be seen in terms of new possibilities for action. For instance, If I promise to someone that I will go with her to the theater, I am expressing a set of commitments with particular patterns of actions, including being at the theater at the time we stipulate. Certainly, not all speech acts present these direct goal-oriented commitments but even when one performs an assertion, the speaker is exhibiting certain commitment with what is rationally and socially expected from this assertion. For example, if I assert that the ice of the lake is dangerously thin, I am committing myself with future patterns of actions my audience is entitled to expect: that I will not skate on the ice or that I will warn other people of the danger. In other words, asserting something is expressing certain commitments with actions that our audience may expect us to follow. Notice that carrying out a speech act does not necessarily involve we are in a particular mental state. As Geurts puts it: Commitments are obligations, and although they may be underwritten by suitable mental states, it is not necessary that they are. Insincere commitments are as binding as sincere ones, and there are unintended commitments, too. If I raise my hand at an auction, I thereby commit myself to be making a bid for whatever is currently under the hammer, even if I have no intention of doing so. True, I can try to get out of my commitment, for example, by arguing that I was only waving away a fly, but that presupposes there is a commitment to be undone.24 The patterns of actions associated with the commitments that follow from a particular speech act do not necessarily rely on the assumption that we are in particular mental state causally connected to these actions. Instead, the theory assumes that certain normative structures (rational and social) police our interactions in a way that connect the content of our commitments with such patterns of actions. For instance, we know what to expect from someone asserting that the ice is dangerously thin because we know what an agent ought to do in such circumstances given the rational and social structures that regulate our actions. The commitment-based approach can help us to explain the social functions of our speech acts. The main advantage of this view is that it can account of the role of our speech acts in social coordination without reducing them to a mere exchange of information. Given that, the view is better posed to explain the speech acts whose function cannot be explained in terms of the information they provide 24 Geurts, "Making sense of self talk," 9. Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 255 to the audience, that is, speech acts such as commands or promises, whose function does not seem to rely on how the audience gain certain piece of knowledge. Furthermore, the approach gives an automatic explanation of how our speech acts are connected to our social actions, so how they facilitate the coordination between speaker and audience. This theoretical apparatus allows us to account the cognitive functions of inner speech in terms of the social functions of outer speech. That is, the inner speech episodes play a functional role in our cognitive machinery that is analogous to the role that external speech acts play in our social interactions. When someone asserts internally that ice of the lake is too thin, one is giving rise to private commitments with what is followed from the ice of the lake being too thin. So, she can regulate her actions and align her mental states in accordance with the commitments associated with the content of the assertion. Similarly, when an agent privately commands something to herself go to the store, she gives rise to certain goal-directed commitment to perform the action of going toward the store. At this point, one may object that there is an important disanaology between outer and inner speech. Notice that, according to the commitment-based approach, the main function of communication is to coordinate agents. However, it is not entirely clear what exactly is the analog to coordination in the case of self-talk. In other words, if the function of inner speech derivate from the coordinating role of outer speech, then there must be a clear analog for coordination in the inner case. In order to address this challenge, one may argue that the function of outer speech for coordinating agents lies on the entitlements and commitments our speech instantiates. Once we learn how outer speech are associated to different patterns of action and cognition via those commitments and entitlement, we can rehearse such episodes in order to trigger the appropriate patterns.25 25 Further, one may argue that, as for the case of intentions, inner speech episodes, as prompters of commitments, can promote intra-personal coordination by aligning volitional attitudes and practical reasoning. For instance, if I say to myself 'I will take the bus earlier tomorrow', this episode can instantiate a commitment that will help me to align my desire-like attitude toward intending to take the bus with the practical reasoning capacities necessary to find the more rational way to perform the action. For such a view regarding intentions see Michael Bratman, Intention, plans, and practical reason (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987) and Elisabeth Pacherie, "Conscious Intentions: The Social Creation Myth," Open MIND 29 (2015). Víctor Fernández Castro 256 5. The Metacognitive Functions of Inner Speech This section aims to account for the metacognitive functions associated with inner speech without postulating second-order access mechanisms o metarepresentational capacities. To see the contrast, notice that the format view appeals to the representational information included in the inner speech episode that produces a metarepresentation of the agent being in certain mental state in order to explain cognitive and behavioral flexibility. As I argued before, the two fundamental problems of this view are that self-ascriptions do not necessarily involve the capacity of modifying our first-order mental processes and actions. So, we can conceive circumstances where an agent ascribes to himself a particular mental state but this ascription does not make any difference. Furthermore, we can conceive several circumstances where agents regulate their actions and mental processes without having access to these states. In other words, intervening our own cognition and action do not require metarepresenting or accessing our mental states. In order to see how the commitment-based approach can explain the connection between inner speech and metacognition, consider again the example of the physicist explained in section 3. The physicist privately utters the expression 'the dinner' which make her remember she has a dinner that night. Furthermore, she says to herself 'I should go to the grocery store' after considering she did not have food at home. The rationale behind the idea that the action of the physicist exhibits a kind of metacognitive endeavor rely on the fact that she refrains to perform the action she was doing (going back home) and triggers a new action on the light of new considerations. In this sense, she evaluates the situation and regulates her cognitive mechanisms to change her mind and carry out the action of going to the store instead of going home. The problem of the format view is that the outcome of the physicist's chain of reasoning is a self-ascription that in principle does not necessarily involve to regulate her action. Furthermore, it is hard to see how we can understand her regulatory capacities in terms of access to a mental state, especially when her private episode 'I should go to the store' does not seem to be a previous mental state in the physicist cognitive machinery, rather than a conclusion she has arrived from an episode of reasoning considering the situation. Given that, the format view should accept that the mental state represented by the private speech 'I should go to the store' was previously instantiated in the physicist's mind or abandon the idea that this case represents a case of metacognition in terms of access. In the commitment-based approach, we can account for the case of the physicist in terms of evaluation and regulation. The metacognitive capacities Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 257 displayed has to do with evaluating an action or mental processes in accordance with certain commitments and regulating first-order mental processes and patterns of action to align them with these commitments. When the physicist brings into consciousness her memory episode through the expression 'the dinner' she evaluates her current actions in terms of the commitments the utterance expresses. Thus, she refrains to go back home when considering her utterance gives rise to certain commitments her current action is not instantiating. In other words, her current action was not conforming the expected patterns given the restrictions imposed by the commitments of having a dinner that night. On the other hand, when she concludes that she should go to the store, she is privately committing herself with the appropriate pattern of action, and thus, she can regulate her actions in accordance with such commitments. In this sense, the inner utterance expresses the same set of commitment with actions that the sentence will express when used in a conversation with the purpose of coordinating with another person. This position differs from the format view in two fundamental aspects. Firstly, metacognition is associated with the notions of evaluation and conformation, rather than to the notion of access. When we assert P privately, we express a set of commitments that draw a cognitive trajectory we tend to conform in order to perform what these commitments prescribe us to do, that is, selfimposed constraints to our actions. In this sense, the commitment-based approach allows us to account for the metacognitive function of inner speech in terms of evaluation and conformation rather than in terms of access. Following Proust's idea, the type of cognitive and behavioral flexibility associated with metacognition does not require the agent to access her own mental states. In my view, rather revealing our previous mental states, our metacognitive capacities shape our cognition and action by triggering different prospective patterns we are inclined to follow given the commitments that the private episodes of inner speech generate.26 Secondly, respecting our intuitions, the metacognitive function of inner speech is not related to the notion of metarepresentation. Modifying our cognitive capacities in a flexible way does not require being able to self-ascribe mental states. In several occasions, the regulation or evaluation of our cognition and action do not require engaging in metarepresentational thinking. In fact, we often engage in reasoning chains that lead us to a private judgment that we do not hold before, and thus, do not represent previous mental states. When we arrive at these judgments we can modify or regulate our actions in the light of the commitments these judgments without the necessity of self-ascribe any particular mental state. In 26 Proust, The philosophy of metacognition, 53-78. Víctor Fernández Castro 258 other words, the effective power of the inner sentence to instantiate the appropriate pattern of action does not require the person to be in the state associated with the sentence, and far less, to represent such mental states. 6. Objections In the previous sections, I have offered a theoretical model of inner speech that account for some metacognitive functions without appealing to metarepresentations or taking for granted that metacognitive capacities require accessing mental states. This move enables us to get around the concern of the format view of inner speech. However, one may wonder whether or not embracing the commitment-based approach could give rise to another type of problems. In principle, there are two main objections one may envisage for the commitment-based approach. Firstly, one may argue that future directed selfcontrol (see section 3) fall out of the explanatory reach of the commitment-based approach. Secondly, one may consider that the notion of speech acts in terms of commitments is problematic or, at least, unnecessary for explaining the function of inner speech. This section is devoted to addressing these two objections. For addressing the first problem, consider again the case of the young rich communist. As we have seen, Vierkant argues this case exemplify a kind of metacognitive capacity that cannot be performed without the metarepresentations and access required by the format view. Given that, one may wonder whether this kind of metacognitive control is a feasible counterexample against the commitmentbased approach. After all, the young rich communist case exhibits the features of metacognitive control the commitment-based approach casts into question as necessary for the display of the metacognitive function of inner speech. Now, it must be clarified that the commitment-based approach is compatible with the fact that we can display mental concepts (belief, desire, fear) in our reasoning or inner speech episodes. In fact, we often self-attribute mental states (avowals) putting those mental concepts into work. However, this does not mean such selfascriptions endow us with a particular mental access to our own psychological states. In fact, when we pay closer attention to the social role of self-ascriptions, we realize that in conversational contexts we often use the first-personal ascription with pragmatic purposes.27 For instance, the phrase 'I think' is frequently presented 27 James O. Urmson, "Parenthetical verbs,"Mind 6, 244 (1952): 480–496; Karin Aijmer, "I think: an English modal particle," in Modality in Germanic Language: Historical and Comparative Perspectives, eds. Toril Swan and Olaf Westik (De Gruyter Mouton, 1997); Anna Wierzbicka, English: Meaning and culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006); Mandy Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 259 as having the function to mitigate the degree of commitment to the sentence it ranges. Wierzbicka provides a deep analysis of parenthetical uses of 'believe,' 'think' and other mental verbs. She claims that the verb 'think' conveys the meaning of disclaiming knowledge "not by saying "I don't know" but by saying "I don't say: I know it."28 In other words, 'I think P' expresses a certain degree of caution. Similarly, the verb 'believe' (in contrast to 'I think' for instance) seems to play an indicative function. As Aijmer claims: "I believe does not only express a subjective attitude. It also conveys that the speaker has some evidence for what he says."29 We can see the contrast between 'I think' and 'I believe' in the incompatibility of 'I believe' with phrases like 'I'm not sure.' While 'I think that Riga is the capital of Latvia, but I'm not sure' is idiomatic, 'I believe that Riga is the capital of Latvia but I'm not sure' is not. This difference between the level of reliability that 'think' and 'believe' convey must not divert our attention away from the fact they share their basic function: they are devices for canceling or altering the speaker's commitments. The verbs 'believe' and 'think' seem to be mitigators of the force of the claim. Of course, parenthetical uses are not restricted to these types of indications involving mitigations. Verbs as 'rejoice' or 'regret' indicate emotional orientation, others as 'wish' or 'desire' indicate the preference toward the commitments of the statement. What these parenthetical uses of propositional attitude verbs share is its function for providing indications or prescriptions to the hearer about how to evaluate the commitments of the proposition associated with the mental verb. As a conclusion, mental verbs in selfascriptions seem to have the pragmatic function of signaling certain attitudes or indications toward the commitments expressed by the statement under the scope of the mental verb. Taking this inside on board, when the young rich communist is evaluating what to do in the light of his future belief 'I will believe social justice does not matter,' he is considering the commitments he will give rise in the future given the content of his future belief. Furthermore, he assesses the type of actions he must carry out in the present in order to avoid his future commitments with the assertion that social justice does not matter. In this sense, we can recruit the same kind of commitment-based explanation without bringing out any type of accesslike explanation. Although this kind of explanation seems to necessitate certain notion of metarepresentation that allows the young rich communist to perceive Simons, "Observations on embedding verbs, evidentiality, and presupposition," Lingua 117, 6 (2007), 1034-1056. 28 Wierzbicka, English, 38 29 Aijmer, "I think," 17 Víctor Fernández Castro 260 himself as a minded creature, it does not commit us with understanding selfascriptions as descriptions of inner processes or psychological states, rather than expressions that make explicit the commitments with the present and future actions associated with the content of the proposition under the scope of the mental verb. Thus, the commitment-based approach could also give a plausible explanation of the metacognitive capacities the future directed self-control requires. A second objection against the commitment-based approach may cast into question its plausibility as a theory of the social function of speech acts. One may argue, for instance, that a neo-Gricean model of communicationprovides a better understanding of communication, and subsequently, for the cognitive function of inner speech.30 In the neo-Gricean model, a hearer expects certain patterns of actions from a speaker because her speech acts express certain mental states that are causally connected with the given action. For instance, when a speaker asserts P, the hearer can infer through different pragmatic mechanisms that he is expressing a belief that P, and thus, the hearer can expect from the speaker a range of patterns of actions causally connected with such belief. The neo-Gricean approaches to communication exhibit certain problems whose consideration is beyond the purpose of this paper.31 However, for the purpose of this article, it is sufficient to notice that such position requires our speech act to voice certain underlying mental states, which again brings out the problem of confabulation. Considering that inner speech requires putting to work pragmatic mechanisms that infer the mental states of the agent implies that the agent must be in a particular mental state that is causally connected to the private episode. However, as the empirical evidence considered in section 3 emphasizes, it is problematic to assume that our reasons, and thus our inner speech episodes always reflect an underlying mental state. On the contrary, this is not problematic for the commitment-based approach. As Strijbos& de Bruin argue, our confabulatory reasons can have two 30 For two well-known neo-Gricean Models of communication see Kent Bach and Robert Harnish, Linguistic Communication and Speech Acts (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1979); and Dan Sperber and Deidre Wilson, Relevance: Communication and Cognition, (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986). 31 For instance, these approaches are usually committed with the idea that communication requires the instantiation of mindreading mechanisms that, as Tadeusz Zawidzki has emphasized, make mental state attribution computationally intractable (see Tadeusz Zawidzki "The function of folk psychology: Mindreading or mindshaping?" Philosophical Explorations 11, 3 (2008): 193210). Inner Speech and Metacognition: A Defense of the Commitment-Based Approach 261 purposes.32 Firstly, they can help to give coherence to our previous actions by providing us with a narrative. Secondly, they can have a prospective function, generating commitments that we are inclined to conform, and thus, that regulate our behavior and cognitive mechanisms. In this sense, the commitment-based approach can help us to elucidate the regulatory function of inner speech while avoiding the problem of confabulation. That is, our inner speech episodes do not necessarily reflect our underlying mental states, rather than it help us to give coherence and regulate our actions by giving rise to the commitments with certain patterns of actions. 7. Conclusion The aim of this paper was to present several concerns regarding the format view of the metacognitive capacities of inner speech and to advocate an alternative. The problems associated with the format view rely on the role that the model assigns to metarepresentations and the notion of access. The solution I have offered respects our intuitions concerning inner speech episodes and accounts for the metacognitive capacities of regulating and evaluation our cognition and action. This position offers an alternative that does not require postulating metarepresentations or considering thinking about thinking in terms of access. Furthermore, the theory can avoid two possible objections. On the one hand, it can account for the cases where our metacognitive capacities require self-ascriptions. On the other hand, the theory can avoid certain challenges that other views of communication that have enjoyed a greater popularity cannot avoid.33,34 32 Derek Strijbos and Leon de Bruin, "Self-interpretation as first-person mindshaping: implications for confabulation research," Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 18, 2 (2005): 297-30. 33 This article was written thanks to the funding provided by the project "Inner speech, Metacognition, and the Narrative View of Identity" (FFI2015-65953-P)and "Contemporary Expressivism and the Indispensability of Normative Vocabulary" (FFI2016-80088-P) funded by Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad; and the postdoctoral research contract "Puente," funded by the University of Granada. 34 Thanks to all members of the Department of Philosophy at University of Granada (AKA Granada Gang) for helpful comments on previous versions of these paper. I would like to also to acknowledge the influence and support of Fernando Martínez-Manrique and Agustin Vicente.

KANT ON PERCEPTION: NAÏVE REALISM, NONCONCEPTUALISM AND THE B-DEDUCTION Anil Gomes Trinity College, University of Oxford Forthcoming, Philosophical Quarterly [accepted 2013] According to non-conceptualist interpretations, Kant held that the application of concepts is not necessary for perceptual experience. Some have motivated non-conceptualism by noting the affinities between Kant's account of perception and contemporary relational theories of perception. In this paper I argue i) that non-conceptualism cannot provide an account of the Transcendental Deduction and thus ought to be rejected; and ii) that this has no bearing on the issue of whether Kant endorsed a relational account of perceptual experience. 1. Introduction Recent debates in the philosophy of perception have focused on the contrast between relational and representational theories of perceptual experience. For initial purposes, the following rough characterisation will suffice: relational theories are those which hold that the phenomenal character of perceptual experience essentially involves the obtaining of a non-representational relation which holds between subject and perceived objects. Representational theories are those which hold that the phenomenal character of perceptual experience essentially involves representational properties which determine accuracy conditions for the perceptual state. 2 Interest in these debates has been prompted by the recent development and defence of naïve realist relational theories. Such views hold that the non-representational relation involved in perceptual experience is one which subjects stand in to ordinary material objects and their properties. Versions of this view were popular amongst the early 20th-century Oxford Realists [Cook Wilson 1926; Prichard 1909], but it is the recent work of John Campbell, Mike Martin and others which has brought the proposal back into the philosophical landscape [Campbell 2002; Martin 2002; Brewer 2006]. This debate in the philosophy of perception intersects with a recent issue of interpretation in Kant's theoretical philosophy. Kant famously holds that there are two stems to human cognition: a passive faculty of sensibility and an active faculty of the understanding. The former presents us with objects by means of intuitions; the latter enables thought by means of concepts. But thoughts without content are empty and intuitions without concepts are blind: only from their unification can cognition arise (A51/B76). An important question to ask is how we should understand the relation between intuitions and concepts and what contribution each makes to our perceptual consciousness of the world. Following a series of papers by Robert Hanna and Lucy Allais, answers to these questions have split into two broad camps. The traditional conceptualist interpretation holds that the application of concepts is necessary for the perceptual presentation of empirical objects in intuition. In contrast, the non-conceptualist interpretation of Allais and Hanna holds that intuitions can present us with empirical objects without any application of concepts. This terminology is somewhat unhelpful since the terms 'conceptualist' and 'non-conceptualist' are used in the philosophy of perception literature to pick out varieties of representational theories: conceptualist theories hold that perceptual experience involves properties which represent the world as being some way and that subjects who undergo such experiences need possess the concepts required to specify the content of those experiences; non-conceptualist theories hold that perceptual experience involves properties which represent the world as being some way but deny that subjects need possess the concepts required to specify the content of those experiences [Crane 1992]. This use should not be confused with the terminology used by those involved in the debate about how to understand 3 Kant's theoretical philosophy. In the rest of this paper I will use the terms 'conceptualism' and 'non-conceptualism' solely in the Kantian sense. How do the debate about the nature of perceptual experience relate to the Kant debate? There is no immediate correspondence between positions in one debate and positions in the other. Yet those on both sides of the Kant debate often assume that conceptualist interpretations are committed to ascribing to Kant a representational account of perceptual experience. This is important because one way of motivating non-conceptualism goes via the claim that Kant's account of the perceptual presentation of empirical particulars should be read on the model of a relational account of perception [Allais 2009, pp.387-392; 2010, pp. 58-62; 2011, pp.379383]. The assumption appears to be that if Kant's account of intuition is relational, then he can't have thought that the application of concepts is necessary for the perceptual presentation of empirical particulars. My primary concern in this paper is to suggest that non-conceptualism is false: Kant holds that the application of concepts is necessary for the perceptual presentation of empirical objects in intuition. But I will also show that this has no implications for the question of whether Kant endorsed a representational or relational theory of perception. Relational theories of perception are compatible with conceptualism. Why would one think that conceptualism required a representational account of perceptual experience? It is true that influential conceptualist interpretations have ascribed to Kant a representational account of perceptual experience [McDowell 1998; Abela 2002], but it is hard to find an explicit argument in the literature for this supposed link. Here is one line of thought: according to conceptualist interpretations, Kant held that the application of concepts is necessary for the perceptual presentation of empirical objects. The reason for endorsing this claim is that Kant takes intuitions to depend on acts of synthesis. And acts of synthesis are undertaken by the understanding: they take the manifold of intuition and combine it according to rules. These rules are concepts of the understanding. Combining the manifold of intuition in accordance with rules thus involves applying concepts in intuition. And if concepts are applied in intuition, then perceptual experience represents the world as being a certain way. Thus the reasons which motivate a conceptualist 4 interpretation of Kant also motivate ascribing to him a representational theory of perception. ([Ginsborg 2006, pp. 64-67] presents a particularly clear exposition of this line of thought.) In the final section of this paper I will examine this argument. Before that, in §2, I will set out the debate between conceptualist and nonconceptualist interpretations and draw attention to the considerations which motivate each side of the debate. In §3 I will draw on the B-edition of the Transcendental Deduction to provide some reason for thinking that non-conceptualism is false. Finally, in §4 I will show that this has no bearing on the question of whether Kant endorsed a relational theory of perception: conceptualism is compatible with relational theories. 2. Non-conceptualism According to non-conceptualist interpretations of Kant's theory of cognition, we can be perceptually presented with particulars without any input from the active faculty of the understanding [Allais 2009, 2012], [Hanna 2001, 2005]. Since Kant introduces the understanding as 'a faculty for judging' and tells us that all judgement proceeds via concepts (A69/B94), this is often expressed as the claim that one can be perceptually presented with particulars without the application of concepts. Nonconceptualist readings hold that 'for Kant, the application of concepts is not necessary for our being perceptually presented with outer particulars' [Allais 2009, p.394]. Non-conceptualism is opposed by those who hold that, for Kant, the application of concepts is necessary for perceptual experience [McDowell 1998], [Abela 2002]. But we need to be careful as to what is meant by the application of concepts. Conceptualist interpreters often distinguish 'two aspects of the activity of understanding' [Longuenesse 1998, p.63]: the understanding as rule-giver for the synthesis of the manifold in intuition and the understanding as discursive combiner of concepts in judgement. It is the former, and not the latter, which conceptualist interpretations take to be necessary for perceptual experience. Thus if the phrase 'application of concepts' is reserved for the latter activity – the deployment of concepts in judgement – then there is no bar to conceptualists accepting Allais's claim that 'the application of concepts is not necessary for our being perceptually presented with outer particulars' [Allais 2009, p.394]. Rather, the sense in which conceptualists take the application of concepts to be necessary for 5 perceptual experience is that they take the perceptual presentation of objects in intuition to require a perceptual synthesis of the manifold of intuition, undertaken by the understanding in accordance with concepts. One way to characterise this dispute is over where best to limn the domain of the understanding. Traditional conceptualist readings of Kant's theory of cognition see the understanding as reaching all the way out to perception itself: the understanding is active in perceptual experience because the application of concepts is required for the perceptual presentation of outer particulars. Non-conceptualists hold that the understanding is required only for subjects to engage in a certain form of thought: the perceptual presentation of particulars can take place in the absence of concepts, but we require input from the understanding in order to cognize them in a certain way. We can mark this distinction by distinguishing the conditions necessary to engage in a certain sort of thought about objects and the conditions necessary to be perceptually presented with such particulars. Conceptualist readings of Kant hold that the application of concepts is necessary for the perceptual presentation of particulars; non-conceptualists hold only that the application of concepts is necessary for us to think about objects in a certain way. As Allais puts it, 'once we draw a distinction between the perception of a distinct particular and cognition of an object in the fullblown Kantian sense of an object, [non-conceptualists] can allow that Kant does not see concepts as necessary for the basic intentionality of perception – that fact that perception presents us with distinct particular things' [2012, p.41]. And this is compatible with thinking that the understanding is required for cognition. How should we decide between these views? Conceptualism is sometimes motivated by appeal to the opening paragraphs of the Transcendental Logic in which Kant distinguishes sensibility from the understanding and notes their interrelation (A50-52/B74-76). But this will not suffice. Kant's claim in these passages is only that the unification of sensibility and the understanding is required for cognition [Erkenntnis] (A51/B76), and this falls importantly short of claiming that their co-operation is required for perception itself. Thus Kant's oft-quoted claim that thoughts without concepts are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind (A51/B75) need not be read as claiming that intuition without concepts do not amount to 6 perception, but rather that intuitions without concepts are incapable of yielding cognition. One might attempt to draw a link from these passages to perception by noting that Kant held experience [Erfahrung] to be 'a kind of cognition requiring the understanding' (Bxvii), for if the understanding is active in cognition, and if experience is a kind of cognition, then the understanding is active in experience. But Kant's use of the term 'experience' is not continuous with that of contemporary philosophers of perception and it is open for non-conceptualists to hold that at least some of Kant's uses of the term pick out a form of judgement made on the basis of perceptual experience rather than the experience itself (e.g., B166, A176/B218, A189/B234). On this reading, those passages in which Kant claims that Erfahrung requires the active, combinatorial input of the understanding (A93/B126) show only that the understanding is required for a certain sort of empirical judgement or thought. There is nothing thus far which threatens the non-conceptualist claim about perception. It is for this reason that the debate between conceptualist and nonconceptualists has largely focused on whether the application of concepts is required for intuition [Anschauung]. In contrast to his use of term 'Erfahrung', Kant tells us explicitly that visual perception is a form of objective empirical intuition [An AA07:154; cf. Prol. AA04:283] and that empirical intuition is the means by which we are perceptually presented with objects [A180/B222; Prol. AA04:283]. Thus if the application of concepts is required for Anschauung itself, this would seem to tell against non-conceptualism: the discursive activity of the understanding would be involved in the very perception of distinct particulars and not just required for their cognition in thought. Are there any reasons to think that one can be presented with particulars in intuition absent any function of the understanding? Particular attention has been paid to a passage at A90/B123 in which Kant raises the possibility that 'appearances could after all be so constituted that the understanding would not find them in accord with the conditions of its unity', before concluding that '[a]ppearances would nonetheless offer objects to our intuition, for intuition by no means requires the functions of thinking' (A90/B123; see [Hanna 2005, pp.249-250], [Allais 2009, pp.387-8]). Non-conceptualists take Kant to be raising a genuine metaphysical possibility here, one which is signalled by his claim that 'objects can indeed 7 appear to us without necessarily having to be related to the functions of the understanding' (A89/B122). But an alternative is to take these passages as expressing a mere epistemic possibility which will later be shown not to be a genuine metaphysical possibility at all. And an epistemic possibility is compatible with the conceptualist reading. Is the metaphysical reading supported by the fact that Kant uses the indicative 'can' [können] in the formulation at A89/B122, as opposed to the subjunctive 'could' [könnten] at A90/B123? ([Allais 2009, p.387 n.13].) The issue is not clear. Guyer and Wood note a passage in the Reflexionnen (1776-78, AA19:122-3, reprinted in [Kant 2005, p.222]) where Kant formulates an epistemic possibility without using the subjunctive: [Kant 1998, p.725 n.17]. And, more generally, the use of the indicative in the formulations at A89/B122 may be compatible with the three paragraphs which end that section (A89-92/B122-124) operating under an assumed 'for all we know' operator. We are not forced to treat the possibility expressed at A90/B123 as metaphysical. More compelling, to my mind, are Kant's scattered writings about the nature of non-human animal (hereafter: animal) engagement with the world. Kant takes animals to be sensible beings that are incapable of discursive thought [An AA07:196]. Thus if one wants to make it plausible that Kant held that we can be perceptually presented with objects through sensibility alone, it is natural to consider Kant's views on animal consciousness. And there are a number of passages in which Kant appears to suggest that animals can be perceptually presented with objects through sensibility, despite the fact that they do not have the resources to conceptualise such objects. These passages have been taken to support a non-conceptualist reading of Kant [Allais 2009, pp.406-407]. Consider Kant's rejection, repeated at various places throughout his writings, of Descartes's view of animals as merely mechanical. In the Critique of the Power of Judgement Kant says that 'animals also act in accordance with representations (and are not as Descartes would have it, machines)' [CJ AA05:464n; cf. MV AA28:449, FS AA02:330-331]. Kant takes this to mark a difference between his and Descartes's views on animal cognition and such acting is often explicated as involving perceptual acquaintance with particulars in the world. The most significant remark is found in Kant's discussion of the different levels of cognition in his lectures on logic where he says that '[a]nimals are acquainted with objects 8 too, but they do not cognize them' [JL AA09:64-5; see also VL AA24:846]. And while he denies that the ox has a distinct concept of its stall, he is clear that the animal perceives it [FS AA02:59]. (See [Naragon 1990] and [McLear 2011] for further discussion and textual evidence.) These passages suggest that animals can be perceptually aware of particulars in the environment without any involvement of the understanding. I take this to be a significant consideration in support of non-conceptualism. However, Kant's comments on animal consciousness are varied and widely dispersed, and there are prominent passages central to the first Critique which appear to tell against the non-conceptualist reading. Let me highlight two from the Transcendental Analytic. The first concerns the role of synthesis in the representation of intuitions; the second concerns Kant's aims in the Transcendental Deduction of the Categories. In each case I will set out why the material has been thought to support a conceptualist reading before providing the non-conceptualist response. (See [Griffith 2012] for discussion of these passages.) (1) Synthesis: the most telling passages in support of the idea that the understanding is involved in intuition are those in which Kant describes the role of synthesis in the representation of intuition (A98-A107, A117f.). Synthesis is the activity of 'putting different representations together with each other' (A77/B103); it is a 'necessary ingredient' (A120n) in the perception of objects because otherwise the manifold of intuition would be 'dispersed and separate in the mind' (A120); without synthesis we would have only 'unruly heaps' of representations [Vorstellungen] (A121). But 'the same function which gives unity to the various ideas in a judgement also gives unity to the mere synthesis of various ideas in an intuition' (A7980/B105-106) and all combination is an act of the understanding (B130). Thus the perceptual presentation of particulars in intuition involves a discursive act of the understanding. The non-conceptualist response to these passages is to deny that all synthesis is a result of the understanding: as Allais puts it, 'synthesizing is not the same as conceptualizing' [Allais 2009, p.396]. And though there are passages in which Kant presents synthesis as an act of the understanding, he most often ascribes its function to the imagination (A78/ B104, A118, A119, A120, A123, A124, B151), an intermediate faculty which has aspects of both sensibility and the understanding. Hanna 9 similarly takes synthesis to be a 'lower-level' spontaneous cognitive power which falls under the remit of sensibility: sensibility is 'only relatively passive, but not entirely passive... by virtue of its expressing a mental power for spontaneous synthesis, or mental processing.' [Hanna 2005, p.249]. The non-conceptualist claim is that the synthesis of intuitions can take place absent any function of the understanding and that the mere recognition of processing activity is not enough to show the involvement of the understanding in perception. (2) The Deduction: Kant's stated aim in the Transcendental Deduction is to show that 'without their [the categories'] presupposition nothing is possible as object of experience' (A93/B125). For 'the objective validity of the categories, as a priori concepts, rests on the fact that through them alone is experience possible (A93/B126). Traditional readings of the Transcendental Deduction have taken these passages to support the claim that the categories are conditions on the possibility of experience [McDowell 1998], [Abela 2002], a conclusion which has been taken as equivalent to the conceptualist claim that the application of concepts is required for perceptual experience. On this reading, demonstrating the objective validity of the categories requires showing how intuitions already involve the actualisation of categorial capacities [McDowell 1998, Lecture II]. Allais's response is to dispute this account of the Deduction. Drawing on the distinction between the conditions necessary to perceive a particular and those necessary to cognize an empirical object, she claims that the Deduction aims only to show that the categories are necessary conditions on the possibility of thinking about objects in a particular way (as persisting, causal unities) and not conditions on being presented with particulars in perception [Allais 2012, pp.41-46]. As we have already noted, Kant takes experience [Erfahrung] to be a kind of cognition involving the understanding. Thus when Kant says here that without the categories' presupposition nothing is possible as an object of experience, the non-conceptualist takes him to be making a claim about the necessity of the categories for thinking of objects in a particular way. On Allais's nonconceptualist reading, the Deduction aims only to show that the categories are conditions on a certain sort of thought. How should we weigh these competing considerations? In what follows I will set out a reason for thinking that the understanding must be involved 10 in intuition for Kant, and therefore that the perceptual presentation of objects involves a discursive act of the understanding. The issue turns on a set of passages in §§20-26 of the B-Edition of the Transcendental Deduction of the Categories and the role that the argument of the Deduction is intended to play in Kant's philosophy. This will comprise my defence of the claim that the understanding is active in perceptual experience, contrary to the non-conceptualist reading, and that the application of concepts is therefore required for perceptual experience. 3. The B-Deduction As has been well documented, the argument in the B-Deduction consists of two separate stages. In §§15-19, Kant focuses on the role that the categories play as intellectual conditions on empirical representation arguing that '[a]ll sensible intuitions stand under the categories, as conditions under which alone their manifold can come together in one consciousness' (B143). This is because 'the combination of the manifold in general can never come to us through the senses' (B129); such combination is possible only if 'all the manifold of intuition stand under conditions of the original synthetic unity of apperception' (B136); bringing representations under this synthetic unity requires a process of synthesis; and the rules which govern this synthesis are the categories (B143). 'Thus the manifold in a given intuition also necessarily stands under the categories' (B143). In the second part of the B-Deduction, Kant shifts his focus from the categories as intellectual conditions on representation to the way in which objects 'come before our sense' (B160). The intention is to show that 'from the way in which the empirical intuition is given in sensibility that its unity can be none other than the one the category prescribes to the manifold of a given intuition' (B144-5). The main argument in support of this claim occurs primarily in §26 with reference to material outlined in §24 and Kant is explicit that this second step is needed to complete his proof (B144-145). (In what follows I draw on my reading of the Transcendental Deduction set out in [Gomes 2010].) Kant's argument in these passages centres on the role that space and time play in our representation of empirical particulars. As the forms of human sensible intuition, space and time structure the manifold of appearance since such a manifold 'can only occur in accordance with this form' 11 (B161). But space and time are represented by us not only as forms of sensible intuition, but also as intuitions themselves, and therefore as possessing a unity of the manifold of empirical intuition within them. This unity 'precedes all concepts, though to be sure it presupposes a synthesis, which does not belong to the senses but through which all concepts of space and time first become possible' (B161n). This presupposed synthesis is one in which 'the understanding determines the sensibility' (B161n). So the unity of space and time is to be explained with reference to the effect of the understanding upon sensibility itself: the understanding plays a role in our representation of particulars as situated in space and time. How should we understand these passages? The second part of the Deduction isolates a form of synthesis which is involved in some aspect of our representation of particulars. Since Kant is explicit that this form of synthesis is one which proceeds from the understanding – he calls it figurative or transcendental (B151) and describes it as 'an effect of the understanding on sensibility' (B152) – it is not open to the nonconceptualist to claim that this is a process of combination which doesn't involve the understanding [Allais 2009, pp.396-397]: Kant states unambiguously that the transcendental synthesis described in §24 is one in which 'the understanding determines the sensibility' (B160n). If such synthesis is governed by the understanding, is it required for the perceptual presentation of particulars in space and time or only for our cognition of objects? Allais claims the latter: she takes these passages in the second part of the B-Deduction to show only that there is a way of thinking about objects as spatial which requires the input of the understanding. As sensible beings, we are presented with objects as spatially arrayed through the form of our intuition and this enables the perceptual presentation of particulars distinct from us and situated about us in the environment. But there is also a way in which concept-using creatures such as ourselves think about space when representing the world as objective and to say that our representation of space is transformed by the understanding through a transcendental synthesis is to say only that there is a way of thinking about space which requires the activity of the understanding. This is compatible with the absence of the understanding in the perceptual presentation of particulars as spatially and temporally arrayed [Allais 2012, pp.47-48]. 12 In order to see why this non-conceptualist reading of §§22-26 is inadequate, we need to fix upon the purpose of the Transcendental Deduction. On Allais's reading, Kant's aim in the Deduction is to show that the categories are necessary conditions on a certain sort of thought. This is a scaling back of the traditional import of the Deduction and Hannah Ginsborg complains that it 'threatens to trivialize Kant's central project in the Critique, or at least to diminish its interest and importance' [Ginsborg 2006, p.62]. This is unfair: as Allais points out it would be interesting if a certain way of thinking about objects – a way which Kant thinks to be both necessary and a priori – were required in order for us to ascribe properties to persisting objects in the world [Allais 2012, p.50]. So the retreat from identifying conditions on experience to identifying conditions on thought does not recede to triviality even if it remains a retrenchment of traditional ambitions. What is more important, however, is that this scaling back prevents the Transcendental Deduction from providing a response to Humean concerns about the justified application of a priori concepts. (Hannah Ginsborg makes this point in her [2007, pp.69-70]; compare [Strawson 1966, pp.73-74, p.85].) As James Van Cleve has pointed out, there is a difference between showing that we must apply the categories and that the categories must apply: 'one may slip without noticing from one to the other, but between the two there is no small distance. It is the distance between our using a category and its being instantiated, or between making a judgement and it being true.' [Van Cleve 1999, p.89]. Humean scepticism about the justified application of a priori concepts will not be answered by showing only that we must apply the categories to experience, for that is compatible with the falsity of any such application. Kant needs the stronger claim: that the categories must apply. Allais's reading of the Transcendental Deduction supports only the weaker claim: that we must make use of the categories in making judgements about the world as containing persisting, causal unities. But it is compatible with this conclusion that all the judgements we so make are false. And if this were the case, our thinking about the world would be subject to an unavoidable error: we would be compelled, of necessity, to think of the world as containing persisting substances, capable of existing unperceived and standing to each other in causal relations; but none of these judgements about the world would be accurate. Without the stronger conclusion that the categories must apply to experience, the Deduction 13 cannot be used to answer Humean scepticism about justification. The result is not simply a curtailment in the argument's ambitions but a neutering of its force. Van Cleve's distinction offers us a way to read the argument which makes sense of the B-Deduction and its relation to Humean scepticism. (This is the reading offered in [Gomes 2010].) The first part of the proof, §§1519, argues for the claim that we must apply the categories, whilst §§22-26 complete the argument by showing that the categories must apply. Kant's claim is that since the unity of space and time arises from a process of transcendental synthesis, that which is given in space and time stands under the unity of apperception. And in virtue of so standing, it is constituted so as to require synthesis in accordance with a priori rules of the understanding, namely the categories. It is the fact that both transcendental synthesis and categorial synthesis originate in the understanding which explains why the categories must apply. Note that the fact that we must apply the categories is not independent of the fact that the categories must apply: if it were so independent, the result would be what Kant calls 'a kind of preformation-system of pure reason' (B168), a view on which it is only accidentally true that our application of the categories is objectively valid. On the reading offered here, the interdependence of our application of the categories and their required application consists in the fact that both transcendental and categorial synthesis originate in the understanding: it is the nature of the understanding which explains both why we must apply the categories and why the categories must apply. (Thanks to a referee for raising this point.) This reading focuses on the way in which transcendental synthesis accounts for a certain aspect of our empirical intuitions: it thus claims a role for the understanding in the perceptual presentation of empirical particulars. If there were no other activity for the understanding than the application of concepts, then the case against conceptualism would be complete. But Kant describes the unity of space and time conferred by transcendental synthesis as preceding all concepts (B160n.), a remark which reaffirms the claims of the Aesthetic that concepts do not contribute towards our representation of space and time (A24-5/B39; A31-2/B47). This suggests that although §§22-26 make the case for the involvement of the understanding in the perceptual presentation of particulars, they don't yet show that perception involves the application of concepts. 14 This can seem incoherent: how can there be activity of the understanding which precedes all concepts when Kant introduces the understanding as the faculty for judging via concepts (A69/B94, A126)? This is a delicate topic. There is a more fundamental characterisation of the understanding in the B-Deduction as the capacity for apperception (B133-134n), and Kant elsewhere suggests that this capacity is more basic than the categories (A401). Béatrice Longuenesse and others have claimed that Kant is committed to a pre-discursive, and therefore pre-conceptual, function for the understanding and one way to understand this is as a non-discursive exercise of the capacity of apperception distinct from the discursive exercise at work in judging via concepts [Longuenesse 1998, p.211f; 2000; Gomes 2010, pp.130-131; Land 2011]. The prospect of the understanding operating on our representation of space and time other than through the application of concepts leaves open the possibility of a position which is non-conceptualist in letter if not in spirit: one on which the perceptual representation of particulars involves a pre-discursive act of the understanding without involving the application of concepts. However, we can now return to §§15-19 to complete the case against the non-conceptualist. §§22-26 show that the categories must apply by isolating a role for the understanding in the perceptual presentation of particulars as situated in space and time. But if this argument is to work, it must be the case that the transcendental synthesis discussed in §§22-26 originates in the same understanding as the categorial synthesis discussed in §§15-19: only so will Kant have a guarantee that what is given in space and time is such as to be necessarily subject to the categories. Thus we must read the process of synthesis offered in the first part of the BDeduction as originating in the understanding and proceeding according to the categories. The synthesis of the manifold of intuition takes place according to the categories, contrary to the non-conceptualist suggestion. On this way of reading the Transcendental Deduction, §§15-19 show that we must synthesise the manifold of intuition in accordance with the categories and §§22-26 show that sensible intuition is constituted such that it must be synthesised in just this way. This is exactly how Kant presents the result of the first part of his proof in the summary at §20 where he concludes: 'the manifold in a given intuition also necessarily stands under the categories' (B143). I have suggested that we must take this at face value if Humean sceptism is to be forestalled: the categories are active, for Kant, in perceptual experience. 15 Is this consideration decisive? There are two caveats to be borne in mind. The first concerns Kant's views on animal consciousness. As mentioned above, there are grounds for thinking that Kant held that animals can be perceptually presented with empirical objects absent any function of the understanding. To the extent that one finds these grounds compelling – as I do – then an onus remains on conceptualist interpretations to explain how their account of human perceptual experience is compatible with the thought that non-human animals can be perceptually presented with objects absent the application of concepts. I won't attempt such an explanation here but it is worth noting that an interpretative debt remains to be discharged. The second concerns the purpose of the Transcendental Deduction. In raising this objection to non-conceptualist readings of Kant, I have assumed that the role of the Deduction is to respond to Humean worries about our justified application of a priori concepts to experience. And one may contest this claim. There are other, more local, sources for the Deduction to which Allais's reading is responsive. In his comments on Kant's Inaugural Dissertation, Johann Heinrich Lambert accepts that knowledge 'arises out of two entirely different and, so to speak, heterogenous sources, so that what stems from the one source can never be derived from the other', but questions 'to what extent these two ways of knowing are so completely separated that they never come together' [C AA10:105]. Similarly Marcus Herz, in his Observations on Speculative Philosophy from 1771, asks how external things can agree with our intellectual representations [in Watkins 2009, p.299]. These challenges to Kant's pre-critical position raise the question of how it is that a priori concepts can be applied to experience, not whether they can ever be accurately applied so. Allais's reading responds to the concerns of Lambert and Herz: it portrays Kant as concerned to show why it is that we must use a certain set of a priori concepts in making judgements about objects in the world. And one might hold that the justification of such application is accomplished elsewhere in the Critique. But if one thinks that the role of the Deduction is to combat Hume's problem [Prol. AA04:259-261] – or, perhaps more accurately, if one thinks that Hume's problem concerns not just our possession and application of a priori concepts but also our justified application of them – then the understanding must be involved in intuition and, in particular, the manifold of intuition must be synthesised 16 in accordance with the categories. This gives us reason to think that, for Kant, the categories need be employed in perceptual experience and therefore that the application of concepts is necessary for perceptual experience contrary to the non-conceptualist claim. 4. Naïve Realism What are the implications of this discussion for the question of whether Kant held a relational or representational theory of perceptual experience? The short answer is: not much. But in order to see why, it will be useful to set out some definitions. Let the phenomenal properties of an experience be those in virtue of which there is something it is like to have an experience. The phenomenal character of an experience consists of its phenomenal properties. We type experiences by their phenomenal character: two experiences are of the same fundamental kind if and only if they have the same phenomenal character [Soteriou 2005, p.194]. Relational theories of perceptual experience are those on which the phenomenal properties of the experiences involved in perception essentially involve non-representational relations to objects. Representational theories of perceptual experience are those on which the phenomenal properties of perceptual experiences essentially involve representational properties. One question about these definitions is where to place the account of perception defended by John McDowell [1994, 1998]. Relational theorists often cite him as a proponent of a representational theory of perceptual experience, on grounds that McDowell takes perception to have a certain sort of content [Brewer 2007]. McDowell disputes this characterisation: he takes his view to show that the proper account of the relational aspect of perception cannot do without representational notions and thus that relational views are compatible with perceptual experience having content. [McDowell 2013]. I won't pursue this issue here. Although McDowell's account of perception is interesting and important, the considerations to be outlined below hold even for those who understand the relational aspect of perception in wholly non-representational terms. In a series of recent articles, Lucy Allais has made the case that there are affinities between Kant's account of the perceptual presentation of empirical particulars and contemporary relational accounts of perception. 17 She is reluctant, for fears of anachronism, to straightforwardly ascribe a relational theory of perceptual experience to Kant, but she nevertheless holds that one finds in Kant 'some of the ideas which [relational] theories of perception are trying to capture' [Allais 2011, p.380]. Let me state some of her considerations. First, there is Kant's notion of intuition. Allais thinks that we 'cannot make sense of the Kantian notion of intuition' without recognising the relational aspect of his account of perception [2011, p.381]. On Allais's reading, intuitions are singular and immediate (A320/B377, A713/B741); they are object-dependent (Prol. AA04:281, B72); and their role is to give us objects in such a way that we can think about them (A23/B39, A239/B298). These considerations do not force upon us a relational reading of Kantian perception, but they can be easily captured on a view which takes intuitions to involve relations of acquaintance which immediately present empirical objects to consciousness in such a way that they can be the subjects of thoughts. Second, there is the argument for transcendental idealism in the Transcendental Aesthetic. Many commentators have noted a gap in this argument: Kant moves from claims about our representation of space to conclusions about space itself. Allais argues that this gap disappears if Kantian intuitions involve a relational component [2010, pp. 58-62]. That is, ascribing to Kant a relational account of intuition explains why he took himself to be justified in moving from claims about our representation of space to conclusions about space itself. Finally there is the Refutation of Idealism. Kant there takes himself to establish the reality of outer objects, those objects which Descartes thought doubtful, for 'the consciousness of my own existence is at the same time an immediate consciousness of the existence of other things outside me' (B276). This thought is echoed in some of the claims made by relational theorists [Gomes forthcoming]. And Allais claims that 'although he [Kant] does not explicitly situate his view in terms of the theories of perception we discuss today, [in the Refutation of Idealism] he clearly commits himself to a key part of the direct realist or relational position.' [2011, p.382]. My purpose here is not to evaluate these considerations but to consider what implications they have for the debate between conceptualist and non18 conceptualist interpretations. Allais appeals to such considerations in motivating her non-conceptualist reading [Allais 2009, pp.387-392] and it is common to find those who reject Allais's non-conceptualism also rejecting her case for a relational aspect to Kant's account of perception [Ginsborg 2007]. One might think, then, that a relational account of Kantian perception entails a non-conceptualist interpretation, and vice versa: that conceptualist interpretations require ascribing to Kant a nonrelational account of experience. In what follows I will show that this is mistaken. Why might one think that there is a link between the conceptualist–nonconceptualist debate and Kant's account of perception? I suggested in §1 that one might think that the reasons which support a conceptualist interpretation also support ascribing to Kant a representational account of perceptual experience. Let us formulate this line of thought by means of the following argument: 1. Intuitions involve acts of synthesis. 2. Acts of synthesis combine a manifold in accordance with rules. 3. If an act of synthesis is undertaken by the understanding, then the manifold is combined in accordance with concepts. 4. All acts of synthesis are undertaken by the understanding. 5. The manifold of intuition is combined in accordance with rules (from 1 and 2) 6. The manifold of intuition is combined in accordance with concepts (from 3, 4 and 5) 7. If the manifold of intuition is combined in accordance with concepts, then intuition represents the world as being a certain way. For the purposes of this discussion, let us accept that if (7) is true, then perceptual experience, for Kant, involves representational properties. And I take (6) to be equivalent to the conceptualist claim discussed in §§2 and 3. Non-conceptualists respond to this argument by rejecting (4): they hold that some acts of synthesis are not undertaken by the understanding. This allows them to reject both (6) and (7): they can deny both that the application of concepts is necessary for experience and that perception involves the presence of representational properties. I have provided some 19 reason above for thinking this rejection to be problematic. If this were the only way to take seriously the relational considerations voiced by Allais, we would be wise to dispute her motivations. Conceptualists endorse (1) to (6). This allows them two options for accepting the relational considerations. First, they can reject (7). Or second, they can claim that (7) is itself compatible with ascribing to Kant a relational theory of perception. It is this second option which I will set out here. To see that (7) is compatible with a relational theory of Kantian perception, we need to make some further distinctions. It is common in the philosophy of perception literature to distinguish strong and weak representational theories of perceptual experience. Strong representational theories hold that all of the phenomenal properties of perceptual experiences are representational properties. Weak representational theories hold that at least some of the phenomenal properties of perceptual experiences are representational properties. This latter position leaves open the possibility of perception possessing non-representational phenomenal properties. Such an option is familiar to us from discussions about whether experiences have qualia, since qualia are non-representational sensational phenomenal properties of experience, but weak representationalism itself is silent on the nature of the non-representational phenomenal properties that it allows. An analogous distinction applies to relational theories of perception. Strong relational theories hold that all of the phenomenal properties of perceptual experience are non-representational relations; weak relational theories hold that at least some of the phenomenal properties of perceptual experiences are non-representational relations. Some naïve realists explicitly commit themselves to strong relational theories [Brewer 2007, p.89], but there are no grounds for thinking that all must do so. As Soteriou puts it, those who appeal to non-representational properties in their account of the conscious character of experience need not deny that experiences have intentional contents with veridicality conditions... They might hold that the obtaining of the relevant psychological but nonrepresentational relation is an element of the conscious character of successful perception. [Soteriou 2010, p.225] 20 Weak relational theories allow that there may be non-relational elements to the phenomenal character of perception. Once we have made these distinctions, we can see that weak representational and weak relational theories are perfectly compatible: one can allow that perceptual experience has both representational and relational phenomenal properties. This is because 'possession of any one phenomenal property does not exclude the possibility of having any of the others' [Martin 1998, p.178 fn.16]. On such a mixed view, the phenomenal properties of perceptual experience involves both representational and relational elements. Thus a commitment to the presence of representational phenomenal properties does not require a rejection of relational phenomenal properties. What are the implications for the argument above? The claim in (7) takes a stand on whether experience, for Kant, has representational properties. It thus commits Kant to some form of representational theory. But it is silent on the question of whether experience also has relational phenomenal properties. It is thus compatible with ascribing to Kant a weak relational theory. How does this bear on the considerations appealed to by Allais? That will depend on whether the considerations appealed to support the claim that perceptual experience has nothing other than relational elements, or whether they support only the weaker claim that perceptual experience has, for Kant, at least some relational component. I take it to be clear that they only do the latter: so long as Kantian experience has some relational component, we can account for all the features that move Allais. And this means that one who does find such considerations suasive has grounds only to ascribe to Kant a weak relational theory of perception. And a weak relational theory is compatible with (7). The result for conceptualist interpretations is that even if they are committed to the claim that perceptual experience has, for Kant, representational phenomenal properties, this is perfectly compatible with holding that such experience also has, for Kant, relational phenomenal properties. They are thus compatible with ascribing to Kant a weak relational theory. 21 Is conceptualism compatible with strong relational theories? That depends on the prospects for rejecting (7). I won't explore that option here, but it is worth noting that (7) is not without question. There are many activities which are conceptual in the sense of requiring the application of concepts, the outcome of which are not themselves conceptual or representational. (Think of building a car.) And it is not clear why combining the manifold of intuition in accordance with concepts requires intuition itself to possess representational properties, as opposed, say, to some other mental state. At the very least, more needs to be said about what is involved in (7) if we are to be confident that conceptualism is incompatible with a strong relational theory. None of this speaks in favour of ascribing to Kant a relational account of perceptual experience. My intent has been simply to show that conceptualist interpretations need not take a stand on this issue. Consideration of the structure and aim of the Transcendental Deduction gives reason to reject non-conceptualism: Kant held that the application of concepts is necessary for the perceptual presentation of empirical particulars. But we can reject non-conceptualism whilst remaining neutral on how best to capture Kant's account of perceptual experience.1 References Works by Kant: References to the Critique of Pure Reason follow the standard A/B pagination. All other references are to the volume and page of the Akademie edition of Kant's works, Kants Gesammelte Schriften, ed. Königlich Preussische Akademie der Wissenschaften, vols. 1–29 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1902–). The titles are abbreviated as follows: 1 Many thanks to Rory Madden, Ian Phillips, Craig French and two anonymous referees for conversations and comments on this paper. 22 An Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View. In Anthropology, History and Education, ed. R.B. Loude and G. Zöller. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. C Correspondence, ed. and trans. A. Zweig Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. CJ Critique of the Power of Judgment, ed. P. Guyer and E. Matthews. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. FS The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures. In Theoretical Philosophy 1775–1770, ed. and trans. D. Walford and R. Meerbote. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. JL Jäsche Logic. In Lectures on Logic, ed. and trans. J. M Young. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. MV Metaphysics Vigilantius. In Lectures on Metaphysics, ed. and trans. K. Ameriks and S. Naragon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Prol. Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics. In Theoretical Philosophy after 1781, ed. H. Allison and P. Heath. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. VL Vienna Logic. In Lectures on Logic, ed. and trans. J. M Young. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Others of Kant's texts referred to: Kant, I. 1998. Critique of Pure Reason, ed. and trans. P. Guyer and A. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kant, I. 2005. Notes and Fragments. ed. and trans. C. Bowman, P. Guyer and F. Rauscher. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Works by other authors: Abela, P. 2002. Kant's Empirical Realism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Allais, L. 2010. Kant's argument for transcendental idealism in the transcendental aesthetic. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 110 (1):4775. Allais, L. 2009. Kant, non-conceptual content and the representation of space. Journal of the History of Philosophy 47 (3):383-413. Allais, L. 2011. Idealism enough: response to Roche. Kantian Review 16 (3):375-398 Allais, L. 2012. Transcendental idealism and the transcendental deduction. In D. Schulting (ed.) Kant's Idealism: New Interpretations of a Controversial Doctrine. Springer 23 Brewer, B. 2006. Perception and content. European Journal of Philosophy 14 (2):165-181. Brewer, B. 2007. Perception and its objects. Philosophical Studies 132 (1):87-97. Campbell, J. 2002. Reference and Consciousness. Oxford: Oxford University Press Cook Wilson, J. 1926. Statement and Inference, with Other Philosophical Papers. Oxford, Clarendon Press Crane, T. 1992 The non-conceptual content of experience. In T. Crane (ed.), The Contents of Experience. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 136–57. Ginsborg, H. 2006. Kant and the problem of experience. Philosophical Topics 34 (1/2):59-106. Ginsborg, H. 2008. Was Kant a nonconceptualist? Philosophical Studies 137 (1):65 77. Gomes, A. 2010. 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A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN ABSTRACT. Although Kant envisaged a prominent role for logic in the argumentative structure of his Critique of pure reason [12], logicians and philosophers have generally judged Kant's logic negatively. What Kant called 'general' or 'formal' logic has been dismissed as a fairly arbitrary subsystem of first order logic, and what he called 'transcendental logic' is considered to be not a logic at all: no syntax, no semantics, no definition of validity. Against this, we argue that Kant's 'transcendental logic' is a logic in the strict formal sense, albeit with a semantics and a definition of validity that are vastly more complex than that of first order logic. The main technical application of the formalism developed here is a formal proof that Kant's Table of Judgements in §9 of the Critique of pure reason, is indeed, as Kant claimed, complete for the kind of semantics he had in mind. This result implies that Kant's 'general' logic is after all a distinguished subsystem of first order logic, namely what is known as geometric logic. 1. INTRODUCTION The purpose of this article is to examine from the point of view of mathematical logic, Kant's formal logic1 and its relation to what Kant called 'transcendental logic'. This may seem to be a hopeless enterprise. A typical modern dismissal of Kant's formal logic is: 'terrifyingly narrowminded and mathematically trivial' 2 and of course every student of logic is aware of the more politely expressed verdicts in Frege's Begriffsschrift and Strawson's The bounds of sense. Worse, Kant's transcendental logic does not seem to be a logic in the modern sense at all: no syntax, no semantics, no inferences. As against the received view, we will argue here that (i) Kant's formal logic is overly restrictive only if it is assumed that its underlying semantics is that of classical first order logic, whereas Kant's implied semantics is very different, (ii) the implied semantics, centered around Kant's three different notions of object, can be given a precise mathematical expression, thus leading to a formalised transcendental logic, and (iii) on the proposed semantics, a logical system very much like Kant's formal logic is a distinguished fragment of first order logic, namely, geometric logic. We thank Béatrice Longuenesse for enlightening correspondence, Pablo Cubiles Kovacs for discussions about the model-theoretic part of the paper, and the anonymous referee for pointing out flaws in the exposition. The first author is supported by the NWO project 360-20-150: 'The origins of truth'. Authors' address: ILLC/Department of Philosophy, University of Amsterdam, Oude Turfmarkt 141, 1012GC Amsterdam. Corresponding author: M. van Lambalgen, [email protected]. 1As expounded briefly in the Critique of Pure Reason [12] and in more detail in the various series of course notes produced by Kant's students, and the Jäsche Logik, commisioned by Kant and compiled from his notes by J.B. Jäsche; for all of which see [11]. We cite the Critique of Pure Reason in the standard manner, by referring to the page numbers of the first (A) and second (B) edition, so for example 'A57/B81'). 2Alan Hazen, 'Logic and Analyticity', in A.C. Varzi (ed.), The Nature of Logic, Stanford, CA: CSLI (1999), pp. 79-110. 1 2 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN What could be the purpose of such a, partly very technical, exercise? To say that the Critique of pure reason3 is notoriously difficult is an understatement. In his attempt to characterise our cognition of objects, Kant employs a vast array of technical terms that are insufficiently defined (at least for readers with an analytical mindset), such as 'judgement', 'transcendental unity of apperception', 'transcendental object', 'synthesis' and 'schema'. Perhaps a mathematical formalisation, however incomplete, can shed some light on these concepts and their relations. We are very far from claiming that the formalisation presented exhausts Kant's concepts; there is hardly a better inducement to modesty than trying to come to grips with the complexities of CPR, not to mention the secondary literature. But the formalisation may provide a starting point. One important aim is to attempt to restore logic to its rightful place in the argumentative structure of CPR. Kant himself was clear about the importance of logic; the so-called Metaphysical Deduction (§10 of CPR) uses the presumed completeness of the Table of Judgements to argue for the completeness of the Table of Categories, the a priori concepts that are supposed to underlie our cognition of objects and their relations. The communis opinio is that the Table of Judgements rests on a thoroughly discredited view of logic, and this has led to many reductive readings of CPR in which logic hardly figures, if at all. One notable exception to this trend is Béatrice Longuenesse's Kant and the Capacity to Judge [15], whose focal point is the connection between the logical forms of judgements and acts of the understanding. In fact, reading Longuenesse's commentary made us aware that there is much more to Kant's logic than meets the eye, and the present article can be seen as an attempt to translate some of her insights into logical terms.4 To our knowledge, ours is the first attempt to shed light on Kant's logic using the tools of modern mathematical logic. There exist overviews, such as Stuhlmann-Laeisz' Kants Logik [14], but these are set firmly in the context of traditional logic. There also studies of specific philosophical aspects, such as MacFarlane's dissertation [16] on Kant's use of the term 'formal'; or Posy on the question whether Kant is guilty of psychologism [18]. A recent article on Kant's transcendental logic, Rosenkoetter's 'Truth criteria and the very project of a transcendental logic' [20] interestingly suggests that transcendental logic is bound up with the search for a truth criterion that traditional logic cannot deliver (A57–9/B82–4), but there is no hint that transcendental logic can be conceived as a formal logic in its own right. This is precisely what we shall attempt. Before we delve into the intricacies of Kant scholarship and the sometimes considerable complexity of the formalisation of transcendental logic, we want to summarise why we think such an exercise can contribute to a better understanding of the first Critique. (i) Kant describes the role of transcendental logic as The part of transcendental logic that expounds the elements of the pure cognition of the understanding and the principles without which no object can be thought at all, is the transcendental analytic, and at the same time a logic of truth. For no cognition can contradict it without at the same time losing all content, i.e. all relation to any object, hence all truth. (A62-3/B87) 3Henceforth abbreviated to CPR. 4This is not to say that Longuenesse [15] is the only work taking the connection between the logical forms of judgements and acts of the understanding seriously. Two other authors that come to mind are Reich [19] and Wolff [28]. Here we shall not discuss the differences in interpretation between these three authors. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 3 The word 'logic' need not be understood metaphorically in this passage, neither did Kant intend it as such: his discussion of logic in A50-7/B74-82 amply shows this. From a modern perspective, what is stated here is a somewhat outlandish completeness theorem, as for instance that for Friedman's quantifier 'almost all' (cf. [21]): a sentence is inconsistent with the Friedman axioms if and only if it does not have a Borel model, i.e. a model where relations are interpreted as (uncountable) Borel subsets of the reals. The situation is completely analogous here: in both cases one needs consistency with a given set of axioms to force the language to have the interpretation one is interested in. Since transcendental logic plays such a huge role in the Transcendental Analytic, it is worth the effort to see whether a formalisation can clarify parts of the argument; much of the effort will go into the formalisation of Kant's three notions of object. (ii) A second potential benefit is conceptual clarification. As an example we may take the notion of judgement, which receives a different characterisation in each of CPR, Prolegomena and Jäsche Logik. The formalisation will illuminate each of these characterisations and show that in the end they are identical. (iii) There is however a potentially damning objection to this enterprise. As will be seen, the mathematical techniques used in proving the completeness theorem for transcendental logic are thoroughly modern, without any relation to what Kant could have known. Doesn't this invalidate the whole enterprise? What sense is there in attributing a logic to Kant whose formal properties are so far beyond what was available to him, thus turning him into some kind of bionic man? We believe a defense can be mounted along the following lines. As an analogy, consider Kant and his treatment of the continuum, which is striking because he does not consider it to be composed of points, as a set theoretic treatment would have it. Consistent with a constructive treatment, points in the Kantian continuum are only boundaries or limitations. Kant reasons quite consistently with this conception, even though its formal treatment, e.g. in terms of locales, was of course not available to him. Similarly, we believe that Kant's intuition about objects come very close to a mathematical structure (inverse systems), even though he could not articulate it in this way. These structures will provide a semantics for the language of transcendental logic, and as we will see this part is neither very sophisticated nor does it depart much from what Kant himself writes. Where we really go way beyond Kant is in using this semantics to prove limitative results, such as that the Table of Judgement is complete, as Kant conjectured (or rather, asserted). Still, one can view the formalisation as providing a model of Kant's thinking, thus showing its consistency and coherence. To us, that seems more profitable than chopping off a large part of Kant's thought because it is presumed to be hopelessly outdated. 2. KANT'S AIMS AND THE ROLE OF LOGIC Kant's overall aim in CPR was to delimit the scope for metaphysical reflection by arguing that (i) all knowledge starts with perceptual experience, (ii) our cognition contributes principles structuring perceptual experience, principles which are themselves not derived from sensory experience (space, time and the Categories), (iii) all our supra-sensory knowledge is confined to these principles, which Kant called 'synthetic a priori', meaning that they are informative but that their truth can be ascertained without recourse to experience, (iv) it is possible to give a complete enumeration of the Categories and the associated synthetic a priori principles, and this yields a precise delimitation of metaphysics. At this point it may be instructive to compare Kant to modern cognitive science, in which the idea that sensory experience needs structuring principles not themselves directly derived from 4 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN experience is fairly prominent. The classic statement of this view comes from F.C. Bartlett [2, p. 1]) Whenever anybody interprets evidence from any source, and his interpretation contains characteristics that cannot be referred wholly to direct sensory observation or perception, this person thinks. The bother is that nobody has ever been able to find any case of the human use of evidence which does not include characters that run beyond what is directly observed by the senses. So, according to this, people think whenever they do anything at all with evidence. If we adopt that view we very soon find ourselves looking out upon a boundless and turbulent ocean of problems. In his famous paper 'Beyond the information given' [4, p. 224], Jerome Bruner took this idea as a starting point, and argued for the importance of coding systems: We propose that when one goes beyond the information given, one does so by being able to place the present given in a more generic coding system and that one essentially reads off from the coding system additional information [. . . ] . Examples of such coding systems abound in vision, mostly of a geometrical kind, e.g. it is assumed that real-world surfaces can be described as smooth manifolds in the mathematical sense (the coding system). This brief excursion should suggest that the basic outlines of Kant's approach to cognition have contemporary relevance. For a much more extensive treatment, the reader should consult Kitcher [23]. We now come to the role that Kant envisaged for logic in this whole scheme. For Kant, all cognitive activity is directed toward judgement. This crucial term is easily misunderstood, especially when one first approaches it through the 'Table of Judgements', which seems to list possible syntactic forms of sentences (universal, particular, singular, hypothetical, disjunctive etc.). But for Kant, judgement is first and foremost a cognitive act, the result of which has one of the listed syntactic forms.5 This act-like character of judgement is clear if one looks at Kant's definitions of judgement A judgement is the representation of the unity of the consciousness of various representations ... (Jäsche Logik, §17) A judgement is nothing but the manner in which given cognitions are brought to the objective unity of apperception (B141). Common in these definitions is that a judgement is the act of binding together mental representations; this is what the term 'unity' refers to. But where the second definition differs from the first is that also the aim of judgement is indicated by means of the word 'objective', which is Kant's terminology for 'having relation to an object'.6 We will return below to the multiple meanings of the term 'object', but for now it suffices to think of objects of experience. For Kant, objects are not found in experience, but they are constructed ('synthesised') from sensory materials under the guidance of the Categories, which are defined as 'concepts of an object in general, by means of which the intuition of an object is regarded as determined in respect of one of the logical functions of judgement' (B128). It is here that judgement plays an all-important role, since Kant's idea is that objects are synthesised through the act of making judgements about them. An example will help here. Consider the universal judgement 'All A are B', which Kant glosses with the help of a quantifier as 'To everything x to which A belongs, also B belongs'. Kant inquires what the presuppositions of such judgements are, and finds that these include the 5Thus a Kantian judgement is very much unlike a proposition in the modern sense. 6 Kant also expresses this by saying that a judgement must be objectively valid. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 5 concepts of unity (to provide units that can act as substitution instances for the variable x), and totality (to ensure that x can run over the whole extension of A).7 Thus the conditions that have to be satisfied to make a universal judgement lead one to consider the Categories of Quantity: unity, plurality, totality. More generally, Longuenesse writes Kant asked himself which logical forms of judgement should be considered primitive if the original function of judgement is to "bring given cognitions to the objective unity of apperception", that is, to relate our representations to objects. Having discovered that the objectifying function of these forms provided him with the solution he was seeking to the problem of the categories,8 Kant retained as primitive only those forms which he thought indispensable for generating the relation of our representations to an object .... [15, p. 78] Thus Kant's argument is the following. Cognitive activity consists in binding together representations, and always issues in judgements. The mode of binding does not derive from the senses, but is contributed a priori by cognition (compare Bruner's 'coding systems'). Each primitive judgement form represents a particular a priori manner of binding together, and conversely, so that we have a one–to–one correspondence between judgement forms and Categories. Assuming that the list of judgement forms is complete, the corresponding list of Categories is complete as well. This is the content of the 'Metaphysical Deduction', which, if successful, would provide an exhaustive list of those concepts that legitimately go beyond sensory experience. Starting with §4 in Frege's Begriffsschrift, Kant's logic came under heavy criticism. Viewed from the perspective of the newly developed predicate logic, Kant's logic seemed a tiny fragment, devoid of special significance; and of course, Frege's anti-psychologism was inimical to associating cognitive operations to judgement forms. Another discussion of 'the trouble with Kant' can be found in Strawson's The Bounds of Sense, which focusses on Kant's aim to identify primitive logical forms, and to associate these with primitive functions of the understanding. At least in classical logic, it is impossible to talk about a distinguished set of primitive logical forms, since judgement forms are interdefinable (e.g. the hypothetical in terms of the disjunctive and negation).9 Strawson observes that if one abandons the idea of primitive logical forms, one could say that each of indefinitely many logical forms gives rise to a Category, which seems ridiculous; or one could say that it is logical ideas and not logical forms that are fundamental, in particular the formally atomic proposition (which for Strawson is in subject predicate form) truth-functional composition10 quantification. This then greatly reduces the number of Categories; what one is left with is that the notions of particular object and universal kind or character as categories must have application in a world in which judgements can be made. More importantly, these two categories can be directly deduced from transcendental considerations, without the detour via the Table of Judgements. 7While running over the extension of A, x describes a plurality, which may or may not be totalisable. 8The problem being how to provide a complete list of the Categories. 9At this point one can begin to see what could be wrong with this line of criticism: it is very much tied to classical logic, and would fail for e.g. intuitionistic logic. It is quite doubtful, to say the least, whether Kant adopts a material implication reading of the hypothetical. It is even unclear whether his disjunctive judgement, with its intended semantics in terms of parts and wholes, fully conforms to the classical model; see footnote 40 for more on this. 10But see footnote 9. 6 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN All in all it seems then as if Kant's attempt to involve logic in determining 'the bounds of sense' is an utter failure; so why try to resuscitate it? One reason for doing so is that the various criticisms have completely bypassed issues of semantics. It has been taken for granted that Kant's judgement forms can be translated in classical predicate logic, and thus inherit its semantics. But a moment's reflection shows that this may well be inappropriate. The semantics for classical predicate logic is given by models consisting of a domain of objects over which relations are interpreted; thus here the objects are assumed to be given. We have just seen however that for Kant, judgements somehow play a role in constituting objects from sensory material, so that it seems wrong to take objects as given from the outset. Could it be that by constructing a semantics that is closer to Kant's intentions, the judgement forms that he considers somehow do acquire a special status? 3. OUR AIMS Kant determined the judgement forms in the Table of Judgements not by looking at what the logic textbooks of the day had to offer, but Only insofar as [judgement forms] were selected and organized under the guidance of the transcendental question (what are the a priori conditions for the representations of objects in general?) could logical functions of judgement serve as a guiding thread to the table of categories [15, p.397]. Kant's procedure can be thought of along the lines of the 'method of analysis and synthesis' in geometry: in the analytic phase one assumes that one knows precisely how objects are constituted and one determines from this the logical forms of judgements that can have relation to an object, in so doing providing a transcendental justification of the Table of Judgements; in the synthetic phase (which takes up most of the Transcendental Deduction) one reverses the argument and shows how logical forms of judgement contribute to the constitution of objects. Our argument is focussed on the first, 'analytic', part. We consider a subset of 'the a priori conditions for the representations of objects in general' (as discussed by Kant) that is sufficient to generate an abstract mathematical representation of Kant's view of objects – as will be seen below for this purpose we use (abstract descriptions of) the three syntheses of the A Deduction (A99–104) and the 'unity of self-consciousness' (A109). The mathematical representation of Kant's view of objects then provides a semantics for judgements that allows one to ask the question: 'which logical forms of judgements are capable of having 'relation to an object'?'. Our main technical result is that this class of judgement forms consists of all and only those formulas that can be written as conjunctions of geometric implications, i.e. of formulas of the form ∀x(θ(x)→ ψ(x)), where θ is a conjunction of atomic formulas, and ψ is constructed from atomic formulas using only ∨,∧,∃,⊥.11 No judgement form outside this class can claim objective validity.12 In this sense there is a completeness result like the one Kant claimed for his Table of Judgements; and it is similarly based on transcendental considerations. At first sight it may seem that the class of judgement forms we have isolated extends the Table of Judgements: after all, it allows (some) quantifier combinations of the form ∀∃, whereas Kant's Table apparently doesn't. We shall argue, however, that this difference is spurious, because Kant's examples, especially in his treatment of causality, show that what he calls a 'hypothetical' judgement can be 11The relevant definitions will be given in section 9. 12For the meaning of this term, cf. footnote 6. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 7 as complex as geometric implications. And clearly the paradigm example of a synthetic a priori judgement Everything that happens (begins to be) presupposes something which it follows in accordance with a rule. (A189) is a geometric implication. Our main mathematical result does not answer the 'synthetic' question: 'how do judgement forms enable us to constitute empirical objects as substitution instances of the "x" in judgements?'.13 This involves looking at judgement forms, to assess their contribution to the constitution of objects. But before the how-question can be answered first those judgement forms need to be identified for which the how-question can be asked at all. 4. KANT'S LOGIC: GENERAL AND TRANSCENDENTAL The key to such an enterprise is that judgements in Kant's sense participate in two kinds of logics: general logic and transcendental logic. 4.1. General logic. [G]eneral logic abstracts from all the contents of the cognition of the understanding and of the difference of its objects, and has to do with nothing but the mere form of thinking. (A54/B78) Kant emphasises time and again the formality of general logic, which contains 'absolutely necessary rules of thinking regardless of difference of objects'. In particular, it abstracts from empirical content and makes no distinction between imaginary and real or actual objects. Kant's general logic is treated in the notes taken by his students and the Jäsche Logik and treats such topics as:14 forms of judgements (categorical, hypothetical, disjunctive, with various subdivisions) the inferences in which these judgements participate (immediate inferences such as conversion of subject and predicate; and inferences of reason such as syllogisms, modus ponens/modus tollens, disjunctive syllogism) the principle on which inferences of reason are based: the major premise must be a 'universal rule' and the minor premise must express subsumption under the condition of the rule. Categorical judgements are judgements in subject-predicate form, combined with quantifiers and optional negation: (affirmative) all A are B, some A are B, (negative) no A are B, some A are not B, (infinite) all A are non-B, some A are non-B, etc.15 Categorical judgements may occur as premises and as conclusion in syllogisms. Disjunctive judgements are not what one would think, judgements of the form p ∨ q. The Jäsche Logik provides the following definition: A judgement is disjunctive if the parts of the sphere of a given concept determine one another in the whole or toward a whole as complements. . . [A]ll disjunctive judgements represent various judgements as in the community of a sphere. . . ( Jäsche Logik, §27, 28) [11, pp. 602-3] As example Kant provides 13Cf. p. 4 for Kant's introduction of bound variables. 14We do not discuss Kant's treatment of concepts here. 15Kant thus makes a distinction between sentence negation (negative judgements) and predicate negation (infinite judgements. 8 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN Every triangle is either right-angled or not right-angled. Thus the logical form is something like ∀x(C(x) → A(x) ∨ B(x)), where C represents the whole, A,B its parts; here it is not immediately clear whether the parts can be taken to exist outside the context of the whole. In our formalisation, we will act as if the ∨ is classical disjunction; but see footnote 40. It would similarly be a mistake to identify Kant's hypothetical judgements with a conditional p → q, let alone material implication as defined by its truth table. A few examples from Kant will make this clear. In the context of a discussion of the possible temporal relations between cause and effect Kant writes in CPR: If I consider a ball that lies on a stuffed pillow and makes a dent in it as a cause, it is simultaneous with its effect. (A203/B246) The hypothetical that can be distilled from this passage is If a ball lies on a stuffed pillow, it makes a dent in that pillow. From this we see that Kant needs relations, not just unary predicates, to formulate his causal hypotheticals, and also that the logical form of this particular causal hypothetical is what we called above (p. 6) geometric implications. We now give an extended quote from the Prolegomena §29 which provides another example of a hypothetical judgement that really has geometric implication form, and which also shows that causality is related to the rule-like character of the hypothetical, which, as we shall see in section 9.1, means that the existential quantifier(s) in the geometric implication can be replaced by a concrete function. It is, however, possible that in perception a rule of relation will be found, which says this: that a certain appearance is constantly followed by another (though not the reverse); and this is a case for me to use a hypothetical judgement and, e.g., to say: If a body is illuminated by the sun for long enough, it becomes warm. Here there is of course not yet the necessity of connection, hence not yet the concept of cause. But I continue on, and say: if the above proposition, which is merely a subjective connection of perceptions, is to be a proposition of experience, then it must be regarded as necessarily and universally valid. But a proposition of this sort would be: The sun through its light is the cause of the warmth. The foregoing empirical rule is now regarded as a law, and indeed as valid not merely of appearances, but of them on behalf of a possible experience, which requires universally and therefore necessarily valid rules [. . . ] the concept of a cause indicates a condition that in no way attaches to things, but only to experience, namely that experience can be an objectively valid cognition of appearances and their sequence in time only insofar as the antecedent appearance can be connected with the subsequent one according to the rule of hypothetical judgements [13, p. 105]. The logical form of the first hypothetical is something like If x is illuminated by y between time t and time s and s − t > d and the temperature of x at t is v, then there exists a w such that the temperature of x at s is v + w and v + w > c, where d is the criterion value for 'long enough' and c a criterion value for 'warm'. Again we see the importance of relations in the logical form of hypotheticals, which is that of geometric implications.16 One last remark before we move on to inferences. Kant makes a distinction 16A full treatment of causality would involve structures containing events and times (as well as axioms governing these), whereas below we consider only the case where quantifiers range over objects. Nevertheless we hope A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 9 between categorical judgements 'To all x to which A belongs, also B belongs' and hypothetical judgements 'if x is A then x is B'. The difference is that in the latter judgement type it is not asserted that x belongs to A, whereas that is asserted in the former type. This difference can be accounted for by working in a many-sorted logic where the subject term of a categorical judgement refers to a separate sort, always taken to be non-empty. This does not affect the technical results given below. Moving now to inferences, we see that general logic contains a specific set of inference rules, not a general semantic consequence relation. Simplifying a bit, one can say that the inference rules are like elimination rules in natural deduction. Corresponding introduction rules are lacking; e.g. there are no formal introduction rules for the hypothetical or the disjunctive.17 The conditions for asserting a judgement are not treated in general logic, but in transcendental logic, about which more will be said below. Before we do so however, we add a few remarks on Kant's formal theory of truth, which also belongs to general logic. Kant lists 3 'formal criteria of truth' (Jäsche Logik, [11, p. 560]: (1) the principle of [non-]contradiction (2) the principle of sufficient reason 'on which rests the (logical) actuality of a cognition, the fact that it is grounded, as material for assertoric judgements' (3) the principle of excluded middle The second principle seems out of place in logic, especially if one reads what Kant writes on the previous page If all the consequences of a cognition are true, then the cognition is true too. For if there were something false in the cognition, then there would have to be a false consequence too. From the consequence, then, we may infer to a ground, but without being able to determine this ground. Only from the complex of all consequences can one infer to a determinate ground, infer that it is the true ground. This seems a blatant fallacy, but the principle will make a surprising appearance in our formal treatment of Kant's transcendental logic. 4.2. Transcendental logic. We began this section by saying that judgements participate in two logics simultaneously: general and transcendental. About the latter, Kant says the following: a science of pure understanding and of the pure cognition of reason, by means of which we think objects completely a priori. Such a science, which would determine the origin, the domain, and the objective validity of such cognitions, would have to be called transcendental logic since it has to do merely with the laws of the understanding and reason, but solely insofar as they are related to objects a priori and not, as in the case of general logic, to empirical as well as pure cognitions of reason without distinction. (A57/B81-2) Roughly speaking, whereas general logic is concerned merely with inference rules, what transcendental logic adds to this is a semantics in terms of objects. At first sight this may seem the message is clear: there is considerable logical complexity (including quantifiers) hidden in Kant's notion of a hypothetical judgement. 17In fact the usual introduction rule for ∨ would be incorrect on Kant's interpretation of the disjunction, since it is tantaamount to the possibility to create wholes by arbitrarily putting together parts. 10 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN rather trivial: after all, first order predicate logic has a semantics in terms of domains of objects and relations defined on these domains, and thus there seems to be no ground for our earlier claim, when discussing Frege's and Strawson's criticism, that Kant's logic is different from first order predicate logic. But there is a vast difference between the notion of object as it occurs in modern semantics and in Kant's logic. In the former, objects are mathematical entities supplied by the metatheory, usually some version of set theory. These objects have no internal structure, at least not for the purposes of the model theory. Kant's notions of object, as they occur in the semantics furnished by transcendental logic, are very different. For instance, there are 'objects of experience', somehow constructed out of sensory material by 'the laws of the understanding and reason'. Transcendental logic deals with a priori and completely general principles which govern the construction of objects, and relate judgements to objects so that we may come to speak of true judgements. Since transcendental logic deals with construction of objects of experience, for the purposes of this logic objects must have internal structure; and a large part of this article will be taken up by a discussion of what that structure is. 5. 'THE RULES FOR THE PURE THINKING OF AN OBJECT' There appears to be an internal inconsistency in Kant's notion of an object, which follows from his treatment of causality. Kant was convinced by Hume's analysis of causality, showing that it cannot be inherent in the phenomena. Kant's proposal was to make causality a category, a 'pure concept of the understanding', which is instrumental in constituting phenomena but which cannot be derived from them. Now this seems to conflict with the natural tendency to say that representations within us are caused by objects outside us, that 'objects affect sensibility'. For in this case one extends the category of causality beyond its legitimate domain of application. We will adopt Longuenesse's analysis here. She proposes, following A92/B125, that Kant replaces the necessity inherent in causality by another form of necessity: instead of 'the object causes representations within us', one now has 'the object alone makes the representation possible', or 'without the representation the object is impossible'. Moreover, and most importantly, this form of necessity is internalised, what Longuenesse calls 'internalisation within representation', so that 'the object' as it occurs in the statement 'without the representation the object is impossible' is itself a kind of representation. Here is a quote from CPR making this point: It is necessary to make understood what is meant by the expression an object of representations. [A]ppearances themselves are nothing but sensible representations, which must not be regarded in themselves ... as objects (outside the power of representation). What does one mean, then, if one speaks of an object corresponding to and therefore also distinct from the cognition? It is easy to see that this object must be thought of only as something general = X, since outside of our cognition we have nothing that we could set over against this cognition as corresponding to it. (A104) We thus have the following slightly paradoxical situation: we have to relate appearances to objects represented internally as existing outside us. How Kant conceived of this remarkable feat will be our next topic. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 11 6. OBJECTS OF APPEARANCE, OBJECTS OF EXPERIENCE, TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECTS Longuenesse's interpretation hinges on an analysis of what Kant might mean when he glosses a categorical judgement such as 'all A are B' as 'To all x to which A belongs, B also belongs'. It is not open to Kant to let the variable x run over a particular set theoretically defined collection of objects; xmust run over objects as he conceives them, that is, as particular internal representations. But now the problem arises that Kant has several notions of object: object of appearance, object of experience, and transcendental object, and in some way the variable x is concerned with all three. In a footnote defending her interpretation against Allison's, Longuenesse puts this as follows: [R]eference to an object represented by the term 'x' in the logical form of judgement does have as one of its components reference to an independent object leading us to seek coherence among our representations of it and allowing us to think of the connection of representations as in some sense necessary, "even if the judgement is empirical and therefore contingent", which is precisely the role Kant assigned to reference to the "transcendental object = x" in the A Deduction [15, p. 111]. This seems to be saying that we should think of a variable x as referring to different types of objects simultaneously. This is a very unusual understanding of variables, and it will be one of our main tasks to make this idea precise. In order to do so, we will briefly introduce the three kinds of objects. In section 2 we remarked that Kant's theory of cognition can be captured by Bruner's phrase 'going beyond the information given'. Kant attempts to show in the A Deduction that the psychological data philosophers of empiricist persuasion typically assume are already the result of mental operations. Receptivity by itself is not enough, but what it yields must be processed in order to be used by the understanding, which is concerned with relating cognitions to objects. The general term for these processes is synthesis: By synthesis in the most general sense ... I understand the action of putting different representations together with each other and comprehending their manifoldness in one cognition. (A77/B103) 6.1. Synthesis of apprehension in intuition. The A Deduction treats three such syntheses, which to a first approximation can be thought of as operating one after the other. The purpose of the first synthesis, the 'synthesis of apprehension in intuition', is to prepare the manifold received in intuition for further processing by representing it internally as a manifold of spatial parts and sensory qualities, together with the manner in which these are bound together: Every intuition contains a manifold in itself, which however would not be presented as such if the mind did not distinguish the time in the succession of impressions on one another; for as contained in one moment no representation can ever be other than absolute unity. Now in order for unity of intuition to come from this manifold ... it is necessary first to run through and then take together this manifoldness, which action I shall call the synthesis of apprehension ...(A99) A concrete example of this process of 'run through and take together' is given later, in B162, where Kant envisages 'mak[ing] the empirical intuition of a house into perception through apprehension of its manifold' by, as it were, drawing its shape, i.e. by a temporal process. Although this first synthesis has made much material available for further processing (spatial parts, sensory qualities), by itself it does not produce objects (always thought of as internal 12 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN representations); it does not distinguish between true cognition of objects and hallucinations. For this, additional mental processes are necessary, which are concerned with various forms of stability that objects must have. 6.2. Synthesis of reproduction in imagination. To begin with, experience presupposes the reproducibility of appearances, as can be seen from the following example, especially when considered in conjunction with the example of the house (B162) just given: Now it is obvious that if I draw a line in thought, or think of the time from one noon to the next, or even want to represent a certain number to myself, I must necessarily first grasp one of these manifold representations after another in my thoughts. But if I were always to lose the preceding representations (the first parts of the line ...) from my thoughts and not reproduce them when I proceed to the following ones, then no whole representation ..... could ever arise. (A102) Thus if one is engaged in mentally tracing the outline of the back of a house but in the meantime the representation resulting from tracing the front has dropped out of memory, no experience of the house will ever arise. In other words, to experience an object qua object, at any particular moment sensory experience has to go hand in hand with the reproduction of those aspects of the object that cannot be perceived at that very moment. Longuenesse puts this as follows: '[T]he aim to represent a whole guides every associative reproduction of the imagination [15, p. 42].' It is only through the synthesis effected by reproduction in imagination that we can strive toward complete knowledge, because at any particular moment sensory knowledge is limited. At the same time the aim to represent a whole is precisely that, an aim, because complete knowledge is beyond our reach. The preceding two syntheses (which are 'inseparably combined' (A102)) yield objects of appearance. In the formal model to be presented in section 7 objects of appearance will constitute the domains of models. Predicates are introduced through the following considerations. 6.3. Synthesis of recognition in a concept. Without consciousness that which we think is the very same as what we thought a moment before, all reproduction in the series of representations would be in vain. For it would be a new representation in our current state (A103) It is the concept's job to generate the consciousness of the generic identity between the reproduced representation and all those preceding it [15, p. 46], i.e. to recognise a representation as being of a certain kind. Kant has an interesting dual view of concepts: they are on the one hand intensional rules (or algorithms) to be applied to objects of appearance, on the other hand the extensions generated by the applications of the rules. If objects of appearance can be stably classified as being of a certain kind, they are called 'determinate objects of experience', where 'determinate' here means 'determined by concepts'. 6.4. From transcendental unity of apperception to transcendental object. We are not yet done, however; there is another kind of stability we have to consider. Even though all our representations are internal, there is sometimes a stable coherence among them, and this leads us to think that there is an object 'behind' the representations that is responsible for the coherence. But we can know nothing about objects 'behind' representations, and the question arises how such an object can be internalised as a particular kind of representation. The answer is given in the following long sequence of quotes: A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 13 We find however, that our thought of the relation of all cognition to its object carries something of necessity to it [...] since insofar as they are to relate to an object our cognitions must also necessarily agree with each other in relation to it, i.e., they must have that unity that constitutes the concept of an object. It is clear however, that since we have to do only with the manifold of our representations, and that X which corresponds with them (the object) [...] is nothing for us, the unity that the object makes necessary can be nothing other than the formal unity of the consciousness in the synthesis of the manifold of representations. (A104–5) Now no cognitions can occur in us, no connection and unity among them, without that unity of consciousness that precedes all data of the intuitions, and in relation to which all representation of objects is alone possible. This pure, original, unchanging consciousness I will now name transcendental apprehension. (A107) [A]ppearances are not things in themselves, but themselves only representations, which in turn have their object, which therefore cannot be further intuited by us, and that may therefore be named the non-empirical, i.e., the transcendental object = X. The pure concept of this transcendental object (which in reality throughout all our cognition is always one and the same = X), is what can alone confer upon all our empirical concepts in general relation to an object, i.e., objective validity. [T]his concept cannot contain any determinate intuition at all, and therefore concerns nothing but that unity which must be encountered in a manifold of cognition insofar as it stands in relation to an object. This relation, however, is nothing other than the necessary unity of self-consciousness, thus also of the synthesis of the manifold, through a common function of the mind for combining it in one representation. (A109) Hence, on the one hand the transcendental object is responsible for grasping objects of experience as the same object, on the other hand the transcendental object is an internal representation of the 'necessary unity of self-consciousness'. To come back to the starting point of this section, the variable x must refer to objects of experience as well as to the transcendental object, and the latter must somehow be constructed from the 'unity of self-consciousness'. We seem to have strayed very far from logical considerations. It will turn out however, that it is possible to give a formalisation of transcendental logic that captures the formal relationships that are hinted at by Kant in the preceding quotes. The first step towards formalisation will be to propose semantic structures that can replace first order models with their inappropriate notion of object; these will be inverse systems of first order models and their limits. We will then show how to interpret formulas on such structures, in so doing making sense of the multiple interpretations of the same variable that Longuenesse believes is essential. Once we have done so, we can set up a proof system for transcendental logic and prove its soundness and completeness. A byproduct of the completeness proof is that there is a sense in which Kant's Table of Judgements is complete. 7. STRUCTURES FOR OBJECTS The purpose of the structure to be presented is to give an account of Kant's notion of object, in terms of formal counterparts of the three syntheses, the transcendental object and unity of self-consciousness. This leaves out important topics of Kant's transcendental logic, notably his theory of causality. The advantage of this restriction is that in our chosen domain, the structures necessary for formalisation already exist, namely inverse systems. 14 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN To make the complexity of the construction somewhat more manageable, we split it in two parts. We first deal with inverse systems of sets and the relation of these inverse systems to the first two syntheses. We then consider inverse systems of models, i.e. of sets with relations defined on them, and we relate these to the third synthesis. We emphasise that we introduce this division only for expository purposes; in reality the three syntheses are inseparably linked. 7.1. Inverse systems of sets, and synthesis. An inverse system is a collection of sets which are connected by mappings. We first give the pertinent definitions, then relate these to abstract properties of synthesis. Definition 1. A directed set is a set T together with an ordering relation ≤ such that (1) ≤ is a partial order, i.e. transitive, reflexive, anti-symmetric (2) ≤ is directed, i.e. for any s, t ∈ T there is r ∈ T with s, t ≤ r Definition 2. An inverse system indexed by T is a set D = {Ds|s ∈ T} together with a family of mappings F = {hst|s ≥ t, hst : Ds −→ Dt}. The mappings in F must satisfy the coherence requirement that if s ≥ t ≥ r, htr ◦ hst = hsr. 7.1.1. Interpretation of the index set. In our case, the index set represents some abstract properties of synthesis.18 Recall that the 'synthesis of apprehension in intuition' proceeds by a 'running through and holding together of the manifold' and is thus a process that takes place in time. We may now think of an index s ∈ T as an interval of time available for the process of 'running through and holding together'. More formally, s can be taken to be a set of instants or events, ordered by a 'precedes' relation; the relation t ≤ s then stands for: t is a substructure of s. It is immediate that on this interpretation≤ is a partial order. The directedness is related to what Kant called 'the formal unity of the consciousness in the synthesis of the manifold of representations' (A105) or 'the necessary unity of self-consciousness, thus also of the synthesis of the manifold, through a common function of the mind for combining it in one representation' (A109) – the requirement that 'for any s, t ∈ T there is r ∈ T with s, t ≤ r' creates the formal conditions for combining the syntheses executed during s and t in one representation, coded by r.19 7.1.2. Interpretation of theDs and the mappings hst : Ds −→ Dt. An object inDs can thought of as a possible 'indeterminate object of empirical intuition' synthesised in the interval s. If s ≥ t, the mapping hst : Ds −→ Dt expresses a consistency requirement: if d ∈ Ds represents an indeterminate object of empirical intuition synthesised in interval s, so that a particular manifold of features can be 'run through and held together' during s, some indeterminate object of empirical intuition must already be synthesisable by 'running through and holding together' in interval t, e.g. by combining a subset of the features characaterising d. This interpretation justifies the coherence condition s ≥ t ≥ r, htr ◦ hst = hsr: the synthesis obtained from first restricting the interval available for 'running through and holding together' to interval t, and then to interval r should not differ from the synthesis obtained by restricting to r directly. We do not put any further requirements on the mappings hst : Ds −→ Dt, such as surjectivity or injectivity. Some indeterminate object of experience inDt may have disappeared inDs: more time for 'running through and holding together' may actually yield fewer features that can be 18At this stage the reader should think of syntheses executed by a single consciousness. This will be generalised later to several cognitive agents when we come to consider Kant's notion of 'objective validity'. 19Of necessity, this discussion is very brief, although it marks the point where the Transcendental Aesthetic comes into contact with the Transcendental Analytic. We will offer a much more detailed explanation elsewhere. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 15 combined.20 Thus we do not require the mappings to be surjective. It may also happen that an indeterminate object of experience in Dt corresponds to two or more of such objects in Ds, as when a building viewed from afar upon closer inspection turns out to be composed of two spatially separated buildings; thus the mappings need not be injective. The interaction of the directedness of the index set and the mappings hst is of some interest. If r ≥ s, t there are mappings hrs : Dr −→ Ds and hrt : Ds −→ Dt. Each 'indeterminate object of empirical intuition' in d ∈ Dr can be seen as a synthesis of such objects hrs(d) ∈ Ds and hrt(d) ∈ Dt. For example, the 'manifold of a house' (B162) can be viewed as synthesised from a 'manifold of the front' and a 'manifold of the back'. (Note that we do not require that every pair of objects in Dt and Ds is unifiable in this sense.) The operation just described has some of the characteristics of the synthesis of reproduction in imagination: the fact that the front of the house can be unified with the back to produce a coherent object presupposes that the front can be reproduced as it is while we are staring at the back. The mappings hrs : Dr −→ Ds and hrt : Ds −→ Dt capture the idea that d ∈ Dr arises from reproductions of hrs(d) and hrt(d) in r. 7.2. Inverse limit of an inverse system of sets. In the quote from A109, repeated below for convenience, Kant talks about the essential connection between the 'necessary unity of selfconsciousness' and the transcendental object: Appearances are not things in themselves, but themselves only representations, which in turn have their object, which therefore cannot be further intuited by us, and that may therefore be named the non-empirical, i.e., the transcendental object = X. The pure concept of this transcendental object (which in reality throughout all our cognition is always one and the same = X), is what can alone confer upon all our empirical concepts in general relation to an object, i.e., objective validity. This concept cannot contain any determinate intuition at all, and therefore concerns nothing but that unity which must be encountered in a manifold of cognition insofar as it stands in relation to an object. This relation, however, is nothing other than the necessary unity of self-consciousness, thus also of the synthesis of the manifold, through a common function of the mind for combining it in one representation. (A109) As we remarked above, this connection seems mysterious: 'unity of self-consciousness' and 'transcendental object' seem to belong to completely different conceptual domains. But if one agrees to represent unity of self-consciousness via a directed set of indices, there is a connection with the transcendental object, which is given through the following definition and theorem 1 below. Definition 3. Let (T, {Ds | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system. Let D ⊆ Πs∈TDs the set of all ξ such that for s ≥ t, hst(ξ(s)) = ξ(t). Such ξ will be called threads. ThenD is called the inverse limit of the given inverse system. We propose to identify the transcendental object of A109 with the inverse limit as just defined. Before we state the properties of inverse limits that we shall use in the sequel, we give an excerpt from a letter from Béatrice Longuenesse (quoted with permission) that sheds considerable light on the notion of transcendental object: I would say "the transcendental object" should be taken as a mass noun referring to whatever it is that our intuition gives us access to without giving us any knowledge 20For an empirical illustration of this phenomenon, one can think of Treisman's 'illusory conjunctions' [25]. 16 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN of it except as an appearance. The singular term "the transcendental object" is not of the same nature as the singular term as we would use it to refer to an empirical object, e.g.: "the dictionary sitting on my desk right now." [One must not] think of "the transcendental object" as a count noun, or of transcendental object(s) as falling under categories of unity and plurality just like empirical objects do. The situation in fact is: thinking of our judgments as ranging over empirical objects is also thinking of our judgments as being about *some object =X*, whatever it is, however it is to be sliced up, that our empirical objects represent for us. To say that that object is "the same through out our cognition" to say that there is one and the same stuff out there that our cognitions try to capture and do capture by way of giving values to the variable 'x' in our judgments.21 This makes clear that the transcendental object must be represented as some thing, otherwise it couldn't be 'sliced up'; hence considered as a classical set it must be non-empty. Now, without additional conditions, it is possible that the inverse limit is non-empty, so that in this formal model there wouldn't be any 'stuff' for our cognition to capture. The comparison of the transcendental object with a mass noun suggests however that our formalisation of the transcendental object as a set is not completely adequate; it would be more appropriate to choose a whole/part template. Technically, this would require a category theoretic formalisation, but this would compound the expository problems. We therefore continue to work in a set theoretic framework, in which we have one transcendental object, the non-empty inverse limit, together with elements of the inverse limit, to be called transcendental elements, introducing a term not to be found in CPR. If the transcendental object viewed as inverse limit is non-empty, it provides 'coherence among our representations' in the following sense Lemma 1. Let (T, {Ds | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system with non-empty inverse limitD. Then for each s, t ∈ T with s ≥ t there exists a mapping πs : D −→ Ds satisfying hst ◦ πs = πt. PROOF Given a thread ξ ∈ D, put πs(ξ) = ξs.  That is, there is a single transcendental object (the inverse limit) to which all intuitions (the Ds) relate. At the same time,'reference to an object represented by the term 'x' in the logical form of judgement does have as one of its components reference to an independent object', in the sense that for some d, assignment of d to x can be thought of as deriving from an assignment to x of an 'independent object' that projects to x. Although, as we remarked above, the elements of the transcendental object have no Kantian meaning per se, it is useful to think of them in the following manner. Recall that theDs represent the possible objects of empirical intuition. Intuitively speaking, one can have many different 21The continuation of the letter shows that there are constructive aspects to the notion of the transcendental object: "[Thus], it is true that if given the choice, the transcendental object should be thought about on the model of part/whole *rather than* set/elements and in that sense, is analogous to the Kantian totum continuum of space. In fact this comparison comes up when Kant discusses the Transcendental Ideal, which is thought of as a whole of reality where whole precedes parts just as in space, as an "infinite given magnitude", the whole precedes parts. But, it is probably even truer that strictly speaking, the transcendental object the object = X that "corresponds to" our intuitions transcends the distinction between the two ways of slicing up reality: whole/part *or* set/elements. For the fact that there is an *alternative* between these two ways of slicing up reality (roughly: whole/part being characteristic of intuition, set/element of understanding) is characteristic of our own, finite understanding, which does not intuit: for which intuition and concepts are two irretrievably separate modes of representation, which complement each other in our cognition. " A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 17 intuitions of the same 'object'; think of all the different possible views of a house. There is no single intuition that contains within itself all the different intuitions one can have of the house; nevertheless these intuitions somehow form a unity. A transcendental element in the sense just defined is not an object of empirical intuition, since it is not an element of a Ds, but in virtue of the previous lemma it binds together objects of empirical intuition into a unity. Our next concern is the non-emptiness of the transcendental object. In the general case that we study here, in which the mappings hst need not be surjective, it is not guaranteed that the inverse limit is non-empty. If we require that the indexed setsDs are finite, non-emptiness can be proved, as we shall see in a moment. There is a Kantian justification for this assumption, which has to with the connection between the Categories of Quantity and finite numbers, provided by the so-called Schemata. In a nutshell, the idea is this. The universal judgement 'all A are B' corresponds to the Category of Totality: to make such a judgement one has to be certain that one has considered everything that falls under the extension ofA. Kant conceives of this 'considering everything that falls under the extension of A' as a serial process, taking place in time, i.e. one must enumerate the objects falling under the extension of A. For Kant, the enumeration yields a totality only if the extension enumerated is finite.22 The existence proof that we are about to give will make clear why there is an essential connection between the non-emptiness of the transcendental object and the directedness of the index set (the 'unity of self-consciousness'). Theorem 1. Let (T, {Ds | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system where each Ds is finite. Then the inverse limit is non-empty. PROOF. For each s ∈ T provide Ds with the discrete topology. Form the Cartesian product Πs∈TDs; this product is non-empty by Tychonov's theorem. We have to show that the subset of Πs∈TDs consisting of the threads is non-empty as well. Define for each s ∈ T , As = {ξ ∈ Πs∈TDs | ∀t ≤ s hst(ξ(s)) = ξ(t)} =⋂ t≤s {ξ ∈ Πs∈TDs | hst(ξ(s)) = ξ(t)} . The last representation shows, using the definition of inverse system, that each As is a closed non-empty set. We show that the collection of sets As has the finite intersection property. Consider As and At. We have to show that As ∩ At is non-empty. By directedness of T , choose r ≥ s, t then Ar ⊆ As ∩At, which shows that As ∩At is non-empty. Analogously for all finite cardinalities. Hence by compactness, the collection of threads, ⋂ s∈T As, is non-empty.  7.3. Inverse systems of models, and the third synthesis. To formalise the 'synthesis of recognition in a concept', we represent concepts as relations on the indexed sets of an inverse system. This additional structure entails additional requirements on the mappings hst. Definition 4. Let T be a directed set. An inverse system of models indexed by T is a family of first order models {Ms|s ∈ T} together with a family of homomorphisms F = {hst|s ≥ t, hst : Ms −→ Mt}. The mappings in F must satisfy the coherence requirement that if s ≥ t ≥ r, 22For the full argument, we refer to Longuenesse [15, Chapter 9]. 18 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN htr ◦ hst = hsr. That hst :Ms −→Mt is a homomorphism means thatMs |= R(a1, a2, . . .) impliesMt |= R(hst(a1), hst(a2), . . .).23 Bearing in mind that s > t means that in index s there is more time for synthesis than in index t, the homomorphism condition means that if an object of appearance a inMs satisfies the concept C, its image hst(a) inMt will also do so; but if hst(a) satisfies C inMt, the extra time available in s may lead one to reject C(a) inMs. For expository reasons we introduced inverse systems of sets before defining inverse systems of models. This does not mean that first the mappings hst are fixed and that concepts have to conform to these via the homomorphism condition; on the contrary, there exists a mutual dependence between concepts and mappings, reflecting Kant's view that concepts play a constitutive role with regard to objects. 7.4. Inverse systems of models and their inverse limits. We are now ready to introduce the main definition, that will ultimately allow us to set up a sound and complete proof system for transcendental logic. Definition 5. Let (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system. Let Ds be the domain ofMs. Let D ⊆ Πs∈TDs the set of all ξ such that for s ≥ t, hst(ξ(s)) = ξ(t). Define a modelM with domain D by puttingM |= R(ξ1, ξ2, . . .) if for all s ∈ T ,Ms |= R(ξ1s , ξ2s , . . .). M is called the inverse limit of the given inverse system. Theorem 2. Let (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system of models where each domain Ds is finite. Then the inverse limit is non-empty. Lemma 2. Let (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system of models with non-empty inverse limitM. Then the projection πs defined by ξ ∈ M 7→ πs(ξ) := ξ(s) is a homomorphism that in addition satisfies for s ≥ t: hst(πs(ξ)) = πt(ξ). 8. A LANGUAGE FOR OBJECTS: OBJECTIVELY VALID JUDGEMENTS Kant provides several definitions of judgement, ranging from the enumeration of syntactic forms in the Table of Judgements24 to a definition of what the cognitive role of judgement is in §19 of CPR – where the latter pays scant attention to the possible syntactic form of judgements. Nevertheless, it is this definition that provides the clearest clue as to Kant's intended semantics for judgements, so we will give the relevant passages from §19 and then turn this into a formal definition. This will allow us to relate the cognitive role of judgements to the syntactic forms in the Table of Judgements, and also to provide a formal underpinning to Longuenesse's ideas about the various roles the variable x plays in Kant's representation of categorical judgements (see the beginning of section 6). If, however, I investigate more closely the relation of given cognitions in every judgement [...] then I find that a judgement is nothing other than the way to bring given cognitions to the objective unity of apperception. That is the function of the copula is in them: to distinguish the objective unity of given representations from the subjective. (B141-2) Only in this way does there arise from this relation [between given cognitions] a judgement, i.e. a relation that is objectively valid, and that is sufficiently distinguished from 23We do not require surjectivity of hst. 24This applies to the headings Quantity, Quality and Relation; Modality refers rather to ways of using judgements. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 19 the relation between these same representations in which there would only be subjective validity, e.g. in accordance with the law of association. In accordance with the latter I could only say "If I carry a body, I feel a pressure of weight," but not "It, the body, is heavy," which would be to say that these two representations are combined in the object [...] (B142) We thus see again the connection between 'unity of apperception' and 'relation to the object' that we also encountered in A109, quoted in section 6.4.25 Following Longuenesse's interpretation, we combine A109 with B141-2, and then (quotation repeated for convenience) [W]e cannot but come to the conclusion that reference to an object represented by the term 'x' in the logical form of judgement does have as one of its components reference to an independent object leading us to seek coherence among our representations of it and allowing us to think of the connection of representations as in some sense necessary [...] which is precisely the role Kant assigned to reference to the "transcendental object = x" in the A Deduction [15, p. 111]. These considerations suggest that judgements must be interpreted both on objects of experience and on the transcendental object and that there should exist a relation between these interpretations. We illustrate this by means of the particular affirmative judgement 'Some A are B', which Kant glosses as 'To some x to which A belongs, also B belongs'. All we can ever do is find witnesses for x among objects of experience; but we hope that this is sufficient to have a witness for x that refers to an object internally represented as existing outside us. In terms of the formal structures introduced in section 7 this means: if we have an inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) whose limitM exists, and if for all indices s, Ms |= ∃x(Ax ∧ Bx), thenM |= ∃x(Ax ∧Bx). More generally, Definition 6. We may provisionally define a first order sentence φ to be objectively valid if for any inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) with inverse limit M, if for all s, Ms |= φ then M |= φ. So far we have talked about sentences only. If we also want to interpret formulas, we need to say something about assignments; this will give us one way of understanding how a variable x can refer both to objects of experience and to the transcendental object. Definition 7. An assignment F on an inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) is a function that assigns to each index s and each variable x an object in Ds (the domain ofMs) such that for s ≥ t, hst(F (s, x)) = F (t, x). We write Fs for the assignment onMs that results if we hold the argument s fixed in F . Definition 8. Let F be an assignment on the inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F). We write (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) ‖−φ[F ] if for all s ∈ T ,Ms |= φ[Fs]. We think of ‖− as representing truth on the world of experience (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F). If there is no danger of confusion, satisfaction on an inverse system will be abbreviated by {Ms} ‖−φ[F ]. Lemma 3. If the inverse limit of (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) exists, F (x), considered as a function of the index s is a thread in theinverse limit. 25§18 makes the point as well The transcendental unity of apperception is that unity through which all of the manifold given in intuition is united in a concept of the object. It is called objective on that account [...] (B139) 20 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN Definition 9. If F is an assignment on the inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F), we write F for the function that assigns to each variable x the thread F (x). If we now look back at Kant's characterisation of transcendental logic as given in section 4.2, we see that transcendental logic is concerned with 'objective validity', and hence what truth of a judgement in the world of experience implies for truth about 'independent' objects. This can be captured formally in terms of a definition of validity as follows: Definition 10. Let Γ be a set of formulas and φ a formula. We write Γ ‖−ovφ if for any world of experience (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F), any assignment F , and the associated transcendental object M, (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) ‖−Γ[F ] impliesM |= φ[F ]. If Γ ‖−ovφ, we say that Γ forces φ to be true of independent objects. Objective validity of a formula φ in the sense of definition 6 now corresponds to the condition φ ‖−ovφ. In section 9.3 we shall see that this characterisation captures a good part of Kant's intentions. Furthermore, if all formulas in Γ are objectively valid, Γ |= φ entails Γ ‖−ovφ. In general the entailment relations |= and ‖−ov are very different however, and their interplay will shed light on Kant's transcendental logic. 9. A CLASS OF OBJECTIVELY VALID JUDGEMENTS: GEOMETRIC IMPLICATIONS We will prove below that the class of objectively valid formulas coincides with a class of formulas that is of independent interest, the geometric implications. Definition 11. Let L be a first order language.26 A formula is geometric in L if it is constructed from atomic formulas in L using ∧, ∨, ⊥ and ∃. Definition 12. A formula in L is a geometric implication if it is of the form ∀x(φ(x)→ ψ(x)), where φ,ψ are positive primitive. We can view a geometric formula ψ(x) as a special case of a geometric implication by writing it as ∀x(φ(x) → ψ(x)) where φ is a conjunction of identity statements for the variables occurring in x. Lemma 4. A geometric implication is equivalent to a conjunction of formulas ∀x(θ(x) → ψ(x)), where θ is a conjunction of atomic formulas, and ψ geometric. If we now compare the judgement forms just defined with Kant's Table of Judgements (restricted to Quantity, Quality and Relation, since Modality is of a different character altogether), we see that the hypothetical and disjunctive judgements are included, as well as the affirmative categorical judgements; no distinction is made between affirmative and infinite judgements (this is because we consider for the moment first order formulas only; see footnote 32 for the required extension. Negative particular judgements are excluded, however, and this for good Kantian reasons, as we shall see in section 9.3. Of course the class of judgements defined in definition 11 goes somewhat beyond the letter of the Table of Judgements because of the ∀∃ combination, although as we have argued, not beyond its spirit: Kant's hypothetical judgement form needs the full complexity of geometric implications, and some of the synthetic a priori judgements have this structure as well. 26We assume L contains =. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 21 9.1. Constructive content. From a philosophical point of view it is interesting that the logic of geometric implications27 is intuitionistic: let Γ ∪ {φ} be a finite set of geometric implications such that Γ ` φ (classically) then there exists an intuitionistic proof of φ from Γ.28 This shows that logical relations between geometric implications are compatible with a constructive understanding of the existential quantifier, as providing a witness given by a construction that takes instantiations of the universal quantifiers as input. This brings us close to the definition of judgement that Kant gives in the Prolegomena §23: Judgements, when considered merely as the condition of the unification of representations in a consciousness, are rules. There is thus a logical relation between the definitions of judgement as given in CPR (B141-2) and as given in the Prolegomena §23. Coquand [6] has in fact devised a proof system for geometric implications (called 'dynamic proofs') which brings out their rule-like character particularly well. Geometric implications have strong connections to Euclidean geometry as well. For example, the axiom saying that given a centre and a radius, one can construct a circle with that centre and radius, can be represented by a geometric implication. Avigad et al. [1] have recently shown in this journal that Euclid's Elements can be axiomatised using geometric implications only, by formalising reasoning with diagrams. That is, proofs via diagrams correspond at the syntactic level to proofs involving geometric implications. Kant of course believed that geometric proofs proceed in intuition via construction, and do not correspond to symbolic proofs. At the same time, Transcendental Deduction B §24 introduces the intriguing notion of synthesis speciosa, the 'effect of the understanding on sensibility', which ensures the correspondence of the syntheses of the understanding according to the possible logical forms (synthesis intellectualis) to the syntheses of our sensibility.29 Seen in this light, it is surely of interest that the same judgement forms play a role in the domains of the understanding and of sensibility. 9.2. Geometric implications are objectively valid on inverse systems of finite models. Theorem 3. Suppose given an inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F), where T is countable and the domain of eachMs finite. In this case the inverse limitM exists (theorem 1). Let φ(x) be a geometric formula and F an assignment such that {Ms} ‖−φ[F ]. ThenM |= φ[F ]. PROOF OF THEOREM 3 By induction on the complexity of φ. The statement of the theorem is true by definition if φ is atomic. If the statement holds for φ1, . . . , φn it holds as well for φ1 ∧ . . . ∧ φn. To proceed, we need a definition and two lemmata. Definition 13. Let T be the index set of the inverse system. A subset S ⊆ T is cofinal if for every t ∈ T there exists s ∈ S with s ≥ t. Lemma 5. If S ⊆ T is cofinal, the inverse limit of (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) is isomorphic to that of (S, {Ms | s ∈ S},F). Lemma 6. (Lyndon) Let h : A −→ B be a homomorphism from a model A to a model B. Let ψ(x) be geometric, and ā a tuple of elements from A, then A |= ψ[ā] entails B |= ψ[h(ā)]. 27The name derives from topos theory; see e.g. [8, §16.4]. 28See Palmgren [17] for a proof theoretic argument. 29Longuenesse [15, Chapter 8] provides an elaborate discussion of this topic. 22 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN Now let φ = φ1 ∨ φ2, where the φi are geometric, such that for all s,Ms |= φ[Fs]. We show that at least one disjunct φ1, φ2 holds on a cofinal set of indices (or rather on the models indexed by these indices). Suppose that for φ1 there exists t ∈ T such that for all s ≥ t,Ms 6|= φ[Fs]. It follows that for all s ≥ t,Ms |= φ2[Fs]. The set S = {s | s ≥ t} is cofinal in T , so the inverse limit determined by T is isomorphic to that determined by S. By the inductive hypothesis, M |= φ2[F ], whenceM |= φ[F ]. Lastly, suppose φ = ∃xθ(x), such that for all s, Ms |= ∃xθ(x)[Fs]. Since the index set is countable and directed, we can construct a linear cofinal subset of T , as follows. Enumerate T as t0, t1, t2, . . . and construct a linear cofinal subset S by putting s0 := t0; s1 is an index larger than both s0 and t1; s2 is an element larger than both s1 and t2, etc.; put S : {s0, s1, s2, . . .}. Since we assumed the indexed models are finite, the collection of domains {Ds | s ∈ S} can be given the structure of a finitely branching tree, using the homomorphisms hst to define the branches. Pick s ∈ S, then by hypothesis, for some assignment f on Ms such that for all variables z different from x, f(z) = Fs(z): Ms |= θ[f ]. If r ∈ S is such that r ≤ s, then hsr(f) defines an assignment onMr andMr |= θ[hsr(f)]. Since θ is geometric, it follows that the objects witnessing the existential quantifier in ∃xθ(x) determine a subtree of the finitely branching tree {Ds | s ∈ S}. Because Ms |= ∃xθ(x)[Fs] for all s, this subtree is infinite. By König's Lemma it must therefore have an infinite branch. This branch is a thread ξ in the limit of the inverse system (S, {Ms | s ∈ S},F) which can be extended to a thread in the inverse limit of (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) by cofinality of S. Define an assignment G by G(s, z) := F (s, z), G(s, x); = ξs. Then {Ms} ‖−θ[G], whence by the inductive hypothesis M |= θ[Ĝ], and henceM |= ∃xθ[F ].  Corollary 1. Suppose given an inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F), where T is countable and the domain of eachMs finite. Let F be an assignment on the inverse system. Let ∀x(φ(x)→ ψ(x)) (where φ,ψ are geometric) be a geometric implication such that {Ms} ‖ −∀x(φ(x)→ ψ(x))[F ], thenM |= ∀x(φ(x)→ ψ(x))[F ]. PROOF OF COROLLARY 1 To show that ∀x(φ(x)→ ψ(x)) holds on the inverse limitM under F , assume thatM |= φ[G], where G is an assignment that differs at most on x from F , so that for all s ∈ T ,Ms |= φ[Gs] by lemma 6. The hypothesis of the theorem gives that for all s ∈ T , Ms |= ψ[Gs], whenceM |= ψ[Ĝ] by theorem 3.  9.3. A closer look at objective validity. With this theorem and especially its proof at our disposal, we can give a more detailed justification of the definition of objective validity. Consider a sentence ∃xA(x). If this sentence is true on some Ms, i.e. if the existential quantifier is witnessed by an object of experience inMs, then ∃xA(x) need not yet be objectively valid, i.e. witnessed by an object represented as being independent of our cognition; for the relevant object of experience inMs may disappear at stage t > s. Moreover, even if ∃xA(x) is witnessed in several Ms, and even though we intend ∃xA(x) to be true of the same object in these Ms, there is no guarantee this will be so. But if ∃xA(x) is witnessed by an object of experience in allMs, one would like this to be so because an object independent of our cognition unifies these witnesses and provides them with objective reality; and the above proof shows that there A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 23 is a transcendental element (a thread in the inverse limit) which does this.30 But whether witnesses among objects of experience can be so related to the transcendental object depends on the type of judgement of which they are witnesses. For consider now ∃x¬A(x). It is easy to construct (see figure 9.3) an inverse system whose limit contains a single thread satisfying A, and where ∃x¬A(x) is true at each indexed model, but where the witnesses for ∃x¬A(x) are totally unrelated. In this context it is interesting what Kant has to say about the role of negation: To be sure, logically, one can express negatively any proposition that one wants, but in regard to the content of our cognition in general, that is, whether it is expanded or limited by a judgement, negative judgements have the special job solely of preventing error (A709/B737). This seems to suggest that negative judgements need not have objective validity.31 In this context, Wolff [28, p. 290–1] quotes C.S. Peirce, who wrote that in traditional logic, existential import of a judgement depends on its Quality not Quantity: negative judgements do not come with existential import. Peirce writes It is probable that Kant also understood the affirmative proposition to assert the existence of its subject, while the negative did not do so; so that 'Some phoenixes do not rise from their ashes' would be true, and 'All phoenixes do rise from their ashes' would be false. The same interpretation is given in Thompson [24], where it is also argued that the infinite judgement corresponding to the negative particular judgement – 'Some A is non-B' – does carry existential import.32 9.3.1. Objective validity and truth. It is important to distinguish objective validity from truth. Objective validity of a judgement does not mean that the judgement is true of transcendental objects, i.e. of objects represented as existing independently of us. Rather, it is a conditional notion: if the judgements holds on the world of experience (represented by an inverse system of models), then it holds for transcendental objects as well. Of course we can never be fully certain that the given judgement holds of the world of experience, so truth on transcendental objects cannot be established definitively, and functions rather as a regulative norm governing the activity of judgement. But if a judgement is objectively valid, we know at least that it is not pointless to verify it on the world of experience, since in doing so we may 'relate our representations to an object' (Longuenesse [15, p. 82]). 30As a consequence, if a geometric implication ∀x(φ(x) → ψ(x)) has existential import on all models Ms, i.e. if in eachMs there is an object of experience satisfying φ(x), then ∀x(φ(x) → ψ(x)) has existential import onM, and we can think of these objects of experience as unified by the transcendental object. 31Note though that it is a consequence of the formal definition of objective validity that negative universal judgements are objectively valid. 32The infinite judgement 'some A are non-B' can be formalised using the infinite disjunction W as_ C∩B=∅ (∃x(A(x) ∧B(x)). interestingly, this is still a geometric formula, and theorem 3 can be extended to show that this infinitary formula is objectively valid. 24 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN A ..... A A A FIGURE 1 9.3.2. Truly objective validity. Despite the relation established in A109 between 'unity of selfconsciousness' and 'objective validity', Kant does not intend that objective validity relates to each subject taken individually only: Persuasion is a mere semblance, since the ground of the judgement, which lies solely in the subject, is held to be objective. Hence such a judgement also has only private validity, and this taking something to be true cannot be communicated. Truth, however, rests upon agreement with the object, with regard to which, consequently, the judgements of every understanding must agree [...] The touchstone of whether taking something to be true is conviction or mere persuasion is therefore, externally, the possibility of communicating it and finding it to be valid for the reason of every human being to take it to be true; for in that case there is at least a presumption that the ground of the agreement of all judgements, regardless of the difference among the subjects, rests on the common ground, namely the object, with which they therefore all agree and through which the truth of the judgement is proved. (A820-1/B848-9) This distinction, between 'private validity' and 'validity for every human being' plays a prominent (and controversial) role in §§18–20 of the Prolegomena; see Longuenesse [15, Chapter 7] for discussion. Here we bring up this topic only to note that it calls for an extension of the interpretation of the index set T , which now contains the mental states in which syntheses are executed of all cognitive agents of interest, together with the requirement that the the mental states of each agent are cofinal in the set of mental states of every other agent (cf. Kant's remark on the 'possibility of communicating'). 10. THE TRANSCENDENTAL OBJECT REVISITED: GENERALISED INVERSE LIMITS So far we have worked with a concrete representation of the transcendental object as an inverse limit of a countable inverse system of finite models. However, if we look carefully at the justification for this identification, we see that what is really important are the properties of the maps that exist between inverse limit and indexed models, and between the indexed models themselves, i.e. the commutativity of the various diagrams of maps, since these express the A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 25 unifying function of the transcendental object. Also, the proof that geometric formulas are objectively valid hinges on the compactness properties that obtain in this concrete setting. In order to get rid of this special feature we define a model-theoretic notion of inverse limit which has preservation of geometric formulas built in. Definition 14. Let an inverse system (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) be given. The structure M is a generalised inverse limit of (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) if it satisfies the properties (1) there exists an injective homomorphism fromM into the inverse limit of (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) (hence the inverse limit is nonempty). (2) for each s there must exist a homomorphism πs :M −→Ms satisfying the coherence condition: for b ∈M, s ≥ t: hst(πs(b)) = πt(b) (3) for geometric formulas φ, and parameters a fromM, if for all s ∈ T ,Ms |= φ[πs(a)], thenM |= φ[a] (4) M is maximal in the following sense: any modelN that satisfies the previous conditions (with projections π ′ n) and whose cardinality is less than that ofM can be embedded into M via a homomorphism g satisfying πn ◦ g = π ′ n). A few comments on this definition will be helpful. The elements ofM can be thought of as threads, via the mapping a ∈ M 7→ {πs(a) | s ∈ T}, where the r.h.s. is a thread because of coherence condition (2). This map will in fact yield the injective homomorphism required by (1); this follows from (3) applied to the geometric formula x = y. One way to think of condition (3) is to assume that the language ofM is expanded with a unique individual constant for each object ofM; we denote the resulting expansion of ofM by (M,−→a ). Let c be a name for the object a, then sinceM |= x = c[a] and x = c is positive primitive,Ms |= x = c[πs(a)]. Thus the constants of the language of (M,−→a ) have a unique interpretation in Ms. In this setting condition (3) can be formulated as for positive primitive sentences φ in the language of (M,−→a ), if for all s ∈ T , Ms |= φ, thenM |= φ. Lemma 7. Let (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system with generalised inverse limitM, and let φ be a geometric implication (in the language of (M,−→a )) true on allMs. Then φ is true on (M,−→a )). PROOF Immediate from definition 14.  We take a generalised inverse limit M to be a representation of the transcendental object associated to the given inverse system. While the mapping posited in (1) need not be surjective, in a sense the threads in the inverse limit are indistinguishable from the elements of M: if a thread ξ in the inverse limit witnesses a geometric formula φ(x), there will also be an element fromM that does so, by (3).33 10.1. Objective validity redefined. Since we will now work with generalised inverse limits, the definition of then entailment relation ‖−ov needs to be adapted. Definition 15. Let (T, {Ms | s ∈ T},F) be an inverse system with generalised inverse limit M. Then Γ(x) ‖−ovφ(x) means that for all a ∈ M, all s ∈ T , Ms |= Γ[πs(a)] implies M |= φ[a]. We call φ(x) objectively valid if φ(x) ‖−ovφ(x). 33Note that condition (4) implies that each set of ξ of cardinality less than |M|can be mapped homomorphically to M; but there doesn't have to be an isomorphism. 26 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN We see that the variables on the l.h.s. of ‖−ov receive their interpretation from the transcendental elements that are assigned to these variables on the r.h.s.; this seems to be as close as one can get to Longuenesse's view, cited on page 19, on the meaning of the variable x in Kant's logic lectures and in CPR. 11. A CHARACTERISATION OF OBJECTIVELY VALID FORMULAS Theorem 4. Let φ be objectively valid. Then there are finitely many geometric implications γ1, . . . , γn such that (1) φ |= γi, for 1 ≤ i ≤ n (2) γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn |= φ PROOF Define Σ = {γ | γ is a geometric implication and φ |= γ}. By the compactness theorem it suffices to prove that Σ |= φ, for this will give us the finitely many geometric implications γ1, . . . , γn.34 The idea of the proof is that we pick a modelM of Σ and show that it can be written as generalised inverse limit of a countable inverse system {Mn | n ∈ N} such that for all n,Mn |= φ. Since φ is assumed to be objectively valid, it follows thatM |= φ. This proof sketch can be turned into a full proof most easily if we work with saturated models. We shall set aside worries about the additional hypotheses needed to guarantee existence of saturated models, and in particular will not present the proof in terms of special models, so as not to obscure the main ideas. (For definitions of 'saturated' and 'special' see Chang and Keisler [5, Chapter 5] or Hodges [9, Chapter 10].) An essential ingredient in the proof is the following reformulation of lemma 5.2.9 in Chang and Keisler [5]: Theorem 5. Let B be a saturated model of cardinal κ, and let A be a model of cardinality ≤ κ. Suppose every geometric sentence true onA is true on B. Let (A,−→a ) the expansion ofA with a 1–1 enumeration of its objects. Then there exists a homomorphism from A to B with respect to geometric formulas in the language of the expansion (A,−→a ) Choose a saturated modelM of cardinality κ withM |= Σ; we have to showM can be written as the generalised inverse limit of an inverse system {Mn | n ∈ N} such that φ is true on eachMn. We proceed by induction, and supposeMn and a projection πn :M −→Mn have been constructed. We assumeMn is saturated of cardinality λ > κ. We constructMn+1 as a saturated model of a certain set of sentences Ξn+1 that we now proceed to specify. (1) φ ∈ Ξn+1 (2) There must be a homomorphism hn+1 :Mn+1 −→Mn. By theorem 5 this means that every geometric formula true on Mn+1 is true on Mn. Since we do not have Mn+1 34At this point there is a curious analogy with one of Kant's 'formal criteria of truth', discussed in section 4.1: If all the consequences of a cognition are true, then the cognition is true too. For if there were something false in the cognition, then there would have to be a false consequence too. From the consequence, then, we may infer to a ground, but without being able to determine this ground. Only from the complex of all consequences can one infer to a determinate ground, infer that it is the true ground. Σ stands for the 'complex of all consequences' of φ that are possible grounds; we try to prove that Σ |= φ, i.e. 'if all the consequences of a cognition are true, then the cognition is true too', and in so doing infer the 'determinate ground', the γ1, . . . , γn. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 27 yet, this translates into: every geometric sentence false onMn must be false onMn+1. Define ∆n+1 = {¬ψ | ψgeometric ,Mn 6|= ψ} and put ∆n+1 in Ξn+1. (3) There must exist a homomorphism πn+1 : M −→ Mn+1. Again by theorem 5 this means that every geometric sentence true onM is true onMn+1. Define Γn+1 = {τ | τ geometric ,M |= τ} and put Γn+1 in Ξn+1. (4) To satisfy condition (3) of definition 14, consider the expansion (M,−→a ). Every geometric sentence false on (M,−→a ) must be false on someMn. We therefore need an enumeration θ1, θ2, . . . of geometric sentences θi and define Θn+1 = {¬θn+1(c) | (M,−→a ) 6|= θn+1(c)}, and put Θn+1 in Ξn+1. (5) This concludes the specification of Ξn+1. Lemma 8. Ξn+1 is consistent. PROOF OF LEMMA Suppose Ξn+1 is inconsistent, then there finite sets ¬ψ1, . . . ,¬ψk ∈ ∆n+1, τ1, . . . , τl ∈ Γn+1, and θn+1(c1), . . . , θn+1(ck) ∈ Θn+1 such that φ |= ¬(¬ψ1 ∧ . . . ∧ ¬ψk ∧ τ1 ∧ . . . ∧ τl ∧ ¬θn+1(c1) ∧ . . . ∧ θn+1(ck)), which is equivalent to φ |= (τ1 ∧ . . . ∧ τl → ψ1 ∨ . . . ∨ ψk ∨ θn+1(c1) ∨ . . . ∨ θn+1(ck)). Since the constants in the occurrences of θn+1 do not occur in φ, we have φ |= ∀x1 . . . xk(τ1 ∧ . . . ∧ τl → ψ1 ∨ . . . ∨ ψk ∨ θn+1(x1) ∨ . . . ∨ θn+1(xk)). The formula on the r.h.s. of |= is a geometric implication, hence in Σ. SinceM |= Σ and all τ are true onM, we have M |= ∀x1 . . . xk(ψ1 ∨ . . . ∨ ψk ∨ θn+1(x1) ∨ . . . ∨ θn+1(xk)). Now by the induction hypothesis a projectionM −→ Mn has been constructed so that the ψi are false onM, whence we get M |= ∀x1 . . . xk(θn+1(x1) ∨ . . . ∨ θn+1(xk)), which is a contradiction.  Due to the contribution of Θn+1, the set Ξn+1 can have cardinality κ. This was the reason we assumedMn to be saturated of cardinality λ > κ. We now chooseMn+1 as a saturated model of Ξn+1 of cardinality λ, then all required homomorphisms exist. We now have to verify thatM satisfies the conditions of definition 14 for being a generalised inverse limit. The essential observation here is that for a constant c in the language of the expansion (M,−→a ), (M,−→a ) |= x = c[a] implies (Mn+1, −−−−−→ πn+1(a)) |= x = c[πn+1(a)], which in turn implies (Mn, −−−−−−−−−−→ hn+1(πn+1(a))) |= x = c[hn+1(πn+1(a))]. But we also have directly (Mn, −−−→ πn(a)) |= x = c[πn(a))], whence hn+1(πn+1(a)) = πn(a). This gives conditions (1) and (2); and (3) holds by construction. To prove (4), observe that the diagram of homomorphisms is such as to force that every geometric sentence true on N is true onM.35 The commutativity of the diagram πn ◦ g = pi ′ n is established as before. Now suppose there are b, b ′ ∈ N such that g(b) = g(b′). Then for all n, Mn |= x = y[πn(g(b)), πn(g(b′))], whence Mn |= x = y[π ′ n(b), π ′ n(b ′)]. Since x = y is geometric, this means that b = b′.  35This is the only place where saturation of M is used. 28 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN Both for the purpose of the proof theory given below and for good Kantian reasons, we need a slight generalisation of the preceding theorem: Theorem 6. If Γ is a set of sentences and φ a sentence such that Γ ‖−ovφ, then there are finitely many geometric implications γ1, . . . , γn such that Γ |= γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn and γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn |= φ. PROOFSKETCH Analogous to the proof of theorem 4, the only change is that Σ is defined as {γ | γ is geometric implication ∀∃,Γ |= γ} and we again show that Σ |= φ.  The sentences in Γ specify a theory that every indexed model in the inverse system under consideration must satisfy. This is related to Kant's remarks in A573-4/B601-2, which point to the fact that concepts are not independent, but carry analytic structure: [W]e nevertheless find that this idea [of the sum total of all possible predicates in general], as an original concept, excludes a multiplicity of of predicates, which, as derived through others, are already given, or cannot coexist with one another [...] Theorem 6 then says that the only consequences of this analytic structure that have objective validity are of the geometric implication form. Longuenesse discusses this point on [15, p. 87] and again on [15, p. 107], both times with reference to §36 of the Jäsche Logik. The point is that Kant also introduces the variable x in the representation of analytic judgements: An example of an analytic proposition is, To everything x to which the concept of body (a + b) belongs, belongs also extension (b). An example of a synthetic proposition is, To everything x to which the concept of body belongs, belongs also attraction (c). Longuenesse comments Kant makes the presence of the x to which the two concepts are attributed explicit for analytic as well as for synthetic judgements. This is because in both cases concepts have meaning only if they are "universal or reflected representations" of singular objects [...] For all judgements, even when they are analytic, what ultimately makes the combination of concepts possible is relation to an "x of judgement". [15, p. 87] Since this 'x of judgement' is the same for both analytic and synthetic judgements, the same notion of objective validity must apply. 12. TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC AS A 'LOGIC OF TRUTH' Theorem 6 leads us back to the original purpose of 'the logic of truth': The part of transcendental logic that expounds the elements of the pure cognition of the understanding and the principles without which no object can be thought at all, is the transcendental analytic, and at the same time a logic of truth. For no cognition can contradict it without at the same time losing all content, i.e. all relation to any object, hence all truth. (A62-3/B87) In this section we present a sound and complete proof system for the 'logic of truth', which more or less does what Kant wants it to do. We will see that the main step in the completeness proof is theorem 6. We claim here that the 'logic of truth' is determined by the notion of validity ‖−ov.36 The logical form underlying ‖−ov involves the Kantian notion of object as formalised through inverse systems and their (generalised) inverse limits. In terms of this notion of validity, that φ is objectively valid can be stated as 'φ ‖−ovφ', or if we restrict ourselves to inverse systems that satisfy 36In the sense of definition 15. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 29 a given theory Γ, as 'Γ, φ ‖−ovφ'. That a 'cognition' φ contradicts the 'logic of truth' can then be formalised as either φ 6‖−ovφ or Γ, φ 6‖−ovφ. In the first case this means concretely that there is an inverse system {Ms} with generalised inverse limitM such that all s ∈ T ,Ms |= φ but M 6|= φ. We would like this to be the case if and only if the sequent φ ⇒ φ is not derivable in a certain sequent calculus. 12.1. A sequent calculus for the 'logic of truth'. Let ⇒ov be the syntactic counterpart of ‖−ov, to be used in the geometric implicationtion of the sequent calculus. The peculiarity of this calculus is that, whereas usually φ ⇒ φ (or more generally Γ, φ ⇒ φ) is taken as an axiom(schema), here it is one purpose of the calculus to determine for which φ, the sequent φ⇒ov φ is derivable. One special case of the schema can be taken as axiomatic, since for atomic formulas A we do have A⇒ov A. In the usual systems one would derive φ⇒ov φ (for arbitrary φ) from this by induction, but with respect to⇒ov the rules should be such that the induction is blocked beyond the geometric implication stage. We achieve this introducing an auxiliary sequent arrow ⇒pov which has the same semantic interpretation as⇒ov, but for which the rules are such that φ⇒pov θ is derivable only if φ, θ are geometric. The proposed proof system thus has three sequent arrows: ⇒, whose interpretation is as in classical logic, and both⇒ov and⇒pov whose interpretation is given by ‖−ov. The purpose of the calculus is to derive sequents of the form Γ ⇒ov φ;⇒ and⇒pov are auxiliary notions. We will have the following types of rules: rules for classical logic, formulated using⇒, rules for the objectively valid formulas involving only⇒pov, rules for the objectively valid formulas holding for both ⇒pov and ⇒ov (to avoid duplication we will write these rules with an arrow ⇒(p)ov which means 'either⇒pov or⇒ov'), and rules that mix the various arrows. The system will be called LT in a reference to Kant's term 'logic of truth', and comprises the following rules: (1) The standard sequent rules for⇒. (2) Rules valid for⇒pov only A⇒pov A Axiom (A an atomic formula) φ⇒pov φ ψ ⇒pov ψ φ⇒pov θ ψ ⇒pov θ Left ∨ φ ∨ ψ ⇒pov θ φ⇒pov θ Right ∃ φ⇒pov ∃xθ φ⇒pov θ Left ∃ (x not free in θ)∃xφ⇒pov θ (3) Rules valid for both⇒pov and⇒ov φ⇒(p)ov θ Left ∧ φ ∧ ψ ⇒(p)ov θ φ⇒(p)ov θ φ⇒(p)ov τ Right ∧ φ⇒(p)ov θ ∧ τ φ⇒(p)ov θ Right ∨ φ⇒(p)ov θ ∨ τ 30 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN (4) Rules valid for⇒ov φ⇒ov θ Left ∀∀xφ⇒ov θ φ⇒ov θ Right ∀ (x not free in φ) φ⇒pov ∀xθ (5) Rules involving⇒pov,⇒ov and/or⇒ φ⇒pov φ φ⇒ov φ φ⇒pov φ Γ⇒ov φ Γ, ψ ⇒ov θ Left→Γ, φ→ ψ ⇒ov θ φ⇒pov φ Γ, φ⇒ov ψ Right→ Γ⇒ov φ→ ψ Γ⇒ φ φ⇒ov ψ ψ ⇒ θ ov–CutΓ⇒ov θ The ov-Cut rule plays a special role inLT : one could say it connects 'general logic' (represented by the classical sequent arrow⇒) with transcendental logic proper (represented by⇒ov). It says that cut-formulas must be of a specific form (geometric implications ). It cannot be eliminated, because it expresses that inferences from inverse system to inverse limit have to proceed via objectively valid formulas, and cannot proceed more directly. Our next aim is to prove soundness and completeness of LT with respect to ‖−ov. Lemma 9. φ1 ⇒ov φ1 . . . φn ⇒ov φn φ1 ∧ . . . ∧ φn ⇒ov φ1 ∧ . . . ∧ φn PROOF. By repeated application of the left and right ∧ rules.  Lemma 10. φ⇒pov φ ψ ⇒ov ψ φ→ ψ ⇒ov φ→ ψ PROOF. φ⇒pov φ ψ ⇒ov ψ Left→ φ→ ψ,φ⇒ov ψ φ⇒pov φ Right→ φ→ ψ ⇒ov φ→ ψ As a consequence we have Lemma 11. φ⇒pov φ ψ ⇒ov ψ ∀x(φ→ ψ)⇒ov ∀x(φ→ ψ) Lemma 12. LT is sound for the intended interpretation: Γ⇒ov ψ implies Γ ‖−ovψ. Theorem 7. φ⇒ov φ is derivable iff φ is provably equivalent (in classical logic) to a conjunction of geometric implications. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 31 PROOF. For the right to left direction, it follows from lemmas 11 and 9 that for every conjunction ψ of geometric implications, ψ ⇒ov ψ is derivable. The ov-Cut rule extends this to the case of φ provably equivalent to such ψ. For let γ1, . . . , γn be such that for, φ |= γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn, and γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn |= φ, then ov-Cut applied to the cut formula γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn yields φ⇒ov φ.37 The left to right follows from theorem 4 by soundness (lemma 12).  Theorem 8. LT is complete: Γ ‖−ovψ implies Γ⇒ov ψ. PROOF. If Γ ‖−ovψ , then by Theorem 6 there is a conjunction γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn of geometric implications γi such that Γ |= γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn and γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn |= ψ. By completeness for classical first order logic it follows that Γ⇒ γ1 ∧ . . .∧ γn and γ1 ∧ . . .∧ γn ⇒ ψ are derivable. By theorem 7 γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn ⇒ov γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn is derivable. The proof is completed by an application of ov-Cut: Γ⇒ γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn ⇒ov γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn γ1 ∧ . . . ∧ γn ⇒ ψ Γ⇒ov ψ  It follows that φ⇒ov φ is not derivable in LT ('contradicts the logic of truth') if and only if there is an inverse system {Ms} with generalised inverse limitM such that all s ∈ T ,Ms |= φ but M 6|= φ ('loses any relation to the object', in the sense that what a sentence says about objects of experience need not be related to what it says about the transcendental object). Our claim is not that the completeness theorem shows that Kant's transcendental logic has now been formalised in its full extent. For example, we did not at all consider his treatment of causality. If we were to do so, the structure of the inverse systems would have to be considerably enriched: the indexed models would have to contain events, and would have to support predicates describing instantaneous and continuous causation,38 perhaps governed by axioms such as the event calculus (van Lambalgen and Hamm [26]). Our main purpose here has been to introduce a formal semantics for judgements based on Kant's notion of object, and in doing so to establish a framework in which further specifications of transcendental logic can be situated. 13. BACK TO THE TABLE OF JUDGEMENTS With these formal results established, we may now consider their implications for Kant's Table of Judgements and its role in the argumentative structure of CPR. It was Kant's intention to enumerate primitive logical forms which each express a particular function of cognition as it attempts to construct objects out of sensory manifolds. Strawson [22] claimed this was a misconceived enterprise, since (a) there are no primitive logical forms due to interdefinability (e.g. the hypothetical judgement is definable using negation and the disjunctive judgement), and (b) based on an (arbitrary) choice of primitives, indefinitely many logical forms can be derived, and one would not want to say that each of these corresponds to a particular function of cognition. The answer to this is that Kant selected 'primitive' logical forms of judgement already with a particular transcendental purpose in mind, a purpose that renders the classical semantics underlying Strawson's objection inapplicable. we have seen on p. 5 that according to Longuenesse 37This explains the peculiar 'symmetric' form of the cut rule. 38Watkins [27] argues that it is especially continuous causation as it occurs in Newtonian mechanics through the concept of force, that led to Kant's particular theory of causality. 32 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN [15, p. 78] Kant selected forms of judgement for inclusion in the Table, not because these were sanctioned by traditional logic, but because they play a role in "bring[ing] given cognitions to the objective unity of apperception,", that is, to relate our representations to objects.39 Thus, there is first a (largely suppressed) general argument selecting particular judgement forms, followed by detailed arguments (mostly in the Transcendental Deduction of the B edition) aligning particular logical forms with particular cognitive functions directed toward the constitution of objects. The results of this paper pertain to the first step in the argumentation. We have seen that in B141-2, Kant provides a functional characterisation of judgement in terms of objective validity: If, however, I investigate more closely the relation of given cognitions in every judgement [...] then I find that a judgement is nothing other than the way to bring given cognitions to the objective unity of apperception. That is the function of the copula is in them: to distinguish the objective unity of given representations from the subjective. Only in this way does there arise from this relation [between given cognitions] a judgement, i.e. a relation that is objectively valid [...] (B141-2) Theorem 4 can be viewed as the derivation of a structural characterisation – deriving specific syntactic forms – from Kant's functional characterisation of judgement. This characterisation is very closely related to the Table of Judgements. On the one hand, it is easily seen that affirmative categorical judgements are included in our class, as are disjunctive judgements. 40 The extended discussion of hypotheticals in section 4.1 shows that their intrinsic logical complexity can be as high as geometric implication, hence they fit in our class. On the other hand, our class does not include negative particular judgements, but then these types of judgements were probably not intended to be candidates for objective validity, given Kant's views on negation. Furthermore, our characterisation limits the complexity of objectively valid judgements to geometric implication, i.e. the logical complexity of hypotheticals. Thus we have in a sense proved the completeness of the Table of Judgements. This is perhaps the place to address what may be a lingering worry in the reader's mind. Michael Friedman [7] has extensively argued that it is precisely Kant's logic's lack of ability to express the ∀∃ quantifier combination that drove his philosophy of mathematics. For example, because his logic does not allow him to express that a certain domain is infinite (this needs the ∀∃ quantifier combination). Kant was forced to adopt a 'constructive' approach to mathematics that acknowledges potential infinity only. By contrast, we have identified the geometric implication judgement forms as those judgements that should be of interest to Kant, since only they can claim objective validity. Shouldn't we say with Friedman that although Kant should have considered geometric implication judgement forms, he was in effect barred from doing so because the inferences contained in his general logic are too weak? The answer must be the following. 39There is one awkward aspect of this interpretation though; as we have seen negative particular judgements are not objectively valid. 40 With the proviso that one may question whether the meaning given to the disjunctive judgement here exhausts Kant's meaning: his talk of parts and wholes, A73-4/B99, and more elaborately in the Jäsche Logik, §27, 28) suggests his disjunction has some substructural aspects. E.g. the usual introduction rule for ∨ fails for his intended meaning. The simultaneous presence of the disjuncts can perhaps be captured by the par connective of linear logic (see the rules for 'par logic' in [10, p. 282]), or the structural connective "," in Boricic' multiple-conclusion natural deduction system [3]. Note that in these cases the elimination rule for disjunction is not the one familiar from classical (or intuitionistic) logic, but the disjunctive syllogism, as in Kant. We conjecture that the connection between disjunctive judgements and the Category of Community that Kant discusses in the Third Analogy can be made much more transparent by giving disjunction one of the substructural readings. A FORMALISATION OF KANT'S TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC 33 It is clear that Kant did not conceive of 'all' in the universal categorical judgement and 'some' in the particular categorical judgements as universal and existential quantifiers that can be freely combined among themselves and with other logical operators, for example to generate a ∀∃ judgement. It is also clear that Kants general logic is not complete for geometric logic. This however is not an argument against the claim that Kant's judgement forms are geometric. Even the fact that Kant takes categorical judgements judgements in subject-predicate form is not a counterargument, since predicates may well contain existential quantifiers (as Kants examples of synthetic a priori principles show), and once this is allowed, geometric implications look like bona fide subject-predicate judgements. Lastly, Kant has ways to deal with the ∀∃ quantifier combination in geometric implications; as the argument of the Second Analogy of Experience amply shows, he interprets the quantifier combination as a rule. Thus for Kant, the inferences necessary for dealing with geometric implications are to be found in transcendental logic. His way of proceeding here is consistent, because geometric logic is intrinsically intuitionistic, so that we may think of the ∀∃ quantifier combination as given by a rule. REFERENCES [1] J. Avigad, E. Dean, and J. Mumma. A formal system for euclid's Elements. Review of Symbolic Logic, 2(4):700– 768, 2009. [2] F.C. Bartlett. Thinking: An Experimental and Social Study. Allen and Unwin, London, 1968. [3] B.R. Boricic. On sequence-conclusion natural deduction systems. Journal of Philosophical Logic, 14:359–377, 1985. [4] J.S. Bruner. Beyond the Information Given. W.W. Norton, New York, 1973. [5] C. C. Chang and H. J. Keisler. Model Theory, volume 73 of Studies in Logic and the Foundations of Mathematics. North-Holland, Amsterdam, third edition, 1990. First edition: 1973, second edition 1977. [6] T. Coquand. A completeness proof for geometric logic. Technical report, Computer Science and Engineering Department, University of Gothenburg. Retrieved September 29, 2010 from http://www.cse.chalmers.se/ coquand/formal.html. [7] M. Friedman. Kant and the exact sciences. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA., 1992. [8] R. Goldblatt. Topoi. The categorial analysis of logic. Dover, 2006. Appeared earlier as Vol. 96 in the series Studies in Logic. [9] W. Hodges. Model theory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1993. [10] M. Hyland and V. de Paiva. Full intuitionistic linear logic (extended abstract). Annals of Pure and Applied Logic, 64:273–291, 1993. doi:10.1016/0168-0072(93)90146-5. [11] I. Kant. Lectures on Logic; translated from the German by J. Michael Young. The Cambridge edition of the works of Immanuel Kant. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1992. [12] I. Kant. Critique of pure reason; translated from the German by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood. The Cambridge edition of the works of Immanuel Kant. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1998. [13] I Kant. Theoretical philosophy after 1781; edited by Henry Allison and Peter Heath. The Cambridge edition of the works of Immanuel Kant. Cambridge University Press, 2002. [14] P.W. Kitcher. Kant's transcendental psychology. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1990. [15] B. Longuenesse. Kant and the capacity to judge. Princeton University Press, 1998. [16] J. MacFarlane. What does it mean to say that logic is formal? PhD thesis, University of Pittsburgh, 2000. [17] E. Palmgren. An intuitionistic axiomatisation of real closed fields. Mathematical Logic Quarterly, 48(2):297– 299, 2002. [18] C.J. Posy. Between Leibniz and Mill: Kant's logic and the rhetoric of psychologism. In D. Jacquette, editor, Philosophy, Psychology and Psychologism, pages 51–79. Kluwer, 2003. [19] K. Reich. Die Vollstaendigkeit der kantischen Urteilstafel. Schoetz, Berlin, 1932. Translated as The completeness of Kant's Table of Judgements¡ transl. by J. Kneller and M. Losonsky, Stanford University Press, 1992. [20] T. Rosenkoetter. Truth criteria and the very project of a transcendental logic. Archiv fuer Geschichte der Philosophie, 61(2):193–236, 2009. 34 T. ACHOURIOTI AND M. VAN LAMBALGEN [21] C.I. Steinhorn. Borel structures and measure and category logics. In J. Barwise and S. Feferman, editors, Modeltheoretic logics, chapter 16, pages 579–596. Springer-Verlag, New York, 1985. [22] P.F. Strawson. The bounds of sense: an essay on Kant's "Critique of pure reason". Methuen, 1966. [23] R. Stuhlmann-Laeisz. Kants Logik. De Gruyter, Berlin, 1976. [24] M. Thompson. On Aristotle's square of opposition. The Philosophical Review, 62(2):251–265, 1953. [25] A.M. Treisman and G. Gelade. A feature-integration theory of attention. Clarendon Press, 12:97–136, 1980. [26] M. van Lambalgen and F. Hamm. The proper treatment of events. Blackwell, Oxford and Boston, 2004. [27] E. Watkins. Kant and the metaphysics of causality. Cambridge University Press, 2004. [28] M. Wolff. Die Vollstaendigkeit der kantischen Urteilstafel. Vittorio Klostermann, Frankfurt a. M., 1995.

www.argument-journal.eu Published online: 25.06.2015 Argument Vol. 4 (2/2014) pp. 405–424 * Doktorant w Instytucie Filozofii i Socjologii, uniwersytet Pedagogiczny w Krakowie. e ‐mail: [email protected]. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka Rys krytyczny Hubert BOŻeK* ABStrACt The theory of the multiple realities by Leon Chwistek. Critical overview the purpose of this paper is to offer a logico ‐philosophical critical overview of the theory of multiple realities (tWr). the paper is divided into three sections. In the first section I present a brief history of the development of some ideas, which combined together form the conceptual framework of the theory in question, whose main thesis is that there is more than one reality. In the second part I present (and try to address) some interpretations of tWr, which can be described as: ontological; epistemological; esthetical; logical ad mixed interpretations. When do‐ ing so, a special emphasis is laid on the presentation of an explication of tWr based on theory of models, an explication authored by teresa Kostyrko. this explication rests on a conditional recognition of the particular 'realities' of Chwistek's theory as proper models (i.e. those, which fulfill the condition of the identity of meaning of theory's fundamental notions) of the theories of reality, with the provision that such models are indeed constructible. In the last section of my paper I propose a preliminary appraisal of the tWr as well as a way to reengineer this theory in order to avoid some of its difficulties. By appealing to Kostyrko's idea on one hand and the spirit Quinean ontological relativism on the other, I wish to argue as follows: (1) 'reality' is the name of the set comprising all meanings of the term 'reality'; (2) under particular conditions these meanings can be arranged in a theory, which posseses a proper model (scientific discourse, some forms of the common talk); (3) model proper designate by definition classes of objects, which we regard as existent on the grounds of a given theory. the above set of theses forms the core of a concept, which I propose to call the 'manifold reality' in order to differentiate it from tWr, the development of which theory it is, as well as its modification towards a new kind of ontology. KeYWOrDS Leon Chwistek; many realities; manifold reality; model theory; ontological relativism; onto‐ logy; logic 406 Hubert BOŻEK WStĘP W artykule przedstawiam rys krytyczny teorii wielości rzeczywistości (tWr) autorstwa polskiego logika, filozofa i malarza Leona Chwistka (1884–1944). ujmując rzecz w znacznym uproszczeniu, wspomniana teoria składa się z czte‐ rech podstawowych tez: (1) zamiast jednej rzeczywistości możemy mówić o wielu rzeczywistościach; (2) rzeczywistości te pojmować należy w sposób analogiczny do systemów logicznych, opartych o określone zestawy aksjoma‐ tów; (3) wspomniane systemy są wewnętrznie niesprzeczne i wykluczają się na‐ wzajem parami; (4) nie ma żadnych metasystemowych reguł, w oparciu o które można by dokonać wyboru pomiędzy nimi. u podstaw mojego przedsięwzięcia w mniejszym stopniu leży chęć przybli‐ żenia tej teorii czytelnikom, którzy nie mieli okazji się z nią zapoznać, w stopniu większym natomiast odczuwana przeze mnie potrzeba zebrania możliwie kom‐ pletnego zestawu istniejących interpretacji tejże, jak również dokonania jej oce‐ ny - choćby 'prowizorycznej'1 i nieroszczącej sobie pretensji do ostatecznych rozstrzygnięć. Ponieważ zarówno sam Chwistek, jak i jego twórczość logiczna i filozoficzna (w mniejszym stopniu malarska) nie są szczególnie znane, zdecy‐ dowałem się rozpocząć od krótkiego i nieco schematycznego omówienia tWr w perspektywie historyczno ‐rozwojowej, nawet jeśli w pewnej mierze miałbym przy tym powtórzyć to, co już na interesujący mnie temat do tej pory napisano. W dalszej części artykułu omówię istniejące interpretacje teorii Chwistka, na koniec zaś postaram się sformułować i uzasadnić swój pogląd na referowane powyżej kwestie. 1. KrÓtKA HIStOrIA 'WIeLOŚCI rZeCZYWIStOŚCI' Pierwszym autorem, który poddał wybrane teksty Leona Chwistka systema‐ tycznemu opracowaniu, był Kazimierz Pasenkiewicz (1961). Jednak to Karol Chrobak w opublikowanej w 2004 roku książce Niejedna rzeczywistość dokonał całościowej syntezy historyczno ‐filozoficznej dorobku naukowego autora Granic nauki (Chrobak, 2004). Zarówno Pasenkiewicz, jak i Chrobak, wyróżniają kilka etapów rozwoju interesującej mnie teorii. Idąc w ich ślady, postaram się prześledzić historię rozwoju głównych wątków tWr. 1 W tekście posługuję się dwoma rodzajami cudzysłowów: „" i ''. Pierwszy cudzysłów zarezerwowany jest dla cytatów. Drugi stosuję w odniesieniu do wyrażeń będących nazwami, których znaczenie wymaga definicji lub przynajmniej eksplikacji. Zabieg ten ma na celu odróżnienie dwóch całkowicie różnych użyć języka, uwydatnienie logicznej formy zdań zawierających nazwy niedookreślone pod względem znaczenia, jak również uniknięcie pomieszania poziomów języka naturalnego. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 407 1.1. SenS i rzeczywiStość (1916) niewątpliwą zasługą Chrobaka jest opracowanie i wydanie pochodzącej z 1916 roku rozprawy Chwistka zatytułowanej Sens i rzeczywistość (Chwistek, 2004). Fakt ten jest o tyle istotny, że właśnie w tej pracy po raz pierwszy pojawia się zarys tWr. Przy znacznym 'rozstrzale' tematycznym omawianej pracy, w in‐ teresującym mnie kontekście zwracają na siebie uwagę dwa rozdziały: I - za‐ tytułowany Problemat istnienia oraz III - Doświadczenie. Oba rozdziały wy‐ dają się znaczące dla zrozumienia genezy tWr, jednak to rozdział I zawiera sugestię odnośnie do istnienia więcej niż jednego 'świata'. Występuje w nim brzemienne w skutki przeciwstawienie 'świata snu' i 'świata jawy'. to, że mowa jest o dwóch odrębnych 'światach', uzasadnione jest nieuzgadnialnością treści wrażeń przynależących do stanów snu i jawy. Chwistek używa w tym kon‐ tekście następującego przykładu: wielokrotnie zdarza nam się śnić o ludziach zmarłych, obcować z nimi, rozmawiać itd., kiedy jednak budzimy się, wiemy przecież, że osoby te nie żyją. Jeśli uznamy ciągłość pomiędzy 'światem jawy' i 'światem snu', zmuszeni jesteśmy przyjąć, że wspomniane osoby jednocześnie żyją i nie żyją. Jedynym sposobem uniknięcia tego paradoksu jest założenie, że mamy do czynienia z dwoma odrębnymi, wykluczającymi się systemami2. Zastosowanie praktyczne znajduje tutaj 'kryterium istnienia', o którym autor pisze kilka paragrafów wcześniej i które możemy zidentyfikować jako derywat zasady niesprzeczności. Choć sam Chwistek nie rozwija tego wątku, kryte‐ rium to można zrekonstruować następująco: jeżeli α ┴ β, to w obrębie jednego 'świata' możemy uznać tylko jedno ze zdań będących podstawieniem α lub β, a w konsekwencji, jeśli mamy do czynienia ze zdaniami egzystencjalnymi, on‐ tologia naszego 'świata' będzie uboższa o obiekt, którego istnienie stwierdza α lub β, albo też o całą klasę obiektów, w przypadku gdy za powyższe wyrażenia podstawimy zdania kwantyfikowane. Sformułowane w ten sposób kryterium określa warunek konieczny uznawania zdań egzystencjalnych. można by przy‐ puszczać, że najlepszym kandydatem na warunek wystarczający będzie zgodność z 'doświadczeniem', jednak sprawa przedstawia się w sposób bardziej złożony ze względu na wieloznaczność omawianego pojęcia. Kwestię tę porządkuje rozdział III, dostarczając typologii podstawowych odmian doświadczenia. Są to: (1) doświadczenie praktyczne; (2) doświadcze‐ nie naukowe; (3) doświadczenie zmysłowe; (4) doświadczenie psychologiczne; (5) doświadczenie metafizyczne. Jak zauważa Chrobak, typ (1) i (3) mają charakter bardziej podstawowy niż (2) i (4), które mogą uchodzić za pochodne tych pierwszych - odpowiednio 2 na planie epistemologicznym rozważania autora Sensu i rzeczywistości dotyczące snu i jawy dają się odczytać jako nowe wcielenie starego problemu kartezjańskiego „złośliwego demona", z tą różnicą, że Chwistek nigdy nie przystałby na rozwiązanie Kartezjusza polegające na wprowadzeniu figury absolutu z racji czysto spekulatywnego charakteru takiego posunięcia. 408 Hubert BOŻEK (2) byłoby zatem pochodną (1), a (4) pochodną (3) - natomiast (5) sta‐ nowiłoby rodzaj metadoświadczenia charakteryzującego przechodzenie od jednego świata do drugiego (na przykład budzenie się ze snu). Owa roz‐ widlająca się dychotomicznie typologia doświadczenia daje początek ak‐ sjomatyce tWr, którą Chwistek rozwija w kolejnych swoich pracach. na fakt ten słusznie zwraca uwagę Chrobak, który z powyższego faktu wy‐ ciąga wniosek, iż teoria Chwistka ma charakter czysto epistemologiczny. niewątpliwie tWr zawiera szereg elementów teoriopoznawczych, lecz nie mniej istotne dla ostatecznego kształtu, jaki przybierze, są zasady kon‐ strukcyjne o rodowodzie logicznym, jak również pewna pluralistyczna wizja ontologiczna. 1.2. trzy odczyty odnoSzące Się do pojęcia iStnienia (1917) Kolejnym krokiem na drodze rozwoju tWr są trzy teksty połączone wspól‐ nym tytułem: Trzy odczyty odnoszące się do pojęcia istnienia (Chwistek, 1917)3. Pierwsze dwa z nich: Nominalizm Poincaré'go i jego konsekwencje oraz Paradoksy logistyki skupiają się na krytyce wybranych elementów systemu Bertranda russella i Alfreda notrha Whiteheada zawartego w Principia mathematica, takich jak aksjomat wyboru czy zasada sprowadzalności. Krytyka ta dokonuje się w duchu finityzmu i konstruktywizmu Henriego Poincaré a jej celem jest 'oczyszczenie' Principia... z naleciałości platońskich. nie jest to cel jedyny. W dalszej konsekwencji Chwistek pragnie uniezależnić logikę od wszelkich rozstrzygnięć natury ontologicznej (Chwistek, 1921a). Dla historii tWr ma takie znaczenie, iż tylko logika wolna od ontologicznego 'zaangażowania' może stanowić narzędzie do analizy i konstrukcji systemów ontologii, które w Sensie i rzeczywistości nazywane były 'światami', 'rzeczywistościami' zaś zostały okre‐ ślone po raz pierwszy w trzecim ze wspomnianych odczytów zatytułowanym Pojęcie rzeczywistości. We wspomnianym tekście ma miejsce zabieg, który okaże się znamien‐ ny w skutki: tWr zyskuje postać aksjomatyczną. typologia doświadczenia, o której mowa była wcześniej, zawarta jest implicite w sposobie, w jaki Chwi‐ stek ujmuje poszczególne 'rzeczywistości'. Dostarcza on najpierw listy zdań elementarnych, z których, za pomocą implikacji i kwantyfikacji, budowane są aksjomaty: 'ix' - x jest rzeczywiste; 'wx' - x jest widzialne; 'bx' - x jest bezpośrednio dane. 3 Odczyty te wygłoszone zostały na posiedzeniu towarzystwa Filozoficznego w Krakowie w 1917 roku i opublikowane w tym samym roku na łamach Przeglądu Filozoficznego. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 409 Z początku mamy do czynienia z dwoma 'rzeczywistościami' (albo 'systema‐ mi rzeczywistości'): (I) fenomenalistyczną i (II) realistyczną. Chwistek charak‐ teryzuje owe systemy przez następujący zestaw aksjomatów (Chwistek, 1917: 146–148): (I) rzeczywistość fenomenalistyczna (1) wx → ix (2) bx → ix (3a) ∀x (ix → wx ∨ bx) (II) rzeczywistość realistyczna (1) wx → ix (2) bx → ix (3b) ∃x (ix ∧ ¬ wx ∧ ¬ bx) Podążając za interpretacją Chrobaka, która w tym punkcie wydaje się niewąt‐ pliwie trafna, należy odnotować, że (I) jest odpowiednikiem doświadczania prakt ycznego, natomiast (II) odpowiada doświadczeniu zmysłowemu. należy przy tym pamiętać, że typologia doświadczenia z Sensu i rzeczywistości obejmowała dodatkowo doświadczenie naukowe i doświadczenie psychologiczne, jak również doświadczenie metaf i z yczne. Wymienio‐ ne typy doświadczenia, podobnie jak odpowiadające im rzeczywistości, nie dają się opisać wyłącznie za pomocą wyszczególnionych powyżej formuł. Fakt ten skłania autora do rozbudowy tWr. Wybiegając nieco naprzód, nadmienię, że rozbudowa ta będzie się dokonywać poprzez rozszerzenie listy zdań elementar‐ nych, a co za tym idzie, aksjomatów i ich możliwych kombinacji. Jednak zanim wspomniane rozszerzenie nastąpi, do wspomnianych dotąd dwóch rzeczywisto‐ ści dołączą dwie kolejne. Dzieje się to za sprawą aplikacji tWr do zagadnień teorii sztuki. 1.3. wielość rzeczywiStości w Sztuce (1918) tekst Wielość rzeczywistości w sztuce (Chwistek, 1918) stanowi rozwinięcie myśli Chwistka wyrażonej w stwierdzeniu, iż: „różnice pomiędzy typami malarstwa odpowiadają ściśle różnicom pomiędzy typami rzeczywistości" (Chwistek, 1918: 24). nie chcąc zagłębiać się w problematykę estetyczną, zaznaczę tylko, że rozważania dotyczące związków sztuki z poszczególnymi typami doświadczenia i, co się wiąże z powyższym, z typami rzeczywistości pojawiają się zarówno w Sensie i rzeczywistości, jak i w Trzech odczytach... W pracach tych wprawdzie brak systematycznego wykładu dotyczącego tych związków, mimo to bez wątpienia można przyjąć, że autor związek taki do‐ strzega i uważa za istotny, na co zgodnie wskazują Karol Chrobak (2004) i Jan Woleński (2005). W interesującej mnie w tej chwili pracy wymienio‐ ne są następujące typy rzeczywistości wraz z odpowiadającymi im typami malarstwa: 410 Hubert BOŻEK Typ rzeczywistości* Typ malarstwa** (a) 'rzeczywistość popularna' (a') prymitywizm (b) 'rzeczywistość fizykalna' (b') realizm (c) 'rzeczywistość psychologiczna' (c') impresjonizm (d) 'rzeczywistość wizjonerów' (d') futuryzm * (a) odpowiada (II), zaś (c) odpowiada (I) w poprzednim zestawieniu. ** Wyróżnione typy malarstwa nie odpowiadają w zupełności znanym z historii sztuki po‐ jęciom: przez sztukę 'prymitywistyczną' autor rozumie głównie sztukę ludową; przywoływanym przezeń przykładem sztuki 'realistycznej' jest malarstwo renesansowe; pod etykietą 'impresjo‐ nizm' Chwistek umieszcza nurt sztuki pod względem deskrypcji bardziej przywodzący na myśl fowizm niż znany z podręczników impresjonizm; wreszcie 'futuryzm' autora Wielości rzeczywistości w sztuce jest niczym innym, jak współtworzonym przez niego formizmem. na postawie Wielości rzeczywistości w sztuce można się pokusić o nieformalną charakterystykę rzeczywistości, o których pisze Chwistek. W przypadku (a') mamy do czynienia z sytuacją, w której twórca koncentruje się na najbardziej oczywistych aspektach fizycznych przedstawianych obiektów zaczerpniętych z potocznej wiedzy na ich temat. rzeczywistość typu (b) jest efektem wiedzy specjalistycznej dotyczącej rzeczy i ich własności często ukrytych przed naszym bezpośrednim doświadczeniem (na przykład sposób rozchodzenia się światła). Sztuka realistyczna (b') to efekt nierzadko wnikliwych studiów nad przedmio‐ tami fizycznymi, jest ona zarazem pozbawiona aspektu kreacji i nastawiona na wierną reprodukcję, której blisko do fotografii. Dla sztuki impresjonistycznej (c') inspiracją są nie same rzeczy, lecz wrażenia, które stają się udziałem artysty. Artysta ten, tworząc dzieło impresjonistyczne, nie czyni użytku ze swej wiedzy na temat świata fizycznego, ale pozostaje na gruncie rzeczywistości psycho‐ logicznej, zwanej w innych miejscach rzeczywistością wrażeń. rzeczywistość wizjonerów (d) jest pewną modyfikacją (c). tutaj plasują się rozmaite wizje i halucynacje, które powstają na bazie wrażeń zmysłowych, jednak uwolnione zostają od bezpośredniego związku ze świadomością. Jej odpowiednik - sztuka futurystyczna (d') - nie reprodukuje rzeczywistości fizycznej, nie stanowi też zapisu albo interpretacji wrażeń zmysłowych, ale jest twórczym przeobrażeniem tych ostatnich. Jak łatwo się zorientować, ten typ sztuki pozostaje autorowi najbliższy. W powyższym zestawieniu występują więc dwa nowe typy rzeczywistości: (b) i (d). Są one, jak się okazuje, rozwinięciem albo modyfikacją (a) i (c). rozwa‐ żania, które doprowadziły Chwistka do wprowadzenia tych modyfikacji, miały swoje umocowanie w spostrzeżeniach dotyczących sztuki. Czy można jednak Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 411 powiedzieć, że to rozszerzenie listy typów rzeczywistości podyktowane jest trudnościami, na jakie natrafia refleksja autora nad sztuką i doświadczeniem, które leży u podstaw tej ostatniej, albo z potrzeby poszeregowania bogactwa stylów artystycznych w prostą typologię (Chrobak, 2004: 115; Kotarbiński, 1922: 428)? Do pytania tego jeszcze powrócę. 1.4. wielość rzeczywiStości (1921) niewielka książeczka zatytułowana Wielość rzeczywistości (Chwistek, 1921b) dostarcza pełnej postaci aksjomatycznej tWr. Do wymienionych wcześniej zdań elementarnych dołączone są dwa nowe: 'wjx' - x jest widzialne na jawie; 'wnx' - x jest widzialne w warunkach normalnych. Wyróżnione zostają tu następujące typy rzeczywistości: (I) 'rzeczywistość wrażeń' (1) wx → ix (2) bx → ix (3a) ∀x (ix → wx ∨ bx) (4a) wx ≡ wjx (4d) ∃x ¬(wx ≡ wnx) (II) 'rzeczywistość rzeczy' (1) wx → ix (2) bx → ix (3b) ∃x (ix ∧ ¬ wx ∧ ¬ bx) (4a) wx ≡ wjx (4c) wx ≡ wnx (III) 'rzeczywistość wyobrażeń' (1) wx → ix (2) bx → ix (3a) ∀x (ix → wx ∨ bx) (4b) ∃x ¬(wx ≡ wjx) (4d) ∃x ¬(wx ≡ wnx) (IV) 'rzeczywistość fizykalna' (1) wx → ix (2) bx → ix (3b) ∃x (ix ∧ ¬ wx ∧ ¬ bx) (4a) wx ≡ wjx (4d) ∃x ¬(wx ≡ wnx) Z powyższego zestawienia widać, że (I) i (II) są zasadniczo tożsame z - odpowiednio: rzeczywistością fenomenalistyczną i rzeczywistością realistyczną z Trzech odczytów... Ich charakterystyka zostaje uzupełniona przez wprowa‐ dzenie aksjomatu (4a) w obu wypadkach i aksjomatów (4d) dla (I) oraz (4c) dla (II). Powyższe uzupełnienie okazuje się nieodzowne, gdy spojrzymy na li‐ sty aksjomatów opisujących dwa nowe typy rzeczywistości, jakie wprowadza artykuł: rzeczywistość wyobrażeń (III) i rzeczywistość fizykalną (IV). Jedyną różnicą pomiędzy (I) i (III) jest to, iż w (I) obowiązuje aksjomat (4a) a w (III) jego zaprzeczenie (4b). Podobnie różnica pomiędzy (II) a (IV) sprowadza się do uznania (4c) lub jego odrzucenia równoważnego (4d). gdyby nie wprowadzenie nowych aksjomatów, pojęcia 'rzeczywistości wrażeń' i 'rzeczywistości rzeczy' 412 Hubert BOŻEK pozostawałyby nie dość sprecyzowane, aby można było jednoznacznie odpowie‐ dzieć na pytanie o to, jakie obiekty możemy uznać za rzeczywiście istniejące na ich gruncie. Innymi słowy brakowałoby jednoznacznego kryterium logicznego pozwalającego na włączenie lub wykluczenie z ontologii danej rzeczywistości pewnych klas obiektów. Od razu nasuwa się pytanie o to, na ile wspomniane kryterium można uznać za ostateczne i czy lista typów rzeczywistości nie może ulec dalszemu rozszerzeniu. Sam Chwistek przyjmuje w tej kwestii stanowisko otwarte, zastrzegając jednocześnie, że starał się jedynie dostarczyć listy pod‐ stawow ych typów rzeczywistości. Ważnym uzupełnieniem poszerzonej aksjomatyki tWr, którą zawiera Wielość rzeczywistości, jest przeniesienie na grunt interesującej mnie teorii typów logicznych russella w wersji pozbawionej aksjomatu sprawdzalności, nad którą Chwistek pracował w latach w latach 1912–1922 (Chwistek, 1922). W zasto‐ sowaniu do wielości rzeczywistości teoria typów logicznych wprowadza obok czterech podstawowych typów rzeczywistości (tI ‐IV)4 rzędy rzeczywistości (r1 ‐n). rzeczywistość r1 podpadająca pod któryś z podstawowych typów, zawierająca obiekty, których ewidencję określa właściwy zestaw aksjomatów (na przykład r1tII), zostaje odróżniona od rzeczywistości wyższych rzędów będących zbio‐ rem sądów odnośnie do danej rzeczywistości pierwszego rzędu (r2tII), sądów o tych sądach (r3tII) i tak dalej aż do nieskończoności (teoretycznie), a w prak‐ tyce do wyczerpania naszych zdolności rekurencyjnych. Powyższe rozwiązanie z jednej strony jest potrzebne ze względu na konieczność zapobieżenia antyno‐ miom związanym ze statusem podmiotu poznania na gruncie tWr (Chwistek, 1921b: 58–59). Z drugiej strony jednak znacznie komplikuje teorię Chwistka. W miejsce czterech rzeczywistości otrzymujemy ich bowiem (przynajmniej w teorii) nieskończenie wiele - jest to konsekwencja, na którą Chwistek jako zwolennik finityzmu i konstruktywizmu nie mógł się przecież zgodzić5. 1.5. Granice nauki (1935) Opublikowana w 1935 roku książka Granice nauki. Zarys metodologii nauk ścisłych (Chwistek, 1935) zawiera ostatnie znane sformułowanie tWr. Autor nie rozwija 4 Wprowadzona przeze mnie symbolika, której brak w tekście Chwistka, ma na celu eksplikację wątku związanego z zastosowaniem teorii typów do tWr. 5 Finityzm Chwistka sprowadza się do dwóch dyrektyw: (1) każde rozumowanie (na przykład dowód matematyczny) można przeprowadzić w skończonej liczbie kroków i (2) wyrażenia mówiące o 'nieskończoności' należy traktować jako skróty wyrażeń odnoszących się do skończoności. Konstruktywizm głosi, że każdy obiekt przyjmowany na gruncie danej teorii musi spełniać warunek konstruowalności. Zasady te sformułowane dla teorii dedukcyjnych miały również zastosowanie w koncepcjach filozoficznych autora Zasad czystej teorii typów. Konsekwentnie, jeśli nawet da się skonstruować dowolną liczbę systemów rzeczywistości, w praktyce, która determinuje ludzkie myślenie (i myślenie w ogóle), ich liczba pozostaje ograniczona. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 413 dalej aksjomatyki czterech rzeczywistości, jednocześnie utrzymując samą teorię przy pewnej nieznacznej modyfikacji. Novum omawianej pracy polega na wpro‐ wadzeniu w miejsce pojęcia 'rzeczywistości' pojęć 'schematu rzeczywistości' oraz odpowiadających im 'systemów'. Jest to próba dalszego uporządkowania tWr na modłę teorio ‐mnogościową, dokonywana pod wpływem prowadzonych wów‐ czas przez Chwistka i jego uczniów badań nad konstrukcją systemu 'semantyki (albo metamatematyki) racjonalnej' (Chwistek, Hetper, & Herzberg, 1933). W Granicach... zostaje przywołana ponadto koncepcja 'systemu indywidual‐ nego', która występuje już w pracy Zagadnienia kultury duchowej w Polsce (Chwi‐ stek, 1931). 'Systemy indywidualne' to systemy filozoficzne, spełniające warunek zupełności i konsekwencji, które każdy człowiek zaopatrzony w zdolność doko‐ nywania prostych operacji logicznych (przynajmniej w teorii) może skonstruo‐ wać na własny użytek. Do kategorii systemów indywidualnych zostaje zaliczona w końcu również tWr. W ten sposób Chwistek zamyka swoje rozważania do‐ tyczące wielości rzeczywistości. Pozostaje kwestią spekulacji, czy autor planował dalsze przeformułowanie albo rewizję tWr. Omawiana teoria pozostaje pełna niejasności i niedopowiedzeń, stanowiąc raczej szkic niż zamkniętą całość, po‐ zostawiając szerokie pole dla mniej lub bardziej spekulatywnych interpretacji. 2. InterPretACJe Z racji dość ogólnikowego i 'niewykończonego' charakteru teoria Chwistka do‐ czekała się kilku konkurencyjnych interpretacji (niekiedy niemających żadnych zwolenników - zagadnienie to postaram się wyjaśnić za moment). W zależno‐ ści od zakresu problematyki filozoficznej, jaki wspomniane interpretacje uznają za najistotniejszy dla tWr, podzielić je można na: ontologiczne; epistemolo‐ giczne; estetyczne; logiczne; pozostałe interpretacje6. 2.1. Interpretacje ontologiczne Interpretacja ontologiczna teorii Chwistka narzuca się za sprawą termino‐ logii, którą posługuje się autor tWr. Wyrażenia takie jak: 'rzeczywistość', 6 nie są to, ma się rozumieć, typy czyste i z pewnością niekiedy krzyżują się między sobą. tam, gdzie niemożliwa wydaje się jednoznaczna odpowiedź na pytanie o to, jaka problematyka filozoficzna jest dla danego sposobu odczytania tWr wiodąca, zaliczam ją do grupy mieszczącej 'pozostałe' interpretacje. Kazimierz Pasenkiewicz jest autorem dwóch interpretacji teorii autora Wielości rzeczywistości, z których tylko jedną uznaję za słuszną, stąd jego obecność w dwóch spośród wyżej wymienionych grup. Jeśli chodzi o interpretacje estetyczne, należy podkreślić, iż niekiedy powstają one niejako 'przy okazji' rozważań nad innymi aspektami twórczości Chwistka, co powoduje, że nie mają one charakteru konsekwentnego i pogłębionego studium. 414 Hubert BOŻEK 'istnienie', 'istnienie rzeczywiste' sugerują dość dobitnie, że mamy tutaj do czynienia z taką właśnie teorią. Co ciekawe, wszyscy bodaj autorzy, którzy od‐ noszą się do koncepcji Chwistka, mimo iż dostrzegają teoretyczną możliwość tego rodzaju interpretacji, odrzucają ją jako nieuprawnioną. Przykładu takiego podejścia dostarcza Kazimierz Pasenkiewicz. Jego zdaniem można rozważyć możliwość, iż tWr: „jest teorią metafizyczną, w której buduje się pojęcia rzeczywistości niezależnie od tego, czy wspominane rzeczywistości są dane w doświadczeniu". Jednak jak szybko (i słusznie) zauważa: „Chwistek bardzo ostro występuje przeciwko podobnym bezpodstawnym założeniom, nie opar‐ tym ani na doświadczeniu, ani na niezawodnych schematach, ani na zdrowym rozsądku" (Pasenkiewicz, 1962: 85–86). takie rozumienie 'ontologiczności' tWr nie jest naturalnie jedynym moż‐ liwym i oparta na nim krytyka ontologicznej wykładni teorii ma jedynie lokal‐ ny - zrelatywizowany do sposobu rozumienia zagadnień ontologicznych - charakter. Jednocześnie nie uważam też, ażeby należało zignorować ontologiczne (to znaczy związane ze schematem pojęciowym ontologii) konotacje 'istnienia' albo 'rzeczywistości'. 2.2. Interpretacje epistemologiczne tę część moich rozważań wypada rozpocząć od przedstawienia interpretacji tWr autorstwa prekursora badań nad twórczością filozoficzną i logiczną Leo‐ na Chwistka, Kazimierza Pasenkiewicza. Jej autor referuje sedno swej propozy‐ cji następująco: teoria wielości rzeczywistości jest konsekwentnym, ogólnym i niesprzecznym opisem całokształtu doświadczenia; zostaje skonstruowana bez wprowadzenia żadnego dogma‐ tycznego założenia, nie uzasadnionego doświadczeniem ani koniecznością logiczną. ma więc tą samą wartość poznawczą, co oparta na doświadczeniu i rozumowaniu i potwier‐ dzona przez praktykę teoria naukowa i może być przyjęta jako podstawa światopoglądu filozoficznego (Pasenkiewicz, 1962: 85). Przy lekturze powyższego fragmentu nasuwa się wątpliwość, czy istot‐ nie teoria Chwistka jest „opisem całokształtu doświadczenia" i czy właści‐ wie rolę taką może spełniać. Jeśli spojrzymy na tWr z punktu widzenia rozwoju jej aksjomatyki, odpowiedź wydaje się przecząca. Skoro wyszcze‐ gólnione przez autora Wielości rzeczywistości układy aksjomatów zawiera‐ ją terminy pierwotne, nieokreślone na tyle ściśle, aby oddalić możliwość dalszego rozszerzenia listy rzeczywistości, okazać się może, iż - trzymając się sformułowań Pasenkiewicza - tWr nie opisuje jednak całokształtu doświadczenia. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 415 Jak wspominałem na początku, zwolennikiem czysto epistemologicznej interpretacji tWr jest też Chrobak. We fragmencie swojej książki, poświę‐ conym analizie Sensu i rzeczywistości pisze: Pokrewieństwo teorii wielu rzeczywistości Chwistka z zagadnieniami epistemologicz‐ nymi [...] stanowi przewodnią nić interpretacji, za którą podążamy, zajmując się ko‐ lejnymi tekstami. Pojęcie rzeczywistości, z jakim zetkniemy się w poniższych rozwa‐ żaniach, będzie zawsze korespondowało z kategorią doświadczenia. można powiedzieć nawet więcej: rzeczywistości, o których będzie mowa, rozumieć będziemy jako formy doświadczenia (Chrobak, 2004: 55). Za tą interpretacją przemawia stała obecność elementów epistemologicz‐ nych w poszczególnych tekstach Chwistka rozwijających tWr. Warto jednak zauważyć, że pojęcie 'doświadczenia', które wydaje się kluczowe dla interpreta‐ cji Chrobaka, występuje raczej na wczesnych etapach rozwoju teorii, co może wskazywać na to, iż miało ono istotne znaczenie z punktu widzenia jej genezy, jednak z czasem zostało przysłonięte przez inne zagadnienia. Ponadto nawet jeśli rozważając poszczególne 'rzeczywistości' Chwistka, istotnie mamy do czynienia z różnymi „formami doświadczenia", to uwaga autora koncentruje się raczej na tym, jakie założenia dotyczące rzeczywistego istnienia określonej klasy przed‐ miotów musimy przyjąć, aby konsekwentnie posługiwać się jednym pojęciem rzeczywistości. W teorii Chwistka kwestie epistemologiczne są nierozerwalnie splecione z zagadnieniami ontologicznym, z kolei styl prezentacji tych ostat‐ nich podsuwa autorowi logika (aksjomatyka, zastosowanie teorii typów itd.). traktowanie tWr jako teorii czysto epistemologicznej jest przesadnym i jed‐ nostronnym uproszczeniem. 2.3. Interpretacje estetyczne Związek tWr z teorią sztuki jest nieprzypadkowy. Historia powstawania tej teorii przypomina pod pewnymi względami proces artystyczny - od wstępne‐ go zarysu albo szkicu, do złożonej i wielobarwnej, choć nigdy nieskończonej kompozycji. Owo wewnętrzne pokrewieństwo w zestawieniu z dokonaną przez samego Chwistka aplikacją teorii do zagadnień sztuki, z jaką mamy do czynie‐ nia w Wielości rzeczywistości w sztuce oraz w Wielości rzeczywistości, sprawia, że względna popularność estetycznej interpretacji tWr nie może zbytnio dziwić. Jako teorię prima facie estetyczną traktował ją Witkacy, czyniąc to wyłącznie na potrzeby dyskusji z Chwistkiem i koncentrując się na wątkach tWr dotyczą‐ cych estetyki (Witkiewicz, 1959). Współcześnie podobne stanowisko (w sensie orientacji estetycznej w odniesieniu do interpretacji tWr) przyjmują maria Hussakowska (2005) i Stefan Konstańczak (2009). Podobnie, choć z intencją 416 Hubert BOŻEK wyraźnie polemiczną, odnosi się do niej tadeusz Kotarbiński, pisząc: „Skąd się jednak biorą aż cztery światy [...]? nie skądinąd, jak tylko z rozmyślań nad typami malarstwa! I dlatego, z pozoru przynajmniej, stosują się do ma‐ larstwa w wykładzie autora owe cztery pojęcia rzeczywistości" (Kotarbiński, 1922: 428). Kotarbiński podejrzewa tutaj u Chwistka petitio principii: skoro tWr ma wyjaśniać odmienność czterech podstawowych stylów malarskich w oparciu o założenie o istnieniu czterech podstawowych typów rzeczywistości i jeśli twierdzenie o czterech podstawowych typach rzeczywistości wynikałoby z „rozmyślań nad typami malarstwa", to zdolność eksplanacyjna teorii Chwist‐ ka w powyższym zakresie musi być poddana w wątpliwość. 2.4. Interpretacje logiczne Odnoszący się do Wielości rzeczywistości polemiczny artykuł romana Ingar‐ dena zawiera pewne elementy interpretacji logicznej. W tekście tym czytamy: „rozprawa stawia sobie za zadanie ustalenie znaczenia wyrazu «rzeczywistość». ma się to dokonać przez określenie zakresu pojęcia rzeczywistości uzyskane‐ go «metodą konstruktywną»" (Ingarden, 1922: 454) Podobne zdanie zawiera przywoływana już recenzja tej samej pracy Chwistka autorstwa Kotarbińskiego: „Cztery rzeczywistości to odpowiedniki czterech znaczeń wyrazu „rzeczywi‐ sty" wyróżnionych przez autora wolnym dekretem" (Kotarbiński, 1922: 426). W obu przypadkach autorzy postulują traktowanie teorii Chwistka jako przy‐ padku analizy pojęciowej odnoszącej się nie do zastanych znaczeń słowa 'rzeczy‐ wistość', lecz do znaczeń związanych z jakimś nowym pojęciem (lub pojęciami) rzeczywistości, które Chwistek zamierza ich zdaniem skonstruować. Interpre‐ tacje Kotarbińskiego i Ingardena nie wychodzą w widoczny poza literę tekstu Chwistka, niejasne miejsca traktując jako przesłanki do argumentacji przeciw jego teorii. Inną strategię obiera teresa Kostyrko, która podejmuje się eksplikacji tWr w duchu teorii modeli. Jak sama pisze: „Istotą przeprowadzonej przeze mnie eksplikacji jest rozumienie różnych rzeczywistości, o których mówi Chwistek, jako modeli teorii tych rzeczywistości" (Kostyrko, 1968: 93). Interpretacja Kostyrko - bazująca na przeświadczeniu autorki, zgodnie z którym za teorią Chwistka stoją zasadniczo te same intuicje, co za współczesną teorią modeli - zaczyna się od rekonstrukcji rozumowania, które według niej doprowadziło Chwistka do sformułowania tezy o istnieniu wielu rzeczywistości. miałoby ono przebiegać następująco: (1) Każdy niesprzeczny układ aksjomatów jest zbiorem zdań prawdziwych. (2) Dla każdego niesprzecznego układu aksjomatów istnieje taka interpre‐ tacja terminów pierwotnych, przy której dany układ jest zbiorem zdań prawdziwych. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 417 (3) Z (2): jeżeli dane są dwa wewnętrznie niesprzeczne i syntaktycznie na‐ wzajem niezgodne układy aksjomatów A1 i A2, to istnieją dwa systemy reguł interpretacyjnych S1 i S2, gdzie S1 ≠ S2, przy których A1 i A2 są prawdziwe. Systemy, o których mowa w punkcie (3) muszą być różne, gdyż jedynie przy różnych interpretacjach terminów pierwotnych syntaktycznie niezgodne układy aksjomatów pozostają jednocześnie prawdziwe (Kostyrko, 1968: 93–94). następnym krokiem, który podejmuje Kostyrko, jest reinterpretacja (2) i (3) odwołująca się do pojęć modelu zdań zbioru Z oraz dziedziny D = (u,C), gdzie u stanowi jej uniwersum, zaś C jest jej charakterystyką, w której praw‐ dziwe są wszystkie zdania Z. W związku z powyższym (2) otrzymuje brzmienie: każdy niesprzeczny układ aksjomatów posiada model, zaś (3): jeżeli dane są dwa niesprzeczne i nawzajem syntaktycznie niezgodne układy aksjomatów A1 i A2, to istnieją dwie różne dziedziny D1 = (u,C) i D2 = (u,C) będące odpowiednio modelami A1 i A2 (Kostyrko, 1968: 94). Autorka wprowadza następnie pojęcie „modelu właściwego", który rozumie jako taki model teorii, w ramach którego definiuje się pojęcia pierwotne zgodnie z pierwotnymi intencjami tej teorii, czyli zachowując ich pierwotny sens. Odwołując się do pojęcia 'modelu wła‐ ściwego' i parafrazując sformułowanie Kostyrko, powiedzieć możemy, iż (4')7 model właściwy określonej teorii rzeczywistości na gruncie tWr nazywamy mianem jednej z czterech wyszczególnionych przez Chwistka 'rzeczywistości' (I–IV) (Kostyrko, 1968: 95). tak oto dochodzimy do teorio ‐modelowego sfor‐ mułowania tezy o wielości rzeczywistości (5): Jeżeli istnieją co najmniej dwie syntaktycznie niezgodne ze sobą teorie rzeczywistości i każda z nich ma model właściwy, to istnieją co najmniej dwie różne rzeczywisto‐ ści, czyli dwie różne dziedziny będące odpowiednimi modelami właściwymi tych teorii (Kostyrko, 1968: 96). Powyższa teza ma charakter implikacji z racji tego, iż jak zauważa Kostyrko, Chwistek nie zbudował sformalizowanej teorii rzeczywistości. Ponadto nawet jeśli teorię taką udałoby się skonstruować i spełniałaby ona warunek wewnętrz‐ nej niesprzeczności, nie wiadomo, czy posiadałaby ona model właściwy. W dal‐ szym ciągu swojego wywodu autorka wykazuje, że aksjomatyka tWr jest nie‐ sprzeczna, o ile niesprzeczna jest arytmetyka liczb naturalnych, można bowiem zbudować dla niej stosowny model we wspomnianej arytmetyce, interpretując terminy pierwotne teorii Chwistka jako określone elementy w dziedzinie liczb naturalnych (Kostyrko, 1968: 100). Pytanie o to, czy możliwe jest spełnienie drugiego warunku zawartego w poprzedniku implikacji, Kostyrko pozostawia bez odpowiedzi. 7 Autorka definicji, której parafrazą jest powyższe sformułowanie, przyporządkowuje oznaczenie '(4)', dla czytelności moją parafrazę odróżniam, wprowadzając indeks. 418 Hubert BOŻEK Wielką zaletą propozycji Kostyrko jest elegancja i przejrzystość jej teorio‐ ‐modelowej eksplikacji tWr. Bez wątpienia autorce udaje się też oddać nowatorski charakter teorii Chwistka, która okazuje się łatwo przekładalna na język współczesnej logiki. Jednocześnie wspomniana eksplikacja obnaża pewną fundamentalną słabość teorii Chwistka: jeśli jego 'rzeczywistości' mają być czymś, to być może właśnie modelami pewnych teorii rzeczywistości. Ale skonstruowanie takich modeli pozostaje zadaniem niewykonanym i nie wia‐ domo, czy wykonalnym. W pewnym sensie więc realizacja pomysłu Chwistka ani trochę się nie przybliża - nie taka zresztą była intencja autorki. 2.5. Pozostale interpretacje Interpretacji tWr, której nie daje się łatwo zaklasyfikować do żadnego z powyż‐ szych typów, dostarcza Jan Woleński w swoim tekście zatytułowanym Wielość rzeczywistości Chwistka i kultura przełomu XIX i XX w. teza artykułu zawiera się w następującym stwierdzeniu: „teoria wielości rzeczywistości jest znako‐ mitą filozoficzną interpretacją kultury monarchii habsburskiej przełomu XIX i XX w." (Woleński, 2005: 31). Powyższe zdanie, na poparcie którego autor przytacza szereg faktów ze schyłkowego okresu historii Austro ‐Węgier, w koń‐ cu odwołując się nawet do autorytetu emila Brixa8, pozostawia wrażenie niepo‐ kojącej niejasności. Czy Woleńskiemu chodzi o to, iż teoria Chwistka powstała, by tłumaczyć zjawiska kultury mu współczesnej? Czy jest raczej tak, iż kultura współczesna Chwistkowi daje się dobrze interpretować na gruncie tWr? Za pierwszą możliwością przemawia otwierające artykuł zdanie, gdzie mowa jest o tym, iż tWr: „jest w gruncie rzeczy teorią pewnego fenomenu kulturowego" (Woleński, 2005: 21). Jest to teza obarczona dużą dozą spekulacji. najprawdo‐ podobniej za tymi, nie do końca zręcznymi, sformułowaniami stoi przeświad‐ czenie, że (zgodnie lub niezgodnie z intencjami autora) tWr opisuje i porząd‐ kuje zjawiska kulturowe składające się na środowisko, w którym przyszło żyć Chwistkowi. Wreszcie, być może, w powyższej interpretacji chodzi po prostu o nakreślenie paraleli między koncepcją autora Z zagadnień kultury duchowej w Polsce a tak zwanym duchem epoki. na koniec wspomnieć wypada o ściśle psychologicznej interpretacji tWr autorstwa Krzysztofa mudynia (2003), który Chwistkową 'wielość rzeczywisto‐ ści' tłumaczy poprzez odwołanie do zjawiska osobowości wielorakiej. Interpre‐ tacja ta nie wchodzi w obręb moich zainteresowań z racji tego, że w niniejszym artykule zajmuję się wyłącznie rozważaniami natury filozo ficznej. * * * 8 Historyka i byłego konsula generalnego republiki Austrii w Krakowie. Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 419 Pora podsumować część tego artykułu poświęconą różnym interpretacjom tWr. nie mam wątpliwości, iż każda z omówionych propozycji interpretacyj‐ nych ma swoje mocne strony. Zebranie ich w powyższym zestawieniu z jednej strony ujawnia wieloznaczność teorii Chwistka, z drugiej zaś wskazuje na to, iż każda jej interpretacja odwołująca się do aparatury pojęciowej którejś z subdy‐ scyplin filozoficznych uznana być musi za jednostronną. Wspomniana okolicz‐ ność jest czymś naturalnym, choć potencjalnie łatwo umknąć może świadomo‐ ści interpretatorów, zwłaszcza niebędących do końca zaznajomionymi z zawiłą historią kształtowania się tWr. Drugą kwestią, na którą chciałbym zwrócić uwagę w niniejszym kontekście, jest to, iż z racji rzucającej się w oczy 'szkicowości' teorii Chwistka każda jej interpretacja dodaje coś istotnego do samej teorii. Przykładem tego jest ekspli‐ kacja teorio ‐modelowa tWr autorstwa Kostyrko. gdyby konsekwentnie prze‐ prowadzić zarysowany przez nią program, tj. zbudować modele właściwe dla teorii poszczególnych typów rzeczywistości, mielibyśmy w gruncie rzeczy do czynienia z zupełnie nową teorią. Czy powinno nas to martwić? niekoniecznie. W ostatniej części moich rozważań będę argumentował, że prawdziwa wartość Chwistkowej teorii tkwi nie w tym, co prima facie sobą prezentuje, lecz w tym, co można z niej 'zrobić', twórczo wykorzystując intuicje autora w niej zawarte. 3. PrÓBA OCenY Pewne wyobrażenie o tym, z jakim przyjęciem spotkała się teoria Chwistka ze strony mu współczesnych, daje poniższy cytat z przywoływanej już recenzji Wielości rzeczywistości autorstwa Kotarbińskiego: Jeżeli pozyskasz, czytelniku, tę książeczkę do swej biblioteki, wypadnie ci się dobrze zastanowić zanim należycie nabytek umieścisz. nie dla rozłożystych wymiarów, gdyż tłoczą się tu rojno myśli na ciasnym obszarze stu niespełna stronic, tłoczą podobne falandze żołnierzy, ekspedjowanych w przeludnionym wagonie: tak samo luzem jedna obok drugiej i tak samo wspólnością munduru objęte. trud ci sprawi, czytelniku, kwe‐ stja czy tę książeczkę umieścić na półce z dziełami nauki, czy raczej pośród swobodniej‐ szy zamyśleń (Kotarbiński, 1922: 426). W podobnym duchu wypowiada się względem tWr Ingarden, wskazując na wiele nieścisłości w wywodzie Chwistka. Dodaje do tego swoją krytykę za‐ stosowania metody konstrukcyjnej do problematyki rzeczywistości, twierdząc, że zamiast wyjaśniać sens terminów pierwotnych, przyczynia się ona tylko do zaciemnienia i tak już nie całkiem jasnego wywodu autora Zdaniem Ingarde‐ na metoda konstrukcyjna nie nadaje się do wyjaśniania sensu wyrażeń takich jak 'rzeczywistość', gdyż aby zrozumieć sens takich wyrażeń, należy uszczegó‐ łowić sens bardziej ogólny do postaci, która daje się jednoznacznie określić. 420 Hubert BOŻEK W przypadku metody konstrukcyjnej nie ma o czymś podobnym mowy, bo‐ wiem sens, który miałby podlegać uszczegółowieniu, jest tym samym sensem, który miałby zostać dopiero skonstruowany (Ingarden, 1922). Znajomość kolei historycznego rozwoju teorii Chwistka umożliwia ogra‐ niczenie wrażenia niejasności i przesadnej swobody wywodów autora, pozwala bowiem na umiejscowienie wybranych aspektów jego koncepcji w określonych kontekstach znaczeniowych. Pokazuje to właśnie przykład pojęcia 'rzeczywisto‐ ści'. Chwistek konstruuje różne jego sensy w oparciu o podstawowe i różniące się między sobą sensy zastane. Ingarden, twierdząc, że Chwistek nie może cze‐ goś podobnego uczynić, gdyż nie pozwala mu na to ściśle konwencjonalny cha‐ rakter symboli logicznych, które wykorzystuje do budowy aksjomatyki różnych typów rzeczywistości, myli się, nie bierze bowiem pod uwagę tego, iż język logiki, który się o nie opiera, jest językiem innego rzędu (dziś powiedzielibyśmy 'metajęzykiem') względem języka poszczególnych teorii rzeczywistości. Pasenkiewicz, inaczej niż współcześni Chwistkowi autorzy, prześledził zawiły tok myślenia, który doprowadził autora Wielości rzeczywistości do sformułowa‐ nia tezy o wielości rzeczywistości właśnie. nie można winić Kotarbińskiego i Ingardena za ich reakcję na teorię Chwistka - nie mieli przecież obowiązku znać wszystkich prac autora tWr. Jednocześnie znajomość kontekstu spra‐ wia, iż krytyka Pasenkiewicza może się okazać o wiele bardziej dotkliwa dla ewentual nych zwolenników tWr. Według mnie najistotniejszym zarzutem, który Pasenkiewicz stawia teorii Chwistka, jest zarzut z nie ‐ jedynośc i rze‐ czywistości. Postulat jedności w stosunku do rzeczywistości brzmi następująco: w całokształcie przedmiotów, stosunków i zdarzeń stanowiących tę rzeczywistość wystę‐ pują dwu ‐ lub n ‐argumentowe stosunki spójne pomiędzy jej elementami. można mówić o różnych rzeczywistościach wtedy tylko, gdy nie ma takiego czasowo ‐przestrzennego lub poznawczego stosunku, który by zachodził dla dowolnej pary elementów, z których każdy należy do innej rzeczywistości niż drugi (Pasenkiewicz, 1962: 88). Otóż jeśli podmiot poznający wchodzi w relacje poznawcze z elementami różnych rzeczywistości, postulat jedyności dla poszczególnych rzeczywistości, o których mowa w tWr, nie zostaje spełniony. Zdaniem Pasenkiewicza mamy więc do czynienia z tylko jedną rzeczywistością, za którą w osobnym rozumo‐ waniu uznana zostaje rzeczywistość naturalna (Pasenkiewicz, 1962: 89). Warto w tym miejscu zauważyć, że aplikacja teorii typów logicznych do tWr, którą skądinąd Pasenkiewicz (1962: 87–88) krytykuje, nie usuwa powyższej trudno‐ ści. Wyższe rzędy rzeczywistości odnoszą się do aktów poznawczych podmiotu i ich zawartości, nie zaś do samego podmiotu. Powyższą trudność udaje się rozwiązać na gruncie teorio ‐modelowej inter‐ pretacji tWr Kostyrko. Jeśli poszczególne 'rzeczywistości' Chwistka trakto‐ wać jako modele teorii rzeczywistości, to mówienie w ich obrębie o podmiocie Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 421 poznania byłoby nonsensem. rozwiązanie to ma jednak swoją cenę: uję‐ cie tWr w kategoriach teorii modeli jest wyraźnie niezgodne z intencja‐ mi Chwistka, który w wielu miejscach wspomina o możliwości przenoszenia się podmiotu z jednej rzeczywistości do drugiej. W tej sytuacji wypada albo uznać koncepcję Kostyrko za autonomiczne rozwinięcie teorii Chwistka, albo przyjąć 'surową' i niewykończoną wersję tej ostatniej, która wszakże podlega rozmaitym zastrzeżeniom i ostatecznie okazuje się być teorią jednej rzeczywi‐ stości, co również nie stanowi zadowalającego rozstrzygnięcia ani rezultatu, który mógłby zostać uznany za wierny intencjom Chwistka. możemy wreszcie odrzucić obie ewentualności, wkładając pisma Chwistka poświęcone proble‐ mowi rzeczywistości „pomiędzy bardziej swobodne rozważania" czy też pomię‐ dzy bajki albo baśnie. Spośród powyższych rozwiązań wybieram to pierwsze, jestem bowiem przeświadczony, podobnie zresztą jak sama autorka, iż teoria Chwistka zasługuje na uwagę ze względu na nowatorski i w pewnym sensie wyprzedzający swój czas charakter. to, że tym samym znacznie ograniczamy zakres stosowalności teorii, wydaje się konieczną ceną, jaką należy zapłacić, pragnąc uzyskać efekt ścisłości, będącej jednym z ideałów przyświecających pracy naukowej samego Chwistka. Kostyrko kojarzy propozycje autora dotyczące rzeczywistości z późniejszymi pomysłami romana Suszki, rudolfa Carnapa i Willarda Van Ormana Qui‐ ne'a dotyczącymi relatywizacji prawdy do dziedziny interpretacji i systemu wiedzy (Kostyrko, 1968: 96–97). Skojarzenie to narzuca się samo. Dla mnie jednak istotniejsze w kontekście rozważań nad tWr wydaje się skojarzenie ze stanowiskiem Quine'a, zawartym w wielokrotnie cytowanym tekście pt. O tym co istnieje, które określam mianem re lat y wizmu ontologicznego (w od‐ różnieniu od re lat y wizmu epistemologicznego, o którym mowa powy‐ żej). relatywizm ontologiczny byłby stanowiskiem, zgodnie z którym określona ontologia nie różni się zasadniczo od teorii naukowej, której przyjęcie winno być dyktowane względami ekonomii aparatu pojęciowego i wartości heury‐ stycznej w odniesieniu do określonej klasy badanych zjawisk (Quine, 1961: 16). Za powyższym ujęciem przemawia fakt, iż poszczególne układy aksjomatów, charakteryzujące cztery typy 'rzeczywistości' Chwistka, spełniają między inny‐ mi funkcję narzędzia definiującego klasy przedmiotów, które należy uznać za rzeczywiste na gruncie danej 'rzeczywistości'. Innymi słowy odpowiadają one na pytanie „co istnieje?" w duchu Quine'owskiego relatywizmu ontologicznego. Próba reinterpretacji tWr w duchu relatywizmu ontologicznego Quine'a okazuje się dobrze korespondować z propozycją Kostyrko, usuwając pewną za‐ sadniczą trudność tej ostatniej. Wspomniałem wcześniej o tym, iż należy wąt‐ pić, jakoby możliwe było skonstruowanie modeli właściwych dla poszczególnych teorii rzeczywistości Chwistka. Jest tak z dwóch powodów. Po pierwsze trudno mówić o modelach właściwych teorii, czyli zachowujących znaczenie termi‐ nów pierwotnych teorii, skoro nie mamy definicji znaczenia tych terminów. 422 Hubert BOŻEK Znaczenie to może zostać skonstruowane, ale wtedy w nowej szacie wraca do nas stary problem podniesiony już przez Ingardena. Po drugie modele właści‐ we teorii muszą być wewnętrznie niesprzeczne. układy aksjomatów Chwistka są wewnętrznie niesprzeczne, ale nie są wewnętrznie niesprzeczne popularne teorie rzeczywistości wyznawane przez ludzi. Jeśli nawet znalibyśmy znaczenie terminów pierwotnych dla danych teorii rzeczywistości, z grona teorii, które posiadają modele właściwe (i modele w ogóle), musielibyśmy wykluczyć popu‐ larny system rzeczywistości, jeśli miałby on być uogólnieniem poszczególnych systemów indywidualnych. Inaczej mówiąc, trudno oczekiwać od popularnych teorii, które spontanicznie wytwarzamy na co dzień, aby opierały się na jasno zdefiniowanych pojęciach pierwotnych i były wewnętrznie niesprzeczne. Inaczej jest w przypadku nauki. Od teorii naukowych możemy i powinniśmy oczeki‐ wać, aby posiadały modele właściwe. Owe modele za każdym razem związane są z pewną ontologią, która na mocy systemu definicji (obojętnie, czy przyjmie ona postać układu aksjomatów, czy nie) określa klasę obiektów, którą na jej gruncie uznajemy. Wspomniane klasy nie muszą wcale spełniać postulatu jedy‐ ności i mogą się między sobą krzyżować - wystarczy, aby były jasno określone. Dla praktycznego myślenia ma to znaczenie o tyle, że ilekroć posługujemy się w naszych codziennych dyskursach pojęciem 'rzeczywistość', to o ile chcemy, aby dobrze nas zrozumiano, musimy zastanowić się, co właściwie przez poję‐ cie to w danej sytuacji rozumiemy. 'Zrozumieć dobrze' znaczy tutaj przekazać intersubiektywnie zrozumiałą informację, co zakłada jej koherencję oraz okre‐ śloność zawartych w niej terminów. W powyższym ujęciu 'rzeczywistość' jest ( jedynie lub aż) nazwą zbioru różnych sensów słowa 'rzeczywisty'. W tym zna‐ czeniu nie ma jednej rzeczywistości pojmowanej przedmiotowo, jest za to wiele rzeczywistości rozumianych jako modele pewnych ontologii, które wytyczają nasze sposoby mówienia i komunikowania się z bliźnimi. Zarysowany powyżej pomysł możemy dla odróżnienia od 'wielości rzeczywi‐ stości' określić jako koncepcję 'r z ecz y wistośc i wie lorakie j'. Przypadkowo lub nie, taki jest właśnie polski odpowiednik tytułu angielskiej wersji artykułu Pasenkiewicza (1964), który mówi o manifold reality. BIBLIOgrAFIA Chrobak, K. (2004). Niejedna rzeczywistość. Racjonalizm krytyczny Leona Chwistka. Kraków: Inter esse. Chrobak, K. (2005). W pryzmacie rzeczywistości. Dekada Literacka, 1(209), 9–19. Chwistek, L. (1917). trzy odczyty odnoszące się do pojęcia istnienia. Przegląd Filozoficzny, 20, 122–151. (Przedruk w: Chwistek, L. (1961). Pisma filozoficzne i logiczne (s. 3–39; t. 1). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo naukowe). Chwistek, L. (1918). Wielość rzeczywistości w sztuce. Maski, 1–4, 38–58. (Przedruk w: Chwi‐ stek, L. (2004). Wybór pism estetycznych (s. 3–20). Kraków: universitas). Teoria wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka... 423 Chwistek, L. (1921a). Antynomie logiki formalnej. Przegląd Filozoficzny, 3–4, 164–171. Chwistek, L. (1921b). Wielość rzeczywistości. Kraków: ministerstwo Wyznań religijnych i Oświecenia Publicznego. (Przedruk w: Chwistek, L. (1961). Pisma filozoficzne i logiczne (s. 1–105; t. 1). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo naukowe). Chwistek, L. (1922). Zasady czystej teorii typów. Przegląd Filozoficzny, 25, 359–391. (Prze‐ druk w: Chwistek, L. (1963). Pisma filozoficzne i logiczne (s. 258–285; t. 2). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo naukowe). Chwistek, L. (1931). Zagadnienia kultury duchowej w Polsce (roz. III, cz 2.). Przegląd Współczesny, 10(105), 87–113. Chwistek, L. (1935). Granice nauki. Zarys logiki i metodologii nauk ścisłych. Lwów–Warsza‐ wa: Książnica–Atlas. (Przedruk w: Chwistek, L. (1963). Pisma filozoficzne i logiczne (s. 1–232; t. 2). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo naukowe). Chwistek, L., Hetper, W., & Herzberg, J. (1933). Podstawy metamatematyki racjonalnej. Bulletin International de l'Academie Polonaise des Sciences et des Lettres, 1, 265–275. Chwistek, L. (2004). Sens i rzeczywistość. Kraków: Inter esse. Hussakowska, m. (2005). Demon intelektu w służbie historii sztuki. Dekada Literacka, 1(209), 37–45. Ingarden, r. (1922). Leon Chwistek „Wielość rzeczywistości" [rec.]. Przegląd Filozoficzny, 25(3), 451–468. Jadacki, J. J. (1998). Pluralistyczna wizja Leona Chwistka. W: J. J. Jadacki (red.). Orientacje i doktryny filozoficzne. Z dziejów filozofii polskiej (s. 212–259). Warszawa: Wydział Filozofii i Socjologii uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. Konstańczak, S. (2009). Od formizmu do strefizmu. ewolucja poglądów estetycznych Leona Chwistka. Słupskie Studia Filozoficzne, 8, 13–29. Kostyrko, t. (1968). Interpretacja koncepcji wielości rzeczywistości L. Chwistka. Studia Metodologiczne, 4, 89–104. Kotarbiński, t. (1922). Leon Chwistek: Wielość rzeczywistości [rec.]. Przegląd Warszawski, 6, 426–428. mudyń, K. (2003). O wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka. Przegląd Filozoficzny, 45(1), 101–112. Pasenkiewicz, K. (1961). Przedmowa. W: L. Chwistek. Pisma filozoficzne i logiczne (s. V– –XXXI; t. 1). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo naukowe. Pasenkiewicz, K. (1962). Analiza i krytyka teorii wielości rzeczywistości Leona Chwistka. Studia Filozoficzne, 1(28), 65–84. Pasenkiewicz, K. (1964). Leon Chwistek's theory of manifold reality. Studia Filozoficzne, 2, 167–184. Quine, W. V. O. (1961). From a logical point of view. London: Harper & row. (Wyd. 1: 1951). Witkiewicz, S. I. (1959). Krytyka teorii sztuki Leona Chwistka. W: S. I. Witkiewicz. Nowe formy w malarstwie i inne pisma estetyczne (s. 246–259). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnic‐ two naukowe. Woleński, J. (2005). Wielość rzeczywistości Chwistka i kultura przełomu XIX i XX w. Dekada Literacka, 1(209), 21–31.

IN THE NAME OF GOD International Journal of Hekmat A Critical, Intellectual Journal Volume 1. Autumn 2009 Editorial Board Hossein Kalbasi Ashtari (Ph.D) Hamid Reza Ayatollahi (Ph.D) Ebrahim Dadjoo (Ph.D) S.Javad Miri (Ph.D) Siavosh Naderi Farsani (Ph.D) S.Mohsen Sadat Kiaei (Ph.D) Shahriar Shojaeipour (Ph.D) Mohammad Hossein Sorouraddin (Ph.D) Hadi Vakili (Ph.D) International Editorial Advisory Board Prof. Reza Davari Ardakani (Iran) Prof. William Chittick (United States) Prof. Yanis Eshots (Latvia) Prof. Ibrahim Kalin (Turkey, United States) Prof. Muhammad Legenhausen (United States, Iran) Prof. James Morris (England) Dr. Parvin Peyrovani (Pakistan, United States) Dr. Hossein Ziyaeyan (Iran, United States) Editorial Executive Editor Manager: Ali Akbar Rashad Editor-in-Chief: Ali Reza Qaeminia Assistant Editor: Parvin Kazemzadeh Editor: Sadrodin Moosavi Jashni Designer: Amir Hossein Heidari The International Journal of Hekmat is being distributed internationally in subjects including: Philosophy, Epistemology, Religious Research and Comparative Studies with Analytical-Critical point of view for studying the most important contemporary issues and theoretical questions and with the intention of establishing a space for dialogue among the thinkers of the foresaid areas. This Journal is published by Islamic Research Institute for Culture and Thought in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Themes of the next issues are as follows: Globalisation (Religion & Culture), Hermeneutics, The language of Religion, Religious Philosophies, Philosophy of Culture, Philosophy of Media, The language of Holy Books, Philosophical Foundations of Political Ethics, Religious Science, Science and Religion. Mailing Address: Islamic Research Institute for Culture and Thought, No. 2, second St.(Pajouheshgah St.), Ahmad Qasir Ave. Tehran, Iran. Postal Code:1514615911, FAX: 0098 21 88764792. E-mail: [email protected] URL: www.alhikmah.org ISSN: 2008-577x Instruction for Contributors In preparing the manuscript for submission to The International Journal of Hekmat, please note the following simple procedures to ensure that we receive your submission in a standard format that is easy to edit and process. 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Table of Contents Articles On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms .................................................. 5 Muhammad Legenhausen Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? ...........................43 Ali Akbar Rashad Religions: Unity or multiplicity? ..............................................................59 Alireza Qaeminia Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism...............................73 Amir Dastmalchian Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric and Practice of Religious...................89 Chakraborty Amitava Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake .................................................101 Reza Akbari Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence: An Islamic Perspective ..........115 Noor Mohammad Osmani Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? ............................133 Abdul Sattar Shaikh Book Review Religious Pluralism in John Kick's Philosophy..................................149 International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 5-42 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms Muhammad Legenhausen* Abstract There is an overwhelming plurality of varieties of pluralism. In this paper types of pluralism are distinguished so that we can understand what is meant by religious pluralism. Even after religious pluralism is distinguished from other sorts of pluralism, a variety of positions could be considered versions of religious pluralism. Among the different sorts of religious pluralism, we may distinguish reductive from non-reductive varieties. The proponents of reductive forms of religious pluralism attempt to identify a common element among different religions on the basis of which the religions are successful in some specified way, while non-reductive pluralists hold that God's guidance through the various religions need not be confined to elements common to them. Religious pluralisms may also be divided between equality pluralisms and degree pluralisms. Pluralisms may be focused on doctrines, practices, institutions, communities, or individual believers. Seven major types of religious pluralism are divided with regard to the types of values that are disputed: soteriological, normative, epistemological, alethic, ethical, deontological, and hermetic. Keywords: religious pluralism, non-reductive religious pluralism, soteriological pluralism, normative pluralism, epistemological pluralism, alethic pluralism, ethical pluralism, deontological pluralism, hermetic pluralism. *. American Professor, Teaching and doing research at The Imam Khomeini High Education and Research Institute, Qom, Iran. E-mail: [email protected] 6 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms I. Introduction There is an overwhelming plurality of varieties of pluralism. In what follows, I will attempt to distinguish among them so that we can understand what is meant by religious pluralism. I will argue that even after religious pluralism is distinguished from other sorts of pluralism, a variety of positions could be considered versions of religious pluralism. Among the different sorts of religious pluralism, we may distinguish reductive from nonreductive varieties. The proponents of reductive forms of religious pluralism attempt to identify a common element among different religions on the basis of which the religions are successful in some specified way. According to non-reductive religious pluralism, to the contrary, God guides whomever He will,1 not only by virtue of features common to several religions, but by their unique divine qualities, as well. More specifically, while reductive pluralism is the position that what is good about religions is what is common to a plurality of them, nonreductive pluralism is the view that each of a number of religions has unique features through which God may guide people, even if there is no common essence to all religions. II. History of Pluralism The term pluralism was first used to signify a metaphysical doctrine by Christian Wolff (1679-1754), and later popularized by William James (1842-1910). A different but related sense of pluralism is moral pluralism. While metaphysical pluralists hold that there is an irreducible plurality of types of substance, truths, or original principles, moral pluralists hold that there is an irreducible plurality of independent moral values. The two sorts of pluralism, metaphysical and moral, are eloquently linked in the work of Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997). Berlin defended moral Muhammad Legenhausen 7 pluralism throughout his long career. Political theorists use the term for systems in which a variety of ways of life are permitted to coexist or are encouraged. Perhaps the best place to look for a discussion of pluralism in this sense is in the more recent writings of the late John Rawls (1921-2002), particularly in his Political Liberalism.2 Rawls speaks of competing comprehensive systems of thought and value (for example, various religious systems, various theories of socialism, ethical humanism, etc.) whose differences can be expected to persist in democratic societies.i Rawls then attempts to show that reasonable people who hold differing comprehensive views will develop an overlapping consensus with regard to basic procedural principles of justice as fairness. Finally, there is religious pluralism, or rather, there are religious pluralisms, for the label has been used for different and often confused claims. Some writers use the term "religious pluralism" for a theological view that allows salvation for the adherents of different religions and concedes some sort of validity to a plurality of religions. Many other writers, however, use the term in a political sense, for a position that advocates the acceptance of and respect for the followers of different religions. All too often, the different uses of the term are confused.3 III. Equality and Degree Pluralisms We can give a rather abstract definition of religious pluralism by saying that it is a doctrine according to which some sort of favorable attribution is ascribed to a plurality of religions. This definition has the advantage of making it crystal clear that we can expect to find a wide variety of positions that could be described by the term religious pluralism. The variety is so wide that the claim that someone accepts religious pluralism in this sense is almost trivial. 8 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms To hold that some favorable attribution is properly ascribed to a religion is to say that there is some value of which the religion partakes. One could, for example, say that the regular practice of some religion is good for one's psychological health. In this case we could say that there is a value, psychological health, and that the religion in question partakes of this value or has a salutary effect in achieving this value. Some formalism will help to add precision to the types of pluralism and exclusivism discussed (and to scare away the fainthearted). The main purpose of the logic is not to prove specific theses about pluralism and exclusivism, but as an instrument to help keep the varieties from being lumped together; so, rules of inference and other niceties will not be introduced. The formalism is that of a standard second order logic with second order quantification limited to monadic predicates. Quantifiers are restricted in the manner stipulated with the introduction of different kinds of variables. Unbound variables are used as constants. The claim that a religion, r, is subject to a favorable estimation due to some value, V, will be abbreviated as Vr. We may then formulate a minimal religious pluralism (MRP) as follows: MRP: 3r 3r' (r:t:-r') & 3 V(Vr & Vr') Here we let r with or without primes be used for religions and V for values. The definition just says that there are at least two religions that share some value. I am tempted to say that no one would deny minimal religious pluralism, but since fanaticism is not rational, caution is to be advised. We may, however, assert that no one could reasonably deny minimal religious pluralism (given the fairly obvious assumptions that there is more than one religion, and that more than one is not completely devoid of any value). In order to go beyond minimal religious pluralism toward Muhammad Legenhausen 9 versions of pluralism about which there may be reasonable differences of opinion, two parameters must be specified: (1) the sort of value to be considered, and (2) the scope of the plurality attached to this value. There are all sorts of positive status that can be claimed for one or more religions. Religions are said to contribute to mental health, to facilitate social arrangements, to lead to salvation, to be true, to be ordained by God, to have a long and rich tradition, and many other things. If V* is some value that is considered particularly crucial to a religion by its followers, we could formulate a minimal religious pluralism with respect to that value as follows. MRPV*: 3r 3r' (rt:-r') & (V*r & V*r') This merely says that at least two religions have the favored value. This, however, would be consistent with an ecumenism that holds that salvation, for example, can be gained through various evangelical churches, but not through the Catholic Church, and not through Judaism, Islam, Hinduism or Buddhism. Religious pluralism with regard to salvation is normally understood to allow that all the major faith traditions provide avenues to salvation. RPV*: VrV*r Some of the positive things said about religions make specific reference to their adherents, while other attributions apply to the doctrines, rituals or historical features of religions without making any claims about their followers. For example, with regard to adherents it has been claimed that some religions provide a framework of beliefs and practices within which some their followers have mystical experiences of various kinds. A different sort of example is the claim that the adherents of different religions are entitled to certain rights, e.g., rights of worship. With regard to the content of religions it is said that 10 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms some religions prescribe beautiful ceremonies, of some it is said that their creeds are true, and of some that the rules they prescribe are morally commendable. An important way of stopping short of pluralism is to claim that although each of several religions has some particular positive status, they do not have the status equally. For example, a Buddhist might hold that all the major religions of the world provide means to obtain peace of mind, but that the means provided by Buddhism is more efficient, or leads to a deeper sense of peace of mind, or brings quicker or longer lasting peace of mind. I don't know of a name that anyone has given for this sort of position, although it has been held by many philosophers and theologians. We might call it degree pluralism, but we should keep in mind that many modem defenders (as well as opponents) of religious pluralism would not call this a form of pluralism at all. They define pluralism in terms of a strict equality of status. Peter Byrne, for example defines religious pluralism as a three part claim: (1) All major religious traditions are equal in respect of making common reference to a single transcendent, sacred reality. (2) All major traditions are likewise equal in respect of offering some means or other to human salvation. (3) All major traditions are equal in their inability to provide a norm for interpreting the others, and offer limited, revisable accounts of the nature of the sacred.4 Byrne's position might be described as a kind of equality pluralism, as opposed to degree pluralism. We might abbreviate the claim that religions rand r' are equal in the degree to which they have the value V as d(Vr)=d(Vr'). Minimal equality pluralism (MEP) could then be defined as follows: MEP: 3r 3r' (n=r') & 3 V(d(Vr)=d(Vr'):;t:O). Muhammad Legenhausen 11 Byrne's equality pluralism mentioned above IS actually a form of equality pluralism defined with reference to three specific values, but with the religions being restricted to the "major traditions". So, Byrne's equality pluralism (BEP) stipulates that for any rand r', if each of them is a major tradition (MT), then with respect to the values mentioned in his three clauses (Vi, v2, V3), both rand r' will have all three values to the same positive degree. BEP: VrVr'((MTr & MTr')--+(d(Vir)=d(Vir'):t:O & d(V2r)=d(V2r'):t:O & d(V3r)=d(V3r'):t:O) It would seem to be an unlikely coincidence if all the major religions coincided on these three values, referring to a transcendent reality, offering a way to salvation, and giving norms and an account of the sacred. One could still be an equality pluralist by holding that the average degree of the values of all the major religions are the same. One might be better at salvation, and another at norms, and another at describing the sacred, but on average, the merits and deficiencies of each average out to the exact same value. While this sort of view would be more plausible than BEP, it still seems to require a leap of faith. Why should we expect the average value of all the major traditions to be exactly the same? It would be another thing to say that an impartial observer subject to certain restrictions or limited information might be incapable of deciding which of competing traditions has greater average value, but we will examine this epistemological version of religious pluralism in greater detail below. MEP is a not really a stronger claim than MRP, because for any value V we could define an absolute version of this value, V', as follows: V'r if and only if d(Vr»O. 12 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms A degree pluralism (DP) with respect to some value V could be defined by saying that there are a plurality of religions each of which has the value V in excess of degree n. (Here and in what follows we can consider r to range over some class of religions, such as Byrne's "maj or traditions" with respect to which claims of religious pluralism are debated.) We abbreviate the claim that r has value V exceeding degree n: d(Vr»n. DP: 3r 3r' (n=r') & d(Vr»n & d(Vr'»n. Whether or not one admits to a degree pluralism with respect to a given value for a variety of religions, one may hold that a unique favored religion, r*, has this value to a degree not matched by any other religion. This could be considered a kind of religious exclusivism. This sort of claim may be considered a version of degree exclusivism (DE), the view that a favored religion has superiority to all others with respect to the value V, and it could be formulated as follows: DE: d(Vr*»n & ~3r(d(Vr~d(Vr*)). This says that one's favored religion, r * exceeds some degree of the value V under consideration, and that there is no religion that exceeds or equals the degree to which r* possesses V DE and DP are compatible, that is, one could hold that there are a variety of religions that exceed a standard degree of value, although one religion has that value to a greater degree than any other. This may be formulated as follows. DE + DP: d(Vr*»n & 3r ((r:t:r*) & d(Vr»n) & ~3r(d(Vr~d(Vr*)). The favored religion exceeds the standard degree of value V; another religion also exceeds this standard, but no religion has V to an equal or greater degree than the favored religion. A more substantive form of degree pluralism (SDP) that Muhammad Legenhausen 13 remains consistent with DE could be formulated by stipulating that for some standard degree of value, n, all the maj or religions have the value (or values) in question to a degree surpassing n. SDP: Vr d(Vr»n. Even if all the major religions meet the same value standards, it could still be the case that one of them far outshines the others. This would seem to characterize the view ofIbn 'Arabi (1165-1240) who wrote: All the revealed religions [sham'i] are lights. Among these religions, the revealed religion of Muhammad is like the light of the sun among the lights of the stars. When the sun appears, the lights of the stars are hidden, and their lights are included in the light of the sun. Their being hidden is like the abrogation of the other revealed religions: that takes place through Muhammad's revealed religion. Nevertheless, they do in fact exist, just as the existence of the light of the stars is actualized. This explains why we have been required in our all-inclusive religion to have faith in the truth of all the messengers and all the revealed religions. They are not rendered null (bati!) by abrogation that is the opinion of the ignorant.5 Just as we defined an almost trivial version of religious pluralism (MRP), we could also define a minimal version of religious exclusivism (MRE), according to which there is at least one value that the favored religion possesses uniquely. MRE: ::3 V(Vr* & Vr(Vr-H=r*)). This says that the favored religion has some value that no other religion has (i.e., that for any religion, if it has this value, then it is the favored one). Just as MRP and MEP are equivalent (as long as we can define our values as we like), so too, minimal religious exclusivism is equivalent to what might be called minimal superiority exclusivism (MSE). 14 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms MSE: ::3 VVr(r#*~dVr*>dVr). Obviously, MRE implies MSE, because if r* has a value that no other religion has, then it has that value to a degree greater than that of any other religion. MSE implies MRE because if r* has a degree n of V that is not matched or exceeded by any other religion, we may define another value V' such that V'r if and only if di/r>», and then V' will satisfy the definition of MRE. It is not plausible to deny MRE and MSE. Each religion that has any value at all probably has its own unique values. Recall that value is to be understood here as that in virtue of which any positive attribution is made about a religion. One might hold that a given religion is valuable because of the holy days or ceremonies that are unique to that religion. In order to go beyond such empty formalism, one must move beyond these considerations to examine specific values and their merits. As mentioned earlier, Byrne does not speak of the equality of religions, but of religious traditions. The difference can be crucial. For Muslims, religion, or din, is what God has revealed to guide us to Him. Religious traditions, however, include all sorts of things that humans have gathered in their attempts to follow religion. One might be an equality pluralist about religious traditions (with regard to some specific value) while taking a more exclusivist view about religions; that is, one could hold that God's guidance for man is to be found in a single religion, but that the religious traditions of mankind fall so far short of what God offers us that none of these manmade traditions can be said to be any better than any of the others. On the other hand, one could take the reverse sort of position and hold that although God has revealed several distinct forms of guidance for human beings, so that there are several true and divinely revealed religions, the followers of all but one of these Muhammad Legenhausen 15 religions have gone astray by adding and subtracting to and from divine guidance in their cumulative traditions, while there is one religious tradition that has remained faithful to divine guidance in a manner superior to the other major religious traditions. I do not intend to defend either of these positions, but the difference between them needs to be kept clear when we attempt to evaluate religious pluralism. Before we decide whether to be in favor of religious pluralism or not, we have to determine exactly what value is being attributed to what multiplicity of religions or religious traditions. Although people have said some pretty silly things about religion, no one would reasonably agree to absolute religious pluralism (ARP), that is, no one has ever claimed that anything good that can be said of any religion can be said of all of them, with a few important exceptions. Some atheists contend that this is vacuously true of all religions. Some religious believers define religion and religious in such an exclusive manner that they contend that there is only one religion and only one religious tradition, and so would agree that whatever is good about one is good about all religions, just because they think there are no others. Other people with a much more embracive attitude reach the same conclusion by holding that there is only one religion, which includes all of what are commonly called "religions" and only one religious tradition, which is the religious heritage of all mankind. Most reasonable people, however, will agree that various good things can be said about different religions and about different religious traditions. They will differ about what good things can and cannot be said about them. Implausible absolute religious pluralism may be formulated as follows: (ARP): VVVrVr'(Vr~Vr') which is equivalent to: 16 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms V VVrVr'(d(Vr)=d(Vr')). Given the assumption that there are at least two religions, MRE implies the denial of ARP. If ARP is true, all religions have the same values, so, if any religions have any values, and there are at least two religions, there will not be any value that is possessed exclusively by just one religion. So ARP implies a denial of MRE, given plausible assumptions. One could also define an implausible absolute religious exclusivism (ARE) that under plausible assumptions is incompatible with minimal religious pluralism. ARE: VrVV(Vr~r=r*) & ::3V(Vr*) This says that any religion that has any value will be the favored religion, and that there is some value that the favored religion does have. ARE implies that MRP is false, and since MRP is plausible, ARE is implausible. The denial of ARE implies MPR under the assumption that the favored religion does have some value. We might strengthen minimal religious pluralism to state not merely that there are different religions with shared positive characteristics or values, but that there are religions other than the favored religion that share values with it. This is still pretty uncontroversial. ::3 V3r(r7'r* & Vr & Vr*) We arrive at a more robust version of pluralism (RRP) if we are willing to allow that any value that the favored religion has is shared with another religion. RRP: VV(Vr*~::3r(r#* & Vr)) I don't think it is very likely that this version of religious pluralism will be widely accepted, because believers generally hold that their own traditions have some unique valuable Muhammad Legenhausen 17 features, even if they are pluralists. Prof. Byrne observes: "We should be clear from the outset that pluralism is not as such committed to saying that all major religions are equal in every aspect of cognitive endeavour...,,6 Byrne claims that what is required by religious pluralism is the three part equality claim mentioned above, while relative superiority in other respects may be allowed. Other advocates of religious pluralism have defined their versions of pluralism with regard to other features. John Hick, for example, places considerably more emphasis than Byrne on the moral function of religion, 7" while Fritjof Schuon contends that the transcendental unity of religions is to be found in their esoteric dimensions.8 All of them, however, seem to favor a form of equality pluralism. A more reasonable form of pluralism would be one based on SDP, defined earlier to state merely that all the religions under consideration exceed some standard with respect to some selection of values. IV. Pluralisms Divided by Seven Types of Value Often, when religious pluralism is discussed, the value attributed to a variety of religions is left somewhat vague. Worse than this is equivocation that begins by pointing out some common feature among religions and concludes with the claim that the religions are all the same in relation to some other feature. In order to avoid this sort of fallacy, at least the following seven sorts of pluralism should be distinguished. Other dimensions of religious pluralism could also be defined, but the following seem more pertinent to contemporary discussions of religious pluralism. 1. Soteriological religious pluralism (SRP) is defined in terms of salvation. According to an equality soteriological pluralism, a plurality of 18 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms religions are equally effective in guiding people to salvation. A degree pluralist in this regard would hold that people may be guided to salvation through a plurality of religions, although some ways will be more effective than others, either by providing guidance that is easier to follow, or that leads to a higher degree of salvation, or that is more suitable to guide a greater number of people, or by some other criterion could be judged superior in bringing people to salvation. SRP may be defined as a version of DP (DPSRP) simply by letting V stand for the value of leading to salvation. DPSRP states that there is some standard degree of guidance to salvation that at least two different religions surpass. A stronger form of SRP would result from its combination with SDP to state that all the major religions pass a certain standard in the ability to guide people to salvation. This would be consistent with a moderate exclusivism, to the extent that might claim that one's own religion is more effective at leading to salvation than others. A word of caution is required here with regard to aims and goals. Not all of the major religious traditions aim at what Christians call "salvation". One might find analogues in other religions to salvation, such as nirvana, but it would be a grave mistake to put them on a par. A Buddhist might agree that Christianity, by its own lights, provides a better vehicle to salvation than Buddhism provides its adherents to nirvana. But the Buddhist might argue that nirvana is a much more lofty goal than mere salvation. So, if the soteriological value in terms of which religions are compared is taken to be the ultimate goal of the religion, whatever that may be, the fact that one religion claims to provide an easy way to its goal does not show that this religion is superior to one that aims at a more difficult goal with a lower success rate. In Christian discussions of religious pluralism, it often seems Muhammad Legenhausen 19 that it is assumed that other religions aim at something analogous to salvation, and pluralists claim that all the major traditions are about equal in terms of effectiveness in guiding their followers to their respective goals. This is a bizarre claim, since none of the religions recognize the goals of all the others. This sort of soteriological pluralism would then seem to require commitment to beliefs that are rejected by all the major traditions. When Peter Byrne defines religious pluralism as including the clause, "All major traditions are likewise equal in respect of offering some means or other to human salvation." room is left open for inequalities in what is achieved in the afterlife. If being saved means escaping the fire of hell, there are still traditionally seven heavens, or various level of divine reward for which one may hope. Would Byrne suggest that a soteriological pluralism is true only for the bare minimum of salvation, or might the holy men and women of different faiths find themselves enjoying first class lodgings in the afterlife? This way of putting the problem is rather crude, but there is a serious point here. Aristotle speaks of the goal of man as a happy life, and Christianity and Islam have used the termfelicity (sa 'adati for ultimate success. Sometimes Christians have used the term beatific vision for the highest goal to be attained by the saint, and Muslims speak of a divine encounter (liqa Allah). Both Christianity and Islam claim to offer a program of living through which the believer is sanctified or purified (tazkiyyah al-nafs), and while it is possible that what the Muslim achieves through this program might be considered sanctification by the Christian, each program has its own unique features and emphases. The question is not merely one of being kept out of sacred precincts because one does not have the right sort of membership card, but that the ways of life prescribed by the different religions 20 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms yield different sorts of spiritual results. However, we could also look at the question of pluralism with respect to a specific goal defined within a particular tradition. Often pluralists take heaven to be the goal, and ask whether God is going to allow Buddhists in. Pluralists claim that God is very liberal and will allow Buddhists to reach the Christian goal of felicity. Equality pluralists will then have to make the incredible claim that Buddhism provides an equally effective means for guiding its followers to a goal that they do not seek as Christianity provides for its followers to a goal that they do seek. Very seldom is this question posed with respect to the perspective of a religion other than Christianity or Islam. It is expected that Christians and Muslims should allow that Buddhism provides a way to salvation, but it is not expected that Buddhists should admit that Christianity and Islam provide an effective way to reach nirvana. Indeed, it would be absurd to think that a religious life that does not provide an effective means for the extinction of desire (according to sects of Buddhism, at least,) might provide a way for Christians and Muslims to reach nirvana. Even if we compare Christianity with Islam, we find that there is much more emphasis on salvation among Christians than among Muslims. Perhaps the reason for this is because of the Christian doctrine of original sin. According to many Christians, as a result of original sin, one cannot gain entrance into the kingdom of heaven unless one is baptized into the church. For Muslims, however, man may be lost without religious training, but this is quite different than needing to have one's sins washed away in the blood of the lamb. Islam emphasizes the need for guidance, without denying that a savior will come at the end of time, while Christianity emphasizes salvation, without denying the need for guidance. Muhammad Legenhausen 21 If the question of soteriological pluralism is raised exclusively within Christian or Muslim theologies, one may ask whether the adherents of different denominations or even those who follow no religious path at all may be granted some sort of divine reward according to the theologies of Christianity and Islam. The strongest case for pluralism on this interpretation could be made by arguing that God rewards all those who do good regardless of their religious beliefs. Something along these lines seems to be indicated in the following ayah of the Glorious Qur'an, although there is controversy about the proper interpretation, and what kind of reward can be expected by nonMuslims in the next life. (Indeed the faithful, the Jews, the Christians, and the Sabaeansthose of them who have faith in Allah and the Last Day and act righteously-they shall have their reward near their Lord, and they will have no fear, nor will they grieve.t (2:62) 2. Normative religious pluralism pertains to how adherents are to treat the followers of religions other than their own. Here it might be supposed that a religion has a peculiar sort of value by virtue of which a certain kind of respect is to be shown to its adherents. However, this does not seem to be what the religious pluralist has in mind. The pluralist is not arguing that equal respect should be shown to the followers of the major traditions but not to members of weird cults or atheists; rather, the pluralist argues that difference in religious belief should not be reason to deny the human dignity of the others. The normative exclusivist might be understood as one who holds that the favored religion has a particular value that confers dignity on its members or that creates obligations to them. Other religions lack this value, and so their adherents might be denied rights given to the followers of the preferred religion. Normative exclusivism (NE) may be defined generally in terms 22 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms of persons, x, to whom obligations or rights (0) of some sort are not due if x is a not a follower of a religion r, Fxr that has a certain value. NE: ::3 V(Vx( <3r(Vr & Fxr)--+~Ox) & Vr(Vr~r=r*)) According to NE, there is some value such that no persons who do not follow a religion with this value are due obligations. An equality pluralist in this regard does not claim that all the major traditions have the sort of virtue that creates obligations, so as to advocate the replacement of the second conjunct ofNE by VrVr, rather they deny that there is any value of a religion such that those who do not follow a religion with this value have no rights or obligations due to them. A normative equality pluralism (NEP) might thus be defined as the denial of the first clause of NE. The normative equality pluralist will hold that there is no value such that failure to believe in a religion that has it implies that one has no rights or obligations due to them. NEP: ~3VVrVx(Ox~(Vr & Fxr)) A proponent of NEP would claim that there should be no difference at all in one's behavior toward persons of different religious beliefs. If carried out strictly, this would prevent any sort of participation in a particular religious community, for such participation requires a special sort of cooperation based on religious affiliation. It is supposed that members of a religious community have special obligations to one another, and recognize special rights for one another under various conditions. The opposite extreme from equality pluralism would be the view that seems to have been held, unfortunately, by some Muslims as well as Christians, that one has no obligations whatsoever toward those who are not of one's own faith, that their blood is permitted to be shed and their property taken. More reasonable would be the view that we are bound by certain Muhammad Legenhausen 23 obligations toward all human beings, although we may have additional special obligations to our co-religionists.9 Even within a specific religion, different rights and obligations for members are prescribed. Catholics hold that the right to administer some sacraments is restricted to priests, Hinduism is notorious for its caste restrictions and privileges, and, at the very least, only the administrators of specific religious organizations are permitted to attend certain meetings. So, what is at issue with regard to normative religious pluralism is the sort of rights and obligations that are owed to people with regard to their religious affiliations. In other words, both NEP and NE may be acceptable for different interpretations of O. It is reasonable to hold that with respect to basic rights, NEP is correct, and with respect to specific rights and duties pertaining to special obligations owed to members of one's religious community, NE would be correct. Many jurists hold that according to Islam, different rights accord to Muslims, other "Peoples of the Book", and other human beings regardless of their religious views. One might accordingly consider Islam to prescribe a sort of normative degree pluralism by issuing duties in accord with levels of religious value. If basic human rights and duties due to persons are represented by o: rights and obligations due for People of the Book are O', and rights and duties for Muslims are Om, and if the degree of value assigned by Islam to religions of People of the Book is p and the degree assigned to Islam itself is m, the position could be formulated by the three clauses below. 'v'x ObX (All persons have basic rights.) 'v'r (d(Vr)4J~'v'x(Fxr~avx))) 'v'r (d(Vr)~~'v'x(Fxr~Omx))) Notice that despite the historical facts linking exclusivist views on salvation with intolerance, soteriological pluralism and 24 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms normative pluralism are logically independent, (although this is not to deny that there may be social-psychological influences or tendencies). Various forms of normative religious pluralism have been the focus of attention of a number of writers, some of whom use the term religious pluralism exclusively for various forms of normative religious pluralism. For example, Francoise Champion understands religious pluralism to be a political principle, and describes how it has gained currency as such in France over the last fifteen or twenty years among socialscience researchers, political analysts and sociologists. She distinguishes two main types of (what I would call) normative religious pluralism, which she terms emancipatory pluralism and identity-based pluralism. Emancipatory pluralism is the claim that the adherents of different religions should be granted equal individual rights. Identity-based pluralism is an attempt to go beyond the liberalism of emancipatory pluralism by recognizing an equality of group rights, as has been suggested by some communitarian thinkers.10 Champion is concerned with political versions of normative religious pluralism, but we should also consider moral versions and religious versions. We may consider when differences in behaviour toward others are morally and religiously justified on the basis of religious beliefs. One may hold that members of some deviant religious group should be shunned according to one's own religious beliefs. One may hold that it is morally justifiable to give preferential treatment to members of one's own religious community with respect to personal relations, but not in a manner that causes harm or significant offence to others, even when such treatment does not violate any law. The relations between legal, religious, and moral considerations are complex. Norms to be adopted may also be studied descriptively Muhammad Legenhausen 25 or prescriptively. We could ask, for example, what legal privileges are given to the established church in England, which would be descriptive; or what laws should be enacted in England with regard to establishment, which would be a prescriptive question. Likewise, one may ask descriptive questions about the moral norms in a given society, or argue about what morality should be understood to require of us. Again, we could ask about what religious rules there are regarding those outside one's denomination, or one could, prescriptively, make a theological argument in favour of the abrogation or adoption of some rule. 3. Often discussions of religious pluralism focus on epistemological issues.11 Epistemological religious pluralism is the view that all the major religious creeds are equally justified according to some proposed criteria of epistemological justification or warrant. This way of putting the matter focuses on the beliefs regardless of who holds them, as though the beliefs themselves have the capacity for being held as justified or warranted beliefs. We could call this epistemological belief pluralism and contrast it to epistemological agent pluralism, which would be expressed by the claim that the followers of no particular religion have any epistemological advantage in their beliefs over the followers of other religions. This could be an equality pluralism, since we should not think that the followers of any of the major religions are a bunch of dummies, but are, generally speaking, epistemic peers. An epistemological degree pluralist would hold that the adherents of several religions differ to some degree in being justified or warranted in holding their beliefs, but that these differences are not sufficient for only one group to be justified and the rest unjustified. Again, this could be defined as a belief pluralism or as an agent pluralism. It would be reasonable to expect to find differences in degree of average intelligence of the followers of different denominations, 26 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms but these differences do not seem so great that we could reasonably claim that the adherents of one faith alone have justified beliefs while the rest don't know how to think properly. The issue becomes more contentious when we consider belief pluralism. Some religious beliefs seem to be intrinsically harder to justify than others. Perhaps every religion has its difficult beliefs and easy beliefs, and perhaps they balance out in the end. But it would not be unreasonable to suspect that there could well be differences on the whole in the justifiability of different creeds. Suppose that p is a part of the doctrines or religious teachings of r. Let this be abbreviated as Trp. An optimistic view of the justification of one's favorite religion's dogmas would be: Vp(Tr*p~Jp) Atheists hold that religious beliefs are false, not that they are never justified. But some atheists also have argued that religious beliefs are unjustified. This form of atheism might be initially formulated as follows. V r( Trp~~Jp) However, believers and atheists might agree on some teachings, e.g., that murder is wrong. An atheist might hold that it is doctrines about which religious believers differ that are not justified, but some religious believers, such as Therevada Buddhists, do not believe in God, and atheists would not say that this belief is unjustified. Perhaps the atheist position is better captured by the statement that some religious teachings of all the religions are unjustified. We could call this position epistemic belief atheism (EBA). EBA: Vr3p(Trp & ~Jp) One may be characterized by epistemic belief exclusivism (EBE) if one is an epistemic belief atheist with respect to every Muhammad Legenhausen 27 religion but one's own. EBE: Vr(r#*~3p(Trp & ~Jp)) An implausible pluralism would be universal epistemic belief pluralism (UEBP) according to which all the beliefs of all the religions are justified. UEBP: Vr(Trp~Jp) A more restricted form of epistemic pluralism would hold that the teachings of all and only those religions that have a certain epistemic value, V, are such that their main beliefs are justified, and that the major religious traditions all fall into this category. Epistemic belief exclusivism could then be formulated as the position that it is only the favored religion that has the value V. One might hold a degree pluralism according to which higher degrees of V correspond to better justification of beliefs. One might then hold a degree pluralism in this regard by claiming that all the major religious traditions' main beliefs are justifiable to some degree past a standard. A degree exclusivist could hold that there is one religion whose degree of V surpasses that of all others. The calculation of different values of V is complicated by the fact that there are several scales on which it might be measured, the degree of justification, the number of justified beliefs, or the number of justified important or essential beliefs. Suppose that one decides to evaluate V in such a way that d(Vr»O if and only if all essential beliefs of r are justified; and the value of d(Vr) is greater when these beliefs are better justified, and is greater when additional non-essential beliefs are also justified. There is no ready rule on the basis of which one could say that a belief system whose essential beliefs meet some minimal standard of justification but in which all peripheral beliefs are also justified is in better or worse epistemic shape that a belief system in which 28 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms the essential beliefs are justified to a very high degree although a fair number of peripheral beliefs are not justified. Then there is the problem of how to distinguish among and count beliefs. Furthermore, the distinction between essential and non-essential beliefs may be vague or be better viewed as a spectrum of beliefs with varying degrees of importance or centrality. Additionally, one should consider that the epistemic value of a system of beliefs may be far more than the sum of its parts. Finally, due consideration should be given to the sustained argumentation by William Alston that epistemic evaluations may be made according to a number of different criteria that are often confused under the label "justification".12 Complications become increasingly manifold when we switch from belief pluralism to agent pluralism. If we seek to understand whether two religions are on an epistemic par by considering the justification that believers have or lack with respect to the teachings of the religion. It may be that believers in one denomination have better justification for their religious beliefs than believers in another denomination because they are better educated. We might decide, then to examine only the beliefs of the top theologians in the various denominations. The exclusivist might claim that the highest justification for religious beliefs is found in the justification that the top scholars of the favored religion have for their religious beliefs. Perhaps the exclusivist could propose a rather Piercean form of religious exclusivism with the claim that the favored religion is epistemically superior to all others in the sense that a community of impartial investigators would come to accept the essential beliefs of that religion in the long run if they devoted themselves to a quest for religious truth.13 This, however, would only be a hypothesis, and for the time being, there is no convergence of religious opinions in sight. Muhammad Legenhausen 29 What is visible is the opportunity for rational discussion about points of religious difference. In order for such discussion to advance fruitfully, it is necessary for participants to treat one another with a certain level of epistemic respect, at least in the sense that we should not assume that someone does not adjudicate beliefs rationally merely because they adhere to a different religion than we accept. So, there is a prima facie moral reason for holding that the followers of the major traditions should not be assumed to be unreasonable in their beliefs. This may be considered a version of normative epistemic agent pluralism. 4. Alethie religious pluralism is about the truth of beliefs rather than their justification. Unlike epistemological pluralism, there is no division here between belief pluralism and agent pluralism. An equality pluralism here would be the position that all the major religions are equally true. This position could be interpreted in a number of different ways. It would not make much sense to say that all the statements in the creeds of every major religion are equally true, because they contradict one another. Of course, one could adopt a relativist position on truth, but that seems a pretty heavy price to pay. Another way to accept contradictory religious claims would be to adopt what logicians call dialetheism, the view that some propositions are both true and false.14 Although dialetheism seems to be accepted by the great Sufi theoretician Ibn 'Arabi,15 it does not appear to be an especially promising way to resolve interreligious contradictions. The ordinary way to be an equality pluralist about truth is to claim that the same amount of truth is to be found in the creeds of every religion. The obvious problem here is that we have no way to measure relative amounts of truth. We cannot just add up the beliefs and see how many come out true on each list. 30 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms John Hick has suggested another way to defend alethic equality pluralism by regarding all of the different religions as imperfect reflections of an ineffable reality.16 Hick's view has been criticized by Alston and Plantinga.l The difficulties in the various attempts to reconcile the contradictions in doctrine among the various major religious traditions should not blind us to the fact that there are many important claims that are shared by the believers of different faiths, such as the rejection of materialism and the acceptance of a variety of common moral truths. The interpretation of statements made in very different religious traditions can be so perplexing that Alston urges his readers "to exercise caution in supposing that, even granting commonality of subject, what is said of God in Hindu perceptual reports contradicts what is said of God in Christian perceptual reports.17 We might begin to characterize an atheistic position as one that denies all religious teachings, but as we saw in the discussion of epistemological pluralism, this would not be tenable because of the existence of truths affirmed by both religious believers and atheists. By analogy to epistemic belief atheism, we might define alethic atheism (AA) as the view that all religions teach some falsehoods.18 AA: Vr3p(Trp & ~p) Following the analogy, one may be characterized by alethic exclusivism (AE) if one is an alethic atheist with respect to every religion but one's own. AE: Vr(r:;cr*~3p(Trp & ~p)) It may be argued that this is a consequence of the assertion of the truth of the teachings of one's own religion and recognition that some of these teachings will be in contradiction with some of the teachings of every other religion, for otherwise they would not be different religions (the religious teachings of no Muhammad Legenhausen 31 religions are a subset of the teachings of any other religion). If so, AE could also be formulated as: AE2: Vp(Tr*p~p) One might deny AE2 while continuing to profess belief in r*, although this would seem to involve something like the preface paradox. However, there are various ways to defend the rationality of admissions that the totality of what one asserts may contain errors, even when one affirms each assertion individually. If one is going to admit that one's own religious school of thought propagates errors (e.g., hadiths may be accepted in one's school that are not accurate), caution will be needed to avoid denying one's religion. One might claim that the basic teachings of the religion are secure from error, but admit that scholars may make mistakes about the finer points of some doctrines or historical details. Universal alethic pluralism (UAP) would be untenable because it would require the affirmation of contradictory statements. UAP: Vr(Trp~p) A trivial form of alethic pluralism (TAP) might be formulated as the claim that every major religion teaches some truths. TAP: Vr3p(Trp & p) A more substantial form of alethic pluralism (SAP) might claim that every religious denomination fails to teach some truths that are taught in other religions, although it is difficult to imagine how such a view could be defended. SAP: Vr3r'3p(~Trp & Tr'p & p) 5. Religions are not theories, nor can they be reduced to their creeds. They also have a practical side. The practical aspect of religion can give rise to two sorts of pluralism. First, one might claim that the major religions counsel equally noble moralities, 32 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms either with regard to the values they instill, the obligations they place upon their adherents or the virtues they encourage. Let's call this ethical religious pluralism. Like epistemological pluralism, ethical pluralism may take the form of an agent pluralism or a precept pluralism. Agent ethical pluralism holds that the adherents of no particular religion have any significant moral distinction over the adherents of any other major religion. Precept pluralism is the claim that the moral precepts taught by the major faith traditions are equally right. Once again, this sort of pluralism can be formulated as an equality pluralism or a degree pluralism. There are two main approaches to ethical precept equality pluralism. One way is to accept a version of moral relativism. Each religion's morality is excellent by its own lights, and there is no absolute position from which one could be said to be better than any other. The other way, which is more commonly proposed, is to claim that the fundamental moral principles of all the major religions boil down to some common set of moral principles such as the golden rule, and that the particular differences in moral systems are relative or of less significance than what is common. 6. The second sort of pluralism that arises in consideration of the practical aspect of religion pertains to specifically religious obligations instead of moral obligations. Is it possible to fulfill one's religious obligations equally through adherence to any of a plurality of religions? A negative answer is given by those who reject deontological religious pluralism. They hold that God has commanded all of mankind at the present time to accept a specific religion. Choice of religion is not a matter of personal preference, but of obedience to divine prescription. Here we should also mention a distinction that may be made between diachronic religious pluralism and synchronic religious pluralism. Although this distinction could be applied to any of Muhammad Legenhausen 33 the various types of religious pluralism mentioned in this paper, it is particularly relevant to deontological religious pluralism, because many of the most staunch exclusivists will accept some form of diachronic religious pluralism, according to which the value of a religion may be judged differently at different times, so that, for example, Christianity might have the value of being required by God for a people for a specific period of time, but not prior to that time. Diachronic religious pluralism is more easy to accept for those with exclusivist tendencies because there is no question of religious choice being arbitrary. What seems to motivate much exclusivist thinking is the idea that the choice of one's religious commitments should be made in accordance with what God prescribes and not as a matter of personal taste or whimsical preference. Those who defend religious pluralism usually take religious choice to be a matter of personal preference because of the normative pluralistic claim that no one should impose or force any religion on anyone. However, normative and deontological pluralism should not be confused. One may endorse normative pluralism while denying deontological pluralism, that is, one may affirm that people should make their religious commitments in accord with their own personal consciences, and reject the notion that whatever they decide is in accord with the commands given by God through revelation. Indeed, I would argue that this sort of position is more consistent with a sound Islamic theology than a blanket acceptance of pluralism. Epistemic agent pluralism is closely related to deontological pluralism. Deontological exclusivism hold that it is only by adherence to a favored religion that one is able to fulfill one's religious duties. There may be a general obligation imposed by God to humanity to accept a given religion, while at the same time the obligation 34 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms may be suspended under certain circumstances. We Muslims believe that we are obliged to observe certain dietary restrictions, for example, but that these restrictions may be lawfully violated in case one is dying of thirst or hunger. One is not obligated to do what is not possible for one to accomplish. If one is unable to provide epistemic justification for belief in Islam, and hence is unable to believe, then we cannot expect the obligation to believe to apply to this person. Ought implies can. If one cannot, any obligation is suspended. In consideration of the epistemic factors concerning the obligation to believe, we can consider a distinction between deontological belief pluralism and deontological agent pluralism. According to deontological belief pluralism (DBP), God permits human beings to pick from among the major traditions any religion they like. There is no religion to which God commands adherence to the exclusion of any other. Let's say that religion r is permitted by God for humanity at time t and location I with the abbreviation Prtl. DBP: Vr(t=now & l=our location ~ Prtl) This formulation is consistent with the idea that God may have allowed only one religion to be adopted in the Egypt of Moses or in the Punjab of Nanak, but at the present time and locale, all the major religious traditions are acceptable. Deontological belief exclusivism (DBE), to the contrary, holds that at any given time and locale, there is one religion that God requires for all of humanity. DBE: VNI3rVrl(Prltl~r=r') Deontological agent pluralism, on the other hand, is a view of what God permits for a given agent with respect to the adoption of a religion, given the agent's epistemic situation and other limitations. Let's abbreviate the proposition that God permits x Muhammad Legenhausen 35 to adopt religion r at t and I as Pxrtl. We can distinguish two sorts of agent pluralism. According to the first type (DAP 1), God allows some agents to pick from any of the major traditions. DAP1: 'v'x'v'r'v't'v'l (Pxrtl) According to the second type (DAP2), God merely allows that different agents may be permitted to adopt different religions given their circumstances. DAP2: 3x3y3t313r3r'(Pxrtl & Pyr'tl & r#') Note that DBE is compatible with DAP2. It may be the case that God commands Islam for all of humanity at a given time and location, while allowing individuals who are unable for some reason to accept Islam to be guided by Him through some other faith tradition. Other variants could also be formulated, e.g., according to which God allows some agents to pick from a limited number of religions, or according to which God requires different religious beliefs from a single individual in different circumstances, as, according to Islam, God required Christianity of some people before the advent of Islam, and Islam afterward. 7. The sort of pluralism advanced by writers such as Ramakrishna (1834-1886), Madame Blavatsky (1831-1891), Rene Guenon (1886-1951) and Frithjof Schuon (1907-1998) could be called hermetic religious pluralism. According to this sort of religious pluralism, although religions are different exoterically, they share a common esoteric core. Although the thesis of hermetic pluralism is characteristically left rather vague, it is often presented as the claim that the major religions lead to the same goal, which is a certain perennial wisdom that comprises various metaphysical principles. A hermetic pluralist could claim that the religions are equally effective means for reaching this knowledge, or merely that the ultimate wisdom is 36 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms the same, or that some essential portion of it is common to the esoteric traditions of the major religions. V. Reductive and Non-Reductive Pluralisms Religious pluralisms of any of the varieties described above may be either reductive or non-reductive. Reductive pluralists hold that all the major religious traditions or at least some plurality of denominations share some degree of a value in terms of which different sorts of pluralism are defined because of some element that is common to them. So, for example, the hermetic religious pluralists generally claim that different religions lead to the same goal because of common esoteric principles. This sort of religious pluralism is reductive because it reduces the essence of a religion to the common elements it shares with other religions. What is not held in common with the other religions is seen as window dressing or cultural accoutrements. Non-reductive religious pluralism, on the other hand, holds that what is unique to a variety of religions may be what gives them value. An extreme form of nonreductive religious pluralism would hold that whatever value any religion has must be due to elements unique to it. There is no reason for thinking that this sort of pluralism might be true. Indeed, very good a priori reasons can be found for rejecting extreme non-reductive religious pluralism. Suppose that one holds that a value in terms of which religions are to be judged is their encouragement of their followers to lead moral lives. Extreme nonreductive religious pluralism would be committed to the view that there could be no common elements in the moral systems supported by different religions that have this value, and such a view is patently absurd. A more moderate form of non-reductive religious pluralism Muhammad Legenhausen 37 would hold that God guides people through the unique features of the various religions He prescribes for them in combination with features that are shared by other religions.19 When the varieties of religious pluralism are set out and analyzed, it seems that there are many forms that will not stand up to analysis. With regard to soteriological pluralism, for example, the problems of the diversity of religious goals seems to make the question quite problematic. It would seem that both exc1usivism and pluralism with regard to soteriology require a rather childish view of the religious life and its goals. We might affirm pluralism as a rejection of the simplistic view that one will be damned by God for lacking membership in some favored congregation. But this should not be confused with the idea that it makes no difference what religion one holds to where one will end up in the afterlife. Surely, the choices one makes with respect to religious affiliation will have an effect of what one ultimately makes out of one's life. More than this, we can only leave to God's mercy and wisdom. With respect to normative religious pluralism, I would urge a non-reductive religious pluralism. Respect should be shown to the members of different religious traditions not merely because of our common humanity, but because of what is unique in each community. This is completely consistent with an admission that we owe members of our own community special obligations. With regard to epistemological religious pluralism, if we take into account the various standards of rationality that may be found in communities that have different standards of logical reasoning (e.g., Nyaya, Aristotelian logic in the Islamic tradition, modem symbolic logic, etc.) a case could be made for a nonreductive interpretation of the normative epistemic agent pluralism suggested earlier. Believers in different traditions may have justifications for their beliefs that at least in part are 38 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms dependent to cognitive standards that are unique to their own traditions.20 With respect to alethic pluralism, I am skeptical of the attempts make by Hick and others who have sought to reconcile conflicting religious truths. I think it is not unreasonable nor theologically unacceptable to allow that SAP may be true, although I would be cautious about such an affirmation, because it seems to me that it would be an impossibly difficult task to find sufficient evidence for it. A non-reductive version of SAP (SANRP) would hold that every religion teaches some truths unique to it. SANRP: Vr3p(Trp & p & Vr'(Tr'p~r=r')) Perhaps this view could be defended in Islamic theology by arguing that in each religious tradition there are truths taught about the founder of that tradition that are not taught in any other tradition. Ayatullah Misbah, for example, has suggested that there might be some truths about Jesus (peace be with him) that are taught by some Christians but that cannot be found the narrations about Jesus in the Shi'i collections. This may be so either because the Imams and the Prophet (salutations upon him and his progeny) considered these truths unnecessary, or because the narrations were lost, or for some other reason known only to God. This insight could be expressed by speculating that what might be correct may be a more moderate form of alethic nonreductive pluralism (MANRP) that would merely claim that there are some different religions each of which teaches truths unique to it. MANRP: 3r3r'3p3q(r7'r' & Trp & p & Vr"(Tr"p~r=r") & Tr'q & q & Vr"(Tr" q~r'=r")) As for ethical religious pluralism, the agent variety this would seem to be explicitly denied by claims of the moral superiority of Muhammad Legenhausen 39 the Prophet (s) over all human beings. This would still be compatible with a non-reductive agent ethical pluralism according to which each prophet has some peculiar praiseworthy moral character trait that is unique to him alone. As for precept pluralism, it would not be hard to show that a diachronic version of non-reductive precept pluralism is consistent with the teachings of Islam. If a synchronic version is to be defended, the most plausible position would be a degree pluralism in which various moral systems are accepted as passing some minimal standard, although it is allowed that the morals taught by our own religion are superior to all rivals. This could be formulated in a non-reductive version according to which each moral system that passes the standard has features unique to it. With regard to deontological religious pluralism, a nonreductive version of DAP2 would seem plausible. A non-reductive form of hermetic pluralism could be formulated according to which truths are divided into the esoteric and exoteric and MANRP is held to be true when the propositional variables are taken to range over esoteric truths. In conclusion, a survey of the range of types of religious pluralism that could be debated by reasonable theologians of various traditions would indicate that it is a mistake for one to characterize one's position as an endorsement or denial of religious pluralism. Indeed, the area that has been given the most attention in philosophical theology, soteriological pluralism, is one in which pluralistic and exclusivist claims often tum out to be absurd. With regard to the other area that has generated the most discussion, normative pluralism, what is most significant is not whether one is a pluralist or not, because everyone will agree with pluralism with respect to some rights and obligations. The question to consider is what rights and obligations are to be considered specially do to one's coreligionists, and whether such 40 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms special obligations can justify political measures to establish a particular denomination as the official religion of the state. Such arguments will take different forms when they are based on English law and Anglican theology and when they are based on Islamic law and theology. The differences, however, should not be cast as a debate between pluralism and exclusivism. Forms of religious pluralism that look promising or at least worthy of further consideration include the versions of nonreductive religious pluralism mentioned above, including versions of non-reductive normative pluralism, non-reductive normative epistemic agent pluralism, epistemic degree pluralism with respect to various forms of justification, SANRP as a version of alethic pluralism, analogous forms of non-reductive ethical pluralism, diachronic deontological pluralism and DAP2, both of which would be non-reductive in the sense that they are not based on some common element that is sufficient to secure the relevant permissibility, and an esoteric version of SANRP. So, although I have argued that several plausible forms of nonreductive religious pluralism might be defended, the main contours that debates about religious pluralism have taken are misleading because they gloss over important distinctions, which, when uncovered, reveal that the moral and theological positions that motivate the debate would be more appropriately addressed by considering such issues as the nature of salvation, divine guidance, and the rights and obligations for religious groups in various societies. With regard to such questions, religious pluralism turns out to be less significant than is often imagined. Notes 1. Their guidance is not your responsibility; but Allah guides whomsoever He wil~ 2:272. 2. John Rawls, Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993, 36Muhammad Legenhausen 41 37. 3. For an overview of definitions gleaned by surfing the internet, see B. A. Robinson, 'Quotations Showing Various Definitions of the Term 'Religious Pluralism;" URL = http://www.religioustolerance.org/relplurl.htm 4. See Peter Byrne, Prolegomena to Religious Pluralism: Reference and Realism in Religion New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995, 12. I have changed the wording of the third clause to stress he equality condition. 5. Futuhat, III, 153.12, translated in William Chittick, Imaginal Worlds: Ibn al- 'Arabi and the Problem of Religious Diversity, Albany: SUNY Press, 1994, 125. 6. Byrne 1995, 5. 7. The definitive statement of Hick's view is spelled out in his An Interpretation of Religion, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989. 8. Frithjof Schuon, The Transcendental Unity of Religions, revised edition, New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1975. 9. For more on the notion of special obligations, see the entry by Diane Jeske, "Special Obligations', in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2002 Edition]; Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL=www.plato.stanford.edu/ archives/ win2002/ entries/ special-o b ligations/. 10. Francoise Champion, "The diversity of religious pluralism," MOST Journal on Multicultural Societies, Vol. 1, No.2, 1999, URL = www.unesco.org /most /vlln2cha.htm 11. An issue of the journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers, Faith and Philosophy, Vol. 14, No. 3, July 1997, was devoted to "The Epistemological Challenge of Religious Pluralism," by John Hick. 12. William P. Alston, Beyond "Justification": Dimensions of Epistemic Evaluation, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005. 13. See Charles Sanders Peirce, "Some Consequences of Four Incapacities," in The Essential Peirce, Vol. 1, ed. Nathan Houser and Christian K1oese1, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992, 52. 14. See Graham Priest, "Dialetheism," The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 1998 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = www.p1ato.stanford.edu/archives /win1998/entries/dia1etheism/. 15. See William C. Chittick, The Sufi Path of Knowledge (Albany: SUNY, 1989), 66, 112-116,324. 16. See Hick, 1989. 17. See William P. Alston, Percieving God: The Epistemology of Religious Experience, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991, 262-266, and Alvin P1antinga, Warranted Christian Belief, New York: Oxford University Press, 2000, 43-44. I have also criticized Hick's view of this issue in Muhammad Legenhausen, Islam and Religious Pluralism, London: A1-Hoda, 1999, 124-129. 18. Alston, 1991, 257. 19. This view is defended in Legenhausen, 1999. 20. This sort of point may be supported to some extent by the sort of argumentation one finds in Alasdair MacIntyre's Whose Justice? Which Rationality? Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988. 42 On the Plurality of Religious Pluralisms Bibliograghy Alston, William P, Beyond "Justification": Dimensions of Epistemic Evaluation, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005. Alston, William P, Percieving God: The Epistemology of Religious Experience,Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991. Chittick, William, The Sufi Path of Knowledge,Albany: SUNY, 1989. P1antinga, Alvin, Warranted Christian Belief, NewYork: Oxford university Press, 2000. Peter, Byrne, Prolegomena to Religious Pluralism: Reference and Realism in Religion, New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995. Rawls, John, Political Liberalism,New York: Columbia University Press, 1993. Schuon, Frithjof, The Transcendental Unity of Religions, revised edition, New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1975. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 43-58 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? Ali Akbar Rashad* Abstract Some scholars like John Hick assume Mowlana not only as a religious pluralist, but also as the founder of religious pluralism. One can prove by various reasons that this perception is incorrect. In ascribing an idea to a person the attention should be paid to the evidences and rules of personality analysis, and the all aspects of his/her ideas. Considering Mowlana's monotheistic Muslim personality, he severely insisted on the legitimacy of the name of Islam, he is a realist and intellectualist philosopher and an eastern man who belongs to the pre-Kant era. In addition, he firmly believes in universalism as revealed in his verses and rejects and disowns other religions – except Islam – and thus, he cannot be regarded as a pluralist. In this article the evidences by which religious pluralism has been ascribed to Mowlana are scrutinized and the author demonstrates that pluralistic interpretations on Mowlana's poems and books are not tenable. This article has been presented at the Conference on Mowlana that was held in Greece (Athens) on November 18, 2007. Keywords: Mowlana, John Hick, religious pluralism, right, wrong, exclusivism, inclusivism, naturalism. *. High Scholar, Mujtahid & Associate professor at Islamic Research Institute for Culture and Thought , Tehran , Iran. E-Mail: [email protected] 44 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? Introduction Some scholars such as John Hick think of Mowlana as a religious pluralist and even consider him as the founder of religious pluralism. We think that this view concerning Mowlana is seriously false. In this short paper, we try to unveil falsity of this view. Before beginning our discussion, we define religious pluralism which is one of the theories concerning the problem of "other religions". Then we will begin our main discussion. Concerning questions such as 1. "what is the reason behind diversity of religions?" 2. "are all the existing religions true, or some of them true and the others false?" 3. "are all of them a combination of falsity and truth?"; and 4. "are all of them false with no true religion?", four theories have been presented: Naturalism: this theory says that the religion cannot not be true, then nor is there a true religion; Religious exclusivism says that there is only one true religion, and other religions are false; Inclusivism says that a particular religion is true; and even if other religions contain some true ideas, the true religion contains all true ideas. Religious pluralism. Let us explain religious pluralism in more details, since it is the subject matter of the present article. Meaning and Kinds of Religious Pluralism Religious pluralism may have various principles and consequently various meanings and instances. For example, religious pluralism may be based on the assumption of the plurality of religion in factual world, i.e. it may be based on the assumption that the essence of religion is, as a matter of fact, Ali Akbar Rashad 45 plural; also religious pluralism may be stemmed from belief in inevitability of the diversity of understandings and acquisition of various kinds of knowledge of religion. Also, it may mean acceptance of possibility of similar functions for religions or various spiritual traditions. The first kind may be called "ontological religious pluralism", the second kind "epistemological religious pluralism", and the third kind "functionalist religious pluralism". In ontological pluralism in which plurality refers to the external existence of the subject, three states may be imagined: 1. Factual plurality of the essence of the religion which means acceptance of existence of some religions in parallel; 2. multidimensionality of the essence of religions which means that though the essences of religions are the same, the religion has different factual manifestations; 3. gradation of the fact and essence of the religion. In the first state, three possibilities may be imagined: the first is that all the existent religions are true; the second is that some of them are true and some others are false. The third is that none of the religions are absolutely true or false, but combinations of truth and falsity. The same three possibilities may be thought of concerning two other assumptions, i.e. different aspects of the religion and factual religion. Epistemological religious pluralism is realized influenced by different factors. The series of factors may be classified under "triple foundations involving in development of knowledge". Triple foundations are as follows: 1. knowing subject, 2. known thing, and influencing external factors which I call them "aids of knowing". By "aids of knowing", I mean factors out of the essences of two main foundations of the development of knowledge (i.e. knowing subject and known thing) which play their role as aids of, or obstacles to, the process of development of knowledge. (This division is based on a particular 46 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? epistemological theory I believe in it)1. Since religions and quasi-religions have various worldly and other-worldly functions in the fields of knowledge, life, guidance, and salvation, to find their similarities and dissimilarities, different and identical functions, these systems are compared with each other. Thus, functionalist pluralism may be deemed as one of the images and interpretations in the field of religious pluralism. In this case, based on the kind of the function taken as a basis for pluralism, various kinds of functionalist religious pluralism may be imagined. The set of expected and existent possibilities and ideas concerning religious pluralism may be depicted as follows: In addition to the above division which is based on the "kind of fundamental hypothesis" for acceptance or realization of plurality, typology of religious pluralism may be based on other criteria as well; for example according to narrowness or extent of the field of pluralism, religious pluralism may be classified in three ways: 1. Maximalist way in which no religious knowledge or tradition will be out of the coverage of pluralism; Ali Akbar Rashad 47 2. Intermediate way according to which only revelatory religions such as Abrahamic ones or only great traditions or Eastern traditions or Western traditions fall within the field of pluralism, or only legitimacy or right to life of those religions is recognized which have been victorious in debates made with their rivals (in other words, pluralism is accepted only for those schools whose demonstrative fight has shown sufficiency of their arguments; their claims have become antinomic) or pluralism is accepted only in the field of religious traditions or religious knowledge and not in the field of factual (revealed) religions. 3. Minimalist pluralism according to which pluralism is accepted and applied only in a very narrow field; for example, plurality is recognized only for various schools of the same religion such as Shi'ism and Sunnism within Islam and Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Protestantism within Christianity. Minimalist pluralism, then, may be called "pluralistic inclusivism" or "family pluralism". Now, Mowlana and Pluralism In order to ascribe an idea to a certain person or to deduce a particular claim from a certain text, many authenticate scientific evidence and rules should be taken into consideration and appealed to. Not all ideas may be ascribed to all persons, and not all texts may be interpreted in whatever way. To explain, it should be said that to ascribe an idea to a theologian, his ideological, intellectual characteristics, and temporal, cultural, social conditions of his environment, limits and kind of his knowledge and the like should be taken into account; and according to suitability (or unsuitability) of that idea for those conditions, that idea may be ascribed to (or, negated of) him. 48 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? To interpret a text as well, it should be understood and interpreted according to a series of rules and evidence. For example, principles such as the following five ones are necessary: 1. Principle of "knowledge of the nature of the text"; for example, whether it is a religious or a scientific one; 2. the principle of "the text being a whole" (each text is consistent and has a focal claim; and claims introduced in it are, in principle, related and even coherent). 3. the principle of "similarity between the text and author"; for example a work of a monotheist mystic is not the same as that of an atheist; 4. the principle of "appropriateness of the text with climatic, historical, epistemic, and scientific containers; emergence of the text should be understand by taking into account historical and scientific conditions of its development; 5literal and rhetoric rules. An atheist saying, therefore, cannot be ascribed to a faithful monotheist one. Also, a modern scientific claim cannot be ascribed to the one who had lived in the Stone Age. Also, a sacred Divine text cannot be interpreted in an atheistic way; or conflicting claim cannot bewithout sufficient evidenceascribed to the same book; or meaningless points cannot bewithout sufficient evidenceextracted from a writing ascribed to a rational and mindful man. (though he may commit errors, but this is an exception; and exception cannot be regarded as rule, nor can it violate the rule). In ascribing pluralism to Mowlana, one should notice that he was a faithful and monotheist Muslim, a wise and clever man, a rationalist and realist philosopher who lived in the Middle (preKantian) Ages in the Islamic East. And one with such characteristics cannot be a pluralist concerning his religious ideas; for, because of his being a Muslim, he insisted seriously in the exclusive or inclusive truth of the religion of Islam. He believes that Islam is a global and eternal religion having Ali Akbar Rashad 49 maximalist truth; and all names and fames other than the name of Islam will be vanishing. If there are some truths in other religions, all truth are contained in the religion of Islam. And relation between Islam and other religions is like the relation between the number 100 and tens under it all of which are contained in the number 100. Having Islam we have all truths. "The names of kings are removed from the dirhems, (but) the name of Ahmad (Mohammed) is stamped on them for ever "The name of Ahmad is the name of all the prophets: when the hundred comes (is counted), ninety is with us as well2. He blames Christians who think that Jesus Christ has been crucified and at the same time regards him as God; he says that those who have crucified him (Jews) may not be saved by taking refuge to him! "See the ignorance of the Christian appealing for protection to the Lord who was suspended (on the Cross) "Since, according to his (the Christian's belief), he was crucified by the Jews, how then can He protect him?3 According to him, man is free and his freedom has led to his greatness; and based on his own knowledge and free will, he chooses either disbelief or belief; either guidance or deviation: "Because We have honoured Man by (the gift of) free-will: half (of him) is honey-bee, half is snake; "The true believers are store of honey, like the bee; the infidels, in sooth, are a store of poison, like the snake; "Because the true believer ate choice herbs, so that, like a bee, his spittle became (a means of giving) life; "(While), again, the infidel drank sherbet of filthy water: accordingly from his nourishment poison appeared in him.4 He is a realist (and not a skeptic or relativist) philosopher; thus, he thinks that acquisition of knowledge is possible, and there is a methodology for this; he regards true knowledge a knowledge 50 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? corresponding to the reality; after narrating the famous parable of the "elephant and blind men", he says that if they did not content themselves to senses and if they consult their reasons, they would be able to understand the reality. "If there had been a candle in each one's hand, the difference would have gone out of their words5. In another place, he regards the reason as a touchstone to evaluate sense perceptions: "Get (learn) the distinction between evil and good from reason, not from the eye that tells (only) of black and white; "The eye is beguiled by the verdure on dunghills, (but) the reason says, "Put it to my touchstone"6. Based on a naïve realism, he thinks that rational understanding of the external world is possible "An intellect giving light like the sun is needed to wield the sword that never misses the right direction7. For him, reason is light, and to gather rational experiences will lead to twofold unveiling of truth: "(If) the intellect is paired with another intellect, light increases and the way becomes plain8. He thinks that sense perceiving eye is unable to understand the truth and acquire knowledge; and regards particularist empiricism as an enemy of the religion and reason: "Throw dust on your sense perceiving eye: the sensuous eye is the enemy of intellect and religion9. He thinks that reason and religion are of the same kind and two wings of life and salvation; he recommends his addressee to take only reason and religion as her/his guides: "Do not mount the restive horse without a bridle: male Reason and Religion your leader, and farewell10. But as is well-known, the theory of religious pluralism has nothing to do with the Mowlana's era, but it is a theory of the Ali Akbar Rashad 51 20th Century and it has been emerged in the modern era. Its social and cultural backgrounds and epistemological, philosophical and religion-philosophical principles are entirely modern. Relation and contacts between religions which may lead to unpleasant social consequences may be entirely found in the contemporary era11. The discipline of philosophy of religion, among whose issues is pluralism, is less than 200 years old12. The main philosophical and epistemological justification of this theory has been taken from Immanuel Kant's epistemology. In addition to all above points, it should be noted that religious pluralism is based on the "essential plurality of religions"; Mowlana, however, insists upon "gradational unity of religions" Also, evidence provided from Mowlana's works and poems to confirm religious pluralism does not prove this claim; on the contrary some evidence suggests against the claims of claimants; and even in his works, there are many points in criticizing pluralism. From among pieces evidence appealed to for ascribing pluralism to Mowlana according to which they have tried to ascribe some sort of critical realism to him and then to call him "pluralist" is some parables and allegories he has made uses of them in Mathnawi to explain philosophical, epistemic, mystical and moral concepts13. Here, I will explore and evaluate some cases: 1the parable of the elephant and blind men; 2the parable of the same light and various lamps or shining of the sun on various places. Before going to analyze, it should be noted that allegories and parables may only be suitable to facilitate understanding of claims; but they never prove the claims; for parable is generalization of a particular judgment to another particular judgment, without there being a certain common point between similar parts or a known reason behind the judgment; in allegory 52 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? as well, similarity may be in an aspect, but there may be difference and even opposition in other aspects; that is why they have said that allegory is in one aspect intimating but in many aspects it increases distance. In the fourth book of the Mathnawi, Mowlana emphasizes this point14. But how about the parable of elephant and the blind men to which in epistemological issues is appealed to prove impossibility or relativity of knowledge? Firstly, one may mention another parable suggesting that truth is accessible, though (and even) by chance or through an ignorant and imitative motion. In the second book of his Mathnawi, Mowlana speaks of a man who has lost his camel and is searching for his lost camel, desert by desert, town by town; and another man, without losing his camel, is imitatively, or to ridicule him, accompanying him claiming that he has lost his camel as well! Whatever the former says or asks, and whenever he runs, the imitating lying man says or asks, and runs. When the truthful man, after knowingly attempts, finds his lost camel, he sees that there are two camels; and suddenly the imitating ignorant man notices that one of them is his own camel, but he has not known that his camel had been lost; and truly he has not been searching for the camel and he has found there his camel accidentally! From this story Mowlana concludes that "When a liar set out (to journey) with a truthful man, his falsehood turns to truth of a sudden "That imitator became a true searcher when he saw his camel browsing there15. Secondly, the parable (of elephant and blind men) is to reject authenticity of senses to acquire knowledge, and to criticize sensesufficiency or to emphasize the necessity of appropriateness between tools of knowledge and subject of knowledge; and notes that true knowledge of the members of elephant is possible Ali Akbar Rashad 53 through the vision and not by hand and touching faculty. Thirdly, if the object of knowledge is the elephant and not its members (which is typically what is considered), the parable is to show defects and inefficiency of one-dimensional and particularist views in acquisition of knowledge, i.e. a defect of which suffer most human hypotheses and theories –in particular in our time-; knowledge of the elephant, which is a whole, is possible through a universal-seeing eye (an eye which sees beyond and comprehensively). In other words, the whole truth is grasped through a universal-seeing philosophical look and not through empiric attempts which are praticularist and one-dimensional. That is why to conclude from this parable, Mowlana says: "On account of the (diverse) place (object) of view, their statements differed: one man entitled it "d'al," another "alif" "If there had been a candle in each one's hand, the difference would have gone out of their words "The eye of sense-perception is only like the palm of the hand: the palm hath not power to reach the whole of him (the elephant)16. According to the other interpretation, mistake committed by, and difference between, blind men were caused by superficialism, obstinacy, and selfishness of blind men and their negligence of esoteric points and guidance made by the spiritual guide. "If a master of the esoteric had been there, a revered and many language man, he would pacified them.17 Fourthly, if the object of knowledge is elephant, the parable will not prove that each and every knowing subject has acquired a portion of reality (even though negligible) and knows one of the dimensions of the elephant. For, in this parable none of the touching men has understood a part or dimension of the truth; and even they have gone further from the truth and all of them have equally committed mistakes; and their states are much worse 54 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? than those who have not yet touched the elephant. For the latter ones have no imagination of the elephant; but those who have touched the elephant have misunderstood him; and simple ignorance is less worse than the complicated ignorance. For the simple ignorance may be likened to the ground zero, while complicate ignorance is like a position under the ground zero! Fifthly, even if we accept that blind men's knowledge shares a portion of truth, that truth is not a truth concerning the elephant; but rather the truth acquired by each one of them is a knowledge concerning the member touched by him. In this case, each one of them has come relatively close to the truth concerning his own object of knowledge; for he has, at least, understood corporality, sensibility, its form and volume, hardness ... of the body touched by him. (Anyway, as seen, a parable may be interpreted in various ways and suggest different and even conflicting claims; in any case, this parable does not suggest critical realism, we do not mention religious pluralism). Other Parables The other parables appealed to for ascribing religious pluralism to Mowlana are as follows: "The single light of the sun being a hundred in relation to the house-courts (on which it shines)"18, which suggests that a single light source creates hundred lights; but if we remove walls, it will become clear that there is only one light (Book 4). We may mention the parable according to which "if there are ten lamps in the same place, apparently there are ten lamps and the light of each one of them is other than those of the others; but, since light is light, all of them are the same thing; and when we take into account instead of lamps, light, we cannot distinguish them from each other.19 Also, like the light of moon which rises in the dark night and Ali Akbar Rashad 55 shines through windows on houses, though each one of the lights shined through each window is apparently an independent light, whenever one of them disappears, the others disappear as well. And this shows that there is but one light.20 Concerning these parables can, and should, be said that: First of all, presupposition of religious pluralism, as its name shows, is plurality of religions (and not their unity). Mowlana is a religious man who believes in the unity of religions and in these parables he has emphasized the unity of religionstrue religions and truth of religions. In the beginning of this part of Mathnawi, Mowlana appeals to the holy verse "The believers are naught else than brothers"21 and the hadith "true scholars are like one soul", and inspired by the holy verse "We make no distinction between any of them [prophets]"22, he emphasizes that denial of one of the prophets is the same as denial of all of them, and mentions that truth and people of truth are but one. Secondly, Mowlana believes in the true unity of prophets and revealed and genuine religions (before being altered); and there is no one of the people and followers of the revealed religions who denies this point. He believes that plurality and diversity of interpretations and alterations are caused by the role played by human beings' understanding in the field of realized religions and religious knowledge. That is why he says: "On that account these companions of ours are all at war, (but) no one (ever) heard of war amongst the prophets "Because of the light of the prophets was the Sun, (while) the light of senses is lamp and candle and smoke.23 This means that the light of the prophets is like the light shone by the Sun, and there is no difference between them. Then, there is no plurality so that pluralism may be necessitated). Human epistemic tools, however, are smoking and dark sources of light. Thirdly, these parables are aimed to make a distinction 56 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? between Lord lights (revealed religions) and sense and noneDivine lights (i.e. thoughts whose source is not Divine revelation); and this has been expressively mentioned by Mowlana. He considers the Divine lights as one light, and nonDivine lights as plural lights. Also, he calls non-Divine lights unstable, and incapable of showing the truth.24 In other words, religious pluralism is founded on a view which assumes plurality of religions. Even if such plurality may be imagined, it is in the nonrevealed schools (schools which are not connected to the source of revelation). Such schools are not representing the truth. Finally, I emphasize that by appealing to such parables, Mowlana can never be called relativist, pluralist, and religious pluralist. Within the frame of Islam, however, Mowlana has supra-sectional ideas, and we think that he cannot be confined within the frame of one of the schools stemmed from Islam. Notes 1. For more details, see Rashad Ali Akbar, Principles of, and Obstacles to Religious Theorization, Qabasat Journal, No. 34. 2. The Mathnawi of Jalal al-Din Rumi, translated and edited by Reynold Alleyne Nicholson, 1: 1105-1106 3. Ibid, 2: 1393-4 4. Ibid, 3: 3289-3291 5. Ibid, 3: 1266 6. Ibid, 6: 2965-6 7. Ibid, 5: 668 8. Ibid, 2: 26 9. Ibid, 2: 1599 10. Ibid, 4: 465 11. Though sometimes in the course of history there had been debates between believers in various religions, meeting between religions has, because of extensive exchanges between human societies, turned into one of the main problems in our times. That is why some thinkers like Mr. John Hick has mentioned such conditions as their motivation to present the theory of religious pluralism. (Problems in Religious Pluralism, First Chapter). 12. See, History of Philosophy of Religion. 13. In his books, John Hick mentions such allegories many times. 14. Differences and difficulties arise from this saying, because this is not a Ali Akbar Rashad 57 (complete) similitude: it is (only) a comparison. Endless are the differences between the corporeal figure of a lion and the figure of a courageous son of man. But at the moment of (making) the comparison consider, O thou who hast good insight, their oneness in respect of hazarding their lives. For, after all, the courageous man did resemble the lion, (though) he is not like the lion in all points of the definition, Mathnawi, ibid, 4: 419-422. 15. Ibid., 2: 2980 and 2983. 16. ibid, 1265-67. 17. Ibid, 2: 3674; for this interpretation, see Este'lami, Mohammad, Ta'iqat, Third Book, pp 274-5. 18. Just as the single light of the sun in heaven is a hundred in relation to the housecourts (on which it shines). But when you remove the walls, all the lights (falling) on them are one. When the (bodily) houses have no foundation remaining, the Faithful remain one soul. (ibid, 4: 416-18). It should be noted that for Mowlana, faithful is the same as Muslim. He has said: It is because of their different viewpoints, O thou the core of existence, that there are difference between the believer, Gabr and Jew (this couplet is translated by the translator of the present article). So long as the sun is shining on the horizon, its light is a guest in every house; Again, when the spiritual Sun sets, the light in all the houses disappears (ibid, 4: 459-60) 19. If ten lamps are present in (one) place, each differs in form from another. To distinguish without any doubt the light of each, when you turn your face towards their light, is impossible (ibid, 1: 678-9) 20. Again, when the moon is born from the Hindu, Night, a light falls upon every window. Count the light of those hundred houses as one, for the light of this (house) does not remain (in existence) without (the light of) the other. (ibid, 4: 456-7) 21. The Holy Quran, 49: 10. 22. ibid, 3: 84. 23. ibid, 4: 450-1. 24. At night a lamp is placed in every house, in order that by its light they (the inmates) may be delivered from darknes. "The lamp is (like) this body, its light like the (animal) soul; it requires a wick and this and that. That lamp with six wicks, namely, these senses, is based entirely upon sleep and food. Without food and sleep it would not live half a moment; nor even with food and sleep does it live either. Without wick and oil it has no duration, and with wick and oil it is also faithless (transient), (4: 425-9) The animal soul does not posses oneness: seek not thou this oneness from the airy (vital) spirit (ibid, 4: 411) The souls of wolves and dogs are separate, every one; souls of the Lions of God 58 Is Mowlana Jalal al-Din Rumi a Religious Pluralist? are united (4: 414) I have told you the purpose of this lamp of animal sense-perception. Beware of seeking to become one (with it in spirit). (4: 447) If this lamp dies and is extinguished, (yet) how should the neighbour's house become dark? Inasmuch as without this (lamp), the light in that house is still maintained, hence (it follows that) the lamp of sense-perception is different in every house This is a parable of the animal soul, not a parable of the Divine soul (4: 454-6) Bibliogeraphy * The Holy Quran Hick, John, Problems in Religious Pluralism, Tebyan, Tehran, Iran, 2008. Mowlavi, Jalal al-Din Mohammad, Mathnawi: Ta'liqat (Book Three), edited by Mohammad Este'lami, Sokhan, Tehran, Iran,2008. Mowlavi, Jalal al-Din Mohammad, Mathnawi, translated and edited by Reynold Alleyne Nicholson, Hermes, Tehran, Iran, 2005. Rashad, Ali Akbar, Dialogue with John Hick ,Qabasat Journal, No. 37, Research Institute for Culture and Thought, Tehran, Iran, 2005. Rashad, Ali Akbar, Principles of, and Obstacles to, New Understanding of Religion and Religious Theorization, Qabasat Journal, No. 34, Research Institute for Culture and Thought, Tehran, Iran, 2004. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 59-72 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? (A critique of Transcendental Unity of Religions) Alireza Qaeminia* Abstract Traditinalists have special view on the diversity of religions; called 'Transcendental Unity of religions'. This view is rooted in Schoun`s work with the same title. This essay illustrates the foundations of traditionalists` view and then criticizes these foundations. According to the author, there is no difference between this view and religious pluralism. Pluralism is the main pre-assumption of traditionalists who maintain no doubt about it. The pre-assumption is among the achievements of the new trend of thought and modernism. Keywords: Traditionalism, Transcendental unity of religion, prennial philosophy, Absolute Truth, Esoteric aspect of religion, Exoteric aspect of religion. Traditionalists have a special perspective on religious multiplicity which they call 'Transcendental Unity'. The issue was expanded by Schoun, a traditionalist scholar, in a work of the same title. The same topic has been also explained, though implicitly, in the works of Genon. But schoun has laid a special foundation for the issue and in fact the most important role played by him in *. Assistant Professor,Department of Philosophy,Baqir al-Ulum University, Qom, Iran. E-mail:[email protected] 60 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? traditionalism is determination of the relations between and among religions and explaining their relations to Truth. Religions do differ from one another in significant aspects and according to Schoun these differences have prevented mutual understanding of religions. In his opinion one of the main causes of such differences lies in the approach to the Absolute Being which has a different station in every religion in such a way that comparison of these stations renders the issue illusory and unrealistic. As a whole Schoun stresses four aspects of religions including 1. diversity of revelations and religious forms, 2. Orthodoxy, 3. distinction between exoteric and esoteric realms and relationship between the two, and 4. the transcendental unity of religions. He has repeatedly reiterated these aspects in his works stating their application to religious issues.1 Traditionalists consider one of the functions of prennial philosophy to observe truths beyond the veil of multiplicity and to grasp the unity from which all Divine rituals and rites emanate. That is why they resort to a certain kind of hermeneutics. Nasr has the following to say on the issue. "Achieving this objective is possible only through resorting to that metaphysical knowledge which leads to a knowledge of existential degree and manifestation of the truths of the Sublime Plane in this lowly world of matter. It is only in the light of hermeneutic knowledge, which is aware of inner dimensions and objective truths which are at times veiled and unveiled by phenomena. And these objectives may be achieved beyond all the psychological, historical and linguistic confusions covering many things even the very concept of hermeneutics in recent years. Another objective of this effort is to discover the truth shining in the heart of all religions and manifests the Absolute Being in its own framework; the Being without whom no religion has any credibility."2 Alireza Qaeminia 61 Diversity of Revelations and Religious Forms Schoun's first claim is that religious diversity should be looked upon within the framework of separation from the Absolute Truth. Religions or revelations or traditions are all forms of the Absolute Truth. Yet, the Absolute Truth is beyond these forms. As such, every religion or tradition is a peculiar form of the Truth and multiplicity takes place in the realm of forms as there is no multiplicity in the Absolute Being. When we talk about multiplicity in fact we are referring to forms. Therefore , the Truth, revelation and trandition are not synanimous terms.3 Oassionlly Schoun has expressed the said point in these words;"Various revelations have been conveyed to humans through different Divine languages and as we must avoid the idea of 'true and false' languages, we also need to understand the necessity and credibility of diversified revelations."4 Not all minds may grasp the principle of diversification of revelation and, the implications will remain detestful for majority of the faithful , and this concerns the very nature of affairs. Yet, from the perspective of traditionalism, everyone who wishes to understand religions as well as the inner relations of various traditions in exact terms has no way other than accepting this principle decisively. Regarding the term 'revelation' it is necessary to mention here that in the traditionalism's terminology it carries a special meaning. Revelation is different from visioning and discovering God. Revelation always signifies the formal origin and springhead of a tradition. Also, revelation differs from inspiration and this distinction is felt in various traditions. According to traditionalists, every revelation or religion has a dual nature. All revelations contain in themselves all affairs necessary for man's salvation and is then complete from this aspect while each is addressing a certain number of human 62 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? beings in certain conditions. From the latter point of view every religion is deficient and limited in scope. Among the traditionlists Nasr offers the most exact description in this connection: "Every revealed religion is both absolute and special. It is absolute because it has the Absolute Truth and means of accessing it within itself and, is special because it lays stress on spiritual and psychological needs of a certain community of human beings who are the addressees of that religion and as such, it emphasizes a certain aspect of truth." Elsewhere and under what he calls "The Universality Principle of Religion" Nasr discusses it as an important principle and bases his debate on the Quran and narrations. According to a prophetic narration, God has sent 124000 messengers to various nations and communities as stated in the Quran (Yonus, 49). "There has been a prophet assigned to every community" and "We did not send any messenger unless (he spoke) in the language of his people" (Ibrahim, 4). The universality of prophethood which has been relayed so clearly in the Quran is tentamount to the universality of tradition or religion and this means that all proper religions have descended from the celestial plane and are not man – made. This principle not only testifies to the presence of Divine revelation in the Ibrahimic tradition but also among all nations. As such, the Quran believes in the principle of universality of religion in explicit terms.5 Of course the universality principle does not indicate that all present religions are truthful. The principle only says that every tribe and community has had a messenger. In other words this principle only speaks of the all-encompassing presence of Divine revelation but it never says that revelations have been left untampered and undistorted. Alireza Qaeminia 63 The essence of Religion The most fundamental question brought about in the realm of religion is: What is religion? From the perspective of traditionalists no response may be provided to this question without referring to the concept of revelation and tradition. From the traditionalist's view every religion is in fact a combination of two elements or two pillars and foundations. These two are: A doctrine that draws distinction between absolute and relative, or, absolute right and relative right and, between what is of an absolute value and what is of relative value. The other element is a method of concentration on Truth for one to connect oneself to the absolute and, living according to the Divine will and in proportion to human destination and objective.6 Drawing distinction between relative and absolute right takes meaning in the framework of traditionalism. Thus the above statement is a theoretical definition of religion; that is religion becomes meaningful only in a certain theoretical framework and loses its credibility when taken out of that framework. So, these theoretical definitions are creditable only to those who accept the related theory. Today there have been many definitions offered on the philosophy of religion dealing with the quality and nature of religion which can be compared with the above-mentioned definition so that the weak and strong points of each of them may come to light. Distinction between Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy One of the most important problems for which the traditionalist should find a solution is presentation of a criterion for distinction between orthodoxy and heterodoxy. The 64 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? traditionalists do not welcome heterodoxy as they regard it a deviation from orthodoxy which does not comply with the original tradition hidden in the heart of religions. But on what criterion is this distinction or separation based? In this connection we are faced with three different criteria: A. Heterodoxies usually have a mundane and unholy form and at times are presented in the form of mystical schools whose contents are egotistic illusions. Schoun writes: "Heterodoxies either put forth a deceptive, unholy and humanistic form of religion and/or are presented in the form of mystical schools whose contents are nothing but ego and illusions."7 B. Heterodoxies lack suitable teachings. The suitability of the teachings is merely determined by a metaphysical insight that has been nourished within complete traditions.8 C. The third criterion is to consider the so-called fruits of the schools. Traditionalists lay stress on two kinds of 'fruits'. Firstly, every orthodox tradition breeds great saints and men of wisdom who bear witness to the spirituality of that tradition. Secondly, the sacred art is one of the most significant fruitions of orthodoxy.9 But a question comes to mind at once. How do Orthodox traditions view each other? Obviously they accuse one another of heterodoxy. For instance from Buddhism's perspective Hinduism is not an orthodox school. But within Buddhism too, existing heterodoxies aside, only the main school is considered as orthodox. This in fact leads to a paradox. Because a tradition has to be orthodox and heterodox, i.e., truthful and false both at the same time. The solution to this paradox should be sought in the role played by formal elements of religions. In the opinion of traditionalist these elements may never be applied in a literal way Alireza Qaeminia 65 beyond the perspective adopted by the tradition itself. This paradox originates in our literal application of framework provided by the tradition itself. Schoun presents the issue in the following words: "Traditional orthodoxy means to be in compliance with a doctrinal or ritualistic form and more importantly, it means to be concordant with the truth embedded within all revelational forms. As such, the essence of every orthodoxy is its intrinsic fact".10 Exoteric Dimension Versus Esotric Dimension The most significant part of Schoun's viewpoint is the separation of exoteric dimension of religion from its esoteric side. This separation is indicative of the impact of mystical debates on Schoun's view. Separating the exoteric side from the esoteric is among the theoretical mysticism's key points and Schoun uses this distinction as a model for understanding relations among religions. He draws a decisive distinction between exoteric and esoteric realms of religions. This so-called demarcation does not concern the fundamental difference between religions. Rather, this line is a horizental one that divides all religions into two categories of exoteric and esoteric levels.11 In Schoun's view, existence has various levels and grades. Above all the levels and forms of existence is God or the Absolute Being. Religions meet each other in that point because they are convergent at Absolute Being. But the more distant religions become from this focal point, the more divergent they shall be from one another. So, religions reach one another at the esoteric level and become convergent while at the exoteric level they turn divergent and sink in 66 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? differences. It should be noted that mystics believe in two levels of separating exoteric from esoteric: 1. Semantic Level: This level concerns the meaning in the Quranic text. The Quran has exoteric and esoteric meanings. Mystics usually do not believe in any end for the esoteric meanings of the Quran.12 2. Ontological Level: Existence has inner and outer levels, so has every being. All beings are indeed manifestations of existence and are only the 'appearance' while the Absolute Being is their 'hidden' or 'innermost' aspect. That is why some mystics have said: "Verily the inner part of every creature is Absolute Truth or the very appearance of Truth is creation.13 Schoun employs the said mystical distinction to separate religions from each other in exoteric and esoteric aspects. Religions may be considered truthful from an esoteric aspect but from an exoteric angle no religion enjoys absolute credibility. Exoteric elements are exclusive to each religion and cannot be applied beyond the scope of that religion. Now for a religion to be regarded as truthful from an esoteric side, certain criteria must be applied. In Schoun's idea such criteria include: 1. The religion should rely on a sufficient and clear doctrine regarding the Absolute Being; 2. The religion should praise and materialize a kind of spirituality which is on equal footing with its doctrine; 3. The religion should enjoy a Divineand not philosophical a origin, and 4. The religion should be in inundated with a holy or blessed presence which shall be manifested especially in miracles and sacred art. Obviously the above perspective requires relativism in the exoteric aspect of religions as they contain the Absolute Truth Alireza Qaeminia 67 only esoterically and, the exoteric components of religion are creditable only within that religion itself and become relative. We cannot then compare exoteric elements as they stand valid only in the realm of their related religion. Even if we condone the problem of relativity we still face another problem: whence has Schoun brought the said criteria? Why should a religion meet the four mentioned criteria if it is to b considered esoterically trueand not other criteria? Are these criteria gained out of a review of certain religions or are they based on a certain set of evidences and justifications? There also exists a special ambiguity in this trend of thought concerning the relationship between the exoteric and esoteric aspects. What is the connection between the two? We may say the two aspects have no relationship and are totally alienated from one another. This assumption opens the door to a series of problems: If the formal (exoteric) components are alien from the esoteric truth, then why they are not found only in one religion? Clearly there is a relation between those elements and the esoteric truth; otherwise we have no bridge to cross over from the exoteric to the esoteric. But if we accept the existence of a relationship between the two, then we have to also believe in some kind of absolute value for the exoteric elements as well. The Gem and the Shell of Religions At times to indicate the difference between the esoteric truth and exoteric aspects the traditionalists speak of the gem and the 'shell' of religions. Every religion has a shell and a gem within it. The gem has unlimited imperatives because it emanates from the Absolute Being. But the shell is a relative issue with limited imperatives. According to Schoun: 68 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? "In spite of realizing the above, two realities cannot be condoned. Firstly, at the level of mere appearances nothing enjoys absolute value; secondly , as far as the faithful in other religions are concerned the literalist and exclusivist interpretations of religious messages are denied by the relative ineffectivity of these messages. This of course does not take place in the realms of expansion of those messages that have been prescribed by God."14 At times Schoun uses the following debate to prove his point, saying: "If the claim of literalist Islam were absolute and not relative no well intentioned man could oppose it and anyone opposing it would be a heterodox as the situation was in the early days of Islam when no one, other than a deviant, could prefer magical idols to the purified God of Abraham. For instance Saint John of Damascuss held a high office in the Caliph's court in that city without having to embrace Islam. in the cases of Franciss of Assizi in Tunisia, Saint Lewis in Egypt or Saint Gregory Palamus in Turkey, none of them had embraced Islam. It may then be concluded that those saints were either ill-acting individuals – and this is meaningless because they were saints – or, the claim of Islam, like those of other religions, is relative to some extent"15 The manner of reasoning, however, does not prove Schoun's assumption. Those saints were great men in their own religions on the basis of intrinsic criteria of those religions. Yet, it cannot be deduced from this reality that all those individuals were absolutely truthful in their religious claims. In other words the dilemma (they were either ill-acting, or, Islam's claim is relative like those of other religions) presented by schoun is a false dilemma. Another form may also be perceived: Those individuals have been saints while Islam's claim is not relative. A Alireza Qaeminia 69 religion may speak of Absolute Truth and this has no discrepancy with the existence of saints in other religions. Those saints are saints because they meet the intrinsic criteria of their own traditions. Being a saint is not collateral with arriving at Absolute Truth. Schoun's Geometrical Allegory Literalism and exclusivism are applied to the exoteric level of religions. At times to indicate limitations arising from the 'shell' (l.e.,outer layer) of religionschoun uses a geometrical allegory: "As a certain geometrical form is in capable of demonstrating all space-related possibilities neither is a certain religious message able to go beyond limits imposed on it by its shell." Schoun's geometrical allegory does not prove his claim and appears to be a taken for granted allegory. We may find a multitude of allegories like this which indicate certain limitations. But what reason is there to believe in the similitude of the allegory to the relationship between exoteric and esoteric aspects of religion. In other words mystics offer many allegories for showing the kind of relation between the limited (exoteric) and unlimited (esoteric); allegories such as the 'wave' and 'sea', letter a and other alphabets, etc., But such allegories never justify their claims. Schoun has accepted this assumption implyingly that the objective of religions is to show the Absolute Truth and the Divine Being but no religion is able to indicate that Absolute Truth and Being in exoteric terms. As such that Truth is intrinsically embeded in religions and other issues are Just external elemements accompanied with limitations. On the basis of such a pre-sumption Schoun claims 70 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? that religions are united at the esoteric level which reflects the Absolute Truth while differences concern the exoteric aspects. This pre-assumption has a special significance in the Transcendental Unity of religions and serves a foundation on which the whole idea is built. A question may be posed at this pre-assumption. What reason is at hand for this implied claim that the objective of all religions is to reveal the Absolute Truth and Being? One of the important points lies in the very difference existing between the objectives of religions. Major differences separating religions in this connection prevent us from busying ourselves with generalities. Schoun also employs the mystical separation of exoteric and esoteric aspects for proposing another point about religions too. But the above statement clarifies the difference between Schoun's idea and that of the mystics. The mystics, by putting forth the issue of pantheism and stating that the universe is a manifestation of Divine Truth, have demonstrated the relation between Indefinite (God) and finite (the manifest), The manifest beings are limited but all are intrinsically united. The esoteric side of the universe is the Absolute Being. Now if we employ, like he mystics, the same model to depict the manner in which God and universe are related, still its imposition on religions and using it for understanding their multiplicity is faced with problems. Lack of Rationality Shoun and traditionalists in general, do not prove their points of view in a logical way and fail to offer rational evidences to support them. "Transcendental Unity of Religions" is not an exception to this Alireza Qaeminia 71 general practice of traditionalists and no conventional rationalization is offered on it. Schoun only proposes a special model by resorting to the mystical separation of esoteric from exoteric in order to understand religious multiplicity. But no view shall be all organized by offering a model only. The model should be proven as a sound one. Why other models are unable to explain the multiplicity of religions? what prerogative does the idea of Transcendental Unity of religion have as compared to other models? Schoun has no acceptable response to such questions. He has just accepted a pre-assumption and bases his model of understanding religions multiplicity on that. His pre-assumption is that all religions are truthful and demonstrate the Divine Reality and Absolute Being. Pluralism is the main pre-assumption of traditionalists who maintain no doubt about it. The pre-assumption is among the achievements of the new trend of thought and modernism. Moderm societies have accepted pluralism as an applied principle. Though against the new trend of thought, traditionalists are also influenced by it in looking at religions. Of course the terms they use differ from those employed by advocates of new trend of thought but traditionalists follow the former in the said pre-assumption. Notes 1. Oldmeadow, Traditionalism, 2000, p. 69. 2. Nasr, 2005, p.40. 3. Schoun, Gnosis, 1959, p.25. 4. Ibid, p. 29. 5. Ibid, p. 117. 6. Ibid, p. 13-14. 7. Schuon, The Transcendent Unity of Religions, 1984, p.218. 8. Oldmeadow, 1974. 9. Ibid. 10. Schuon, 1959:I. 11. Schuon, 1984: xii, xiii. 72 Religions: Unity or multiplicity? 12. Ibn fanari, 1984: p. 5. 13. Al-Kashani, 2000. 14. Schoun, 2004: p.30. 15. Ibid: p.32-33. Bibliogeraphy * Quran Edwin, Hohn, The philosophy of S.H. Nasr,; Auxier & Stone, Open Court 2001. Frithjof, Schoun, Islam and Prennial Philosophy Tr. F. Rasekhi- , Hermes Publications, Tehran,Iran, 2003. Frithjof, Schoun, The Transcendent Unity of Religions, U.S.A. 1984. Frithjof, Schoun, Gnosis; Divine Wisdom, Great Britain, Maekays of Chatham 1959. Frithjof, Schoun, Wisdom and Wisdom of Wisdom, Tr. Babak Alikhani, Hermes Publications Tehran, 2005. Kashani, K.A, Lata'if , Mirath Maktub Center 2000. Kenneth, Oldmeadow, Traditionalism, U.S.A. 2000. Nasr, S.H, Knowledge and Spirituality, Tr. Enshaallah Rahmati, Sohravardi Publications, Tehran,Iran. 2001. Nasr, S.H, Need for the Sacred Knowledge, Tr. Hassan Mianclari, Entesharat, Qom,Iran, 2000. Nasr, S.H, Prennial Wisdom, V.l, Soroush Co., 2003. Nasr, S.H, The Sufi Teachings , Qasideh Sara, 2003. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 73-88 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism Amir Dastmalchian* Abstract Much has been said on the religious pluralism of John Hick but little attention has been given to a key step in his argument for religious pluralism. This key step is the observation that the universe is religiously ambiguous. Hick himself is ambiguous about what he means by 'religious ambiguity'. In this essay I will attempt to rectify this ambiguity by analysing the notion of 'religious ambiguity' and arguing what interpretation of this term Hick must commit himself to. Keywords: John Hick, pluralism, diversity, ambiguity, epistemology, philosophy, religion. Introduction John Hick is arguably the foremost philosophical proponent of religious pluralism today. An Interpretation of Religion is widely viewed as the final statement of his theory of religion.1 In this book Hick expresses the idea that religious experience (construed very broadly) provides a justification for adopting religious beliefs. This is because, Hick claims, it is rational for a *. Department of Theology and Religious Studies, King's College London, United Kingdom. E-mail: [email protected] 74 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism person to adopt religious beliefs in accordance with his experience. But different people have different experiences so how can they all be rational in their conflicting beliefs? This is the epistemic problem of religious diversity. Hick's solution to the problem is to recognise that people have different, yet equally justified, experiences of the same ambiguous reality. Furthermore, all religions are partially correct with no religion being completely correct. No religion is completely correct because any human interpretation of reality is very limited. Hick is not altogether clear on what he means by 'religious ambiguity', even though it is an important part of his argument for his interpretation of religion. Hick says, By the religious ambiguity of the world I do not mean that it has no definite character but that it is capable from our present human vantage point of being thought and experienced in both religious and naturalistic ways.2 However, Hick speaks of the "objective ambiguity" of the universe as if to say there is something in the character of the universe which is ambiguous: the universe, as presently accessible to us, is religiously ambiguous in that it is capable of being interpreted intellectually and experientially in both religious and naturalistic ways. [...] [T]he objective ambiguity of our environment consists in the fact that it is capable of being interpreted in a variety of ways [...].3 So, on the one hand Hick seems to speak of the universe having a definite character, and on the other hand he speaks of the universe having an indefinite character. This essay is aimed at discovering how exactly we should interpret Hick. I will begin by outlining Hick's interpretation of religion. Secondly, I will discuss what 'religious ambiguity' could mean. Thirdly, I conclude by stressing that the success of Hick's interpretation of religion depends on further argument. Hick's Interpretation of Religion Amir Dastmalchian 75 The Justification for Religious Belief At the beginning of his argument for the reasonableness of religious belief Hick makes it clear that it is by way of religious experience that religious belief can be made to seem reasonable.4 According to Hick, for a person to undergo religious experiences is for the person to make a choice about the way he interprets the universe that surrounds him. In a phrase, a person who undergoes religious experience lives by faith and not by sight such that he, for example, feels as if his life is lived in the presence of God.5 Hick does not aim to show that religious experiences are veridical but rather that it is reasonable for those who have them to suppose that they are veridical. Hick points out that we have to rely on our sensory experiences even though we cannot logically prove them to be veridical. There is no logical proof, suggests Hick, of an external world yet it is reasonable to believe in our sensory experiences.6 Similarly, we have to rely on our religious experiences even though we cannot prove them to be veridical. From Hick's discussion of the reasonableness of religious belief it transpires that he is referring to epistemic justification deontologically construed. Hick is under no pretence that a person cannot be wrong about his religious experience.7 The point Hick is trying to make is just that it is reasonable for a person who undergoes religious experience to suppose that his experiences are veridical.8 In this regard Hick specifically mentions entitlement.9 The foregoing resonates with the approaches of other contemporary analytical philosophers of religion. For example, the doxastic practice approach of Alston10, Plantinga's basic belief apologetic,11 and Swinburne's Principle of Credulity.12 Alston, Hick, Plantinga, and Swinburne all believe that, generally speaking, 76 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism religious experiences can be trusted. However, Hick (unlike the others) has a partly Kantian epistemology; for Hick religious experience cannot be trusted to give information about reality in any straightforward sense of reality, as will soon be discussed. The Epistemic Challenge from Religious Diversity As I have explained, Hick affirms that religious experience justifies religious belief. However, different people have different religious experiences and this has given rise to different religious beliefs. Can all the different beliefs, which may even contradict each other, be justified? If not, it would seem that Hick's suggestion has been defeated. If yes, then it would seem that there is an anomaly. For Hick, neither religious epistemic exclusivism nor naturalism can solve this problem.13 Religious epistemic exclusivism is the view that one particular religious ideology is exclusively true or justified. Naturalism here refers to the view which rejects religious experience as delusory. Hick feels pushed to find a path to religious epistemic pluralism which is the view that more than one particular religious ideology is true or justified. Although Hick believes that it is reasonable for a person to trust his religious experiences to be veridical and to form beliefs on the basis of them he maintains that it would be arbitrary to hold one's own religious experiences as reasonable to the exception of all others, in the absence of good reasons.14 As Hick (in debate with fellow Christians) says, the alternative to some kind of religious pluralism is to leave unexplained the immensely significant fact that the other great world faiths are as epistemically well based as Christianity; and also that they seem, when judged by their fruits, to be morally on a par with Christianity.15 Indeed, for Hick, epistemic pluralism saves the credibility of religious belief. Were it not for the pluralist explanation for Amir Dastmalchian 77 religious diversity, suggests Hick, we would have to doubt the reliability of religious experience and therefore religious belief.16 After all, mutually inconsistent reports of an event would create doubts concerning the reliability of each report. Similarly, mutually inconsistent religious ideologies create doubts concerning the reliability of each ideology. Hick's Religious Epistemic Pluralism At this juncture in the essay it is appropriate to present in more detail the understanding of religion which Hick believes solves the epistemic challenge of religious diversity. Hick's understanding of religion results in various types of pluralism, of which epistemic pluralism (defined above) will be of interest to me in this essay. Hick builds his interpretation of religion, which has both epistemological and non-epistemological aspects, upon a simple Kantian distinction which he claims is one of Kant's most basic epistemological insights.17 The distinction is between two types of reality: reality as it is in itself and reality as it is perceived by a subject. The former type of reality may be called 'actuality' but Kant calls it the 'noumenon'. The latter type of reality involves the interpretation of the mind of the subject and is therefore called 'phenomenal' by Kant. So, the noumenal world is that which exists independently of human consciousness whereas the phenomenal world is the world as it appears to human consciousness. Hick claims that the idea that the mind contributes to the character of its perceived environment has been "massively confirmed" by cognitive and social psychology and in the sociology of knowledge.18 According to Hick the Kantian distinction between noumenal and phenomenal is also supported by the realisation that it is quite normal to expect something to appear differently to different people depending 78 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism upon their location, their sensory and mental faculties, and their interpretive habits.19 Hick appeals to this distinction to argue for a pluralist "hypothesis". The hypothesis is that each of the great religious traditions of the world is based on an attempt to understand the noumenon but each great religious tradition only manages to construct a partially adequate understanding of the noumenon in its own cultural terms. In other words, the understanding of the noumenon in each religious tradition is only how the noumenon appears to the people in that tradition. For the pluralist hypothesis Hick replaces reference to the 'noumenon' with reference to the 'Real' as it is in itself.20 The 'Real' is Hick's preferred term for the 'Ultimate', the 'One', or 'Ultimate Reality', and so forth. The equivalent of phenomenal reality in the pluralist hypothesis is the Real as variously understood by different religious traditions rather than as it actually is. The Real as it is in itself transcends positive characterisations by humans; it can only be known via negativa, that is, by saying what it is not.21 For example, the Real is not finite and is not fully knowable by humans. The Real as it is in itself cannot be experienced by humans therefore there are no human concepts which are applicable to the Real as it is in itself.22 It follows that no human descriptions of the Real can be literally true. Although literal descriptions of the Real are not possible Hick does allow for non-literal descriptions of the Real. Hick calls these 'myths'.23 A true myth appropriately relates us to the Real by causing us to behave appropriately in relation to the Real and to have an appropriate attitude regarding it. In practice an appropriate relation to the Real is for a response to any one of its manifestations to be appropriate. The manifestations of the Real are the various personal deities and impersonal absolutes of Amir Dastmalchian 79 the world religions such as Allah, God the Father, Shiva, and Brahman. Hick says the Real is a required postulate in order to solve the challenge of religious diversity.24 However, others have criticised the concept of the 'Real' by saying either that it is such a vague concept that it is useless or that it is defined through so many negations that it amounts to nothing. Aslan considers the concept of the Real to be the most problematic aspect of Hick's pluralistic hypothesis.25 But it occurs to me that the problem of affirming and describing a transcendent ineffable being is not unique to Hick. For the introduction to the second edition of An Interpretation of Religion Hick lists the objections which have been made to his book and accordingly offers responses. The first objection and response is in fact regarding the concept of the Real. As alluded to above, Hick's interpretation of religion, applies to the great religious traditions, but what distinguishes great religious traditions from non-great religious traditions? It is the ability to transform a person from self-centredness to realitycentredness. Hick says, Religious traditions in their various components – beliefs, modes of experience, scriptures, rituals, disciplines, ethics and lifestyles, social rules and organisations – have greater or less value according as they promote or hinder the salvific transformation [sic].26 With the pluralist hypothesis in place Hick discusses various theistic and non-theistic conceptions of the Real and argues in some detail that they are all consistent with his hypothesis. Hick's claim is that the distinction between the Real as it is in itself and as experienced is present in each of the great religious traditions, but to differing degrees.27 Hick's pluralist interpretation of religion appears to solve the 80 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism challenge of religious diversity with a simple postulation, specifically, the postulation of the Real. The pluralist hypothesis maintains that it is not just the core beliefs of one religious tradition which are true but rather that the core beliefs of all the great religious traditions are true (at least mythically or nonliterally so). Although the pluralist hypothesis advocates that some changes need to be made within religious traditions in order to accommodate the hypothesis these changes, it is argued, are not alien to the religious traditions. It is not advocated that such radical reinterpretations of religion be made as those of anti-realists such as Braithwaite, Cupitt, Feuerbach, Phillips, and Randall (all of whom are discussed by Hick).28 Religious Ambiguity What is Religious Ambiguity? Ambiguity can be construed in two main ways. On the one hand it can mean that those aspects of the universe which can be experienced appear ambiguous to humans as a result of ignorance (which is potentially 'overcomable'). I will call this temporary ambiguity. On the other hand 'ambiguity' can mean that the experiencable universe is itself ambiguous and will always be ambiguous however much knowledge humans obtain. I will call this permanent ambiguity. The first meaning of 'ambiguity' invokes a sense of the unknown and the second meaning invokes a sense of the unknowable. I define temporary religious ambiguity as follows. The experiencable universe is temporarily religiously ambiguous if, at a given time, and despite the best of human intellectual efforts, one religious ideology cannot be distinguished from others on truth-conducive grounds, without there being reason to suggest that this stalemate must necessarily be the case for all time. As for permanent religious ambiguity, it can be defined Amir Dastmalchian 81 similarly. The experiencable universe is permanently religiously ambiguous if it is inescapably the case in this life that one religious ideology can never be distinguished from all other religious ideologies on truth-conducive evidential grounds. That many people of intelligence subscribe to different religious ideologies suggests that the universe is at least temporarily religiously ambiguous, for if it were otherwise then intelligent people would not have disagreed on how it should be conceptualised. In the case of temporary religious ambiguity only one of a number of incompatible religious ideologies will be true. But perhaps the subject matter of religion is too complex to be either true or false in which case the idea that the world is permanently religiously ambiguous becomes credible. A person could, for example, reasonably interpret reality as created rather than an uncreated brute fact; mystical experience as veridical rather than hallucinatory; or a person may interpret his life in terms of destiny rather than chance. If there are no facts of the matter regarding these differing interpretations of features of the universe then a permanent religious ambiguity thesis would seem appropriate. One likeness of permanent ambiguity is that of the physical ambiguity of light. Light can in cases correctly be interpreted as being a particle and in other cases correctly be interpreted as being a wave. Another likeness of permanent ambiguity is that of the duck-rabbit puzzle picture which can be correctly experienced as either a rabbit or as a duck. If the experiencable universe is temporarily ambiguous it means that the universe has a precise and definite character but is nevertheless understood in different ways due to incomplete knowledge about it. In this scenario, it could be said that humans are at present dumbfounded by the universe but an advanced race (such as the human race in 1,000 years time) may 82 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism find ways to calculate the answers to religious, ideological, metaphysical, and philosophical questions akin to the way we now calculate complicated mathematical problems. For example, in principle there is a unique correct answer for 1,985,4364,353 × e2,132, but in practice a human would require a computer to find the correct answer to a good level of accuracy. If the experienceable universe is permanently ambiguous it has an imprecise and indefinite character and the property of being understood in different ways even if there is complete knowledge about it. Permanent ambiguity is about more than a thing having different aspects. For example, something as mundane as water has different aspects, that is, it can correctly be understood in different ways by chemists, sociologists, and economists, and so forth. But water is not permanently ambiguous because the understandings chemists, sociologists, economists, and so forth, have of water are not incompatible. Neither do each of the understandings claim to be comprehensive, that is, about all (or many) aspects of water. There is yet another way to explain the two senses of religious ambiguity. The world is temporarily religiously ambiguous if an omniscient and perfectly reasonable being could judge one of the many differing human religious ideologies to be true. However, if an omniscient and perfectly reasonable being recognises that a number of the differing human religious ideologies are equally true then the world is permanently religiously ambiguous. Permanent religious ambiguity could be due to human cognitive limitations rather than the way the universe is in itself. According to this idea, try as we might, we humans are just not capable of understanding the universe as it really is, that is, as an omniscient and perfectly reasonable being understands it. This is because humans interpret the experiencable universe by using Amir Dastmalchian 83 concepts and can therefore only see the universe, so to speak, through tinted spectacles and not as the universe in fact is. The thesis that the experiencable universe is religiously ambiguous could be both an epistemological and a metaphysical thesis. It is clearly an epistemological thesis, in both its temporary and permanent forms, because it makes a claim about our knowledge: either that our religious beliefs are highly disputable or that there is no single correct way to think of, or give religious meaning to, the experiencable universe. I think the permanent religious ambiguity thesis could also be understood to be a metaphysical thesis if it says the universe is so constructed that it does not lend itself to unambiguous religious interpretation, even by a cognitive subject with unlimited powers and information. Hick's Argument for Religious Ambiguity Before determining the type of religious ambiguity Hick needs to commit himself to in order to make his pluralist hypothesis coherent, it would be prudent to acquire a deeper understanding of religious ambiguity in Hick's thought. This can be done by examining Hick's arguments for religious ambiguity. Hick lends support to his observation that the universe is religiously ambiguous by way of two theses which will be explained below. There is also an additional idea which can be gleaned from his work. This will be presented below also. Cognitive Freedom According to Hick our environment is capable of being interpreted, or given meaning, in a variety of ways.29 Hick identifies three aspects, or levels, of the universe to which humans respond.30 These levels are the natural (or physical), the 84 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism social (or ethical), and the religious. We have great liberty to interpret the universe at the religious level and also at the social level. Hick calls this liberty 'cognitive freedom'. The appropriateness of a person's response to the physical aspect of the universe is largely determined. If a person responds to the physical aspect of the universe in an inappropriate way, that is, does not understand it correctly or does not find it meaningful then he may well die. In contrast to the physical level of universe, the appropriateness of a person's response to the ethical aspect of the universe is largely (but not completely) undetermined. When a person interacts with others he has an inclination to treat them as people also. Anything other than this would be hardhearted to say the least. However, he can subdue or go against his inclination that the humans he interacts with are people and that he has a duty to behave ethically toward them. Hick points out that people often manage to convince themselves strongly that unethical behaviour is ethical behaviour.31 At the religious level people are able to completely ignore any religious yearning or tendency to interpret life experiences in a religious way. Hick develops a concept of 'experiencing-as' from Wittgenstein's concept of 'seeing-as' in order to explain how a person gives meaning to the universe.32 The outcome in consciousness of interpreting the universe is that an object is experienced as such-and-such. This is true, according to Hick, for all conscious experience. For example, the famous duckrabbit puzzle picture which can correctly be experienced in different ways. Other examples include experiencing a building as a house, or experiencing a figure near the letterbox as a human who is a postman. 'Experiencing-as' can also be called 'recognising' or 'identifying'. In sum, Hick maintains that all conscious experience is "concept-laden" because people, Amir Dastmalchian 85 through use of language, have created conceptual structures with which they have interpreted their experiences.33 The different conceptual structures present among people reflect the different cultures of the earth and allow scope for there to be different interpretations of the universe. Theism vs. Naturalism Hick further argues for religious ambiguity by assessing arguments for and against theism. Hick uses theism as an example to illustrate that arguments for religious viewpoints are not definitive. Hick assesses numerous arguments for theism and numerous arguments for naturalism and finds that none of them are definitive and therefore feels forced to conclude that the universe is religiously ambiguous.34 In other words, for Hick, religious ambiguity is the best explanation for religious diversity. This is rather like a pessimistic meta-induction: because all of the main arguments for theism or for naturalism can be interpreted in different ways all such arguments will be interpretable in different ways.35 Not only can the phenomena which are used to support a religious outlook of the universe have their persuasive force neutralised, so too can the phenomena which are used to support a non-religious outlook of the universe have their persuasive force neutralised. Gödel's Theorem Gödel's first incompleteness theorem shows that any formal system that includes enough of the theory of natural numbers is incomplete. This means that the system contains statements that are neither provably true nor provably false. Hick speculates that perhaps there is something like this in metaphysics.36 So, for any system of religious belief there is at least one belief which is 86 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism unprovable. After all, religious systems of belief seek to conceptualise that which we, as humans, are ourselves a part of, namely religious reality. Perhaps it is theoretically impossible for us to ever comprehend religious reality in its entirety. Conclusion Having presented Hick's pluralist interpretation of religion, and having distinguished between two types of religious ambiguity, we are now in a position to ask whether Hick advocates temporary religious ambiguity or permanent religious ambiguity. From the two quotations in the introduction it would seem that Hick advocates both types of religious ambiguity! This, of course, is something which is not possible. In my view, the plausibility of Hick's religious epistemic pluralism depends on the presence of permanent religious ambiguity in the experienceable universe. This is because if the experiencable universe is temporarily religiously ambiguous a religious epistemic exclusivist may still have confidence in the truth of his own religious beliefs – perhaps expecting that they will eventually be shown to be true – but if the experiencable universe is permanently religiously ambiguous he will have grounds for no such hope and his exclusivism will be misplaced. There is scope for Hick to offer clarification on which type of religious ambiguity he subscribes to. But if he does subscribe to permanent religious ambiguity, as I have suggested he should, he faces the challenge of providing an argument for this. Furthermore, the plausibility of Hick's interpretation of religion, and consequently his religious epistemic pluralism, will depend on the success of any such argument Amir Dastmalchian 87 Notes 1. Hick, John, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent (Houndmills and London: Macmillan, 1989, 210. A second edition has been published with a new introduction where Hick responds to some key criticisms, see John Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 2nd ed. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. 2. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 73. 3. Ibid., 129. 4. Ibid., 210. 5. Ibid., 210-211. 6. Ibid., 213, 214. 7. Ibid., 210, 212, 223. 8. Ibid., 211-212. 9. Ibid., 216. 10. Alston, William P, Perceiving God: The Epistemology of Religious Experience, Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1991. 11. Plantinga, Alvin, Warranted Christian Belief, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. 12. Swinburne, Richard G, The Existence of God, 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004. 13. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 234-235. 14. Hick, John, "The Epistemological Challenge of Religious Pluralism," Faith and Philosophy 14, no. 3, 1997: 278, Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 235. 15. Hick, "The Epistemological Challenge of Religious Pluralism," 279. 16. Ibid., 278. 17. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 240. 18. Ibid. 19. Ibid., 242. 20. As often as not, Hick speaks of the Real 'an sich' which is German for 'as it is'. 21. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 238, 239. 2. Ibid., 246. 23. Ibid., 248. 24. Ibid., 249. 25. Aslan, Adnan, Religious Pluralism in Christian and Islamic Philosophy: The Thought of John Hick and Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Richmond: Curzon Press, 1998. 26. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 300. 27. Ibid. 28. See Ibid., ch. 12. 29. Ibid., 12, 129. 30. Ibid., 12, 132. 31. Ibid., 150-151. 32. Ibid., 140. 33. Ibid., 142. 88 Religious Ambiguity in Hick's Religious Pluralism 34. Ibid., part 2. 35. The phrase 'pessimistic meta-induction' is the name given to an argument in the philosophy of science. The argument objects to scientific realism on the basis that past theories have proven false. 36. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, 354. Bibliogeraphy Alston, William P. Perceiving God: The Epistemology of Religious Experience. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1991. Aslan, Adnan. Religious Pluralism in Christian and Islamic Philosophy: The Thought of John Hick and Seyyed Hossein Nasr. Richmond: Curzon Press, 1998. Hick, John. "The Epistemological Challenge of Religious Pluralism." Faith and Philosophy 14, no. 3, 1997, 277-286. Hick, John, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent. Houndmills and London: Macmillan, 1989. Hick, John, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent. 2nd ed. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. Plantinga, Alvin. Warranted Christian Belief. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Swinburne, Richard G. The Existence of God. 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 89-100 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric and Practice of Religious Pluralism in India Chakraborty Amitava* Abstract India has a long history marked by both religious dogmatism and pluralism. This article aims at offering an introduction to some important moments of the pluralist experience and expression of Indian tradition. The essay begins with a discussion into Anekantavada, the pluralist epistemological and ontological theory of the Jains, an ancient religion; followed by an account of the pluralist experimentation of the medieval Mughal emperor Akbar. This study of examples selected from distant times is expected to introduce the reader to two of the finest moments of pluralist experiments and conceptualizations in India. The article ends with some speculations regarding the relevance of the experiences and conceptualization discussed above. Keywords: Jain, Anekantavada, Syadvada, Naya, Akbar, Din-i-Ilahi, Rah-i-Aql, Sufism, Pluralist Religious Policy. 1 While religious clashes of various volume pose threat to even *. Associate Professor, Department of Modern Indian Languages and Litrary Studies,University of Delhi, India. E-mail: [email protected] 90 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric ... the most cohesive of contemporary societies and take the character of civilizational clashes more than often, nothing could be best thought of but revisiting the pluralist rhetoric and experiences of various religions. Understanding contemporary religions from a pluralist perspective, even remodeling religious practices from such an understanding must be felt fit by most; given the usually monolithic disposition that mark religious traditions; however, what could be better if we could locate pluralist sanction in the tradition itself? With this understanding, present article offers a tour into the Indian tradition, a search into the rhetoric of pluralism available in this tradition. This is not to deny that Indian religions have often postulated, accommodated, preached and practiced religious dogmatism; nevertheless, there is aplenty of moments of pluralist postulations and practices as well. As Harold Coward has noted in an interesting study on pluralist experience of modern India: "India is perhaps the world's oldest and most interesting 'living laboratory of religious pluralism"1 In this paper, some moments of religious pluralism experimented in that laboratory are explored to provide an insight into the valuable pluralist utterances which shall serve the purpose of a better understanding of the Indian religious tradition, and, offer useful terms for dealing with the contemporary preachers of the religious dogmatism. The survey, therefore, offers a descriptive introduction to moments of religious pluralism as experienced and manifested in diverse productions of religious culture, like epistemology, religious practice and state policy, chosen from various epochs of Indian history. In a chronological mode, we propose to discuss the Anekantavadi epistemology postulated by the Jains, an ancient religious tradition of India and the religious experience and policies of Akbar, the 16th century Mughal emperor, as part of a cultural location with a complexly Chakraborty Amitava 91 interconnected history. 2 Jainism, a religion with a history of more than two thousand years, tracing its beginning back to Mahavira (599-527 BC), had postulated a theory of reality and knowledge which was essentially pluralist. Jain theory of Anekantavada, supported by Syadvada and Naya, makes possible an epistemology of pluralism to its best. Explaining the etymological meaning of the term Anekanta, Samani Charitrapragya comments: "The term anekanta consists of two words "aneka" (more than one) and "anta" (qualities, attributes or ends)."2 Naya means "the method of comprehending things from particular standpoints"3 adopted by the inquirers. Nayavada regards ordinary, non-omniscient knowledge claims as limited by the particular standpoint on which they are based. This epistemological position was reasonably linked with a pluralist ontology, as manifested in Siddasena's assertion: "Since a thing has manifold character, it is (fully) comprehendible (only) by the omniscient. But a thing becomes the subject matter of a naya, when it is conceived from one particular standpoint."4 Siddhasena accepts the partial truth of all possible standpoints, and also their partial fallibility: "All the standpoint (nayas) are (sic) right in their own respective spheres but if they are taken to be refutations, each of the other, then they are wrong. But a man who knows the 'non-one-sided' nature of reality never says that a particular view is absolutely wrong."5 Jains also introduced the concept of Syat, which stands for "multiplicity or multiple possibilities" and "allows us to logically express or determine the nature of modes from different perspectives"6 Bhadrabahu, a fourth century Jain preacher, explained the principle of Syadvada. The principle of 92 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric ... Syadvada maintains that manysidedness of reality and limitations of given standpoint of truth claims require that all knowledge claims be qualified in various ways.7 From the abovementioned understanding of Naya, Jains propose a sevenfold reality and propositions about reality, depending on the naya or standpoint of the inquirer. Samantabhadra's Aptamimamsa describes such possible forms of reality and proposition: A thing is existent – from a certain point of view; It is non-existent – from another point of view; it is both existent and non-existent in turn – from a third point of view; It is indescribable (that is, both existent and non-existent simultaneously) – from a fourth point of view; it is existent and indescribable – from a fifth point of view; it is nonexistent and indescribable – from a sixth point of view; it is both existent and non-existent and indescribable – from a seventh point of view. Syadvada mandates qualifying each proposition with the property of probability, formulating the sevenfold proposition as follows: May be, it is; may be, it is not; may be, it is and it is not; may be, it is indescribable; may be, it is and yet it is indescribable; may be, it is not and it is also indescribable; may be, it is and it is not and it is also indescribable. It is notable, how the Jain epistemology also accommodates the 'inexpressible' as a possible description of reality. The statement accommodating the possibility of the inexpressible is considered to be the most important one in the Jain epistemology as that type accommodates even the most bizarre of the positions possible in argumentation. By recognizing possibility of various positions and descriptions of reality, Jains, however, do not propagate exclusivity or relativism, rather mandate assuming other perspectives. According to Jains, as nyays offer only partial understanding, only a combination of nayas can lead one to a total understanding of the truth. The valid means of knowledge for Jains is therefore Pramana which Chakraborty Amitava 93 takes into cognizance all possible standpoints. An anekantavadi position would necessarily take care of all propositions as expressions of partial truth. Siddhasena writes: "All the nayas, therefore, in their exclusively individual standpoints are absolutely faulty. If, however, they consider themselves as supplementary to each other, they are right in their viewpoints...(I)f all the nayas arrange themselves in a proper way and supplement each other, then alone they are worthy of being termed as "the whole truth" or the right view in its entirety."8 Based on such an epistemology and ontology, pluralism becomes a precondition for attaining Truth for the Jains. It is this pluralist attitude which is manifested in Mahavira's saying: "Those who praise their own faiths and ideologies and blame that of their opponents and thus distort the truth will remain confined to the cycle of birth and death."9 Jainism thus mandates an acceptance of the truth claims of religions, including those of Jainism, to be true, albeit partially, and also mandates an accommodative appreciation of all probable religious positions for an understanding of the whole truth. Pluralism thus becomes a precondition for reaching at true knowledge in Jain epistemology. This characteristic could enable the followers of Mahavira to promulgate open positions like the following: "I have no bias for Mahavira, and none against Kapila and others. Reasonable words alone are acceptable to me, whosever's they might be."10 It is needed to be appreciated that such utterance, made about the founder of the respective religion was made possible only due to the specific epistemology of that religion, which was impossible to be decreed as an expression of disrespect from that theoretical perspective, rather should be considered as a logical and necessary formulation. 94 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric ... 3 Centuries after Jains formulated their pluralist ontology and epistemology, they were invited to deliberate on their religion in the court of a Muslim Emperor, Akbar (1542-1605), who himself was then involved in the most fascinating experiment with religious pluralism in Indian history. The sixteenth century Mughal emperor was in search of a religious code which could accommodate the best of all religion and stay free of limitations. He considered the search of a collective religious code as a divine duty. Abul Fazal quotes him saying : "Although I am the master of so vast a kingdom, and, all the appliances of government are in my hand, yet since the greatness consists in doing the will of God, my mind is not at ease in the diversity of sects and creeds: and apart from that outward pomp of circumstance, with what satisfaction in my despondency can I undertake the sway of the empire: I wait in coming of some man or principle, who will resolve the difficulties of my conscience."11 His experimentation started with the process of understanding the comparative acceptability of the thesis of different existent sects of Islam, plenty of them by then; and soon extended to consulting other religious groups resulting in the promulgation of a new code of belief and practice, known as Din-i-Ilahi, assimilating traits from various religions, guided by the Sufi policy of Sulah-i-Kul, universal peace and toleration, and his own policy of Rah-i-Aql, the path of reason. Akbar built a Hall of Worship (Ibadat Khana) in 1973 for holding discussion on theological and philosophical questions. Different groups of Islamic theologicians, Sheikhs, Sayyids and Ulama were given different places for debate. Soon, Akbar also started inviting scholars and preachers of other religions, Brahmin (Hindu)-JainParsee-Bauddha-Christian, for deliberation and debate. They were granted space for offering prayer and preaching. As Abul Fazal, his Chakraborty Amitava 95 biographer12 writes: "A proclamation was issued that on that night of illumination, all orders and sects of mankind those who searched after spiritual and physical Truth, and those of common public who sought for an awakening, and the enquiries of every sect – should assemble in the precincts of the holy edifice, and bring forward their spiritual experiences and their degrees of knowledge of the Truth in various and contradictory forms in this bridal chamber manifestation. ...Sufi philosopher, orator, jurists, Sunni, Shia, Nazarene, Jew, Sabi (Christians of St. John), Zoroastrians thus enjoyed exquisite pleasure by beholding the calmness of the Assembly, the sitting of the world-lord on the lofty pulpit and the adornment of the pleasant abode of impartiality."13 His quest resulted in his proclamation of the pluralist religious code of Din-i-Ilahi. Surely, history has rarely witnessed an emperor taking such pain to reach at the Truth, through the interaction of preachers and practitioners of all affiliation; pluralist attitude was glowing at its best. In this process of interaction with other religious groups, he also granted them some rights and concessions which transformed his administration into a supporter of religious pluralism, exceptional amongst the known empires of medieval era. Brahmans like Debi and Purushottam visited Akbar. Akbar "praised the truth-seeking of the natives of India and eloquently described the companionship of fidelity, property, life, reputation and religion which are reckoned as comprising the four goods of the world market."14 Akbar adopted some practices of the Hindu religion, like, putting an auspicious mark (Tilak) on the forehead, decreeing the slaughter of cows a capital offence. He, along with royal ladies, made grants for Hindu temples. He liked the teachings of the Parsees that one can approach God through any religion and that the prophets had 96 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric ... been so numerous only to show that there were different ways to God; he paid veneration to the Sun, ordered that a sacred fire be kept burning under the supervision of Abul Fazal, learnt some religious terms and rules of the old Parsees, adopted the Parsee calendar and some Parsee festivals. He offered honor and grant to Parsee religious leaders. Akbar also honored Jain preachers like Padma Sunder, Buddhisagar, Shuddhakirti, Hir Vijay Suri, Jai Chandra Suri, and Bhanu Chandra Upadhyay. He ordered the release of caged birds and prisoners, abolished the confiscation of the property of deceased persons, abolished Jezia tax, a tax levied on Non-Islamic pilgrimages, and, another tax on non-Islamic pilgrimage;15 prohibited the slaughter of animals on certain days, and, vowed not to eat flesh on Fridays. He liked the Jain idea that God is one but differently named in different faiths. He requested the Portuguese authorities of Goa to send Christian missionaries to his court. Two Jesuit fathers, Rodolfe Aquaviva and Antonio Monserrate visited Akbar; the emperor placed Bible on his head after removing his turban and then kissed it. He allowed the Jesuits to build a church and made building of synagogue, idol temple, Parsee tower of silence etc permissible. The experimentation resulted into the proclamation of the code of Din-i-Ilahi,16 in a General Council in 1581, in which Akbar could accommodate the traits of various religions which he felt of value, accumulated through his interaction with these religions. Din-i-Ilahi was perhaps the most important test of the pluralist attitude of Akbar, which being his conceptualization, which he believed to have concentrated the best of all religions, could be made compulsory with all good intention. But, Akbar proved to be an ideal pluralist in preaching the new code. He continued to support other religions and sects, Chakraborty Amitava 97 showed no dishonor to his officers who preferred not to accept the new code, and did not ask the disciples of Din-i-Ilahi to denounce belief in their own religion. Though Din-i-Ilahi was proclaimed in 1981, he honored Parsee religious leader Dastur Ardhesir in 1592, who stayed for five years in Akbar's court; in 1594, he sent an ambassador to Goa to ask for a mission to instruct him in the doctrines of Christianity, and received the mission with due respect in 1595; in 1591, Jain saint Jai Chandra Suri was invited by the emperor, and was offered due honor. Surely, Akbar had no intention to impose Din-i-Ilahi on his subjects, nor was his quest and interaction with other religions end with the proclamation of Din-i-Ilahi. His tryst with religious plurality continued and as the emperor, he was practicing the policy of religious pluralism in a manner suitable to an Anekantavadi at his best. 4 Jainism had a history of more than thousand years; centuries have passed after Akbar had his pluralist experiment; yet, assaults on religious pluralism has continued to grow, taking lives of thousands of innocent people in its cruelest manifestation and constraining free exchange of ideas and practices in its subtle operation. Arguing for pluralist understanding of religion, therefore, remain the most important agenda of the contemporary world. Liberal intellectuals cannot more stress upon the need of revisiting the concept of Anekantavada, or, the mission of Akbar. Koller explains how Jain epistemology is the ideal one for conflict resolution by foregrounding its pluralistic bend: "The ideological dogmatism underlying violence is grounded in knowledge claims that though limited and only partially true, 98 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric ... are mistaken for absolute truth. Therefore, to avoid violence, one key step is to find an alternative theory of knowledge, an epistemology, (sic) that can support dialogue and negotiation among people of diverse perspectives and claims. Such an epistemology, that includes the truths of multiple perspectives, is made possible by the Jain philosophy of Anekantavada (nonabsolutism)."17 Some scholars had argued that true pluralist approach is impossible as all worldviews claim some truth added to it, leading to the position of moral relativism or religious exclusivism: "(T)here is no such thing as pluralism because pluralists are committed to holding some form of truth criteria and by virtue of this, anything that falls foul of such criteria is excluded from counting as truth (in doctrine and in practice). Thus, pluralism operates within the same logical structure of exclusivism and in this respect pluralism can never really affirm the genuine autonomous value of religious pluralism for, like exclusivism, it can only do so by tradition specific criteria for truth."18 Vallely, however, argues against this position, stressing upon the fact that-- "anekanta is a way out of this epistemological quagmire, and ... a genuine pluralist view is possible without lapsing into extreme moral relativism or exclusivity."19 As already exposed, Anekanta not only allows pluralism, rather, mandates a pluralist attitude. And, while Anekantavada works at the level of scholarly conceptualization, Akbar's experience brings into fore a state policy of pluralistic tolerance and interaction. Amartya Sen reasonably feels "It is worth recalling that in Akbar's pronouncements of four hundred years ago on the need for religious neutrality on the part of the state; we can identify the foundations of a nondenominational, secular state which was yet to be born in India or for that matter anywhere else." Thus, Akbar's reasoned conclusions, codified during 1591 and 1592, had universal implications. Europe had just as much reason to listen to that Chakraborty Amitava 99 message as India had."20 And, given the contemporary scenario of religious conflicts and one would agree that it still has universal implications. Jain theories and Akbar's policy experiment offer a multifarious exposure to religious pluralism, touching upon all possible areas of our existence, private as well as public, practical as well as theoretical, individual as well as collective. Notes 1. Coward : 1987 : xi 2. Charitrapragya : 2004: 80 3. Vidyabhusana: 1920:181 4. Siddhasena, Nyayavatara, 29 5. Siddhasena, as cited by Matilal : 1981 : 31 6. ibid p. 81 7. Koller:2001:90 8. Siddhasena Divakara: Sanmati Tarka, cited by Trapnell:1998:220 9. Sutrakrtanga 1.1.2.23, cited in Trapnell: 1998 : 219 10. Maibhadra, cited in Chatterjee and Datta: 1968: 105 11. Abul Fazal: Akbar Nama, III, Beveridge:1973: 386 12. Abul Fazal was more than a chronicler of Akbar's reign, he was a Sufi who believed in the policy of Sulah-i-Kul, and had, along with his father Sheikh Mubarak and brother Faizi, persuaded the emperor to adopt the policy of Sulahi-Kul. 13. Abul Fazal: Akbar Nama, III, Beveridge:1973:158 14. Abul Fazal, III, Beveridge:1974:371 15. Akbar, however, re-imposed the Jezia tax in 1975. 16. Scholars are divided on the issue whether Akbar meant Din-i-Ilahi to be a new religion. Prasad argue that Akbar remained a Muslim, Din-i-Ilahi being only an attempt at reform of the received tradition. "The Din-i-Ilahi must be treated as a sect in the same way as the Mutzalia sect or the Ismaili sect or the Roshni sect. It is so treated in the Dabistan. (Prasad: 1974: 397) Dabistan Mazahib was written by Mohsin Fani fifty years after the death of Akbar. (Trns. David, Shea and Anthony Tryer. 1843. Oriental Translation Fund) 17. Koller:2001:86 18. D'Costa: 1996: 226, in Vallely: 2004: 225-26 19. Valley: 2004: 100 20. Sen:2005:287 100 Tryst with Pluralism: Rhetoric ... Bibliography Beveridge, H, The Akbar Nama Of Abul Fazl (Hisotry of the Reign of Akbar Including an Account of His Predecessors (Trns), VolIII, Delhi: Ess Ess Publications, 1973. Charitrapragya, Samani, Mahavira, Anekantavada and the World Today, in Tara Sethia, 2004. Chatterjee, S and Datta, D, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy, Calcutta: University of Calcutta Press, 1968. Coward, H. G, Modern Indian Responses to Religious Pluralism, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987. D'Costa, G, "The Impossibility of a Pluralist View of Religions," Religious Studies, 32, 1996. Koller, J.M, Why is Anekantavada Important, in Mahaprajna: 2001. Mahaprajna, Acarya, Anekanta: Reflections and Clarifications, Ladnun: Jain Vishva Bharti Institute, 2001. Matilal, B.K, The Central Philosophy of Jainism (Anekanata-vada) Ahmedabad: L.D. Institute of Indology31, 1981. Prasad, Ishwari, The Mughal Empire , Allahabad: Chugh Publications, 1974. Prawdin, Michael, The Builders of the Mogul Empire, London: George Allen Unwin Ltd, 1963. Sen, Amartya, The Argumentative Indian, England: Allen Lane England, 2005. Siddhasena, Divakara: Nyayavatara, 29, A. N. Upadhye (ed). Bombay, Jaina Sahitya Vikas Mandal, 1971. Trapnell, J.B, "Indian Sources of a Pluralist View of Religions", Journal of Ecumenical Studies, 35:2, Spring, 1998. Vallely, A, Anekanta, Ahimsa and the Question of Pluralism in Sethia: 2004. Vidyabhusana, Satis Chandra, A History of Indian Logic: Ancient, Medieval and Modern Schools, Delhi: Motilal Banarassidas Publisher, 2002. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 101-113 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake Reza Akbari* Abstract John Hick's theory concerning plurality of religions is an ontologic pluralism according to which all religions are authentic ways for man to attain the "real an sich". Gods of religions are real as perceived and veridical hallucinations; while the "real an sich" has ineffable substantial and trans-categorical properties. Hick's view suffers from several problems. As a second order analysis of religions, Hick's view is not a correct one. To reject naturalism, it falls into an epistemological circle, where distinction between formal and substantial properties fades away. It seems that Hick is captured by a category mistake in the presentation of his own theory concerning authenticity of all religions to attain the "real an sich". Keywords: pluralism, formal properties, substantial properties, category mistake, trans-categorical. Introduction Through a review of various religions, we would easily find that God, man, and relation between the two are portrayed in various ways; and these images are, sometimes, in absolute *. Associate Professor,Department of Philosophy and Theology, Imam Sadiq University, Tehran, Iran.E-mail: [email protected] 102 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake opposition to each other. Conflicts between religions are not confined to theoretical issues but extend to practical points as well. Concerning diversity of religions, numerous theories have been proposed. In recent times, discussion about diversity of religions has turned into a philosophical one; and for the same reason, it is more accurate. Today, we find four main theories: naturalism, exclusivism, inclusivism, and pluralism. 1. A Review of Hick's View John Hick is the founder of one of the most important pluralist theories. John Hick's theory is among ontologic pluralist ones, which, as compared to epistemic pluralist theories, poses a stronger claim. Ontologic pluralist theories claim that truth of all religions is a factual one; whereas epistemic pluralist theories claim that no religion is able to prove its own validity for other religions; and since we have no reason, we assume that all religions are true and authentic; but that whether all religions are factually true and authentic is a point about which we cannot speak. John Hick's theory contains the following claims: A. In theoretical discussions of all great religions of the world (whether monotheistic or else) there is a combination of true and false claims. B. Man's salvation is attained through going from selfcenteredness to Real-centeredness and all religions are seeking to do so. C. All religions have been, to some extent, successful in guiding man towards Real-centeredness. D. All religions share the idea that possibility of man's salvation is based on belief in the Ultimate reality of the world; Reza Akbari 103 the same reality which is called in various religions variously "Allah", "Jehovah", "Sacred Trinity", and "Brahma". E. Based on the items A-D, all religions are considered authentic ways for man to relate to the same Divine Reality. To demonstrate the strength of his own pluralist theory, Hick has appealed to various arguments. Appealing to God's grace and strengthening it on sociological foundations is one of such arguments.1 It should be noted that this argument is merely for rejection of giving rewards to the followers of a single religion and punishments to the followers of other religions, and it does not prove the truthfulness of claims of all religions. But two bases taken by Hick (which may be taken as two arguments to prove pluralism) are aimed to prove the truthfulness of claims of all religions. The first basis is the term "experiencing as" which may be considered as a generalization of Wittgenstein's term "seeing as". Wittgenstein introduces the term "seeing as" in puzzle pictures2; Hick, however, applies the term "experiencing as" to all human perceptions.3 This term means various presuppositions which are not in many cases in man's control and impose themselves on man, influence his perception; for the same reason and based on different presuppositions, a single ultimate reality is perceived under various names such as Allah, Yahweh, Brahma, and the like; thus the difference between gods of religions is not an external one; rather all religions perceive the same reality; and differences lie in presuppositions. The second basis is the Kantian distinction between noumenon and phenomenon and making use of it to perceive the Ultimate reality of the world.4 Hick calls the Ultimate reality of the world faced by the followers of all religions "real an sich". For him, each and every religion makes a picture of the "real an sich" through its own cultural, social, historical, and 104 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake geographical eyes; and this is only a picture of the "real an sich. Given acquisition of God's pictures in various religions through facing the "real an sich" and through perceptional glasses, Hick calls gods of religions "veridical hallucinations"; and since gods of religions have no correspondence with the "real an sich", he calls the real an sich "ineffable" and "transcategorical". To demonstrate the strength of his two bases concerning Hick appeals to a famous parable mentioned in the ancient books, i.e., the parable of elephant and blind men. Having made use of this parable, Hick identifies positions of religions on the "real an sich" with those of men who are seeking to know the elephant in darkness.5 Now let us take some of the most important problems in Hick's view. 2. Main Problems in Hick's View Attempts have been made in the present article to present the most important problems in Hick's theory, which will be followed by a discussion of the most important problem, i.e., "category mistake". 1. In Hick's theory there is no direct reference to the real God or the "Real an sich". This is in conflict with the fundamental faith of all religious men in all religious traditions; for no religious man believes that he is worshipping a god which is forged by his own mind. Since Hick's view is a general one; it covers even the relation between prophets and mystics and God. According to Hick's theory, prophets see God through cultural, social, historical, and linguistic eyes; thus, they are never related to the "real an sich". Since Hick considers properties of the "real an sich" as being beyond human understanding, we will have to deny prophets' speaking with God. The followers of Abrahamic Reza Akbari 105 religions, in particular Judaism and Islam, believe that God has communicated necessary commandments to human beings through speaking with chosen men, prophets. Now, if Hick's view concerning the "real an sich" is accepted, believers will have to believe that the prophets have not found the "real an sich" at all, and what they have presented is a product of their speaking with a god which is forged by their own minds. One may say that the followers' understanding of the prophets' speaking with God is a false one and John Hick's theory has revealed this falsity. This reply however seems to be false. Our main question is "What is John Hick's main concern in the theory of pluralism?" Is he seeking to make a synthesized religion and then to call the entire mankind to believe in it? Is John hick seeking to present a new religion other than the existing ones to people? Having studied John Hick's writings, we find that neither he seeks to present a synthesized religion nor a new one to the people. The reason is that he asks all followers of each religion to be faithful to their own religious traditions and to accept that other religions too will lead to salvation. So it seems that he is seeking to provide a second order analysis of the existing religions. This analysis should, like all other second order analyses, fulfill two points so that it may be considered as an authentic one. Firstly, it should have internal consistency; secondly, it should be consistent with the field analyzed. Hick's theory, however, seems to have problems in both cases. It has no internal consistency; and this will be shown in the next objections to his theory. And, John Hick's theory is not consistent with the field analyzed (i.e. various religions). Each and every religion claims that the image presented by it of God is an objective one; but Hick considers gods of religion as mental ones, and introduces the real God as a transcategorical one.6 2. Hick says that noumenon or the "real an sich" is ineffable 106 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake and beyond human understanding. Now, the main objection is that if the "real an sich" is ineffable and beyond human understanding and man has no direct contact with it, how can existence of such reality be accepted?7 What is said by Netland is what is wrong with each and every theory which accepts indirect realism concerning perception. John Hick says that various images made of God by religions as a matter of fact stem from man's perceptual interaction with the "real an sich". For the same reason, such images may be considered as verifiable hallucinations. Netland's objection is: "If there is no relation between divine images of the "real an sich" on the one hand and the "real an sich" on the other, why do we call such images as real-like hallucinations?" Perhaps it is better to call them merely "hallucinations". In this way, it may be concluded that there is no "real an sich" and this means to be entrapped by naturalism.8 Hick is, somehow, aware of this objection; and for the same reason, in his theory he has tried to evade this objection. He says that the existence of the "real an sich" has been known through an inductive methodology and by a pragmatic criterion. Since all religions have managed to upbring moral men, it becomes clear that gods of religions are not mere hallucinations; but they unveil the existence of a reality beyond human understanding. This is what Hick says in reply to Dr. Phillip Almond's article concerning the parable of elephants and the blind men. Almond says that the blind men cannot claim that all of them are holding the same thing, i.e., an elephant; rather this can be claimed by the one who is not blind and at the same time sees the blind men and elephant. Almond's objection is that in John Hick's theory all human beings are like blind men and cannot speak of the existence of the external elephant. Thus, Almond says that John Hick's theory is inconsistent.9 In reply to Almond, Hick says that the parable of the blind men and elephant does not Reza Akbari 107 mean that he has an advantageous position, rather this parable is aimed only to reject naturalism; and the existence of "real an sich" has been known through an inductive methodology which results from study of the performance of various religions in upbringing moral men and mystics.10 Having taken this position, Hick falls into a vicious circle to reject naturalism; and as long as naturalism which rejects the "real an sich" is not rejected by an authentic method, pluralism cannot be proved. 3. Hick makes a distinction between two kinds of the properties of the "real an sich": substantial and formal properties. Hick maintains that formal properties do not speak of the nature of the "real an sich"; and only allow us to be able to speak of the "real an sich". For example, he mentions some formal properties of the "real an sich" among which one may mention "being able to be referred to"11 The other example is the following notion: existence of the "real an sich" in a way to which the substantial concepts cannot be applied.12 What Hick says in this regard has been thoroughly criticized by Insole.13 Having used the term coined for the first time by Alston (fingers in jam pot), Insole says that if Hick is to keep his fingers out of the jam pot (if he does not want to violate his own view concerning non-applicability of the substantial concepts about the "real an sich"), he will have to make uses only of formal properties. Insole says that Hick has not been committed to this, and in many cases he has made use of the substantial concepts when speaking of the "real an sich" and put his fingers in the jam pot.14 As an example, Insole mentions Hick's statement suggesting that the real an sich is, in terms of its content, so rich that it can be experienced only in a limited manner and through particular and unsatisfactory ways described by the history of religions.15 Having arguably insisted on the property of "richness", Insole 108 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake says that "richness" is a substantial property of which Hick has made use to speak of the "real an sich". He argues: if Hick accepts that the property of "richness" is a substantial one, he has violated his own view; and if he considers this property as a formal one, properties such as good, bad and the like should be considered as formal ones as well; and this means to remove the borders between formal and substantial properties. Now, let us assume that we have accepted formal properties and separated them from substantial ones. Thus, the most essential question is: "what is the criterion to distinguish formal properties from substantial ones?" Hick does not provide a clear definition for formal properties. Hick's closest statement to such definition is perhaps as follows: "logically generated properties"16. In addition to this statement, Hick provides us only with examples of formal properties; properties such as: ATo be a referent for a word. BBeing in such a way to which the substantial concepts could not be applied.17 Hick calls such properties "logically generated properties", but it seems that this is not the case. What is logically generated is what is analytic; but the second property, for example, is not so. The only way to consider such properties as being analytic is to define God in this way: "A being to which our substantial concepts cannot be applied". Since to predicate definiens to definiendum is a primary predication and provides us with an analytic proposition, if we define God in this way, the abovementioned property would be an analytic one; but, the problem here is that we have repeated our claim. According to the above definition, we have taken our claim as presupposition.18 And we are, as a matter of fact, entangled in a vicious circle. By applying formal properties to the "real an sich" we have presupposed application of the substantial properties to this Reza Akbari 109 "real"; though we have avoided verbal application of the substantial properties to the "real an sich". Insole strengthens his own objection through a study of Aquinas' views concerning God. Aquinas maintains that religion's language to qualify God by attributes such as goodness and power is an analogous one; then these words should not be taken for their conventional senses.19 Having employed Aquinas' literature, Hick presents a special interpretation of his [Aquinas'] view. According to this interpretation of Aquinas' view only formal properties may be applied to God. Insole says that according to Aquinas' view, application of attributes such as goodness and power to God is because of God's simplicity; and this latter property is a substantial one. Thus, application of formal properties to God presupposes substantial property (properties) of the "real an sich"; even though this is not mentioned verbally. Having studied Aquinas' view, Insole says correctly that application of formal properties to the real requires knowledge of some things about the real, and all those things are substantial ones. Hick's expression that the substantial properties are not applied to the "real an sich" is, therefore, false, for this very expression requires knowledge of the "real an sich", and in it, we have applied the substantial properties to the "real an sich", even though we have not spoken of it. 3. Hick and Category Mistake Taking into account the term coined for the first time by Gilbert Ryle (1949), we find one of the most important problems in Hick's theory. Ryle employs this term to mention falsity of the theory of those believing in soul. He maintains that they are in category mistake. What is meant by "category mistake"? Assume that someone asks you to show him the 110 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake Tehran University, and you show him all faculties, halls, and the like. Now, assume that he tells you: "What is shown by you is not the Tehran University, but faculties, halls..., but I wanted to see the University and not such things". According to Ryle, he is in category mistake. He thinks that the University is other than faculties, halls and the like; and in the same way that faculties, halls ... have their own existence, university has its own realization as an independent category, and it can be seen like faculties, halls, and the like. Ryle maintains that those believing in soul are in such a mistake; for they think that man is something other than material body and behaviors issued from it. Ryle's view concerning the relation between the psyche and body is false; but what we are seeking to introduce here is to show this mistake in Hick's thought. As said, Hick mentions the religions efficiency in upbringing moral and great men as a common property of religions; and to say this, he makes use of Wittgenstein's term "family resemblance". Also as mentioned above, for Hick, theoretical issues of religions are completely unimportant. What is wrong with this notion is that if we consider upbringing moral men as a reason for efficiency of the religions and put theoretical points of each and every religion aside and take them as being stemmed from cultural, social, and geographical... conditions, and think that like some glasses they cause the "real an sich" to be inaccessible from perception, we have committed a category mistake in using the term "religion"; for when we are using the term "religion", we mean nothing other than "schools". In reality, the religion of Islam is not other than schools which are covered by the general name of Islam. Thus, instead of saying that religions have managed to upbring moral and better men, it is better to say that schools have been successful in doing so. Now, let us look at this second claim. A through study of the second claim, would demonstrate that this Reza Akbari 111 claim suffers from a category mistake as well, for schools are not other than sects consisting them. When we make use of the term "Shi'i", we mean nothing other than Imami, Zaydi, Isma'ili, ... sects. Thus, it is better to say that sects have managed to upbring moral men; but the category mistake is still seen, for sects are not other than branches. Religious men are covered by various branches. One may conclude that on the basis of what was discussed above if we want to put aside the theoretical issues of the religion and look at the practical effects of the religions and take them as reasons for efficiency of the religions, we will have to change our approach from religions to persons. It is through coming into the field of persons that one can avoid category mistake. In this way, however, we will face another problem. If we look at the persons who are classified under the various branches, we will find that in addition to moral men, there are immoral persons among them. Not all followers of the religions are moral men. On the other hand, if we look at persons who are committed to no branch of religious schools, we will find that, in addition to immoral men, there are moral men among them. This comparison shows that among both groups of the religious men and atheists there are, in addition to moral men, immoral men as well. Through this comparison, the religion loses its own place; for the same thing which is shared by the followers of the religions is shared by the opponents of the religions and agnostics as well. This problem indicates that Hick's view, which concerns diversity of the religions, is reduced to a view concerning persons; and then one has to say that morality of men (whether religious or atheist or agnostic) is a sign of the truth of their beliefs, which is opposite to intuition of each one of us. Conclusion A study of Hick's theory shows that his pluralist theory 112 Hick, Pluralism, and Category Mistake concerning the religions is internally inconsistent. From among objections to Hick's theory, the most important one is perhaps category mistake. Hick's motivation in introducing his theory is a valuable one, his epistemic tool to attain his goal is, however, an inefficient. Notes 1. Hick, John, Problems of Religious Pluralism, London: St. Martin's Press, 1985, ch. 5. 2. Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Philosophical Invastigation, trans. G E. Anscombe, Oxford: Blackwell Publisher Ltd. 1953, 185. 3. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1989, 12. 4. Hick, 1372, pp. 274-276. 5. Hick, The Rainbow of Faiths, London: SCM Press, 1995, 61. 6. Robert Mckim, "Could God Have More Than One Name", Faith and Philosophy, October 1988: 383; Harold A. Netland, "Professor Hick on Religious Pluralism," Religious Studies 22, June 1989: 254-55. 7. Netland, 261. 8. for other versions of this objection see: Richard L. Corliss, "Redumption and the Divine Realitties: A Study of Hick and an alternative," Religious Studies, 22, 1986: 235-49; Eliot Deutsch, "Review of Hick's An Interpretation of Religion" Philosophy East and West 40, 1990: 551-63. 9. Almond, Philip, "John Hick's Copernican Theology". Theology 86, 1983: 37. 10. Hick, 1985, 97. 11. Hick, 1989, 239. 12. Ibid. 13. Chrisopher J. Insole, "Why John Hick Cannot and Should not Stay Out of the Jam Pot," Religious Studies 36, March 2000: 25-33. 14. Insole, 26. 15. Hick, 1989, 247. 16. Hick, 1989, 239. 17. Hick, 1989, 239, 246. 18. Insole, 28. 19. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, trans. Anton Pegis, in on the Truth of the Catholic Faith, Book 1, Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1955, 130-4. Bibliogeraphy Almond, Philip, "John Hick's Copernican Theology", Theology, January, 1983. Alston, William, "Realism and Christian Faith", International Journal for the Philosophy of Religion 38, 1995. Reza Akbari 113 Corliss, Richard L., "Redemption and the Divine Realities: A Study of Hick, and an Alternative", Religious Studies 22, 1986. Deutsch, Eliot, "Review of Hick's An Interpretation of religion". Philosophy East and West 40, 1990. Hick, John, Problems of Religious Pluralism. London: St. Martin's Press, 1985. Hick, John, Philosophy of Religion, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall; 4th edition, 1990. Hick, John, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent, New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1989. Hick, John , The Rainbow of Faiths. London: SCM Press, 1995. Hick, John, "Ineffability" Religious Studies 36, 2000. Insole, Christopher J., "Why John Hick Cannot and should not Stay Out of the Jam Pot." Religious Studies 36. March 2000. McKim, Robert, "Could God Have More Than One Name", Faith and Philosophy 5, October 1988. Netland, Harold A, "Professor Hick on Religious pluralism", Religious Studies 22, June 1986. Ryle, Gilbert, The Concept of Mind, London: Hutchinson, 1949. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, trans. Anton Pegis, in On the Truth of the Catholic Faith, book 1. Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1955. Wittgenstein, Ludwig, Philosophical Investigation trans, G. E. Anscombe, Oxford: Blackwell Publisher Ltd, 1953. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 115-132 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence: An Islamic Perspective Noor Mohammad Osmani* Abstract Right after the Cold-War a lopsided dominance of the Western civilization took a shape in reality, creating an invisible division of the West and the rest. This imaginary division, in affect, triggered a cultural domination of the Western culture and traditions, undermining other cultures. Hence there took a turnabout in history from a 'physio-psychical' war to a 'psycho-cultural' war. Huntington argued that there will be seven – eight civilizations ruling the next century, thus resulting to a possible clash among them. And among these, West faces the greatest threats from the Islamic civilization. The purpose of this research is to examine the perceived clash between civilizations and the criteria that lead a civilization to precede others from both Islamic and Western perspective. The research would conduct a thorough study of the available literatures, analyze historical facts and data and make a critical evaluation. On the basis of the criteria for civilizational hegemony from an Islamic view point, this paper argues that there should be no clash, rather a co-existence of civilizations. Keywords: Islamic Civilization, Western Civilization, Religious pluralism, Culture, Identity. * Associate Professor, Department of Qur'an and Sunnah Studies, International Islamic University Malaysia. E-mail: [email protected] 116 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence Introduction: From WWI to the Cold-War Exercising power or the practice of dominionship became a trend of the Western foreign policy, especially the US, since the beginning of the 20th century. The first of these traumatic exercises took place in the European nations and the surrounding seas in the war of 1914-1918, which pitted the Great Britain, France and Russia against Germany, AustriaHungary and Turkey. The US entered the war on the British side only in 1917, when the strength of the main protagonists was nearly exhausted. Russia was defeated and had a communist revolution later the same year. A truce was signed in 1918 where European borders were rearranged mainly based on language. Poland, Finland, the new Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and many other nation-states were created anew. To be noted, one of the influential participants of this peace truce was the then US president Wilson.1 The 1939-1945 war was the second great trauma of the 20th century. It claimed some 52 million lives. The United States, still regarding 'isolationism' as the most profitable policy –to excel in business and also to save American liveskept out of the war until December 1941, and might well have kept out longer had US not been attacked at Pearl Harbor. By then Britain was almost down on its knees and dependent on American supplies. France had surrendered already in 1940. On the other hand, Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941 diverted his soldiers, resulting him a failure in taking over England. Thus the over-confidence and greed of Germany and Japan probably prevented their victory. By the time they were finally defeated in 1945, the United States was the only power of global economic stature. Britain, France, Germany, Japan and the Soviet Union were totally Noor Mohammad Osmani 117 exhausted by the war and their economic infrastructures had suffered enormous damage.2 US could virtually dictate the rates of their economic revival. The prime American aim was to prevent a revival of Great Britain as a dominating power in its own axis and to limit the aptitude of France to influence events on the continent of Europe. US also played significant roles in dissolving the nations and breaking up the colonial powers after the World-War II in 1945. This was, again, to actualize its goals in preventing other powers from dominionship. On the other part of the world the Soviet Union, under the leadership of Stalin, was able to establish its hegemony in creating a bipolar world. It lasted for forty years, which was destroyed in the hands of Mikhail Gorbachev. With this, there came the end of the 'ColdWar' era. After the dissolution of the colonial powers and the traumatic age of the Cold-War, a lopsided dominance of the Western civilization took a shape in reality; creating an invisible division of the West and the rest. Hence there took a turnabout in history from a "physio-psychical war" to a "psycho-cultural war." Huntington (1996) argued that there will be seven/eight civilizations ruling the next century, thus resulting to a possible clash among them. And among these, West faces the greatest threats from the Islamic and the Sinic civilizations.3 Since the emergence of Huntington's theory, which is widely known as "the clash of civilizations," it caught proper attention of the mass; be it in the form of media such as radio, television and various internet sites, be it at the particular level of research, study and discussion in circles of research, studies and decision support, be it in faculties and universities, in intellectual forums, in political and cultural encounters, or in specialized and nonspecialized conferences dealing with the international issues on 118 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence the international scene at this stage which was and still is unquestionably one of the most talked issue in the history of mankind. Though Huntington's theory is widely known as "Clash of Civilizations," this term was, however, used decades before him by Basil Mathews when he marked in his book that Islam needs Christ to save them from the ignorance, and the clash they face.4 Huntington's theory is considered a biased one, as he tried to reflect his own presuppositions about other cultures in general and Islam in particular.5 From an Islamic view point, there could be no clash among civilizations, as civilizations are not to clash but rather to cross-breed and succeed, indeed. They complement each other, succeed and continue, for they are the synthesis of human intellect, man's creativity and the movement of history which is, in the Islamic conception, God's law in the Universe.6 Here, this paper tries to investigate the stance of Islam in the midst of the so called "clash" by the western thinkers like Huntington. The Post-Cold War and the Clash Huntington argues that the post-cold war era will take a shape from a tri-polar world of the cold-war era to a multi-polar and a multi-civilizational world. He writes: "In this new world, local politics is the politics of ethnicity; global politics is the politics of civilizations. The rivalry of the superpowers is replaced by the clash of civilizations."7 His thesis concludes that the post-cold war era is a world of seven-eight major civilizations, where cultural commonalities and differences shape interests, antagonisms, and associations of states. For obvious reasons, power is slowly shifting from the long predominant West to the non-Western civilizations in a multi-polar and multi-civilizational political arena. Noor Mohammad Osmani 119 West threatened: Is there a new enemy? The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990-1991 left the world with one superpower and an explosive situation for some time. However, the West sees a rapid change in the global politics. It fears the rise of non-Western powers as threats to its monarchy. Ramati identifies the U.S. support for the Taleban in the 1979 war against Russia as one of the serious mistakes in wide opening the 'opportunities of anti-western Islamic Terrorism.'8 From the fears of Bernard Lewis (1990), expressed vividly in his article "The Roots of Muslim Rage," the West perceives Islam as 'aggressive, irrational, militant, terrorist, and always ready for jihad,' as it was portrayed throughout the article.9 He asserts that 'Islamic fundamentalists' wage wars against secularism, capitalism, democracy and modernity as a whole, and perceive Western civilization as a threat to their way of life and culture.10 However, stereotype of Islam as such, is nothing new in the history of Islam-West relationship. Whether it is Dante's Divine Comedy or the Arabian Night's Entertainment in Richard Burton of 1885, or Weber's presentation of Islam as a 'national Arabic warrior religion' Islam has always been portrayed with biasness, prejudice, fear coupled with misunderstandings and ignorance.11 After all, the West discovered Islam as the 'new enemy' with the need of one in the post cold-war era. This is significantly replicated in Huntington's hypothesis of seven-eight civilizations dominating the next world, where he finds Islam and the Sinic civilizations are the most threatening. Huntington and the "Clash" Huntington sees the next century as an era of 'clash' and 'conflict' mainly of cultural distinctions.12 However, what he sees 120 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence is basically enrooted in what he and the West 'desires to see' where essentially the whole problem lies there. He thinks that the West is and will remain the most powerful civilization for years to come, yet its power is slowly in decline. He further asserts that some societies attempt to emulate the West and to join or to 'bandwagon' with the West, with exceptions from the Confucian and the Islamic societies, which does not only try to resist western values but also try to expand their own economic and military power in order to check and 'balance' against the West.13 However, more than the Chinese civilization, he perceives Islam and its revival as more threatening. He tries to justify his claims quoting western writers like Bernard Lewis who only observed a thousand years of constant threat from Islam to Europe.14 Huntington asserts later that Islam is the only civilization which has put the survival of the West in doubt for at least twice.15 As a matter of fact, Huntington is in a constant fear of Islam, and assumed that Islam is the civilization to 'clash' with the dominionship of the west in the years to come. Islam is the new enemy to replace their old cold-war enemy. Islam faces the West Although Huntington is too concerned about the Islamic threat from a cultural dominionship, Hunter however, does not agree that the 'conflict' or the 'clash' between Islam and the West is mainly due to cultural and ideological differences alone.16 The 'clash' is rather in terms of interests and power related issues; for a global power and global influence, more than it is for a global culture, "it is over the unequal distribution of world power, wealth and influence" as Graham Fuller writes.17 Besides these, another important and crucial factor Noor Mohammad Osmani 121 behind the perceived 'clash' between Islam and the West is 'the marriage of Islam and oil.' Hunter rightly identified the western interest in the 'reservoirs of oil and gas' in the Muslim lands, which highly incites the west to continue its hegemonic attitude. This is further affirmed by political scientists like Zbigniew Brzezinski, who indicated the abundant natural resources in the Central Asian region as a means of the west to technically keep them destabilised.18 Islam and the West The West-Islam relationship has been of a dualistic nature since quite long. The Western perception of the natural relationship takes the form of either 'ours' or 'theirs,' 'Occident' or 'Orient,'19 'in favour of' or 'against,' 'strong' or 'weak,' 'rich' or 'poor,' 'civilized' and 'uncivilized;' which later turned out to be in the form of 'masters' and 'slaves,' 'powerful' or 'puny,' 'rulers' or 'ruled' especially after the period of colonialism.20 A hostile view of Islam began during the 8th century when Muslims expanded into the Iberian Peninsula. Islam as a faith was rejected as a fundamental religion and seen as a direct theological and political threat to Christianity throughout the Middle Ages; Muslims were seen as heretics and their prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, a diabolical fraud.21 The medieval Christian views of Islam as a heresy and its Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, as an impostor have had a lasting impact on how Europeans came to see Islam and Muslims for over a millennia and this mode of perception continues to be a key factor in modern depictions of Islam in certain parts of the Western world.22 Karmi argues that this phenomenon of dualistic philosophy was adapted into the Western philosophies from the concept of 'Chosen' and 'Gentiles' of Judaism. This division continued to 122 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence dominate human thinking throughout the ages, till now, and those who are 'Chosen' are also rich, masters and mighty. And in the era of neo-colonialism, the same philosophy is applied from a micro level area to a macro level area, seeing the western (or to be precise, 'our' as the West sees) nation states as 'rich,' 'mighty,' and 'strong.' This hegemonic attitude of the West does not end with the end of colonization. The era of neo-colonization takes a different shape of dominionship through mass emigration from the East or Orient to the West, ultimately creating crises of 'brain drain' to keep the divided nations ever poor with 'meritless leadership'.23 It does not only evacuate the 'brains' of a nation, but also keeps the nation eventually dependant on the Western 'brains.' The Islamic perception of Islam-West relationship, however, is unlike the dualistic nature of the western view. Islam sees every other civilization as a part of the whole for a 'co-existence,' under the virtue of 'universal brotherhood' derived from the 'Tawhidic' worldview. On the other hand, the 'Islamic civilization' embraces anyone from any locality under the banner of 'Ummah,' which is purely antagonistic to the 'exclusivistic' attitude of 'dualism' of the West. Ummah is a universal brotherhood, a collective community, which surpasses all geographic, territorial, ethnic, racial, or any boundaries set, be it by language, colour or location. The focus of identity in the ummah is the Islamic ideology and Islamic philosophy, and is determined by its divine mission; as Ismail R. Faruqi cites it 'translocal,' 'transracial,' and 'transtatal'.24 The Islamic concept of ummah is neither a 'chosen' people nor a 'saved' community as that of the Jews and Christians. Indeed, it's the Ummah-tanWahidah (holy Quran 30:30) of the believers by the virtue of final Din; Din al-fitrah, a community by decision, not by nature. It's anti-ethnocentric, Noor Mohammad Osmani 123 universal, totalistic, and mission oriented in nature. Islam recognizes different religious faiths, cultures and civilizations and requires the people of all faiths to come together and have mutual understanding. Naderi Farsani vividly points out this issue deriving it from the Qur'anic ayah of Surah al-Hujurat, as Allah says: "O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that ye may know each other (not that ye may despise (each other)." (Al-Hujuraat 49: 13). Naderi asserts that Allah never asked people to follow only one religion or faith for any specific nation. Rather they were commanded to continue mutual understanding and respect for each other.25 As a matter of fact, there seems to be a different approach towards the so called perceived 'clash' from the Islamic philosophical viewpoint. The reason for the stemming differences in the philosophical discourses of West – Islam relationship and the 'clash' itself is mainly due the flawed foundations of western philosophy, and its materialistic worldview. Throughout the history, many of the appealing western philosophical ideas have again and again been refuted to be proven flawed. Consequently, a civilization based on jumbled and flawed foundations should naturally bring about incongruent ideas. It seems that what the West 'sees' has much to do with what the West 'aspires to see' and there the whole set of problem lies in.26 The West 'aspires to see' them as the most powerful civilization ever remaining, is and to come.27 The sources of Western Materialism Jameelah remarks that the medieval Christian Europe and the Muslim world shared a basic common heritage, the concern of salvation in the life beyond the grave, at least until the Renaissance, when man sought only to enjoy the pleasures of exercising intellectual curiosity to investigate the world around 124 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence them.28 However, from the inception of Renaissance onwards, the intellectual atmosphere of Europe and the Muslim world drifted further and further apart. And the modern civilization, as we know, had born amidst the shift of developing the potentialities of each individual instead of attaining salvation in the Hereafter. As faith in the freedom of unaided human intellect replaced faith in God, pagan philosophies glorifying the jewels of the earth tied with the Church. At a stage, worldliness and wealth increasingly corrupted the Church itself to the extent that the luxuriously lead life of the popes and bishops were scarcely distinguishable from the secular monarchs. This 'vacuum' of a sense of spirituality slowly grasped the whole of Western mode of life, giving a new meaning to its worldview. This was evident in the scientific discoveries to the writings and ideas of the philosophers. After Copernicus, the Western astronomers saw man as a puny speck on a tiny planet revolving around the tenth rate star, drifting aimlessly in an endless cosmic ocean. Since God, angels and Satan were not seen in their telescopes they concluded that man was completely alone in the cosmic machine, which resulted, perhaps, from an accident. Similarly, Western scientists like Descartes held that the nature was nothing more than a machine with no sense of spirituality. All living beings, including man, were mere a matter of automatic chemical reactions. Hume rejected all religious beliefs on the ground that they could not be proven by empirical facts or reasoning. This age considered morality as a science like any other sciences and branches of human knowledge.29 With the evolution theory of Darwin, the West experienced a new philosophy, a new scale of values; evolving in a constant state of flux and change from a lower category to a much complex category. The principles of biological evolution, when applied to human society, identified it with labels of 'modern,' Noor Mohammad Osmani 125 'up-to-date,' 'advanced,' 'progressive,' 'post-modern' and whatever they aspired. And Darwin's idea of 'survival of the fittest' seems to be the root of the Western worldview on the questions of race, identity, self and nationhood. Ahmed points out that the genealogy of this arrogant worldview is to be directly traced to Darwin, then nimbly skipping past Christ, to the Greeks back to Achilles the warrior, Homer the poet and Plato the philosopher. Darwin, to the European society, appeared like an iconoclastic revolutionary. However, he too, was echoing the Greeks when the Spartans left out their own frail babies to face the elements, and their death was a testimony to the Spartan philosophy.30 Another important factor that has contributed to the Western materialism is the secular understanding of worldviews, denying completely the place of religious beliefs and practices in a society. Esposito pointed out that few analysts have become 'conservative clerics' who treat religious beliefs and practices as 'isolated, freestanding realities.'31 In such a superficial treatment of religion, particularly to Islam, represents a gross injustice to Islam, which is not a 'personal belief,' rather a 'way of life.' However, secular ideologies ultimately pave ways to materialistic worldview. Esposito identified another important factor, the 'secular elite orientation,' in this connection. He observed that the tendency of the Western scholars to learn Islam from the like-minded Westerntrained Muslim scholars, highly influences the understanding of Islam by the West, as 'prejudiced,' 'limited,' and 'confused'.32 And, with no or less concern about Islam, this 'prejudice' leads, ultimately, to the feeling of superiority of the West. And once again, the dualistic philosophy of 'Ours,' and 'theirs,' 'master,' and 'slaves,' plays the minds of the West. 126 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence The characteristics of Islamic Civilization Similar to the human beings, every civilization consists of a body and a soul. The body of a civilization is the material achievements in terms of development, infrastructure, buildings, competence and advancement of the system, machinery and anything which reflects welfare and earthly advancement. Its soul is the set of creeds and concepts which condition the behaviors of individuals and groups, their mutual relationships and their worldview. These are the elements which constitute the characteristics of the Islamic civilization. Altwaijri identified five main characteristics of the Islamic civilization that distinguishes it from other past and present civilizations. These characteristics form the fundamental identity of the Islamic civilization in other hand.33 The first characteristic is that it is a civilization founded on the Islamic faith, permeated with the values and principles of Islam itself. It is a civilization based on the concept of Tawhid, oneness of Allah Almighty, the Creator of all. It is also partly a man-made civilization, built on robust religious background of faith. The holy, righteous religion was, indeed, a strong factor which contributed to the rise and prosperity of this civilization. The second important characteristic of the Islamic civilization is the fact that it is a universal civilization; as Faruqi mentioned 'translocal,' 'transracial,' and 'transtatal.' It is also 'translingual' and 'transcultural'34 (See holy Qur'an: 12:104, 81:27, 74:31, 6:19, 14:52) .The Islamic civilization is also predicated on the idea that Man has precedence over the rest of Allah's creatures, that all human activities should lead to the happiness and welfare of Man and that any action intended to serve this goal is a God-blessed action, indeed a human action in the first place. Noor Mohammad Osmani 127 The next characteristic of the Islamic civilization is its being a 'generous civilization'(holy Quran 6:19) which contributed to the human society in large, with no exception or biasness. Its contributions are founded on the basis of the previous generations' and ancient nations' experiences, and are ranged from science, technology, knowledge, morality to any other aspect of human society, for any civilization of the society. The fourth uniqueness of Islamic civilization lies in its 'median' and 'balanced' nature of the community, which is termed as 'Ummatan-Wasatan' in the Qur'an (Al-Qur'an, 2:143) itself. The Islamic civilization is 'balanced' between rigidity and leniency, between extremism and rejection, and most importantly, between the spiritual aspects of human life and the material aspects of it. As Altwaijri writes, "it is a moderation built on justice and equity."35 The fifth characteristic of the Islamic civilization is a long lasting civilization;(see holy Quran: 30:30,12:40,9:36) it would last as long as Islam lasts. And Islam, as the final Din, will last until the end of the human history; hence the Islamic civilization is a permanent and perpetual civilization. Its perpetual nature is further affirmed by its strong and wellgrounded foundation of Tawhid, unlike the other civilizations of materialistic philosophy. Any civilization is the yield of all efforts made by humans to improve their living conditions, regardless of whether such effort is intentional or not or whether its outcomes are material or moral.36 Therefore, the Islamic civilization is the blessed fruit of the efforts made by the Islamic Ummah throughout the different ages for the betterment of human conditions and living. 128 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence Conclusions: Towards a peaceful co-existence In the 'clash' perceived among the civilizations and religious faiths, the fundamental source will not be primarily ideological or primarily economic, as Huntington views. Rather the great divisions among humankind and the dominating source of conflict will be cultural and religious. But Hunter37 argues that it is for a global power and global influence, more than for a global culture. Yet, Amartya Sen thinks that had there been any classification among the civilizations, it should be primarily epistemic and empirical, not based on religions as of Huntington's ideas.38 On the other hand, Islam does not perceive this as an obvious "clash." The Islamic philosophy of political dominionship or power is vicegerency (Khilafah) of human beings, whereas the sovereignty belongs only to Allah (swt). And thus the differences among the civilizations are only background to a healthy competition, not a conflict.39 However, it is clear from the Western philosophy's double standards, self centeredness and an apparent biasness, it has failed to convince the genuine minds and dominate ethically.40 With a distinct failure of the Western secular-materialistic philosophy, the demand for a new philosophy has arisen to peak. This philosophy should comprehend science, politics, economics and other conventional knowledge with religious values and ethics, which is antithetical to materialistic and secular philosophy. In no means, none other than the Islamic philosophy apprehends the criteria required, thus is the only alternative to the Western materialistic philosophy.41 This emphasizes the necessity of Islamic civilization, and demands the end of a self-centered, biased and imperialistic Western civilization, yet with no clash rather a peaceful co-existence. Noor Mohammad Osmani 129 Notes 1. Ramati, Yohanan, The Islamic Danger to Western Civilization, Jerusalem: Jerusalem Institute for Western Defence. Accessed online, on 14th February, 2007, from: www.westerndefense.org/special/TwinTowers2001.htm. 2. Koreshi, S.M., New World Order: Western Fundamentalism in Action, Islamabad: Institute of Policy Studies and Islamabad Publications, 1995, 29-42. 3. Huntington, Samuel P., The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, N.Y.: Simon & Schuster. P. 1996, 31. 4. Mathews, Basil, Young Islam on Trek: A Study in the Clash of Civilizations, London: Church Missionary Society, 1928, 24. 5. Naderi Farsani, "Worldviews Dangle before Democracies", Assisi, Highlands Institute for American Religious and Philosophical Thought, Italy, 2007. 6. Altwaijri, A. Othman, The Characteristics of the Islamic Civilization and its Future Prospects. Rabat: Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, 2002, (ISESCO). Retrieved online, on 26th January, 2007, from: www.isesco.org.ma/pub/Eng/Characteritics/Chap5.htm. 7. Huntington: 28. 8. Ramati, op.cit. www.westerndefense.org/special/TwinTowers2001.htm 9. Lewis, Bernanrd, "The Roots of Muslim Rage," The Atlantic Monthly, September, 1990. 10. Ibid. 11. Ali, Muhammad Mumtaz, The Clash of Civilizations or Civilizational Peaceful CoExistence: An Analysis of the Views of Huntington and Khurshid Ahmad, Kuala Lumpur: The Other Press, 2006, 32. 12. Huntington: 21. 13. Ibid: 29. 14. Lewis, Bernanrd, Islam and the West, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993, 13. 15. Huntington: 210. 16. Hunter, Shireen, The Future of Islam and the West: Clash of Civilization or Peaceful CoExistence? London: Centre for Strategic and International Studies, 1998, 21. 17. Fuller, Graham, "The Next Ideology," Foreign Policy. No. 98. Spring, 1995, 150. 18. Brzezinski, Zbigniew, The Grand Chessboard, New York: Basic Books, 1997, 31. 19. Said, Edward W, Covering Islam, N.Y.: Pantheon Books, 1981, 4. 20. Karmi, Hasan S, Islam and the West,.Rabat: ISESCO, 2004, 28. 21. Gainem, Alexander, "Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia: Lessons from History" Islam Online, Retrieved online, on 16th January 2007, from: www.islamonline.net/English/Views/2006/02/article09.shtml. 22. Kalin, Ibrahim, "Western Perceptions of Islam: Yesterday and Today", Islam Online. Retrieved online, on 27th June 2005, from: www.islam-online.net/english/Contemporary/2003/04/Article01a.shtml. 23. Jameelah, Maryam, Western Imperialism Menaces Muslims, Lahore: Mohammad 130 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence Yusuf Khan & Sons., 1978, 3. 24. Faruqi, Ismail R, Tawhid: Its Implications for Thought and Life, Herndon, VA: International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT), 1984, 124-5. 25. Naderi Farsani, "An Investigation on the Possibility of Mutual Understanding in a Pluralistic World", (paper presented at the IX Conference, European Culture, Navara, Spain, 2007. 26. Ali, Mumtaz: 11. 27. Huntington: 29. 28. Jameelah, Maryam, Islam versus the West, Lahore: Mohammad Yusuf Khan, 1977, 5th ed., 7-8. 29. Ibid: 9-16. 30. Ahmed, Akbar S, Postmodernism and Islam: Predicament and Promise, London, N.Y.: Routledge, 1992, 110. 31. Esposito, J. L, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), 200-1. 32. Ibid: 201-2. 33. Altwaijri, www.isesco.org.ma/pub/Eng/Characteritics/Chap5.htm. 34. Faruqi: 125. 35. Altwaijri, www.isesco.org.ma/pub/Eng/Characteritics/Chap5.htm. 36. Altwaijri, Dialogue for Co-existence (Cairo: Dar al-Shuruq, 1998), 22-3. 37. Hunter, op cit. 38. Sen, Amartya, "Is There a Clash of Civilizations? Americans must Learn More About Real World History." Slate, 5th May 2006. Retrieved on 16th January, 2007, online from: www.slate.com/id/2140932/?nav=navoa. 39. Abu Rabì, Ibrahim M. (Ed.), Islamic Resurgence: Challenges, Directions and Future Perspective – A Round Table with Khurshid Ahmad. Florida: World and Islam Studies Enterprise, (WISE), 1994, 32. 40. Rajamoorthy, T, "Double Standards, Selectivity and Western Domination", in Dominance of the West over the Rest, Kuala Lumpur: JUST, 1995, 73-82. Also at Jameelah, Western Imperialism Menaces Muslims, Lahore: Mohammad Yusuf Khan & Sons, 1978, 1-23. 41. QaraÌawi, Yusuf, Islam the Future Civilization (Al-Islam Hadaratul Ghad), Cairo: ElFalah Foundation for Translation, Publishing and Distribution, 1998, 45. Bibliogeraphy Abu Rabì, Ibrahim M. (Ed.), Islamic Resurgence: Challenges, Directions and Future Perspective – A Round Table with Khurshid Ahmad, Florida: World and Islam Studies Enterprise, (WISE), 1994. Ahmed, Akbar S, Postmodernism and Islam: Predicament and Promise, London, N.Y.: Routledge, 1992. Ali, Muhammad Mumtaz, The Clash of Civilizations or Civilizational Peaceful CoNoor Mohammad Osmani 131 Existence: An Analysis of the Views of Huntington and Khurshid Ahmad, Kuala Lumpur: The Other Press, 2006. Altwaijri, A. Othman, The Characteristics of the Islamic Civilization and its Future Prospects. Rabat: Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, 2002 (ISESCO). Retrieved online, on 26th January, 2007, from: www.isesco.org.ma/pub/Eng/Characteritics/Chap5.htm. Altwaijri, Dialogue for Co-existence, Cairo: Dar al-Shuruq, 1998. Brzezinski, Zbigniew, The Grand Chessboard, New York: Basic Books, 1997. Esposito, J. L, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, 200-1. Faruqi, Ismail R, Tawhid: Its Implications for Thought and Life, Herndon, VA: International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT), 1984. Fuller, Graham, "The Next Ideology," Foreign Policy. No. 98. Spring, 1995. Gainem, Alexander, "Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia: Lessons from History" Islam Online, Retrieved online, on 16th January 2007, from: www.islamonline.net/English/Views/2006/02/article09.shtml. Hunter, Shireen, The Future of Islam and the West: Clash of Civilization or Peaceful CoExistence? London: Centre for Strategic and International Studies, 1998. Huntington, Samuel P., The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, N.Y.: Simon & Schuster. P. 1996. Jameelah, Maryam, Islam versus the West (Lahore: Mohammad Yusuf Khan, 1977, 5th ed.). Jameelah, Maryam, Western Imperialism Menaces Muslims, (Lahore: Mohammad Yusuf Khan & Sons., 1978. Kalin, Ibrahim, "Western Perceptions of Islam: Yesterday and Today", Islam Online. Retrieved online, on 27th June 2005, from: www.islam-online.net/ english/ Contemporary/2003/04/Article01a.shtml. Karmi, Hasan S, Islam and the West,.Rabat: ISESCO, 2004. Koreshi, S.M., New World Order: Western Fundamentalism in Action, Islamabad: Institute of Policy Studies and Islamabad Publications, 1995. Lewis, Bernanrd, "The Roots of Muslim Rage," The Atlantic Monthly, September, 1990. Lewis, Bernanrd, Islam and the West, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. Mathews, Basil, Young Islam on Trek: A Study in the Clash of Civilizations, London: Church Missionary Society, 1928. Naderi Farsani, "An Investigation on the Possibility of Mutual Understanding in a Pluralistic World", paper presented at the IX Conference, European Culture, Navara, Spain, 2007. Naderi Farsani, "Worldviews Dangle before Democracies", Assisi, Highlands Institute for American Religious and Philosophical Thought, Italy, HIARPT, 2007. QaraÌawi, Yusuf, Islam the Future Civilization (Al-Islam Hadaratul Ghad), Cairo: ElFalah Foundation for Translation, Publishing and Distribution, 1998. Rajamoorthy, T, "Double Standards, Selectivity and Western Domination", in Dominance of the West over the Rest, Kuala Lumpur: JUST, 1995. Ramati, Yohanan, The Islamic Danger to Western Civilization, Jerusalem: Jerusalem 132 Civilizational Clash or Co-Existence Institute for Western Defence. Accessed online, on 14th February, 2007, from: www.westerndefense.org/special/TwinTowers2001.htm Said, Edward W, Covering Islam, N.Y.: Pantheon Books, 1981. Sen, Amartya, "Is There a Clash of Civilizations? Americans must Learn More About Real World History." Slate, 5th May 2006. Retrieved on 16th January, 2007, online from: www.slate.com/id/2140932/?nav=navoa. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 133-148 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? Abdul Sattar Shaikh* Abstract Pluralism is promoted as a system for the "common good" of all and It is a coming together with common recognition and credence to all beliefs and developments of modern social, scientific, and economic societies. All groups have to agree to a minimal consensus regarding both shared values, which tie the different groups to society, and shared rules. Religious pluralism is a set of worldviews that stands on the premise that one religion is not the sole exclusive source of values, truths, and supreme deity. The concept of religious pluralism is not new; it has been discussed in one form or another by past philosophers and theologians of various schools. The great philosopher, Āyatullâh Murtadhâ Muťahharî, wrote his seminal work, `Adl-e Ilâhî (The Divine Justice) about thirty-five years ago, the debate on religious pluralism had not yet become that popular in Iran. The most famous proponent of modern religious pluralism is John Hick, who abandoned his Catholic exclusivist view and formulated his specific theory in the seventies. Keywords: Pluralism, Religious Pluralism, Divine Justice, Theologians, Messengers, Religions, Islam, Judaism, Christians, Social, A pluralism definition has the basis in operating under the *. Department of Art, Tarbiat Modares University,Tehran, Iran. E-mail: [email protected] 134 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? principles of acceptance and diversity. It is promoted as a system for the "common good" of all. It is a coming together with common recognition and credence to all beliefs and developments of modern social, scientific, and economic societies. For pluralism to function and be successful in achieving the common good, all groups have to agree to a minimal consensus regarding both shared values, which tie the different groups to society, and shared rules. . ." This sounds good but is impractical and can we dare say impossible when there will always be certain truths that are non-compromising. Religious pluralism is a set of worldviews that stands on the premise that one religion is not the sole exclusive source of values, truths, and supreme deity. It therefore must recognize that at least "some" truth must exist in other belief systems. This is one example of "they can't all be right." The concept of religious pluralism is not new; it has been discussed in one form or another by past philosophers and theologians of various schools. However, with the increased interaction between followers of different religions and interfaith dialogues, religious pluralism has taken a new life in the stream of current thought. When the great philosopher, Āyatullâh Murtadhâ Muťahharî, wrote his seminal work, `Adl-e Ilâhî (The Divine Justice) about thirty-five years ago, the debate on religious pluralism had not yet become that popular in Iran. What you have in your hands is the translation of `Adl-e Ilâhî's last chapter on "Good Deeds of Non-Muslims". The more appropriate place to discuss religious pluralism and its related issues would be under the theme of "nubuwwah prophethood" when discussing the finality of Prophet Muhammad's (S) prophethood, however the question "What happens to the good Abdul Sattar Shaikh 135 deeds of non-Muslims?" is also connected to the theme of Divine justice; and so Āyatullâh Muťahharî has answered it at the end of his `Adl-e Ilâhî. Nonetheless, before discussing that question in detail, Āyatullâh Muťahharî has also briefly stated his views on religious pluralism itself. As you will read yourself, he expresses the prevailing view of the Muslim theologians and philosophers that Islâm is the only right path. However, and more importantly, he cautions the readers not to jump to the conclusion that since Islâm is the only right path therefore all non-Muslims will go to hell. The exclusivist view of Islâm being the right path does not automatically and necessarily lead to the belief that all non-Muslims will go to hell. In the last one and a half decades, the question of religious pluralism has been passionately debated among the Muslims in the West as well as the East. Some Muslim intellectuals have even tried to impose the concept of religious pluralism onto the Qur'ân itself! we would like to take this opportunity to briefly present this discussion as a preamble to the writing of the great scholar, Āyatullâh Murtadhâ Muťahharî. While discussing the concept of pluralism in the Islâmic context, it is important to define the term clearly. Pluralism can be used in two different meanings: "Social pluralism" in the sociological sense means a society, which consists of a multifaith or multi-cultural mosaic. "Religious pluralism" in the theological sense means a concept in which all religions are considered equally true and valid. As far as social pluralism is concerned, Islam seeks for peaceful co-existence and mutual tolerance between the people of different religions and cultures. Among the three Abrahâmic religions, it is only Islam, which has accorded recognition to 136 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? Judaism and Christianity. In the Islâmic worldview, God sent many prophets and messengers to guide humankind. The first prophet was Ādam B and the last Prophet was Muhammad the Prophet of Islam (S). However, not all the 124,000 prophets were of the same rank and status.1 Five of these prophets are given the highest rank in the spiritual hierarchy: and they are Nûh (Noah), Ibrâhîm (Abraham), Mûsâ (Moses), `Isâ (Jesus), and Muhammad (as). Almighty Allah says in the Qur'ân: "And when We made a covenant with the prophets: with you, with Nûh, Ibrâhîm, Mûsâ and `Isâ, son of Mariam..."2 A Muslim is required to believe in all the prophets; otherwise, he cannot be considered a "Muslim".3 If a person, for instance, says that I believe in Muhammad, `Isâ, Ibrâhîm and Nûh but not in Mûsâ as one of the prophets of God, then he cannot be accepted as a Muslim; similarly, if a person believes in all the prophets but refuses to accept `Isâ as one of the prophets and messengers of God, then he is not a Muslim. That is why Islam considers the Christian and the Jewish communities as "the People of the Book" or "the People of Scripture" (Ahlul Kitâb). Islam has even allowed a Muslim man to marry a Christian or Jewish woman, but not those from the other faiths. What is noteworthy is that Islam accorded this recognition to the Ahlul Kitâb fourteen centuries ago when there was absolutely no talk of tolerance among people of different faiths or an ecumenical movement among religions.4 On a socio-political level, a Muslim government would readily sign an agreement with its Christian and Jewish minorities. Imâm `Alî Zaînul `Ābidîn, the great-grandson of the Prophet, writes: Abdul Sattar Shaikh 137 "It is the right of the non-Muslims living in a Muslim country that you should accept what Allâh has accepted from them and fulfill the responsibilities which Allâh has accorded them... And there must be a barrier keeping you from doing any injustice to them, from depriving them of the protection of Allâh, and from flaunting the commitments of Allâh and His Messenger concerning them. Because we have been told that the Holy Prophet said, 'Whosoever does injustice to a protected non-Muslim, I will be his enemy (on the Day of Judgement."5 Although Islâm does not accord to followers of other religions the same recognition that it has accorded to Jews and Christians, it believes in peaceful co-existence with them. One of the earliest messages of peaceful co-existence given by the Prophet Muhammad (S) to the idol-worshippers of Mecca is reflected in Chapter 109 of the Qur'ân: Say: "O unbelievers! Neither do I worship what you worship; nor do you worship what I worship. Neither am I going to worship what you worship; nor are you going to worship what I worship. To you shall be your religion and to me shall be my religion." The treatment that Muslim societies have given to the minorities under their rule, especially the Christians and the Jews, is comparatively better than the way minorities were treated in Christian Europe.6 Religious Pluralism The most famous proponent of modern religious pluralism is John Hick, who abandoned his Catholic exclusivist view and formulated his specific theory in the seventies. Hick's pluralistic hypothesis claims that each religion in its own way represents an authentic revelation of the Divine world and a fully authentic means of salvation. He believes that all religions are culturally conditioned responses to the same ultimate reality; and, 138 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? therefore, are equally valid, and salvation is possible through any of them. Hick uses the famous story of the Hindu mystics to illustrate his point: "An elephant was brought to a group of blind men who had never encountered such an animal before. One felt a leg and reported that an elephant is a great living pillar. Another felt the trunk and reported that an elephant is a great snake. Another felt a tusk and reported that an elephant is like a sharp ploughshare, and so on. And then they all quarrelled together, each claiming that his own account was the truth and therefore all the others false. In fact of course, they were all true, but each referring only to one aspect of the total reality and all expressed in very imperfect analogies." 7 There are many flaws in Hick's hypothesis. The most serious problem is of reconciling the conflicting truth-claims of various religions: for example, monotheism of Islâm as opposed to polytheism of Hinduism; death and resurrection of Islâm and Christianity as opposed to reincarnations and reaching the state of nirvana of Buddhism; salvation through Trinity as opposed to Tawhîd (Monotheism), etc. In order to resolve the problem of conflicting truth-claims, Hick suggests that religious traditions differ on three issues: 1. on historical facts; 2. on trans-historical facts; 3. on conceptions of the Real. Then he proposes the solution for these differences. For the disagreements on historical facts, Hick suggests that they are minor issues and they could be resolved by application of the historical method. As for differences on trans-historical facts (i.e., matters that cannot be established by historical or empirical evidence such as "is the universe temporal or eternal" or "death and then resurrection versus reincarnations"), he says that the resolution of such differences are not necessary for salvation Abdul Sattar Shaikh 139 and that religions need to dialogue more in order to modify their beliefs. For differing conceptions of the Real, Hick assumes that all religious traditions are authentic manifestations of the Real and that each tradition's deity is an authentic face of the Real.8 Finally, Hick believes that any religious belief that would conflict with, and if literally true, falsify another religious belief, must be treated as mythological. The end result of this theory is that in order to make it workable, Hick would have to redefine many religious beliefs in ways that the founders and followers of those religions would strongly protest! Take the example of the historical status of Jesus from Islâmic, Christian and Jewish perspectives: Apart from the two first items (and that also only between Islâm and Christianity), all three Abrahamic religions have conflicting views on Jesus. According to John Hick's theory, the first two common beliefs would be considered as "facts" (at the least in Christianity and Islâm) whereas the other points of disagreements must be treated in two possible ways: Either these conflicting views should be resolved by historical/empirical inquiry or they should be put in the category of "mythology"! The first solution will force the Jews, the Christians and the Muslims to reject many verses of their respective scriptures while the second solution will place many statements from the Bible and the Qur'ân into the category of "mythology". None would be acceptable to any of the three faiths. I think this one example (that also of Islâm vis-à-vis Christianity and Judaism which are closer to one another than Islâm vis-à-vis Hinduism and Buddhism) suffices to show that Hick's theory of religious pluralism is not workable. Based on Hick's solution for meta-historical facts (issues related to death and after), Muslims will be forced to consider more than five hundred verses of the Qur'ân on death, resurrection and afterlife as part of "mythology"! 140 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? Coming to the third type of differences on conceptions of the Real, Dr. John Hick wants us to believe that the Trinity of Christians, the multiples idols of Hindus, and the Tawhîd (Monotheism) of Muslims are equally valid and true! This hypothesis weakens the faith in one's religion and pushes one towards agnosticism if not atheism. Using Immanuel Kant's view of dualistic categories, Hick says that there is a difference "between an entity as 'it is in itself' and as 'it appears in perception'." 9 Something could be completely true "in itself" but when it is perceived by others, it is relatively true. Based on this idea, Hick wants all religions to accept all differing conceptions of God as equally authentic because none of them are absolutely true, all are only relatively true. The way Hick has used the story of the blind men and the elephant, he has assumed all religious people to be blind and that they lack the ability to know the complete truth. Unfortunately, he has missed the moral of the same story as given by Mawlânâ Rûmî on elephant.10 These men were groping in darkness and, therefore, they came with wrong description of the elephant; if they had used a "candle", they would have seen the light! In Islâm, God does not let a searcher for truth grope in darkness: "Allâh is the Protector of the believers, He brings them forth from the shadows into the light." 11 The Qur'ân and Religious Pluralism Some Muslim intellectuals have attempted to read the theory of religious pluralism into the Qur'ân itself. The most famous argument used by them is that the term "Islâm," in the Qur'ân, should not be taken as a noun but just as a verb. Sometimes they differentiate between "islam" (the act of submission) and Abdul Sattar Shaikh 141 "Islam" (the religion); and say that the main message of God and the basis of salvation is submission to God, and that it does not matter whether the submission takes place through Ibrâhîm, Mûsâ, `Isa or Muhammad (as). This is nothing new; even Āyatullâh Muťahharî, in the present work, writes, "If someone were to say that the meaning of 'Islâm' in this verse is not our religion in particular; rather, the intent is the literal meaning of the word, or submission to God, the answer would be that undoubtedly 'Islâm' means submission and the religion of Islâm is the religion of submission, but the reality of submission has a particular form in each age. And in this age, its form is the same cherished religion that was brought by the Seal of the Prophets (Muhammad). So it follows that the word 'Islâm' (submission) necessarily applies to it alone. "In other words, the necessary consequence of submission to God is to accept His commandments, and it is clear that one must always act on the final Divine commandments. And the final commandments of God is what His final Messenger [Muhammad] has brought." 12 "Islâm" in the Qur'ân [3:19-20] When the Qur'ân says, for example: some Muslim intellectuals say that it does not mean "Islâm" the religion that started in the seventh century by Prophet Muhammad (S). They say it means "islâm," submission to God through any of the Abrahamic religions. In their attempt to read a politically correct idea into the Qur'ân, they even ignore the context of the verse. Let us read the whole passage together: "Surely the religion with Allâh is al-Islâm. And those who have been given the Book [i.e., the Christians and the Jews] did not show opposition but after knowledge had come to them, out of envy 142 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? among themselves. And whoever disbelieves in the verses of Allâh, then surely Allâh is quick in reckoning." 13 "But if they dispute with you, say: "I have submitted myself entirely to Allâh and (so has) everyone who follows me." "And to those who have been given the Book [i.e., the Christians and the Jews] and to the idol-worshippers [of Mecca], say: "Do you submit?" If they submit, then they are rightly guided; but if they reject, then upon you is only the delivery of the message. And Allâh sees the servants."14 This passage clearly states the following: "Al-Islâm" mentioned in this verse is the message of submission as brought by Prophet Muhammad (S). The People of the Scripture (i.e., Christians and Jews) are in opposition of this version of submission to God. The Prophet Muhammad (S) and his followers are followers of the Islâm which was brought by him. The People of the Scripture are being asked to submit to God through Prophet Muhammad (S) even though they already are followers of Prophets Mûsâ (as) and `Isâ (as). The same message is given to the idol-worshippers of Mecca. If the People of the Scripture do not submit (as Prophet Muhammad (S) and his followers have submitted), then they are not "rightly guided". So the term al-Islâm, in this verse, refers to "submission to God" through His final message brought by Prophet Muhammad (S) and not through previous prophets. "Islâm" in the Qur'ân [3:83-85] Another passage from the same chapter is also relevant for understanding the meaning of "Islâm": "Is it then other than Allâh's religion that they seek while to Him submits whoever is in the heavens and the Earth, willingly or Abdul Sattar Shaikh 143 unwillingly, and to Him shall they be returned?" "Say: "We believe in Allâh, and what has been revealed to us, and what was revealed to Ibrâhîm, Ismâ'îl, Ishâq, Yàqûb, and the Tribes; and what was given to Mûsâ and `Isâ and to the prophets from their Lord. We do not make any distinction between (the claim of) any of them, and to Him do we submit." "And whoever desires a religion other than Islâm, it shall not be accepted from him, and in the hereafter he shall be one of the losers." This passage clearly explains basic beliefs of Allâh's religion: Among those basic beliefs is the requirement to believe in "what has been revealed to us" (i.e., the Qur'ân that has been revealed to Muslims). "Islâm – submission" only follows when one accepts all the prophets and does not differentiate in the truth of any one of them, including Prophet Muhammad (S). "Islâm" and "Imân "in the Qur'ân [2:135-137] The following passage in Chapter Two of the Qur'ân further clarifies the meaning of "islâm–submission" as well as "imân– belief": "And they say: "Be Jew or Christian and you will be guided aright." "Say: "Nay! (we follow) the religion of Ibrâhîm, the sincere, and he was not one of the polytheists." "Say: "We believe in Allâh, and what has been revealed to us, and what was revealed to Ibrâhîm, Ismâ'îl, Ishâq, Yàqûb, and the Tribes; and what was given to Mûsâ and `Isâ and to the prophets from their Lord. We do not make any distinction between (the claim of) any of them, and to Him do we submit." "If they (i.e., the Jews and the Christians) then believe as you believe, then they are rightly guided; but if they refuse, then they are only in great opposition; and Allâh will suffice you against them. He is the Hearing, the Knowing." 144 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? These two verses clearly define the "imân faith and belief" of the Muslims as opposed to that of the Jews and the Christians. Central to the imân of the Muslims is belief in the revelation of all the prophets, including the revelation to the Prophet Muhammad (S). They clearly say that if the Jews and the Christians "believe as you believe," only then will they be rightly guided. Sûratul Baqarah (2), Verse 285 also confirms this meaning of "imân": "The Messenger (i.e., Muhammad) has believed in whatever that has been revealed to him from his Lord; and the believers all believe in Allâh, His Angels, His books, and His messengers. (And they say:) "We do not differentiate between (the claim of) any one of His messengers." A note on "we do not differentiate between any one of the messengers" or "we do not make any distinction between any one of them": it does not mean that all the prophets and messengers of Allâh (S) are of the same rank and status. We have already mentioned that there are five prophets who rank highest in the spiritual hierarchy. Rather, this means that we do not make any distinction in the truth of any of the prophets; all are equally true in their claim. This is unlike the Jews who accept all the prophets but reject `Isâ (as) and Muhammad (S) or the Christians who accept all the prophets but reject Muhammad (S). Prophet Muhammad (S) and Religious Pluralism Those Muslim intellectuals who preach about religious pluralism in Islâm seem to be oblivious of some historical facts of Islâmic history and the Prophet's life. If Judaism and Christianity are concurrently valid paths of submission to God, then why did the Prophet Muhammad (S) work so hard to Abdul Sattar Shaikh 145 convey his message even to the Jews and the Christians? If they were already on the Right Path (Ŝirat Mustaqîm), then why did the Prophet (S) feel it important to invite them to Islâm? After the peace treaty of Hudaybiyya in 6 A.H., the Prophet of Islâm (S) sent emissaries to various rulers and tribes around and beyond the Arabian Peninsula with a distinct purpose of inviting them to Islâm. According to historians, around 25 letters were sent by the Prophet (S) to various rulers and tribes.15 Among those who were sent to the Christian rulers and tribes, we see the following names: Dihyah al-Kalbî sent to Heraclius, the Emperor of Byzantine; `Amr bin Umayyah Zamrî to the Negus, the King of Abyssinia; Hâťib bin Abî Baltâ'a sent to the Muqawqis, the King of Egypt; and the tribes of Ghassan and Ĥanîfah (in northern Arabia). Three letters are important and relevant to our discussion. In his letter to Heraclius, the Byzantine Emperor, the Prophet Muhammad (S) wrote: "... Peace be upon him who follows the guidance. I invite you to accept Islâm. Accept Islâm and you will prosper and Allâh will give you double rewards. But if you refuse, then the sin of your people also will fall upon your shoulders. O' People of the Scripture, come to the word common between us and you that we shall not worship anything but Allâh, and that we shall not associate anything with Him, nor shall some of us take others for lords besides Allâh. But if you turn back, then say: Bear witness that we are Muslims." In the letter to the Negus, the King of Abyssinia, the Prophet Muhammad (S) wrote: "... Peace be upon him who follows the guidance. Praise be to Allâh besides whom there is no other god, the Sovereign, the Holy One, the Preserver of Peace, the Keeper of the Faithful, the Guardian. I bear witness that Jesus, son of Mary, is indeed a spirit of God and His word, which He conveyed unto the chaste Mary. He created 146 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? Jesus through His word just as He created Ādam with His hands. And now I call you to Allâh who is One and has no partner, and to friendship in His obedience. Follow me and believe in what has been revealed to me, for I am the Messenger of Allâh. I invite you and your people to Allâh, the Mighty, the Glorious. I have conveyed the message, and it is up to you to accept it. Once again, peace be upon him who follows the path of guidance." In the letter sent to the Muqawqis, the King of Egypt and a Coptic Christian, the Prophet Muhammad (S) wrote: "...Peace be upon him who follows the guidance. I invite you to accept the message of Islâm. Accept it and you shall prosper. But if you turn away, then upon you shall also fall the sin of the Copts. O' People of the Scripture, come to a word common between us and you that we shall worship none but Allâh and that we shall ascribe no partner unto Him and that none of us shall regard anyone as lord besides God. And if they turn away, then say: Bear witness that we are Muslims."16 Even the arrival of the delegation from Christian Najranis and how the Prophet (S) invited them to Islâm and, finally, the mubâhala with them is in the same spirit of inviting the Ahlul Kitâb to Islâm. All these letters and the meeting with Najranis prove beyond any doubt that if the Ahlul Kitâb (the People of the Scripture) were on Ŝirât mustaqîm on the right path that leads to salvation then the Prophet (S) would not have invited them to Islâm. At the conclusion of this introduction, we would like to reiterate the caution that believing in Islâm as the only valid path of submission to God does not automatically and necessarily lead to the belief that all non-Muslims will go to hell. Neither does this exclusivist view of Islâm as the only sirât mustaqîm prevent us from promoting tolerance and peaceful co-existence Abdul Sattar Shaikh 147 among the followers of various religions, especially the Jews and the Christians. While talking about polytheist parents, Almighty Allâh says: "And if they insist on you to associate with Me (someone as on object of worship) of what you have no knowledge, then do not obey them, however interact with them in this world kindly ..."17 Thus, a Muslim has to resist the un-Islâmic influence of nonMuslims, but still be kind to them. In other words, although your paths in the hereafter will be separate, that does not prevent you from being kind, merciful, and just to non-Muslims in this world. Notes 1. Al-Qur'ân, Sûratul Baqarah (2), Verse 253; Al-Qur'ân, Sûrat Banî Isrâ'îl (17), Verse 55 2. Al-Qur'ân, Sûratul Ahzâb (33), Verse 7; also see Al-Qur'ân, Sûratul Shûra (42), Verse 13: "He has made plain to you the religion that He enjoined upon Nûh, and that which We have revealed to you, and that We have enjoined upon Ibrâhîm, Mûsâ, and `Isâ..." 3. Al-Qur'ân, Sûrat Āli Imrân (3), Verse 84 4. It took the Catholic Church almost two thousand years to recognize the nonChristians including the Muslims. The Second Vatican Council declared in 1964 that "Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his church, but who seek God with a sincere heart, and moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience–those too may achieve eternal salvation." Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, Wilmington, Delaware: Scholarly Resources, 1975, p. 367. 5. Imâm `Alî Zaînul `Ābidîn, Risâlatul Huqûq, tr. SSA Rizvi, Vancouver: VIEF, 1989, p. 36. 6. Ira Lapidus writes: "The Ottomans, like previous Muslim regimes, considered the non-Muslim subjects autonomous but dependent peoples whose internal social, religious, and communal life was regulated by their own religious organizations, but their leaders were appointed by, and responsible to, a Muslim state." A History of Islâmic Societies, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1990, p. 323. Also see Marshall Hodgson, The Venture of Islâm, vol. 1, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974, p. 306. 7. Hick, God and the Universe of Faith, London: Macmillan, 1977, p. 140. 148 Pluralism definition What does pluralism mean? 8. Hick, An Interpretation of Religion, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989, p. 364-365. 9. John Hick, An Interpretation of Religion, p. 241. In other words, we cannot really know God; what we know is our perception of Him. Muslim philosophers do not accept Kant's theory. For more on the theory of knowledge from the Islâmic perspective in English, see Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Tabâ'tabâ'î, The Elements of Islâmic Metaphysic, tr. S.A.Q. Qarâ'I, London: ICAS Press, 2003, p. 115-132 and also Part One of S.M. Bâqir as-Sadr, Our Philosophy, tr. Shams C. Inati, London: Muĥammadi Trust, 1987. 10. The Essential Rumi, translated by C. Barks, New Jersey: Castle Books, 1997, p. 525. 11. Al-Qur'ân, Sûratul Baqarah (2), Verse 257 12. See the discussion in this book. Āyatullâh Muťahharî's comment that "the reality of submission has a particular form in each age" is also key to the proper understanding of Sûratul Baqarah (2), Verse 62. 13. Al-Qur'ân, Sûrat Āli Imrân (3), Verse 19 14. Al-Qur'ân, Sûrat Āli Imrân (3), Verse 19-20 15. Muhammad Ibrâhîm Āyatî, Târîkh-e Payghambar-e Islâm, Tehran: Tehran University Press, n.d. p. 480-482. 16. Ibid, p. 483494. 17. Al-Qur'ân, Sûrat Luqmân (31), Verse 15 Bibliogeraphy Al-Qur'ân Āyatî, Muhammad Ibrâhîm, Târîkh-e Payghambar-e Islâm ,Tehran: Tehran University Press, n.d. Hick, John, An Interpretation of Religion, New Haven: Yale University Press,1989. Hick, John, God and the Universe of Faith, London: Macmillan,1977. Hodgson, Marshall, The Venture of Islâm, vol. 1, Chicago: University of Chicago Press,1974. Imâm `Alî Zaînul `Ābidîn, Risâlatul Huqûq, tr. SSA Rizvi, Vancouver: VIE, 1989. Sadr, S.M. Bâqir, Our Philosophy, tr. Shams C. Inati, London: Muĥammadi Trust,1987. Tabâ'tabâ'î, Muhammad Husayn, The Elements of Islâmic Metaphysic, tr. S.A.Q. Qarâ'i , London: ICAS Press, 2003. International Journal of Hekmat / Vol.1/Autumn 2009/ 149-153 Book Review: Epistemological and Theological Foundations of Religious Pluralism in John Hick's Philosophy Wajih Qansu, Published by: al-Dar al-Arabiyah lil Ulum, Beirut, 2007. Introduced by: Zahed Veysi, Iran. The book under review focuses on John Hick's philosophy concerning religious pluralism. In the first chapter, the author gives a brief account of John Hick's biography and biodata, and then he presents a summary of Hick's most important thoughts about the philosophy of religion. Also, a list of John Hick's writings is provided in this chapter. In the first chapter, of course, not all Hick's ideas are presented; but the focus of his discussion includes his viewpoints, methodologies, and comparisons Hick has adopted 150 Book Review concerning religious pluralism and his theory of religious pluralism. For the same reason, in the consequent chapters, the concepts and points mentioned related to John Hick's religious pluralism which are dispersed throughout his writings are elaborated. The second chapter which is titled "The Problem of Religious Pluralism" discusses the approach of Christian theology towards other religions. Also, in this chapter, the author speaks of the problem of religious pluralism and backgrounds of the theological revolution sought by John Hick. The Third Chapter, "God between Transcendence and Experience", discusses the idea of God or transcendent reality in the great religions of the world, and elucidates various names and attributes of God in a comprehensive manner. The Fourth Chapter, "Epistemological Pattern of John Hick", studies John Hick's attempts to construct an epistemological pattern similar to the epistemological pattern of Kant. This is, of course, aimed to recognize perceptional foundations and infrastructures to perceive Divine truth and make interpretation and understanding of religious experience possible. Chapter five, "Conflict between Claims Concerning Religious Truths", studies the problem of conflict between claims concerning religious truths, and provides some solutions for such conflicts. Chapter six, "the Problem of Salvation", discusses the concept of salvation, and attempts have been made in this chapter to shed light on the equal possibility of salvation for the followers of all religions. Chapter seven, "Religion and Religious Experience", discusses the religious pluralism realized in the existing world. It also provides such definition for religion that may be suitable for the existing situation of religious pluralism. In the conclusion, Book Review 151 attempts made by John Hick to understand and interpret religious experience are illustrated. Chapter Eight, "Christology and Religious Pluralism", discusses John Hick's challenge with the problems of "superiority of Christianity" and "Singleness of Christ". Also mention is made of his attempts to re-understand Christ, his opinion about equality of Christianity and other religions, his idea of the essence of Christianity, and new theological ideas concerning ransom, incarnation, and Trinity. Chapter Nine, "Conclusion: Criticism and Evaluation" provides a critical reading of the main points of John Hick's pluralist pattern to understand religious experience. The book describes religious pluralism and its branches based on John Hick's philosophy and his ideas in this regard. The main basis of this theory is that there are some sort of relationship between plurality of human societies and plurality of religions. The reason underling this argument is that religion is not something added to the society from without, but one of its institutions and historical foundations. That religion has a hidden dimension does not mean that its truths are of particular kind, or are hidden, or are beyond the reality of human society. On the contrary, religion is always manifested in social frame, cultural structures, and linguistic and semantic systems where it finds its qualities as well. This means that religion is not merely a heritage of the prophets or a revelatory text received by the believer. Religion is a product of historical institutionalization of religious call which is realized after death of the founder (of that call). In this way, religion changes from a state of conscious awareness and spontaneous commitment to the teachings of the founder into an organized and rationalized state of awareness, and includes a series of common convictions and legislative and behavioral principles as 152 Book Review well as devotional acts. Religion includes frames organizing relationships between believers and between them and the world. The chapters of the book and their contents have been already mentioned briefly, hence there is no need to repeat them again. However, a brief account of what the author has written about religious pluralism in John Hick's viewpoint is provided here. Taking into account Hick's viewpoints, methodologies and comparisons made by him concerning religious pluralism on whose basis he founds his theory of pluralism, the author describes the main ideas of John Hick about pluralism. In addition, he mentions various concepts introduced by John Hick concerning religious pluralism. Such concepts, of course, are dispersed in John Hick's writings and works. While discussing the issue of religious pluralism, the author describes the methodology of Christian theology with an eye on John Hick's stance towards other religions. He discusses religious pluralism in the same way. It should be borne in mind that the term "pluralism" when used in the field of religion is to a great extent ambiguous. More clearly, the concept of "pluralism" came into existence when the religious conviction was the foundation of identity and the main link of social relations that tried to coordinate such relations. Later, the term was used to describe diversity of religious attitudes and plurality of creedal approaches within a single society so that religion may be taken as a personal choice. Nevertheless, since moral values take their essence and significance from the divine laws, the moral issue proceeds to reproduce its own independent principles and commitment. The main mistake of John Hick was his attempt to transform historical and objective reality of the religious pluralism existing within the precinct of world great civilizations to a rational and Book Review 153 creedal reality. In other words, he tried to found this pluralism on religious foundations with a religious justification. Discussion about religious pluralism, of course, is not an attempt to prove legitimacy of the existing religious pluralism in the world, for this pluralism is an existing reality and it is not necessary to prove it. Hick's discussion about the truth of this pluralism is a theoretical endeavor. The main context of John Hick's theory is reality and its data with all its dispersed segments. Thus he focuses on such data to construct a rational and theological system which interprets and depicts the universe concealed in these data. Therefore, the epistemological question turns from a question of the competence of religious system into a question of historical situation producing the religious system and of rational and epistemological frames which are able to provide a proper understanding of its internal instruments, intrinsic structure, and historical developments. One may, of course, raise an objection that Hick does not provide sufficient justification for moving from inclusivism to pluralism which considers the system of truths and sacredness existing in all religions to be on the same level. It seems that the present book can be an important step towards understanding Hick's philosophizing for nonWesterners, in particular if we bear in mind that the way of religious understanding in Islamic World is different from what is thought by John Hick. Thus, this book seems to be an important work for filling the lacuna existing in the literature concerning this field. Naturally, this subject with its extensive scope cannot be contained in such a small book. If the author speaks sometimes in brief and probably ambiguously, it is based on the presupposition that the reader is familiar with the main ideas of Hick. However, the book cannot be regarded as a textbook. Nevertheless, the scholars in the Islamic and Arab are 154 Book Review recommended not to miss this valuable source.

Penultimate draft of an article published in M. Grajner and G. Melchior (ed.), Handbuch Erkenntnistheorie, Stuttgart: Metzler, 2019, 129-135. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-476-04632-1_17 Introspektion Der Begriff der Introspektion Unter Introspektion versteht man das Vermögen, Wissen über die eigenen gegenwärtigen geistigen Zustände zu erlangen, ohne sich dabei auf andere Quellen des Wissens, wie etwa auf die Sinneserfahrung oder das Zeugnis anderer, stützen zu müssen. Obwohl der Ausdruck „Introspektion" nahelegt, dass es sich bei jenem Vermögen um eine auf den eigenen Geist gerichtete Wahrnehmung handelt, kann diese Erläuterung keineswegs als ausgemacht gelten. Denn viele Philosophen bestreiten die Existenz einer inneren Wahrnehmung, stellen die Existenz der Introspektion jedoch nicht in Abrede. Der Begriff der Introspektion sollte daher in einem neutralen, nicht auf das Bild einer inneren Wahrnehmung verpflichtenden Sinne verstanden werden. Der Erwerb introspektiven Wissens geht mit der Bildung introspektiver Überzeugungen einher. Als Beispiele für introspektive Überzeugungen werden Überzeugungen gehandelt, die mithilfe von Sätzen wie „Ich habe jetzt Schmerzen", „Ich habe gegenwärtig den visuellen Eindruck von etwas Rotem" oder „Ich glaube, dass heute Freitag ist" zum Ausdruck gebracht werden können. Allerdings ist hier Vorsicht geboten: Obwohl alle introspektiven Überzeugungen von den eigenen gegenwärtigen geistigen Zuständen handeln, sind nicht alle Überzeugungen, die von den eigenen gegenwärtigen geistigen Zuständen handeln, introspektiver Art. Wenn ich aufgrund der Tatsache, dass mir der Psychoanalytiker meines Vertrauens bescheinigt, einen Ödipuskomplex zu haben, zu der Überzeugung gelange, dass ich meine Mutter begehre, handelt meine Überzeugung zwar von einem meiner gegenwärtigen geistigen Zustände, sie ist jedoch nicht introspektiver Art. Denn sie beruht auf dem Zeugnis anderer. Ob es sich bei einer Überzeugung um eine introspektive Überzeugung handelt, lässt sich daher nicht allein an ihrem propositionalen Gehalt ablesen – die Art und Weise ihrer Bildung und Aufrechterhaltung spielt ebenfalls eine entscheidende Rolle. Das Spektrum geistiger Zustände ist vielfältig. Einer geläufigen Unterscheidung zufolge gibt es mindestens vier verschiedene Arten geistiger Zustände: körperliche Empfindungen (z.B. Schmerzen, Juckreiz oder Kribbeln), sinnliche Erfahrungen (z.B. visuelle, auditive oder taktile Eindrücke), propositionale Einstellungen (z.B. Überzeugungen, 2 Wünsche oder Hoffnungen) und Emotionen (z.B. Freude, Eifersucht oder Scham). Darüber hinaus lassen sich zumindest im Hinblick auf propositionale Einstellungen und Emotionen noch einmal episodenhafte von dispositionalen Varianten unterscheiden. (Körperliche Empfindungen und sinnliche Erfahrungen werden dagegen von vornherein als Episoden konzipiert.) Die meisten Philosophen nehmen an, dass wir zumindest auf die episodenhaften geistigen Zustände introspektiven Zugriff haben. Ob sich die Introspektion auch auf dispositionale geistige Zustände erstreckt, ist dagegen umstritten. In einem bestimmten Sinne ist es sicherlich richtig zu sagen, dass eine Person, die introspektiv erkennt, dass sie sich in einem bestimmten geistigen Zustand befindet, sich jenes geistigen Zustands bewusst ist. Allerdings ist Bewusstsein in diesem Sinne nicht mit Bewusstsein im Sinne des Phänomens zu verwechseln, das gegenwärtig im Zentrum der Philosophie des Geistes steht und häufig als „phänomenales Bewusstsein" bezeichnet wird. Unter phänomenalem Bewusstsein versteht man die Eigenschaft geistiger Zustände, sich für die Person, die sich in ihnen befindet, auf eine bestimmte Weise „anzufühlen". Paradigmatische Beispiele für phänomenal bewusste geistige Zustände sind körperliche Empfindungen und sinnliche Erfahrungen. Es ist jedoch eine offene Frage, ob jene Zustände stets von auf sie bezogenen introspektiven Überzeugungen begleitet werden. Die Idee eines geistigen Zustands, der zwar phänomenal, aber nicht introspektiv bewusst ist, ist – logisch betrachtet – nicht inkohärent. Die philosophische Brisanz der Introspektion Ursprünglich haben sich Philosophen für die Introspektion interessiert, weil die Frage, welche Informationen uns die Introspektion über die Natur geistiger Zustände liefert, für die Debatte zwischen Dualisten und Materialisten in der Philosophie des Geistes eine wichtige Rolle spielt. Ein traditionelles Argument für den Dualismus hebt etwa mit der Prämisse an, dass sich in der Introspektion die eigentliche Natur geistiger Zustände offenbare. Da uns, so heisst es weiter, geistige Zustände in der Introspektion als etwas Immaterielles gegeben seien, folge, dass sie tatsächlich eine immaterielle Natur hätten. Materialisten halten in der Regel dagegen, dass die Introspektion keineswegs gegen Fehler gefeit sei und wir die Art und Weise, wie geistige Zustände introspektiv erschienen, daher keineswegs für bare Münze nehmen dürften. Ein weiterer philosophischer Diskussionszusammenhang, für den die Introspektion 3 von Bedeutung ist, ist der Streit zwischen Fundamentalisten und Kohärentisten in der Erkenntnistheorie. Fundamentalisten behaupten, dass unser empirisches Wissen auf einem Fundament beruhe, das aus Überzeugungen bestehe, die selbst keiner epistemischen Rechtfertigung durch andere Überzeugungen bedürften, sondern, wenn man so will, für sich selbst bürgten. Introspektiv erworbene Überzeugungen scheinen für die Rolle eines solchen Fundaments prädestiniert zu sein. Denn es sieht so aus, als hätten sie einen epistemischen Vorzug, der sie vor allen anderen Arten empirischer Überzeugungen auszeichne (vgl. Lewis 1946). Kohärentisten stehen der Idee eines epistemischen Fundaments dagegen skeptisch gegenüber. Sie bemühen sich zu zeigen, dass auch introspektive Überzeugungen einer epistemischen Rechtfertigung durch andere Überzeugungen bedürfen (vgl. BonJour 1985). Der Streit zwischen Fundamentalisten und Kohärentisten drehte sich lange Zeit um die Frage, ob introspektive Überzeugungen unfehlbar seien. Spätestens seit den Arbeiten William Alstons ist jedoch klar, dass Fundamentalisten keineswegs auf die These der Unfehlbarkeit verpflichtet sind. Es gibt andere, weitaus besser zu verteidigende Kandidaten für epistemische Alleinstellungsmerkmale introspektiver Überzeugungen, auf die sich Fundamentalisten berufen können. Ein besonders vielversprechender Kandidat ist die Wahrheitshinlänglichkeit (truth-sufficiency): Bereits das Bestehen des geistigen Zustands, auf den sich eine introspektive Überzeugung bezieht, scheint hinreichend für ihr Gerechtfertigtsein zu sein (vgl. Alston 1971). Selbst wenn introspektive Überzeugungen ungeeignet sein sollten, die Rolle des Fundaments empirischen Wissens zu spielen, ist es plausibel zu sagen, dass jene Überzeugungen hinsichtlich des Grads ihrer epistemischen Rechtfertigung nichtintrospektiven Überzeugungen überlegen sind: Ich scheine besser als alle anderen zu wissen, was ich gegenwärtig denke, fühle oder empfinde. Diese unter dem Stichwort „privilegierter Zugang" geläufige These steht in einem gewissen Spannungsverhältnis zum Prinzip der epistemischen Egalität, eines wichtigen Bestandteils unseres modernen, aufgeklärten Weltbildes, dem zufolge alles, was sich überhaupt wissen lässt, im Prinzip für beliebige Personen gleichermassen gut wissbar ist. Eine zentrale mit der Introspektion verbundene philosophische Herausforderung besteht insofern darin, die These des privilegierten Zugangs mit dem Prinzip der epistemischen Egalität zu versöhnen. Die These des privilegierten Zugangs wird häufig in einem Atemzug mit der These der besonderen Zuverlässigkeit introspektiver Überzeugungen genannt: Obwohl sie nicht unfehlbar sein mögen, scheinen introspektive Überzeugungen – zumindest solche über 4 körperliche Empfindungen und sinnliche Erfahrungen – in höchstem Masse zuverlässig zu sein. Irrtümer, so heisst es, sind Ausnahmen, die besonderen Umständen geschuldet sind. Dieser Konsens ist mittlerweile ins Wanken geraten: Die empirische Psychologie hat in den letzten Jahrzehnten einige Entdeckungen gemacht, die dafür zu sprechen scheinen, dass uns die Introspektion nicht nur gelegentlich in die Irre führt, sondern grundsätzlich ein verzerrtes Bild unseres geistigen Lebens zeichnet. Ein einfaches, aber verblüffendes Experiment mag zur Illustration dieser Behauptung dienen: Man halte seinen Blick starr geradeaus gerichtet und führe dabei eine Spielkarte unbekannter Farbe langsam, in einer Armlänge Entfernung, vom äusseren Rand des Gesichtsfeldes beginnend bis hin zu seiner Mitte. Es ist erstaunlich, wie lange es dauert, bis man in der Lage ist, die Farbe der Karte zu erkennen. Die Introspektion, so scheint es, führt uns systematisch in die Irre: Während sie uns den Eindruck vermittelt, dass unsere visuellen Eindrücke durch und durch farbig sind, sind wir tatsächlich an den Rändern unseres Gesichtsfeldes farbenblind. Wenn uns die Introspektion bereits in diesem relativ einfachen Fall im Stich lässt, wie mag es dann erst um ihre Zuverlässigkeit in komplexeren Fällen bestellt sein? (Vgl. Hulburt & Schwitzgebel 2007). Die Introspektion ist jedoch nicht nur wegen ihrer instrumentellen Rolle (die sie für Debatten in der Metaphysik oder Erkenntnistheorie spielt), des privilegierten Zugangs (den sie uns zu unserem eigenen Geist zu verschaffen scheint) und der besonderen Zuverlässigkeit (die sie angeblich auszeichnet) interessant. Sie wirft auch ein philosophisches Problem ganz eigenen Rechts auf. Paul Boghossian (1989) hat dieses Problem mithilfe eines Trilemmas auf den Punkt gebracht, das von vielen zeitgenössischen Philosophen als Bezugspunkt ihrer Überlegungen verwendet wird. Plausiblerweise gibt es nur drei Möglichkeiten, den Erwerb introspektiven Wissens zu erklären: Introspektives Wissen wird dadurch erworben, dass wir entweder (a) unsere eigenen geistigen Zustände direkt wahrnehmen, (b) ihr Vorliegen auf der Basis gewisser Anhaltspunkte erschliessen, oder (c) keinerlei kognitive Anstrengung, welcher Art auch immer, unternehmen müssen. Keine dieser Optionen scheint attraktiv zu sein. Ad (a): Die direkte Wahrnehmung einer Sache kann uns lediglich ihre intrinsischen Eigenschaften vor Augen führen. Gemäss einer weithin akzeptierten Auffassung wird der Inhalt eines geistigen Zustands jedoch durch gewisse Relationen festgelegt, die die betreffende Person zu ihrer Umgebung unterhält (vgl. Putnam 1975, Burge 1979). Folglich können wir durch die direkte Wahrnehmung eines geistigen Zustands niemals von seinem Inhalt Kenntnis erlangen. Ad (b): Introspektives Wissen scheint ein Paradefall von Wissen zu sein, zu dem wir spontan, d.h. ohne den Umweg über Schlussfolgerungen, gelangen. Der Vorschlag, dass wir das 5 Vorliegen geistiger Zustände auf der Basis von Anhaltspunkten erschliessen, ist mit jener Intuition schwer zu vereinbaren. Ad (c): Je müheloser die Art und Weise ist, auf die wir zu empirischem Wissen gelangen, desto weniger informativ wird jenes Wissen sein. Das Wissen, das sich mithilfe des Satzes „Ich bin jetzt hier" ausdrücken lässt, ist ein gutes Beispiel: Wir kommen zwar mühelos in seinen Besitz, aber dafür ist jenes Wissen inhaltlich so gut wie leer. Introspektives Wissen dagegen ist nicht leer. Die Beantwortung der Frage, in welchem geistigen Zustand wir uns momentan befinden, scheint daher irgendeiner Form von kognitiver Anstrengung zu bedürfen. Die meisten Theorien der Introspektion lassen sich mithilfe der drei von Boghossian aufgelisteten Optionen klassifizieren: Es gibt Theorien, die sich am Modell der direkten Beobachtung orientieren, Theorien, die introspektives Wissen als Resultat anhaltspunktbasierter Schlussfolgerungen betrachten, sowie Theorien, die versuchen, bei der Erklärung introspektiven Wissens ohne den Rekurs auf irgendeine Form von kognitiver Anstrengung – sei es Beobachten, Schliessen oder etwas Drittes – auszukommen. Im folgenden Abschnitt werden die wichtigsten dieser Theorien in ihren Vorund Nachteilen vorgestellt. Theorien der Introspektion Einer traditionellen, oft mit dem Namen „Descartes" verknüpften Auskunft zufolge besitzen wir neben der Fähigkeit, die Aussenwelt wahrzunehmen, auch die Fähigkeit, den eigenen Geist wahrzunehmen. Im Gegensatz zur äusseren Wahrnehmung, so heisst es, werden die Gegenstände dieser inneren Wahrnehmung allerdings nicht sinnlich repräsentiert, sondern sind uns, wenn man so will, leibhaftig gegeben. Daher ist in der inneren Wahrnehmung der Unterschied zwischen der Erscheinung einer Sache und der Sache selbst aufgehoben: Wie einer Person ihr geistiger Zustand erscheint, so ist er auch, und wie der geistige Zustand einer Person ist, erscheint er ihr auch. Obwohl die Einfachheit und Eleganz dieser Auskunft bestechend wirkt, ist sie in der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts auf grosse Vorbehalte gestossen. Es war allerdings weniger die durch die Entdeckungen Freuds gespeiste Skepsis an der Idee der Unfehlbarkeit, sondern eine sich auf die Privatheit der angeblich innerlich beobachtbaren Gegenstände beziehende sprachphilosophische Überlegung, die viele Philosophen von der Idee der inneren 6 Wahrnehmung abrücken liess. Die Vorschriften, die die Verwendung eines Wortes regeln, so der Gedanke, müssen sich auf öffentlich beobachtbare Anhaltspunkte beziehen. Andernfalls könne das betreffende Wort nicht die Rolle eines bedeutungsvollen Begriffs einer erlernbaren Sprache spielen. Wörter wie „Schmerzen", „Überzeugung" oder „Wunsch" bilden hier keine Ausnahme. Ihre Verwendungsregeln müssen ebenfalls auf öffentlich beobachtbare Anhaltspunkte Bezug nehmen, und das heisst in diesem Fall: auf das Verhalten der Person, auf die das betreffende Wort angewendet wird. Wenn das richtig ist, scheint an der Idee der inneren Wahrnehmung etwas faul zu sein. Denn was es auch immer sei, das wir in der inneren Wahrnehmung zu Gesicht bekommen – sicher ist, dass es sich nicht um die öffentlich beobachtbaren Anhaltspunkte handelt, auf die sich die für Wörter wie „Schmerz", „Überzeugung" oder „Wunsch" geltenden Verwendungsregeln beziehen. Gilbert Ryles (1949) Überlegungen können als Reaktion auf diese Schwierigkeit aufgefasst werden. Wenn das Verhalten der Massstab ist, an dem sich die Verwendung alltagspsychologischen Vokabulars messen lassen muss, dann gilt das nicht nur für ihre Verwendung in der dritten Person, sondern auch für ihre Verwendung in der ersten Person. Wenn ich wissen will, in welchem geistigen Zustand ich mich gegenwärtig befinde, muss ich mich folglich auf dieselben Arten von Anhaltspunkten stützen, auf die sich auch andere Personen stützen müssen, wenn sie etwas über meine geistigen Zustände herausfinden möchten: Anhaltspunkte, die aus der Beobachtung meines Verhaltens gewonnen werden. Ryle zufolge handelt es sich bei der Introspektion also keineswegs um eine eigenständige Wissensquelle. Im Gegenteil: Introspektives Wissen speist sich aus gewöhnlichen Wissensquellen wie der Sinneserfahrung, der Erinnerung oder der Schlussfolgerung. Auch Ludwig Wittgensteins (1953) Position kann als Antwort auf die sprachphilosophischen Schwierigkeiten verstanden werden, vor die uns die Idee der inneren Wahrnehmung stellt. Wittgenstein teilt zwar Ryles Überzeugung, dass das Verhalten als Massstab der richtigen Verwendung alltagspsychologischen Vokabulars dient. Selbstzuschreibungen wie „Ich habe jetzt Schmerzen" können daher nicht auf innerer Wahrnehmung beruhen. Im Gegensatz zu Ryle hält Wittgenstein es allerdings für einen Fehler zu glauben, dass sie auf irgendeiner anderen Art von Beobachtung beruhen. Selbstzuschreibungen, so die Pointe seiner Überlegungen, haben nicht den Charakter von Berichten, in denen wir irgendwelche Beobachtungen zu Protokoll geben – sie gleichen vielmehr Gesten oder Ausrufen, die unserer Gemütsverfassung Ausdruck verleihen. Wenn ich den Satz „Ich habe Schmerzen" äussere, beschreibe ich kein wie auch immer 7 wahrgenommenes Ereignis. Ich tue vielmehr das, was jemand tut, der vor Schmerz sein Gesicht verzieht: Ich verleihe meinem Schmerz Ausdruck. Wittgensteins Expressivismus zufolge gibt es also in einem bestimmten Sinne gar kein introspektives Wissen: Die Äusserungen, die wir gemeinhin als Manifestationen jenes Wissens betrachten, entpuppen sich bei näherem Hinsehen als Formen von Ausdrucksverhalten. Sowohl Ryles als auch Wittgensteins Auffassungen werden heute gemeinhin für inadäquat gehalten. Der an Ryle gerichtete Hauptvorwurf lautet, dass seine Auffassung schlecht zu der weitverbreiteten Intuition der „epistemischen Asymmetrie" passe, der zufolge zwischen der Art und Weise, in der wir von unseren eigenen geistigen Zuständen, und der Art und Weise, in der wir von den geistigen Zuständen anderer Personen Wissen erlangen, ein prinzipieller Unterschied bestehe. Wittgenstein wiederum wird vorgehalten, dass seine Auffassung der semantischen Kontinuität zwischen Selbstund Fremdzuschreibungen nicht Rechnung tragen könne. Wenn ich zu Ihnen sage: „Sie haben Schmerzen", und Sie zu mir sagen: „Ich habe Schmerzen", dann sagen wir damit in einem bestimmten Sinne dasselbe, und zwar, dass Sie Schmerzen haben. Je nachdem, ob Sie Schmerzen haben oder nicht, sagen wir beide zudem etwas Wahres oder Falsches. Wenn Wittgenstein Recht haben sollte, wäre diese Intuition falsch. Denn Wittgenstein zufolge haben Sie mit Ihrer Äusserung von „Ich habe Schmerzen" nichts gesagt, das sich als wahr oder falsch bewerten liesse. Trotz dieser Bedenken finden zumindest die Grundideen Ryles und Wittgensteins auch heute noch Befürworter. So hat etwa Dorit Bar-On (2004) eine neo-expressivistische Theorie der Introspektion vorgelegt, die von Wittgensteins Überlegungen inspiriert ist. Die Tatsache, dass eine sprachliche Äusserung eine Form von Ausdrucksverhalten darstelle, bedeute, so Bar-On, allerdings nicht notwendigerweise, dass sie semantisch inert sei. Eine Äusserung wie „Ich habe Schmerzen" könne sowohl meinem Schmerz Ausdruck verleihen als auch wahrheitsfähig sein. Zu den Autoren, die auf Ideen Ryles zurückgreifen, zählt etwa Quassim Cassam (2014). Cassam stimmt mit Ryle darin überein, dass introspektives Wissen das Ergebnis von auf Anhaltspunkten beruhenden Schlussfolgerungen ist. Anders als Ryle vertritt er, was die Art jener Anhaltspunkte betrifft, jedoch eine liberale Auffassung: Nicht nur die eigenen Verhaltensweisen gehören dazu, sondern auch gewisse innere Erlebnisse (internal promptings). Aufgrund des Einflusses von Ryle und Wittgenstein galt die Idee der inneren Wahrnehmung lange Zeit als kompromittiert. Erst mit dem Abflauen der ordinary language philosophy konnte sie in der Philosophie wieder Fuss fassen. Eine gutes Beispiel für diese 8 Renaissance ist David Armstrongs (1968) materialistische Theorie der Introspektion. Geistige Zustände, so Armstrong, sind identisch mit bestimmten Arten von Gehirnzuständen. Introspektives Wissen sei daher das Resultat der Tätigkeit eines zerebralen Scanners, der das Auftreten jener Gehirnzustände registriere. Es gebe zwar keine logische Garantie dafür, dass dieser Mechanismus stets richtig funktioniere. Aber solange keine gravierenden Störungen aufträten, arbeite er zuverlässig. Ein gewichtiger Einwand gegen Armstrongs Version der inneren Wahrnehmung lautet, dass sie mit der Möglichkeit von Selbstblindheit vereinbar sei: Wenn introspektives Wissen das Resultat der Tätigkeit eines zerebralen Scanners ist, dann ist es möglich, dass eine rationale, begrifflich kompetente Person das geistige Leben führt, das sie in der Tat führt, ohne dass sie sich ihrer geistigen Zustände jemals bewusst wird – dann nämlich, wenn ihr zerebraler Scanner systematisch versagt. Sydney Shoemaker (1994) zufolge ist ein solches Szenario jedoch begrifflich inkohärent. Betrachten wir eine Person, die unter Schmerzen leidet. Da ein Zustand kein Schmerz wäre, wenn er in der Person, die ihn verspürt, nicht das Verlangen hervorrufen würde, ihn loszuwerden, wird unsere Person Schritte unternehmen, dieses Verlangen zu stillen. Sie wird z.B. zum Telefonhörer greifen und einen Arzt konsultieren. Da wir uns nun allerdings zugleich vorstellen sollen, dass unsere Person selbstblind ist, sind wir gezwungen anzunehmen, dass sie sich weder ihres Schmerzes noch ihres Verlangens, ihn loszuwerden, gewahr ist. Sie wird sich folglich keinen Reim auf die Tatsache machen können, dass sie zum Telefonhörer greift und den Arzt um einen Termin bittet. Ihr Verhalten wird ihr selbst vollkommen rätselhaft erscheinen. Es wird ihr so vorkommen, als sei sie nicht mehr Herr über ihre eigenen Handlungen – als würden die Dinge, die sie tut, von einer anderen Person getan werden. Dieses Resultat, so Shoemaker, zeige, dass wir uns eine selbstblinde Person in Wirklichkeit gar nicht vorstellen könnten. Was wir uns in Wirklichkeit vorstellen, sind zwei Personen, die sich in einem Körper befinden: eine, die den Schmerz hat, das Verlangen verspürt, ihn loszuwerden, und zum Telefonhörer greift, und eine andere, die ihr Unverständnis über das, was „sie" tut, zu Protokoll gibt. David Chalmers (2003) und Brie Gertler (2001) haben unabhängig voneinander eine spezielle Variante der Idee der inneren Wahrnehmung entwickelt, die vollkommen anderer Art ist als Armstrongs Scanner-Modell. Sie greifen dabei auf den von Russell (1912) ins Spiel gebrachten Begriff der Bekanntschaft (acquaintance) zurück. Dieser Begriff beschreibt ein besonders inniges epistemisches Verhältnis, das angeblich zwischen uns und den von uns momentan durchlebten phänomenalen Episoden bestehe und uns ermögliche, introspektive 9 Urteile zu fällen, die gegen jede Form von Irrtum immun seien. Denn die Begriffe, die wir anlässlich dieser Urteile verwenden – sogenannte „direkt phänomenale Begriffe" –, bestehen Chalmers und Gertler zufolge im wortwörtlichen Sinne aus genau jenen phänomenalen Episoden, auf die wir uns urteilend beziehen. Unser Urteil könne sein Objekt daher nicht verfehlen. Ein Nachteil des Bekanntschaftsmodells besteht darin, dass es sich lediglich auf unser Wissen über gegenwärtig durchlebte phänomenale Episoden erstreckt. Unser Wissen bezüglich anderer Arten geistiger Zustände fügt sich diesem Modell nur schlecht. Propositionale Einstellungen etwa scheinen keine phänomenalen Komponenten zu haben, mit denen wir im relevanten Sinne bekannt sein können. Eine andere Schwierigkeit, die das Bekanntschaftsmodell mit sich bringt, betrifft die Kohärenz der Idee direkt phänomenaler Begriffe: Einerseits (sofern sie aus phänomenalen Episoden bestehen) soll es sich bei ihnen um erlebnishafte Strukturen handeln, andererseits (sofern sie als Bestandteile propositionaler Gehalte fungieren) soll es sich bei ihnen um Begriffe handeln. In dieser Janusköpfigkeit erinnern sie fatal an die ideas der klassischen britischen Empiristen. Ausserdem haben direkt phänomenale Begriffe eine äusserst begrenzte Lebensdauer: Sie existieren nur so lange, wie auch die körperlichen Empfindungen und Sinneserfahrungen existieren, aus denen sie bestehen. Es sieht daher so aus, als könne ein bestimmter direkt phänomenaler Begriff nur bei einer einzigen Gelegenheit – nämlich anlässlich des Auftretens der ihn konstituierenden phänomenalen Episode – verwendet werden. Ist dieser Umstand mit der Idee eines Begriffs vereinbar? Ein grundsätzlicher Einwand gegen die Idee der inneren Wahrnehmung – in welcher Spielart auch immer – lautet, dass sie der Phänomenologie der Introspektion nicht gerecht wird: Die Aufmerksamkeit einer Person, die sich über ihre eigenen gegenwärtigen geistigen Zustände klar zu werden versucht, scheint sich nicht nach innen zu richten, sondern nach aussen. Der Grund dafür liegt in der unserem Geist eigentümlichen Transparenz: Wenn ich meine gegenwärtigen geistigen Zustände in den Blick zu nehmen versuche, endet dieser Versuch zwangsläufig darin, dass meine Aufmerksamkeit auf die intentionalen Objekte jener Zustände gelenkt wird. Diese Beobachtung deutet darauf hin, dass wir introspektives Wissen nicht durch einen wie auch immer gearteten Blick nach innen erlangen. Die Introspektion scheint, so paradox es klingen mag, ein auf die Aussenwelt gerichteter Vorgang zu sein. Einem Vorschlag von Gareth Evans (1982) zufolge beantworten wir die an uns selbst gerichtete Frage „Glaube ich, dass es einen dritten Weltkrieg geben wird?" z.B. nicht 10 dadurch, dass wir unser Inneres nach der passenden Überzeugung durchforsten, sondern dadurch, dass wir uns fragen, ob es einen dritten Weltkrieg geben wird. Ähnliches scheint auch für andere Arten geistiger Zustände zu gelten: Jeder auf den Besitz eines bestimmten geistigen Zustands abzielenden Frage lässt sich eine geeignete Frage über das Bestehen eines Sachverhalts in der Aussenwelt zuordnen, durch deren Beantwortung wir in den Besitz introspektiven Wissens gelangen können (vgl. Barz 2012). Selbst wenn es gelingen sollte, für jeden Typus von geistigen Zuständen geeignete, auf die Aussenwelt bezogene Fragen zu finden, wäre immer noch rätselhaft, warum wir durch die Beantwortung solcher Fragen in den Besitz von Wissen über den eigenen Geist gelangen: Was sich in der Aussenwelt abspielt, ist eine Sache, in welchem Zustand sich unser Geist befindet, eine ganz andere. Eine weitere Schwierigkeit mit dem Transparenzmodell besteht darin, dass es schlecht zur Unmittelbarkeit introspektiven Wissens zu passen scheint. Wenn ich weiss, dass ich glaube, dass es einen dritten Weltkrieg geben wird, so handelt es sich bei diesem Wissen dem Transparenzmodell zufolge um das Resultat eines wie auch immer gearteten Erwägens der Möglichkeit eines dritten Weltkrieges. In der Regel scheinen wir jedoch wissen zu können, was wir über eine bestimmte Sache glauben, ohne näher über diese Sache nachdenken zu müssen. Manche Kritiker halten das von Anhängern des Transparenzmodells vorgeschlagene Verfahren daher für wenig geeignet, um eine bereits vorhandene Überzeugung zu entdecken – es handelt sich eher um ein Verfahren, mit dessen Hilfe wir neue, vorher nicht vorhandene Überzeugungen erzeugen. Die mit den bislang betrachteten Introspektionsmodellen verbundenen Schwierigkeiten sind Wasser auf die Mühlen derjenigen Philosophen, die annehmen, dass es keiner besonderen epistemischen Anstrengung bedarf – sei es in Form eines nach innen oder nach aussen gerichteten Blicks –, um zu introspektivem Wissen zu gelangen. Introspektives Wissen, so sagen sie, wird vielmehr „frei Haus" geliefert: Es wird durch begriffliche Zusammenhänge garantiert, die zwischen dem Besitz introspektiver Überzeugungen und dem Haben der geistigen Zustände bestehen, auf die sich jene Überzeugungen beziehen. Dieser Gedanke lässt sich in zweierlei Richtungen ausbuchstabieren. Man kann ihn zum einen so verstehen, dass es unter gewissen Randbedingungen begrifflich unmöglich ist, sich in einem geistigen Zustand φ zu befinden, ohne zu glauben, dass man sich in φ befindet. Diese Idee ist vor allem von Shoemaker (1994) im Rahmen seiner Kritik an Armstrongs Scanner-Modell stark gemacht worden: Der Besitz der relevanten alltagspsychologischen Begriffe, zusammen mit einem gewissen Grad an Rationalität, sei, so Shoemaker, bereits hinreichend für 11 introspektives Wissen. Man kann jenen Gedanken jedoch auch in der umgekehrten Richtung ausbuchstabieren: Für das Haben eines geistigen Zustands φ ist bereits der Besitz der Überzeugung, dass man sich in φ befindet, hinreichend – vorausgesetzt, man ist begrifflich kompetent und rational. Diese Idee lässt sich mithilfe des folgenden Beispiels illustrieren. Nehmen wir an, ich sei der Meinung, dass ich glaube, dass p. Ich werde dann die Frage „Glaubst du, dass p?" affirmativ beantworten. Da ich rational bin und den Begriff der Überzeugung beherrsche, werde ich wissen, dass jemand, der die Frage „Glaubst du, dass p?" bejaht, die Frage „Ist p der Fall?" schlecht verneinen kann. Mit der Bejahung der Frage „Ist p der Fall?" gehe ich jedoch genau dieselben Verpflichtungen ein, denen auch derjenige unterliegt, der glaubt, dass p – etwa die Verpflichtung, die Behauptung, dass p, gegen Einwände zu verteidigen. Kurz: Die „höherstufige" Überzeugung, dass ich glaube, dass p, geht – falls das betreffende Subjekt rational ist und weiss, was es heisst, eine Überzeugung zu haben – mit genau denselben Dispositionen einher wie die „niedrigstufige" Überzeugung, dass p. Und dieselben Dispositionen zu haben wie jemand, der die Überzeugung, dass p, hat, heisst nichts anderes als die Überzeugung, dass p, zu haben (vgl. Moran 2001). Manche Autoren geben dieser Idee eine konstruktivistische Wendung: Wir dürfen, so sagen sie, den geistigen Zustand φ nicht als etwas betrachten, das bereits vor der Bildung unserer Überzeugung, dass wir uns in φ befinden, existierte. Es ist vielmehr so, dass φ durch jene Überzeugung überhaupt erst ins Leben gerufen wird (vgl. Coliva 2009). Die engen begrifflichen Verflechtungen, die den „Frei Haus"-Theorien zufolge zwischen der Überzeugung „Ich befinde mich jetzt in φ" und dem geistigen Zustand φ bestehen, lassen es fraglich erscheinen, ob wir in diesem Zusammenhang überhaupt noch von Wissen reden dürfen. Denn normalerweise nehmen wir an, dass die Gegenstände unseres Wissens von unseren Wissenszuständen begrifflich unabhängig sind. „Frei Haus"-Theorien laufen daher Gefahr, das Phänomen des introspektiven Wissens wegzuerklären, anstatt es verständlich zu machen. In ihrem Licht erscheint die Introspektion nicht länger als die Fähigkeit, die eigenen geistigen Zustände zu entdecken. Sie entpuppt sich vielmehr als die Fähigkeit, die eigenen geistigen Zustände zu gestalten. Literatur 12 Alston, William: Varieties of Privileged Access. In: American Philosophical Quarterly 8 (1971), 223-241. Armstrong, David M.: A Materialist Theory of the Mind. London 1968. Bar-On, Dorit: Speaking My Mind. Expression and Self-Knowledge. Oxford 2004. Barz, Wolfgang: Die Transparenz des Geistes. Berlin 2012. Boghossian, Paul: Content and Self-Knowledge. In: Philosophical Topics 17 (1989), 5-26. BonJour, Laurence: The Structure of Empirical Knowledge. Cambridge, Mass. 1985. Burge, Tyler: Individualism and the Mental. In: Midwest Studies in Philosophy 4 (1979), 73122. Cassam, Quassim: Self-Knowledge for Humans. Oxford 2014. Chalmers, David: The Content and Epistemology of Phenomenal Belief. In: Aleksandar Jokic und Quentin Smith (Hg.): Consciousness – New Philosophical Perspectives. Oxford 2003, 220-272. Coliva, Annalisa: Self-Knowledge and Commitments. In: Synthese 171 (2009), 365-375. Evans, Gareth: The Varieties of Reference. Oxford 1982. Gertler, Brie: Introspecting Phenomenal States. In: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 63 (2001), 305-28. Hulburt, Russell T./Schwitzgebel, Eric: Describing Inner Experience? Proponent Meets Skeptic. Cambridge, Mass. 2007. Lewis, Clarence I.: An Analysis of Knowledge and Valuation. La Salle 1946. Moran, Richard: Authority and Estrangement. Princeton 2001. Putnam, Hilary: The Meaning of 'Meaning'. In: Minnesota Studies in Philosophy of Science 7 (1975), 131-193. Russell, Bertrand: Problems of Philosophy. London 1912. Ryle, Gilbert: The Concept of Mind. London 1949. Shoemaker, Sydney: Self-Knowledge and 'Inner Sense'. In: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 54 (1994), 249-314. Wittgenstein, Ludwig: Philosophische Untersuchungen [1953]. Frankfurt a. M. 71990.

International Journal of Academic and Applied Research (IJAAR) ISSN: 2000-005X Vol. 3 Issue 5 , May, 2019 Pages: 14-18 http://www.ijeais.org/ijaar 14 Estimation of the Bi-response Poisson Regression Model Based on Local Linear Approach Darnah 1 , Moh. Imam Utoyo 2 and Nur Chamidah 3 1Department of Mathematics, Mulawarman University, Makassar 75123, Indonesia correspondence author: [email protected] 2,3Department of Mathematics, Airlangga University, Surabaya 60115, Indonesia [email protected], [email protected] Abstract: Bi-response Poisson regression model based on the bivariate Poisson distribution and the response variable is a count data that correlate. The function of the bi-response Poisson regression model can be estimate using the parametric approach and the nonparametric approach. In this paper, we discuss the nonparametric approach using local linear estimator. The parameters of the bi-response Poisson regression model are estimated by the method of maximum likelihood. Keywords: bi-response, Poisson regression, local linear. 1. INTRODUCTION The regression model can be used to describe the relation between the response variable and the predictor variable. The response variable of the regression model allows for continue data and count data. Some the regression model of the count data are Poisson regression model, Generalized Poisson regression model, and Negative Binomial regression model. According to Zamani, et al (2015), Poisson regression model has been widely used for modeling count data with covariates. The Poisson regression model is the basic framework for count data analysis and it arises from the evidence that the number of occurrences of a given event over a specific time period depends on some covariates (Santos & Neves, 2008). The Poisson regression model based on the Poisson distribution. The Poisson distribution satisfies the equal-dispersion property because the conditional mean of the response variable equals its conditional variances (Famoye, 1993). Poisson regression modeling often involves not only one response variable but also can two or more response variables because of a phenomenon involving multiple response variables. Poisson regression analysis involving one response variable with one or more predictor variables is called Poisson regression. Poisson regression involving two response variables correlated with one or more predictor variables is called bi-response Poisson regression. The extension of the bi-response Poisson regression is the multiresponse Poisson regression, the Poisson regression involving more than two response variables with one or more predictor variables. The function of the Poisson regression model can be estimated using two approaches, there are the parametric approach and the nonparametric approach. The parametric approach used if the function of the regression model is known except for finitely many unknown parameters and the relation between the response variable and the predictor variable is assumed to have a specific type curve. If we used the parametric regression approach to this condition then consequently, giving misleading inference about the regression model (Chamidah & Saifuddin, 2013). One collection of procedures that can be used for this purpose are nonparametric regression approach. These approaches give estimate of regression function that allow great flexibility in the possible form of the regression curve because the estimate get from data. A nonparametric regression model generally only assumes that the regression curve satisfies smooth properties that are continuity and differentiability (Eubank, 1999). In this research, we will be studied about bi-response Poisson regression estimation based on local linear approach. 2. BI-RESPON POISSON REGRESSION MODEL Let the three random variables 1 V , 2 V , and U to follow three independent Poisson distributions with the positive parameters 1 2 , ,  and  respectively. According to Jung & Winkelmann (1993), new random variables 1 Y and 2 Y can be constructed by 1 1 Y V U  and 2 2 Y V U  where 1 Y and 2 Y are Poisson random variables. The mean 1 Y and 2 Y are 1 1 ( )E Y    and 2 2 ( )E Y    . The density probability function of 1 Y and 2 Y given by: 1 1 2 2 1 2P(Y = y , Y = y ) ( , )f y y   1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2 0 exp ( ) ; ! ( )! ( )! s k y k y kk k y k y k                 (1) where 1 2y , y 0,1,2, and 1 2s = min(y , y ) . The covariance between 1 Y and 2 Y is: 1 2 1 2 (Y , ) (V , V )Cov Y Cov U U   ( )Var U International Journal of Academic and Applied Research (IJAAR) ISSN: 2000-005X Vol. 3 Issue 5 , May, 2019 Pages: 14-18 http://www.ijeais.org/ijaar 15  (2) The correlation between 1 Y and 2 Y is: 1 2 1 2 (Y , ) ( )( ) Corr Y         (3) The parameter  is non-negative (Berchout & Flug, 2004). Following the standard approach in univariate Poisson regression we model the marginal expectation of 1 Y and 2 Y , respectively, as a loglinear function of exogenous variables. (Jung and Winkelmann, 1993). exp( ); 1, 2 dan 1, 2, ..., T ri ri r x r i n      (4) The likelihood function for the observed random sample is given by: 1 2 2 11 ( , , ) = exp( exp( )) T ri r i n ri x B        and the log likelihood function is: 1 2 L = log ( , , )   1 1 2 2 1 1 1 = exp( ) exp( ) log ; T T i i i n n n i i i n x x B           (5) where 1 2 1 1 2 2 1 2 0 [exp( ) ] [exp( ) ] ; ! ( )! ( )! T Ti i i i i i i i k y k y kks x x B k y k y k              min( ), 1, 2 i ri s y r  The maximum likelihood estimates of the parameters can be obtained by solving equations: log log 0 and = 0; r = 1, 2. L L r       3. LOCAL LINEAR ESTIMATOR IN SINGLE RESPON Local linear estimator is special case in local polynomial estimator. Local polynomial estimator is one of the smoothing methods that can be used as a regression function approach (.)m (Fan & Gijbels, 1996). Local polynomial estimators can estimate regression functions 0 ( )m x and their derivatives: ( ) 0 0 0 '( ), ''( ), , ( ) p m x m x m x Suppose the regression function (.)m has a derivative (p + 1) at the point 0 x , the regression function (.)m can be approached locally with the degree of polynomial p. By Taylor expansion, for x in a neighborhood of, we have: 0 0 0 ( ) ( ) '( )( )m x m x m x x x    2 ( ) 0 0 0 0 ''( )( ) ( )( ) 2! ! p p m x x x m x x x p     (6) or ( ) 0 0 0 0 0 0 ( ) ( ) ( ) ( )( ) ; ! j j j j p p j j m x m x x x x x x j         0 0 ( , )x x h x h   where ( ) 0 0 ( ) ( ) ; 0,1,2, , . ! j j m x x j p j    (7) Suppose we taking n-pairs data sample ( , ) i i x y , the estimates of  based on Weighted Least Square (WLS) procedure by minimizing function: 2 0 0 0 1 0 { ( )( ) } ( ); 1, 2, , j i j i h i pn i j y x x x K x x i n        (8) where (.)K is Kernel function and h is bandwidth. Local polynomial estimators can estimate regression functions 0 ( )m x and their derivatives. According to Equation (7), local polynomial estimators of derivatives jth in regression function ( ) 0 ( ) j m x is: ( ) 0 0 ( ) ! ( ); 0,1,2, , ; j j m x j x j p  (9) For j=0 , the estimate of regression function at the point 0x is: 0 0 0 ( ) ( )m x x . (10) Local linear estimator we obtain if the degree of polynomial (p) equal one (p=1). Local linier estimator can be written is: 2 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 { ( ) ( )( )} ( ) i i h i n i y x x x x K x x       (11) 4. STUDY OF BI-RESPONSE POISSON REGRESSION USING LOCAL LINEAR ESTIMATOR Suppose we have pair observational data ( , ) i ri x y , 1, 2 dan 1, 2, ..., r i n  which is distribute independently with x is vector of covariates and ri y is the count bi-response that follows the Poisson distribution. The probability density function of ri y given by equation (1). Generally, equation (4) can be wrote: exp[ ( )]; 1, 2 dan 1, 2, ..., ri r i m x r i n     (12) The function (.) r m in equation (5) is a smooth function. Assume that the function (.) r m has a ( 1) th p  continuous derivative at the point 0 x . We approximate the function (.) r m by Taylor expansion with order one or 1p  , for data point i x in a neighborhood of 0 x with 0 0 ( , ) i x x h x h   and h is a bandwidth: ( ) ( ) 0 0 1 0 0 ( ) ( ) ( )( ); 1, 2. r r r i i i i m x x x x x r     or International Journal of Academic and Applied Research (IJAAR) ISSN: 2000-005X Vol. 3 Issue 5 , May, 2019 Pages: 14-18 http://www.ijeais.org/ijaar 16 ( ) 0 0 ( ) ( ) ( ); 1, 2. T r r i i m x x x x r  where  01 ( ) T i i x x x  and  ( ) ( ) ( )0 0 1 0( ) ( ) T r r r i i x x   Let 0 ( ) h i K x x is a Kernel weight and h is bandwidth, the local likelihood function can be obtained from Eq (1): 0 1 2 0 1 2 1 ( ) ( , , , ) = ( , ) h i i i i i n i K x x x f y y      (13) The log local likelihood function is: 1 2 0 1 2 0 L( , , , )= ln ( , , , ) i i i i x x        1 2 1 2 0 1 2 1 2 1 0 = ( ) ( ) ln ! ( )! ( )! i i i i h i i i i i y k y kk n s i k K x x k y k y k                            (14) Next, by subtituting Equation (12) into Equation (14), we have:    1 2 0 0 1 2 1 L( , , , ) ( ) exp ( ) exp ( ) i i h i i i n i m m x K x x m x m x            1 21 2 1 2 0 exp ( ) exp ( ) ln ! ( )! ( )! i i i i i i y k y k k s k m x m x k y k y k                   (15) Let (1) (2) 0 ; i ik ik s k D D D    Where (1) 1 1 0 0(1) 1 [exp( ( ) ( )) ] ! ( )! T i i ik i y kk x x x D k y k       and ( 2) 2 2 0 0( 2) 2 [exp( ( ) ( )) ] ( )! T i i ik i y k x x x D y k       The Equation (15) can be written : (1) (2) 0 0 0 0 1 ( ( ) ( ), , ) ( ) h i n i L x x x K x x        ( )0 0 2 1 exp ( ) ( ) ln T r i i r x x x D        (16) Parameter estimation  , (1) 0 ( )x , dan (1) 0 ( )x in biresponse Poisson regression model can be obtained by local likelihood maximum method given by following Theorem 1. Theorem 1 By assuming bi-variate Poisson distribution for response variable ri y , these considerations yield the conditional local weighted log-likelihood in Equation (16), the maximum likelihood estimator for parameter can be found from a solution of maximum likelihood equation:     (1) (1) 0 0 1 0 1 0 (1) (1) 2 0 0 1 0 1 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) 1 exp ( ) ( ) i i i i h i i i i n s i k x x x yL K x x x x x                               2 ( 2) ( 2) 0 0 1 0 exp ( ) ( ) i i i i k k y x x x                 (17) and  (1)0(1) 1 ( ) exp T h i i i n i L K x x x x             (1)1 (1) 0 exp exp T i i i T i s k y k x x x                  (18)  ( 2)0( 2) 1 exp( ) Ti ih i n i x x L K x x               ( 2)1 2 ( 2) 0 exp exp T i i i i T i s k y k y k x x x                (19) Proof: The likelihood function in Equation (16) will have maximum value when the first derivative of parameter  , (1) 0 ( )x , and (2) 0 ( )x equal to zero. The partial derivatives of equation (11) is: 0 1 1 ( ) 1 i h i i n i L D K x x D                  (20) i D    in equation (20) can be obtained using equation (15) and equation (16) as follows: (1) ( 2) ( 2) (1) 0 i ik ik ik ik s k D D D D D                  (21) where   11 (1) (1) 0 0 1 1 exp ( ) ( ) !( )! ik T i ik i ky x x xD k y k                 (1)0 0 1exp ( ) ( )Ti ik x x x y    (22)    2( 2) ( 2) 2 0 0 2 1 exp ( ) ( ) ( )! iT i i ik i y k k y x x xD y k              (23) By substituting equation (15), equation (16), equation (22), and equation (23) to equation (21), we have:   1(1)0 0 1 20 exp ( ) ( ) !( )!( )! ik T ii i i y k s k x x x k y k y k D                       International Journal of Academic and Applied Research (IJAAR) ISSN: 2000-005X Vol. 3 Issue 5 , May, 2019 Pages: 14-18 http://www.ijeais.org/ijaar 17   2(2)0 0exp ( ) ( ) iTi y k x x x          (1) 0 0 1 2 (1) 2 (2) 0 0 0 0 exp ( ) ( ) exp ( ) ( ) exp ( ) ( ) T i i i T T i i k x x x y k y x x x x x x                              (24) According to equation (14) and equation (23), equation (20) can be written: (1) 0 0 1 0 0 (1) 2 0 0 1 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) 1 exp ( ) ( ) T i i h T i n s i k k x x x yL K x x x x x                           2 ( 2) 0 0 exp ( ) ( ) i T i k y x x x           (25)  ( )0 00( ) 0 1 exp ( ) ( )( ) ( ) T r i ih ir n i x x x x L K x x x            ( ) 0 1 ( ) ;i r i D D x      (26) (1) 0( ) iD x   and (1) 0( ) iD x   in equation (26) can be obtained based on equation (14) :    1(1) 1 0 0 (1) 0 1 1 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) ! ( )! iT k i i i i y k s k y k x x xD x k y k                      2( 2) 0 0(1) 0 0 0 2 exp ( ) ( ) exp ( ) ( ) ( ) ( )! iT iT i i i y k x x x x x x x x y k                  (27)    1(1) 1 0 0 (2) 0 1 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) ! ( )! iT k i i i i y k s k y k x x xD x k y k                      2( 2) 2 0 0 2 1 exp ( ) ( ) ( )! iT i i i y k y k x x x y k            (2)0 0 0exp ( ) ( ) ( )Ti ix x x x x    (28) According to equation (27), equation (26) can be expressed as:  (1)0 0 0 0(1) 0 1 ( ) exp ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) T h i i i n i L K x x x x x x x x              (1)1 0 0 0 (1) 0 0 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) exp ( ) ( ) T i i i T i s k y k x x x x x x x x                  (29) According to equation (28), equation (26) can be expressed as:  ( 2 )0 0 0 0( 2) 0 1 ( ) exp ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) T h i i i n i L K x x x x x x x x               ( 2 )1 2 0 0 0 ( 2) 0 0 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) exp ( ) ( ) T i i i i T i s k y k y k x x x x x x x x                   (30) The likelihood function in equation (16) has maximum value when equation (25), equation (29), and equation (30) equals zero, we can be written as : (1) 0 0 1 0 (1) 2 0 0 1 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) 1 exp ( ) ( ) T i i h i T i n s i k k x x x y K x x x x x                        2 ( 2) 0exp ( ) ( )0 0 T i k y i x x x           (31)  (1)0 0 0 0 1 ( ) exp ( ) ( ) ( ) T h i i i n i K x x x x x x x         (1)1 0 0 0 (1) 0 0 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) 0 exp ( ) ( ) T i i i T i s k y k x x x x x x x x                  (32) (34)  (2)1 0 0 0 0 1 ( ) exp ( ) ( ) ( ) T h i i n i K x x x x x x x          ( 2)1 2 0 0 0 ( 2) 0 0 0 exp ( ) ( ) ( ) 0 exp ( ) ( ) T i i i i T i s k y k y k x x x x x x x x                   (33) The first partial derivative obtained in Equation (31) to Equation(33) are nonlinear in parameters so that an iteration process is required to obtain the solution. The commonly used numerical method is the Newton-Raphson method. In the Newton-Raphson method, there is a Hessian matrix whose element is a partial derivative of the two functions of ln likelihood to the  , (1) ( ) T  , and (2) ( ) T  parameters. 5. CONCLUSION Estimator bi-response Poisson regression model using local linear approach can be obtained from the first partial derivative of the likelihood function. The first partial derivative are nonlinear in parameters so that we required an iteration process to obtain the solution, it is the NewtonRaphson method. International Journal of Academic and Applied Research (IJAAR) ISSN: 2000-005X Vol. 3 Issue 5 , May, 2019 Pages: 14-18 http://www.ijeais.org/ijaar 18 REFERENCES [1] Berkhout, P. & Plug, E. 2004. A Bivariate Poisson Count Data Model using Conditional Probabilities. Statistica Neerlandica, 58(3):349-364. [2] Fan, J. & Gijbels, I. 1996. Local Polynomial Modelling and Its Application. Chapman and Hall. London. [3] Chamidah, N. & Saifuddin, T. 2013. Estimation of Children Growth Curve Based on Kernel Smoothing in Multi-Response Nonparametric Regression. Applied Mathematical Science, 7(37): 1839 – 1847. [4] Famoye, F. 1993. Restricted Generalized Poisson Regression Model. Journal of Communication in Statistics-Theory and Methods, 22(5): 1335-1354. [5] Eubank, R. 1999. Spline Smoothing and Nonparametric Regression Second Edition. Marcel Dekker. New York. [6] Jung, R. C. & Winkelmann, R. 1993. Two Aspects of Labor Mobility: A Bivariate Poisson Regression Approach. Empirical Economics, 18:543-556. [7] ZASantos, J. A. & Neves, M. M. 2008. A Local Maximum Likelihood Estimator for Poisson Regression. Metrika, 68: 257-270. [8] Zamani, H., Faoughi, P., & Ismail, N. 2016. Bivariate Generalized Poisson Regression Model: Application On Health Care Data. Journal of Empirical Economics, 115.

pdf version of the entry fictional EntitiEs URI: from the 2013 Edition of the onlinE companion to problEms of analytic philosophy 2012-2015 FCT Project PTDC/FIL-FIL/121209/2010 Edited by João Branquinho and Ricardo Santos ISBN: 978-989-8553-22-5 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy Copyright © 2013 by the publisher Centro de Filosofia da Universidade de Lisboa Alameda da Universidade, Campo Grande, 1600-214 Lisboa Fictional Entities Copyright © 2013 by the author Fiora Salis All rights reserved First published in 2013 Fictional Entities Among the most hotly debated issues in contemporary analytic philosophy are those related to the nature and foundations of fiction. One of them regards the distinction between fiction and non-fiction, which pertains to the area of aesthetics. Another one regards the nature of the cognitive and linguistic resources required to produce and appreciate fiction, which pertains to the area of the philosophy of mind and cognitive science and the philosophy of language. One further issue regards the question of whether there are fictional entities as the objects of our thoughts and discourse about fictional characters and, if there are any such entities, what their nature really is. This, which pertains to the area of metaphysics, will be the focus of this entry. In the philosophy of fiction the term 'fictional characters' applies only to the characters originally introduced in a work of fiction. Fictional characters are, e.g., fictional people (Emma Woodhouse, Pinocchio), fictional things (the scarlet letter, the seven-league boots), fictional places (Lilliput, Macondo) and (according to Friend 2007) perhaps also fictional events (Ophelia's death, Crusoe's shipwreck) that should not be confused with mythical characters (Pegasus, Odin), posits of false scientific theories (Phlogiston, Vulcan) and figments of our imagination (the Bogeyman, a child's imaginary friend). Furthermore, although Paris plays an essential role in Victor Hugo's Les Miserábles and Virgil plays a fundamental role in Dante's Divine Comedy, neither Paris nor Virgil is a fictional character (Thomasson 1999; Friend 2003; for a different view see Castañeda 1990, pp. 274-5; Lamarque and Olsen 1994, pp. 126, 293; Voltolini 2013, and 2006, pp. 117-124, Bonomi 2008). Thus, if there really are fictional characters, they belong to a special class of entities known as ictional entities. According to a familiar distinction put forward by Amie Thomasson (1999), there are two different questions that philosophers can ask about fictional entities. The first is what Thomasson calls the metaphysical question: if there were fictional entities, how would they be? The second is what she calls the ontological question: are there any such entities? While the metaphysical question regards the very Fiora Salis2 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy nature of fictional entities, the ontological question regards the motivations that can be adduced in favor of or against positing fictional entities into our ontology. Let us consider each question separately, first the first, and second the second. 1 The metaphysics of fiction Philosophers of fiction face the initially intuitive datum that fictional entities do not exist as ordinary physical objects. For example, we say that Hamlet does not exist and that Middle-earth is just a fiction. Depending on the interpretation that they give of this datum, they divide into two opposite parties. Fictional irrealists believe that there are no such entities and hold that the overall domain of what exists does not contain them. Hence, they give a negative answer to the ontological question and for this reason do not even try to answer the metaphysical question. Fictional realists instead believe that there are such entities. Hence, they give a positive answer to the ontological question and offer a variety of answers to the metaphysical question, which can be identified with three main metaphysical theories: ictional Meinongianism, ictional possibilism and ictional creationism. 1.1 Fictional meinongianism Fictional Meinongianism, which was originally inspired by Alexius Meinong's theory of objects (Gegenstandstheorie), is characterized by the combination of the following two theses: Ontological Thesis (Realism) : There are fictional entities. Metaphysical Thesis (Meinongianism) : Fictional entities are non-existent objects. The ontological thesis characterizes fictional realism in general by saying that fictional entities are part of the ontological structure of the world. The metaphysical thesis instead differentiates Meinongianism from the other varieties of fictional realism by stating that there are fictional characters, but that they do not exist. Thus, Meinongianism appeals to a metaphysical distinction between 'there is' and 'exists'. Some upholders of the view think that this is rooted in 3Fictional Entities 2013 Edition ordinary language, as when we say things like 'there are no one-eyed giants' and 'there are one-eyed giants, Polyphemus for example' (e.g. Parsons 1980; Zalta 1988; Reimer 2001a,b). But other philosophers have denied that there is any such evidence (e.g. Geach 1971, p. 531) and many have simply rejected the distinction (e.g. Quine 1953; van Inwagen 1977; Lewis 1990; Priest 2005). Meinong's (1904) departing point was the so-called "principle of intentionality", according to which every mental phenomenon is directed towards an object. For example, to judge is always to judge something, to have an idea is always to have an idea of something, to imagine is always to imagine something etc. According to this principle, the idea of a round square requires the existence of a round square, which is a contradictory object. One's thought about the golden mountain also requires the existence of a golden mountain, which is an impossible object. And Ponce de Leon's search for the fountain of youth requires the existence of the fountain of youth, which we know does not exist. Some philosophers took this kind of cases to be counterexamples to the principle of intentionality and rejected the relational view of intentionality itself (cf. Searle 1983). Meinong instead embraced these consequences. He originally thought that there are two modes of being (Sein), namely existence (Existenz) and subsistence (Bestand). He further divided all objects into ideal - or abstract or nonspatiotemporal - and real - or concrete or spatiotemporal - and claimed that real objects (e.g. Mont Blanc, Bucephalus, Rome) exist while ideal objects (e.g. numbers, classes, ideas) subsist. Over and above the realms of ideal objects and real objects he further introduced the new realm of nonexistent objects (e.g. the round square, the golden mountain and the fountain of youth). Meinong (1904) endorsed the principle of independence of so-being from being (explicitly formulated by Mally 1912), according to which the ways in which objects are descriptively given, or the way they are (their Sosein), is distinct and independent of their being (Sein). Related to this principle he also endorsed the Characterization Principle, stating that all objects, whether they exist or not, have the properties which are used to characterize them (explicitly formulated by Routley 1980, p. 46). According to this principle, although the golden mountain does not exist, it does have the properties goldenness and being a mountain that are used to characterize it; and although Charles Marlow does not exist, he does have the properties in terms of which Conrad characterizes him, e.g. being a sailor for the British Empire or being captain of a steamboat. (However, Raspa 2001 and Marek 2009 notice that in Meinong's original account fictional objects are conceived as higher-order entities constructed out of simpler entities.) Yet, neither the golden mountain nor Charles Marlow are identical with the set containing the property of goldenness and being a mountain and with the set containing the properties being a sailor for the British Empire or being captain of a steamboat respectively. Furthermore, Meinong introduced a sort of Comprehension Principle for objects stating that for any set of properties, some object has all the properties in that set and no other property. The golden mountain has the properties of goldenness and being a mountain and no other properties. An object is complete if it either has a certain property F or it has the negation of F, namely not-F. Every existing object is a completely determined object. Mont Blanc has an infinite number of properties and is therefore complete. But many non-existent objects simply lack both F and not-F, and in this sense they are incomplete or indeterminate with respect to F and not-F. The golden mountain is complete with respect to the properties goldenness and being a mountain, but it is incomplete with respect to properties such as being 1000 meters high and not being 1000 meters high. Similarly, Marlow is complete with respect to the properties attributed to him in the story, but he is incomplete with respect to many other properties not explicitly predicated of him in the story and not implicitly derivable from the explicitly predicated properties, such as having a brown mole on the neck and not having a brown mole on the neck. Bertrand Russell (1905a, 1905b, 1907) put forward two objections against Meinong's theory (for a detailed discussion of the Russell-Meinong debate see Smith 1985; Griffin 1985-86; and Simons 1992). The first consists in noticing that nonexistent objects are apt to infringe the law of contradiction. According to Meinong there is an object that is both round and square (the round square) and hence that is both round and not-round (Russell 1905b, pp. 482-3). Meinong (1973) accepted the objection and recognized that indeed the round square does infringe the law of contradiction. But he replied Fiora Salis4 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy that that law holds only for existent objects and that objects such as the round square are contradictory and hence necessarily nonexistent. Russell's second objection could not be dismissed in the same way. Since Meinong endorsed the Comprehension Principle and since he treats existence as a property, there is an object that has the properties goldenness, being a mountain, and being existent. Hence, it follows that there is an existent object that is golden and a mountain. But it is an empirical fact that no golden mountain exists. A further paradox seems to arise from the following considerations. Given the comprehension principle, there is an object having the property being blue. The blue object has exactly one property, i.e. being blue, but it certainly has also the property of having exactly one property. And given that the property of being blue and the property of having exactly one property are not the same, then it follows that the blue object has at least two properties. Contemporary upholders of fictional Meinongianism - or NeoMeinongianism - endorse Meinong's distinction between being and existence, but some of them avoid appealing to the notion of subsistence in their theories (e.g. Parsons 1980, p. 10). Depending on their interpretation of the Meinongian metaphysical thesis, they divide into two main groups. On one side are upholders of what I call C-Meinongianism, according to which fictional objects are concrete non-existent entities (e.g. Parsons 1980; Routley 1980; Jacquette 1996). On the other side are upholders of what I call A-Meinongianism, who revise Meinong's distinctions between existence and non-existence in terms of being concrete and being abstract and claim that nonexistent objects are abstract entities (cf. Zalta 1983 and Pelletier and Zalta 2000; Rapaport 1978 suggests that Meinongian objects should be conceived as of the same metaphysical status as plans rather than concrete individuals, but he does not explicitly endorse the view that they are abstract non-spatiotemporal objects). Upholders of C-Meinongianism claim that nonexistent objects are concrete in the sense that they are correlates of sets of the very same properties that are usually predicated of ordinary objects (Castañeda 1989, spec. Ch. 11, suggests a similar theory in terms of bundles of guises and consociation). So, the golden mountain is a concrete nonexistent object in virtue of being a correlate of the set containing the properties goldenness and being a mountain. Similarly, Marlow 5Fictional Entities 2013 Edition is a concrete nonexistent individual in virtue of being a correlate of the set of properties attributed to him in the story. Upholders of A-Meinongianism instead put forward a technical notion of existence as synonymous with concrete, actual and real, and a notion of non-existence as synonymous with abstract and non-spatiotemporal (Zalta 1983, pp. 12, 173, n. 15). They claim that abstract objects are characterized by a distinct non-spatiotemporal mode of being and by properties that they do not have in the same way as spatiotemporal objects. The way in which the golden mountain has the property of being a mountain is different from the way in which Mont Blanc has that very property. Mont Blanc is a particular object in space and time, while the golden mountain is an abstract entity. Mally (1912) originally suggested two kinds of strategies based on two alternative metaphysical distinctions that defendants of Meinongianism could use in order to solve the difficulties involved in Meinong's original theory. The first strategy appeals to the distinction between two kinds of properties; the second appeals to the distinction between two kinds of predication or two kinds of relations between properties and individuals. Upholders of C-Meinongianism and Meinong (1972) himself followed the first strategy in distinguishing between two kinds of properties that all objects have, i.e. nuclear and extranuclear (this is Parsons' terminology, which was later endorsed by Jacquette 1996). Nuclear properties are ordinary properties such as being blue, being kicked by Socrates or kicked somebody (Routley 1980, pp. 507-10, similarly talks of an object's characterizing properties). Extranuclear properties are ontological properties such as being existent and being fictional, modal properties such as being possible and being impossible, intentional properties such as being looked for and being thought about etc. Thus, the golden mountain has the nuclear properties goldenness and being a mountain, but it does also have the extranuclear property being thought by Meinong. And Charles Marlow has the nuclear properties being a sailor and being the captain of a steamboat, but he also has the extranuclear properties being a fictional character and being a recurrent character of Conrad's novels. The two kinds of properties strategy has been criticized by Priest (2005: 83-84) as putting forward a distinction that is gerrymandered by the desire to avoid the aforementioned problems (and hence ad Fiora Salis6 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy hoc) and unmotivated. This becomes perspicuous if one considers (as Priest does) that even the existence property is relevant for the identity of an object. Although I might fear a real serial killer (e.g. the Unabomber), whom I know to exist, I might not fear a fictional serial killer, whom I know not to exist (e.g. Dexter). The fact that the fictional serial killer does not exist is clearly relevant for its identity and characterization. Furthermore, one important drawback of this strategy consists in the fact that there is no principled criterion to draw the distinction between nuclear and extranuclear properties. The property being a fictional character can be both nuclear and extranuclear. In Who Framed Roger Rabbit Jessica Rabbit is a fictional character (a cartoon), but she is a fictional character also outside the story, just like Marlow and Winston Smith. Thus it seems that the property in question is both nuclear (the property being a fictional character is among those characterizing her in the story) and extranuclear (she is really just a fictional character). Upholders of the distinction have a ready answer to this problem in terms of watered-down properties (Parsons 1980, pp. 42-4). They hold that the nuclear property in question is the watered-down counterpart of the corresponding extranuclear property. According to this proposal there are two properties rather than just one. However, this answer would also be ad hoc and it would further face an endless regress of more watered-down nuclear properties (Jacquette 1996, pp. 83-4; Voltolini 2006, p. 28). Upholders of A-Meinongianism avoid this kind of problem by following the alternative distinction between two modes of predication. (Some opponents of Meinongianism, e.g. van Inwagen 1977, appeal to the same strategy although for different reasons.) Although they do recognize that nonexistent objects have the very same kind of properties that ordinary objects have, they hold that the ways in which they have them are very different. When we say that Charles Marlow was a sailor of the British Empire during the late 19th and early 20th century and that Joseph Conrad was a sailor of the British Empire during the late 19th and early 20th century we use two different kinds of predication of the same property. Rapaport (1978) talks of properties that are constituents of objects and properties that are exempliied by objects. Zalta (1983, 1988) claims that fictional entities encode such properties while ordinary objects exemplify them. 7Fictional Entities 2013 Edition Castañeda (1989) appeals to an internal as well as external mode of predication of properties. Furthermore, according to Zalta (1983: 12), encoding is a primitive notion that is used to prove the existence, and derive the properties, of abstract objects, including fictional objects. According to both Castañeda (1989: 200) and Rapaport (1978: 162), internal predication applies to set-correlates, and so internal predication and properties that are constituents of objects can be defined in terms of set-membership: a (fictional) entity e has a property F internally or as a constituent if and only if F belongs to the set of properties that is correlated with e. While both Charles Marlow and Joseph Conrad have the property being a sailor of the British Empire during the late 19th and early 20th century, Marlow has the property as a constituent (Rapaport), he encodes the property (Zalta), or the property is predicated of him internally (Castañeda), while Conrad exemplifies it (Rapaport and Zalta) or has it externally (Castañeda). One virtue of fictional Meinongianism is that it can give a straightforward account of the nonexistence datum. When we say that Hamlet does not exist we say something true because Hamlet is a non-existent entity. Another virtue is that it accounts for the intuition that fictional objects have the properties that we predicate of them, either as nuclear or extranuclear, or as externally or internally predicated. Hence, a related virtue is that it provides a straightforward account of the truth of statements such as 'Winston Smith is an employee of the Ministry of Truth and a fictional character' and of comparative statements such as 'both Marlow and Conrad were sailors for the British Empire in the late 19th and early 20th century'. A further virtue is that it can offer a straightforward account of impossible or inconsistent fictions. One famous example of the first kind is Conan Doyle's characterization of Dr. Watson as having a single war wound, variously placed on a shoulder or on a leg (see A Study in Scarlett and The Sign of Four). Upholders of Neo-Meinongianism claim that the incoherence would be unproblematic because these properties would be among the characterizing properties of fictional objects. According to Parsons (1980, pp. 49-60, 228-23) a fictional object to which the story ascribes incompatible properties is an impossible object, but this is unproblematic because the object does not exist. (Howell 1979 criticizes Parsons' theory and recommends an Fiora Salis8 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy alternative approach construing fictional objects as non-actual objects in fictional worlds, which can be either possible or impossible.) According to Zalta (1988, pp. 123-29) a fictional object that encodes incompatible properties is unproblematic because it does not exemplify them. One important drawback of the theory however is that it cannot account for one important feature of fictional characters, namely their being created entities. It seems fundamental to a correct comprehension of the notion of what a fictional character is that it is created. We say things like Agatha Christie created Miss Marple in The Murder at the Vicarage and James Bond is a fictional character created in 1953 by Ian Fleming. But if fictional characters are non-spatiotemporal entities then it seems that their authors cannot create them. Parsons (1980, p. 188) appeals to a notion of creation consisting in a mechanism of selection of preexisting objects through stipulative descriptive reference fixing (see Deutsch 1991 for a development of this idea). Yet, picking out a preexistent object via descriptive stipulation is certainly not a way of genuinely creating an object in the sense of bringing something new into existence. And this is the idea involved in the intuitive notion of creating a fictional character. 1.2 Fictional possibilism Fictional possibilism can be characterized by the two following theses: Ontological Thesis (Realism) : There are fictional entities. Metaphysical Thesis (Possibilism) : Fictional entities are possible objects. According to this version of the metaphysical thesis, fictional entities do not exist in the actual world but they do exist in some other possible world. Fictional entities are objects that exist at those possible worlds that realize the story. For example, although at the actual world Conrad told Heart of Darkness as fiction, there is a possible world in which everything that is explicitly told in the story is realized, and hence where Marlow, Kurtz and the other characters exist and are and do as the story tells. 9Fictional Entities 2013 Edition Possible objects are objects whose existence is metaphysically possible. Upholders of possibilism hold that there are possible objects, which do not exist at the actual world but that could exist at some other possible world. The view is usually contrasted with actualism, according to which there are only actual objects, namely those objects that exist at the actual world. Suppose that animals of any given species could exist only as members of that given species. Because animals of some other species than those existing could have existed, animals that actually do not exist could have existed. If there are these possible animals, then possibilism is true. According to actualism, in this context the expression 'these possible animals' is empty because it has no referent. Yet, if these animals that do not actually exist could have existed, then the expression 'these possible animals' might have referred. Thus, similarly to Meinongianism, possibilism distinguishes two senses of being, actual existence and possible existence or actual non-existence. Differently from Meinongianism however, possibilism is not committed to the view that any referring or denoting expression refers or denotes something. Upholders of possibilism can deny that the expression 'winged horses' refer because the description is simply empty. If there could have been winged horses then, according to possibilism, something could have been a winged horse. But it does not follow from possibilism that if there could have been winged horses then something is a winged horse. Three familiar problems arise from the application of this picture to fictional entities as non-actual possible objects. The first is the problem of non-uniqueness or ontological indeterminacy (Kaplan 1973, p. 505-6; Kripke 1972/1980, pp. 156-8). There is more than just one possible world that realizes Heart of Darkness. In each of these worlds there is a man called Marlow who accepts an appointment as captain of a steamboat and is and does everything that is recorded in Conrad's novel. These Marlow-candidates are all distinct individuals; yet they match exactly the way in which Marlow is described in the story. However, they may differ in some crucial aspects, e.g. they may be born from different parents in different places and under different circumstances. And when characters are only roughly sketched there might even be more candidates in the same possible world that fit what the story says. Hence one might legitimately ask: which one Fiora Salis10 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy of those Marlow-candidates is Marlow? There are two standard answers to this question. The first is offered by Lewis' (1986) theory of possibilist realism, which is based on his counterpart theory. The second is offered by Priest's (2005) theory of noneism and Berto's (2011) theory of what he calls modal Meinongianism, which are both based on a variable domains notion of what there is. Let us briefly consider each solution. According to Lewis, non-actual possible objects are genuine objects just as actual objects are. Both non-actual possible objects and actual objects exist, although the first are not included in the realm of existence that we call actuality. Yet, they are included in some other possible realm of existence, which is metaphysically on a par with the actual realm of existence. According to Lewis' (1970) indexical theory of actuality, actuality for us is the realm that includes us, while actuality for any object x is the realm that contains x. All possible worlds, like all possible objects, are concrete in the sense that they are spatiotemporal objects. And every possible object bears no relation to any actual object or to any world where it does not exist. This is the sense in which, according to his counterpart theory, possible objects are world-bound. Lewis (1978) takes a possible individual to be a Marlow-candidate if it has Marlow's properties in a possible world in which Conrad tells Heart of Darkness as known fact. Given that each Marlow-candidate is world bound, Lewis can offer a principled way to identify a Marlow-candidate as Marlow in terms of acquaintance. Suppose you are a reader of Heart of Darkness. Each Marlow-candidate is a counterpart for you of every other Marlowcandidate. For even if they should differ substantially in terms of overall qualitative similarity, the various Marlow-candidates are all counterparts by acquaintance for you (and your counterparts), they are all, in their respective worlds, the person called 'Marlow' whom you or your counterparts learn about by reading Heart of Darkness told as known fact (cf. Lewis 1983b; Currie 1990, pp. 136-9; Kroon 1994, pp. 211-212). According to Priest's (2005) theory of noneism, inspired by Routley (1980), only concrete (past, present and future) objects exist, while abstract objects and possible or impossible objects do not exist (Routley's original theory was even more radical, holding that past and future concrete objects do not exist either). Fictional objects 11Fictional Entities 2013 Edition pertain to the second category. Just like in the standard Meinongian framework, the domain of each world is the totality of objects. To account for the intuitively true claim that some objects that do not exist could have existed Priest introduces a predicate of existence E (or !) and holds that some object o exists at world w 1 , but not at world w 2 , if o satisfies E at w 1 and not at w 2 . Thus, there are fictional entities in the actual world and at all other possible worlds. But at the actual world they do not exist, while they do exist (they satisfy E) at some other possible worlds. Within this framework the indeterminacy problem does not arise. For example, one might ask: When are two nonexistent objects identical? Priest's (2005, p. 87ff.) simple answer is that any objects o and e are the same if and only if they have the same actual identity. That is, if and only if they are identical at the actual world. But how do we establish which of the (nonexistent) objects among the totality of objects is Marlow? Priest's (2005, pp. 119-20) answer is that once Conrad has written the entire story (the first in which he introduces Marlow), he has imagined one particular object to be Marlow, and it is in virtue of that intentional act of imagination involved in telling the story that he picks out Marlow at the actual world and not some other fictional individual. Marlow of course does not exist at the actual world, but he does exist at those worlds where the story is realized. Conrad could go on imagining more and more things about Marlow, but this would not entail that a different object is picked out every time that a new predicate is added to the character's characterizing properties. Instead, Priest claims that once the character has been picked out after telling the first story, all that Conrad does by adding more and more properties to the character is just restricting the set of possible worlds in which those properties are satisfied by the same fictional individual. Priest (2005, pp. 93-4) himself recognizes that the actual world contains several distinct possible individuals that do not exist there but that might exist and realize Heart of Darkness in some other possible worlds. So, one problem that Priest does not fully answer is: how can Conrad intend just one of those objects as being Marlow rather than another? The second problem for fictional possibilism is that of impossible ictional objects. Howell (1979, p. 139) considers a story according to which Sherlock Holmes is a famous circle-squarer. According to Fiora Salis12 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy his construal, the apparently true report 'According to the story, Holmes squared the circle' is necessarily false. That is, it cannot be true at any metaphysically possible world. Alternatively Lewis suggests that in the story anything would be vacuously true, including 'According to the story, Holmes did not square the circle'. As a result, every contradictory story would generate exactly the same fictional truths. But surely different fictions generate distinct fictional worlds. Lewis (1983a, pp. 277-8) suggests that impossible fictions be divided into coherent fragments that can be realized at different possible worlds. More specifically, given a certain property F and not-F both attributed to the same character w, both F(x) and not-F(x) can be true in an impossible fiction but not their conjunction. Such solution might account for Doyle's unintentional characterization of Dr. Watson as having a single war wound on one shoulder and on one leg in different stories. But it would not account for an author's intention to produce an inconsistent fiction about an impossible object (say about the round square or about some dead-and-not-dead individual). Priest's (2005) version of fictional possibilism, noneism, is much broader than standard possibilism and fully embraces impossible objects as existent in those impossible worlds that realize the relevant inconsistent fiction. The third problem for fictional possibilism is that of extra-ictional statements. We make various assertions about fictional objects outside the stories in which they occur and some of them seem to be straightforwardly true. We say that the character of Mr. Kurtz in Heart of Darkness inspired the character of Captain Kurtz in Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now. Thus, against the central metaphysical thesis upheld by upholders of fictional possibilism, it seems that fictional objects are actual objects after all. Or suppose we say that Marlow is a better storyteller than I will ever be. We seem to be saying that Marlow actually has this comparative property, that is, he has it in the actual world, not merely in some possible world or other. Priest (2005, p. 123) would reject this reading and hold that what we are actually saying is that Marlow is possibly a better storyteller than I would ever be. In a world where Marlow is as good a storyteller as he appears to be in Heart of Darkness, he is a better story teller than I will ever be in the actual world. But no such cross-world way of reading this statement matches the way we normally read any other 13Fictional Entities 2013 Edition sentence involving a comparison between individuals. Conrad is a better storyteller than I will ever be, and this is straightforwardly true at the actual world. It would be incorrect to interpret this statement as involving a cross-world comparison such as Conrad is possibly a better storyteller than I am. He is a better storyteller than I am at the actual world. Fictional possibilism further suffers of the same drawback indicated at the end of the previous section. It cannot account for the fact that one characteristic property of fictional characters is their being genuinely created (read: brought into existence) by their authors through the activity of storytelling. Our intuition is that there was no Charles Marlow before Conrad had told the stories in which Marlow was originally introduced. The third version of fictional realism that we will explore next instead starts from this datum and tries to build a coherent theory of fictional entities as created artifacts. 1.3 Fictional creationism Fictional creationism can be characterized by the following two theses: Ontological Thesis (Realism) : There are fictional entities. Metaphysical Thesis (Creationism) : Fictional entities are abstract human artifacts created by authors through the activity of story telling. According to this version of the metaphysical thesis fictional entities are abstract human artifacts created by authors that can be thought as being social constructs or theoretical entities of criticism. Upholders of fictional creationism notice that there are apparently true utterances of sentences such as 'The picaresque novel originated in 16thcentury Spain' and 'Dante Alighieri created the Terza Rima rhyme scheme'. These utterances are usually taken as sincere assertions that entail an unproblematic inference to the existence of picaresque novels and rhyme schemes. Similarly, there are apparently true utterances of sentences that, if taken seriously, entail the existence of fictional entities, e.g. 'James Bond is a fictional character created in 1953 by Ian Fleming' and 'Agatha Christie created Miss Marple in The Murder at the Vicarage'. Upholders of fictional creationism claim Fiora Salis14 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy that we cannot reject fictional entities if we admit picaresque novels and rhyme schemes (and meters, plots, poems, screenplays etc.), because they are entities of the same kind, i.e. abstract artifacts created by authors (for similar versions of the same idea see van Inwagen 1977, pp. 302-303, 307; Salmon 1998, p. 300; Thomasson 1999, p. 143; and Braun 2005, p. 609; however, Van Inwagen 2003, pp. 15354, raises a doubt about whether there are abstract artifacts, and thus about creationism). However, even admitting that both fictional objects and fictional works are abstract entities sharing the same type of dependence relations on the author's activity of story telling, it has been objected that they do differ in kind. For example, Iacona and Voltolini (2002) argue that while literary works of fiction are syntactical-semantic entities, fictional entities are not. Furthermore, Yagisawa (2001) argues that creationism conflicts sharply with other seemingly obvious thoughts such as the nonexistence datum (for a response see Goodman 2004). And Brock (2010) argues that the appeal to creation leaves more questions than answers. For example, when and how are fictional entities created? Upholders of fictional creationism claim that by pretending to refer to fictional people (and fictional places, events etc.) in the act of telling a story authors genuinely bring fictional entities into existence. Let us consider this last problem carefully. Rather than focusing directly on the mechanisms of creation of fictional entities, most upholders of fictional creationism have been more interested in discussing the problem of when utterances and inscriptions of fictional names refer to fictional entities. This should come as no surprise given that the initial motivation for introducing fictional entities derives originally from linguistic arguments of the sort I have mentioned above. Thus, one can reformulate the question 'when are fictional characters created?' by asking: when do utterances and inscriptions of fictional names refer to fictional entities? Upholders of fictional creationism have offered two main different standard answers. According to what one might call the mixed account (Kripke 1973/2013; Searle 1974-75/1979; Schiffer 1996), fictional names are rigid nondesignators (Salmon 1998, p. 292), that is necessarily nonreferring, when uttered by the author of fiction in the process of story telling (cf. also Kripke 1980, pp. 157-8, Kaplan 15Fictional Entities 2013 Edition 1973, pp. 5058; Donnellan 1974, pp. 24-25; Plantinga 1974, pp. 159-163); they are rigid designators when used by readers and critics in sincere assertive utterances. On this view, there are two fictional names 'Marlow 1 ' and 'Marlow 2 ' corresponding to two different uses of the same syntactic name. 'Marlow 1 ' is a rigid nondesignator (it has no referent, neither actual nor possible) when used in story telling (i.e. in pretense). 'Marlow 2 ' is a rigid designator (it refers to the same abstract artifact in all possible worlds) when used in sincere assertions that entail the existence of fictional entities. The first use is ontologically foundational; the second use is parasitic on the first. Conrad uses 'Marlow 1 ' in the process of telling Heart of Darkness to pretend to refer to a particular individual, without referring to anything and hence without expressing any proposition. Readers and literary critics genuinely use the name 'Marlow 2 ' when they engage in sincere assertions. In this case uses of the name genuinely refer and utterances of sentences genuinely express propositions. This view has several well-known drawbacks including the problem of the indeterminacy of content (both of the author's story telling, of the story itself and of reports produced in pretense, but also asserted as embedded in the fictional operator, cf. Salmon 1998, pp. 297-8), the related problem of the indeterminacy of fictional truth-conditions (what is the case according to the story?), and the problem of the purported ambiguity in the use of fictional names (of which there seems to be no evidence, cf. Everett 2007, p. 59). But most relevantly, the mixed account offers no explanation of the creation of the abstract artifact that, supposedly, is the referent of 'Marlow 2 '. According to Salmon's (1998, p. 294) interpretation of Kripke's (1973/2013) view, Conrad tells Heart of Darkness in the pretense that Marlow is so and so and did such and such things. But by uttering the relevant words in the process of story telling he expresses nothing. Yet, Conrad's use of the name 'Marlow 1 ' in pretense licenses a sort of metaphysical move. At a later stage, speaking from without that pretense, engaging in serious assertions about the fictional character, our use of the name 'Marlow 2 ' licenses a sort of semantic move. That is, when performed in a sincere assertion our use of the name refers to the fictional character created by Conrad's pretense. As Salmon states Kripke's view: "The language allows a grammatical transformation of a fictional name for a person into a name of a fictional Fiora Salis16 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy person". According to Searle (1974-75/1979, p. 73), "By pretending to refer to people and to recount events about them, the author creates fictional characters and events. (...) once the fictional character has been created, we who are standing outside the fictional story can really refer to a fictional person". Van Inwagen (1977, p. 307) claims that discourse about fictional characters involves certain rules "for talking about fiction" according to which "a creature of fiction may be referred to by what is (loosely speaking) 'the name it has in the story'". And the same idea can be found in Schiffer's (1996, pp. 154-159) proposed distinction between a pretending or ictional use of a fictional name within fiction and what he calls a hypostatizing use of the name without fiction. According to his view, the connection between the two different uses gives rise to a "something-from-nothing feature" of the hypostatizing use: "whenever one of us uses a name in the fictional way (in which case one's use refers to nothing), then that use automatically enables any of us to use the name in the hypostatizing way, in which case we are referring to an actually existing fictional entity." (p. 156). Still, none of the previous claims explains the genuine creation of fictional entities. What kind of metaphysical move is the one licensed by the pretense use of language in story telling? How does a use of a fictional name automatically enable us to refer to fictional entities? How can one genuinely create some abstract artifact from nothing? Upholders of the mixed account offer no answer to these questions. One still wonders about how and when a character is genuinely created. One might object that there is nothing puzzling about this idea since many social and cultural entities such as marriages, promises and obligations are created via the use of language. But there are two kinds of considerations that should make us suspicious of this comparison. First, it is not clear that these are genuine entities. Van Inwagen (2005) himself expresses a similar doubt: "It seems to me to be much more plausible to say that in such cases "all that happens" is that things already in existence acquire new properties or come to stand in new relations: the property having promised to teach Alice to drive, for example, or the relation is married to" (p. 154). Second, even if one were to accept the idea that marriages, promises and obligations are real entities, there seems to be a radical difference between the creation of these entities and the creation of fictional 17Fictional Entities 2013 Edition entities. While the first are introduced via the serious use of language, fictional characters would be introduced in pretense as concrete individuals that (metaphorically) exist in works of fiction and only later (through some mysterious ontogenetic mechanism) would pop into existence via the serious use of language, but this time as abstract artifacts existing in the actual world. Far from being obvious and intuitively clear, this comparison seems to obscure the specificity of fictional entities. According to what one might call the uniform account (Salmon 1998; Thomasson 1999), fictional names are rigid designators referring to fictional characters already when used in story telling. This view has several advantages over the mixed account, including the fact that it offers a uniform semantics for fictional names. There is only one name 'Marlow' and this rigidly refers to the same abstract artifact when used both in story telling and in serious assertions. Utterances of sentences containing the name always express propositions. According to Salmon, this does not mean that the author of fiction refers to anything when she uses the name in story telling. It only means that once one accepts that there are fictional entities, one better interprets utterances of fictional names as referring to those entities. As he puts it: "Once fictional characters have been countenanced as real entities, why hold onto an alleged use of their names that fails to refer to them? It is like buying a luxurious Italian sports car only to keep it garaged" (1998: 298). However, this view entails no explanation of how and when fictional entities are created. Like Salmon, Thomasson (1999) endorses the idea that fictional entities come into existence already when the author pretends to refer to some fictional individual in story telling. She suggests that the author's act is a sort of special performative speech act that immediately brings something into existence: "If there is no preexistent object to whom Austen was referring in writing her words [the very first sentence of Emma] (...) writing those words brings into existence the object therein described: The fictional character Emma Woodhouse" (p. 13). Once the character has been generated through the creative power of the author's acts all other references by the author in the story and by readers and critics in serious discourse refer back to the character thereby introduced. Thomasson's (1996a, 1996b, 1999, spec. Ch. 6-8) account is highly indebted to the pheFiora Salis18 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy nomenological tradition and in particular to the work of Ingarden (1931: §§15, 20, 25, 28, 38). She argues that by postulating fictional entities one can offer a straightforward account of the intentionality of thoughts and discourse about fictional characters (pp. 90-92). Thoughts about King Lear are directed towards him (not towards Edmund or Edgar) and are specifically about him (not about whoever plays the Lear-role). We can counter-fictionally imagine that he would not have descended into madness if he had not disposed of his estate between his two oldest daughters. And you and I can identify him even when we describe him in different ways. You might claim that King Lear was a fool and arrogant old man; I might argue that he was just a naïve and old-fashioned chap. Yet our disagreement is clearly about the same character. Thomasson claims that a fictional entity comes into existence as the purely intentional object of a particular mental act of an author that talks of it (pp. 5-7, 88-90) and it continues to exist if some literary works continue to exist (pp. 7, 36, 88-9). Ingarden claims that purely intentional objects are entities that survive their own creating mental acts and fictional objects are a subset of the set of purely intentional objects. This picture clearly attributes generative ontological power to thoughts. Yet, as Voltolini (2006: 49-55) forcefully notices, just like our dreams of dwarves and elves do not commit us to their existence, our imaginings about dwarves and elves do not commit us to their existence either. Furthermore, as Howell (2002: 283) correctly points out, Thomasson never explains how it is that by imagining a certain concrete individual that does not exist the author successfully brings into existence a new abstract entity. Moreover, she claims that the author baptizes a fictional character in the act of telling the story through a sort of 'quasi-indexical reference' to the character that depends upon those linguistic acts. Austen's first use of the name 'Emma Woodhouse' (in the pretense that the name refers to a concrete non-existent individual) is supposed to serve as quasi-indexical reference to the abstract character thereby created as if that use were to say 'the character founded on these very words is to be called "Emma Woodhouse"' (pp. 47-8). But what is "quasiindexicality" exactly? How does the author successfully refer to the character dependent on the words used in pretense? Does the formula indicated by Thomasson work as a reference-fixing description? 19Fictional Entities 2013 Edition On a conclusive remark, one might wonder why fictional creationists should really care about providing a complete explanation of when and how creation occurs. After all, there are many entities the metaphysics of which are debated despite the lack of agreement on this score, e.g. theories, literary works and persons. But asking when and how creation occurs is a legitimate question since the central thesis that distinguishes fictional creationism from other stripes of fictional realism is that fictional entities are created entities. Furthermore, claiming that an answer to these questions is irrelevant because others do not pose the same questions for other cases seems like a lazy attempt not to offer any real basis for what is in fact the main tenet of creationism. Fictional Meinongians and upholders of Fictional Possibilism have to account for the intuitively true claim that fictional characters are created entities. But since they hold that these are not genuinely created, they do not need to offer any explanation of their ontogenetic mechanisms. If one were to put forward a metaphysical account of theories, literary works and persons whose main thesis is that they are created entities, then one should be able to explain their existence conditions. Otherwise, any such theory would be irremediably flawed and without any real metaphysical basis. 2 The ontology of fictional entities Upholders of fictional realism and upholders of fictional irrealism put forward two different kinds of arguments for or against positing fictional entities into our ontology. The first kind has been inspired by the linguistic data coming from our talk about fictional characters. The second and most recent kind builds on genuine ontological considerations. 2.1 Linguistic arguments Consider the following sentences involving apparent reference to fictional entities: (1) Medardo was Viscount of Terralba. (2) Medardo is a fictional character. Fiora Salis20 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy (3) The character of Medardo was created by Italo Calvino. (4) Medardo is as realistic a character as Zaphod Beeblebrox. (5) There are fictional characters that could never have been depicted prior to the creation of Miss Marple. (6) Mary Shelley first thought about Frankenstein in Switzerland. (7) Conrad was a better sailor than Marlow. Evans (1982, Ch. 10) originally distinguishes two different uses that speakers can make of sentences such as (1)-(7). When performing what he calls a conniving use, the utterer engages in pretense or make-believe (cf. Walton 1973). When performing what he calls a non-conniving use, the utterer engages in serious assertion with real truth-conditions and hence real truth-values. When Calvino utters (1) in telling The Cloven Viscount he engages in an act of pretense and therefore performs a conniving use of the sentence. But when a student utters (1) in answering a question during an exam in Italian Literature she engages in a genuine act of assertion, hence in a nonconniving use, for she says how things are according to the story (alternatively, Currie 1990 and García-Carpintero 2007 argue that Calvino's utterances are instances of a genuine speech act characterized by a special intention to make the audience imagine that Medardo was such and such). Thus, when analyzing discourse about fictional characters it is more appropriate to talk about utterances or uses of sentences that seem to make reference to fictional entities rather than to talk just about sentences. According to Russell's (1905) vulgate, Meinong's (1904) idea was that every denoting expression stands for something and that what a denoting expression stands for is the meaning of that expression. Since sentences involving denoting expressions such as 'Medardo' are clearly meaningful, the expressions must stand for something. Since Medardo does not exist, the name must denote a nonexistent individual. Russell (1905a,b) objects to Meinong's theory for the reasons that we have described in §1.1. But he also offers an alternative solution in terms of his theory of descriptions. He follows Frege (1892) in distinguishing between the meaning and the denotation of a denoting phrase. However, contrary to Frege, at the very beginning of On Denoting he claims that a phrase may be denoting and yet 21Fictional Entities 2013 Edition not denote anything: a denoting phrase is denoting not in virtue of being about something, but in virtue of its logical form. For example, the denoting phrase 'the present King of France' has no denotation (because France has no King). Yet the sentence 'The present King of France is bald' is meaningful and should be analyzed in terms of variables, quantifiers, predicates and logical connectives. More specifically, its meaning is given by the following three propositions: (i) There is at least one present King of France; (ii) There is at most one present King of France; (iii) Everything that is a present King of France is bald. In other words, the sentence means that the unique King of France is bald. Since no individual satisfies the predicate 'is bald', according to Russell the sentence is just false. Russell thought that proper names are disguised definite descriptions and should therefore be analyzed in the same way. The name 'Medardo' is just an abbreviation for a longer phrase such as 'the cloven Viscount' with no denotation. Hence, the sentence 'Medardo was Viscount of Terralba' is to be analyzed as: there is at least one cloven Viscount; there is at most one cloven Viscount; and every cloven Viscount is Viscount of Terralba. In other words, the unique cloven Viscount is Viscount of Terralba. Again, just as before, the original statement is fully meaningful but also false because there is no unique cloven Viscount that satisfies the predicate 'is Viscount of Terralba'. Russell's analysis entails that sentences containing fictional names (and non-denoting names in general) are all false, yet (1)-(7) are intuitively true. Furthermore, sentences such as 'Medardo was a Danish prince' are clearly false, but intuitively this is not because of failure of denotation of the subject expression, but because according to Calvino's The Cloven Viscount Medardo was not a Danish prince. Reports of how characters are described in stories can be interpreted as utterances produced from a perspective internal to the fiction or they can be interpreted as utterances produced from a perspective external to the fiction. Call the first intraictional statements and call the second metaictional statements. Intrafictional statements are to be analyzed as conniving uses performed by the author of fiction in Fiora Salis22 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy story telling (or as instances of a special speech act) or as a natural continuation of the reader's imaginative engagement with the story. Metafictional statements are usually analyzed as non-conniving uses of a sentence involving an implicit "according to the fiction" operator. Predelli (1997) describes the operator view as a sort of replacement view: an utterance of (1) in its nonconniving use is to be analyzed in terms of a longer sentence in which the explicitly uttered sentence is embedded in the "according to the fiction" operator. On this view, 'According to The Cloven Viscount, Medardo is Viscount of Terralba' is a report of what is the case in Calvino's story. Lewis (1978) originally introduced the fictional operator as an intensional operator working as a restricted quantifier on the qualitative worlds of the story, i.e. those possible worlds in which the story is told as known fact. In an irrealist framework the fictional operator works as a restricted quantifier on certain dicta or propositions. In other words, what is said to be true in the fiction is a certain dictum or proposition and not the claim, about some particular thing or res, that it has a certain property (cf. Rorty 1982; Lamarque-Olsen 1994; Orenstein 2003). According to Russell's original analysis, the name 'Medardo' should be replaced by the equivalent description 'the cloven Viscount'. Russell distinguishes two different analyses of (1) depending on whether the definite description has a primary occurrence or a secondary occurrence. According to the first reading, (1) would be analyzed as: 'There is exactly one cloven Viscount, and according to The Cloven Viscount he is Viscount of Terralba'. Since there is no unique cloven Viscount, (1) would turn out to be false. According to the second reading (1) would be analyzed as: 'According to The Cloven Viscount, there is exactly one cloven Viscount and he is Viscount of Terralba'. And since this is what the story says, (1) would turn out to be true, as it should be. One difficulty for the operator view emerges when one considers that there are many non-conniving uses of sentences about fictional characters that cannot be embedded in the fictional operator, namely the extra-ictional statements (2)-(7). For example, (2) cannot be understood as elliptical for 'according to The Cloven Viscount, Medardo is a fictional character', because according to the story he is a man of flesh and blood (cf. Lewis 1978, p. 38). Phillips (2000) and Brock 23Fictional Entities 2013 Edition (2002) extend the operator strategy to the analysis of extra-fictional statements by introducing an operator that appeals to the realist presumption that these statements involve genuine reference to fictional entities. For example, (2) would be analyzed as: 'according to the realist fiction, Medardo is a fictional character'. Provided that the resulting complex sentences are read de dicto, any apparent commitment to fictional entities seems to disappear. However, one further difficulty for the operator view comes from worries about what concerns us when (thinking and) talking about fictional characters (Eagle 2007; Doggett and Egan 2007; Currie 2010). When we say that Medardo is Viscount of Terralba we do not seem to be talking about Calvino's story (at least, not always). We are talking about Medardo, the fictional character described in that story. The subject matter of our concern is Medardo, the character described in the story as being Viscount of Terralba, not the story The Cloven Viscount as containing that information. The same kind of consideration could be extended to Philips and Brock's analysis. (See originally Yablo 2001 for a similar worry concerning the interpretation of sentences containing reference to numbers interpreted within a fictionalist approach to mathematics.) Alternatively, one might dispense with the operator view and claim that uses of apparently true sentences such as (1)-(7) involve some kind of pretense or make-believe. Conniving utterances of sentences involving fictional proper names would carry not genuine but pretend ontological commitments. For example, when Calvino uttered (1) in telling The Cloven Viscount he uttered a sentence in the pretense that the name 'Medardo' refers. This entails that, in the context of telling The Cloven Viscount, (1) has not genuine but merely ictional truthconditions and has also a ictional truth-value. Similarly, my utterance of (1), as a continuation of Calvino's imaginative activity, would involve the same kind of pretense according to which there is an individual x to which the name 'Medardo' refers. Utterances of (2)-(7) would extend the relevant pretense above the original authorial pretense. According to Walton (1990, pp. 51, 406, 409), the two cases involve two different kinds of pretense. In the former case, speakers play a game of make-believe authorized by the story, which is a prop dictating how things are to be imagined. In the second case, they play an unoficial game of make-believe in which there may be Fiora Salis24 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy no constraints provided by the story. The obvious drawback of the pretense theory is that it cannot account for the strong intuition that utterances of (2)-(7) involve genuine truth-conditions and genuine truth-values (cf. Thomasson 1999; van Inwagen 2000). One major problem for Russell's analysis of proper names is that it entails that they are synonymous with definite descriptions because every proper name is replaced with an equivalent definite description. Yet there are widely accepted arguments showing the analysis to be incorrect (cf. Donnellan 1972; Kripke 1972/1980; Evans 1973, 1982). One might tentatively restrict synonymous descriptivism to fictional names (and non-denoting names more generally) and reject it for referring names (cf. Currie 1988; 1990, pp. 158-62). But there are reasons to be suspicious of this option too (cf. Adams et al. 1997). Alternatively, one might endorse a uniform semantics for fictional proper names inspired by Referentialism or Direct Reference Theory, according to which the semantic contribution of a name to the proposition expressed by an utterance of a sentence containing that name is its referent, if it has any. A particularly strong version of Referentialism is Millianism, according to which the semantic content of a proper name is exhausted by its individual referent. This further entails that if a name has no referent then it has no semantic content or, perhaps, it is not a genuine name. One problem for Referentialism about fictional names in an irrealist framework is how to account for the meaningfulness of such names. Standard solutions usually appeal to some sort of associated information. According to Referentialism, utterances of sentences containing proper names express singular propositions, i.e. propositions that are about a particular individual in virtue of having that individual as a constituent (cf. Kaplan 1989, pp. 512-13). An utterance of 'Mont Blanc is the highest mountain in the Alps' expresses a singular proposition that can be conventionally represented by (although is not identical to) the ordered pair <Mont Blanc, being-the-highestmountain-in-the-Alps> having Mont Blanc itself as an individual constituent in subject position and the property of being-the-highestmountain-in-the-Alps in predicate position. Given the assumption that there are no fictional entities, fictional proper names have no referents. And this can be taken as a basis to hold that utterances of sentences containing fictional proper names express either no propo25Fictional Entities 2013 Edition sition or a gappy proposition. Upholders of the no-proposition theory can argue that the apparent meaningfulness and truth-value of (utterances of) sentences expressing no proposition concerns what is pragmatically implicated rather than what is semantically expressed (e.g., Taylor 2000). Others appeal to the notion of pretense and claim that the apparent meaningfulness and truth-value of such sentences are merely fictional (Evans 1982; Walton 1990; Recanati 2000). One difficulty for this view however consists in specifying the relevant pretense. According to Walton (pp. 396-405), a pretend assertion of a sentence such as (1) is an act is of a specific kind, which one might call K. When one performs a non-conniving use of (1), what one genuinely asserts is that Heart of Darkness is such that one who engages in a kind of pretense K in a game authorized for this story makes it fictional of himself in that game that he speaks truly. But how can one identify K? When there is no apparent reference to fictional characters, Walton indicates a purely descriptive way of specifying the relevant pretense. So, for example, if the sentence uttered is 'the cloven Viscount was Viscount of Terralba' what is said is that The Cloven Viscount is such that one who fictionally asserts that the cloven Viscount was Viscount of Terralba in a game authorized for this story makes it fictional of herself in that game that she speaks truly. Unfortunately, no such paraphrase is available for (1), because the longer statement retains the apparent reference to Medardo. This semantic interpretation has been strongly criticized (cf. Richard 2000). Furthermore, within this account one cannot identify K and hence one cannot distinguish it from any other kind of pretend assertion of sentences involving non-referring proper names. For example, one cannot distinguish a pretend assertion of (1) from a pretend assertion of 'Dr. Trelawney is Viscount of Terralba' both said in a game of make-believe for The Cloven Viscount. That is, within this proposal one cannot explain in virtue of what K is a kind of pretense about Medardo that can be distinguished from a different kind of pretense about Dr. Trelawney. Those assuming some version of the gappy proposition theory can easily explain the meaningfulness of sentences involving empty names by claiming that they express gappy or incomplete propositions. An utterance of (1) expresses an incomplete proposition that can be conventionally represented by the ordered pair <__, beingFiora Salis26 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy Viscount-of-Terralba> having nothing as an individual constituent in subject position and the property of being-Viscount-of-Terralba in predicate position. Braun (1993, 2005) claims that sentences of the form 'a is F', where a is an empty name, are false (for criticisms see Adams et al. 1997; Adams and Stecker 1994; Everett 2003). Salmon (1998) and Adams and Dietrich (2004) claim that they are neither true nor false. Furthermore, Braun (2005) and Adams et al. (1997) claim that sentences such as 'According to The Cloven Viscount, Medardo is Viscount of Terralba' can be true. But they disagree about extra-fictional statements like 'Medardo is a fictional character'. Braun upholds a mixed account of fictional names as referring and non-referring in different contexts and endorses a version of fictional creationism for extra-fictional statements. Adams et al. uphold a uniform account of fictional names as non-referring in all contexts and claim that extra-fictional statements can be true even though fictional names do not refer. One drawback of gappy proposition theories is that different sentences directed towards different fictional characters might express the very same gappy proposition, e.g. (1) and 'Dr. Trelawney is Viscount of Terralba'. Thus, something other than the reference of names must be relevant to their identification. Adams and Stecker (1994) originally suggest that fictional names can be used to invoke information through Gricean pragmatic mechanisms. Different utterances of different sentences semantically expressing the same gappy proposition pragmatically convey different implications involving different descriptions associated with names (for criticisms see Reimer 2001; Everett 2003; Green 2007). Braun appeals to the different ways in which a gappy proposition can be imagined. And yet he does not explain in virtue of what certain types of ways of imagining are directed towards Medardo while others are directed towards Dr. Trelawney if the two characters do not exist. In other words, one still needs to explain in virtue of what certain types of imagining count as Medardo-ish while others count as Dr. Trelawney-ish (cf. Friend 2011b). Alternatively, Friend (2011b, forthcoming) offers an alternative explanation in terms of participation in what Perry (2001) calls notion-networks, but she does not develop a full-blown account of how to individuate non-referring networks. Salis (2013) on the contrary does offer such an account in terms of participation in 27Fictional Entities 2013 Edition Sainsbury's (2005) name-using practices individuated by their origin in a baptism (which can be empty). Against both descriptivism and Millianism Sainsbury (2005) argues that proper names, with or without referents, have non-descriptive meanings specified in a Davidson-style truth theory. He further assumes Negative Free Logic, according to which all atomic sentences involving non-referring singular terms are considered to be just plainly false. Negative Free Logic is motivated by the fundamental assumption of bivalence. A true sentence is one for which predication itself has an extension (its corresponding set containing at least one individual of which the property can be truly predicated) and it predicates a property, which an object possesses. A false sentence is one that fails to be true (that is untrue) either because the object of which a certain property is predicated is not in the extension of the predicate ('This page is blue' when this page is not blue), or because a singular term fails to refer ('Medardo is a Viscount' where 'Medardo' is an empty name). Of course, the biggest problem for such a view would be to account for the apparent truth of sentences (1)-(7). But Sainsbury (2010) develops such an account in terms of presuppositionrelative truth. 2.2 Theoretical arguments Upholders of fictional realism have suggested some arguments in favor of the recognition of the existence of fictional entities building on genuine ontological considerations. The first of these arguments was put forward by Thomasson (1999, p. 143), who originally suggested that we cannot reject fictional objects if we admit literary works of fiction. Since fictional objects and fictional works belong to the same kind of entities (that is abstract created artifacts) it would be false parsimony to accept the one and reject the other. However, as we have mentioned in §1.3 above, Iacona and Voltolini (2002, pp. 286-7) already notice that Thomasson's argument is disputable since it assumes that fictional objects and fictional works are entities of the same kind. Even admitting that both of them are abstract entities sharing the same type of dependence relations on other entities, Thomasson herself recognizes that they differ in kind: while fictional works are syntactical-semantic entities, fictional entities are Fiora Salis28 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy not. Thomasson (2003a, pp. 147-151; 2003b) further suggests that it would be false parsimony to reject entities of a given kind while admitting other entities that are logically sufficient for their existence. Fictional works are logically (that is conceptually) sufficient for the existence of fictional entities. But we have seen that her account of the existence conditions of fictional entities and similar arguments presented by upholders of fictional creationism fail to succeed (cf. §1.3). Voltolini (2003; 2006, p. 241-245) suggests that if we admit a certain kind of entity, we cannot but admit all other kinds of entities that figure in the identity conditions of such an entity. Since we admit fictional works, and since fictional entities figure in the identity conditions of fictional works, we cannot but also admit fictional objects. He claims that fictional entities arise only once we (as readers and literary critics) reflect, from outside the story, on the fact that a certain game of make-believe determines certain sets of properties (cf. 2006: Ch. 3-4, spec. 84-89). In a nutshell, he argues that a fictional entity is an abstract compound entity whose elements are, on the one hand, the make-believe process-type in which an author pretends that there is a (typically) concrete individual that has certain (explicit and implicit) properties and, on the other hand, the set of properties of the pretend individual that have been 'mobilized' in the story. García-Carpintero (2009) already noticed that this picture has some peculiar aspects of its own, the most relevant of which being that it does not seem to fit with a realist stance on fictional characters. Voltolini argues that no genuine ontological commitment to fictional entities is involved in make-believe process-types since they are performed in pretense (pp. 76-78). He criticizes intentionalist views claiming that mental acts such as imagining or daydreaming require the existence of the entities they are about, including Thomasson's creationism. But now one might wonder why reflecting on a make-believe process-type as mobilizing a certain set of properties should commit us to the existence of a further (fictional) entity, namely the make-believe-process-type-plus-set-of-properties entity. As far as this question receives no answer, it is difficult to understand how fictional entities could figure in the identity conditions of fictional works. 29Fictional Entities 2013 Edition Everett (2005) recently articulated a series of ontological criticisms against fictional realism inspired by Russell's (1905a,b) original objections against Meinong. Everett states two platitudinous principles based on the idea that which fictional characters we take to occur in a story depends upon what the world of that story is like: P1: If the world of a story concerns a creature a, and if a is not a real thing, then a is a fictional character. P2: If a story concerns a and b, and if a and b are not real things, then a and b are identical in the world of the story if and only if the fictional character of a is identical to the fictional character of b. Since our intuitions that (P1) and (P2) are true seem at least as strong as our intuitions that sentences (1)-(7) are true upholders of fictional realism are committed to both principles. Everett's first objection begins by considering an intelligible story according to which the nature of the world itself is indeterminate. If the world of the story is such that it is indeterminate whether an individual a is identical to an individual b, and a and b are not real things, then (P2) entails that it is indeterminate whether the character of a is identical to the character of b. This would be a case of pernicious ontic indeterminacy concerning the nature of the world itself that should be distinguished from what Everett calls benign or conceptual indeterminacy concerning, e.g., questions of intertextual identity such as whether Christopher Marlowe's Faust is the same character as Goethe's Faust. Everett's second objection regards the possibly vague existence or indeterminate being of a character. If according to the story it is indeterminate whether a certain character a exists, then (P1) entails that it is indeterminate whether a exists. This further entails that if fictional realism was true then human beings could generate cases of ontic indeterminacy at will, simply by writing fiction. But surely, Everett notices, we do not have this degree of control over the metaphysical nature of the world. Everett's third objection starts by considering that a story might describe an impossible world in which the laws of logic or identity fail. By (P1) and (P2) what exists in the world of a story determines which fictional characters occur in that story. Therefore various impossibilities within the world Fiora Salis30 Online Companion to Problems of Analytic Philosophy of a story will determine various impossibilities about the fictional characters that occur in that story. Hence, upholders of fictional realism appear to be committed to the existence of logically incoherent objects. But surely we cannot be able to violate the laws of logic and identity by making up stories. Howell (2010) recognizes the power of Everett's arguments. Schnieder and Von Solodkoff (2009) and Voltolini (2010) instead suggest that a distinction between ontic indeterminacy in a story and ontic indeterminacy out of a story may allow one to rebut the indeterminacy part of the critique. Yet this would require some alternative account of the identity conditions of fictional entities that does not appeal to how the story describes them to be. Alternatively, one might rejoin either the two Neo-Meinongian alternative distinctions between different modes of predication or different properties. As we have seen in §1.1 these distinctions seem to be obscure or just ad hoc. And so the debate between upholders of fictional realism and fictional irrealism still goes on.1 Fiora Salis Centro de Filosofia Universidade de Lisboa Faculdade de Letras Alameda da Universidade 1600-214 Lisboa, Portugal LANCOG & LOGOS [email protected] References Adams, Fred and Dietrich, Laura. 2004. What's in a(n empty) name? Paciic Philosophical Quarterly 85: 125-148. Adams, Fred; Fuller, Gary and Stecker, Robert. 1997. The semantics of fictional names. Paciic Philosophical Quarterly 78: 128-148. Adams, Fred and Stecker, Robert. 1994. Vacuous singular terms. Mind & Language 9: 387-401. Berto, Francesco. 2011. Modal Meinongianism and Fiction: the Best of Three Worlds. Philosophical Studies 152: 313-334. Bonomi, Andrea. 2008. Fictional Contexts. 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Uller, Tobias and Laland, Kevin N., editors. Evolutionary Causation: Biological and Philosophical Reflections. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. 2019. vii + 352pp., illus., bibliography, index. $60.00. preprint of a review available in The Quarterly Review of Biology, 2020, vol. 95 no. 2 This book is an impressive achievement. Recognizing that a scope as broad as "evolutionary causation" should require genuine collaboration between evolutionary biologists and philosophers of science, the editors have brought together fifteen contributions spanning the gamut from what we might call "pure" philosophy of science to "pure" biological works. Of course, it is well known that producing genuine, transformational interdisciplinarity work – work, that is, where scholars from multiple disciplines come together not just to talk at one another, but rather to think in ways that transcend their traditional disciplinary ways of working – is an extremely difficult task. This is made all the more challenging in this case by the fact that "evolutionary causation" itself has two profoundly different meanings for each field. For biologists, this phrase calls to mind concerns about enumerating the various kinds of processes that might impinge on organisms over evolutionary time. Given the volume's connection to the project of the "extended evolutionary synthesis," this takes the shape here of considering the roles and scope of processes like evo-devo, niche construction, phenotypic plasticity, and so forth. For philosophers, on the other hand, a natural move is to consult general theories of causation (one of the oldest topics in the discipline), and apply them to various parts of the evolutionary process. The book is at its best when its authors are recognizing – even trading on – this ambiguity. The contributions of Helanterä and Uller, of Watson and Thies (on the biological side), and of Chiu and of Stotz (on the philosophical side) are particularly noteworthy in this regard. These chapters weave together promising contemporary philosophical work with extensive empirical and theoretical support, producing in the process wholes that are greater than the sum of their parts. As already mentioned, this book forms part of the broader cluster of recent work on the "extended evolutionary synthesis." As such, it is delightfully expansive, covering a huge amount of biological and philosophical phenomena of interest. Topics as diverse as the modeling of directed mutation and the continued utility of Ernst Mayr's distinction between proximate and ultimate causes all fall within the book's remit. It thus forms an enjoyable, if somewhat polemical, survey of a wide variety of current trends in empirical, theoretical, and philosophical approaches to the process of evolution. In short, I strongly recommend it for anyone interested in either the biological or the philosophical formulation of the problem of evolutionary causation. Last, it is appropriate to pause here to mourn the recent loss of Karola Stotz. Her outstanding contribution to this volume indicates precisely why she will be so keenly missed. Charles H. Pence Université catholique de Louvain

Forthcoming in Mathematical Social Sciences Weak Pseudo-Rationalizability Rush T. Stewart January 8, 2020 Abstract This paper generalizes rationalizability of a choice function by a single acyclic binary relation to rationalizability by a set of such relations. Rather than selecting those options in a menu that are maximal with respect to a single binary relation, a weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice function selects those options that are maximal with respect to at least one binary relation in a given set. I characterize the class of weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice functions in terms of simple functional properties. This result also generalizes Aizerman and Malishevski's characterization of pseudo-rationalizable choice functions, that is, choice functions rationalizable by a set of total orders. Keywords. Aggregation; binariness; multi-criteria choice; rationalizability 1 Introduction In many of the most important and influential theories of rational and social choice, preferences are assumed to be complete and transitive (e.g., Von Neumann and Morgenstern, 1944; Arrow, 1951; Savage, 1954; Anscombe and Aumann, 1963). The view that preferences are or should be so can be questioned on numerous grounds. As Sen has stressed, such a preferential structure is not required for reasoned choice. Neither incompleteness nor (certain forms of) intransitivity prevents choosing maximal alternatives, i.e., alternatives to which no other option is strictly preferred. As Sen sees it, "there is no analytical reason, nor any practical necessity, why the ranking of alternative conclusions must take this highly restrictive form" (2017, p. 455). In decision problems with finitely many options at least, acyclicity suffices for maximization. Moreover, relaxing transitivity of social preference opens up certain possibilities in the setting of social choice (e.g., Sen, 1969). There is also a sizable empirical literature on behavioral departures from transitive preferences (e.g., Tversky, 1969; Loomes et al., 1991). Still, choosing maximal options according to an acyclic relation retains the assumption that an agent's or group's preferences are or should be given by a binary relation. It is another level of heterodoxy to relax binariness. One motivation for doing so comes from unresolved conflicts in values or goals at the time of choice. According to Sen, such unresolved conflict is the "primary source" of incompleteness (Sen, 2018, p. 11). In such cases, various values induce different preference relations on the options. There are many different decision rules one might employ in such cases. But Isaac Levi, who Sen often cites in this context (e.g., 2004; 2017, p. 460), argues that each such preference relation amounts to an evaluation of the options that the agent regards as permissible to use in choice (1986).1 So the admissible options in any menu are those that are maximal with respect to some way of evaluating the options that the agent regards as permissible. On such a view, the set of admissible options according to the set of preference relations may resist representation in terms of a single, categorical or all-things-considered binary preference relation. 1In the setting of cardinal utilities, Levi allows that an agent may not have settled on a precise weighting, i.e., a unique convex combination, of different objective functions (perhaps corresponding to primitive values or goals), even if the agent has ruled out some such weightings. 1 In this paper, I characterize those preference structures that allow for incompleteness due to unresolved conflicts in values, while also allowing that the conflicting values themselves may fail to induce complete or transitive relations. Formally, I characterize those choice functions that, for any menu of alternatives, select those options that are maximal according to some acyclic binary relation in a set of such relations. The binary relations are not required to be weak or total orders. Such choice functions will be called weakly pseudo-rationalizable. The are several potential interpretations, both descriptive and normative. For example, a decision maker faced with a set of options may rank them along multiple dimensions. If there is no analytic reason or practical necessity for single preference relations to take the form of weak orderings, as Sen argues, it is difficult to see why any given dimension must take such a highly restrictive form. One rule such a decision maker could follow is to restrict attention to options that are best along at least one dimension. The set of such options might also be interpreted as a type of consideration set that filters out the other available options from the decision maker's attention. Lleras et al. refer to a consideration set mapping that satisfies Sen's property α as a competition filter (2017). When interpreted as a consideration set map, a weakly pseudo-rationalizable correspondence is a special case of a competition filter.2 To take another possible interpretation, the set of rankings that weakly pseudo-rationalize a given choice function may already include potential ways of trading off yet more fundamental values or dimensions of comparison, but the decision maker has not settled on a uniquely acceptable form of compromise. Rather, under such unresolved conflict among candidate rankings of the options, there are various candidate rankings, corresponding to ways of trading off the fundamental values, that the decision maker has not ruled out and these form the relevant set of relations for weak pseudorationalizability. The choice-worthy options are the options that are maximal with respect to some permissible way of evaluating the options, some way the decision maker hasn't ruled out. This interpretation extends Levi's philosophical motivation for E-admissibility beyond the expected utility setting. Levi has long advocated a theory that allows both probabilities and utilities to be "indeterminate" (1974). Given a set of probabilities P over states and a set of utilities U over consequences of options, an option x is said to be E-admissible in a menu of alternatives Y if there is some probability utility pair (p, u) with p ∈ P and u ∈ U such that x maximizes p-expected u-utility in Y . In such a framework, the probability-utility pairs induce various weak order rankings of the options and Levi's E-admissibility rule selects those options in a menu that are maximal according to some ranking. These ideas have been extended in various ways by Seidenfeld, Schervish, and Kadane (e.g., 1995; 2010). Choice functions generated by Levi's E-admissibility criterion generally violate binariness. But they do nonetheless enjoy a certain discernible structure. Rather than being rationalizable by a single complete and transitive relation, they are pseudo-rationalizable by a set of such relations. Independently of Levi's work, Aizerman and Malishevski characterize pseudo-rationalizable choice functions in terms of simple properties of abstract choice functions (Aizerman and Malishevski, 1981). This work (and more) is reviewed in (Aizerman, 1985) and extended in (Aleskerov et al., 2007), but there does not appear to be a characterization of the more general case in which the set of relations used to rationalize a choice function consists of merely acyclic relations. Given that standard presentations of choice theory typically distinguish rationalizability of a choice function (by an acyclic binary relation) from stronger concepts like rationalizability by particular types of orderings, Theorem 4 fills an obvious gap in the literature extending rationalizability concepts to rationalizability by sets of relations. Other studies explore using multiple relations or "rationales" to explain choice behavior. Kalai 2Relatedly, Duggan studies a weak notion of rationalizability that he labels "proto-rationalizability." Protorationalizable choice functions can be represented as taking a certain union of intersections of the maximal elements according to a set of acyclic relations and are characterized by Sen's property α (Duggan, 2019, Theorem 6). With the help of an example, Duggan observes that removing the intersections is not possible: "Theorem 6 is not true if proto-rationalizability is stated with only a union (rather than a union of intersections) of acyclic relations" (2019, p. 22). In Duggan's terminology, our main result, Theorem 4 below, provides a characterization of the version of proto-rationalizability stated with only a union of acyclic relations. 2 et al. (2002) work in the framework of element-valued choice functions and introduce the notion of rationalization by multiple rationales. An element-valued choice function is said to be rationalized by a set of total orderings if the chosen option from a menu is maximal with respect to some ordering in the set. The central notion of this paper, weak pseudo-rationalizability, is one way to generalize rationalization by multiple rationales to set-valued choice functions while relaxing the requirement that the rationales be total orders. So, we make less restrictive assumptions about the nature of rationales. Manzini and Mariotti's sequentially rationalizable choice also appeals to a fixed set of rationales to rationalize an element-valued choice function. However, they do not require that the rationales be total orders and, importantly, the rationales are applied sequentially to eliminate inferior options (2007). Manzini and Mariotti interpret sequentially rationalizable choice as a form of bounded rationality, one that allows for some but not all departures from "the standard model of rationality." A similar interpretation is possible for weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice functions. If, unlike Sen or Levi, one thinks of rational (categorical) preferences as inducing a weak ordering of the options (or at least inducing a binary preference relation rationalizing choice), weak pseudo-rationalizability could be conceived of as choice behavior that violates some but not all rationality constraints. Our characterization of weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice functions facilitates comparisons to characterizations of rationalizability (Theorem 1) and rationalizability by a weak ordering (Theorem 2) so that possible departures from the standard model of rationality are apparent. Yet another interpretation of weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice, then, is as a certain form of boundedly rational choice. After rehearsing the basic notions relating to binary relations, choice functions, and rationalizability that will be employed in Section 2, I briefly review subrationalizability and pseudo-rationalizability in Section 3. In Section 4, I introduce an axiom-a weakening of standard expansion consistency- that, along with Sen's α, allows us to state a characterization of weak pseudo-rationalizability (Theorem 4). 2 Preliminaries Let X be a finite set of options. A preference relation on X is a binary relation R ⊆ X ×X. We will use the infix and graph notations for R, xRy and (x, y) ∈ R, interchangeably. We call R asymmetric if xRy implies ¬yRx. Any binary relation R can be decomposed into its asymmetric and symmetric parts, P and I, respectively, by putting xPy if and only if xRy and ¬yRx and xIy if and only if xRy and yRx. Clearly, R = P ∪ I. If we think of R as a preference relation, then P represents strict preference and I represents indifference. If xRy and yRz implies xRz, R is called transitive. We say that R is acyclic if, for any k ∈ N, x1Px2, x2Px3, ..., xk−1Pxk implies ¬xkPx1. If xRy or yRx for all x, y ∈ X, R is complete. A relation that is complete and transitive is a weak order. If R is also antisymmetric-xRy and yRx implies x = y-then it is called a total order. Define X to be the set of all non-empty subsets of X. We will refer to elements of X as menus. A choice function C : X → X associates a choice set C(Y ) ⊆ Y to every menu Y ∈ X . Note that we require C(Y ) 6= ∅. A binary relation R generates a choice function CR by determining the maximal elements on any given menu, M(Y,R). ∀Y ∈ X , CR(Y ) = {x ∈ Y : yPx for no y ∈ Y } = M(Y,R) Starting with a choice function, when can it be regarded as selecting the maximal elements according to some binary relation for any menu? If there exists a relation R such that ∀Y ∈ X , C(Y ) = {x ∈ Y : yPx for no y ∈ Y }, then C is said to be rationalizable. Since we are considering choice functions on the unrestricted domain of non-empty subsets of X, only acyclic relations can rationalize choice functions. If R contains a cycle x1Px2, x2Px3, ..., xk−1Pxk, xkPx1, then C({xi : i = 1, .., k}) = ∅, contradicting the fact that C is a choice function. For selecting maximal elements, R need not be complete. However, maximizing 3 an incomplete but acyclic relation R can be mimicked by optimizing a complete relation R′, where xR′y if and only if ¬yPx. Essentially, R′ converts any incompleteness of R into indifference. Now we have x ∈ CR(Y ) = M(Y,R) if and only if x ∈ CR′(Y ) = {x ∈ Y : xRy for all y ∈ Y }. Sen has made much of the distinction between maximization and optimization (e.g., Sen, 1997, 2017, chs. 1∗, A6). There are a number of ways to think of a choice function as revealing an underlying preference relation. For example, we could say xRsy if x ∈ C(Y ) for some menu such that y ∈ Y . That is, x is selected in the presence of y. Or we could put xRby if x ∈ C({x, y}). This is typically called the base relation for C. Unlike the base relation, Rs is always acyclic. The two relations coincide if the choice function satisfies perhaps the most central axiomatic constraint on choice functions, so-called contraction consistency also known as Chernoff and Sen's property α. (α) If S ⊆ T , then S ∩ C(T ) ⊆ C(S) Proposition 1. Let C be a choice function on X. If C satisfies property α, then Rb = Rs. Another central constraint in the theory of choice is often dubbed expansion consistency or Sen's property γ. Since we are assuming that X is finite, we can express it in the following simple form. (γ) C(S) ∩ C(T ) ⊆ C(S ∪ T ) Together, contraction and expansion consistency are equivalent to rationalizability. Theorem 1. (e.g., Sen, 1971, Theorem 9) A choice function C : X → X is rationalizable if and only if it satisfies properties α and γ. It is a straightforward exercise to verify that C is rationalizable if and only if it is rationalizable by its base relation. Rationalizability by certain types of relations may be of particular interest. For instance, when can C be regarded as selecting the maximal elements according to some ranking or weak order? Sen's property β does not imply γ in general, but in the presence of α, it does. (β) If S ⊆ T , x, y ∈ C(S), and x ∈ C(T ), then y ∈ C(T ) Properties α and β characterize rationalizability by a weak order. Theorem 2. (e.g., Sen, 1977, Proposition 11) A choice function C : X → X is rationalizable by a weak order if and only if it satisfies properties α and β. Since Sen's work, presentations of choice theory standardly distinguish rationalizability from the stronger notion of rationalizability by a weak order, just as we have here. Yet, in generalizing to rationalizability by sets of binary relations, there is an analogue of Theorem 2, but, as far as I know, no analogue of Theorem 1. Theorem 4 below fills this lacuna in the literature. 3 Pseudo-Rationalizability The development in this section closely follows Moulin (1985, § 5). A choice function is called subrationalizable if it contains a rationalizable choice function. Equivalently, for some acyclic relation R, M(Y,R) ⊆ C(Y ), for all Y ∈ X . (1) Moulin reports that this property was introduced by Deb (1983) under the name weak rationalizability (1985, p. 155). That seems to be not quite correct, as Deb refers to this property as weak representability (1983, p. 100). For finite sets, subrationalizability is equivalent to subrationalizability by a total order. 4 Lemma 1. (Moulin, 1985, Lemma 4) A choice function C : X → X is subrationalizable if and only if there is a strict total order R such that M(Y,R) ⊆ C(Y ) for all Y ∈ X . Since R is a total order, it has a unique maximum in every menu, so CR(Y ) will be a singleton for every Y ∈ X . One point worth emphasizing for our purposes is the distinction between a choice function's being subrationalizable and its being subrationalizable in a way that, for a particular option x ∈ C(S) and menu S, delivers x ∈ CR(S). It does not follow from Lemma 1 that if C is subrationalizable and x ∈ C(S), then there is a total order R such that CR(S) = {x} and CR(Y ) ⊆ C(Y ) for all Y ∈ X . (Consider C1 in Example 1 with y ∈ C1({x, y}).) Lemma 2. (Moulin, 1985, Lemma 5) Let C be a choice function on X. If C satisfies property α, then C is subrationalizable. When is it the case that a choice function's total order subrationalizations generate the choice function? Let N be a finite set of total orders of X, {Ri : i = 1, ..., n}. Each Ri generates a totalorder rationalizable choice function, Ci. We say that C is pseudo-rationalizable if there exists such a set of total orders such that ∀Y ∈ X , C(Y ) = ⋃ i∈N Ci(Y ). Aizerman and Malishevski also call this collected extremal choice. Pseudo-rationalizability can be characterized in terms of α and the following axiom often referred to as Aizerman's axiom. (Aiz) If C(T ) ⊆ S ⊆ T , then C(S) ⊆ C(T ) Theorem 3. (Aizerman and Malishevski, 1981, Theorem 3; Moulin, 1985, Theorem 5) A choice function C on X is pseudo-rationalizable iff it satisfies α and Aiz.3 If C is pseudo-rationalizable by a set of total orders, it is clearly rationalizable by a set of weak orders: total orders are weak orders. The converse is also true. One way to see this is that properties α and β, the properties characterizing rationalizability by a weak order, jointly imply Aizerman's axiom. So any weak order rationalizable choice function is pseudo-rationalizable by a set of total orders. Thus, if C is pseudo-rationalizable by a set of weak order rationalizable choice functions, it is pseudo-rationalizable by a (generally larger) set of total order rationalizable choice functions. Pseudo-rationalizability (Theorem 3) generalizes rationalizablity by a weak order (Theorem 2) to rationalizability to a set of weak orders. It is natural, then, to inquire into the analogous generalization of rationalizability tout court (Theorem 1) to rationalizability by a set of acyclic binary relations. We turn to this issue now. 4 Weak Pseudo-Rationalizability What if we relax the assumption that the subrationalizations must be total (or weak) orders? Now we are concerned only that there exists a finite set N of binary relations on X, {Ri : i = 1, ..., n}, each of which generates a rationalizable choice function, Ci(Y ) = M(Y,Ri) = {x ∈ Y : yPix for no y ∈ Y }, that pseudo-rationalizes a choice function, C. Weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice functions, put another way, are those for which there exists a finite set of rationalizable choice functions, {Ci : i = 1, ..., n}, such that 3Pseudo-rationalizability can also be characterized in terms of a single axiom due to Plott known as path independence: for all S, T ∈ X , C(S ∪ T ) = C(C(S) ∪ C(T )). Choice functions satisfying path independence, i.e., pseudorationalizable choice functions, have been used to study matching markets (e.g., Chambers and Yenmez, 2017). 5 ∀Y ∈ X , C(Y ) = ⋃ i∈N Ci(Y ). Again, we do not require that the choice functions Ci be rationalizable by a weak or total order, only by some (acyclic) binary relation. Weak pseudo-rationalizability implies neither expansion consistency nor Aizerman's axiom as the following example illustrates. Example 1. Let X = {x, y, z}. Consider two rationalizable choice functions, C1, C2, and C such that C(S) = C1(S) ∪ C2(S). Choice sets for singletons are defined in the obvious way. C1(X) = {x} C1({x, y}) = {x, y} C1({x, z}) = {x} C1({y, z}) = {z} C2(X) = {x} C2({x, y}) = {x} C2({x, z}) = {x, z} C2({y, z}) = {y} C(X) = {x} C({x, y}) = {x, y} C({x, z}) = {x, z} C({y, z}) = {y, z} To see that C violates property γ, notice, for example, that y ∈ C({x, y}) ∩ C({y, z}), but y /∈ C(X). For a violation of Aizerman's axiom, observe that {x, y} ⊆ X and C(X) ⊆ {x, y}, but C({x, y}) * C(X). 4 The following example illustrates that not all choice functions satisfying contraction consistency are weakly pseudo-rationalizable. Example 2. Let X = {x, y, z} and consider the following choice function on X. Again, choice sets for singletons are defined in the obvious way. C(X) = {x} C({x, y}) = {x, y} C({x, z}) = {x, z} C({y, z}) = {y} It is easy to check that C satisfies property α. It does not satisfy property γ since y ∈ C({x, y} ∩ C({y, z}) but y /∈ C(X). If C were weakly pseudo-rationalizable, then, for each i ∈ N , Ci({y, z}) = {y}. But for some j ∈ N , we must have y ∈ Cj({x, y}). Since it is assumed that Cj is rationalizable, by property γ, y ∈ Cj(X), in turn implying that y ∈ C(X), contrary to the definition of C. 4 So weak pseudo-rationalizability is not a trivial property in the presence of property α. One idea is simply to restrict the sorts of violations of expansion consistency that a choice function can exhibit. The following property, which we call weak γ, blocks the pattern displayed in Example 2 and is generally satisfied by weakly pseudo-rationalizable choice functions. It clearly weakens property γ while placing limits on the ways in which the axiom can be violated. (Weak γ) If C(S) = {x} and x ∈ C(T ), then x ∈ C(S ∪ T ) In terms of the representation we are seeking which appeals to a set of relations, the reason that property γ can fail is that an option might be maximal according to R in S and maximal according to R′ in T , but not maximal according to either (or any) in S∪T (as is the case for y in Example 1). This situation is not possible when an option is uniquely admissible in S or T (as is the case for y in Example 2). Put informally, the axiom says that if an option is best according to every rationale in one menu, 6 and best according to some rationale in another menu, then the option must be best according to some rationale in the union of the two menus. It is notable that this key axiom refers centrally to unique admissibility. Moreover, while properties α and γ characterize rationalizability by a binary relation, α and weak γ-the latter an exceedingly simple modification of γ-jointly characterize rationalizability by a set of binary relations. Perhaps greater insight could be achieved eventually by finding a more handsome but equivalent (in the presence of α at least) axiom. From a normative point of view, though, weak γ must be regarded as at least as compelling as property γ which implies it. Weak γ also constrains the sorts of failures of Aizerman's axiom that C can display. Proposition 2. Let C be a choice function on X satisfying weak γ. If C(T ) ⊆ S ⊆ T but C(S) * C(T ), then for any x ∈ C(S) \ C(T ), C(T \ C(T )) 6= {x}. Proof. Suppose C(T ) ⊆ S ⊆ T , and let x ∈ C(S) \ C(T ). If x ∈ C(T \ C(T )), then, since x ∈ C(S)∩C(T \C(T )) but x /∈ C(S∪T \C(T )) = C(T ), weak γ implies that C(S) 6= {x} 6= C(T \C(T )). If x /∈ C(T \ C(T )), clearly {x} 6= C(T \ C(T )). Together, property α and Aizerman's axiom imply weak γ. Proposition 3. Let C be a choice function on X. If C satisfies properties α and Aiz, then C satisfies weak γ. Proof. Let C satisfy α and Aiz. Suppose that C(S) = {x} and that x ∈ C(T ). We want to show that x ∈ C(S∪T ). For any y 6= x such that y ∈ C(S∪T ), y ∈ S∪T , so α implies that y ∈ C(S) or y ∈ C(T ). By our assumption that C(S) = {x}, we must have y ∈ C(T ). Hence, C(S ∪ T ) ⊆ T ⊆ S ∪ T . By Aiz, it follows that C(T ) ⊆ C(S ∪ T ). Since x ∈ C(T ), we have x ∈ C(S ∪ T ) as desired. However, properties α and weak γ do not imply Aizerman's axiom, as Example 1 demonstrates. Moreover, properties α and Aiz do not imply standard expansion consistency γ.4 In light of our main result below, Proposition 3 is not surprising. Along with property α, weak γ allows us to state a simple characterization of weak pseudo-rationalizability. So, if C is pseudo-rationalizable by a set of total orders, thus satisfying properties α and Aiz, then C is weakly pseudo-rationalizable by a set of acyclic relations, thus satisfying properties α and weak γ. Before proving the main result, we introduce one more concept that plays a central role in the proof. Define the set of options that x weakly pseudo-dominates as follows. Dx := { y ∈ X \ {x} : ∃Y ∈ X such that y ∈ Y and C(Y ) = {x} } (2) As the categorical choice function, C, in Example 1 shows, y ∈ Dx does not imply that y is never chosen from a menu containing x. Property α allows us to state more about Dx. Lemma 3. Let C be a choice function on X and x ∈ X. If C satisfies property α, then (i) C(Dx ∪ {x}) = {x}, and (ii) y ∈ Dx implies x /∈ Dy. Proof. Let C be a choice function on X that satisfies property α and suppose x ∈ X. (i). To see that C(Dx ∪ {x}) = {x}, observe that if C(U) = {x}, then U ⊆ Dx ∪ {x}. Suppose there is a z 6= x such that z ∈ C(Dx ∪ {x}). Since z ∈ Dx, then, there is some Uz ⊆ Dx ∪ {x} such that z ∈ Uz and C(Uz) = {x}. By α, z ∈ C(Uz), which is a contradiction. Hence, (i). (ii). Let y ∈ Dx and suppose x ∈ Dy. By assumption, there exist menus Ux, Uy ∈ X such that x ∈ Ux and C(Ux) = {y} and y ∈ Uy and C(Uy) = {x}. Since Ux ⊆ Ux∪Uy, by α, Ux∩C(Ux∪Uy) ⊆ C(Ux) = {y}. So, x /∈ C(Ux∪Uy). Analogously, α implies Uy ∩C(Ux∪Uy) ⊆ C(Uy) = {x}. It follows that C(Ux ∪ Uy) = ∅, contradicting the assumption that C is a choice function. Hence, (ii).5 4Consider X = {x, y, z} and two total orderings R1 and R2 with xR1y, yR1z and zR2y, yR2x. Letting C denote the pseudo-rationalzable choice function generated from R1 and R2, we have y ∈ C({x, y}) ∩ C({y, z}), but y /∈ C(X). 5Thanks to an anonymous referee for suggesting a shorter proof Lemma 3.ii. 7 We conclude with the statement and proof of the main result. Theorem 4. A choice function C : X → X is weakly pseudo-rationalizable if and only if it satisfies α and weak γ. Proof. (⇒). Let C be weakly pseudo-rationalizable by the collection {Ci : i ∈ N} of rationalizable choice functions: for all S ∈ X , C(S) = ⋃ i∈N Ci(S). We show that C satisfies α and weak γ in turn. Let S ⊆ T and suppose x ∈ S ∩ C(T ). So, x ∈ S and, for some i ∈ N , x ∈ Ci(T ). Since Ci satisfies property α, x ∈ Ci({x, y}) for all y ∈ T . Since S ⊆ T , we have x ∈ Ci({x, y}) for all y ∈ S. By property γ, it follows that x ∈ Ci(S). Hence, x ∈ C(S) and C satisfies property α. Now, weak γ. Suppose that C(S) = {x} and that x ∈ C(T ). We want to show that x ∈ C(S ∪T ). Since C(S) = {x}, it follows that for all i ∈ N , Ci(S) = {x}. Since x ∈ C(T ), it follows that, for some j ∈ N , x ∈ Cj(T ). Hence, x ∈ Cj(S) ∩Cj(T ), and since Cj satisfies property γ, x ∈ Cj(S ∪ T ). This, in turn, implies that x ∈ C(S ∪ T ) as desired. So, C satisfies weak γ. (⇐). Suppose that C satisfies properties α and weak γ. There are finitely many acyclic subrationalizations, R1, ..., Rn, of C. We need to prove that C(Y ) is a subset of ⋃ i∈N Ci(Y ) for any Y , where Ci(Y ) = M(Y,Ri). (The other inclusion is trivial since each acyclic subrationalization R generates a choice function CR such that CR(Y ) ⊆ C(Y ) for any menu Y .) Let S ⊆ X and x ∈ C(S). We must find an acyclic relation R satisfying x ∈M(S,R) (3) and ∀Y ∈ X , M(Y,R) ⊆ C(Y ). (4) Recall the set of options that x weakly pseudo-dominates from (2). Dx = { y ∈ X \ {x} : ∃Y ∈ X such that y ∈ Y and C(Y ) = {x} } We will use Dx to define a choice function C ′ such that C ′(Y ) ⊆ C(Y ) for all Y ∈ X . Then, we will prove that C ′ satisfies α so that we can appeal to Lemma 2 for the existence of a subrationalizing total order. This total order may lack property (3). So we define a new, acyclic but incomplete relation on the basis of the total order that is guaranteed to satisfy (3) and prove that it preserves property (4). Define the choice function C ′ by C ′(Y ) := { C(Y ) \ {x}, if Y \ (Dx ∪ {x}) 6= ∅; C(Y ), otherwise. Observe that C ′ is a well-defined choice function. By construction we have C ′(Y ) ⊆ C(Y ) ⊆ Y for all Y ∈ X . To see that C ′(Y ) 6= ∅, notice that if C(Y ) = {x}, then Y \ (Dx ∪ {x}) = ∅. So C ′(Y ) = C(Y ) 6= ∅. We now show that C ′ satisfies property α. Let Y ⊆ U ⊆ X and w ∈ C ′(U)∩ Y . We want to show that w ∈ C ′(Y ). If w = x, then U \ (Dx ∪ {x}) = ∅ and C ′(U) = C(U) by the definition of C ′. Since C satisfies property α, w ∈ C(Y ). And since Y ⊆ U , we have Y \ (Dx ∪{x}) = ∅. So, C ′(Y ) = C(Y ). It follows that w ∈ C ′(Y ) as desired. If w 6= x, then, since C ′(Y ) = C(Y ) or C ′(Y ) = C(Y ) \ {x}, w ∈ C ′(Y ). This establishes that C ′ satisfies property α. By α and Lemma 2, there is a subrationalizing total order preference relation R such that ∀Y ∈ X , M(Y,R) ⊆ C ′(Y ). In general, there are several such relations. Obviously, if M(S,R) = {x} for some such R, we are done. So suppose that for no subrationalizing strict preference relation R do we have M(S,R) = {x}. Pick a total order subrationalizing relation R and define R′ := R \ {(y, x) : y ∈ S \ {x}}. 8 Since the relation R is acyclic, R′ is as well-though R′ is no longer complete-since we introduced no new strict preferences.6 Observe that we have yR′x for no y ∈ S so yP ′x for no y ∈ S. Thus, x ∈M(S,R′), thereby securing (3).7 Finally, we need to show that M(*, R′) satisfies (4). Notice that if x /∈ M(Y,R′), we are done: M(Y,R′) = CR(Y ) ⊆ C ′(Y ) ⊆ C(Y ). So suppose that x ∈ M(Y,R′). For any y /∈ Dx ∪ {x}, C ′({x, y}) = {y} by construction. Hence, yPx. If, in addition, y /∈ S, we have yP ′x. So, it must be the case that Y ⊆ S ∪ (Dx ∪ {x}) = S ∪ Dx since x ∈ M(Y,R′). We have x ∈ C(S) by assumption. Since C satisfies property α, by Lemma 3.i, C(Dx ∪ {x}) = {x}. Weak γ now implies that x ∈ C(S ∪ (Dx ∪ {x})) = C(S ∪Dx) since x ∈ C(S) and C(Dx ∪ {x}) = {x}. 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The Design and Operation of Rules of Origin in Greater Arab Free Trade Area: Challenges of Implementation and Reform Bashar H. MALKAWI* & Mohammad I. EL-SHAFIE** Rules of origin (ROO) are pivotal element of the Greater Arab Free Trade Area (GAFTA). ROO are basically established to ensure that only eligible products receive preferential tariff treatment. Taking into consideration the profound implications of ROO for enhancing trade flows and facilitating the success of regional integration, this article sheds light on the way that ROO in GAFTA are designed and implemented. Moreover, the article examines the extent to which ROO still represents an obstacle to the full implementation of GAFTA. In addition, the article provides ways to overcome the most important shortcomings of ROO text in the agreement and ultimately offering possible solutions to those issues. 1 INTRODUCTION Rules of Origin (ROO) mechanism is used to determine the origin of a product. ROO serve many purposes such as collecting data on trade flows, implementing preferential tariff treatment, and applying anti-dumping duties.1 ROO can be divided into preferential and non-preferential rules. Preferential ROO are used to determine whether a product originates in a preference-receiving country or trading area and hence qualifies to enter the importing country on better terms than products from the rest of the world.2 Non-preferential ROO are used for all other purposes, including enforcement of productand country-specific trade restrictions that increase the cost of, or restrict or prevent, market entry. Malkawi, Bashar H. & El-Shafie, Mohammad I. 'The Design and Operation of Rules of Origin in Greater Arab Free Trade Area: Challenges of Implementation and Reform'. Journal of World Trade 53, no. 2 (2019): 243–272. © 2019 Kluwer Law International BV, The Netherlands * Dean and Professor of Law at the University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. He holds S.J.D in International Trade Law from American University, Washington College of Law and LL.M in International Trade Law from the University of Arizona. Email: [email protected]. ** Associate Professor of Law at the University of Sharjah. He holds Ph.D from University of Paris 1 (la Sorbonne), France. This research was funded by grant from the University of Sharjah. 1 See Edwin Vermulst, Rules of Origin as Commercial Policy Instruments – Revisited, 26(6) J. World Trade 61, 63 (1992). See also Maarja Saluste, Rules of Origin and the Anti-Dumping Agreement, 12 Global Trade & Cust. J. 54, 57 (2017). 2 See Joseph A. LaNasa III, Rules of Origin and the Uruguay Round's Effectiveness in Harmonizing and Regulating Them, 90 A. J. I. L. 625, 627 (1996). Preferential ROO differ from non-preferential ones because they are designed to minimize trade deflection.3 The key challenges of constructing ROO in preferential trading relationships are first, finding the balance between the effectiveness and the efficiency of ROO, and second, simplifying them and making them more transparent.4 In principle, ROO are supposed to be straightforward and easy-to-follow methods used to determine origin especially when a product is manufactured in one country, which rarely happens in reality. However, more than often, ROO are complex and protectionist method used a barrier to trade. The higher the level of processing that is required in the partner the more difficult it will be for the partner's products to receive trade preferences, especially if the partner is a small low-income, low-wage economy. Further, restrictive rules of origin not only affect trade within a region but also the ability of local firms to participate in global trade networks. Thus, the nature of the rules of origin can act to undermine the stated intentions of preferential trade agreements to stimulate regional trade but also to compromise broader trade objectives.5 While ROO intended to facilitate trade among Arab countries and keep free riders from profiting unwarrantedly from Greater Arab Free Trade Area (GAFTA), ROO should not become instruments of forced investment and cumbersome for traders so that they forgo using GAFTA preferences.6 ROO GAFTA deflects nonpartner country goods from profiting from the favourable tariff rates. GAFTA ROO determines the tariff levied on each product imported into an Arab country. The cornerstone of GAFTA is the preferential tariffs for GAFTA-origin products. GAFTA eliminate all tariffs on products that originate in participating countries within no more than ten years.7 In most instances, higher 'most favored nation' tariffs remain applicable to imports from outside the region.8 The article begins in section 1 with a brief introduction on the functioning of ROO. Section 2 analyses the different ROO and common provisions used in 3 Trade deflection occurs when a company undertakes minimal processing or assembly in a preferencereceiving country to take advantage of preferences. See Kathryn L. McCall, What Is Asia Afraid of? The Diversionary Effect of NAFTA's Rules of Origin on Trade Between the United States and Asia, 25 Cal. W. Int'l L.J. 389, 393 (1995). See also Ann Van de Heetkamp & Ruud Tusveld, Why Is this Complex? Origin Management: Rules of Origin in Free Trade Agreements 183 (2011). 4 See Vivian C. Jones & Michael F. Martin, International Trade: Rules of Origin, Congressional Research Service, CRS Report for Congress, 7 (2012). 5 See Paul Brenton et al., Rules of Origin and SADC: The Case for Change in the Mid Term Review of the Trade Protocol, Africa Region Working Paper Series, 83 (June 2005). 6 See Ahmed Al-Kawaz, Occupational Restructuring of Non-Oil Manufacturing Labor Force: The Case of Kuwait 8–10 (Arab Planning Institute, 2010). 7 See GAFTA, Part 2, Art. 2.1, Executive Program for Implementing GAFTA. This does not apply to all products such as agricultural products. 8 Arab countries maintain different MFN applied tariff rate: Algeria 18.8, Bahrain 4.7, Djibouti 20.9, Egypt 16.8, Jordan 10.2, Kuwait 4.7, Lebanon 5.7, Mauritania 12.0, Morocco 11.2, Oman 4.7, Qatar 4.7, Saudi Arabia 5.1, Sudan 21.2, Syria 16.5, Tunisia 14.1, UAE 4.7, Yemen 7.5. See WTO, ITC and UNCTAD, World Tariff Profiles 6–10 (2015). 244 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE GAFTA accompanied by examples, when appropriate, to illustrate the rules. Section 3 analyses other relevant issues for GAFTA ROO such as operations not conferring origin and cumulation. Section 4 addresses the issue of reviewing Customs Decisions regarding GAFTA ROO. Section 5 analyses the status of adopting ROO in Arab countries and the gaps that exist in relation to implementation. Section 6 describes certificate origin as currently implemented in GAFTA and its regulations. Section 7 provides statistics as to inter-trade among Arab countries and measures the possible impact of ROO on trade among trading partners. Section 8 concludes with a set of conclusions and recommendations on how ROO should be reformed and considered in order to facilitate trade among GAFTA countries. 2 RULES OF ORIGIN IN GAFTA The most important attempts to achieve economic integration among Arab countries were the Common Market of 1964, and the Agreement of 1981 on the Facilitation and Development of Trade. During their summit in Cairo, Egypt in 1996, Arab countries took the decision to revive the 1981 agreements and create GAFTA.9 The agreement of GAFTA entailed, among other things, the elimination of non-tariff barriers and the reduction of tariff rates on goods. The Economic and Social Council of the League of Arab States (LAS) declared an executive program for GAFTA.10 According to that decision, it was expected that the implementation of the executive program would be accomplished on 21 December 2007. However, in reality, the first steps for implementing the executive program have not taken place until the year 2005. GAFTA includes general rules of origin comprising thirteen pages.11 In addition to the general rules of origin, GAFTA and implementing regulations and decisions include detailed ROO, which covers approximately hundred pages. GAFTA implementing regulations and decisions provide in exhaustive detailed and specific ROO for each product which determines the process required of exporters and importers in order to qualify for preferential tariff benefits under GAFTA. Without the inclusion of these ROO, it would allow some Arab countries, especially the ones that enjoy low labour cost, to serve as an export platform, where foreign companies could establish final assembly facilities which can import parts and components from Asia such as China, and then assemble them in that particular Arab country. GAFTA desires to encourage manufacturers in Arab countries to go beyond serving as staging grounds for final assembly and into the 9 See Tamer Mohamed Ahmed Afifi, The Challenge of Implementing the Overlapping Regional Trade Agreements in Egypt 19–20 (2007). 10 See Economic and Social Council of the League of Arab States, Decision no. 1317/59 (19 Mar. 1997). 11 See GAFTA, Part 4, Executive Program for Implementing GAFTA. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 245 manufacture of major parts and components anywhere in the region. Of course, if there were a customs union among Arab countries ROO would become irrelevant since all imported goods would face the same tariff level thus it does not matter from where these imported goods would enter the region.12 However, as long as there are differences in the tariffs from one Arab country to another, then the preferred place of entry will be the one that provides for the lower tariff, from which goods then can be circulated throughout the region.13 GAFTA formulated ROO that have four characteristics: consistency, uniformity, objectivity, and reasonableness.14 However, achieving such objectives is important, but unfortunately this has not been always the case given the complicated nature of GAFTA general ROO and the other varied rules. GAFTA adopted several general criteria to determine origin of goods. These rules are: 1) Goods that are wholly produced in one country. Under the 'wholly obtained or produced' rule of origin, in order for a good to qualify for preferential treatment, the product must be 'wholly' the growth, production or manufacture of a GAFTAMember State. Also, the concept of 'wholly' should be interpreted narrowly since all the inputs must be produced in the exporting country to qualify for preferential treatment; third party inputs are not allowed. GAFTA provides a list of goods to be considered 'wholly produced'. The list covers primary products, raw minerals, lumber, and unprocessed agricultural commodities. Examples of these goods include live animals born and raised in an Arab country (chapter 01), live trees and other plants harvested or gathered in a single country (chapter 06), edible fruit and nuts; peel of citrus fruit or melons (chapter 08), cereals (chapter 10). Fisheries can qualify for preferential treatment if they caught in a country's river (chapter 03). For fisheries captured in high seas or outside of territorial waters, they will originate in GAFTA if the vessel is owned by the beneficiary country. This means that flag, registration, and ownership will determine the nationality of the vessel and thus meeting GAFT rules of origin. It is not obvious if there is a national officer and crew requirement. Rules of origin for fisheries caught in high seas ought to be relaxed by requiring nationality of vessels based on flag, registration, and ownership only. 12 See Daniel Schwanen, A NAFTA Customs Union: Necessary Step or Distraction? 60 Int'l J. 399, 400 (2005) (the need for verifying the origin of goods circulating across borders within the customs union disappears. A customs union would thus reduce the need for border checks on trade and remove other important trade distortions within the NAFTA). 13 See WTO, ITC and UNCTAD, supra n. 8. 14 See Rule 11, Ch. 4, GAFTA. Art. 2(e) of the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin provides that WTO member countries must ensure that 'their rules of origin are administered in a consistent, uniform, impartial and reasonable manner.' See also John J. Barceló III, Harmonizing Preferential Rules of Origin in the WTO System, Cornell Law Faculty Publications Paper No. 72, 7 (2006). 246 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE The 'wholly obtained or produced' rule of origin is straightforward since it does not include materials from third countries and thus does not pose problems.15 The more difficult and more common situation occurs when particular parts of a product, often in the form of raw materials or components, come from more than one country.16 2) Value-added content allows for imported goods to receive preferential treatment under GAFTA only if no less than 40% of the total product's value is attributable to production in another Arab country using: 'net cost' method, or the 'final value of product' method. Examples of goods subject to this rule of origin include butter (sub-chapter 0405), non-organic chemical products (chapter 28), fertilizers (chapter 31), and electrical generators (sub-chapter 8504). The 'net cost' method aggregates the costs of the various inputs.17 On the other hand, the 'final value of product' method examines value of the finished products.18 Under both methods, the non-regional materials (imported inputs) are subtracted.19 GAFTA uses ex-works price to calculate value-added.20 The ex-works price exceeds ex-works cost and net cost since it includes additional factors such as manufacturing profit, packing cost, packing material, and royalty. The 'net cost' method requires accurate accounting for input, direct and indirect labour and overhead costs, and other costs.21 Certain costs be ultimately included or excluded from the calculations. Parts and materials accounting can be 15 Producers even of basic goods or raw materials are plagued with the various phases of a good's production to determine originating status. If a fish is caught, transported to shore, and then cleaned and filleted, the question arises if there has been a significant transformation of the original product. See Stefano Inama, The Uruguay Round Agreement on Rules of Origin, in Rules of Origin in International Trade 104 (2009). 16 With the increasing trend that has been labelled as the 'global factory,' most final products in contemporary international commerce involve factors of production from more than one country. See Jacques HJ. Bourgeois, Rules of Origin: An Introduction, in Rules of Origin in International Trade 1, 4–5 (Edwin Vermulst, Paul Waer & Jacques Bourgeois eds,1994) (discussing this trend). 17 The added-value content of a product, where calculated on the basis of the 'net cost' method shall be determined as follows: The value content as a percentage = value-added inputs/final value of the product X 100 See Rule 3, Ch. 4, GAFTA. 18 The value content of a product, where calculated on the basis of the 'final value' method, shall be determined as follows: The value content expressed as a percentage = (final value-value of non-originating materials)/final value of the product X 100 Ibid. See Rule 3, Ch. 4, GAFTA. 19 See Catherine Truel, A Short Guide to Customs Risk 85–89 (2017) (The value added content rule demands the identification of both the value of the imported materials and the value produced in the country). 20 Ex-works price means the price paid to the manufacturer in whose facility the last processing is carried out, provided the price includes the value of all the products used in the manufacturing minus any internal taxes which are, or may be, repaid when the product obtained is exported. See Antoni Estevadeordal & Kati Suominen, Rules of Origin in the World Trading System 61 (2003), https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/ region_e/sem_nov03_e/estevadeordal_paper_e.pdf (accessed 11 June 2018). 21 See Rule 3, Ch. 4, GAFTA. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 247 straightforward. However, other costs, such as labour and overhead items which normally must be allocated over different product lines.22 GAFTA does not provide details as how to allocate these costs. Indeed, this is where inconsistencies and uncertainties can arise. Costs may be altered to benefit a product line which is struggling to meet a 40% value-added when the other product line is either well above or well below the required threshold. The accounting can be complex. For example, if an Egyptian factory produces both pens and pencils in equal quantities. The materials cost for each is EGP 100; however, labour on a per unit basis for the pen is EGP 25, while it is EGP 50 for the pencils. The issues that arises is whether labour charges such as supervisory personnel and factory overhead should be allocated equally to pens and pencils based on materials costs, or one third to pens and two thirds to pencils based on labour costs. The 'final value of product' method is generally simpler for manufacturers, importers and customs officials than calculating 'net cost'. With the 'final value of product', only the value of the non-originating imported materials must be calculated.23 The invoice prices of the components can be representative of the cost for the non-originating imported inputs. Thus, a production cost analysis with all its complexities is normally not required. The 'final value of product' method can be difficult when there are many inputs from many different sources so it is hard to record-keep all the information, or if there is sourcing between related companies. For example, if an Egyptian producer of XYZ sells all of the products it produces to a related Lebanese importer. Here, for purposes of determining the final value, parties are related to each other can it can be difficult to do the accounting for the value of non-originating materials can be based. GAFTA does not determine the situations whereby any of these two methods can be used. It is safe to say that whenever the use of either method is permitted, the exporter may use the most favourable method. For instance, suppose that the 'net cost' of XYZ is 100. The 'final value of product' is 120 and the value of nonoriginating materials imported from outside the region is 60. Under the 'final value of product' method, value content is 50% [value content = (120–60)/120 X 100 = 50]. Under the 'net cost' method, the value content is 40% [since value content = (100–60)/100 X 100 = 40]. In this typical example, the 'final value of product' method produces big value content. Customs authorities worldwide, including in Arab countries, face difficulties in verifying the value-added of inputs in order to determine preferential 22 Overhead costs include charges for testing, research and development, insurance, royalty for intellectual property rights, and factory rental. Ibid. 23 See David A. Gantz, A Post-Uruguay Round Introduction to International Trade Law in the United States, 12 Ariz. J. Int'l & Comp. Law 7, 140 (1995). 248 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE treatment.24 GAFTA authorities may need to do away with the 'net cost' method. If this seems not plausible, then the 'final value of product' should be used in most cases. Exceptions for applying the 'net cost' can be used in very limited cases such as when the 'final value of product' cannot be used because of dealings between two related companies. 3) Specific criteria such as a change of tariff category test using the Harmonized System (HS) nomenclature.25 Under this 'change of tariff category' rule, when a change in tariff category occurs, the country where that shift occurs is the country of origin.26 This most commonly occurs when a manufacturing process results in a product that is assigned a tariff heading different from the tariff heading of input or materials from outside the region. In other words, a 'change in tariff category' rule requires classification of the good in question twice: once on arrival into an Arab country and again on departure from that country. The GAFTA 'change of tariff category' rule is not completely different from the 'substantial transformation' rule adopted by some countries like the US27 For instance, a UAE producer of matches imports a paperboard sheet from Morocco which is classified under harmonized tariff schedule subheading 4823.20. After importation, the producer cuts and folds the sheet and prints upon it the name of 'al-ʿūd', and then inserts a UAE produced slide drawer with UAE produced matches into the sleeve. The finished matchbox is classified under harmonized tariff schedule subheading 4819.60. The change in tariff category rule is applied at the four-digit heading level. The imported paperboard sheets of heading 4823 undergo the specified change in tariff category to heading 4819, and the origin of the matchbox is UAE. 24 See World Customs Organization, World Trends in Preferential Origin Certification and Verification, WCO Research Paper No. 20, 18 (Nov. 2011). 25 The Harmonized System has twenty-two sections divided into ninety-seven chapters and contains over 5,000 article descriptions using a six-digit description for all products. The Harmonized System headings are designed to progress from crude products to those based on increasingly sophisticated processing. The first two digits are the 'Chapter' in which the product is contained. There are ninetyseven Chapters in the Harmonized System, reflecting the diversity of possible product categories. The first four digits taken together are called the 'Heading' and provide a more specific description of the product. The last two digits of the six digits provide a still more specific level of description. See Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, United Nations International Trade Statistics Knowledge-base, http://unstats.un.org/unsd/tradekb/Knowledgebase/Harmonized-CommodityDescription-and-Coding-Systems-HS (accessed 18 Nov. 2017). 26 See LaNasa III, supra n. 2 at 625, 629–36 (all discussing this test in detail). 27 Substantial transformation means fundamental change in form, appearance, nature 'or' character of article which adds to value of article. The US Supreme Court defined substantial transformation further in Anheuser-Busch Brewing Association case. See Anheuser-Busch Brewing Assn. v. US, 207 U.S. 556, 561 (1908) (The court decided that manufacture implies a change, but every change is not manufacture, and yet every change in an article is the result of treatment, labour, and manipulation. There must be transformation: a new and different article must emerge, having a distinctive name, character, or use). Change in name only could not be in and of itself the determinative factor to meet the 'substantial transformation' test. The CIT decided that the name factor in meeting the 'substantial transformation' test is the weakest evidence of meeting the test. See Juice Prod. Assn. V. US, 628 F. Supp. 978, 989 (Ct. Int'l. Trade 1986). THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 249 In GAFTA, there are about 112 HS subheadings that incorporate change of tariff category-based rules. This is a reminder to the importance of HS classification in determining origin. Examples of goods subject to GAFTA 'change in tariff category' rule include furniture (chapter 94), foodstuff (chapter 21), raw minerals (chapter 26), natural and artificial fur (chapter 43), and silk (chapter 50). It should be noted that GAFTA tariff change rule is strict since it requires – in most circumstances – that all of the parts used in manufacturing a product be imported and classified under a different tariff category than the category in which the final product would be classified. In order to facilitate trade, GAFTA 'change of tariff category' rule should be relaxed. For example, there could a de minimis exception, in which parts comprising up to a certain percentage can be classified under the same tariff category of the final product.28 Not all tariff heading changes are considered significant enough to produce a change in origin. Use of tariff heading in GAFTA should necessitate the drafting of additional specifications to indicate which changes in tariff classification must occur to change the origin of imported materials.29 This determination requires reviewing the tariff list product-by-product. Moreover, classification of goods is not always a simple exercise.30 When the classification of a good and its materials is not known, making that determination can be a significant problem. Some Arab countries who export only a limited number of products could opt for an origin regime based on an across-the-board change in tariff heading. GAFTA could ease the burden of ROO by exempting certain goods from meeting the required ROO. In other words, in some cases and for some goods there ought not to be value-added, changes of tariff category, or certain process requirements. Simply, these goods can pass through some Arab countries. The exemption can apply to imported goods that have no tariffs at all or where trivial tariff is imposed. 4) Certain process requirements for some products allowing certain operations to confer origin. Goods that are subject to this rule of origin include soya bean oil, groundnut oil, olive oil, palm oil, sunflower-seed, safflower or 28 In some parts, GAFTA adopts this approach by allowing up to 20% of any material to be used and that are classified under the same tariff category of the final product. See Economic Committee, Explanatory Notes: Item 6, List 1, Items whose ROO are Agreed Upon according to Change in Tariff Category Rule, Doc. No. G03-96/ (15/08)/05-m (0326)). 29 HS codes are continuously amended; producers must constantly re-evaluate sourcing and production patterns, as fluctuations in HS codes trigger fluctuations in prices of production materials and associated costs. Stefano Inama, Drafting Preferential Rules of Origin, in Rules of Origin in International Trade 426 (2009). 30 See David Palmeter, The WTO as a Legal System – Essays on International Trade Law and Policy 141, 150– 52 (2003) (Although tariff heading changes method, though perhaps on balance the least costly and clearest, is nevertheless not without costs such as maintaining records of input origins, classification conundrums, and other disadvantages). 250 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE cotton-seed oil, coconut, palm kernel or babassu oil, rape, colza or mustard oil, animal or vegetable fats and oils, margarine; edible mixtures or preparations of animal or vegetable fats or oils, and their fractions (sub-chapters 1507–1515), and goods listed in sub-chapters 2840, 4302, 5007, 5604. Although certain process requirements are intended to clarify the value-added determination for particular products, they are often complex. 5) Combination of one ormore of the above ROO. For example, GAFTA requires some products satisfy the change in tariff heading test as well as contain a minimum level of domestic added value. Examples include organic chemicals (chapter 29), photographic or cinematographic goods (chapter 37), felt, whether or not impregnated, coated, covered or laminated (sub-chapter 5602). Based on the current text of GAFTA and its rules, there is no hierarchy in determining what rule of origin comes first when combining more than rule of origin. GAFTA specified production methods for textiles and clothing products.31 Although GAFTA claims duty free access for textile and clothing products, the specific ROO for these products are drafted to mitigate the likely effects of textiles and apparels trading on domestic clothing industry in Arab countries especially Arab producing countries such as Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia.32 For some intermediate products – such as woven fabrics of silk or of silk waste, textile wall coverings, and textile fabrics otherwise impregnated, coated or covered (sub chapter 5007)GAFTA uses the 'three operations' rule. Under the 'three operations' rule, a textile product will be considered a product of an Arab country, if the fabric is printed in an Arab country and the printing is accompanied by two or more of the following operations: bleaching, shrinking, fulling, napping, decating, permanent stiffening, weighting, permanent embossing or moireing.33 In other words, combination of processing operations – such as printing, shrinking, and weaving – confers origin. Under the 'three operations' rule, it does not matter if for instance a fabric of silk or of silk waste is actually woven in an Arab country. The fabric of silk or of silk waste could be woven in Lebanon, but the printing, bleaching, and shrinking can occur in Jordan. For some other textile products – such as textile fabrics impregnated, coated, covered or laminated with plastics (sub chapter 5903)-, the 'three operations' rule is used provided that the value 31 Textile and clothing products are classified under Chs 50–63. Division can be made between textile products in Chs 50–60 and clothing products (finished products) in Chs 61–63. 32 The reasons for protectionist policies in the textile sector are to be found in the importance of the textile sector for employment policy in some Arab countries. Textile is a labour-intensive industry which requires low skilled workers who if laid off could encounter hard time to find a new job. See Masakazu Someya, Hazem Shunnar & T. G. Srinvasan, Textile and Clothing Exports in MENA: Past Performance, Prospects and Policy Issues, in Post MFA Context, 6–8 (2002). 33 An article usually will not be considered to be a product of a particular country by virtue of merely having undergone printing of fabrics or yarns (marginal operations). The printing confer origin when accompanied by two or more of the following finishing operations: bleaching, shrinking, fulling, napping, decating, permanent stiffening, weighting, permanent embossing, or moireing. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 251 of the unprinted fabric used does not exceed 47.5% of the ex-work price of the product. This is a special technical requirement combined with a value added rule. For some textiles and apparels (such as felt, textile fabrics, floor coverings, textile wicks, and headgear and parts thereof), they must be produced from yarn or fibre produced in the partner country.34 This means that everything from the yarn forward up the production chain of an article must be of an Arab country origin. This may restrict the ability of a manufacturer to source its inputs. Furthermore, this rule may cause tariff escalation since the cost of using foreign yarn from a non-Arab country results in a higher tariff for the entire product. In a temporary fashion, GAFTA should allow for importation of apparel containing third-party content. 3 MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS GAFTA provides for operations that result from non-qualifying operations such as simple packaging operations, dilution with water, or any process. These operations may be used to circumvent GAFTA's ROO. Therefore, these kinds of operations do not confer origin.35 For example, processing such as peeling, freezing, or cooking, may not significantly alters the good's character by changing its shape or size or its quality. To wit, such processing is not sophisticated and adds little value to the good in question. A combination of two or more insufficient processing operations does not confer origin, even if the product specific rules of origin have been satisfied. However, all operations carried out by the producer on a given product shall be considered together when determining whether the combined operations are to be regarded as insufficient.36 In cumulation, GAFTA allows for 40% of Arab country input into another Arab country's goods, and vice versa, without conferring upon those goods the status of non-originating products.37 In other words, GAFTA permits Arab countries to use inputs from a specific GAFTA member or group of GAFTA members without affecting the origin of the goods. For full cumulation, which allows the parties to an agreement to carry out working or processing on non-originating products in the area formed by them, Arab countries can examine the possibility of adopting full cumulation or even cross cumulation in the future.38 34 Manufacture from fabric is not sufficient to confer origin on apparel. There is the requirement of double transformation i.e. from yarn to fabric and from fabric to clothing. See Jaime de Melo, Improving Market Access for Jordanian Exports to Europe, Economic Research Forum, https://theforum.erf.org.eg/ 2018/03/19/improving-market-access-jordanian-exports-europe/ (accessed 24 Oct. 2018). 35 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 6.1, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/09)/02-t (0542)). 36 Ibid., Art. 6.2. 37 See Rule 5, Ch. 4, GAFTA. 38 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 3, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). See also Pamela Bombarda & Elisa Gamberoni, Firm Heterogeneity, Rules of Origin and 252 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE GAFTA requires direct transportation between members.39 Direct transportation applies to goods which satisfy the origin requirements and which are transported directly between GAFTA parties. However, transportation through third countries is allowed under strict conditions requiring supervision by customs authorities of the transit countries.40 In addition, a good will lose its originating status if, subsequent to meeting the required ROO, the good undergoes further production operations outside the territories of Arab countries, other than operations related to shipment of the good such as loading or unloading.41 As a result of this exception from the direct transportation rule, GAFTA did not need specific provisions for goods sent to exhibitions outside the GAFTA region. Nevertheless, GAFTA includes detailed rules on exhibitions i.e. originating goods which were sent to countries outside GAFTA for exhibition in third countries and which are sold to a buyer in GAFTA. These goods sent for exhibition benefit from preferential treatment at importation. If there is no exhibition exception, such goods would have to be returned to the GAFTA country where the good had initially been manufactured for re-export to the GAFTA country of the buyer to benefit from the preferential treatment. GAFTA prohibits duty drawback.42 In other words, GAFTA does not reimburse tariffs paid on non-originating components that are subsequently included in a final product exported to another GAFTA country. This is to encourage companies to change from imported components from non-participating GAFTA countries towards sourcing inputs from GAFTA countries. It could also be that duty drawback is prohibited so as not to favour producers who direct their products-using non-originating componentstowards export over producers who direct their products to the domestic market. Producers for the domestic market are put at disadvantage. Thus, to ensure equal footing in treatment, GAFTA parties Rules of Cumulation, 54 Int'l Econ. Rev. 307, 312 (2013). See also Anna Jerzewska, Brexit and Origin: A Case for the Wider Use of Cross-Cumulation, Int'l Centre Trade & Sust. Dev. 1, 2 (2018), https://www. ictsd.org/sites/default/files/research/rta_exchange_-rules_of_origin-jerzewska-final.pdf (cross-cumulation is increasingly being applied in trade agreements around the world. Cross cumulation allows the cumulation of origin between three or more countries which are not necessarily joined by a trade agreement or are joined by agreements with disparate rules of origin. E.g., under the CanadaColombia and Canada-Peru trade agreements, various materials originating in the US can be used in the production of passenger vehicles while maintaining originating status). 39 See Rule 17, Ch. 4, GAFTA. See also General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/09)/02-t (0542)). 40 Maria Donner Abreu, Preferential Rules of Origin in Regional Trade Agreements, WTO Staff Working Paper No. ERSD-2013–05, 13 (2013). 41 See Rule 17, Ch. 4, GAFTA, supra n. 35. 42 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 14, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). Drawback can be defined as the refund or remission, in whole or in part, of a customs duty which was imposed on imported merchandise because of its importation. See Munford Page Hall & Michael S. Lee, International Trade Decisions of the Federal Circuit, 57 Am. U. L. Rev. 1145, 1158 (2008). Countries use duty drawback to attract investment and encourage exports. See also Arvind Panagariya, Input Tariffs, Duty Drawbacks, and Tariff Reforms, 32 J. Int'l Econ. 131(1992). THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 253 ruled in favour of this prohibition. However, the absence of duty drawback – combined with tariffs and logistical costs – may lead to an increase in the cost of final product as a result of incorporating components with no drawback. GAFTA could allow for the use of partial drawback subject to certain qualifications.43 GAFTA does not include a provision for fungible goods or fungible materials.44 Certain accounting methods can be used to determine the different origin of input materials which are identical and interchangeable without any obligation to stock nonoriginating and originating physically segregated.45 These methods are not used for finished products but only for inputs. When modifying GAFTA rules, these rules should not make such distinction regarding the application of these methods. In addition, any GAFTA modification should set pre-conditions for applying these accounting methods such as requiring a specific authorization from the customs authorities for the application of this method. The purpose of all these modifications should be to facilitate trade and ensuring that these accounting methods for fungible goods do not become unnecessarily restrictive. In contrast with GAFTA detailed preferential ROO, GAFTA does not include provisions for determining when a product which does not meet the preferential ROO. Nevertheless, it will be considered a product of a particular Arab country for other purposes such as the application of a country-specific quota or anti-dumping duty or countervailing duty. Besides ROO for goods, GAFTA does not establish ROO for services.46 This is major omission considering that most economies are service-driven. The rationale for establishing ROO for goods also applies for services. However, the mechanism for determining origin is totally different. For example, while the focus of ROO for goods lies primarily in the manufacturing of the good (for example added-value test or change in tariff heading), the focus of ROO for services is on the nationality of the service provider.47 Nationality can be determined by country of nationality for natural person and by ownership or control for 43 E.g., partial drawback can be used for particular products. In addition, a limit on the amount of refundable duties can be imposed under partial drawback. Partial drawback should be subject to time limits and periodic reviews. See Sherzod Shadikhodjaev, Duty Drawback and Regional Trade Agreements: Foes or Friends? 16 J. Int'l Econ. Law 587, 609 (2013). 44 Fungible goods or fungible materials means goods or materials which are interchangeable because they are of the same kind of commercial quality, possess the same technical and physical characteristics, and, once mixed, cannot be readily distinguished. See Arthur E. Appleton & Michael G. Plummer, The World Trade Organization: Legal, Economic and Political Analysis 647–48 (2007). 45 Ibid. 46 This is understandable since GAFTA does not cover service which reduces the benefit of the agreement. See Bernard M. Hoekman & Jamel Zarrouk Catching Up with the Competition: Trade Opportunities and Challenges for Arab Countries 297 (2000). 47 See Olivier Cadot, Antoni Estevadeordal, Akiko Suwa-Eisenmann & Thierry Verdier, The Origin of Goods: Rules of Origin in Regional Trade Agreements 135–38 (2006). See also Khuong-Duy Dinh, 'Mode 5' Services and Some Implications for Rules of Origin, 12 Global Trade & Cust. J. 299, 301 (2017). 254 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE companies. Of course, GAFTA can be modified, by virtue of article 36 chapter 4 of GAFTA which permits the Economic and Social Council to change ROO, to accommodate ROO for services. 4 REVIEW OF CUSTOMS DECISIONS REGARDING GAFTA ROO Importers and exporters should have the right to request a review of decisions given by the customs authorities. GAFTA does not have specific provisions on review and appeal. In GAFTA, review and appeal of administrative actions are dealt with under the general customs law.48 Perhaps the most important aspect of GAFTA ROO is the dispute settlement process. Any dispute relating to interpretation of ROO or origin verification is settled bilaterally or if unsuccessful through the Committee on Implementation and Execution or through the Committee of Dispute Settlement.49 The dispute settlement process can play a crucial role especially at times when the political will of the integration is questionable. If the dispute settlement body or process is seen independent and able to ascertain its power, this will engender confidence in an integration scheme.50 There is no public record of origin disputes among GAFTA countries that would shed light on thorny issues. The resulting body of case law can help in interpreting origin rules and remove ambiguities. 5 THE STATUS OF ROO IN GAFTA There are several factors that affected the negotiations for ROO starting from drafting the agreement on facilitating and developing trade among Arab countries of 1981. Article 9 of the agreement provided the Economic and Social Council will decide on ROO for purposes of the agreement taking into account that the value-added for goods produced in an Arab country should be no less than 40% and this percentage would be reduced to 20% in case of industrial assembly projects in Arab countries. In 1984, an expert committee for tariffs determined the criteria for setting the added-value on the basis of the difference between the final value of the good and value of imported raw materials or imported inputs used in the production of the good in question. Then, in 1995, the World Trade Organization (WTO) created the Agreement on Rules of Origin which provided rules for determining non48 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 29.3, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). 49 Ibid., Art. 29.1 & 2. 50 In the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) integration example, panels played an important role in strengthening the free trade area. See also Myung Hoon Choo, Dispute Settlement Mechanisms of Regional Economic Arrangements and Their Effects on the World Trade Organization, 13 Temp. Int'l & Comp. L.J. 253, 254 (1999). See also Ji-Soo Yi, A Study on the Dispute Settlement Procedure for the Preferential Rules of Origin, 26 J. Arb. Stud. 3, 6–8 (2016). THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 255 preferential treatment.51 Nevertheless, Arab countries – during the transition period of implementing the executive program of GAFTA – were guided in part by the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin. For example, GAFTA requires that ROO do not themselves create restrictive, distorting or disruptive effects on trade among Arab countries.52 In addition, GATT ROO is based on a positive standard i.e. ROO should state what does confer origin rather than what does not. Negative standards are permissible either as part of a clarification of a positive standard or in individual cases where a positive determination or origin is not necessary.53 New ROO or modifications thereof should not apply retroactively.54 During the transitional period, Arab countries adopted decisions regarding the general application of ROO and any conditions that must be satisfied especially in case of a change of tariff category test and any exceptions for this rule. In 1996, Arab countries entered into new round of negotiations for adopting ROO. This came in response to an earlier decision taken by the Economic and Social Council of LAS which clarified that according to paragraph 1 of the Economic and Social Council of LAS No. 1249 that Arab countries should submit its own ROO and determine goods that should receive priority for determining its origin. Over the years, the LAS technical committee for ROO have held many meetings independently and sometimes in conjunctions with the meetings of the Economic and Social Council for purpose of discussing detailed rules of origin. For example, on 6 September 2007, the Economic and Social Council approved the general rules for ROO for the list of goods agreed upon. By examining the different reports and recommendations issued or made by the LAS technical committee for ROO as well as the extraordinary rounds for the Economic and Social Council, Arab countries of GAFTA are in agreement for some ROO. However, there remain ongoing negotiations among parties for adopting ROO for some other goods. There are several economic factors that make these goods sensitive from the perspective of some Arab countries: number of economic industries, production volume, level of investment, economic contribution to 51 Art. 1(1) of the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin limits its scope to 'those laws, regulations and administrative determinations of general application applied by any [WTO members] to determine the country of origin of goods provided such rules of origin are not related to contractual or autonomous trade regimes leading to the granting of tariff preferences going beyond the application of para. 1 of Art. I of GATT 1994.' Art. 1(2) of the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin then states that the ROOs referred to in Art. 1(1) include 'all rules of origin used in non-preferential commercial policy instruments, such as in the application of ... most-favored-nation treatment under Articles I.' See World Trade Organization, Agreement on Rules of Origin, 1868 U.N.T.S. 397 (1994). See also Zviad V. Guruli,What is the Best Forum for Promoting Trade Facilitation? 21 Penn. St. Int'l L. Rev. 157, 163 (2002). 52 See GAFTA, Ch. 4, rule 10. 53 The use of 'negative standards if they clarify a positive standard' is vague as to have had small impact. Ibid., rule 12. 54 Ibid., rule 14. 256 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE economy, export value, and use of large number of labor.55 Many GAFTA Member States face pressures from particular interests to delay or avoid the implementation of some of ROO. It is noted that only nine of eighteen Arab countries submitted statistics concerning sensitive goods.56 Moreover, those nine countries submitted these statistics at a later date after several calls and recommendations of LAS bodies. Even the statistics submitted by these countries were absolute not relative/comparative i.e. not of total economic industries in the country in question, export value, labour. This is contributed to delayed implementation of ROO. A Saudi-Moroccan working group was formed to develop a proposal for those goods whose ROO are disagreed upon. On 27 October 2011, the outcomes of the working group were discussed in a meeting of the technical committee of ROO which approved some of ROO for a number of goods. The technical committee on rules of origin recommended in its 21 meeting during the period 8–11 April 2012 continuing discussion of ROO for those goods which Arab countries have not agreed on their origin determination. It is noted that there is a gap in the timely approval from the concerned bodies in LAS. For example, there was a delay in adopting recommendations of the technical committee on rules of origin as the adoption of the recommendations did not occur until the Economic Summit No. 1924 of 2013 in the ordinary meeting No. 91 held during the period 11–12 February 2013. The technical committee for rules of origin held meeting no. 24 on 9–7 May 2013. In addition, the General Secretariat of LAS issued a circular of the report and recommendations of the Doha Summit no. 582 held on 24–26 March 2013. The circular stated in part that 80% or more of Arab countries are principally in consensus regarding ROO.57 The circular also encouraged those remaining Arab countries to improve their negotiating positions before the end of 2013. The technical committee on rules of origin would continue to discuss those ROO that are disagreed upon and present the outcome of the discussion the Economic and Social Council in its next meeting. Some Arab countries (Tunisia, Sudan, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, and Yemen) made reservations concerning adopting a majority voting when approving ROO. For those countries, ROO are related to economies of countries and the status of industries in these countries – protecting Arab industries and preventing non-originating imports from enjoying preferential treatment – and thus decisions should be based on consensus. Therefore, it is obvious that there is disagreement among Arab countries on the decision mechanism for adopting ROO. In light of the above, the Economic and Social Council issued decision instructing the General Secretariat of LAS to prepare a list of those goods where 55 See Explanatory Note, Extraordinary Meeting of the Economic and Social Council S (15/06)/02-M (0271), at 41–46 (14–16 June 2015). 56 Ibid. 57 Ibid., at 6. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 257 there is disagreement and distribute the list to countries by the end of February 2016.58 Also, the Economic and Social Council requested Arab countries members of GAFTA who have sensitive goods on the list to provide the General Secretariat of LAS of these goods and any supporting information. Nevertheless, in the extraordinary meeting of the Economic and Social Council held during 20–22 May 2015, only four countries provided an initial list of important goods.59 The delayed submission by other Arab countries is considered an obstacle in concluding negotiations over ROO.60 -In the extraordinary meeting of the Economic and Social Council held during 3–4 September 2016, participants were informed of the classification made by the General Secretariat of LAS for lists of goods whose ROO are not agreed upon. These lists are: List (1): Goods not included in GAFTA members' lists which include thirtyseven rules List (2): Goods of relative importance for industry coming from one country which include twenty-four rules. List (3): Goods of relative importance for industry coming from two countries which include nine rules. List (4): Goods of relative importance for industry coming from three countries which include eight rules. List (5): Goods of relative importance for industry coming from four countries or more which include forty-seven rules. Those participants in the meeting agreed to apply the general rule of origin (40% value-added for goods included in lists 1, 2, and 3). Participants agreed to hold an extraordinary meeting to discuss goods on lists 4 and 5. Arab countries were supposed to provide the General Secretariat of LAS with ROO to facilitate negotiations over lists 4 and 5. In the extraordinary meeting of the Economic and Social Council held in the period 5–6 January 2017, participants discussed lists of 4 and 5 which include fiftyfive goods of relative importance for three Arab countries or more. Participants agreed on two lists: List (a) where there is consensus over its rule of origin and includes twelve good items and list (b) where there is no consensus over its rule of origin and which includes forty-three good items. Participants recommended approval of list (a). As for list (b), it would be subject to further discussion during 58 See League of Arab States, Economic and Social Council, Decision no. 1984 (13 Feb. 2015). 59 These four countries are: Egypt, Palestine, Morocco, and Yemen. 60 Indeed, this is what forced those attending the extraordinary meeting of the Economic and Social Council to recommend to all Arab countries to submit the requested information (number of industry establishments in each country, labour, production volume, investment level, inter-Arab import and export) within thirty days of the meeting. Then, the General Secretariat of LAS would refine the list of goods and send back to countries within thirty days. 258 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE the next meeting of the ordinary meeting of the Economic and Social Council. In the meantime, list (b) will be subject to the general rule of origin of 40% valueadded taking into account interests of least developed Arab countries. It is noted that six countries (Tunisia, Sudan, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, and Libya) made reservations regarding this recommendation claiming that it is contrary to earlier decisions of the Economic and Social Council to agree on all ROO as part of a single package. Those six countries also disagreed over the application of the general rule of origin of 40% value-added regarded list (b) goods. Those six countries will take several measures to protect their local industries and their goods until their ROO are agreed upon especially that those six countries offered greater flexibility to finalize ROO for these goods during the meeting. The Economic and Social Council of LAS held an extraordinary meeting on 14–16 June 2017 to examine several proposals for these forty-three good items subject to disagreement among Arab countries. In the meeting, participants classified these forty-three good items into three lists and recommended: approval of ROO for certain goods (List 1) on the basis of change of tariff heading. The total number of these items on the list is sixteen and they vary from pharmaceutical goods, polyester, shoes, steel, furnaces and oven, aluminium products, electrical cables, to metallic furniture. ROO for these items look for downstream input vs. processed product which ought to fall into a different class or kind when compared to the downstream input. To put it differently, ROO are met when all downstream input and upstream product falls into two different classes. It should be noted that Bahrain, Saudi Arabic, Oman, and Qatar made reservations over this list and proposed that the approval of ROO for List 1 items should be postponed until ROO for the remaining two lists of items (List 2 and 3) are agreed upon all together. It is more practical to get the implementation of ROO on List 1 items forward regardless of the approval on the remaining list of items. Otherwise, the implementation of ROO for the agreed upon items on List 1 can be delayed and held hostage for the outcome of negotiations on Lists 2 and 3 items which could take months if not years to conclude. In addition, unlike WTO, there is no legal requirement of 'single undertaking' under GAFTA.61 In other words, Arab countries do not have the obligation to accept all the negotiations results or nothing. List 2 includes items under negotiations revolve around the appropriate valueadded percentage. The total number of items on List 2 is nineteen mostly of manufactured goods such as pesticides, plastic goods, air conditionings, refrigerators, TVs, radios, cables, and vehicles. Some Arab countries suggested adopting two options for foreign imported inputs: 45% or 55% as a percentage of the final product price. On 61 Single undertaking is known also as the principle of globality or single roof policy. See Anu Bradford, When the WTO Works, and How It Fails, 51 Va. J. Int'l L. 1, 54 (2010). THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 259 the other hand, some Arab countries – Jordan, UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman, and Qatar – made reservations concerning the foreign input percentage and suggested that the percentage should be 60% instead of 55%. The different propositions made by Arab countries can be attributed to diverged economic interests of these countries. There are assembly operations/plants in Arab countries that employ large number of workers and provide job opportunities. In the short and medium run, the more foreign input in the value-added test the better in meeting the proposed ROO for items on List 2. The reasoning for such a suggestion (55% or 60%) is to easily meet ROO in GAFTA without it would be difficult to claim Arab country origin. Moreover, it would be better to maintain the level investment in these manufacturing areas and level of employment. In the long run, for purposes of development, the local content should be increased in return for decreasing the percentage of foreign input. This will strengthen local industry in GAFTA countries with focus on innovation, Research & Development, and intellectual property. List 3 includes items not agreed upon and still under negotiations. The total number of items on List 3 is eight and includes goods such as yogurt and cream, cereals, meat and fisheries, sausage, sugar cane, fruits juice, natural and sparkling water, cloths and cloths accessories. Arab countries have different negotiation positions regarding the items on List 3.62 For example, for animal products (yogurt and cream) positions of Arab countries can be grouped into two groups: (1) those agricultural Arab countries such as Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Sudan, Syria, and Tunisia who favour the wholly-produced rule. Regardless of the domestic 62 For the sausage item, most of Arab countries proposed 50% value-added content. On the other hand, there are other countries that proposed to adopt the wholly-produced rule. The value-added criterion is more logical than the wholly-produced rule although sausage is taken from animals but it needs further processing and thus value-added. For sugar and sugar cane, positions of Arab countries vary between adopting specific manufacturing process starting from refinement stage, changes of tariff heading, 60% value-added, and wholly-produced rule. Eight Arab countries are calling for adopting specific manufacturing process starting from refinement stage. It is preferable to adopt the specific manufacturing process starting from refinement stage because this is the most significant and valuable step in producing sugar. Change in tariff heading may not capture the actual transformation process of making sugar. For fruit juice, nine Arab countries are calling for a 60% content while eight Arab countries are suggesting adopting combined criteria of change in tariff heading and 30% content. Those countries calling for the 60% content are not agricultural countries and do not produce fruits rather they import them. Those countries that call for combined criteria of change in tariff heading and 30% content are agricultural countries depending on local produce of fruits and thus percentage of foreign imported input is low. Applying the cumulation rule in this area is helpful. For waters, including mineral waters and aerated waters, containing added sugar or other sweetening matter or flavoured, and other non-alcoholic beverages, not including fruit or vegetable juices of heading 2009, Arab countries are in disagreement as to the appropriate rule of origin. Some Arab countries are calling for change of tariff category test whereby all parts used in manufacturing be classified under a different tariff category than the category in which the final product would be classified. As Alternative rule of origin, the ex-factory price of any non-originating materials should not exceed 50%. For articles of apparel and clothing accessories, knitted or crocheted (Ch. 61), some Arab countries (such as Tunisia a textile-producing country) are calling for manufacturing processing starting from thread i.e. spinning stage, while other countries (such as Lebanon) are calling for manufacturing processing starting from fabric. 260 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE interests in these countries, the wholly-produced rule is logical and in line with GAFTA ROO (Chapter 4, Rule 7/D of GAFTA); (2) those Arab countries who are not agriculture by nature and have local industry that depends upon inputs from other countries and thus they go for the 50% value-added rule. The application of cumulation rule in this area is helpful to alleviate differences between these two groups and can enhance inter-trade among Arab countries. Examples of gaps between decisions and implementation include observations made among numerous exporters that despite compliance with ROO under GAFTA, companies are not granted preferential treatment and are obliged to pay tariffs.63 Such decisions are often the result of customs officials' lack of knowledge about the different origin requirements. Moreover, for GAFTA, the zero tariff rate has been applied for the past few years, but only for goods whose rules of origin are agreed upon. 6 GAFTA CERTIFICATE OF ORIGIN While certificates of origin are necessary, they also generate cost and delays for businesses and may be a source of risk and uncertainty.64 According to GAFTA, the certificate of origin is prepared by the exporter or his representative.65 However, GAFTA should allow also the producer of the goods to prepare the certificate since the exporter may reasonably rely on the written representation of the producer that the good satisfies the particular rule of origin upon which the claim of preferential treatment under GAFTA is founded. After completion of the certificate by the exporter, it shall be issued and certified by designated authorities in Arab countries members of GAFTA. Issuers of certificates of origin under GAFTA can be categorized into four categories66 (1) Chambers of commerce (Jordan, Tunisia, Sudan, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, Qatar, Lebanon, Libya, and Yemen). (2) Ministries of Economy/Trade/Industry (Kuwait, UAE, and Saudi Arabia). (3) Customs authorities (Bahrain and Morocco). (4) Import and export authorities (Egypt). In general, chambers of commerce are the leading entities for issuing and certifying certificates of origin under GAFTA. Other governmental entities play less 63 See International Trade Centre, Making Regional Integration Work – Company Perspectives on Non-Tariff Measures in Arab States 27 (2015). 64 SeeWTO,WTOHosts Forum to Exchange Views on Trade Challenges from Certificates of Origin (18 Apr. 2018). 65 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 16, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). 66 See GAFTA, Part 4, Annex 1, Executive Program for Implementing GAFTA. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 261 important role. There should a standardized authority in all Arab countries that oversee certificates of origin i.e. chambers of commerce. The certificate itself is a relatively simple and straightforward document. It contains information relating to the goods in question, producer, exporter, importer, date of manufacturing, final value of the goods, and official stamps. The exporter must simply follow the instructions and complete the form. However, the most time-consuming part of the certificate of origin requirement is determining how goods qualify for preferential tariff treatment under GAFTA. Once the exporter has made that determination, the exporter can easily insert the information on the certificate by simply following the instructions provided. Thus, the additional burden imposed by GAFTA certificate of origin, as a stand-alone documentis minimal. The exporter must complete the certificate in the Arabic language or can be translated to another language whenever it is necessary.67 A number of countries require the GAFTA certificate of origin and enclosed bills to be 100% in Arabic.68 This is a strict interpretation of GAFTA rules. The purpose of strictness is evidently to protect the interests of importing country and prevent against concealing fraud. However, it makes common sense to allow some items to be in English especially if these items are commonly used. Trade could not proceed if GAFTA rules are interpreted strictly as there must be a level of good faith and honesty. GAFTA regulations focus on paper format for proof origin.69 This is understandable since GAFTA approved in 1990s when the use of Internet was not common. However, with the advance of technology electronic format should be acceptable to facilitate trade. The certificate may cover a single importation of goods or multiple importations of goods (blanket certificate).70 The certificate of origin is valid for a sixmonth period.71 The certificate shall be submitted to the customs authority of the importing country within the validity period. However, even though the certificate is submitted after the period specified, the certificate can be accepted in case the failure to observe such a period because of force majeure or other circumstances accepted by the importing country. For purposes of flexibility and facilitating inter67 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 16, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). 68 See International Trade Centre, supra n. 63, at 28. 69 Electronic application and issuance of preferential certificate of origin are even less implemented. Electronic exchange of certificates of origin is the least implemented measure having been implemented on a limited basis by less than 10% of the economies in the region. Joint United Nations Regional Commissions, Trade Facilitation and Paperless Trade Implementation Survey 2015: Middle East and North Africa Report 23 (2015). 70 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 22, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). 71 Ibid., Art. 20. The validity period means that the duration allowed for finalizing the importation of goods under this certificate from the date of issuance in the exporting country. 262 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE trade, the validity period for certificate of origin can be expanded to twelve months for instance. For the same token, exporters may need to include only a copy of the certificate with other documentation submitted to customs authorities. There is no need for certificates with original signatures as a certified copy suffices. The manufacturing record and all other pertinent records which substantiate the claim for preference based upon GAFTA origin must be retained by the exporter for three years.72 Thus, GAFTA provides for a relatively long recordkeeping period. Throughout this period, the substantiating records can be available for an Arab country customs services – seeking to verify originupon demand. Similarly, the importer, in reliance on the certificate of origin, must repeat the claim for preferential tariff treatment under GAFTA as part of his/her entry documentation.73 There is no requirement that the importer must retain his/her records, including the certificate of origin and all other relevant documentation, for a period of time. Retaining such documentation can help to avoid denial of preferential tariff treatment or the imposition of penalties. Custom authorities in Arab countries initially afford duty free treatment to shipments of goods accompanied by appropriate certificates of origin. Denial of benefits may occur only after a verification inquiry which determines that GAFTA treatment was unwarranted.74 The regulations provide procedures for verifying the accuracy of certificates of origin, including but not limited to checking documents. This could include checking for signatures, stamps, and accuracy of the content. Verification could alsomean visiting a manufacturer or exporter in the exporting Arab country. The customs authority of the Arab importing country request from the relevant authority of the Arab exporting country to undertakes verification.75 This requires mutual administrative cooperation between the authorities in the importing and exporting countries.76 Authorities in the exporting country then conducts an investigation and checks the accuracy of a proof of origin or the invoice declaration or any other related documents. The Customs authority of the exporting country presents the findings and results of the origin determination to the customs authority of the importing country.77 Based on current provisions of GAFTA, the customs authority of exporting country plays a larger role in 72 Ibid., Art. 25. 73 Ibid., Art. 21. 74 Ibid., Arts 16.5, 28. 75 Ibid., Art. 28.2. 76 In some countries (such as Kuwait, Egypt, and Morocco), customs authorities in the importing countries tend to experience some difficulties in securing the necessary cooperation from the responsible authorities in the exporting countries. See World Customs Organization, Origin Irregularity Typology Study 7–8 (July 2013). 77 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 28.5, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 263 verification. There is no direct interaction between exporters in the exporting country and the customs authority of the importing country. The importing Arab country has the strongest interest in determining whether it has been deprived of revenue through improper claims for preferential tariff treatment. In this instance, inter-country verification missions could prove helpful. GAFTA does not provide for governmental authorities of one Arab country to make verification into another Arab country's territory. If permitted that may lead to sensitive jurisdictional issues regardless of the fact that such verifications are important. However, as a consequence of this anticipated sensitivity, GAFTA could have provided for a notification and consent process for verifications, along with representation by counsel and the presence of observers. In other words, through notification and consent, customs authorities of one Arab country may not undertake a verification mission if consent is refused. In the absence of consent or upon finding that the required supporting documentation is missing, the customs authorities presumably will deny GAFTA tariff treatment to the goods in question (can be called adverse conclusion).78 To facilitate trade under GAFTA, Arab custom authorities can identify certain goods as priorities for verifications. These goods may include certain agricultural goods, certain electrical products, and apparels. These goods, and possibly others, can be singled out for deeper verification presumably because they could represent large volumes of imports or politically sensitive. It is not incidental that many of these goods are among those subject to complex rules of origin. In a step taken to facilitate inter-trade among GAFTA countries, it is acceptable to present a commercial invoice – as long as it is issued in an Arab country – as proof of origin.79 This step presents another option for traders to proof origin thus reducing non-compliance and ease administrative procedures and costs (no need to fill in certificate of origin and stamp it from designated authorities). Exporters can simply insert the required preferential origin declaration on a commercial invoice.80 However, details on the use of commercial invoice as proof of preferential treatment must be spelled out. Details would have to determine the list of approved exporters who make frequent shipments and are authorized to make invoice declarations without the direct involvement of any issuing authority. Because of the legitimate need of exporters and importers to know whether GAFTA preferential tariff rate or the higher most-favoured nation tariff rate will apply to their products, GAFTA regulations should allow written advance rulings. Advance ruling allow traders to obtain an origin ruling prior to the 78 Ibid., Art. 28.6. 79 See The Economic and Social Council, Decision No. 1960 (12 Sept. 2013). 80 Commercial invoice is usually used to determine the actual transaction value of a particular shipment of goods. 264 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE importation of a product. Hence, advance ruling saves time and energy.81 Advance rulings can be issued within say ninety days of a request. Penalties are imposed against a requesting party that has omitted or misrepresented material facts in its request for a ruling. There is a form of leniency for trivial discrepancies in the information contained in the certificate of origin and accompanied documents. In case of no significant errors, GAFTA does not nullify the already issued certificate of origin or requires the issuance of a new certificate of origin.82 Rather, the certificate of origin could be changed. In practice, however, forms are sometimes rejected because of minor mistakes such as typos.83 It seems that in cases of doubt, the safest course customs official to take is to reject the forms. A distinction must be made between minor and major variations or discrepancies and whether it is material enough to warrant rejection. For example, if there variation relates to unimportant typos then the certificate of origin as well as accompanied documents should be accepted. On the other hand, if discrepancies relate to the description of goods then a judgment can be made to reject the documents. At any rate, rejection of certificate of origin and any accompanying documents should not be made for petty bureaucratic reasons. Companies are responsible for other forms of discrepancies between preferential and regular tariff rates where origin is denied, and authorities will require the importer to pay the difference between GAFTA duties and the normal most favoured nation duty. In addition, customs authorities can collect these fines. The question that arises is whether fines should be collected retroactively or from the date of denial. In the optimal scenario, it is better if fines are collected from the date of denial especially for bona fide companies. There are times when certificate of origin is not required. Generally, importers do not need certificates when the value of an imported good does not exceed USD500 for small parcels or USD1000 for goods that constitute part of the personal effects to a person.84 Of course, to benefit from this exemption, importation should not part of a series of importations since this may reasonably be 81 See Tim Tatsuji Shimazaki, North American Free Trade Agreement: Rules of Origin – Free Trade or Trade Barrier? 25 W. St. U. L. Rev. 1, 24–25 (1997) (NAFTA contains a provision requiring on-demand advance rulings). See also Bashar Malkawi, Rules of Origin Under US Trade Agreements with Arab Countries: Are They Helping and Hindering Free Trade? 10 J. Int'l Trade L. & Pol'y 29, 34 (2011). 82 The discovery of minor discrepancies between the information recorded in the certificate of origin and those made in the documents submitted to the customs authorities of the importing country for the purpose of carrying out the procedures for importing the products shall not ipso facto invalidate the certificate of origin if it does in fact correspond to the products submitted. See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 26, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/09)/02-t (0542)). 83 See International Trade Centre, supra n. 63, at 28. 84 See General and Detailed Principles of GAFTA Rules of Origin, Art. 23, Doc. No. G03-19/13 (07/ 09)/02-t (0542)). THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 265 considered to have been arranged for the purpose of avoiding the certificate requirement. A delay in issuing certificate of origin is a cause of concern for exporters. Because certificates are issued much later than expected or promised, products may be held at the production site, the home border or the port of destination, resulting in delays in shipment and demurrage fees.85 Delays in obtaining certificates of origin are aggravated by the paperwork that accompanies certification requests with unnecessary duplication and at times differing demands depending on the day or the official in charge. Delays are often reported when more than one institution is involved in the process due to limited coordination among them.86 It seems that procedures related to the certificate of origin remain opaque and defined in an ad hoc way. To encourage regional trade among GAFTA countries, GAFTA regulations need to be re-examined to allow for exporter's self-determination of origin as this can help in facilitating prompt clearance.87 Of course, there is always the risk that such self-determination will be accepted by customs authorities in the Arab country in question. However, such self-determination can balance duties of customs authorities and importers for the sole purpose of facilitating trade. 7 IMPACT OF RULES OF ORIGIN ON TRADE AMONG GAFTA COUNTRIES The experience under GAFTA suggests that its goals are being met steadily. However, intra-trade among GAFTA countries is still hovering around 10% of the total trade of Arab Countries.88 In 2016, the share of Arab exports to other countries was around 4.7% of total world exports, whereas its portion of imports did not surpass 4.6% of total world imports. The figures of table (1) reveal the extent of Arab countries contribution to world trade during the years 2012–2016. It is noticed that the contribution of Arab countries is insignificant. 85 See International Trade Centre, supra n. 63, at 29. 86 Ibid. 87 See Patricio Díaz Gavier & Luc Verhaeghe, The EU–Korea Free Trade Agreement: Origin Declaration and Approved Exporter Status, 7 Global Trade & Cust. J. 315, 310 (2012) (The EU-Korea free trade agreement is a new generation agreement. The system of origin certification by a competent authority is replaced by a system of self-certification while in previous free trade agreements both systems coexisted. Under this free trade agreement, consignments of EUR 6000 or more can only be granted preferential treatment where the origin declaration is made out by an approved exporter). 88 See Imed Limam & Adil Abdalla, Inter-Arab Trade and the Potential Success of AFTA, Arab Planning Institute, API/WPS 9806, Kuwait, 1, http://www.arab-api.org/images/publication/pdfs/305/305_ wps9806.pdf (accessed 10 Oct. 2018). See also Hassan Al-Atrash & Tarek Yousef, Intra-Arab Trade: Is Too Little? IMF Working Paper n. WP/00/10, 18 (2000). 266 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE T ab le 1 E vo lu tio n of T ot al A ra b Fo re ig n T ra de D ur in g th e Pe rio d 20 12 – 20 16 . V al ue (U SD bi lli on ) (% ) of to ta l w or ld ex po rt s (im po rt s) A nn ua l ch an ge ra te (% ) 20 12 20 13 20 14 20 15 20 16 20 12 20 13 20 14 20 15 20 16 20 12 – 20 15 A ra b ex po rt s to ot he r co un tr ie s 13 22 13 11 12 44 85 7 76 9 7. 2 7. 0 6. 6 5. 2 4. 7 1. 4 A ra b im po rt s fr om ot he r co un tr ie s 81 6 85 8 90 1 85 1 79 6 4. 4 4. 5 4. 7 5. 1 4. 6 13 .5 So ur ce : A ra b M on et ar y Fu nd , Jo in t A ra b E co no m ic R ep or t, 20 17 , pa ge s 14 3 an d 36 7. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 267 On the other side, intra-trade among Arab countries as percentage of their total exports and imports was respectively around 12% and 14% in 2016. The ratio of intra-Arab exports has been increasing steadily during the period 2012–2016, while the percentage of intra-Arab imports has remained relatively constant over the reference period. Some quantitative studies concluded that overall intra-Arab trade should be about 10–15% higher than what is observed.89 The top exporting countries are Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Egypt capturing 64.6% of total intra-regional trade in 2016.90 The top importing countries are UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Oman with 49.8% of total intra-regional trade.91 Roughly half of Saudi Arabia exports to the region are oil-related and much of the remainder is related to downstream hydrocarbon industries such as petrochemicals, plastics, rubber and chemicals. Saudi Arabia is also an important regional source of manufactured goods and food. The UAE is an important player to intra-regional trade as non-hydrocarbons account for major portion of UAE exports. However, around 38% of exports from the UAE are re-exports mainly from countries outside GAFTA. This means that these exports only passing through the UAE thus making it difficult to measure genuine inter-regional trade.92 It might be difficult to draw conclusions as how much GAFTA ROO itself contributed to volume of trade. Many factors play a role in explaining the weakness of intra-Arab trade. These factors range from mere economic factors, such as high level of tariffs and nontariff barriers, trade impediments in some Arab countries, similarity of production structure and traded goods, and lack of adequate transportation infrastructure compounded by distance.93 Restrictive ROO is considered as one of the major obstacles that might impede the growth of regional trade and slow down the process of economic integration by making the costs of compliance higher than the perceived worth of the underlying preference margins.94 The empirical data on the impact of ROO on trade under GAFTA is inadequate. Thus, it is difficult to measure the effects of ROO on trade. Utilization rate is a clear sign of the efficacy of trade preferences.95 89 Ibid. 90 Figures were calculated by authors according the data included in Joint Arab Economic Report, Arab Monetary Fund 370 (2017). 91 Ibid. 92 See Arab News, Greater Arab Free Trade: Higher Hydrocarbon Prices Boost Surplus (13 May 2013), http:// www.arabnews.com/news/451429 (accessed 9 Sept. 2018). 93 See Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, Assessing Arab Economic Integration: Towards the Arab Customs Union, E/ESCWA/EDID/2015/4, 16–17 (2015). 94 See Dylan Geraets, Colleen Carroll & Arnoud R. Willems, Reconciling Rules of Origin and Global Value Chains: The Case for Reform, 18(2) J. Int'l Econ. L. 287, 293–94 (2015). 95 The utilization rate of a given preferential trade agreement is calculated as the value of imports receiving preferential treatment divided by the value of imports that are eligible for preferences. See Alexander Keck & Andreas Lendle, New Evidence on Preference Utilization, WTO Working Paper ERSD-2012-12, 6 (2012). 268 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE T ab le 2 E vo lu tio n of In tra -A ra b T ra de D ur in g th e Pe rio d 20 12 – 20 16 . V al ue (U SD bi lli on ) (% ) of to ta l A ra b ex po rt s (im po rt s) A nn ua l ch an ge ra te (% ) 20 12 20 13 20 14 20 15 20 16 20 12 20 13 20 14 20 15 20 16 20 12 – 20 15 In tr aA ra b tr ad e ex po rt s 11 2 11 7 12 1 10 7 96 8. 4 9 10 12 .4 12 1. 4In tr aA ra b tr ad e im po rt s 11 1 12 1 12 2 11 5 11 0 13 .6 14 13 .5 13 .5 14 1. 2 So ur ce : T he fig ur es in co lu m ns 1 an d 2 w er e de ri ve d fr om A ra b M on et ar y Fu nd , Jo in t A ra b E co no m ic R ep or t, 20 17 , pa ge 37 0, w he re as fig ur es in co lu m n 3 w er e ca lc ul at ed by th e au th or s. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 269 Poor use rates of trade preferences can be explained – among various reasons – by complex ROO.96 The different committees responsible for GAFTA should develop and make available empirical studies on preand post-GAFTA utilization and the impact of ROO on trade among partner countries. This would highlight the contribution of ROO to increase or decrease volume of trade under GAFTA and how ROO can be modified to facilitate trade. 8 CONCLUSIONS GAFTA uses several ROO – such as change in tariff category, value-added, and certain process requirements – to determine origin. These ROO has been confusing to traders, producers, and even lawyers. No single rule used is better than the other. Each origin determination under GAFTA has its own set of advantages and disadvantages. It is noted that there are elements of unpredictability and restrictiveness in each method thus limiting the benefits of tariff reduction or elimination. For example, GAFTA requires for many goods that all parts used in manufacturing a good be imported and classified under a different tariff category than the category in which the final good would be classified. In order to facilitate trade, GAFTA 'change of tariff category' rule should be relaxed. Also, for some goods, GAFTA requires a change in chapter category at the two-digit level from imported materials to final product (restrictive). At the other end, for some goods, GAFTA requires a change in tariff heading at the four-digit level (less restrictive). For some textiles and apparels, origin is conferred when a product undergoes the required manufacturing process or when the thread or yarn is product of an Arab country. Some companies or enterprises in Arab countries may decide to export under the normal Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) tariffs (which can be relatively low) thus foregoing GAFTA benefits. These companies or enterprises – especially small and medium-size companies – are doing so because they believe that their costs of 96 The existing literature and empirical studies have established that ROOs can deter preferential trade. E.g., the average utilization ratio of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was around 64% in 2000 and in the case of the ASEAN FTA below 10% was utilized in 2002. See Jisoo Yi, Rules of Origin and the Use of Free Trade Agreements: A Literature Review, 9 World Cust. J. 43, 50 (2015). See also Kazunobu Hayakawa, Hansung Kim & Hyun-Hoon Lee, Determinants on Utilization of the Korea – ASEAN Free Trade Agreement: Margin Effect, Scale Effect, and ROO Effect, 13(3) World Trade Rev. 499, 507–08 (2014). See also Paul Brenton & Takako Ikezuki, The Initial and Potential Impact of Preferential Access to the U.S. Market under the African Growth and Opportunity Act, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper No. 3262, 21 (2004) (ROOs have a strong impact on preference utilization, particularly in apparel. Loose ROOs for LDC apparel products have had a substantial positive effect on AGOA utilization). See also Paul Brenton & Miriam Manchin, Making EU Trade Agreements Work: The Role of Rules of Origin, 26(5) World Econ. 755, 761 (2003) (restrictive ROOs hamper utilization of unilateral EU preferences and association agreements). 270 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE complying with GAFTA requirements, as reflected by change in tariff category, or value content calculations, the anticipated administrative costs of preparing GAFTA documentation such as certificates of origin, and subsequent customs verification, are greater than the import duties that would be saved. These costs may require accounting and customs specialists who small and medium-size companies do not have. This may discourage new exporters and importers from participating in the anticipated benefits of free trade under GAFTA. Strict rules of origin limit sourcing options. There is a need to reform GAFTA ROO in several aspects. Rules of origin should as far as possible be based on a sector-by-sector rather than a product-by-product basis or line-by-line. Where the change in tariff category or specific process is used, ROO must require compliance with simple operations; where if a value-added is adopted, the percentage level should reflect the limited production capacity in some Arab countries. In addition, the use of multiple specific criteria for one product should be limited as this may lead to complexity and confusion. Under 'net cost' rule of origin, details should be provided for allocation of other costs such as labour and overhead items. Furthermore, GAFTA should provide an option for exporters to choose the most favourable method between 'net cost' and 'final value of product'. Full cumulation should be adopted for greater flexibility. Certain goods should be exempted from meeting the required ROO i.e. imported goods that have no tariffs at all or trivial tariff is imposed. A review should also be undertaken of the scope for the introduction of origin certification for known reliable exporters which would ease the burden on firms in proving compliance with the requirements of the rules of origin. There must be simplification of certificates and forms of origin. Currently, there are several entities that can issue certificate of origin. Therefore, there should a standardized authority in all Arab countries that oversee certificates of origin i.e. chambers of commerce. Arabic is the language of the certificate. However, use of common technical terms in other languages such as English should be accepted. There is a need to eliminate certification for certain products shipped by less-developed Arab countries. Certificate of origin and forms should not be rejected because of minor mistakes such as typos or variations. A distinction must be made between minor and major variations or discrepancies and whether it is material enough to warrant rejection. Institutions should adopt a tracking system for requests, complaints, and other correspondence. This would allow companies to follow the handling of their requests and shed light on what many companies perceive as cumbersome administrative procedures. Such a tracking system would also provide valuable statistics for institutions, enabling them to better monitor the quality and speed of handling requests and inquiries and to take corrective action where needed. THE DESIGN AND OPERATION OF RULES OF ORIGIN 271 GAFTA regulations should allow for written advance rulings. Advance ruling allow traders to obtain an origin ruling prior to the importation of a product. A formal dispute settlement mechanism must be developed to hear ROO disputes and make it operational. The resulting body of case law can help in interpreting origin rules and cement trade liberalization. 272 JOURNAL OF WORLD TRADE

Pritchard's Reasons Clayton Littlejohn King's College London Abstract: Pritchard's epistemological disjunctivist thinks that when we come to know things through vision our perceptual beliefs are based on reasons that provide factive support. The reasons that constitute the rational basis for your belief that the page before you is white and covered in black marks entails that it is and includes things that could not have provided rational support for your beliefs if you had been hallucinating. There are some issues that I would like to raise. First, what motivation is there for thinking that this sort of view is preferable to a more traditional internalist view that insists that the rational support for our beliefs is always limited to things that are common to the cases of knowledge and subjectively indistinguishable cases of non-knowledge? I suspect that an important part of the motivation for the view comes from worries about skepticism. Second, if we're worried about skepticism, can we resist these skeptical pressures without an appeal to metaphysical disjunctivism? Pritchard's epistemological disjunctivist differs from McDowell's in that Pritchard's epistemological disjunctivist doesn't take up controversial positions in the philosophy of perception. Is this kind of neutrality tenable? Third, should we follow Pritchard in thinking that the rational basis for our perceptual beliefs involves reasons? What specifically is the relationship between cases in which there is something the subject knows and cases in which there is something that is the subject's reason for believing what she does? Introduction Pritchard's right about something that most of his critics will get wrong.1 It doesn't make sense to say that the skeptic is wrong about the scope of our knowledge if we're going to say that the way things really are has no bearing on what reasons we have for our beliefs. Reality has to guide us rationally if we're to know how things are. When it does, we'll have reasons we wouldn't if we were ignorant of how things were and were misled by mere appearances. The non-skeptical views that deny this by denying that our reasons include facts about things in view are just confused when they try to tell us how visual knowledge is possible while denying that we could ever have such 'external' reasons. He's right that when we have perceptual knowledge about our surroundings, we have reasons that provide us with a kind of rational support for our beliefs that's better than the rational support we'd have in the really bad cases (i.e., the cases in which someone like us 'on the inside' is deceived by a demon) and he's right that without this support, we couldn't have knowledge of an external world. As I write this and sip on some bland builder's tea, annoyed that the rain is keeping me from the nearest coffee shop, my belief that my teacup is to the left of my laptop constitutes knowledge and wouldn't constitute 1 The critics I have in mind are philosophers critical of Duncan's work. I didn't have Sandy Goldberg or Ram Neta in mind. In addition to Duncan, Ram, and Sandy, I'd also like to thank Maria Alvarez, Robert Audi, Charles Cote-Bouchard, Christina Dietz, Claire Fields, Craig French, John Hawthorne, John Hyman, Brent Madison, and Tim Williamson for discussion of the issues in this paper. 2 knowledge if I didn't see that it was there. That I see that it's there provides rational support for things that I believe and for things that I could believe. It's a kind of rational support that I couldn't have had if, say, I had been in the bad case and some nasty demon was tricking me into thinking that some delicious coffee I was drinking was just some tepid tea with skimmed milk. Pritchard and I don't disagree about whether things are this way, but we might disagree about why things are this way. I'll take this opportunity to press him to say more about the motivation for his brand of epistemological disjunctivism. Pritchard's (2011, 2012) epistemological disjunctivist thinks that when you know visually, say, that Agnes is on the sofa, you know this because you have reason(s) that provide factive and reflectively accessible rational support for the belief that Agnes is on the sofa. Your reason for believing that she's on the sofa is that you see that she's on the sofa. Schematically, then, the proposal we'll consider is this: ED: In paradigmatic cases of perceptual knowledge, your belief that p constitutes knowledge because your reason for believing p is that you see that p. If this proposal is correct, the good case is a case in which your rational support involves reasons that aren't available to your systematically deceived internal duplicates. If we think about views like Conee and Feldman's evidentialism (2004) or Huemer's phenomenal conservatism (2001), the evidence you have for your visual beliefs is the same in the good cases and bad. They think that your evidence supervenes upon your nonfactive mental states. The first question I want to press Pritchard on is why he thinks that we should prefer his externalist view to familiar internalist views. I'll look at possible answers in §1. In §2, I'll discuss the connection between epistemological disjunctivism and the kind of metaphysical disjunctivism McDowell (1988) defends: MD: In paradigmatic cases of perceptual knowledge when you know visually that p, it appears to you that p because p is a fact that's been made visually manifest to you. The experience in the good case isn't a mere appearance as it is in the bad. When we look at some of the arguments in §1, some of them suggest that epistemological disjunctivism requires metaphysical disjunctivism. I want to press Pritchard a bit to tell us more about whether someone who holds to the traditional view of experience could plausibly maintain that our perceptual beliefs are supported by reasons that provide factive support. In §1 we'll look at some of the debates between people who think that our visual beliefs are based on evidence that supervenes upon our non-factive mental states and people who think that it doesn't. The parties to these debates all seem to agree that our perceptual beliefs are based on reasons. Are they? In §3, I'll explain why I'm skeptical of the suggestion that our perceptual beliefs are based on reasons. 1. Reasons for Externalism about Reasons Pritchard rejects the idea that when our beliefs are based on reasons, these reasons are the reasons we share in common with all of our non-factive mental duplicates. If you're in 3 the good case and your duplicate is hallucinating in the bad case, you'll have factive and reflectively accessible support for some of your visual beliefs but they will not. You'll believe, say, that Agnes is sleeping on the sofa for a reason and your reason for believing this will be that you see that she's sleeping on the sofa. This view faces a number of challenges, but they've been addressed elsewhere in detail and interested readers can check to see if those challenges have been met.2 For now, I want to consider some of the possible motivations for adopting such a view. Pritchard claims that ED accords with our ordinary practice of offering reasons when we're asked why we believe something or how we know that something is so: For example, suppose I tell my line manager over the phone that my colleague is at work today (thereby representing myself as perceptually knowing this to be the case), and she expresses scepticism about this (perhaps because she falsely believes that my colleague always skips work when she isn't there). In response I might naturally say that I know that she's at work today because I can see that she's in work- she's standing right in front of me (Pritchard 2012: 18). This seems rather plausible to me, although internalists will either contest Pritchard's point or the point's significance. I'd expect the internalists to say that such a remark is perfectly in order, but then say that a subject's reasons ultimately won't include facts that imply the existence of external objects. Perhaps, following Chisholm, they might say that when someone cites such a fact in explaining why they believe something, we would need to press further to find the ultimate evidence, the evidence that supports her basic beliefs. They'll say that when we ask the subject if she has any reason to believe that she actually sees so and so, our subject will say that it seems to her that she does or something along these lines. At this point, they'll say, we've identified the subject's reasons for her perceptual beliefs. We often won't press people in this way because we are often quite confident that people will see things as they actually are, but their reasons are nevertheless always something about seemings or appearances and never imply the existence of external objects.3 While I don't find these internalist views all that plausible, internalists do. I don't think that observations about the kinds of things we'd say in conversational exchanges with people asking us why we believe things or how we know provides much support for internalism, but it doesn't provide overwhelming support for externalism, either. Let me briefly sketch three further arguments that might help bolster the case for an externalist approach to epistemic reasons (i.e., one on which it's possible to believe things for reasons that your internal duplicates don't have access to). 2 See Alvarez (2010) and Littlejohn (2012, 2013b) for discussion of arguments from error and various other kinds of arguments for psychologizing reasons or taking them to be false contents. See Unger (1975) for linguistic evidence that shouldn't be ignored. 3 See Chisholm (1982), Conee and Feldman (2008), or Huemer (2001). So far as I can tell, Chisholm never offers any reason to think that a description of our reasons/evidence has to be neutral on any further claims about the existence of external objects. 4 First, we'll see that Pritchard's externalism is quite plausible once we try to settle some basic questions about reasons: The Possession Question: What does it take to have a reason? The Constitution Question: What do reasons consist of? The Adequacy Question: When is the rational support provided by reasons adequate? Setting the Adequacy Question aside for the moment, let's consider the Constitution Question. If we think about the normative reasons that determine what someone should do, it's pretty clear (I think) that those reasons won't be states of mind and won't consist of false contents of states of mind. If you have a reason to pull over and offer someone a lift, this reason will presumably be that they needed help, which is to say that it's the fact that they needed help. Since it's possible to act for good reasons (i.e., to act for a reason that is itself a good reason to act that way), your reasons for acting or the reason for which you act have to be the kinds of things that could be good reasons to so act. If you pulled over for a good reason, your reason for pulling over is that someone needed help. That's true iff your reason for pulling over is the fact that someone needed help. If your reason for pulling over could be a fact, surely your reason for believing that you should pull over could also be a fact. We often act for the very same reason we think we should act. We shouldn't lose sight of this obvious fact. It's a helpful reminder that all the arguments that purport to show that our reasons for believing things are limited to reasons we'd share in common with our systematically deceived counterparts couldn't possibly show what they purport to. If we think about our reasons for emoting for a moment, we find something similar. If you are surprised that Boris is polling so well, your reason for being surprised is that Boris is polling so well. Your reason for being surprised can only be that Boris is polling so well if your reason for being surprised is the fact that Boris is polling so well. To be surprised that something is so, it is something that doesn't meet your expectations. It's a fact that's unlikely given your evidence, not a state of mind that surprises you. (You can be surprised to discover that you harbor racist attitudes, but that's to be surprised by the fact that you harbor such attitudes. You could equally be surprised to discover that your mother harbors racist attitudes.) Similarly, if you are a right thinking person and you're upset that Boris is polling so well, your reason for being upset is the fact that Boris is polling so well. It's the fact that's your reason for being upset because if something upsets you, it's something you want not to be the case. If you're a right thinking person, you didn't want not to have various attitudes about Boris or Boris' popularity. No, you wanted Boris to do poorly in the polls and the fact that things aren't going your way is why you're upset. If it's possible to be upset that Boris is doing well in the polls, it's surely possible to do things for the very same reason that you're upset and to believe things for the very same reason that you're upset. The very same fact that makes you upset could be your reason for thinking that the people polled are being swayed by irrational factors, for example. Show me an argument that purports to show that it's impossible for such things to be your reason for believing something and I'll show you a parallel and equally facile argument for the conclusion that you couldn't be upset that Boris is polling well. 5 If you want to see what such an argument might look like, here's one. You're upset having just received a rejection from a journal. The referee admits that he hasn't read the material you discuss, but he's nevertheless confident that you're wrong about what the author says in some recent book.4 You'd say that you're upset that your paper was rejected. It's a natural reaction. But then in an effort to cheer you up (?) the internalists could argue that it's impossible to be upset that your paper was rejected: P1. In the bad case (i.e., a case just like the actual case in terms of your non-factive mental states where a Cartesian demon has decided to cause a series of hallucinations that would convince you that you've just had another paper rejected), you can't be upset that your paper was rejected because, well, there was no paper and no rejection. P2. You are upset that your paper was rejected iff your reason for being upset was that your paper was rejected. P3. In the bad case, your reason for being upset wasn't that your paper was rejected. P4. You don't φ for different reasons in the good case and the bad (i.e., It won't be that your reason for φ-ing in the bad case is something and your reason for φ-ing in the good case is something else). P5. So, your reason for being upset in the good case/the actual case isn't that your paper was rejected. C. You aren't upset that your paper was rejected. We know that this argument is unsound. We also know that the considerations that bear on whether it's possible to be upset for reasons that consist of facts about the situation are the very same considerations that bear on whether it's possible to believe things for reasons that consist of such facts. We are, after all, often moved by the very same thing when we are convinced that something is so, convinced to do something, or feel certain ways about things. Because we know that this argument is no good and should see that this kind of argument is good iff parallel arguments work for believing things for reasons, we know that at least one of the premises in the argument above is false and that parallel reasoning to rule out the possibility of believing things for reasons that are facts will fail for similar reasons. Briefly, here are two possible lines of response. First, you could take issue with P4. You could say that while the good and bad cases are cases of φ-ing for reasons, the reasons for which you φ in the good case and the bad differ. This is disjunctivism about motivating reasons. Your reasons for φ-ing will always be facts, perhaps facts you know, but since you know different things in the good and bad cases, your reasons for φ-ing will also differ.5 Applied to the case of visual belief, the disjunctivist about motivating reasons 4 This could be a purely fictional example. Readers shouldn't assume that the example has to do with any referees who describe Pritchard's views from the armchair and reject papers without bothering to look at his recent work. 5 See Hornsby (2007, 2008) for discussion of this view. 6 can say that the subject's reason for believing in the good case that Agnes is sleeping on the sofa is that she sees that Agnes is sleeping on the sofa even though her reason for believing this in the bad case is something else (e.g., that it seems to her that Agnes is sleeping on the sofa). Second, you could take issue with P4 on the grounds that you don't think that the bad case is a case of φ-ing for reasons. On this line, there will be reasons why you φ'd, but there's nothing that could have been your reason for φ-ing in such a case. This isn't disjunctivism about motivating reasons. On this view, you could say that when we have pairs of subjects in the same non-factive mental states who φ, they won't φ for different reasons; rather, if one of these subjects is mistaken about p and one of these subject's reason for φ-ing is that p, the mistaken subject doesn't φ for a reason. In the good case, your reason for believing that Agnes is sleeping on the sofa might be that you see that she's sleeping on the sofa, but in the bad case there's nothing that's your reason for believing this. We can say that the reason why you believe she's sleeping on the sofa is that it seems to you that she is, but this is true because there is an explanatory reason that we can cite in explaining your belief. Not all explanatory reasons are motivating reasons. I'll have more to say about these two responses later, but suffice it to say for now that one of these responses will be sufficient. Let's suppose, then, that your reason for believing things can include facts and that since your reasons for feeling things or doing things can include facts about the situation, the same holds true for belief. That's sufficient to show that internalism is false. Our internalists believe that when it comes to reasons and the rational support that your reasons provide, your reasons are things you share in common with your non-factive mental duplicates. This kind of view seems to be an obvious non-starter if we shift away from belief and think about emotion and will hopefully seem to be a non-starter when we shift back again to the case of belief. If the correct answer to the Constitution Question is the factualist view that says that reasons consist of facts, we can turn to the Possession Question. What does it take to have facts as your reasons, reasons that can guide you in belief and action? Knowledge should be sufficient for possession.6 If you know p, you're nonaccidentally right about p, so it seems that p should be something that could guide you. If you know p, you're entitled to believe p and that entitlement or right comes with the right to include p in your reasoning. It seems that motivating reasons for belief have to wear two hats. You have to be related to it in such a way that you're able to φ for that very reason and here knowledge seems to rule out the accidental connections between belief 6 Most critics of E=K focus on necessity, not sufficiency. See Conee and Feldman (2008), Hughes (2014), Locke (2015), McCain (2014), McGlynn (2014), Mantel (2013), and Silins (2005), for example. For defenses of necessity and sufficiency, see Bird (2004), Dietz (MS), Hyman (1999, 2006), Littlejohn (2013), and Williamson (2000). While some of the objections to necessity focus on the truth-condition, some focus on the role of environmental luck. For discussion of environmental luck and the possession of reasons, see Littlejohn (2014). 7 and fact that would prevent you from being guided by the relevant fact. You have to have authority or warrant and knowledge seems sufficient for that, too. With this much in place, we have a quick argument for externalism. We'll suppose that the skeptic is wrong and that we have knowledge of the external world. If so, we'll know some facts about the external world. If so, we'll possess reasons that consist of such facts. If, however, we had no such reasons, it follows rather quickly that we wouldn't have knowledge of such facts. Non-skeptical internalism is a muddled mess. Now, this argument is certainly available to Pritchard and he should feel free to use it. It doesn't support epistemological disjunctivism, however. There are alternatives on which everything I've just said is true but ED is false. Suppose you think that E=K is true and you think that a subject's reasons will include all and only what they know. On such a view, it's true that you couldn't know p unless you had better reasons available to you than your deceived counterparts would, but it's not clear yet why we'd need to appeal to ED to explain why this is so. If E=K is correct, this is just a trivial consequence of E=K and an anti-skeptical assumption. The argument I've just sketched is really just an argument against internalism, not an argument for any particular externalist view. It's here that I think Pritchard might try to argue that knowledge requires a kind of rational support and that it's only possible to have this support if ED is true. In offering such an argument, we would shift our attention away from the Possession and Constitution questions and try to answer the Adequacy Question. Although this argument doesn't receive a great deal of discussion in the book, Pritchard does seem to offer this argument against internalism. He suggests that when the knowledge of a proposition depends upon having evidential support, the kind of support required is favoring support: FP: If (i) S knows that p, and (ii) knows that q, and (iii) knows that p entails q, S has better evidence in support of her belief that p than for believing that not-q (2012: 76). Better evidence, he says, is evidence that makes the target proposition more likely. This causes trouble for the internalists, he says, because it's not at all clear how the internalist could plausibly claim that we have favoring support for our beliefs about the external world. As they see it, our evidence is evidence we share with our systematically deceived counterparts and it doesn't seem that such evidence favors the hypothesis that we have hands, say, over the rival hypothesis that we're BIVs (2012: 120). It seems that Pritchard's objection to internalism assumes that the reason that internalism implies that we don't have favoring evidence for believing that we have hands is that we'd have the same evidence in the good case and in the bad. This suggests that you couldn't have favoring evidence for the hypothesis that we have hands over the hypothesis that we're handless BIVs unless we would have different evidence in the two scenarios: FD: If S has favoring evidence that better supports her belief that p than for believing not-q, S would have different evidence if p than if not-q. If this is how favoring evidence is understood, it's clear why internalists cannot claim that their account vindicates the intuitions that underwrite FP. 8 Here's one worry about appealing to the favoring principle to support ED. In introducing the principle, Pritchard hedges and says that it's plausible when we consider, "those propositions which, if known at all, one knows in virtue of possessing appropriate supporting evidence" (2012: 76). It's not at all clear whether we should think of perceptual beliefs as being based on evidence. If they aren't, it doesn't seem that FP applies to the cases of non-inferential visual knowledge. If it doesn't apply to these cases, it doesn't seem that arguments from the favoring principle will lend much support to ED. What's needed is some reason to think that perceptual beliefs are based on reasons and some reason to think that the reason has to be something like the fact that you see that something is so. We might turn to McDowell at this point because he seems to provide just such an argument. Consider McDowell's complaints about hybrid accounts of knowledge: In the hybrid conception, a satisfactory standing in the space of reasons is only part of what knowledge is; truth is an extra requirement. So two subjects can be alike in respect of the satisfactoriness of their standing in the space of reasons, although only one of them is a knower... But if its being so is external to her operations in the space of reasons, how can it not be outside the reach of her rational powers? And if it is outside the reach of her rational powers, how can its being so be the crucial element in an intelligible conception of her knowing that it is so--what makes the relevant difference between her and the other subject (1998: 403)? The idea here seems to be that if you're 'in the know', this has to be the result of having reasons that provide the right kind of rational support, support that would constitute favoring support, to use Pritchard's terminology. If you like slogans, the idea would be that facts or reasons are first. The facts/reasons possessed are prior to knowledge and so possession can explain how knowledge is acquired. McDowell's line here seems to be that if there were cases of knowledge without supporting reasons, the subject would have knowledge and so have cognitive purchase of a fact but there would be no story to tell about how the obtaining of this fact could confer any benefit upon the knowing subject. This gets us part of the way there, but why should we think that to know p visually, you need a further reason, such as the fact that you see that p? Why can't we say, following Schroeder, that your reason for believing p when you have a veridical experience as of p is simply p (2011: 215)? It's clear that McDowell thinks it's silly to say that a subject's reason for believing p is simply p, but it's difficult to distill any argument in the work that I've seen.7 My suggestion is that a subject's reason for believing something has to be something that convinced her that something is so. It's not at all clear how p could be what convinced you that p. To be your reason for believing p, it has to be 'the light in which' you took it that there was something good about believing p, but if it played that role, it would seem that you'd have to already be committed to p for p to 7 He dismisses the idea that p could be your reason for believing p in McDowell (2006: 134). 9 convince you of something.8 Thus, if there is something that's your reason for believing p, it's something that isn't p. With this in place, we have a general argument, then, for ED: First Argument for Epistemological Disjunctivism 1. If knowledge is a matter of having cognitive purchase on a fact, the fact cannot be outside of the reach of the subject's rational powers. 2. If the fact cannot be beyond the reach of the subject's rational powers, necessarily, knowledgeable beliefs are based on sufficient reason and the target fact obtains if the subject has sufficient reason to believe that it obtains. C1. So, if knowledge is a matter of having cognitive purchase on a fact, necessarily, knowledgeable beliefs are based on sufficient reason and the target fact obtains if the subject has sufficient reason to believe that it obtains. 3. Knowledge is a matter of having cognitive purchase on a fact. C2. Knowledgeable beliefs must be based on sufficient reason where you have sufficient reason to believe p only if your reasons entail that p obtains. 4. If knowledgeable beliefs must be based on sufficient reason and you have sufficient reason to believe p only if your reasons entail that p obtains, your reason for believing p will either be p itself or some further fact that entails p. 5. It must be a further fact because the stuttering inference does not generate knowledge. C3. If your belief in p is a knowledgeable belief, your reason for holding that belief is some further fact that entails p. In the case of visual belief, the only natural candidate is the further fact that you see that something is so. Let's consider a second argument for ED. The previous argument tries to show that knowledgeable beliefs have to be based on reasons and then argues that only a certain kind of reason could play the required role to turn a belief into a knowledgeable belief. This argument aims to establish the same conclusion, but from a different starting point. Second Argument for Epistemological Disjunctivism 1. Perceptual beliefs are beliefs based on reasons because when we ask subjects who hold such beliefs why they believe the relevant target propositions or ask how they know the target propositions, the question has application and subjects are well positioned to offer a rationalizing explanation. 8 The 'light in which' is McDowell's (1978) gloss. 10 2. If your perceptual belief that p is based on a reason and believing for this reason explains why your perceptual belief constitutes knowledge, that reason has to provide factive support for believing p. 3. The potential reasons for believing p that provide factive support are the fact that p or some further fact that entails p. 4. Your reason for believing p cannot be p. C. If your belief in p is a knowledgeable belief, your reason for holding this belief is some further fact that entails p. Let me note an important difference between these arguments. The first tries to derive a claim about the kinds of reasons that support visual beliefs from some general claims about the requirements for knowledge. The second tries to derive a claim about the kinds of reasons that support visual beliefs by offering a reason for thinking of visual beliefs as being based on reasons along with some further claims about what the adequacy of support amounts to. I'll discuss these arguments in §2 and §3 respectively. 2. Let's Get Metaphysical! A crucial premise in our first argument for ED is this: KR: All propositional knowledge involves believing something for a reason.9 It's important to stress that the kind of reason that matters here is motivating, not merely explanatory. All motivating reasons that explain our actions or attitudes are explanatory reasons. If something was your reason for buying more gin or believing that you're out of olives, it's a reason why you buy more gin or believe that you're out of olives. The converse isn't so. A reason why your deceived counterpart believes that she has hands is that it seems to her that she does. A reason why your deceived counterpart believes that she has hands is that she's deceived by a demon. That's not her reason for believing what she does! There are epistemic constraints on motivating reasons, but not on explanatory reasons unless those explanatory reasons are also motivating reasons. That's because motivating reasons are supposed to capture the light in which a subject's response struck her as being appropriate, good, or fitting. If we assume KR, there's a quick and easy argument from the non-skeptical assumption that we have some visual knowledge to the claim that our relevant visual beliefs are based on reasons. With that in place, we can then argue that only certain kinds of reasons could provide adequate support for these beliefs. In their own ways, McDowell or Pritchard could argue that we need factive support for such beliefs if they're to constitute knowledge. Since your reason for believing p cannot be p, there must be some further fact that provides rational support for p and the epistemological disjunctivist suggests that that fact is the fact that you see that p. Some authors say that your reason is that it seems that p or that it appears to you that p and while that's a different fact to the 9 See McDowell (2002) for a discussion of whether the proposition known could itself be the reason for which you believe. 11 fact that p, it's not a fact that could provide sufficient support for believing p if McDowell and Pritchard are right. The question to consider at this point is how it's possible to believe something for the reason that you see that p. One suggestion is this. The subject knows that she sees that p and then reasons from the premise that she sees that p to some conclusion, such as that p is true. While this might be possible, this isn't the proposal on the table. If this is our model, we need a story about how the subject knows that she sees that p. KR tells us that she knows that she sees that p only if there's something she knows that's her reason for believing that she sees that p. The considerations from above tell us, in turn, that this is some further fact, one that provides factive support for believing that she sees that p. It's not at all clear what this would be. It doesn't matter what this fact is, really, for we can ask again whether this fact is known or not. If not, we need a story about how this fact gets into the subject's 'evidence box'. If it's known, we need a further fact again. If at every point the possessed reason is possessed by virtue of being known, a regress results. It's best to try to avoid that regress now and reject the idea that the subject needs to know that she sees that p for this to be her reason for believing something. If we can't appeal to knowledge to explain how the subject's reason for believing something could be that she sees that p, the natural alternative is experience.10 It's by virtue of having a certain kind of perceptual experience that she can believe something for the reason that she sees that something is so. On the traditional view of experience, to see that something is so, I suppose one must have an experience as of p and p must be the case. Some further conditions would have to be met to ensure that this is a case of seeing that p and not a case of veridical hallucination. If seeing that p is the kind of thing that puts a subject in a position to know that p and being in such a position requires that you have a rational basis for your belief that's going to establish a non-accidental connection between the believer and the fact, the fact that p has to be related to the experience as of p in an appropriate way. These further conditions wouldn't have any bearing on how the experience was individuated, however, for the experience is conceived of something that's common to the good case and the bad. According to McDowell, experiences so conceived could not do the epistemological work required of them: 10 This is not a capitulation to 'experience-first' epistemology of the kind defended by Dougherty and Rysiew (2014). They think that experience is epistemically prior to knowledge and that it is epistemically first. We could say instead that reasons are epistemically prior to knowledge (although, I would resist this) and the remarks above are sufficient to explain why it's a mistake to follow Dougherty and Rysiew in identifying reasons with experiences rather than facts. (For a defense of the conception of reasons as facts, see Alvarez (2010) and Dancy (1999).) There are further reasons not to identify reasons with experiences. Experiences are concrete events and as such are things that have temporal locations. Reasons stand in logical relations. There's nothing concrete that stands in a logical relation and there's nothing that has a temporal location that stands in logical relations. Events are also coarse-grained particulars. As Neta (2008) reminds us, coarse-grained particulars aren't suited for the role of reason because they cannot rationally constrain belief or degrees of confidence. 12 The root idea is that one's epistemic standing ... cannot intelligibly be constituted, even in part, by matters blankly external to how it is with one subjectively. For how could such matters be other than beyond one's ken? And how could matters beyond one's ken make any difference to one's epistemic standing? ... But the disjunctive conception of appearances shows a way to detach this "internalist" intuition from the requirement of a non-question begging demonstration. When someone has a fact made manifest to him, the obtaining of this fact contributes to his epistemic standing on the question. But the obtaining of the fact is precisely not blankly external to his subjectivity, as it would be if the truth about that were exhausted by the highest common factor (1998: 390). The worry, then, is something like this. Since we can't use knowledge to explain the possession of factive reasons for our visual beliefs, we need to appeal to experience to explain how it is that we have such reasons. The traditional view of experience says that a subject's experience in the good case is nothing more than what's present in the bad, which suggests that the crucial requirement for having factive support for your perceptual beliefs is 'blankly external' to the subject's mental life. It's placed outside the reach of the operation of her rational faculties, and so cannot be the something that provides the favoring support needed to put a subject in a position to know that something is so. If we look for motivation for epistemological disjunctivism in McDowell's arguments against the hybrid conception of knowledge, it's not surprising that the arguments against the cogency of the hybrid conception of knowledge turns out to cause trouble for the traditional conception of experience. With KR in place, we need something that isn't propositional knowledge to understand how we possess reasons that constitute the rational basis for such knowledge. If experience is going to do the work, it seems that the traditional conception of experience must be rejected. While Pritchard is certainly right that there's no inconsistency in accepting ED whilst rejecting MD, it's not clear how we could get hold of the reasons that ED tells us constitutes the basis of our visual knowledge unless MD is correct. One question to press epistemological disjunctivists like Pritchard on is this. Unless you're willing to embrace McDowell's metaphysical disjunctivism, how could your beliefs be based on the reason that you see that something is so? If you want to resist this kind of metaphysical disjunctivism (which I think there's good reason to do), it looks like you'd have to respond to McDowell's epistemological argument for metaphysical disjunctivism.11 My worry is that the responses that might undermine his argument for MD would have to show that the traditional conception of experience is cogent and that any such defense of the traditional conception of experience could do double duty as a defense of the cogency of the hybrid conception of knowledge. 11 While I have no objection to metaphysical disjunctivism, I have concerns about McDowell's version of metaphysical disjunctivism. See French (2016) and Travis (2013) for discussion. 13 There's a further potential problem with the envisaged argument. While many epistemologists believe that our visual beliefs are based on reasons, few believe that they are based on factive reasons. These epistemologists will want to know why our visual beliefs have to be based on reasons that provide factive support and we've seen two ways that Pritchard might explain the need for such reasons. First, he might argue that alternatives to ED aren't adequate because they don't explain how we could have favoring support for our beliefs. Second, he might appeal to McDowell's arguments against the hybrid conception of knowledge. The strategy would be to argue that certain conditions are necessary for visual knowledge on the grounds that these conditions are required for knowledge as such. My main concern here is that whether we go with Pritchard's favoring principle or go with McDowell's argument, it seems that a crucial step in the argument for ED will be something like this: Infallibilism: All propositional knowledge requires believing something for entailing reasons.12 Now, it's one thing to say that all propositional knowledge requires believing something that you have entailing evidence for. E=K gives you that and it doesn't lead to any untoward skeptical results precisely because it doesn't commit you to KR and doesn't require that the entailing evidence you'd have that supports a known proposition is some further fact that could have been your basis for believing the target proposition. Infallibilism as it's understood here requires something more because it says that you couldn't come to know something unless your reason for believing it entailed the target proposition. As we've seen, your reason for believing something is always a further fact, so this bit of cleverness isn't available to the defenders of ED. If we shift our focus away from the case of visual belief to cases of inferential knowledge, it certainly looks as if Pritchard's favoring principle or McDowell's rejection of the hybrid conception of knowledge will result in a kind of inductive skepticism. As suggested earlier, it looks like McDowell's rejection of the hybrid conception of knowledge commits him to something like Pritchard's favoring principle on the reading offered above. It looks as if McDowell and Pritchard agree that knowledge requires favoring support in the sense that it requires an evidential basis for your knowledgeable beliefs that you couldn't have unless you were in a position to know the relevant target propositions. In cases of inductive inference, we have no such evidential basis. It doesn't seem that the mere lack of such a basis guarantees that you're not in a position to know, but if you can know something by means of inductive inference, it certainly looks as if this is knowledge without favoring support. None of the criticisms discussed here are directed at ED. What I've done in this section is look at some potential strategies for defending ED, argued that they would seem to commit us to MD, and argued that the strategies appeal to some principles about knowledge that seem to generate a kind of skepticism about induction. The challenge that proponents of ED face is that of providing a better motivation for ED, one that avoids the difficulties associated with McDowell's view by virtue of his apparent 12 See Brueckner (2005) for further discussion. 14 commitment to MD and his apparent difficulties dealing with cases of inductive inference. 3. Knowledge, Reasons, and Basing If you have concerns about the epistemological assumptions underwriting the first argument for epistemological disjunctivism, we might try to argue from some more modest assumptions. Rather than argue from general assumptions about the kinds of reasons you'd have to base your beliefs on to have knowledge, we might try to argue that the case of visual belief is a case of believing something for a reason, argue that this reason has to be distinct from the fact believed, and argue that there's no good reason to insist that this reason is one that's available to your deceived internal duplicates. The starting point for the second argument is the claim that when we have visual knowledge, our perceptual belief is based on reasons. There's something that's your reason for believing that, say, Agnes is sleeping on the sofa, and ED tells us that if you know that she's sleeping on the sofa, it's that you see that she's sleeping on the sofa. I'm open to the idea that we believe things, do things, or feel things for reasons that consist of facts about the situation, but it's not clear why we should think of visual beliefs as being based on reasons. As someone attracted to E=K, I'd think that the reason that it seems quite natural to say that perception provides us with reasons is that perception provides us with knowledge. I wouldn't take the further step and say that perception provides us with knowledge by providing us with reasons that we might possess without possessing perceptual knowledge as E=K tells us that cases of non-inferential belief aren't cases of believing things for reasons. What's wrong with this picture? Why should we think of visual belief as being based on reasons? The problem with my preferred approach cannot be that it doesn't have any positive story to tell about how we acquire non-inferential knowledge. If you're looking for a view on which perceptual knowledge doesn't require basing beliefs on motivating reasons, we're spoiled for choice. There is a line that's popular amongst some action theorists, which is that every intelligible, intentional action is done for a reason. These are the actions where Anscombe's (2000) special 'why?' question has application and the answer to such questions specifies the agent's reason for doing what she did. If we apply this to the case of belief, we might say that every intelligible, rational belief is something believed for a reason. This isn't just to say that in every case of intelligible, rational belief there is a reason why the subject believes what she does. The point is the stronger point that in every such case, there's something that's the subject's reason for believing what she does. In the case of action, there must have been something that was the agent's reason if the action is to be intelligible. In the case of belief, there must have been something that was the subject's reason if the belief is to be intelligible. It is the kind of thing that the subject would offer if asked why they believe something or how they know something. And it's here that Pritchard's earlier observation matters. If Pritchard is right, and I think he is, that we often appeal to external reasons in explaining why we believe something or how we know something, perhaps we have the start of an argument for ED. In explaining how I know that Agnes is sleeping on the couch, I'd say that I see her there. In the cases 15 where I can cite such a thing in support of my belief, I'll have visual knowledge. In the cases where I'm mistaken in thinking that I could cite such a thing, I won't. If this is right, it seems we've identified some reason for thinking that visual beliefs are based on reasons. With this much in case, it looks like we have some reason to prefer ED to the Williamsonian view I prefer for the key difference between these views seems to be that the Williamsonian view denies that visual beliefs are based on reasons whereas ED doesn't. As we saw earlier, there's a straightforward argument for thinking that it's only views along these lines that can avoid skepticism, so we have the makings of an impressive argument for ED. While I suspect that most readers will side with Pritchard here in thinking that visual belief is based on reasons, let me note that there's a prima facie troubling implication of ED when coupled with the following thesis: RR: If S's belief about p is rational or intelligible, S's belief about p is based on a reason. Think about the bad case in which a subject believes Agnes to be sleeping on the sofa because the subject is hallucinating. I don't think the subject's belief in such a case is justified, but it does seem intelligible or rational. Perhaps Pritchard would agree. If he does, RR implies that the bad case is a case of believing something for a reason. What could the subject's reason be? If it's the bad case, we cannot describe the subject's reason as the fact that the subject sees that something is the case and we cannot describe the subject's reason as the fact she believes being the case. Maybe it's the fact that it seems to her that Agnes is sleeping on the sofa. Whatever it is, it's crucial that the subject's reason in the bad case isn't the subject's reason in the good. ED tells us that the subject's reason in the good provides factive support for a fact that isn't a fact in the bad. Thus, it looks like RR combined with ED leads to disjunctivism about motivating reasons: MRD: If a subject φ's for the reason that p in the good case but p is false in the bad, the subject φ's for a reason in the bad case, but the reason isn't that p. While some do defend MRD, the view strikes me as being extremely problematic. For a start, it strikes me as odd to suggest that there might be differences between the pairs of subject's reasons for φ-ing in the relevant cases because the subject's reasons are supposed to capture the light in which these subjects φ. If these subjects are non-factive mental duplicates, they'll believe that their reasons for φ-ing will be the same. It's one thing to be mistaken about explanatory reasons, but it's quite another to be mistaken about motivating reasons. In the bad case, the subject's experience doesn't faithfully represent how things are. How does this failure explain the subject's failure to understand her own reasons for φ-ing? There's a second problem here, which is that those who want to say that both subjects φ for reasons while allowing that they φ for different reasons has to say that these subjects φ for different reasons even though there is no difference in their non-factive attitudes or the psychological processes involving such attitudes. While I think it's a mistake to say that rationalizing explanations are purely psychological, there are psychological constraints on what an acceptable rationalizing explanation should look like. One plausible constraint is that for any difference in pairs of subjects' motivating 16 reasons, there must be some difference in their non-factive attitudes, a difference in how they take things to be. Let me note one further problem with MRD. I think that MRD doesn't actually do very well when it comes to helping us understand how the relevant range of subjects and their attitudes count as intelligible or rational. This is clearest in the case of emotion. If subjects felt things for the kinds of reasons that MRD suggests, they wouldn't be intelligible and they wouldn't be irrational. Let's consider again the facile argument for internalism about motivating reasons sketched above. Some of us want to describe good cases like this: GC1: Agnes' reason for believing that we're out of gin is that she sees the bottles are empty. GC2: Agnes' reason for heading out the door is that we're out of gin. GC3: Agnes' reason for being upset is that someone drank all the gin. Focus on GC3. We imagine a case in which Agnes is mistaken about the gin. We can't say that this is a case in which Agnes' reason for being upset is that someone drank all the gin because this is a case in which, say, there's plenty of gin left in the cupboard. We describe it as follows: BC3: Agnes' reason for being upset is that she believes that someone drank all the gin. That can't be! What makes Agnes upset is something she's aware and something she doesn't want to be or happen. Agnes doesn't want not to believe that someone drank all the gin. What Agnes wants is gin and if she's upset that something is so, it's something to do with gin, not her beliefs. If we applied MRD to the case of emotion, we end up ascribing reasons to Agnes that make her unintelligible and quite unreasonable. If Agnes is reasonable and her attitudes are intelligible, she couldn't be upset that she believes something about the amount of gin in the flat. Similarly, if Agnes is reasonable and her actions are intelligible, her reason for going to the store won't be that she believes that we're out of gin. This isn't the kind of thing that calls for a trip to the store or calls for more gin. Moreover, if Agnes is reasonable and her attitudes are intelligible, her reason for believing that we're out of gin won't be that she believes the bottles to be empty. She doesn't just believe that we're out of gin, mind you, she believes it with the very same degree of confidence that she does in the good case. Someone who would believe that we're out of gin to the same degree of confidence on the basis of this very different sort of evidence is not reasonable. I suspect epistemologists would recognize this if they thought more about the case of emotion, but it's been a sadly neglected case.13 What that case reminds us is that our reasons are what convince us that something is so, convince us to do things, and make us feel things. What convinces us that something is so are the facts that figure in our reasoning just as what makes us happy, sad, upset, or angry are the facts we have in mind. What convinces us that something is so is not necessarily the same thing as what explains why we're convinced and running these two things together lends spurious credibility to 13 See Gordon's (1987) discussion of knowledge and emotion. 17 the kinds of silly views on which our reasons are always mental things. I suspect MRD rests on a similar sort of conflation. The assumption is that because something made Agnes think that she's out of gin, her beliefs must have been based on a reason. No, not necessarily. Upon reflection she might think that it is, but that's no guarantee. What is guaranteed, if you accept the principle of sufficient reason, is that there's a reason why she believes what she does. That's not the same thing, however, it might be the kind of thing that helps us see why her actions and attitudes are intelligible or rational in spite of the fact that they aren't based on reasons. If I'm right and the case of emotion shows that MRD is mistaken, it looks like the considerations that cause trouble for MRD cause trouble for RR. What makes an emotional response based on a mistaken belief rational isn't that the emotional response is based on a reason. Once we see that, we should start to wonder why we should think that the case of visual belief is a case of believing something for a reason. 14 The motivation for thinking this has proven to be unreliable. As I said earlier, if we give up on the idea that our visual beliefs are based on reasons, there are still things we can say to explain how such beliefs could constitute knowledge. One could, for example, say that much of our visual knowledge results from the operation of recognitional capacities under appropriate conditions where these capacities produce knowledgeable belief as an output without taking reasons as inputs. Such a view would have some of the advertised virtues of ED and I don't yet see what this approach is missing. What I want to know is the reason to introduce reasons into the story as the rational basis for visual knowledge. References Alvarez, Maria. 2010. Kinds of Reasons. Oxford University Press. Anscombe, G.E.M. 2000. Intention. Harvard University Press. Bird, Alexander. 2004. Is Evidence Non-Inferential? Philosophical Quarterly 54: 253–65. Brueckner, Anthony. 2005. Fallibilism, Underdetermination, and Skepticism. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 71: 384-91. Chisholm, Roderick. 1982. The Foundations of Knowing. University of Minnesota Press. Conee, Earl and Richard Feldman. 2004. Evidentialism. Oxford University Press. ____. 2008. Evidence. In Q. Smith (ed.), Epistemology: New Essays. Oxford University Press, pp. 83–104. Dancy, Jonathan. 1999. Practical Reality. Oxford University Press. Dietz, Christina. MS. Knowledge and Recognition. Dougherty, Trent and Patrick Rysiew. 2014. Experience First. In M. Steup, J. Turri, and E. Sosa (ed.), Contemporary Debates in Epistemology. 2nd Edition. WileyBlackwell, pp. 17-22. French, Craig. 2016. The Formulation of Epistemological Disjunctivism. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 92: 86-104. Gordon, Robert. 1987. The Structure of Emotions. Cambridge University Press. 14 For arguments that the case of visual belief isn't a case of believing something for a reason, see Littlejohn (forthcoming) and McGinn (2012). I take it that this is the view you must hold if E=K. 18 Hornsby, Jennifer. 2007. Knowledge in Action. In A. Leist (ed.), Action in Context. De Gruyter, pp. 285–302. ____. 2008. A Disjunctive Conception of Acting for Reasons. In A. Haddock and F. Macpherson (ed.) Disjunctivism: Perception, Action, and Knowledge. Oxford University Press, pp. 244-61. Huemer, Michael. 2001. Skepticism and the Veil of Perception. Rowman and Littlefield. Hughes, Nick. 2014. Is Knowledge the Ability to φ for the reason that p? Episteme 11: 457-62. Hyman, John. 1999. How Knowledge Works. Philosophical Quarterly 49: 433-51. ____. 2006. Knowledge and Evidence. Mind 115: 891-916. Littlejohn, Clayton. 2012. Justification and the Truth-Connection. Cambridge University Press. ____. 2013. The Russellian Retreat. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 113: 293-320. ____. 2013b. No Evidence is False. Acta Analytica 28: 145-59. ____. 2014. Fake Barns and False Dilemmas. Episteme 11: 369-89. ____. Forthcoming. Evidence and its Limits. In C. McHugh, J. Way, and D. Whiting (ed.), Normativity: Epistemic and Practical. Oxford University Press. Locke, Dustin. 2015. Knowledge, Explanation, and Motivating Reasons. American Philosophical Quarterly 52: 215-33. McCain, Kevin. 2014. Evidentialism and Epistemic Justification. Routledge. McDowell, John. 1978. Are Moral Requirements Hypothetical Imperatives? Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volume 52: 13-29. ____. 1998. Criteria, Defeasibility, and Knowledge. In his Meaning, Knowledge, and Reality. Harvard University Press, pp. 369-95. ____. 2002. Responses. In N. Smith (ed.), Reading McDowell on Mind and World. London, pp. 269-305. ____. McDowell, J. 2006. Reply to Dancy. In C. Macdonald and G. Macdonald (ed.), McDowell and his Critics. Blackwell, pp. 134-42. McGinn, Marie. 2012. Non-Inferential Knowledge. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 112: 1-28. McGlynn, Aidan. 2014. Knowledge First? PalgraveMacmillan. Mantel, Susanne. 2013. Acting for Reasons, Apt Action, and Knowledge. Synthese 17: 3865-3888. Neta, Ram. 2008. What Evidence do you Have? British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 59: 89-119. Pritchard, Duncan. 2011. Evidentialism, Internalism, and Disjunctivism. In T. Dougherty (ed.), Evidentialism and its Discontents. Oxford University Press, pp. 235-54. ____. 2012. Epistemological Disjunctivism. Oxford University Press. Schroeder, Mark. 2011. What does it take to 'Have' a Reason? In A. Reisner and A. Steglich-Peterson (ed.), Reasons for Belief. Cambridge University Press, pp. 20122. Silins, Nico. 2005. Deception and Evidence. Philosophical Perspectives 19: 375-404. Travis, Charles. 2013. Perception: Essays After Frege. Oxford University Press. 19 Unger, Peter. 1975. Ignorance. Oxford University Press. Williamson, Timothy. 2000. Knowledge and its Limits. Oxford University Press.

International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 1 A Rational System for Diagnosing Banana Disorders Jawad Yousif AlZamily Department of Information Technology, Al-Azhar University, Gaza, Palestine Abstract: Background: Plant production provides human and animal life with different requirements. The concern of workers in agriculture in general and those interested in plant diseases, in particular, has been focused on protection from all that is expected to have problems of production. As environmental conditions play a critical role in the treatment of diseases, the plant is prepared and rendered more susceptible to production, which is exposed and may result in the loss of the entire crop. Objectives: The main goal of this expert system is to get the appropriate diagnosis of musa acuminata disease and the correct treatment. Methods: In this paper the design of the proposed Expert System which was produced to help farmers, people interested in agriculture and agricultural engineers in diagnosing many of the musa acuminata diseases such as: Panama wilt, Mycosphaerella leaf spot, yellow sigatoka, black sigatoka, Anthracnose, Moko disease/bacterial wilt, Tip over or bacterial soft rot, Bunchy top/curly top, Musa acuminata bract mosaic virus (BBMV), Musa acuminata Streak disease (BSV), Infectious chlorosis (CMV). The proposed expert system presents an overview about musa acuminata diseases are given, the cause of diseases are outlined and the treatment of disease whenever possible is given out. CLIPS with Delphi language was used for designing and implementing the proposed expert system. Results: The proposed musa acuminata diseases diagnosis expert system was evaluated by farmers, agricultural experts and Agriculture teachers and they were satisfied with its performance. Conclusions: The Proposed expert system is very useful for Farmers, and those interested in agriculture with musa acuminata disease and recent graduate students. Keywords: cognitive system, musa acuminata, disorder 1. INTRODUCTION A musa acuminata is an edible fruit produced by several kinds of large herbaceous flowering plants in the genus Musa. In some countries, musa acuminatas used for cooking may be called plantains, distinguishing them from dessert musa acuminatas. The fruit is variable in size, color, and firmness, but is usually elongated and curved, with soft flesh rich in starch covered with a rind, which may be green, yellow, red, purple, or brown when ripe. The fruits grow in clusters hanging from the top of the plant [1]. Figure 1: The figure shows Musa acuminata [1] Although musa acuminata can be very easy to grow in different places, there are many diseases, pests and other issues which can affect musa acuminata growth. Identifying these problems is the first step to solving them, and catching the problem early can make the disease treatments. So we have developed this expert system to help Agricultural engineer and farmers in diagnosing many of the musa acuminata diseases, in order to prescribe the appropriate treatment. An expert system is a program designed to simulate the intelligence of an expert in a particular field. It is mainly developed using artificial intelligence concepts, tools and technologies. An expert system is typically designed to provide capabilities similar to those of a human expert when performing a task. Moreover, it can be used to drive vehicles, provide financial forecasts or do things that human experts do (as shown in figure 2). An expert system usually has two core components [2]: • Knowledge base -This component consists of data, facts and rules for a certain topic, industry or skill, usually equivalent to that of a human expert. • Interference engine -This component uses the facts and rules in the knowledge base to find and learn new knowledge or patterns. International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 2 Figure 2: The figure presents the Main Components of an Expert System [2]. The proposed Expert System for Musa Acuminata Diseases Diagnosis was implemented using, CLIPS language with Delphi. It is a forward chinning reasoning expert system that can make inferences about facts of the world using rules, objects and take appropriate actions as a result. CLIPS Object executes any Expert System looks like frames. It's easy for the knowledge engineer to build the Expert System and for the end users when they use the system. 2. MATERIALS AND METHODS The proposed expert system performs diagnosis for eleven musa acuminata diseases o by Show symptoms. The proposed expert system will ask the user to choose the correct Symptoms of potato disease in each screen. At the end of the dialogue session, the proposed expert system provides the diagnosis and recommendation of the disease to the user. Figure 3 shows a sample dialogue between the expert system and the user. Figure 4 shows how the users get the diagnosis and recommendation 3. LITERATURE REVIEW There is a lot of Expert System that were designed to diagnose plant Diseases. But there is no specialized expert system for diagnosis of musa acuminata diseases available free and use CLIPS language linked with Delphi as the user interface. This expert system is easily use it by farmers and people concerned. This is due to the coordinated application interface. Some of these Expert Systems are specialized in one specific disease and others in five diseases; but the current proposed expert system is specialized in the diagnosis of nine musa acuminata diseases. International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 3 4. KNOWLEDGE REPRESENTATION The main source of the knowledge for this expert system is Agricultural expert and specialized websites for musa acuminata diseases. The captured knowledge has been converted into CLIPS syntax. Currently the expert system has rules which cover nine musa acuminata diseases. 4.1 Panama wilt Disease symptoms  Yellowing of the lower most leaves starting from margin to midrib of the leaves  Yellowing extends upwards and finally heart leaf alone remains green for some time and it is also affected.  The leaves break near the base and hang down around pseudostem. Longitudinal splitting of pseudostem. Discolouration of vascular vessels as red or brown streaks(as shown in Figure 5).  Survival and spread  The pathogen spreads through infected rhizomes. Favourable conditions  Continuous cultivation in the infested field or monocroping results in buildup of inoculum. Figure 5: The figure shows the Symptoms of the disease Panama wilt 4.2 Mycosphaerella leaf spot, yellow sigatoka, black sigatoka Disease symptoms  Early symptoms appear on the third or fourth leaf from the top, i.e., on young leaves.  Small spindle shaped spots on foliage with greyish centre and yellowish halo running parallel to veins. If the fruit is nearing maturity at the time of heavy infection, the flesh ripens but evenly and individual musa acuminatas appear undersized and their flesh develops a buff pinkish colour, and store poorly(as shown in Figure 6). Survival and spread  The conidia of the fungus are carried by wind, rain water and old dried infected leaves and they help to spread the disease. Figure 6: The figure shows the Symptoms of the disease Mycosphaerella leaf spot 4.3 Anthracnose Disease symptoms  At the initial stage, small, circular, black spots develop on the affected fruits. Then these spots enlarge in size, turn to brown colour  The skin of the fruit turns black and shrivels and becomes covered with characteristic pink acervuli. Finally the whole finger is affected. Later the disease spreads and affects the whole bunch.  The disease results in premature ripening and shriveling of the fruits which are covered with pink spore masses.  Occurrence if black lesions on the pedicel causes withering of the pedicel and dropping of the fingers from the hands. Sometimes the main stalk of the bunch may become diseased. Infected fruits become black and rotten (as shown in Figure 7). Survival and spread  The spread of the disease is by air-borne conidia and numerous insects which frequently visit musa acuminata flowers also spread the disease. International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 4 Favourable conditions  The disease is favoured by high atmospheric temperature and humidity, wounds and brusies caused in the fruit and susceptibility of the variety. Figure 7: The figure shows the Symptoms of the Anthracnose 4.4 Moko disease/bacterial wilt Disease symptoms  Leaves become yellow and progress upwards. The petiole breaks and leaves hang.  When it is cut open discolouration in vascular region with pale yellow to dark brown colour.  The discolouration is in the central portion of the corm.  Internal rot of fruits with dark brown discoloration.  When the pseudostem is cut transversely bacterial ooze can be seen in Figure 8. Survival and spread  The bacterium survives in infected plant material, vegetative propagative organs, wild host plants, and soil. Favourable conditions  High temperatures and high soil moisture generally favors disease. Figure 8: The figure shows the Symptoms of the Moko disease/bacterial wilt 4.5 Tip over or bacterial soft rot Disease symptoms  This disease is more pronounced on young suckers leading to rotting and emitting of foul odour.  Roting of collar region is a commonest symptom followed by epinasty of leaves, which dry out suddenly.  If affected plants are pulled out it comes out from the collar region leaving the corm with their roots in the soil.  In early stage of infection dark brown or yellow water soaked areas are more in the cortex area When affected plants are cut open at collar region yellowish to reddish ooze is seen Figure 9. Survival and spread  Bacteria survive in crop debris and infect by water splash through damaged tissues.  Worse in hot wet weather. The bacteria spread in contaminated water. Favourable conditions  Higher temperatures and high humidity are ideal growing conditions for the bacteria. Figure 8: The figure shows the Symptoms of the Tip over or bacterial soft rot 4.6 Bunchy top/curly top International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 5 Disease symptoms  Prominent dark green streaks on the petioles and midrib along the leaf veins.  Marginal chlorosis and curling of leaves  Petioles fail to elongate  Leaves are reduced in size, chlorotic, stand upright and become brittle and are crowded at the top (Bunchy top) and shoe dark green streaks with 'J hook' shape near the midrib.  Flowers display mottled and streaked discolouration Plants show marked stunting (as shown in Figure 9). Survival and spread  Vector: musa acuminata aphid, Pentalonia nigronervosa  The disease can be spread by infected plant debris, plant wounds and injuries. Favourable conditions  Hot and damp weather with plenty of rainfall trigger the disease to occur. Figure 9: The figure shows the Symptoms of the Bunchy top/curly top 4.7 Musa acuminata bract mosaic virus (BBMV) Disease symptoms  The disease is characterized by the presence of spindle shaped pinkish to reddish streaks on pseudostem, midrib and peduncle  Typical mosaic and spindle shaped mild mosaic streaks on bracts, peduncle and fingers also observed  Suckers exhibit unusual reddish brown streaks at emergence and separation of leaf sheath from central axis Clustering of leaves at crown with a travelers palm appearance, elongated peduncle and half filled hands are its characteristic symptom (as shown in Figure 10). Survival and spread  The disease is caused by a virus belonging to potyvirus group. The virions are flexuous filamentous  The virus is transmitted through aphid vectors such as Aphis gosypii, Pentolonia nigronervosa and Rhopalosiphum maidis. In field the disease spread mainly through suckers. Figure 10: The figure shows the Symptoms of the BBMV 4.8 Musa acuminata streak disease (BSV) Disease symptoms A prominent symptom exhibited by BSV is yellow streaking of the leaves, which becomes progressively necrotic producing a black streaked appearance in older leaves (as shown in Figure 11). Survival and spread International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 6  The virus is transmitted mostly through infected planting materials, though mealy bugs (Planococcus citri) and more probably Saccharicoccus sacchari are also believed to transmit it. Shoot tip culture does not eliminate it from vegetatively propagated materials. Figure 11: The figure shows the Symptoms of the BSV 4.9 Infectious chlorosis (CMV) Disease symptoms  The disease manifests itself in all stages of crop growth.  Due to repeated use of suckers from infected plants the disease spreads and resulting in the gradual decrease in yield and quality.  The disease is known to occur in all musa acuminata-growing states.  Light yellow streaks run parallel to leaf veins giving the leaf a striped appearance. The streaks run usually from mid rib to edge of the blade(as shown in Figure 12). Survival and spread  Virus is disseminated by suckers and Aphis gossypi. Figure 12: The figure shows the Symptoms of the CMV 5. LIMITATIONS The current proposed expert system is specialized in the diagnosis only the following nine musa acuminata diseases: Panama wilt, Mycosphaerella leaf spot, yellow sigatoka, black sigatoka, Anthracnose, Moko disease/bacterial wilt, Tip over or bacterial soft rot, Bunchy top/curly top, Musa acuminata bract mosaic virus (BBMV), Musa acuminata streak disease (BSV), Infectious chlorosis (CMV). 6. SYSTEM EVALUATION As a preliminary evolution, many agricultural engineers, agricultural teachers and agriculture students tested this proposed Expert System and they were satisfied with its performance, efficiency, user interface and ease of use. 7. CONCLUSION In this paper, a proposed expert system was presented for helping Farmers as well as those interested in agriculture in musa acuminata disease with nine different possible potatoes diseases. Farmers as well as those interested in agriculture diseases can get the diagnosis faster and more accurate than the traditional diagnosis. This expert system does not need intensive training to be used; it is easy to use and has user friendly interface. It was developed using CLIPS with Delphi language. 8. FUTURE WORK This expert system is considered to be a base of future ones; more plants diseases are planned to be added and to make it more accessible to users from anywhere at any time. International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 7 9. EXPERT SYSTEM SOURCE CODE (defrule disease1 (musa acuminata-symptom 1 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 2 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 3 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 4 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "1" crlf ) ) (defrule disease2 (musa acuminata-symptom 5 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 6 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 7 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "2" crlf ) ) (defrule disease3 (musa acuminata-symptom 8 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 9 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 10 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 11 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 12 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "3" crlf ) ) (defrule disease4 (musa acuminata-symptom 13 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 14 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 15 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 16 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 17 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "4" crlf ) ) (musa acuminata-symptom 18 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 19 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 20 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 21 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "5" crlf ) ) (defrule disease6 (musa acuminata-symptom 22 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 23 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 24 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 25 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 26 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 27 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "6" crlf ) ) (defrule disease7 (musa acuminata-symptom 28 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 29 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 30 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 31 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "7" crlf ) ) (defrule disease8 (musa acuminata-symptom 32 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "8" crlf ) ) (defrule disease9 (musa acuminata-symptom 33 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 34 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 35 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 36 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom 37 yes) (not (musa acuminata disease identified)) => (assert (musa acuminata disease identified)) (printout fdatao "9" crlf ) ) (defrule endline (musa acuminata disease identified) => (close fdatao) ) (defrule readdata (declare (salience 1000)) (initial-fact) ?fx <- (initial-fact) => (retract ?fx) (open "data.txt" fdata "r") (open "result.txt" fdatao "w") (bind ?symptom1 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom2 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom3 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom4 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom5 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom6 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom7 (read fdata)) (bind ?symptom8 (read fdata)) (assert (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom1 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom2 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom3 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom4 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom5 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom6 yes) (musa acuminata-symptom ?symptom7 yes) ) (close fdata) ) International Journal of Academic Information Systems Research (IJAISR) ISSN: 2000-002X Vol. 2 Issue 8, August – 2018, Pages: 1-8 www.ijeais.org/ijaisr 8 References 1. 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REIDIANISM IN CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH-SPEAKING RELIGIOUS EPISTEMOLOGY PETER BYRNE King's College London Abstract. This paper explores the main contours of recent work in englishspeaking philosophy of religion on the justification of religious belief. It sets out the main characteristics of the religious epistemologies of such writers as Alston, Plantinga, and Swinburne. It poses and seeks to answer the question of how far any or all of these epistemologies are indebted or similar to the epistemology of the Scottish enlightenment thinker Thomas reid. It concludes that while there are some links to reid in recent writing, contemporary approaches depart from reid's views on the specific topic of the justification of religious belief. INtroDuCtIoN my aim in this paper is to present a survey of the contemporary debate as to 'positive epistemic status' and religious belief highlighting (as much as I can) the use of reid and Scottish philosophy in contemporary philosophy of religion. There is a great deal that can be done by way of fulfilling this aim, since reid is referred to frequently by important protagonists in contemporary english-speaking religious epistemology – though only reid: I have come across no mention in this literature to other Scottish philosophers (except of course for David Hume). The most important figures in debates about the rationality and justification of religious belief in the last 20 years have been William Alston, Alvin Plantinga and richard Swinburne. Nicholas Wolterstorff also deserves a mention here, but though he is not in any sense a follower of Plantinga, his work tends (unfairly) to be regarded as a supplement euroPeAN JourNAl For PHIloSoPHY oF relIGIoN 3/2 (AutumN 2011), PP. 267-284 Peter bYrNe268 to Plantinga's. Alston, Plantinga and Wolterstorff are regarded as representatives of so-called reformed epistemology. This is misleading because Alston was not a reformed thinker but an episcopalian (i.e. uS Anglican). All three evince an approach to justification, rationality or warrant in religious belief that is either anti-evidentialist or that plays down the importance of backing religious beliefs by evidence in granting them positive epistemic status. Swinburne's contribution to religious epistemology is by contrast one that makes great play with finding evidence for religious beliefs. He has constructed a complex apologetic for the Christian creed. It commences with an inductive, evidential case for truth of the bare claim that there is a God and then proceeds to an evidential case for specifically Christian claims about God. There is a relation between Swinburne and 18th century british philosophy but it is not with North britain. Swinburne evidently stands in a tradition that includes Joseph butler and his Analogy of Religion. His appeal to natural theology and to probability as the basis of religious assent is butlerian. There are also notable links between his case for the rationality of assent to revelation and that which is contained in locke's writings. The differences between Plantinga and co., on the one hand, and Swinburne, on the other, might seem to be great. Swinburne is an evidentialist in epistemology and also an internalist. The reformed epistemologists are anti-evidentialist and move towards the application of externalist epistemologies to religious belief. (This is latter move is notable in Plantinga's three books on warrant and in Alston's appeal to doxastic practices as the locus of justified belief.) It must be said, however, that there are areas of agreement between these apparently divergent approaches to religious epistemology. It is notable that in Perceiving God1 Alston can appeal to natural theology as a supplement to the justification of religious beliefs provided by the fact that they are generated by a doxastic practice whose reliability has not been refuted. There is also a significant fact about Swinburne's apologetic scheme that places him closer to the reformed epistemologists. In Chapter 13 of The Existence of 1 William Alston, Perceiving God (Ithaca and london: Cornell university Press, 1991) reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 269 God2 he places great weight on religious experience as 'evidence' for the truth of his core theism. but his use of religious experience is in fact not evidential in the strict sense. He contends that claims to experience God are to be considered as analogous to ordinary sense-perceptual claims and these claims are non-inferentially justified in the circumstances that give rise to them. Sense-perceptual beliefs for Swinburne are not justified through being the product of good inferences from further data. They are basic beliefs, innocent until proved guilty. And in this he is close to Plantinga, the first phase of whose reformed epistemology can be seen as based on an appeal to religious experience. Thus our contrast between an anti-evidentialist movement in reformed epistemology and an evidentialist rearguard action in Swinburne is too simple. The reformed epistemologists may see some role for the evidences for God collected in traditional natural theology. Swinburne is one of many contemporary philosophers of religion who appeal to religious experience but do so in a non-evidentialist way, on the basis of a direct realist theory of perception. He thus takes a stance toward religious experience that puts him in the company of Alston and the others. Where does reid come into the picture sketched thus far? There is a direct link to him. Alston, Plantinga and Wolterstorff3 all write about him and cite him as a source for their general epistemological strategies. There is also an indirect link. The views about the justification and character of sense-perceptual beliefs that have become an orthodoxy in so much contemporary religious epistemology are reidian. They are strikingly similar to the relevant parts of reid in An Inquiry Into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense and the Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man. but we shall see that the coincidence of these views on perception with reid's does not demonstrate a real indebtedness to reid. We shall also point out that reid's own views on the justification of religious belief are not at all similar to those of the reformed epistemologists. 2 richard Swinburne, The Existence of God (oxford: Clarendon Press, 2nd edn 2004) 3 Wolterstorff has a monograph on reid: Thomas Reid and the Story of Epistemology (Cambridge: Cambridge university Press, 2001) Peter bYrNe270 I. reFormeD ePIStemoloGY AND reID 'reformed epistemology' is a label given to a loosely-connected group of thinkers who have challenged a long-established orthodoxy in religious epistemology. The orthodoxy states that if religious beliefs are to be rational, they must be based on evidence. both Plantinga and Wolterstorff began to question this orthodoxy in articles and books in the 1970's (in fact in Wolterstorff 's case as early as 1967 in Reason within the Bounds of Religion4). Plantinga's way of formulating the critique became the most famous5. According to Plantinga, the orthodoxy rests upon the key premise that religious beliefs cannot be properly basic beliefs. A basic belief is construed by analogy with a basic action, where the latter is an action I perform without doing anything else in order to perform it. A basic belief is one I hold while not inferring it from any other beliefs. It is properly basic belief if I am justified, rational, warranted, etc., in so holding it. The orthodoxy about religious beliefs and evidence is held to flow from locke and to have been established in religious epistemology since. The only reason to hold to the orthodoxy Plantinga can think of is 'classical foundationalism'. This epistemological stance maintains that the only properly basic beliefs are those which are self-evident in themselves ('All bachelors are unmarried') or self-evident to me ('I seem to see a desk before me'). Such propositions are indubitable and incorrigible. All other propositions that I believe with justification are deductive or inductive inferences therefrom. Propositions like 'God spoke to me in prayer' and 'God exists' are not thus self-evident, indubitable and incorrigible, are not properly basic and therefore need to be supported by deductive or inductive inferences from those that are. Thus is launched a familiar task of seeking the 'evidences' for theistic and Christian beliefs in modern philosophy of religion. The door for philosophical scepticism regarding 4 Nicholas Wolterstorff, Reason within the Bounds of Religion (Grand rapids: eerdman, 1967) 5 Plantinga's early papers in religious epistemology include: 'Is belief in God rational?' in Rationality and Religious Belief, ed. C. Delaney (Notre Dame: Notre Dame university Press, 1979); 'Is belief in God Properly basic?', Nous, vol. 15/1, 1981; 'The reformed objection to Natural Theology' in Rationality in the Calvininan Tradition eds H. Hart, J. van der Hoeven, N. Wolterstorff (lanham: university Press of America, 1983); 'reason and belief in God', in Faith and Rationality eds A. Plantinga and N. Wolterstorff (Notre Dame: Notre Dame university Press, 1983). reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 271 those beliefs is thereby opened. This scepticism is equally characteristic of modern philosophy of religion – since it is easy to pick holes in the arguments of natural theology and press the weight of counter-evidence provided by such things as the problem of evil. Plantinga thinks that classical foundationalism is easily refuted. First it is self-referentially incoherent and second it faces innumerable counter examples in the shape of properly basic beliefs that do not fit its criteria. The first point above can be stated quite briefly: the proposition 'All properly basic beliefs are self-evident to in themselves or self-evident to me' is not self-evident in itself or self-evident to me [Alvin Plantinga!]. It therefore needs to rest on an inferential proof and Plantinga thinks no one has come up with a deductive or inductive argument that remotely comes near to being such a proof. The second point in the Plantingian critique consists in maintaining that all manner of kinds of belief are properly basic that do not conform to the criteria of self-evidence, indubitability and incorrigibility. Thus: 'I had an egg for breakfast this morning' and 'There is a greenfinch in my garden' can in appropriate circumstances be justifiably believed by the subject even though they are in no sense inferred from other beliefs. They can be, instead, the direct deliverances of memory and sight, respectively. both Plantinga and Wolterstorff cite reid as a source of the insight that classical foundationalism is false. The Inquiry and Essays are appealed to as an early, but neglected, proof of its limitations. Crucial for them is the way in which reid attacks the Way of Ideas and its associated notion that 'I see a greenfinch' must really be an inference from the immediate perception of an impression of a greenfinch. They also cite reid's plea for acceptance of irreducibly diverse ways in which beliefs may be justifiably sourced. His attack on the philosophical sceptic is held to be a paradigmatic demonstration of the falsity of classical foundationalism. Plantinga's early forays in reformed epistemology distinguished between reasons for beliefs and grounds. A non-basic belief (such as 'Australia is an island') is justified if it rests on other justified beliefs that are themselves justified. Properly basic beliefs end the chain of justification because they get their justification from the circumstances in which they arise or are maintained. 'I see a greenfinch' is not based on reasons, but, granted that I have normal eyesight, the light is good and I know the names of common british birds, may rest on perfectly adequate grounds. Peter bYrNe272 For Plantinga the belief that there is God for the ordinary believer can get its justification from being the straightforward entailment of beliefs such as 'God spoke to me in prayer last night', 'I felt God forgiving my sins'. Such beliefs may themselves be grounded in surrounding circumstances in a way analogous to a straightforward perceptual claim. This grounding is fleshed out via the postulation of a sensus divinitatis. This is a faculty for being directly aware of God's presence that, when excited by the requisite stimuli from God, produces appropriate beliefs in the subject. No wonder, then, that some commentators took Plantinga's case for religious beliefs being properly basic to be an appeal to religious experience as the ground of religious beliefs. If reid was one direct influence upon Plantinga and Wolterstorff, so was Calvin (in the Institutes of the Christian Religion) and a number of 19th and 20th century thinkers in the Dutch reformed Church. Plantinga traces the notion of the sensus divinitatus back to Calvin (though we should note that there is critical literature questioning his fidelity to Calvin on this point). The Dutch reformers influencing our two authors plead for the autonomy of distinctively Christian modes of knowing and reasoning6. reformed epistemology in the hands of Plantinga is a thing that is subject to much change and development. The above gives the essence of his views in his early articles on the subject. Almost from the beginning he was pressed with an obvious objection to his plea for tolerance of many kinds of properly basic belief. The objection was that this introduces epistemic anarchy: anyone can claim that their foundational beliefs are properly basic once the criteria of classical foundationalism are abandoned. This came to be known as 'the Great Pumpkin objection' (a label which will make sense to all those familiar with the Peanuts cartoon series). Various strategies for dealing with this objection emerged from the keyboard of Plantinga. one was to the effect that we might use an inductive procedure to determine canons of proper basicality. Instead of laying down criteria for proper basicality a priori, we might look at those forms of belief we pre-theoretically agree are properly basic and then work out what set of properties (presumably a disjunctive set) 6 See for example: Cornelius van til, Common Grace (Phillipsburg: Presbyterian and reformed, 1947) reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 273 they have in common. This suggestion rapidly proved worthless, since it struck the obstacle that there is no pre-theoretic agreement on what beliefs count as properly basic. The introduction of the sensus divinitatus can be seen as another attempt to defeat the Great Pumpkinites. Properly basic beliefs need grounding in appropriate justificatory circumstances. So a claim that a given class of beliefs is properly basic needs to come with an account of the relevant circumstances. The sensus divinitatis story does just that. but note that we will only accept the story if we accept the truth of certain Christian beliefs. Great Pumpkin rears its ugly head again at this point: we can easily imagine other belief systems, world-views, coming equipped with their own anthropologies. These will in turn enable such a worldview to tell a story about how its foundational beliefs are properly basic beliefs. rose Ann Christian's 1992 paper on Plantinga7 makes this point very clearly and shows that it is not just a notional one (being exemplified in certain Hindu and buddhist philosophical systems – see p. 568 of Christian). This is the charge then that Plantinga's appeal to a reidian pluralism over sources of properly basic belief faces: it gives rise to relativism and subjectivism in epistemology. much of the critical literature on Plantinga's early articles in reformed epistemology can be seen as, in effect, trying to circumvent his refutation of classical foundationalism. He affirms that only classical foundationalism will justify the insistence that rational religious beliefs must be based on evidence. His critics were charging that other reasons can be given for denying proper basicality to religious beliefs. Notably, what was being pressed was that religious belief is not the direct, unmediated outcome of 'the standard package' of cognitive faculties: memory, sense-perception, rational intuition and the like. What is distinctive about items in the standard package? – They are all faculties that we expect any compos mentis, adult human being to have. once we allow a sensus divinitatis to play the same role as memory, sense-perception and the like, what is indeed to stop us allowing a sensus pumpkinitatis to do a corresponding job for followers of Snoopy? Here is a question about the direction in which a reidian, moderate, pluralist 7 rose Ann Christian, 'Plantinga, epistemic Persmissivism and metaphysical Pluralism', Religious Studies vol. 28/4, 1992 Peter bYrNe274 foundationalism leads. Some would answer: to a defence of items in the standard package against the scepticism implicit in the Way of Ideas but not to Plantinga's religious epistemology. (We will see below that Alston addresses this same issue about the universality of approved beliefforming mechanisms.) Plantinga's work in religious epistemology soon moved in a direction that in essence meant he could leave behind many facets of the debate on proper basicality he found himself embroiled in. He moved to an externalist stance on epistemology and upon the epistemology of religious belief in Warrant: the Current Debate8, Warrant and Proper Function9 and Warranted Christian Belief10. A number of features of this later stance distinguish it from the earlier attack on classical foundationalism and the defence of the properly basic status of religious belief. They include: removal of notions of justification and rationality from centre stage. Their replacement by the notion of warrant, warrant being whatever must be added to a true belief that will make into knowledge. An externalist view of the property of warrant. Warrant is essentially that property of a belief which ensures that it has been produced by a truth-tracking mechanism in the environment in which the subject finds him/herself. The subject need not be aware of the nature of this mechanism or that his/her beliefs have warrant in order for them to have warrant. An account of warrant in terms of 'proper function': a belief has warrant if and only if it is the product of cognitive faculties that are functioning properly in an environment that enables them to deliver true beliefs (or: more true beliefs than false). In addition, the relevant faculties have to be the product of a design plan that means that they do produce true beliefs in the environment in question. The design plan has to be a good one, ensuring that there is a high statistical probability that true beliefs will be produced by these faculties in this environment. 8 Alvin Plantinga, Warrant: The Current Debate (NY: oxford university Press, 1993) 9 Alvin Plantinga, Warrant and Proper Function (NY: oxford university Press, 1993) 10 Alvin Plantinga, Warranted Christian Belief (NY: oxford university Press, 2000) reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 275 The account of warrant in terms of proper function seems to me to be at root a refinement on reliabilism: true beliefs are knowledge if they are produced by reliable cognitive faculties. The reasons why the warrant epistemology of late Plantinga leaves behind the earlier debates we have documented can now be spelled out. Notice that he now has an overwhelming reason to reject classical foundationalism. That view was part of an attempt to seek some internal (i.e. open to conscious reflection) property of beliefs that would enable us to tell when our beliefs are rationally held. externalism sweeps this attempt aside. Plantinga's warrant approach entails straight off that we cannot do epistemology independent of some anthropology or other. We need an account of what cognitive faculties there are, how they function and who or what designed them. This means, as he is fond of stressing, that we cannot tell whether Christian beliefs are warranted without telling whether they are true. If Christian beliefs are true, then they can be warranted for Plantinga. If Christianity is true it will provide an account of human nature and associated matters that will yield the result that we have cognitive faculties enabling us to reliably form beliefs about God. The sensus divinitatis is wheeled out again and supplemented by other 'Christian' cognitive faculties (in particular, our receptivity to the instigations of the Holy Spirit). These faculties, if real, would enable us to form Christian beliefs in response to appropriate stimuli. Faculties of inference then enable us to deduce further Christian truths from those produced by stimulation of the distinctively Christian epistemic suite that we possess. In a way, these parts of Plantinga's theory tell us that our epistemology simply cannot be neutral as between our religious beliefs, so that the aim of seeking agreed criteria of proper basicality is now seen as deluded. The warrant books have one further trick up their sleeve. In Warrant and Proper Function Plantinga has an extended argument that, in effect, can be seen as a final attempt to defeat the Great Pumpkinites. He contends across chapters 11 and 12 that only a theistic account of human nature can provide an account of proper function. only if our cognitive faculties are the product of a design plan, and one that is good, can they yield warranted beliefs. So there is no proper basicality (to use the old terminology), and thus no basis for inferred beliefs, unless some version of theism is true. Peter bYrNe276 Plantinga claims that reid is one of the sources of the warrant epistemology. There are references throughout Warrant: the Current Debate to reid. He is cited as one source of externalism in epistemology (p. v) and Plantinga refers to 'the debt my views owe to Thomas reid' (p. vii). Similar references can be found in Warrant and Proper Function. I take it that the source for this attribution of externalism to reid includes such passages as the famous one about the 'mint of Nature' in IHM VI, XX. reid is asked by the sceptic 'Why do you believe the existence of the external object which you perceive?' He replies The belief, sir, is none of my manufacture; it came from the mint of Nature; it bears her image and superscription; and, if it is not right, the fault is not mine: I even took it upon trust, and without suspicion. reid is taken by externalists such as Plantinga to be sharing in their basic assumption that a belief may be warranted even though the subject cannot articulate the ground on which it rests. It is warranted in virtue of being the product of cognitive faculties that are functioning well. The answer to the sceptic does not appeal to reasons or evidence in favour of our belief in the external object but to the fact that we are constructed in such a way that this belief arises in us. moreover, we must have confidence that the faculties that give rise to such a belief are well-designed and thus are to be trusted11. II. AlStoN William Alston is another writer on religious epistemology who claims descent from reid. In Perceiving God he offers an account of the epistemic force of religious experience. The account is structured around the notion of a doxastic practice. According to Alston's general epistemology, our beliefs across a broad range of subject matters are formed within doxastic practices. These are shared and socially established practices in which are enshrined distinctive ways human beings have of moving from various kinds of 'inputs' (stimuli) to beliefs. examples of such doxastic practices include: sense-perception, rational intuition, introspection and memory. 11 An interpretation of reid along these lines is defended in Falkenstein 'Nativism and the Nature of Thought in reid's Account of our Knowledge of the external World' in the Cambridge Companion to Thomas Reid, eds t. Cuneo and r. van Woudenburg, (Cambridge: Cambridge university Press, 2004), pp. 156-79. reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 277 These practices are irreducibly various and they have to be taken on trust for the most part. That is to say, it is difficult, if not impossible, to give them a cogent external justification. much of Perceiving God is devoted to showing that 'sense-perceptual practice' (the doxastic practice of forming beliefs about the material world on the basis of sensory experience) cannot be externally justified (see chapter 3 of Alston). Sense-perceptual practice cannot be shown to be reliable on external grounds. This doxastic practice exhibits what is styled 'significant self-support' (roughly: beliefs generated by sense perception strongly support each other). However, there is no way in which it can be proved to be reliable when faced with external rivals such as Cartesian scepticism or berkeleyan idealism. We take it to be reliable and we are entitled so to do – because it is a socially established practice and no one has come up with a refutation of its reliability. Well-established doxastic practices are innocent until proved guilty. Alston contends that the practice, within Christianity, of forming beliefs about God on the basis of apparent perceptions of him, is just such another socially established doxastic practice. It is like others insofar as its reliability cannot be proved on external grounds. It is like others insofar as that reliability has to be conceded unless there is proof positive that it is not reliable. There are clear links between Alston and Plantinga. Plantinga's early papers on proper basicality share Alston's emphasis on religious experience as an immediate ground for religious beliefs. Alston states that many of the beliefs generated by Christian mystical practice will be properly basic: the subject will be entitled to hold them in the absence of inference from other justified beliefs. Alston also rejects classical foundationalism as an exhaustive account of the criteria for properly basic beliefs. (Alston makes these links on pp. 173-75 of Perceiving God.) There is another clear connection between the two authors. Alston's doxastic practice approach to epistemology is, broadly, an externalist one. on p. 75 he rejects the key requirement of internalism on justified belief that "the justificational status of a belief is, at last typically, open to the reflective grasp of the subject". In particular, Alston denies the condition that a subject who has an adequate ground for his/her belief must be justified in supposing that the ground is adequate. This particular condition generates a vicious infinite regress. Alston does make some concessions to internalism, but it will be seen that epistemic subjects can Peter bYrNe278 have justified beliefs for him if those subjects form them within socially established, and presumed reliable, doxastic practices while simply taking those practices on trust in an unreflective way. So, he too has a general and a religious epistemology that is removed from evidentialism. As with Plantinga, so with Alston: reid is cited as a prime source for the doxastic practice approach to epistemology. Alston in fact links reid with Wittgenstein (the Wittgenstein of On Certainty). These are the two authors from whose writings he has derived the doxastic practice approach. Alston thinks he has support in reid for the notion that doxastic practices are irreducibly plural. Where reid speaks of a variety of evidences for beliefs, Alston speaks of a variety of doxastic practices (p. 164). reid is one with Alston in protesting against the likes of Plato and Descartes and their insistence that nothing counts as knowledge unless it meets the highest conceivable standards and in the counter-insistence that the sources of knowledge are irreducibly plural (pp. 234-35). Alston quotes the reid passage given above appealing to Nature, and another passage from IHM V, VII, in reply to the sceptic as indicating that reid thinks with Alston that our established doxastic practices have to be relied on because they are firmly established doxastic practices, so firmly established that 'we cannot help it'; and we have exactly the same basis for trusting senseperception, memory, nondeductive reasoning, and other sources of belief for which Descartes and Hume were demanding an external validation. (p. 151). What impresses Alston in reid, and what he wishes to endorse in his own epistemology, is what he sees as reid's insistence on: the giveness of our routine modes of forming beliefs on the basis of external and internal stimuli; the variety of these modes; the impossibility of trying to get behind these modes and provide them with an external justification; the manner in which the sceptic must rely on these modes even as s/he seeks to question them; and thus the futility of the traditional epistemological debates between sceptic and defender of common sense beliefs. Alston does note differences between his doxastic approach and reid's. For example, he remarks on the fact that reid does not stress the context of belief formation in our practices: 'reid's perspective is that of a purely cognitive, mentalistic psychology' (p. 165) – and thus contains reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 279 little emphasis on the social dimension of epistemology. Alston further remarks on the way in which reid only endorses ways of forming beliefs from stimuli that are universal to the human race, such as memory and sense-perception (p. 169). It is crucial to Alston's defence of Christian mystical practice as a prima facie reliable doxastic practice that we accept as reliable practices that, though well established, are only engaged in by a percentage of the population. His apologetic on behalf of Christian religious experience is peppered with references to other non-universal sensitivities to features of the world – such as the refined palate of the wine connoisseur or the refined ear of the musicologist. III. SWINburNe In Swinburne will be found a more old fashioned religious epistemology. As indicated at the start of this paper, Swinburne assembles a body of evidence for a core theism, and then proceeds to marshal further evidence for specifically Christian claims about God, God's providence and human destiny. He also gives an account of, and defends, the canons of right reason that must be used to show that this body of evidence shows Christian claims to be more probable than not. Great reliance is placed on bayes's theorem as giving an account of the correct way of assessing the interplay between evidence for an hypothesis, our background knowledge and the prior probability of that hypothesis. There is a rich interplay between inductive and a priori considerations in Swinburne's apologetic. In The Existence of God the traditional starting points of natural theological arguments (such as: that there is a universe, that it is ordered) are treated as so many pieces of inductive evidence for the claim that there is a God. but these are combined with wholly a priori epistemological principles, notably the principle that 'the simple is more likely to be true than the complex' (a synthetic a priori truth according to Swinburne12). In contrast to Plantinga in particular, Swinburne maintains that, though there are many notions of justification, the important form of justification we need for religious beliefs is of an internalist kind. 12 See his Simplicty as Evidence for Truth (milwaukee: marquette university Press, 1997) Peter bYrNe280 In his critical notice of Warranted Christian Belief in Religious Studies13 Swinburne does not so much deny the truth of Plantinga's account of warrant as declare that it dodges the key question that the religious sceptic asks and the religious believer must answer. This question is: 'Are religious beliefs justified given our evidence and in the light of reflection on that evidence and the inductive standards we use to appraise it?' only internalism asks the right questions and can thus provide the right answers. Swinburne writes: Despite what Planting seems to say, there is a clear and all-important question about whether a belief is rational (or justified) which has nothing to do with whether it is justified by the believer's own lights or with whether it is produced by 'properly functioning' processes. In a strong internalist sense, a belief of a person S is rational if it is rendered (evidentially) probable by S's evidence. evidently – scientists, historians, judges and juries ask this question about their hypotheses. (p. 207) Swinburne has many specific criticisms of Plantinga's warrant epistemology (see his Epistemic Justification14 for these), but his main criticism of its use in the religious sphere is that it simply ignores the main problem. I would put that problem this way: warrant epistemology (and its predecessor's appeal to proper basicality) opts for a defensive strategy rather than offensive one. The offensive strategy of showing the truth of theistic/Christian claims to those not antecedently convinced is required. only this will suit a world in which there is much religious diversity. Warrant epistemology only serves to show at best that the believer is entitled to his/her beliefs and that Christian belief is warranted if it is true. exactly the same point can be, and has been, made in critique of Alston15. Swinburne states the importance of internalist justification for belief quite clearly on p. 7 of Epistemic Justification: 'it is only in so far as the justification of a belief is internally accessible that it can guide a person in deciding what to do'. 13 'Plantinga on Warrant', Religious Studies, vol. 37/2, 2001, pp. 202-214. Plantinga responds in the same number, 'rationality and Public evidence: A reply to richard Swinburne', Religious Studies vol. 37/2, 2001, pp. 215-222. 14 richard Swinburne, Epistemic Justification (oxford: Clarendon Press, 2001) 15 See the brilliant paper by N. Kretzman: 'mystical Perception', in ed. A. Padgett, Reason and the Christian Religion (oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994) reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 281 For all Swinburne's defence of internalism as the only relevant stance in religious epistemology, there are strong affinities between Swinburne, on the one hand, and Alston and the early Plantinga, on the other. These lie, as indicated at the start of this paper, in the area of religious experience. A crucial portion of the evidence for God's existence in Swinburne's The Existence of God is provided by purported experiences of God. It is a striking feature of Swinburne's use of 'the argument from religious experience' that he does not present it is an inference to best explanation. The bulk of chapter 13 presents the argument as an analogical one. The use of sense experience to ground beliefs about the material world is non-inferential for Swinburne. He employs a direct realist theory of sense perception. Statements such as 'I see a tree' do not rest on tacit inferences from facts about sense data. Such a statement is innocent until proved guilty. It is to be treated as justified in the typical circumstances of appearing to see something – unless specific reasons can be found to doubt it. It is justified in a non-inferential way, but it is defeasible. Swinburne appeals to a 'principle of credulity': we are to trust the deliverances of our senses unless facts indicate otherwise. (Nb this is not reid's principle of credulity. That relates to our right to trust the testimony of others. Swinburne has a very reid-like view of the independent and original warrant to be found in reliance on human testimony, but his phraseology is different.) Swinburne then proceeds to argue that there is good reason to treat experiences of God as analogous to sense-perceptual experiences. They too are innocent until proved guilty. They too provide good noninferential grounds for believing in their apparent object, provided only that specific reasons for discounting them are not established. They too are governed by the principle of credulity. All the above is very similar to Alston on religious experience and early Plantinga on properly basic belief. The similarity is marked by Alston (p. 195 of Perceiving God). There is no appeal to doxastic practices by Swinburne in his support of the principle of credulity. rather, like his principle of simplicity, he contends that we have no alternative but to take our sense experiences on initial trust. If we did not do so, we would never get started in the construction of belief systems and would have to surrender ourselves to extreme scepticism. The principle of credulity is another a priori epistemic truth. Swinburne's use of religious experience in his apologetics is also bound up from the start with his cumulative, Peter bYrNe282 natural theological argument for God's existence. one reason for doubting an experiential report is a knowledge that it is highly improbable that the thing apparently experienced actually exists. Thus we need to establish that 'God exists' has some minimal probability (meaning: it is not too close to 0.0) in order for the principle of credulity to apply in this case. It is important that the appeal to religious experience in The Existence of God comes after such arguments as the cosmological and teleological arguments have added to the probability of 'God exists'. but notice here that there is no complete contrast with Alston. For he too has a role for natural theology in adding to the justification for religious belief provided by Christian mystical practice (see Perceiving God p. 295). Swinburne's use of religious experience within the context of a direct realist, non-inferential theory of perception is typical of many writers in contemporary religious epistemology. This approach to the argument from religious experience has wholly changed the character of debates about its cogency. The general approach to perception and perceptual belief at work here is, of course, very similar to that of reid's. The approach is fully in line with reid's attack on the Way of Ideas. We find, however, no references to reid in Swinburne. This is for the good reason that he is not indebted to him. The philosophy of perception and perceptual belief that Swinburne is working with is derived not from reid but from post-War philosophers such as David Armstrong and roderick Chisholm. Their ideas are in turn part of a discussion independent of reid that grows out of a reaction to the sense-datum and phenomenalist theories of logical positivists and of other 20th century epistemologists such as russell. I don't believe knowledge of reid is a significant factor in that reaction. (I would hazard that the work of Armstrong, Chisholm and others – consider here John Austin's Sense and Sensibilia – predates by a long way the 'rediscovery' of reid in recent english-speaking philosophy.) Swinburne's appeal to religious experience shows, then, that there is a strain of anti-evidentialism in his religious epistemology, one that softens the contrast between him and the reformed epistemologists. There is still a significant divide between the main actors in our story. That is the divide between internalism and externalism in general epistemology and in religious epistemology. reIDIANISm IN CoNtemPorArY relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY 283 IV. reID'S relIGIouS ePIStemoloGY We have seen that both Plantinga and Alston advance religious epistemologies that they claim have a provenance in reid. In their opinion, not only does reid provide objections to the Cartesian/lockean foundationalism that favours the demand that religious beliefs be based on evidence anyone could recognise, he also supports the externalist approaches to epistemology that allow Alston to claim there is a distinctive doxastic practice of religious forming beliefs and Plantinga to claim that there is a distinctive set of mechanisms that generate them. We have had occasion to note above Alston's lament that reid only allows universal practices/processes in non-inferential belief formation. We can take this point of difference further. reid is no reformed epistemologist. In the Inquiry and the Essays there is not so much as a mention of distinctive religious epistemic practices or mechanisms. Nor does reid appeal to religious experience, in the manner of either Alston or Swinburne. If Dale tuggy's account of reid's lectures on religion is correct16, reid answered the religious sceptic not by appealing to Nature and its dictates to us, but rather by good old-fashioned appeals to natural theology. He endorses the Samuel Clarke version of the cosmological proof and, in particular, the argument from design. tuggy (p. 295) quotes reid as stating there is as much reason to believe that there is a supreme being, as that there are minds besides our own. From the actions of a human being conducted with wisdom and design we conclude that this being has an intelligent mind, and that this is all the evidence we have of it ... even in the formation of a human body, there is much more design displayed than in any human action. In both cases we see not the cause, but trace it out by its effects. What the above remarks of reid show is not a parallel to the Plantinga of Warranted Christian Beliefs, but to Plantinga's first foray into religious epistemology: God and Other Minds17. 16 In 'reid's Philosophy of religion', The Cambridge Companion to Thomas Reid, t. Cuneo and r. van Woudenberg eds (Cambridge: Cambridge university Press, 2004) pp. 289-213. 17 Alvin Plantinga, God and Other Minds (Ithaca and london: Cornell university Press, 1969)

When Shapes and Sounds Become Words: Indexicals and the Metaphysics of Semantic Tokens 1. The Trouble with Indexicals Kaplan (1979) proposed that the meaning of indexicals like 'I', 'here' and 'now' is fixed by rules he called their 'character'. When coupled with a 'context', which is a set of indices picking out an agent, time and place, the character identifies a 'content' for an indexical, which is what the indexical refers to. The content of 'I' is the agent at the context, the content of 'here' is the place of the context, and the content of 'now' is the time of the context. Kaplan then proposes that admissible or 'proper' contexts are restricted to those in which the agent is at the time and place of the context. As a result, the following string will always be true: 1) I am here now Where indexicals are produced in token utterances, Kaplan's schema is generally taken to imply that 'I' will refer to the agent that produces the token, 'here' to the place of production, and 'now' to the time of production. This makes sense of many typical uses of indexicals. If Superman, standing on Krypton on the 1st of April 1938 says 'I'm here now', the token 'I' picks out Superman, 'here' picks out Krypton, and 'now' picks out the 1st of April 1938 – the producer, place of production, and time of 2 production. However, many other cases where indexicals are produced have been identified that do not follow this pattern. One can, for example, record the following message on an answering machine: 2) I am not here now When this message is played back to a caller, the token 'now' appears to refer not to the time the token is produced by the agent, but to the time when the message is played back (Sidelle 1991). Similarly, recall the tour--‐guide in Jurassic Park, who conducts his tour remotely. His voice is projected over a loudspeaker on the tour--‐ bus, while he remains safe in a central office. As the tour--‐bus is passing the Tyrannosaurus Rex enclosure, he can say: 3) Here you can see T--‐Rex But in this case the token 'here' refers not to the location of the tour--‐guide, but to the location of the bus where his voice is broadcast. Again, the location of production is not the location picked out by 'here'. As a result of cases like these, many have argued that a speaker's intentions must play a role in deciding the meaning a token indexical has. It has been argued that intentions fix, from one case to the next, either the character that governs a token indexical (Smith 1989); the context in which a token indexical is supposed to be evaluated (Predelli 1998, 2002, 2008, Akerman 2009); or the content of a 3 demonstrative component that may belong to indexicals, supposing 'I', 'here' and 'now' are equivalent to 'this person', 'this place' and 'this time' (Krasner 2006, Mount 2009, Recanati 2001, 20101). According to these views, the reference of a token indexical is determined by its producer's intentions, and not just who produces it or when. This allows that a token of 'now' can refer to the time of playback of an answering machine message, for example, just in case the person who records the token intends either the character, context of interpretation, or demonstrative content of the indexical to deliver the time of hearing as the reference of the token, and similarly for the Jurassic Park and other cases. The difficulty faced by the intentionalist strategy is that it makes it hard to explain how uses of indexicals are easily understood. We have no trouble understanding utterances of 1), 2) or 3). But if a producer's intentions can adjust the character, context or content of a token indexical so that it picks out whatever person, place or time they like, then it is unclear how hearers confidently know what uses of these indexicals refer to. If nothing stops a speaker from intending a token of 'now' she records into her answering machine to refer to a thousand years past, why is it that hearers always know that the token picks out the time of hearing? And if nothing stops the tour--‐guide in the case above from intending 'here' to refer to the moon, why does his audience immediately know which location he is referring to? This has become the standard objection to the intentionalist approach. To avoid this problem, others argue that the meaning of indexicals must be constrained by conventional rules to a greater degree than the intentionalist allows. 1 Recanati endorses this approach for 'here' and 'now' only. 4 Some of these proposals appeal to multiple rules, and hold that the rule that applies is determined not by a producer's intentions, but by non--‐intentional features of the context (Corazza et al 2002, Gorvette 2005, Parsons 2011, Michaelson 2013). On an answering--‐machine, the rule will fix the time of hearing as the time picked out by a token of 'now', but in face--‐to--‐face discourse, the rule fixes the time of speaking. But this view has implausible implications too. If indexicals were governed by many rules, they should be hard for users to learn, and to use, and yet they don't seem to be (Predelli 2002: 313, Corazza 2004: 306). The multiple--‐rule approach also suggests that indexicals are ambiguous, something that we have independent reasons to doubt (Cohen and Michaelson, 2013: 585). What would avoid all of these problems, of course, is an account that explains our various uses of indexicals by assigning just one rule to each indexical type, but without requiring speaker intentions to arbitrate on what counts as the context or content from one token to the next. Cohen (2013) has recently argued that we can accomplish exactly this. What is required is what Cohen calls a 'token--‐contextualist' interpretation of Kaplan's model, a proposal he attributes originally to Sidelle (1991). On this view, the content of 'I', 'here', or 'now' is not the agent, place or time in the context of production, but the agent, place, or time in the context of tokening2. Importantly, for typical uses of indexicals, where the producer, place and time of production is referred to with 'I', 'here' and 'now', this model will deliver the same 2 Cohen in fact thinks 'I' always refers to its producer, while 'now' and 'here' pick out the time and place of tokening. This can be interpreted to mean that the context for 'I' is the context of production but the context for 'here' and 'now' is the context of tokening, which some find inelegant (Michaelson 2011: fn15). However if we assume that the agent of a context of tokening just is the original producer of the token, then we can eliminate the inelegance so that all variables are fixed by facts about the context of tokening (Cohen 2013: 7). 5 results as the production--‐contextual model, since in such cases the context of tokening will be the same as the context of production. But the account promises to deal with the atypical cases considered too. The token 'now' in a message played back by an answering--‐machine refers to the time the message is played back, not produced – and the token--‐contextual account predicts this, since the time of playback is the time of tokening (the time the token occurs). And the token 'here' in the tour--‐guide's message in Jurassic Park refers not to the location of production of the message but to the location of tokening (the place the token occurs), which is on the tour--‐bus. Since it avoids the difficulties faced by more elaborate approaches, this account is well worth pursuing. However, there is a set of problem cases for the account that are largely unexplored, and which threaten to entirely upend the view. 2. Travelling tokens, Stray tokens, Extra tokens Difficulties arise for the token--‐contextual view when tokens occur in places or at times that they don't seem to refer to. Cases already discussed include the following. Suppose I inscribe a note on a post--‐card – 'I wish you were here' – and send it from Tahiti to Ireland. We use the token 'here' in such cases to refer to Tahiti. And yet the token ends up, and is read, in Ireland. The token--‐contextual view seems to imply, as a result, that 'here' refers to Ireland (Michaelson 2013: 17). Cohen (2013: 24) argues that such cases may be understood anaphorically, where the reference of 'here' is anaphorically fixed by a location specified elsewhere on the post--‐card (such as the 6 post--‐mark). It is acknowledged that the details underpinning this kind of anaphora are not clearly understood, but for the sake of argument let's suppose that's a possible solution. Even if we allow it, however, there are more serious problems. Consider a case discussed by Predelli (1998). A note is written in the morning by Jones for his wife, who he expects to return to the house at 4pm. Jones writes 'As you can see, I'm not here now' on the note. However, his wife returns at 10pm, and reads the note then. The token--‐contextual account seems to imply that the indexical picks out 10pm, when it is read – and yet Predelli's reasonable intuition is that Jones' wife misunderstands the note if she takes it to refer to 10pm. Cohen replies to this case by simply rejecting Predelli's intuition, and insisting that the token does indeed refer to 10pm. I don't find this convincing, particularly in light of the following analogous case. Suppose a restaurant manager places a sign inside the door of her restaurant reading 'Please wait here to be seated'. The sign seems to refer to its location – just as the token--‐contextual account predicts. But consider what happens if the sign is thoughtlessly moved by a cleaner from its current position to a broom closet at the rear of the building. A customer looking for the restroom now sees the sign through the open closet door. Just as in Predelli's case, where the note is read at a time other than that intended, in this case the sign is read in a place other than that intended. Since Cohen is committed that Predelli's note refers to the time it is read, he should be committed in this case that customers have been asked to wait in the broom closet. That this is doubtful is even clearer when we think about where the sign in the restaurant came from in the first place. Presumably, somewhere in the world there is a factory that makes these signs. In 7 the corner of the factory, a stack of 'Please wait here' signs sits ready to be dispatched to restaurants. Do the signs in the stack form a chorus inviting people to wait next to them? Cohen's position seems to commit him to the implausible claim that they do. We could call such cases 'stray tokens', which either end up or start out where nobody intended them to be. And the difficulties don't end there. Perhaps the most pervasive problem for a token--‐contextual account is what we could call 'extra tokens'. When my message 'I'm not here now' is played back to someone whose call I miss, the token 'now' refers to the time of tokening. But there is another apparent token in this case that the token--‐contextualist does not explain. When I originally record the message into my answering--‐machine, I produce an apparent token of the sentence 'I'm not here now'. The token--‐contextual account seems to imply that in this event, I refer to the time at which I speak. The account threatens, as a result, to make all answer--‐phone users liars. The same problem arises for the tour--‐guide: although the sentence 'here you will see T--‐Rex' is tokened on the tour--‐bus, another apparent token of the sentence occurs in the office where the tour--‐guide speaks. Does he lie and tell the truth at the same time? Or consider an ordinary telephone conversation. If I phone you in Alaska and say 'I'm here now' while speaking in Paris, one apparent token of 'here' occurs where I am, and another is produced in Alaska, for you to hear. Do I refer to both locations simultaneously, and contradict myself? Finally, in a particularly perplexing case, consider a billboard at the side of a motorway that reads 'You are now entering beautiful Poughkeepsie' (cf. Egan 2009). 8 If we suppose a temporal indexical tokens at a time, and that the inscription on the billboard tokens when it is read by passing drivers, then the token--‐contextual account predicts, rightly, that the inscription refers to those occasions on which it is passed. But what about the occasions when the sign is not being passed? The token--‐ contextual account does nothing to rule out those occasions, and so implies that what the sign displays the majority of the time is at best nonsense, and at worst a lie. This seems like another bizarre outcome for the token--‐contextual view. Can the token--‐contextualist deal with these cases? As I argue next, she can, by appealing to speaker intentions. However, by making the appeal to speaker--‐ intentions at the level of the metaphysics of tokens rather than in order to decide their meaning, this can be done without reintroducing the difficulties associated with intentionalist approaches that the conventionalist hopes to avoid. 3. A Minimally Intentionalist Metaphysics for Semantic Tokens Nobody should believe that intentions have no role at all to play in a semantic theory. Intentions, after all, are required to turn a shape or sound into a semantic token in the first place. Suppose a rock trapped in a glacier slowly carves the shape 'I'm not here now' into a wall of granite it passes over (Millikan 2012: 221). Does anyone think that the rock tells a lie? Hopefully not: the rock is obviously incapable of saying anything. Although an inscription of the shape 'I'm not here now' can under some circumstances mean I'm not here now, what is at least required for this to happen is that some agent intends it to express this meaning. This is simply to 9 restate the point made by Grice (1957) that isolates the class of linguistically meaningful events from everything else (including scratches made by glaciers, shapes in the clouds, and noises made by cats that sound like 'hello'). Although Grice's full conditions for a shape or sound to count as an utterance are often considered too strong, this minimal component of his view is widely endorsed (Searle 1969, Kaplan 1990, Richard 1990, Davis 2003, Recanati 2010, Millikan 2012). We could call this view 'minimal intentionalism', which holds that some morphological token φ (a token shape or sound) is a semantic token (an utterance) with the meaning p only if it is intended by its user3 S to express p: MI: φ is a semantic token meaning p → S intends that φ expresses p To distinguish utterances of 'hello' from the cat's miao, it would seem that any theory of meaning needs to endorse something like MI. Crucially, however, the appeal to intentions in MI is very different to that made on the more liberal intentionalist accounts considered above, on which a speaker's intentions can arbitrate between multiple possible referents a token indexical can have. This is the result the conventionalist wants to block, and replace with a semantic rule that determines just one possible referent for any token indexical, thus minimizing the interpretation work demanded of hearers. But the conventionalist can do this while still endorsing MI. Even if the only reference a token of 'here' can have is its location 3 I say 'user' rather than the more common 'producer' here because, as we shall see, the user of a morphological token needn't always be its producer. 10 of tokening, for example, it can still be the case that for a morphological token to be a token indexical in the first place, it must be intended to be by its user. In spite of its modesty, however, MI has quite far--‐reaching consequences for the metaphysics of token utterances, which can be invoked to resolve the problems raised here for token--‐contextualism. First consider the 'extra--‐tokens' problem. In the production of an answering machine message, in addition to the sounds produced by the answering machine when someone calls, the recorder produces the sound 'I'm not here now' in recording the message – and this creates an apparent problem for the token--‐contextualist. But MI eliminates the problem. If the producer doesn't intend the noise that comes out of her mouth at the time of recording the message to express the proposition I'm not here now, but intends only the sound subsequently produced by the answering machine to express that proposition, the sound initially produced is not a semantic token at all – it's just a noise. Note again that speaker intentions are not arbitrating here between many possible meanings for a given semantic token, as they are on more liberal intentionalist accounts. Instead, they are invoked to decide, for a given morphological token, whether it counts as a semantic token in the first place. MI similarly resolves the tour--‐guide problem. The tour--‐guide causes two morphological tokens to be produced – one in the tour--‐bus, and one in his office, which raises a problem for the token--‐contextualist. But if the guide does not intend the sound he makes in his office to express any meaning, but rather intends only the sound on the bus to, then we can again rule out the former as a non--‐utterance. And this resolves the puzzle raised by the telephone call too. The sound 'here' I produce 11 in Paris is intended to have semantic content by its user, me, and according to the token--‐contextual account, it picks out Paris. But if the sound produced by the telephone in Alaska is not intended by me to express anything, then according to MI it simply doesn't count as a semantic token.4 The first advantage of MI, then, is that it resolves the extra--‐tokens problem. The consequences of MI reach farther still, however. Note that morphological tokens exist at particular places and times. If user--‐intentions are required for morphological tokens to count as semantic tokens, these intentions must be directed at shapes and sounds in particular places, and at particular times. The consequence of this is that morphological tokens can change from being mere shapes and sounds to being semantic tokens, and back again. To see how this works, suppose I inscribe 'this is a wall' on a post--‐it note, and then affix the note to the wall. Once the note is affixed to the wall, it seems I have said something true. But before I stick the note to the wall, we are not tempted to think that I have lied – even if the note starts out on the table. Why not? The reason is that the inscription only becomes a semantic token when I stick it to the wall, since it is only while it is on the wall that I intend it to express anything. Equally, I am not made a liar if the note later falls off the wall and lands on the floor – because my intention is only for this inscription to express something when it is fixed to the wall. Outside of the time and place at which it is intended by me to express something, it loses its semantic token--‐ hood. 4 This might sound surprising, since by listening to the sound produced in Alaska, you can know what I have said. However, note that if the sound in Alaska is morphologically type--‐identical to the sound in Paris (they sound the same), it can allow you to know what I have said by allowing you to know what the token I have produced in Paris sounds like. It needn't itself, as a result, be a semantic token. 12 This consequence of MI resolves the stray--‐tokens problem. In Predelli's case, Jones writes the note in the morning, expecting it to be read at 4pm, but it isn't read until 10pm. Cohen bites the bullet and concludes that the indexical in the note picks out 10pm. But it follows from MI that this is not necessary. If Jones only intends the inscription on the paper to count as an utterance at 4pm, then MI entails that it only counts as an utterance at that time. On this view, the indexical 'tokens' at 4pm --‐ when it is intended to. But it does not token at the time Jones writes the note (which would make him a liar as he writes); and if Jones intends it only to token at 4pm it will cease to be a semantic token after 4pm, when the inscription will return to being simply a shape. We can therefore maintain the token--‐contextual view without abandoning Predelli's reasonable intuitions about this case: the token indexical picks out 4pm, which is the only time at which it is a token indexical. All this follows from MI. That shapes and sounds can transition in and out of being utterances is made even clearer when we revisit the case of the 'Please wait here' sign. The stack of signs in the factory easily fails MI, since here the signs are not intended by anyone to express anything. Their producers, the factory workers, are making the signs not with the intention that the signs express something, but that they display particular shapes. But now consider what happens when the signs are bought by restaurateurs and positioned intentionally inside the doors of their establishments. What was just a shape on a piece of metal becomes a semantic token, because now the shape is used with the intention that it express a particular meaning.5 And this resolves the 5 As a result, in this case, the producer of the sign is not its user – see fn. 2. 13 puzzle that arises when the sign is moved to the closet by the cleaner. In this case, customers are not in fact invited to wait in this absurd location. Rather, since the manager who originally places the sign intends it to express 'Please wait here' only when it is at the location at which she places it, it ceases to be a semantic token when it is removed from that position and unthinkingly placed somewhere else. And of course it can become a semantic token again, if it is repositioned anew with the intention that it express this proposition once again. The most delicate consequence of MI is found in the case of the billboard reading 'You are Now Entering Beautiful Poughkeepsie'. If the token--‐contextual account is right, the token 'now' on the sign refers to the time or times at which it tokens. We want those occasions to be those on which drivers pass the sign – and not the indefinitely many occasions on which no one is passing. But again, MI can rule out those occasions. Since the person who erects the sign only intends it to express the proposition in question when it is seen by a passing driver, this means that what hangs indefinitely on the side of the motorway is not a semantic token at all. Rather, what hangs there indefinitely is simply a shape, which becomes a semantic token only on those occasions that it is passed by a driver. To all of this, it might be objected that although I have insisted that this appeal to intentions does not introduce the problems for interpretation of earlier accounts, it introduces difficulties of interpretation of its own. For example, a hearer will have to decide which morphological tokens are utterances, and which are simply sounds and shapes – the noise made in recording an answer--‐phone message, or the noise made at playback. That is true, although the decision will often be 14 relatively easy. In the answer--‐phone case, if we assume the message--‐leaver is honest and sane, only the sound at playback could be intended to express the proposition 'I'm not here now', and hence only that sound could count as a semantic token. But no matter how hard it is to decide which are the semantic tokens, the current account will still leave interpreters with less work to do than more liberal intentionalist accounts. On this account, once it is decided which are the token indexicals, there is only one possible referent for each, while on the more liberal intentionalist accounts there still remain many. As we can see, the metaphysics of semantic tokens is thus quite complex, allowing shapes and sounds to transition in and out of being semantic tokens, even assuming no more than the modest criterion for semantic token--‐hood in MI. For all its complexity, however, I wager that it is quite consistent, and that qualifying the token--‐contextual account with these considerations greatly reinforces this promising approach. 6 References: Akerman, J. (2009). A Plea for Pragmatics. Synthese, 170: 155--‐167. Borg, E. (2004). Minimal Semantics. Oxford University Press. Cohen, J. (2013). Indexicality and the Puzzle of the Answering Machine. The Journal of Philosophy, 110 (1): 5--‐32. 6 Thanks to Jonas Ackerman and Francois Recanati. Research for this paper was supported by the Fondation Maison des Sciences de l'Homme, The European Commission's Action Marie Curie COFUND Programme, Institut Jean Nicod Paris, and EU grants no. ANR--‐10--‐LABX--‐0087 IEC and ANR--‐ 10--‐IDEX--‐0001--‐02 PSL. 15 Cohen, J. and Eliot Michaelson. (2013). Indexicality and the Answering Machine Paradox. Philosophy Compass 8(6): 580--‐592. Corazza, E., Fish, W., and Gorvett, J., (2001). Who is 'I'? Philosophical Studies, 107: 1--‐ 21. Corazza, E. (2004). On the Alleged Ambiguity of 'now' and 'here'. Synthese. 138: 289--‐ 313. Davis, M. (2003). Meaning, Expression, and Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dodd, D. and Sweeney, P. (2010). Indexicals and Utterance Production. Philosophical Studies, 150:331–348. Egan, A. (2009). Billboards, Bombs and Shotgun Weddings. Synthese 166 (2): 251--‐ 279. Gauker, C. (2008). Zero Tolerance for Pragmatics. Synthese, 165: 359--‐371. Gorvett, J. (2005). Back Through the Looking Glass: On the Relationship between Intentions and Indexicals. Philosophical Studies, 124: 295--‐312. Grice, P. (1957). Meaning. The Philosophical Review, 66: 377--‐88. Kaplan, D. (1977/1989). Demonstratives. In Almog, Perry and Wettstein, Themes from Kaplan (Oxford: Oxford University Press): 481--‐564. Kaplan, D. (1990). Words. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supp Vol LXIV: 93--‐ 121. Krasner, D. A. (2006). Smith on indexicals. Synthese, 153, 49–67. Michaelson, E. (2011). Shifty Characters. Ms., UCLA. Millikan, R. (2012). Are there Mental Indexicals and Demonstratives? Philosophical Perspectives, 26: 217--‐234. 16 Mount, A. (2009). The Impurity of Pure Indexicals. Philosophical Studies 138: 193--‐ 209. Parsons, J. (2011). Assessment--‐Contextual Indexicals. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 89: 1, 1--‐17. Perry, J. (2003). Predelli's Threatening Note. Journal of Pragmatics 35: 373--‐87. Predelli, S. (1998). I am not here now. Analysis 58: 107–15. Predelli, S. (2002). Intentions, Indexicals and Communication. Analysis, 62: 310--‐316. Recanati, F. (2001). Are 'Here' and 'Now' Indexicals? Texte: 127/8. Recanati, F. (2010). Truth Conditional Pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Searle, J. (1969). Speech Acts. Oxford: Blackwell. Smith, Q. (1989). The Multiple Uses of Indexicals. Synthese 78: 167--‐191. Sidelle, A. (1991). The Answering Machine Paradox. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 81:4: 525--‐539.

LIV U tom jordiskt Syntetisk A rtificiellt Jessica A bbott & Erik Persson (red.) LIV Utomjordiskt Syntet iskt Art i f ic ie l l t Jessica Abbott & Erik Persson (red.) Pufendorfinstitutet/Pufendorf Institute for Advanced Studies Liv är ett centralt begrepp inom många forskningsområden, exempelvis inom biologi, astrobiologi, kemi och medicin, såväl som inom juridik, teologi och filosofi. Liv är också ett centralt tema i konsten. Det behandlas och begrundas i åtskilliga konstverk, i dikt, roman och film. Hur vi skall förstå, värdera och skydda livet, är oerhört fundamentala frågor. I framtiden kommer dessa frågor att bli än svårare och om möjligt ännu viktigare. Forskargrupper från hela världen arbetar idag med att skapa liv i laboratoriet, leta efter liv i rymden och förse maskiner med egenskaper som tidigare bara har varit förunnade levande varelser, och utvecklingen går fort. Det är viktigt att vi samtidigt funderar över de utmaningar som detta innebär. Det kommer att ta tid att hitta sätt att leva i en värld där liv finns i former vi idag knappt kan föreställa oss och där gränsen mellan levande varelser och maskiner blir alltmer suddig. De beslut vi fattar idag kommer också att påverka utvecklingen inom samhälle, forskning och utveckling under lång tid framöver. Den här boken är ett resultat av ett tvärvetenskapligt projekt vid Pufendorfinstitutet, Lunds universitet. Tolv forskare från lika många discipliner har ingått i projektet. Syftet har varit att belysa utmaningar som följer med utomjordiskt, artificiellt och syntetiskt liv. Det tvärvetenskapliga angreppssättet har gett oss möjlighet att belysa frågorna från alla upptänkliga vinklar, men också att hitta helt nya kombinationer av metoder och synsätt. Med tanke på livets mångsidighet och stora betydelse ur så många olika perspektiv, har detta grepp varit helt nödvändigt. Vår förhoppning är att boken skall inspirera till nya tankar och diskussioner om liv. Boken vänder sig både till som redan är intresserade och de som ännu inte har börjat fundera kring de utmaningar som utomjordiskt, artificiellt och syntetiskt liv innebär. LIV Utomjordiskt, Artificiellt och Syntetiskt Jessica Abbott & Erik Persson (red.) Pufendorfinstitutet, Lund 2017 © Pufendorfinstitutet, Lund 2017 Skriftseriens redaktör: Eva Persson Formgivning: Jessica Abbott Omslag: Jessica Abbott, Bengt Pettersson & Eva Persson Tryck: MediaTryck, Lund 2017 ISBN 978-91-984394-0-3 3 Innehåll Förord (Erik Persson & Jessica Abbott) 7 DEL 1: LIV I OLIKA FORMER 11 Fascinationen för liv (Mats Johansson) 13 Vad är liv? Jakten på en ny definition av liv (Jessica Abbott & Erik Persson) Olika slags definitioner Andra definitioner inom biologin Vad kännetecknar liv? Problem och lösningar Jobba hårdare Avvakta Acceptera att det inte finns en definition Familjelikhet 21 22 23 24 25 27 28 30 Molekylära uppvaknanden (Petter Persson) Livets molekylära komplexitet Molekylär evolution Nya horisonter från syntetisk biologi till biomimetik Molekylär astrobiologi Sammanfattande reflektioner och utblick 35 38 47 54 56 61 DEL 2: UTOMJORDISKT LIV 63 Liv långt ute i rymden? (Dainis Dravins) Redan i avlägsen forntid: Australiens aboriginer Nyare tid: Naturvetenskapens intåg 1800-talets populärvetenskap och Camille Flammarion Sent 1800-tal: Giovanni Schiaparelli Tidigt 1900-tal: Kanaler på Mars! 1900-talets mitt: Livsbetingelser på Mars? Orson Welles och "Världarnas Krig" Årstidsväxlingar och tänkbar växtlighet på Mars Harry Martinson: Aniara 1900-talets slut: Första rymdsonderna till Mars och Venus 65 65 66 66 68 70 71 72 72 73 74 4 Livsbetingelser i solsystemets utkanter? Planeter kring andra stjärnor Biologiska markörer hos exoplaneter? Letandet efter utomjordiska civilisationer Men vet vi vad vi letar efter? Färdas till andra stjärnor? Om vi hade en annan sol? Astrobiologins mål? 78 81 82 84 86 87 88 89 Livstecken: Sökandet efter liv i främmande världar (David Dunér) Det mångtydiga livet Jordtvillingar Främmande berg och dalar Nyfikenhet och dåliga ögon Venus atmosfär Kanalerna på Mars Livstecknet och det levande Bilder av liv Livets pekfinger Det levandes symboler Om vi en dag upptäcker liv 91 92 94 96 100 102 106 110 111 115 121 124 Att presentera människan för utomjordingar (Klára Anna Čápová) Den interstellära grottmålningen Voyagers flaskpost The Golden Record Skapande av liv: Voyagers berättelse Berättelsen fortsätter: Samhälle, natur och teknologi Interstellära schlagers: Ljud på jorden Livets skapelse: Adam och Eva i rymdåldern Den ideala mottagaren Talar man verkligen för alla? 129 131 132 134 136 138 140 141 143 144 DEL 3: ARTIFICIELL INTELLIGENS 149 Nästan levande: robotar och androider (Christian Balkenius) Turingtestet Eliza och Parry Geminoider Kroppens betydelse Humanoider Kusliga dalen-fenomenet (不気味の谷現象) 151 151 153 155 155 157 158 5 Att imitera liv 159 Artificiell intelligens som livsform: Om autonoma vapensystems rättsliga ställning (Markus Gunneflo) Varför autonoma vapensystem inte är vapen Varför autonoma vapensystem inte är kombattanter Nytt "liv" – Ny lag 161 162 163 165 Artificiell intelligens: Vems ansvar? (Maria Hedlund) Expertis och demokrati Ansvar Politiska initiativ om robotik och artificiell intelligens AI och ansvar AI och etik AI och demokrati "AI tar över" eller "här och nu" Slutdiskussion 169 172 173 174 176 179 180 182 183 DEL 4: SYNTETISK BIOLOGI 187 Är syntetisk biologi moraliskt otillåtet? (Anders Melin) Den syntetiska biologins etiska utmaningar Vi skadar människor eller andra kännande varelser Människan överskrider en otillåten gräns Framställandet av syntetiska mikroorganismer skadar dessa organismer Slutsatser 189 191 192 193 196 200 Synen på människan som skapare av (o)mänskligt liv: Exemplet Mary Shellys Frankenstein, eller den moderne Prometeus (Anna Cabak Rédei) Frankenstein, och hans Varelse Nya vetenskapsideal växer fram under Upplysningen Frankenstein och den moderna vetenskapen Mary Shelleys Frankenstein och filmen Frankenstein som metafor? 203 205 206 207 210 214 Skapat liv och livets värde (Erik Persson) Livets originalitet Livets uppkomst Livets mystik Livets naturlighet Livets autonomi 219 219 226 229 232 234 6 Slutord 236 Bildkällor Medverkande författare 239 241 7 Förord en här boken handlar om liv, inte minst liv som vi ännu inte känner till, i vissa fall för att det finns väldigt långt bort – utomjordiskt liv – och i vissa fall för att det ännu inte finns – konstgjort liv. Man kan förstås fråga sig hur vi kan skriva en bok om liv som vi inte känner till. Saken är emellertid den att trots att vi inte känner till detta liv och därför inte kan uttala oss om det i detalj, så kan vi vara tämligen säkra på att när det väl dyker upp så kommer det att få ett enormt inflytande på våra eller våra efterkommandes liv. Livet som vi ännu inte känner väcker alltså en mängd frågor som det är hög tid att börja fundera över, inte minst eftersom själva funderandet kring dessa frågor idag kommer att ha betydelse för hur vi väljer att förhålla oss till själva sökandet och skapandet. Hur och var vi väljer att söka efter liv på andra världar beror till exempel till stor del på vad vi menar med liv och hur vi väljer att reglera forskningen och utvecklingen av syntetisk biologi och artificiell intelligens beror till stor del på hur vi ser på risker och fördelar med dessa tekniker. Denna bok är ett resultat av ett projekt i vilket författarna till boken har undersökt och diskuterat dessa frågor. Projektet gick under namnet A Plurality of Lives ("En mångfald av liv") och finansierades av Pufendorfinstitutet vid Lunds universitet, som också var värdar för projektet. Deltagarna i projektet kom från 12 olika ämnen. Ämnesbredden möjliggjorde dels att vi kunde identifiera en bred uppsättning olika frågor och dels att vi kunde genomlysa frågorna från många olika perspektiv. Detta märks också i boken där varje kapitel illustrerar någon liten del av projektet. Kapitlen utgör alltså nerslag i projektets forskning men kan också med fördel läsas fristående för den som bara är intresserad av någon särskild fråga. Det första kapitlet presenterar ett smörgåsbord av filosofiska frågor. Några av dessa kommer att gås igenom mer detaljerat i de följande kapitlen medan andra lämnas åt läsaren och framtida forskning att fundera kring. Det följande kapitlet handlar om den grundläggande frågan vad liv egentligen är. Idag finns det ingen allmänt accepterad definition av liv, vilket på sätt och vis inte är så konstigt med tanke på hur mångfacetterat livet är. Författarna vill försöka råda bot på avsaknaden av definition genom att kombinera ett filosofiskt begrepp från mitten av förra århundradet med det senaste i form av matematisk modellering. Efter det följer ett kapitel som presenterar livets kemi. Vi vet inte om allt liv måste vara baserat på kemi. Kanske kommer framtida liv att ta formen av mekaniska/elektriska system. Vad vi vet är emellertid att allt liv som vi känner det på jorden idag är baserat D 8 på kemi. På senare tid har vår förståelse av livets kemi tagit flera stora steg framåt. Det finns emellertid en hel del frågor som fortfarande är obesvarade. Därefter följer tre kapitel om utomjordiskt liv. Det första av dessa kapitel handlar om sökandet efter utomjordiskt liv och ger en både historisk och vetenskaplig bakgrund till sökandet. Det därpå följande kapitlet handlar om det som kallas biosignaturer, det vill säga frågan om vad som egentligen räknas som bevis, eller åtminstone en indikation på att man har funnit liv. I det tredje kapitlet om utomjordiskt liv presenteras olika försök att skicka meddelanden som kanske i en avlägsen framtid kommer att läsas av livsformer långt från jorden, långt efter att den civilisation som sände iväg meddelandena själv har försvunnit. Efter denna utflykt i universum följer tre kapitel som handlar om Artificiell Intelligens (AI), det vill säga om försöken att skapa intelligenta maskiner. Det första av dessa kapitel diskuterar försöken att skapa robotar som på olika sätt liknar oss, antingen till utseendet eller till sättet att tänka, eller bådadera. Det andra kapitlet på detta tema tar upp frågan om så kallade autonoma vapensystem, det vill säga vapen som kan fatta egna beslut. Vad säger internationell lagstiftning om sådana vapen? Är de överhuvudtaget vapen eller är de i själva verket stridande med rättigheter och skyldigheter? Det tredje kapitlet handlar om hur frågor om artificiell intelligens hanteras och diskuteras politiskt i Sverige, EU och USA. Särskilt diskuteras frågan om hur man kan fatta demokratiska beslut i ett så pass tekniskt komplicerat ämne utan att all makt egentligen hamnar hos några få experter, och frågan om vem som skall ta ansvar för beslut som fattas av intelligenta maskiner. Den sista delen av boken handlar om försöken att skapa liv i laboratoriet – så kallat syntetiskt liv. I det första kapitlet i den delen ställs frågan om det är omoraliskt att skapa liv och vem det i så fall är vi felar mot? Är det de skapade livsformerna, redan existerande livsformer (vi och andra kännande varelser) eller är det rent av Gud? Det här med att skapa liv i laboratoriet är för övrigt något som också har problematiserats inom litteratur och film. Det mest kända exemplet torde vara Frankenstein och hans "monster". Den historien och dess inflytande på debatten diskuteras i det andra kapitlet om skapat liv. Det sista kapitlet handlar om livets värde och hur det kommer att påverkas om vi tillägnar oss förmågan att skapa liv. Kommer det skapade livet att betraktas som mindre värdefullt än "originalet" för att det är skapat, eller kommer själva förmågan att skapa liv att leda till att allt liv sjunker i värde? Detta är naturligtvis en fråga som bör diskuteras innan vi kommer så långt att vi faktiskt börjar skapa liv. Naturligtvis finns det också en massa andra frågor som kan och bör diskuteras. De frågor som tas upp här får ses som en introduktion och kanske i vissa fall som en provokation med syfte att få till en levande debatt om hur vi bör förhålla oss till livet som vi ännu inte känner det men som en dag kommer att få ett stort inflytande på alltifrån hur vi definierar liv till hur våra egna eller våra efterkommandes liv kommer att gestalta sig. 9 Den som är intresserad av att veta mer kan läsa om projektet på Pufendorfinstitutets hemsida: (http://www.pi.lu.se/sites/pi.lu.se/files/tv_a_plurality_of_lives_info_0.pdf) eller anmäla sig till projektets facebookgrupp här: https://www.facebook.com/ groups/364382563686049/ Lund 6 oktober 2017 Erik Persson och Jessica Abbott 10 11 DEL 1: Liv i olika former 12 13 Fascinationen för liv Mats Johansson Detta kapitel tar sin utgångspunkt i den mänskliga fascinationen för liv. Utifrån fyra teman – utomjordiskt liv, skapat liv, levande maskiner och livets värde – görs ett antal filosofiska nedslag. I fokus är det intresse, de farhågor samt de förhoppningar som nytt och främmande liv väcker. Någon uttömmande eller strukturerad analys är det inte frågan om. Inte heller mynnar reflektionen ut i handfasta slutsatser. I den mån det alls går att tala om ett resultat består detta i en ökad genomlysning av vårt förhållningssätt till liv, samt av vad vår fascination för liv säger om oss själva. dag riktar astronomer sin uppmärksamhet mot avlägsna solsystem. Med hjälp av kraftfulla instrument söker man beboliga världar och snart även tecken på liv. I den mån man finner sådana tecken, kommer det att röra sig om indikationer eller indirekt evidens. Hade det varit möjligt skulle upptäckten av en enda utomjordisk skalbagge räcka för att skapa sensation. En fantastisk och epokgörande upptäckt, skulle man säga. Förstasidesstoff! Skulle man därmed sätta punkt för sökandet, stänga anläggningen och gå hem? Knappast. Snart skulle man leta efter fler och mer avancerade livsformer, på samma position och på andra platser. Nya frågor skulle omedelbart ställas. Att sluta leta ligger inte för oss. Är det bättre att finna tecken på utomjordiskt liv än att inte göra det? Vetenskapen som sådan ger inga svar. Den förser oss med teorier, metoder och fakta, inte med mål och önskningar. Majoriteten föredrar dock nog ett sådant fynd framför frånvaron av detsamma. Men varför? Upptäckarna själva skulle skriva in sig i historieböckerna och för oss andra skulle världen bli än mer intressant. Upptäckten av främmande liv skulle troligen även slå an en närmast existentiell sträng. Gäller detsamma frånvaron av liv? Frånvaron av liv kan förvisso bekräftas – gång på gång – men någon epokgörande upptäckt kan det aldrig bli frågan om. I motsats till protagonisten Justine i Lars von Triers mästerverk Melancholia kan vi vanliga människor aldrig säkert veta om rymden är tom på liv. Men Justine vet – helt utan stöd – att resten av universum är tomt på liv. Genom Justine släcker von Trier därmed allt hopp om en fortsättning efter det att jorden gått under. Ett brilliant drag. Men varför bry sig om ifall resten av universum är dött eller inte? I 14 Finns det andra skäl att leta efter liv i yttre rymden? Kunskap om beboeliga världar kan möjligen bli användbar om vi en dag måste lämna vår planet. Som argument för dagens kunskapssökande är det otillfredsställande. Oftast torde sökandet bottna i ren och skär nyfikenhet (vilket inte är fel). En del tar dock mänsklig fortlevnad på stort allvar. Hit hör Superentrepenören Elon Musk som siktar på att göra människan interplanetär. Musk har gått från ord till handling, med grundandet av rymdföretaget SpaceX, och med siktet inställt på att göra rymdfarten billig och möjliggöra snar kolonisering av planeten Mars. Om mänskligheten ska överleva jorden, behövs sannolikt personer som Musk. Men hans intelligens, visioner och exceptionella driv ger honom inte rätt i den så grundläggande värdefrågan. Det är nämligen oklart varför vårs arts existens skulle ha någon som helst betydelse. I Carl Sagans roman Kontakt uppfångar radio-astronomen Ellie Arroway ett meddelande från yttre rymden. Avsändarna visar sig inte bara vara intelligenta, utan besitter en teknologisk kompetens bortom vår föreställningsförmåga. Kanske är det just så vårt första möte med främmande livsformer kommer att ta sig uttryck; att vi kontaktas av utomjordingar vars civilisation med marginal överträffar vår egen – vetenskapligt och teknologiskt. Är detta hoppingivande? Optimism tycks som bäst ogrundad och som sämst felaktig. Låt oss för tillfället bortse ifrån vad vi idag tror oss veta om utsikterna för interstellära resor och föreställa oss att utomjordingar faktiskt anländer till vår planet. Hur ska vi förhålla oss till ett sådant scenario? Om varelserna kommer i syfte att skada oss är det naturligtvis kört för oss. Redan en primitiv art som vår egen besitter ju kapacitet bomba sönder och samman jorden, så vad skulle inte en långt mer avancerad civilisation kunna åstadkomma. Vi vet förstås ingenting om besökarnas avsikter. Men också om deras avsikter inte skulle vara onda, betyder inte det att mötet med dem blir friktionsfritt. Tänk om de är likgiltiga inför vår existens; om vi är den tiotusende art de stött på med halvdan kognitiv förmåga, ännu en art som är obrukbar och ointressant. Hoppet står i så fall till att de låter oss vara ifred. Intressantast är nog dock om besökarna har goda avsikter. Säg att den första kontakten skett under 1600-talet. Hade utomjordingarna förhållit sig passiva i relation till det de såg i termer av slaveri, tortyr, kvinnors frånvarande rättigheter med mera, och vad hade de ansett om dagens jordbor? Det råder ju knappast någon brist på tvivelaktiga statsskick. Diskriminering är vanligt förekommande, och människor behandlas på många håll på de mest vedervärdiga sätt. Att utomjordingarna skulle invända mot dessa saker ter sig kanske bra, åtminstone sett till vissa västerländska värderingar. Men antag att besökarna har synpunkter på vårt sätt att behandla andra kännande varelser? Vad skulle de till exempel ha att säga om vårt förhållande till grisar, som material i vetenskapliga experiment, som nöje på djurparken, och som mat. Sådana praktiker är rimligen uttryck för speciecism – inställningen att en art (i detta fall: människan) har etisk prioritet framför 15 andra arter. Och den inställningen hade kanske inte fallit i god jord hos utomjordingarna. Bättre för oss vore det knappast om de var lika speciesistiska som vi, men gav sig själva absolut etisk prioritet. Hur utomjordingar skulle se på vår art och vårt samhälle är tankeväckande. Huruvida de existerar är av underordnad betydelse. Som tankeexperiment torde detta synliggörande av våra brister kunna ha moralisk och politisk relevants helt oavsett om dessa utomstående betraktare verkligen finns. Vet någon där ute att vi finns och, om så, var vi befinner oss? Sedan decennier har människan oavsiktligt röjt sin position, med TVoch radiosändningar. Det kan vara ett generalfel för en civilisation på uppgång. Måhända har signaler redan snappats upp av främmande civilisationer som beslutat att släcka lågan innan den börjat sprida sig. Någon illvilja behövs inte som förklaring, bara en rimlig riskbedömning från deras sida. Kanske räds de inte oss, men den teknik vi inom "kort" kommer att ta fram. Hur skulle vi själva förhålla oss till en civilisation som vår egen om vi trodde att den strax skulle nå en nivå där den skulle vara en likvärdig part, kanske med kapacitet att utplåna oss. Skulle vi inte ha anledning att känna oro? Alla sändningar ut i rymden är dock inte oavsiktliga. Tvärtom. Åtskilliga försök har gjorts att förmedla budskap ut i universum – från fysiska föremål till riktade radiosändningar. Vad bör ett sådant meddelande innehålla? För att besvara frågan behöver man först fundera över syftet med att alls skicka det. Om man med meddelandet vill inleda en relation med en främmande art, kanske man bör sikta in sig på att göra ett gott intryck, vilket inte är detsamma som att ge en rättvisande bild av människan eller av jorden. En rättvisande bild kanske kan passa för utomjordiska "antropologer". Vill man lämna ett sista avtryck, förvissade om att vår tid i universum är kort, kanske detta är det lämpliga. Ingen där ute kan väl vara intresserad av skönskrivningar och tillrättalagd information av den en gång existerande mänskligheten. Är sådana beskrivningar vad vi kan vänta oss från dem? Svaret på denna fråga är nog tyvärr ja, dvs. om vi utgår från att de är som vi själva. Gissningsvis kan endast en civilisationskollaps – kanske med upprinnelse i kärnvapenkrig, klimatförändringar, asteroidnedslag, solstormar, eller pandemier – hindra oss från att uppnå den teknologiska nivå där maskiner kan tänka. Antag att vi övervinner alla sådana hot och konstruerar autonoma intelligenta system som i sin tur kan förbättra sig själva – oförtröttligt, dygnet runt utan att behöva bry sig om bagateller som matpauser, semester, eller biologisk evolution. Processen torde leda fram till en intelligens som vida överträffar vår egen i alla relevanta avseenden. Ett sådant scenario fascinerar och borde även göra oss en smula ödmjuka inför 16 vår egen otillräcklighet. Det kan hjälpa oss förstå våra egna kapaciteter och brister därpå. Men scenariot är som vi ska se tänkvärt också av andra skäl. Somliga menar att en sådan superintelligens mycket väl kan bli slutpunkten för vår existens. Den svenskfödde filosofen Nick Bostrom har uppmärksammat behovet av att i förväg analysera hur en sådan intelligens kan kontrolleras. Vi har nämligen bara ett försök på oss. Hur det än förhåller sig med den faktiska hotbilden, aktualiserar den skapande intelligensen utmaningen med att utforma acceptabla instruktioner. Temat är inte nytt. I Stanely Kubriks 2001 – A Space Odyssey uppstår en intressekonflikt mellan besättningen på rymdskeppet och uppdraget. Skeppsdatorn HAL9000 prioriterade uppdraget, vilket ledde till att snart sagt hela besättningen dog. Dess agerande var varken ologiskt eller märkligt. Klart är att datorns mål kunde ha varit precis vilka som helst, allt baserat på instruktionerna. Det spelar ingen roll att den kan mycket och tänker snabbt. Fakta, logik och snabbtänkthet ger ingen vägledning i grundläggande värdefrågor. Detta uppmärksammande redan 1700-talsfilosofen David Hume som uttryckte det som att det inte strider mot förnuftet att föredra världens utplånande framför en skråma i fingret. Att utgå från att datorer kommer att resonera och drivas på sätt som liknar det mänskliga är ett allvarligt misstag. Visserligen kanske människan en dag kan konstruera en sådan intelligens, men det är endast en möjlighet bland alla andra. Följer man Hume är datorns motivation inte mer irrationell än vår egen motivation att äta, skaffa barn och ha trevligt. Biologer fascineras av extrema livsformer. Med extrem menas då liv som frodas i, ur vårt perspektiv, synnerligen ogästvänliga miljöer, det vill säga i miljöer där liv givet vår erfarenhet och kunskaper inte är att vänta. Möjligen kan man utsträcka "extrem" till att gälla annat än biologiska förutsättningar – till att gälla en mer existentiell mening – där drivkrafter och mål är i fokus. Det konstgjorda livet kan lära oss något om våra egna ofta smått besynnerliga mål, som att ha en perfekt gräsmatta eller se en total solförmörkelse med egna ögon. Mot bakgrund av evolutionen skulle man kunna förvänta sig att levande varelser hade mycket lika målsättningar. Biologiskt liv tenderar förvisso att sträva efter sin fortsatta existens och efter att reproducera sig. Just detta är naturligtvis vad som alls möjliggjort vår egen arts existens. Men sådana strävanden tycks inte genomsyra våra medvetna önskningar. Att vilja se Malmö FF vinna allsvenskan (igen och igen) eller söka land och rike runt för ett exklusivt frimärke, har ingen klar och okontroversiell koppling till evolutionära fördelar. Likväl kännetecknar det vissa människors målsättningar. Naturligtvis går det att föreställa sig kopplingar till evolutionen, men det betyder inte att dessa är med sanningen överensstämmande, ens givet en evolutionsteoretisk hållning. Hursomhelst vore det ett misstag att sluta sig till att vi, när helst vi strävar efter mer vardagliga mål, egentligen har evolutionära vinster i åtanke. Få människor om någon torde dagligdags reflektera över evolutionära fördelar när de agerar, planerar och resonerar. Det kan sig i själva 17 verket te sig svårare att förstå en person som lever för sådana fördelar, än en person som lever för golf eller sin trädgård. Hur flexibla som helst är vi naturligtvis inte i vår förståelse av andra livsformers målsättningar. Vår mänskliga form har i detta avseende vissa begränsningar. Vi har nog alla lite svårt att förstå hur man kan ha som ultimat mål i livet att omvandla all materia i universum till gem, vilket är ett av Nick Bostroms exempel. Här kan AI sätta vår förståelsekapacitet på prov, men vi kan dra fördel av att den påminner oss om att snart sagt inga mål är så besynnerliga att de inte kan existera (åtminstone hos en individ eller entitet). En tänkande maskin väcker flera frågor. En sådan är om en tänkande maskin är en levande maskin? Svaret beror ytterst på hur vi dels definierar liv (se Abbotts och Perssons kapitel), dels definierar maskin. Att det går att föreställa sig maskiner liknande människan (eller andra varelser) är dock något man tagit fasta på inom science fiction-genren. I film och litteratur förekommer robotar som odlar personliga relationer, samt kan tänka, planera och ta ansvar. Bara för att nämna några exempel finns Ava i Ex Machina, Bishop i Aliens, Dolores i West World och Data i Star Trek – The Next Generation. Intressant nog är dessa förmågor och egenskaper på intet sätt nödvändiga för liv. En kantarell besitter ingen av dessa egenskaper men lever alltjämt, vilket naturligtvis inte betyder att egenskaperna är irrelevanta för liv. De kan vara tillräckliga för liv och nödvändiga för att vara en person. De är bara inte nödvändiga för liv. Att anamma en definition som utesluter möjligheten av levande robotar tycks bakvänt. Vad skulle grunden till en sådan begränsning vara? Frånvaron av biologi är av vikt om man tar fasta på hur livs-begreppet fram till nyligen utformats. Här måste man dock stanna upp. Språklig praxis kan studeras och klargöras, men den ger ingen vägledning i frågan om vilket livs-begrepp som är att föredra. Det tycks inte särskilt fruktbart att använda en begreppsapparat som utesluter kännande, autonoma, intelligenta och moraliska robotar. Och om man ändå väljer en sådan begränsning uppstår omedelbart ett tomrum. Ett utrymme lämnas för ett mer inkluderande begrepp – liv*– neutral för vilka sorters processer som utgör plattformen för egenskaper vi normalt associerar med liv. Henry Frankenstein (vars förnamn man i filmen anmärkningsvärt nog ändrat från bokens Victor) blir extatisk när hans skapelse vaknar till liv. I filmatiseringen från 1931 ter han sig i detta ögonblick spritt språngande galen. Scenen stannar kvar i minnet, men det är inte galenskapen som sådan som griper tag (för sådan galenskap finns det gott om i andra sammanhang), utan överträdelsen. Genom sitt experiment utmanar Henry den naturliga eller gudomliga ordningen. Ingen gav honom denna rätt och inte heller efterfrågade han andras råd. Henry gick först. 18 Omedelbart efter det att varelsen vaknat till liv utropar Henry att han nu förstår hur det känns att vara Gud. Är detta påstående rimligt? Skulle Gud – en allsmäktig, allgod och allvetande varelse – alls känna en sådan eufori. Knappast. Och jämförelsen med Gud brister naturligtvis också i flera andra avseenden. Utmärkande för Henrys experiment är inte bara bristen på ödmjukhet, utan även bristen på ansvar och kontroll – det vill säga sådant vi gärna ser hos Gud. Kanske ter det sig naivt att tolka Henrys gudsjämförelse bokstavligt. Den bör dock granskas, då den har kommit att ges utrymme och betydelse utanför fiktionen. Där har den blivit ett uttryck för mänsklig hybris, brist på ansvar och faran med att experimentera med just liv. Just därför är det viktigt att nagelfara vad jämförelsen, om något, bär för insikter. I den mån vi har att göra med en illusion kan denna endast skingras genom att man undersöker den ingående. Henrys övertramp har rimligen föga att göra med att livslågan som sådan endast är Guds att tända eller släcka. I alla tider har människan tänt (om än "på naturlig väg") och släckt denna låga och på senare år har vi lärt oss kontrollera den allt mer. I vården fattas dagligen beslut om liv och död. Potentiella barn väljs ut med hjälp av fosterdiagnostik och några av dem blir föremål för abort. Andra barn har medicinska landvinningar att tacka för sin existens. Livsuppehållande åtgärder avbryts för mycket svårt sjuka eller skadade människor. En del genomgår cellgiftsbehandling och tillfrisknar. Andra personer får ett nytt organ – kanske ett hjärta från en just avliden donator. Och så vidare. Gränsen för vad som är möjligt och god praxis flyttas ständigt och gråzoner framträder. Det går till exempel att under kontrollerade former sänka en patients medvetande till en nivå där alla upplevelser upphör (så-kallad terminal sedering). Under speciella omständigheter är detta tillåtet fram till det medicinska (i Sverige: hjärndöd) dödsögonblicket. Syftet är smärtlindring. En del hävdar att agerandet utgör förklädd dödshjälp. Kritiken är inte helt orimlig, även om det finns avgörande skillnader mellan terminal sedering och dödshjälp. Vad finns kvar av en person efter det att individens medvetande släckts? En viktig skillnad mellan att vara en person och, säg, en gran, är ju att personer har upplevelser, planer, önskningar, med mera. Släcks medvetandet upphör personen. Släcks medvetandet permanent tycks man med facit i hand kunna säga att personen i relevanta avseenden upphörde att existera i detta ögonblick. Under alla omständigheter står det klart att den personliga upplösningen inte behöver sammanfalla med den biologiska döden. Det har inte minst demenssjukdomarna lärt oss. En del människor vill bli infrysta efter sin död. Tanken är att kunna väckas till liv när tekniken är mogen. Antag för sakens skull att det finns en möjlighet att några av dessa personer faktiskt kommer att väckas i en avlägsen framtid. Hur förändrar det vår syn på dem som nu ligger i sina frysar. Betyder det att de ännu inte är döda? Enligt dagens hjärndödsdefinition är det så, för då är de inte oåterkalleligt döda. 19 Hjärndödsdefinitionen är av förklarliga skäl inte utformad för att hantera denna möjlighet. Likväl belyser den en intressant slitning mellan döden som definitivt oåterkalleligt tillstånd och framtida teknologiska och biologiska möjligheter. Huruvida de lever tycks paradoxalt nog hänga på den teknologiska utsikten att framgångsrikt aktivera deras hjärnor igen. Enbart det faktum att alla biologiska processer upphört, är inte avgörande. Avslutningsvis bör man fråga sig varför framtida generationer skulle vilja väcka dessa frysta individer till liv? Är de moraliskt skyldiga att göra det? Möjligen. Möjligen skulle framtidens historiker även få ett nytt källmaterial: uppväckta människor från det förflutna. Att låta frysa ner sig ter sig dock synnerligen tveksamt. Under högstadietiden påstod en av mina klasskamrater att han blivit ateist som följd av att ha läst Douglas Adams bok "Liftarens guide till Galaxen". Detta borde ha förvånat mig då bokens minst sagt utflippade historia inte innehåller mycket av religionfilosofiskt intresse. Min klasskamrats påstående förvånade mig emellertid inte alls. I boken lekte författaren friskt med universums ofattbara storlek och möjligheter och av någon anledning gav det även mig känslan av att Guds roll förminskades. Insikten om hur obetydlig jorden och vårt solsystem är, kan onekligen te sig skakande – och sätta religiösa dogmer i nytt ljus – men det gäller att inte göra för mycket av denna känsla. Precis som evolutionsbiologen Richard Dawkins konstaterat vilar inte ateism på tro, utan på frånvaro av skäl att tro på de religiösa påståenden som presenterats. Någon annan form av riktning i existentiell mening erbjuds inte. Vetenskapens metod kan visserligen, då den tillämpas på religiösa påståenden, ge upphov till ateism, men den ersätter inte påståendena på något sätt. Universum innehåller inte några gåtor, mysterier eller paradoxer. Allt sådan ligger i betraktarens ögon. Universum är intressant för den intresserade, varken mer eller mindre. Dess förmodade mångfald i termer av möjliga livsformer ger oss dock anledning att fundera över våra egna livsförutsättningar, vårt värde i relation till andra livsformer, samt över hur långt vi egentligen kommit i utvecklingen. 20 Lästips Böcker: Bostrom, Nick (2014) Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies Oxford University Press Dunér, David (red.) (2013) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet Dunér, David; Parthermore, Joel; Persson, Erik; Holmberg, Gustav (red.) (2013) The History and Philosophy of Astrobiology Cambridge Scholars 2013 Sagan, Carl (1987 m.fl. uppl.) Kontakt Legenda Filmer: Ex Machina (2014) Melancholia (2011) 21 Vad är liv? Jakten på en ny definition av liv Jessica Abbott & Erik Persson I årtusenden har människan försökt definiera livet – hur levande djur och växter skiljer sig från död materia. Problemet är dock att livet är mångfacetterat, och varje regel har sitt undantag. Vi försöker möta kommande utmaningar med nya livsformer, genom att lyfta fram en ny definition av liv. u sitter och läser en bok, och kommer över ett ord som du inte känner igen. Hur gör du? Om det inte går att uttyda ordets betydelse från sammanhanget, brukar man vända sig till en ordbok. Där står det kanske en beskrivning av vad ordet betyder, en lista med olika användningsområden för samma ord och exempel på dessa, samt kanske ett flertal synonymer (ord med samma eller liknande innehåll). Även ett tillsynes enkelt ord som "stol" kan bli svårt att definiera om det har många olika användningsområden. Svenska akademins ordboks definition av "stol" är till exempel hela 5400 ord lång! Det finns en stor kontrast mellan detta och hur små barn lär sig nya ord. Där handlar det inte om att slå upp ord i en ordbok, utan man lär sig genom att bli visad många olika exempel på samma sorts föremål och själv hitta likheter mellan dem. Mamman säger till exempel "sätt dig på stolen" och visar barnet med en gest vad hon menar. Då får barnet samtidigt information om hur en stol kan se ut och vad den används till. Har man sett många stolar med olika form, kan man så småningom känna igen även en ovanlig stol, men hur är det med ett mer abstrakt begrepp som "liv"? Där finns det tekniska definitioner som används inom biologi eller forskning om livets uppkomst, men även gemene man har en intuitiv definition av liv som utgår från egna erfarenheter om livet och döden. Frågan om hur man definierar liv är dessutom ännu mer aktuell idag. Forskare runt om i världen håller på att försöka skapa helt syntetiska celler i laboratoriet (se Melins, Cabak Rédeis och E. Perssons kapitel) och det pågår en intensiv jakt på tecken på liv i universum (se Dravins och Dunérs kapitel). Resultatet av dessa verksamheter kan bli att rådande idéer kring liv kontra icke-liv omkullkastas. Går det att hitta en definition av liv som fungerar i både tekniska och informella sammanhang, samt har potential att kunna appliceras på ännu okända livsformer? För att se om det ens är möjligt måste vi titta lite närmare på olika typer av definitioner och deras föroch nackdelar. D 22 Olika slags definitioner De två exempel som nämns ovan om ordet "stol" (en vuxen som slår upp ett obekant ord i en ordbok, samt ett barn som lär sig nya ord genom egna upplevelser) uppvisar inte bara två olika sätt att ta till sig information, utan också två olika sätt att se på hur ord kan definieras. I det första fallet utgår man ifrån att det finns en komplett lista med egenskaper som ska uppfyllas för att ett föremål ska räknas till kategorin "stol". Detta brukar kallas för en de re-definition. "De re" är latin för "om saken", och brukar stå i motsättning till "de dicto", eller "det som har sagts". Det innebär att en de re-definition handlar om en saks inneboende egenskaper. De re-definitioner är vanliga i ordböcker när det gäller vardagliga ord, och inom naturvetenskap när det gäller föremål och fenomen (man vill till exempel kunna lista vilka kriterier en atom måste uppfylla för att tillhöra kategorin "guldatom"). I det senare fallet utgår man snarare från likheter i form och funktion mellan olika stolar, och skapar en intern lista över egenskaper som en stol brukar uppfylla. Denna lista med egenskaper är mer flytande än hos en de re-definition. Inte alla egenskaper måste uppfyllas, listan med egenskaper kan uppdateras kontinuerligt, och olika egenskaper kan upplevas som mer eller mindre viktiga. Avvikande former av stolar kan därför ändå kännas igen som sådana om de har tillräckligt mycket gemensamt med stolar man har stött på tidigare (se Figur 1). Detta är ett exempel på familjelikhet, där ordet förstås utifrån övergripande likheter mellan föremål istället för en lista med nödvändiga kriterier. Språkforskning har visat att vi oftast använder oss av familjelikhet när vi lär oss ord på vårt modersmål. Familjelikhet som fenomen inom språket föreslogs först av filosofen Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951), verksam vid University of Cambridge under det tidiga Figur 1: Hur uppbyggandet av en familjelikhetsdefinition går till. Viktiga egenskaper skulle kunna vara storlek, form, material, och så vidare. 23 nittonhundratalet. Han ville undersöka hur vi beskriver och förstår komplexa fenomen som konst eller spel. Spel är ett förrädiskt enkelt koncept. Alla vet vad ett spel är, men att hitta en lista med kriterier som alla spel har gemensamt, men som inte delas med andra fenomen (en klassisk de re-definition) är mer eller mindre omöjligt. Det är för att det finns så många olika sorters spel; brädspel, bollspel, kortspel, tv-spel, sällskapsspel, och så vidare. I princip det enda alla dessa har gemensamt är att de är underhållande och innebär ett tävlingsmoment, men detsamma gäller även andra fenomen (som till exempel en debatt). Det blir då svårt att definiera ett spel på samma sätt som man definierar en guldatom. Det har därför föreslagits att man i sådana fall istället bör försöka konstruera en ny typ av definition med familjelikhet som grundsten. Med hjälp av familjelikhet, där man använder sig av egenskaper som delas av de allra flesta medlemmarna i kategorin, blir det betydligt mer intuitivt att beskriva spel. Då är det tillåtet att vissa egenskaper inte uppfylls, så länge likheterna är tillräckligt stora överlag. Det innebär att trots att de flesta spel kräver flera spelare, kan patiens ändå räknas som ett spel med hjälp av familjelikhet för att det har mycket gemensamt med andra kortspel. Andra definitioner inom biologin Inom biologin finns det gott om svårdefinierade fenomen. Vad är egentligen en gen, eller en art? I båda fallen används olika definitioner i olika sammanhang, därför att det är svårt att ta fram en definition som passar i alla lägen. När det gäller definitionen av en art finns det ett flertal olika artbegrepp, och tittar man igenom kursböcker i evolutionsbiologi kan man lätt få ihop ett tiotal olika artbegrepp som alla har sina föroch nackdelar. Ett av de vanligaste artbegreppen är det biologiska artbegreppet, som går ut på att individer som kan para sig och få fertil avkomma tillhör samma art. Men detta artbegrepp passar inte alls för bakterier eller andra organismer som förökar sig asexuellt, och tar inte hänsyn till att det finns många djur och växter som kan para sig över artgränser om tillfället bjuds. Till exempel kan tiger och lejon producera avkomma som är delvis fertila (honor är det men inte hannar), men detta sker inte i naturen eftersom de bor på olika platser. De kan inte gärna betraktas som samma art med tanke på deras olika utbredningsområden, anpassningar till olika miljöer (djungeln kontra savannen), olika social struktur och olika utseende. Vissa författare menar att vi kanske måste ändra på våra förutfattade meningar kring vilka organismer som tillhör olika arter, och därmed klassa tiger och lejon som samma art, för att vara konsekventa med det biologiska artbegreppet. Andra menar att vi får nöja oss med att använda olika artbegrepp till olika sorts organismer, eftersom det inte går att utveckla ett artbegrepp som täcker in alla kända arter på ett tillfredsställande sätt. Att en art är så svårdefinierad beror delvis på livets mångfald, som gör att olika grupper av organismer lever och förökar sig på väldigt olika sätt, men också delvis på att artbildning är en gradvis process. Till exempel brukar skillnader i utseende och beteende uppkomma långt 24 innan två olika populationer blir så genetiskt skilda att de inte kan korsa sig längre. Det blir då svårt att sätta skarpa gränser för vad som bör räknas som en art, när olika populationer har kommit olika långt med själva artbildningsprocessen. På så sätt har diskussionen kring artbegrepp ganska mycket gemensamt med problemet med att definiera liv. Livet i sig är faktiskt om något ännu mer svårdefinierat, eftersom uppkomsten av levande organismer har skett gradvis och det finns så många varelser som rör sig i gränslandet mellan levande och icke-levande. (Som kuriosa kan det nämnas att Svenska akademins ordboks definition av "liv" är över 9000 ord lång, nästan dubbelt så lång som för ordet "stol"!). Här kan det vara lämpligt att ta upp problematiken kring liv och levande som motsats till död. Levande kontra död handlar om individuellt liv och död. Vi är snarare intresserade av att kunna skilja mellan levande och icke-levande, dvs alla varelser som faktiskt lever, kan leva, eller har levt ("Liv" med stort L), till skillnad från sådant som aldrig har levt och aldrig kommer att kunna göra det. Alla dinosaurier är döda nu (individuellt liv), men var levande varelser under tiden de fanns på jorden ("Liv"). En sten kan dock inte betraktas som död eftersom den aldrig har levt, och är snarare icke-levande. Problemet är att vissa av kriterierna som traditionellt förknippas med "Liv" överlappar med kriterierna för levande-kontradöd, vilket gör att dessa två frågor blir svåra att diskutera helt oberoende av varandra. Vad kännetecknar liv? Problem och lösningar Typiska egenskaper som förknippas med liv är bland annat energianvändning, tillväxt, fortplantning, förmågan att känna av sin miljö och förmågan att kunna anpassa sig till denna miljö. Det finns ett antal olika biologiska system som uppfyller vissa av dessa krav, men inte alla. De kanske mest kända är virus (Figur 2), men det finns även andra exempel som transposoner (gener som kan självständigt kopiera sig mellan olika platser i arvsmassan) eller prioner (proteiner som kan omvandla andra proteiner till sin egen form). Det är då en utmaning att ens kunna beskriva och definiera livet som redan finns på jorden. En ännu större utmaning är att ta fram en definition av liv som inte är bunden till nu levande jordiskt liv. Experterna är överens om att det bara är en tidsfråga innan vi måste ta oss an praktiska frågor rörande alternativa livsformer. Det kan till exempel handla om självstyrande robotar och artificiell intelligens, eller helt syntetiska celler som vi skapar i laboratoriet. Lite mer spekulativt (men ändå möjligt) är om vi upptäcker utomjordiskt liv, kanske i form av signaler från rymden eller bakterier under ytan på Mars. För det första vill vi kunna känna igen liv även om det skiljer sig markant från de livsformer vi redan känner till, och för det andra anses liv ofta ha ett särskilt värde (se E. Perssons kapitel). I fall som de ovannämnda är en de re definition som täcker in alla möjliga livsformer omöjlig. Man är inte ens överens om ett bestämt antal kriterier som täcker alla nu levande varelser på jorden och utesluter 25 alla icke-levande föremål och system. Det är ännu svårare att hitta unika kriterier som förenar robotiskt, syntetiskt eller utomjordiskt liv med befintligt liv. Vad kan vi då göra för att komma vidare? Det finns ett par olika möjliga lösningar på detta problem. Vi kan till exempel jobba hårdare på en bättre de re-definition i förhoppning om att lyckas med hjälp av vår konstant ökande kunskap om olika livsformer. Det är dock problematiskt att vi bara känner till liv med ett gemensamt ursprung – det är svårt att veta vilka egenskaper som bara är bundna till livet här på jorden och vilka som är universella. En annan lösning kan då vara att avvakta, och vänta tills vi har skapat eller upptäckt andra livsformer med ett annat ursprung, för att sedan försöka hitta en bred definition av liv. Ett tredje alternativ kan vara välja att ha samma inställning som vissa har när det gäller artbegreppet, och konstatera att livet är för mångfacetterat för att kunna skapa en enda definition som fungerar i alla lägen. Vi får i så fall nöja oss med olika tekniska definitioner som funkar bra inom ett begränsat område. Ett exempel på ett forskningsområde som då skulle kunna ha sin egen definition av "liv" är sökandet efter livets ursprung. De tidigaste biologiska systemen saknade förmodligen en del egenskaper som finns hos liv idag, så definitioner av liv som används inom forskning kring livets ursprung innehåller breda kriterier som "energianvändning" och "icke-jämviktstillstånd", snarare än smala kriterier som "består av celler" eller "innehåller DNA". Ingen av dessa lösningar är dock riktigt tillfredsställande. Först ska vi diskutera problemen med dessa lösningar i tur och ordning, och sedan argumentera för ett annat angreppssätt som vi tror kan leda till en bättre definition av liv än vad som hittills har åstadkommits. Jobba hårdare Det kan förstås vara värdefullt att fortsätta sökandet efter universella kriterier för att definiera liv. Frågan är bara hur sannolikt det är att detta angreppssätt kommer att ge utdelning. Man har jobbat med frågan hur man bäst definierar liv under årtusenden, och förvirringen har snarare ökat än minskat med tiden. Innan mikroorganismer upptäcktes var det relativt enkelt att dela in världen i levande varelser och icke-levande föremål. Men huruvida virus ska räknas som levande är fortfarande en kontroversiell fråga idag. Vissa menar att endast celler kan räknas som levande eftersom de har en egen metabolism, medan virus måste låna av en annan cells metabolism för att kunna föröka sig. Andra menar att förmågan att föröka sig och genomgå en evolutionär utveckling är viktigare kriterier, och att virus borde räknas som levande för att de uppfyller dessa kriterier. Nya rön kring virus ursprung kommer förmodligen att röra till diskussionen ytterligare. Det finns olika hypoteser kring var virus kommer ifrån. En tidig hypotes var att virus var rester från de allra äldsta livsformerna på jorden, en sorts mellanting mellan icke-levande organiska molekyler och levande celler. Denna hypotes har dock förlorat stöd i och med att man har insett att en grupp som behöver celler 26 för att existera knappast kan ha föregått uppkomsten av dessa celler. Virusliknande varelser kanske var en del av livets tidiga utveckling, men med tanke på hur lång tid som har gått sedan dess är det inte sannolikt att dagens virus är direkta efterkommande från denna tidiga utveckling. Hypotesen som det har rått störst samstämmighet kring den senaste tiden, är att virus kommer från transposoner, självständigt hoppande DNA-fragment som kopierar sig till nya ställen i arvsmassan. En del av våra transposoner verkar vara gamla virus som har blivit en del av genomet, och största skillnaden mellan virus och transposoner är egentligen att transposoner endast kan överföras vertikalt, det vill sägas från förälder till avkomma, medan virus kan överföras horisontellt – det vill säga mellan (eventuellt) obesläktade individer. En transposon skulle dock kunna bli till ett virus genom att ta med sig en intilliggande gen för ett protein som kan fungera som en skyddskapsel, vilket möjliggör för transposonen att överleva utanför kroppen och därmed bli smittsam. I detta fall blir det kanske okontroversiellt att klassificera virus som icke-levande, eftersom de i grund och botten bara är DNA-fragment som har fått lite nya egenskaper. På senare år har man emellertid upptäckt nya "jättevirus", som ger stöd åt en annan hypotes, nämligen att virus har utvecklats ur bakterier. Jättevirus innehåller långt fler gener än ett genomsnittligt virus, upp till 2300 gener i Pandoravirus, medan vanliga virus kan ha från två till ett tiotal gener (Figur 2). I jämförelse innehåller våra vanliga tarmbakterier Escherichia coli (E. coli) cirka 4300 gener, och Syn-3.0, ett syntetiskt bakterium konstruerad för att innehålla så få gener som möjligt, har bara 473 stycken. På så sätt har jättevirus gett nytt stöd till hypotesen att virus kan ha utvecklats ur parasitiska bakterier som vistades inom en värdcell, och så småningom förlorade en stor del av sina oberoende funktioner. Figur 2: Zikavirus kan utvecklas och föröka sig i en cell, men har ingen egen metabolism. Dess genom kodar 15 proteiner. 27 I så fall blir det märkligt (åtminstone för biologer) att klassificera virus som ickelevande om de har utvecklats ur levande celler. Idag är det många som tror att olika sorters virus kan ha utvecklats på olika sätt – vissa ur transposoner som blev självständiga, andra ur bakterier som förlorade överflödiga funktioner. Om virus har flera olika ursprung kommer det inte att bli lättare att komma överens om huruvida virus är levande. Detta är bara ett exempel baserat på en relativt välkänd form av organisk varelse. Problemen kommer att mångdubblas om och när vi hittar eller skapar helt nya livsformer. Därför känns det inte sannolikt att lösningen bara är att jobba hårdare med problemet att definiera liv. Avvakta Som nämndes ovan är det ett problem att vi i nuläget bara känner till liv på jorden. Det innebär att vi inte kan avgöra om de egenskaper som är gemensamma för allt känt liv är det för att dessa egenskaper verkligen är universella, eller för att allt jordiskt liv har ett gemensamt ursprung. Experiment med att skapa syntetiska livsformer kanske kan hjälpa till i detta fall, men dessa livsformer kommer att vara präglade av livet på jorden till stor del – delvis för att det är vi som är skaparna och dessa syntetiska livsformer kommer att behöva vara anpassade för att odlas i laboratoriet, åtminstone till en början. Men också för att nutida försök med syntetiskt liv använder befintligt liv som mall. Till exempel Syn-3.0, ett syntetiskt Figur 3: Mycoplasmabakterier 28 bakterium skapad av Craig Venter och kollegor. Syn-3.0 är en kraftigt modifierad version av bakterien Mycoplasma mycoides, en parasitisk bakterium som lever inuti cellerna hos nötkreatur och getter och som är släkt med bakterierna som ofta orsakar urinvägsinflammation (Figur 3). Trots att det idag är möjligt att skapa syntetiska DNA-sekvenser och sätta in dessa i befintliga celler, har man långt kvar innan det går att designa och bygga upp nya livsformer helt och hållet. Det innebär att det förmodligen kommer att dröja ganska länge innan man kan börja utforska hur mycket man kan tänja på gränserna för befintligt liv. På så sätt skulle det vara mycket mer värdefullt om man upptäcker utomjordiskt liv som har ett helt annat ursprung än livet på jorden. Det kanske inte ens räcker om man upptäcker liv på Mars, eftersom trafik mellan Mars och Jorden har skett via både naturliga meteoriter och konstgjorda prober, så eventuella bakterier på Mars skulle kunna ha samma ursprung som jordiska bakterier. Men ska man leta nya livsformer längre ut i solsystemet med andra biokemier än det som finns på jorden, då hamnar man i ett slags moment-22. Utan en definition av liv som fungerar för livsformer som inte liknar våra egna, hur kommer man då att kunna känna igen dessa främmande livsformer? Man kan alltså konstatera att även om vi kommer att lära oss mycket genom att skapa eller upptäcka helt nya livsformer, kan vi inte vänta tills dess med att ta fram en definition av liv. Acceptera att det inte finns en definition I enlighet med biologernas artbegrepp skulle man kunna bestämma sig för att sluta leta efter en enda definition av liv, och istället använda olika tekniska former av de re-definition beroende på användningsområde. Fördelen är att det reflekterar det faktum att livet är en dynamisk process som inte lätt går att fånga i ett bestämt antal kriterier. Olika kriterier kan lyftas fram beroende på om man pratar om övergången från kemi till biologi under livets ursprung, vilka egenskaper en artificiell intelligens eller självstyrande robot skulle behöva ha för att betraktas som levande, eller vilka minimala kriterier som måste uppfyllas för att en utomjordisk varelse kan misstänkas vara levande. På samma sätt kan biologer använda olika artbegrepp beroende på situationen – en genetisk definition när det gäller bakterier, en morfologisk definition när det gäller vissa växter, eller en definition som baseras på parningsframgång när det gäller många djur. Detta har ibland kallats för ett pluralistiskt artbegrepp. Kan vi då vara nöjda med ett pluralistiskt livsbegrepp? Vårt svar är nej, av ett par olika anledningar. För det första kan en gemensam definition vara värdefull för att kunna ha en diskussion kring de kommande utmaningarna med nya livsformer. Ska alla kunna bidra till samhällsdebatten behövs det en definition av liv som är så pass bred att den kan kännas igen av alla, både lekmän, politiker, och forskare inom olika ämnen. Detta betyder såklart inte att de tekniska definitionerna måste ge vika för en bred definition (om en sådan kan uppnås), men en bred definition kan eventuellt göra kommunikation mellan olika 29 grupper smidigare. Ett annat problem med de befintliga tekniska de re-definitionerna, är att många försöker täcka in livets komplexitet genom att blanda kriterier som hamnar på olika hierarkiska nivåer. Till exempel innehåller många definitioner kriterierna energianvändning, utveckling från embryo till vuxen, fortplantning, förmågan att känna av sin miljö, och förmågan att kunna anpassa sig till denna miljö via evolution. De första fyra kriterierna gäller på individnivån, men den sista, evolutionär anpassning, gäller endast på populationsnivån. En population utvecklas inte från embryo till vuxen, och en individ kan inte anpassa sig evolutionärt. Det leder till en märklig situation där man varken kan tillämpa alla kriterierna på en specifik individ (till exempel Jessicas katt Missy), eller en specifik population (alla svenska katter), utan måste istället föreställa sig någon form av typexempel av alla katter som har egenskaper som tillhör både individen och populationen. Frågan om individuellt liv (och död) återkommer här, eftersom kriterierna som ligger på individnivån (energianvändning, förmågan att känna av sin miljö) överlappar delvis med kriterier för att betrakta en individ som levande istället för död (vid döden slutar metabolism och därmed energianvändning, medvetandet och därmed förmågan att känna av sin miljö försvinner). Det blir då svårt att hålla isär frågan om kattens individuella liv från alla katters status som levande varelser. Frågan är hur mycket nytta man har av en definition som blandar ihop individoch populationsnivån på detta sätt. En del forskare har försökt komma runt problemet med kriterier på olika nivåer genom att försöka lägga alla kriterier på samma nivå. Eftersom förmågan att anpassa sig evolutionärt anses vara en av de viktigaste egenskaperna som skiljer levande system från andra dynamiska men icke-levande system (som till exempel en självkörande bil eller jordens havsströmmar), innebär det i praktiken att man får försöka lägga alla kriterier på populationsnivån eller högre. Dessa definitioner har fördelen att de är konsekventa, men blir oftast krångliga och lite luddiga. Frågan är då snarare om problemet inte är definitioner av livet i sig, utan fixeringen vid en de re-definition? Uppenbarligen har vi alla en intuitiv definition av liv som bygger på de levande organismer vi träffar på i vardagen – växter och djur. Ju längre ifrån dessa välbekanta organismer vi kommer, desto svårare blir det att avgöra om en varelse borde räknas som levande. Man skulle kanske kunna tro att det beror på avsaknaden av detaljkunskap, och att om man kan mycket om virus eller transposoner borde det bli lättare att komma överens om huruvida dessa borde räknas som levande. Så behöver emellertid inte vara fallet. Vi har genomfört en kort enkät bland forskare på enheten för evolutionär ekologi, på biologiska institutionen vid Lunds Universitet. Vi valde ut fall som vi bedömde i förväg kunde utgöra problematiska fall och bad forskarna klassificera dessa olika varelser som levande eller inte. Exempel på problematiska fall var bland annat mitokondrier (en cellkomponent som har eget DNA och delar sig självständigt), virofager (virus som infekterar andra virus), transposoner ("hoppande gener"), datorvirus, syntetiska bakterier, och ett plockat äpple. Resultatet var slående – till 30 och med bland professionella biologer (som ändå måste räknas som experter på liv, nästan per definition) fanns det ingen samstämmighet kring vilka varelser som borde räknas som levande. Familjelikhet Vi tror därför inte att det är fruktbart att fortsätta söka efter en de re-definition för livet, åtminstone i bred mening. Vi måste istället tänka om, och försöka hitta en definition som stämmer bättre överens med den komplexitet som finns och som kommer närmare gemene mans intuitiva definition av liv. Vi tror att det är ett bra alternativ att utgå ifrån familjelikhet när man konstruerar sin definition, eftersom den i så fall innebär att man gör en övergripande bedömning av likheterna mellan olika livsformer, utan att slå fast att inga undantag tillåts. Man öppnar också upp möjligheten att låta olika egenskaper väga olika tungt, till exempel att metabolism kan väga tyngre än evolution. Undantag i en definition kan såklart vara problematiska, och en återkommande kritik av definitionsarbete som utgår ifrån familjelikhetstänk är just hur man hanterar undantagen. Om undantag tillåts i en definition, är det nämligen oklart hur många undantag blir för många. Risken är att definitionen blir luddig om alla gör olika bedömningar över hur mycket (eller vad) två olika varelser måste ha gemensamt för att betraktas som levande båda två. Det finns dock en lösning. I vårt arbete kring definitioner av livet använder vi oss av modeller för att hitta egenskaper som kan användas för att förena olika livsformer, och gallra bort egenskaper som inte tillför mer information. Många biologiska definitioner av liv innehåller till exempel en del generella fenomen som Figur 4: Lever just denna katt, eller är populationen av alla katter levande? 31 tillväxt och fortplantning, och sedan några specifika egenskaper såsom en arvsmassa som består av DNA eller att kroppen är uppbyggd av celler. I dessa fall tillför inte de generella egenskaperna så mycket eftersom de trumfas av de specifika egenskaperna. På så sätt kan vi dra nytta av fördelarna med en familjelikhetsdefinition, utan att den blir godtycklig. Modellbygget går till i flera olika steg. Till att börja med har vi undersökt den publicerade litteraturen kring definitioner av liv, och lyckats ta fram cirka 130 olika egenskaper som har föreslagits som kriterier in en de re-definition. Det låter som väldigt många egenskaper, men ett flertal är olika formuleringar av samma grundläggande koncept. Sedan har vi samlat information om många olika varelser om täcker hela spännvidden från klart levande till klart icke-levande. Nästa steg är att bedöma vilka egenskaper som varje varelse uppfyller och på så sätt skapa ett datamaterial med en serie ettor och nollor (är egenskapen uppfylld? – ja eller nej) för Figur 5: Exempel på hur olika varelser kan grupperas när information från alla föreslagna kriterier samman-ställs. Memer är kulturella element som kan ärvas och spridas mellan individer. 32 varje varelse. Modeller som beskriver detta dataset byggs med hjälp av olika statistiska metoder; till exempel kan man se vilka varelser som har flest egenskaper gemensamt och bygga en sorts "släktträd" där liknande varelser grupperas tillsammans. Arbetet är pågående, men två exempel på hur ett sådant "släktträd" skulle kunna se ut visas i Figur 5. I del (a), finns det en uppenbar uppdelning mellan varelser med och utan metabolism. Alla djur grupperas tillsammans, och alla celldelar och celler (som inte är encelliga organismer) grupperas tillsammans och nära djuren eftersom de har en metabolism. I del (b), finns det istället en uppenbar uppdelning mellan varelser med och utan förmågan att föröka sig. Virus, transposoner, och prioner bildar en egen grupp inom de levande sakerna eftersom de ändå har ärftlighet, trots avsaknaden av metabolism. Vi vet inte i nuläget hur utfallet kommer att bli till sist, och andra indelningar är också möjliga. Ett sådant diagram kan därför ge nya insikter i vilka organismer eller varelser som liknar varandra när det gäller livets egenskaper, men huvudsyftet med vårt arbete är snarare att genom vidare analyser bättre förstå vilka egenskaper som bäst beskriver livet vi känner till, och hur dessa kan överföras till nya livsformer. När vi väl har en beskrivning av hur vi definierar livet vi känner till, kommer vi därför att testa utfallet av dessa egenskaper på tilltänkta livsformer. Beroende på resultatet kan definitionen och egenskaperna eventuellt uppdateras för att bättre täcka in de okända livsformerna. På så sätt hoppas vi hitta en ny definition av liv som är rigorös men flexibel, kan användas över områden och ämnen, och ska ge nya insikter om hur vi tänker kring liv. Lästips Dupré, John (1995) The disorder of things; The metaphysical foundations of the disunity of science Harvard University Press Ernberg, Ingemar m.fl. (2010) Vad är liv, i kosmos, i cell, i människan? Karolinska Insitutet University Press Persson, Erik (2013) "Vad är Liv?" i Dunér, David (red.) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet 33 Pross, Addy (2012) What is life? How chemistry becomes biology Oxford University Press Wittgenstein, Ludwig (2009) Philosophical Investigations Wiley-Blackwell 34 35 Molekylära uppvaknanden Petter Persson Livet är en molekylär process som pågått oavbrutet på jorden under cirka fyra miljarder år. Medan den moderna biologin under det senaste århundradet successivt har gett en allt bättre förståelse för hur livet fungerar ner i minsta biokemiska beståndsdel, så är frågan om livets molekylära ursprung och tidigaste utveckling en av de stora och ännu i hög grad obesvarade vetenskapliga frågorna. Från sin enkla början har livet steg för steg utvecklats till den grad att vi nu själva kan reflektera över detta livs ursprung och utsikter. Vi kan också fråga oss hur unik denna molekylära utveckling är ur ett universellt perspektiv, och på allvar börja utmana oss själva genom skapande av alternativt liv (både organiskt och oorganiskt) som i grunden förändrar livets kemi på molekylär nivå. Även sökandet efter utomjordiskt liv ställer viktiga frågor på sin spets om livets kemi bortom vårt eget paradigm. Det här kapitlet handlar om att försöka förstå vilka allmänna molekylära principer som styr livets uppkomst och utveckling, och vilken variationsrikedom som över huvud taget är möjlig i olika molekylära miljöer. ivet på jorden uppvisar en imponerande rikedom som fångas under det välkända begreppet Livets mångfald. Forskning och upptäckter har dessutom på senare år visat att livet anpassat sig till många extrema miljöer – med mikrober eller andra levande organismer som klarar sig i snustorra öknar, i klippskrevor långt under jordytan, i skållheta källor, och miljöer som är så förgiftade av arsenik eller andra för oss giftiga ämnen att man fram tills nyligen skulle trott att dessa vore helt obeboeliga. Detta har vidgat vår uppfattning om livets anpassningsförmåga avsevärt. Dock har alla molekylärbiologiska analyser hittills pekat på att allt liv på jorden hör ihop ur ett grundläggande biokemiskt perspektiv där allt från de enklaste mikrober till vi själva utvecklats från en gemensam utgångspunkt – ofta benämnd LUCA efter det engelska Last Universal Common Ancestor (ungefär sista gemensamma ursläkting eller urcell). Hur främmande vi än kan känna oss inför en bakterie som lever i en het arsenikkälla i Yellowstone nationalpark så delar vi ändå ett viktigt arv av gemensamma biokemiska komponenter och processer med DNA, proteiner, enzymer, cellmembran och förmåga att tillgodogöra oss näring och förbränna energi som är nära besläktat ur ett molekylärt perspektiv. Hur imponerande livets mångfald än är så besvarar det inte direkt den fråga som nu öppnar sig om vilken ytterligare variationsrikedom som är möjlig när man L 36 flyttar fram fokus till att betrakta en mångfald av liv. Då övergår fokus till den mer allmänna frågan om möjligheterna för fundamentalt annorlunda livsformer där man inte bara kan tänka sig avancerad genmodifiering utan även syntetiska (laboratorieframställda) eller utomjordiska livsformer baserade på andra molekylära komponenter än DNA och så vidare. Här befinner sig forskningen fortfarande på ett mycket tidigt stadium av att förstå vad som över huvud taget är möjligt, eller vad – om något som faktiskt redan förekommer på andra platser i universum. När vår traditionella bild av vad Liv är nu för första gången utmanas på allvar från flera olika håll är det värdefullt att belysa det enda konkreta exempel vi än så länge känner till – livet på jorden. Här finns möjligheter att se både vilka, om några, generella insikter detta exempel kan tillhandahålla för betraktandet av nya eller alternativa livsformer, eller på vilket sätt sådana potentiella livsformer i stället utmanar vår traditionella bild av livet. Detta kan exemplifieras av NASA:s kärnfulla och ofta använda inofficiella arbetsdefinition av liv som "Ett självuppehållande kemiskt system kapabelt till darwinistisk evolution." Denna definition är som diskuteras av Abbott och Persson i förra kapitlet hett omdebatterad och det finns många andra möjliga infallsvinklar. Men det är säkerligen ingen slump att denna definition som NASA ofta använder sig av i sökandet efter nya livsformer på avlägsna platser i universum passar väl in på vårt eget liv, för det vore naturligtvis mindre lyckat om den inte ens stämde in på det enda kända exemplet på det som den förmodas karakterisera. Det är också tydligt att detta är en modern naturvetenskaplig definition av livsbegreppet som grundar sig i de senaste två århundradenas landvinningar inom såväl biologin med den darwinistiska utvecklingsläran, som biokemin med den grundläggande förståelsen av livets molekylära uppbyggnad som först uppnåtts under 1900-talets andra del. Förståelsen av bygger också på att den klassiska evolutionsbiologin successivt har knutits ihop med den molekylära forskningen, vilket illustreras av Francis Cricks och James Watsons publicering av den berömda dubbelhelix-strukturen för DNA 1953. Trots sin koncisa formulering av livsbegreppet är detta alltså en relativt specifik naturvetenskaplig definition som varken Aristoteles, Rousseau, eller Linné skulle ha kunnat framföra. En fråga som direkt aktualiseras av moderna tekniska landvinningar med intelligenta robotar är att även om robotar och halvledarteknologi också i grunden är uppbyggda av atomer så är de knappast vad vi normalt skulle kalla för "ett kemiskt system". Sådana system förefaller inte heller behöva följa darwinistisk evolution. Man skulle därför snabbt kunna anföra att även om robotar är intelligenta så är de inte levande enligt denna definition, eller alternativt skulle de kunna framföras som ett motexempel mot denna biokemiska livsdefinition. I fråga om syntetiska biologiska organismer är frågan fortfarande mer öppen – det mesta av dagens genmanipulering där forskare klipper och klistrar i arvsmassan ändrar knappast grundmodellen med darwinistisk evolution, men det är en ännu öppen fråga i vilken mån man på längre sikt kommer att kunna skapa mer radikalt annorlunda 37 biologiska organismer, och om de i så fall nödvändigtvis måste följa samma darwinistiska evolutionsprincip. Om vi däremot avvaktar lite med dessa frågor om de mer renodlat tekniska utmaningar som vi ställs inför i en postbiologisk värld, kvarstår en annan mycket grundläggande fråga om livets uppkomst och utveckling. Det är fullt möjligt att vi efter ca fyra miljarder års utveckling kan börja utmana oss själva tekniskt i en postbiologisk värld, men om vi ska förstå hur unikt eller allmängiltigt livet är ur ett universellt/astrobiologiskt perspektiv behöver vi betrakta livets utveckling ur ett modernt molekylärt perspektiv. Inte minst en rikedom av upptäckter av exoplaneter med fysikaliska förutsättningar som mer eller mindre liknar jordens (se även Dravins kapitel) ställer frågan på sin spets om hur lätt någon form av liv kan uppstå under alternativa begynnelsevillkor, och i vilken mån livet skulle kunna förväntas se snarlikt ut om det uppstod någon annan stans. Är det enda rimliga att livet skulle likna vårt eget "darwinistiska kemiska system", eller skulle det till exempel lika gärna spontant kunna uppstå någon form av AI/robot baserad på halvledare och mekaniska griparmar utan att ta omvägen via den biologiska utvecklingen? En grundläggande fråga är därför att försöka förstå i vilken mån liv kan uppstå och utvecklas under olika fysikalisk-kemiska förutsättningar. Frågan är också i vilken mån en sådan utveckling styrs av allmänna naturlagar som ser likadana ut i hela universum, eller mer specifika fysikaliska förutsättningar som kan variera kraftigt mellan olika tider och platser? Dessa frågor är långt ifrån enkla att besvara för spännande, men ofullständigt utforskade, miljöer som saturnusmånen Enceladus (Figur 1). Till att börja med knyter det an till frågan om livets ursprung och tidiga Figur 1: Vattenplymer från Saturnus måne Enceladus som tyder på förekomsten av flytande hav under den frusna ytan är ett av många aktuella exempel på ökad kunskap om intressanta och varierade förhållanden som råder både inom vårt eget solsystem och i andra planetsystem. Foto: NASA/ESA. 38 utveckling på jorden. Här har många framsteg under de senaste årtiondena gjort att vi har en betydligt bättre uppfattning om hur detta kan ha skett, men med omfattande kvarstående kunskapsluckor om den tidigaste utvecklingen är detta i sig en av de stora ännu obesvarade vetenskapliga frågorna. Ur ett universellt perspektiv ger livet på jorden bara ett exempel på den mer allmänna frågan om hur liv uppstår. För att förstå var, när och under vilka förutsättningar vi kan förvänta oss att liv kan uppstå eller faktiskt har uppstått behöver vi en mer generell förståelse för livets uppkomst. För att komma vidare med dessa allmänna frågor behöver i alla fall tre olika aspekter knytas samman. För det första behövs en gedigen förståelse av vad vi än så länge lärt oss om livet på jorden. Nittonhundratalets omfattande landvinningar inom molekylärbiologin har tydligt visat att livet på jorden måste förstås ur ett molekylärt perspektiv, där även de mest komplexa biokemiska processer i grunden måste följa samma universella kemiska reaktionsprinciper som gäller överallt. För det andra behövs en allmän förståelse för hur de molekylära förutsättningarna för liv påverkas av olika fysikaliska (till exempel temperatur) och kemiska (till exempel pH eller tillgång till olika näringsämnen) förutsättningar. Med närmast oändliga variationsmöjligheter riskerar denna aspekt att svämma över alla gränser i sin mest allmänna tappning, så utmaningen är i hög grad att identifiera allmänna principer som kan kopplas till specifika molekylära exempel. Till exempel kan man pröva hur väl andra potentiella informationsbärande molekyler fungerar i jämförelse med DNA under varierande förhållanden som till exempel högre temperaturer. Slutligen kan detta kopplas mer konkret till vår gradvis ökade kunskap om variationsrikedomen i olika potentiellt beboeliga miljöer på andra platser i universum. Inte minst den mycket aktiva forskningen om exoplaneter som tagit fart under de senaste par decennierna (se även Dravins kapitel) ger intressanta målbilder för vilka olika typer av miljöer som förekommer på andra platser, och som således ger värdefull information för att konkretisera de allmänna betraktelserna om fysikaliska och kemiska förutsättningar för olika livsformer. Målet med detta kapitel är att ge en inblick i den aktuella förståelsen för dessa tre aspekter (liv på jorden, livets förutsättningar, och liv i universum) ur ett modernt molekylärt systemperspektiv, och därigenom öppna för en avslutande reflektion om kommande möjligheter och utmaningar inom detta snabbt avancerande forskningsområde. Livets molekylära komplexitet För att kunna föra en insiktsfull diskussion om alternativa livsformer behövs till att börja med en god förståelse för vår egen form av liv. Detta är dock något som har utvecklats påfallande sent ur ett historiskt perspektiv. Inom astronomin har man tvistat om olika tolkningar av observerade himlakroppar och deras egenskaper åtminstone sedan antiken, och fysiker har under århundraden utvecklat teorier för att förklara fysikaliska fenomen med Newtons gravitationsteori i Principia 39 Mathematica från 1686 som gott exempel. Biologerna har samlat in empiriska data och sedan Likt Linné i Systema Naturae från 1735 i allt högre grad även systematiserat sina iakttagelser. Däremot är den molekylära förståelsen för livet och dess inre beståndsdelar något som till största delen utvecklats först under de senaste hundra åren. Detta hänger i hög grad ihop med att molekyler och kemiska processer helt enkelt är för små eller snabba för att kunna observeras i detalj utan avancerade mätinstrument. Så även om kemin från sjuttonhundratalet gradvis övergick från medeltida alkemi till modern naturvetenskap, så har ändå många grundläggande aspekter om atomernas och molekylernas värld växt fram förhållandevis sent. Detta gäller inte minst den biokemiska förståelse som etablerades kring mitten av nittonhundratalet och som idag genomsyrar vår förståelse av hur livet fungerar. Med tanke på det korta tidsperspektivet är det kanske därför inte så konstigt att frågan om livets molekylära ursprung och utveckling är förhållandevis outvecklad. Att ge en fullständig bild av all kemi och biokemi som spelar in för förståelsen av livets ursprung och tidiga utveckling är naturligtvis inte möjlig i detta sammanhang, men några nedslag i historien kan lyftas fram för att illustrera den omfattande utveckling som skett och var vi står idag. Utvecklingen av det klassiska mikroskopet var ett viktigt steg för att i detalj studera livets beståndsdelar. Den engelske naturfilosofen Robert Hooke:s verk Micrographia från 1665 har gått till historien för att det för första gången nämner celler som sedan allt mer kommit att etableras som en grundenhet för alla levande varelser – vilket återspeglas i den kända uppdelningen av levande varelser i enrespektive flercelliga organismer. Däremot räcker inte de klassiska mikroskopens förstoringsförmåga ner till ca mikrometernivå (tusendels millimeter) för att studera enstaka molekyler vars strukturer är ytterligare ca tusen till tiotusen gånger mindre. För att bestämma strukturen hos grundläggande biomolekyler som proteiner och DNA krävdes därför än mer avancerad utrustning som exempelvis röntgenapparater vilka huvudsakligen utvecklats först från slutet av artonhundratalet och framåt. Sådana molekylstudier är fortfarande ett mycket aktivt forskningsområde, där mycket av frontlinjeforskningen för att undersöka hur det biokemiska maskineriet ser ut och fungerar ner på den minsta molekylära nivån numera bedrivs vid stora internationella forskningsanläggningar som MAX-IV och ESS (European Spallation Source) i Lund. Säkerligen har vår oförmåga att alls se de objekt som är av intresse i hög grad bidragit till att detta är ett forskningsområde som blommat ut först under nittonhundratalet. Däremot gjordes från sjuttonhundratalet många andra viktiga kemiska upptäcker som lagt grunden för vår förståelse av livet och dess samspel med naturen i övrigt. Den franske kemisten Antoine Lavoisier fann under sjuttonhundratalets andra hälft en tidig koppling mellan grundläggande kemiska processer och fysiologiska funktioner innan han föll offer för den franska revolutionen och guilliotinerades i 40 Paris 1794. Genom klassiska studier av syrets allmänna roll för förbränning kunde han genom att koppla marsvins inandning av syrgas (O2) och utandning av koldioxid (CO2) konstatera en av de mycket centrala grunderna för organismers energirelaterade molekylomvandlingsprocesser, nämligen att "andningen (respirationen) är alltså en förbränning". Insikten att kroppens energiomvandling är direkt relaterad till en klassisk kemisk förbränningsprocess och styrs av samma allmänna naturlagar som det grundläggande energibevarandet – illustrerat i Figur 2 – har i all sin enkelhet mycket långtgående konsekvenser för att förstå de molekylära förutsättningarna för livets uppkomst som en del av naturen i sin helhet, snarare än som ett separat fenomen med egna lagar. Det är dock talande att den allmänna uppfattningen även inom akademiska kretsar ända in på artonhundratalet genomsyrades av Vitalismen som gick ut på att det levande i grunden skulle vara väsensskilt från övrig "död" materia. Näringsrik mat kan här ses spela rollen av ett bränsle i en bil där motorn tar in bränslet och omvandlar energin till något användbart, men aldrig med någon närmare sammanblandning mellan bil och bränsle. Denna vitalism kunde dock den tyske kemisten Friedrich Wöhler effektivt avliva genom en helt laboratoriebaserad syntes 1828 av urea (även känt som urinämne eller karbamid, Figur 3) som anses som den första på konstgjord väg återskapade naturliga produkten. Efter att Wöhlers syntes av urea följts av en lång rad framgångsrika synteser av allt mer komplexa organiska och biokemiska substanser kan man konstatera att Figur 2: Cellerna i alla levande organismer utnyttjar energirik biomassa som bränsle för att ha råd att driva både kemiska och mekaniska processer, men för livets upprätthållande är det viktigt att förbränningen av biomassa sker under kontrollerade förhållanden så att inte all energi går åt på en gång likt ett majbål. Privat bild. 41 gränsen mellan naturliga och artificiella ämnen numera i hög grad är utsuddad. Naturens förmåga att hitta vägar att framställa ett brett spektrum av extremt komplicerade molekyler utmanar dock ofta fortfarande kemisternas kreativitet och kunnande att upprepa motsvarande bedrifter. Men alla dessa biomolekyler är i grunden uppbyggda av samma atomer och med samma typer av kemiska bindningar som alla andra molekyler, och det är uppenbart att det inte är något magiskt med livets kemi som sträcker sig bortom de allmängiltiga naturvetenskapliga grundprinciper som även styr all annan oorganisk materia. Utan att på något sätt förringa den, inordnar sig därför livets kemi i denna bemärkelse därför naturligt inom resten av de framväxande molekylära vetenskaperna med beröringspunkter såväl med kemi som med biologi, fysik, och geologi. Detta kan illustras genom att markera de vanligast förekommande atomslagen i levande organismer i det klassiska Periodiska Systemet som den ryske kemisten Dmitrij Mendelejev introducerade 1869 (se Figur 4). Redan för Charles Darwin som 1859 publicerat sin berömda bok Om Arternas Uppkomst var det därför naturligt att spekulera i livets eventuella molekylära ursprung. I ett brev från 1871 till sin botanikerkollega Joseph Dalton Hooker skriver Darwin (fritt översatt): "Det har ofta sagts att alla förutsättningar för det första bildandet av en levande organism nu föreligger, som någonsin kan ha förekommit. – Men tänk om (& vilket stort om) vi kunde föreställa oss en varm liten damm med alla slags salter av ammoniak och fosfor, ljus, värme, elektricitet etc. tillgängliga, så att en proteinmolekyl bildades, redo att genomgå ytterligare komplexa förändringar. Idag skulle sådana substanser genast slukas eller absorberas, men detta skulle inte ha skett innan levande varelser hade skapats." Figur 3: Kemisk struktur för urea (CO(NH2)2) som det första naturliga organiska ämne att framställas på konstgjord väg i ett laboratorium av Friedrich Wöhler 1828. 42 Figur 4: Periodiska Systemet med grönmarkering av grundämnen som är vanligt förekommande i levande organismer. Även om Darwins tidiga spekulationer föregriper många upptäckter av både strukturen av viktiga biomolekyler och många centrala biokemiska processer finns i alla fall ett uppenbart frö till förståelse av behovet för samspel mellan olika typer av molekylära komponenter och gynnsamma fysikaliska förutsättningar. Dessa tankegångar utvecklades vidare av den sovjetiske biokemisten Alexandr Oparin och den engelske vetenskapsmannen John Haldane vars oberoende insatser på 1920-talet mynnade ut i den så kallade Oparin-Haldane hypotesen för livets ursprung. Här etablerades för första gången ett relativt trovärdigt molekylärt scenario för livets ursprung som en kombination av alstrande och ansamling av organiska ämnen i en prebiotisk miljö alltså någon sorts enklare föregångare till den numera förhärskande biologiska världen. För detta introducerade de också begreppet "prebiotic soup" på engelska, eller "ursoppa" som vi ibland säger på svenska. När sedan den unge forskaren Stanley Miller tillsammans med sin mentor Harold Urey – på hösten 1951 för första gången slog på strömmen till det numera berömda Urey-Miller experimentet innehållande en blandning av vätgas, metan, vatten och ammoniak satte han inte bara igång en kemisk process som skapade biokemiska komponenter som aminosyror. Han startade också en kapplöpning 43 om att med moderna experimentella metoder förstå ett av de mest komplexa problem som den moderna vetenskapen fortfarande brottas med – frågan om hur livet uppstått och utvecklats från en livlös ursoppa med enkla kemiska substanser till dagens komplexa liv. Redan med relativt enkla kemiska apparatuppställningar som finns att tillgå i välsorterade kemilabb går det att göra en mängd informativa experiment (Figur 5). Sådana kan antingen syfta till att undersöka sådana kemiska reaktioner som kan tänkas motsvara de som rådde på den unga jorden när livet uppstod för första gången, eller användas för att bättre förstå under vilka betingelser sådana substanser bildas genom så kallad helsyntes av olika organiska och biokemiska molekyler (såsom DNA-fragment). Figur 5: Schemaskiss över Urey-Miller försök för att återskapa de första ursprungliga kemiska reaktionsstegen som slutligen ledde till livets uppkomst (vänster); experiment som relativt enkelt kan genomföras vid ett välutrustat kemilaboratorium (höger). Privat bild. Redan tidiga Urey-Miller försök påvisade bildandet av flera naturligt förekommande aminosyror. Men viktiga frågor har fortsatt att i stor utsträckning gäcka forskarvärlden. För det första har det länge varit fortsatt oklart om de väterika (så kallat "reducerande") kemiska förhållanden som förutsattes i de tidiga experimenten verkligen överensstämmer med förhållandena som rådde på den tidiga jorden. Det råder också fortfarande överlag omfattande osäkerhet kring vad som bör antas i fråga om kemisk sammansättning och fysikaliska förhållanden för denna tidiga utveckling. Detta blir naturligtvis inte enklare av insikten att det kan ha rått 44 vissa förhållanden över stora delar av jorden, men att livet kanske uppstod i någon speciell nisch – till exempel i någon speciell vulkaniskt aktiv miljö eller i samband med tillskott av särskilda organiska föreningar i samband med meteoritnedslag. Sådana hypoteser kan förefalla mer eller mindre sannolika, men är svåra att avfärda eller bedöma sannolikheten för utan ytterligare information, som i många fall saknas på grund av bristande geologiska spår. Kanske kan studier av unga exoplaneter i framtiden bidra med möjligheter att faktiskt studera förhållandena på planeter som kan ha liknat vår egen för länge sedan, men även dit är vägen än så länge lång. Ett uppmärksammat exempel från senare år som visar på framsteg av ny laboratoriebaserad syntes av olika ämnen där man i ett steg kokar ihop en ursprunglig lösning av olika grundsubstanser, är den engelske kemisten John Sutherlands lyckade försök att på helt konstgjord väg framställa olika RNA-fragment från enkla kemiska substanser som ammoniak och fosfater som rimligen kan ha funnits tillgängliga på den tidiga jorden. Detta visar ett möjligt steg på vägen mot en så kallad RNA-värld som många förespråkar som ett preludium till den "färdiga" biologin med DNA-molekylen som bärare av genetisk information. Många forskares fokus på RNA för livets tidiga utveckling har till stor del att göra med problemet att ett fungerande biokemiskt maskineri både måste kunna bidra till skapandet av nya Figur 6: Enkla aminosyror kopplas ihop genom en så kallad kondensationsreaktion för att skapa långa så kallade polypeptidkedjor (vänster). Sådana kedjor bildar sedan färdiga proteiner som är makromolekyler med bestämd struktur och aktiv biologisk funktion (höger). 45 biomolekyler och lagra information. Medan DNA som den klassiska bäraren av den genetiska koden är bra på det sistnämnda finns inga tecken på att DNA självt spelar en aktiv roll i tillverkningen av nya biomolekyler. Detta talar emot att den på egen hand skulle ha förmågan att aktivt driva den tidiga livsutvecklingen framåt. RNA har däremot visat sig i viss mån besitta båda funktionerna. Särskilt viktigt är att RNA har visat sig ha vissa katalytiska egenskaper. Detta betyder att den selektivt kan snabba upp vissa kemiska/biokemiska reaktioner vilket är en av grundpelarna för att ett visst molekylärt system ska kunna utveckla ett försprång över alla andra slumpmässiga kemiska processer. Detta utgör sedan grunden för något som gradvis kunnat utvidgas till den grad att livet uppnått en ointaglig särställning i fråga om basal fortplantningsförmåga och tillgodogörande av näring och andra resurser som krävs för bevarandet av ett självuppehållande system. Ett andra, och än mer grundläggande, problem med dessa försök att skapa komplexa biokemiska produkter har varit en omfattande brist på resultat som pekar bortom skapandet av enstaka – om än så imponerande – molekyler och makromolekylära fragment, som till exempel polypeptidkedjor, som ett steg på vägen mot fullfjädrade biologiska proteiner (Figur 6). Många eleganta röntgenkristallografiska studier har gett ett växande bibliotek med bekräftade strukturer av olika enzymer och makromolekylära strukturer som exempelvis ringar av ljusabsorberande antennmolekyler som ingår i fotosyntetiska organismer. Omfattande DNAsekvensering av arvsmassan hos olika organismer har under de senaste två decennierna genererat ytterligare kunskap om fler och fler enskilda biologiska strukturer. Särskilt parallellpubliceringen av den kompletta mänskliga arvsmassan år 2000 efter en tuff kapplöpning mellan ett internationellt akademiskt nätverk under namnet HUGO (en akronym för det engelska human genome project) och det nystartade genteknikföretaget Celera Genomics under ledning av den färgstarke bioteknikentreprenören Craig Venter, har gått till historien som given höjdpunkt i detta avseende. Men hur viktig all denna kunskap än är så saknas något mycket viktigt. Den moderna molekylärbiologin pekar tydligt på annan central aspekt för att förstå framväxten av liv behovet av ett helomfattande systemperspektiv. Även de enklaste encelliga organismerna innehåller ett mått av grundläggande strukturell organisation och ett imponerande biokemiskt maskineri, och för att förstå livets tidiga utveckling har biologer länge sökt efter spåren av de tidigaste organismerna genom att försöka identifiera de äldsta och mest grundläggande egenskaperna i tidiga organismer. Bland de epokgörande upptäckterna märks den amerikanske mikrobiologen Carl Woeses upptäckt från 1977 av så kallade arkéer som en förhållandevis enkel form av encellig organism som en tredje gren på livets träd utöver de två sedan tidigare kända huvudklasserna bakterier och så kallade eukaryota celler (celler med cellkärnor som såväl djur som växtriket stammar från). Arkéer återfinns ofta i miljöer som vi idag kan tycka extrema, men utmärker sig också ofta genom egenskaper som kan ha varit fördelaktiga när jorden var ung, som till 46 exempel förmågan att tillgodogöra sig all energi från energirika oorganiska näringsämnen (så kallad kemiautotrofi). Detta gör dem oberoende av den fotosyntes (se Figur 7) som idag dominerar energitillförseln för de flesta levande organismer antingen direkt eller indirekt – men som knappast varit fullt utvecklad under livets tidigaste skeden. Genom att följa spåren så långt tillbaka som möjligt går det att få en hyfsad uppfattning av de molekylära egenskaperna hos, om inte av den första levande organismen, så i alla fall av den sista gemensamma urcellen LUCA (Figur 8). Även som en ganska enkel cell utan många av de organeller – miniatyrorgan – som man kan se i mikroskop i mer utvecklade (eukariota) celler, så har här funnits ett tydligt skydd mot omvärlden i form av yttre membran inom vars ramar det funnits en väletablerad och fungerande arvsmassa (DNA) tillsammans med redan långt utvecklade system för diverse centrala biokemiska processer som skapande av biomassa och nedbrytning av näringsämnen för att tillgodogöra grundläggande energibehov. Membranen består företrädelsevis av fettliknande molekyler, och många av de basala biokemiska processerna drivs av enzymer med hög katalytisk aktivitet som får rätt saker att hända inne i cellerna. Även de så kallade ribosomerna utgör en viktig knutpunkt för att med hjälp av RNA "koda" över den genetiska koden till proteiner med korrekt ordning på de ingående aminosyrorna vilket gör att de måste ha funnits med mycket tidigt i någon ursprunglig form. Här Figur 7: Kontinuerlig tillgång till energi är ett av de mest grundläggande behoven för allt levande. Livet på jorden drivs sedan uppskattningsvis ett par miljarder år till allra största delen av solenergi som tas upp av växter och alger genom fotosyntesen. Ljuset tas upp av speciella antennmolekyler som klorofyll (inlägget). Bladens karakteristiska gröna färg är anpassad på molekylär nivå för att optimera energiupptagningen från det energirika solljuset. Privat bild. 47 visar sig behovet av ett molekylärt systemtänkande bortom enskilda typer av biomolekyler – för även de enklaste organismerna består uppenbarligen av många olika typer av molekyler som måste samverka för att ge livet dess karakteristiska kombination av överlägsen överlevnadsförmåga på den molekylära nivån genom en uthållighet och flexibilitet som enbart kan uppnås genom en hög grad av strukturell och biokemisk komplexitet. Molekylär evolution Med tanke på hur svårt det visat sig vara att på konstgjord väg återskapa ens enstaka komplexa biomolekyler i laboratorier är frågan var och hur ett så komplext system som en cell bestående av flera olika typer av biomolekyler med en rad olika mekaniska och biokemiska funktioner skulle kunnat uppstå av sig självt, helt utan hjälpande hand från exempelvis en nyfiken forskare som aktivt söker efter de mest gynnsamma näringsblandningarna och fördelaktiga reaktionsförhållandena? För att komma vidare med frågan om hur livet uppstått på jorden är det viktigt att bättre försöka förstå var, och under vilka förhållanden, detta kan tänkas ha skett. Ett stort problem med att förstå var livet har, eller åtminstone kan ha uppstått är svårigheten att i tillräcklig grad förstå hur det såg ut på tidiga jorden i fråga om kritiska kemiska och fysikaliska förutsättningar som atmosfärens och havens kemiska sammansättningar. Nästan alla konkreta spår har förstörts eller förvanskats Figur 8: Principskiss över den sista gemensamma urcellen (LUCA), bestående av ett yttre skyddande membran (svart) som innesluter såväl den DNAbaserade arvsmassan (blå) som diverse biokemiska system med enzymer för energiomsättning och biosyntes liksom ribosomer för proteintillverkning (röda). 48 efter omkring fyra miljarder år av omfattande geologisk aktivitet, inklusive både aktiv vulkanisk aktivitet och långsammare vittring, sedimentering och omvandling av berggrunden. Dessutom har livet självt haft betydande påverkan på hur jorden ser ut i dag. Till exempel anses fotosyntesen vara en av huvudorsakerna till en omfattande syresättning av atmosfären som med sin kraftigt oxiderande förmåga i grunden har förändrat den globala kemiska balansen, och ligger bakom geokemiska processer som bildandet av omfattande roströda randiga järnformationer ("banded iron") för ca två miljarder år sedan. Slutligen påverkas hela jorden av förändringar i solsystemet i stort, där till exempel solen idag skiner avsevärt starkare än när jorden bildades, samtidigt som nedfallen av meteoriter och annat rymdstoff kan ha påverkat tillgången till vatten och andra essentiella substanser successivt avtagit. Med sådana omfattande förändringar i fråga om såväl de geologiska, biologiska, och astronomiska förutsättningarna är det inte konstigt att det är svårt att med säkerhet säga hur det såg ut på jorden när livet uppstod. Här finns en uppenbart intressant koppling till pågående rymdforskning där en ökad förståelse av hur jorden såg ut när livet uppstod kan ge viktiga ledtrådar för vilken typ av miljöer som är intressantast att leta efter och studera ute i rymden – både inom vårt eget solsystem och bland alla nyupptäckta exoplaneter. Men även kunskapsöverföring i den omvända riktningen skulle kunna vara av betydande intresse i den mån nya rön inom rymdforskningen kan ge bättre inblick i tidiga exoplaneters atmosfärskemi, vilket i sin tur kan ge viktiga ledtrådar till hur det sett ut på den tidiga jorden. Även om det råder stor osäkerhet och ibland betydande oenighet om många konkreta detaljer om livets tidigaste utveckling, så finns det vissa grundförutsättningar som under alla omständigheter måste ha förelegat för den allra tidigaste utvecklingen innan det biokemiska maskineriet tagit form fullständigt. För det första måste livet naturligtvis ha utvecklats på en plats där det funnits riklig tillgång till lämpligt grundmaterial i fråga om organiska molekyler och mineraler. Genom att betrakta livets kemiska sammansättning går det att sluta sig till vissa av de viktigaste grundämnena som behövs. Här talas ofta om de sex huvudämnena "HCNOPS" (H: väte, C: kol, N: kväve, O: syre, P: fosfor, och S: svavel) som de grundämnen som huvudsakligen ingår i de biokemiska makromolekylerna som proteiner, DNA-strängar, kolhydrater och fetter. Men flera andra grundämnen har också viktiga funktioner om än i mindre mängder. Hit hör ämnen som kalium (K) och natrium (Na) vars joner spelar viktiga roller för att upprätthålla den kemiska balansen över olika membran. Även joner från järn och vissa andra så kallade övergångsmetaller utgör ofta centrala komponenter i exempelvis enzymer. Men rätt atomer flyter normalt inte omkring för sig själva och väntar på att radas upp i bestämd ordning. I stället gäller att utröna vilka sammansättningar av mineraler, salter, och enkla oorganiska och organiska föreningar som blandas eller ansamlas under olika förhållanden – vare det rör sig om små varma dammar eller i vulkaniskt aktiva områden. Den prebiotiska ursoppan torde under alla förhållanden ha 49 varit rik på såväl organiska beståndsdelar som mineraler och andra oorganiska komponenter. Här finns viktiga skillnader av mer teknisk karaktär, som att fundamentalt olika typer av kolföreningar tenderar att bildas beroende på den kemiska omgivningen. Ett enkelt men viktigt exempel på detta är den övergripande balansen mellan de två reaktiva beståndsdelarna syre och väte som ingår i de flesta biomolekyler. Finns det ett överskott av väte säger man att miljön är reducerande, och i extremfallet går varje kolatom ihop med fyra vätemolekyler och bildar metangas (CH4). Finns det däremot ett överskott av syre sägs miljön vara oxiderande, och det bildas i stället koldioxid (CO2). Livets kemi balanserar i mitten med de klassiska kolhydraterna som bildas i fotosyntesen som genererar biomassa med generella formler som (CH2O)x och som motsvarar längre molekylkedjor där såväl kol som syre och väte ingår. Så länge det är oklart var livet uppstod är det långt ifrån självklart vad de ursprungliga förhållandena var eller hur denna balans uppstod. En andra lika viktig grundförutsättning för livets tidiga utveckling har varit en rik och aldrig sinande tillgång till energi. Sedan fotosyntesen utvecklades för åtminstone ett par miljarder år sedan har det framgångsrika och effektiva utnyttjandet av solenergi kommit att dominera som livets energikälla. Det är den direkta energikällan såväl för växter som för många fotosyntetiserande mikroorganismer som de blågröna algerna vi förfasar oss över i samband med omfattande algblomning i Östersjön och andra vattendrag. Solenergin är i lika hög grad, fast indirekt, grunden för djurens energiförsörjning högre upp i näringskedjan. Från början måste det dock ha funnits andra, mer primitiva, energikällor för att skapa en kontinuerlig tillväxt av biomassa. Det är visserligen möjligt att tänka sig att någon initial blandning av reaktiva kemikalier skulle ha kunnat ge upphov till en mängd mer komplicerade molekyler – kanske till och med i riktning mot biomolekyler. Men de reaktiva komponenterna torde snabbt ta slut av sig själva, och reaktiva blandningar tenderar att gå mot en kemisk jämvikt där den molekylära utvecklingen först saktar in och sedan avstannar helt. Formuleringen av livet som ett självuppehållande system ska alltså inte förstås som något som inte tillgodogör sig både ämnen utifrån för att växa och energi för att fortsätta utvecklingen framåt med ständiga kemiska omvandlingsprocesser som kan vara nog så energikrävande. En nyckel till livets framgång är i stället en förmåga att tillgodogöra sig energitillskott av olika slag, och inte minst att systematiskt utnyttja olika naturligt förekommande kemiska obalanser. Till exempel finns det under rätt betingelser betydande energi att hämta ur mineralriket när järn rostar (eller oxideras som man säger mer generellt inom kemin). Men om vi tänker oss en primitiv cell så ter den sig nog rätt väsensskild från "rostande" järn. En orsak till framgång är dock förmågan att koppla den energi som frigörs vid "rostandet" till att driva viktiga men energikrävande biokemiska processer. Väl kontrollerade biokemiska cykler med många steg utgör grunden för dagens väloljade livsprocesser, men principen att låna energi för egna syften kan ha varit en tidig framgångsstrategi även med mer rudimentära 50 processer. Från början kan effektiviteten ha varit låg, men detta är en klassisk grogrund för en evolutionär utveckling där de mest framgångsrika processerna successivt genererat mest ny biomassa och så småningom kommit att dominera den prebiotiska världen. Det illustrerar också en allmän princip om hur det kan uppstå en sorts dynamisk ordning långt från jämvikt i komplexa system, något som tidigt diskuterades från ett allmänt termodynamiskt perspektiv av den belgiske nobelpristagaren Ilya Prigogine. En naturlig följdfråga gäller var, och under vilka betingelser, lämpliga miljöer för livets uppkomst uppstår. Eftersom de flesta kemiskt reaktiva omgivningarna snabbt skulle gå mot jämvikt ter det sig mest lämpligt att leta efter platser med ett kontinuerligt och rikligt energiflöde som kan upprätthålla den slags kemiska obalans som tidiga livsformer kan dra nytta av. Samtidigt pekar allt på att i alla fall jordelivet uppstått i en vattenrik miljö där vattnet i sig fyller en viktig funktion som lösningsmedel åt olika biokemiska substanser (Figur 9). Ett tidigt förslag från Alexandr Oparin och John Haldane som nämndes ovan var att starkt UV-ljus från solen skulle kunna tillhandahålla den nödvändiga energin. UV-ljuset bör dessutom ha varit starkare innan det skyddande ozonlagret hade bildats. UV-ljuset kan klyva Figur 9: Det är fortfarande en öppen fråga var livet först uppstod på den unga jorden. Att detta skedde i en vattenrik miljö är tämligen oomstritt, men om det var i en lugn och varm sjö ("warm little pond") som Darwin tänkte sig, på vattenytor där starkt UV-ljus från solen kunde trigga igång kemiska reaktioner som Alexandr Oparin höll för troligt (foto), eller i näringsrika områden med vulkanisk aktivitetlångt under havets yta (inlägg) som Michael Russell och William Martin med flera moderna forskare argumenterat för är fortfarande omtvistat. Däremot torde det vara rätt uppenbart att jorden, oavsett klimatförhållanden, måste tett sig mycket ödslig för en modern betraktare innan livet tog fart – utan tillstymmelse till det ymniga djur och växtriket varken på land eller i haven som vi normalt tar för givet. Privat bild. Magma 1200°C Saltvatten Mg2+, SO4 2Avkylningszon 100-500°C Havsvatten 2°C Mn2+, CH4, Fe 2+ FeS2, H2, H2S CO3 2-, HPO4 2- 51 många kemiska bindningar, så grunda vattendrag eller vattenbryn där det ansamlades organiska substanser uppfyller flera av de angivna grundkriterierna för lämpliga miljöer. En annan idé som vuxit sig stark under de senaste trettio åren är att leta efter mineraloch energirika undervattensmiljöer med vulkanisk aktivitet (Figur 9). Sådan vulkanisk aktivitet bidrar med energi som kan driva livsprocesser, och här finns intressanta miljöer som i viss mån utgör en motpol till grunden för RNAvärlden. Förespråkare för RNA-världen har traditionellt lagt mycket fokus på nukleinsyrornas goda förmåga att föra vidare genetisk information. Även om viss katalytisk förmåga demonstrerats så är denna förmåga förhållandevis måttlig. Om man i stället ser till många viktiga enzymers förmåga att spjälka näringsämnen inom det som kallas metabolism (och motsvarar matsmältning på den molekylära nivån), så är det slående hur många av dessa som får sin goda funktionsförmåga från reaktiva områden som innehåller antingen enstaka metalljoner eller i vissa fall små ansamlingar av några få metalljoner. Denna insikt framhölls på 1980-talet av Gűnter Wächtershäuser en tysk kemist verksam som patentingenjör i Műnchen. Särskilt vissa små järn-svavel områden (så kallade kluster) i enzymernas aktiva kärna är påfallande lika naturligt förekommande mineralfragment, vilket skulle kunna tyda på att de från början förekommit naturligt och utgjort en grogrund för en utveckling driven av effektiv metabolism i första hand. Detta kan ha förekommit naturligt vid vulkaniskt aktiva heta undervattenskällor på havets botten redan på den tidiga jorden. På engelska kallas sådana skorstensliknande formationer som reser sig från havets botten ofta "smokers" och kan beroende på rökutvecklingen karakteriseras som antingen vita eller svarta. Nya rön kring lämpliga mineralrika miljöer i vissa typer av "smokers", identifikation av molekylära nyckelprocesser, och en hypotes om så kallad serpentisering som ett sätt att skapa något liknande en primitiv cellulär struktur inuti dessa "skorstenar" har utvecklats av den amerikanske geologen och geokemisten Michael Russell och även populariserats av den brittiske biokemisten Nick Lane. Med höga tryck och temperaturer långt under havets botten ter sig dessa vulkaniska miljöer främmande och ogästvänliga för mycket av dagens liv – men intressant nog har vissa organismer påträffats som frodas även i dessa miljöer. Detta inkluderar inte minst vissa typer av värmeälskande (termofila) mikrober som enligt en omfattande analys av den i Tyskland verksamme amerikanske mikrobiologen William Martin har många likheter med LUCA – urcellen. Även med många luckor i förståelsen för hur livet verkligen började, så går det i alla fall att skönja vissa grundprinciper för hur den prebiotiska ursoppan kan ha utvecklats till det fullfjädrade liv vi ser omkring oss. Det finns således visst hopp om att fortsatt forskning ska kunna överbrygga den än idag fortfarande relativt svaga kopplingen mellan möjliga prebiotiska processers utvecklingsmöjligheter och den tidigaste biologiska utvecklingen. Här finns flera intressanta frågor ur ett 52 allmänt evolutionärt perspektiv, vilka har att göra med utvecklingen av den darwinistiska evolutionsprincipen ur en öppnare prebiotisk process där denna form av biologisk evolution ännu inte hunnit etableras. För kemiska system gäller i grunden enklare villkor där kemiska reaktioner sker enligt allmänna naturvetenskapliga principer. En första huvudregel är att reaktioner spontant går mot stabilare produkter – vilket diskuterades ovan i samband med behovet att koppla ihop energikrävande processer inom en cell med motsvarande energitillskott från externa källor. För reaktioner där reaktanter och produkter har någorlunda lika energi inställer sig normalt sett en jämvikt mellan dessa vars exakta värde beror på diverse omständigheter som den yttre temperaturen med mera. Men i ett komplext system kommer det att finnas en närmast obegränsad mängd reaktioner som kan ske ur ett rent energiperspektiv – och frågan är hur något system kan ha utvecklats med selektiv anrikning av vissa komplexa molekyler. I ett system som utvecklas fritt – vilket förefaller troligt i en prebiotisk omgivning innan mer omfattande kontrollmekanismer kommit på plats – finns inte minst en överhängande risk att ett system efter någon tid helt enkelt faller isär i enkla och stabila slutprodukter som vatten (H2O), koldioxid (CO2), och kvävgas (N2). Det är dock långt ifrån alltid som en reaktiv blandning snabbt ger de energimässigt mest stabila produkterna. Många reaktioner går i normala fall mycket långsamt även om slutresultatet ger en betydande energivinst. Detta är viktigt eftersom det betyder att det är fullt möjligt att skapa komplexa biomolekyler utan att de direkt faller sönder. Det betyder också att det ofta är de snabbaste reaktionsvägarna som vinner, även om de totalt sett ger mindre energivinster. Man säger att sådana reaktioner är kinetiskt kontrollerade (en term som har med reaktionshastighet att göra) snarare än att de är termodynamiskt kontrollerade (alltså styrda av den övergripande energivinsten). Förmågan att styra utfallet av kemiska reaktioner är något som kemister använt flitigt för att ta fram nya och spännande syntetiska produkter. Men även livet kan på denna molekylära nivå i någon mån sägas ha möjlighet att hinna undan värmedöden (det vill säga tillstånd utan fri energi) – bara det går tillräckligt snabbt. Den svenske kemisten Svante Arrhenius bidrog också med en viktig grundläggande insikt om att reaktionshastigheten för de flesta reaktioner är starkt temperaturberoende, men också att olika reaktioner kan ha olika starkt temperaturberoende så att en reaktion som är relativt sett långsam vid en viss temperatur kan visa sig vara den snabbaste vid en annan temperatur. Allt detta bäddar för möjligheten att det kan bildas komplexa prebiotiska molekyler under rätt begynnelseförhållanden. Frågan kvarstår dock vad som kan ha lett till en sådan framgång – för att inte säga global dominans – som det komplexa livet uppvisar. Något som varit avgörande för förmågan att styra industriella reaktioner är utnyttjandet av vissa ämnens katalytiska förmåga – det vill säga förmågan att starkt påverka reaktionshastigheten utan att själv förbrukas i processen. Detta fenomen återfinns också inom den biokemiska världen, främst i form av katalytiskt aktiva 53 enzymer. Dessa kan selektivt mångdubbla hastigheten för vissa reaktioner. Vissa molekyler kan dessutom bidra till att snabba upp reaktioner i vilka de själva ingår. Man talar då om så kallad autokatalys, och detta skulle kunna fungera som ett sätt för vissa prebiotiska substanser att uppnå det nödvändiga försprång som krävs för början till en mer selektiv ansamling av just dessa substanser. Det är också känt att vissa kedjor av molekyler – så kallade polymerer – kan bildas med ökad hastighet genom en molekylär aktivering som fortplantar sig genom kedjan så att ändarna förblir reaktiva och mottagliga för tillägg av flera länkar till den aktiverade kedjan. Man kan också se hur vissa sammansättningar av molekyler skulle kunna utvecklas om de bidrar sinsemellan till fördelaktiga katalytiska processer i enkla biokemiska cykler. Den israeliske biokemisten Addy Pross har beskrivit sådana processer i termer av så kallad dynamisk kinetisk stabilitet. Här skulle kunna utvecklas ett selektionstryck som ett förstadium till den senare utmejslade darwinistiska evolutionen. Detta har också diskuterats med ett likartat uttryck av så kallat självpåskyndande ("self speeding" på engelska) vilket knyter an till den autokatalytiska förmågan hos vissa molekyler att ge sig själva ett numerärt överläge genom att själva bidra till att öka hastigheten med vilken de bildas. Med dessa insikter vore det spännande om det gick att uppskatta sannolikheten för att liv ska uppstå mer generellt i olika "aktiva" miljöer. Det skulle kunna belysa både var, och under vilka förhållanden, det är störst chans att livet på jorden utvecklades, men också ha vidare betydelse för sökandet efter liv på andra platser i universum. En sådan bild skulle kunna klargöra intressanta kombinationer av både fysikaliska förhållanden (tryck, temperatur, och ljusförhållanden) med kemiska förutsättningar i fråga om till exempel pH och förekomst av olika mineral och näringsämnen. Vissa miljöer, som till exempel de underjordiska källorna, ger naturliga variationer av till exempel temperatur så här kan finnas en naturlig tillgång till olika förhållanden. För en mer komplett bild måste dock den omfattande molekylära komplexiteten i prebiotiska system beaktas, vilka gör dessa system svåranalyserade bortom de allmänna principer som diskuterades i föregående stycken. Samtidigt är antagligen komplexiteten inte att betrakta som något nödvändigt ont, utan snarare som en grundförutsättning för livets framväxt genom de omfattande möjligheter till variationsrikedom och återkoppling som kan antas ha bidragit till att ge redan de tidiga livsformerna unika egenskaper i fråga om motståndskraft och överlevnadsförmåga. En viktig aspekt för den fortsatta forskningen kan därför vara att snarast bejaka komplexiteten och se vilken förståelse som kan uppnås ur studier av verkligt komplicerade molekylära processer långt bortom de typiska laboratorieförsök som görs att bena ut reaktionshastigheter och mekanismer för enskilda reaktioner en åt gången. Storskaliga kombinatoriska experiment skulle kunna vara en väg framåt, men detta ser också ut som ett lämpligt område för omfattande datorsimuleringar av öppna kemiska problem där även moderna metoder som genetiska algoritmer och djupinlärning skulle kunna bidra till att utröna, 54 om inte hur livet på jorden de facto uppstod, så under vilka molekylära förutsättningar det finns goda möjligheter till uppkomsten och utvecklingen av verkligt komplexa och dynamiska molekylära system. Nya horisonter från syntetisk biologi till biomimetik Liv och alternativa livsformer kan också betraktas från ett helt annat perspektiv som i stället tar fasta på den moderna forskningen kring livets molekylära mekanismer och egenskaper. Omfattande framsteg har gjorts under de senaste årtiondena för att bättre förstå livets kemi i allmänhet, och hur arvsmassan styr produktionen av olika proteiner med mera i synnerhet. Den moderna gentekniken ger effektiva verktyg för att avläsa arvsmassan för hela organismer, och efter fördjupade studier är det i allt högre grad möjligt att förstå vilka DNA-sekvenser som ansvarar för framställning av olika proteiner, och vilka mutationer som leder till avgörande förändringar av deras egenskaper. Men den moderna gentekniken har också gett kraftfulla verktyg som den omtalade CRISPR-Cas9 metoden för genmodifiering som bland annat den franska forskaren Emmanuelle Charpentier, som under några år verkade i Umeå, tog fram. Detta har gjort att det i allt större utsträckning är möjligt att skräddarsy DNA-strängar och manipulera olika organismers DNA. Här öppnar sig spännande möjligheter att bota ärftliga sjukdomar och kromosomförändringar inom sjukvården, men som nästan alltid när det gäller så radikala ingrepp i människor och andra levande varelser finns också betydande farhågor för missbruk och oanade negativa konsekvenser när forskningen och tekniken kommer in på helt okänd mark. I dagens globala och tävlingsinriktade forskningsvärld går den tekniska utvecklingen snabbt framåt i många olika länder med olika forskningstraditioner och lagar, samtidigt som många frågor om etik, juridik med mera behöver besvaras både nationellt och internationellt. I detta kapitel står förståelsen av den molekylära världen i fokus snarare än tillhörande samhällsfrågor i vidare bemärkelse (se emellertid Melins kapitel för en diskussion av några av de etiska frågor som kan uppstå i samband med den syntetiska biologin), och då är det intressant att betrakta de möjligheter till genetiska variationer som dessa tekniker för med sig lite mer ingående. Att klippa och klistra i DNA-sekvenserna ger till att börja med möjligheter att studera olika genetiska variationsmöjligheter inom vad man skulle kunna säga är livets befintliga paradigm. Det går att både ta bort och lägga till valda delar och se om någon speciell funktion faller bort eller förändras. Alternativt går det att föra över delar av den genetiska koden från en organism till en annan. I det enklaste fallet kan arvsmassan för ett visst enzym, som tillverkar något unikt protein, från en organism isoleras och introduceras i en helt annan organism. På så sätt kan man göra allt från enkla genetiska tester som att ändra färgen på en grönsak till att exempelvis försöka påverka dess växtförmåga eller motståndskraft mot skadedjur. Sådan avancerad genmanipulation testas på allt från enkla mikroorganismer till växter och djur. Ett 55 aktuellt exempel är omfattande försök att få cyanobakterier som Nostoc punctiforme att i högre grad generera energirik vätgas vilket aktivt utvecklas för en hållbar energiframställning i bioreaktorer. Här finns förhoppningen att i accelererande takt kunna designa organismer med förändrade egenskaper. Denna typ av försök ger samtidigt också omfattande ny kunskap om hur olika cellulära processer hänger ihop, där det i många fall inte alls är så enkelt som att man kan "transplantera" en gen från en varelse till en annan utan att samtidigt ta i beaktande samspelet mellan flera olika kontrollsystem och sammanlänkade biokemiska processer. Genom att steg för steg byta ut alla naturliga delar av ett genom i en enkel encellig organism kunde den beryktade amerikanske genomforskaren och entreprenören Craig Venter 2010 presentera Mycoplasma laboratorium (eller "Synthia") – den första helt och hållet syntetiska organismen som framställts med modern genteknik i ett laboratorium. Efter ytterligare några års arbete presenterades 2016 en omarbetad version med bara 473 gener som sägs innehålla den minsta nödvändiga genetiska koden för en fungerande organism. Det går med andra ord inte att ta bort någon ytterligare av de kvarvarande generna utan att den nedbantade Synthia slutar att fungera. Denna lilla kärna av essentiella gener kan jämföras med människans ca 20.000 gener, vilket säger en del om livets komplexitet. Även om Synthia och andra genmanipulerade organismer visar på de omfattande möjligheter som den moderna gentekniken erbjuder, så har mycket av forskningen handlat om att manipulera befintliga DNA-strängar. Synthias gener må vara artificiellt skapade, men de bygger ändå på existerande kunskap om DNA-baserade geners egenskaper. Det ger goda förutsättningar för att testa gränserna för genmanipuleringen, och ger en annan ingång jämfört med mer klassiska studier av genetisk anpassningsförmåga för att studera extrema variationer exempelvis för att försöka anpassa mikroorganismer till extrema miljöer (till exempel för kolonisering av månen eller Mars om så skulle anses önskvärt). En uppenbar fördel kan vara de goda möjligheterna att med banbrytande teknik förena egenskaper från helt olika organismer för att till exempel skapa en mikroorganism som både tål låga temperaturer och stark strålning som man kan förvänta sig på månen som saknar jordens skyddande atmosfär. Sådana möjligheter diskuteras ofta inom mer eller mindre spekulativa grenar av rymdforskningen som en väg att utnyttja biologiska vägar för så kallad "terraforming" som går ut på att i grunden förändra förutsättningarna på andra himlakroppar som månen eller Mars för att göra dessa miljöer mer beboeliga och lämpade för en förestående mänsklig kolonisering. Om detta är önskvärt eller försvarbart kan sedan diskuteras ur en mängd perspektiv som inkluderar såväl genetiska som interplanetära moraliska och juridiska frågeställningar. Ett annat spår är att med nyskapande molekylär syntes i grunden gå ifrån det levande paradigmet med DNA och RNA som bärare av den genetiska koden och på så sätt skapa mer radikalt annorlunda helsyntetiska organismer. Här finns potentialen att ge en mer heltäckande bild av hur unik livets kemiska sammansättning 56 är, och hur stora variationsmöjligheter som finns såväl under normala biologiska förhållanden som under andra mer extrema betingelser. Kanske finns det exempelvis alternativ till DNA som arvsmassa som passar bättre under starkt UV-ljus som är känt för att vara skadligt för DNA? Vägen till fullt utvecklade rivaler till det existerande livet är mycket lång, men det är i alla fall möjligt att identifiera viktiga steg på en sådan väg. Detta faller inom ett större perspektiv av omfattande "biomimetisk" molekylär forskning som söker härma olika biologiska funktioner och inkluderar allt från mekaniska egenskaper som starka silkestrådar och hala hajskinn till mer avancerade kemiska funktioner som artificiella motsvarigheter till enzymer och försök att på konstgjord väg efterlikna fotosyntesens förmåga att omvandla solljus till biomassa. Samtidigt gäller det att inte underskatta komplexiteten och systemtänkandet som diskuterats ovan som något som särskiljer levande system från mer ordinära molekylära mekanismer. Här finns fortfarande många obesvarade frågor för fortsatta experiment, inte minst rörande möjligheterna att säga något om alternativa livsformer under annorlunda förhållanden som tas upp ur ett astrobiologiskt perspektiv i nästa avsnitt. Figur 9: Utforskandet av olika platser inom vårt eget solsystem ger viktig information om utomjordiska miljöer, som en tidig bild av fruset marslandskap från Vikingsonden (vänster). Analyser av plymer av stoff från kometen Churyumov-Gerasimenko observerade med Rosetta-sonden har gett information om olika kemiska komponenter som fruset vatten och organiska föreningar (höger). Foto: NASA (vänster) och ESA / Rosetta / MPS (höger). Molekylär astrobiologi Frågor om livets uppkomst och utvecklingsmöjligheter får helt andra perspektiv som ännu obesvarade centralfrågor inom astrobiologin som företrädelsevis rör förekomsten av – och tecken på – liv i universum. Sådana frågor om liv i rymden har länge intresserat såväl forskare som folk i allmänhet. Utan ordentlig kunskap om hur det ser ut bortom vår egen horisont är det lätt att ställa fantasieggande 57 frågor, men desto svårare att ge några konkreta svar. Mycket av den livliga vetenskapliga diskussion som förs inom detta område kan vid en första anblick tyckas relativt vidlyftig jämfört med många mer vardagsnära och konkreta forskningsproblem, men det hindrar inte att det går att föra sunda resonemang baserat på tillgänglig kunskap även om man får acceptera att eventuella slutsatser tills vidare får gälla som preliminära och behäftade med omfattande osäkerheter. Som Dravins beskriver i sitt kapitel, så har forskningen gått framåt avsevärt på flera viktiga områden bara under de senaste par decennierna. Inom solsystemet, som i astronomiska termer får räknas till vårt eget närområde, har kunskapen om andra miljöer på till exempel Mars, flera av Jupiters och Saturnus månar, och olika kometer och småplaneter gått framåt avsevärt genom icke-bemannade rymdsonder (Figur 10). Många platser förefaller markant ogästvänliga för oss själva liksom för alla kända livsformer på jorden. Inte minst är många miljöer så kalla att den mesta biologiska aktiviteten skulle avstanna. Numera finns dock belägg för livsviktigt vatten i både flytande och frusen form på flera olika platser, där möjligheterna till flytande hav under några av Jupiters och Saturnus månars istäckta ytor kanske är de enskilt intressantaste outforskade miljöerna som vi kommer att kunna utforska på plats med rymdsonder inom överskådlig framtid. Heta miljöer, som Venus med sin för oss mycket giftiga atmosfär, får anses vara av betydande intresse ur ett bredare perspektiv av alternativa molekylära processer, men utan mer kunskap om lokala förhållanden är det mycket osäkert vilka typer av komplexa kemiska processer som skulle kunna uppstå, utvecklas, eller överleva. Jordens extremofiler har dock lärt oss att miljöer som för Figur 10: Artistisk representation av exoplanet i Trappist-systemet. Bild NASA/JPL-Caltech 58 oss framstår som mycket giftiga i själva verket kan innebära möjligheter för levande organismer som anpassat sig till de rådande förhållandena. Frågan är då om något livsliknande system kunnat uppstå och dra fördel av den aktiva omsättningen av kemikalier som förekommer för att hitta en kontinuerlig energiförsörjning för skapande av komplexa, biologiskt jämförbara processer. För att få svar på detta krävs dock med största sannolikhet närmare undersökningar på plats – något som hittills visat sig svårgörligt i den förhärskande korrosiva miljön. En av de mest betydelsefulla utvecklingarna inom astronomin de senaste 25 åren har – som Dravins skriver om i sitt kapitel – varit upptäckten, och det begynnande utforskandet av, ett stort antal exoplaneter. Detta har i ett slag förändrat den astrobiologiska spelplanen fullständigt – från en handfull intressanta platser att studera inom vårt eget solsystem har det nu även visat sig finnas ett stort antal exoplaneter värda att undersöka närmare med avseende på fysikaliska och kemiska Figur 11: Nebulosan "Pillars of Creation" fotograferad med Hubble-teleskopet. Bild: NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI / AURA). Urval av prototypiska astromolekyler (infälld ruta). 59 livstecken. Även om detaljerade studier av exempelvis exoplaneters atmosfärer ännu är i sin linda, ges fältet kontinuerliga knuffar framåt av nya upptäckter av exoplaneter som liknar vår egen jord till storlek och förhållanden (se Figur 11) och som ger en inblick i den variationsrikedom som förekommer utanför vårt eget solsystem. Rent statistiskt finns nu också goda belägg för ett svindlande stort antal potentiellt beboeliga miljöer i universum i sin helhet. Ett par av de centrala molekylära frågorna inom astrobiologin handlar om vad som utgör lovande molekylära miljöer för att liv ska uppstå, samt att identifiera molekylära markörer för liv i rymden. Det kan till exempel handla om det går att sluta sig till om det finns liv på en avlägsen exoplanet genom att studera sammansättningen av atmosfärsgaser på en exoplanet – något som är ett aktivt och lovande forskningsområde för detaljerade spektroskopiska studier inom astronomin och som diskuteras i Dravins kapitel. Ytterligare en aspekt som är värd att ta upp här är att se i vilken mån de centrala aspekterna av ett systemtänkande kring liv som en komplex molekylär process passar in på det som vi vet om olika miljöer ute i rymden. Här bör man kanske inte utesluta möjligheten att det kan finnas livsformer som är ännu mer annorlunda än vi kan föreställa oss, men frågan om något livsliknande molekylärt system skulle kunna tänkas utvecklas utanför vårt eget solsystem är både nog så svår och intressant för att vara värd att begrunda. Stora delar av universum utgörs av interstellär rymd som är mestadels både kall och allt för tom på materia för att te sig riktigt intressant. Förutom färdigbildade stjärnor som likt vår egen sol har planeter kretsande kring sig finns det dock även så kallade nebulosor som i alla fall med astronomiska mått mätt är mycket aktiva molekylära miljöer med gasmoln och i vissa fall områden med aktivt bildande av nya stjärnor och planeter (Figur 12). I sådana gasmoln kan förhållandevis komplexa molekyler bildas, och under gynnsamma omständigheter även observeras. Det finns spektroskopiska belägg för förekomsten av både biologiskt relevanta substanser som enkla aminosyror, och bildandet av större organiska föreningar som så kallade polycykliska aromatiska kolväten (PAH). Frågan är om något mer komplext kemiskt system skulle kunna bildas redan ute i rymden, snarare än enbart på färdigbildade planeter och andra fasta himlakroppar. Det finns idag inga vetenskapliga belägg för bildandet av mer komplicerade kemiska system ute i rymden. Däremot är det god tillgång på energi där strålning från omgivande stjärnor kan bidra till att skapa kemiskt reaktiva miljöer genom brytning av kemiska bindningar och skapandet av högreaktiva så kallade fria radikaler. Dessutom finns möjligheter till betydande ansamlingar av organisk materia i så kallad smutsig is som kan förekomma antingen fritt i partikelform eller på ytor av rymdgrus, kometer och andra fasta himlakroppar som börjar formas redan innan ett solsystem är färdigbildat. Två relaterade faktorer som baserat på aktuell kunskap talar emot förekomsten av mer komplexa organismer är bristen på flytande vatten kombinerat med generellt låga reaktionshastigheter vid kalla 60 temperaturer. För kalla gasmoln så kan smutsig is bildas men även om strålning skulle ge upphov till kemiskt aktiva radikaler så ser ett livsliknande kemiskt system ut att kräva snabbt och mångfalt upprepade cykler av kemiska reaktioner för att nå ett högre stadium av komplexitet. För varmare gasmoln, till exempel nära en nyvaknande stjärna, återstår frågan hur ett komplext system skulle bildas utan en stabil och sammanhängande våt miljö som de sjöar och hav som kan bildas på planeter med gynnsamma temperaturer för flytande vatten. Här kan möjligen nya rön om mer varierade rymdförhållanden ge nya impulser, men även om fullfjädrat liv inte skulle utvecklas utanför en planetär miljö är det en intressant fråga hur komplexa molekyler och reaktionskedjor som bildas ute i rymden. En ännu obesvarad fråga är exempelvis om de interstellära gasmolnen kan bidra i någon större utsträckning till skapandet av organiska föreningar som sedan bidrar till planeters molekylära sammansättning efter tidigt bombardemang av smutsiga kometer och liknande nedfall av rymdstoff. Figur 12: Aktivt bildande av en ung stjärna HL Tauri med tillhörande protoplaneter avbildad med ALMA (vänster). Bild: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO). Översikt över grundämnenas relativa förekomst (logaritmisk skala) som indikation på tillgängliga atomer som byggstenar för molekylär utveckling (höger). Slutligen, och kanske allra intressantast ur ett molekylärt systemperspektiv, är själva bildandet av nya system med stjärnor och (exo)planeter (Figur 13). Här finns en möjlighet att med konkreta observationer förstå hur den tidiga jorden och vårt eget solsystem bildades och att se hur olika de processerna kan se ut beroende på den astronomiska omgivningen. I vilket skede läggs grunderna för senare utveckling i fråga om tillgång till vatten och de första organiska föreningarna? Och hur varierande är de fysikaliska och kemiska förhållandena under den första avgörande tiden för unga planeter inom den beboeliga zonen? Om dessa frågor vet vi ännu mycket lite, men de kan tydligt pekas ut som några av de intressantaste aspekterna 61 att studera vidare i takt med att förmågan att observera sådana okända miljöer successivt förbättras med till exempel nya och mer kraftfulla rymdteleskop. Med mer omfattande kunskap om sådana förhållanden kommer vi att ha mycket bättre förutsättningar att sätta in vårt eget liv i ett större sammanhang av uppkomst av liv i beboeliga miljöer ur ett mer universellt och allmängiltigt perspektiv. Sammanfattande reflektioner och utblick Den moderna forskningen har gett djupa insikter i hur livet fungerar ner i minsta molekylära beståndsdel, och omfattande försök bedrivs nu i många forskningslaboratorier för att testa och tänja på livets gränser. Samtidigt börjar vi för första gången i historien närma oss en djupare förståelse av jordens och solsystemets tidiga utveckling, liksom vi börjar få kunskap om hur vårt eget solsystem ser ut i förhållande till en mängd andra platser i universum. Om inget radikalt förändras lär denna vetenskapliga och tekniska utveckling fortsätta med oförminskad fart mot bättre kunskap, men också mot bättre förmåga att manipulera livet ända ner på den mest grundläggande genetiska och molekylära nivån. Detta kapitel har syftat till att teckna en någorlunda översiktlig bild av liv och livsprocesser ur ett allmänt molekylärt perspektiv, med fokus på ett komplext systemperspektiv. Många detaljer kring jordelivets uppkomst och utveckling är ännu, och kommer kanske alltid att förbli, okända. I stället är det för denna bok relevant att försöka ge en bredare bild av olika förutsättningar och de variationsmöjligheter som kan anas, vad gäller både tekniska landvinningar och alternativa extrema miljöer, om än fortfarande ofta i något abstrakta termer. När det astrobiologiska och prebiotiska sökandet efter andra livsformer respektive livets uppkomst, än så länge i första hand kan karakteriseras som nyfikenhetsdriven forskning, så ställer många av de snabba tekniska landvinningarna inom genteknik och syntetisk biologi oss och hela vårt samhälle inför flera svåra frågor om lagar och etik. Utan att här föregripa några slutsatser om vad som är rätt och rimligt i fråga om hur vi bör förhålla oss till många av de nya möjligheterna att manipulera liv eller till och med skapa helt nya livsformer, så är det tydligt att det är viktigt att vara beredd på denna utveckling. Snabba eller oförutsedda genombrott kan snabbt ändra hela spelplanen till exempel i fråga om att erbjuda genmodifikationer för människor eller foster. Det är lätt att underskatta vidden av de förändringar på gott och ont som nu sker. Detta är också ett område som är upplagt för konflikter mellan motstridiga intressen från olika aktörer som forskare, företag, nationer, politiska rörelser, religioner, och intresseorganisationer som alla kan tänkas ha starka åsikter om hur nya upptäckter, möjligheter och risker ska bedömas. Allt som allt framträder bilden av en omfattande samhällsutmaning som det är viktigt att vi står rustade att möta med ingående kunskap och insikt, snarare än med fördomar eller fromma förhoppningar. 62 Lästips Atkins, Peter (2011) Reactions – The Private Life of Atoms Oxford University Press Ball, Philip (1994) Designing the Molecular World Princeton University Press Ellervik, Ulf (2016) Ursprung Fri Tanke Ernberg, Ingemar; Aurell, Erik; Blomberg, Claes; Cöster, Joakim; Malmnäs, PerErik (2010) Vad är liv i kosmos, i cellen, i människan? Karolinska University Press Lane, Nick (2010) Life Ascending Profile books Persson, Petter (2013) "Universums molekylära utveckling" i Dunér, David (red.) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet Pross, Addy (2012) What is Life? How Chemistry Becomes Biology Oxford University Press Sjöström, Jörgen (2010) På spaning efter livets ursprung Norstedts Stenholm, Björn (red.) (2012) Astrobiologi Liber 63 DEL 2: Utomjordiskt liv 64 65 Liv långt ute i rymden? Dainis Dravins Finns det liv någonstans utanför jorden? Och i så fall, hur kan man veta detta? Frågan om liv i rymden har engagerat människor från historiens tidigaste gryning och varje tidsepok har burit på sina speciella tankar om vilka tecken i skyn som kan tolkas som belägg för liv långt därute. I detta kapitel följer vi de växlande föreställningar som präglat forskningen från 1800-talet fram till våra dagar, men blickar även framåt mot kommande projekt. et finns flera hundra miljarder stjärnor bara i vår egen galax Vintergatan. De åtskilliga tusentals stjärnor i vår närhet som hittills kunnat undersökas i mer detalj har visat att planeter är vanliga och troligen kretsar det åtskilliga kring de flesta stjärnor. Detta vet vi säkert. Men hittills känner vi bara till liv på en enda av dessa planeter. Hur kan vi dra slutsatser om det verkligen finns liv även långt ute i rymden, dit vi ännu inte förmår att själva färdas, utan måste lita till rymdsondernas mätningar eller fjärrobservationer med teleskop? Att leta efter liv i rymden är svårt. Extra svårt blir det eftersom vi inte vet riktigt vad som man egentligen ska leta efter eller hur man ska tolka de möjliga tecken på liv som man möjligen lyckas hitta. Men det är svårt att entydigt tolka det okända. Ännu under 1900-talet trodde man att årstidsväxlingar på Mars berodde på ömsom grönskande och torkande växtlighet innan man insåg att det bara var sand som sveptes med vårens bris och höstens stormar. Med stora teleskop söker man nu efter planeter kring andra stjärnor där det finns vatten och syre. Men hur kan man veta om det också bor livsformer i dess vatten? Och svårast att avgöra är om det rentav finns varelser som bygger på helt andra principer än de jordiska, kanske resultatet av en teknologisk snarare än en biologisk utveckling?? Redan i avlägsen forntid: Australiens aboriginer De äldsta existerande kulturerna på jorden är nog de som bärs upp av Australiens urinvånare, aboriginerna, vars muntliga traditioner sträcker sig kanske femtio tusen år tillbaka. Bland traditionella föreställningar finns att de avlidna färdas till förfädernas land, där deras lägereldar brinner med fladdrande lågor längs stranden av den stora flod som går tvärs över himlen. Att de avlidna tryggt anlänt till sina förfäders land bekräftar de genom att till jorden sända ner kanoterna i vilka de D 66 färdats, vilka då syns brinna upp som sken över himlen. Numera identifierar vi dessa fladdrande lägereldar med blinkande stjärnor, stråket över himlen kallar vi Vintergatan och lysande meteorer kallar vi stjärnfall, fastän vi numera vet att det förstås inte är stjärnor utan bara grus som faller in i jordatmosfären och brinner upp. Men tanken att betrakta företeelser på himlen och koppla dem till liv ute i rymden fanns alltså redan under människosläktets förhistoriska tid. Nyare tid: Naturvetenskapens intåg Under historisk tid grubblade inte minst de gamla grekerna över bebodda världars mångfald. Kunde kanske månen vara bebodd eller var det ändå något som gjorde jorden speciell? Diskussionerna då och även under medeltiden byggde på vad man menade var logiska argument. Även religiösa teser fördes fram: om det fanns en allsmäktig gud, skulle han då ha avstått att skapa liv på många planeter och kanske nöjt sig med bara jorden? Dessa typer av resonemang ändrades i och med naturfilosofins framväxt under 1600och 1700-talen. Nu avsåg man att systematiskt studera och försöka förklara naturen genom att undersöka den med experiment och observationer som kunde upprepas och kontrolleras av även andra forskare. Vid mitten av 1800-talet hade denna naturvetenskapliga metod blivit ledande såväl inom samhällsutvecklingen (inte minst för industrialiseringen), som inom frågan om liv ute i rymden. I vår betraktelse ansluter vi nu vid 1800-talets mitt: 1800-talets populärvetenskap och Camille Flammarion En inflytelserik astronom under det senare 1800-talet var fransmannen Camille Flammarion (1842-1925). Han hade ett eget observatorium och grundade även det franska astronomiska sällskapet, fullt aktivt än i dag. Han var dock inte så mycket av en forskande astronom som en enormt produktiv författare som skrev en mängd populära böcker om rymden. Vissa hade inslag av mysticism och vad man måste kalla vetenskapliga fantasier; även beskrivningar av observerade företeelser i kosmos saknade ofta klara gränser mellan vad som var vetenskapligt belagt och vad som var hans egna funderingar eller fria fantasier. Hans skickliga penna och entusiasmerande texter rönte enorma framgångar. Böckerna trycktes i stora upplagor, översattes till många språk och inspirerade ett par generationer till studier av världsalltet. Av Flammarions mer än femtio böcker har tio översatts till svenska. Ett av hans mest bekanta verk – om bebodda världarnas mångfald – kom ut på franska år 1862 och på svenska 1866: Bebodda verldar eller vilkoren för himlakropparnas beboelighet, betraktade från astronomiens, fysiologiens och den naturliga filosofins synpunkter. Anmärkningsvärt är att detta verk kom ut när Flammarion blott var 20 år gammal! 67 Flammarion skriver lyriskt om allehanda möjligheter för liv på andra planeter, till exempel: "... har jorden ej erhållit något företräde framför de andra planeterna; dessa äro beboeliga likaväl som hon. ... Antingen är han [månen] bebodd eller har han varit bebodd, eller ock skall han blifva bebodd". Efter att i boken ha behandlat faktiska astronomiska rön, fortsätter Flammarion med spekulationer kring andra planeters möjliga invånare. Innehållsförteckningen i kapitlet om "De andra verldarnas invånare" antyder de ganska fria tyglar som Flammarions upplåtit åt sin fantasi (Figur 2). Vid 1800-talets mitt började astronomiska teleskop med riktigt bra och stora linser bli tillgängliga. De var väl lämpade att observera planeter och Flammarion satte upp ett privat observatorium med ett rejält teleskop (24 cm linsdiameter), med vilket han kunde studera årstidsväxlingar på planeten Mars. Han var i kontakt med professionella astronomer som också observerade Mars och han skrev en bok om dess förutsättningar för beboelighet. Figur 1: Camille Flammarions bok Bebodda verldar eller vilkoren för himlakropparnas beboelighet, betraktade från astronomiens, fysiologiens och den naturliga filosofins synpunkter kom i svensk översättning 1866. Boken blev omåttligt populär på många språk: detta är den 27:e (!) franska utgåvan från 1880. 68 Sent 1800-tal: Giovanni Schiaparelli En inflytelserik professionell astronom under sent 1800-tal var italienaren Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835-1910), mest verksam vid Brera-observatoriet i Milano. Där observerade han planeten Mars och ritade av de strukturer som syntes på dess yta, samt hur dessa skiftade utseende under marsårets olika årstider. Avståndet mellan jorden och Mars ändras avsevärt beroende på deras lägen i banorna runt solen, speciellt eftersom marsbanan runt solen inte är helt rund utan något utdragen, elliptisk. Ibland infaller speciellt gynnsamma tillfällen, då Mars kommer särskilt nära jorden och kan observeras extra tydligt. Ett sådant inträffade år 1877, då Schiaparelli kunde teckna de dittills mest detaljrika kartorna över marsytan. Han kompletterade dem med senare observationer och gav ut sin marskarta (Carte de la planète Mars) år 1888. På denna hade han ritat in ett flertal raka stråk, vilka han kallade "canali", ett ord som på italienska kan beteckna olika typer av diken, räfflor eller kanaler. Ett motsvarande ord på engelska – "canal" – betecknar dock främst en konstgjord kanal och detta blev senare övertaget som fantasieggande beteckning för vad som skulle ha observerats på Mars. (Hade man i stället tagit något annat ord på engelska, kanske "channel", som i "English Channel", Engelska kanalen, hade historien kanske tagit en annan vändning.) Under 1800-talets slut blev det ganska accepterat att det skulle kunna finnas liv på Mars. Det uppfattades inte som särskilt märkvärdigt – Mars var ju en planet liksom jorden. Från den gamla kontinenten Europa hade man under de gångna seklen upptäckt och koloniserat nya kontinenter där det levde allehanda konstiga djur, så varför skulle Mars vara så mycket annorlunda? Figur 2: En kapitelrubrik ur Camille Flammarion: Bebodda verldar eller vilkoren för himlakropparnas beboelighet, L.J.Hiertas förlag, Stockholm, 1866 69 Figur 4: Teckning av strukturer på planeten Mars, färdigställd av Schiaparelli år 1888. Figur 3 Schiaparelli vid ett teleskop på observatoriet i Brera; teckning i tidningen "La Domenica del Corriere", 28 oktober 1900. 70 Tidigt 1900-tal: Kanaler på Mars! Schiaparellis observationer inspirerade amerikanen Percival Lowell (1855-1916) (se även Dunérs kapitel), ursprungligen amatörastronom som bestämt sig att bli forskare på heltid efter att ha läst just Camille Flammarions böcker om Mars. Lowell var speciellt fängslad av de "kanaler" som Schiaparelli observerat. Han byggde upp ett stort privat observatorium i Arizona (numera ett professionellt institut som bär hans namn, fortfarande är mycket aktivt och som i staden Flagstaff bär den stolta gatuadressen "Mars Hill"). Lowell studerade Mars under en rad år och ritade upp allt mer detaljerade kartor över dess yta med fler och fler "kanaler". Han skev också flera böcker i ämnet, även om Mars som en livets boning. Mer än någon annan spred Lowell uppfattningen att Mars var en plats med intelligenta livsformer. Observerade fläckar på Mars tolkade han som oaser, vissa kanaler syntes honom dubbla och han förmodade att de alla var konstgjorda vattenstråk som byggts av en civilisation som sökte hushålla med Mars knappa vattenresurser genom att leda vatten från polarkalotterna. Många i den breda publiken fängslades av dessa visioner men fackastronomerna förblev skeptiska. Vissa försökte upprepa Lowells observationer men lyckades inte se de kanaler som Lowell hävdade. När de stora spegelteleskopen kom i bruk efter 1910, kunde man observera marsytan i hög upplösning men där fanns inga kanaler. Troligen var de resultatet av någon synvilla vid observationer av något knappt urskiljbart, där ögat omedvetet förenar närbelägna fläckar till en linje. Möjligen kan också en speciell injustering som Lowell ibland hade på sitt teleskop haft till effekt att han projicerat skuggor av blodkärlen i sitt eget öga på näthinnan och uppfattat dessa som "kanaler". Figur 5: Vänster, Percival Lowell observerar vid sitt teleksop i Arizona (1914). Höger, Marsglob baserad på hans observationer, med ett stort antal inritade kanaler (1909). 71 1900-talets mitt: Livsbetingelser på Mars? Den för allmänheten mest bekante svenske astronomen under mitten av 1900talet var Knut Lundmark (1889-1958). Han var inte bara chef för Lunds observatorium utan också en mycket flitig populärvetenskaplig författare med ett otal skrifter i veckopressen, föreläsningar för allmänheten och medverkan i radioprogram. En av hans populärvetenskapliga böcker, Livets välde. Till frågan om världarnas beboelighet kom ut 1935 och diskuterar ingående observationer av marskanalerna, vars uttolkning i termer av ingenjörskonst han dock förhåller sig skeptisk till. Han menade dock att det vore otänkbart att vår planet skulle vara den enda bebodda men drog också slutsatsen att "...några utsikter ej finns för att astronomien skall komma dithän inom överskådlig tid att genom direkta iakttagelser kunna påvisa spår av andra världars bebyggelse". Även om den föreslagna tolkningen av kanalerna på Mars inte var tecken på en avancerad civilisation, var den dåtida uppfattningen bland astronomer av facket att Mars hade ett kargt men ändå rimligt beboeligt klimat. Ett av kapitlen i Lundmarks bok Livets välde heter just Tundreplaneten. Man förmodade att observerade årstidsvariationer på Mars visade på växlingar i växtligheten, kanske av lavar eller annan arktisk vegetation. Denna föreställning fortlevde fram till 1960-talet, då de första rymdsonderna till Mars avslöjade att förhållandena var betydligt barskare än så. Figur 6: Knut Lundmark på [Gamla] Observatoriet i Lund, ca 1930. På skrivbordet står en marsglob med "kanaler" enligt Lowells observationer. Globen fanns vid Lunds observatorium under ett sekel innan den blev stulen år 2015. 72 Orson Welles och Världarnas Krig Med marskanaler i folkligt medvetande och med fackfolk som bekräftade uppfattningen om Mars beboelighet, blev även den bredare publiken engagerad. En uppmärksammad händelse var radioteatern Världarnas Krig (The War of the Worlds) med den amerikanske skådespelaren Orson Welles (1915-1985) och hans grupp (The Mercury Theatre on the Air) som sände denna pjäs i en amerikansk radiokanal i oktober 1938. Radiopjäsen följde den brittiska science-fiction författaren H. G. Wells roman, där ondsinta utomjordingar från Mars anfaller jorden. Orson Welles var då bara 23 år gammal. Dagstidningarna rapporterade efteråt att radioprogrammet hade spridit riktig skräck, då allmänheten som kanske börjat lyssna först en bit in i programmet inte hade hört de introducerande förklaringarna om att det följande programmet "bara" var teater. Även om tidningarnas löpsedlar nog överdrev dramatiken, illustrerar händelsen att – enligt den tidens värderingar – publiken var benägen att tro på dylika utomjordingars existens. Årstidsväxlingar och tänkbar växtlighet på Mars Redan med ganska små teleskop kan man följa årstidsväxlingarna på Mars och dessa tolkades ofta som växlande vegetation i ett arktiskt tundraklimat. Den vitryske astronomen Gavriil A. Tikhov (1875-1960) verkade vid olika observatorier i Sovjetunionen. I Kazachstan grundade han 1947 en forskningsenhet för det nya ämnesområdet "astrobotanik". Här försökte man mäta egenskaper av växtligheten i subarktisk tundra för att jämföra dessa med de förändringar i färg och av ljusets polarisation som man kunde observera i de mörkare områdena på Mars, de som ansågs som det troligaste tecknet på växtlighet. Man var redan medveten om den ringa syrehalten på Mars, liksom frånvaron av ett mot solens ultravioletta strålning skyddande ozonskikt. Dock visste man också att syret och ozonlagret hos oss är ganska nya företeelser som tillkommit under jordens senare utveckling. De mikroorganismer som levde under jordens tidigare årmiljarder visste ju att klara sig ändå. Tikhov förmodade att anpassningen till det bistra klimatet på Mars lett till att dess växtlighet tillgodogjorde sig solstrålningen vid andra färger än växterna på jorden och att man därför inte skulle vänta sig gröna växter med den jordiska typen av klorofyll. Livet på andra världar borde alltså kunna vara väsentligt annorlunda än det som vi är bekanta med här på jorden – en uppfattning som delas av många nutida forskare. Föreställningen om Mars som en med karg växtlighet täckt planet var allmänt spridd vid 1900-talets mitt. Den svenske astronomen Åke Wallenquist (19041994) gav 1955 ut boken Planeten Mars, där han menade: "Man skulle kunna skriva en hel bok enbart om marskanalerna och den 'kanalstrid' som rått under flera decennier mellan olika uppfattningar beträffande tolkningen av dessa fenomen. Det är ett i flera hänseenden olustigt kapitel inom marsforskningens historia som 73 här upprullas, ett kapitel fullt av feltolkningar och okritiska spekulationer. ... Pressen och den stora allmänheten har med förtjusning accepterat och givit spridning åt de mest fantastiska spekulationer och lösa hugskott i samband med kanalerna." Men han skrev också: "Förutom denna eventuella klorofyllvegetation förekommer som redan nämnts sannolikt på Mars andra lägre och härdiga växtslag såsom alger, lavar och mossor. Dessutom trivs säkerligen en mångfald olika slags mikroorganismer, vilka kan fördra betydligt extremare klimatologiska förhållanden." Harry Martinson: Aniara Denna föreställning om Mars som en karg tundraplanet präglar 1900-talets mitt. En skönlitterär författare med även astronomiska intressen var Harry Martinson (1904-1978). Hans dystopiska epos Aniara. En revy om människan i tid och rum kom ut 1956. Det hade påbörjats redan några år tidigare och är färgat av andra världskrigets fasor. Där återfinns till exempel Sång om Karelen en lyrisk beskrivning av Karelens försvunna skönhet. Aniara handlar om den förstörda jorden, varifrån människor ombord på stora rymdskepp flyr till de närbelägna planeterna Mars och Venus. Medan den samtida uppfattningen om marsytan var som en kall tundra, täckt med lavar och annan mindre växtlighet, föreställde man sig att Venus hade ett hett klimat, som de varmaste platserna av tropiska Afrika. I Aniara skaldar Harry Martinson: ____ Till vilken del av Mars ni då vill komma, till östra eller västra tundran preciseras här. ____ Allt marsfolk krävde skydd mot köld på tundran och venusfolket skydd mot träskklimatet. ____ Men fortsätt själ (försent att minnet klandra) till Tundra två där plexbaracken står, där jag med Nobby hade tänkt att vandra i marsnaturens strålningsfria vår. Där växer stolt den svarta köldtulpanen som härdar ut med kallplanetsklimat och över tundran gal den hese Hanen sitt vittnesrop om tundrans enkla stat. Patetiskt svulten, vördad av de flesta den fågeln vet om köld och nöd det mesta. ____ 74 1900-talets slut: Första rymdsonderna till Mars och Venus Uppfattningen om Mars som en tundraliknande planet fick ett abrupt slut i och med de första rymdsonderna som i början av 1960-talet nådde fram till den röda planeten. När man nu i detalj kunde studera marsatmosfären, visade den sig vara ännu tunnare än förmodat och betingelserna nere på ytan betydligt strängare än vad Harry Martinson hade diktat. Luften på Mars var visserligen tät nog för att bära upp sandstormar och stora molnformationer men var ändå mycket tunnare än jordens atmosfär på toppen av Mount Everest. Kombinationen av tryck och temperatur medför vidare att förhållandena på marsytan normalt är sådana att vatten knappast kan finnas i flytande form. Antingen är det fruset till is eller också finns det som vattenånga i gasform. (På jordytan finns ett likartat beteende för torris, kolsyresnö (frusen koldioxid), som också direkt övergår mellan fruset tillstånd och gas eftersom lufttrycket vid jordytan är för lågt för att koldioxid ska finnas i flytande form.) Ett par andra rymdsonder nådde Venus och kunde avslöja att temperaturen på ytan ingalunda var som i tropiska Afrika utan för liv outhärdliga 400 grader, tillräckligt för att smälta bly. Detta var överraskande eftersom mängden solvärme som tränger in i Venus tjocka atmosfär faktiskt är mindre än den solvärme som vi får ner till jordytan. Visserligen ligger Venus närmre solen än jorden men i gengäld är den helt täckt av ljusa moln som reflekterar tillbaka det mesta av solljuset, så att Figur 7: Uttorkade flodbäddar på Mars, fotograferade från omloppsbana. Här är flodbädden Reull Vallis ca 7 km bred och 300 m djup. Skrapmärken i flodrännans botten tyder på is och stenar som glidit under strömmande vatten eller under en glaciär. Foto: ESA Mars Express, High-Resolution Stereo Camera 75 det faktiskt – något förvånande – är mindre solvärme som går ner i Venus atmosfär än vad som kommer ner till jorden. Förklaringen till den varma Venusytan är den extremt kraftiga drivhuseffekt som skapas av dess tjocka atmosfär av koldioxid med ett tryck bortåt hundra gånger större än jordens. Atmosfären på Mars, å andra sidan, har ett tryck på endast en hundradel av jordens. Även om Mars atmosfär också mest innehåller koldioxid, räcker den extremt tunna luften inte alls till att ge någon väsentlig drivhuseffekt. Raden av successiva rymdsonder avslöjade dock efter hand även en rad mer spektakulära egenskaper: Visserligen finns inga sådana kanaler som Percival Lowell föreställt sig, men det finns däremot många uttorkade flodbäddar, i vilka det helt tydligt forsat fram massor av vatten någon gång för riktigt länge sedan. Och geologiskt sett var Mars ingen död planet – här fanns rader av jättestora vulkaner. Visserligen verkade de inte vara aktiva just nu men, med geologiska mått mätt, hade de ännu ganska nyligen haft utbrott och skulle mycket väl kunna få nya. Senare landsattes självgående marsfordon som kunde färdas åtskilliga kilometrar på Mars och fotografera uttorkade sjöbottnar täckta av mineral som uppenbarligen bildats i kontakt med vatten. Från omloppsbana kunde kretsande sonder ta högupplösta bilder som visade både platser som emellanåt var fuktiga, som öppningar till stora grottor som fortsatte okänt djupt ner under marken. Det var tydligt att Mars undergått dramatiska klimatförändringar, där ett fuktigt klimat i fjärran forntid nu utvecklats till en sandig och torr öken. Figur 8: Den synliga marsytan undergår växlingar inte bara mellan olika årstider. De mest långtgående förändringarna är de globala sandstormar som under någon månad eller två kan svepa in hela planeten i ett rödaktigt töcken. Dessa globala sandstormar kan följas även av amatörastronomer med ganska små teleskop. Dessa bilder är tagna med Hubbleteleskopet med två månaders mellanrum. Foto: NASA/ESA. 76 Men livet på jorden utvecklades redan mycket tidigt, bara några hundra miljoner år efter jordens bildande. Då fanns det flytande vatten, vilket behövs för alla hittills kända livsformer. På Mars fanns också flytande vatten under dess tidiga historia och säkert under längre tid än vad som behövdes för livet att bli etablerat på jorden. Om betingelserna på jorden och Mars var så pass lika, uppstod eller utvecklades livet då också samtidigt på båda planeterna? Eller bara på den ena? Och i så fall, på vilken – kanske livet först uppstod på Mars och sedan på något sätt överfördes till jorden?? Och fanns det liv på Mars, var har det i så fall tagit vägen? Det kanske inte alls är utdött? Även om vi inte ser det på ytan, fortlever det kanske i grottor eller nere i marken, där tryggt skyddat mot solens och Vintergatans skadliga energirika strålning? Livet på jorden är beroende av vatten. Vi vet förstås inte om det finns liv som bygger på andra principer men tills vidare har sökandet efter möjligt liv på Mars följt samma tanke: följ vattnet till möjliga platser för liv! Sådana platser är områden där floder förr runnit ut i vad som varit sjöar eller hav, platser där det finns avlagringar av mineral som bildats i vatten eller rentav platser där det emellanåt än i dag sipprar fram små mängder av flytande vatten. Detta är visserligen inget rent vatten utan starka saltlösningar, vilka – precis som en kylvätska – endast fryser till vid temperaturer långt under noll grader och därför håller sig flytande även under kallare dagar på Mars. Sökandet efter möjligt liv påverkas dock även av andra överväganden. De rymdfarande organisationerna har enats om att inte redan nu direkt utforska de mest intressanta platserna med landsatta marsfarkoster utan att tills vidare nöja sig Figur 9: Det finns olika spår av vatten som funnits på Mars. Bilden från en marslandare visar en uttorkad sjöbotten med sådana avlagrade mineral som endast kan bildas i närvaro av vatten. Foto: NASA/JPL-Caltech, Curiosity. 77 med att studera dem på avstånd, från satelliter i bana över Mars. Det kan låta motsägelsefullt men anledningen är att det inte är möjligt att helt sterilisera rymdsonder som skickas iväg från jorden: Det kommer alltid att finnas ett antal mikroorganismer ombord. Många av dessa är tåliga mot rymdens vakuum och andra kommer att vara skyddade mot solens ultravioletta strålning i rymdsondens inre. Om dylika jordiska organismer skulle visa sig kunna överleva eller rentav frodas på Mars, skulle det kunna komplicera eller rentav äventyra sökandet efter ursprungliga marsorganismer. För att inte riskera att Mars förorenas med jordiska organismer har man alltså bestämt att tills vidare skynda långsamt. En besläktad frågeställning blir aktuell när det blir möjligt att till jorden hämta ner markprover från Mars. Mars är visserligen en betydligt mindre planet än jorden men dess yta är ändå avsevärd och ungefär lika stor som jordens samlade landyta (världshaven alltså borträknade). Det kommer därför att dröja ett bra tag innan dessa speciellt intressanta områden på Mars ("Mars special regions"), kan kartläggas i detalj. Efterhand som nya rön tillkommer, uppdateras även listan på områden som man särskilt önskar skydda. Vad som däremot en rad av senare marssonder kunnat utröna, är att det för länge sedan fanns riktigt stora mängder vatten som flöt omkring på marsytan. För länge, länge sedan, i planetens barndom, fanns en tid, då klimatet var annorlunda, lufttrycket högre och vatten forsade fram. Vissa av vattenflödena var massiva floder som dagens Nilen eller Mississippi på jorden, på andra ställen fanns det kilometerhöga vattenfall. I dag ser vi spåren av detta som uttorkade flodbäddar, där spåren efter stenar eller isblock rispat fåror som ännu markerar forna tiders vattenflöden. De närmsta årens letande efter tidigare eller nutida liv på Mars står inför två stora utmaningar: Undersökning av material långt nere under marsytan samt transport av markprover tillbaka till jorden. Eftersom atmosfären är så tunn och saknar egentligt ozonskikt, är själva marsytan inte skyddad mot det energirika bombardemanget av röntgenstrålar och snabba kosmiska partiklar. Sådan strålning har sannolikt dödat eventuellt liv och förstört biologiska och organiska molekyler på själva ytan och ner till kanske en meters djup. För att ha en chans att hitta spår av nuvarande eller tidigare liv, måste man därför gräva ner sig djupare än så. Ett första allvarligt försök planeras med den europeiska marslandaren ExoMars. Dess mest speciella utrustning utgörs av ett långt borr som kan tränga ner (tillsammans med olika mätinstrument) till ett par meters djup. Det är dock inte säkert att detta kommer att räcka för att ge besked om det fanns livsformer på Mars förr i tiden. Sådana kan ha lämnat spår, om inte som tydliga fossil, så kanske som speciella kemiska signaturer. De flesta kemiska grundämnen förekommer i olika tunga varianter, så kallade isotoper, som till exempel vanligt (lätt) väte och tungt väte (deuterium), vilka ingår i vanligt respektive tungt vatten. Vid biologiska processer påverkas och omsätts de lättare isotoperna oftast 78 något mer effektivt än de tyngre, vilket så småningom leder till karakteristiska skillnader mellan olika isotoper av kol, syre och andra grundämnen på platser där liv har funnits. Om man till exempel inuti en sten skulle hitta något som man misstänker är ett litet fossil efter någon organism, skulle man vilja veta om dess isotopsammansättning avviker från det i stenen runtomkring. Att utrusta marslandare med apparatur för isotopmätningar av sådana små prover börjar dock bli alltför svårt, varför detta är en typ av undersökning för vilken det krävs att man hämtar hem prover till laboratorier på jorden. Detta blir också nästa mer ambitiösa utforskning av Mars. Denna är tänkt att påbörjas med uppsändningen av en marslandare som, förutom sedvanlig förmåga att åka omkring på marsytan, även kan plocka upp intressanta markprover och lägga dem i speciella behållare. Efter något års rekognoscerande ska några tiotal utvalda prover placeras i en särskilt skyddande kapsel, varefter det blir dags för nästa rymdfarkost att bege sig till Mars, denna gång för att landa intill denna kapsel, hämta upp den och sedan flyga tillbaka till jorden med alla dessa markprover. På jorden har man överlägsna möjligheter att undersöka proverna i stora laboratorier men kanske framför allt kan man efter hand komma på nya sätt att undersöka dem med metoder som man ursprungligen inte kunnat komma på. Strängt taget har vi redan i dag tillgång till prover från marsytan, detta i form av meteoriter som man kunnat konstatera härrör från Mars. Dock kan man bara få ut en begränsad mängd information från dem: Man vet inte exakt varifrån Mars de har kommit; de har kastats ut i samband med att någon liten asteroid krockade med Mars men då blev allt material utsatt för höga temperaturer och tryck, vilket troligen förstört mycket av de eventuella spåren av tidigare liv. Livsbetingelser i solsystemets utkanter? Eftersom flytande vatten är ett villkor för sådant liv som vi känner till, har ett vanligt kriterium för att bedöma en himlakropps möjliga beboelighet varit huruvida flytande vatten kan finnas på dess yta. För en planet betyder det att dess bana inte får gå så nära sin värmande sol att allt vatten kokar bort, inte heller så långt bort att allt vatten frusit till is. Att detta kriterium om avstånd till solen eller stjärnan ingalunda är nödvändigt insågs när de första rymdsonderna nådde ut till vårt solsystems jätteplaneter Jupiter och Saturnus, på fem och tio gånger längre solavstånd än jordens. Dessa omkretsas av ett stort antal månar, varav ett halvdussin är ganska stora, ungefär som vår måne eller rentav lite större. Så långt ut från solen når bara en liten del av dess värme och man väntade sig att inte hitta annat än kalla, frusna världar. Men man slogs med häpnad när det visade sig att flera av månarna kring Jupiter och Saturnus i verkligheten var varma platser. Jupiters fyra största månar upptäcktes av Galileo redan år 1610, strax efter att teleskopet kommit i bruk. Den innersta av dem, med namnet Io, i bana närmast 79 Jupiter, är täckt av glödande lavaströmmar från ständigt aktiva vulkaner medan den näst innersta, Europa, visade sig vara täckt av ett tillfruset istäcke under vilket man kunde konstatera att det finns en ocean av salthaltigt vatten. Detta var helt oväntat men man kunde ganska snart inse varifrån värmen kom. Det var givetvis inte solvärme (och ingen annan strålning heller) utan tyngdkraften från den massiva jätteplaneten Jupiter. Denna kraft är förstås den som håller kvar jupitermånarna i sina banor kring planeten. Men månarna rör sig inte i exakt cirkulära banor, så att den kraft med vilken Jupiter drar dem mot sig ändras periodiskt. Och den sida av månen som vetter närmast Jupiter utsätts för en större dragningskraft än baksidan som ju är längre bort från planeten. Resultatet blir en tidvattenkraft, där hela månen dras ut och knådas än åt ena, än åt andra hållet som en mjuk degboll. Och precis som när man vickar en metallbit fram och tillbaka, så blir det varmt av friktionen, en uppvärmning som i detta fall hämtar sin energi ur Jupiters gravitationsfält. Io, den innersta stora jupiterrmånen, utsätts för särskilt starka krafter och blir så uppvärmd, att hela ytan täcks med glödande lava och ständigt aktiva vulkaner. Men nej, vi förväntar oss inget liv i denna extrema miljö. Den näst innersta större jupitermånen däremot – Europa – känner också av en betydande uppvärmning från Jupiters gravitation, dock betydlgt svagare än Io och Figur 10: Istäcket på ytan av jupitermånen Europa, sett från en rymdsond. Mönstret tyder på sprickbildning och skjuvning av ismassor som täcker en underliggande ocean av vatten. Bilden täcker ca 70 x 30 km. Foto: NASA, Galileo. 80 här är betingelsena gynnsamma för flytande vatten. Månen är täckt av en ocean med vatten ovanför vilken ett istäcke utbreder sig. På närbilderna ser man att detta har frusit till relativt nyligen – detta sluter man sig till av att det nästan helt saknas spår av meteoritnedslag: hade ytan varit gammal, hade den varit hårt sönderpepprad med kratrar överallt. Hur tjockt istäcket är vet man ännu inte – någon kilometer eller kanske flera mil, men man har kunnat konstatera att det emellanåt sprutar upp vattenånga från någonstans under isen. Detta visar att det finns öppningar från den underliggande oceanen upp till ytan, varför man kan förmoda att istäcket inte kan vara speciellt tjockt överallt. Att vattnet i oceanen nedanför är salthaltigt har man kunnat konstatera genom att mäta radiosignaler från någon rymdsond som flugit bakom Europa: Sättet som dessa signaler förvrängs visar att den underliggande volymen är elektriskt ledande, vilket tyder på i vattnet lösta salter, precis som i våra oceaner på jorden. Vidare kan man sluta sig till att denna ocean måste vara i kontakt med berggrunden på havsbotten och därför måste olika kemiska ämnen finnas lösta i vattnet, även sådana som ingår i livets byggstenar. På jorden finns miljöer som nog har en del gemensamt med Europas överfrusna hav. I Antarktis finns ett flertal sjöar med flytande vatten djupt under dess tjocka istäcke. Detta vatten hålls flytande tack vare jordvärmen som kommer underifrån. Troligen finns det även livsformer i dessa antarktiska sjöar, givet insikten att livets biologiska gränser tycks vara mycket vidare än vad som tidigare förmodats och allehanda mikroorganismer återfinns på även de mest osannolika platser på (och inuti) jorden. Att på ort och ställe undersöka livsbetingelserna på Europa är en än större utmaning än motsvarande för Mars. Svårigheterna kommer inte bara av att det är längre ut till Jupiter (och rymdflygningen flera år längre) utan främst av Jupiters egna och mycket kraftiga strålningsbälten. Dessa motsvarar jordens van Allenbälten som rymmer elektriskt laddade partiklar. Jupiters bälten är dock mycket stora – kunde vi se dem för blotta ögat, skulle de på himlen omge Jupiter med en utsträckning flera gånger större än fullmånens. Banorna för de innersta månarna, även Europa, ligger inuti dessa intensiva strålningsbälten. Istäcket skyddar säkert eventuellt liv under detta men en rymdsond som närmar sig kommer att utsättas för en intensiv partikelstrålning som på kort tid kan förstöra solceller och annan elektronik. Med de rymdsonder till Europa som nu planeras avser man att göra djärva om än korta förbiflygningar och då välja de säkraste vägarna genom strålningsbältenas svagaste delar. Man hoppas att så småningom även kunna mjuklanda på ytan men detta kräver att man utvecklar speciellt strålningstålig elektronik. Inte bara kring Jupiter, utan även kring Saturnus finns månar där det finns oceaner av flytande vatten under en frusen yta. Och kring Saturnus kretsar den stora månen Titan, en värld i sig, inte bara med en atmosfär som är tjockare än jordens utan med ett vädersystem som är det mest jordliknande i vårt solsystem: 81 Sjöar, floder, moln, regn, snö, hagel... Men: Där är det verkligen riktigt kallt och det som rinner i floderna är inte vatten utan flytande kolväten som metan och etan. Det är svårt att där föreställa sig liv av den typ som vi känner till men vi måste ändå konstatera att den kemiska miljö som man i dag möter på Titan har likheter med den som fanns på jorden när livet var ungt på vår planet. Samma typ av kemiska reaktioner – om än vid mycket låga temperaturer – torde i dag äga rum på Titan, som på den tidiga jorden, så att även här kan vi få insikter om livets möjliga uppkomst och utveckling. Planeter kring andra stjärnor Huruvida det finns planeter också kring fjärran stjärnor, har man grubblat på sedan lång tid tillbaka men länge var svårigheterna att hitta dem oöverkomliga. Man visste mycket väl hur man i princip skulle kunna upptäcka dem genom att mäta de minimala rubbningar som tyngdkraften från en kretsande planet måste utöva på sin centralstjärna men den nödvändiga mätnoggrannheten förblev länge utom räckhåll. Först efter flera decenniers utveckling av successivt noggrannare mätinstrument kunde den första planeten kring en annan stjärna än solen upptäckas år 1995. Därefter har utvecklingen varit omstörtande snabb, så att man numera känner till flera tusen så kallade exoplaneter. Svårigheten att hitta dem ligger inte främst i att de är ljussvaga – även om de ju bara lyser med återskenet av det ljus som deras stjärna utsänder – utan främst i att de på himlen ligger alldeles tätt intill sin moderstjärna som lyser miljoner gånger starkare och bländar dem som från jorden försöker särskilja planeten. Metoderna för att hitta exoplaneter är i huvudsak två, där båda mäter hur stjärnljuset påverkas. I det ena fallet mäter man genom dopplereffekten den lilla rörelse som stjärnan utför när den, tillsammans med sin planet, kretsar i en bana Figur 11: Planetpassage framför och bakom en stjärna. Om en planet råkar ses passera framför stjärnskivan, kan man mäta det stjärnljus som sipprar genom planetens atmosfär och bestämma dennas kemiska sammansättning. (Efter figur av Sara Seager) 82 kring deras gemensamma tyngdpunkt. I det andra fallet – och det som är viktigast i sökandet efter tecken på liv – mäter man den lilla förändringen av stjärnans ljusstyrka under de timmar som planeten i sin bana råkar passera framför stjärnan. Detta kräver förstås att planetens bana råkar ligga i sådan vinkel, att vi från jorden kan se planeten passera framför stjärnan, så att den kan skymma bort lite av dess ljus. Det ljus som når oss under en sådan planetpassage är alltså stjärnans vanliga utstrålning, minskat med den andel som skyms av planeten vilken oftast täcker mindre än 1% av stjärnans yta. Men om planeten omger sig med en atmosfär blir det mer komplicerat (och mer intressant!). Planetens atmosfär är åtminstone delvis genomskinlig och en viss liten del av ljuset som når oss är inte det som kommit direkt från stjärnan, utan stjärnljus som filtrerats och färgats vid passagen genom planetens atmosfär, ungefär som vi ser det försvagade solljuset vid solnedgången. När ljus passerar genom en gas, får det "fingeravtryck" i form av spektrallinjer i olika färger, mönster av ljusets absorption vid speciella våglängder. Dessa markörer är olika för skilda grundämnen och för olika molekyler och medger att man på distans kan känna igen vattenånga, syre, metan och andra kemiska ämnen, för övrigt samma metoder som används vid fjärranalys av luftföroreningar på jorden. Eftersom planetens atmosfär normalt bara utgör ett tunt skikt runtom den, är denna typ av mätningar svåra. Dock underlättas letandet efter kemiska ämnen av det att – nu förutsatt att planeten inte kretsar kring en speciellt sval stjärna – spåren av molekyler oftast inte finns i stjärnans eget spektrum. Vid de temperaturer som råder på stjärnytor bryts mer komplexa molekyler ner i sina atomära byggstenar. Om man observerar närvaron av molekyler, måste de således härröra från den svalare planeten. Dessa utmanande mätningar kräver utnyttjande av de största teleskopen. Det byggs just nu några extremt stora teleskop, bland annat ELT (Extremely Large Telescope) med spegeldiameter på nästan 40 meter vid ESO, Europeiska Sydobservatoriet i Chile. För detta är en uttalad prioritet just sökandet efter sådana kemiska markörer i exoplaneters atmosfärer. Biologiska markörer hos exoplaneter? Förutom utmaningen att först hitta exoplaneter som omger sig med en detekterbar atmosfär och att sedan identifiera möjliga spår av kemiska ämnen och molekyler i dessa, är den kanske svåraste frågan: vilka ämnen kan överhuvudtaget antyda närvaron av liv? Eftersom den mätbara signalen är så liten, kan mätningar endast göras med ganska grov upplösning. De ämnen som då realistiskt kan hittas är enkla molekyler med lätt igenkännbara mönster och linjer i spektrum. Om man observerar jorden från långt håll, kan man i det ljus som jorden återspeglar från solen se signaturer av vattenånga H2O, koldioxid CO2, metan CH4, syre O2 och även ozon O3. Men ur enbart detta är det vanskligt att säkert sluta sig till att det faktiskt finns liv på jorden. Mer komplicerade organiska molekyler, sådana som 83 mer säkert skulle kunna visa på närvaron av liv, saknar sådana lätt igenkännbara mönster av spektrallinjer och förekommer i jordens atmosfär endast i så små koncentrationer att de i praktiken torde vara näst intill omöjliga att säkert identifiera hos avlägsna planeter. Tolkningen kompliceras ytterligare av att man inte alltid vet huruvida planeten är (delvis) molntäckt, vilket kan förändra utseendet av spektrum. Många molekyler har sina viktigaste spektrallinjer i den infraröda delen av spektrum. Denna strålning är dock svår att mäta från jordytan eftersom även olika molekyler i jordens atmosfär absorberar sådan strålning. Det planeras därför rymdexperiment för att söka mäta den kemiska sammansättningen av exoplaneters atmosfärer. Avsikten är att leta efter åtminstone några tiotal olika molekyler som innehåller kol, kväve, fosfor, kisel, svavel och andra ämnen. Men... även om vi nu hittar något som vi misstänker är en andra jord och i dess atmosfär återfinner samma ämnen som hos oss – vattenånga, koldioxid, metan, syre och även ozon – vad säger det oss om huruvida det verkligen finns liv där? Visserligen måste allt liv som vi känner till, någon gång under sin livscykel ha tillgång till flytande vatten, men omvändningen gäller inte – det räcker inte med vatten för att det ska finnas liv. Fritt syre i större mängder i luften är något som successivt utvecklades under jordens geologiska historia, när tidiga livsformer – mikroorganismer i form av cyanobakterier – hade byggt upp skiktade strukturer, så kallade stromatoliter, längs världshavens stränder. Genom fotosyntes frigjorde de syre, vilket under ett par årmiljarder successivt ökade syrehalten i den ursprungligen syrefria atmosfären, för att till slut bli en av dess väsentliga beståndsdelar. Givetvis är dagens syre i luften en förutsättning för människans liv såväl som för många andra livsformer men höga halter av syre i luften har bara förekommit den senaste tiondedelen av jordens historia. I dag underhålls syrehalten genom växternas fotosyntes, i vilken solens strålningsenergi utnyttjas för att binda koldioxid, varvid syre frigörs. Om livet helt skulle försvinna från jorden, skulle också syret tämligen snabbt (med geologiska mått mätt) försvinna ur luften. Eftersom det är ett kraftfullt oxiderande kemiskt ämne, skulle syret oxidera det mesta i dess väg, bli bundet i olika oxider, och därefter inte längre vara detekterbart genom signaturer i jordatmosfärens spektrum. Samma gäller ozon, den tre-atomers variant av syre som bildas med hjälp av solens ultravioletta strålning högt uppe i lufthavet. Liv har funnits på jorden under den mesta tiden av jordens historia men fritt syre alltså endast under en ganska liten del. Om man inte hittar syre på en annan planet är det alltså inget som behöver tyda på frånvaron av liv. Men om man hittar syre i väsentliga mängder, är det nog ett tecken på att det på den planeten pågår något som håller syrehalten uppe. Kanske motsvarigheten till jordens fotosyntes, kanske något annat? I jordens spektrum kan man även identifiera sumpgasen metan, CH4. Denna kommer från vulkaner, mänsklig verksamhet, odlingar, matsmältningen hos boskap och annat. Metan finns det också en hel del av ute i 84 rymden, det är en av beståndsdelarna i atmosfärerna hos jätteplaneter som Jupiter och Saturnus. Men kombinationen av metan och syre är mer speciell. Metan är en viktig beståndsdel av naturgas och biogas och förbränns lätt med syre till koldioxid och vatten. Att det samtidigt i en planets atmosfär finns både större mängder syre och metan, tyder alltså på att där inte råder kemisk jämvikt utan "något" håller uppe detta tillstånd (annars skulle metanet redan brunnit upp). På jorden vet vi att det är livet och dess fotosyntes. Men på en annan planet skulle det kanske kunna vara något helt annat? Åtminstone små mängder av syre frigörs när vattenånga sönderdelas av solens ultravioletta strålning och metan finns ju naturligt i berggrunden. Vi vet alltså (ännu) inte hur man ur mätningar av fjärran planeters kemiska sammansättning entydigt skulle kunna avgöra om där finns liv. Letandet efter utomjordiska civilisationer Undersökningen av kemiska signaturer möjliggör letandet efter spår av mikroorganismer, växlighet eller andra typer av liv som inte för särskilt mycket väsen av sig. Men det finns kanske även intelligent liv på fjärran planeter som inte bara omsätter syrgas och andra ämnen utan har utvecklad teknologi. Dessa gör kanske mycket mer väsen av sig och kanske kan göra sig påminda även över interstellära avstånd? Letandet efter möjliga sådana utomjordiska civilisationer går ofta under namnet SETI, sökandet efter extraterrest intelligens (engelska Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence). En ofta använd utgångspunkt är Drakes ekvation, ett utryck som formulerades av den amerikanske radioastronomen Frank Drake på 1960-talet: Drakes ekvation i sig utsäger inget om hur sannolikt (eller ej) det skulle vara med avancerade civilisationer i Vintergatan. Däremot utgår den från betraktarens egna uppskattningar av hur sannolikt det är att på en planet, där det finns rimliga förhållanden för liv, också verkligen har utvecklats liv; hur sannolikt det är att sådant liv också utvecklats vidare till en teknologisk nivå, och för hur länge sådana civilisationer kan tänkas fortleva med bibehållet intresse att kommunicera även utanför sin hemplanet. Det finns alltså ingen exakt lösning till Drakes ekvation, utan resultatet som erhålls beror på de uppskattningar och gissningar som olika personer bidrar med. Betydelsen av ekvationen kommer dock av att, om man som uppskattningar använder belopp som många forskare anser rimliga, blir det sannolika antalet civilisationer i Vintergatan tämligen stort. Vi vet säkert att antalet stjärnor och planeter i Vintergatan uppgår till flera hundra miljarder och – om livets uppkomst inte skulle vara en alldeles oerhört osannolik process – så "borde" det finnas liv på kanske miljoner eller rentav miljarder andra planeter. Frågan uppstår då, hur man ska kunna avgöra förekomsten av sådana avancerade civilisationer? Redan på 1800-talet, innan radiotekniken utvecklats, fanns det idéer om hur man från jorden skulle kunna kommunicera med de invånare som man då förmodade kunde finnas på månen eller Mars. Man kunde hugga ut stora geometriska mönster i Sibiriens urskogar och dessa enorma kalhyggen skulle då 85 kunna observeras i teleskop av de astronomer som man tänkte sig kunde finnas på andra planeter. För signaler nattetid kunde man i stället gräva ut kanaler i speciella mönster ute i Saharaöknen, fylla dessa med petroleum och sedan tända på. Så småningom insåg man dock att varken månen eller Mars var bebodda och dessa sambandsmöjligheter skulle inte fungera över de enorma avstånden till andra stjärnor. En psykologiskt viktig barriär bröts någon gång på 1950-talet. De första stora radioteleskopen hade tagits i bruk och radiooch radartekniken hade utvecklats dithän att man insåg att om det vid någon närbelägen stjärna fanns en civilisation med liknande radioteleskop, skulle man kunna utbyta signaler med denna. Visserligen skulle det ta flera år för en signal att nå fram till en stjärna många ljusår bort, det kunde bara vara enkla meddelanden, men för första gången någonsin behövde mänskligheten inte känna sig isolerad i vårt solsystem i Vintergatans utkant utan kunde i princip ta upp kontakten med andra, kanske likasinnade, civilisationer. Ur detta utvecklades olika program för SETI. Tanken bakom är att – om "vi" har möjlighet att skicka och ta emot radiosignaler över interstellära avstånd – så borde även "de" ha utvecklat en sådan möjlighet och troligen redan utnyttjat denna för att kommunicera med sina lokala grannar på närbelägna planeter eller i Figur 12: Innebörden av Drakes ekvation för hur många utomjordiska civilisationer det troligen finns i Vintergatan. Ekvationen i sig ger inget entydigt svar utan fordrar att man uppskattar hur stor andel av alla planeter som man tror har liv och hur stor andel av dessa som har utvecklat intelligens. De som varaktigt bibehållit intelligent teknologiskt liv kan man tänka sig skulle kunna kontaktas. 86 andra stjärnsystem. Om "de" – liksom "vi" använder radiovågor, sprids dessa naturligt ut över ganska breda vinklar och kommer att träffa inte bara den egentliga mottagarens planet utan även passera bredvid och således läcka ut i Vintergatan. Genom att "tjuvlyssna" lite varstans, skulle vi kunna fånga upp delar av sådana pågående "samtal" och få insikt i hur livet pulserar i Vintergatan. Ett problem är dock att det finns ett otal sätt hur man kan koda in meddelanden i en radiosignal och man vet förstås inte alls hur detta kan ha gjorts – det är knappast troligt att de skulle följa de jordiska radiostationernas standard från sent 1900-tal. Man hoppas dock på att signalerna på något sätt skiljer sig från det naturliga kosmiska bruset, så att de kan kännas igen som konstgjorda. Vissa sökningar görs som "gratis" tillsatser till ordinarie radioastronomiska observationer, där man bara kopierar den signal som ändå mäts från något astronomiskt objekt och sedan undersöker om den i någon mening verkar underlig. I vissa projekt engageras även allmänheten för att på sina lokala datorer leta efter mönster i misstänkta signaler. Andra, mer riktade sökningar observerar systematiskt närbelägna stjärnsystem där det förmodas finnas beboeliga planeter. Ännu har man dock inte hittat något som rimligen kan tolkas komma från någon annan civilisation. De senaste årtiondena har en annan grupp anordningar blivit vanliga på jorden, nämligen lasrar som utsänder mycket intensiva men mycket korta pulser av synligt ljus. Man kan konstatera att, om sådana skulle riktas exakt mot någon närbelägen stjärna, skulle en tänkt mottagare där kunna uppfatta dess snabba blinkningar vid just laserns speciella våglängd. Detta har lett till en optisk gren av SETI, oftast kallad OSETI. I detta fall observerar man ljuset från närbelägna stjärnsystem i förhoppningen att uppfatta dylika snabba blinkningar. En skillnad mot radiovågor är dock att synligt ljus inte naturligt sprids ut över breda vinklar och kommer därför att endast träffa den avsedda mottagaren. Det skulle därför kunna tänkas vara ett sätt för en annan civilisation att ta kontakt med just oss. Men även här har man hittills inte sett något som tyder på konstgjorda signaler. Men vet vi vad vi letar efter? Genom historien verkar diskussioner om avancerade utomjordiska civilisationer i allmänhet ha präglats av de skeenden som just då utmärkt livet på jorden. Man har gissat att andra civilisationer är ungefär som vi, bara i någon mening större och kraftfullare. Det fanns en tid då man såg industriella städers framtid i en mångfald av fabriksskorstenar vars rök fyllde himlen ovanför telefonstolpar med otaliga hängande ledningar. Redan en (i de stora sammanhangen) tämligen kortvarig teknisk utveckling har gjort att vi småskrattar åt dessa visioner men vi vet inte riktigt vad man kommer att småskratta åt efter ytterligare bara ett sekel eller två. Man kan spekulera om den tekniska utvecklingen kan leda till någon slags hopsmältning av biologiskt liv och tekniskt konstgjort liv? Vi använder ju redan olika 87 mekaniska verktyg och tekniska hjälpmedel men människans fortplantning är (åtminstone än så länge) biologisk. Men behöver "liv" vara baserat på biologiska processer i meningen att livets koder lagras i biologiska molekyler som går i arv mellan generationerna och successivt förändras under evolutionen? Det har föreslagits möjligheten till "postbiologiskt" liv, där det i stället skulle vara vad vi i dag kallar artificiellt liv som utvecklas, där livets koder i stället finns lagrade i (kanske?) datorliknande minnen och nya "varelser" skulle då tillkomma genom att "tillverkas" utifrån råvaror och oorganiskt material, kanske som något slags robotar som tillverkar kopior av sig själva? Evolutionen då kanske inte fortsätter med biologisk kodning som hittills utan på ett teknologiskt eller kulturellt plan?? Att upptäcka huruvida en sådan typ av liv existerar i Vintergatan är en avsevärd utmaning: Vi vet inte vad för signaturer det skulle lämna efter sig, än mindre hur man skulle kunna kommunicera med det. Man kanske då inte borde leta efter utomjordiska civilisationer i "beboeliga zoner" där det kan finnas flytande vatten utan kanske i "teknologiska zoner" där temperaturen är lämplig för att maximera effektiviteten för datorer eller motsvarande och där det även finns energikällor för till exempel fusion. Kanske optimala platser för detta ligger i galaxens utkanter? Om sådant liv skulle ha blivit mycket omfattande och mycket energiförbrukande, borde man, åtminstone i princip, kunna upptäcka spår av dess energiomsättning. Men om något sådant skulle upptäckas, hur skulle vi kunna kommunicera med det? Och skulle dylika postbiologiska "varelser" vilja kommunicera med oss biologiska objekt? Och om inte, är det kanske inte så konstigt att vi ännu inte hört något från dem. Eller är sådana funderingar åter bara en återspegling upp mot rymden av precis den typ av teknisk utveckling som just nu för tillfället råkar utmärka livet på jorden? Färdas till andra stjärnor? För att bli helt säkra på livets roll och vår plats i Vintergatan måste vi nog vara beredda att själva ta steget fullt ut och färdas till andra stjärnor, inte bara försöka tjuvlyssna efter okända typer av signaler. Men detta är inte precis enkelt. Visst, människor har landat på månen och obemannade rymdsonder har redan flugit förbi dvärgplaneten Pluto och fortsatt ännu längre ut. Långa avstånd i rymden mäts ofta med den tid som ljuset behöver för att färdas motsvarande sträcka. Till månen är det drygt en ljussekund medan Neptunus, den yttersta egentliga planeten i vårt solsystem, ligger ungefär 10 000 gånger längre bort, ca 4 ljustimmar. Men det närmsta stjärnsystemet, Alfa Centauri är ännu 10 000 gånger mer fjärran, drygt 4 ljusår bort. Spekulationer om tänkbara resor till stjärnorna har funnits länge och även ett antal seriösa tekniska studier har gjorts. Även om sådana färder nog inte är aktuella inom en överskådlig tid, görs sådana grundläggande studier inom astronautiken, rymdfartsforskningen (alltså inte rymdforskningen). För att restiden till de mest 88 närbelägna stjärnorna ska kunna begränsas till 50 år, säg (alltså göras inom en generation), måste man uppnå hastigheter kring en tiondedel av ljusets. Man kan tänka sig mycket stora rymdfarkoster som drivs fram av en rad små vätebombsexplosioner eller också extremt små sonder med speglande ytor som får upp hastigheten genom att bestrålas med kraftigt ljus från högeffektlasrar någonstans i jordens närhet, kanske på månen. Idéer om sådana ultralätta rymdsonder utvecklades redan på 1980-talet men har nyligen fått ökad aktualitet i och med utveck-lingen av mikroelektronik, nanoteknologi och möjligheter att skapa stora men extremt lätta speglar, kanske gjorda av tunna kolskikt i form av grafen. Om vi hade en annan sol? Svårigheterna att färdas till andra världar beror i mycket på att vi lever i ett planetsystem med endast en enda säkert beboelig planet och vår sol befinner sig i en ganska gles del av Vintergatan. Men om vi i stället bodde i ett planetsystem med tätt mellan planeterna? Gör man tankeexperimentet att man låter Venus och Mars byta plats i vårt planetsystem, får vi plötsligt tre beboeliga planeter i stället för bara en: Venus svalnar ute på Mars avstånd men håller sig ändå varm tack vare sin kraftiga drivhuseffekt medan Mars tinar upp i värmen nära solen. Lokaltrafiken mellan dessa tre planeter skulle nog kunna vara en god grund för att utveckla rymdfart. Och kring andra stjärnor har vi redan funnit planetsystem med flera planeter i banor helt nära varandra, platser där man kan börja spekulera om pendeltrafik i rymden. Detta gäller alltså planeter i samma system. Men även stjärnor ligger mycket olika långt från varandra. Hade solen varit en typisk dubbelstjärna, skulle den andra solen kunnat ligga på kanske bara tio gånger avståndet till Neptunus och vi hade haft en stjärna 1000 gånger närmre och mycket mer åtkomlig än vad vi har i dag. En del av Vintergatans stjärnor ligger samlade i klotformiga stjärnhopar, där det är tätt mellan stjärnorna. I deras centralare delar kan finnas hundratals stjärnor inom samma avstånd som vi har till vår granne Alfa Centauri. Detta skulle givetvis underlätta interstellära resor till närbelägna stjärnor men å andra sidan kan livet där vara behäftat med andra risker. Om någon annan stjärna i sin bana skulle råka passera helt nära, finns det risk att en planet blir störd i sin bana och kanske rentav slungas iväg från sin sol. 89 Astrobiologins mål? Sedan urminnes tider har människor grubblat på möjligt liv utanför jorden och ibland kan man undra om det går att formulera något uttalat mål för allt detta sökande. Kanske den skånske astronomen Tycho Brahe (1546-1601) gav ett svar redan på sin tid. På hans slott Uraniborg på Ven fanns de latinska inskriptionerna "Suspiciendo despicio" – "då jag ser upp, så ser jag samtidigt ner" samt "Despiciendo suspicion" – "när jag ser ner, ser jag samtidigt upp". Himlen och jorden var egentligen varandras spegelbilder och deras studier var förenade. På Tychos tid kanske det var mer en kombination av alkemi och astrologi snarare än dagens kemi och astrofysik men den grundläggande tanken på att kunna förena det stora och det lilla – rymden över oss och jorden under oss – är ändå fundamental i letandet efter liv utanför jorden och för förståelsen av människans plats i kosmos. Figur 13: Den klotformiga stjärnhopen Messier 10, en rund samling av hundratusentals stjärnor i Ormbärarens stjärnbild, kan ses redan i ett litet amatörteleskop. Denna bild från Hubbleteleskopet upplöser enstaka ljusare stjärnor i hopens centrala delar, vars utsträckning är ett tiotal ljusår. Här ligger stjärnorna mycket tätare än i vår del av Vintergatan. Foto: NASA/ESA. 90 Lästips Catling, David C. (2014) Astrobiologi Fri Tanke Dunér, David (red.) (2013) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet Flammarion, Camille (1866) Bebodda verldar eller vilkoren för himlakropparnas beboelighe, L.J.Hiertas förlag Linde, Peter (2013) Jakten på liv i universum Karavan förlag Lundmark, Knut (1935) Livets välde. Till frågan om världarnas beboelighet Albert Bonniers förlag Mustelin, Nils (1978) Liv bland miljarder stjärnor. Civilisationer i Vintergatan och därbortom? Natur och Kultur Nilsson, Peter (1980) Främmande världar. Liv i kosmos Rabén & Sjögren Rådbo, Marie (2012) Finns det liv i rymden? Opal [Främst för yngre läsare] Stenholm, Björn (red.) (2012) Astrobiologi Liber Valtaoja, Esko (2003) Hemma i världsrymden Söderström & Co/Atlantis 91 Livstecken Sökandet efter liv i främmande världar David Dunér Du går på en okänd strand vid ett oändligt hav. Du finner vad du först tror är en vanlig sten, men när du lyfter upp den och tittar närmare på den, ser du att den har ett intrikat mönster. Den är regelbundet räfflad, spiralformad, helt annorlunda alla andra stenar på stranden. Längre bort i vattenbrynet ser du en grå massa som rör sig och försvinner ner i havet. Du går vidare och finner märken i sanden, parvisa trekantiga märken som du kan följa med blicken som om de var på väg i en bestämd riktning. Till slut finner du cirklar, trianglar och geometriska figurer liksom om de vore inristade av någon och innehöll en inre mening. Är det tecken på att något levande funnits och ännu finns på denna strand vid det okända? ågra forskare studerar en meteorit i ett laboratorium och finner tubliknande strukturer. En rymdsond landar på Mars yta, borrar sig ner i den röda sanden och dess instrument ger strax utslag att några intressanta molekyler finns där gömda under Marsytan. Ett stort teleskop riktas mot en avlägsen planet. Några astronomer analyserar ljuset från denna främmande värld som visar ovanliga proportioner av gaser i dess atmosfär. En natt fångar ett radioteleskop in okända radiosignaler från yttre rymden som bryter av det vanliga bruset i universum. Är det tecken på liv? Vår levande jord är en av många miljarder planeter i vår vintergata, en bland många miljarder andra galaxer i vårt universum. Är detta den enda plats där liv växer, frodas och går under eller finns det måhända otaliga andra världar, med sina hav, stränder, kontinenter och levande varelser? Detta är vad astrobiologin försöker besvara, det vill säga det mångvetenskapliga utforskandet av livets ursprung, utveckling och förekomst i rymden (se även Dravins kapitel). Om vi inte kan färdas till dessa främmande världar, skulle vi i stället kunna studera dem på avstånd och söka efter tecken på liv? Det mest sannolika scenariot i sökandet efter liv i rymden är att vi en dag upptäcker tecken på liv på andra planeter, inte att vi håller detta liv i handen, men finner de spår som biologiska processer lämnar efter sig. Dessa så kallade biosignaturer är i sig själva inte liv, men skulle kunna avslöja särskilda biokemiska processer som har sitt ursprung i utomjordiskt liv. Detta är vad N 92 astrobiologerna hoppas kunna upptäcka en dag, livstecken, för vi kommer sannolikt inte att inom överskådlig framtid komma på sätt att resa till andra planeter, så kallade exoplaneter, utanför vårt solsystem. Men hoppet om att finna liv på andra planeter och månar inom vårt eget solsystem har inte givits upp. I något avlägset hörn av vårt solsystem kanske det, hoppas man, gömmer sig mikrober eller encelliga mikroskopiska organismer, men några mer komplexa former av liv är det nog osannolikt att vi finner. Hur som helst, det framstår som alltmer uppenbart att bland de hundratals miljarder stjärnor som finns i vår vintergata kan det finnas många miljoner jordliknande planeter varav många kan vara beboeliga och ha de rätta förutsättningarna för att liv ska uppstå och trivas. Även om vi inte i en nära framtid kommer att kunna se dessa varelser framför oss, inte ens kunna se dessa planeters ytor, är det fullt möjligt att vi inom en snar framtid skulle kunna förfina våra metoder och observationer så att de en dag låter oss upptäcka tecken på liv. Utmaningen är att kunna tolka dessa tecken, att utifrån speciella fenomen dra slutsatsen att de måste vara tecken på liv. För att lyckas med detta måste det, förstås, finnas liv som vi kan upptäcka. Vi måste också ha tekniska möjligheter och metoder för att finna det. Men detta är inte tillräckligt. Vi är också utlämnade till vårt eget tänkande och de vetenskapliga metoder och samarbeten som står oss till buds och som är ett resultat av människans korta historia och kultur. Biosignaturer kan vara av många olika slag, det kan röra sig om kemiska substanser som grundämnen och molekyler som har samband med biologiska processer, det kan vara geologiska och mineralogiska formationer skapade av biologisk aktivitet, men också om fysiska föremål som strukturer eller former som liknar levande organismer, och om fysiska fenomen som elektromagnetisk strålning, ljus och temperatur. De kan variera i storlek från atomer till planeter, kanske till och med i storleken av hela solsystem. Vi kan söka efter dem på plats på våra närmaste planeter och månar eller upptäcka dem på avstånd genom att analysera främmande planeters atmosfärer. Biosignaturerna kan vara tecken på både levande och dött liv, liv som finns just nu och liv som en gång har funnits, liv som vi känner det eller ett fullständigt annorlunda sorts liv, bortom våra vildaste fantasier. Det här kapitlet syftar till att lyfta fram några frågor människan ställs inför i sökande efter livstecken, hur vi skapar begrepp och analogier, hur vi tolkar vår omgivande värld och skänker den mening. Det mångtydiga livet Den stora utmaningen när vi söker efter tecken på liv är att avgöra om dessa verkligen har sitt ursprung i biologiska processer eller har uppkommit genom olika geologiska, kemiska eller fysiska processer som inte alls har med liv att göra. Hur skiljer vi liv från icke-liv? Vad är liv egentligen? Om vi söker efter något som vi kallar liv, så borde vi åtminstone ha någon sorts föreställning om vad detta är. Det kanske framstår som självklart för oss vad liv är, men i själva verket är det svårare 93 än vad vi först tror att ge en tydlig definition av liv. Frågan om hur liv ska definieras är en av de mest omdebatterade frågorna inom astrobiologin och en rad försök till definition har lagts fram genom åren utan att man kommit fram till en definition som alla kan ansluta sig till (se Abbotts och Perssons kapitel). När vi studerar den stora variationen av olika livsformer på vår jord finner man ett antal egenskaper som de delar genom att de har ett gemensamt ursprung. De består av kol, de behöver energi, flytande vatten och andra ämnen – som kväve, fosfor och svavel – som finns i den omgivande miljön, men i andra proportioner. Liv på jorden uppvisar vanligtvis en ordnad struktur, förmåga att reproducera sig, de kan växa och utvecklas, anpassa sig till miljön och bevara sin inre miljö oberoende av den yttre miljön. Definitioner av liv kombinerar ofta särskilt förmågan till ämnesomsättning, reproduktion och evolution. En av de populäraste definitionerna, NASA:s "arbetsdefinition" definierar liv som "ett självbevarande kemiskt system med förmåga till evolution". Utgångspunkten är att en definition av liv bör vara en hjälp för oss att avgöra om det vi finner är liv, men samtidigt vara tillräckligt bred, så att den också omfattar liv som inte liknar det liv som vi känner från jorden. Svårigheten här är att vi bara känner till ett slags liv, en enda levande planet, vår egen, och vi vet ännu inte riktigt hur livet en gång uppstod på denna planet. Även om vi vet vilka egenskaper som utmärker allt liv på vår jord, vet vi inte om dessa är specifika för vårt slag av liv, genom att de har ett gemensamt evolutionärt ursprung, eller om de också utmärker allt annat liv ute i rymden. Utan några ytterligare exempel på liv kan vi inte veta om vårt begrepp om liv är universellt, eller bara gäller för det enda exempel på liv vi råkar känna till. Eventuella framtida upptäckter av liv bortom jorden kommer sannolikt att utmana våra föreställningar om vad liv är. Livstecken är tvetydiga. Frågan gäller hur vi ska skilja verkliga livstecken från tecken som påminner om livstecken men i själva verket har ett icke-biologiskt ursprung. Å ena sidan måste vi undvika att förväxla livstecken med sådana tecken som påminner om livstecken men inte är det, å den andra att undvika att förbigå tecken som vi inte uppfattar som tecken på liv men som i själva verket har sitt ursprung i en biologisk aktivitet. Det här problemet gäckar geologer som söker efter de tidigaste spåren av liv på vår jord, men också när forskare analyserar stenprover från Mars. Den 19 juni 1976 landade rymdsonden Viking 1 i Chryse Planitia på Mars, kort därefter den 7 augusti samma år landade en annan sond, Viking 2 i Utopia Planitia (Figur 1). Båda var utrustade med vetenskapliga instrument med vilka man hoppades kunna hitta tecken på liv, det vill säga sådana organiska molekyler som utmärker liv på jorden eller gaser som konsumeras eller produceras i jordliknande livsformers ämnesomsättning. Trots en välutrustad expedition med den allra senaste tekniken blev resultatet tvetydigt och har sedan dess omdebatterats. 94 Jordtvillingar Vi känner till endast en levande planet och allting som lever på den planeten är besläktat, har ett enda gemensamt ursprung. Inom astrobiologin antas att denna planet, förutom att den är levande, inte utmärker sig genom några unika egenskaper. Det finns miljarder av stjärnor där ute av samma slag som vår sol och med största sannolikhet finns det miljoner, kanske miljarder jordliknande planeter som uppvisar i det närmaste identiska fysiska egenskaper som vår planet. Jorden är en Figur 1: Utopia Planitia, Mars. Ett tunt lager av frost ligger över den steniga ytan bestående av vatten och sandpartiklar. Bild tagen av rymdsonden Viking 2 den 18 maj 1979. Foto: NASA/JPL. 95 tämligen alldaglig himlakropp. Det finns inget uppseendeväckande med den. Om det stämmer, så öppnar detta för ett sökande efter jordtvillingar som rimligtvis borde vara mycket vanliga i universum. Om det finns liv här på jorden, varför skulle det då inte också finnas liv på jordens tvilling? Skulle det inte finnas liv där, så behöver vi en rimlig förklaring till vad det är som gör vårt levande klot unikt i universum. Astrobiologin utgår ofta från en sorts analogiresonemang, det vill säga utifrån det vi vet drar vi slutsatser om det vi inte vet. Vi utgår från vår kunskap om den enda form av liv vi känner till – liv på jorden – och går sedan vidare och söker efter liknande livsformer på andra planeter. Vi letar alltså efter det slags liv vi känner till, med andra ord något som behöver flytande vatten, som består huvudsakligen av kolföreningar, som bebor en planet av viss storlek, gravitation, atmosfär, kemi och temperatur, som kretsar kring en stjärna av samma slag som vår sol i en bana, inte för nära, inte för långt ut, just där vattnet inte förångas eller fryser, utan håller sig flytande. Ett sådant analogiresonemang kan tyckas som en rimlig arbetshypotes, men innebär dock vissa svårigheter. Känner vi till alla nödvändiga eller tillräckliga förutsättningar för liv? Samtidigt begränsar vi vårt sökande till en sorts liv som vi råkar känna till, och kanske därigenom förbiser andra, kanske mycket annorlunda livsformer som vi inte ens kan föreställa oss. Till detta kommer också evolutionens oförutbestämbarhet, att det tycks finnas vissa tillfälliga händelser som vi inte kan förutse, men som väsentligt påverkar den riktning som evolutionen tar. Om inte en asteroid för 65 miljoner år sedan mellan krita och tertiär hade slagit ner vid nuvarande Yucatánhalvön och som innebar själva dödsstöten för dinosaurierna, så hade kanske inte vi människor utvecklats och evolutionen tagit en annan riktning. Vi själva är delvis resultatet av en slump. Frågan är alltså: Om alla ingredienser för liv finns för handen, måste detta med nödvändighet leda till uppkomsten av liv? Är liv en naturlig konsekvens av materiens lagbundna processer? Det finns en risk att förväxla nödvändiga villkor med tillräckliga. Om flytande vatten är ett nödvändigt villkor för liv, så är det bara ett i raden av andra nödvändiga villkor som alla måste finnas för att en planet ska vara beboelig. En upptäckt av en atmosfär, även om den innehåller de rätta kemiska ingredienserna inklusive vatten, är inte tillräckligt för att bevisa att liv existerar på dess yta. Ofta genom astrobiologins historia har man försökt, utifrån fyndet av några nödvändiga villkor bland en större mängd nödvändiga villkor, leda i bevis existensen av liv. Frågan är dock om vi känner till alla nödvändiga egenskaper som måste finnas eller om det finns okända villkor för liv som vi ännu inte känner till. Så länge vi inte känner till dem, så kan vi bara dra slutsatsen att planeten ifråga kan vara beboelig, inte att den verkligen är bebodd. Ändock kan ett analogiresonemang ha vissa metodologiska fördelar som ett sätt att börja leta efter liv. Jordtvillingsanalogin kan inte bevisa att liv måste finnas på andra platser i rymden, men det ger oss öppningar för en teoretisk möjlighet att liv kan existera bortom jorden. Ett enda exempel på 96 liv är en svag empirisk utgångspunkt, men inte heller ett stort antal möjliga jordtvillingar tvingar oss att dra slutsatsen att liv måste finnas på andra planeter. Men det är en teoretisk möjlighet att så är fallet. Främmande berg och dalar Hösten 1609 vände den italienske vetenskapsmannen Galileo Galilei sitt egentillverkade teleskop mot månen. För första gången kunde en människa teckna av månens yta sedd genom ett teleskop (Figur 2). I Stjärnornas budbärare (Sidereus nuncius) från 1610 drar han utifrån sina observationer analogier mellan månen och vårt klot. Månen uppvisade berg och därför var den av samma solida, ogenomskinliga och skrovliga natur som jorden. Den ojämna gränsen mellan dess mörka och belysta sida var oförenlig med idén om ett perfekt runt klot. Galilei skrev att ingen vill då med sinnenas visshet anta att månen har en slät och polerad yta, utan är grov och ojämn och, liksom jordytan, överallt är full med stora utskjutande delar, djupa klyftor och veck. Månen framstod som slät i dess kontur, på Figur 2: Galileo Galilei riktade den 30 november 1609 sitt teleskop mot månen och fann en värld av berg, dalar och slätter. De första bilderna av månen sedd genom ett teleskop publicerades i hans bok Stjärnornas budbärare (Sidereus nuncius, 1610). 97 grund av, antog han, att den kanske hade en atmosfär. Även om han inte drog några djärvare slutsatser utifrån analogier med jorden, så såg han det inte som omöjligt att det skulle kunna finnas invånare på andra klot. Men vi kan inte heller, menade han, ta det för givet att liv på andra platser i universum måste likna vårt eget. Senare i sin Dialog om de två världssystemen (Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo, 1632) konstaterade han att det inte finns vatten, ingen fuktighet, inga hav på månen, och därför inte heller något liv. Den holländske vetenskapsmannen Christiaan Huygens uttryckte tanken i sin bok Cosmotheoros (1698) att det var mycket sannolikt att det fanns liv på andra planeter. Han antog att flytande vatten är nödvändigt för liv. Han såg också mörkare och ljusare fläckar på Mars och Jupiters yta, vilka han tolkade som bestående av vatten och is. Bortom vårt solsystem finns det stjärnor liknande vår sol, och han frågade sig, varför inte dessa stjärnor skulle kunna ha sina egna planeter med egna månar. Vad gäller Venus antog han att den omgärdas av en tjock atmosfär. Han kunde visserligen inte klart urskilja några fläckar på dess yta, vilka skulle kunna vara tecken på hav och berg. Kanske finns det inga hav på Venus, tänkte han, eller som han antog var mer sannolikt, luften och molnen kring Venus reflekterade nästan allt ljus från solen. De första mer säkra observationerna av Venus genom ett teleskop, efter Galileis upptäckt av Venus faser, gjordes under Venuspassagen den 6 juni 1761. Många observatörer rapporterade vissa fenomen när Venus passerade över solskivan som de antog orsakades av en atmosfär kring Venus. Vissa fakta om denna planet var välkända för de flesta astronomer, som till exempel dess bana kring solen, dess storlek och faser. Men om den hade en atmosfär och en topografi var ännu okänt. Observationerna av Venuspassagen 1761 förändrade situationen. Förutom att passagen gav möjlighet till att beräkna avstånden i vårt solsystem i ett av vetenskapshistoriens första större internationella samarbeten, kunde observationerna avslöja något om Venus egenskaper. Man utgick från att det inte fanns någon större skillnad mellan jorden och Venus. Båda var planeter som kretsade kring solen, de var av liknande storlek, båda solida, och som några astronomer antog, så hade Venus också berg och en atmosfär. Om det finns liv på jorden, så bör man också ställa sig frågan om det inte då också borde finnas liv på Venus. Om vi kan bestämma Venus rotation kring sin axel och upptäcka en atmosfär och berg på dess yta, så kanske man kan dra slutsatser om den eventuella existensen av liv. Under 1600och 1700-talen försökte man just besvara dessa frågor. Den ryske vetenskapsmannen Michail Lomonosov argumenterade för att hans observationer under Venuspassagen 1761 stödde tanken på existensen av atmosfär kring Venus. Eftersom existensen av en atmosfär hade bevisats, menade han, så skulle vi kunna dra slutsatsen att den också är bebodd. Johann Elert Bode vid observatoriet i Berlin antog år 1801, i linje med sin landsman, den tyske astronomen Johann Hieronymus Schröter, att det fanns berg och dalar på Venus. Han slog fast att om Venus hade land och hav, berg och dalar, 98 öppna ytor och kondensation i dess atmosfär, samt hade en måne, så vore den fullständigt lik vår jord och följaktligen också beboelig. Den franske populärastronomen Camille Flammarion menade i den vitt lästa Bebodda världar (La pluralité des mondes habités, 1862) att det var absurt att solen fanns endast för att belysa och värma vår lilla jord, i synnerhet med tanke på att Venus visade sig vara en planet av samma storlek som jorden, med berg och slätter, årstider och år, dagar och nätter i likhet med vår egen planet (Figur 3) (mer om Flammarion finns att läsa i Dravins kapitel). Överensstämmelsen vad gäller fysiska egenskaper innebar, menade han, att de också hade liknande funktion i universum. Om Venus saknar invånare, så måste på motsvarande sätt också jorden sakna det, och omvänt, om jorden är bebodd, så måste också Venus vara bebodd. I ett senare verk från 1880 i populär astronomi säger han om Venus, att denna värld skiljer sig lite från vår i storlek, massa och densitet, i dagarnas och nätternas längd. Därför borde den Figur 3: Bergen på Venus södra halvklot, enligt Camille Flammarion, Jordkloten i rymden (Les terres du ciel, 1877). 99 också vara bebodd av växter, människor och djur, inte mycket annorlunda de vi finner på vår planet. Dessa och liknande analogiresonemang i den tidiga astrobiologin kan karakteriseras som ett sökande efter så många likheter som möjligt, i synnerhet de som antogs vara av särskild betydelse för att anses kunna påvisa en beboelig miljö. Förutom förhållandet att både jorden och Venus var solida planeter av liknande storlek som kretsade kring samma sol och därigenom utsattes för dess ljus och värme, så menade vissa astronomer att de båda dessutom hade nästan exakt samma rotation kring sin axel, hade var sin måne, atmosfär, liksom berg och hav. Om jorden och Venus är perfekta tvillingar, så måste det också finnas liv på Venus. Även inom modern astrobiologi, under de senaste två decennierna, finner man liknande analogiresonemang. Man har bland annat gjort ett antal experiment rörande jordiskt liv som en sorts förberedelse inför efterforskningar av liv på andra himlakroppar. Tecken på liv på jorden har använts som modeller för möjliga utomjordiska livstecken. Om vi betraktar oss själva utifrån, skulle liv på jorden vara möjligt att upptäcka från rymden? Astronomen Carl Sagan föreslog 1993 att man utifrån Galileosonden skulle studera det ljus som reflekteras från jordytan för att se om det uppvisade tecken på liv. Resultaten visade att vatten, syre, ozon, koldioxid, kolmonoxid, metan med mera kunde identifieras i jordens atmosfär. Tjugo år senare gjordes ett försök av ytterligare några forskare med "Det mycket stora Figur 4: Jordsken över Paranal-observatoriet i Chile, med planeterna Merkurius och Venus. Foto: ESO/B. Tafreshi, 2011. 100 teleskopet" (The Very Large Telescope, VLT) i Atacamaöknen i Chile för att studera "jordskenet", det vill säga det ljus från jorden som reflekteras mot månens yta, vilket ses som ett gråaktigt ljus från den sida av månen som inte belyses av solen (Figur 4). Analysen av detta jordsken visade att jordens atmosfär bestod av moln, att dess yta delvis var täckt av hav och att den hade vegetation. Tanken var alltså att genom att studera hur jorden ser ut från rymden, så skulle man kunna få ledtrådar inför framtida analyser av främmande planeter och deras atmosfärer. Nyfikenhet och dåliga ögon Under en promenad i en vacker slottspark tillsammans med en förnäm och vetgirig markisinna, lägger filosofen i Bernard de Fontenelles Samtal om världarnas mångfald (Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes, 1686) fram påståendet att all filosofi (det vill säga i betydelsen naturvetenskap) grundar sig på två ting: nyfikenhet och dåliga ögon (Figur 5). Vi vill veta mer än vad vi kan se. Filosoferna misstror det de ser och försöker gissa sig till det de inte ser. I modern astrobiologi tycks det liv vi söker ständigt vara bortom det vi vet och kan se. Observationerna är osäkra och otydliga. Det som våra sinnen förmedlar måste därför tolkas utifrån Figur 5: Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle, Samtal om världarnas mångfald (Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes, 1686), här ur en upplaga från 1687. 101 våra förståndsgåvor och den tolkning vi gör av det vi observerar utgår från våra förkunskaper och våra begrepp. Våra observationer är inte oavhängiga våra teorier, tvärtom, vi behöver teorier för att förstå det vi ser och våra förkunskaper och förväntningar leder oss i en eller annan riktning. Ibland förleds vi till felaktiga slutsatser. Inte sällan ser vi det vi hoppas och förväntar oss att se. När astronomerna studerar främmande världar i sina teleskop formas alltså deras tolkning av det de redan vet. Observatören tar inte bara passivt emot bilder och intryck från yttervärlden, utan med sitt tänkande söker han eller hon efter mönster och tolkar dessa intryck både utifrån sina mänskliga förmågor och utifrån sin vetenskapliga kultur. Man skulle kunna säga att världen förvrängs av våra begrepp, liksom våra begrepp förvrängs av världen. Figur 6: Ansiktet på Mars, klippor i Cydonia Mensae-regionen. Den vänstra bilden togs av Viking 1 den 25 juli 1976 och skapade uppståndelse genom sin likhet med ett mänskligt ansikte. Kunde det vara ruinerna efter en forntida marsiansk civilisation? Mars Global Surveyor passerade över samma område 2001 och visade ett vindpinat, eroderat berg vars skuggspel lurade ögat att se ett ansikte. Ett exempel på pareidolia, människans benägenhet att söka efter ansikten. Foto: NASA/JPL. Den 28 maj 1776 observerade den i England verksamme astronomen William Herschel "växande substanser" på månen som han antog var stora skogar bestående av träd upptill sex gånger högre än våra träd. Hans månobservationer visar hur svårt det är att se och komma fram till säkra slutsatser om vad man ser. År 1778 antog han dessutom att månkratrarna skulle kunna vara måninvånarnas städer. Han såg cirkelformade byggnader på månen, och han sade sig vara helt övertygad om att dessa otaliga små cirklar på månen var måninvånarnas verk, vilka skulle kunna kallas för deras städer. Herschel var inte ensam om att se spår av civilisationer på månen. I en artikel från 1824, "Upptäckt av många tydliga spår av måninvånare, särskilt av en av deras kolossala byggnader" (Discovery of Many 102 Distinct Traces of Lunar Inhabitants, Especially of One of Their Colossal Buildings) rapporterade den tyske astronomen Franz von Paula Gruithuisen att han bland annat hade observerat städer, fort, tempel och djurstigar på månen. Vad gäller de speciella lysande fläckar som man ibland kunde se på månens mörka yta hade Herschel förklarat som vulkanutbrott. En skotsk amatörastronom, Thomas Dick, skrev senare i mitten av 1800-talet att en mer tilldragande förklaring kunde vara att de var tillfälliga, praktfulla fyrverkerier som måninvånarna arrangerade under sina långa, mörka nätter. Astronomerna letar efter mönster, samband, mening. Ett sentida exempel på seendets sökande efter mönster är vår benägenhet att se ansikten omkring oss, som gubben i månen och ansiktet på Mars (Figur 6). Venus atmosfär Venuskartor från 1600och 1700-talen uppvisar inte sällan berg och andra geologiska formationer. Även ett svagt ljus, bleka fläckar och linjer, till och med en beledsagande måne, tycks ha setts i teleskopet när man studerade Venus. Astronomerna tolkade sina otydliga observationer i linje med sina förkunskaper och tankar om hur världen var inrättad – och de fann ofta det de sökte. Om de trodde på existensen av berg och en atmosfär kring Venus, så fann de dem också. År 1645 lade den napolitanske astronomen Francesco Fontana märke till mörka fläckar i centrum av Venusskivan, som kan anses vara det första försöket att registrera detaljer på dess yta. En annan italiensk astronom, Giovanni Domenico Cassini, såg 1667 olika ljusa och dunkla fläckar utifrån vilka han gjorde den första beräkningen av Venus rotationstid (Figur 7). På 23 timmar och 21 minuter rörde den sig ett helt varv runt sin axel. Ytterligare en annan italiensk astronom, Francesco Bianchini, gjorde den första Venuskartan 1726 som anger både oceaner och kontinenter (Figur 8). Dimfria dagar, vid skymningen, kunde han se runda fläckar Figur 7: Giovanni Cassinis teckning från 1667 av Venus yta, ur Camille Flammarions Les terres du ciel (1877). 103 liknande de kratrar man kunde se på månen, och utifrån deras rörelse kunde han komma fram till en rotationstid motsvarande 24 dagar och 8 timmar. Föga anade de dock att Venus rotationshastighet egentligen var väsentligt långsammare – rymdsonden Mariner 2 uppmätte i december 1962 en rotationstid på hela 243 jorddagar. Det råder ingen tvekan om att 1600och 1700-talens noteringar av formationer på Venus yta var rena optiska illusioner. Förutom det att den optiska kvaliteten hos tidens teleskop inte alltid var helt tillförlitlig och att väderförhållanden kunde märkbart påverka kvaliteten på observationerna, så innebar också tolkningen av observationerna att man kunde förledas i en viss riktning. Fontana, Figur 8: Den ljusa ringen och den svarta droppen sett från Uppsala under Venuspassagen 1761. Torbern Bergmans brev i Philosophical Transactions (1762). 104 Cassini, Bianchini och andra astronomers osäkra observationer tvingade dem på ett eller annat sätt att tolka det de såg. Om de trodde på existensen av oceaner och kontinenter på Venus, så sökte de efter dem – och fann dem, eftersom deras förkunskaper och förväntningar ledde deras uppmärksamhet mot sådana tolkningar som överensstämde med vad de antog vara sannolikt. Illusionen hade sin grund inte enbart i bristerna i deras optiska utrustning, utan i deras tolkning av sinnesintrycken. Under Venuspassagen den 6 juni 1761 observerades två oväntade fenomen: en ljus ring kring Venus och en "svart droppe" i kontaktpunkten mellan Venus och solskivan (Figur 9). Den ljusa ringen observerades också den 3 juni 1769. Dess orsak debatterades, men de flesta var eniga om att den bevisade existensen av en atmosfär kring Venus. Vad gäller den svarta droppen, menade den svenske astronomen Daniel Melanderhjelm, hade också den sin orsak i Venus atmosfär. Sekreteraren i Kungliga svenska vetenskapsakademien, Pehr Wilhelm Wargentin, å andra sidan, menade att den i stället kunde förklaras som ett enkelt ljusbrytningsfenomen. Melanderhjelms observationer, sade han, var endast optiska villfarelser. Figur 9: Francesco Bianchinis framställning av Venus i sitt arbete Hesperi et phosphori nova phaenomena (1728). 105 Den svenske fysikern Johan Carl Wilcke utförde ett antal experiment under sommaren 1769 som visade att samma fenomen uppstod ifall man höll upp ett mörkt föremål mot en ljus yta, utan att man för den skull behövde anta existensen av en atmosfär. Men hur som helst, varken Wargentin eller Wilcke betvivlade att Venus hade en atmosfär, men den svarta droppen kunde inte vara beviset. I slutet av 1700-talet drabbade astronomerna Herschel och Schröter samman i en hetsig debatt rörande närvaron eller frånvaron av berg på Venus. De var dock trots allt samstämmiga vad gäller existensen av en atmosfär kring Venus. Det var välkänt för de flesta av tidens astronomer att Venus och jorden var i det närmaste perfekta tvillingar vad gäller storlek och massa. Det fanns därmed också skäl för att anta att dessa två planeter också hade liknande atmosfärer vad gäller omfattning och sammansättning. I februari 1788 observerade Schröter att den vanligtvis enhetliga ljusa skivan tycktes vara täckt av genomskinliga strimmor som han antog vara den yttersta delen av en tjock, molnaktig atmosfär (Figur 10). Därtill tycktes "hornen" på Venusskäran sträcka sig bortom halvcirkeln, vilket inte kunde vara fallet om den saknade en atmosfär. Den 28 december 1789 såg Schröter vidare att den södra änden av Venusskäran var trubbig och att där fanns en liten belyst fläck. Han observerade detta återigen både 1790 och 1791 och drog slutsatsen att det Figur 10: Johann Hieronymus Schröters teckning av Venus atmosfär. 106 måste vara ett mycket högt, upplyst berg som fångade solens strålar. År 1793 vände Herschel sitt teleskop mot Venus, men kunde inte återfinna vad Schröter hade sett. Han intygade att Venus hade en atmosfär, men några höga berg, som Schröter påstod fanns, kunde han inte se. I Philosophical Transactions samma år skriver han ifråga om bergen på Venus, att inga ögon som inte är betydligt skarpare än hans eller assisterade av mycket bättre instrument, kommer någonsin att få en glimt av dem. När Schröter, Herschel och andra studerade Venus såg de fenomen som krävde förklaringar och tolkningar. De tyckte sig se otydliga fläckar, streck, linjer, droppar, ett dunkelt ljus och skymten av en måne. Det askgrå ljuset, som syntes dunkelt över den icke solbelysta sidan av Venus, när den var halvmåneformad, rapporterades första gången 1643 av den italienske jesuiten och astronomen Giovanni Battista Riccioli. Även detta fenomen ledde till vissa tolkningar av det de tycktes se. Gruithuisen förklarade att detta ljus hade setts både 1759 och 1806, alltså med ett intervall på 76 Venusår. Hans lite besynnerliga förklaring var att detta uppenbarligen var ett resultat av offentliga festilluminationer för att hedra en ny kejsares bestigande av tronen. Emellertid modifierade Gruithuisen sin förklaring och i stället för en venusiansk kröning, så föreslog han att ljuset kunde vara orsakat av svedjebruk när venusianerna brände ner skog för att skapa jordbruksmark. Senare under 1800-talet skapade den nya spektroskopiska analysmetoden förhoppningar om att kunna upptäcka spektrallinjer för syre och vattenånga i Venus atmosfär. Vissa preliminära resultat tycktes understödja en sådan upptäckt. Först 1966–1967 när de ryska rymdsonderna Venera 3 och Venera 4 dök ner genom Venus täta molnmassa uppenbarade sig en mycket ogästvänlig miljö (Figur 11). En het, tryckande atmosfär, en värld lidande under växthuseffektens plågor. Kanalerna på Mars Ett av de mest kända exemplen i astrobiologins historia där planetskådarnas föreställningar och förväntningar visade sig bedrägliga är debatten kring Marskanalerna i slutet av 1800-talet (se även Dravins kapitel). Giovanni Schiaparelli vid Figur 11: Det första fotot på Venus yta taget av den sovjetiska rymdsonden Venera 13 den 1 mars 1982. Foto: Union of Soviet Socialist Republics/NASA. 107 Brera-observatoriet i Milano gjorde 1877 detaljerade bilder av ett nätverk av kanaler på Mars (Figur 12). Till en början hade de flesta astronomer svårt att bekräfta dessa observationer, men under de följande årtiondena lyckades många återse det som Schiaparelli tyckte sig se. Den amerikanske amatörastronomen Percival Lowell bekräftade Schiaparellis "upptäckter" och mer därtill – han "upptäckte" hundratals Marskanaler, vilka han tolkade som ett konstgjort bevattningssystem skapat av intelligenta marsianer (Figur 13). I sin bok Mars (1895) hävdade han att han nu hade bindande bevis för en intelligent civilisation på en döende planet. Figur 12: Giovanni Schiaparellis karta över kanalerna på Mars från 1888 jämförd med en modern satellitkarta. 108 Färgskiftningar på Marsytan observerades också, vilka togs som bevis för existensen av årstider och vegetation. Ytan förmörkades när våren var i antågande. Men det fanns de som förhöll sig skeptiska till dessa uppgifter. Edward Walter Maunder vid Greenwich-observatoriet ifrågasatte dessa kanalobservationer som han menade endast var optiska illusioner. Ögat tenderar att föra samman detaljer som befinner sig bortom det synbaras gräns, förklarade han. Eugène Antoniadi, vid observatoriet i Meudon i Frankrike, använde sig av ett teleskop av högsta kvalitet, med vars hjälp han gjorde teckningar av specifika regioner på Mars, vilka han sedan jämförde med Schiaparellis teckningar av samma områden. Det visade sig att där Schiaparellis teckningar visade kanaler, där kunde Antoniadi endast finna otydliga detaljer, men inga kanaler (Figur 14). Antoniadis förklaring var att Schiaparellis kanaler hade skapats genom att binda samman fläckar på Marsytan eller genom att markera gränslinjerna mellan mörkare och ljusare regioner. I ett nummer från 1912 av den amerikanska tidskriften Popular Science kunde läsaren själv få en upplevelse av denna optiska illusion genom ett enkelt, praktiskt test bestående av slumpartade punkter (Figur 15). Vid den tiden hade de allra flesta astronomer övergivit denna fantasieggande tanke. Figur 13: Konstgjorda kanaler på Mars, enligt Percival Lowell 1894. 109 Att kartera planeterna fordrade stort tålamod. Under långa vakande nätter tvingades man följa det skimrande ljusets förändringar i teleskopet som förvrängdes av jordens atmosfär. De suddiga bilderna som syntes i teleskopet var inte annat än otydliga sinnesintryck som avkrävde betraktaren tolkningar genom att applicera sina förkunskaper och begrepp på det som ögat förmedlade. Det aktiva seendet sökte efter regelbundenheter, ordning och begriplighet i observationerna. Berättelsen om människans observationer av månen, Venus och Mars säger oss något om det mänskliga ögats, hjärnans och handens osäkerhet när hon ställs inför svårtolkade fenomen. När människor söker efter livstecken, spanar de efter regelbundenheter, ordning och samband utifrån sina förkunskaper, förväntningar och teorier om verkligheten. Men hur binder vi samman det vi ser, livstecknet, med det som vi antar är dess orsak, det levande? Figur 14: Mars i det mänskliga ögat. Fyra tolkningar av en och samma planet: Schiaparelli 1877; Antoniadi 1909; Lowell 1909; och ett fotografi tagit samma år från Pulkovo-observatoriet utanför Sankt Petersburg. 110 Livstecknet och det levande Sökandet efter livstecken handlar mycket om hur vi upptäcker, skapar, dechiffrerar och tolkar samband mellan olika företeelser, mellan livstecknet och livet självt. Först måste man förstå att det man ser just är ett tecken på liv och att det på något sätt står i samband med något levande. I vårt vardagliga liv gör vi ganska enkelt dessa sammankopplingar. När vi ser fotspår på stranden kan vi dra slutsatsen utifrån våra tidigare kunskaper och erfarenheter vad för slags djur det är, hur stort och tungt det är och i vilken riktning det är på väg. Emellertid när vi söker efter livstecken på okända livsformer, om vilka vi inte har några som helst kunskaper, blir våra slutsatser väsentligt osäkrare. Vi tvingas till en rad antaganden om sambanden mellan livstecknet och det liv det refererar till. Våra antaganden kan vara oriktiga, vilket leder till felaktiga tolkningar, eller kanske ännu värre, vi misslyckas med att upptäcka att tecknet innehåller mening, och förbiser därmed att tecknet i själva verket är ett livstecken. Även om vi skulle ha goda skäl att anta att våra teorier om sambandet mellan livstecknet och livet är vetenskapligt korrekta, så måste vi därtill utesluta alla andra möjliga förklaringar till "livstecknet". Det kanske visar sig att det vi först trodde var ett livstecken inte alls är det, utan har sin orsak i en för oss okänd icke-biologisk process. Livstecken blir meningsfulla först när någon tolkar dem och antar att de har en specifik mening eller betydelse genom att upprätta ett samband mellan livstecknet och det liv det tänks avslöja. Att söka efter livstecken är ett sätt bland många att Figur 15: Har professor Lowell bedragit sig? Betrakta bilden från 20 fot och du kommer då se att fläckarna på den vänstra bilden kommer likna linjerna i den högra. Ur Popular Science (1912). 111 finna mening i de observationer och data som vi samlar in. Livstecknen finns inte bara där ute för oss att upptäcka. I någon mening finns de också i våra huvuden, i vår tolkning av världen, i samspelet mellan vårt tänkande och världen. Alltså, förutom livstecknet och det liv det betecknar, måste vi räkna in oss själva. Så vad astrobiologen gör är att försöka hitta dessa samband mellan uttryck och innehåll, det vill säga mellan livstecken och liv. Detta sökande efter samband sker i det mänskliga tänkandet. När astrobiologerna studerar ljuset från andra planeter eller radiovågor från yttre rymden försöker de välja ut de mest meningsbärande tecknen, de som antas vara de mest relevanta. Vad av allt detta vi tar emot är meningsfullt för oss och vad är bara ett meningslöst brus? Och vi behöver också kunna ge en rimlig förklaring till på vilket sätt tecknet på liv står i samband med liv och inget annat. På vilket sätt är en specifik gas ett resultat av ämnesomsättningen hos en för oss okänd levande organism? På vilket sätt är en viss form en kvarleva från en levande organisms anatomiska uppbyggnad? Vi måste med andra ord känna till de fysiska processerna som binder samman tecknet med det levande. Dessa samband mellan uttryck och innehåll är i huvudsak av tre slag, det kan vara en relation baserat på likhet, närhet eller konventioner. Hos ikoner (bilder) finns det en likhet mellan tecknet och dess objekt. Index bygger i stället på närhet eller kontinuitet med objektet, tecknet liksom pekar mot objektet. Och slutligen symboler, när det egentligen inte finns något fysiskt samband mellan livstecknet och det liv det refererar till, utan är en konvention eller vana. Astrobiologen är en sorts teckentydare i det okända. Bilder av liv När han vandrade på stranden och i bergen i Attika lade den grekiske filosofen Aristoteles märke till att de snäckliknande strukturer man kunde finna i klippbranterna liknade de som sköljdes upp på havsstranden. Är denna likhet bara en slumpmässig tillfällighet eller finns det i själva verket ett verkligt samband mellan de förstenade snäckformerna och de levande snäckorna i havet? Om det är så, hur kan det komma sig? Den persiske naturforskaren Ibn-Sīnā (Avicenna) lade i början av 1000-talet fram hypotesen att det skulle kunna finnas vissa vätskor som låg bakom denna försteningsprocess. Under många århundraden diskuterades om dessa så kallade figurstenar, som påminde om levande organismer, var fossiliserade havssnäckor eller just bara var naturens gyckelspel, och om de växte inne i stenen eller rentav var lämningar efter ett levande djur som dog ut med Syndafloden. Den danske anatomen och geologen Nicolaus Steno fann 1665 när han vandrade i bergen i Toscana vassa trekantiga stenar som var mer eller mindre identiska med levande hajars rakbladsvassa tänder, varvid han drog slutsatsen att där det nu var höga berg, en gång har varit ett hav (Figur 16). Andra fynd som gjordes av geologer tycktes dock inte ha några nu levande motsvarigheter. I slutet av 1700- 112 talet började den franske paleontologen Georges Cuvier ana att dessa annorlunda fossiler i själva verket var lämningar efter nu utdöda arter. Den begynnande kunskapen om fossiler kombinerades snart med tanken om utomjordiskt liv. Om meteoriter hade sitt ursprung i rymden, vilket man i början av 1800-talet hade börjat förstå, i stället för att vara uppkastade stenar från vulkaner, så skulle dessa kunna studeras med kemiska och geologiska metoder. Måhända kunde dessa meteoriter från yttre rymden innehålla spår av utomjordiskt liv, om inte av levande, så åtminstone av fossiliserad form. Den svenske kemisten Jöns Jacob Berzelius upptäckte att meteoriter faktiskt innehöll organiskt material, det vill säga kolväteföreningar. Han hade undersökt ett antal meteoriter från ett meteorregn i november 1833. Vidare gjorde han en kemisk analys av en kolhaltig meteorit som fallit ner i Alès i Frankrike 1806, men kunde inte dra några säkra Figur 16: Fossila hajtänder är av samma slag som nu levande hajars. Nicolaus Steno, Elementorum myologiae specimen, seu musculi descriptio geometrica (1667). 113 slutsatser ifall dess kolföreningar var av utomjordiskt ursprung. På 1870-talet var de flesta ense om att vissa meteoriter kunde innehålla organiskt material, men något övertygande bevis för att de också innehöll utomjordiskt liv fanns inte. Med Berzelius och andra blev emellertid tanken om "panspermia", det vill säga att meteoriter genom rymden kunde föra med sig frön till liv, ett alltmer möjligt forskningsområde. En av de mest tongivande i utvecklandet av panspermiehypotesen var den svenske fysikaliske kemisten Svante Arrhenius i början av 1900-talet. Ännu i dag diskuteras denna möjlighet. Forskningen har visat att mikroorganismer faktiskt kan överleva i rymden och färdas från planet till planet med meteoriter. Björndjur – upp till en millimeter stora så kallade trögkrypare – kan utstå extrema förhållanden, rymdens kyla, vakuum, strålning och torka (Figur 17). En grupp svenska och tyska forskare, ledd av Ingemar Jönsson vid Högskolan i Kristianstad, visade 2008 i ett experiment att de kan överleva minst två veckor i rymden om de skyddas från solens UV-strålning. År 2007 skickades ett antal björndjur upp i rymden med en rysk rymdsond från kosmodromen i Baikonur. En stor andel överlevde rymdfärden. En del till och med trivdes och förökade sig, andra föll i dvala. Figur 17: En rymdresenär. Björndjur kan överleva i rymden. 114 Ett tema i paleontologins historia är frågan om hur man ska skilja verkliga kvarlevor av levande organismer från strukturer som bara tycks härma levande former. Dessa så kallade pseudofossil kan misstas för att vara verkliga fossiler, som till exempel grenliknande strukturer i kalksten, eller den så kallade mossagaten vars mossliknande blad, eller andra mönster i stenar och mineral, uppstår genom geologiska och inte biologiska processer. I sökandet efter fossiler för att spåra livets tidiga historia på jorden eller för att finna fossiliserat liv i stenar från Mars innebär detta påtagliga utmaningar. År 1996 tillkännagavs att fossiliserat liv hade upptäckts i Marsmeteoriten ALH84001 (Figur 18). När man studerade den under ett elektronmikroskop fann man tubliknande strukturer som påminde om fossiliserade bakterier. Det var dock en förhastad slutsats. Icke-biologiska processer kunde i själva verket skapa dessa strukturer. Detta manade till sökandet efter nya prover för att kunna bekräfta existensen av fossiliserat liv i stenar från yttre rymden. Ytterligare prover är med andra ord nödvändiga för att bekräfta eller avvisa tidigare hypoteser som baserats på den första omgången av prover. Livstecken i form av fossiler är märkbart annorlunda till sin natur än de som skulle kunna upptäckas genom studier av den kemiska sammansättningen av fjärran atmosfärer. Inte just för att de kan studeras på plats, utan genom relationen mellan det som är ett tecken på liv och det liv som det hänvisar till. Fossiler är livstecken som uppvisar likheter med levande organismer. De, skulle man kunna Figur 18: Marsmeteoriten Allan Hills 84001 fotograferad genom ett elektronmikroskop, uppvisar strukturer som en del har hävdat kan vara fossiliserade bakterieliknande livsformer. Foto: NASA. 115 säga, avbildar det levande och delar något av deras egenskaper och utseende. Fossiler är avtryck av de hårda delarna av djur och växter, varvid avtrycken av skelett eller bladverk låter oss, genom deras likhet, etablera ett samband mellan den fossiliserade strukturen och den levande organismen. Själva detaljrikedomen hos fossilen leder oss mot slutsatsen, utifrån antagandet att en sådan detaljrikedom och komplexitet inte skulle kunna ha uppstått genom någon annan känd icke-biologisk process. Mikroskopiska fossiler, så kallade mikrofossil, är än mer utmanande. Allt liv som vi känner det delar egenskapen att ha inre volymer eller celler, vilka skiljs från den omgivande miljön genom cellmembran. Tanken är alltså att man skulle kunna söka efter sådana cellstrukturer. Välbevarade fossila celler kan vara identiska i fråga om storlek, form och struktur med levande encelliga organismer. Deras cellstruktur, som uppvisar mindre komplexitet än fossiler efter hela djur och växter, gör det emellertid svårare att verkligen kunna skilja biologiska strukturer från ickebiologiska. På vår jord, i Pilbara i västra Australien, har man hittat celliknande strukturer som bedömts vara hela 3,5 miljarder år gamla. Tolkningarna har gått isär, å ena sidan fossiliserade celler av trådliknande bakterier eller resultatet av ickebiologiska processer å den andra. Alltså för att kunna antas vara ett verkligt livstecken är det inte tillräckligt att det finns en likhet mellan tecknet och det levande. Vi behöver också en förklaring till hur den levande organismen kan bli ett fossil. Om vi finner något som påminner oss om något levande, till exempel en mikrob, en cell eller liknande, behöver vi en teori som länkar samman den levande organismen med biosignaturen. För liv på jorden har vi en ganska klar uppfattning om hur fossiliseringsprocessen kan ha gått till. Många genomförda experimentella fossilstudier ger oss goda skäl att göra denna sammankoppling. Och vidare, fossiler är i sig inte heller tillräckliga för att ge oss fullständiga kunskaper om det liv som det är spår av. De ger oss till exempel inte fullständig information om den levande organismens biokemi. Den här likheten mellan livstecknet och det levande behöver inte endast bestå i en synlig likhet grundad i likheter i struktur och uppbyggnad, utan kan uppstå genom att de delar vissa kemiska egenskaper. De kan till exempel dela komplexa biologiska makromolekyler som kolväteföreningar, proteiner och nukleinsyror (RNA och DNA). De flesta biomolekyler förändras emellertid och bryts ner, och produkterna (vad man skulle kunna kalla molekylfossiler) av denna nedbrytning är inte längre något som liknar de ursprungliga molekylerna, men ändå har ett samband med dem. Det finns något i livstecknet som pekar mot det levande. Livets pekfinger "En dag vid middagstid när jag var på väg till min båt, fick jag till min häpnad se spår av en naken mans fot på stranden, där det var tydligt avtryckt i sanden. Jag stod liksom träffad av blixten eller som om jag sett ett spöke. Jag såg mig omkring, 116 jag lyssnade men kunde varken se eller höra någonting. Jag gick upp på en höjd för att kunna se längre bort, jag gick åt båda hållen på stranden, men allt förgäves. Jag kunde inte upptäcka något mer spår än detta enda. Jag gick tillbaka till spåret igen för att se om där var några fler eller om det hela endast var ett foster av min inbillning. Så var det emellertid inte, för där var fortfarande ett tydligt märke av en fot med tå och häl och varje del av den. Hur det kommit dit kunde jag inte på något sätt föreställa mig." När den skeppsbrutne Robinson Crusoe, uppkastad på en strand på en obebodd ö, en dag såg fotspår i sanden, visste han att där fanns mänskligt liv – sin Figur 19: Robinson Crusoe finner ett fotspår i sanden. Illustration från 1894 av Walter Paget. 117 blivande vän Fredag (Figur 19). Han drog denna slutsats, inte genom att detta fotspår på något sätt skulle likna en mänsklig varelse, utan därför att den hade ett orsakssamband med den livsform som hade gjort det. Spåret pekade mot en levande varelse. På samma sätt när man ser röken över en skog och drar slutsatsen att där måste finnas en eld, som orsakat denna rök. Dessa tecken, som inom semiotiken kallas index, upprättar ett kausalt samband mellan uttryck och innehåll genom närhet eller beröring. Tolkningen av dessa tecken förutsätter kunskaper genom erfarenheter av de återkommande sambanden mellan tecknet och vad det refererar till. Det finns en stor mängd sådana potentiella tecken omkring oss även om vi ännu inte lärt oss känna igen dem som meningsfulla tecken. Några av dessa otaliga tecken, som för oss återstår att upptäcka, kan i själva verket hänvisa till dess orsak, något levande. Inom astrobiologin söker man efter sådana tecken som pekar på en biologisk process som orsakat dem. Bland annat skulle man kunna söka efter kemiska livstecken i en främmande planets atmosfär orsakade av levande organismers ämnesomsättning. Skulle man till exempel finna stora mängder metangas i atmosfären Figur 20: Stromatoliter, det vill säga sedimentstrukturer uppbyggda av mikroorganismer, särskilt cyanobakterier. Ouarzazate-stromatoliterna är från kambrium och prekambrium, och bildades i en grund lagun för omkring 600 miljoner år sedan. Foto: David Dunér. 118 skulle det kunna vara tecken på förekomsten av biologiska processer, även om man inte kan utesluta en icke-biologisk orsak. Vissa mineral skulle kunna vara orsakade av ämnesomsättningen hos mikroorganismer, men som så ofta kan de vara ytterst svåra att skilja från mineral som har ett icke-biologiskt ursprung. Ett annat slag av tecken som pekar mot biologiska processer är olika strukturer som bär spår av levande organismers beteende eller aktivitet. På vår jord har man till exempel funnit så kallade stromatoliter, vilka består av skiktade mattor av fossila mikroorganismer (Figur 20). Dessa stromatoliter är i sig inte levande, liknar inte heller något levande, men är orsakade av levande organismer, särskilt cyanobakterier. Andra exempel på sådana tecken som är spår av levande organismers aktivitet är urborrningar, hålor och fotspår. Återigen, utmaningen är här att skilja dessa livstecken från mönster som endast är resultatet av icke-biologiska processer som vi tycker liknar de som orsakas av levande organismer. Frågan är hur man skulle kunna söka efter dessa kemiska tecken på liv, då vi knappast kan resa till andra planeter utanför vårt solsystem och undersöka dessa på plats. Den frågan fick en oväntad vändning på 1800-talet. Den franske positivisten Auguste Comte, som ständigt underströk den rationella vetenskapligheten, menade att det finns vissa saker vi aldrig kommer att veta, utan endast kan spekulera om. I fråga om himlakropparna skrev han 1835 att vi aldrig på något sätt kommer att kunna studera deras kemiska eller mineralogiska sammansättning. Men bara några få årtionden senare upptäcktes en ny metod, kallad spektroskopi, för att analysera ljuset från andra himlakroppar. Spektroskopet blev ett verkningsfullt redskap inte bara för att undersöka andra himlakroppars kemiska sammansättning, utan dessutom för att söka efter utomjordiskt liv. Beroende på olika molekyler som var och en har sin unika karaktär, kunde forskare genom att analysera ljuset nu dra slutsatser om de främmande atmosfärernas kemiska sammansättning. De första studierna med hjälp av spektroskopi för att upptäcka syre och vatten i Mars atmosfär gjordes av astronomerna William Huggins och Jules Janssen på 1860-talet. De utgick från antagandet att vatten är en nödvändig förutsättning för liv. Om man därtill förknippar planetens miljöförhållanden (närvaron av vattenånga i atmosfären och flytande vatten på dess yta) med möjligheten för liv att uppstå och överleva, så har man en ledtråd. Det vill säga, en upptäckt av vattenånga i en planets atmosfär skulle därigenom bli en avgörande indikation på att det kan finnas liv på dess yta. Janssen hävdade 1867 också att han hade upptäckt närvaron av vattenånga i Mars atmosfär, vilket därmed skulle bekräfta hypotesen om en levande planet. Troligen var detta tecken på vattenånga i själva verket av jordiskt ursprung, vilket den amerikanske astronomen William Wallace Campbell korrigerade 1894. Förhoppningen är att vi i framtiden skall kunna studera exoplaneter av samma slag som jorden. Men de är ännu för små och ligger för långt bort från sin stjärna för att vi med dagens instrument skulle kunna observera dem. Med den teknik vi nu har är det omöjligt för oss att urskilja denna främmande planets geologiska 119 formationer, som hav, berg och kontinenter. Men vi skulle sannolikt inom ganska snar framtid kunna upptäcka vissa gaser i dess atmosfär som kan förknippas med liv, även om tolkningen av denna förekomst skulle vara besvärlig och tvetydig. Ett första steg i sökandet efter livstecken på en exoplanet skulle vara att ta reda på dess temperatur, storlek, massa, densitet, gravitation och ljusförhållanden. I ett nästa steg skulle man kunna försöka ta reda på om den har en atmosfär, flytande vatten, moln, hur ytan kan vara beskaffad, planetens dagliga rotation kring sin axel, hur årstiderna varierar och hur vädret skulle kunna vara. I ett tredje steg skulle man kunna vara redo för ett mer konkret sökande efter livstecken, det vill säga försöka upptäcka specifika gaser – till exempel syre, ozon, metan och koldioxid – som kan ha sitt ursprung i biologisk aktivitet (se även Dravins kapitel). Särskilt intressant är kombinationen av gaser och mängden av dem. Som forskarna Joshua Lederberg och James Lovelock föreslog 1965 kan gaser i ojämnvikt vara tecken på liv. Liv, kan man säga, leder till ojämnvikt, det vill säga, mängden och kombinationen av gaser skulle inte vara som den är om inte en biologisk aktivitet upprätthöll denna obalans. Om livet plötsligt skulle dö ut på en levande planet, skulle de kemiska livstecknen snart försvinna. Alltså, om de ändå finns där, så måste det finnas en kontinuerlig källa som upprätthåller den mängd gas som egentligen inte borde finnas. En sådan källa skulle kunna vara livet självt. Men som ett återkommande tema i sökandet efter liv är livstecknen tvetydiga. Först och främst försöker astrobiologerna leta efter tecken på enkla biologiska processer, men det finns också möjligheter för att söka efter mer avancerade livsformer. En annan skeppsbruten resenär i främmande trakter, den antike grekiske filosofen Aristippos, kastades i land vid Rhodos kust någon gång omkring 400 före vår tideräkning. När han fann geometriska figurer i sanden blev han emellertid övertygad om att han hade kommit till ett land bebott av civiliserade människor (Figur 21). Dessa geometriska figurer indikerade inte bara att där fanns liv, människor, utan till och med att där fanns en intelligent civilisation. Tanken på att kunna finna konkreta tecken på intelligenta utomjordiska civilisationer har eggat forskare sedan länge. Sedan 1960-talet har man avlyssnat rymden på radiovågor, men man kan också tänka sig att man i framtiden skulle kunna analysera ljuset från jordliknande exoplaneter som kanske uppvisar tecken, vilka vad vi vet, inte har en naturlig orsak, utan måste vara artificiella, skapade av en teknisk civilisation. Till exempel, som på vår jord, skulle man kunna finna en förändrad atmosfär orsakad av industriföroreningar, molekyler framställda på konstgjord väg som freoner eller andra artificiella spår av en miljö i obalans. Dessa skulle kunna vara tecken på att det där finns en avancerad livsform som på konstgjord väg kan förändra och påverka sin livsmiljö. Finns det utomjordiska astrobiologer på en annan avlägsen planet som studerar oss, som följt vår utveckling ett par hundra år, skulle se en planet som dramatiskt har förändrats vad gäller livsbetingelser, med föroreningar och ökad temperatur. En döende planet, kanske de då tänker. 120 När vi genomsöker stjärnor och planeter i vår galax, avlyssnar rymden på främmande signaler, kan vi en dag råka på tecken på tekniskt avancerade utomjordiska civilisationer. En eventuell upptäckt av tecken på teknik måste dock inte nödvändigtvis leda till slutsatsen att den har sitt ursprung i en civilisation bestående av biologiska varelser. Hypotetiskt kunde man tänka sig att livet där för länge sedan dött ut och övergått till ett så kallat postbiologiskt tillstånd där det levande, organiska, bytts ut mot självkopierande maskiner. Dessa så kallade von Neumann-maskiner, en idé som kastades fram av matematikern John von Neumann i slutet av 1940-talet, kan kopiera och sprida sig själva oberoende av några biologiska skapare. Figur 21: Aristippos finner spår av mänsklig civilisation. Ur Euklides, Elementa, i en utgåva från 1703 av den skotske astronomen och matematikern David Gregory. 121 Sökandet efter tecken på liv är, kan man säga, ett sätt att finna samband mellan olika fenomen omkring oss, dra slutsatser utifrån vissa tecken att de står i orsakssamband med sitt ursprung – liv. Detta sökande efter mening består av något mer än själva livstecknet och vad det betecknar, det levande. Som den brittiske astrofysikern Arthur Eddington uttryckte det i en bok om den allmänna relativitetsteorin från 1920: "Vi har funnit ett underligt fotspår vid det okändas strand. Vi har tänkt ut djupsinniga teorier, den ena efter den andra, för att förklara dess ursprung. Till slut lyckas vi rekonstruera den varelse som gjorde detta fotspår. Och se! Det är vårt eget." Det är vi själva, uttolkarna av dessa tecken som upprättar detta samband mellan tecknet och det betecknade, livstecknet och det levande. Sökandet efter tecken på liv skulle kunna ge oss ny kunskap om det levande universum i vilket vi lever, men också en ny, djupare förståelse av hur vi som meningssökande varelser finner mening i den till synes obegripliga och kaotiska världen omkring oss. Det levandes symboler Den 15 augusti 1977 tog "det stora örat", radioteleskopet Big Ear i Ohio, emot en mycket kraftfull radiosignal från yttre rymden som varade i 72 sekunder. När astronomen Jerry R. Ehman gick igenom datautskriften noterade han en märklig avvikelse. Slagen av häpnad antecknade han i marginalen: "Wow!" (Figur 22) Denna avvikelse har sedan varken kunnat återfinnas eller kunnat ges en tillfredsställande förklaring. Det första problemet man ställs inför i en sådan situation är att bestämma ifall det är en naturlig eller en artificiell signal av utomjordiskt ursprung. Det vill säga man måste utesluta alla kända naturliga orsaker till signalen, liksom alla mänskliga, jordiska källor, som till exempel satelliter eller mikrovågsugnen i rummet bredvid. Genom att utesluta alla sådana naturliga förklaringar, hoppas man kunna komma fram till slutsatsen att det måste vara en artificiell signal från en tekniskt avancerad intelligent civilisation. Men än svårare är det efterföljande problemet att avgöra om den okända signalen är något mer än endast ett tecken på teknik, eller närmare bestämt, om den därtill också innehåller ett meddelande, information, ett budskap som är menat att kommuniceras, dechiffreras och bli förstått av en mottagare. Om vi får in en sådan signal från yttre rymden vill vi nog inte stanna vid att konstatera att den kan ha sitt ursprung i en annan teknisk civilisation även om detta skulle vara i högsta grad uppseendeväckande – vi skulle ju också vilja veta vad den betyder, vad de vill säga. Livstecknet kan nämligen innehålla ett budskap till oss. Ett aktivt sökande efter utomjordisk intelligens med hjälp av radioastronomi har pågått sedan 1960-talet. År 1960 startade ett projekt kallat Ozma (efter prinsessan i det imaginära landet Oz) som ämnade söka efter tecken på utomjordiska civilisationer. Utgångspunkten är fullt rimlig. Elektromagnetisk strålning från jorden går att upptäcka från rymden. Från vår jord läcker det ut 122 radiooch tv-program i en strid ström som i teorin skulle kunna vara detekterbara för en främmande civilisation. Men om vi då för dem framstår som intelligenta är en annan fråga. På motsvarande sätt skulle en utomjordisk intelligens som använder sig av radiokommunikation kunna upptäckas av oss, åtminstone i teorin. Men än så länge ekar det tomt i världsrymden. Någon otvetydig signal från yttre rymden har hitintills inte tagits emot. Problemet med interstellär kommunikation ligger emellertid inte så mycket i att det skulle vara fysiskt eller tekniskt omöjligt, snarare tvärtom. Fysikens lagar medger detta och vår tekniska förmåga är tillräcklig för att kunna avlyssna till och med mycket avlägsna stjärnor och planeter, även om det förstås skulle vara en inte helt okomplicerad vetenskaplig och teknisk utmaning. Problemet är snarare ett annat: hur vi med våra mänskliga hjärnor ska kunna tolka, avkoda och dechiffrera dessa interstellära meddelanden. Att vara intelligent är något mer än att kunna skapa avancerade maskiner. Teknik förutsätter vissa mentala och sociala färdigheter. När vi söker efter utomjordisk intelligens, söker vi efter varelser med förmågan att tänka abstrakt, symboliskt, och inte minst kan och vill överföra dessa tankar till andra tänkande varelser. Intelligens kan beskrivas som en sorts mental förmåga att snabbt och flexibelt kunna förändra sitt tänkande när situationen så kräver det. Denna mentala gymnastik har växt fram under människans evolution i och med att den visat sig underlätta förmågan att överleva och reproducera sig inom en specifik miljö. Till dessa mentala förståndsgåvor hör förmågan att skapa inre föreställningar om världen, men med tänkandet kan man också föreställa sig ting som inte existerar i sinnevärlden, som inte finns närvarande, inte har existerat eller kommer att existera. Med lätthet kan vi föreställa oss enhörningar som inte existerar och aldrig har existerat, vi kan föreställa oss utomjordingar även om vi inte vet att de existerar. Vi kan föreställa oss abstrakta ting som pengar, demokrati eller mänskliga rättigheter. Detta abstrakta tänkande bygger till stor del på användandet av symboler. Med hjälp av språket kan vi förmedla dessa abstrakta tankar från medvetande till medvetande. Figur 22: Wow! antecknade astronomen Jerry R. Ehman i marginalen. En signal från yttre rymden den 15 augusti 1977. 123 De sorters tecken jag tidigare har talat om, ikon och index, det vill säga bilder och "pekningar" som bygger på likhet respektive närhet med det de refererar till, är inte godtyckliga, utan har i någon bemärkelse ett verkligt samband med det de står för. Problemet med symboler är däremot att de bygger på konventioner. De är i någon mening godtyckliga och är beroende av det kulturella och sociala sammanhanget. Ordet "liv" har inget orsakssamband med vad det står för, inte heller liknar detta ord en levande organism. Det finns alltså inget inneboende samband mellan ordet "liv" och verkligt liv. Det hela bygger på en konvention. Vi har, kan man säga, kommit överens om att ordet "liv" betecknar något som vi förstår som "liv". Det är något vi måste lära oss. När vi ställs inför ett kosmiskt meddelande är det inte självklart att vi kommer att förstå vad deras meddelande står för. Eftersom det abstrakta tänkandet är beroende av symboler kommer vi sannolikt att ha stora svårigheter med att lista ut betydelsen av utomjordiska meddelanden. Det finns med andra ord inget i den fysiska anblicken av tecknet som ger oss några ledtrådar till vad det står för. Om man skulle upptäcka signaler som har sitt ursprung i en teknisk civilisation, skulle detta inte bara visa att det finns liv i rymden – det skulle dessutom visa att det finns andra intelligenta varelser som kan resonera, tänka, kommunicera och konstruera avancerad teknik. Det sistnämnda skulle dessutom innebära, menar man, att de har ingående kunskaper i vad vi skulle kalla matematik, fysik och kemi (Figur 23). Det är förstås inte otänkbart att föreställa sig att utomjordingarna skulle kunna ha specifika och initierade kunskaper om sin miljö, som till sitt innehåll mer eller mindre motsvarar våra egna grundläggande naturvetenskapliga kunskaper. Figur 23: Förstår sig utomjordingarna på matematik, fysik och kemi? Voyager Golden Record skickades ut i rymden 1977 med sonderna Voyager 1 och Voyager 2. Foto: NASA. 124 Men hur de uttrycker dessa kunskaper kommer med stor sannolikhet att vara väldigt olikt vårt sätt. Det är således snarare meddelandets uttryck än dess innehåll som skapar svårigheter för oss. Då de rimligen inte skickar konkreta föremål till oss, utan vill uttrycka abstrakta tankar, så måste de på ett eller annat sätt koda detta i ett språk som vi måste dechiffrera. De flesta försök som gjorts att konstruera interstellära meddelanden som ska förstås av en utomjordisk tänkande varelse går bet på denna skillnad mellan uttryck och innehåll (se vidare Čápovás kapitel angående försök att skapa interstellära meddelanden). Symboler är som sagt konventioner och därmed beroende av det kulturella och sociala sammanhanget som skapar dessa godtyckliga, men mer eller mindre regelbundna samband. Just vårt sätt att kommunicera och symbolisera våra tankar med hjälp av våra talade språk har växt fram genom en evolutionär och historisk process på vår jord, och är därmed också begränsad av våra mänskliga kroppar, vår specifika miljö och vår arts sociala och kulturella egenheter. På motsvarande sätt kommer de eventuella meddelanden som vi kanske en dag mottar från yttre rymden att vara symboliska meddelanden begränsade av de biologiska och kulturella förutsättningarna hos den intelligenta art som skickade dem. Om vi en dag upptäcker liv Än så länge har vi inte några säkra bevis på existensen av utomjordiskt liv. Men kommer vi någonsin att bli fullständigt säkra på att vi är ensamma? En svårighet som sökandet efter utomjordiskt liv tyngs av är att det i praktiken är omöjligt att falsifiera tesen om att liv finns där ute. Det finns ingen metod eller något sätt att bevisa att liv inte existerar eller inte kan existera någon annanstans i universum än här på jorden. Det är ju inte praktiskt möjligt att vända på varenda sten i universum, på varenda planet i varenda galax. Hittar vi inte liv under den stenen kan vi gå vidare och lyfta på en annan, finner vi inte liv på den planeten kan vi gå vidare till nästa och så vidare. Astrobiologin kan alltid färdas vidare, förfina sina metoder, observationer, teorier, ständigt hitta nya förklaringar till misslyckandet och finna på nya sätt att i framtiden göra, förhoppningsvis, framgångsrika upptäckter. Om vi inte finner liv på Mars yta, fortsätter vi och letar under dess yta – vilket man nu är i färd att göra. Om man inte hittar liv i vårt solsystem, fortsätter vi till nästa och nästa, kanske i det oändliga. Men när ska vi ge upp och dra slutsatsen att liv med största sannolikhet inte existerar någon annanstans än på vår jord? Efter hundra noggrant undersökta planeter, efter tusen eller miljoner? Vi kommer aldrig att kunna veta att vi är ensamma i världsrymden. Det förblir en fråga om sannolikhet. Men det räcker med ett enda exempel på utomjordiskt liv – och vi vet att vi inte är ensamma. Vi söker efter liv som vi känner det. Vi letar efter något som på sätt och vis påminner om oss själva, som liknar oss, vårt jordiska liv. Men annat liv i rymden skulle kunna vara mycket olikt det vi finner på jorden, långt bortom våra vildaste 125 fantasier. Vetenskapshistorien är just en historia om mänsklig förvåning. Världen vi lever i visade sig vara mycket annorlunda det vi först tänkte oss, rikare, mer komplicerad, mer egendomlig och mer förvånande än vad vi kunde drömma om: när Galilei fann berg och slätter på månen, när Newton fann himlakropparnas dragningskraft genom tomrummet, när Darwin fann människan vara släkt med aporna, när Einstein beskrev hur tiden kan gå olika snabbt och hur rummet kröks av materiens massa. Detta gäller också astrobiologin och sökandet efter liv i rymden. Framtida upptäckter inom astrobiologin kommer att fullständigt överraska oss. En dag kanske vi finner tecken på liv på en annan planet. Vi kommer då att erhålla vissa kunskaper, som till exempel om planetens kemiska sammansättning Figur 24: Fotspår på månen. Buzz Aldrin den 21 juli 1969. Foto: NASA. 126 och miljöförhållanden. Men framför allt, beskrivningarna, tolkningarna och slutsatserna rörande denna nya värld kommer då också att säga något om oss själva och vår plats i det levande universum, och hur vi tolkar och förstår den verklighet vi erfar. Det finns nämligen något vi vet. Sökandet efter liv har sin grund i det mänskliga tänkandet, människans kultur och historia. Astrobiologerna använder tankeförmågor som har växt fram genom människans evolution och historia. Särskilda tankeprocesser är i verksamhet när vi ställs inför okända ting, när vi tolkar potentiella tecken på liv, när vi samlar och klassificerar den information som vi inhämtar från rymden, och när vi drar slutsatser utifrån dessa observationer. Och detta sker i en kultur, vid en bestämd tidpunkt i historien, i en specifik forskningsmiljö och i samarbete med andra tänkande varelser av vår art. Vårt sökande efter livstecken vilar på de tankeförmågor och det sociala-kulturella sammanhang i vilket vår mänskliga art lever – och som gör vår planet till levande och tänkande. Även om liv inte existerar där ute, är det vi mänskliga, jordiska varelser med våra hjärnor, kroppar och kultur som söker efter det. Även om vi aldrig finner något, lär vi oss mer om oss själva – vi finner fotspår i sanden, våra egna (Figur 24). Lästips Crowe, Michael J. (1986) The extraterrestrial life debate 1750–1900: the idea of a plurality of worlds from Kant to Lowell. Cambridge University Press Dick, Steven J. (1982) Plurality of worlds: the origins of the extraterrestrial life debate from Democritus to Kant. Cambridge University Press Dick, Steven J. (1996) The biological universe: the twentieth-century extraterrestrial life debate and the limits of science. Cambridge University Press Dunér, David (2013) "Extrema världars historia", i Dunér, David (red.) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet Dunér, David (2013) "Extrem kommunikation", i Dunér, David (red.) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet Dunér, David, Joel Parthemore, Erik Persson & Gustav Holmberg (red.) (2013) The history and philosophy of astrobiology: perspectives on extraterrestrial life and the human mind. Cambridge Scholars Publishing 127 Persson, Erik (2013) "Philosophical aspects of astrobiology" in Dunér, D.; Pathermore, J.; Persson, E.; Holmberg, G. (eds.): The History and Philosophy of Astrobiology Cambridge Scholars Publishing Sullivan, Woodruff T. & John A. Baross (red.) (2007) Planets and life: the emerging science of astrobiology. Cambridge University Press 128 129 Att presentera människan för utomjordingar Klára Anna Čápová Översättning Anna Cabak Rédei Detta kapitel ger en kort översikt över hur mänskligt liv framställs i bild på Pioneer-plaketten 1972 och i ljud och bild på Voyagers guldskiva 1977, båda utsända av USA:s rymdfartstyrelse (NASA) och nu på väg ut i den interstellära rymden. Dessa rymdskepp bär med sig meddelanden som innehåller information om livet på jorden. Vilken information inkluderades? Hur presenterades människan? Vilka kommunikativa metoder användes i dessa meddelanden? Och, talar dessa meddelanden å människans vägnar, på denna planet? Efter översikten över NASA:s två interstellära meddelanden, undersöker jag meddelandenas design och analyserar "berättelsen om mänskligt liv". Genom en antropologisk ansats, visar jag på att den grundläggande idén bakom utformandet av meddelandena på både Pioneer och Voyager byggde på en naturvetenskaplig världssyn. änniskans vetgirighet är i det närmaste gränslös och den fascinerande, och än idag obesvarade frågan om vi är den enda intelligenta arten i universum, är en fråga som generationer av tänkare, författare och forskare har grubblat på. Är vi ensamma? Finns det annat liv därute? Om ja, hur är det beskaffat? Med 1900-talets intåg i rymdåldern och framstegen inom rymdteknologin, blev det möjligt för vetenskapsmän att ta sig an frågan, trots små chanser att nå positiva resultat. En av de första metoderna som astronomer och astrofysiker använde sig av var att skicka meddelanden med hjälp av rymdfarkoster eller i form av signaler från radioteleskop. 1972 sköt NASA upp rymdskeppet Pioneer 10 på uppdrag till Jupiter. Dess tvilling, Pioneer 11, följde ett år senare. Efter ett framgångsrikt utforskande av Jupiter och dess månar, fortsatte Pioneer-sonderna sin resa först till Uranus och sedan längre bort ut i yttre rymden. Fram till 1998, då Voyager nådde längre med sin högre hastighet, hade Pioneer 10 haft en särställning som den från jorden mest avlägsna rymdfarkosten. Pioneer-sonden förblev dock det första människoskapade objektet som lämnade vårt solsystem. Pioneeroch Voyager-projekten utgör båda viktiga milstolpar i NASA:s historia, tillsammans med Apollo-programmet, Challenger-tragedin, rymdteleskopet Hubble och NASA:s grundande 1958. Vid sidan av insamlingen av vetenskapliga data och upptäckterna som gjordes inom ramen för dessa två uppdrag, finns det M 130 ytterligare en sak som gör dem speciella. Förutom de vetenskapliga instrumenten, fästa på Pioneer- (10 och 11) och Voyager-sonderna (1 och 2) fanns även så kallade "interstellära meddelanden". Lika till formen, men ändå olika i mängden information som de tillhandhåller, var deras uppgift att informera mottagaren om att det finns liv på vår planet. Sannerligen hade forskarteamet som ansvarade för utvecklandet av dessa meddelanden tagit sig an en utmanande uppgift. Den första, att presentera våra livsformer för andra livsformer bortom vår föreställningsförmåga, avskilda från oss i tid och rum, och genom biologiska och kulturella faktorer. Den andra, en lika svår uppgift, var att beskriva vad mänskligt liv är för något. Vilka är vi? Vad har vi gemensamt? Vad betyder det att vara människa? Medan Pioneer-meddelandet bestod av några ingraverade symboler, var idén med Voyagers guldskiva att ge en omfattande beskrivning av naturen, människan och kulturen. Bilder, grafiska figurer, röster, hälsningar och musik lades till för att illustrera livets mångfald på jorden. Skivan skulle, som gruppledaren Carl Sagan uttryckte det, tala i allas vårt ställe, om människans liv, känslor, evolution, miljö, vetenskap, framsteg och kultur. Men hur presentera och förmedla en sådan mängd information? Hur kan vi beskriva människan och hennes planet? På vilket sätt? Genom vetenskap, konst, litteratur, musik, eller något annat? Det är tydligt att inget av dessa angreppssätt är oproblematiskt och att utformningen av meddelandena och deras innehåll har skapat mycket debatt som fortsatt att intressera allmänheten. Kritiken av NASA:s interstellära meddelanden tycks faktiskt stå mer i rampljuset nu än vid tiden för när meddelandena producerades. På följande sidor beskrivs vad som skickades med avsikt att presentera människan för utomjordingar under 1970-talet och vad det har att säga om hur det är att vara människa. Figur 1: Carl Sagan. Foto: NASA 131 Den interstellära grottmålningen En liten ingraverad guldanodiserad aluminiumplakett, idag känd som Pioneer-plaketten, fästes på rymdfarkosten. Den visar en mans och en kvinnas nakna kroppar tillsammans med flera symboler som var formgivna i syfte att ge information om rymdfarkostens ursprung. Plaketten beskrevs av NASA i termer av att vara "ett avtryck av människan", och var utformad av en liten grupp som bland annat bestod av Carl Sagan, astronom och populärvetenskaplig forskare på Cornell University och den amerikanske astronomen och astrofysikern Frank Drake. Artisten Linda Salzman Sagan, Carl Sagans fru, gjorde plakettens illustrationer. Sagan, som håller Pioneer-plaketten på bilden nedan (Figur 1), blev senare ordförande för den kommitté som sammanställde det meddelande som kom att färdas till yttre rymden ombord på Voyager-farkosterna. Enligt NASA:s uppdragsrapport, skapades Pioneer-meddelandet på kort tid: "Dr. Sagan var också entusiastisk vad gäller idén om ett meddelande på Pioneer. Han och Dr. Drake utformade en plakett, och Linda Salzman Sagan förberedde utsmyckningen, vilken presenterades för NASA som accepterade den för denna första rymdfarkost, från solsystemet ut i Vintergatan." Plaketten mäter endast 15 x 23 centimeter och visar fem ingraverade figurer (se Figur 2), som informerar om människans existens och plats i vår galax. I det övre vänstra hörnet på plaketten kan vi se två sammankopplade cirklar som illustrerar hyperfinövergången i en neutral väteatom (det vill säga en energiövergång i en väteatom, varvid det utsänds radiovågor med 21 cm våglängd). Radialdiagrammet (figuren som ser ut som strålar), är en karta som anger vår sols position i Fig.2: Teckning av Pioneer-plaketten med förklarande textrutor. Foto: NASA History 132 relation till fjorton pulsarer (roterande stjärnor som avger elektromagnetiska pulser). I den nedre delen av plaketten visas solsystemets planeter. Linjen med en pil visar att rymdfarkosten kommer från den tredje planeten från solen. Pioneer-farkostens siluett som visas i den övre högra delen ackompanjerar människoparet som vänskapligt hälsar invånarna från andra världar. I skymundan, till höger, finns ett litet diagram som visar talet åtta i binär form. När man kombinerar två av symbolerna, eller mer precist, "när vätelinjens våglängd (21 cm) multipliceras med det binära talet 8 vid sidan av kvinnan, får man hennes längd", som det förklaras i NASA:s uppdragsrapport. Plakettens design kan verka enkel, men ändå måste varje mottagare ha ett antal nödvändiga förkunskaper och förmågor för att kunna hitta, läsa och förstå ett sådant meddelande. För det första krävs en rymdteknologi och utrustning för att upptäcka och fånga in rymdfarkosten. För det andra, krävs ögon eller annat organ för seende, för att kunna se och känna igen gravyren. För det tredje, och det kan låta absurt, måste mottagaren vara intresserad av att läsa ett sådant meddelande och vara beredd att göra en tillräckligt stor ansträngning för att reda ut symbolernas mening. Särskilt de vetenskapliga koncepten, hyperfinövergången i neutralt väte och kartan över närliggande pulsarer och solsystem, kräver en vetenskaplig bakgrund och nyfikenhet. Denna nödvändiga förutsättning röjer Sagans uppfattning om att vetenskap är det enda språk vi skulle ha gemensamt med (de förmodade) mottagarna av meddelandet. Det är inte endast långa avstånd och tid som skiljer oss från mottagarna. Troligen kan även kognitionsmodell och språkbarriären hindra dem från att lösa gåtan. Även om chansen att ett Pioneer-rymdskepp upptäcks är liten, skulle mottagarna veta vad gravyrerna på Pioneer-plaketten representerar eller var menade att representera? Skulle de kunna få ut något av en radial figur, mystisk symbolism och en siluett? Skulle ens vi, hemmahörande i den kultur som producerade detta meddelande, förstå betydelsen av Pioneer-figurerna? Voyagers flaskpost År 1977 placerades två identiska interstellära meddelanden på utsidan av rymdfarkosterna Voyager 1 och Voyager 2, vilka skickades ut på sina uppdrag att utforska solsystemet och därefter fortsätta till dess gränser och längre. För att använda Sagans populära metafor, en flaskpost kastades ut från en öde ö i hopp om att någon en dag skulle ta upp den ur den djupa rymdens ändlösa djup. Voyager-meddelandet består av en guldpläterad kopparskiva, ofta benämnd Voyager Golden Record (Figur 3), med innehållet indelat i fyra sektioner:  "Scener från jorden" – 118 bilder och grafiska figurer om vår art och vår planet (inklusive basala matematiska, kemiska och fysikaliska definitioner). 133  "Hälsningar från jorden" – hälsningar från jorden intalat av människor på 55 olika språk och tryckta meddelanden från president Jimmy Carter och FN:s generalsekreterare Kurt Waldheim.  "Musik från jorden" – ett musikaliskt urval från olika kulturer och epoker (27 ljudinspelningar av österoch västerländska klassiker och en mängd etnisk musik).  "Ljud från jorden" – en mängd naturliga ljud (21 ljudinspelningar av mänskliga aktiviteter, maskiner och naturliga fenomen). Skivans innehåll skapades och sattes ihop för NASA av en kommitté ledd av Carl Sagan, och i övrigt bestående av Frank Drake, Ann Druyan, Timothy Ferris, Jon Lomberg och Linda Salzman Sagan. Drake är upphovsman till några av figurernas visuella delar, särskilt de matematiska definitionerna. Lomberg, amerikansk rymdartist och designer, skapade skivans grafiska figurer. Internationella konsultationer förekom i syfte att uppnå målet. Figur 3: Vänster, konvolutet till Voyagers Golden Record, med dess utomjordiska instruktioner. Det interstellära omslaget fäst på rymdskeppet Voyager. Foto: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Höger, The Sounds of Earth. Voyager Golden Record. Foto: NASA 134 The Golden Record Till skillnad från de informativa plaketterna på Pioneer 10 och Pioneer 11, så innehåller Voyagers grammofoninspelningar mera komplex information. För det första, det skyddande omslaget runt meddelandet, det så kallade interstellära konvolutet. Vi ser samma pulsarkarta och tidsreferensdiagram som används på Pioneer-plaketten (Figur 2 och 3). Sex av åtta diagram ger instruktioner om hur grammofonen sätts ihop för att spela skivan (Figur 4). Det finns en skiss över en pickup med stift sett från sidan och framifrån. När väl grammofonen har monterats, är nästa steg för mottagaren att titta på bilderna som lagrats elektroniskt på skivan. Bilddelen innehåller 118 bilder totalt, av vilka 17 är beskrivande, svartvita, tvådimensionella grafiska figurer skapade av den vetenskapliga gruppen. Återstoden består av färgfotografier från olika källor. Om Golden Record avkodas, sammanställs och spelas på rätt sätt så framträder den första bilden i meddelandet, "Kalibreringscirkeln". En enkel teckning i svart och vitt av en cirkel, samma Figur 4: Förklaring av diagrammet på Voyager Golden Records omslag. Foto: NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory. 135 utformning som skivan, är det uppmuntrande tecknet på att meddelandet avkodats på rätt sätt och scenerna från jorden öppnar sig. Efter den introducerande diabilden följer grundläggande definitioner av matematiska och fysiska enheter och kvantiteter. Sekvensen fortsätter med två diagram av "solsystemets parametrar" som visar solen och nio planeter. Efter diagrammen visas NASA:s fotografier av objekt från solsystemet: Solen, Merkurius, Mars (Figur 5), jorden (Figur 6), och Jupiter. Figur 6 (höger) är ett fotografi rubricerat "Egypten, Röda havet, Sinaihalvön och Nilen" som också ger en beskrivning av den kemiska kompositionen av jordens atmosfär. Den första markeringen på bilden gäller kvävemolekyler (N2) som fyller 78% av atmosfären ("n2 78/100" på Figur 6, höger). Därefter följer grundläggande definitioner av astronomiska och kemiska enheter (grundämnena C, N, H, O); och två bilder av Lombergs DNA-struktur. Varför använda kemi? De kemiska beståndsdelarna, som i kombination bygger upp all materia, visar här på livets essens. Figur 9 visar modeller av kemiska komponenter; väte (H, den enklaste och den mest rikligt förekommande beståndsdelen i universum), kol (C, finns i alla organiska föreningar), kväve (N, en beståndsdel i all levande vävnad), syre (O, det rikligast förekommande grundämnet i jordskorpan). En modell av fosfor (P), ett grundämne som vanligen förekommer i form av oorganisk fosforit och som organiska fosfater i alla levande celler, var också inkorporerad i diagrammet. DNA (deoxiribonukleinsyra) associeras med överföringen av genetisk information och betraktas som en databas över allt levande. I denna serie framträder ett avgörande tema, beskrivningen av människan som en "kolbaserad" livsform. Nästa bild visar celler i mikroskopisk detalj samt celldelning. Den åtföljs av 20 bilder som illustrerar mänskligt liv på jorden. Dessa bilder dokumenterar människans anatomi, utveckling, och fortplantning: med andra ord, livsödet. Figur 5: Mars. Foto: NASA 136 Figur 6: Vänster, Jorden. Foto: NASA. Höger, Egypten, Röda havet, Sinaihalvön och Nilen. Foto: NASA. Skapande av liv: Voyagers berättelse Den uppsättning av bilder som dedikerats till "skapande av liv" visar celldelning, människans anatomi och könsorgan. Människans anatomi illustreras med hjälp av poster ur World Book Encyclopedia. Den grafiska illustrationen över befruktningen visar spermiens storlek och hur den penetrerar ägget. Här kan vi igen se länken mellan två-dimensionella bilder och färgbilder, och se att färgbilden stått som modell för figuren. Bilden av ett "befruktat ägg" visar ett ägg i färd med att dela sig och därmed börja utvecklas till en ny människa. Tidsangivelsen i bilden representerar fostrets tillväxt under de första sekunderna efter befruktningen (till skillnad från bilderna ovan där märkningen i bilden representerar storleksangivelser). Vi kan se här att bildserien delats upp i två fundamentala delar. Den första delen är gjord av äkta färgfotografier som dokumenterar händelser. Den andra delen består av grafiska illustrationer som visar resultatet av konceptuellt tänkande och pedagogiska ansträngningar. Vi kan se länken mellan två-dimensionella bilder och färgbilder, och se att färgbilden stått som modell för figuren. Vi kan se de förklarande diagrammen och mycket mer matematik infogade direkt på bilden i fråga. På ett liknande sätt är bilderna markerade med ett nummer som visar deras numeriska ordning. Den visuella illustrationen av befruktningen visar den konventionella modellen för befruktning och kunskap om embryologi. Representationens biologiska nivå härrör från en historisk tradition som legat till grund för dess nuvarande form. Framställningen av fostret är igen både symbolisk och autentisk; figuren inkluderar en beskrivning av fostrets utveckling i tid och tillväxt, och använder sig av numeriska förklaringar för att indikera dess utveckling upp till en storlek av 5 cm. Vi kan förstå dessa bilder på två nivåer. För det första, som en beskrivning av hur människan reproducerar sig, och för det 137 andra, hur människan förstår och föreställer sig reproduktionsprocessen. Dessa bilder illustrerar hur vetenskap bedrivs, kommuniceras och visualiseras. Den svartvita grafiska figuren av en man och en kvinna som håller varandras händer är omgiven av symboler för kön, ålder och längd tillsammans med ett foster som placerats i livmodern. Syftet med figuren är att understryka det biologiska faktum att människor får barn. Textrutor talar också om för oss att mannen är 160 cm lång och 20 år gammal, medan kvinnan är 155 cm lång och av samma ålder som mannen. För att förstärka budskapet att bilden förmedlar den universella, "nakna sanningen" om livet har man infogat ett objektivt element i form av ett neutralt diagram som skall kommunicera exakt kunskap. Bilden benämnd "Födsel", visar en kirurg som har munskydd och bistår vid spädbarnets nedkomst. Här kan vi notera att barnafödsel visas upp i en neutral, vetenskaplig kontext. Betoningen på medicinsk närvaro och adekvat utrustning under förlossningen av barnet är en etablerad medicinsk praktik typisk för de västerländska samhällena. Moderns vidare band och omsorg för barnet och faderns roll finns dokumenterade i två bilder: "Vårdande moder", och "Fader och dotter" (från Malaysia), båda presenterar ytterligare ett faktum: föräldrar visar omsorg om sina avkommor. Det är värt att nämna att det finns en länk mellan bilden av "Ammande moder" och ett av ljudspåren. Upptagningen spelar upp ett gråtande barn och moderns röst som talar till barnet, men det talade språket är engelska. Efter livssektionen kommer fem bilder som visar människor i ett sammanhang med andra människor (familj, grupper). Detta består av fem poster – "Ammande moder", "Fader och barn", "Grupp av barn", "Diagram över familjeåldrar", och "Familjeporträtt". Vad gäller representationen av familjen så kan vi notera direkt att det finns en länk mellan de två sistnämnda bilderna. I detta fall användes siluetter från ett familjeporträtt som modell för de förklarande gravyrerna, gjorda av Lomberg. Gravyren specificerar ålder och vikt på fyra familjemedlemmar, bestämda med hjälp av de numeriska inskrifterna. Skrivna på engelska ("y" för "years" och "kg" för "kilograms), presenterar textrutorna två barn, 4 (22,5 kg) och 12 (38,5 kg) år gamla, och två kvinnor 30 (54,5 kg) och 80 (42,5kg) år gamla. Bilden indikerar släktgenerationer: en moder och en mormor. Det visuella berättandet om det mänskliga livets skapelse består av endast nio bilder. Den föregående anatomiskt beskrivande delen inkluderar åtta bilder. Trots att de biologiska fakta som presenteras följer en kronologisk ordning, framstår resultatet som fragmenterat och på något sätt taget ur sitt sammanhang, och där alternativ saknas. Men det finns ytterligare ett underliggande motiv, och detta utgörs av den allmänna basen för liv, det vetenskapliga faktum att vi är en väte-kolkväve-syre-baserad livsform som genom en evolutionär process utvecklades till intelligenta varelser som producerar verktyg och teknologi. 138 Berättelsen fortsätter: Samhälle, natur och teknologi Direkt efter familjefotografiet följer en representation av kontinentaldriften såsom den framskridit med tiden: dåtida, nutida och framtida kontinentala positioner. Denna grafiska figur öppnar den dokumentära presentationen av naturens värld och omgivningar: öar, hav, floder, berg, öknar, klippor, skogar, träd och blad. Människans plats och aktiviteter i naturen porträtteras här, som fyren på ett foto vid havskusten, som ryttaren på en bild av sanddyner, som fåraherden i Monument Valley. Bilden av "Flygande insekter med blommor" öppnar djurlivets sektion tillsammans med den grafiska figuren som visar ryggradsdjurens utveckling. Denna gravyr är intressant av flera anledningar. Manoch kvinnofigurerna återfinns på toppen av evolutionsprocessen. Här stöter vi igen på paret som visades på Pioneer-plaketten, men i denna figur så hälsar den kvinnliga representanten mottagaren. Färgfotografier av delfiner, fiskar, en groda, en krokodil och en örn representerar den biologiska mångfalden på jorden. Den biologiska mångfalden är ett resultat av en lång evolutionär process och länken mellan människans sfär och de andra djurens representeras i det evolutionära processdiagrammet. Släktskap och kontakt mellan människor och djur visas på flera bilder såsom "Fiskstim" (med dykare), och "Jane Goodall och schimpanser". Ett fotografi av Bushmän är uppstarten till ett bildgalleri över människor från hela världen. Betraktaren av denna spektakulära diabildsshow kan få se ansikten av människor från Guatemala, Bali, Thailand och Turkiet, samt deras verksamheter. Bilderna föreställer jakt, arbete, dans, klättring, träning (en uppvisning av en "Gymnast") och löpning ("Sprinter"), men även undervisning, lärande, fiske, matlagning, shopping på stormarknaden och middagsätande i Kina. Förutom aktiviteter, visar Figur 7: Uppskjutning av Titan Centaur. Foto: NASA 139 bilderna mänskliga kontaktytor (middag, klassrum, "Barn med glob") eller mänskliga interaktioner med omgivning och djur (skördearbete, fiske) och dess sammanhang i naturen, som ett fotografi av en dykare och en havsfisk, och av en man som vandrar i skogen. Sektionen som dedikerats till människor i rörelse, övergår till beskrivningar av byggnader och strukturer. Här kan vi observera skiftet från "naturen" (det naturliga) till "teknologi" (det artificiella). Fotografiet av den "Kinesiska muren" åtföljs av fotografier av ett husbygge i Afrika och i Amish Country, och av bilder av färdigbyggda (amerikanska) hus och deras interiörer. Både byggnader som Taj Mahal och Förenta nationernas högkvarter, båda i dagsoch kvällsljus, och även städer finns inkorporerade i fotogalleriet: Oxford och Boston. Fotografiet av Operahuset i Sidney, en demonstration av modern arkitektur öppnar den tekniska delen. Berättelsen om ingenjörskonst och teknologi startar med fotografier av en hantverkare med borrmaskin, en fabrik fylld med maskiner, en röntgenbild av en hand, en kvinna med ett mikroskop. En stor del av sammanställningen utgörs av kommunikationsmedel och kommunikationsnätverk – en trafikstockning i Indien, en motorväg, ett stridsflygplan, ett tåg, rymdfarkosten Titan (bärraketen för båda Voyager-farkosterna, Figur 7), flygplatser och en bro. Kommunikationstekonologin utelämnades inte, som vi kan se på fotografiet av Arecibo-observatoriet som användes vid den första sändningen av radiomeddelanden till utomjordingar, tillsammans med fotografier av radioteleskop från Nederländerna. De avslutande delarna av den visuella presentationen har tillägnats fotografier av "Boksidor", tagna ur The System of the World skriven av Isaac Newton , en astronaut som svävar i rymden (Figur 8), "Solnedgång med fåglar" och "Stråkkvartett". Den sista bilden i det visuella avsnittet på Golden Record är "Fiol med noter". Fotografiet av notbladet från Cavatina, komponerad av Ludwig van Beethoven, avslutar den visuella delen och utgör övergång till ljuddelen. Figur 8: Astronaut i rymden. Foto: NASA 140 Interstellära schlagers: Ljud på jorden Ljuddelen innehåller 21 ljudupptagningar: "Ljud på jorden". Den totala speltiden av olika ljud är nära 13 minuter. På samma sätt som med bildsekvensen så följer ljudsammanställningarna en kronologisk ordning, vilket tycks understödja ett historiskt perspektiv. Enligt Sagan har en del av dessa ljud funnits på jorden sedan förhistorisk tid. Ljud från vulkaner, jordbävningar, åska, lera som bubblar ur heta källor, atmosfäriska vindar, regn och vågsvall illustrerar naturliga fenomen. Dessutom innehåller skivan djurläten: Grodor, elefanter och schimpanser, hyenans ylande, tamhundens skall och fåglars sång. Några av de dessa djurarter porträtterades även i det visuella avsnittet. Den evolutionära symfonin öppnar med slag från tidiga verktyg och fortsätter med ljud från smide, sömnad och vallande av får. Mänsklig aktivitet från mera avancerade tider representeras av vanliga artificiella ljud från en traktor, nitmaskin, fartyg, tåg, buss, bil, en överflygning av ett F 111 jetplan, en Saturn V-raket som lyfter och morsekod. Ljud från fotsteg, hjärtslag, skratt, eld, tal, kyssande och en moder som talar till sitt barn dokumenterar mänskligt liv på planeten jorden. Det sista ljudspåret innehåller en inspelning av elektrisk aktivitet i en mänsklig hjärna som transformerats till ljud, med avsikt att tydliggöra ett tecken på liv. Sektionen med hälsningar från jorden innehåller talade rapporter från representanter för vår planet, det vill säga, 55 hälsningar på olika språk och en på valspråk. Den totala uppspelningstiden för hälsningarna är cirka fyra minuter. Den kortaste hälsningen består endast av ett enkelt "Hej!". Med sina 15 sekunder är hälsningen på gujarati, ett av de mest utbredda språken i Indien, den längsta. Sammansättningen av hälsningarna föregicks inte av någon noggrann urvalsprocess. Inte endast på så sätt att talarna valdes slumpmässigt, utan även på så sätt att den orala kommunikationen saknar en fast struktur; varje hälsning har sina egna kännetecken, som möjligen uttrycker även de vanliga hälsningsformuleringarna i det aktuella språket. Vissa av hälsningarna är orienterade mot mottagaren. Till exempel: Engelska: "Hej från barnen på planeten jorden". Svenska: "Hälsningar från en dataprogrammerare i den lilla universitetsstaden Ithaca på planeten jorden". Tjeckiska: "Kära vänner, vi önskar er allt gott". Amoy (dialekt av Min-kinesiska): "Rymdens vänner, hur har ni det? Har ni ätit ännu? Kom och besök oss om ni har tid". Latin: "Hälsningar till dig, vem än du är; vi vill dig väl och vi bringar fred i rymden". På samma sätt som den visuella diabildsvisningen, var avsikten med sammanställningen av ljud, "Musik från jorden", att erbjuda åhörarskaran ett bra urval. Tjugosju spår spelar upp nära 90 minuter av musik. De musikala framställningarna 141 inkluderar västerländska klassiker, en "det bästa av"-samling, populära rocklåtar och musik typisk för olika geografiska områden. Sammanställningen av den klassiska musiken uppfyller höga krav inte endast vad gäller kvalitet och musikens popularitet (Nattens drottning, aria av Mozart, Femte symfonin av Beethoven, Brandenburgkonserten av Bach) utan även vad gäller uttolkarnas och dirigenternas renommé (Gould, Moser, Richter, Stravinskij). Bland de västerländska kompositörerna fick Johann Sebastian Bach och Ludwig van Beethoven lite särbehandling med tre respektive två spår var. Avdelningen med icke-västerländsk musik ger en melodisk uppsättning; åhörarna erbjuds aboriginska sånger, azerbajdzjanska säckpipor, georgiska körer, senegalesiska slagverk, pygmé-flickors initieringssånger från Zaire, Navajofolkets nattsånger, musik från Java, Mexiko, Nya Guinea, Japan, Bulgarien, Kina och Indien med oöversatta texter. Beethoven tillägnas inte endast den sista bilden i Scener från jorden, utan även det sista ljudspåret i Musik från jorden: Cavatine, en kort och enkel sång som sägs vara det enda stycket som fick dess tonsättare att gråta. Livets skapelse: Adam och Eva i rymdåldern Den då kontroversiella representationen av ett naket jordiskt par skapade allmän upprördhet och en het debatt inom grupper av religiösa ledare. Den beskrevs till och med som "pornografi". Detta allmänna missnöje med Pioneer-plaketten, tillsammans med begränsningar vad gäller copyright verkar ha varit anledningen till att allmänheten inte informerades om det slutliga innehållet på Golden Record förrän Voyager var i säkerhet bortom jordens omloppsbana. Bortsett från mottagandet i början, har denna ikoniska bild blivit till en symbol för sökandet efter liv bortom jorden och ännu i denna dag utgör Pioneer-gravyrerna en central del i representationen av liv, och de har även blivit en mall för framtida interstellära meddelanden. Här behöver vi påminna om en skillnad mellan olika typer av interstellära meddelanden. Medan Pioneer och Voyager bar på materiella meddelanden, det vill säga, fysiska objekt fästa på en rymdfarkost som plaketter, plåtar eller skivor; finns det en andra kategori för meddelanden till stjärnor: Radiomeddelanden i form av signaler som sänds via ett radioteleskop till rymden. Radiomeddelanden betraktas ofta som mer effektiva därför att signalen färdas med ljusets hastighet, den maximala kända hastigheten. Den första radiosändningen lämnade jorden 1974 från ett stort radioteleskop i Arecibo, Puerto Rico, en del av Nationella Astronomioch Jonosfärscentret (NAIC). Meddelandet, som kom att bli känt som Arecibo-meddelandet, designades av Frank Drake, även känd som upphovsmannen till ekvationen som beräknar antalet avancerade civilisationer i universum, formulerad 1961 (se Dravins kapitel). En digital version av Pioneers hälsande par (Figur 9, vänster) utgör öppningen av Cosmic Call-meddelandet som skrevs av de kanadensiska astrofysikerna Yvan 142 Dutil och Stephane Dumas och sändes första gången 1999. Cosmic Call-meddelandet var avsett att vara en uppdatering av Arecibo-meddelandet och är därför större till storlek, längd och räckvidd. Det ursprungliga 23 sidor långa Cosmic Call 1-meddelandet uppdaterades fyra år senare med fotografier, teckningar, samt med ljudoch videofiler som kom in från medlemmar av Team Encounter från hela världen. Bilder nedan visar rymdålderns Adam och Eva, såsom porträtterade på den ursprungliga Pioneerplaketten (1972) och i Cosmic Call-meddelandet 1999 (och 2003; Figur 9, höger). Figur 9: Vänster, Detalj från Pioneer-plaketten: Det hälsande paret från joden. Foto: NASA. Höger, Hälsande paret, Cosmic Call (1999). Foto: Y. Dutil, S. Dumas. Det finns en omfattande debatt i den akademiska litteraturen, populära media och akademiska publikationer om Pioneer-plakettens framställning av ett heterosexuellt par, avbildat på toppen av dess biologiska fertilitet; ett par som främjar reproduktion är ett fundamentalt kännetecken för mänskligt liv. De mänskliga kropparna såväl som könen är porträtterade inom ramen för den konventionella och stereotypa förståelsen av könsmässiga skillnader som stelnat i bestämda former utan några fysiska avvikelser. Även Voyager-meddelandet (Figur 20) – en variation av det fertila paret – visar normen för den mänskliga fortplantningen enligt 1970-talets västerländska normativa synsätt vad gäller genus, etnicitet och sexualitet, snarare än ett prov på en jordvarelse. Dessa amerikanska kulturikoner fortlever inte bara i form av meddelandena som färdas på sina pionjärresor genom den interstellära rymden, utan också i medierna och konsten på jorden. De undgick inte heller science fiction-författares uppmärksamhet, särskilt inte i den avslutande scenen i 1979-års fullängdsfilm Star 143 Trek: The motion picture (regisserad av Robert Wise). I slutet återbördar en avancerad utomjordisk varelse Voyager-sonden till dess hemplanet med meddelandet oläst. Men meddelandena har även en mytisk aspekt; de har en mytologisk betydelse som gör bibliska anspelningar på Adam och Eva i Edens lustgård. Även idag lever arvet efter Voyager vidare. För att fira 40-årsdagen av uppskjutandet av Voyager 1, lanserade NASA en rymdkampanj på sociala medier där Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Google+ och Tumblr användes. Allmänheten ombads att inkomma med en kort och upplyftande text taggad som #MessageToVoyager. Det vinnande meddelandet "We offer friendship across the stars. You are not alone" utsågs i demokratisk anda genom en omröstning och strålades mot Voyager 1 ut i den interstellära rymden den 5:e augusti, 2017. Star Trek-stjärnan William Shatner, känd som Kapten Kirk på rymdskeppet Enterprise, medverkade vid sändningen. Figur 10: pulsarkartan och vätesymbolen. Vänster, segment av Voyager-meddelandets inskription. Höger, segment av Pioneer-plakettens ingravering. Foto: NASA. Den ideala mottagaren Efter att ha tittat på Voyageroch Pioneer-meddelandena, kan man inte låta bli att undra vem som skulle kunna vara den ideala mottagaren av dessa meddelanden. Vi har sett att bilderna användes för att förmedla information, förklara och 144 tolka. Musik som ett alternativ till språk verkar ha haft en speciell roll i utformningen av meddelandena. Likt det skrivna språket kan musiknoter eller notblad reproduceras av alla som vet hur symbolerna läses och tolkas. Vetenskapen är det språk som föredras och föreslås och som för decennier framåt även blev en mall för interstellär kommunikation. Ett bra exempel är modellen av neutralt väte. Tider i meddelandet bygger på multipler av frekvensen hos de radiovågor som sänds ut i samband med energiövergångar hos väteatomen. Vätesymbolen åtföljs av jordens positionering, båda tagna från Pioneer-plaketten. Kartan utgår från pulsarer i vår omgivning för att lokalisera vår sol inom galaxen. Bilderna nedan illustrerar att symbolerna för energiövergången hos neutralt väte, liksom pulsarkartan presenterades både på skyddsomslag till Voyagers Golden Record (Figur 10, vänster) och på Pioneer-plaketten (Figur 10, höger). Tidsreferensen pekar på ett annat viktigt kännetecken i berättelsen om mänskligheten, nämligen en linjär och utvecklingsinriktad förståelse av tid. Scenerna från jorden fortskrider som en serie av händelser som leder mot något: Från det basala till mångfald, från vild natur till högteknologi. Förståelsen av hur tid uppfattas i olika kulturer har studerats av antropologer som har lyft fram skillnaderna i förståelsen av tid. Nämligen, den cykliska föreställningen av tid (som bland annat förekommer på Hawaiiöarna) som en ständig upprepning i överensstämmelse med årstidernas växlingar, eller, den balinesiska föreställningen om tid och det kalendariska systemet där variationer i faktiskt dagsljus leder till olika föreställningar om varaktighet och tidsenheters flexibilitet. Det verkar som om att designen av meddelandena, mer än något annat, är baserad på två oundvikliga antaganden. Dessa är förmågan att uppfatta och bearbeta intryck från miljön, och den västerländska typen av intelligens. Med andra ord, den utomjordiska livsformen måste ha ett synsinne som främjar det synliga eller "seende", och hörselsinne som främjar hörbarheten eller "hörande" och "lyssnande". Mottagaren förutsätts dela de mänskliga kvaliteterna av en fysisk kropp, med en hjärna som producerar ett intellekt; och kunskap om den fysiska och naturliga världen, det vill säga, vetenskap. Det krävs att varelsen ser, hör, tänker, läser, tolkar, och förstår. Högteknologi, vetenskap, universums regelbegrepp, kunskap om matematik, och förmåga till konceptuellt tänkande var och en av dessa aspekter är förväntade av mottagaren. Ovanpå detta tillkommer att vara nyfiken på vad budbäraren som svävar i rymden har att säga om dess sändare (se även Dunérs kapitel). Talar man verkligen för alla? Låt oss anta att Voyager-meddelandets innehåll är som en utställning på ett museum. Vi har just avslutat en promenad genom detta museum som visar upp färgrika fotografier och kulturella artefakter från den amerikanska eran 1977. 145 Samlingen, som är ackompanjerad av ett vackert musikaliskt urval, har sitt ursprung i flera icke namngivna platser och kulturer vilka presenteras i dessa olikartade artefakter. Vi läser "inskrifterna" som har bifogats bilderna som beskriver ursprungsplatserna, datum, storlekar och kvantiteter. Vid slutet av utställningen har kanske besökaren gripits av fascination för den underbara mångfalden i naturen och kulturen och känner sig entusiastisk och överväldigad av utställningens omfång. Vissa besökare kanske tycker att muséet innehåller tillräckligt mycket information om vår värld, men andra kanske har invändningar mot följande: För det första, sammanställningen i sig är inte omfattande nog, oundvikligen lämnades många "utställningsfotografier" i muséets magasin helt enkelt för att det inte fanns tillräckligt med utrymme för att visa dem alla. Trots försöket att beskriva "livet", finns det en sak som man missade helt. Golden Record innehåller inte någon relevant information om döendet och döden. Utan att nämna något om livets fundamentala faktum, kan man paradoxalt nog inte hävda att meddelandet innehåller en komplett berättelse om det mänskliga livet. Inte heller refererar berättelsen till negativa kännetecken hos mänskligheten. Den bättre delen av mänskligheten påvisades till förmån för ett framförande av "en hoppfull snarare än en förtvivlad syn på mänskligheten och dess möjliga framtid", som Sagan förklarade det. Av denna anledning, nämndes inga referenser till krig eller konflikt heller. Voyager-meddelandet visar endast positiva värden och progressiv utveckling av det samtida västerländska samhället. För det andra, referenser till religiöst liv och/eller ritualer har helt exkluderats från människans historia. Med tanke på den odiskutabla förekomsten av religiösa och/eller spirituella trosuppfattningar i det mänskliga samhället, är frågan varför en sådan central aspekt av mänskligt liv har utelämnats i sin helhet. En förklaring kan vara att det är vetenskap, inte religion, som utgör den grundläggande stöttepelaren för den senaste västerländska utvecklingen och att avgörande värderingar även härstammar från vetenskapen: Sekularisering, rationalitet och idén om framsteg. Vad som i regel anses vara viktigt – reproduktionens kulturella kontext och äktenskapet som institution – saknas också. Även om man kan invända att de sociala relationerna på ett ungefärligt sätt är hämtade från "Familjeporträtt" och "Fader med barn", kan vi endast beskriva denna berättelse om människan som tagen ur sin kontext. Men vi kan se att bildsekvensen går från en anonym kropp som står för alla kroppar och från anonym individualitet, till interaktioner, relationer och människor med ansikten. Dock är det den anonyma kroppen som användes som modell för människan, som subjekt för tolkning. Den fjärde punkten är ganska enkel. Urvalet av innehållet som gjordes av expertgruppen är partiskt; profession och även övertygelser om vår levda världs natur har spelat in. Av denna anledning erbjuder livsberättelserna inte endast rena beskrivningar utan även tolkningar om vad livet består av. Inte endast de schema- 146 tiska representationerna utan även användningen av flera definitioner (matematiska och kemiska formler som konventionella beteckningar) understryker preferensen för en rationell förståelse och vetenskaplig beskrivning av världen samt för vetenskapliga paradigm. Ett bra exempel på en tidsbestämd kunskap och ett kommande paradigmatiskt skifte inom astronomin kan beskådas på Drakes representation av solen med dess nio planeter. 2006 gjorde Internationella astronomiska unionen ett utkast till en ny definition av planeter och bestämde genom en omröstning att Pluto inte uppfyller kraven på att vara en planet. Detta betyder att paradigmet ändrades och solsystemets planetantal reducerades från nio till åtta. Som en konsekvens är modellen av vårt solsystem som placerats på Voyager-sonderna inte längre giltig. Självklart skulle andra människor vid andra tidpunkter i historien ha gjort andra val. Snarare än en kritik av Pioneers och Voyagers vetenskapliga grupp, så ger vår förståelse av urvalsproceduren en referenspunkt för framtida komposition av meddelanden ämnade för utomjordingar. Det ger en möjlighet till att förstå varför skaparna av Pioneeroch Voyager-meddelandena lämnade de alternativa perspektiven och perspektiv från icke-industriella kulturer utan notis och istället anpassade sig till traditionella västerländska och naturvetenskapliga normer. Snarare än en rikedom av liv och kulturer på jorden, presenterar meddelandena västerlandets samhälleliga framgångshistoria, dess vetenskap och dess representanter. Deras urval sändes som en för dem objektiv beskrivning av mänskligt liv. En dag i en avlägsen framtid når kanske de interstellära sonderna sina slutliga destinationer och berättar sina historier om våra livsformer. Kanske kommer den utomjordiska vetenskapliga gemenskapen en dag att upptäcka meddelandena som har seglat i universum i tusentals århundranden långt bort från de oundvikliga förändringarna som skett på planeten jorden, och läsa Pioneer-plaketten eller spela upp Voyager-meddelandet. Hursomhelst, ett fragment av vår arts historia som har riktats mot stjärnorna skickar ett tydligt budskap till samtida jordvarelser: Att förstå och beskriva jordelivets komplexitet och mångfald är en utmanande uppgift. Kanske lika svår som att definiera vad "liv" och "vara levande" faktiskt innebär. Lästips Čápová, Klara Anna (2013) The Charming Science of the Other: The cultural analysis of the scientific search for life beyond earth Department of Anthropology, Durham University 147 NASA (1977) Pioneer Odyssey NASA Scientific and Technical Information Office 349/396 NASA (1977) The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Scientific Publication 419, NASA Scientific and Technical Information Office NASA (1981) Life in the universe. Proceedings of a conference held at National Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California NASA History Office Message to Voyager (2017) https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/message/ 148 149 DEL 3: Artificiell intelligens 150 151 Nästan levande: robotar och androider Christian Balkenius Runt om i världen pågår arbetet med att bygga humanoidrobotar som efterliknar människans utseende och intelligens. Vissa projekt har som mål att reproducera varje aspekt av mänskligt tänkande för att i framtiden styra en robot. Andra börjar med kroppen och försöker gradvis bygga in intelligens. Men hur ska man kunna veta när roboten är klar? Räcker det att roboten ser ut att vara levande? Borde målet inte istället vara att skapa robotar som fungerar smidigt tillsammans med människor? å den stora robotutställningen i Osaka står alla utställningsbås tomma. Alla besökare har samlats i en stor klunga mitt i lokalen och tittar i samma riktning. Men när jag går förbi är där inga robotar. Bara någon som håller en presentation på japanska. Eftersom jag inte förstår ett ord går jag vidare när det plötsligt slår mig. Något stämmer inte. Det jag bevittnat var en av de första demonstrationerna av androiden Repliee Q2, en robot som konstruerats för att imitera en människa, med hud av silikon och avancerad ansiktsmimik. Androiden har en stor mängd rörelsemöjligheter och de flesta av dessa finns i ansiktet. Även om det är en bit kvar till människans 43 ansiktsmuskler kan androiden visa en stor mängd ansiktsuttryck och munnen rör sig på ett relativt realistiskt sätt när den pratar. Kroppen har däremot väldigt liten rörelseförmåga och roboten måste sitta ner eller vara fastskruvad i golvet för att inte ramla. Hade den rört på kroppen lite mer hade jag kanske inte reagerat alls, för det som fick mig att tveka var den ganska udda kroppshållningen (Figur 1). Armen rörde sig inte på ett fullt naturligt sätt. En liten detalj, kan tyckas, men tillräckligt för att illusionen av liv skulle brytas. Robotens konstruktörer berättar att androiden idag kan lura människor att den är levande i femton sekunder. Deras mål är att upprätthålla illusionen i femton minuter, säger de. Då skulle androider kunna arbeta i serviceyrken där interaktionen med andra människor ofta är betydligt kortare än så. Turingtestet Men varför luras att en maskin är en människa? För att förstå vad som ligger bakom detta måste man gå tillbaka till femtiotalet och en idé som lanserats av den P 152 engelska datorpionjären Alan Turing (Figur 2). Förutom sina revolutionerande bidrag till teoretisk datavetenskap, bidrog Turing även till forskningen inom matematik och teoretisk biologi. Men mest känd är han idag för sin insats under andra världskriget. En insats som ansågs så viktig att den hölls hemlig ända fram till 1974, tjugo år efter hans död. Tillsammans med en brokig skara kreativa snillen på Bletchley Park ledde han arbetet med att dechiffrera tyska marinens radiokommunikation. För att snabba upp processen konstruerade man den elektromekaniska beräkningsmaskinen Bombe. Maskinen, som kunde dechiffrera det tyska Enigmakryptot uppskattas av historiker ha förkortat andra världskriget med mer än två år och därigenom räddat mellan 14 och 21 miljoner liv. Trots att Bombe inte var en generell dator var den ett steg på vägen mot Turings vision om en generell beräkningsmekanism. Redan tidigare hade Turing visat att det är möjligt att definiera en abstrakt maskin, Turingmaskinen, som kan beräkna allt som kan beräknas, och det ligger nära till hand att fundera över om en sådan maskin också kan bli intelligent. Men hur ska man mäta intelligensen hos en maskin? Figur 1: Repliee Q2. En android som utvecklats vid Osakas universitet. 153 I en av sina mest uppmärksammade artiklar presenterade Turing det som senare kommit att kallas Turingtestet. Testet försöker lösa problemet med att avgöra om en maskin är intelligent eller inte. Idén är att låta en person konversera med maskinen och sedan be den avgöra om den just kommunicerat med en människa eller en maskin. Om det inte går att avgöra, då måste man dra slutsatsen att maskinen är lika intelligent som en människa. För att personen som utför testet inte ska kunna veta vem den kommunicerar med, tänkte sig Turing att man kommunicerar med maskinen på något indirekt sätt, till exempel via en textterminal. Man skriver in meningar som sedan levereras till maskinen eller människan i andra änden, och sedan får man ett svar tillbaka som en utskrift på papper. Då går det inte att se vem som levererar svaren. Naturligtvis måste man också se till att svarstiderna motsvarar dem hos en människa. Om man frågar datorn vad 234×6345 blir, så kanske den kan svara direkt, medan en människa tar en stund på sig att räkna ut svaret. Eliza och Parry Turingtestet är både briljant och enkelt, men det har en stor brist: människor kan vara ganska lättlurade. Redan 1966 lyckades Joseph Weizenbaum, som var en av de tidiga pionjärerna inom artificiell intelligens, konstruera programmet ELIZA. Programmet gjorde det möjligt för datorn att föra ett samtal med en person på ungefär det sätt som Turing föreslog i sitt test. ELIZA, som döpts efter rollfiguren Eliza Doolittle i George Bernard Shaws teaterpjäs Pygmalion, hade som mål att Figur 2: Vänster. Staty av Alan Turing i skiffer av Stephen Kettle. Höger. Den excentriske Turing kedjade fast sin temugg i elementet bredvid sitt skrivbord i Hut 8 i Bletchley Park. Inte utan orsak visade det sig, när man många år senare fann en ansenlig mängd muggar kastade i dammen utanför huset. 154 imitera en psykoterapeut i Carl Rogers skola. En central tanke i Rogers terapi är att terapeuten i första hand ska låta klienten själv driva samtalet. Detta var perfekt för ett datorprogram som egentligen inte förstår något utan bara försöker få samtalet att fortsätta. Om ELIZA hittade ord som "mamma" eller "pappa" i sitt input kunde hon svara med en färdig mening som "Berätta mer om din familj". Med en uppsättning enkla regler och mer eller mindre färdiga svar gick det att lura folk, som på sextiotalet inte hade någon större erfarenhet av datorer. Under tester med ELIZA hände det till och med att deltagarna bad att få vara ensamma för att ostört få prata med programmet om sina problem. En intressant utveckling av idéen gjordes några år senare av den amerikanska psykiatrikern Kenneth Colby som tog upp tråden med programmet PARRY. Istället för att imitera en terapeut försökte PARRY imitera en person med paranoid schizofreni. Programmet var framgångsrikt såtillvida att personer som skulle avgöra om de kommunicerade med ett program eller människa inte klarade av detta, men till resultatet bidrog förstås att PARRY imiterade en irrationell paranoid person. Att varken ELIZA eller PARRY har mycket att komma med blev uppenbart när de kopplades samman för ett samtal på tu man hand. Eftersom båda programmen behöver mänskligt input för att det ska bli något innehåll i samtalet blev deras konversation mycket tom. Den enda gången det hettar till lite är när PARRY råkar slänga in några ord om maffian, men ämnet ebbar snabbt ut igen och konversationen övergår till ett ping-pong spel med tomma fraser. Figur 3: Vänster. Geminoid HI-1 Android. En androidtvilling till den japanska robotforskaren Hiroshi Ishiguro. Höger. Geminoid DK tillsammans med sin mänskliga tvilling Henrik Scharfe på Aalborgs universitet. 155 Utvecklingen av program som kan konversera har fortsatt och idag anordnas det årliga tävlingar där olika program försöker klara Turingtestet. Programmen har nu blivit så bra att det är svårt även för experter att efter några minuters interaktion vara säkra på om de pratar med en människa eller en dator. Med längre interaktion går det däremot lätt att upptäcka att man pratar med en maskin, så även om man ibland får höra att olika program har klarat Turingtestet så gäller det bara i en situation med begränsad längd på interaktionen. Geminoider Det är inte lätt att klara Turingtestet, men det har inte hindrat vissa forskare att försöka gå ännu längre och försöka bygga maskiner som uppfattas som människor även om man får se dem. Robotforskaren Hiroshi Ishiguro som låg bakom Repliee Q2 har också konstruerat andra robotar med mänskligt utseende. Man brukar skilja mellan humanoider, som är robotar med mänsklig form, men som fortfarande ser ut som maskiner, och androider, som är robotar som är gjorda för att likna en människa så mycket som möjligt. Ishiguro har till och med gått ett steg längre med det han kallar geminoider, eller tvillingrobotar, som har som mål att imitera specifika personer. Bland annat har han konstruerat en kopia av sig själv som han kan fjärrstyra med hjälp av sensorer som läser av hans rörelser och ansiktsmimik (Figur 3). Den senaste geminoiden är en kopia av den danska forskaren Henrik Scharfe. Att bara försöka imitera människor kan uppfattas som ett ganska ytligt sätt att närma sig levande intelligenta maskiner, men det finns flera skäl till att det ändå kan vara en fruktbar väg att gå. Varför skulle man bortse från vissa aspekter av människans konstitution? Man skulle kunna citera de två cybernetikerna Norbert Wiener och Arturo Rosenblueth som i sin bok om vetenskapliga modeller skrev att "den bästa modellen av en katt är en annan, eller allra helst samma, katt". Ju fler aspekter av människan vi kopierar, desto närmare kommer vi en artificiell människa. Vad androidforskarna gör är att börja på utsidan, med kroppens utseende, för att sedan efterhand utveckla intelligens för kroppen. Kroppens betydelse Att kroppen är viktig för tänkande och intelligens har under de senare åren blivit allt mer uppenbart. Vår hjärna är trots allt i första hand utvecklad för att styra kroppen. Man brukar prata om "embodied cognition", alltså att kroppen är en del av det kognitiva systemet och att hur kroppen ser ut och interagerar med omgivningen är centralt för att förstå intelligens. En av de främsta förespråkarna för denna inriktning inom robotik är Rodney Brooks som i mitten av åttiotalet revolutionerade området. Han visade att robotar 156 med ändamålsenlig kropp, men väldigt lite intelligens, kunde utföra uppgifter som varit väldigt svåra att lösa på traditionellt sätt. Istället för att låta robotarna bygga komplicerade interna modeller av omgivningen menade Brooks att de i de flesta fall bara ska reagera direkt på sensoriska signaler. Genom att utgå från kroppsligt baserade beteenden istället för resonerande och planering kunde robotarna fungera snabbt och effektivt trots att de nästan helt saknade intelligens. Brooks robotar var ett svar på en fråga som ställts av den amerikanska filosofen Daniel Dennett som ifrågasatt att man skulle kunna skapa konstgjord intelligens utan en kropp. Varför inte bygga ett helt djur? Kanske en ödla? Han hävdade att det bästa sättet att uppnå mänsklig intelligens vore att börja med ett enkelt men komplett robotdjur och sedan utveckla denna robot vidare både fysiskt och kognitivt. Man kallar ibland robotarna som byggs inom denna forskningsinriktning för animater och man baserar sina konstruktioner på insikter ifrån biologin. Några av Brooks första robotar försökte efterlikna insekter och använde sex ben för att gå omkring. De hade diverse sensorer längst fram som gjorde att de kunde gå mot olika mål eller undvika hinder. Robotarna hade ingen central intelligens utan sensorerna var kopplade så att de direkt påverkade gångmönstret på olika sätt. Genom att robotarna var anpassade till omgivningen på samma sätt som ett djur utvecklats att fungera i sin ekologiska nisch, fungerade dessa enkla system förvånansvärt bra. Deras beteende och rörelsemönster visade många egenskaper som man förknippar med biologiskt liv, fjärran från de robotar som man ser inom industrin. En annan robot som byggts på dessa principer var Hebert. Roboten hade som uppgift att samla upp tomburkar i labbet och slänga dessa i en soptunna. Istället för att låta roboten använda en karta av labbet och beskrivningar av tomburkar, så byggde alla beteenden på att roboten reagerade på signaler här och nu. Dessa beteenden arrangerades i en hierarki så att mera specifika beteenden tog över när deras signaler dök upp. På den lägsta nivån fanns ett beteende som fick roboten att flytta sig framåt. Om dess avståndssensorer reagerade på att det fanns ett hinder framför roboten tog ett annat beteende över som fick roboten att svänga undan. När hindret inte lägre detekterades, fortsatte den att röra sig framåt. Samma principer användes även högre upp i systemet. När roboten detekterade en yta i bordshöjd så stannade den och började scanna efter objekt i burkstorlek. Om ett sådant objekt hittades aktiverade detta i sin tur robotens arm. Så länge objektet fanns kvar rörde sig robotens arm mot det tills en fotocell detekterade någonting mellan robotens fingrar. Denna signal satte i sin tur igång ett gripbeteende som hade som mål att greppa det som förhoppningsvis var en tomburk. När robotens fingrar slutligen kände att de rörde vid något, satte detta igång ett nytt beteende, nämligen att återigen driva omkring slumpmässigt i labbet, denna gång i hopp om att hitta en soptunna. 157 Den här beskrivningen av Herbert gör att roboten framstår att ha intelligensen hos en biltvätt snarare än ett djur eller människa, men det som gör robotens styrsystem så fascinerande är hur flexibelt dess beteende blir. Om man hjälper Herbert och sträcker fram en burk till den kan den ta den och ge sig sen ut i jakt på soptunnan. Om man istället tar ifrån Herbert burken så känner roboten inte längre att den håller något i handen och kommer att börja leta efter andra burkar istället. Fast det inte finns någon plan eller modell av världen kommer Herbert att bete sig ändamålsenligt i de flesta fall. Genom att direkt reagera på världen utanför uppstår inga problem med att modellen av världen är felaktig. Brooks formulerade detta som att "världen är sin egen bästa modell". Humanoider Framgången för den beteendebaserade robotiken gjorde att man snabbt höjde ambitionsnivån. I början av nittiotalet var arbetet med roboten Cog i full gång i Rodney Brooks labb. Målet var att med beteendebaserade principer bygga en humanoid robot och enligt den ursprungliga planen förväntade man sig att Cog skulle uppnå självmedvetande år 1997. Trots att man inte uppnådde sina mål har Cog-projektet varit oerhört viktigt för utvecklingen av humanoida robotar. Projektet visade vägen för den fortsatta forskningen, framförallt genom att göra det accepterat att försöka imitera människans kropp såväl som vår intelligens. Ett mycket intressant resultat av Cog-projektet var att det visade sig att vi som människor inte kan låta bli att förhålla oss till humanoiden som om den är en levande varelse. Även forskarna som programmerat synsystemet i Cog tyckte det blev jobbigt när roboten tittade på dem hela tiden och satte upp skärmar för att kunna jobba avskilt. Daniel Dennet har kallat detta förhållningssätt för the intentional stance. Vi väljer att tolka beteendet hos roboten som om den hade avsikter med sitt handlande, som om den hade föreställningar om världen och önskningar som den försöker uppfylla. Det hjälper inte att man vet hur roboten är programmerad, och att det kanske bara är enkla regler som styr den. Upplevelsen av intentionalitet finns där i alla fall. I den mest extrema tolkningen av teorin så räcker detta för att ha uppnått intelligens hos roboten. När den enklaste förklaringen till robotens beteende är att den har avsikter på samma sätt som en människa så spelar det ingen roll hur detta är programmerat. Man kan se detta som ett uppdaterat Turingtest. Vi ser att det är en maskin, men väljer ändå att tolka dess beteende som om den vore en levande varelse. Det är denna tankegång som ligger till grund för handlingen i filmen Ex machina. Programmeraren Caleb Smith får till uppgift att avgöra om humanoidroboten Ava är medveten och kan tänka. Det är klart från början att Ava redan klarat Turingtestet och nu är frågan om hon är medveten på riktigt eller om hon bara 158 imiterar en människa. Filmen ger aldrig svaret, men Dennet och Brooks skulle säga att det inte spelar någon roll. Om roboten ser ut att ha ett medvetande så är det rimligt att förhålla sig till den som om den har det, på samma sätt som vi antar att andra människor har medvetande fast det inte finns något sätt att bevisa det Kusliga dalen-fenomenet (不気味の谷現象) Ingen av dagens androider ser riktigt människolika ut på nära håll. Istället för att se sympatiskt mänskliga ut ger de hos de allra flesta upphov till obehagskänslor. Man känner samma reaktion som om man mött en zombie eller mumie. Något dött som borde vara orörligt har fått liv. De ryckiga och onaturliga rörelserna gör inte saken bättre. Intressant nog är reaktionen inte den samma för en humanoid robot som inte är så människolik. Roboten iCub som utvecklats i ett stort europeiskt konsortium har konstruerats för att ha ett barns proportioner och uppsyn (Figur 4). Det är tydligt att det är en robot och den uppfattas av många som både söt och trevlig. Detta är ett exempel på ett fenomen som först beskrevs av den japanska robotforskaren Masahiro Mori på sjuttiotalet. Han noterade att ju mer människolik en robot är desto trevligare känns den, men detta samband bryts när man kommer Figur 4: iCub. En humanoidrobot med ett barns proportioner. Roboten används i många europeiska forskningsprojekt. 159 väldigt nära ett mänskligt utseende. Då uppstår istället obehagskänslor. Fenomenet kallas på engelska för "the uncanny valley". Istället för att se mer levande ut är resultatet snarare det motsatta. Man lägger extra mycket märke till det som inte är mänskligt hos roboten. Att imitera liv Det finns flera skäl till att man skulle vilja konstruera en robot som upplevs som en människa. Ett är att en robot som ska fungera tillsammans med människor bör kunna kommunicera med dessa på ett naturligt sätt. Detta handlar inte bara om språk utan också om hur man kommunicerar med sina rörelser. När vi tittar på en annan människa så kan vi oftast förstå vad den håller på med. Rörelserna och kroppsspråket kommunicerar avsikter och mål. Vi ser om en person vi möter i korridoren har uppmärksammat oss och att den inte kommer att krocka med oss. Det är naturligtvis lättare att förstå sådana subtila signaler från en robot som är människolik än en som ser ut som en dammsugare. Det kan alltså finnas anledning att konstruera robotar med humanoid form. Och ska vi tro Dennett kommer vi att förhålla oss till roboten som om den vore levande, helt enkelt för att det är mest ekonomiskt. Målet borde inte vara att försöka luras att en maskin är en människa, utan att konstruera robotar som vi lätt kan förstå och interagera med. Sådana robotar kan vara humanoida, eller kanske djurlika, men det är inte människolikheten i sig som är det viktiga, utan att vi på ett naturligt sätt kan kommunicera med dem och uppfatta vad de håller på med. Här är det fundamentalt att titta på grundläggande aspekter av kommunikation mellan människor: Hur vi använder kroppsspråk och blick för att koordinera våra handlingar. Det är först när man lyckas fånga dessa egenskaper som man kommer att kunna bygga robotar som är nästan levande. Lästips Balkenius, Christian; Gärdenfors, Peter (2011). Artificiell intelligens Nationalencyclopedin Brinck, Ingar; Balkenius, Christian; Johansson, Birger (2016) Making Place for Social Norms in the Design of Human-Robot Interaction. In Seibt, J.; Nørskov, M.; Schack Andersen, S. (Red.) What Social Robots Can and Should Do. Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence and Applications IOS Press 160 Brooks, Rodney (1989) Cambrian Intelligence. The Early History of the New AI MIT Press Gärdenfors, Peter; Balkenius, Christian (1993) Varför finns det inga riktiga robotar? Lund University Cognitive Studies, 18 Nordin, Peter; Wilde, Johanna (2003) Humanoider: Självlärande robotar och artificiell intelligens Liber Turing, Alan (1950) Computing Machinery and Intelligence Mind 59 (236): 433– 460 http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html Ziemke, Tom; Balkenius, Christian; Hallam, John (2012). From Animals to Animats 12 Springer 161 Artificiell intelligens som livsform Om autonoma vapensystems rättsliga ställning Markus Gunneflo Artificiell intelligens bryter med invanda sätt att tänka kring å ena sidan objekt, ting, teknologiska artefakter och, å andra sidan, handlande subjekt. Somliga tänker rent av på artificiell intelligens som en ny form av liv. En sfär där artificiell intelligens står inför ett genombrott är i krig. Av förklarliga skäl finns starka åsikter om detta. Utvecklingen förkastas som innebärandes slutet på "humanitet" i krig med krav på ett omedelbart stopp av utveckling och användning och, motsatt, omfamnas, med förhoppningar om en dramatisk ökning av militära styrkors effektivitet. Teknologin tycks erbjuda möjlighet att befästa större områden militärt, nå djupare in på fienders territorium och utökad uthållighet på slagfältet utan risk för egna soldater och till, på sikt, lägre kostnad. rågan om laglighet och rättsligt ansvarsutkrävande upptar en central plats i en pågående global diskussion om dessa system. Här ställs vi emellertid inför ett grundläggande problem som rör autonoma vapensystems ontologiska status eller "varande". Detta problem löses inte utan underblåses av krigets lagar: Antingen är autonoma vapensystem att betrakta som vapen eller som en stridande part; antingen är de ett objekt, ting eller teknologisk artefakt eller ett handlande subjekt. Det senare är en kategori som, i krigets lagar, förbehålls människan, något som fästs särskild vikt vid eftersom regelverkets själva raison d'être är "humanitet" som motvikt till den militära nödvändighetens kalla rationalitet. Om autonoma vapensystem är att betrakta som vapen ställer krigets lagar krav på rättslig prövning om användning av dem under vissa eller alla omständigheter kan vara förbjudna enligt krigets lagar. Detta främst därför att vapnet på ett otillbörligt sätt kan få konsekvenser för civila eller orsakar onödigt lidande för soldater eller "kombattanter". Problemet med denna klassificering är emellertid att så fort systemet utövar mer avancerade former av självständig handlingsförmåga överskrider de vapenkategorins gränser; övergår från ett objekt till ett handlande subjekt och kommer då mer att likna en kombattant. Om autonoma vapensystem är att betrakta som kombattanter ställs krav på att dessa ska kunna utbildas i krigets lagar men även att de ska kunna bestraffas vid överträdelse. Autonoma vapensystem har emellertid svårt att passera som kombattanter så länge de enbart kan tränas att tillämpa krigets lagar med en form av F 162 på förhand bestämd automatik. Just denna automatik gör även att de inte kan bestraffas för krigsbrott eftersom det kräver uppsåt eller oaktsamhet i förhållande till handlingen, en kognitiv förmåga som denna typ av artificiell intelligens inte besitter. Krigets lagar ger oss således två ömsesidigt uteslutande alternativ när vi ska bedöma lagligheten hos autonoma vapensystem. Samtidigt som de överskrider vapenkategorin når de inte upp till – eller är någonting annat än – det krigets lagar avser med ett handlande subjekt. Detta korta inlägg diskuterar autonoma vapensystems rättsliga ställning och frågan om rättsligt ansvarsutkrävande vid användning. Jag börjar med problemen med att tänka på autonoma vapensystem som vapen och går därefter vidare till problemen att betrakta dem som soldater eller kombattanter. Sist prövas förutsättningarna för att betrakta autonoma vapensystem som en ny typ av rättssubjekt eller, med andra ord, "liv" i lagen. Varför autonoma vapensystem inte är vapen Den dominerande uppfattningen i debatten om autonoma vapensystem (Figur 1) är att de ska betraktas som vapen. Därmed förutsätts också att deras laglighet, i likhet med andra ting som används av människor i krigföring, laglighetsprövas i förhållande till deras "användning". Problemet är emellertid att avancerade autonoma vapensystem inte kan reduceras till ting, eller objekt, eftersom dess mest karaktäristiska egenskap är just att de har egenskaper som gör dem till handlande subjekt. Det sätt på vilket autonoma vapensystem överskrider kategorin vapen illustreras bäst genom att beakta hur folkrätten kräver prövning om ett vapens användning under vissa eller alla omständigheter är förbjudna. Detta krav sträcker sig mer än ett sekel tillbaka men har senare formulerats som en förpliktelse att vid studium, utveckling, anskaffning eller val av ett nytt vapen eller stridsmedel eller en ny stridsmetod, prövning skall ske om dess användning under vissa eller alla omständigheter är förbjuden. Som synes förutsätter denna regel att vi har att göra med en teknologisk artefakt som "används" av en kombattant. Vapen är antingen lagliga eller olagliga därför att de orsakar onödigt lidande eller inte kan användas på ett sådant sätt att civila inte kommer att drabbas på ett otillåtet sätt. Laglighetsprövningen ser alltså till att deras design och förmågor är förenliga med krigets lagar med avseende på deras "normala" eller "förväntade" användning. Problemet med autonoma vapensystem, om de ska betraktas som vapen är emellertid att de inte är lagliga eller olagliga per design. Istället agerar de lagligt eller olagligt. På detta sätt liknar de soldater eller kombattanter. Frågan infinner sig då om autonoma vapensystem, i likhet med kombattanter, kan tränas i uppfyllande av krigets lagar och om individuellt ansvar vid överträdelser kan göras gällande? 163 Varför autonoma vapensystem inte är kombattanter Kategorin kombattanter utgörs av en stats väpnade styrkor samt därmed tätt förknippade milisoch andra frivilliga grupperingar (Figur 2). Bland de regler som kombattanter förväntas följa återfinns reglerna för stridande handlingar. Endast mål som är nödvändiga att angripa för att segra, och som är lagliga mål, får angripas. Strikt åtskillnad måste göras mellan kombattanter och militära mål å ena sidan och civila och civila mål å andra sidan. Endast de förra får angripas. När civila eller civila mål ändå drabbas är det olagligt endast när en attack kan ha förväntats förorsaka oavsiktliga förluster som kan anses överdrivna vid jämförelse med den påtagliga och direkta militära fördel som förväntas av attacken. För att möta dessa krav skall de som planerar eller beslutar om anfall vidta försikthet och göra allt som är praktiskt möjligt för att kontrollera att de mål som angrips varken är civilpersoner eller civil egendom och inte heller är föremål för särskilt skydd, utan att det är militära mål. Om autonoma vapensystem betraktas som kombattanter måste de också kunna tränas eller utbildas i uppfyllande av dessa normer. Figur 1: Ett autonomt militärfordon. 164 Christian Balkenius som i sitt kapitel skriver om utmaningarna i samband med att tillverka människolika robotar, har i en vetenskaplig artikel visat hur angelägenheten att robotar agerar i enlighet med normer ofta tar sig formen av externt formulerade lagar eller uppförandekoder som en robot ska följa. Science fictionförfattaren Isaac Asimovs robotlagar är ett välkänt sådant exempel. Krigets lagar är autonoma vapensystems robotlagar. Problemet med externt formulerade regler är att de kräver att roboten har en full förståelse av reglerna och dess konsekvenser men även kapaciteten att förstå det sammanhang i vilket de ska appliceras. En fullständig förståelse av norm och fakta ska även kunna leda fram till en förmåga att resonera kring tillämpligheten i enskilda fall. Gregor Noll, professor i juridik vid Lunds universitet, har diskuterat frågan hur just de abstrakt formulerade reglerna i krigets lagar ska kunna appliceras i konkreta fall. Han konstaterar att det finns ett grundläggande problem i att tillämpningen av krigets lagar tycks kräva en typ av kompetens – fantasi och förmåga att göra avvägningar mellan ojämförbara värden – som inte passar datorers styrka inom beräkningar och logik. Som illustration, och mot bakgrund av användningen av neuroteknologi för utveckling av vapensystem, vidtar Noll ett tankeexperiment: Han föreställer sig att ledande experter på krigets lagar från världens alla hörn samlas och ställs inför olika scenarier i vilka de får tillämpa internationell humanitär rätt. Ögonrörelser och hjärnaktivitet iakttas och hur man talar om sina bedömningar spelas in. Samma sak görs med en grupp icke-experter. Noll tänker sig att det utmärkande för expertis på detta sätt kan registreras och översättas till en kod som kan förstås av ett vapensystem. På så sätt har en typ av mjukvara. Figur 2: Soldater i Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan, juli 2012. 165 Det ska påpekas att Noll inte själv förespråkar utvecklingen av sådan mjukvara. Han menar till och med att det är omöjligt eftersom tanken att relevanta mänskliga egenskaper är tillgängliga genom neurologiska processer representerar en form av urartad Cartesianism (efter filosofen René Descartes) där sinnesintryck och kognitiva processer placeras i hjärnan snarare än i en förkroppsligad rationalitet eller sinne. Som kontrast understryker Noll vikten av språk och kommunikation för de avväganden som krigets lagar kräver. Andra debattörer menar att normen om försiktighet i krigföring samt att allt som är praktiskt möjligt måste göras för att kontrollera att de mål som angrips varken är civilpersoner eller civil egendom och inte heller är föremål för särskilt skydd. Det innebär att beslutsfattaren måste utöva "diskretion", något de menar att autonoma vapensystem är oförmögna till. Denna argumentation håller också fram avvägningar och kommunikation framför beräkningar och logik vid tillämpning av krigets lagar. Förpliktelsen att utöva diskretion innebär att beslutsfattaren i varje beslut måste beakta de mål som normerna syftar till samt samtliga de rättigheter och intressen som påverkas. Beslutsfattaren måste lyssna och vara beredd att riva upp beslut och ändra riktning. Det finns de som menar att ett autonomt vapensystem som inte kan förändra sina algoritmer genom en process som kan jämföras med mänsklig inlärning inte kan vara kapabelt att utöva diskretion. Ett sådant system kontrolleras av överväganden som gjorts i förväg av människor, medan diskretion helt enkelt inte kan förutbestämmas. Detta leder oss vidare till frågan om ansvarsutkrävande. Om ett autonomt vapensystem begår ett krigsbrott och ingen har handlat med uppsåt eller oaktsamhet, vem ska då hållas ansvarig? Det finns förvisso förslag på lösningar av detta, men de avvisas på goda grunder i forskning om ansvarsutkrävande i krig. Det har till exempel hävdats att oförutsebarheten i autonoma vapensystems handlingar gör att ett förändrat befälsansvar som skulle innebära att en människa med någon form av kontroll över systemen alltid ska kunna göras ansvarig riskerar att strida mot principen "utan brott inget straff". Ett förslag på en typ av strikt ansvar för de som utvecklar systemen skulle också kräva en förändring av befintlig reglering, en förändring som inte bara är osannolik utan hamnar i samma problem som ett utvidgat befälsansvar. Nytt "liv" – Ny lag Forskare har skiljt mellan vapen som är autonoma i bemärkelsen att de kan agera oberoende av omedelbar mänsklig kontroll å ena sidan och å andra sidan vapen som fattar egna beslut om och, i så fall hur, mål ska angripas på ett sådant sätt att även om normer tillämpas, vapnets interna "uppfattningar" och "värderingar" kommer att få betydelse. De senare systemen kan också ha förmågan att utvecklas 166 genom erfarenhet, och vara normstyrda i bemärkelsen att de förses med motivation att respektera gällande normer och bedöma operativa fakta som leder till normuppfyllande resultat. Det är intressant att innehållet i den kritik som jurister riktar mot att låta avancerade datorsystem tillämpa krigets lagar enbart tycks gälla den förra typen av automatiskt beaktande av externt formulerade regler, inte den senare typen av internaliserad normuppfyllnad. Så är fallet med Nolls fokus på problemet med normer som implicerar relationer mellan ojämförbara värden och hur dessa kräver fantasi och kommunikation snarare än beräkningar och logik. Så är fallet även med de som lägger fokus på skyldigheten att utöva diskretion. Diskretion, menar de, är förknippat med inlärning och förmåga att förändra beteende. Deras slutsats att autonoma vapensystem är olagliga är därför uttryckligen begränsad till "teknisk" till skillnad från "substantiell" autonomi. "Substantiell" autonomi är just precis vad forskning inom artificiell intelligens som söker utveckla robotar med en inneboende, snarare än externt formulerad, etik har formulerat. Christian Balkenius har exempelvis varit med om att utveckla en modell där robotar lär genom att observera interaktion mellan robotar eller mellan robotar och människor. Det är alltså fråga om en i grunden social inlärning där robotens "fysiologi", "sinnesorgan" och "motorik" kommer att spela en viktig roll. Det är naturligtvis viktigt att påpeka att utvecklingen av robotar med en inneboende moral inte primärt syftar till att utveckla autonoma krigare. Syftet är att bygga robotar som människor kan ha förtroende för i olika miljöer. Den metod som tillämpas tycks emellertid vara fullständigt öppen inför vilken typ av normer och beteende robotar tillåts utveckla. Författarna beskriver hur en utmärkande faktor för denna typ av robotar är just förmågan att internalisera moral, beteenden och känslor från sin omgivning. Om denna omgivning utgörs av militär träning, inklusive träning i krigets lagar, kan vi få ett autonomt vapensystem. Vissa menar att försöken att inrymma de mest avancerade autonoma vapensystemen – de som besitter självförståelse och förmåga till inlärning och förändring beroende av miljö – i befintliga kategorier leder fel och att konsekvensen av detta är att vi begränsar våra möjligheter att reglera denna framväxande teknologi. Istället bör en framtida reglering av autonoma vapensystem ta sin utgångspunkt i teknologins unika natur, förutsättningar och förmågor. En sådan rättslig regim kommer att behöva innehålla såväl normer om rättslig prövning vid utveckling och användning, utbildning i normuppfyllande beteende samt regler om ansvarsutkrävande. Tanken är likväl svindlande. Vi står i så fall inför att acceptera ett nytt rättssubjekt – nytt "liv" i krigets lagar – artificiell intelligens med laglig rätt att fatta beslut om, och själv ta, mänskligt liv. 167 Lästips Eliav Lieblich; Benvenisti, Eyal (2016) "The Obligation to exercise discretion in warfare: Why autonomous weapons systems are unlawful" I Nehal Bhuta, Susanne Beck, Robin Geiss, Hin-Yan Liu and Claus Kress (red.) Autonomous Weapons Systems: Law, Ethics, Policy Cambridge University Press Rebecca Crootof, 2016, Autonomous Weapon Systems and the Limits of Analogy, manuskrip tillgängligt på SSRN: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2820727 Sartor, Giovanni & Omicini, Andrea (2016) "The Autonomy of Technological Systems and Responsibilities for their Use", i Nehal Bhuta, Susanne Beck, Robin Geiss, Hin-Yan Liu and Claus Kress (red.) Autonomous Weapons Systems: Law, Ethics, Policy, Cambridge University Press 168 169 Artificiell intelligens Vems ansvar? Maria Hedlund Detta kapitel tar ett politiskt perspektiv på liv med artificiell intelligens som exempel. Kapitlet undersöker politiska initiativ om robotar och artificiell intelligens för att se hur beslutsfattare och deras rådgivare resonerar kring frågor om etik, demokrati och ansvar. et är långt ifrån självklart att robotar och artificiell intelligens (AI) skall betraktas som en livsform i samma mening som andra livsformer. Medan den syntetiska biologin försöker efterlikna livsformer här på jorden och astrobiologin letar efter livsformer på andra platser i universum, förknippas robotik och artificiell intelligens inte i första hand med liv, utan med maskiner. Och maskiner är väl inte levande? Men robotar och andra intelligenta maskiner kan ha funktioner som liknar funktioner hos levande varelser, till exempel spela schack eller Go, fungera som sällskap, hjälpreda, barnvakt eller polisassistent, tolka bilder, identifiera ansikten och detektera känslor och reagera på dem. Med maskininlärning kan robotar också lära sig nya saker på liknande sätt som levande varelser gör (vilket även Balkenius diskuterar i sitt kapitel). Robotar kan alltså bete sig som om de vore levande, och de utformas också ofta som levande varelser, med huvud, ögon, armar och kropp, ibland med ben, ofta gulliga. De kan alltså också se ut som om de vore levande varelser. Så även om robotar inte kan definieras som levande (se Abbotts och Perssons kapitel om jakten på en ny definition av liv), uppmuntras vi av deras funktioner och av deras utseende att betrakta dem som om de vore levande. Vi får något slags relation till roboten, och denna relation påverkar hur vi förhåller oss till den. Detta gör förstås inte roboten levande i sig, men tillsammans med andra aspekter är det ändå en del som talar för att det skulle kunna vara rimligt att se robotar och artificiell intelligens som en livsform (Figur 1). Och även om vi inte accepterar tanken på levande maskiner, har robotar egenskaper som väcker viktiga frågor som vi på något sätt måste hantera. Liksom inom den syntetiska biologin, diskuteras inom robotiken vilken moralisk status som konstgjort liv kan eller bör ha. Inom astrobiologin, som söker efter liv i rymden, talas det om att de livsformer man hoppas (?) upptäcka inte nödvändigtvis liknar de livsformer vi känner till här på jorden. Kanske "befolkas" rymden av intelligenta maskiner, som har skapats i någon annan galax? Kanske D 170 kommer livet på jorden att lämna spår i rymden, inte genom människor bosatta på andra planeter, utan i form av intelligenta maskiner – så kallat post-biologiskt liv – som reproducerar sig själva och koloniserar andra solsystem eller galaxer? Ett sådant scenario är också en skrämmande framtidsvision hos en del forskare och debattörer som ser en risk med att allt intelligentare maskiner så småningom kommer att bli intelligentare än människan och därefter ta över världen. Att "ta över världen" kan syfta på att robotar successivt ersätter människan på allt fler jobb, fattar allt fler beslut, och till slut blir omöjliga att ersätta, men det kan också handla om en plötslig övergång, där AI väldigt snabbt blir mycket intelligentare och utvecklar så kallad superintelligens. I en sådan framtid finns ingen självklar plats för människan, som, i bästa fall, får fungera som slavar eller husdjur till maskinerna, men, troligare, förintas i superintelligensens ändlösa strävan efter resurser. Här skulle man kunna invända att det inte nödvändigtvis krävs superintelligens för att utmanövrera människan. AI är redan överlägsen människan på många områden, men det handlar om intelligens på specifika och avgränsade områden. De som målar upp dystopiska framtidsscenarier tänker sig oftast en generell AI, som inte bara är intelligentare än människan på alla olika områden, utan som också har förmågan att interagera med och anpassa sig till en dynamisk omgivning. Med maskiner som kan programmera sig själva att bli allt intelligentare kan steget till så kallad superintelligens eller artificiell generell Figur 1: Kan (eller bör) intelligenta maskiner betraktas som levande i någon mening? 171 intelligens komma väldigt snabbt, och för mänsklighetens överlevnad är det nödvändigt att vi utvecklar en artificiell intelligens som är fredlig och inte riskerar att utgöra något hot mot människan. Forskare som den svenskfödde filosofen Nick Bostrom och fysikern och kosmologen Stephen Hawking kan sägas representera denna position, liksom ingenjören, uppfinnaren och entreprenören Elon Musk. Alla är dock inte eniga om att allt intelligentare maskiner behöver innebära ett hot mot mänskligheten. Även om maskiner i framtiden skulle ha en intelligens som vida överstiger människans, skulle de inte kunna utveckla en egen vilja, och utan egen vilja skulle maskiner aldrig kunna göra något som vi inte ber dem att göra, går resonemanget. En annan argumentationslinje är att ett eventuellt hot ligger väldigt långt fram i tiden. Den AI som utvecklats hittills är specifik, och saknar därmed förmåga att utföra något som går utöver dess specifika område. Utvecklingen av generell artificiell intelligens, som skulle kunna utmanövrera människan på alla områden, ligger enligt detta sätt att resonera så långt fram i tiden att det bara är en onödig distraktion att nu försöka hantera ett eventuellt hot från framtida intelligenta maskiner. I stället bör vi rikta uppmärksamheten mot nödvändig forskning och utveckling om befintliga problem. Detta kapitel tar delvis sin utgångspunkt i dessa två positioner, som vi skulle kunna kalla "AI tar över" respektive "här och nu". Utvecklingen inom robotik och artificiell intelligens ger upphov till frågor av olika karaktär. En typ av frågor handlar om konsekvenser av automatiseringen, som bortrationalisering av jobb. Andra frågor handlar om robotarna själva. Bör vi betrakta intelligenta maskiner som moraliska agenter med skyldigheter, eller till och med som moraliska subjekt som också har rättigheter? Vilket moraliskt ramverk vill vi att de skall följa? Och hur lär vi robotar att handla moraliskt? Skall vi programmera in en viss moral, eller skall robotarna lära sig den moral som råder i samhället? Vilka värderingar lär sig maskiner som programmerats att lära sig själva? Forskare har visat att en algoritm (det vill säga en sekvens av instruktioner som talar om för en dator vad den skall göra) som får lära sig att tolka språk genom att ta del av stora textmängder, plockar upp djupt liggande fördomar som är dolda i språkstrukturen. Skulle det kunna bidra till att förstärka dessa fördomar, eller är det något vi kan utnyttja för att lära oss något om oss själva? Frågor om robotars agentskap och moral hänger ihop med frågor om ansvar för konsekvenser av vad robotar gör. Vem är moraliskt ansvarig för skador som orsakas av AI? Vem är till exempel ansvarig om en förarlös bil skadar eller dödar en människa? Och hur skall vi komma fram till svaren på dessa frågor? Syftet med detta kapitel är att undersöka hur politiska beslutsfattare förhåller sig till frågor om ansvar som utvecklingen inom robotik och artificiell intelligens ger upphov till. Även om arbetet med robotik och artificiell intelligens har rötter i 1950-talet, har de senaste decenniernas teknologiska utveckling på dessa områden fullkomligen exploderat. Både forskare och politiker uppmärksammar 172 alltmer behovet av reglering av robotik och artificiell intelligens, inte minst för att klargöra ansvarsförhållanden. Går det i den politiska debatten att se spår av de två positioner (den framtidsinriktade respektive här och nu-positionen) som kan identifieras i den vetenskapliga debatten? Vilken typ av aktörer inkluderas i processerna med att ta fram underlag till politiska beslut? Med andra ord, vilka röster får höras i den politiska debatten om robotik och artificiell intelligens, och hur tas de emot? Hur diskuteras ansvarsfrågor? Talas det något om vilka normer och värderingar som skall ligga till grund för beslut om robotar och AI? Och diskuteras i så fall hur vi skall komma fram till det och vem som skall få vara med och påverka dessa beslut? Undersökningen utgör ett nedslag i den samtida politiska debatten i Sverige, EU och USA. Expertis och demokrati Möjligheter att upptäcka eller uppfinna nya livsformer bygger på avancerad teknisk och vetenskaplig kunskap som involverar experter från många olika områden. Liksom på alla komplicerade områden, är politiska beslutsfattare beroende av experter för att kunna fatta välinformerade beslut. Politisk praktik är emellertid mer komplex och mindre rätlinjig än den bild av politiskt beslutsfattande som en rationell process, som vi ibland föreställer oss. Inte bara ideologi och folkvilja, utan också egenintresse, maktsträvan och lojaliteter påverkar vad aktörer de facto gör, något som delvis förklarar varför råd från experter ibland bara delvis eller inte alls gör avtryck på politiska beslut. Trots detta, finns alltid en risk att experter med sin överlägsna kunskap dominerar, på bekostnad av medborgerligt inflytande och demokratiska värden. Det kanske viktigaste argumentet för demokrati är att den ger människorna i ett samhälle möjlighet att vara med och bestämma vilka normer mot vilka samhället skall styras. Att människor inkluderas och får ha inflytande på frågor som berör dem är därför grundläggande i demokratiska samhällen (och borde vara fallet i alla samhällen). Hur vi på bästa sätt förenar expertinflytande med demokratiska värden är dock långt ifrån självklart. Olika politiska system gör olika avvägningar mellan värden såsom jämlikhet och frihet, opartiskhet och effektivitet. Nya livsformer är inte bara ett tekniskt komplext område där beslutsfattare är i stort behov av expertråd, utan också ett område som ger upphov till långtgående existentiella frågor såsom vad liv egentligen är och vad nya livsformer innebär för livet för oss människor – frågor som berör hela mänskligheten. Det finns således starka skäl till att både experter och medborgare behöver vara inkluderade i politiska processer som berör nya livsformer. Det spelar också stor roll vilka experter som inkluderas och vilka organisationer de representerar. Vi kan förvänta oss att olika experter har olika intressen och olika agendor. Forskare kan betona olika frågor beroende på vilka vetenskapliga discipliner de arbetar inom. Filosofen ser sannolikt andra problem än ingenjören eller programmeraren. Företag, myndigheter och intresseorganisationer gör 173 i sin tur andra prioriteringar som kan påverka vilka frågor de lyfter fram. Från ett demokratiskt perspektiv bör vi inkludera bred och varierad representation av olika åsikter, en mångfald av intressen liksom vanliga medborgare. Vi behöver experter för teknisk vägledning, och vi behöver medborgare – inklusive experter – för att olika värderingar och normer skall komma till uttryck. Teknisk expertis är inte tillräckligt. Vi behöver också veta mot vilka normer samhället bör organiseras, och det är därför demokrati är så viktigt. Demokratiska processer behövs för att stöta och blöta olika åsikter och göra normerna explicita, så att vi så småningom skall veta vad det är vi fattar beslut om, och varför. Ansvar I en artikel i Sydsvenska Dagbladet våren 2013 uttalar sig dåvarande regionrådet Katarina Erlingsson angående att hon utpekas som ansvarig för den styrande femklöverns hantering av barnintensiven i Skåne: "Jag tar ansvar genom att sitta kvar." Detta avviker från hur ansvar vanligtvis förstås. En standardförståelse av ansvar är att den som har orsakat någon form av normbrott också är den som är ansvarig och skall ta konsekvenserna av detta, och i politiska sammanhang handlar "att ta ansvar" ofta om att avgå. Resonemanget bygger på en enkel orsakskedja, och blickar alltså bakåt i tiden. Vi kan kalla detta sätt att förstå ansvar för bakåtblickande ansvar. Det finns emellertid problem med en sådan här bakåtblickande förståelse av ansvar. Med sina rötter i juridiken, ligger fokus på denna förståelse av ansvar på att hitta den skyldige, och den skyldige skall på något sätt stå till svars – an-svara – genom att ta sitt straff (betala böter, sitta i fängelse, eller som i fallet med politikern: avgå). Men om vi uteslutande koncentrerar oss på att straffa den skyldige, missar vi hur vi skall komma tillrätta med dåliga förhållanden. Klimatförändringar, diskriminering och social orättvisa är exempel på förhållanden i samhället som har orsakats av människor. Det skulle alltså, om än kanske inte i praktiken, så i alla fall i princip, vara möjligt att identifiera dem som är skyldiga till dessa fenomen. Bakåtblickande ansvar är dock begränsat till att peka ut de skyldiga, men utan att den dåliga situationen förbättras. Om vi nöjer oss med att straffa dem som är skyldiga till klimatförändringar, diskriminering eller social orättvisa, kommer dessa dåliga förhållanden att bestå även i framtiden. De skyldiga har fått stå till svars, men det som de har gjort sig skyldiga till – och som är grunden till att vi vill straffa dem – är kvar. För att ansvar skall vara meningsfullt, behöver vi komplettera det bakåtblickande ansvaret med ett framåtblickande ansvarsbegrepp som tar fasta på hur vi skall kunna komma tillrätta med dåliga förhållanden. Eftersom framåtblickande ansvar tar sikte på att göra något åt en viss situation är förmågan att agera central. Man brukar tala om denna förmåga i termer av att ha den kapacitet som krävs (till exempel kunskap eller pengar) och att vara i en position som gör det möjligt att agera (till exempel att besitta en maktposition, 174 men också att befinna sig på rätt plats i rätt tid). Argumentet är att makt och resurser kan göra en aktör moraliskt förpliktigad att avhjälpa en dålig situation oberoende av hennes direkta inblandning i hur denna situation uppkommit. En konsekvens av att kapacitet och position här är viktigare än orsakssamband är att det framåtblickande ansvaret inte nödvändigtvis tillhör den som orsakat skadan. Detta kan innebära legitimitetsproblem, och på något sätt måste därför kapacitetsprincipen knytas till den aktör som tillskrivs ansvar. Professorn i statsvetenskap Iris Marion Young (1949–2006) har föreslagit att detta kan göras genom att beakta de sociala processer som förbinder människor. Genom att vara en del av de sociala strukturer som gör vissa utfall möjliga, bidrar människor i olika utsträckning till dessa utfall. Det kan till exempel handla om att de val man gör som konsument har betydelse för dem som arbetar med att tillverka det man köper. Dessutom, menar Young, kan solidaritet moraliskt rättfärdiga varför personer med kapacitet att agera eller som befinner sig i en position som gör det möjligt att agera borde ha framåtblickande ansvar. Ansvar behöver alltså inte enbart handla om att blicka bakåt och hitta den skyldige, utan kan också handla om att blicka framåt och att åtgärda dåliga förhållanden. Bakåtblickande och framåtblickande ansvar kan följaktligen leda till stora skillnader både avseende hur ansvaret fördelas, och när det gäller vad ansvaret innebär i konkreta åtgärder. Politiska initiativ om robotik och artificiell intelligens Redan på 1950-talet diskuterade datorforskare artificiell intelligens. På ett möte i New Hampshire 1956 föreställde sig forskarna en värld där maskiner löser problem som ännu bara människor kan lösa, använder språk och förbättrar sig själva. Utvecklingen har sedan gått från 1980-talets regelbaserade expertsystem på väldefinierade områden till dagens snabbt växande maskininlärning, som bygger på betydligt större datamängder. AI-system överträffar numera människan på specialiserade uppgifter såsom exempelvis olika spel. Det är troligt att nästa fas i AI kommer att handla om en mer generell artificiell intelligens, som fungerar på många olika områden. Artificiell intelligens har, som Johansson talar om i sitt kapitel, länge varit föremål för fantasifulla gestaltningar i film och litteratur. Hittills har detta alltså mest handlat om spekulationer, och det är först på senare år som robotik och artificiell intelligens börjat nå politiska dagordningar. Utvecklingen inom robotik och artificiell intelligens sker nu närmast explosionsartat och även om politiken vanligtvis ligger efter tekniken, kan nya politiska initiativ snabbt tas. Denna text gör inte anspråk på att ge en heltäckande bild av det politiska landskapet, utan utgör ett nedslag i frågan om nya livsformer (här exemplifierade med robotar och AI) vid en viss tidpunkt (våren 2017) utifrån perspektivet expertinflytande och demokrati i politiska processer i EU, USA och Sverige med ett särskilt fokus på ansvarsförhållanden och demokrati (Figur 2). Materialet som ligger till 175 grund för den här genomgången är olika initiativ från politiker och forskare, expertrapporter, utredningar, kommunikation mellan olika politiska institutioner och policydokument. I det material som jag har tittat på finns både likheter och skillnader. Gemensamt för EU, USA och Sverige är att alla framhåller vikten av att satsa på forskning och utveckling för att bli världsledande eller att bibehålla sin ledande ställning. I EU:s fall handlar det om att satsa tillräckligt med pengar för att fortsatt vara ledande på forskning inom robotik och AI, men vilken forskning det rör sig om uttrycks i ganska allmänna termer. I USA, som också säger sig vilja förbli världsledande inom AI, diskuteras specifikt att forskning om till exempel interaktionen människa-maskin och forskning om maskininlärning bör prioriteras. En utmaning som lyfts fram är att maskiner som styrs av AI verkligen gör det som människan vill att de skall göra – och inte det som vi säger att den skall göra. Ett exempel skulle kunna vara städroboten som täcker över röran i stället för att städa bort den, när vi sagt åt roboten att göra fint i vårt hem. (Ett mer drastiskt exempel är städroboten som avlivar de mänskliga invånarna i bostaden för att de inte skall skapa mera röra.) Svårigheten att göra om mänskliga avsikter med alla underförstådda antaganden till ett precist programmeringsspråk är en reell svårighet som explicit diskuteras i de amerikanska dokumenten. I Sverige förekommer inte begreppen robotik och AI på samma sätt i den politiska diskussionen, men här finns ändå skrivningar om att Sverige skall bli bäst i världen på att använda digitaliseringens möjligheter, och om vikten av satsningar för att bli världsledande på e-hälsa. Med e-hälsa menas användningen av digitala verktyg för att uppnå och bibehålla hälsa, ett område som sägs ha stor utvecklingspotential med hjälp av artificiell intelligens. Annars sägs inte så mycket om AI i de svenska dokumenten. Några enstaka motioner om uppmaningar till satsning på AI-forskning har avslagits med hänvisning till en stor utredning om digitalisering och datahantering, och det som Figur 2: Sveriges riksdag. 176 nämns om AI i digitaliseringsutredningen är mest av beskrivande karaktär. Även om de utvecklingssatsningar som diskuteras i USA, EU och Sverige har lite olika karaktär och riktar sig mot delvis olika områden är det en sak som alla skrivningar har gemensamt: Säkerhet och etik måste alltid ha högsta prioritet, men – inte till den grad att det hämmar utvecklingen och konkurrensförmågan. Formuleringar om att en för stark säkerhet kan hindra innovation och utveckling (Sverige), att etik och säkerhet inte får kväva, utan måste underlätta innovation (EU) eller att åtgärder för att säkerställa säkerhet samtidigt måste uppmuntra innovation och tillväxt (USA) förekommer i olika varianter genomgående i dokumenten. Denna tillväxtorientering är särskilt intressant i EU-dokumenten, eftersom de ekar av tidigare diskussioner inom EU, till exempel i den långdragna processen om biologiska patent, där etiken lyftes in för att stilla allmänhetens oro först efter starkt motstånd mot ett ensidigt fokus på konkurrens och ekonomisk tillväxt. AI och ansvar Ansvar är ett återkommande begrepp i alla dokument. Ofta används ansvar i allmänna formuleringar av typen "det är viktigt med en ansvarsfull utveckling", men på många ställen handlar det uttryckligen om försök att klargöra ansvarsförhållanden mellan människa och maskin. Tydligast är detta i diskussionen om självkörande fordon, som både USA, EU och Sverige diskuterar. Ett inlägg som fick mycket medial uppmärksamhet kom från EU-parlamentet. Våren 2017 tog EUparlamentets juridiska utskott fram ett förslag om att EU-kommissionen bör lägga fram ett förslag om att förarlösa bilar och andra autonoma system skall kunna hållas ansvariga för sina handlingar, och kort därefter röstade EU-parlamentet igenom en resolution, i vilken det uppmanade kommissionen att ta en ledande roll i dessa frågor för att inte behöva anpassa sig till standarder som sätts i länder utanför EU. Särskilt akut uppfattades frågan om ansvar för förarlösa bilar, där EUparlamentarikerna ville se snabba åtgärder för att säkerställa att offer för olyckor med förarlösa bilar blir fullt kompenserade. Två förslag stack ut, sannolikt på grund av hur de presenterades. Det ena handlade om att förse robotar med en mekanism för att en människa enkelt skall kunna stänga av den i en nödsituation, och kom att benämnas kill switch. Detta fick stor medial spridning och omtalades som att det skulle vara möjligt att "döda" en robot, vilket onekligen ger associationer till robotar som någonting levande. Det andra förslaget målade möjligen ännu mer upp en bild av robotar som levande. EU-parlamentarikerna argumenterade för att avancerade robotar skulle kunna hållas juridiskt ansvariga för skador som de orsakar, och för att kunna göra det, föreslog de att robotar skulle få juridisk status som "elektroniska personer". Också detta föreslag uppmärksammades stort i olika medier. Båda dessa förslag (och en rad andra förslag om robotik och AI) ligger nu hos EU-kommissionen, som väntas ta ställning till EU-parlamentets resolution under slutet av 2017 eller början av 2018. 177 Även i Sverige är det självkörande fordon (Figur 3) som tydligast aktualiserar ansvarsfrågan. I slutet av 2015 fick en särskild utredare i uppdrag av regeringen att komma med förslag på regeländringar som behövs för att kunna möjliggöra försöksverksamhet med självkörande fordon i allmän trafik. Ett delbetänkande presenterades i början av 2016 och ligger till grund för en förordning om testverksamhet med självkörande fordon som trädde i kraft den 1 juli 2017. I delbetänkandet diskuteras ansvarsfrågan ganska ingående. Fordonet skall följa trafikregler och inte skada någon, och det som diskuteras är vem som skall vara skadeståndsansvarig för skador som det självkörande fordonet orsakar. Slutsatsen är att det är ägaren som skall ha ansvaret för fordon som är fullt automatiserade, vilket i det aktuella fallet betyder det företag som testar de självkörande fordonen (testorganisationen). Även för fordon som är högt, men inte fullt, automatiserade är testorganisationen ansvarig. Det innebär att en person som befinner sig i bilen och som tillfälligt ingriper i framförandet av bilen när körsystemet ber om det, inte är ansvarig för eventuella skador som bilen orsakar. Argumentet är att testorganisationen inte skall ha några incitament att ta onödiga risker. Detta skiljer sig från vissa delstater i USA, där beslutsfattarna har valt att låta fordonsföraren ha det fulla straffrättsliga ansvaret även när ett högt (men inte fullt) automatiserat fordon kör själv. I Sverige menar man dels att detta skulle ställa orimliga krav på fordonsföraren, dels att det bör vara samma regler för helt självkörande fordon Figur 3: Googles självkörande bil 178 och för fordon som är nästan helt självkörande. Frågan om det straffrättsliga ansvaret diskuteras alltså ganska ingående i delbetänkandet. Något som däremot inte diskuteras är vad fordonet bör göra i knepiga situationer som inte går att förutse, och hur ansvarsförhållandena då bör se ut, till exempel om fordonet tvingas välja mellan att köra på ett utspringande barn och att köra in i en betongvägg och riskera att döda sin passagerare. Självkörande bilar diskuteras också i den amerikanska rapporten "Preparing for the future of artificial intelligence" och det strategidokument som ackompanjerar rapporten, men då mer med fokus på hur AI bör utvecklas. Diskussionen blir då också mer detaljerad när det gäller kniviga situationer som ofta uppstår i trafiken, men som kan vara svåra att förutsäga. Till exempel poängteras att det inte är tillräckligt att ett automatiserat fordon följer trafikregler. I vissa situationer, som i exemplet ovan, krävs kreativitet, men det är svårt för självlärande maskiner (som förarlösa bilar) att lära sig att hantera sällsynta situationer. Här behövs utveckling av stora dataset, som inkluderar tillräckligt många sällsynta fall som den självlärande maskinen får träna på, och rapporten rekommenderar att staten, industrin och forskarsamhället tar gemensamt ansvar och delar med sig av data till varandra för att öka möjligheterna till avancerad maskininlärning. När det gäller ansvar, handlar alltså mycket av diskussionerna i USA, både i rapporten och i strategidokumentet, om vem som skall ansvara för att utveckla artificiell intelligens som är säker och som gagnar samhället. Detta är exempel på framåtblickande ansvar, som beaktar vem som befinner sig i en position att ta ansvar och på vem som har den kapacitet som krävs för att kunna ta ansvar. Något bakåtblickande ansvar aktualiseras inte eftersom diskussionen inte refererar till någon specifik händelse för vilken vi kan spåra ett orsaksförhållande. Bakåtblickande ansvar aktualiseras däremot i frågan om delegering av beslutsfattande till AI. I detta sammanhang förs ett resonemang om att det skall vara möjligt att förstå hur AI-processer arbetar eller hur de kommer fram till ett visst resultat. Först när vi vet vilka data som ligger till grund för till exempel AIbaserad skanning av sökande i en rekryteringsprocess, kan vi förstå varför utfallet blev skevt eller diskriminerande, går resonemanget. När maskininlärnings-processen blir transparent, skulle det alltså vara möjligt att spåra processen och se vad som har orsakat vad och därmed att utkräva ansvar på motsvarande sätt som vid delegering av beslutsmakt till expertis. Frågan är emellertid om sådan transparens alls är möjlig. Vissa AI-forskare menar att inte ens de som själva har skapat den artificiella intelligensen kan förklara hur den fungerar, eftersom ingen riktigt vet vad algoritmerna egentligen gör. Detta skulle förstås göra frågan om bakåtblickande ansvar än mer komplicerad. 179 AI och etik Kraftfulla intelligenta maskiner skulle kunna utgöra ett hot även om de inte är programmerade till att vara illvilliga eller onda. Likgiltighet för mänskliga värderingar – inklusive mänsklig överlevnad – skulle vara tillräckligt. Att den artificiella intelligensen måste vara etisk – vad det än kan tänkas innebära – framhålls i alla dokument, men det finns en del skillnader när det gäller hur specifikt etiken diskuteras. Allt från den svenska digitaliseringsutredningens allmänna konstaterande att stora etiska utmaningar är att vänta, till EU-parlamentarikernas detaljerade genomgång av vilka etiska principer som måste var vägledande, förekommer i materialet. Att det svenska expertorganet Statens medicinsk-etiska råd (Smer) i sin rapport ingående diskuterar etiska normer som måste beaktas innan vårdrobotar placeras i människors hem är inte så överraskande, men det är ändå intressant att notera att Smer tog fram rapporten redan 2014, och att man gjorde det på eget initiativ, utan att ha fått något uppdrag från politiskt håll. En vårdrobot kan fungera som ersättning för kroppsfunktioner som individen saknar eller utföra uppgifter som vårdpersonal tidigare gjort. I båda fallen betonar Smer att det är viktigt att göra en avvägning mellan nytta och risker innan dessa robotar börjar användas. Hur kan man till exempel få en balans mellan intrånget i den enskildes integritet och nyttan med en sällskapsrobot som kanske får ersätta mänskliga kontakter? Integritetsfrågor som aktualiseras av elektronisk övervakning ägnas särskilt intresse i denna rapport, som också pekar på hur robotar och AI införs i vården som ett sätt att effektivisera och spara in på personalresurser. Här lyfts också risken att dyra vårdrobotar kan innebära att andra insatser måste prioriteras bort. I Smers rapport förs en ingående diskussion såväl om etiska principer som om hur de skall beaktas och vem som skall ansvara för vilka etiska principer som antas och för hur man skall säkerställa att de följs. Som nämndes ovan, är även dokumenten från EU-parlamentet ganska specifika, och etikdiskussionen förs på flera nivåer. På en övergripande nivå talar man om att principer som trygghet, säkerhet, hälsa, integritet, självbestämmande och icke-diskriminering skall styra utveckling, design, produktion och användning av robotar och AI. Man anknyter också till de fyra etiska principerna att göra gott, att inte göra ont, autonomi och rättvisa, principer som har sitt ursprung i etiska diskussioner i slutet av 1970-talet efter att det blivit känt att medicinska forskare utnyttjat fattiga och sjuka människor på ett synnerligen hänsynslöst sätt. Hädanefter skulle skyddet för människor som deltar i medicinska experiment vara överordnat, och de fyra etiska principerna ligger idag till grund för arbetet i etiska kommittéer världen över. På en mer specifik nivå argumenterar EU-parlamentet för att Asimovs lagar skall vara styrande etiska principer för robotar. Dessa lagar har fått sitt namn efter science fiction-författaren Isaac Asimov, som i sin novellsamling I, Robot lanserade tre regler för robotar: 1) en robot får aldrig skada en människa eller, genom att inte ingripa, tillåta att en människa kommer till skada, 2) en robot måste lyda order från en människa, förutom om sådana order kommer 180 i konflikt med den första lagen, och 3) en robot måste skydda sin egen existens, såvida detta inte kommer i konflikt med den första eller den andra lagen. Senare lade Asimov till ytterligare en lag som skulle gälla före de andra lagarna, lag nummer noll: en robot får inte genom handling, eller underlåtelse att handla, orsaka att mänskligheten skadas. Det kan vara värt att erinra om att dessa fiktiva lagar formulerades av författaren för att driva historien framåt. De var alltså inte i första hand avsedda att fungera som rättesnören i Asimovs berättelser (vilket de heller inte lyckades med), än mindre i verkligheten. Det är också osäkert om det skulle vara möjligt att bygga in Asimovs lagar i en riktig robot, och om det skulle vara möjligt, vad skulle konsekvensen bli om en robot till exempel skulle lyda vilken människa som helst? Nu påpekar visserligen EU-parlamentet att Asimovs lagar riktar sig mot dem som utformar, producerar och använder robotar, och inte mot robotarna själva, men den reservationen bygger ändå på att lagarna som sådana verkligen skulle kunna fungera. I dokumenten från USA diskuteras inte specifika etiska principer. Här refereras istället till existerande lagar och normer, och tyngdpunkten ligger på hur dessa skall inkorporeras i algoritmer och arkitekturer. Även här är alltså utvecklingen av själva AI i centrum, och det betonas att AI-utvecklare och studenter behöver etisk träning. Det förmedlas en medvetenhet om att etik är svårt. Etiska principer, säger man, uttrycks ofta med olika grader av vaghet, och varierar med religion, kultur och individuella övertygelser. Etiska principer är därför svåra att översätta till precisa system och algoritmer, och särskilt svårt är det när autonoma beslutsfattande algoritmer möter moraliska dilemman som baseras på värdesystem som kan stå i konflikt med varandra. Trots dessa svårigheter, menar rapportförfattarna att det är möjligt att utveckla acceptabla etiska ramverk som kan vägleda hur AI-system resonerar och fattar beslut. Vad som däremot inte sägs något om är hur vi skall komma fram till vilka värderingar som skall vara styrande. AI och demokrati Vilka röster är det som hörs i de första, trevande diskussionerna om robotar och AI som kommer till uttryck i de politiska initiativ som diskuteras i det här kapitlet? Talas det något om vilka aktörer som kommer till tals eller som skall få komma till tals? Och förs i dokumenten någon diskussion om hur vi skall komma fram till vilka normer och värderingar som skall vara vägledande för robotar och AI? Här finns både skillnader och likheter. De svenska dokument som har diskuterats här är offentliga utredningar och en rapport från ett befintligt expertråd. Detta är det typiska sättet som politiken arbetar på inom ramen för det svenska representativa parlamentariska systemet: Expertorgan och politiskt tillsatta utredningar med experter och sakkunniga som går igenom kunskapsläget och föreslår åtgärder. Det är därför inte särskilt förvånande 181 att dessa eller alternativa processer för att diskutera ny teknologi inte problematiseras i det svenska materialet. Däremot förekommer en del resonemang om vad digitaliseringen kommer att innebära för demokratin, som till exempel att den kan öka insynen och göra privatpersoner mer delaktiga i beslut. Det handlar alltså framför allt om vilka effekter digitaliseringen kan ha på demokratin, och inte om att använda demokratiska processer för att gemensamt besluta om hur vi bör förhålla oss till digitalisering och AI. I ett av kapitlen i digitaliseringsutredningen finns emellertid ett exempel på en antydan till att beröra frågan om hur vi beslutar om AI. Författaren talar om att utvecklingen inom datahantering har utvecklats mycket kraftigt de senaste decennierna, men konstaterar att de omvandlingar som kan och bör följa av detta har utvecklats mer blygsamt. Det intressanta här är ordet bör. Hur bör samhället omvandlas? Med en generös tolkning kanske till och med frågan hur vi skall komma fram till hur samhället bör omvandlas kan sägas ha lyfts här. Om de svenska dokumenten är återhållsamma med tankegångar kring hur besluten bör fattas, är EU-dokumenten desto tydligare. I sin resolution till EU-kommissionen framför EU-parlamentarikerna uppmaningar om att ett nytt expertorgan bör instiftas. Denna myndighet eller kommitté skall bestå av personer med teknisk, etisk och juridisk expertis och ha uppgiften att stödja offentliga aktörer i EU och i medlemsländerna i deras beslutsfattande. EU-parlamentarikerna säger också att alla policybeslut som berör robotar och AI måste föregås av konsultation med ett europeiskt forskningsoch utvecklingsprojekt om robotar och neurovetenskap med experter som har förmåga att bedöma alla risker och konsekvenser. Man säger sig också vilja uppmuntra till offentlig dialog om konsekvenser av att utveckla AI, och i dokumenten förs diskussioner om vikten av respekt för alla berörda intressenters legitima tillgång till information och deltagande i beslutsprocesser. Berörda intressenter som pekas ut är framför allt företag och utvecklare av robotik och AI. Även civilsamhället nämns, om än mer i förbigående. Liksom i Sverige, gör även aktörerna i EU som man brukar, det vill säga inrättar expertkommittéer och bjuder in näringslivet. I USA har man inte bara talat om att uppmuntra dialog och inflytande, utan också resonerat kring vikten av att involvera hela befolkningen. I rapporten "Preparing for the future of AI" framhålls, att en värld som till stor del baseras på AI förutsätter att medborgarna inte bara kan läsa, använda, tolka och kommunicera om detta, utan också kan ta del av policydebatter om frågor som berörs av AI. Under våren 2016 efterlyste president Obamas vetenskapsoch teknologiråd synpunkter från den amerikanska allmänheten. Efter att ha arrangerat fyra stycken allmänna seminarier om AI tidigare samma år, gick rådet ut med en så kallad "Request for Information", en process som används för att samla in information till hjälp för att fatta beslut om vad som skall göras härnäst. Förfrågan var väldigt konkret, med faxnummer, mailadress och länk till ett webformulär, och alla intresserade uppmanades att utrycka sina synpunkter om allt från säkerhet och 182 kontroll och sociala och ekonomiska effekter av AI till vad regeringen, forskningsinstitut och universitet specifikt borde göra för att uppmuntra mångvetenskaplig AI-forskning. Svaren som kom in offentliggjordes i sin helhet och integrerades senare i rapporten. De som svarade var till stor del personer som på olika sätt arbetar med eller studerar AI, men också privatpersoner, liksom anställda på företag och icke vinstdrivande organisationer. En del svar består av korta kommentarer av typen "vi bör fråga AI", andra ger uttryck för oro för att bli arbetslösa, att AI snabbt kan komma att bli alltför komplex för de styrande att reglera, och för att det inte finns något skydd mot negativa effekter av superintelligens i händerna på några få, och många inlägg består av längre utläggningar av teknisk karaktär som vittnar om den svarandes intresse för och kunskap om AI-relaterade frågor. Även om inläggen inte kan sägas representera det amerikanska folkets åsikter om AI, är det intressant att regeringen efterfrågade synpunkter på en komplex fråga och också inkorporerade svaren i en rapport med syftet att ligga till grund för fortsatt beslutsfattande om AI. Vad som kommer att hända med den rapporten med en ny president vid makten är emellertid svårt att sia om. Vetenskapsoch teknologirådets grupp om maskininlärning och artificiell intelligens finns fortfarande kvar, men har inte släppt några rapporter under nuvarande regering. I övrigt är pressekreterarens svar på en fråga vid en pressträff om handelsöverenskommelser våren 2017 det enda material från Trump-administrationen som nämner artificiell intelligens som jag har hittat. Frågan som ställdes var om regeringen skulle beakta studier som hävdar att förlusten av jobb i tillverkningsindustrin inte bara beror på att jobben har flyttat utomlands, utan också på ökad produktivitet och teknologiska framsteg. Pressekreterarens svar ger en indikation om att Trumpadministrationen inte avser att fördjupa sig i AI-frågor: "Vi måste möta utmaningarna från artificiell intelligens, från förarlösa bilar, från robotar och Gud vet vad som unga vetenskapsmän i ett garage kan hitta på. Men det är inget som vi kan kontrollera. Vi måste försöka hantera sådant som vi kan kontrollera." "AI tar över" eller "här och nu"? En fråga som ställdes inledningsvis i det här kapitlet var om det i det politiska materialet går att se spår av de båda ytterlighetspositionerna som jag kallade "AI tar över" respektive "här och nu". Här finns vissa skillnader. Tydligast är EU:s hållning, eller i alla fall EU-kommissionens hållning. I sitt svar på Europaparlamentets initiativ om att autonoma system och förarlösa fordon skall kunna hållas ansvariga för sina handlingar – ett initiativ som kommissionen välkomnade – betonar kommissionen återkommande att det är viktigt att inte vara spekulativ, utan att arbeta med konkreta, befintliga problem utifrån de faktiska möjligheter som dagens robotar och AI-baserade system besitter. Alla beslut skall baseras på fakta, och inte på orealistiska förväntningar, och kommissionen framhåller att den inte kommer att ta ställning förrän efter ingående analys och att fakta har fastställts. 183 Den svenska hållningen påminner mycket om EU-kommissionens, men är mer underförstådd. Till exempel sägs att "omotiverad optimism" om framtida möjligheter kan dölja andra viktiga aspekter, men framför allt är det materialet i sin helhet som andas en väldigt jordnära hållning till AI och robotik. USA:s hållning är svårare att fastställa. Varken expertrapporten eller strategidokumentet avfärdar framtida scenarier med superintelligens, och det går till och med att ana ett underliggande antagande om att sådana scenarier kommer att bli verklighet, åtminstone på vissa områden. I förordet till rapporten sägs att det visserligen är osannolikt att det kommer att finnas maskiner med intelligens som överstiger människans inom de kommande tjugo åren. Samtidigt framhålls att vi kan förvänta oss att maskiner kommer att överträffa mänskliga förmågor på alltfler områden. Rapporten lyfter också fram att de flesta forskare inom artificiell intelligens tror att generell artificiell intelligens ligger flera årtionden bort, och att det skulle krävas en långsiktig forskningsansträngning för att nå dit. Samtidigt som det går att skönja en viss skepsis angående ett scenario där AI tar över, sägs ingenstans att det är viktigt att man avhåller sig från spekulationer eller att "här och nu"-positionen gäller, vilken alltså är tydlig både i EU:s och i Sveriges dokument. Slutdiskussion För oss som inte är experter på artificiell intelligens är det givetvis omöjligt att avgöra vems förutsägelse som är troligast, och det är sannolikt inte heller möjligt för experterna själva. Att det saknas en övergripande koordination av utvecklingen av AI runt om i världen innebär att det är svårt att veta var och när ett eventuellt framtidsscenario à la science fiction skulle kunna bli verklighet. Det vore dock oklokt att vara tvärsäker på att en eventuell superintelligens ligger så långt in i framtiden att det inte finns skäl att beakta denna möjlighet redan nu. Artificiell intelligens påverkar oss redan i hög grad på snart sagt alla områden och det är därför angeläget att hantera frågor som den redan existerande teknologin väcker, men detta står inte i motsättning till att vi också behöver fundera över hur vi kan försäkra oss om att artificiell intelligens inte kommer att "ta över". Och kanske har den artificiella intelligensen redan tagit över. Att AI tar över behöver inte nödvändigtvis betyda att krigiska maskiner anfaller och förintar människor som i fiktionens värld, utan kan vara mer subtilt. I takt med att vi överlåter alltfler beslut till artificiell intelligens, som också hela tiden lär sig av alla nya data som den har att hantera, blir AI-system alltmer sofistikerade och överlägsna människan både i snabbhet och träffsäkerhet och vi vänder oss i allt större utsträckning till AI för att få svar på våra frågor. Många har hävdat att människans förmåga till kreativitet ändå kommer att göra människan överlägsen datorer och att yrkesgrupper som advokater, revisorer, läkare, forskare och andra professioner inte behöver frukta att bli bortrationaliserade. Men om AI kan göra en analys baserad på alla tillgängliga data och komma ut med träffsäkrare förutsägelser än den mest avancerade 184 mänskliga analys, finns kanske risk att även kvalificerade och kreativa yrkeskategorier kommer att ersättas av AI. Människan kommer kanske inte att utplånas som varelse, vilket är vad "AI tar över"-positionen ytterst fruktar, men vi kommer kanske att bli överflödiga i samhället. Och det är definitivt ett framtidsscenario som vi behöver hantera. För att återkoppla till frågan i titeln på detta kapitel om vems ansvar AI är, kan vi konstatera att det i både Sverige, EU och USA pekas ut aktörer och institutioner som skall vara ansvariga för att AI blir säkert och etiskt. Särskilda myndigheter och expertgrupper skall skapas för att utvecklingen av AI skall göras på ett ansvarsfullt sätt, de som arbetar med att utveckla AI skall ha ett särskilt ansvar för att bygga etisk AI, och människor som använder AI skall göra det på ett ansvarsfullt sätt. Vad som däremot inte diskuteras särskilt mycket är vilken AI vi vill ha, och till vad. Frågor om vilken roll AI bör ha i samhället, hur vi skall hantera att robotar tar över allt fler jobb och hur vi skall komma överens om svaren på dessa frågor är nödvändiga att ställa om vi skall behålla kontrollen över den artificiella intelligens som alltmer underlättar vår tillvaro men också styr våra tankar och vårt beteende. Att betrakta AI som en livsform kanske inte är så märkligt ändå. Lästips Bostrom, Nick (2014) Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies Oxford University Press Collins, Harry och Robert Evans (2017) Why Democracies Need Science Polity Press Dahl, Robert A. (1989) Demokratin och dess antagonister. Yale University Press Douglas, Heather E. (2009) Science, Policy, and the Value-Free Ideal University of Pittsburg Press Hedlund, Maria (2007) Demokratiska genvägar: Expertinflytande i den svenska lagstiftningsprocessen om genteknik Statsvetenskapliga institutionen, Lunds universitet Johansson, Linda (2015) Äkta robotar Fri tanke Lin, Patrick, Keith Abney & George A. Bekey (red.) (2012) Robot Ethics: The Ethical and Social Implications of Robotics MIT Press 185 Susskind, Richard & Daniel Susskind (2017) Professionernas framtid: Hur teknologin kommer att förändra exporters arbete Daidalos Young, Iris Marion (2011) Responsibility for Justice Oxford University Press 186 187 DEL 4: Syntetisk biologi 188 189 Är syntetisk biologi moraliskt otillåtet? Anders Melin Syntetisk biologi, det vill säga det forskningsoch teknikområde som syftar till att skapa artificiella biologiska system och levande organismer, väcker många etiska frågor. I detta kapitel granskas olika möjliga argumentet för att skapandet av artificiella organismer bör ses som moraliskt otillåtet. yntetisk biologi är ett tvärvetenskapligt forskningsområde inom biologi och ingenjörskonst. Det kombinerar olika discipliner inom dessa områden, såsom bioteknologi, evolutionär biologi, genetisk ingenjörskonst, molekylär biologi, molekylär ingenjörskonst, systembiologi och datavetenskap. Syntetisk biologi kan beskrivas som design och konstruktion av biologiska system och levande organismer, vilka kan användas inom industrin eller inom biologisk forskning. En grundläggande aspekt av den syntetiska biologin är att tekniker som normalt används inom ingenjörsmässig design och utveckling tillämpas på biologiska system. Idén om att kunna skapa levande organismer har funnits länge, men det är framför allt genom de senaste decenniernas vetenskapliga och teknologiska landvinningar som forskare har kommit att betrakta det som realistiskt. En grundläggande princip inom den syntetiska biologin är att definiera de egenskaper hos delar, apparater och system som krävs och att utveckla en design som motsvarar dessa krav. Nästa steg i produktionscykeln är implementeringen. Inom syntetisk biologi består den normalt av att man syntetiserar DNA och sätter in det i en värdcell (som ofta benämns "chassi"). Det efterföljande steget är testning och validering, som består i att undersöka hur värdcellen reagerar på insättandet av främmande DNA. Inom syntetisk biologi används samma principer som inom övrig ingenjörskonst, d.v.s. att ett antal delar kombineras för att producera en särskild apparat (Figur 1). Från ett ingenjörsmässigt perspektiv kan syntetisk biologi ses som en utökning av bioteknologin med det yttersta målet att kunna utforma och bygga biologiska system som behandlar information, manipulerar kemikalier, skapar material och strukturer, producerar energi och livsmedel, och vidmakthåller och förstärker mänsklig hälsa. Vissa teknologiska landvinningar har varit betydelsefulla för utvecklingen av syntetisk biologi. Det handlar bland annat om DNA-sekvensering, vilket består i S 190 att bestämma ordningen på nukleotidbaserna i en DNA-molekyl. Två viktiga genombrott skedde år 1996 och 1997 när forskare lyckades att kartlägga genomen (samtliga gener) hos två modellorganismer som används flitigt inom bioteknologin, bakterien Escherichia coli (Figur 2) och jästsvampen Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Inom syntetisk biologi finns målsättningen att kunna skapa syntetiska celler med gensekvenser som aldrig har existerat tidigare i naturen. Det gäller i första hand mikroorganismer, såsom bakterier eller jästsvampar. Syntetisk biologi som fungerar enligt en "bottom-up"-modell har som syfte att skapa celler som är rationellt designade för att kunna fungera som specialiserade chassin. Dessa skulle vara mer användbara för bioteknologiska syften än naturliga celler, bland annat för att de vore mer förutsägbara än naturliga celler, vilka vi inte förstår fullt ut, och för att de skulle använda färre resurser än naturliga celler i och med att de är skapade enbart för en viss uppgift. Hittills har dock ingen forskare lyckats skapa någon syntetisk cell. Forskare inom syntetisk biologi använder sig i nuläget av framför allt E. coli-bakterier och jästsvampar (S. cerevisiae) som chassi. På det nuvarande stadiet i den syntetiska biologins utveckling kan man inte tillverka hela organismer från grunden, utan man kan endast förändra redan existerande celler genom att införa nytt DNA i cellkärnorna. På så sätt kan man skapa mikroorganismer som producerar substanser vilka är värdefulla för människan. Bland annat har forskare lyckats skapa E. coli-bakterier som producerar insulin samt S. cerevisiae, som tillverkar artemisinisk syra, vilken används för tillverkning av ett läkemedel mot malaria, Artemisin. Den amerikanske genetikern Craig Venters forskargrupp lyckades år 2010 skapa ett syntetiskt genom för Mycoplasma mycoides, en parasitisk bakterieart som Figur 1: Konstruktion av artificiellt DNA. 191 lever inuti cellerna hos nötkreatur och getter, som man transplanterat in i celler tillhörande Mycoplasma capricolum, en närbesläktad bakterieart. Därigenom har man lyckats omvandla M. capricolum-organismer till M. mycoides-organismer. Som beskrivits tidigare i denna bok (se P. Perssons kapitel), lyckades forskargruppen samma år att skapa den syntetiska organismen Cynthia genom att byta ut alla naturliga delar av genomet i en enkel encellig organism och år 2016 skapade man en omarbetad version med betydligt färre gener. Den syntetiska biologins etiska utmaningar Skapandet av mikroorganismer med artificiellt DNA som inte tidigare existerat i naturen kan möjliggöra många värdefulla applikationer, men det har också gett upphov till moraliska reaktioner. I detta kapitel granskar jag olika argument för varför det bör anses som moraliskt felaktigt att skapa mikroorganismer med artificiellt DNA (i en avlägsen framtid kan det kanske bli möjligt att skapa också kännande varelser med artificiellt DNA, men frågan huruvida detta kan anses vara moraliskt försvarbart kommer jag inte att ta ställning till här). Jag skiljer mellan tre typer av argument för att skapandet av mikrorganismer med artificiellt DNA är moraliskt felaktigt: 1) därför att det har negativa effekter för människan och andra Figur 2: E. coli-bakterier 192 kännande varelser som vi anser vara moraliskt beaktansvärda (det vill säga att vi bör bry oss om dem för deras egen skull), 2) därför att det innebär att människan överskrider en förbjuden gräns för sina handlingar och 3) därför att det skadar de artificiella organismerna. Vi skadar människor eller andra kännande varelser Det mest uppenbara skälet för att syntetisk biologi bör ses som moraliskt otillåtet är att det riskerar att skada andra människor. Att vi bör bry oss om andra människor för deras egen skull är den kanske mest grundläggande moraliska ståndpunkten, såväl inom den etiska debatten som bland människor i allmänhet. På senare tid har ståndpunkten att vi också bör bry oss om andra kännande varelser för deras egen skull blivit allt mer allmänt accepterad. Inom den etiska debatten är Peter Singer den mest välkände företrädaren för denna ståndpunkt. Han hävdar att den egenskap som är nödvändig för att en varelse ska kunna tillskrivas moralisk status är förmågan att uppleva njutning eller smärta. Vi kan inte välja att behandla en varelse enbart som ett medel bara för att den har låg intelligensnivå. Inom den etiska debatten har det framhållits att syntetisk biologi leder till ökade risker för bioterrorism eller biologisk krigföring. De teknologiska landvinningar som gjorts inom den syntetiska biologin gör det möjligt att med relativt enkla medel framställa skadliga organismer eller virus. Individer eller grupper kan med syfte att skada andra upprätta ett "hemmalab" där de kan antingen återskapa utdöda skadliga organismer eller virus, exempelvis det influensavirus som orsakade spanska sjukan i början av 1900-talet, eller skapa nya typer av skadliga organismer eller virus som det inte finns några botemedel mot. Riskerna med syntetisk biologi har fått vissa individer och organisationer att argumentera för att forskning om och kommersiella tillämpningar av syntetisk biologi bör förbjudas. Jordens Vänner menar exempelvis att ett globalt moratorium bör införas för kommersiell användning av syntetiska organismer. Frågan är dock om riskerna är så stora att ett totalt förbud mot skapandet av syntetiska organismer är befogat. Det är en vanlig ståndpunkt i debatten att riskerna inte kan motivera något totalt förbud, utan endast vissa former av reglering och övervakning. Med tanke på att tillämpningar av syntetisk biologi kan vara till stor nytta för människor är det kanske en mer rimlig respons på de risker som finns att införa nya lagar och regler för kontroll och övervakning, snarare än ett totalt förbud mot syntetisk biologi. Det råder också delade meningar om huruvida det behövs nya lagar och regler, eller om det befintliga regelverket för bioteknologi är tillräckligt. Sammanfattningsvis verkar det faktum att människor och andra kännande varelser kan skadas av syntetisk biologi inte vara ett övertygande argument för att all framställning av syntetiska organismer bör ses som moraliskt otillåten. 193 Människan överskrider en otillåten gräns Vissa kritiker har menat att syntetisk biologi skiljer sig från andra tekniker för att manipulera naturen genom att den syftar till att syntetiskt framställa biologiska system från grunden för mänskliga syften. Det handlar inte enbart om att skapa nya kombinationer av det som är naturligt givet. Därmed suddar den syntetiska biologin ut gränserna mellan organism och artefakt, mellan organiskt och syntetiskt och mellan levande och icke-levande. Enligt denna argumentationslinje är alltså syntetisk biologi problematisk för att den inte beaktar gränsdragningen mellan dessa kategorier. Frågan är dock om dessa kategorier är möjliga och viktiga att upprätthålla. Representanter för posthumanismen, en tanketradition som problematiserar den västerländska humanistiska traditionen, argumenterar för att vi inte kan se ovannämnda gränser som absoluta. Den italienska genusvetaren Rosi Braidotti framhåller att dikotomin mellan organiskt och syntetiskt inte går att upprätthålla. Under hela den mänskliga kulturens historia och särskilt sedan industrialismen har människan ingått i nätverk med redskap och maskiner. Inom det akademiska området vetenskapsoch teknikstudier har det vuxit fram en insikt om hur dagens teknologier binder samman mänskliga och icke-mänskliga element i ett nätverk. Bl.a. intresserar sig vetenskapsoch teknikstudier för hur utvecklingen av robottekniken skapar robotar som är allt mer autonoma. Den amerikanska vetenskapsteoretikern och genusvetaren Donna Haraway framhåller att den medicinska utvecklingen har förvandlat många människor, exempelvis de som har en pacemaker inopererad, till cyborger, det vill säga varelser som på samma gång är människor och maskiner. En annan typ av argumentation går ut på att syntetisk biologi är något onaturligt (se också E. Perssons kapitel). Denna argumentation förutsätter oftast, uttryckligen eller underförstått, att det finns en objektiv ordning i naturen som människan bryter mot genom skapandet av artificiella organismer. Idén om en naturlig ordning eller naturlig lag är en central tanke inom antik filosofi. Den går ut på att det finns en i viss betydelse naturlig etik, som inte är bunden till vissa sociala eller historiska sammanhang. Istället uttrycker den vad som ur allmänmänsklig synvinkel är moraliskt gott och rätt. Enligt läran om den naturliga lagen finns det vissa oföränderliga "högre lagar" som man ofta föreställer sig har ett gudomligt ursprung. Dessa lagar är moraliska normer eller föreskrifter om rätt beteende. Genom sitt förnuft, en förmåga som alla människor har fått, har människan möjlighet att få kunskap om och handla i enlighet med den naturliga lagens universella föreskrifter. På så sätt kan vi skapa en moralisk och politisk ordning som krävs för att människor ska kunna förverkliga ett gott liv. Läran om den naturliga lagen finns på ett tydligt sätt utformad inom ramen för stoicismen, en av de viktigaste filosofiska riktningarna under antiken. Den började utvecklas i Grekland på 300-talet före Kristus. Åsikterna hos olika stoiker var inte helt samstämmiga. En allmänt omfattad tes var emellertid att man skall leva "enligt naturen" och lojalt underordna sig ett ändamålsenligt verkande världsförnuft 194 (Gud, Försynen) och viljefast stå emot alla lidelser som för bort från "dygden". Inom stoicismen menade man att det finns en gudomlig ordning i kosmos som människan kan inse med förnuftet och som hon måste följa för att kunna leva ett gott liv. Kosmos är det enda som är fullt gott, eftersom det är det enda som är fullständigt. Kosmos kan därför ses som gudomligheten. Genom sitt förnuft är det endast människor som har potentialen att bli ett med kosmos i den bemärkelsen att deras förnuft kan förstå ordningen i kosmos. Om någon person skulle uppnå detta, skulle hon bli fullkomlig och därför en god person, i realiteten gudomlig. Läran om den naturliga lagen blev sedan ett centralt begrepp även inom den kristna teologin. Den kristne tänkare som betytt mest för utvecklingen av läran om den naturliga lagen är Thomas av Aquino. Hans syn på moralen kan beskrivas som en syntes av antik grekisk filosofi och kyrkofädernas teologi. Thomas etik utgår från att den mänskliga tillvaron och universum är en välstrukturerad ordning och en gemenskap mellan människor och andra levande varelser. Varje ting och varje levande varelse har en speciell plats i denna ordning. Människan har en speciell ställning i skapelsen på grund av sitt förnuft. Lagbegreppet är centralt i den thomistiska etiken. Thomas tänkte sig att Gud som förnuftsväsen styr tillvaron genom en gudomlig lag som är en evig lag. Eftersom människan är förnuftig kan hon bli delaktig i den gudomliga lagen och denna delaktighet kallar Thomas för den naturliga lagen. Om vi utgår från idén att det finns en naturlig ordning som människan bör hålla sig inom, skulle man kunna hävda att skapandet av artificiella organismer ligger utanför denna. Enligt detta resonemang överträder vi en förbjuden gräns genom att skapa artificiella organismer. Denna slutsats bygger emellertid på vissa problematiska antaganden, dels att det verkligen finns en objektiv ordning i naturen som vi bör följa och dels att vi kan få kunskap om denna ordning. Därför är den tveksam som grund för politiska och rättsliga beslut om syntetisk biologi. Idén om att människan överskrider en gräns genom att framställa organismer med syntetisk DNA är ibland kopplad till föreställningar om att det innebär att vi "leker Gud". Vad denna metafor är tänkt att betyda kan skilja sig från fall till fall. Ibland är det bara ett annat sätt att påstå att människor genom att framställa artificiella organismer träder in på ett område som vi inte har tillräcklig överblick över och där vi riskerar att åstadkomma mycket mer skada än nytta för oss själva. I så fall är det ett exempel på argumentationslinjen att syntetisk biologi är moraliskt problematisk eftersom den riskerar att skada intressena hos människor eller andra moraliskt beaktansvärda kännande varelser. En annan mer bokstavlig tolkning är att vi genom att skapa nya livsformer ger oss in på Guds domäner, eftersom det är Guds och inte människans uppgift att skapa liv. Många akademiska teologer är emellertid skeptiska till slutsatsen att skapandet av artificiella organismer innebär att vi "leker Gud" i denna mer bokstavliga bemärkelse. Den tyske teologen Peter Dabrock menar exempelvis att 195 syntetisk biologi inte kan ses som en skapelse i den bibliska betydelsen, det vill säga såsom Guds skapelse av världen. Enligt Bibeln betecknar skapelsen inte en enskild handling som ger upphov till en specifik entitet eller varelse. Istället betecknar skapelsen den gudomliga kärlek som skapar och bevarar livet som helhet, vilket människor inte är kapabla till. Av den anledningen kan vi inte hävda att människan i bokstavlig bemärkelse "leker Gud" genom att skapa syntetiska organismer. Ett liknande resonemang har presenterats av den sydafrikanske teologen Riaan Rheeder. Han skiljer mellan två olika betydelser av begreppet "skapelse" inom kristen teologi, dels skapelse från intet (creatio ex nihilo) och dels den kontinuerliga skapelsen (creatio continua). Enligt den kristna traditionen är det enbart Gud som har förmåga att skapa något från intet. All mänsklig skapelse sker genom att man utgår från något redan existerande material. Inte heller skapandet av organismer med artificiellt DNA kan ses som en skapelse från intet. Därmed kan det inte ses som att människan övertar Guds roll. Rheeder menar emellertid att syntetisk biologi kan ses som en del av den kontinuerliga skapelsen, vilken är den skapelse som fortgår genom historien. I enlighet med detta begrepp kan man se världen som en fortgående kreativ process. Rheeder hävdar att människan fått i uppdrag av Gud att vara delaktig i den fortgående skapelsen i egenskap av att vara en "skapad medskapare" (Figur 3). Han är kritisk till en mer traditionell syn på människan som förvaltare av skapelsen, eftersom den innebär att människans enda uppgift är att bevara och upprätthålla skapelsen såsom den är. Därmed bygger den på en föreställning om naturen som statisk, vilken strider mot nutida naturvetenskap. Idén om människan som medskapare presenterades ursprungligen av den amerikanske teologen Philip Hefner. Den bygger på idén att människan har till uppgift Figur 3: Människan som skapad medskapare. 196 att vara Guds redskap i den fortgående skapelsen på jorden. Rheeder menar att syntetisk biologi kan ses som ett exempel på hur Gud placerar vissa aspekter av den evolutionära utvecklingen i människans händer såsom varande Guds medskapare. Den bibliska uppfattningen att människan är skapad till Guds avbild innebär att det finns vissa likheter mellan Gud och människan. Eftersom Gud skapar är det också människans uppgift att skapa, även om hon till skillnad från Gud inte kan skapa något från intet. De flesta akademiska teologer tar alltså avstånd från uppfattningen att skapandet av artificiella organismer innebär att människan "leker Gud" i betydelsen att människan inträder på Guds domän. Det kan förstås finnas medborgare med en religiös övertygelse som anser att människan överträder en förbjuden gräns genom att skapa organismer med artificiellt DNA, men man måste fråga sig vilken roll detta bör spela för policybeslut om syntetisk biologi. Det är en vanlig uppfattning att en sekulär stat bör vara neutral mellan olika verklighetsuppfattningar och att politiska beslut om exempelvis lagstiftning inte kan baseras på vissa religiösa uppfattningar. Framställandet av syntetiska mikroorganismer skadar dessa organismer Ett annat sätt att rationellt motivera slutsatsen att det är moraliskt felaktigt att skapa mikroorganismer, åtminstone i vissa fall, är att det skadar dessa organismer. Frågan är dock varför vi skulle skada mikroorganismer genom att på artificiell väg skapa dem. Ett möjligt svar är att artificiellt skapade organismer lever sämre liv än naturliga mikroorganismer. Frågan är emellertid vad det skulle kunna innebära. Varför skulle exempelvis en E. coli-bakterie som producerar insulin leva ett sämre liv än en naturlig E. coli-bakterie? Bakterien kan förstås inte göra en sådan bedömning själv men vi människor kan kanske göra en sådan bedömning, exempelvis om den artificiella bakterien i genomsnitt har kortare livslängd. Även om vi kommer fram till slutsatsen att vissa artificiella bakterier lever sämre liv än motsvarande naturliga bakterier, verkar det emellertid inte vara ett hållbart argument för att vi skadar de artificiella bakterierna genom att skapa dem. De individuella bakterier vi har skapat har ju inte möjligheten att istället leva ett liv som naturliga bakterier. Vi kan bara dra slutsatsen att vi skadar de artificiella bakterierna genom att skapa dem om vi kommer fram till att det är bättre för dem att inte existera alls än att existera såsom artificiellt skapade bakterier. Frågan är på vilka grunder vi skulle kunna dra en sådan slutsats. För kännande varelser skulle vi kunna argumentera att det är bättre att inte leva alls än att leva ett liv med mycket lidande, men bakterier verkar inte kunna uppleva lidande. Även om vi drar slutsatsen att det hade varit bättre för vissa artificiellt skapade mikroorganismer att inte leva alls, räcker det inte för att dra slutsatsen att det är moraliskt fel att skapa dessa individer. Vi måste också kunna motivera varför dessa 197 organismer är moraliskt beaktansvärda. Såsom nämnts tidigare har ståndpunkten att även andra livsformer än människan kan ha moralisk status blivit vanligare under de senaste decennierna. Den ståndpunkt som fått störst genomslag är uppfattningen att även kännande icke-mänskliga varelser kan ha moralisk status. Det finns emellertid filosofer som vill gå längre och som menar att även icke-kännande levande varelser bör tillskrivas moral status. Frågan är dock om vi har hållbara skäl att tillskriva mikroorganismer moralisk status. Till vardags brukar människor inte ha några moraliska betänkligheter mot att utnyttja mikroorganismer för sina egna syften, även om det skulle vara dåligt för dessa organismer. Vi använder ju jästsvampar för att tillverka bröd och alkoholhaltiga drycker. Det är tveksamt om det är mer moraliskt problematiskt att använda "naturliga" jästsvampar för att tillverka öl, än att använda artificiella jästsvampar för att tillverka artemisin. Att vi till vardags inte har några moraliska betänkligheter mot att använda oss av mikroorganismer är dock i sig ingen hållbar anledning till att det är moraliskt acceptabelt. Mycket av det som historiskt sett betraktats som moraliskt tillåtet, exempelvis slaveri, tar människor avstånd från idag. Dock är det tveksamt om vi har några hållbara skäl för att anse att mikroorganismer är moraliskt beaktansvärda. Det har gjorts vissa försök att understödja denna slutsats. Den amerikanske filosofen Gary E. Varner, exempelvis, hävdar att alla levande varelser har moraliskt relevanta intressen. Först och främst är det varelser som har önskningar som har moraliskt relevanta intressen. Till denna grupp räknar han människor, men också däggdjur och fåglar. Enligt Varner har experiment visat att även däggdjur och fåglar har så pass avancerad tankeförmåga att det är meningsfullt att hävda att de kan hysa önskningar. Varner hävdar att också varelser som inte kan ha önskningar kan ha intressen, även om de har betydligt färre moraliskt relevanta intressen än varelser som har önskningar. Därför bör också de räknas som moraliskt beaktansvärda, men i en lägre grad än varelser som kan ha önskningar. Varner menar att vissa tillstånd kan vara i en varelses intresse även om den inte önskar något och därför inte är intresserad av något. Vissa intressen hos levande varelser, både de som kan och de som inte kan ha önskningar, kan inte identifieras genom att studera de önskningar de har eller skulle ha under ideala förutsättningar. Exempelvis är det i ett träds intresse att få vatten eftersom det behöver vatten för att överleva, även om det inte har någon önskan om att få vatten. De dominerande filosofiska teorierna om vad som är i människors intresse har formen av vad som kallas mentala tillstånd-teorier. Dessa definierar en individs intressen utifrån idealiserade önskningar, det vill säga de önskningar individen skulle ha om hen var både tillräckligt informerad och opartisk vad gäller olika faser av sitt liv. Varner är dock kritisk till dessa teorier. Han menar att människor liksom andra levande varelser kan ha biologiska intressen, som inte kan identifieras genom att hänvisa till deras önskningar. Det är ett biologiskt intresse för människor 198 att sluta röka även om de är tillräckligt informerade och opartiska vad gäller olika faser i deras liv och fortfarande önskar röka. Även om en person tar ett välinformerat beslut att röka, är det inte i hens intresse eftersom det skadar hens biologiska funktioner. Hen har ett biologiskt intresse av att sluta röka, även om hen inte har någon önskan att göra det. Varner menar att vi bör betrakta människors biologiska intressen som moraliskt beaktansvärda. Därför bör vi även betrakta djurs och växters biologiska intressen som moraliskt beaktansvärda. Av den anledningen kan vi hävda att också levande varelser som inte har några önskningar, exempelvis växter, kan ha moraliskt relevanta intressen. Varners kritik av mentala tillstånds-teorier om önskningar är dock inte särskilt övertygande. Om vi tar ett exempel med en välinformerad och normalt fungerande vuxen rökare, kan vi förstås säga att personen ifråga har ett biologiskt intresse av att sluta röka. Hens lungfunktioner försämras av rökningen, men frågan är om det är moraliskt relevant ifall hen har tagit ett välinformerat beslut att röka. Det är en vanlig moralisk övertygelse att normalt fungerande vuxna personer har rätt att i de flesta fall själva besluta över sin hälsa (paternalistiska beslut från statens sida kan ibland vara berättigade, exempelvis förbud mot att sälja narkotika, men jag kommer inte att gå in på denna problematik här). Det är därför tveksamt om en välinformerad rökares biologiska intressen av att inte röka kan ha någon moralisk relevans. Ett annat exempel som mer tydligt talar emot Varners kritik gäller en normalt fungerande vuxen person som tagit ett väl övervägt beslut att hungerstrejka, exempelvis av politiska skäl. Uppenbarligen har personen ett biologiskt intresse av att äta, men det verkar inte vara moraliskt relevant. Vi har ingen anledning att förse den här personen med mat och det vore moraliskt felaktigt att tvångsmata personen ifråga. Om vi inte på goda grunder kan hävda att människor har moraliskt relevanta intressen som är enbart biologiskt baserade och inte baserade på deras idealiserade önskningar, kan vi inte längre använda detta påstående som ett skäl för att hävda att även varelser som inte kan ha önskningar, exempelvis mikroorganismer, har moraliskt relevanta intressen. Det finns andra miljöetiker, exempelvis den australiensiske filosofen Nicholas Agar, som argumenterar för att alla levande varelser har moraliskt relevanta intressen utan att basera denna tes på premissen att vi bör ta hänsyn till alla levande varelsers biologiska intressen eftersom vi bör ta hänsyn till människors biologiska intressen. Agars försvar för att alla levande varelser är moraliskt beaktansvärda bygger på tanken att vi genom naturvetenskaplig kunskap kan utsträcka commonsense uppfattningar om vilka entiteter som har egenvärde. Med egenvärde menar han det värde något har i sig själv, oberoende av hur det gynnar någon annan. Han menar att vårt tillskrivande av egenvärde åt olika entiteter baseras på att de har önskningar och preferenser. Det är enbart medvetna varelser som har preferenser och som vi normalt sett är benägna att tilldela ett egenvärde. Agar menar emellertid att vi utifrån naturvetenskapliga fakta om icke-medvetna varelser bör tillskriva 199 även dessa ett egenvärde. Det bör ske i ett kontinuum från självmedvetna varelser som har störst egenvärde till enkla organismer som varken har rationalitet eller förnimmelseförmåga och därmed minst egenvärde. I ju högre grad levande varelser har något som liknar mänskliga önskningar och preferenser, desto högre egenvärde bör de också tillskrivas. Agar menar att även mycket enkla organismer, såsom bakterier och virus, har tillstånd som liknar föreställningar och tillstånd som liknar önskningar. Tillstånd som liknar föreställningar har funktionen att förmedla information om centrala delar av organismens miljö. Viruset T4 som reproducerar sig med hjälp av en bakterievärd har sensorer, som känner av substanser på bakteriers ytor. När den kommer i kontakt med en bakterie skapas en respons och den injicerar sitt genetiska material i bakterien. T4 har ett tillstånd som innehåller informationen "bakterie", vilket liknar en föreställning. Tillstånd som liknar önskningar, vilka också kan kallas biopreferenser, har som funktion att skapa en viss relation mellan organismen och dess miljö. T4s biopreferens kan beskrivas som att injicera material i en bakterie. Eftersom också mycket enkla organismer har biopreferenser vilka har en strukturell likhet med preferenser bör också de tillskrivas egenvärde, men i betydligt lägre grad än varelser med preferenser. Ett första problem med Agars resonemang är att tillskrivandet av egenvärde har en oklar moralisk relevans. Att något har ett egenvärde innebär inte nödvändigtvis att det är moraliskt beaktansvärt. Här väljer jag dock att tolka honom som att han menar att alla levande organismer är moraliskt beaktansvärda, om än i olika hög grad. Även efter en sådan tolkning kvarstår dock det som jag uppfattar som huvudproblemet med Agars teori, nämligen hans slutsats att eftersom icke-medvetna varelser har biopreferenser, vilka har vissa likheter med preferenser, bör man dra slutsatsen att också de är moraliskt beaktansvärda. Agar menar att eftersom biopreferenser liknar preferenser är också innehavare av biopreferenser moraliskt beaktansvärda, men i lägre grad än innehavare av preferenser. Frågan är dock varför denna slutsats är den mest rimliga. Kan man inte lika väl hävda det motsatta, det vill säga att endast innehavare av preferenser är moraliskt beaktansvärda och inte några andra entiteter? Varför ska tilldelningen av moralisk status ske i ett kontinuum, snarare än att man drar en skarp gräns mellan de som har och de som inte har preferenser? Hade det endast funnits en kvantitativ skillnad mellan de som har och de som inte har moralisk status, exempelvis om den förra gruppen endast hade färre biopreferenser än den senare, hade det varit svårt att motivera en skarp gräns. I detta fall skulle vi emellertid kunna argumentera för att det finns en kvalitativ skillnad mellan de individer som har preferenser och de som inte har preferenser och att det motiverar att endast den första gruppen tilldelas moralisk status. Jag drar alltså slutsatsen att det finns stora svårigheter med att motivera moraliska plikter mot mikroorganismer utifrån de plikter vi anser oss ha mot människor eller andra kännande varelser. Det grundläggande problemet är att skillnaderna 200 helt enkelt är för stora mellan människor och mikroorganismer för att vi skall kunna basera moraliska omdömen om de senare på omdömen om de förra. Detta utgör ytterligare ett hinder för att kunna dra slutsatsen att skapandet av mikroorganismer med artificiellt DNA är moraliskt felaktigt, eftersom det skadar dessa organismer. Slutsatser Det mest uppenbara skälet till att syntetisk biologi bör anses vara moraliskt otillåtet är det faktum att det kan leda till risker för människor och andra kännande varelser. Även om forskning om och kommersiell tillämpning av syntetisk biologi kan leda till risker, är detta faktum emellertid mest hållbart som ett skäl för att införa nya lagar och regler för kontroll och övervakning (givet att de lagar och regler som finns i nuläget inte är tillräckliga) och inte som ett skäl för att införa ett totalförbud mot syntetisk biologi. Eftersom tillämpning av syntetisk biologi kan vara av stort värde för människor, verkar ett allmänt förbud inte vara det mest rimliga sättet att hantera de risker som finns. Uppfattningen att människan överträder en förbjuden gräns genom att skapa organismer med artificiellt DNA är mer hållbart som ett skäl för att syntetisk biologi bör anses vara moraliskt otillåtet. Det finns dock uppenbara problem med att motivera denna uppfattning. Ett möjligt sätt är genom tanken att det finns en objektiv ordning i naturen som människan överträder genom att skapa organismer med artificiellt DNA, men det är en kontroversiell ståndpunkt att det finns en sådan ordning och att vi kan få kunskap om den. Ibland har syntetisk biologi beskrivits som ett sätt att "leka Gud" i bokstavlig bemärkelse, det vill säga att överta Guds roll, men de flesta akademiska teologer motsätter sig en sådan slutsats. Ett religiöst motiverat avståndstagande från syntetisk biologi är också problematiskt som en grund för politiska beslut i ett sekulariserat samhälle. Uppfattningen att vi skadar de artificiella mikroorganismerna själva genom att framställa dem kan också vara ett hållbart skäl för att syntetisk biologi åtminstone i vissa fall bör anses vara moraliskt otillåtet. Även denna uppfattning är dock svår att motivera. Först och främst är frågan om vi verkligen skadar mikroorganismer genom att framställa dem, eftersom det verkar förutsätta att det är bättre för dem om de överhuvudtaget inte hade existerat. Dessutom förutsätter slutsatsen att framställandet av mikroorganismer med artificiellt DNA är moraliskt otillåtet att dessa mikroorganismer är moraliskt beaktansvärda. De försök som hittills gjorts att rationellt motivera denna ståndpunkt är inte övertygande. 201 Lästips Braidotti, Rosi (2013) The Posthuman. Polity Press Freemont, Paul Simon; Kitney, Richard I. (2016) Synthetic Biology: A Primer World Scientific Publishing Co Kaebnick, Gregory E.; Murray, Thomas H. (red.) (2013) Synthetic Biology and Morality: Artificial Life and the Bounds of Nature MIT Press Singer, Peter (1996) Praktisk etik Thales Torpman, Olle (2017) Miljöetik: från problem till lösning Studentlitteratur Åsberg, Cecilia; Hultman, Martin; Lee, Francis (red.) (2012) Posthumanistiska nyckeltexter Studentlitteratur 202 203 Synen på människan som skapare av (o)mänskligt liv: Exemplet Mary Shellys Frankenstein, eller den moderne Prometeus Anna Cabak Rédei Människans nyfikenhet och strävan att tänja på gränserna för att stilla vetgirigheten är inget nytt och kanske inte ens mest utmärkande för just vår tid. Dokumenterade källor från 1200talet kan tjäna som goda exempel som stödjer ett sådant antagande. Mary Shelleys roman från början av 1800-talet, Frankenstein, eller den moderne Prometeus, är kanske den än idag mest kända kommentaren till detta gränstänjande, som fått sin fortsättning i lite ny tappning i filmen och den vetenskapliga debatten. tt experimentera på människor för att nå kunskap om vad det är att vara människa är kanske något som är just en del av att vara människa? Mary Shelleys (1797–1851) Frankenstein, eller den moderne Prometeus, publicerades först 1818 och är en fiktiv berättelse om vetenskapsmannen Frankenstein och hans Varelse (monstret) och som fick tidigt fäste i populärkulturen. Den sattes upp som teater redan under 1800-talet, där en ny tolkning av berättelsen om Frankenstein tog form och fortsatte inom filmen sedan den första filmatiseringen år 1910 (16 minuter lång). En historisk roman alltså, som fått fortsättning in i vår tid genom otaliga nya tolkningar på teaterscenen och på filmduken. Fokus kom att ligga på (och gör fortfarande) Frankensteins vetenskapliga besatthet i att skapa liv, en besatthet som så småningom leder till en ödesdiger överträdelse av etiska och religiösa gränsvärden på bekostnad av de frågor som möjligen uppehöll Mary Shelley (Figur 1) än mer, nämligen: frågan om ansvar och gränsen mellan vad som är mänskligt och inte. Därmed, kanske som en följd av denna omorientering, har även Varelsen i boken reducerats i populärkulturen till ja, ett monster. Monstret har tappat de mänskliga aspekter som Varelsen hade, och grymtar i filmen och på scenen där Varelsen i boken fascinerades av språket som han ägnade stor möda åt att lära sig. Nedan följer en beskrivning av den idémässiga bakgrund som fanns i den kontext i vilken Mary Shelley verkade, och något om romanen. Kapitlet avslutas sedan med ett försök att besvara frågan om huruvida vi kan tala i termer av att FranA 204 kenstein, genom populärkulturen – främst filmen – blivit till en metafor inom ramen för vad vi idag kallar den syntetiska biologin. Många vetenskapliga böcker och artiklar bär titlar, och har ansatser, som vittnar om detta, såsom till exempel: Frankenstein's footsteps, The Frankenstein syndrome, "The Frankenfood myth", eller i titeln på en intervju med genetikern J. Craig Venter, känd för sin forskning i avancerad syntetisk biologi som resulterat i den första artificiellt skapade DNA-molekylen 2010, "J. Craig Venter talks life, ego, ambitions-and Frankenstein". Karaktären Frankenstein, såsom den renodlats inom populärkulturen, används alltså ofta metaforiskt för att beskriva den konflikt som kan uppstå mellan vad vetenskapen förmår att göra, och det vi som människor lärt oss att vi inte bör göra mot bakgrund av vår kulturella historia. Det uppstår, förenklat, en konflikt mellan den "hårda" vetenskapen som inte tar någon hänsyn annat till sin egen förmåga och de "mjuka" värdena som handlar om mänskliga rättigheter som på allvar började formuleras under upplysningstiden på 1600och 1700-talen. Å den andra sidan, handlar konflikten även om vetenskapens förmåga och människan plats i Skapelsen, om vi ser till religiösa skapelseberättelser. Shelleys mera komplexa och nyanserade budskap om vad det är att vara människa, sett ur två perspektiv – Frankensteins och Varelsens – har gått förlorat i dagens tolkningar inom film och teater. Hur speglas då den framväxande naturvetenskapen i Mary Shelleys roman? Figur 1: Mary Shelley. 205 Frankenstein, och hans Varelse Shelleys roman publicerades först år 1818, och gavs ut i en andra något reviderad upplaga år 1831 (Figur 2). Romanen är uppdelad i tre delar och börjar med Waltons berättelse från sitt expeditionsfartyg långt norrut i hav nära Nordpolen. Walton räddar Frankenstein som i jakten på Varelsen (skapelsen som aldrig får något namn utan kallas som oftast för Varelsen, eller ibland för monstret, uslingen eller andra nedsättande tillmälen) fört honom till ishaven där han ramlar i när isen bryter upp. Walton är angelägen om att bli hans vän och så småningom berättar Frankenstein historien bakom sin jakt, som återges i romanens första del. Waltons Figur 2: Frontispiece Shelleys Frankenstein 206 återberättande av Frankensteins livshistoria (och hans möte med Varelsen i slutet av romanen) utgör en ram för romanen, och läsaren får ta del av den i form av hans brev till systern. Walton har en del likheter med Frankenstein. Hans expedition till Nordpolen kan sägas vara ett resultat av en besatthet likande den som drivit Frankenstein. Skillnaden är att Walton ger upp när sjömännen på fartyget är nära myteri på grund av de svåra omständigheterna ute på havet, och byter kurs och vänder tillbaka. Denna gräns saknar Frankenstein. I den andra delen får vi ta del av Varelsens berättelse, en berättelse om lidande och sökande efter mänsklig värme och kärlek, då kärlek och omsorg från hans skapare, d.v.s. Frankenstein, förnekats honom och om hur det sakteliga går upp för Varelsen hur han ser ut vilket ger honom en förklaring till varför människor (inklusive Frankenstein själv) flyr honom. Men Varelsen ger inte upp sitt rättmätiga krav på kärlek utan ber Frankenstein om att skapa honom en brud. Frankenstein går motsträvigt med på detta, men skjuter upp det tills han slutligen inser att han måste. I ögonblicket då han nästan är klar vägrar han slutföra experimentet, till Varelsens stora vrede. Varelsens lidande och besvikelse går över i hat och han grips av ett hämndbegär som till slut kostar Frankensteins nyblivna hustru livet, men innan dess har Varelsen orsakat stor olycka, ofrivilligt genom olyckshändelser i början men sedan med berått mod, då Frankensteins bästa vän Henry Clerval faller offer för Varelsens vrede. Den tredje och sista delen av romanen är en dialog där Frankensteins, Waltons, Varelsens och andras röster belyser tragedin som slutligen kostar Frankensteins, och möjligen även Varelsens liv, ute på ishavet i norr när den senare kastar sig ut genom kabinfönstret på Waltons fartyg där hans "skapare" somnat in i sviterna av den långa jakten och av förlusterna av de som stått honom allra närmast, hustrun Elisabeth, fadern som dött av sorg vid förlusten av Elisabeth, bäste vännen, en kär lillebror och en trogen anställd i hushållet. Frankenstein och Varelsen har båda blivit varandras olycka. Hur såg då den framväxande naturvetenskapen ut på Mary Shelleys tid? Nya vetenskapsideal växer fram under Upplysningen Den materialistiska filosofin under 1700-talet gav uttryck för dessa vetenskapsideal i begrepp såsom till exempel filosofen La Mettries (1709–1751) "l'homme machine" [maskinen människan], som var en förlängning av Descartes arbete och som utmynnade i tanken att det inte fanns någon skillnad mellan djur och människor, de var båda "maskiner" (Descartes gjorde en skillnad mellan djur och människa här, eftersom människan enligt honom hade en själ, men förutom själen var båda mekanistiska). Huvudkaraktären i Shelleys roman, en tidig, vad vi idag skulle kalla science fiction roman, är en ung vetenskapsman, Victor Frankenstein. Han har redan i skolåldern i Genève blivit besatt av naturfilosofin, och detta intresse leder så småningom till en nästan tvångsmässig dröm om att skapa mänskligt liv. Detta är en fantasi och en ambition som inte delas av någon av Frankensteins 207 lärare på universitetet i Ingolstadt där han studerat naturfilosofi och slutligen blivit tagen av de senaste rönen inom elektricitet och galvanism. Frankensteins mani tar här form: "Jag ska göra något banbrytande, upptäcka okända makter, utforska okända krafter, och avslöja skapelsens djupaste mysterier". Frankenstein har därmed bestämt sig för att sätta sig över sina lärare och ja, sätta sig över skapelsen och Skaparen (se mer om denna fråga i Melins kapitel). Vi får inte veta i romanen huruvida Frankenstein har en tro eller inte, men La Mettrie hade när han skrev sitt verk L'homme Machine (1748) även gjort upp med Gud, vars existens han betvivlade. Om vi antar att Frankenstein tagit till sig materialismen full ut, så blir det även fritt fram för honom (och andra människor) att träda in i rollen som "skapare" med nycklarna till "skapelsen djupaste mysterier", som Shelley uttrycker det. Denna fråga kan även gälla vetenskapen såsom den utvecklades under 1700-talet. Galvanismen, till exempel, var en metod som byggde på idén att man genom elektricitet kunde påverka kroppens inre kretslopp, en metod som romanens Frankenstein tagit djupt intryck av. Denna metod har sitt namn från den italienske läkaren och naturfilosofen Luigi Galvani (1763–1834) som i slutet av 1700-talet experimenterade med grodor och kom fram till att djur och människor innehade en typ av elektriska kretslopp som var avgörande för livskraften och som kunde påverkas utifrån. Därav föddes idén att människan kunde återuppväcka djur och människor från de döda genom elektricitet. Galvanistiska experiment blev populära i början av 1800-talet i städer som Paris och London. Särskilt vanliga var de i London där brottsligheten var hög och eftersom straffen var mycket hårda var tillgången till kroppar förhållandevis god (galvanistiska experiment fick endast göras på avrättade brottslingars kroppar). Är det konsekvenserna av detta synsätt, att det är fritt fram för människan att utforska skapelsen djupaste mysterier, som Shelley vill visa på? Frankenstein och den moderna vetenskapen Att människan tagit sig rätten att experimentera med människor var inte nytt vid tiden för Shelleys roman. Den italienske Franciskanmunken Salimbene (1221– 1290), till exempel, beskriver kejsaren Fredrik II:s (1194–1250) "nyfikenhet", eller kanske bättre "excesser" när denne experimenterade med barn, likt Psammetichus I (som regerade över Egypten 664–610 f.Kr.) i Herodotos (484–425 f.Kr.) verk Historia. Där lät Psammetichus I lämna två barn till en herde som fick instruktionen att ta hand om dem, men utan att tala med dem. Experimentet gick ut på att herden istället skulle lyssna noga och registrera det första ordet något av barnen yttrade. På så sätt skulle Psammethicus I få svaret på vilket språk som var människans urspråk. När det ena barnet yttrade sitt första ord med utsträckta armar, tolkade herden ordet som "bröd" på frygiska. Psammetichus I drog slutsatsen att frygier var ett äldre folk än egyptierna och att frygiska var människans ursprungliga språk. Enligt Salimbene, lät Fredrik II, inspirerad av Psammethicus I, fånga in 208 mindre bemedlades barn och låste in dem i en källare och gav sin personal instruktionen att inte tala, leka eller på annat sätt ge barnen några ömhetsbetygelser. Fredrik II ville nämligen se vilket av de klassiska språken grekiska, latin eller arabiska som barnen skulle börja tala "naturligt". Hypotesen var att människan är "förprogrammerad" med ett språk, frågan var bara vilket. Resultatet, enligt berättelsen, var att barnen inte lärde sig något språk alls, om de ens överlevde den grymma och omänskliga behandlingen. Idag vet vi, genom den moderna psykologin , att det späda människobarnet kan dö om det berövas värme och mänsklig beröring. Liknande försök, fast med ungar av rhesusapor, har gjorts av psykologen Harry Harlow i en rad uppmärksammade experiment. Forskningen bedrevs på University of Wisconsin-Madison, där Harlow tog ett par nyfödda rhesusungar från sina mammor och satte dem i en social isoleringsbur, "Förtvivlans bur" tillsammans med en konstgjord "surrogatmamma". Där vistades aporna utan kontakt med andra apor under 24 månader. "Surrogatmammorna" kunde vara konstruerade på lite olika sätt, den ena var "hård", gjord av ståltråd med fyrkantigt huvud och försedd med en nappflaska som rhesusungen kunde dia ifrån, den andra var däremot mjuk och klädd i någon typ av päls, alstrade kroppsvärme och kunde vagga rhesusungen. Det visade sig senare att rhesusungarna föredrog den senare, och det var av underordnad betydelse huruvida surrogatmamman kunde ge mat åt rhesusungen eller inte. Men rhesusungarna utvecklade allvarliga störningar efter denna behandling, och experimenten visade att rhesusungarna till varje pris försökte utveckla en relation till "sin surrogatmamma", och att beröringskontakten var det avgörande. Men kritiken mot det "omänskliga" i Harlows experiment växte då många upplevde att han låtit experimentet gå alltför långt. Detta väckte en medvetenhet om grymheten i experiment med djur. Resultaten av Harlows experiment visade att inlärning är beroende av trygghet och nyfikenhet, och att även människans behov är långt mer komplexa än sömn och föda. Dessa resultat bekräftar vad forskningen visat inom ramen för anknytningsteorin som växte fram genom psykologerna Mary Ainsworths och John Bowlbys arbeten med barn och barnens anknytning till sina omsorgspersoner, ett samarbete som startade på 1950-talet och varade i flera decennier framåt. Särskilt kan Ainsworths begrepp "en trygg bas" lyftas fram i detta sammanhang, en teori om vikten för det lilla barnet att känna att hen har en omsorgsperson att knyta an till och vända tillbaka till för att söka trygghet när barnet stöter på "faror och hot" i det nyfikna utforskandet av omvärlden. Inom ramen för denna ansats skulle vi kunna säga att Victor Frankensteins största misslyckande i sitt experimenterande på människor var att han försummade att ge Varelsen den omvårdnad och omsorg varje människa behöver för att kunna ta sig ut i världen utan att drabbas av meningsförlust. Inom den kliniska psykologin så vet man vilka negativa konsekvenser, i termer av psykisk ohälsa, det kan få för den enskilde att växa upp utan anknytningsperson – en person att ty sig 209 till – som kan härbärgera och reglera negativa känslor som rädsla utan istället spär på, eller triggar dessa. Särskilt påverkar detta förmågan till nära och närande relationer, utan vilka människan har svårt att klara sig. I detta avseende är det inte alltför långsökt att anta att Frankensteins Varelse är mänsklig (om vi kan acceptera att resultaten av Harlows experiment även i någon mån är giltiga för människan), och mera så kanske än Frankenstein själv. Detta är åtminstone den fråga som Mary Shelley väcker i sin kritik mot vetenskapsmannen som inte tar ansvar för sin skapelse, stänger honom inne tills dess att han rymmer ut i världen för att nyfiket upptäcka den utan att ha en trygg bas, en anknytningsperson, att återvända till när världen blir obegriplig och hotande. "Monstret", som Varelsen också kallas, straffar sin "skapare" för två försummelser: avsaknad av omsorg, och underlåtelse att skapa en brud åt honom. Det senare är i ljuset av vad man vet om människans anknytning fullt naturligt, människans romantiska relationer har det visat sig i forskningen, återspeglar den anknytning som barnet haft med sina omsorgspersoner, oftast föräldrarna. Men det finns en stor skillnad, de senare är liksidiga till sin natur vilket inte relationen barn-omsorgsperson kan vara, där omsorgspersonen är den vuxne som ger till barnet, i strikt bemärkelse. I vuxna nära relationer tycks människan skapa anknytningsrelationer lika starka som den mellan barnet och omsorgspersonen. Men detta säger inget om kvaliteten i relationen. Människan, enligt anknytningsforskningen, knyter an till sin omsorgsperson av nödvändighet för fortlevnaden och detta på gott och ont. Anknytningen tycks ha biologiska rötter, något som Harlows experiment på rhesusungarna visat. Frankensteins monster gav alltså inte upp längtan efter en anknytningsrelation, den som han berövats av sin skapare, men även av andra han försökt knyta till sig längs vägen. När Frankenstein berövar Varelsen en fru, börjar kampen och jakten. Varelsen hämnas, och Frankenstein jagar sin skapelse i spåren av våld och mord till utkanten av civilisationen och går under på vägen medan Varelsen undflyr honom i flykten mot de iskalla vidderna på nordpolen. Frankenstein undandrar sig "föräldrarollen" i det ögonblicket Varelsen får liv – vägrar vara en omsorgsperson – abdikerar, och full av skräck överger sin varelse som sträcker ut sin hand mot honom, som om han ville hålla honom kvar. Frankenstein rusar ut vid anblicken av Varelsens anstötande yttre, käkarna som öppnas, de gula vattniga ögonen och huden som knappt tycktes täcka benen. Frankenstein har alltså under sina studier på universitetet i Ingolstadt blivit besatt av tanken på att skapa mänskligt liv då han gripits av beundran för framstegen gjorda inom galvanismen. Mary Shelley kom tidigt i kontakt med debatten kring galvanismen då hon i egenskap av att vara dotter till de brittiska filosoferna och författarna William Godwin (1756–1836) och Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797) föddes in i ett hem som utgjorde ett centrum för engagerande diskussioner om samtida vetenskapliga rön. Bland annat fick hon höra historien om Giovanni Aldini, systerson till Luigi Galvani, och dennes experiment på liket efter en brottsling som oskyldigt (visade det sig) dömts till döden för att ha dränkt sin fru och 210 barn i en av Londons kanaler. Med hjälp av elektriska chocker mot huvudet öppnades ögonen, ansiktet grimaserade otäckt samtidigt som huvudet slängde fram och tillbaka. Men inget hände när elektriciteten riktades mot hjärtat, kroppen förblev livlös. Troligen baserade Mary Shelley sin protagonist Victor Frankenstein på Giovanni Aldini, en person som även hennes man poeten Percy Bysshe Shelley tagit intryck av. Helt kort, Mary Shelley befann sig i mitten av en krets som fascinerades av galvanismen och tanken på att kunna återuppväcka döda kroppar med hjälp av metoden. Det är också genom att låta elektriciteten från ett blixtnedslag träffa den av likdelar (från bårhuset) ihopsamlade livlösa kroppen som Frankenstein ger liv åt sin varelse. Likt Prometeus, som stal elden från gudarna i den grekiska mytologin och gav den till människorna för att de var överlägsna alla andra djur, tillskansar sig Frankenstein skaparkraften. Prometeus straffades genom att bindas fast vid en klippa som vaktades av en örn, eller en gam. Herakles sköt ned den vaktande fågeln med en pil och räddade Prometeus. Prometeus förbrytelse blev ursprunget till all konst och vetenskap. Frankenstein straffas också, genom undergång och genom att varelsen undflyr honom, utsläppt som denne är i världen. Kanske kan man också föreställa sig ett djupt och omedvetet personligt intresse hos den unga Mary för denna nya vetenskap? Hon hade ju förlorat sin egen mor som dog i barnsängsfeber när hon föddes och tvingades växa upp med en styvmor med vilken hon inte hade någon närmare relation. Mary var mycket upptagen av minnet av sin mor som hon liknade mycket, och hennes far tog henne ofta till moderns grav. Mary Shelleys Frankenstein och filmen Scenen där Varelsen väcks till liv är central i berättelsen, och intressant att studera i ett jämförande perspektiv med filmiska tolkningar eftersom de är senare och gjorda i ett annat vetenskapligt och kulturellt sammanhang. I romanen är scenen nedtonad i jämförelse med hur den kommit att bli i filmiska tolkningar, med start redan i den första långfilmen, Frankenstein (Whale, 1931). Shelley beskriver natten då Frankenstein äntligen lyckas gjuta liv i den livlösa kroppen som han sytt ihop av likdelar och burit till det ödsliga tornhuset. Mödosamt har Frankenstein arbetat med sitt experiment, självupptaget har han försummat alla sina relationer i sin besatthet att nå framgång. Utmattad beskriver Frankenstein det "stora" ögonblicket: Det var en sorglig natt i november, som jag skådade fullbordandet av mitt slit. Med oro, som nästan stegrades till ångest, samlade jag ihop livsinstrumenten omkring mig, så att jag kunde ingjuta en livsgnista i denna livlösa tingest som låg vid mina fötter. Det hade redan hunnit bli morgon; regnet slog dystert mot rutorna och mitt ljus var nästan nedbrunnet, när, i skenet av det nästan utslocknade ljuset, jag såg varelsens vattniga gula ögon öppnas. (Min översättning.) 211 Inte mycket sägs om vilken metod som används när den livlösa kroppen ska ges liv, annat än att det handlar om "instrument". Frankenstein beskriver det som ett ångestfyllt ögonblick, där han står och ska ingjuta liv i den "livlösa tingesten" vid hans fötter. Och Frankenstein funderar inte alls på om Varelsens liv i sig har någon mening, annat än att stilla Frankensteins sökande efter ära och kunskap. Annat är det i den första långfilmen (Whale, 1931). Scenen sker under stor dramatik, Elizabeth (Frankensteins trolovade), Victor (bästa vännen, Henry i romanen) och Dr. Waldman (Frankensteins lärare) söker upp Henry Frankenstein (Victor i romanen) en ovädersnatt då han är fullt upptagen med att iscensätta experimentet och med vildsint blick slutligen släpper in sina besökare i experimentrummet högst upp i en gammal borg (se även Johanssons kapitel). Åskan dundrar utanför, takluckorna öppnas och britsen med den livlösa kroppen hissas upp och träffas av blixten och hissas sedan ned. Frankenstein stirrar exalterat på kroppen som plötsligen börjar röra på handen, och Frankenstein uttalar de filmhistoriska orden: "Den lever, den lever ... I Guds namn, nu vet jag hur det känns att vara Gud!" (Whale, 1931, min översättning). Figur 3: Boris Karloff som Varelsen 212 Dessa ord censurerades senare på 1930-talet på grund av blasfemi. I senare restaurerade versioner har orden tagits fram igen, då de dolts under ett dunder av åska. Observera att Varelsen (Figur 3) omnämns som "den", alltså som ett ting. Denna skillnad mellan den nedtonade scenen i boken och den uppskruvade i filmen (som blivit standard i senare filmatiseringar, där scenen ofta placeras i laboratorium som för tankarna till den moderna vetenskapen) kan styrka uppfattningen att Frankenstein, eller vetenskapen, i sig inte var den centrala figuren för Shelley. Det som var viktigt för henne handlade om vad som hände med Varelsen som föds likt ett barn in i världen och berövas den kärlek, som han och alla andra, har rätt till. Detta gör Varelsen till slut till ett monster, och Frankenstein har genom sin försummelse bidragit till detta, som alla andra som mött och stött bort honom. Även slutscenen skiljer sig åt väsentligt. I romanen dukar Frankenstein under, medan monstret flyr undan. I filmen (Whale, 1931) går istället monstret under i en kvarn som han flytt upp i, undan Frankenstein och byborna som jagar honom för att ta hämnd för brotten han begått. Frankenstein följer efter och fångas in av det grymtande monstret i en dramatisk scen, men han lyckas ta sig loss. Byborna sticker sedan kvarnen i brand så att monstret slukas upp av lågorna skrikande av fasa medan de hurrar nere på marken. Varelsens egna berättelse i romanen ger en annan bild, en bild som aldrig kommer fram i filmen från 1931 (Whale), och inte heller i den senaste långfilmsversionen Victor Frankenstein (McGuigan, 2015), för att ge ytterligare ett exempel. Shelleys perspektiv, hennes intresse för det mänskliga och för livet som ett socialt och politiskt fenomen, baserat på våra mänskliga relationer kommer fram i romanens skildring när denna syn sätts i ett motsatt perspektiv: livet reducerat till något biologisk och mekaniskt, och som sådant blir omänskligt. Frankenstein ville bli skapare av mänskligt liv och drevs av högst själviska motiv, utan att tänka på ansvaret. Avsaknaden av "faderliga" omsorger och kärlek fick så den tragiska följen att Frankensteins skapelse gavs ett omänskligt liv, ett liv som till slut förmörkades av hat och hämndbegär för det som berövats honom. För Shelley var livet alltså inte främst ett biologiskt fenomen. Frankenstein möter sin skapelse som förebrår honom: Du, min skapare, avskyr mig; vilket hopp kan jag inhämta från dina medmänniskor, vilka inte är skyldiga mig någonting? De avvisar och hatar mig. De ödsliga bergen och de dystra glaciärerna är min tillflyktsort. Jag har vandrat här många dagar; isgrottorna, som endast jag inte fruktar, är min bostad, den enda som människan inte har några invändningar emot. (Min översättning.) På så sätt, genom filmens genomslagskraft och den ursprungliga romanens idag undanskymda budskap, har Frankenstein blivit till en symbol för biologin som ingenjörskonst, det som brukar karaktärisera definitionen av den så kallade syntetiska biologin, och skapat myten om vetenskapsmannen som någon som leker Gud i sitt laboratorium (Figur 4). För det var inte denna typ av vetenskap som 213 var "gudomlig" i Shelleys ögon, utan snarare den som monstret upptäcker när han studerar den mänskliga kommunikationen: Gradvis gjorde jag en upptäckt av något ännu mer betydelsefullt. Jag fann att dessa personer hade en metod att kommunicera sina erfarenheter och känslor till varandra genom att artikulera ljud. Jag uppfattade att orden de talade ibland gav upphov till glädje eller smärta, leenden eller sorgsamhet, i de lyssnandes sinnen och ansikten. Detta var verkligen en gudomlig vetenskap, som jag ivrigt ville lära känna bättre. (Min översättning.) Mot bakgrund av detta är det kanske inte förhastat att tro att Mary Shelly själv snarare sympatiserade med Frankensteins monster som sökte närhet och gemenskap med andra, än med Frankenstein som blir till romanens verkliga monster. Och även här ges språket en central roll. Varelsens fascination över detta kommunikationsmedel endast människan förunnat, och som vi genom tiderna ständigt försökt hitta en vetenskaplig förklaring till, allt från Psammetichus I:s grymma försök till dagens högteknologiska experiment. Figur 4: Poster/filmaffisch. 214 Frankenstein som metafor? Frankenstein-figuren har alltså inte upphört att fascinera. Men den ursprungliga betydelse som Mary Shelley ville ge sin karaktär har tunnats ut till förmån för den moderna synen på den besatte vetenskapsmannen (och hans monster), så till den grad att den återkommit i en relativt oförändrad form sedan den första populärkulturella teateruppsättningen till den senaste filmatiseringen. Kan vi härmed tala om Frankenstein som metafor? Det är inte självklart hur vi kan argumentera för det. För i vilken bemärkelse kan Frankenstein, som en fiktiv karaktär i en roman och i ett antal filmer, stå som en metafor för det arbete som utförs av forskare som arbetar i laboratorier där man utför experiment inom syntetisk biologi? Den sociokulturella kopplingen är inte alltför svår att se. Trots att antagligen få människor idag faktiskt har läst romanen har de förmodligen kommit i kontakt med några av de filmversioner som har producerats sedan början av 1900-talet, antingen genom att titta på några av dem själva eller genom att prata med någon som har sett dem, eller genom att läsa recensionerna. Om vi antar detta, så kan grunden för förhållandet mellan den fiktiva karaktären och metaforen upprättas, även om kopplingen till Frankenstein är lite flytande (den är öppen för oändliga tolkningar och kan inte tala för sig själv), inklusive den mellan skapare och monster. Men hur kan man föra resonemanget längre och säga att Frankenstein är en metafor? Enligt Charles Sanders Peirces teckenteori hör metaforen till klassen av ikoniska tecken, som består av: bilder, diagram och metaforer, alla baserade på likhet med det föremål som den står för men i olika aspekter (kvaliteter). I vilken bemärkelse kan Frankenstein-karaktären vara ett tecken på en kvalitet som betecknar "människan som skapare av liv" inom syntetisk biologi? Det kan knappast vara på något materialistiskt sätt, eftersom karaktären själv inte har några speciella materiella egenskaper som kan delas med biologer eller genetiker som arbetar inom syntetisk biologi, eftersom det förmodligen inte finns några materiella egenskaper som specifikt förbinder biologer (förutom de vi delar med alla människor). Då måste svaret vara att om det finns några egenskaper som delas mellan Frankenstein-karaktären och de biologer som arbetar med syntetisk biologi så måste likheten ligga någon annanstans. Den som uppfattar metaforen finner sannolikt metaforens likhetsrelation (ikonicitet) i känslan som väcks: användningen av metaforen synliggör likheten med det "objekt" den står för, samtidigt som metaforen laddar detta objekt med mening. I detta fall är det känslan av mänskligt (individuellt) förkastligt handlande som förbinder den samtida användningen av Frankenstein-metaforen, i kontexten av den framväxande syntetiska biologin, med vad Mary Shelley ursprungligen ville – och lyckades – förmedla av kritik till sin samtida publik. Det finns alltså vissa likheter i vår tolkning av metaforen, som beror på att delar av metaforens betydelse stått fast genom tiderna. Men idag signalerar metaforen något mer eftersom det även finns delar av den som vidareutvecklats, och samtidigt verkar den även ha blivit mer konventionell. Att den blivit mer konventionell (mera "mainstream") har kanske till och med 215 grumlat vår allmänna förståelse för komplexiteten i utmaningarna som den nutida syntetiska biologin står inför, och vad den är? Detta eftersom metaforen gradvis blivit till en godtycklig symbol och som sådan, paradoxalt nog, blivit mer exakt (och "fryst", eller "låst") i jämförelse med att vara en metafor som är mera öppen och tvetydig till sin karaktär, såsom en känsla kan vara. Frankenstein tycks förvisso ha förblivit en symbol för den besatte vetenskapsmannen, men i denna har känslan av "förkastligt beteende" som fanns tydligare uttryckt i den ursprungliga metaforen försvagats i den nutida användningen. Detta har att göra med att idag har de aspekter som berör Varelsens mänsklighet och sökande efter närhet och kontakt med sin avvisande skapare och sina medmänniskor försvunnit, medan Frankensteins omänsklighet och oansvariga kallsinnighet skärpts men inte i relation till det skapade. Shelleys ursprungliga perspektiv på vad ett mänskligt liv är var alltså mycket mer komplext än det som ryms inom dagens Frankenstein-metafor som stelnat till en konventionell symbolisk stereotyp som används inom populärkulturen, men även som referens i vetenskapliga böcker och texter som på lite olika sätt beskriver och förklarar den syntetiska biologin. I den kanske mest kända filmiska tolkningen från 1931 (Whale) ges metaforen ytterligare en dimension, som inte fanns med lika tydligt (om än alls) i Shelleys roman, nämligen Frankenstein som "leker Gud", en kraftfull laddning som bitit sig fast i dagens Frankensteinmetafor. Och kanske har det att göra med att metaforen begränsats, och idag nästan uteslutande används med referens till vetenskapliga laboratorieexperiment och den syntetiska biologin? Diskussionen i kapitlet har syftat till att belysa den frågan, genom historiska återblickar på ett modernt fenomen. Lästips Artiklar och böcker: Broberg, Anders; Granqvist, Pehr; Ivarson, Tord; Risholm Mothander, Pia (2006) Anknytningsteori. Betydelsen av nära känslomässiga relationer Bokförlaget Natur & Kultur Coulton, George Gordon (1906) St. Francis to Dante David Nutt https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/source/salimbene1.html Mazzarella, Merete (2014) Själens nattsida. Om Mary Shelley och hennes Frankenstein Atlantis 216 Nilsson, M. (2013) Frankensteins elektriska monster. Makabra experiment födde världens mest kända skräckfigur Allt om vetenskap http://www.alltomvetenskap.se/nyheter/frankensteins-elektriska-monster Shelley, Wollstonecraft Mary (1831) Frankenstein, or the modern Prometheus Lackington, Hughues, Harding., Mavor, & Jones http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/42324 Wennerberg, Tor (2010) Vi är våra relationer. Om anknytning, trauma och dissociation. Bokförlaget Natur & Kultur Filmer: Whale, James (1931) Frankenstein McGuigan, Paul (2015) Victor Frankenstein 217 Skapat liv och livets värde Erik Persson Om människan någon gång kommer att få förmågan att skapa nya livsformer, hur kommer det att påverka livets värde? Detta är en fråga som kan vara en källa till oro när man diskuterar konstgjort liv, men är oron befogad? I ett försök att svara på den frågan kommer jag att gå igenom några möjliga skäl till varför förmågan att skapa konstgjort liv skulle hota livets värde, och se om de verkligen ger oss skäl att oroa oss. nnan vi börjar diskussionen, låt mig först förklara lite mer vad jag menar, och vad jag inte menar, när jag talar om livets värde. Vad innebär det att liv har värde? Som jag tänker mig det så handlar det om våra attityder till liv. De allra flesta människor tycks ha en generellt positiv attityd till liv. Det hindar förstås inte att man har en negativ eller neutral attityd till visa individuella liv. Man kanske är av uppfattningen att ett visst liv, eller till och med en viss slags liv, till exempel ett liv i ständig smärta och utan hopp om lindring, är ett negativt liv som man helst skulle vilja avsluta. De flesta av oss är väl också av den uppfattningen att det är fullt acceptabelt att göra slut på miljontals bakteriers liv med hjälp av antibiotika, eller för den delen, varje gång vi tvättar händerna (se även Melins kapitel). Inget av dessa fall hindrar dock att man rent generellt tycker att liv är något bra. Det kan yttra sig i allt från att man är glad att livet uppstod till att man ägnar sitt eget liv åt att skydda andras liv. Kanske innebär det också en nyfikenhet på hur livet uppstod, hur det fungerar och om det finns liv utanför vår planet. I vissa fall innebär det till och med att man förespråkar spridning av liv från jorden till planeter som inte har något liv. Om liv är något gott, varför inte se till att det finns på så många ställen som möjligt i universum? I lite mer filosofiskt språkbruk kan man säga att liv har värde om man, allt annat lika, tycker att liv är något bra. Hur det värdet sedan står sig i förhållande till andra värden beror på hur värdefullt man menar att livet är, och hur höga de konkurrerande värdena är, men det kommer jag inte att gå in på här. Jag kommer inte heller att tala om en viss individs liv och jag kommer inte att begränsa mig till någon särskild livsform, till exempel människor eller däggdjur. Det värde jag tänker på här är något mer grundläggande. Det handlar inte om värdet av specifika levande individer, utan om värdet av livet i sig. Alltså ett värde som är oberoende av vilken levande varelse vi pratar om, liksom av vilka andra egenskaper det levande har. När jag talar om livets värde så talar jag alltså inte om I 218 ditt, din katts eller dina krukväxters värde som individer, utan om det faktum att ni är levande. Jag kommer inte heller att tala om liv kontra död, utan om liv kontra icke-liv, alltså om värdet av att vara levande i kontrast till saker som stenar, bord och annat icke-levande. Att skapa liv i den mening jag diskuterar här innefattar inte heller den ständigt pågående tillkomsten av nya individer. Istället handlar det om att på något sätt kopiera livets uppkomst. En annan sak som också är viktig att påpeka, är att när jag talar om livets värde, eller värde generellt, så menar jag inte moralisk status. Moralisk status är något man har i kraft av att man har intressen som andra behöver ta hänsyn till när de agerar. För att kunna ha det behöver man ha ett medvetande (se Melins kapitel för exempel på andra sätt att se på moralisk status). Man behöver vara ett subjekt som kan uppleva saker som händer positivt eller negativt. Man kan, enkelt uttryckt, säga att moralisk status inte innebär att du har värde men att en förutsättning för moralisk status är att saker har värde för dig. Om en varelse inte har subjektiva upplevelser som kan klassificeras som positiva eller negativa för den varelsen i åtminstone en rudimentär bemärkelse så är det väldigt svårt att förstå vad det ens skulle betyda att denna varelse har intressen och ännu svårare att se vad det skulle innebära att ta hänsyn till denna varelse. Om varelsen å andra sidan har sådana upplevelser så är det på motsvarande sätt svårt att motivera varför dess upplevelser av vad som är bra eller dåligt skulle vara mindre viktiga än dina. Det är det som är själva grundidén bakom det här sättet att se på etik. Värde är annorlunda. En antik vas kan ha ett väldigt högt värde helt oberoende av om den själv upplever något. Om vasen ramlar i golvet och går i småbitar så innebär det en förlust av värde även om det inte gör ont på vasen och även om vasen inte känner sig kränkt eller ledsen och inte får uppleva de beundrande blickarna från framtida gäster. Vasen har därför ingen moralisk status men den har värde. Om vi har någon moralisk plikt att inte krossa vasen eller till och med att skydda vasen från att bli krossad av andra, så är det alltså inte en plikt gentemot vasen utan gentemot dem för vilka vasen har värde, kanske dess ägare eller kanske alla som besöker muséet där den är utställd, eller kanske hela mänskligheten om vasen till exempel är en del av vårt mänskliga kulturarv. Jag tänker inte gå in mer i detalj än så här på vad för slags värde vi pratar om när vi pratar om livets värde. Det finns massvis med filosofiska texter som behandlar den frågan. Jag kommer, som jag nämnde ovan, inte heller att försöka uppskatta hur högt livets värde är, varken i absoluta termer eller i förhållande till andra saker. Jag lämnar det helt upp till läsaren. Kanske du är av uppfattningen att livet i sig inte har något värde alls. Kanske är du av uppfattningen att liv är något som är oerhört värdefullt och måste skyddas och bevaras till varje pris, eller, kanske mest troligt, så befinner du dig någonstans däremellan. Oavsett var man befinner sig på 219 den skalan så kan man emellertid alltid ställa frågan om värdet kommer att förminskas den dag vi människor lär oss tillverka liv på egen hand. Det gäller faktiskt även om man anser att livet har noll värde. Inget värde alls är ju ändå bättre än ett negativt värde. En svårighet när vi talar om livets värde är att det inte finns någon allmänt accepterad definition av liv. Det är naturligtvis en utmaning i sig att tala om värdet av något som man inte är helt överens om vad det är. Det finns dock också ett annat mer specifikt problem här. Man kan nämligen ifrågasätta att det verkligen skulle finnas en specifik egenskap eller en specifik uppsättning egenskaper som delas av allt levande. Om det istället är så att livet bäst definieras av en uppsättning egenskaper som alla associeras med liv men där varje enskild egenskap inte nödvändigtvis måste delas av allt levande (som hävdas i Abbotts och Perssons kapitel), då kanske man måste göra motsvarande med livets värde. Det vill säga, det kanske är olika egenskaper som ger värde åt olika levande varelser. Jag kommer inte att gå närmare in på den frågan här då det skulle leda för långt från huvudfrågan, men det kan vara bra att ha i åtanke att de egenskaper jag kommer att diskutera kan vara egenskaper som ger värde åt livet även om de inte delas av alla levande varelser. De egenskaper jag kommer att titta närmare på är originalitet, livets uppkomst, den mystik som omgärdar livet och dess uppkomst, det till synes självklara faktum att liv är ett naturligt fenomen, samt det faktum att liv är något som tenderar att finna sin egen väg, det vill säga dess autonomi. Dessa egenskaper har alla det gemensamt är att de associeras med liv, att de associeras med värde, och att de kan tänkas vara hotade av att vi tillägnar oss förmågan att skapa liv. Dessutom kommer jag att kort diskutera mångfald som exempel på en egenskap som associeras starkt med liv och som också kan tänkas vara en värdeskapare, men som inte hotas av en mänsklig förmåga att skapa liv utan som kanske till och med kan förstärkas om det leder till tillkomsten av fler och mer olika livsformer. Jag kommer dock inte att gräva så djupt i denna fråga då den ligger lite utanför ämnet för kapitlet. Livets originalitet Ett vanligt skäl att tillmäta till exempel konstverk ett extra högt värde är att det i någon mening är originellt. Vi tenderar att värdera konstverk högre om de är originella. Om något är påtagligt annorlunda än allt annat så blir det också mer intressant. Ett konstverk som skiljer sig radikalt från alla andra konstverk, eller till och med från alla andra föremål i världen, skapar intresse och höjer konstverkets värde, ofta oberoende av om det betraktas som vackert eller ej. Konstverk som är mindre originella betraktas som mindre värdefulla och saker som är massproducerade har, ur detta perspektiv, ett mycket lägre värde även när de är lika vackra som en originalmålning. Det handlar inte bara om ekonomiskt "värde" (pris). De 220 mest värdefulla konstverken betraktas som "ovärderliga" ur ekonomiskt perspektiv, inte därför att de inte skulle gå att sälja (det finns samlare som är beredda att betala fantasisummor för konstverk som de aldrig kommer att våga visa upp eller erkänna att de har), utan för att deras estetiska, kulturella, historiska eller andra värden vida överstiger deras potentiella marknadsvärde. Om någon till exempel skulle vilja köpa ett unikt konstverk, säg Mona Lisa (Figur 1), med syftet att förstöra det så misstänker jag att det skulle leda till oerhört upprörda känslor oavsett hur mycket pengar köparen är beredd att betala för "nöjet". Hur påverkar detta frågan om livets värde? Betyder det att om vi lär oss att tillverka liv och på så sätt får flera upplagor av liv, så skulle det förringa värdet av Figur 1: Leonardo da Vincis Mona Lisa. Exempel på originalitet inom konsten. 221 det befintliga livet eftersom det skulle göra att livet som vi känner det inte längre kommer att vara en unik företeelse? Det vi måste fråga oss här är om livet verkligen är originellt på samma sätt som ett konstverk, och i så fall, om det verkligen är därifrån livet får sitt speciella värde. Alla levande varelser skiljer sig ju från alla andra levande varelser på något sätt, men det räcker knappast. Det gäller ju för allt och kan knappast vara ett skäl att tilldela något extra högt värde. (Vad skulle "extra högt värde" betyda om allt har det?) Dessutom är ju många levande varelser trots allt rätt lika. Det är därför vi kan dela in livet i arter, släkten och så vidare. Det är ju till och med så att allt liv vi känner till på jorden idag är släkt, visserligen på avstånd, men ändå. Vi härstammar alla från en gemensam förfader, vad vetenskapen kallar Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA) (mer om detta finns att läsa i P. Perssons kapitel). Det betyder visserligen att var och en av oss inte är så originell som vi kanske vill tro, men det gäller ju i förhållande till andra levande varelser. I förhållande till sådant som inte är levande kanske man ändå kan hävda att vi är rätt originella. Kom ihåg att det inte är värdet av enskilda levande varelser vi diskuterar här, utan värdet av livet som sådant. Exakt hur mycket livet som vi känner det idag skiljer sig från icke-liv är en fråga som i hög utsträckning beror på hur man skall definiera "liv". Det är (som vi kunde se i Abbotts och Perssons kapitel) en uppgift som inte är så enkel som man kan tro, vilket gör att det kan vara vanskligt att basera livets värde på hur och hur mycket vi skiljer oss från det icke-levande. Det faktum att allt liv på jorden härstammar från samma "ur-förfader" (eller "ur-population"), vilket alltså betyder att vi kanske inte skiljer oss så mycket från varandra, betyder ju å andra sidan att vi levande varelser (så länge vi håller på jorden) tillsammans skiljer oss på ett tydligt sätt från allt som är icke-levande, nämligen genom vi har ett gemensamt ursprung. Kan man använda det för att hävda livets originalitet? Om det är så att livet på jorden faktiskt bara har uppkommit en gång så kan man ju med fog säga att livet verkligen är originellt. Svaret på frågan om huruvida livet på jorden bara har uppkommit en gång är dock att vi inte vet. Det kan vara så, men det kan också vara så att det har uppkommit flera gånger men att det bara en av gångerna har lyckats, i den meningen att livet lyckades överleva och sprida sig över planeten. Dessutom vet vi ju ännu inte om det finns liv utanför vår planet (se Dravins respektive Dunérs kapitel för mer om hur man söker efter utomjordiskt liv). Om det skulle vara så att liv bara har uppkommit en gång i universums historia så kan man ju verkligen säga att det är originellt, till och med unikt, på samma sätt som ett unikt konstverk, som Mona Lisa till exempel. Om det istället är så att liv har uppkommit på jorden flera gånger, så tycks det dock ändå vara så att "vårt" liv är unikt i den meningen att det är det enda nu existerande livet på jorden. Det är då inte unikt i universell mening men det är fortfarande väldigt originellt, tillräckligt för att tillmätas ett väldigt högt värde. Det betyder att livet som existerar på jorden idag inte är unikt på samma sätt som Mona Lisa i den meningen att det 222 bara har uppkommit en gång, utan mer som ett arkeologiskt fynd av något föremål som det en gång fanns flera exemplar av men som det nu bara finns ett enda bevarat exemplar av. Även i det fallet verkar det dock befogat att tillmäta det ett ganska högt värde baserat på dess originalitet trots att det då inte är helt unikt i ett bredare perspektiv. Om det istället är så att liv visserligen kanske bara har uppkommit en gång på jorden, men även har uppkommit på flera platser i universum, kanske på miljoner eller miljarder andra planeter (Figur 2), vad innebär det för livets originalitet? Man skulle kunna resonera som så att de fysikaliska och kemiska förutsättningarna på olika planeter är rätt olika, så om det finns liv på andra planeter är det förmodligen ganska annorlunda jämfört med livet på vår planet. Om vi jämför med konstverk igen, så finns det ju en mängd ovärderliga konstverk på jorden idag, men så länge vi talar om konstverk som skiljer sig tillräckligt mycket från varandra (man kan förstås diskutera vad som är tillräckligt) så tycks det inte vara något problem att se vart och ett av dem som originellt. De är alla konstverk men de är fortfarande tillräckligt olika sinsemellan för att tillmätas ett särskilt värde. Kanske kan man säga detsamma om livet på olika himlakroppar? Om universum skulle vara fullt av liv, men livet på varje planet är tillräckligt annorlunda än livet på vår planet, kan Figur 2: Om det finns liv på andra planeter, hur påverkar det livets originalitet? (foto: NASA) 223 vi kanske fortfarande säga att livet på jorden är tillräckligt originellt för att det skall förtjäna ett extremt högt värde. Beror då livets värde på dess originalitet? Den frågan är inte helt enkel att svara på. Vi känner ju faktiskt bara till ett fall av liv och har aldrig upplevt en situation där vi haft att göra med flera upplagor av liv (i betydelsen liv med olika ursprung). Kanske kan vi jämföra med hur vi ser på individer av sällsynta arter? Det är naturligtvis en helt annan fråga än den som vi diskuterar här, det vill säga hur vi ser på en situation där allt liv har samma ursprung jämfört med en situation med liv som har olika ursprung, men låt oss i alla fall börja där för att ha något att utgå ifrån. De flesta av oss tycker nog att det är mer spännande när vi upptäcker en individ från en sällsynt art än när vi ser en individ från en mycket vanlig art. Om man någon gång skulle få se det sista exemplaret av en art skulle det förmodligen vara en oerhört speciell upplevelse. Den som besökte Galapagos medan "Lonely George", det sista exemplaret av arten Chelonoidis abingdonii, fortfarande levde, hade till exempel chansen att uppleva detta. Figur 3a,b: Är en kungsörn mer värdefull än en skata? (foto: 3a: Adamantios, 3b: Luis García) Så långt verkar det alltså som att även när det gäller levande varelser så spelar sällsynthet en roll för dess värde. Jag är dock inte helt övertygad om att hur vi värderar upplevelsen av att träffa på en individ från en sällsynt art enkelt kan översättas till hur vi värderar arten. Vi kan värdera upplevelsen av att se en kungsörn högre än upplevelsen av att se en skata, men det är inte exakt samma sak som att värdera till exempel arten kungsörn (Aquila chrysaetos) högre än arten skata (Pica pica). Om vi värderar arten kungsörn högre än arten skata kan det kanske bättre förklaras av andra faktorer än egenskapen att vara sällsynt. Det kan till exempel handla om örnens majestätiska karaktär, dess livsstil, dess roll i ekosystemet, eller dess roll i mytologin (Figur 3). Det kan till och med handla om påstådda egenskaper som inte längre är vetenskapligt giltiga men som ändå har format vår bild 224 av arten. Alla dessa saker påverkar säkert hur vi uppskattar arten. Ett annat faktum som talar för att andra saker är viktigare än sällsyntheten är att de flesta människor som inte är experter värderar till exempel kungsörnar högre än kornsparvar (Emberiza calandra) trots att kornsparven som art är mer sällsynt än kungsörn (åtminstone i Sverige). Å andra sidan reser entusiaster gärna långa sträckor för att beskåda ett exemplar av en sällsynt art även om den inte är särskilt uppseendeväckande på andra sätt, men det är kanske ett specialfall och något som säger mer om vad det innebär att vara entusiast? En riktig entusiast är intresserad av andra saker än den breda allmänheten. Dessutom talar vi ju här åter om värdet av upplevelsen att se ett exemplar av arten, vilket alltså inte nödvändigtvis var detsamma som värdet av arten. En indikation på att vi kanske ändå värderar sällsynta arter högre är att vi anstränger oss mer för att rädda sällsynta arter än vanliga arter, men det kan lätt förklaras i termer av behov, inte hos arten utan hos oss som värderar den. Om vi värderar två arter lika högt och den ena är mer sällsynt än den andra, så behöver vi anstränga oss mer för att den sällsynta skall finnas kvar. Det finns alltså alternativa förklaringar till uppmärksamheten vi ger sällsynta arter och det finns alternativa förklaringar till att vi värderar kungsörn högre än skata, men det måste ju inte betyda att inte sällsyntheten trots allt spelar en roll. Det kan fortfarande vara så att sällsynthet har betydelse för hur vi värderar arter, även om det inte är det som har störst betydelse. Det är dock inte säkert att vi kan överföra den slutsatsen till frågan om livets värde. När vi säger att en art är sällsynt, menar vi inte att det finns få arter, utan att det finns få exemplar av den arten. Vi kan inte mena samma sak när vi pratar om livet som sällsynt. Det finns en oerhörd mängd levande varelser. Det finns till och med en oerhörd mängd olika sorters levande varelser. Livet är oerhört mångfacetterat, bland det mest mångfacetterade man kan tänka sig. I själva verket kan man misstänka att detta nog är en viktigare förklaring än originalitet till att vi värdesätter livet så mycket. Är det då rimligt att förvänta sig att detta förändras om vi skapar mer liv på ett konstgjort sätt? Jag skulle inte tro det. Ett tillskott av livsformer i form av syntetiskt liv skulle ju inte göra livet mindre mångfacetterat. Om de nya livsformerna kommer att "räknas" och på så sätt tillföra värde till livet genom att öka dess mångfald är svårt att säga, men det är åtminstone svårt att tro att det skulle minska värdet. Låt oss emellertid återvända till frågan om originalitet. Vi har så här långt kommit fram till att originalitet inte nödvändigtvis är den bästa förklaringen till att vi tillmäter livet ett särskilt värde, men att det trots allt inte är osannolikt att det spelar en viss roll i sammanhanget. Även om vi också tycks ha andra, och till och med starkare skäl att värdera arter än att de är sällsynta så kan vi inte helt utesluta sällsyntheten ur resonemanget. Dessutom är ju sällsynta arter något annat än livet som sådant. Att en del av livets värde är baserat på dess mångfald hindrar ju inte heller att en del av värdet också är baserat på dess originalitet. Vi har ju till exempel konstaterat att originalitet tycks spela en stor roll inom konsten, och även om 225 förmågan att skapa konstgjort liv inte förminskar den del av livets värde som är baserad på till exempel dess mångfald, så kanske livets värde ändå minskar även om bara en del av dess värde är baserat på originalitet. Vi har också kommit fram till att livet som vi känner det på jorden idag förmodligen inte är unikt, det kan ju ha uppkommit liv vid fler tillfällen på jorden och mycket talar för att det kan finnas liv även utanför vår planet. Ändå tycks det vara åtminstone hyfsat originellt i betydelsen att det är det enda liv som existerar på jorden idag och i betydelsen att även om det finns annat liv i universum så är det förmodligen väldigt annorlunda än vårt, samt att även om det har uppkommit liv vid fler tillfällen på jorden så tycks inte detta liv längre finnas kvar. Vad betyder detta för frågan om hur livets värde kommer att påverkas om vi människor lär oss tillverka liv? För att besvara den frågan behöver vi börja med att klargöra vilket liv vi pratar om, det konstgjorda livet, det ursprungliga "naturliga" livet, eller båda? Vi kan åter jämföra med hur det ser ut inom konsten. Vi konstaterade tidigare att ett massproducerat verk inte alls har samma värde som ett verk som det bara finns ett exemplar av, till exempel Mona Lisa. Å andra sidan finns det ju faktiskt hur många bilder som helst av Mona Lisa (Figur 4). Man kan till och med köpa vykort med Mona Lisa på i museishopen på Louvren. Det finns alltså rent faktiskt en otalig mängd Mona Lisa-kopior. Vad betyder det för värdet av Mona Lisa? För att ge ett vettigt svar på den frågan måste vi alltså fråga oss vad det är vi syftar på. Är det Leonardos originalmålning, är det kopiorna, eller är det båda? Om vi börjar med kopiorna så är det lätt att konstatera att de inte tycks tillmätas något större värde. De kan köpas ganska billigt och om ett vykort med Mona Lisamotiv förkommer så är det inget som bekymrar oss särskilt mycket. Detta ligger Figur 4: Hur påverkar alla de otaliga masstillverkade kopior som finns av Mona Lisa värdet av da Vincis originalmålning? 226 helt i linje med vårt tidigare konstaterande att massproducerade verk inte tillmäts ett tillnärmelsevis lika stort värde som något det bara finns en av. Vad betyder då existensen av alla dessa Mona Lisa-kopior för värdet av originalmålningen? Svaret tycks vara: Ingenting. Oavsett hur många kopior vi gör av Mona Lisa, så tycks inte detta på något sätt förringa originalets originalitet och därmed tillhörande värde. Det ligger i själva begreppet "original" att originalet alltid är originalet oavsett hur många kopior som tillverkas. Det faktum att kopian är en kopia gör dess värde mindre, men det förringar inte värdet av originalet. Kanske kan vi säga samma sak om livet? Det skulle betyda att om vi lyckas göra flera instanser av liv på jorden med oss som skapare så skulle dessa kopior ha ett lägre värde, åtminstone ur det här speciella perspektivet (men som vi har sett tycks ju inte originalitet vara det enda som ger livet värde), medan originalet inte påverkas alls, det är ju fortfarande originalet. Om det verkligen fungerar att göra en sådan här jämförelse mellan livet och konsten är svårt svara på, vilket delvis säkert beror på att det är så svårt att sätta fingret på vad det är som är så speciellt med liv till att börja med. Till en del beror det förmodligen också på att vi idag inte har någon kopia av livet och därför inte kan veta säkert hur våra värderingar kommer att ändras när en sådan väl dyker upp, men det skulle förstås vara bra att ha en antydan till svar innan vi börjar göra kopior. När de väl finns är det ju för sent att ändra sig. Resonemanget om originalitet och jämförelsen med konst tycks inte ge någon stark indikation på att det existerande livets värde skulle minska av att vi lär oss att kopiera det, men kanske kan det vara ett problem om det leder till att det nya, konstgjorda livet tillmäts ett lägre värde än originalet. Å andra sidan vet vi inte hur avgörande bristen på originalitet kommer att vara. Det finns ju som sagt också andra värden som kanske är viktigare? Vi såg till exempel ovan att mångfald tycks vara något som ger livet värde. Frågan om huruvida det nya livet kan sägas tillföra mångfald till originallivet och därmed faktiskt öka dess värde är inte helt lätt att svara på. Däremot kan vi säkert säga att det skapade livet till en början kommer att innehålla mycket lägre mångfald än originallivet vilket skulle förstärka bilden av en klasskillnad mellan de två. Detta torde ju hur som helst vara lätt att komma till rätta med genom att tillåta eller till och med uppmuntra skapandet av många olika konstgjorda livsformer. Om detta är tillrådligt ur andra perspektiv är förstås en annan fråga. Livets uppkomst En annan anledning till att vi värdesätter en del konstverk mer än andra är att det har krävts en hel del skicklighet för att åstadkomma dem. Detta är för övrigt något som inte bara är sant för konst. Vi tenderar att värdera saker i allmänhet högre om de är svåra att uppnå och vi tenderar att värdera saker högre om färre människor kan utföra dem. Så här långt har ingen människa lyckats skapa liv, och det beror inte på att man inte har försökt. Om en av anledningarna till att vi värderar livet 227 så högt är att det är väldigt svårt att kopiera, hur kommer då livets värde att påverkas när vi lär oss att kopiera liv? Livet som finns på jorden idag, "liv 1.0", skiljer sig förstås från konstverk genom att det inte har tillkommit på samma sätt som konstverk, och framför allt genom att det inte finns någon konstnär som ligger bakom tillkomsten. (Jag utgår här från att det inte finns någon gudomlig skapare bakom livets tillkomst, men även om man tror att livet som vi känner det har en skapare så finns det i alla fall ingen mänsklig konstnär bakom tillkomsten av liv.) Går då livets uppkomst att jämföra med tillkomsten av ett konstverk även om det inte finns någon skapare av livet som vi känner det idag? Det är naturligtvis svårt att tala om skicklighet när det inte finns någon skapare, men vår uppgift är Figur 5: Den italienske fysikern Enrico Fermi var den förste att klyva atomen. Idag klyvs atomer hela tiden i kärnkraftverk och laboratoriet jorden runt, men att vara den förste som gör något utan någon annan att lära från är en extraordinär bedrift oavsett hur många som sedan lyckas göra om bedriften. (Foto: United States Department of Energy) 228 ju inte att identifiera någon skicklig konstnär bakom liv 1.0 som vi kan hedra, utan att reda ut vad som ger livet dess värde och om det förminskas av att människan tillskansar sig förmågan att skapa nytt liv. Om vi återvänder till Mona Lisa så kan man säga att vi har anledning att beundra både verket och konstnären. När det gäller liv 1.0 har vi ingen konstnär, men kan sättet på vilket det har tillkommit ändå ge oss skäl att beundra "verket", det vill säga livet? Vi vet ännu inte exakt hur livet har uppkommit, så hur kan vi då säga att omständigheterna för dess tillkomst ger oss anledning att tillmäta det ett speciellt värde? Ett svar på den frågan kan vara att just det faktum att vi ännu inte har klurat ut hur det gick till tyder på att det inte är gjort i en handvändning. Att tillskansa sig "tekniken" att skapa liv är något som det krävs oerhört mycket jobb och förmodligen en rejäl dos genialitet för. Ingen har ju gjort det hittills. Det gör att analogin med konstverk fortfarande kan hålla. Visserligen skiljer sig konstverket från liv 1.0 i att det förra har en konstnär medan det senare inte har någon, men livet har fortfarande det gemensamt med de mest värdefulla konstverken att de är saker som inte vem som helst kan skapa. Kanske är det där fokus skall ligga snarare än på frågan om originalet är skapat eller inte? Om vi kommer på hur man kan skapa liv och faktiskt lär oss att göra det, kommer det då att förminska livets värde? Om åtminstone en del av livets värde är baserat på att det är oerhört svårt att skapa, så talar ju det för att så skulle vara fallet. Även här kan det vara på sin plats skilja mellan hur det kommer att påverka det skapade livets värde och hur det kommer att påverka värdet av det existerande livet. Oavsett hur många kopior det finns så är originalet fortfarande originalet. På samma sätt gäller att oavsett hur många som kopierar något så är det alltid en större prestation att vara den första som gör någonting. Om någon lyckas kopiera ett konstverk så handlar det fortfarande bara om kopiering. Att åstadkomma en bra kopia kan vara mycket svårt och kräva en färdighet som få lyckas förvärva fullt ut, men det kan inte jämföras med den skicklighet och kreativitet som krävs för att vara den första att komma på någonting. Samma sak gäller för uppfinningar och vetenskapliga upptäckter. Uppfinnaren eller upptäckaren hedras mycket mer än de som gör kopior av uppfinningen eller upprepar experimentet eller observationerna bakom upptäckten, och det med rätta (Figur 5). Att göra någonting för första gången, från början, utan någon att kopiera eller lära av är en extraordinär prestation. Det betyder alltså att tillkomsten av konstgjort liv inte kommer att påverka det nuvarande livets värde men att det skulle kunna innebära att det konstgjorda livet tillmäts ett lägre värde. Å andra sidan kan man också hävda att med tanke på hur svårt det är att kopiera livet så måste ju också kopierandet betraktas som en oerhörd bedrift som kräver mycket kunskap och stor skicklighet. Om en sak som aldrig kan kopieras är värdig stor respekt, förtjänar en sak som tar mer än 4 miljarder år att kopiera, nästan lika mycket respekt. Det borde i sin tur betyda att även om värdet av det 229 konstgjorda livet är lägre än originalets så är det fortfarande mycket högt. Personen eller forskargruppen bakom den första instansen av konstgjort liv kommer att ha gjort en fantastisk vetenskaplig prestation. Det kommer naturligtvis att vara en prestation som bygger på en intensiv studie av livet som redan existerar. I jämförelse med det existerande livet kommer det därför att förbli en kopia, men i jämförelse med andra mänskliga prestationer kommer det första skapandet av konstgjort liv ändå att vara en av de mer imponerande prestationerna i vetenskapshistorien. Kanske kommer tekniken att skapa liv så småningom att bli allmänt tillgänglig och kanske kommer det efter några år inte att krävas särskilt mycket skicklighet att skapa liv, men även när så är fallet så kommer livet fortfarande att vara ett av de naturfenomen som det har tagit människan längst tid att kopiera, vilket borde göra det bara marginellt mindre värdefullt i detta avseende jämfört med någonting som aldrig kopierats, och mycket mer värdefullt än allt annat som har kopierats, inklusive alla världens konstverk. Livets mystik Det har ibland hävdats att en av de saker som gör livet speciellt är att vi inte riktigt förstår det. I så fall skulle själva kunskapen som krävs för att skapa konstgjort liv utgöra ett problem även om den aldrig används för att skapa liv. Kunskapen i sig skulle ta bort något av mystiken kring livet och det skulle vara detta som förringar dess värde. I likhet med vad vi har sett tidigare så skulle det finnas en viss skillnad mellan liv 1.0 och liv 2.0, alltså mellan det liv som finns på jorden idag och det konstgjorda livet. Skillnaden ligger i det här fallet i att även om vi lyckas komma på hur man kan skapa liv så måste inte det betyda att vi därmed också har ett svar på frågan om hur livet uppstod på jorden. Det skulle strängt taget bara betyda att vi har kommit på ett sätt på vilket liv kan uppkomma. Vi kan fortfarande inte veta säkert om originalet uppstod på samma sätt. Det skulle ju kunna tänkas att det finns fler sätt på vilka liv kan uppkomma. Det är med största sannolikhet också så att det som krävs för att skapa liv i ett laboratorium på jorden idag är något annat än vad som krävdes för att liv skulle uppstå spontant för cirka 4 miljarder år sedan då jorden och dess atmosfär såg helt annorlunda ut. Förmågan att skapa liv skulle utan tvekan hjälpa oss att skingra en del av mystiken kring hur liv 1.0 uppstod men det skulle inte ta bort den helt på samma sätt som skulle vara fallet för liv 2.0 vars uppkomst skulle bli beskriven in i minsta detalj av dess skapare. Det betyder att om mystiken är viktig för livets värde så befinner vi oss återigen i den situationen att vi behöver göra skillnad mellan originallivets värde och det konstgjorda livets värde. Mystiken kring originallivet och dess uppkomst skulle skingras till viss del men mycket av den skulle fortfarande finnas kvar. För det konstgjorda livet skulle åtminstone mystiken kring dess uppkomst vara helt frånvarande. Värdet av liv 1.0 230 skulle därför påverkas men i lägre grad än värdet för det konstgjorda liv som uppkommer tack vara vår kunskap om hur man skapar liv (Figur 6). Är då mystiken kring livets uppkomst viktig för dess värde? Vi kan återigen jämföra med konsten. En del av fascinationen över Mona Lisa ligger utan tvivel i dess mystik. Å andra sidan finns det många andra berömda verk vars tillkomst är väl känd utan att det tycks ha påverkat deras värde. Kanske är trollkonster ett bättre exempel. Här har vi en hel konstform där mystiken kring utförandet utgör själva kärnan. Å andra sidan, om vi bevittnar ett fantastiskt och till synes obegripligt trolleritrick och vi efter mycket funderande faktiskt lyckas lista ut hur det gick till, vad betyder det för vår fascination? Jag kan inte låta bli att misstänka att det faktiskt skulle leda till att vi minns den där kvällen på teatern med ännu större tillfredsställelse än om vi aldrig lyckas lista ut hur tricket genomfördes. Däremot skulle vi säkert bli besvikna om någon talade om det för oss och därmed berövade oss chansen att lista ut det själv. I det fallet tycks det dock inte vara det att de berövar oss mystiken i sig som är problemet utan att de berövar oss chansen att utmana vår egen förmåga. Icke desto mindre tycks mystiken i sig spela en stor roll i vår uppskattning av trolleritricket. Figur 6: Att skapa liv i laboratoriet kan ge oss en fingervisning om vas som krävs för att liv skall uppstå men det kommer inte nödvändigtvis att en gång för alla tala om hur och var det uppstod på jorden. Ett förslag på var livet först uppstod som fått nytt vetenskapligt stöd är att livet uppkom i heta vulkaniska källor på land, som här i Grand Prismatic Spring of Yellowstone National Park. (Foto: Jim Peaco, National Park Service) 231 Å andra sidan finns det också många fall där det är uppenbart att mer kunskap om en företeelse snarare leder till att vi värderar den högre. De som arbetar med naturvård påpekar ofta att ett av de bästa sätten att förmå folk att vara mer rädda om naturen är att informera, inte bara om naturens sårbarhet utan om naturen generellt. Det finns flera undersökningar som pekar på att information om vilka arter som finns i ett område och om dessa arters biologi, beteende, historia i området och så vidare, leder till att besökare allmänt sett värderar naturen i området högre jämfört med vad som är fallet för andra likvärdiga områden. Mystikens roll som värdeskapare är alltså inte helt entydig. Dels verkar den fungera på olika sätt för olika fenomen. Dels verkar det som att även om mystiken kan göra att vi värderar något högre så kan ökad kunskap, i synnerhet om det handlar om kunskap som förklarar något vi har funderat över hårt och länge, också leda till att vi värderar det högre. Dessutom tycks det skilja sig från person till person. Min personliga erfarenhet är att ju mer jag förstår av ett fenomen, desto mer spännande blir det. Det är naturligtvis en personlig reflektion och det hindrar inte att det kan det vara så för andra att "av-mystificering" faktiskt är ett problem. Det faktum att det är något personligt kommer å andra sidan också att göra det till mindre av ett problem. Om någon känner att förståelsen som krävs för att skapa liv kommer att förringa deras värdering av livet, så kommer de förmodligen inte att vara villiga att investera den tid och ansträngning som det utan tvekan kommer att krävas för att uppnå denna typ av kunskap om livet. Kanske kommer man till och med att aktivt undvika att utsätta sig för sådan kunskap. När vi fascineras av ett trolleritrick så är vi ju (åtminstone de flesta av oss) fullt medvetna om att det är ett trick och att trollkonstnären själv naturligtvis är väl förtrogen men hur tricket egentligen går till. I det fallet tycks det alltså räcka med att vi själv inte vet hur tricket utförs för att vi skall uppleva mystiken. Det betyder att så länge det är frivilligt att lära sig om livet till den grad som krävs för att återskapa det (vilket borde vida överstiga vad som till exempel kan krävas för ett godkänt avgångsbetyg i gymnasiet), och så länge det är den personliga känslan av mysterium som det handlar om så blir det lätt att välja bort denna kunskap för den som så önskar och fortsätta att förundras över livets mysterier. Det blir en annan sak om ens värdering av livet förminskas av vetskapen att någon vet tillräckligt om livet för att återskapa det. Det här är utan tvekan en möjlig position men det verkar ganska extremt och det skulle vara ännu mer extremt att kräva att andra slutar undersöka ett ämne av det skälet. Det är viktigt att komma ihåg att det finns andra värden än ökad kunskap och det är något vetenskapen måste ta hänsyn till, men att sluta undersöka något för att det finns de för vilka det upplevs som negativt att någon (även om det inte är de själv) vet hur det fungerar, vore att gå alldeles för långt. Det gäller väl särskilt med tanke på att många andra (inte bara jag) faktiskt kommer att påverkas i motsatt riktning, det vill säga, kommer att se livet som ännu mer spännande och fantastiskt tack vare denna typ av kunskap. 232 Slutsatsen måste bli att det är svårt att se att risken för av-mystifiering skulle kunna vara ett starkt argument för att avstå från att skaffa den kunskap som krävs för att skapa konstgjort liv. Figur 7a,b: Är en varg mer naturlig än en tamhund och har vargen i så fall högre värde än tamhunden? Livets naturlighet En annan möjlig anledning till att utvecklandet av en förmåga att skapa konstgjort liv kan minska livets värde skulle kunna vara att det då blir onaturligt. Det är en vanlig tanke att det som är naturligt har högre värde än det som är onaturligt (se även Melins kapitel). Liv i dess ursprungliga form får betraktas som typexemplet på naturlighet. Liv som har modifierats och därmed i någon mening har blivit mindre naturligt betraktas däremot redan idag med skepsis i många fall (Figur 7). Om livets naturlighet är något som bidrar till dess värde, så kanske tillkomsten av konstgjort liv kommer att förringa livet värde. Uttrycket "onaturligt" är precis som dess motsats "naturligt", notoriskt svårt att definiera. Det är särskilt svårt att definiera dem på ett sätt som är rimligt informativt och normativt samtidigt. Det vill säga, det är svårt att definiera dem på ett sådant sätt att det preciserar vad som är naturligt respektive onaturligt och varför, samtidigt som det förklarar varför det ena skulle vara mer värdefullt än det andra. I litteraturen finns hundratals definitioner av "naturlig" respektive "onaturlig" och det är omöjligt att gå igenom alla här. Ett kriterium på onaturlighet som finns med i många definitioner och som skulle vara relevant i vårt fall är att om något är människoskapat så är det onaturligt. Det måste inte innebära att människan som sådan är onaturlig. Det verkar som att mångas intuitioner om gränsen mellan naturlig och onaturlig går just vid vad människan gör, inte vid människan som sådan. I många fall verkar det också vara en gradfråga snarare än "antingen-eller". Man tänker sig alltså att saker kan vara mer eller mindre naturliga. Om man resonerar på det sättet skulle till exempel en hundras som har tillkommit genom avel vara mindre naturlig än en varg men mer naturlig än en som har tillkommit genom 233 genetisk modifiering. Avel innebär att vi griper in i naturen genom att välja ut de hundar för avel som bäst stämmer överens med våra ideal. Vi tar alltså över rollen som "det naturliga urvalet", vilket leder till att vi dels skyndar på evolutionen och dels leder den i en viss, för oss önskvärd riktning. Genetisk modifiering innebär att vi tar ytterligare ett steg genom att också (åtminstone delvis) ta över rollen att skapa de genetiska förändringar som urvalet baseras på. Att skapa liv helt från grunden skulle enligt det här resonemanget vara att ta ytterligare ett långt steg från det naturliga, och förmodligen nå så långt man kan komma ifråga om onaturlighet när det gäller just liv. Det är dock långt ifrån självklart att det är meningsfullt att göra den här typen av åtskillnad. Dels är det oklart varför en högre grad av mänsklig påverkan på en process gör den mindre naturlig om vi samtidigt accepterar att människan är en del av naturen. Dels är det oklart hur frågan om naturlighet påverkar värdefrågan. Om naturlighet bara är ett sätt att ange hur lite människan har varit involverad, hur går vi därifrån till att säga att mer naturligt är bättre än mindre naturligt? I många fall har förvisso mänsklig påverkan lett till problem i naturen, men samtidigt är det svårt att förneka att många mänskliga uppfinningar inom till exempel medicin och teknologi faktiskt har varit väldigt användbara och gjort våra liv bättre. Dessutom får man inte glömma de uppfinningar som vi tillmäter ett värde i sig, såsom konst och litteratur. Det tycks alltså som att det åtminstone finns en del uppenbara undantag från antagandet om att mänsklig påverkan måste vara något negativt. Därmed kan det också vara svårt att upprätthålla en allmän princip som säger att ju mer mänsklig påverkan, desto lägre värde. Att gå vägen via termen "naturlighet" tycks inte ändra på detta. Det kan till och med uppfattas som ett sätt att försöka skymma ett tvivelaktigt samband genom att använda en luddig terminologi. Om vi nu ändå accepterar, dels att graden av mänsklig påverkan är vad som avgör hur naturligt något är och dels att mindre naturlighet också gör det mindre värdefullt – två antaganden som alltså är mycket kontroversiella – så återstår frågan vad detta betyder för livets värde om och när vi lär oss att skapa konstgjort liv. Återigen måste vi skilja mellan det konstgjorda livet (liv 2.0) och originalet (liv 1.0). Om vi accepterar resonemanget ovan som säger att mer mänsklig inblandning innebär mindre naturlighet och därmed lägre värde, så blir det uppenbart att konstgjort liv blir mindre naturligt och därmed mindre värdefullt än det liv vi känner idag som uppstod långt, långt innan människans inträde på scenen. Därmed ser vi återigen den skillnad vi har talat om tidigare, det vill säga att det konstgjorda livet påverkas mer (i det här fallet mycket mer) än det ursprungliga, vilket i sin tur leder till en bekymmersam skillnad i värde mellan dem. Man kan till och med misstänka att det konstgjorda livet kommer att fungera som kontrast mot vilket det ursprungliga livet kommer att te sig än mer naturligt, vilket skulle kunna göra skillnaden ännu större, åtminstone i våra medvetanden. 234 Vi bör emellertid också se det i ett längre perspektiv. Vad händer efter några generationer när det nya livet inte är så nytt längre och de organismer som skapades av oss har förökat sig och givit upphov till nytt liv? Är allt liv som kommer från den/de ursprungliga konstgjorda organismerna onaturligt för evigt, eller kommer de organismer som härstammar från de första konstgjorda organismerna att så småningom börja betraktas som naturliga? Sammanfattningsvis kan man säga att om man baserar värde på grad av naturlighet så pekar det i samma riktning som de flesta av de egenskaper vi har diskuterat ovan, det vill säga att även om vi tillskansar oss förmågan att tillverka liv så kommer det inte nämnvärt att påverka värdet av det existerande livet men däremot kommer det att skapa en klyfta mellan det nya och det gamla livet som kan vara en källa till oro. Dock måste vi också konstatera att naturlighet tycks vara en högst tveksam egenskap att basera livets värde på. Livets autonomi Den sista möjligheten jag kommer att diskutera för varför förmågan att skapa konstgjort liv skulle kunna försämra livets värde är att om vi skaffar oss förmågan att skapa liv så innebär det att vi skaffar oss en makt som tidigare bara naturen själv har haft. Man talar ibland om att vi "leker Gud" (se mer om detta i Melins kapitel). I litteraturen finns det gott om varnande exempel – alltifrån Frankenstein till Jurassic park – som visar hur fel det kan gå om människan skaffar sig en sådan makt. I dessa fall tycks det dock handla om andra problem än att livets värde som sådant skulle vara i fara. I fallet Frankenstein (se till exempel Cebak Rédeis kapitel där hon diskuterar just Frankenstein) tycks det handla om att skaparen inte är en vidare föredömlig "förälder" till livet han skapade och i fallet Jurassic Park tycks det handla om att John Hammond och hans bioingenjörer överskattar sin förmåga att kontrollera det liv man har skapat. Båda dessa verk kan ge god anledning till att tänka efter både en och två gånger innan vi ger oss till att skapa (eller som i Jurassic Park, återskapa) liv, men de tycks inte direkt ha att göra med livets värde som sådant. En generell svårighet med argumentet att vi tar över makten att skapa liv från naturen är att det är lite oklart hur det skall tolkas. Om vi med "naturen" menar livet som sådant så har den ju aldrig haft förmågan att skapa liv i den mening vi pratar om här. Liv har förmågan att skapa mer liv, men det kommer den ju att ha även fortsättningsvis och det kommer även att gälla det konstgjorda livet. Livet har emellertid aldrig haft förmågan att skapa liv från början så att säga (livet fanns ju inte när livet först uppstod). I själva verket skulle man kunna vända på argumentet och säga att när människan väl skaffar sig förmågan att skapa liv så innebär det faktiskt att liv för första gången på vår jord kan skapa nytt liv (inte bara mer av detsamma). Om man vill kan man uttrycka det så att människan blir livets sätt 235 att skaffa sig makten att skapa liv. Vi ökar alltså därmed livets makt över sig själv snarare än att minska den. Man kan emellertid också se det ur ett jämlikhetsperspektiv. Vi "ger" livet en förmåga som inget liv tidigare har haft, men det är en förmåga som bara en livsform har – människan (och dessutom bara vissa människor). Det förstärker därmed det redan existerande maktförhållandet i naturen där vår art har en närmast ofattbar makt över allt annat liv. Hur stor skillnad det gör i praktiken är svårt att spekulera om. Faktum är ju att vi redan i stor utsträckning har makten att påverka livsförhållandena för i stort sett allt liv på jorden. I värsta fall kanske det nya livet kommer att utgöra ett hot mot det existerande livet. I bästa fall kanske de kunskaper vi får genom våra försök att skapa konstgjort liv leder till att vi också blir bättre på att ta hand om existerande liv. Att leda forskningen och utvecklingen åt rätt håll är därför en oerhört viktig utmaning, men det tycks återigen inte handla om livets värde som sådant utan snarare om hur vi på bästa sätt tar hand om livet givet att det faktiskt har ett högt värde. Det finns dock en annan aspekt av detta som kan ge anledning till oro. Vissa tror att det nya livet kommer att ses som maskiner eller varor och att detta kommer att smitta av sig på vår attityd till existerande liv. Detta är en inställning till liv som verkligen kan ge anledning till oro. Tanken är att genom att vi tillägnar oss förmågan att producera liv när och hur vi vill, så kommer vi att betrakta alla levande organismer som produkter bland andra produkter. Detta är ett sätt att ta kontroll över livet som skulle vara klart negativt. Man kan här invända att levande varelser i stor utsträckning redan betraktas som råvaror på detta sätt. Det sätt som icke-mänskliga djur betraktas och behandlas i samhället som helhet, som råvaror, underhållning och annat, är ett av vår arts allra största och mest stötande moraliska fiaskon. Den verkliga frågan här är dock om detta kommer att förvärras med tillkomsten av det artificiella livet. Vi kan inte förneka att det finns en risk för det. Vi har å andra sidan också sett att samhällets normer i allmänhet rör sig långsamt mot att vara mer inkluderande. Fler och fler grupper har kommit att inkluderas i den moraliska gemenskapen och det gäller också, åtminstone till en del, icke-mänskliga djur. Vi vet inte om den här trenden fortsätter och vi kan inte säkert veta hur det kommer att påverkas om vi lyckas skapa konstgjort liv. Som Cabak Rédei berättar i sitt kapitel om Frankenstein och hans "monster" så verkar det dock som att den allra viktigaste frågan är hur vi behandlar det liv vi skapar, inte att det skapas i sig. Det tycks gälla även när det handlar om icke-mänskligt liv. 236 Slutord De vanligaste argumenten för att livets värde riskerar att undermineras om och när vi skaffar oss förmågan att skapa konstgjort liv tar sig uttryck i en serie egenskaper som dels är starkt förknippade med liv, dels är starkt förknippade med värde, och dels riskerar att påverkas av att vi människor lär oss att skapa liv. De egenskaper som vi har diskuterat här är originalitet, egenskapen att vara svårskapad, mystik, naturlighet, samt autonomi. Det visade sig att om vi accepterar både att de här nämnda egenskaperna faktiskt är en viktig grund för livets värde, och att de kommer att påverkas genom vår förmåga att skapa liv, så tycks ändå inte det ursprungliga livets värde vara i fara. Däremot kan det vara så att det konstgjorda livets värde kommer att bli avsevärt lägre, vilket i sin tur kan leda till en oroväckande skillnad i värde mellan olika slags liv. Å andra sidan kom vi också fram till att det verkar tveksamt om de diskuterade egenskaperna verkligen är så avgörande för livets värde, och i många fall också om en kommande mänsklig förmåga att skapa liv verkligen kommer att ha den stora negativa påverkan på dessa egenskaper som hävdas. Vi måste också komma ihåg att vi här i stort sett bara har diskuterat egenskaper som har valts ut just därför att de kan komma att påverkas negativt. Det finns också många andra skäl att tilldela liv ett högt värde, skäl som inte alls kommer att påverkas av att vi skaffar oss förmågan att skapa liv. Detta sagt så återstår naturligtvis en hel rad andra frågor att reda ut och ta ställning till vad gäller konstgjort liv innan man sätter igång att skapa. När det gäller konstgjort liv gäller ju samma sak som för alla andra forskningsfält. Det räcker inte att fråga "kan vi göra det". Man måste också ställa frågan "bör vi göra det?". Lästips Bedau, Mark; Parke, Emily C. (red.) (2009) The Ethics of Protocells. MIT Press Crichton, Michael (1991) Jurassic Park Ballantine Books Dunér, David (red.) (2013) Extrema världar – Om sökandet efter liv i rymden Pufendorfinstitutet 237 Kaebnick, Gregory E. & Murray, Thomas H. (2013) Synthetic Biology and Morality: Artificial Life and the Bounds of Nature. MIT Press Shelley, Mary (2017) Frankenstein – eller den moderne Prometeus. Novapress 238 239 Bildkällor https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SciAm_Wavy_Text_Divider.svg https://www.pexels.com/photo/chair-furniture-furniture-pieces-sit-279690/ https://pixabay.com/en/chair-butterfly-chair-sit-chairs-1355327/ http://maxpixel.freegreatpicture.com/Png-Chair-Furniture-Pieces-FurnitureAntique-1904883 http://www.freestockphotos.biz/stockphoto/9530 https://www.flickr.com/photos/ergonomic_office/3604453020 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rockingchair.JPG https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ZigzagChair.png https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Zika-chain-colored.png https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Mycoplasma_pneumoniae#/media/File:1995dkdj,x.jpg https://www.pexels.com/photo/silver-tabby-cat-lying-on-brown-wooden-surface-126407/ http://zookasbooks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/La_pluralite_des_Mondes_habites_Camille_Flammarion_zookasbooks_3.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46113620 https://research-development.hetnieuweinstituut.nl/sites/default/files/styles/pages_slider/public/mars_atlas_by_giovanni_schiaparelli_1888.jpg?itok=ZVE0JS-7 https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Percival_Lowell_observing_Venus_from_the_Lowell_Observatory_in_1914.jpg http://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/567262.html http://hubblesite.org/image/1102/gallery/56-hubble-telescope http://www.sen.com/news/esa-mars-express-reull-vallis-where-a-river-onceflowed.html http://www.planet.geo.fu-berlin.de/eng/projects/mars/hrsc582-UpperReullVallis.php http://www.planet.geo.fu-berlin.de/eng/projects/mars/hrsc582-UpperReullVallis.php https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA01127 http://seagerexoplanets.mit.edu/research.htm https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1225a/ https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/Adult_tardigrade.jpg 240 http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=34074&picture=happy-dog NASA JPL, Golden Record: https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/golden-record NASA, Pioneer Mission: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/pioneer/index.html https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Repliee_Q2.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Turing-statue-Bletchley_14.jpg https://www.flickr.com/photos/maxbraun/1525101748 https://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/6818431732 https://www.flickr.com/photos/jiuguangw/4981810943/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_robot#/media/File:FCS-MULE-ARV2007.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Soldiers#/media/File:120705N-DW912-025_(7588779676).jpg https://pixabay.com/sv/pussel-dna-forskning-genetiska-2500333/ https://pixabay.com/sv/koli-bakterier-escherichia-coli-123081/ https://pixabay.com/sv/skapelsen-av-m%C3%A4nniskan-god-finger-1159966/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mona_Lisa.jpg https://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/planet20110518.html https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Aquila-chrysaetos-golden-eagle0b.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Magpie_in_Madrid_(Spain)_08.jpg http://maxpixel.freegreatpicture.com/Leonardo-Da-Vinci-Portrait-MonalisaPeople-Antique-726797 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Enrico_Fermi_194349_(cropped).jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life#/media/File:Grand_prismatic_spring.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eurasian_wolf.JPG 241 Medverkande författare Jessica Abbott är lektor i evolutionär genetik på biologiska institutionen, Lunds universitet. Hennes forskning handlar framförallt om utvecklingen av könsskillnader och könskromosomer. Hon är även aktiv inom olika former av populärvetenskap. Christian Balkenius är professor i kognitionsvetenskap vid Lunds universitet. Hans forskning kretsar kring inlärning, kognitiv utveckling och uppmärksamhet och använder datormodeller av den mänskliga hjärnan för att styra humanoidrobotar. Målet är att förstå hur barns kognitiva förmågor utvecklas i samverkan med omgivningen. Anna Cabak Rédei, docent i kognitiv semiotik vid Lunds universitet. Hon forskar om film, litteratur, (1700och 1800-tal) hällristningar och psykologi. Klára Anna Čápová är doktor i antropologi vid Durham University i Storbritannien. Hon arbetar inom området Science and Technology studies (samhällsvetenskapliga studier av vetenskap och teknologi). Hon studerar särskilt samhälleliga aspekter av astrobiologi. Hennes senaste arbete inkluderar studiet av transformationer av människans förhållande till yttre rymden och populära uppfattningar om vetenskap samt rymdforskningens samhälleliga kontext med särskilt fokus på vetenskapligt sökande efter liv bortom vår planet och populära föreställningar om utomjordiskt liv. Doktor Çapova var även gästforskare i projektet "A Plurality of Lives" som ligger bakom den här boken. Dainis Dravins, professor i astronomi vid Lunds universitet. Forskar om hur solen och stjärnor ser ut på sina ytor och arbetar med att utveckla nya observationsmetoder för astronomiska precisionsmätningar. Dessa syftar till att direkt kunna upplösa detaljer på stjärnytor och även att hitta små planeter vilka liknar jorden och som kretsar kring solliknande stjärnor. Webbplats: http://www.astro.lu.se/~dainis/ David Dunér är professor i idéoch lärdomshistoria vid institutionen för kulturvetenskaper, Lunds universitet. Han har också varit verksam som forskare i kognitiv semiotik vid Lunds universitet samt har under ett antal år forskat om 242 astrobiologins historia och filosofi bland annat inom ett europeiskt forskningsprojekt om livets ursprung och utveckling på jorden och i universum. Åren 2010– 2011 ledde han ett forskningstema vid Pufendorfinstitutet om astrobiologi. Markus Gunneflo är vikarierande universitetslektor på Juridiska fakulteten, Lunds universitet. Hans forskning rör folkrättens teori och historia. Maria Hedlund är universitetslektor vid statsvetenskapliga institutionen vid Lunds universitet. Hennes forskningsintressen är expertinflytande i demokratin, särskilt i relation till ny teknik, och hon har tidigare bland annat skrivit om experters roll i politiska beslutsprocesser om genteknik och epigenetik. Mats Johansson är filosof och docent i medicinsk etik. Hans doktorsavhandling behandlade filosofiska aspekter på empatisk förståelse. Efter disputationen har hans forskningsfokus främst legat på etiska frågor inom medicin, medicinteknik och forskning. Anders Melin är docent i etik vid Malmö högskola. Han har framför allt arbetat med miljöetiska problemställningar, exempelvis frågor om biologisk mångfald och etik. Melin har också studerat miljöetiken inom nutida kristendom och buddhism samt frågor om energipolitik och rättvisa. Erik Persson är doktor i praktisk filosofi och forskare i tillämpad etik vid Lunds universitet och Center of Theological Inquiry i Princeton. Hans forskning rör framför allt aktuella frågor inom områdena miljö, biologi, rymdforskning och ny teknik. Petter Persson är universitetslektor i teoretisk kemi vid Lunds universitet. Han är utbildad naturvetare från Cambridge University i England, doktorerade vid Uppsala universitet på en avhandling om kvantfotoelektrokemi, och har bedrivit postdoktoral forskning vid California Institute of Technology (CALTECH). Hans forskning handlar huvudsakligen om att förstå och utveckla nya molekylära solenergitillämpningar med hjälp av avancerade materialberäkningar. Han intresserar sig sedan flera år tillbaka också för centrala frågor inom astrokemi och molekylär astrobiologi, som livets molekylära ursprung och de kemiska förutsättningarna för att hitta liv i universum. LIV U tom jordiskt Syntetisk A rtificiellt Jessica A bbott & Erik Persson (red.) LIV Utomjordiskt Syntet iskt Art i f ic ie l l t Jessica Abbott & Erik Persson (red.) Pufendorfinstitutet/Pufendorf Institute for Advanced Studies Liv är ett centralt begrepp inom många forskningsområden, exempelvis inom biologi, astrobiologi, kemi och medicin, såväl som inom juridik, teologi och filosofi. Liv är också ett centralt tema i konsten. Det behandlas och begrundas i åtskilliga konstverk, i dikt, roman och film. Hur vi skall förstå, värdera och skydda livet, är oerhört fundamentala frågor. I framtiden kommer dessa frågor att bli än svårare och om möjligt ännu viktigare. Forskargrupper från hela världen arbetar idag med att skapa liv i laboratoriet, leta efter liv i rymden och förse maskiner med egenskaper som tidigare bara har varit förunnade levande varelser, och utvecklingen går fort. Det är viktigt att vi samtidigt funderar över de utmaningar som detta innebär. Det kommer att ta tid att hitta sätt att leva i en värld där liv finns i former vi idag knappt kan föreställa oss och där gränsen mellan levande varelser och maskiner blir alltmer suddig. De beslut vi fattar idag kommer också att påverka utvecklingen inom samhälle, forskning och utveckling under lång tid framöver. Den här boken är ett resultat av ett tvärvetenskapligt projekt vid Pufendorfinstitutet, Lunds universitet. Tolv forskare från lika många discipliner har ingått i projektet. Syftet har varit att belysa utmaningar som följer med utomjordiskt, artificiellt och syntetiskt liv. Det tvärvetenskapliga angreppssättet har gett oss möjlighet att belysa frågorna från alla upptänkliga vinklar, men också att hitta helt nya kombinationer av metoder och synsätt. Med tanke på livets mångsidighet och stora betydelse ur så många olika perspektiv, har detta grepp varit helt nödvändigt. Vår förhoppning är att boken skall inspirera till nya tankar och diskussioner om liv. Boken vänder sig både till de som redan är intresserade och de som ännu inte har börjat fundera kring de utmaningar som utomjordiskt, artificiellt och syntetiskt liv innebär.

DEBATE Open Access Conceptual and terminological confusion around personalised medicine: a coping strategy Giovanni De Grandis* and Vidar Halgunset Abstract Background: The idea of personalised medicine (PM) has gathered momentum recently, attracting funding and generating hopes as well as scepticism. As PM gives rise to differing interpretations, there have been several attempts to clarify the concept. In an influential paper published in this journal, Schleidgen and colleagues have proposed a precise and narrow definition of PM on the basis of a systematic literature review. Given that their conclusion is at odds with those of other recent attempts to understand PM, we consider whether their systematic review gives them an edge over competing interpretations. Discussion: We have found some methodological weaknesses and questionable assumptions in Schleidgen and colleagues' attempt to provide a more specific definition of PM. Our perplexities concern the lack of criteria for assessing the epistemic strength of the definitions that they consider, as well as the logical principles used to extract a more precise definition, the narrowness of the pool from which they have drawn their empirical data, and finally their overlooking the fact that definitions depend on the context of use. We are also worried that their ethical assumption that only patients' interests are legitimate is too simplistic and drives all other stakeholders' interests-including those that are justifiable-underground, thus compromising any hope of a transparent and fair negotiation among a plurality of actors and interests. Conclusion: As an alternative to the shortcomings of attempting a semantic disciplining of the concept we propose a pragmatic approach. Rather than considering PM to be a scientific concept in need of precise demarcation, we look at it as an open and negotiable concept used in a variety of contexts including at the level of orienting research goals and policy objectives. We believe that since PM is still more an ideal than an achieved reality, a plurality of visions is to be expected and we need to pay attention to the people, reasons and interests behind these alternative conceptions. In other words, the logic and politics of PM cannot be disentangled and disagreements need to be tackled addressing the normative and strategic conflicts behind them. Keywords: Personalised medicine, Definition, Conceptual confusion, Research policy, Healthcare policy, The politics of naming, Systematic literature review, Methodology, Medical ethics, Contextual meaning Background Since the Human Genome Project the prospect of using genomics (as well as other 'omics) to make medicine more precisely targeted to the particular biology of individuals and their diseases has fuelled hopes, ambitious initiatives and mobilised considerable funding.1 While several different labels have been used-like precision medicine and P4 medicine-one has proved especially popular and successful: Personalised Medicine (henceforth PM). As many have pointed out [1–9], doctors have always practiced with the aspiration to respond to individual variability and to tailor care and treatment to the specific needs of each patient. Nevertheless the popularity of the concept in biomedical sciences, health policy, science policy and in public discourse is a recent phenomenon that has been largely stimulated by advances in genomics and molecular biology [10–13].2 As a concept that concerns a broad range of stakeholders-scientists * Correspondence: [email protected] Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, NTNU Dragvoll, 7491 Trondheim, Norway © 2016 The Author(s). Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 DOI 10.1186/s12910-016-0122-4 and policymakers, healthcare workers, the pharmaceutical and diagnostics industries, IT network providers and users, health insurances and taxpayers, not to mention patients themselves-it is subject to a variety of different uses and interpretations [14, 15]. With this kind of variety typically comes the Babel worry: are people speaking the same language and understanding each other? This worry has generated a number of attempts to analyse the meaning of PM, either with the aim of facilitating better communication and understanding or in the attempt to promote or criticise particular uses [9, 12, 13, 16–20]. So far the most influential analysis has been the paper by Sebastian Schleidgen and colleagues [12] who have attempted to accurately specify the nature and boundaries of PM.3 They pursue this goal through a systematic literature review (henceforth SLR), aiming to extract from this a more precise definition of PM. No doubt their attempt addresses a genuine need for some guidance through a debate that is not easy to approach. The sheer number of publications, as their literature survey attests, is daunting; the field is still young and rapidly evolving; but most importantly there is lack of consistency in the use of terminology and concepts. As noted above, PM has also been named precision medicine, stratified medicine, genomic medicine, personalised molecular medicine, individualised medicine, P4 medicine, personalised healthcare-and this is not even an exhaustive list. The scope of the concept is equally variable, and sometimes explicitly disputed: some use it to refer only to the new possibilities offered by molecular biology to improve diagnosis and therapy on the basis of individual biological differences, some use it much more comprehensively to envision a new paradigm of healthcare. Against this confusing backdrop Schleidgen and colleagues' effort has considerable appeal, insofar as a systematic literature review promises a solid evidence base for clarifying the issue. Their study moreover claims to have important practical implications: according to the authors their definition provides "an adequate basis for public discourse on PM" ([12]: p. 2) thus facilitating legislators in drafting regulatory mechanisms and making policy decisions, preventing the public from developing misplaced hopes and fears, and last but not least preventing stakeholders from pursuing their own interests above patients' needs. Another important achievement that they claim for their work is to have established the proper scope of the concept: "PM can only be understood as an add-on to standard medical care" ([12]: p. 10) and "is not medicine with a special focus on the interests and preferences of the individual patient. ... Hence PM as such is not related to the term patient-centred medicine" ([12]: p. 11). The definition at the basis of these claims is the following: PM seeks to improve stratification and timing of health care by utilizing biological information and biomarkers on the level of molecular disease pathways, genetics, proteomics as well as metabolomics ([12]: p. 10). Their emphasis is thus fully on the side of the development of new scientific and technological means that will merely enrich the toolkit of medicine.4 This contrasts with a trend within the PM literature towards a broader understanding of PM, namely an understanding that while centred on the advances of molecular biology, includes within its remit its clinical translation, implementation, integration within the healthcare system and its funding [1, 3, 21–27]. Similarly, their resolute disconnection between PM and patient-centred care does not go unchallenged in the literature. Some authors have put forward plausible reasons for integrating PM and (some features of) patient-centred care [9, 28–35]. Others have questioned the use of the label "personalised medicine" only for biologically personalised medicine, arguing that the concept needs to have a broader and nonreductionist understanding of "the person"-along the lines advocated by patient-centred care [8, 19, 34, 36–39]. In light of these opposing views, we think that Schleidgen and colleagues' bold and ambitious attempt to provide such a strict definition deserves close scrutiny. Is their case robustly grounded and has their method really given them an edge over other writers arguing for opposite conclusions? We conclude that it has not. Our analysis indicates that disagreements and conflicts around the scope and meaning of PM cannot be solved by producing a better definition: for there is more than logic and semantic at stake. Hence we urge to map and understand the theoretical and practical (i.e. ethical, economic, political, professional) reasons and roots of disagreements. In this way, if we are lucky, we may promote mutual understanding and reasonable accommodations, and if the goings get though we may expose some of the cunning of power and vested interests. Discussion Outline of the argument Since our argument is rather long and structured in several steps, readers may find it helpful to have the plan of the discussion clearly laid out at the outset. We begin by questioning Schleidgen and colleagues' use of a SLR in the "methodological critique" section, which is articulated in three stages. We first question the epistemic robustness of definitions and the lack of selection criteria that pay attention to how definitions are produced and which purpose they serve. Then we examine the process De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 2 of 12 of extracting a more precise definition and argue that the logical principles used to filter out noise are not normatively neutral and beg some questions. We further argue that Schleidgen and colleagues' evidence base is too narrow, for they have confined their review to only one type of literature to the effect that their results are partial towards the point of view of one group of stakeholders. The conclusion of this long initial section is that Schleidgen and colleagues' use of a SLR has some rhetorical force, but actually does not provide robust and compelling grounds for a normative definition. In the next section, "philosophical critique", we contend that they have misplaced hopes in the power of definitions-because having a solution accepted in the real world is not simply a matter of offering philosophical arguments-and a mistaken belief that concepts can be defined without paying proper attention to the context of use and the purposes of users. In the following section we make a more general point and call attention to the distinction between two related but different disputes about PM: namely the question of the extension of the concept (and drawing the boundaries with neighbouring ones) and the question of what is the most appropriate name for what we refer to as PM. These are not merely "logical" questions: they are ethical and political as well since they affect the roles and responsibilities of different stakeholders and hence their power and leeway. Our argument culminates in the "values and pluralism" section, where in an almost Hegelian spirit we attempt to show that once we appreciate the reasons why "PM" is such a messy concept and why people wrestle around it and put forward competing visions, then we may make sense of the apparent confusion, see the rationale behind it and the costs of getting rid of it. Any attempt at disciplining the use of a contested concept is unlikely to be neutral in its implications or acceptable to all stakeholders. Because of their attempt to pin down and restrict the concept, Schleidgen and colleagues fail to give all voices a fair hearing and unwittingly favour those of some stakeholders. In the attempt to stay clear of stakeholders' interests for the sake of neutrality they have made themselves blind to the normative and non-neutral implications of their own analysis. We agree that philosophers should aim to lessen confusion-though not by ignoring complexity or prematurely adjudicating between contenders-but by making this complexity and the alternative perspectives that constitute it more intelligible.5 Therefore, we propose to see PM as a work in progress and the label for a cluster of visions for the future of healthcare (cf. [14, 18, 40]). One of its key functions today is to bring together stakeholders and in order to do that it has to remain open to different and sometimes conflicting interpretations [16, 41]. This openness itself, though not without its dangers, is valuable in that it may help to prevent that the preferences and aims of only a subset of stakeholders shape the language and the agenda giving them a hegemonic position. Once we acknowledge the contestedness of PM, decisions that adjudicate between conflicting interests have to be justified through fully engaging in normative debates. The clarity and fairness of such normative work can be greatly enhanced by a preliminary philosophical mapping of the values and interests that motivate different actors. Methodological critique We believe that the high impact of Schleidgen and colleagues' paper is largely due to their having based their conclusions on a systematic literature review, a method that over the last three decades has achieved a very high status. As is well known, together with randomised controlled trials (RCTs) and meta-analyses, SLRs are the primary tools of Evidence Based Medicine and of Evidence Based Policy, two prominent trends in the medical and policy domains respectively. The importance of SLR is well exemplified by the key role they play in the work of the Cochrane Collaboration and of the Campbell Collaboration: the two most authoritative and emblematic institutions in supporting evidence-based medicine and evidence-based social policy and in disseminating their results [42, 43]. SLRs have earned their reputation as powerful tools for providing reliable evidence and solid empirical grounding, especially when performed on literature reporting the results of RCTs. These latter provide the solid experimental evidence while SLRs conveniently synthesise their results. The robustness of their results depends on the quality of the studies reviewed: SLRs are subject to the principle garbage in, garbage out. This is why SLRs often need to mediate and make trade-offs between two desiderata: synthesising all the evidence available vs. synthesising the best evidence available [44, 45]. The former avoids introducing any bias, the latter avoids relying on poor quality evidence. When the latter option is chosen the criteria of exclusion become very important and have to respect widely acknowledged principles of methodological robustness. Epistemic robustness It is important to keep in mind why and under which conditions SLRs deliver robust results. This is achieved when the set of reviewed studies includes either a large number of methodologically sound small RCTs or a smaller number of methodologically sound large RCTs.6 We will call reviews that meet these criteria epistemically robust SLRs. To what extent does the review conducted by Schleidgen and colleagues meets the conditions that secure the robustness of its results? SLRs typically analyse reports of experimental results or other empirical inquiries. In dealing with their sources assessing and weighing their strength is paramount. This is De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 3 of 12 done along two dimensions. Reviewed studies are assessed on the breadth of their evidence base and the robustness of their method. The larger the evidence base and the more robust the method, the more weight is accorded to a study. A small observational study cannot count as much as a large RCT. Schleidgen and colleagues do not analyse reports of experimental results, but academic papers featuring a definition of PM. This makes their SLR atypical. What is more questionable, they do not apply any selection or classification criteria to their material. They simply aggregate PM definitions as if they were all arrived at through rational procedures as reliable as an RCT. Our objection is that, just as different empirical studies must be assessed differently and ranked in order of epistemic merits, so too must definitions be approached with sensitivity to how they were arrived at. We should be equally sensitive to the fact that the purpose a definition serves is likely to vary. The following list of examples is not meant as an exhaustive taxonomy, it simply shows that even in the academic debate definitions constitute a heterogeneous category of variable quality and epistemic strength.7 Sometimes PM definitions are used by authors to specify their own use of the term in a given paper (e.g. [46, 47]). Assuming that the authors manage to use it consistently, a definition of this kind is robust; however its "evidence base" is limited since it can claim only to apply in one case. Then there are papers where the authors define PM in order to characterise how this phenomenon is commonly understood (e.g. [3, 48]). Often these are expert opinions, offered by scholars who can claim familiarity with the field and acknowledged expertise. However, even if these definitions are often supported by references to the literature, they are not necessarily worked out according to systematically collected evidence. This marks them off as "less robust" than definitions of a third kind. Some PM definitions that aim at describing actual use boast both a broad evidence base and derivation from wellestablished methods, e.g. comprehensive literature reviews. The paper of Schleidgen and colleagues fits in this latter category (cf. also [13, 27]). Yet their methodology passes over such epistemic differences and overlooks that definitions vary in nature and quality. Treating all definitions as equals leads to the striking and paradoxical result that in an iteration of their systematic review their own definition (based on reviewing more than 1400 definitions) would count no more than a definition describing a rather idiosyncratic use or one casually dropped in an editorial. This epistemic blindness seems to us a betrayal of a key methodological rule of SLRs. Logical issues Another departure from the conditions of epistemic robustness is that Schleidgen and colleagues do not simply synthesise the findings: they want to come up with a "precising" definition, i.e. they want to single out PM's core meaning so as to reduce vagueness. In order to compensate for the lack of quality criteria for inclusion and to produce an improved definition, Schleidgen and colleagues have to combine the extraction of results with a process of "noise removal". The processing of their inputs (the definitions found) happens in two stages. The first is an extraction of features organised along the categories of ends and means of PM, the second is a filtering through the application of "logical" criteria. Roughly speaking we have first an analytical dissection (resolutio) of definitions, and then a synthetic recombination (compositio) guided by some normative principles. We are going to focus on the recombination process, because it is the most unusual and original feature of their SLR, as well as being the "logical laundromat" that turns inputs of variable quality into an output of higher quality and value. The authors employ "six criteria of adequate definitions" ([12]: p. 5) that are then used to filter the definitional features found in the literature. Focusing on the first two principles will be enough to make our point. The first is that "a definition must be necessary, i.e. there must not exist any well-established term equivalent with its definiens" ([12]: p. 5). This principle raises a question that the authors completely ignore. As mentioned, several other names have been used to indicate what they define as PM. Considering that there was a different use of PM in the medical literature (see [49–51], cf. [52, 53]) and that patients often attribute to it a meaning different from those prevailing among medical researchers ([34, 39, 54: pp. xiii-xiv, 55: p. xii]), it is not clear why they do not even consider adopting one of these synonyms rather than the ambiguous PM. After all it seems a fair corollary of the principle of necessity that one should not use a name already in use if equally valid alternatives are available and thereby avoid unnecessary multiplications and confusions. Adopting instead, say, the label "stratified medicine" would avoid misunderstandings and associations with person (or patient)-centred medicine (that seem particularly invidious to Schleidgen and colleagues) and also prevent unfounded hopes of genuinely individualised 'omics therapies [56]. More generally, their principle of necessity seems to us to call for a serious discussion of the fact that their definition (i.e. their definiens) could be used for stratified medicine and precision medicine. We find surprising that Schleidgen and colleagues neither tackle this problem nor attempt to consider what is the relation between PM and related concepts. This is not a criticism of the principle itself, but of the fact that Schleidgen and colleagues fail to apply it thoroughly. Taking the principle seriously should raise the question not only of defining the concept, but also of how to name it, since many different names have been used for the concept here referred to as PM. De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 4 of 12 That said, the criterion of necessity is not unproblematic in the context of the task the authors set for themselves. By requiring that what is described by the definiens is new, the criterion rules out the possibility that PM has always been there and is nothing new. This was one of the competing understandings of PM mentioned at the beginning of their paper and it seems illegitimate to simply rule out one of the contending interpretations through some logical stipulation. Would it be logically incorrect to conclude that PM is something broader and more generic than what they have defined, while what they have defined is, say, 'omics medicine? If not (and the authors provide no reason for thinking that it is) then it should not be ruled out by some criterion for adequate definition. It is peculiar to want to determine whether PM is something new or not and then to assume that it has to be something new.8 The second logical criterion they propose is that "a definition must be neither too broad nor too narrow" ([8]: p. 5). This evidently leaves a lot of scope for the judgment of the authors and hence introduces a strong subjective element. For instance they make some choices on the basis of their understanding of what falls within and outside the boundaries of medicine, and their interpretation is clearly open to question, as when they claim that "prevention and therapy are what constitute health care" ([8]: p. 10), a position that has the rather controversial implication of excluding palliative care from health care.9 Selection bias Perhaps the most important reason why their SLR is not up to the task set by the authors is its narrow scope. The authors sensibly want to ground their definition on the actual use of the term, but then questionably limit the survey to "[PM] definitions appearing in the academic literature" and to "its current use in the sciences" ([12]: p. 2). They themselves acknowledge that PM "has become a buzz word in the academic as well as public debate surrounding health care" ([12]: p. 1). Hence actual use is clearly not confined to the academic literature. Schleidgen and colleagues justify excluding "the stakeholders' discourse" from their survey by wanting to exclude vested interests and ill-founded hopes. What they want is to focus on the "actual scientific possibilities as well as limitations of medical measures labeled as PM" ([12]: p. 2). We are not convinced by this argument. One reason of perplexity is that if they want to avoid hype they should not only exclude what is beyond the scientific limits, but also what is non viable because it is financially not sustainable, ethically unacceptable for patients or healthcare providers, incompatible with deeply entrenched professional cultures and practices etc. (cf. [57, 58]). Another and more serious problem with their argument is its naive assumption that biomedical literature is immune from stakeholders' interests. It is hard not to see that the research community has a great stake in PM and that they are as vulnerable to the temptation of hype as any other stakeholder, to the point that social scientific and historical looks at PM have emphasised the key role of expectations in gaining momentum and shaping actual developments [11, 14, 15, 40, 58–62]. For fear of stakeholders' vested interests they have appointed one group of stakeholders as the only authoritative voice, thus leaving their interests uncontrolled by any check and not counterbalanced by conflicting interests.10 Taking a more inclusive perspective is possible, since others have looked at different stakeholders groups and captured different voices. Lada Leyens and colleagues [27] have shown that a literature review can be done of policy documents about PM-and the results are rather different from those of Schleidgen and colleagues. McFarland and colleagues [39] and Heusser [34]-drawing from a Swiss study-provide some empirical evidence of patients' views of PM, and a survey of General Practitioners' views would be necessary to test how popular is the view that PM "has always been a component of good medical practice", "based on the relationship between patient and physician rather than on any particular technology" ([37]: p. 1684). Views vary not only across stakeholders but also across circumstances, to the effect that the same stakeholders may express differing views according to their interlocutors. For instance, Susanne Michl [14] has shown that academic authors provide different visions of PM when they write for their peers and when they address the lay public. The list of stakeholders could be made longer, but the essential point is clear: any definition that reflects only a subset of uses (e.g. the internal discourse of biomedical researchers) is bound to be biased. Instead of producing a PM definition robustly grounded in empirical evidence, Schleidgen and colleagues have ended up making methodologically dubious moves and producing a definition grounded in only one source of evidence. It is revealing that at the end of their paper Schleidgen and colleagues seem to recognise some of these shortcomings. They admit that PM cannot be treated simply as a scientific concept, because it has already established itself outside the purely scientific discourse. When scientists step out of their laboratories, "Personalised Medicine" will inevitably evoke (unpredictable) associations and expectations. Surprisingly, they therefore conclude by proposing to abandon the term altogether ("To forestall false hopes attached to the concept and accordingly wrong decisions regarding investments, it might be reasonable to adapt terminology" ([12]: p. 12)) and to adopt "stratifying medicine" instead-and indeed we agree that stratified medicine is the more accurate label. Nevertheless we conclude that a discourse analysis might have been a more appropriate method for achieving their goal and that carrying De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 5 of 12 out a SLR has not in itself made their analysis and proposal more compelling than alternative ones. Philosophical critique: concepts and meaning Having noted problems with the authors' choice of method and the result (the definition) it yields, in this section we move on to the further question whether a definition could possibly have achieved the result they were aiming for. We argue that their project is hampered by philosophically dubious ideas about definitions and the workings of language more generally, and also that it reflects a lofty view of the importance of conceptual analysis. The authors start by describing PM as a hopelessly vague term, and aim therefore to help "structuring the debate over PM's meaning by developing a sufficiently precise definition" ([12]: p. 2). Sharper concepts may be helpful in giving a more coherent structure to a diffuse debate. However, in practice the quality of one's analysis is not the main factor determining what influence one has on a debate. What impact (if any) their definition will have on the subsequent PM debate ultimately depends on how it is received by the pertinent readers. Unless this more focused definition is also seen as suitably focused (and thus as an improvement) by a sufficient number of stakeholders, its effect on the debate is likely to be limited. Confident in their undertaking, the authors anticipate some disagreements-but only minor ones, since, according to them, the majority already understands PM more or less in line with their definition ([12]: p. 11). The suggestion is that their definition may indeed succeed in structuring the subsequent debate because the debate already is (largely) structured around the stratification of treatment on the basis of molecular biology. This is puzzling. By claiming that their definition ought to be acceptable to the majority since it converges with the dominant understanding,11 the argument seems to invite two interpretations: either their solution works only under the assumption that the problem is already solved-which is no solution at all-or there is no major disagreement to speak of in the debate-which is to say that there never was a problem to be solved in the first place. The authors may accept the latter interpretation, not as an objection but rather as an account of what they have discovered, namely that at the centre of the debate, obscured by inconsistent terminology, there is major agreement on PM's meaning. Hence what their definition actually does is to bring this common ground into sharper focus. This move would be untenable, however, because their empirical evidence does not warrant such a conclusion. In the previous section we observed how the authors selectively reviewed only academic papers; but what prompted their hunt for a sharper definition was the cacophonic impression created by various stakeholders using PM to signify different things in "the academic as well as public debate surrounding health care" ([12]: p. 1)-and they have not provided any reason for believing that the majority in this broader context will find their results acceptable. Consider this conclusion: As our results show, PM is not medicine with a special focus on the interests and preferences of the individual patient. For instance, PM does not include any reference to an adequate doctor-patient relationship. Hence, PM as such is not related to the term patient-centered medicine. ([12]: p. 11) If this is meant to be a statistical remark about the use in scientific literature, it is correct. We are not contesting their empirical findings, merely emphasising the obvious point that what they found is a function of where they chose to look-as other studies suggest [34, 39, 63] a survey among patients or family doctors would probably have yielded different results. What they can reasonably claim to have shown is that references to adequate doctor-patient relationships are uncommon in the scientific literature about PM, and that, in the context of scientific reporting on new findings in genomic and molecular biomarkers, PM can be defined in purely molecular terms. But the more ambitious claims about this being the "true" meaning of PM cannot be supported, since if PM is a notion used in different contexts and by different actors, then what PM is and should be cannot be determined by extrapolating from the use of one group of stakeholders in one specific context. At the roots of this mistake is a philosophical assumption about language: that words may be sharp or vague in themselves. The paper is subtitled "sharpening a vague term", and the suggestion is that the lack of a precise definition is responsible for the varying uses of "PM". Lack of a fixed meaning, however, is not peculiar to PM. Consider the concept "game": there are board-games, card-games, ball-games, computer games, Olympic Games and children's games; we may speak of mind games, game shows, the game of politics; philosophers discuss language-games [64] and psychologists sometimes talk about social games (as in "the games people play", [65]). A continuum of uses may of course make a concept philosophically confusing and difficult to pin down; but this does not necessarily mean that either the term or people using it are confused. Miscommunication can of course arise when people using the same concepts differently come together. Tempting as it may be, philosophical abstraction is not the solution, because the meaning of words is generally determined by where and why words are used. When is a knife sharp enough? It depends on the context. Depending on the De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 6 of 12 work it is meant to do, the same knife may be both dull and sharp-in the hands of a child practicing wood carving it may be dangerously sharp, while it may still be hopelessly dull for proper fish filleting. Similarly, it is futile to attempt a precise definition of "PM" without a fairly definite context in mind, since distinguishing between precise and imprecise uses of a word is possible only when the aims and purposes are clear. Misunderstandings and disagreements will have to be solved when they arise by people patiently negotiating their meanings and purposes. There is no general philosophical quick-fix (for a philosophical discussion see [66–68]). Therefore it makes no sense to stipulate the rules for how "PM" should be used without simultaneously describing the circumstances under which those rules would apply. Schleidgen and colleagues' definition is in this respect an abstraction-both in the pejorative sense of being other-worldly and in the etymological sense of being disconnected from its proper surrounding. Their aim is to provide "an adequate basis for public discourse on PM", but unfortunately they leave the notion of "public discourse" too vague and unspecified to provide a meaningful context: sometimes public discourse is presented in contrast to academic debate, sometimes it seems to include this latter. We are told nothing specific about this public debate: what it is about, what is at stake in it, who the stakeholders are, what their converging and conflicting interests are? All these crucial questions are left unanswered. As a result what could count as a sufficiently precise definition in such a hazy context is very hard to figure out. Taking seriously the variety of actual uses, one should not assume that a concept like PM must be held together by some common core, for the simple reason that in so far as this is partly an empirical question one must remain open to the possibility that there may be no one thing in common to all uses of "PM".12 Instead of trying to reduce the complexity by determining rules for the use of "PM"-as if one rule could be valid universally or prohibit the word from travelling and thus taking on new meanings-a more sensible way to try to clear the fog would be to contextualise the various uses so that we can achieve a clearer view of the aim and functioning of the words. Two sources of disagreement Once discussions are viewed more in context it is easier to appreciate that there are two kinds of disputes around the notion of PM. The first concerns the extension or scope of the concept: i.e. discussions about what it includes and what lies outside its remit. These conceptual disputes are often tackled by producing a taxonomy of concepts and placing PM within it (see for instance [13, 17, 19]). The other dispute-often arising in reaction to a narrow understanding of PM as genomic medicine-centres on whether "PM" is the appropriate label or rather a misnomer or an objectionable expropriation of a name with a broader meaning. Some authors resent the fact that the words "personal" and "personalise" that used to belong to clinical practice-especially to primary care-have been appropriated by biomedical science, which is thus exploiting its rhetorical force and emptying it of its critical potential to oppose narrow and reductionist approaches to medicine [19, 34, 38]. One issue is how to organise the logical space, i.e. what kind of conceptual grid is needed in order to specify most effectively the boundaries and relations between neighbouring concepts, e.g. to establish whether PM and Genomic Medicine are co-extensional, mutually exclusive, partially overlapping or one subsuming the other. For instance, Pokorska-Bocci and colleagues [13] suggest a grid with 4 basic concepts subsumed by one more general concept, which in turn is subsumed under another still more general one. But once the grid has organised the relations between concepts, there is the question of what is the most appropriate name for each cell of the grid (i.e. for each concept). For instance, if a distinction has been drawn between attempts at personalising medicine through 'omics and through other means the question arises whether either of the two should be called "personalised medicine"-or whether PM should be used as a broader concept encompassing both. Reasons for and against each possibility can be given. Calling 'omics medicine "PM" has the advantage of reflecting a common use, but the disadvantage of not being very accurate because arguably what can be achieved is stratification of patients rather than personalisation [69, 70, 71]. Using PM only for personalising measures not based on molecular biology goes against what is now a widespread use, but it could be a way of reclaiming a name that has been captured by molecular medicine [19, 38]. Using PM as a broader category may seem a fair and conciliatory choice [13], but again it may be confusing given the prevailing current use-that's why "personalised healthcare" is often preferred for this purpose [9, 17]. As it already emerges from these examples, questions of naming are affected by a diverse range of considerations: semantic clarity, consistency with established uses, but also grievances towards the practices with which they are connected, and considerations of fairness and impartiality. Lexical choices have as much to do with ethics and politics as they have with logic and semantics. Furthermore how these multiple criteria are balanced and weighed is open to reasonable disagreement ([72]: II, §2). Another source of indeterminacy lies in the fact that PM is very much a future-oriented concept. More than an existing reality, PM is currently the controversial label of a cluster of visions for (some aspects of) the future of healthcare. Future-oriented concepts, aimed at De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 7 of 12 mobilising initiatives and building networks, are bound to be fluid and contested. Given that it is still something in the making, what PM will become depends on what the technologies can actually deliver and which decisions are made, which in turn depends on who gets involved, which ideals, values and interests different stakeholders want to realise, which alliances are formed among stakeholders, which compromises are made, which scientific discoveries take place etc. [14, 18, 59]. In view of this, the attempt to decide what PM will become is not only premature, but also fails to understand the current grip of the term. By trying to structure the debate around a predefined and limited range of topics one obscures the fact that which people are using the concept and the contexts in which they do so are key determinants of its meaning. This is why attention should be refocused towards stakeholders and their roles, aspirations, powers and on how they converge and conflict. Philosophical critique: values and pluralism We have argued that the meaning of concepts depends on their context of use, and that this in turn importantly depends on the purposes of people. Now we want to suggest that stakeholders and their interests are also contextual and relational, thus requiring a form of analysis that accounts for such pluralism. Schleidgen and colleagues at the beginning of their paper suggest a view of medicine as a practice centred on one fundamental goal (meeting patients' needs) and that other interests, especially economic ones, can only be disturbances to be kept out. We want to show that this is a simplistic and false picture and that stakeholders have goals and purposes (beyond the health of patients) that are perfectly legitimate and need to be recognised. Furthermore, the interests of patients and stakeholders cannot be determined in the abstract: they need to be worked out in the appropriate contexts. It should be noticed that not all medical needs are equally urgent and serious, especially when health needs are supply-induced (e.g. by pharmaceutical industry [73, 74]). Thinking that patients' interests always and necessarily override any other interests is both unrealistic and morally unwarranted. Arguably some non-vital patients' interests have no claim on doctors' time or on taxpayers' money. So all we need to say is that patients' serious interests have prima facie priority, but can occasionally be overridden by other legitimate stakeholders' interests, when a convincing case for these latter can be made. Moreover, to claim that one particular value or interest is central and articulates the goal and the ethos of a particular activity (e.g. medicine) does not entail that any other value and interest is always and necessarily subordinated and overridden, let alone irrelevant. On the contrary, other values and interests constitute the framework of constraints within which any activity is itself sustainable, permissible and valuable. So for instance, the extremely long working hours of junior doctors (or residents, as they are called in the USA) may be criticised because they jeopardise patients' safety [75], but also because they are exploitative.13 However, the view that stakeholders' interests have no place in medicine would disallow the latter reason of complaint. We can make the point in loftier Kantian terms: stakeholders should not be treated simply as means (for promoting health), but also always like ends in themselves, i.e. like people with their own aims to pursue. But to have goals implies being interested in the means to achieve them, and when resources are not unlimited this leads to concerns about their distribution, i.e. to economic issues. While we share Schleidgen and colleagues' concern that the economic interests of, say, the pharmaceutical and biotech industries may orient PM too much in view of their own profit, we believe that bluntly condemning (direct or indirect) economic interests gives too simplistic and moralistic a picture. We rather need to make an honest appraisal of economic interests and acknowledge that, within proper limits, they are legitimate. Surely it is not always wrong for taxpayers to be concerned about escalating health costs, for patients to worry about out-of-pocket payments or loss of working days and income, for policy-makers to wonder about the sustainability and opportunity costs of endorsing a new health technology, for industries to aim for a profit. Furthermore, as we have anticipated, stakeholders' goals and preferences too should be seen as context-dependent: they emerge in real situations as responses to problems, challenges and conflicts. Doctors are doctors when lobbying against health care cuts, but they are cardiologists, oncologists and pediatricians when making claims about how the health budget should be allocated. Patients are sick people, but they are also tax-payers and perhaps parents concerned about the future sustainability of the healthcare system. It is in response to concrete difficulties, hard choices and rival claims that groups of stakeholders get formed, are defined and articulate their aspirations. Since stakeholders' interests are not necessarily illegitimate and they are not given and fixed, we can appreciate that the plurality of visions of PM is not only an unfortunate source of confusion, but also the result of a variety of concerns and aspirations being articulated. If we have a closer look at the implications of acknowledging the context-dependence of stakeholders' interests, we should realise that these contexts are socially constructed and that this means that they are framed by other stakeholders who have set the agenda and the discursive space. Contexts come with biases: to reset them in neutral terms is rarely, if ever, possible. This is De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 8 of 12 why seeing PM as an open negotiable concept not only reflects current reality better, but may also be useful and enrich the ethical reflection around PM: accepting a plurality of visions allows for a variety of fora where a multiplicity of views is voiced, so that gatekeeping and framing is not monopolised by any one group or coalition. The openness and negotiability of "PM" may help to prevent hegemonic control over it and capture of the concept by some stakeholders (cf. the concept of disciplinary capture [76, 77]). Our claim is that the current plurality of visions of PM may not only be an annoyance and an obstacle-an unfortunate source of confusion-but may also be the result of a variety of concerns and aspirations being articulated by different stakeholders in different contexts. If this is the case, imposing a more consistent view may not be a desirable solution: we suggest instead that we accept PM as an open negotiable concept. This would be no panacea, but rather a coping strategy that is still preferable to a very invasive therapy. Conclusions Our task has been largely critical, because we believe that in the literature about PM there are too many attempts to bring order and clarity without really understanding the deep roots of the disputes and that any semantic claim has deep normative implications. For instance if, against all odds, Schleidgen and colleagues' attempt were successful, it would decide against those who argue for a not merely molecular view of the personalisation of medicine without even having given a fair hearing to their arguments. Schleidgen and colleagues have pursued the task of "sharpening a vague term" with the goal of preventing stakeholders from appropriating it. However they have ended up embracing the point of view of some stakeholders without realizing that the appropriation of the concept by those very stakeholders is itself a cause of contention. Furthermore, and ironically enough, in spite of their (overstated) claim that patients' benefits override any other stakeholders' interests, they have completely excluded the voice of patients from the construction of their definition. We suggest that in dealing with personalised medicine it is wise to turn on its head Marx's famous statement that it is time for philosophers to move from interpreting the world to changing it. So instead of attempting to impose a particular view of PM it would be wiser to be more modest and more open. We should acknowledge the fuzziness, the differences as well as the similarities between many views and visions of PM voiced in different circumstances. A thorough and (as far as possible) unbiased description of this cluster or family of related, overlapping and sometimes contradictory understandings of PM (and its relations to neighbouring concepts like precision medicine, stratified medicine, and patientcentered medicine) seems the appropriate starting point for any philosophical clarification of the concept of PM. Any attempt to go beyond a description of the situation and an interpretation of its drivers becomes a normative attempt and as such needs to engage explicitly with competing normative claims. When language and politics are intermingled-as is the case with PM-there is no such thing as purely logical tidying up. What is in dispute are not merely terminological disagreements, but are different values, ideals and allocations of powers and resources. The question "What is PM?" cannot be separated from questions like "Who contributes what to PM?", "Who is setting the agenda?", "Who has been excluded?", "Who gets what?". None of these questions is settled yet, and so it seems to us that rather than trying to pin down an elusive concept, it would be worth mapping stakeholders' aspirations and interests and try to contribute to make the negotiations about the future of PM as fair and transparent as possible. Endnotes 1The European Commission recently endowed the call for research on Personalised Medicine with € 659 million [78], and claims to have already committed more than € 1 billion since 2007 [79]. In the US president Obama in the 2015 State of the Union launched the Precision Medicine Initiative (precision medicine is part of Personalised Medicine as we use the term in this paper) and then endowed it with $ 215 million [80–82]. 2It should be noted that another driver of PM is the development of self-tracking devices that allow individuals to collect data and information that could be used to monitor and promote health [83–88]. This trend is usually subsumed under the concept of the Quantified Self (or self-tracking) and linked to the concept of PM especially in the literature aiming at popularising the concept [14]. While it is likely that we are going towards an integration of information coming from molecular biology and information coming from personal wearable or implanted devices, in the present paper we focus on molecular biology and leave aside self-tracking technologies. 3On April 4 2016 the article boosted 50 citations according to Google scholar, 16 citing articles according to Web of Science, 7792 accesses according to BMC Medical Ethics, 24 citations according to the ranking of bioethical articles produced by Georgetown University Research Library, where the paper ranked 19th for the year 2013 (thus looking like the most influential bioethical publication on the topic of defining PM), and it has been included in a recently published anthology on The Ethics of Personalised Medicine [89]. 4A reviewer remarked that the word "utilizing" in the definition may suggest that they include translation, De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 9 of 12 implementation etc. The reason why we have not followed this charitable reading is that Schleidgen and colleagues understand the possibilities and limitations of PM only in techno-scientific terms and see PM as just an add-on to current practice, thus seeming to rule out the need for structural changes and downplay the importance of organisational and financial adjustments demanded by PM. 5Our objection is not against taking a stance. But when taking sides in a debate, one should do so not pretending to be merely doing logical tidying up, but should fully engage with the normative claims in the debate. 6Clearly this is an oversimplification. In certain cases, for instance when external validity is more important than internal validity, other design studies may be preferable to RCTs. However, here our point is simply that if the sources reviewed lack robustness, the final result cannot claim much strength. 7The same kind of sensitivity should be used in understanding what kind of academic papers one is reviewing. Reviews, editorials and commentaries are all academic subgenres, but differ radically from research articles, and the criteria to judge how reliable and robust they are vary accordingly. For instance experimental results have different weight if they report an early observation of a phenomenon or whether they confirm very compellingly earlier more tentative studies. An editorial or a commentary has to be read differently when it is about a scientific issue that is controversial or about one over which there is a settled consensus. The role of different genres of scientific writing in PM is stressed by Adam Hedgecoe [54]. 8Here again the problem is that they have not distinguished between concepts and names. It is indeed possible that PM is sometimes used to refer to an old concept and sometimes to a new concept [4, 90], and it is certainly possible that there are sensible criteria for naming that suggest to use PM for the old concept and a new name for the new concept. If they wanted to give a fair refutation of the view that PM is nothing new, they should have shown that PM (broadly defined to accommodate common current uses) cannot be used to identify pre-existing medical practices because such practices are already covered by an existing concept different from PM. If this were the case this proposed use of PM for old medical practices would be unnecessary, redundant and confusing. But they have not shown that. It is also worth noting that some proponents of PM (e.g. [69]) have explicitly presented it as the scientific culmination of the time-honoured medical habit of adapting knowledge to individual cases. For a discussion of this dialectical tension between PM as revolutionary and as consistent with the medical tradition see [11, 14, 15]. 9For the articulation of a broader and historically rooted view of medicine that includes not only curing and preventing but also relieving and comforting see [91]. 10It is worth remembering that the genomic understanding of PM first appeared in 1997 in an article by Andrew Marshall [92] who used the concept in the plural ("personalized medicines") and in his next publication dropped it in favour of "pharmacogenomics". The paper that really kicked-off the new understanding of PM was Langreth and Waldholz's "New Era of Personalized Medicine" which appeared in 1999 in the Wall Street Journal and shortly after was reprinted by The Oncologist [93]. This paper reports the strategies and alliances that pharmaceutical industries had launched on in pursuing new opportunities in pharmacogenomics (incidentally the opportunities for pharmaceutical industry were given as much emphasis, if not more, as benefits for patients already in Marshall's 1997 paper). This should remind us that stakeholders' interests have contributed from the start to shape the visions of PM and that many researchers pioneering PM were working for pharmaceutical or biotech companies, making it hard to separate science from industry (cf. [58]). 11Though one may assume the authors think everyone ought to accept their definition, they have no illusions that in fact they will; however they do claim that their definition ought to be regarded as acceptable by the majority ([12]: p. 10). 12For instance Richard Tutton noted (in 2012, before Schleidgen and colleagues published their paper) that "there have been different historical forms of 'personalization' over time" ([11]: p. 1726) and that before the rise of genomic medicine, clinicians had used it to describe a way of practicing medicine "endangered by continued technologization and reductionism of biomedicine" ([11]: p. 1721). A recent article published in such a prestigious journal as The Lancet [94] shows that this understanding of PM has not disappeared. Hedgecoe and Martin [59] have shown that even within that subset of PM represented by pharmacogenetics, alternative visions of its mission and scope exist and that these latter are affected by the coalitions that support them and can be modified when this latter change. "For example, as new groups of actors join the emerging network, they may favour particular options over others and shape the future direction of research" ([59]: p. 330). These examples suggest that PM is an evolving concept, still fluid and whose meaning is not, and cannot be, fixed yet. 13It has been noted that junior doctors have fewer protections than workers in sweatshops [95] and prisoners of war [96]. Abbreviations PM, personalised medicine; RCT, randomised controlled trial; SLR, systematic literature review. De Grandis and Halgunset BMC Medical Ethics (2016) 17:43 Page 10 of 12 Acknowledgements An earlier version of the paper was presented at both the RESET seminar and the VERP seminar (both at NTNU). We are very grateful to the participants in both seminars for very thoughtful and helpful feedback. Their comments prompted a substantial rethinking and rewriting of the paper as did a very helpful conversation with Bjørn Myskja. Silvia De Marco and Flavio D'Abramo have read the final version of the paper and provided helpful feedback and suggestions that we have tried to incorporate in the paper. Garrath Williams too read the last version of the paper and provided very detailed comments and suggestions, which we have largely followed. Finally we would like to thank the two reviewers for their constructive and encouraging suggestions, which have helped us in making the argument clearer. Funding The authors have received no funding for the research presented here. Availability of data and materials As a critical discussion of some views presented in the literature, the manuscript is not based on any original data that the authors can share. The works referred to in the reference list are our data set. Authors' contributions Both authors have equally contributed to developing the conception and design of the paper as well as to the development of the argument. All revisions, corrections and improvement have been discussed and decided together by the two co-authors. The final draft was mostly written out by GD with substantial contributions from VH. Both authors read and approved the final manuscript. Authors' information Both authors have a background in philosophy and are currently working on the RESET:PM project at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), a research project devoted to studying the ethical aspects of personalized medicine. GD is a postdoctoral researcher and VH is a PhD candidate. Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Consent for publication Not applicable. Ethics approval and consent to participate Not applicable. 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penultimate draft forthcoming in Philosophical Studies Sider, The Inheritance of Intrinsicality, and Theories of Composition1 Cody Gilmore UC Davis [email protected] Abstract. I defend coincidentalism (the view that some Xs have more than one mereological sum) and restricted composition (the view that some Xs don't have a mereological sum at all) against recent arguments put forward by Theodore Sider in his paper 'Parthood'. I. Introduction In a recent paper, Theodore Sider has proposed new arguments for a package of controversial views about parthood, including the following: Unrestricted composition: Any Xs have a mereological sum Uniqueness of composition: No Xs have more than one mereological sum (2007:70). 2 Unrestricted composition (UC) says that any things, no matter how scattered and unrelated they might be, compose some further thing. There is, on this view, something that is composed of the moon and the Eiffel Tower. The Uniqueness of Composition (Uniqueness) says that it never happens that some things compose two or more further things. Uniqueness tells us that if some particles compose both a statue-shaped lump of clay, Lump1, and also a clay statue, Goliath, then Goliath=Lumpl, despite any apparent differences between them. Sider's arguments for UC and Uniqueness are quite different from anything previously on the metaphysical landscape, and in my view they have a lot of initial appeal. But, as I will argue here, a core segment of their target audience has a surprising and potentially viable way to resist them. II. Sider's Arguments The arguments have an inference-to-the-best-explanation structure familiar from the natural sciences. Certain propositions (the data) are taken to support certain other propositions (the predictions) indirectly, via an intermediary theory. The theory is said to do two things: (i) provide the best explanation of the data, and (ii) entail or otherwise 'yield' the predictions. When all goes well, the theory inherits justification from the data, and the predictions inherit justification from the theory.3 1 Thanks to Kris McDaniel, Adam Sennet, Alexander Skiles, Ted Sider and a referee for helpful comments. 2 Sider adopts the following definitions (2007: 52), stated a bit differently: y is a mereological sum/fusion of the Xs =df. the Xs compose y =df. (i) each of the Xs is a part of y, and (ii) each part of y overlaps (shares a part with) at least one of the Xs. 3 The diagram is adapted from Sider (2007:76) 2 Data 'flows from' theory Predictions 'flow from' theory justifies In the present case, the role of the predictions is played by Uniqueness and UC, and the role of the data is played by a pair of 'Inheritance' principles that Sider takes to be relatively uncontroversial: Inheritance of Intrinsicality: If property P is intrinsic, then the property having a part that has P is also intrinsic. Inheritance of Location: If x is part of y, then y is located wherever x is located (2007: 70). Finally, the role of the theory is played by a rough and intuitive 'picture' of the part-whole relation: The Intimacy of Parthood: The part-whole relationship is especially close: in some loose sense, a whole 'just is' or 'is nothing over and above' its parts. To get a feel for Intimacy, it may help to contrast it with a stronger and more precise view that Sider rejects, namely: Strong Composition as Identity For any Xs and any y, if y is composed of the Xs, then y = the Xs (2007: 55). Suppose that an object – Michigan, say – is composed of two smaller objects, the Upper Peninsula and the Lower Peninsula.4 As applied to this case, Strong Composition as Identity (SCI) entails that Michigan is quite literally numerically identical to the Upper Peninsula and the Lower Peninsula. SCI does not entail that Michigan is identical to the peninsulas 'individually': it does not entail that Michigan=the Upper Peninsula or that Michigan=the Lower Peninsula. Rather it entails that Michigan is identical to the peninsulas 'collectively'. On this view, 'is identical to' is an irreducibly plural predicate, like 'surrounds'. (To borrow an example from Sider, "Tom, Dick, and Harry surrounded John" can be true even when "Tom surrounded John", "Dick surrounded John", and "Harry surrounded John" are all false.) On its face, SCI is bizarre. How could Michigan be identical to the peninsulas, given that Michigan is one thing, whereas the peninsulas are two things? Sider is unwilling to reject SCI on the basis of initial worries such as this. (I assume that he is willing to say that, despite appearances, being one thing is compatible with being two things.) But he does reject SCI in the end, on the basis of theoretical considerations that we don't need to discuss here. 4 We can ignore the many islands in the Great Lakes that are parts of the state but disjoint from both peninsulas. Theory The Intimacy of Parthood Data Inheritance of intrinsicality Inheritance of location Predictions Unrestricted Composition Uniqueness of Composition 3 What is important for our purposes is just to see how SCI differs from Intimacy. SCI is a precisely stated but very radical thesis about composition and identity. Intimacy is less radical (in part because it is consistent with the standard view that the identity predicate is not irreducibly plural) and much less precise. It does not say that a composite object is strictly identical to the things that compose it, but merely that the object stands in an especially close relationship with those things: in some unspecified sense, it 'is nothing over and above' them. As a heuristic, we can think of Intimacy as the view that we get when we try to treat the relation between a composite object and the things that compose it as being as identity-like as possible, short of embracing full-blown SCI. With the relevant views on the table, two questions arise right away. (1) How is the theory supposed to explain the data? That is, how is the Intimacy of Parthood supposed to explain the Inheritance of Intrinsicality and Location? Briefly, Sider's line of thought is this. The Inheritance principles tell us that "the part – its intrinsic nature and location – is reflected in the whole. The part shines through" (2007: 70). Why does a thing's nature reflect the natures of its parts in this way? Because – as the Intimacy of Parthood states – the thing is nothing over and above those very parts; it 'just is' those parts! Now, this is not exactly a rigorous proof. Sider of course recognizes this, but he takes it to have some force anyway, and he claims that we cannot expect to do much better, given the nature of the territory: Intimacy is, after all, just a rough picture. (2) Why should we think that Uniqueness and UC 'flow' from Intimacy? There are really two questions here, and Sider addresses them separately. First, why should the friend of Intimacy feel pressure to accept Uniqueness? First, the intuitive picture of the intimacy of parthood demands that we adhere as closely as possible to strong composition as identity, and so requires acceptance of unrestricted composition (though as we saw in section 3.2, the relation between strong composition as identity and unrestricted composition is not straightforward). Second, consider the following line of thought, which is compelling though hard to evaluate. Unless composition is unrestricted, it is in general an open question whether some Xs compose something. But then in cases where some Xs do compose something, the composed object seems to be something 'over and above' the Xs. For it is an open question whether it exists, given that the Xs do, whereas it is not an open question whether the Xs exist, given that the Xs do. Finally, opposition to unrestricted composition – distrust of scattered objects and the like – is undermined by the idea that the whole is 'nothing over and above the parts' (2007: 72-73). Second, why can't the friend of Intimacy reject Uniqueness and say that in some cases, two different objects are composed of the very same things? If some Xs compose two things, then wholes could not be "nothing over and above their parts," for how could distinct things each be nothing over and above the same parts? (2007: 70). I will say no more about Sider's argument from Intimacy to UC. He takes it to be 'regrettably shaky' (2007: 72), but for the sake of argument I'll assume it goes through. In the next section I'll briefly comment on the case from Intimacy to Uniqueness, about which Sider does not express any doubts. My main ambition, though, will be to challenge some of the data on which Sider's argument operates. Sider takes it that one will find both Inheritance principles to be plausible regardless of one's views on the controversies surrounding Uniqueness and UC (2007: 74), and on first blush this seems appropriate. In particular, it is natural to think that the Inheritance of 4 Intrinsicality is neutral with respect to the debate between unrestricted composition and its rivals (compositional nihilism5 and various 'moderate' theories of composition). I argue, however, that a core segment of Sider's target audience has independent reason for rejecting or at least being agnostic about the Inheritance of Intrinsicality. This segment includes some philosophers who accept, or at least take seriously, a theory of composition that embraces most of the composite objects of our commonsense ontology (organisms, artifacts, etc.) but that stops short of unrestricted composition. When such a theory is combined with a 'microphysical supervenience' principle that some have found appealing, the Inheritance of Intrinsicality becomes vulnerable to a surprising counterexample. It turns out, then, that whether or not one should find the Inheritance of Intrinsicality plausible will depend upon one's prior inclinations regarding (i) theories of composition and (ii) the relevant sort of microphysical supervenience; the Inheritance of Intrinsicality is not neutral with respect to those views. I take this result to be interesting in its own right, even apart from any destructive effect that it might have upon Sider's arguments for Uniqueness and UC. III. Does Intimacy Require Uniqueness? In defense of the claim that Uniqueness 'flows' from Intimacy, Sider asks, "how could distinct things each be nothing over and above the same parts?" (2007: 70) The short answer is: in whatever way distinct pluralities (e.g., the rows and the columns on a chessboard) could each be nothing over and above the same parts (the squares), perhaps by being nothing over and above each other. Now for a longer answer. Sider's route from Intimacy to Uniqueness runs through the following principle: P1 For any Xs, any y, and any z, if y is nothing over and above the Xs, and z is nothing over and above the Xs, then y=z. We can think of P1 as the uniqueness of nothing-over-and-above: it says that it never happens that two distinct objects are each nothing over and above the same plurality of things. It can be motivated by appeal to the thought that being nothing over and above should turn out to be as identity-like like as possible. After all, assuming that we allow '=' to be flanked by 'mixed' pairs consisting of one singular term and one plural term, presumably everyone will grant: P1= For any Xs, any y, and any z, if y = the Xs, and z = the Xs, then y=z.6 So if P1 were false, this would be a respect in which being nothing over and above was unlike identity. Despite this, I think that P1 is vulnerable. Now one might be unwilling to assent to P1 simply because one finds the predicate 'is nothing over and above' unintelligible. I have some sympathy for this reaction, but it would be nice to do better. So let's work under the assumption that 'is nothing over and above' is a well-understood primitive. Here is a different concern. It seems to me that P1 is plausible only if it's backed by a more general principle, namely: 5 Compositional nihilism is the view that there are no composite objects. An object is composite iff it has a proper part (a part with which it is not identical). An object is simple iff it is not composite. 6 Even those who deny SCI can hold that some claims of the form 'a=the Bs' are true. For a plural term such as 'the Bs' can refer to some things of which there is only one. In that case, the singular referring term 'a' and plural referring term 'the Bs' might both refer to the very same entity, thus making 'a=the Bs' true. 5 P1+ For any Xs, any Ys, and any Zs, if [the Ys are nothing over and above the Xs, the Zs are nothing over and above the Xs, and there are exactly as many of the Ys as there are of the Zs7], then the Ys = the Zs. Like P1, P1+ is motivated by the idea that we should make being nothing over and above as identity-like as possible. P1+ is more general, however, since it applies not just to single individuals but to pluralities as well; it says that it never happens that two distinct (but equinumerous) pluralities are each nothing over and the same plurality. So just as P1 can be thought of as the uniqueness of nothing-over-and-above for individual things, P1+ can be thought of as the uniqueness of nothing-over-and-above for pluralities. I think we should expect P1+ to be true if P1 is; surely the latter is most appealing when it is seen as a special case of the former. But as the 'short answer' hinted earlier, P1+ is in trouble. I assume that Intimacy-lovers will say that (i) the rows in my chessboard are nothing over and above the squares in my chessboard, (ii) the columns in my chessboard are nothing over and above the squares in my chessboard, and (iii) there are exactly as many rows in my chessboard as there are columns in my chessboard. (There are eight of each.) Together with P1+, these entail (iv) the rows in my chessboard = the columns in my chessboard. But (iv) should be rejected by all but friends of SCI. For the rows on my chessboard run horizontally, whereas the columns do not; they run vertically. So P1+ is too strong for Intimacylovers who reject SCI. I think this reflects badly on P1. The Intimacy-lover is free to endorse the non-identity of pluralities (e.g., the rows and the columns) each of which he takes to be nothing over the same things. So why not think that he's free to endorse the non-identity of single individuals (e.g., Lumpl and Goliath) each of which he takes to be nothing over and above the same things? To reject P1+ (the uniqueness of nothing-over-and-above for pluralities) but then stridently insist on P1 (the uniqueness of nothing-over-and-above for individuals) strikes me as being rather ad hoc. This verdict is reinforced when we notice that there are appealing substitutes for these principles close at hand. The Intimacy-lover can account for the close connection between pluralities (or single things) that are nothing over and above the same things without holding that those pluralities (or single things) are identical. He can hold that they are nothing over and above each other. That is, he can endorse P1* For any Xs, any Ys, and any Zs, if the Ys are nothing over and above the Xs, and the Zs are nothing over and above the Xs, then the Ys are nothing over and above the Zs. The Intimacy-lover who accepts P1* will say that while the rows and the columns may be nonidentical, the rows are nothing over and above the columns, and vice versa. Likewise for Lumpl and Goliath: though they may be non-identical, they are nothing over and above each other. 7 Without this last clause the principle would be vulnerable to counterexamples such as the following: my cells are nothing over and above my atoms, and my molecules are nothing over and above my atoms, but (since I have more molecules than cells) my cells are not identical to my molecules. 6 IV. The Inheritance of Intrinsicality The previous section shows that Sider's argument from Intimacy to Uniqueness can be resisted. The remainder of the paper focuses on a principle that Sider appeals to in support of Intimacy, the Inheritance of Intrinsicality: if a property P is intrinsic, then the property having a part that has P is also intrinsic. It will be useful, therefore, to begin with a few informal remarks about the notion of intrinsicality. To say that a property P is intrinsic is, very loosely, to say that whether or not a given object has P depends only on what the object is like in itself and is independent of how the object is related to things separate from itself. Put in different terms, intrinsic properties are the ones that cannot differ between intrinsic duplicates. Shapes and rest masses are typically regarded as intrinsic; properties such as being two miles from a lake are typically regarded as extrinsic (i.e., not intrinsic). According to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, if the property roundness is intrinsic, then so is the property having a part that has roundness. This is appealing: on the assumption that roundess is intrinsic, it would seem that if I have a round part, so must any intrinsic duplicate of me. To get a better feel for the principle, it may help to contrast it with a pair of much stronger and less plausible variants. First, consider: V1 For any property P whatever, intrinsic or extrinsic, the property having a part that has P is intrinsic. This is clearly false. Let P be the extrinsic property being in California. Then the hydrogen atoms in California have the property having a part that has P, but presumably there are intrinsic duplicates of them elsewhere that lack that property. Second, consider: V2 For any intrinsic property P and any dyadic relation R whatever, the property bearing R to something that has P is intrinsic. This is no better. Even if roundness is intrinsic, the property bearing the being two feet away from relation to something that has roundness (roughly, being two feet away from a round thing) is not. So if either (i) the property P is itself extrinsic or (ii) R is some relation other than having as a part, then there is clearly no guarantee that the property bearing R to something that has P will be intrinsic. But when P is intrinsic and R is having as a part, it may initially seem that bearing R to something that has P must be intrinsic too. In the next section, however, I will argue that in the presence of a pair of apparently respectable views about intrinsicality and composition, the Inheritance of Intrinsicality is vulnerable to a surprising counterexample. V. The Counterexample Here is a first pass; refinements will be made in response to objections. Suppose that we are attracted to the following theory of composition:8 VIPA+ Some things, the Xs, compose something if and only if either: 1. there is only one of the Xs, or 8 Markosian (2008) abbreviates van Inwagen's Proposed Answer (according to which some things compose something iff either there is just one of them or they are arranged living-organism-wise) as VIPA. Hence the name VIPA+. 7 2. the Xs are arranged living-organism-wise (where this is a purely intrinsic matter), or 3. the Xs are arranged artifact-wise, (where this is at least partly an extrinsic, historical matter that concerns the relation between the Xs' present internal arrangement and the intentions and activities of some sentient designer(s)). Nothing will turn on accepting this answer in particular. As I explain in my reply to Objection 2, the relevant style of counterexample can be generated in the presence of a very wide range of moderate theories of composition. I introduce VIPA+ merely to give us a clear and definite representative to work with initially. There are two points to note about this theory. (1) To fix ideas, I will help myself to Lewis's notion of perfectly natural properties and relations.9 Whether or not some simple particles are arranged living-organism-wise seems to supervene on their perfectly natural properties (perhaps masses, charges, spins) and on the perfectly natural relations (spatiotemporal and, perhaps, causal relations) that hold among the simples in question, independently of how those simples are related to other things. (2) However, whether or not some simple particles are arranged artifact-wise is clearly an extrinsic matter, not entirely fixed by the perfectly natural properties of the simples and the perfectly natural relations that hold between them. It also depends upon their history, on how they came to be arranged as they are. Suppose that I have some particles, the Xs, arranged chair-wise in one corner of my office and some duplicate particles, the Ys, in exactly the same internal arrangement, located in another corner of my office. If the Xs came to be arranged in this way as a result of the right sort of intentional activity, then VIPA+ says that they compose something (a chair, presumably). It also says that if the Ys came to be arranged in that same way just by chance, then they don't compose anything, since in that case there are more than one of them and they are arranged neither living-organism-wise nor artifact-wise. With these points in mind, consider two living human beings, Xavier and Yorick, both composed of simples. The simples that compose Xavier are the Xs, and those that compose Yorick are the Ys. Intuitively, the Xs match the Ys with respect to their intrinsic properties and internal arrangement. We can make this talk of matching more precise by saying that there is a one-to-one correspondence between the Xs and the Ys that preserves perfectly natural properties and relations – i.e, there is a bijective function f from the Xs to the Ys such that (i) for any x among the Xs and any intrinsic property P, x has P iff f(x) has P and (ii) for any ordered n-tuple <x1, . . ., xn> of the Xs and any perfectly natural, n-adic relation R, x1, . . ., xn instantiate R (in that order) iff f(x1), . . ., f(xn) instantiate R (in that order). This makes it plausible that Xavier and Yorick are intrinsic duplicates, that they share all of their intrinsic properties. To see why, consider the following principle, which is a variant of a principle that Trenton Merricks calls the Principle of Microphysical Supervenience:10 9 Roughly, these are the properties and relations that correspond to the primitive predicates in a complete physics and that ground objective resemblances. Following Lewis, I will assume that (a) all perfectly natural relations are intrinsic but that (b) many intrinsic properties (e.g., being either round or square) are not perfectly natural, and that (c) all intrinsic properties (hence all perfectly natural properties) and all perfectly natural relations are purely qualitative – roughly, not such as to 'constitutively involve' any specific concrete particulars. (Being two feet away from George W. Bush is not purely qualitative, whereas being two feet away from a man with gray hair is.) On perfectly natural properties, see Lewis (1986: 6069). 10 The principle that Merrick's discusses (and attacks) is: "Necessarily, if atoms A1 through An compose an object that exemplifies qualitative properties Q1 through Qn, then atoms like A1 through An (in all their respective intrinsic qualitative properties), related to one another by all the same restricted atom-to-atom relations as A1 through An, compose an object that exemplifies Q1 through Qn" (1998: 59). 8 MS* Necessarily, for any objects Ox and Oy, any simples, the Xs, and any simples, the Ys, if (i) Ox is composed of the Xs, (ii) Oy is composed of the Ys, and (iii) there is a one-to-one correspondence between the Xs and the Ys that preserves perfectly natural properties and relations, then Ox and Oy are intrinsic duplicates: i.e., then for any intrinsic property P, Ox has P iff Oy has P. 11 12 MS* says that a sufficient condition for two things to be intrinsic duplicates is for them to be composed of matching simples in matching internal arrangements. MS* does not say that if the Xs and the Ys are matching simples in matching internal arrangements, then the Xs compose something iff the Ys compose something: it leaves open the possibility (endorsed by friends of VIPA+) that such pluralities of simples might still differ with respect to whether they compose anything. So MS* is neutral with respect to VIPA+ and similar 'externalist' theories of composition. Suppose now that Xavier has an artificial hand but that Yorick does not. Some of the Xs – those arranged right-hand-wise – were deliberately arranged in that way by a team of superadvanced biomedical engineers, who then seamlessly attached the artificial hand to Xavier's wrist. Then, according to VIPA+, those simples compose something – Xavier's right hand, presumably. Those of Yorick's constituent particles that are arranged right-hand-wise were not arranged in that way intentionally, however, so they aren't arranged artifact-wise. But nor are they by themselves arranged organism-wise. The result, then, is that they don't compose anything, according to VIPA+. So Yorick has no right hand (for if he did it would be composed of those simples). In fact, Yorick's only proper parts are his simple particles and perhaps his cells (if simples arranged cell-wise count as being arranged organism-wise).13 Xavier's parts, by contrast, include not just his simple particles (and cells, perhaps) but also a certain artifact – an artificial right hand. 11 This is a 'weak supervenience' claim: in possible worlds terminology, it says that any two objects within the same possible world that are alike in a certain way will be alike in another way as well. MS* is entailed by a corresponding 'strong supervenience' claim, MS*+, to the effect that for any possible worlds w1 and w2, and for any object O1 in w1 and any object O2 in w2, if O1 in w1 and O2 in w2 are alike with regard to the relevant base facts, then O1 in w1 and O2 in w2 will be alike with regard to the relevant supervening facts as well. I suspect that virtually everyone who finds MS* plausible will be attracted to the stronger principle too. Unsurprisingly, all the work done in this paper by MS* could also be done by MS*+. I use MS* merely because it's somewhat easier to state and because MS*+, though probably equally plausible, is not needed. 12 MS* should be distinguished from a weaker principle, MS*-: Necessarily, for any objects Ox and Oy, any simples, the Xs, and any simples, the Ys, and any intrinsic properties, the Ps, if (i) Ox is composed of the Xs, (ii) Oy is composed of the Ys, (iii) Ox has each of the Ps, and (iii) there is a one-one correspondence between the Xs and the Ys that preserves perfectly natural properties and relations, then the Ys compose something (not necessarily Oy) that has each of the Ps. MS*-, but not MS*, leaves open the possibility that there are intrinsic properties that can differ between coinciding objects composed of simples. Perhaps some wish to claim that modal properties such as possibly existing while squashed or aesthetic properties such as being beautiful are intrinsic but can differ between a statue and a lump both composed of the same simples. MS*allows this, while still guaranteeing that any matching simples in an internally matching arrangement, if they compose anything, must compose at least one thing that is an intrinsic duplicate of the statue and at least one thing that is an intrinsic duplicate of the lump. With one exception, the work that MS* does in this paper could also be done by MS*-. The exception concerns the proof that I give in my reply to Objection 4. As I explain there, if MS* were replaced with MS*-, the proof would also need to invoke the mereological principle strong supplementation. (Like MS*, MS*is a weak supervenience claim but can be modified in an obvious way to produce a corresponding strong supervenience claim.) 13 Some friends of VIPA+ might wish to leave open the possibility that there are objects composed of the Ys but not identical with Yorick. Such objects might also be among Yorick's proper parts. 9 Now consider some intrinsic property had by this hand but not by any of Xavier's other parts. Suppose that being hand-shaped is such a property,14 and consider the property of having a part that has that property: having a hand-shaped part. According to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, since being hand-shaped is an intrinsic property, having a hand-shaped part must also be intrinsic. But if VIPA+ is the correct theory of composition, and if MS* is true, then the case of Xavier and Yorick refutes the Inheritance of Intrinsicality. After all, MS* tells us that Yorick and Xavier are intrinsic duplicates, and VIPA+ tells us that only one of them – only Xavier – has the property having a hand-shaped part.15 No property with respect to which intrinsic duplicates can differ is intrinsic. Contrary to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, then, having a hand-shaped part is not intrinsic, even though being hand-shaped is. Or so it can be argued by friends of VIPA+. VI. Objections and Replies Objection 1. MS*, which was used to argue that Xavier and Yorick are intrinsic duplicates, is refuted by the possibility of strongly emergent properties, where that term is defined as follows: F is a strongly emergent property =df. (i) F is a perfectly natural property, (ii) F can be exemplified by composite material objects, and (iii) F does not locally supervene on the perfectly natural properties and relations exemplified by only atomic material objects (McDaniel 2008: 131). Examples of such properties are sometimes taken to include phenomenal properties and certain quantum states possessed by systems of entangled particles (McDaniel 2008). The possibility of strongly emergent properties is apparently incompatible with MS*. Since, according to clause (i), strongly emergent properties must be perfectly natural, and since, in the standard Lewisian framework, all perfectly natural properties are intrinsic, we can conclude that strongly emergent properties must be intrinsic. But clause (iii) tells us, in effect, that things composed of 'matching simples in matching internal arrangements' can differ with respect to these properties. Thus it appears that if strongly emergent properties are possible, then – contrary to MS* – it is possible for things composed of matching simples in matching arrangements to fail to be intrinsic duplicates. Without MS*, we lose our original motivation to believe that Xavier and Yorick share all their intrinsic properties, and hence we lose our original reason for doubting the Inheritance of Intrinsicality. Reply. The possibility of strongly emergent properties is in tension with the Intimacy of Parthood itself. Intimacy is the 'picture' according to which a whole is nothing over and above its parts. Sider is concerned to defend Intimacy against the objection that it is incompatible with what he calls 'irreducibly macroscopic features of composite objects' (2007: 73). As examples of such properties, he cites quantum states of entangled systems and shapes of composite objects. He claims that such properties are not incompatible with Intimacy, because they can be pinned on the relations between the parts. . . For every property P of a composite object, x, there are some proper parts of x, the Ys, and some relation R, such that the Ys compose x, the Ys 14 The claim that shapes are intrinsic has been challenged (McDaniel 2003, Skow 2007). Perhaps those who doubt that shapes are intrinsic will be able to find some other property that is intrinsic even by their lights and that can play the same role in my argument as being hand-shaped. 15 MS*-, however, tells us merely that the Ys compose something (maybe not Yorick) that is an intrinsic duplicate of Xavier. No matter. After all, given VIPA+, we can conclude not merely that Yorick has no hand-shaped part, but also that nothing composed of the Ys has a hand-shaped part. Which part would be hand-shaped? Not any of the simples, not any of Yorick's cells (suppose), and not anything composed of all of Yorick's simples. But given VIPA+ and the set-up of the case, these are the only available parts. 10 stand in R, R is at least as natural as P, and necessarily, anything composed of some things standing in R has P (2007: 73-74). If there can be properties that satisfy McDaniel's definition of 'strongly emergent', however, then at least some of them resist being 'pinned on relations' in the way Sider indicates. To see this, suppose that P is strongly emergent. Then there can be composite objects x and y such that: (i) both x and y are composed of simples, (ii) there is a one-to-one correspondence between the simples that compose x and the simples that compose y that preserves perfectly natural properties and relations, and yet (iii) x has P whereas y does not. In that case P cannot be pinned, in Sider's sense, on any equally natural relation that holds amongst x's simple parts. After all, P is strongly emergent, which entails that it is perfectly natural, and in light of the one-to-one correspondence, x's simples and y's simples are alike in their perfectly natural relations. Now this leaves open the possibility that P can be pinned on some perfectly natural relation that holds amongst some things that compose x some of which are non-simple. But I take it that if strongly emergent properties are possible, then at least some of them could be instantiated by an object all of whose proper parts are simple, e.g., an object composed of just two simples. So if strongly emergent properties are possible, then some of them resist being 'pinned on relations'. As Sider seems to concede (or at least suggest), such properties would be contrary to the spirit of Intimacy: an object that had such a property would not be 'nothing over and above its parts'. For there would be more to that object's intrinsic nature than what is fixed by the intrinsic natures of (and perfectly natural relations between) its proper parts. Granted, this is not exactly an airtight proof that the relevant sorts of properties would run contrary to the Intimacy of Parthood, but since Intimacy is just a rough picture, we cannot expect much better. On the assumption that Intimacy is in tension with the possibility of strongly emergent properties, it would be self-defeating for Sider to appeal to that possibility as a way of defusing my objection to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality. We can think of situation as constituting a dilemma for Sider. Either strongly emergent properties are possible or they're not. If they are, then Intimacy becomes highly implausible and cannot function as a premise in a persuasive argument for Uniqueness and UC. If they're not possible,16 then they do not undermine my argument against the Inheritance of Intrinsicality (i.e., Objection 1 fails). Either way, Sider's case for Uniqueness and UC is in trouble. Objection 2. So far the argument against the Inheritance of Intrinsicality appears to require VIPA+. If it does, then Sider need not be much bothered by the argument, for it would have extremely limited appeal: VIPA+ has never actually been defended in print. Reply. The general style of counterexample to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality given here does not depend upon VIPA+. It can be produced in the presence of almost any theory of composition that gives extrinsic factors a role in determining whether composition occurs. This is a very broad and formidable group of theories. It would seem to include, for example, Commonsensism, the theory that recognizes just simples and the composite objects of scientifically-informed common sense (e.g., DNA molecules, amoebas, artworks, human beings, and planets, but not a fusion of my head and the Eiffel Tower).17 I take it that common sense does not recognize any such thing as a fusion of my moles but that it does recognize such things as pieces of body art, and that if I had a twin who was given an exactly similar pattern of duplicate moles (via artificial UV exposure, say) by an artist who then dubbed his work "The Map", this 16 The friend of MS* can take this second option while still embracing the possibility of something like 'emergent phenomena' – e.g., qualia that do not supervene on ordinary physical properties or spatiotemporal relations – so long as he attributes these phenomena to perfectly natural relations between simples. Thanks to a referee. 17 Compare this with the view defended in Markosian (1998). 11 would count as a piece of body art. If so, then Commonsensism tells us that my twin's moles, unlike mine, do have a fusion.18 So again we have a counterexample to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality. The precise shape, S, of The Map is intrinsic but having a part that has S is not, for it can differ between duplicates (e.g., my twin and me). This makes it clear, I hope, what a broad range of theories allow for the relevant sort of example. Those who take such answers seriously constitute a core segment of Sider's target audience. Insofar as Sider is arguing for unrestricted composition, his argument is aimed at those who initially take seriously some other theory of composition – either nihilism or some moderate theory. As Sider notes, his argument will have very little force on nihilists, since they can explain the truth of the Inheritance principles without appeal to the Intimacy of Parthood. They will (or at least can) explain the truth of those principles by appeal to nihilism itself: given nihilism, the inheritance principles are both vacuously true. Thus it seems that the primary audience for Sider's argument will be those who take moderate theories seriously: composition occurs sometimes but not always. To be sure, some moderate theories obey an intrinsicness constraint, according to which extrinsic factors are never relevant to whether composition occurs. (van Inwagen takes his own theory to obey such a constraint (1990: 138-140).) Such answers cannot be used to produce Xavier-Yorick-style examples. But these theories tend to conflict with common sense – in addition to conflicting, as all moderate theories do, with the well-known theoretical pressures toward the extreme theories. (See Markosian 2008.) Most who take moderate theories seriously will do so out of allegiance to common sense, in which case they will also have reason to take seriously those moderate theories (such as Commonsensism and VIPA+) that abandon the intrinsicness constraint. As I see it, these philosophers constitute the bulk of the target audience of Sider's argument for unrestricted composition. Objection 3. The discussion above may show that much of Sider's target audience has independent reason to doubt the Inheritance of Intrinsicality; this principle is not, as he claims, neutral with regard to theories of composition. But there is another principle in the neighborhood that does have this status. Moreover, this other principle is only slightly weaker than the original and arguably can do the same job as the original in Sider's argument: it can function as a piece of data that is common ground and that is best explained by appeal to the Intimacy of Parthood. The new principle is Weak Inheritance: If P is intrinsic, then the property having a part that has P is quasi-intrinsic, i.e., it is a property G such that necessarily, for any objects O and O*, if O and O* are intrinsic duplicates and 'part-whole isomorphs', then O has G iff O* has G.19 To say that O and O* are part-whole isomorphs is to say that their parts can be put into a one-toone correspondence that preserves the part-whole relation, i.e., it is to say that there is a bijective 18 The main lesson of Rea (1998) is that if one holds that being arranged artifact-wise (where this is at least partly an extrinsic matter) is sufficient for composing something, then one must either accept unrestricted composition or admit that extrinsic factors are at least sometimes relevant to whether composition occurs. The reason for this is that (plausibly) for any things, no matter what they are like intrinsically and no matter what their internal arrangement, it is possible that things intrinsically just like those, in just that internal arrangement, be arranged artifact-wise (because, say, some artist put them in precisely that arrangement in fulfillment of a very detailed artistic vision). 19 We could also consider a stronger variant, WI+, to the effect that if P is intrinsic, then having a part that has P is quasi-intrinsic+, i.e., a property G such that for any possible worlds w1 and w2, any object O1 in w1, and any object O2 in w2, if O1 in w1 is an intrinsic duplicate and part-whole isomorph of O2 in w2, then O1 has G in w1 iff O2 has G in w2. This would of course be vulnerable to the same objection that I give to Weak Inheritance. 12 function f from O's parts to O*'s parts such that for any parts x and y of O, x is a part of y iff f(x) is a part of f(y). The original Inheritance of Intrinsicality said that if P is intrinsic, then having a part that has P cannot differ between intrinsic duplicates. Weak Inheritance says merely that if P is intrinsic, then having a part that has P cannot differ between things that are both intrinsic duplicates and part-whole isomorphs. According to Objection 3, the original principle may admit of counterexamples, but only when the objects involved are not part-whole isomorphs. To motivate this thought, suppose that Xavier and Yorick are each composed of exactly five simples. Suppose also that Xavier's parts are his simples, himself, and his left hand (which is itself composed of two of his simples), and that Yorick's parts are his simples and himself. Then Xavier has seven parts, whereas Yorick has just six, in which case their parts cannot even be put into a one-to-one correspondence at all, much less one that preserves the part-whole relation.20 Weak Inheritance thus stands unscathed. Reply. It is easy to construct a Xavier-Yorick-style counterexample to Weak Inheritance that is just as forceful as the original. Let us alter our original example by giving Yorick an artificial left foot to go along with Xavier's artificial left hand, and let us suppose that this foot has the same number of constituent simples as does Xavier's hand. The result will be that the two men are not only intrinsic duplicates (by MS*) but also part-whole isomorphs. To see the isomorphism, suppose, as we did above, that each of them is composed of just five simples. Then a one-to-one, part-whole preserving correspondence between their parts can be established as follows: (The large oval on the left represents Xavier; the one on the right represents Yorick; the small oval on the left represents Xavier's hand, the one on the right represents Yorick's foot; the dots represent simples; and being-colocated-with-or-inside-of is being-a-part-of.) 20 We could have stipulated instead that each had himself and (say) a countable infinity of simples as parts, and that Xavier, but not Yorick, also had an additional proper part composed of some of his simples. In this case they would have the same number of parts but would still not be part-whole isomorphs, for only Xavier would have a part (any of the simples in his left hand) that is a proper part of two different parts of his (himself and his left hand). To see that this blocks the existence of the relevant sort of correspondence, let x be such a simple, and let 'x<y' mean 'x is part of y'. Then s<s, s<Hand, and s<Xavier, s≠Hand, s≠Xavier, and Hand≠Xavier. Now suppose for reductio that there is a one-one, part-whole preserving correspondence f between Xavier's parts and Yorick's. Then Yorick has parts f(s), f(Hand), and f(Xavier). Since f is one-one, the relevant parts of Yorick must be pairwise distinct (as are the corresponding parts of Xavier), and since f is part-whole preserving, f(s)<f(s), f(s)<f(Hand), and f(s)<f(Xavier). But we know that Yorick does not have such parts: in particular, Yorick has no part such as f(s) that is a proper part of two different parts of Yorick. Yorick's only parts are himself (which is not a proper part of any of his parts) and his infinitely many simples (each of which his a proper part of Yorick but not of any of Yorick's other parts). So there is no such correspondence. 13 Xavier and Yorick are intrinsic duplicates and part-whole isomorphs, and yet they still differ with respect to the property having a hand-shaped part, despite the fact that being handshaped is intrinsic. (Now they differ with respect to having a foot-shaped part too.) This violates Weak Inheritance. Objection 4. The correspondence given above is clearly of the wrong sort, for it preserves the part-whole relation but does not preserve perfectly natural relations between simples. For example, it fails to preserve spatial distance relations: the simples in Xavier's hand are exactly one nanometer apart (suppose), but the 'corresponding' simples in Yorick's foot are not. So what we need is not Weak Inheritance but Very Weak Inheritance: VWI If P is intrinsic, then the property having a part that has P is quasi-quasi-intrinsic, i.e., it is a property H such that necessarily, for any objects O and O*, if O and O* are intrinsic duplicates and both composed of simples21, and there is a bijective function f from the parts of O to the parts of O* such that: (i) for any parts x and y of O, x is part of y iff f(x) is part of f(y), (ii) for any simple part x of O and any perfectly natural property G, x has G iff f(x) has G, and (iii) for any ordered n-tuple <x1, . . ., xn> of simple parts of O and any perfectly natural relation R, x1, . . ., xn instantiate R (in that order) iff f(x1), . . ., f(xn) instantiate R (in that order), then O has H iff O* has H.22 In other words, VWI says that if P is intrinsic, then having a part that has P cannot differ between intrinsic duplicates (composed of simples) whose parts can be put into a one-to-one correspondence that preserves both the part-whole relation (amongst all the parts) and the perfectly natural properties and relations amongst the simples. This would seem to block all of the counterexamples presented so far. Reply. I agree that VWI avoids Xavier-Yorick style counterexamples. But this principle is now so much weaker than the original that I doubt it can play the role in the argument that Sider assigned to the original. The original principle asserted an extremely tight link between parts and wholes – to put it aphoristically, that the intrinsic nature of the part is always represented in a certain way within the intrinsic nature of the whole. One might well think that only a picture as bold as the Intimacy of Parthood ("a whole is nothing over and above its parts") offers a fully satisfying explanation of that tight link. But as soon as we start to doubt the full-strength Inheritance of Intrinsicality and admit that sometimes the intrinsic nature of a part might not be represented in the relevant way within the intrinsic nature of the whole, it is much less clear that we need to appeal to a picture as bold as 21 If this clause were omitted, then the principle would be vulnerable to counterexamples involving gunky intrinsic duplicates, which would satisfy (ii) and (iii) vacuously. Consider the Xavier-Yorick case represented by the diagram above, and alter it in just one way: suppose that each of the dots represents a 'gunky particle' (a particle each of whose parts, itself included, has proper parts). Then it would seem that (a) we could still establish a one-to-one, part-whole preserving correspondence between the parts of Xavier and the parts of Yorick (viz., one that pairs Xavier's hand with Yorick's foot and pairs the particles in the foot with those in the hand), that (b) Xavier and Yorick would still be intrinsic duplicates, and that (c) Xavier and Yorick would still differ with respect to having a hand-shaped part, even though being handshaped is intrinsic. Admittedly, in light of Xavier's and Yorick's gunkiness, we couldn't use MS* to argue for (b), but (b) certainly will seem highly plausible to anyone who was attracted to MS*, and there are plausible variants of those principles (arrived at by replacing 'simple' with 'particle') that we could use. So the given clause is crucial. 22 This can be plausibly strengthened in a manner parallel to that suggested for Weak Inheritance, yielding VWI+. 14 Intimacy to explain the remaining link between parts and wholes. For more modest explanations become available. VWI, e.g., seems to explicable merely by appeal to MS*, as the latter entails the former. (See the appendix for a proof.) Of course, MS* might still stand in need of explanation, and it may seem that the Intimacy of Parthood is the best candidate to do the explaining. Can Intimacy earn its keep in this way? It's not clear that it can. Unlike the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, MS* doesn't say anything about the intrinsic nature of the part always being represented within the intrinsic nature of the whole. It merely says (aphoristically put) that when things are alike at the level of the simples that compose them, then those things will be alike intrinsically 'at the level of the whole'. This is consistent with there being no especially interesting correspondence between the natures of the parts and the natures of the wholes, and it is consistent with there being intrinsic duplicates that are not just alike at the level of the simples that compose them. So, given the great distance between MS* and the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, the burden would be on Sider to motivate the claim that it is Intimacy, rather than something more modest, that provides the best explanation of MS*. Objection 5. The Inheritance of Intrinsicality tells us that the nature of the part is represented within the nature of whole – as Sider puts it, that 'the part shines through' (2007: 70). VWI tells us no such thing; it allows the part to be 'blotted out'. But Sider need not retreat to anything as weak as VWI. Instead he can conjoin VWI with: Simple Inheritance (a) If property P is intrinsic, then the property having a simple part that has P is intrinsic; and (b) if relation R is perfectly natural, then the property having some simple parts that instantiate R is intrinsic.23 What sorts of composite parts a thing has might be an extrinsic affair, if some externalist theory of composition is true. Even so, what sorts of simple parts a thing has (and how they are related) would plausibly remain intrinsic. So Simple Inheritance is not threatened by the examples so far considered. Moreover, while Simple Inheritance does not go so far as to say that all parts 'shine though' in the relevant sense, it does say that at least the simple parts do. This goes well beyond MS* or VWI and calls for a correspondingly stronger explanation. Granted, Simple Inheritance does leave open the possibility of objects none of whose proper parts 'shine through', for there might still be gunky objects. (An object is gunky just in case each of its parts, itself included, has proper parts; a gunky object has no simple parts.) But Sider can appeal to additional principles to cover those cases: G1 The property being gunky is intrinsic. G2 The property having a gunky part is intrinsic. The first ensures that if an object is gunky, this fact is reflected in its intrinsic nature. Together, the first and the second guarantee that even gunky parts 'shine through,' at least in a limited way. Whereas Simple Inheritance ensures that the complete intrinsic nature of a simple part of a thing will be reflected in the intrinsic nature of the whole, G1 and G2 ensure that at least one aspect of the intrinsic nature of a gunky part of a thing (the part's gunkiness) is reflected within the intrinsic nature of the whole. So once again, Sider has uncontroversial data (the conjunction of VWI, Simple Inheritance, G1, and G2) that is best explained by appeal to the Intimacy of Parthood. 23 Thanks to Ted Sider for suggesting something in this neighborhood. 15 Reply. This is a definite improvement over the two previous suggestions. But there is still a significant gap between the new 'conjunctive principle' and the original Inheritance of Intrinsicality. The conjunctive principle guarantees only that the gunkiness of a gunky part is reflected in the intrinsic nature of the whole. According to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, if a thing A has a part b, then, regardless of whether b is gunky, every intrinsic property of b is reflected in A's intrinsic nature: e.g., if having a mass of 1 unit is an intrinsic property of b, then having a part with mass of 1 unit is an intrinsic property of A. We give this up when we shift to the conjunctive principle. It tells us that if b is simple, then all of its intrinsic properties are reflected in A's nature, and if b is composite but composed of simples, then at least the complete natures of its simples (and their arrangement) will be reflected in A's nature. But if b is gunky, then, for all the conjunctive principle tells us, much of b's nature may be 'blotted out' and go completely unrepresented in A's nature: e.g., even if having a mass of 1 unit is an intrinsic property of b, having a part that has a mass of 1 unit might (for reasons stemming from Xavier-Yorick-style cases, e.g.) merely be an extrinsic property of A. And if A itself is gunky, then what is true of b may be true of all of A's proper parts, so that A's intrinsic nature reflects relatively little about the intrinsic natures of any of its proper parts. So there is a significant gap between the Inheritance of Intrinsicality and the Conjunctive Principle. As a result, even if the Intimacy of Parthood would be needed to explain the former principle, there is still plenty of room to doubt that Intimacy is needed to explain the latter. In light of the distance between the original data and the new data, Sider's case for saying that Intimacy is the best explanation of the old data does not transfer directly to the new data.24 Objection 6. What Xavier-Yorick-style examples show is that a certain set S of propositions is inconsistent. S includes: (i) the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, (ii) MS*, (iii) VIPA+ (or some relevantly similar theory of composition, such as Commonsensism), and (iv) some proposition to the effect that simples are arranged in the manner indicated in the example and have the indicated histories. This does not cast doubt on the Inheritance of Intrinsicality; rather, it casts doubt on the conjunction of MS* and VIPA+. Reply. Different philosophers will of course respond to the example in different ways. I have no intention of arguing that (ii) and (iii) are so plausible that everyone ought to respond by doubting (i). But I do think that they are sufficiently plausible, or at least taken seriously by a sufficiently large group of metaphysicians, that the inconsistency of set S is significant. Whether this inconsistency is used to argue against (i), (ii), or (iii), the resulting argument will be of interest. For example, there has been intense controversy surrounding microphysical supervenience principles in the neighborhood of MS*.25 The fact that MS* conflicts with the conjunction of (i), (iii) and (iv) will give some philosophers a new reason to doubt it. Likewise, I suspect that many philosophers have felt vaguely uncomfortable with externalist theories of composition like VIPA+ and Commonsensism and yet have been unable to 24 A referee suggested replacing Simple Inheritance with a certain principle that he or she suggested might be equally plausible but stronger and more robust as data in support of Intimacy: roughly, if P is intrinsic, then the property having a part that has P and that does not 'owe its existence to outside factors' is intrinsic. Since there are, presumably, composite objects and even gunky objects that do not owe their existence to outside factors (in the manner of Xavier's hand), this principle, unlike Simple Inheritance, would have the consequence that the properties of such composite objects do 'shine through'. Whether this move helps depends on whether we can make sense of the notion of owing one's existence to outside factors. On this latter question I am agnostic. Although I have made several attempts to define the notion without success (and without achieving any insights that would justify discussing them in print, which would be somewhat lengthy and tedious), I admit that others might do better, and that, alternatively, the notion might be a legitimate primitive. 25 See, e.g., Merricks (1998a ,1998b), Hawley (1998), Noonan (1999a, 1999b). 16 formulate a non-question-begging argument against those theories. This seems to be Peter van Inwagen's predicament. Concerning VIPA+ (or a close variant of it), he writes that This answer goes against all my deepest instincts. . . . [A] proper answer to the Special Composition Question must conform to the following principle: If the xs compose something, and if the ys perfectly duplicate the xs (both in their intrinsic properties and in the spatiotemporal and causal relations they bear to one another), the the ys compose something. . . . . I do not know how to defend my instinctive allegiance to this principle except by trying, as I have tried, to present the principle in as attractive a light as possible (1990: 140). The argument from (i), (ii), and (iv) to the negation of (iii) strikes me as being just the sort of thing that van Inwagen is looking for.26 And, just as a matter of sociology, I predict that some philosophers will respond to the example in just the way I've been highlighting here – by reducing their credence in (i). Objection 7. The case against MS* is more powerful than you acknowledge. After all, the following argument against MS*, which the VIPA+-lover is in a position to offer, does not rely on the Inheritance of Intrinsicality: Xavier and Yorick each have, say, exactly 1,000 simple parts. Given VIPA+, Xavier has two additional (non-simple) parts, his hand and himself; and Yorick, by contrast, has only one non-simple part, namely himself. So Xavier has 1,002 parts overall, whereas Yorick has only 1,001 parts overall. Together with the principle that INP for any number n, the property having exactly n parts is intrinsic, this entails that Xavier and Yorick are not intrinsic duplicates, contrary to MS*. So it's not just the Inheritance of Intrinsicality that would be threatened by conjunction of MS* and VIPA+; INP would be too. This reflects badly on MS*. Reply. Two points are relevant here. First, rejecting INP is not much costlier than rejecting the Inheritance of Intrinsicality. I take it that upon initially encountering the case of Xavier and Yorick, virtually everyone will find it natural to assume that (given VIPA+) Xavier has one more part than Yorick. If, in the context of that assumption, one is willing to take the case seriously as a counterexample to the Inheritance of Intrinsicality, then why shouldn't one take it seriously as a counterexample to INP as well? Second, remember that we have the option of putting the blame on VIPA+ (or whatever externalist theory of composition we're using) rather than on MS*. For what it's worth, if we set aside the possibility of strongly emergent properties and relations, I would much sooner reject VIPA+ than MS*, and I'm not alone in this. But I confess that I have no argument for this preference beyond an appeal to intuition. Objection 8. Perhaps there are different senses of 'intrinsic', some of which make the Inheritance of Intrinsicality true and others of which don't, but all of which are legitimate, reasonably natural sharpenings of the term as it has been used in the recent literature. In that case, couldn't Sider just stipulate that for the purposes of his argument, only the former senses of 'intrinsic' are relevant? Reply. To admit that the Inheritance of Intrinsicality will fail (or at least be controversial) on some legitimate, reasonably natural sharpenings of 'intrinsic' would be to diminish the force 26 Cameron (2007) responds to a related argument that I suggested in my commentary on that paper at the 2006 Bellingham Summer Philosophy Conference. 17 of the argument. If that principle were uncontroversial on all legitimate sharpenings of 'intrinsic', this would be a much more robust piece of data, and it would be much more likely to support Intimacy, than if the Inheritance principle were merely uncontroversial on some legitimate sharpenings while being controversial on others. I take it that Sider's claim is that the Inheritance principle is uncontroversial on all such sharpenings; see, e.g., (2007: 75). VII. Conclusion Classical mereology is opposed by two partially overlapping groups of dissenters: coincidentalists, who embrace coinciding objects and deny Uniqueness, and composition restricters, who deny UC and say that some pluralities of objects lack fusions. How do these rebel groups fare against Sider's counteroffensive? Some will find the Intimacy of Parthood so nebulous as to be incapable of explaining any data, or of yielding any predictions. Others will be more concessive. They will allow that Intimacy is intelligible, that it is supported by the data to which Sider appeals, and that it supports UC and Uniqueness. But in the end they will reject it anyway, simply because they take the case against UC and/or Uniqueness to outweigh the case for Intimacy. I have explored a pair of responses that engage with Sider's arguments in a more substantive way. On behalf of the coincidentalists, I have suggested that they can concede the case for Intimacy while resisting the step from Intimacy to Uniqueness. On behalf of the composition restricters, I have suggested that some of them – those who are firmly attached to the relevant doctrines concerning microphysical supervenience and externalism about composition – will have independent reason to reject some of the data that Sider uses to support Intimacy. But even those who are not so firmly attached may still have something to learn from the XavierYorick case, for they can see it as providing a new and unanticipated reason to reject the conjunction of the given doctrines. Appendix: Proof that MS* entails VWI Suppose that (a) o and o* are intrinsic duplicates, that (b) they're both composed of simples, and that (c) their parts can be put into a one-one correspondence f that preserves both the part-whole relation (amongst all parts) and perfectly natural properties and relations (amongst their simple parts). Finally, suppose that (d) P is an intrinsic property. To show that MS* entails VWI, it suffices to show that (a) – (d) plus MS* entails that o has the property having a part that has P iff o* does. Since our assumptions do not distinguish o from o*, we can prove the biconditional by proving just one direction of it. So suppose that o has the property having a part that has P. Then there is a part of o, call it o-, that has P. Since o is composed of some simples (call them the Os) and ois a part of o, we can conclude that ois also composed of some simples (the O-s) and that the O-s are among the Os: the set of the former is a (proper or improper) subset of the set of the latter. Since f is part-whole preserving and hence pairs simples only with simples, it will give us some simple parts of o*, call them the O*-s, that correspond to the O-s. Moreover, the fact that f is part-whole preserving also entails that the O*-s compose f(o-). Since f preserves perfectly natural properties and relations between the simple parts of o (the Os) and the simple parts of o* (the O*s), and since the O*-s are among the O*s just as the O-s are among the Os, f also preserves perfectly natural properties and relations between the O-s and the O*-s. So we now know this: (i) ois composed of the O-s, (ii) the O-s are all simples, (iii) f(o-) is composed of the O*-s, (iv) the O*-s are all simples, (v) there is a one-one correspondence between the O-s and the O*-s that preserves perfectly natural properties and relations, (vi) P is 18 intrinsic, and (vii) ohas P. Conjoined with MS*, this entails that f(o-) has P too.27 Since f(o-) is a part of o*, it follows that o* has a part that has P and hence that o* instantiates the property having a part that has P. So MS* entails VWI. 28 References Cameron, R. 2007. 'The Contingency of Composition', Philosophical Studies 136: 99-121. Hawley, K. 1998. 'Merricks on whether Consciousness is Intrinsic', Mind 107: 841-843. Lewis, D. 1986. On the Plurality of Worlds (London: Blackwell). Markosian, N. 1998. 'Brutal Composition', Philosophical Studies 92: 211-249 Markosian, N. 2008. 'Restricted Composition', in Sider, Hawthorne, and Zimmerman, eds., Contemporary Debates in Metaphysics (London: Blackwell), pp. 341-363. McDaniel, K. 2003. 'No Paradox of Multi-Location', Analysis 63: 309-311. McDaniel, K. 2008. 'Against Composition As Identity' Analysis 68: 128-133. Merricks, T. 1998a. 'Against the Doctrine of Microphysical Supervenience', Mind 107: 59-72. Merricks, T. 1998b. 'On Whether Being Conscious is Intrinsic', Mind 107: 845-846, Noonan, H. 1999a. 'Microphysical Supervenience and Consciousness', Mind 108: 755-759. Noonan. H. 1999b. Identity, Constitution and Microphysical Supervenience. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 99(3), pp. 273–88. Rea, M. 1998. 'In Defense of Mereological Universalism', Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 58: 347-360. Skow, B. 2007. 'Are Shapes Intrinsic?,' Philosophical Studies 113: 111-130. Sider, T. 2007. 'Parthood', The Philosophical Review 116: 51-91. Van Inwagen, P. 1990. Material Beings (Ithaca: Cornell). 27 MS*does not have this effect; it merely guarantees that the O*-s compose something (call it q) that has P, not that f(o-) itself has P. If q (unlike f(o-)), might fail to be a part of o-, then we have no guarantee that ohas a part that has P. We do get this guarantee, however, if we adopt the popular (though not universally accepted) mereological principle strong supplementation: necessarily, if every part of x overlaps y, then x is a part of y. Since every part of p is either a simple part of oor is entirely composed of simple parts of o-, it follows that every part of p overlaps o-, which together with strong supplementation entails that p itself is a part of o-. 28 Likewise, VWI+ is entailed by MS*+. The proof is parallel.

Chomskyan arguments against truth-conditional semantics based on variability and co-predication Agustín Vicente Ikerbasque: Basque Foundation for Science & University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) [email protected] Abstract In this paper I try to show that semantics can explain word-to-world relations and that sentences can have meanings that determine truth-conditions. Critics like Chomsky typically maintain that only speakers denote, i.e., only speakers, by using words in one way or another, represent entities or events in the world. However, according to their view, individual acts of denotations are not explained just by virtue of speakers' semantic knowledge (since, according to them, semantic knowledge is very scarce: see Pietroski, 2018). Against this view, I will hold that, in the typical cases considered, semantic knowledge can account for the denotational uses of words of individual speakers. Introduction The idea that the meaning of a sentence of a natural language determines its truthconditions has a long history. Minimally, the idea comes to the view that, given that a sentence is a representation that has a predicative structure, its representational content determines the conditions under which the representation is true. In general, the content 2 of a representation, or what the representation is about, determines its accuracy conditions. For instance, the content of a perceptual representation determines the conditions under which tokening that representation would make the tokening accurate. If the perceptual representation is about a black flying object, then the tokening of the representation is accurate only if it is tokened when there is a black flying object in the environment. All representations have accuracy conditions determined by what they are about. The accuracy conditions of representations that have a predicative structure are truth-conditions: the representation is accurate if it is true1. Thus, if a sentence of a natural language is representational, its content has to determine its truth conditions. The tradition of thinking that the meaning of a sentence can be expressed in terms of the truth conditions that its content determines is under heavy attack these days. The more we know about language, the more clearly we see that it is impossible to pair sentences with truth conditions one to one, even if we remove from our vocabulary all those expressions that require some contextual parameter to get a denotation (from demonstratives to gradable adjectives). This is because the rest of the lexical items also fail to have a definite denotation or content. No single word-type, it seems, has a representational content in the minimal sense that was introduced above, such that it seems impossible to provide the accuracy or appropriateness conditions of the use of a certain word. Examples abound, but probably the most striking ones concern proper and natural kind terms. As Chomsky (2000, 2016) has long argued, a proper name such as London can be used to refer to a place, to a set of people, to a political institution, to an economic centre, and even to a way of life, while the natural kind term water refers to 1 I do not mean to say that only sentences have predicative structure. The claim is that if a representation has a predicative structure, then its accuracy conditions are truth-conditions. 3 H2O only in the scientific "language game", so to speak2. Otherwise, we do not call water a cup of tea, even if it may have a higher percentage of H2O molecules than the liquid that comes from a well (see Malt, 1994, Pietroski, 2018) The accuracy conditions of uses of London or water, thus, are not univocal or even consistent. In the case of perception, it has proven to be notoriously difficult to specify what a certain perceptual representation represents. There is a long debate concerning what kind of entity a frog may be representing when she snaps her tongue at a fly. However, we can say that a certain perceptual representation produced by the frog's visual system represents, or is about, some particular content –we only do not know what that content is, and thus, we are not in a position to state its accuracy conditions-. A word-type, in contrast, seems to lack a particular denotation. That is, the issue is not that we do not know what content a word has; the issue is that a word does not have a content, i.e. an entity or event that it is about. As Chomsky and Pietroski insist, word-types fail to have denotations. A denotation, so the reasoning goes, is some entity in the world (or in the world as we believe it to be), and there is nothing in the world that is a place, a political institution, a way of life, etc., all at the same time3. Also, there is nothing in the world that covers all the uses we make of the term water, uses which are not based on how much H2O a certain liquid has. 2 Here I will be concerned with cases similar to the London and the water case. For other examples and responses, see Kennedy and Stanley (2009), Forbes (2012), and Segal (2012). 3 See Chomsky (2000; 37): "London is not a fiction, but considering it as London – that is, through the perspective of a city name, a particular type of linguistic expression – we accord it curious properties: as noted earlier, we allow that under some circumstances, it could be completely destroyed and rebuilt somewhere else, years or even millennia later, still being London, that same city. [...].We can regard London with or without regard to its population: from one point of view, it is the same city if its people desert it; from another, we can say that London came to have a harsher feel to it through the Thatcher years, a comment on how people act and live. Referring to London, we can be talking about a location or area, people who sometimes live there, the air above it (but not too high), buildings, institutions, etc., in various combinations (as in London is so unhappy, ugly, and polluted that it should be destroyed and rebuilt 100 miles away, still being the same city). Such terms as London are used to talk about the actual world, but there neither are nor are believed to be things-in-the world with the properties of the intricate modes of reference that a city name encapsulates". 4 Travis' famous cases point at the same phenomenon (Travis, 1996, 2008): in There is milk in the fridge, milk may stand for some portion of drinkable milk, or for some portion of milk that has been spilled inside the fridge. In The leaves are green, the leaves we speak about can be the leaves as they are intrinsically, or the leaves as they look, after having been painted (see Vicente, 2015), etc. So, declarative sentences do not have a particular truth conditional content, because their constituents do not have a denotational semantics, i.e. their constituents are not representations in the sense explained above: they are not about particular entities or events in the world. From here critics conclude that semantics is not in the business of explaining word-to-world relations (Chomsky, 2000, Pietroski, 2005, 2018, Yalcin, 2014, Collins, 2017). This latter is the thesis I will scrutinize in this paper. I will try to argue that the arguments that critics present do not show that semantics cannot explain word-to-world relations because sentences do not have meanings that determine truth-conditions4,5. Critics typically maintain that only speakers denote, i.e., only speakers, by using words in one way or another, represent entities or events in the world. However, according to their view, individual acts of denotations are not explained just by virtue of speakers' semantic knowledge (since, according to them, semantic knowledge is very scarce: see Pietroski, 2018). Against this view, I will hold that, at least in the cases critics seem to find more problematic, semantic knowledge can account for the denotational uses of 4 That sentences have meanings that determine truth-conditions does not imply that sentences have univocal truth-conditions. It can be that sentences have several meanings, and that each of these meanings determines a set of truth-conditions. That is, in the view, as it is stated, sentential meanings cannot be captured in a simple T-schema. 5 Also, I have to note that I will be less concerned with sentences and truth-conditions than with (certain) words and denotations. That words have denotations is a pre-requisite that has to be satisfied so that sentences can have truth-conditions. But then it has to be explained how composition rules work: this is the part that I will be less concerned with in this paper. Also, the paper will be focused on nominals and what nominals denote because the arguments based on variability and co-predication affect nouns (proper or common). As I will argue, this is also the case with respect to Travis cases. The thesis that I defend may not be valid for other classes of words (though see below). But the dialectics of the paper is: if the biggest problem that truth-conditional semantics has to face is the one that the critics signal, truthconditional semantics is not in such big trouble. 5 words of individual speakers. I will summarize my position at the end of this introductory section. Before that, I briefly review different ways in which one can react to this kind of attack on truth-conditional semantics. There are different ways to react to this attack on truth-conditional semantics. One is to single out a particular denotation among the different denotations that a word can have and explain the rest of possible denotations in terms of semantic or pragmatic mechanisms. For instance, it can be held that the literal meaning (i.e., the "real" denotation) of London is a certain spatial location, the rest of the possible denotations being generated by means of metonymical operations on that literal meaning. If the explanation provided for these denotation shifts is pragmatic, the result would be that although word-types have denotations and sentences contents that determine truthconditions, the truth-conditions of particular utterances of those sentences will typically not coincide with the truth-conditions of the sentence-type. This gives rise to the debate between minimalists and contextualists over what type of content theoreticians should attempt to explain: literal truth-conditions, which are usually not entertained in linguistic processing, or "intuitive" truth-conditions, which incorporate already shifted denotations (Recanati, 2010). This kind of "go pragmatic" reaction to arguments from variability is now loosing traction. On the one hand, as some authors have noted (e.g., Asher, 2011, Del Pinal, 2018), it is certainly difficult to specify the when and why of the pragmatic mechanisms that are said to operate on literal meanings. An account such as Recanati's, which allows for free modulation of literal meanings according to contextual information, seems to lack the resources to explain why John finished the apple can easily be read as "John finished eating the apple" while John stopped the apple will never be read in such a way (Asher, 2011). Similarly, it is easy to understand Mary began the book as meaning that Mary began reading the book, but an utterance of 6 Mary began the elevator will not be understood as meaning that Mary began going up in the elevator. On the other hand, the idea that lexical items have literal meanings that are simple and stable denotations is an idealization that has at least two problems. The first problem is that the idealization is insensitive to a lot of systematic ways in which words combine (see below on Travis cases) and to the richness of such combinations: for instance, a privative adjective such as fake does not simply affect the denotation of the noun it modifies, but it also affects in a systematic way several other dimensions of its meaning (function, origin, sortal: Del Pinal, 2015). The second problem is that the idealization is simply untenable on the face of how entrenched polysemy is and how senses of polysemous expressions are typically stored and processed. A literalist hypothesis would predict that a particular sense of each word is accessed easier in all conditions. However, by and large, this is not what is observed, especially in the case of polysemies that pass copredication tests (Frisson, 2015, Schumacher, 2013, OrtegaAndrés & Vicente, 2019). On the other hand, one can also think that truth-conditional semantics has the resources to explain meaning shifts and provide "intuitive" truth conditions without invoking pragmatic operations. A number of rules have been proposed to account for regular polysemies under names such as "meat grinder" or "universal grinder" (Copestake and Briscoe, 1995), and some authors make massive use of coercion to explain how a literal denotation can be coerced into a different meaning if the type of the literal denotation clashes with the selectional restrictions of the surrounding linguistic material (Asher, 2015). This kind of reaction to the variability argument tries to show that the denotational semantic apparatus is not as meager as the skeptics, as well as the pragmaticians, think. The approach, however, shares some problems with the pragmatic approach, since there is evidence against any kind of general literalist approach. In 7 many cases (and especially in the cases of copredication), switching from one sense to another of a polysemous expression is smooth, there being no trace of an operation such as coercion (Frisson, 2015, Schumacher, 2013, Ortega-Andrés & Vicente, 2019). Another way of responding to the skeptics challenge is to hold that, contrary to what they claim, there are indeed entities in the world with the adequate profile to be denotations of word-types. Thus, London can be said to denote a complex entity formed by aspects or parts that specify a place, a political institution, a set of inhabitants, etc; school can be said to denote a complex entity formed by aspects that relate to a certain building, an institution, the people who run the institution, the kids that go to a certain building each day to attend classes, etc. According to this view, the ontology of the world includes complex entities formed by simpler entities: a statue is a complex formed by a piece of matter and some structure or organization; a human being is – maybea mongrel formed by a body and a person, etc. Such complexes have distinct parts, each with its own persistence conditions; however, when they are together, they can be considered a single entity. Word-types denote these complex entities, but we can also use the words that denote these complexes to denote only parts of them. In a sense, the literal meaning of a word for, e.g., a city, is a complex entity. However, we can also single out a part or an aspect of that complex entity and refer only to that particular aspect, as when we say London is huge or London is unfriendly. The selection of these particular aspects is mediated by some semantic mechanism6: huge is a predicate that requires a "place" argument, whereas unfriendly requires an "animate entity" argument. It is relatively easy for us to believe that, say, John is a person and a body. When we say I met John, we say that we met the whole thing. But when we say John is fat we refer to his body, while when we say John is kind we refer to the person. Similarly, book 6 Although explaining how this semantic mechanism works is no easy task (see Asher, 2011, Gotham, 2016). 8 denotes an informational content and a physical object. When we say I have a new book in the market, we refer to the whole complex; when we say the book is heavy but interesting the book we talk about is still the text and tome complex, which offers its two aspects for separate predication. But in the book is interesting we only denote the text aspect, and in the book is heavy we refer to the tome aspect. Pustejovsky (1995) introduced a new type in type theory, "dot types", which refer to complex entities: dot objects. Dot objects are formed by two or more different objects that belong to different types, which are then called the 'aspects' of the dot object. The denotation of book is text•tome, the denotation of lunch is food•event of eating the food, etc. The idea that has been pointed at in the previous paragraph is to consider that our word-types may denote, or may be about, dot-objects, dot-objects being part of the world we talk about. Some formal ontologists (Arapinis, 2013) as well as formal semanticists (Gotham, 2016) have indeed pursued this line. I will criticize this view in the next section. However, it is also possible to think about these dot objects (and other similar posits) not as things in the world, but as descriptions or representations of conceptual structures in our minds. In this view, which is a yet third way to react to the attack of the skeptics, word-types do not denote entities in the world, but stand for conceptual structures that offer different possibilities of denotation. This is the line I am going to pursue here. The picture I will argue for is the following: the meaning of a word-type is a concept, a concept being a body of knowledge about a certain category stored in long-term memory. Concepts understood in this sense are structured mental entities that support different ways of categorizing the categories they are about and of supporting inferences. Categorization and inference can be based (at least) on theory-like or prototypical knowledge, as well as on stored exemplars or on idealizations (Machery, 9 2009, Weiskopf, 2009, Murphy, 2002, 2016, Rice, 2014, Vicente & Martínez-Manrique, 2016). This variety of ways of categorizing explains why words can be used to denote only partially overlapping categories (say, water perhaps including tea but excluding water from a well vs. water including water from a well but excluding tea). However, concepts also provide a different kind of possibilities of denotation, related not to different ways of categorizing certain entities or substances, but to different pieces of information stored in the concept or knowledge structure. These are the cases of London, book, or school. In these cases, word tokens have denotations that do not overlap; rather, they refer to different kinds of entities in the world. But such denotations are represented by highly salient parts or aspects of a concept which, given the activation they receive, are easily targeted by the use of the word the concept is related to. I will try to explain how these two different kinds of possibilities of denotation (overlapping vs. not overlapping) can be accounted for. My focus, however, will be the non-overlapping cases, which I will examine by looking at the school example. I will provide a sketch of a conceptual structure that can be thought as the lexical meaning of school, which accounts for its different word-token denotations. This view should be able to provide a plausible account of how lexical meaning connects to (word-token) denotations. The most difficult issue to tackle in such a picture is co-predication, i.e. those cases where, apparently, we refer to the complex entities mentioned above. Copredication is a problem also for the authors that take a more Strawsonian view on denotation (i.e., language is not representational, but individuals do refer to worldly entities by using language). I will suggest that co-predicational sentences are compilations of complex semantic structures. It still has to be explained when these compilations are available: I will suggest that, typically, it is a matter of how certain 10 aspects of a concept enter into co-activation patterns. The general upshot of the approach, in any case, will be the following: whereas lexical meaning is not denotational in a simple, direct, way, it does determine a set of possible denotations. The critics are right about the claim that word-types do not have denotations, but not about the argument they mount on the basis of that claim. That word-types do not have denotations does not mean that lexical meanings do not contribute to determining truthconditions or that semantics is not in the business of explaining word-to-world relations. I will restrict my discussion to the case of nouns. It is possible that other classes of words (e.g., verbs) do not behave in the way that nouns behave. It is credible that verbs have the kind of scarce or thin meaning that Pietroski says all words have, encoding only general or schematic information of the kind that Levin and Rappaport Hovav have been pointing at for a long time (Levin & Rappaport Hovav, 2013; see also Allott & Textor, 2017). This possibility suggests that semantics can be more complicated than expected, such that the truth-conditions of a given sentence arise from an interaction between the rich meanings of nouns and the schematic meaning of verbs and other classes of words. For the most part, I will not enter into this issue here, though, as a reviewer reminds me, cases analogous to co-predication can also be found in the verbal domain: e.g., Elena writes movingly but illegibly. In any case, my claims will concern the semantic knowledge associated with nouns, which is, after all, where the critics have lately placed the battleground7. 7 What can be called a "rich meanings" or multidimensional account of verbs can be found in Zeevat et al. (2017), as applied to the polysemy of fall, and especially in Loebner's (ms) cascade account of verbs meanings. According to Loebner, verb meanings can be explained in terms of levels of what I will here call "realization". A case in point is the example above of writing, which can denote different actions that are in realization relations. Loebner makes use of frame semantics to flesh out his proposal. Frame semantics are also close in spirit to the proposals here presented, though I prefer not to commit to any particular account in linguistic semantics (not even to Pustejovsky's, which I will take as a starting point later on). Thanks to a reviewer for directing me to Loebner's work. 11 Dot objects and concepts as routes to denotations It is certainly weird to believe that there is an entity that is a place, a political entity, an economic centre, a way of living, and maybe a football team, all at the same time. It may make sense to believe that there is an entity that is a person and a body, or a text and a tome, but the denotational variability associated with a word is difficult to handle in terms of complex objects8. Think for instance about school: school can stand, at least, for: (1) a building: the school has been painted in red; (2) an educational process: she went to school; (3) a daily event: school starts at 9:00; (4) the rules of the institution that is associated with the building: the school has prohibited wearing hats in the classroom; (5) the people who run the local institution: I have talked to the school about it already; (6) the kids that attend a particular local institution: Today the school went for a visit to the Cathedral. There is a unity to all these different denotations, for all of them relate to a certain social artifact that is there for the purpose of educating people, but it is unclear that this unity can be captured in terms of a complex object that is a compound of the different denotations. The literature on dot objects discusses whether the alleged dot objects can be counted as such. Asher (2011), for instance, holds that we can only count informational books or 8 The book case is not so easy either: in yes, the book is beautiful but not credible we seem to denote two different senses associates to the "text" meaning: say, the writing and the plot. Thanks to my student Marina Ortega-Andrés for pointing this to me. 12 physical books, not pairs formed by physical objects (tomes) and contents (texts). From this he infers that dot objects, understood as complex entities, do not exist (if you cannot count them, they don't exist). Gotham (2016), in contrast, claims that in There are three red interesting books we count physical objects paired with the contents they realize. Arapinis and Vieu (2015), on the other hand, try to establish conditions that the physical objects and the contents have to fulfill in order to be the objects of counting as complex entities. I think that, pressing as this counting objection is, there is an even more pressing objection against the existence of the complex entities that allegedly figure as denotations of polysemous terms such as book or school. This objection against the "ontologization" of dot objects revolves around the idea that the persistence conditions of the wholes that inherently polysemous terms allegedly denote are unclear. If we say (Chomsky, 2000): London is so unhappy, ugly, and polluted that it should be destroyed and rebuilt 100 miles away, it seems that we are claiming that the alleged whole would survive even if only one of its parts (its reconstructed buildings and streets) would survive (nowhere is it said that inhabitants and councils are moved 100 miles away). However, it seems that the alleged whole should not exist when only one of its constitutive parts persist: if we say that a human being is constituted by body and mind, then the human being goes out of existence if either part does. In contrast, if, in the Chomskyan situation, all Londoners and the London institutions go on exile and decide not to move to the new location, we can also say that London is wherever the Londoners and the institutions are. So, if London could persist with the persistence of any of its parts, and parts can persist independently from each other, then we have too many Londons9. This, I take it, is a serious problem for defenders of the "complex entities" approach. 9 Riaño, a village in the North of Spain, was flooded after a dam was constructed. The Government built a 13 I will take a very different route: I will attempt at explaining facts about co-predication in terms of our conceptualization of the world, a point of view that can also explain the water and the Travis's cases (although I will not say much about these cases here). This means, to begin with, that the proposal has more explanatory power than any other proposal that tackles each of these phenomena with different tools. As said above, a concept, according to the standard view in psychology, is a body of knowledge stored in long-term memory that is involved in higher level cognitive tasks, especially in categorization and inference. Concepts have some internal structure and are not isolated from each other. There are different accounts about how concepts are structured: in terms of exemplars and a similarity metric, in terms of prototypes that abstract statistical information from exemplars, in terms of theory-like or causal structures, or as hybrids of all these different structures –and maybe more, such as ideals (Murphy, 2002, Weiskopf, 2009, Machery, 2009, Rice, 2014, Bloch-Mullins, 2017)-. Here I will assume that a concept typically includes prototypical and theory-like information, maybe meshed together (Hampton et al. 2009, Rice, 2014, Bloch-Mullins, 2017), and can also recruit information from stored exemplars and idealizations (see Vicente & MartínezManrique, 2016). The notion of concept that (some) psychologists use is said to be different from the notion used in philosophy (Machery, 2009). The following difference will be relevant to new village by the side of the lake that emerged, but many people refused to go to the new Riaño. Suppose that all the inhabitants of the old Riaño, including the major and the town council, refused to move to the new location. In that case, the following three assertions would have been true: (1)Riaño is now in the middle of the lake. (2) Riaño is an ugly village. (3) Riaño refused to move to the new location and ended up settling down in a different place. Nobody would utter (1-3) in a row, but each of (1-3) says something that is true. One cannot react, to any utterance of (1-3), by saying: 'well, strictly speaking, Riaño does not exist anymore'. My point, thus, is that, contrary to intuitive ontological principles, the defender of dot objects has to commit to the view that a particular dot object would persist even when its constitutive parts are pulled apart, with the consequence that the dot object entity is then able to persist in several different entities. 14 our concerns: whereas psychologists identify concepts as bodies of knowledge that have certain roles in higher order cognition, philosophers have it that concepts are constituents, or building blocks, of thoughts. The view that will be defended here is that concepts in the psychologist's sense do not form part of thoughts; rather, the building blocks of thoughts will be parts or aspects of the concepts psychologists-sense. The hypothesis that I want to pursue is that nouns stand for concepts. In other words, the meaning of a noun is a concept. Concepts are representational entities: they are bodies of information about a certain category. However, concepts also offer different possibilities for denotation, depending on what kind of information the thinker focuses on and is therefore brought to working memory. To use an example borrowed from Machery and Seppälä (2010): there is a GRANDMOTHER concept, which is about grandmothers. This concept includes theory-like information about what grandmothers are -how they come into being-; but it also has prototypical information about grandmothers. Upon seeing an old lady, one can categorize her as a grandmother based on prototypical information only; accordingly, her thought "there is a car approaching a gentle grandmother" will have a prototypical representation of grandmothers as a constituent. The denotation of that representation in thought, and the denotation of the word-token grandmother used in giving voice to that thought, is not the set of actual grandmothers, but the set of old people that look like typical grandmothers. This kind of view can easily explain the water case: water can denote H2O, thus excluding the liquid from the well, when categorization is guided by the theory-like, essentialist, structure. But it can also stand for a liquid that looks enough like the stuff in rivers and lakes when categorization uses the prototype structure10. An adequate 10 It also explains cases like these, where the words in italics take a prototypical denotation: (1) Your friend is very German 15 explanation of Travis' cases requires a paper on their own, but proposals such as Vicente's (2012, 2015) and Del Pinal's (2017) can serve as illustrations of how conceptual structures can account for the "green leaves" case. Del Pinal (2017), for instance, uses a slightly revised version of Pustejovsky's qualia structures (Pustejovsky, 1995) in order to explain the behavior of a number of adj+noun and noun+noun constructions. To put it very briefly: a qualia structure (Del Pinal's version) is a conceptual structure associated with a noun that includes information about the kind, the origin, the constitution, the stereotypical appearance, and the function, of the entity the noun denotes. According to Del Pinal's view, modifications can apply in principle to any of the qualia. Thus, green N can be three ways ambiguous: greenness can be predicated of the origin of the denotation of the nominal, of its associated stereotypical appearance, and of its constitutive structure. When green modifies ORIGIN we get the reading "naturally green"; when green modifies APPEARANCE the reading is "looks green"; and modification of CONSTITUTION in principle accounts for the variability observed in our judgments about how much of a certain object has to be green to be considered green. If an object has parts (that's what CONSTITUTION refers to), then it may be enough that some parts of the object are green for it to be considered a green object (e.g. a green apple has to have a green skin, a green tree is not expected to have a green trunk, etc) . The school case (2) The platypus is more a mammal than a bird (Sassoon, 2017). Cases like (1) have been typically treated as cases of coercion, where the denotation of the predicate, which is not gradable, is turned into a gradable property: the prototype/stereotype associated to Germans. However, both in (1) and in (2), cases that Sassoon (2017) uses to assign a prototypical meaning to common names, can be seen as exhibiting that kind of polysemy that results from having different conceptual structures, or ways of categorizing, associated with a particular word. 16 In this section, I will present a somewhat simplified conceptual structure that represents the knowledge associated with the multiply polysemous word school. The structure attempts at capturing a relevant part of the knowledge that we have about schools, as well as how the different aspects of the informational structure relate to each other. We can begin by noting that a school is, categorically, an institution, and that its function is educating. Now, if that is the case, a typical school, being an institution, will need to have a physical realization (i.e., a physical object that hosts it and, in that sense, makes it real), and a certain social implementation or organization, including certain ways of being represented in society at large. Given the particular function that schools have, it is also expected (i) that schooling takes some time, which can be thought of as a process; (ii) that this process is in turn temporally organized, and (iii) that schools have students and teachers as participants or "inhabitants". All these features, aspects or pieces of knowledge, are linked to, and to some extent depend on, our conceptualization of school as a social institution whose purpose is that students learn and socialize. A way of seeing how these pieces of information are all kept together or conform a coherent, robust, structure, is to think about all of them as specifying different realizers or implementers of an abstract entity (i.e. as things that the institution requires to be actualized). So, the knowledge structure is organized on the basis of our understanding of what a school is and how it is actualized in the world. A (Pustejovsky-inspired) way to represent the informational structure that captures the lexical meaning of school is the following: 17 There is a principled reason to include some information in the structure and leave some other information outside: the information that is included is all related to the realization (the making real or actual) of the institution. It captures what is typically required to have an institution with that function running. In order to have an institution for educating young people one needs some kind of organization, rules, staff, students, a location that is usually a building; also, one also needs to structure a schedule for teaching, organized in terms of hours, days, weeks, years, etc. Besides, any institution requires representatives that represent the institution in different social forums. The concept is structured and held together via explanatory relations: the fact that a school is the kind of institution that it is explains that there is a process, that the participants are teachers and young people, that there is some physical realization, typically a building, hosting the institution, etc. However, it is usually the case that entities and events can be realized in different ways. So there may be various ways in which the telos of the institution can be realized. While it is certainly typical to locate schools-institution in buildings, one can find schools-institutions in barracks, for instance. In such a case, the 18 word 'school' will apply to the barracks. So, the proposal is that a word that designates an institution (and, in general, any kind that requires realizers) will also denote its different realizers or implementers. The structure in (7) represents the realization structure of the school concept and assigns default values to each item in the structure11. For those familiar with the concepts literature, it represents some kind of integrated theory-prototype conceptual structure, since it captures explanatory relations and prototypical knowledge at the same time. This kind of account, besides explaining polysemy and co-predication (see below), is able to explain the linguistic facts that the Pustejovskyan qualia structures are supposed to explain, without resorting to the dubious dot objects or types. Pustejovsky (1995) introduced the qualia structures to account for the different ways in which predicates can modify nouns: a fast car is a car that drives fast, while a plastic car is a car made of plastic. In the first case, the modifier regards to the telos or function of the car, while in the second case it regards to its constitution (see above on Del Pinal's treatment of Travis cases). In a parallel way, the different kinds of predicates that 'school' combines with are traceable to the knowledge structure in (7): the school (building) can be in ruins, it (process) can be expensive, it (rules) can be strict, etc. The structure in (7) implies a modification to the Pustejovskyan schema, where only four qualia are always considered (without much more motivation than reflecting the four causes distinguished by Aristotle: see Moravcsik, 1975). Although this is an issue that would take us too far, it is probably sensible to assign different kinds of knowledge structures/concepts to different classes of entities. Like in the original qualia structures, the aspects to be taken into consideration are the aspects or features that characterize a certain kind. However, 11 Again, it is interesting to compare the approach to Loebner's study case of writing. The high-level action of writing (as when one writes movingly) requires realizers. The typical realizer of that action used to be moving a pen in certain ways on a sheet of paper. Perhaps that is still the prototypical realizer of writing-high-level, even though it is now more usual to realize that action by typing. 19 not all kinds of entities are characterisable in the same way. In the kinds that concern us now, characteristic features include features that typically realize, make actual or implement the kind (plus: they are typically available for being the objects of predication). This holds for institutions and their different ways of being part of the world (as social organizations, as part of society, as physical entities, etc.), as well as for countries, informational contents, drinkables, and so on. Drinkables, for instance, require containers to be "actualized" as such drinkables: this is the reason why it would make sense to include a "container" aspect in the knowledge structure corresponding to 'beer', for instance. Informational contents, in turn, require physical realizations, which explains that reference to a physical object will be in the knowledge structure associated to 'book', 'letter', etc. In sum: it seems that more features than the four Aristotelian causes are relevant (i) to characterize a kind, and (ii) to account for predication. Some of these features or aspects relate to ways of making certain (typically abstract) kinds real. Thus, the proposal in (7) is not simply an after-the-fact structure that accounts for the different senses the word school. However, a structure like this does account for the typical senses of school, namely: (8) The school [building] is on fire. (9) She went to school [process]. (10) School [timetable] starts at 9:00. (11) The school [rules] has prohibited wearing hats in the classroom. (12) I have talked to the school [director, staff] about it already. (13) Today the school [participants] went for a visit to the Cathedral. (14) The school [sport team representation] has won the championship again. 20 A structure like this locates all these different aspects in a single representation. How are these different aspects of a knowledge structure/concept turned into senses of a polysemous expression? The response depends on the general answer we give to why polysemy is so widespread. A fair bet is that polysemy (using the same word to mean different but related things) makes communication and learnability easier and more efficient (Falkum 2011; 2015; Xu et al. 2017). Polysemy is a way to comply with the maxim of Relevance that guides communicative exchanges in general: a way to maximize cognitive effects while minimizing processing cost (Falkum 2011). Applying this general view to the polysemy of school, we can say that communicative exchanges about the building where students go, the process they engage in, etc., are facilitated by the use of the same word, school. These different contents are already part of a coherent knowledge structure, which means that they are easily accessible to both speaker and hearer. The use reinforces the coherence of the structure and the accessibility of the different senses, but it is reasonable to think that the meanings are easily accessible from the start. We can say, thus, that the information structure provides different possibilities for denotation for the word school, and that speakers and hearers are aware of this. The consensus in psycholinguistics seems to be that the polysemous senses of a word are stored in one single lexical entry. At least, the thesis seems to hold for closely related senses, given that closely related senses co-activate each other instead of competing for activation. This co-activation, on the other hand, may last for 750 ms. or more (McGregor et al. 2015). Now, the senses of a polysemous expression such as school are particularly closely related . There may be some dispute about the extent to which the 'one representation' thesis applies to all kinds of polysemous words, but it surely applies to school and similar cases. The next step is tentative, but seems to have 21 some empirical support: whereas many different polysemy patterns show sense coactivation, the more related the aspects are, the stronger the co-activation pattern they form (see Schumacher, 2013, forth.). That is, if two, or three, or n senses are very closely related, it will be usually the case that the activation of one of them results in a high and enduring activation of the others. In what follows, I will try to explain why senses that belong to structures like (7) may form especially coherent activation packages. The idea will be that these senses are more closely related than any other set of senses because we picture the entities that they denote very closely related by means of realization or actualization relations. Co-predication The notion of activation packages is the starting point for an account of co-predication patterns. Co-predication occurs when the same polysemous nominal expression has simultaneous predications selecting for two different meanings or senses. Consider: (15) The school that caught fire was celebrating 4th of July when the fire started. (16) Brazil is a large Portuguese-speaking republic that is very high in inequality rankings but always first in the FIFA ranking. (17) The city has 500,000 inhabitants and outlawed smoking in bars last year (Asher 2011) (18) The best university of the country has caught fire. Co-predication generates some puzzles that must be solved, apart from the puzzle that it generates to the truth-conditional semantics enterprise. Here I want to focus on two 22 issues, also relevant to the issue about truth-conditions: (i) why there are some senses that co-predicate and others that do not, and (ii) how we interpret co-predicative sentences. Let's take (15): when the reader reads (15), the word school activates the whole informational structure (7), and, with it, all the different aspects. The predicate caught fire selects the building aspect of school. However, this does not mean that the other senses decay –that is, they do not get deactivated-. They are all still active when the reader encounters the next predicate: was celebrating 4th of July. Thus, she finds no problem in selecting another sense that would comply with the selectional preferences of the predicate, namely, the sense "participants", which targets teachers and students. There is, in principle, no difference between co-predication and anaphoric binding: in both cases what is required is that the reader or hearer can select the sense that she needs in order to comply with the selectional preferences of the surrounding linguistic material. The initial answer to the question (i): what makes co-predication easy for some polysemes and not for others, is that co-predication will be easy and natural if the senses form an activation package, which, in turn, will occur when the senses are particularly closely related (as in the case of school). In polysemies that do not allow for copredication (e.g., 'the ham sandwich is impatient [sense: person] and cold [sense: sandwich]'), we see that the activation of one sense involves the de-activation of the other, and so that they do not form a package (see Schumacher, 2013 for the experimental evidence). More controversially, the same seems to happen with the marginally good 'Tim drank the bottle [content] and broke it [container]'. In such cases, where we see some inhibitory effects, we also observe that the entities that the senses denote are not related by realization relations (e.g., a bottle (container) is not made actual by a content). 23 This proposal has some similarities with what Arapinis (2013) and Arapinis and Vieu (2015) propose, except that they want to argue for the existence of complex entities. Arapinis and Vieu (2015) take a mereological approach towards dot objects and address the question of what glues together the aspects of a dot object (e.g., school-as-institution and school-as-building) so that aspects can actually be considered parts or constituents of a complex entity. Their response, putting it briefly, is that we have dot objects when (a) the aspects constitute the entity; (b) the aspects are in some coincidence relation; and (c) the aspects are linked by some constant dependency relation that ensures and explains that they are typically in coincidence. The present approach to co-predication can be seen as a way of psychologizing Arapinis and Vieu's ontological proposal. In the current view, co-predication and anaphoric binding are particularly facilitated because senses that denote entities that are linked by realization relations plausibly form an activation package. If denotations of senses are related in this way, then thinking about one of them makes thinking about the others easy. This is, at the end of the day, what explains that these senses form activation packages: they form activation packages because we know that the entities they denote are related in a special way, and in such situations, representations forge strong association links. In a nutshell: there is a strong link between the different denotations that facilitates co-predication via sustained activation of different senses. Note, however, that the ultimate explanation of what makes co-predication easy for some polysemes and not for others, is associationist: the activation of one sense activates another provided that their denotations are in a relation such that thinking about one facilitates thinking about the other. For this reason, typically, representations of denotations that are in realization relations will activate each other. Yet, there may be more requirements that two or more senses have to meet in order to actually persist into 24 a mutual sustained activation dynamic. For instance, it seems that the representation of the events (i.e. whole situations) in which the denotations participate need to fulfill some requirements. For instance, examples (19a-b) and (20a-b) suggest that the events have to be spatially or temporally coincident for co-predications to be acceptable. (19) ?? a. On Monday morning, the school convened to set new rules against plagiarism. Later that day, it was re-painted12. b. The school convened to set new rules while it was re-painted. (20) ?? a. The school caught fire when it was on excursion. b. The school caught fire when it was celebrating 4th of July. What we see in (19a) and (20a) is that temporal or spatial displacement of the events involved makes interpretation difficult. Why could this be so? Phenomenologically, it seems that (19b) and (20b) are good because the reader can easily access a (perhaps imagistic)13 representation of the second event and its participants, facilitated by the representation of the first event and participants. In contrast, in (19a) and (20a) the reader experiences problems about locating the participant denoted by the intended sense of school in the second event. It looks like the activation of the different senses holds at least as long as they refer to participants in events that are temporally or spatially coincident or very proximal. The first event sets the spatio-temporal frame, and co-predication will work if the second event describes a situation easily accessible from that frame. Otherwise, the activation of the other senses decays14. So a possibility is that all the senses are activated, and so easily retrieved while an event or situation is being 12 Thanks to a reviewer for the example and for pressing the point. 13 This is the account that Löhr (manuscript) is exploring. 14 It would be good to be able to support these claims with empirical results, but, unfortunately, there is very little work done on co-predication. The interest that co-predication is receiving lately will hopefully change the situation soon. 25 described, but then sustainment or decay of the activation depends on there being strong association links between the representation of that event or situation and the representation of a second event or situation. I have to note, though, that there may be problems for such a view. Compare (20a), now (21a), with (21b): (21) ?? a. The school caught fire when it was on excursion. b. The school in NYC caught fire when it was celebrating 4th of July in Chicago.15 Why is (21b) better than (21a), given that the two events involved are explicitly spatially located in two different places? These are issues that a full account of copredication has to solve. In this moment, we are very far from having such an account – we are even far from having the stock of examples that we would require to start doing good theorizing-. We are only beginning to scratch the surface of the phenomenon. So, for now, I want to restrict my commitments at this stage to the claim that all the senses in a structure such as the "school" structure above receive a synchronous initial activation and that the activation of one of the senses strongly activates the rest, forming thus an activation package. Then there seem to be conditions that favor suppression of some of these senses that are initially activated, and conditions that do not conspire against sustainment of the activation of all the senses. Until now, empirical research has been focused on studying polysemy in general in the latter kind of conditions, since the objective has been to research on the differences (competition vs. co-activation) between homonymy and polysemy. Hopefully, the interest that co-predication is attracting lately will foster empirical research that can help us know when and why sustained co-activation fails. 15 The example was provided by an anonymous referee of a different journal and of a different paper. 26 Denotations and truth-conditions In the view defended here, concepts provide different possibilities for denotation. If a speaker uses the prototypical structure associated with a concept or with a part of a concept, the denotation of her word will differ from the denotation the word would have if she instead uses a theory-like structure (this is the case of water). This, of course, has an impact on the truth-conditions of the utterance she makes. Likewise, if she retrieves the physical realization part of the SCHOOL concept, the denotation of school will be a building, not an institution or a time in her life, or whatever. Thus, if lexical meanings are concepts, lexical meanings do not have denotations, but only offer possibilities for denotation, i.e., a variety of possible denotations from which the speaker has to select. That is, the denotation potential of a word-type is not explained in terms other than the information stored in the meaning of such a word-type. In this view, thus, a word is associated with a number of denotations, and a sentence with a number of contents that determine different truth-conditions. Usually, the number of contents that a sentence can have will appear to be smaller than the number of denotational possibilities associated with a single word, given that much of the selection of denotations is supposed to be intra-linguistic: in I have talked to the school, as talk has selectional restrictions for animacy in both of its arguments, there are some denotations of school that are ruled out. 27 Is language a representational device on this approach? Remember that, according to some authors, the language system does not deliver contents with truth-conditions, even if it does deliver units that have a predicative structure, i.e., sentences. In that view, language cannot be considered a representational device, unlike perceptual systems, monkey calls or individual uses of language (Chomsky, 2016). However, according to the view here put forward, language should prima facie be regarded as a representational device: sentences do have contents that determine truth-conditions. Note, again, that we have only taken into account nominal expressions. What has been said about the lexical meaning of nouns cannot be directly transferred to verbs, adjectives and adverbs, much less to functional words16. Some of these classes of words may have thinner meanings. But it is interesting to think that sentential meanings may derive from the interplay between rich meanings (of e.g., nouns) and thin meanings (of e.g., verbs), If something along these lines is true, then sentential meanings would actually determine what contents, and thus what truth-conditions, an utterance of a sentence may have. It is true that only individual utterances have some determinate, specific, truth-conditions, but, typically17, they inherit their truth-conditional content from the sentence-type they are tokens of: they realize or select one of the possible contents that the sentence provides. Alternatively, it can be said that sentence meanings determine disjunctive truth-conditions. They specify a definite number of situations in which the sentence will be true. Speakers and hearers have to select among the different possibilities, so there is a role that pragmatics has to play, but the role that pragmatics plays is that of selecting among alternatives provided by semantic knowledge. 16 Even some nouns can have thinner meanings. Pritchard (2018) analyzes relational nominals such as target and argues that they have an abstract schematic meaning. 17 Typically, because words can also be meaningfully used in novel, ad hoc, ways (Carston, 2015). 28 Still, co-predication creates a puzzle for this kind of account. The account has it that word meanings are conceptual structures that offer possibilities for denotation by having aspects or parts that can be selected. However, what can we say about sentences such as (16) Brazil is a large Portuguese-speaking republic that is very high in inequality rankings but always first in the FIFA ranking? It seems that co-predication generates a problem, since, prima facie, Brazil in sentences like this "intends" to stand for many parts of the concept simultaneously. An option that I think should be taken seriously is to hold that co-predicational structures are shorthands of more complicated structures. Thus, (16) can be taken to be shorthand of: (16a) Brazil [place] is a large piece of land & Brazil [people] is Portuguese-speaking & Brazil [State] is a republic & Brazil [economic system] is very high in inequality & Brazil [football team] is always first in the FIFA rankings. Actually, this explicitation of truth-conditions is the best option for anybody who wants to hold at least that linguistic utterances have representational contents. As mentioned above, co-predication is not a specific problem for defenders of truth-conditional semantics. It is also a problem for those who, like Pietroski (2005, 2018), following Strawson (1950), want to maintain that only individual speakers refer, i.e. that reference is an individual's act. In this case, we can say either that an individual using (16) fails to refer or that she is ultimately expressing something like the paraphrase (16a) by some sort of previous compilation of the different senses. That is, a speaker seems to intend to refer to many of the different aspects that form the BRAZIL concept, since she predicates properties that correspond to those different aspects or parts of the concept. However, the way she refers to those different parts is by using a single, compilatory, term that binds (in the psychological sense) them all. At the hearer's end, the singular tem Brazil 29 activates the package formed by all the different senses or parts of the concept. Thus, it is easy for her to establish a correspondence between the predicates and the entities such predicates ascribe properties to: senses are there, active, for her to retrieve them as she goes on processing the sentence. But then note that this kind of response is also available to someone who wants to hold that word-type meanings provide possibilities for denotation and that speakers select among them. Providing the truth-conditions of a co-predicative (or anaphoric) structure in this way may be a non-trivial matter. I assume some examples will be more complicated than others. The sentence above (16), is structurally simple, and can be "paraphrased" by the procedure of stacking conjunctions. Initially, it may seem more difficult to provide paraphrases for: (22) There is no school painted in red that is good enough. However, one possible explicitation of the truth-conditions of (23) is: (22a) there is no school [building] that is painted in red such that that school [institution] is good enough. The problem, of course, is how it can be that that school in the final clause refers to an institution, given that apparently it has to make reference to a building. But this is possible: the hearer or reader of (22) can easily retrieve the sense "institution". The relative clause in (22) does not have the effect of determining that the reference of the subject of the clause is a building, precisely because school offers different possibilities for denotation, all of which are active at the moment of interpreting the relative clause. This means that when the speaker has to find a meaning for school in the relative clause she can select the institution sense, give school the semantic value: [that institution: institution located in building painted in red], and thus get the truth-conditions in (22a). 30 Actually, assigning these truth-conditions to (22) is no more problematic than assigning its corresponding truth-conditions to a sentence like: (23) I talked to the hospital but they told me that I have to wait still another week. In (23) the reader accesses the sense "staff" and consequently uses the plural pronoun they to refer to the staff in the second clause. The sense of hospital is the same in both clauses. However, research on this kind of polysemy has shown that switching from one sense to another of a polysemous expression is only a bit more costly than repeating senses (Frisson, 2015), which means that assigning truth-conditions (22a) to (22) should not be more complicated that assigning its corresponding truth-conditions to (23). I am aware that this way of explaining the truth-conditions of co-predicative sentences may clash with some well-established ideas and practices in linguistics and philosophy of language. For instance, the proposal has to reject the ideas that each NP/DP should have just one denotation and that sentences that are syntactically alike have to be semantically alike as well. The proposal has to reject also that any sentence of the kind 'a is F' entails an existential 'there is an x that is F'. From 'the school round the corner is big but not what we like for our kids', it does not follow that there is a something that is round the corner, big, and not what we like for our kids'. It is therefore understandable that semanticists have not taken the turn that I commend here. Yet, my concern here has been with whether the truth-conditions of co-predicative sentences can be said to depend on semantic knowledge. Following Pietroski (Pietroski et al., 2009), it is possible to link truth-conditions with "verification procedures": the truth-conditions of a given expression are linked to the way we actually try to verify whether the sentence is true or not. In the case of co-predicative sentences, it seems reasonable that we verify whether they are true by picking apart the different senses and pairing them to 31 their respective predicates. The claim then is that to do this we do use semantic knowledge, i.e., that the verification procedure that we use to assign truth-conditions to co-predicative sentences resorts to our lexico-conceptual knowledge associated with nouns that co-predicate. Closing Remarks Chomsky (2016) (see also, Berwick and Chomsky, 2016) holds that there are two mysteries associated to language: one is how recursion appeared, and the other is where the atoms of meaning, the units that recursion operates on, came from. His view is that, whereas animal signs are referential, the basic units of human languages are minddependent, perspectival, concepts. Thus, he insists that the semantic properties of human language cannot have evolved from animal signing –or from any other animal cognitive capacities-. One of his major arguments is based on copredication, since copredicative sentences have NPs that cannot be said to refer to anything in the world. Followers of Chomsky such as Pietroski, Glanzberg (2014) or Yalcin (2014) interpret the import of the phenomenon somewhat differently. In their view, co-predication and variability show that meanings have to be underdetermined, to the point that they could be mere indexes to concepts. In the view presented here, the semantic properties of language could draw from our conceptual structures. Perhaps there is nothing like these conceptual structures in animals, though there is plausibly some continuity between animals' concepts and human concepts (bodies of knowledge stored in long-term memory). However, this does not imply that our language is not referential, that the meanings of the words of our language are mysterious in any sense, or that they are underdetermined, schematic, or 32 indexical in nature18. The way in which signs connect with references is more complicated than customarily assumed, but still, language can be said to be representational. A lexical meaning, that is, the meaning associated with a word-type is a concept that offers different possibilities for denotation. The meaning of a sentence depends on the possibilities for denotation offered by words, the selectional preferences of such words, and the proper structure of the sentence. In some cases, it may look like certain word-tokens cannot have a denotation: instead of selecting one of the possibilities offered by the lexical meaning of the word-type, the speaker seems to be intending to refer to several of these denotations at the same time. However, the world does not contain entities that can be formed by an operation that takes as input such denotations. In these cases, speakers form a compilation of senses with different denotations, a compilation that is made possible by an especially high degree of coactivation, but refer to each of the denotations that form part of the compilation. That is, senses are compiled, though referential intentions relate to each of the different senses in the compilation. Acknowledgments Versions of this paper, or parts of it, have been presented at the conferences CONTEXT (2017) and Semantics and Philosophy in Europe (2017), also at the Workshop on Ambiguity and Context-Sensitivity in Berlin, and at a talk at UCL. Thanks to audiences 18 An anonymous reviewer suggests that the view here presented may not differ from Chomsky's much after all. I think it is dissimilar in at least two ways: (i) it is not internalist, since I try to explain how words relate to denotations; and (ii) it is not "mysterian" in any way. Chomsky has it that meanings emerged at some point in evolution, unconnected to communication systems in animals, basically because he thinks lexical meanings are not referential. What I try to say is that lexical meanings are referential, although multiply so. That a word is polysemous does not mean that it lacks a reference, only that it does not have a single reference. On the other hand, many of those who endorse a Chomskyan (internalist) semantics program take it that co-predication and variation show that meanings are underspecified or underdetermined representations that connect to concepts. I do not think that this is Chomsky's own (elusive) view, though, again, the view here presented differs from this other view in that meanings are taken to be multidimensional concepts directly. Underdetermined representations are unnecessary intermediate stations and it is unclear what role they could play in semantic theorizing and interpretation. 33 in these events, especially to Tim Pritchard, Robyn Carston, Manuel García-Carpintero, Elliot Murphy, François Recanati and Emanuel Viebahn. Thanks also to John Collins, Elena Castroviejo, Guido Löhr and two anonymous referees from Erkenntnis. Very special thanks to Marina Ortega-Andrés. 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ACTA UNIVERSITATIS LODZIENSIS FOLIA GERMANICA 2, 2000 Barbara Ratecka WAR GOETHE EIN EROTISCHES VORBILD FUR RAINER MARIA RILKE? EINIGE BEMERKUNGEN ZU DAS TAGEBUCH VON J. W. GOETHE UND SIEBEN GEDICHTE VON R. M. RILKE Fast jeder Kiinstler stiitzt sich auf Vorbilder, die er sein ganzes Leben lang oder nur eine gewisse Zeit verfolgt. Manche tun es offen, manche heimlich, manche erleben eine Art HaBliebe ihrem Vorbild gegeniiber. Rainer Maria Rilke hat sich ganz friih und von Anfang an bewuJ3t mit Goethes Werk beschaftigt. In seinen AuJ3erungen aus den Jahren 1889-1890 finden slch genug Beweise dafiir, daJ3 er nicht nur Faust gelesen hatl, sondern auch Gedichte und Prosawerke des groJ3en Weimarers. Der einzige erhaltene Schulaufsatz Rilkes war eine Analyse von Goethes Gedicht Der Wanderer. Es blieb auch nicht ohne Folgen: Einige Jahre spater nahm Rilke das Thema in seinem Gedicht Der Fremde selbst auf.2 Wahrend der Vorbereitung auf das Abitur, da er aIs Externer nachholen muJ3te, las er Wilhelm Meister, Dichtung und Wahrheit und Die Wahlverwandschaften. In einem seiner Briefe gestand er, daJ3 er bei der letzten Lektiire, tief geriihrt, geweint habe.3 1898, wahrend seiner Italienreise, begegnete Rilke Stefan George und fiihrte mit ihm lange Gesprache iiber Kunst und Leben. In seinem Tagebuch aus dieser Zeit finden wir folgende Notiz "Da muJ3 ich oft an Goethe denken" und an einer anderen Stelle schreibt er von Goethes "reichem, reifem, und klar gewordenem Wesen.4 l So in einem Brief an seine Mutter vom 27.10.1889, zit. nach: H. Schnack. In: I. M. Rilke, Chronik seines Lebens uns seines Werkes, Passau 1975, S. 16. 2 R. M. Rilke, Der Fremde. In: ders. Werke Auswahl in zwei Biinden, Bd. 1, Leipzig 1953, S.200. 3 Zit. nach: I. Schnack. In: R. M. RiJke, Chronik ... , S. 21. 4 R. M. Rilke, Tagebiicher aus der Friihzeit, Frankfurt a.M. 1973, S. 42. [219] 220 Barbara Ratecka Rilkes Verhaltnis zu Johann Wolfgang Goethe anderte sich spater und schlug in eine Abneigung um. s 1900 verfaBte Rilke ein Gedicht mit dem Titel Begegnung, wo er seine Beziehung zu Goethe bloI31egte, indem er direkt seinen Wanderer paraphrasierte: Ich bin ein Wanderer. Und nennst dich? Das war einst. Wer bist du denn? Ein Anderer aIs Jeder, den du meinst.6 Lange Zeit blieb Rilke ein "Anderer" in seiner Beziehung zu Goethe. Im Jahre 1904 diskutierte Rainer M. Rilke in Schweden7 mit einer jungen Malerin, Tora Holmstr6m, iiber Goethe und schrieb dann in Ankniipfung an die Diskussion einen Brief an sie, in dem er das Gesprach folgendermaBen kommentierte". Denn ich habe kein Recht, mehr zu sagen aIs dieses: DaB mir ein Organ fehlt, um von Goethe zu empfangen; mehr weiI3 ich wirklich nicht. 8 Zu der Zeit, also um 1904, beschaftigte sich Rilke sehr intensiv mit Kierkegaards Werken. Er was von seinen Schriften: Entweder-Oder, Tagebuch des Verfiihrers und von Fiinf christlichen Reden iiber die Sorge so eingenommen, daB er sogar Kierkegaards Briefe an seine Verlobte, Regine Olsen, ins Deutsche iibersetzte. Was faszinierte Rilke an den Werken und besonders an den Briefen des Danen? Vor allem war es die Offenheit und der Mut zur freien AuBerung der innersten Gefiihle, es war die groBartige Schilderung der Haltung eines Liebenden der Geliebten gegeniiber. Kierkegaards Goethe-Kritik in seinen Briefen und in Entweder-Oder hatten Rilkes Abneigung der "Erstarrten Hoheit" gegeniiber vertieft. Einige Tage spater las Rilke ein Buch, das seine Goethe-Abneigung noch verstarkte und das sein Vorurteil zum Urteil und zur Verurteilung mach te. Es war Goethes Briefwechsel mit einem Kinde von Bettina von Arnim. Rilke befand sich damais mitten in der Arbeit an einem Prosawerk, das von vie1en Kritikern aIs ein wichtiger Beitrag zur Moderne verstanden wird. Das Werk, betitelt Die Aufzeichnungen des Malte Lauricls Brigge, das Rilke selbst aIs ein Buch vom Sterben begriff und aIs ein Buch in dem s Mehr dariiber efiihrt man aus den Briefen, die R. M. Rilke geschrieben hat: so z.B. an Sidonie Nadherny. R. M. Rilke, Rriefe an Sidonie Nadhemy von Rorulin, Frankfurt a.M. 1973. 6 S. Unseld, ••Das Tagebuch" Goethes und Rilkes "Sieben Gedichte", Insel Verlag, Frankfurt a.M. 1978, S. 106. 7 Ausfiihrlicher Bericht iiber Rilkes Schwedenaufenthalt in: Rilke und Venedig Rilke in Schweden, hrsg. von der Rilke-Gesellschaft, Sigmaringen 1990. 8 S. Unseld, Das Tagebuch..., S. 107. War Goethe ein erotisches Vorbild fUr Rilke? 221 "das einfahe Leben einer Liebe"9 geschildert wurde, spiegelt die Ansichten des Dichters klar wieder. Obwohl sich der Dichter mit dem Protagonisten des Romans nur am Anfang der Randlung vollig identifiziert, darf man nicht iibersehen, daB es "ein Dokument groBter personlicher Krise wie ein Dokument kriseiiberwindender Kunst ist oder werden sollte". 10 Mit der Gestalt Maltes schuf Rilke eine Idealgestalt, "dieses entschlossene Rerz, das bereit war, die ganze Liebe zu leisten bis ans Ende.ll Die AuBerung Rilkes ist von einer groBen Bedeutung fur unsere Untersuchungen, weil sie im Zusammenhang mit Goethes Beziehung zu Bettina Arnim formuliert worden ist. Rilke HiBt den Protagonisten des Romans Bettinas Buch lesen. Die Briefe Bettinas an den groBen Dichter haben Rilkes Enthusiasmus hervorgerufen und zugleich Emporung, was die Raltung Goethes der jungen Verehrerin gegeniiber betraf. Diese Emporung driickte er unter anderem in einem seiner Briefe an Sidonie Nadherny aus: "Ich habe nie begriffen, wie eine wirkliche, elementare, durch und durch wahre Liebe unerwidert sein kann".12 Die Emporung fiihrte zu einer vernichtenden Kritik an Goethe, die Rilke in Aufzeichnungen des Ma/te Laurids Brigge zum Ausdruck brachte: Wie ist es miiglich, daB nicht noch alle erzahlen von deiner Liebe? Was ist denn seither geschehen, was merkwiirdiger war? Was beschaftigt sie denn? Du selber wuBtest urn deiner Liebe Wert, du sagtest sie laut dienem griiBesten Dichter vor, daB er sie menschlich mache; denn sie war noch Element. Er aber hat sie den Leuten ausgeredet, da er dir schrieb. Alle haben ąiese Antworten gelesen und g1auben ihnen mehr, weil der Dichter ihnen deutlicher ist aIs die Natur. Aber vielleicht wird es sich einmaI zeigen, daB hier die Grenze seiner Gr6Be war. Diese Liebe ward ihrn auferlegt, und er hat sie nicht bestanden. Was heiBt es, daB er nicht hat erwidem kiinnen? Solche Liebe bedarf keiner Erwiderung, sie hat Lockruf und Antwort in sich; sie erhiirt sich selbst. Aber demiitigen hatte er sich mussen vor ihr in seinem ganzen Staat und schreiben, was sie diktiert, mit beiden Handen, wie Johannes auf Patrnos, kniend. Es gab keine Wahl dieser Stirnme gegenuber, die "das Amt der Engel verrichtete"; die gekornmen war, ihn einzuhiillen und zu entziehen ins Ewige hinein. Da war der Wagen seiner feurigen Hirnmelfahrt. Da war seinern Too der dunkle Mythos bereitet, den er leer lieB.13 Rilkes scharfes Urteil iiber die ablehnende Raltung Goethes erfolgte aus seiner Auffassung der Liebe, die Erotik und SexualiHit einschloB und aIs schopferisches Element begriffen wurde. Er widmete viele Gedichte dem Liebesgefiihl: dem Erwachen der Liebe, der Erinnerung der Liebe, dem Liebesverlangen und der Liebeshingabe. Es sind leise, zartliche Worte eines o In einem Brief an Clara Rilke vom 19.10.1907. In: R. M. Rilke, Die Aufzeichnungen des Mafte lAurids Brigge, Leipzig 1984, S. 315. 10 S. Unseld, "Das Tagebuch ... , S. 1l0. 11 So Rilke selbst iiber MaIte. Siehe: S. Unseld, ••Das Tagebuch" ... , S. II. 12 In einem Brief an Sidonie Nadherny. Siehe: S. Unseld, ,,Das Tagebuch" ... , S. 114. 13R. M. Rilke, Die Aufzeichnungen ... , S. 170. 222 Barbara Ratecka Gedichtes wie: Und wie mag die Liebe ... oder Die Liebende, hinreiBende Liebesbeschworungen wie Losch mir die Augen aus oder pathetische Verse solcher Ge1egenheitsgedichte wie Per/en entrollen , in denen LiebesgefUhle zum groBen empfindungslyrischen Ausdruck geformt wurden. "Die gewaltigen Liebenden", wie sie Rilke in Ma/te nannte, also Sappho, He10ise oder Gaspara Stampa, waren seine Heldinnen. Ihre Liebesgefiihle besaBen, seiner Meinung nach, einen wahren Unendlichkeitscharakter. Ihre Liebe war von der groBten Intensitat und Echtheit, sie iibertraf unendlich die GefUhle des Mannes. Es waren aber Liebende, derer GefUhle unerwidert blieben, oder die von ihren Geliebten verlassen wurden. Eudo Mason, ein groBer RilkeKenner, stelte in seiner Abhandlung Rilke und Goethe fest: "Rilke macht es Goethe zum Vorwurf, daB er diese Vorstellung der besitzlosen weiblichen Liebe aIs der hochsten Moglichkeit des menschlichen Gemiits nicht anerkennt, und den Beweis dafiir findet er in Goethes Verhalten gegeniiber Bettina, die ibm aIs reinste Vertreterin dieser Liebe gilt".l4 Goethes Zuriickhaltung und Ironie in dem Briefwechse/ mit einem Kind haben Rilke tief bewegt. Lange Zeit verarbeitete er in seinem Gewissen jedes Wort "des groBen Weimarers" und iiberlegte, wie er selbst in einer ahnlichen Situation hande1n wiirde. In Rilkes Korrespondenz aus dieser Zeit finden wir Spuren einer Auseinandersetzung mit Goethes Einstellung zu Bettinas Liebe. In einem Brief an seine Frau Clara (September 1908) erkI art Rilke, warum er den Briefwechse/ mit einem Kind aIs ein "starkes instandiges Zeugnis" gegen Goethe verstehe. Die Antworten Goethes waren fUr ihn "traurig und verlegen", er war "zerstreut und konventionell aIs Liebhaber"Y Rilke se1bst fUhlte sich einem solchen iiberwaltigenden GefUhl gewachsen: "Wie herrlich ist diese Bettine Arnim! [...] Wie hatte man sich geliebt, face en face. Ich hatte wohl ihre Briefe beantworten mogen; das ware wie eine Himme1fahrt geworden, ohne Scham, vor aller Augen ...".16 Diese wahren "Botschaften der Liebe", die Bettina an Goethe richtete, blieben fUr Rilke lange Zeit "MaBstabe fUr Grade der Leidenschaft" Y Er verschickte einige Exemplare der Briefe an seine Freundinnen, mit der Bitte, sich iiber das Werk Bettinas zu auBern. Einige Wochen spater, im November 1908, verfaBte Rilke das Reguiem. Fiir eine Freundin, eine Erinnerung an die jung verstorbene Malerin Paula Modersohn-Becker.18 DaB es fUr Rilke eine auBerst wichtige Publikation war, zeugt die Tatsache, daB er sich bemiiht hat, es in einem eigenen Buch 14 E. Mason, Rilke und Goethe, KaIn, Graz 1958, S. 10. 15 R. M. Rilke, Die Aufzeichnungen ... , S. 319. 16 Ebd., S 319/320. 17 S. Unseld, "Das Tagebuch" ... , S. 116. 18 Ausfiihrliche Information uber die Beziehung Rilkes zu Paula bei H. Nalewski, Rainer Maria Rilke in seiner Zeit, Leipzig 1985, S. 79-90, 137-139. War Goethe ein erotisches Vorbild fUr Rilke? 223 zu ver6ffentlichen. Er kehrt darin zur Vorstellung von der "besitzlosen Liebe" und zurn Konflikt zwischen einem groBen Gefiihl und einer sich daraus ergebenden Bindung und dem Kiinst1ertum zumck. So wie in anderen Gedichten und in Ma/te iiuBert Rilke seine BefUrchtungen, daB ein Kiinstler, der liebt, der auch geliebt wird und sich bindet, die Integritat seiner Pers6nlichkeit partieH oder ganzlich verliert. Es schHeBt also die Gemeinschaft zweier Menschen aus. Rilkes Ansichten sind in der Hinsicht extrem. Das Requiem bringt es deutlich zum Ausdruck: Denn das ist SchuId, wenn irgendeines SchuId ist: die Freiheit eines Lieben nicht vermehren urn alIe Freiheist, die man in sich aufbringt. Wir haben, wo wir lieben, ja nur dies: einander lassen; denn daB wir uns halten, das raUt uns Ieicht und ist nicht erst zu Iernen ... Die Frauen leiden: lieben heiBt allein sein, und Kiinst1er ahnen manchmal in der Arbeit daB sie verwandeIn miissen, wo sie liehen. So hor mich: HiIf mir. Sieh wir gleiten so, nicht wissend wann, zuriick aus unserm Fortschritt in irgendwas, was wir nicht meinen ... Denn irgendwo ist eine alte Feindschaft zwischen dem Leben und der groBen Arbeit. DaB ich sie einseh und sie sage: hilf mir.19 Rilke war damais iiberzeugt, daB Goethe diese "Feindschaft" zwischen Leben und Arbeit nicht erleben, nicht erleiden muBte. Er selbst Htt standig unter dem Konflikt, was er in einem Brief an seine Mazenin, die Fiirstin Thurn und Taxis, beklagte: "SchlieBlich ist's immer dieser eine, in meiner Erfahrung unvers6hnliche Konflikt zwischen Leben und Arbeit, den ich in neuen unerh6rten Abwandlungen durchmache und fast nicht iibersteh. "20 In seinem Testament (im April 1921 verfaBt, 1974 ver6ffent1icht) gesteht der Dichter: "SoH ich mich fUr immer ung1iickHch nennen [...], weil ich die Liebe nicht so leicht nehmen kann, um aus ihr nur eben eine Steigerung meiner Fahigkeiten herauszuschlagen? Ich habe nie viel von denen gehalten, die der Verliebung bedurften, urn im Geiste angetrieben zu sein, wie sollte 19 R. M. Rilke, Werke ... , S. 214. 20 S. UnseId, "Das Tagebuch" ... , S. 128. 224 Barbara Ratecka ich auf diesen AnlaB rechnen, da ja die Arbeit selber so unendlich vie! mehr Liebe ist aIs der Einzelne in einem bewegen kann. Sie ist alle Liebe".21 Das Testament hilft uns, Rilkes Beziehung zu Goethe besser zu verstehen. Rilke war iiberzeugt, dal3 Goethe die Liebe sehr leicht nahm und den Konflikt zwischen Leben und Arbeit nie wahrnehmen wollte. S. Unse!d, der Rilkes Leben und Schaffen sorgfaltig untersuchte, stellte fest: "Seit er [Rilke B.R.] erfuhr, daB auch Goethe dieser Urkonflikt nicht fremd war, veranderte sich seine Einstellung zu ihm". 22 Seine Mazene, die Fiirstin Thurn und Taxis wie auch das Verlegerpaar Katharina und Anton Kippenberg verhalfen Rainer M. Rilke, die "bizarre Antipathie" (so die Fiirstin) Goethe gegeniiber abzubauen. Anton Kippenberg, Rilkes Verleger und der groBte Goethe-Kenner und -Liebhaber seiner Zeit, lud Rilke zweimal nach Leipzig ein. In seinem Hause sowie auch auf Reisen nach Weimar (1911 und 1913) fand Rilke endlich Gefallen an Goethes Gedichten. Es waren die beriihmten "Mappenabende"23 der Goethschen Gedichte in Kippenbergs Villa in Leipzig, wo man laut Fragmente aus Goethes Werk las und dariiber diskutierte. Im Sommer 1913, aIs Katharina Kippenberg zur Kur fuhr, lud Anton Kippenberg Rilke und seine Freunde wieder ein. Er nutzte die Abwesenheit seiner Frau aus, um ihnen ein wenig bekanntes Gedicht Das Tagebuch von Johann W. Goethe, das eben erst 1908 aIs ein Sonderdruck in 36 nummerierten Exemplaren erschienen war, vorzustellen. Der Verleger war der Meinung, dal3 Goethes Gedicht fUr die feinen Ohren seiner Gattin eher nicht geeignet sei. Rilke war, dem Bericht Anton Kippenbergs nach, von Goethes Tagebuch iiberrascht und zugleich entziickt. Er schrieb es sofort in sein Notizbuch ab. Die Lektiire wie auch die Gesprache mit Lou Andreas-Salome iiber Freud wiihrend ihrer zwei Ausfliige ins Riesengebirge im Jahre 1913 fUhrten zur Entstehung der "phallischen Hymmen", die aber erst im Oktober und November 1915 niedergeschrieben wurden. Rilke, der iiberrascht war, dal3 Lou ganz offen iiber sexuelle Probleme sprechen und schreiben konnte (wie z.B. in Drei Briefe an einen Knaben, in denen sie das Geheimnis von Liebe, Zeugung und Geburt zu erkI aren wuBte), faBte selbst den Mut, iiber sinnliche Liebe zu schreiben, "das Unbeschreibbare zu beschreiben, [...] Erscheinung und Vision in eins zu bringen". 24 Bin erstes Zeugnis seiner Wandlung sind die Sieben Gedichte, in denen er offenbart: 21 R. M. Rilke, Das Testament, Frankfurt a.M. 1974, S. 155 IT. 22 Ebd., S. 107. 23 Es schreibt dariiber E. Mason in Rilke ... , S. 26. 24 S. Unseld, "Das Tagebuch" ... , S. 158. War Goethe ein erotisches Vorbild fUr Rilke? 225 Reden will ich, nicht mehr wie ein banger Schiiler, der sich in die Prufung stimmt. Sagen will ich: Himmel, sagen: Anger und der Geist, der mirs vom Munde nimmt, wende es dem Ewigen zugut.2S Der Dichter hat seine Freiheit gewonnen und will iiber Himmel und Erde, Gott und die Welt und sein dichterisches Werk sprechen. In den Sieben Gedichten gibt es genug Anspielungen auf Goethes Tagebuch, die uns erlauben anzunehmen, daB bei der Entstehung der "phallischen Hymmen" Rilkes Goethe Pate gestanden hat. Goethes Tagebuch wurde im Jahre 1808 konzipiert und im April 1810 endgiiltig verfaBt. Goethe weigerte sich, diesen "priapeischen Scherz" zu seinen Lebzeiten zu verOffentlichen. Er erschien erst 1908. Das Thema des langen Gedichts in Stanzen bildet eine Geschichte eines reifen Mannes, der wahrend einer Geschaftsreise, in einem Gasthaus, ein Abenteuer mit einem jungen Madchen erleben kann. Bei ihrem Zusammensein versagt er aIs Liebhaber und erst die Erinnerung an seine geliebte Gattin, die ihn daheim erwartet, hebt die Impotenz auf. Er nutzt aber die giinstige Ge1egenheit nicht mehr aus und entzieht sich der Versuchung. Er berichtet seiner Frau iiber seine Erlebnisse und reist ab. Goethe knupft an die antiken Beispiele an, an das Motiv des mannlichen Versagens, das schon von Ovid, Ariost, Tibull und anderen behandelt wurde. Eckermann .bezeichnete etwas ironisch die Geschichte aIs ein "Abenteuer von heute in der Sprache von heute"26, und Riemer hat ebenfalls in einem Gesprach mit dem Dichter das Gedicht aIs "hochst moralisch" bezeichnet. 27 Der Dichter bietet uns einen Schlussel zum besseren Verstandnis der Gedichts an, in dem er es als Tagebuch betitelt. Das Tagebuch war fur Johann W. Goethe eine vollberechtigte Kunstform, die er jeden Tag pflegte und z.B. in Wilhelm Meister nutzte. Mit dieser AuBerung, daB er an jedem Abend den Tagesablauf zu summieren versuchte und daB ihn diese Tatigkeit aIs schopferischen Menschen bewahrte, gab er sich eine BloBe und konnte daher mit dem lyrischen "Ich" identifiziert werden. Nach dem Treffen mit dem Miidchen, das ihn im Hotel bediente und dessen Schonheit ihn sofort ergriff, was er fest entschlossen, es zu erobern, wobei ihre Zuneigung die ganze Angelegenheit leichter machte. Bevor das Miidchen auf sein Zimmer kam, wollte der Reisende sein Tagebuch fortsetzen, 2S Ebd., S. 159. 26 Zit. nach: J. W. von Goethe, Das Tagebuch, hrsg. von E. Leibfried, Femwald 1995, S. 35. 27 Ebd., S. 16. Mehr dariiber in: H. R. Vaget, Der Schreibakt und der Liebesakt. Zur Deutung von Goethes Gedicht "Das Tagebuch", "Goethe Yearbook" 1982, S. 112-137. 226 Barbara Ratecka und da erwies es sich, daB seine schopferische Kraft versagte. Er konnte seine Gedanken nicht so recht sammeln wie sonst. Er versagte aIs Dichter. Nun setzt ich mich zu meiner Tasch und Briefen Und meines Tagebuchs Genauigkeiten, Um so wie sonst, wenn alle Menschen schliefen, Mir und der Trauten Freude zu bereiten, Doch weiB ich nicht, die Tintenworte tiefen Nicht so wie sonst in alle Kleinigkeiten.28 Erst aIs sich der Schreibende, zugleich aber auch. der Liebende, an seine eheliche Liebe, an die Liebste daheim und an die vergangenen Augenblicke des gemeinsamen Gliicks erinnerte, wurde die geistige wie auch die korperliche Impotenz aufgehoben. "Meister", "Iste" so bezeichnete Goethe das mannliche Glied, das hier eine entscheidende Rolle spielt. Der Dichter hat den Namen aus dem Lateinischen iibernommen. Es ist das Pronomen demonstrativum, dieser da, jener da, der da, das aber in der Bibel und in den Psalmen auftritt und fUr den Herm, der in Glorie einzieht, oder den Brautigam stellvertretend gebraucht wird.29 "Meister" "Iste" oder "der Knecht", Synonyme fUr das mannliche Glied, wurden gegensatzlich verwendet. "Der Meister", wenn er seine Kraft zeigen sollte und "verfluchter Knecht", indem er versagte. Die liebende Erinnerung an die Ehefrau und die mit ihr verbrachten "siiBen Stunden" hat eine doppelte Wirkung: einerseits weckt sie den erschlafften "Meister", der sich "zu allen seinen Prachten erhebt" und dem Helden wieder dienen kann, anderererseits fUhrt sie den Helden auf den Weg der Ptlicht zuriick. Der Held entzieht sich dem Zauber des Madchens, dieser unerwarteten Versuchung. Er verlaBt das Liebeslager und setzt sich ans Tagebuch. Jetzt schreibt er ohne Hemmungen. Sein Tagebuch wird zum Symbol der Treue und des PtlichbewuBtseins. Das Gedicht hat deut1iche Rahmen, die die moralische Absicht des Dichters voU zum Ausdruck bringen. Am Anfang stehen die Zeilen: Das Menschenherz sei ewig unergriindlich Und wie man sich auch hin und wieder wende So sei der Christe wie der Heide siindlich ...30 und am Ende wird aus der ganzen Geschichte eine moralische Lehre gezogen: 28 J. W. von Goethe, Das Tagebuch ... , S. 6. 29 Siehe Oberlegungen von N. van der BIom, Iste. Goethe au! Priaps Spuren, "Diutse Kroniek" (33) 1983, S. 12-15. 30 J. W. von Goethe, Das Tagebuch ... , S. 5. War Goethe ein erotisches Vorbild fUr Rilke? 227 Wir stolpern wohl auf unsrer Lebensreise, und doch verrn6gen in der Welt, der tollen, zwei Hebel viel aufs irdische Getriebe: sehr viel die Pflicht, unendlich mehr die Liebep1 Beide: die Pt1icht (also die Arbeit) wie auch die Liebe sind fur Goethe wichtig, doch aus dieser Geschichte geht deutlich hervor, daB von diesen zwei Werten, die uns am Leben erhalten, die Liebe machtiger ist. Zu dem SchluB kam der Dichter erst nach einer Probe, nach einer Versuchung, der er sich widersetzen muBte. Mit der Probe konnte er seine Kraft des moralisch Gesunden zum Widerstand beweisen. Am Ende des Gedichts stellte er fest: Die Krankheit erst bewiihret den Gesunden.32 Dieses Gedicht, das ein Zeugnis sowohl einer schopferischen aIs auch einer moralischen Krise im Leben des groBen Dichters war, sprach Rainer M. Rilke an. Er schrieb und wagte mehr als nur eine Beschreibung einer gewohruichen Liebesgeschichte. Er verfaBte sieben hymnische Gedichte uber das ganze Liebeserlebnis (von der Seite des Liebenden und der Geliebten so mit allen seinen voneinander kaum unterscheidbaren Entziickungen (so im Brief an Rudolf Bodlander vom 25. Marz 192233). Die sexuelle Schwache, das Versagen des Liebenden wie bei Goethe werden nicht thematisiert. In Rilkes Gedichten wird die Pracht des Phallus, seine Kraft, seine lebensgebende Rolle besungen. Rilke spricht nicht von einem Knecht, und sogar Meister oder Iste sagen fUr ihn nicht genug aus. Der Phallus wird in den Sieben Gedichten zur gottlichen Wurde erhoben. Das III. Gedicht Rilkes laBt sich auf folgende Zeilen aus dem Tagebuch beziehen. Und ais ich endlich sie zur Kirche fUhrte, Gesteh ich's nur vor Priester und Altare, Vor deinem Jammerkreuz, blutninstiger Christe, Verzeih roir's Gott, es regte sich der Iste.34 Rilke paraphrasiert Goethes Zeilen indem er den Gott nicht zum Zeugen eines Liebesaktes beruft, sondern das miinn1iche Glied mit Gott direkt vergleicht: 31 Ebd., S. 14. 32 Ebd., S. 13. 33 Siehe: S. Unseld, ••Das Tagebuch" ... , S. 157. 34 J. W. Goethe, Das Tagebuch, S. 11. 228 Barbara Ratecka Von dir gestiftet, steht des Gottes Bild am leisen Kreuzweg unter meinem Kleide; mein ganzer Korper heiBt nach ihm.3S S. Unseld ist der Meinung, daB die "Verbindung des Sohnes Gottes, des Sch6pfers der Welt, mit dem Phallus, dem Sch6pfer des Menschen"36 ohne Vorbild Goethes nicht zustande kommen konnte. Goethe hat aIs erster gewagt, eine solche blasphemische Verbindung in einem Gedicht zu gebrauchen. Rilke hat aber noch einen Schritt weiter getan. In Rilkes Sieben Gedichten wird nicht zwischen der "sinnlichen", der "k6rperlichen" und der "wahren" Liebe unterschieden. Seine Liebenden traffen sich, um das Wunder der sinnlichen Liebe und das Wunder der Zeugung zu erleben. Der Liebende driickt sein Verlangen nach der Partnerin ohne Umschweife aus. Einen groBen Unterschied gibt es in der Darstellung der Liebespartnerin bei Goethe und bei Rilke. Die Kellnerin im Tagebuch J. W. Goethes war selbstbewuB, emanzipiert. Sie hat den Liebhaber selbst gewahlt; sie wollte ihn lieben und gestand, daB sie bereits Erfahrungen hatte. Rilkes Geliebte in den Sieben Gedichten tut alles "ahnungslos", "unwissend ": Aufgerichtet hast du ihn ahnungsIos mit Blick und Wink und Wendung. und Schon richtet dein unwissendes GeheiB die SauIe auf in meinem SchamgehoIze.37 AIs sie das mannliche Glied erfaBt, fahrt sie "an dem Schreck des Unterschiedes" auf. Der Liebende wendet sich also einige Male an sie, darnit sie sich bewuBt arn Liebesspiel beteiligt und alle Stufen der Hingebung erlebt: o stiirz ihn o •• Gieb nach ... VerschIeiB dein Angesicht ... Schmeich1e mir ... Nun hilf mir 1eise '" und arn Ende o gib dich hin138 3S S. UnseId, "Das Tagebuch" ... , S. 26. 36 Ebd., S. 159. 37.Ebd., S. 26. 38 Ebd., S. 25-28. War Goethe ein erotisches VorbiId fUr Rilke? 229 Eine SchiIderung der GeIiebten wird in den Sieben Gedichten ausgespart; eine Beschreibung der Umgebung wird iiberfliissig. Es bIeiben die BIicke, die die Nervenzellen wecken, die Kiisse, die die Erregung steigern, der Phallus und der SchoB: der Gebende und die Nehmende, die Empfangende. Rilke unterIiiBt die Beschreibungen und verzichtet auf jegliche HandIung, urn sich ausschlieBlich auf den Vorgang des Liebesaktes zu konzentrieren. Goethes VageI schweigen: ein Mysteriurn der Liebe beginnt, ein Mysteriurn des Lebens und des Todes zugleich. Die Metaphorik, die RiIke verwendet, wird nicht zur Verschleierung der sinnlichen Liebe benutzt, sondern dient einer direkten Beschreibung des Liebesaktes.39 Mit diesem Griff schafft Rilke ein Gedicht, das einer "modernen" Auffassung vider Menschen von der Liebe entspricht. Die Erotik verschwindet, die Leistung siegt. Wie Siegfried UnseId in seiner AbhandIung hervorhebt: "Goethes Gedicht Das Tagebuch ist ein Gedicht, das Ziirtlichkeit iiber Leistung, Liebe iiber Ptlicht stellt".40 Bei der Lektiire der Sieben Gedichte von Rainer M. RiIke hat man manchmaI das GefiihI, daB es sich um literarische Pornographie handdt. Vielleicht ist es eine zu weit getriebene Beurteilung, dieser Gedanke aber driingt sich immer mehr auf, wenn man reflektierende und revidierende Verse liest, die er mehrere Jahre spiiter entwarf. Sei wie ein Engel. LaB sie nicht nickwiirts. Weiter gib ihr die Freiheit. Ober das bloBe Liehen gib ihr die Gnade der Liehe.41 Barbara Ratecka CZY GOETHE BYL EROTYCZNYM WZORCEM DLA RAlNERA MARII RILKEGO? KILKA UWAG DO DZIENNIKA J. W. GOETHEGO I SIEDMIU WIERSZY R. M. RILK.EGO Artykuł dotyczy dwóch bardzo mało znanych utworów słynnych twórców literatury niemieckiej. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, twórca Fausta, ma w swym dorobku moralizatorski wiersz pt. Dziennik. Jednak z obawy o posądzenie go o niemoralne treści, nigdy za życia poety utwór ten nie został opublikowany. Również Siedem wierszy Rainera Marii Rilkego jest bardzo rzadko drukowanych. Mimo, iż Rilke długo wzbraniał się przed lekturą utworów 39 Mehr dazu in: A. Stephens, Zur Funktion sexuelier Metaphorik in der Dichtung Rilkes, "Jahrbuch d. dt. Schiller-Gesellschaft" (XVIII) 1974, S. 521-558. 40 Ebd., S. 160. 41 Ebd., S. 160. 230 Barbara Ratecka niemieckiego wieszcza, to jednak Dziennik stanowił wyjątek. Wiersz Goethego poświęcony jest kryzysowi seksualnemu i twórczemu bohatera, za którym kryje się sam poeta. Wiersze Rilkego stanowią cykl poświęcony aktowi miłosnemu dwojga kochanków. Artykuł stara się przeanalizować wzajemne związki obu tych tak różnych dzieł i odpowiedzieć na pytanie, czy R. M. Rilke wzorował się na twórczości J. W. Goethego.

ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 UDC 1:292 A. V. HALAPSIS 1* 1*Dnipropetrovsk State University of Internal Affairs (Dnipro, Ukraine), e-mail [email protected], ORCID 0000-0002-9498-5829 THE MEASURE OF ALL GODS: RELIGIOUS PARADIGMS OF THE ANTIQUITY AS ANTHROPOLOGICAL INVARIANTS Purpose of the article is the reconstruction of ancient Greek and ancient Roman models of religiosity as anthropological invariants that determine the patterns of thinking and being of subsequent eras. Theoretical basis. The author applied the statement of Protagoras that "Man is the measure of all things" to the reconstruction of the religious sphere of culture. I proceed from the fact that each historical community has a set of inherent ideas about the principles of reality, which found unique "universes of meanings". The historical space acquires anthropological properties that determine the specific mythology of the respective societies, as well as their spiritual successors. In particular, the religious models of ancient Greece and ancient Rome had a huge influence on formation of the worldview of the Christian civilization of the West. Originality. Multiplicity of the Olympic mythology contributed to the diversity of the expression forms of the Greek genius, which manifested itself in different fields of cultural activity, not reducible to political, philosophical or religious unity. The poverty of Roman mythology was compensated by a clear awareness of the unity of the community, which for all historical vicissitudes had always remained an unchanging ideal, and which was conceived as a reflection of the unity of the heavens. These two approaches to the divine predetermined the formation of two interacting, but conceptually different anthropological paradigms of Antiquity. Conclusions. Western concepts of divinity are invariants of two basic theological concepts – "Greek" (naturalism and paganism) and "Roman" (transcendentalism and henotheism). These are ideal types, so these two tendencies can co-exist in one society. The Roman trend continued to be realized by the anti-Roman religion, which took Roman forms and Roman name. Iconoclasm was a Byzantine version of the Reformation, promoted by the Isaurian emperors and failed due to the strong Hellenistic naturalistic lobby. Modern "Romans" are trying to get rid of the last elements of religious naturalism, and modern "Greeks" are trying to preserve the Hellenic elements in Christianity. Patterns can be transformed, but the observational view will still be able to ident ify their lineage. The developed model allows a deeper understanding of the culture of both ancient societies, as well as the outlook of Western man. Keywords: henotheism; polytheism; monotheism; man; Antiquity; religion; myth; paganism; anthropology Introduction As it is known, Oswald Spengler considered the religion to be the essence of every culture. Indeed, the people's theology (representing the story of its gods from the outside) unfolds (from the inside) as its anthropology, where correlation with the sacral allows for appropriate positioning of a person. From this, in particular, it follows that the study of the culture of certain peoples should begin with the reconstruction of their religious patterns. However, often the reconstructions, which are supposed to be working models, turn out to be only static models, more or less dexterously adapted to historical reality. Dissecting a foreign religion, the researcher is inclined to lose sight of the fact that it was filled with living acts of faith, without which all its charm disappears, integrity crumbles, and intimate depth transforms into a popular print. Starting from Modernism, the heaven jurisdiction is becoming increasingly limited, and in all areas of theoretical activity classified as "scientific", God's participation gradually shifts from the necessary, as in previous ages, towards the optional, and subsequently, completely undesirable. Already in Hegel, God is forced to put on the mask of the Absolute Spirit only in order to blend into the crowd of Friedrich Wilhelm III's subjects. Today, only a politician or a street preacher can speak of a divine presence in this world; still, perhaps, a theologian, and even then, not eve158 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 ryone. And although the rumors about the death of God turned out to be greatly exaggerated, nowadays no one of the sane people would ever think to compose a philosophy of history modeled after St. Augustine's "The City of God". Nevertheless, the gods, who were dismissed by the thought leaders from the duties of managing life and death of people, contrary to forecasts, did not leave this world at all. They remained and reincarnated, they enter into breathtaking alliances between themselves and lead exhausting and fierce wars. And if many opposing gods find themselves in the same territory, the consequences of their hostility affect even those who deny their reality. The gods are alive as long as they are believed in, and as much alive as much they are believed in. Protagoras, who did not consider it possible to reliably establish the existence of the gods, was convinced of the need to venerate them. After all, even if you personally do not believe in any gods, it would be extremely presumptuous of you to exclude the factor of their influence from life. The Protagorean position "Man is the measure of all things, of the things that are, that they are, and of the things that are not, that they are not" makes evident not only the ontology of our ideas about reality for us, but also the fact that these ideas can become a reality not only for us. It can be a creative plan that was realized in a Gothic cathedral or a musical symphony, a physical theory or a philosophical treatise – where the personal, sometimes even intimate aspects of the spiritual life of the author(s) reach the "objective" level of social being. But the matter is not limited to this kind of visual (to a greater or lesser extent) objectivations, because when the famous sophist spoke about this human privilege, he meant the relationship of people with heaven (it cost him accusations of godlessness and exile from Athens). The question can be, of course, not about gods as such, but about sociocultural ideas about gods, which are made up of people's ideological patterns, and, in turn, influence these patterns (Halapsis, 2015). They can be called egregors in the spirit of some mystical teachings, or interpreted in the manner of Neil Gaiman (remember his famous "American Gods"), or somehow else. In any case, no matter how we treat belief in the existence of gods as personalities, the fact of faith in them is quite clearly historically fixed, and since belief causes the actions of participants in historical processes corresponding to it, it is quite impossible to dismiss such facts. Since the religious forms of identity previously had no less significance than today (and in most cases much more), then the conversation about the religions of antiquity should be conducted with no less seriousness than about the religions of modernity. To understand the ancient culture, one should get rid of the habit of viewing its religious sphere as an amusing fable, where even a beautiful retelling does not negate the fact that its content – in the opinion of the narrator himself – is a lie. The following text is an attempt to interpret the religious patterns of the ancient Greeks and Romans as anthropological invariants that define the existential patterns for subsequent eras. And besides purely historical, there are other reasons that make the reconstruction of the religious beliefs of classical Antiquity relevant to people of the XXI century. Traditionally, the Greek and Roman religions are regarded as past practices and plots that have little or no effect on our own relationship to the divine world. We readily recognize ourselves as the spiritual heirs of the Greeks and Romans in the fields of science and philosophy, the theory of state and law, art and life, but not in the religious sphere. In accordance with church tradition, a line is built from Adam to Abraham, from Abraham to Moses, from him to the rest of the prophets (Old Testament), then to Jesus and the apostles (New Testament), and further to modern Christianity (of course, each the confession treats the history of the last two millennia in favorable optics). Homer and Hesiod, Orpheus and Musaeus, the Delphic oracle and the Sibyls, the Greek philosophers and the Roman legislators simply do not fit into this scheme. However, as Simon Goldhill 159 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 (2004) notes, "the problem is that ancient Greece cannot just be "different". It is one of those privileged sources from which modern Western culture derives its own values" (p. 87). Taking over the forms of the ancient worldview, the people of the West simply could not but adopt the forms of their religiosity, even if in a veiled form. What are these forms? This article reveals some of them to the attention of readers. Ancient Greek religiosity has been the object of numerous studies, because it is difficult to overestimate the significance of religion for the formation of the Hellenic civilization. The Greeks had words for "customs", "sacrifices", "prayers", "temples", "hymns", "priests", "sacred things", "gods", "piety", but they did not have a word that could collectively denominate all the above under a general term such as "religion" (Polinskaya, 2013, p. 3). According to Jan Bremmer, "religion was such an integral part of Greek life that the Greeks did not have a separate word for "religion" (Bremmer, 1994, p. 2). Indeed, "it is almost impossible to separate religion, as a category, from the rest of life in the ancient world" (DuBois, 2014, p. 57). On the other hand, it is possible to speak about the "religion of the Greeks" quite notionally, as each city had its own cult, only partly associated with the common Hellenic one. The ancient Greek religion is largely a reconstruction of the later eras than something that existed as a "religion" in our understanding. The geopolitical fragmentation of the Greek world resulted in the existence of many centers of religious life in ancient Greece (Mikalson, 2010, p. 47; Parker, 2005, p. 70; Versnel, 2011, p. 88). In different polises and localities of Hellas, the same gods were worshiped under different epithets, sometimes in the same polis there were several temples of the same gods, who, in accordance with their epithets, were honored in different ways. Fustel de Coulanges noted: "The fact that two cities gave their god the same name should not lead us to conclude that they worshiped the same god" (Fustel de Coulanges, 2010). Ian Bremmer also notes that «Every city had its own pantheon in which some gods were more important than others and some gods not even worshiped at all... Yet the various city-religions overlap sufficiently to warrant the continued use of the term "Greek religion"» (Bremmer, 1994, p. 1). Walter Burkert (1985) stated that the ancient Greek religion was a plurality in unity, because despite local peculiarities, "the Greeks themselves viewed various manifestations of their religious life as essentially compatible, because the diversity of practice in devotion to the same gods was not questioned even by Greek philosophy" (p. 8). In one degree or another, the unity of Greek religiosity is recognized by other researchers (Parker, 2005, p. 66; Price, 1999, p. 3; Sissa, & Detienne, 2000, p. 155; Versnel, 2011, p. 240). In forming the spiritual unity of the Greeks, poetry played an enormous role (Vernant, 1993, p. 100), however, it is necessary to distinguish between the gods of poetry and the gods of cults, for "Deities of Greek poetry, in a sense, both were (by name, physical appearance, and sometimes function) and were not (by local cult myths, ritual, and sometimes function) the deities whom each Greek personally worshiped (Mikalson, 2010, p. 35). Here we see the amazing anthropological responses to myth-theological challenges. The diversity of reality, suggesting the parallel existence of the same gods in different lacunae, allowed opposite interpretations of divinity, which required special skill in the transition between different registers or foci of consciousness (Versnel, 2011, p. 90). Herewith the Greeks managed to do this procedure so skillfully that their models (interpretations of divinity) were not directly opposed to each other. And philosophy was born as an interpretation: if they had had a single cult and strict creed, it might not have arisen. This Greek "postmodernism" is very different from the Roman religious worldview already because the latter spread from one center, and at the level of the base code it had a much greater de160 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 gree of integration (another thing is that having already become a world empire, Rome experienced the actions of deities, not all of whom were supportive of it, and some were clearly hostile). Charles King identifies three basic conceptual mechanisms of the Roman religion: polymorphism, meaning that gods can have multiple identities with incompatible attributes, orthopraxy, focusing on standardized ritual rather than standardized faith, and piety (pietas), the Roman ideal of mutual commitment, which was flexible enough to allow the Romans to maintain relations simultaneously with several gods at different levels of personal commitment (King, 2003). In my article I will also focus on other features of the Roman religion, as well as on its differences from the Greek one. Purpose The purpose of the article is the reconstruction of ancient Greek and ancient Roman models of religiosity as anthropological invariants that determine the patterns of thinking and being of subsequent eras. Statement of basic materials Arguments about the essence of man will remain empty without being tied to the specific cultural and historical conditions within which this personality is developing. The very idea of "personality" and its inherent properties, rights (let us recall the doctrine of "natural law", etc.) is also historically conditioned. And the tradition, thanks to which our contemporaries talk about such things, did not arise yesterday or the day before yesterday. The basic patterns of our thinking and our relationship to the world began to form in Antiquity; therefore, turning to it has the meaning of self-knowledge. Science and philosophy, the doctrine of state and law, ethics and fine arts, inherited from the Greeks and Romans, were considered by them in close connection with religious concepts and ideals, only in the context of which they acquired their meaning. Therefore, the reconstruction of ancient religious paradigms is necessary for a deeper understanding of those ideological patterns that underlie the worldview of modern man. For most of our contemporaries, the differences between the Greek and Roman religions are almost entirely reduced to different designations (names) of the same gods. The facts of the mutual influence of Greek and Roman religiosity and the parallelism of mythological plots can be cited in favor of this point of view. However, even if the Greeks and Romans prayed to the same gods, it is not at all the fact that they treated them equally. The actual absence of professional clergy in the sense that it was established in later times was also greatly contributed to the absence of any dogmatism, which is why the corresponding religious beliefs did not have a rigid framework. The Greek gods did not hide from people in other words, they were near, accompanying man from birth to death. They gave strength to his sails, and they smashed his ships, they pulled him into the abyss, and they gave him salvation, they took care of his harvest, and they sent diseases to him. And although not all the Greeks took the poets' stories at face value, few of them doubted the very existence of the gods. How can you doubt those who are present here, near, whose strength you feel in the tumult of the elements and the change of seasons, in the storm at sea and lightning breaking the skies, in the noise of the forest and the greatness of the stars, in the breath of the earth and the whisper of the stars? The intimate relationship with the gods was also manifested in the absence of intermediaries between man and the gods. The priests only maintained the temples in decent condition, but they did not take over the function of the representatives of heaven. Each Greek could independently appeal to the gods, who were specific individuals, whose visualization (for example, in the form 161 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 of marble statues) served only as an auxiliary means for establishing special relations with the higher forces. Here, one of the markers will be exactly the fact with what forces these relations are established and the nature of their features. Anyone who wishes to form a holistic view of the ancient Greek religion has every chance of despairing very quickly in the performance of their intention. It is difficult to find gods, regarding the origin, details of the biography, and sometimes – the functions, in relation to which numerous myths come to consensus. Robert Parker compares the Greek pantheon with a heaped line basket that no one considered necessary to tidy up (Parker, 2005, p. 387). However, it is possible to try to clean up this basket. But for this, one should turn not to the myths themselves, but to their background. The absence of universally recognized dogma texts by the Greeks and Romans creates considerable difficulties for the reconstruction of their spiritual life, but we have enough data on religious practices to derive from them the canonically unformed, but effective, due to its motivational potential, content of the views that determined the fundamental parameters of the evolution of relevant civilization projects. Philosophy is primarily interested in the experience of the spirit from its ancient laboratory – experience, the consequences of which continue to influence our own projects. Throughout the entire historical period, and almost everywhere in Greece, Zeus was considered the supreme Greek god. However, the supreme god was not the main addressee of the prayers of the Greeks, being the personification of abstract cosmic justice, too far from the needs of a particular Hellene. Therefore, "religious holidays in honour of Zeus are few, since a number of his functions were entrusted to other gods – executors of the will of Zeus, who were in much closer relations with man (italics added by me. – A. H.)..." (Losev, 1991, p. 221). Usually the role of the mortals in establishing close relations with the heavens is rather passive; they act only as objects to which the interest of higher powers is directed. Practically in all religions of the world there are plots about how gods choose individuals for expressing their will, often gods patronize those who could draw their attention to themselves, sometimes whole nations become favorites of gods. But for the gods themselves to participate in the casting for the favor of the mortals – such examples are few. But the Greeks have them at least two. Paris became a judge in the contest of divine beauty, the participants of which did not hesitate to commit acts of corruption in relation to him. The second well-known example is the dispute between Athena and Poseidon over the right to rule Attica, and this dispute was resolved by people who determined the degree of usefulness of the divine gifts. In both cases, the rival gods tried to please the mortals, and in both cases the result had far-reaching consequences. The decision of Paris led to the Trojan War, but the audience award received by Athena turned out to be much more significant. Athena had the subjects whom she favoured with knowledge and skills, and to whom she granted her patronage. Her rule turned out to be very beneficial, because most of the achievements that the Hellenes were proud of – craft, science, art, polis organization of public life – were due to Athena. Therefore, the most luxurious temples were dedicated to her, majestic statues were put to her, her image was decorated with vases, coins, etc. A. F. Losev noted that Athena is equal in importance to Zeus, and sometimes even surpasses him (Losev, 1991, p. 72). A close relationship with (some) gods means that the celestials live the life of their people, they support and take care of it. Gods share victories and holidays with people, but also in trouble they do not abandon their wards. And when hard days came, a resident of Attica knew whose help he could count on. However, it should be borne in mind that although in the inter-Hellenic conflicts Athena behaves as befits the ruler of Attica, in the conflicts of the Greeks with the barbarians she is always on the side of the Greeks. Thus, this goddess acts in two roles: as the ruler 162 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 of one of the regions of Little Greece (there was even the epithet "Athena of Athens" (Polinskaya, 2013, p. 10)) and as an all-Hellenic goddess-protector. Each Greek polis had its own palladium – a sacred image of Athena, which was a city talisman; her image, and not the image of the supreme god Zeus, or the military god Ares. An idea of the power of the warrior goddess can be obtained from a story about how, pursuing the running giant Enceladus, she brought down the island of Sicily on him (Apollodorus, 1921, p. 45). The Greeks were convinced that every nation has its own celestial curator, who not only protects his own subjects (to the extent that the supreme god allows), but is also responsible for their well-being. (By the way, interesting parallels can be found in Deuteronomy (chapter 32, verse 8)), where the number of nations is related to the number of heavenly inhabitants. The Synodal Bible, however, refers to the "sons of Israel", but in modern translations the word "angels" is used in this place or even "gods"; for example, in the New Revised Standard Version we read: "When the Most High apportioned the nations, when he divided humankind, he fixed the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of the gods" (Coogan, Brettler, Newsom, & Perkins, 2010, p. 304). Apparently, it was this fragment that allowed Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite to assert that God had assigned one of the angels to every people (Dionysius the Areopagite, 1899, p. 36). Such an idea was implicitly implied behind the external outline of the narration of Greek myths; Plato himself writes about the division of the world between the gods as a well-known fact (Plato, 1997, p. 1295). The lovers asked for help from Aphrodite, the sailors from Poseidon, the merchants from Hermes; while all the Greeks prayed to Athena. The Greeks worshiped other gods; they loved Athena, not sparing their efforts and means, in order to express their gratitude to her. The gods ruled the whole world; Athena was their – Greeks' – goddess, she was their Ruler, Protector and Benefactor. Being subsequently ridiculed and anecdotized by Christian authors, the Hellenic myths were much more flexible than the ingenuous straightforwardness of the main plot of the Old Testament books. Reading the latter, you never get tired of being surprised by the fantastic persistence with which the "chosen people" resisted the will of their divine Patron. But if we consider the Old Testament history not as a reliable story, but as a metaphysical concept, a lot falls into place. In essence, Yahweh combines the features of a universal God with the features of a pagan deity, but if the presence of Zeus and other gods diverted from Athena possible reproaches of insufficient support, then Yahweh had no such "justification". The "ingratitude" of the Jews plays a key role in the concept of Judaism, making it possible to explain the fact that the people chosen by the One and Almighty God are being defeated by wicked polytheists. Still the Greek concept of separation of the supreme and beloved (domestic) deities both allowed to consistently describe the divine world and provided motivation for human actions. After all, although the gods have the capabilities incomparable with those of the mortals (what would the island thrower do to the enemy army?), the justice of the supreme god actually leveled these capabilities (when Zeus directly forbade Athena to use her Wunderwaffe, or when he opposed the power of other gods to her power). Consequently, the outcome of this or that battle is more dependent on weak and mortal people than on strong and immortal celestials. The Romans built relationships with the world of the gods in other way. Although they borrowed Greek mythological plots, and their poets tried to imitate Homer, the equivalence of the mythological component should not be misleading, because it plays far from the main role. After all, the sacred history in Judaism, Christianity and Islam is also almost identical, which in no way testifies to the identity of the religious models that serve as a guide to action for their followers. 163 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 The abundance of myths does credit to the creative imagination of the Greek people, but their storylines do not always contribute to piety. The Roman religion did not give grounds for licentiousness and irreverence, and in this, according to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the main merit belongs to the legendary founder of Rome. The Greek historian noted with approval that Romulus dismissed all the myths in which the gods appear in an unattractive form, setting people to say only the good things about the gods (Halicarnassus, 1960, p. 363). Plutarch, however, attributed the beginning of the formation of a specific Roman religiosity to the rule of Numa Pompilius, who (in his opinion) was under Pythagorean influence. It is interesting that Plutarch ascribes to Numa the doctrine, in accordance with which the first principle of being is sensually imperceptible, invisible, indistinct and intelligible; from this followed the prohibition to honor God in the form of a man or animal, as well as to create his images; for a long time (170 years) the Romans allegedly followed this prohibition (Plutarch, 1967, p. 333). This suggests parallels with Judaism and Islam, which prohibit the image of God, as well as with the tradition of iconoclasm – from the Isaurian emperors of Byzantium to the Protestants. The majority of contemporary historians following Theodore Mommsen consider Romulus and Numa to be mythological characters (Cornell, 1995; Momigliano, 1990; RodríguezMayorgas, 2010; Wiseman, 1995). As Mary Bird noted, it was not Romulus who gave his name to the city, but, on the contrary, his name is derived from the name of the city; so Romulus is the archetypal "Mr. Rome" (Beard, 2015), chap. 2. However, there are those (for example, the Italian archaeologist Andrea Carandini), who hold the opposite point of view, considering the first kings to be historical figures (Carandini, 2011). I will not interfere in the discussions of historians. For me, the historicity of Romulus and Numa (as well as the historicity of other characters in early Roman history) is not critical. For historians it is important to find out how it really was, and for the tasks of my research it is much more important what the Romans thought about how it really was. I call a historical figure the person about whom the history speaks as about a "historical figure", who could fit into it. Since one has become part of a mythologema, taken into account and used by the spirit in its historical evolution, he or she has become history, and this fact itself is sufficient to state that in a historical sense this one is not at all nobody (even if there are doubts about his or her physical existence). It is indicative that both Greek authors point out the differences between the Roman version of religiosity and the traditional Greek beliefs that are familiar to them, and Plutarch points out the closeness of the Roman code to the most mysterious philosophical and mystical teaching of Hellas. Athena in the Roman pantheon corresponds to Minerva, who is part of the Capitoline Triad (along with Jupiter and Juno). But the Greek parallels were made later, and Minerva was originally the Etruscan Menrva who "changed citizenship", the goddess of motherhood and craft; she was also a protector of the cities, portrayed in military armament and with a spear, was part of the Etruscan triad (along with Tinia and Uni) (Nemirovskiy, 1991, p. 361). Having "enticed" the goddess of their enemies, the Romans could not fail to find in her the similar features with the patroness of their teachers. However, the Minerva for the Romans is not at all the same as Athena for the Greeks, and the matter is not only in its national sympathies and political projects. Unlike the Greeks, whose gods besides external anthropomorphism were human-like also in actions, the Romans were inclined to perceive gods as abstractly universal cosmic entities. If Greek mythology is dramatic (the amorous adventures of the immortals, their quarrels and intrigues, causing the indignation of philosophers by their simplicity, were considered by most Hellenes to be quite permissible pastime), then Roman religiousness stays away from all this. An exception can be considered poetic 164 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 works created as direct imitation of Greek originals, which, incidentally, have almost no religious significance. Therefore, Minerva is Athena, and not Athena, Venus is both Aphrodite and not Aphrodite, and of course Jupiter is the one the Greeks honored under the name "Zeus", but this is "not quite" Zeus. The supreme god of the Romans is not at all like the hero-lover who is fed up with power; he is the universal principle that rules the world and can manifest himself in a particular personality. The Olympians dispelled the boredom of eternal life by rivalry with each other, in which they gladly involved the mortals, while the Roman gods did not confront each other at all, not because of corporate ethics, but because the entire Roman pantheon represented different aspects of the unified cosmic principle. So, Mars is an expression of the power of Jupiter, Ceres – fertility, Venus – love, etc. This multidimensionality of the supreme deity partly corresponds with the concept of "hypostasis" in Neo-Platonists and in Christian theology. No matter what thunders and lightning Christian writers threw at the pagans, they themselves, with all their desire, could not completely get rid of pagan intellectual patterns when adapting the Middle Eastern religion to forms acceptable to the descendants of Romulus and the heirs of Athena. These latter (Greeks) relatively easily accepted Christianity to a large extent precisely through the traditions of the Roman religion of Jupiter, since, although the cult of Olympians was preserved in Greece conquered by Rome, the ideas were undoubtedly intertwined. Ye. M. Shtaerman (1991) noted that "... as the monotheistic tendencies increased, Jupiter was considered not only as supreme, but as the only god ("everything is full of Jupiter"), as the soul or mind of the world, the ether that generates and accepts into itself" (p. 647). Roman (and already under its influence – Greek) polytheism in its most elite version turned out to be much more universal (and therefore less "pagan") than the strict monotheism of the Old Testament, tied to the interests and history of only one people (however, there is an opinion that a clear transition to monotheism among the Jews was outlined only in the Roman period of their history, in particular, by Philo of Alexandria, and in the Hebrew Bible it is virtually absent (Serandour, 2005)). The Roman religious paradigm basically allowed the reduction of all divine aspects to one Personality. Of course, it was not monotheism in the truest sense of the word; rather, Jupiter embodied the supreme will of the "community of gods", which acted as one. As Christopher Jones (2012) notes, many pagans are inclined to monotheism or to modified monotheism, who considered one god to be far superior to all others. There is even the term "pagan monotheism", which was devised to describe monotheistic tendencies in the Greco-Roman world (Mitchell, & Van Nuffelen, 2010; Van Nuffelen, 2012). Such a construction is not devoid of meaning, but it may be misunderstood, given the tradition of using the respective terminology. In essence, monotheism and polytheism are habitual clichés that have a very conventional relation to the content of belief in the supernatural. Pure monotheism is extremely rare; it is not so much a religion as a philosophical concept. Christian theologians and mystics used up a lot of paper, describing the angelic hierarchy. With their vigorous imagination, pious authors tried to level out the simple idea that an omnipotent and self-sufficient God does not need helpers or a bureaucratic apparatus. Protestantism is closer to the idea of monotheism than Catholicism and Orthodoxy (with their cult of saints and the Virgin Mary), but it is also far from pure monotheism, because Protestant theologians cannot ignore those places in the Bible where angels and demons are mentioned (by the way, what do the latter expect, entering into the struggle with the Almighty?). It is quite another thing if monotheism is declared in milder forms, sprouting through polytheism in the form of one of its versions, as is the case with the Roman religion. Jupiter could have many aspects, so there was no contradiction in the appearance of "new" gods, for these gods 165 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 were only other forms of worship of Jupiter. And there was no contradiction in his veneration under various names. If Jupiter manifested himself here and in this way, it is logical to worship him in that way, if there and in other way, then he will be worshipped accordingly. The main gods are the main aspects ("hypostases"), the minor gods corresponded to the minor aspects (minor from the point of view of the interests of the whole community, but for the current interests of a particular person this aspect could turn out to be the most important, and for another person – the other one). The main gods had their official (appointed by the community) priests – pontifices, and the pontifex board were headed by a great pontifex, which symbolized the integrity of the cult. At the same time, Jupiter was not directly positioned either as the only one or as the almighty. Ted Peters counted nine different conceptual models of God: atheism, agnosticism, deism, theism, pantheism, polytheism, henotheism, pantheism, and eschatological pantheism (Peters, 2007). If we talk about the Roman religion, it seems to me that it is closest to henotheism. The latter is a point of view, according to which there are many gods, but all of them are subject to one supreme god and carry out his will. Dirk Baltzli even claims that henotheism was the dominant approach to the gods among the pagan philosophers of antiquity (Baltzly, 2016), and it is difficult to disagree. Judean monotheism was not only unwilling to part with its "paganism" (as a national commitment to the detriment of the universal), but also refused to recognize the possibility of considering the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in "aspects", even if they were hypostases of Trinity; the expected Messiah must be a divine Messenger and a King, but not God. This, by the way, is one of the reasons why, for the most part, the Jewish people did not accept Christianity. And the same hypothesis explains the fact that the distance between universalist polytheism and universalist monotheism occurred much shorted than between the monotheistic paganism of the Old Testament and the universal monotheism of the New one. Originality The multiplicity of Greek mythology to a large extent contributed to the diversity of expression forms of the Greek genius, who manifested himself in various fields of cultural activity, without being concerned about bringing the results to a certain unity – political, philosophical, religiousdogmatic. The myths, in which people chose gods, can be seen as a symbol of the mutual obligations of people and celestials, and hardly any other culture could have the idea of man as the measure of all things, at least in the Protagorean sense. Although religion was a state (polis) creed, there were many cults and interpretations far removed from any kind of Olympic orthodoxy (the Orphic movement, the Pythagorean order, etc.). Philosophy itself appears as an intellectual interpretation of religious experience. The variability and selectivity of the ideological system provoked a creative understanding of reality and in many respects contributed to the formation of the "Greek miracle". The poverty of the mythological component of the Roman world outlook system was compensated by a clear awareness of the unity of the community, which for all historical vicissitudes had always remained an unchanging ideal, and which was conceived as a reflection of the unity of the heavens. The Romans were neither inclined to create grandiose mythological constructions, nor to reflect on the place of the divine in the world. However, they were scrupulous about the observance of standard religious procedures in order to be confident in the approval of their actions from heaven. The auspices that accompanied each more or less significant event in the life of both the Roman community and the individual citizen were a symbol of such a strategy (the need to maintain pax deorum). And if Greek anthropology developed under the sign of creative diversity, then the sign of Roman anthropology was the integrity of the collective, which was the only environment where a person could realize himself. 166 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 These two approaches to the divine predetermined the formation of two interacting, but conceptually different anthropological models of Antiquity. Conclusions I suppose it would not be a great exaggeration to assert that Western ideas about divinity are invariants of two main theological concepts – "Greek" (naturalism and paganism) and "Roman" (transcendentalism and henotheism). Of course, we are talking about ideal types, so these two tendencies can co-exist in the same society. So, speaking of Greek naturalism and paganism, I have in mind the popular religion, and not the philosophical speculations, which were often far from both of them. In Roman society too, besides monotheistic (henotheistic) tendencies, the researcher will easily find both pagan and naturalistic tendencies. Nevertheless, the selected ideal types allow a deeper understanding of the culture of both the two ancient societies and their heirs. The mole of history turned out to be a great joker. The Roman trend continued to be implemented by the anti-Roman religion, which took the Roman form and the Roman name. Modern "Romans" are trying to get rid of the last elements of religious naturalism, so it is not surprising that at the Second Vatican Council the Roman Church made fasts non-binding, and the "Roman" Protestants proclaimed renunciation thereof even earlier. On the other hand, it is not by chance that it was the Greek tradition that retained the fast and many other "Hellenic" elements when the two "Roman" branches of Christianity abandoned them in whole or in part. Patterns can be fancily transformed, but the observational view will still be able to identify their lineage. Thus, iconoclasm was a Byzantine version of the Reformation, promoted by the Isaurian emperors and failed due to the strong Hellenistic naturalistic lobby. I believe that the reader will have no difficulty to draw other parallels. REFERENCES Apollodorus. (1921). The Library (Vol. I). J. G. Frazer (Ed.), Trans. London: W. Heinemann. (in English) Areopagite, D. (1899). Works (Vol. 2). J. Parker, Trans. London: James Parker and Co. (in English) Baltzly, D. (2016). Divine immutability for Henotheists. Sophia, 55(2), 129-143. doi: 10.1007/s11841-015-0472-2 (in English) Beard, M. (2015). SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome. New York: Liveright. (in English) Bremmer, J. N. (1994). Greek Religion (Vol. 24). Oxford: Oxford University Press. (in English) Burkert, W. (1985). Greek Religion. J. Raffan, Trans. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. (in English) Carandini, A. (2011). Rome: Day one. S. Sartarelli, Trans. Princeton: Princeton University Press. (in English) Coogan, M., Brettler, M., Newsom, C., & Perkins, P. (Eds.). (2010). The new Oxford annotated Bible with apocrypha: New revised standard version (4 Edit.). New York: Oxford University Press. (in English) Cornell, T. J. (1995). The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 BC). 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(in English) 167 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 Jones, C. P. (2012). The Fuzziness of "Paganism". Common Knowledge, 18(2), 249-254. doi: 10.1215/0961754X-1544932 (in English) King, C. (2003). The Organization of Roman religious beliefs. Classical Antiquity, 22(2), 275-312. doi: 10.1525/ca.2003.22.2.275 (in English) Losev, A. F. (1991). Afina. In Y. M. Meletinskiy (Ed.), Mifologicheskiy slovar (pp. 72-73). Moscow: Sovetskaya entsiklopediya. (in Russian) Losev, A. F. (1991). Zevs. In Y. M. Meletinskiy (Ed.), Mifologicheskiy slovar (pp. 220-221). Moscow: Sovetskaya entsiklopediya. (in Russian) Mikalson, J. D. (2010). Ancient Greek religion (2 Edit.). Malden: Wiley-Blackwell. (in English) Mitchell, S., & Van Nuffelen, P. (Eds.). (2010). 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Religions of the ancient greeks. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (in English) Rodríguez-Mayorgas, A. (2010). Romulus, Aeneas and the cultural memory of the Roman Republic. Athenaeum, 98(1), 89-109. (in English) Serandour, A. (2005). On the appearance of a monotheism in the religion of Israel (3rd Century BC or Later?). Diogenes, 52(1), 33-45. doi: 10.1177/0392192105050601 (in English) Shtaerman, Y. M. (1991). Yupiter. In Y. M. Meletinskiy (Ed.), Mifologicheskiy slovar (pp. 646-647). Moskow: Sovetskaya entsiklopediya. (in Russian) Sissa, G., & Detienne, M. (2000). The daily life of the Greek Gods. J. Lloyd, Trans. Stanford: Stanford University Press. (in English) Van Nuffelen, P. (2012). Beyond categorization "Pagan monotheism" and the study of ancient religion. Common Knowledge, 18(3), 451-463. doi: 10.1215/0961754X-1630332 (in English) Vernant, J.-P. (1993). Greek religion. In M. Eliade (Ed.), The Encyclopedia of Religion (Vol. 6, pp. 99-118). New York: Macmillan Publishing. 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Wiseman. – Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1995. – 260 p. 169 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 О. В. ХАЛАПСІС 1* 1*Дніпропетровський державний університет внутрішніх справ (Дніпро, Україна), е-пошта [email protected], ORCID 0000-0002-9498-5829 МІРА ВСІХ БОГІВ: РЕЛІГІЙНІ ПАРАДИГМИ АНТИЧНОСТІ ЯК АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНІ ІНВАРІАНТИ Метою статті є реконструкція давньогрецької і давньоримської моделей релігійності як антропологічних інваріантів, що визначають патерни мислення й буття наступних епох. Теоретичний базис. Автор застосував положення Протагора про те, що "людина є мірою усіх речей" до реконструкції релігійної сфери культури. Я виходжу з того, що кожна історична спільнота людей має набір властивих їй уявлень про принципи реальності, на підставі яких виникають унікальні "всесвіти смислів". Історичний простір набуває антропологічних властивостей, які визначають специфічну міфологію відповідних суспільств, а також їх духовних спадкоємців. Зокрема, релігійні моделі Стародавньої Греції та Стародавнього Риму справили величезний вплив на формування світогляду християнської цивілізації Заходу. Наукова новизна. Мультисюжетність олімпійської міфології сприяла різноманіттю форм вираження грецького генія, який проявив себе в різних областях культурної діяльності, котрі не зводилися до політичної, філософської або релігійної єдності. Бідність римської міфології компенсувалася чітким усвідомленням єдності громади, яка при всіх історичних перипетіях завжди залишалося незмінним ідеалом, і мислилась як відображення єдності небес. Ці два підходи до божественного визначили формування двох взаємодіючих, але концептуально різних антропологічних парадигм Античності. Висновки. Західні концепції божественності є інваріантами двох основних теологічних концепцій – "грецької" (натуралізм та язичництво) і "римської" (трансценденталізм і генотеїзм). Йдеться про ідеальні типи, тому ці дві тенденції можуть співіснувати в одному суспільстві. Римський тренд продовжила реалізовувати антиримська релігія, яка прийняла римські форми і римське ім'я. Іконоборство було візантійським варіантом Реформації, який просували імператори-ісаврійці та який був провалений завдяки сильному еллінському натуралістичному лобі. Сучасні "римляни" прагнуть позбутися останніх елементів релігійного натуралізму, а сучасні "греки" намагаються зберегти еллінські елементи в християнстві. Патерни можуть трансформуватися, але спостережливий погляд все ж зможе ідентифікувати їх родовід. Розроблена модель дозволяє глибше зрозуміти культуру як двох античних суспільств, так і світогляд західної людини. Ключові слова: генотеїзм; політеїзм; монотеїзм; людина; Античність; релігія; міф; язичництво; антропологія А. В. ХАЛАПСИС 1* 1*Днепропетровский государственный университет внутренних дел (Днипро, Украина), е-почта [email protected], ORCID 0000-0002-9498-5829 МЕРА ВСЕХ БОГОВ: РЕЛИГИОЗНЫЕ ПАРАДИГМЫ АНТИЧНОСТИ КАК АНТРОПОЛОГИЧЕСКИЕ ИНВАРИАНТЫ Целью статьи является реконструкция древнегреческой и древнеримской моделей религиозности как антропологических инвариантов, определяющих паттерны мышления и бытия последующих эпох. Теоретический базис. Автор применил положение Протагора о том, что "человек есть мера всех вещей" к реконструкции религиозной сферы культуры. Я исхожу из того, что каждая историческая общность людей обладает набором присущих ей представлений о принципах реальности, на основании которых возникают уникальные "вселенные смыслов". Историческое пространство приобретает антропологические свойства, которые определяют специфическую мифологию соответствующих обществ, а также их духовных наследников. В частности, религиозные модели Древней Греции и Древнего Рима оказали огромное влияние на формирование мировоззрения христианской цивилизации Запада. Научная новизна. Мультисюжетность олимпийской мифологии способствовала многообразию форм выражения греческого гения, который проявил себя в разных областях культурной деятельности, не сводимых к политическому, философскому или религиозному единству. Бедность римской мифологии компенсировалась четким осознанием единства 170 ISSN 2227-7242 (Print), ISSN 2304-9685 (Online) Антропологічні виміри філософських досліджень, 2018, Вип. 14 Anthropological Measurements of Philosophical Research, 2018, NO 14 АНТРОПОЛОГІЧНА ПРОБЛЕМАТИКА В ІСТОРІЇ ФІЛОСОФІЇ doi: 10.15802/ampr.v0i14.150756 © A. V. Halapsis, 2018 общины, которое при всех исторических перипетиях всегда оставалось неизменным идеалом, и которое мыслилось как отражение единства небес. Эти два подхода к божественному предопределили формирование двух взаимодействующих, но концептуально различных антропологических парадигм Античности. Выводы. Западные концепции божественности являются инвариантами двух основных теологических концепций – "греческой" (натурализм и язычество) и "римской" (трансцендентализм и генотеизм). Речь идет об идеальных типах, поэтому эти две тенденции могут сосуществовать в одном обществе. Римский тренд продолжила реализовывать антиримская религия, принявшая римские формы и римское имя. Иконоборчество было византийским вариантом Реформации, продвигавшимся императорами-исаврами и провалившимся благодаря сильному эллинскому натуралистическому лобби. Современные "римляне" стремятся избавиться от последних элементов религиозного натурализма, а современные "греки" пытаются сохранить эллинские элементы в христианстве. Паттерны могут причудливо трансформироваться, но наблюдательный взгляд все же сможет идентифицировать их родословную. Разработанная модель позволяет глубже понять культуру как двух античных обществ, так и мировоззрение западного человека. Ключевые слова: генотеизм; политеизм; монотеизм; человек; Античность; религия; миф; язычество; антропология Received: 23.03.2018 Accepted: 20.11.2018

Świat Idei i Polityki Mikołaj Raczyński Przyszłość przez przeszłość – rola historii w koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego Jürgena Habermasa Streszczenie: Defi nicja patriotyzmu najczęściej ogranicza się do stwierdzenia, że jest to tylko pielęgnowanie pamięci o historii. Jednak patriotyzm może mieć dwojakie oblicze: jedno – najczęściej podkreślane – skierowane ku przeszłości i drugie ukierunkowane na teraźniejszość, a nawet przyszłość. Co więcej, zdaniem wielu badaczy patriotyzm nie musi być ściśle związany z jednym narodem czy kulturą. Wartą zainteresowania koncepcję patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego podczas dyskusji o tożsamości narodowej toczonych po II wojnie światowej wypracowali historycy i fi lozofowie niemieccy. Jednym z popularyzatorów tego projektu był i cały czas jest Jürgen Habermas. Według niemieckiego fi lozofa patriotyzm konstytucyjny to nie pozytywistyczne zasady konstytucyjne, ale pewne abstrakcyjne formy, sposoby interpretacji spajające określoną zbiorowość. Takimi uniwersalnymi zasadami mogą być procedury suwerenności oraz liberalne prawa jednostki. Patriotyzm konstytucyjny wydaje się odchodzić od tradycyjnego powoływania się na pamięć historyczną. Zamiast niej proponuje nie tyle czystą naukę, ale próbę uzyskania samoświadomości poprzez jej znajomość. W artykule przedstawiono argumenty wskazujące na to, że w koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego proponowanej przez J. Habermasa refl eksyjnie opracowana historia odgrywa bardzo istotną, a nawet kluczową rolę. Słowa kluczowe: Jürgen Habermas, patriotyzm konstytucyjny, historia, fi lozofi a, demokracja. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  67 Wstęp Patriotyzm jest ideą niezwykle płodną fi lozofi cznie, na której temat napisano niezliczone ilości książek i artykułów, jednak co się z tym wiąże, jest pojęciem bardzo trudnym do zdefi niowania. Według jednej z defi nicji „patriotyzm to cnota moralna miłości do ojczyzny – ziemi ojczystej, zamieszkujących ją ludzi, jej ładu politycznego, zinstytucjonalizowanego w państwie i personifi kowanego przez suwerena oraz do jej dziedzictwa kulturalnego ładu moralno-społecznego uformowanego przez normy cywilizacji i religii"1. Jednak nawet przyjmując taką defi nicję, napotykamy na problemy interpretacyjne, gdyż konieczne jest wyjaśnienie takich terminów jak cnota, miłość czy ojczyzna. Dlatego wydaje się, że słuszne jest twierdzenie, że patriotyzm jest zagadnieniem z natury spornym. Problem ten w jednym ze swych tekstów trafnie opisał Jerzy Szacki: „pojęcia patriotyzmu niepodobna zdefi niować w zadowalający każdego sposób, można je co najwyżej po swojemu interpretować, odrzucając tym samym inne interpretacje"2. W artykule odwołam się do koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego proponowanej przez Jürgena Habermasa. Moim celem jest przedstawienie ogólnych zarysów tego projektu i wskazanie roli, jaką w nim odgrywa historia. Temat ten podejmuję, gdyż wydaje mi się, że nie jest on zbyt często podkreślany przy omawianiu teorii politycznej autora Faktyczności i obowiązywania. Postaram się wykazać, że zdaniem niemieckiego fi lozofa myślenie o przyszłości powinno być kształtowane poprzez odwoływanie się do krytycznie opracowanej przeszłości. Tylko dzięki takiemu podejściu można uzyskać kompletną ideę patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego, mającą podwójne oblicze, jedno skierowane ku przeszłości i drugie ukierunkowane na teraźniejszość, a nawet przyszłość. 1 J. Bartyzel, Patriotyzm, [w:] Encyklopedia polityczna, t. 1, red. J. Bartyzel, B. Szlachta, A. Wielomski, Radom 2007, s. 294. 2 J. Szacki, Patriotyzm jako „błąd" i jako „cnota", „Gazeta Wyborcza", 9 maja 2013 (online), http://wyborcza.pl/magazyn/1,124059,13881264,Patriotyzm_jako__ apos__apos_blad_apos__apos__i_jako.html, 15.12.2016. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość68 Debaty historyków a powstanie koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego Tragiczna w skutkach działalność III Rzeszy pozostawiła traumatyczne ślady na psychice obywateli niemieckich. Polityka nazistowskich Niemiec całkowicie skompromitowała niemiecką ojczyznę, a to pod dużym znakiem zapytania postawiło sens patriotyzmu jako elementu legitymizacji nowej tożsamości. Co więcej, jak w swojej książce Pamięć – brzemię i uwolnienie: Niemcy wobec nazistowskiej przeszłości (1945 – 2010) napisała Anna Wolf-Powęska „hasło patriotyzmu wypędzono po 1945 r. na banicję" i „patriotyzm stał się synonimem agresywnego nacjonalizmu"3. Przez długi okres po wojnie w debatach społeczno-politycznych prowadzonych w Niemczech pojęcie patriotyzmu nie występowało bez opisującego przymiotnika, stąd też pojawiły się takie koncepcje jak patriotyzm wolnościowy, rewolucyjny, narodowy, europejski, oświeceniowy, gospodarczy, demokratyczny oraz najbardziej mnie interesujący, czyli konstytucyjny4. To właśnie z tego powodu okres II połowy XX w. w Niemczech nasycony był różnego typu debatami społecznymi. Najczęściej wyróżnia się dwa etapy sporów. Pierwszy toczony w latach 60. związany był z publikacją przez teologa i historyka Fritza Fischera pracy dotyczącej odpowiedzialności Niemiec za rozpętanie I wojny światowej5. Główną tezą książki było stwierdzenie, że jej wybuch był konsekwencją prowadzonej przez Niemcy polityki imperialnej, która miała prowadzić do uzyskania pozycji hegemona w Europie. Pogląd F. Fischera skrytykował inny uznany historyk niemiecki – Gerhard Ritter, a to zainicjowało bardzo żywą dyskusję, w którą włączyli się nie tylko akademicy, ale także prominentni politycy, tacy jak Ludwik Erhard. Ostatecznie można uznać, że spór zakończył się „wygraną" F. Fischera i z tego powodu to jego wersja historii stała się 3 A. Wolf-Powęska, Pamięć – brzemię i uwolnienie: Niemcy wobec nazistowskiej przeszłości (1945 – 2010), Poznań 2011, s. 303. 4 Tamże, s. 301. 5 Zob. F. Fischer, Griff nach der Weltmacht: die Kriegszielpolitik des kaiserlichen Deutschland 1914/18, Düsseldorf 1967. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  69 podstawą nauczania w szkołach6. Jednak debata nazywana „Fischer- -Kontroverse" była tylko preludium do uważanej za najważniejszą z dyskusji współczesnych Niemiec, czyli „Historikerstreit". Za początek drugiej debaty historyków uważa się tekst Ernsta Noltego7 O przeszłości, która nie chce przeminąć wydany w 1986 r. we „Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung". W tym tekście historyk ogłosił tezę, że eksterminacyjne praktyki nazizmu były jedynie reakcją na podobne praktyki radzieckie. Co więcej, jego zdaniem narodowi socjaliści mogli się czuć ofi arami wojny, a wszelkie ruchy podjęte przez Adolfa Hitlera były jedynie odpowiedzią na „azjatycką dzikość". We wspomnianym tekście E. Nolte retorycznie pytał: „Może naziści, a także Hitler, dokonali aktu «azjatyckiej dzikości» dlatego, że sami uważali się za potencjalne lub rzeczywiste ofi ary «azjatyckiej dzikości»? Czy archipelag Gułag nie ma prawa starszeństwa w stosunku do Oświęcimia? Czy «morderstwo klasowe» dokonane przez bolszewików nie jest logicznym i faktycznym poprzednikiem «rasowego morderstwa» dokonanego przez narodowych socjalistów?"8. Kontrowersyjny tekst E. Noltego rozpoczął dyskusję najczęściej nazywaną „sporem historyków", choć nazwa ta nie jest zbyt precyzyjna, gdyż uczestnikami tego ważnego dla kształtowania niemieckiej tożsamości wydarzenia byli także fi lozofowie, socjologowie i politycy. Warto wymienić takich autorów jak chociażby Michael Stürmer, Andreas Hillgruber, Joachim Fest czy Rudolf Augstein. Jednak najczęściej uważa się, że prawdziwą polemikę z tezami E. Noltego podjął dopiero J. Habermas, który w swoim tekście Sposób zacierania winy, czyli tendencje apologetyczne we współczesnej historiografi i niemieckiej otwarcie skrytykował wersje odczytywania 6 M. Latkowska, Historikerstreit – przyczyny i skutki jednego z najważniejszych niemieckich sporów o historię w XX wieku, „Studia Interkulturowe Europy Środkowo-Wschodniej" 2011, t. 6, s. 4 – 6. 7 A. Romaniuk w swojej książce E. Noltego określa jako „historyka o zacięciu spekulatywno-teoretycznym" – zob. A. Romaniuk, Czytanie Habermasa, Warszawa 2013, s. 227. 8 E. Nolte, O przeszłości, która nie chce przeminąć, tłum. M. Łukasiewicz, [w:] Historikerstreit: spór o miejsce III Rzeszy w historii Niemiec, red. M. Łukasiewicz, Londyn 1990, s. 68. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość70 historii proponowane zarówno przez M. Stürmera, A. Hillgruber i E. Noltego. Całą trójkę nazwał neokonserwatystami, których celem jest rozpowszechnienie historycznego rewizjonizmu. Swoim adwersarzom zarzucał, że aby ożywić niemiecką tożsamość narodową stosują zabiegi typowo ideologiczne. Tezy głoszone przez wspomnianych autorów J. Habermas uznał za „małostkowe i inspirowane belferskimi intencjami anektowanie prostacko umoralnianej przeszłości ojców i dziadków"9. Jednak nie były to ostatnie, aż tak krytyczne słowa wystosowane przez autora Teorii działania komunikacyjnego, gdyż w jednym z kolejnych akapitów stwierdził, że jego oponenci są w stanie „hipnotycznego paraliżu", z którego niezwłocznie powinni się wybudzić10. Zdaniem J. Habermasa celem owych neokonserwatywnych autorów jest „wyrównanie szkód", jakie zostały wyryte w świadomości historycznej Niemców przez tragiczne w skutkach czyny nazistowskie. Jednak według niego „Niemcom nie powinien znikać z twarzy płomień wstydu na wspomnienie narodowosocjalistycznej przeszłości"11. Oczywiście nie oznacza to, że niemiecki fi lozof zaleca, żeby wydarzenia z pierwszej połowy XX w. nieustanie wspominać i po nich pokutować, chodzi mu zapewne o ich rzetelną interpretację i wyciągnięcie odpowiedniej nauki na przyszłość. Według J. Habermasa najbardziej adekwatną narracją historyczną byłaby taka, która pozwoliłaby przyjąć zarówno rolę obserwatora i uczestnika (w wypadku dyskusji dotyczącej II wojny światowej „późnego uczestnika" poczuwającego się do odpowiedzialności za historię narodu, do którego należy)12. Taka postawa umożliwiłaby „ostrożne rozróżnienie między rozumieniem a potępieniem szokującej przeszłości"13. Trzeba jednak zaznaczyć, że w dyskusji tej J. Habermas zebrał tyleż głosów poparcia, ile krytycznych. Z czasem wykształciły się dwa 9 J. Habermas, Sposób zacierania winy, czyli tendencje apologetyczne we współczesnej historiografi i niemieckiej, „Aneks" 1987, nr 46 – 47, s. 32. 10 Tamże. 11 A. Romaniuk, Czytanie Habermasa, s. 229. 12 Tamże. 13 J. Habermas, Sposób zacierania winy..., s. 32. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  71 przeciwstawne sobie „obozy" historyków. Ostatecznie „spór historyków" nie zakończył się spektakularną wygraną któregoś z obozów, lecz wygasał powoli, zostawiając każdego z uczestników przy swoich racjach. Z upływem czasu wydaje się, że można stwierdzić, iż „Historikerstreit" oscylował wokół próby odpowiedzi na pytanie: „jak wziąć odpowiedzialność za przeszłość i zbudować samokrytyczną, gotową na konfrontację tożsamość?". Jednakże, co dla współczesnego namysłu fi lozofi cznego najważniejsze – przyniósł wiele wartych uwagi pomysłów. To właśnie podczas drugiego „sporu historyków" rozpowszechniono koncepcję patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego14. Co prawda, już w 1968 r. niemiecki socjolog Mario Rainer Lepsius mówił o konstytucji jako o „demokratycznej świadomości instytucjonalnej", jednak sam termin patriotyzm konstytucyjny pochodzi najprawdopodobniej z 1979 r., kiedy został użyty przez innego akademika – Dolfa Sternbergera. W tekście wydanym 23 maja tegoż roku przez „Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" stwierdził on, że „narodowe uczucia zostały zranione. Nie żyjemy w całych Niemczech. Żyjemy całkowicie w konstytucji, w całym państwie konstytucyjnym i już to samo jest rodzajem ojczyzny"15. Według niego obywatel powinien być jednocześnie „przyjacielem konstytucji", dlatego też taki patriotyzm można by określić jako świadomość przynależności do państwa. D. Sterbnberger zwracał uwagę, że patriotyzm konstytucyjny jest patriotyzmem przednarodowym, gdyż ludzie najpierw odczuwali związek z instytucjami państwa, a dopiero potem między sobą. Proponowany przez D. Sternbergera patriotyzm miał być rozwiązaniem dla ogarniętego traumą społeczeństwa niemieckiego. Z historycznych względów nowa koncepcja nie mogła być oparta wyłącznie na tożsamości narodowej. Dlatego też niemiecki patriotyzm konstytucyjny, który stał się częścią patriotyzmu narodowego, miał uczyć szacunku dla instytucji demokratycznych jako gwarancji podstawowych wolności, tolerancji i tradycji państwa prawa. Nie 14 J.W. Muller, K.L. Scheppele, Constitutional patriotism: An Introduction, s. 7 (online), http://icon.oxfordjournals.org/content/6/1/67.full, 21.12.2016. 15 A. Wolf-Powęska, Pamięć – brzemię..., s. 304. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość72 oznacza to, że idea ta odwołuje się tylko do zapisów dokumentu, jakim jest ustawa zasadnicza. Jej głównym celem jest promowanie systemu wartości, wokół których społeczeństwo może się integrować. Zdaniem J. Habermasa jedynym patriotyzmem, który „nie uczyni Niemców obcymi na Zachodzie jest patriotyzm konstytucyjny". Według niemieckiego fi lozofa II wojna światowa przyczyniła się do odrzucenia kształtującej obywateli tożsamości konwencjonalnej16. Do funkcjonowania patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego konieczne jest odejście od takowej konstytuanty, gdyż „ci, którzy zachęcają Niemców do przyjęcia konwencjonalnej formy tożsamości narodowej, niszczą jedyną mocną podstawę naszego powiązania z Zachodem"17. J. Habermas zaznacza, że analogicznie dzieje się ze społeczeństwem, które przybiera formę postnarodową i bardziej potrzebuje odniesień do zasad ogólnych niż tradycji czy historii. Ciągłe tworzenie i kształtowanie tożsamości wymaga dużego wysiłku społeczeństwa obywatelskiego w sferze publicznej, która umożliwia – by to nazwać po kantowsku publiczne użycie rozumu i jest sferą – albo lepiej powinna być – sferą racjonalizacji tożsamości zbiorowej. Idea tożsamości postnarodowej jest bardziej wymagająca niż koncepcje mistyczne czy sakralne, gdyż wymaga przywiązania do wartości demokratycznych i praw człowieka, rozwiniętych w określonej tradycji konstytucyjnej. We współczesnych, zglobalizowanych, różnorodnych społeczeństwach budowanie wspólnej tożsamości jest utrudnione i naród nie zawsze, a na pewno coraz rzadziej, spełnia funkcję integrującą. Tożsamość polityczna ze względu na warunki społeczne musi umożliwiać współistnienie różnorodności i odrębności. Dlatego zdaniem J. Habermasa tożsamość taka powinna być budowana wokół systemu wartości, który wyrażony jest w konstytucji, a jedynym czynnikiem integrującym może być zgoda społeczności na zasady w niej zapisane. Warto jednak zaznaczyć, że koncepcja patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego w istotny sposób ewoluowała. Wydaje się, że celem, jaki J. Habermas stawiał przed tą ideą, było odciągnięcie Niemców od wizji państwa narodowego, który musi być homogeniczne etnicznie. Jego zdaniem 16 A. Dupeyrix, Zrozumieć Habermasa, Warszawa 2013, s. 189 – 190. 17 J. Habermas, Sposób zacierania winy..., s. 34. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  73 patriotyzm konstytucyjny powinien być świadomą afi rmacją społeczno-politycznych pryncypiów. Natomiast D. Sternberger koncentrował swoją uwagę przede wszystkim na demokratycznych instytucjach, najważniejsza dla niego była zdecydowana, wręcz radykalna obrona państwa prawa. Z kolei J. Habermas kładł większy nacisk na sferę publiczną, w której obywatele uznają się nawzajem jako wolne i równe jednostki i biorą udział w demokratycznym dyskursie. Autor Faktyczności i obowiązywania już od czasów „sporu historyków" podkreślał konieczność pamięci o okresie nazistowskiej dyktatury. Jego zdaniem jej zrozumienie powinno się stać dla Niemców podstawą demokratycznej świadomości18. Według J. Habermasa „patriotyzm konstytucyjny równocześnie pogłębia zrozumienie wielości i integralności koegzystujących ze sobą w wielokulturowym społeczeństwie różnych form życia"19. W fi lozofi i niemieckiego myśliciela pamięć pełni ważną funkcję, gdyż świadomość różnic i wynikających z nich konfl iktów jest kontekstem, dzięki którem można przeprowadzić analityczną i opiniotwórczą dyskusję i wyciągnąć z niej wnioski na przyszłość. Jak trafnie zauważyła Agnieszka Nogal, w koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego J. Habermasa istotny jest horyzont „aby od partykularyzmu konkretnej sytuacji kierować się w stronę uniwersalnych reguł"20. Rola historii w koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego J. Habermasa Patriotyzm konstytucyjny nie proponuje odrzucenia historii narodowej, wręcz przeciwnie koncepcja ta jest na niej osadzona. Jednak w przeciwieństwie do tradycyjnego uprawiania historii, wedle tego pomysłu jest ona poddawana publicznej dyskusji opartej na 18 Zob. A. Wolff -Powęska, Czy Niemcom wolno być patriotami?, „Gazeta Wyborcza", 31.05.2008. 19 J. Habermas, Obywatelstwo a tożsamość narodowa. Rozważania nad przyszłością Europy, Warszawa 1993, s. 17. 20 A. Nogal, Ponad prawem narodowym: konstytucyjne idee Europy, Warszawa 2009, s. 220. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość74 rzetelnych argumentach. Komunikacja zdaniem J. Habermasa jest możliwa wyłącznie dzięki temu, że rozumiemy racje, które umożliwiają normatywną ocenę tej wypowiedzi. Czyli, jeśli rozmówca nie przerywa mi i nie dopytuje, kiedy wypowiadam jakieś zdanie, to oznacza, że zgadza się z roszczeniem do prawdy zawartym w mojej wypowiedzi. Oczywiście komunikacja nie jest zdaniem niemieckiego fi lozofa przestrzenią wolną od konfl iktów, wręcz przeciwnie – jest miejscem permanentnie powstających wątpliwości. Do racjonalnego porozumienia można dojść jedynie poprzez odwoływanie się do lepszego argumentu, a nie za sprawą groźby, przymusu, na mocy tradycji czy odgórnego zobowiązania. Poprzez to, że jest wykorzystywany do manipulacji, instrumentalizacji i propagandy, język staje się miejscem ciągłych nieporozumień. Dlatego może stać się przyczyną konfl iktów i niejasności, które jednak w procesie komunikacji można przezwyciężyć. Co więcej, język skierowany jest nie tylko na wzajemne porozumienie, ale także umożliwia lepsze zrozumienie. Zdaniem J. Habermasa doświadczanie konfl iktów i sporów komunikacyjnych pozwala poszerzać horyzonty poznawcze21. Autor Teorii działania komunikacyjnego przypisuje historii ogromną rolę, która jednak jest zupełnie odmienna od tego, co proponowali E. Nolte, A. Hillgruberg czy M. Stürmer. W przeciwieństwie do tych myślicieli J. Habermas – jak sam zaznacza – nie dąży ani do „zrzucenia z siebie hipoteki przeszłości, szczęśliwie nie poddawanej już ocenie moralnej", ani do oddania rewizjonistycznej wersji historii na „usługi narodowo-historycznego umacniania tożsamości konserwatywnej"22. W ujęciu popularyzatora koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego działalność historyków po tragicznej w skutkach II wojnie światowej musi przejść przemianę, a dawny sposób myślenia historiografi cznego winien zniknąć wraz z nazizmem, z którym w dużej mierze współpracował. Podczas „sporu historyków" J. Habermas podkreślał, że nauka płynąca z wydarzeń pierwszej połowy XX w. „zburzyła przesłanki ideologiczne historiografi i niemieckiej" 21 A. Dupeyrix, Zrozumieć Habermasa, s. 41 – 48. 22 J. Habermas, Sposób zacierania winy..., s. 32. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  75 i, co ważniejsze, wyostrzyła świadomość uzależnienia historiografi i od aktualnych wydarzeń politycznych i kontekstu społecznego23. Według J. Habermasa w świecie opierającym się na różnicy i na Innym24 nie ma już miejsca dla zamkniętej i jedynej prawdziwej interpretacji dziejów. Niemiecki fi lozof zwraca uwagę, że współczesne społeczeństwo otwarte (zarówno wedle defi nicji Henri Bergsona, jak i Karla Poppera) wprost w swej strukturze wymaga pluralizmu poglądów na historię i ambiwalencji różnorodnych tradycji kształtujących postnarodową tożsamość. Pisząc swój tekst w latach 80., J. Habermas zwracał uwagę na (obecnie już raczej minione) trendy powodujące „utratę historii". Jednak jak pisał, coraz częstsze zadawanie pytań i otwieranie się na różne interpretacje „są to wszystko oznaki tworzenia się postkonwencjonalnego poczucia tożsamości"25. Wedle koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego odejście od tożsamości narodowej, uznanie równoważności opinii Innego, dowartościowanie różnicy i co się z tym wiąże otwarcie na kulturę polityczną opartą na uniwersalnych zasadach demokracji i praw człowieka jest jedyną drogą do akceptacji samych siebie i swojej historii, zarówno na poziomie jednostki, jak i całego społeczeństwa. Jest sprawą oczywistą, że większość państw zaliczanych do demokratycznych i liberalnych ma bardzo zbliżone zapisy konstytucyjne, mówiące o suwerenności i prawach człowieka. Jednak J. Habermas zwraca uwagę na istotną rolę interpretacji poprzez doświadczenia społeczne na swój sposób. Taka interpretacja powinna mieć miejsce na drodze racjonalnej komunikacji, dyskusji, w której decyduje siła argumentu, a nie chwilowe emocje. Patriotyzm konstytucyjny, o którym mówi J. Habermas, nie jest tworem gotowym, podlega ciągłej aktualizacji i zrozumieniu. Jednak, co niezwykle istotne, wszystkie interpretacje muszą mieścić się w duchu demokracji deliberatywnej, opartej właśnie na szeroko rozumianych uniwersalnych i liberalnych wartościach. Zdaniem niemieckiego myśliciela 23 Tamże, s. 32 – 33. 24 Zob. J. Habermas, Uwzględniając Innego. Studia do teorii politycznej, Warszawa 2009. 25 J. Habermas, Sposób zacierania winy..., s. 34. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość76 prawo nie jest kategorią statyczną i niewzruszoną, wręcz przeciwnie jest płynne i zmienne. Miejscem, gdzie dyskutuje się z zasadami leżącymi u podstaw porządku politycznego, krytykuje się władzę oraz formuje się idee i pomysły jest sfera publiczna, która stanowi podstawowy element Habermasowskiej teorii demokracji. Jest to forum do dyskusji (w parlamencie, zgromadzeniach, mediach, stowarzyszeniach), które można umieścić gdzieś pomiędzy społeczeństwem obywatelskim a państwem. Kolejny raz nawiązując do I. Kanta, można uznać, że jest – warunkiem możliwości demokracji, czyli przestrzenią debaty publicznej, w której kształtują się opinie i wola obywateli, które mogą zostać przetransmitowane do samego centrum władzy politycznej. Dlatego sferę publiczną porównać można do pudła rezonansowego, które nagłaśnia problemy, którymi powinien zająć się system polityczny26. J. Habermas podkreśla ogromną rolę i możliwość wpływu, jakie ma społeczeństwo obywatelskie. Zauważa, że wszystkie tematy debat toczonych w latach 80. i 90. XX w., takie jak broń nuklearna, badania genetyczne, kwestie ekologiczne, problemy trzeciego świata, feminizm itp. były wysuwane właśnie przez aktorów społeczeństwa obywatelskiego – intelektualistów, ekspertów, a nie przez system polityczny. Doskonałym przykładem są opisane przeze mnie wcześniej dyskusje dotyczące niemieckiej świadomości historycznej po II wojnie światowej. Autor Teorii działania komunikacyjnego uważa, że konstytucja defi niuje wspólną kulturę polityczną podzielaną przez wszystkich obywateli. Patriotyzm konstytucyjny można by porównać do religii obywatelskiej, która stanowi spoiwo współczesnego demokratycznego społeczeństwa. Wyraża on minimum lojalności wobec uniwersalnych zasad państwa praworządnego. Jednak, co niezwykle istotne, patriotyzm konstytucyjny nie opiera się jedynie na więzi formalnej, wręcz przeciwnie wynika z niego interpretowanie doświadczeń historycznych i kulturowych. Relacja między kulturą polityczną a konstytucją jest żywa i dynamiczna. Konstytucja powinna być pewnym otwartym projektem, poddawanym ciągłej reinterpretacji i analizie. 26 A. Dupeyrix, Zrozumieć Habermasa, s. 47 – 53. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  77 Zakończenie J. Habermas zdaje sobie sprawę, że „przeszłość, do której można się odwołać, by wzmocnić poczucie przynależności, zawsze była podstawą wspólnoty, a historia i naród nie mogą żyć bez siebie"27. Jednak, jak zauważa, współczesne, wolne i różnorodne społeczeństwa mają zdolność do autokrytycyzmu, dystansu wobec siebie i, co się z tym wiąże, zawierają w sobie duży pierwiastek obywatelskości. Dzięki temu duma i wstyd z tradycji i historii w demokratycznej kulturze politycznej nie muszą się wykluczać i często są wręcz komplementarne. To oznacza, że można czuć się zarówno członkiem Niemiec, jak i wspólnoty europejskiej. Wydaje się, że „spór historyków" był punktem zwrotnym w fi lozofi i J. Habermasa, gdyż od tego momentu w dużo większym stopniu niż wcześniej skupił się na fi lozofi i politycznej, często także korzystając z koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego28. W dyskusji dotyczącej integracji europejskiej niemiecki fi lozof stwierdził, że nie da się zbudować zjednoczonej Europy na mitycznej koncepcji wspólnoty (czyli na poczuciu identyfi kacji kulturowej i historycznej) – odpowiedzią na to może być jedynie patriotyzm konstytucyjny, czyli uniwersalizm zasad prawnych określanych przez konsensus proceduralny (oparty na pełnej swobodzie wypowiedzi) osadzony w danej kulturze politycznej. Taka koncepcja wymagałaby, aby polityka, której celem byłoby zagwarantowanie stabilności i ochrona podstawowych zasad, skupiała się wokół norm wartości i procedur demokratycznych, a nie kultur narodowych29. Zdaniem J. Habermasa do realizacji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego na poziomie ponadnarodowym konieczna jest sfera publiczna, czyli sieć dla komunikowania swoich opinii. Przepływy komunikacyjne są przy 27 A. Wolff -Powęska, Jak dziś być patriotą, „Gazeta Wyborcza" (online), http:// wyborcza.pl/magazyn/1,124059,3637522.html?disableRedirects=true, 30.12.2016. 28 J.G. Finlayson, Habermas: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford 2005, s. 126 – 128. 29 G.J. Wąsiewski, Koncepcja „patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego" Jürgena Habermasa. W kręgu poszukiwań modelu ustrojowego Unii Europejskiej, Toruń 2010, s. 131 – 135. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość78 tym fl itowane i syntetyzowane w taki sposób, że zagęszczają się do powiązanych w określone tematy opinii publicznych30. Najprościej rzecz ujmując, wedle niemieckiego fi lozofa demokracja europejska nie powinna być rozszerzoną demokracja narodową, lecz winna stanowić efekt komunikacji między poszczególnymi publicznym sferami narodowymi, tworząc sferę europejską. J. Habermas wierzy w ogólnoświatową solidarność, na której można budować kosmopolityczne prawo. Jego zdaniem spoiwem może być omawiany właśnie przez mnie patriotyzm konstytucyjny. Według niemieckiego fi lozofa od ewentualnych przybyszów powinno się wymagać jednie gotowości dostosowania się do politycznej kultury nowej ojczyzny, bez rezygnacji z rodzimej, określonej kulturowo formy życia. W swoim tekście Obywatelstwo a tożsamość narodowa. Rozważania nad przyszłością Europy J. Habermas stwierdził wprost: „demokratyczne obywatelstwo nie musi przy tym być zakorzenione w narodowej tożsamości jakiegoś narodu; szanując wielość kulturowych form życia, wymaga ono jednak uspołeczniania wszystkich obywateli w ramach wspólnej wspólnoty politycznej"31. Podobnie jeśli chodzi o integrację UE, niemiecki fi lozof nie wierzy w siłę łączącej tradycji i historii Europy. Choć oczywiście nie neguje tych wartości, uważa, że szansą jest budowanie europejskiego społeczeństwa obywatelskiego, które łączy przywiązanie do wartości demokratycznych umożliwiających autorefl eksję. Wydaje się, że po syntetycznym omówieniu koncepcji patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego można stwierdzić, że zdaniem J. Habermasa rola historii w tej koncepcji jest niezwykle istotna, wręcz niezbędna. Jednak nie należy tego rozumieć jako jednobarwnego gloryfi kowania swoich dziejów, tradycji i unikania trudnych tematów. Wręcz przeciwnie, według niemieckiego fi lozofa bez rzetelnego zderzenia się ze swoją odmitologizowaną przeszłością bardzo trudno będzie funkcjonować w teraźniejszości. Dzięki nauce, którą niesie historia, czyli zarówno czyny chwalebne, jak i te przynoszące wstyd – można 30 J. Habermas, Faktyczność i obowiązywanie: teoria dyskursu wobec zagadnień prawa i demokratycznego państwa prawnego, Warszawa 2005, s. 380. 31 J. Habermas, Obywatelstwo a tożsamość ..., s. 17. Mikołaj Raczyński: Przyszłość przez przeszłość  79 wypracować takie idee, co do których różnorodne społeczeństwo się zgadza i według których chciałoby funkcjonować. J. Habermas zdaje się twierdzić, że w myśleniu o teraźniejszości, a nawet o przyszłości, nie powinno się zapominać o krytycznie opracowanej przeszłości. W taki sposób przyszłość można konstytuować przez przeszłość. Bibliografia Dupeyrix A., Zrozumieć Habermasa, Warszawa 2013. Encyklopedia polityczna, t. 1, red. J. Bartyzel, B. Szlachta, A. Wielomski, Radom 2007. Finlayson J.G., Habermas: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford 2005. Habermas J., Obywatelstwo a tożsamość narodowa. Rozważania nad przyszłością Europy, Warszawa 1993. Habermas J., Sposób zacierania winy, czyli tendencje apologetyczne we współczesnej historiografi i niemieckiej, „Aneks" 1987, nr 12, 46 – 47, 1987. Habermas J., Faktyczność i obowiązywanie: teoria dyskursu wobec zagadnień prawa demokratycznego państwa prawnego, Warszawa 2005. Habermas J., Uwzględniając Innego. Studia do teorii politycznej, Warszawa 2009. Latkowska M., Historikerstreit – przyczyny i skutki jednego z najważniejszych niemieckich sporów o historię w XX wieku, „Studia Interkulturowe Europy Środkowo-Wschodniej" 2011, t. 6. Muller J.W., Scheppele K.L., Constitutional patriotism: An Introduction, http://icon. oxfordjournals.org/content/6/1/67.full, 21.12.2016. Nolte E., O przeszłości, która nie chce przeminąć, [w:] Historikerstreit: spór o miejsce III Rzeszy w historii Niemiec, red. M. Łukasiewicz, Londyn 1990. Romaniuk A., Czytanie Habermasa, Warszawa 2013. Szacki J., Patriotyzm jako „błąd" i jako „cnota", „Gazeta Wyborcza", 9.05.2013. Wąsiewski G.J., Koncepcja „patriotyzmu konstytucyjnego" Jürgena Habermasa. W kręgu poszukiwań modelu ustrojowego Unii Europejskiej, Toruń 2010. Wolff -Powęska A., Czy Niemcom wolno być patriotami?, „Gazeta Wyborcza", 31.05.2008. Wolf-Powęska A., Pamięć – brzemię i uwolnienie: Niemcy wobec nazistowskiej przeszłości (1945 – 2010), Poznań 2011. Wolff -Powęska A., Jak dziś być patriotą, „Gazeta Wyborcza" (online), http://wyborcza.pl/magazyn/1,124059,3637522.html?disableRedirects=true, 30.12.2016. Mikołaj Raczyński: 80 The future by the past: The role of history in the concept of constitutional patriotism of Jürgen Habermas Summary: The defi nition of patriotism is usually restricted to the conclusion that its aim is mere cultivation of the historical memory. However, patriotism has two distinct faces: one pointed at the past and the other focused on the present. What is more, in the opinion of many scholars, patriotism doesn't need to be closely related to one nation or culture. An interesting concept of constitutional patriotism was developed by German historians and philosophers during the debate on national identity after World War II. Jürgen Habermas has been one of the founders of this project. According to the German philosopher, constitutional patriotism doesn't mean just positivist constitutional acts, but some abstract forms, interpretations of a particular community. Such universal principles may be, for instance, procedures of sovereignty and liberal rights. The following article conveys arguments indicating that the role of history is very important in the concept of constitutional patriotism by Jürgen Habermas. Keywords: Jürgen Habermas, constitutional patriotism, history, philosophy, democracy.

euroPeAN JourNAl For PHIloSoPHY oF relIGIoN 4/1 (SPrING 2012), PP. 177-195 CAN GOD'S GOODNESS SAVE THE DIVINE COMMAND THEORY FROM EUTHYPHRO? JEREMY KOONS Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar Abstract. recent defenders of the divine command theory like Adams and Alston have confronted the euthyphro dilemma by arguing that although God's commands make right actions right, God is morally perfect and hence would never issue unjust or immoral commandments. on their view, God's nature is the standard of moral goodness, and God's commands are the source of all obligation. I argue that this view of divine goodness fails because it strips God's nature of any features that would make His goodness intelligible. An adequate solution to the euthyphro dilemma may require that God be constrained by a standard of goodness that is external to Himself – itself a problematic proposal for many theists. The euthyphro dilemma is often thought to present a fatal problem for the divine command theory (aka theological voluntarism). Are right acts commanded by God because they are right, or are they right because they are commanded by God? If the former, then there is a standard of right and wrong independent of God's commands; God's commands are not relevant in determining the content of morality. This option seems to compromise God's sovereignty in an important way. but the second horn of the dilemma presents seemingly insurmountable problems, as well. First, if God's commands make right actions right, and there is no standard of morality independent of God's commands, then that seems to make morality arbitrary. Thus, murder is not wrong because it harms someone unjustly, but merely because God forbids it; there is (it seems) no good connection between reason and the wrongness of murder. Furthermore, if God commanded us to torture an innocent child to death, then torturing an innocent child to death would (it seems) be 178 JeremY KooNS morally obligatory. most of us find these consequences absurd, and a sufficient reason for rejecting divine command theory. Since the first horn of the dilemma represents moral obligations as being independent of God's commands, a divine command theorist must somehow tackle the second horn of the dilemma. A tempting strategy is to say that while torturing an innocent child to death would be obligatory if God commanded this, God would never command such a thing because such a command would be contrary to His good and loving nature. However, such a move seems incompatible with divine command theory: it suggests that God is bound by moral requirements (He cannot command torturing an innocent child to death because such a command would be immoral), whereas divine command theory claims that God is the source of all moral requirements.1 However, a number of divine command theorists have argued recently that this move is legitimate. These theorists argue that divine command theory is not a theory of all moral values; it is merely a theory of moral obligation.2 We can still say that God is good, as long as we do not construe this goodness in terms of God doing what He ought to do. 'oughts' (which apply to finite beings such as us humans) are in turn constituted by the commands of God. And since He is good, He would never command torturing an innocent child to death, and so the second horn of our euthyphro dilemma is defused. Thus, Wierenga writes, "bringing about a foully unjust state of affairs [S]...is incompatible with being loving and just; so then is commanding someone else to bring S about. Accordingly, since these are essential features of God's character, they preclude his commanding that someone bring about S in any possible world."3 Further, God's nature provides God with adequate reason to issue the particular commands He does, alleviating the arbitrariness worry about divine command theory: this move seems to restore the relation between moral reasons and God's commands. I. WHAT IS GoD'S GooDNeSS? Wherein does God's goodness consist? Alston writes that God's goodness supervenes on His lovingness and other such traits.4 A natural question 1 For a particularly lucid statement of this objection, see Hooker (2001). 2 See, for example, Wierenga (1989), Adams (1999), Alston (2002), and Quinn (2006). 3 Wierenga (1989), p. 221. 4 Alston (2002). 179CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY arises as to the relation between the traits that God manifests qua supremely good being and His goodness: are qualities like being merciful and loving traits of God because they are good, or are they good because they are traits of God? Simply put: why is it good to be loving? Is being loving independently good, apart from its being one of God's traits? or is it good merely because God is loving? This is not simply another iteration of the euthyphro problem – is God loving because being loving is good or is being loving good because God is loving? – because the horns of this dilemma have somewhat different outcomes. In the original euthyphro dilemma, the worry about the second horn of the dilemma was that if right acts were right because God commanded them, then that made morality arbitrary – torture for fun is immoral, but God did not have a good (i.e., moral) reason for forbidding such torture, and there would have been nothing immoral about his commanding torture for fun. but the divine command theorist is not saying that the relation between the goodness of being loving and the fact of God's lovingness is so arbitrary as that: it is not the mere fact of God's being loving that makes it good to be loving. rather, it is the fact that God is loving, combined with the fact that God is supremely good that makes being loving good. As Alston puts the point, We can think of God himself, the individual being, as the supreme standard of goodness...lovingness is good (a good-making feature, that on which goodness is supervenient) not because of the Platonic existence of a general principle or fact to the effect that lovingness is good, but because God, the supreme standard of goodness, is loving. Goodness supervenes on every feature of God, not because some general principles are true but just because they are features of God.5 So God is good (indeed, He is the supreme standard of goodness), and that is why His being loving makes being loving good. So it seems initially that the second option involves no arbitrariness: being loving is good because it is a trait of God, who is supremely good. (We will revisit this initial conclusion later, though.) Notice, however, the order of explanation here. God is not good because He is loving. That would imply a standard of goodness independent of God, which divine command theorists like Alston and Adams must deny. They claim that God is the standard of goodness, that 5 Alston (2002), pp. 291-2. 180 JeremY KooNS whatever properties (such as being loving) God has are good in virtue of God's essential goodness. Thus, God's goodness must be logically prior to the goodness of God's mercy, justice, lovingness, and so on. Indeed, Adams speculates that in a possible world with no God, nothing would be excellent or good, not even character traits we normally consider good (like being loving). Adams writes, If there is a God that satisfies [the] conditions imposed by our concepts [of the Good], we might say, then excellence is the property of faithfully imaging such a God...In worlds where no such God exists, nothing would have that property, and therefore nothing would be excellent. but beings like us in such a world might have a concept subjectively indistinguishable from our concept of excellence, and there might be an objective property that corresponded to it well enough, and in a sufficiently salient way, to be the property signified by it, though it would not be the property that we in fact signify by 'excellent'.6 Wainwright notes that an apparent consequence of Adams's theory is that if there is a possible world where there is no God, and no plausible alternative candidate for the role of the Supreme Good, then assuming that "Adams's account of the semantics of 'good' is more or less correct, then the term 'good' doesn't pick out a real property in those worlds; the concept of good will be as empty in those worlds as the concept of phlogiston is in ours".7 In those worlds, being (e.g.) loving is not good. God's goodness is logically prior to the goodness of such traits, and their goodness depends on and is parasitic on the prior goodness of God.8 II. IS THIS VIeW oF GoD'S GooDNeSS CoHereNT? Does this picture of God's goodness make any sense?9 (Alston will be our primary interlocutor since he, more than others, has grappled with the problematic implications of this conception of God's goodness.) 6 Adams (1999), p. 46. 7 Wainwright (2005), p. 95. 8 of the authors under discussion, Alston alone disputes this; but I will argue below that Alston endorses incompatible theses about the relation between God's goodness and the goodness of traits like mercy and justice. 9 This view of God's goodness has had its critics; see, in particular, morriston (2001) and (2009) and Kowalski (2010). I will be approaching the issue from a somewhat different direction than these authors, trying to tease out whether the conception of God's goodness proposed by Adams, Alston, and their allies is metaphysically coherent. 181CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY Certainly, it seems to reverse the intuitive order of explanation between something's goodness and the other properties it exemplifies. As Wes morriston writes in a penetrating critique of Alston's view, Is God good because He has these good-making properties? or are they good-making because God has them? The first alternative seems, intuitively, to be the right one. Why should it make any difference to the good-makingness of compassion, say, if there is (or isn't) a supremely compassionate God?10 This is puzzling, but there is a deeper problem confronting the Adams/Alston account. Adams and Alston claim that God is good, but given the above order of explanation, they are debarred from pointing to any feature in virtue of which God is good. (Alston denies this, but I will argue that he cannot do so coherently; we will return to this point later.) rather, those features themselves are good in virtue of belonging to God (who is good). Then what does it mean to say that God is good? It doesn't mean that He is just, or loving – His goodness is prior to the goodness of these features. Alston and Adams must say this, else admit that there is a standard of goodness independent of God. So the property of goodness, as it applies to God, is undifferentiated, a 'featureless property'. As Kowalski summarizes the problem, How should we understand God, a particular concrete being, serving as the standard of goodness? In virtue of what does God so serve? In order to avoid grounding God's goodness, as the Platonist would, in truths that do not depend on God, it seems that God must somehow serve as the supreme standard of goodness apart from the properties He in fact possesses. It thus seems that God, qua bare particular, serves as the ultimate standard for moral goodness.11 The problem is this: actions and agents instantiate morally thin properties (rightness, goodness, etc.) in virtue of the morally thick properties these actions and agents instantiate. An action is not good simpliciter; it is good because it represents an act of charity, or a repaying of a debt, or something else. It is good in virtue of something else. Similar comments apply to the goodness of agents. The benefit of moving to the level of the descriptively thin is that it can be silent as to what this 'something else' is – as elstein and Hurka write, "The mark of a thin 10 morriston (2009), p. 253. 11 Kowalski (forthcoming), p. 5. 182 JeremY KooNS concept like 'right' is that it says nothing about what other properties an item falling under it has"12 – but let us not take this silence to be metaphysical. We cannot use these thin concepts without remembering that at bottom they are paper currency whose value depends on a reserve of thick virtues. III. AlSToN'S PArTICulArISm Alston has addressed the worry that this strategy of making God the standard of moral goodness renders God's goodness unintelligible. Alston writes: Note that on this view we are not debarred from saying what is supremely good about God. God is not good, qua bare particular or undifferentiated thisness. God is good by virtue of being loving, just, merciful and so on.13 Does this answer the objection? It is unclear. For mark how the passage continues: Where this view differs from its alternative is in the answer to the question, 'by virtue of what are these features of God good-making features?' The answer given by this view is: 'by virtue of being features of God.'14 So Alston is explicit here that these features are only good because God possesses them. As Alston writes earlier in his essay, lovingness is good (is a good-making feature, that on which goodness is supervenient) not because of the Platonic existence of a general principle or fact to the effect that lovingness is good, but because God, the supreme standard of goodness, is loving. Goodness supervenes on every feature of God, not because some general principles are true but just because they are features of God.15 So we have a puzzle. The first passage indicates that God is good because of these good-making traits (such as lovingness, mercy, and so on). but the second and third quotes reverse the order of explanation: they say not that God is good because He possesses these traits, but that these traits are good-making because God possesses them. What is the correct order of explanation? Can Alston have it both ways? I will argue that he 12 elstein and Hurka (2009), p. 516. 13 Alston (2002), p. 292. 14 Alston (2002), p. 292. 15 Alston (2002), pp. 291-2, emphasis added. 183CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY cannot; Alston's particularism requires that God's goodness be logically prior to the goodness of the moral virtues. And we will see that this view is incoherent; it makes God's goodness unintelligible. Alston distinguishes between (a) 'Platonic' predicates, the criterion for the application of which is a general 'essence' or 'Idea' that can be specified in purely general terms, and (b) 'particularist' predicates, the criterion for the application of which makes essential reference to one or more individuals.16 Alston suggests 'triangle' as a good paradigm of the former kind. Alston's theory of the good is particularist: a particular individual (God) is the standard of goodness. Alston suggests an illuminating analogy: A sub-type closer to our present concern is the much-discussed 'meter'. let's say that what makes a certain length a meter is its equality to a standard meter stick kept in Paris. What makes this table a meter in length is not its conformity to a Platonic essence but its conformity to a concretely existing individual. Similarly, on my present suggestion, what most ultimately makes an act of love a good thing is not its conformity to some general principle but its conformity to, or imitation of, God, who is both the ultimate source of the existence of things and the supreme standard by which they are to be assessed.17 To imagine the Paris meter bar as a particularist paradigm, we shall have to re-imagine its history to some extent. (And in the above quote, Alston seems to realize that treating the Paris meter bar as a genuine particularist example requires some fictionalization.) In real history, there was already a definition of the meter, and the meter bar was made in accordance with this definition. Thus, the meter bar was produced with the intention that it be precisely 1 meter long. Thus, real history causes the meter bar to diverge from Alston's model of God, because the meter bar isn't really a particularist model: it violates the requirement of the particularist model that the paradigm be the standard, instead of conforming to an external standard. let us suppose, then, that the meter bar really does match Alston's particularist model. let us suppose that there was no external standard of metric length prior to the creation of the meter bar, and that the meter bar really did establish, for the first time ever, the length of the meter, 16 Alston (2002), p. 292. 17 Alston (2002), p. 292. 184 JeremY KooNS and that the length of the meter was determined only by reference to this particular entity, the meter bar. Now this model fits Alston's particularism: it is truly accurate to say that anything that is (or approximates) a meter is so purely in virtue of resembling the meter bar, and not in virtue of matching any pre-existing standard independent of the meter bar. It is a genuine particularist model, on our retelling of history. (And I think that something like this retelling is what Alston intends when he prefaces his discussion of the Paris meter bar with the phrase "let's say that...".) Now consider an object – say, a piece of wood. This piece of wood has a particular length, l. Suppose this length, l, is the same length as that of the Paris meter bar. Thus, l is 1 meter. Which of the following claims is true? (1) This particular length, l, is 1 meter because the Paris meter bar has this particular length. (2) The Paris meter bar is 1 meter because it is this particular length, l. If the Paris meter bar is a genuine particularist standard, (1) is true and (2) is false. As Alston writes, "What makes a certain length a meter is its equality to a standard meter stick kept in Paris."18 (2) must be rejected for multiple reasons, not the least because it smacks of the Platonism rejected by Alston – "What makes this table a meter in length is not its conformity to a Platonic essence but its conformity to a concretely existing individual."19 but more importantly, (2) reverses the order of explanation – the measurement of the meter bar isn't fixed by comparison with some abstract length, or by comparison with some external standard. rather, the meter bar is the standard which determines the unit of measure for l and other lengths. That is how a particularist model works. So understanding the Paris meter bar as a particularist example, (1) is true and (2) is false. but understanding particularist examples like the Paris meter bar sheds light on Alston's particularist model of goodness. For sentences precisely parallel to (1) and (2) can also be constructed with respect to God, goodness, and the virtues: (3) These particular virtues (lovingness, mercy, etc.) are good because God possesses these particular virtues. (4) God is good because God possesses these particular virtues (lovingness, mercy, etc.) 18 Alston (2002), p. 292. 19 Alston (2002), p. 292. 185CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY (3) and (4) are precisely parallel in structure to (1) and (2)20; and with the particularist example of the Paris meter bar, (1) is true and (2) is false. (2) is false because with particularism, the order of explanation goes in a particular direction: from the exemplar toward the traits the exemplar is established to exemplify. The order of explanation does not reverse; if it does, you are not a particularist. This strongly suggests that if we construe God as a particularist paradigm, as Alston intends, we should likewise find (3) to be true and (4) to be false. The Paris meter bar example reveals something about particularism. With particularism, the order of explanation goes one way: it goes from the exemplar to the specific traits it possesses, conferring some status on them. The meter bar confers meter-hood on its specific length; that is its job as the particularist model of the meter. The order of explanation does not reverse: meter-ness, as a Platonic entity or independently-defined length, does not define the meter bar as being a meter long. Similarly, God defines the virtues as good, by being the particularist model of goodness. The virtues do not confer goodness on God, any more than a meter length confers meter-hood on the meter bar. let us apply this lesson to the theory endorsed by Alston, Adams, Craig and company. We have seen that it is the function of particularist exemplars to have a particular logical priority, a particular order of explanation. The meter bar exists to confer 'meter-hood' on particular lengths. lengths do not confer meter-hood on the meter bar; that would reverse the order of explanation and violate particularism by implying a standard prior to the meter bar for judging lengths. Similarly, if God is to serve as a particularist exemplar, He must confer goodness on the virtues. The virtues cannot confer goodness on him, cannot explain wherein God's goodness consists. For to say that God is good because 20 We can show that 1 and 3 have exactly the same structure: A is B because C has the same A (with the implication that the explanation is provided by the fact that C is B). Substituting terms for variables A, b and C, 1 becomes: This length is 1 meter because the meter bar has this length (and the meter bar is 1 meter). 3 becomes: Virtues (like kindness) are good because God has the same virtues (and God is good). The parallel structure of 2 and 4 can also be shown: C is B because it has A (with the implication that the explanation is provided by the fact that A is B). Again, substituting for variables, 2 becomes: The meter bar is 1 meter because it is this length (and this length is 1 meter) 4 becomes: God is good because he has virtues like kindness (and the virtues are themselves good). 186 JeremY KooNS he possesses these virtues, or that God's goodness supervenes on these virtues, is to reject particularism in favour of some theory that locates the source of moral value outside of God. Wes morriston has recognized this point: Is God good because He has these good-making properties?...If this is the right way to look at the matter, then moral goodness supervenes directly on the good-making properties, and it makes not the slightest difference to their good-makingness who has them. A person is morally good to the degree that she possesses these properties. That goes for God as much as for anyone else. but then we are right back in the box we were trying to get out of. God is subject to an independent standard of goodness...21 Alston cannot consistently maintain that "God is good by virtue of being loving, just, merciful and so on"22 and be a particularist. If he wants to be a particularist, the order of explanation can only go in one direction: the character traits like being loving, just and merciful are virtues – are good – just because they are possessed by God. There are other ways of seeing how on Alston's view, God's goodness must be logically prior to the goodness of the particular moral virtues. That this is so can be seen by looking at another objection to Alston's account raised by morriston. morriston writes, Alston's point...is that explanation must come to an end somewhere. Whatever our ultimate standard is – whether it is an individual paradigm or a general principle of the sort favored by Platonists – that is as far as we can go. If Alston cannot say what makes goodness supervene on God's characteristics, neither can the Platonist say what makes it supervene on a bunch of properties. In either case, it just does supervene, and that is all there is to say. but even if this is right, we can still ask which stopping point is preferable. If we have to stop somewhere, why not stop with the special combination of love and justice that make up God's moral character? Why go further and insist that goodness supervenes on these characteristics only because they are characteristics of the particular individual who is God? From the point of view of moral theory, it is hard to see any real advantage in doing this; it complicates things considerably, and the theological window-dressing seems quite superfluous.23 21 morriston (2009), p. 253. 22 Alston (2002), p. 292. 23 morriston (2001), p. 132. 187CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY of course, Adams' and Alston's answer to morriston's hypothetical question ("Why not stop with the special combination of love and justice...?") must be that if these were not characteristics of God, they wouldn't be virtues – they wouldn't be good. recall our discussion of Adams' theory of the semantics of 'good' – for Adams, in a world without God, there might be traits such as lovingness and justice, but they wouldn't be good, per se. As Wainwright commented, assuming that "Adams's account of the semantics of 'good' is more or less correct, then the term 'good' doesn't pick out a real property in those worlds; the concept of good will be as empty in those worlds as the concept of phlogiston is in ours."24 Alston, as we have seen, seems to make a similar claim, writing, lovingness is good (is a good-making feature, that on which goodness is supervenient) not because of the Platonic existence of a general principle or fact to the effect that lovingness is good, but because God, the supreme standard of goodness, is loving. Goodness supervenes on every feature of God, not because some general principles are true but just because they are features of God.25 Notice the crucial phrases: 'because ... just because...". The clear implication is that the virtues are virtues – are good – just because there is a God who exemplifies these traits. These traits have no independent power to impart goodness on something. If there were no God, and someone were loving, merciful, and so forth, then that person (on the Adams/Alston view) would not be good. Thus, God's goodness is logically prior to the goodness of these traits – these traits are not intrinsically good (for without God, they are not good). God is good, and in virtue of God's possession of these traits, they too are good. We see, then, that God cannot be good in virtue of these traits, because God's goodness must be logically prior to the goodness of these traits. So with this in mind, let us recall Alston's quote, cited earlier: Note that on this view we are not debarred from saying what is supremely good about God. God is not good, qua bare particular or undifferentiated thisness. God is good by virtue of being loving, just, merciful and so on.26 This cannot be right. God cannot be good by virtue of possessing these traits, because these traits don't have the power to confer goodness upon God. God's goodness is logically prior to the goodness of these traits, 24 Wainwright (2005), p. 95. 25 Alston (2002), pp. 291-2, emphasis added. 26 Alston (2002), p. 292. 188 JeremY KooNS so logically speaking God's goodness comes first, and then comes the goodness of these traits. You cannot explain God's goodness in terms of His being "loving, just, merciful, and so on," because the goodness of these traits is logically subsequent to God's goodness, and is to be explained in terms of the latter property. IV. THe INCoHereNCe oF AlSToN'S VIeW I conclude that God's goodness cannot be explained in terms of the goodness of the concrete virtues. We cannot say that God is good because He is loving, merciful, just and so on. Again, this violates our normal understanding of thin moral concepts: agents are not good simpliciter, but are good because they embody thick moral concepts, like lovingness and justice. but the particularism defended by Alston prevents him from explaining God's goodness in this way, and saddles him with a notion of divine goodness that is empty of content. How can Alston reply? Perhaps one can argue that we can say something about even such a stripped down property: we can say (with Aquinas) that "the essence of goodness consists in this, that it is in some way desirable".27 The problem is that God's goodness, understood in the minimalist way outlined above, is a total blank, stripped of any feature that would make intelligible why it is desirable or worthy of pursuit. The essential problem in the Adams/Alston view can be brought into sharp relief by discussing another objection addressed by Alston. Speaking for his opponent, Alston writes, "Isn't it arbitrary to take some particular individual, even the supreme individual, as the standard of goodness, regardless of whether this individual conforms to general principles of goodness or not?"28 In response to this objection, Alston writes, An answer to the question, 'What is good about?' will, sooner or later, cite certain good-making characteristics. We can then ask why we should suppose that good supervenes on those characteristics. In answer either a general principle or an individual paradigm is cited. but whichever it is, that is the end of the line...on both views something is taken to be ultimate, behind which we cannot go, in the sense of finding some explanation of the fact that it is constitutive of goodness.29 27 Aquinas, Summa Theologica Ia.5.1. Quoted in Wierenga (1989), p. 202. As Wierenga notes, though, Aquinas is not talking specifically about moral goodness here. 28 Alston (2002), p. 293. 29 Alston (200), p. 293. 189CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY There are a few comments that need to be made at this point. First, Alston is making a familiar point about explanatory regress, and solving it in a familiar way: eventually, you reach a stopping point in the regress of explanations, and some principle or exemplar must be taken as ultimate. While this may, in some instances, be an acceptable move, it is not acceptable in all cases. one's stopping point must be intelligible as a stopping point. For example, when Aristotle conducts his familiar inquiry into the ultimate telos of all human action, the stopping point he finds – eudaimonia, happiness, or flourishing – is intelligible as a stopping point for such an inquiry. It has features that make sense of it as a goal of human striving. but, as we have already seen, God is not morally good in virtue of any of the familiar characteristics (such as being just or loving). God's moral goodness is utterly blank, without any features that make it intelligible as a stopping place in an inquiry into the ultimate foundation of goodness. Since Alston and Adams make God's goodness prior to any of God's concrete moral virtues, the person of God is not intelligible as a stopping place in the quest for the ultimate source of good. God's supposed goodness, as I said above, is a complete blank, lacking any features whatsoever that would make it intuitively appealing why the object in question should be regarded as the ultimate exemplar of moral goodness.30 Alston writes that it is 'self-evident' that God is the ultimate exemplar of moral goodness, and a legitimate stopping place: I would invite one who finds the invocation of God as the supreme standard arbitrary, to explain why it is more arbitrary than the invocation of a supreme general principle. Perhaps it is because it seems self-evident to him that the principle is true. but it seems self-evident to some that God is the supreme standard. And just as my opponent will explain the lack of self-evidence to some people of this general principle by saying that they have not considered it sufficiently, in an impartial frame of mind or whatever, so the theistic particularist will maintain that those who don't acknowledge God as the supreme standard are insufficiently acquainted with God, or have not sufficiently considered the matter.31 In our regress of justification, we ultimately encounter some principle or exemplar, and the truth of this principle (or the exemplariness of this 30 We have seen above, in the second lengthy quote by morriston, how he criticizes Alston's choice of stopping places in the regress of explanations. 31 Alston (2002), p. 293. 190 JeremY KooNS exemplar) is self-evident or known via intuition. once again, our question must be, 'Is this plausible?' Alston implies that one who is sufficiently acquainted with God and who has given the matter adequate, impartial thought will come to see (with justification or warrant) that God is the standard of moral perfection. but we can now see why this is wrong. For when one imagines acquaintance with God, and contemplation of the divine, one naturally imagines contemplating God given his attributes – such as being perfectly loving, just, merciful, and so forth. And of course someone who contemplated God as so presented might well come to believe in God's moral perfection. but Alston must claim that God is the standard of moral perfection independently of his possession of these characteristics. He is not morally perfect because he possesses these characteristics; these characteristics are features of moral perfection only because they are possessed by God. Thus, what Alston should exhort us to do is this: imagine God, stripped of every moral perfection – His lovingness, His justice, His caring. Now is it self-evident that God as so conceived is morally perfect, the ultimate standard of good? Intuition is not a magical power; it needs something to work with. If intuition is a genuine mental power (and presumably, if it is, it is the power of forming non-inferential beliefs in response to some stimulus or mental input), then intuition requires inputs to generate an output. When Alston tells us that God's moral perfection is self-evident, he is imagining God's moral virtues as cognitive inputs, in which case we should expect as an output the belief "God is the standard of goodness". but the question must be reconceived: 'Does it make sense to say of God, independent of these virtues, that He is good?' I have argued this is not coherent; it is certainly not self-evident that God so conceived is the ultimate standard of moral perfection. Anyhow, this discussion of self-evidence may mislead us: the problem we are dealing with is metaphysical, not epistemological. Alston presents the regress problem almost as an epistemological problem: how do we identify the ultimate source of good? If we have some knowledge of what traits (such as being loving and just) are good, then (plausibly) we need only find the being who exemplifies these traits to the maximal degree to find the exemplar of the good. but the problem we are grappling with is metaphysical, not epistemological: we are not (merely) trying to identify the source of good; we are trying to explain how it confers goodness on all things. So we cannot help ourselves to these virtuous traits (even if we know they are virtuous), because our problem is to explain how they are 191CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY virtuous, not merely to identify which being is most virtuous. We must consider the source of these traits' goodness (God), and ask, "How is it that this being confers goodness on these traits?" Alston, Adams, Craig and others answer, "In virtue of being supremely good." but once we confine ourselves to a strictly metaphysical investigation, we see that this statement is meaningless, because we are debarred from appealing to any features of God which might make His goodness coherent, or explain why His goodness is worthy of admiration or capable of conferring praiseworthiness on the traits (such as lovingness and justice) that He possesses. I said when we began our discussion of the regress of explanations that a few comments were in order. Here is another: we must distinguish between explanations-why and explanations-what. even if explanationswhy come to an end, and no further reasons can be given at this point, it does not follow that at this point there can be no further explanationwhat. For we should still be able to explain what something is even if we can give no further explanation for why it is the way that it is. For example: suppose (contrary to fact) that the electron's negative charge were simply a brute fact, and that no explanation could be given for why electrons have a negative charge. This would be an example of running to the end of explanations for why things are the way they are. but we could still give an explanation of what a negative charge is: how it interacts with positively-charged items (like protons), what the strength of its electrical charge is, and so forth. So even if we can say nothing about why the electron has this charge, we can say quite a lot about what this charge is. To deny this with respect to God's goodness is to conflate the two types of explanation, explanations why and explanations what. (This confusion is, I think, a natural consequence of confusing the epistemological and the metaphysical.) The particularist says, in explaining why certain things are good, that at some point these why-explanations run out when we arrive at the exemplar of God's character. but this does not entail the absence of any what-explanations, and we should still be able to say what God's moral goodness consists in. but the particularist has debarred us from doing this: since God's goodness is prior to any feature we could cite in an explanation (what) of God's goodness, we cannot say what God's goodness is. It is, again, a featureless property. The particularist is not just saying that there is an end to why-explanations; she is saying that no what-explanation can be given either. And that is simply not plausible, since this makes God's goodness completely unintelligible. 192 JeremY KooNS one might argue that one can give some sort of what-explanation about God's goodness. If Adams et al cannot explain God's goodness in terms of concrete virtues (such as lovingness, mercy and justice), perhaps they can attempt to explain this goodness without reference to these virtues. That is, instead of giving the explanation in terms of morally thick virtues (such as mercy, justice, kindness, etc.), they can give the explanation at the more abstract level of morally thin virtues (such as 'morally good'). As the description in question couldn't make reference to the specific thick virtues, this description would of necessity have to be somewhat general in nature. but it might nevertheless be a satisfactory what-explanation. Can you say anything substantive about the morally thin virtues that doesn't rely, even implicitly, on the morally thick virtues? Perhaps one could say that God's goodness consisted of God always doing what was right. This won't work, though, as theological voluntarists have specifically bifurcated their moral theory to respond to the original euthyphro problem for divine command theory: there is a theory of the good for God, and a theory of obligation for finite beings like humans. more importantly, though, good must be definable antecedent to right (since it is God's goodness that gives God reason to issue the particular commands that He does). Thus, on this view, good is logically prior to the right, and so it must be possible to give a definition of 'good' that makes no reference to rightness, obligation, or other cognate notions. one cannot say that God's goodness consists in that He always does the good, for not only is that definition circular, but it uses a predicate (good) that we are already complaining is undefined. Consider again Aquinas' suggestion: "the essence of goodness consists in this, that it is in some way desirable."32 However, as Scanlon33 and Quinn34 have argued, something is desirable not because you desire it, but because it has features that render it desirable – that is, in some way good. Now, there is a clear risk of circularity here – "the essence of goodness consists in this, that it is in some way good" – so to render our formulation non-circular, we must specify the precise ways in which God is good: we must specify the features of God that render Him desirable, good. but if there were specific features of God, in virtue of 32 Aquinas, Summa Theologica Ia.5.1. Quoted in Wierenga (1989), p. 202. 33 See Scanlon 1998, particularly pp. 43ff. 34 Quinn (1993), chapter 12. 193CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY which He was good, then we would be thrown back on the first horn of our dilemma: God is good in virtue of certain features (and hence there is a standard of goodness independent of God). Indeed, the whole problem of trying to move the explanations-what up to the level of thin virtues must fail. As I have repeatedly emphasized, agents instantiate morally thin properties (such as goodness) in virtue of the morally thick properties these agents instantiate. Alston's particularism cannot countenance this fact, and so must fail as a supplement to the divine command theory. In a last-ditch move, one might cite authors (like G.e. moore) who have argued that the Good is unanalyzable. but even if moore was right, he merely meant that one could not analytically reduce the Good to other non-normative or non-moral concepts. So, when moore argued that the Good was unanalyzable, he simply meant that it was not definitionally reducible; he didn't mean that it was inexplicable. So the divine command theorist will find no comfort coming from that quarter. Thus, Alston must commit to one or the other horn of the dilemma. His particularism commits him to the second horn of the dilemma. In short, Alston must answer the question, "Why is being loving good?" by saying, "Traits (like being loving) are good-making because God has them, and God is good." but on Alston's particularism, when we say "God is good", we haven't said anything, because Alston's particularism prevents him from giving any concrete articulation of what goodness is. unfortunately, on the particularist theory, we have no more (or less) reason to declare God essentially good than to declare Him essentially fnord or bxtzs; for by calling God 'good' we haven't really said anything at all. CoNCluSIoN Adams writes that "the part played by God in my account of the nature of the good is similar to the Form of the beautiful or the Good in Plato's Symposium and Republic. God is the supreme Good, and the goodness of other things consists in a sort of resemblance to God."35 In a similar vein, Alston writes, "I want to suggest...that we can think of God himself, the individual being, as the supreme standard of goodness. God plays the role in evaluation that is more usually assigned, by objectivists about 35 Adams (1999), p. 7. 194 JeremY KooNS value, to Platonic Ideas or principles."36 but as we have seen, since Adams and Alston are forced to make the goodness of God logically prior to any of the traits that might plausibly constitute God's goodness, it is not at all clear what is meant by the claim that God is the standard of goodness, for the simple reason that it is not clear what is meant by the claim that God is good. To make any sense of the claim that God is good, the traits constitutive of goodness (such as being loving) must be good prior to God's goodness: it must be the case that God is good because he is loving, and not the case that being loving is good because God is loving. but this requires a repudiation of the particularism that is at the heart of views like Adams' and Alston's. This would also require a standard of moral goodness that is independent of God's nature. one could make it dependent on God's will or commandments or decisions, but of course that throws us back in the original arbitrariness problem. Thus, it seems as though an adequate solution to the euthyphro problem requires that God be constrained by standards of moral goodness that are external to Himself.37 Perhaps this creates problems for divine sovereignty and the like, but that is separate problem.38 bIblIoGrAPHY Adams, robert merrihew. 1999. Finite and Infinite Goods: A Framework for Ethics (New York: oxford university Press) Alston, William P. 2002. "What euthyphro Should Have Said", in William laine Craig (ed.), Philosophy of Religion: A Reader and Guide (rutgers university Press), pp. 283-298 elstein, Daniel Y. and Thomas Hurka. 2009. "From Thick to Thin: Two moral reduction Plans", Canadian Journal of Philosophy 39:4 (December) Hooker, brad. 2001. "Cudworth and Quinn", Analysis 64:1, pp. 333-335 Kowalski, Dean A. forthcoming. "remembering Alston's 'evaluative Particularism'", Religious Studies 36 Alston (2002), p. 291. 37 An alternate solution to the euthyphro problem is proposed in Chapter 2 of Stump (2003). This solution requires embracing some potentially contentious notions, such as that of divine simplicity and the Thomistic idea that being is identical to goodness. To address these issues is unfortunately beyond the scope of the current essay. 38 I am grateful to an anonymous referee for the European Journal for Philosophy of Religion for very helpful feedback on an earlier draft. 195CAN GoD'S GooDNeSS SAVe THe DIVINe CommAND THeorY morriston, Wes. 2001. "must There be a Standard of moral Goodness Apart from God?", Philosophia Christi, Series 2, 3:1, pp. 127-138 – 2009. "What if God Commanded Something Terrible?", Religious Studies 45:3, pp. 249-267 Quinn, Philip l. 2006. "Theological Voluntarism", in David Copp (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory (oxford: oxford university Press), pp. 63-90 Quinn, Warren S. 1993. Morality and Action (Cambridge: Cambridge university Press) Scanlon, T.m. 1998. What We Owe to Each Other (Cambridge, mA: Harvard university Press) Stump, eleonore. 2003. Aquinas (New York: routledge) Wainwright, William J. 2005. Religion and Morality (Aldershot: Ashgate) Wierenga, edward r. 1989. The Nature of God: An Inquiry into Divine Attributes (Ithaca, New York: Cornell university Press)

Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 www.elsevier.com/locate/futures Words "Dediction" Kirk W. Junker ∗ Cross-Border Programme in Science Communication, The Queen's University of Belfast, Northern Ireland & Dublin City University, School of Communications, Dublin 9, Ireland 1. Introduction Of course it is not a word, this "dediction"; at least, not yet. But why not? As the story goes, James Joyce was once asked whether his habit of inventing words was because there were not enough words in the English language. He answered that there were enough words, just not the right words. To see whether "dediction" might be a "right word", I begin by considering related terms, and then consider what they do for us-why do they exist and my new term, "dediction", does not? For example, if we construct for ourselves a simple list of Latinate roots related to writing and seeing, and then add time-related prefixes, we could quickly come up with "post-script", "describe", "description," "prescribe", and "prescription", among others. ("Depict" and "depiction" come to mind as well, but their treatment is beyond my scope here.) If we then do the same for speaking, we have no trouble recognising "predict" and "prediction", but what about "postdict" and "postdiction" or "dedict" and "dediction"? Recalling one of the previous words that I discussed here, "expectation" (Futures, 32:7 September 2000), we may begin to see the answer to the questions above. Prediction may of course be founded upon expectation, to good or ill consequence. As Bertrand Russell noted, "Domestic animals expect food when they see the person who usually feeds them. We know that all these rather crude expectations of uniformity are liable to be misleading. The man who has fed the chicken every day throughout its life at last wrings its neck instead." [1, p. 21] Is it largely the repetition of patterns that gives us the sense of expectation? Can we consequently say that the perception of patterns allows us to feel that we can predict? ∗ Tel.: +353 1 700 8133; fax +353 1 700 5447. E-mail address: [email protected] (K.W. Junker). 0016-3287/02/$ see front matter.  2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S 00 16 -3287( 02 )0 0012-5 896 K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 Regarding the notion of expectation, at section 465 of his Philosophical Investigations, Ludwig Wittgenstein writes: "An expectation is so made that whatever happens has to accord with it, or not."Suppose you now ask: then are facts defined one way or the other by an expectation-that is, is it defined for whatever event may occur whether it fulfils the expectation or not? The answer has to be: "Yes, unless the expression of the expectation is indefinite; for example, contains a disjunction of different possibilities." [2] It is precisely here-in the disjunction of different possibilities-that we may locate some virtual space that opens for multiple futures. It is a space in the matrix of time-plus-speech words. My invented word-"dediction"-works as a placeholder in one of those spaces. And "dediction" does much more than that. It calls attention to the artificial (and to my mind, wrong), normative distinctions among such words as "description", "prescription", and "prediction". Regarding Wittgenstein's point, to say that "facts" are defined by expectations is to make a statement that runs counter to our usual conceptions of facts. Especially in the sciences, we treat facts as though they are determined by the material world. This conception ignores the necessity of interpretation that accompanies the material world such that we can arrive at something and call it a "fact". Therefore, I maintain that facts are constructed by arguments, not things. Yes, but the material world remains a recalcitrant limitation in arguments, one may insist. No more than the social world, I would counter. To illustrate, while thinking about "expectation", I came across the headline "Death Rates at Four Hospitals Higher Than Expected." [3] What could that mean? How do we create such expectations? By announcing a count of past events (deaths), and stating the time at which to count them (the present) such that we can say that they did or did not meet a pre-diction from the past (expectation). I checked with a hospital official in the region as to how such expectations are created, and he told me that they are created by categorising types of procedures, such as heart surgery, and then counting, nation-wide (or sometimes regionally), the number of procedures attempted and the number of survivors. No account is taken of the difference in condition of the patient, the skills or education of the physician and nurses, the technology available, the wealth or poverty of the neighbourhood in which the hospital is located, et cetera. There is a stronger point to be made beyond this relatively simple point regarding the prediction, description, and the creation of expectations. This stronger point is that these deceivingly simple words which couple time and writing, or time and speaking, also connote powerful normative positions. An expectation is thus made possible because we have spoken our belief in advance of an event-we have pre-dicted. Prediction, thought of in this way, is the marking in time of the moment when we move from speaking of the past, in the present, to create a future. In this way, "prediction" can be thought of as the word we use while making firm an otherwise unspoken belief-an "expectation". But what is "expectation" if not a linguistic framework? With the prefixes "de-" and "pre-", 897K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 we comfortably set the markers of the past and the future, respectively. A pure mechanics of language would suggest that by adding these prefixes to "-dict", we ought to be symbolising our talk about the past or the future. And by adding these prefixes to "-script", we ought to be symbolising our writing about the past or future. It is worth noting that Latour and Woolgar in their Laboratory Life characterise technological apparatus in a scientific laboratory as "inscription devices", because it is through these devices that arguments can be brought forth. "Inscription", in this sense, is "not so much a transferring of information as a material operation of creating order". [4, p. 245] Taking symbols in the oral and the written together, with "description" and "prediction", the simple mechanics of meaning brought about by adding a suffix to a baseword seems to work; not so with "prescription". With "prescription", a normative connotation is introduced which adds a different layer of meaning to the simple mechanics of a time-focussed prefix and a base-word denoting writing or speaking. And it is precisely because we do add connotative meaning beyond the denotation suggested by simple mechanics, that I want to introduce "dediction" to the matrix. This artificial introduction makes conscious the otherwise unconscious process of adding or inventing connotations. One might look to politics, race, gender, economics, or other social forces to explain how audiences invest meaning. But by operation of language alone, Wittgenstein shows us how "expectation" helps to create the mode of the future. And because the operation of language can do this, we ought closely to examine those words that pretend to refer only to the abstract vagaries of language itself, but in practice, tend, if not portend, to create normative comportments. With description and prescription, normative comportments are created through references to time. Therefore I want to ask, why not "dediction"? 2. Creating connotations-the time of the signs Here I must be careful not to suggest some linear origin story. Saussure cautions: Language at any given time involves an established system and an evolution. At any given time, it is an institution in the present and a product of the past. At first sight, it looks very easy to distinguish between the system and its history, between what is and what it was. In reality, the connexion between the two is so close that it is hard to separate them. Would matters be simplified if one considered the ontogenesis of linguistic phenomena, beginning with a study of children's language, for example? No. It is quite illusory to believe that where language is concerned the problem of origins is any different from the problem of permanent conditions. There is no way out of the circle. [5, p. 24 in original pagination] To begin simply, I look to the Oxford English Dictionary ("OED"-Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1989) to locate the likely first use of these, and related words. It is not that the OED is the truth in some a priori way, but rather that as a culturally898 K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 received, powerful and pervasive repository of the English word, it serves as an anchoring point for investigations of the word. In the OED, the following years are assigned to the following words as being the first-found use: "description", 1380, from "describe", Latin, de+scribere (to write), and preceded in ME by "descrive". The earliest reference to "describe" in the sense of "to set forth by characteristics" is 1513. The earliest reference of it in the sense of "to write down" is 1526. "Prescription"-writing beforehand-was used in the 1540s, as was "prescribe". Quite relevant for my purposes is the fact that the same etymological root generates the normative or moral sense of "prescribe". As of 1579, we find "prescription" used to indicate a physician's written orders. Did writing it down make it imperative? Here Plato's objections in the Phaedrus dialogue are called to mind. The written word, according to Plato, does not serve to aid or create memory, but rather only to remind us of what we already know. [6, sections 275a–b] In making this critique of the informative sense of acts of communication, Plato does not explore what ramifications writing may have for the moral or normative sense of acts of communication. To complete the matrix, one finds in the OED that "predict" is first recorded as having been used to mean "say beforehand" in 1611, and was made a verb by Milton, although "prediction", was already recognised as a noun in 1561. One finds "postscript" used in 1551, and "postscribe" in 1614; but "postdiction"-to assert something about the past-was only introduced in 1940 with specific dialectic reference to "prediction", a fact I take as evidence to support my method of investigation here. At that time, J. Laird, in Theism & Cosmology, states "If however, the future be indeterminate before it occurs, it cannot be fixed before it occurs. For there is nothing determinate to fix. Hence inferential prediction has quite a different status from inferential post-diction." From their simple etymologies, the words "prescribe", "describe" and "predict" help to create a matrix that yields an interpretive space-a space that the reader will want to fill, due to the structure of the matrix. Already in place are "prescription", "description" and "prediction". Time-determined communications: Spoken Written Pre-dict Pre-scribe De–dict De–scribe Post–dict Post–scribe (There are words about communication not determined by time as well, both spoken, such as "inter–dict", "a–dict", and "e–dict", and written, such as "inter– scribe", "a–scibe", and a neologism which I have created to mean electronic communication, "e–scribe".) 899K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 Separating these terms into simple components, we find two roots-one for writing ("-scription"), the other for speaking ("-diction"). For writing, we have prefixes that place the writing temporally before something else (prescription), one that places the writing contemporaneous with something else (description), and one that places the writing after something else (postscription). So too, for speaking: we have prefixes that place the speaking before something else (prediction), and after something else (postdiction), but noticeably absent is the contemporaneous counterpart of description-"dediction". This hole causes me to pause and wonder, and as I wonder about what I perceive to be a lack here-due to my expectation, I am also struck by the other meanings that the words in the matrix have in addition to their temporal senses. And still more important are the seemingly neutral senses of temporality that permits us our apathy. We let the normative connotation drift by as the uninterrogated shadow of the sturdy temporal denotation. The vertical divide on this matrix seems to be one that separates the written from the spoken word. If we compare the use, impact and meanings of the written versus the spoken, we may see that perhaps Plato was right when, through the words of Socrates, he ranted against the written word in his Phaedrus dialogue: "If men learn this [writing], it will implant forgetfulness on their souls; they will cease to exercise memory because they rely on that which is written, calling things to remembrance no longer from within themselves, but by means of external marks." [6, section 275a]. Plato's position on language and its various forms continues to be echoed in Neil Postman's Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology1 and Sven Birkert's2 The Gutenberg Elegies: The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age. If Plato's prediction was correct in saying that the Athenians would lose oral eloquence due to writing, it would seem that he was only wrong in stopping there. Italo Calvino bemoans the "pestilence" that has befallen both written and oral language as a "loss". [7, p. 56] By inventing "de-diction" and comparing it to the full development of the written word with "prescription", "description" and "postscript(ion)" may illustrate our loss of focus on speaking. As indicia of this loss, can we take the facts that we have developed a full temporal root, stalk and flower for written communication, but for oral counterparts have only the dormant seed of "prediction"? And with that loss, (or failure to develop), the seed, root, stalk and flower have adapted over generations to their environmental condition that privileges the word. As Michel Foucault and many other contemporary theorists have noted, connotations are held in place by living language power structures of the time. What might we observe about the words in this matrix, which would serve as evidence of this power relationship, and demonstrate variations away from meanings derived from their simple structure of time-plus-writing or speaking? "Pre-scription", for example, has a very normative capacity about it, extending to both the written word and the oral word. "Description" takes on a sense not only of time-writing about the present, but also of neutrality. It suggests an ability in 1 New York: Vintage Books, 1993. 2 London: Faber & Faber, 1994. 900 K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 our language to attach words to things in a neutral way or we might say (since Descartes), in an "objective" way. We must ask ourselves what cultural pressures exist in our language environment to turn the meaning in this way? What purposes are served by a word which not only connotes neutrality, but has been put in place or held in place or left in place with a plausible connection to writing, where for speaking we have none? The artificiality of placing "dediction" in the matrix would send us back to "description" wanting to know why "description" means more than "writing in the present" (literally, "of writing"). Moreover, if we stay on the same side of the oral-written vertical divide on the matrix and go back to "pre-scription", we find a further important connotative difference, of which we must query the cultural pressures that necessitated adaptation. While "pre-diction" connotes saying and writing how things will be before they are, "pre-scription" connotes saying and writing how things ought to be before they are. Apparently Hume said, "a description of existing facts never logically entails a moral judgement". [8, p. 112.] I must disagree with Hume on this. With reference to the example, the question is "why choose to re-tell those facts? (versus, for example, other facts). It is that sort of selection process that creates a framework, perhaps even a matrix, within which to consider the facts. The dimensions of the framework, which serve to enframe or include descriptions, also serve to exclude other descriptions-a normative function. In the standard oath used for witnesses in most courts of law in the United States, the witness must swear not only that he or she will tell the truth, but that he or she will tell the whole truth. Telling the whole truth, if that is what telling the truth means, requires a witness to have a sense of all that is relevant to the point at issue. And insofar as this is regarded as a standard, it is treated as though it is surely the case that the judge, the lawyers, the witnesses, the parties and everyone present will have the same sense, more or less, of what is relevant. Simply giving some of the facts will not do-the truth (as understood to be the whole truth)-can only be told when one understands the normative standard of all that ought to be included as relevant to that truth. Thus, the descriptive act is indeed a prescriptive one, and in the case of the courtroom, is the prescriptive response to the oath's prescriptive call. So while I remain indebted to Hume for his indictments of both induction and deduction, I must disagree with his position here. Hume provides us with a good example of the language environment-formal logic-that is benefited by accommodating "description" to a neutral position-at least a morally neutral position. But that language environment is not the vernacular or vulgar language environment by which we live our lives in creating meanings. Writing may corrupt the mind and its ability to remember in the same way in which hand-held calculators corrupt a person's numeracy, or that electronic texts corrupt one's literacy. More important for this investigation is the fact that the physical existence of the written word helps to assign and entrench connotations. Today at least, we find a need to translate Plato as having explicit concern with description and prescription. In The Laws, Plato's Athenian says (in what we now recognise as post-16th century translation, given the OED's etymologies): "Thus you see that while it would be wrong to call these various subjects incapable of description, it 901K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 is very right to call them incapable of prescription, for prescription can throw no light on their contents." [6, chapter XII, section 968e.] The temporal sense of being able to say what will happen before it happens (predict) gives us the normative ethos of saying what should happen (pre-scribe). But we often do not speak of what will happen in certain, or absolute terms. Twentieth century quantum physics, and most of science in the Comtean cascade from physics, focuses on probabilities, not certainties, and such common daily concerns as economics and weather are always discussed in probability terms. In this conditional mode of probability, prediction takes on the quality of what should happen, given the applicable probability calculation, not what will happen. Once the realm of should is entered, it is easy to see how ambiguity between normative and probable should develop. From there, one could use a reverse logic that goes something like this: We do not have "dediction" because we recognise that "pre-diction" means both the present and the future-as with description; it so thoroughly includes prescription that it too is redundant. Why do we hang on to it? I am presenting "dediction" mostly as an heuristic device, possibly because, to borrow from Joyce, it is one of the "right" words, but not simply because we need more words. One of the common topoi of classical Greek rhetoric was definition. It certainly still is today. (I should emphasise that it is nothing more than a common topus.) I might say that "pre-diction" literally means to speak before. Typically then, the sense of the word "prediction" is to speak of an event before the event happens. If the speaking-before is sufficiently similar to the occurring-after, we say that the speaking-before is "pre-diction". But the judgement and interpretation that we exercise in comparing the occurring-after with the speaking-before is loose and accommodating. [9, p. 21.] What then, by comparison, would be the definition of de-diction? "Speaking possible futures into existence today." This may sound like a very weak definition, including just about all possibilities and excluding none. But that is not the case. With every formulation that recalls a past or re-enforces a present, an unconscious line is drawn to a particular future. Not all of the possible futures are part of this drama. Some are purposely excluded; others simply do not ever come to be heard. The choice to speak particular facts today does limit the possibilities in the future, and with the selection of facts we speak into existence today, we have selected which futures can be. That selection is therefore a normative act. So through the artificial addition of "dediction" to the matrix, we can make an analogy to another part of the matrix-as a proportion. So the invention of "de-diction" shows us not only that all dediction is pre-diction, but also that all description is pre-scription. This brings us back to Plato's Gorgias dialogue. There, with the support of characters Thamus and Theuth, Socrates speaks against the written word in ways similar to those who since have spoken against other new media of communication-the radio, the phonograph, the television, talking films, the computer, the hand-held calculator. [6, sections 274–275] Speaking, as opposed to writing, has additional features with which we must reckon in our consideration of futures. Speaking is a far more common feature of communication both historically [10] and contemporaneously, for those who cannot write, for those in private or intimate situations, for those in informal situations, for those without a means available for writing. In all 902 K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 of these cases, futures are being created through spoken language. Dediction is present. And once again we see the proportion whereby, just as all description is prescription, all dediction is prediction. If we push this idea a bit further and extend it to entire branches of thought, we might notice that epistemology-"How do you know?" is more like ethics-"Why do you believe?" 3. All description is prescription Nietzsche provides us with reason to think that with classical civilisation we have the very conditions that made possible our concept of science, such that we can look back at those conditions today and recognise something. From that classical civilisation, Aristotle's principle of non-contradiction provides an example of a linguistic framework that functions beyond a matrix of words as labels. In response, as Nietzsche shows us with his principle of contradiction, non-contradiction operates in the realm of norms and values. Regarding Nietzsche's self-professed project of re-valuing all values, "the most fundamental 'value' of all [is] the principle of noncontradiction, . . ." writes de Man in his Allegories of Reading. As a value, this manifests itself as pre-scription, not de-scription-normative, not neutral. De Man finds this to be manifestly clear in section 516 of Nietzsche's The Will to Power. We are unable to affirm and to deny one and the same thing: this is a subjective empirical law, not the expression of any "necessity" but only of an inability.If, according to Aristotle, the law of contradiction is the most certain of all principles, if it is the ultimate and most basic, upon which every demonstrative proof rests, if the principle of every axiom lies in it; then one should consider all the more rigorously what presuppositions already lie at the bottom of it. Either it asserts something about actuality, about being, as if one already knew this from another source; that is, as if opposite attributes could not be ascribed to it. Or the proposition means: opposite attributes should not be ascribed to it. In that case, logic would be an imperative, not to know the true, but to posit and arrange a world that shall be called true by us [11]. Nietzsche's critique raises the question of how one justifies an ordering principle, if a principle like non-contradiction is not what it purports to be. Wittgenstein connects this question to prediction, prescription and personal motivation, when in his Philosophical Investigations he shows how a prescription, a command even, can change the course of how we necessarily must interpret subsequent action. "I am leaving the room because you tell me to.""I am leaving the room, but not because you tell me to."Does this proposition describe a connexion between my action and his order; or does it make the connexion?Can one ask: "How do you know that you do it because of this, or not because of this?" And is the answer perhaps: "I feel it." [2, section 487] 903K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 Among Ludwig Wittgenstein's investigations, number 487 is where we can perhaps best see how language produces, enables and constrains futures. Statements are to commands, as Wittgenstein demonstrates, as description is to prescription. With this theme of the structure of language in mind, we must to consider the following mechanics of the structure. Kierkegaard says that when Abraham chooses to obey God's order, he is authorising God to command him. God has not forced Abraham to do anything. Likewise for Sartre, the same is true when we choose to obey a law or policeman, or sign. [8, p. 77] These observations help to illustrate how meaning is created not only by the definitions of words, but by the social interpretation of structure, tone, and the mechanics of language. It seems a bit strange to say that neither God nor the policeman has forced the action. And we may be particularly surprised to find such a statement coming from Sartre. But if we examine what has been said, we should notice that we are talking about the creation of meaning and the authorisation for action through commands. Commands are not commands just because of the definitions of individual words contained within them. As Saussure reminded us above, language involves both an established system and an evolution. Moreover, individual parts of the language in the system must be understood in the context of the system, not as free-standing meanings. So while it may take Abraham's authorisation to construct God's statement as a command, Abraham's failure to follow the mandate of the command will be interpreted as disobeying the command, not as some unrelated action. Our social use of language does not permit the hearer of a statement that has been directed at him to ignore the preceding statement when taking subsequent meaningful actions. A hearer cannot say that he heard the speaker, but neither agreed nor disagreed with the statement, and simply chose to act independently. Why is this? Because the systematic nature of the language means that every utterance is made in the context of all language, and every speaker and every hearer is hearing and speaking in the contexts of all speaking and hearing. That is how meanings are created. This means that while the meaning of a statement is not solely for the speaker to determine, as Kierkegaard and Sartre illustrate, so too it is not solely for the hearer to determine. I would even go a step further than this, and say that while it is true that the interpretation of meaning from speaker and hearer are necessary for a command, so too is it necessary to have the interpretation of meaning created by the audience? This is the case because the hearer interprets the statement in the context of what "the audience", real or virtual, may make of it. Moreover, this meaning is determined by speaker, hearer and audience not only in the definition of words, but in the structure and mechanics of language, in the ethos of the persons involved and the social dynamics of its use, among other things. For example, a command has a meaning different than a statement not just because of the accumulated definitions of the words in the command, but also because of its structure and mechanics. The audience, together with the speaker and hearer, creates the meanings. There is more-it is not only the audience who is present during this particular interlocution, but all audiences in the language family, who are responsible for the meanings created. Consequently, in the above example, even if the hearer genuinely did not hear 904 K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 the preceding statement, the audience will interpret the hearer's actions as re-actions to the statement. This means that the statement is functioning as a command-not because of the content of the intentional command of the speaker, and not because of the content of the re-actions of a wilful hearer, but because of the power of the audience to influence the interpretive possibilities of meaning in social speaking and hearing. This dynamic has ramifications for the speaker, listener and audience who make up the social group. The social understanding of group language dynamics plays a necessary and powerful force in establishing the system identified by Saussure. And because we all, at one time or another, are part of the interpretive audience that produces the system, we have contributed to the socially-constructed conditions which remove the ability of the speaker or hearer (was it ever there?) to insist upon his intentional will as the supreme interpretation of the definitional meaning of a statement, and in its function as a command or statement-a prescription or a description. In the evolution of language that Saussure regards as being essential, I would suggest that ultimately this environment of interpretation stops the speaker or hearer from expecting that the audience privilege the meaning that is conscious to the intentional will of the speaker or hearer. Once that expectation is removed, we may see that there is an element of complicity by the speaker or hearer in the dynamic whereby the audience helps to create the meaning for both the speaker and the hearer. In short, we have moved from the notion that the speaker controls the meaning for the hearer, to the hearer contributing to the meaning, to the audience contributing to the meaning. Once the speaker or hearer acknowledges this, he or she is complicit in the audience's construction of meaning and must surrender the expectation that the singular, intentional will of the speaker must be privileged as the supreme interpretation of meaning. 4. Conclusion Throughout this essay, I have hung my arguments on a framework of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. To that framework then, I give the final words. In investigations 579–81, he writes: The feeling of confidence. How is this manifested in behaviour?An 'inner process' stands in need of outward criteria.An expectation is imbedded in a situation, from which it arises. The expectation of an explosion may, for example, arise from a situation in which an explosion is to be expected. In an established system that is necessary for language to have meaning, all description is prescription. Adding "de-diction" to the etymological matrix helps to illustrate that point. As an heuristic device that is intended to make us reflect upon the creation of futures through language, we might want to relate it to the deceivingly-simple concept of a model. I recently asked some university students what a fashion model has in common with a carbon molecule model-"toothpicks" was the answer that I received. (One might need to have done primary school science a while 905K.W. Junker / Futures 34 (2002) 895–905 ago to know that models of molecules were constructed with balls and toothpicks.) That may in fact be the only thing that those two models have in common. We are tricked by what appears to be the same word, but I would suggest it functions more as a homonym. Models in science are intended to describe the world as it exists; fashion models, as any woman (or man) will tell you, are not at all like the rest of us-their function is normative, a prescription of how we should look, not a mirror of how we do look. The use of the same word-model-for description and prescription allows even the scientist to create models and then look for a world that is like the model, rather than to make a model to look like the world. Within this notion of modelling then, the notion of how description becomes prescription is summarised. References [1] Russell B. On Induction. In: Swinburne R, editor. The Justification of Induction. London: Oxford University Press; 1974. p. 1–25 Reprinted. [2] Wittgenstein L. Philosophical Investigations, third edition. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1958 G. E. M. Anscombe, transl. [3] Snowbeck C. Pittsburgh Post–Gazette, December 17, 1999, p. B-1. [4] Latour B, Woolgar S. Laboratory Life: The Social Construction of Scientific Facts. London: Sage, 1979. [5] De Saussure F. Course in General Linguistics. London: Duckworth, 1983 Roy Harris, transl. [6] Plato Unknown. Gorgias. In: Hamilton E, Cairns H, editors. The Collected Dialogues. Princeton: Princeton University Press; 1961. [7] Calvino I. Six Memos for the Next Millennium. London: Vintage, 1996 Patrick Creagh, transl. [8] Palmer D. Sartre for Beginners. New York, NY: Writers and Readers Publishers, 1995. [9] Junker K. How the Future is Cloned. In: Sardar Z, editor. Rescuing all our Futures: The Future of Future Studies. Twickenham: Adamantine Press Limited; 1999. [10] Ong W. Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. London: Routledge, 1982. [11] de Man P. Allegories of Reading: Figural Language in Rousseau, Nietzsche, Rilke. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979 quoting the Kaufmann–Hollingdale translation of Friedrich Nietzsche's The Will to Power.

Open Journal of Fluid Dynamics, 2014, 4, 278-287 Published Online September 2014 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/ojfd http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojfd.2014.43021 How to cite this paper: Tsuboi, K., Morishita, S. and Tomita, E. (2014) Consideration on the Flow Velocity in the Experimental Analysis of the Flame Displacement Speed Using DNS Data of Turbulent Premixed Flames with Different Lewis Numbers. Open Journal of Fluid Dynamics, 4, 278-287. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojfd.2014.43021 Consideration on the Flow Velocity in the Experimental Analysis of the Flame Displacement Speed Using DNS Data of Turbulent Premixed Flames with Different Lewis Numbers Kazuya Tsuboi, Shingo Morishita, Eiji Tomita Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan Email: [email protected] Received 19 May 2014; revised 19 June 2014; accepted 20 July 2014 Copyright © 2014 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Abstract The flame displacement speed is one of the major characteristics in turbulent premixed flames. The flame displacement speed is experimentally obtained from the displacement normal to the flame surface, while it is numerically evaluated by the transport equation of the flame surface. The flame displacement speeds obtained both experimentally and numerically cannot be compared directly because their definitions are different. In this study, two kinds of experimental flame displacement speeds-involving the mean inflow velocity and the local flow velocity-were simulated using the DNS data with the different Lewis numbers, and were compared with the numerical flame displacement speed. The simulated experimental flame displacement speed involving the mean inflow velocity had no correlation with the numerical flame displacement speed, while the simulated displacement speed involving the local flow velocity had a clear correlation with the numerical displacement speed in the cases of higher Lewis number than unity. The correlation coefficient of the simulated displacement speed involving the local flow velocity with the numerical displacement speed had a maximum value on the isosurface of the reaction progress variable with the maximum temperature gradient where the dilation effect of the flame is strongest. Keywords Flame Displacement Speed, Simulating Experimental Measurement and Analysis, Lewis Number, Dilation Effect, Turbulent Premixed Flame, Direct Numerical Simulation K. Tsuboi et al. 279 1. Introduction Turbulent flames are the configuration to have been widely used for actual combustors for automobiles, ships, aircraft, power generations, and industrial furnaces. To achieve further high efficiency and low emission of the actual combustors, it is necessary to investigate the detailed mechanism of turbulent combustion. Burning velocity is one of the major characteristics in turbulent premixed flames. In the various definitions of the burning velocity, turbulent burning velocity is a global quantity and is related to combustion efficiency, while the local burning velocity and the flame displacement speed are the dominant factors in the discussion of the local structure of turbulent premixed flames. The local burning velocity is the quantity based on the local consumption rate of the unburned mixture by the chemical reaction, while the flame displacement speed is the quantity based on the flame normal component of the speed, which a flame surface, defined as the isosurface of temperature or mass fraction of the unburned mixture, moves relatively to a flow [1]. It is not straightforward to measure the local chemical reaction rate using the current measurement technology, thus the local burning velocity can be obtained numerically only. Therefore, the flame displacement speed has been used for experiments instead of the local burning velocity. The flame displacement speed is experimentally obtained from the displacement normal to the flame surface, while it is numerically evaluated by the transport equation of the flame surface which is defined as the isosurface of the reaction progress variable. These flame displacement speeds obtained both experimentally and numerically cannot be compared directly because their definitions are different. Thus, it is necessary to investigate the relationship between the experimental and the numerical flame displacement speeds. The flame displacement speed involves flow velocity. In this relationship, the consideration of the flow velocity in the experimental flame displacement speed is also important. Hartung et al. [2] developed the new experimental analysis and formulation of the flame displacement speed in turbulent premixed flames using stereoscopic particle image velocimetry (PIV) and time-sequenced OH-planar laser-induced fluorescence (PLIF). The two-dimensional flame displacement speed was measured as the projection of the three-dimensional flame displacement speed onto the plane defined by the laser sheets intersecting a flame. Chakraborty et al. [3] performed the DNS analysis on the flame displacement speed using the experimental definition of the two-dimensional flame displacement speed by Hartung et al. [2]. The flame displacement speed is essentially a three-dimensional quantity. Because it is difficult to measure the three-dimensional flame displacement speed experimentally, the flame displacement speed is measured as a two-dimensional quantity. They evaluated the correlation between the two-dimensional flame displacement speed, which was obtained from the experimental formulation by Hartung et al. [2], and the three-dimensional flame displacement speed, which was evaluated by the transport equation. They reported that the correlation was positive. In our previous study [4], the experimental measurement and analysis on the two-dimensional flame displacement speed were simulated and analyzed using the DNS data with the different density ratios of the unburned mixture to the burned product. In the simulated analysis on the experimental flame displacement speed, the treatment of the local flow on the flame surface was discussed, and it was found that the correlation between the experimental and numerical flame displacement speeds was affected by the density ratio and the isosurface of the reaction progress variable due to the dilation effect of the flame. In this study, the experimental measurement and analysis on the two-dimensional flame displacement speed were simulated using the DNS data with the different Lewis numbers. The two-dimensional flame displacement speed obtained with simulating the experimental measurement and analysis was compared with the two-dimensional flame displacement speed numerically evaluated by the transport equation, and subsequently the correlation between the both flame displacement speeds was shown. In the simulation of the experimental measurement and analysis, the flow velocity involved in the simulated experimental flame displacement speed was considered as the mean flow or the local flow, and the impact of their flows on the correlation between the simulated experimental and the numerical flame displacement speeds was also shown. The experimental measurement and analysis on the flame displacement speed were assessed on the basis of the results simulated them using the DNS data. 2. Numerical Analysis Method 2.1. DNS Database The DNS database used for the numerical simulated analysis of the experimental measurement and analysis was K. Tsuboi et al. 280 constructed with different Lewis numbers. These were Le = 0.8, termed case Ml; Le = 1.0, termed case Mm; and Le = 1.2, termed case Mh. The simulations were carried out using the PRIMEPOWER HPC2500 installed at Nagoya University [5]. Details of the database are given in Table 1, and the computational domain is shown in Figure 1. The governing equations for constructing the database were the conservation of mass, chemical species, energy, and momentum (compressible Navier-Stokes equations), and the equation of state for an ideal gas. The database was constructed using a sixth-order central finite difference scheme in the mean flow direction and a spectral collocation method in the directions perpendicular to the mean flow for spatial discretization. A thirdorder three-step Runge-Kutta method was used for the time evolution and an overall single-step irreversible reaction was used to describe the chemical kinetics. The inflow and outflow boundaries were described on the basis of Navier-Stokes characteristic boundary conditions (NSCBC) [6] [7], and the lateral boundaries were periodic. The computational domain was 8 mm in the mean flow direction and 4 mm in the directions perpendicular to the mean flow; 512 and 128 grid points were used in the respective directions. At the inflow boundary, preliminary calculated homogeneous isotropic turbulence with a cycle of several milliseconds was used, with a mean inflow velocity assuming Taylor's hypothesis of frozen turbulence with a phase shift. Initially, a laminar premixed flame was formed, which grew to form a turbulent premixed flame. The inflow velocity of the unburned mixture was adjusted while monitoring the turbulent burning velocity until the turbulent premixed flame became fully developed and stabilised. The instantaneous turbulent burning velocity varied temporally; however, the time-averaged turbulent burning velocity, which can be measured experimentally, was steady. The database was constructed without changing the inflow velocity. Each case in the database consisted of almost 200 sampled data points at 51.68-μs intervals (which was longer than the DNS time step). The conditions described in the database correspond to the boundary between wrinkled flamelets and corrugated flamelets in the turbulent combustion regime diagram [8]. Further details of the calculation method to construct the DNS database can be found in Nishiki et al. [9] [10] and Nishiki [11]. Table 1. The DNS database. case Ml Mm Mh u bρ ρ 5.00 5.00 5.00 Le 0.8 1.0 1.2 0 Lu (m/s) 0.523 0.523 0.523 0 fδ (mm) 0.191 0.191 0.191 inu (m/s) 1.406 0.992 0.840 0 Lu u′ 1.01 1.01 1.01 0 fλ δ 10.7 10.7 10.7 0 t fl δ 18.0 18.0 18.0 Reλ 56.7 56.7 56.7 Relt 95.5 95.5 95.5 Figure 1. Computational domain. K. Tsuboi et al. 281 2.2. Numerical Analysis Simulating Experimental Measurement In this study, the DNS analysis simulated the experimental measurement and analysis of the flame displacement speed was performed in accordance with Renou et al. [12] [13]. The flame surface is experimentally measured as the two-dimensional cross section of a flame on a laser sheet using laser tomography. The analysis in this study was performed by simulating the experimental measurement and analysis using the data on the two-dimensional cross section parallel to the mean propagation direction of a flame in the three-dimensional DNS data of turbulent premixed combustion. The flame surface was identified as the isosurface of the reaction progress variable: u T a u T Tc T T − = − , (1) where T is the temperature, aT is the adiabatic flame temperature, and uT is the temperature of the unburned mixture (300 K). Three isosurfaces of the reaction progress variable in all the cases were considered as follows: 0.167Tc = , the isosurface corresponding to 500 K where silicon oil droplets seeded in the unburned mixture evaporate [12] [13]; 0.690Tc = , the isosurface where the temperature gradient indicates a maximum value; 0.900Tc = , the isosurface where the reaction rate in the planar flame reaches a maximum value. Two-dimensional flame displacement speed simulating the experimental measurement and analysis was defined by two kinds of equations dependent on the treatment of the flow velocity involving in the flame displacement speed: gi du using the mean inflow velocity on the upstream boundary as shown in Figure 2(a), u gi d int u uρ ρ   = + ∆  Δx ; (2) gn du using the local flow velocity defined as the normal component of the local flow velocity at each point on the flame surface as shown in Figure 2(b), cosgnd u u t ρ α ρ   = + ⋅ ∆  tu nx∆ , (3) where ρ is the density, uρ is the density of the unburned mixture, x∆ is the displacement vector of a flame, t∆ is the time interval of measurement, inu is the mean inflow velocity, tu is the flow velocity vector at the time, t, and α is the angle between u and unit normal vector to a flame surface, n. The flame surfaces were measured experimentally every 0.167 ms in Renou et al. [12] [13], whereas the DNS data were sampled every 0.0517 ms. For the similar simulating analysis using the DNS data to the experimental measurement and analysis in Renou et al. [12] [13], t∆ was 0.1551 ms as three times of the interval sampled the DNS data. The twodimensional flame displacement speed evaluated by the transport equation of Tc , ( ) 0bT d Tc u ct ∂ + + ⋅ = ∂ u n ∇ (4) (a) (b) Figure 2. Schematic of simulating experimental analyses on the flame displacement speed. (a) gidu obtained in consideration of the mean inflow velocity on the upstream boundary, (b) gndu obtained in consideration of the normal component of the local flow velocity. K. Tsuboi et al. 282 is defined as: 1b T d T T cu c c t ∂ = − + ⋅ ∂  u ∇ ∇ . (5) Note that gidu , gndu , and bdu were non-dimensionalised by the laminar burning velocity without flame stretch in each case after the next section. 3. Results and Discussion 3.1. Flame Displacement Speed Involving the Mean Inflow Velocity The probability density functions (pdfs) of both gidu as the simulated experimental flame displacement speed involving the mean inflow velocity and bdu evaluated by the transport equation on each isosurface of Tc in the different Lewis number cases are shown in Figure 3. In all Lewis number cases, the pdfs of gidu disagreed with those of bdu . In each Lewis number case, however, the difference of the mode location between gidu and b du decreased with Tc , and the mode locations of both gidu and bdu were very close especially in 0.167Tc = . Tc becomes larger in average in the downstream direction and smaller in average in the upstream direction. The flow velocity on the isosurface of 0.167Tc = where is less affected by the flame than the isosurfaces of 0.690Tc = , 0.900 is close to the mean inflow velocity on the upstream boundary. Therefore, the pdf of gidu involving the mean inflow velocity was similar to the pdf of bdu involving the local flow velocity in the isosurface of 0.167Tc = . The joint pdfs of gidu with bdu on each isosurface of Tc in the different Lewis number cases are shown in Figure 4. The joint pdfs of gidu with bdu in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = had the largest probability density of the mode in the isosurfaces of Tc in each Lewis number case. However, the joint pdf of gi du with bdu had almost no correlation in all cases. The correlation coefficients of gidu with bdu on each isosurface of Tc in the different Lewis number cases are shown in Figure 5. The correlation coefficients were low values in all cases, even the largest coefficient on the isosurface of 0.690Tc = in case Mh did not reach 0.3. This implies that the mean inflow velocity is not appropriate to the flow velocity involved in the flame displacement speed. 3.2. Flame Displacement Speed Involving the Local Flow Velocity The pdfs of both gndu as the simulated experimental flame displacement speed involving the normal component of the local flow velocity at each point on the flame surface and bdu in the different Lewis number cases are shown in Figure 6. The mode locations of gndu and bdu in each isosurface of Tc were almost constant independent of the Lewis number. The shapes and the mode locations of the pdfs of gndu in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = were similar to those of bdu in case Mm, Mh. This indicates the possibility that gndu is more appropriate definition of the experimental flame displacement speed than gidu . The joint pdfs of gndu with bdu on Figure 3. Probability density functions (pdfs) of non-dimensionalised gidu and b du on some isosurfaces of cT with different Lewis numbers. From the left, case Ml, case Mm, and case Mh. K. Tsuboi et al. 283 Figure 4. Joint pdfs between non-dimensionalised gidu and b du on some isosurfaces of cT with different Lewis numbers. From the top, case Ml, case Mm, and case Mh, and from the left, cT = 0.167, 0.690, 0900. Figure 5. Correlation coefficients between non-dimensionalised gidu and b du on some isosurfaces of cT with different Lewis numbers. From the left, case Ml, case Mm, and case Mh. K. Tsuboi et al. 284 Figure 6. Pdfs of non-dimensionalised gndu and b du on some isosurfaces of cT with different Lewis numbers. From the left, case Ml, case Mm, and case Mh. each isosurface of Tc in the different Lewis number cases are shown in Figure 7. The joint pdfs of gndu with b du in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = had the largest probability density of the mode in the isosurfaces of Tc in each Lewis number case. In case Ml, bdu was insensitive to gndu in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = , and had no correlation with gndu in other isosurfaces of Tc . In case Mm, Mh, gndu had positive correlations with bdu in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = , and had indefinite but slightly positive correlations with bdu in other isosurfaces of Tc . The isosurface of 0.690Tc = is where the temperature gradient indicates a maximum value, and thus where the dilation effect of the flame is strongest. gndu had a clear correlation with bdu in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = because the flame displacement speed is affected by the dilation effect of the flame [4]. The reason that bdu was insensitive to gndu in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = in case Ml is considered to be the suppression of the dilation effect due to the predominance of the mass diffusion over the thermal diffusion in lower Lewis number than unity. The correlation coefficients of gndu with bdu on each isosurface of Tc in the different Lewis number cases are shown in Figure 8. The correlation coefficient in the isosurface of 0.690Tc = was highest and more than twice value in the case of gidu in each Lewis number case. This means that gndu involving the local flow velocity is more appropriate definition of the experimental flame displacement speed than gi du involving the mean inflow velocity. By comparing two kinds of experimental flame displacement speeds-involving the mean inflow velocity and the local flow velocity-with the numerical flame displacement speed, it was found that even if under the weak turbulence conditions in this study the local flow velocity is required to define the experimental flame displacement speed appropriately. However, the correlation coefficient which does not reach 0.6 is not so high, thus it is necessary to investigate the way to involve the local flow velocity in detail. Moreover, the fact-the correlation coefficient between the experimental and numerical flame displacement speeds is affected by Lewis number-means that the current experimental definition of the flame displacement speed is insufficient. It is also necessary to consider the way to incorporate the mass diffusion and the thermal diffusion into the definition of the experimental flame displacement speed. 4. Conclusion The experimental measurement and analysis of the flame displacement speed were simulated using the DNS data of turbulent premixed flames with the different Lewis numbers, and the flame displacement speed obtained with simulating the experimental measurement and analysis was compared with the displacement speed numerically evaluated by the transport equation. The simulated experimental flame displacement speed involving the mean inflow velocity had no correlation with the numerical flame displacement speed, while the simulated displacement speed involving the local flow velocity had a clear correlation with the numerical displacement speed in the cases of higher Lewis number than unity. The correlation coefficient of the simulated displacement speed involving the local flow velocity with the numerical displacement speed had a maximum value on the isosurface of the reaction progress variable with the maximum temperature gradient where the dilation effect of the flame was strongest. Towards a more appropriate experimental flame displacement speed, it is necessary to K. Tsuboi et al. 285 Figure 7. Joint pdfs between non-dimensionalised gndu and b du on some isosurfaces of cT with different Lewis numbers. From the top, case Ml, case Mm, and case Mh, and from the left, cT = 0.167, 0.690, 0900. Figure 8. Correlation coefficients between non-dimensionalised gndu and b du on some isosurfaces of cT with different Lewis numbers. From the left, case Ml, case Mm, and case Mh. K. Tsuboi et al. 286 consider the treatment of the local flow velocity and the mass and thermal diffusions in the definition of the experimental displacement speed. References [1] Poinsot, T., Echekki, T. and Mungal, M. G. (1992) A Study of the Laminar Flame Tip and Implications for Premixed Turbulent Combustion. Combustion Science and Technology, 81, 45-73. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00102209208951793 [2] Hartung, G., Hult, J., Balachandran, R., Mackley, M.R. and Kaminski, C.F. (2009) Flame Front Tracking in Turbulent Lean Premixed Flames Using Stereo PIV and Time-sequenced Planar LIF of OH. Applied Physics B, 96, 843-862. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00340-009-3647-0 [3] Chakraborty, N., Hartung, G., Katragadda, M. and Kaminski, C.F. (2011) Comparison of 2D and 3D Density-Weighted Displacement Speed Statistics and Implications for Laser based Measurements of Flame Displacement Speed Using Direct Numerical Simulation Data. Combustion and Flame, 158, 1372-1390. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.combustflame.2010.11.014 [4] Tsuboi, K., Morishita, S., Tomita, E. and Hasegawa, T. (2014) Evaluation of Experimental Measurements and Analyses on the Flame Displacement Speed Using DNS Data of Turbulent Premixed Flames with Different Density Ratios. Journal of Thermal Science and Technology. (Submitted). [5] Tsuboi, K., Nishiki, S. and Hasegawa, T. (2008) An Analysis of Local Quantities of Turbulent Premixed Flames Using DNS Databases. Journal of Thermal Science and Technology, 3, 103-111. http://dx.doi.org/10.1299/jtst.3.103 [6] Poinsot, T.J. and Lele, S.K. (1992) Boundary Conditions for Direct Simulations of Compressible Viscous Flows. Journal of Computational Physics, 101, 104-129. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0021-9991(92)90046-2 [7] Baum, M., Poinsot, T. and Thévenin, D. (1995) Accurate Boundary Conditions for Multicomponent Reactive Flows. Journal of Computational Physics, 116, 247-261. http://dx.doi.org/10.1006/jcph.1995.1024 [8] Peters, N. (1999) The Turbulent Burning Velocity for Large-Scale and Small-Scale Turbulence. Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 384, 107-132. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0022112098004212 [9] Nishiki, S., Hasegawa, T., Borghi, R. and Himeno, R. (2002) Analyzing and Modeling of Transport Properties of Turbulent Kinetic Energy and Turbulent Scalar Flux in Turbulent Premixed Flames by DNS. Journal of the Combustion Society of Japan, 48, 47-57. (In Japanese). [10] Nishiki, S., Hasegawa, T., Borghi, R. and Himeno, R. (2006) Modelling of Turbulent Scalar Flux in Turbulent Premixed Flames based on DNS Databases. Combustion Theory and Modelling, 10, 39-55. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13647830500307477 [11] Nishiki, S. (2003) DNS and Modeling of Turbulent Premixed Combustion. Doctoral Thesis, Nagoya Institute of Technology, Nagoya. [12] Renou, B., Boukhalfa, A., Puechberty, D. and Trinité, M. (1998) Effects of Stretch on the Local Structure of Freely Propagating Premixed Low-Turbulent Flames with Various Lewis Numbers. Proceedings of the Combustion Institute, 27, 841-847. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0082-0784(98)80480-3 [13] Renou, B., Boukhalfa, A., Puechberty, D. and Trinité, M. (2000) Local Scalar Flame Properties of Freely Propagating Premixed Turbulent Flames at Various Lewis Numbers. Combustion and Flame, 123, 507-521. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0010-2180(00)00180-2. K. Tsuboi et al. 287 Nomenclature Tc Reaction progress variable Le Lewis number lt Integral length scale n Unit normal vector to a flame surface Relt Reynolds number based on integral length scale Reλ Reynolds number based on Taylor microscale T Temperature u Flow velocity vector u′ Turbulence intensity b du Flame displacement speed evaluated by the transport equation gi du Flame displacement speed obtained in consideration of the mean inflow velocity on the upstream boundary gn du Flame displacement speed obtained in consideration of the normal component of the local flow velocity inu Mean inflow velocity Lu Laminar burning velocity Tu Turbulent burning velocity V Total volume of the computation domain Y Mass fraction α Angle between u and n t∆ Measurement time interval x∆ Displacement vector of a flame fδ Flame thickness λ Taylor microscale ρ Density Superscripts 0 Without flame stretch t At the time t t t+ ∆ At the time t t+ ∆ Subscripts a In adiabatic condition b In burned product u In unburned mixture

LINGUAGGI Leonardo Caffo, Prevedere il comportamento 98 LEONARDO CAFFO PREVEDERE IL COMPORTAMENTO. ATTEGGIAMENTI PROPOSIZIONALI E PRAGMATICA 1. Termini della questione 2. Il problema 3. Credenza e stati di credenza 4. La mia proposta 1. Termini della questione La psicologia del senso comune (folk psycology) inquadra gli atteggiamenti proposizionali come entità teoriche fondamentali per la costruzione di un modello volto a prevedere il comportamento di un soggetto. Un fatto banale come quello di afferrare una penna e scrivere rivela, in realtà, qualcosa di complesso riguardo il nostro comportamento. Quando afferro una penna e inizio a scrivere lo faccio, banalmente, perché credo che un certo oggetto di fronte a me sia una penna e che svolga una determinata funzione che è, appunto, quella dello scrivere. Quando credo che l'oggetto che sta di fronte a me sia una penna, mi trovo nella relazione di "credere" con il contenuto proposizionale che di fronte a me c'è una penna. S&F_n. 4_2010 99 Buona parte dei teorici della proposizione, da Frege in poi, hanno dedicato i loro studi all'analisi di che tipo di entità siano gli atteggiamenti proposizionali. Jerry Fodor1 sostiene che, a oggi, l'adeguata predittività della psicologia del senso comune non possa essere messa in discussione e che gli atteggiamenti proposizionali rappresentino il modo più efficace per descrivere il nostro comportamento. Ciò che Fodor dice, però, è che gli atteggiamenti proposizionali funzionano, ma non come funzionano. Gran parte dei filosofi interessati alla questione si sono dedicati alla ricerca di una teoria che possa tener conto, coerentemente, sia di una semantica per gli atteggiamenti proposizionali, sia di ciò che queste entità sembrano causare nel comportamento di un individuo razionale. Nella teoria della proposizione sono due i principali paradigmi ad aver contribuito alla riflessione sugli atteggiamenti proposizionali. Uno è quello che inizia con Gottlob Frege, l'altro con Bertrand Russell. I difensori del paradigma fregeano affermano che oggetti e proprietà non possono essere costituenti dei contenuti proposizionali che hanno una natura puramente concettuale. In altri termini i filosofi afferenti al paradigma di Frege, anche se non tutti, escludono che si possano testare in modo rigoroso le condizioni di verità degli atteggiamenti proposizionali. Chi difende il paradigma russelliano sostiene invece che i contenuti proposizionali siano costituiti dagli oggetti e dalle proprietà su cui gli atteggiamenti proposizionali vertono. Lo scopo di quest'articolo non è quello di ricostruire – dettagliatamente – entrambi i paradigmi e neanche quello di ricostruirne uno ma, in un certo senso, il mio sarà un lavoro completamente parziale il cui obiettivo è quello di dimostrare come il paradigma russelliano risulti più proficuo non soltanto per rendere coerente una teoria semantica per gli atteggiamenti 1 J. Fodor, Psicosemantica (1987), tr. it. Il Mulino, Bologna 1990, p. 31. LINGUAGGI Leonardo Caffo, Prevedere il comportamento 100 proposizionali2, ma anche per predire il comportamento di un agente razionale, nonostante le continue critiche nella letteratura contemporanea3. Sul finire dell'articolo verrà abbozzata una proposta volta alla costruzione di un modello coerente per prevedere il comportamento di un agente razionale sulla base di una teoria referenzialista degli atteggiamenti proposizionali. 2. Il problema Immaginiamo un caso in cui una persona non sappia che Mark Twain è lo pseudonimo di Samuel Langhorne Clemens e consideriamo gli enunciati: (6) Salvo crede che Twain sia morto, (7) Salvo crede che Clemens sia morto; L'intuizione comune è che (6) è vero ma, se se Salvo non sa che Twain è Clemens, (7) è falso. Infatti, tenere conto di ciò che il parlante sa rispetto agli individui su cui sono orientate le sue credenze, sembrerebbe importante per discriminare credenze vere, o false, del parlante in questione. Il fregeanesimo, che dei modi di presentazione di nomi propri teneva conto, non considererebbe (6) e (7) uguali perché ciò che cerchiamo non è il riferimento ma la verità interna al sistema di credenze del parlante. Il russellianesimo, teoria spesso vista come poco intuitiva, vede (6) e (7) veri nelle stesse situazioni (uguali) in quanto hanno lo stesso contenuto semantico e, citando Richard, «ci dicono 2 Cfr. McKay, Thomas, Nelson, Michael, Propositional Attitude Reports, in E.N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), 2008. 3 Ibid. S&F_n. 4_2010 101 letteralmente e rigidamente la stessa cosa»4. Il riferimento dei nomi propri "Twain" e "Clemens" è infatti identico. Kripke, e nella stessa direzione si muove anche Richard, propone una strategia per andare incontro alle intuizioni comuni dei parlanti, vedendo enunciati come (6) e (7) diversi nelle loro implicazioni pragmatiche5 e non nel valore di verità. Questa idea è una sorta di estensione di altri casi come ad esempio6: (6') Tonto saltò sul suo cavallo e cavalcò verso l'orizzonte, (7') Tonto cavalcò fino all'orizzonte e saltò sul suo cavallo; Dal punto di vista semantico gli enunciati (6') e (7') ci stanno dicendo letteralmente la stessa cosa, la differenza sembrerebbe pragmatica e riguarda, a esempio, l'ordine degli eventi <saltare sul cavallo, cavalcare fino all'orizzonte>. I teorici del russellianesimo contemporaneo7 hanno proposto diversi modi di trattare le discrepanze pragmatiche degli enunciati che ho preso in considerazione. Quello che il russellianesimo sostiene è che (6') e (7') sono enunciati diversi che esprimono la stessa proposizione. La tesi di fondo che si vuole sostenere è: si può avere una credenza riguardo una proposizione in modi differenti. Ad esempio Leo potrebbe avere nel suo insieme di credenze che: (8) Twain è morto, 4 "Strictly and literally say". Cfr. M. Richard, Propositional Attutudes: an Essay on Thiughts and how we Asribe them, Cambrige University Press, Cambridge 1990, p. 119. 5 Per un'introduzione alla pragmatica si veda R. Stalnaker, Pragmatics, in «Synthese», 22: 272‐289, 1970. 6 M. Richard, op. cit., p. 120. 7 Si vedano in particolare D. Kaplan, Demostratives, in J. Almog, Themes from Kaplan, Oxford University Press, 1989 e N. Salmon, Frege's Puzzle, Mit Press, Cambridge (Mass), 1986. LINGUAGGI Leonardo Caffo, Prevedere il comportamento 102 senza però credere a, (9) Clemens è morto; Flavio potrebbe, al contrario di Leo, crede a (9) ma non credere a (8). In questo caso tanto Leo quanto Flavio credono alla proposizione russelliana: <la proprietà di essere morto, Twain> e i due mediano questa credenza in modi differenti. Ma «il russellianesimo individua le condizioni di verità di un'asserzione [riguardo agli atteggiamenti proposizionali] non nel come ma nel cosa»8. Questo non vuol dire sottovalutare il modo attraverso cui si esprime una credenza ma semplicemente concentrare la propria analisi semantica sull'oggetto su cui verte questa credenza9. Rimane il fatto che le credenze di un soggetto vengono in qualche modo ignorate a favore del contenuto semantico delle sue credenze. Proviamo a considerare un caso del genere. Chiunque abbia letto i fumetti di Superman (o visto i film di cui è protagonista) sa che Lois Lane crede sicuramente che Superman può volare ma che Clark Kent, suo collega di lavoro, non è certamente in grado di spiccare il volo. Sappiamo che Superman e Clark Kent sono la stessa persona anche se Lois Lane è all'oscuro di questo fatto; sulla scorta di questo breve preambolo proviamo a considerare il seguente enunciato: (b) Lois Lane crede che Superman può volare; 8 M. Richard, op. cit., p. 121. 9 Si noti come qui risieda uno dei punti fondamentali del confronto tra russelliani e fregeani. Mentre i fregeani contemporanei, come Forbes e McGinn, preferiscono concentrare l'analisi delle condizioni di verità sui modi di pensare qualcosa i russelliani, al contrario, concentrano la valutazione semantica sull'oggetto della credenza senza però trascurare i risvolti pragmatici dei diversi modi di esprimere una stessa proposizione. S&F_n. 4_2010 103 In una visione russelliana, la that‐clause crede che Superman può volare esprime la proposizione data dalla coppia ordinata <Superman, essere in grado di volare> costituita dal nome proprio "Superman" e dalla proprietà essere in grado di volare; considerando, sulla scia di Russell, i nomi propri come abbreviazioni di descrizioni definite, "Superman" e "Clark Kent" si riferiranno allo stesso individuo. In una visione referenzialista, nomi, dimostrativi e indicali che riferiscono alla stessa cosa, forniscono lo stesso contributo alla proposizione per cui, se (b) sarà vero, anche l'enunciato che segue, (c) Lois Lane crede che Clark Kent può volare, sarà vero! Questo sembra inaccettabile perché il contenuto cognitivo di Lois è in qualche modo violato. Se il russellianesimo vuole dare un resoconto pragmatico delle differenze di enunciati come (6) Salvo crede che Twain sia morto e (7) Salvo crede che Clemens sia morto, deve identificare chiaramente i principi pragmatici che rendono questi enunciati diversi da questo punto di vista. Paul Grice ha offerto una celebre teoria pragmatica delle implicature conversazionali10 ma, come fanno notare McKay e Nelson11, è quanto meno improbabile che la teoria di Grice aiuterà il russellianesimo in tal senso. Le informazioni sul modo in cui il credente crede in ciò che crede non possono, a quanto sembra, essere ottenute tramite un'implicatura conversazionale in quanto, tali informazioni, non sono deducibili dai partecipanti a una 10 H. P. Grice, Logic and conversation, in «Syntax and Semantics», 3: 41‐58. [Versione originale presentata per le William James lectures presso la Harvard University nel 1967], 1971; Id., Further notes on logic and conversation, in «Syntax and Semantics», 9: 113‐128, 1978; Id., Presupposition and conversational implicature, in P. Cole (ed.), Radical Pragmatics, Academic Press, New York 1981, pp. 183‐198. 11 Cfr. T. McKay e M. Nelson, Propositional Attitude Reports, in E. N. Zalta, op. cit. LINGUAGGI Leonardo Caffo, Prevedere il comportamento 104 conversazione. Sempre McKay e Nelson12 sostengono che, se è vero che un sostenitore del russellianesimo non potrà impiegare la teoria di Grice per rendere conto delle nostre intuizioni sulla differenza di enunciati come (6) e (7), questo non vuol dire, tuttavia, che non possano individuare degli ulteriori principi pragmatici a sostegno del russellianesimo. Quello di cui il russellianesimo ha bisogno è una nozione di implicatura pragmatica che non si basi, come accade in Grice, sulla calcolabilità e che non richieda il ruolo psicologico dei partecipanti alla conversazione. Inizierò, adesso, a presentare una proposta in tal senso. 3. Credenza e stati di credenza Due nozioni spesso confuse, quasi fossero un'unica nozione, sono la credenza e lo stato di credenza. Questo, secondo MckKay e Nelson13, capita perché la gente non riesce a distinguere le due nozioni e così l'uso degli atteggiamenti proposizionali diventa, erroneamente, bivalente: esprimere una relazione col contenuto delle credenze e diffondere informazioni sugli stati di credenza del soggetto della relazione. Non distinguere le informazioni veicolate da un atteggiamento proposizionale dal modo in cui un soggetto crede queste informazioni è un grave fraintendimento. Riconsideriamo, velocemente, il caso di Superman e la seguente relazione utilizzata in un paradigma russelliano. Relazione asimmetrica: Se i nomi sono davvero coestensionali (e dunque intersostituibili) e, se (1) è vero, (1) Lois Lane crede che Superman è più forte di Clark Kent, allora anche (2) e (3) saranno veri, 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. S&F_n. 4_2010 105 (2) Lois Lane crede che Superman è più forte di Superman, (3) Lois Lane crede che Clark Kent è più forte di Superman. Il russellianesimo sostiene che il senso comune che vede (2) e (3) come intuitivamente diversi da (1) si basa su un'incomprensione di origine pragmatica; (2) pone, tuttavia, un problema: Lois deve anche credere che Superman è più forte di se stesso, o possiamo isolare questa credenza dalle rivendicazioni precedenti? Alcuni detrattori del paradigma russelliano hanno argomentato rispondendo positivamente a questa domanda14, in quanto, il secondo termine "Superman" sarebbe sostituibile, sempre per i detrattori del russellianesimo, con "se stesso"; attribuire questa credenza a Lois sulla base di alcune considerazioni pragmatiche sembrerebbe, però, inaccettabile. Quest'ultima questione è discussa da Salmon15 che lavora entro un paradigma russelliano e sostiene che credere che Superman sia più forte di Superman è distinto da credere che Superman sia più forte di se stesso perché la proposizione che "Superman è più forte di Superman" è diversa dalla proposizione che "Superman è più forte di se stesso", in quanto una proposizione ha una struttura diversa rispetto all'altra; la prima è una relazione a due posti <Superman, Superman>, la seconda è una relazione a un posto. L'argomento di Salmon è una risposta ad alcuni tentativi fregeani16 di minare il russellianesimo dalle fondamenta portando all'esasperazione alcune implicazioni anti‐intuitive di questa teoria. 14 Si veda, ad esempio, Problems for the Naive Russellian theory, in McKay e Nelson, op. cit. 15 N. Salmon, Reflections on reflexivity, in «Linguistics and Philosophy», 15: 53‐63, 1992. 16 T. McKay, Representing de rebeliefs, in «Linguistics and Philosophy», 14: 711‐739, 1991. LINGUAGGI Leonardo Caffo, Prevedere il comportamento 106 Sulla scia di questi problemi per il russellianesimo sorgono ulteriori questioni connesse, ad esempio, ad argomentazioni pertinenti con il comportamento razionale di un individuo. Considerando l'enunciato: (4) Lois crede che Superman è forte, il russelliano sosterrà che se (4) è vero allora anche, (5) Lois crede che Clark Kent è forte, è vero. Sembrerebbe però che (4) predica dei comportamenti molto diversi da (5). Accettare questi due enunciati come veri – negli stessi identici casi – potrebbe rendere lecito attendersi che, quando Lois, ad esempio, è indaffarata a spostare scatoloni pesanti nel suo ufficio, se vede Clark Kent in piedi pur non sapendo che è Superman dovrebbe chiedergli aiuto. Questa, naturalmente, è una predizione scorretta. Lois, probabilmente, non farebbe nulla del genere. Certo, entro il paradigma russelliano un enunciato come (4) è vero esattamente alle stesse condizioni in cui (5) è vero. Si potrebbe pensare, è il focus di un'obiezione perspicua discussa, ad esempio, da Richard17, che è difficile sostenere una teoria che vede identici enunciati che hanno così diverse potenzialità predittive. Quest'obiezione è, in parte, un corollario del problema sulle implicazioni pragmatiche. Se stipuliamo che la differenza di enunciati come (4) e (5) non risieda nel valore di verità ma nei risvolti pratici sul modo che, per esempio, Lois ha di pensare 17 Cfr. M. Richard, Propositional Attutudes, in Bob Hale e Crispin Wright (ed.), A companion to the philosophy of language, Wiley‐Blackwell, London 1999. S&F_n. 4_2010 107 certe cose, dovremmo stipulare anche dei principi tali per cui (4) e (5) possono predire delle situazioni diverse. Richard è tuttavia convinto, credo ragionevolmente, che pretendere da una teoria semantica un criterio corretto per predire il comportamento di un soggetto sia sbagliato e che, in questo modo, stiamo mischiando ambiti diversi18 a beneficio di un'obiezione che fonda le sue premesse su delle discrepanze di comportamento di un soggetto. Cosa che, tuttavia, sembrerebbe irrilevante per una teoria semantica. Ma se volessimo individuare un modello di predizione corretto del comportamento sulla base di una teoria degli atteggiamenti proposizionali? 4. La mia proposta Recentemente Richard ha ridiscusso, sulla scorta di un lavoro di Soames19, questo problema soffermandosi sulla nozione di realizzazione20. Possiamo, sulla scorta di quanto dice Richard, riconsiderare i casi precedenti come, (4) Lois crede che Superman è forte, e (5) Lois crede che Clark Kent è forte, aggiungendo un nuovo enunciato, (6) Lois non realizza che Superman è Clark Kent. 18 Ibid, p. 208. 19 S. Soames, Beyond Rigidity: The Unfinished Semantic Agenda of Naming and Necessity, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2002. 20 M. Richard, Propositional Attitude Ascription, in Michael Devitt and Richard Hanley (ed.), The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of Language, Blackwell, Oxford 2006. LINGUAGGI Leonardo Caffo, Prevedere il comportamento 108 Questa strategia, ovvero aggiungere (6) a un presunto modello volto a isolare dei principi predittivi del comportamento suggeriti da (4) e (5), è una strategia non definitiva e tutt'ora discussa in letteratura, ma credo potrebbe essere un ottimo punto di partenza per rendere conto delle obiezioni che ho discusso al paradigma russelliano. Se davvero vogliamo ottenere da una teoria semantica dei principi teorici in grado di prevedere le diverse situazioni che, intuitivamente, sono implicate da enunciati come (4) e (5), tentare di inserire nel nostro modello enunciati come (6) sembrerebbe chiarire alcune situazioni come quella che ho descritto prima riguardo gli scatoloni pesanti nell'ufficio di Lois. Credo sia normale non aspettarsi da Lois, se non ha realizzato l'identità di Superman con Clark, che chieda aiuto al collega per spostare gli scatoli. Ma, immaginando che Lois realizzi che Superman è Clark Kent, a quel punto i fatti cambierebbero radicalmente e probabilmente la situazione che vedeva Lois chiedere aiuto a Clark sembrerebbe tutt'altro che paradossale. La mia proposta – per rispondere alle obiezioni che vertono sull'inadeguatezza predittiva del russellianesimo – è vedere questa teoria come predittiva di come le situazioni dovrebbero essere se il soggetto dell'azione descritta avesse realizzato l'identità tra gli individui che costituiscono il contenuto delle sue credenze. Il modello, che qui voglio semplicemente abbozzare per ricerche future, risulterebbe perfettamente coerente per prevedere delle situazioni in cui agiscono degli agenti razionali ideali, in grado di esaurire tutti i diversi modi di presentazione di oggetti, individui, proprietà e relazioni su cui vertono le loro credenze. Aggiungendo enunciati come (6) che esplicitano la non realizzazione dell'identità tra Superman è Clark possiamo aggirare S&F_n. 4_2010 109 predizioni scorrette rispetto agli stati di cose attuali che, tuttavia, sarebbero corrette se la realizzazione fosse avvenuta. Un modello del genere andrebbe costruito isolando tutte le variabili di un termine aventi lo stesso riferimento, aggiungendo la nozione di realizzazione come legame tra queste variabili. Possiamo ipotizzare, credo con ragione, che un soggetto di credenza persuaso a realizzare l'identità tra termini aventi una stessa estensione si comporterebbe, esattamente, entro i parametri imposti da un modello pragmatico di derivazione referenzialista. LEONARDO CAFFO è direttore della «Rivista Italiana di Filosofia Analitica» e svolge attività di ricerca presso l'Università degli Studi di Milano

CHAPITRE VI REPRÉSENTATION, COLORATION ET ÉCLAIRAGE DANS LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE Was sonst noch den Inhalt des Satzes ausmacht, nenne ich die Färbung des Gedankens 1. Frege traite la coloration et l'éclairage toujours en second lieu, à la marge de ses grands textes. Mais il les traite dans tous ses grands textes sur le langage et on les retrouve aussi dans un grand nombre de textes secondaires. Leurs noms se multiplient, mais si on sait les reconnaître, on peut dégager un noyau de propriétés que Frege leur accorde ou – très souvent – ne leur accorde pas. Dans ce travail, nous allons essayer d'y voir plus claire sur la fonction et le fonctionnement de ces concepts pour aboutir à une présentation aussi systématique que leur traitement chez Frege et son intérêt décroissant pour ces concepts le permet. La plupart des interprètes n'accordent qu'une toute petite place à l'explication des concepts de coloration et d'éclairage 2 ou les passent entièrement sous silence. Le parfum poétique 3 et l'air ou Stimmung, concepts similaires, sont encore moins souvent mentionné. Dans notre travail, nous essaierons de distinguer ces concepts, de dégager leur fonction 1. Frege, Nachgelassene Schriften, Meiner Verlag, Hamburg, 1969 (par la suite : NS), 214. 2. Frege dispose au moins de trois expressions qui désignent le phénomène de coloration. Si nous allons favoriser l'expression coloration dans notre travail, c'est principalement pour simplifier. 3. Pour citer, nous utilisons indistinctement des guillemets et la mise en italiques. Nous n'utilisons ni l'un ni l'autre lorsque un terme sert de traduction entre parenthèse. 148 CHAPITRE VI et de montrer leur importance particulière pour la philosophie du langage de Gottlob Frege. Au contraire de la plupart des interprètes, il nous semble que coloration et éclairage ne sont pas synonymes chez Frege : on peut distinguer le concept de coloration de celui d'éclairage et – dans la plupart des cas – déterminer si il s'agit de coloration ou d'éclairage du sens d'un mot ou d'une phrase. A partir d'une relecture très proche des textes de Frege, nous allons montrer pourquoi plusieurs critiques antérieures de ces concepts ne sont pas pertinentes et proposer une nouvelle discussion basé sur des exemples. Cela nous mènera à une exposition des difficultés qui persistent. Frege indique que la traduction de mots dotés de coloration et d'expressions qui donnent un éclairage est extrêmement difficile. Moins un texte en comporte plus il sera scientifique et moins sa traduction pose de problème. Par conséquent, nos réflexions partiront du terme allemand. L'Allemand faisant foi, les traductions figurent uniquement pour faciliter la compréhension des réflexions pour un public francophone. Concernant la coloration, Frege a probablement plus recours à des intuitions linguistiques que pour tout autre concept. Par conséquent, nos réponses s'appuient sur nos intuitions quand nécessaire. Pour les soutenir, nous avons eu recours au Duden – Deutsches Universalwörterbuch 1. Ce n'est qu'à condition que nos intuitions linguistiques sur un mot coïncident avec les explications de la Dudenredaktion que nous les avons défendues. STIMMUNG, COLORATION, ÉCLAIRAGE, PARFUM POÉTIQUE, AIR – MÉTAPHORES MULTIPLES Frege lui-même multiplie les expressions qui désignent ce que les interprètes traitent communément sous nom d'éclairage ou de coloration. Dans le texte « Zusammenfassung meiner logischen Lehren » qui date probablement de 1906, Frege introduit l'expression « parfum poétique » (poetischer Duft) pour ensuite passer au terme "coloration" qu'il utilise dans beaucoup d'autres textes. Le parfum poétique, affirme-t-il, ne fait pas partie de ce que nous jugeons vrai ou faux dans une proposition, c'està-dire la pensée. La logique n'a par conséquent pas à s'en occuper 2. 1. Wissenschaftlichen Rat der Dudenredaktion : Duden. Deutsches UniversalWörterbuch, Bibliographisches Institut & F. A. Brockhaus AG, Mannheim, 2003. 2. Voir NS, 213/214 ; Traduction française (par la suite : Fr.) : Écrits Posthumes, traduit sous la direction de Ph. de Rouilhan et de Cl. Tiercelin, Paris, Éditions Jacqueline Chambon, 1994 (par la suite : EP), 235/236. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 149 On remarquera que la métaphore « parfum poétique » est assez étrange, pour ne pas dire déplaisante. Normalement "Duft" (parfum) désigne une odeur agréable, certes, mais en combinaison avec le qualificatif "poetisch" (poétique) et au sein d'un texte d'une tonalité scientifique, on ne peut guère s'empêcher de le percevoir comme péjoratif. Il est intéressant de voir que "Duft" porte lui-même une coloration ou un parfum : le terme non-coloré correspondant – Frege parlerait d'« expression normale » – aurait été "Geruch" (odeur). Si on sait que Frege considère qu'un texte scientifique doit autant que possible se passer de coloration et éclairage, il est clair que l'usage que Frege fait du mot "parfum" ici, est polémique. Comme "éclairage", "parfum" fait penser à quelque chose d'éphémère. Et c'est bien ce que Frege affirme par la suite. Ce n'est que ce qui fait le contenu d'une proposition en plus d'une valeur de vérité et d'une pensée. Dans « Der Gedanke », Frege parle aussi de Stimmung et Luft (air). La métaphore air souligne de même l'éphémère du phénomène qui gêne l'analyse logique. Le terme Stimmung a ceci d'intéressant qu'il a deux significations : état d'âme 1 et ambiance. C'est donc d'un côté quelque chose de subjectif, une sorte de fond émotionnel. Mais c'est de l'autre quelque chose d'extérieur que des sujets distincts peuvent en principe percevoir, même si on ne dirait peut-être pas que l'ambiance est objectivement de telle ou telle sorte. Ainsi le terme Stimmung reflète une difficulté principale de la catégorie en question : la coloration ou l'éclairage interviennent de manière durable sur le sens d'une proposition qui est objectif, mais ne sont pas objectifs eux-mêmes. Ils sont essentiels pour agir sur les représentations d'un sujet qui sont subjectives, mais restent sans influence déterminée : chacun doit se les ajouter lui-même 2. Cette difficulté continuera à nous occuper. 1. « Der Gedanke », Beiträge zur Philosophie des deutschen Idealismus 2, 1918-1919 (par la suite : Gedanke), 63. Ailleurs dans le même texte, Frege l'utilise dans le premier sens : « Das soll nicht selten auf das Gefühl, die Stimmung des Hörers wirken » ; Fr. Frege, Écrits logiques et philosophiques, Paris, Seuil, 1971 (par la suite : ELP), 176 : « Bien souvent, il doit agir sur le sentiment, l'état d'âme de l'auditeur. » 2. Voir Fr. : ELP, 177. Claude Imbert traduit Stimmung par tonalité, Luft par parfum. La traduction tonalité est appauvrissante. Il est probablement impossible de conserver l'ambivalence de Stimmung (intérieur/extérieur) par une expression en Français. Mais en plus, la traduction assimile entièrement les termes Duft (parfum) et Luft (air) et réduit ainsi le grand nombre des termes variés. Cela peut faciliter la compréhension, mais ne rend pas tout à fait compte des textes originaux de Frege qui frappent surtout par la grande variété d'expression. Il semblerait en outre que cette traduction donne un contre-exemple pour l'idée qu'une traduction vise à conserver le sens au détriment de la coloration ou de l'éclairage. « Parfum » et « air » n'ont nullement le même sens, mais ils sont très proches dans leur coloration. Les deux mettent en avant l'éphémère. Au contraire de Frege, il nous semble que les traductions favorisent souvent la stabilité de l'éclairage au détriment de celle du sens. 150 CHAPITRE VI Mais revenons aux termes Färbung (coloration) et Beleuchtung (éclairage). Frege les utilise fréquemment. On remarquera que ces deux métaphores sont bien distinctes : « avoir une couleur », « être coloré » est une propriété intrinsèque, « être éclairé » indique une propriété relationnelle et, nous l'avons déjà dit, plus éphémère. Un éclairage peut donner l'impression d'une coloration (comme lorsqu'en été, on éclaire les statues de la Cathédrale d'Amiens pour – pendant une heure – leur rendre leurs couleurs d'origine). Mais l'objet éclairé n'en est pas modifié de manière durable. En indiquant une propriété éphémère, le terme éclairage ressemble à parfum (comme opposé à coloration). Beaucoup d'interprètes de Frege n'utilisent que le terme coloration ou un terme d'art comme tone (Dummett) pour parler des phénomènes que Frege désigne par des expressions aussi diverses. Pourtant, les termes choisis par Frege sont très spécifiques et la différence du champ sémantique des différentes métaphores est plus qu'accessoire. A QUEL NIVEAU LA COLORATION INTERVIENT-T-ELLE ? Dans son fameux texte « Über Sinn und Bedeutung » (1892) Frege écrit : « On pourra aussi tolérer les différences qui tiennent à la couleur et à la lumière que la poésie et l'éloquence s'efforcent de donner au sens. » 1 C'est donc sur le sens que la coloration et l'éclairage interviennent. Mais de quelle manière ? Dans « Kurze Übersicht meiner logischen Lehren » en 1906, Frege note : On extraira ainsi du contenu d'une phrase une partie qui seule peut être reconnue comme vraie ou rejetée comme fausse. C'est cela que j'appelle la pensée exprimée par la phrase. [...] C'est seulement avec cette partie du contenu que la logique a affaire. Ce qui, en plus de cela, contribue au contenu d'une phrase, je l'appelle la coloration de la pensée 2. Ici, il n'est pas clair si la coloration est indissociablement attaché au sens ou si Frege la conçoit comme un élément du contenu à part qui doit sa visibilité à une intervention sur le sens, mais qui peut en être indépendante. Pour illustrer cette idée prenons l'exemple de "hélas". Ce mot n'a pas de sens selon Frege. Pourtant il peut éclairer des phrases d'une « lumière particulière ». Ainsi on pourrait dire que son éclairage n'est que potentiel et 1. , ELP, 107 ; « Über Sinn und Bedeutung », Funktion, Begriff, Bedeutung, Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, Göttingen, 1975 (par la suite : SB), 44. 2. Fr. : EP, 236 ; NS, 213/214. On remarquera que Frege fait lui-même l'économie de l'« éclairage » ici. C'est probablement le signe de son intérêt décroissant pour les différences qu'il peut y a voir au sein du phénomène en question. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 151 s'active au moment où il y a un sens sur lequel il peut agir. Il diffère donc de "Köter" (cabot) qui a un sens, le sens de "chien". Par conséquent, on peut probablement dire que la coloration y est active dans le mot isolé aussi. La coloration du sens de ce mot conceptuel s'étendrait sur le sens d'une phrase lorsque le mot est mis en contexte. Il y a visiblement une certaine tension entre l'affirmation que la coloration et l'éclairage interviennent au niveau du sens et l'idée que celui-ci reste le même. Plus bas, nous nous reposons ce problème. REPRÉSENTATIONS ET COLORATION/ÉCLAIRAGE Dans le texte « Über Sinn und Bedeutung », le terme coloration intervient après la distinction de sens (Sinn), référence (Bedeutung) et représentation (Vorstellung). La frontière que Frege trace entre sens/référence d'un et représentation de l'autre côté est particulièrement nette. Les deux premiers sont objectifs, la représentation est subjective et varie d'une personne à l'autre. Lorsque Frege dit qu'il est impossible que deux personnes aient la même représentation, alors que deux personnes peuvent bel et bien concevoir le même sens, saisir la même pensée, il n'est pas tout à fait clair s'il parle d'une simple « différence numérique » 1 ou si c'est « das Problem des Fremdpsychischen » (le problème de l'accès à autrui) qui le préoccupe. Frege était très sensible à la privauté des représentations. Il dit qu'un accès extérieur à la représentation d'une autre personne montrerait qu'elle est bien distincte pour la personne extérieure : « Ainsi pourrait-on [peut-être] montrer qu'une représentation peut elle-même être prise pour objet [...] ; toutefois elle n'est [en tant que telle] pas pour l'observateur ce qu'elle est immédiatement pour le sujet » 2. Il pourrait surprendre que Frege se pose de telles questions si on connaît son scepticisme concernant toute sorte de "psychologisation", mais si Frege ne fait que quelques petits pas sur le terrain de la représentation pour aussitôt l'abandonner, il en dit assez pour faire penser 1. Voir SB, 44 ; Fr. ELP, 106. 2. ELP, 107 ; SB, 45 : « Hiermit wäre vielleicht zu zeigen, wie eine Vorstellung zwar selbst zum Gegenstande genommen werden kann, als solche aber doch dem Betrachter nicht das ist, was sie unmittelbar dem Vorstellenden ist. ». Nous avons légèrement modifié la traduction de Claude Imbert qui place « en tant que telle » dans la première partie de la phrase, alors que sa place est dans la deuxième et qui enlève le « peut-être » ce qui rend la phrase affirmative alors que, pour des raisons évidentes, elle n'est qu'hypothétique chez Frege. Voir aussi : NS, 151 ; Fr. EP, 164. Comme dans SB Frege s'y imagine de disposer d'un écran de projections pour extérioriser et comparer des représentations. Celui-ci montrerait des différences essentielles. 152 CHAPITRE VI que selon lui la structure de l'esprit humain empêche que deux personnes aient la même représentation 1. Si deux personnes ne peuvent pas avoir la même représentation, on peut encore se demander si deux personnes peuvent avoir le même type de représentation. La réponse de Frege n'est pas claire : il accepte simplement « quelque affinité entre les représentations humaines » 2. Frege ne dit rien sur la manière dont cette affinité est réalisé. La récurrence d'un type de représentations comme certains interprètes le proposent, est une possibilité 3. Frege affirme que, malgré une affinité dans la manière de former des représentations, une seule expression entendu par de différentes personnes au même moment peut donner lieu à des représentations très distinctes 4. Plus tard, Frege spécifie que la représentation peut également varier pour une même personne à différents moments : « Bien des choses, en ce domaine, dépendent du contexte. On comparera, par exemple, les phrases « Avec quelle joie il monte son fringant cheval » et « Je viens de voir un cheval tomber sur l'asphalte mouillé » 5. C'est en outre le contexte qui détermine la représentation d'un sujet lorsqu'il entend un mot. Il n'est pas clair si Frege parle uniquement du contexte d'une proposition dans lequel est insérée une expression ou (aussi) de l'environnement non-verbal d'une proposition. Son exemple n'inclut pas de description du contexte nonverbal hormis la description dans les exemples de phrases eux-mêmes, mais il nous semble qu'il faut également admettre que la situation concrète joue un rôle pour la formation des représentations. Ce qui est sûr est que le contexte d'une proposition détermine non seulement le sens d'un mot (comme Frege le défend en avant-garde 6). Il détermine également la représentation liée à celui-ci qui se fait de manière peu spécifique à travers certaines sensation sonores ou autres. Au fond, cela n'est pas étonnant car le sens d'un mot donne une "Anregung", une indication, pour la formation d'une représentation. Or, si le sens d'un mot est déterminé par le contexte 1. Voir aussi Frege, Gottlob : Grundlagen der Arithmetik, Reclam Verlag, Stuttgart, 1997 (par la suite : GA), 23 (Original : X) ; Fr. : Les Fondements de l'arithmétique, Paris, Seuil, 1969 (par la suite FA), 122. 2. ELP, 107. La traduction est imprécise. Frege parle de « Verwandtschaft des menschlichen Vorstellens » (SB, 45). Il s'agit plus d'affinités de la manière de se représenter plus que d'affinités entre des représentations concrètes. 3. Stuhlmann-Laisz, Rainer : Gottlob Freges « Logische Untersuchungen », Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1995, 72. 4. Voir SB, 44 ; Fr. : ELP, 107. 5. EP, 164 ; NS, 151. 6. Voir GA, 23 (Original : X), : « Nach der Bedeutung der Wörter muss im Satzzusammenhange, nicht in ihrer Vereinzelung gefragt werden » (Le texte fut écrit avant la distinction entre Sinn et Bedeutung. On peut supposer que plus tard Frege aurait parlé de « Sinn » au lieu de « Bedeutung ») Fr. : FA, 122. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 153 d'une proposition, la représentation en est également influencé à travers ce sens. Frege spécifie que « la langue est peu appropriée pour susciter [hervorrufen] chez l'auditeur des représentations à volonté [beliebig] exactement comme on le souhaite » 1. Il nous paraît que Michael Dummett ne rend pas clairement compte de cela lorsqu'il écrit « [Frege] accounts for tone [Färbung] as a matter of the association with a word or expression of certain 'ideas' (Vorstellungen) » 2. L'"association" chez Dummett est si forte que la coloration en est entièrement déterminé. C'est bien plus que ce que Frege accorde réellement. De plus, une définition de la coloration purement en termes de représentation est trop restreinte. Par la suite, Dummett reproche à Frege de dire que la coloration est subjective tout en parlant d'une différence de sens. Pour lui, il s'agit d'une contradiction. Plus précisément, Dummett part d'une réduction de toute différence de coloration/éclairage à une différence de représentation. Sachant que les représentations sont subjectives, la coloration serait alors dépendante de quelque chose de subjectif. Et puisque la coloration ("tone" chez Dummett) intervient au niveau du sens, le sens serait selon Dummett subjectif. Il conclut en disant que c'est une « simple contradiction » 3. Mais ce raisonnement pose problème à plusieurs endroits. D'abord la différence de coloration n'est pas une différence de sens, même si c'est au niveau du sens qu'intervient la coloration. Ensuite, il est faux de dire que « Frege [...] accounts for tone as a matter of the association with a word or expression of certain 'ideas' (Vorstellungen) » 4. La coloration n'est pas uniquement expliqué en termes d'association de certaines représentations avec certaines représentations. Et si on parle en termes d'association, on ne doit pas oublier que cette association n'est ni forte ni spécifique. Il nous semble qu'une critique de Frege sur la question de coloration et éclairage doit plutôt passer par des exemples concrets. Si à partir d'une telle critique, les différences de coloration apparentes s'avèrent être des différences de sens, Frege s'est trompé sur la gravité de certaines différences. Cependant, il serait loin de s'être contredit. Rainer Stuhlmann-Laeisz propose deux manières apparemment exclusives de comprendre la coloration. D'abord, il prend la « Verwandtschaft des Vorstellens » (l'affinité de la manière de se représenter) de deux personnes comme prémisse. Si alors 1. EP, 163 ; NS, 151 (légèrement modifié). J. Dubucs traduit : « ...à volonté avec la précision souhaitée ». L'Allemand fait penser que le souhait concerne la représentation qu'on veut susciter et non pas sa précision. 2. M. Dummett, Frege. Philosophy of language, London, Duckworth, 1973, 85. 3. Ibid. 4. ibid. 154 CHAPITRE VI deux propositions sont égales au niveau de la pensée et que pourtant, il y existent des différences de représentation pour de différentes personnes face à ces phrases, cela montre que les deux propositions diffèrent au niveau de la coloration. Dans un deuxième temps, il prend comme prémisse que la représentation de deux personnes n'est pas "verwandt", n'a pas d'affinité. Dans ce cas, leurs représentations varient, selon lui, indépendamment des phrases qu'ils entendent. Ils peuvent donc entendre une même phrase et avoir des représentations distinctes 1. Le problème de cette présentation est que les inférences de Stuhlmann-Laeisz ne sont possibles qu'à condition de penser le lien entre proposition et représentation comme déterminant de manière unique. Pourtant – comme nous l'avons indiqué – Frege affirme à plusieurs reprises que cette détermination n'est pas précise et qu'elle reste très limitée. Si Dummett et Stuhlmann-Laeisz rendent le lien entre coloration/ éclairage et représentation trop fort, Benmakhlouf a plutôt tendance à le rendre trop faible. Ainsi il écrit : « Une pensée reçoit sa coloration de la représentation qui lui est associée et cette coloration apparaît dans la différence que remarque tel locuteur et non tel autre dans l'expression d'une pensée » 2. Or, Frege n'est pas tellement individualiste concernant la coloration et l'éclairage. Il ne faut pas oublier que la coloration et l'éclairage font partie du contenu d'une proposition 3. Le fait que leur influence soit changeante, ne signifie pas qu'une personne remarque une différence et l'autre pas du tout. En fait, la capacité à reconnaître des différences comme celle entre chien et cabot est largement partagée. Comme nous allons essayer de montrer, elle est si bien partagée qu'il est difficile de ne pas l'admettre comme différence de sens. Il est clair qu'une proposition sans coloration peut influer une représentation (nous n'avons qu'a nous souvenir des deux phrases contenant "cheval"). Mais est-ce qu'une expression sans sens peut l'influer ? Une lettre à Edmund Husserl du 24 mai 1891 fait penser que Frege n'était pas toujours conscient de cette possibilité : « Pour l'usage poétique, il suffit que tout ait un sens. Pour l'usage scientifique, il faut aussi que les références ne fassent pas défaut. » 4 Dans SB déjà Frege conçoit qu'une expression 1. Voir R. Stuhlmann-Laisz, op. cit., 72/73. 2. A. Benmakhlouf, Frege le nécessaire et le superflu, Vrin, Paris, 2002, 149. 3. Voir NS, 214 ; Fr. EP, 236. 4. Frege, Husserl, Correspondance, Mauvezin, Éditions T.E.R. (Par la suite : Corresp.) ; version intégrale : 1987 Frege (éd. Gabriel, Gottfried) : Wissenschaftlicher Briefwechsel, Meiner Verlag Hamburg, (par la suite : Briefe), 1976, 96 : « Für den dichterischen Gebrauch genügt es, dass Alles einen Sinn habe, für den wissenschaftlichen dürfen auch die Bedeutungen nicht fehlen ». Évidemment, le fait qu'une chose soit suffisante n'implique pas LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 155 comme « bien que » qui n'a – selon lui – pas de sens peut donner un certain éclairage. Et puisqu'on sait que l'éclairage agit sur la représentation, la possibilité d'agir sur les représentations par une expression sans sens semble impliqué 1. C'est dans "Logik", écrit six ans plus tard, que Frege accorde clairement la possibilité d'influer les représentations par une expression sans sens. Même une onomatopée suffit 2. Et puisque Frege soutient que la poésie fonctionne essentiellement par cette « Verwandtschaft des menschlichen Vorstellens » (affinité de la manière de se représenter), il paraît que cette théorie peut rendre compte du fonctionnement d'un type de poésie devenu important au XX e siècle : poésie qui tâche d'évacuer tout sens pour travailler avec un certain pouvoir évocateur des mots. Wittgenstein écrit : « Es ist so wenig für das Verständnis eines Satzes wesentlich, dass man sich bei ihm etwas vorstelle, als dass man nach ihm eine Zeichnung entwerfe. » 3 Pour Wittgenstein, la représentation (Vorstellung) ne joue aucun rôle dans la compréhension d'une proposition. On peut se demander si Frege est tout aussi certain de cela que Wittgenstein. Lorsqu'il compare fameusement la Lune à la référence, l'image dans un télescope au sens et l'image rétinienne à la représentation, cela incite plutôt à penser le contraire : car l'image rétinienne est essentielle pour voir la lune. Mais peut-être que l'on ne doit pas perdre de vue que cette comparaison sert surtout à illustrer le degré de partage qui est possible pour chacun des trois niveaux. Sans pousser plus loin l'analyse de cette métaphore, on peut se demander si l'association entre représentation et sens ne marche pas dans les deux directions : le sens d'une expression induirait une représentation qui serait nécessaire pour la compréhension du sens. Il est intéressant que malgré toute critique de la psychologisation, Frege ne paraît pas exclure cette possibilité. Ce serait là une association et un entrelacement assez complexe entre sens et représentation, mais qui nous paraît largement envisageable 4. Si Frege était convaincu que la capacité de former des représentations ne joue aucun rôle pour la faculté linguistique, il serait étonnant qu'il ne se demande pas ce qui se passerait lorsqu'on enlève toujours qu'elle est indispensable. Mais la deuxième partie de la proposition incite à une lecture forte du « es genügt » (il suffit) dans la première partie : Le sens est le seuil à franchir pour un effet quelconque. La référence est l'idéal. 1. Voir SB, 59/60 ; Fr. : RLP, 121. 2. NS, 151 ; Fr. EP, 164. 3. Wittgenstein, Philosophische Untersuchungen, § 396 : « Il importe aussi peu pour la compréhension d'une phrase que l'on s'imagine quelque chose que de faire un dessin d'après elle. ». 4. Toutefois des mots abstraits comme « vérité » poseraient problème si on croyait que la représentation est une clef indispensable pour l'accès au sens. 156 CHAPITRE VI la représentation de la chaîne référence – sens – représentation. S'il paraît envisageable dans la théorie de Frege de répondre non à la question « Est-ce que sans une représentation, on peut accéder à un sens quelconque ? », c'est parce que la nécessité d'une représentation n'impliquerait nullement que le sens deviendrait subjectif. Chacun pourrait, à l'aide d'une représentation personnelle, accéder à un sens objectif et commun. En ce qui concerne l'influence du sens sur la représentation, il est important de voir qu'elle ne doit pas forcement être précise pour que le sens puisse jouer un rôle essentiel pour induire des représentations : Qui voudrait s'essayer à susciter précisément par des mots l'image d'Apollon dans l'esprit d'un autre, comme on peut le faire sans difficulté par la vue d'une oeuvre d'art ? Mais on dira que le poète peint. Et, de fait, il est indéniable que le mot entendu agit lui-même sur la conscience [Vorstellung] en tant qu'il est un complexe de sensations sonores 1. Mais le poète ne peint pas lui même. Il incite l'auditeur à peindre d'après ses indications (Winke). Et pour lui aider, il dispose de mots variés qui ne modifient pas la pensée mais donnent des indications distinctes pour la création d'une représentation 2 : Si plusieurs artistes illustrent, indépendamment les uns des autres, le même poème, ils divergeront considérablement dans leur présentation de la chose. Le poète ne peint donc pas à proprement parler, mais ne fait que suggérer la peinture et donner des indications pour elle, en laissant l'exécution à l'auditeur. Et c'est pour ces indications qu'il est précieux au poète d'avoir différents mots à sa disposition, qui pourraient être substitués les uns aux autres sans changer la pensée, mais qui peuvent agir de différentes manières sur les représentations et les sentiments de l'auditeur. Que l'on pense, par exemple, aux mots « marcher » [gehen], "déambuler" [schreiten] et "cheminer" [wandeln] 3. Retenons encore ici que les mots colorants/éclairants permettent au poète d'agir non seulement sur les représentations, mais aussi sur les sentiments d'un auditeur. Frege part de l'exemple d'un peintre qui doit illustrer une histoire pour – sans réelle transition – parler de la position dans laquelle se trouve tout 1. EP, 164 (traduction légèrement modifiée) ; NS, 151 : « Wer wollte es wagen, das Bild eines Apollo durch Worte in der Seele eines Anderen genauso entstehen zu lassen, wie es durch die Anschauung eines Kunstwerkes ohne Schwierigkeit erzeugt wird. Aber doch sagt man, dass der Dichter male. Und in der Tat ist es nicht zu leugnen, dass das gehörte Wort in die Vorstellung eingreift, schon dadurch, dass es selber als Ganzes von Gehörempfindungen ins Bewusstsein tritt. » 2. Voir Ibid. 3. EP, 164/165 ; NS, 151/152. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 157 auditeur. Cela indique un trait important de la théorie de Frege : la représentation est une image mentale. Dans « Sens et Dénotation » il écrit : Si un signe dénote un objet perceptible au moyen des sens, ma représentation est un tableau intérieur, formé du souvenir des impressions sensibles et des actions externes ou internes auxquelles je me suis livré. Dans ce tableau, les sentiments pénètrent les représentations 1. L'idée des représentations comme images intérieures (innere Bilder) revient à plusieurs reprises 2. Comme nous l'avons indiqué, Frege s'imagine en outre de projeter sur un écran des représentations qui accompagnent le terme "cheval" pour de différentes personnes : Si différents individus étaient capables, disons, de projeter immédiatement sur un écran les représentations suscitées en eux à l'audition du mot « cheval », alors nous serions confrontés à des images très différentes les unes des autres 3. Théoriquement, l'image mentale pourrait donc être transformée en image matérielle sans que l'on perde ce qui est essentiel pour voir la différence de deux représentations. Les chevaux qu'on verrait apparaître auraient des couleurs distinctes, se montreraient sous des angles distincts etc. tout autant que si dès le début nous avions eu affaire à des images matérielles. Dans les Investigations Philosophiques, Wittgenstein, loin de se contenter de cette description, réfléchit longuement sur la différence possible entre représentation mentale et dessin correspondant 4. Dans le paragraphe 301, il écrit : « Une représentation n'est pas une image, mais une image peut lui correspondre. » Dans Les remarques philosophiques cette idée se trouve encore plus explicitement formulée : Ce qu'est une image, nous le savons, mais les représentations, bien sûr, ne sont pas du tout des images. Car je puis en d'autres circonstances voir l'image et l'objet dont elle est l'image. ; mais ici il en va manifestement tout autrement. Nous venons d'utiliser une métaphore et voilà que cette métaphore nous tyrannise 5. Pour Ludwig Wittgenstein, « image intérieure » n'est qu'une métaphore trompeuse. Pour Frege c'est une description. 1. ELP, 105 ; SB, 43. 2. Voir aussi GA, 19 (Original : VI) ; Fr. FA, 119 : Frege passe directement de « représentation » à « images intérieures ». 3. Ibid., p. 151, 164. 4. Voir Wittgenstein, Investigations philosophiques, in Tractatus logico-philosophicus suivi de Investigations philosophiques, Paris, Gallimard, 1961, § 364-405. 5. Wittgenstein, Remarques philosophiques, Paris, Gallimard, 1975, V, 49. 158 CHAPITRE VI Pour conclure cette partie, on peut dire que la coloration et l'éclairage sont des moyens privilégiés pour influer les sentiments et les représentations d'un auditeur. Mais leur influence reste limité et peu prévisible. Les représentations qu'on peut ainsi influer – même par des expressions sans sens – sont des analogues mentaux d'images matérielles. La question de savoir si pour Frege les représentations sont nécessaires pour l'accès au sens de certaines ou même toutes les propositions, reste ouverte. FÄRBUNG (COLORATION) ET BELEUCHTUNG (ÉCLAIRAGE) : UNE DISTINCTION SANS DIFFÉRENCE? La plupart des interprètes de Frege traitent les expressions coloration et éclairage comme synonymes – au point où ils n'utilisent souvent que l'une d'entre elles dans l'explication d'un passage où Frege avait utilisé les deux 1. Dans SB et Der Gedanke, Frege indique que des conjonctions comme "ach" (Hélas !), "leider" (malheureusement), "noch" (encore), "schon" (déjà), "obgleich" (tout de même), "doch" (si) et "aber" (mais) éclairent la proposition qui leur suit de manière particulière. Le passage de SB en question laisse penser que Frege utilise Beleuchtung (éclairage) et Färbung (coloration) pour parler de deux phénomènes distincts. Il les introduit d'un coup, mais ensuite Frege utilise "beleuchten" (éclairer) de manière unique : Les subordonnées introduites par « bien que » expriment elles aussi des pensées complètes. Cette conjonction n'a proprement aucun sens ; elle ne change [...] pas le sens de la proposition, elle lui donne une lumière particulière [beleuchtet ihn nur in eigentümlicher Weise – l'éclaire de manière particulière]. (Note de bas de page : Il en va de même avec "mais", "cependant"). On peut en effet substituer à la proposition concessive une autre ayant même valeur de vérité sans altérer la vérité du tout ; mais l'éclairage paraîtrait quelque peu inadéquat, comme si l'on voulait chanter une mélodie aux paroles tristes après une chanson gaie 2. Ce passage indique qu'il y a des mots qui éclairent sans avoir un sens, comme nous l'avons vu pour "hélas". Un tel mot agit sur le sens, mais le mot lui-même en est dépourvu. A partir de ce passage, on peut essayer de distinguer plus clairement éclairage et coloration. Dans « Sens et dénotation », Frege utilise 1. Voir p.ex. A. Benmakhlouf, Frege le nécessaire et le superflu, Paris, Vrin, 2002, p. 149. 2. RLP, 121 ; SB, 59/60. Nous proposons des traductions alternatives entre parenthèses et modifions la fin de l'extrait. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 159 Beleuchtung lorsqu'une expression – sans pour autant être coloré ou éclairé elle-même – modifie la manière dont nous appréhendons d'autres expressions de la même phrase. "Cependant" est un cas typique. Une expression qui éclaire serait comme une lampe qui éclaire sans s'éclairer elle-même. Cette absence d'auto-éclairage s'expliquerait par l'absence de sens pour l'expression éclairante puisque c'est au niveau du sens qu'interviennent éclairage et coloration. Frege parlerait de Färbung (coloration) quand un mot lui-même n'est pas neutre. "Cabot" serait un cas typique. La différence des métaphores que nous avons remarquée plus haut s'expliquerait parfaitement par cette distinction. Pour clarifier la distinction, il convient d'introduire la « proposition normale ». Une proposition normale est une phrase dont aucun mot a une coloration. Lorsque dans une phrase P, on remplace m (expression colorée, par ex. "cabot") par n (expression normale, par ex. "chien"), cela devrait permettre de conserver la pensée qui était exprimée par la proposition lorsque m en faisait encore partie. « Avec une proposition normale, chacun aurait en effet le système complet des propositions équipollentes et pourrait passer à n'importe laquelle de celles dont l'éclairage lui disait quelque chose de particulier » 1. Deux propositions sont équipollentes si elles expriment la même pensée. Elles sont congruentes si en plus l'éclairage ou la coloration est pareil. L'ensemble des « propositions normales » doit suffire pour exprimer toute pensée 2. On peut dire que pour éliminer la coloration spécifique d'une proposition et ne pas perdre la pensée, il faut remplacer l'expression par une autre qui est différemment colorée ou qui n'est pas colorée du tout. Il paraît que pour faire disparaître l'éclairage d'une proposition et conserver la pensée, il suffit d'enlever le mot qui éclaire. Les phrases « Er ist noch gekommen » (Il est encore venu), « Ach, er ist gekommen » (Hélas ! Il est venu), « Er ist schon gekommen » (Il est déjà venu), « Er ist leider gekommen » (Malheureusement il est venu), « Aber er ist gekommen » (Mais il est venu), « Er ist doch gekommen. » (Il est tout de même venu) deviennent toutes : « Er ist gekommen » (Il est venu). « Leider ist er gekommen » au lieu de « Er ist leider gekommen » et « Noch ist er nicht gekommen » au lieu de « Er ist noch nicht gekommen » ainsi que « Obgleich er gekommen ist » peuvent paraître problématiques parce qu'on doit modifier la structure des phrases lorsqu'on veut enlever le terme qui éclaire. Une telle modification peut parfois indiquer une modification de la structure profonde comme pour le cas de contextes 1. Lettre à Husserl du 30/10-01/11/1906, Corresp., 43 ; Briefe, 102. 2. Voir ibid. 160 CHAPITRE VI obliques (« ungerade Rede »). Dans notre cas, la modification à faire semble simplement grammaticale. Elle ressemblerait à la transformation nécessaire pour passer du passif à l'actif. Et nous savons que Frege considère que cette transformation ne modifie pas le sens. Pour distinguer coloration et éclairage, un critère essentiel serait que dans le cas d'un éclairage, on n'ait pas à remplacer l'expression qu'on veut faire disparaître par une autre si on veut conserver une pensée complète. Si, par contre, on enlève "cabot" de la phrase « Ce cabot a hurlé toute la nuit » cela donne « Ce _ a hurlé toute la nuit ». La pensée exprimée par cette proposition est visiblement incomplète (en Allemand : distincte de celle exprimée par la première phrase). Il lui manque une information. Pour aspirer à conserver la pensée, il faut bien dire : « Ce chien a hurlé toute la nuit » 1. Si nous prenons pour acquis la possibilité de distinguer différences d'éclairage/coloration et différences de sens, nous pouvons retenir deux critères qui distinguent éclairage de coloration. Il s'agit d'un éclairage si 1) l'élément clef peut-être enlevé sans qu'on aboutisse à une pensée incomplète ou distincte. 2) l'élément clef n'a pas de sens 2. Resterait à classifier la transformation de l'actif au passif et vice-versa. Selon Frege, cette transformation donne également une coloration ou un éclairage distinct 3. L'intonation de la voix peut modifier le contenu d'une proposition 4. Mais elle peut être remplacé par un mot 5. Une phrase exprimé avec une intonation triste devrait être équipollente à la même phrase à laquelle on aurait ajouté "hélas". Il reste à déterminer duquel des deux types relèvent ces manières de donner un éclairage/une coloration. A partir de nos deux critères, on peut penser qu'une intonation de la voix relève du domaine de l'éclairage parce qu'elle ne peut pas avoir de sens. Pour un mot qui remplace une intonation, on doit refaire le test individuellement (Si une intonation est remplacé par "hélas", c'est un cas d'éclairage. Si on la remplace par "cabot" pour obtenir une phrase équipollente, ce serait un cas de coloration. Le fait que l'on puisse faire ce remplacement montre bien que la différence entre éclairage et coloration ne dépend pas de l'effet qu'a l'élément clef sur la pensée. C'est la manière de donner l'effet qui compte. Cela nous ramène encore à l'analyse des 1. Voir M. Dummett, op. cit., p. 85 2. Par « élément clef » nous entendons ce qui induit la (différence de) coloration/ éclairage. 3. Gedanke, 64 ; Fr. ELP, 177. 4. Lettre à Husserl (Briefe, 102) et NS, 152 ; Fr. EP, 164. 5. NS, 152 ; Fr. EP, 164. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 161 métaphores au début de notre travail. On retrouve le cas où on ne fait qu'éclairer des statues et que cela produit le même effet perceptif qu'une coloration réelle. Toutefois, les expressions "mais" et "et" dans le cas où on ne peut pas enlever l'une sans la remplacer par l'autre, posent quelques problèmes pour la distinction tel que nous l'avons envisagé. (1) Hans et Gretel étaient beaux mais pauvres. Selon Frege, on peut remplacer "mais" par "et" sans que cela change la pensée. Le terme "mais" indiquerait simplement que ce qui suit dans la phrase est différent de ce que l'on pourrait d'abord penser. (2) Hans et Gretel étaient beaux et pauvres exprime donc la même pensée que (1). En revanche, il est impossible d'enlever le "mais" sans modification de la phrase. Ce cas diffère de celui traité plus haut (« Mais il est venu. »), où on pouvait enlever "mais" sans remplacent. "Mais" autant que "et" aurait alors plusieurs fonctions très différentes. Dans le cas de (1), "mais" a le sens de "et" et ne peut pas être supprimé sans perte de la pensée exprimée. On peut conclure que le contexte formé par une phrase joue parfois un rôle pour distinguer éclairage et coloration. Lorsque une expression est utilisé comme connective et doit, lorsqu'on la supprime, être remplacé par "et", cela indique qu'elle a un sens (celui de "et"). On pourrait dire que "mais" ne rentre pas toujours dans le schème distinctif de coloration/éclairage. Une alternative plus intéressante serait de dire que "mais" est une expression qui éclaire ou colore selon le contexte. Cela s'accorderait parfaitement à la théorie de signification contextualiste de Frege. Peut-être que de tels cas ont empêchés que Frege formule explicitement la distinction en question qui – de toute facon – n'est pas au centre de sa théorie. Mais le fait qu'il y ait des cas intermédiaires n'entraîne pas l'invalidité de toute distinction. N'empêche que l'on puisse, à partir de ces considérations affirmer que Frege ne traite pas toujours les expressions comme "hélas" et la différence entre "chien" et "cabot" dans la même catégorie. L'objection de Michael Dummett, selon qui « il n'y a pas de raison de supposer que toutes les variations de signification entre des expressions ayant le même sens [...] que Frege considère comme des différences de coloration [tone] soient du même type » 1 ne serait plus justifié. Frege ne le supposerait pas. 1. Ibid. : « There is no reason to suppose that all those variations in meaning, between expressions having the same sense [...], which Frege counts as differences in tone, are uniform in kind. ». 162 CHAPITRE VI Évidemment, le fait que Dummett, comme beaucoup d'autres auteurs, introduit dès le début un terme unique ("tone") pour traiter indistinctement coloration et éclairage rend impossible qu'il s'interroge sur une distinction possible. COMMUNIQUER LA COLORATION/L'ÉCLAIRAGE Nous avons vu qu'à partir de leur intervention sur le sens d'un mot ou d'une proposition, la coloration et l'éclairage ont une influence sur les représentations. Mais il reste à éclairer comment se réalise cette influence. Dans « Über Sinn und Bedeutung », Frege donne quelques indications : Ces couleurs [Färbungen] et cette lumière [Beleuchtungen] n'ont rien d'objectif, et chaque auditeur ou lecteur doit les recréer [hinzuschaffen] à l'invitation [nach den Winken] du poète ou de l'orateur [...]. [Il est] impossible de savoir [exactement] dans quelle mesure [...] on répond aux intentions du poète 1. L'auditeur ou lecteur doit lui-même « se procurer » 2 la coloration ou l'éclairage d'après les indications du poète ou de l'orateur. Cette indication s'accorde difficilement avec certaines propriétés de la coloration et de l'éclairage que nous avons déjà exposées. A part le problème d'une intervention sur le sens, mais sans modification du sens, c'est le deuxième grand problème : la coloration ou l'éclairage sont dans la phrase, mais chacun doit se les procurer lui-même. C'est en partie à partir de ce passage que Dummett essaie de montrer que Frege se contredit. D'un côté il y a possibilité de communiquer coloration/éclairage, attachés au sens, mais de l'autre ils n'ont « rien d'objectif ». Une issu serait de dire que Frege parle de manière elliptique ici et que ce qu'on peut tenter de se procurer est une représentation qui a une affinité avec celle qui a déterminé le choix d'une certaine coloration. Un passage de "Logik" peut faire penser que c'est essentiellement de cela qu'il s'agit 3. On remarquera que ni dans ce texte, qui date de 1897, ni dans la lettre à Husserl en 1906, Frege répète explicitement que la coloration et l'éclairage n'ont rien d'objectif. En revanche, il insiste sur l'idée qu'ils ne modifient pas la pensée et qu'ils ont un effet sur les représentations. Il faut probablement penser que la coloration/l'éclairage reste bien attachée au sens, mais sans le modifier – qu'elle soit objective ou non. 1. ELP, 107 (traduction légèrement modifié) ; SB, 45. 2. « recréer » surtraduit « hinzuschaffen ». Frege ne dit rien sur la préexistence de la coloration. 3. Voir NS, 151/152 ; Fr. EP, 164/165. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 163 Peut-être que l'idée de potentiel et d'activation pourrait être une issue. Lorsqu'il y a coloration ou éclairage, il y a un potentiel supplémentaire dans une phrase qu'un auditeur ou lecteur peut activer par sa manière de la comprendre et surtout ses représentations correspondantes. Il reste ouvert si cette activation est comme l'auteur avait souhaité qu'elle soit. Toutefois le résultat n'est pas arbitraire car il y existe une « certaine affinité de la manière de former des représentations » et il y a un certain partage linguistique. Il y aurait donc quelque chose dans l'objet, dans la phrase, qui nous laisserait quelque liberté de compréhension sans nous laisser toutes les libertés. La coloration/l'éclairage rapprocheraient alors les phrases où ils interviennent des oeuvres d'art visuel tel que nous les comprenons. Celles-ci n'ont pas de signification prédéterminé claire, mais un potentiel de significations qu'un spectateur peut activer selon son expérience et ses dispositions. Ce serait dans ce sens que la coloration/l'éclairage sont dans la phrase et que pourtant l'ont doit se les procurer. COLORATION ET PENSÉES ANNEXES : UNE CRITIQUE De manière générale on peut dire qu'une différence de coloration peut exister dans la description d'une action ("marcher"). Mais le sens d'un mot conceptuel peut également être coloré. La distinction entre chien (noncoloré) et cabot (coloré) ainsi que celle entre "Pferd" ("cheval") et "Gaul" ("coursier"), "Mähre" ("monture"), "Ross" ("rosse") sont de ce type 1. Par la suite, nous allons essayer de montrer pourquoi il est difficile de soutenir que ces expressions n'impliquent pas de pensées annexes 2. Nous ne nous attarderons pas trop sur une explication de l'idée de pensée annexe, puisque Ali Benmakhlouf lui a consacrée des réflexions perspicaces dans son livre Frege. Le nécessaire et le superflu 3. Il nous suffira d'en retenir les choses suivantes : Si une proposition comporte effectivement une pensée annexe, cela a une importance pour la conduite des preuves dont s'occupe la logique. Si Frege veut assurer que la coloration et l'éclairage restent sans importance pour la logique, il doit donc montrer qu'ils n'introduisent pas de pensées annexes. C'est ce qu'il tâche de faire de manière exemplaire pour le cas de "chien" et "cabot". 1. Voir RLP, 177 ; Gedanke, 63 : Les traductions ont un sens distinct des originaux. « Mähre » p.ex. est péjoratif. 2. Pour les raisons indiquées dans l'introduction, ce passage nécessite plus que tout autre le recours aux expressions allemandes. Mais nous avons essayé de rendre possible la compréhension pour un lecteur qui serait uniquement francophone. 3. Voir A. Benmakhlouf, Frege. Le nécessaire et le superflu, Paris, Vrin, 2002, p. 151-154. 164 CHAPITRE VI Frege nous demande de prendre en considération le cas où (3) « Ce chien a hurlé toute la nuit » est juste et où quelqu'un dit (4) « Ce cabot a hurlé toute la nuit ». On pourrait croire que celui qui dit (4) exprime non seulement que le chien a hurlé toute la nuit, mais aussi qu'il déprécie le chien en question. Pour contrer cette idée, Frege nous demande de nous imaginer le cas où la proposition (3) est juste et où quelqu'un dit (4) sans sentir la dépréciation qui semble se manifester dans le mot "cabot". Il y aurait alors deux pensées dans (4) dont la deuxième serait fausse. Toute la proposition deviendrait fausse, tandis que (3) serait juste. Il est difficile d'être d'accord avec cette analyse ; bien au contraire, l'usage du mot « cabot » n'empêche pas de tenir la seconde phrase elle aussi pour correcte. Il convient en effet de distinguer entre les pensées que l'on exprime et celles que l'on amène les autres à tenir pour vraies sans les exprimer 1. On peut se demander en quoi ce cas se distingue de celui de quelqu'un qui dirait (5) « Bebel s'imaginait [wähnt] que le retour de l'Alsace-Lorraine à la France pourrait affaiblir son désir de vengeance » sans pour autant penser que Bebel se trompe s'il croit que la volonté de vengeance des Français sera calmée par le retour d'Alsace-Lorraine. Frege croit que (5) exprime deux pensées : (6) Bebel croit que le retour d'Alsace-Lorraine à la France affaiblirait son désir de vengeance (7) Le retour d'Alsace-Lorraine à la France ne peut pas affaiblir son désir de vengeance 2. Il nous paraît tout à fait possible de dire que (4) exprime les deux pensées suivantes : (8) « Ce chien a hurlé toute la nuit. » (9) « Ce chien est exécrable. » Cette présentation nous paraît au moins aussi bien rendre compte de nos intuitions linguistiques que celle de Frege. Elle montre au moins que la différence entre les deux exemples choisis par Frege n'est pas évidente. Le deuxième « exemple standard » est encore plus difficilement envisageable comme simple différence de coloration. Dans La pensée, Frege écrit : « Que j'emploie le mot « cheval » [Pferd], "coursier" [Gaul], "monture" [Mähre], ou "rosse" [Ross], aucune différence n'en résulte pour la pensée. » 3 1. EP, 165 ; NS, 152. 2. Voir ELP, 123. 3. ELP, 177 ; Gedanke, 63. Si les traductions françaises ne peuvent conserver ni la coloration ni même le sens des expressions allemandes, une réflexion similaire à la nôtre LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 165 Voyons ce qui en est. Est-ce que nous pouvons utiliser ces mots de manière indistincte ? Il nous semble que non. Un Ross n'est pas un Gaul ou une Mähre. Ou plus précisément : le mot Ross fait référence au concept de Ross, c'est-à-dire au concept d'un cheval de grande qualité [Duden : « edles Pferd »], dans le « parcours de valeurs » du concept Gaul on trouve des mauvais chevaux [Duden : « (abwertend) schlechtes Pferd »]. Mähre, en plus de faire référence à une femelle, indique que le cheval est vieux et ne sert plus à rien [Duden : « Ein [altes] abgemagertes Pferd, das nicht mehr zu gebrauchen ist »]. Mais tous les Gäule, Rösser et Mähren sont aussi des Pferde, des chevaux. Pferd inclut masculin et féminin et n'implique pas de jugement de valeur. On peut dire que les ensembles d'objets formées par les trois expressions colorées sont des sous-ensembles de l'ensemble Pferd. Si Gaul et Mähre ne sont pas strictement distincts au niveau du sexe, l'ensemble formé par Gaul et celui formé par Mähre ont des éléments communs. Mais comme un mauvais cheval (Gaul) ne doit pas forcément être maigre ou vieux, il y a des chevaux qui appartiennent uniquement à l'ensemble formé par Gaul (Frege dirait : « Sie fallen unter den Begriff Gaul »). Le groupe des Rösser, enfin, doit contenir des chevaux complètement distincts. Pour illustrer ces explications, il est utile de regarder quelques exemples de phrases : (10) « Es steht ein Gaul im Stall. » exprime deux pensées. (11) « Il y a un cheval dans l'écurie. » et (12) « Le cheval dans l'écurie est mauvais. » En revanche (13) « Es steht ein Ross im Stall. » exprime les pensées (14) « Il y a un cheval dans l'écurie. » et (15) « Le cheval dans l'écurie est de grande qualité. ». Alors le remplacement de Gaul par Ross pourrait jouer un rôle pour les inférences. L'inférence : (16) « Ce cheval est rapide. » ou (17) « Ce cheval est fort. » serait probablement vrai pour (13) mais ne le serait pas pour (10). Par conséquent, la différence de Ross et Gaul est importante pour la logique parce qu'elle indique des pensées annexes distinctes. Si nous avons raison, notre traitement des trois exemples de Frege indique que Frege n'a pas bien choisi ses exemples. Cela montre la grande difficulté de trouver un exemple où, effectivement, deux termes distincts peuvent être utilisés dans tous les cas sans que des pensées annexes différentes soient produites. Mais cela ne montre pas qu'il est toujours impossible de distinguer les mots colorés des mots qui comportent une pensée annexe. Une découverte annexe de notre examen est qu'une différence de valeur peut être essentielle pour les pensées exprimées. Cela serait possible à partir des expressions françaises. Tous les chevaux sauvages, par exemple, ne sont pas des « montures ». 166 CHAPITRE VI montre que la présence ou l'absence de jugement de valeur n'est pas un critère utile pour distinguer différence de coloration et différence de sens. A présent, nos exemples ne concernent que la coloration. Pour les cas d'éclairage, il paraît impossible de dégager des pensées annexes qui ne concernent pas l'attitude de celui qui parle. Ainsi (18) « Er ist doch gekommen » (Il est tout de même venu) semble impliquer (19) « La personne qui dit (18) à moment T ne croyait pas qu'il [le sujet de la phrase] viendrait. » Des attitudes jouent un rôle essentiel dans ce cas et on peut effectivement dire que (19) est une proposition qui est non pas exprimée, mais uniquement suggéré. Ou pour parler avec Frege, (18) aurait en outre la fonction de faire saisir la pensée exprimé par (19) 1. Reste le cas de "gehen" (marcher), "schreiten" (déambuler), "wandeln" (cheminer) 2. Il nous a paru difficile de trouver de véritables pensées annexes distinctes pour des phrases qui contiennent ces expressions. Peutêtre qu'il s'agit effectivement d'un groupe d'expressions qui est clos. Cela semble d'autant plus montrer la sensibilité linguistique de Frege si on prend en considération qu'en ce sens d'autres termes que l'on peut grouper autour de "gehen", des termes comme "marschieren", "stampfen", "wandern" sont très différentes. Frege, Benmakhlouf a raison d'y insister, était tout à fait conscient de cette difficulté 3 : la frontière entre exprimer une pensée et la suggérer n'est pas étanche. Frege il écrit : « Quelque chose qui, initialement, ne servait pas à exprimer une pensée peut finir par acquérir cette fonction en vertu d'un usage constant des cas de ce genre. Une pensée qui, au début, n'était que suggérée par une expression, peut en venir à être expressément assértée par elle. » 4 Un élément essentiel de la théorie de la coloration de Frege n'a pas été ébranlé par notre traitement des ses exemples : il y a toujours une expression normale qui peut fournir une « proposition normale », qui est neutre et 1. Voir NS, 152 ; EP, 165. 2. La traduction française ne rend pas tout à fait compte de l'allemand. 3. Voir A. Benmakhlouf, Frege le nécessaire et le superflu, Paris, Vrin, 2002, p. 154. Pourtant, la capacité de se rendre compte de la différence entre « Mähre » et « Ross » a plutôt dû s'affaiblir depuis le temps de Frege. Dans notre vie commune, nous avons beaucoup moins affaire à des chevaux que lui et par conséquent, les distinctions qui s'y rapportent sont moins utiles. 4. EP, 165/166 ; NS, 152. Malgré les énormes différences de leurs théories, ce passage fait fortement penser à la notion de « generalized conversational implicature » de Paul Grice. Frege semble songer à quelque chose de ce genre. Peut-être que la notion de Grice expliquerait le passage de la simple suggestion à l'expression. Mais Grice y voit un moyen d'expression à plein droit et non pas un moyen pour suggérer des pensées (Voir P. Grice, Studies in the Way of Words, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.), 1989, p. 37-40). LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 167 qui est libre de qualités trop spécifiques. Dans nos exemples, il s'agit de "Hund" (chien), "Pferd" (cheval) et "gehen" (marcher) respectivement. Cela indique qu'un groupe de mots comporte souvent une expression qui est plus générale que les autres, expression qui « permet de passer à n'importe laquelle » du groupe 1. Avec cette distinction, Frege a déjà saisi une différence dans notre langue que l'on essaie souvent d'expliquer en termes d'aspect aujourd'hui. Mais il se peut qu'il lui a donné une place trop faible dans l'ensemble de ses réflexions sur le langage commun. GENÈSE ET FONCTION DES CONCEPTS DE COLORATION ET ÉCLAIRAGE On peut se demander pourquoi Frege ne veut pas admettre qu'il y a des pensées différentes pour des mots comme chien et cabot. Après avoir expliqué à Husserl que ce qui compte pour la logique dans une phrase A, n'est que ce qu'on peut juger vrai ou faux, il ajoute : « On peut, bien entendu, inscrire au compte du contenu de A quantité de choses, par exemple une humeur, un sentiment, des représentations, mais rien de tout cela ne peut être jugé vrai ou faux ; au fond, cela ne concerne pas la logique. » Si on ne dispose pas d'un moyen de pour juger quand deux propositions expriment la même pensée « on peut discuter à l'infini des questions logiques sans résultat. » 2 Une fois qu'on a décidé de se libérer de ce qui ne fait parti de la pensée pour le classer sous nom de coloration et éclairage « on se débarrasse d'un seul coup de tout un fatras de distinctions inutiles, qui donnent lieu à d'innombrables conflits, pour lesquels la plupart du temps il n'existe pas de décision objective » 3. Frege veut garder la logique libre de termes qui pourraient donner lieu à des discussions trop pénibles. Et pour assurer cela, il finit parfois par exclure trop de différences de son champ. Au fond, on peut probablement dire que le cas concret du langage ordinaire lui importe peu. En ce qui concerne l'origine des distinctions futiles, Frege écrit : Ce ne peut pas être la tâche de la Logique que de suivre la langue à la trace et de dépister ce que recèlent les expressions langagières. Quiconque voudrait apprendre de la langue la logique serait comme un adulte voulant apprendre d'un enfant à penser. Lorsque les hommes donnèrent forme à la langue, leur pensée se trouvait dans un état enfantin, plein d'images. Les langues ne sont pas faites selon la règle logique. Même ce qui est logique dans la langue apparaît dissimulé sous des images, qui ne sont pas toujours 1. Voir Lettre à Husserl du 30/10-1/11/1906, Corresp., 43 ; Briefe, 102. 2. Lettre à Husserl du 9/12/1906, Corresp., 55. 3. Lettre à Husserl, Corresp., 41. 168 CHAPITRE VI pertinentes. A l'aube de l'élaboration de la langue, il y eut, semble-t-il, un foisonnement exubérant de formes langagières. [...] Le premier devoir du logicien consiste à se libérer de la langue et à opérer une simplification. La Logique doit étendre sa juridiction sur les langues 1. Cette description de la genèse de la faculté langagière donne appui aux idées fregennes sur la relation entre logique et langage naturel. On peut penser que les concepts de coloration et d'éclairage ont essentiellement une fonction méthodologique. Ils sont essentiels pour faire le tri entre ce qui n'est qu'"excédent" dans une langue et ce qui en est important (pour la logique). Cependant, il y a d'autres raisons pour vouloir exclure la coloration et l'éclairage de ce qui est objectif et qui importe pour l'analyse logique. Une grande faiblesse des langues naturelles est qu'on y dispose d'expressions qui ont un sens sans pour autant avoir une référence. Dans une langue formelle parfaite comme la Begriffsschrift, ce cas est exclu. Mais Frege était également gêné par l'idée qu'il pourrait y avoir plus de pensées simples que de propositions. Cela impliquerait qu'il y a des pensées qui ne peuvent pas être dites de manière directe. Plus Frege admettait d'expressions qui peuvent créer des pensées annexes, plus le nombre de pensées simples sans manière d'expression propre augmentait. Les catégories d'éclairage et de coloration lui aident à se débarrasser sans plus d'explication de beaucoup de cas difficiles. Il y a deux passages dans « Über Sinn und Bedeutung » qui indiquent l'embarras dans lequel les pensées annexes le mettent : Parce qu'elles sont si évidemment liées à nos paroles, presque aussi étroitement que la pensée principale, nous voulons qu'elles soient effectivement exprimées en même temps que la principale. Le sens de la proposition y gagne en richesse et il est possible que nous ayons plus de pensées simples que de propositions 2. On hésitera à décider si cette pensée n'est que discrètement éveillée ou réellement exprimée. On se demandera si notre proposition serait fausse au cas où Napoléon aurait déjà pris sa décision avant d'avoir eu conscience du danger. Si l'on veut croire que la proposition serait vraie même dans ce cas, il ne faudra pas prendre la pensée annexe comme un partie du sens de la proposition. Il est vraisemblable qu'on inclinera à cette interprétation. Dans le cas contraire, la situations serait bien embrouillée, car nous aurions plus de pensées simples que de propositions 3. 1. Ibid., 43 ; Briefe, 102/103. 2. ELP, 122 ; SB, 61. 3. ELP, 123 ; SB, 62. LA PHILOSOPHIE DU LANGAGE DE GOTTLOB FREGE 169 La juxtaposition montre que Frege frôle la contradiction ici. D'abord, il admet qu'il est bien possible que nous ayons plus de pensées simples que de propositions. Après, il favorise la décision contre une certaine pensée annexe en disant qu'autrement, les choses deviendraient bien compliquées, car nous aurions plus de pensées que de propositions. N'avait-il pas écrit « es kann wohl geschehen » (« bien possible » ou « il peut arriver »), la contradiction aurait été parfaite. Cela montre bien que Frege continuait à lutter contre les excédents de la langue tout en sachant que la lutte était perdue. Si la coloration fait bel et bien partie du contenu d'une proposition, comme la valeur de vérité et le sens, elle est souvent définie de manière purement négative : « Ce qui, en plus de cela, contribue au contenu d'une phrase, je l'appelle la coloration de la pensée » 1. On remarquera que Frege n'utilise plus que le terme "coloration" dans ce texte de 1906. Il nous semble que cela témoigne autant de désintérêt que la multiplication des métaphores (notamment dans « La pensée »). Les métaphores tardives (air, parfum poétique) soulignent encore plus l'aspect éphémère. Cela montre la tendance croissante dans la pensée de Frege à ne plus accorder une fonction positive aux concepts de coloration et d'éclairage. Ils deviennent comme une boite noire dans laquelle Frege jette tout ce que la langue a pour lui d'"exubérant" pour y voir plus clair dans ce qui reste. CONCLUSION Résumons rapidement les différents aspects de coloration/éclairage tel que Frege les décrit : 1. Coloration/éclairage interviennent sur le sens sans en faire partie. Par conséquent, il ne peut y avoir coloration ou éclairage sans sens 2. Coloration/éclairage sont particulièrement importants pour la littérature, plus un texte est scientifique, moins il montre des phénomènes de coloration/éclairage 3. Lorsqu'on traduit, on perd le plus souvent coloration/éclairage au détriment du sens. Ainsi, les textes scientifiques sont le plus facile à traduire 4. Une coloration/un éclairage distinct peuvent influencer la représentation et les sentiments d'un auditeur/lecteur, mais leur influence reste peu contrôlable. 5. Un auditeur/lecteur doit se procurer la coloration/l'éclairage d'après les indications d'un auteur. Ils ne sont pas objectifs. 6. Il y a de différentes manières de produire une coloration/un éclairage : 1. EP, 236 ; NS, 214. 170 CHAPITRE VI – par un mot coloré (cabot) – par le jeu Actif/passif – par une expression éclairante sans propre sens – par une intonation de la voix 7. Il suffirait de disposer des propositions normales pour pouvoir exprimer toute pensée. On peut dire que coloration/éclairage viennent se glisser entre le sens et la représentation. Ils ne sont pas complètement subjectifs, comme les représentations, mais ils ne sont pas objectifs non plus. Nous avons proposé de les penser en termes de potentiel et activation. Il s'est avéré difficile de distinguer différence de sens et différence de coloration, mais il y a des cas où la distinction semble fonctionner. Concernant les représentations, on peut retenir que 1. Les représentations sont subjectives, mais il y existe une « affinité dans la manière de se représenter » entre différentes personnes. C'est cette affinité qui rend l'art possible 2. Le sens et la coloration/l'éclairage d'une élocution ont une influence sur les représentations de l'auditeur/lecteur, mais elles varie aussi selon le contexte et selon les personnes et leur histoire 3. Il n'est pas nécessaire qu'une expression ait un sens pour qu'elle puisse agir sur les représentations. Une onomatopée suffit On constatera que les représentations sont très facilement stimulés et que la moindre expression suffit pour agir sur elles. Il n'est pas clair quel rôle les représentations jouent pour l'accès à un certain sens. Son silence plus encore que certaines remarques font penser que Frege n'était pas tout à fait convaincu de leur futilité dans la saisi d'une pensée. Aujourd'hui la tendance logiciste a presque entièrement disparue et il est intéressant de revenir à plusieurs aspects de la distinction initiale de Frege. La distinction entre expressions qui éclairent et expressions qui colorent est encore intéressante. Sa métaphorique la rend très intuitive, même si – confronté au langage technique de la linguistique contemporaine – on peut facilement sentir qu'elle appartient à un monde perdu. Le concept de proposition normale nous semble encore extrêmement utile. Frege a effectivement mis les mains sur un aspect important de notre langue qui dispose d'une hiérarchie selon la généralité de certains mots dont on se sert quotidiennement souvent sans en être conscient. Klaus SPEIDEL ENS

www.ontologia.net/studies Ontology Studies 10, 2010 199-207 Moîra, aión, khrónos y la noción de «Zeitlichkeit» en Sein und Zeit. La posibilidad de un espacio hermenéutico. Aida Míguez Barciela Universitat de Barcelona Departament d'Història de la Filosofia, Estètica i Filosofia de la Cultura Reception date / Fecha de recepción: 02-02-2009 Acceptation date / Fecha de aceptación: 06-05-2009 Resumen Partiendo de la imposibilidad de encontrar entre las palabras del griego antiguo habitualmente traducidas por "tiempo" (entre ellas khrónos y aión) expresión alguna correspondiente a la noción de "el tiempo que infinitamente sigue", exponemos una vía para pensar la relación entre el papel de la temporalidad finita en Ser y tiempo y la averiguación en torno a tales palabras griegas. Palabras clave: tiempo, límite, integridad, Grecia, Hermenéutica. Abstract. Moîra, aión, khrónos and the notion of «Zeitlichkeit» in Sein und Zeit. The possibility of a hermeneutic space. Starting from the impossibility of finding any expression which corresponds to the notion of "the time that infinitely continues" among the ancient Greek words usually translated by "time" (for instance: khrónos and aión) , we expound a way to think the relation of the role of the finite temporariness in Being and Time with the inquiry into such Greek words. Keywords: time, limit, wholeness, Greece, Hermeneutics. Es sabido que la noción de «el tiempo ilimitado» tiene el carácter de representación resultante del haberse perdido algo que, con razón, aunque exigiendo aclaraciones, podemos identificar con la primariedad de la semántica del «es» griego, eso que otras veces aparece como la esencial «originariedad» de la Grecia arcaica y clásica. Plantearemos aquí la cuestión de en qué sentido hablamos de la posibilidad de darnos cuenta del carácter derivado del modo moderno de acontecer «tiempo» tratando de aclarar con ello cómo la posibilidad de percibir nuestra secundariedad es ya en sí misma una posibilidad hermenéutica, la Aida Míguez Barciela200 Ontology Studies 10, 2010 posibilidad de apertura de un espacio en el cual nosotros, lectores modernos, podemos intentar oír el significado más básico de ciertas decisivas palabras griegas.1 Una de esas palabras es aión. En eso que anacrónicamente llamamos la «poesía» griega arcaica, los usos de aión dan como significado la «vida», el «tiempo de la vida» o el «tiempo» sin más. Aquiles sabe de antemano que su aión será breve y lo acepta sin rodeos, renunciando a la posibilidad de un deròs aión (Il. 9.4152), una vida larga que le conduzca a la vejez. En otra ocasión él mismo se refiere a la pérdida del amigo diciendo que su aión «ha quedado muerto» (Il. 19.27), es decir, menciona la «vida» de Patroclo en atención a su cumplimiento, el mismo que hace posible que, mientras él duerme, Patroclo se le acerque como psykhé, es decir, siendo ya la figura cerrada que tiene lugar cuando se ha abandonado el ámbito de la presencia. En estos y otros lugares del corpus griego, aión nombra la distensión entre el nacimiento y la muerte, la finitud del tiempo concedido. A veces la ley constitutiva de esta distensión aparece designada con la palabra moîra. Según sus usos comunes, moîra significa o bien la «adjudicación» de parte o bien la «parte» que uno obtiene en un reparto: el «lote» asignado de tierra, la «porción» de carne en un banquete, o la «sección» de ámbito cuando se habla del gran reparto entre los dioses. Cuando de lo que se trata es del reparto que es la vida misma moîra es «la» moîra, el término y el límite puros, la parte a secas, si bien esto nos pone a nosotros, intérpretes modernos, en la tesitura de intentar pensar una parte y un trecho (el «trecho de vida» que designa aión) sin referencia a una extensión o un todo infinitos. En la misma línea, la palabra móros (una variante de moîra) significa «muerte» porque ante todo significa la parte propia, y decir «parte» cuando lo que está en juego es el reparto básico que llamamos «vida» supone remitir a eso que convencionalmente traducimos por «destino»: moîra y aîsa son el destino por cuanto éste no es más que la porción adjudicada, el camino (cf. oîtos –destino– tiene que ver con avanzar, ir) que a la vez consiste en caer y acabar (cf. pótmos –destino– como caída, desplome). Por esta razón, ni la riqueza de Agamenón ni la dicha de Príamo desvelan su auténtico fondo hasta que éstos mueren, pues sólo con el fin de la muerte puede decirse (verse, captarse) la figura 1 [La realización de este trabajo ha contado con el soporte del Departament d'Universitats, Recerca i Societat de la Informació de la Generalitat de Catalunya y del Fondo Social Europeo]. Con «básico» o «inicial» no nos referimos a un significado «más antiguo», sino más bien al uso no temático de ciertas palabras griegas, hecho del cual se sigue el que no podamos asentar positivamente nada respecto a qué sería lo significado con tales palabras, pues la dimensión en la cual tiene vigencia su uso no temático sólo «es» (se manifiesta, acontece) como pérdida de ella misma. Para oír eso que hemos llamado el «significado más básico» necesitamos no tanto establecer como lo contrario: se trataría de intentar destacar aquello que nosotros no oímos en estas palabras, pero que formaba parte de la dimensión en la cual ellas resultaban comprensibles para un griego. Los recursos de los que nos valgamos para resaltar eso «otro» griego (las traducciones, las exégesis) no serán la «base preparatoria» sobre la cual, más tarde, discutir sobre «el pensamiento» o «la tesis» en la que se inscribe el uso de tales palabras, sino la auténtica tarea de comprensión de lo griego. 2 Cito por la edición de D. V. Munro, T. W. Allen, Oxford 1920. Ontology Studies 10, 2010 201Moîra, aión, khrónos y la noción de «Zeitlichkeit» en Sein und Zeit... de cada uno. Así, cuando un griego hace referencia a un recibir parte a secas a lo que se refiere es al morir; por esto moîra, móros y thánatos van juntos (cf. Il. 3.101-102, 24.132, etc.), y por esto el aión, el tiempo que para uno empieza con el nacimiento, está siempre ya remitido al mórsimos êmar (cf. Il .15.613, 22.212, 21.100), el día determinado, el día de la de-terminación. Con esto encaja el hecho de que cuando moîra aparece en sentido enfático, por ejemplo cuando Héctor dice que a la «parte» nadie permanece oculto una vez que ha nacido (Il. 6.488-489)3, lo que ocurre es una referencia al límite que constituye el ser del hombre (cf. también Il. 5.629, 12.116, 22. 303 y otros). No casualmente la moîra presencia la ocasión cuando por primera vez se abre para uno el «mundo» y se constituye «tiempo»: el nacimiento (Il. 24.209-210). Probando nuestra capacidad de oír el significado más inicial de aión y moîra constatamos que el «es» griego expresa finitud. Es sin embargo necesario que no perdamos de vista que la exégesis a través de la cual tratamos de oír el significado inicial, no-temático, de ciertas palabras griegas es un proceso conceptual nuestro, nuestro peculiar esfuerzo por comprender algo que para nosotros no es obvio, a saber: que «ser» es término; que lo primero es la distancia, el trecho o el lapso; que sin final no es posible ni el comprender ni el haber ni, por tanto, el reconocimiento de cosa.4 Permanecer conscientes de nuestra constitución como modernos conlleva admitir que cada vez que constatamos que aión significa la distancia lo hacemos desde la inmediata pertenencia a la noción de «continuidad infinita», presuponiendo, por tanto, algo en lo que cada delimitación es accidental y suprimible. Sin embargo, la propia exigencia moderna de mantener con claridad la diferencia de los puntos de partida puede ser ya un modo de establecer cierto control frente a la proyección irrestricta de nuestras nociones obvias: lo que simplemente pasa desapercibido es lo que con más eficacia funciona, por eso sugeríamos que percibir con claridad lo nuestro propio puede abrir una posibilidad hermenéutica, pues tal vez sea el propio hacerse cargo de lo nuestro la única manera de superarlo, de establecer una especie de correctivo frente a su obviedad. Esto implica que la posibilidad de que nos tomemos en serio palabras que no pueden ser dichas sin más en una lengua moderna dependa del grado de problematización de nuestros supuestos del que seamos capaces, los mismos supuestos que siempre ya operan 3 Las palabras que habitualmente traducimos por «destino» (moîra, aîsa, pótmos) significan algo del tipo parte, porción, caer, de otro modo no se entendería que el «destino» de alguien pudiese ser no sólo bueno o malo, sino breve o duradero (cf. Hom. Il. 1.416). 4 Como consecuencia de esto aparecen las ambigüedades en ciertas palabras, poniendo de manifiesto con ello problemas que son exclusivamente nuestros. Así, al traducir un verbo como ekteleutáo nos resulta inevitable distinguir entre un «cumplir» en tanto que realizar (vollenden), y un «terminar» en tanto que desaparecer (beenden). El verbo griego significa «llevar a fin», y esto, el «fin», significa cumplimiento sin que haya escisión en dos sentidos. En griego «término» es acabamiento, y acabamiento no es desaparición, sino, por el contrario, constitución de figura, posibilidad de reconocimiento y captación. En otras palabras: la ambigüedad sobre si «fin» aparece como estado de perfección o de carencia (si el acabamiento es «positivo o negativo)» tiene sentido sólo para nosotros. Aida Míguez Barciela202 Ontology Studies 10, 2010 en nuestro inmediato acercamiento a un texto griego. Con todo, la posibilidad de ganar cierta distancia respecto a lo propio ni lo elimina ni nos sitúa en un ámbito distinto de la modernidad; se trata más bien de, frente al mero estar en ello, optar por verlo, lo cual implica, como siempre, una separación, la separación del comprender y hacerse cargo. La autocrítica contenida en el devenir relevantes los propios supuestos aparece así como una manera de poder leer habiendo ganado la actitud consistente no en superar nuestra condición de modernos, sino en soportarla y exhibirla; es decir: se trata de que la distancia que esclarece lo propio sea aquella desde la que abordar la comprensión de eso que en el propio esclarecimiento aparece como lo «otro», a saber: Grecia. Por otro lado, percibir sin engaños la inadecuación de nuestro acceso inmediato (esto es: no neutral, sino mediado por una carga de supuestos) a un texto griego, así como el carácter insuperable de la distancia, no nos exime de confrontarnos con ellos, sino que nos obliga tanto más a plantear con seriedad el intento de interpretación, pues podría ser que justamente en hacer notar el fracaso de la comprensión resida nuestro éxito como intérpretes. Parece así que la actitud que abre un espacio para dialogar con un texto griego sólo se sostiene si acepta que el diálogo está de algún modo frustrado de antemano; si acepta que la distancia es, en efecto, pura distancia. Quizá nuestra cercanía Grecia esté en relación con el grado de conciencia de la imposibilidad de superar el propio punto de partida, con la claridad que reside en aceptar que en eso que Hölderlin llama el «libre uso de lo propio» reside la verdadera tarea. Sólo en este sentido se nos impone «acercarnos» a Grecia. Decíamos que la relevancia de nuestras nociones obvias constituye una especie de suspensión –no eliminación, ni siquiera debilitación– de la noción de infinitud que encontramos como constitutiva de tales nociones. La suspensión era la actitud desde la que intentar oír el significado inicial de palabras como moîra y aión, palabras que nos remiten a la noción de finitud como lo primero, de «tiempo» como lapso y de «ser» como de-terminación. Veamos ahora un fragmento de Píndaro en el que lo dicho adquiere suma relevancia.5 Traducimos así: El cuerpo de cada uno sigue en efecto a la muerte, fuerte en extremo. Pero viviente queda todavía la figura Del aión. Pues sólo ésta procede De los dioses. Y duerme mientras los miembros todavía actúan, pero A los que duermen, en muchos sueños, Les muestra el discernimiento que se acerca de los goces y los sufrimientos. La palabra griega que hemos traducido por «discernimiento» es krísis, substantivo del verbo krineîn, que significa separar, distinguir, discriminar; conceder lugar; decidir como cortar y determinar. En este sentido habla el fragmento de la krísis «de lo uno y de lo otro», esto es, 5 Frg. 131b de la edición Snell-Maehler, Leipzig, 1980. El fragmento fue agrupado en un conjunto de canciones que los alejandrinos titularon thrênoi («cantos fúnebres»). Ontology Studies 10, 2010 203Moîra, aión, khrónos y la noción de «Zeitlichkeit» en Sein und Zeit... de la determinación de lo uno como uno y lo otro como otro, los goces como goces y los sufrimientos como sufrimientos, determinación que, como hemos dicho, sólo es posible por el cierre de la muerte. Desarrollemos esto. La krísis no sólo es algo que aparece en sueños y de la que es relevante decir que se acerca, es decir, presentarla sin presentarla, sino que precisamente ella es eso que la figura que queda viviente muestra; y si la figura del aión pone de manifiesto la decisión por venir es porque ésta es condición de aquélla, porque krísis es corte y determinación, y sólo el término permite captar la entera figura. Así, lo que en todo caso se acerca y consiste en acercarse es el desistir, el terminar, el final que concede sentido a todo aquello que contemplado desde el punto de vista de la vida («mientras los miembros...») es pura alternancia, ahora esto, ahora lo otro, unas veces dolor y otras goce.6 El advenir puro, la no-presencia que, sin embargo, está siempre por llegar, es decisión porque es delimitación; por eso el sentido, la figura de conjunto de la vida, adviene justo con la krísis de la muerte. En la muerte no queda «vida» alguna, sino la «imagen» de la vida, y si sólo ella «es de los dioses» es porque el hombre sólo muriendo se hace inmortal, sólo dando con el límite de la no-presencia conquista un «es» definitivo. Por eso, si aión es el «tiempo de la vida» es porque la vida, en el fondo –«en sueños»–, es muerte. Esta fenomenología del venir y del límite forma figura coherente con otros lugares del corpus griego en los que se trata de reconocer el substraerse como substraerse y la posibilidad como posibilidad. Nos interesa ahora observar la conexión entre el que la krísis definitiva sea «la que se acerca» y el que la palabra khrónos, que en Homero encontramos poco y sólo en caso acusativo7, aparezca en Píndaro acompañado no sólo de expresiones del tipo «moverse», «acercarse» e incluso «alzarse» (Ol. 6.97, Ol. 8.28; 6.97, Pít. 1. 57), sino también de «cumplir» y «llevar a cabo» (Nem. 4.41). En una ocasión dice el poeta (Ol. 10.7) que él, khrónos, llega desde lejos, y lo hace como ho méllon khrónos, como el tiempo a punto de venir. En griego el tiempo no «pasa», sino que llega acercándose; el «pasado» no es tiempo, 6 La alternancia cuyo sentido es el cese de la muerte es el cambio de lo uno en lo otro constitutivo de la existencia humana en tanto que ésta consiste en posibilidad, poder ser ahora lo uno y ahora lo otro; por eso tal vez la asociación de aión como la distancia con los «días cambiantes» (I. 3.18). Que a la pluralidad cambiante le pertenece el sentido del cierre suena en la expresión, común en Píndaro, mórsimos aión, traducida convencionalmente como «tiempo asignado», «tiempo concedido» (Ol. 2.10), también «tiempo de la muerte» (Ístm. 7.40ss.). Se trata en todo esto de que el tiempo esencial es, en definitiva, discriminación, por eso otro de los adjetivos atribuidos a aión es thnatós (Nem. 3.75), y si de alguien en una encrucijada se dice que «escoge aión» (Nem. 10.59) con ello se hace referencia precisamente a su decidirse a morir; los dioses no escogen aión por lo mismo que tampoco tienen psykhé; éstos son los distintivos de ese ser que solemos llamar el «hombre» y que los griegos llamaban simplemente el «mortal». 7 Cf. Fränkel 1955, pp. 1-3, p. 15, donde también se plantea el que la relevancia del tiempo tiene lugar precisamente ahí donde algo se interrumpe, se demora o falla; sin estos «estados negativos» el tiempo no se convierte en objeto de atención. En el proceso hacia la relevancia del tiempo como tal la palabra que juega en primera instancia el papel decisivo es «día», no khrónos. Aida Míguez Barciela204 Ontology Studies 10, 2010 sino lo de antes (prósthen), lo de una vez (póte) o lo antiguo (pálai). En griego no operan los tres modos del tiempo solidarios de que el tiempo ilimitado sea la noción vinculante. Según ciertos usos de la palabra en Píndaro, khrónos tiene que ver más con ausencia que con presencia, más con lo no-esperado que con lo esperado, con posibilidad y no con realidad. «Tiempo» es el advenir en su calidad de tal, el mismo advenir que encontramos en la semántica del verbo méllein que a veces acompaña a khrónos. Y si «tiempo» dicho en griego no expresa la línea del tiempo, si esta palabra significa o bien el intervalo y la duración8 como lo primero, es decir, sin presuponer un ilimitado «en el cual» suprimirse, o bien el porvenir que descubre y cumple, no nos sorprende que una palabra griega clave para captar la temporalidad básica sea «día», y decimos «temporalidad básica» insistiendo en el hecho de que para entender algo del tiempo de los griegos debemos esforzarnos por poner entre paréntesis nuestra noción obvia del tiempo ilimitado, observando que, por el contrario, y como hemos sugerido a propósito de aión, «tiempo» es en griego primariamente «un tiempo», es distancia y determinación, y ésta es la condición para que quepa atribuir propiamente «ser». Del día se dice a veces que es «hijo del sol» (Ol. 2.35) porque él es la presencia en la que aparece lo que en cada caso, enfrente, aparece, y tal vez por eso, porque el día es presencia de las cosas y las cosas son siempre pluralidad cambiante, Píndaro dice en la segunda oda olímpica (vv. 31-37) algo así como que los mortales, precisamente ellos, no saben si el día terminará sin temblor, pues el dolor y la tranquilidad son las corrientes que se alternan en la vida humana, y si uno ahora arde en prosperidad divina, también luego la moîra trae dolor, estando también éste sujeto al cambio «en otro tiempo», cambio por el cual se ha dicho que en Grecia las relaciones de tiempo son fundamentalmente relaciones de justicia, pues justicia consiste en dar pago desde la injusticia, es decir, justicia es la alternancia que sobreviene: es vuelco, movimiento, medida: tiempo.9 Sin embargo, no acertaríamos a comprender el día como una noción temporal griega si lo entendiésemos como unidad «en» el tiempo. Lo que ocurre es que la unidad encontrada que llamamos «día» constituye ella misma la noción que hay de tiempo, es decir, el día es el tiempo porque es lo que nosotros llamamos «espacio de tiempo»: porque es «un» tiempo y no «el» tiempo. Los usos que encontramos en Homero indican que con expresiones del tipo «ese día cuando...» no tanto se ubica cronológicamente como se alude a la ocasión, al contenido, a la situación 8 De ahí que a veces khrónos nombre la «edad de la vida» (cf. Fränkel 1955, pp. 19s.), y el adjetivo khroníos, además de «tarde», signifique (como también ocurre con el correspondiente derivado de aión: aioníos) «tener una duración», «ser duradero». 9 Cf. Hom. Il. 4.155-170; Solón fr. 24.3 («en la justicia del tiempo»); fr. 3.14-16 («...no custodian las leyes sagradas de la justicia, que callando conoce a la vez lo acontecido y lo que va a ser luego, y de todos modos retribuye con el tiempo»); Hesíodo, Erg. 754 («pues con el tiempo habrá, también sobre esto, terrible pago»). La conexión tiempo y cambio en Simónides 16 y 22 P («Y en poco tiempo todo lo cambia el dios»), Píndaro, Ol. 12.10-12 («en breve tiempo el dolor cambia en profundo goce»); Nem. 4. 41ss. Cf. también Der Neue Pauly, s.v. Zeitkonzeptionen. Ontology Studies 10, 2010 205Moîra, aión, khrónos y la noción de «Zeitlichkeit» en Sein und Zeit... y la presencia del caso. Por eso del día se dice que «trae», que entrega la posibilidad de lo uno y lo otro.10 Asimismo, el punto de vista narratológico descubre que por ejemplo la estructura temporal de la Ilíada está marcada por un único «gran día», algo que nos conduciría a hablar del carácter fenomenológico primario del decir homérico, pues si el centro del poema es un solo día que cubre muchos cantos es porque ahí, en la mañana que se extiende hasta la noche, toda posibilidad está en juego. Y cuando Alcmán dice en una ocasión (Parth. 37ss.) que de quien hasta el final teje el día sin lágrimas cabe decir que es «feliz» no podemos evitar pensar que de algún modo el día es, como aión, el tiempo-todo de la vida humana. Por último: si el día es el abrirse el mundo, la luz y la presencia, hablar de cierto alguien marcado esencialmente por el día (cf. por ejemplo Semon. 1.3-5; Pi. Pit. 8.95-96) no es sino decir originariamente el ser del hombre. Retomamos finalmente la cuestión de cuál es carácter de nuestra referencia al significado «inicial» de aión y moîra de modo que se aclare un poco en qué sentido hemos hablado de abrir un espacio hermenéutico. Que la estructura de la parte publicada de Ser y tiempo está marcada por el giro que introduce la imposibilidad de pensar integridad y figura (el poder-ser-entero del Dasein) sobre la base de algo que precisamente aparece de mano de esa constatada imposibilidad, a saber: la ilimitada dispersión en el tiempo que implícitamente operaba como fondo del análisis, es una observación de la que se desprende la que resulta ser condición esencial del modo de comprensión hermenéutica que antes introdujimos diciendo que sólo en la asunción de nuestros supuestos puede abrirse el espacio en el que apuntar de algún modo a la dimensión inicial en la cual eran dichas palabras como aión y moîra. En la medida en que la asunción es pura distancia y no un salto exitoso el giro es insuperable, esto es, la operación de hacer relevante nuestras nociones básicas ha de renovarse una y otra vez en el trabajo con los textos; por eso dijimos también que la apertura de un espacio hermenéutico coincide con la exigencia de que acontezca un examen de lo propio, es decir: de que se manifieste siempre de nuevo el carácter secundario de nuestro insustituible fondo de sentido. Antes constatamos que la noción de finitud era lo que cabía dar como significado más básico de aión, y «básico» no era sino un modo de referirnos a esa dimensión en la que los griegos se movían, conforme a la cual decían, pero que no tematizaban; pero eso ocurría siendo precisamente nosotros los incapaces de pensar consecuentemente el límite. Esta consciencia, digamos, ambigua y escindida, tiene que ver con el hecho de que en la parte publicada de Ser y tiempo la problemática del sentido repita en dirección contraria la trayectoria griega, pues si aquí el vuelco va desde la infinitud como fondo incuestionado del análisis hacia la finitud como condición para pensar completud y ser (cf. la Ganzheit 10 Cf. Schadewaldt 1989, p. 123, que a propósito de Arquíloco escribe: «der Tag wird nicht als Zeitpunkt in einer Kette verstanden, sondern konkret wie ein Gefäss, das uns alle umgibt unter der Glocke des Himmels und in dem doch jeder wieder ‚seinen' Tag hat, bestimmt durch die Dinge, die ihm begegnen. Auch wir kennen noch den griechischen Begriff des Ephemeren, was eben dies bedeutet». Aida Míguez Barciela206 Ontology Studies 10, 2010 del Dasein), lo que con Grecia ocurre es justamente contrario: siendo khrónos inicialmente la distancia cualificada11, la actitud fenomenológica se produce en dirección la indiferencia del «ahora» (nûn), es decir, hacia la uniformidad, descualificación y continuidad ilimitada que se sigue de tomar en consideración el tiempo-lapso. A una con esto ocurre que la noción de límite deja de tener propiamente sentido; sólo hay, o mejor, no hay (pues en Grecia siempre valdrá que ser es límite, que lo carente de límite es no-ente), la serie ilimitada del «ahora».12 Correspondiéndose a la inversa con la situación griega, la noción de temporalidad finita que aparece en el desarrollo de Sein und Zeit una vez que se recupera la cuestión del sentido no tiene el carácter de supuesto, pues mientras la cuestión del sentido permanece desplazada, el sentido obvio es precisamente la secuencia ilimitada, la misma que llama la atención sobre sí en la imposibilidad de seguir pensando las estructuras encontradas sin admitir que ser es límite. De todos modos, el que nosotros tengamos que retornar fracasadamente a la finitud impide que ésta pueda ser proclamada como la «nueva» noción de sentido: la temporalidad originaria no sustituye sin más el fondo de obviedad que opera en ausencia de cuestión, aunque sí pone a la luz la incongruencia moderna frente a la constatación fenomenológica de que ser es límite. Tal vez la descripción heideggeriana de una temporalidad previa a la nivelación teórica no es sino un modo de recibir aquello griego primario sobre cuya retención se sustenta la noción moderna de tiempo, un modo de hacer sonar a lo lejos aquello cuya pérdida dejó el tiempo ilimitado, y quizá sea justo ésta la manera de reconocer y a la vez permanecer en la secundariedad del propio sentido.13 Expresémoslo provisionalmente también así: Zeitlichkeit es, en cuanto 11 Es esencial que la primariedad del tiempo-lapso no sólo sea una cuestión léxica, sino concerniente a la estructura misma de la lengua griega: la observación fenomenológica del paradigma del verbo griego expone que en el cruce de dimensiones del que ahí se trata la «línea del tiempo» no está expresada por la dimensión «tiempo» (ni «modo»), sino que ésta (a saber: cursivo, factivo y estativo o, también: presente, aoristo y perfecto, cf. Martínez Marzoa 1999b, pp. 15-23) significa el intervalo (khrónos) y los tres aspectos de la comparecencia del intervalo. 12 Cf. Der Neue Pauly, s.v. Zeitkonzeptionen, sobre la puesta en conceptos de la pérdida que es la propia Grecia en la Física de Aristóteles: «Im Unterschied zum kairós (dem handlungstheoretisch bedeutsamen Begriff des günstigen Augenblicks, der für eine inhaltlich qualifizierbare Gelegenheit steht) ist der formale Begriff des nyn rein funktional bestimmt: Das nyn ("Jetztpunkt") dient zur Eingrenzung einer bestimmten Zeitdauer und vermittelt in sich zwischen Vergangenem und Zukünftigem, so dass es als Unterteilungs wie als Kontinuitätsprinzip der erstmals in ihrem Kontinuumscharakter betonten Zeit fungiert. Vor dem Hintergrund dieser Doppelfunktion des nyn legt Aristoteles auch als erster die Betonung auf den Kontinuumscharakter der Zeit, den er von dem analogen Kontinuumscharakter der Veränderung und diesen wiederum von demjenigen der Grösse herleitet. Das Kontinuum wird dabei (in einer wiederum als zirkulär angreifbaren Definition) als etwas Ausgedehntes und in sich Zusammenhängendes bestimmt, das sich immer weiter zerlegen lässt und zwar nicht in Unteilbares, sondern in Teile, die selbst wiederum in Teilbares, also in Kontinua, teilbar sind». 13 Zeitlichkeit es el desquiciamiento de die Zeit, no la posición de una nueva noción de tiempo, sino el reconocimiento de la noción de tiempo que vale en la modernidad. Si ella es lo primario, entonces nuestro único acceso a un «primario» no es nada más que la asunción de la secundariedad del seOntology Studies 10, 2010 207Moîra, aión, khrónos y la noción de «Zeitlichkeit» en Sein und Zeit... quiebra del secundario die Zeit, la aproximación hermenéutica al primario khrónos griego, por lo cual si cabe hablar de una presunta coincidencia entre, por un lado, la noción de Sinn von Sein que aparece en Ser y tiempo, por otro, aquello conforme a lo cual decían los dicentes griegos arcaicos y clásicos, sólo puede ser en el sentido de comprender la vocación del proyecto Ser y tiempo como ya hermenéutica, como ya un esfuerzo por comprender esos y otros decires. Referencias bibliográficas Cancik, H., Schneider, H. (1996). Der Neue Pauly. Enzyklopädie der Antike, Stuttgart-Weimar. Fränkel, H. (1955). Wege und Formen frühgriechischen Denkens, München. Heidegger, M. (2001). Sein und Zeit, 18. Auflage, Tübingen. Martínez Marzoa, F. (1999a). Heidegger y su tiempo, Madrid. Martínez Marzoa, F. (1999b). Lengua y tiempo, Madrid. Martínez Marzoa, (2008). "El pensamiento de Heidegger ante la brutalidad contemporánea", en F. Duque (ed.), Heidegger. Sendas que vienen, Madrid, pp. 67-81. Schadewaldt, W. (1989). Die frühgriechische Lyrik, Frankfurt am Main. cundario que es nuestro tiempo (cf. Martínez Marzoa 1999a, 2008). Si desde esto se pretende hablar de algo así como una «superación» de la modernidad, entonces ésta no consiste en otra cosa que en hacerse cargo de que ella es el mundo, la estructura o la época definida por el hecho de que la verdad sea compatibilidad con la secuencia infinita que opera como fondo de sentido, esto es: la asunción de la ausencia de comunidad, de la mercancía, del enunciado, etcétera. Respecto al problema de hasta qué punto Heidegger es siempre consecuente con que la tarea sea la asunción y no la proclamación de una nueva verdad, cf. ibid. Quedaría pendiente ver cómo se presenta esta misma cuestión vista desde los escritos donde Heidegger habla no de «temporalidad», sino de «cosa» y «poema».

Quantum Mechanics Unscrambled* Jean-Michel Delhôtel1† Abstract. Is quantum mechanics about 'states'? Or is it basically another kind of probability theory? It is argued that the elementary formalism of quantum mechanics operates as a well-justified alternative to 'classical' instantiations of a probability calculus. Its providing a general framework for prediction accounts for its distinctive traits, which one should be careful not to mistake for reflections of any strange ontology. The suggestion is also made that quantum theory unwittingly emerged, in Schrödinger's formulation, as a 'lossy' by-product of a quantum-mechanical variant of the Hamilton-Jacobi equation. As it turns out, the effectiveness of quantum theory qua predictive algorithm makes up for the computational impracticability of that master equation. "Our present quantum mechanical formalism is a peculiar mixture describing in part laws of Nature, in part incomplete human information about Nature – all scrambled up together by Bohr into an omelette that nobody has seen how to unscramble. Yet we think the unscrambling is a prerequisite for any further advance in basic physical theory. ...if quantum theory were not successful pragmatically, we would have no interest in its interpretation. It is precisely because of the enormous success of the QM mathematical formalism that it becomes crucially important to learn what that mathematics means. To find a rational physical interpretation of the QM formalism ought to be considered the top priority research problem of theoretical physics; until this is accomplished, all other theoretical results can only be provisional and temporary." – E.T. Jaynes * This paper is the final (v3) version of a 2004 preprint, to the original title of which it reverts. The previous two Arxiv.org postings should henceforth be ignored, with the understanding that no further update is intended. For those readers who missed the hint, the title makes slightly ironical reference to Daniel Dennett's Consciousness Explained. Needless to say, this implies no pretence of providing any 'final' answer to some vexing questions, but should be regarded as an invitation to tackle those without smugness and prejudice. † [email protected] 2 1. Quantum mechanics without 'states'? "The best response so far is from Pauli, who at least admits that the use of the word 'state' [Zustand] for the psi-function is quite disreputable 2 ." – E. Schrödinger Should we follow Pauli and refrain from thinking of Hilbert space vectors or 'wave functions' as representatives of quantum states – given what the word 'state' is intended to mean: how something is and, by implication, what makes it such (which properties it has etc.) ? Given the lack of a satisfactory, widely agreed upon 'interpretation' of the basic formalism of quantum theory – some eight decades after its inception – this cannot be lightly dismissed as an idle question. Back in the late 1920s, Niels Bohr pointed out that, whilst observation implies "interactions with suitable agencies of measurement, not belonging to the system", it is also the case that "the definition of the state of a physical system, as ordinarily understood, claims the elimination of all external disturbances 3 ." In atomic physics, however, interactions implied by the operation of probing devices can never be assumed to have a negligible effect on our descriptive and predictive abilities. As a result, the idea of an individual system 'having a state' or its 'being in' one can no longer, in general, be consistently maintained: "an unambiguous definition of the state of a system is naturally no longer possible, and there can be no question of causality in the ordinary sense of the word." Nothing in the quantum-mechanical formalism would qualify as a meaningful representative of the state of a physical system. Whoever, by contrast, keeps regarding a Hilbert space vector as one such representative would overlook a key lesson of the quantum 'revolution', mistaking its epistemic and pragmatic implications for manifestations of a baffling ontology: one according to which quantumstuff could at once be – no kidding – 'something like' this or that, or perhaps this and that, but neither this nor that or partly this and partly that. Throughout his discussions with Bohr and until his last breath, Albert Einstein remained convinced that quantum mechanics is irrevocably inadequate as a truly fundamental physical theory, since it does not fulfil the descriptive and explanatory aims which, he believed, are those of such a theory. Einstein was adamant that fundamental physical laws cannot "consist in relations between probabilities for the real things, but [should consist in] relations concerning the things themselves 4 ." As he saw it, the probabilistic use of 'state vectors', or wave functions, would rather indicate that they refer to ensembles. Whichever way Einstein conceived 5 of such ensembles, he persisted in regarding the 'mechanics' of Heisenberg or Schrödinger as a makeshift, whilst keeping 2 Erwin Schrödinger, referring to the EPR challenge (Einstein et al. 1935) in a letter to Albert Einstein dated 13 July 1935; quoted by Fine 1986, p.74. 3 Bohr 1928; quoted from Jammer 1989, p.366. 4 Einstein, quoted by Fine 1986, pp.100-101. 5 Deltete and Guy 1990. 3 up hopes that it would, sooner or later, give way to a truly worthy account of the interactions and properties of microphysical systems. Bohr's and Einstein's attitudes sharply contrast with those of some of their most prominent colleagues, and in particular Dirac's. Indeed, the entire introduction to his Principles of Quantum Mechanics is devoted to quantum states and to their representation 6 . Dirac regards the task of setting up a novel kind of mechanics as a necessary response to the recognition of "a limit to the gentleness with which observations can be made 7 " on physical systems. The principle of superposition would be "one of the most fundamental and drastic 8 " of a new set of "laws of nature", which it would be necessary to introduce because such disturbance cannot be eliminated. That much sounds close enough to Bohr's own views. However, Dirac also maintains that, as "a mathematical procedure 9 ", expressing a state as a superposition of various other states "is always permissible, independent of any reference to physical conditions, like the procedure of resolving a wave into Fourier components. 10 " Permissible as such an expression may be, one should be wary of interpreting relationships between linearly superposed states, since those relationships "cannot be explained in terms of familiar physical concepts 11 ." Dirac is well aware of the difficulties that a state-based account of quantum mechanics is bound to raise: we certainly "cannot in the classical sense picture a system being partly in each of two states and see the equivalence of this to the system being completely in some other state. There is an entirely new idea involved, to which one must get accustomed and in terms of which one must proceed to build up an exact mathematical theory, without having any detailed classical picture 12 ." By way of addressing the "new idea", Dirac comes close to venturing an ontological reading of superpositions: "When a state is formed by the superposition of two other states, it will have properties that are in some vague way [!] intermediate between those of the two original states and that approach [?] more or less closely to those of either of them according to the greater or less 'weight' attached to this state in the superposition process 13 ." Aware that it is all getting shaky, Dirac hastens to add: "the intermediate character of the state formed by superposition thus expresses itself through the probability of a particular result for an observation being intermediate between the corresponding probabilities for the original states, not through the result itself being intermediate between the corresponding results for the original states 14 ." But there remains the thornier question of hypothetically possessed properties in relation to their presumed numerical, empirically accessed indicators (the measurement results). Does it make any sense to think of such properties as in some way 'intermediate' between observationally ascertainable attributes – if the latter are what eigenvalues denote? Dirac brushes aside questions that one may be tempted to ask regarding the definiteness of 'possessed values' between observations, regarding them as 'metaphysical' issues of 6 Dirac 1958. 7 Dirac 1958, p.4. 8 Ibid. 9 Ibid., p.12. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid.(italics added). 13 Ibid., p.13 (italics added). 14 Ibid. The whole sentence appears in italics in Dirac's text. 4 no concern to the physicist 15 . The matter is settled: the principle of superposition derives both its necessity and its effectiveness from the recognition of an irreducible susceptibility of microphysical objects to disturbance, which just "demand[s] indeterminacy in the results of observation 16 ." Once we have come to terms with the irreducible character of that susceptibility, developing a probabilistic framework with inherent linear features – superposition obliges – should not give rise to any qualms. A view of quantum mechanics as fundamentally about the specification, evolution and structural changes of 'quantum states' crystallized with the first abstract formulations of the principles of the new theory. After Dirac, von Neumann's influential monograph 17 greatly contributed to promoting a conception of quantum mechanics where 'quantum states' are pervasive (it is no coincidence that von Neumann should have been led, in that very same endeavor, to confronting a 'measurement problem' he could not solve 18 ). However, in spite of Dirac's claims, an idea of quantum state was certainly not forced upon the physicists as a direct response to theoretical puzzles, e.g. the black-body problem or the discrete patterns of atomic spectra. Heisenberg's initial matrix formalism ignored such states, the very idea of which was fundamentally at odds with his focus on physical, experimentally accessible quantities and the way they evolved. Nonetheless, Dirac's and von Neumann's authority prevailed, and we have been stuck with those 'quantum states' ever since. Like it or not, thinking habits and word usage are intertwined and not so easily disentangled. Thus, referring to states, however loosely (or especially so), can breed some ill-advised expectations. One can therefore do worse – much worse – than be mindful of the critical attitude of some, at least, of the founding fathers; for they may not, after all, have been the elderly holdouts they have often been portrayed as. As we shall see in Section 2, a host of variously convincing, but certainly significant derivations of the elementary formalism of quantum theory converge towards the conclusion that it functions as a specific kind of linear predictive scheme, which differs in some essential respects from ordinary ('classical') ways of evaluating and computing probabilities. All those derivations have the common characteristic of proceeding from a minimal set of assumptions that are essentially neutral when it comes the 'quantal', microscopic or even physical nature of the 'systems' the scheme is applied to. Indeed, that scheme may well be relevant to conceptual domains and areas of experience which have little, if anything, to do with the subject matter of physical science. 'State' assignments would then be just a way of encapsulating a compendium of probabilities of possible outcomes ('events' or measurement results), any such assignment being referred to what will be, lacking a better word, called a preparation. 15 In a letter to Einstein (dated 18 November 1950), Schrödinger expresses his dissatisfaction with Dirac's and others' use of probability, which in his view just covers up basic problems or inadequacies: "It seems to me that the concept of probability is terribly mishandled these days. Probability surely has as its substance a statement as to whether something is or is not the case – an uncertain statement, to be sure. But nevertheless it has meaning only if one is indeed convinced that the something in question quite definitely either is or is not the case. A probabilistic assertion presupposes the full reality of its subject." (Przibram 1967, p.37). 16 Dirac 1958, p.14. 17 Von Neumann 1932. 18 And that no one can claim to have solved yet – unsurprisingly enough, if the problem does not so much need to be solved as to be dissolved. 5 The word 'preparation' should not be taken too literally, e.g. as implying operations that would, or could, be consciously performed on a system. The assignment might just as well be the result of an informed guess at the 'predictive potential' of a given experimental set-up or observational situation. In any case, the resulting 'state' would have no objective significance besides its predictive function. Making use of such a construct would require (i) specifying how it transforms with time; and (ii) an effective algorithm for computing outcome probabilities given its initial or time-evolved expression. Such specification and rules are precisely what quantum theory provides. Those realists who believe that no physical theory is worth its salt unless it delivers objective truths about a pre-existing and pre-structured reality 'out there' will certainly recoil at the above characterization of quantum mechanics. However, acknowledging the chief predictive aim of the theory, and that its mathematical structure is wholly determined by the basic requirements such a purpose entails, need not amount to one's surrendering to some barren form of operationalism. Rather, recognizing its fundamentally predictive role is a necessary first step towards a positive reassessment of the nature and scope of the standard quantum-mechanical formalism. As it will be argued in Section 4, a view of quantum theory as a linear predictive scheme can be consistently maintained together with a principle-based, if tentative account of the occurrence of and the need for quantization. Quantum theory, qua linear predictive scheme, will be seen to emerge as a result of selecting, either unwittingly (as it seems to have been the case in the historical development of quantum mechanics) or in full awareness of what such selection presupposes and implies, a certain class of solutions to Schrödinger's equation (itself the outcome of linearizing a dynamical 'master' equation). Valuable light may thus be shed on vexed questions, such as whether standard quantum mechanics can be said to provide a complete picture of dynamics in the microrealm, or whether resorting to probability is indispensable. 6 2. Quantum theory as a predictive scheme Erwin with his psi can do Calculations quite a few. But one thing has not been seen Just what psi really mean. – F. Bloch In the early 1940s Jean-Louis Destouches, a physicist with philosophical inclinations, made a rather remarkable, if long-winded and not entirely satisfactory attempt at deriving basic features of quantum theory from a minimal set of operational assumptions 19 . Destouches started from the idea that distinct measurements afford different resolutions of a given quantity A, associated with different partitions of the 'spectrum' of its admissible values. It is assumed preparations exist, for which measuring A with a given resolution yields an outcome that falls with certainty within a given interval . Destouches assigns to any such preparation a predictor 20 , such that the probability , and a suitable set of can be chosen so as to form an orthogonal basis of an appropriate 'predictor space'. Owing to this structure, any preparation to which a measurement of A at the given resolution is relevant can be assigned a predictor, in the form of a vector that can be expanded in the { } basis, with the requirement that . Destouches's next essential move consists in assuming that, for any quantity A, the algorithm for computing the probabilities of measurement outcomes given a 'X preparation' should be independent of the chosen partitioning of the spectrum of A, i.e. of the choice of basis 21 . The upshot is a probability function of the form , where x is a coefficient in a suitable linear expansion of the predictor X. The expression of f follows from a consistency requirement that implies the satisfaction of the Cauchy functional equation . Destouches leaves it as an empirical matter to determine the value of k. However, a formal proof that k must be equal to 2 was supplied a few years later by P. Destouches-Février 22 . The proof, which relies on a theorem by Birkhoff and von Neumann 23 , boils down to ensuring consistency between the projective (inner product) structure of the predictor space and the requirement that probabilities add up to 1. 19 Destouches 1942. 20 Destouches uses the expression 'élément de prévision'. 21 Somewhat similarly, Saunders (2004) has recently shown that, if the rule for computing expectation values depends only on conditions imposed on a preparation, then requiring that those expectation values be the same regardless of differences in 'descriptions' of the corresponding experiments is sufficient for constraining the rule to be Born's. 22 Février 1946, 1956. 23 The projective character of a framework with a built-in nondistributive orthocomplemented lattice structure implies as well as requires the existence of an involutive anti-isomorphism over the reference field – the complex number field in the case of quantum theory (Birkhoff and von Neumann 1936, reprinted in Hooker 1975, p.14). 7 Several decades after Destouches, other significant attempts at a partial reconstruction of quantum theory were, in particular, made independently by Y. Tikochinsky 24 and A. Caticha 25 . The idea of both is to assign numbers (real or complex) as an auxiliary device in the process of working out the probability of 'transition' between an initial (I) and a target (T) configuration 26 . (I) refers to an experimentally given or theoretically assumed preparation and (T) to the end product of an observation or measurement (whereby a new preparation effectively obtains). As sequences of transitions, mutually exclusive 'parallel' transitions, or both, are considered, assigned numbers – amplitudes – must combine in a consistent fashion. The relevant consistency constraints amount to requiring associativity and distributivity, and they result in an essentially unique form for the composition rules: those are the sum and product rules ('Feynman rules') which, in standard quantum theory, respectively apply to amplitudes associated with parallel and successive transitions. Given the assumption that the corresponding probabilities are mutually independent, the product rule for amplitudes then leads 27 , for the probability as a function of the total amplitude, to what is in effect the same Cauchy relation that is crucial to Destouches's derivation, hence , where k is a positive real number. Identity of the endpoints in the 'self-connection' warrants28 setting as the probabilistic expression of a tautology. Breaking down into a complete set  iK of alternative subtransitions, given the sum and product rules for amplitudes , leads to k=2 through the matching of with the requirement that the probabilities of all mutually exclusive subtransitions add up to 1. Allowing amplitudes to be complex, the amplitude for the inverse transition that is obtained by exchanging endpoints is shown 29 to be equal either to the amplitude itself or to the complex conjugate of that amplitude. The former is ruled out because there would then be choices of amplitudes for which vanishes (this is the nearest Tikochinsky comes to justifying the occurrence of complex amplitudes in quantum theory). The value 2 of k is, there again, found to reflect consistency between the additivity of probabilities and the projective structure of the predictor space 30 . Let the two 'kets' and be predictors that are assigned respectively to two preparations and , and A be an observable, the measurement of which is used to distinguish (statistically) between the two preparations – think about one using the relative numbers of Heads and Tails outcomes in repeated tosses of two (not necessarily 24 Tikochinsky 1988a,1988b. 25 Caticha 1998. 26 The word must be understood here without any spatial connotation. 27 Tikochinsky 1988b. 28 There is no need to introduce, as Tikochinsky (1988b) does, time-reversed 'transitions' in order to ensure that both endpoints refer 'to the same time': temporal considerations are no more required for working out the probability rule than they had been needed for deriving the composition rules for amplitudes. 29 Tikochinsky 1988b. 30 As S. Saunders points out about his own derivation of the Born rule, "examination of the proof shows that the dependence of probabilities on the modulus square of the expansion coefficients of the state ultimately derives from the fact that we are concerned with unitary evolutions on Hilbert space, specifically an inner-product space, and not some general normed linear topological space." (Saunders 2002) 8 fair) coins in order to evaluate the 'statistical distance' between them. Given preparation , the probability of the result ak associated with eigenvector of A is . In the context that is associated with choosing A, the expression of the statistical distance between the two preparations is then 31 Two preparations that correspond to the same eigenket of A are thus trivially indistinguishable, whereas they are statistically as far apart as two preparations can be if the corresponding predictors are two distinct eigenvectors of A. The sum reduces to a single term if one of the preparations corresponds to an A eigenket assignment. The statistical distance is then identical with the Hilbert space angle between the rays associated with those preparations. This requires a suitable reference observable to be chosen, relative to which a given preparation is statistically gauged. Insofar as it requires choosing a reference set of mutually compatible observables (e.g. all of those that commute with A), this connection between statistical and angular distance can be regarded as an expression of context-dependence. As for the relative phases of amplitudes, their justification must be looked for in transformational, grouptheoretically regulated properties that determine the form of the operator representatives of relevant, e.g. spin observables and their mutual relationships 32 . The 'statistical algorithm of quantum theory 33 ' (SAQM) can also be formulated without any mention of amplitudes, e.g. in terms of probability tables 34 and rules for extracting from any such table the probability of a given outcome. This requires choosing a set of reference measurements in terms of which the probability tables can be set up. Such measurements are 'mutually unbiased' just in case, if experimental conditions are such that measuring one observable in the set is certain to yield a given outcome, then all the possible outcomes of measuring any other observable in that set are equally likely. An example of such a set is given by the spin-1⁄2 observables x, y and z that correspond to mutually orthogonal directions x, y and z. Observables in such a set are as statistically distant as comparable types of measurement can be, so that redundancy in the information supplied by measuring any two such observables is minimal. The observables in question can then be regarded as providing an optimal reference for setting up a probability table and deriving from it a density matrix. If N+1 mutually unbiased basis sets are available, a NN density matrix can be constructed from the probability table and, conversely, the probability table is uniquely derived from the density matrix. The table is only constrained by the requirement that the probabilities of the outcomes of measuring any given reference observable add up to 1, and that the density matrix derived from that table admit no negative eigenvalue. The same conditions have to be satisfied in the composite case. If it is additionally required that the probabilities of the outcomes of reference measurements performed on subsystems should not depend on measurements one may (choose to) perform on the other 'complementary' subsystems within the composite, then it follows that N 2 – 1 real 31 Wootters 1981. 32 See Lévy-Leblond 1974 for an enlightening discussion. 33 Redhead 1987, p.5. 34 Wootters 1986. 9 numbers are needed for setting up a complete probability table, and this number is just the same as that needed to specify a density matrix in the 'full' tensor product space. The physical (ontological) neutrality of the basic requirements is clear enough, as is the fact that, claims of nonlocality notwithstanding, all of the predictions of quantum theory in the composite case can be derived from such tables. An important aspect of the above derivations of both the rules for amplitudes and that for probability is that they are essentially independent of assumptions regarding the nature – 'quantal' or whatever – of the systems to which the predictions apply. That much is also true of Lucien Hardy's tightly worked out derivation 35 of the mathematical backbone of quantum mechanics from four or five basic axioms. Hardy's ab initio reconstruction leads him to conclude that "quantum theory, when stripped of all its incidental structure, is simply a new type of probability theory 36 ." In fact, switching from the SAQM to a vector space realization of classical probability theory comes down to accepting or rejecting a mere continuity requirement. Four only of Hardy's axioms actually contribute to the derivation. The remaining one (HA0) serves only the purpose of specifying how computed probabilities relate to the collection of relevant data: this is achieved, in practice, through the identification of the probabilities of measurement results with limiting relative frequencies. Nothing, however, in Hardy's subsequent derivation of the SAQM depends on his preference for a frequency-based understanding of probability 37 . Hardy's approach builds upon the idea that a given setting of an appropriate preparation device fully determines the probabilities of all 'non-null' outcomes of measurements one may perform on its output. It is reasonable to assume that there exists a minimum number 38 K of probabilities, knowledge of which suffices to characterize the predictive yield or 'potential' of a given preparation. This yield is encapsulated in what Hardy chooses to call a state, presumably to make the connection to quantum theory as explicit as possible from the outset. This choice of terminology is misleading, however, for it will soon clearly appear that the framework Hardy works out is primarily aimed at yielding probabilistic predictions, whatever the subject matter. This should be borne in mind, given Hardy's common reference to "systems in some state 39 " or his speaking of "ascrib[ing] a state to a preparation 40 ". A 'Hardy state' is entirely specified through the listing of K outcome probabilities, subject to completeness and closure conditions. Hardy now takes the crucial step of 35 Hardy 2001a,b. 36 Hardy 2001b, p.1. 37 Hardy's introduction of 'mixed states' as linear combinations, with suitable probabilistic 'weights', of what he calls pure states (see text below), suggests that the primary view of probability that (HA0) expresses is overlaid with 'subjective' aspects. However, a Bayesian alternative to (HA0) (see Schack 2002) is unlikely to satisfy many physicists, reluctant as they are to accept in their field an epistemic conception of probability (i.e. of probability as 'degree of belief'); either because they feel it is simply inadequate in the context of handling empirical data, or for fear that their ideal of objectivity might be threatened. 38 Hardy's reference to K as a "number of degrees of freedom" suggests a parallel with classical mechanics that is unwarranted – indeed almost incongruous – in this context, and is therefore best avoided. 39 Hardy 2001b, p.2. 40 Ibid. 10 writing those probabilities as components of a K-dimensional vector p. 'Pure states 41 ' are by definition those primary vectors that cannot be written as convex sums of other vectors in the relevant set. Hardy regards it as a "driving intuition" that such "pure states represent definite (non-probabilistic) states of the system 42 ". However, such an ontological construal of 'states' detracts from the operational foundation of the formalism, where the whole point of introducing them is to provide a convenient linear representation of probability distributions for measurement outcomes (there is no question here of hazily conceived propensities of physical or other kinds of systems). In effect, what those 'pure states' provide are reference sets in the following sense: to any such pure state, there corresponds a vector pj, the j th component of which is set equal to 1 whilst all others are 0. This is associated with a setting of the preparation device for which the j th outcome is certain to obtain if the relevant test is actually performed. Alternatively a vector rj, such that rj.pk=jk, can also be assigned to the corresponding 'yes-no measurement'. Generalizing to an arbitrary preparation and any choice of measurement, the outcome probability is given by the scalar product r.p of suitably chosen r and p vectors. That Hardy's states can be indifferently 43 represented as p or r vectors bears further witness to their being close relatives to Destouches's predictors and correspondingly devoid of ontological significance. Assuming that there is a set of 'states' whose members can be distinguished from each other by a 'single shot' measurement, there is no reason a priori for expecting their minimum number N to be equal to K. Nonetheless, a structural relation presumably exists between those two numbers; a relation Hardy ascribes to "a certain constancy in nature 44 ". Regardless of whether nature has any relevance to the matter, it is a sensible prerequisite for setting up an optimal framework for prediction that the predictive yield of a preparation, as encapsulated in a 'predictive vector', should properly (functionally) connect to distinguishability within an outcome set. The (HA1) axiom asserts this connection, with the additional ('simplicity') requirement that K, as a function of N, take the smallest value that is consistent with the full axiom set. If the mode of preparation, or any conditions that prompt the assignment of a given predictor, imply that certain measurement outcomes are precluded, the maximum number of distinguishable states, hence the dimension of the predictor space, can be reduced accordingly. This axiom (HA2) conforms to the expectation that the probability of occurrence of an outcome should not depend on whether the set it belongs to is embedded in some larger set. Axiom (HA3) then addresses those cases where "a preparation device ejects its system in such a way that it [the system] can be regarded as made up of two subsystems 45 " (1) and (2). If N1 and N2 are the numbers of distinguishable Hardy 'states' that relate to the performance of measurements on (1) and (2) respectively, then the number of distinguishable 'states' associated with joint (1)-(2) preparations cannot be less than N1N2. (HA3) requires N to be, in all circumstances, equal to N1N2. The Ki = K(Ni) components of a vector p (i) are 41 The null state is excluded from the set of pure states. 42 Ibid. (italics added). 43 Ibid., 2. 44 Hardy 2001a, 6.14. 45 Ibid. 6.16. 11 measurement probabilities relative to the (i)-member (i = 1 or 2) of any (1)-(2) pair. The construction of a 'joint' probability matrix in which the outcome probabilities for measurements performed on (1) and (2) separately are compounded suggests that the number K of real parameters that are necessary and sufficient for defining a (1)-(2) 'state' is also just equal to the product K1K2 (this suggestion is also part of (HA3)): "there should not be more entanglement than necessary 46 " for prediction to be successfully (optimally) achieved. (HA2) and (HA3) entail that K(N+1) > K(N) and K(N 2 ) = K 2 (N), and the only polynomial in N that satisfies those conditions is K(N) = N r . Now, in quantum theory, if the relevant Hilbert space is of dimension N, then N 2 – 1 independent real numbers are required to specify a density matrix (or, in usual parlance, to fully determine a 'state'). This is also the number of independent entries in Wootters's probability table, which was seen to follow from requiring, besides the normalization of probability, that the probabilities of the results of measurements performed on any subsystem should not depend on which measurement is actually (or intended to be) performed on the complementary subsystem(s). Insofar as it does comply with Wootters's 'local accessibility' thesis ("any set of measurements which are just sufficient for determining the states of the subsystems are, when performed jointly, also just sufficient for determining the state of the combined system 47 ") quantum theory qua predictive framework optimally uses information supplied by measurements performed separately on subsystems. It is satisfying that Wootters's conjecture: that any theory which satisfies local accessibility through the optimality condition 48 g(N1N2) = g(N1) + g(N2) + g(N1)g(N2) would be such that g(N) = N r – 1, with r a positive integer, happens to be vindicated by Hardy's (HA1-2-3) axioms, since those imply that K(N) = g(N) + 1 = N r . Given the simplicity requirement that (HA1) includes, we are left with only two kinds of scheme, depending on whether r equals 1 or 2. The first one (K = N, r = 1) corresponds to a vector space realization of the classical probability calculus, in which the number of parameters needed to probabilistically characterize a preparation is equal to the maximum number of distinguishable 'states'. Suppose, for example, that the set-up includes an apparatus that releases either red or green balls. The K = 2 probabilities of finding a ball to be red or to be green exhaust the specification of the 'state', whilst the maximum number of distinguishable 'pure states' is obviously N = 2: a single red/green measurement will at most distinguish between those two colors. It is, however, conceivable that the equality of K and N might not always be satisfied, and the SAQM, for which K = N 2 , appears to be a case in point. Real Hilbert spaces are actually ruled out 49 by (HA3) : for those spaces and specifying 'states' in the bipartite case would then require more (K > K1K2) than can provide data gathered separately on the two subsystems 50 , thereby violating local accessibility. Complex numbers, therefore, appear to be a necessary 46 Hardy 2001b, p.10. 47 Wootters 1990, p. 44. 48 Wootters 1990. 49 For a counterexample, see Wootters 1990, p.44. 50 Hilbert spaces over the quaternions – if one should ever care to consider such possibilities – would require strictly less (K < K1K2). 12 ingredient in the kind of linear predictive scheme Destouches tentatively initiated, of which Wootters hypothesized some essential features and which Hardy successfully derives from his simple set of axioms. More light has recently been shed on the relationship between complex numbers and -composition. A linear operator  has been shown51 to exist, such that the joint probability for any ordered pair (E,F) of locally 'observable' positive operator-valued measures takes the trace form tr((EF)).  turns out to be unique in the case of complex Hilbert spaces (the proof falls short of establishing that  is, or has to be, a density – statistical – operator). Uniqueness follows because the set {EF} forms a complete basis for Hermitian operators. It is as yet unknown whether this only holds in the complex case, although it is highly likely: when the field is complex, the operator space of the tensor product is known to be isomorphic to the tensor product of the original operator spaces. By contrast, the dimensionality of the space of symmetric operators on a real Hilbert space is strictly less than that of the (complex) vector space of Hermitian operators over the base space, thus preventing  to be uniquely specified. If normalization is not assumed, all of the predictively useful information a N-dimensional density matrix  encapsulates amounts to that which is supplied by a Hardy vector whose components are K = N 2 probabilities. The equivalence holds because any Hermitian operator which admits a NN matrix representative can also be written as a linear combination, with real coefficients, of K = N 2 projection operators. Writing those K operators as the components of a vector E, then p = tr(E). The most general expression of probability is tr(A), where A is a positive operator such that 52 A = r.E. Whatever essential difference there is between 'quantal' and 'classical' frameworks boils down to the composition of the sets of allowed p and r vectors. The split occurs with axiom (HA4), which asserts the existence of a continuous reversible transformation along a path connecting two arbitrary 'pure states'. This is directly linked to 'superpositions' of states being allowed in the r = 2 case: a Hardy state can then be gradually (continuously, reversibly) transformed into another, and the 'in-between' states are linear combinations of those two states (the continuous distribution of points on the surface of the Bloch sphere illustrates that property of quantum-theoretic 'states' in the two-level case). In contrast, 'classical' (K = N) pure Hardy states form a discrete set (compare the red and green ball example). It is somewhat ironical that classical probability theory should be characterized by a necessity to 'jump' between 'pure states', whereas the trait that singles out quantum theory among the schemes that satisfy Hardy's other axioms would be the existence of continuous transformations between its 'states'. Hardy suggests that the necessity to 'jump' from a 'classical state' corresponding to, say, a ball being in one box to that corresponding to its being in another merely reflects our crude partitioning of possibilities into what just appears to us to be clear-cut alternatives. It is quite hard, to say the least, to figure out how certain human (perceptual?) limitations could determine the type of Hardy scheme that should be selected as adequate. Why should a K = N 2 framework replace its 'classical' K = N 51 Fuchs 2002. 52 Hardy 2001a, 5 & 8.7. 13 counterpart as our means of investigation 'reach out' to a (sub)atomic realm 'where' our perception cannot guide us and our rational expectations are thus likely to be challenged? This is, at any rate, idle speculation: nothing in the content of Hardy's axioms warrants ontological preconceptions about systems and their 'modes of being', let alone invocations of 'natural' limits to our cognitive or perceptual capacities. The most general kind of time evolution that is consistent with all the axioms is a linear and completely positive map on the space of operators on Hilbert space, such that the trace (or normalization coefficient in the pure case) does not increase. Unitary evolution obtains if it is required that the corresponding transformation should also be invertible and that it should preserve the trace, whereas 'reduction' means net trace decrease, which is accompanied by the increase of the von Neumann entropy. Updating the representation upon acquisition of new information is subject to the same basic constraints in classical (probability) and quantum theory. However, the updating rules reflect the structural features of each particular framework 53 . Hardy's axioms – invocation of 'states' notwithstanding – provide no grounds for believing that any kind of physical 'collapse' accompanies the updating process. 3. Prediction and beyond "...I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics... Nobody knows how it can be like that." – R.P. Feynman Prédire n'est pas expliquer. – R. Thom None of the derivations of the SAQM we have reviewed hinges on any assumption regarding the nature, 'quantal' or 'classical', of physical systems. A probabilistic formalism of the same kind might well turn out to be applicable, with benefit, to disciplines that have little, if anything, to do with the concerns of physicists 54 . One might also maintain that operational effectiveness in anticipating results of measurements is all that one should ask of a physical theory, and therefore all that quantum mechanics can realistically provide. Asking for 'more' would not be sensible, confusing as it does the anticipative and predictive aims of science with 'metaphysical' yearnings that cannot be substantiated. Many, however, will certainly side with Einstein, who once expressed his opinion on the matter in a pretty harsh way: "If that were so then physics could only claim the interest of shopkeepers and engineers; the whole thing would be a wretched bungle 55 ." Physics, indeed, would not be half as 53 Despite appearances, 'state vector collapse' may not radically differ from the ordinary Bayesian update of 'classical' probabilities; see Fuchs 2002. 54 See Aerts and Gabora 2004 for an application of the same kind of Hilbert space-based scheme to the classification and combination of concepts. 55 In a letter to Schrödinger, quoted from Przibram 1967, p.39. 14 exciting if all it could offer were a laundry list of 'results' and a compendium of useful recipes. But however strongly one may concur, this is hardly an argument; merely the negative of a widespread aspiration: that of gaining an ever more faithful and accurate understanding of 'what there is'. Let's try to overcome our reluctance to surrender those uplifting, if unrealistic prospects and cautiously assume that a physical theory cannot simply (we do not say 'simply cannot') provide a description, be it approximate and forever amendable, of 'things as they are' or of 'the world as it is'– no more, indeed, than our brains provide any direct access to a reality out there. One might argue that such a theory may nonetheless adequately reflect fundamental aspects of our experience, bearing in mind that the latter is never 'raw' but constantly and necessarily 'informed' through those feed-backs of our mental make-up that are necessary for converting 'unformatted' sensory inputs into reliable and shareable expressions of our thought. According to M. Bitbol 56 , "the basic formalism of quantum mechanics can effortlessly be construed as a structural presupposition of any activity of production and unified anticipation of mutually incompatible contextual phenomena 57 ." A correct 'philosophical' evaluation of quantum mechanics, Bitbol contends, should have the quasi-therapeutic effect of dispelling a major illusion: that a phenomenon can always be in principle detached from the very conditions that make its occurrence possible. What Bohr strove to express in his later writings 58 is that phenomena like those one encounters in atomic physics are necessarily and indissolubly co-determined by the experimental conditions of their manifestation ('context-dependence'). This belated recognition of the aim and structure of quantum theory would "undermine the pictures so cherished by supporters of the ontological (disengaged) outlook...by showing that the predictive success of some of our most general scientific theories can be ascribed, to a large extent, to the circumstance that they formalize the minimal requirements of any prediction of the outcomes of our activity, be it gestural or experimental. The very structure of these theories is seen to embody the performative structure of the experimental undertaking 59 ." Once this is realized, there will "no [longer be any] need to further explain" the adequacy of the quantum rules "by their ability to reflect in their structure the backbone of nature 60 ". The position Bitbol defends is a contemporary offshoot of a distinguished 'critical' tradition 61 , the advocates of which have striven to provide a middle way between the unreasonable expectations of unrestrained realism on the one hand, and the more unpalatable aspects of instrumentalism on the other. 56 Bitbol 1996,1998,2002. 57 Bitbol 2002. 58 For a lucid discussion of the evolution of Bohr's views, see Held 1994. 59 Bitbol 1998. 60 Ibid. Physicists or philosophers with realist leanings may be "very imprudent", according to Bitbol, in believing that "self-existent objects are what justify the intentional attitudes". An unprejudiced philosophical inquiry would rather prompt the conclusion that "[the] project of ontologizing certain theoretical entities appears a mere attempt at hypostatizing the major invariants of those activities." [Bitbol 1998] 61 This line of thought originates in Kant's Critique of Pure reason. Modern updates, like that of Hintikka (1999) to which Bitbol is indebted, downplay Kant's much-criticized apriorism and redirect focus on 'structural' constraints of experimental activity. 15 Bitbol bases his pronouncements almost entirely upon (i) Destouches's derivation of the Born rule (see Section 2) and (ii) Heelan's unconventional take on so-called quantum logic 62 . The sole purpose of functions, kets and so forth would be to provide sets of abstract predictors, whose mathematical properties would basically reflect their invariance under changes of 'experimental contexts'. If the mutual 'compatibility' of experimentally ascertainable quantities is restricted to non-equivalent classes, propositions that can be asserted about values of the quantities in question cannot be co-ordinated in a unified way within a Boolean framework, isomorphic to the algebra of set-theoretical operations. Instead, the validity of Boolean logic can be maintained only within strictly delimited contexts. Predictive consistency across such nonequivalent contexts will then call for a suitable 'metacontext' logic. Heelan 63 tentatively argues that "the locus of nonclassical logic in quantum mechanics is in the plane in which physical contexts are related to one another, and not, as all writers have hitherto held, in the plane of single quantum-mechanical events...the proper subject matter of so-called quantum logic would be the manifold of experimental contexts in which it is relevant to use one linguistic or conceptual framework rather than another 64 ". The characteristic orthocomplemented and non-distributive lattice structure of quantum logic would consist in a partial ordering of a set of experimental languages that are pairwise incompatible. Each language would correspond to the selection of a definite context i.e. of a class of experimental propositions whose conjunction is operationally meaningful. A metacontext language would then be required in order to co-ordinate propositions of languages that are tied to distinct contexts, and the corresponding lattice structure would be that of quantum logic. Ab initio derivations of the SAQM (cf. Section 2) suggest that quantum theory owes its structure, and in particular the form of its most basic rules, to its capacity to operate, as a predictive scheme, both within and across such non-equivalent, 'incompatible' contexts. Acknowledging this connection between the role of the SAQM and its structure would "automatically defuse[s] major paradoxes 65 ." Is this all that one should expect from a fundamental physical theory? Bitbol's answer is unambiguous: "the only thing a physical theory does, and the only thing it has to do, is to embed documented actualities in a (deterministic or statistical) framework, and to use this framework to anticipate, to a certain extent, what will occur under well-defined experimental circumstances 66 ." Our most successful theoretical frameworks would be (nothing but) "embodiments of the necessary pre-conditions of a wide class of activities of seeking and predicting 67 ." Nevertheless, rather than seize an opportunity to reassess pre-conditions of our activities within a world-as-experience(d), many are expected to remain stuck with their classical, 'pre-critical' illusions and "systematically favor a 62 Heelan 1970a,b. 63 Heelan 1970a,b. 64 Ibid. 65 Ibid. 66 Bitbol 1998. 67 Ibid. 16 disengaged outlook, even though their very undertaking is grounded on the presuppositions of an engaged activity 68 ." But the question remains of why it should have taken confrontation with the puzzles of atomic physics for physicists to realize – to the extent they did – that means and procedures of investigation cannot be 'neutralized' in all circumstances. It is rather hard to believe that the pioneers of quantum physics did, through the finiteness of Planck's constant and subsequent developments, unwittingly stumble upon (nothing but) the empirical trace (?) of – to put it in Bitbol's philosophese – pre-conditions to the coordination and anticipatory effectiveness of experimental activity, ending up with a 'mechanics' that embodies in its structure a major philosophical lesson. Besides, how terms get reinforced or cancel out in the process of computing probabilities with the SAQM is certainly 'wavelike' in a rather metaphorical sense: this is paper interference, part and parcel of the operation of a particular type of formalism that allows one to predict the measured values of measurement outcomes, cross-sections and so on. It is quite another matter, however, to claim that a basic mathematical trait associated with consistent operation of a predictive scheme 'across' different contexts should be underwritten by specific interference patterns exhibited e.g. on photographic plates. It might well be that the SAQM is all we can afford, whether in principle or 'only' in practice, as a framework in which our – necessarily mediated – approaches to the microworld can find a consistent and effective mathematical expression. This should not prevent us, however, from attempting to trace the quantum back to sound and compelling physical principles. Granting that the predictive rules of quantum theory can, as we saw, be justified without making any 'ontic' reference to physical systems, I shall put forth the following suggestion: far from falling from the sky, the SAQM actually arises as a result of selecting a certain type of mathematical structure. Historically, this 'selection' unwittingly occurred in the process of elaborating a theoretical framework for atomic physics. More precisely, quantum theory will, in the next section, be seen to emerge as a by-product of setting up a consistent 'protoquantal' dynamical framework, based on the acceptance of a definitely 'non-classical' but wellmotivated (and by no means preposterous) postulate. Given the assumption that quantum mechanics, in its currently accepted form, turns out to be just such a byproduct, reasons will be adduced for resorting to the SAQM, beyond the historical fact that the protoquantal framework in question was never suspected by the great pioneers of quantum physics. 68 Ibid. 17 4. From the Quantum to the SAQM In the early days of quantum physics (mid-1910s), some parallels were pointed out between the integral formulation of the Bohr-Sommerfeld quantization condition and the action-angle methods that had been introduced half a century before to help tackle problems in celestial mechanics 69 . Such similarities, just as the dimensions and apparent ubiquity of Planck's constant itself, suggested focusing upon action as the key quantity for unlocking the mystery of the quantum and working out a compelling alternative to classical mechanics. Such hints were all but forgotten, however, once Heisenberg, Born and Jordan had come up with an effective 'matrix' framework that seemed to owe nothing, except for some dubious analogies, to any classical predecessor. Action and related issues had briefly come back to the fore with the contributions of Louis de Broglie and Schrödinger. Nevertheless, the view eventually prevailed that no amount of reflection on the basic concepts and assumptions of classical mechanics could possibly help understand how and why quantum physics is so 'special' in the ways it departs from 'classicality'. It is well known that, if one substitutes into Schrödinger's time-dependent equation a polar form of its solution , one of the resulting two equations turns out to be identical with the classical Hamilton-Jacobi equation, except for the presence of an 'extra' contribution. The de Broglie-Bohm 'pilot-wave' approach 70 focuses on that 'non-classical' term, interpreted as a new kind of potential, which is regarded as the source of all 'quantum effects'. However, it is a major drawback of that approach that it relies on the prior availability of the Schrödinger equation. Besides, although Bohm's guidance condition suggests a trivializing map whereby phase space coordinates transform into a set that is constant in time, the dual of that transformation appears to be left out without reason 71 . It is as if the initial substitution pointed toward some possible alternative to Hamilton-Jacobi theory, but without giving more, as it were, than half a hint. The dependence of Bohm's quantum potential on Hamilton's principal function also implies higher derivatives of that function. What is the structural role and conceptual significance of such higher derivatives? In the first part of his 'wave mechanics' paper 72 , it is with the purpose of addressing quantization as an eigenvalue problem that Schrödinger expressed the 'characteristic function' as the logarithm of a new function . Conversely, writing the  function, solution to the (one-dimensional) stationary Schrödinger equation, in polar form leads to a third-order non-linear differential equation that must be satisfied by the quantummechanical version of the characteristic function : 69 See Jammer 1989, pp 103-107. 70 Bohm 1952, Holland 1993. 71 Holland 2001a. 72 Schrödinger 1926. 18 ( etc.). This equation differs from the stationary Hamilton-Jacobi equation by its non-vanishing right-hand side. The function can be interpreted as the generator of the motion for a single trajectory ( then corresponds to the conjugate momentum). Knowing the trajectory then suffices to specify the  function – there is no need for an ensemble of such trajectories to be considered. The  function, however, does not always afford resolution into single trajectories. Most significantly – this can hardly be regarded as a 'coincidence' – the 'extra' term turns out to be proportional to the so-called Schwarzian derivative of . The above equation will, from now on, be referred to as the quantum stationary Hamilton-Jacobi equation (QSHJE). The QSHJE has never been fashionable as a conceptual lead to the resolution of quantum mysteries. Worth mentioning, however, is Floyd's 'trajectory representation of quantum mechanics 73 ', which proceeds directly from the QSHJE, bypassing the Schrödinger equation. Floyd's approach differs from Bohm's in some fundamental respects, not least in the nature of the trajectories. Conjugate momentum is not identified with mechanical momentum and, since the QSHJE itself completely determines the motion, there is no need for any guiding field. Floydian trajectories, though consistent with the requirement that probability should be conserved, are not distributed in accordance with the  function density. They are also distinct from Feynman paths: in Floyd's account, the generator of the motion ought to be regarded as an alternative to Hamilton's characteristic function, whereas Feynman's propagator is classical. Nowhere is any randomness involved, but our general inability to resolve a -based account into distinct trajectories happens (more about that later) to be 'fortunately' compensated by the use of the probabilistic methods of standard quantum theory. Being able to derive the QSHJE from the Schrödinger equation is by itself of little help to figure out what set of theoretical requirements could give rise to that equation (QSHJE) in the first place, or to decide whether its solutions are more physically significant than 'wave functions'. Some invaluable light, however, has recently been shed on the matter by A. Faraggi and M. Matone 74 , who succeeded in deriving the QSHJE on the basis of a single, theoretically well-motivated 'equivalence' postulate 75 . In a mechanical framework where the functional dependence of the characteristic function or 'reduced action' on a set of generalized coordinates determines the dynamics, does some coordinate transformation  generally exist, such that the resulting reduced action has the same dependence on as S0 has on ? If both and are non-constant, such a coordinate transformation makes sense from the point of view of an observer in motion relative to both systems. However, no coordinate transformation can map a non-constant into the constant reduced action that characterizes, in classical mechanics, a free point mass with zero energy. Setting up an alternative ('non-classical') dynamical framework in which the existence of locally 73 Floyd 1996, 2000. 74 Faraggi and Matone 2000. 75 For the sake of easy reference, the notation and terminology used in the following are those of Faraggi and Matone 2000. 19 invertible coordinate transformations is not subject to any such limitation is precisely the aim of Faraggi and Matone. The programme is reminiscent of Hamilton-Jacobi theory, although coordinate transformations only are considered, the transformation of being induced by that of through . Classical mechanics never treats canonical variables on a truly equal footing. However, the involutive nature of the Legendre transformation, which is implied by the definition of the generating function, gives rise to explicit duality (Hamilton's equations of motion are, up to sign, symmetrical). This duality can be made manifest by introducing a generating function , which stands in the same relation to as does to , i.e. . As a result, the description of a system can be indifferently achieved in either of the or pictures. Requiring both stability under evolution in time of the S-T relationship, and that symmetry be the highest amongst all possible interchanges of the two pictures leads to the 'natural' introduction of imaginary numbers (this is as far as the occurrence of complex numbers in quantum mechanics, at the dynamical level, can be traced back). Moreover, and are related through a so-called Möbius transformation (generators of the Möbius group are translations, dilations and inversions). According to the Equivalence Postulate (EP), for any pair of dynamical systems A and B there exists a coordinate transformation A B such that ( A) transforms into ( B), where W = V( ) – E (V and E are the potential and the total energy terms). The postulate implies the existence of a coordinate mapping between any system and that corresponding to  0. If satisfies the classical stationary Hamilton-Jacobi equation (CSHJE), then the W( )'s transform as quadratic differentials: . Since can then only transform into itself, the W of an arbitrary system cannot be connected to by an invertible coordinate transformation.Therefore, implementing the Equivalence Postulate calls for a radical departure from classicality. Mapping into some W0 requires W to transform non-quadratically: , where the inhomogeneous term accounts for the abovementioned departure. Besides, one should reasonably expect the succession of two transformations, one from into and another from into , to be equivalent to a single coordinate transformation from into . This 'pseudogroup' requirement amounts to the satisfaction of the cocycle condition , which condition implies the invariance of under a Möbius coordinate transformation  '. The term is then proportional to the Schwarzian derivative , which is indicative of Möbius symmetry (the Schwarzian derivative is such that ). The cocycle condition uniquely determines the Schwarzian derivative, up to a global constant and a coboundary term, and . 20 The EP-based alternative to the CSHJE can, with no loss of generality, be written where . The inhomogeneous term is in practice negligible for very small values of , and the CSHJE is recovered as  0 with the classical reduced action. Just as in classical mechanics, the dynamics is encoded in the functional dependence of on its argument ( will still be referred to as a 'reduced action', bearing in mind that it is not identical with its classical namesake). The resulting alternative to the CSHJE is just the QSHJE provided is identified with Planck's 'reduced' constant . Momentum is evaluated through , whereby a definite (Floydian) trajectory follows. The time-dependent Hamilton-Jacobi equation obtains upon substituting . being a solution of the QSHJE is equivalent to and , such that , being linearly independent solutions of the equation Identification of with yields Schrödinger's stationary equation. The 'quantum potential' Q is fundamentally different from Bohm's in that, consistently with the Equivalence Postulate, is never constant. This fact is reflected in the bipolar form of a general solution of Schrödinger's equation. As Einstein objected to Bohm 76 , the classical motion does not always get recovered in the (improper)  0 limit. The objection does not apply in the present context since the quantum reduced action can never be constant. A consistent exploitation of the Equivalence Postulate requires the coordinate transformations to be locally invertible. Continuity conditions for the existence of the Schwarzian derivative must also hold on the extended real line. Schrödinger's eigenvalue problem connects to a local invertibility condition thanks to a theorem 77 that makes energy quantization a manifestation of the existence of a self-homeomorphism of the extended real line (the existence of this self-homeomorphism is directly reflected in the Möbius invariance of the ratio ). Thus, the EP leads to quantization as a response to symmetries that underlie the form of the QSHJE. Most significantly, quantization 76 See Holland 1993, p.243. 77 Faraggi and Matone 2000, section 18. 21 does not require that all 'physical' solutions to the Schrödinger equation should be square summable, but only that such solutions exist. Summarizing, the QSHJE can be derived as a consequence of complying with a single postulate (EP): the term whereby the QSHJE differs from its classical predecessor originates in the postulated universal existence of a trivializing coordinate transformation. Schrödinger's stationary equation follows as a result of linearizing the QSHJE. The existence of the trivializing coordinate transformation requires the form of a general solution of the Schrödinger equation to be bipolar, in accordance with Floyd's approach and in disagreement with Bohm's. An existence condition for the Schwarzian derivative is that the total energy E admit a value that is an eigenvalue of the corresponding Schrödinger equation, or equivalently that the Schrödinger equation admit a solution that is a function on the real line. Quantization does not require that all 'physically acceptable' functions should be square summable. However, interest in solutions having that property is justified, a posteriori, insofar as their existence provides a structural basis for setting up the kind of effective predictive scheme that was discussed in Section 2. In its operation as such a scheme, quantum theory has amply proven to be able to make up for the potential loss of descriptive power implied in bypassing the Q(S)HJE and relying instead exclusively on solutions of the Schrödinger equation. Are 'quantum' probabilities dispensable? Implications of a theorem by M. Gromov provide at least a hint at an answer. The theorem itself 78 , which relates to the existence of a certain symplectic invariant (symplectic width), falls way beyond the scope of this paper. One of its consequences, however, is an intriguing classical precursor of Heisenberg's 'uncertainty principle'. Any attempt to determine empirically the phase space coordinates of a system with N degrees of freedom is, in practice, limited by the resolutions and of measurements. Letting be the minimal value amongst the areas of all the N error 'boxes', the theorem implies that determining a pair with a given accuracy requires that some of the remaining degrees of freedom be known with the same or better accuracy, but the error cannot be made less than . In classical mechanics though, nothing prevents setting in principle . It may be conjectured, however, that an alternative dynamical framework based upon the QSHJE preserves that consequence of Gromov's theorem, supplementing it with a lower bound  on the permissible values of , where is the empirical value of the structural constant . Were this highly plausible conjecture to be proven 79 , one might be justified in regarding the emergence of quantum theory as a response, however unwitting, to the impossibility of taking, even in principle, full advantage of a dynamical account based upon the QSHJE (an equation that is notoriously tricky to solve). The possibility of developing a Hardy r=2 type of predictive scheme (SAQM) happens to be, fortunately enough, afforded through the existence of a 'special' class of solutions to the Schrödinger equation, which existence would manifest itself in the quantization of energy. 78 Gromov 1985,1987; see Hofer 1998 for a survey. Thanks to Ivar Ekeland for drawing my attention to the implications of Gromov's theorem and supplying some references. 79 This might connect to the result that the EP implies phase space nonlocalization, which directly reflects the simple fact that a point cannot be diffeomorphic to a line (Faraggi and Matone 2000). 22 If the QSHJE is regarded as the basic equation underlying all things quantummechanical , then classical dynamics can, in practice (only), be regarded as a limiting case of 'quantum behavior'. But why should a theoretical framework, in which the appearance of an action quantum = and the quantization of energy can80 be conceived as manifestations of an 'equivalence' postulate, be adequate to investigating structures and processes on (sub)atomic scales? To the best of our current understanding, the most that can be said is to remark that the coincidence of with the empirically given is neither more nor less mysterious than the identification of the structural constant c with the empirical value of the speed of light 81 . All there is to the 'microscopic' adequacy, both descriptive (QSHJE, to the extent it is practicable) and predictive (SAQM), of quantum mechanics – besides some essential group-theoretical input – might just be the smallness of Planck's constant in conventional units that are tailored to human scales. Early breakthroughs, from the resolution of the black-body or photoelectric puzzles to the Bohr-Sommerfeld model of the atom, had given physicists very few hints at structural necessities behind the occurrence of Planck's quantum. When a new scheme eventually emerged, its agreement with the empirical data appeared to be quasimiraculous. As we have come to realize, this was made possible because the very form of the Schrödinger equation (or its matrix/operator equivalents) happens to lend itself to setting up a consistent and adequate 'non-classical' framework for prediction. Behind the 'miracle', there is the fact that Hilbert space structure both (i) yields, through a linearization procedure, a faint echo of protoquantal dynamics as captured in the QSHJE, and (ii) constrains the linear representation of groups that determine 82 the form of quantities whose measurement are the object of prediction by means of the SAQM. The latter is a Hilbert space-based (Hardy r=2) scheme for the calculation of probabilities of measurement outcomes that hinges on the identification of a crosscontextual mathematical entity or predictor ('state vector', density matrix) that characterizes the 'predictive potential' of a given preparation. To be adequate, the predictive algorithm must obviously preserve the compliance of probability with the Kolmogorov axioms within any given context i.e. with respect to any chosen set of mutually compatible observables. On the other hand, its basic rules will be constrained in accordance with an underlying metacontext lattice structure that is non-Boolean (Heelan's thesis). Although neither Hardy's axioms nor Destouches's more rudimentary calcul des prévisions make explicit reference to context-dependence, it is satisfying to conceive of the form of the statistical algorithm of quantum theory as reflecting its role in co-ordinating probabilistic valuations at a metacontext level – in other words, to think of it as an algorithm that functions both within and across definite contexts. 80 Admittedly, much remains to be clarified about the conceptual meaning and the significance of the EP. What matters to us here is not any particular commitment to Matone and Faraggi's EP approach, but the recognition of the action-based roots of quantum mechanics and of the central role of the QSHJE as the physical source of the Schrödinger equation. 81 It will never be emphasized enough that the Lorentz transformation can be (and, I strongly believe, should be) derived from a single postulate, without making any reference to the propagation of light (see e.g. Lévy-Leblond 1976). 82 Lévy-Leblond 1974. 23 Tensor product composition allows the predictive formalism to be applicable to preparations that are multipartite, i.e. such that various agents may operate separately on 'parts' of a 'larger' system, then work out statistics of their results, including specific correlations. It is legitimate to inquire about the way mutual relationships between parts of a composite system should be treated in a truly 'quantum dynamical' framework, and how the dynamics of the whole connects to that of the constituent parts. However, those are matters that will not be settled using the resources of quantum theory as we know and use it, if the latter essentially functions as a predictive scheme. Careful comparison of locally gathered data does exhibit correlations that cannot be accounted for on the basis of a simple-minded picture relying on common causes. Owing to the purely predictive scope of the SAQM, this means nothing but that some commonsense expectations associated with classical (typically 'non-contextualized') uses of the probability calculus need not apply to all kinds of predictive schemes. It certainly does not imply the existence of any sort of nonlocal influences. Manifestations of alleged nonlocality in the quantum-mechanical setting are all notoriously ineffective: 'quantum' correlations cannot be made use of for signalling superluminally or achieving spooky 'transfers' in a controllable manner (quantum teleportation 83 , despite its name, is no exception to the rule). Although belief in nonlocality as a pervasive and radically nonclassical feature of quantum theory, or as a trait inherent in a 'quantum world', remains predominant, some of the most dedicated explorers of quantum mysteries have voiced a well-informed perplexity: "...people may have become too facile in their readiness to blame everything on (or credit everything to) "quantum nonlocality". Nonlocality seems to me to offer "too cheap" a way out of some deep conundra [sic] (to appropriate Einstein's remark to Born about Bohm's theory). If you push hard on it you can force "nonlocality" into offering some explanations that strike me as just plain silly....people have been a little too quick in talking themselves into this widely held position 84 ." If the predictive rules of quantum theory can be derived without making any 'ontic' reference to physical systems, it is just as important to realize that the SAQM owes its structure and its actual availability to the existence of a certain class of solutions to the Schrödinger equation, and that this equation can itself be derived as a mere by-product of a principle-based dynamical framework that is regulated by the Q(S)HJE. 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Daniele Bertini "Against Trinitarian Enthusiasm: The Approach of Relative Identity Logic to the Trinity" Reportata. Passato e presente della teologia 3, 2015 The theorizing about the doctrine of the Trinity by contemporary analytic philosophers of religion has recently been imbued with an air of enthusiastic excitement and selfconfidence. Some of them claim to have conclusively solved the mystery (Bohn 2011). Others advocate (more modestly) to have worked out new trinitarian analogies silencing the objections commonly perceived to challenge the compatibility of monotheism with the distinct existence of three personal divine beings (Brower & Rea 2005; Moreland & Craig 2009; Leftow 2009; Rea 2009). Still others overturn perspectives on the burden of proof and charge trinitarian skeptics with being unable to provide sound arguments for the (alleged) conceptual flaws of the notion of the Trinity (Senor 2013). As a consequence, according to such theorists, traditional worries about identity, distinctness and number in the doctrine are due to a shallow understanding of the topic. Once such notions are addressed with an in-depth insight, reason suggests to dismiss any trouble. !1 My intuition is that, despite of the euphoria spreading from the new trinitarian approaches, there's room for saying something more in support to the embarrassment and puzzlement commonly related to the predication of God's onefoldness and threefoldness. Briefly, trinitarian enthusiasm fails to see how necessarily having eternal personal properties definitely conflicts with the possibility to instantiate personally the same divine substance. Moreover, since personal properties are traditionally thought of as originated by genealogical relations, and genealogical relations are asymmetric relations, one divine Person can't instantiate one and the same being God as another divine Person (e.g., God the Father can't instantiate one and the same being God as God the Son). My working plan is the following. In the first section I will outline the doctrine of the Trinity as a basic set of propositions (T) adherents to Christianity are committed to. Although I will rely on current construals of the logical problem of the Trinity, I will complement such accounts in order to highlights pieces of theological constraints usually neglected in the debate. In the second section I will argue for the claim that the RI logic developed by P. van Inwagen (van Inwagen 1995) is the best conceptual apparatus to handle T. Notably, some scholars contend that RI logic doesn't help in trinitarian theorizing (Rea 2005; Tuggy 2003; Vohánka 2013). I will address their claims by showing how they miss the point. In light of the acquisitions of this section, the subsequent one will be devoted to the main reasons supporting the refutation of latin trinitarianism (LT), social trinitarianism (ST) and constitution trinitarianism (CT). In the fourth section, I will finally deliver a general argument for (weak) trinitarian skepticism. My view is that the argument provides substantive reasons in support to the common sense intuition that either God's !2 onefoldness and threefoldness aren't actually compatible or God's onefoldness and threefoldness aren't robustly construed. 1. Mainstream Christianity is Nicene Christianity. That is, mainstream christians assent to the creedal propositions normatively stated during the fourth century by the First Council of Nicea and the First Council of Constantinople. The collections of materials from both Councils open with a declaration about the content of christian faith by the Fathers convened in assembly. Such declarations are called Profession of Faith of the 318 Fathers (Nicene Creed) and Profession of Faith of the 150 Fathers (Costantinopolitan Creed). During the church history both texts have gone under revision. Such revisions include latin and armenian translations of the original greek documents (with important theological supplements). At present the expression "Nicene Creed" is used as an umbrella word for one or the other among the original texts of the Profession of Faith and their revisions. However, in order to refine, purify, and modernize the original Creeds, other creedal statements appeared too. Among them, there are the Athanasian Creed (or Quicumque vult), the Apostolic Symbol, and the Symbol of Faith. The creeds are normative texts. They establish in succinct statements what a believer should assent to in order to be counted as a christian. As such, they are synopses of the christian faith. It is then commonly assumed that creeds are the primal source of the doctrine of the Trinity christian believers confess. Notoriously, the creeds mostly overlap in content. Nonetheless, there are few but relevant differences among them. Such differences concern different understandings of the generation and the nature of the Holy !3 Spirit. Consequently, it is not theologically neutral to choose one or the other of these in order to assess what the doctrine of the Trinity is meant to be. Any version of the creed explicitly asserts that christians worship three Divine Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. While it is not obvious from any of the texts (with the exception of the Athanasian Creed) that christians assume monotheism, the council materials from the Council of Nicea and the Council of Constantinople clarify that the existence of a plurality of Divine Beings is to be understood in terms of monotheism. The logical problem of the Trinity (LPT) concerns the formal consistency of monotheism, the instantiation of the divine nature by the divine Persons, and the actual distinctness of the divine Persons. As such LPT does not address each theological issue the creeds give voice to: it simply aims at developing an understanding of the notions of identity and distinctness by which identity and distinctness claims about the divine Persons don't conflict with the basic belief that there is only one God. It is therefore not necessary to take into consideration the different conceptions of the genealogical relations among the divine Persons in order to deal with LPT. Basically, the doctrine of the Trinity is the conjunction of two beliefs: (a) that there is only one God and (b) that each of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is God, (Council of Constantinople, "Letter of the Bishops convened in Assembly in Constantinople to Pope Damasus and the Western Bishops"). Evidently, taken one at a time, neither (a) nor (b) need special comments. On the contrary, their conjunction raises more than mere perplexity: it seems prima facie definitely false. The church fathers in Constantinople answered such a difficulty by the statement that the Divine Beings are one God, because each Person instantiates the same nature, the same power and the same divinity. Particularly, they !4 have perfectly overlapping divine properties (e.g., being one, being powerful and being divine). That is, the divine Persons are identical as to their being God, enumerating how many Gods there are being a matter of how many divine natures are instantiated by the existence of the divine Persons. Personal distinctness doesn't realize different divine natures the church fathers advocated. According to them, personal distinctness in God doesn't affect then the assumption of monotheism. In light of these considerations, scholars agree (with irrelevant nuances) that "(a) & (b)" is to be unpacked as the conjunction of (a) with a number of identity and distinctness claims (Cartwright 1987; van Inwagen 1988; Rea 2003; Brower and Rea 2005; Rea 2009; Bohn 2011). By common consensus the following set of propositions (call the set T) is thought to express the doctrine of the Trinity: a) There is only one God; b) The Father is God; c) The Son is God; d) The Holy Spirit is God; e) The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are distinct. According to the classical theory of identity, T is formally contradictory. It results that: 1) For any x, y, z and j, if "x=j & y=j & z=j", then "x=y & y=z & x=z" (from indiscernibility); 2) For any x and y, if x=y, then y=x (from simmetry); 3) God=Father (from (b)); !5 4) God=Son (from (c)); 5) God=Holy Spirit (from (d)); 6) The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are identical (from (1)-(5)). Evidently, being identical entails being not (numerically) distinct. Consequently: 7) The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are not distinct. Conclusion follows: 8) T implies "(e) & not (e)". The deduction (1)-(8) from (a)-(e) gives formal expression to the common intuition that T is puzzling because three divine beings can't count as one God. That is, it is plain to assume that if x and y are F, where F stands for a count noun, and x is distinct from y, then x and y are not the same F. But if x and y are not the same F, there are then (at least) two Fs. Now, the church fathers in Constantinople claimed that (b), (c), and (d) means that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are consubstantial, i.e., they instantiate the same nature. Therefore, (b), (c), and (d) should be read as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit instantiate the same nature. Nonetheless, they are distinct. Consequently, they can't be the same God; that is, there are three Gods. LPT consists in giving an interpretation of T which makes (a) consistent with (b)-(e). There are two main ways to understand the task. According to a maximally robust reading of the !6 notions of onefoldness and threefoldness, being onefold (i.e., being a unique individual) prevents a thing from being threefold (i.e., being constituted by three individuals). If this is the case, being one excludes being three; i.e., God can't be said to be both one and three beings. On the other hand, according to a sufficiently robust reading of the notions, being onefold (i.e., being an individual) doesn't entail being not threefold (i.e., being at a time the source of three different streams of phenomenal features). Evidently, a maximally robust reading of the notions of onefoldness and threefoldness rules out any possibility of answering LPT. The trinitarian theorist has then only the weak option at her disposal: showing that a sufficiently robust reading of onefoldness and threefoldness suffices to make sense of the doctrine of the Trinity (Senor 2013). Contemporary trinitarian enthusiasm emerges from holding the belief that the one or the other among the new approaches to the Trinity manages these notions in such a sufficiently robust way as to dismantle the charge of incoherence. Unfortunately, trinitarian enthusiasm seems groundless. Recent works by D.Tuggy provide interesting reasons in support of the claim that no theory on the marketplace accomplishes the task. The problem common to all is that, while they appear able to give interpretations of T by which the propositions (a)-(e) don't imply formal contradictions, their rendering of the notions of the identity and distinctness of God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit doesn't capture the data of the revelation. Tuggy outstandingly makes the case for the different difficulties LT, ST and CT involve. Particularly, he argues that each of these solves LPT in reason of the following unpalatable reading of the relations between God (the onefoldness of the divine nature) and the Divine Persons (the threefold realization of the divine nature): !7 T1) personal distinctness is modal distinctness (Tuggy 2003); T2) only the Trinity is properly God, God being distinct from any of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (Tuggy 2003); T3) the Trinity is materially constituted by three overlapping (but not mutually ontologically dependent) Divine Beings (Tuggy 2013). Considerations against (T1), (T2), and (T3) are ad hoc arguments. They address the peculiar features of LT, ST, and CT, and establish which unreliable intuitions each approach is construed on. Consequently, they are particularly useful in setting the agenda of trinitarian theorizing. That is, trinitarian enthusiasm is reliable if and only if one between LT, ST, and CT is able to answer LPT without assuming the disjunction "(T1) ⋁ (T2) ⋁ (T3)". Tuggy's core idea consists in the claim that no sufficiently robust understanding of the notions of onefoldness and threefoldness among the ones at the theorists' disposal is suitable to express the data of revelation. My intuition is that a general reason accounts for this fruitful thesis: christian faith asks believers to assent to a maximally robust understanding of such notions. If this is the case, trinitarian skepticism can be developed as the claim that no trinitarian analogy answers consistently LPT since the data of revelation suppose a maximally robust understanding of the notion of onefoldness and threefoldness. As a consequence, Tuggy's refutations of LT, ST, and CT should turn out to be particular cases of the general argument for trinitarian skepticism. That is to say, be ATS the general argument for trinitarian skepticism. It results that: !8 ATS → (not T1) & (not T2) & (not T3)) In order to give a formulation to ATS, I begin with listing some theological requirements any answer to LPT should embodied. Meeting such requirements is necessary because they determine which notions of identity and distinctness are at work in the doctrine of the Trinity. Firstly, each Divine Person is identical to each others as to the instantiation of a single divine nature (IDENTICAL INSTANTIATION OF NATURE). God the Father begets God the Son. Creedal formulations explain that begetting here means that the Father transfers the whole of his nature to the Son; i.e., God the Son is of one substance with God the Father. While there aren't analogous declarations concerning the genealogical relation of God the Holy Spirit to God the Father (and eventually God the Son), the church fathers in Constantinople explicitly claimed that the Holy Spirit possesses the same single divine nature as the Father and the Son. Consequently, it seems reasonable to assume that, independently on the way God the Holy Spirit genealogically relates to the source of His own divinity, He possesses the divine nature as God the Father and God the Son do. Secondly, christian monotheism is the claim that, notwithstanding the existence of three divine Persons, the divine nature is an universal actualized just once, because the three divine Persons are the same God (SINGULARITY OF DIVINE NATURE). That is, the divine nature is a set of properties each of the divine Persons instantiate completely. The history of trinitarian theology provides evidence for such a reading of the notion of monotheism (Cross 2002; Jacobs 2008). Thirdly, according to very traditional interpretations of trinitarian claims, the divine !9 Persons are distinctly discernible just in terms of their genealogical relations (Bottarini 2006; Emery 2007; Rahner 1967). The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are properly God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit because each of them is simply and fully the whole of God. The distinctness of the divine Persons consists then in the fact that the actualization by the Father of the whole set of properties the divine nature is ontologically relates to the identical actualization by the Son and the Holy Spirit (the same for the relations between the Son and the other divine Persons and the Holy Spirit and the other divine Persons). If this is the case, the divine Persons have personal properties just in reason of the real subsistence of such relations. Consequently, a divine Person is the instantiation of the divine properties plus the ontological relation of such an instantiation to the others (DISTINCTNESS BY GENEALOGICAL RELATIONS). Fourthly, the meaning of ontologically relating is being metaphysically dependent on (PERSONAL DEPENDENCE). According to the received view, if God exists, God necessary (eternally) exists. That is, whatever the divine Persons are, inasmuch as they are God, they enjoy necessary both the divine nature and their personal properties. Now, if their possession of personal properties consists in having a genealogical relation to the others, and such possession is necessary, each divine Person is necessary constituted by His relation to the others. That is, the Father can't be God the Father without the Son being God the Son and the Holy Spirit being God the Holy Spirit (the same for the Son and the Holy Spirit). Consequently, the Trinity of the divine Persons doesn't relate to God's agency ad extra: there's no difference in considering the trinitarian relations among the divine Persons in se and in the history of salvation. Notoriously, K.Rahner gives a widely accepted formulation to this claim by the basic axiom of trinitarian theorizing ("The immanent Trinity is the !10 economic Trinity, and viceversa", Rahner 1967). Fifthly, all creeds mention that christians worship the Trinity of God. This is the central statement of christian faith, and there's no risk to overestimate its importance. What is worth noting here is that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are clear devotional figures believers encounter in their own liturgical experience. That is, christian faith has three different focal points. Each of these has proper individuation features and fulfills peculiar religious needs. As a consequence it is natural to expect that the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit exhibit evident identifying traits in the believer's everyday religious life. Creeds attest such an attitude by plainly individuating strong personal properties each Divine Person enjoys. The Father is the Maker of all things visible and invisible, and He is the source of the Godhead. The Son is the Only-begotten of the Father. He takes part in the world creating process as the mean the Father makes us of. Further, He incarnates for the purpose of the salvation of the human kind, and experiences as a man the birth from a poor family, a public religious ministry in Palestine, the death by crucifission, and, finally, the resurrection from death. In the latter days He will come again to judge the living and the dead. The Holy Spirit proceeds either from the Father or the Father and the Son. He is the Lifegiver, and the voice who spoke by the Prophets. He takes also part in the Incarnation process, in someway operating the conception of Jesus. He refills (whatever refilling could mean) the Apostles in order to inspire them the theological understanding of the life and the dead of Jesus; and He leads them to found christian communities all over the world by giving the power to produce miracles and healings (LITURGICAL BOOSTING OF PERSONAL DISTINCTNESS). !11 2. With all this in mind, I will now move to show that, under the theological constraints driving the interpretation of (a)-(e), RI logic is the most reliable instrument to engage with T. The basic intuition motivating the construal of a logic of relative identity is that identity and distinctness claims are not absolute but predicate relative. Consider the following case. Sir Ian McKellen plays the role of Gandalf in the Lord of the Ring Saga and the role of Magneto in the X-Men Saga. According to the classical theory of identity, this is to be expressed by the following propositions: 1) the actor who plays Gandalf=Ian McKellen; 2) the actor who plays Magneto=Ian McKellen; 3) the actor who plays Gandalf=the actor who plays Magneto. Proposition (1) attests a referential relation between the actor who plays Gandalf and Ian McKellen; proposition (2) between the actor who plays Magneto and Ian McKellen. In reason of the identity of the referential relation between the actor who plays Gandalf and Ian McKellen in (1) and the actor who plays Magneto and Ian McKellen in (2), the identity sign in (3) is thought to be independent on any predicative context. Whatever the actor who plays Gandalf enjoys, the actor who plays Magneto enjoys too (e.g., if the actor who plays Gandalf is the recipient of six Laurence Olivier Awards then the actor who plays Magneto is the recipient of six Laurence Olivier Awards too). Relative identity challenges the soundness of such an analysis, because it assumes that !12 sameness among referential relations is always stipulated in terms of one predicate. Consider again the propositions (1), (2), and (3). They assert that the actor who plays Gandalf, the actor who plays Magneto, and Ian McKellen are the same man. That is, the meaning of the actor who plays Gandalf (Magneto) is identical to Ian McKellen is that the actor who plays Gandalf (Magneto) is the same man as Ian McKellen; the meaning of the actor who plays Gandalf is identical to the actor who plays Magneto is that the actor who plays Gandalf is the same man as the actor who plays Magneto. If this is the case, it results that the identity sign in (1), (2), and (3) stands for x is the same man as y. The relative identity theorist asks: what, if any, warrant that sameness in a predicative context attests sameness across different predicative contexts? If the semantic interpretation of the identity sign in ordinary attributions of sameness and distinctness show that such attributions are contextdependent, what reasons justify the assumption that no couple of predicate F and G satisfies the proposition "x is the same F as y, but x isn't the same G as y"? RI logic opposes the classical theory of identity in considering what metaphysical consequences could follow from a context-dependent analysis of identity and distinctness claims. Particularly, against the assumption that sameness is a transcontextual relation (i.e., indiscernibility in a given context implies indiscernibility in all contexts), the RI logician claims that indiscernibility is a matter of fact. Suppose x is the same F as y. According to the classical theory of identity, from being the same F, it follows that P(x) implies P(y). That is to say, it is necessary to assume that F-ness dominates P-ness (whatever is the same F is the same P too). But, the RI logician demands reasons in support to the necessity of such an assumption: predicate dominance is throughout a matter of fact. Consequently, RI logic is a way to resist the temptation of assuming identity !13 claims on purely metaphysical grounds. Van Inwagen's development of RI logic is a formal language constituted by: vocabulary: it doesn't include terms for identity, descriptions, demonstratives, names, and it contains predicates as x is the same F as y, usual sentential connectives, variables, the universal and existential quantifiers, and punctuation marks; formation rules; rules of inference: the rules of ordinary quantifier logic; Simmetry for any x and y, if x is the same F as y, then y is the same F as x -; Transitivity for any x, y, and z, if x is the same F as y, and y is the same F as z, then x is the same F as z). This apparatus suffices to engage consistently with T. Consider the predicates is the same being as and is the same Person as. It results that trinitarian statements fall under the following general interpretation pattern for (a)-(e): α) There exists a x and x is God. Then, for any y, if y is God, y is the same being as x; β) There exist a x, a y, and a z, and x is God, y is God, and z is God; but x is not the same Person as y, y is not the same Person as z, and x is not the same Person as z. Then, for any w, if w is God, w is the same Person as x, or w is the same Person as y, or w is the same Person as z; γ) (β), and for any x and y, if x is God, and y is God, then x is the same being as y. Evidently, (α)-(γ) doesn't imply any formal contradiction. Consequently, RI logic allows to !14 give a sound expressions to trinitarian propositions. Van Inwagen's move consists in translating proper names as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit into properties each of them enjoys: God the Father =def x is the Father means that there exists a y, and x begets y and for any z, if z begets y, then z is the same Person as x; God the Son =def x is the Son means that there exists a y, and y begets x and for any z, if y begets z, then z is the same Person as x; God the Holy Spirit =def x is the Holy Spirit means that there exists a y and a z, and x proceeds from y (and eventually from z too) and for any w, if w proceeds from y (and eventually from z too), then w is the same Person as x. Propositions (a)-(e) are then expressed as follows: a') There exist a x and x is God; then for any y, if y is God, y is the same being as x; b') there exist a x and a y, and x is God; then x begets y and for any z, if z begets y, z is the same Person as x (F(x)); c') there exist a x and a y, and x is God; then y begets x and for any z, if y begets z, z is the same Person as x (S(x)); d') there exist a x, a y, and a z, and x is God; then x proceeds from y (and eventually from z too) and for any w, if w proceeds from y (and eventually from z too), w is the same Person as x (H(x)); e') there exist a x, a y and a z, and x is God, y is God, z is God; then F(x) is not the same !15 Person as S(y) or H(z), G(y) is not the same Person as F(x) or H(z), H(z) is not the same Person as F(x) or S(y). My claim is that RI logic is the most appropriate instrument to handle T. Indeed, classical trinitarian theorizing is a vigorous attempt to highlight the fact that the predicate being the same God as is not dominant on the predicate being the same divine Person as. In order to argue for my claim I will address two different tasks. Firstly, critics charge van Inwagen's RI logic with being unintelligible (Tuggy 2003, Rea 2005), false (Tuggy 2003) and unhelpful to make the point for the logical possibility of T (Vohánka 2013). I will then shortly defend RI logic. Secondly, I will show that the only way to do justice of the theological constraints listed at the end of the previous section is to deal with them in a RI logical setting. As to the first task, M.Rea contends that the account of T by van Inwagen's RI logic supplies a solution to LPT just in case it is able to supplement the logical treatment of (a)- (e) with a clear story about how identity can be predicate relative. That is, RI logic gives an intelligible answer to LPT if and only if it can cast light on the way being the same God as doesn't dominate being the same Person as. Unless such a story is available, RI logic is simply a formal statement of trinitarian claims. Now, van Inwagen doesn't provide the trinitarian theorist with the required supplemental story. Conclusion follows: RI logic is to be dismissed as a solution to LPT. Particularly, in the absence of such a supplemental story, while RI logic succeeds to manage the data of revelation in a way that prevents T from generating formal contradictions, RI logic has a hard price to pay: distinctness claims could turn out to be numerical distinctness claims. If this is the case, RI logic solves LPT by assuming a veiled form of tritheism (which isn't obviously an orthodox way of facing the !16 trinitarian doctrine). In my view the issue here is to identify what the data of revelation ask the christian to believe, and what requirements should be met in order to count a logical formulation of trinitarian statements as a solution to LPT. Suppose for a while that RI logic accommodates soundly the data of revelation, and consider what a solution to LPT should be. In a relevant respect, a solution to a problem is a complete explanation of it. As a consequence, strictly speaking, it is evident that RI logic doesn't solve LPT, because it doesn't say how it is possible that the predicate being the same God as doesn't dominate the predicate being the same Person as. It seems an uncontroversial principle of classical western ontology that different instantiations of the same nature involve numerical distinctness. Common sense shares such belief. And classical theism assumes that God is a Person (Swinburne 2004). Accordingly, being the same God as should no doubt dominate being the same Person as. But the question is: does all this matter to the evaluation of the RI logic's application to LPT? The answer is plainly negative. Van Inwagen explicitly asserts that what a system of RI logic for trinitarian theorizing should aim at isn't explaining the metaphysical possibility of the existence of one God in three Persons; rather, it should simply look for a sound formulation of the doctrine of the Trinity by which T doesn't generate formal contradictions. Rea grants that van Inwagen's RI logic accomplishes such a task. Therefore, it appears irrelevant whether the formulation is supplemented with a metaphysical explanation concerning predicative dominance. And once the predicative dominance of being the same God as over being the same Person as is rejected, tritheism is justifiably dismissed. Evidently, the opponent of RI logic can argue along the following lines. Right! You give a !17 formally consistent interpretation of T. But even if your proposal works from a logical viewpoint, it is unintelligible. It lacks any experiential grip. It isn't possible, in fact, to understand how relative identity could be true (Tuggy 2003). Therefore, it is nothing more than a refined restatement of trinitarian claims. It is abstruse, redundant, and definitely question begging. All true, I say. But I ask: should the trinitarian theorizing provide solutions to LPT? That is, does engaging consistently with T involve that LPT should be definitely answered? An ecumenical commonplace of trinitarian theology is the assumption that the doctrine of the Trinity is a mystery. Could christian believers fully understand the mystery? Evidently, no. Should they? Again, no. The contemplation of God is the culmination of the christian hope for the afterlife. The Trinity of God won't be a mystery for all those partaking in the joys of heaven. Unfortunately, due to this-worldly condition, no human being in the present state of affairs can attain a complete conceptual enjoyment of the trinitarian nature of God. And no human being ever had: neither the Apostles, the disciples, and the other individuals having had face to face experiences of Jesus. Such evidence notwithstanding, christians are asked to confess their faith in the full divinity, full identity to God and full personal distinctness of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is a consequence of the fact that the Trinity is a mystery that what trinitarian theorizing can achieve at best is a statement of the doctrine handling consistently the data of revelation. Does such an enterprise suffice in order to assent to the Trinity? Evidently, yes. I assent to Kepler's Laws. I understand what their contents mean, because I'm able to apply them for solving easy exercises contained in my old handbook of physics. Nonetheless, I have no intuition helping me to exactly clarify how it is that Kepler's Laws are true. I can't imagine the actual size of astronomical bodies, the actual distance among them, and, more importantly, !18 the relationship among them. My imaginative experiences are strongly approximate here, and, supposedly, doesn't provide a well established model for planetary motions. I learned, however, that Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation accounts for the reason why planets move. But I can't really conceptually enjoy what gravitation is. I can see its effects, I can't see gravitation. I can feel its effects (I feel resistance when I climb the stairs), but I can't feel gravitation. Further, I know that it is possible to describe these effects by measuring quantities involved in planetary motions. And I can use these measures for the purpose of calculation. But I can't grasp gravitation itself. Consequently, I can't really conceptually enjoy all that Kepler's Laws actually claim. Does the assent to Kepler's Law parallel the assent to the Trinity? To an important extent, yes. Both Kepler's Laws and the doctrine of the Trinity are (allegedly) consistent settlement of acquired data. Both Kepler's Laws and the doctrine of the Trinity aren't objects of full conceptual intuitions. What's needed in order to assent them then? Minimal rationality, i.e. consistency and accuracy in settling data. Does the RI logic treatment of trinitarian data is consistent (I will address accuracy shortly)? Yes, it is. The opponents grant this too. Conclusions follows: it is not necessary to supplement the RI logic's application to trinitarian theorizing. If RI logic accurately accommodates the data of revelation and captures how traditional trinitarian theorizing addressed and gave formulation to the doctrine to the Trinity, than RI logic is an instrument to reason into the mystery, i.e., to state the doctrine consistently. Further criticisms come from V.Vohánka. As Rea, he concedes that the expression of the doctrine of the Trinity in RI logic is a consistent one. Differently from Rea and Tuggy, he concedes even more: Van Inwagen's treatment of T doesn't necessary require a supplemental story, because logical possibility doesn't involve strong intelligibility. !19 However, Vohánka claims, consistent formulation in RI logic doesn't imply that they are logically possible. Impossible propositions as something is and isn't red are formally consistent in sentential logic. Nonetheless, they appear logically impossible. Consequently, RI logic should strive for something more than mere formal consistency: it should prove that the doctrine of the Trinity is also logically possible. Vohánka understands logically possible as not entailing any explicitly self-contradictory proposition, a proposition being explicitly self-contradictory when it states that something is and isn't so and so, or that something is and isn't such and such, or that something is and isn't in such and such relation, or that something does and doesn't exist. According to this understanding, van Inwagen development of RI logic doesn't provide any reason for the logical possibility of the doctrine of the Trinity, because formal consistency in RI logic or standard logic doesn't imply logical possibility, whereas sharing a form with something logically possible in RI logic doesn't warrant that (at least) some among the semantic interpretations of the form aren't logically self-contradictory. As regards to this, Vohánka observes that a typical case of self-contradictory interpretations of valid forms in RI logic concerns the treatment of the instantiation of specific and generic properties. Evidently, it is logically impossible that some things are of the same species but of different genus. Now, being the same species as and being the same genus as are two relative identity predicates. As for T, they can be used to handle in a formally consistent way propositions as x is the same species of y, but is not the same genus of y. As a consequence, the formal consistency of T doesn't exclude that T is not logically self contradictory. Now, Vohánka's counterexample hits the target. In reason of α, β, and γ, (a')-(e') can be given a formal translation in such a way that the form involved is shared by both logically !20 possible and impossible contents. I ask notwithstanding: isn't the doctrine of the Trinity an unique and unparalleled case? Isn't RI logic's application to LPT an use sui generis? Van Inwagen states very clearly that he believes RI logic to be useful only inside theology. It doesn't seem compelling then to refute RI logic's application to LPT in reason of the alleged falsity of general RI logic (Tuggy 2003). Even if RI logic were definitely rejected for application to ordinary contents, it could turn out to be the case that its application to the logically consistent formulation of the Trinity works. There's an evident reason for this claim. While the notion of logical possibility in terms of not entailing anything explicitly self-contradictory (probably) matters to all earthly things, it is not sure that transcendent objects (as God is thought to be) necessary fall under the rule of the one or the other among the standard developments of logic. I'm not claiming that dealing with the notion of God supposes the use of some exotic logic opposing the notion of logical possibility assumed by standard logic. Rather, I hold simply that it seems uncontroversial that what pertains to the notion of God could not parallel what pertains to earthly things, pace Leibnizians. Consequently, I'm not sure that the logical possibility of T should be evaluate unintelligible in reason of the logical impossibility of propositions sharing its very same form in RI logic. After all, Vohánka just proves that a set of propositions, translated consistently in RI logic by the same form used to translate trinitarian claims, is evidently logically impossible. No doubt, it doesn't follow from this that the translation of T is logically impossible too. And the theological and non-theological views driving the semantic interpretation of the relevant form in RI logic suggest that the case of T doesn't actually parallel the case of specific and generic properties. !21 The RI logic's application to LPT then leads theorists to the starting point of the development of RI logic. Which reasons attest that identity is transcontextual? Which reasons demonstrate that the predicate being the same God as dominates the predicate being the same Person as? The RI logician will answer: it is sure that no logical reason succeeds in pursuing the task. All considered, this is a matter of fact throughout. There's an important outcome here: RI logic isn't an explanatory program for T. On the contrary, it is a way to engage with T without assuming that T generates formal contradictions. How making (a')- (e') logically possible then depends only on the way the Trinity of God actually is. Conclusion follows: it can be granted that van Inwagen's RI logic doesn't show that T is logically possible. Nonetheless, Vohánka's claim appears irrelevant: sharing the same form in RI logic with logical impossible contents doesn't prove that the translation of T is logically impossible either. Consequently, the core problem with RI logic's application to LPT should consist simply in evaluating how accurately RI logic accommodates the data of revelation. I will now move to such a topic. Consider the five theological constraints of IDENTICAL INSTANTIATION OF NATURE, SINGULARITY OF DIVINE NATURE, DISTINCTNESS BY GENEALOGICAL RELATIONS, PERSONAL DEPENDENCE, and LITURGICAL BOOSTING OF PERSONAL DISTINCTNESS. The first and second constraints specify the way being God is to be understood. By IDENTICAL INSTANTIATION OF NATURE christians are asked to believe that there's just one actualization of divine properties. Evidently, being God means instantiating divine properties. Suppose divine properties are being eternal, being necessary, being omnipotent, being omniscient, and the like. Then, christians should hold that there's just one way of enjoying eternity, necessity, omnipotence, omniscience, and the like. By SINGULARITY OF DIVINE !22 NATURE christians assent to a more peculiar belief. Divine nature is an universal (i.e. a collection of properties) necessary realized by one single being: whoever actualizes divine nature enjoys identically the whole collection of divine properties and nothing more. Evidently, the conjunction of the first and second constraints implies that God's onefoldness is understood in a maximally robust way. That is, according the data of the revelation, the predicate being God (being the same God as) is dominant on the predicate instantiating divine properties (being the same instantiation of divine properties as), because given that x and y are God, if x instantiates one among the divine properties, then y instantiates it too. Van Inwagen's RI logic expresses such a maximal robust reading of the two constraints by the assumption of (α). The fourth and fifth constraints specify how being a Person should be meant to be. By PERSONAL DEPENDENCE christian should believe that Persons are constituted by mutual relationships. This claim is to be read in a very strong sense. Each of us is obviously constituted by our relationship to our relatives, our friends, and all relevant persons we encounter in our life. But no one of us is constituted by relations to others as strongly as divine Persons are, because while we are used to think ourselves to be contingent, divine Persons' existence is evidently necessary. That is, some of the persons I'm acquainted with may have never seen any of my children. Naturally, they know me, i.e., they know a person who does most of what he ordinary does in reason of the fact that he is what he is because he has a family so and so. Nonetheless, in some important respect, they have knowledge of me as ontologically independent on any person I'm actually related to. On the contrary, the divine Persons don't enjoy an analogous ontological independence. Seeing the Father is seeing the Son and the Holy Spirit too. To an important respect, their !23 relationship forms an indissoluble knot. However, such a knot is a connection among three clearly distinct beings. By LITURGICAL BOOSTING OF PERSONAL DISTINCTNESS christians reveal a very precise awareness of personal distinctness. The agency of the divine Persons show individual actualizations of divine properties. Each of them plays a different role in the history of salvation, does different things, and experiences different states of affairs. The conjunction of the fourth and fifth constraints makes sense just in terms of a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God. That is, it seems that christians are committed to worship three inter-twinned but numerically distinct divine beings. Consequently, according to the data of revelation, the predicate being a divine Person (being the same Person as) dominates the predicate instantiating personal properties (being the same instantiation of divine properties) because given that x and y are the same divine Person, if x instantiates one among the personal properties, then y instantiates it too. Van Inwagen's RI logic assumes such a maximal robust reading of the two constraints by the assumption of (β). What is the dominance relation between being God and being a divine Person? Evidently, the data of revelation ask christians to believe that the former doesn't dominate the latter, however difficult such a task could be. According to the first, second, fourth, and fifth constraints the notion of God entails indeed that both God's onefoldness and threefoldness are to be read in a maximally robust sense. Onefoldness: all which is divine is identical. Threefoldness: all which is personal is distinct. Now, the doctrine of the Trinity is the claim that there are three divine Persons. That is, all which is personal means all which is personally divine. Consequently, the doctrine of the Trinity consists in the claim that the divine nature is the realm of identity, but, at least for a case, i.e. the personal actualization of the divine !24 nature, the actualization of identity allows for personal but not divine distinctness. There's no easy escape from the demanding cave of trinitarian theorizing. Now, the third constraint specifies how being a Person relates to being God. By DISTINCTNESS BY GENEALOGICAL RELATIONS christians should believe that Persons differ only for the way their possession of the same divine nature relates to others. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit aren't distinct in reason of either their nature or the instantiation of their nature. Rather, they are distinct because of the relationship among them. The Father possesses the divine nature causa sui; the Son receives the divine nature from the Father; the Holy Spirit takes the divine nature from the Father (and eventually the Son). Therefore, according to the third constraint, each of them instantiates identically the same single nature (first and second constraints), but having such an instantiation a relationship to others, each of them is distinct and enjoys peculiarly the same stream of divine properties (fourth and fifth constrains). Van Inwagen's RI logic expresses the assumption of the third constraint by (γ). The source of the conflict among trinitarian claims stands here. DISTINCTNESS BY GENEALOGICAL RELATIONS assumes that a maximally robust reading of the uniqueness of both the divine nature and its instantiations can't be formally consistent with a maximally robust reading of the threefold personality of God unless christians are able to disentangle the way the divine nature is realized (being God) from the way the realizations of the divine nature relates among them (being a Person). Any other compatibilist reading of God's onefoldness and threefoldness clashes among different pieces of evidence. Suppose personal distinctness relies on the different forms of agency the divine Persons are told to exercise by the creedal statements. Then the notion of onefoldness couldn't be !25 read robustly, since (at least) the IDENTICAL INSTANTIATION OF NATURE is rejected. That is, x and y are two divine Persons. Accordingly, they instantiate identically the same single nature. Among the divine properties there's omnipotence. In reason of the dominance of being God over instantiating divine properties, whenever x and y exercise an agency, x and y should exercise the same agency. Nonetheless, the starting supposition assumes that personal distinctness relies on the evidence of distinct qua individually different agencies by the divine Persons. Therefore, distinct agencies shouldn't be dismissed. Conclusion follows: the divine Persons doesn't instantiate identically omnipotence. On the contrary, suppose the uniqueness of both the divine nature and its instantiation is seriously taken. Consider x and y being two divine Persons. Since being a person dominates instantiating personal properties, both of them instantiate a peculiar personal properties. Evidently, personal properties are divine personal properties for God. Consequently, because of the domination of being God over instantiating divine properties, if x and y are God, x and y instantiate identically divine properties. Personal properties should then be identically instantiated too. The conclusion is that personal distinctness vanishes. What attains to a Persons attains identically to all, and there's just a single Person here: God. In light of these considerations the third constraint results to be the decisive reason in support of the RI logic's approach to LPT. The identity in the instantiation of a single nature definitely conflicts with strong personal distinctness because if divine Persons are to be distinguished in terms of their relationships, and such relations are asymmetric relations, then the divine Persons can't instantiate the same nature. Consider the begetting relation subsisting between the Father and the Son. Begetting is asymmetrical. If someone begets some other, than the other is not begetting, but begotten. According to the fourth !26 constraint the Father's begetting the Son is a necessary relation. According to the first constraint any divine being instantiates identically the same properties. Now, according to the second and third constraints being the Father means instantiating the divine properties plus begetting the Son; being the Son means instantiating the divine properties plus being begotten by the Father. Consequently, in reason of the necessary possession of contrary properties by the divine Persons, christians should be able to say at a time that being the Father is definitely different from being the Son, that the Father is God and the Son is God, and that there is only one God. The third constraint suggests a way to perform the task, i.e., resisting the temptation of considering the divine Persons like mere tokens of the type divine beings. Indeed, there's just one divine being, that is God. God instantiates the whole set of divine properties, and has a threefold relation to such an instantiation (begetting, being begotten, proceeding). This threefold instantiation is necessary. More interestingly, having a threefold relation to the instantiation of the divine nature it allows God someway to exist as three divine Persons. How it is possible no one knows. What exactly means, no one knows. It's a mystery christian theologians advocate. Anyway, He is each divine Persons. That is, the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God. Consequently, whoever instantiates the unique divine nature, instantiates it identically. Nonetheless, God's threefold relation to His nature ontologically constitute Him as a Trinity of divine Persons. Since each of them is strongly distinct from the others, each of them actually exercises a different agency in the history of salvation, experiences a peculiar stream of awareness, and has individual features. The key move here is to hold that the intension of the predicate being God doesn't overlap completely with the intension of the predicate being a Person. That is, such predicates point !27 at partially different things. The third constraint asserts exactly that if a Person is said to be God, what the proposition expresses is that there is an instantiation of divine properties; differently, if a divine Person is said to be a Person, what the proposition expresses is that there is a peculiar relation among the instantiations of the divine properties. Now, there's an evident way to embody the deep core of these considerations into a formally consistent statement of the Trinity, i.e., assuming that being God doesn't dominate being a divine Persons. No intuition helps here. Common sense raises doubt indeed. Trinitarianism asks christians to understand being God and being a Person as intensionally differing and (at least in part) extensionally overlapping. But such a reading is a very innatural one. Maximally robust understandings of God's threefoldness evidently suppose to read prima facie the predicates in terms of intensional overlapping and extensional difference. Is this enough to reject the Trinity? I'm not sure: human logical skills appear to be suitable to this-worldly affairs. What is certain is that christians should confess the doctrine of the Trinity. The doctrine requires to understand God's onefoldness and threefoldness in a maximally robust way. Although RI logic can't provide clear intuitions accounting how it is possible that being God doesn't dominate being a Person, it complies with such a requirement comfortably, i.e. in a formally consistent way. Therefore, it can be the case that no christian results able to make intuitively compatible her understanding of the onefoldness of God with His threefoldness. But it seems the only right way to travel, any other trinitarian analogy being threatened by unsound reading of the notion of God's onefoldness and threefoldness. !28 3. General arguments against LT, ST and CV follow from the assumption of the treatment of LPT by RI logic. I will now briefly state what the lines of argumentation are. LT is an explanatory project for the notion of the Trinity. Its starting point is the uniqueness of the divine nature. The proposal consists in accounting for the threefoldness of God in reason of the uniqueness of His nature. On the contrary, ST moves from the threefold personality of God to the uniqueness of His nature (Tuggy 2003; Moreland & Craig 2009; Leftow 2010; Bohn 2011). CT is the view that three distinct divine Persons share the same substratum by accidental sameness. Shortly, each Person is a unity of matter and form. Divine properties constitute matter. Form is the principle of personal individuation. The three divine Persons identically actualize the same nature by personally informing the onefold divinity (Rea 2009; Tuggy 2013). Finally, E.D.Bohn proposes a solution to LPT which doesn't fit into any of the preceding categories. He claims that identity is a one-many/many-one relation. Consequently, God's uniqueness and tripersonality are to be accounted for by the way the same substance is regarded. That is, God's reality can be conceptually divided into two different ways: considered as a whole it's simply God; considered as a multiplicity of Persons it's a Trinity (Bohn 2011). My general claim is that neither of these solutions to LPT works because of the impossibility to give a maximally robust reading of the onefoldness and threefoldness of God outside the speculative province of RI logic. Tuggy distinguishes two versions of LT, the popular and the refined (Tuggy 2003). The former is committed to the assumption of (T1), i.e., personal distinctness is modal distinctness. The latter (among which Tuggy unsoundly positions RI logic too) is refuted in !29 reason of ad hoc considerations. B.Leftow is the proponent of the most notable refined version of LT (Leftow 2009). My claim is that Leftow's refined LT collapses into popular LT because Leftow's main assumption is that God is one Person acting concurrently three different roles in the history of salvation. True: Leftow's approach allows attributing to the divine Persons three different streams of consciousness as personal distinctness entails. But such three different streams of consciousness are distinct just from the viewpoint of human beings. In God they are three simultaneous flows of actions produced by one single personal agency. Consequently, each of the divine Persons is a different mode of consciousness of the same divine Person, i.e. the only God. Conclusion follows: Leftow's LT assumes (T1). Now, the general argument against LT runs as follows: 1) In order to be evaluated a sound theory, any theory handling T should meet the conjunction of the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from hypothesis); 2) The fourth and fifth theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing entails a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (from hypothesis); 3) Each version of LT assumes (T1); 4) (T1) isn't a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God; 5) LT doesn't assume a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (for (3) and (4)); 6) LT doesn't meet at least one requirement by the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from (2) and (5)); !30 7) LT isn't a sound theory handling T (from (1) and (6)). Surprisingly enough, ST turns out to be unsound for the very same reason than LT. Since ST's starting point is the threefold distinctness of the divine Persons, it would be reasonable to expect that ST fails to meet the first and second theological constraints. Nonetheless, as Tuggy proves, it is an immediate consequence of ST's approach to LPT that only the Trinity is properly God, God being actually the community of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Consequently, if the Trinity alone is God, personal distinctness doesn't permit to state that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are God. It is then evident that (T2) can't do justice to a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God. It results that: 1) In order to be evaluated a sound theory, any theory handling T should meet the conjunction of the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from hypothesis); 2) The fourth and fifth theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing entails a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (from hypothesis); 3) Each version of ST assumes (T2); 4) (T2) isn't a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God; 5) ST doesn't assume a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (for (3) and (4)); 6) ST doesn't meet at least one requirement by the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from (2) and (5)); !31 7) ST isn't a sound theory handling T (from (1) and (6)). As for LT and ST, also CT can give a consistent solution to LPT just setting aside maximally robust reading of God's threefoldness. Indeed, (T3) infringes directly upon the fourth constraint (CT assumes that the divine Persons aren't strongly dependent on each others) and the fifth constraint (CT assumes that the divine Persons are exactly identical inasmuch as they stand in a relation of accidental sameness without identity). Particularly, accidental sameness involves complete overlapping. Distinctness appears only if one of the materially composed beings sharing the same substratum ceases to impose its form on matter. That is, distinct beings enjoying accidental sameness are commonly discernible in terms of their different conditions of permanence. Conclusion follows: as long as the divine Persons share the same substratum, i.e., they are one God, they aren't actually distinct. On the contrary, suppose they are strongly discernible (as the fifth constraint requires). Then, they are no more in the relationship of accidental sameness. Therefore: 1) In order to be evaluated a sound theory, any theory handling T should meet the conjunction of the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from hypothesis); 2) The fourth and fifth theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing entails a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (from hypothesis); 3) Each version of CT assumes (T3); 4) (T3) isn't a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God; !32 5) CT doesn't assume a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (for (3) and (4)); 6) CT doesn't meet at least one requirement by the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from (2) and (5)); 7) CT isn't a sound theory handling T (from (1) and (6)). I now come to the last option for trinitarian theorizing (Bohn 2011). Bohn's proposal depends on the claim that identity is a one-many/many-one relation. Naturally such a claim is strongly controversial, but I don't intend to move criticism to the metaphysical point here; because, even if identity were as Bohn assumes it be, the application of the onemany/many-one notion of identity to LPT would remain unpalatable. What's wrong is again the impossibility to accomodate the requirements by the fifth constraint. Evidently, concepts cut reality. As a consequence, the use of concepts renders reality according to different conceptual views. Bohn states with a dose of common sense that it is a matter of fact how much adequately concepts cut reality. While diverging concepts could apply to the same reality, just appropriate concepts express soundly the state of affairs they extend on. The divine reality is differently cut by the notions of onefoldness and threefoldness. But, since the data of revelation attest us that they are adequate to God's reality, then it is to be assumed that God is a Trinity of Persons. Bohn claims: suppose to regard God's reality in terms of onefoldness. God will appear as one being. On the contrary, suppose to regard God's reality in terms of threefoldness. God will now appear as three Persons. The basic point in Bohn's solution is that the identity with God of the Father, the Son, and the !33 Holy Spirit is to be understood collectively and not distributively (B). Such a claim prevents from attributing distinct divinity to each of the Persons. That is, according to Bohn's solution each of the Persons isn't really God if regarded distinctly from the other. There's just a way then to make (B) theologically acceptable: to assume that the Persons are discernible, but actually not distinct. Consequently, (B) implies that the fifth constraint is to be dismissed. The general argument against Bohn's view (BT) is then the following: 1) In order to be evaluated a sound theory, any theory handling T should meet the conjunction of the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from hypothesis); 2) The fourth and fifth theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing entails a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (from hypothesis); 3) Each version of BT assumes (B); 4) (B) isn't a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God; 5) BT doesn't assume a maximally robust reading of the threefoldness of God (for (3) and (4)); 6) BT doesn't meet at least one requirement by the five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing (from (2) and (5)); 7) BT isn't a sound theory handling T (from (1) and (6)). 4. Trinitarian skepticism is the claim that, while the notion of the Trinity can be expressed in !34 a formally consistent way, human understanding is unable to grasp completely what the Trinity actually is. There are two possibilities of construing trinitarian skepticism. Weak trinitarian skepticism is the claim that human understanding is unable to grasp completely what the Trinity actually is because of God's transcendence. That is, the fact that human beings haven't the capability to fully understand God in this-worldly condition is due to a lack of cognitive, sensorial, and experiential skills suitable to enjoy Him. Consequently, from the assumption of weak trinitarian skepticism it follows that God can be a Trinity, and that human beings are perfectly entitled to worship the Trinity of God. The alternative construal of trinitarian skepticism, the strong one, infers metaphysical facts from epistemological evidence. It is the claim that, since human understanding is unable to grasp completely what the Trinity actually, God can't be a Trinity. In my view, strong trinitarian skepticism is definitely irrational and I'm not willing to subscribe it (although in the past I felt sympathetic to such a position). On the contrary, what RI logic's application to LPT inclines to it is the assumption of weak trinitarian skepticism (I believe van Inwagen won't be at ease with the claim that his development of RI logic constitutes evidence in support of a form of moderate skepticism). Indeed, ATS is to be spelled out as follows: 1) According to maximally robust reading of the notion of onefoldness and threefoldness, either a thing is onefold or threefold (from hypothesis); 2) The five theological constraints over trinitarian theorizing entails a maximally robust reading of both the onefoldness and threefoldness of God (from hypothesis); 3) Maximally robust onefoldness and maximally robust threefoldness aren't compatible in !35 the claim that God is one being in three Persons (from (1) and (2)); 4) Human understanding is unable to grasp completely what the Trinity actually is (from (3)). Now: 1) A theory soundly handling T expresses (a)-(e) accordingly to a maximally robust reading of both the onefoldness and threefoldness of God (from the five theological constraints); 2) RI logic soundly handles T (from hypothesis); 3) RI logic expresses (a)-(e) accordingly to a maximally robust reading of both the onefoldness and threefoldness of God (from (1) and (2)); 4) RI logic expresses (a)-(e) by disentangling maximally robust God's onefoldness from maximally robust God's threefoldness (from hypothesis); 5) According to RI logic's application to LPT, maximally robust onefoldness and maximally robust threefoldness aren't compatible in the claim that God is one being in three Persons (from (3) and (4)). There's an uncontroversial moral in all this story. RI logic provides a formally consistent account for the notion of the Trinity. Such account suffices for worshipping one single God and three divine Persons to the higher justifiable degree at disposal to human understanding. What lacks here to achieve better results is not cognitive in nature. It is experiential. The problem isn't indeed handling consistently T. Rather, it is grasping how it !36 is possible to be the case that a state of affairs reveals the compatibility of maximally robust onefoldness with maximally robust threefoldness. Maybe, the apostle Paul pointed at such a problem when he claimed that human beings are in need of a spiritual nature in order to be commensurate with God: "So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body" (1 Cor 15.42-15.44). !37 References. Bohn, E.D. (2011), The Logic of the Trinity. Sophia, 50(3), 363-374; Bottarini, G. (2006), Tommaso e la dottrina delle relazioni sussistenti. Doctor Virtuali, 5; Brower, J.E. & Rea, M.C. (2005), Material Constitution and the Trinity. Philosophia Christi, 22, 487-505; Cartwright, R. (1987), On the Logical Problem of the Trinity, in R.Cartwright, Philosophical Essays (187-200). Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press; Cross, R. (2002), Two Models of the Trinity?. Heytrop Journal, 43, 275-294; Emery, G. (2007), The Trinitarian Theology of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Oxford: OUP; Jacobs, N. (2008), On Not three Gods Again: Can a Primary-Secondary Substance Reading of Ousia and Hypostasis Avoid Tritheism?. Modern Theology, 24(3), 331-358; Leftow, B. (2009), A Latin Trinity, in M. Rea (Ed.), Oxford Readings in Philosophical Theology (76-106), Oxford: OUP, Vol. 1; Leftow, B. (2010), Two Trinities: Reply to Hasker. Religious Studies, 46, 441-447; Moreland, J.P. & Craig, W.L. (2009), The Trinity, in M. Rea (Ed.), Oxford Readings in Philosophical Theology (21-43), Oxford: OUP, Vol. 1; Rahner, K. (1967), Der dreifaltige Gott als transzendenter Urgrund der Heilsgeschichte, in J.Feiner & M.Löhrer (Eds.), Mysterium Salutis, Einsiedeln: Benzinger, 5 voll., vol. 2; Rea, M.C. (2003), Relative Identity and the Trinity. Philosophia Christi, 5(2), 431-445; Rea, M. (2009), The Trinity, in T.A. Flint & M. Rea (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology (403-429), Oxford: OUP; !38 Senor, T.D. (2013), The Doctrine of the Trinity is Coherent, in J.P. Moreland, C. Meister, & K.A. Sweis (Eds.), Debating Christian Theism (335-346), Oxford: OUP; Swinburne, R. (2004), The Existence of God, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Tuggy, D. (2003), The Unfinished Business of Trinitarian Theorizing. Religious Studies, 39, 165-183; Tuggy, D. (2013), Constitution Trinitarianism: an Appraisal. Philosophy and Theology, 25(1), 129-162; van Inwagen, P. (1988), And yet They Are not Three Gods but One God, in T.V.Morris (Ed.), Philosophy and the Christian Faith (241-278), Notre Dame, In., USA: University of Notre Dame Press; Vohánka, V. (2013), Why Peter van Inwagen Does not Help in Showing the Logical Possibility of the Trinity. Studia Neoaristotelica, 10(2), 196-214. !

Open Theology 2017; 3: 167–173 Charles Taliaferro, Elliot Knuths* Thought Experiments in Philosophy of Religion: The Virtues of Phenomenological Realism and Values DOI 10.1515/opth-2017-0013 Received March 20, 2017; accepted March 23, 2017 Abstract: We present a criterion for the use of thought experiments as a guide to possibilia that bear on important arguments in philosophy of religion. We propose that the more successful thought experiments are closer to the world in terms of phenomenological realism and the values they are intended to track. This proposal is filled out by comparing thought experiments of life after death by Peter van Inwagen and Dean Zimmerman with an idealist thought experiment. In terms of realism and values we contrast an exemplary thought experiment by Iris Murdoch with one we find problematic by William Irwin. Keywords: Thought experiments; Peter van Inwagen; Dean Zimmerman; William Irwin; Iris Murdoch; Berkeley 1 Introduction Thought experiments are frequently employed in philosophy in general, philosophy of religion in particular. Thought experiments involve conceivable states of affairs that are at some remove from ordinary experience, designed to enhance, clarify or critique some philosophical position. So, the Ring of Gyges, in which a shepherd discovers a ring that will make him invisible is engaged in Plato's Republic to test our view about what human beings are really like, viz. what would you do if you could do anything you wished and get away with it?1 In philosophy of religion since World War Two, we have had famous thought experiments in which God is compared to an invisible gardener and someone in the underground resistance during wartime who seems loyal but the evidence is not clear.2 We also have thought experiments in which two persons traveling along a road, one of whom believes they will come to a great kingdom, and more recently, God's hiddenness is likened to a parent who hides from her child who is lost in the woods.3 In "Sensibility and Possibilia: A defense of Thought Experiments," Taliaferro defended the evidential role of thought experiments against modal skepticism.4 In this paper we extend that project and then propose two points: thought experiments are better served when they are in accord with our phenomenological experience and when they track the values that are in play. We critically assess what we believe to be incidents of when this is not the case in thought experiments by Peter Van Inwagen and William Irwin, 1 Plato, The Republic, Book II. 2 Flew, "Theology and Falsification". 3 Tooley, "John Hick and the Concept of Eschatological Verification"; Schellenberg, The Hiddenness Argument. 4 Taliaferro, "Sensibility and Possibilia". © 2017 Charles Taliaferro, Elliot Knuths, published by De Gruyter Open. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License. *Corresponding author: Elliot Knuths, St. Olaf College, United States of America; E-mail: [email protected] Charles Taliaferro, St. Olaf College, United States of America Analytic Perspectives on Method and Authority in Theology Open Access Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM 168 C. Taliaferro, E. Knuths and then assess a thought experiment which we think succeeds admirably in light of our proposal about phenomenology and value. 2 Modal Realism Taliaferro has earlier defended the claim that if one can conceive of (imagine, consistently describe) a state of affairs obtaining and know of no independent reasons for thinking its obtaining to be impossible, then one has prima facie justified in believing the state of affairs to be possible. We now wish to amend this to take into account conditions of when such conceivability takes place with the careful scrutinizing of possible defeaters that would show the state of affairs to be impossible. We are impressed by David Lund's notion of what he calls secunda facie justification. Lund articulates his ideas in the context of addressing thought experiments involving persons existing in a disembodied state. Though ideal conceivability would yield conclusive knowledge of metaphysical possibility, the ideal form is apparently beyond our reach, at least in the case of any matter as complex as one's possible disembodiment. On the other hand, we should strive to attain more than prima facie conceivability, for it may be quite vulnerable to defeaters revealed by a more detailed conception and better reasoning. Secunda facie conceivability, by contrast, survives an informed and painstaking search for possible defeaters. Though the likelihood of defeaters is not eliminated, it is greatly reduced. Thus we must acknowledge secunda facie conceivability to be an extremely reliable guide to nonfactual possibility unless we are willing to deny that any form or level of conceivability provides any epistemic access to such possibility. But the implications of such a denial would be intolerable if, as seems clear, conceivability is our only basic access to nonfactual possibility.5 We will use this enriched condition of secunda facie conceivability in what follows. 3 Phenomenological experience The philosophical literature on the conceivability of life after life, in which there is personal continuity after the dissolution of the body, consists of a multitude of thought experiments. We have imagined states of affairs in which philosophers have sought to distinguish between the re-creation of a person after physical death with the re-creation of a replica of that individual. The most creative thought experiments have involved the replacement of physical bodily parts with immaterial objects to the replacement of a person's body at the point of death with a simulacrum while God has taken the bodily person to some remote realm to God siphoning off bodily elements of a person's body to another spatial dimension where a closest continuer, successor of the (soon to be) dead person has been created and can become the continuant of the deceased.6 We propose that each of these thought experiments involves a remoteness from ordinary experience and, in the van Inwagen case, not just a remoteness from ordinary experience but also a remoteness from our values and what, for theists, is our understanding of God's goodness. Let us first propose some thought experiments that do not have these impairments and then offer some critical observations about the thought experiments that, in our view, fail in terms of connecting with phenomenological experience. A thought experiment that would, in our view, more successfully make a case for the coherence of believing that there could be life after life would be one in which one imagines that Berkeleyan idealism is true here and now of our world. Consider, for example, the extensive work of John Foster in which our world of sensations and perceptions, ostensible material objects et al, turns out to be the world according to Bishop Berkeley.7 From such a standpoint, the customary assumption that the mind-independent physical world is epistemically and metaphysically primary is overturned. In a Berkeleyan framework, the coherence of mind surviving the perishing of what we take to be physical is apparent insofar as we have a radical nonidentity between mind and material body. A subjective idealist can accept mortalism, the idea that mind 5 Lund, The Conscious Self, 264-265. 6 See van Inwagen, "The Possibility of Resurrection". 7 Foster, The Case for Idealism. Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM Thought Experiments in Philosophy of Religion 169 perishes with the body, but she is not committed to that and has the resources to articulate how it is that there may be continuity of person after death. What if we have good reason to believe that a Berkeleyan universe is, in fact, not our universe? We are, say, in a universe in which there is a mixture of mind and non-mind and the physical domain is mindindependent (at least of finite minds). Then the thought experiment can be shifted to become a description of the next life.8 If Berkeleyan idealism involves some known impossibility such as a violation of the law of non-contradiction or in violation of some metaphysical truth that is evident for all possible worlds (e.g. backwards causation), then the thought experiment is useless, but short of this, its apparent conceivability is prima facie evidence of it being a genuine possibility and, insofar as we examine possible defeaters and establish that they do not undermine the coherence of a Berkeleyan realm, we have secunda facie justification. Note that the above thought experiments (in which we imagine either this life or the next in idealist terms) do not involve God's engagement in the deception required for van Inwagen's thought experiment. In van Inwagen's case we have to imagine a situation in which the (ostensible) body of the deceased is not numerically identical with the body of the living person and thus it only resembles the body of the deceased. Perhaps at the moment of each man's death, God removes his corpse and replaces it with a simulacrum which is what is burned or rots. Or perhaps God is not quite so wholesale as this: perhaps He removes for "safekeeping" only the "core person"-the brain and the central nervous system-or even some special part of it.9 Van Inwagen's thought experiment has been criticized by others on matters of value. Here, however, we go further, making note of van Inwagen's reply to these objections. So, as one reviewer of an earlier version of this article observed, "van Inwagen has argued that the model should not offend our values since the simulacrum is a counter-factual demonstration of all that God has achieved in Christ and the fact that we mistake the simulacrum for the corpse is just an example of mistaken identity in epistemically favorable conditions, which is something that can easily occur and does not entail that one has been deliberately deceived."10 Van Inwagen makes the following claim in "I Look for the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the World to Come": If God does replace each fresh corpse with a simulacrum, he does thereby show us an important truth: what death mean, or what it would mean if he had not gone beyond justice, beyond mercy, and drawn death's sting in Christ. He shows us this, so to speak, counterfactually, but it is a counterfactual situation he's showing us. He's showing us what would have been if he were no more than a God of justice and had left us to the situation we had earned for ourselves by our rebellion against our creator."11 We offer a threefold reply. First, contra van Inwagen, it is far from clear how this body-switching amounts to "showing" God's powerful love. The switch is not observable. Presumably any switch would have to be instantaneous. Imagine if it were otherwise. This would be close to a horrifying gradual substitution of one body with another, the parasitic simulacrum slowly expanding until it has fully replaced the person's actual body. Secondly, the substitution would, in our view, undermine the reverence Christians show to the corpse, a reverence van Inwagen acknowledges.12 This, however, would seem at odds with the longstanding tradition within Christianity of venerating relics. If van Inwagen's thought experiment holds, then the relics of the bodies of saints are not actually the bodies of saints. Rather, relics collected after death are merely bits taken from divinely-constructed sculptures of saints' bodies. Even if, like ourselves, one does not practice the veneration of relics, this would be a practice that would be outrageously misplaced if one follows van Inwagen's thought experiment. Third, we propose that van Inwagen's thought experiment is 8 As suggested in Taliaferro's Consciousness and the Mind of God, this was done, in part, by H.H. Price in "Survival and the Idea of 'Another World'". 9 van Inwagen,"The Possibility of Resurrection", 121. 10 Reviewer 2, Open Theology, January 17, 2017. 11 van Inwagen, "I Look for the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the World to Come", 8. 12 Ibid., 9. Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM 170 C. Taliaferro, E. Knuths more a description of an act of magic than a miracle. We are not skeptics about the possibility or even the reasonability of believing in some miracles. But note that such miracles, including Biblical resurrections, do not involve substitutions. When Christ resurrects Lazarus, he returns life to the corpse of the deceased Lazarus. This is impossible, per van Inwagen's view. For van Inwagen, Christ's resurrection of Lazarus must involve a substitution of Lazarus' simulacrum with his already-transported body. This, however, seems inconsistent with the recollection of the miracle presented in the Gospel. A fourth point may be added, but we will not develop it here. Van Inwagen is driven to his extreme thought experiment by a rejection of dualism and acceptance of materialism. If dualism is indeed thoroughly, demonstrably false, then it may be reasonable to consider replacement accounts like van Inwagen's, but we do not find this to be the case. Instead, we hope that the implausibility of materialist accounts of resurrection will lead those inclined to believe in resurrection to reconsider dualism. There is also something at least peculiar about imagining God collecting parts of human bodies and then re-assembling them in some other realm, as we find with Zimmerman's thought experiment. The escape is by a hair's breadth, effected by a miraculous last minute "jump" that takes me out of harm's way. So I am tempted to call this story "the falling elevator model of survival" - for you'll recall that, according to the "physics" of cartoons, it is possible to avoid death in a plummeting elevator simply by jumping out in the split second before the elevator hits the basement floor. I argue that it is consistent with the rest of van Inwagen's materialistic metaphysics that our bodies do something like that when we die.13 Perhaps Zimmerman is merely offering a logically or metaphysically possible way in which materialism could be true, and a person's human body persists in an afterlife, rather than identifying a way in which we may recognize such a transition as either probable or elegant. Nonetheless, his thought experiment raises the same concerns as van Inwagen's. Zimmerman's account of budding caused by the worldly body is not at all observable and seems closer to science fiction than everyday experience. Other things being equal, the Berkeleyan thought experiment seems more elegant and proximate. In thinking of this life or an afterlife one does not need to posit a phenomenology other than what we experience and, when we imagine a transformed afterlife, we need not think about the transfer of physical particles or the causal processes going on among them. 4 Tracking values in thought experiments There are numerous thought experiments involving values in the philosophy of religion; often these involve the problem of evil and different accounts of redemption or the atonement.14 Here we identify only one case, but which we think is quite instructive by the atheist, existentialist philosopher William Irwin. He rejects moral realism, and advances an error theory in terms of moral judgments. On his view, there is no objective fact of the matter that the torture of children is morally wrong. He advances some thought experiments designed to wear away the intuitions of moral realists who assume that there are objective facts of the matter. Let us first review his position succinctly and then indicate why we think his use of thought experiments loses track of the values in question. Irwin writes: Advocates of objective morality often fall back on a piece of subjective evidence: morality feels true. That may be, but we need to ask why. Does morality feel true because we were raised with morality? Probably both. The fact that a thing feels true may provide subjective reason to look for an objective reason that validates the subjective feeling, but if no such reason is forthcoming, the feeling must be rejected as insufficient evidence.15 Irwin notes the pervasiveness of our ethical feelings: 13 Zimmerman, "The Compatibility of Materialism and Survival", 196. 14 See Taliaferro and Meister, Contemporary Philosophical Theology, for a review of cases. 15 Irwin, The Free Market Existentialist, 105-106. Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM Thought Experiments in Philosophy of Religion 171 It certainly is true that, aside from psychopaths, virtually all human being will find the torture of children for fun to be abhorrent. But that feeling does not make it true that the action is morally wrong.16 But does it provide evidence that it is morally wrong? No. The feeling is not proof of an objective moral fact; it is simply evidence for an evolved reaction of strong disapproval. As strange and awful as it sounds, if our evolutionary history had been different we could have developed the tendency to approve of the torture of children. The near universal reaction of moral disapproval establishes nothing about objective morality.17 Irwin likens our response to events in ethical terms to the biological reaction to dog faeces. The fact that nearly every human being with normal olfactory operation finds the smell of dog droppings to be disgusting does not mean that dog droppings objectively smell disgusting. Rather, what the evidence tells us is that, given the senses human have evolved, dog dropping's smell bad to nearly all humans. Does that mean they smell bad objectively? Not in any objectively real or supernatural sense. Consider the fact that dogs seem to love the smell of dog droppings. With just some small difference in our evolutionary history, we might have come to really enjoy the smell of dog droppings too.18 Irwin goes on to propose that we might have evolved so that we find eating the corpses of human beings desirable. What should we make of these claims and appeals to thought experiments of how we might have evolved differently? We suggest that they miss the point. Most moral realists (such as ourselves) would take it to be an objective fact of the matter that torturing children is morally wrong. Why? Because it is bad for them. It violates their very being. Describe a case of what we would normally call "torture" but without using the word (so as to avoid a tautology according to which that which is "torture" is ipso facto wrong): the skinning and salting of live children. Can there be any doubt that this is a clear, evident case of harming children, and thus doing something that not only violates their health but brings about their deterioration and the collapse of their faculties? What Irwin asks us to imagine is that bystanders or those inflicting this damage might think it morally good or permissible, but that is different from asking us to imagine that the skin laceration and salt is good for the child or contributes to her health. We submit that while we can engage in thought experiments in which we imagine ourselves to be psychopaths, that does nothing to de-stabilize the realization of objective facts of health and disease, good and bad, for human persons. Consider the following thought experiment: Imagine a world in which white persons love removing the eyeballs, tongues, and ears of black people, and then use their labor to cultivate their fields of cotton. In this world, such action is perfectly good and healthy for all concerned. We suggest that this thought experiment is utterly incoherent. So long as we are imagining human persons, there is no possible world in which the dismembering of black persons can be good and healthy for all concerned. Only if we engage in the most outrageous science fiction in which human anatomy is utterly different (people don't use eyes to see, etc.), could we begin to begin entertaining something remotely like this. But then it should be apparent that the thought experiment serves no purpose other than being an exercise in imaginative sadism. 5 Virtuous thought experiments We summarize our proposal in this short paper by pointing to a thought experiment that we think succeeds in terms of proximity and the tracking of values. Consider Iris Murdoch's thought experiment designed to show that the prevailing, largely behavioristic philosophy of mind of her day was truncated as developed 16 Ibid., 101-102. 17 Ibid., 103. 18 Ibid. Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM 172 C. Taliaferro, E. Knuths in her classic The Sovereignty of Good. In chapter one, she develops in detail the picture of the ideal person in light of the work of Stuart Hampshire. In this picture, persons lack interior mental thoughts that are not directly related to actual or hypothetical behavior. Murdoch artfully develops the portrait of the inner life of a mother-in-law who overcomes her contempt and disdain for her daughter-in-law and yet this involves no actual change in her real or hypothetical behavior. A mother, whom I shall call M, feels hostility to her daughter-in-law, whom I shall call D. M finds D quite a good-hearted girl, but while not exactly common yet certainly unpolished and lacking in dignity and refinement. D is inclined to be pert and familiar, insufficiently ceremonious, brusque, sometimes positively rude, always tiresomely juvenile. M does not like D's accent or the way D dresses. M feels that her son has married beneath him. Let us assume for purposes of the example that the mother, who is a very 'correct' person, behaves beautifully to the girl throughout, not allowing her real opinion to appear in any way. We might underline this aspect of the example by supposing that the young couple have emigrated or that D is now dead: the point being to ensure that whatever is in question as happening happens entirely in M's mind.19 What makes this a great thought experiment is its proximity to ordinary experience (we are led in to think about the inner mental life of the mother-in-law) and to appreciate the values at stake (we can appreciate the cruelty of the mother-in-laws contempt and how she comes to love the daughter-in-law). We are thereby led to see Hampshire's ideal as truncated, as missing out on what we can see as something valuable and yet Hampshire's schema prevents us from appreciating. "This is one of those exasperating moments in philosophy when one seems to being relentlessly prevented from saying something which one is irresistibly impelled to say."20 Thought experiments in philosophy in general and philosophy of religion in particular, can give us a forum in which we might find ways to express insights into matters from which we are otherwise cut off. In constructing these thought experiments, the focus on proximity and values is paramount. References Baker Lynne R., "Death and the Afterlife." The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Religion. William Wainwright edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. 366–91. Baker, Lynne R., "Material Persons and the Doctrine of Resurrection." Faith and Philosophy 18:2. 2001. 151–67. Baker, Lynne R., Persons and Bodies: A Constitution View. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Flew, Antony. "Theology and Falsification." The Philosophy of Religion. Oxford Readings in Philosophy. London: Oxford University Press, 1971. Foster, John. A World for Us: The Case for Phenomenalistic Idealism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Foster, John. The Case for Idealism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982. Hick, John. Philosophy of Religion. 3rd Edition. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1983. Irwin, William. The Free Market Existentialist. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2015. Lund, David H. The Conscious Self. New York: Humanity Books, 2005. Mitchell, Basil. "Theology and Falsification." The Philosophy of Religion. Oxford Readings in Philosophy. London: Oxford University Press, 1971. Murdoch, Iris. The Sovereignty of Good. New York: Schocken Books, 1971. Plato, "The Ring of Gyges." The Republic Book II, 380 B.C. Price, H.H. "Survival and the Idea of 'Another World.'" Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research 50:182. 1953. 1–25. Reprint. Classical and Contemporary Readings in the Philosophy of Religion 2nd edition. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1970. 370–93. Schellenberg, John. The Hiddenness Argument: Philosophy's New Challenge to Belief in God. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Taliaferro, Charles. Consciousness and the Mind of God. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Taliaferro, Charles. "Sensibility and Possibilia: A defense of Thought Experiments." Philosophia Christi 3:2. 2001. 403-432. Taliaferro, Charles and Meister, Chad. Contemporary Philosophical Theology. London: Routledge, 2016. Tooley, Michael. "John Hick and the Concept of Eschatological Verification." Religious Studies 12:2. 1976. 177-99. van Inwagen, Peter. "I Look for the Resurrection of the Dead and the Life of the World to Come." Unpublished. Available http://andrewmbailey.com/pvi/Resurrection.doc. Accessed March 6, 2017. 19 Murdoch, The Sovereignty of Good, 17. 20 Ibid., 21. Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM Thought Experiments in Philosophy of Religion 173 van Inwagen, Peter. "The Possibility of Resurrection." International Journal for the Philosophy of Religion, 9:1978. 114–21. Reprint. Immortality Paul Edwards edition. New York: Macmillan, 1992. 242–46. Zimmerman, Dean A. "Bodily Resurrection: The Falling Elevator Model Revisited." Personal Identity and Resurrection: How Do We Survive Our Death? George Gasser edition. Farnham, England: Ashgate Publishing, 2010. 51–66. Zimmerman, Dean A. "The Compatibility of Materialism and Survival: The 'Falling Elevator' Model." Faith and Philosophy. 16:2. 1999. 194–212. Unauthenticated Download Date | 12/29/17 5:34 PM

UNIVERSIDADE ESTADUAL DE CAMPINAS INSTITUTO DE FILOSOFIA E CIÊNCIAS HUMANAS ROAN COSTA CORDEIRO VOZES DA METAFÍSICA: SOBRE A CRÍTICA DA LINGUAGEM E DA NEGATIVIDADE NA OBRA DE GIORGIO AGAMBEN. CAMPINAS UNIVERSIDADE ESTADUAL DE CAMPINAS INSTITUTO DE FILOSOFIA E CIÊNCIAS HUMANAS A Comissão Julgadora dos trabalhos de Defesa de Dissertação de Mestrado, composta pelos Professores Doutores a seguir descritos, em sessão pública realizada em 08 de junho de 2016, considerou o candidato Roan Costa Cordeiro aprovado. Prof. Dr. Oswaldo Giacoia Júnior Profa. Dra. Yara Adario Frateschi Prof. Dr. Glauco Barsalini A Ata de Defesa, assinada pelos membros da Comissão Examinadora, consta no processo de vida acadêmica do aluno. AGRADECIMENTOS Agradecer é uma daquelas atividades cujo excesso facilmente se traduz em complacência e cuja escassez se converte em esnobismo ou injustiça. Mas pelo que se rege a justiça de seus meios, se seus fins são dados por princípio como gratidão? Talvez o seu meio não possa ser extensivamente medido, mas apenas materialmente percebido pelos votos concretos. Aqui, apenas a sua natureza linguística, tradução do reconhecimento em palavras, permite que o agradecimento apareça na sua sutileza, numa espécie de concretização votiva e intencional. Cada agradecimento é um pequeno mundo que se completa em si mesmo. Cada um se mede na sua justiça – ao menos na justiça ou injustiça que sejamos capazes de lhes fazer. Agradeço, a todos em um, a Luiz Henrique Budant – aquele que pelos intrépidos ventos de Eros varreu e reconstruiu meu coração, como um vendaval que arremessa os carvalhos sobre as montanhas. Nem é preciso falar de sua infinda paciência para comigo quando de todo o processo de idealização e construção deste trabalho. Sem o seu suporte, o todo e as partes estariam desencontrados, como um vaso composto de cacos de vasos (o que, talvez, fosse uma bela combinação, mas estaria longe do propósito que aqui se desenrola). Se, por acaso, apesar da intenção, for um vaso furado de cacos de vasos, impera apenas a minha responsabilidade. A Oswaldo Giacoia Júnior, que generosa e gentilmente aceitou orientar este trabalho. Não era propriamente este trabalho, quando ingressei no Programa de Mestrado em Filosofia da Unicamp, em 2013, mas um conjunto relativamente coeso de intenções analíticas. A liberdade com a qual pude conduzir minha pesquisa se traduz numa responsabilidade também inteiramente minha. Espero que o resultado tenha correspondido ao grau de confiança em mim depositado. Será um vivo reconhecimento o que a isso sobrepujar. A Yara Frateschi e a Glauco Barsalini, pela receptividade ao meu trabalho desde a banca de qualificação, o que foi um incentivo constante ao desenvolvimento cuidadoso, por meio do qual tentei, no máximo de minhas então atuais capacidades, orientar-me pela generosidade, princípio que me fez tanto retomar diversas passagens, reconsiderando-as, quanto animou as que lhes sobrevieram. A Maria Betânia Amoroso, alento intelectual num período de decisão de mudança de rumos, a quem agradeço por ter me mostrado como se pode conjugar paixão e pensamento sem que um passe a dever algo ao outro. Seus gestos acompanharão, seguramente, meus caminhos futuros, por onde e quando forem, como imagem mental e perceptiva do que passou a significar, sem que você tenha sabido, ou em qual nível de enraizamento, para mim, l'esser un maestro. A João Paulo Arrosi, sem o qual, provavelmente, o descaminho Agamben não teria sido encontrado. Remonto a uma banca de avaliação de pesquisa na qual, por indicação sua, iniciei a leitura de Homo sacer, de cujo autor, até então, apenas ouvia algo pelas leituras de corredor de colegas de uma faculdade de direito. Agradeço-lhe efusivamente pelo carinho e pela amizade. A Ricardo Marcelo Fonseca e a Angela Couto Machado Fonseca, que, em sentido contrário dos corredores, incentivaram efetivamente que este trabalho fosse levado adiante, alimentando, nos anos finais de minha graduação, a passagem do direito à filosofia como campo de pesquisa (apesar das discretas ponderações do primeiro a não abandonar, de todo, o campo do pensamento jurídico – tantos são os caminhos, talvez adiante...). A Thais Pinhata de Souza, grande amiga da qual acabei por me afastar devido às distâncias físicas. Nossa íntima afinidade, porém, continua plenamente viva. O futuro, a inexistência que pesa sobre nossa existência, é incapaz de separar aquilo que o presente, sempre nos presenteando, conecta. A Suelen Luczynski Florentino, idem sobre as distâncias. Desde nosso primeiro encontro chamuscou a chama da fé que se chama amizade. A Luiz Henrique Krassuski Fortes, meu caro amigo a quem continuarei a importunar com meus textos e trabalhos acadêmicos. Agradeço-lhe por ter sempre tido paciência com este personagem (algumas vezes mais triste que outras, literal ou figurativamente, mas agora feliz – veja-se acima sobre Luiz Henrique Budant). A Edmar Antonio Brostulim, radiante amigo que sempre desarma as intricadas armadilhas de nossas pseudorracionalizações cotidianas. Compartilhando afinidades e brindando diferenças temos cultivado laços que, sem dúvida, estão sob o sinal de uma constante travessia. A Judá Leão Lobo, a quem admiro não apenas como pesquisador e cujo convívio, apesar dos afastamentos forçados, sempre foi muito significativo para mim. A Aukai Leisner, cujos auxílios têm sido essenciais desde que planejei, ainda num esboço qualquer, este trabalho. Agradeço-lhe pela ajuda, pela amizade, e espero que o porvir, realizado, represente a materialização de um mundo menos massacrante, no qual as belezas todas possam resplandecer e se ocultar livremente. A Ana Paula Mühlenhof, aquela que, dentre todos os até aqui mencionados, convive comigo há mais tempo – e me tolera, portanto, há muito mais tempo. Agradeçolhe, sinceramente, por tudo. Foi em nossas conversas que um dia acabei comparando a amizade com uma chama (seria alguma ressonância agostiniana?), alimentada pelas achas de nossos gestos cotidianos compartilhados. Desde então, essa imagem define o sentido da amizade. Minha amiga, espero que estejamos à altura de nossa amizade e sejamos sempre capazes de mantê-la acesa. A minha família, cujo suporte foi essencial. Agradeço por ainda mais apostarem na nova empreitada que se inicia e para a qual terminar este trabalho representava um momento crucial de mudanças. Por fim, agradeço a todos aqueles que, de alguma forma, contribuíram para que este trabalho viesse a lume. (...) a realidade é a sombra da palavra. Bruno Schulz RESUMO O projeto de crítica das categorias éticas e políticas – estéticas e jurídicas – fundamentais do Ocidente tendo em vista a sua operatividade, o modo como estruturam a composição do tempo presente, segundo o tem perseguido Giorgio Agamben, desde antes, porém, de Homo sacer (1995-2015), seu mais vasto projeto filosófico, articula-se a partir do lugar de uma crítica à fundamentação da linguagem (e do ser) na negatividade. Tal é a proposta analítica que conduz as investigações deste trabalho. Se o diagnóstico acerca do destino niilista da cultura ocidental sustém-se, na ótica agambeniana, o vir à luz do vazio e do nada não mais seria do que a exposição do próprio fundamento negativo das experiências de pensamento que se conceberam como metafísica. No tocante à experiência que ela realiza, como filosofia, com a linguagem, evidencia-se, no plano do lugar do seu fundamento, a negatividade do silêncio, o qual seria operacionalizado a partir de um comutador articulatório denominado Voz, comissura da dúplice estrutura da experiência com a palavra entre mostrar e dizer. A partir, portanto, de uma topologia da negatividade, o plano da própria fundamentação metafísica pode ser investigado com relação ao seu indizível fundamento, ao inefável como o seu limite. Nesse sentido, entendemos que uma tentativa de elucidação do pensamento filosófico de Giorgio Agamben passa pelo questionamento da experiência que toma a linguagem a partir de bases negativas, compondo a metafísica como a entende Agamben, e pela compreensão do seu efetivo fundamento – o problema do experimentum linguae como tal, a existência e a maravilha da linguagem, ao qual se confronta o exílio representativo da postulada necessidade humana de falar (o lógos como condição do humano). O que significa, por conseguinte, que o homem, por ser aquele capaz de linguagem, seja também aquele capaz de política, de vida em comum? Se a linguagem aparece como insígnia da nossa antropogênese – portanto, do humano e da ética –, qual o fundamento da linguagem, com base no qual se a concebe como lugar dessa operação, bem como da experiência a partir da negatividade – da subtração, da falta, da finitude – que travamos com ela? Essas questões permitemnos sintetizar o caminho do pensamento agambeniano diante da experiência metafísica com a palavra como aprisionamento à representação e ao lógos, além de vislumbrar possíveis resultados dessa crítica para o seu próprio pensamento sobre a linguagem e a ética, momento fundamental da construção de sua filosofia. Palavras-chave: Giorgio Agamben; linguagem; negatividade; metafísica; topologia; fundamento; arqueologia. ABSTRACT The project of critique of western fundamental ethical and political – aesthetic and legal – categories aiming at their operativity, the way they structure the present time composition, as pursued by Giorgio Agamben, since before Homo Sacer (1995-2015), his widest philosophical project, articulates itself from the place of a critique of language (and Being) grounded on negativity. This is the analytical proposal that drives the investigations of this work. If the diagnosis on the nihilistic destiny of western culture is maintained, in an Agambenian view, the taking place of emptiness and nothing would be no more than the exposition of the negative fundament of the experiences of thought that conceived themselves as metaphysics. Considering the experience that metaphysics does, as philosophy, with language, it becomes clear, in its fundament's place, the negativity of silence, which would be operationalized from an articulatory shifter called Voice, double structure's commissure of the experience with the word between indicating and speaking. From, therefore, one topology of negativity, the place of the proper metaphysical foundation can be investigated as related with its unspeakable fundament, with the ineffable as its limit. In this sense, we understand such an attempt to elucidate Giorgio Agamben's philosophical thought involves questioning the experience that takes language from its negative basis, which constitutes metaphysics as understood by Agamben, and understanding its effective fundament – the problem of experimentum linguae as such, language's existence and wonderfulness, to which is confronted the representative exile from the postulated human need to speak (logos as condition of the human). What does it mean, then, that men, because they are capable of language, are also capable of politics, of common life? If language appears as insignia of our anthropogenesis– therefore, of the human and of ethics -, what would be the fundament of language, what is conceived as place of this operation, as well as experience from negativity – from subtraction, from lack, from finitude – that we make with it? These questions allow us to summarize the Agambenian way of thought facing the metaphysical experience with the word as imprisonment to the representation and to the logos, besides seeing possible results of this critique in his own thought on language and ethics, a fundamental moment of the construction of his philosophy. Keywords: Giorgio Agamben; language; negativity; metaphysics; topology; fundament; archeology. SUMÁRIO INTRODUÇÃO.............................................................................................................12 CAPÍTULO 1. A ESTÂNCIA NEGATIVA DA PALAVRA.....................................19 1.1. Um percurso na negatividade: fronteiras críticas.................................................19 1.2. O lugar e a topologia................................................................................................25 1.3. A escrita da fantasia, produção de fantasmas ("o fantasma faz o prazer próprio ao desejo").......................................................................................................................30 1.4. Os fantasmas da escrita: o testemunho do poeta, arauto da representação........43 1.5. A travessia do fantasma à voz ("uma barreira resistente à significação")............52 1.6. A irrupção do negativo: Saussure, um linguista nos limites da linguagem.......60 1.7. Entreatos..................................................................................................................70 1.7.1. A linguagem e o humano, o animal e a voz, ainda a desventura...............70 1.7.2. O experimentum linguae.............................................................................78 CAPÍTULO 2. A METAFÍSICA DA VOZ..................................................................86 2.1. Uma topologia da negatividade..............................................................................86 2.2. O lugar do ser (Dasein: être le-là)...........................................................................93 2.3. O mistério dos demonstrativos (das Diese)............................................................98 2.4. O lugar da dêixis....................................................................................................105 2.5. Uma protoarqueologia dos pronomes (shifter)....................................................114 2.6. A metafísica da Voz...............................................................................................128 2.7. Entreatos................................................................................................................137 2.7.1. A Voz e a voz da morte..............................................................................137 2.7.2. Stimmung e Stimme, ou A paixão, sem voz, pela palavra........................144 CAPÍTULO 3. O MITOLOGEMA SACRIFICIAL DA LINGUAGEM................142 3.1. A ideia de linguagem.............................................................................................142 3.2. O mitologema da Voz............................................................................................159 3.3. O silêncio do fundamento......................................................................................171 3.4. O mitologema sacrificial.......................................................................................180 CONCLUSÃO..............................................................................................................198 REFERÊNCIAS...........................................................................................................218 12 INTRODUÇÃO A linguagem ocupa um lugar fundamental no cerne da obra teórica de Giorgio Agamben e configura, para nós, o prisma segundo o qual a acessamos. A mais cotidiana das capacidades humanas, e também aquela que se traduz como a maravilha do mundo, da sua existência, perpassa-nos nos discursos que atravessam as práticas e instituições humanas – instituições cujo Vocabulário o brilhante linguista Émile Benveniste já tentara enredar no círculo mágico da efetividade da palavra, das palavras que formam mundos – , mas também atravessa nossos próprios corpos na carne da palavra, não apenas como matéria ou forma para o pensamento, mas como lógos, como organização do mundo, como tessitura que compõe, nas suas tramas, o próprio lugar das coisas humanas. A pergunta pela existência da linguagem, pela existência desse maravilhamento como nosso mundo – a ética e também a política –, marca-se como o fio condutor, tanto explícito quanto implícito, que conduz a obra filosófica de Giorgio Agamben. A própria natureza dessa pergunta leva a linguagem até os seus limites, sendo filosófica justamente por se basear na diferença entre aquilo que existe e aquilo que funda, que dá-lugar à existência. O pensamento que se suspende na visão da linguagem é o ponto de regresso e desenvolvimento do seu pensamento filosófico. A linguagem, e, com ela, a ética, o humano, constantemente regressam nas constelações dos seus arranjos conceituais, deixando o rastro de uma potência que aguça os questionamentos, que os eleva a outro patamar que não o da urgência de uma resposta. As indagações ético-políticas de Giorgio Agamben, filtro da recepção brasileira que vem se realizando já ao longo de quase duas décadas sob a insígnia do projeto Homo sacer, são afirmadas como uma série de investigações voltadas à compreensão do presente político e a sua estrutura subjacente, cujas raízes não necessariamente estão situadas no imediato histórico percebido pelo observador atual. O modo arqueológico de consideração das nossas estruturas político-institucionais conectase, porém, diretamente as suas considerações sobre a linguagem, em cuja investigação acabou por burilar o problema da arkhḗ, do princípio-fundamento a partir do qual se experimenta a palavra e o mundo, a partir do qual se estrutura uma experiência com a linguagem. As ramificações de um périplo conceitual tão amplo – da estética à ética, da metafísica à teologia, da política ao direito – encontrariam, assim, no questionamento de nossa experiência com a linguagem, o seu lugar, o seu tópos. 13 Logo na Advertência de Signatura rerum (2008), obra em que se dedica a algumas questões de método, Giorgio Agamben expõe dois princípios que permanecem não desenvolvidos: conforme o primeiro, inspirado em Walter Benjamin, uma "doutrina pode ser exposta legitimamente apenas na forma da interpretação"1. O método, portanto, tal como a lógica, é impassível de ser destacado, de uma vez por todas, do contexto em que se torna operativo, do contexto em que se funda e no qual faz funcionar as suas operações. O segundo, por sua vez, tomado de empréstimo (interpretado) de Ludwig Feuerbach, insinua que "o elemento genuinamente filosófico em toda obra, seja ela obra de arte, de ciência ou de pensamento, é a sua capacidade de ser desenvolvida, que Feuerbach definia Entwicklungsfähigkeit"2. Tais princípios conduzem nossa investigação na tentativa de compreender a estruturação das maquinarias conceituais forjadas por Giorgio Agamben, o estruturar-se de sua teoria segundo uma característica interpretação marcada pelo gesto crítico-filológico no seu questionamento acerca da linguagem, e na tentativa de indicar a sua coloração eminentemente filosófica, a sua potência de desenvolvimento para o pensamento. A capacidade de desenvolver interpretações de uma obra que mantém uma potência latente em si, conjugando esses dois princípios, marca o modo como Agamben situa-se não apenas em relação aos problemas filosóficos, mas em relação aos planos do pensamento numa relação vital com a tradição – lida, porém, criticamente segundo a compreensão de que ela é valiosa mediante as cadeias de sua transmissão (isto é, recepção e desenvolvimento, assim como não recepção e abandono, ou, em outros termos, seletividade) na história do pensamento. Ao lado deles, coloca-se, segundo vemos, ainda, um terceiro princípio não tematizado pelo qual, de certa forma, Agamben pode falar de si e atingir o latente em si mesmo: trata-se do gesto que recai sob a "cautela arqueológica" e consiste em "regressar no próprio percurso até o ponto em que algo permaneceu obscuro e não tematizado. Apenas um pensamento que não esconde o próprio não-dito, mas incessantemente o retoma e o desenvolve pode, eventualmente, aspirar à originalidade"3. Nesse sentido, regressar às questões que conduzem o seu pensamento passa pelo regresso às suas primeiras obras, as quais não esgotaram a potência dos seus questionamentos e acabam, ainda, por até mesmo potencializar as suas investigações. Elaboradas nas décadas de setenta e oitenta, suas primeiras publicações marcam-se por 1 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Signatura rerum, p. 7. 2 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Signatura rerum, p. 8. Grifo nosso. 3 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Signatura rerum, p. 8. 14 uma constelação de questões que tanto indagam a negatividade que atravessa o estatuto das obras na modernidade como, num passo atrás mais amplo, indagam a sua fundação metafísica como já negativa, isto é, as filosofias do ser como já estando acompanhadas de um espectral horror vacui, um terror do nada que marca a sua experiência com a palavra, com a linguagem. Se em O homem sem conteúdo (1970), as questões pertinentes à linguagem como tal (isto é, o seu sentido profundo na formação do humano e sua relação com o âmbito de sentido do ser) pouco despontam, em Estâncias (1977), porém, elas adquirem todo o seu peso. No caminho que se abre em Estâncias, passa por Infância e história (1979) e culmina em A linguagem e a morte (1982), encontramos esse primeiro grande capítulo da obra filosófica agambeniana, o qual, a título hipotético, configura o mapa dos seus andaimes analíticos, ou a sua montagem primária, base da estrutura, em relação ao solo de problemas. Encontramos, nesse caminho inicial, os materiais e ideias cuja potência pode ser analisada e lida à luz não apenas de sua própria força, mas também de seu ulterior desenvolvimento no escopo da própria obra de Agamben. Mas em que consistiu essa investigação sobre a negatividade e a linguagem? Qual a sua irradiação no pensamento agambeniano? Essas questões orientam nosso trabalho. A partir da ideia de tópos, lança-se a via de consideração para o problema da negatividade que assola a experiência com a linguagem no Ocidente, experiência, ainda, que se articula como o fundamento mais amplo da experiência ética e política e as marca como nossa tradição institucional. Tradição essa que, afirmando a necessidade da sua própria transmissão, assegurando-a como valor, experimentaria o mundo, as práticas, as ações, segundo uma institucionalização do discurso calcada na negatividade fundante do lógos e que configuraria, assim, o que se pode chamar de experiência metafísica com a linguagem: o homem é tomado, ao longo de nossa tradição, como o ser capaz de linguagem, como aquele que a possui e pode falar e estabelecer discursos, seja para a construção arquitetural da vida prática (a cidade), seja para o trânsito das coisas humanas que compõe as inter-relações econômicas (a habitação), seja, enfim, para transmitir algo a respeito da vida: do problema do lugar da palavra e da negatividade, somos deslocados ao problema da voz, o qual passa a acompanhar a própria definição de linguagem. É da voz que se passa ao lógos, e novamente a negatividade funda o próprio lógos. Mas possui o homem uma voz, ou antes, enquanto ser cindido da natureza numa cultura, ele não possui uma voz, mas habita a sua subtração, o seu silenciar? 15 Está em jogo, pois, uma crítica da negatividade, e, pela crítica, entende-se a negatividade pela ideia dos seus limites. Por isso tantas serão as idas e vindas pelas quais veremos que Agamben se depara com a negatividade, mas mesmo a noção de crítica, da qual se parte em Estâncias, por exemplo, não incorpora toda a necessidade de, também com a descrição pensante, parte essencial de seus trabalhos (e poderíamos dizer, base de caráter filológico de seu pensamento), preparar caminho para um "pensamento que vem" – e a partir do que, por exemplo, outras estratégias passam a ser construídas, como a topologia. Trata-se, precisamente, segundo a abertura de A linguagem e a morte, de compreender a negatividade estruturante da metafísica, da experiência metafísica com a linguagem, – etapa necessária pela qual se pode entender algo de sua reprodução em inúmeros estratos do pensamento ocidental –, tarefa que, aguçada com os extremos de nossas experiências contemporâneas, mostra-se também concernente ao próprio estatuto da prática e da produção do mundo. É com um tal movimento, pois, que o próprio presente pode lançar as pontes que representam as lacunas nas quais as máquinas emperram e os restos podem ser identificados. Em termos analíticos, trata-se de perseguir o rastro de negatividade que se esboça em Estâncias e culmina em A linguagem e a morte e marca o viés crítico da escavação de sentidos da filosofia de Giorgio Agamben, portanto, o caminho que nos conduz do fantasma, uma imagem-sombra que acompanha a palavra e o desejo e se situa no lugar da articulação entre ambos, à sua incidência na visão da voz que afeta as nossas concepções sobre a linguagem, e daqui, enfim, à experiência metafísica com a linguagem, que se transmite e se trai, então, como a tradição de um fundamento negativo. Ou, em outros termos, o fantasma como indício (1) para penetrar um problema fundador da linguagem, a negatividade, na sua compreensão metafísica (2), e daqui, enfim, para a escavação dessa experiência medida com a ideia de linguagem, com a própria visão dela que afirmaria a filosofia, diante do seu abandono por um pressuposto de discurso que estrutura os espaços humanos, tolhendo, contudo, os seus usos e os seus gestos, e fundando a arquitetura da vida humana sobre um mitologema da Voz e do sacrifício. Além, ainda, dos princípios que são considerados pelo próprio Agamben, e dos quais nos servimos na consideração de sua obra (tanto no sentido de explorá-los quanto no de, explorando-os, explorarmos mais largamente a sua obra), há uma ressalva que, a nosso ver, consolida ainda mais a cautela arqueológica. "Parece-me necessário (...)", diz-nos Georges Didi-Huberman, "discutir as construções de Agamben no próprio 16 plano que elas querem se situar"4. Ora, esse apontamento revela ainda mais o seu alcance quando é afirmado por um dos críticos de Agamben que não apenas o debate no seu próprio plano, mas que discute o modo como ele, a partir de outros referenciais – Walter Benjamin, por exemplo –, formula o seu plano, diante do qual o crítico pode tentar medir o alcance de sua relação com o passado e a crítica da tradição com relação ao diagnóstico do presente viabilizado por essa sua visão que, em princípio, volta-se apenas para trás e fecha sobre nós um horizonte sombrio. O objetivo de nosso trabalho passa necessariamente por essa situação: o fato de termos de nos situar no lugar das questões e dos conceitos de Agamben. Situarmo-nos diante deles, porém, significa contemplá-los de frente, como se fossem algo acabado. Estamos aquém, portanto, pois o que se coloca diante de nós aparece como construção inacabada e nos move a mapear e tentar compreender a sua composição em relação aos conceitos recepcionados, elaborados e articulados, o colocar-se em campo deles. Mas onde se situam as construções de Agamben? Essa, sem dúvida, é uma questão que deve permanecer aberta ao longo de nosso percurso, mas talvez alguns ensaios sejam, a partir dele, possíveis. Em última análise, deparamo-nos com o que Giorgio Agamben faz com o pensamento e o que faz da filosofia na investigação do problema da linguagem, medindo aquela, por exemplo, na sua relação fronteiriça com a poesia, com a literatura, com aqueles atos de palavra cujos mundos escapam do juízo apodítico, mas nem por isso são menos efetivos. Afinal, o lógos diz-se de vários modos, assim como os povos, sob a face da terra, falam em inúmeras línguas. Tal perspectiva coloca-nos diante de uma análise – menos sistemática do que problemática – do pensamento agambeniano. Eis por que, portanto, nosso ponto de partida é o seu próprio pensamento também como filosofia, também como dizendo respeito ao modo como se pensa a ideia da linguagem – e isso, parece-nos, envolve também disputa: disputa das fronteiras –, e não outro pensamento a partir do qual se poderia medir. Como isso se conduza também criticamente, é o que permite medir, por sua vez, este trabalho. É atravessando, portanto, a alta voltagem filosófica da obra agambeniana, explicitada ao longo deste trabalho a partir de sua investigação sobre a linguagem, sobre a experiência metafísica com a linguagem, que se pode entender o como o seu pensamento tenta se reconstituir à partilha, ao comum, ao político, e, assim, contribuir para a potência do pensamento. 4 DIDI-HUBERMAN, Georges. Sobrevivência dos vaga-lumes, p. 108. 17 Uma vez que devamos nos colocar em seu território, diante das suas questões, e segundo a sua investigação, é preciso ter em vista que nela desponta, a partir da crítica, uma topologia e um gesto arqueológico que, antes da explícita formulação da sua arqueologia filosófica, apresentar-se-á, aqui, como "protoarqueologia", isto é, como análise do condicionamento da palavra à rede de representações discursivas. Enquanto uma topologia da negatividade investiga a nossa relação com a palavra, tida como cindida, como assinalada por um hiato que se deve articular, apontando-nos uma ideia subjacente de lugar que abre a experiência – a negatividade que se abre pela indagação do fundamento do lugar, ou melhor, dos limites do fundamento do lugar do ser e da linguagem –, o gesto arqueológico mapeável numa "protoarqueologia" permite vislumbrar o erguer-se do edifício da fundamentação filosófica cuja visão da linguagem, cuja experiência com a linguagem, porém, retorna até o lugar da abertura para consignar ao homem a um fundamento. Se a palavra não for um mero veículo do pensamento que exista em algum lugar que não na linguagem e por meio dela, talvez não possamos explicá-la sem nos depararmos, a cada vez, com o seguinte princípio: "não há nada fora da linguagem". Sobre o que se funda, no entanto, a linguagem? Com essa pergunta, colocamos a indagação sobre a metafísica ocidental da linguagem conforme moldada por Agamben, afinal, é na indagação sobre o fundamento do ser (ser que, na sua filosofia, é fundamentado pela e como linguagem) que pode riscar os limites da metafísica e, ao traçálos, tentar estar fora desse círculo. Se assim o for, pode ser que a soberania da linguagem não seja mais do que um efeito da pressuposição de um fundamento último e totalizante para a linguagem, mas isso só se expõe por um incessante movimento que, indo até os limites da experiência, da experiência metafísica com a linguagem, busca compreendê-la e pensá-la. "O pensamento é o movimento que, fazendo até o fundo a experiência da inalcançabilidade do lugar de linguagem", ter-lugar que funde e confunde o fundo (o fundamento) e o limite, "busca pensar, isto é, manter em suspenso, comparar as dimensões"5. Atentar ao modo de composição, e também à linguagem de sua exposição, significa investigar como se estrutura o seu campo conceitual diante dos problemas que o interpelam – como se desenvolve a complexa composição de conceitos e categorias que visam a compreender a experiência metafísica com a linguagem, a sua base negativa, e como se pode, se é que se pode, a partir disso, compreender as vias de outra experiência 5 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 100. 18 possível, na medida em que aquela não seria a única visão da linguagem, mas um acercarse dela que bloqueia a visão mesma da ideia e nos conjura o discurso. Coloca-se, com isso, o desafio de delimitar criticamente uma composição entre a reconstrução e a compreensão dos fundamentos de sua indagação sobre a linguagem – a qual acaba por se revelar uma indagação sobre os fundamentos da linguagem, sobre os limites da experiência metafísica com a linguagem, o que, em consonância com o seu pensamento, significa também o questionamento de limites éticos. Ao lado de um operador metafísico fundamental, a Voz, ele mapeia um operador da ação, o sacrifício, e é a comunicação entre ambos como fundamento e fundação, como ser e como ação. Uma composição, ainda, que distende em termos filosóficos as bases que servem de substrato ao desenvolvimento teórico de Giorgio Agamben – isto é, não apenas como ele situa a filosofia, seus referenciais e planos, mas, em função dessa mesma operação, como ele acaba por nela se situar – quanto a sua visão da linguagem. Não se trata, de forma alguma, de forjar coerência, mas, pelo contrário, de verificar as condições internas (e as ressonâncias externas) de sua possibilidade, a composição mesma da sua orientação no pensamento. Orientação que conduz um experimentum linguae que nos apresente, remetendo as fronteiras aos limiares, as oposições às dualidades, outra experiência que não a da prisão da linguagem, que não a experiência que nos condena ao discurso e à negatividade – nosso trabalho desdobra-se na investigação, também, dessa possível mirada. Também permanece válida para Agamben a cautela de que "não queremos assaltar a linguagem para obrigá-la a cair nas presas das representações já prontas e acabadas"6, intentando-se – e com isso os descaminhos do próprio humano – conduzir a linguagem para o seu próprio ter-lugar, isto é, conduzir a linguagem para a sua ideia, para a ideia da linguagem. Em que medida se fala, aqui, a linguagem como ética, tal é outro cruzamento que, possibilitando o humano na encruzilhada dessas veredas, desponta-nos como seres capazes de falar, de compartilhar, de estabelecer a morada habitual da condução das vidas e seus usos como política. Se o tempo das técnicas é o tempo consagrador das representações aprisionantes, da máquina da linguagem, do mesmo modo em que indistintamente impinge a que se fale em ética, é um passo fundamental escutar o questionamento do fundamento negativo da experiência, da experiência ética e política. 6 HEIDEGGER, Martin. A caminho da linguagem, p. 8. 19 O projeto de crítica das categorias éticas e políticas fundamentais do Ocidente, como propugna Agamben em seu mais vasto e audacioso projeto (Homo sacer), não apenas passa pelo questionamento da metafísica, da experiência com a linguagem que moldou a estruturação de nosso mundo partilhado, mas pressupõe a compreensão desse seu fundamento. É a exposição do começo dessa jornada, portanto, a tarefa à qual nos lançamos. 20 CAPÍTULO 1. A ESTÂNCIA NEGATIVA DA PALAVRA 1.1. Um percurso na negatividade: fronteiras críticas Na história do que se costuma chamar de pensamento ocidental, mais por comodidade do que por rigor dos termos, há um célebre acontecimento, não sem suas ambiguidades, que move e provoca esse mesmo pensamento: a separação entre filosofia e poesia. Giorgio Agamben, como filósofo, não apenas levanta esse evento e o envolve em espectros aurorais, mas acaba por se deixar situar em relação a ele. Percorrendo o rastro que assinala a sua filosofia, começa a nossa investigação, colocando diante do olhar a possibilidade de perceber nesses indícios algo mais do que um simples motivo do pensar, mas um questionamento filosófico do estatuto metafísico da linguagem no Ocidente que, permitindo-se questionar a cisão com a poesia, acaba por percebê-la como produtora de deslocamentos de fronteiras e de articulações. O caráter desse evento, porém, não se deixa captar simplesmente pela ordem de uma causa fixa e determinável. Pelo contrário, Agamben dissolve essa diáspora na história de tal modo que até mesmo Platão, o insigne nome evocado a favor do banimento da palavra poética (com a exceção, autorizada na República, dos edificantes hinos aos deuses e dos discursos pios), pode aparecer apenas como o sagrador da diferença entre filosofia e poesia, tomada, então, como algo corrente. Longe de restringir a discussão apenas à natureza genérica da arte, Agamben retoma-a numa zona de convergência e de encontros possíveis entre metafísica e estética, ética e política, tornando-a sintoma de uma mais profunda interrogação que organiza a sua ordem de problemas. Ao considerar, sempre seriamente, a insígnia desse "divórcio que domina o destino da cultura ocidental de modo bem mais decisivo do quanto o nosso hábito nos permite perceber"7, o que essa separação revela é o que se abre ao horizonte, caso não termine, ao fim, por retirá-lo de sob nossos pés. Ela se torna, mais do que um momento cronologicamente passível ou não de delimitação, uma marca da cultura ocidental, fundamental por aquilo que configura como acontecimento, como algo que existe e é, enquanto efetivo num sentido ontológico, produtor de experiências vitais na cultura e no pensamento. Em O homem sem conteúdo, seu primeiro livro, publicado em 1970, Agamben pontua esse movimento e o encadeia, sob o sinal do negativo – a saber, a 7 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'uomo senza contenuto, p. 79. 21 negação da arte pela crítica como momento avançado do niilismo –, à dilaceração da subjetividade do artista moderno e à relação que a crítica, mediante a figura do juízo, estabelece com a obra de arte. A delimitação de fronteiras, mais ou menos permeáveis, entre a filosofia e a poesia, surge, assim, como um especial lugar de gestação de problemas, no qual Agamben estabelece não apenas um núcleo substancial de produção teórico, mas uma situação desviante para o seu pensamento. O questionamento da poética, portanto, não poderia deixar de constituir um momento elementar do pensamento de Agamben. Sua filosofia, pode-se dizer, constróise em profunda reflexão sobre as zonas fronteiriças das palavras e dos discursos. E, em seu projeto, movendo-se com a acuidade conceitual esperada de um filósofo, não deixa de, com um outro gesto, chamar atenção para o caráter artificioso das separações, que encobrem, às vezes, profundas compatibilidades e complementações do plano de fundo que nada mais é, por sua vez, do que a especial concepção de linguagem sobre a qual se constroem capítulos essenciais da filosofia ocidental, por vezes deixada de lado em detrimento de algum suposto saber ou verdade. A volta e a insistência sobre a visão de linguagem que a metafísica assenta e sobre a qual institui as suas próprias condições conceituais de possibilidade, então, constituem o eixo fundamental das indagações de Agamben que podem ser lidas, num sentido filosófico estrito, como crítica da metafísica: isto é, como veremos, uma profunda indagação sobre os limites do alcance metafísico – outros diriam ontológico – de uma concepção da experiência de linguagem que estrutura e organiza não apenas o filosofar e o poetar, mas, num sentido ainda mais amplo, o pensar e o falar humanos. A negatividade, não obstante seja lida, em O homem sem conteúdo, pelo viés da constituição de um esvaziamento substancial da relação com a obra de arte, fundante de uma faculdade julgadora, o gosto, cindida de uma faculdade produtiva, o gênio, verdadeira fonte de idealização da subjetividade soberana e inspirada do artista, deixa aparecer, entretanto, o pertencimento do problema da linguagem às mais interiores questões da metafísica, de modo que nos deparamos com passagens que deslocam as disputas entre o gosto e o gênio para uma disputa pelas condições e lugares de acesso à palavra: O complexo significante-significado faz, de fato, tão indissoluvelmente parte do patrimônio da nossa linguagem, pensada metafisicamente como φωνή σημαντική, som significante, que toda tentativa de superá-lo sem mover-se, ao 22 mesmo tempo, fora dos confins da metafísica, está condenada a recair aquém de seu objetivo.8 Apropriando-se concretamente do problema da linguagem, em Estâncias (1977), sua segunda obra, publicada depois de seus anos de pesquisa no Warburg Institut9, Agamben passa desenvolvê-lo por meio da conceitualidade pertinente ao fantasma (a imagem) e à fantasia (a imaginação), de tal modo que o destaque recai, propriamente, sobre os eventos de palavra. A imagem, nessa obra, assim como a palavra e o evento de linguagem, nas posteriores, aparece pelo deslocamento de sentido provocado pela suspensão das dicotomias categoriais fundantes do pensamento ocidental – como voz e lógos, símbolo e signo, significante e significado –, as quais, uma vez assim estabilizadas, dão ensejo à investigação das articulações conceituais e efetivas que as fundaram, uma vez que resguardam os aspectos produtivos da representação da realidade. Se o projeto Homo sacer, pesquisa bastante posterior cuja publicação se deu em 1995, coloca-se na perspectiva de uma "reconsideração [ripensamento] de todas as categorias da nossa tradição política à luz da relação entre poder soberano e vida nua"10, como esclarece Agamben na Advertência de Meios sem fim (1996), é porque já estava em curso, desde as suas primeiras publicações, o gesto fundamental. A crítica e seu véu negativo, pela incisividade com a qual traça os limites de um evento fundador, mas também de uma possibilidade, de uma prática, assim, coloca-se diante de nós desde o princípio de seu trajeto teórico e se desdobra no continuum de seu plano de obra. Entretanto, ao contrário do que se poderia esperar, a negatividade não é o ponto de chegada para Agamben. Antes, constitui-se como o que se deve, copiosamente, investigar. E se pôde partir, em O homem sem conteúdo, do diagnóstico de Martin 8 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'uomo senza contenuto, p. 21-22. Grifo nosso. Observe-se que, ao mesmo tempo em que se apresenta um tópico essencial do pensamento agambeniano, ele se mostra, ainda, em etapa de formação, como a tradução de phōnḗ sēmantikḗ por "som significante", em lugar da qual, como se verá, encontraremos "voz significante". A importância de demarcar essas pequenas "faltas" não tem outro sentido senão o de expor, propriamente, o caminho que conduz ao pensar em suas tensões e hesitações. Sem essa dimensão viva, algo se perde, ainda mais quando se lembra que Giorgio Agamben frequentava o círculo de Pier Paolo Pasolini (talvez sem ter tirado disso muitas conclusões, o que ainda se está por fazer), de Calvino (sempre lembrado como próximo), de Elsa Morante (quem de fato rememora em ensaios seus, como A festa do tesouro escondido e Paródia). 9 Estâncias consiste na organização e desenvolvimento de dois trabalhos então já publicados parcialmente ou modificados (Os fantasmas de Eros, aparecido na revista Paragone em 1974, e O mundo de Odradek, na revista Ulisse em 1972) e dois inéditos (A palavra e o fantasma e A imagem perversa). O núcleo de nossa investigação situa-se em relação aos últimos, por desenvolverem plenamente a concepção crítica anunciada no Prefácio e retomada, anos depois, na Apostila que, em 1993, somou-se ao livro. A importância da lembrança dessa sua estada no Warburg Institut é capital para assinalar não apenas a relevância teórica e "formativa" do historiador da arte alemão Aby Warburg para Agamben, mas para realçar o estatuto privilegiado que as imagens assumem na sua filosofia. 10 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Mezzi senza fine, p. 10. 23 Heidegger sobre a estreita relação do niilismo com a história do pensamento do ser no Ocidente, é por antever, na crítica das categorias da negatividade, uma possibilidade de superação dessa mesma história e suas categorias enquanto história da metafísica. Sem apontar esperanças concretas, a potência de seu pensar deflagra uma incessante pesquisa – arqueologicamente impulsionada, num significativo passo para trás baseado numa sui generis história das categorias, conceitos e problemas – dos momentos de inflexão daquilo que chamamos tradição e das suas condições de transmissibilidade, seja ela nossa tradição política, ética, ou, naquela que se apresenta, mais originariamente, como nossa própria linguagem. O rastro originário da negatividade, que irrompe no plano de obra agambeniano como crítica da subjetividade fragmentada do artista e do espectadorcrítico, encontra no fantasma o momento conceitual em que a linguagem se coloca diretamente como objeto na sua formulação, e é por ela que o problema da negatividade é enfrentado enquanto sendo a aventura linguística do humano. O possível nexo entre o destino da imagem e da palavra e "o movimento fundamental da história do Ocidente"11 consolida-se como plano de fundo da obra filosófica de Agamben, ao mesmo tempo em que carrega consigo um espectro do pensamento heideggeriano (pelo qual se estabelecem as principais vias de acesso às filosofias de Aristóteles e Hegel). Além disso, a herança metafísica deixada à poesia ocidental que foi gerada no entardecer do medievo se deixa assinalar pelo lugar a partir do qual se desdobra a presença do fantasma. Antes de indagar pelo lugar mesmo da linguagem, o evento poético de palavra é conduzido conceitualmente a um plano mais original, e a poesia, mais do que poema, versos, estruturas de som e de sentido, é poíesis, isto é, produção12. As crises que 11 Trata-se, nessa passagem, do Heidegger de Nietzsches Wort " Gott ist tot " (A palavra de Nietzsche "Deus está morto"), o qual, além de assinalar uma das marcas fundamentais do caminho de Agamben, aqui assoma a partir da determinação do niilismo e seu destino na cultura Ocidental e sua caracterização, por Agamben, a partir do destino da obra de arte em seu despontar moderno e em seu impasse contemporâneo (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'uomo senza contenuto, p. 43-44). 12 A poíesis, substantivo derivado do verbo grego poieîn, "fazer", "criar", "produzir", é desdobrada como "pro-dução na presença" (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'uomo senza contenuto, p. 104), o que quer dizer, em torção heideggeriana, que estamos diante da dimensão mesma na qual algo do não ser vem ao ser, retomando a tradição grega que desloca a esfera produtiva da esfera prática, a poíesis da prâksis, a produção da ação. Se o fim e o limite, então, da poíesis é externo, diferindo as coisas produzidas do a que se visa, a práxis, pelo contrário, enceta um movimento de autorrealização, no qual o visado se encontra na própria ação – remonta-se, aqui, à Metafísica de Aristóteles (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'uomo senza contenuto, p. 110-111). Que a experiência do homem moderno acabe por conjugar a produção de um mundo com a ação mesma no mundo, e a produção, destingida de sua metafísica, torne-se um fazer, uma ação – não à toa, pois, o trabalho e a sua ética tornam-se base categorial da explicação da modernidade ocidental –, torna-se indício de que a produção e a ação consolidam a doutrina da efetividade herdada da teologia cristã. Quatro décadas depois, em Opus dei (2011), Agamben retoma esse fio explicativo e o leva as últimas consequências – se, antes, compunha-o a partir da obra de arte, agora, de outro modo, considera-o no plano 24 atravessam a história da poesia e também o confronto de limites com a filosofia – bem como a crise de narração que afeta a experiência e a possibilidade de sua construção e transmissão pela palavra – surgem como sintomas de uma crise do estatuto produtivo do homem, ou melhor, revelam-lhe as nuances de sua própria presença. Na zona de palavra em que tanto a poesia quanto a filosofia podem surgir, ser ditas, configuradas como linguagem, enfim, há a marca de um acontecimento originário, antropogenético, e é esse estatuto que se tratará de investigar. A poesia, ao revelar ao homem o seu lugar de palavra, permitindo-lhe fazer experiência do seu ser humano enquanto falante, revela o caráter tênue da fronteira, com a qual a história da filosofia precisa se medir para alcançar a inteligibilidade não apenas de seu próprio espaço, mas do lugar mesmo que possibilita o salto no mundo do discurso articulado. E Estâncias, dando-nos temas e conteúdos de pensamento, permite que nos debrucemos sobre o próprio processo de um pensar que, em sua via de problemas, chocando-se constantemente com a linguagem de sua própria exposição, move-se constantemente em consonância com sua forma, cujo "aspecto de montagem"13 retorna não menos a Walter Benjamin que a Aby Warburg, cuja biblioteca era experimentada por Agamben quando das pesquisas que ensejaram partes desse livro, como ressalta um dos críticos contemporâneos de Agamben, Georges Didi-Huberman. Não é por acaso, portanto, a existência, logo no prefácio, de uma consideração sobre o papel da crítica que conecta o seu despontar moderno e teórico com os seus desdobramentos setoriais, movendo-se com uma espécie de autoconsciência da tarefa do pensamento. A ideia de crítica é incorporada não apenas com a carga propriamente filosófica inerente a sua cunhagem, como "indagação sobre os limites do conhecimento, sobre aquilo que, precisamente, não é possível nem pôr nem apreender"14, mas em acordo com a remissão ao específico contexto de formulação, não menos filosófico, da crítica da obra de arte, pictórica ou literária. Fixando o olhar aguçadamente sobre a presença do negativo, a própria atividade da crítica indica a relação entre o lugar e o negativo, introduzido pela fixação dos limites da própria empreitada teórica. Nesse sentido é que Agamben mapeou, com os desdobramentos decorrentes do criticismo kantiano, um momento fundamental da história da filosofia moderna: mais abstrato de uma metafísica da efetividade e da vontade (a própria ideia de obra vista como ato de criação baseado na vontade como raiz da efetividade do mundo), o que, em outros termos, a nosso ver, apenas revela o contínuo aprofundamento do campo de problemas ao qual Agamben se dedica. 13 DIDI-HUBERMAN, Georges. Sobrevivência dos vaga-lumes, p. 69. 14 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xi. 25 quando o romantismo de Jena, tomando a crítica num sentido radical, aprofundou o conhecimento da negatividade a ela inerente de tal forma que a conduziu a consequências que culminaram, com Schlegel e seu desejo de uma "poesia universal progressiva", na proposta de supressão das fronteiras entre poesia, crítica e filologia. Ora, Hegel, que não escapou de extensas considerações sobre o negativo e a negatividade, e consciente, para o seu sistema do Saber Absoluto, do lugar nele reservado à filosofia, não pôde endossar as vias últimas da negatividade que estavam em jogo nos projetos de seus contemporâneos românticos, caminho pelo qual, portanto, de forma a assegurar o papel da positividade no seu sistema, assinalou uma diversa posição para a sua filosofia15. Ora, depois de um momento de radiosa lucidez com o projeto romântico e das admoestações de Hegel, a crítica como atividade como que perdeu a consciência do caráter negativo do seu objeto e, esquecendo da necessária relação com o limite de suas possibilidades, passou a se considerar criativa. Criando uma identificação positiva com a obra que a motiva, moveu a sua própria condenação, pois, se a crítica se identifica, hoje, verdadeiramente, com a obra de arte, isso não ocorre por ser também ela 'criativa', mas, eventualmente, por ser também ela negatividade. Ela não é mais do que o processo de sua irônica autonegação: um 'nada autonadificante' ['autoannientantesi nulla'], sem dúvida, ou 'um deus que se autodestrói', segundo a profética, ainda que maléfica, definição de Hegel 16. A figura da crítica, formulando-se de modo a estar vinculada à negatividade, fornece-nos uma chave possível para a consideração dos primeiros mecanismos metodológicos forjados por Agamben – a exemplo, de sua crítica da relação entre obra de arte e crítica da obra, em O homem sem conteúdo. Em Estâncias, em que se pode ver a coragem do passo seguinte, busca-se compreender o fenômeno da cisão da palavra, com o que se abre o caminho das questões ontológico-metafísicas que culminam em A linguagem e a morte. As vias, porém, podem ser consideradas ao menos segundo dois enquadramentos, como vias para, como direcionamento cujo fim é determinado, ou como próprio movimento do pensamento que importa já em si. Para não perdermos o segundo, e sua potencialidade, devemos subordinar aquela outra visão a esta, e encontrar uma via de acesso por meio dos problemas e questões a cada vez em jogo – embora sem perder de vista o seu fundamento. 15 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xii. 16 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xii. 26 1.2. O lugar e a topologia A análise da relação entre a palavra e o fantasma – a imagem (phántasma) produzida pela imaginação (phantasía)17 – na cultura ocidental, compõe o eixo de investigação que orienta Estâncias. Mas não se trata de qualquer palavra, uma vez que o pensamento de Agamben está marcado, enquanto intento crítico que perscruta as fronteiras, pela sua escolha dos lugares de palavra: a palavra privilegiada é a do poeta, ao lado daquela do filósofo, sendo o fantasma que a acompanha o indício de uma forma de negatividade que ronda a experiência da palavra. Nesse sentido, é significativo qual palavra, qual forma de relação com a linguagem esteja sob análise. Ou ainda, qual poesia, pois não se trata, nessa obra, de uma investigação sobre o poeta moderno, soberano da sua subjetividade, mas da lírica trovadoresca (e do dolce stil nuovo), a qual nos apresenta um modelo de relação com a palavra que conduz a um complexo enredamento com a negatividade, na forma do desejo e do amor, tal como se encontra no testemunho poético deixado por versos que permaneceram em latência na base da vida imaginária da moderna poesia ocidental. Há, em Estâncias, portanto, uma indagação elementar aos termos da própria investigação: estamos diante, desde o título, de um questionamento sobre o lugar. Esse tema surge sob a marca de uma palavra do vocabulário dos trovadores, e daqueles que lhes reconheceram a influência, como Dante Alighieri: stanze – "estâncias", vocábulo cuja acepção básica aponta para a estrofe como unidade de versos de um poema, mas que remete para além, para a estância enquanto "morada capaz e também receptáculo" da poesia, segundo a formulação de Dante em De vulgarii eloquentia, de modo a sinalizar o lugar no qual a palavra se realiza como acontecimento poético. Na estância, o poeta poderia experimentar a alegria da captura fantasmática do seu objeto de amor, o que representou, para Agamben, com um sentido que na sequência exporemos, o rompimento com a "'posição primordial do significado e do significante, como duas ordens distintas 17 A respeito do estreito laço etimológico entre as palavras φάντασμα (phántasma) e φαντασία (phantasía), ao que se nos parece, ambas as palavras são derivadas do verbo φαντάζειν (phantázein) em sua acepção de "fazer visível", "mostrar" e de sua forma médio-passiva φαντάζομαι (phantázomai). No caso das duas palavras ora postas em análise, o sufixo -μα (-ma), presente φάντασμα, marca o processo de derivação da forma ativa do verbo, apontando o resultado da ação (cf. MURACHO, Henrique. Língua grega: teoria, p. 85), dessa forma, em uma tradução perifrástica, teríamos: "aquilo que foi feito visível", "aquilo que foi mostrado"; o sufixo -ία (-ía), gerador de substantivos abstratos, aplicado à forma médio-passiva φαντάζομαι, gera "o poder pelo qual um objeto é apresentado à mente", em outras palavras, fantasia. Por fim, cabe apontar, numa construção etilomológica da qual se vale o próprio Aristóteles, que o próprio verbo φαντάζειν contém dentro de si a raiz "φάος" (fáos) (ou, na forma usada no grego ático, "φῶς") significando "luz". 27 e separadas por uma barreira resistente à significação' que impera em toda concepção ocidental do signo, fiel à original posição metafísica da voz como 'som significante'"18. Algo mais essencial, portanto, do que o simples espaço. Mas o pensamento em jogo não quer apenas "verificar" qual seja uma ou outra coisa, ou o seu lugar; não se trata simplesmente de uma descrição. Isso seria a tarefa de uma topografia. A radicalidade em jogo, e que marcará o início do empreendimento intelectual de Giorgio Agamben como, podemos assim dizer, uma "topologia filosófica" – talvez como raiz do movimento, quando as teorias de Foucault passarem a interferir no campo conceitual, que levará a sua "arqueologia filosófica" –, é pensar o lugar menos como palco e mais como acontecimento efetivo, e que veremos ser fundado sobre um não lugar (o que significará infundado), isto é, sobre a negatividade19. E daqui, portanto, a inalcançabilidade, na poesia dos trovadores, do objeto de amor que, não fosse o mecanismo do desejo, e precisamente a estância da palavra, estaria para sempre excluído do horizonte do poeta-trovador. Mas em que essas figuras do tropo poético dos séculos XII e XIII poderiam contribuir para uma investigação das questões metafísicas que acompanharam e dirigiram o pensamento sobre a linguagem no Ocidente? Se investigá-las é um desvio, precisamos compreender a ordem de motivos que conduziu a ele, e por isso Estâncias afirma-se como lugar para se compreender a efetiva colocação do problema da linguagem por Agamben, pois já aqui, sob a rubrica, interessante de ser captada, de formulações ainda tateantes, poderemos encontrar algumas das linhas fundamentais que posteriormente se consolidarão. Partindo das ideias aí presentes, se o entrelaçamento (que, no vocabulário da trova, surgia como resultado do entrebescar, isto é, do "entrelaçar") no qual está envolvida a palavra pode ser indicado como algo tão significativo, apontando outra experiência dela possível, é por responder, antes, a uma ruptura, uma quebra. Assim, está em operação uma cisão que acompanha a reflexão sobre a palavra e se coloca, até mesmo, por debaixo ou detrás dela, seja como filosofia versus poesia, seja no interior da própria palavra ("palavra pensante" versus "palavra poética"20). O que surpreende, ao sermos remetidos da matéria poética à estruturação das relações entre filosofia e poesia, é o 18 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 151. 19 Esse ponto, agora apenas sugerido, será devidamente analisado quando tratarmos de A linguagem e a morte. 20 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xiii. 28 problemático esquecimento da produção da cisão entre ambas, operação que se agrava e radicaliza na cultura moderna. Assim, é precisamente a busca por pensar a cisão da palavra e do seu produtivo esquecimento na história do ocidente, o que enseja para Agamben a investigação da poética, pois, quando uma tal separação é tomada como óbvia e permanece subquestionada por uma cultura como a nossa, que se movimenta por cisões e oposições e as agrava na medida de seu "progresso", constrói-se uma tradição de pensamento que, separando a "palavra poética" da "palavra pensante", cinde, ainda, o próprio conhecimento e os modos de possuí-lo. Afinal, "o problema do conhecimento é um problema de posse, e todo problema de posse é um problema de gozo, isto é, de linguagem"21. No contexto moderno, o despedaçamento da palavra ratifica a diversa relação que a poesia e a filosofia mantém, cada uma, com a linguagem e o conhecimento. A nossa relação com a linguagem é diversa conforme nossa situação nela (isto é, como discurso), e isso a mais trivial observação traz os seus elementos – dos registros de fala aos modos diversos de conceber e praticar textualidade, por exemplo. Mas também a relação que mantemos com o objeto do conhecimento será diversa segundo a relação estabelecida, isto é, conforme a nossa representação dele – o que nos remete, novamente, à linguagem e ao efeito fundante das separações: a poesia possui o seu objeto sem conhecê-lo e a filosofia o conhece sem possuílo. A palavra ocidental está, assim, dividida entre uma palavra inconsciente e como que caída do céu, que goza o objeto do conhecimento representando-o na forma bela, e uma palavra que tem para si toda a seriedade e toda a consciência, mas que não goza do seu objeto porque não sabe representá-lo.22 Ora, o problema da posse do conhecimento traduz aquele da relação com a palavra humana, com a posse da palavra, seja ela fundante de mundos ou fundada sobre o mundo (sendo tradutora das coisas), de modo que, introduzindo a separação entre linguagem e conhecimento, poética e filosofia foram concebidas como atinentes ao conhecimento ou à posse como "polos". Se ao poeta coube a possessão, o ser possuído pela palavra, expressando-a por meio de uma representação, ao pensador coube a fuga constante do seu postulado e inalcançável objeto, postergado pelo método. Se o poeta representa, e goza, não conhece. Se o filósofo conhece, não goza jamais, embora até possa, consciente das falhas do seu construto, se for lúcido, apresentar frangalhos de 21 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xiii. 22 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xiii. 29 representação que não condizem, porém, com a medida mesma do seu conhecimento e da sua consciência. Vejamos, porém, pela negativa: se o poeta tenta conhecer o seu objeto, acaba encerrado na representação tacanha, afoita à "realidade" do seu objeto, ou se vê encerrado, sem rumo, pela metalinguagem, pela tentativa de conhecer a sua representação (embora possa apenas gozá-la, no que se conservaria como poeta); se o filósofo pretende gozar o seu objeto pela representação que dele faz, acaba no limiar com a poesia, e sem dúvida atrairá a censura de seus pares, ao menos dos mais ortodoxos e afeitos àquela cisão. Não apenas se enrijecem os limites de fronteira entre aqueles que "moram próximos nas duas montanhas mais separadas"23, como o contato entre ambas se torna ainda mais difícil. Aos aventureiros, caberia a experiência do abismo. Ambos são reféns das representações, mas em posições distintas. Ambos têm seu lugar na linguagem, como todo o ser dito humano, mas os seus ofícios conduzem-nos de modos próprios, e, ao menos conforme a imagem que deles nos acostumamos a fazer, enquanto o poeta se alimenta da sua representação, da sua língua e da sua linguagem – o seu mundo é um mundo de linguagem, afinal –, o filósofo depara-se com a representação apenas quando percebe que ela não é simples instrumento de percepção, mas a estrutura por meio da qual se constitui o seu próprio objeto – para o filósofo, diante de todas as suas preocupações, a linguagem se lhe apresenta em seu estatuto fundamental a partir do choque, da ruptura das suas representações, sensação essa que ao poeta importa praticamente como matéria, se não como forma, do seu fazer. Apesar de podermos questionar a relação e a igualdade entre linguagem e representação, é preciso insistir e reter como o elemento fundamental pelo qual nos relacionamos com o mundo, a linguagem, apresenta-se por meio da "palavra despedaçada", da qual o conhecimento não escapa. Mas, ao pensar a separação e a articulação, trata-se, ainda, como já apontamos, da "tentativa de reencontrar (...) um modelo do significar que escapasse da posição primordial do significante e do significado que domina toda a reflexão ocidental sobre o signo"24, o que, em nosso esforço analítico, sintetiza o plano sobre o qual se desloca o intento crítico do filósofo italiano: pensar a cisão e suas operações separatórias coloca-se como o gesto propriamente filosófico de 23 Essa figura, mencionada por Agamben em O homem sem conteúdo (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'uomo senza contenuto, p. 80), quando remonta a Heidegger, pode ser encontrada explicitamente ao menos em dois dos textos mais conhecidos do filósofo alemão, Que é isto – a filosofia? (1955) e Posfácio (1943) de O que é metafísica?. A passagem é extraída dos versos do hino Patmos de Hölderlin, do qual retirou, na sua análise da essência da técnica, outros versos tão significativos e conhecidos. A esse respeito, veja-se WERLE, Marco Aurélio. Heidegger e a arte de questionar, p. 29-30. 24 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xiii. 30 Agamben nessa empreitada, mas não se extingue aí. A sua tentativa de pensar a dualidade do signo, embora centrada na sua articulação "interna", a saber, a quebra entre significante e significado, conforme se aprofunda, tem por objetivo situar a metafísica ocidental ao problema do plano de significação, isto é, o lógos como mecanismo articulatório que fez esquecer a separação. A articulação, a partir disso, poderia aparecer como reconstituição de uma unidade perdida, ilustrando a influência propriamente teológica, e num contexto judaico-cristão que institui a ideia da queda (que está por ser redimida), ou como a harmonia que, "na linguagem auroral do pensamento grego"25, responde à "fratura da presença". Sendo assim, trata-se de compreender, primeiramente, o que "a posição primordial do significante e do significado que domina toda a reflexão ocidental sobre o signo" representa, e como, enquanto cisão e articulação, constitui-se a fratura do ser e situação (no sentido do situar-se) do homem. A partir daí, teremos meios não apenas de situar as dualidades, já num contexto próximo do estágio arqueológico, mas de estabelecer uma via de interpretação que nos desloque das análises "literárias" de Agamben, situando-o, caso não de todo na filosofia, ao menos no obscuro limiar entre poesia e filosofia – o que explicaria a dificuldade com a qual, em cada um dos mirantes sobre os mais separados cumes, encontram os respectivos artífices com a obra e o escopo teórico da filosofia aqui abordada. E isso só poderemos configurar depois de um tortuoso caminho, conforme o vem traçando Agamben na tentativa de pensar a experiência da linguagem. Devemos estabelecer, portanto, claramente a relevância da negatividade como conceito – via sem a qual não vêm à superfície os problemas fundamentais que conectam Agamben não apenas à filosofia, mas especialmente ao desdobramento moderno da filosofia. Precisamos interrogar as primeiras manifestações da relação da negatividade com a linguagem, como fantasma e como voz, de modo a perceber como Agamben estabelece a relação entre semiologia e metafísica, isto é, entre a articulação, da voz como "som significante" ou do signo, e o problema da fundação negativa do ser, aqui ainda colocado, primariamente, em termos de uma pouco definida "fratura da presença". 25 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 188. 31 1.3. A escrita da fantasia, produção de fantasmas ("o fantasma faz o prazer próprio ao desejo") A estreita relação tecida por Agamben entre representação, conhecimento e gozo, ao invés de conduzir a uma teoria do conhecimento, desloca-nos, de outro modo, para um questionamento da representação enquanto encontro – imaginário – entre palavra e negatividade. A cisão entre filosofia e poesia, assim, faz aparecer as dimensões cindidas como diferentes montagens do sentido, como lugares de eventos que, de modo mais primário, na sua diferença, precisamente por ela apontam para um núcleo originário da significação: precisamente, fazendo uma torção sobre si, a própria cisão. Mas o que há, aí, de tão fundamental, que justifique todo esse movimento? Há o rastro da negatividade – cuja manifestação nas raízes da representação aparece conceitualmente como fantasma, como imagem. É por haver negatividade entre o que diz e o que se deseja, ou se vê, que se abre para nós algo como um fantasma, uma espécie de imagem produzida nas regiões limítrofes da imaginação – limítrofes porque a imaginação ou fantasia, ao levarmos em conta a herança deixada pelo De anima ao pensamento ocidental, coloca-se entre a percepção sensível e a percepção intelectual posicionando-se como, por assim dizer, antessala do intelecto, que necessita das imagens –, pela qual se apresenta, para nós, o objeto na negatividade. O fantasma, pela operação da fantasia, plasma a negatividade, tornando, assim, o objeto de desejo não apenas verbalizável, mas "poetizável". Nesse caso, o poeta apreende a imagem do objeto de amor dela fazendo palavra. A representação, retornando à imagem, ou melhor, retornando como fantasma, permite vislumbrar o lugar de palavra (e imagem) no seu lugar, na sua estância. Torna-se, mesmo, estruturação de sentido na negatividade, e por isso o elevado peso metafísico das indagações agambenianas. Afinal, a metafísica, como a interrogação sobre o ente que se move além do ente, "diz o que é o ente enquanto ente. Ela contém um lógos (enunciação) sobre o ón, o ente"26. Assim, encaminhando as suas representações para o núcleo do ente em sua totalidade – tanto representando-o como um universal ou um comum quanto como o supremo, o completo, isto é, tanto, e numa mesma formação, como ontologia quanto como teologia, isto é, "ontoteologia" –, marca-se como um pensamento da representação, um pensamento que enuncia o representado e que se enuncia como 26 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Que é metafísica? – Introdução (1949), p. 61. 32 representação. Ora, ao questionar o estatuto da representação, confrontando-a com o conhecimento e a capacidade de linguagem humanas, Agamben propõe-se como alguém que, afundando o seu pensar na negatividade (um dos nomes agambenianos para o nada de Heidegger), sem a garantia da plena representação (no que seria um metafísico) e sem a esperança do gozo dela possível (no que seria um poeta), pode se colocar como um filósofo, pois a representação ainda assoma, mesmo que questionada, que se propõe pensar o próprio fundamento do pensamento filosófico, que coloca em jogo o pensamento metafísico. Não apenas, então, a ideia de estância aparece como solução formal para a necessidade de dar lugar preciso à posse da imagem (objeto de amor) pela palavra, mas constitui um momento no qual, segundo Agamben, a cisão pareceu até mesmo se retrair e a palavra atingir a distância zero de seu lugar originário, a estância da própria linguagem. O fantasma, portanto, longe de ser uma irrupção categorial abrupta, aparece no trabalho teórico de Agamben por meio do que denomina "fantasmologia medieval", uma "convergência da teoria da imaginação de origem aristotélica com a doutrina do pneuma como veículo da alma"27, o que, em outros termos, é o seu modo de encarar aquela relação entre representação e conhecimento. Mas que a presença do fantasma seja elemento de uma tão potente coarticulação – afinal, o fim de conjunção fantasmáticoamorosa, o fin'amors dos poetas provençais, acontece apenas com a união de fantasma, palavra e desejo –, isso se deve a ele vir marcado, por uma antiga tradição, pela noção de juntura das partes da alma. A grande imagem que nos foi legada sobre a fantasia é, precisamente, aquela que a transforma, pela dupla lavra de Platão, na atuação dos artistas interiores. Apresentação dupla, pois, para Agamben, são duas as imagens que concorrem para a formação da emblemática construção de Aristóteles em De anima, a qual consolida a visão metafórica da estrutura da imaginação28. Nesse sentido, para que não apenas cheguemos à última, mas também possamos situar o seu lugar estratégico como uma das retomadas teóricas características de Agamben – inclusive por suas extensas considerações sobre o caráter glosador da cultura e do pensamento medievais que incorporam o legado aristotélico –, é preciso considerar, pela voz de Sócrates, uma breve passagem do Filebo e outra do Teeteto. 27 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 29. 28 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 84-86. 33 No Filebo, partindo de uma sugestiva aproximação que propõe considerar a nossa alma (psikhé) como um livro (38e), Sócrates, ao tratar do papel da memória, verifica que ela se conjuga às sensações (aisthḗsesi) e, fazendo-se acompanhar das paixões (pathḗmata), daí resulta a imagem do processo como a de um escriba (grammateús): escreve-se, pela paixão, o recebido pelas sensações em nossas almas29. Ainda, e ao lado desse escriba, há "um pintor que, depois do escriba, desenha no espírito [nell'animo] as imagens das coisas ditas [ou melhor, escritas, pelo primeiro artesão]", e mesmo "(...) quando um homem, depois de ter recebido da visão ou de qualquer outro sentido os objetos das opiniões e dos discursos, vê de alguma maneira dentro de si as imagens desses objetos"30. Há um processo em jogo, pois, que precisa da atuação de dois artesãos (dois artistas, na tradução de Agamben), o escriba e o pintor. O escriba é aquele capaz de escrever, com a paixão ou afecção, o recebido dos sentidos em nossa alma e disso pode surgir algo como a memória. Seu registro é o do verdadeiro e do falso. O pintor, por sua vez, é aquele que desenha na alma a imagem daquilo que já foi apreendido e escrito pelo artesão da letra. Enquanto o escriba assinala na alma segundo a linguagem da percepção, o pintor apresenta-nos imagens já oriundas dos discursos e opiniões. Ele atua apenas depois da recepção do objeto pelos sentidos e da sua conversão, por assim dizer, em composição gráfica, pelo processamento perceptivo que nos apresenta "quase que" palavras na alma. E são essas, depois, que o nosso pintor mental transforma em imagens, dando-nos, então, contornos daquele objeto, que, de traçado pela letra, torna-se, então, traçado como imagem (eikónas). 29 "SÓCRATES A memória, unida às sensações, e as paixões (παθήματα) conectadas com essas parecemme que quase escrevem palavras nas nossas almas; e quando essa paixão escreve veramente, então se produzem em nós opiniões e discursos verdadeiros; mas quando o escriba dentro de nós escreve o falso, o resultado é contrário ao verdadeiro" (p. 84). Assim Giorgio Agamben começa a tradução de Filebo, 39a. Sempre que preciso, apresentaremos, traduzida para português, e com eventuais notações de especificidades terminológicas, a sua tradução (ao menos, na falta de qualquer indicação de que sejam de outrem, presumese que sejam suas). Reproduzo, ainda, para que se tornem visíveis as operações teórico-conceituais que encaminham as estratégias tradutórias, as passagens do texto em grego, quando possível e oportuno. "ΖΩ. Ἡ μνήμη ταῖς αἰσθήσεσι συμπίπτουσα εἰς ταὐτὸν κἀκεῖνα ἃ περὶ ταῦτ ἐστὶ τὰ παθήματα φαίνονταί μοι σχεδὸν οἷον γράφειν ἡμῶν ἐν ταῖς ψυχαῖς τότε λόγους: καὶ ὅταν μὲν ἀληθῆ γράφῃ [τοῦτο τὸ πάθημα], δόξα τε ἀληθὴς καὶ λόγοι ἀπ αὐτοῦ συμβαίνουσιν ἀληθεῖς ἐν ἡμῖν γιγνόμενοι: ψευδῆ δ ὅταν ὁ τοιοῦτος παρ ἡμῖν γραμματεὺς γράψῃ, τἀναντία τοῖς ἀληθέσιν ἀπέβη". Os textos em grego de Platão que reproduzimos são os encontrados na edição de John Burnet, Opera platonis (1900-1907), constando no volume II o Filebo e no I o Teeteto) (PLATO. Opera platonis, II). 30 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 84. Grifo nosso. "ζωγράφον, ὃς μετὰ τὸν γραμματιστὴν τῶν λεγομένων εἰκόνας ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ τούτων γράφει (...) ὅταν ἀπ ὄψεως ἤ τινος ἄλλης αἰσθήσεως τὰ τότε δοξαζόμενα καὶ λεγόμενα ἀπαγαγών τις τὰς τῶν δοξασθέντων" (PLATO. Opera platonis, II). Ressalte-se que se tenha traduzido en têi psykhêi por "nell'animo" ("no espírito"), ao invés de "nell'anima" ("na alma"), como pareceria mais coerente com as outras ocorrências do vocábulo na passagem apresentada. 34 Mas uma consideração faz-se, aqui, necessária: "O artista que desenha na alma as imagens (eikónas) das coisas, na passagem de Platão, é a fantasia, e esses 'ícones' são, de fato, um pouco abaixo, definidos [como] 'fantasmas' (φαντάσματα) (40a)"31. Ora, deslocando o foco para a produção de imagens, o que se reconhece como operação da fantasia, a imagem, agora, pode de fato aparecer, e não apenas um "ícone", assim conduz Agamben, ao menos, de modo a encontrar, já no texto platônico, hesitante entre o ícone e a imagem, o gérmen da doutrina aristotélica da imaginação. De fato, na sequência do diálogo, Sócrates coloca o problema da relação temporal entre a produção de dor e prazer e a atuação dos artesãos da alma (o que escreve e o que desenha). Aparece a elpís, que, de uma indistinta "esperança", pode ser entendida, no contexto da discussão entre Sócrates e Protarco, como "expectativa pelo objeto da dor ou do prazer". Os homens, então, não apenas estão repletos de "muitas expectativas" (geradas pelo passado e pelo presente das sensações e dos conhecimentos), mas elas, por sua vez, são da ordem daquelas palavras escritas em nossa alma pelo escriba, bem como, ao seu lado, surgem as imagens (phantásmata) pintadas pelo segundo artista interior – e isso de tal forma que, dessa dupla conjugação, pode-se dizer que há imagens dos prazeres pintadas na alma (40b), tanto verdadeiras, se forem orientadas pelo bem, quanto falsas, se não o forem. Se, como insiste Agamben, "o tema central do Filebo não é, todavia, o conhecimento, mas o prazer"32, então o núcleo da produção de imagens não se orienta, na sua leitura, para a composição de uma explicação do conhecimento, mas, sim, para o próprio papel desempenhado pelas imagens ("pintadas na alma") na produção do prazer e na consecução do desejo, o que, não se faz sem a intervenção da memória. Orientado pelo contexto no qual faz ressaltar o jogo do prazer e do desejo, Agamben conecta a discussão do fantasma – assim como a da representação, como insistimos – ao complexo mecanismo do desejo (revelando uma incursão da psicanálise pelas figuras do gozo e do desejo): Desde o início da nossa pesquisa [em Estâncias], graças a uma intuição que antecipa singularmente a tese lacaniana segundo a qual 'le phantasme fait le plaisir propre au désir' ["o fantasma faz o prazer próprio ao desejo"], o fantasma põe-se, então, sob o signo do desejo e é isso um pormenor que será bom não esquecer.33 31 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 86. 32 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 86. 33 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 86. Que a tradução brasileira dessa passagem, parte do importante Kant com Sade, contida nos Escritos, opte por traduzir phantasme por "fantasia" - "(...) a fantasia torna o prazer apropriado ao desejo" (LACAN, Jacques. Escritos, p. 785) –, pode-se entender como estratégia 35 Ora, esse é apenas o "pormenor" que dá o tom para a inserção do fantasma na negatividade. Não fosse a espiral complexa que joga o sujeito para trás e aquém do desejo, não se poderia, nesse sentido, entender como a imagem plasma uma negatividade, ou ainda, como permite que a palavra alcance uma falta precisamente ao dela fazer imagem e, assim, consiga, de alguma forma, gozá-la. O fantasma coloca-se sob o signo do desejo, e o desejo, na perspectiva agambeniana, guarda uma vital relação com a linguagem - "o problema do conhecimento", almejado na mesma medida em que escapa por entre as mãos, vale a pena repetir, "é um problema de posse, e todo problema de posse é um problema de gozo, isto é, de linguagem"34. Percorrendo esse fio condutor, podemos perceber o movimento que conecta o fantasma à palavra, pois posse e gozo35, representação, linguagem e conhecimento são os termos que se nos apresentam já no prefácio de Estâncias, ao modo de uma composição por exclusão (se se conhece, não se consegue representar, nem possuir e gozar; se se consegue representar, possuindo e gozando o representado, não se o conhece). O problema da posse do conhecimento como um problema de gozo e capacidade de representação, quer-se dizer, é um problema de linguagem. Eis a estratégia de Agamben que explica, ainda, o caráter sintomático do retorno à querela platônica a respeito o lugar dos poetas na pólis, pela qual se apresenta, desde o início, uma cisão do lógos. Desloca-nos, então, no curto-circuito entre representação e imagem, cuja sorte na cultura ocidental é deslocada da teoria do conhecimento para uma maior aproximação reconstrutiva em relação aos textos de Freud, nos quais, já em A interpretação dos sonhos, desponta o termo Phantasie como núcleo do estrato profundo da realidade psíquica, a qual, contudo, cabe destacar, não se resume apenas a uma operação que formaria imagens. Agamben, no seu comentário da passagem, traduz o phantasme por fantasma. Assim, bem como pelo uso central desse termo em Estâncias, desde o subtítulo até o título da seção principal, justifica-se que o mantenhamos como fantasma. Encontra-se essa posição tradutória também em A paixão do negativo (SAFATLE, Vladimir. A paixão do negativo, p. 199). Além disso, o fantasma, já como produto de uma operação, coloca-se como a captura da negatividade em uma imagem, a qual será acessada pela palavra, enquanto a fantasia, por sua vez, como a própria operação, como imaginação, coloca-se em aberto. Neste momento, como se pode fazer um paralelo, está em evidência menos a enunciação do que o enunciado, posição que será alterada nas obras seguintes de Agamben, da palavra ao lugar de palavra e, desse, ao lugar da própria linguagem). 34 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. xiii. 35 A rigor, não parece haver, na retomada de Agamben, uma manutenção rigorosa das diferenciações conceituais de Jacques Lacan, como, por exemplo, entre o prazer, evocado na interpretação do Filebo, e o gozo. De todo modo, é a entrada do desejo na relação entre palavra e fantasma o que se coloca, aqui, em evidência, possibilitando que se forme, de fato, uma constelação entre os três termos. Tendo em vista a letra agambeniana, deve-se levar em conta que a relativa sinonimização histórica do gozo com o prazer, contudo, é evento semântico que se superpõe à relação originária com a posse – a qual se deixa transparecer –, definindo-se o gozo, por conseguinte, também num contexto jurídico (de gozo ou posse de direitos ou objetos, por exemplo). 36 com as zonas com as quais a filosofia estabelece suas fronteiras. Nesse sentido, caso não seja possível desvencilhar-se de todo da imagem, e dos diversos problemas conceituais que sua estrita consideração traria pelo retorno à história da filosofia (phántasma, eikón), contudo, por a ela chegar já pelos caminhos da representação, pode tomá-la na sua relação com a palavra, no plano linguístico, e na sua relação com o desejo, contornando, com uma ponte ou atalho, o que seria a parte que cabe de psique à imagem (e dispensando, assim, o psicologismo que poderia afetar uma doutrina da representação). Nessas passagens entre imagem e representação, destaca-se, pois, que não podemos encobrir, pela tradução e leitura do fantasma como imagem, o estarmos diante da negatividade como problema – não mais e apenas imagem, portanto, mas, de fato, fantasma. A escolha terminológica, como se nota na teorização de Giorgio Agamben e como ele próprio insiste em destacar, é o momento no qual o pensamento não apenas se condensa, mas possibilita uma diluição estratégica. O fantasma torna-se o modo pelo qual a palavra se mantém na negatividade, circunscrevendo em si o negativo do objeto que de outro modo não se acessaria: ao mesmo tempo que condensa o problema da imagem, traduzindo aquele da representação e da linguagem, na mesma medida se dilui, uma vez que carrega consigo o rastro das aparições fantasmáticas e das imaginações fantásticas, e, interpondo-se entre o sujeito e a palavra, permite que ele habite precisamente o hiato e tenha acesso ao prazer que, pela posse da palavra, consigna-se ao desejo. Como vimos, a representação que se interpõe entre o poeta e o filósofo é aquela que não permite articular, numa mesma juntura, conhecimento e gozo. Tal é o diagnóstico que Agamben separa para o nosso tempo, no qual a fratura da palavra tenderia a alcançar sua máxima saturação. Por um lado, está implicado um contínuo, o agravamento de uma situação; por outro, o agravamento revela algo dessa mesma situação, de modo a podermos, no contexto topológico em que nos encontramos, considerá-la próxima da estruturação de um lugar. Que encontremos um diagnóstico semelhante num poeta tão distante de Agamben quanto possamos supor, é algo cuja inquietação, ao menos, não deixa de nos provocar a necessidade de pensar os termos nos quais essa discussão é entabulada. Czesław Miłosz, poeta polonês nosso contemporâneo (e, cabe anunciá-lo, sem hesitação, contemporâneo no sentido filosófico trabalhado pelo próprio Agamben), galardoado pela Academia Sueca, é quem nos lança estas palavras: Desde tempos imemoriais, a humanidade tem-se dividido naqueles que sabem, mas não falam e naqueles que falam, mas não sabem. Cabe discernir nesta máxima uma alusão à dialética do senhor e do escravo, pois ela lembra os séculos de ignorância e miséria entre servos, camponeses e proletários, os únicos a conhecer a crueldade da vida em toda a sua nudez, mas que precisaram 37 guardá-lo para si mesmos, porque a arte da leitura e da escrita era privilégio dos poucos que possuíam um saber mitigado pelo poder e pela riqueza. Aqueles que falam não sabem. E mesmo que saibam, encontram um óbice na forma da própria linguagem, que tende a coagular-se neste ou naquele classicismo, quer dizer, empregam com a maior boa vontade expressões convencionais, não obstante estas não sejam capazes de aderir a uma realidade sempre inesperada. O problema tornou-se manifesto durante a última guerra, naqueles territórios em que a população europeia conheceu os horrores da ocupação alemã, os quais superavam quaisquer noções herdadas acerca do mal.36 A dialética do senhor e do escravo, cuja importância recebe muito de sua sustentação a partir da leitura a que Alexandre Kojève submeteu a obra hegeliana, particularmente a Fenomenologia do espírito, trata-se de uma profunda dialética de desejo e morte, reconhecimento e negatividade sendo o escravo aquele que conhece a situação da luta de vida e de morte, enquanto o senhor, ávido e temerário, é quem pode gozá-la. O que intentamos destacar, com essa intromissão antecipada, é que a relação entre conhecimento e fala, similar àquela entre conhecimento e gozo estabelecida por Agamben, permite-nos considerar, pelo lado daqueles que falam e sabem, que a enunciação poética está sempre às voltas com a possibilidade de gozar a sua representação, de construir, pelo instrumento mesmo da sua interposição ao desejo, uma parede entre si e o objeto – essa, ao menos, é a inquietação de Miłosz e inúmeros outros poetas preocupados com seus caminhos e acessos de palavras –, lançando-se a um mutismo autenticado, paradoxalmente, pela própria palavra que decai de sua enunciação. Assim, entre o gozo que se possa encontrar na linguagem e a sua constante frustração, tende-se a tecer a poesia como gozo inconsciente da linguagem – e o conhecimento, não sem boa dose de estoicismo, pode se tornar o sofrimento impassível diante da dela, pois, não podendo extrair um mínimo de gozo da representação, ele não logra levá-la a cabo. E, como destino trágico, não se deve esquecer a configuração histórica e concreta dos que tem de falar e conhecem, mas perderam diante de si as palavras – eis o terrível lugar do testemunho, o falar (o ter de falar) de uma impossibilidade de dizer. Ora, vê-se que Agamben projeta, para trás, a modulação da imagem utilizada para explicar o processo da fantasia, pelo qual põe a nu a fratura da palavra como nossa herança metafísica e a expõe, como forma de denunciar o caráter produzido e produtor das separações, contudo, num momento de conjuntura. É a noção de fantasma que o permite mapear o entrelaçamento que revela mais profundamente a cisão, pois o nexo é possibilitado de modo fantasmático. A dinâmica em jogo aponta não para um dos polos, 36 MIŁOSZ, Czesław. O testemunho da poesia, p. 99. 38 para a palavra poética ou para a pensante, para a inconsciente ou a consciente, mas para a própria tensão existente. Resta-nos, porém, a outra ponta que fecha o jogo para trás que Agamben estabelece para conseguir passar pela teoria aristotélica da imaginação levando em conta o mote lacaniano, de modo a atingir, ainda, na poética provençal, a relação entre palavra e fantasma. Essa ponta encontra-se no Teeteto, em que a imagem aparece no contexto do processo da memória, agora como eídōlon. De fato, estamos diante de algo que é um dom, ou dádiva, de Mnemósine, mãe das musas (191d). Esse algo, porém, não é a própria imagem, mas uma "uma cera impressionável" (191c)37 (kḗrinon ekmageîon)38, presente em nossas almas, que se apresenta aos sentidos e às concepções e pela qual se conserva gravado em nós o que nela é impresso, assim como acontece com um sinete de um anel e a cera. A imagem, propriamente, surge no intervalo seguinte à gravação na cera, isto é, é produto de uma impressão: "daquilo que se imprime, nós conservamos memória e conhecimento [scienza], enquanto dure a imagem (τὸ εἴδωλον)" (191d)39. Enquanto persiste a imagem, há memória e conhecimento, possibilidade de ciência. Enquanto há imagem (eídōlon), pode-se produzir a lembrança da impressão (ou do que, mesmo, foi pensado). Mas aquilo que não foi capaz de impressionar a "cera impressionável" que possibilita a memória, ou o foi de modo insuficiente, isso se esquece e se ignora. Não sem motivo, pois, "a história da psicologia clássica é, em grande medida, a história dessas duas metáforas", tendo em vista que, tomando-as de Platão, Aristóteles continua a usá-las – porém, num contexto outro e, por que não, original. No De anima, o "processo da sensação" 40 articula-se sobre o plano de fundo da metáfora icônica, de uma cera que se deixa impressionar por um anel ou sinete e recebe apenas a gravação de uma marca (sēmeîon)41, não retendo em si nada do material que compõe o objeto que impressiona a cera dos sentidos (424a16-21). A marca ou sinal que se recebe pelo sentido, conecta o processo à significação de uma imagem. A percepção ou sensação produz, na alma, uma afecção, e essa é como um desenho, pois a percepção produzida pelo objeto perceptível que passa pelo crivo do 37 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 86. 38 A tradução de Agamben, levando em conta o original grego "(...) ἐν ταῖς ψυχαῖς ἡμῶν ἐνὸν κήρινον ἐκμαγεῖον" (PLATO. Opera platonis, I), apresenta-nos de fato a cera (kḗrinon) "na qual se faz uma impressão" (ekmageîon). 39 "καὶ ὃ μὲν ἂν ἐκμαγῇ, μνημονεύειν τε καὶ ἐπίστασθαι ἕως ἂν ἐνῇ τὸ εἴδωλον αὐτοῦ" (PLATO. Opera platonis, I). 40 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 87. 41 Sēmeîon, "sinal", "marca", "impressão", que Agamben, aqui, traduz por impronta, "marca", "figura", "imagem", "impressão". 39 sentido é como aquela impressão deixada na cera. De uma marca deixada na alma a partir de formas sensíveis recebidas sem a matéria, passa-se, então, à faculdade produtora de imagens, propriamente: "O movimento ou paixão produzido pela sensação é depois transmitido à fantasia, que pode produzir o fantasma também na ausência da coisa percebida"42. No encaminhamento das potências da alma a capacidade de nutrir-se, de perceber, desejar, locomover-se e pensar (414a29-33)43, quando se abre ao investigar o lugar da imaginação44, ela se caracteriza, por um lado, pela afirmação da possibilidade de engano, do qual não escapa a fantasia, e, por outro, pela constituição ou abertura de um espaço entre o perceber e o pensar, no qual, então, constitui o seu lugar: "a imaginação é algo diverso tanto da percepção sensível como do raciocínio; mas a imaginação não ocorre sem percepção sensível e tampouco sem a imaginação ocorrem suposições"45. Ao lançar mão de um interessante expediente para tratar da imaginação, apresentando-a em confronto com as faculdades entre as quais se encontra (o intelecto e a percepção sensível), Aristóteles acaba por caracterizar a imaginação fazendo dela a produção de imagem (phántasma). Com isso, tem-se o quê de original que Aristóteles lega à história, pois se pode passar a teorizar, de modo relativamente autônomo, o segmento da alma que produz o fantasma. Mas de que produção de imagens se trata? São apenas aparições que se apresentam aos nossos olhos, no que se esbarraria na zona de acomodação do sentido da visão e a percepção sensível visual compartilharia, por assim dizer, seu objeto? E quanto ao pensamento? Primeiramente, trata-se de diferenciar a relação da imaginação com as capacidades do intelecto, pois, segundo ele, elas estão marcadas por algo que ultrapassa a nossa "vontade". A fantasia, por sua vez, "é afecção [que] depende de nós e do nosso querer (pois é possível que produzamos algo diante de nossos olhos, tal como aqueles que, apoiando-se na memória, produzem imagem)" (427b17-19) 46. Assim, enquanto a opinião, por exemplo, leva ao compartilhamento de uma emoção, a imaginação deixa-nos como que em estado contemplativo, e, por ela, "permanecemos como que contemplando em uma pintura coisas terríveis e encorajadoras" (427b22-23)47. 42 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 87. 43 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 77. 44 A partir de De anima III, 3 (427a17 e ss). 45 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 110. 46 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 110. 47 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 110. 40 Fixa-se, dessa maneira, o caráter imagético da fantasia, por ela ser "aquilo segundo o que dizemos que nos ocorre uma imagem – e não no sentido em que o dizemos por metáfora" (428a)48. Se assim o é, qual a sua natureza? Aristóteles passa, dando continuidade a sua investigação, a distingui-la da percepção. Enquanto a percepção sensível é potência ou atividade, capacidade de visão ou atividade de ver, por exemplo, sempre presente nos seres que a possuem e sempre sendo verdadeira49, a fantasia, pode gerar imagens quando dormimos ou de olhos fechados, num estado de não atuação da visão ou de não presença do objeto da visão, o que pode até mesmo gerar imaginações falsas e é indício de que ela não sempre está presente, e isso ocorre com aqueles que têm um mínimo perceptivo – além de haver animais sem imaginação, pelo que, também, não poderia haver identidade entre fantasia e percepção. Se pode ser falsa, a imaginação também não é idêntica à ciência nem ao intelecto, sempre verdadeiros. Também diferenciada entre o verdadeiro e o falso, eis que poderia se assimilar à opinião, mas isso não se dá, pois enquanto a opinião necessita de convencimento – o que requer persuasão e razão –, a imaginação ocorre nos animais. Ora, resta, assim, um balanço não muito extenso, ou, se extenso for, não confiável o suficiente, pois a cada passo Aristóteles frisa que as imaginações podem ser falsas e as imagens geradas ilusórias, quiméricas, oníricas. Porém, enquanto está na alma, deve-se explicá-la, uma vez que o sentido do tratado é a progressão analítica das potências anímicas de modo a conhecer a psykhḗ como princípio. Mas, não sendo percepção, isso não quer dizer que ela não necessite do movimento da percepção. De fato, sem percepção não haveria imaginação, pois ela 48 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 110. 49 Essa passagem sobre o caráter verdadeiro das percepções, talvez, seja a passagem mais complexa desse seguimento, pois embora assim as apresente, logo abaixo (428a17-19) nos diz que "quando estamos em atividade acurada no que concerne a um objeto perceptível, não dizemos que ele aparenta ser um homem, mas antes que não o percebemos claramente. É neste caso que a percepção seria verdadeira ou falsa" (ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 111). Para explicar e diferenciar o que geraria uma incompatibilidade e para justificar que ainda assim a imaginação é movimento da percepção, Aristóteles elabora um escalonamento, por assim dizer, da percepção: "primeiro, há a percepção dos objetos sensíveis próprios, que é verdadeira ou contém minimamente o falso; em segundo lugar, há a percepção do incidir também essas coisas que não são incidentais aos objetos perceptíveis, e neste caso já se admite cometer erro; pois que é branco, não admite erro, mas pode-se errar quanto ao branco ser isso ou alguma outra coisa. Em terceiro lugar, há a percepção dos sensíveis comuns, isto é, por exemplo, o movimento e a magnitude, a respeito dos quais já é possível estar enganado segundo a percepção sensível" (428b17-24) (ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 112-113). Barbara Cassin, em Aristóteles e o logos, destaca sobremaneira a relevância do alcance dessa passagem, a partir da qual ressalta o hiato existente entre o que seria uma lógica estética e uma lógica ordinária, e como a fenomenologia que aí se constrói se alimenta desse salto entre as duas dimensões nas quais o lógos afunda o seu sentido, performando o mundo sensível e o fenômeno ao modo de uma "coerência" projetada da lógica sobre a percepção (Cf. CASSIN, Barbara. Aristóteles e o logos, p. 201 e ss). 41 também é um movimento realizado na alma. Com isso, no que toca à percepção sensível, à sensação, "A imaginação é o movimento que ocorre pela atividade da percepção sensível. Já que a visão é, por excelência, percepção sensível, também o nome 'imaginação' [phantasía] deriva da palavra 'luz' [pháous], porque sem luz [phōtòs] não o ato de ver" (428b31-429a1-4)50. Se, por um lado, a fantasia pressupõe o movimento da percepção, por outro, para que a alma seja capaz de pensar, de fato, ela necessita das imagens, e elas lhe são transmitidas precisamente pela fantasia: "Para a alma capaz de pensar, as imagens [phantásmata] subsistem como sensações percebidas (...) a alma jamais pensa sem imagem" (431a13-16)51. Por ser o lugar das formas, a alma intelectiva (potencialmente) necessita de um trabalho prévio que lhe apresente alguma forma com a qual possa operar, e aí encontra os fantasmas, "quando se contempla, há necessidade de se contemplar ao mesmo tempo alguma imagem, pois as imagens são como que sensações percebidas, embora desprovidas de matéria" (432a 8-11)52, ao lado da qual conjuga o que é propriamente seu, os pensamentos, que, não se confundindo com as imagens (e menos ainda com as percepções), delas não prescindem. A fantasia, portanto, atua como uma espécie de ponte, seja-nos concedido dizer, entre as potências perceptiva e intelectiva53. Ela processa as percepções em imagem – como, porém, Aristóteles não nos deixa visualizar –, e acaba por fazê-lo pelo próprio movimento daquelas recebido. Ao modo, porém, de uma aparição imagética, a qual, precisamente, é o que já se apresenta ao intelecto para o seu funcionamento. Se a natureza própria do intelecto é o seu ser separado da percepção e de seus aparatos e a sua impassibilidade, além de sua heterogeneidade cósmica (o seu ser "sem mistura"), colocase precisamente em jogo a atividade do intelecto individual – o que nos antecipa, assim, o problema medieval sobre a natureza do intelecto e sua relação com os seres pensantes (e as manchas cosmológicas que atravessam o De anima, então, transformam-se propriamente em teologia). A alma intelectiva como lugar das formas em potência, quando não recebe matéria de algo pensado recebe a forma do pensado. Porém, quando pensa uma forma realizada na matéria, necessita da atuação da percepção, pois necessita, 50 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 113. ARISTOTLE. On the soul, Parva naturalia, On breath, p. 162. 51 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 119. 52 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 121. 53 Na organização das faculdades, Aristóteles acaba por cindir internamente a fantasia conforme as potências entre as quais ela se enquadra, diante do que surge a "imaginação perceptiva" e a "imaginação deliberativa", a primeira encontrável em todos os animais dotados de imaginação e a segunda, apenas, naqueles capazes de cálculo, de raciocínio. 42 então, de perceber algo, e não apenas uma pura forma – e o intelecto, na célebre imagem do seu ser pura potência, é como a tabuleta que pode receber inscrições, mas na qual não há nada escrito (429b 30-33). A fantasia cumpre o seu papel ao possibilitar as imagens que se nos apresentam ao intelecto e o fantasma, enviado ao intelecto, permite que exista uma continuidade anímica sem, entretanto, deixar que o separado e o diverso se misturem ou se identifiquem. "O capaz de pensar pensa as formas, portanto, em imagens" (423b2), ele pode, "com as imagens e pensamentos na alma" (423b8)54, raciocinar, quando não está diante de algum estímulo dos sentidos, a visão de algo, por exemplo. Nesse sentido, Agamben afirma que a função do fantasma no processo cognoscitivo é tão fundamental que se pode dizer que ele seja também, em certo sentido, a condição necessária da inteligência: Aristóteles chega até mesmo a dizer que o intelecto é uma espécie de fantasia (φαντασία τις) e repete várias vezes o princípio que dominará a teoria medieval do conhecimento e que a escolástica fixará na fórmula: nihil potest homo intelligere sine phantasmata.55 Mas o papel da fantasia e do fantasma não se encerra aí, apesar do lugar de destaque que ocupa na dinâmica da organização das faculdades anímicas, ainda mais daquela superior, a intelectiva. E de forma não menos surpreendente, que retoma o nosso fio condutor, surge-nos novamente o problema da relação com o desejo – movente da alma, ao lado do intelecto (como inteligência prática, mas também como imaginação). Se retomarmos uma passagem do começo do Livro II do De anima, encontramos um enunciado que já antecipa essa proximidade entre imaginação e desejo: "onde existe sensação, existe dor [lýpē] e prazer [hēdonḗ]; e, onde eles existem, necessariamente também existe desejo [epithymía]" (413b 21-23)56. Ora, o desejo que se encontra nas partes da alma, portanto, é motriz anterior do movimento dos corpos em relação ao intelecto, afinal, mesmo para os animais destituídos de intelecto (todos exceto o homem), há a possibilidade de se locomoverem. Numa complementariedade que talvez, ao início, não se mostrasse tão notável, desejo e fantasma articulam-se de modo profundo. Por um lado, "a imaginação, quando move, não move sem desejo. Há algo único, de fato, que faz mover: o desejável"; por outro, "o animal não é capaz de desejar sem imaginação" (433b 28-29)57. Tanto o movimento provocado pela imaginação é um movimento desejante quanto o desejo 54 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 120. 55 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 88. 56 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 75. ARISTOTLE. On the soul, Parva naturalia, On breath, p. 76. 57 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 126. 43 necessita de arregimentar fantasmas. Sem o desejo, a imagem é inerte. Sem a fantasia, o animal não sai do eterno círculo orgânico-sensorial de dor e prazer. Se "todo desejo é em vista de algo"58, portanto, e o desejo é denunciado pela existência de dor e prazer sobre o aparato perceptivo, pode-se entrever então que o desejar apreende o aprazível e o torne desejável, e, para isso, há necessidade de que haja fantasia, isto é, atividade que produz fantasmas. E para que se mova, então, a imaginação o faz com o desejo. O movimento é daquele que "está em vista de", e o que está em vista de enseja buscar (ou evitar) aquilo que visa, pode buscar o prazer, integrando-o como seu desejo, ou no seu desejo59. O fantasma faz, de fato, o prazer próprio ao desejo – e num sentido que mostra uma conexão subterrânea, intuída e trabalhada por Giorgio Agamben, que aproxima a ilação lacaniana a estratos longínquos da filosofia ocidental, ao modo de uma síntese formular de vasta e até mesmo desencontrada tradição da analítica do desejo, a qual se mostra, então, num contexto propriamente ético (e, assim, por que não, já com Agamben, político)60. Tendo pertencido, em algum momento, aos domínios de Mnemósine, se retomarmos as palavras de Platão sobre a "cera impressionável" que prefigura, ao seu modo, a operação da fantasia, a imagem passa a cumprir ainda um relevante papel mnemônico, uma vez que a memória, consolidada como capacidade anímica, necessita das imagens produzidas pela fantasia, compondo-se, conforme o tratado Sobre a memória e a reminiscência (De memoria et reminiscentia), como "a posse de um fantasma como ícone daquilo de que é fantasma"61. Os fantasmas seriam, nas galerias da memória, as 58 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 124. 59 A possibilidade de buscar o desprazer e a dor como forma de persecução do desejo (ou do gozo), embora possamos facilmente cogitá-la, não caberia ser formulada no contexto aristotélico, pois, nos termos do ethos contextual à letra do tratado, não responderia às exigências do bem-estar para o qual os sentidos (que não o tato, voltado ao ser) se dirigem, por exemplo (434b 19-21), e pelo desprazer, ainda, indicar um excesso de estímulo (barulho para audição, excesso de luminosidade para a visão, etc.), "excesso do objeto perceptível" (435b 12-13) (ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 131), destruidor dos aparatos orgânicos (os ouvidos, os olhos, etc.). 60 Não apenas Kant com Sade representa um momento de inflexão ao apresentar o estatuto de uma ética do desejo, mas também há de se ter em vista, ainda, que há uma aproximação, talvez forjada por Agamben, com o substrato aristotélico do De anima. O que em Lacan e na ética da psicanálise deve ser absorvido e tratado como exemplar do sujeito, pode fazer Aristóteles surgir como acontecimento teórico sintomático. O curto-circuito, encontrado na ética aristotélica, entre a imperiosa busca da felicidade e do bem pelo estrato superior da alma, o intelecto, e o movimento que se tenciona nas antecâmaras pelo desejo-fantasma (que remetem, então, à percepção), pois, leva a uma mudança do movimento dentro-fora, e o excêntrico, então, pode integrar, agora, a ética. Porém, para não sairmos pela tangente que toca nossas questões, mantenhamos encerrado, pela fórmula lacaniana utilizada como fio de alinhavar por Agamben, o estofo de problemas outros, que não os nossos imediatos, aí sintetizados. 61 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 88. 44 imagens que ela conservaria e fixaria além da percepção imediata. E até mesmo o sonho, como já na diferença com a percepção sensível se pode entrever, é produzido com as imagens da fantasia, numa espécie de livre mobilização do repertório acumulado de imagens, gravadas na alma como fantasmas pela fantasia. O fantasma encontra-se ao "centro de uma constelação psíquica"62. Dos sentidos, irradia-se, como imagem, não apenas para o intelecto, mas para o sonho – e, em semelhança ao que acontece no mundo onírico, para as práticas divinatórias –, para a memória e, como veremos pela doutrina da voz, para a qual essa investigação conduz, para a linguagem. O mecanismo tético que permitirá a Agamben passar da filosofia à poética moderna em seus raiares63, por conseguinte, bem como fazer o caminho de volta, é a identificação de uma "fantasmologia medieval", pela qual não apenas se mostra o legado da doutrina helênica da fantasia ao medievo, mas a formulação de uma perspectiva original que, ao experimentar a civilização medieval em termos de seu apreço pela imagem, tornou-se de tal modo elementar que, sem ela, os trovadores estariam privados de seu elo essencial com a palavra: a imagem de amor, o fantasma pelo qual a palavra pode atingir o desejo. 1.4. Os fantasmas da escrita: o testemunho do poeta, arauto da representação Se podemos passar do legado aristotélico à fantasmologia medieval, de modo a não rompermos as sutis e esvaecentes conduções históricas, como cadeia de transmissão e conformação do plano da tradição (ao que ficamos tentados a dizer tradições, por se tratarem de visões em constante conflito, indicando a disputa que dispõe vencedores e vencidos), é porque há, então, um medium que permite a passagem e revela, por trás da retomada dos antigos, uma construção própria. Ao fazer da glosa um expediente de criação, a civilização medieval acabava por encobrir as suas originalíssimas apropriações criadoras. A glosa revela-se como 62 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 89. 63 Segundo a letra de Agamben dá a entender, trata-se do conjunto heteróclito composto pela poesia provençal, o Roman de la rose, Dante Alighieri e a lírica estilonovista. Nossa atenção recai sobre o primeiro conjunto por ser aquele cuja posição se mantém ao longo da obra agambeniana como de especial relevância, além de testemunhar, a respeito dos poetas, uma produção menos abalizada pelos desígnios da intelectualização do que a de Dante, por exemplo, afinado discípulo do "maestro di color che sanno" – e que, além do mais, tomou os poetas trovadores, no De vulgarii eloquentia, como aqueles de quem sua própria lírica é herdeira e continuadora, até mesmo no especial papel de passagem do latim para a língua vernácula. 45 estratégia para o próprio desenvolvimento, como espaço no qual podem ser desdobradas, sobre o manto protetor de uma auctoritas, as próprias inclinações. Assim, as idades dotadas de forte fantasia têm amiúde necessidade de ocultar os próprios impulsos mais originais e as próprias obsessões criadoras por detrás de formas e figuras tomadas de empréstimo de outras épocas, enquanto as idades carentes de fantasias são geralmente também aquelas menos dispostas a se render à reivindicação da própria novidade.64 Partindo do princípio de que "a obra do auctor compreender também a sua citação"65, Agamben, de maneira sugestiva, considera os comentários medievais como um capítulo do corpus aristotelicum. Não há um engessamento entre obra e comentário; pelo contrário, a obra é composta, também, pelos seus comentários, e as glosas, com isso, tornam-se, paradoxalmente, parte integrante do opus autoral. As obras de um autor, para o medievo, são compostas no tempo e com ele, o que nos mostra a complexa espessura temporal com a qual essa época se relacionava com o clássico, não fazendo de si um corte, mas dissimulando a própria temporalidade na plena atualização de um autor inatual. E o que se configura, a rigor, de inédito, para Agamben, mostra sua ocorrência precisamente no lugar dos comentários sobre a fantasia, e sobre o modo, num contexto teológico, de relação entre o intelecto superior (Deus, o criador) e as individualidades (os homens, as criaturas). É conforme esse modo de relação com os clássicos que se passa a ter, então, na Baixa Idade Média, especial atenção com Aristóteles, que se torna, para Agamben, como que consubstancial ao período e que permite explicar, então, o ingresso de Avicena e Averróis na circulação intelectual da época. Com um modelo que relaciona o anatômico e o fisiológico ao psicológico, a medicina encontrou-se com a filosofia quando as partes do cérebro foram relacionadas às capacidades da alma. Avicena, ao separar o "sentido externo" do "sentido interno"66, recepcionou, como "virtudes", as capacidades que encontrávamos no De anima, e relacionou-as às cavidades cerebrais, num sentido que progride das anteriores às posteriores67, cujo sentido contribui para "um progressivo desnudamento do fantasma de 64 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 84. 65 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 86. 66 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 91. 67 São elas: a fantasia ou senso comum, força que recebe e transmite as formas impressas nos sentidos; a imaginação, força que detém o que o senso comum recebe dos sentidos e que faz permanecer o que resta quando se removem os objetos sensíveis; a força imaginativa/cogitativa, que compõe segundo a sua vontade as formas que estão na imaginação, e se remete, respectivamente, à alma em geral e à alma humana; a força estimativa, que apreende as intenções não sensíveis que se encontram nos singulares objetos sensíveis; e a força memorial e reminiscível, que detém aquilo a estimativa apreende (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 91-92). 46 seus acidentes materiais"68. Esse desdobramento, ainda, converge para a formação da racionalidade anímica, após o completar-se do caminho do sentido interno: no processo que vai das sensações, passando pela imaginação, à intelecção, há um desnudamento e abstração da matéria. A imagem, ao final, pode-se converter em forma, pois não apenas a alma intelectiva não pensa sem imagens, mas também ela é o lugar das formas. E esse processo, descrito por Averróis, diante do qual o olho pode até mesmo figurar como um espelho que reflete os fantasmas (agora, como as imagens formalizadas da matéria denudada), permitirá, numa ampliação de escala, ao processo cognoscitivo aparecer como uma especulação. Diante dos processos desiderativos e da relação amorosa, a psicologia desenvolvida no pensamento medieval terminou por traduzir "o amor como um processo essencialmente fantasmático, que implica imaginação e memória em um continuo ímpeto ao redor de uma imagem pintada ou refletida no íntimo do homem"69. O enamoramento e a até mesmo a idolatria pela imagem do objeto de amor, no seu desenrolar entre o sagrado e o profano de uma "dona" ou "amiga" das canções e poesias dos trovadores e de outros desenvolvimentos poéticos da época, não surgem da imaginação fantasiosa dos poetas, que os teriam concebido ex nihilo com seu gênio, mas, sim, "referem-se diretamente às doutrinas fisiológicas de seu tempo, (...) [e] com frequência essa referência é complicada por uma intenção alegórica que se exercita de modo privilegiado sobre a anatomia e a fisiologia do corpo humano"70, como o olho, por exemplo, e a visão. Ora, não apenas se desmistifica, por conseguinte, a moderna projeção romântica sobre o gênio dos artistas, como, mais importante, confere-se espessura histórica aos processos produtivos da palavra humana. E esse é um dos ensinamentos que Agamben encontra, também no período de estudos do qual Estâncias se constitui com um fruto, pela figura de Aby Warburg. Tem-se, assim, uma forma de perceber como o fantasma é legado à poesia medieval, como uma forma pela qual se permite dar substância à matéria poética – o que, na perspectiva psicológica em jogo, ao contrário, significa uma 68 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 92. 69 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 96. Essa herança encontra-se de tal forma arraigada em nossa cultura que não é preciso investigar as mais "elevadas" obras para encontrar seus influxos. Pelo contrário, é observando no mais cotidiano e próximo a nós e de nosso tempo que encontramos a cadeia dessa transmissão: quantas não são, pois, as canções de amor que evocam o reflexo deixado pelo objeto de amor em nossos olhos ou a imagem em nossas mentes? A proximidade entre amor e visão, que já era vislumbrada no mundo antigo, adquire, com a especulação medieval e, depois, com a poesia dos trovadores, o trato específico de uma imagem mental, a qual pode, na fixação pelo objeto, até mesmo (ou principalmente) perturbar o intelecto e turvar os sentidos. 70 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 91. 47 passagem do objeto de amor, visto, num primeiro momento, como algo real e corpóreo, ao seu estado próprio, isto é, seu estado de forma, de matéria denudada: A descoberta medieval do amor, sobre a qual, não sempre propositadamente, tanto se discutiu, é a descoberta do seu caráter fantasmático. E é nessa descoberta, que impulsiona até as extremas consequências aquela conexão de desejo e fantasma que a antiguidade havia apenas pressentido no Filebo platônico, que consiste a novidade da concepção medieval do eros, e não certamente em uma pretensa ausência de espiritualidade erótica do mundo clássico.71 O fantasma do objeto de amor, do qual se nos faz, uma imagem fantasmática (expressão que resguarda, agora, uma sombra de tautologia, ao mesmo tempo em que nos remete à saga do desejo, o qual tende a nos distanciar do psicologismo ao qual se poderia ingressar por uma teoria do conhecimento), figura, pelas mãos dessa elaboração do medievo na qual circulam feitos dos filósofos e dos poetas, como o próprio objeto de amor, sendo desígnio da negatividade que funda o poetar, anunciado como gozo da representação, pois é pela palavra que se pode aferrar a imagem do objeto de amor, é com a negatividade – em última instância, a falta do objeto que a palavra se põe a serviço da representação e do desejo (e do gozo). Se "o lugar do amor para a sensibilidade medieval é uma fonte ou um espelho"72, Eros ao espelho73, portanto, é a imagem de Narciso: ele deixa de ser aquele que dá nome ao retraimento e fechamento sobre si, o narcisismo em sentido corrente, para, voltando a ser aquele que se apaixona pela própria imagem refletida, fazer-se alegoria do amor, bem como um Pigmalião reencontrado da mitologia clássica. Alegoria marcada de um caráter fantasmático indelével ao qual o poeta, de aí em diante, estará devotado a plasmar, fazendo palavra do processo imaginativo que filtra os fantasmas das suas vinculações perceptivas. Se nos recolhermos, agora, à poesia de Guilherme IX de Aquitânia, trovador dos mais célebres, e cujos escassos poemas que restaram e foram transmitidos (onze, apenas) surpreendem pela ímpar e coerente versatilidade: da apercepção brutal da negatividade fundante da linguagem, cantada em Farei versos de puro nada, à eroticidade efusiva da partida de dados de Quero que saibam com rigor, com a amiga 74 jogado no 71 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 96. 72 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 97. 73 Esse é o título do terceiro capítulo, da Terceira Parte de Estâncias, intitulada A palavra e o fantasma, e aqui tem estado sob nossa análise. 74 A figura da amiga que aparece nos poemas de Guilherme IX de Aquitânia soa tão intrigante quanto a da dona, mais típica da captação do amor cortês pelo discurso, erótico ou não, que nos foi legado sobre os trovadores. Da diferença entre essas duas figuras, pode-se estabelecer uma diferença entre o jogo do prazer, do efêmero cotidiano que configura a existência, em seu aspecto de alegria, e o jogo do desejo, conformado 48 seu tablado, ou ainda, daquele que, ao lado dos versos sobre o nada, ao qual voltaremos alhures, é uma das mais artificiosas das suas composições, Farei um poema, tenho sono. Se os dois últimos, em termos de seu plano de conteúdo, dão ideia da prática amorosa e seus conluios táticos ou estratégicos, é Cheio de gozo estou a amar o lugar no qual se pode encontrar o enredamento entre a palavra e o fantasma em sua forma pensante – uma estância, propriamente, arriscamos dizer: Cheio de gozo estou a amar o gozo e não quero sair. E já que ao gozo torno a ir, podendo, o melhor vou buscar; e é o melhor, sem hesitar, que se pode olhar ou ouvir. Sabei: não me quero gabar, nem grandes louvores nutrir. Mas se o gozo pode florir, fruta melhor este vai dar, e entre outros há-de brilhar como o dia sombrio a abrir. Corpo igual não se pode idear nem no querer, nem no sentir, nem no pensar, nem no urdir. Nem gozo tal se pode achar. E quem o queira celebrar nem num ano vai conseguir. O gozo tem de inclinar e o poder há-de servir a minha dona, o seu sorrir, o seu belo e ardente olhar. Mais de cem anos vai durar quem do seu gozo usufruir. Seu gozo pode o mal curar, sua ira o são submergir, o homem sábio confundir, o homem belo afear, o mais cortês vilão tornar, e o vilão fazer luzir. Pois mais gentil não há para amar, Olhos verem, boca aplaudir. Para mim, só, a quero atrair, ao meu coração dar novo ar, a minha carne renovar e nunca, nunca empedernir. Se seu amor me quer doar eu pronto estou a servir, para a louvar e encobrir, segundo um poder legiferante que provém do outro e que nele deixa, perfazer a possibilidade de prazer, ou não, e por isso faz sofrer. Por isso, então, podemos apresentar joi como "alegria-gozo", pois como que se indeterminam, aí, a alegria e o gozo, remetidos que são ao eros, ao amor – afinal, há joi d'amor subjacente. 49 seu prazer dizer e alçar, o seu alto preço prezar, e o seu louvor difundir. Nada por outrem vou mandar, tal pavor tenho de a ferir, nem, para ela me não punir, ouso o meu amor declarar. Ela o melhor irá achar para o meu gozo garantir.75 Pareceria, à primeira vista, que "Cheio de gozo estou a amar" é a abertura do poema, pela qual o poeta, ditando sobre o seu amor, exulta-lhe o gozo. Mas essa leitura detém-se na porta, pois a fórmula que enceta a trova está incompleta, não se encerrando em amar, mas, primeiramente, em gozo, e, como segunda saída, ou melhor, fechamento, em sair. "Cheio de gozo estou a amar o gozo" – ora, que inversão se tem agora! O gozo decorre não do amor, mas do amar o gozo. O processo de condução fantasmático, então, ilustra-se aqui com um círculo. "Amar un joi", fonte da própria alegria-gozo. Mas fonte perigosa – e a fonte espelhada de Narciso revigora o seu encanto –, pois não mais se quer sair desse círculo mágico, que, já no terceiro verso, converte-se em espiral, pois a ele, ao gozo, vai-se, e, adiante, ele próprio evolui, florindo, frutificando e nutrindo aquele que nele se move76: 75 GUILHERME IX DE AQUITÂNIA. Poesia, p. 81; 83; 85. Levando em conta um ensinamento que não pode ser desprezado, a saber, de que a poesia se constitui no choque entre o som e o sentido (o que, para mencionar apenas um nome, encontra ecos de Roman Jakobson), reproduzimos o original provençal antigo conforme a edição de Arnaldo Saraiva, destacando a coluna sonora da qual também se compõe a poesia – "Mout jauzens ne prenc em amar / um joi don plus mi vuelh aizir: / e pus em joi vuelh revertir, / bem dei, si puesc, al mielhs anar, / quar mielhs onra n, estiers cujar, / qu'om puesca vezer ni auzir. / Ieu, so sabetz, no m dei gabar / ni de grans laus no m sai formir, / mas si anc nulhs jois poc florir, / aquest deu sobre totz granar / e part los autres esmerar, / si cum sol brus jorns esclarzir. / Anc mais no poc hom faissonar / cors, em volver ni em dezir / ni em pensar ni em cossir; / aitals jois no pot par trobar / e qui be l volria lauzar / d'um na noit i poiri' avenir. / Totz joi li deu humiliar, / e tota ricors obezir / midons, per son bel aculhir / e per son bel plazent esguar; / e deu hom mais cent tans durar, / qui l joi de s'amor pot sazir. / Per son joi pot malautz sanar /, e per sa ira sas morir / e savis hom enfolezir / e belhs hom as beutat mudar, / e l plus cortes vilanejar / e l totz vilas encortezir. / Pus hom gensor no n pot trobar / ni huelhs vezer ni boca dir, / a mos ops la vuelh retenir, / per lo cor dedins refrescar / e per la carn renovelar, / que no puesca envellezir. / Si m vol midons s'amor donar, / pres sui del penr' e del grazir / e del celar e del blandir / e de sos plazers dir e far / e de son pretz tener en car / e de son laus enavantir. / Ren per autrui non l'aus mandar, / tal paor ai qu'ades s'azir, / ni ieu mezeis, tan tem falhir, / no l'aus m'amor fort assemblar; / mas elha m deu mo mielhs triar, / pus sap qu'ab lieis ai a guerir" (GUILHERME IX DE AQUITÂNIA. Poesia, p. 80; 82; 84). 76 Nos Comentários que Segismundo Spina presta ao poema, após apresentar a sua tradução (recolhida em A lírica trovadoresca e a primeira, em português, registrada por Arnaldo Saraiva), que muito acaba por escamotear da significação e versificação originais, "Muito contente me sinto em amar, e procuro mergulhar mais profundamente nesta alegria" (SPINA, Segismundo. A lírica trovadoresca p. 105), após começar com uma descrição corriqueira dos versos – "Oito estrofes que alongam monotonamente o mesmo tema: o elogio impossível da mulher, a descrição dos seus feitiços, dos poderes que se ocultam nos profundos de sua alma, das virtudes sortílegas na transformação dos seres e na terapêutica das almas" (SPINA, Segismundo. A lírica trovadoresca p. 107) –, deixa escapar, contudo, uma observação que acaba por tocar nos pontos que então levantamos: "é esse jogo da fantasia, que tem raízes mais profundas no intelecto que na sensibilidade, 50 Na prática poética, entendida como significação do inspirar de amor, Narciso consegue de fato apropriar-se da própria imagem e saciar o seu fol amour em um círculo em que o fantasma gera o desejo, o desejo traduz-se em palavra e a palavra delimita um espaço em que se torna possível a apropriação daquilo que não poderia de outro modo ser nem apropriado, nem gozado".77 Recurso característico da filosofia de Giorgio Agamben, a etimologia, aqui, orientando-nos sobre possíveis derivações de sentido da palavra joi, substantivo fio condutor do poema, mostra a conexão que ela estabelece como um jogo entre o poetado e a palavra poética: "A palavra provençal joi, que reassume em si a plenitude da experiência erótico-poética dos trovadores, está também etimologicamente conectada a uma prática linguística, enquanto deriva, presumivelmente, de Jocus, oposto, como 'jogo de palavras', a Ludus, 'jogo corpóreo'"78, efetivo "juec d'amor", como nos diz o trovador na canzo sobre o "lance de dados"79. Há o gozo do jogo, no qual se experimenta o círculo fantástico da estância, mas também, como sua condição, há o jogo do gozo, cujo corpo se confunde com o corpo da dona e da amiga dos outros poemas. A figuração trovadoresca da imagem, aparece, de início, velada, mas o seu encobrimento aparente é o vir à tona capital daquilo que a figura mesma permite acessar: o desejo e o gozo, que, vindo como tais pela palavra, conseguem, por alguns segundos, aceder como puro fantasma que revela a fantasia em operação, mas por pouco tempo, pois logo surge a imagem da dona, e, quando ela, sorrindo, espreita com seu resplandecente olhar, o próprio gozo tem de se humilhar e obedecer. Corpo ideal ou imagem fantástica, podemos dizer na chave agambeniana, o que permite nos distanciarmos de possíveis derivações platônicas, as quais aqui não estão em caso, uma vez que nos encontramos diante de uma linhagem da poesia trovadoresca com pendores realistas, dentre cujos representantes está o próprio Guilherme IX de Aquitânia. Nesse sentido, no jogo aqui revelado, o amor cortês é denodado pelo gozo da dona imaginária, e nenhuma força da alma pode nos deixar apresentá-lo, nem o querer, nem o sentir, nem o pensar, a não ser a fantasia. É por ela que se pode produzir imagens, que se pode aferrar aquilo que tem de se despir da matéria para se poder trovar, ou gozar o que, aqui, tem de dar no mesmo. o centro criador das imagens e metáforas que pululam na poesia provençal" (SPINA, Segismundo. A lírica trovadoresca p. 107. Grifo nosso). 77 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 153. 78 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 152. 79 CAMPOS, Augusto de. Verso, reverso, controverso, p. 21. Assim é como o poeta-tradutor intitula, com vasta compreensão do alcance do poetar de Guilherme IX, e com intervenção de Mallarmé, o poema Quero que saibam com rigor ("Ben vuelh que sapchon li pluzor"). 51 É assim que o sentido histórico-social do trovadorismo pode ser indicado pela figura do fin'amor, pois a complexidade dessa figura, e a sua amplitude históricogeográfica, no mais, estabelecem uma relação cujo campo de forças não se resume na santificação da dona. Com o recurso ao senhal, figura pela qual se pode cifrar a identidade de quem é traçada a imagem, revela que o objeto desta relação é uma mulher casada, que provoca no amente um sentimento que ele traduz fazendo-lhe a corte e expondo-lhe um pedido através de uma mensagem expressa pelos poemas ou canções dos trovadores. Esta relação decalca-se do modelo feudo-vassálico: a mulher amada é a dama (mi dona significa 'monsenhor' em occitano), e o apaixonado, bem como o seu mensageiro trovador, o seu vassalo. O objetivo do fin'amor é a satisfação afetiva e carnal que os trovadores chamam de joi. Já se definiu o fin'amor como 'um erotismo do controle do desejo'.80 Os sentidos e o poetar conjugam-se na captação da visão da dona, ou melhor, a percepção, capitaneada pelo prazer, pela dor e pelo gozo, é entronizada pelo poetar a imagem, pela boca que, literalmente, diz a amada, e não, apenas, diz da amada. A dona é a captação fantasmática – imagética, diríamos hoje – como objeto de amor, e é à imagem que o ideal, nesses versos, diz respeito. A vassalagem amorosa, conformadora de um dos tropos da trova, enquanto integrada numa forma de sociedade feudal, encerra mais questões do que a "cortesia" do amor cortês deixa perceber – na verdade, antes uma "poesia cortês do amor descortês"81. Ingresso na espiral de joi, o sujeito poemado passa a integrar uma dialética com a dona, e, se aqui, ele é servil, noutro poema, revidando, da sua parte, o quinhão que lhe cabe de gozo, dirige à dona ideal invectivas até mesmo jocosas ("Que vos vale, dona ideal, / se vosso amor me não vale? / Quereis ser monja, afinal?"82), mas que não passam, ao fim, do desespero que enlouquece, aos poucos, o amante que teme o punhal da dor proveniente da desmesura do amor medido como do tamanho do mundo – "Totz lo jois del mon es nostre"83: "Todo o gozo do mundo é nosso". A figura da "insatisfação erótica", largamente propagada e que encontra ecos eruditos – "desde que os trovadores provençais do século XII deram voz à melodia do desejo não correspondido, as violas entoaram cada vez mais alto as cantigas de amor, até que apenas Dante conseguisse tocar o instrumento da forma mais perfeita"84 –, não deve 80 LE GOFF, Jacques. Heróis e maravilhas da Idade Média, p. 281-282. Grifo nosso. 81 CAMPOS, Augusto de. Verso, reverso, controverso, p. 13. 82 GUILHERME IX DE AQUITÂNIA. Poesia, p. 77. "Qual pro i auretz, dompna conja, / si vostr'amors mi deslonja?/ Par que us vulhatz metre monja!" (GUILHERME IX DE AQUITÂNIA. Poesia, p. 76). 83 GUILHERME IX DE AQUITÂNIA. Poesia, p. 78. 84 HUIZINGA, Johan. O outono da Idade Média, p. 177 52 nos deixar perder de vista a dimensão visada, contudo, se não na própria composição medieval, ao menos através dela: não é a satisfação real, isto é, configurada no plano objetal, que está no cerne, por mais que não deixe, contudo, de estar presente. Trata-se, na verdade, de uma satisfação que se dá ou não no plano da própria palavra, e é assim que o conceito de estância mostra a sua extensão, ou melhor, a palavra poética configura a própria estância como lugar capaz de permite uma sutura – sobre e pela negatividade – entre os termos que se apresentavam disjuntivos. Nesse sentido, "a inclusão do fantasma e do desejo na linguagem é a condição essencial para que a poesia possa ser concebida como joi d'amor"85. A insatisfação do amor e a frustração do gozo, mais do que um tropo regular, mostra-se um construto poético profundo, balizado em construtos intelectuais do medievo estabelecidos em glosa a categorias da filosofia helênica clássica: aponta-se para um momento em que a palavra poética e a palavra pensante encontram-se numa possibilidade de uso articulado da palavra ao pensamento, cuja potência, contudo, é moldada ao modo do imaginário – a tentativa de, mais que imaginar o gozo, alcançá-lo pela imaginação. A fantasia e os seus fantasmas, portanto, configuram um imaginário concreto, por um poetar realizado linguisticamente, e também como um modo de articulação do imaginário. A presença do fantasma presentifica uma ausência, uma falta, uma negatividade – permite-se acessar, pela imagem-objeto de amor, o gozo, que, em princípio inacessível, como o desejo, fazia o sujeito submergir na dor e descontentamento, emerge da negatividade inicial da falta, abraçado à flutuação de um reflexo no espelho d'água. Fazendo-se o negativo de uma presença, à sombra das luzes reveladoras que a constituem, apropria-se, assim, uma negatividade. Com essa produção do fantasma, tem-se um modo de conceber a fratura, como algo fundante, e do qual podem abundar articulações. Essa é a importância capital do estudo do fantasma e das relações que a filosofia mantém com a fantasia – entendida precisamente na sua medida técnico-conceitual e poética –, expondo, sob a forma de articulações, mais ou menos felizes, um profundo rasgo que se constitui, não sem historicidade, como matriz metafísica do ocidente – e o que se busca pensar, na esteira das trilhas de Agamben, é o caráter amplamente produtivo dessas cisões. É nesse sentido, pois, que as palavras de um poeta de nossos tempos novamente nos ressoam, encadeando a dança de paços marcados entre conhecimento e representação como o estágio de nossa relação (poética) com a palavra: 85 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 152. 53 O poeta visa a representação do mundo, mas resta-lhe um amargo sentimento de inadequação da linguagem. (...) se alguém deseja ardentemente possuir um objeto, não se pode dar a isso outro nome senão o de amor. O poeta aqui figura, portanto, como um homem apaixonado pelo mundo, porém condenando a uma eterna insaciedade, porque com a ajuda das palavras ele gostaria de penetrar o cerne mesmo do real, ele tem de novo a esperança de fazê-lo, e isto lhe é sempre recusado. Filosoficamente, a questão tem seu análogo mais próximo no discurso sobre o amor no Banquete de Platão.86 Ora, ao falar do poeta dissimulando seu próprio lugar, nota-se o que, nas diferenças de constituição, aproxima Miłosz do evento do qual Guilherme IX de Aquitânia representa um dos momentos mais instigantes. Sim, pois no poeta polonês, de fato há uma abertura à espiral do gozo, que puxa o sujeito para trás justamente quando ele se coloca diante do objeto – ou melhor, quando ele coloca o objeto diante de si –, e, no outro, mesmo que se fale que "o gozo tem de se inclinar" diante do objeto de amor, no fundo, o que prevalece é o agigantamento dilacerante do mundo dos amantes encadeado por joi. O duelo entre gozo e desejo produz, na fidelidade ao desejo, o demover do mero gozo objetivo (fisiológico, pode-se dizer), ao passo que, pelo contrário, a queda no gozo corresponde à dilaceração da configuração do objeto de amor como objeto de desejo. Mais ainda, pois se cede o próprio gozo ao gozo da sua dona. O próprio gozo está lançado à condição de usufruir do gozo da amiga, da dona intangível que apenas uma palavra pode abalar, tanto a palavra torta encadeada por algum emissário, impudente ou sem ardil, quanto a própria declaração – os versos, aqui, aparecem de fato como performances de palavra. Soberano, o desejo, é que se nos projeta – e ele, desejo do outro, é que "o melhor irá achar / para o meu gozo garantir". A categoria do fantasma apresenta, pela apropriação de uma negatividade, a imagem à palavra. A imagem da qual a palavra se apropria, ou, ainda, a imagem que a palavra faz para si e sobre si, diz respeito à relação da palavra com uma falta, a falta do objeto, à cisão que, ao menos desde o Crátilo, coloca em suspeita a relação da palavra com a realidade, o ente e o ser. Seja como representação, seja como imagem, trata-se, no fundo, de uma relação da linguagem consigo mesma, de uma relação da linguagem com a sua falta suprema: a coextensividade da palavra e do mundo como coisa-objeto a todas as camadas que, desde a percepção, recobrem o mundo de sentido. 1.5. A travessia do fantasma à voz ("uma barreira resistente à significação") 86 MIŁOSZ, Czesław. O testemunho da poesia, p.108-109. 54 Com o retorno significativo e substancial a Aristóteles, dá-se o rastrear teórico por meio do qual Agamben situa as formulações da poesia de amor dos poetas-trovadores na história do pensamento, vinculando-as a uma longa tentativa de mapear as percepções humanas nas agruras da "alma", afinal, "já Aristóteles referia o caráter semântico da linguagem humana à fantasia, cujas imagens, segundo uma metáfora já presente em Platão, são concebidas como 'um escrever na alma''87. Ora, agora passamos ao momento de delimitar de que maneira incide a recepção do fantasma na teorização da linguagem, na medida em que ele é colocado não apenas como faculdade integrativa da compreensão da psikhḗ na teoria aristotélica, mas também como espécie de "sombra" que sempre acompanha a significação, auxiliando a compor, se bem que com estatuto intermediário e complexo, a voz (humana) como "som significante". Em outros termos, importa como a integração do fantasma, na voz como som significante, repercute no posterior entendimento agambeniano a respeito "fratura da presença", quando, num terreno pertence à obra A linguagem e a morte, o problema da articulação da linguagem por meio da voz atinge a sua maturação propriamente metafísica. Nesse sentido, no primeiro estágio do desenvolvimento filosófico agambeniano, a voz como que pressupõe o fantasma, como se compreende pela leitura da passagem do De anima que configura o ingresso do fantasma, de fato, no que seria uma teoria da linguagem, entre a phōnḗ e o lógos, cujo estatuto, contudo, é estrategicamente como que indeterminado. Se, depois, o problema da voz passa ao centro, é por essa categoria consolidar-se como manifestação da negatividade. Aqui, contudo, o fantasma ainda é o operador conceitual que nos permite captar a negatividade e ingressar no problema da voz. Numa passagem muito significativa, Agamben estabelece textualmente o que intentamos delimitar como uma sua primeira aproximação do problema da linguagem. Ei-la: A definição da linguagem como signo não é, como se sabe, uma descoberta da semiologia moderna: antes de ser formulada pelos pensadores da Stoa, ela estava já implícita na definição aristotélica de voz humana como σημαντιkός ψόφος – 'som significante'. 'Nem todo som', lê-se no De anima, 'emitido pelo animal é voz (pode-se produzir um som com a língua ou ainda tossindo), mas é necessário que aquele que faz vibrar o ar esteja animado e tenha fantasmas; a voz é, de fato, um som significante e não apenas ar inspirado...'. O caráter 'semântico' da linguagem humana é assim explicado por Aristóteles, no âmbito da teoria psicológica que conhecemos, com a presença de uma imagem mental ou fantasma, de modo que, se quiséssemos transcrever em termos aristotélicos o algoritmo em que se costuma hoje representar a noção de signo 87 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 187. 55 (S/s, onde s é o significante e S o significado), ele se configuraria deste modo: F/s (s = som e F = fantasma).88 O que Agamben evidencia, fornecendo uma passagem temática do fantasma à voz, é que o signo está eminentemente associado ao fantasma, e esse ingresso se dá pela voz. A voz tem fantasmas, e é por seu intermédio que chegamos ao fantasma na definição do signo, e, com isso, à delimitação do próprio espaço que se deve entender como semiologia. Suplantando o cientificismo das correntes da linguística, Agamben reconstitui o conceito, ao seu cerne na linguagem – a sua pertença ao lógos, o qual se deixa acessar, saindo da natureza pelo conceito de voz. Em De anima, o contexto para a voz é dado no tratamento da audição, trabalhada no Livro II, no qual, dentre a tentativa de delimitar um enunciado geral para alma e diferenciação de suas partes, os sentidos aparecem como receptores dos objetos externos e como base para a percepção. Esquematicamente, o som aparece, aí, como objeto para a audição, isto é, como o audível. Assim como não é qualquer coisa que produz som, nem em quaisquer condições, também a voz não é sem condições. Sendo o som em atividade produzido pelo choque de um golpe contra algo capaz de gerar som (o bronze, por exemplo, e não a lã), o que indica movimento, e em um meio adequado (419b9-10), como o ar, que pode ser indicado, basicamente, como o meio de propagação, no qual o golpe pode permanecer de modo a não se dissipar até chegar ao ouvido. Constitui-se, então, a complementariedade entre fonação e audição. A voz, além do seu plano físico-sonoro de determinação, uma vez que se define pelo som, também é condicionada pela presença de outro elemento, a presença da alma: "A voz é um certo som de algo animado [empsikhou]" (420b5-6)89. É preciso que se trate de um ser dotado de alma, e, nessa medida, será um animal, embora Aristóteles admita que haja aqueles que não possuam voz, como os peixes. De todo modo, os animais capazes de produzir voz mobilizam, para tanto, e sobre a base do funcionamento do som, aquilo que hoje chamamos de aparelho fonador, isto é, um conjunto orgânico no qual se 88 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 187. "οὐ γὰρ πᾶς ζῴου ψόφος φωνή, καθάπερ εἴπομεν (ἔστι γὰρ καὶ τῇ γλώττῃ ψοφεῖν καὶ ὡς οἱ βήττοντες) ἀλλὰ δεῖ ἔμψυχόν τε εἶναι τὸ τύπτον καὶ μετὰ φαντασίας τινός· σημαντικὸς γὰρ δή τις ψόφος ἐστὶν ἡ φωνή, καὶ οὐ τοῦ ἀναπνεομένου ἀέρος ὥσπερ ἡ βήξ" (420b 29-34) (ARISTOTLE. On the soul, Parva naturalia, On breath, p. 118). Na tradução brasileira de Maria Cecília Gomes dos Reis, lê-se: "Pois não é todo som de animal que é voz, como dissemos (pois existe também o som emitido com a língua e como no tossir). Mas é preciso que aquele que provoca o golpe seja dotado de alma e, mesmo, que tenha alguma imaginação (pois a voz é um certo som significativo, e não som do ar respirado, como a tosse" (ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 93). 89 ARISTÓTELES. De anima, p. 92. ARISTOTLE. On the soul, Parva naturalia, On breath, p. 114. 56 trabalha o ar expirado – o que evidencia a corrente subterrânea que sustenta as investigações sobre a linguagem, da especulação medieval, por exemplo, à linguística. Se há de lembrar, nesse sentido, que a "voz significante" é o lógos (17a 26). Essa passagem, agora do De interpretatione, sugere-nos, em alguma medida, uma conglobação categorial: no anel exterior, a voz é som significante; no interior, o lógos é voz significante. Ora, o impacto do tratado sobre a interpretação é geralmente medido pela célebre, e complexa, simbolização que a voz realiza das "afecções na alma" (16a 34), o mesmo valendo para aquilo que se escreve, mas em relação à voz. Com o valor de comentário da semiologia medieval em relação a essa passagem, coloca-se em jogo o papel da fantasia na voz, pois se há remissão, de fato, ao De anima, caberia indagar se tal movimento orienta-se no sentido da fantasia e das percepções ou no do intelecto, pois "a expressão 'paixões que estão na alma' pareceria referir-se, segundo a definição do De anima, às imagens da fantasia"90, o que nos permite projetar os termos do tratado sobre a alma de modo acessar o tratado sobre a interpretação. Cabe trazer dessa cadeia complexa, na qual os termos trocam de lugar (signo, símbolo e sinal, significar e mostrar), a possibilidade articulatória, na qual o lógos se sutura como voz dotada alguma capacidade significante mais ou menos determinada. Pode-se perceber que o traço de significação se mantém, contudo – e dele pode-se entender que não são todos os sons, nem todas as vozes, que possuem a capacidade de fazer mover sinais ou signos (o estalar da língua em relação à voz, no exemplo do De anima, uma glossolalia, podemos sugerir, em relação ao lógos). O que resta, nesse caminho, são os próprios termos entre os quais se salta – som, voz, lógos. Além disso, eles sugerem uma diferenciação implícita, pois nem todo som é voz, nem toda voz é lógos, e aquilo que não possui esse operador fica para trás na classificação: no extremo de lá, ficará o mundo meramente físico e inanimado; no extremo de cá, o homem. E, no meio, possibilitando a coerência física do movimento, a voz. Operação antropologizante? É o que se destaca, de todo modo, na preparação do salto da voz para o lógos (presente, de modo diverso, ao menos em dois tratados aristotélicos tão diversos quanto o De interpretatione e a Política), passagem elementar para Giorgio Agamben e que tanto o fará cogitar se o homem, afinal, possui ou não voz, dando-nos sinalização não apenas de um problema de antropologia filosófica, mas de metafísica, pois está em questão nada menos que o estatuto do próprio lógos assumido como linguagem. E isso 90 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 148. 57 por ser o elemento sonoro crucial, uma vez que ele, definindo a voz, acaba, em última análise, por definir, também, desde que seja significante, a linguagem. É o peso que se confere à voz na teoria da linguagem que nos é legada o que conduz Agamben no seu retorno até Aristóteles, em cuja obra se consolidam essas operações de transferência: o lógos que se faz físico como voz que significa; a significação como traço cujo sentido é o lógos; e a voz como a física do som produzida por aqueles que têm alma, exclusivamente. Ora, com base na teoria do fantasma esboçada por Agamben e na relação estabelecida pelo texto aristotélico – que conjuga o ser dotado de alma e a capacidade de produzir fantasmas –, pode-se precisar, agora, num primeiro momento conceitual e com outros termos, a relação entre a negatividade e a linguagem. O índice para tal compreensão está estabelecido, já na leitura de Agamben, em fórmula: F/s (F = fantasma e s = som). É da interpretação dessa fórmula da função da fantasia na significação que se pode entender o papel da produção de fantasmas na voz, e como essa, então, mantém-se a meio do caminho no sentido do lógos, com uma ambiguidade cuja determinação significa nada menos do que a definição do humano. O fantasma é a imagem que se sobrepõe ao som, construindo, assim, o signo, numa fórmula de três termos, pois a barra faz parte da formulação e desempenha o papel de destaque, encoberto pelos próprios termos que ela articula. Mas qual caminho de indagação é esse? Por que, ainda, num período de auge da linguística estruturalista, remontou-se a Aristóteles, e ainda ao impacto de sua retomada no seio do medievo, para questionar o enfoque dos elementos positivos do signo, de que o significante e o significado seriam os componentes presenciais? Uma resposta parece cabível e nos direciona para o desenvolvimento agambeniano da linguagem: quer-se, com isso, resgatar a diferença específica, como se poderia formular em termos aristotélicos, ou ainda, em termos mais radicais, apontar, com efeito, para o específico lugar da diferença ontológica – a qual seria condizente à linguagem, no caso do vivente homem. Se uma teoria do fantasma responderia a isso, por que, então, a indagação permanece em pé, e ainda com mais força, após o que seria uma tentativa resposta? É o caso em que a hipótese, enquanto encaminhamento entre pergunta e resposta, estaria simplesmente equivocada? Não parece ser o caso, mas um enfoque excessivo do olhar aos elementos que compõe a indagação. O fantasma não é o elemento, mas antes um representante, um paralelo, na história do pensamento, no qual a abertura da lacuna que separa significante de significado pode ainda aparecer, deslocando, 58 portanto, a positividade do signo. O que está em jogo é o que Agamben chama de barreira, apoiando-se numa leitura bastante livre e interlinear de A instância da letra no inconsciente (1957) de Jacques Lacan, numa retomada cujo protótipo, também em Estâncias, consideramos ao analisar a sintetização da analítica do desejo. Pode-se cogitar, agora, que o modelo da fórmula F/s bem pode ter feito Agamben ingressar na obra de Saussure a partir da retomada do grafo do signo, instituída no Curso de linguística geral, feita por Lacan nesse texto. E, pelo fio condutor que temos puxado, aqui chegamos pelo fantasma, e, daqui, poderemos passar não apenas à voz, mas à fratura metafísica em relação a que ela se relaciona. O momento da análise lacaniana que submerge no texto agambeniano, aparece, de fato, da confrontação de Lacan com a linguística, o qual dela retira, reconhecendo o caráter inevitável da formulação axial, a possibilidade de um uso apropriável dos termos lançados, podendo distanciar-se após o empréstimo: Para marcar o surgimento da disciplina linguística, diremos que ela sustenta, como acontece com toda ciência no sentido moderno, no momento constitutivo de um algoritmo que a funda. Esse algoritmo é o seguinte: S s que se lê: significante sobre significado, correspondendo o 'sobre' à barra que separa as duas etapas (...). A temática dessa ciência, por conseguinte, está efetivamente presa à posição primordial do significante no significado, como ordens distintas e inicialmente separadas por uma barreira resistente à significação.91 Com o mesmo gesto em que rende homenagem, Lacan abala, de início discretamente, todo o desenvolvimento calcado sobre essa fórmula – é o olhar rigoroso, tomado de empréstimo sem maiores disposições explicativas, o que apoia a passagem, já para o plano conceitual dos problemas que movimentam a filosofia de Giorgio Agamben, do fantasma à voz, ou melhor, o ingresso do fantasma na voz. Tem-se, por conseguinte, dupla via de condução do pensamento: tanto pela fórmula relida está disponível o acesso ao problema da moderna fórmula do signo, que se pode conectar às formulações de séculos da filosofia da linguagem pela presença do operador voz, quanto pela disposição à negatividade, ou melhor, disposição na negatividade: antes, absorvida pelo fantasma, agora, sintetizada na barreira que separa o significante do significado, e ambas enquanto voz articulada. Ora, "a posição primordial do significante" e a "barreira resistente à significação" encaminham, no escrito lacaniano, a função da letra, até mesmo como 91 LACAN, Jacques. Escritos, p. 500 [497]. Grifo nosso. 59 possibilidade de demover o significante, mas de tal modo que é ele, enfim, que acaba se destacando, e isso até o ponto em que a letra, de fato, "parece ser apenas outro nome do significante, o nome deste quando se separa da significação, besta como tudo"92. Agamben, por sua vez, pegando um atalho por Lacan, conduz-se para outro lugar, pois o seu arsenal se orienta, precisamente, para a "barreira resistente à significação" – o que, nos seus termos, significa a transposição da simples barra, mecanismo articulatório aparente, para a barreira, que mantém a cisão na medida mesma em que conecta. Tanto é assim que, ao contrário de Lacan, que cria a fórmula segundo a sua intenção de desmascaramento da pujança do significante, reintegra a posição do significado sobre o significante, que permanece na fórmula da voz feita ao paralelo daquela do signo. O fundamental, aí, em termos filosóficos, é a pergunta pelo lugar do negativo existente no signo, pela negatividade que acompanha a linguagem. É assim que Agamben se permite "integrar" o pensamento linguístico ao pensamento filosófico. E o lugar que encontra para perscrutar é, à primeira vista, surpreendente: a própria posição e composição intelectual de Ferdinand de Saussure, que, colocado nas fímbrias e nos limites do pensamento da linguagem, permite delinear a discussão como propriamente filosófica93, além de assegurar a coerência do campo de escavações conceitual agambeniano. Se a semiologia moderna parte do signo como o resultado por excelência da articulação linguística, é antes por ter havido quem pensasse a dificuldade da agregação de elementos sob a figura do signo – além da ressalva, é claro, de que "referir os fatos de linguagem ao signo é um lugar-comum da tradição filosófica", como relembra o próprio Agamben, "minimamente desde os estoicos"94. Estamos diante de uma tensão, e é a partir dela que Agamben se orienta, entre o enfoque no resultado, o que fundamentaria a linguística ou a própria semiologia como ciência positiva, ou no processo, isto é, no estabelecimento histórico do signo, no decorrer de uma profunda indagação cujas respostas remontam às origens da filosofia ocidental. Mas o que representa essa tomada 92 MILLER, Jacques-Alain. O escrito na fala. p. 10. 93 Daqui tem-se uma interessante via de acesso às grandes questões de fundamentação da linguística como ciência, cuja pavimentação sem dúvida não seria a mesma sem o desbravamento e pioneirismo do "pai da linguística". Porém, enquanto se insiste na fundamentação científica da linguística, na recepção de Saussure como positivista, ao nosso ver, reduz-se significativamente a abrangência e desbravamento teórico da teoria de Saussure. Se ele é, basicamente, uma personagem, pois sabemos, hoje, de toda a dificuldade filológica que a sua obra carrega, a sua teoria é menos um corpo estabelecido do que um canteiro de escavações. Quando nos despimos do preconceito positivista em relação a Saussure, podemos compreender não apenas sua complexidade, mas também a relevância de uma proposta filosófica arqueológica como tem sido aquela de Giorgio Agamben. 94 MILNER, Jean-Claude. O amor da língua, p. 56. 60 da linguagem pelo signo? Qual lugar de discussões é esse que o signo vem ocupar? Se, com isso, Agamben não faz uma genealogia da semiótica, é por menos lhe interessar o lugar que ela ocupa na história do Ocidente do que o lugar que uma reflexão propriamente filosófica ocupa no interior da linguística. Situando a discussão no limiar, Agamben parte de Ferdinand de Saussure, que não só "representa, de fato, o caso extremamente precioso de um filólogo que, preso na rede da linguagem, sente, como Nietzsche, a insuficiência da filologia e deve tornar-se filósofo ou sucumbir", mas que, tendo permanecido fiel aos estudos filológico-linguísticos, e talvez justamente por essa insistência, "viveu a fundo a experiência exemplar da impossibilidade de uma ciência da linguagem no interior da tradição metafísica ocidental"95: A noção de signo que está na base da semiologia moderna se funda sobre uma redução metafísica do significar de que 'a ciência que estuda a vida dos signos no âmbito da vida social' ainda está longe de ter tomado consciência. Essa redução, cujas raízes afundam na história da filosofia ocidental, tornou-se possível pelas condições particulares em que veio à luz o texto ao redor do qual se consolidou o projeto semiológico moderno.96 Ao restituir a discussão sobre o signo às raízes do pensamento ocidental – num remontar que, se retrocede ao próprio Aristóteles, não deixa de nele encontrar uma bifurcação na qual parece ter se perdido algo do acontecimento originário –, Agamben questiona a fratura fundamental da linguagem, que se constitui, enquanto "morada do ser", como o lugar do humano. A busca, portanto, relacionando o projeto agambeniano às categorias linguísticas, é pelo lugar da diferença enquanto tal, pelo lugar em que a negatividade se apresenta, vista pelo tênue despontar do signo como algo que existe, na sua tensão com a positividade, ou ainda, em termos de longo alcance, pela arkhḗ da própria linguagem. Veremos, assim, com um peso às vezes sufocante, o quanto a Martin Heidegger (a quem se dirige a dedicatória de Estâncias) deve a teoria de Agamben, e do qual o seu pensamento, pôde, talvez, alcançar o distanciamento e o abandono, tendo-se servido, também, do pensamento de outros teóricos como "antídoto"97 – cabendo ressaltar nomes como Walter Benjamin e Michel Foucault, Émile Benveniste e Aristóteles. O caráter semântico da linguagem está indissoluvelmente associado à presença de uma negatividade, que encontrou no fantasma da imagem de amor dos poetas 95 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 182. "Saussure não abandonara, como Nietzsche, os estudos linguísticos; mas, fechando-se por trinta anos num silêncio que parece para muitos inexplicável, interrompido apelas pela publicação nos mélanges de breves notas técnicas, aquele que tinha sido l'enfant prodige que aos vinte e um anos tinha renovado os estudos de linguística indo-europeia com o genial Mémoire sur le sistème primitif des voyelles" (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 182). 96 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 181. Grifo nosso. 97 Cf. COSTA, Flávia. Entrevista com Giorgio Agamben, p. 132. 61 trovadores um momento exemplar de tentativa de superação e podemos entender o profundo rastro metafísico daquela formulação quando até mesmo Saussure, nas lucubrações que deram um novo começo para a teoria da linguagem, com sua semiologia geral, coloca-nos precisamente o significante como "imagem acústica" ao lado do "conceito", o significado, – o significante latino arbor para o conceito árvore"98. O "som significante" que é a voz, transmitida ao ocidente moderno pela especulação medieval sobre a linguagem, encontra-se, assim, com o signo, esse elemento fundante da moderna semiologia. E, sem o enfrentamento da função do signo, assim como fizemos com o fantasma, não possuímos os elementos conceituais mínimos para ingressar, com rigor, no projeto aberto que é filosofia de Giorgio Agamben, bem como perderíamos, ao não fazêlo, a especificidade conceitual que diferencia as estratégias que permitem, de fato, encarálo a partir de um ângulo filosófico e das temáticas às quais ele pode contribuir em seu avanço prospectivo. 1.6. A irrupção do negativo: Saussure, um linguista nos limites da linguagem O interesse contemporâneo pela obra de Ferdinand de Saussure não se encerra no papel de artífice da fundação epistemológica da linguística, da sua promoção como ciência. Seu nome traz, antes de tudo, dificuldades incontornáveis para o estudo: sua obra mais conhecida, o Curso de linguística geral (CLG), sequer pode ser dita, a rigor, pelo modo como veio a público, sua: publicada postumamente em 191699 (Saussure falecera em 1913), e organizada por Charles Bally e Albert Sechehaye, com colaboração de Albert Riedlinger, baseou-se nas anotações de alunos que acompanharam cursos seus, em "ciclos" (1907; 1908-1909; 1910-1911), na Universidade de Genebra. Se os problemas filológicos e autorais que daí surgem já são enormes, acompanha-os, porém, algo ainda mais inquietante, uma vez que "representam o momento culminante de uma crise intelectual, cuja experiência como impasse constitui, talvez, o aspecto mais essencial do pensamento de Saussure"100. O que, ainda mais significativamente, coloca a própria publicação do Curso como exemplo da transformação de uma "experiência de uma aporia radical", experimentada pelo debater- 98 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 80. 99 Agamben equivoca-se, então, ao apontar o ano de publicação como sendo 1915 (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 182). 100 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 182. 62 se de Saussure com os fundamentos e os limites da investigação linguística, em "uma série de resultados positivos", ilustrando, não sem ironia, o percurso de positivação do signo – o qual se postulava, para Saussure, conforme se verifica em suas anotações, em termos diferenciais e negativos101. Assim, é mediante uma afirmação que pode parecer paradoxal, a partir da publicação da edição crítica de Rudolf Engler em 1967 e das Notas inéditas de Ferdinand de Saussure por Robert Godel em 1954, que Agamben situa as indagações de Saussure sob o sinal de certa negatividade, "nos próximos anos, na medida em que se reflita autenticamente o pensamento de Saussure, o Curso não poderá mais ser considerado como a fundação da semiologia, mas, eventualmente, como o seu questionamento radical: esse não contém, a saber, o seu exórdio, mas, em certo sentido, o seu desenlace"102. Se, ao lado disso, recordarmos, com Émile Benveniste, que "Saussure é em primeiro lugar e sempre foi homem dos fundamentos"103, com isso significando que se trata de entender que os elementos de uma teoria são estabelecidos em função da definição que lhes damos104, podemos situar a sua posição singular como a de um linguista que, quanto mais aprofundava o seu estudo dos "fatos de língua", buscando um terreno sólido para as investigações, mais perdia a possível segurança de um fundamento, pois já não via mais a língua, mas a linguagem 105. Apenas se inicia, com isso, uma problemática via marcada pela indagação dos fundamentos, em franco confronto com a própria estruturação da linguística como ciência: a língua, o objeto da linguística segundo o CLG, ao contrário da linguagem, "não é apanhada na bifurcação de uma inexistência que vira existência, não possibilita relatos [récits] de origem"106, e, se o problema do fundamento é um problema de origem, como pensador dos fundamentos e pensador da língua, Saussure só poderia, mesmo, estar diante de um entroncamento de veredas cujo encaminhamento na direção de uma significaria o abandono da outra. O impasse vivido por Saussure configura-se, assim, como inerente à tentativa de delimitação da ciência da linguagem. Se esse modo de compreender, ao integrar o linguista ao seu tempo, conjugando a sua insatisfação e desapreço pela situação das investigações de sua época a sua sensibilidade, não retira a sua grandeza, é por situar esse 101 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 184. 102 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 182-183. 103 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 35 (Saussure após meio século). 104 BENVENISTE, Émile. Idem, p. 37. (Saussure após meio século) 105 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 37 (Saussure após meio século). 106 MILNER, Jean-Claude. O amor da língua, p. 36. 63 mal-estar como um momento em que a negatividade, encoberta pela articulação linguística, aflora súbita e profundamente na história do pensamento. O grande impasse, portanto, ilustrado pelos dilemas de Saussure, era sobretudo um drama do pensamento. Saussure afastava-se da sua época na mesma medida em que se tornava pouco a pouco senhor da sua própria verdade, pois essa verdade o fazia rejeitar tudo o que então se ensinava a respeito da linguagem. Mas ao mesmo tempo em que se hesitava diante dessa revisão radical que sentia necessária, não podia resolver-se a publicar a menor nota antes de haver assegurado, em primeiro lugar, os fundamentos da teoria.107 Depois do Curso de linguística geral, porém, outra parece que foi a figura de Saussure que vigorou – e bastante diversa do perfil esboçado por Benveniste. De um Saussure concretamente torturado pelos seus problemas, que vieram a se mostrar problemas de linguagem, passamos, com a interpretação baseada no Curso, a uma autoridade paterna e mítica que teria, livre dos problemas e com soberano desenvolvimento da razão, estabelecido as bases da linguística moderna. Apenas esse movimento de constituição do Saussure autor e autoridade, valendo a pena sublinhar a redundância desses termos quando lado a lado, já ensejaria discussões. Se, porém, mencionamo-lo, sem, contudo, aprofundá-lo, é por essas sumárias linhas servirem como sintetização do que, na leitura agambeniana e seu desenvolvimento posterior, é crucial: a tensão, dual, que alimenta a interrogação e que é sufocada pela univocidade do signo elevado à unidade positiva e totalizante dos sistemas linguísticos. O lugar onde se expressa essa tensão entre positividade e negatividade, aparecendo ao leitor como prestes a explodir, capaz de explodir e levar consigo qualquer tentativa de estabelecer um território seguro, e que ao mesmo tempo oferece para o linguista tarefas precisas108, pode ser encontrado, antes de qualquer outra fonte, no próprio Curso. É no capítulo O valor linguístico que se coloca o problema da articulação que acompanha a história da teoria da linguagem em relação à língua. Justamente daí surgirá a questão do signo como totalidade positiva de elementos diferenciais, residindo aqui a querela sobre o caráter positivo ou negativo da composição do todo. A questão que pode 107 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 40 (Saussure após meio século) 108 Numa passagem inaugural, lê-se que "A tarefa da Linguística será: a) fazer a descrição e a história de todas as línguas que se puder abranger, o que quer dizer: fazer a história das famílias de línguas e reconstituir, na medida do possível, as línguas-mães de cada família", o que corresponde, pode-se dizer, à homenagem (última) que se rende à gramática comparada e a sua vertente histórico-comparativa; "b) procurar as forças que estão em jogo, de modo permanente e universal, em todas as línguas e deduzir as leis gerais às quais se possam referir todos os fenômenos peculiares da história", pelo que, saindo-se das limitações comparatistas, visa-se a um ideal de ciência; "c) delimitar-se e definir-se a si própria" (SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 13), com o que afirma, propriamente, o fazer-se ciência dos fatos de língua como linguística. 64 sintetizar esse desenvolvimento pode ser assim colocada: se a língua é um "fato de linguagem" entre outros, como se justifica, então, a sua primazia analítica? O que nos faz ir da língua para a linguagem – um permanecer na linguagem que consiste na afirmação semiológica de Saussure. Logo na Introdução do CLG, diante da busca pela definição da língua como o objeto da linguística, encontra-se a afirmação do caráter social da faculdade de linguagem, o que se faz como forma de resposta à objeção ao primado do estudo da língua dentre os outros "fatos de linguagem". Se Saussure o faz, é menos pelo caráter pleno da língua do que pela necessidade de "colocar-se primeiramente no terreno da língua e tomála como norma de todas as outras manifestações da linguagem"109. Assim operando, intentou-se, "entre tantas dualidades"110, encontrar um elemento capaz de definição autônoma e de ser considerado um "ponto de apoio satisfatório para o espírito". Não obstante a premência da língua como objeto da linguística que norteia o Curso, tal consideração, por fundamental que seja, não pode obscurecer a afirmação de um fenômeno que permite compreender relações e formas, e jamais uma substância ou dados existentes por si mesmos, cuja natureza seria captada apenas pela observação. E Saussure é muito preciso ao estabelecer o seu ponto de partida: eis a nossa profissão de fé em matéria linguística: em outros campos, pode-se falar de coisas segundo este ou aquele ponto de vista, estando certos de reencontrar um terreno seguro no próprio objeto. Em linguística, nós negamos por princípio que haja objetos dados, que haja coisas que continuem a existir quando se passe de uma ordem de ideias a outra e que possamos, por consequência, permitirmo-nos considerar as 'coisas' em ordens diversas, como se essas fossem dadas por si mesmas...111 A agudeza da formulação de Saussure, além do que possa encerrar de comovente, tem de ser percebida como a indicação radical da limitação do horizonte não apenas das investigações linguísticas precedentes (no que consiste a primeira parte do 109 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 16. 110 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 17. 111SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Notes inédites de Ferdinand de Saussure, p. 63. APUD Agamben, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 184. No Curso, encontra-se passagem muito semelhante, que reproduzimos aqui com intento comparativo – e, também, para ressaltar que uma leitura atenta, não sem certo pendor filosófico, ou ao menos especulativo, mesmo com os possíveis "vícios" da apresentação do CLG, teria evitado incompreensões e desvios em relação ao projeto de Saussure: "Outras ciências trabalham com objetos dados previamente e que se podem considerar, em seguida, de vários pontos de vista; em nosso campo, nada de semelhante ocorre. Alguém pronuncia a palavra nu: um observador superficial será tentado a ver nela um objeto linguístico concreto; um exame mais atento, porém, nos levará a encontrar no caso, uma após outra, três ou quatro coisas perfeitamente diferentes, conforme a maneira pela qual consideramos a palavra: como som, como expressão duma ideia, como correspondente ao latim nudum etc. Bem longe de dizer que o objeto precede o ponto de vista, diríamos que é o ponto de vista que cria o objeto; aliás, nada nos diz de antemão que uma dessas maneiras de considerar o fato em questão seja anterior ou superior às outras" (SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 15. Grifo nosso). 65 Curso), mas das possibilidades de investigação de sua época112. É um gesto cuja força reside na apreensão da irredutibilidade do objeto a uma substância e no embate com a ordem de representações da linguística, inscritas na ordem da ciência113, a qual, conforme a delimitação dominante, atuava como sistema de saberes que se moveria nos confins da tradicional relação entre sujeito e objeto – o que, da parte de Saussure, fiel à linguagem, segundo Agamben, mais do que à língua, conforme se depreende das considerações de Jean-Claude Milner114, significou um rechaçar tanto do organicismo quanto da posição coisificante. Se em termos da história da filosofia, porém, tal abordagem possa parecer trivial, sem dúvida não o é no que diz respeito à ciência da linguagem, a qual, mesmo diante das mais notáveis conquistas da metafísica ou da epistemologia modernas, moviase nos resíduos por elas deixados. Nesse complexo contexto é que foi desdobrado aquele que ainda seria visto como um dos mais vibrantes princípios da teoria saussuriana, a saber, o da natureza articulatória da linguagem, mais tarde formulada teoricamente como dupla articulação da linguagem por André Martinet115. É apenas com a consciência de que "o fenômeno linguístico apresenta perpetuamente duas faces que se correspondem e das quais uma não vale senão pela outra"116, que se pôde instaurar, no âmbito do Curso, a língua como elemento no qual as faculdades articulatórias melhor se exprimem. Ao fixar a natureza da relação estabelecida pela língua entre o "plano indefinido das ideias confusas" – o pensamento "como uma nebulosa onde nada está em si delimitado" – e o "plano não menos indefinido dos sons" – "substância fônica" ou "matéria plástica"117 –, que nos recorda a relação, interna ao signo, entre significado e significante, levando-a a reflexões mais profundas, chegou-se ao seguinte: não há, pois, nem materialização de pensamento, nem espiritualização de sons; trata-se, antes, do fato, de certo modo misterioso, de o "pensamento-som" implicar divisões e de a língua elaborar suas unidades constituindo-se entre duas massas amorfas. (...) Poder-se-ia chamar a língua o domínio das articulações, tomando esta palavra no sentido definido na p. 18 ["Em latim, articulus significa 'membro, parte, subdivisão numa série de coisas'; em matéria de linguagem, a articulação pode designar não só a divisão da cadeia falada em sílabas, como a subdivisão da cadeia de significações em unidades 112 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 40 (Saussure após meio século). 113 MILNER, Jean-Claude. O amor da língua, p. 42. 114 Cf. MILNER, Jean-Claude. O amor da língua, p. 49 e ss. 115 Roland Barthes já chamara a atenção para esse movimento nos seus Elementos de semiologia: "A partir de Saussure, a teoria do signo linguístico enriqueceu-se com o princípio da dupla articulação, cuja importância foi mostrada por Martinet, a ponto de torná-la o critério definicional da linguagem (...)" (BARTHES, Roland. Elementos de semiologia, p.42). 116 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 15. 117 Todas essas citações são encontradas no §1 de O valor linguístico. Saussure, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 130. 66 significativas; é neste sentido que se diz em alemão gegliederte Sprache. Apegando-se a esta segunda definição, poder-se-ia dizer que não é a linguagem que é natural ao homem, mas a faculdade de constituir uma língua, vale dizer: um sistema de signos distintos correspondentes a ideias distintas"]: cada termo linguístico é um pequeno membro, um articulus, em que uma ideia se fixa num som e em que um som se torna o signo de uma ideia.118 A partir desse seguimento do Curso, no qual mais explicitamente poderíamos compreender como as concepções aí desenvolvidas mantêm relação com as concepções filosóficas da época, bem como em que medida lhes responde aquém, à altura ou além, podemos nos deter naqueles elementos já apresentados e relacioná-los entre si. Se há faces correspondentes que compõem uma fratura sobre a qual a língua se articula – o que responderia a uma estrutura da própria linguagem humana (embora aqui, nos passos de Saussure, pareça que a dedução tenha sido feita ao contrário, isto é, da língua como mecanismo articulatório chega-se à linguagem como dupla articulação – essa é uma dúvida que deixamos viva em nossos questionamentos) –, isso não significa que os elementos da língua estejam em relação de adequação119, ao menos como poderíamos entender, em princípio, assimilando o termo corresponder ou correspondência à adequação. Ressalta-se que uma não prescinde da outra, sendo o valor aquilo que representa o caráter relativo e diferencial entre os componentes do signo linguístico, de modo que a lei na verdade última da linguagem, ao menos enquanto ousemos dizê-lo, é que não há nada que possa residir num só termo, e isso por causa do fato de que os símbolos linguísticos não têm relação com aquilo que devem designar, portanto a é incapaz de designar alguma coisa sem a ajuda de b, e igualmente 118 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 131. 119 A ideia da adequação entre significante e significado parece ser claramente afastada. Mas, ao menos na linha tensionada por Émile Benveniste, abre-se uma importante questão, condizente à relação de necessidade entre os componentes do signo: onde atua a arbitrariedade, no signo, entre significante e significado, ou entre signo e realidade? Em seu ensaio "Natureza do signo linguístico", de 1939 (BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 53-59), cuja exiguidade de páginas é extrapolada pela profundidade com a qual interpreta Saussure, Benveniste trata especificamente de afirmar "o caráter absoluto do signo linguístico", por meio do qual define que a relação entre significante e significado não pode ser arbitrária, mas sim necessária. Dizer, como se encontra no Curso, que "o laço que une o significante ao significado é arbitrário" (SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 81) é algo diferente de dizer que o "o signo linguístico é arbitrário" (SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Idem, ibidem). Saussure iguala, na visão de Benveniste, aquilo que é diferente, de modo que a extensão da arbitrariedade do signo à relação entre significante e significado corresponde à intromissão de um terceiro elemento, a referência, a realidade – o que diz respeito ao signo, e não aos seus componentes. Com isso, Benveniste considera o outro eixo da composição do curso, o valor, vendo nele uma comprovação de sua hipótese. Se o valor é elemento do signo, e este, por sua vez, nada encerra de arbitrário, a relatividade do valor não pode depender da arbitrariedade do signo. Extrai-se daí, por sua vez, o caráter relativo dos valores como indicando que são, na verdade e nada além disso, "relativos uns aos outros" ((BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 59), o que, exprimindo necessidade, seria indicado pela oposição dos valores, definidos, assim, pela própria diferença. Ao discordar da posição de Benveniste, Milner destaca que "o arbitrário visa, justamente, a livrar a linguística das verossimilhanças sensíveis" (MILNER, JeanClaude. O amor da língua, p. 59), apontando, então, nas relações dos signos com as coisas, um "dualismo absoluto" que se expressaria apenas como encontro. 67 b sem a ajuda de a; ou ambos valem apenas pela sua diferença recíproca ou nenhum dos dois vale, mesmo que por parte qualquer de dele mesmo (por exemplo, 'a raiz', etc.), por esse mesmo plexo de diferenças eternamente negativas... Maravilhamo-nos. Mas onde estaria em verdade a possibilidade do contrário? Onde estaria um só instante o ponto de irradiação positivo em toda a linguagem, desde o momento em que não há imagem vocal que responda melhor do que outra àquilo que devo dizer?120 Baseando-se nessa indagação, Agamben insiste em mantê-la operante, no que se contrapõe ao caráter pretensamente peremptório do Curso na resposta que estabelece. Em O signo considerado na sua totalidade (§4 de O valor linguístico), vemos a tentativa de se precisar a localização do signo em relação às "diferenças eternamente negativas", o que, nos termos da indagação das Notas, deveria ser transposto como pesquisa sobre "o ponto de irradiação positivo". Temos aí um salto que, se não for considerado enquanto tal, deixa escapar a importância desse movimento para o pensamento e também as suas consequências para a teoria da linguagem. Por um lado, Saussure afirma que "na língua só existem diferenças. E mais ainda: uma diferença supõe em geral termos positivos entre os quais ela se estabelece; mas na língua há apenas diferenças sem termos positivos"121. O desenvolvimento do raciocínio, porém, revela que "dizer que na língua tudo é negativo só é verdade em relação ao significante e ao significado tomados separadamente122: desde que consideremos o signo em sua totalidade, achamo-nos perante uma coisa positiva em sua ordem"123. Ora, com que autoridade surge o signo como positivo em sua ordem! Afirma-se, de fato, seu domínio absoluto, sua soberania: Um sistema linguístico é uma série de diferenças de sons combinadas com uma série de diferenças de ideias; mas essa confrontação de um certo número de signos acústicos com outras tantas divisões feitas na massa do pensamento engendra um sistema de valores; e é tal sistema que constitui o vínculo efetivo entre os elementos fônicos e psíquicos no interior de cada signo. Conquanto o significado e o significante sejam considerados, cada qual à parte, puramente diferenciais e negativos, sua combinação é um fato positivo; é mesmo a única espécie de fatos que a língua comporta, pois o próprio da instituição linguística é justamente manter o paralelismo entre essas duas ordens de diferenças.124 120 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Notes inédites de Ferdinand de Saussure, p. 63. APUD Agamben, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 183-184. 121 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 140. 122 Pouco antes Saussure já revelara que a diferença apareceria entre os componentes do signo: "Quer se considere o significado, quer o significante, a língua não comporta nem ideia nem sons preexistentes ao sistema linguístico, mas somente diferenças conceituais e diferenças fónicas resultantes deste sistema" (SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 139). 123 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 139. 124 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 139-140. Talvez seja significativo que a exemplificação seguinte se baseie na diacronia, e não mais no eixo sincrônico: "Certos fatos diacrônicos são bastante característicos nesse aspecto: são inúmeros os casos em que a alteração do significante provoca a alteração da ideia e nos quais se vê que, em princípio, a soma das ideias distinguidas corresponde à soma 68 O signo nasce na teoria semiológica dotado, portanto, de um estatuto surpreendentemente complexo: a sua composição é marcada pela diferença negativa entre os seus elementos – é relacional, portanto, e negativa. Ao lado disso, ainda, no que seria uma das mais efetivas tentativas de expulsar o realismo da adequação das análises da teoria da linguagem, lança-se a constatação de que "a língua é uma forma e não uma substância"125. Voltando, pois, à atenção que Agamben dedica a essas passagens, efetivamente, no escopo do Curso, entende-se que prevalece a positividade do signo – a qual, por sua vez, representaria a fundação da linguística, agora como ciência, no século XX126. Por outro lado, refletindo seriamente sobre o algoritmo ou fórmula do signo (So/se), Agamben insiste não no todo, na positividade, no signo como totalidade, mas na barreira, entendida justamente como o que aponta para "a impossibilidade do signo de produzir-se na plenitude da presença"127. Sendo assim, fixa-se a atenção não na totalidade, no signo, mas no próprio lugar da negatividade, de modo a efetivar nada menos do que a própria linguagem: Se a linguagem é o espaço absolutamente insubstancial de tais 'diferenças eternamente negativas', o signo é certamente o último elemento que pode oferecer em si próprio aquele 'ponto de irradiação positivo' sobre o qual poderia se construir uma ciência da linguagem finalmente liberta da 'ineptie de la terminologie courante': antes, enquanto define o estatuto duplo da unidade linguística, ele é o lugar da diferença absoluta, em que a fratura metafísica da presença vem à luz no modo mais deslumbrante.128 Seria do alternar da perspectiva entre o total e o parcial que proviria a delimitação dos sinais (positivo-negativo), o que introduziria, ainda, as noções de "exterior" e "interior"? Mas, se toda uma fundamentação é movida para justificar as dos signos distintivos. Quando dois termos se confundem por alteração fonética (por exemplo décrépit = decrepitus e décrépi de crispus), as ideias tenderão a confundir-se também, por pouco que se prestem a isso. Diferencia-se um termo (por exemplo, em francês chaise e chaire)? Infalivelmente, a diferença resultante tenderá a se fazer significativa, sem nem sempre consegui-lo na primeira tentativa. Inversamente, toda diferença ideal percebida pelo espirito busca exprimir-se por significantes distintos, e duas ideias que o espirito não mais distingue, tendem a se confundir no mesmo significante" SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 140). 125 SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 141. Grifo nosso 126 "Quando se comparam os signos entre si – termos positivos – não se pode mais falar de diferença; a expressão seria imprópria, pois só se aplica bem à comparação de duas imagens acústicas, por exemplo pai e mãe, ou de duas ideias, por exemplo a ideia de 'pai' e a ideia de 'mãe'; dois signos que comportam cada qual um significado e um significante não são diferentes, são somente distintos. Entre eles existe apenas oposição. Todo o mecanismo da linguagem, que será tratado mais adiante, se funda em oposições desse gênero e nas diferenças fônicas e conceptuais que implicam" (SAUSSURE, Ferdinand de. Curso de linguística geral, p. 140). 127 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 186. 128 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 185. 69 diferenças, onde está o fundamento de que o todo é positivo? Ao menos no caso do Curso, isso está longe de ficar claro – se é a linguagem ou da língua que temos como horizonte, conforme se tome uma ou outra, o "ponto de vista" é outro: por exemplo, o lúcido Saussure filósofo de Agamben versus o louco Saussure epistemólogo de Milner, marcados ambos pelo limiar de um quase; de todo modo, não nos é estranha a ideia de que a loucura seja motriz de uma profunda lucidez, uma vez que, mesmo que, a partir do turbamento da visão regrada das representações cotidianas, possa chegar às raias da cegueira, isto é, do não representável ou não visível à representação. Indício do papel das perspectivas é que Émile Benveniste, para dar conta do caráter complexo da linguagem, precise encerrar a perspectiva totalizante do signo numa dimensão na qual ele impere absoluto (o "semiótico"), para, assim, poder instituir uma outra camada de linguagem (o "semântico", cujo "modo de significação" é o discurso) – e, entre ambas, há nada menos que um abismo. É esse salto de "ponto de vista" entre negativo e positivo que temos de reter para, pensando a linguagem no interior da metafísica, compreendermos que essa passagem ao positivo (e que por hora apenas podemos acenar como efetividade) seja posterior àquela passagem "mais originária" – mas também mais mítica – ao ser da linguagem que funda o humano e fixa, para ele, algo como uma ética e uma política. Agamben parece mover-se, portanto, a partir de onde o pensamento do Curso – não necessariamente o de Saussure, que para Agamben estava reticente quanto a esse passo – estagnara e precisou saltar para a positividade, assinalando, nos termos do filósofo, uma recaída na metafísica. Por isso, então, o destaque e o retorno ao momento dos impasses, o qual, já na arquitetura conceitual de Agamben, apresenta-se como, por excelência, o momento mais produtivo: quando Saussure, que tinha atingido no conhecimento da linguagem o ponto de não retorno em que se 'é abandonado por todas as analogias do céu e da terra', fala, com expressões aparentemente paradoxais, que recordam a definição aristotélica do enigma como 'comissura de impossíveis', de 'um plexo de diferenças eternamente negativas', de um 'vínculo entre as coisas que preexiste às próprias coisas', de uma dupla unidade 'que tem anverso e verso', aquilo que antes de tudo lhe premia era evitar de substancializar os termos daquele cisão que se lhe era revelada como coessencial à linguagem. Ele entendia, assim, sinalizar para aquela diferença e aquela 'comissura de impossíveis' que foi coberta e removida, na semiologia moderna, com a 'barreira resistente à significação'. No algoritmo semiótico, a barreira que separa o significante do significado está ali para mostrar a impossibilidade do signo de produzir-se na plenitude da presença. Isolar a noção de signo, entendido como unidade positiva de signans e signatum, da original e problemática posição saussuriana do fato linguístico como 'plexo de diferenças 70 eternamente negativas', equivale a fazer recair a ciência dos signos na metafísica. 129 Saussure, então, mantendo-se fiel ao seu desejo, privando-se do gozo das representações, e ainda assim visando a conhecê-lo, coloca-se como a própria advertência que se inclina sobre o Curso de linguística geral, o qual não é, jamais, a representação daquele seu desejo sempre maior do que o seu objeto, a língua. Pelo contrário, coloca-se essa obra como testamento do seu sofrimento com o objeto, numa irônica reviravolta cujo êxito se fez (e se faz) sobre as ruínas da sua hesitação, reduzida pela visão positivadora do signo linguístico, de um linguista que levou o seu fazer até os limites da dissolução. Mas, ao mesmo tempo, evidencia-se por essa fenda, portanto, a carga metafísica inerente ao pensamento sobre a linguagem no Ocidente. Nesse ponto, em que Agamben parece até aí bastante próximo de Heidegger, move-se ainda naquele espaço de discussão relativo à "superação da metafísica", e que apenas enfrentará como tal, de fato, em A linguagem e a morte. Sobre a relação entre a metafísica e a significação, entende que a metafísica não é, com efeito, simplesmente a interpretação da fratura da presença como dualidade de aparência e de essência, de significante e de significado, de sensível e de inteligível; mas que a experiência original esteja já sempre presa numa dobra, já seja simples em sentido etimológico (sim-plex – 'dobrado uma vez'), isto é, que a presença esteja já sempre presa num significar, esta é precisamente a origem da metafísica ocidental. 130 Mas se aqui já antecipamos alguns dos principais termos da investigação de Agamben, será apenas com A linguagem e a morte, em que se precisa o despontar da negatividade e do fundamento na metafísica da linguagem ocidental, que poderemos, retomando conceitos e suas relações, ter acesso ao "ter-lugar" que permite acessar a negatividade da linguagem e da subjetividade. O que nos remeterá, traduzindo em termos linguísticos, ao problema da enunciação, cuja importância será de relevância constatável. Situando-nos num terreno em que a subjetividade é conduzida pelas tensões da linguagem e no qual se visualiza a negatividade em manifestação, poderemos compreender o que há de fundamental nas propostas de leitura da ética e da política como Agamben veio a fazêlas, bem como o limite desse pensamento – limite cuja compreensão, ao invés de significar uma falha, indica a zona a partir da qual temos de aprender a nos movimentar, para que se nos abra, assim, a potência do pensamento. No que constitui o nexo elementar de nosso problema da linguagem e da voz, da metafísica e da negatividade, chocamo-nos com o caráter ambíguo da relação da voz, 129 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 185-186. 130 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 187. 71 o som significante, com o fantasma. Ora, o nosso conceito de linguagem está cindido radicalmente, e isso constitui o grande problema que Agamben perscruta, e tal cisão, na sua leitura, não é nada menos do que a fratura metafísica original, isto é, "a fratura da presença", pois é nessa cisão que habitamos como os viventes dotados de linguagem, os viventes dotados de língua que podem falar. Esse processo desvela como há uma metafísica da voz que, transmissão de uma imemorável experiência com a linguagem, afunda-nos na negatividade ao nos fazer romper a continuidade sonora e vocálica do mundo com uma língua, que, condenando-nos a ela, se nos apresenta, então, como o operador que nos permite passar, como sobre um abismo, entre o som e o sentido, o significante e o significado, a natureza e a cultura – e que constitui a própria abertura, sem uma necessária implicação de causa e efeito, como veremos (e, na verdade, como entrelaçamento complexo dos termos) para a ética e a política. [Fim do primeiro capítulo] 1.6. Entreatos 1.6.1. A linguagem e o humano, o animal e a voz, ainda a desventura [Aqui começa o entreatos] Ao tomarmos a língua, ou, mais amplamente, a linguagem, como meio, nada fazemos senão dissimular a relevância filosófica dos termos assim mediatizados, o destaque recaindo, então, nas velhas dicotomias, as quais, como alerta Agamben com frequência, apenas encobrem o plano da cisão que fundamenta. O problema da linguagem, portanto, mais do que um meio para um fim (seja ele um bem ou mesmo a sobrevivência socialmente mediatizada), está vinculado ao despontar, sempre cambiante, do humano – como fenômeno e como conceito. Desde Aristóteles, ao menos, não é novidade que o homem seja concebido como o vivente que possui a linguagem. Nem surpreende, também, o regresso a essa relação, tida como fundante do humano, efetuado pelos debates sobre o estatuto político da linguagem, uma vez que, estando além da voz, a saída desta a caminho da linguagem é a abertura, também, para a política. Essas relações, cerne do pensamento ocidental, encontram-se enunciadas por Aristóteles numa passagem fundamental de sua Política (1253a 10-18), a qual possui certa relação estrutural com a passagem, no De interpretatione, sobre o lógos como voz significante (e, obliquamente, 72 com os termos do De anima sobre a voz) – por mais que os usos, nelas, não sejam os mesmos: Apenas o homem, dos viventes, possui a linguagem. A voz, de fato, é sinal da dor e do prazer, e por isso, ela pertence também aos outros viventes (a sua natureza, com efeito, chegou, até, a ter sensação da dor e do prazer e a significá-los reciprocamente), mas a linguagem é para manifestar o conveniente e o inconveniente, assim como, também, o justo e o injusto: isso é próprio dos homens com respeito aos outros viventes, somente o ter sensação do bem e do mal, do justo e injusto e de outras coisas do mesmo gênero, e a comunidade dessas coisas faz a habitação e a cidade.131 No contexto de articulação da pólis, evento capital do mundo helênico, e logo após definir o homem como um "vivente político" (politikòn zōon), naquela que talvez seja a mais incrustrada proposição do filósofo grego no pensamento ocidental, Aristóteles ressalta que o determinante diferencial está relacionado a algo que é pertinente exclusivamente ao homem: o lógos. Se em outros contextos o lógos e a voz entram em conjugação, aqui, todavia, eles são afirmados na sua diferença. Enquanto a voz "é sinal" ou signo (sēmeîon) da dor e do prazer, e não é exclusiva do homem, pois os demais animais não apenas chegaram à sensação de dor e de prazer, mas também alcançaram a capacidade de sinalizá-la, de emitir um sinal para ela; o lógos, por sua vez, ultrapassando a voz, consiste no mostrar o justo e o injusto, o bem e o mal, sendo sobre a "comunhão" (koinōnía) possibilitada pela indicação do lógos que se funda a cidade e a habitação. Estão constituídas, assim, as dimensões em que o homem desenvolve sua existência e sua vida, com base no gesto que separa a voz do lógos. Ora, manifestar uma orientação ética e política, organizar-se em função do bem (a ideia de que a língua, por exemplo, além de servir para a gustação, o que é comum entre os animais, pode servir para a articulação linguística, aparecendo por trás da hermēneía como explicação, em vista do bem132), só o homem os pode, e os pode porque possui o lógos, a linguagem, o que amplia a politicidade do homem como sendo uma capacidade pública de articulação da vida em comunidade. Não se pode deixar de ressaltar, ainda, um dado elementar que constitui o tom com o qual Agamben nos 131 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 108-109. O texto em grego reproduzido em Il linguaggio e la morte e no qual se baseia a tradução de Agamben é o seguinte: "λόγον δὲ μόνον ἄνθρωπος ἔχει τῶν ζῴων: ἡ μὲν οὖν φωνὴ τοῦ λυπηροῦ καὶ ἡδέος ἐστὶ σημεῖον, διὸ καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις ὑπάρχει ζῴοις μέχρι γὰρ τούτου ἡ φύσις αὐτῶν ἐλήλυθε, τοῦ ἔχειν αἴσθησιν λυπηροῦ καὶ ἡδέος καὶ ταῦτα σημαίνειν ἀλλήλοις, ὁ δὲ λόγος ἐπὶ τῷ δηλοῦν ἐστι τὸ συμφέρον καὶ τὸ βλαβερόν, ὥστε καὶ τὸ δίκαιον καὶ τὸ ἄδικον: τοῦτο γὰρ πρὸς τὰ ἄλλα ζῷα τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἴδιον, τὸ μόνον ἀγαθοῦ καὶ κακοῦ καὶ δικαίου καὶ ἀδίκου καὶ τῶν ἄλλων αἴσθησιν ἔχειν: ἡ δὲ τούτων κοινωνία ποιεῖ οἰκίαν καὶ πόλιν" (AGAMBEN, GIORGIO. Idem, p. 108). 132 De anima, 420b 17-20, p. 93. 73 apresenta a passagem: a tradução do vocábulo grego lógos por linguagem, elevando-o ao sentido mais abstrato – e mais humano – de capacidade de linguagem. Afinal, não escolhe traduzi-lo pelos termos mais usuais discurso e capacidade de fala, o que não é uma escolha naturalmente óbvia. Essas outras possibilidades, em conformidade com o próprio ulterior desenvolvimento teórico agambeniano, aparecem como manifestações específicas da linguagem, e não como o conceito de fundo, como o conceito fundamental. Assim, ao não hesitar em realizar tal tradução, por meio dela opera uma verdadeira conceituação. Levando em conta os desvios cuja articulação conceitual percorremos até aqui e que nos apresentam uma diversa composição de caminhos, o que se coloca fundamentalmente em jogo nessa passagem, por conseguinte, é o caráter diferencial do lógos, que opera, em relação à voz, uma cisão, possibilitando a abertura do lugar próprio do vivente homem. Ora, é esse movimento que Agamben insiste em resgatar quando afirma, por exemplo, que "político não é um atributo do vivente como tal, mas é uma diferença específica que determina o gênero zōon"133. A voz sinaliza, mas só o lógos permite, verdadeiramente, o mostrar, que abre a possibilidade do dizer. Ora, o caráter sinalizante da voz já pudemos notar quanto ao papel "significante" que ela também possui. Há algo no lógos, então, que o impulsiona além do sinal. Não é fora de propósito, então, buscarmos uma distinção elaborada por Émile Benveniste, a saber, entre os códigos de sinais e a linguagem, entre o sinal e o símbolo: "o animal exprime as suas emoções mas não pode nomeá-las. Não é possível encontrar nos meios de expressão empregados pelos animais um começo ou uma aproximação da linguagem. Entre a função sensório-motora e a função representativa, há um limiar que só a humanidade transpôs"134. Os animais podem ter sinais, mas símbolo, apenas o homem; a capacidade de expressão é genérica, a simbolização, específica. A delimitação do humano no seio físico da natureza, então, encontra no lógos o seu determinante. O homem é, de fato, aquele capaz de nomeação, e sem a constituição do mundo como nomeado-representado, não teria como ser um ser político, ético, como aquele ser capaz de fazer promessas: o surgimento do humano é o surgimento do mundo político, do mundo nomeado e nomeador, com ambos, humano e político, sobrepondo-se (afinal, é o terreno discursivo para a delimitação do político que Aristóteles está 133 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 5. 134 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 27 (Vista d'olhos sobre o desenvolvimento da linguística). 74 trabalhando quando enuncia, na Política, sobre o lógos) e circunscrevendo a indeterminação entre linguagem e política, humanidade e ética, portanto. No mesmo sentido, então, a comunidade humana está além de um mero agrupamento de abelhas ou outros animais que formam, no sentido de uma politicidade orientada de intensidade diversa - "o 'mais' político torna-se o verdadeiramente político"135 –, pode-se, paralelamente, ver que aquelas (e os animais que não os humanos) possuem apenas um "código de sinais"136, enquanto a cidade se constrói sobre a mobilização de uma "capacidade representativa de essência simbólica"137. A passagem ao lógos produz, pois, um fundamental "efeito de limiar"138 que se interpõe na continuidade vocálica entre o homem e a natureza. Ora, diversas são as formas de representar esse salto, afinal, diversas são as tentativas de representar a representação. Aqui, pois, o lógos, um dos mais indeterminados conceitos metafísicos, e dos mais utilizáveis, todavia, na e pela sua indeterminação, aparece como urdindo a sutura que possibilita a percepção de propriedades cuja comunidade forma a casa (e daí a oikonomia) e a cidade (e daí a política). E não custa lembrar, ainda, a confusão que geralmente impera na composição dessa passagem sobre o "animal social", ao lado da qual se sobrepõe a outra, não menos crucial, sobre a "posse da linguagem" – e, com essas advertências, tendo em vista a sua sutileza de pensamento que insiste em conectar o político às práticas de linguagem, mesmo que como léksis no sentido de "discurso", como definindo o caráter político do homem (bíos politikós), Hanna Arendt considera que, indicando-nos uma orientação assaz diversa daquela cujos traços aqui tentamos esboçar, "Aristóteles não pretendia definir o homem em geral nem identificar a mais alta capacidade do homem (...). Em suas duas mais famosas definições Aristóteles apenas formulou a opinião corrente na pólis acerca do homem e do modo de vida político"139. Essa fonte inestimável da tradição sobre a linguagem (e a política, e a ética) não será, de forma alguma, aqui esgotada. Pelo contrário, colocando-a no centro do 135 CASSIN, Barbara. Aristóteles e o lógos, p. 51. 136 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 67 (Comunicação animal e linguagem humana). 137 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 26 (Vista d'olhos sobre o desenvolvimento da linguística). 138 CASSIN, Barbara. Aristóteles e o lógos, p. 50. 139 ARENDT, Hannah. A condição humana, p. 36. Embora o caminho do pensamento seja bastante diverso, parece ter despertado em Giorgio Agamben certo pendor para a matriz do político no ocidente (a qual, contudo, ele acaba por vincular à metafísica) e para a identificação das diferenças entre os pensamentos dos "antigos" e dos "modernos" (com certa predisposição aos primeiros) – postura cujo caráter exemplar, naturalmente, não se desdobraria, ainda, para o jovem Agamben, de modo tão claro, a partir de Heidegger ou de Foucault. 75 trabalho com a negatividade, do lugar do salto entre a voz e a linguagem, trata-se de fazêla jorrar, analisando a corrente que, a partir dela, desenvolve-se na obra de Agamben. O fantasma permitiu-nos delimitar os termos, alcançando, pela primeira vez, uma delimitação de lugar, a voz, agora, como aprofundamento da topicalização, permite-nos colocar em questão a operação antropogênica efetivada pelo lógos desde que ele começou a jorrar como fonte – o que recobre Aristóteles, sem dúvida, mas remonta, na verdade, ao verdadeiro plano de um fundamento cujos efeitos que não cessam de se inscrever e escrevem, da filosofia, a sua história, e no qual Aristóteles já se encontraria fundado e se fundamentando. Assim, dentre os vários momentos nos quais nos deparamos com a citação dessa passagem na obra de Agamben, ao menos três são essenciais: na jornada final de A linguagem e a morte, sua direta investigação sobre a negatividade; o Prefácio acrescido à Infância e história, com o expressivo título de Experimentum linguae, no qual revela um projeto a respeito do problema metafísico da voz e sua relação com a ética; e, por fim, O poder soberano e a vida nua, primeiro e programático volume de Homo sacer. Uma aparente obsessão com essa citação a Aristóteles esconde, na verdade, um valor estratégico muito preciso, uma vez que Agamben não apenas se depara com a metafísica da voz e da linguagem num de seus momentos essenciais, a saber, a filosofia de Aristóteles, mas com ela se confronta. Ao mesmo tempo em que desce à fonte, apropriase da passagem como caminho, para, com esse movimento, não apenas situar o seu objeto em relação à tradição, mas, no que consiste o momento mais revelador, colocá-lo como engrenagem ativa de seu próprio projeto e de sua filosofia. Se isso pôde valer para a reconstrução de uma teoria do fantasma (ou, propriamente, uma construção), tanto mais se torna claro, aqui, diante dessa passagem, que aparece num texto para nele desaparecer e depois aparecer em outros: a sua flutuação, então, coloca-nos às voltas com o enfrentamento do objeto, ou melhor, com a necessidade de encarar o problema que o impulsiona a filosofar. Se, no final de A linguagem e a morte, o filósofo articula, a partir dessa citação, a relação entre a linguagem, a voz e o suplemento metafísico Voz, entre o humano, o vivente e a negatividade, no início de Homo sacer, I, esse problema é colocado em seus termos explicitamente políticos: elabora-se com bases firmes na discussão da metafísica da linguagem e suas categorias, o problema do político – bem como da relação entre vida e vida nua, entre política e biopolítica. O que se percebe é um alargamento da análise, e isso pode permitir vislumbrar possíveis deslocamentos de perspectiva em 76 relação ao campo de problemas concernentes ao seu pensamento se situa, ou ainda, uma focalização diversa. De todo modo, movemo-nos constantemente, assim, entre investigações filosóficas de problemas claramente metafísicos e de seus contextos específicos, como a definição política do humano, que são remontados ao seu cerne filosófico e até mesmo teológico. Vejamos como isso se apresenta, e como essas idas e vindas nos fazem percorrer a sua obra em diversos sentidos e camadas: A pergunta 'de que modo o vivente possui a linguagem?' corresponde exatamente àquela 'em que modo a vida nua habita a pólis?'. O vivente possui o lógos tolhendo e conservando nele a própria voz, assim como ele habita a polis excetuando nela a própria vida nua. A política se apresenta, então, como a estrutura, em sentido próprio fundamental, da metafísica ocidental, enquanto ocupa o limiar em que se leva a termo a articulação entre o vivente e o lógos. A 'politização' da vida nua é a tarefa metafísica por excelência, em que se decide sobre a humanidade do vivente homem, e, assumindo essa tarefa, a modernidade não faz mais do que declarar a própria fidelidade à estrutura essencial da tradição metafísica. O par categorial fundamental da política ocidental não é aquele amigo-inimigo, mas aquele vida nua-existência política, zoḗ-bíos, exclusão-inclusão. Há política porque o homem é o vivente que, na linguagem, separa e opõe a si a própria vida nua e, ao mesmo tempo, mantémse em relação com ela numa exclusão inclusiva.140 A primeira cisão resgatada, portanto, composta como estruturação das demais, é aquela entre a linguagem e a voz (a qual sobrepuja a outra separação, de cunho naturalista, entre som e voz), entre a capacidade de linguagem e a voz inarticulada e meramente sinalizadora dos demais viventes. Se o que une os viventes é a voz, para o homem resta a linguagem, e no salto da natureza para a comunidade surge a política. E é nesse salto, como abertura, que devemos situar o lugar no qual Agamben coloca o problema da antropogênese: não apenas voz e linguagem, mas inumano e humano, animal e homem, zōḗ ("vida", simplesmente) e bíos ("vida qualificada"), que constituem aquela que tem sido a dualidade mais polêmica da criação conceitual de Agamben e, precisamente por isso, permite visualizar a sua constante estratégia de construção por meio de uma referida reconstrução categorial, tanto pela necessidade de decidir sobre o momento de crise que se manifesta no plano dos conceitos quanto pela forma de apresentar nos autores saídas que não necessariamente se encontram neles evidentes, ou que, simplesmente, neles não se encontram141. 140 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 11. 141 Assim, ao menos, pode-se compreender a crítica de Jacques Derrida à interpretação agambeniana do "vivente que possui a linguagem", que não seria, com a sua separação entre vida nua e vida qualificada, uma oposição tão segura e clara no mundo helênico. "Toda a estratégia demonstrativa de Agamben, aqui e alhures, coloca-se sobre uma distinção ou uma exclusão radical, clara, unívoca, nos gregos, e em Aristóteles em particular, entre a vida nua (zōē), comum a todos os viventes (animais, homens e deuses), e a vida qualificada como vida individual ou vida de grupo (bios: bios theōrētikos, por exemplo, vida contemplativa, bios apolaustikos: vida de prazer, bios politikos: vida política). A infelicidade é que essa distinção não é 77 Tanto mais é válida essa consideração para a retomada do problema da linguagem como o lógos. A estrutura metafísica desvela-se propriamente no hiato entre voz e linguagem, o que significa que a separação, o salto, como dissemos, apresentado na Política, é levado a consequências severas, tendo-se aí, ao mesmo tempo, o despontar da política e da metafísica, a abertura ao lógos, que faz com que se revolva, a cada vez que vêm à superfície, o problema do fundamento outro nome, mais próprio, para o problema da origem em seu mais intenso sentido metafísico. Trata-se, além do mais, de observar que essa disposição encerra o problema, que se deixa apresentar na Política, da relação de causalidade entre lógos, a política e a ética antes como uma relação de coemergência do que de, propriamente, anterioridade lógica entre os espaços: funda-se, assim, uma investigação sobre a linguagem que recai na política e na ética (estando ainda mais indeterminado o modo de relação entre ambas) e uma investigação sobre a política (e a ética) que não cessa de recair, mais do que no linguístico, no plano da própria linguagem. Porém, na mesma medida em que Agamben abre uma estruturação ele a fecha com um golpe complementar: "O vivente possui o lógos tolhendo e conservando nele a própria voz, assim como ele habita a polis excetuando nela a própria vida nua". Tolher e conservar em si o que possui de voz é o modo de possuir o lógos. Sutil forma de indeterminar o momento crítico-decisório sobre a continuidade entre voz e linguagem ou o hiato absoluto que confisca do homem algo como uma voz, e, se a favor do hiato, negando uma voz ao homem, Agamben defronta-se com Martin Heidegger – num enfrentamento que é uma das composições de sua obra A linguagem e a morte, pelo qual pode passar à leitura heideggeriana da Stimme (voz) –, suturando o hiato, de maneira a sustentar uma estruturação metafísica, passível de visualização por trás dos mais jamais tão clara e segura, e que Agamben deve ele mesmo admitir que há exceções, por exemplo, no caso do Deus que leva, diz a Metafísica de Aristóteles, uma 'zōē aristē kei aidios', uma vida nobre e eterna; uma distinção semântica tão pouco segura não poderia ser utilizada para determinar uma periodização histórica (...)" (DERRIDA, Jacques. Séminaire La bête et le souverain, I (2001-2002), p. 420-421). Se, de fato, Agamben inicia O poder soberano e a vida nua (Homo sacer, I) dizendo "Os gregos não possuíam um único termo para exprimir aquilo que nós entendemos com a palavra vida ", isso, porém, não nos faz avançar a não ser que vejamos, na interpretação por ele tecida na sequência, sobre a disjunção de vida entre bíos e zōḗ um efeito de projeção, sobre os gregos, da interpretação de um Aristóteles matizado de Heidegger muito agambeniano – o que não exclui a relevância e a consistência de sua atuação como filósofo, mas depõe contra ele na sua atuação filológico-hermenêutica. Cf. Séminaire La bête e le souverain, I (20012002), Douzième séance (Le 20 mars 2002). Cabe destacar, também, um breve apontamento crítico de Jeanne-Marie Gagnebin quanto ao uso de vida nua, feito sobre decalque, considerado "apressado", da "mera vida" (blosses Leben) benjaminiana (Cf. GAGNEBIN, Jeanne-Marie. Limiar, aura e rememoração, p. 55-56). 78 específicos intentos da linguística, podemos situar Émile Benveniste, quando categoricamente, ao confiscar a voz dos animais, diz "não há linguagem sem voz"142. Na reformulação que apresenta para a tese foucaultiana, surgida no final de A vontade de saber (História da sexualidade, I), de que a modernidade coloca o homem como o animal que tem sua animalidade questionada ou ameaçada em sua política, Agamben efetiva esse jogo de indeterminação com apenas um golpe143: "Há política porque o homem é o vivente que, na linguagem, separa e opõe a si a própria vida nua e, ao mesmo tempo, mantém-se em relação com ela numa exclusão inclusiva". Nesse sentido, em que pese o caráter específico do mecanismo da "exclusão inclusiva" – a captura daquilo mesmo que se expulsa (como a vida nua, que é incluída pela figura soberana na medida em que foi banida) –, o problemático, porém, é o significado desse "na linguagem", cuja delineação teórica é o que se coloca no horizonte. Portanto, para compreendermos rigorosamente as operações em jogo, é preciso continuar o passo atrás com o qual começamos e que agora, contudo, conduz-nos adiante. É sobre um "suplemento de politicidade ligado à linguagem"144 que um projeto como Homo sacer poderá se estruturar; a abertura entre voz e linguagem ligar-se à fratura entre zōḗ e bíos; e mesmo o "ingresso da zōḗ na esfera da pólis, a politização da vida nua como tal" adquirir o status de uma "transformação radical das categorias políticofilosóficas do pensamento clássico"145 – às possíveis respostas sobre o nosso estágio político, portanto, antepõe-se, com uma seriedade excruciante, nem paciente nem impaciente diante dos conceitos, mas que os interpela de um modo outro, colocam-se perguntas cujas respostas fazem Giorgio Agamben oscilar e até mesmo o afastam de respondê-las de uma vez por todas: de que modo fracassa essa estruturação metafísica – ou ainda, essa estrutura da metafísica que revela um modo de ser humano e como se pode compreendê-la, por um lado, sem se abrir mão da filosofia e da poesia, e, por outro, sem recair nela novamente? É possível escapar da prisão representacional da linguagem? Caberia testar – o que excederia os limites deste trabalho se essas interrogações, traçadas 142 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 65 (Comunicação animal e linguagem humana). 143 Com esse mesmo gesto, Agamben distancia-se de Foucault (e a bibliografia estende-se aos acólitos e aos não praticantes), pois enquanto este se depara com a história e perscruta a modernidade e os seus discursos de saber e suas estratégias de poder, aquele, por outro lado, ontologiza os termos em jogo, não apenas ao jogá-los "para os gregos", mas por ver, neles, a estruturação mesma da metafísica. Daqui, então, a conhecida saída do filósofo italiano com o conceito de paradigma, o qual, de fato, atesta a seu favor (e que faz ressoar, nos estratos anteriores de sua obra, conceituações como a de topologia e lugar que apresentamos neste trabalho) – embora permaneça em aberto, todavia, a pertinência de seu método. 144 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 5. 145 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 6. 79 a partir de um profundo situar-se nas posições de Agamben, têm sustentação efetiva na sua obra, sendo capazes de ser dela um fio condutor, ou se remetem apenas a alguma intencionalidade autoral que se imiscui, retórica, nessa mesma obra – o que, a nosso ver, pode muito depor para a situação do seu pensamento como filosofia. 1.6.2. O experimentum linguae Os principais momentos da filosofia agambeniana, se podem ser unidos pelo recurso estratégico à citação aristotélica, é por haver, antes, uma forma de indagação capaz de coordená-los. Por conseguinte, apesar dos campos e contextos de obra diversos, podemos conectá-los e torná-los inteligíveis quando relacionados à cadeia de problemas filosóficos de fundo, permitindo vislumbrar prospectos de mudanças de perspectiva. Contudo, tanto em A linguagem e a morte quanto em Homo sacer, chegamos a essa abordagem de Aristóteles após dois dos marcos essenciais de Agamben discutirem o legado do filósofo grego: enquanto naquela obra se coloca a contraposição de Martin Heidegger à possível leitura da linguagem como sendo a voz do homem, a contrapelo da concepção incrustada na tradição ocidental, nesta, por sua vez, aparece Michel Foucault levantando uma alteração de sentido na relação entre o vivente e a política. Mas um efetivo substrato do qual aflora o pensamento de Giorgio Agamben encontramos em Experimentum linguae, prefácio à edição francesa (1989) de Infância e história (1978), acrescido à obra, posteriormente, em nova edição italiana (2001). Esse texto, mais do que um prólogo à obra que integra, na verdade, pode ser considerado como epílogo ou carta de intenções a toda a sua produção precedente, oferecendo importantes indicações sobre os projetos executados e por executar146. Experimentum linguae aponta, desde o título, para o que há de herança dos textos de Heidegger que se encaminham para a essência da linguagem, no sentido do "fazer uma experiência com a linguagem", numa deambulação que se indetermina entre experimento e vivência. Mas, ao experimentar o fundo, lá onde o caminho da meditação levaria à contemplação do silêncio, à sigética, Agamben encontra o conceito-limite de uma infância, conceito-limite com o qual a história se possibilita enquanto operação das capacidades humanas – e esse conceito- 146 Lembre-se, ainda, sucintamente, que Experimentum linguae pode ser ligado temporalmente à obra A comunidade que vem (em sua edição de 1990), justamente quando propõe, a partir de uma diversa percepção da relação entre linguagem e ética, que a própria ideia de Comum – que também aparece, pela koinōnía, na fundação aristotélica da cidade – deve ser revista (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. xiv). 80 limite é, na verdade, o lugar de possibilidade da "dupla articulação em língua e discurso"147: agravamento antropológico além do salto ou fratura entre voz e lógos, agora, como fratura do próprio lógos, anunciada anteriormente por um despedaçamento da palavra e por uma "experiência original (...) já sempre presa numa dobra"148. Bem como representa uma saída de Estâncias e o encadeamento efetivo do tema da negatividade a partir da voz – à diferença, contudo, que o problema do fantasma, então índice da negatividade, cede lugar ao conceito de infância como tentativa, também, de não recair no inefável. O intuito prefaciador de Agamben é conduzido por um estranho modo de reconsideração de sua obra, pois remete a uma obra que não foi escrita, mas cujo projeto estendeu-se ao menos entre a escrita de Infância e história e A linguagem e a morte, as quais, assim, apresentaram-se, cada uma ao seu modo, como vias de solução para um "érgon ilegível"149. Orientadas por uma obra ausente, por um princípio inacabado, as obras presentes tornam-se, é justo afirmar, uma espécie de resposta ensaiada, mas também jamais finalizada.150 As obras realizadas constituem-se a partir de um ponto de investigação que insiste em se manter aberto, irrealizado, e, enquanto tal, permanece propriamente uma questão. Isso nos possibilita fazer surgir o "érgon ilegível", como obra que se frustra diante da sua legibilidade, como problema. Se Infância e história aparece como estudo preparatório a "uma obra que remanesceu obstinadamente não escrita"151, A linguagem e a morte e as obras subsequentes são uma espécie de comentário ou glosa à indagação que abandonou, de tão viva, qualquer obra na qual pudesse se realizar e, portanto, dissolveu suas centelhas em cada gesto futuro. Se embarcamos nessa espécie de viagem borgiana com a qual Agamben nos introduz no universo temático de seu pensamento e de suas indagações, é porque já aqui, no próprio modo como lemos, ou não, um texto, afirma-se a potência mais interior que o sustenta, e que mesmo essas leituras são incapazes de totalmente atualizar. Ao menos esse é o projeto de Agamben, o qual, como tal, só pode sucumbir – no que é vitorioso – ou abandonar-se a si mesmo. 147 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. xi. 148 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Stanze, p. 187. 149 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. vii. 150 Esta, em última análise, é a pretensão de Agamben, segundo ele próprio, quanto a sua obra: que seja, tal como Giacometti dizia de seus tableaux, jamais terminada, mas sim abandonada (Cf. CERF, Juliette. Le philosophe Giorgio Agamben: 'La pensée, c'est le courage du désespoir") – isto é, entregue a sua própria potência. 151 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. vii. 81 Orientamo-nos, portanto, por uma potência que se manteve enquanto tal, ou melhor, e mais precisamente, por uma problemática potência. Os possíveis títulos que permitem acessar essa obra não realizada que revela uma potência – e esse gesto de abandonar uma obra não deixa de ser uma marca agambeniana – são sobremaneira reveladores: "A voz humana" – "Ética, ou da voz". Vestígio que, não nos interessando pelo que teria sido, mas não foi, mas pelo que lança de luzes sobre o que foi, muito nos orientam com a transcrição de um dos textos que, segundo o seu idealizador, fazia parte do projeto abandonado: 'Existe uma voz humana, uma voz que seja voz do homem como o fretenir é a voz da cigarra ou o zurrar é a voz do burro? E, se existe, é esta voz a linguagem? Qual é a relação entre voz e linguagem, entre phoné e lógos? E se algo como uma voz humana não há, em que sentido o homem pode ainda ser definido como o vivente que possui a linguagem? As perguntas que formulamos delimitam uma interrogação filosófica. Segundo uma antiga tradição, o problema da voz e da sua articulação era, de fato, por excelência um problema filosófico. De vocis nemos magis quam philosophi tractant [Da voz ninguém mais [trata] do que os filósofos tratam], lê-se em Sérvio, e, para os estoicos, que deram o impulso decisivo à reflexão ocidental sobre a linguagem, a voz era a arkhé da dialética. Todavia, a filosofia quase nunca mais pôs tematicamente o problema da voz...152 Esse registro, compondo uma inusitada "citação", reafirma a obstinada interrogação com a qual o pensamento agambeniano não cessa de se chocar. Vê-se como a voz e a linguagem, representando um impasse entre fratura e articulação, circunscrevem um problema eminentemente filosófico, para não dizer metafísico, cujo impacto não é outro que não a própria especificidade do humano – no que é, portanto, radicalmente ético. E um problema, além do mais, que se revolve nos próprios textos fundantes da experiência ético-política da linguagem, constituindo-se, então, na encruzilhada entre leitura e interpretação de um texto. Assim, de um lado, o legado aristotélico continuaria em ação, uma vez que os animais seriam capazes de emissões vocais, "Fischi, trilli, chioccolii, tocchi come di legno o metallo scheggiato, zirli, frulli, bisbigli: ogni animale ha il suo suono" 153 ("silvos, gorjeios, assovios, badalos como de madeira ou metal estilhaçado, chilros, adejos, cicios: cada animal tem o seu som"); porém, de outro, a possibilidade 152 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. vii-viii. A diferença que Agamben prefacia em relação à Infância e história, então, não se mostra tão intensa assim; o que acontece, apenas, é que o tom ligeiramente responsório dessa obra termina relativizado – e a categoria de infância ressurge mais como aparição do problema do que como resposta: afinal, o conceito de infância vem assumir o lugar que a tradição concedia ao inefável, e, se isso é precisamente a paragem questionada, Agamben não progrediria em nada ao chegar ao limite mudo da linguagem. Pelo contrário, é justamente desse direcionamento que forma a metafísica como transmissão de uma tradição do inefável que o faz questionar. 153 O fim do pensamento, p. 4; p. 137. 82 mesma de uma voz humana é suspensa com uma dupla indagação: se é que existe uma voz do homem, qual é essa voz? A voz do homem é a linguagem? Com a postura que enfrenta a relação entre voz e linguagem, indaga-se o estatuto do humano diante do mundo que o circunda, visto, tradicionalmente, como o mundo dos outros viventes, com o que se firma uma especificação do gênero, uma taxonomia pela qual os animais adquiriram destaque, e, priorizando-se a inclusão ou a exclusão, a pertença ou a especificidade, o homem foi transposto ao lugar principal. Porém, se lembrarmos da passagem aristotélica na qual o vivente como tal tem voz, estando o homem aí incluído, deduz-se que o homem, por sua vez, também possui algo, em algum lugar, que deveria ser equivalente a uma voz (animal). Isso seria, então, o substrato comum, e diferença alguma pareceria se originar aqui. Indagar o estatuto da própria voz significaria uma busca por essa morada da voz no homem, a qual apontaria, por sua vez, para o inumano aí presente (o elo com os demais viventes), ao passo em que uma reflexão sobre a linguagem conduz para as vias da subjetivação, isto é, da formação de algo como um falante, de um ser capaz de atualizar, mediante sons capazes de significação, ideias, conceitos, enfim, o sentido. Havendo ou não uma voz cabível ao homem, continua a subsistir o salto da phōnḗ para o lógos, resolvido como cisão ou como articulação – o que não significa que uma solução não acabe por se desembocar na outra –, e persiste a insistência na análise do status que resta ao enunciado que define o homem como o vivente que possui a linguagem. Se essa, sem dúvida, perfaz a interrogação filosófica cujos rastros começamos a perseguir, colocando-se ora sob a perspectiva da voz e da sua articulação, ora estando sob o efeito do ultrapassamento da voz e da queda irrevogável do homem no lógos, do abandono do homem ao lógos e às suas cisões, o conceito encoberto de linguagem não é nada mais do que uma indagação sobre a possibilidade mesma da linguagem e do homem enquanto falante, ou, em outros termos, do homem enquanto humano. Assim, focando na vida e na linguagem, no animal e no humano, o que Agamben coloca no centro do pensamento é a própria possibilidade, isto é, a relação, o ékhon – como posse de uma propriedade, apropriação efetiva, como dom, como ser dotado de uma essência – que permite a um animal possuir a linguagem e definir-se como homem. A indagação filosófica de Agamben, assim, encaminhou-se e continua a se encaminhar para esses problemas, suspendendo-os logo no momento em que parece ter alcançado uma resolução. Não apenas foi possível acessar a ideia de infância como insígnia dos limites da linguagem, mas também ao estatuto da ideia de Voz, intermediado 83 pela ideia de morte. Na discussão com os limites portanto, como crítica –, Agamben não foi unívoco em seu percurso, assinalado como variações de um tema que se faz soar e ressoar ao longo já de algumas décadas ("pensamento vivo"...), ou que também se permite silenciar, ecoando, apenas, ou percorrer algumas dissonâncias, mas de modo tal, porém, que volta a encontrar a sua voz, num entrelaçamento capaz de surpreender – as suas conhecidas zonas de indeterminações. Isso se deve a que, confrontando-se com os limites da linguagem, tenha se batido na fronteira filosófica entre a experiência e o transcendental – e que o levou à formulação do experimentum linguae como experiência "em que aquilo de que se faz experiência é a própria língua"154: mas o que pode ser uma tal experiência? Como é possível fazer experiência, não de um objeto, mas da linguagem mesma? E, quanto à linguagem, não desta ou daquela proposição significante, mas do puro fato de que se fale, de que haja linguagem? Se para cada autor existe uma interrogação que define o motivum do seu pensamento, o âmbito que essas perguntas circunscrevem coincide sem resíduos com aquele para o qual se orienta todo o meu trabalho. Nos livros escritos e naqueles não escritos, eu não quis pensar obstinadamente mais do que uma coisa só: o que significa 'há linguagem', o que significa 'eu falo'? Visto que, é claro, que nem o ser-falante nem o ser-dito, que lhe corresponde a parte objecti, são predicados reais que possam ser identificados nesta ou naquela propriedade (como o ser-vermelho, francês, velho, comunista). Eles são, antes, transcendentia no sentido que esse termo possui na lógica medieval, isto é, predicados que transcendem toda categoria, não obstante perseverando em cada uma delas; mais precisamente, eles devem ser pensados como arquitranscendentais, ou transcendentais à segunda potência, os quais, no elenco do adágio escolástico retomado por Kant (quodlibet ens est unum, verum, bonum seu perfectum), transcendem aos próprios transcendentais e estão implicados em cada um deles.155 Experiência da existência da linguagem – uma dimensão que ultrapassa a categorização e a predicação, fundando a sua existência – experiência de pensar aquilo que seria, mesmo, a condição de possibilidade, mas sem se tornar, o indeterminável, pelo qual ingressaria, por trás, a reboque, o inefável. Como escapar, se é que se pode, da espreita do inefável, ao que se aferra a linguagem da representação, é o que Agamben perscruta de modo bem pouco ortodoxo, ao espelhar o gesto crítico-filosófico na acentuação do fundamento, do lugar, do ter-lugar, e sem deixar espaço para denominar qualquer nome de coisa em si (a vontade, etc.), no que Agamben também seria a Heidegger's child, não necessariamente um discípulo bem comportado, antes insubordinado, alguém que se situa em relação aos confins do pensamento magistral. Pelo contrário, a barreira que a linguagem se impõe como sendo o limite da representação é aquilo com o que cabe se medir, e é questionando a barreira que permite a efetividade do 154 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. ix. 155 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. x. 84 mundo, mantendo-se oculta, esquecida, que ele pode articular seu pensamento de um modo que assinala um trajeto que confina com a metafísica. O papel fundamental do Experimentum linguae, apesar das possíveis respostas dadas ou ensaiadas a esse problema no interior da filosofia e de sua história, continua em cena, tanto que é uma mola fundamental da maquinaria conceitual de Giorgio Agamben, mas não é uma exclusividade sua156, uma vez que, inflacionada, a linguagem como signo aponta para o processo mesmo de desvalorização da sua capacidade de representação da troca157 – a diferença, aqui, é o modo de interrogação mais do que as respostas, que, talvez, nem mesmo sejam objetivos, nem objetivas. A formulação de que se possa fazer uma experiência da própria linguagem, ao contrário do que se poderia esperar, portanto, não condiz com a sua experiência cotidiana, isto é, à fala ou ao discurso; diz respeito, antes, à tentativa de pensar a falência das articulações que tentaram soldar as fraturas sobre as quais o homem se dá como experiência e que, com isso, apenas aprofundaram as cisões que fundamentam a sua experiência, até mesmo a cisão fundamental que nos abre mundos: linguagem e mundo. Se lembrarmos, agora, que, o homem é aquele capaz de falar, porque possui a capacidade de instituir discursos e símbolos, de atualizá-los, a partir de um sistema linguístico, num determinado discurso, mediante a fala, e é aquele capaz da política, podemos insistir que o questionamento da linguagem nos coloca diante da indagação dos limites da própria experiência ética. "Aquele que realiza o experimentum linguae", afinal, "deve por isso arriscar-se numa dimensão perfeitamente vazia (o leerer Raum do conceito-limite kantiano)"158. O "espaço vazio", o lugar (impossível?) do experimentum linguae, seja ele concebido como infância ou como situação entre voz e lógos, apontará justamente o enfrentamento ético constantemente gerado pela produção do humano e do inumano, pela mobilidade de um fronteira entre a phōnḗ e o lógos, entre a natureza e a cultura. Esse é o problema cujo defrontar constitui, em duplo sentido, o embasamento do movimento filosófico de Giorgio Agamben, da ética à linguagem, da experiência à condição 156 De imediato, Heidegger, do qual até mesmo decalca a fórmula. Mas também outro, com o qual normalmente se choca o seu pensamento sobre a linguagem, Jacques Derrida – talvez de modo mais relevante, nesse ponto nodal, do que Walter Benjamin ou Michel Foucault. 157 Sacamos esses termos, em consonância com a última nota, às expensas dos fundos de Jacques Derrida (DERRIDA, Jacques. Gramatologia, p, 7). 158 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. x-xi. 85 transcendental da experiência possível159, mas também, em termos mais afins a sua conceituação, do mitologema da voz e do mitologema sacrificial à desativação poética do dispositivo linguagem e ao novo uso de nossas capacidades comuns. Com isso, podemos partir para uma outra sentença, e, a partir dela, finalizar esse seguimento para prosseguir, noutra camada, a escavação desse vasto canteiro de obras, ou melhor, desse desafiador campo arqueológico de pesquisas, organizando, por conseguinte, num jogo entre pergunta e resposta, o núcleo de preocupações: 'Se a expressão mais adequada para a maravilha da existência do mundo é a existência da linguagem, qual é, então, a expressão justa para a existência da linguagem?'. A única resposta possível a essa pergunta é: a vida humana enquanto éthos, enquanto vida ética. Buscar um pólis e uma oikía que estejam à altura dessa comunidade vazia e impressuponível, é a tarefa infantil da humanidade que vem.160 Como Agamben constrói a linguagem como evento ético originário, e quais consequências se pode extrair disso para a sua filosofia (e não apenas a sua) constitui, propriamente, o horizonte visado, o qual se define, diante da série de elementos em jogo, apenas num movimento para aquém, levando a sério as propostas de Agamben, situandonos na relação da linguagem consigo mesma, entendendo-a no seu próprio despontar, apontando para os problemas lógico-metafísicos da voz e da indicação. Entre fraturas e tentativas de articulação de toda uma série de dualidades, encontra-se o caminho para tentar tornar inteligíveis os processos construtivos e desconstitutivos – o que, fora de nosso escopo, poder-se-ia observar como aquisição de fala e de sua perda, por exemplo, como constituição e desconstituição contínuas da subjetividade, ou como a crescente desvalorização do componente eticamente qualificável da existência, em prol de uma vida biológica e orgânica qualquer. Estar à altura da intensidade desses problemas tem sido o 159 Uma interessante tese de Agamben, que tem permanecido não indagada, é a de que "Se é verdadeiro, com efeito, que Kant pôde articular o seu conceito de transcendental apenas na medida em que se omitiu de pôr o problema da linguagem, 'transcendental' deve aqui, ao invés, indicar uma experiência que se sustém apenas na linguagem, um experimentum linguae no sentido próprio do termo, em que aquilo de que se faz experiência é a própria língua" (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. ix). O que gera um desafio cujo enfrentamento deixa, a quem o fizer, um ingrato trabalho, pois "Uma das tarefas mais urgentes do pensamento contemporâneo é, certamente, a redefinição do conceito de transcendental em função das suas relações com a linguagem" (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. ix). Talvez seja a única vez em que Agamben seja tão enfático quanto ao papel relevante dessa releitura do conceito de transcendental – o conceito de infância é a primeira tentativa de responder ao desafio. Em A linguagem e a morte, também é necessário pressupor esse destaque, pois nessa obra também há uma tentativa de "redefinir" o conceito de transcendental em termos linguísticos. Destaque-se, ainda, A imanência absoluta, em que estará voltado a enfrentar esse tema, quando a filosofia é decomposta em duas grandes linhas de força, a da imanência e a da transcendência (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'immanenza assoluta, in La potenza del pensiero, p. 385413). 160 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. xv. 86 longo esforço agambeniano, o qual, se encontra término textual em algum lugar, talvez não encontre, em nenhum, o esgotamento de sua potência. Experimentá-la, contudo, é tarefa que há para qualquer leitor, e não poderia, assim, deixar de ser também nossa – como a experimentamos é o que assinala, porém, a diferença, indicando novas experiências possíveis do sentido, do seu sentido. [Fim do entreatos] 87 CAPÍTULO 2. A METAFÍSICA DA VOZ 2.1. Uma topologia da negatividade A linguagem permanentemente a ela nos encaminha, colocando-nos, assim, a caminho de nós mesmos como sujeitos. Não apenas, é claro, enquanto sejamos capazes de possuí-la virtualmente, em potência, mas de modo efetivo como sujeitos de discursos, isto é, falantes. Entre essa dupla face da linguagem, contudo, não há uma passagem imediata, nem, a rigor, pode haver entre elas um simples sobrepor-se. Uma negatividade abre-se a cada confronto com a linguagem como representação. Entre a estruturação do mundo e o ato efetivo de palavra, entre a representação e o dizer, há outro salto, cujo lugar de articulação é precisamente onde o homem se distingue como ser de potência e ser em ato. Deslizamos constantemente nos limites de nossas próprias linguagens, e os poetas podem nos mostrar, a cada palavra levada até o seu limite, que afundamos num evento de linguagem que, ao mesmo tempo que nos ultrapassa, em nossa contingência natural, é por nós levado ao seu limite. É tal curto-circuito, pensado nas intricadas malhas da metafísica, o que Giorgio Agamben questiona. Que possamos fazer uma experiência com a linguagem, ou de que exista algo como um experimentum linguae, está-se a indicar que a possibilidade da nossa experiência humana encontra sua condição num limite que se pode, de algum modo, apontar e acessar, mesmo que numa gestualidade – esse limite, de acordo com uma incrustada perspectiva metafísica que acompanha as reflexões ocidentais sobre a linguagem, da filosofia à poesia, da teologia à linguística, é a fundação da linguagem no salto entre a voz, as vozes diversas da natureza, e a capacidade de linguagem; é, também, a fundação da linguagem na sua série de cisões internas – signo e discurso, língua e fala. Mas o que funda? Qual o fundamento, a origem da linguagem? Se a pergunta pela origem como causalidade derivada das ciências naturais deve ser descartada161, por reverter os processos históricos a relações de derivação cronológica, devemos tomá-la naquilo que encerra de metafísica, naquilo que constitui das condições mesmas de aparição de algo como um fenômeno – isso, para Agamben, é o que quer dizer infância, mas também, limitante em outro sentido, morte; o transcendental e a negatividade. Se a linguística, propondo-se ciência, pôde vedar a pergunta pela origem da língua, a filosofia, 161 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. 47. 88 enquanto metafísica, ao colocar-se diante da linguagem, mede-se propriamente com a questão sobre a origem, a qual passa a se traduzir, pois, nos termos do fundamento, da fundamentação e da fundação162. Trata-se de colocar a própria ideia de origem e fundamento como passíveis de indagação, de compreender o estatuto de uma delimitação que se inicia ao dizer que "a origem da linguagem deve necessariamente situar-se num ponto de fratura da oposição contínua de diacrônico e sincrônico, histórico e transcendental, em que seja possível capturar, como um Urfaktum ou um arquievento, a unidade-diferença de invenção e dom, humano e não humano, palavra e infância"163. Se a infância, atravessando a linguagem, possibilita a experiência, a morte, atravessando a experiência, possibilita o confronto com o humano. Se lá nós temos o transcendental da experiência, aqui nós temos a negatividade do fundamento – e, como já salientamos, quer se tome a linguagem, quer se tome a língua como situada no ponto de fratura, é ele mesmo, o ponto de fratura, que está no cerne da investigação. A verificação de que cada ser humano não venha ao mundo falando imediatamente, conecta-se, de modo misterioso, ao fato de que não se possa dizer do humano um momento histórico separado de seu ser falante. O ser humano é, desde a sua aparição, o ser simbólico, o ser capaz de instituir, mediante uma língua, um discurso, uma fala, mas cada exemplar da espécie, vindo à luz no entorno de um mundo, recepcionado no contexto da linguagem, todavia, não é ainda alguém que fala, embora seja dotado de uma capacidade de falar. O conceito de origem atua nessa indeterminação, nessa relação que, de um lado, oferece ao pensamento a infância e, de outro, a morte. A quebra do mundo em dýnamis e enérgeia, potência e ato, revela mais uma vez o seu alcance – podese dizer, ainda, um ápice de seu alcance, ao afetar a própria capacidade mais inquietante do homem, a capacidade de atualização e fundação de seu próprio mundo. De todo modo, agora estamos na altura de começar a precisar que é algo mais que uma simples voz ou capacidade de linguagem o que instaura a cisão do homem – é ela como separação entre a condição da própria potência humana de linguagem e a atualização dessa mesma potência o que se coloca como o que vai ao fundo de forma tal que nos oferece um fundamento. Assim, 162 Veremos como esses termos mais ou menos se definem ao final do percurso deste trabalho. O uso desses conceitos permite uma precisão que o ato de tentar defini-los de antemão poderia tornar impraticável. A esse respeito, portanto, veja-se o uso que fazemos dos termos a partir das considerações de Karl Kerényi, na seção O mitologema da Voz, no terceiro capítulo deste trabalho. 163 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. 48. 89 – como mostrou Lenneberg –, enquanto na maioria das espécies animais o comportamento comunicativo se desenvolve invariavelmente segundo leis de maturação genética preestabelecidas, de modo que o animal terá, enfim e como quer que seja, à disposição um repertório de sinais característicos da espécie, no homem produziu-se uma separação entre a disposição à linguagem (o sermos prontos para a comunicação) e o processo de atualização dessa virtualidade. A linguagem humana resulta, assim, cindida originalmente em uma esfera endossomática e uma esfera exossomática, entre as quais se estabelece (pode se estabelecer) um fenômeno de ressonância que produz a atualização. Se a exposição à herança exossomática não intervém dentro de uma certa fase da plasmabilidade cerebral (que, segundo Lenneberg, tem o seu limite extremo no processo de laterização cerebral que se completa por volta dos doze anos), a disposição à linguagem é irreversivelmente perdida (...). O que caracteriza a linguagem humana não é o seu pertencimento à esfera exossomática ou àquela endossomática, mas o seu encontrar-se, por assim dizer, a cavalo entre as duas e o seu ser, por isso, articulada sobre a diferença entre elas e, ao mesmo tempo, sobre a sua ressonância. Nessa perspectiva, as oposições binárias que se encontram em todos os níveis da linguagem, como aquelas entre língua e discurso, entre nível fonêmico inconsciente e nível semântico do discurso, entre forma e sentido, adquirem um significado particular. Sendo cindida entre uma herança exossomática e uma herança endossomática, a linguagem humana deve necessariamente comportar uma estrutura tal que permita a passagem de uma a outra.164 Ora, que a linguagem, contudo, não seja patrimônio da ciência da linguagem, da filosofia, da poética, da retórica etc., mas também ponto de inquietação para as ciências naturais, não se deve apenas às dinâmicas técnicas e científicas das sociedades ditas modernas, mas também à penetração do conceito de linguagem naquilo que diz respeito ao ser humano enquanto tal, enquanto elemento tomado, ao lado de um tão inflacionado "racional", como antropogenético. Mais ainda, ultrapassando a formulação conceitual, tal percurso diz respeito à estrutura das representações, pela qual tanto ideamos o humano quanto ele, supondo-se sujeito de subjetividades, apresenta-se-nos como o falante ideal. Dando atenção ao somático, digamos, às transferências entre o que é da genética interior da espécie (o endo-) e o que é derivado mediante processos de aquisição (o exo-), colocamo-nos, enquanto indivíduos da espécie, conservada a lógica entre indivíduoespécie, diante de uma "disposição à linguagem" e da possibilidade de, por meio de uma ressonância gerada pelos processos aquisitivos, colocarmos em ato essa disposição. Segundo a leitura de Agamben, a linguagem não se situa nem totalmente num polo nem noutro. É na própria diferença entre duas esferas que não coincidem, entre as quais se coloca uma lacuna, que se coloca a articulação que funda a linguagem: articulação encaminhada sobre um "plexo de diferenças" e sobre a ressonância que permite a passagem e a composição de valores referenciais entre elas. Mas que o lugar 164 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. 60-61. 90 dessa diferença seja esquecido, que haja um esquecimento dessa cisão, eis, para Agamben, o que constitui a insígnia definidora da tradição da metafísica165 e da sua transmissão (e, se Heidegger podia defini-la também pelo "esquecimento do ser", Agamben a define pelo esquecimento da fratura fundante da linguagem entre mostrar e dizer, entre langue e parole). Como o esquecimento se processa, portanto, é o que nos faz penetrar na negatividade do fundamento, nas suas operações articulatórias que atuam soldando a cisão mesma da qual ele irrompe. A restituição do pensamento ao lugar dessa fratura é o que permite colocar em jogo o que Agamben denomina compreender a metafísica. Sua escolha, aparentemente mais modesta que a de seu mestre da floresta negra, segue, contudo, pari passu o seu gesto e, ainda mais, dá-lhe continuidade: dá-lhe a sua continuidade e aponta para a superação desse gesto, na busca do que é próprio. Se, no plano da história, não se pode conceber como origem – a não ser numa historiografia pouco sutil – uma cronologia, um antes ou um depois para a linguagem, pois a ideia mesma de história humana nos desloca da história natural como acontecimento (a humanização como evento); no plano da experiência, que marca os registros individuais da espécie, por ele estar conectado à rede das demais experiências, à história, enfim, também não se pode dizer de nós próprios antes de nossa aquisição da linguagem, pois nós nos vemos como seres de linguagem, e as mais tenras reminiscências, mesmo que mudas, estão inscritas na rede da representação, integrando em si o mudo e o sonoro. O inefável da experiência, portanto, é o próprio limite da experiência – e dele não se pode falar; e, quando dele se fala, faz-se, então, o mito. Mas o inefável, persiste Agamben, não aparece senão como o lugar no qual a metafísica, assim como a linguagem que ela pressupõe, encontra o seu limite, confina com o mito, assim como confina, também, com a poesia. A linguagem e a morte surge, nesse interstício, como momento de expor "ideias e materiais"166, e se não podemos considerá-la como protocolo ou síntese do curso do qual resultou, não obstante deve, segundo entendemos, ser considerada como um programa de suas indagações, na mesma medida ou além de futuras obras programáticas. Logo de início, na Introdução, são expostos de modo relativamente sistemático, o que pode surpreender o leitor acostumado à linguagem de exposição de suas obras mais recentes e conhecidas, os problemas em jogo, as indagações que conduzem o pensamento 165 165 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. 58. 166 O livro, publicado em 1982, resultou da compilação dos materiais que ensejaram um seminário, ministrado pelo autor, ocorrido "do inverno de 1979 ao verão de 1980". 91 e os objetivos da investigação167. Trata-se de questionar um problema que revolve a filosofia ocidental, dando-nos um roteiro relativamente possível e uma progressão de problemas que não podem permanecer não articulados. Seguindo aquele preceito que posteriormente indicará como sendo o de desenvolver o que restara em potência na obra de um autor que admira, daquilo que poderia ter um potencial de desenvolvimento, Agamben aproxima-se de um limite do pensamento por meio de uma passagem final do ensaio de Heidegger, essencial para o seu próprio desenvolvimento, sobre A essência da linguagem: os mortais são aqueles que podem fazer experiência [erfahren] da morte como morte. O animal não o pode. Mas o animal não pode sequer mesmo falar. A relação essencial [das Wesensverhältnis] entre a morte e a linguagem aparece como em um lampejo, mas está ainda impensada. Ela pode, todavia, dar-nos um aceno quanto ao modo em que a essência da linguagem nos reivindica a si e nos mantêm assim consigo, caso a morte pertença originariamente àquilo que nos reivindica.168 A partir da experiência íntima da morte, pela qual, podendo encará-la face a face, separa-se do animal, vem à luz aquela outra capacidade que lhe é intrínseca, a de linguagem. Mesmo que, para conectá-las, baste atentar ao "lampejo" que permite vislumbrar a relação, ao mesmo tempo essa relação permaneceu no limbo do pensamento. É justamente o "impensado" que se constitui como o que deve ser explorado; é um problema que permaneceu continuamente em estágio larval, em vias de constituição. A "relação essencial entre morte e linguagem" apresenta-nos, portanto, a delimitação mínima de um projeto que, além da interpretação particular de um pensamento, revolve a história da filosofia ocidental em busca dos momentos nos quais essa relação se mostra de fato essencialmente e que permite atravessá-lo no sentido em que haja uma liberdade para o homem além dos vínculos que fazem dele o mortal e o falante. Se o pensamento filosófico pôde delimitar o homem por suas "faculdades" de falar e de morrer, o cristianismo, por seu lado, consagrou e difundiu a conexão entre elas 167 Algumas conclusões, sinteticamente, já se encontram aí enunciadas. Como o sentido delas só adquire concretude, parece-nos, com a leitura integral da obra, entendemos ser mais adequado expô-las adiante. 168 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 3. HEIDEGGER, Martin. Unterwegs zur Sprache, p. 203 [p. 215]. Novamente, baseamo-nos na tradução do próprio Agamben, na medida em que revela os seus processos não apenas interpretativos, mas propriamente de conceituação. Conforme for o caso, reproduziremos traduções vernáculas para cotejo, ou introduziremos os termos do original que revelariam alguma possível nuance de ordem tradutória ou algum uso de língua próprio do original. Na tradução brasileira de Márcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback, lê-se: "Mortais são aqueles que podem fazer a experiência da morte como morte. O animal não é capaz dessa experiência. O animal também não sabe falar. A relação essencial entre a morte e a linguagem lampeja, não obstante ainda de maneira impensada. Essa relação pode, contudo, nos dar um aceno para o modo em que a essência da linguagem nos intima e alcança e, com isso, nos sustenta, se é que a morte faz parte do que nos intima" (HEIDEGGER, Martin. A caminho da linguagem, p. 170-171). 92 na experiência: segundo Paulo, um dos artífices da instituição do cristianismo, e outro referencial para a constituição do pensamento agambeniano, "os homens, os viventes, são 'incessantemente remetidos à morte por meio de Cristo (ἀεὶ γὰρ ἡμεῖς οἱ ζῶντες εἰς θάνατον παραδιδόμεθα διὰ Ἰησοῦν, II Cor. 4,11)", isto é, "por meio do Verbo, e é essa fé que os move à palavra (καὶ ἡμεῖς πιστεύομεν, διὸ καὶ λαλοῦμεν, 4,13) e os constitui como 'os ecônomos dos mistérios de Deus' (οἰκονόμους μυστηρίων θεοῦ, I Cor. 4,1)"169. Detendo o pensamento, tais constatações, sem dúvida concernentes a momentos cruciais da cultura ocidental, colocam-se como uma cadeia de problemas: a faculdade da linguagem e a faculdade da morte: o nexo entre essas duas 'faculdades', sempre pressupostas no homem e, todavia, jamais colocadas radicalmente em questão, pode verdadeiramente restar impensado? E se o homem não fosse nem o falante nem o mortal, sem por isso cessar de morrer e de falar? E qual é o nexo entre essas suas determinações essenciais? Sob as duas diversas formulações, não dizem elas talvez o mesmo? E se esse nexo não tivesse, com efeito, lugar?170 Em última análise, que o homem fale e morra sem estar circunscrito essencialmente por faculdades para uma mesma coisa, a qual, todavia, pode nem ter um lugar, reconfigura a formulação. O que era tomado "enquanto tal", a relação, o nexo, até então transmitido num continuum, torna-se ele próprio um problema. O que a investigação de Agamben permite constatar, assim, é que iluminar a relação entre a linguagem e a morte traz à luz o problema do lugar da negatividade – até então buscado nos termos da relação entre palavra e fantasma, signo e barreira, presença e falta: "Tanto a 'faculdade' da linguagem quanto a 'faculdade' da morte, enquanto abrem ao homem a sua morada mais própria, abrem e desvelam essa morada como já sempre atravessada pela negatividade e nela fundada"171. A negatividade exposta como fundamento da "morada mais própria" do homem, apresentar-se-á, então, numa indicação radical, como o problema do fundamento (negativo) concernente à própria metafísica, e não apenas aos seus modos de compreensão e formulação. A isso chegará a pesquisa agambeniana a partir da confrontação com o problema da Voz como sendo a estruturação da negatividade. A tradição filosófica é, assim, suspensa com um gesto sutil, pois, entravando a operacional separação metafísica entre phoné e lógos, por em nenhum deles se poder situar a Voz, acaba por indagá-la "por 169 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 4. 170 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 4. 171 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 4. 93 meio da definição da esfera de significado da palavra ser e dos indicadores da enunciação que dela constituem parte integrante"172. Deste modo, diante da possibilidade de se encontrar um lugar para a Voz, com esse encadeamento, tem-se uma topologia da negatividade a partir da linguagem. Indicando tal problema como um caminho a ser percorrido pelo pensamento, coloca-se no horizonte a ética, "o ἦθος, isto é, a morada habitual do homem"173. Como vimos, uma vasta tradição coloca a linguagem como abrindo a ética e a política ao homem. Sem também questioná-la, portanto, não se poderia levar a cabo o questionamento efetivo de seu fundamento na tradição filosófica ocidental, ainda mais que no próprio cerne do ēthos (ἦθος) aflora o fundamento negativo cujo advento assoma como niilismo, envolvendo a teoria e a prática humanas. Conduzir o pensamento por outra via que não a do niilismo, na senda heideggeriana explorada por Agamben, significa, portanto, compreender efetivamente a relação com um fundamento negativo, e compreendê-lo, nesse caso, quer dizer além do niilismo174. No movimento de rastrear a origem do traço de negatividade, desafia-se a atividade filosófica do pensamento ao colocar no centro, pois, o seu próprio material e a sua própria forma, a linguagem e a representação. Colocando no centro o papel da linguagem, ele, mais do que uma função do pensamento ou um meio de expressão, deve ser considerado como pertinente a problemas ontológicos, isto é, originários e condizentes à própria historicidade do homem. Pelo questionamento da negatividade em Heidegger, sintetizado pela busca do significado da partícula Da do Dasein, é que Agamben pode remontar ao pensamento hegeliano e, lá, desdobrar um segundo problema, o da indicação. Entender a homologia estrutural meditada entre o "ser-o-aí" e o "apreender-o-isto", isto é, Heidegger e Hegel, significa conduzir o problema da topologia da negatividade à própria linguagem. 172 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 4-5. 173 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 5. 174 Conquanto seja um termo relativamente raro na obra de Agamben (com a exceção de L'uomo senza contenuto, no qual essa temática também vigora, embora voltado ao estatuto das obras de arte), o niilismo tanto o coloca diante do tempo presente quanto o conecta à "tradição" que se estende, passando por Heidegger, a Nietzsche. Agamben parece retomar, com isso, o veredicto de Heidegger: "'Trata-se, de fato, de remover o niilismo. A preparação da superação do niilismo começa na experiência fundamental de que, como o fundador de Da-sein, o homem é usado pela divindade do outro deus. O mais essencial e difícil nesta superação é, porém, o conhecimento [Wissen] do niilismo' (LXV [1989], 140s" (HEIDEGGER, Martin. Beiträge zur Philosophie (Vom Ereignis), p. 140 e ss. APUD INWOOD, Michael. Dicionário Heidegger, p. 130). 94 2.2. O lugar do ser (Dasein: être le-là) Embora Martin Heidegger enverede-se de mais de uma forma em suas perguntas pelo ser, isto é, desdobre, com o abandono do horizonte de Ser e Tempo, em outros sentidos a busca pela constituição de um caminho para o ser enquanto ser, para uma meditação sobre o sentido do ser, Ser e tempo continua a ser um momento essencial para a inteligibilidade do seu pensamento filosófico e para a sua formulação. Uma tentativa de compreensão da estrutura da metafísica não poderia deixar de passar, então, por tal obra – e mais, não poderia deixar de encontrar, nela, um capítulo crucial de inflexão do pensamento filosófico. A analítica do Dasein constitui-se sobre o ângulo do questionamento do sentido de uma totalizante pergunta sobre o sentido do ser – e a busca pelo lugar da pergunta conduz-se sobre outro questionamento, o qual não apenas revela que aquela permaneceu em suspensão, mas que a preeminência metafísica ocultou o questionamento originário. Ela é o modo de explicitar de um projeto filosófico e um modo então singular de partir rumo a uma investigação ontológica: partir daquele que é o Dasein, daquele que não é o ser mas permite perscrutar um horizonte de aproximação do ser. Eis por que, portanto, Ser e tempo, do ser, da pergunta monumental, visando a um modo de acesso, desloca-se para o ser do Dasein, para a abertura da existência, como sendo aquele que não apenas coloca o ser em jogo numa temporalidade, apresentando-se um modo de ser, mas como aquele "que em tal ser tem em jogo o próprio ser"175, como sendo aquele cujo modo de ser permite lançar um modo de compreensão do ser, uma vez que pode se colocar a questão do ser, do sentido do ser, não apenas em potência, por ser dotado de tal capacidade, mas pode efetivamente experimentá-la. No plano de fundo, se a indagação sobre o ser se encaminha sobre a indagação do ser de um ente, é porque ele se estrutura de forma tal que permite, pelo horizonte de Ser e tempo, entender algo do âmbito originário. Ao se colocar no próprio espaço aberto por Ser e tempo, Agamben obtém o ponto de partida da sua explicitação de um modo de compreender a metafísica que seja capaz de entender a negatividade do seu fundamento, a negatividade fundante da linguagem. Sendo o Dasein a abertura do ser, é da estrutura do Dasein que se parte para o contraponto de um pensamento que indaga a metafísica, e não simplesmente a continua 175 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 639 [p. 231]. 95 ou a nega, implícita ou explicitamente. Embora o problema da negatividade – e sua remissão ao Nada –, em uma de suas formas mais burilada, apareça em O que é a metafísica, Agamben coloca-o pela busca, a partir da especificidade do Dasein ("ser-aí") como conceito fundador do pensamento heideggeriano de Ser e tempo, de um contínuo que perpasse tanto a sua analítica existencial quanto o seu desvelamento no contexto da história da verdade do ser. Coloca-se a pergunta, então, agambeniana, de onde e como, no Dasein, provém a negatividade. Segundo essa via, A linguagem e a morte inaugura-se com a remissão dessa negatividade proveniente ao Dasein à própria ideia de morte – afinal, é a "relação essencial" da linguagem com a morte o impensado que se deve investigar. Agamben precisa, pois, entender como se revela a negatividade ao Dasein, o que, diante dos desdobramentos internos de Ser e tempo, decorre do enfrentamento com a morte. O animal, ao reportarmos ao contexto da obra heideggeriana, não experimenta a fala, mas também não experimenta a morte. Ele é o "apenas-vivente"176, e, enquanto tal, pode apenas "cessar de viver"177. A morte não pertence a outro ente que não o homem enquanto Dasein. Porém, não sendo fortuita essa ligação, pois a morte não está à espreita desde fora, opera-se a elevação da morte ao estatuto "existenciário"178 do Dasein, isto é, ontológico, constitutivo, carregando, para o seu cerne, a possibilidade mais extrema, "a possibilidade da pura e simples impossibilidade-de-ser-'aí' [Daseinunmöglichkeit]"179. Se o lógos separa o homem do animal, também a morte, aqui, mutatis mutandis, tem de separá-los. Ao homem, portanto, não apenas é aquele que morre e pode morrer, mas aquele a quem é dado "experimentar a morte como morte" – ele é aquele que se coloca diante da morte (que só se abre para ele) e se permite encará-la. Ele é o ente cujo modo de ser, a sua existência, o seu ser-aí, permite-lhe contemplar a própria possibilidade de não ser ("a impossibilidade-de-ser-'aí'"). Precisamente, é a morte o que permite ao Dasein deixar de ser aí. Ao mesmo tempo, a morte é a sua "possibilidade-de-ser [Seinsmöglichkeit]"180, aquilo mesmo que lhe possibilita estar "aí". Sendo a morte o que lhe aponta a passagem do Dasein ao nãoDasein, do ser possibilitado à impossibilidade de abrir um lugar para o ser, na medida em 176 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 7. 177 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 665 [p. 241]. 178 Essa é a sugestão tradutória de Fausto Castilho, tradutor da edição brasileira que tomamos por referência, para o termo Existenzial, o qual remete a um modo de denominar a existência no sentido do ser, do ontológico, não se confundindo com a sua designação no sentido apenas ôntico. 179 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 691 [p. 250]. 180 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 690 [p. 250]. 96 que lhe é constitutiva, ocorre, nos desdobramentos diante do seu ser para a morte, a "revelação de uma negatividade (Nichtigkeit) que pertence originalmente ao ser do Dasein"181. Como se revela a negatividade, isto é, aquilo a que Agamben visa, é algo que pode ser buscado no desdobramento das figurações da consciência que culminam com uma disposição extremada, a angústia. Dissemos, acima, que o homem é aquele que morre e que pode morrer. Ora, com isso dizemos que o homem não apenas efetivamente morre, fecha a existência atrás de si, mas que, mediante uma potência, pelo fato de ele se encontrar sendo na existência, ele pode se defrontar consciente e angustiosamente com essa capacidade, cuja efetividade é a sua aniquilação, a sua "nadificação". Se ele pode morrer, no sentido de enfrentamento, ele pode, pelo contrário, afundando-se na cotidianidade, afugentá-lo, ele pode decair na fuga dessa verdade e esconjurá-la na linguagem ordinária atribuindo-a tanto aos outros quanto a si mesmo apenas abstratamente dizendo "a-gente morre", o que recai (ou decai) no sentido banal do morrer como finar-se. A revelação da sua possibilidade mais extrema, possibilitando atravessá-la mediante uma experiência de profunda angústia, surge de uma "voz da consciência". Desde aqui, portanto, coloca-se em relação a disposição (Stimmung) e a voz (Stimme) – uma voz, agora, oriunda dos desvios fenomenológicos, os quais conduziram a projeção discursivo-fônica à composição da consciência do eu como acontecimento, por assim dizer, interior. No sentido de possibilitar uma compreensão do horizonte total do Dasein, é diante da morte, com a interpelação de uma voz da consciência a chamar e despertar uma culpa, que se abre a ideia de uma antecipação da possibilidade da morte, apenas sob o modo, puramente negativo, do seu ser-para-a-morte, Assim, quando dissemos que o homem é aquele que se coloca face a face com a morte, isso é possível mediante uma tal "antecipação", pela qual, interpelado pela voz da consciência, revela-se que, "coerentemente com a estrutura puramente negativa da antecipação da morte, a 181AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 8. Importante ter em mente aqui que Agamben traduz Nichtigkeit, derivada de nicht ("não" e "nada"), como "negatividade". Ainda, poder-se-ia traduzi-la por "nulidade", conforme a tradução de Fausto Castilho (HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p.781), na qual se vê Nichtheit como "negatividade". Assim, o problema de uma negatividade condizente ao fundamento e o de outra ao nada estão, praticamente, assimilados. A negatividade buscada por Agamben é a que como que deriva e diz respeito precisamente ao nada – não sem alguma razão, então, o termo niilismo aparece. Com a negatividade remetendo, para Agamben, essencialmente ao nada, ele está afirmando, ao fim, que o homem se dá ao ser diante do nada – e isso origina as negações, os nãos específicos e discursivos. Agora, a condição mesma da linguagem, encontra-se, diante do ser, e como o ente que se abre ao ser como o ser, isto é, o Dasein, na mais completa negatividade, que é outro modo de indicar o "não-lugar" onde se dá a apropriação (o acontecimento que dá lugar). 97 experiência da própria possibilidade mais autêntica coincide, de fato, para o Dasein, com a experiência da mais extrema negatividade"182. A aparição da negatividade, portanto, a cada imersão da analítica da existência, intensifica-se cada vez mais até o seu despontar como negatividade, isto é, o "ser-projeto" como fundamento das possibilidades do Dasein, no qual a "negatividade (Nichtigkeit) não significa de algum modo não estar presente, não consistir, mas significa um Não que constitui esse ser do Dasein, o seu ser-projetado"183, e mesmo o "cuidado [Sorge] – o ser do Dasein –", que responde pela culpa, pelo ser-culpado do Dasein "significa como projeto jogado: o (negativo) ser-fundamento de uma negatividade [Das (nichtige) Grund-sein einer Nichtigkeit]"184. A estrutura de um tal fundamento negativo disponibiliza ao Dasein a sua existência, o seu ser como cuidado e o seu ser-culpado até o fim. No Dasein, portanto, está em jogo o próprio ser, a sua possibilidade atravessada pela sua impossibilidade – na sua existência, a morte. Diante dessa irrupção do nada e da negatividade, Heidegger questiona, então, "o problema da origem ontológica da negatividade"185, o que, já prefigurando O que é a metafísica?, remete o não e a negação a um substrato mais profundo, do qual deriva, pois, o próprio poder negador. A inquietação agambeniana diante dessas questões, então, levao a questionar o locus de proveniência dessa negatividade que atravessa e constitui o Dasein. Se a negatividade que perpassa de modo constitutivo o ser do Dasein de múltiplos modos, não é, por conseguinte, introduzida por algo de fora, nem pode ser removida (ou "superada", o que introduziria o Dasein numa dialética), ela tem de estar, de algum modo, no seu próprio ser – o que a autêntica antecipação da morte deixa entrever. Enquanto a fuga da suprema angústia diante da morte exterioriza a negatividade, fazendo-a, por exemplo, morte dos outros, a antecipação da morte efetivada pelo Dasein revela-lhe, para si próprio, que é nele, ou melhor, que ele é a possibilidade da morte: é na sua própria constituição, no aí do seu ser, do qual surge uma ameaça, que está entranhada 182 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 8. 183 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 8. "Nulidade não significa de modo algum nãosubsistência, não-constar, designando, ao contrário, um não que constitui esse ser do Dasein, a dejecção" (HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 781 [p. 284]. Grifo nosso). 184 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 8. HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 781 [p. 285]. Na tradução de Castilho, "A preocupação – ser do Dasein – significa, por conseguinte, como projeto dejectado: o nulo ser fundamento de uma nulidade" (HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 781) 185 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 783 [p. 286]. 98 essa possibilidade186 - "o Dasein se abre para uma constante ameaça que surge do seu 'aí' ele mesmo"187. Não apenas em Ser e tempo o papel do aí do Dasein é destacado. Numa carta posterior de Heidegger, endereçada a Jean Beaufret (23 de novembro de 1945), já no contexto da Kehre ("viravolta") do seu pensamento, pela qual olha para o projeto abandonado, ele conecta o aí ao desvelamento, à possibilidade mesma de ser o aí, de darse à existência mantendo-se nela suspenso: Da-sein é uma palavra-chave do meu pensamento (ein Schlüssel Wort meines Denkens), e, por isso, ela também ocasiona graves mal-entendidos. Da-sein não significa tanto, para mim, me voilà, quanto, se posso me exprimir em um francês talvez impossível, être-le-là. E le-là é precisamente Ἀλέθεια: desvelamento-abertura.188 Para esclarecer essa negatividade que provém ao Dasein a partir dele mesmo como abertura, é preciso colocar o que, no aí, abre-lhe isso, pois "algo há, na pequena palavra Da, que nulifica, que introduz a negação naquele ente – o homem – que tem de ser o Da", e que leva a perguntar, agora, "(..) de onde provém ao Da o seu poder nulificante? (...) Onde está o Da, se aquilo que se sustém na sua clareira (Lichtung) é, por isso mesmo, o 'lugar-tenente do nada' (Platzhalter des Nichts [...])?"189. A questão sobre a negatividade especificamente se encaminha com e se coloca em jogo no gesto topológico, isto é, a busca pelo que há, no dar-se da negatividade, de propriamente condizente a um acontecimento, e não a um mero espaço já circunscrito no ser, uma vez que o Dasein topicaliza o mundo, abre-o como lugar da existência, mas, antes, abre-o à existência, ao próprio ser190. O Dasein, como conceito fundamental de Ser e tempo, enquanto é aquele que torna manifesto o problema do esquecimento e velamento do ser na metafísica (na filosofia), é aquele que, na sua constituição mesma, revela-se (autêntico) e encobre-se (inautêntico) no modo da ambiguidade da alḗtheia, o que Heidegger reforça na passagem acima. Podemos dizer, portanto, que as determinações fundamentais do Dasein por ele expostas atuam de modo a apontar, na estrutura mesma do ser-o-aí, a partir do seu Da, 186 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 10. 187 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 729 [p. 265]. 188 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 11. No texto original, com diferenças sutis mas que revelam a expressividade da missiva, "'me voilà!'" e "être le-là" (HEIDEGGER, Martin. Lettre a Monsieur Jean Beaufret, p. 182). Como Agamben utiliza-se de "essere-il-ci", hifenizando toda a expressão, utilizaremos "ser-o-aí", apesar do uso original de Heidegger. 189 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 11. 190 Vale reafirmar, aqui, a virada do lugar em relação ao simples espaço na filosofia de Agamben, como já vimos com Estâncias – onde se detém o encaminhamento, agora, é o que permitirá circunscrever o sentido filosófico da investigação. 99 aquilo que, abrindo-se também negativamente como um nada, encaminha para o seu ser – o qual, já tomando o Heidegger posterior, é vinculado essencialmente à linguagem. Deste modo, mais do que do próprio Dasein, agora "ser-o-aí", como conceito e como termo filosófico, é do próprio aí que parte a investigação de Agamben: a possível aparência de aventura meramente terminológica revela-se como uma teoria do lugar, do lugar da linguagem, conduzida pela abertura percebida no interior do Da-sein, cujo ser se define pelo seu aí, pelo sua abrir não apenas de um lugar, mas do seu próprio. A negatividade que se remete à linguagem aponta para um nexo que tem história em nossa cultura e em nossa filosofia. E é, primeiramente, essa relação que, num movimento tomado, não sem hesitação, como análogo ao de Heidegger, conduz Agamben a Hegel, ao debruçar-se sobre "uma partícula morfológica e semanticamente conexa com o Da: o pronome demonstrativo diese (isto)"191, e pela qual se expressa a tentativa frustrada de a certeza sensível apreender o seu objeto192. Se há uma homologia, de fato, entre essas duas estruturações, então, talvez, o projeto heideggeriano não tanto se desloque além do limite, mas, como Hegel, aponte-o de modo certeiro, permitindo, nesse caso, um ponto de partida para uma compreensão da metafísica, isto é, da fundamentação da filosofia sobre um fundamento negativo. 2.3. O mistério dos demonstrativos (das Diese) Em um gesto que não escapa ao leitor, Agamben situa o problema do indizível numa problemática continuidade em Hegel, a saber, aquela que, pela ideia de mistério, une um poema de juventude chamado Elêusis (1796), dedicado a Hölderlin, à Fenomenologia do espírito (1807). O mistério como mediador do indizível, indicado pela sabedoria muda dos iniciados no contexto dos mistérios eleusinos, não deve ser suplantado, na leitura agambeniana, da perspectiva geral da compreensão da obra hegeliana. Assim, logo na abertura da Fenomenologia, cujo ponto de partida se dá no capítulo A certeza sensível, ou: O Isto e o querer-dizer (Die sinnliche Gewissheit, oder: 191 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 11. 192 Além disso, tendo sempre em mente que a obra não se trata de uma exegese da negatividade no pensamento de Heidegger, mas sim uma aproximação do problema que ela encaminha no pensamento. Heidegger, então, deve ser situado nessa história como um caso limite, o qual pode ser lido à luz da sua própria postura em relação a Nietzsche. Essa hipótese, que suplanta a análise substantiva aqui em questão e ensejaria outros enfrentamentos, não deve ser descartada nesse aparente salto entre um sistema filosófico e um pensamento tão distintos entre si. Com isso, evidencia-se um pensamento sobre o próprio "estado" da linguagem na concepção filosófica ocidental – para cuja elucidação, ainda, contribuem as sempiternas querelas entre filosofia e poesia. 100 Das Dieses und das Meinen) 193, ao confrontar a certeza sensível, observa-se uma passagem do resguardo do indizível pelo silêncio da própria linguagem, o qual, no poema, estava ligado à experiência dos mistérios. A experiência dos mistérios que Hegel exalta na sua poesia, iniciada com louvores a Ceres – deidade à qual, na imagem da helênica Deméter, comum e primariamente se reporta o culto eleusino –, é a experiência de uma vida cujo percurso, alterado profundamente pelos ensinamentos iniciáticos, adquire seu ápice quando o pensamento, desprendendo-se de uma alma, devota-se, "além do tempo e do espaço a expiar o infinito" ("Die auẞer Zeit und Raum in Ahndung der Unendlichkeit"), diante do esquecer-se de si, despertando a consciência: "(...) Quem aos outros quisesse disso falar, / falaria com a língua dos anjos, experimentaria a pobreza das palavras" ( "Wer gar davon zu andern sprechen wollte, Sprach er mit Engelzungen, fühlt' der Worte Armut")"194. Diante dos altares abandonados, até mesmo pelos deuses, desapossados, em vão o estudioso procura palavras a respeito dos ritos aos mistérios de Ceres. O sagrado está terminantemente confiado à memória. 193 Diversas têm sido as traduções do termo das Meinen em edições da Fenomenologia do Espírito. Enquanto a tradução brasileira opta pela tradução "o visar", as francesas de Jean Hyppolite e Jean-Pierre Lefebvre, respectivamente, por exemplo, optam por "ma visée du ceci" e "le point de vue intime", oscilando ao redor de um significado da ordem do visual. Nota-se, então, a originalidade da tradução de Agamben. Pela língua inglesa, encontramos em to mean e em meaning – que são os termos adotados por Michael Hardt e Karen E. Pinkus para, respectivamente, meinen e Meinung, em sua tradução (Cf. Language and death, p. 10 e ss) – a indicação de um compartilhamento de campo semântico entre Meinung e Bedeutung: isto é, há uma "intenção" significante que as perpassa. No comentário que tece ao termo Das Meinen, Lefebvre tece a seguinte consideração: "Trata-se, aqui, em conformidade com os usos e as significações desse verbo muito comum na língua popular, de uma forma primeira, quase pré-discursiva, da consciência do mundo exterior, que sublinha a dimensão subjetiva, individual, ainda interior da experiência feita, antes da identificação pela percepção. Ou, se se quiser, de uma apreensão pobre, defeituosa. Tão pobre que ela não pode nem mesmo ser uma ilusão" (HEGEL, G. W. Phénoménologie de l'esprit, p. 37). "(...) Meinung ("opinião, ponto de vista") e meinen ("pensar, acreditar, opinar"). Kant definiu Meinung como 'uma aceitação como verdadeiro (Fürwahrhalten) do que é conscientemente insuficiente, tanto do ponto de vista subjetivo quanto do objetivo. Se a aceitação como verdadeiro é apenas subjetivamente suficiente, mas é evidente a sua insuficiência objetiva, então estamos na presença da fé. Finalmente, se a aceitação como verdadeiro é subjetiva e objetivamente suficiente, isso é conhecimento' (CRP, B850). Hegel associa Meinung com (o etimologicamente não aparentado) mein ('meu'), e portanto, com idiossincrasia: é uma 'REPRESENTAÇÃO (Vorstellung) subjetiva, um pensamento fortuito, uma fantasia, que posso formar de qualquer modo que me agrade, enquanto que outrem pode fazê-lo de modo inteiramente diverso. Um Meinung é mein; não é um pensamento intrinsecamente universal, um pensamento que é EM E PARA SI. Mas a filosofia é CIÊNCIA objetiva da verdade, ciência de sua necessidade, conhecimento conceitual, não opinião é desfiar de opiniões' (IHF, Introd.). Em FE, I, e em outras partes, Hegel contrasta meu Meinung e o que eu meine com o que digo: o que eu meine, o meu particular Meinung, não pode expressar-se nas palavras universais disponíveis na linguagem. (Hegel defende invariavelmente a racionalidade da linguagem e deprecia Meinung.) Neste caso, meinen e Meinung correspondem a 'pretender, impulsionar' e 'pretensão, intenção', mas sempre no sentido do que uma pessoa quer dizer ou pretende significar por uma expressão ou elocução, não pelo significado de uma palavra" (INWOOD, Michael. Dicionário Hegel, p. 84-85. Grifo nosso). A tradução de Agamben trata-se, parece-nos, de uma tradução pelo sentido que o vocábulo pode assumir na conceituação hegeliana. 194 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 14-15. 101 Enquanto nos cultos eleusinos a experiência cotidiana era assolada e transformada pelos mistérios, que atravessavam e até mesmo barravam a constituição da experiência iniciática em discurso, a certeza sensível, no início da Fenomenologia do espírito, é apresentada segundo o que ela faz acreditar, isto é, como configuração imediata da experiência – seria, então, um saber do ente, daquilo que imediatamente se nos apresenta. Contudo, a partir do momento em que se questiona a sua verdade, quando se submete essa certeza a um exame atento, ela nada mais expõe do que uma forma rarefeita e abstrata, um universal: o puro Eu. Aquilo que apareceria como ponto de partida mais concreto e imediato à consciência não passa, pois, daquilo que é o mais abstrato. O particular "visado", então, não passava de um efeito do que se mantém contínuo na cadeia da experiência. A consciência opera, na certeza sensível, na forma de um puro Eu, o qual, nessa pureza, encontra-se apenas com universais e revela que "Eu só estou presente ali como puro este, e o objeto, igualmente, apenas como puro isto"195. Assim é que o Isto aparece como tal e ele é que passa a estar em jogo, uma vez que ele sintetiza o momento em que o pensamento se depara com os demonstrativos. Mas o que é o Isto, se ele não é o que se aponta ao se dizer isto? Como pura forma do indicar, o Isto tem, então, uma negatividade como base de sua universalidade. Aqui entre em cena a "dialética" do aqui e do agora, segundo o objeto e o sujeito196, os quais, longe de serem este ou aquele aqui e agora específicos, são universais. Mas o que tudo isso significa, de fato? A consciência, ao se tomar como eu, apresenta-se na vacuidade do puro eu, do qual a condição é um deslocamento entre a indicação e a enunciação. A esfera dos pronomes mostra-se não apenas pela referência aos objetos, pelos demonstrativos, mas também pelos pronomes que designam pessoas, pelos pronomes pessoais. Aqui, a rigor, não há ainda conteúdo algum da subjetividade, o que, na marcha da pesquisa agambeniana, constitui um relevante momento de averiguação que o permite precisar a cisão da linguagem entre o indicar e o significar como a cisão que funda a metafísica. Mas, no contexto hegeliano, a consciência está ainda longe de sua volta sobre si mesma: aqui apenas está começando a dialética da certeza sensível, na qual "ressaltam logo para fora do puro ser os dois estes já mencionados: um este, como Eu, e um este como 195 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 74. 196 Seguimos a sistematização proposta por Alexandre Kojève em Estrutura da Fenomenologia do espírito, pela qual se evidencia essa obra de Hegel em termos das suas "articulações dialéticas". Há, então, uma dialética do Isto (do objeto), que se analisa numa dialética do agora e outra do aqui; uma dialético do Eu (do sujeito), também desdobrada em agora e aqui; e uma dialética do todo, em cujo agora e aqui se opera a destituição do meinen segundo o movimento da indicação (KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 537; 540). 102 objeto"197. Se a um tal entendimento pode chegar Agamben, é porque persegue, aí, o "apreender-o-Isto", vale dizer, o meinen que se revela como o querer-dizer e que se separa do falar. Na dialética do objeto desdobra-se o isto, e nela o essencial e imediato é o objeto e o inessencial e mediatizado é o eu. Interrogando o que é o isto, o que é a certeza sensível como isto, ela se quebra segundo "o duplo aspecto de seu ser"198, no tempo e no espaço, como agora e como aqui. Na dialética do agora, parte-se da pergunta sobre o que é o agora. Ora, pode-se muito bem responder, e Hegel de fato assim o faz, dizendo que "agora é noite", o que, comumente, veicula a crença de que agora seja noite e de que se possa facilmente comprovar essa experiência escrevendo-a num pedaço de papel. Porém, quando for amanhã, agora também será dia, meio-dia, entardecer. Não há, além disso, mecanismo (gráfico-visual ou sígnico, como a escrita do exemplo hegeliano) que possa conservar a verdade de algum de tais agoras. O que se apresentava como "essente (Seiendes)" torna-se um "não-essente (Nichtseiendes)" e o agora aparece como "um negativo em geral", mediato, porque permanece diante da cessação, isto é, do não ser, de outros agoras (noite, dia, meio-dia) 199. Disso resulta que "nós denominamos um universal um tal Simples, que é por meio da negação: nem isto nem aquilo – um não-isto –, e indiferente também a ser isto ou aquilo"200. O mesmo que se desdobra para o agora é válido para a dialética do aqui, pois ele é o que resta depois que se o indicou como sendo árvore ou casa ou qualquer objeto, ele é o que permanece indiferentemente, como tal, apesar de cada denominação num ato de fala. "Nosso 'visar'", nosso querer-dizer, "é tudo quanto resta frente a esses aqui e agora vazios e indiferentes"201. Ora, com isso se inverte a dialética do objeto, e passamos, então à dialética do Eu (do sujeito), que passa, então, a ser o essencial e o imediato, pois a certeza sensível está no meu objeto. O Eu, então, passa a ser o que assegura a unidade dessa certeza, pois, na sua dialética do aqui e do agora, se agora é dia ou aqui é uma casa, eles o são porque eu os vejo como tais. Diante da "imediatidade (Unmittelbarkeit) do ver" 202 e da possível multiplicidades daqueles que veem, o eu, universal assim como o isto, impede que cada 197 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 75. 198 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 76. 199 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 76. 200 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 76. 201 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 77. 202 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 77. 103 aqui ou agora se percam nessa imediatididade e multiplicidade. Cada isto, aqui, agora ou eu acaba por recair na generalidade de cada uma dessas partículas em si desprovidas de substância e individualidade. Desmonta-se, assim, a possibilidade de que se diga, de fato, pelos próprios pronomes, aquilo a que se visa, aquilo que se quer-dizer. Coloca-se em jogo, já que tanto o objeto quanto o eu (o sujeito) são universais, o próprio meinen, que se constitui, na indicação, como a dialética do todo da certeza sensível. É o indicar e a indicação que se colocam, pois, entre o aqui e agora dessa dialética. Na dialética do agora, a indicação movimenta-se diante da perda do indicado: quando digo este agora, noite, e o agora passar a ser outro, frustra-se a indicação, pois aquele este agora, noite não mais diz do que foi indicado. De negação em negação, o agora deixa de ser algo (noite) para ter-sido (noite), ele não é mais; mas isso ao mesmo tempo em que é agora outra coisa (dia, por exemplo). O indicar, portanto, desloca o agora de uma simplicidade imediata, uma vez que há momentos nos quais se insere uma alteridade; e, assim como indicar é a experiência de que o agora é um universal, também na dialética do aqui, ele é "um movimento, desde um aqui 'visado', através de muitos aquis, rumo ao aqui universal"203. Mas há algo que está em questão como uma falência anterior à indicação: quando indico, dizendo agora é noite, trai-se a intencionalidade; o sensível que se querdizer não pode ser dito como tal: surge uma fronteira entre o dizer e o querer-dizer. Querendo-dizer o isto, representá-lo, o que se acaba por fazer é exprimir, enunciar, um universal. Nesse sentido, a linguagem apresenta-se como "o mais verdadeiro", pois nela nós mesmos contradizemos imediatamente o nosso querer-dizer (unsere Meinung) e, visto que o universal é o verdadeiro da certeza sensível e a linguagem exprime apenas esse verdadeiro, não é, portanto, possível que nós possamos dizer (sagen) um ser sensível que nós queremos-dizer (meinen).204 Há um curto-circuito que afasta o dizer do querer-dizer, o falar do que jaz, então, sobre o falado. Querer-dizer o objeto externo como isto não é o que se diz no dizer: o sensível é inacessível pela linguagem, e toda tentativa de plasmá-lo pelo falar, pela linguagem, em suma, redundaria numa descrição sem fim que, num movimento não 203 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 80. 204 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 18. "Enunciamos também o sensível como um universal. O que dizemos é: isto, quer dizer, o isto universal, ou então: ele é, ou seja, o ser em geral. Com isso, não nos representamos, de certo, o isto universal ou o ser em geral, mas enunciamos o universal; ou por outra, não falamos pura e simplesmente tal como nós o 'visamos' na certeza sensível. Mas, como vemos, o mais verdadeiro é a linguagem: nela refutamos imediatamente nosso visar, e porque o universal é o verdadeiro da certeza sensível, e a linguagem só exprime esse verdadeiro, está, pois, totalmente excluído que possamos dizer o ser sensível que 'visamos'" (HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 76). 104 exauriente, acabaria por dar-se conta de que não fala do que é; não fala do isto individual que se quer-dizer, desta caneta, por exemplo, mas de um universal. "O falar tem a natureza divina de inverter imediatamente o 'visar' [o querer-dizer], de torná-lo algo diverso, não o deixando assim aceder à palavra"205. O indizível torna-se, por conseguinte, o que recai sobre o querer-dizer; a linguagem, por outro lado, é convocada pela consciência como universal em si. O que Agamben leva em conta, nisso que se configura como uma interpretação, é que o falar não visa apenas ao universal, mas deixa insinuar, sob si, a negação do querer-dizer. A partir do momento em que Hegel cinde o falar do querer-dizer, é da própria cisão, que ensombrece e exclui o querer-dizer, que surge a negatividade, isto é, da frustração mesma do querer-dizer, por exemplo, isto é uma caneta. Com essa interpretação, insinua-se um momento essencial para a concepção agambeniana da linguagem como acontecimento. O querer-dizer como tal, deste modo, é assumido como resguardando o indizível, pois seu objeto, o sensível, não é o correspondente da enunciação, mas o universal. O querer-dizer vive à sombra da linguagem: este é o mistério por ela guardado. E falar em mistério, aqui, não é casual, pois é à "escola" dos mistérios antigos que Hegel recomenda aquele que quer-dizer a todo custo o objeto sensível, para, nela, "aprender o mistério [Geheimnis] de comer o pão e beber o vinho"206, pois, nele e por ele, permite-se a ele superar a imediatidade da experiência. Não apenas se participa da aniquilação desse pão e desse vinho, comendo e bebendo, mas se consuma a própria aniquilação; o iniciado não espera realidade alguma das coisas, ele as "des-espera" – elas, então, como que se "nadificam", traduzem-se como "negatividade": "a Meinung, (...) como tal, resta necessariamente não dita em todo dizer: mas esse não-dito, em si, é simplesmente um negativo e um universal"207. Com isso, ao invés de o silêncio ser o guardião do indizível, é a própria linguagem, a cada vez, que o traz negativamente, pela sua frustração diante do falar. Se o calar-se do iniciado, vivido na experiência dos mistérios, custodiava o indizível, agora a linguagem custodia o indizível dizendo-o, isto é, capturando-o na sua negatividade (...)[;] a linguagem capturou em si o poder do silêncio e aquilo que aparecia como indizível 'profundidade' pode ser custodiado – enquanto negativo – no próprio coração da palavra. Omnes locutio – poder-se-ia dizer 205 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 82. 206 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 20. HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 81. 207 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 21. 105 retomando um axioma de Nicolau de Cusa – ineffabile fatur, todo discurso diz o inefável; isto é, di-lo, mostra-o por aquilo que é: uma Nichtgkeit, um nada.208 Com esse movimento, que traz o indizível para dentro da linguagem, o qual como se coloca por trás dela, mas que ela acaba por acolher, Hegel extrai, para o seu sistema, o lugar de possibilidade do discurso – o fora da linguagem, ao qual os sensíveis simples que se pode querer-dizer serão confiados, na verdade, é o limite a partir do qual se possibilita a própria linguagem. Com isso, Agamben avança sua interpretação e conclui, com uma leitura que terá consequências para o seu próprio pensamento, que "Hegel, no primeiro capítulo da Fenomenologia, afirma simplesmente que o limite da linguagem cai sempre no interior da linguagem, já está sempre nela contido como negativo"209. Sendo o querer-dizer uma negatividade, todo dizer, então, trará consigo um traço dela, e a indicação, convertendo-se em falar, portanto, frustrar-se-á diante de si mesma. O propósito desse primeiro movimento, então, que aí chega a partir daquela relação entre morte e linguagem, apresenta-se como sendo o de expor o vínculo entre a negatividade, que nos foi revelada pela morte, e a linguagem. Com Heidegger, indica-se o abrir-se do Dasein à existência pelo seu próprio aí; com Hegel, abre-se a intangibilidade do indicar, enquanto apreensão de uma impossibilidade de trazer o dizer o Isto à palavra mesma – curto-circuito que frustra o querer-dizer, cuja frustração é interiorizada na indicação ou perdida na exteriorização do dizer O que se ressalta da homologia é uma negatividade radical como sendo o próprio do homem, tanto perpassando o seu ser-aí (oaí do ser enquanto sua abertura) quanto separando o humano da natureza, tendo em vista que "destacar do hic et nunc é universalizar"210. O questionamento dessa relação é o que oferece algo de genuinamente próprio do pensamento agambeniano em A linguagem e a morte, e é a isso que nos dedicaremos na sequência. O que devemos desdobrar, da leitura agambeniana de Hegel, é a remissão do o homem à negatividade na relação entre indicação e linguagem. O pensamento passa a girar, então, ao redor da indicação: não é ela mesma que está em jogo na insistência no aí e no isto? O que, no indicar e na indicação, frustra a remissão ao ente e remete ao nada? Essas perguntas dirigem-se ao fundo da investigação agambeniana – começam a tocar naquilo que ele instaura como a sua filosofia, construída a partir da 208 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 21. 209 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 25. 210 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 517. 106 crítica da metafísica em sua relação com aqueles que, levando-a suficientemente a sério, deixaram as marcas do seu limite. 2.4. O lugar da dêixis Um "problema" do pensamento pode, ao que indica a metodologia Agambeniana, permanecer latente na história das ideias sem que deixe, contudo, de vir informulado à superfície, com o que se mantém, por assim dizer, em estado bruto. Nesse sentido, a dêixis como um problema genuinamente filosófico, que apareceria na discussão da velha determinação entre linguagem e mundo, teria sido, no máximo, uma espécie de ponte, insegura, ao mais das vezes, entre ambos. Qual seja o seu papel específico a cumprir nesta história, ele permaneceu, em que pese seu papel fundamental, sem uma análise detida. O século XX, então, é que teria dado forma à questão, remetendo-a, para darmos apenas um exemplo, à referência, o que alterou, por sua vez, o curso de questões. O movimento de Agamben, num primeiro momento, é de retrocesso, isto é, ele retorna ao importante marco antigo da ontologia, sintetizado no tratado aristotélico sobre as Categorias, para, a partir daí, detectar uma gema bruta, mas preciosíssima, para a sua investigação. O lapidar é todo seu. Que encontre o que ainda lapidar sobre a categoria das categorias, a categoria primeira, a ousía, pode parecer surpreendente. E o é, de fato, na medida em que reata a ontologia e a linguagem no contexto de um puro indicar, a partir da diferenciação, dada pelo corpo textual aristotélico, entre ousía primeira (a "substância" ou "essência" primeira) e ousía segunda (as "substâncias" secundárias). Num gesto que se assemelha ao de Émile Benveniste ao analisar os exemplos dados a cada uma das categorias por Aristóteles, ao apontar justamente as categorias de língua (da língua grega) a que se relacionam211, Agamben, a partir do "ὁ τις ἄνθρωοπος, ὁ τὶς ἳππος, este certo homem, este certo cavalo"212, remete a ousía primeira à esfera de significado dos pronomes demonstrativos, enquanto as substâncias segundas são referidas à esfera de significado 211 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral I, p. 71 e ss. (Categorias de pensamento e categorias de língua). A diferença essencial entre as perspectivas é que Benveniste de fato remete as categorias de pensamento às categorias de língua. Agamben, por sua vez, considera os exemplos dados à "essência" em relação à "esfera de significado" do pronome demonstrativo e do nome. Pode-se dizer, assim, que a espreita agambeniana se dá além da categorização linguística, interessando-lhe capturar o ponto em que a metafísica atua por trás das classificações linguísticas por meio da significação e do sentido. 212 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 24. Grifo nosso. Como o texto corrente dos Excursos de A linguagem e a morte encontra-se em itálico e os destaques estão em fonte normal, invertemos essa sistematização do texto agambeniano, aqui, para não gerar confusão gráfica. 107 dos nomes213. Tal interpretação filosófica de Agamben, mediante sua operação tradutória, baseia-se numa afirmação filológica: "o artigo grego tem, na origem e ainda nos poemas homéricos, valor de pronome demonstrativo", função a qual, remetida a extratos mais antigos da língua grega, precisaria ser reativada por Aristóteles, o qual, "para restituirlhes essa função, (...) acompanha-os do pronome τὶς; os tradutores latinos das Categorias traduzem, de fato, ἄνθρωοπος com homo, e o ὁ τις ἄνθρωοπος com hic homo"214. Como o conceito fundamental da metafísica, o do ser, é aquele que subjaz à investigação das categorias, verifica-se que ele já aparece capturado numa rede de palavras conexa ao problema mais elementar do significado da indicação, na medida em que "Toda essência [primeira] significa um isto que (3b 10)"215. Ο "τóδε τι", o "isto que", para Agamben, representa a conexão do problema ontológico ao da indicação. Não sendo um este individual (como o agora desdobrado em noite ou dia da discussão hegeliana), a interpretação de Agamben adquire sentido no seio das formulações que então traçara, na medida em que destaca o próprio isto, que não se refere a nenhum indivíduo, mas a sua própria "estanciação", isto é, remete à própria existência discursiva, ao lugar da dêixis enquanto tal. Estando no ponto de passagem entre o mostrar e o dizer, "a dimensão de significado do ser é, assim, uma dimensão-limite da significação, o ponto em que essa se transpõe na indicação"216. A determinação categorial da essência primeira do ser esbarra nos limites da significação, atingindo um limite que não pertence ao dizer, mas ao mostrar, ao indicar. A duplicidade que se abre, no ser, desdobra a estância dupla da linguagem – a cisão aristotélica da οὐσία (que, como essência primeira, coincide com o pronome e com o plano da ostensão e, como essência segunda, com o nome 213 "2a 11 – Uma substância – aquela que é dita uma substância mais rigorosa, primariamente e acima de tudo – é aquilo que nem é dito de um sujeito nem em um sujeito, e. g., o homem individual ou o cavalo individual. As espécies em que as coisas primeiramente chamadas substâncias são, são chamadas de substâncias segundas, como também são os gêneros [genera] dessas espécies. Por exemplo, o homem individual pertence a uma espécie, homem, e animal é o gênero [genus] da espécie; então esses – ambos homem e animal – são chamados de substâncias segundas" (ARISTOTLE. Categories and De Interpretatione, p. 5-6. 2a 11-18. Grifo nosso); "algum homem (...) algum cavalo" (ANGIONI, Lucas. Teoria da predicação em Aristóteles, p. 197). 214 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 24. 215 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 24. "Every substance seems to signify a certain 'this'" (ARISTOTLE. Categories and De Interpretatione, p. 9). "Toda substância parece significar um certo isto" (ANGIONI, Lucas. Teoria da predicação em Aristóteles, p. 199). Comentando essa passagem, e desviandoa de interpretações que substancializam o "um certo isto" em um indivíduo, Angioni reitera que "a expressão tode ti não escapa ao que normalmente ocorre com a terminologia aristotélica: de acordo com contextos variados, o sentido relevante do 'isto' parece-nos ser dado pela oposição com 'quanto', 'qual' etc. (que são as rubricas pelas quais se mencionam as demais categorias que não a ousia), sem comportar necessariamente uma 'referência dêitica' a itens individuais'" (ANGIONI, Lucas. Idem, p. 171. Grifo nosso). 216 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 25. 108 comum e com a significação) constitui o núcleo originário de uma fratura do plano da linguagem em mostrar e dizer, indicação e significação que atravessa toda a história da metafísica e sem a qual o próprio problema ontológico resta informulável. Toda ontologia (toda metafísica, mas também toda ciência que se move, conscientemente ou não, no âmbito traçado pela metafísica) pressupõe a diferença entre indicar e significar e se define, ainda, propriamente por meio do ponto em que situa o limite entre eles.217 Reconquistamos, aqui, nosso terreno inicial de investigação: a fratura no plano da linguagem e sua vasta hereditariedade metafísica. Agora, clara e diretamente remete-se à ontologia. Além disso, porém, a cisão interior à linguagem não apenas diz respeito à ontologia, mas como que gera uma determinação significante do problema ontológico que permanecerá em alguma medida indeterminada como sendo a sua limitação (como aquele "impensado" da "relação essencial" anunciada por Heidegger). A ontologia (e a metafísica) não apenas pressupõe a cisão, agora nomeada entre mostrar e dizer, mas também se define pela relação que traça com ela, pelo modo como se coloca diante da cisão e como forja os limites entre os quais se situará. A insistência que deixa os seus traços neste trabalho pela questão do lugar e nas formas da topologia, topicalização, etc., mostra, assim, o seu sentido, pois é com esse conjunto de ferramentas herdadas da crítica que Agamben articula a sua perspectiva (seja ela topológica ou arqueológica), enquanto confronto com os limites, as condições de possibilidade, ou, já na sua terminologia, com o ter-lugar mesmo que possibilita os fenômenos, o ter-lugar da linguagem enquanto tal. Se da importância dessa "história", ou, ao menos, do relato que nos dá Agamben, já conhecemos algo, deve-se precisar em que sentido – e como – abre-se ontologicamente (já sobre uma metafísica) a fratura, sendo o problema da indicação o guia diante da clareira do mistério do mostrar e da selva do dizer. Mais do que reportar à linguagem da ontologia, aos modos como ela se apropria das palavras – cuja análise constitui uma ferramenta de investigação, na escavação de sentidos –, o ponto de confronto reside justamente naqueles confins nos quais a palavra falta e a ontologia se depara com a linguagem como simples indicar. Se a passagem entre ambos é o que a metafísica, não apenas em momentos extremos, atesta, o lugar ao qual se visa não poderia ser outro – a discussão sobre a negatividade pertence à história desse "hiato". A incursão rumo à ligação entre a matriz metafísica do ocidente e as concepções nela vigentes de linguagem, contudo, precisa partir do dizer, e da subversão de seu sentido, para que se acesse algo como o indicar – para isso, portanto, confluirá 217 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 27. 109 novamente a ciência da linguagem, a qual deixa sobressair não apenas o seu caráter instrumental, perceptível no fluxo da investigação, mas também o seu papel críticofundamental, como vimos no caso de Saussure. A similaridade analógica entre as remissões teórico-conceituais ao Da e ao Diese, cede lugar ao aprofundamento do aspecto linguístico em jogo, o qual, para Agamben, permanece latente como formulação: enquanto podendo dizer respeito a uma ampla categoria dos pronomes, é dela, mesmo como conexão aparentemente simples e fortuita, que se deve continuar. Para tanto, erige uma espécie de investigação arqueológica sobre o pronome, na qual realça três marcas que se depositaram no campo de significados da classificação e do conceito: a articulação dêitica, a qual anuncia uma fratura préexistente; a aproximação com a questão dos transcendentais, que busca dar sentido à articulação e questiona a juntura em jogo, bem como os seus elementos; e, a partir do ego moderno, o desvendamento da fratura pelo pensamento linguístico do século XX. Tais momentos, todavia, leremos em dois caminhos: um primeiro, da metafísica às formulações gramaticais, a partir do vínculo entre lógica e gramática, colocando o campolimite no qual se compreenderam os pronomes, e outro, em sentido diverso, da linguística à metafísica, pelo que se expõe a articulação, em termos propriamente ontológicos, ao recompor a carga de sentidos que se depositou com os "indicadores da enunciação" e pelos shifters. O movimento, portanto, construindo uma breve espécie de arqueologia da categoria dos pronomes inicia-se com a filosofia e a gramática gregas, indicando a sua recepção e formulação medieval, até a moderna formulação do eu como sujeito, a partir do qual, enfim, tem-se acesso a uma formulação mais concreta com a linguística do século XX. Complexa categoria, os pronomes devem sua primeira consolidação gramatical, com Dionísio da Trácia, à cunhagem estoica das "articulações indicativas [àrthra deikhitikhá]"218, a qual se deve, segundo Agamben, à retomada das partículas que subordinam ou coordenam elementos no discurso, e que já eram expostas por Aristóteles na Retórica como "ligamentos" (sýndesmoi). Juntos, então, numa mesma formulação devedora do conceber retórico-filosófico da articulação, o problema do pronome e o problema da dêixis, isto é, a indicação – ou demonstração, a partir das traduções latinas – que acompanha o pronome e lhe dá uma especificação de sentido. A partir daí, tem-se o solo mínimo com o qual o pensamento pode continuar a questionar essa tão estranha e 218 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 28. 110 fascinante faculdade pela qual se diz a verdade e a mentira, o juramento e o perjúrio, a beleza e a trapaça, no que a formulação gramatical revela seu íntimo parentesco ao contexto filosófico no qual primeiramente se questionou a ordem linguística além do "dom", divino ou natural. No curso do seu desenvolvimento, a reflexão gramatical do mundo antigo operou uma ligação entre conceitos gramaticais em sentido estrito e conceitos lógicos (...). O entrelaçamento de categorias gramaticais e categorias lógicas, que aparece já aqui completo, não é, todavia, um nexo casual, que possa ser desatado como, em certo ponto, parece ter sido enodado: antes, como haviam intuído os gramáticos antigos atribuindo a Platão e a Aristóteles a origem da gramática, categorias gramaticais e categorias lógicas, reflexão gramatical e reflexão lógica implicam-se originalmente em reciprocidade e são, portanto, inseparáveis.219 O nexo entre formulação gramatical e especulação filosófica revela-se pela íntima conexão, que já se pode entrever no próprio mundo antigo, entre as categorias gramaticais e as categoriais ontológicas, que se equiparam no sentido da categorialização que efetuam – "assim como as categorias de Aristóteles determinam os modos segundo os quais um objeto em geral pode ser representado ao conhecimento num juízo, as categorias gramaticais também o fazem para uma língua em geral"220. Estabelece-se, deste modo, um traçado da tradição gramatical que se conecta à investigação do fundamento a partir do qual ela adquire caráter inteligível e sua permanência como tradição, isto é, sua transmissibilidade. A nossa tradição é aquela que remonta à formalização da língua grega segundo uma técnica, o que encontramos já na denominação do clássico tratado da Antiguidade: A arte da gramática [Tékhnē grammatiké], fruto da elaboração de Dionísio da Trácia, por volta do século II, que já aí depositou parte do pensamento classificatório daquilo que viria a ser conhecido como gramática. Ora, esse percurso sobre a língua não era, ainda, a rigor, uma preocupação com a língua como objeto no sentido de um saber específico – isso, como vimos, é desenvolvimento muito posterior da teoria da linguagem. Mas era um acontecimento do pensamento sobre a estrutura de pensamentos e palavras helênicas. É esta, então, da emergência do lógos com o pensamento grego originário às inflexões promovidas por Platão-Aristóteles e pelos estoicos, em sua complexa rede de conceitos – pensamento-palavra, intelecto-lógos, substância-acidentes, etc. –, a matriz nem tão oculta assim da gramática, que aparece como uma tecnologia da linguagem, como a linguagem sendo colocada em execução segundo um modus faciendi. A gramática 219 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 29. 220 MILNER, Jean-Claude. O amor da língua, p. 114. 111 clássica, portanto, avizinhava-se, no sentido de sua origem, da lógica, pois se articulava sobre as conexões do que é ou pode ser dito. Desdobrava-se dos moldes de sentido construídos com e pela língua grega, mas também se aproximava da retórica, uma vez que poderia prescrever performances da palavra quanto a efeitos visados pelo falante, e não só classificar: a tradição gramatical clássica, assim, remetendo à língua aquilo que a lógica extraíra das possibilidades de cálculo e raciocínio da língua, consolidava um modelo de relação entre a linguagem e o pensamento, entre as palavras e os meandros da intelecção. Num continuum estrutural, o mundo latino, com as consequentes transposições feitas por Donato, por volta do século IV, de Dionísio da Trácia e por Prisciano, já no século V, de Apolônio Díscolo, realizou a passagem da língua paradigma, uma vez que o objeto (ou a base para o objeto) passou do grego ao latim, o qual, então, marcará o quadro da gramática no período medieval. Se a relevância do papel da retórica, e até mesmo a incidência dela sobre a gramática, sem dúvida consagrou-a como disciplina de estudo (a qual, com a lógica e a dialética, compunha o trivium), a prática efetiva da constituição de gramáticas continuava a se dar conforme os modelos transmitidos da antiguidade, embora com o impacto dos filtros eclesiásticos, como o modelo textual bíblico. O que o mundo antigo apenas isolou, quanto aos pronomes, articulando-os com a dêixis, o pensamento medieval especulativo intuiu como um problema articulatório, de ordem essencialmente teo-lógica, e, tendo recebido a relação entre as partes do discurso e as categorias aristotélicas pelas mãos de gramáticos latinos os ensinamentos da gramática clássica, tratará de aprofundá-las. Mas a gramática em seu caráter especular não recebe essa denominação de uma forma de rarefeita abstração teórica feita quanto ao pensamento medieval, mas de uma específica forma de pensar. Trata-se, com a gramática especulativa, de considerar as múltiplas reflexões entre pensamento e linguagem. Como já vimos, o papel de mediação da imagem tem um elevado caráter meditativo na civilização medieval; a imagem é, mesmo, uma forma de encaminhamento teórico entre as palavras e o pensamento. Movendo-se por analogias, mais do que pela dedução, o pensamento medieval, altamente enraizado na teologia, implementa-a no plano do raciocínio: como na rede universal de significados tudo que existe sob forma material foi antes concebido e depois criado por Deus, todos os seres e coisas são imagens, são reflexos, são espelhos. Tudo se reporta a um Primeiro Modelo, cuja totalidade não pode ser colocada em fragmentos da realidade material (...). Como toda relação Modelo/Imagem é especular, ganharam grande importância 112 no pensamento medieval (prolongada no dos séculos posteriores) os termos do campo semântico de specio – speculum, spectrum, spectator, specularius, specimen, prospicio, circumspicio, suspicio, etc. Portanto, não é casual que tenha existido toda uma literatura medieval de speculum, com a palavra sendo aplicada ao título de obras de diferentes tipos. De maneira ampla, desde Santo Agostinho até o século XIII aceitou-se o neoplatonismo de Plotino, para quem o universo é um espelho no qual a alma-mundo ou princípio inteligível aparece refletido. Mesmo a literatura laica adotou a ideia, com a Epistola presbyter Johannis e com Dante Alighieri usando o espelho como metáfora de Deus, com Le roman de la rose considerando Deus 'espelho da Natureza'. Entre os séculos XII e XVI, os poetas dedicados ao amor usaram o tema do espelho de forma cada vez mais introspectiva, porque tal metáfora não apenas aproximava amantes terrenos como também associava o amor humano ao Amor divino.221 Com a gramática especulativa ou filosófica, a gramática vem à luz, segundo o modelo teológico, segundo fontes lógico-metafísicas. Não à toa, portanto, o maior destaque dado por Agamben recai sobre esse período, no qual, sob a base de um modelo especulativo herdado da leitura cristã do platonismo, o modelado passou a ser outro, pois passou a renascer a herança clássica aristotélica. Trata-se, aqui, de um Aristóteles desvelado, pois, em muitos dos desenvolvimentos especulativos, estará no centro a análise da relação das categorias gramaticais com as categorias de pensamento: uma singular redescoberta que tem de ser reportada ao resgate de Aristóteles que se desenvolveu na Baixa Idade Média. Pode-se perceber, aí, certo retorno ao fundamento, com o destaque à formalização gramatical, a qual é racionalizada. Mas mesmo esse movimento é limitado, pois a formalização clássica é reportada, por assim dizer, ao intelecto: há algo que não a mera língua, que não a simples letra – a razão, o intelecto – que a fixa, ou, por outro viés, que nela se fixa. A relação entre pronome e nome, que não é de mera dependência entre eles nos planos do discurso – ora, uma definição ainda corrente de pronome é aquela segundo a qual ele substitui um nome, por bom uso ou economia –, mas de relação de cada qual com o plano da substância, revela uma atualização da metafísica, pelas vias da linguagem, ao lado da investigação lógica estabelecida com base em categorias. Devia-se considerar, então, os modos do significado (de modis significandi), de uma estrutura que vai da categoria essencial da substância às demais categorias, da substância aos acidentes, conforme o movimento que parte do ser do ente, passa pelo intelecto e adquire expressão. Por meio da voz, a mente externaliza a intelecção das coisas, garantindo a passagem da expressão – vale lembrar o problema do intelecto e da comunicação entre suas partes, das quais a voz é um operador expressivo. As partes do 221 FRANCO JÚNIOR, Hilário. Modelo e imagem. O pensamento analógico medieval, p. 12. 113 discurso são reconhecidas pelo seu modo de significação, ou melhor, pelas categorias das quais são a expressão. O nome, portanto, do lado das partes do discurso, aponta, para o lado das categorias, a uma "substância com qualidade", isto é, determinada; o pronome, por sua vez, diz respeito à essência ela mesma, a uma "substância sem qualidade", em princípio indeterminada222. A marca do pensamento medieval, diante da recepção das concepções clássicas, pode ser assinalada pela aproximação à esfera da transcendentia que culminou no desenvolvimento conceitual da demonstração (demonstratio). Tomando o pronome como desprovido, em si, de determinação, na medida em que ele se apresentaria "vazio", não podendo ser identificado com este ou aquele ente, pôde-se problematizar a correspondência, pois a dimensão da transcendentia223 divisa com a essência primeira, e, enquanto tal, não apontando uma determinação concreta, mas constitui algo que acompanha a possibilidade mesma de conhecer, aparecendo como o máximo cognoscível que não remonta, em cada conhecimento concreto, ao específico, ao apreendido. Não têm, atrás de si, como aquilo que está além, algo que as defina. Se a esfera pronominal diz respeito a uma esfera da substância que não possui qualidades a ela inerentes, os pronomes, na medida em que indicam uma essência primeira, algo indeterminado, enquanto uma das partes do discurso, necessitam de uma complementação de significado, de onde se conclui que, embora permaneçam, em si, indeterminados, eles de algum modo são determináveis – e uma tal determinação é realizada por meio da demonstração, da indicação. Um gesto efetivo, portanto, de retomada e afirmação do papel da dêixis. Como especificação do pronome, a demonstração é dele consubstancial, conforme o ensinamento das gramáticas especulativas medievais. A síntese medieval apresentou o pronome como passagem entre um modo de significar extremo, deste modo, e a indicação: "o puro ser, a substantia indeterminata que ele significa e que, como tal, é, em si, insignificável e indefinível, torna-se significável e determinável por meio de um 222 222 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 30. 223 "Transcendentia: ens, unum, aliquid, bonum, verum [Transcendentais: ente, uno, algo, bom, verdadeiro]" (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 30). Essa enumeração pode ser vista como uma síntese agambeniana da concepção escolástica dos transcendentais (com destaque àquela de Tomás de Aquino, embora não se conte, aqui, com res) – outra enumeração os estabelece como "quodlibet ens est unum, verum, bonum seu perfectum", sendo a determinação do quodlibet o ponto de partida de A comunidade que vem, que origina a categoria do qualquer (sinteticamente, qualunque; analiticamente, qualsivoglia) (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. La comunità che viene, p. 9). Se ens não é algo dotado de determinação, no sentido de algum objeto, mas "o que está sempre apreendido em todo objeto apreendido e predicado em toda predicação" (AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idem, p. 30), os demais transcendentais acompanham-no sem a ele acrescentar algo efetivo. 114 ato de 'indicação'"224. Ao lado do significar, apresentado ontologicamente como o limite da significação, como o puro ser em seu vazio, a definição de pronome necessita da indicação, pois ela o remete ao mundo, e o mundo, aqui, é um fato discursivo. A questão daí levantada, alcance máximo da elevada formulação medieval, insiste na natureza da demonstração, uma vez que torna operacional uma indicação relacionada à esfera ontológica mais profunda, à substância, à essência. Ora, é precisamente no auge da gramática especulativa na Baixa Idade Média, com Tomás de Erfurt, que o tratamento da linguagem no período medieval atinge seu ápice, pois não possui condições de ultrapassar as suas raízes filosóficas, uma vez que, com a análise da demonstração, chegou-se a reproduzir no seu interior mais uma separação: de um lado, tem-se a demonstração referida aos sentidos (demonstratio ad sensum), quando se está diante de algo que significa o que indica, remetendo a coisas concretas, de outro, a demonstração referida ao intelecto (demonstratio ad intellectum), pela qual aquilo que se indica não adquire, por esse meio, significação, mas é um aliud, isto é, algo outro (o que coloca o problema da significação da substância suprema, do puro ser)225. Com "dois estatutos de presença"226, tem-se uma indicação que significa ao lado de uma indicação que não consegue significar, uma vez que seu objeto introduz um deslocamento entre ambos. A passagem entre indicar e significar, portanto, não teria resolução passível de acontecer nesse terreno, levado até as suas bordas. Quanto mais se buscou o problema, mais ele escorregou numa espécie de "semântica" pronominal, determinando uma busca das ordens diversas de "presença" e do significado por trás da dualidade, distanciando as partículas da indicação de sua função primária, a demonstração. O intelectualismo da mentalidade medieval colocou-se como o próprio limite, ao mesmo tempo em que foi o ápice da concepção linguística, claramente mediada pela escolástica, de matriz aristotélica. A lacuna ideológica que há entre o desdobramento histórico das gramáticas "racionalistas", ao modelo de Port-Royal, e a especulação medieval, e o distanciamento histórico entre ambas e as gramáticas comparativas, com as quais propriamente se funda a linguística, representam rupturas entre mundos – ao mesmo tempo em que, pela ideia de gramática, mantém-se um fio metafísico que as conecta entre si (são gramáticas de 224 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 31. 225 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 32. 226 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 32. 115 mundos distintos, mas que se conectam pela metafísica segundo a qual se aproximam de seu mundo). Foi preciso que o eu fosse categorial e conceitualmente estabelecido para que se originasse algo como o "eu que fala", sendo que a segunda parte da sentença, porém, diante do destaque ao espírito, ao sujeito, bem poderia, então, continuar a ser aquela que se atingiu com o medievo. Se até os séculos XVIII e XIX não pôde florescer uma abordagem científica dirigida inteiramente às línguas como objetos de conhecimento de um saber específico, é por, diante de abandono do mundo medieval, muitos tópicos terem permanecido vigentes, mesmo que à revelia das tentativas de desmontagem dos teóricos modernos. Com isso, o aspecto mentalista das abordagens subjugou o linguístico, o interesse da língua como língua, e não apenas língua como veículo do pensamento ou do espírito. Com o limite da sentença racionalista pelo "esgotamento" do eu, quando pôde novamente florescer o aspecto linguístico, permitido pelo questionamento filosófico radical da representação, o que havia atrás com o que se deparar era pré-moderno. Como proceder, então? Como pensar a relação entre linguagem e mundo se entre eles, agora, mais do que um intelecto, uma capacidade intelectiva, existe um eu, um sujeito? Que tenha sido o questionamento do eu possibilitado pelo problema da natureza dos pronomes o que viabilizou a compreensão da metafísica por trás da linguagem, é precisamente a contribuição da linguística à topologia agambeniana da negatividade – a qual, agora, já podemos expressar plenamente em seus termos linguageiros. 2.5. Uma protoarqueologia dos pronomes (shifter) Ora, essa "protoarqueologia" dos pronomes pela indicação, que partira de uma homologia morfológica encontrada em duas figurações conceituais do pensamento, o aí e o isto, conduz, então, a um revolver da categorização gramatical no ocidente – revolver que parte da íntima conexão entre a gramática, a lógica e a ontologia. E essa investigação, ao averiguar o impasse medieval diante dessas imbricações, depara-se não apenas com a tentativa, moderna, de resolução, mas permite ver que essa se tornou vislumbrável "porque entre o pensamento lógico gramatical do Medievo e o nascimento da moderna ciência da linguagem situa-se o desenvolvimento da filosofia moderna que, de Descartes a Kant até Husserl, é, em boa parte, uma reflexão sobre o estatuto do 116 pronome Eu"227. Como acontecimento singular da história do ser, o moderno despontar do eu (Ego sum, ego existo...228) como unidade dos processos de consciência e sua posterior transcendentalização, isto é, sua verdadeira fundamentação de um sujeito, contou com uma refundação da racionalidade: da razão objetiva à razão subjetiva – começa aí a soberania categorial do eu e do sujeito, a soberania da subjetividade. Inicia-se, com isso, um amplo e profundo processo de refundação dos mais diversos campos do saber, e das práticas nele calcadas (se não um processo total, ao menos parcial, se não real, ao menos aparente). A gramática do eu, ou melhor, da racionalidade centrada no eu, é um evento central cuja importância não pode ser esquecida enquanto acontecimento setorial da gramática, apenas. A célebre Gramática de Port-Royal (1660), fruto da elaboração do legado cartesiano pelos jansenistas Antoine Arnauld e Claude Lancelot, ao sair da analogia especulativa para encontrar a razão própria da língua, acaba por confinar a matriz dela diretamente na razão. A "Grammaire générale et raisonnée contenant les fondemens de l'art de parler, expliqués d'une manière claire et naturelle , les raisons de ce qui est commun à toutes les langues, et des principales différences qui s'y rencontrent" ["Gramática geral e racional contendo os fundamentos da arte de falar, explicados de uma maneira clara e natural, as razões do que é comum a todas as línguas e as principais diferenças que são encontradas"] não apenas se coloca na linhagem da vasta tradição das gramáticas gerais229, mas também o geral do seu nome indica o sentido mesmo da operação: a gramática é geral porque raisonnée, isto é, não é apenas "razoável", "razoada", mas de tal forma "chamada à razão" que ela é, mesmo, fundada na razão; ela é racional, e, na medida em que o é, pode se dizer geral, pertencente ao gênero daqueles capazes de dizer (e de pensar) eu. Não surpreende, pois, que o mesmo movimento do pensamento tenha produzido a Lógica de Port-Royal, de Arnauld e Pierre Nicole, e que nela apareça o signo como trazendo 227 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 33. 228 O ego sum que se apresentou com Descartes é bastante diverso, e filosoficamente representa um rompimento radical, daquele outro famoso ego sum da história ocidental: "Ego sum qui sum" (Exodus, 3, 14). Lá, EGO sum, EGO existo, há um eu que é, que existe e que se constitui na mens humana como unidade da substância, como a substância pura; aqui, Ego SUM – há um ser que é, Deus, ao qual acontece de se exprimir, nessa instância de enunciação, como um eu: o pronome eu revela algo da sua pureza enunciativa, pois remete ao ser, propriamente, que é e se diz dizendo que é. Que Descartes tenha implementado, pois, uma prova ontológica da existência de Deus, pode-se entender como necessidade de sua própria filosofia na tentativa de reintroduzir o ser totalizante de Deus diante da inovações do espírito. 229 Lembremos, pois, que o Cours, de Ferdinand de Saussure, trata da linguística e não mais da instituição de uma gramática, bem como, apesar da presença do termo, générale, apresenta-o com outro enfoque – o sentido, aqui, da generalidade do racional, capaz de ser encontrado por Port-Royal em línguas diferentes, é mitigado diante do esgotamento das filosofias do eu experimentado pelo linguista genebrino; geral, então, é por postular princípios concernentes à língua. 117 questões cadenciadas pelo problema da referência. Já daqui, então, a bifacialidade do signo, a qual, conjugada entre as ideias do representante e o representado, afundando ainda mais o gramatical na razão, representa o acontecimento capital da modernidade como o esquecimento efetivo da juntura entre ambas as faces do signo230. O pensamento regrado mostra-se na sua proximidade com a gramática, que deixa vir à luz o regramento dos movimentos do espírito que ela opera. O lógos é remetido ao eu, o qual encontra, por sua vez, sua habitação na razão. Apesar dos desvios, a atenção ao aspecto vocálico da linguagem consagrou o tratamento positivo como base gramatical. Mas também, insiste Agamben, quando voltamos a atenção ao aspecto indicativo, tendo diante de nós a frustração do quererdizer, coloca-se em destaque a extensão da herança metafísica no tratamento conferido à linguagem – ainda mais quando percebemos as correspondências, consagradas pela especulação medieval, entre as categorias ontológicas e as partes do discurso, ou ainda, o dimensionamento entre gramática e lógica a partir do centrar-se da razão no eu. A grande ruptura da linguística, como formulação científica, teve de partir, então, de toda a contestação moderna da ontologia clássica operada sob o signo da subjetividade calcada no eu231. Com isso, a linguística coloca-se novamente em posição de confronto com o extremo de nossa tradição filosófica, uma vez que, quando questiona o papel do eu, o qual já pertence aos processos discursivos, ao tentar remover toda substância metafísica ao jogá-lo como operador da enunciação, encontra-se experimentando limites. Agora, porém, o impasse, que representamos com Saussure, é ultrapassado com uma retomada crítica da tradição e, ao mesmo tempo, com um novo passo, interrompido pela trágica incidência fisiológica que tolheu, ao linguista da enunciação, Émile Benveniste, a possibilidade de desdobrar o seu projeto232. 230 Cf. FOUCAULT, MICHEL. As palavras e as coisas, p. 58 e ss. 231 A postura das teorias da linguagem diante do eu e de todo o seu campo de conceitos (como consciência, mente, etc.), hoje, parece poder servir de diferenciador teórico. É sobremaneira significativo, portanto, que a grande linha teórica que praticamente encobriu o estruturalismo, teve, no seu grande formulador, Noam Chomsky, um turning point rumo a René Descartes, ou, ao menos, ao inatismo intelectualista. 232 Enquanto o primeiro volume dos Problemas de linguística geral, de 1966, recompila uma série de trabalhos anteriormente publicados e pode ser visto, propriamente, como uma em si já profunda abertura e preparação de terreno pela discussão dos mais elevados problemas com os quais se deparava a linguística , o segundo volume, de 1974, é o despontar específico que caracteriza o "projeto" de Benveniste, a saber, a instituição da linguística da enunciação, a qual, contudo, não foi, após a demarcação e a construção dos moldes dos seus alicerces, construída – Benveniste teve, no final de 1969, uma acidente vascular cerebral que o impediu de continuar quaisquer atividades acadêmicas e lhe tolheu, numa ironia inconcebível da vida, a fala. Também o Vocabulário das instituições indo-europeias (I, de 1966, e II, de 1974), pode, acreditamos, embora seja um todo à parte, ser encadeado aqui: afinal, nele se encontra como problema corrente, no segundo volume, o questionamento da relação entre a palavra e a autoridade, dando-nos como problemática a autoridade da palavra e a sua eficácia, inclusive "mágica", no mundo. O projeto enunciativo de 118 O estudo linguístico de Benveniste sobre A natureza dos pronomes (1956) encontra-se, precisamente, na encruzilhada entre o problema do eu e o problema dos pronomes. Não apenas pelo motivo de que seja a categoria eu um "pronome pessoal", mas porque, ao modo dos demais pronomes, como os demonstrativos, encontra-se numa particular situação que os revela como um problema concernente à própria estrutura da linguagem, o qual se revela de modos distintos233. Com isso, quer-se considerar o papel específico e capital dos pronomes enquanto representantes das "instâncias de discurso", formulação à qual recorre Agamben como modo de precisar o estatuto do pronome, que, desde o problema do eu, encobriu a sua natureza "vazia" que havia sido intuída pelos pensadores medievais. Mas o que é uma "instância de discurso"? Numa definição bastante sucinta, Benveniste a define como consistindo nos "atos discretos e a cada vez únicos pelos quais a língua é atualizada em palavra por um locutor"234. O problema do eu, então, torna-se um problema enunciativo, e a natureza dos pronomes é precisada pelo papel de "indicadores da enunciação", uma vez que asseguram a relação dos indicadores de pessoa com as suas respectivas instâncias de discurso235. À diferença da gramática moderna do eu, a categoria ego, agora, será considerada como eminentemente linguística e como uma função elocutória. Para Agamben, já nas meditações cartesianas se imiscuía, enquanto pertinente à natureza do problema investigado, o contexto de linguagem, pois, "na sua pureza originária, o sujeito cartesiano não é senão o sujeito do verbo, um ente puramente linguístico-funcional, (...) cuja realidade e cuja duração coincidem com o instante da sua enunciação"236. Agora, contudo, lê-se efetivamente o eu por meio da instância de discurso, e não o contrário, como parecia decorrer do eu unificador dos processos mentais. Considerando a operação de referência que os nomes realizam, o indicador eu não se refere a nenhum "objeto" Benveniste, ainda, segundo o entendemos, mostra-se como uma forma de escapar à "soberania do signo" que se instaurou, caso não se queira falar em toda a sua marca na história do ser conforme a escavação agambeniana, no mínimo, na linguística depois de Saussure: não é a referência ao sistema de signos e sua relação que vem à tona nos problemas do movimento da linguagem. Pelo contrário, é no sentido oposto que se deve partir, além do próprio hiato entre semiótico e semântico – nisso consistia o projeto de construção de uma semiologia tal como a concebe Benveniste nas últimas linhas de seu famoso texto A semiologia da língua. 233 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 277 (A natureza dos pronomes). 234 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 277 (A natureza dos pronomes). 235 Deste modo, é da categoria de pessoa que parte Benveniste, pois ela compreende os pronomes eu e tu, os quais, excluindo toda terceira pessoa – cuja marca é a "não pessoa" –, conformam o eixo, ulterior, entre eles e a instância de discurso por meio dos "indicadores". 236 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. 16. 119 chamado eu e que garantiria a unidade da cadeia de referências – como ocorre, ao contrário, com os nomes. "Cada eu tem a sua referência própria e corresponde cada vez a um ser único, proposto como tal"237. Assim, qual a relação entre os pronomes pessoais e a instância de discurso? Sua relação é precisada pela própria instância de discurso que os define, e nada fora dela. O eu é cada eu que é dito numa enunciação, colocando em ato a língua por um processo elocutório individual. "Eu significa 'a pessoa que enuncia a presente instância de discurso que contém eu'"238. É na e pela instância de discurso que se identifica o valor de eu. Da relação entre eu e instância percebe-se "uma dupla instância conjugada: instância de eu como referente, e instância de discurso contendo eu, como referido"239. A operação de referência, geralmente medida pelo nome, que unifica a representação, não tem, diante do pronome, o mesmo estatuto. Pelo contrário, coloca-se como diante de um acontecimento singular, e só é inteligível em relação a ele. Nenhuma noção de "objeto", na perspectiva de Benveniste, aplica-se ao eu, o que, se for pressuposto o problema da relação entre sujeito-objeto, remete o problema da subjetividade a outro patamar. "É na linguagem e pela linguagem que o homem se constitui como sujeito; porque só a linguagem fundamenta na realidade, na sua realidade que é a do ser, o conceito de 'ego'"240. Subjetividade, aqui, "é a capacidade do locutor para se propor como 'sujeito'", e designa "(...)[;] a emergência no ser de uma propriedade fundamental da linguagem", propriedade que não se constitui como substância, mas revela que "(...)[;] o fundamento da 'subjetividade' é determinado pelo status linguístico de pessoa (...) É na instância de discurso na qual eu designa o locutor que este se enuncia como 'sujeito'. É, portanto, verdade ao pé da letra que o fundamento da subjetividade está no exercício da língua"241. Eu passa a indicar, então, o "'indivíduo que enuncia a presente instância de discurso contendo a instância linguística eu'". O próprio eu, em sua ausência de referência "objetiva", torna-se uma instância. A natureza do pronome é precisada pela sua constituição em relação à instância de discurso, na qual e pela qual não apenas as categorias pessoais eu-tu adquirem seu sentido, mas também os pronomes que até então considerávamos, os pronomes demonstrativos – e ainda advérbios e locuções adverbiais, a exemplo do hic et nunc do problema hegeliano da indicação: eles "delimitam a instância 237 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 278 (A natureza dos pronomes). 238 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 278 (A natureza dos pronomes). 239 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 279 (A natureza dos pronomes). 240 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 286 (Da subjetividade na linguagem). 241 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 288 (Da subjetividade na linguagem). 120 temporal e espacial coextensiva e contemporânea da presente instância de discurso que contém eu"242 –, eles, os demonstrativos são os "indicadores da dêixis"243. Altera-se, assim, a definição de dêixis, que passa a ser "contemporânea da instância de discurso que contém o indicador de pessoa; dessa referência o demonstrativo tira o seu caráter cada vez único e particular, que é a unidade da instância de discurso à qual se refere"244. Ora, todo esse deslocamento operado pelo problema dos demonstrativos, cuja investigação leva a uma confrontação com o eu da filosofia e da gramática modernas, conjugado ao problema da dêixis, encontra sua sintetização conceitual num operador o qual, como os indicadores (os embrayeuers) de Benveniste, tem um estatuto deveras particular: os shifters. A categoria dos shifters, Agamben a encontra em Roman Jakobson, o qual, por sua vez, a toma de empréstimo de Otto Jespersen: trata-se, originalmente, de "uma classe de palavras (...) cuja significação [meaning] se modifica de acordo com a situação"245. Sendo os pronomes pessoais os representantes por excelência dos shifters, Jespersen apresenta-os como produtores de um grande efeito de estranhamento quando da aquisição da linguagem na infância. Como precisará Jakobson, pelo fato de que os "pronomes pertencem às últimas aquisições da linguagem infantil e às primeiras perdas na afasia"246, eles dizem respeito a um estrato de elevada complexidade, uma vez que são concernentes à própria dimensão dos limites da aquisição da linguagem. Na medida em que os shifters são retomados para indicar a operação de referência à situação discursiva na qual se realizam, eles são desdobrados no contexto de investigação da duplicidade da linguagem que engloba tanto o código quanto a mensagem247. Tendo em vista que Jakobson, admitindo um ganho com a teoria computacional para as investigações linguísticas (e, de um modo geral, para a teoria da linguagem), propôs sua mudança terminológica e conceitual substituindo os termos 242 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 279 (A natureza dos pronomes). 243 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 288 (Da subjetividade na linguagem). 244 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 280 (A natureza dos pronomes). 245 JESPERSEN, Otto. Language, §7, p. 123. 246 JAKOBSON, Roman. Shifters, verbal categories, and the russian verb, p. 132. 247 Cf. JAKOBSON, Roman. Shifters, verbal categories, and the russian verb, p. 130 e ss. O texto de Jakobson parte da assunção de que há um funcionamento duplo na mensagem (M) e no código (underlying code) (C), enquanto "veículos da comunicação linguística". Há um "reenvio" (renvoi) que os desloca entre si. A duplicidade assim se manifesta: como circularidade: M/M e C/C (entendendo-se a barra como a operação de reenvio); e como sobreposição (overlapping): M/C e C/M. Para explicar a circularidade entre M/M Jakobson considera o discurso indireto e entre C/C o problema dos nomes próprios; para a sobreposição entre M/C considera as interpretações que, numa língua ou entre línguas, tem potencial elucidativo acerca de elementos linguísticos e entre C/M os shifters. 121 saussurianos langue e parole por código e mensagem248, podemos compreender por que Agamben a leva em consideração: está novamente em jogo a fratura da linguagem. Um shifter surge no momento em que o código se sobrepõe à mensagem, isto é, quando, para o código linguístico, é imprescindível a referência à mensagem. Ela é exposta em referência a si mesma, sem referência a coisas ou quaisquer outros objetos do pensamento. Em Benveniste, é a instância de discurso que define o que o termo linguístico eu quer dizer, pois a situação enunciativa expõe a língua ao discurso; em Jakobson, é à mensagem que se faz referência: "de fato, shifters distinguem-se de todos os outros constituintes de um código linguístico somente por sua referência compulsória à mensagem dada"249, a uma situação dada de atualização dos elementos do código (sua atualização discursiva, podemos dizer). Não há, assim, um significado "geral", no sentido da constituição de uma substância, por trás de eu: cada eu, como instância/shifter, faz referência ao seu próprio acontecimento na linguagem, ao seu próprio ter-lugar, "eu significa o emissor (e você o receptor) da mensagem à qual ele pertence"250. A necessidade da passagem de uma esfera à outra, traduzindo um princípio que tanta relevância assume na obra agambeniana – "na linguagem e no uso da linguagem, a duplicidade desempenha um papel cardinal"251 –, permite não apenas apresentar o próprio vocábulo shifter pelo seu conceito, mas precisar o âmbito no qual o termo se desdobra: o shifter, assim, é um "deslocador", um "comutador". Derivado do verbo to shift, que indica mudança e movimento, o shifter aponta uma operação de deslocamento – ele é o "dispositivo" que assegura a transposição entre os planos de linguagem (código, mensagem; língua, fala...). Estamos, aqui, diante de um conjunto de signos 'vazios', não referenciais com relação à 'realidade', sempre disponíveis, e que se tornam 'plenos' assim que um locutor os assume em cada instância de seu discurso'. Desprovidos de referência material, não podem ser mal-empregados; não afirmando nada, não são submetidos à condição de verdade e escapam a toda negação. O seu papel consiste em fornecer o instrumento de uma conversão, a que se pode chamar a conversão da linguagem em discurso. É identificando-se como pessoa única pronunciando eu que cada um dos locutores se propõe alternadamente como 'sujeito'252. 248 Cf. JAKOBSON, Roman. Linguagem e comunicação, p. 77. 249 JAKOBSON, Roman. Shifters, verbal categories, and the russian verb, p. 132. 250 JAKOBSON, Roman. Shifters, verbal categories, and the russian verb, p. 132. 251 JAKOBSON, Roman. Shifters, verbal categories, and the russian verb, p. 133. 252 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 280 (A natureza dos pronomes). 122 O problema da dupla significação da linguagem que aí se apresenta coloca a enunciação no seu meio, pois apenas há efetividade, locupletação do processo significativo, do reenvio do código à mensagem, com a apropriação que o indivíduo, a cada processo elocutório, faz da língua. Salta-se, aqui, do problema dos signos e seus sistemas, que era o que estava em jogo para a semiologia segundo Saussure, para o das instâncias de discurso. O que o pronome nos revela, assim, é a complexa operação, "intradiscursiva", que subsiste na passagem do semiótico ao semântico, do signo ao discurso – isto é, as faces segundo as quais Émile Benveniste interpreta a cardinal duplicidade da linguagem e entre as quais se coloca um hiato. Onde antes se expunha o eu como universal, lá onde apenas podia Hegel esconjurar "a verdade e certeza da realidade dos objetos sensíveis"253, e acabava por remeter a linguagem a si mesma, expõe-se, agora, o pronome como propriamente uma "forma vazia", como instância pela qual se encontra uma saída, pela linguagem, para o problema da objetividade dos sensíveis. Se para Hegel, como figura da filosofia que toca a linguagem, esse era o primeiro obstáculo a considerar, para Benveniste, na linguística que toca a filosofia e os limites do pensamento representativo, trata-se de responder ao problema da relação comunicativa entre "sujeitos". Nesse âmbito, a linguagem resolvese além da referência "extradiscursiva", com "um conjunto de signos 'vazios'" cuja indicação é efetuada no próprio discurso realizado concretamente pelo falante que se apropria da língua. Os signos aqui mobilizados não se referem àquilo que se indica como sendo isto no plano da ostensão. Ora, suponhamos uma caneta para a qual apontemos o indicador e digamos, capturando-a na fala, isto: apresentar linguisticamente um objeto, dizendo 'isto', é, na verdade, dizer: o objeto que 'eu' mostro (mediante um gesto) ao dizer: 'isto' (...) só pode haver um único 'isto' ou 'este lápis', pois 'isto' e 'este' são instaurados pelo ato de discurso que os enuncia e onde um único 'eu' pode estar mostrando algo; assim como, no momento em que alguém diz 'eu', existe um só 'eu', um só 'agora', apenas um 'ontem', etc.... Em outros termos, ao impor essas circunstâncias – isto é, as condições de elocução vinculadas às coordenadas deste ato de fala – como determinantes do objeto visado.254 O fundamental, na dimensão teórica aqui aberta, é "a relação [ou não] dos signos com a enunciação"255 – a mesma relação que permite definir o traço distintivo entre a noção de pessoa e de não-pessoa no plano da definição dos pronomes pessoais, isto é, entre o que define a realização de uma situação enunciativa do discurso (eu-tu) e o 253 253 HEGEL, G.W. Fenomenologia do espírito, I, p. 81. 254 LAHUD, Michel. A propósito da noção de dêixis, p. 77; 78. 255 LAHUD, Michel. A propósito da noção de dêixis, p. 109. 123 que se coloca como insistindo na remissão do discurso para algo que não faz parte dele (ele). Assim, o sentido do signo eu define-se pela relação que eu, sim, estabelece com a enunciação, e é nessa medida que ele não é referencial à realidade; de outra forma, o sentido do signo ele define-se pelo fato de que ele não se relaciona com a enunciação, e é assim que ele é referencial à realidade extradiscursiva. Podem ser delineadas, de forma a não apenas fixar uma demarcação mínima da dêixis, mas também a dimensionar o alcance da investigação agambeniana sobre os pronomes, "duas noções distintas de 'dêixis': uma relacionada com uma caracterização interna de certos signos, a outra com um processo que se aplica, digamos, do exterior aos signos linguísticos (e aos objetos do mundo)"256. Isto é, podemos entender a dêixis conforme a diferente dimensão da linguagem à qual se associa: caso se desdobre no sentido do que chamamos "extradiscursivo" ("aos objetos do mundo"), ela atende à dimensão da referência e adquire um "sentido 'lógico'"257; caso se vincule ao "intradiscursivo" ("caracterização interna de certos signos"), atende à dimensão da enunciação e adquire um "sentido 'linguístico'"258. Onde, em Hegel, a Meinung mostrava a falência do querer-dizer diante do dizer, por ser sempre detida por um universal, vê-se que as investigações sobre a linguagem respondem com uma forma capaz de assegurar a passagem entre a fala (o dizer) e a língua com uma desenvoltura que prescinde tanto da "certeza sensível" quanto da dialético de desmonte. O vazio do pronome encontra-se com o problema que o universal hegeliano tangenciava com o isto e o eu – e o universal, ao eco de um pensamento de largas consequências para o pensamento e para o mundo ocidentais, sendo flatus vocis259, é um puro indicar que se resolve apenas na remissão do discurso a ele mesmo, enquanto acontecimento da linguagem que se apropriou de si (isto é, discursividade), mas que acontece, propriamente, como linguagem. A partir daqui Agamben pode sintetizar os termos que estavam em questão e prepará-los para o desdobramento interpretativo sobre a negatividade: O significado próprio dos pronomes – enquanto shifters e indicadores da enunciação – é inseparável de uma remissão à instância do discurso. A articulação – o shifting – que eles operam não é do não linguístico (a indicação sensível) ao linguístico, mas da língua à palavra. A dêixis, a indicação (...)[,] não mostra simplesmente um objeto inominado, mas antes de tudo a instância do discurso, o seu ter-lugar. O lugar, que é indicado pela demonstratio e a partir da qual apenas outra indicação é possível é um lugar de linguagem e a 256 LAHUD, Michel. A propósito da noção de dêixis, p. 87. 257 LAHUD, Michel. A propósito da noção de dêixis, p. 136. 258 LAHUD, Michel. A propósito da noção de dêixis, p. 136. 259 Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 47-48. 124 indicação é a categoria por meio da qual a linguagem faz referência ao próprio ter-lugar.260 O acercar-se das categorias pronominais – demonstrativas e pessoais – enquanto "indicadores" possibilitou o acesso a essa dimensão em que a própria linguagem como tal acontece, na possibilidade mesma de vir à palavra, mas sem vir, ainda, e sem ter para isso, a rigor, uma palavra. O seu ter-lugar é "revelado" pela enunciação, de modo que ele aparece marcado como um acontecimento de essencial singularidade. Mas o que é a enunciação? Surge o quê, nela, que a remete a uma negatividade? Com essas questões, coloca-se, ainda, a relação, efetiva, entre o problema da negatividade e o da linguagem, ou melhor, pode-se ver como conformam um mesmo núcleo de problemas. Nesse sentido, o que cabe precisar, da passagem de Agamben, é que a articulação, ou shifting, dá-se no plano da própria linguagem, no plano em que a linguagem remete a nada mais, e nada menos, do que a sua própria existência. Essas categorias expressam o questionamento da relação entre linguagem e comunicação, segundo Benveniste; entre o ter-lugar da linguagem e o dizer, na terminologia agambeniana: a enunciação como que remete todo problema do discurso e do dizer, todo problema da significação do sentido investido em palavras à existência mesma da linguagem – e, nela, a uma fratura. Ao ter analisado que os limites da linguagem recaem no interior da linguagem, Agamben pôde verificar como se fixa a capacidade humana de linguagem como articulação entre as suas duas faces da própria linguagem, sendo que o negativo é subsumido nessa passagem, nessa travessia, e é nela ocultado e esquecido (não seria, portanto, "suprassumido", pois isso significaria que ele deveria ser, de algum modo, aniquilado na passagem e o ser restaria como totalidade de si – como o imediatismo dos animais com o seu ambiente, "como a água na água", segundo Georges Bataille). O problema entre a palavra e o mundo é reconfigurado entre a linguagem e a palavra. A cisão da palavra, ou melhor, da linguagem, é retomada – e negatividade, como já pudemos notar, é a manifestação dessa fratura. Agora, apresenta-se a recíproca implicação entre linguagem e negatividade: isto é, a linguagem pertence ao homem porque, estando ele lançado numa negatividade radical e sem fundamento, apropria-se dessa linguagem e dela faz a sua morada, isto é, o seu "lugar" no tempo e no espaço – lugar que se baseia numa negatividade sem fundamento que se constitui como o fundamento negativo da experiência metafísica com a palavra. 260 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 35. Grifo nosso. 125 Em A semiologia da língua (1969), de Émile Benveniste, a enunciação, como manifestação da língua, possui a noção de referência como sendo intrínseca ao seu contexto: "falar, é falar-de"261. Essa indicação é precisada num texto de publicação posterior, O aparelho formal da enunciação (1970), no qual se estabelece que "a enunciação é este colocar em funcionamento a língua por um ato individual de utilização"262. A enunciação, em sua singularidade, é o que se estabelece quando um locutor se assume como tal na linguagem, mediante a fala, e apropria-se do sistema de signos da língua. Como precisa Agamben, a esfera do dizer não é, ainda, o dito, o discurso encadeado, mas o lugar possível de todo discurso, a enunciação "é o ato mesmo de produzir um enunciado, e não o texto do enunciado"263. A enunciação, portanto, no contexto de um severo problema de linguística, expressa-o ao dizer respeito à essência da experiência metafísica da linguagem: isto é, à cisão, na língua (que é o objeto do linguista, afinal), entre o signo e o discurso264, a fratura, da linguagem, entre o mostrar e o dizer. Sendo um problema concernente à linguagem, pode-se começar a entender a primeira razão de seu aparecimento na investigação agambeniana, pois ele indica o modo como a ciência da linguagem possibilitou que o "evento de linguagem" pudesse ser exposto enquanto tal, como condição de possibilidade do dizer, o que na história da filosofia ocidental, (...) chama-se, há mais de dois mil anos, ser, οὐσία. Aquilo que sempre já se mostra em todo ato de palavra (ἀνὰγχη γὰρ ἐν τῷ ἑχὰστου λὸγῳ τὸν τῆς οὐσῖας ἐνυπὰρχειν; Metafísica 1028a, 36-37; 'illud... cuius intellectus includitur in omnibus, quaecumque quis apprehendit'), aquilo que, sem ser nomeado, já está sempre indicado em todo dizer, é, para a filosofia, o ser. A dimensão de significado da palavra 'ser', cuja eterna busca e cuja eterna perda (ἀεὶ ζηεοῦμενον χαὶ ἀεὶ ἀποποὺμενον; Metafísica 1028b, 3), constitui a história da metafísica, é aquela do ter-lugar da linguagem e metafísica é aquela experiência da linguagem que, em todo ato de palavra, colhe o abrir-se dessa dimensão e, em todo ato de dizer, faz, antes de tudo, experiência da 'maravilha' de que a linguagem seja. Apenas porque a 261 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, II, p. 63 (Semiologia da língua). Grifo nosso. 262 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, II, p. 82 (O aparelho forma da enunciação). 263 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, II, p. 82 (Semiologia da língua). 264 É por isso, para Benveniste, que a língua é o objeto privilegiado do linguista. Aprofundando a demarcação saussuriana, constata o seu caráter pioneiro e, ao mesmo tempo, limitador, na medida em que o processo que instaurou a matriz de condução do trabalho do linguista, o signo linguístico, cindido e articulado, terminou, em sua positividade, por sufocar o desdobramento da semiologia. Deste modo, para que ela continuasse a se desenvolver, o signo linguístico é restringido a uma das faces da língua – seu outro lado é o discurso. É porque existe essa cisão, porque a língua é um objeto complexo, interiormente cindido e não unívoco, que toda semiologia pode se espelhar na semiologia da língua. Ao ultrapassar o legado de Saussure da soberania do signo linguístico – lembrando que essa interpretação diz mais respeito à herança do Curso de linguística geral, que, de fato, é o que foi consagrado, do que ao próprio pensamento saussuriano, que permanecerá ambíguo e passível de consideração filológica –, é que se teria a base de um novo modelo semiológico, possibilitado pelo gesto além do signo que funda a semântica, e da qual se poderia instituir uma "análise translinguística dos textos, das obras, pela elaboração de uma metassemântica que se construirá sobre a semântica da enunciação" (BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, II, p. 67. Semiologia da língua). Esse texto de Benveniste é considerado por Agamben, num contexto bastante próximo deste, também em O que resta de Auschwitz. 126 linguagem permite, por meio dos shifters, fazer referência à própria instância, algo como o ser e o mundo se abrem ao pensamento.265 O pensamento sobre a linguagem encontra-se com o pensamento sobre o ser não por um acaso. Não apenas, em primeiro lugar e à superfície, porque a linguagem pertence à história do ser, nela tendo um lugar fundamental, mas também, em segundo lugar e penetrando a essência mesma da superfície, porque possibilita a abertura do lugar específico do homem, pelo qual ele pode coabitar o ser (existir, possuir um mundo, falar...) – porque, enfim, o ser, nas suas múltiplas formas de se dizer, subjaz à ciência da linguagem, até mesmo pelas categorias que o ocultam e o encobrem, como o eu e o sujeito. Nesse contexto da obra agambeniana, pode ser evocado o inquietante "tó dé ón légethai mén pollakhṓs", o ser (dito) que se diz de múltiplos modos, ou ainda, os múltiplos modos de se dizer o (dito) que é, o ser que já está contido em cada dizer a respeito do ser, habitando-o, bem como dizendo-se, como interpreta Agamben, pelas categorias, ao modo da ousía que habita cada uma delas. A vinculação, efetivada na transição entre o mundo antigo e o medieval, entre as partes do discurso e as categorias aristotélicas, colocando o problema dos pronomes, e entre os pronomes e a instância de discurso, colocando o da dêixis, agora absorvida como fenômeno eminentemente linguístico, aprofunda-se como relação entre ser e linguagem no seio da própria metafísica. É no caminho de busca do ser, cujas sendas se abrem e se fecham, por esse próprio movimento, que surgem momentos em que algo se insinua na abertura. Aí, jaz a linguagem – ou melhor, a linguagem é o próprio jazer, o lugar que se apresenta, e nesse sentido é que se revela ao ser como ter-lugar. E é nele, então, que ao pensamento, na instância da linguagem, ser e mundo afloram, aí conduzidos pelos shifters, pelas categorias que referenciam a linguagem a si mesma, a língua ao discurso, o código à mensagem. Mas esse estranho lugar, surgido como num lampejo, como a relação entre a linguagem e a morte, não seria precisamente o lugar entre a linguagem e a morte? E essa relação, como vimos, não se dá como uma negatividade que perpassa, agora, ser e linguagem? Que a operação do pensamento heideggeriano, portanto, seja capaz de aceder à linguagem, precisamente, no momento inaugural dessa relação, seja como pensamento 265 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 36. A tradução para as passagens em grego, respectivamente, conforme a edição de Giovanni Reale, sugere: "na noção de toda categoria está necessariamente incluída a noção de substância" e "o eterno objeto de pesquisa e o eterno problema". (ARISTOTELE. Metafisica, II, p. 289). 127 ou como metafísica, torna-se agora menos obscuro: não se trata de um início forjado, mas de um deparar-se com um fundamento enquanto ultrapassamento – o que, na terminologia de Heidegger, vale como o horizonte em que o Dasein se mostra na sua transcendência e que já estava em jogo na própria analítica do ser-o-aí, pois ele, como o ente que pode se deparar com e se colocar, a partir da sua própria existência, o problema do ser, possibilitaria, pelo horizonte da sua própria transcendência, uma forma de assegurar o "horizonte transcendental da questão do ser" – propriamente o que coloca a analítica do Dasein de Ser e tempo no seu horizonte: logo, como uma "interpretação ontológica do ser na e a partir da transcendência do ser-[o-]aí"266. A ultrapassagem (Überstieg), de fato, aparece, na investigação sobre o fundamento, como significando transcendência, fundando-se sobre uma relação que se direciona de algo, que será transcendido, para algo, então, que se constitui como horizonte. Ora, não está em questão nada menos do que o Dasein quanto ao seu Da, isto é, diante da topicalização mesma da existência, de um acontecer "espacial" originário (diríamos, segundo Agamben, lugar ou ter-lugar): se o Dasein ultrapassa algo física ou metaforicamente, ele o faz porque, antes, "a transcendência (...)", aquilo que o estrutura como tal, até mesmo subjetivamente, "é a ultrapassagem que possibilita algo tal como existência em geral e, por conseguinte, também um movimentar-'se'-no-espaço [Sichbewegen-im-Raume]"267. Trata-se da ultrapassagem, diante do projeto de Ser e tempo, dos entes para os entes em sua totalidade como mundo pelo Dasein, e daí rumo ao próprio ser. O Dasein, ele mantém na abertura (sua transcendência). O ultrapassamento, por conseguinte, aqui entendido conforme o desenvolvimento agambeniano, remete à própria abertura do ser que, em suspensão e manutenção na abertura, tenta capturar o ter-lugar da linguagem, tenta capturar a sua própria possibilidade de ser como tal. É precisamente a transcendência que aflora da cisão. Cisão entre ser e mundo, entre ter-lugar da linguagem e linguagem articulada, entre mostrar e dizer: A transcendência do ser e do mundo – que a lógica medieval recolhia no significado dos transcendentia e que Heidegger identifica como estrutura fundamental do ser-no-mundo – é a transcendência do evento da linguagem com respeito àquilo que, nesse evento, é dito e significado; e os shifters, que indicam, em todo ato de palavra, a sua pura instância, constituem (como Kant havia perfeitamente entendido atribuindo ao Eu o estatuto da trancendentalidade) a estrutura linguística originária da transcendência. 268 266 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Sobre a essência do fundamento, p. 118. Grifo nosso. 267 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Sobre a essência do fundamento, p. 104. HEIDEGGER, Martin. Wegmarken, p. 137 [p. 33] (Vom Wesen des Grundes). 268 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 37. 128 À cisão da linguagem remetem as demais cisões. A linguagem como língua não é imediatamente fala, mas nela se realiza; o pronome não é originariamente preenchido, substancial, mas vazio, e adquire contexto na enunciação. A passagem entre o ego cartesiano e, mutatis mutandis, o sujeito dos confins da metafísica moderna, transcendentalmente marcado, representa, na verdade, a compreensão de uma estrutura linguística, que consiste naquele "signo vazio, mas móvel, eu"269, que é, de fato, o que assegura a continuidade da língua na cadeia intersubjetiva (um universal, segundo dialética hegeliana da certeza sensível). O indivíduo não tem linguagem porque é sujeito, isto é, intelecção pura de uma mens; antes, ele é sujeito porque ingressa na rede de significações da linguagem – a representação, com isso, a antiga imagem (e cuja negatividade a configura como fantasma), acompanha o lógos, e nesse sentido é adquire uma demarcação lógica. Eis o que se encontra, pois, sob "a estrutura linguística originária da transcendência" da qual fala Agamben. É num tal contexto em que um plano ultrapassa o outro – a linguagem e a palavra, o ontológico e o ôntico – sem haver uma sobreposição ou passagem imediatos, mas um "descompasso", um hiato, que o ser-o-aí adquire seu lugar. Entender a transcendência que acompanha a estrutura da separação significa entender que "a estrutura linguística da transcendência" é acompanhada por um shifter. Assim, apesar do rasgo pós-estruturalista da formulação, a transcendência deve ser entendida como a própria cisão no cerne da linguagem, como o que, nela, ultrapassandoa, remete-a ao seu ter-lugar. Também a lucubração etimológica de Agamben – "é de se notar, além disso, que a proximidade entre o pronome e a esfera de significado do ser tem, provavelmente, também um fundamento etimológico. O pronome i.e. *so, *sā (gr. ὁ, ἡ, got. sa, so) provém, com efeito, da raiz s-, e o verbo essere [ser] (es-) poderia representar uma verbalização dessa raiz"270 – opera, por meio da remissão à raiz protoindo-europeia, uma demarcação propriamente linguística do horizonte da transcendência: revela-se a profunda conexão com a produção de origens, por meio da filologia, a qual, mais do que um recurso, revela uma aproximação de ordem filosófica na obra de Giorgio Agamben. E a etimologia, se não estiver "correta", tanto mais corresponde a sua conexão com a filosofia (e sua história encontra uma vastíssima tradição): não uma prova, mas uma conceitualização; não um exemplo conceitual, mas uma remissão do conceito à própria 269 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 281 (A natureza dos pronomes). 270 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 37. 129 língua, uma instanciação do conceito na língua e pela língua. Mais ainda, a etimologia das raízes indo-europeias, constituindo o modelo do protoindo-europeu, indica-nos os limites da própria filologia, pois postula uma origem que se baseia sobre uma textualidade revelada virtualmente no limite das línguas existentes. Na medida em que "ela [a raiz indo-europeia] se situa num ponto de coincidência entre diacronia e sincronia, em que, como estado da língua não atestado historicamente, como 'língua nunca falada' e, todavia, real, ela garante a inteligibilidade da história linguística e, ao mesmo tempo, a coerência sincrônica do sistema"271, esse ponto de coincidência, revelando a origem, o fundamento, permite apontar, mediante uma delineação conceitual, para o próprio ponto de fratura sobre o qual deve se situar a articulação metafísica da linguagem. Tal dimensão limite que dá estrutura coloca-nos, portanto, diante do horizonte do transcendental. Como o hiato venha a ser articulado, seja como transcendência ou negatividade, sobre a qual aquele, pode-se afirmar, adquire o seu sentido, significa conceber a metafísica em seu todo, isto é, pela negatividade da fratura e pela positividade da articulação. Além do encobrimento, perspectiva a ser levada em conta, diante do reenvio e confrontação do pensamento agambeniano com o de Heidegger, a metafísica aparece como uma experiência da linguagem, ponto de partida da investigação do seu sentido e, antes, do seu ter-lugar no pensamento. O que se deve expor, agora, é como a metafísica se constitui como experiência da linguagem, isto é, como a metafísica experimenta a linguagem, sobre quais fundamentos e com quais pressupostos. Percorrendo esse caminho, pode-se apontar qual o shifter, por conseguinte, que permite à metafísica experimentar, mesmo que seja encobrindo, o ter-lugar linguagem. 2.6. A metafísica da Voz A análise dos indicadores da enunciação a que se deu ensejo, com o questionamento de categorias filosóficas que confinam com categorias de língua encontradas na posição de um extremo do discurso, acabou por reconduzir ao plano conceitual de partida. Assim sendo, a percepção de tal plano, depois das últimas conduções do problema, não continua a mesma e a topologia da negatividade deve ser reconduzida. Com a notação metafísica revelada pela "protoarqueologia" agambeniana dos pronomes, somos remetidos, pela instância de discurso, na qual ainda não há, a rigor, 271 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. 48. 130 enunciados ou proposições, portanto, por uma pura enunciação, à instância da própria linguagem, isto é, ao lugar da linguagem, a sua presença – e na qual nenhum palavra é pronunciada sem que já esteja, por sua vez, numa instância de discurso. Como o universal é o que está encoberto pela certeza sensível, assim uma "instância de discurso" é o que os pronomes permitem acessar: o universal, ao qual o eu responde, é singularizado em cada ato de enunciação. Nesse caso, nada de "real" ou "objetivo" adquire consistência. Ela é meramente linguística, isto é, discursiva. "Quando o indivíduo se apropria dela, a linguagem se transforma em instancias de discurso, caracterizadas por esse sistema de referências internas cuja chave é eu, e que define o indivíduo pela construção linguística particular de que ele se serve quando se enuncia como locutor" 272. É a relação da linguagem com ela mesma que se coloca, pois, como o elemento pressuposto como instância originariamente constituinte da própria linguagem discursiva, sendo aí que, na sua própria instauração, e na sua cisão interna, de alguma forma, a negatividade terá de ser considerada. A concepção de "fratura da presença", adquire, aqui, o peso que a afunda nas brumas mesmas do ser: trata-se, de fato, da fratura do plano da linguagem. Agora, porém, ela aparece no hiato entre a sua existência (o seu ser, a sua "presença"), cuja inaferrabilidade está em questão, e o discurso ao qual o homem, como ser capaz de fala e como ser falante, já se encontra consignado. A cisão do ser encontra-se com a cisão da linguagem. Diante das análises precedentes, não era precisamente da "fratura" que emanava a negatividade? Se o caráter específico dos pronomes é a indicação desse terlugar da linguagem, o Da-sein, apontando a abertura entre o ser e a existência como o-aí, e a "apreensão-do-Isto", movendo-se nos confins da racionalidade discursiva da consciência e a irracionalidade não universalizável, portanto "significam: ser o ter-lugar da linguagem, capturar a instância de discurso"273. Enquanto indicadores do ser e da linguagem, revelam sua pertença à esfera de significado dos pronomes. O homem encontra-se, portanto, de todas as formas enquanto homem, preso na rede discursiva do lógos, mediante a qual o seu ser (e todo o ser?) adquire expressão. Ao tentar voltar-se ao ter-lugar da linguagem – a possibilidade de enunciação de todo discurso –, e dele fazer morada, o homem abre-se como negatividade e experimenta, por essa tentativa frustrada de querer-dizer o seu lugar como linguagem, a negatividade que se constitui como o fundamento negativo do ser (e do seu ser). 272 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, I, p. 281 (A natureza dos pronomes). 273 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 43. Grifo nosso. 131 O estar rodeado de linguagem, num movimento que suspende a continuidade da instrumentação de sons e vozes da natureza, gerando a possibilidade do silêncio consciente, arremessa-o em confronto com o que lhe seria exterior, suspende-o e joga os limites da linguagem no interior da própria linguagem: a consciência desprovida de fala ainda assim já é uma consciência capaz de linguagem, por isso a linguagem, como diz Hegel, possui na consciência o lugar de sua própria guarda – o mundo do infante, pois, coloca os limites físicos da linguagem; o mundo da infância como conceito, os limites do próprio ser da linguagem. A negatividade provém ao homem do ser ele mesmo ser de linguagem. Que ele o seja, portanto, significa que ele pode transcender o seu entorno num mundo – ainda mais, ele não vive num entorno, num ambiente, mas num mundo. Entre mundo e "ambiente", a negatividade, o salto que sutura a quebra do ser. É o tópos da linguagem, a sua topologia, por conseguinte, que permite expor aquela da negatividade – o modo como se a resolva aponta a posição filosófica de Agamben sobre o fundamento do ser e o destino da metafísica, e, em relação a isso, numa compreensão da instituição desse núcleo conceitual, pode nos permitir deixar elementos para uma abordagem da "situação" filosófica das construções agambenianas. E esse lugar, como já foi assinalado, na história da metafísica, apareceu como deslocado entre phoné e lógos, entre uma voz e um discurso. Como a diferença entre voz e linguagem seja agora compreendida, depois de todas essas delimitações, é a via de passagem para o entendimento possível de todo o pensamento agambeniano que vem. Diante disso, na série de contrapontos, aos quais somos remetidos pelo pensamento analisado, a variação deve retomar o problema da voz, mesmo que em sua insuficiência. Se o homem já está circunscrito pelo círculo discursivo, como poderia, em sua tentativa de capturar o acontecimento de linguagem como tal, fazê-lo, a não ser retornando à voz? Porém, depois de todo o percorrido, como poderia a voz, cuja compleição revela ao homem a sua animalidade, revelar-lhe algo sobre a sua condição de ser, como "ser-o-aí", aquele que surge de sua "topicalidade linguística"? Como, então, escapar do modelo tradicional e compreender, ao mesmo tempo, o papel da voz? Ora, mais do que a percepção dos linguistas de que é vã toda tentativa de buscar uma origem para a língua, o que apenas varria os problemas metafísicos para o novo tapete na sala dos saberes, a saber, a cientificidade que se queria atribuir à linguística, tanto mais o é a insistência na voz como fundamento da linguagem. Insistir na voz como originada num som emitido por um corpo dotado de alma e capaz de imaginação, relembrando a célebre forma aristotélica, não mais pode corresponder a uma tentativa de compreender a sua 132 efetividade na metafísica: não podendo a sua função na doutrina da alma significar, ao mesmo tempo, sua função, pode-se dizer, metafísica – e isso constitui um movimento que caracteriza A linguagem e a morte. Para compreender a remodelagem conceitual, devemos considerar o que o prospecto de uma a teoria enunciativa deixou evidenciado a respeito da questão da voz. Em O aparelho formal da enunciação (1970), como indica Benveniste, pode-se dar de três modos a abordagem da enunciação. O primeiro deles, "o mais imediatamente perceptível e o mais direto – embora de um modo geral não seja visto em relação ao fenômeno geral da enunciação – é a realização vocal da língua"274. O segundo, por sua vez, pressupõe a passagem da língua à fala, num processo de "semantização da língua"275. A questão da voz permanece latente, e, para Benveniste, remete à tentativa de captar a enunciação vocálica por meio dos "sons emitidos e percebidos" por meio de um ato individual, os quais, na postulação científica, tem de ser conduzidos a um núcleo além da variabilidade individual. A identidade da realização vocálica é colocada pela tentativa de compreensão do linguista – aquela, portanto, é um produto. Por mais que a enunciação signifique uma produção vocálica, a atualização da língua em discurso, realizada pela ativação do aparelho fonador individual, esse âmbito de estudo adquire seu extremo setorial na análise do som. O linguista pode se tornar um cientista do som, e a fonética teria o caráter de fio condutor. O conceito de fonema não surgiu, nessa perspectiva, a não ser como forma de reconduzir o linguista ao seu fazer, à consideração, atenta e significativa, da língua – e, mesmo com tal formulação, como se percebe pela insistência de Agamben, não se corta o vínculo que reconduz à concepção de voz276. A fonologia, a partir de sua unidade mínima de voz (significante), o fonema, confina, em sua forma cientificamente rebuscada, com a ontologia. A isso nem mesmo Benveniste escapou, embora permaneça numa posição de limite. De fato, como já apontamos, ao considerar a diferença existente entre a comunicação animal e a linguagem humana, entre um sistema de sinais e um sistema de representações simbólicas, ele afirma peremptoriamente que "não há linguagem sem voz", embora relativize a vocalidade em prol do caráter diferencial da linguagem humana, a sua capacidade de simbolização. Ao mesmo tempo em que deve à tradição alguns de 274 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, II, p. 82 (O aparelho formal da enunciação). 275 BENVENISTE, Émile. Problemas de linguística geral, II, p. 83 (O aparelho formal da enunciação). 276 Afinal, apesar de propósitos e modos de operação distintos, fonética e fonologia debruçam-se sobre os sons da fala, imediata e isoladamente, ou de modo mediato e em cadeia comunicativa, o que equivale dizer, em termos fundamentais, tendo em vista a longeva tradição de pensamento em análise, voz. 133 seus problemas capitais, a teoria enunciativa é uma tentativa de conduzir a semiologia além dessas limitações. É nesse movimento que as teorias de Benveniste foram retomadas. Por fim, a terceira forma de considerar o quadro formal da enunciação, e na qual se inclui a própria tentativa benvenistiana, indicativa da relativização da voz, é uma forma de se afastar do problema da vocalização e remeter ao da significação. Aqui podemos colocar em jogo a remissão de Agamben a Benveniste, pois a noção de enunciação poderia aparecer como atualização linguística refinada do problema da voz? É possível que se compreenda de fato a relação entre linguagem e negatividade pela noção de voz? Com isso, a fala não seria a voz do homem? E a língua? Ou melhor, por não possuir uma voz, como a cigarra ou o estorninho, é que o homem cai, ao falar, na língua? Afinal, é pela fala que o homem se apropria da língua. As dimensões da linguagem, para a instauração do discurso, precisam se cruzar. O limite conceitual da categoria da voz para a compreensão da negatividade da linguagem que estrutura a metafísica se afirma definitivamente. Por um lado, então, Agamben não poderia se basear em Benveniste, para quem a linguagem pressupõe sempre voz e, nisso, é fiel à tradição ocidental da voz significante – exatamente tal fidelidade transmissória está em jogo, é essa tradição sobre a linguagem que está sendo discutida desde o início. Por outro lado, é com a noção de enunciação, isto é, da entrada definitiva do homem na fala e na língua – é pela enunciação que o indivíduo se constitui como falante, apropriando-se da língua –, que se pode aceder a uma instância de palavra na qual importa o evento de linguagem e não o conteúdo – ainda. Para responder a essas questões, ao lado dos problemas que encontramos com Hegel e Heidegger, é que se desenvolve o dispositivo fundamental capaz de garantir a estrutura da compreensão agambeniana da metafísica. Apresenta-se, portanto, um desafio ao pensamento da voz: a tarefa é restituílo ao seu contexto propriamente metafísico, além de todo o psicologismo incrustado nas definições. Afinal, sob a sombra do modelo do tratado aristotélico, a voz permaneceu refém, na história do pensamento filosófico, das noções de alma e de intelecto, quando não, meramente, da continuidade naturalista do "aparelho fonador". Ora, para Agamben, impõe-se pensá-la, ao contrário, como "dimensão ontológica fundamental"277. Com isso, as concepções vigentes sobre a voz na tradição clássica e medieval, as quais, por mais que quisessem determinar aspectos concretos, corpóreos e até fisiológicos (lembremos do modelo físico do som, do qual, em De anima, a explicação da voz é tributária), adquirem 277 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 45. Grifo nosso. 134 o seu pleno sentido apenas numa dimensão metafísica – num intento, de certa forma, esboçado em Estâncias e Infância e história. Se o fundamento do humano dá-se na negatividade, a qual adquire seu sentido, por sua vez, na fratura da linguagem, não pode ser a voz, mesmo que "anterior" ao discurso, na tradição vocalizante da linguagem, o fundamento. A voz tem uma estrutura positiva e coextensiva ao vivente. É, ainda, o resquício da vida natural, e não a diferença específica da vida humana. A antropologia filosófica que aí se desenvolve, depositária da ideia de articulação, não pode se configurar sem cindir o ser, sem separar o humano do animal278. É preciso fazer jus, portanto, à pura instância de significação que ultrapassa o puro querer-dizer que, como negativo, restará pressuposto por todo discurso, numa volta sobre si mesmo, numa simples dobra. A voz, pressuposta na tradição, está à altura compreensiva desse lugar? Agamben aposta que não: A voz – que é suposta pelos shifters como ter-lugar da linguagem – não é simplesmente a phoné, o mero fluxo sonoro emitido do aparelho fonatório, assim como o Eu, o locutor, não é simplesmente o indivíduo psicossomático do qual o som provém. Uma voz como mero som (uma voz animal) pode certamente ser índice do indivíduo que a emite, mas não pode de modo algum remandar à instância de discurso enquanto tal nem abrir a esfera da enunciação. A voz, a phoné animal, é, sim, pressuposta pelos shifters, mas como aquilo que deve necessariamente ser subtraído para que o discurso significante tenha lugar.279 O estatuto da subtração da voz (e do discurso, que vem apenas depois da estância originária da linguagem, apenas post festum) abre a dimensão da negatividade na qual o humano, que intenta capturar a sua instância, fazendo dela palavra, vem a ser. Além da voz física, atinge-se uma dimensão na qual se está diante de uma experiência sui generis, cuja pertença metafísica é determinada por estar no substrato de todo proferimento verbal, no que se assemelha efetivamente à essência primeira e ao plano do "puro ser", indicando uma dimensão em que a linguagem existe, como instância de linguagem, mas sem qualquer evento de significação concreto nela firmado, isto é, apenas como possibilidade de instância de discurso. A experiência que aí se faz, pois, "tem o estatuto de um não-mais (voz) e de um não-ainda (significado)"280. 278 Encontramos, já aqui, o lugar ao qual a reflexão de O aberto (2002) deve ser remetida. Compreende-se, nesse movimento, que a máquina antropológica e a máquina governamental são coarticuláveis (o que não quer dizer contínuas, mas, sim, uma composição na qual paradigmas ontológicos, teológicos e políticos podem se sobrepor). Ao lado, ainda, de uma terceira máquina, de cuja exposição deixaremos os traços mais gerais na finalização deste trabalho. 279 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 48. Grifo nosso. 280 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 47. Grifo nosso. 135 O conceito que nomeia a dimensão situada no entre que suspende toda voz, a imediatidade com a qual os viventes residem na vida ou na natureza, e que apenas permite a possibilidade da existência do discurso, é a Voz, a qual se coloca como dimensão de passagem, ou melhor, passagem entre dimensões: assim como o shifter, revelado, primeiramente, na universalidade dos pronomes – do eu e do isto, dos pessoais e dos demonstrativos –, atua de forma a enviar a língua às dimensões do limite281, ou, em outra formulação, ao lugar mesmo das condições de possibilidade do próprio código inscrito no mundo como homem falante, assim a Voz, subtraindo a voz, envia o discurso aos limites de sua dimensão, envia a instância de discurso articulado à instância de linguagem. A Voz surge da fôrma de cunhagem conceitual de Giorgio Agamben como forma de responder ao problema do ter-lugar da linguagem em relação a sua negatividade de fundamentos. Onde o pensamento da voz estanca com uma articulação que oculta o problema da negatividade e do caráter único da maravilha da linguagem, que é a maravilha da existência, Agamben restitui à metafísica "um pensamento da Voz como articulação negativa originária"282, revelando a estrutura originária da transcendência não apenas numa remissão ao ter-lugar da linguagem, mas que, sob ele, realiza-se uma operação que permite a articulação da cisão entre mostrar e dizer. Mais do que o nome de uma dimensão ou de uma categoria, Voz é a operação que, assegurando a vigência da negatividade no interior da linguagem além de toda voz sonora, possibilita, na medida em que habita o limbo silencioso da fratura, a efetividade do mundo, do ser e da linguagem para a estrutura da metafísica. A Voz é "fundamento, mas no sentido que ela é aquilo que vai ao fundo e oculta-se para que o ser e a linguagem tenham lugar"283. A forma da negatividade que sustenta a articulação da linguagem, a qual, separando o vivente homem dos demais viventes, lança-o no mundo discursivo, é a estrutura negativa que fundamenta a articulação. É uma clivagem na presença do ser e da linguagem que impede a sua experiência imediata. Mas, na medida em que o homem aí estabelece sua morada, a fundação da morada do seu ser falante e político é atravessada, como vimos, por uma negatividade que o coloca, em seu ser, nada menos do que diante do nada. Além disso, enquanto ser político, o homem não apenas aí funda uma cidade e uma habitação, mas há um querer fundá-las que o ultrapassa como humanidade, afinal, o mundo político e o mundo social existem antes de nós, ao menos como rede pretérita e autoritária de 281Cf. MILNER, Jean-Claude. O amor da língua, p. 75-76. 282 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 50 283 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 49. Grifo nosso. 136 representações. E esse querer responde, de algum modo, a uma forma de vontade que se apresenta, para Agamben, apenas como um dos nomes que apontam para o problema do fundamento da metafísica, para a sua fundação e fundamentação. A estrutura da Voz responde pela terrível ameaça do nada que, na história do pensamento ocidental, a partir do encobrimento dessa sua sombra sobre o ser, o desvia aos entes e às coisas. Lembrando que a negatividade não se refere a qualquer negação proposicional, a um simples não que se opõe ao ente, mas diz respeito ao nada esquecido por uma forma de pensamento e que é intrínseco à dimensão da transcendência – tanto que é ultrapassando a totalidade do ente, como mundo, que o ser-o-aí experimenta a negatividade que possibilita o ter-lugar da linguagem. Trazendo o tópos fundante da linguagem ao ser, a Voz não apenas dá a negatividade como o lugar de abertura do humano, mas também a temporalidade: "Enquanto tem lugar na Voz (isto é, no não-lugar da voz, no seu ter-sido), a linguagem tem lugar no tempo. Mostrando a instância de discurso, a Voz abre, ao mesmo tempo, o ser e o tempo. Ela é cronotética"284. O ter-sido e o ainda não revelam-nos a suspensão que funda o próprio tempo na linguagem – presente e presença de um puro ser de linguagem, cujos limites, passado ou futuro, espreita em relação a sua própria instância efetiva de realização. A marca da metafísica enquanto "pensamento representante", é, então, representar o ente como ente e o discurso como voz significante. A relevância filosófica da "barreira resistente à significação" reside na possibilidade de trazer à luz esse encobrimento da negatividade que funda a articulação com a qual se pensou a linguagem. Que a metafísica seja, então, "a tradição de pensamento que pensa a autofundação do ser como fundamento negativo"285, isso significa que ela experimenta o pensamento a partir da negatividade, que ela pensa o ser a partir do ente e a linguagem a partir do discurso ou da voz significante, deixando de atender, pois ao próprio ser ou ao lugar da própria linguagem. Pensando os fundamentos (negativos) da metafísica, portanto, move-se Agamben, em A linguagem e a morte, em um caminho do pensamento cuja senda foi deixada pelo vário Heidegger, conduzindo-se, porém, e conduzindo-a, de um modo que parece assegurar a autonomia de seu próprio traço. A partir dessa virada da voz para a Voz, a ideia de voz significante desponta como expressão pósarticulatória, afinal, ela se desloca entre a voz e o discurso. Atrás de si, ou melhor, como seu fundamento, encontra-se a Voz, a qual, sim, responde pela 284 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 49, 285 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 6. 137 estruturação da negatividade da fratura. Diante da inapreensibilidade, pela palavra, do evento de linguagem como tal, e da sua ausência de um fundamento imediato na voz sonora, portanto, o acesso ao evento de linguagem por via da estruturação dessa negatividade na Voz foi encontrado e experimentado segundo uma operação que será encoberta por articulações, por uma Voz que, como "shifter supremo que permite capturar o ter-lugar da linguagem, aparece, por conseguinte, como o fundamento negativo sobre o qual repousa toda a onto-lógica, a negatividade originária sobre a qual toda negação se sustenta"286. A Voz não apenas "responde" ao evento da linguagem, como o incorpora, como base negativa, para que o discurso tenha lugar. Anterior, portanto, à dimensão na qual se afirma e se nega, é a dimensão em que se afirma, a partir da negatividade – consubstanciando o modo como a metafísica experimenta a linguagem, isto é, a partir da Voz –, a própria instância de linguagem. Por não ser imediatamente uma voz, por dar-se já como fala, a partir de uma língua, a linguagem humana adquire sua articulação por um "dispositivo", um "comutador" que a permite existir mediante um deslocamento. O shifter Voz, portanto, é o que operacionaliza a articulação como tal, dá fundamento, no lugar em que se estende aquele "plexo de diferenças eternamente negativas", à letra, o grámma do pensamento grego, e ao signo, o conceito fundamente da semiologia moderna. Assim, enquanto o shifter linguístico referia o código à mensagem, a língua ao discurso, atuando a partir de um vazio de conteúdo que o torna apto à indicação, o seu esvaziamento de certa forma corresponde à negatividade que encontramos na Voz como shifter metafísico. Sem pressupor a negatividade, que emana da cisão, qual sentido teriam operações articulatórias? É por haver cisão entre ser e ente, entre mostrar e dizer, que algo como uma articulação é capaz de dar sentido, sendo a possibilidade mesma da significação: eis o que podemos chamar de metafísica da Voz, agora numa consolidação daquilo que apenas indicávamos aproximando as palavras metafísica e voz e intuindo a sua pertença conceitual. Com isso, a cisão pertence à própria concepção metafísica do fenômeno linguístico. A aposta na Voz indica o âmbito de sua experiência da linguagem, como, essencialmente, uma aposta na voz e na letra – que é para todos os efeitos a expressão da voz na escrita – e, com base nessa configuração, pode-se entender por que Agamben pôde 286 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 50. 138 realocar também a gramatologia no horizonte da metafísica, embora como uma postulação extrema e bem-acabada dos seus elementos fundamentais, assim como, em O homem sem conteúdo, o niilismo aparecia como o despontar, o vir à superfície, do próprio fundamento da metafísica. Como a resolução articulatória seja insuficiente, significa que há uma latente fissura a partir da qual surge a negatividade: mais fundamental ao lógos como resposta, é o problema da Voz como fundamento. O desvelamento da "estrutura da tradição metafísica", a qual, sim, é dita de múltiplas maneiras, possibilita uma experiência da linguagem baseada na subtração da voz como sendo o que permite ao discurso vir à luz – e a partir daqui começa a se delinear o tour de force da escavação agambeniana. Entre a voz e o discurso, entre o som e o sentido está a Voz, e, analogamente à operação do shifter, o que ela fez é remeter o discurso significante, o enunciado, à situação mesma da Enunciação – o ato pelo qual o ser humano, o "ser-o-aí", assume a palavra, colocando em ato, como discurso, a sua capacidade de linguagem. [Fim do segundo capítulo] 2.7. Entreatos 2.7.1. A Voz e a voz da morte [Aqui começa o entreatos] Se é no início da Fenomenologia do espírito que Agamben encontra o lugar para se confrontar com o papel dos pronomes e da indicação no interior da metafísica, entendendo o modo como a linguagem se autoarticula, é num desenvolvimento anterior de Hegel, iniciado nos primeiros anos da permanência em Jena, em que uma filosofia especulativa se desenhava como filosofia real, que Agamben consegue unir uma ideia de linguagem a uma "voz da morte". Ora, a linguagem e a voz da morte articulam-se porque a primeira, que aparece no especulativo, e permanece, assim como na Fenomenologia, no cerne da consciência, relaciona-se com a segunda como a voz da morte que surge da morte da voz animal, assim como a linguagem articulada aparece mediante uma suspensão da continuidade vocálica da natureza. Se a linguagem pertence à consciência, e isso se conserva para a Fenomenologia, qual é o processo pelo qual ela se apresenta como tal? Como a consciência coloca-se como momento de autorreconquista do espírito, num processo que 139 se move além do meramente sensório e das imaginações terrificantes, com a superação do mundo aí tingido com as cores da noite – um mundo natural de imagens terrificantes? Agamben entende o princípio do movimento desse processo a partir da superação do signo natural, o qual se encontra, no âmbito da natureza e do exterior, arbitrariamente colocado por um sujeito em relação a um objeto. Uma vez sendo sua significação de ordem externa, objetificada, o sujeito torna-se refém do objeto, e, com isso, da natureza, reingressando permanentemente no imaginário e impedindo que a consciência surja e o espírito acorde de seu sono atormentado por monstros. Ora, é com o aparecimento da memória que se conquista, para a consciência, a linguagem, e, assim, o espírito pode começar o seu périplo rumo a si mesmo. De fato, num fragmento intitulado A primeira forma da existência do espírito [Die erste Form der Existenz des Geistes...] (Fragmento 19), consolida-se não apenas a consciência como o terreno para o desdobramento do espírito, mas também o discurso, a linguagem: "a consciência existe primeiro como memória, e seu produto, a linguagem [die Sprache]"287 Com a memória ultrapassa-se a dimensão de uma arbitrariedade do signo natural e conquista-se o nome; nega-se a relação com o exterior e o desligamento do aspecto coisal inerente ao signo. A adâmica nomeação dos seres do mundo, que designa um ato de soberania e governo, indica o ato de nomeação como a negação da multiplicidade das coisas com o nome: são negados os múltiplos animais assinalados como cão, por exemplo, e o nome acaba por idealizá-los. Ora, o nome, diferentemente do signo, idealiza, adquire uma permanência que se destaca tanto da natureza exterior da coisa, à qual está preso o signo natural, como do próprio sujeito. No nome, a linguagem desponta e revela-se como a conquista da relação estruturada entre o sujeito e o objeto, entre a consciência e o conceito. A memória, então, operacionaliza o nome como memória do nomeado, como memória daquilo que foi negado, em sua particularidade. "O nome – enquanto 'existe no ar' como negação e memória do nomeado – abole, portanto, aquilo que no signo era ainda natureza, uma realidade outra do próprio significado e, despertando o espírito do próprio sonho e restituindo-o ao seu elemento aéreo, transforma o reino das imagens em 'reino dos nomes'"288. É no tornar-se linguagem da memória, possibilitando à consciência acordar do seu sono na noite da natureza, que algo como uma voz desponta. 287 HEGEL, G. W. Jenaer Systementwürfe, I, p. 195 [p. 280] (Fragment 19). "Das Bewuẞtsein existiert zuerst als Gedächtnis und sein Produkt, die Sprache". 288 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 57. 140 Por mais que se determine a voz humana como voz articulada que indica a consciência, ainda assim permanece indeterminado o papel da memória e seu papel na articulação. É com a ideia de voz animal que se percebe o que é articulado na faculdade de linguagem. Nesse contexto da obra hegeliana, a palavra interrompe a continuidade vocálica da natureza, conservando, ao mesmo tempo, o seu aspecto sonoro mediante uma interferência na cadeia de sons "naturais" ou "vocálicos" que insere consoantes que não soam. O vocálico é não apenas o relativo à voz, como também o que é contínuo como vogal. Introduz-se na cadeia vocálica da voz animal uma diferença, a consoante, permitindo que cada som venha a ter um significado por si, delimitado entre sons. Determina-se a articulação, marca da linguagem humana, "como um processo de diferenciação, de interrupção e de conservação da voz animal"289; a linguagem torna-se voz da consciência não apenas por ser sonora e articulada, mas porque, assim, passa a existir um nome, porque cada som pode ter um significado e, transformado em idealidade, existir independentemente do nomeado. Mas se isso tudo revela o processo, ou melhor, o aspecto formal, pouco nos diz do conteúdo processado, à exceção da vaga cadeia vocálica intercalada por consoantes mudas – ideias cujo significado é filosófico, de história das ideais e do pensamento, sem o resguardo, é importante notar, de alguma verossimilhança da ordem da investigação linguística dos fenômenos de linguagem. É preciso insistir no caráter determinante da voz animal que se dá a ouvir no momento em que morre, e o que, nela, permite à memória, na voz articulada, atuar como memória no nome. É no sentido exprimido pela voz que se pode entender o seu vínculo com a negatividade. É na autoprivação de si causada pela morte violenta que o animal adquire uma voz, e essa voz, Agamben a chama, pois, de "voz da morte". Assim, a memória é conservação da morte do animal que culmina numa voz, permanecendo ("no ar") como uma dimensão entre o signo natural (que poderia ser o aspecto vivente do animal, o mero sinal) e o plano consumado do sentido (a consumação da morte enquanto fim). A voz, portanto, conserva a morte enquanto tal, como acontecimento, e o seu extremo, o grito, representa a privação última da voz como privação da vida e conservação da morte. É precisamente na morte que o animal tem uma voz, mediante a qual é conservado enquanto morto: A voz animal é, assim, voz da morte. Aqui o genitivo é entendido em sentido subjetivo além de objetivo. Voz (e memória) da morte significa: a voz é morte 289 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 57. 141 que conserva e recorda o vivente como morto e, ao mesmo tempo, imediatamente traço e memória da morte, negatividade pura.290 Não apenas a voz aparece para assinalar a morte, mas, antes, a morte exprime-se como voz, com um sinal, fazendo, pela voz do animal na hora de sua morte, um sinal para a sua recordação – do animal que morre e de si mesma enquanto morte que aniquila o animal. O paralelo entre a voz animal e a conservação, pela memória, do nomeado, no nome, é assim estabelecido na investigação agambeniana. Assim como a linguagem humana, na cadeia vocálica, segmentando-a e definindo seus termos pelos limites que estabelecem entre si, a voz que o animal profere na hora de sua morte segmenta, de uma vez por todas, a sua voz unívoca: separa-lhe, aí, vida e morte – e o que é levado pela memória da linguagem, então, é a própria morte do animal. O nome nega e conserva o nomeado; a voz animal nega e conserva a morte do animal. Como memória, "a linguagem, pelo fato de se inscrever no lugar da voz, é duplamente voz e memória da morte: morte que recorda e conserva a morte, articulação e memória do traço da morte"291. Na medida em que adquire seu lugar nessa negatividade, portanto, a "voz humana" pode se tornar voz da consciência e atingir o plano da significação: sua matéria é a voz da morte, é, numa imagem cuja potência é explícita, "túmulo da voz animal"292. A passagem – entre o animal e o humano, entre o natural e o discursivo – é assegurada, agora, em termos de forma e de conteúdo, pela memória, pela memória que resulta em linguagem. A potência de linguagem mostra-se, portanto, como intimamente instituída em relação àquela outra potência, a de morrer. À diferença de Heidegger, contudo, que separa homem e animal, linguagem e voz, em Hegel essas categorizações mostram-se nos termos da "voz significante" como articulação. "Por isso", pode concluir Agamben quanto ao período jenense de Hegel, apontando já o terreno da Fenomenologia, "a linguagem significante é verdadeiramente 'a vida do espírito' que 'carrega' a morte e 'se mantém' nela; e, por isso, a saber, enquanto permanece (verweilt) na negatividade compete -lhe o 'poder mágico', que 'converte o negativo em ser'"293. Se já aqui se pode vislumbrar que Hegel não apenas ficou circunscrito pelo círculo mágico de uma Voz como operador metafísico entre o não mais do animal e o ainda não do humano, é com a relação entre linguagem e trabalho consolidada na Fenomenologia do espírito que se estabelece a relação entre linguagem e negatividade a 290 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 59. 291 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 60. 292 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 59. 293 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 59. 142 partir de uma operação como aquela da Voz. A linguagem, na Fenomenologia, será lida, precisamente, ao lado do trabalho, como exteriorização294. Ora, esse paralelo já se constatava nos fragmentos do período de Jena, nos quais a linguagem e o trabalho apareciam como "meio" (Mitte), pelos quais sujeito e objeto superavam a sua separação: no caso da linguagem, enquanto verdade da consciência (numa linguagem que encontramos na seção sobre a certeza sensível), representa o meio de integração entre a consciência e conceito, o trabalho, por sua vez, permitia a integração entre o indivíduo, o trabalhador, e a natureza, justamente pelo produto de seu trabalho295. Ao lado deles, o terceiro "meio", a propriedade, como meio entre grupos nacionais diversos. Daqui a célebre "luta por reconhecimento", a qual representa, pode-se dizer, em cada transição entre meios, o tópico da integração. Mas essa exteriorização aponta algo mais profundo. Trata-se, no que nos servimos da linguagem de Alexandre Kojève em A ideia da morte na filosofia de Hegel, da superação da realidade do mundo como ser-dado da natureza, cuja continuidade é interrompida de uma vez por todas com a ideia de morte, com a finitude que cinde o homem da natureza e o separa do animal: A morte – se assim quisermos chamar essa inefetividade – é a coisa mais terrível; e suster o que está morto requer a força máxima. A beleza sem-força detesta o entendimento porque lhe cobra o que não tem condições de cumprir. Porém não é a vida que se atemoriza ante a morte e se conserva intacta da devastação, mas é a vida que suporta a morte e nela se conserva, que é a vida do espírito. O espírito só alcança sua verdade à medida que se encontra a si mesmo no dilaceramento absoluto. Ele não é essa potência como o positivo que se afasta do negativo como ao dizer de alguma coisa que é nula ou falsa, liquidamos com ela e passamos a outro assunto. Ao contrário, o espírito só é essa potência enquanto encara diretamente o negativo e se demora junto dele. Esse demorar-se é o poder mágico que converte o negativo em ser.296 A vida do espírito que se conserva diante da morte é abertura para o humano e a morte, ao menos para a leitura de Kojève, é o fundamento da visão hegeliana do homem, pois "a filosofia dialética ou antropológica de Hegel é, em última análise, uma 294 HEGEL, G. W. Fenomenologia do espírito, p. 198. 295 Acompanhamos, ainda, a sistematização de Herbert Marcuse em seu estudo sobre Hegel, Razão e revolução (MARCUSE, Herbert. Reason and revolution, p. 75-77), na medida em que o entendemos como um leitor de Hegel que sempre atentou para o papel fundamental e estratégico (e problemático) da negatividade como um motor interno essencial do sistema hegeliano, embora limitado – aqui já segundo a visão marcusiana tardia – a culminar num momento final de positividade da Razão: a negatividade integra o processo dialético não apenas para separar o real do efetivo (entrando aqui o problema da negação determinada), mas para ser, precisamente, o que deve ser reconquistado e superado como positividade no estágio absoluto de realização do espírito. Em que pese a insistência nesse momento final positivo, de uma "consciência feliz", isto é, a integração das forças antagônicas, a inspiração hegeliana para o seu projeto teórico-crítico permanece como o resgate da negatividade como princípio que abre a totalidade histórica e o homem para a potencialidade. 296 HEGEL, G. W. Fenomenologia do espírito, p. 38. 143 filosofia da morte"297. E o modo de manifestação dessa morte é o que revela ao homem, no modo de uma angústia surgida no risco de morrer, numa luta que separa a vida e a morte, a sua finitude. A morte permite que o homem adquira uma consciência da finitude e lhe revela seu ser no tempo, sua temporalidade. Assim, "é separando e reunindo coisas em e por seu pensamento discursivo que o homem formula seus projetos técnicos que, uma vez realizados pelo trabalho, transformam realmente o aspecto do mundo natural dado, nele criando um mundo cultural"298. A negatividade que surge da morte como confrontação com a finitude é também o que propulsiona o homem, ao tomar a sua finitude, à ação – a ação abre-se como negatividade. Em termos essencialmente discursivos, "a força do entendimento só separa a ideia-essência de seu suporte natural para ligá-la, como ideia-sentido, ao suporte específico do discurso, que, por sua vez, está aqui e agora (já que ele só é discurso-dotadode-um-sentido na medida em que é compreendido por um homem concreto)"299. Ora, o que se destaca do aqui e do agora, como vimos, é o universal, e o universal revela a linguagem como pertencendo aos domínios da consciência. Mas a morte não é a própria morte, a nossa morte como possibilidade, mas a morte do animal e também de um outro. Com a passagem entre a voz animal silenciada para sempre na voz da morte, que daquela faz tumba, "a humanidade do homem pressupõe, portanto", por um lado, "a finitude do animal que o encarna, e, por conseguinte, pressupõe a morte do próprio homem"300. Morte do animal quer dizer, nesse sentido, também morte do homem enquanto vivente, e isso se estende ao gênero humano. "Por outro lado, o homem provoca também a morte do animal, transcendendo, pela ação negadora, sua natureza dada. A rigor, ele arrisca a vida e é morto sem motivo biológico válido. Logo, pode-se dizer que o homem é uma doença mortal do animal"301. Morte do animal, agora, coloca-se no sentido da ação, da negatividade da finitude que significa a morte do animal como morte consciente e provocada, de si mesmo ou de um outro. A aniquilação, segundo insiste Kojève, revela-se enquanto luta de vida e de morte entre senhor e escravo – e a angústia, na obra de Hegel, desperta nesse contexto, o da "luta por reconhecimento", contexto de um imperioso desejo que deseja não uma presença, mas o fazer-se presente da ausência do ser nessa luta aniquilado. 297 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 504. 298 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 507. 299 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 507. 300 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 516. 301 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 516-517. 144 Na destruição do animal de si, que supera a primeira negação, a negação de si como natureza e ser-dado, o homem revela a estrutura sacrificial da própria fundação, o humano revela-se como o atributo de uma autoimolação: "O Homem revelou e fundou a verdade humana sacrificando"302. Ora, essas palavras de Georges Bataille consideram justamente as lições de Kojève sobre a morte em Hegel, e, mais do que isso, atingem, na finitude e na negação, o fazer-se ação e exteriorização concretos dessa finitude e dessa negação (o que vale, temos de dizer, para trabalho, linguagem, propriedade). Pelo fato de que não possa conhecer imediatamente a própria morte, "no sacrifício", pelo qual estabelece uma relação com o animal, com a vida simplesmente vivente, "o sacrificante se identifica com o animal atingido pela morte. Assim, ele morre vendo-se morrer, e até mesmo de certo modo, por sua própria vontade, fazendo um só corpo com a arma do sacrifício"303. Ora, e no confronto com o outro, não é a própria vida e a própria morte que estão em jogo? Não é o perecimento do animal de si? O sacrifício, então, bem pode ser a insigne imagem pela qual o homem acessa a própria mortalidade fazendo morrer, pela qual funda o confronto provocado com a sua mortalidade – É na luta, em que a força do negativo se manifesta pela aceitação voluntária do risco de vida (o senhor) ou pela angústia provocada pelo aparecimento consciente da morte (o escravo) que o homem cria seu ser humano, transformando, assim como por magia, o nada que ele é, e que se manifesta a ele e por ele como morte, em uma existência negadora do combatente e do trabalhador criadores da história. É essa permanência junto à morte que realiza a negatividade e a insere no mundo natural sob a forma do Ser humano.304 No contexto da Fenomenologia, Agamben observa, sob essa sugestão kojèviana, que o compasso entre voz e linguagem se manifesta de modo correspondente ao dessa dialética entre senhor e escravo: a voz e o gozo do senhor são determinados pelo esvanecimento, isto é, por uma marca negativa; a linguagem e o trabalho, por sua vez, interrompem e conservam; lá o som da voz, aqui o desejo. O que consolida a correspondência, contudo, é o papel da morte como elemento mediado e mediador em ambos os movimentos: enquanto a voz é memória da morte, o reconhecimento é produto dessa luta. Enquanto o senhor goza essa luta, aceitando o risco de sua morte e por isso sendo reconhecido (e podendo se impor ao escravo), o escravo, aquele que conhece a mediação mortal em jogo, desperta e experimenta a angústia e confronta-se com a sua finitude. Pelo movimento que confronta o animal em si, aceitando o risco ou sofrendo a 302 BATAILLE, Georges. Hegel, a morte e o sacrifício, p. 403. 303 BATAILLE, Georges. Hegel, a morte e o sacrifício, p. 404. 304 KOJÈVE, Alexandre. Introdução à Fenomenologia do espirito, p. 513. 145 angústia, porém, movimento oportunizado pelo reconhecimento como busca da totalização do outro e irrupção da consciência, o senhor e o escravo, na sua luta de vida e de morte, humanizam-se: é pela consciência da finitude no confronto direto com a morte provocada por um confronto que escapa à tendência dos animais de conservarem a sua vida, ameaçando a própria sobrevivência, que se produz a antropogênese. "Não mais animal, mas não ainda humano, não mais desejo e não ainda trabalho, a 'pura negatividade' do gozo do senhor aparece como o ponto em que se mostra, por um instante, a articulação originária daquela 'faculdade da morte' (Fähigkeit des Todes) que caracteriza a consciência humana" 305. Também a Voz, entre voz e discurso, atua de modo a possibilitar articulação da faculdade da linguagem. O seu terlugar, contudo, coincide com o não lugar aberto pela morte. A Voz torna-se, aqui, voz da morte, ela é o ponto de articulação das duas faculdades. A Voz, a estrutura fundamental da experiência metafísica com a linguagem, portanto, manifesta sua estrutura na filosofia de Hegel, a qual de fato pressupõe uma voz e sua negação, uma permanência na negatividade pela "voz da morte"306. A voz da morte importa enquanto irrupção da negatividade, a qual é precisamente conservada na linguagem: a relação entre linguagem e morte, dá-se, portanto, pela negatividade de uma voz da morte, de um "não mais animal, mas não ainda humano", pela negatividade de uma Voz efetivamente articulatória e fundante, portanto, da negatividade como fundamento (negativo) do humano. 2.7.2. Stimmung e Stimme, ou A paixão, sem voz, pela palavra Como se dá composição à Voz num contexto em que o homem é como que arrancado do seio da natureza, e assumido, desde o ser do seu ente, como lançado e projetado na existência? Diferentemente do contexto metafísico no qual se desenvolve a filosofia hegeliana, o qual não apenas não rechaçava como deu azo a originais filosofias da natureza, Heidegger acaba por confiscar o contexto orgânico (ou fisiológico) para o desenvolvimento da negatividade da morte. Por esse motivo, a indagação de Agamben precisa basear-se em outros termos, pois nenhuma voz, em Heidegger, teria ligação com a "voz da morte" do animal, porque, à luz de Ser e tempo, os animais nem sequer morrem. Heidegger leva a fundo a distinção, sob a marca de uma diferença ontológica, entre phoné e lógos, e a linguagem tem de ser pensada em outra chave. Só o homem morre e isso, a 305 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 62. 306 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 62. 146 rigor, desloca a discussão para além de todas as vozes presentes na natureza. Se há alguma manifestação da negatividade conectada à voz, essa não pode partir de qualquer consideração sobre o "vivente" – sobre o animal. No pensamento de Heidegger, a conexão histórico-metafísica (da história da metafísica, leia-se) entre o homem enquanto vivente e o lógos é um marco de distanciamento, e não o ponto de partida (como continuava a ser em Hegel, de acordo com o que pudemos analisar das considerações agambenianas) – Giorgio Agamben, por sua vez, com outra perspectiva, toma essa conexão como o que provoca o pensamento sobre a linguagem, e, a partir do desenvolvimento conceitual da Voz, até mesmo a posição de Heidegger lhe parecerá insuficiente. A conexão, no pensamento heideggeriano, entre linguagem e voz significante – sendo por essa que se podia instituir a vinculação do homem com o plano do simplesmente vivente – é radicalmente contestada e a concepção que definia a linguagem como "articulação de uma voz (animal)"307, portanto, é confinada como essencialmente metafísica. Onde antes a "voz significante" atuava sob o lógos, revelando, ao lado do seu caráter meta-físico, também o seu caráter essencialmente físico, até mesmo orgânico, gerando uma corrente subterrânea que marcou a experiência ocidental com a linguagem e o pensamento sobre essa experiência, agora, qualquer tentativa de pensar algo como a essência da linguagem, partindo do Dasein como aquele que se mantém no seu aí e, aí mantendo-se, abre-se para o ser (e abre o ser), tem de indagar como o remeter-se do Dasein ao seu aí, enquanto ter-lugar da linguagem, pode se dar sem que haja uma voz e de modo a que, ainda assim, coloque-se em jogo a negatividade. Antes, se ela irrompe, e também a angústia como disposição fundamental do Dasein, é porque – e aqui começa a se delinear a apropriação agambeniana de Heidegger e, ao mesmo tempo, o afastamento – "sendo o Da, o homem está no lugar da linguagem sem ter uma voz"308. Se relembrarmos, então, aquela passagem de A essência da linguagem que nos lança a questão sobre o "impensado" da "relação essencial" entre a linguagem e a morte, vê-se, de fato, que é apenas pela linguagem que a morte adquire o horizonte do ser – é na e pela linguagem que a morte desponta ao vivente e se lhe apresenta pela experiência extremada de uma angústia diante da morte, como, mutatis mutandis, já em Hegel, na Fenomenologia do Espírito, a experiência da formulação do humano dava-se, segundo Agamben, não mais por uma voz (Stimme), segundo o papel que ela 307 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 69. 308 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 69. 147 desempenhava na tentativa sistemática de Jena, mas por uma Stimmung extrema309, pela qual, na dialética do desejo entre senhor e escravo, insere-se a morte. Para o Heidegger de Ser e tempo, que interpreta não a voz animal, ou a voz orgânica do proferimento verbal, mas a "voz da consciência"310, a conexão entre linguagem e morte, enquanto experiência que funda o humano, revela-se por uma Stimmung extremada, a angústia. Nesse sentido, Agamben, antes de tudo, destaca a proximidade etimológica que Stimmung guarda com Stimme. Revela-se, assim, ainda mais profundo o deslocamento do campo semântico originário de Stimmung de uma dimensão acústicomusical para uma delimitação de contexto psicológica311, a partir do qual continuaria a ser tomado: "Stimmung aparece na língua alemã como tradução do latim concentus e do grego harmonía. Iluminante é, desse ponto de vista, o modo em que Novalis pensa a Stimmung não como uma psicologia, mas como uma 'acústica da alma'"312. Se, originalmente, o termo significava algo como "entonação, acordo, harmonia" 313, como entendê-lo agora, se não for para tomá-lo como "tonalidade emotiva", "disposição de humor" ou "estado-de-ânimo"314? Ora, na condução de uma leitura filosófica que tem de levar em conta tal deslocamento – afinal, o visado, aqui, é a Stimmung em sua relação com a Stimme no pensamento de Heidegger – , Agamben enuncia um princípio de orientação que, a rigor, tem extensa validade para a sua filosofia, a saber, que "a história da cultura humana, com efeito, não é, amiúde, mais do que a história de tais mudanças, de tais deslocamentos, e é propriamente porque não se presta atenção a eles que, com frequência, a interpretação de categorias e conceitos do passado dá lugar a tantos mal-entendidos"315. Com base nesse princípio, enunciado num contexto de sua obra que começa a se afinar com uma perspectiva arqueológica, não apenas se pode perceber a atenção quanto aos campos de significação que caracteriza o gesto filológico da filosofia de Agamben, mas também é 309 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 60. 310 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 737. (§ 54). A voz, em Ser e tempo, aparece essencialmente no Segundo Capítulo da Segunda Parte, isto é, onde está em jogo a relação entre o Dasein e o apelo da consciência e do "cuidado" (Sorge). Aí, então, é preciso entendê-la como diversa do pensamento que a metafísica instituiu sobre a voz, conectando-a ao vivente como gênero, pois ela aparece no contexto de determinação conceitual do Dasein nos termos de uma analítica "existenciária". 311 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 70. 312 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 70. 313 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Vocazione e voce in La potenza del pensiero, p. 79. 314 Respectivamente, a tradução encontrada em italiano, segundo a que Agamben aponta, para Stimmung, a tradução de Ernildo Stein (conforme a encontramos em Que é metafísica) e a de Fausto Castilho, no §29 de Ser e tempo. 315 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Vocazione e voce in La potenza del pensiero, p. 79. 148 intuída a sua pertença originária à relação entre lógos e ser, na medida em que está em jogo um conceito utilizado para abrir ao Dasein a sua própria relação com a existência, a "disposição", no aí, do ser-o-aí. Conforme se pode notar do destaque conferido por Agamben ao §29 de Ser e tempo ("O Da-sein [ser-"aí"] como encontrar-se"316), lê-se o conceito de Stimmung em profunda relação com o Da do Dasein, isto é, com o-aí, o ter-lugar como tal, do ser-o-aí. O caráter da Stimmung é dispor o ser-o-aí para a sua condição de ser-lançado, isto é, de estar em vias de possibilitar a sua existência mesmo que em meio a uma negatividade. A Stimmung, pois, é propriamente o operador (o dispositivo) que, ao remeter o ser-o-aí ao aí, dispõem-no numa negatividade radical. Na medida em que o ser-o-aí é aquele que faz experiência de o-aí como terlugar da linguagem, desvenda-se o aspecto de negatividade que desponta com a Stimmung: está-se no ter-lugar (da linguagem) sem que se tenha uma voz. Numa interpretação bastante singular, pela qual a Stimmung se coloca entre o Dasein e o-aí, entre o homem e mundo que se abre por ele e para ele, na medida em que encaminha o Dasein para a linguagem, a "Stimmung é a experiência de que a linguagem não é a Stimme do homem e, por isso, a abertura do mundo que ela realiza é inseparável de uma negatividade"317. Daqui, portanto, a leitura agambeniana da angústia como o estranhamento do Dasein com esse seu insólito lugar, com a sua situação de ausência de uma voz diante do mundo, além da negatividade (toda "nulidade") que ultrapassa o seu ter-lugar como profunda conversão ao ser e ao discurso. "O Dasein – enquanto a linguagem não é a sua voz – não pode jamais capturar o ter-lugar da linguagem, não pode nunca ser o seu Da (a pura instância, o puro evento de linguagem) sem se descobrir sempre já lançado e consignado a um discurso"318. Pelo fato de estar lançado ao discurso, de já estar sempre capturado na ordem das representações que o configura, diante do próprio lugar da linguagem, da própria abertura do ser e do mundo, o homem encontra-se diante da negatividade, "propriamente porque o Dasein é aberto ao mundo de modo tal que ele não é nunca senhor da sua abertura, essa abertura ao mundo tem o caráter do desambientamento [spaesamento]"319. O estar em exílio de sua própria linguagem, consignado, como humano, ao discurso e à 316 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 383. [p. 134]. 317 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 71. 318 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 71. Grifo nosso. 319 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Vocazione e voce in La potenza del pensiero, p. 82. 149 fala, caracterizam a angústia e o espanto pelos quais o homem experimenta, pela disposição do seu próprio ser, a negatividade, e a morte, portanto, revela-lhe a subtração de todo lugar para si possível. O ser-o-aí, reportando-se ao seu aí, não encontra nele um lugar (o equivalente ao ambiente no qual os viventes se enraízam ou circulam), mas um "não-lugar": "O Da, o lugar da linguagem é, assim, um não-lugar"320. O ter-lugar da linguagem, pela experiência da Stimmung como angústia, que ameaça de todos os lados, revela-se, na experiência do próprio homem, um não-lugar, pois, diante dela, ele não tem mais voz nem ainda discurso. Tal não-lugar é a abertura e o abismo em que é lançado o ser – valeria dizer um nada, apostando na "hipótese niilista" sobre o destino da metafísica e da experiência com o ser e a linguagem no ocidente, mas não é de um nada que se trata, e sim da própria abertura do mundo, do ser, da linguagem: a angústia não 'vê' também um determinado 'aqui' e 'ali' a partir do qual o ameaçador se aproximaria. Que o ameaçador não esteja em parte alguma caracteriza o diante-de-quê da angústia. A angústia 'não sabe' o que é aquilo diante-de-que se angustia. Este 'em parte alguma' não significa nada, mas no em parte alguma está contida a região em geral, a abertura de mundo em geral (...), o ameaçador (...) já está 'aí' – e, no entanto, em parte alguma está tão perto que ele oprime e corta a respiração – e, não obstante, não está em parte alguma.321 É esse "em parte alguma" no qual está contido a topicalização mesma do mundo (uma espécie de utópica ou atópica que se coloca como limite de todo dimensionamento tópico), esse "em parte alguma" que já está aí, portanto, que revela o que Agamben exprime como o não-lugar que, diante do não profundo que o sustenta, que não é um nada, no sentido de não existente, mas a abertura mesma da existência. Porém, esse nãolugar não parece justamente apontar a situação da Voz? Se o que se revela no Da, no terlugar da linguagem, mostra-se um não-lugar, isso não se deve ao pensamento de uma Voz que pensa o ser e a linguagem? Para Agamben, a resposta afirmativa a essas questões é o que permite situar a metafísica e apresentar o plano de seu fundamento. Em primeiro lugar, pois, "o paradoxo, aqui, é que a própria ausência de voz do Dasein, o próprio 'vazio silencioso' que a Stimmung lhe revelara, recai, agora, em um Voz, mostra-se, antes, como já sempre determinado e 'afinado' [accordato] (gestimmt) por uma Voz", isto é, até mesmo o pensamento que teria ido mais longe na compreensão da abertura da linguagem e do ser acabou absorvido pela negatividade revelada, uma vez que "mais originário do que o ser 320 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 71. 321 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Ser e tempo, p. 523. [p. 186] 150 lançado sem voz na linguagem é a possibilidade de compreender o chamamento da Voz da consciência, mais originária do que a experiência da Stimmung é aquela da Stimme"322. Esse dito caráter original adquire ainda maior peso quando se atenta ao fato de que, no modo do mudo chamamento da consciência, o ser está pré-disposto a compreender o silêncio em jogo, possibilitando que se se pudesse deixar de ultrapassar os limites da circunscrição do pensamento da linguagem em uma Voz. "Apenas enquanto o Dasein encontra uma Voz e se deixa chamar por ela, pode aceder àquele Insuperável que é, por isso, a possibilidade de não ser o Da, de não ser o lugar da linguagem"323: ora, isso mesmo é o colocar-se diante da possibilidade da própria morte, naquela antecipação reveladora. Sem a vocalidade – no que somos remontados também a Hegel –, como poderia o homem relacionar-se com a morte? A morte autêntica apenas se antecipa, então, com uma Voz; é quando pode colocar a morte não apenas para o pensamento, mas para a experiência da mais extrema Stimmung do Dasein. Se não houvesse algum operador que possibilitasse ao Dasein pensar a sua morte, transpor ao pensamento essa "experiência", justamente uma analítica da finitude estaria como que partida ao meio por se privar, na sua propulsão fenomenológica, de uma relação com o lógos e com o discurso que possibilite apreender algo da possibilidade mesma do fenômeno como transcrição do problema originário do ser. "O pensamento da morte é, simplesmente, pensamento da Voz". Ora, a diferença entre Hegel e Heidegger, para Agamben, é que o segundo foi mais longe na compreensão do substrato negativo do ser ao compreender que "a linguagem não é a voz do Dasein e o Dasein, lançado no Da, experimenta o ter-lugar da linguagem como um não-lugar (um Nirgends)"324, quase tendo ultrapassado a estrutura da Voz. Se o desenvolvimento heideggeriano, na ótica de Agamben, pôde ir mais longe, ao tolher do homem a voz e a relação com o animal, não ultrapassou, contudo, o limite da Stimme, pois a reintroduz pela questão do "chamamento" e da interpelação de uma voz silenciosa, a qual aparece, além da análise de Ser e tempo, precisamente em O que é metafísica? como "voz do ser"325. Assim, ainda no modo daquela homologia estrutural que permite compreender a metafísica, "como, para Hegel, o animal tem, na morte violenta, uma voz, assim o Dasein, no ser para a morte autêntico, encontra uma Voz: e 322 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 74. 323 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 75. 324 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 72. 325 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Que é metafísica? – Posfácio (1943), p. 49. Grifo nosso. 151 essa Voz guarda, como para Hegel, o 'poder mágico' que revira o negativo em ser, isto é, mostra que o nada é apenas 'o véu' do ser"326. Se todo esse movimento de confisco das bases das formulações metafísicas é para apenas acabar no silêncio, na voz silenciosa, etc., para Agamben, então, não se ultrapassou de fato o limite da Voz, mas foram explorados, assim, os limites de sua possibilidade. No desenvolvimento da obra heideggeriana, a Voz como operador fundamental acaba por ser reafirmado conforme a sua significação última – isto é, ligando a abertura do ser a um pensamento que o pensa a partir de uma Voz – e a Stimmung aparece como o desenrolar da Voz que responde como chamado do próprio ser: "somente o homem, em meio a todos os entes, experimenta, chamado pela voz do ser, a maravilha de todas as maravilhas: que o ente é"327. É a experiência do ser o que está em jogo nesse chamado sempre silencioso da Voz do ser. A experiência humana da palavra é como um sopro que responde ao silêncio como o qual, ecoado pelo pensamento, o ser permitese falar no seu fundamento, no seu estar diante da abertura: A experiência da Voz – pensada como puro e silencioso querer-dizer e como puro querer-ter-consciência – desvela ainda uma vez a sua fundamental tarefa ontológica. O ser é a dimensão de significado da Voz como ter-lugar da linguagem, isto é, do puro querer-dizer sem dito e do puro querer-terconsciência sem consciência. O pensamento do ser é pensamento da Voz.328 A "voz do ser" é, assim, numa dimensão originária, a própria Voz, o operador metafísico fundamental. Em última análise, diante do não-lugar que se revela como negatividade que atravessa o ser, a Voz responde como a experiência do ser no ter-lugar da linguagem. Se a metafísica é o pensamento do ser, e o pensamento do ser é um pensamento da Voz, a metafísica torna-se um pensamento do ser sobre bases estritamente negativas e infundadas – todo terreno aquém disso não seria nem mesmo teologia, mas teogonia: Abismo (Bythós), Silêncio (Sigḗ). Heidegger, que, ao livrar-se da voz, poderia passar incólume à tradição metafísica, é ao seu círculo reintegrado "pelo poder mágico que converte o negativo em ser", pela estrutura de uma Voz. O que configura, aos olhos de Agamben, um limite do pensamento de Heidegger, é, ao mesmo tempo, um modo mais preciso de formulação do pensamento da Voz, e, deste modo, sobre o ser e sobre a metafísica. A Voz permite definir o não-lugar como fundamento da metafísica e da sua experiência com o ser, fazendo, com isso, uma experiência da linguagem que se funda numa articulação que acaba por definir o homem como aquele que está consignado à 326 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 76. 327 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Que é metafísica? – Posfácio (1943), p. 49. 328 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 77. 152 língua e à fala. A duplicidade que atravessa a linguagem, portanto, responde como a estrutura originária da metafísica. A própria exposição das Stimmungen, também, deve ser configurada nesse núcleo fundamental em que a linguagem se expõe ao ser como negatividade. A Stimmung deve ser pensada ao modo da relação que o homem tenta estabelecer com a sua linguagem – com a fala e o discurso, a partir da base impessoal da língua: a teoria das paixões, das Stimmungen, é desde sempre o lugar em que o homem ocidental pensa a própria relação fundamental com a linguagem. Por meio dela, o homem ocidental – que define a si mesmo como animal rationale, o vivente que possui a linguagem – busca capturar o arthros, a própria articulação entre vivente e linguagem, entre zōon e logos, entre natureza e cultura. Mas essa conexão é, ao mesmo tempo, uma desarticulação: e as paixões, as Stimmungen, são o que se produz nessa conexão, o que que revela esse desvio.329 Aqui a vocação do poeta, que, desativando o circuito ordinário da fala e do discurso, isto é, a articulação cotidiana da linguagem, remete à própria existência da língua, chama atenção a sua existência, e, nesse processo, assenta-lhe o seu lugar, mesmo que como o que sempre acaba se distanciando da palavra. A angústia do poeta, portanto, na teoria das paixões agambeniana, poderia mostrar-se como o paradigma da experiência da linguagem no ocidente, com as suas ambiguidades, os seus infortúnios e sortilégios, e, também, o seu prestígio. De fato, é o "o que se põe ao lado" de uma relação com a linguagem demarcada essencialmente como filosofia, o que, ainda segundo Agamben, dá-se sobre uma mesma base, um mesmo fundamento. Uma ambiguidade, porém, permite certos deslocamentos. Assim, ao menos em Estâncias e em O que resta de Auschwitz, experiências de outra relação possível podem se colocar em cena: lá, a arte do fin'amors, aqui, a condição paradoxal do poeta como testemunha e da poesia como testemunho; lá, a profundidade de uma "joi" que se completa, na falta do seu objeto, na imagem e na palavra; aqui, o subtrair-se de toda voz, de toda enunciação, que atesta a necessidade da própria enunciação, do curto-circuito entre a ausência e a presença da própria subjetividade. [Fim do entreatos] 329 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Vocazione e voce in La potenza del pensiero, p. 85. 153 CAPÍTULO 3. O MITOLOGEMA SACRIFICIAL DA LINGUAGEM 3.1.A ideia de linguagem O pensamento, diante de tantas homologias escavadas pelo gesto crítico de Agamben – e crítica, aqui, como topologia, de alguma forma antevê e prescreve a necessidade de uma arqueologia filosófica –, acaba por encontrar um caminho para compreender a experiência com a linguagem que a metafísica tem conduzido desde que se propôs pensar o ente, o ón, fazendo-o com o lógos. Os andaimes da escavação (que, talvez, sejam eles próprios o pensamento e tudo que reste do gesto "protoarqueológico") tanto sinalizaram para um plano primeiro da Enunciação, o próprio ato pelo qual o mortal que abre e se abre ao o-aí da existência e pode falar assume a palavra, colocando em ato a sua capacidade de linguagem como discurso sem possuir uma voz, quanto para a coincidência que se revela acontecer entre esse plano com o campo do significado do ser – o qual pertence à história da metafísica como sendo o seu substrato. Se esse significado afunda no próprio silenciar do lógos (no tolher de toda voz e no ainda não discursivo), então esse fundamento é negativo e a Enunciação é possível porque existe uma Voz. Efetiva-se, assim, o gesto pelo qual Agamben confina o pensamento da Voz, isto é, o pensamento das bases negativas da linguagem humana, com o pensamento do ser, o pensamento da própria negatividade pela qual o ser vem à abertura pelo "ser-o-aí", isto é, "dá-se" ser, o ser passa a ser o lugar por excelência. Assim, se o shifter é o operador pelo qual se reporta ao ter-lugar da linguagem, à instância "pura" de Enunciação, essa operação põe-se e dá-se na negatividade. Entre o enunciado e a Enunciação, entre a linguagem discursiva e o ter-lugar de toda linguagem, entre ente e ser, existe uma cisão cujo nome é a operação de um shifter, uma Voz: A Voz, que é aqui pressuposta, é, porém, definida por meio de uma dupla negatividade: de um lado ela é, de fato, suposta apenas como voz subtraída, como ter sido da φωνή natural, e esse privar-se é a articulação originária (ἅρθρον, γράμμα) em que se realiza a passagem da φωνή ao λόγος, do vivente à linguagem; de outro, essa Voz não pode ser dita no discurso do qual mostra o ter-lugar originário.330 Poderíamos dizer, depois de tudo o que foi dito, até mesmo sobre a imagem, que a Voz e a linguagem articulada se relacionam ao modo de um reflexo. Qual um corpo que se coloca diante do espelho e tem seus traços não apenas duplicados (o fora 330 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 104. 154 e o dentro, o real e o virtual), mas como que invertidos (o torto e o direito do real não são os mesmos do mundo refletido do espelho), a Voz "reflete", como dupla negatividade, a duplicidade da linguagem articulada entre o mostrar e o dizer. Já aqui, então, nessa imagem, vê-se como a linguagem articulada é tomada como o positivo, como o que se apresenta como fenômeno. Mas, na verdade, como insiste Agamben, a positividade da articulação linguística pressupõe a articulação originária de uma Voz, diante, primariamente, da ausência de uma voz, do ingresso radical no ser como lógos, como tópos da existência humana. Onde a linguagem virá a mostrar, e depois falar, a Voz antes de tudo subtraiu a voz animal, consignando o homem ao lógos. Depois disso, a Voz calase e aparece, diante do mostrar da linguagem, do apontar do seu ter-lugar, rompendo, portanto, com o mundo natural, como silêncio fundante: "o silêncio que aqui advém não é simplesmente suspensão do discurso, mas silêncio da própria palavra, o tornar-se visível da palavra: ideia da linguagem"331. No lugar desse silenciar da natureza onde desponta o humano, essa palavra muda nos aparece, na terminologia posteriormente utilizada por Agamben332, num rosto, e não numa simples face (o que também possuem os animais), fazendo-se gesto. O que se apresenta com a exploração cujos andaimes ressoam no silêncio, com a exploração desse silêncio fundamental da Voz, desse fundamento que possibilita e estrutura uma metafísica da Voz, é a própria ideia de linguagem, a sua aparição enquanto tal. Em Ideia da linguagem I, em que se exprime justamente isso que se intitula, o que se encontra é palavra tornada visível, a palavra muda que existe como tal no seu-lugar, o mostrar-se do próprio ter-lugar da linguagem – aquela capacidade que o ser humano possui e pela qual se define, interrompendo a cadeia vocálica da natureza, sem que possa dela falar, pois isso já seria outra coisa que não ela, seria discurso, seria aquisição e enunciação de linguagem. Por conseguinte, cabe falar de uma idade da linguagem, pois a ideia, antes de tudo, "não é, absolutamente, segundo uma interpretação comum, um arquétipo imóvel, mas, antes, uma constelação em que os fenômenos se compõe em um gesto"333. Agamben reencontra-se, aqui, na sua tentativa de compreender a metafísica da 331 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea del linguaggio I in Idea della prosa, p. 103. Grifo nosso. 332 Ideia da prosa (1985) é uma obra que não está próxima de A linguagem e a morte apenas temporalmente, mas também, por assim dizer, no seu campo de "ideias e materiais". Daqui a importância, portanto, acreditamos, não apenas de relacioná-las, mas de apontar, ainda, os desenvolvimentos que daí se seguiram e culminaram em novos conceitos. Nesse sentido, resgatamos os aportes feitos sobre o gesto em Meios sem fim, no qual Agamben apresenta os deslocamentos que culminaram não apenas em A comunidade que vem, mas também em Homo sacer. 333 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Mezzi senza fine, p. 50. 155 Voz, com a imagem, precisamente o termo que, com a poesia dos trovadores, de Dante e com aquelas que lhe são devedoras, possibilitava acessar o objeto de amor – imagem que, em último sentido, para um poeta, é a imagem da sua própria linguagem, imagem do poetar como caminho para a existência da linguagem, da palavra. Em a Ideia da prosa não existe, a rigor, nenhuma textualidade que se chame Ideia da ideia, mas há, significativamente, uma ideia de um termo a ela conexo, uma Ideia da aparência, na qual, porém, o que se expressa é que "a ideia, a coisa mesma" é "a coisa não mais separada da sua inteligibilidade, mas no meio daquela [da aparência]"334. A linguagem compõe-se, na sua ideia, como uma constelação dos seus gestos, dos quais se destaca o seu puro mostrarse, sem télos, no qual apenas existe. Nas fronteiras da linguagem, de uma ideia da linguagem, com a qual pensamento filosófico se confronta, encontramo-la, além da aparência, da miríade de fenômenos da linguagem, como aquilo que aparece como tal, isto é, o próprio ter-lugar da linguagem. Porém, se a filosofia consagrou o grámma como face visível da articulação, do árthron, e não a Voz, é porque a letra já se deixa capturar no discurso e dissimula a subtração da voz natural. A letra, porém, pressupõe a Voz, a articulação originária que torna possível o discurso articulado, a "voz articulada", a phonḗ énarthros, que, desde ao menos a reflexão estoica sobre a linguagem, recobre o seu fundamento negativo, a cisão que se constitui como barreira e que resiste à positivação e à discursividade, isto é, o lógos como ter-lugar da palavra como fundamento do lógos como discurso – e isso também afirma, apresentando o articulado e o positivo, o sentido da estrutura negativa do fundamento. Para Agamben, não há possibilidade de a letra ter sido esquecida na história da metafísica335, pois, pelo contrário, ela foi a operação que possibilitou fundar a articulação linguística além da voz animal, de instituir-se, assim, positivamente, sobre o primeiro sentido de Voz: há uma coarticulação entre letra e privação da voz, entre positividade e negatividade. A articulação e a cisão encontram-se, agora, radicalmente, e é o nexo, a relação entre ambas que permite demarcar a experiência que a metafísica fez com linguagem, pois a Voz é o que articula a passagem entre o ter-sido e o não mais da voz do animal e o ainda não do discurso, consignando, na negatividade, o homem ao lógos; 334 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea dell'apparenza in Idea della prosa, p. 112. 335 A estrutura dúplice da Voz é assim fortificada de modo a se valer contra possíveis objeções "gramatológicas", pois não é a phonḗ que aquela reivindica, mas propriamente a sua privação primária (o seu ter-sido) pressuposta pela letra. Se, contudo, a fortificação resiste, ou o seu ataque encontra sucesso efetivo, tais indagações fogem do escopo analítico deste trabalho. 156 ela, a Voz, é a forma da relação, a articulação originária, entre o que aparece como cindido (o ser e o ente, a língua e a fala): Essa passagem já é sempre pensada como um ἅρθρον, uma articulação, isto é, como uma descontinuidade que é, ao mesmo tempo, uma continuidade, um privar-se que é, também, um conservar-se (ἅρθρον como ἁρμονία pertencem em origem ao vocabulário da marcenaria: ἁρμóττω significa com-ponho [commetto], uno, como faz o marceneiro com dois pedaços de madeira).336 Cisão e articulação, fratura e presença, assim, compostos, apontam ao próprio despontar da linguagem a partir da negatividade e à conservação da negatividade no interior da linguagem. Sem a privação, a negatividade não deixa manifestar a sua carga "efetiva" e a articulação perde o seu sentido compositivo, o que também se perderia sem a subsistência da negatividade, o que geraria uma coincidência entre língua e discurso, impensável em relação à fundação metafísica do vivente que tem a linguagem, entre língua e fala. Desse modo, o significado antropogenético dessa estrutura articulatória acompanha a negatividade duplicada e a cisão pressuposta sobre a qual se articula a linguagem. Mais do que isso, leva-a à ambiguidade que caracteriza o modo metafísico de experimentar a linguagem, a qual passa, conforme o modo de expressão agambeniano, a ser e não ser a voz do homem. Por um lado, portanto, a linguagem não é a voz do homem, pois, se o fosse "como o zurro é voz do burro e o fretenir é voz da cigarra, o homem não poderia ser-o-aí nem apreender o Isto, isto é, não poderia jamais fazer experiência do ter-lugar da linguagem e do abrir-se do ser"337. Sem uma dimensão de transcendência, isto é, o horizonte, de mundo e de linguagem, de um ultrapassamento a partir de um fundar-se, o homem não seria entendido como o ente pelo qual se acessa a totalização dos entes e que pode indagar algo como ser, ou linguagem, nem apareceria como sendo aberto à abertura de mundos, mas estaria apenas como "a água na água": "porque as plantas e os animais estão mergulhados, cada qual no seio de seu ambiente próprio, mas nunca estão inseridos livremente na clareira do ser – e só assim é 'mundo' -, por isso, falta-lhes a linguagem. E não porque lhes falta linguagem, estão eles suspensos sem mundo em seu ambiente"338. Ora, sendo assim, o fato de que o homem não tenha uma voz, a qual pode ser vista como 336 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 105. 337 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 105. 338 HEIDEGGER, Martin. Sobre o 'humanismo', p. 155-156. Não se diz, aqui, desse encontro que provocamos ao lembrar das palavras de Bataille, que sintetizam o problema da transcendência do homem, que eles, Bataille e Heidegger, encontram-se entre si. Porém, o que se pode dizer, de fato, e isso é o que se nos coloca, é que eles acabam por ser encontrados, e talvez mesmo acabem por se encontrar, positiva ou negativamente, no plano-Agamben. 157 indício da ambiência dos viventes, revela o horizonte da dimensão na qual ele se desdobra como outro – quem se encontra suspenso, mas no seio da negatividade, é o homem. Justamente porque esses movimentos se colocam na negatividade, contam eles com o lugar vazio entre vivente e lógos. Para Agamben, isso é a própria ideia de linguagem, a qual, no seu lampejo de aparição (e também no lampejo de uma "relação essencial" com a morte), mostra-se apenas ao homem, àquele que se encontra desambientado, pois apenas ele "consegue interromper, na palavra, a língua infinita da natureza e pôr-se por um instante de frente às coisas mudas"339. Só o homem se coloca diante de algo como um isto, a saber, o acesso a uma dimensão na qual a coisa é formulada no seu aparecer: "a rosa informulada, a ideia de rosa, só existe para o homem"340. Por outro lado, se não tivesse algo como uma voz, porém, esse mesmo evento da linguagem não viria à tona, não se teria como indicá-la. (A imagem deter-se-ia nela mesma, numa pura contemplação – a qual seria condizente, a nos valermos, talvez indebitamente, da cosmogonia cristã, apenas a uma demora na arkhḗ sem lógos.) Colocase, aqui, precisamente, o que chamamos de experiência metafísica com a linguagem segundo a tentativa agambeniana de compreensão da metafísica da linguagem: é porque o homem, mesmo estando suspenso na existência sem voz, aferra-se à linguagem, tentando ambientar-se nas palavras, no discurso, que algo como uma Voz adquire operacionalização como "o shifter supremo que permite ao pensamento fazer a experiência do ter-lugar da linguagem e de fundar, com isso, a dimensão do ser na sua diferença com respeito ao ente"341. Uma tal experiência com a linguagem revela-se como uma metafísica da Voz. Ora, a Voz é, como vimos, o fundamento negativo, mas a experiência que dele se faz, absorvendo a negatividade do entre que a define (subtração da phonḗ e ainda não do lógos, do discurso articulado), impinge o homem – o que para Agamben pode soar algo paradoxal (uma necessária vida na linguagem para o humano, conquanto ele mesmo tenha sido aberto à existência pela linguagem a partir de uma ausência originária de ambiente), segundo o funcionamento de uma máquina ou dispositivo – a uma vivência na linguagem. A negatividade é fundamento da possibilidade de acesso ao ser, seja pela experiência angustiante do "ser-o-aí" que naquela se encontra suspenso, seja pelo cuidado em relação ao apelo silencioso que emana como "voz do ser". Porém, nos termos da 339 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea del linguaggio I in Idea della prosa, p. 103. 340 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea del linguaggio I in Idea della prosa, p. 103. 341 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 105. 158 tradição metafísico-analítica da linguagem que percorremos, quer-se, com isso, dizer: o acesso à linguagem dá-se mediante a articulação, isto é, pressupõe-se o esquecimento da negatividade originária que ela pressupõe (e oculta) como cisão. Na definição aristotélica da qual partimos, e a qual se coloca, assim, como insígnia do pensamento ocidental sobre a Voz, é sob o signo da articulação possibilitada pela assunção da negatividade de uma Voz, da "comissura de impossíveis", que é pensado "o ἔχειν, o ter do homem [o ter a linguagem], que constitui em unidade a dualidade de vivente e linguagem". Com a manifestação do sentido articulatório, revela-se que "o homem é aquele vivente que se subtrai e, ao mesmo tempo, conserva-se como indizível na linguagem: a negatividade é o modo humano de ter a linguagem"342. A experiência da linguagem que a metafísica efetiva é uma experiência cindida: ou experimenta o mostrar, a indicação do evento de linguagem (e aí nada pode ser dito, pois não tem voz), ou o experimenta como dizer, como discurso, o qual já se dá no interior do evento de linguagem (e aí só se pode dizer)343. Tal separação entre dois planos de linguagem é a sorte da linguagem no interior da metafísica, e a não coincidência entre eles, ainda, conduz, com a Voz, à estrutura da transcendência, a qual revela o modo fundamental da filosofia e do pensamento que se acercam do ser, uma vez que "(...) apenas porque o evento de linguagem transcende já sempre o que é dito nesse evento, algo como uma transcendência em sentido ontológico pode ser mostrada"344. Mas aqui também se começa a esboçar a própria tentativa agambeniana de, compreendendo a estruturação da metafísica, buscar uma efetiva experiência com a linguagem, uma experiência que esteja à altura de sua ideia e de sua indicação. O gesto, a pura esfera da gestualidade, a qual indicamos como se abrindo, a partir da ideia da linguagem, como a postura do ente desambientado que se coloca diante da ausência de voz e de palavra, também indica a espécie de mal-estar do homem na sua própria linguagem – não apenas como fala ou discurso, mas diante, também, do encontrar-se abandonado na existência, diante da qual se desdobra uma imperiosa necessidade de língua. Assim, "visto que o ser-na-linguagem não é algo que possa ser dito em proposições, o gesto é, na sua essência, sempre gesto de não se orientar na linguagem, é sempre gag no significado próprio do termo, que indica antes de tudo algo que se coloca 342 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 105. 343 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 106. 344 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 106. 159 na boca para impedir a palavra"345. O fato de que o homem não se encontre na linguagem, que ele não tenha nela um caminho previamente traçado, definido, mas que seja abandonado sem voz e sem ambiente, é precisamente o que o gesto visa a resgatar como a experiência dissimulada sob a articulação. Apenas atravessando a negatividade, o homem poderia se encontrar na linguagem, mas isso já seria outra coisa que não o babélico império das línguas soberanas, seria outra experiência que não a da linguagem soberana. Mal-estar: "o homem tem Stimmung, é apaixonado e angustiado, porque se sustém, sem ter uma voz, no lugar da linguagem. Ele está na abertura do ser e da linguagem sem nenhuma voz, sem nenhuma natureza: ele é lançado nessa abertura e desse abandono deve fazer o seu mundo, da linguagem, a sua voz"346. O homem não tem seu lugar, para Agamben, e nisso ele acompanha o velho mestre, num ambiente, num viver demarcado pela ambiência, mas, sim, tem o seu lugar naquela suspensão da vocalidade da natureza que é o ter-lugar da linguagem. Mas aí, de fato, ele não tem ainda discurso, fala, isto é, lógos voltado a um fim (comunicativo, expressivo...). Ele se encontra, em oaí, na essência do ter-lugar da linguagem: a ideia de meios sem fim, portanto, vem do desligar-se da articulação metafísica, que faz, na medida mesma da falta de voz do homem, a necessidade do discurso como sendo a sua voz. O gesto aponta para o puro meio sem fim diante do qual o homem se encontra como tal, como sendo aquele que habita o ter-lugar da linguagem. O que desliga, ao menos tal é a aposta de Agamben, a passagem articulatória entre as duas dimensões (mostrar e dizer) possibilitada pela operacionalização da negatividade como sendo a Voz, o shifter, o comutador entre um plano e outro. E, se a filosofia não deixou sua fuga do mal-estar do homem na linguagem, nem conseguiu de fato atravessá-lo, atingindo a felicidade na suspensão e na contingência, a ciência da linguagem, cuja sorte acompanhamos, também não foge dessa duplicidade. Ou cai diretamente na esfera do significado e do discurso (a semântica e suas variedades), ou, atentando ao plano vocálico da linguagem, constrói, sobre a ideia de fonema, uma investigação que "se apresenta como um análogo perfeito da ontologia"347. Aquilo que não a sua vertente crítica, que se tolhe de toda voz para tornar a experiência do evento mesmo de linguagem não imediatamente configurável nas facilidades da comunicação, tentando acessar os seus limites e a questão do seu fundamento – e os impasses 345 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Mezzi senza fine, p. 52-53. 346 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Vocazione e voce in La potenza del pensiero, p. 86. 347 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 107. 160 saussurianos podem apontar algo nessa direção –, recai no cerne da metafísica ou padece ao lado, suportando todo o encadeamento que parte da voz significante e da Voz. A positividade da articulação, como vimos em relação ao signo linguístico, sintoma semiótico de um problema metafísico, agora, é propriamente desvendada em seu campo originário de formulação, a negatividade que funda a experiência do ser e da linguagem na história da metafísica, pela qual, vale dizer, enfim, tem-se acesso à linguagem como negatividade. 3.2. O mitologema da Voz Toda essa maquinaria complexa institui uma experiência da linguagem que confina com o silêncio, forma significativa pela qual o sentido se manifesta como mistério, se lembrarmos de um momento fundamental que está no plano de origem do mundo ocidental. Com um gesto de nomeação e categorização conceitual, Agamben expõe não apenas as raízes metafísicas do pensamento sobre a voz, no qual culmina a confrontação com a "essência" da linguagem, mas a Voz como fundamento da metafísica, no sentido originário de arkhḗ, remetendo à dimensão originária do fundamento: "O mitologema da Voz é, portanto, o mitologema original da metafísica; mas, enquanto a Voz é também o lugar original da negatividade, a negatividade é inseparável da metafísica"348 De forma sutil, o fundamento negativo ganha uma nova indumentária conceitual. A metafísica da Voz torna-se então, a partir da mistérica dimensão do silêncio – e a insistência agambeniana nos mistérios de Elêusis é capaz de mostrar, mais uma vez, o seu caráter substancial –, mitologema da Voz, ou, de forma mais precisa, expõe-se a metafísica como tendo as bases de seu pensamento sobre o ser da linguagem num mitologema da Voz349. A metafísica da Voz, desse modo, faz o pensamento filosófico retroceder até o lugar no qual disputa sobre o discurso instituinte da palavra, até os confins 348 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 105. Grifo nosso. 349 "A essência ontoteológica da filosofia propriamente dita (proté philosophía) deve estar, sem dúvida, fundada no modo como lhe chega ao aberto o ón, a saber, enquanto ón (...). O caráter teoógico da ontologia se funda, muito antes, na maneira como, desde a Antiguidade, o ente chega ao desvelamento enquanto ente" (HEIDEGGER, Martin. Que é metafísica? – Introdução (1949), p. 61). Nesse sentido, Agamben conduz Heidegger de tal forma às últimas consequências que se torna difícil, no plano de obra do filósofo italiano, concebê-lo como dissociado da metafísica, no plano em que, como ontologia, sua essência coincide com a teologia. A profundidade dessa conexão é perceptível no desdobramento teórico de Agamben, não apenas pelas investigações sobre tópicos da teologia, mas pela pertença essencial da teologia à metafísica, o que, tanto explícita, como aqui, quanto subterraneamente, o seu percurso insiste em expor. 161 do "círculo mágico" da mitologia. Não surpreende que Agamben tanto insista naquele célebre rompimento do (pretenso) esponsal originário entre poesia e filosofia, rompimento que pode ser lido como a quebra na cadeia mítico-cosmológica do mundo antigo (iniciada) com Platão, o assim chamado "pai da metafísica ocidental"350, e (efetivada) com Aristóteles, que pode muito bem disputar o título de paternidade, caso se queira insistir nisso. Metafísica da Voz, mitologema da Voz. Não se trata, então, de disposição imotivada de palavras. Pelo contrário, são articulações que meditam a articulação mesma e o seu estatuto problemático. Que a metafísica repouse, portanto, sobre um mitologema, ou melhor, que o atualize em suas manifestações, mantendo-o latente, significa não (e esse não deve ficar bem delineado) que ela se explique pelo mito, o que seria uma perspectiva indevida de consideração, mas que ela, a metafísica, atinge um ponto de impasse no qual propriamente as formações mitológicas adquirem a sua inteligibilidade: o inefável e o silêncio, convertido, dessa maneira, em emudecimento da palavra. Seria o caso em que o problema da transcendentalidade, esbarra com o transcendente, no sentido teológico? Tal não parece ser o caso. Pelo contrário, e ainda numa chave de pensamento heideggeriana, esse problema remete ao do fundamento, e ambos, mutuamente, apontam para a dimensão de ultrapassamento no qual o homem se manifesta como abertura o fundamento que ultrapassa, com o horizonte de mundo, a ambiência do simplesmente vivente. Como aí se encontra sob o signo da subtração, da negatividade, a sua expressão é propriamente o modo do silêncio. Ora, o que Agamben retoma, diante dessa posição, é que ela encontra um símile na história da cultura, precisamente na experiência dos mistérios, no qual não se trata de aprender um conhecimento e dele manter segredo. Não, "a indizibilidade que estava em jogo nos mistérios (...) [não] apenas não se tratava da interdição de comunicar uma doutrina secreta, mas tampouco de uma absoluta impossibilidade de dizer"351. Ora, é diante disso tudo que aparece o conceito de mitologema. Não explicado nem referenciado – apenas sua própria aparição, como sói acontecer na categorização agambeniana, como um empréstimo não nomeado. Além do aspecto poético que ronda uma terminologia, como o próprio Agamben o ressalta, jamais devemos perder de vista o sentido que essa qualificação traz em seu cerne: a pertença à esfera produtiva da poíesis. Sendo assim, a força do nome desse conceito permite 350 AGAMBEN, GIORGIO. La potenza del pensiero, p. 17. 351 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. La ragazza indicibile, p. 15. 162 identificá-lo no circuito de reflexões sobre a origem e o fundamento que estão na base da ciência da "arte da mitologia" como a praticava o filólogo e erudito húngaro Karl (Károly) Kerényi, mestre de outro teórico italiano, Furio Jesi – a respeito do qual ainda não foi explorado o modo de relação que com ele estabeleceu Giorgio Agamben. Se o plano teórico de aparição do conceito de mitologema coincide, vale o mesmo para o seu significado? Por que não, antes, filosofema? De imediato, não pareceria estarmos diante de um filosofema, pois a dimensão para a qual aqui se aponta ainda não está condenada ao discurso – ao discurso filosófico –, afinal, é a dimensão da Voz que está em questionamento, e é essa que atua no interior da metafísica como operador de transitividade diante da fratura da linguagem e da presença (que, afinal, é o modo como a metafísica, helenicamente, pensa o ser do ente...352). Está-se diante de algo primordial em relação à estrutura da proposição. Uma negatividade que está nas raízes da própria fundação de todo discurso significativo. E isso – isso é a metafísica pensada a partir de seu fundamento negativo, o qual é, ao mesmo tempo, pressuposto, para que ela tome lugar, e esquecido, para que o lógos adquira a sua soberania. Nesse sentido, apenas um conceito que deslocasse a Voz em relação ao discurso articulado, colocando-a, precisamente, na sua base, caberia, diante do caminho traçado. Mas também, de outro lado, o mitologema aponta para um rearticular. Para entender a aparição e a rearticulação, que se processam praticamente de modo conjunto, na medida da exiguidade da primeira, é preciso resgatá-lo em seu plano originário, a saber, a pergunta pela relação entre a mitologia e a origem353. Afastando-se do termo mito, e retomando a própria cunhagem platônica, Kerényi compreende a mitologia não apenas como arte, mas como uma dimensão que coincide com aquela da poesia. A mythología, como ele próprio lembra, escandindo-a e alcançando a sua derivação a partir da figura daquele que é capaz de dizer (légein) mythos, trata-se de um narrar, de um dar forma, que se exerce sobre uma matéria específica (e que apenas o termo mythos não ajudaria a precisar) o que atesta o caráter duplamente poético em jogo. Há uma matéria especial que determina a arte da mitologia: um conjunto de materiais antigos, transmitidos pela tradição – 'mitologema' é o termo grego mais adequado para designá-lo –, contido em narrativas conhecidas – que, no entanto, não excluem qualquer criação ulterior – sobre deuses e seres divinos, combates de heróis e descidas ao inferno. A mitologia é o movimento dessa matéria: algo firme e ao mesmo tempo móvel, material contudo não estático, mas aberto a transformações354 352 Cf. HEIDEGGER, Martin. Que é metafísica? – Introdução (1949), p. 60. 353 Cf. KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 14. 354 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 15. Grifo nosso. 163 Essa passagem condensa de tal forma, em si, o emaranhado de questões sobre o problema do fundamento (do tópos, do lugar) que denodá-la pode apontar esclarecimentos relevantes. É preciso, portanto, encará-la em seus termos, em seu plano, mas também verificar como ele se desloca, a partir do uso do termo no contexto agambeniano, numa profícua passagem entre ambos. Apresenta-se não apenas uma definição substancial de mitologema – "um conjunto de materiais antigos, transmitidos pela tradição" –, mas a forma da relação, vital, entre mitologia e mitologema. O complexo dessa relação não atende à oposição forma e substância, mas ao todo que as duas, juntas e cada uma ao seu modo, possibilitam. Todo que se conjuga, como relação, pela consolidação tradicional de um mitologema, fundando fontes narrativas sagradas, por exemplo, e pela sua transmissão. O complexo conceito de mitologema coloca questões que, ao seu modo, conduzem, de um lado, ao caráter narrativo do que é dito a partir de sua apresentação como material e, de outro, que se trata de um processo narrativo que versa sobre o fundamento e a origem. Se lembrarmos o modelo de relação entre fantasia e fantasma (imaginaçãoimagem), isto é, de uma capacidade que apresenta imagens e a imagem apresentada, percebemos que Kerényi elabora uma estrutura de algum modo, a título apenas elucidativo, parecida: mitologia-mitologema. Só que aqui, porém, à abordagem filológica deve se juntar a filosófica. A mitologia é como que a capacidade que apresenta narrativamente o mitologema. A mitologia trabalha sobre a tradição, produz sobre o mitologema e o transmite ao mesmo tempo que o afeta. É, precisamente, o movimento dessa matéria, assim como a imaginação é o movimento das imagens. Esse processo tem um equivalente em outra arte, a música. Assim como a arte do compositor e a sua matéria – o som, as partículas sonoras que aquela articulará –, "a arte da mitologia e sua matéria estão combinadas num só e mesmo fenômeno (...). A obra musical revela o artista como configurador e nos mostra ao mesmo tempo o mundo dos sons no formato configurado"355. À diferença da música, porém, e neste sentido mais próxima da capacidade imaginativa, a formação da mitologia, enquanto configuradora de matérias mitológicas, de mitologemas, "é figurativa. É uma efusão de figuras mitológicas"356, isto é, institui uma composição figurativa que revela esses materiais como configurados discursivamente. A arte da mitologia é uma composição, portanto, na qual o configurador, 355 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 15. 356 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 16. 164 a emblemática e também figura do "narrador de mitos", e o configurado se encontram numa relação que não é possível romper, sob pena de desconstituição de sentido – o qual se deve fazer aparecer pelo todo da configuração. A mitologia não é, então, apenas um modo de expressão entre outros. Ela é como que "requisitada" pelo mitologema. É dele a parte formativa, sólida o suficiente para servir de fundamento; plástica o suficiente ao ponto de apresentar variações, no sentido que Kerényi toma da música e desdobra em seu fazer teórico, como quando fala das "variações de um mesmo tema" sobre o mitologema da criança original (das Urkind). Como unidade com solidez constatável, pode-se apresentar como obra "algo concreto, convertido em objeto que fala por si mesmo, que não justificamos pela interpretação e explicação, mas, em primeira linha, pelo fato de colocarmos ali e permitirmos que expresse seu próprio sentido"357. A mitologia como narração aparece como o discurso da origem, isto é, tem o privilégio de significar a origem no mitologema e suas variações. O mitologema é o que se deixa ouvir, caso se dê atenção suficiente358. Essa, ao menos, é a postura exigida pelo cientista da mitologia em suas observações "introdutórias" ao seu modo de fazer teórico. Mas não nos deixemos perder de nosso rumo, por mais que possa ser menos encantador do que esse belo canto de sereia da "ciência da arte da mitologia". Afinal, o que na perspectiva de Kerényi viemos encontrar é um ponto de apoio para tornar inteligível o mitologema da Voz, sobre o qual, na medida em que elege o silêncio como seu modo de expressão, não se pode, precisamente, silenciar. Se a palavra falta, isso deve ser tematizado, e não encoberto, como silêncio. Assim, tendo em mente o caráter musical, figurativo, inteligível e etiológico da mitologia, deve-se considerar que é propriamente do último que Kerényi desdobra o problema do fundamento e da origem para a mitologia. As precauções mantêm-se, todas, e ainda redobradamente, em pé. Agamben, em Tradição do imemorável (1985), formula o problema da tradição e da transmissão claramente como sendo, de fato, algo de valioso para a filosofia. De fato, 357 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 16. 358 O paralelo com as considerações heideggerianas sobre o pensamento e a "voz silenciosa do ser" mostram a sua pertinência, ainda mais quando se medita a respeito das palavras sobre a sua "preleção" sobre a metafísica: "esta pensa a partir da atenção à voz do ser" (Cf. HEIDEGGER, Martin. Que é metafísica? – Posfácio (1943), p. 49). Não se quer dizer, de forma alguma, que Heidegger estivesse pensando algo como a mitologia ou o mitologema, mas, sim, que a estratégia agambeniana com a ideia de mitologema se mostra produtiva, pois a metafísica da Voz trabalha sobre um mitologema sobre o ser em vias negativas, apresentando um mitologema a respeito do silêncio, do tolher-se de voz anterior ao ato de palavra. 165 Toda reflexão sobre a tradição deve começar com a constatação, em aparência trivial, de que, antes de transmitirem-se algo, os homens têm, antes de tudo, de transmitir-se a linguagem. Toda tradição específica, todo patrimônio cultural determinado, pressupõe a tradição daquilo por meio do qual, somente, algo como uma tradição é possível. Mas o que se transmite o homem se transmitindo a linguagem? Qual é o significado da transmissão da linguagem, independentemente daquilo que, na linguagem, é transmitido? Essas perguntas, longe de serem irrelevantes, constituem, do começo ao fim, o tema da filosofia: ela se dá pensamento daquilo que está em questão não neste ou naquele discurso significante, mas no próprio fato de que o homem fale, de que exista linguagem e abertura de sentido, aquém ou além, ou, antes, em todo evento determinado de significação.359 A filosofia não se ocupa, de fato, somente do que é revelado por meio da linguagem, mas também da revelação da própria linguagem. Uma exposição filosófica é, assim, aquela que, de qualquer coisa que fale, deve dar conta também do fato de que fala, um discurso que, em todo dito, diz antes de tudo a própria linguagem. (Daqui a essencial proximidade – mas também a distância – entre filosofia e teologia, ao menos tão antiga quanto a definição aristotélica da filosofia primeira como theologikē.)360 Ora, ao lado daquilo que se revela na tradição mitológica como sendo a transmissão e o trabalho sobre um mitologema, Agamben revela, homologamente, segundo a sua confrontação da filosofia, como sendo a transmissão e o trabalho que ela faz sobre o seu mitologema. No caso da experiência da filosofia como metafísica, a transmissão e o trabalho de um mitologema da Voz. A filosofia que se revela nessa passagem é aquela por trás do próprio gesto agambeniano de compreender a metafísica, pois ele a reinaugura como questionamento pelo fundamento da linguagem "aquém ou além" de todo discurso instituído como numa base negativa. Nesse sentido, leva-a, concretizando uma tarefa de fato crítica, até o limite da condição de seu próprio discurso: a transmissão da própria linguagem, a visão que ela faz, para si, da linguagem – no caso de estar assentada sobre fundamentos negativos, de uma metafísica da Voz como tradição que se transmite um mitologema da Voz, "a filosofia não pode mais do que conduzir o pensamento até o limite da voz: não pode dizer a voz (ou, ao menos, assim parece)" 361. Isso não significa, porém, de alguma forma, que a filosofia tenha exaurido a ideia de linguagem ou a sua própria ideia. Tendo de se medir com os limites não apenas do seu discurso, mas da própria linguagem, do ter-lugar possível de todo discurso, a filosofia tem de se confrontar com o problema do fundamento, do qual ela mesma se apresenta como fundamentação. Com esse gesto extremo, "a filosofia não é uma visão do mundo, mas uma visão da linguagem"362: o que está em questão, na investigação filosófico- 359 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Tradizione dell'immemorabile in La potenza del pensiero, p. 152. 360 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 29. 361 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 29. 362 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 29. Grifo nosso. 166 arqueológica agambeniana, é que uma visão da linguagem tenha encontrado, diante da transparência da linguagem, além da qual espreita toda a negatividade, o ponto de impasse que ela encobre para continuar a articular discursos ou, caso não o faça, adotando o nada como seu fundamento, apenas nomeia, como niilismo, a falta radical de fundamento. Aqui a filosofia mostra, enquanto assentada na linguagem, e como visão da linguagem, o seu profundo contexto ético, uma vez que trata não apenas do fundamento comum – e o parecer de Agamben não pode ser deixado de lado, pois é com base nele que se orienta o seu próprio gesto filosófico. Mas, por ora, não antecipemos a ética para continuar nossa regressão sobre o mitologema. De fato, a mitologia é um dizer sobre a origem, assim como é a mobilização de mitologema. O mitologema e a origem apontam para o plano do fundamento, daquilo que que dá origem – e é disso que trataria, então, a mitologia: A mitologia fundamenta. Ela não responde, na realidade, à questão 'Por quê?', mas à questão: 'De onde?'. A língua grega permite expressar bem precisamente essa diferença. A mitologia não indica propriamente αἰτία, 'causas'. Ela faz isso (ela é 'etiológica') apenas à medida que as αἰτία – como ensina Aristóteles (Metafísica Λ 2, 1013a) – são ἀρχαί. Segundo os filósofos gregos mais antigos αἰτία eram, por exemplo, a água, o fogo ou o ἂπειρον, ο ilimitado. Não são meras 'causas', portanto, mas antes matérias-primas ou estados originais que nunca envelhecem nem são superados, mas sempre possibilitam que tudo se origine deles. Algo parecido ocorre com os acontecimentos da mitologia. Constituem o fundamento do mundo, uma vez que tudo se baseia neles. São as ἀρχαί, às quais cada coisa individual e particular recorre par si mesma e das quais ela se nutre diretamente, enquanto aquelas permanecem indestrutíveis, inesgotáveis e insuperáveis em um primórdio atemporal, em um passado que se revela imperecível por causa de seu ressurgimento em eternas repetições.363 Uma via inversa de consideração pode, diante disso, ser estabelecida: se o paralelo de Kerényi, na questão do fundamento, é o pensamento grego em sua aurora, no qual os "elementos" têm relevante papel enquanto matérias formadoras de mundo, o paralelo, agora, ao tomar o mitologema no contexto filosófico, é, ao contrário, a mitologia como constituinte de narrativas a partir do mitologema, seu material, que veicula origens, isto é, uma visão da origem – um fundamento. Há um paradoxo revelador, como revela Kerényi, no modo de fundamentar mitológico: aquele que faz a experiência do retorno à origem, aquele que experimenta a sua situação como fundamento, ao fazê-lo, abre a si próprio e o seu próprio mundo. Também aqui, nessa dimensão da fundamentação mitológica, está em jogo uma abertura: "O fundamentador, que em cada submersão mergulha até o próprio fundamento, 363 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 20. 167 fundamenta seu mundo. Erige-o para si o mesmo sobre uma base da qual tudo emana, brota e nasce: que é original no sentido pleno do termo"364. A ideia de um núcleo do ser humano, um universo "interior" abismal, faz parte desse movimento. O que está mais perto da origem, desse núcleo, propriamente, é o que Kerényi considera como universal, e o que nele se baseia dá origem ao fundamentar por excelência, o fundamentar mitológico que abre o mundo. Ao submergir ao próprio fundamento, àquilo que o organiza – a sua própria abertura, poderíamos dizer –, aquele que fundamenta, a partir desse movimento em direção ao "núcleo", fundamenta o mundo, a exemplo das mitologias sobre as origens do mundo como cosmogonias e sobre o surgimento dos deuses como teofanias cujo fundamentar revela na criança divina (que já é um trabalho sobre o mitologema da criança original) como núcleo e fundamento. Revela-se, desse modo, o sentido, propriamente mitológico, de fundamentar e de fundamentação. Ao lado desse, aponta-se uma variação outra, a saber, a fundação, cujo sentido prático e material é mesmo o de fundar espaços de convivência humanos, dos quais a cidade se torna o modelo por excelência, sob o modelo da fundamentação oferecida pela mitologia cosmogônica365. A cidade como fundação, portanto, revela raízes com traços mitológicos, os quais, incorporadas no pensamento político do ocidente, permitem expô-lo, então, de maneira originária. O caráter dessa constatação é fortalecido quando se recorda que, tomando a investigação de Benveniste sobre o caráter religioso da figura do rex – no contexto das suas investigações sobre a consolidação lexical de instituições ocidentais em relação ao que seria a sua delimitação indo-europeia originária (bem como suas variações) –, os traços que delimitavam as cidades, as linhas fundadoras traçadas em linha reta (a partir de um regere fines executado ritualmente pelo rex), em sua origem, eram propriamente um ato religioso366. A origem é duplamente significada, por conseguinte, em solo mitológico: "Como conteúdo de uma narrativa, de um mitologema, é 'fundamentação'; como conteúdo de um ato, é fundação"367. O que unifica a origem em ambos é aquele retorno à ideia mitológica, da qual estarão marcados com o selo de pertença originária, como suas manifestações, consolidando-se como figuras, mitologemas ou cerimônias. Expressam, então, como linguagem apropriada, o núcleo do ser humano, o núcleo que ele, na sua 364 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 23. 365 Cf. KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 20 366 BENVENISTE, Émile. Vocabulário das instituições indo-europeias, II, p. 14 (Rex). 367 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 30. 168 "viagem interior" (não devemos esquecer que Jung e Kerényi eram colaboradores368), pode acessar como sua origem, como o seu elemento originário. Bastante distante desse universalismo do elemento ou de um "núcleo" universal do humano, importa, porém, o caráter histórico do mitologema como operação, o qual é esclarecido quando se nomeia esse "abismo do núcleo"369 como sendo o âmbito das "ideias mitológicas", do que é propriamente atemporal: "Do ponto de vista histórico, somente existem as variações dos mitologemas originais e não seu conteúdo atemporal, as ideias mitológicas"370. Todas as mudanças de plano de perspectiva mostram-se a partir daqui. O gesto de Agamben, de fato, ao incorporar a categoria de mitologema, que responde pela narração, e, portanto, pela história, pelo que encadeia a transmissibilidade da tradição, não apenas não remete ao atemporal e ao universal, como o que ambos carregam é incompatível com a sua teoria. É preciso ter em vista que a ruptura essencial do uso do termo na sua formulação é quanto à referencialidade do próprio mitologema: além dele, o "abismo do núcleo", ao invés de uma ideia atemporal (ou um arquétipo), revela um vazio. No máximo, o silêncio, o que já é uma operação originária do mecanismo da Voz ao permitir que os caminhos do discurso sejam instaurados, como o que vem à luz, do abismo, como pré-fundação do lógos. Assim é instaurada, para a metafísica como tradição que experimenta a própria ideia de transmissão da linguagem como baseada num fundamento negativo que se oculta, uma Voz como o seu princípio organizador e estruturação de sua maquinaria. Escapar dessa circularidade, eis o que se pode apontar como tarefa do pensamento-quevem, a qual, tomando o puro acesso à palavra pelo seu resto como língua, por tentar susterse no mostrar do ter lugar da linguagem, como o faz o poeta, indicando um gesto, ou uma dimensão apocatástica, como o faria a restauração messiânica, tem aí formas do fazer cessar a retroalimentação do mitologema da Voz a partir de suas narrações do vazio que é, paradoxalmente, o conteúdo do silêncio que emana da voz do ser. A arqueologia e os paradigmas de Giorgio Agamben, nesse sentido, podem ser vistos no rastro dessa primária consideração do mitologema, a qual se desloca entre uma topologia, a procura do terlugar, e uma busca do fundamento que, ainda não se postulando como arqueológica, 368 É preciso ter cuidado, contudo, com a diferença de fundo dos planos em jogo. Kerényi era colaborador de Jung, e nada seria mais estranho ao projeto agambeniano do que o conceito de arquétipo, isto é, de um simbolismo universal e latente (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Aby Warburg e la scienza senza nome in La potenza del pensiero, p. 150). 369 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 23. 370 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 41. 169 propriamente, denominamos "proto-arqueológica". Não são nem uma busca das causas no sentido vulgar, nem o perscrutar de uma dimensão transcendente que a tudo iluminaria com seu sentido numinoso, mas uma concreta investigação dos fundamentos – e toda a constelação daí derivada, o fundamentar e a fundamentação, o fundar e a fundação que não indica uma mera sinonímia terminológica, mas encontra, como se vê a partir do exemplo tomado de Kerényi, como conceituação. Ora, para Agamben, "a tradição da tradibilidade [tradibilità] está, assim, imemoravelmente contida em toda tradição específica, e esse legado imemorável, essa transmissão da ilatência [illatenza] constitui, antes, a linguagem humana como tal"371. A tradição da tradibilidade, no sentido daquilo que ao mesmo tempo que é transmitido é traído, isto é, traditio, é a tradição da própria transmissibilidade, portanto, que esquece o seu fundamento, que esquece a própria abertura – a ilatência é o termo segundo o qual Agamben traduz a alḗtheia a partir de sua inflexão heideggeriana, a qual, como já tivemos oportunidade de apontar, é precisamente a dimensão de "desvelamento-abertura" de o-aí. Por um lado, "o que há aqui para transmitir (...) é a própria ilatência (alētheia), a própria abertura em que algo como uma transmissão é possível"372. Por outro, é a própria ilatência, o encontrar-se aberto como tal na abertura da existência sem uma voz, que acaba traída na tradição, ao mesmo tempo que é transmitida como fundamento negativo, como Voz. Se a mitologia, narrando mitologemas, variando-os nos seus mitológicos acordes, possui marca fundamental no "remontar à origem e ao tempo primordial"373, o mitologema da Voz força o pensamento a considerar uma dimensão análoga: a do fundamento, historial, porém, da metafísica. A fundamentação é um retorno ao fundamento. Pensando o "de onde", a mitologia retoma a sua arkhḗ, de onde aparece "a fundamentação como o regresso espontâneo ao 'fundamento'"374. Pensando-se a linguagem na situação metafísica, pode-se indicar um debater com o silêncio daquilo que a ultrapassa. Assim o fazendo, tal experiência permite que se o coloque como originário – isso seria, pois, o seu infundado pressuposto, o inefável. Apesar de nada, porém, mais afastar Agamben da perspectiva aqui encerrada do que a atemporalidade do primórdio, ao tomar o mitologema da Voz, introduzindo o 371 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Tradizione dell'immemorabile in La potenza del pensiero, p. 153. 372 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Tradizione dell'immemorabile in La potenza del pensiero, p. 153. 373 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 21. 374 KERÉNY, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 21. 170 conceito de shifter para tornar a operação da metafísica inteligível em sua fundamentação, revela-se, diferentemente do plano de partida das categorias de Kerényi, que a instância que se abre, com o ter-lugar da linguagem, é a própria historicidade da existência do humano: "a condição histórica do homem é inseparável da sua condição de ser falante e está inscrita na própria modalidade do seu acesso à linguagem, que é originalmente marcada por uma cisão"375. Se os nomes são, segundo uma longeva tradição, algo que escapa de antemão à constituição do discurso (do que a aquisição dos nomes é um indício, exterior e redutor, do processo de aquisição da língua pelo adquirente), revela-se, portanto, uma vez que os homens não vêm ao mundo pronunciando nomes, de fato, uma mediação e um condicionamento históricos dessa transmissão dos nomes, que "somente podem nos ser dados, traídos"376. Se embarcamos nessa aparente "digressão", foi com o propósito de podermos situar o aspecto de reconfiguração conceitual em jogo na recepção do mitologema, e, com esse movimento, avançar. Não apenas uma nomeação, portanto, está em jogo, mas um resíduo de não dito que acompanha o momento de categorização dos conceitos, o qual, vindo à palavra, oferta-se como forma de tornar inteligível a complexa abordagem que encerra A linguagem e a morte, cujo enredamento permanece como prelúdio das suas obras futuras, especialmente A ideia da prosa, A comunidade que vem e Homo sacer, no que vale para a sua extensão, e como forma de tornar inteligível, como intensão, parecenos, o percurso do pensamento filosófico e político, lógico e ético em suas formas mais abstratas, como metafísica, e mais concretas, como ação. Porém, nesse movimento, tratase da mitologia explicando a filosofia? Não. Trata-se da releitura conceitual de um complexo processo histórico de transmissão de questões, de transmissão de uma tradição de pensar que cinde mostrar e dizer, que experimenta a linguagem a partir da negatividade. O que se mantém nela como não dito, e constitui o que Agamben diz, é que a Voz opera no nível dos fundamentos da metafísica, responde nesse lugar e os constitui. É o lugar do fundamento – aquela arkhḗ que tanto mobilizamos e que não tem o sentido de uma origem cronológica, mas de um princípio originário, atravessado de história, de traição e de tradição, isto é, um lugar que serve de base para o desdobramento dos fenômenos e, mantendo-se, possibilita o seu próprio desdobramento. A importância do acontecimento histórico adquire, portanto, um assento estratégico essencial. Não se trata de um evento atemporal, mas da própria fundamentação 375 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Lingua e storia in La potenza del pensiero, p. 40. 376AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Lingua e storia in La potenza del pensiero, p. 38. 171 do tempo e da história como acontecimentos essencialmente humanos. O pendor heideggeriano do plano de fundo, obstinado com a dimensão originária do ser, em certa medida, entra em consonância com a necessidade de salvar o aspecto histórico do humano. A temporalidade messiânica, contraposta ao tempo escatológico, é uma tentativa de resposta posterior ao impasse já aqui configurado, a saber, a historicidade do plano da fundamentação, da constituição de um retorno ao fundamento, e da fundação. Ou, em termos sucintos e mais contundentes, a historicidade da própria arkhḗ – sem resvalar, por um lado, para o causalismo (para a dimensão das causas, isoláveis cronologicamente, a partir das aitíes), nem, por outro, para o universalismo a-historicizante de um simbólico arquetípico. O que destacamos, ao modo de precisar o sentido incorporado à inteligência de mitologema de Voz, é a sua configuração como "material transmitido pela tradição", mais do que, simplesmente, um material "antigo". A antiguidade pode ser subjetivada como um valor (positivo-negativo), e, enquanto tal, permite que outros elementos sejam subjetivados, sob ela, como valores (positivos-negativos). O que é valorizado é que se revela sob o "antigo" – e isso é plasmado pela tradição como tradicional. Cabe complementar o enunciado: material transmitido pela tradição sobre (como o duplo sentido de situar-se em e de tratar a respeito de) a origem, sobre o fundamento. Que seu modo de transmissão seja lembrança/esquecimento seletivos, seja produtivo ou improdutivo na medida de uma seleção – e aqui é difícil, mas preciso, contornar a teleologia naturalizante de um princípio de economia linguística para pensar em contextos específicos de realização da discursividade –, isso diz respeito ao seu modo de operacionalização. A sua "essência", porém, é manter o pensamento no caminho de uma fratura que funda articulações, de uma diferença produtiva. Nessa perspectiva, o signo torna-se uma imagem, um fantasma, da própria relação que o pensamento experimenta, como metafísica, com a linguagem: pressupõe uma cisão, a qual sutura ao modo de uma articulação, de uma operação, portanto. Pressupõe um fundamento sobre o qual erige a sua fundamentação, e sobre o qual estrutura a fundação do discurso. Nesse sentido, o pensamento revela-se como um plano de ação – a cisão entre ambos se torna mais um sintoma de encobrimento do que uma "verdade". Momentos essencialmente práticos, isto é, de conteúdo político, mobilizamse por abstratas construções. A filosofia, isso, ao menos, é o que Agamben insiste em dizer e fazer, não é um simples retrato do tempo, no sentido de uma camada de conceitos que vem apenas se juntar ao acontecido. Ela é uma operação de realidade – valeria dizer, 172 de realização. Daqui a insistência do Heidegger tardio no seu caráter essencialmente já técnico e metafísico, do qual o pensamento vindouro teria de se desarmar. 3.3. O silêncio do fundamento O mitologema, que na ciência da mitologia é um material originário plasmado e transmitido pela tradição, uma vez deslocado para o plano do pensamento filosófico, por Agamben, insere-se naquela cadeia de tradição-transmissão que diz respeito às produções humanas. Ele indica um lugar passível de permanecer no plano do fundamento, fundamentando uma origem com seu processo de seleções. O mitologema, diante do plano de questões no qual surge em A linguagem e a morte, pode ser o nome para a esfera irrefletida do fundamento na metafísica, a partir da qual se fundamenta uma origem ou mecanismo articulatório: Voz, mas também sacrifício, contrato, etc. O recurso ao mitologema, portanto, é uma forma de retratar não apenas o problema do lugar, do fundamento, no interior do pensamento filosófico ocidental, mas também de localizar, nele e por meio dele, o fundamento problemático de uma experiência com a palavra que se constitui como metafísica da Voz. Por conseguinte, "or meio de um mitologema original, todas as instituições da era mitológica obtêm sua transfiguração e fundamentação, isto é, sua santificação, a partir da origem divina comum da vida, da qual elas são formas"377. Porém, não apenas somos remandados aos confins da mitologia, para, com ela nos confrontando, precisarmos as posições metafísicas, mas também com aquele processo mitológico que acompanha, como material sobre a dificultosa origem e fundamento da divindade, as ponderações teológicas – as quais, investigando o conteúdo daquilo que se revela, indagando a revelação, aproximam-se, na ponderação agambeniana, da reflexão filosófica sobre a linguagem como fundamento, até mesmo por meio da célebre revelação da palavra encarnada fundante do cristianismo e que se exprime, antes de tudo, como "na arkhḗ, no princípio e no fundamento, era o lógos, a linguagem" ("en arkhẽi ẽn ho lógos...") (Jo, I, 1-2). Conferir atenção a isso auxilia a delimitar a esfera de inflexão do mitologema, pois, "o mitologema de uma voz silenciosa somo fundamento ontológico da linguagem aparece já na mística tardoantiga, gnóstica e cristã"378. 377 KÉRENYI, Karl. A origem e o fundamento da mitologia, p. 23. 378 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 79. 173 No contexto do pensamento gnóstico, parte-se, na reflexão sobre o fundamento do qual a prática recebe a sua fundação, da sigḗ, isto é, do "silêncio", e, na medida mesma da importância dos mistérios antigos e do rompimento de sentido com eles, Agamben coloca em questão o problema da própria fundamentação de Deus, o qual, sendo inefável, manifestar-se-ia pelo silêncio. Essa concepção encontra um lugar fundamental na gnose valentiniana como forma de "conhecimento" da divindade, surgida no século II e detratada por importantes teólogos como Irineu de Lyon (cuja Adversus haereses é uma das principais fontes a respeito dessa doutrina) e Clemente de Alexandria (Excerpta ex Theodosio). Abriu-se, com ela, um caminho bastante complexo sobre a manifestação da divindade, praticamente lida em termos afeitos à tradição cosmogônica helênica: o que não e passível de compreensão e não foi gerado, ao invés de se dar simplesmente como "Deus", é assumido a partir das diversas manifestações que constituem o pleroma, a plenitude do divino. Nesse contexto, aparece o Bythós, o "Abismo", o qual, na sua pré-existência eterna, para fecundar a existência do Nous (contrapartida cognoscitiva "à imagem e semelhança" do incognoscível Abismo) a partir de uma conjunção, extrai de si seu próprio par, a Sigḗ, a qual, ainda como Énnoia, "Pensamento" ou "Intenção", "é o primeiro, negativo fundamento da revelação e do Lógos, a 'mãe' de tudo aquilo que é gerado do Abismo"379. O papel do Silêncio, mesmo que anterior à Intelecção e mesmo ao Lógos, é o de abrir o Abismo como dimensão (ou melhor, como "não-lugar"). Ao confiar o incognoscível ao silêncio, abriu-o negativamente ao sentido: "o Silêncio é o fundamento místico de toda revelação possível e de toda linguagem, a língua original de Deus enquanto Abismo (em termos cristãos, a figura da morada do Lógos na arkhḗ, o lugar original da linguagem)"380. O sentido da digressão agambeniana, cabe dizer, dá-se pelo fato de não haver oposição entre o Silêncio dos gnósticos e a Palavra dos cristãos apostólicos, cuja luminosa revelação pressupõe um ensombrecimento da sua fundamentação (isto é, da remissão ao fundamento) como essencialmente negativa, sem uma voz ou um discurso. Mais do que isso, trata-se de uma figura fundamental também para a filosofia, ainda mais quando já se revelou o seu pensamento sobre a linguagem como se fundando na subtração de uma voz e num tolher-se da natureza: O silêncio não é, aqui, mais do que o fundamento negativo do Logos, o seu terlugar e o seu demorar (segundo a teologia de João) não conhecido na arkhḗ que é o Pai. Essa morada do Lógos na arkhḗ (como aquela de Sigḗ junto a Bythós) 379 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 79. 380 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 79-80. 174 é uma morada abissal isto é, in-fundada e essa abissalidade a teologia trinitária não consegue confrontar até o fundo.381 Com todas as diferenças entre os mistérios helênicos e os mistérios cristãos, e apesar delas, mantém-se, todavia, o silêncio como pertencendo fundamentalmente à origem indizível do ser do Deus, no caso do cristianismo (a exemplo da "oração espiritual" de antigos autores siríacos, pela qual se ultrapassa a palavra e se atinge o puro pensamento382), e, nos ritos de Elêusis, de uma experiência significada além da voz significante (e em cuja ausência se pode expor o silêncio como Voz), afinal "tratava-se de um caminho de iniciação essencialmente sem palavras que conduzia a um conhecimento no qual as palavras não eram necessárias nem se tinha a capacidade de utilizá-las"383. Com o silenciar, revelava-se, em Elêusis, o mistério. Onde em Elêusis se calava, o gesto mostrava – e isso bastou. Não menos misteriosa é a relação entre a arkhḗ e o lógos, cuja proximidade do Deus acaba por fazer mistério e silêncio da origem da divindade. O milagre do verbo, do lógos, da soteriologia, enfim, não consegue sair, sem cindir o ser e a práxis, do abismo silencioso que funda e encobre Deus como mistério. O milagre quer provocar as pessoas a falar dele, sempre e em toda parte. O mistério é mantido em silêncio. Não seria este talvez o segredo de todo verdadeiro e grande mistério, simplesmente ser? Não é exatamente por isso que ele ama o segredo? Pronunciado, seria palavra; silenciado, seria ser. E também seria um milagre no sentido de que o ser com todos os seus paradoxos é miraculoso. É nesse sentido que se via, certamente também em Elêusis, os milagres e as revelações dos deuses: o milagre da origem visto naquelas figuras em que este se revelou num determinado em período da história mundial.384 O mistério pronunciado faz-se carne – eis um acontecimento "miraculoso", no sentido de Kerényi. Mas isso não apenas não elide o problema do ser, como ainda o aprofunda. Começa aí a longa história da teologia trinitária, cujas sínteses são tão reveladoras da tradição ocidental (teológica e secular) quanto as aporias que ela pretensamente sana – e, em grande medida, ajuda a criar, como a "teologia política" e a "teologia econômica". Em O silêncio da linguagem (1983), investigando a experiência negativa da linguagem a partir do silêncio no contexto de práticas extáticas dos "mistérios" cristãos, é o próprio "mistério" que aparece reconfigurado como a experiência do silêncio: 381 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 81. 382 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. O silêncio da linguagem, p. 298. 383 KÉRENYI, Karl. A jovem divina, p. 219. 384 KÉRENYI, Karl. O milagre de Elêusis, p. 261. 175 O que está assim em questão no silêncio e no estupor é a experiência do fundamento negativo (do in-fundamento) da linguagem, do seu ter-lugar no abismo de Deus. Nesse abismo, o silêncio é fundamento, mas – para retomar as palavras da Ciência da lógica hegeliana – é fundamento (Grund) no sentido em que ele é o que vai ao fundo (zu Grunde geht) para que a linguagem seja como in-fundada (grundlose). Desse ir ao fundo surge o estupor: estupor que a linguagem, o ser e Deus são: in-fundados. E esse estupor só pode ser silencioso, porque nenhuma proposição (nenhum 'saber composto') pode dizer o ter-lugar da linguagem, a sua permanência divina. (Por isso, todo autêntico estupor confina com angústia e desespero, a experiência do ser com a do nada). Silêncio e estupor não são patrimônio exclusivo da mística. Se lermos agora um texto que por certo pertence à tradição da filosofia (isto é, de uma doutrina que tem desde o início reivindicado a sua relação privilegiada com o estupor e a maravilha), é com uma experiência não diferente que nos encontramos confrontados: 'E agora descreverei a experiência de maravilhar-se pela existência do mundo, dizendo: é a experiência de ver o mundo como um milagre. Sou então tentado a dizer que a expressão justa na língua para o milagre da existência do mundo, ainda que não seja nenhuma proposição na língua, é a existência da própria linguagem... transferindo a expressão do milagroso de uma expressão por meio da linguagem à expressão pela existência da linguagem, disse somente, de novo, que não podemos exprimir o que queremos exprimir, e que tudo o que dizemos sobre o milagroso absoluto permanece privado de sentido'.385 O "texto que por certo pertence à tradição da filosofia" cabe a ninguém menos que Wittgenstein386 e não tem por intento, não para Agamben, em princípio, fundar a filosofia na mística, assim como o recurso ao mitologema não significa que a metafísica simplesmente seja "mitológica", mas que, no fundamento da linguagem, na qual todos esses "mundos" se tornam acessíveis para o ser humano, o homem faz experiência de uma falta de palavra e de voz – de um limite. Pelo contrário, é apenas com a "liquidação do místico"387, do indizível, e, portanto, negativo, fundamento e limite da potência de linguagem discursiva, que se pode escavar o caminho para um pensamento que pretenda ultrapassar a Voz e o inefável. Se o gesto de Wittgenstein afasta o fazer filosófico de dizer algo proposicional sobre o ter-lugar da linguagem, cabendo-lhe calar, Agamben não se propõe simplesmente, em direção contrária, dizer o ter-lugar da linguagem, mas, antes, compreender e desativar essa relação articulada entre mostrar e dizer – nem um calar-se diante do mistério, guardando-o e velando pelo silêncio, nem, por outro lado, recair na compulsão ao discurso e à fala. Com esses deslocamentos entre a ciência da mitologia, a teologia, as práticas mistéricas e a ontologia, a filosofia, enfim, Agamben não apenas mostra o contexto 385 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. O silêncio da linguagem, p. 299-300. 386 Embora Agamben não referencie o texto, trata-se da Lecture on ethics, uma espécie de fala ou conferência que Wittgenstein apresentou, em novembro de 1929, diante da Heretics Society da Universidade de Cambridge (Cf. WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig. Philosophical ocasions 1912-1951, p. 3644). 387 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 114. Grifo nosso. 176 metafísico de toda "sigética", mas também expõe as raízes que ela deita na teologia. Ela não poderia, assim, diante da sua crítica, ser o caminho que nos abre para uma experiência radicalmente distinta daquela em que se experimenta da linguagem como metafísica da Voz, a qual deixa de experimentar a linguagem na sua maravilha para recolhê-la num silêncio que, constituindo-se como um fundamento negativo, retira-a de seu simples terlugar diante de um abismo, de um vazio sem nome, e acaba por afundá-la no indizível do mistério. Ou também, no caso em que se resolva colocar em palavra e discursos o maravilhamento, que se transforma, então, caso tomemos as palavras de Kerényi, em milagre, é porque já possui um fundamento. O ter-lugar da linguagem afunda num abismo, num vazio sem nome, e o fundamento seria aquilo que vai até esse fundo (sem fundo) para que algo seja, isto é, vai até o vazio e nele institui um fundo, um fundamento para o ser e para a linguagem, capturando-o. Sendo o fundamento negativo, o que aí se funda é in-fundado, isto é, assentado sobre fundamentos negativos. O mitologema da Voz apresenta-nos, quanto à linguagem, o problema da negatividade como fundamento, como posse recíproca entre ambas (linguagem e negatividade, lógos e bythós) numa arkhḗ, num abrir-se originário para toda tópica ontológica – mais uma vez, "o fundamento é, para a metafísica, fundamento (Grund) no sentido em que é aquilo que vai ao fundo (zu Grunde geht) para que o ser tenha lugar e enquanto tenha lugar no não-lugar do fundamento (isto é, no nada) o ser é o in-fundado (das Grundlose)"388. O fundamento vai ao fundo para que o ser tenha lugar; o fundamento ele mesmo, porém, não é fundado em "algo", mas, capturando o próprio estar suspenso no nada, no vazio, dela faz o fundamento negativo do ser o qual se diz, nesse sentido, infundado, assentado no fundamento como um não-lugar. E, de fato, a negatividade aparece como um modo humano de ter a linguagem, um modo humano de abrir-se, também, o ser. Mas isso, como vimos, constitui a experiência metafísica com a linguagem, e com o ser, e não o destino como tal do homem. Pelo contrário, se a ele se apresenta algo como um destino, é porque ele já está capturado, seja na prisão do discurso, da necessidade do ter de falar, seja como sociedade, como política. Se ao homem se apresenta uma destinação, é porque ele já está assentado sobre um fundamento. Aquele o-aí, a proposição não alcança, pois ela só tem lugar sobre o discurso. O que mostra a insuficiência da palavra e do discurso, e, ao fazê-lo, acaba por instaurar o silêncio não apenas como o que a linguagem supõe para sua existência, para o seu dar-se a ser, mas 388 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 6. 177 também para guarda da sua estada no ser. O silêncio é (como que) a sombra da linguagem, ele interpõe-se, como Voz, entre o mostrar e o dizer, entre a ausência de voz e o discurso, consignando o homem justamente ao discurso como a sua voz. O mitologema permite expor não apenas o fundamento negativo que causa um espanto no iniciado, um estupor que se relaciona ao êxtase, mas também naquele que se propõe encontrar uma linguagem (um dizer "polifônico") para o ser, e que, assim, encontra-se sem voz diante da dimensão fundante da linguagem – o que, a rigor, como vimos, é o gesto da filosofia, o seu conformar-se como uma visão da linguagem. Se a metafísica encontra na Voz o seu operador fundamental, marca da subtração, passada e futura, e como que preso no eterno presente de um silenciar que funda negativamente o dizer, e se a teologia encontra no seu légein um discurso que no seu extremo não tem nada a dizer, pois não pode conhecer o seu sujeito supremo, que se encontra além de todo intelecto mundano, de acordo com a herança gnóstica na qual insiste Agamben, então o conceito de mitologema de fato coarticula uma experiência da linguagem que se declina conforme a expressão "onto-teo-logia" e marca o fundamento da relação fonética e sígnica (isto é, positiva) que experimentamos como tradição da palavra. A dimensão limite do discurso, a qual se apresenta pela negatividade, impede o homem de, pelo discurso, acessar positivamente o ter lugar-da linguagem, pois aquele não é voz. Porém, é diante do aferrar-se na negatividade, com ela e apesar dela, que o homem se dá a linguagem, a sua "língua", não tendo uma voz como o animal a tem. O que a Voz nos revela, contudo, não é uma mera intenção ou querer, mas uma forma pura da vontade: o puro querer-dizer, isto é, o querer capturar a própria existência da linguagem, "o evento originário, que contém a possibilidade de todo evento"389. Logo, pode-se entender que, na vasta arqueologia que tem conduzido Agamben, uma das etapas mais recentes do seu projeto tenha colocado em jogo precisamente a vontade, a partir da qual pode indagar a deontologia do fazer humano que funda o direito e a ética normativa. A pertença recíproca entre lógica e ética, anunciada na Introdução de A linguagem e a morte como um desafio constante ao pensamento, é também exposta no mitologema da Voz na forma desse puro querer-dizer como sigética. Diante da captura da negatividade, dando-se o homem, além de uma voz natural, uma Voz, assumindo-se como ser para a morte (paradoxalmente, ainda: um ser cuja vontade – que é um dispositivo, um operador metafísico – é morte), tanto a lógica quanto a ética se encontram 389 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 107. 178 na negatividade, isto é, quando todo o dizer desaparece, em perspectiva da ética, e recai no mostrar, no limite da lógica, e quando todo problema ético, em perspectiva lógica, mostra-se como informulável390. A sigética, portanto, é a experiência da linguagem nos termos da própria Voz. Aí não houve voz, nem, a rigor, dizer. Por isso, trata-se de um puro querer-dizer que, não dizendo nada, pois não o pode, e movendo-se longe de qualquer esfera psicológica de intenção e de volição objetal, funda o evento do dizer, afunda o seu fundamento – indizível – no seu próprio interior, e isso é que quer dizer que "a linguagem é o que deve necessariamente se pressupor a si mesmo"391. Trata-se de um querer-dizer que se move entre as dimensões separadas do indicar e do efetivo dizer, trazendo, dentro de si, a indicação frustrada, pois o homem tomou a linguagem como vontade, isto é, como Voz: " ela indica e quer-dizer o puro ter lugar da linguagem, é, assim, uma dimensão puramente lógica"392, a qual, ao lado da ética, é a fundação do lógos, na medida em que ambas se fundamentariam sobre a Voz como mitologema: A Voz é a dimensão ética originária, em que o homem pronuncia o seu sim à linguagem e consente que ela tenha lugar. Consentir (ou recusar) à linguagem não significa, aqui, simplesmente falar (ou calar). Consentir à linguagem significa dizer sim, na experiência abissal do ter-lugar da linguagem no privarse da voz, para que se abra ao homem uma outra Voz e, com essa, a dimensão do ser e, ao mesmo tempo, o risco mortal do nada.393 Esse "dizer sim" revela, na verdade, nada mais do que a vontade comumente vista sob o viés de "liberdade". O "dizer sim" dissimula a vontade sobre o mitologema da Voz como silêncio presumido, instituindo-se, com a ideia de liberdade, em manifestação essencialmente moderna, a forma de um hiperprodutivo "mitologema do contrato"394, o qual aparece, segundo a forma de uma relação jurídica, nada menos do que como o dissimular da fundação de nossos espaços políticos e jurídicos; caso de dissesse "não", tratar-se-ia, apenas, de um calar-se – a negatividade surge, porém, de todos os lugares. Se a devida consideração da apropriação da negatividade e do vazio, o qual se constituir como a substância política do ocidente ao redor da qual gira a maquinaria governamental, mas também a antropológica – e, talvez possamos dizer, também, a linguística –, deveria se dar em termos da estrutura de bando, isto é, da própria forma de relação, na medida em que essa responde como fundação do mitologema da Voz, aquela, a relação jurídica, é duplamente uma mitificação quando ingressa na modernidade como "estado de 390 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 109. 391 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 27. 392 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 107. 393 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 108. 394 Cf. GIACOIA JR., Oswaldo. Estado, democracia e sujeito de direito, p. 50-56. 179 natureza", o qual, pressuposto pelo mitologema do contrato, funda a sua possibilidade instituinte395. O mitologema do contrato parte da dissimulação dessa natureza da vontade, que se apresenta, no mitologema da Voz, em sua forma mais pura no limite da metafísica – a dissimulação, que, para nos mantermos contratualmente delimitados, aparece como figura categorial da má-fé no direito privado, na verdade, mostra-se como sendo da própria constituição da natureza da forma jurídica. Poder-se-ia discorrer, aqui, sobre a liberdade ou causalidade desse movimento e a sua sorte na história da metafísica (por exemplo, o homem tem a linguagem porque pode tê-la ou porque não pode não tê-la? Ela é uma possibilidade ou é necessária?). O que está em jogo mais fundamentalmente, porém, é que a dimensão de abertura do ser confina com a vontade, assim como a linguagem, com a Voz. É um "dizer sim" ao ser dando-se uma morte, e não um cessar, simplesmente – o que, não se pode deixar de observar, é a angústia não como uma bela disposição, mas uma terrível espada de Dâmocles, um "terror do nada". É um "dizer sim" à experiência da linguagem como articulação pressuponente de cisões, é um pensar a linguagem já a partir de uma negatividade, já pressupondo uma Voz e uma vontade. Lembramos, com as palavras de Nietzsche – "o dado fundamental da vontade humana, o seu horror vacui", diante do qual é preferível "querer o nada a nada querer" 396 –, que a forma extrema da vontade é, na verdade, o ápice da experiência da negatividade suprema: é "vontade de nada"397. A forma da questão nietzschiana, mutatis mutandis, pensada, agora, por meio da visão metafísica da linguagem, não seria, justamente, "é preferível querer-dizer mesmo que seja o nada a nada querer-dizer"? Ora, a ideia culpada de linguagem, que pressupõe o banimento e a queda, ou melhor, que estrutura o banimento como o próprio pressuposto das comunidades humanas, consiste precisamente nesse "dizer sim", na medida em que ela "diz sim para que a linguagem seja a nossa linguagem e o mundo seja o nosso mundo e constitui, para o homem, o fundamento negativo do seu ser livre e falante" – e isso, dissimulado como liberdade, ameaçando o homem com o "terror do nada", lança-o na linguagem e na ética sob a égide da culpa e da pena: Estabelecendo com rigor os limites daquilo que pode ser conhecido naquilo que se diz, a lógica recolhe essa Voz silenciosa e a faz o fundamento negativo de todo saber. A ética, por sua vez, experimenta-a como aquilo que deve 395 Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 35. 396 NIETZSCHE, Friedrich. Genealogia da moral, p. 80; 140. 397 NIETZSCHE, Friedrich. Genealogia da moral, p. 140. 180 necessariamente restar não dito naquilo que se diz. Em ambos os casos, todavia, o fundamento último resta rigorosamente informulável.398 Aquela citação a Wittgenstein não poderia na escavação desse sentido, aparecer num momento mais oportuno, afinal, ao concluir "que não podemos exprimir o que queremos exprimir, e que tudo o que dizemos sobre o milagroso absoluto permanece privado de sentido", acaba por situar a metafísica de fato sob o sinal do dizer o inefável. A lógica, por sua vez, não podendo dizer a respeito disso, aparece como tendo de fato uma base negativa. A metafísica, a ética e a lógica encontram-se pela Voz, encontram-se na Voz. A diferença que elas venham a ter será uma diferença no modo como a capturam, no modo de relação. O que permanece, contudo, é a ideia de limite, ou melhor, a limitação que operam da ideia de linguagem – e o juízo de que se pode ou não ultrapassá-los, alcançando ou não a negatividade, funda, no sentido dessa investigação agambeniana, o que se conhece como metafísica ou como lógica. A filosofia captura a "muda e angustiada consciência", a "sigética que se abre entre o ser-nascido do homem e o seu ser falante"399, entre o seu ser vivente e o seu ser o ser que tem a linguagem, e é aqui que funda a lógica e a ética. É o estatuto, mais uma vez, desse ter que está em jogo, como habitação (para a ética e para a política) e como capacidade (para a ontologia e a lógica). Com a mesma passagem de Wittgenstein que já tivemos a oportunidade de apontar, Agamben não apenas conclui o seu Experimentum linguae, mas, parodiando-a, lança seu projectus, aquilo que ele não apenas lança e projeta, mas pelo qual, também, lança-se a uma experiência do pensamento e da linguagem como o que vem: 'Se a expressão mais adequada para a maravilha da existência do mundo é a existência da linguagem, qual é, então, a expressão justa para a existência da linguagem?'. A única resposta possível a essa pergunta é: a vida humana enquanto éthos, enquanto vida ética. Buscar um pólis e uma oikía que estejam à altura dessa comunidade vazia e impressuponível, é a tarefa infantil da humanidade que vem.400 Pode-se dizer que A linguagem e a morte é uma obra cujo efeito crítico não se restringe ao limite de suas páginas. A pergunta que a move, "qual o modo para a exposição da linguagem", continua sendo inexorável para o pensamento de Agamben, pois dela irradia o pensamento sobre os problemas éticos e políticos. Ela continua a ser feita e refeita: é com base em toda a indagação topológica que aí levanta, coroada com o mitologema da Voz, que a metafísica e a teologia, a ética e a lógica, o político e o jurídico, 398 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 114. 399 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 114. 400 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Infanzia e storia, p. xv. 181 são expostos na sua relação com o fundamento, o fundamento negativo da linguagem (como o silêncio de uma Voz). A sua continuidade é essencialmente notável pela tese que sustenta o seu mais ambicioso, intenso e extenso projeto: Homo sacer, o qual carrega, na figura do seu nome, o que sustenta, como fundamento, o peso das categorias sobre a política e a ética, o ser e o fazer do homem, a saber, o mitologema sacrificial. 3.4. O mitologema sacrificial Ao aproximar-se do problema do fundamento, e deparar-se com o-aí do sero-aí como o abrir-se na e da negatividade pelo qual o homem entra na linguagem, no discurso, dando-se uma Voz, a experiência dessa Voz e dessa negatividade são feitas como diante de um "abismo", como um mistério informulável que permanece velado à linguagem enquanto tal, e, inacessível pelo discurso articulado, como milagre que se apresenta como palavra já na forma do lógos. A aproximação da dimensão do mistério esclarece, no nível pragmático, o que o teológico, talvez a posteriori, considera como significação. E o nível pragmático do mistério, nível em que, como cerimônia, as vozes rituais são como que silenciadas (por mais que venham a dizer, o que elas dizem é que a palavra existe), é também aquele em que se dá o sacrifício, a efetiva operação que intenta tornar a presença presente. A arkhḗ – o fundamento – propriamente permite conceber, analogamente, as duas dimensões. Ao mitologema da Voz, como conteúdo narrativo originário, apresenta-se, pois, paralelamente, o mitologema sacrificial também como fundamento, ao qual o sacrifício se sucede como atualização. Não há sentido, se quisermos compreender a fundo as teses de Agamben, bem como o seu caminhar teórico, pensar a metafísica destituída da política e da ética, o ser da ação, pois é o próprio mecanismo articulatório, com suas cisões e separações, que garante, ao pensamento e à prática, no interior desse contexto, a sua inteligibilidade. Assim, não haveria sentido pensar e entabular algo como um mitologema da Voz se não se pudesse vê-lo como uma operação, como estruturação de técnicas, atos, discursos. E, de fato, isso parece ser o que até aqui se encaminha: o próprio fazer filosófico e poético (em sua origem compartilhada) surgem, nesse sentido, como lugares de escavação efetivos. Se o problema do fundamento se processa de modo mais agudo, na metafísica, pelo processo de absolvição do absoluto – bem como pelo Ereignis da virada teórica de Martin Heidegger –, é porque ele conduz ao que Agamben denomina "in-fundado" ou à 182 "in-fundação", é porque esse processo é uma situação no negativo, a conquista do ser a partir de nenhuma determinação ôntica, mas o seu puro dar-se a partir da negatividade mais extrema, isto é, o nada – em última análise, a metafísica que morde a sua cauda. O absoluto, como o problema da resolução da filosofia (e do pensamento), ao mesmo tempo cume e esgotamento, encontra-se com o problema do fazer humano que o estágio histórico conduz à incessante repetição e, ao mesmo tempo, ao esvaziamento. Nessa temporalidade assim encetada, marcada por um fazer contínuo cuja significação parece esvaída – isto que Agamben já chamou de "destruição da experiência" –, a máquina política encontra um mecanismo cuja efetividade conduz a nada além de um vazio interior; tal vazio, propriamente, é a substância cuja captura permite a operação das suas engrenagens. Na medida em que a investigação do absoluto – em outros termos, o acolhimento, na e como filosofia, do fundamento negativo – revela que o homem é infundado, o fazer humano é que aparecerá como seu dar-se um fundamento, como fundação, assim como o acolhimento da Voz é o seu modo de possuir a linguagem e darlhe fundamentação. Nisso, a filosofia aproxima-se do mistério (no que pode ser uma definição tardia da metafísica), mas "o que significa a proximidade entre o indizível saber sacrificial, como iniciação à destruição e à violência [consumir o pão e o vinho comendo e bebendo, isto é, destruindo e consumando], e o fundamento negativo da filosofia?"401. A resposta adquire formulação originária, e conecta a filosofia do absoluto com toda o arcabouço de fazeres, ditos e silêncios da experiência – e não só da experiência mistérica, mas também da que é afetada pelos efeitos que ultrapassam as fronteiras daquela, a rigor, a própria experiência cotidiana dos homens. A autofundação do homem, o infundado, no seu fazer, conduz a uma experiência na qual a violência é fundante: ao mitologema da Voz vem se juntar outra visão da arkhḗ, o mitologema sacrificial. Nele, expressa-se nada menos que o sacrifício como paradigma do fazer humano. A profundidade e o alcance dessa formulação são tais que não apenas permitiram uma vereda fundamental a um projeto vasto como Homo sacer – de fato, o texto inicial de O poder soberano e a vida nua é visivelmente similar ao final de A linguagem e a morte402 401 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 131. 402 A essencial diferença entre ambos, é que, tanto em A linguagem e a morte quanto em *Se. O Absoluto e o Ereignis (que reproduz quase na integralidade, ao final do texto, assinalados por um aleph, o texto que aqui abordamos) a tese sobre a "ambivalência do sagrado" – que se encontra em Mauss e Hubert como "ambivalência das próprias forças religiosas" (MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 67) e auxilia a demarcar um "mitologema científico" que foi variado por uma série de teóricos a partir da 183 –, mas ainda a escavação de outros problemas capitais da ontologia e da política, da lógica e da ética. Se damos ao problema agambeniano tal destaque, é porque pôde, a partir dele, existir toda a especulação posterior, na qual o paradigma como operador e a arqueologia como caminho se afirmaram teoricamente. Anuncia-se, pois, antecipadamente o problema da sacralidade do homem, sendo o sagrado, para Agamben, em linhas gerais, a constituição de uma esfera separada do uso comum, num apartar-se e num abandono da própria comunidade: "o essencial [da função sacrificial] é que, em todo caso, o fazer da comunidade humana é, aqui, fundado em um outro fazer seu; isto é, que, como ensina a etimologia, todo fazer é sacrum facere"403. Fazer sagrado, tomando literalmente a expressão da atividade que torna algo sagrado, é o fazer que, de fato, funda o sagrado no mundo, liberando e como que gerenciando uma espécie de efetividade – ou força, como se pode considerar a partir do célebre Sobre o sacrifício (1899) de Marcel Mauss e Henri Hubert. O ato de tornar algo sagrado é a fundação do próprio sagrado, pois com isso as coisas, os viventes e os homens apartam-se em profanos e sagrados. O tornar sagrado, ao mesmo tempo em que desloca algo da pertença comum para uma esfera separada, acaba por fundar essa esfera. Os atos de palavra que o orientam são, a rigor, performativos, realizam, sobre o próprio ser que a palavra cinde, uma performance que institui a esfera separada, o sagrado, e a esfera partilhada, a profana. Mas o que a expressão ainda coloca, além de remeter o fazer profano ao sacrifício (sacrum facere), é colocar em situação especial o fazer (facio, facere) e o sagrado (sacer, sacrum). Porém, a operação de consagração não se confunde com o próprio sacrifício, como bem alertaram os autores de Sobre o sacrifício: A palavra [sacrifício] sugere imediatamente a ideia de consagração, e poderse-ia pensar que as duas noções se confundem. Com efeito, é certo que o sacrifício sempre implica uma consagração: em todo sacrifício um objeto passa do domínio comum ao domínio religioso – ele é consagrado. Mas as consagrações não são todas da mesma natureza. Há aquelas que esgotam seus efeitos no objeto consagrado, seja ele qual for, homem ou coisa. É o caso, por exemplo, da unção. Na sagração de um rei, somente a personalidade religiosa do rei é modificada; fora dela nada é alterado. No sacrifício, ao contrário, a consagração irradia-se além da coisa consagrada, atingindo, entre outras coisas, a pessoa moral que se encarrega da cerimônia. O fiel que forneceu a vítima, objeto da consagração, não é no final da operação o que era no começo. Ele adquiriu um sentido religioso que não possuía, ou se desembaraçou de um caráter desfavorável que o afligia; elevou-se a um estado de graça ou saiu de um estado de pecado.404 ideia de mana – é afirmada, enquanto que, em O poder soberano e a vida nua, a crítica dessa tese, na verdade, é próprio ponto de partida da investigação sobre a fórmula do sacer esto. 403 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 131. 404 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 17. 184 O movimento que desloca algo – um corpo, antes de tudo – para o sagrado – retirando-o do uso comum dos corpos na comunidade – é o ato da consagração. É preciso haver a constituição do sagrado, portanto, de uma esfera resguardada pelos preceitos religiosos, que podem ser morais ou até mesmo jurídicos, uma vez que o sacrifício, bem como a consagração, está resguardado por inúmeras prescrições, acompanhadas de sanções ou maldições405. Antes que o próprio ato de sacrificar se dê, a irradiação do sentido da consagração, naquilo que aparece como traço de unidade nas diversas consagrações, é, propriamente, o deslocamento para o sagrado – e a religião, ao menos assim a define Agamben, é precisamente "o que subtrai coisas, lugares, animais ou pessoas ao uso comum e as transfere a uma esfera separada"406. O ato de consagrar mostra, aqui, a sua efetividade, o seu caráter constituinte e constituído: ele responde a uma religião, à constituição em separado, mas também a constitui, pois é por ele que as coisas ingressam efetivamente numa tal dimensão. Mas o dispositivo que assegura a separação de uma esfera sagrada do uso comum dos homens (que, a partir disso, tornase profana), que assegura as funções religiosas, é o sacrifício: O dispositivo que efetua e regula a separação é o sacrifício: por meio de uma série de rituais minuciosos, diversos segundo a variedade das culturas, que Hubert e Mauss pacientemente inventariaram, ele sanciona, de todo modo, a passagem de algo do profano ao sagrado, da esfera humana àquela divina407. O sentido dessa irradiação do sacrifício não se esgota com o que há de consagração nele. O sacrifício tem o sentido de sua irradiação para além da função imediatamente a que se destina. A força do seu ato consiste, justamente, na liberação de forças que transformam, mediante um ritual concreto, as relações nas quais pessoas, deuses e objetos estão envolvidos. O deslocamento operado pelo sacrifício gera efeitos que transbordam o sentido, por assim dizer, mais genérico da consagração. Consagração e sacrifício compõem-se, portanto, de modo complexo, não apenas individual, mas solidariamente. Nesse sentido é que se pode dizer que o que distingue a consagração que ocorre no sacrifício daquela consagração no sentido 405 "As faltas rituais", recordam Mauss e Hubert, "são em sua maior parte sancionadas pelo infortúnio ou pelo mal físico"; "É a sanção geral das faltas rituais no Levítico, no Deuteronômio e no Êxodo, assim como em Ezequiel e nos livros históricos: é preciso observar os ritos para não morrer, para não ser atingido pela lepra como o rei Osias" (MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 60; 156). A respeito da maldição, reportamos, especialmente, ao estudo agambeniano O sacramento da linguagem, no qual, propondo-se realizar uma "arqueologia do juramento", também apresenta todo o problema da rede de interdições que acompanhava o perjúrio – maldição emanada, a rigor, do objeto pelo qual se jura, pelo qual se garantia uma fonte material para resguardar a quebra do juramento, o horkos (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il sacramento del linguaggio, p. 17; p. 41-44) 406 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Elogio della profanazione in Profanazioni, p. 84. 407 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Elogio della profanazione in Profanazioni, p. 84. 185 genérico, é que, no sacrifício, a coisa consagrada serve de "intermediário entre o sacrificante, ou o objeto que deve receber os efeitos úteis do sacrifício, e a divindade à qual o sacrifício é endereçado. O homem e o deus não estão em contado imediato408. Tal diferença, todavia, verifica-se como sendo insuficiente diante da série e da variedade de ritos que poderiam cair sob a denominação de sacrifício ou de consagração – a exemplo das oferendas. É preciso que outra diferença venha se agregar e, com ela, dá-se uma definição mais específica da operação sacrificial: "deve-se chamar de 'sacrifício' toda oblação, mesmo vegetal, em que a oferenda, ou uma parte dela, é destruída, embora o costume pareça preservar o termo apenas à designação de sacrifícios sangrentos"409. O que confere unidade ao procedimento do sacrifício é o fato de que ele estabelece não apenas um deslocamento, colocando coisas no trânsito entre o sagrado e o profano, e, com isso, operando uma modificação do seu estatuto, e do seu entorno, no caso do sacrifício, mas também uma destruição. "Chegamos então à seguinte fórmula: O sacrifício é um ato religioso que mediante a consagração de uma vítima modifica o estado da pessoa moral que o efetua ou de certos objetos pelos quais ela se interessa"410. Nada menos do que a vítima, aquilo que é como tal destruído sacrificialmente, é o que finaliza a específica consagração sacrificial e define a unidade do procedimento411 – além, é claro, daquele fim visado de por essa destruição colocar em comunicação as duas esferas, regulando-a. "A aproximação do sagrado e do profano, que vimos se processar progressivamente com os diversos elementos do sacrifício, se completa na vítima"412. Ora, isso quer dizer que, retomando nossa abertura, o que a consagração separa, como ato de auto-criação, o sacrifício une e articula: "de uma ponta a outra do sacrifício o profano se une ao divino"413. É a visão de todo, o sacrifício na consagração – o sacrifício, segundo o Sobre o sacrifício, como "uma ramificação especial do sistema da consagração"414 – e a consagração no sacrifício – aquela não apenas configura a primeira fase deste, mas se apresenta como a sua conditio sine qua non, pois nada pode ser 408 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 19. 409 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 20. Grifo nosso. 410 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 21. Grifo nosso. 411 Cf. MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 105. 412 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 40. 413 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 133. Com isso, o sacrifício coloca-se, precisamente, naquela dimensão de passagem, e, assegurando-a, assegura a constituição prática da religião, daquilo que é mantido em separado e que o sacrifício permite unir – ora, é a partir da inversão da relação de separação-junção que a religião pode aparecer como um religare: nesse sentido, ela parte do próprio sacrifício para tecer a sua definição (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Elogio della profanazione in Profanazioni, p. 85.) 414 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 106. 186 sacrificado sem que tenha sido imantado daquelas forças religiosas, de sagrado, o que, a rigor, não se verifica como tal no ambiente415 – que devem ser levados em conta, propriamente, como constituindo o modelo articulatório que Agamben entende como subsistindo no sacrifício e que ele configura, por fim, como mitologema sacrificial. A partir disso, o sacrifício desvela o seu caráter específico em relação à consagração, e é nessa medida que Agamben poderá tomá-lo como paradigma de um fazer humano, do qual, propriamente, o sacer esto, o tornar homo sacer, revela-se como a exceção fundante. Como se sabe, a fórmula do homo sacer, segundo a constrói Agamben em O poder soberano e a vida nua, estabelecendo uma efetiva filologia do instituto, indica que quem é por ela atingido está tanto excluído do trânsito jurídico humano quanto da entrada no mundo regulado das coisas divinas, tornando-se, como isso, matável e insacrificável, pois quem o golpeia, aos olhos do direito das relações profanas, não comete homicídio nem interfere, quanto ao âmbito que rege o sagrado, no sacrifício, nem fazendo-o, nem violando-o. O homo sacer não é nem atingido pelas prescrições regulares do direito penal, nem, a rigor, constitui-se como vítima. Ele não integra mais a comunidade dos usos profanos e não passa ao sagrado, consagrado ou sacrificado. Enquanto a consecratio, na categorização conceitual agambeniana desse primeiro volume de Homo sacer, configura a consagração, a sacratio é o mecanismo (jurídico-ritual) que configura o fazer sacer416. Se o sacrifício é a consagração especial que se constitui como o dispositivo entre o sagrado e o profano (ao dizer que ela pode ocorrer "num sentido ou noutro", Agamben remete-o ao seu caráter consagrador), se o fazer sagrado é o paradigma da ação humana, é porque na, base do sacrifício, portanto, desse ato por excelência sagrador, atua e opera uma exceção: o homo sacer. Como se pode entender das operações arqueológicas de Agamben, exemplo (sacrifício) e exceção (a sacratio do homo sacer) coarticulam-se, conquanto diversos, na inteligibilidade de um paradigma. A estrutura do sacrifício, porém, de um fazer sagrado que leva para a esfera do sagrado mediante a destruição, (e não, ainda, aquele outro fazer sagrado que funda o sacer esto, pois excepciona o sacrifício), encontra a sua "operação suprema" com a destruição da vítima, a sua morte: "A morte irá desfazer esse vínculo [entre o divino na 415 Cf. MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 27-28. 416 Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 90. É interessante notar que, a rigor, sacratio e consecratio aparecem como sinônimos, geralmente (em A Latin Dictionary, de Lewis e Short, por exemplo, ambos os termos aparecem como "consagração"). Mas assim como sacer verifica uma homonímia, havendo o sacer do sagrado e o sacer da operação de tornar homo sacer e de sacer esto, Agamben especifica, parece-nos, a sacratio para essa segunda operação e a consecratio para a primeira. Ele de fato conceitualiza a partir da própria investigação filológica que estabelece, o que não lhe rende poucas 187 vítima encarnado e o mundo profano], tornando a consagração definitiva e irrevogável. É o momento solene. É um crime que começa, uma espécie de sacrilégio"417. Pode-se perceber, assim, do caráter do sacrifício, que a sacratio do homo sacer era bastante diversa. Mas sem remeter à compreensão de estrutura entre ambos, exemplo e exceção, como propomos, parece que se perde o problema do fundamento, da violência contida em ambos (institucionalizada e regida no primeiro, desinstitucionalizada e liberalizada, por assim dizer, no segundo). A morte que aí se revela trata-se de uma verdadeira aniquilação: "com essa aniquilação efetuava-se o ato essencial do sacrifício. A vítima separava-se definitivamente do mundo profano; estava consagrada, sacrificada, no sentido etimológico da palavra, e as diversas línguas chamavam santificação o ato que a elevava a esse estado" 418. Aquele núcleo da negatividade que a filosofia hegeliana percebeu e em relação ao qual começou por se medir, revela-se justamente aqui – e, nesse sentido, encontrará no Heidegger do "ser-para-a-morte" um contraponto – segundo a compreendeu Georges Bataille, pois, "no sacrifício, a morte, de um lado, atinge essencialmente o ser corporal; e é, por outro, no sacrifício que exatamente 'a morte vive uma vida humana'"419 – a morte que define o humano o define, agora, por uma sangrenta fundação, que encontra no mitologema sacrificial o seu fundamento. "O sacrifício", desse modo, "por si só dá testemunho de todo o movimento da morte"420. O sacrifício, do seu rito concreto que aniquila, revela que houve um trabalho sobre o seu núcleo mitologemático, ao atentarmos além do seu caráter de fundação, quando se nota que ele "produziu na mitologia uma infinidade de descendentes. De abstração em abstração ele se tornou um dos temas fundamentais das lendas divinas"421, dando azo, portanto, a uma narração mitológica: O sacrifício veio a ser rapidamente considerado a condição mesma da existência divina. É ele que fornece a matéria imortal de que vivem os deuses. Desse modo, não somente é do sacrifício que nascem alguns deuses, mas ainda é pelo sacrifício que todos conservam sua existência. O sacrifício acabou então por se revelar como a essência e a origem dos deuses, o seu criador. E é também o criador das coisas, pois é nele que está o princípio de toda vida.422 417 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 40. 418 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 42. 419 BATAILLE, Georges. Hegel, a morte e o sacrifício, p. 403. 420 BATAILLE, Georges. Hegel, a morte e o sacrifício, p. 406. 421 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 95. 422 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 99. 188 Vê-se aqui, pois, que a mitologia dos deuses sacrificados varia aquele "material antigo, herdado da tradição", aquele núcleo mitologemático que se presta a inúmeras variações, ressonâncias, e talvez, ainda, dissonâncias – das quais A sagração da primavera, de Igor Stravinsky, teria sido uma das mais notáveis que nosso tempo pôde produzir. Porém, não só a mitologia desenvolveu suas variações, mas ainda "a teologia tomou suas cosmogonias dos mitos sacrificiais. Ela explica a criação (...) por um sacrifício. Com efeito, reporta o sacrifício do deus à origem do mundo"423, o que diz respeito não apenas a antigas religiões, como a hinduísta, mas ao nosso "moderno" cristianismo. O sacrifício não apenas foi conservado pela teologia cristã, mas a imolação do cordeiro, do agnus dei, não apenas remite os pecados, mas é atualizada diretamente pela liturgia, e a imolação, onde se leria a destruição dos ritos antigos como sendo a própria paixão na cruz, torna-se a consumação da eucaristia. Destruição e consumação. "Comer do pão e do vinho" – consumir, por certo, mas também consumar, levar à realização e à efetividade o sacrifício: Ao centro do sacrifício está, de fato, simplesmente um fazer determinado que, como tal, é separado e golpeado pela exclusão, torna-se sacer e é, por isso mesmo, investido de uma série de interdições e de prescrições rituais. O fazer interditado, atingido de sacralidade [sacertà], não é, porém, simplesmente excluído: antes, ele é, de agora em diante, acessível somente para certas pessoas e segundo regras determinadas. Desse modo, ele fornece à sociedade e a sua infundada legislação a ficção de um início: aquilo que é excluído da comunidade é, na verdade, aquilo sobre o que se funda a completa vida da comunidade e é assumido por ela como um passado imemorial e, todavia, memorável.424 A operação do sacrifício sobre o fazer do homem constitui uma remoção de fazeres, objetos e palavras que serão deslocados para uma esfera separada, a saber, serão confinados no sagrado. O sacrifício, que pressupõe uma consagração, consiste sempre numa operação entre sagrado e profano, seja para expulsar uma força negativa, expiar a mácula, seja para tornar um objeto ou alguém sagrado. Isso, ao menos, é o que podemos identificar, aqui, como aproximação com as considerações do estudo de Mauss e Hubert e com as quais ainda podemos conectar o sentido das formulações agambenianas. Mas já aqui está no cerne a operação que, mediante uma exclusão, o sacrum facere, ao mesmo tempo inclui o objeto ou sujeito na esfera dos interditos sacrificiais, criando um conjunto de regras cuja violação é mais efetiva que a simples interdição penal, pois acarreta uma 423 MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 100. 424 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 131. Toda essa passagem encontra-se também, como já mencionamos, em *Se. O Absoluto e o Ereignis (1982) (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. La potenza del pensiero, p. 195-197). O que há de essencialmente diferente no seguimento dessa passagem, citaremos na sequência. 189 comunicação não mediatizada entre o sagrado e o profano, liberando – segundo aqueles teóricos, não poucos, que absorveram o tema do mana, das energias ou forças religiosas ou espirituais– forças cuja potência é da ordem do terrível. Trata-se, na verdade, da composição prática da origem, ou melhor, da composição da origem numa prática específica. Nesse sentido é que o fazer atingido pela prescrição ritual, pela sacralidade, dá à comunidade e as suas regras uma ficção bastante concreta: origem como um início, o qual se faz atual no sacrifício, principalmente naquele mais elevado e no qual essa operação é exposta em toda a sua clareza: o sacrifício do deus425. O início assim figurado, mitologizado e consubstanciado numa operação sacrificial evidencia a negatividade do fundamento – a saber, a fundamentação de uma prática proscrita. A interdição do simples fazer figura o início da cadeia de separações da vida prática do homem, do seu fazer subscrito à religião e à moral (vale dizer, a moralidades): consagração e profanação, justo e injusto, bem e mal. A exclusão do livre fazer da forma de comunidade assentada sobre o mitologema sacrificial torna-se o princípio mesmo cuja inclusão é o fundamento dessa comunidade. Toda a liberdade dissimilada como vontade, ou como contrato, portanto, funda-se, na verdade, nesse fundamento de um fazer circunscrito, regulado, prescrito ou proscrito. O dar-se uma origem figurada num início significa, ainda, retomando o problema da transmissão contido na configuração dos mitologemas, a constituição de um passado imemorial – mas que é, na verdade, uma operação ativa de memória e de esquecimento, uma tradição e uma transmissão, "ressaltando assim", em que pese o núcleo mitologemático de uma tradibilidade, como vimos acima, "o processo histórico concreto, material, de desistência, perseverança, lutas e violência que transporta ou não, leva ou não, transmite ou não um acontecimento ou uma obra do passado até nosso presente"426. O princípio mesmo que articula, pressupõe o ocultamento da fundamentação e da fundação: "Todo início é, na verdade, iniciação, todo conditum é um abs-conditum" 427. O abscôndito como iniciação é o mover-se do início, o qual, como aquilo que está 425 A esse respeito, Cf. MAUSS, Marcel. HUBERT, Henri. Sobre o sacrifício, p. 85-101. 426 GAGNEBIN, Jeanne-Marie. Walter Benjamin, p. 197. 427 Encontramos um modelo para essa síntese agambeniana no comentário de João Crisóstomo à Epístola aos Colossenses, de Paulo, na qual se diz: "Dela [da Igreja] me tornei ministro, por encargo divino a mim confiado a vosso respeito, para levar a bom termo o anúncio da palavra de Deus, o mistério escondido desde os séculos e desde as gerações, mas agora manifestado aos seus santos. A estes quis Deus tornar conhecida qual é entre os gentios a riqueza da glória deste mistério, que é Cristo em vó, as esperança da glória!" (Cl 1, 25-27). A consideração de João Crisóstomo é que "Ideo non solum dixit, Conditum, sed etiam, Absconditum" (CRYSOSTOMI, Joannis. Opera omnia, X, p. 331 (Homilia V). O que está oculto, no início, como origem, é o mistério, e o mistério é revelado pela iniciação. 190 oculto e oculta, afasta-se cada vez mais daquilo que põe junto, dissimulando o passado imemorial como aquilo que conjuga em comunidade. Mover-se do início, então, é ocultar, pois afunda cada vez mais o início dissimulado como origem no passado. O início oculto é a forma do mistério que a iniciação expõe como revelação. Ora, ao colocar o sacrifício como visão privilegiada da origem – com o que queremos dizer, criação de inícios, gênese –, a prática humana é estabelecida originariamente pela destruição e consumação, pela violência e pela morte. Além de tudo, o sacrifício conecta a violência e a morte, o silêncio e o voto, além de seu direcionamento mais imediato de comunicação entre sagrado e profano: O sacrifício não contém um assassinato porque a vida e a morte eram para o homem as coisas mais sagradas; pelo contrário, vida e morte tornaram-se as coisas mais sagradas porque os sacrifícios continham um assassinato. (Nesse sentido, nada poderia melhor exprimir a diferença entre antiguidade e mundo moderno quanto o fato de que, para a primeira, sagrada era a destruição da vida, enquanto, para o segundo, sagrada é a vida mesma.) Antes, é a mesma in-fundatez [l'infondatezza] do fazer humano (a qual o mitologema sacrificial quer remediar) a constituir o caráter violento (isto é, segundo o significado que a palavra tem em latim, contra naturam) do sacrifício. Todo fazer humano, enquanto não é naturalmente fundado, mas deve por si pôr o próprio fundamento, é, segundo o mitologema sacrificial, violento (isto é, pressupõe uma natureza negada), e é essa violência sagrada (isto é, abandonada a si mesma) que o sacrifício assume para repeti-la e regulá-la na própria estrutura. 428 Isso auxilia a vislumbrar porque, deslocando-se a partir do mitologema sacrificial, a lógica da soberania, e, com ela, a noção de exceção, constitua o seu paradigma no sacer esto – cuja fórmula é exaustivamente analisada por Agamben em O poder soberano e a vida nua – , num limbo entre sagrado e profano que abandona o homem a si mesmo e poderia significar a indiferenciação com um pressuposto caráter animal (essa ambiguidade é tão relevante quanto aquela pretensamente atestada pelo 428 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. *Se. L'Assoluto e l'Ereignis in La potenza del pensiero, p. 196. Enquanto a edição brasileira, do tradutor português António Guerreiro, com revisão técnica de Cláudio Oliveira, traduz o italiano uccisione por "homicídio" (Cf. AGAMBEN, Giorgio. A potência do pensamento, p. 170), traduzimo-lo, aqui, por "assassinato", embora também pudesse ser traduzido como "morte", o que, no passo em questão, poderia gerar alguma confusão. Entendemos que homicídio, por ser um termo jurídico (não se deve esquecer a formação jurídica do filósofo) e que se encontra, em italiano, na forma omicidio, não poderia, aqui, ser usado intercambiavelmente com assassinato (ao contrário do que seria a relação mais direta entre uccisione e assassinio). A ideia de matar ou causar simplesmente a morte de outrem não é imediatamente homicídio no mundo causal. Pelo contrário, o homicídio pressupõe o mundo das instituições humanas, a regulação jurídica (prescrição) de um ato punível com sanção (tanto é que a prescrição do sacer esto é que dispensava o eventual assassino do homo sacer tanto do homicídio quanto do sacrifício). A nosso ver, então, se Agamben quisesse demarcar a possível conotação jurídica da discussão, tê-lo-ia feito. Tendo em vista o contexto, deve-se lembrar que imolação sacrificial geralmente era feita com o uso de animais – e o protótipo para O esquema do sacrifício, Hubert e Mauss o encontram no "sacrifício animal védico". Portanto, uma palavra com campo de abrangência mais largo, como a que adotamos, presta-se mais adequadamente à significação, que está justamente no limiar entre natureza e cultura, entre o vivente, capturado e produzido em sua vida nua, e a fundação da cidade. 191 "mitologema científico" da ambiguidade do sagrado429). O ato extremo de fazer com que o homem seja sacer significa retirá-lo do trânsito entre as esferas do sagrado e do profano, remetendo-o a um estado que, visto como "pré-comunitário" ou animal, é propriamente o que é pressuposto para a fundação da comunidade. O homo sacer expressa, em relação ao político (e que podemos formular como mitologema do bando), o que o silêncio, no mitologema da Voz, e o sacrifício, no mitologema sacrifical, expressam na metafísica e na religião: a origem, a qual coloca algo (e, antes de tudo, a sua própria ideia) como pressuposição, é justamente posta por aquilo que separa – para articular e fundamentar a forma da relação. Porém, ao contrário do que se poderia esperar, a ideia de interdição, que aparece ao centro do sacrifício, bem como a ideia de banimento, que não deixa de aí encontrar o seu protótipo, na medida em que se deixa isolar com o fazer ritual que segrega mundos em limites próprios e os afasta, permite expor que "a violência não é o que explica o sacrifício: é a própria violência que tem de ser explicada"430. Não se trata apenas da violência do sagrado visível na exigência de consumação da vítima no sacrifício, mas a violência de toda separação-articulação, como na consagração, delimitante dos espaços profano e sagrado a partir do próprio sagrado. A violência do fazer humano não é tomada por Agamben como uma inscrição no seu corpo orgânico. Pelo contrário, o que ele designa como "inaturalidade da violência humana"431 não encontra nenhuma relação com qualquer forma "natural" de violência, pois já diz respeito a uma produção, a um fazer circunscrito e que encontra no sacrifício o seu paradigma432. Mas o caráter inatural da violência humana não é precisamente o que circunscreve o mundo humano como tal? O 429 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il sacramento del linguaggio, p. 20 e ss. 430 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 132. 431 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 132. 432 Não poderíamos deixar de notar, de passagem, que o embate iluminista com a ideia de uma violência incrustrada no homem conduziu a sérias confrontações no binário natureza-cultura: o bom selvagem, geralmente como signo do caráter corruptor dos processos de interação social, antes aponta para o estágio de inocência e pertença íntima ao natural a partir de uma moralização positiva da natureza. A inflexão iluminista que, diante da supremacia da Razão, confinará a violência no inatural – ou, por outros caminhos, ao animalesco –, estando em jogo, então, o conceito de natureza humana conforme os preceitos da Razão. O sério e profundo embate sobre a natureza humana, entre a cultura e a natureza, entre a razão e a violência, marcou profundamente as instituições modernas. Nossas cartas políticas, principalmente segundo a matriz revolucionária francesa, perdem muito de sua inteligibilidade se desligadas do enredo filosóficoantropológico que as fecundou, cujas raízes antecedem o próprio iluminismo e se confundem com as origens desse longo período que chamamos modernidade e cujas fronteiras não nos cansamos de medir. É preciso que a recordemos, então, para dimensionar o alcance da postura crítica de Giorgio Agamben, precisamente aquela que virá, posteriormente, na terceira parte de O poder soberano e a vida nua, intitulada O campo como paradigma biopolítico moderno, ao tratar das declarações de direito e sua fundação originária (conquanto cindida entre homem privado e cidadão) pela captura do corpo, físico e político, na ordem jurídica. 192 fazer humano, pois, torna-se autofundado; nada importa além da violência do fazer que dá fundação aos seus atos, a cada ato. A violência não surge intrinsecamente com o homem, Agamben insiste nisso. Pelo contrário, ela é uma operação do fazer – mas de um fazer específico, de um fazer baseado na sua autofundação, a qual, por sua vez, só é possível porque ele se desdobra numa negatividade. E isso, por sua vez, já é uma experiência, a saber, a experiência do absoluto, a experiência do processo mais elevado da metafísica da Voz. O central dessa sua tese sobre a violência é que o homem não é uma máquina biológica – o homem é abertura: ele subverte o que seria uma natureza, e mais ainda a concepção de uma violência naturalmente condizente ao humano. A humanidade do homem fundada na separação-articulação entre natureza e cultura também retoma o célebre salto entre a phoné, a voz contínua da natureza, e o lógos, e, retomando-o, reativa, sob a forma positiva do discurso articulado, a operação do shifter Voz. Não há natureza humana que se lhe atribua que ele não possa dizer/fazer: "preferiria não". A figura de Bartleby, o famoso scrivener de Herman Melville que, ao trabalho designado, respondia formular e categorialmente "I would prefer not to", e que é uma presença constante nas obras de Agamben433, adquire assim uma significação menos abstrata, pois desativa as máquinas de capturas de gestos e palavras, resistindo à violência fundante da ação. Com isso, o fazer humano é confrontado com uma radical potência de não fazer – o que, é necessário frisar, não guarda relação com a mera impassibilidade – e constitui um ponto nodal da retomada agambeniana das categorias modais (necessidade e possibilidade, contingência e impossibilidade) em sua tentativa de pensar a figura da contingência não apenas como modalidade do ser (poder não ser), mas do fazer (poder não fazer) que restitui o homem a um estágio potencial de abertura. Depois de toda a exposição do percurso agambeniano, que tenta, ao lado de uma análise minuciosa, desvencilhar-se do fundamento negativo, a figura de Bartleby poderia, ao contrário, parecer estar situada no ápice da perspectiva que se tenta denodar, pois poderia nos parecer, à primeira vista, uma precisa amostra do culminar da metafísica (na tentativa de dizer um não). Porém, está-se pensando algo além do mero não e, todavia, não é o nada o visado. Trata-se, verdadeiramente, de "demorar-se na abertura", sem, com isso, ceder ao não absoluto (não poder não fazer/ser) que se consolida, como forma jurídica da vontade, como dever; trata- 433 Veja-se, a esse respeito, Bartleby, a fórmula da criação (1993), que conjuga um texto de Gilles Deleuze, Bartleby, ou a fórmula, originalmente publicado em 1989, ao ensaio de Agamben, Bartleby, ou da contingência. 193 se de fazer sua morada na potência – efêmera – que apenas a contingência consegue transformar na possibilidade de viver Todo o percurso analítico de instituição de uma topologia da negatividade é então lido criticamente para colocar em questão a própria ideia de fundamento, e com isso de natureza e de cultura, enfim, encoberta na produção e no fazer sacrificial, comunitário e de si, no confronto com o mundo, com o outro e com si próprio: A infundatez [l'infondatezza] de toda práxis humana encobre-se aqui no ser abandonado a si próprio de um fazer (de um sacrum facere), sobre o qual se funda, porém, todo fazer lícito: ele é aquilo que, restando indizível (ἅρρητον) e intransmissível em todo fazer e em toda palavra humana, destina o homem à comunidade e à transmissão.434 Encontramos, nessa passagem, a práxis conjugada como um fazer. De uma matriz do fazer, da operação sacrificial, conjuga-se o fazer humano lícito, devido, "reto", de acordo com a demarcação mítica da cidade. Uma certa forma de fazer é o operador sobre o qual se funda a práxis humana. Daí o destaque à operação sacrificial. Sacrum facere, num sentido filológico-filosófico, pode ser lido, então, como produção sagradora, como produção do sagrado, por meio de atos que consistem numa verdadeira operação. O caráter infundado da ação humana, assim, significa que ela não está baseada num ser que a determina e fixa de antemão435. O mitologema sacrificial trata, portanto, da arkhḗ negativa, do fundamento negativo que fundamenta e funda o pensamento e a prática, a ontologia e a política. A negatividade que se introduz na linguagem e na práxis, cindindo-as, indica que o homem se dá uma linguagem e uma práxis admitindo uma negatividade e uma violência. Se o mitologema da Voz permite expor toda essa carga negativa do fundamento, como fundamentação, o mitologema sacrificial, ao já remeter a uma prática, a um rito, a uma fundação, expõe o fazer como fundado pela violência. A estrutura da separação e a estrutura da violência equivalem-se. A articulação como operação metafísica, como um acolhimento da negatividade que mantém o homem na abertura, efetiva a violência que se manifesta como cisão (fratura, separação) e articulação. O que se revela no núcleo do sacrifício como o que tem de ser revelado verdadeiramente é a violência – não apenas a constituição de algo como uma 434 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 132. 435 O ser sagrado, que resguardaria o plano ontológico, não precederia logicamente a sagração: de alguma forma, antecipa-se aqui o que, em Opus dei, Agamben dará a conhecer como paradigma do ofício e da efetualidade, isto é, uma espécie de ontologia alternativa baseada na operatividade como ser. Há um paradigma produtivo ao qual se sobrepõe um paradigma prático, mas, mais do que isso, trata-se de ressaltar, sob ambos, ou melhor, como marcando-os, especialmente na modernidade, um paradigma operativo. 194 vítima e a sua destruição, mas a própria separação do mundo em sagrado e profano, interdito e obrigatório-permitido, silêncio e prece. A comunidade funda-se, assim, como a transmissão da tradição, num fazer tornado possível, e isso foi efetivado pelo sacrifício como o que torna possíveis as ações cotidianas do homem (aqui, religiosidade e ritualidade entram numa zona de interpenetração extrema). O fundar-se da comunidade, a constituição em separado de um fazer humano, retirado da vida comum, assinala-o como negativo e arremessa-o na negatividade. O fazer humano então, é infundado num sentido mais profundo: trata-se não de um não ter determinação, simplesmente, mas de ter uma determinação negativa, de um encontrar-se fundado, assim como a linguagem, na negatividade. A estratégia agambeniana de atribuir ao homem uma infundação do fazer revela-se mais claramente quando ele diz que a violência é inatural. Com isso, assim, pode colocar a possibilidade de uma outra prática humana, não baseada no que poderia ser a sua verdadeira natureza, mas em natureza alguma. Ao dizer que a violência é inatural, não pretende apontar algo que seja de fato natureza humana, mas que a violência não lhe pertence por natureza, como a civilização e a cultura fizeram-se interiorizar na metafísica. Quanto à "violência natural", é a presença corpórea – dir-se-ia fisiológica – do homem, o que não pode ser deixado de lado, como outra cisão elementar da filosofia, aquela entre corpo e alma (ou matéria e forma), pareceria fazer. Manifesta-se, pois, uma posição extrema de Agamben, segundo a qual o fisiológico não determina o homem – ao mesmo tempo, porém, em que não se opõe a ele. Simplesmente, porém, o homem é tomado como ser que habita a abertura. Que seja forma-de-vida, contudo, coloca-nos diante de ambiguidades: é uma superação ou uma convivência com a sua animalidade? De todo modo, e esta é a questão que para nós permanece latente, o caráter inatural da violência humana não é precisamente o que circunscreve o mundo humano, como o delimitaram as relações entre phýsis e lógos? A "infundação da práxis humana" quer dizer não que as ações do homem não encontram fundamento algum, mas que elas se situam sobre um fundamento negativo. É nesse sentido que Agamben concebe a estreita relação entre lógica e ética, pelo situar-se de ambas na assunção da negatividade. O falar e o fazer humanos, em ato, baseiam-se na apropriação da negatividade, seja do lugar de todas as falas possíveis, do seu fundamento negativo, o silêncio (os quais, assim, conformam o ter-lugar da linguagem), seja do paradigma ritual dos atos e fazeres humanos, do sacrifício como paradigma da consumação. O caráter exemplar dos mistérios de Elêusis deixa de parecer uma mera 195 recuperação deslocada e extemporânea. Pelo contrário, eles sintetizam a relação entre mitologema da Voz e mitologema sacrificial, do silêncio como conformação de um fazer ritual e da necessária ideia de consumação, isto é, na semiótica do rito, na continuidade entre morte e vida. Mais do que isso, ainda, atendendo ao apelo aristotélico da passagem da voz ao lógos, Agamben insinua, colocando lado a lado os mitologemas, o caráter "cooriginário" de ética e da linguagem, da política e da linguagem – ou, nos termos que usamos para síntese, dos fazeres e dos falares humanos. E não só. Trata-se de uma "cooriginariedade", se disso se trata, na negatividade. No fundamento do lógos está não a voz, mas o silêncio, a Voz, e no princípio da ação está não um fazer livre, mas uma circunscrição encoberta, um fazer sacrificial. As instituições humanas, como o sacrifício e o direito, encobrem a operação de abandono na qual se fundam: precisam colocar e deslocar fronteiras, fundar domínios e separá-los como suas jurisdições – o profano não antecede o sagrado, nem o inverso: é a própria separação de algo como sagrado de uma esfera da vida comum que funda o sagrado e o profano como esferas extremas, o direito e a religião. E abandono, então, como deixar entregue a si próprio, significa capturar pela expulsão: é a expulsão de algo como o profano que funda a autoridade do sagrado, de modo que é a relação – profunda e tênue – a força mantenedora da instituição e da manutenção. A lógica da soberania, que consiste na explicação onto-teo-lógica436 da figura de homo sacer como paradigma da forma da relação entre linguagem, ética e política no mundo ocidental, encontra sua preparação, e mais, seu fundamento, no mitologema sacrificial. O fundamento negativo, o indivízel e o intransmissível, é afirmado, pois, como o destinador fundamental do homem, isto é, como aquilo que é apropriado, na subtração de uma voz e uma pertença originárias, e dá ao homem um lugar. O homem não tem um destino em sentido teológico, nem mesmo uma determinação essencialista, mas é destinado a uma forma específica – humanidade, por exemplo – pelo modo como é capturado numa linguagem e numa comunidade. A capacidade de dizer e a capacidade de transmitir, a comunidade de fala e a transmissão, enquanto capacidades vislumbradas em atualidade, estão, no fundamento negativo, em potência. Não à toa, portanto, 436 Esse termo categorial, com os seus "vagões", geralmente associado ao plano conceitual da obra heideggeriana, pode ser transladado, como forma de atestar e denunciar a profunda relação entre a obra de Agamben e a de seu mestre alemão, para o campo das formulações agambenianas. A esse respeito, veja-se o fluxo contínuo do texto principal. 196 aparecem sob os termos capacidade, potência. A capacidade de linguagem, em ato, tornase discurso, fala. A capacidade de transmitir é o que, em ato, assegura a comunicabilidade e, com isso, a comunidade, a qual, diante da fulguração do sagrado, aparece, agora, como a esfera profana do "fazer lícito". A comunidade surge originariamente cindida, mediante um ato de abandono (o qual, paradoxalmente, inclui o interdito, o expulso), e os atos humanos encontram-se na esfera do permitido, do obrigatório ou do interdito. A interdição mostra o seu caráter comunitário e, com isso, linguístico, na sua própria letra: é um dizer-entre que bane. Sem a possibilidade mesma de algo como palavra e transmissão, o banimento e a interdição perdem o seu sentido instituinte. A insistência futura de Agamben na chave interpretativa do bando como estrutura originária da política, dissimulada com a ideia de contrato e de estado de natureza, objetiva romper com o mitologema moderno do contrato e reconduzir a discussão aos fundamentos. Conduzir a discussão aos fundamentos, trilhando o caminho que a eles retorna, expõe o problema do fundamento, expressão lapidar da crítica filosófica moderna, até mesmo como princípio de razão (suficiente). A crítica do fundamento, encabeçada por Agamben como compreensão do fundamento negativo da linguagem e da prática humana, por meio de uma escavação que denominamos topológica (ou ainda, proto-arqueológica) e que conduz, desse modo, a dois mitologema fundamentais – isto é, aos verdadeiros fundamentos, os quais, como arkhaí que são, atualizam-se a cada vez ao mesmo tempo em que se mantém latentes em cada ato como potência e força que o estrutura. A atualização crítica do conceito de arkhḗ cumpre o devido distanciamento das investigações causais, o que parece convir, de fato, a um pensamento que se propôs a enfrentar a metafísica e o niilismo que desponta como forma do fundamento que agora governa no vazio, que agora governa como forma esvaziada de significação e sentido, capturando toda significação e sentido, consumando, por conseguinte, o próprio fundamento negativo. Longe da cronologia e toda visão asséptica da temporalidade, construtoras de origens que consagram um determinado estado de coisas, o enfoque topológico orienta, com sua diversa concepção de lugar, a crítica filosófica. Não se trata, pois, de tomar os artífices da história da filosofia como pontos numa mais ou menos ampla curva, mas como uma sobreposição seletiva de fundamentações, e, num plano mais elementar, como sobreposição de relações diversas com o fundamento. Se não há um fundamento que se possa encontrar sob a estrutura da realidade, como uma essência, o que há, de início, é o próprio fundamentar. Atrás dele, há o nada – que assoma, então, quando a experiência e o sentido são removidos pela técnica, pelas tecnologias do poder. 197 A crítica do niilismo não poderia ser mais necessária – ainda mais que, no trajeto e no traçado de Agamben, o niilismo expressa precisamente esse assomar, esse vir a nu do fundamento negativo; ou, em seus termos mais conhecidos, e políticos, um desnudamento da vida humana, exposta, em sua pertença originária ao corpo soberano, como vida nua. O pensamento do fundamento como ser do ente, consagrado como ontologia, é um movimento epocal da fundamentação da filosofia como apreensão do negativo na linguagem: Também a filosofia [e principalmente ela, diríamos], por meio do mitologema da Voz, pensa a infundatez do homem e dela oferece pensamento. A filosofia é, antes, precisamente a fundação do homem enquanto humano (isto é, enquanto vivente que possui o lógos), a tentativa de absolver o homem da sua infundação e da indizibilidade do mistério sacrificial. Mas, precisamente, enquanto essa absolvição é pensada a partir de um ter sido e de um fundamento negativo, a libertação do mitologema sacrificial resta necessariamente incompleta e a filosofia se encontra, antes de tudo, a dever 'justificar' a violência.437 A filosofia, que quer absolver o humano da violência sacrificial (ao menos na filosofia do absoluto), na medida, porém, em que também faz sua morada no lógos, no dar-se fala a partir do assumir do silêncio, fundando-se numa Voz, não completa a sua "absolvição". Que ela se veja justificando a violência, isso quer dizer que, baseada no fundamento negativo compartilhado tanto pela operação da Voz como pela operação sacrificial, presta-se então como discurso do fundamento, porque situada nele e por ele limitada. A busca pelo fundamento negativo aparece, pela ideia de ter-lugar, do dar-se fundamento, como a expressão mais elevada, porém, da crítica da violência – o que a filosofia, de algum modo, tentava expiar absolvendo o homem do indizível na linguagem ao mesmo tempo em que mergulhava em aporias indecidíveis tendo em vista a sua fundamentação no mesmo fundamento negativo. Em síntese, que marca o percurso aqui traçado, a crítica da violência atinge seu mais elevado grau como crítica do fundamento negativo. Com uma torção que não deixa de lembrar uma estrutura de linguagem que se poderia encontrar em Heidegger, Agamben sintetiza na própria ideia de fundamento (negativo) a relação entre o sacrifício e a Voz: "o fundamento da violência é a violência do fundamento"438. Não se trata de uma crítica à fundamentação teórica. Como se pode perceber pela exposição agambeniana, isso é matéria da exposição lógica, e o que está em jogo, aqui, é a natureza do fundamento da metafísica. O que se quer dizer, com isso, é que a 437 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 133. 438 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Il linguaggio e la morte, p. 132-133. 198 violência é fundamentada em um fundamento que funda a violência, isto é, o mitologema sacrificial que é transmitido pelo sacrifício, como a arkhḗ que fundamenta o acontecimento violência em suas ocasiões, em ato, mas apenas porque o sustenta já sempre em potência, enquanto sua condição. Assim como certo discurso não poderia mover-se fora das determinações do princípio de razão, da conjugação de tempo, espaço e causalidade, a filosofia como metafísica está limitada à experiência do fundamento negativo. A crítica a ele, contudo, é profundamente filosófica na medida em que, pensando no limite do fundamento, intenta compreendê-lo. Mas é também uma operação profunda do pensamento, pois visa a questionar a experiência da linguagem que se nos dá e que fazemos como filosofia, e o estar entre aspas do justificar indica que sua vocação absolutória frustrada permanece latente ante a justificação da violência do fundamento. Vale dizer, enfim, que há uma potência do pensamento que resta na filosofia, e o acesso a esse resto marca uma outra experiência possível da linguagem – da ética e da política –, então liberta da negatividade, do indizível. [Fim do terceiro capítulo] 199 CONCLUSÃO PATRIOTA? Não: só português. Nasci português como nasci louro e de olhos azuis. Se nasci para falar, tenho que falar uma língua. Alberto Caeiro A máquina-linguagem de Giorgio Agamben I Em Na Colônia Penal, Franz Kafka narra a existência de um "aparelho singular", descrito, pelo oficial que vela o seu funcionamento, a um explorador que viaja especialmente para conhecer um tal lugar no qual não apenas o apelo à pena ultrapassa os mares – a colônia situa-se nos trópicos –, mas a punição e o senso de justiça penal materializam-se completamente sobre o corpo da culpa. O aparelho é o corpo da colônia penal, materializando nas suas engrenagens o próprio espírito da punição. A descrição do oficial, a explicação da máquina que oferece ao explorador, faz-se acompanhar, revelando a máquina na sua inteireza, da sua efetiva operação. Não apenas se está envolvido pela austeridade ritual, exteriorizada nas roupas do oficial executor, de forma alguma condizente, no seu peso, aos trópicos, mas por uma minuciosa prescrição para operar a máquina, estabelecida pelo antigo comandante num complexo sistema de anotações e transmitida pela força da tradição que envolve a sua figura. Força, porém, que vacilará aos olhos do explorador, acostumado a outros procedimentos, a outros princípios. Se a força de convencimento é fraca, isso se deve menos à própria máquina do que ao conflito de valores entre o mundo fechado da colônia penal e aquele do viajante. A máquina mantém a potência das suas justas engrenagens e mesmo o condenado não passa de um meio para que ela alcance o seu fim, a justiça – e não o contrário, talvez, a máquina para alcançar a justiça para o condenado. A sujeição canina do executado revela menos uma crença interior na credibilidade do procedimento do que a exterioridade inabalável que configurava a maquinaria – também nas últimas linhas de O processo morria-se como um cão. A máquina cujos contornos são, mais do que descritos, narrados pelo oficial, apresenta, de fato, uma forma de justiça na sua mais singular relação com o corpo, atravessando-o pela culpa e, ao mesmo tempo, atravessando-o pela expiação. O princípio de decisão que regia o seu operar, o fundamento decisório que garantia o funcionamento, 200 não apenas afastava a possibilidade de defesa, mas até mesmo a necessidade do conhecimento da condenação: a indubitabilidade da culpa. Se esse era o seu princípio aterrador, não menos surpreendente era a sua estrutura, fundada na relação entre seus três principais componentes: uma cama, um rastelo e um desenhador. Na cama, permitindo a passagem do corpo do condenado do mundo exterior ao mundo interior da culpa, interioridade resguardada pela decisão que o condena tout court, deita-se-o com as costas viradas para cima, mantendo-o firmemente atado ao aparato. No desenhador, situam-se as engrenagens, forçadas pelo uso, configuráveis de acordo com a pena a ser aplicada, isto é, o desenho que se configura como a sentença mesma que aplica a pena. No rastelo, enfim, como o lugar da própria execução, atualiza-se o desenho, a sentença, "na própria carne", executando sobre o condenado, nele, a justa pena, cuja sentença ele desconhece de antemão e só conhece na hora de sua morte. Entre os extremos do aparelho, cujo entre dista em torno de dois metros, situase o seu coração feito de vidro, o rastelo, cuja vítrea composição tem por objetivo garantir uma paradoxal transparência a uma execução sumária, possibilitando, como se fosse preciso, que a operação fosse vistoriada. De grandes proporções, ao menos o suficiente para nos fazer imaginar uma máquina terrível, ela é, na verdade, grande o suficiente para estender-se sobre o corpo do condenado: um rastelo para o tronco, outros para as pernas, e para a cabeça um pequeno buril. O rastelo compõe-se de pares de agulhas. Uma agulha comprida faz o desenho, aplica ao corpo do condenado a escrita da sentença; uma agulha curta lava a ferida, garantindo a clareza do trabalho do seu alongado par. O único defeito da maquinaria, que, aos olhos do seu guardador, era de ordem mecânica, devia-se ao fato de ficar tão suja e, diante da difícil manutenção e da falta de peças para reposição, ter passado a fazer tanto barulho. Não menos instigantes são os desenhos que configuram a sentença: tanto a máquina quanto os desenhos que ela aplica são criações do antigo comandante. Uma caligrafia intricada, uma composição gráfica exaustivamente adornada, como uma selva de floreios, que não apenas deve fazer com que se a estude para entendê-la (para quem a aplica), mas para que o processo que conduz a morte a que se condena o culpado seja longo o suficiente: não mais de doze horas, com um ponto de inflexão na sexta hora. Até a sexta hora, as agulhas vão afundando o desenho na carne do condenado. São as suas horas de puro vivente – ele apenas sente as dores da execução. Na sexta hora, porém, quando a pena está suficientemente sendo encarnada, sobrevém-lhe o entendimento: ele 201 começa a entender a sua condenação, ele começa a decifrar a sentença que nele está sendo escrita. Nessa sexta hora, quando, de fato, decifra-a e entende-a, numa espécie de "prometida redenção", as agulhas do rastelo – o pequeno buril destinado à cabeça – de uma vez perfuram a sua carne e o corpo é jogado no fosso dos restos da maquinaria, junto com o sangue aguado das feridas e os fiapos de algodão embebido que as limpavam. Para o oficial, adepto inconteste dos métodos do antigo comandante, a justeza da máquina não estava fora de questão; para o viajante, a injustiça era indubitável. O curto-circuito aí produzido conduz o oficial, para provar-lhe a justiça fechada do seu procedimento, da sua aplicação e execução, a aplicar sobre si mesmo a pena capital da máquina, também o seu princípio, o seu fundamento – a sua arkhḗ cujo desenho dita: "Sê justo!". A autodestruição consuma a autofundação (o cárater autofundado de um fazer baseado na violência...). Não apenas a máquina não resiste, como estava fadada a uma tal destruição diante da autoaplicação do seu princípio. Nem mesmo a sexta hora pôde chegar, configurando a execução do oficial como puro assassinato consumado. II Em Ideia da linguagem II, para Agamben, essa máquina não é nada menos do que a forma da nossa condenação ao discurso segundo o peso de nossa culpa diante da falta de voz humana no lugar mesmo do mundo, do ser e da linguagem. A figura de uma tal máquina coincide com o fluxo de nossa investigação. É, por assim dizer, como que a sua síntese numa imagem – e numa imagem plasmada pela palavra poética de uma prosa lapidar (afinal, Kafka trabalhou o poético, o fazer-se e indagar-se palavra do humano)439. O próprio Agamben inicia sua trajetória filosófica numa profunda relação com a imagem – e dela e das suas formas, a rigor, não se afastou. Essa preocupação com a imagem não é distanciada da linguagem. Pelo contrário, com a imagem, Agamben pode apontar a linguagem no seu ter-lugar, na sua gestualidade aquém de toda voz (Ideia da linguagem I), e também acessar a negatividade que espreita a própria linguagem e a verbalização, a articulação metafísica que funde a imagem do conceito (do pensamento) 439 A análise da palavra poética, por sua vez, aponta não apenas para a finalização da forma do problema da linguagem, mas permite identificar restos que, na profanação dos mitologemas, são "pontos de apoio" essenciais – os restos que, diante da transcendência, apontam para a imanência. 202 – o que implica um processo de intelectualização da imagem, distanciada do seu próprio lugar originário, a fantasia – ao discurso (Ideia da linguagem II). Ora, a esse respeito Agamben diz que a máquina, essa máquina da colônia penal, construída para punir e justiçar, é a linguagem. É a ideia da linguagem, na verdade, no seu duplo – a resposta daquela estrutura culpada da linguagem à ideia mesma da linguagem. A duplicidade da linguagem, a sua dupla articulação, revela-se, agora, na configuração de uma saída possível: Ideia da linguagem é a única ideia que se apresenta em duas faces, que se pode, ou não, articular entre duas dimensões. Enquanto A ideia da linguagem I mostra-nos, ou intenta apresentar-nos, a ideia mesma da linguagem, habitando o vazio de voz sem responder com língua, linguagem ou voz, mas com o gesto, o rosto, A ideia da linguagem II diz o sentido mesmo do discurso, da linguagem como discurso. Lá, a abertura, aqui, o fechamento; lá, o dar-se da linguagem, o seu ter-lugar; aqui, a necessidade de o vivente homem ter de falar, e ter de falar numa língua, num discurso, numa fala. Aqui já não se trata, ainda, de um sacrifício, mas de uma execução, de uma execução da pena. A importância da sexta hora como momento da revelação – e a sua ausência para o aplicador, diante do princípio mesmo que configura o sentido de seus atos, o sentido da própria máquina – coloca-se, especialmente, pois o que o condenado consegue, portanto, na sua última hora, silenciosamente compreender é o sentido da linguagem. Os homens – poder-se-ia dizer – vivem a própria existência de seres falantes sem entender o sentido que está nela em questão; mas vem para cada um uma sexta hora em que também ao mais idiota deve se abrir a razão. Não se trata, naturalmente, da compreensão de um sentido lógico, qual se poderia também ler com os olhos; mas de um sentido mais profundo, que pode ser decifrado apenas com as feridas e que à linguagem cabe unicamente como pena. (Por isso a lógica tem o seu âmbito exclusivo no juízo: o juízo lógico é, na verdade, imediatamente juízo penal, sentença.) Entender esse sentido, medir a própria culpa é um trabalho difícil, e apenas no ponto em que esse trabalho é conduzido ao fim se pode dizer que justiça tenha sido feita.440 O problema do sentido que aqui se conjuga, como esclarece Agamben, não é o do sentido no discurso, das significações que se articulam ou não num plano de discurso – vale dizer, o reino regulado pelo tribunal da lógica. Não, o que aqui se articula, uma vez que é condizente a um modo de experiência com a linguagem que se constitui como discurso, que decai do ter-lugar na linguagem num discurso articulado, são os limites da experiência metafisica com a linguagem. O gesto filosófico de Agambem, parece-nos, potencializa-se, aqui, como indagação, como o percurso que se move naquela tentativa 440 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea del linguaggio I in Idea della prosa, p. 105. 203 de compreender uma experiência com a palavra que marca o Ocidente. Potencializa-se como tentativa, arqueológica ou genealógica, de compreender os fundamentos de nossa experiência com a palavra e com o pensamento, e, diante dela, apontar que a indagação revolve os fundamentos, colocando-se diante de seus limites. A contemplação dos limites como gesto crítico realiza-se como ética quando os próprios limites são colocados em questão (a questão dos limites aponta aos limites das questões). Ultrapassar a culpa, perceber-se, sem voz, na linguagem, na existência, sem, por isso, aprisionar-se no discurso de uma vez. A ética e a linguagem como tópos do humano apontam ao gesto filosófico que irrompe eticamente da linguagem, das experiências da linguagem. Mas, enquanto ético, também político. A visão culpada da linguagem configura a imagem (a estrutura da representação) de uma experiência não apenas da linguagem, mas do humano, da ética. Por isso tanto se insiste em antropogênese. Por isso coloca-se em articulação uma máquina antropológica que se funda nas articulações e cisões fundamentais da metafísica, e ao lado da qual se pode apresentar, agora, uma máquina propriamente linguística que se encontra com uma visão do humano baseada na negatividade que funda o ser, que funda a linguagem. A máquina configura precisamente aquela figura culpada da linguagem, aquela experiência que a vê como queda, aquela tradição que a experimenta como já sempre presa nas redes da representação, que a configura apenas como meio para as ideias e para os pensamentos – queda que ela dissimula pseudocontratualmente como leis da linguagem ou da representação, leis cuja violação encontram na lógica o tribunal instituído do discurso, e de onde se origina a sentença da qual nos fala Agamben. Falar numa "ideia culpada da linguagem" significa dizer que há uma visão da linguagem que se institui a partir de uma estrutura de banimento, isto é, num fundamento que opera na negatividade por meio de exceções e inclusões estruturantes (o que é justo, o que é injusto – mas também o que é ser, o que é justo na linguagem, e o que não é ser, o que não pertence à justa estrutura da representação. A ideia culpada de linguagem pressupõe o banimento e a queda, ou melhor, estrutura o banimento como o próprio pressuposto das comunidades humanas, e, antes, como o fundamento da própria experiência e da linguagem humanas. É precisamente esse o dispositivo que se trata de desarmar – o necessário "dizer sim", a estruturação metafísica que se trata de compreender como o mais difícil passo para entender a captura do vazio pelo niilismo como ápice da tradição que se assenta sobre fundamentos negativos. 204 A experiência metafísica com a linguagem, já refém da linguagem representativa (ou de um sistema de linguagem articulada fundado sobre bases negativas), faz-se refém de si mesma ao tomar a linguagem pelas suas representações, isto é, ela experimenta a linguagem pelos seus próprios postulados, postulações, representações, e não a partir da própria linguagem. A linguagem é tornada refém da representação; o terlugar da linguagem, do discurso articulado. A liberdade, do sacrifício. O sentido último da linguagem parece então dizer a lenda é a injunção 'seja justo'; e, todavia, justo o sentido dessa injunção é aquele que a máquina da linguagem não está absolutamente em posição de nos fazer compreender. Ou melhor, pode fazê-lo apenas cessando de desdobrar a sua tarefa penal, apenas despedaçando[-se] e tornando-se, de punidora, assassina. Nesse modo a justiça triunfa, da justiça, e a linguagem, da linguagem. Que o oficial não tenha encontrado na máquina aquilo que os outros haviam encontrado é, então, perfeitamente compreensível: naquele momento não havia para ele, na linguagem, mais nada a compreender. Por isso a sua expressão permaneceu tal qual havia sido em vida: o olhar límpido, convencido, a fronte transpassada pelo grosso aguilhão de ferro 441. A autofundação do fazer que opera a máquina (afinal, a inquestionabilidade do procedimento deriva da certeza da própria máquina, da certeza da sua justiça e da sua execução), que requer que o próprio executor seja executado, fechando o círculo mágico da justiça e da pena, não seria como o sacrifício? Ele não liga os dois mundos – o mundo da expiação e o mundo da culpa – num medium que, ele mesmo, tem de ser destruído para efetivar a consumação do ritual? Essas aproximações só podemos deixar em aberto – a aproximação entre a máquina linguagem, que talvez sintetize numa só imagem, com todas as suas ambiguidades, a nossa tênue conclusão, e o circuito que se move entre a culpa e a expiação cabe permanecer não de todo articulada, ou, se o for, ao menos para uma ideia da linguagem, aquela que já denominamos, neste trabalho, como ideia culpada da linguagem, a experiência que a metafísica tem feito com a linguagem como um mitologema da Voz. O cessar da necessidade de se cumprir o dever culmina na consumação do dever. Assim, ao invés de uma aplicação da pena ao oficial que teria sido injusto, que teria faltado em sua realização da máquina, como poderia ser uma leitura da condenação última da máquina, trata-se, como o entende Agamben, de uma prescrição destinada à destruição do aparelho. Justamente o sentido de tal mandamento suspende o sentido da aplicação de todos os demais mandamentos. Confina-se, aqui, com a limitação dos sentidos discursivos e os próprios limites do discurso, dessa máquina que se funda sobre 441 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea del linguaggio I in Idea della prosa, p. 106. 205 a negatividade de um interdito indizível (e princípio de todo interdição), ou, ao menos, silenciável fundamento. Aplicado à própria máquina que o executa, o mandamento não apenas a destrói, como se anula como tal. A investigação do justo sentido dessa parábola ou lenda kafkiana, porém, pode nos conduzir além dos limites deste trabalho. Basta-nos como imagem, como uma visão da linguagem que, resultado de uma investigação topológica e arqueológica movida por Agamben, configura e cristaliza numa constelação de experiências o que ele intentou investigar como metafísica, como a experiência da linguagem conduzida pela metafísica, ou melhor, fundada numa metafísica que, por sua vez, funda-se na negatividade – eis o percurso, portanto, da negatividade do fantasma ao fundamento negativo, da metafísica da Voz ao mitologema da Voz, e, deste, ao mitologema sacrificial. Da metafísica, do "abstrato" do fundamento, do fundamento "posto à parte" – o mitologema da Voz que afunda no silêncio –, à experiência que ela possibilita, aos limites da experiência que, nela, efetua-se com a linguagem – às práticas humanas que, a partir da fundação do sacrifício, articulam-se pressupondo um mitologema sacrificial. A visão da linguagem que se cristaliza como máquina da linguagem é aquela que, na Ideia da linguagem II, portanto, Agamben, incorporando-a de Kafka, erige como duplicidade da articulação da linguagem – movemo-nos, então, entre o I e o II da ideia, entre o próprio ter-lugar, o seu mostrar-se, o seu dar-se, e a linguagem topicalizada como discurso, como fala. Mas essa imagem tomada de Kafka, ainda, Agamben explica-a por intermédio das palavras de Ingeborg Bachman, as quais figuram como legenda, parecenos, da imagem que se erige: "Confiar-te-ei um segredo terrível: a linguagem é a pena. Nela todas as coisas devem entrar e nela devem perecer segundo a medida da sua culpa"442. Essa leitura de Agambem, que ele não apenas retoma como aprofunda ao longo de sua obra – em obras como O poder soberano e a vida nua (Homo sacer, I) Estado de exceção (2001) (Homo sacer, II.1), tanto por uma analogia entre a linguagem e a soberania quanto por outra entre o direito e a linguagem –, narra o nexo entre a culpa e a pena, o mysterium burocraticum, o mistério da culpa e o mistério da pena, como sendo o mistério da linguagem: 442 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Idea del linguaggio I in Idea della prosa, p. 105. Assim Agamben apresenta, sem referenciar, as palavras de Ingeborg Bachman, que se encontram no seu romance Malina (1971): "Ich werde Ihnen ein furchtbares Geheimnis verraten: die Sprache ist die Strafe. In sie müssen alle Dinge eingehen und in ihr müssen sie wieder vergehen nach ihrer Schuld und dem Ausmass ihrer Schuld". 206 A pena que o homem expia, o processo que há quarenta mil anos – isto é, desde quando começou a falar – está sempre em curso contra ele não é outro que a própria palavra. 'Tomar o nome', nomear a si mesmo e as coisas significa poder a si e a elas conhecer e dominar; mas significa, ao mesmo tempo, submeter-se às potências da culpa e do direito. Por isso o decreto último que se pode ler entre as linhas de todos os códigos e de todas as leis da terra recita: 'A linguagem é a pena. Nela todas as coisas devem entrar e nela devem perecer segundo a medida da sua culpa' 443. Funda-se, a partir daqui, um nexo entre a ideia culpada de linguagem e a forma jurídica. Ou melhor, a forma do nexo como tal, a forma da relação como estrutura de bando mais do que de contrato, é que se mostra articulada sobre os mitologemas estruturantes de uma experiência com a linguagem e com o pensamento que se configura com o nome de metafísica e que no niilismo encontra apenas o seu ápice. A dupla articulação da linguagem traduz-se, metafisicamente, numa multiplicação da cisão – eis por que, então, pode-se dizer que a cisão é produtiva, ao lado da sua complementar articulação. O esquecimento da própria cisão faz o humano surgir como não problemático. Há uma circularidade entre cisão e articulação, e não uma linearidade, uma cisão prévia que exista como tal e uma soldagem que sobre ela se faz. A cisão – fratura, separação, quebra ou hiato – que se transpunha ao interior da linguagem entre voz e lógos segundo uma perspectiva articulatória, agora, diante da investigação que questiona os seus fundamentos, coloca-se entre o mostrar e o dizer, sendo a passagem entre ambos possibilitada por um operador metafísico pré-lógico chamado Voz – que também responde como Silêncio. Que a própria linguagem, a capacidade que define o humano, seja cindida, é o que, para Agamben, funda-a na negatividade e o que nos permite compreender o estatuto da palavra despedaçada com o qual se confronta concretamente desde Estâncias – ou a fratura entre língua e discurso, entre semiótico e semântico que encontra na linguística que se depara com essas fronteiras, sem falar, é claro, das próprias cisões da metafísica, da política e do direito. A negatividade que se interioriza no lugar de palavra pelo fantasma (pela imagem que plasma o desejo) ingressa, como vimos, na formação da voz. Na passagem da voz à linguagem, é suposto que o homem leve consigo os seus fantasmas, sejam eles frutos da imaginação afixada aos sentidos ou da intelecção, e, com isso, a negatividade manifesta-se na própria passagem, no movimento de cisão-articulação entre os polos. A infância não é mais do que uma tentativa de capturar a negatividade da situação limite da experiência do homem, assim como a morte. Enquanto aquela, porém, coloca-se com 443 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Mysterium burocraticum in Il fuoco e il racconto, p. 22. 207 certa notação positiva, a morte, porém, faz-nos ingressar numa pura negatividade, num defrontar-se com o nada. E, aqui, a "dupla articulação" manifesta-se não mais com uma voz, mas apenas com um operador propriamente metafísico, uma Voz. Se metafísica e niilismo podem parecer vocábulos pertencentes a outras eras do pensamento, isso antes serve de indício de que a primeira, sob a forma dissipada do segundo, impera, pela técnica e pelas tecnologias, pelas ciências e pelas epistemologias, como fundação ético-política que, mesmo na sua falência ou obsolescência (algo como a proclamada falência das categorias ético-políticas que estruturam, ao longo de seu movimento epocal, o Ocidente – ou melhor, o centro de um sistema de mundo bastante específico como o Ocidente), opera no vazio, opera capturando do homem não apenas a sua potência, instigando-o à ação, mas condenando-o a uma experiência com a linguagem que se administra como discurso regrado. A palavra e o nome, esses elementos que, ao longo da cultura e do pensamento, definem o homem como homem, definem-no, assim, também como soberano. Mas soberana, aí, é a visão da linguagem que se conduz (e conduz a) por práticas humanas que a compreendem pelas "potências da culpa e do direito". Se essa visão agambeniana pode ser subscrita sob o sinal da negatividade que ele mesmo busca analisar, isso é um julgamento que, de todo, não parece de todo devido. Mesmo que a crítica da negatividade seja vista como um momento negativo do pensamento de Agamben, englobando também a crítica das categorias ético-políticas (afinal, é o plano do seu fundamento negativo que também se coloca, para ele, em jogo), constituindo, portanto, grande parte de sua obra, isso não significa que não haja um momento "positivo": insinua-se ele pelas brechas da crítica, pela reconfiguração que desliga a operacionalidade dos conceitos, das práticas, e objetiva torná-las comuns, isto é, passíveis de uso comum. O como se pode julgar esse momento aponta para uma disputa em aberto ao redor de um tal pensamento. O que não se pode, contudo, é abstrair a sua condição de possibilidade: o questionamento da metafísica da linguagem e da voz, do fundamento negativo do ser, da efetividade dos dispositivos, e tudo o que acabe por se apresentar como bloqueando ao vivente que somos o dar-nos, ou não dar-nos, nós mesmos, nossos usos. Mantendo alguma linha em comum com o pensamento sobre o qual nos debruçamos, porém, e na medida que pareça interessante compreender os dispositivos e, de algum modo, desativar a captura que eles realizam dos usos (talvez apenas atopicamente, como exercício da liberdade hipotética do pensamento), pelo contrário, 208 esse pensamento parece mover-se numa crítica dos limites da negatividade, diante da qual pode-se pensar, positivamente, como pela ideia da própria potência, de contingência, de outras experiências que se movam fora do círculo mágico do direito e da pena, da ideia culpada da linguagem, da experiência metafísica da linguagem, experimentando-a como negatividade e como positividade, como fratura e como articulação. Entender, então, que o ser tenha um fundamento negativo, significa concebêlo como situado na fratura da linguagem – vê-lo em sua positividade visualiza a articulação que ele efetivou, mas que carrega consigo a negatividade. A fratura originária, assim, que é uma experiência da metafísica, não pode ser superada pela articulação – essa é, antes, como momento afirmativo, a produção da própria metafísica. Eis por que não seja absurdo contemplá-la como produzindo fraturas a partir de sua necessidade autoafirmativa. À diferença da tradição metafísica que polariza e opõe substâncias ou essências, resgatando-as no penhor da negatividade, Agamben coloca a dualidade e a tensão que se move num campo de forças. Ao pensamento da articulação-separação, Agamben coloca o da desativação-profanação. Nem fazer tabula rasa, ignorando a historicidade (o que significaria anular, também, por definição, o humano), nem superar num sentido dialético, mas – e essa aparente "parada" é o mais difícil – desativar os usos coercitivos, os pensamentos representantes e a linguagem prescritiva para o livre uso, isto é, deixar os usos abertos a si mesmos, sem capturá-los segundo maquinarias que os quebram ao meio e parasitam a sua potência interior. A compreensão da transmissibilidade que opera subterraneamente como o que é transmitido antes de tudo pela tradição, por exemplo, que Agamben chama de tradibilidade, coloca-se nesse horizonte, pois a transmissão da transmissibilidade, como vimos, antes de tudo diz respeito à próprio linguagem, à necessária pertença do homem à língua (às línguas e aos discursos) como sujeito, como subjetividade que se desloca num campo de forças entre um processo instituinte que Agamben denomina subjetivação e um processo que a desconstitui, a dessubjetivação. O mistério que se coloca para o homem como o seu mistério, diante da maravilha do milagre da existência, da existência da linguagem, coloca-se, tanto na leitura da Ideia da linguagem II quanto, décadas depois, naquela de O fogo e a narração [Il fuoco e il racconto] (2014), como o "mistério da linguagem e da culpa, isto é, na verdade, do seu ser e não ser ainda humano, do seu ser ou não ser mais animal", isto é, o processo de antropogênese pelo qual uma visão da linguagem funda uma ética, "está sempre em curso, porque o homem não cessa de tornar209 se humano e de restar inumano, de entrar e sair da humanidade" 444. Mistério cuja transmissão perpetua o processo de tornar-se humano e de desconstituir-se como humano, segundo uma oscilação de um campo de forças e não de uma pertença essencialista a qualquer substância, e se mostra como o "ato imemorável pelo qual o vivente, falando, tornou-se homem, legou-se [e ligou-se: si è legato] à língua" 445. A relação essencial entre metafísica e ética é que parece estar em andamento, de alguma forma uma ontologia do político, segundo considerações possíveis, mas que, diante da crítica da metafísica, conforme vimos, não parece se sustentar, pois essa interroga pelo estatuto do fundamento do ser, e, logo, pela condição da ontologia como tal. Antes, o problema que aqui está em vias de elaboração, e cuja forma ganhará corpo em A comunidade que vem, é o que Agamben chamou de "comunidade sem pressupostos", cabendo ressaltar, como ocorre justamente ao final de A linguagem e a morte, a crítica do fundamento (negativo) da metafísica (Voz) e da ação, indeterminando ética e política (sacrifício). Mais do que isso, porém, e tão ao gosto das operações de deslocamento levadas a cabo por Agamben, trata-se de uma indiscernibilidade entre metafísica e ética: não se pode dizer se a linguagem se converte em pressuposto da comunidade ou se a comunidade é pressuposto da linguagem em termos causais. Uma experiência com a linguagem, portanto, que a experimenta sobre fundamentos negativos (a metafísica) e também condena um determinado vivente ao discurso e a uma ética e a uma política determinadas – isto é, que dá fundamentação a uma visão de linguagem e fundação a práticas calcadas a partir daquela, também, como uma visão do humano. "Se o fundamento é, todavia, indizível e irredutível, se ele já sempre antecipa o homem falante, lançando-o numa história e num destino epocal", fundando-o sobre a linguagem e sobre o ser cindidos, em si lacerados e apresentando o homem ao que lhe seria próprio (o estar separado e a articulação), "então um pensamento que recorde e cuide desse pressuposto parece eticamente equivalente àquele que, abandonando-se ao seu destino, experimenta até o fundo (e não há, na verdade, fundo) a violência e a infundatez" 446. Tanto um pensamento que retorne aos seus fundamentos negativos e deles cuide quanto outro que os conduza até o limite de sua negatividade, tanto as formas extremas da metafísica, de um lado, quanto a sua consumação pragmática como niilismo, de outro, continuam a se mover no mesmo horizonte ético que se constitui 444 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Mysterium burocraticum in Il fuoco e il racconto, p. 23. 445 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Mysterium burocraticum in Il fuoco e il racconto, p. 23. 446 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 31. 210 a partir da linguagem em bases negativas – seu vizinho, seu próximo, aí, é a lógica, aquela dimensão do juízo lógico, das regras que governam o reino da proposição, a qual, como sendo aquilo que é, já se dá, e só pode se dar, sobre uma base de linguagem. Esse horizonte ético é aquele que, entre a Voz e o sacrifício, oferece-nos uma visão do humano marcada pela negatividade e pela injunção – e não pela positividade ou pela liberdade. A sentença da linguagem soberana que se desdobra como a necessidade última de justiça revela tanto a justiça quanto a linguagem como constituídas em separado do homem, como voltando ao homem uma prática, um uso, um discurso que, pertencendo a ele, volta-se contra ele na medida mesma do pertencimento, pertencimento ao ter-lugar da linguagem, ao humano, à ética. A eticidade de um tal pensamento, portanto, de uma tal experiência com a linguagem, encontra o seu limite lá onde oferece fundamentação à violência humana, à violência de seu fazer, à fundação polêmica dos espaços do humano como necessariamente violenta – há, por exemplo, fundação de um Estado que não seja uma expropriação dos usos e discursos, que não acabe por se mover sobre a violência de um fazer que prescreve o "sacrifício"? Se essa questão abre um mundo de respostas e de indagações, o pensamento que Agamben conduz, porém, intenta atingir o limite mesmo de uma tal ética, de um tal pensamento, exatamente a partir da experiência metafísica com a linguagem segundo a qual eles se tornam inteligíveis, isto é, aquela experiência que articula o humano a partir da relação, dada pelo lógos, entre ética, política e linguagem, entre natureza e cultura. Nesse sentido é que a vida desdobra-se, com a morte e com a linguagem, em existência – e a contraposição entre zōḗ e bíos deve ser reportada a esse núcleo para que entendamos a posição agambeniana da política como estruturação da metafísica. Valendo-nos, ainda, das palavras de Kérenyi, a fundação do espaço humano da vida prática não está dissociada de uma visão da linguagem que se assenta sobre uma separação, sobre um hiato, cuja articulação fundamenta o que se mostra como próprio do homem, como lógos. Lógos cuja complexa determinação, cujo complexo retorno ao fundamento e a sua ideia, atua articulando os hiatos da metafísica, fazendo do humano vivente (animal) e humano, natureza e cultura, sensação e intelecto, anomia e nómos, vida e direito. O que o pensamento agambeniano como investigação filosófica permite expor na sua protoarqueologia é que o problema dos pronomes e, consequentemente, o da dêixis apresentam-se como aqueles que permitiram a Agamben compreender o 211 dispositivo metafísico da negatividade, pois verifica que eles, revelando o pensamento sobre a linguagem que se sobrepõe ao pensamento sobre o ser, operam no mais íntimo substrato da linguagem como seu fundamento e permitem mostrar o conceito de Voz. Da insuficiência da voz natural, cujo salto Aristóteles evocava para então deixar como que à sombra, chega-se, pela dêixis, à efetividade de uma Voz como articuladora, como articulação. O problema da noção de dêixis traz ao primeiro plano o que aparece, a rigor, como sendo o último, a saber, o plano fundamental, o plano do fundamento. A dêixis expõe o problema da existência da significação, a consolidação do dizer como capacidade de fala, mas de tal forma que a significação vem ao mundo num sentido mais profundo e próximo do ser; a linguagem e o ser vêm à luz, portanto, como fundação do mundo: a dimensão aberta do significado e do sentido do ser, do discurso sobre o ser, só é possível porque existe a dimensão originária do ter-lugar da linguagem, na qual o ser habita e a partir da qual todo o dizer se torna possível. O indicar – o apontar – que, antes de dizer, nessa muda existência do lugar da linguagem (pois lhe falta a inércia da naturalidade do animal, já que há a intromissão do símbolo), mostra que o dizer é possível, é uma potência que vem a ato e, quando vem, traz em seu seio a negatividade de sua fundação, do mudo mostrar, a indicação que ultrapassa o querer-dizer do inefável e funda uma pura capacidade de dizer. A circunstância-base, aqui, é: existe lógos, ele tem-lugar – isso, a rigor, não se pode dizer, pois já é colá-lo um outro lugar, num discurso, propriamente. Recaímos, então, no embate entre o endo e o exossomático do qual falava Agamben em Infância e história: a pura capacidade, herdada do gênero, apenas adquire sua concretude com a "aquisição" dos códigos capaz de mover a pura potência. Introduz-se um hábito, digamos, retomando a héksis aristotélica. A atualidade, a ordem do discurso, é da atualização da língua que recebe a sua consolidação. Mais ainda, o mitologema da Voz mantém um nexo com o mitologema sacrificial, o fazer humano que opera uma separação e uma destruição, pelo sacrifício, e possibilita, num nível mais profundo, a incorporação e o governo do fazer humano como tal, pelo tornar sacer, encontra-se com uma visão da ideia da linguagem que faz do homem aquele vivente condenado ao tribunal das sentenças do lógos, capturado na estrutura soberana da linguagem. Esse nexo é um dos fundamentos, mais ou menos implícito, de Homo sacer: tal fundamento é articulado, de modo mais sólido, com e a partir de A linguagem e a morte, o que nos permite conectar as obras de Giorgio Agamben segundo um programa que busca pensar as condições que formularam e ainda formulam 212 o humano (a metafísica, a ética, a política, o direito), buscando compreendê-las, e também apontar que, no seu fluxo historial de transmissão, de constituição da tradição, os mitologemas dissimulam uma forma que condena a um modo de ser, barrando-nos, propriamente, a potência da contingência e os gestos sutis que a indicam. Mostra-se, assim, o papel de A linguagem e a morte ao centro de uma exposição, como a nossa, que visou a abordar o pensamento agambeniano como filosófico, não apenas por indagar a filosofia, seus nomes e etapas, sua tradição, mas, sutilmente, a constituição de suas linhas de transmissão, oferecendo uma conceituação que não se rende ao mero categorizar, oferecendo-nos mais conceitos (isso, de fato, realiza, mas não parece ser o mais importante), mas acaba por se voltar, de fato, à base da categorização, ao lugar em que aqueles se assentam num discurso, à ordenação do discurso soberano e ao ter-lugar da linguagem como fundamento: A linguagem é o soberano que, em permanente estado de exceção, declara que não há um fora da língua, que ela está sempre além de si mesma. A estrutura particular do direito tem o seu fundamento nesta estrutura pressuponente da linguagem humana. Ela exprime o vínculo de exclusão inclusiva ao qual está sujeita uma coisa pelo fato de ser na linguagem, de ser nomeada. Dizer é, nesse sentido, sempre ius dicere.447 O movimento que compõe "a estrutura pressuponente da linguagem humana" é atestado por Agamben já com aquela exposição hegeliana sobre o indizível – se a exclusão inclusiva é a inclusão do expulso, verifica-se, então, como a incorporação do indizível na linguagem opera por um tal mecanismo. O negativo que se coloca por trás do véu da linguagem nela acaba por ser acolhido e revela-se, na verdade, como "véu do ser" – com isso, como pudemos notar segundo a análise agambeniana, Hegel poderia extrair, para o seu sistema, o lugar de possibilidade do discurso. O fora da linguagem (ao qual os sensíveis simples serão confiados, uma vez que a certeza sensível os trai e os abandona ao querer-dizer), na verdade, é o limite a partir do qual se possibilita a própria linguagem. A analogia com o direito, portanto, com o poder soberano, expõe essa totalização da linguagem, o fato de que o mundo se dá, como dar-se do ser existência, a partir da linguagem – e as comunidades humanas, a partir do discurso articulado. Essas palavras de Agamben, que carregam um peso extremo, podendo beirar a insustentabilidade, movem-se naquela tentativa de compreensão que se depara com o próprio pesar das articulações que visam a dar conta de que as coisas são, tentativa de compreender a metafísica e os seus nexos com a política e a ética, os quais permitem 447 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Homo sacer, p. 26. 213 postular a política como respondendo à estrutura da metafísica, o direito, à da linguagem, os fazeres humanos, ao ser, cindido, os discursos, à palavra despedaçada. Tentativa de compreender, contudo, que não se esgota em si, que não vela pelos fundamentos indizíveis. Pelo contrário, expõe-nos como produtivos, como uma efetividade que se desdobra além do ser a partir de sua própria cisão, além do ter-lugar da linguagem e da ausência de voz, como discurso e como Voz. O seu gesto filosófico intenta estar à altura da gestualidade, potencializando o pensamento na configuração de uma experiência outra que venha a ser, sem, contudo, perder a sua potência e sem, todavia, recaia na impassibilidade: "Se toda palavra humana já sempre pressupusesse uma outra palavra, se o poder pressuponente da linguagem não tivesse jamais fim, então verdadeiramente não poderia haver experiência fora dos limites da linguagem" 448. Assim, de alguma forma, coloca-se que outra experiência com a linguagem, a partir da própria ideia de linguagem, é possível, outra experiência liberada do "poder pressuponente". A ideia de linguagem, porém, está capturada no curto-circuito que governa a falta de nome para a linguagem (a anonímia) e a presença de nome para o nexo entre as ideias e as coisas (a homonímia). "A ideia", contudo, não é uma palavra (uma metalinguagem) e muito menos visão de um objeto fora da linguagem (um tal objeto, um tal indizível não existe), mas visão da própria linguagem. Pois a linguagem, que medeia para o homem toda coisa e todo conhecimento, é ela mesma imediata. Nada de imediato pode ser alcançado pelo homem falante – exceto a própria linguagem, exceto a própria mediação. Uma tal mediação imediata constitui para o homem a única possibilidade de alcançar um princípio liberado de todo pressuposto.449 É a ideia da linguagem assim pensada, como meio sem fim, que abriria os usos à libertação da pressuposição – pressuposição que é uma forma dos nexos soberanos, das vinculações condenatórias. A ideia da linguagem volta-se, pelo gesto e pela gestualidade, contra o soberano-linguagem, contra o discurso e a discursividade. A Ideia da linguagem I confronta o mitologema da Voz, e o enfrentamento, parece-nos, é o apontar para a tentativa de desativar o mitologema sacrificial. A esfera do gesto é abertura do ēthos, da ética e da política, assim como o ter-lugar da linguagem, e é a partir de um conceito como esse que muito depois algo como um "uso dos corpos" pode adquirir o seu sentido de repensamento radical das categorias ético-políticas do ocidente. A obra de Agamben mostra a sua contínua coerência, coerência de um pensamento cuja acuidade (termo que, parece-nos, indica algo menos institucional do que fidelidade e algo menos 448 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 34. 449 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 35; 214 heterônomo do que rigor) é traçada pelos próprios gestos com os quais se relaciona com as profundas cadeias de transmissão da tradição filosófica do ocidente. A tentativa agambeniana de compreender a estruturação da metafísica não cessa, entretanto, no objetivo compreensivo. Ele não é o fim, mas o movimento que busca fazer cessar a necessidade de um fim, uma finalidade necessária para o homem. Nesse sentido, coloca-se a busca de uma experiência com a linguagem que esteja à altura de sua ideia e de sua indicação. O gesto, a pura esfera da gestualidade, a qual indicamos como se abrindo, a partir da ideia da linguagem, como a postura do ente desambientado que se coloca diante da ausência de voz e de palavra, também indica a espécie de mal-estar do homem na sua própria linguagem – não apenas como fala ou discurso, mas diante, também, do encontrar-se abandonado na existência, diante da qual se desdobra uma imperiosa necessidade de língua. O fundamento negativo não é o horizonte necessário daquele ser (alguns diriam ente, outros, vivente) que, sobre a terra, pode experimentar a linguagem e constituir mundos. Não: "o próprio do homem, não é um indizível, um sacer que deve restar não dito em toda práxis e em toda palavra humana. Ele não é, tampouco, segundo o pathos do niilismo contemporâneo, um nada, cuja nulidade funda a arbitrariedade e a violência do fazer social. Antes, ele é a mesma práxis social tornada, ao fim, transparente a si mesma"450. O que seria tal práxis, isso ultrapassa nossa investigação – e talvez até mesmo a investigação agambeniana, que se move na busca por pensar o que seria tal transparência do gesto, do uso, da práxis. Isso é o que permanece como escavação em busca da potência do pensamento, em busca de libertar, ao homem, as suas potências: Pensar o que seria uma comunidade humana e uma linguagem humana que não reenviassem mais a nenhum fundamento indizível e não se destinassem mais a uma transmissão infinita, e em que as palavras não se distinguissem mais de nenhuma outra prática humana, é certamente uma tarefa árdua. Mas isso, e nada menos do que isso, é o que resta para pensar a um pensamento que queira verdadeiramente estar à altura do próprio problema.451 Nenhuma verdadeira comunidade humana pode, de fato, surgir sobre a base de um pressuposto – seja ele a nação, ou a língua, ou também o a priori da comunicação de que fala a hermenêutica. O que une os homens entre si não é nem uma natureza, nem uma voz divina, nem a comum prisão na linguagem significante, mas a visão da própria linguagem e, por isso, a experiência dos seus limites, do seu fim. Verdadeira comunidade é apenas uma comunidade não pressuposta. A pura exposição filosófica não pode ser por isso exposição das próprias ideias sobre a linguagem ou o mundo, mas exposição da ideia da linguagem452. 450 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. *Se. L'Assoluto e l'Ereignis in La potenza del pensiero, p. 196. 451 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Lingua e storia in La potenza del pensiero, p. 54. 452 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. L'idea del linguaggio in La potenza del pensiero, p. 35. 215 Ora, essa árdua tarefa continua sendo levada a cabo – ela resta ao pensamento, ela resta ao pensamento como a tarefa que pode libertar a sua potência. A visão da linguagem como limite mostra-nos a ideia de comunidade e que o caminho da compreensão ética de Agamben está estruturado sobre a sua visão da linguagem, sobre a ideia da linguagem que a sua filosofia, dupla e ambiguamente, acaba por conformar. Parece que toda tentativa de se medir com o alcance de sua investigação arqueológica sobre o nosso ēthos tem de se medir com tal visão da linguagem, cujos andaimes, aqui, apenas tentamos configurar num esboço analítico, percorrendo-os. Medir-se com um tal pensamento sobre a linguagem, parece-nos a tarefa cabível a um pensamento que venha a se confrontar com o pensamento agambeniano que, desde que se pôs a caminho, está a vir, percorrendo o caminho que indaga pelo tópos e pela arkhḗ da linguagem, pelo lugar e pelo fundamento do humano, da sua ética, da sua política, da sua economia. Uma topologia e uma "protoarqueologia" (ou uma arqueologia, enfim), os andaimes da escavação, são formas de pensar, em última análise, o lugar – específico e único, milagre e maravilha – do humano. Se a topologia está orientada para o em, para o próprio tópos como situar-se possível, para o lugar, a arqueologia move-se para o por, isto é, para o dar-se mesmo de um lugar, para o fundamento como princípio, para a arkhḗ453. Tanto a arkhḗ quanto o tópos não são eles o de que se faz discurso, isto é, lógos, mas, antes, apontam o dar-se, mesmo, da linguagem, do humano e do histórico – e isso tem estado numa posição de problema fundante do gesto filosófico agambeniano. A ideia de crítica, bastante ativa na topologia da negatividade, culmina, com a consciência do histórico, na arqueologia. A investigação do tópos, do ter-lugar da linguagem, é uma condução, no que diz respeito à compreensão da metafísica, à investigação de sua arkhḗ, de seu fundamento – as duas investigações, aqui, sobrepõe-se, pois a topologia da negatividade e da linguagem é observada em seu funcionamento diante de uma arqueologia dos fundamentos negativos da metafísica (e uma tal arqueologia a 453 Para Agamben, a rigor, na sua investigação arqueológica, importa não o causalismo, mas a exposição do fundamento. O que está em jogo é que ambos engendram cisões, pressupõem uma cisão entre si, e é ela que está em questão. É mais produtivo fundar uma cisão irrespondível, em termos de efetividade ontológica, e aos olhos dessa interpretação da metafísica que se pôde expor, do que o contrário. E é essa produtividade inquestionável que está sob o crivo da investigação filosófica. E mais. É por tratar-se de um vazio, conforme hoje se nomeia a partir da arqueologia de O reino e a glória (2007), de um nada, como se vê a partir de A linguagem e a morte, que o absurdo dessa máquina política não apenas vem exposto, mas deve ser minuciosamente analisado. Por esse filtro é que Agamben recepciona a contenda sobre o niilismo que "assola" a cultura ocidental (moderna ou originariamente). 216 denominamos, e também para diferenciá-la da arqueologia mobilizada por Agamben em proximidade com uma genealogia, de protoarqueologia). Ao dizer, portanto, que "a arqueologia (...) é a única via de acesso ao presente" 454, o pensamento filosófico de Agamben denuncia a sua matriz ética, a qual, nos termos da investigação que conduzimos, coloca-se pela busca por se medir com os limites da visão da linguagem, com a ideia da linguagem. A sua indagação sobre a vida mostra, sob o véu da negatividade dos "objetos" que estuda, sob o véu de negatividade que vê encobrindo a ideia de linguagem, o seu pensamento como um pensamento vivo – e de que valeria uma potência se ela não nos abrisse a vida, agora não "simplesmente existente", como a própria existência aberta a nós? A abertura, de todo modo, independentemente do modo se responda concretamente a essa questão, na perspectiva agambeniana, é levada a um extremo singular, pois, não sendo determinada por uma causa ou pré-moldada por um arquétipo, o ser humano é o seu próprio devir – a potência latente no pensamento. A sua marca essencial é a indeterminabilidade que ele, o vivente, encontra, não tendo uma voz, na abertura que, ao mesmo tempo, permite-lhe construirse, num campo de forças entre subjetivação e dessubjetivação, a si mesmo, aquém, na verdade, da série de determinações condicionantes instauradas pelo binômio naturezacultura. A abertura que se apresenta ao homem e que o apresenta é a abertura que se apresenta ao pensamento e que o apresenta: a crítica torna-se um incessante e potencial pensamento do pensamento, que o leva além de si mesmo ao apontar tudo aquilo que, nele, está aquém de sua potencialidade. Ainda, mapear o que está aquém, como resto, pode ser uma via de considerar a vitalidade do pensamento. A nossa política e a nossa ética moralista e normativista, as quais constituem a arquitetura e os desenhos com os quais se constitui e se julga nosso presente, surgem como baseadas e estruturadas em sacrifícios, isto é, na captura daquilo que é singular, possível, potente, e continuam, na sua estruturação movida em ato, a exigir o sacrifício que isola e regra os usos – seja para expurgar a sua má-infinitude, seja para expiar a sua culpa (culpa e expiação são complementares, como há muito se sabe) –, e até mesmo as contra-políticas, as políticas que se voltam contra as políticas estabelecidas, fizeram-se e fazem-se valer da mesma estrutura punitiva. Sob o sacrifício, que ao menos consagra a vítima, diviniza-a (no cristianismo a vítima assim divinizada já era o próprio deus), o homo sacer, aquele que é simplesmente vivente, representa a exceção que é o fundamento 454 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. Archeologia filosofica in Signatura rerum, p. 103. 217 que então se desvenda diante dos andaimes da investigação arqueológica. Enquanto sacrifícios forem feitos, a fábrica de corpos simplesmente viventes, caso se queira insistir nessa fórmula, continuará aberta – a sua insígnia, que bem poderia ser a da as portas abertas de Janus, dito o bifronte, na verdade, deve ser desativada como tal: não se trata apenas de fechar as portas e mantê-las fechadas, mas de desativar o mecanismo que sustenta a abertura-fechamento. * "Por conseguinte, a linguagem é a nossa voz, a nossa linguagem. Como tu agora falas, isto é a ética"455. Outrora, com essa sentença, Giorgio Agamben finalizou um opúsculo intitulado O fim do pensamento, o qual se tornou, com o mesmo título, o epílogo de A linguagem e a morte. Mas essa formulação menos encerrou o problema em cujo rastro prosseguia a sua pesquisa filosófica – a saber, a indagação pelo experimentum linguae – do que conseguiu, sinteticamente, capturá-lo, deixando-o latente. As afirmações aí contidas não encerram a densa especulação sobre as raízes e o "destino" da metafísica da linguagem na filosofia que tanto animam Agamben em sua produção teórica; são, na verdade, um epítome, uma formulação que está carregada de tensões, de contradições que indicam, diante do todo que as formula, para os problemas que movem o pensamento e sustentam a investigação filosófica. Essa passagem, na verdade, ilustra o estreito e fundamental vínculo entre linguagem, ética e política como condizente a um confronto com o cerne da metafísica. Trata-se de um problema apto a mover uma análise da produção filosófica agambeniana, capaz de situar os problemas que a movem, sem, contudo, restringi-los ao direito e à política ou apenas à linguagem: são problemas de limiares, antes de tudo – e a insistência do filósofo nesse termo, que pode parecer, à primeira vista, um simples expediente organizativo ou estilístico, indica uma contínua zona cinzenta contra a qual parecem se mover as questões cintilantes que, em princípio, movem o pensamento. A insistência nesse processo, nesse movimento, é uma forma de indicar uma forma de trabalhar o pensamento que está profundamente relacionada aos conteúdos abordados. O movimento conceitual, assim, antes de desdobrar problemas novos, parece, e isso também permanece latente, evanescer, conduzindo o desenvolvimento teórico a uma contínua zona gris de 455 AGAMBEN, Giorgio. La fine del pensiero, p. 10. Também em AGAMBEN, Giorgio. 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Lorentz contraction, Bell's spaceships and rigid body motion in special relativity This article has been downloaded from IOPscience. Please scroll down to see the full text article. 2010 Eur. J. Phys. 31 291 (http://iopscience.iop.org/0143-0807/31/2/006) Download details: IP Address: 155.247.160.10 The article was downloaded on 05/11/2010 at 22:15 Please note that terms and conditions apply. View the table of contents for this issue, or go to the journal homepage for more Home Search Collections Journals About Contact us My IOPscience IOP PUBLISHING EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICS Eur. J. Phys. 31 (2010) 291–298 doi:10.1088/0143-0807/31/2/006 Lorentz contraction, Bell's spaceships and rigid body motion in special relativity Jerrold Franklin Department of Physics, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122-6082, USA E-mail: [email protected] Received 10 June 2009, in final form 13 August 2009 Published 8 January 2010 Online at stacks.iop.org/EJP/31/291 Abstract The meaning of Lorentz contraction in special relativity and its connection with Bell's spaceships parable is discussed. The motion of Bell's spaceships is then compared with the accelerated motion of a rigid body. We have tried to write this in a simple form that could be used to correct students' misconceptions due to conflicting earlier treatments. 1. 'Lorentz contraction' in special relativity We have put the term 'Lorentz contraction' in quotes, because, as we will explain, Lorentz contraction is not what actually occurs for a moving object in special relativity (SR). This is well known to most physicists, but too often 'Lorentz contraction' is given a spurious physical reality. Lorentz contraction is so called because H A Lorentz proposed an actual physical contraction of a moving object as an explanation of the null result of the Michaelson–Morley experiment, thus preserving the aether [1]. Lorentz's equation for the length L′ of a rod moving at velocity v was1 L′ = L/γ, with γ = 1√ 1 − v2 , (1) where L is the length the rod would have at rest. The shrinking of a moving rod, with similar motivation, had been suggested previously by Fitzgerald [2], and the effect is often called 'Lorentz–Fitzgerald contraction'. Lorentz and Fitzgerald attributed this physical contraction to new electromagnetic molecular forces within a moving rod with concomitant stresses and strains. Although there is an equation identical to equation (1) in special relativity, the Lorentz derivation and its application to the Michaelson–Morley experiment contradicts relativity. Indeed, if the 1 We are using units with c = 1. 0143-0807/10/020291+08$30.00 c© 2010 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK 291 292 J Franklin velocity of light is the same in all directions in any inertial frame, then applying the 'Lorentz– Fitzgerald contraction' to the Michaelson–Morley apparatus would produce a positive result. The equation for Lorentz contraction (we drop the quotes and Fitzgerald) in SR is the same as originally given by Lorentz, but the physical significance is quite different. In SR, equation (1) relates the length L = |L * v| of an object as measured in its rest system to the length L′ = |L′ * v| of the same object as measured in a particular way in a system S′ that moves with constant velocity v with respect to the system S. There are several important things to note in the wording of the previous sentence. (i) In order to compare the measured length of a moving object to its measured length in a system in which it is not moving, two different Lorentz systems, each with a constant velocity, are required. (ii) In SR, there is no change in the object. It is only the coordinate system that is changed from S to S′. (iii) The measured length of a moving object depends on the 'particular way' in which it is measured. The length of a stick which is at rest is measured by the difference x2 −x1 of its ends. For a stick at rest, the time at which each end is measured is unimportant, and they can be measured at different times. In the usual textbook formulation of SR, the length of a moving stick is defined by measuring the coordinates x ′1 and x ′ 2 of each end at the same time (simultaneously), t ′1 = t ′2, in S′ and taking the length L′ as the difference x ′2 −x ′1. This seems obvious in classical mechanics where it gives the same length to a moving stick as it has at rest. However, there are some difficulties and ambiguities associated with this definition, and there are other reasonable definitions of the length of a moving object. For one thing, there is no a priori reason to expect a classical method of measurement to still be valid for relativistic motion. An observer at rest in S will tell the measurers in S′, 'Of course you got the wrong answer. You measured each end at different times. If you're moving past me, you should measure the distances at the same time.' This argument occurs because, in SR, what is simultaneous in one Lorentz system is not simultaneous in others. A witness in S would testify in court that the measurers in S′ made the length measurement incorrectly. If the measurers in S′ made their measurements at each end when told to by those in S so that the measurement times were equal in S, their measured length L′ would be greater than L, not less. In prerelativistic physics, it did not matter in which system the distance measurements were simultaneous, since in either case the measurement would give the same result. But that is no longer true in relativity. It should also be pointed out that another classically reasonable method of measuring the length is to take a photograph of a moving object and compare it with a photograph of the same object at rest. As Terrell [3] showed some time ago, the photograph would show an object that is somewhat rotated, but of the same shape and dimensions as it had at rest. Indeed, the photograph of a moving sphere would show a sphere of the same size. These ambiguous definitions of 'length' for a moving object arise from the fact that x2−x1 is not a Lorentz invariant, but only one component of a four-vector, so the Lorentz transformed difference x ′2−x ′1 is just for this one component. A Lorentz transformation between coordinate systems in relative motion is a generalized rotation in spacetime. Just as a three-dimensional rotation changes the coordinate difference x2 − x1 to x ′2 − x ′1, so does the four-dimensional rotation in spacetime. And, just as the 'shortening' of a stick that is rotated in three dimensions is an illusion, we now can see that the 'shortening' of a stick that is rotated in four dimensions by a Lorentz transformation is also illusory. Lorentz contraction, Bell's spaceships, and rigid body motion in special relativity 293 This suggests the need for a definition of 'length' that is the same for any state of uniform motion. This would correspond to the use in relativity of 'proper time' and 'invariant mass' for time and mass, but the terms 'proper length' and 'invariant length' have already been used in the literature with other meanings. The term we recommend for length is 'rest frame length', which we define as the length a moving object has after a Lorentz transformation to its rest system. If length is to be considered a physical attribute of an object, then this physical attribute should be the rest frame length. This length, of course, would not be changed by uniform motion. One other point to be considered is whether strains and stresses can be induced by Lorentz contraction, as is contended in [1, 2, 4, 5]. Our answer to this is clear from the previous discussion. Just as a 3D rotation of an object does not induce strain, a 4D rotation (Lorentz transformation) will not induce strain and consequent stress. We illustrate this with a simple example. Consider a brittle wine glass at rest on a table. If motion at constant velocity induced strain, then constant motion could shatter the wine glass. However, by the first postulate of special relativity, moving the wine glass at constant velocity is equivalent to having the wine glass at rest and an observer moving past it at an equal, but opposite, velocity. This means that just walking past (and looking at) a wine glass at rest on a table could shatter the wine glass. We see from this example that it is only the rest frame length of an object that relates to strains or stresses on the object. The process of accelerating an object to a constant velocity may induce strain, depending on how the acceleration is applied, and we discuss this below in connection with the Bell spaceships. We summarize this section as follows. The belief that a moving object has a different length comes from using the prerelativistic notion that keeping t ′2 = t ′1 permits correct length measurement of the moving object. We see that this does not give an unambiguous length, and has sometimes incorrectly suggested that motion at constant velocity can induce strain. We conclude that the length of an object can be measured only in its rest system. If the object is moving, making a Lorentz transformation to its rest system is the only way to get a reliable measurement of its length. This is generally true of intrinsic properties of physical objects that are not Lorentz invariants. 2. The Bell spaceship paradox We first present the nexus of the Bell spaceship paradox as originally presented by John Bell [4]. Although Bell's name has been attached to the paradox, the thought experiment involved was first considered by Dewan and Beran [5] as a demonstration that 'relativistic contraction can introduce stress effects in a moving body'. We have disputed this contention in the previous section. A large number of published [6] and unpublished papers of varying contentions and conclusions have been written in the years since Bell's original formulation. While not addressing these subsequent papers here, we think that our resolution of the paradox (as no paradox) applies to most of them. A recent paper by Petkov [7] comes to conclusions similar to ours about Bell's spaceships, and critiques a number of earlier papers. Bell considered two spaceships starting from rest in a Lorentz system S, and undergoing identical accelerations a(t) in that system. We analyse this situation now in some detail. We denote the spaceships as L and R, each having acceleration a(t) in the positive x direction in system S, starting from rest at positions xL = 0 for the nose of L and xR = d for the tail of R, so the starting distance between the ships is d. At equal times in S with tL = tR = t , the spaceships will have equal velocities v = vL = vR, and the difference xR − xL will remain constant at d. 294 J Franklin If, at a time when each spaceship has a velocity v, we make a Lorentz transformation with velocity v, each spaceship will be at rest and the distances x ′L and x ′ R will be given by x ′L = γ (xL − vt) (2) x ′R = γ (xL + d − vt). (3) The distance between the two ships in system S′ is given by d ′ = x ′R − x ′L = γ d. (4) We see that this length is greater than the length between the spaceships before their motion. That is, as the velocity in S increases, the distance between the spaceships in their rest system S′ increases. Equation (4), as is usual for Lorentz contraction, states that the length between the moving ships, measured at equal times (for each ship), is shorter than this length measured at different times in their common rest system. The situation here is a bit different than in the usual discussion of Lorentz contraction, where the rest length is fixed and the measured moving length shortens. Here, because of the way Bell constructed his example, the measured moving length is constant as the velocity increases. Consequently, the rest frame length in the instantaneous rest system S′ must increase in accordance with equation (4), and get longer than the original rest frame length in system S. Although the spaceships are accelerating, the system S′ is a Lorentz system moving at constant velocity. Since each ship is instantaneously at rest in this system, the length d ′ = γ d is the rest frame distance between the ships. As such, it is the physical distance between the ships. If there were an inextensible cable between the ships, it would snap at the start of motion of the ships. An elastic cable would stretch until it reached its maximum possible length dmax, at which point it would snap. That is, a cable connecting the two ships would snap when d ′ = γ d = dmax. (5) The velocity at which the cable would snap corresponds to a γ given by γ = 1 + (dmax − d)/d = 1 + smax, (6) where smax is the maximum strain the cable can withstand. Note that there is no hint of a paradox in the above treatment of two accelerating spaceships. Bell's paradox was that his intuition told him that the cable would break, yet there was no change in the distance between the ships in system S. He suggested resolving the paradox by stating that a cable between the ships would shorten due to the contraction of a physical object proposed by Fitzgerald and Lorentz, while the distance between the ships would not change. This resolution however contradicts special relativity which allows no such difference in any measurement of these two equal lengths. A question might be raised by the fact that, although each spaceship is instantaneously at rest in system S′, the x ′R and x ′ L measurements are made at different times. Since the ships are accelerating, will that not affect the measurement? Without acceleration, it is clear that length measurements can be made in the rest system at different times for each ship. When there is acceleration, we first consider a case where the two ships are initially at rest with no acceleration. Then the distance measurement for each ship can be made at any time. If each ship starts to accelerate after its distance measurement is made, this cannot affect a measurement which has already been made. The ship's distance will be the same immediately after acceleration is applied because the velocity will still be negligible and the distance would not have changed yet. A similar argument can be applied to a situation where the ships are originally accelerating and their acceleration is stopped at the instant each comes to rest in Lorentz contraction, Bell's spaceships, and rigid body motion in special relativity 295 system S′. Once the acceleration stops and the ship is at rest, it does not matter when each measurement is made. The measurements could also be made just before the acceleration is turned off because the velocity and distance moved will be negligible, as in the previous case. We have come to the reasonable conclusion that past events and future events cannot affect a distance measurement between ships, each of which was at rest at the time of measurement. This means that the ship's distances can be measured at different times in their common rest system even if each has acceleration. A similar argument can be made in system S where each ship is moving with the same velocity and acceleration at the same time. Future events and past events will not affect the distance between the ships, so the rest frame distance between them will be the same as if they had constant velocity at the time of measurement. We conclude that the rest frame distance between the ships depends only on their common velocity and not on their acceleration. The result is that when each spaceship has the same velocity v at the same time, the rest frame distance between them is d ′ = γ d, even for continually accelerating spaceships. 3. Rigid body motion in special relativity In the motion described by Bell and in the preceding section, the acceleration of each spaceship is the same at equal times in system S. This also corresponds to each having the same acceleration a′ in their instantaneous rest system2 if their rest system acceleration is constant in time. This is because their acceleration in system S, in which they each have velocity v, is given by3 a = a′/γ 3. (7) Thus, if the two spaceships have constant equal acceleration in their rest system S′, they will also have equal (but not constant) acceleration in system S. This keeps their velocities the same, and the distance between the ships constant in system S. But we have seen that the distance between the ships increases in their mutual rest system. In the motion of a rigid body, the dimensions of the object are unchanged by acceleration. This type of motion in special relativity was first considered by Max Born and is often called 'Born rigid motion' [8], but our treatment of rigid body motion is somewhat different than Born's. From the preceding paragraph, we see that keeping lengths constant in the rest system requires different rest frame accelerations for different parts of a rigid body. The two spaceships are a simple example of this in that we have to consider separate accelerations for each ship. To simplify the treatment, we consider the two accelerations gR and gL to be two different constants in time. We first consider the motion of either spaceship in system S. The acceleration there is related to the rest frame acceleration g by4 g = γ 3 a = d dt (γ v), (8) where we have used the relation d dt (γ v) = d dt [ v√ 1 − v2 ] = γ a + γ 3 v(v * a)] = γ 3 a, (9) 2 What we mean by 'instantaneous rest system' is a Lorentz system moving at constant velocity in which the object is momentarily at rest. 3 Equation (7) follows from transformation equations for acceleration on page 569 of [9] and page 375 of [10] when a′ is the acceleration in the rest system. 4 Although we use the symbol g, it is not the acceleration due to gravity. 296 J Franklin for a parallel to v. We solve this differential equation by the following steps: g = γ 3a = d(γ v) dt gt = γ v = v√ 1 − v2 v = gt√ 1 + g2t2 = dx dt∫ x x0 dx ′ = ∫ t 0 gt dt√ 1 + g2 t2 x = x0 + ( √ 1 + g2t2 − 1)/g. (10) For the two ships R and L, equation (10) gives xR = d + (√ 1 + g2Rt 2 R − 1 )/ gR (11) xL = (√ 1 + g2Lt 2 L − 1 )/ gL. (12) We see that if gL = gR, the distance between the two spaceships remains constant at d for equal times in system S, in which they are each moving. Rigid body motion for the two spaceships means keeping the distance between the ships constant at d in their mutual rest system, either by appropriately adjusting their thrusts, or by connecting them with a cable of fixed length. In order to transform to the mutual rest system of R and L, we have to know xR and xL when they have equal velocities in S. We can do this by using the relations t = γ v/g and γ = √ 1 + g2t2, (13) which follow from the steps in equation (10) above. Then, we have xR = d + (γ − 1)/gR (14) xL = (γ − 1)/gf L (15) for the position of each spaceship with the same velocity v. Of course, the two times tR and tL are now different. The times are given by tR = γ v/gR (16) tL = γ v/gL. (17) The condition that the distance between the ships in their rest system be fixed at d can be imposed by Lorentz transforming the difference in the ship's positions in system S to their rest system. The space and time differences for the two spaceships are x = d + (γ − 1)δ (18) t = γ vδ, (19) where δ = 1 gR − 1 gL . (20) Lorentz contraction, Bell's spaceships, and rigid body motion in special relativity 297 The Lorentz transformation to the rest frame is d = x ′ = γ (x − vt) = γ [d + (γ − 1)δ − v2γ δ] = γ d + (1 − γ )δ, (21) so that δ = d = 1 gR − 1 gL , (22) and gL = gR 1 − gRd . (23) Thus, there is a fixed relation between the constant accelerations of the two spaceships in their instantaneous rest system. Maintaining these different rest frame accelerations for each ship will keep the rest frame distance between them constant. For a rigid body, the rest frame acceleration throughout the body would be given by gL in equation (23) with gR being the acceleration of the front end and d the x distance from the front end. We see that in order to keep the body rigid in its rest frame, the acceleration has to vary. Although the acceleration varies throughout the rigid body, there will be no strain because this varying acceleration preserves the rest frame dimensions of the body. Any stress in the body will not be appreciably different than the stress induced by nonrelativistic acceleration of a rigid body. This is to be contrasted with the case of a cable between the two Bell spaceships, which will have ever increasing strain from the beginning of the motion. For rigid body motion, the time difference in the rest frame is given by the Lorentz transformation t ′ = γ (t − vx) = γ [γ vδ − vd − v(γ − 1)δ] = γ vδ − γ vd = 0. (24) Thus, the two rest frame times t ′R and t ′ L are equal and there is no question that d remains the constant rest frame distance between the ships. 4. Conclusion We have seen that the physical length of an object is the rest frame length as measured in the instantaneous rest frame of the object. For two spaceships having equal accelerations, as in Bell's spaceship example, the distance between the moving ships appears to be constant, but the rest frame distance between them continually increases. This means that a cable between the two ships must eventually break if the acceleration continues. For rigid body motion in special relativity, the rest frame acceleration throughout the body will vary as in equation (23), but this will preserve the rest frame dimensions of the object. We have only treated rigid body motion with constant acceleration in the instantaneous rest frame. For a general time dependence of acceleration, our Bell spaceship discussion would not be affected, but the spatial dependence of the rest frame acceleration for a rigid body could be more complicated than that in equation (23). References [1] Lorentz H A 1892 Versl. Kon. Akad. Wetensch. 1 74 [2] FitzGerald G F 1889 Science 13 390 298 J Franklin [3] Terrell J 1959 Phys. Rev. 116 1041 [4] Bell J S 1993 Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) pp 67–8 [5] Dewan E and Beran M 1959 Am. J. Phys. 27 517 [6] Evett A A and Wangsness R K 1960 Am. J. Phys. 28 566 Nawrocki P J 1962 Am. J. Phys. 30 771 Dewan E M 1963 Am. J. Phys. 31 383 Romain J E 1963 Am. J. Phys. 31 576 Evett A A 1972 Am. J. Phys. 40 1170 Flores F J 2005 Phys. Educ. 40 500 Cornwell D T 2005 Europhys. Lett. 71 699 Redzic D V 2008 Eur. J. Phys. 29 N11 [7] Petkov V 2009 arXiv:0903.5128 [8] Born M 1909 Ann. 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ʔʑʟʝʞʔʘʠʙʗʘʒʢʛʏʜʗʡʏʟʜlsʘʢʜʗʑʔʟʠʗʡʔʡ ФИЛОСОФСКО-КУЛЬТУРОЛОГИЧЕСКИЙ ЖУРНАЛ ТОПОС No 2 , 2012 ISSN 1815-0047 Редакционная коллегия П. В. Барковский, Е. В. Борисов, А. А. Горных, И. Н. Инишев, А. В. Лаврухин, П. Рудковский, А. Р. Усманова, О. Н. Шпарага, Т. В. Щитцова (гл. редактор) Editorial Board P. Barkouski, E. Borisov, A. Gornykh, I. Inishev, A. Lavrukhin, P. Rudkouski, A. Ousmanova, O. Shparaga, T. Shchyttsova (Editor-in-chief ) Журнал включён в международные базы данных: The Philosopher's Index; EBSCO-CEEAS (Central & Eastern European Academic Source) Научный совет Ю. Баранова У. Броган Б. Вальденфельс А. Ермоленко Х. Р. Зепп Д. Комель К. Мейер-Драве A. А. Михайлов В. И. Молчанов Дж. Саллис Л. Фишер В. Н. Фурс А. Хаардт Advisory Board J. Baranova (Lithuania) W. Brogan (USA) B. Waldenfels (Germany) A. Yermolenko (Ukraine) H. R. Sepp (Germany) D. Komel (Slovenia) K. Meyer-Drawe (Germany) A. Mikhailov (Belarus) V. Molchanov (Russia) J. Sallis (USA) L. Fisher (Hungary) V. Fours (Belarus) A. Haardt (Germany) Адрес редколлегии: [email protected] Информация о журнале размещена на сайте: http://topos.ehu.lt Адрес издателя: Европейский гуманитарный университет Tauro st. 12, LT-01114 Vilnius Lithuania Учёный секретарь Л. Михеева Scholarly secretary L. Mikheeva СОДЕРЖ АНИЕ ЛЬВОВСКО-ВАРШАВСКАЯ ШКОЛА: ПО НАПРАВЛЕНИЮ К АНАЛИТИЧЕСКОЙ ФИЛОСОФИИ П. Рудкоўскі Адкрыць незачыненае: Львоўска-Варшаўская школа і яе прапановы для Беларусі (прадмова да рубрыкi) .............................................7 Б. Домбровский Утрата бытия, или Об апофатической логике Яна Лукасевича ......................................... 10 Ч. Леевский Чем философия обязана апостату философии? ........................................... 25 П. Роек Общие предметы и универсалии (к годовщине доказательства Лесневского) ............................................................ 36 К. Твардовский Философия и мировоззрение (речь, произнесённая на торжестве по случаю двадцатипятилетия Польского философского общества во Львове 12 февраля 1929 года) ....................... 50 К. Твардовский Историческое понятие философии (резюме доклада, прочитанного в философской секции XI съезда польских врачей и естествоиспытателей в Кракове, 18 июля 1912 года) ............................ 56 И. Домбская К вопросу о так называемых пустых именах ................................ 58 ТРАНСЦЕНДЕНТАЛЬНАЯ ФЕНОМЕНОЛОГИЯ А. Шиян Трансцендентальная субъективность и жизненный мир. Размышления над книгой А.Э. Савина Трансцендентализм и историчность в феноменологии Гуссерля .................................... 62 4 N. Artemenko «Zeit – das In-der-Welt-Sein – Verstehen» – Kreis oder Ontologie des Zuhandenen ............... 75 СОЦИАЛЬНАЯ КРИТИКА И КУЛЬТУРНАЯ АНАЛИТИКА I.E. Ukpokolo, E. Imafidon Philosophy interrogates an African Culture: Echoes from the Frankfurt School ........................ 89 А. Тарабанов Нарративная идентичность в культуре ислама ................................................ 105 М. Мацевич Куда уехал «цирк»? .............................................. 115 Б. Домбровский Философия стены ................................................ 125 A. Khitrov Irony about Tragedy: The Onion's treatment of 9/11 ............................ 153 ПОБЕДИТЕЛИ КОНКУРСА СТУДЕНЧЕСКИХ РАБОТ В ОБЛАСТИ ФИЛОСОФИИ И КУЛЬТУРНОЙ АНАЛИТИКИ А. Борисёнок В поисках новых инструментов политического кинематографа ........................ 168 Ю. Щербина Феномен заботы в философии Яна Паточки и Мишеля Фуко .......................... 179 А. Новик Изобретение фотографии. Фотографический медиум как порождение и способ репрезентации культуры модерна ................. 189 Информация для авторов ......................................................................197 5 CONTENTS THE LWÓW–WARSAW SCHOOL: ONTO ANALYTICAL PHILOSOPHY P. Rudkouski To Open the Unclosed: The Lwów–Warsaw School and Its Proposals to Belarus (Foreword to Section).................................................7 B. Dombrovski Loss of Being or On Jan Lukasiewicz's Apophatical Logic .................................................... 10 Cz. Lejewski What Does Philosophy Owe to an Apostate of Philosophy? ............................... 25 P. Rojek General Objects and Universals (On the Hundredth Anniversary of Lesniewski's Proof) ............................................. 36 K. Twardowski Philosophy and World-Outlook (Speech delivered on the occasion of the twenty fifth anniversary of Polish philosophical society in Lwow on 12 February, 1929) .............................................. 50 K. Twardowski Historical Notion of Philosophy (summary of the report made at the philosophical section of the 11th congress of Polish doctors and naturalists in Krakow on 18 July, 1912) .................................... 56 I. Dąmbska To the Question of the So-Called Empty Names ................................. 58 TRANSCENDENTAL PHENOMENOLOGY A. Shiyan Transcendental Subjectvity and Life-World. Speculations over A.E. Savin's Book Transcendentalism and Historicity in Husserl's Phenomenology ................ 62 N. Artemenko «Zeit – das In-der-Welt-Sein – Verstehen» – Kreis oder Ontologie des Zuhandenen ................ 75 6 SOCIAL CRITIQUE AND CULTURAL ANALYTICS I.E. Ukpokolo, E. Imafidon Philosophy interrogates an African Culture: Echoes from the Frankfurt School ........................ 89 A. Tarabanov Narrative Identity in Culture of Islam ................ 105 M. Matsevich Where the «Circus» Has Gone? .......................... 115 B. Dombrovski The Philosophy of Wall ......................................... 125 A. Khitrov Irony about Tragedy: The Onion's Treatment of 9/11 ........................... 153 WINNERS OF THE STUDENTS' CONTEST IN PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURAL ANALYTICS Aliaksei Barysionak In Search of New Instruments of Political Cinematography................................. 168 Julia Shcherbina Phenomenon of Care in Jan Patočka's and Michel Foucault's Philosophies ................... 179 Alina Novik Invention of Photography. Photographical Medium as Generation and Means of Representation of Culture of Modernity ...... 189 Instructions for authors ............................................................................197 153No 2. 2012 СО Ц И А ЛЬ Н АЯ К РИ ТИ КА И К УЛ ЬТ УР Н АЯ А Н А ЛИ ТИ КА IRONY ABOUT TRAGEDY: THE ONION'S TREATMENT OF 9/11 Arseniy Khitrov1 Abstract In this paper the author analyses the materials that were published in the American satirical magazine The Onion in the period from 2006 till 2011 and mentioned September 11 terrorist attacks. The focus of the research is the persistence of 9/11 jokes five years after the tragedy occurred and later on. The jokes are classified basing on their subject-matter and rhetorical patterns. The author concludes that most of these jokes promote respect towards collective memory about the attacks and their victims. Keywords: cultural trauma, collective memory, irony, 9/11. Introduction After 9/11 some social commentators2 declared that irony would not be acceptable anymore. They declared the end of the age of irony. They declared the end of irony, the comeback to reality, and the recovery of the blanket of satire. 1 Arseniy Khitrov – Associate Professor at National Research University Higher School of Economics, Department of Cultural Studies, National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia). 2 The social critic Roger Rosenblatt wrote about the end of irony in Time Magazine (see Rosenblatt R. The Age of Irony Comes To an End // Time Magazine. 2001. Sept. 24. P. 79. Retrieved Dec. 16, 2012, from: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1000893,00. html, and comedians Jay Leno, David Letterman, Conan O'Brien, and Jon Stewart replaced their usual comic performances with emotional speeches (cf. September 11 issue of The Daily Show with John Steward: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-september-20-2001/ september-11-2001). Moreover, on October 16, 2001, comedians and authors who worked for The New York Observer, The Time Magazine, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Modern Humorist, and The Onion participated in a public round table entitled No Laughing Matter? Comedy Writing in Unfunny Times (the advertisement of this event can be still found here: http://www.ersvp.com/rsvp/reply.htm?evt r=ifda&cacheid=1073627238.8021&cobrandid=ersvp&user_sessio n=e7c9873ee420806c7e423a5b12989e78). Rosenblatt's article provoked a series of responses by social critics who disagreed with him; see: Beers D. Irony is dead! Long Live Irony! // Salon. 2001. Sept. 25. Retrieved Dec. 16, 2012, from: http://www.salon.com/2001/09/25/ irony_lives/; Kurtzman D. The Return of Irony // AlterNet. 2002. Sept. 10. Retrieved Dec. 16, 2012, from: http://www.alternet.org/ story/14068/the_return_of_irony; Newman A. Irony Is Dead. Again. Yeah, Right // The New York Times. 2008. Nov. 21. Retrieved Dec. 16, 2012, from: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/23/fashion/23irony. html?pagewanted=all&_r=0. 154 In particular, a few late-night comedy shows went off the air, infrequent political jokes were met with public disapproval, The New Yorker appeared with a black cover and lacking its famous cartoons, finally, a satirical magazine The Onion did not appear till the week after the event. The Center for Media and Public Affairs reported that the number of political jokes dropped by 54% on late night television in the month following the attack and that uncomic guests were featured twice as frequently in the fifteen weeks after 9/11 as they had been in the previous fifteen weeks.3 On September 18 the comedian Gilbert Gottfried made a joke mentioning the attack: «I have to leave for L.A. tonight. I couldn't get a direct flight. They have to make a stop at the Empire State Building». As he himself recalls, after these words were said, there was a long gasp in the hall and then somebody said: «Too soon». The joke was cut off entirely from the cable version.4 On October 10 New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani gave New Yorkers permission to laugh again. It was a charity event featuring many New York comedians where Giuliani said: «I am here to give you permission to laugh. If you don't, I'll have you arrested»5. Indeed, after 9/11 people were mourning victims looking for ways to commemorate them. Any significant historical event would have the same consequences. What is surprising is that it was the irony issue that resonated with the posttraumatic discourse. The first post-9/11 issue of The Onion appeared on September 26. Some researchers have pointed out this particular issue was the first piece of humour that made them smile after the attack,6 therefore, The Onion actually started laughing before the official permission had been given. Looking at the examples above, one might wonder: would it be morally acceptable to laugh about the tragedy? Is it morally acceptable, appropriate, and correct to make these kinds of jokes? Instead of developing a moral argument, in this paper I concentrate on the issue how the society and media function, therefore I have to find more appropriate questions. I ask myself: How and why can irony become acceptable or unacceptable? Are there norms that regulate irony? Is there a kind of irony that is specific to the trauma's aftermath? 3 O'Rourke III, D.J. The Death and Re-Birth of Irony: The Onion's Call for Rhetorical Healing in the Wake of 9/11 // R.E. Denton (ed.) Language, Symbols, and the Media. Communication in the Aftermath of the World Trade Center Attack. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Publishers, 2006. P. 102. 4 Achter P. Comedy in Unfunny Times: News Parody and Carnival after 9/11 // Critical Studies in Media Communication. 2008. Vol. 25/3. P. 275. 5 Kuipers G. 'Where Was King Kong When We Needed Him?' Public Discourse, Digital Disaster Jokes, and the Functions of Laughter after 9/11 // The Journal of American Culture. 2005. Vol. 28/1. P. 73. 6 See Kuipers, op. cit., p. 73; Achter, op. cit., p. 286. A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 155No 2. 2012 To answer these questions I analyze the contents, delivery, and exact timing of The Onion's jokes to determine the functions of irony in regard to the attack. I will examine publications mentioning 9/11 from 2006 till 2011. It is the period from the fifth anniversary of the attack till the day when Osama bin Laden was killed. My sample allows me to uncover delayed effects of the trauma on humour. Throughout all eleven years that have passed since 2001 The Onion's stories included materials on 9/11. I find that the persistence is rather rhetoric-motivated than event-based. In other words, many stories were independent from then recent historical events. They were using the attack as a reference point within several stable rhetorical patterns. Theories that help to find out a possible explanation are those of cultural trauma by Jeffrey Alexander and of irony by Linda Hutcheon. I will detail their major points below and then I will proceed to the analysis of jokes. The Social Process of Cultural Trauma Jeffrey Alexander's theory of collective trauma is a constructivist one. He proceeds from the idea that trauma «is not the result of an event but the effect of a sociocultural process»7. «Collective actors "decide" to represent social pain as a fundamental threat to their sense of who they are, where they came from, and where they want to go».8 Analysing trauma as a process carried out by social agents, Alexander proposes the following schematic sequence of events: speaker(s) claim(s) trauma, labels an event as traumatic; carrier groups spread this idea out and make sense of an event; and the audience receives this message. Alexander labels this process «cultural construction of trauma». A trauma claim proposed by the speaker should satisfy several criteria. First, the nature of the pain must be explained. Second, it must be clear who the victim is. Third, a relation of the trauma victim to the wider audience should be explained. Finally, responsibility should be attributed, i.e. it must be clear who the perpetrator is. Given these conditions, it is assumed that the majority of people accept the idea of a traumatic nature of an event, and trauma becomes a new master narrative. The sociologist Neil Smelser proposes his analysis of the traumatic aspect of 9/11 in terms developed by Alexander.9 In his article, written four months after the attack, Smelser describes how the nation was mobilized and solidarity was strengthened. Moreover, as the author points 7 Alexander J. Toward a Theory of Cultural Trauma // J. Alexander (ed.) Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity. Berkley: University of California Press, 2004. P. 10. 8 Ibid. 9 Smelser N. Epilogue: September 11, 2001, as Cultural Trauma // Alexander (ed.), op. cit., p. 264–282. 156 out, 9/11 caused «the emergence of primordial cultural themes»10 which included, in particular: «... a reassertion of the virtues of nation and community: unashamed flagwaving patriotism; a feeling that we, as Americans, under attack, were one again; and a feeling of pride in the American way of life, its values, its culture, and its democracy»11. This tells us that humor and irony were likely to be considered inappropriate in the aftermath of the attack. However, as I demonstrated on the examples above, it did not take long for irony to resume. How did it become possible? The contradiction between the seriousness of a reactivated primordialism and irony seems impossible if the irony is seen solely as a deconstructive, destabilizing, and relativizing practice. It can be also mobilizing, if, for example, it is regarded as one of the American values,12 or as helping to cope with the trauma, as the aforementioned Rudolf Giuliani's permission to laugh again may suggest.13 The fact is that the same joke can be regarded both as deconstructive and mobilizing. There is nothing intrinsically ideological in the irony itself. What matters is its intended use and its perception. The contradiction between humour and trauma narrative is elusive. In order to understand this point better I will discuss the differences between conservative and deconstructive discourses, then I will proceed to Linda Hutcheon's theory of irony, and ultimately, I will analyse certain jokes about 9/11 from The Onion. Official Discourse versus Irony? When thinking about trauma discourse and its relation to different kinds of parody, it is very probable to assume that the trauma discourse is equivalent to the official discourse, ushered by serious news media and political agents. It can be characterized as hegemonic, conservative, protective, healing, re-establishing collective identity, and serious. The ironical discourse would automatically become the counter-discourse and would embrace very different characteristics: being resisting to dominant systems of meanings, irritating, challenging existing social institutions, and undermining values. Note that the entire sequence of events, however consistent it seems at first, is based entirely on a single assumption that pure types and binary oppositions exist, and that their function is inscribed in them naturally and cannot be changed through time or through agency and use. This assumption is very strong. It is very likely to observe ironical discourse bearing the official discourse characteristics. For example, it can be trauma healing, protecting people from the pain of the loss, re10 Smelser, op. cit., p. 269. 11 Ibid., p. 270. 12 Kuipers, op. cit., p. 73. 13 For criticism of the coping interpretation of disaster humour cf. Kuipers, op. cit., p. 71–72. A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 157No 2. 2012 uniting people, creating a new sense of community. Relaxing this assumption I discovered that ironical discourse tries to delude readers and to hide an attempt to re-establish hegemony. Theoretically, it is not a contradiction. It is not necessarily true that ironical discourse just mocks, destroys, and deconstructs, and that it does not propose anything positive or conventional. In this instance, it can help the official discourse to establish some values. It is not necessary that it is as revolutionary as it seemed in the beginning. But did it really seem revolutionary? Or is it just the reader being trapped into the binary mode of thinking? What about hybridity of discourses? And what if different people who hear a joke can interpret it in different ways, that is to say that the result of the ironical discourse depends not only on intentions of the ironist, but also on the audience's choice? And does the overall outcome always depend on the audience anyway? The theoretical approach is limited in its ability to answer the question. I will perform an empirical analysis based on Linda Hutcheon's theory of irony. Theory of Irony In her book The Edge of Irony, Linda Hutcheon argues that the situation when the ironist produces a joke and the interpreter gets it is an unreal one because this vision ignores the syntactic (contextual) and pragmatic (responsive) aspects of communication. In the entirety of a communicative situation, the interpreter is not exogenous. She or he has freedom to interpret a message and participate in the creation of the ironical effect of it. Another element of the process is discursive communities. That is why Linda Hutcheon insists on the fact that irony «happens» in discourse. There is no guarantee that the joke would be interpreted in an intended way if it is. Hutcheon calls the situation of the ambiguity 'politics of irony'. Linda Hutcheon points out that the meaning of irony is not just the reverse of what is said.14 Therefore, it would be too simplistic if not totally wrong to regard The Onion as a mirror that reflects serious discourses but just turning them upside down. One will see that in reality the spectrum of humourist approaches to 9/11 by The Onion is quite broad. Nevertheless, the occurrence of jokes about 9/11 might indicate the on-going activity in re-framing and re-interpreting the event of the official discourses. I concentrate on the rhetoric of jokes without establishing any causal relationships with events. It is important to keep in mind that the meaning of a sign be it a serious concept or a matter of a joke, is arbitrary, time-dependent, and varies by an interpreter. In regard to The Onion's irony it means the following: it is unlikely that throughout the 2000s 9/11 as a concept meant 14 Hutcheon L. Irony's Edge. The Theory and Politics of Irony. London and New York: Routledge, 1995. P. 23. 158 the same thing. Then, since different audiences perceive, interpret, and use media materials in various ways, 9/11's meaning cannot be the same for everybody. There are two important implications of these two points for this research. Firstly, it is essential to trace the change in The Onion's irony about 9/11 through time rather than assuming that 9/11 stands for the same thing in 2001 as in 2008. Secondly, my interpretation and understanding of The Onion's 9/11 jokes represents just one of many possible ones. The Onion is a weekly newspaper that comes out every Wednesday. In September 2001 it did not appear when it was supposed to, namely on September 19. It resumed on September 26 and was nearly entirely dedicated to the event. About a half of materials of the following, October 10, issue mentioned 9/11 as well. Moreover, there were jokes about 9/11 appearing steadily throughout the whole decade after the attack. Despite the fact of the stability of 9/11 as a rhetorical frame, media scholars who studied media coverage of 9/11 by The Onion's 9/11 have dealt mostly with the September 26 issue.15 In this paper, I will go further to analyse 9/11 humourist representations from a long-term perspective. More specifically, I will focus on publications made between the fifth 9/11 anniversary and May 2011 when Osama bin Laden was killed. I look at the persistence of 9/11 jokes in the period well beyond the event has been settled. How was 9/11 remembered on its fifth anniversary and during the years that followed, till the moment when Osama bin Laden was killed? In what contexts does 9/11 appear years after the tragedy? How do these jokes frame and re-frame the event of 9/11? How is the nature of pain/victim/perpetrator and the relation with a wider audience established? Which discursive communities is the irony related to? What is the politics of irony (inclusion/exclusion, subordination)? What do The Onion's authors try to communicate through these jokes about post-9/11 collective consciousness of the U.S.? Objects of Jokes During the first five years after the event The Onion recalled 9/11 in the materials that ridiculed such political and social issues as the war in Iraq, the Patriot Act, and the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005. In the period from 2006 to 2011 The Onion mentioned 9/11 in relation to the fifth anniversary of the tragedy; the 'War on Terror' campaign, which included the Iraq war as well, counter-terrorism measures; the release of two 9/11 films in 2006, Oliver Stone's World Trade Center and United 93 by Paul Greengrass; debates about constructing the New York Islamic Center around Ground Zero; the President Election campaign of 2007–2008; and, finally, the killing of Osama bin Laden. Political fig15 Achter, op. cit. (2008); Kuipers, op. cit. (2005); O'Rourke III, op. cit. (2006); Warner, J. Humor, Terror, and Dissent: The Onion after 9/11 // V.G. Ted Gournelos (ed.) A Decade of Dark Humor. How Comedy, Irony, and Satire Shaped Post-9/11 America. University Press of Mississippi/Jackson, 2011. P. 57–77. A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 159No 2. 2012 ures that were ridiculed the most between 2006 and 2011 in relation to 9/11 were George W. Bush, Bush's Vice President Dick Cheney, and the former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. In particular, such events as Bush's retirement, Dick Cheney's alleged sternness and heart problems, Giuliani's participation in the presidential election campaign became triggers for The Onion's humourists. Among these publications, I find not only event-triggered reports, but most interestingly, rhetoric-motivated ones. They did not address any particular events but were informed by specific rhetorical frames and had to do with long-lasting social phenomena. Such social conditions were fear of terrorists, islamophobia, the state's security measures, pragmatic exploitation of and profiting from the tragedy by politicians, conspiracy theories, and, finally, collective memory about 9/11 itself. In addition, a number of commentaries had 9/11 events on their background. I will focus on rhetorically motivated materials only. They deserve a particular attention because they have to do with stable interpretative patterns that circulate in the society, and therefore, their analysis will permit a better understanding of the reasons and ways of 9/11 becoming a part of American collective identity and initiated persistent collective discourses about the post 9/11 American society. I show that these discourses, which initially intended to contrast themselves to official memory discourses by allowing for ambiguity in its steadiness, had become hegemonic, steady, and unilateral in the end. The following rhetorical patterns were the most frequent on The Onion's pages during the period in question: a 'memory hole', anxiety about security measures, 9/11 capitalizers, terrorists and their interrogations, and American islamophobia. I will analyze three of these patterns in detail leaving the rest for the future research. Memory Hole When Ernest Renan in his lecture What is a Nation? stated that forgetting «is a crucial factor in the creation of a nation»16 he meant that in order to become a political formation its members should first forget that they had been different once and that the way towards the current state of nation lied through brutality, violence, and compulsion. His idea was provoking since it is commonly assumed that a sense of belonging or, in other terms, a collective identity very much depends on memory. On the other hand, it is often said that precisely collective identity is based on memory of violence and trauma. Moreover, trauma can be the very trigger of the identity creation, as it was in the case of trauma of slavery, which led to the emergence of the African-American cultural identity.17 16 Bhabha H. Nation and Narration. Bristol: Routledge, 2000. P. 11. 17 Eyerman R. Cultural Trauma: Slavery and the Formation of African American Identity // Alexander (ed.), op. cit., p. 60–111. 160 Interpreting the idea of cultural identity in the light of Ernest Renan's theory, one can argue that in order to be a nation or, to put it differently, in order to obtain a collective identity, members of a community should forget some things and retain others. The issue about what should be remembered and what should be forgotten is a battlefield where politicians, critics, experts, moralists fight among each other. Another name of this battlefield is politics of memory. In regard to the Unites States, one of the parties, that takes part in this battle, promotes the idea that the United States of America can be seen as, metaphorically speaking, the United States of Amnesia. This idea implies that the entire nation systematically tries to force out painful and shameful memories such as the war in Vietnam or Abu Ghraib issue, or alternatively, to reframe them in a way so that actual deaths and sufferings of the country's citizens or victims of the country's politics are put aside and the country itself is remembered as possessing no responsibility for that.18 Whether 9/11 has passed or it is still going through a similar purification is an interesting question. Whatever the answer would be, it is clear that any practice of evocation of 9/11 is a part of the memory process. The Onion takes part in this process and it proposes its own vision of the nation's and its authorities' ability to remember the attacks. It can be assumed from The Onion's jokes that the ones who suffer from amnesia are ordinary Americans: «On the fifth anniversary this month, CNN.com will be streaming footage all day of the network's televised coverage from Sept. 11th, 2001, enabling viewers to relive it as events unfolded. What do you think?»19, asks the September 8, 2006 issue20. «September what?» answers Becca Townes, Systems Analyst. Later on, on May 14, 2009 The Onion asks its 'readers': «Beginning July 4, the crown of the Statue of Liberty will be open to the public for the first time since Sept. 11, 2001. What do you think?» (Italics in the original.)21 Claudia Bunning's answer is: «They closed the Statue of Liberty on Sept. 11? Did anything good happen on that day?» (Italics in the original.)22 18 Cf. the analysis of the cinematic memory about the War in Vietnam is carried out in: Fluck W. The 'Imperfect Past': Vietnam According to the Movies // H.-J. Grabbe, S. Schindler (eds.) The Merits of Memory. Concepts, Contexts, Debates. Heidelberg: Universitatsverlag, 2008. P. 353–387. 19 All the articles of The Onion are cited from the newspaper's web-site http:// www.theonion.com/. In order to group the articles chronologically, I used the advanced search options on Google search engine using «'Sept. 11' OR 9/11» as a keyword. 20 CNN's Chilling 9/11 Tribute // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2006. Sept. 8. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from http://www.theonion.com/articles/cnns-chilling-911-tribute,15064/ 21 Statue of Liberty's Crown Reopening // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2009. May 14. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from http://www.theonion. com/articles/statue-of-libertys-crown-reopening,15704/ 22 Ibid. A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 161No 2. 2012 Once more The Onion represents the Americans as having no memory in the article by a thought-out columnist Michael Jenkes Hey, Wasn't There Some Sort Of National Tragedy A Few Months Back? in the June 6, 2007 issue.23 (22. Jenkes) As a matter of fact, 2007 was a pretty quit year for the United States. The last significant tragic events before 2007 took place in 2005 when the Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans. Thus, the author does not refer to any particular national tragedy but he rather addresses the absence of the sense of responsibility, seriousness, and long-term memory about what had happened to the US previously. The indicator of this intention is in the following line: «Because if something like that had actually happened just a few months ago, I'm sure we'd all still be hearing about it and talking about it every day»24. In other words the author is framing the USA as the United States of Amnesia and talks about what is known in popular culture as «the Great American Memory Hole», meaning a lack of collective long-term memory. He compares his personal memories with a movie: «I must be thinking of some movie I saw. But if so, man, it was a pretty fucked-up movie»25. This comparison reminds of another one, from the September 26, 2001 issue, from the article entitled American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie26 where the major point is that despite the fact that 9/11 looks like a movie in the media it is nevertheless real. The Onion's criticism of the 9/11 media coverage can be a separate research issue and it is not my focus here. What is still important to notice in regard to the memory issue is that Michael Jenkes's article is a good example of the ambivalence of irony. On the one hand, it might be seen as a parody of a moralist discourse and of those who criticise Americans for their collective amnesia. On the other hand, it might be interpreted as a serious statement, The Onion's critical opinion about people's short memory and disrespect directly expressed through the fist-person narrative. 23 Jenkes M. Hey, Wasn't There Some Sort Of National Tragedy A Few Months Back? // The Onion. America's Finest News Source, June 6, 2007. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/hey-wasnt-theresome-sort-of-national-tragedy-a-fe,11314/ 24 Jenkes, op. cit. 25 Ibid. 26 American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2001. Sept. 26. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/american-life-turns-into-bad-jerrybruckheimer-mov,220/ 162 In 2009 The Onion thrust Americans once again in the video entitled Americans Observing 9/11 By Trying Not To Masturbate27. This material ridicules ordinary people's practices of commemoration of the national tragedy. Their inability to respond to 9/11 has already become a matter of parody in the September 26, 2001 issue.28 But while the 2001 issue described memory practices as a result of an interiorised ideology of commemoration that became automatic, the 2009 issue emphasises a restrictive and repressive aspect of memory practices that people reluctantly subjected themselves to, and the fact that the agreement to do so is actually challenged. The challenge to this agreement is expressed through the last person who speaks in this video: «I know that I shouldn't masturbate on this day, but, I don't know... Should I not masturbate on Pear Harbour Day too?.. There is literally nothing in this world that'll keep me from masturbating»29. Thus, The Onion equates those memory practices that are reproduced mechanically or out of conformism to the absence of memory. What is also absent in both cases is sincerity, and The Onion seems to be protecting this value rather then undermining it. Interestingly, while ordinary Americans are the objects of The Onion's irony for their amnesia, the authorities are represented as remembering 9/11 very well, but the newspaper shows their memory as not being sincere. It mocks the ways the state authorities express their grief. In the articles dealing with this aspect of the 9/11 aftermath The Onion represents state authorities as being cynic, highly pragmatic, profitdriven, non-efficient, and neglecting the task to remember. For example, the September 11, 2006 issue published an article entitled NYC Unveils 9/11 Memorial Hole30 which talks about the opening of the 70-foot hole on the site where the Twin Towers once stood. The Hole, as the articles says, «contains over 16 acres of empty space, and is visible as far away as Hoboken, NJ. Over USD 175 million has been spent on the Hole's development, and thousands of pages of proposals and designs concerning the site in which the Hole was excavated were reviewed in over 2,800 hours of meetings. Work crews comprising more than 7,500 welders, equipment operators, ex27 Americans Observing 9/11 by Trying Not to Masturbate // The Onion. America's Finest News Source, 2009. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http:// www.theonion.com/video/americans-observing-911-by-trying-not-tomasturbat,14366/ 28 Not Knowing What Else To Do, Woman Bakes American-Flag Cake // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2001. Sept. 26. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/not-knowing-what-else-todo-woman-bakes-americanfl,221/ 29 Americans Observing 9/11, op. cit. 30 NYC Unveils 9/11 Memorial Hole // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2006. Sept. 11. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: ttp://www.theonion. com/articles/nyc-unveils-911-memorial-hole,2038/ A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 163No 2. 2012 cavators, and other construction specialists spent long, often unpaid shifts in its depths»31. The Hole is supposed to bring profit to the state and to promote the clash of civilizations idea. The article hints not only at the fact that by the fifth anniversary of 9/11 no memorial had been accomplished allegedly due to the bad management, corruption, and illegal status of workers involved, but also at the more broad symbolic meaning of the hole: «... that this deep, empty hole has come to stand not only for the New York City of today, but also for the transformation of the entire United States since Sept. 11, 2001»32. The September 22, 2008 issue suggests yet another variant of a 9/11 memorial which would also be a profit-oriented, blindly patriotic place revealing the state's impotence in front of real terrorism.33 Alongside these 9/11 memorials The Onion reports about another one, opened by the conspiracy theory advocates.34 Thus, those who oppose themselves to the official version of the event become objects of jokes. A similar attitude towards the conspiracy theory supporters can be found in the video 9/11 Conspiracy Theories 'Ridiculous', Al Qaeda Says35 in which a supposed conspiracy theory advocate meets an Al Qaeda representative. Despite the fact that the latter is scoffed at, the former one is mocked in not a lesser degree. Thus, The Onion points its sting at those who forget the tragedy, who capitalise on it, and who oppose the official version of 9/11. Therefore, The Onion's irony is far from being subversive towards traditional values of respect, esteem, and memory. It can be said that The Onion ridicules unauthentic ways of mourning and remembering and, as a consequence, it probably has an idea of an authentic way. But since the principle of irony is to say things indirectly, this authentic way can be only reconstructed through hints left by the newspaper's humourists. Anxiety and Security Measures What does The Onion say about 9/11 implications for the society's psyche? Its vision can be summarized as follows: the U.S. government propagated the sense of terror, fear, and anxiety in order to take control over the population. 31 NYC Unveils 9/11 Memorial Hole. 32 Ibid. 33 Plans For 9/11 Museum Revealed // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2008. Sept. 22. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion. com/articles/plans-for-911-museum-revealed,8466/ 34 Construction Complete On 9/11 Truther Memorial // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2010. Sept. 7. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http:// www.theonion.com/articles/construction-complete-on-911-truther-memorial,18034/ 35 9/11 Conspiracy Theories 'Ridiculous', Al Qaeda Says // The Onion. America's Finest News Source, 2010. Retrieved July 16, 2012 from: http:// www.theonion.com/video/911-conspiracy-theories-ridiculous-al-qaedasays,14222/ 164 «No, Cheney continued. No, 9/11 is about the warm feeling you get when you help an elderly woman cross the street and then whisper to her that the terrorists can strike at any moment. 9/11 is about the satisfaction of telling people to do things and then them doing it – not because they want to, but because they are afraid to do otherwise. 9/11 is about removing Saddam Hussein from power. But most of all, 9/11 is about love».36 A fake George W. Bush takes a similar position: «Everywhere I look brings back memories. The Blue Room is where Laura and I put up our first White House Christmas tree. Down the hall, in the East Room, is where I concocted my favorite signing statement to circumvent the anti-torture guidelines of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, and – ooh! – right across the way is where Cheney and I decided to use the death of 3,000 Americans on 9/11 and the nation's subsequent fear of another attack as an excuse to carry out our long-standing plan to invade Iraq. I should really get a picture before I leave»37. (36. Bush) Moreover, The Onion ridicules the security measures, which were taken after the attack for their alleged inefficiency and their provoking terrorists' further aggression. In The Onion's imaginary world, U.S. Counter-Counterterrorism Unit exploits Washington Monument in order to show the Americans how fragile their security is,38 then, the Department of Homeland Security releases several Guantаnamo detainees providing them with necessary means for organization of terrorist acts in order to test the security system39. These two latter examples are interesting because that they can be interpreted in a way that The Onion actually does not totally disapprove of the conspiracy theory. If the former implies that there might be the State behind terrorist attacks, the latter openly labels 9/11 «the botched Sept. 11, 2001 security preparedness exercise». Sometimes The Onion's irony allows for a judgment, which is serious and straightforward. In respect to the anxiety issue this seriousness can be found in the following quote: 36 Cheney Waits Until Last Minute Again To Buy Sept. 11 Gifts // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2008. Sept. 1. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/cheney-waits-until-last-minute-againto-buy-sept-1,2521/ 37 Bush G. I'm Really Gonna Miss Systematically Destroying This Place // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2008. Dec. 1. Retrieved from http:// www.theonion.com/articles/im-really-gonna-miss-systematically-destroying-thi,11435/ 38 U.S. Counter-Counterterrorism Unit Successfully Destroys Washington Monument // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2007. April 11. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/us-countercounterterrorism-unit-successfully-destr,2181/ 39 DHS Releases 5 Terrorists Into U.S. To Test National Security // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2010. Aug. 4. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/dhs-releases-5-terrorists-into-us-totest-national,17838/ A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 165No 2. 2012 «Considering I was in a coma at the time, this will certainly help me fully assimilate to the scarred, paranoid society into which I awoke»40. Thus, according to The Onion, one of the consequences of 9/11 is a state of an excessive anxiety. The Onion ascribes the responsibility for this condition to the state bureaucracy. Moreover, the newspaper accuses state bureaucracy for profiting from 9/11, but not only them. 9/11 Capitalizers Articles dealing with the problem of the post-9/11 memory in the American society contained several hints on pragmatic and even cynic uses of the tragedy by political figures. In fact, The Onion dedicates some of its 9/11 materials to this very issue alone. The Onion seems to imply that George W. Bush, former Vice President of Cheney personally, the Bush's administration in general, and media structures used it to accomplish their own egoist plans. In 2006, two feature films about 9/11 came out: Oliver Stone's World Trade Center and United 93 by Paul Greengrass. Both films were criticized for their conservatism, conventionalism, but also for their use of the 9/11 issue for self-promotion. The Onion follows this line of criticism «live in a post-United 93 world now», declares the newspaper equating the damage caused by 9/11 to the damage produced by watching the film.41 «This film [United 93] will be a touching tribute to the media exploitation of Sept. 11», says one of the 'respondents' in the article First 9/11 Film Coming42. This is another example of the irony which is not ironic, as it was in the article "Hey, Wasn't There Some Sort Of National Tragedy A Few Months Back?" in the June 6, 2007 issue.43 Media exploitation of 9/11 is further criticised in the article, which mocks at Olive Stone's «three-and-a-half-hour film»44. Here again The Onion mocks at the conspiracy theory and media's pretention to be showing 'the reality'. It can be argued that The Onion's parodies promote a constructivist vision of the media production and stimulate a critical stance towards political and media initiatives. In other words, The Onion propagates the idea that the media reality is not the reality itself but representation: 40 CNN's Chilling 9/11 Tribute, op. cit. 41 Springer M. Is Opening Week Too Soon To See A 9/11 Movie? // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2006. April 26. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/is-opening-week-too-soon-tosee-a-911-movie,11221/ 42 First 9/11 Film Coming // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2006. April 10. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/ first-911-film-coming,14965/ 43 Jenkes, op. cit. 44 New Oliver Stone 9/11 Film Introduces 'Single Plane' Theory // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2006. Aug. 8. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/new-oliver-stone-911-film-introducessingle-plane,2017/ 166 «After seeing that sequence, there's no way anyone can ever deny again that there was only one plane in the airspace over the eastern seaboard that morning», Stone said.45 The concern that viewers will not be able to tell a media show from a real terrorist event had been already expressed in the 2001 article American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie46. «An actual scene from real life» and «Another scene not from a movie» said the captions for real photos of 9/11 attack placed in the article. These captions suggested that despite the fact that the attack might seem unreal it is not a special effect. The Onion emphasises that, once having appeared on the screen, 9/11 representations became embedded into the logic of media production. The September 26, 2001 issue contained a thought out TV programme grid where all programmes were about 9/11. The October 3, 2001 issue called 9/11 media coverage «Surreality TV»47. The September 8, 2006 issue treated this phenomenon as follows: «I doubt many people will watch. During that time, FoxNews.com will be airing Pirates of the Caribbean», says Zac Polk, Interior Decorator, in the article CNN's Chilling 9/11 Tribute.48 The Onion's vision of the 9/11 capitalisation includes not only media structures but also political figures. As various jokes suggest, Rudolph Giuliani used 9/11 as an investment into his symbolic capital for his presidential campaign,49 George W. Bush used 9/11 as a pretext to invade Iraq50, Dick Cheney used it to propagate the sense of terror amongst citizens to facilitate manipulation51. While ordinary Americans, according to The Onion, do not remember 9/11, Dick Cheney remembers it very well. In the end all the aforementioned persons are honoured with a prize for being the tragedy capitalizers.52. 45 New Oliver Stone 9/11 Film Introduces 'Single Plane' Theory. 46 American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2001. Sept. 26. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/american-life-turns-into-bad-jerrybruckheimer-mov,220/ 47 Network Programming Dominated by 'Surreality TV' // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2001. Oct. 3. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http:// www.theonion.com/articles/network-programming-dominated-by-surreality-tv,3293/ 48 CNN's Chilling 9/11 Tribute, op. cit. 49 Giuliani to Run for President of 9/11 // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2007. Feb. 21. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion. com/articles/giuliani-to-run-for-president-of-911,2152/ 50 Bush, op. cit. 51 Cheney Waits Until Last Minute Again To Buy Sept. 11 Gifts // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2008. Sept. 1. Retrieved July 16, 2012 from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/cheney-waits-until-last-minute-againto-buy-sept-1,2521/ 52 Congress Honors 9/11 First Capitalizers // The Onion. America's Finest News Source. 2011. Jan. 18. Retrieved July 16, 2012, from: http://www.theonion.com/articles/congress-honors-911-first-capitalizers,18856/ A. Khitrov · Irony About Tragedy 167No 2. 2012 Thus, once more one can see that The Onion's role in respect to the memory about trauma is protective. One of the indicators of its protective intentions is its humourists' sudden seriousness, which has been already mentioned before. One more example of this seriousness can be found in the following quote from the article Congress Honors 9/11 First Capitalizers: «Americans who eventually capitalized on the tragedy with their bullshit advertising, partisan rhetoric, forgettable novels, defence contracts, and all-around cheap, manipulative sentimentalism»53. Here The Onion steps back from its ironic tone and turns to straightforward accusations. Conclusion In the course of ten years since 9/11 The Onion has been developing ironic narratives about the attack. I have shown how the newspaper remembered this event during last five years. There are several discursive patterns into which 9/11 publications can be qualified. These include «Memory Hole», the spirit of anxiety and concern with security measures, and 9/11 capitalizers. I argue that in my reading of these jokes The Onion does not take a subversive position towards the tragedy itself. Instead it rather functions as a censor who ridicules the absence of memory, perverse forms of commemoration, profit-driven commemoration, and exaggeration of security measures. The newspaper accuses ordinary Americans of having no memory and state bureaucrats along with media structures for remembering 9/11 in a cynic way. Speaking about 9/11 itself, The Onion becomes extremely serious. 53 Congress Honors 9/11 First Capitalizers.

Philosophy
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2018 https://philosophypathways.com/newsletter/ 1 The definition of systematizing in S. Baron-Cohen's gender and autism research Terence Edward Abstract. The professor of psychopathology Simon Baron-Cohen is wellknown for his thesis that males are on average better at systematizing than empathizing and females are on average better at empathizing than systematizing. In this paper, I note an ambiguity in how he defines systematizing. Introduction Since very early on in this century, Simon Baron-Cohen has advocated a certain theory about what is true on average about males and what is true on average about females (2003: 8-9). Baron-Cohen tests human beings along two dimensions: empathy and drive to systematize (2003: 6). Empathy is understood as the ability to identify the thoughts and feelings of others and the trait of responding appropriately. (An example he gives of responding appropriately is responding with consideration towards someone in pain. See 2003: 2.) The drive to systematize is understood as the drive to construct or understand systems, systems being things that are rule governed or operate according to laws. According to Baron-Cohen, if one plots people's scores on these two dimensions, one can distinguish between individuals whose empathizing is stronger than their systematizing, individuals whose systematizing is stronger than their empathizing and individuals whose empathizing and systematizing are equal (2003: 6). He refers to those with stronger empathizing as having brain type E, those with stronger systematizing as having brain type S, and those who are balanced in these qualities as having brain type B. He also says that females on average have brain type E and males on average have brain type S, and goes on to refer to type E as the female brain and type S as the male brain (2003: 6). But Baron-Cohen allows that a male may have a female brain and that a female may have a male brain. Autistics, Baron-Cohen proposes, have an extreme version of the male brain (2003: 6). The statistics Baron-Cohen presents are very much worth looking into. But with only 56% of men qualifying as type S and 44% of women qualifying as type Philosophy
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2018 https://philosophypathways.com/newsletter/ 2 E (Baron-Cohen 2009: 76), there seems to be quite a lot of diversity that is masked by speaking of the male and female brain as he does. However, I do not pursue this point below. The purpose of this paper is to raise another point of concern: there is an ambiguity regarding his definition of systematizing. Defining the systematizing quality On the basis of what he says, I am unsure how best to define the systematizing quality which Baron-Cohen is interested in. Earlier I introduced it as a drive to systematize, because that is how Baron-Cohen introduces it. In his 2003 book for non-specialist audiences, entitled The Essential Difference: Men, Women and the Extreme Male Brain, he writes: Systematizing is the drive to1 analyse, explore and construct a system. (2003: 3) Baron-Cohen sometimes refers to systematizing as systemizing. In a 2009 article summarizing his research on autism for neuroscientists, he writes: To understand this theory we need to consider... the concept of systemizing. Systemizing is the drive to analyze or construct systems. These might be any kind of system. What defines a system is that it follows rules, and when we systemize we are trying to identify the rules of the system, in order to predict how that system will behave. (2009: 71) Baron-Cohen is using much the same definition at present (see Warrier et al. 2016: 2). The definition of systematizing as a drive is also repeated in an article by Daniel Nettle responding to Baron-Cohen (2007: 237). If Baron-Cohen is interested in a drive to analyse, explore or construct systems, then it makes sense to speak of one person as having a stronger drive to do such things than another person. It also makes sense to compare this drive within a person with another drive within them, saying that this drive is stronger or weaker than the other drive. However, Baron-Cohen sometimes writes as if what he is interested in is not 1 I am not sure if it makes sense to say that "Systematizing is the drive to..." because systematizing sounds as if it refers to something one can be doing, whereas a drive is not something one can be doing, rather it is something one has or does not have. I think it would be better to either say, "Systematizing is the activity of..." or else "The drive to systematize is the drive to..." Philosophy
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2018 https://philosophypathways.com/newsletter/ 3 a drive at all, rather a skill (2003: 6; 2009: 72). For example, in his 2003 book, he poses the following question: We all have both systematizing and empathizing skills. The question is: how much of each have you got? (2003: 6) Skill is different from drive. One can have a drive to do something, but repeatedly fail in one's efforts to do this thing, because one lacks adequate skill. One can also have a skill, but little drive to use it. An emphasis on skill can be found in a writer summarizing Baron-Cohen's thinking, namely Deborah Barnbaum, in her book on the ethics of autism.2 On Barnbaum's interpretation, when Baron-Cohen associates the male brain with systematizing, what he is saying is that the male brain is better at certain systematizing tasks than the female brain (2008: 26). So is the systematizing quality Baron-Cohen is interested in to be defined in terms of the drive to construct, explore or analyse systems, or a skill in at least one of these areas, or some mixture of drive and skill? As far as I can see, his texts are ambiguous regarding how best to characterize the qualities he is focusing on. References Barnbaum, D.R. 2008. The Ethics of Autism: Among Them, but Not of Them. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Baron-Cohen, S. 2003. The essential difference: men, women and the extreme male brain. London: Allen Lane. Baron-Cohen, S. 2009. Autism: The Empathizing-Systemizing (E-S) Theory. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1156: 68-80. Fine, C. 2010. Delusions of Gender: The Real Science Behind Sex Differences. London: Icon Books. 2 Some of Cordelia Fine's responses to Baron-Cohen also depend on the skill interpretation. For example, she considers girls with congenital adrenal hyperplasia. In relation to their level of systematizing, she writes, "As for systemising, in the absence of an actual test of this ability it's impossible to know." (2010: 120) Systematizing is understood in terms of skill at this point, not drive. But elsewhere she works with a drive interpretation, criticizing a systematizing quotient questionnaire for being insufficiently focused on determining the level of drive to understand systems (2010: 110). Philosophy
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2018 https://philosophypathways.com/newsletter/ 4 Nettle, D. 2007. Empathizing and systemizing: What are they, and what do they contribute to our understanding of psychological sex differences? British Journal of Psychology 98: 237-255. Warrier, V., Toro, R., Chakrabarti, B., Litterman, N., Hinds, D., Bourgeron, T., Baron-Cohen, S. 2016. Genome-wide analyses of empathy and systemizing: heritability and correlates with sex, education, and psychiatric risk. bioRxiv beta: the preprint server for biology. Accessed on 10th July 2016 from: http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/04/29/050682.full.pdf+html Terence Rajivan Edward University of Manchester © Terence Edward 2018 Email: [email protected]

An eclectic blog on which appears daily one-thousand word essays on somethingorother. prairiemary Friday, March 22, 2013 AMERICAN GOTHIC MAINSTREAM FICTION It was all very unexpected and unpredictable that suddenly a man named Subhasis Chattopadhyay, who according to Google is an Assistant Professor of English http://www.academicroom.com/users/cshubho posted a message to the Westlit acadenuc listserv. "I am currently on PhD completion sabbatical provided by the Government of India. I am working on the problem of evil, the soveriegnty of the good and millenial concerns in the works of Stephen King and Cormac McCarthy. I hold a First Masters in English from the University of Calcutta. I have also earned a Post Graduate Diploma in Biblical Studies from the Pontifical Athaenuem, Banaglore; also having separately trained there to become a spiritual counsellor." But he confides on an email, "In person, I am a lazy music listening , reading and theological fellow. Not religious though." I take that to mean he is not conventionally religious in the sense of observant and that I would get along with him just fine. I also find his insights valuable enough to quote. ______________ Here is his thesis title: "Revisiting the American Western and the Thriller with special reference to Cormac McCarthy and Stephen King." This is his idea, mercilessly edited by myself: "Stephen King and Cormac McCarthy are not usually studied together. . . . Their critical receptions have been very different: King has been rejected as being "a writer of penny dreadfuls" (Bloom n.pag.) for writing "socially marginal money-making pulp" (Ingebretsen 105) unworthy of the National Book Foundation's annual award for 'distinguished contribution to American letters' [awarded to King in 2003] while Cormac McCarthy has been praised by the same Harold Bloom as an heir to Herman Melville." . . .Both Stephen King and Cormac McCarthy, though committing themselves to different genres, have the same aim: they subvert their chosen genres and engage with horror and violence not for the sake of horror and violence but for the sake of critiquing society. . . One of the ideological issues that both King and McCarthy engage with is the problem of evil. Their portrayal of violence goes beyond surface gore questioning the meanings of both good and evil, for "a fundamental religious and moral question has to do with goodness amid ... evil. Still, in the configurational act of understanding, "world" comes to some meaningfulness, whether good or evil. This is not a creation ex nihilo since the fundamental fact of our existence is that we find ourselves in a world to which we respond. . . . . . . Like Emmanuel Kant (1724 – 1804) they are "haunted by a sense of cosmic mystery" (Greene 92). It has been remarked recently that "some of the most stirring affirmations of Christian faith can be found in the chilling stories of King" (Blake n. pag.) and Cormac McCarthy's novels have been seen as allegories of spiritual survival, suggesting "religious themes centering around suffering and a hope for answers, if not redemption" (Rothfork 285). . . .An "apocalyptic tone" (Derrida, Apocalyptic Tone 3-37) provides them the necessary intellectual space required to study Christian theology and theodicy [if God is omnipotent and good, why does he make us suffer?] in terms of the thriller and the Western. Both Stephen King and Cormac McCarthy make explicit the risks of "doing theology" (Hopkins 136) within the parameters of their fictions and this is of concern in this study. ...where did Evil go? And the answer is: everywhere ...In a society which seeks ...to concern itself solely ... with the discourse of Search SEARCH THIS BLOG clustrmaps ► 2017 (159) ► 2016 (408) ► 2015 (389) ► 2014 (373) ▼ 2013 (380) ► December (32) ► November (33) ► October (33) ► September (30) ► August (33) ► July (33) ► June (32) ► May (32) ► April (31) ▼ March (31) THE EASTER OVUM KNOTTING A SHAWL FOR A PLANET LOVE AND MARRIAGE AN ACTING ROLE MODEL THE ECOLOGY OF CHARITY THE TRIUNE BRAIN OUT ON THE EDGE THREE SOURCES OF MORALITY HEROES IN OUR MIDST AMERICAN GOTHIC MAINSTREAM FICTION "LIVVAGTERNE"-- "THE PROTECTORS" RE-CRIMINALIZING CONDOMS THE MACHINIFICATION Blog Archive 0 More Next Blog» Create Blog Sign In converted by Web2PDFConvert.com Newer Post Older PostHome Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) Posted by Mary Strachan Scriver at 3:10 AM Labels: American lit, Theology the Good, in a society where it is no longer possible to speak Evil, Evil has metamorphosed into all the viral and terroristic forms that obsess us. (Baudrillard 81) There are two traditional interpretations of the dominant mode of American literature, especially its fiction – the mode of romance, and the mode of the Gothic which is a variant of the romance, emphasizing its darker aspects (Miller 241-78) . . . Throughout the works of King and McCarthy we encounter instances of clinical insanity. The theme of insanity which runs through Gothic literature including bestsellers is relevant to our discussion since the content of both King's and McCarthy's works, including the former's short stories deal with issues within clinical psychology and psychiatry. . . .While American literature has been an unabashed investigation into the underbelly of lived experience, nonetheless "critics have made every effort to hide this fact" (Goddu 267). . . . Suttree [by McCarthy] specifically deals with alienation which may be seen for our purpose here, to re-enact the Crucifixion loneliness of Jesus. When Christ felt abandoned by His Father, He became the type for all who were abject before Him, and also crucially, of all who are to experience abjection after the Christ-event (this is the field of kenotic theology). Suttree, in this sense is a theological tale of men alienated from all others. . . He is doomed to failure. . . .From the discussion above it is now evident that both Stephen King and Cormac McCarthy have extended the unique American literary syndrome of constructing the Gothic to the realm of popular culture. And thereby they have revised American horror and western literature into vehicles of theodicy, theology and apocalyptic meditation. They are our neo-evangelists. __________________ To me, religious concepts as expressed by formal philosophers and institutions begin within the assumptions identified in this paper: good and evil, self and other, and even binaries like beginning and end. My own thoughts have run quite a different way, trying to get under these binaries by going to felt rather than defined concepts. Thus, I begin with Eliade's "The Sacred and the Profane" and an ecological "web" paradigm. That is, I look for the assumptions that our experience teaches us, and that are normally stored unconsciously. So I will say that one can feel direct contact with "the mysterium tremendum and fascinans" and that this is the true source of the Holy, truly "Other." It is as scary as the night sky. Dark, hallucinatory -and therefore Gothic. Professor Chattopadhyay points out that the sources of uncanniness and horror in these two "pop" writers are ordinary and within our experience, even the ghastly violence in McCarthy which seems not to concern most readers. I hardly know King's work. It soon becomes apparent, reading this paper, that it deals with white mainstream assumptions as suggested. I would suggest that the underlying Gothic horror is slavery and the holocaust of the American Indian. Native American "religion" is entirely experience-based, ecologically sourced, and rarely teleological though there is usually a genesis story -not always. Maybe this is why the apocalypse of the European invasion took them so much by surprise. To the white mainstream Euro, a population rapidly draining off to the Right, the Devil is the Dark Man as in McCarthy. King seems to be reacting to the ghastly wilderness of the human interior and the uncertainty whether one is dealing with reality. Recently a third source of the Gothic dark and uncanny has been the explosion of vampire romance, which some take to be an account of the HIV-AIDS epidemic and others take to be about the discovery that same-sex-desiring people are everywhere among us. Once one admits these out-groups, the whole issue of what is good versus what is evil is called into question. The relevance of the Western is partly that the "other" is so present (Indians, Mexicans, Asians) and partly that the ecologies of such a wide land throw the focus back on the tension between the loner and the group when both struggle to survive. It is also a place where time is brought up to consciousness again and again because so much irresolvable and evil history still lingers. In fact, I think our reluctance to give up this "story" is at the heart of our meddling in the Middle East. Some explicitly WANT the apocalypse to come in order to end the horror of ambiguity. "And thereby they have revised American horror and western literature into vehicles of theodicy, theology and apocalyptic meditation. They are our neo-evangelists." This is very valuable, and the more it is brought to consciousness the better. The approach will re-dignify "the people's stories" and increase our honesty about what we're doing. __________________ If you wish to contact Professor Chattopadhyay or to get the full document I quote above, you could contact me for help. Post a Comment No comments: THE MACHINIFICATION OF EVERYTHING ATTACHMENT THEORY EXPECTATIONS SHAPE POPE FRANCIS MARCH IN MONTANA: Remarks THREESOME More Thoughts about "An Unquenchable Thirst" WATCHING ALVINA KRAUSE TEACH ACTING "GROWING UP IN GLACIER PARK" Review DATA IN A WORLD OF HURT "THE UNQUENCHABLE THIRST" BY Mary Johnson FAMILY BRANCHES FEELINGS MATTER "NAPI'S LOOKOUT: THE STORY OF WILLOW ROUNDS" CELEBRATING CELIBACY "BONK" by Mary Roach: A Review RESPONSE TO SUFFERING MINISTERIAL BATSHIT TRIBAL COHERENCE AMONG THE BLOODS HIV/SDD/HCV COUNSELING, TESTING AND REFERRAL TRAIN... ► February (28) ► January (32) ► 2012 (372) ► 2011 (345) ► 2010 (369) ► 2009 (356) ► 2008 (315) ► 2007 (289) ► 2006 (222) ► 2005 (157) Simple theme. 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Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 366 Les conditions de l'écriture sur l'habiter. Le défi de deux discours savants: l'architecture et la philosophie The conditions of writing on living. The challenge of two scholarly discourses: architecture and philosophy Madjid CHACHOUR A ; Mohammed Chaouki ZINE B ************************* Date Publication :31/01/2019 Date Acceptation : 23/11/2018 Date Soumission : 14/11/2018 Résumé : Parler de l'habitat ou de l'habitant ? Du sujet ou de l'objet ? Du sujet demeurant dans un « chez soi » qui ne fait qu'intérioriser un extérieur ? Comme la philosophie dépasse le cadre historique des idées pour se concentrer sur ce qui fonde ces idées, à savoir "le philosopher", l'activité même de réfléchir et de problématiser, l'architecture a fait également sienne cette démarche pour rendre lisible "l'habiter". Telle est donc la tâche qui incombe à ces deux discours, chacun voulant penser les conditions d'une écriture savante sur l'habiter. Ce qui revient à dire qu'il y a des points de chevauchement et d'articulation, car de tout lieu et de tout temps, les philosophes ont pensé l'habiter dans le cadre d'une réflexion anthropologique et ontologique sur le statut de l'homme dans la cité. De même, les architectes ont eu recours à un cadre conceptuel pour penser l'habiter, pour lui donner une formalité, phénoménologique de surcroît. Il revient à l'architecture et à la philosophie de repenser les conditions éthiques et esthétiques de cette relation, dans laquelle sera inclus, dans sa formalité, le cadre matériel d'un habitat et l'expérience vécue d'un habitant. Mots-clés : architecture, philosophie, discours, écriture, l'habiter. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 367 Abstrat : Talk about the habitat or the inhabitant? Subject or object? The subject living in a "home" that only internalizes an outside? As philosophy goes beyond the historical framework of ideas to focus on the basis of these ideas, namely "to philosophize", the very activity of thinking and problematizing, architecture has also made this approach to make it readable. inhabit ". This, then, is the task incumbent on these two discourses, each one wanting to think of the conditions of a learned writing on living it. That is to say that there are points of overlap and articulation, because from any place and from any time, philosophers have thought to inhabit it within the framework of an anthropological and ontological reflection on the status of the man in the city. In the same way, architects have resorted to a conceptual framework to think about living it, to give it a formality, phenomenological in addition. It is up to architecture and philosophy to rethink the ethical and aesthetic conditions of this relationship, in which will be included, in its formality, the material framework of a habitat and the lived experience of a resident. Keywords: architecture, philosophy, speech, writing, living it. ---------------------AMaître assistant (A) enseigne l'architecture à l'Université de Mostaganem (Algérie), et prépare une thèse de doctorat sur la forme et les signifiants de l'habiter auDeVisU (Design Visuel et Urbain),EA n°2445,UVHC –Valenciennes (France). B Docteur en philosophie de l'Université d'Aix-Marseille, Maître de conférences habilité à l'Université de Tlemcen (Algérie). Chercheur associé au CEPERC – UMR 7304, Aix-en-Provence (France). Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 368 1. Spécificité de l'écrit sur l'habiter 1.1. Position du problème L'écriture sur l'habiter a pris ces dernières années un caractère diffus. Toutes les disciplines y ont été associées, chacune dans son domaine de prédilection. Ce concours des savoirs, tout aussi éclectiques que divergents, n'a pas donné souvent un résultat escompté pour deux raisons au moins : d'une part, chaque discipline revendique, dans son discours, le dire-vrai sur la question de l'habiter ; d'autre part, cette thématique a été fragmentée selon la variété des approches au point qu'elle a perdu de son statut essentiel. Le sociologue tout aussi que l'architecte, le psychologue ou l'anthropologue, quand il aborde l'habiter, lui applique son épistémologie régionale, et le truffe de gloses et de termes savants comme pour témoigner du bien-fondé de sa démarche. Est-ce un tort ? Le même thème ne peut-il pas être étudié de façon transversale et interdisciplinaire où les savoirs sont articulés entre eux ? N'y a-t-il pas des points de chevauchement où les disciplines se prêtent mutuellement des cadres de pensée, des méthodes et des concepts pour se consolider ? Peut-on tabler uniquement sur un parallélisme radical où le maître mot serait "l'incommensurabilité1" ? 1.2. Questions de méthode En réalité, l'habiter requiert une approche spécifique qui ne se réduit pas à une habitation(l'oîkos chez les grecques ou Domus chez les romains)aux dimensions spatio-temporelles définies, ni à un habitant comme atome psycho-social, immergé dans l'instantanéité des nécessités quotidiennes. L'habiter se réfère, dans son soubassement, à ces aspects urbanistiques et socio-psychologiques, mais il ne s'y réduit pas. Il nécessite une approche phénoménologique dont le principe fondateur formulé par Husserl est « le retour aux choses mêmes ». C'est la chose-même de l'habiter qu'il conviendrait d'interroger et 1Dans une réflexion à la fois épistémologique et historiographique, Thomas Kuhn a démontré le caractère incommensurable des savoirs, en ce sens que ceux-ci ne se réduisent pas les uns aux autres. Chaque savoir garde une autonomie et une "propreté" intrinsèque, aussi bien dans l'image du monde que dans la formulation linguistique et conceptuelle. Incommensurable veut dire ici ce qui ne peut être traduit d'une discipline à l'autre. Cf. Kuhn (Thomas), La structure des révolutions scientifiques, trad. L. Meyer, Paris, Flammarion, 1983. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 369 savoir dans quelle mesure une telle problématisation de l'habiter se concentre sur ce que l'habiter veut dire, et non pas uniquement sur ce que habiter signifie. La substantivation du verbe introduit cet essentiel qui manque à l'analyse. En effet, en tant que précurseurs dans la compréhension de la demeure humaine, les philosophes s'interrogent souvent dans leurs écrits sur l'existence d'un réel concept de l'habiter : est-il marqué par une rupture entre sa conception architecturale et son instanciation physique ? Où peut-on distinguer l'écart qui réside entre la synchronie de la conception et la réalisation diachronique du projet architectural de l'habiter ? 2. Le statut de l'écriture dans les discours architectural et philosophique 2.1. Culture de l'écrit sur l'habiter et fondement des connaissances Le thème de l'habiter est très présent dans la philosophie2. En effet, au début du XIXe siècle, le nombre de traités consacrés explicitement dans les pages de la philosophie sur l'esthétique de l'architecture est important, notamment dans les développements del'esthétique de Hegel et les réflexions de Martin Buber3. La culture de l'écrit sur la boîte noire habitable donne accès à une pensée plus ambiguë et plus abstraite qu'elle en apparaît dans la réalité, car elle cristallise la complexité économique des interactions entre pratiques spatiales et leurs significations socio-spatiales. Il y a lieu de commencer par la gamme des énoncés qui désignent le vocable « habiter » du point de vue étymologique et lexicographique. Nous nous contenterons de quelques références relatives aux langues anciennes, en l'occurrence le grec et le latin auxquelles nous rajouterons l'arabe classique qui recèle une terminologie intéressante concernant l'idée de l'habiter. Comme l'ont montré de nombreuses études4, il y a lieu de distinguer les vocables « habitation », « habitat » et « habiter » pour donner sa spécificité à chaque terme et le rôle qu'il joue dans ses différents 2Payot (Daniel), Le philosophe et l'architecte, Paris, Aubier, 1982. 3Buber revisite l'histoire de la philosophie et propose des idées philosophiques sur la manière d'habiter la maison dans sa dimension architecturale.Voir à ce sujet :Buber (Martin), Le problème de l'homme, trad. par Jean Loewenson-Lavi, Paris, Aubier, 1962. 4Cf. à titre d'exemple, Paquot (Thierry), « Introduction. "Habitat", "habitation", "habiter", précisions sur trois termes parents », dans Paquot (T.),Lussault (Michel) et Younès (Chris), Habiter, le propre de l'humain, La Découverte, Paris, 2007, p. 716. Nombreuses sont les études qui vont dans ce sens et le lecteur trouvera dans la bibliographie une sélection suggestive. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 370 emplois. Il est indispensable de reprendre succinctement la généalogie de ces termes et en faire le bilan épistémologique. Le terme « habitat », dans son acception du XIXe siècle, est relatif à la botanique pour désigner le territoire qu'occupe une plante, et il y a lieu de se demander si le terme arabe nabita5 n'aurait-il pas une parenté sémantique avec cet état de fait, lequel terme fait référence à une plante sauvage qui pousse partout. Le terme habitat désignait au XIXe siècle le « milieu » dans lequel évolue une espèce animale ou végétale et par extension, le milieu qu'occupe l'espèce humaine, pour ne pas se cantonner dans l'aspect éthologique, lequel milieu a pris le sens basique de logement. Se loger, pour l'homme, c'est construire une habitation, une démarche culturelle propre à son espèce. Demeurer, c'est culturel contrairement à l'occupation, par la plante ou l'animal, d'un terrain sauvage ou domestique, c'est naturel.Mais à la lisière de la culture et de la nature, l'homme porte des dispositions spécifiques qui se traduisent par les termes de la même famille : habitude, habit, habitus. Les habitudes peuplent les logis par les actions récurrentes ; l'habit est ce qui permet de se protéger (du froid, du chaud, du regard indiscret, etc.) ; l'habitus désigne, enfin, une manière d'être, un terme qui a été réactualisé par Pierre Bourdieu et qu'il a élevé au rang de concept opératoire pour désigner un principe générateur de pratiques. La notion de l'habitus est capitale pour démontrer la capacité de l'habitant à organiser l'espace vécu par un fonds de dispositions acquises et mises en pratique. 2.2. Au-delà du sujet et de l'objet : le statut phénoménologique de l'habiter. Il y a lieu de penser que l'habitus contribue à créer des pratiques, à inventer le quotidien (d'après les dires de Michel de Certeau), et non pas uniquement le répéter de façon monotone comme le stipule 5Il a été évoqué par le philosophe arabe du Xe siècle Abu NasrFarabi (870-950) dans son livre Kitab al-siyassa al-madaniyya (Le livre de la politique civile), éd. FawziNajjar, Beyrouth, Dar al-Machriq, 1993. Le terme est employé dans le cadre d'une société réfractaire à l'ordre politique et crée ses propres mécanismes de défense, comme il est constaté dans toute démocratie avec la grève, la désobéissance civile, la manifestation ; mais aussi dans des sociétés marginales qu'on appelle "communauté" (étrangers, homosexuels, groupe subalterne quelconque..). Farabi appelle "nawabit" (pl. de nabita) de telles sociétés libres qui n'obéissent pas à un ordre unitaire et impérieux. Le mot nabita vient du terme nabat qui signifie plante. La variante nabita est choisie pour démontrer le caractère réfractaire (certains diraient : "déviant") d'une personne ou d'une société qui s'octroie cette désignation. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 371 l'habitude. Il requiert la dimension ontologique d'être-dans-le-monde, et non pas l'aspect éthologique d'occuper un territoire par nécessité biologique. Cette dimension ontologique a particulièrement été soutenue par Martin Heidegger avec sa fameuse conférence de Darmstadt datée du 5 août 1951, aujourd'hui un classique pour toute réflexion sur l'habiter : « Bâtir habiter penser6 ». La particularité de ce titre, c'est qu'il a été rédigé sans virgule : « BauenWohnenDenken ». Comme si l'auteur voulait montrer le caractère inextricable entre l'usage des mains et des matériaux (une entreprise spécifiquement humaine et culturelle), le fait d'habiter la demeure faite par les mains et les matériaux et enfin, l'usage de la réflexion dans la mise en forme de la demeure, la main fabricatrice n'étant pas dissociée de la raison planificatrice selon la dialectique de la fin et des moyens. Dans cette conférence, Heidegger ne parle pas du logement comme construction achevée et prête à être occupée par l'homme, mais d'être-là (Dasein7). Ce n'est pas toute construction qui est habitable, bien qu'elle serve d'habitacle pour l'être humain. Il y faut une manière d'être : « Le vieux mot bauen, auquel se rattache bin, nous répond : "je suis", "tu es", veulent dire : j'habite, tu habites. La façon dont tu es et dont je suis, la manière dont nous autres hommes sommes sur terre est le buan, l'habitation. Être homme veut dire : être sur terre comme mortel, c'est-à-dire : habiter8» ; et plus loin, il conclut : « Habiter est la manière dont les mortels sont sur terre9». Cette définition ontologique promulguée par Heidegger dit-elle le sens de l'habiter par-delà son essence ? Cet "habiter" se réduit-il à un simple « être dans l'espace » ? Se résume-t-il à une simple "habitation" ? En effet, il est difficile de cerner la conception de l'habiter en dehors de ses eccéités spatio-temporelles, et il est même inopportun de le saisir dans sa dimension abstraite et détachée des êtres qui le peuplent et le remplissent de sens, d'action et d'intention. Mais pourquoi Heidegger a-t-il associé l'habiter à la manière d'être sur terre ? La lecture de Peter Sloterdjik10 est, à ce propos, éloquente. Il y a matière à penser que la terre est "sphérique" et que l'homme suit 6Heidegger (Martin), « Bâtir habiter penser », repris dans Essais et conférences, Paris, Gallimard, 1958, p. 170-193. 7 Ibid., p. 171. 8 Ibid., p. 173. 9 Ibid., p. 175 10Sloterdijk(Peter), La Domestication de l'Être. Pour un éclaircissement de la clairière, trad. O. Mannoni, Paris, Éditions Mille et une Nuits, 2000. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 372 ce mouvement depuis la mémoire prénatale (un foetus en position sphérique) jusqu'aux actions tourbillonnaires et browniennes dans les gestes quotidiens, et jusqu'à l'édification d'une civilisation mondialisée et donc, par principe, sphérique11 où êtres, choses et personnes tournent de façon récurrente, sans pouvoir s'exorbiter. Sur le sillage de ces réflexions ouvertes par Heidegger et la conception ontologique de l'espace, un certain nombre de philosophes se sont penchés sur la question, en premier lieu desquels figure Benoît Goetz. Selon lui, l'habiter est dans son premier sens, un procédé d'occupation de l'espace : « Habiter est un mode de spatialisation »12, celle-ci pouvant converger vers une philosophie de l'espace ou un art de l'espace. Elle peut être aussi, du point de vue phénoménologique, portée uniquement sur la perception qui suscite une recherche sur le sens des lieux habités comme un espace sensible du vécu13. 2.3. L'entrée en dialogue : prémices de l'écrit sur l'habiter. La matière écrite permet d'une manière globale la fixation de la mémoire, des classifications systématiques et des raisonnements plus rigoureux14. En outre, l'écriture des architectes a permis la concrétisation du passage d'une forme du discours oral de l'habitant, accompagné par ses aspirations de l'usager temporaire ou du scientifique qui explicite le sens lié au vécu quotidien, au mythe de la maison d'Eden, au dialogue de l'« habiter » et le « bâtir » à titre de solutions au problème existentiel de l'Être15, vers une nouvelle expression où l'analyse logique, l'argumentation et la recherche de la preuve prennent le pas sur le récit et la poétique que recèle cet espace heureux Bachelardien : « maison avec cave et grenier »16. L'écrit sur l'habiter a profondément modifié les conditions de production du 11L'habiter reflète cette dimension sphérique au sein même de l'habitat carré ou rectangulaire. Les parois rendent possible un mouvement rotatif. De même, la manière d'être sur terre, la manière d'être dans le monde et d'être mondialisé, renvoient à l'image circulaire des phénomènes (le caractère itératif de l'habitude, le mouvement dans l'habitation, la malléabilité de l'habit, etc.). 12Goetz (Benoît),Théorie des maisons. L'habitation, la surprise, Paris, éditions Verdier, 2011, p. 86. 13Bachelard (Gaston), La poétique de l'espace, Paris, Presses universitaires de France, 2012. 14Olson (David), L'Univers de l'écrit. Comment la culture écrite donne forme à la pensée ?, Paris, Retz, 1998. 15Norberg-Schultz (Christian), Habiter. Vers une architecture figurative, Paris, Editions Electa Moniteur, 1985. 16Cf. Bachelard (Gaston),op. cit., p. 23-50. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 373 savoir dans ce domaine. Au lieu d'être avant le positivisme du XIXe siècle, une simple fixation sur un récit ontologique d'un espace à vocation géographique17 à travers lequel un attachement au lieu développe le sentiment d'appartenance (Sense of Ownership18), elle devient, par les décloisonnements disciplinaires érigés par la modernité, la transcription raisonnée de la parole habitante. L'écrit sur l'habiter prend le pas avec ses supports d'expression et outils linguistiques d'interlocution19 comme forme de pensée, exprimée par la logique, l'analyse des faits et du vécu, la formulation de supposition, de déduction, d'hypothèses et le recours à l'argumentation. Le texte qui, en général, traite des questions liées à l'habitat possède ce caractère inachevé laissant le lecteur participer au complément des interlignes des paragraphes rédigés. La subjectivité interprétative du phénomène abordé sur « l'habiter » domine par l'usage de référencement par rapport à d'autres oeuvres, de rapports analogiques (similitude ou divergence) d'autres auteurs et sont autant d'indices, de coquilles et de failles, opportuns à l'interprétation individuelle. 3. Y a-t-il un discours sur l'habiter ? Entre confrontation et confluence épistémologique. 3.1. L'habiter et ses formes discursives Parler de l'habiter revient à montrer que l'habiter est un « parler », un discours ayant ses règles et ses modalités de fonctionnement. On ne peut montrer un habiter sans l'insérer dans une forme de discours, lequel est régi par une panoplie de notions et de préceptes, fondatrices pour les premières, régulatrices en ce qui concerne les secondes. L'habiter n'est pas uniquement ce qui se donne à voir (une « monstration »), mais aussi ce qui se donne à décrire par un langage qui prétend à la scientificité (une « démonstration »), le discours architectural en l'occurrence. La question qui se pose d'emblée est de savoir pourquoi et dans quelle mesure l'habiter a un statut spécial, sujet à une description savante, ouverte sur les données pluridisciplinaires, par-delà un habitat techniquement mesurable (et 17Buttimer (Anne), "Home, Reach, and the Sense of Place", Edited by Buttiner (A.) &Seamon (D.), Thehuman Experience of Space and Place. London, CroomHelm, 1980. 18 Ibid., p. 166-187. 19Jacques (Francis), L'espace logique de l'interlocution, Paris, Publications Universitaires de France, 1985. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 374 qui constitue donc seulement l'ossature de la forme habitable) et pardelà un habitant qui, de par son statut transcendantal, échappe à certaines mesures, fussent-elles objectives et quadrillées. 3.2. Une grammaire de l'habiter C'est à Wittgenstein que revient le mérite de déterminer ce que « grammaire » veut dire dans une approche qui n'est pas strictement linguistique, mais spécifiquement pragmatique et s'apparente, ainsi, à une logique des formes articulée sur des modes d'être ou des manières de faire. Il nous semble que cette approche grammaticale, au sens wittgensteinien du mot, est à même de nous instruire sur l'état de l'habiter, sa structure interne et son statut ontologique. Elle décrit un mode d'être indissociablement lié à une manière de faire, et ce dans un but heuristique afin de montrer que cet habiter, bien qu'il soit ontologiquement autonome, s'incarne dans un habitat, lequel est une structure qui peut être peuplée de pratiques dégourdies. Wittgenstein est le penseur contemporain chez qui se convergent philosophie et architecture. Cette convergence est visible dans le fait que philosophie et architecture sont une activité. La philosophie n'est plus cette théorie qui baigne dans l'abstrait, mais une activité ayant ses règles et ses modes d'emploi. De même que l'architecture est une activité de figuration et d'illustration. Il y a un souci apparent de clarté20 qui véhicule en amont les discours philosophique et architectural grâce à cette vision synoptique qui saisit les relations entre les choses par-delà leur caractère individuel et essentiel. Par ailleurs, la confrontation épistémologique par les thèses d'architectes penseurs et écrivains comme Peter Eisenman, Bernard Tschumi, Christian Norberg-Schulz et Henri Gaudin est illustrative 20« La réalisation de la clarté conceptuelle est le résultat du genre de thérapie philosophique que Wittgenstein n'a cessé d'illustrer à travers ses investigations. Une telle clarté est très souvent décrite par Wittgenstein en termes de représentation synoptique. Le penseur, en ce qu'il vise la clarté des relations, s'attache à relier les cas fondés sur l'occurrence de certains termes comme "identique", "vrai", "faux", "possible" – et beaucoup d'autres termes philosophiquement séduisants comme "intentionnel", "voulu", "causé"... et à considérer comment ils fonctionnent effectivement. Un bon dessinateur est celui qui clarifie l'ensemble des relations des parties entre elles, ce qui constitue, l'une des dimensions philosophiques de l'architecture moderniste, là où le dessin a éliminé l'ornement et offre ainsi une représentation synoptique du bâtiment. » Hagberg (Garry L.), « La pensée, le dessin : philosophie et architecture comme "travail sur soi-même" », In:Poisson (Céline), Penser, dessiner, construire : Wittgenstein & l'architecture, Paris,éditions de l'Éclat, 2007, p. 64-65. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 375 pour saisir les termes controversés que « l'espace habité » recèle en tirant de cette situation un enseignement très riche sur le vrai sens de « l'habiter ». Ces discours naissent justement au coeur de cette confrontation entre des approches contrastées. Par exemple, lorsqu'on site Le Corbusier comme architecte et théoricien du mouvement moderne, on se rend compte qu'il prône au début de ses écrits dans son manifeste au profit d'une idéologie réductrice et machinale de l'habitation l'expression métaphorique « La machine à habiter21 » comme comparaison sans outils de comparaison. Le terme mécanique y est employé ici au sens figuré d'une conception techniciste et purement fonctionnelle. Le Corbusier revisite cette notion de l'habiter, enclenchant par la suite une intertextualité explicite dans une version révisée, annotée et augmentée. Il rectifie le tir par des locutions de substitution à l'encontre de l'espace habité, en déclarant à partir de 1930 par cette interjection « Voici la machine à émouvoir. Nous entrons dans l'implacable de la mécanique [...]22. » La substitution des termes renvoie à une nouvelle architecture faite de mouvement, d'une chorégraphie, d'une balade architecturale séduisante par la légèreté de sa forme plastique et encore une totale ouverture sur l'extérieur qui se déploie. N'est-il pas pertinent de faire la concrétisation dans le même contexte de ses idées en faisant appel ici à la philosophie du pli de Deleuze23 (fig.01) que ce dernier affirme24 ? D'un autre côté, Henri Gaudin souligne l'importance d'une spatialité de l'habitat sous forme de récit qu'entretient un contenu en rapport à unecontenance spatiale 25 ; un sujet par rapport à son espace vécu, pour paraphraser cette expression qui déjoue le sens de l'habiter. Par un recours actantiel ménageant à la fois tactique et stratégie de 21Le Corbusier, Urbanisme, Paris, Crès, 1925, 219 p. 22Le Corbusier, Vers une architecture, chapitre « Architecture, pure création de l'esprit », Paris, Crès. 1923, p. 173. 23« C'est un grand montage baroque que Leibniz opère, entre l'étage d'en bas percé de fenêtres, et l'étage d'en haut, aveugle et clos, [...], une correspondance et même une communication entre les deux étages, entre les deux labyrinthes, les replis de la matière et les plis dans l'âme. », Deleuze (Gilles), Le Pli. Leibniz et le baroque, Paris, les éditions de Minuit. 1988, p.6. 24« [...] les forces plastiques sont donc machiniques plus encore que mécaniques », Ibid., p. 12. 25« Le dehors n'est pas une chose inerte, c'est une habitation [...]. »Gaudin (Henri), La cabane et le labyrinthe, Bruxelles/Liège, éd. Mardaga, coll. « Architecture & Recherches », 1984, p. 97. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 376 l'habitant, faites de détours et de ruses autour desquels la question architecturale de la maison trouve son sens ; une architecture qui, en fin de compte, émerge d'une combinaison spatiale entre un vide enfermé et enveloppé et un dehors inconnu dont leurs limites respectives demeurent imperceptibles26. Nous trouvons davantage ce rapport de la compatibilité/incompatibilité entre l'écriture et l'engagement dans les avancées théoriques d'une antithèse selon laquelle le paradoxefondamental d'une architecture de plaisir27de BernardTschumitrouve un essor dans l'écrit architecturaldes années 1970. En effet, d'après ses « Manifestes », cette architecture résulte des paradoxes conceptuelsqui laissent fusionner les formes habitablesentre ellesau milieu des sensations créant le mot d'ordre :la joie. Le langage architectural se trouve dès lors démonté en plusieurs morceaux.Ce procédé rhétoriqueest adopté plus tard par Peter Eisenman28par l'emploi d'un langage non conventionnel et déstabilisant,une figure d'opposition et de conflit dans The Architectural Paradox 29.Celle-ci est suggérée afin de désigner « l'espace vécu» comme un processus langagier qui se déploie ainsientre ouverture et fermetureautour desquellesle mode d'action se fait dans la contradiction totale de ses énonciations.En plus, l'espace vécu ou du moins habité est pour Tschumi un événement paradoxal déjouant ses scènes entreopposition et reliance : entre expérience d'un intérieur et événements situationnistes ; entre l'historicisme et le politique révolutionnaire ; entre la rigueur et la sensualité ; entre le plaisir textuel 30 et la jouissancede G. Bataille31. Dans les années 1980, Tschumi continue son argumentation à l'appui par un raisonnementpersuasif, cherchant à convaincre les architectes et les théoriciens,en ressuscitant de nouveau cette figure d'opposition 26 Ibid., p. 97. 27Tschumi (Bernard), "The Pleasure of Architecture", In:Theorizing a new agenda for architecture, New York, Princeton Architectural press, 1996, 532 p. 28Eisenman (Peter), The Formal Basis of Modern Architecture, Zürich, Lars Muller Publishers, 2006. 29Tschumi (Bernard), « The architectural Paradox 'Studio International' », September-October, revised in Bernard Tschumi, Architecture and Disjunction, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1994 [1975]. 30Barthes (Roland), Image, Music, Text, Essays selected and translated by Stephen Heath, Fontana Press, London, 1977, p. 79-124. 31Simon (Agathe), « Georges Bataille, le plaisir et l'impossible », Revue d'histoire littéraire de la France, vol. 103, n° 1, 2003, p.181 Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 377 et en structurantses propos autour de relations logiques illustrées d'exemples.Il la dénomme par une nouvelle terminologie : « la disjonction 32 »,ou la logique de déconnection, celle-ci étant employée pour définirla métaphore architecturale et sa mise en médiation. D'autre part, Tschumi ne s'éloigne pas de la pensée philosophique contemporaine. Cette position, partagée sans doute par bien des philosophes, paraît assez proche, par exemple de celle de Deleuzeet Guattari33dont ils approuvent la fécondité d'une vie humaine à partir d'un territoire inconnu de la maison. Il est clair que Deleuze apporte des notions nouvelles sur le paradoxe du nomadisme qui consiste logiquement à rester sur place et ne pas bouger, mais le nomade emmène tout le temps sa maison avec lui et ne la quitte jamais. C'est pour cette raison qu'afin de se déterritorialiser géographiquement, il faut posséder une demeure,d'où l'habiter ne se réduit pas uniquement à construire sa maison en voyageant. Ce serait alors un oxymore ! Parallèlement à cela, Emmanuel Levinas34 évoque,dans sa théorie de l'accueil,l'existence d'une demeure totalitaire35 et infinieet rejoint ainsi les réflexions de Jacques Derrida36. En effet, Derrida37 en rappel dans sa démonstration par la déconstruction du sens, et ajoute que l'architecture de l'habitation est ponctuée par l'expérience habitante non seulement pour faire espace, mais aussi pour désigner un espacement. Il est difficile de s'interroger sur la nature d'un espace architectural et en même temps vivre l'expérience réelle de cet espace. L'idée est plus poussée en particulier chez Walter Benjamin où la notion d'habiter dans le XXe siècle devient insolite38. Elle repose sur le vivre dehors39et se décline de plusieurs manières.Benjamin se contente deprouver que le monde d'aujourd'hui est caractérisé par l'absence de l'habitation ; l'habitation n'étant qu'éphémère, l'homme en réalité n'habite pas, il est loin d'être exposé au dehors,bien que sa 32Tschumi (Bernard),« Sequences », In: Architecture and Disjunction, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996. 33Deleuze (Gilles) et Guattari (Félix), Mille plateaux, Paris, Minuit, 1980. 34Levinas (Emmanuel), Totalité et infini : essai sur l'extériorité, La Haye, Nijhoff, 1974 [1961]. 35 Totalitaire au sens de total. 36Derrida (Jacques), Demeure, Paris, Galilée, 2009. 37Derrida (Jacques), De l'hospitalité, Paris, Calmann-Lévy, coll. « Petite Bibliothèque des idées », 1997, p. 56. 38Sloterdijk (Peter), op. cit., p. 75. 39Salignon (Bernard), Qu'est-ce qu'habiter ?, Paris, éditions de La villette, 2010. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 378 maison lui offre ce monde clos et fermé.En poursuivant la même logique, la maison au lieu qu'elle soit le lieu des habitudes, elle est le lieu de l'événement et de la surprisechez B.Goetz40, elle ne représente pas un endroit clos et enfermé sur soi, plutôt elle est l'aventure de s'être exposé dehors.Goetz amplifie ses argumentations par une lecture sur la situation symptomatique chargée de signesde la célèbre toile deCarpaccio sur Saint Augustin41, ce n'est qu'en observant le dehors à partir d'une fenêtre qu'on s'aperçoit qu'on est sous l'extase d'une sensation surprenante, qu'on est en réalité dans un intérieur, en faisant référence à la fascination et à la rigueur de l'espace picturale du Studiolo,du point de vue narratif et iconographique dans le tableau de Carpaccio42 (fig.02). 3.3. Contextes d'énonciation : sémantique et figures de style Dans les textes relatant l'habiter dans les deux discours architectural et philosophique, il est souvent assigné des emprunts métaphoriques de concepts, une fois posées les libertés respectives de la philosophie et de l'architecture43.Les passages qui semblent en apparence peu ou mal fondés entre les deux disciplines ne doivent pas être interdits. C'est la condition contemporaine d'une coalition langagière d'un échange philosophie/architecture qui mériterait d'être analysée et critiquée de façon approfondie et précise. La philosophie vise une connaissance globale du phénomène de l'habiter, embrassant son sujet dans toute son extension épistémologique et phénoménologique. Cette double stratification de l'habiter s'est centrée sur un terrain d'entente mené par les architectes et les philosophes et interprété par une dislocation44 et un flottement de l'espace habité par une conduite singulière et/ou 40Goetz (Benoît), op. cit.,p. 109. 41Bolard (Laurent), « Augustin, du songe à la lumière. Sur La Vision de Saint Augustin, de Carpaccio », Revue de l'histoire des religions [En ligne], 2/2005, mis en ligne le 25 janvier 2010, consulté le 10 octobre 2012. URL : http://rhr.revues.org/4183. 42« Dernière trace commune aux deux peintures, et non des moindres, l'ambivalence qui y prévaut entre la présence et l'absence et qui coïncide avec cette autre équivoque entre intérieur et extérieur. La présence se lit dans l'espace clos que les lignes délimitent fortement, que les objets saturent et en un sens, pour le Saint Augustin, plombent de leur densité rigoureuse ; elle se lit dans l'événement [...]. »,Goetz (Benoît), op. cit., p. 226. 43Payot (Daniel), Le philosophe et l'architecte, Paris, Aubier, 1982. 44La dislocation Chez Goetz signifie à la fois l'éparpillement ontologique inévitable à toute existence et le pouvoir de l'architecture contemporaine à créer des espacements indicibles,Goetz (Benoît), La dislocation. Architecture et philosophie, Paris, éditions de La Passion, 2001. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 379 universelle et hybride provenant des attitudes habitantes contemporaines. L'architecture en général et « l'habitologie »45(la science de l'habitat) en particulier, n'ont jamais nié l'importance d'échange entre les autres disciplines connexes, surtout celles qui essaient de convertir ses théories au profitde l'expansion et l'élargissement de son champ de référence comme la philosophie et la linguistique. En outre, c'est par des concepts issus de la linguistique que certains architectes transforment la « syntaxe » architecturaleafinde singulariserleurs oeuvres. À titre d'exemple, cette grammaire générative est développée dans la « notion de polythétique »46, reprise par Raymond Boudon des écrits de la thèse de Wittgenstein et remplacée par le terme « rationalité »47, elle en constitue une figure de substitution, en remplaçant le terme par celui qui le définit. Par ailleurs l'usage de la rhétorique sert quelques fois à impressionner, à convaincre, à émouvoir, à séduire le lecteur et/ou à donner de la crédibilité aux énonciations. Par untexte qui rassemble les trois articles48 parus dans la revue new-yorkaise ArtForum, Bernard Tschumi49souligne pardivers constats et observations émis à l'égard des attitudes ou des comportements dans la manière d'habiter, l'importance du mouvement du corps et ses plis dans la création de l'espace habité. Le paradigme du pli de Deleuze revient simultanément, il en est très présent dans ce cas-là (fig.03). Tschumi réemploie l'usage de la figure de l'insistance par ledétournement du discours et metexpressémenten valeur l'idée de la manipulation formelle et stylistique d'un espace habité : « la forme suit la forme ;seule la signification et la formulation des références diffèrent50». L'expression de Tschumi, dans son traité est soulignée 45Expression qui revient d'usage à l'architecte hongrois AnttiLovag, voir :Maurer (Alfred Werner), AnttiLovag, Kugelbauten in den Felsenüber der französichen Côte D'Azur in Tourettes-sur-Loup, Basel, Philologus-Verlag, 2007. 46Raynaud (Dominique), Cinq essais sur l'architecture : études sur la conception de projets de l'AtelierZô, Scarpa, Le Corbusier, Pei, Paris, L'Harmattan, 2002. 47 Ibid., p. 31. 48Tschumi (Bernard), « Architecture and Limits I », Art Forum, vol.19, n°4, 1980, p. 36. 50Avec la participation de Peter Eisenman, Rem Koolhaas, Anthony Vilder, Raimund Abraham, et Kenneth Frampton. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 380 par l'usage d'un terme allégorique en anglais « Architectural Disjunction », traduit en français par« Architecture Disjonctive »51 ;elle représente de façon concrète et imagée les divers aspects d'une idée abstraite, symbolisant un processus personnifiépar une logique de déconnection. Par ailleurs, il reste impossible de refermer ou de limiter la notion de l'habiter sur un concept particulier, identifiable. Les théories de l'architecture contemporaines sont, de ce point de vue, impuissantes à générer un parfait modèle d'habiter. Ce qui revient, ou mieux s'attellera, de façon limitée et imperceptible n'est qu'une partie limitée aussi de la production philosophique. Comme il a été évoqué plus haut, seule "la substantivation du verbe habiter" qui est en mesure de nous éclairer sur son statut particulier, car il ne s'agit plus d'accomplir un geste somme toute anodin : habiter ! Ce qui stipule donc une manière ordinaire de "se loger". L'habiter va au-delà de cette image mondaine d'occuper un lieu, de prendre un logis. Il est ce par quoi, ce pour quoi, il y a l'usage d'un lieu, en étant viscéralement inséré, inextricablement incorporé. On parerait ainsi de l'habiter comme la « scène de l'énonciation52 » où le primat est donné au geste ordinaire. Architecture et philosophie semblent accorder à cette scène un droit de cité. L'usager y joue un rôle de premier plan. Conclusion : Si nous maintenons l'interpénétration des deux disciplines dans le domaine de l'habitat, pour travailler en marges, aux limites de l'architecture et de la philosophie, l'usage de la preuve et l'argumentation philosophique accentue leurs crédibilités scientifiques, ils sont néanmoins entrepris comme outils de passage d'un état d'abstraction de l'habitation dans sa dimension formelle, 51Cette expression s'évade du dogmatisme architectural fonctionnel du XIXe siècle, et est appréhendée par l'existence ou non d'une limite de la discipline architecturale à l'encontre de l'objet et des thématiques étudiés. Tschumi (Bernard), « Architecture and Limits II »,In: Nesbitt (K.), Theorizing a New Agenda for Architecture. An Anthology of Architectural Theory 1965–1995. New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 1996, p. 156-161. 52. Nous empruntons cette expression à Michel de Certeau. Cf. De Certeau(Michel), La Fable mystique, XVIe-XVIIe siècle, Paris, Gallimard, 1982, Partie 3, p. 424. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 381 fonctionnelle et rationnelle vers une vraie notion de l'habiter dûment recherchée par l'usager de l'espace.La combinaison commune serait de distinguer les limites des deux pôles disciplinaires par la présence d'une part, d'une polythétique dans la pensée philosophique et d'autre part, la persistance d'une thétique phénoménologique récurrente dans les écrits architecturaux. Les deux spirales (sous forme d'oculus) (fig.04) représentent les visions et les regards bipartites que développent les deux disciplines à partir de la perception et la conception de l'objet architectural du projet de la maison. Le contexte et les enjeux engendrés par les écrits sur l'espace réel à charge matériel de la maison demeure à présent, pour autant banalisé par un discours potentiel entre les échanges ouverts et perméables des deux disciplines (philosophie et architecture), alors que le caractère maniable et instrumental de l'objet d'étude que constitue l'habitation résonne avec certaines confusions, voire même transgressions indiscernables dans son identité comme espace imaginaire, fictionnel et intemporel à la fois. Bibliographie Sources : BUTTIMER (Anne), "Home, Reach, and the Sense of Place", Edited by Buttiner (A.) &Seamon (D.), The human Experience of Space and Place. London, CroomHelm, 1980. EISENMAN (Peter), The Formal Basis of Modern Architecture, Zürich, Lars Muller Publishers, 2006. GAUDIN (Henri), La cabane et le labyrinthe, Bruxelles/Liège, éd. Mardaga, coll. « Architecture & Recherches », 1984. GOETZ (Benoît),Théorie des maisons. L'habitation, la surprise, Paris, éditions Verdier, 2011. HEIDEGGER (Martin), « Bâtir habiter penser », repris dans Essais et conférences, Paris, Gallimard, 1958. LE CORBUSIER, Urbanisme, Paris, Crès, 1925. LE CORBUSIER, Vers une architecture, Paris, Crès. 1923. NORBERG-SCHULTZ (Christian), Habiter. Vers une architecture figurative, Paris, Editions Electa Moniteur, 1985. PAQUOT (Thierry),LUSSAULT (Michel) et YOUNÈS (Chris), Habiter, le propre de l'humain, La Découverte, Paris, 2007 PAYOT (Daniel), Le philosophe et l'architecte, Paris, Aubier, 1982. POISSON (Céline), Penser, dessiner, construire : Wittgenstein & l'architecture, Paris,éditions de l'Éclat, 2007. RAYNAUD (Dominique), Cinq essais sur l'architecture : études sur la conception de projets de l'AtelierZô, Scarpa, Le Corbusier, Pei, Paris, L'Harmattan, 2002. SALIGNON (Bernard), Qu'est-ce qu'habiter ?, Paris, éditions de La villette, 2010. TSCHUMI (Bernard), Theorizing a new agenda for architecture, New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 1996. Revue AT-TADWIN / Laboratoire Systèmes, Structures, Modèles et PratiquesNuméro 12/ 31 Janvier 2019 382 TSCHUMI (B.), Architecture and Disjunction, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1994. Bibliographie secondaire : BACHELARD (Gaston), La poétique de l'espace, Paris, Presses universitaires de France, 2012. BARTHES (Roland), Image, Music, Text, Essays selected and translated by Stephen Heath, Fontana Press, London, 1977. BUBER (Martin), Le problème de l'homme, trad. par Jean Loewenson-Lavi, Paris, Aubier, 1962. DE CERTEAU(Michel), La Fable mystique, XVIe-XVIIe siècle, Paris, Gallimard, 1982. DELEUZE (Gilles), Le Pli. Leibniz et le baroque, Paris, les éditions de Minuit. 1988. DELEUZE (Gilles) et Guattari (Félix), Mille plateaux, Paris, Minuit, 1980. DERRIDA (Jacques), Demeure, Paris, Galilée, 2009. DERRIDA (Jacques), De l'hospitalité, Paris, Calmann-Lévy, coll. « Petite Bibliothèque des idées », 1997. JACQUES (Francis), L'espace logique de l'interlocution, Paris, Publications Universitaires de France, 1985. KUHN (Thomas), La structure des révolutions scientifiques, trad. L. Meyer, Paris, Flammarion, 1983. LEVINAS (Emmanuel), Totalité et infini : essai sur l'extériorité, La Haye, Nijhoff, 1974. OLSON (David), L'Univers de l'écrit. Comment la culture écrite donne forme à la pensée ?, Paris, Retz, 1998. SLOTERDIJK (Peter), La Domestication de l'Être. Pour un éclaircissement de la clairière, trad. O. Mannoni, Paris, Éditions Mille et une Nuits, 2000.

Please cite only the final published version 1 Relevance and Non-Consequentialist Aggregation J. Paul Kelleher University of Wisconsin – Madison Utilitas 26(4) (2014): 385-408 ABSTRACT: Interpersonal aggregation involves the combining and weighing of benefits and losses to multiple individuals in the course of determining what ought to be done. Most consequentialists embrace thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation, the view that any large benefit to each of a few people can be morally outweighed by allocating any smaller benefit to each of many others, so long as this second group is sufficiently large. This would permit letting one person die in order to cure some number of mild headaches instead. Most nonconsequentialists reject thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation despite also believing it is permissible to let one person die in order to prevent many cases of paraplegia instead. Non-consequentialists defend this asymmetry largely on the basis of intuition, and some rely on the notion of relevance to formalize the grounding intuitions. This paper seeks to clarify and strengthen the nonconsequentialist notion of relevance by engaging with three objections to it. 1. INTRODUCTION Consequentialists embrace thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation; most non-consequentialists do not. Interpersonal aggregation simpliciter is the combining and weighing of benefits and losses to multiple individuals in the course of determining what ought to be done. (Until section 5, I will use 'aggregation' to mean 'interpersonal aggregation.') For example, many people agree that it is permissible, and can even be obligatory, to help the larger of two groups when all individuals stand to gain the very same benefit. Thus, in cases where we can either save one person from dying or five (and all else is equal), it is not uncommon for consequentialists and non-consequentialists alike to recommend saving the larger number. The same goes for cases where the potential benefit falls short of life-saving, for example where we must choose between restoring the mobility of one person or that of five others. In each of these cases, it seems to matter morally that one group of beneficiaries is larger than the other: when each group's Please cite only the final published version 2 individual benefits are combined and weighed against the other's, the moral scales are tipped in favor of the larger group. What tends to separate consequentialists and non-consequentialists are cases in which potential beneficiaries stand to gain benefits of different sizes. Again, consequentialists embrace thoroughgoing aggregation, which holds that the allocation of any large benefit to fewer people can be morally outweighed by the allocation of any smaller benefit, so long as the group of people receiving the smaller benefit is sufficiently large. Hence a proponent of thoroughgoing aggregation will accept that there is some finite number of headaches such that it is permissible (and perhaps even obligatory) to relieve that many headaches instead of saving an innocent person's life. My aim in this paper is to clarify and strengthen a standard non-consequentialist alternative to thoroughgoing aggregation by engaging with three objections to it. The nonconsequentialist alternative I will focus on is built around the technical notion of relevance. Before introducing this notion of relevance, I want to distinguish between two varieties of aggregation – or, perhaps better, between two domains of morality within which aggregation is an issue. The first is axiological aggregation, or aggregation within the domain of axiology. Axiology is the study of goodness or value, and it seeks to understand what makes some states of affairs better or worse than others. As Alastair Norcross explains, aggregation within the domain of axiology 'involves the claim that harms and benefits [of different sizes] can be traded off against each other in determining the overall goodness (or badness) of a state of affairs.'1 The other kind of aggregation is deontic aggregation, or aggregation within the domain of permissibility and obligation. This is the domain of morality that issues in conclusions about 1 A. Norcross, 'Two Dogmas of Deontology: Aggregation, Rights, and the Separateness of Persons,' Social Philosophy & Policy 26 (2008): 76-95, p. 84. Please cite only the final published version 3 what may or must be done. Since consequentialism is the view that the right thing to do is that which maximizes goodness, consequentialists hold that considerations within the domain of axiology completely determine the facts about moral permissibility and obligation. But nonconsequentialists reject the view that the right thing to do is always that which maximizes the good, and so they hold that some moral questions cannot be answered by axiological considerations alone. Now, it is controversial whether thoroughgoing aggregation is the correct approach within the specific domain of axiology. Consider Derek Parfit's so-called 'Repugnant Conclusion': For any possible population of at least ten billion people, all with a very high quality of life, there must be some much larger imaginable population whose existence, if other things are equal, would be better, even though its members have lives that are barely worth living.2 'Better' here means 'better with respect to the amount of goodness produced by or contained in the state of affairs.' As Parfit's name for this conclusion indicates, many find it very difficult to believe that it would be better to convert a population of ten billion happy people into a much larger population of individuals with lives 'barely worth living.' But note that even if a nonconsequentialist concedes that thoroughgoing aggregation operates within the domain of axiology – that is, even if the larger of Parfit's populations really is better than the smaller one – the non-consequentialist can still say that it is an open question whether thoroughgoing 2 D. Parfit, Reasons and Persons (Oxford, 1984), p. 388. Please cite only the final published version 4 aggregation is permissible within the domain of deontic assessment. After all, she does not concede that goodness always determines rightness and permissibility. In any case, my reason for distinguishing axiological from deontic aggregation is simply to stress that this paper is concerned with aggregation within the domain of deontic assessment. I will be assuming (but purely for the sake of argument) that thoroughgoing aggregation is perfectly permissible within the domain of axiology.3 2. NON-CONSEQUENTIALIST AGGREGATION AND THE IDEA OF RELEVANCE The non-consequentialist alternative to thoroughgoing aggregation that I seek to explore actually embraces quite a bit of aggregation. In particular, it generally follows Norcross in accepting that for any large benefit b that can be given to each member of group G, there is at least one kind of benefit smaller than b which, when given to sufficiently many others, can morally outweigh giving b to G. For example, this non-consequentialist view can accept that rather than save S's life, one should instead cure paraplegia in, say, 1,000 others. Typically, this stance is not grounded in theory. Many non-consequentialists simply find it implausible that one must always help the group that is worse off or whose members can be helped the most, regardless how many others one can help with less serious but still significant needs. To avoid inconsistency when saying that aggregation is permissible in some cases but not others, many non-consequentialists have come to rely on the technical notion of relevance. To illustrate, suppose that we are presented with the choice between (a) curing one person's onehour long headache or (b) curing half-hour long headaches afflicting some number of 3 For an argument against thoroughgoing aggregation within the domain of axiology, see D. Dorsey, 'Headaches, Lives, and Value,' Utilitas 21 (2009), pp. 36-58. Please cite only the final published version 5 individuals. The non-consequentialist who accepts aggregation in some death-vs-paraplegia cases will also likely accept aggregation in some hour-long-headache-vs-half-hour-longheadache cases. But she may well deny that half-hour headaches can be aggregated to morally outweigh saving a life. She will say, then, that while paraplegia is relevant to death (in that paraplegia can be aggregated to morally outweigh death), and while half-hour long headaches are relevant to hour-long headaches, half-hour long headaches are not relevant to death. Relevance can thus be thought of as a relation that determines 'when the numbers count.' As T.M. Scanlon puts it, 'if one harm is not only less serious than, but not even "relevant to," some greater one, then we do not need to take the number of people who would suffer these two harms into account in deciding which to prevent, but should always prevent the more serious harm.'4 (In what follows I will refer both to relevance between the harms that we might prevent and relevance between the benefits that we might confer. I take these to be two ways of framing and discussing what is ultimately the same moral relation.) What could possibly justify belief in the idea that relevance is a genuine relation between types of harm and benefit? I am not certain that anything other than unshakeable intuitions can be marshaled to support it. There are, however, formidable arguments against the idea and its commonly associated claim that headaches are not relevant to death, and in the remainder of this article I will engage with three such arguments. My main goal is to assess the force of each argument and to formulate what I take to be the most plausible response on behalf of proponent of the idea of relevance. Due to space limitations, and to my own reservations about their success, I shall not attempt a full defense of each response. Instead, I seek to understand where 4 T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe To Each Other (Cambridge, MA, 1998), pp. 239-40. See also F. M. Kamm, Morality, Mortality: Death and Whom to Save from It: Volume 1 (Oxford, 1993). Please cite only the final published version 6 and why the conventional notion of relevance needs refinement, and to get that work started. It is my hope that others will find my responses to these three objections useful, and will perhaps develop them further. The remainder of the paper is structured as follows. Section 3 considers an objection pressed by Alastair Norcross, and argues that the objection is not at all damaging to the idea of relevance. Section 4 articulates a risk-based objection to relevance, and argues that the nonconsequentialist's most plausible response to it requires the somewhat radical step of foreswearing any appeal to the relative strengths of individuals' claims to assistance. Here I go on to suggest a sketchy but (I think) still promising account of why it might be that headaches are not relevant to death. Section 5 considers a powerful objection to the idea of relevance that is due to John Broome. Broome offers an example of an intuitively permissible policy that arguably involves aggregating many prevented headaches to morally (that is, deontically) outweigh saving a life. Here I suggest that the non-consequentialist must lean on a distinction between interpersonal aggregation and intrapersonal aggregation, and must maintain that Broome's policy is permissible only to the extent that it is defensible in intrapersonal terms. Section 6 concludes. 3. NORCROSS'S ARGUMENT AGAINST IRRELEVANT GOODS Alastair Norcross observes that 'the relation of moral relevance does not obey the principle of transitivity.'5 Much of the aggregation literature's discussion of transitivity is focused on claims within the domain of axiology. There, the issue is whether the relation 'all things considered 5 A. Norcross, 'Two Dogmas,' p. 81. Please cite only the final published version 7 better than' is transitive (recall Parfit's Repugnant Conclusion).6 Norcross's focus, by contrast, is on deontic claims about which options must or may permissibly be chosen. According to Norcross, if one embraces the deontic notion of relevance, one must also accept that there can be cases in which one ought to choose option A over option B, option B over option C, and option C over option A. He views this as a serious problem for the claim that relevance is a genuine moral relation between benefits of different sizes. To use his example, suppose for the sake of argument that '(a) the loss of both arms is less serious than but morally relevant to death; [and] (b) that a broken leg is less serious than but morally relevant to the loss of both arms, but not morally relevant to death' (p. 83). Assume also that preventing one death can be morally outweighed by preventing 1,000 people from losing their arms, and that preventing 1,000 people from losing their arms can be outweighed by preventing 1 million people from breaking a leg. Now suppose you must choose between three mutually exclusive options: saving one life, preventing 1,000 people from losing their arms, and preventing 1,000,000 people from breaking a leg. What should be done? One worry is that whichever you choose, you would act wrongly, since for every option there is an alternative that is morally superior.7 But let us set that issue aside (as Norcross agrees to do) and assume that at least one of your three options must be 6 See, for example, L. S. Temkin 'A Continuum Argument for Intransitivity,' Philosophy & Public Affairs 25 (1996), pp. 175-210. 7 Derek Parfit thinks this is a serious problem for a view that invokes the notion of relevance (what Parfit calls 'The Close Enough View'). Whether this is in fact a serious problem turns in part on whether there can be moral dilemmas and whether this might be one. I lack the space to discuss this adequately here. See D. Parfit, On What Matters (Oxford, 2011), p. 203. Please cite only the final published version 8 morally permissible. Even so, Norcross claims that the non-consequentialist's introduction of the notion of relevance has a 'very strange,' 'unpalatable consequence.'8 To see this, suppose you are morally permitted to choose any of your three options, and you decide to save the one life. Just as you set off to save the life, however, one of the two other options becomes unavailable when a tree falls and blocks the path to it; in particular, you can no longer consider preventing 1,000,000 broken legs as one of your options. Norcross then states the putative problem: 'You are about to perform the perfectly permissible act of saving a life, when one of your other permissible alternatives becomes unavailable by chance. Now it is no longer permissible to save the life,' since we have stipulated that if you are choosing between saving a life and preventing 1,000 people from losing their arms, you must do the latter. According to Norcross, 'We should, if at all possible, avoid having to swallow such an unpalatable consequence.'9 Since this consequence follows from the 'intransitivity' engendered by the notion of relevance, we should abandon that notion. This would appear to force nonconsequentialists to choose between thoroughgoing aggregation (which in effect makes headaches relevant to death) and thoroughgoing anti-aggregation (which denies that paraplegia is relevant to death), both of which most non-consequentialists wish to reject. In response to Norcross, David Lefkowitz has argued that a nuanced account of relevance can be used to convert the problematic three-option case into a non-problematic two-option case. According to Lefkowitz's 'orbital' notion of relevance, 'the option of preventing a given harm provides an agent with both a first-order reason to prevent that harm, and a second-order reason 8 A. Norcross, 'Two Dogmas,' p. 83 9 A. Norcross, 'Two Dogmas,' p. 83 Please cite only the final published version 9 not to consider as part of his deliberation the option of preventing irrelevant harms.'10 The idea of a harm's 'orbit' is just the idea of there being a certain range of alternate harms that are relevant to it. So far, this adds nothing new to notion of relevance as I have described it. What is new is Lefkowitz's claim that when one has an opportunity to prevent a given harm, one thereby acquires two practical reasons: a first-order reason to prevent the harm, and a second-order reason to ignore opportunities to prevent harms that are not within the orbit of the first harm. Lefkowitz claims that this 'two-level theory of practical rationality' can be used to avoid the dilemma Norcross constructs for those who embrace the idea of relevance.11 Since (by hypothesis) a broken leg is not within the orbit of an imperiled life, the option of preventing many broken legs should not even be on the table in the first place, according to Lefkowitz. If that is correct, then one is left with just the two options of saving the life and preventing 1,000 lost pairs of arms, and one must therefore prevent the lost pairs of arms. I do not believe that Lefkowitz's response to Norcross is successful. It is of course clear why the orbital notion of relevance provides a reason to ignore the prospect of preventing the broken legs. Since a broken leg is not within the orbit of a death, we have a second-order reason to ignore each and every broken leg whose prevention conflicts with preventing the death. What is not so clear, however, is why this second-order reason automatically trumps the second-order reason there is to consider the broken legs given that a broken leg is within the orbit of a lost pair of arms. Lefkowitz seems to assume that once a second-order reason exists to ignore a harm as irrelevant, that harm can never be heard from again. But Lefkowitz gives no reason to think that second-order 'exclusionary' reasons are ipso facto excluding reasons. That is, he does not 10 D. Lefkowitz, 'On the Concept of a Morally Relevant Harm,' Utilitas 20 (2008), pp. 409-23, at 416. 11 D. Lefkowitz, 'On the Concept,' p. 418. Please cite only the final published version 10 address the possibility that a second-order exclusionary reason can be counterbalanced or neutralized by another second-order reason that pulls in the other direction. Instead, he asserts that since death is the worst harm one can prevent in Norcross's case, 'Therefore, according to the orbital conception of relevant harms, the agent should only consider in his deliberation the possibility of preventing harms that are relevant to' death.12 But this is not an automatic consequence of the orbital notion of relevance, and thus it must be supported by further argument. It is true that given the prospect of preventing a death, one has a second-order reason to ignore the prospects one has for preventing broken legs. But for all Lefkowitz has argued, it is also true that given the prospect of preventing a lost pair of arms, one has a second-order reason to give concomitant consideration to all those harms that are within the orbit of a lost pair of arms. And if that is correct, then we are arguably where Norcross left us, namely in a threeoption case that invites a strange consequence when one's permissible option is rendered impermissible by the removal of an option one permissibly avoided in the first place. In my view, a better way to rebut Norcross is simply to show that the nonconsequentialist should not be embarrassed by the consequence that Norcross finds strange and unpalatable. Thus, consider the following case. Suppose that (a) Anne and Bill have played each other in Scrabble 1,000 times, and Anne has always won; (b) Bill and Clara have played 1,000 times, and Bill has always won; and (c) Clara and Anne have played 1,000 times, and Clara has always won. You have promised your rich uncle that you will place a bet on his behalf at the National Scrabble Tournament's final three-person championship game between Anne, Bill, and Clara. Your only guidance is to place the wisest bet possible. Since you are morally bound by your promise to bet, and since the intransitivity between the finalists leaves none as 'the wisest' 12 D. Lefkowitz, 'On the Concept,' p. 418. Please cite only the final published version 11 choice, let us assume you permissibly blindly draw a name out of a hat, selecting Anne. However, just as you are about to place your bet on Anne, you learn that Bill has been disqualified (it turns out he is Canadian and ineligible for the US Tournament). If this happens, then plainly you must now bet on Clara, since she has never lost to Anne. But this is precisely the phenomenon that Norcross called 'unpalatable' and claimed must be avoided: a permissible option is rendered impermissible by the removal of an option one permissibly avoided in the first place. As far as I can tell, the only thing strange about the Scrabble case is the empirical implausibility of the fictional players' head-to-head Scrabble history. But that was not Norcross's concern. Rather, he claimed the serious problem arises once Bill is disqualified. But pace Norcross, there is nothing all that bizarre about what you are required to do once Bill is disqualified. I therefore agree with John Broome that 'Cycles may occur in what one ought to choose; it may be that, given a choice between A and B one ought to choose A, and given a choice between B and C one ought to choose B, and given a choice between C and A one ought to choose C.'13 Deontic intransitivity is simply not itself the theoretical dealbreaker Norcross thinks it is.14 Thus, in order to criticize the non-consequentialist's reliance on the notion of 13 J. Broome, Weighing Lives (Oxford, 2004), p. 60. 14 It is worth noting that what Norcross calls deontic 'intransitivity' is arguably not really a form of intransitivity at all. As Daniel M. Hausman explains, '[T]ransitivity concerns preferences over a single set of alternatives. Transitivity says nothing about how preferences over one set of alternatives {apple pie, blueberry pie} should be related to preferences over a different set of alternatives {apple pie, blueberry pie, cherry pie}.' See D. M. Hausman, Preference, Value, Choice and Welfare (Cambridge, UK, 2012), pp. 15-16. Please cite only the final published version 12 relevance, I believe one is better served by focusing more directly on the claim that headaches are not relevant to death. Putting concerns about deontic intransitivity aside, then, is it really true that headaches are irrelevant to death? The next two sections consider powerful arguments for skepticism about that claim. 4. CLAIMS TO ASSISTANCE AND A RISK-BASED ARGUMENT AGAINST IRRELEVANT GOODS Non-consequentialists are famous for thinking that morality sometimes imposes constraints against maximally promoting the good. Often these constraints are said to forbid harming some to provide benefits to others. But non-consequentialists who reject thoroughgoing aggregation evidently must embrace a constraint of a different kind. For none of the cases I've discussed involves harming; they are all cases of deciding whom to aid and whom to leave unaided. This may seem to make the idea of relevance all the more mysterious. After all, the idea that human agents are to be regarded as inviolable against bodily aggression has deep roots in ordinary moral thought. Yet no comparable violation seems to occur when aid is allocated to many people with minor ailments rather than to fewer people in imminent peril. Why, then, should we believe in constraints against thoroughgoing aggregation? A common non-consequentialist answer to this question invokes the idea of a claim to assistance. There is more than one account of claims in the literature, but at least since Thomas Nagel's seminal discussion of aggregation, many non-consequentialists have expressed sympathy with what Nagel calls the 'individual acceptability' model (IA) of claims and of how conflicting claims should be reconciled. (I will briefly discuss a different model in section 5.) IA holds that the strength of an individual's claim to assistance is commensurate with the urgency of Please cite only the final published version 13 her needs (and perhaps also with the degree to which she can be helped), and that conflicts between claims are to be adjudicated by finding the outcome 'that is least unacceptable to the person to whom it is most unacceptable.'15 Nagel's discussion suggests something like the following relation between an outcome's unacceptability to an individual and the strength of her claim: the strength of her claim to assistance (which she possesses before any allocation choice is made) is equal to the strength of the complaint she could lodge if she is not helped; and the strength of the complaint she could lodge if not helped is equal to that outcome's degree of unacceptability to her. For example, in a two-way conflict case pitting one person in mortal peril against many others who are about to suffer mild headaches, the person with the dire need possesses a much stronger claim to assistance, and she will therefore have a much stronger complaint if the others are helped instead of her. This in turn means that the outcome involving cured headaches will be more unacceptable to the person in mortal peril than the outcome involving life-saving would be to those who are forced to endure headaches. Since IA instructs helping agents to pursue the outcome that is least unacceptable to the person to whom it is most unacceptable, IA in this case requires the life to be saved. We can articulate the same choice procedure in terms of claims: the person in mortal peril has a much stronger claim to assistance than any of the others, and IA directs agents in a position to help to satisfy claims in order of their strength. As Nagel puts it, 'Each individual with a more urgent claim has priority, in the simplest version of such a view, over each individual with a less urgent claim.'16 Following Nagel, this method of adjudicating conflicts between claims has been called 'pairwise comparison,' since it compares each individual's claim with each other individual's claim, rather 15 T. Nagel, 'Equality,' in his Mortal Questions (Cambridge, UK, 1991 [1979]), pp. 106-127, at 123. 16 T. Nagel, 'Equality,' p. 118. Please cite only the final published version 14 than (for example) comparing the strength of one person's claim with the aggregated strength of many other people's combined claims. Plainly, a constraint against thoroughgoing aggregation falls out of IA's procedure of pairwise comparison. The problem, however, is that IA seems to rule out any form of aggregation. Take, for example, the two-way conflict case involving one person in mortal peril and a great many (e.g. a billion) others who will be paralyzed if not helped. Since there is no one among the group who has as strong a claim as the person facing death, there is no person among the group who will find the outcome involving life-saving more unacceptable than the worst off person would find the outcome in which she is left to die. And since IA adjudicates claims (and prospective complaints of unacceptability) using the method of pairwise comparison, the verdict will always come down in favor of the individual with the strongest claim. Nagel understood this and believed it was unacceptable: It seems to me that no plausible theory can avoid the relevance of numbers completely. There may be some disparities of urgency [of claims] so great that the priorities persist whatever numbers are involved. But if the choice is between preventing severe hardship for some who are very poor and deprived, and preventing less severe but still substantial hardship for those who are better off but still struggling for subsistence, then it is very difficult for me to believe that the numbers do not count, and that priority of urgency goes to the worse off however many more there are of the better off.17 I have already said that most non-consequentialists agree with Nagel that numbers can be 17 T. Nagel, 'Equality,' p. 125. Please cite only the final published version 15 decisive in at least some cases. The hard part, as Nagel saw, is accounting for this in a theoretically satisfying way. One cannot, for example, simply admit that the dictates of IA can in principle be outweighed by large enough amount of aggregate value, since we are assuming that any amount of value can be generated by curing sufficiently many headaches. But nor can selective forms of aggregating smaller benefits fit within a framework that requires the pairwise comparison of claims. The only option open to non-consequentialists who are sympathetic to IA is to say that IA is right to stress the moral importance of claims, but then to concede that sometimes relatively weaker claims can be aggregated to outweigh stronger claims. This of course amounts to saying that some relatively weaker claims are nonetheless relevant to comparatively stronger claims. Such a view would still impose some constraints on promoting the good through aiding, as it would remain impermissible to satisfy a great number of very very weak claims when one could instead satisfy one very strong claim. This is more or less the position reached by T.M. Scanlon in what is arguably the most careful and sustained attempt to fit the selective aggregation of weaker claims into an IA model. Scanlon holds that IA (which, following Parfit, he calls the 'complaint model') 'avoids implausible cases of aggregation in what seems, intuitively, to be the right way.'18 But he realizes that IA also rules out plausible forms of aggregation. He therefore endorses a mixed view on which weaker claims can be aggregated if and only if they are deemed relevant to stronger ones.19 Scanlon does not offer an account of why some weaker claims are relevant to stronger ones while others are not. He suggests only that claims are to be regarded as relevant when ignoring them would not give 18 T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe, p. 241. 19 T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe, pp. 239-40. Please cite only the final published version 16 'proper consideration' to the individuals whose claims they are.20 I worry, however, that things are much worse for Scanlon's account than he realizes. This is because a focus on claims seems to open the door to an argument in support of aggregating many very very weak claims over fewer very strong ones. That of course would undermine the rationale for introducing the notion of relevance in the first place. To see the problem, consider what I shall call the 'case of tiny reductions in risk.'21 Suppose you come upon a very large island nation inhabited by 300,000,001 people. Suppose also that you possess a very versatile medication. In particular, a full dose of the medicine (which is all you have) will cure one person who is about to die of a fatal disease, X, while 1/300,000,000th of the medicine will reduce a healthy person's risk of acquiring and dying from X by one-in-10,000,000 (from a five-in10,000,000 risk to a four-in-10,000,000 risk). As it happens, there is one person in the nation who is fatally ill with X right now, while the other 300,000,000 are currently healthy but still face a five-in-10,000,000 chance of acquiring and dying from X. You therefore have the choice between (1) curing the one sick person now or (2) preventing thirty (expected) deaths from X in the future by reducing each healthy person's small risk by a further tiny amount. (To give you some perspective, the risk-reduction that you can give to each healthy person is of the same magnitude as the risk of death incurred by the average American on an average car trip. This suggests that few of the currently healthy people would be willing to make a great sacrifice to 20 T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe, p. 240. 21 This case was inspired by a case presented by Norman Daniels in 'Reasonable Disagreement about Identified vs. Statistical Victims,' Hastings Center Report 42 (2012), pp. 35-45, at 41. For a related riskbased case, see Sophia Reibetanz, 'Contractualism and Aggregation,' Ethics 108 (1998), pp. 296-311, at 302. Please cite only the final published version 17 achieve that level of risk reduction. Indeed, I will assume that each of them is indifferent between achieving that level of risk reduction and curing the short but unpleasant headache they currently have.) Now let us ask: would it be wrong to use your medicine to reduce many people's already low risk by a further tiny amount instead of saving the life of the one person currently dying of X? I do not think this would be wrong; indeed, I think you might very well be morally required to provide the tiny reductions in risk in order to prevent thirty (or so) deaths from X. But if that is true, then it is permissible after all to promote the good by neglecting one very strong claim in order to satisfy a great many very weak claims. And if that is right, then it seems we must admit that very weak claims are indeed relevant to very strong claims, and thus that it can be permissible to cure or prevent a great many headaches instead of saving a life. This result would render appeals to relevance pointless. I can see two ways for a non-consequentialist like Scanlon to evade this line of argument. The first is to deny that this case involves 300 million tiny claims being aggregated to outweigh one very strong claim; instead (the response continues) this case involves 30 (or so) very strong claims conflicting with one very strong claim. This response requires one to hold that the strength of an individual's claim to assistance is a function of the harm he will in fact suffer if not helped, rather than a function of his antecedent risk of suffering the harm. Following Johann Frick, I will call this the ex post approach to assessing the strength of claims.22 Since we can say 22 See Frick 'Treatment vs Prevention in the Fight Against HIV/AIDS and the Problem of Identified vs Statistical Lives', in Identified v. Statistical Lives: Ethical, Legal, and Medical Perspectives, ed. I. Glenn Cohen, Norman Daniels, and Nir Eyal (Oxford, in press). Unaware of Frick's work at the time, I discussed the ex post view in 'Prevention, Rescue, and Tiny Risks,' Public Health Ethics 6 (2013), pp. 252-261, under the name of 'Brock and Wikler's view' of how to assess the strength of claims. Please cite only the final published version 18 with confidence that in a population of 300 million there will in fact be 30 (or so) people who develop X, it will follow on the ex post approach that there are 30 (or so) people who have a claim that is just as strong as the claim possessed by the one person already suffering from X. On this view, if we assume (as virtually all non-consequentialists do)23 that claims of the same strength are relevant to one another, then one should provide the 300 million tiny reductions in risk, as that is your only way to satisfy the largest group of very strong claims. I do not think this response succeeds, however, because I think that the ex post approach to claims should be rejected. To see why, consider the following example.24 Suppose Alice currently has a 99 percent chance of dying and that one other person has a headache. And suppose we must choose between curing the other person's headache and eliminating Alice's risk. On the ex post view of how to assess the strength of claims, the strength of Alice's claim to assistance is not a function of her antecedent risk, but rather depends entirely on what will in fact happen to her if she is not helped. So if we now choose to cure the headache and Alice miraculously does not die, the proponent of the ex post view must say that Alice in fact had no claim at all to our assistance. But that is not plausible. Surely if anyone had a claim to assistance, it was Alice.25 I have elsewhere offered other arguments against the ex post view (as has Frick)26, 23 A notable exception is J. Taurek, 'Should the Numbers Count,' Philosophy and Public Affairs 6 (1977), pp. 293-316. 24 I deploy this case to make similar point in 'Prevention'. 25 Of course, both defenders and opponents of the ex post view can agree that Alice's antecedent risks gave us good epistemic reason to believe that Alice had a strong claim. But that is the only role that proponents of the ex post view give to antecedent risks, and this is what makes that view so implausible. 26 See again Kelleher, 'Prevention,' and Frick, 'Treatment vs Prevention in the Fight Against HIV/AIDS and the Problem of Identified vs Statistical Lives.' Please cite only the final published version 19 but I think this example suffices to show that in cases involving risks of harm, the strength of one's claim to assistance is a function of one's antecedent risk of suffering a given harm. And if that is correct, then in preventing 30 (or so) deaths by providing tiny reductions in risk to 300,000,000 people, one is satisfying 300,000,000 very very weak claims, rather than 30 (or so) very strong claims. The case of tiny reductions in risk is, therefore, a case in which it seems permissible to neglect one very strong claim in order to satisfy a great many very weak claims instead. But then that is precisely what happens when one cures a great many headaches instead of saving a life. So in putting the focus on claims and their relative strength, nonconsequentialists like Scanlon invite the very sort of aggregation they originally invoked the ideas of claims and relevance to rule out. The only other way I can see of blocking the conclusion that headaches are relevant to death is to abandon the reliance on claims altogether. Since claims were introduced to help place constraints on promoting the good, and since the case of tiny reductions in risk seems to show that it is permissible to satisfy many very weak claims instead of satisfying one very strong claim, it appears that claims are unable to serve the function for which they were intended. My suggestion, then, is that non-consequentialists should not invoke them at all – or at least they should not invoke them in cases of aiding (perhaps claims work differently in contexts that involve harming). But with claims out of the picture, the idea of relevance will have to be interpreted as a relation between the discrete units of goodness that different actions bring about.27 On this view, the permissibility of aggregating benefits would turn on two equally 27 The argument from tiny risks therefore provides reasons to join Kamm in talking about (ir)relevant goods, rather than (ir)relevant claims. See Kamm Intricate Ethics: Rights, Responsibilities, and Permissible Harm (Oxford, 2007), p. 34. Please cite only the final published version 20 crucial factors: (1) the amount of good one can produce; and (2) the internal structure of that quantity of goodness. Thus, if one is able to prevent a death or prevent many headaches, it will not matter how much good one can do by preventing headaches, for that amount of good will simply not have the requisite internal structure: since the-good-of-a-prevented-headache is not relevant to the-good-of-a-prevented-death, it does not matter how much good one can do by preventing headaches. This view would capture the permissibility of catering to individuals with very weak claims in the case of tiny reductions in risk, and the impermissibility of catering to individuals with very weak claims in a life-vs.-headaches case. In providing tiny reductions in risk, one is promoting the good by preventing deaths. The resulting amount of good therefore has an internal structure suitable to be a candidate for receiving priority over saving another person from imminent peril. The same cannot be said when one chooses to prevent many headaches instead of saving the life. Can non-consequentialists live with this proposal? I think they may have to. Of course, many non-consequentialists will not like the suggestion that constraints on aggregation are not grounded in facts about what beneficiaries are entitled to claim, but rather in facts about how benefactors must go about promoting the good. But that seems a small concession, especially since non-consequentialists who believe in relevance are already willing to run roughshod over the strongest claims in order to satisfy many weaker yet still relevant ones. Moreover, consider a two-way conflict case in which we must choose between saving a group of individuals or saving a larger number of others. Many non-consequentialists will already agree with Frances Kamm that 'as the number of people in the larger group who outnumber those in the smaller group increases, there is a greater wrong done if we do not save the greater number.' But as Kamm points out, 'there seems to be no individual complaint that can capture this.' So even in the most Please cite only the final published version 21 uncontroversial cases of aggregation – where lives are aggregated to outweigh other lives – the reasonable non-consequentialist must, it seems, be willing to take up 'some point of view outside that of any individual.'28 My proposal to treat claims as morally inert, and to impose more direct constraints on how the good is to be promoted, simply takes this line of reasoning a bit further. It is of course standard for consequentialists to hold that the only plausible moral perspective outside that of any individual's is a maximizing perspective from which thoroughgoing aggregation is viewed as unproblematic. But there are alternatives worth exploring. Nagel, for example, recommends a perspective from which agents (or perhaps moral communities understood as collective agents) are to display equal and impartial concern for all others. Here concern for others is construed as concern for them as individuals, as 'a separate concern for each person' rather than a concern for 'a conglomeration of them.' He then adds that this form of other-regarding concern 'is realized by looking at the world from each person's point of view separately and individually, rather than by looking at the world from a single comprehensive point of view.'29 But this last step can be questioned. Consider a parent who loves her five children equally. Suppose she is told that one child, Sarah, has a fatal condition, and that two of the other four will also die soon, with each of the four having an equal probability (<1.0) of ending up in the group of two that will die. If, tragically, the parent must choose between preventing Sarah's death or preventing two deaths among the other four, surely a choice to minimize deaths is consistent with her showing equal concern for each of her children. Yet in light of her greater antecedent risk, Sarah has a stronger claim on her mother's assistance than 28 F. M. Kamm, 'Owing, Justifying, and Rejecting,' Mind 111 (2002), pp. 323-354, at 348; emphasis in original. 29 T. Nagel, 'Equality,' p. 127. Please cite only the final published version 22 does any of her four siblings (at least on the view of claims that I have endorsed). So I think Nagel is wrong to hold that a perspective of equal concern requires one to 'look at the world from each person's point of view separately and individually, rather than by looking at the world from a single comprehensive point of view.' It would, however, be nice if the non-consequentialist could say a bit more about why his or her preferred 'comprehensive point of view' treats paraplegia, but not headaches, as relevant to death. Here I think non-consequentialists would do well to expand upon an observation made by Roger Crisp in the course of defending an 'impartial spectator' approach to distributive ethics. After criticizing traditional utilitarianism for embracing thoroughgoing aggregation (which he calls aggregation 'all the way up'), Crisp writes, 'It is important to note that the objection often made against utilitarians – that they are concerned merely with happiness and not with individuals – cannot be made against the spectator. He or she recognizes the distinction between persons, and, to that extent, [his or her] compassion is here to be understood as a personal, rather than an impersonal virtue.'30 Here Crisp draws on work by Kai Draper, who writes: It has often been observed that classical utilitarians value well-being too impersonally. Because they value for its own sake happiness per se, they value persons merely as a means to the end of maximizing aggregate happiness...It is safe to say that a genuine compassionate individual will value well-being in a more personal way...A genuine compassionate concern for well-being must be distinguished from [a] sort of benefit 30 R. Crisp, 'Equality, Priority, and Compassion,' Ethics 113 (2003), pp. 745-763, at 757. Please cite only the final published version 23 fetishism.31 I think this is a view that can be adopted by the non-consequentialist who now wishes to appraise allocation decisions from a point of view outside that of any individual beneficiary's. She can now say that headaches are not relevant to death because, in entertaining aggregation in that context, one reveals that one is more concerned with (or for, or about) benefits per se than she is with (or for, or about) individuals. Something like this idea does seem to capture my own hesitation about letting headaches outweigh death. At any rate, with the appeal to claims no longer on the table, non-consequentialists would do well to explore and expand upon Crisp's and Draper's suggestion that thoroughgoing aggregation is inconsistent with a proper concern for persons, in contrast to a concern for bits of welfare.32 The resulting view will still need to appeal to intuitions, and I admit that it is hard to imagine a theoretical explanation for why one cannot be properly concerned for persons while aggregating headaches when the alternative is preventing one death, while one can be properly concerned for persons while aggregating headaches when the alternative is preventing one earache. But the non-consequentialist is obviously not afraid to rely on intuitions or to say that the relevance of a harm or benefit is context-dependent. 5. JOHN BROOME'S ARGUMENT AGAINST IRRELEVANT GOODS 31 K. Draper, 'The Personal and Impersonal Dimensions of Benevolence,' Noûs 36 (2002), pp. 201-227, at 208. 32 Although he only makes passing reference to aggregation, Richard Yetter Chappell provides a valuable related discussion in 'Value Receptacles,' Noûs (forthcoming). Please cite only the final published version 24 I have argued that the proponent of relevance should declare that claims to assistance (assuming there are such things) are in effect morally inert when it comes to deciding whether and when aggregation is permissible. Claims therefore cannot do the aggregation-blocking work that many non-consequentialists ask of them. Whatever work they appear to be doing must be explained by some other theoretical element or principle. Perhaps, however, this apparent uselessness of claims stems from a faulty account of how claims work. Such an objection can be found in John Broome's work. According to Broome, claims never work as constraints blocking all appeals to aggregative considerations. Broome therefore rejects the notion that some goods or claims are ever irrelevant. According to him, there is always a pro tanto requirement of fairness that individuals' claims be 'satisfied in proportion to their strength.' More specifically, Broome holds 'that equal claims require equal satisfaction, that stronger claims require more satisfaction then weaker ones, and also – very importantly – that weaker claims require some satisfaction. Weaker claims must not simply be overridden by stronger ones.'33 How, then, can claims be satisfied in proportion to their strength in the sort of two-way conflict situation that I have been focusing on? Broome's answer is that they cannot, since by hypothesis only one of the groups can be helped. In such cases, Broome says that the best we can do is provide everyone with 'a sort of surrogate satisfaction' in the form of a lottery.34 By holding a suitable lottery, we can ensure that those with equally strong claims receive equal chances of being helped, and that those with claims of different strengths receive differently sized chances. This is not, however, to say that holding suitably weighted lotteries is always the right thing to do, only that holding such lotteries would be the fair thing to do. Whether one must do the fair thing depends, Broome claims, 'on how 33 J. Broome, 'Fairness,' in his Ethics Out of Economics (Cambridge, UK, 1999), pp. 111-122, at 117. 34 J. Broome, 'Fairness,' p. 119. Please cite only the final published version 25 important fairness is in the circumstances.'35 And Broome is explicit that the aggregate sum of value associated with helping one group can be so large that it justifies directly helping that group – even if that sum is generated by curing a great many headaches: I believe that a lot of small benefits can add up to be as important as one large benefit. When a patient in a United Kingdom hospital gets a headache, he or she is given an analgesic. Over a few years, the UK Health Service gives out a few million analgesics to cure headaches. The cost of all these pills adds up, and eventually it will amount to more than enough to save someone's life. Evidently, the Health Service thinks that curing all those headaches is as valuable as saving a life. I agree. 36 Broome's discussion and his Health Service example raise two important questions for the approach to aggregation that I sketched in the previous section. First, is Broome correct to retain a focus on claims by arguing that fairness (but not necessarily rightness) requires their proportional satisfaction, rather than satisfaction in order of strength (as the competing IA approach has it)? Second, is Broome correct that the Health Service example illustrates that 'all goods are relevant' to life-saving, even the good of headache-alleviation? In my view, these questions must be sharply distinguished, for I believe that Broome's account of claims is implausible, whereas I think that his Health Service example is perhaps the strongest argument in the literature for the view that all goods, including headache-alleviation, are relevant to life- 35 J. Broome, 'Fairness,' p. 120. 36 J. Broome, 'All Goods Are Relevant,' in Summary Measures of Population Health, ed. C. J. L. Murray, J. A. Salomon, C. D. Mathers and A. D. Lopez (Geneva, 2002), pp. 727-9, at 728. Please cite only the final published version 26 saving. The main problem with Broome's account of fairness and of how claims 'work' is nicely illustrated by Brad Hooker: Suppose your claim on the medicine comes from the fact that you need it to save your life, and my claim on it comes from the fact that I need it to save my little finger. Suppose an average life is something like a thousand times more important than my little finger. So should the matter of who gets the medicine be decided by a lottery in which you have a 999/1000 chance of winning and I have a 1/1000 chance? Given that your claim is so much stronger than mine, how could it be right to take any risk that I rather than you might end up with the good?37 Here Broome might agree with Hooker that the life should be saved straightaway (without holding a lottery); Broome could simply say that since a life is so much more valuable than a mere finger, saving the life straightaway is the right thing to do all-things-considered (even if it is not the fair thing to do). But as Hooker goes on note, 'Letting the stronger claim win [without first holding a weighted lottery] seems completely fair.'38 And that is what is so difficult to accept about Broome's account of claims and fairness: he must say that when choosing between saving a life and preventing even one mild headache, it is unfair to save the life straightaway without first holding a weighted lottery. But that is hard to believe. It is not plausible to say that in directly saving the life, one has done the unfair thing. If Hooker and I are right about that, then it 37 B. Hooker, 'Fairness,' Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 8 (2005), pp. 329-352, at 349. 38 B. Hooker, 'Fairness,' p. 349; emphasis added. Please cite only the final published version 27 means that fairness does not require proportional satisfaction of claims (at least not in every case), and thus that Broome's attempt to vindicate the indispensability of claims fails. What, then, should we say about Broome's Health Service example? The force of that example does not hinge on the success of Broome's view of claims and fairness. Even if one were sympathetic to a Crispand Draper-inspired 'proper concern for persons' view of why headaches are not relevant to death, Broome's Health Service example should still give one pause. For I suspect many find the Health Service's policy permissible, and it is hard to see why it should be permissible to aggregate headaches in that context but not in the two-way conflict cases I have been discussing. Consider, for example, a rather unsatisfying explanation from Frances Kamm. In response to the related observation by Dan Brock that many people find it permissible to fund public Botanical Gardens for the sake of minor aesthetic pleasures instead of an extra ICU bed for life-saving, Kamm writes: [Brock] suggests that I might make my claim normative rather than descriptive; what we do is just wrong. But there may be other explanations for our actual investments. We may not exclude even the most trivial concerns from receiving some of our resources, because the resources are divisible...So, problems may receive divisible resources in proportion to their importance, but also in proportion to the probability of our resources successfully dealing with the problem...Even with divisible resources, I still think it should require a much greater number of people experiencing headaches and a much higher probability of curing them to appropriately invest as much in headache cures as in cures for fatal diseases.39 39 F. M. Kamm, 'Replies,' Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 58 (1998), pp. 969-974, at 973-4. Please cite only the final published version 28 It is not clear to me why the (in)divisibility of one's resources for assistance should make a difference to whether the headaches one can cure are relevant to the deaths one can prevent. But let us nevertheless confine our attention to cases in which resources are divisible. Here, Kamm suggests that headaches are in fact not irrelevant: 'So, if we do not face the choice of either giving all of our money to curing a fatal disease that hits a few people or saving many from headaches or withered arms, we could give some to each cause.'40 And yet in direct response to Broome's Health Service case, Kamm writes: [S]uppose that we did argue even for the permissibility of investing in cures for truly minor problems affecting many, such as headaches, rather than in a cure of a rare fatal disease...This does not imply that here and now we should not save someone from dying from the rare fatal disease, if we could, rather than cure millions of headaches. For example, suppose that, surprisingly, giving someone who develops the fatal disease all of the aspirin that has been produced to cure headaches could still now save him. It could be wrong to leave him to die...It is here and now that the irrelevant utilities of headache cures do not aggregate to override saving a life.41 It is hard for me to see why Kamm's view is not straightforwardly incoherent. After all, if it really is permissible to fund aspirin for headaches in the way the Health Service does, surely that 40 F. M. Kamm, Intricate Ethics, p. 47n74. In context it is clear that by 'could' Kamm means 'could permissibly'. 41 F. M. Kamm, Intricate Ethics, pp. 36-7. Please cite only the final published version 29 means it is permissible to actually use that aspirin to cure headaches even when it is possible (say) to sell the aspirin to pay for an extra dialysis machine that could save a life now. In my view, since the Health Service policy of funding and providing aspirin seems entirely permissible, the only way to rebut Broome's conclusion that 'all goods are relevant' is to argue that the Health Service case does not actually involve the sort of aggregation that the nonconsequentialist rejects. To see how such an argument might go, consider one real-world context in which it is obviously permissible to balance death against the prevention or cure of many headaches: viz. when one drives to the store to buy a bottle of aspirin. By driving, one risks death. But, typically, one accepts this risk as the price one must pay to be in a position to relieve relatively minor aches and pains. Following Scanlon, let us call this form of aggregation – i.e. the aggregation of many relieved aches and pains within one's own life – intrapersonal aggregation.42 Intrapersonal aggregation is aggregation within a single life, rather than aggregation between or across different lives (which I have been calling interpersonal aggregation). The two-way conflict case we have been discussing quite clearly involves interpersonal aggregation. There, we are asking whether it is permissible to let the headaches of many different people outweigh saving one other person's life. I believe that if one is to deny that the Health Service case justifies the interpersonal aggregation of headaches over lives, one must argue that the Health Service case instead involves intrapersonal aggregation. More specifically, one must argue that funding aspirin is permissible only to the extent that it involves permissible intrapersonal aggregation. Otherwise the example really would establish the permissibility of thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation. How might such an intrapersonal aggregation argument go? We might imagine that the 42 T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe, p. 237. Please cite only the final published version 30 Health Service reasonably assumes that each citizen would be willing ex ante to trade guaranteed headache-relief (when in hospital) against the small risk that he or she will be denied whatever life-saving treatment the aspirin funds displace. Because not much life-saving could be achieved with the aspirin budget, and because several different life-saving programs would be good candidates for the funds if the budget were redirected, no single individual who faces death in the hospital can say with any confidence that his chances of living would have been appreciably greater if aspirin were not funded. So the Health Service might reasonably suppose that it is rational, from each British citizen's standpoint, to trade guaranteed headache cures against a very small increase in the risk of dying in the hospital. This rationale is obviously not the rationale Broome ascribes to the Health Service in his formulation of the example. As he presents it, the Service's goal is straightforwardly to maximize the value it can achieve with its limited funds. But if the non-consequentialist is right to reject thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation, the Health Service cannot permissibly invoke the rationale Broome has in mind. Its rationale will instead have to make essential reference to intrapersonal aggregation. In doing so, it will have to draw upon the value of autonomy – of giving people what they themselves prefer (or perhaps what they reasonably prefer) – rather than exclusively drawing upon a benevolent concern to promote well-being (where that can be interpreted in either the maximizing consequentialist manner or in the 'proper concern for persons' manner suggested by Crisp and Draper). Of course, many non-consequentialists might be perfectly happy to let policy be shaped both by the demands of benevolence and by a requirement to respect autonomy. But the hard part comes in explaining how intrapersonal aggregation and respect for autonomy can justify a policy that would be impermissible if it were defensible solely by reference to thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation. Please cite only the final published version 31 To appreciate the challenge, consider a case in which the demands of benevolence arguably trump the requirement to respect autonomy. (I borrow the following science-fiction case from Tom Dougherty, who reports that it originally comes from Michael Otsuka.) There is a giant roulette wheel in the sky. It has a billion slots that are connected to chutes. The chutes are directed at individuals who have swallowed poison. The poison will make each individual have a headache and die, if untreated. To make the wheel work, you have to press a button. This will give the wheel an indeterministic spin, and then release the contents of each slot into a chute. Before you do so, you have to make an antidote to put in the slots. You only have enough resources to choose between these options: Vials For Everyone. You make a billion vials of an antidote that will certainly save each recipient's life, but do nothing for each recipient's headache. Vials That Cure Headaches. You make a billion minus one vials of an antidote that will certainly save each recipient's life and cure this person's headache.43 It would not be surprising to learn that each of the billion individuals prefers Vials that Cure Headaches to Vials for Everyone. After all, virtually everything we do in life carries some risk of death, and a 1/1,000,000,000 chance of dying does not seem too high a price to pay for 43 T. Dougherty, 'Aggregation, Beneficence and Chance,' Journal of Ethics & Social Philosophy 7 (2013), pp. 1-19, at 17. Please cite only the final published version 32 headache-relief. (If one does find it too high, one can simply adjust the example to involve more people, more vials, and more chutes.) This suggests that if individual autonomy were the only value at stake here, one should choose Vials That Cure Headaches. But I suspect many people will share my (and Dougherty's) intuition that it would be wrong to choose Vials That Cure Headaches. Here, a concern for the fate of each individual – and especially for the individual who will die under Vials That Cure Headaches – seems to pull decisively in favor of Vials For Everyone. So here we have a case in which the demands of benevolence conflict with demands of autonomy, and benevolence arguably wins. How, then, could a non-consequentialist defend the Health Service's aspirin policy by invoking the idea intrapersonal aggregation? Why should the Service's policy not also be criticized as flouting an overriding demand of benevolence? I believe the answer will have to do with fact that the Health Service's aspirin protocol can be embedded in a larger framework of policy that strikes a reasonable balance between benevolence and respect for autonomy. I take it as uncontroversial that the Health Service makes many allocation decisions that are quite clearly motivated by benevolent concern for the lives and well-being of the individuals it serves. Among these is the initial choice to fund any ICU beds at all, as well as the choice to pay for various forms of cancer screening and treatment. (If we moved to an even higher-order level of policymaking, we could also cite here various public health measures such as sanitation, clean water, and pollution controls.) With this background of benevolent policy in place, it seems to me permissible for the Health Service to turn some of its attention to the risk-taking preferences of the individuals it serves. That is, when the Health Service can make a good case that it is displaying enough benevolent concern for the lives and well-being of those it serves, it can then permissibly add a layer of policy aimed at satisfying individuals' autonomous preferences for risk-taking. Compare this appraisal of the Health Please cite only the final published version 33 Service case to the Roulette Wheel case. Unlike the Health Service's policymakers, the decisionmaker in the Roulette Wheel case cannot point to any background choice or policy that embodies her benevolent concern for the billion individuals who are now the targets of her choice. Rather, this is her opportunity to display proper benevolence. Here it seems reasonable for her to choose benevolence over respect for preferences, both because a life is at stake and because her choice of Vials for Everyone does not seriously injure or curtail the autonomy of any individual. After all, each will continue to have their own life to lead after her decision is made, and they can take all the risks they want after she is out of the picture. Admittedly, if the decision-maker were repeatedly faced with this choice day in and day out, her situation might well become more and more like the Health Service's situation; at some point it will be reasonable for her to say, 'I have saved these people's lives time and again; it is time to give them what they want.' But until that point arises, she is obligated by demands of benevolence to neglect the individuals' preferences and prevent death. That is simply what benevolence, properly balanced against respect for autonomy, requires, and that is why the intrapersonal rationale can license headache-alleviation in the Health Service example but not in the Roulette Wheel example. Let me stress that I am not claiming that the Health Service in fact justifies its aspirin policy by citing reasons of intrapersonal aggregation; nor am I claiming that others judge the policy to be permissible because they implicitly see that it can be presented as a case of intrapersonal aggregation (rather than interpersonal aggregation). I am instead seeking to explain why the Health Service's policy is in fact permissible. It is permissible, I claim, only to the extent that it is a case of permissible intrapersonal aggregation. I understand that some people will judge the NHS policy to be (1) permissible and (2) a case of interpersonal aggregation, and will therefore accept that (3) there is some number of headaches that outweigh saving a life in an Please cite only the final published version 34 interpersonal two-way conflict case. But in light of how counter-intuitive (3) is, I suggest we have strong reason to hold that independently reasonable intrapersonal considerations offer the best account of the permissibility of the Health Service's policy. I therefore think Broome is wrong to offer his example as establishing that 'all goods are relevant' or (what comes to the same thing) that the notion of relevance is pointless. 6. CONCLUSION My goal in this paper has been to clarify and refine the non-consequentialist notion of relevance by engaging with three lines of argument against it. Obviously I am very sympathetic to the view that benefits and harms can be relevant and irrelevant to one another, and that there are indeed some hard constraints against certain kinds of interpersonal aggregation. But throughout my main aim has been to articulate the non-consequentialist's best response to each of the three challenges I have considered. I have been surprised to see where this has led, especially with regard to the idea that claims to assistance are morally inert in the context of deciding whom to help. That conclusion in particular seems very difficult for a non-consequentialist accept, but I am willing to entertain it because I do not see another way to block the route to thoroughgoing interpersonal aggregation that is opened up by what I called the case of tiny reductions in risk. In that case, it does seem perfectly permissible to promote the good by catering to those with exceedingly weak claims, even as the very strong claim of someone in dire peril is ignored. I think it is important here to stress that most non-consequentialists already accept a great deal of aggregation that does not easily mesh with any plausible framework that cares deeply about giving competing claims a fair hearing. That, after all, is why non-consequentialists needed the idea of relevance in the first place. One tentative conclusion, then, is that if non-consequentialists Please cite only the final published version 35 wish to hold onto a meaningful notion of relevance, they must focus more of their attention on developing a decidedly 'supply-side' morality concerned with the proper promotion of goodness by benefactors, and less attention on developing 'demand-side' principles concerned with the fair or even-handed treatment of prospective beneficiaries. I think this would certainly drive nonconsequentialist moral views further in the direction of consequentialism, and that will of course make many non-consequentialists nervous. But I think that if there is one thing I have shown decisively, it is that we non-consequentialists should already be rather nervous in embracing an idea as slippery and mysterious as relevance. Perhaps a little more consequentialism is a price worth paying for a little less mystery.44 44 For helpful comments and discussion, I thank Paul Audi, Thomas Dougherty, Molly Gardner, Dan Hausman, Gordon Hull, Justin Klocksiem, Win-chiat Lee, John C. Moskop, Peter Nichols, Robert Streiffer, and audiences at Amherst College, the University of Nebraska-Omaha, the 2012 Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress in Boulder, Colorado, and the 2013 Junior Scholars in Bioethics Workshop at Wake Forest University.

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[3] The author shall receive for the rights granted a free copy of the issue of the journal in which the article is published, plus a PDF file of his/her article. Editorial Board Edwin Vermulst, VVGB Advocaten, Brussels, Immediate Past General Editor Patricio Diaz Gavier, Customs Lawyer, Brussels Laura Fraedrich, Jones Day, Washington, DC Maurizio Gambardella, Grayston & Co., Brussels Folkert Graafsma, Holman Fenwick, Brussels Gary Horlick, Law Offices of Gary N. Horlick, Washington, DC Arnaud Idiart, Corporate Export Control Advisor of EADSs HQ and affiliates in France Robert Ireland, Head of Research and Communications, World Customs Organization, Brussels Jesse G. Kreier, Counsellor and Chief Legal Officer, Rules Division, World Trade Organization Michael Lux, Customs Law Expert, Brussels Timothy Lyons QC, London Yves Melin, McGuire Woods, Brussels Jean-Michel Grave, Head of Unit 'Customs Legislation' European Commission, Brussels Kunio Mikuriya, Secretary General, World Customs Organization, Brussels James J. Nedumpara, Jindal Global Law School, India Fernando Piérola, ACWL, Geneva, Switzerland Davide Rovetta, Grayston & Company, Brussels Cliff Sosnow, Fasken Martineau, Ottawa, Canada Paolo R. Vergano, FratiniVergano, Brussels Dr Carsten Weerth, Lecturer of Law at the FOM University of Applied Sciences for Economics and Management, Bremen Notification of the GCC to the WTO as a Customs Union: The Whys and Hows Bashar H. Malkawi* 1 BACKGROUND The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is generally regarded as a success story for economic integration in Arab countries. The idea of regional integration gained ground by signing the GCC Charter. It envisioned a closer economic relationship between Member States. Although economic integration among GCC Member States is an ambitious step in the right direction, there are challenges ahead. One of the GCC challenges has been in the context of 'dual notifications' leading to political and legal frictions among World Trade Organization (WTO) members. The issue of 'dual notification' is not only a transparency issue, but also substantive and legal in nature. 2 ESTABLISHMENT OF THE GCC The current era is characterized by the proliferation of regional trade agreements around the world.1 In light of the slow progress made to conclude the Doha Round of the WTO, an avalanche of bilateral and regional free trade agreements will fill in the vacuum. The legacy of the failure of multilateralism is a renewed global push toward bilateralism. Arab countries have embarked upon ambitious continental integration efforts designed to fulfil their developmental goals.2 The principles surrounding Arab economics, their economic integration focus, are the same as for any regional integration: combining the resources of constituent members in an effort to achieve economies of scale, comparative advantages and development.3 The GCC was established in May of 1981. The GCC consists of six Member States: (1) United Arab Emirates, (2) Bahrain, (3) Saudi Arabia, (4) Oman, (5) Kuwait and (6) Qatar.4 While there are many elements which led to the establishment of the GCC, chief among them was to foster economic integration between members, increase their bargaining power in international relations and, through collective security, to guard against any threat from neighbouring states. Structurally, the GCC is helped along by the fact that it has a manageable number of states and a high level of development. Thus, GCC members share an already existent common identity and cohesion. The idea of regional integration gained ground by signing the GCC Charter. It envisioned a closer economic relationship between Member States. The aim of the GCC was to promote cooperation in all fields of economic activity in order to increase and maintain economic stability, fostering closer relations among its members, and Notes * Acting Dean and Professor of Law, University of Sharjah, UAE. He holds SJD in Law from American University, Washington College of Law and LLM in International Trade Law from the University of Arizona. Special thanks to the reviewers for their insightful critique and helpful comments. 1 Looking at regional integration, one can immediately see the upward pattern of the trend. Between 1978 and 1991, the number of regional trade agreements (RTAs) remained nearly static. Since the beginning of the 1990s, the trend was reversed and one could observe a constant dramatic increase in the number of RTAs that are being formed. From forty-two RTAs notified to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) according to Art. XXIV:7(a) of the GATT in 1991, the number increased by 107% to eighty-seven Agreements in 1998. See Matthew W. Barrier, Regionalization: The Choice of a New Millennium, 9 Currents: Intl. Trade L. J. 25, 27 (2000). 2 Arab Countries are: Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestinian Autonomous Territories, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates and Yemen. 3 See Raj Bhala, International Trade Law: Theory and Practice 635–650 (2d ed., 2001). 4 See the Cooperation Council Charter, List of Member States (1981), http://www.gccsg.org/eng/index.php?action=Sec-Show&ID=1 (accessed 3 Dec. 2015). ARTICLE 189 Global Trade and Customs Journal, Volume 10, Issue 5 © 2015 Kluwer Law International BV, The Netherlands contributing to the progress and development of the Gulf region.5 The other founding documents that established the GCC, its main organizations, and its executive procedures are the Supreme Council Rules of Procedure,6 the Ministerial Council Rules of Procedure,7 and the Commission for the Settlement of Disputes Rules of Procedure.8 The GCC led to the establishment of free trade area among its members in 1983 and customs union in 2003. The basis of customs law in the GCC is the Common Customs Code of the GCC.9 The Code provides a uniform set of general rules to be implemented by national customs authorities to harmonize the application of duties and procedures for processing imports into the GCC. The Code mandates the implementation of a common external tariff or common customs tariff (CCT) scheme applicable to all third-country imports by the Member States, as well as requires cooperation between national customs authorities in relation to customs matters.10 The common external tariff of the GCC Customs Union is 5%.11 The common external tariff is a flat-rate charge thus erecting a single tariff wall which no individual state is free to breach. Nevertheless, some GCC members have, individually, bilateral free-trade agreements, e.g., US–Bahrain and US–Oman.12 3 THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN GCC AND THE WTO The GCC does not exist in legal vacuum. Rather, GCC is part of the wider corpus of WTO law.13 The GCC and the WTO are not independent of each other; they are highly interdependent. The GCC interacts with regional and international systems.14 The GCC integration agreements have paid little attention to its relationships with the WTO. There are references to regional blocks and international organizations and the need for the GCC Member States to coordinate with each other. However, these references are not enough. These references do not provide an ordered legal framework for the relations between the GCC and WTO. Issues such as the status of WTO law within the GCC, how the multiple commitments of GCC Member States under GCC law and WTO law can be reconciled, and the rules for resolving conflicts between WTO law and the GCC law have not been addressed by GCC legal documents. A large number of regional trade agreements are either customs unions or free trade agreements. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), in Article XXIV, provides for the possibility of creating customs unions and free trade agreements amongst a number of member countries and under which reciprocal preferences are accorded to the participating countries. In addition, developing countries can enter into trade agreements on the basis of the Enabling Clause. An explanation as to why developing countries choose enter into free trade agreements under the Enabling Clause is that the Enabling Clause, contrary to Article XXIV trade agreements, does not require that tariffs and other restrictive regulations of commerce be eliminated with respect to 'substantially all the trade'.15 This means that the Enabling Clause enables trade agreements providing for reduction, and not necessarily elimination, of some but not close to all. In other words, regional trade agreements Notes 5 The aim of the establishment of the GCC can be deduced from the Charter's preamble: 'to effect co-ordination, integration, and interconnections between them in all fields'. See the Cooperation Council Charter, Preamble (1981), http://www.gccsg.org/eng/index.php?action=Sec-Show&ID=1 (accessed 20 Jul. 2014). 6 The Supreme Council is the most powerful GCC institution and is the head of the GCC governance structure. The Supreme Council is composed of the head of each of the Member States. The Supreme Council is the principal legislative body of the GCC and authorizes the other GCC entities to implement its decisions in pursuit of its mandate to realize the objectives of the GCC. Ibid. at Art. 7. 7 The powers of the Ministerial Council are more detailed than the Supreme Council. These powers include proposing policies, prepare recommendations, studies and projects aimed at developing cooperation and coordination between Member States in various fields; endeavouring to encourage, develop and coordinate activities existing between Member States in all fields. Ibid. at Art. 12. 8 The GCC Charter establishes the Commission for Settlement of Disputes (Commission). The Commission is composed of at least three citizens of the Member States. The Commission has jurisdiction to consider matters referred to it by the Supreme Council regarding disputes between Member States as well as disputes over the interpretation and implementation of the Charter. Ibid. at Art. 10. 9 See the Common Customs Code of the GCC States (January 2003), http://library.gcc-sg.org/English/Books/customs2003.htm (accessed 19 Jun. 2014). 10 The Economic Agreement of the GCC countries state that member states shall establish uniform minimum Customs tariffs applicable to the products of countries other than GCC member states. See Economic Agreement, Art. 4.1 (31 Dec. 2001) (available at http://library.gcc-sg.org/English/econagreeeng2003.htm). The Economic Agreement amended and revised the Unified Economic Agreement, which was signed and approved on 11 Nov. 1981. See Unified Economic Agreement (11 Nov. 1981) (available at http:// www.gcc-sg.org/Economic.html). 11 See Implementation Procedures for the Customs Union of the GCC (2003), http://www.gccsg.org/eng/index.php?action=Sec-Show&ID=93 (accessed 19 Jun. 2014). 12 See United States-Bahrain Free Trade Agreement, (14 Sep. 2004) (available at http://www.ustr.gov/sites/default/files/uploads/agreements/fta/bahrain/ asset_upload_file418_6280.pdf); and United States-Oman FTA, (19 Jan. 2006) (available at http://www.ustr.gov/sites/default/files/uploads/agreements/fta/oman/ asset_upload_file987_8839.pdf). 13 The WTO Appellate Body in the United States-Reformulated Gasoline case stated regarding Art. 3.2 of the Dispute Settlement Understanding that 'direction reflects a measure of recognition that the General Agreement on Tariff and Trade is not to be read in "clinical isolation" from public international law'. See Appellate Body Report, United States-Standards for Reformulated and Conventional Gasoline, 29 Apr. 1996, WTO Doc. No. WT/DS2/AB/R, at 17. 14 See Joost Pauwelyn, Overlaps with the WTO and Other Jurisdictions, 13 Minn. J. Global Trade 231 (2004). 15 See GATT Art. XXIV:8. Global Trade and Customs Journal 190 under the Enabling Clause are not required to cover 'substantially all the trade'. A customs union is basically defined as the substitution of a single customs territory for two or more customs territories so that duties and other restrictive regulations of commerce are eliminated with respect to substantially all the trade between the members and that substantially the same duties and other restrictive regulations of commerce are applied by each member to the trade of territories not included in the union.16 The main difference between a customs union and a free trade agreement is that a customs union has a common external trade regime, including a common external tariff, while a free trade agreement has different external tariff among the members. 4 NOTIFICATION OF THE GCC: SINGLE OR DUAL NOTIFICATION Regional Trade agreements under GATT Article XXIV shall be notified in accordance with GATT Article XXIV 7(a) which states that any contracting party deciding to enter into a customs union or free-trade area shall promptly notify the agreement and shall make available such information regarding the proposed union or area. The Committee on Regional Trade Agreements (CRTA) ensures the transparency of customs union and free trade agreements and allows countries to evaluate an agreement's consistency with WTO rules.17 Interestingly, no examination report of an agreement in the CRTA has been finalized since 1995 because of lack of consensus. According to the Enabling Clause paragraph 4, free trade agreements among developing countries should be notified no later than its entry into force. The Enabling Clause does not however specify where the notification has to be made. A notification can be made either in the Committee on Trade and Development (CTD) or the CRTA.18 Both the CTD and the CRTA has rather similar powers to undertake examinations of such free trade agreements. Free trade agreements have to be notified under a transparency mechanism either pursuant to GATT Article XXIV or the Enabling Clause or both. This raises a number of questions. Can a customs union be notified under the Enabling Clause or must it be notified under Article XXIV? There is little guidance on where to notify different free trade agreements. It is important to address the issue of notification being possible under two different legal acts and what legal and practical effects that can have. The GCC's notification serves as an example of the controversies surrounding the issue of notification. The GCC was notified to the WTO as GATT Article XXIV customs union.19 Later, the GCC wanted to change its GATT Article XXIV notification and notified the CTD under the Enabling Clause since it is designed to facilitate trade among developing countries.20 WTO Members have not reached a consensus on where the GCC will be considered. After the change in notification made by the GCC, other WTO members seemed bewildered and wary. For example, the EC requested for further elaboration on the reasons for this change in notification. There is no obvious reason for change in notification but one can speculate that the GCC may have determined that its customs union qualifies under both GATT Article XXIV and the Enabling Clause but chose the Enabling Clause given the developing country status of GCC members. In the alternative, the GCC could have thought that its customs union would not pass under Article XXIV, but would under the Enabling Clause. Therefore, the GCC changed its notification. The EC also argued that any change cannot be based on the member's preference to do so but rather requires a sound legal justification.21 In addition, the EC contended that paragraph 2(c) of Enabling Clause does not cover customs unions.22 Paragraph 2(c) of the Enabling Clause allows 'MFN-inconsistency of regional or global arrangements entered into amongst less-developed contracting parties for the mutual reduction or elimination of tariffs and, in accordance with criteria or conditions which may be prescribed by the Contracting Parties, for the mutual reduction or elimination of nontariff measures'. According to the EC, this paragraph can only be invoked to justify preferential non-tariff measures in a regional arrangement among developing countries if Notes 16 See GATT Art. XXIV subparas 8(a)(i) and (ii) define a customs union. 17 On 6 Feb. 1996, the WTO General Council decided to establish the Committee on Regional Trade Agreements. Under its terms of reference, the Committee on Regional Trade Agreements is mandated to examine regional trade agreements referred to it by the Council for Trade in Goods. See Committee on Regional Trade Agreements – Decision of 6 Feb. 1996, WTO Document No. WT/L/127, para. 1.a (7 Feb. 1996). 18 See WTO, Committee on Trade and Development, Legal Note on Regional Trade Arrangements under the Enabling Clause, WT/COMTD/W/114, (13 May 2003), paras 19–20. 19 See WTO Committee on Regional Trade Agreements, Gulf Cooperation Council Customs Union – Notification from Saudi Arabia, 20 Nov. 2006, WTO Doc. No. WT/ REG222/N/1. 20 See WTO Committee on Trade and Development, Notification of Regional Trade Agreement, 31 Mar. 2008, WTO Doc. No. WT/COMTD/N/25. 21 See WTO Committee on Trade and Development, supra n. 18. 22 See Communication from the European Communities, Committee on Trade and Development, Gulf Cooperation Council Customs Union – Notification, WT/COMTD/66/ Add.2, (25 Nov. 2008). Notification of the GCC to the WTO as a Customs Union 191 criteria or conditions specified therein are established by WTO members.23 For this is not the case yet, EC argues, the GCC Customs Union – for its non-tariff provisions – is not justifiable under Enabling Clause. Furthermore, the US argued that the Enabling Clause is an exception to GATT Most-Favoured-Nation principle.24 According to US, GCC Customs Union has resulted in a common external tariff which is above the tariff bindings of some of its members.25 Whenever regional agreements result in inconsistencies with other GATT provisions, such as Article II on tariff bindings, these inconsistencies can only be justified under GATT Article XXIV. Therefore, the GCC Customs Union should be exclusively reviewed by CRTA rather than CTD. If the US and EC are right in their arguments, this would mean that Article XXIV prevails over Enabling Clause paragraph 2(c) for all regional arrangements. Thus, few if any Customs Unions with non-tariff measures can be covered by the Enabling Clause. By examining the words of paragraph 2(c) of Enabling Clause, it becomes clear that regional or global arrangements with non-tariff measures can benefit from the waiver under the Enabling Clause when there have been no criteria or conditions which may be prescribed by members. WTO members have not yet drafted such criteria or conditions thus allowing developing countries to actions as they see fit in their regional arrangements. A long discussion followed about whether the GCC notification issue was resolved.26 Because the GCC is notified under both GATT Article XXIV and the Enabling Clause and the latter notification has not been withdrawn yet, there are legal and procedural implications for this. It could lead to the possibility that the GCC customs union could be evaluated under Article XXIV and the Enabling Clause. No precedent exists regarding dual examination. The Transparency Mechanism for Regional Trade Agreements of 2006 did not envisage a situation where an agreement is notified twice under two distinct legal provisions.27 Thus, there should be a modification to the Transparency Mechanism to clarify this issue. In addition, dual examination could create the possibility of conflicting rulings.28 If, for example, the CTD and CRTA came to opposite debates or arguments, this could complicate the task of the multilateral system to check on regional trade agreements and customs unions. Irreconcilable differences between GCC and some WTO members can be susceptible to challenges under the WTO dispute settlement system.29 Internally, some GCC members such Saudi Arabia undertook in their WTO accession to notify trade agreements under GATT Article XXIV.30 This may lead to a situation where some GCC members would like to notify these trade agreements under the Enabling Clause. There is no obvious way to determine which position prevails. 5 CONCLUSIONS Customs union and free trade agreements can be notified under either GATT Article XXIV or the Enabling Clause. However, there is controversy about notifying customs unions under the Enabling Clause and GATT Article XXIV which is not prohibited legally. The purpose of the Enabling Clause is to facilitate and promote the trade of developing countries and to support their integration into world trade. The issue of 'dual notification' raises procedural and legal questions that require clarification or eventual resolution. Notes 23 Ibid. 24 See Communication from the United States, Committee on Trade and Development, Gulf Cooperation Council Customs Union – Notification, WT/COMTD/66/Add.1, (25 Nov. 2008). 25 GCC countries apply the GCC common external tariff. The rates of common external tariff for more than 85% of the tariff lines were 5% or 0%. 26 See WTO, Committee on Trade and Development, Gulf Cooperation Council Customs Union – Notification (WT/COMTD/N/25), WT/COMTD/66/Add.2, (25 Nov. 2008), WT/COMTD/M/79, (3 Sep. 2010), WT/COMTD/W/175, (30 Sep. 2010), WT/COMTD/M/80, (21 Dec. 2010), WT/COMTD/M/81, (16 Jun. 2011), WT/COMTD/M/82, (19 Oct. 2011). 27 See Jo-Ann Crawford, A New Transparency Mechanism for Regional Trade Agreements, 11 Sing. Y.B. Intl. L. 133 (2007). 28 There are different scenarios that would result if the GCC is notified under Art. XXIV of GATT or under the Enabling Clause because of the differences between these two systems. GATT Art. XXIV condoned the establishment of customs union subject to several stringent conditions. For example, any agreement must include a plan and schedule for the formation of a free trade area or customs union and the formation should be achieved within a 'reasonable length of time'. Because the GCC was notified under Art. XXIV, the WTO CRTA will examine and scrutinize this agreement more extensively to ensure that the GCC does not adversely affect the interests of nonmembers and to determine how much trade diversion it created, if any. A plan and schedule for implementation of the customs union is required under Art. XXIV:5(c), but not under the Enabling Clause. The Enabling Clause includes more lenient criteria compared with GATT Art. XXIV. For example, unlike Art. XXIV of GATT, the Enabling Clause drops the conditions on the substantial coverage of trade and allows developing countries to reduce tariffs on mutual trade in any way they wish. See Different and More Favourable Treatment Reciprocity and Fuller Participation of Developing Countries, L/4903, Art. 4.a (28 Nov. 1979). 29 There are several instances in which regional blocks have been dragged before the WTO Dispute Settlement Body for violating WTO law. See for example Turkey-Restriction on Imports of Textiles and Clothing Products, WTO Doc. No. WT/BS34/AB/R (1999). See also Brazil-Measures Affecting the Imports of Retreaded Tyres, WTO Doc. No. WT/DS332/AB/R (2007). 30 See Report of the Working Party on the Accession of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to the World Trade Organization, WT/ACC/SAU/61, para. 314 (1 Nov. 2005). Global Trade and Customs Journal 192 Publisher Kluwer Law International P.O. Box 316 2400 AH Alphen aan den Rijn The Netherlands General Editor Jeffrey L. Snyder, Crowell & Moring, Washington, DC Corporate Counsel and Book Review Editor Dr Michael Koebele, General Manager – Legal (Europe), Kia Motors Europe GmbH, Frankfurt am Main Interview Editor John B. Brew, Crowell & Moring, Washington, D.C. 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[2] The following rights remain reserved to the author: the right to make copies and distribute copies (including via e-mail) of the contribution for own personal use, including for own classroom teaching use and to research colleagues, for personal use by such colleagues, and the right to present the contribution at meetings or conferences and to distribute copies of the contribution to the delegates attending the meeting; the right to post the contribution on the author's personal or institutional web site or server, provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication; for the author's employer, if the contribution is a 'work for hire', made within the scope of the author's employment, the right to use all or part of the contribution for other intra-company use (e.g. training), including by posting the contribution on secure, internal corporate intranets; and the right to use the contribution for his/her further career by including the contribution in other publications such as a dissertation and/or a collection of articles provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication. [3] The author shall receive for the rights granted a free copy of the issue of the journal in which the article is published, plus a PDF file of his/her article. Editorial Board Edwin Vermulst, VVGB Advocaten, Brussels, Immediate Past General Editor Patricio Diaz Gavier, Customs Lawyer, Brussels Laura Fraedrich, Jones Day, Washington, DC Maurizio Gambardella, Grayston & Co., Brussels Folkert Graafsma, Holman Fenwick, Brussels Gary Horlick, Law Offices of Gary N. Horlick, Washington, DC Arnaud Idiart, Corporate Export Control Advisor of EADSs HQ and affiliates in France Robert Ireland, Head of Research and Communications, World Customs Organization, Brussels Jesse G. Kreier, Counsellor and Chief Legal Officer, Rules Division, World Trade Organization Michael Lux, Customs Law Expert, Brussels Timothy Lyons QC, London Yves Melin, McGuire Woods, Brussels Jean-Michel Grave, Head of Unit 'Customs Legislation' European Commission, Brussels Kunio Mikuriya, Secretary General, World Customs Organization, Brussels James J. Nedumpara, Jindal Global Law School, India Fernando Piérola, ACWL, Geneva, Switzerland Davide Rovetta, Grayston & Company, Brussels Cliff Sosnow, Fasken Martineau, Ottawa, Canada Paolo R. Vergano, FratiniVergano, Brussels Dr Carsten Weerth, Lecturer of Law at the FOM University of Applied Sciences for Economics and Management, Bremen

Nominalization, Specification, and Investigation By Richard Wyley Lawrence A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in Charge Professor John MacFarlane, Co-chair Professor Paolo Mancosu, Co-chair Professor Hannah Ginsborg Professor Line Mikkelsen Summer 2017 Nominalization, Specification, and Investigation This dissertation, in its entirety, is the original work of the author. Copyright Richard Wyley Lawrence 2017 Abstract Nominalization, Specification, and Investigation by Richard Wyley Lawrence Doctor of Philosophy in Philosophy University of California, Berkeley Professor John MacFarlane, co-chair Professor Paolo Mancosu, co-chair What does it mean for something to be an object, in the broad sense in which numbers, persons, physical substances, and reasons all play the role of objects in our language and thought? I argue for an epistemological answer to this question in this dissertation. These things are objects simply in the sense that they are answers to questions: they are the sort of thing we search for and specify during investigation or inquiry. They share this epistemological role, but do not necessarily belong to any common ontological category. I argue for this conclusion by developing the concept of an investigation, and describing the meaning of nouns like 'number' in terms of investigations. An investigation is an activity structured by a particular question. For example, consider an elementary algebra problem: what is the number x such that x2 − 6x + 9 = 0? Beginning from this question, one carries out an investigation by searching for and giving its answer: x = 3. On the view I develop, nouns like 'number' signify the kind of question an investigation addresses, since they express the range of its possible answers. 'Number' corresponds to a 'how many?' question; 'person' corresponds to 'who?'; 'substance' to one sense of 'what?'; 'reason' to one sense of 'why?'; and so on. I make use of this idea, which has its roots in Aristotle's Categories, to solve a puzzle about what these nouns mean. As Frege pointed out in 1 the Foundations of Arithmetic, it seems to be impossible for (1) The number of Jupiter's moons is four. to be true while (2) Jupiter has four moons. is false, or vice versa. These sentences are just two different ways of expressing the same thought. But on a standard analysis, it is puzzling how that can be so. Every contentful expression in (1) has an analogue in (2), except for the noun 'number'. If the thought is the same whether or not it is expressed using 'number', what does that noun contribute? Is the concept it expresses wholly empty? That can't be right: 'number' is a meaningful expression, and its presence in (1) seems to make that sentence about numbers, in addition to Jupiter and its moons. So why doesn't it make a difference to the truth conditions of the sentence? The equivalence between these two sentences is famous, but it is hardly a unique example. To say that Galileo discovered Jupiter's moons is just to say that the person who discovered them was Galileo. Likewise, to say that Jupiter spins rapidly because it is gaseous is just to say that the reason it spins rapidly is that it is gaseous. So the same puzzle that arises for 'number' also arises for 'person', 'reason', and other nouns of philosophical interest. If they are significant, what contribution do they make? Because the problem is general, I pursue a general solution. The sentences which introduce the nouns in these examples are known as specificational sentences, because the second part specifies what the first part describes. In (1), for example, 'four' specifies the number of Jupiter's moons. I argue that we should analyze specificational sentences as pairing questions with their answers. At a semantic level, a sentence like (1) is analogous to a short dialogue: "How many moons does Jupiter have? Four." This analysis is empirically well supported, and it unifies the theoretical insights behind other approaches. Most importantly, it solves the puzzle. According to this analysis, (1) asserts no more or less than the answer it gives, which could also be given by (2); that is why they are equivalent. But it differs from (2) by explicitly marking this assertion as an answer to the 'how many?' question expressed by 'the number of Jupiter's moons'. That is why the two sentences address different subject matters and have different uses. 2 In order to formulate this analysis in a contemporary logical framework, I apply the concept of an investigation in the setting of gametheoretical semantics for first-order logic. I argue that quantifier moves in semantic games consist of investigations. A straightforward first-order representation of the truth conditions of specificational sentences then suffices to explicate the question-answer analysis. In the semantic games which characterize the truth conditions of a specificational sentence, players carry out investigations structured by the question expressed in the first part of the sentence. When they can conclude those investigations by giving the answer expressed in the second part, the sentence is true. The game semantics characterizes objects by their role in investigations: objects are whatever players can search for and specify as values for quantified variables in the investigations that constitute quantifier moves in the game. This semantics thus captures the sense in which objects are answers to questions. I use this account to offer a new interpretation of Frege's claim that numbers are objects. His claim is not about the syntax of number words in natural language, but about the epistemological role of numbers: numbers are the sort of thing we can search for and specify in scientific investigations, as sentences like (1) reveal. 3 The substantive form belongs originally only to things, the adjective form to qualities, the verb form to events. But, of course, language could not in its judgments always begin with the thing, and annex qualities and action to this as the subject; it had to make the qualities in themselves and action in itself also object of its reflection. Hence it severed their connection with things, gave them a substantive form. . . Almost invariably we find a tendency to make the newly acquired syntactic dignity of words convertible with a new metaphysical dignity acquired by their matter. . . . Language creates for us a mythology, from which, of course, in the use of language we can never wholly set ourselves free without becoming pedantically precise, but against the influence of which on the moulding of our thoughts we ought to be carefully on our guard. - Hermann Lotze (1887, pp. 629–630) If I want to speak of a concept, language, with an almost irresistible force, compels me to use an inappropriate expression which obscures-I might almost say falsifies-the thought. . . . We cannot avoid words like 'the concept', but where we use them we must always bear their inappropriateness in mind. - Gottlob Frege (1891/1997a, p. 174) i Acknowledgments This dissertation has been a long time in the making, and I am indebted to many people for their conversation, feedback, encouragement, and support. I must thank first and foremost my advisors, who have had an enormous influence on the dissertation. Their feedback and advice shaped its overall narrative, the contents of particular chapters, and the details of its arguments. The rough edges that remain are, of course, my own. (I must also thank them for their patience where my own inability, or authorial stubbornness, have left their comments unaddressed.) Hannah Ginsborg's interest and encouragement during the early stages of the project helped make it as ambitious as it is, and my conversations with her kept me focused throughout on the philosophical issues at the heart of the matter. Line Mikkelsen's expertise and guidance through the linguistic literature was immensely helpful as I worked out my study of specificational sentences in Part I. Paolo Mancosu's knowledge of the history of logic and mathematics had a strong influence on the chapters in Part II, and my discussions with him have helped me conceive how the project will develop into further research. And John MacFarlane, whose incisive comments have sharpened my thinking since my first day of graduate school, was unfailingly attentive to both my biggest ideas and the smallest details of my work at every stage. Over the years, each of my advisors has supported me in too many other ways to list here, and I will never forget the warmth, generosity, faith, and pride they have shown toward me as I brought this project to fruition. Many other Philosophy faculty at Berkeley, especially Timothy Clarke, Klaus Corcilius, Michael Martin, Hans Sluga, and Seth Yalcin, deserve my thanks for their words of encouragement and the conversations that they had with me about my work. I also received valuable comments from faculty members at other institutions, including Ivano Caponigro, ii Robert May, and Gila Sher. I am grateful to Janet Groome and David Lynaugh for relieving me of a thousand administrative tasks, for patiently enduring my constant presence in their office, and for providing me with sweets and conversation whenever I needed a break. And I will always be grateful for the time and financial support I have received from the Department and the University as a whole, which enabled me to pursue this project and see it through. Before I came to graduate school, Thomas Ricketts told me that most of my education would come from my fellow graduate students. He was right, and I couldn't have made a better choice in coming to Berkeley. My fellow graduate students have been my friends, my support network, and the first sounding board for all of my ideas. I am especially grateful to the following students for their comments on my writing and the conversations they had with me about my work, though I am sure that this list is incomplete: Austin Andrews, Eugene Chislenko, Lindsay Crawford, Caitlin Dolan, Peter Epstein, Melissa Fusco, Nick Gooding, Jim Hutchinson, Ethan Jerzak, Jeff Kaplan, Alex Kerr, Arc Kocurek, Katie Mantoan, Luke Misenheimer, Ethan Nowak, Emily Perry, Kirsten Pickering, Michael Rieppel, Rachel Rudolph, Pia Schneider, Janum Sethi, Umrao Sethi, Justin Vlasits, and James Walsh. Of these, Michael Rieppel deserves special mention. Mike and I discovered early on in my graduate career that our philosophical interests and outlook were closely aligned. In the years since, we have enjoyed many, many conversations about philosophy, particularly over beers at the Heart and Dagger. He has read and commented on more of this dissertation than anyone apart from my advisors, and it is possible that his influence on my thinking exceeds even theirs; I only hope that my conversation has been half as useful to him as his was to me. Mike is also responsible for introducing me to the circle of friends who have been my closest and most trusted companions during graduate school, including Anna Bailey, Bill Campbell, and Lindsay Crawford. Their friendship has sustained me all throughout the years I've spent writing this dissertation, and I would never have completed it without their encouragement and commiseration-not to mention their cooking, their wine and whiskey, their songs, and their adventures. I also owe much to my family for their patience and love as I made my way through graduate school. I rarely faced the dreaded question from them of when I would finish-or what would happen if I didn't. iii I am especially grateful to my sister Kendra and her husband Robby, who allowed me to stay in their beautiful home in the Oakland hills for a month during the summer of 2016. Most of the final chapter of this dissertation was written over the course of that month. My stay there provided the seclusion and atmosphere that I needed to work out how I should finally conclude the project. That was an otherwise difficult period for me, and staying in their home was the most welcome retreat I can imagine; without them, I am not sure whether I would have reached the conclusion I did, or any conclusion at all. Finally, I am grateful to Jillian Budd, without whom I would never have started this great adventure, and never would have believed I could finish it. No other person has done more to support me in the years since I began. Now that I have finished, it is time to begin again. iv Contents Acknowledgments ii Contents v I Nominalization and Specification 1 1 Numbers, questions, and (some) nouns 2 1.1 Statements of numbers as focus constructions . . . . . . . . 4 1.2 A syntactic proposal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 1.3 Nouns corresponding to questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 1.4 The plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 2 Specification 34 2.1 Ambiguities in pseudo-cleft sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 2.2 Other types of specificational sentences . . . . . . . . . . . 49 3 Semantic analyses of specification 64 3.1 The inversion analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 3.2 The equative analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 3.3 The question-answer analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 II Investigation 114 4 Investigation 115 4.1 The structure of investigations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 4.2 Investigatory semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131 4.3 Back to natural language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147 v CONTENTS 5 Numbers, again 155 5.1 Frege's understanding of objects and concepts . . . . . . . 160 5.2 The investigatory conception of concepts and objects . . . . 185 5.3 Platonism and the independence of objects . . . . . . . . . 209 Bibliography 219 vi Part I Nominalization and Specification 1 Chapter 1 Numbers, questions, and (some) nouns Frege thought that sentences like the following should be analyzed as identity statements: (1) The number of moons of Jupiter is four. He took both 'the number of moons of Jupiter' and 'four' as proper names, and 'is' as the sign of identity. His motivation for doing so seems to have been primarily mathematical. Frege was convinced that the numbers must in some sense be self-subsistent objects if arithmetic is to be a genuine science.1 Thus, our words for numbers must be like other words that stand for objects: names or singular terms. There are some reasons to be suspicious of the identity analysis, though, that I want to examine here. The first, as Frege had observed already, is that number words are also used in attributive constructions. In modern syntactic terms, they are determiners. For example: (2) Jupiter has four moons. In this sentence, the words one can substitute for 'four' while preserving well-formedness are not names or singular terms, but words like 'the', 'some', 'most', 'its' or 'those'.2 This should make us suspicious that 'four' 1See Frege (1884/1980, § 57). 2Of course, one may also substitute adjectives, like 'bright' or 'beautiful', in this position. I treat number words in attributive position as determiners, rather than adjectives, because this is one way of accommodating Frege's insight that "the content of a statement of number is an assertion about a concept" in modern terminology (Frege, 2 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS as it occurs in (1) is a singular term, since substituting one singular term for another usually preserves well-formedness. Furthermore, (1) and (2) seem to have the same truth conditions; it is difficult to see how one could be true while the other was false. This makes it unlikely that 'four' is simply ambiguous between a singular term use and a determiner use. Positing that 'four' is ambiguous would leave the close semantic relationship between these two sentences unexplained. Another cause for suspicion is the fact that the definite description in (1) doesn't have the relationship to the corresponding indefinite description that we would expect. Normally one can exchange the definite article for the indefinite: (3) a. The composer of Tannhäuser is Wagner. b. A composer of Tannhäuser is Wagner. Both of these sentences are grammatical, and (3-b) says much the same as (3-a). The difference is that (3-b) does not presuppose that Tannhäuser has a unique composer, whereas (3-a) does. By contrast, (4) ?A number of moons of Jupiter is four. is not even clearly grammatical, and if it is, it's not clear what it says or how its meaning is related to (1).3 Finally, there is some evidence that the definite description in (1) might be more like a question than a singular term. Definite descriptions are usually ambiguous between an acquaintance reading and an indirect question reading when they occur as the direct object of 'knows'. For example, (5-a) is ambiguous between the two readings (5-b) and (5-c): (5) a. Ralph knows the teacher. b. Ralph knows who the teacher is. (indirect question) c. Ralph is acquainted with the teacher. (acquaintance) But when a definite description headed by 'the number' occurs as the object of 'knows', the indirect question reading is strongly preferred. (6) a. Frege knows the number of sections in the Grundlagen. 1884/1980, § 46). 3This observation, and the example in (3), are due to Hofweber (2007). I discuss Hofweber's view further below. 3 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS b. Frege knows how many sections are in the Grundlagen. c. ?Frege is acquainted with the number of sections in the Grundlagen. It is much more natural to read (6-a) as synonymous with (6-b) than as saying that Frege is acquainted with the number 109. To my ear, the acquaintance reading is not even clearly possible. Even if it is, we need an explanation of why the ambiguity is so lopsided in the case of 'the number'. Why is the indirect question reading so strongly preferred? If definite descriptions headed by 'the number' are not semantically singular terms, it would explain our preference for the indirect question reading of (6-a). This is another cause for suspicion about the identity analysis of (1). I think the suspicions are right: (1) is not an identity sentence, at least not in the sense that it should be thought of as an identity sign flanked by two semantically singular terms. The apparent definite description 'the number of moons of Jupiter' should be interpreted more like an indirect question than a singular term which refers to an object. Likewise, 'four' should be interpreted more like an answer to that question. This means it also needn't be construed as a singular term, since pronounced answers to questions can come from many parts of speech. This claim about (1), if it is correct, has interesting consequences for the philosophy of mathematics. I am more interested here, however, in generalizing the lessons of this example to other sentences, about things other than numbers. I will argue that 'number' is part of a special class of nouns, nouns which have an important relationship to questions. It is this fact that accounts for the suspicious behavior of 'the number of moons of Jupiter' in the examples above. I will characterize this class of nouns, and say more about what they mean, in the following chapters. Here, I focus mainly on bringing the puzzle posed by these nouns more clearly into view. 1.1 STATEMENTS OF NUMBERS AS FOCUS CONSTRUCTIONS Thomas Hofweber (Hofweber, 2007, 2005) has also recently taken issue with Frege's analysis of (1), and developed an alternative analysis. In response to some of the suspicions I pointed to above, he proposes that (1) is not an identity statement, but a focus construction. It is merely a syntac4 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS tic variant of sentence (2). The syntactic variation communicates stress or focus on the 'how many' aspect of what is communicated, but (1) and (2) are semantically equivalent, and communicate the same information. To support this claim, Hofweber makes some very illuminating observations. I agree that these observations motivate a different analysis of (1). But as we will see in the next section, I don't think Hofweber's proposal that (1) is a focus construction is quite right. The problem is that it does not account for the role of 'number' in sentences like (1). Hofweber's argument deals with the use of number words like 'four' in ordinary, non-arithmetical language.4 As we have seen, there are two such uses. Number words sometimes occur syntactically as determiners, as in (2), and sometimes as singular terms, as in (1). Hofweber argues that the latter uses are not semantically singular terms, as Frege thought. We should not semantically construe such uses as identity statements. Hofweber cites a family of substitution problems, like those I explained above, as evidence that sentences like (1) are not identity statements containing semantically singular terms. Specifically, he appeals to the oddness of substituting the indefinite article for the definite article in number-descriptions, like in (4). He also points out that one cannot substitute a number-description for a number word in its determiner use. If we try to substitute 'the number of moons of Jupiter' for 'four' in (2), the resulting sentence is not grammatical: (7) *Jupiter has the number of moons of Jupiter moons. This is odd, if we assume that 'the number of moons of Jupiter' and 'four' are always co-referring singular terms, for we should be able to substitute one for the other in extensional contexts like (2). It's not odd, of course, if 'four' is ambiguous between a determiner use and a singular term use, since there's no reason to expect that 'the number of moons of Jupiter' could be substituted for the determiner uses of 'four'. But as I pointed out above, positing that 'four' is ambiguous leaves the felt equivalence of (2) and (1) unexplained. Hofweber concludes from this evidence that (1) should not be read as an identity statement. Instead he claims that, in their ordinary usage, 4The use of number words in arithmetical discourse is somewhat different. Though Hofweber also has an account of arithmetical discourse, articulated in Hofweber (2005), it is outside the scope of my interests in this chapter. 5 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS statements of number like (1) are best understood as focus constructions. The central idea of his proposal is that the relationship between (2) and (1) is much like the relationship between (8-a) and (8-b), or between (9-a) and (9-b): (8) a. Johan likes soccer. b. It is soccer that Johan likes. (9) a. Mary entered quietly. b. Quietly is how Mary entered. The distinction here is between neutral sentences, like (8-a) and (9-a), and focused sentences, like (8-b) and (9-b). Intuitively, a focused sentence places stress or emphasis on some part of what's said, where the neutral sentence does not. The idea is that (1) is a focused variant of the neutral sentence (2). Hofweber argues that these focus constructions are truth-conditionally equivalent to their neutral variants.5 For how could it be true that Johan likes soccer, but false that it is soccer that Johan likes? Or true that Mary entered quietly, but false that quietly is how she entered? Or true that Jupiter has four moons, but false that the number of moons of Jupiter is four? In each case, the focused sentence communicates just the same information as its neutral variant; it just does so in a different way. So the neutral and focused versions of these sentences are semantically equivalent. How, then, should we account for the differences between them? Hofweber's answer is that the neutral and focused versions of a sentence have different communicative uses, which accounts for the differences in syntax. The most important communicative difference is that neutral sentences can be used to answer more questions than their focused variants. For example, (8-a) can be an answer either to 'Who likes soccer?' or 'What does Johan like?', while (8-b) is only an appropriate answer to the latter. The second sentence exhibits a focus on some aspect of the information being communicated. When that aspect of the information is not in question, or when some other aspect of the information was asked for, this focus is communicatively inappropriate. Hofweber 5Hofweber points out that this is not true in general. Focus can affect truth conditions. But it doesn't seem to in the examples above, including the case of numbers. Indeed, it is the felt equivalence of (2) and (1) that Hofweber thinks needs to be explained. 6 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS claims that (1) communicates the same information as (2), but focuses on the 'how many' aspect of that information. Both (1) and (2) can answer a question like 'How many moons does Jupiter have?'. But due to its focus, (1) is not an appropriate answer to other questions, like 'Which planet has four moons?'. Part of what makes this account plausible is the parallel between structural focus constructions, like (8-b) and (9-b), and tonal focus constructions, where focus is achieved through intonation. For example, a tonally focused variant of (8-a) would be: (10) Johan likes SOCCER. where the capital letters indicate a stress that is pronounced. It is hard to deny that such tonal focus constructions have the same truth conditions as their neutral counterparts.6 On the other hand, the communicative import of tonal focus constructions is evident from everyday conversation. Why, then, do we also have structural focus constructions, like (8-b) and (9-b)? Because not all language is pronounced. We have a communicative need for focus constructions even in settings where we can't use words with different intonations. In such settings, we impart focus through syntax rather than intonation. This helps explain why the significant differences in syntax between structural focus constructions and their neutral counterparts does not prevent them from having the same truth conditions. In structural focus constructions, the syntax has a communicative role over and above its usual role as the starting point of semantic interpretation, so it is not necessarily a good guide to the semantic structure of the sentence at the sub-sentential level. In particular, if (1) is a focus construction, 'four' there might still have the semantic role of a determiner, extracted away from the noun that it modifies ('moons') for the sake of focus. In the same way, 'quietly' in (9-b) has been extracted away from the verb it modifies ('entered'), but it remains semantically an adverb modifying that verb. In this case, there is little temptation to treat 'quietly' as a singular term or anything other than an adverb. Hofweber thinks there should be equally little temptation to treat 'four' as a singular term in (1). When we treat 'four' as a determiner rather than a singular term, and explain (1) as a focus construction rather than an identity statement, the 6Again, this is not quite true in general, but the exceptions need not concern us here. 7 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS substitution problems dissolve, because they are based on the assumption that both 'four' and 'the number of moons of Jupiter' are semantically singular terms. This is a good reason to think Frege's analysis is wrong, and that we can better account for the semantics of (1) by treating it as a merely syntactic variant of (2). The syntactic difference is communicatively important, but for just this reason, the syntax of (1) is a misleading guide to its semantics. 1.2 A SYNTACTIC PROPOSAL I agree with Hofweber's assessment that (1) should not be construed as an identity statement. And I think Hofweber is right to draw attention to the truth-conditional equivalence of (1) and (2), as well as their different communicative roles. I think Hofweber's observation that (2) can answer a wider range of questions than (1) is particularly important. In fact, I think it is the key to understanding the semantic role of 'the number of moons of Jupiter' in (1). In this section, I want to raise a problem for Hofweber's view. The problem is this: what is the role of 'number' in (1)? Attempting to solve this problem will show us that we cannot view (1) as merely a syntactic or structural variant of (2). This means that Hofweber's claim that (1) is a focus construction is not quite right. But our attempt to make it work will lay the foundations for a different account, one which gives us a clearer picture of the role of 'number' and a family of other nouns. 1.2.1 Whence 'the number'? Hofweber's analysis of the singular term uses of number words as focus constructions explains both the felt equivalence of (2) and (1) and the reason we have such constructions: they serve an important communicative function. Still, I think the analysis does not address one important question. If non-arithmetical uses of number words like (1) are merely focus constructions, why do they contain apparently contentful words that do not appear in their unfocused counterparts? Specifically, why do they contain the expression 'the number'? The problem here is that 'the number' seems to contribute some important content to such statements. This is not true of Hofweber's other examples of focus constructions, like (8-b) or (9-b), where the words which appear in the focus construction but not 8 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS the neutral sentence do not seem to introduce any new concepts. We need a way of accounting for the fact that (1) and (2) are equivalent, despite the fact that (1) employs the concept of number, while (2) apparently does not. Otherwise, there is room to doubt that (1) is merely a syntactic variant of (2). One way to see the problem here is to compare Hofweber's proposal to a suggestion of Frege's. Hofweber intends his proposal to be a development of Frege's idea that we may 'recarve' the content of a sentence in a way that uses different concepts. Frege says, for example, that (11-b) is a 'recarved' version of (11-a)7: (11) a. Line a is parallel to line b. b. The direction of line a is the direction of line b. (11-b) employs the concept of direction, where (11-a) does not, but the two sentences have the same truth conditions. Frege's idea is that the truth conditions of the sentence are prior to its analysis into individual terms and incomplete expressions, and we have some choice in the concepts we use to express these truth conditions. Thus we can, as it were, shift some of the content expressed by 'parallel' in (11-a) over to the concept expressed by 'direction' in (11-b), in order to make use of the concept of identity in the latter, without changing the truth conditions. This 'recarving' metaphor is suggestive, but Frege does not develop it further in the Grundlagen. If we could further articulate what it is to 'recarve' the content of a sentence, we would have an explanation of why the concept of number occurs in (1) but not (2), despite their equivalence. Hofweber's idea is that 'recarving' is structural focus. Thus, seeing (1) as a focused version of (2) spells out Frege's recarving metaphor, so it provides such an explanation. The problem is that Hofweber argues for his proposal by assimilating (1) to examples of focus constructions which do not introduce new concepts into the sentence, and it is difficult to see how we could extend his proposal to cases like (11). (What aspect of the information communicated by (11-a) does (11-b) focus on?) Thus the focus construction proposal provides little insight into the sense in which recarving can introduce a new concept while holding truth conditions fixed. For that reason, it cannot fully account for the relationship of (1) to (2). 7See Frege (1884/1980, § 64). 9 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS As an answer to this problem, I would like to make a proposal on Hofweber's behalf. When we use a structural focus construction like (8-b), we typically have (at least) two communicative goals: to give the information that Johan likes soccer, and to stress the part or aspect of this information that answers the question of what Johan likes. To achieve these goals, we must typically use an expression that satisfies two constraints: it must be a grammatical sentence, and it must have a structural focus. The extra words are required in order to simultaneously satisfy these constraints, but they carry no independent semantic content. Could the same be true of (1)? This sentence has several words that do not appear in (2): 'the', 'number', 'of', and 'is'. Can these be understood as merely required to meet the demands of grammaticality while achieving focus? In particular, can 'number' be understood this way? Let us see how one might spell out such a proposal. I will call this the syntactic proposal about 'number'. 1.2.2 The syntactic proposal about 'number' We have seen that one common way of achieving structural focus is by extraction: movement of the word or phrase which contributes the information the speaker wants to focus on into a privileged position. In (8-b) and (9-b), this is a position at or near the grammatical subject of the sentence. According to the syntactic proposal about 'number', a parallel phenomenon is involved in (1). The typical communicative role of this sentence, we are granting, is as a focus construction, which communicates the same information as (2) but additionally has a structural focus on the 'how many' aspect of that information. This focus effect is achieved by extracting the part of the sentence that carries the 'how many' information-namely, the determiner 'four'-to a privileged position. In this case, the privileged position is at the end of the sentence, but we could also put it in subject position without too much awkwardness: (12) Four is the number of moons of Jupiter. But extracting 'four' is not as simple a syntactic operation as extracting a direct object (as in (8-b)) or an adverb (as in (9-b)). We cannot, as it were, simply move it to the front of the sentence, and replace it with a 10 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS cross-referencing word like 'that' or 'how', while preserving grammaticality: (13) a. *Four is Jupiter has . . . moons. b. *Four is . . . Jupiter has moons. There is evidently no way to fill in the blank in (13-a) or (13-b) that would yield a grammatical sentence. We can come close if we follow the model of (9-b), and notice that a question and its focused answer employ the same question word: (14) How did Mary enter? (9-b) Quietly is how Mary entered. A direct analogy with (9-b) is (15-a), but it is ungrammatical. Grammaticality is restored if we also move 'moons' to complement the question word, as in (15-b): (15) How many moons does Jupiter have? a. *Four is how many Jupiter has moons. b. Four is how many moons Jupiter has. This is the first observation that the syntactic proposal about 'number' draws on: extracting number determiners to a privileged position requires both moving their complements ('moons') and introducing a new construction, such as a question word. Let's call this new construction the focus-forming expression. The focus-forming expression in (15-b) is the question word 'how many'. Of course, (15-b) is not yet a sentence containing 'number'. We have not yet arrived at a syntactic explanation for the occurrence of 'number' in (2). To get there, we need a second observation about (14), namely, that we can form structurally-focused answers using other types of focusforming expressions besides the question word 'how'. We can also form a structurally-focused answer using the determiner 'the' as part of the focus-forming expression, rather than the question word 'how': (14) How did Mary enter? (16) Quietly is the way Mary entered. (or: The way Mary entered is quietly.) 11 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS Why would we do this? Why not just stick to 'how' as a focus-forming expression when giving an answer to (14)? One answer is that, as a strategy for achieving structural focus, this approach is more flexible than 'how'. A variety of determiners can be used in focus-forming expressions, not just 'the': (17) Quietly is {a/one/the first. . . } way Mary entered. The sentences in this family have different, but related, communicative uses. You might wish to tell me that Mary entered quietly, and additionally to imply that relative noiselessness was the only salient feature of her entering. You can do this with (16). But you might also want to avoid that implication; in that case, a sentence in the (17) family is more appropriate. Using a determiner in a focus-forming expression also has important consequences for the subsequent discourse. Depending on how our conversation about Mary develops, you might also wish to highlight the similarity between how Mary entered and how Sean entered, for which you'd use (18-a). Or you might wish to contrast how Mary entered with how Sean entered, in which case you'd use a sentence like (18-b). (18) a. Sean entered in {that/the same} way, too. b. Sean entered in {a different/another} way. And so on. The point is that being able to employ different determiners in your answers to questions like (14) can be quite useful. Different determiners can impart or avoid certain immediate implications, as well as enable certain types of anaphora later in the discourse. The flexibility of using determiners in focus-forming expressions, as opposed to question words, carries a small price. Using a determiner in a focus-forming expression requires introducing a new word into the sentence. In the cases above, that word is 'way'. This word is required for grammaticality, as a complement to the determiner. But that seems to be its only purpose. We don't use (16) instead of (9-b) because we wish to talk about something other than how Mary entered. 'Way' is just a dummy noun here. We use it for the effects its determiner has on communication, not because we want to talk about a new family of objects, the ways. Thus, it is plausible that it occurs in (16) merely as a syntactic side-effect of the structural focus construction, not as a word 12 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS which makes a semantic contribution. The idea of the syntactic proposal about 'number' is that 'number' plays a similar role in (1) that 'way' plays in (16) and (17). It provides a dummy noun phrase, an appropriate syntactic complement for a determiner in a focus-forming expression. We use the determiner with 'number' as a focus-forming expression, as opposed to the question phrase 'how many', because of its relationship to a family of determiners which enable more flexible communication. Specifically, sentences using 'number' as part of a focus-forming expression imply weaker sentences, are implied by stronger sentences, and enable contrasting sentences and discourse anaphora. It is more difficult to achieve such effects using 'how many' as a focus-forming expression. To see this more clearly, consider the conversation that might develop when someone asks: (19) How many moons orbit each planet? Here are two ways you might answer this question in the case of Jupiter: (20) a. Four is how many moons orbit Jupiter. b. Four is the number of moons orbiting Jupiter. Notice, however, that the latter answer is more flexible, in much the same way as (16). It is implied by stronger sentences like (21-a), implies weaker sentences like (21-b), has contrasts like (21-c) and enables discourse anaphora as in (21-d) and (21-e): (21) a. Four is the number of moons orbiting each planet. b. Four is {a/one} number of moons orbiting a planet. c. Two is {another/a different} number of moons orbiting a planet. d. Venus has that same number of moons, too. e. Saturn has at least that number of moons. It is difficult to make the natural relationships between such sentences felt if you are limited to using 'how many' instead of using 'number' with a determiner in the subsequent discourse: (22) a. Four is how many moons orbit each planet. b. Four is {*one/*a} how many moons orbit a planet. 13 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS c. Two is {*another/*a different} how many moons orbiting a planet. d. Venus has {*that same} how many moons, too. e. Saturn has {*at least that} how many moons. In particular, there doesn't seem to be a weaker sentence (22-b) implied by (20-a) in the way that (21-b) is implied by (20-b). Nor does there seem to be a contrasting sentence (22-c).8 Thus, we can tentatively conclude that (20-b) is more flexible than (20-a). In a conversation where one can choose either sentence as a way of focusing on the 'how many' aspect of the information communicated, using (20-b) seems to allow the conversation to develop in ways that (20-a) does not. To summarize the syntactic proposal about 'number', then: 'number' is a dummy noun phrase, much like 'way'. It is introduced into focus constructions like (1) because extracting a number determiner to a privileged position requires moving the noun phrase it modifies and introducing a focus-forming expression. There are at least two options for the focus-forming expression: a question word like 'how many', or a determiner-noun combination. The latter option is communicatively more flexible because of the relationships between different determiners, but using a determiner requires a noun phrase complement. In the case of (1), 'number' is that complement. It is introduced to meet the demands of grammaticality when a determiner is chosen over a question word as the means of achieving structural focus. 8Actually, things are not quite this simple. In some cases, there are workarounds that allow one to achieve similar effects on communication when 'how many' is the focus-forming expression. For example, the intended meaning of (22-d) can be grammatically expressed as "Venus has (exactly) that many moons, too" or "Venus has just as many moons", while the intent of (22-e) might be expressed as "Venus has at least that many moons". These workarounds exploit the parallels between 'the same number' and '(exactly) that many', and 'at least that number' and 'at least that many' to achieve the same effect as the focused sentences using 'number'. This works because 'that many moons' can serve as an anaphor whose antecedent is 'how many moons' in (20-a). But this strategy won't help in the cases of the weaker and contrasting sentences (22-b) and (22-c), because there are no parallel expressions with 'many' that do the work of 'a number', 'one number', 'another number' and 'a different number'. This shows that there is still an expressive advantage gained by using 'the number' as a focus-forming expression. 14 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS 1.2.3 A problem with the syntactic proposal I think the syntactic proposal about 'number', sketchy though it may be, provides an illuminating view of the role of 'number'. If it is right, it provides a solution to the problem I raised above, that we have no account of how (1) can be equivalent to (2) given that (1) introduces the concept of number. The solution is deflationary: 'number' only appears to introduce a new concept; in fact, it is semantically idle, serving only to help achieve focus by syntactic means. Thus, there is no disanalogy between (1) and more straightforward cases of focus constructions like (8-b) and (9-b): none of these sentences introduces a concept absent from its neutral counterpart. So there is no reason to doubt that (1) is a structural focus construction after all. Nevertheless, I think there is a problem with the syntactic proposal. The problem is this: even if 'number' occurs in (1) and related sentences merely for the sake of grammaticality, this does not show it is semantically idle. There is an important semantic difference between focused sentences which use 'number' as part of the focus-forming expression and sentences which don't. The syntactic proposal says that 'number' is introduced into (1) to preserve grammaticality in the face of two factors: the extraction of the number word 'four' to a privileged syntactic position, and the use of a determiner rather than a question word in the focus-forming expression. It claims that 'number' is just a dummy noun like 'way', which makes no semantic contribution to focus constructions like (1). Against this claim, we can make two observations. First, 'number' is not intersubstitutable with 'way', as we might expect if both are just dummy nouns. Second, 'number' is sensitive to the semantic properties of the extracted determiner. These observations suggest that 'number' has important semantic features that the syntactic proposal overlooks. According to the syntactic proposal, there are at least two 'dummy' nouns in English, 'number' and 'way'. If these are just dummy nouns, which serve only the grammatical purpose of providing a complement to words like 'the' or 'that', it seems we should be able to use one wherever we can use the other. This is clearly not so, however: (23) a. #Four is the way of moons Jupiter has. b. #Quietly is the number Mary entered. 15 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS These sentences, it seems, are syntactically well-formed but semantically bad. It is not clear why this should be so, if both 'number' and 'way' are merely uninterpreted bits of syntax. Intuitively, the problem with these sentences is that there is some kind of semantic disagreement between the focused expression and the noun in the focus-forming expression: four is not a way you can have moons, and quietly is not a number you can enter. This suggests that 'number' and 'way' have semantic features which can agree or disagree with the semantic features of extracted expressions. This conclusion is further supported by a second observation. 'Number' cannot be used as part of a focus-forming expression when the extracted determiner is not a number word. We can see this as follows. In (2), 'four' is a determiner modifying 'moons'. There is a family of related sentences that have other determiners in the place of 'four': (24) a. Jupiter has some moons. b. Jupiter has a few moons. c. Jupiter has many moons. d. Jupiter has every moon. e. Jupiter has a moon. f. Jupiter has the moon. g. Jupiter has that moon. These sentences are all perfectly grammatical, and can be used to communicate information in a variety of contexts. But notice what happens if we try to extract the determiner, in a way analogous to (1), for the sake of focus: (25) a. Some is {?how many/*the number of} moons Jupiter has. b. A few is {?how many/*the number of} moons Jupiter has. c. Many is {?how many/?the number of} moons Jupiter has. d. A is {*how many/*the number of} moons Jupiter has. e. Every is {*how many/*the number of} moon Jupiter has. f. The is {*how many/*the number of} moon Jupiter has. g. That is {*how many/*the number of} moon Jupiter has. In most of these cases, both 'how many' and 'the number of' fail as focusforming expressions. 'How many' seems to work best, though still somewhat awkwardly, as a focus-forming construction when 'some', 'many' 16 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS or 'a few' is the extracted determiner. (This is unsurprising, given the intuitive semantic relationship between these determiners and number words. Like number words, they express quantities, though not definite quantities.) But 'the number of' seems to be even more selective than 'how many'. I do not see any way of rendering any of these examples clearly grammatical when 'the number of' is employed as a focusforming expression. 'The number of' seems to be appropriate only when the extracted determiner is a number word. If that is right, 'number' is sensitive to the semantic features of the extracted determiner, and not merely the syntax. 'Number' distinguishes between number determiners and other determiners, and the only plausible way of drawing this distinction is along semantic lines: number determiners express definite quantity, and other determiners do not. If the use of 'number' in focus-forming expressions is sensitive to this semantic distinction, it means that 'number' has some semantic features. And similar considerations show that 'way' has semantic features, too.9 These semantic features explain why 'number' is not intersubstitutable with 'way', and why it can only be used in a focus-forming expression when the focused determiner expresses a definite quantity. Thus, we cannot plausibly maintain that 'number' is simply an uninterpreted piece of syntax. Unfortunately, this leaves us with the question of exactly what its semantic contribution is. Without an answer to this question, we still lack an explanation of why (2) and (1) are truthconditionally equivalent. Because (1) uses 'number' while (2) does not, and because 'number' is not merely a dummy noun, we do not seem to have grounds to claim that (1) is merely a structurally-focused variant of (2). So we need a different approach to understanding the relationship between (2) and (1). 9For example, consider what happens if 'the way' is used to focus on 'occasionally' in "Mary entered occasionally". Though 'quietly' and 'occasionally' are syntactically both adverbs, "Occasionally is the way Mary entered" makes no sense, presumably because 'occasionally' does not express anything about the manner of Mary's action. Like 'number', 'way' is sensitive to such semantic distinctions among adverbs when used as a focus-forming expression. 17 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS 1.3 NOUNS CORRESPONDING TO QUESTIONS In light of these problems, I do not see any plausible way of maintaining Hofweber's proposal that (1) is a focus construction. In this section, I'd like to say where I think we went wrong, and lay out a different proposal for understanding (1) and the role that 'number' plays within it. In spelling out the syntactic proposal about 'number', we made two crucial observations, which I think still hold good. First, we observed that there are two strategies for achieving structural focus: by using either a question word or a determiner-noun pair as a focus-forming expression. Second, we compared these two strategies, and observed that while using a determiner-noun pair did not seem to alter the subject matter of a focus construction, it did alter its communicative import. A focus construction like (16), which uses a determiner-noun pair, says the same thing as a question-based focus construction like (9-b), but it has a different effect on the subsequent discourse. We went wrong in concluding from these observations that nouns used in focus-forming expressions, like 'number' and 'way', were just dummy nouns, syntactically required in focus constructions but making no interesting semantic contribution. As we have just seen, this conclusion was too hasty; it is unlikely that 'number' occurs in sentences like (1) for purely syntactic reasons. In fact, this conclusion was only attractive because we were attempting to see how (1) could be a structurallyfocused variant of (2). Intuitively, both 'number' and 'way' do mean something, and they mean quite different things. Thus, we should put aside the focus construction proposal, and ask more directly: what do these nouns mean? 1.3.1 Other question words and nouns The observations which supported the syntactic proposal about 'number' are really instances of a more general pattern. To understand the role of 'number' and other nouns, it will be helpful to have this pattern more fully in view. Nearly every question word has the same relationship to some other noun as 'how many' has to 'number', or 'how' has to 'way'. The relationship is this: a given use of a question in an indicative sentence can be replaced by a definite description employing a noun corresponding to 18 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS that question, and the resulting sentence is felt to be truth-conditionally equivalent to the original. These question-noun relationships are summarized in Table 1.1.10 Examples of sentences which have two equivalent versions, one using a question word and one using a corresponding noun, are provided in (26)–(33). Table 1.1: Relationships between question words and nouns Question word Corresponding Nouns how way how many number how much quantity, amount when time, moment, day, year. . . where place, location position why reason, cause, explanation who person what thing (26) a. Quietly is how Mary entered. (=(9-b)) b. Quietly is the way Mary entered. (=(16)) (27) a. Four is how many moons Jupiter has. (=(15-b)) b. Four is the number of moons Jupiter has. (=(12)) (28) a. One cup is how much milk is needed. b. One cup is the amount of milk needed. (29) a. Ten p.m. is when I go to bed. b. Ten p.m. is the time I go to bed. (30) a. Charlotte went back to where she first saw the spy. b. Charlotte went back to the place she first saw the spy. (31) a. We'll never know why Oscar fled the country. b. We'll never know the reason Oscar fled the country. (32) a. Who Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. b. The person Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. 10There are two question words which appear to be exceptions to this pattern: 'which' and 'whether'. Thus, they do not appear in Table 1.1 or the examples in (26)– (33). These two question words are rather special; I will have more to say about them in Chapter 4. 19 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS (33) a. What Harry most desired was his dinner. b. The thing Harry most desired was his dinner. Some terminology will be useful for characterizing the relationship we see here. Question words are the words (and phrases) which appear in the left hand column of Table 1.1; their corresponding nouns appear in the right hand column. For example, 'why' is a question word, and 'reason' one of its corresponding nouns. The relationship between question words and their corresponding nouns shows itself primarily in complete phrases. A question is a complete phrase headed by a question word, such as 'how Mary entered' in (26-a), or 'why Oscar fled the country' in (31-a).11 A question-replacing description is likewise a complete phrase, headed by 'the' plus a noun phrase headed by a corresponding noun, such as 'the way Mary entered' in (26-b) or 'the reason Oscar fled the country' in (31-b). Each of the examples in (26)–(33) contains two versions of an indicative sentence. The question version contains a question. In the description version, a question-replacing description replaces the question. Specifically, the question is replaced by a description formed using a noun corresponding to the question word which heads the question. Several features of this question word-noun relationship seem noteworthy here. First of all, the examples are far from exhaustive. The questions and descriptions in (26)–(33) occur in different environments, and in sentences which differ in their overall surface syntax. So far as I can see, it would not be difficult to multiply these examples; a description can be substituted for a question in many syntactic environments. Second of all, it seems to me that in each example, the two versions of the sentence are truth-conditionally equivalent. I do not know how it could be true that one cup is how much milk is needed, but false that one cup is the amount of milk needed, or true that we'll never know why Oscar fled but false that we'll never know the reason he fled. Nor could I suppose that ten p.m. is when I go to be bed without supposing that ten p.m. is the time I go to bed. And so on. Substituting the question with an appropriate description seems to yield a completely equivalent sentence, at least as far as truth conditions are concerned. 11Note that questions differ from relative clauses, which are also headed by question words in English. 20 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS These observations generalize the observations we made earlier. They suggest that the relationship between questions and question-replacing descriptions is a productive phenomenon.12 Question words are systematically correlated with certain nouns, and replacing a question with an appropriate description does not affect the truth conditions of the containing sentence. This relationship seems to hold for many different question words and nouns, across many containing sentences. It is not an isolated or limited phenomenon, and it is unlikely to be a coincidence. In particular, the relation between questions and descriptions is not limited to sentences which can be construed as focus constructions. Neither sentence in (30) or (31), for example, appears to be a focus construction. These sentences do not limit the questions they can answer as narrowly as focus constructions, nor do they seem to have neutral variants. (30-b), for example, can answer both "Who went back to where she first saw the spy?" and "Where did Charlotte go?". Thus, these sentences do not seem to stress any particular aspect of the information they convey, either through syntax or intonation. Even if some of the sentences in (26)–(33) should be regarded as focus constructions, the notion of a focus construction is not general enough to account for all instances of the relationship between question words and nouns. We cannot hold that the nouns in Table 1.1 are merely 'dummy' nouns which serve only to help achieve structural focus, because there are cases where they do not serve this purpose. This is another strike against the syntactic proposal about 'number'. To sum up: we have discovered a class of nouns which have an important relationship to question words. Questions can be replaced by descriptions formed using these nouns in a wide variety of sentences. This is the same relationship we earlier characterized in terms of two different strategies for achieving structural focus, but it now appears to extend more widely than sentences which can be construed as focus constructions. The nouns in this family include 'number' and 'way', but these are only two examples among many. There is at least one such noun corresponding to every question word in Table 1.1; some question words have several corresponding nouns. 12Schlenker (2003) argues that definite descriptions can be productively interpreted as questions, using evidence from French. 21 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS 1.3.2 Do nouns corresponding to questions denote objects? With the relationship between question words and their corresponding nouns more fully in view, we can now return to the question I raised at the beginning of this section: what do 'number' and 'way' mean? More generally, if we take it that 'number' and 'way' are part of the family of nouns which correspond to question words, what do the nouns in this family mean? Our usual model for understanding the semantics of nouns says that nouns denote classes of objects. 'Horse' denotes the (class of) horses, 'potato' the (class of) potatoes, and 'silicate' the (class of) silicates. Does it make sense to say the same thing about the nouns in Table 1.1? Should we say that 'way' denotes the (class of) ways, 'amount' (the class) of amounts, 'time' the (class of) times, and so on? We have already seen some intuitive reasons why doing so is unattractive. In motivating the syntactic proposal about 'number', for example, we noted that we do not seem to use 'way' because we wish to talk about a class of objects, the ways. This led us to conclude that 'way' was a dummy noun, at least as it appears in sentences like (16). Though this conclusion was incorrect, our willingness to draw it does point to a contrast between nouns like 'way' and nouns like 'horse'. Part of the point of saying that nouns denote classes of objects is to indicate their contribution to the subject matter of clauses where they appear. It seems obvious that there are such things as horses, and that we use the word 'horse' to talk about them. By saying that 'horse' denotes the class of horses, we indicate what sentences containing 'horse' are about, and which objects we must look to when determining if they are true. But nouns corresponding to questions seem to differ from 'horse' in just this respect. It is not so clear that sentences containing 'way', for example, are about ways, or that we must 'look to the ways' to determine if they are true. At any rate, it is not clear that we talk about them or look to them in the same sense as we talk about or look to horses. So we might doubt that these two kinds of noun should be given the same treatment by a semantic model for our language. Another consideration against the usual model comes from grammar. Individual ways, amounts, times and so on are often not specified by expressions that should be treated as singular terms. Instead, they are often specified by expressions from other parts of speech, such as the adverb 22 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS 'quietly' in (16). Individual horses and potatoes, by contrast, are typically specified using expressions which are clear examples of singular terms, such as names or deictic demonstratives. I shall return to this point in Section 1.3.3. These intuitive considerations are not strong enough to show that the usual model does not apply to the nouns in Table 1.1, though. For one thing, they do not hold equally well for all the nouns that appear there. It is just as obvious that there are persons as that there are horses, for example, and that we use 'person' to talk about them and proper names to specify them. For another, we might simply deny that part of the point of saying a noun denotes a class of objects is to capture our intuitions about their relation to subject matter. Perhaps the notion of 'object' which is most useful for semantic theorizing has nothing to do with subject matter, and as far as that sense of 'object' goes, ordinary nouns and nouns corresponding to questions denote objects in exactly the same sense. Still, applying the usual model to nouns corresponding to questions will not help us to understand their special features. The puzzle presented by these nouns is that they can appear in the description version of a sentence, and not in the question version, without preventing the two versions from being truth-conditionally equivalent. These nouns appear to make a semantic contribution, but not a contribution that can't be had in their absence. The usual model won't capture this puzzling feature of these nouns, even for nouns like 'person' to which it uncontroversially applies, precisely because it applies equally well to nouns that don't have this feature. To see this, consider again the sentences in (32): (32) a. Who Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. b. The person Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. Suppose we follow the usual model, and grant that 'person' denotes the (class of) persons, and that both 'Who Oedipus married' in (33-a) and 'The person Oedipus married' in (33-b) are semantically singular terms which refer to a certain person. Even granting this, a version of the problem I raised for Hofweber's account remains: why should it be obvious that (33-a) and (33-b) are equivalent-and hence that these singular terms co-refer-given that the latter employs 'person' and the former does not? Observing that 'person' denotes the class of persons does not resolve 23 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS this problem. In fact, it makes it more acute, because saying that 'person' denotes the class of persons assimilates our semantic explanation of (33-b) to our explanations of sentences where another noun occurs in the place of 'person': (34) a. The queen Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. b. The woman Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. c. The relative Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. d. The Greek Oedipus married was, tragically, his mother. e. . . . A typical semantic explanation of sentence (34-a) would compositionally derive a statement of its truth conditions from, among other things, a clause that says 'queen' denotes the class of queens. This explanation could be carried over to any of the other sentences in the family in (34) simply by replacing this clause with a clause for another noun. Likewise, it could be carried over to (33-b) simply by replacing the clause for 'queen' with a clause that says 'person' denotes the class of persons. The trouble is that none of the sentences in (34) is equivalent to (33-a), and any reasonable explanation of their semantics will predict this. Each of the sentences in (34) could be false while (33-a) is true. Intuitively, the reason in each case is that the italicized noun restricts which objects the description 'the NOUN Oedipus married' might refer to, while 'who Oedipus married' is not similarly restricted: it might have been true of someone that she was who Oedipus married, yet false that she was a queen, a woman, a relative, or a Greek. This restricting effect of nouns will typically be represented in a semantic theory in the way that clauses for nouns compose in larger expressions.13 But 'person' differs from 'queen', 'woman', 'relative' and so on precisely in that it does not impose a similar restriction in this context, or any other context where a question-replacing description can occupy the same position as a 'who'question. Thus, saying that 'person' denotes the class of persons just as 'queen' denotes the class of queens makes the need for an explanation of 13For example, the denotation of the expression queen Oedipus married might be derived by intersecting the denotation of queen-that is, the class of queens-with the denotation of Oedipus married t. By taking the intersection with the class of queens, the theory ensures that candidates for the reference of The queen Oedipus married are restricted to queens. 24 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS this difference all the more pressing. One might object here that the difference between 'person' and other nouns like 'queen' is not really so stark, because 'person'-descriptions are not always equivalent to 'who'-questions. Consider, for example, your exclamation to the guilty-looking dog in a kitchen where trash has been strewn about: "I see who got in the garbage!" It would be a little strange to say instead: "I see the person that got in the garbage!" Thus, it may seem, even 'person' introduces more restrictions than 'who', and so 'who . . . ' and 'the person . . . ' are not equivalent. I reply that such cases clearly involve derivative uses of 'who'. 'Who'-questions can by default be replaced by 'person'-descriptions, though particular contextual or pragmatic factors can sometimes undermine this relationship, like the familiar relationship we have with non-human pets. At any rate, it seems clear that 'who' bears a much closer semantic relationship to 'person' than to any other noun. This is the phenomenon that needs to be explained, and assimilating 'person' to other nouns won't help explain it. The conclusion is not that we cannot apply our usual model for the semantics of nouns to the nouns in Table 1.1. I am only claiming that if we apply it, we will not have made any progress toward understanding the special features of these nouns. When a question is replaced by a description headed by an appropriate corresponding noun, the resulting sentence is truth-conditionally equivalent; when the same question is replaced by a description headed by an ordinary noun, it is not. Since all the usual model says about nouns is that they denote classes of objects, it provides no resources for explaining this difference. So we still have not solved our puzzle. I leave it open, for now, whether and in what sense the usual model can be applied to nouns corresponding to questions. My point is simply that the usual model cannot explain the relationship of question words and their corresponding nouns on its own, so we have to look elsewhere if we want to understand this relationship. 1.3.3 Meanings via questions We don't yet have an account of what the nouns in Table 1.1 mean, or an explanation of why the question and description versions of a sentence are truth-conditionally equivalent. Nor do we know how far this class of nouns extends, or why our language has them at all. I will investigate 25 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS these issues in subsequent chapters. Here, I want to conclude by making a few suggestions about where that investigation should begin. We have seen that these nouns are related to question words. Perhaps we can get a grip on what they mean by looking further at how questions work. Questions have answers, and we ask them in order to receive answers. Of course, sometimes things turn out badly: a question can be confused, or have no answer, or have no good answer so far as anyone knows. But these exceptions prove the rule. Questions are asked in expectation of getting an answer. In the normal case, an answer can be supplied, though perhaps only after some investigation or thought. The remarkable thing about questions is that one need not already know the answer to a question to ask it. An answer supplies more information about a certain topic than the question it answers. One way to put this is to say that, whereas a question raises an issue, an answer resolves it. Another is to say that a question admits of a range of answers. To ask a question, you do not need to know what its specific answer is, but you do need to know what would count as an acceptable answer, or what in general the range of answers is like. That is, you must be able to distinguish between expressions which provide an answer and expressions which don't. This is where things get interesting. How do you recognize what counts as an answer to a question you've asked? As far as surface-level syntax is concerned, answers to questions can be expressions from many parts of speech. To see this, we can look at how questions are answered in discourse. Here are some examples: (35) a. How many moons does Jupiter have? b. Four. (36) a. How did Mary enter? b. Quietly. (37) a. What does Harry want most? b. His dinner. (38) a. Where did you leave your bicycle? b. At the park. (39) a. When are we meeting? b. At noon. 26 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS Here, (35-a) is answered by a determiner in (35-b), (36-a) is answered by an adverb in (36-b), (37-a) is answered by a singular noun phrase in (37-b), and (38-a) and (39-a) are both answered by prepositional phrases in (38-b) and (39-b), respectively. The discourse participant who supplies an answer to a question does not generally need to do so using any particular part of speech. In some sense, of course, the answer to a question must be a complete sentence, because to answer a question is to assert something-to say something true or false. The most proper answer to (39-a), for example, is something like, "We are meeting at noon." Only sentences are asserted; when subsentential expressions are used to make an assertion, as in the examples in (35)–(39), we may think of the rest of the sentence as being elided. But this should not distract us from the fact that certain parts of those sentences are more relevant than others in answering the question. They are generally the parts which supply more information than the question itself does, which is why they must be pronounced rather than elided. What the examples in (35)–(39) show is that an expression cannot be recognized as an answer to a question by its syntax alone. There is no general syntactic category of 'answers to questions'. Nor is there much hope of recognizing the answers to a particular question by their syntax. Consider, for example, that both (38-b) and (39-b) are prepositional phrases headed by 'at', yet (39-b) cannot answer (38-a), and (38-b) cannot answer (39-a): 'at the park' does not specify when we can meet, and 'at noon' does not specify where we can meet. Although perhaps we could reject some expressions as appropriate answers to a question just by their syntax, syntax will not in general be enough. Recognizing when an answer to a question has been given likely requires being able to make semantic distinctions between candidate answers. The questions in (35)–(39) are all uttered in the interrogative mood, but there are also indicative sentences that pair questions with their answers. These are known to linguists as specificational sentences. Specificational sentences are a species of copular sentence.14 Like other copular sentences, specificational sentences have two significant parts: a pre14The terminology here is due to Higgins (1979). For a discussion of the taxonomy of copular sentences and different issues surrounding their semantics, see Mikkelsen (2011). 27 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS copular element, and a post-copular element. The distinguishing semantic feature of specificational sentences is that one of these elements specifies what is asked for by the other. Pseudo-clefts provide one important example of a kind of specificational sentence. Their form is by now familiar: (40) a. How many moons Jupiter has is four. b. How Mary entered was quietly. c. What Harry wants most is his dinner. d. Where you left your bicycle is at the park. e. When we are meeting is at noon. In a pseudo-cleft sentence, the pre-copular element is like a question, and the post-copular element supplies its answer, as the parallel between the sentences in (40) and the question-answer pairs in (35)–(39) shows. As we saw with answers to questions in discourse, the post-copular element in a pseudo-cleft sentence is not restricted to any given part of speech. Determiners, adverbs, singular terms, and prepositional phrases can all occupy the post-copular position. And as with questions in discourse, the part of speech of the post-copular element does not determine whether it is an appropriate answer to the question in the pre-copular element: (41) a. #Where you left your bicycle is at noon. b. #When we are meeting is at the park. These sentences are syntactically well-formed but semantically bad, precisely because the post-copular phrase cannot specify the information the pre-copular phrase asks for. The sentences in (40), of course, are much like those we were looking at above, such as the sentences in (26)–(33). The questions in their precopular phrases can be replaced by question-replacing descriptions. The result is a new set of specificational sentences: (42) a. The number of moons Jupiter has is four. b. The way Mary entered was quietly. c. The thing Harry wants most is his dinner. d. The place you left your bicycle is at the park. e. The time we are meeting is at noon. 28 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS Notice that in each case, when replacing the question, we must choose an appropriate corresponding noun to head the question-replacing description. In (42-e), for example, only 'time' works as a noun corresponding to 'when', not 'day', 'year' or 'interval'.15 Here, then, is my suggestion. Question-replacing descriptions are more like questions than like singular terms or names. Let's hypothesize that a question and a description which can replace it both express the same issue, which can be resolved by an answer in discourse. A speaker can use a specificational sentence to say that a specific answer resolves that issue. As we have seen, answers to questions may come from many parts of speech. For this reason, construing the preand post-copular elements in a specificational sentence as expressing issues and their answers, respectively, does not require us to construe either as a singular term. If we adopt the suggestion that question-replacing descriptions express issues, a natural account of nouns corresponding to question words also becomes available. To use a question, a speaker does not need to know its answer. Similarly, to use a question-replacing description, she does not need to know the answer to the issue it expresses. But in both cases, she does need to have some grasp of the range of answers, and this grasp requires her to make semantic distinctions between answers and non-answers. The role of nouns corresponding to questions is to make these semantic distinctions explicit. They indicate what range of expressions will count as answers to a question or as resolving an issue. For example, consider again the sentences in (23): (23) a. #Four is the way of moons Jupiter has. b. #Quietly is the number Mary entered. We observed above that these sentences, just like those in (41), are syntac15Higgins had already argued that sentences like "The number of planets is nine", and so presumably also (42-a), are specificational sentences rather than identity statements in Higgins (1979, pp. 215–218). Since this chapter was originally written, Higgins' point has become much more widely appreciated in the philosophical literature, in part due to interest in Hofweber's proposal about (42-a). See, for example, Brogaard (2007), Moltmann (2013), Jackson (2013), Felka (2014), Hofweber (2014), Knowles (2015), Felka (2016). Below, I propose an alternative analysis which is similar to those of Moltmann (2013) and Felka (2016) in holding (42-a) to be a specificational sentence, and in adopting a question-answer analysis of such sentences. 29 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS tically well-formed but semantically bad. Intuitively, this is because four is not a way you can have moons, and quietly is not a number you can enter. My suggestion is that this intuition can be cashed out as follows: 'quietly' cannot provide an answer in the range of expected answers that 'number' allows, and 'four' cannot provide an answer in the range of expected answers that 'way' allows. We can see why it is important to be able to express distinctions among ranges of possible answers by considering that some questions admit different ranges of answers, depending on the context. Some expressions, even those that can answer questions expressed by the same question word, may or may not count as expressing an answer to a particular question in a discourse, or resolving a particular issue. We use multiple nouns corresponding to a single question word to help us draw more precise boundaries between answers and non-answers than the question word itself does. To see this, consider three ways of answering a 'when'question: (43) When did you start your dissertation in earnest? a. The year I started my dissertation in earnest was 2013. b. The semester I started my dissertation in earnest was last spring. c. The month I started my dissertation in earnest was April of last year. In each of these responses, the speaker could have used a 'when'-question instead of a question-replacing description. But by using a description, she expresses her understanding of the issue that the questioner has raised with (43). With (43-a), for example, she expresses that she takes the issue to have answers in the range allowed by 'year', such as '2013'. Expressing her understanding this way serves at least one important communicative purpose: it helps her coordinate with the questioner on the issue. If his understanding does not agree with hers, he can rephrase: "Ah, no, I meant to ask, which semester. . . ". This is one way that using a noun in a question-replacing description can have an expressive advantage over using a question word in a question. Finally, I think these suggestions also point the way toward explanations of the data which motivated an alternative analysis of (1): 30 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS 1. 'How many'-questions only admit of one correct answer, so exchanging the definite article for the indefinite in a 'how many'replacing description, as in (4), results in a mismatch of presuppositions. 'Number' indicates that a 'how many' issue is being addressed, so only one answer is possible, but 'a' indicates that more than one answer is possible. The indefinite article can be substituted for the definite in question-replacing descriptions when the corresponding question does not presuppose that only one answer is possible. 2. When embedded under 'knows', the question reading of a questionreplacing description is much more natural than an acquaintance reading, because a question-replacing description expresses an issue, rather than denoting an individual with which one might be acquainted. (When a question-replacing description can also be used to refer to an individual, such as 'the person. . . ', the preference for the question reading disappears.) 3. We should not expect to be able to substitute a question-replacing description for an answer, even in extensional contexts, any more than we would expect to be able to substitute a question for its answer. Questions and their answers are generally of different syntactic and semantic types. The specificational sentences which connect them should not be understood as identities that license substituting an issue-denoting expression for an answer, so it's no surprise that 'the number of moons of Jupiter' cannot be substituted for 'four', as seen in (7). 4. Specificational sentences like (1) can be used to answer fewer questions than neutral sentences like (2), not because they are structurally focused, but because they contain statements of the particular issue they address. They say that a particular answer is the answer to a particular issue. It is incongruous to use a sentence which specifies an answer to one issue to answer a different issue. Thus, it seems a view of the sort sketched above provides many of the advantages of the focus construction view, without the negative consequences that follow from treating nouns corresponding to question words as having purely syntactic occurrence. 31 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS The syntactic proposal about 'number', then, did not lead us entirely astray. It gave us the idea that nouns like 'number' have an important relationship to questions, and that there may be expressive or communicative reasons to use descriptions containing these nouns rather than questions. Once we drop the problematic assumption that nouns corresponding to questions occur for purely syntactic reasons, the way is clear for developing an account of their meanings based on their relationship to questions. There is obviously much more to be said to develop these thoughts, and to show that such an account can solve the problems with which I began. But I hope I have made it plausible that such an account has good prospects. 1.4 THE PLAN In this chapter, I argued that we should not take Frege's analysis of statements of number at face value. Given some of the problems we looked at, it is not obvious that sentences like (1) The number of moons of Jupiter is four. should be analyzed as statements of identity, that is, as an identity sign flanked by two semantically singular terms. I made two suggestions about how we might give statements of number an alternative analysis. First, I suggested that we should think of statements of number as part of the class of specificational sentences. The copula in these sentences separates expressions which behave like a question and its answer. I observed that 'the number of moons of Jupiter' belongs to the class of question-replacing descriptions. These descriptions can be productively interpreted like questions across many contexts, and in some contexts (such as under 'know' or 'tell') this interpretation is strongly preferred. But in general, neither a question nor its answer need be construed as a semantically singular term. Thus, we might doubt that 'the number of moons of Jupiter' and 'four' need to be construed as semantically singular terms in (1), contrary to Frege's view. Of course, if we accept that descriptions like 'the number of moons of Jupiter' should be treated semantically like questions, another issue arises: why does our language have these question-replacing descrip32 NUMBERS, QUESTIONS, AND (SOME) NOUNS tions at all? Why don't we simply use the questions themselves? My second suggestion was that there may be a communicative or expressive advantage to using question-replacing descriptions in place of questions. Factoring the sense of a question word into a determiner and a corresponding noun makes it possible to use other determiners and nouns in their places, both of which may be communicatively advantageous. Being able to use other determiners allows a speaker more fine-grained control over the effects of her question on the discourse, such as avoiding presuppositions or enabling certain kinds of anaphora. Being able to use other nouns allows a speaker to be more explicit about what kind of answer she is looking for, and to coordinate with others about how to understand an issue. So far, these suggestions do not add up to a concrete proposal for semantic analysis of sentences like (1). My goal in the next few chapters is to develop these two suggestions into a more precise account of the semantics of specificational sentences and the various kinds of expressions that appear within them, and the role that these expressions play in our broader linguistic practice. I will be particularly concerned with nominalizations, such as 'the number of moons of Jupiter' or 'the reason Oscar fled', which can appear as the pre-copular phrase in a specificational sentence, and which are often of significant philosophical interest. I will then leverage the account in those chapters to answer some of the outstanding questions from the present one: do nominalizations like 'the number of moons of Jupiter' denote objects, or not? And is (1) an identity statement? It will turn out that there is a sense in which I think 'the number of moons of Jupiter' stands for an object, and (1) is an identity statement. But I will try to develop a sense for these claims which is compatible with the observations and suggestions I have made here, and different from the platonism that has often been attributed to Frege. 33 Chapter 2 Specification Specificational sentences are a class of copular sentence. This class includes sentences like: (1) a. What Caesar wants is his ball. b. The thing Caesar wants is his ball. One type of specificational sentence consists of pseudo-clefts like (1-a), which have an explicit question in the subject position. Another type consists of sentences like (1-b), which have descriptions in the subject position. Not all copular sentences are specificational, though. For example, (2) a. What Caesar wants is red and squishy. b. The thing Caesar wants is red and squishy. are predicational, rather than specificational. My goal in this chapter is to get clear on what specification is. What makes the sentences in (1) cases of specification, as opposed to predication, or something else? I will argue in Section 2.1 that specification is at least partly a semantic or interpretive phenomenon: it is a way of interpreting a copular sentence, a particular kind of meaning that copular sentences can have. My argument that specification should be considered a semantic phenomenon is simple. There are certain well-formed sentences that have multiple interpretations or readings, only one of which is specificational. One such sentence is this example, from Higgins (1979, p. 7): 34 SPECIFICATION (3) What John is is enviable. On a specificational reading, this sentence specifies one of John's qualities: it says that John is enviable. On a predicational reading, it says that John's position or role is enviable. If John is vice president, for example, it says that being vice president is enviable, but it does not imply that John himself is enviable. This shows that one cannot in general determine whether a sentence counts as specificational just by looking at its syntax or grammar. Instead, whether a sentence is specificational is a matter of how it is interpreted in context. Thus, characterizing the specificational reading is a task for semantic theory. This argument, which I discuss in more detail in Section 2.1, appeals only to the existence of pseudo-cleft sentences which are ambiguous between a specificational reading and a predicational reading to show that specification is a semantic phenomenon. But this conclusion is only really interesting because there are many other kinds of sentences which have a specificational reading, and because there are other readings for copular sentences besides the specificational and predicational ones. The latter part of the chapter lays the foundations for a systematic semantic account of specification, one which makes sense of its relationship to the other readings, and which accounts for the wide variety of sentences that have a specificational reading. I survey the other readings in Section 2.1.3, and the other types of specificational sentences in Section 2.2. These surveys provide the data which show that the question-answer analysis is a more illuminating model of the specificational reading than two existing alternatives, as I argue in Chapter 3. It also points the way to an account of the epistemological and communicative role of specificational sentences, which I will develop in Chapter 4. 2.1 AMBIGUITIES IN PSEUDO-CLEFT SENTENCES I introduced the idea of a specificational sentence in the last chapter by looking at pseudo-cleft sentences, such as those in (40). But while some pseudo-cleft sentences are paradigmatic examples of specificational sentences, not every pseudo-cleft sentence has a specificational reading. Since at least Higgins (1979), linguists have recognized a distinction between specificational and predicational readings for pseudo-cleft sentences, and observed that some sentences are ambiguous between the two. It is 35 SPECIFICATION worth looking at these different interpretations in order to see what distinguishes the specificational interpretation. The following pair of pseudo-clefts illustrates the distinction between the specificational and predicational readings: (4) What I bought for mother was some flowers. (specificational) (5) What I bought for mother was expensive. (predicational) These sentences are unambiguous; each has only the reading indicated. Sentence (4) is a specificational sentence: it specifies that what I bought for mother was flowers. Sentence (5), on the other hand, does not specify what I bought for mother, but rather describes it as being expensive. It predicates expense of what I bought for mother, whatever that was; but it does not say which thing or things I bought. My main goal in this section is to show that some pseudo-clefts are ambiguous between these two readings. To that end, I provide some tests that help distinguish the two readings, which will also be useful later on. I then argue that the existence of pseudo-clefts which are ambiguous between these readings shows that whether or not a sentence is specificational is not a matter of its grammar, but of how it is interpreted. This shows that specification is a semantic phenomenon: saying what it is for a sentence to have a specificational interpretation, and what that interpretation consists in, falls within the domain of semantic explanation. At the end of this section, I will introduce two other readings for pseudo-clefts, the equative reading and the issue-predicational reading. These are not crucial for my main line of argument here, but they help strengthen it. They will also help reveal the virtues (and vices) of some semantic analyses of specification in Chapter 3. 2.1.1 Two intuitive tests The difference between the specificational and predicational readings of a copular sentence has to do with how the pre-copular phrase relates to the post-copular phrase. For the sake of brevity, I will call the pre-copular phrase the subject and the post-copular phrase the complement. In a predicational sentence, the complement describes or is true of the subject; in a specificational sentence, the complement specifies the subject. But what is the difference between 'describing' and 'specifying'? There are two 36 SPECIFICATION ways of bringing out this difference that I will rely on here, the list analogy and the directness test. These give us some intuitive tests for whether a sentence has a specificational reading. In formulating these tests, I am drawing on discussion in Higgins (1979, Ch. 1 and 5), Mikkelsen (2005), and den Dikken, Meinunger, and Wilder (2000). The reader should keep in mind that these tests are meant to be intuitive. They can help English speakers who already intuitively understand the difference between specification and predication to disentangle these two readings in particular cases, and bring the distinction more sharply into focus. But they will not always yield unambiguous results, and they are not intended to unexceptionably track the theoretical distinction. They are instead a ladder to be thrown away once a theoretical account of specification is available. With that caveat, here are the tests: The list analogy. Sentences with a specificational reading often seem to work like lists, where the subject gives the heading of the list, and the complement gives the item or items on the list. When expressed in sentences, lists are often introduced by a colon. To get the specificational reading of a sentence like (4), it can help to think of it as a one-item list, and imagine a colon appearing after the copula: (6) What I bought for mother was: some flowers. There is a clear parallel here between the specificational sentence (6) and sentences which give multi-item lists: (7) What I bought for mother was: some flowers, a card, and an extraordinary broach. Indeed, for my purposes here, lists like (7) are clear cases of specificational sentences, with or without the colon. In contrast to specificational sentences, predicational sentences like (5) do not work like lists, as shown by the fact that inserting a colon is ungrammatical: (8) *What I bought for mother was: expensive. 37 SPECIFICATION The problem here seems to be that 'expensive' does not say what or which things go under the heading of 'what I bought for mother'. What belongs on this list is left open by (5). Instead, the role of the complement is to say something about whatever belongs on that list, namely, that it cost rather a lot. The directness test. Another way to think of the contrast between the specificational and predicational readings is to consider the contrast between direct and indirect answers to questions. With respect to the right question, a specificational sentence gives a direct answer, while a predicational sentence gives only an indirect one. When a speaker asks a question, a direct answer is an assertion made in response that is fully cooperative and provides some information about the issue expressed by the question. For example, in response to (9) What did you buy for mother? paradigmatically direct answers would be: (10) a. Some flowers. b. I bought some flowers for mother. c. One thing I bought was some flowers. Indirect answers, by contrast, do not provide information directly relevant to answering a question. Clear cases of indirect answers to (9) are: (11) a. I didn't buy anything for mother yet. b. I'm not telling you. c. I'm not saying, but it was expensive. None of these sentences directly answers (9). The first rejects a presupposition of the question. The second and third are pragmatically uncooperative: though they do not reject the question, they do not provide information that helps answer it. In the last case, the speaker provides some information that may or may not help the audience infer what she bought for mother (namely, that what she bought was expensive), depending on what other knowledge they have. But what she says leaves that question just as open as if she had not given this information, so her answer still counts as indirect. 38 SPECIFICATION Which question should we look at to determine if a sentence directly answers it, and therefore has a specificational reading? In the case of a pseudo-cleft, this is easy: the relevant question appears explicitly as its subject. The relevant question for (4) and (5) can be expressed by (9), for example (after adjusting the indexical 'I'). With respect to this question, the specificational sentence (4) is a direct answer, very much like (10-b) or (10-c), while the predicational sentence (5) is an indirect answer, akin to (11-c): (9) What did you buy for mother? (4) What I bought for mother was some flowers. (specificational, direct) (5) What I bought for mother was expensive. (predicational, indirect) This holds true generally: a specificational pseudo-cleft provides a direct answer to the question that appears as its subject; a predicational pseudocleft provides at best an indirect answer. We will shortly see examples of specificational sentences where the subject is not an explicit question. In these cases, finding a question which reveals the sentence to have a specificational rather than predicational reading is a more subtle matter, because there are some questions which admit predicational sentences as direct answers. I shall describe how to find such a question in more detail below. The list analogy and the directness test give us two ways to show that a sentence has a specificational reading, and to distinguish that reading from a predicational one. They make use of different grammatical devices to bring out the specificational reading, and in this sense they are complementary. At the same time, it seems clear that they reveal the same phenomenon. Higgins' terminology is helpful here: questions and list headings both express constraints. Directly answering a question, or placing an item on a list, are ways of saying what satisfies such a constraint. A specificational pseudo-cleft says what or which things satisfy a constraint. A predicational pseudo-cleft describes or says something about whatever satisfies the constraint expressed by its subject, but it does not specify what satisfies that constraint. 39 SPECIFICATION 2.1.2 An ambiguity between specification and predication With these tests in hand, we are now in a good position to see that some pseudo-clefts are ambiguous between the specificational and predicational readings. Consider again Higgins' example (3): (3) What John is is enviable. Let's look at the directness test first. The relevant question is: (12) What is John? This question is ambiguous between several readings. On one reading, it is asking for John's qualities. In that case, it could be directly answered by sentences like the following. (13) John is. . . a. tall and rich. b. a good friend. c. enviable. On this understanding of the question, (3) directly answers it, and so counts as a specificational sentence. In another context, the question (12) might be interpreted as asking for John's position or role; in that case it can be answered by sentences like: (14) John is. . . a. the vice president. b. the night watchman. c. the first chair violinist. Understood this way, the question is not directly answered by (3). An assertion of (3) in response to this question is an indirect answer, and has the predicational reading. It says that, whatever position John has, that position is enviable; but it does not say which position this is. The list analogy confirms these results. Thought of as the heading of a list, the subject phrase 'what John is' is ambiguous in just the same way as the question (12). When the subject is thought of in the first way, as the heading of a list of John's qualities, then 'enviable' potentially belongs on 40 SPECIFICATION the list, and inserting a colon in (3) is appropriate: (15) What John is is: enviable. But when the subject is thought of in the second way, as the heading of a list of roles or positions which John might have, (3) can only be interpreted as describing this position as enviable, in which case inserting the colon is inappropriate. It's easiest to see the ambiguity in pseudo-clefts which have 'what' questions as the subject and an adjective for a complement, like (3). But these are not the only examples. Higgins also gave some examples of ambiguous 'what' pseudo-clefts which have a noun phrase as the complement. Sentence (16) has this feature1: (16) What we saw in the park was a Labrador and a Poodle. The list analogy is helpful with this example. In (16), the specificational reading lists two dogs we saw in the park: it says we saw at least one Labrador, and at least one Poodle, in the park. The predicational reading says that we saw a dog in the park which was both a Labrador and a Poodle. It says we saw a cross-bred Labradoodle in the park. There are also ambiguous pseudo-clefts where the subject employs a question word other than 'what': (17) Where John's going is the pits. (18) How John got hurt was an accident. On the specificational reading, (17) says John is going to the pits; it specifies the place John is traveling to. On the (slangy) predicational reading, the sentence says that the place John is going is depressing or boring, though it leaves open which place that is.2 Likewise, the specificational reading of (18) specifies the cause of John's injury, namely, an ac1This example is a modified version of one from Higgins (1979, p. 11). 2If the metaphorical character of the predicational reading in this example seems worrisome, here is another example: "Where John's going is the best restaurant in town." On the specificational reading, when the interpreter understands which restaurant is meant, the sentence specifies John's destination. On the predicational reading, it says that some restaurant-whichever one John is going to-is the best in town. The two readings are easier to pry apart in (17), so I will rely on that example below, but 'where' pseudo-clefts can be ambiguous even when no metaphor is present. 41 SPECIFICATION cident. The predicational reading says that John's injury was not caused intentionally. As with 'what' pseudo-clefts, the different readings can be brought out by the intuitive tests, though I leave this to the reader. The ambiguity exhibited by sentences like (3) or (18) should be distinguished from a simpler kind of ambiguity, of the sort in (19): (19) Where I went first was the bank. In this sentence, the lexical ambiguity of 'bank' does not give rise to different kinds of readings for the whole sentence. The ambiguity is localized to the complement. That is, neither reading for the complement forces a different interpretation of the subject, or a different interpretation of the relationship of the complement to the subject. The natural readings of this sentence are both specificational: they differ only in whether they specify my destination to be a financial institution or a spot down by the river. The examples above are not like this. (16), (17) and (18) have ambiguous complements, but the ambiguity 'infects' the whole clause: interpreting the complement one way or the other also requires interpreting its relationship to the subject differently.3 This observation is in line with what I suggested above: specification and predication appear to be different ways of relating the complement to the subject when interpreting a whole copular clause. In this sense, the ambiguity is structural rather than merely lexical. Specification, like predication, is a way of interpreting a whole sentence, not just a way of interpreting one of its parts. This brings me to the main claim of this section: specification is a semantic phenomenon, something that requires an explanation within the domain of semantic theory. I think a simple argument is enough to establish this claim in the sense I intend it. The task of semantic theory is to systematically describe and explain the different ways sentences can be interpreted. Since there are sentences, such as (3), (16), (17), and (18), that admit of both specificational and predicational interpretations, it is clear 3In (3), the ambiguity seems more localized to the subject, but I think this is not the best way to describe the case. To see this, consider the following schema: x envies y because y is F. When a sentence of this form is true, both y and F might be said to be 'enviable', but in different senses. On the specificational reading of (3), the subject plays the role of y in this schema, while on the predicational reading, it plays the role of F. The two interpretations of the subject are thus of different types; if the interpretation of 'enviable' is held constant, its relation to the subject must vary. 42 SPECIFICATION that specification is one way of interpreting a sentence, but not the only way. Thus, it falls to semantic theory to describe the specificational reading, and explain how it differs from other ways of interpreting a copular sentence. This may seem too quick. How do we know that there is not some other, non-semantic explanation of the ambiguity between specification and predication? Perhaps, for example, the ambiguity can be explained in purely syntactic terms. To make this plausible, consider a parallel sort of ambiguity in English: quantifier scope ambiguity. A sentence like (20) Some dog is loved by every boy. is ambiguous between two readings, on which the universal and existential quantifiers take different relative scopes: (21) (∀x : Bx)(∃y : Dy)(xLy) (Every boy loves some dog or other.) (22) (∃y : Dy)(∀x : Bx)(xLy) (There is some particular dog which every boy loves.) Like the ambiguity between specification and predication, such scope ambiguity is structural, not merely lexical. The ambiguity is not localized to any particular expression; rather, it concerns how two different expressions in the sentence are interpreted relative to one another in the whole clause. It is typically assumed that quantifier scope ambiguity can be explained in purely syntactic terms. Such an explanation makes two important claims. First, it posits two different parses, or 'logical forms', for the sentence in (20). These logical forms are distinct syntactic structures, licensed by different syntactic rules in the grammar of English, but pronounced and written in the same way. The structures will differ at least with respect to the relative scopes of the quantifiers. Second, it assumes that the semantic component of the grammar interprets logical forms, rather than the pronounced form of the sentence. Quantifier scope ambiguity thus arises in a sentence like (20) because there are two different starting points for interpreting it, not because there are two ways of interpreting the same starting point. The semantic ambiguity traces back to a syntactic ambiguity, a difference in logical form. So quantifier scope ambiguity is a syntactic, rather than semantic, phenomenon. 43 SPECIFICATION This standard picture motivates an objection to my argument that specification is a semantic phenomenon. Couldn't there be a similar explanation of the ambiguity between specification and predication? Such an explanation would claim there are distinct logical forms for the specificational and predicational readings of sentences that exhibit the ambiguity, licensed by different syntactic principles in the grammar of English. Second, it would assume that these logical forms are the starting points of semantic interpretation. Thus, the ambiguity between specification and predication in sentences like (17) or (18) would again trace back to a syntactic ambiguity between different logical forms. If such an explanation were right, it would show that specification could be distinguished from predication in purely syntactic terms. In that case, we might not need any particular semantic account of what it is to interpret a sentence specificationally; we might only need to apply general semantic principles to distinctly specificational logical forms. I do not mean to rule out an explanation of specification which involves distinct logical forms for sentences ambiguous between the specificational and predicational readings. But I do think any such explanation is unlikely to count as 'purely syntactic' in a way that threatens my claim that specification is a semantic phenomenon. The problem with the objection is that it assumes all ambiguities in logical form have a purely syntactic explanation, and can be derived just from rules governing the syntactic categories of English expressions, without appealing essentially to facts about how these expressions are interpreted. Such an explanation of the specification-predication ambiguity seems unlikely, given facts we have already reviewed. To see this, consider that the syntactic category of the complement does not predict whether a pseudo-cleft exhibits the structural ambiguity between specification and predication. (23) a. Where John is going is the pits. (specification/predication) b. Where John is going is the bank. (lexical only) c. Where John is going is the park. (no ambiguity) (24) a. What John is is enviable. (specification/predication) b. What John is is slow. (lexical only) c. What John is is angry. (no ambiguity) 44 SPECIFICATION In the examples in (23) and (24), the first sentence exhibits the structural ambiguity between specification and predication. The second exhibits a simple lexical ambiguity, but no structural ambiguity. The third exhibits no ambiguity at all. But in each case, the three sentences differ only at the final word. These examples illustrate an important difference between quantifier scope ambiguity and the ambiguity between specification and predication. Quantifier scope ambiguity is isolated to sentences containing words in a particular syntactic category. This makes it possible to formulate syntactic rules (such as 'quantifier raising' rules) that apply to all and only the expressions in that category, which allows licensing multiple logical forms for sentences containing quantifiers, without overgenerating logical forms for sentences that don't. But as (23) and (24) show, the ambiguity between specification and predication arises in pseudo-clefts with complements in different syntactic categories (namely, NPs in (23) and APs in (24)), and only for some expressions within those categories. A purely syntactic explanation of the ambiguity between specification and predication would need to license distinct logical forms for the first sentence in each example without overgenerating distinct logical forms for the other two. Doing so requires that the syntactic rules distinguish the first sentence from the other two just based on the syntactic categories governing the final word. But what purely syntactic criterion could simultaneously distinguish 'pits' from 'bank' and 'park', and 'enviable' from 'slow' and 'angry'? It seems unlikely that we could justify rules that make such a distinction solely by appealing to syntactic facts. Instead, the most plausible justification for distinguishing the first sentence from the other two in (23) and (24) would appeal to semantic facts, such as that 'the pits' can be interpreted both as specifying a place or as a predicate true of places, while 'the park' can only be interpreted as specifying a place. But if semantic facts like these are part of the reason for assigning such sentences two different logical forms, then positing distinct logical forms does not yield a purely syntactic explanation of the ambiguity between specification and predication. Rather, the fact that some sentences are ambiguous between the specificational and predicational interpretations is prior: the semantic ambiguity explains our identification of distinct logical forms, not the other way around. Insofar as we posit different logical forms for these sentences in order to represent 45 SPECIFICATION the semantic ambiguity, we give up on the idea that ambiguities in logical form can be explained purely by appealing to syntactic principles. And since we most likely must appeal to semantic facts to justify licensing distinct logical forms for sentences like (23-a), there is room for an independent semantic description of what it is to interpret such sentences specificationally, rather than predicationally. That is the project I am pursuing here. All this is not to say that specificational sentences do not have interesting syntactic, grammatical, or other non-semantic properties. In fact, they do. Many of these properties have been studied by linguists, and there is ongoing debate about the proper syntactic analysis of specificational pseudo-clefts.4 In claiming that specification is a semantic phenomenon, I am not claiming that these investigations are ungrounded or uninteresting. I am only claiming that syntactic features do not exhaust what it is to be a specificational sentence. The ambiguity between specification and predication which I have examined in this section shows that specification is a way of interpreting the relation between the subject and the complement in a copular sentence, not merely a unique syntactic construct. Thus, whatever the best account of the syntax of specificational sentences turns out to be, the way we interpret them should also be described and characterized by semantic theory. 2.1.3 Two other readings for pseudo-cleft sentences Recognizing sentences like (3) as ambiguous between the specificational and predicational readings suffices to make the point that specification is a semantic phenomenon. The point may be strengthened, however, by noting that the specificational and predicational readings do not exhaust the possible interpretations of pseudo-clefts, or copular sentences more generally. This underscores the point that the specificational reading is just one reading among many, and hence that it belongs in the domain of semantic explanation. It thus helps motivate a systematic semantic 4Apart from Higgins (1979), the syntax of specificational pseudo-clefts has been discussed by Ross (1972), Moro (1997), Heycock and Kroch (1999), den Dikken, Meinunger, and Wilder (2000), Schlenker (2003), Mikkelsen (2005), Romero (2005), and many others. Most of this discussion revolves around the so-called connectivity problem, the fact that constructions such as negative polarity items and reflexive pronouns are unexpectedly licensed in the complement position of a specificational sentence. 46 SPECIFICATION analysis. The existence of other readings for copular sentences raises the question of how all these interpretations are related, and whether they can be described by a unified semantic account. I would like to call attention to two additional readings here, because they will be important later on. One is an equative or 'generalized identity' reading. A paradigmatic example might be: (25) What I did yesterday is what you'll do tomorrow. In this sentence, the relationship of the complement to the subject does not appear to be the same as in the predicational or specificational readings. Rather, the sentence appears to equate two constraints. It says that whatever satisfies 'what I did yesterday' will also satisfy 'what you'll do tomorrow', and vice versa. But the sentence leaves open exactly what sort of action satisfies these constraints, as our intuitive tests show: in most contexts, it would be strange to write 'what you'll do tomorrow' on a list of things I did yesterday; and (25) does not seem like a direct answer to "What did you do yesterday?" Thus this sentence does not quite seem specificational-though it could be in a context where what you'll do tomorrow is commonly known. On the other hand, the sentence does not exhibit the semantic asymmetry of a predicational sentence: it does not seem right to say that the complement describes or is true of what the subject denotes, any more than the other way around. Thus the sentence does not seem predicational. Linguists debate how the equative reading relates to the specificational and predicational readings. Indeed, one possible semantic analysis of specificational sentences is that they are a species of equatives. I think there is something right about this analysis, and I will discuss it further in Chapter 3, after I have presented some additional kinds of specificational sentences in Section 2.2. For now, I will assume that the equative reading is not distinct from the specificational reading, mostly to ease exposition, although I will qualify this claim later. Another reading that will play a role in my argument is one that I call issue-predicational. I have not seen this reading discussed elsewhere in the literature. A typical example is: (26) What I bought for mother is not a question I'm willing to discuss. This sentence is predicational, in that the complement is predicated of 47 SPECIFICATION what the subject denotes. But it differs from predicational sentences like (5) in that the subject denotes a question or issue, rather than something I bought for mother. Suppose that what I bought for mother was some flowers. In that case, (26) does not imply that (27) #Some flowers is not a question I'm willing to discuss. whereas the predicational sentence (5) does imply that (28) Some flowers are expensive. This indicates that the subject 'what I bought for mother' is interpreted differently on the predicational and issue-predicational readings. A few sentences are ambiguous between the specificational, predicational and issue-predicational readings simultaneously. An example is: (29) What John is is superfluous. The ambiguity can be brought out via three different paraphrases: (30) a. John is superfluous. (specificational) b. John's position is superfluous. (predicational) c. The question of what John is is superfluous. (issue-pred.) The ambiguity between the specificational and predicational readings of (29) is parallel to the ambiguity of (3), which I discussed above. But unlike (3), (29) also has an issue-predicational reading, as shown by the paraphrase in (30-c). One might use (29) to say that the question of what John is is superfluous, and so we should talk about something else. To sum up: we have found that the specificational reading is but one possible reading among several for pseudo-cleft sentences, which shows that whether a sentence is specificational is a matter of how it is interpreted. On the specificational interpretation, a sentence says what or which thing satisfies a constraint. The distinction between the specificational and predicational readings is particularly important, and I have discussed two intuitive tests, the list analogy and the directness test, to help make this distinction clear. In the next section, I will extend this distinction to some other copular sentences by applying these tests. The equative and issue-predicational readings will not be important for that 48 SPECIFICATION discussion, but they will re-appear later on, because I aim to provide a semantic analysis for specificational sentences that makes sense of its relationship to each of these other readings. 2.2 OTHER TYPES OF SPECIFICATIONAL SENTENCES Now that we have a better grip on the specificational reading in the paradigm case of pseudo-clefts, I would like to survey a wider range of specificational sentences. This survey will help us see how far an account of specification must extend, and what a successful theory must explain. I will argue in Chapter 3 that a particular theory, the question-answer analysis, best makes sense of these data. The variation among specificational sentences that interests me most here concerns the subject phrase. In specificational pseudo-clefts, the pre-copular phrase is an explicit question, an expression headed by a wh-word. But linguists have recognized specificational sentences with other types of subjects for basically as long as they have recognized the category of specificational sentences. For example, Higgins (1979, p. 11) claimed that (31) Nixon's peace plan is a bomb. has an unfortunate specificational reading, on which the complement specifies or gives the content of Nixon's peace plan.5 This sentence has a possessive description rather than an explicit question in the subject position. Subsequent work has also recognized other kinds of expressions, such as anaphoric pronouns, as able to occupy the subject position of a specificational sentence. My primary goal in this section is to survey the variety of expressions that can give rise to a sentence with a specificational reading when they occupy this position. 2.2.1 Descriptions Let's focus on descriptions first. By 'description', I mean any noun phrase headed by a determiner-what linguists now call a determiner phrase ('DP'). Which descriptions can occupy the subject position of a specificational 5The sentence also has a slangy predicational reading, on which what is said is that Nixon's peace plan is disastrous. 49 SPECIFICATION sentence? There are quite a variety. We already saw one class of descriptions that can do so in Chapter 1: the question-replacing descriptions, definite descriptions in which the head noun is a noun corresponding to a question word.6 But these are a relatively small family. In fact, definite descriptions seem generally able to occupy the subject position in a specificational sentence. Here are some examples: (32) a. The youngest student is Elizabeth. b. The claim he made was that he was innocent. c. The height of the building is 100 feet. d. The marital status she uses for tax purposes is single. e. The top priority is getting re-elected. It should be clear that each of the sentences in (32) has only a specificational reading. In each case, inserting a colon between the copula and the complement would be appropriate. Thus these sentences have a specificational reading, according to the list analogy. And in each case, the complement phrase either cannot function semantically as a predicate (as in (32-a), (32-b) and (32-c)7), or it cannot sensibly be predicated of what the subject would denote in a predicational sentence (as in (32-d) or (32-e)), so the predicational reading is unavailable. I do not see any other potential readings for these sentences. As I noted above, the directness test can only be applied to these sentences if we can find a question for which the specificational reading would give a direct answer, while the predicational reading would give an indirect answer. As a first pass, we can say that a suitable question can be formed by prefixing the subject with 'what is' (adjusting for tense and number as necessary). For example, (32-b) can be seen to be specificational because it directly answers (33) What was the claim he made? 6These nouns are listed in Table 1.1. 7If it seems unclear that in the case of (32-c), '100 feet' cannot function semantically as a predicate, ask yourself what it would mean for '100 feet' to be true of an object. The related expression '100 feet tall' is semantically a predicate, but when this predicate is the complement of (32-c), I hear the sentence as having a (necessarily false) predicational reading, not a (possibly true) specificational one. 50 SPECIFICATION This way of forming a suitable question will not work in all cases, however. For one thing, a 'what' question is unsuitable for bringing out the specificational reading of a sentence whose complement refers to a person, such as (32-a). Consider the relationship of this sentence to the following question: (34) What is the youngest student? (32-a) does not seem like an appropriate answer to this question at all, much less a direct answer. Instead, this question can be directly answered by sentences like (35) The youngest student is. . . a. very attentive. b. older than the teacher. c. Danish. which are clearly predicational, rather than specificational. Rather than (34), the question which shows (32-a) to have a specificational reading is: (36) Who is the youngest student? because (32-a) directly answers it, while predications like those in (35) do not. Thus, when the complement of a copular sentence refers to a person, the 'who is. . . ' question formed from its subject should be used in the directness test. The ambiguity of 'what' can also obscure the specificational reading of sentences where the complement does not refer to a person. Consider, for example, (37) What is the number of moons of Jupiter? Usually, this question should be answered by a specificational sentence like (38) The number of moons of Jupiter is four. But in some contexts, it is more appropriate to answer (37) with a sentence which is most naturally interpreted predicationally, like 51 SPECIFICATION (39) The number of moons of Jupiter is even. For example, this answer is appropriate when the questioner introduces her question (37) by saying: "Some numbers are odd, and some numbers are even." This shows that passing the 'what is. . . ?' version of the directness test is not always sufficient to show that a sentence has a specificational reading; we must also observe that the sentence has no predicational reading. This may not be possible in many cases when the subject is a description. To avoid this problem, when a copular sentence has a description as its subject, it is frequently helpful to use a 'which' question instead. To form this question, use the schema (40) Which N is S? where S is the full subject of the sentence to be tested, and N is the head noun of that subject. Such 'which' questions cannot be answered by predicational sentences of the form (41) S is P. (where S is held constant between (40) and (41)), so if the copular sentence in question answers the 'which' question directly, it is generally clear that it has a specificational reading. For example, (42) Which student is the youngest student? (43) Which number is the number of moons of Jupiter? can be used to test (32-a) and (38), respectively.8 Keeping these refinements of the directness test in mind, we can see that other forms of definite noun phrase, including possessives, plurals, 8The reason this works is that 'which', unlike 'what', always has to be paired with a noun; this forces a reading of the question on which its answers have the form 'S is . . . ' where the gap must be filled by an expression denoting the same kind of thing as S itself, thus ruling out predicational answers. Thus, the same result can be achieved with 'what' if we pair it with the same noun N as in (40): "What N is S?" will also rule out predicational answers. The problem is just that an unadorned 'what' can also introduce a variable over the predicate in a predicational sentence, as in (37) and (39). For more on the relationship between 'which' and the other wh-words, see Chapter 4. 52 SPECIFICATION and universal quantifications, may also occupy the subject position of a specificational sentence: (44) a. My youngest daughter is Elizabeth. b. Every inmate's claim was that he was innocent. c. (There is a new building on the waterfront.) Its height is 100 feet. d. Your marital status is single, at least for tax purposes. e. Their top priorities are getting re-elected, winning a majority in the House, and passing banking reform. But definiteness is not a requirement. Indefinite descriptions can occupy this position as well: (45) a. One place to get a nice Chianti is the trattoria on Columbus. b. A book that rewards careful study is Plato's Republic. c. A few good routes to campus are Telegraph, Euclid, and College. d. Some of my best students were Gareth, Valeria, and Angela. e. Some great subjects to start with are mathematics and biology. Again, in the examples in (44) and (45), the predicational reading does not seem to be available, either because the complement cannot function semantically as a predicate, or because interpreting it as a predicate applying to the subject is non-sensical. Nor are there other readings. The preferred reading of each sentence is the specificational one, which may be confirmed using both the list analogy and the directness test. Note that in cases where an indefinite descriptions is the subject, the 'which' version of the directness test is not applicable. This is because asking a 'which' question of the form in (40) seems to require a description with a definite determiner in the place of S. Consider the 'which' question for (45-a), for example: (46) *Which place is one place to get a nice Chianti? This question, if not ungrammatical, is at least extremely odd. For the sentences in (45), however, the 'what' version of the directness test is sufficient. 53 SPECIFICATION There seem to be few restrictions on the sort of description that can serve in the subject position of a specificational sentence. In the examples above, the descriptions employ determiners and nouns of several types. The determiners can be definite or indefinite, and singular or plural; and they may be articles ('the' or 'a'), possessives ('my', 'your', 'its'), or even quantifiers ('one', 'every', 'some', 'a few'). The head nouns can be abstract ('height', 'marital status') or concrete ('book'), and the whole noun phrase can be simple ('height') or complex ('place to get a nice Chianti'). I have been unable to find examples of descriptions that can never give rise to a specificational reading when they appear in the subject position of a copular sentence. It is true that some descriptions make it more difficult to get this interpretation than others. One class of descriptions which are difficult to interpret this way is simple, concrete indefinites, like 'a dog'. In the subject position of a non-predicational copular sentence, they tend to sound like awkward Yoda-speak: (47) ??*A dog is Caesar. Notably, this awkwardness does not attach to more complex indefinites, even when the head noun is concrete, as (45-b) shows. But even these simple indefinites seem to give rise to specificational sentences when appropriately contextualized: (48) a. I want to adopt a pet, but I don't know what kind of animal I want. What have you got available? b. ?Well, a dog is Caesar. He's very gentle and would make a great pet. (A cat we've got is Francisco, and a rabbit is Horace, but they're both a bit more ornery.) Given the context in (48-a), the use of (47) in (48-b) sounds mostly felicitous to me, though somewhat strained. Its acceptability seems to depend on hearing the speaker as using 'a dog' to contrast the option of adopting Caesar with that of adopting another kind of animal. I do not have a good explanation for why these simple indefinites are so hard to get a specificational reading from, especially given that complex indefinites seem to work just fine. But if examples like (48) are sometimes felicitous, it seems like even simple concrete indefinites can in principle serve as the subject phrase of a specificational sentence. 54 SPECIFICATION Descriptions headed by strongly quantificational determiners, such as 'both' or 'few', are also often difficult to interpret specificationally: (49) a.??*Both authors are George. b.??*Few votes are 'nay'. Other theorists, like Mikkelsen (2005, Cf. pp. 112–113), seem to think that such descriptions can never be specificational subjects. Still, like (47), descriptions like these seem mostly felicitous to me as specificational subjects when appropriately contextualized: (50) a. I've been getting two sorts of anonymous letters. In one sort, the author writes beautiful, flowing prose. In the other sort, the author's thoughts are barely coherent and quite disconnected. I recently found out who the authors of these mysterious letters were. I expected them to be different, but as it turns out, both authors are George. b. It appears that the budget will be nearly-unanimously approved. The roll-call is still ongoing; but so far, most of the votes have been 'aye', with a handful of legislators abstaining. Few votes have been 'nay'. I suggest we interpret these examples as follows. When strongly quantificational determiners are felicitously used in the subject of a specificational sentence, they can be thought of as quantifying over 'potential specifications'. To see what I mean by this, consider the analogy with the case of predication. In predicational sentences with a quantificational noun phrase in the subject, of the form (51) QF ispred G the quantifier Q may be thought of as quantifying over potential predications; it 'summarizes' how many of the potential predications of Fs as being G are true. For example, someone who says (52) Most e-mails are not worth reading. is saying something true just in case most of the potential predications in which 'x is not worth reading' is predicated of an email are true. 55 SPECIFICATION I am suggesting that we use the notion of a 'potential specification' to extend the concept of specification to sentences with quantificational determiners in the subject in an analogous way. To see why this is helpful, notice that the speaker in (50-a) could also have said: (53) The author of the first kind of letters was George, and the author of the second kind was George, too. Here it is clear that both of the embedded copular clauses are specificational. Likewise, the speaker in (50-b) is describing a situation that could potentially be described like: (54) The vote by legislator 1 was 'aye', and the vote by legislator 2 was 'aye', . . . the vote by legislator n was 'nay', . . . where few of the embedded clauses have 'nay' in the complement. Again, it is clear that these embedded clauses are specificational. The speaker of (50-a) or (50-b) is, in effect, 'summarizing' these alternative descriptions: she is saying that both ways of specifying the authors will specify them to be George, or that few ways of specifying the votes of individual legislators will specify them to be 'nay'. By extending the notion of specification in this way, we are able to make sense of the felt distinction between quantified specifications, like those in (50), and quantified predications, like these: (55) a. Both authors are famous. b. Few votes are cast on Sundays. The fact that the examples in (50) are possible indicates that we need to keep track of this distinction, even if quantified specifications are comparatively rare. In the absence of other candidate counterexamples, I tentatively conclude that all descriptions are capable of occupying the subject position in a specificational sentence, at least if we admit 'quantified specifications' as a type of specificational sentence. If we don't, more work is required to demarcate those descriptions which can be specificational subjects from those which cannot. Our observations here suggest that drawing that line will involve distinguishing quantificational and non-quantificational determiners, and perhaps certain kinds of indefinites from others. But on the basis of examples like those in (48) and (50), I will assume for now 56 SPECIFICATION that all descriptions can be specificational subjects, and there is no pressing need to make such a distinction. 2.2.2 Anaphora Anaphoric pronouns form another important class of expression that can serve in the subject position of a specificational sentence. For example, (56-b) has a specificational reading, and the anaphoric pronoun 'it' as its subject: (56) a. How far away is Sacramento? b. It is about 80 miles. The list analogy confirms this reading; a colon would be appropriate after the copula in (56-b). But in this case, the directness test is more useful. It is clear that (56-b) directly answers the question asked in (56-a), in a way that, say, (57) It is too far to drive tonight. does not. (Sentence (57) is predicational, rather than specificational.) Given the context provided by (56-a), (56-b) clearly means something similar to (58) The distance to Sacramento is about 80 miles. which belongs to the same class as the specificational sentences in (32). It may not seem obvious that the 'it' in (56-b) is an anaphor. There are two alternative hypotheses that initially appear plausible. One is that pronouns in the subject position of specificational sentences are simply semantically vacuous. This seems credible because 'About 80 miles' (without the initial 'it is') gives exactly the same answer to (56-a) as (56-b). In that case, 'it' would not denote anything at all in (56-b). The other hypothesis is that these pronouns are instead cataphors, which inherit their denotation from complement phrase, rather than the preceding question. In that case, 'it' in (56-b) would refer to the distance specified by 'about 80 miles'. These alternative hypotheses are unlikely, however, given some facts about agreement. 57 SPECIFICATION (59) Who is at the door? a. It is Samantha and Dave. b. *They are Samantha and Dave. (60) Which guests were the last two to leave? a. ??It was Samantha and Dave. b. They were Samantha and Dave. (61) Who is the lead in North by Northwest? a. It is Cary Grant. b. ?He is Cary Grant. Each of the answers given to the questions in (59)–(61) is a specificational sentence with a pronoun in the pre-copular position. What's important here is that this pronoun seems to be required to agree with the presuppositions of the preceding question, rather than with any features of the complement, which gives the answer. In (59), the question does not presuppose that the answer should be plural, and answering with the singular 'it' is grammatical, while answering with the plural 'they' is not. The opposite pattern occurs in (60), where the question does presuppose that the answer should be plural, even though the complement ('Samantha and Dave') is the same. In (61), 'it' is preferable to 'he', especially when the question is not interpreted as presupposing that the lead is male. If the pronoun was a cataphor referring to Cary Grant, 'it' would be ungrammatical, and 'he' would be required. The fact that agreement is required at all, and that examples like (56-b) can be paraphrased using a meaningful definite description for a subject, makes it unlikely that the pronouns in the subject positions of these specificational sentences are completely vacuous. On the other hand, since they are required to agree with the features of the antecedent question, rather than with the features of the subsequent answer, these pronouns are properly regarded as anaphora rather than cataphora. The range of anaphoric pronouns that may serve as the subject of a specificational sentence is somewhat unclear. In English, the neuter pronouns 'it' and 'they' clearly work as specificational subjects, as shown by examples like (59-a) and (60-b). But it is not clear whether the gendered pronouns 'he' and 'she' can do the same. The issue here is whether we should classify sentences like (61-b), where a gendered pronoun appears before the copula and a name or other non-predicate is the complement, 58 SPECIFICATION as having a specificational reading. Although such sentences are not predicational, they do not unequivocally pass the tests I have been using to bring out the specificational reading. In addition, such sentences have a good claim to be identity statements or equatives; so our judgment about these cases depends on how the class of specificational sentences relates to the class of equatives. I discuss this issue further below. Anaphoric uses of 'this' and 'that' are also pretty clearly acceptable as the subject of a specificational clause: (62) There was only one thing left to do, and {this/that} was to call the doctor. Here, either demonstrative seems acceptable to me (though 'that' is clearly preferable), and is most naturally read as anaphoric on 'one thing left to do'. The list analogy reveals the second conjunct to be specificational. Moreover, either version of the sentence may be paraphrased as (63) The only thing left to do was to call the doctor. and this sentence is a specificational sentence of the same type as those in (32). Non-anaphoric uses of demonstratives, however, are another unclear case. In his original taxonomy, Higgins classified sentences like (64) That is Francis. as 'identificational' when the demonstrative is used deictically. According to Higgins, identificational sentences are distinct from both specificational sentences and identity statements or equatives (Higgins, 1979, Ch. 5). Whether identificational sentences form a distinct class of copular sentence, or whether they should be subsumed into some other class, is debated; see the discussion in Mikkelsen (2011). 2.2.3 Other types of subject There are a few other sorts of expression which may be able to serve as specificational subjects. Certain abstract nouns can appear as the subject of a specificational sentence: (65) a. Piety is being loved by all the gods. 59 SPECIFICATION b. Validity is never having true premises and a false conclusion simultaneously. c. Racism is actions, practices or beliefs that consider different races to be inherently inferior to others.9 Similarly, infinitives and gerunds can also take the subject position: (66) a. To be wise is to know what is good. b. Having courage is knowing what to fear. The intuitive tests render fairly clear verdicts here. The list analogy predicts that the examples in (65) and (66) all have a specificational reading. A colon would be appropriate in these sentences, as would adding further items to the list, as in (67) Piety is: being loved by all the gods, making timely sacrifices, and praying twice daily. (68) To be wise is: to know what is good, and to act in accordance with that knowledge. Likewise, each could serve as a direct answer to a corresponding 'what is. . . ?' question, and it is reasonably clear that on this interpretation, the questions do not permit predicational sentences as answers, though I will not try to argue that here. As with sentences with gendered pronouns for subjects, however, sentences like those in (65) and (66) have a good claim to be equatives, or 'generalized identities'. So a more considered judgment about these sentences must be postponed until after the discussion of equatives in Chapter 3. Still, these examples raise an interesting point. Neither abstract nouns nor infinitives and gerunds count as descriptions in the sense used above, since they do not have the form of a noun phrase headed by a separate determiner. The feature that these expressions share with questions and many descriptions, however, is that they are nominalizations. They are expressions which can syntactically occupy the same kinds of positions as proper names, but which are derived from expressions in other syntactic categories, such as adjectives or verbs. (One such position, of course, is 9A longer version of this sentence began the Wikipedia article on racism (accessed at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism on May 16, 2014). 60 SPECIFICATION the subject position of a copular sentence.) In some cases, English has a special form for the nominalization of another expression, as 'justice' is the nominalized form of the adjective 'just'. But we also have productive devices for nominalizing: verbs are nominalized by forming their infinitives or gerunds; adjectives and concrete nouns are commonly nominalized with suffices like -ity, -hood, -ness, and -ism. If we take the category of nominalizations to encompass all the examples of specificational subjects we have looked at so far, we can ask: can expressions which are not nominalizations serve as specificational subjects? The answer appears to be negative. I have been unable to find examples of well-formed copular sentences which clearly have a specificational reading, but which have anything other than nominalizations in the subject position, such as adjectives, adverbs, or conjugated verbs: (69) a. Blue is . . . b. Dreary is . . . c. Older than me is . . . (70) a. Quietly is . . . b. At noon in Paris is . . . c. Forevermore is . . . (71) a. *Run is . . . b. *Will consider is . . . c. *Had felt worse is . . . There seems to be no way of supplying a complement in these examples that will yield a specificational sentence.10 In some cases, a well-formed copular sentence is possible, but it will only have a reading which is not 10In conversation, John MacFarlane has suggested that examples like "Quietly is without making a sound" or "Biweekly is every two weeks" are specificational sentences with adverbial subjects. These examples do not seem clearly grammatical to me; but insofar as they are, I read them as akin to, or elliptical for, sentences like " 'Quietly' means without making a sound", in which the adverb appears quoted. Since quoting an adverb forms a nominal expression, it seems to me that reading such sentences specificationally still somehow requires nominalizing the adverb. Thus, if they do indeed have a specificational reading, they won't be counterexamples to my claim that specificational subjects are nominalizations. For a fascinating meditation on some further themes in this general direction, see Sellars (1985). 61 SPECIFICATION clearly specificational, such as the predicational reading, or a 'pure' equative reading: (72) Blue is a color. (73) Honest is honest. Interestingly, proper names also do not seem to permit specification. There are no clearly specificational sentences of the form: (74) a. Ralph and Amelia are . . . b. Cicero is . . . though there are predicational and equative sentences of this form: (75) a. Ralph and Amelia are at the dance. b. Cicero is Tully. This observation permits me to summarize the conclusion of this section: nominalizations can serve as specificational subjects; other expressions cannot. I have not, of course, offered a theory of what 'nominalizations' are. Still, this choice of terminology is appropriate, because our intuitive concept of nominalization lines up fairly neatly with the observations we have made about which expressions can serve as specificational subjects. Nominalizations include questions in the pre-copular position of pseudo-clefts; all descriptions; and at least some anaphora, abstract nouns, infinitives, and gerunds. They exclude adjectives, adverbs, conjugated verbs, proper names, and a host of expressions in other syntactic categories. Thus, although there are a great variety of nominalizations, it seems like there is still an interesting distinction between expressions which can, and expressions which cannot, serve as the subject of a specificational sentence. By contrast, I have found no interesting distinctions between the kinds of expression which can and cannot serve as the complement. The examples above reveal a great variety of expressions in this position. There are isolated examples of expressions which cannot work there, such as bare articles like 'a', or particles like 'of'. But I have no suggestions for how to categorize specificational complements more systematically. In a sense, this is not surprising, given the intuitive tests: specificational complements encompass anything we might care to make 62 SPECIFICATION a list of, or answer a question with; and that is a very wide category indeed. This concludes my survey of the variety of specificational sentences. I turn now to developing and defending a semantic analysis which makes sense of these data. 63 Chapter 3 Semantic analyses of specification We are now in a position to evaluate some existing semantic analyses of specificational sentences. There are three prominent proposals in the literature about the semantics of specificational sentences: the inversion analysis, the equative analysis, and the question-answer analysis. I will assess each of these analyses in this chapter on intuitive, empirical, and theoretical grounds, arguing that the question-answer analysis provides the best prospects for a philosophical understanding of specification. To assess each analysis, I will rely on criteria that have emerged from the survey of specificational sentences in Chapter 2. The criterion I consider most important is how well each analysis captures the pre-theoretical characterization of specification discussed in Section 2.1: namely, that the subject of a specificational sentence expresses a constraint, while its complement says what satisfies that constraint. This characterization of specification is brought out by the list analogy and the directness test. It tells us what unifies specificational sentences at a semantic level, despite the significant syntactic variation in both their subject and complement positions. And it distinguishes the specificational interpretation of a sentence from other readings it may have, such as a predicational or issue-predicational reading. Any semantic analysis of specification should thus try to represent this characterization in theoretical terms. To do so, a successful analysis must capture two different ideas. First of all, it should capture the asymmetry in meaning between the subject and complement of a specificational sentence. This is an asymmetry of semantic function, or role: it is the difference between 'expressing' a constraint and 'saying what satisfies' it. On the other hand, a successful analysis should also capture a certain symmetry in the meaning of the 64 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION subject and the complement, namely, the fact that they are concerned with the same constraint. The subject and complement are in this sense 'about the same thing'; their meaning is connected by sharing the same subject matter, though they play different roles with respect to that subject matter. The idea that specificational sentences involve both an asymmetry of role and a symmetry of subject matter is recognized throughout the literature, though it has not been expressed in consistent terminology. Akmajian, for example, says that the subject of a specificational sentence "contains what is essentially a semantic variable, a semantic 'gap' that must be 'filled' or specified by the [complement]" (Akmajian, 1970, p. 19). Higgins (1979), Mikkelsen (2005, 2011) echo this terminology of 'introducing a variable' and 'specifying a value'. Higgins also says that a specificational sentence "functions rather like a list", where the subject "constitutes the heading" of the list, and the complement is an item on it (Higgins, 1979, p. 8). And Heycock and Kroch say that the subject "has the same denotation as" the complement, but differs in "information packaging", with the subject being less informative than the complement (Heycock & Kroch, 1999, pp. 388,394). Each of these ways of speaking posits something shared by the subject and complement (a variable, a gap, a list, a denotation), as well as something that differs between them. I shall continue to say that the subject and complement share a subject matter, but differ in semantic role. Compared to the other choices, this terminology seems less theoretically-loaded as well as more general. But whatever terminology we use, the challenge for any analysis of specification is to represent both what is common, and what differs, between the meanings of the subject and the complement. What makes this difficult is the wide variety of expressions found in specificational sentences. A successful analysis must work for all the syntactic and semantic types we have found in both the subject and the complement positions. Each of the three prominent analyses goes some way toward capturing the intuitive characterization, but also faces some problems. I will argue that the inversion analysis neatly captures the asymmetry of role, but fails to capture the symmetry of subject matter, in specificational sentences. The equative analysis, on the other hand, easily captures the symmetry of subject matter, but fails to capture the asymmetry of role. These two analyses thus have complementary virtues and vices; each captures an aspect of the intuitive characterization that the other does not. 65 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION This argument points toward the question-answer analysis as a perspicuous way of unifying the virtues of the other two into a single account. Compared to either inversion or equation, questions and answers provide a clearer model of how two expressions can share the same subject matter while differing in semantic role. The question-answer analysis has recently been challenged on empirical grounds, however. I will argue that it survives this challenge, so it is the best contender for a satisfactory view. To be clear, I am not claiming that the inversion and equative analyses are empirically inadequate, or that they cannot be made adequate. They probably can. Rather, I am claiming that evolving either of them toward a satisfactory account will involve making it more like a version of the question-answer analysis, because only the question-answer analysis currently has the resources to capture both the symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. 3.1 THE INVERSION ANALYSIS The inversion analysis proposes that specificational sentences are inverted predications. They are predicational copular sentences in which the predicative expression occupies the grammatical subject position, rather than the complement position. This idea has mostly been pursued as a syntactic hypothesis, in literature that starts with Williams (1983).1 Here, I focus on a semantic proposal which supports and complements this syntactic hypothesis, defended by Mikkelsen (2005). According to this proposal, the subject of a specificational sentence functions semantically as a predicate. That is, in a specificational sentence, the subject purports to describe, or be true of, the complement. Two important ideas motivate the inversion analysis. The first is that we can understand the semantic roles of the expressions in the subject and complement positions of a specificational sentence by examining the roles they play in non-specificational copular sentences. For example, sentence (1-a) is specificational, like the examples in (32). But it is reasonable to expect that 'the lead in North by Northwest' and 'Cary Grant' make the same contributions in (1-a) as they make in (1-b), which is not speci1See citations in Mikkelsen (2005, Ch. 1) and Heycock and Kroch (1999) for other work in this line. 66 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION ficational. The inversion analysis thus hopes to understand the semantic roles of these expressions in (1-a) in terms of the roles they play in (1-b). (1) a. The lead in North by Northwest is Cary Grant. (specificational) b. Cary Grant is the lead in North by Northwest. (non-spec.) The second motivating idea is that definite descriptions in the complement position of copular sentences can function semantically as predicates. This idea dates back at least to Strawson (1950), and is formalized by Partee (1987). In type-theoretic terms, the idea is that the type of the subject in a sentence like (1-b) is e, while the type of the complement is 〈e, t〉. Most significantly, this means that the complement is not a singular term, and that the sentence need not be analyzed as an identity statement.2 By putting this idea together with the first, we arrive at the following proposal. In a specificational sentence like (1-a), where a definite description appears as the subject and a proper name occurs as the complement, these expressions retain the types they have in predicational sentences like (1-b), despite appearing on the other side of the copula. The definite description in this sentence has type 〈e, t〉, while the proper name has type e. That is, in a specificational sentence, the subject functions semantically as a predicate of the complement-an inversion of the relationship observed in predicational sentences. This proposal is summarized in Table 3.1. Table 3.1: The inversion analysis of specification Subject Complement Predication e 〈e, t〉 Specification 〈e, t〉 e 2A variety of empirical tests support the claim that definite descriptions can function as predicates in the complement position of a copular sentence. According to these tests, definite descriptions in this position pattern with clear cases of predicates, such as adjectives, rather than with paradigmatically e-type expressions, such as proper names. For example, post-copular definite descriptions can be coordinated with adjectives and other predicates, while names cannot: consider "He is tall, handsome, and {the lead actor/*Cary Grant}." For a more extensive discussion of these tests for predicativity, see Rieppel (2013b). 67 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION 3.1.1 Support for the inversion analysis: pronominalization of specificational subjects How does the inversion analysis make it plausible that a definite description in the subject of a specificational sentence has type 〈e, t〉, rather than type e? Mikkelsen (2005) argues directly for this claim using pronominalization data. She observes that there is a systematic difference in the way definite descriptions pronominalize in specificational and predicational clauses. In English, the difference appears with descriptions that can refer to humans. When such a description appears as the subject of a predicational clause, it must pronominalize with a gendered pronoun, such as 'he' or 'she'3: (2) a. The tallest girl in the class is Swedish, isn't {she/*it/*that}? b. As for the tallest girl in the class, {she/*it/*that} is Swedish. c. What nationality is the tallest girl in the class? {She/*It/*That} is Swedish. But when the same description appears as the subject of a specificational clause, it can pronominalize with neutral anaphors, such as 'it' and 'that': (3) a. The tallest girl in the class is Molly, isn't {it/?she}? b. As for the tallest girl in the class, {it/that/?she} is Molly. c. Who is the tallest girl in the class? {It/That/?She} is Molly. Mikkelsen argues that this contrast in the way descriptions pronominalize in these positions points to a difference in the semantic type of the subject expression in specificational and predicational clauses. She points out that 'it' and 'that' cannot be used to pronominalize e-type expressions which refer to humans, such as proper names: (4) a. Cary Grant is tall, isn't {he/*it/*that}? b. As for Cary Grant, {he/*it/*that} is tall. The pronominalization facts for predicational clauses in (2) parallel those for proper names in (4). Thus, they are consistent with treating descriptions in the subject of a predicational clause as having type e. But this 3The examples in (2) and (3) appear in Mikkelsen (2005, Ch. 5). 68 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION implies that such descriptions must not have type e when they appear as they subject of a specificational clause. If they did, they would obligatorily pronominalize with gendered pronouns, since neutral anaphors cannot be used to pronominalize expressions which refer to humans. In fact, however, a gendered pronoun is not obligatory; such descriptions can pronominalize with neutral anaphors, as the examples in (3) show. On the other hand, neutral anaphors can be used to pronominalize 〈e, t〉-type expressions: (5) Cary Grant is tall. {It/That} is a good thing to be in Hollywood, if you want to work as a leading man. Thus, the pronominalization facts illustrated in (3) are consistent with the hypothesis that the subject of a specificational sentence is of type 〈e, t〉, but not the hypothesis that it is of type e, as the inversion analysis predicts.4 3.1.2 Assessing the inversion analysis So the inversion analysis appears to be motivated by independentlyplausible ideas, as well as supported by some empirical data. How well does it capture the characterization of specification which emerged from our earlier discussion? Can the inversion analysis explain the sense in which specificational sentences exhibit both a symmetry of subject matter and an asymmetry of semantic role? The inversion analysis does a fair job of representing the asymmetry of semantic role between the subject and complement of a specificational sentence. The contrast between the roles of 'expressing a constraint' and 'saying what satisfies it' is encoded in the theory as the contrast between 4As noted, we can only contrast how the subjects of specificational and predicational sentences pronominalize using English descriptions that can refer to a human. This is because English only uses gendered pronouns to pronominalize humandenoting expressions. But Mikkelsen also shows that in Danish, which has grammatical gender, the contrast extends to descriptions which refer to inanimate objects. In Danish, such descriptions also pronominalize like 〈e, t〉-type expressions rather than like e-type expressions when they appear as the subject of a specificational clause. This indicates that the contrast is robust and not a mere fluke of how English pronominalizes humandenoting descriptions. For more detailed discussion of the data, see Mikkelsen, 2005, § 5.3. 69 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION 〈e, t〉-type subjects and e-type complements. This is a natural way of representing the asymmetry. In general, a semantic type system is meant to encode differences of semantic role, such as the difference between referential, predicative, and quantificational expressions. Moreover, type 〈e, t〉 is a natural choice for a type representing 'constraints' on values denoted by expressions of type e. An object satisfies a constraint when the constraint is true of it, and does not satisfy it otherwise. This idea has a fruitful history in logic and computer science. Still, this representation of the asymmetry looks somewhat limited in scope, given the variety of specificational sentences that we surveyed in Section 2.2. First of all, it's not clear how well it extends to specificational sentences where the complement is not of type e, like (6) a. The claim he made was that he was innocent. b. The top priority is getting re-elected. The natural way to deal with such examples is to generalize the inversion analysis along the lines in Table 3.2: for any type α, in a specificational sentence whose complement has type α, the subject has type 〈α, t〉. This extends the idea that the subject expresses a constraint, while the complement says what satisfies it, to higher-type complements. Table 3.2: An inversion analysis for higher-type complements Subject Complement Specification 〈α, t〉 α This proposal has a technical cost. It requires at least as many types for definite descriptions as there are types for complements in specificational sentences. For example, consider a version of (4) that has a definite description for a subject: (7) The thing I bought for mother was some flowers. On the standard analysis, the complement 'some flowers' is a generalized quantifier, with type 〈〈e, t〉, t〉. Thus, according to Table 3.2, the definite description in the subject needs to have type 〈〈〈e, t〉, t〉, t〉. Though definite descriptions are generally recognized to take on at least three 70 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION different types, this is not among them.5 So this proposal implies that higher-type definite descriptions would be needed in specificational sentences. Admitting such higher-type descriptions would likely require constraining their availability elsewhere in semantic theory, and it is not clear how easy this would be to accomplish. Another issue with generalizing the inversion analysis this way arises for specificational sentences with 〈e, t〉-type complements. According to the generalized inversion analysis, such sentences would have a subject of type 〈〈e, t〉, t〉. This assignment of types, however, collides with the standard analysis of sentences containing generalized quantifiers in subject position. (8) a. Most students are smart. b. What Amelia is is smart. If we accept both the standard analysis of generalized quantifiers and the inversion analysis, then both of the sentences in (8) have a subject of type 〈〈e, t〉, t〉 and complement of type 〈e, t〉. Yet (8-b) is specificational, while (8-a) is not. The inversion analysis thus fails to distinguish specificational and non-specificational sentences in this case. Even if we leave these technical issues aside, the inversion analysis faces some empirical problems. Perhaps the most pressing problem is that inverting a predicational sentence does not always yield a specificational sentence. Consider an adjective like 'handsome', as used in a sentence like (9-a). This sentence is an ordinary predicational sentence, with a subject of type e and complement of type 〈e, t〉. But inverting this sentence around the copula, as in (9-b), does not yield a specificational sentence. (9) a. Cary Grant is handsome. b. *Handsome is Cary Grant. Note that the problem here is not simply that adjectives are syntactically barred from the subject position of copular sentences: (10) a. Handsome is what I want to be. b. Honest is honest. 5Following Partee (1987), the standard types are e, 〈e, t〉, and 〈〈e, t〉, t〉. 71 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION c. Happy is the man that findeth wisdom.6 The problem with (9-b) instead seems to be that 'Cary Grant' cannot be the complement of a sentence which has such an adjective as its subject. Since proper names can be specificational complements in general, the problem must be that adjectives like 'handsome' cannot be specificational subjects, at least not when paired with a complement that is a proper name.7 This point is in line with our earlier observation that adjectives, conjugated verb phrases, and other non-nominalizations cannot serve as the subject of a specificational sentence. Under the inversion analysis, it is not clear why this should be so, since many such expressions are standardly analyzed as predicates of individuals. Thus, even if we grant the inversion analysis' proposal that specificational sentences are inverted predications, that cannot be the whole story. There's something special about nominalizations that allows them to serve as specificational subjects, while adjectives and other 〈e, t〉-type expressions cannot.8 The inversion analysis also has trouble accounting for the fact that specificational sentences support some substitution inferences. Consider the inference in (11): (11) Ms. Pruett praised the tallest girl in the class. The tallest girl in the class is Molly. So, Ms. Pruett praised Molly. This looks like a good substitution inference, with a specificational sentence as its second premise. The problem is that the inversion analysis can't on its own explain why this inference is good, rather than fallacious: according to the inversion analysis, 'the tallest girl in the class' as it appears in the second premise is a predicate, not a singular term. Thus, according to the inversion analysis, the inference has a logical form like: 6Proverbs 3:13, King James Bible. 7Similar observations are made by Heycock and Kroch (1999). 8Mikkelsen herself recognizes a parallel gap here; she says "a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for a DP to be the subject of a specificational clause is that the DP can. . . occur in type 〈e, t〉" (Mikkelsen, 2005, p. 108). But so far as I can see, she does not offer an explanation of why some 〈e, t〉-type expressions cannot be specificational subjects, whether they are DPs or not. 72 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION (12) S(p, t) T(m) So, S(p, m) which is clearly invalid as it stands. To validate the inference, the inversion analysis needs some other principle that connects the denotation of 'the tallest girl in the class' when it occurs as a predicate in the second premise with its occurrence as a singular term in the first premise.9 These last two problems are symptoms of a more general one. Although the inversion analysis captures the asymmetry of role in the subject and complement of a specificational sentence, it has little to say about their symmetry of subject matter. From my perspective here, this is the most serious problem with the inversion analysis. There is a clear and intuitive sense in which a name and a definite description can be 'about the same thing'. This fact explains why the second premise in (11) supports the substitution inference: substituting 'Molly' for 'the tallest girl in the class' is legitimate because the specificational premise guarantees that these expressions are about the same thing. On the other hand, it is equally clear and intuitive that a name and an adjective cannot be 'about the same thing' in this same sense. This seems like the reason why (9-b) does not work as a specificational sentence, despite the fact that adjectives can be subjects, and proper names can be complements, of copular clauses in general. The fact that the inversion analysis has trouble accounting for these examples suggests that it does not sufficiently distinguish when a subject and complement expression can be 'about the same thing', and when they cannot. That is, it does not adequately represent the symmetry of subject matter in specificational sentences. Actually, we have already seen a similar problem in example (23) of Chapter 1, repeated here as (13). We observed there that 'number' and 'way' are not interchangeable: (13) a. #Four is the way of moons Jupiter has. 9In this case, an appropriate type-shifting principle can probably do the job. But Mikkelsen (2005) proposes no such principle, so it is hard to tell whether the inversion analysis can use type-shifting to account for such inferences in general, including inferences where the specificational premise has a higher-type complement. I discuss one such case below, in connection with the equative analysis; see example (31). 73 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION b. #Quietly is the number Mary entered. Consider a version of (13-b), inverted to form a clear case of an (attempted) specificational sentence. The result is still semantically unacceptable: (14) #The number Mary entered was quietly. By contrast, (15) The way Mary entered was quietly. is a perfectly fine specificational sentence. But there is no reason to suspect that 'the number Mary entered' is a defective specificational subject, while 'the way Mary entered' is not. Rather, in the language of this chapter, the problem in (14) is that 'quietly' cannot say what satisfies any constraint that 'the number Mary entered' could express. These two expressions cannot share a subject matter. Again, I am not claiming that the inversion analysis cannot respond to these difficulties. But I think they do show that the analysis needs to be extended, and they indicate that the extension should be toward representing the symmetry of subject matter in the subject and complement of specificational sentences. This is a point on which the equative analysis fares better, so let's consider that next. 3.2 THE EQUATIVE ANALYSIS The original proponent of an equative analysis was Frege. Frege, of course, held that sentences like (16) The number of moons of Jupiter is four. are identity statements. In such sentences, the copula expresses the identity relation, and both the subject and the complement are singular terms. As we have seen, there are some reasons to doubt Frege's analysis. In general, specificational sentences can have complements which are not singular terms. Once we recognize that (16) is a specificational sentence, and that 'four' is not a singular term in many of the other contexts where it appears, it's natural to suppose that 'four' does not occur as a singular term in (16) either. This sentence is a specificational sentence, but it may 74 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION not be an identity statement, because it may have a higher-type complement. At any rate, it is obvious that Frege's analysis of (16) will not extend to clear cases of specificational sentences with higher-type complements: he takes the identity relation to be distinctive of objects, and the sign of identity to only appropriately occur between singular terms.10 There are two possible responses to this problem. One response holds that specifications with higher-type complements undermine Frege's original thought, and show that a completely different analysis of specification is needed. Another response tries to hang on to Frege's idea that specifications somehow 'identify' their subject and complement, by generalizing it to account for specifications with higher-type complements. The equative analysis is a version of the second response. For a proponent of the equative analysis, specificational sentences are one species of equatives. Recall from Section 2.1.3 that equatives are copular sentences that state 'generalized identities'. So according to the equative analysis, a specificational sentence equates the denotations of its subject and its complement, even when neither is a singular term. In type-theoretic terms, this implies that for any type α, when the subject of a specificational sentence has type α, the complement must have type α too. This proposal is summarized in Table 3.3. Table 3.3: The equative analysis Subject Complement Specification α α Recent versions of the equative analysis appear in Heycock and Kroch (1999) and Heller (2005). I will focus on the version defended by Heycock and Kroch, because their proposal specifically addresses specificational sentences with higher-type complements. Heller's proposal is also quite interesting, and I will have more to say about it later. But because she focuses on specificational sentences with e-type complements, her proposal suffers from the same lack of generality as Frege's. 10Frege says, for example: "the relation of equality (Gleicheit) by which I understand complete coincidence, identity, can only be thought of as holding for objects, not concepts" (Frege, 1891/1997a, p. 175). 75 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION 3.2.1 Support for the equative analysis: pure equatives and connectivity effects Heycock and Kroch motivate their version of the equative analysis by observing that English contains 'true equatives' like those in the following examples.11 (17) a. Your attitude toward Jones is my attitude toward Davies. b. Your opinion of Edinburgh is my opinion of Philadelphia. (18) a. When it comes down to it, honest is honest. b. In the end, long is long. c. You can dress is up if you like, but in the end being dishonest is just being dishonest. The sentences in (17) help show that equatives are not plausibly interpreted as a species of predicational sentences, even when the subject and complement are different. In these examples, neither expression is 'more referential' or 'more predicative' than the other, and neither is predicated of the other. The same is true of the tautologous (embedded) equatives in (18). These examples show that there are clear cases of equatives with higher-type expressions, such as adjectives, on both sides of the copula. Heycock and Kroch conclude from these examples that we need a category of equatives which includes sentences with higher-type complements. So the only question is whether specificational sentences are among them. To show that specificational sentences are indeed equatives, they appeal to the following examples (Heycock & Kroch, 1999, pp. 379–380): (19) John is the one thing I have always wanted a man to be (that is, he's honest). (20) a. The one thing I have always wanted a man to be is honest. b. *The one thing I have always wanted a man to be is John. Sentence (19) shows that 'the one thing I have always wanted a man to be' is most naturally read as predicative, or type 〈e, t〉. But when this 11These examples are from Heycock and Kroch (1999, pp. 373–374). See also examples (25) and (10) in Chapter 2, which are plausible cases of equatives. 76 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION predicative phrase is used as the subject of a specificational sentence, it only allows other predicative expressions as complements. This is shown by the contrast between sentences (20-a) and (20-b): an 〈e, t〉-type complement like 'honest' is grammatical, but an e-type complement like 'John' is not. The pattern in (20) therefore suggests that the subject and complement of a specificational sentence must have the same type, as the equative analysis predicts.12 Once we take the subject and complement to have the same semantic type, an equative analysis of specificational sentences seems like the only viable option. For example, a sentence like (20-a) is naturally read as saying that 'the one thing I have always wanted a man to be' and 'honest' denote the same property. That is, it seems best interpreted as equating the denotations of its subject and complement. Other possible relations between same-type denotations (such as non-identity or a generalized quantifier) do not seem to fit the meaning of the sentence. Here are the details of how Heycock and Kroch implement their equative analysis. They focus on specificational pseudo-clefts, and assume that these sentences have an equative syntax. They also assume that the subject of such a sentence is a free relative, and claim that this free relative has the form of a definite description ιy[ f (y)], where the type of the variable y "ranges over all the semantic types that free relatives can denote" (Heycock & Kroch, 1999, p. 383). They define the ι operator as follows (Heycock & Kroch, 1999, p. 383): (21) ιy[ f (y)] denotes a iff f (a) (and a uniquely satisfies f ) I am abstracting here from Heycock and Kroch's initial formulation of the uniqueness condition, which they eventually remove in favor of thinking of uniqueness as a pragmatic presupposition. Thus, according to their analysis, in a specificational pseudo-cleft like (22) What Mary did was run the marathon. the subject is a free relative with the form 12Note that the inversion analysis predicts the opposite pattern in this case. If specificational sentences are inverted predications, then (20-b) should be grammatical rather than (20-a). 77 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION (23) ιy[Mary did y] y here has type 〈e, t〉; it is a predicate of Mary. 'Did' constrains y to be an action in the past, which I will simply represent as 'y-ed'. So writing (23) in the form need to apply the definition of ι, we have (24) ιy[λx.[Mary x-ed](y)] The whole sentence then has a form that is more perspicuously represented as: (25) ιy[λx.[Mary x-ed](y)] = run the marathon where 'run the marathon' has type 〈e, t〉, and '=' is a (polymorphic) sign of equation.13 An equative sentence like (25) is true just in case the two expressions in the equation have the same denotation. We can thus compute its truth conditions by computing the denotation conditions for the subject, given a denotation for the complement. Suppose that the complement 'run the marathon' denotes the property of running the marathon. Call this property rm for short, keeping in mind that since 'run the marathon' has type 〈e, t〉, rm is a function from individuals to truth values. So (25) is true just in case the subject phrase also denotes rm. We can now apply the definition of the ι operator to reduce this as follows: (26) the subject denotes rm, iff λx.[Mary x-ed](rm) (and rm is unique), iff (by def. of ι) Mary rm-ed (and rm is unique) (by β-reduction) So the sentence is true just in case Mary performed the action of running the marathon in the past-that is, if she ran the marathon. It presupposes that running the marathon is all she did in the relevant context. Notice that by applying the definition of ι in this way, we effectively transform the pseudo-cleft (22) into a simpler sentence, one that would 13Heycock and Kroch treat equative syntax as a type of small clause, and argue that it is independent of the copula (Heycock & Kroch, 1999, §3.4). On their analysis, we should not think of the '=' sign in (25) as expressed by the copula in (22); rather, the equation is implicit in the clause type, and the copula is semantically vacuous. Again, this detail is not important for my purposes here. 78 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION read like: (27) Mary ran the marathon. Heycock and Kroch call this transformation ι-reduction, and they go on to show that, by treating ι-reduction as an obligatory operation for interpreting a specificational pseudo-cleft, they can explain why these sentences exhibit some syntactic features known as connectivity effects. I won't go into too much detail here, because explaining connectivity is mainly a problem for the theory of syntax and outside the scope of my discussion. But I will examine it briefly, since it provides important empirical support for Heycock and Kroch's view.14 Here's the idea. Some specificational pseudo-clefts exhibit a puzzling syntactic property: (28) a. What Vinny didn't buy was any wine. b. What Narcissus likes is staring at himself. These sentences each contain an element in the complement that normally must occur in a configuration with some other expression. In (28-a), this element is the negative polarity item 'any', which normally must occur in the scope of a negation (or other downward-entailing context). In (28-b) it is the reflexive pronoun 'himself', which normally must occur in the scope of a human-denoting expression. But in specificational pseudo-clefts, these expressions are licensed in the complement even though standard syntactic analyses say that those configurations do not obtain. That is the connectivity effect: an NPI or reflexive pronoun is grammatical in the complement, even though it is predicted not to be. Heycock and Kroch explain this by observing that ι-reduction transforms a pseudo-cleft with a connectivity effect into an equivalent sentence where the normally-required configurations are present. (29) a. Vinny didn't buy any wine. 14I should point out that, for reasons that are too complicated to review here, Heycock and Kroch think of ι-reduction as a syntactic transformation. But their discussion makes clear that they also think of ι-reduction as part of the interpretation of a sentence; calling it 'syntactic' is, for them, compatible with thinking of ι-reduction as a step in a semantic derivation of the truth conditions of a specificational pseudo-cleft. That is how I shall think of it here. 79 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION b. Narcissus likes staring at himself. ι-reducing (28-a) produces (29-a), where the NPI 'any wine' occurs in the scope of the negation in 'didn't'. Likewise, ι-reducing (28-b) produces (29-b), where 'himself' is c-commanded by 'Narcissus'. Basically, Heycock and Kroch's idea is that 'any' and 'himself' are licensed in the pseudo-clefts in (28) because they are licensed in these reduced forms, which are obligatorily produced during interpretation of the pseudoclefts. Thus, the equative analysis, when paired with obligatory ι-reduction, accounts for an important class of connectivity effects. 3.2.2 Assessing the equative analysis So the equative analysis is supported by empirical data, and has some important explanatory advantages. I think it also has an undeniable pretheoretical appeal: specificational pseudo-clefts in particular 'feel like' equations of some kind. When I say (30) What I bought for mother was some flowers. what I say seems true only if I am using 'what I bought for mother' and 'some flowers' as different descriptions of the very same thing. In my terminology, the right way to articulate this intuition is that the subject and complement of a specificational sentence exhibit symmetry of subject matter. The equative analysis represents this in a natural way: for the two parts of a specificational sentence to have the same subject matter is for them to have the same denotation. The theoretical concept of denotation plays many roles, but one role it often takes on is providing a precise counterpart to the idea that linguistic expressions are 'about' things in the world. If two expressions have symmetry of subject matter when they are 'about the same thing', then equality of denotation is a good candidate for representing symmetry of subject matter. So the equative analysis captures one part of our characterization of specification quite well. One consequence of this is that the equative analysis does not face some of the worries that face the inversion analysis. For example, the equative analysis has a straightforward story about why (9-b) is ungrammatical: 80 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION (9-b) *Handsome is Cary Grant. The problem here is that 'handsome' has type 〈e, t〉, and 'Cary Grant' has type e, and neither of these expressions can take on other types. Because of the type mismatch, this sentence cannot be an equative sentence. Thus, it cannot be a specificational sentence, even though both the subject and complement can appear in other copular sentences at the same positions. Likewise, the equative analysis has no trouble accounting for the inference in (11): (11) Ms. Pruett praised the tallest girl in the class. The tallest girl in the class is Molly. So, Ms. Pruett praised Molly. According to the equative analysis, 'the tallest girl in the class' has type e in the second premise, so this premise is just an identity statement. Thus, the equative analysis can validate this inference just by appealing to the logic of identity. With higher-type complements, the picture is more complex, because it is less clear that higher-type expressions with the same denotation are intersubstitutable salva veritate, even in extensional contexts.15 Still, it appears that some higher-type substitutions make good inferences: (31) Oscar came to campus the (same) way Ernie came to campus. The way Ernie came to campus was via Telegraph. So, Oscar came to campus via Telegraph. Here, the second premise is a specificational sentence with a higher-type complement. Substituting this complement for the occurrence of the subject in the first premise, in a manner analogous to the inference in (11), yields a conclusion that seems to follow. If this is indeed a good inference, the equative analysis could validate it just by appealing to a higher-order analogue of the laws of identity. This seems like a virtue, although I don't want to pursue this here. 15One reason this is not clear is that higher-type expressions of the same semantic type often do not have the same syntactic type, and substituting an expression of one syntactic type for another usually yields nonsense, even if they have the same denotation. 81 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION Still, the equative analysis faces both technical and empirical problems. On the technical side, Heycock and Kroch's analysis faces problems similar to those facing the inversion analysis. First of all, the analysis needs to be extended to specificational sentences other than pseudoclefts before it can account for all the types of specificational subject that we observed in Section 2.2. Officially, Heycock and Kroch's assumption that specificational subjects are descriptions of the form ιy[ f (y)] only applies to free relatives in the subject position of a pseudo-cleft, though it is straightforward to extend this assumption to overt definite descriptions as well. It is less obvious how to extend their analysis to specificational sentences with other types of definites or with indefinites as subjects, like those in (44) and (45). But presumably, these cases could be handled by defining analogues of the ι operator to represent the different determiners in these kinds of subject. Like the inversion analysis, the equative analysis also may require more types of definite description than are standardly recognized. The problem is less aggravated in this case, because the equative analysis does not hold that the subject has a higher type than the complement. But there are still some potentially awkward examples. Non-intersective modifiers in the complement provide one kind of case: (32) (Some mothers are harsh, some are overbearing.) But the kind of mother mine is is good. On the specificational reading, this sentence says what kind of mother the speaker has; it says he has a good mother. Since 'good' is a nonintersective modifier, the best analysis of 'good' in this reading of the sentence might assign it a type like 〈〈e, t〉, 〈e, t〉〉. The equative analysis would then assign this non-standard type to the definite description in the subject position as well. Again, the problem is that admitting such higher types of definite descriptions likely requires constraining them in other contexts, and it's not clear how easily this can be done. On the empirical side, the most pressing problem for the equative analysis is that it has no obvious explanation of the pronominalization data which supported the inversion analysis. Recall that human-denoting descriptions may pronominalize with neutral anaphors in English when they occur as the subject of a specificational sentence (but generally not elsewhere), as we saw in (3): 82 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION (3) a. The tallest girl in the class is Molly, isn't {it/?she}? b. As for the tallest girl in the class, {it/that/?she} is Molly. c. Who is the tallest girl in the class? {It/That/?She} is Molly. Mikkelsen (2005, §5.1) argues that anaphors must agree in type with their antecedent, and that the antecedents of the anaphors in these sentences are the subjects of the specificational clauses. On the equative analysis, however, the subjects of these specificational clauses should be e-type expressions that refer to a human, Molly. So the equative analysis either needs to dispute Mikkelsen's argument that a pronoun reflects the type of its antecedent, or show that expressions which refer to humans actually can pronominalize with neutral anaphors like 'it' and 'that'. As far as I can see, neither Heycock and Kroch (1999) nor Heller (2005) (who is aware of Mikkelsen's argument) pursue either option. But the most serious problem with the equative analysis is that it does not adequately account for the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. For all we have said so far, the equative analysis cannot distinguish specificational sentences like those in (33) from 'pure' equatives like those in (34). (33) a. The lead in North by Northwest is Cary Grant. b. What Mary did was run the marathon. (34) a. Cary Grant is Cary Grant. b. What Mary did is what I'm going to do next month. According to the equative analysis, both types of sentences are equatives, so a sentence in either group is true if and only if its subject and complement have the same denotation. Yet the specificational sentences in (33), in some obvious and intuitive sense, exhibit an asymmetry that the 'pure' equatives in (34) do not. In the 'pure' equatives, we cannot construe one expression as expressing a constraint, and the other as saying what satisfies it, any more than the other way around. But in specificational sentences, these different roles always belong to the subject and complement respectively. This asymmetry of role is what makes specificational sentences special, and distinguishes them from equatives more generally. Since the equative analysis is an analysis of specification, it is 83 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION obliged to give an account of the asymmetry.16 Heycock and Kroch recognize this problem, but their solution is hard to make sense of. Basically, they suggest that the syntax of a specificational pseudo-cleft instructs an interpreter to interpret its subject and complement in different ways. Rather than computing denotations for the subject and complement independently and then comparing the results, the interpreter should compute the denotation of the complement and then assign it as the denotation of the subject. This suggestion recovers an asymmetry in how the subject and complement are interpreted in specificational sentences. Here is how they put it: In [specificational] pseudoclefts, the free relative [i.e., the subject] expresses the ground, an open proposition that the speaker assumes to be a salient member of the belief set that the hearer is using to interpret the discourse; and the focus [i.e., the complement] of the pseudocleft expresses the value of the variable that the speaker intends the hearer to add to his or her belief set. . . . If we accept the above treatment of the information structure of pseudoclefts, we see quite easily how the equative syntax of a pseudocleft encodes its information-packaging effect; but the analysis of pseudoclefts as equative sentences takes on a somewhat different significance. In logic, a = b and b = a are indistinguishable; but in natural language, the two arguments of an equative sentence typically differ in informativeness. It is this difference in information packaging that has been wrongly described as a subject-predicate asymmetry by proponents of the syntactic inversion analysis of copular sentences. The asymmetry is better captured by reconceiving "equal16One might think that the contrast between (33) and (34) is purely a pragmatic contrast, not a semantic one, and so the equative analysis is not obliged to account for it. Against this, I would point out that this sort of contrast is quite stable across contexts. No particular contextual setup is required to feel the contrast; it seems to arise from the default interpretation of these sentences. Thus, the contrast seems to reflect a general fact about what these sentences mean, not a particular fact about what speakers mean by them, or about how they are interpreted in particular contexts. For that reason, I think of the relationship as a semantic one, rather than a purely pragmatic one. I discuss this contrast further, as well as how the category of specificational sentences relates to the distinction between semantics and pragmatics, in Section 4.3. 84 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION ity" as an instruction to assign a value to a variable, that is, as an instruction to assign to the precopular phrase the denotation of the post-copular one. (Heycock & Kroch, 1999, 393–394, my emphasis) This solution seems to make room for the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences only by giving up the idea that they are semantically equative in any substantial sense. It is not clear how much a 'pure' equative has in common with a sentence that instructs an interpreter to assign a value to a variable. A pure equative presumably does not contain such an instruction, since that would introduce exactly the asymmetry which is absent in pure equatives. So by reconceiving the 'equality' in specificational sentences as an asymmetric assignment instruction, Heycock and Kroch are in danger of divorcing this notion from the notion of semantic equality that applies to pure equatives. Their suggestion does preserve the idea that interpreting a specificational sentence as true involves assigning the same denotation to the subject as the complement. But this is not sufficient to say that a specificational sentence is interpreted equatively, or that it belongs to the semantic category of equatives. For Heycock and Kroch, how an expression is interpreted depends on both the denotations of its constituents and its information packaging. In particular, two copular sentences whose subjects and complements all have the same denotation, such as (33-a) and (34-a), can still be interpreted differently when they differ in information packaging. In fact, that is the whole point: Heycock and Kroch's explanation of connectivity effects requires that interpreting a specificational pseudocleft involves ι-reducing the sentence to a non-equative form. So when they say that the equative analysis of specification "takes on a somewhat different significance" on this proposal, they seem to be severely understating the point. If their suggestion is taken seriously, it becomes totally unclear that we have any reason to think specificational sentences are interpreted equatively, or to analyze them as semantically equative, at all. The very first sentence in the passage quoted above indicates that something has gone wrong here. There, Heycock and Kroch suggest that the information packaging in a specificational pseudo-cleft takes the following form. The subject expresses an open proposition, while the complement expresses a value which satisfies that open proposition. But notice that the general semantic type of an open proposition is 〈α, t〉, 85 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION while the type of an expression denoting a value which satisfies that open proposition is α. This agrees exactly with the 'generalized inversion analysis' I suggested in Table 3.2. So just at the point when they try to capture the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences, Heycock and Kroch's analysis looks like it treats specifications as inverted predications rather than equatives. This is a result that they take great pains to reject earlier in their discussion. Thus, I conclude that Heycock and Kroch have not offered any satisfactory account of the asymmetry. Heller's (2005) version of the equative analysis, on the other hand, offers a much more interesting approach to the asymmetry. She proposes that specificational sentences have rising discriminability. This means that in a specificational sentence, the complement is somehow 'more discriminating' than the subject. Rising discriminability distinguishes specifications from pure equatives (as well as predications). In a pure equative, the subject and complement have equal discriminability. To make sense of this idea, Heller demonstrates that there is a systematic pattern in how speakers choose between expressions which refer to the same individual. Speakers generally prefer proper names to definite descriptions, which they in turn prefer to free relatives. Consider, for example, the following sentences17: (35) a. Giacomo brought the lasagna. b. The neighbor brought the lasagna. In a context where Giacomo is the neighbor and both the speaker and hearer know who 'Giacomo' refers to, (35-a) is preferred to (35-b) as a way of saying that he brought the lasagna. Assuming that speakers prefer to use expressions which will make it clearest to their listeners which object they are referring to, this preference indicates that proper names are more discriminating than definite descriptions. This seems like the right result: though many people might satisfy the description 'the neighbor' in this context, only one (contextually relevant) person is named 'Giacomo', so by using the latter, the speaker makes it clearest who she is talking about. If that is right, then we can explain the difference between a pure equative like (36-a) and a specificational sentence like (36-b): 17These sentences are based on an example in Heller (2005, §4.1.1). 86 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION (36) a. Giacomo is Giacomo. b. The neighbor is Giacomo. The difference is that, in the pure equative, the subject and complement have equal discriminability, whereas in the specificational sentence, the complement is more discriminating than the subject. The asymmetry of role found in specificational sentences is thus a matter of their subjects and complements differing in discriminability. This idea strikes me as being on the right track. But rather than developing a complete theory of discriminability, Heller stops short, and so her proposal does not provide a fully satisfying account of the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. She eventually retreats from the claim that proper names are more discriminating than definite descriptions, holding instead that "discriminability is not fixed" and suggesting that the relative discriminability of two expressions is highly sensitive to contextual factors, which she only partly explores (Heller, 2005, p. 182). More importantly, as I noted above, Heller is focused on specificational sentences with e-type complements. She does not extend her observations about discriminability to higher-type expressions, instead leaving that for further research (Heller, 2005, p. 181). It is not clear, however, that her concept of discriminability can be extended to accommodate such cases. Heller says that a speaker chooses among referring expressions based on "the familiarity of the interlocutors with the entity" to which he is referring, and she explains discriminability in terms of a systematic pattern in how we make such choices (Heller, 2005, p. 132). The trouble is that we find exactly parallel choices among expressions which are not referring expressions, but instead play some other semantic role. For example, compare (37-a) to (37-b): (37) a. Audrey is coming to campus by bicycle. b. Audrey is coming to campus how she usually does. In a context where the audience knows what it means to come by bicycle but does not necessarily know Audrey's transportation habits, a speaker will generally prefer (37-a) to (37-b) as a means of saying how Audrey is coming to campus. This preference is just like the general preference for (35-a) over (35-b), except that the speaker is choosing between the adverbial phrases 'how she usually does' and 'by bicycle'. It is likewise 87 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION reflected by the asymmetry in a related specificational sentence: (38) How Audrey usually comes to campus is by bicycle. In this case, though, the pattern is not well-described by saying that the speaker chooses based on the interlocutors' familiarity with the entity he is referring to, since it is not plausible that he is using these adverbial phrases to refer to anything at all. Even if we grant that he refers to something with these expressions, what would it mean for an interlocutor to be more or less familiar with the referent of an adverbial phrase? We would have to make sense of this obscure idea before it could explain the asymmetry in (38). So although I think we need something like Heller's concept of discriminability, it is not general enough in its present form to account for the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. I conclude that the equative analysis has no satisfying explanation of the asymmetry, and a different account is needed. 3.3 THE QUESTION-ANSWER ANALYSIS Here is a summary of where we are at. Different empirical and theoretical considerations support the inversion analysis and the equative analysis. The inversion analysis is supported by data about how specificational subjects pronominalize. It accounts for the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences by assigning the subject and complement different semantic types, but it does not account for their symmetry of subject matter. As a consequence, the inversion analysis has trouble explaining why not all inverted predications are specificational sentences, and why some simple substitution inferences are valid. The equative analysis is supported by data about connectivity effects. It accounts for the symmetry of subject matter in specificational sentences by assigning the subject and complement the same denotation, and it can explain the cases that the inversion analysis can't. But it has no explanation of the pronominalization data which support the inversion analysis, and it provides no satisfying account of the asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. Thus, the inversion analysis and the equative analysis have complementary virtues and vices. Each accounts for one important set of data 88 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION that the other does not, and each captures one part of our characterization of specification that the other does not. It is time to see whether we can unify their virtues into a single account. Unfortunately, we can't simply combine the inversion analysis and the equative analysis into an account with the virtues of both. At the empirical level, we have seen that the inversion analysis and the equative analysis each have trouble accounting for some data that support the other. At the theoretical level, the two analyses take incompatible approaches to representing the symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. Both analyses are presented in the framework of a typed denotational semantics, where it is assumed that differences in semantic type imply differences in denotation. Within this framework, we cannot simultaneously assign the subject and complement of a specificational sentence the same denotation and different types. Thus, we cannot combine the equative approach to the symmetry with the inversion approach to the asymmetry. A unified analysis must therefore take a different tack at both levels. I will argue that the question-answer analysis is the best candidate to do so. According to the question-answer analysis, the subject of a specificational sentence functions like a question, and the complement functions like its answer. Versions of this analysis have been offered by Ross (1972), den Dikken, Meinunger, and Wilder (2000), Schlenker (2003), and Romero (2005). I will focus here on arguing for the question-answer analysis in informal terms, using the empirical and theoretical considerations we have already seen. 3.3.1 Support for the question-answer analysis To motivate the question-answer analysis, recall that our paradigm cases of specificational sentences are pseudo-clefts. The subject of a pseudocleft begins with a wh-word, just like a question. Intuitively, a specificational pseudo-cleft reads like a sentence containing both a question and its answer, as we saw in Chapter 1. Moreover, for every specificational pseudo-cleft, there is a corresponding question-answer dialogue. There is a clear parallel in meaning between a specificational pseudo-cleft like (39) What I bought for mother was some flowers. and its corresponding question-answer dialogue, like 89 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION (40) a. What did you buy for mother? b. Some flowers. This intuitive parallel underlies the directness test, which I employed above as a way of identifying the specificational reading of pseudo-clefts which also have a predicational reading. There are also some empirical observations which support the questionanswer analysis. Let's first consider some syntactic observations, starting with one made by Ross (1972). In the question-answer dialogue in (41), the first two answers not full sentences, but in some sense elided. Fullsentence answers like (41-c) are also possible: (41) What did you do then? a. Call. b. Call the grocer. c. I called the grocer. Ross observed that there is a parallel phenomenon in the complement position of specificational pseudo-clefts. (42) a. What I did then was call. b. What I did then was call the grocer. c. What I did then was I called the grocer. Notice that the possible complements in these pseudo-clefts exactly mirror the possible answers for the corresponding question in the dialogue in (41). In general, as den Dikken, Meinunger, and Wilder (2000) and Schlenker (2003) observe, it appears that the principles of ellipsis which apply to answers in question-answer dialogues mirror those which apply to the complement of a specificational pseudo-cleft, except that such ellipsis seems to be more often obligatory in pseudo-clefts. This is evidence that specificational pseudo-clefts function like question-answer pairs, at least at a syntactic level. This syntactic parallel also suggests a natural explanation of connectivity effects. If specificational complements are syntactically analyzed as elided full-sentence answers, connectivity effects can be explained by the elided material. For example, consider again sentence (28-b): (28-b) What Narcissus likes is staring at himself. 90 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION Recall that the connectivity effect in this sentence is that the reflexive pronoun 'himself' is grammatical in the complement, even though it does not appear to be in a configuration which licenses reflexives. But if the complement is treated as an elided sentence, like (43) What Narcissus likes is Narcissus likes staring at himself. then 'himself' occurs in the proper configuration to be licensed by the elided 'Narcissus'. Den Dikken, Meinunger, and Wilder (2000) and Schlenker (2003) develop syntactic analyses of specificational pseudo-clefts to explain connectivity effects in this manner. They also extend their analyses to explain connectivity in specificational sentences with other types of subject. I cannot evaluate here whether all specificational sentences should be analyzed syntactically as question-answer pairs, or whether this approach will ultimately provide a satisfying explanation of connectivity effects. Still, it appears that the question-answer analysis has a natural path to such an explanation, which means that it plausibly offers the same explanatory advantages as the equative analysis with respect to connectivity data. Several semantic observations also support the question-answer analysis. First of all, the analysis is consistent with the pronominalization data which support the inversion analysis. Recall that Mikkelsen (2005) showed that human-denoting descriptions in the subject position of a specificational sentence can pronominalize with neutral anaphors like 'it' and 'that'. She argued that this is not consistent with such descriptions having type e, and instead concluded that they have type 〈e, t〉.18 But in fact, these data only seem to require that we not assign type e to the subject of a specificational sentence. As Mikkelsen (2005, p. 61) herself notes, treating the subject of a specificational sentence as a question is compatible with the pronominalization data. This is because questions, like predicative expressions, pronominalize with neutral anaphors. We can see this by considering issue-predicational sentences. As I observed in Section 2.1.3, issue-predicational sentences are sentences where the complement is predicated of what the subject denotes, but the subject denotes a question or issue. When the subject of an issue-predicational 18See the discussion above of the examples in (3). 91 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION sentence is anaphoric on the previous expression of a question, it will be a neutral anaphor, as the following examples show. (44) a. How many people are expected for lunch? That is a good question. (I wish I knew the answer.) b. Who we should invite is still being discussed, and I expect it will not be an easy question to reach agreement on. The answer in the dialogue in (44-a) is an issue-predicational sentence. It predicates 'being a good question' of what its subject denotes. But its subject is the neutral anaphor 'that', which is only plausibly interpreted as having the prior question as its antecedent. Similarly, the second conjunct of (44-b) is an issue-predicational sentence with 'it' as its subject, which is only plausibly interpreted as anaphoric on the question expressed by 'who we should invite' in the first conjunct. Note that the first conjunct is also an issue-predicational sentence, which makes it clear that 'who we should invite' denotes a question there, rather than a person or group of people.19 We can also see that questions pronominalize with neutral anaphors by looking at verbs like 'to wonder', which are standardly analyzed as taking questions as arguments. (45) Silas wondered who Bertram would marry, a. . . . but concluded that it was an inscrutable question. b. . . . and concluded that {it/??*he/??*she} would be Leslie. In both of the examples in (45), the question 'who Bertram would marry' is the argument of 'wondered' in the first conjunct. When the sentence is continued with a second conjunct containing an issue-predicational clause, as in (45-a), a neutral pronoun is grammatical, and the only plausible antecedent for the pronoun is the question in the first conjunct. When the second conjunct instead contains a specificational clause, as in (45-b), a neutral anaphor is still grammatical, but gendered pronouns are very marginal, even when the specificational complement refers to a person. This is consistent with Mikkelsen's observation that it is preferable to pronominalize a specificational subject with a neutral anaphor, 19: See the discussion of example (26) in Section 2.1.3 above. 92 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION even when a gendered pronoun is possible.20 The example in (45-b) also suggests a further point. When the subject of a specificational clause is an anaphor, it is required to agree in type with its antecedent. In all of Mikkelsen's examples, the antecedent is a description; and since descriptions can have type 〈e, t〉, they point toward treating specificational subjects as predicates. But there do not seem to be any plausible predicative antecedents for 'it' in the first conjunct, unless we construe the question 'who Bertram would marry' as a predicate. If there are reasons for assigning this question a type other than 〈e, t〉, then in cases like (45-b), the question-answer analysis may actually explain the pronominalization behavior of specificational subjects better than the inversion analysis does.21 Another semantic observation which supports the question-answer analysis is that descriptions can sometimes make the same semantic contributions as questions. This is an important point for the question-answer analysis to establish, since it is clear that many specificational sentences have a description in the subject position. Unless descriptions can be analyzed as behaving semantically like questions, the question-answer analysis will fall flat as a general proposal about the semantics of specification. In fact, though, the claim that descriptions can express questions is not controversial. One way to see this is to look at how descriptions interact with verbs like 'to tell' and 'to find out'. These verbs are called concealed question verbs because in addition to explicit questions, they can take descriptions as arguments: (46) a. Tell me what your favorite book is. b. Tell me your favorite book. (47) a. Edward found out where the treasure was. b. Edward found out the location of the treasure. (48) a. Charlotte knows when the meeting is. b. Charlotte knows the time of the meeting. 20See the judgments in example (3) above. Note that Mikkelsen interprets the possibility of gendered pronouns in the subject position as indicating an ambiguity between specificational and equative readings of the clause in question. 21Schlenker (2003) makes similar observations, employing an anaphoric relation between the subject of a specificational sentence and the argument of 'to wonder' to argue that specificational subjects should be construed as questions. 93 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION Because they also accept explicit questions as semantic arguments, these verbs are standardly analyzed as requiring a question in their object positions. Thus, the fact that these verbs also allow descriptions in this position indicates that some descriptions can make semantic contributions akin to explicit questions. (We made similar observations in Chapter 1.) Such a description is called a 'concealed question' in the literature. Other recent work in linguistics shows that descriptions are usefully analyzed as behaving like questions in a variety of contexts. For example, Barker (2016) shows how a natural semantics for questions can explain a distributional difference in the head nouns of descriptions which can function as concealed questions. AnderBois (2010) develops a semantics that treats indefinite descriptions like questions in order to explain licensing conditions on sluicing. And Romero (2005) shows how an ambiguity between two readings of concealed questions, first observed by Heim (1979), is also present for descriptions in the subject position of a specificational sentence. She develops a semantics which treats specificational subjects as concealed questions in order to generate both readings. Thus, empirical observations about both the syntax and the semantics of specificational sentences support treating them like question-answer pairs. In particular, the question-answer analysis seems to have a plausible story about both sets of data that supported the equative and inversion analyses. Since neither of the other analyses had an explanation for both sets of data, the question-answer analysis looks like the most promising candidate for a unified empirical account. 3.3.2 An empirical challenge Before I can conclude that the question-answer analysis is empirically satisfactory, however, I need to respond to some objections raised by Caponigro and Heller (2007). Their objections are the strongest empirical claims against the question-answer analysis that I am aware of. They argue that, despite the observations we've made above, specificational subjects cannot be construed as questions, either syntactically or semantically. I accept their claims about syntax, but I think their semantic claims fail. Let's look at both arguments in turn. On the syntactic side, Caponigro and Heller (2007) argue that the subjects of specificational pseudo-clefts belong to the category of free relatives rather than the category of interrogatives. They appeal to data from lan94 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION guages that morphologically distinguish these categories (namely Macedonian, Hungarian, Wolof, and Hebrew), and show that, in each of these languages, free relatives can appear as the pre-copular phrase in a specificational sentence, while interrogatives cannot. (Caponigro & Heller, 2007, § 4.1) English does not morphologically distinguish these categories; some English phrases that begin with wh-words work as both interrogatives and free relatives. But Caponigro and Heller (2007) demonstrate that there is a distributional difference between these categories, so there is still reason to treat them as syntactically distinct. In English, interrogatives that begin with 'which' or 'how much' cannot also function as free relatives. This provides a test of whether an environment accepts free relatives or interrogatives. They observe that verbs like 'wonder' accept the full range of interrogatives22: (49) Interrogatives a. I wonder where she has lunch. b. I wonder what John is reading. c. I wonder who gave you the flowers. d. I wonder which book John is reading. e. I wonder how much Sue weighs. But 'which' and 'how much' constructions cannot be used in contexts where only free relatives, and not interrogatives, are grammatical, such as the object positions of verbs like 'to read' or 'to meet': (50) Free relatives a. I have lunch where she has lunch. b. I read what John is reading. c. ??I met who gave you the flowers. d. *I read which book John is reading. e. *I weigh how much Sue weighs. They then point out that the distribution of wh-phrases in the subject position of specificational pseudo-clefts patterns with free relatives, not 22The examples in (49), (50), and (51) are from Caponigro and Heller (2007, §7.4.2). Interestingly, they do not consider phrases that begin with 'whether', 'how', or 'how many'; in all of these cases, I think, the distributional difference is less clear. 95 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION interrogatives: (51) Specificational pseudo-clefts a. Where she has lunch is at the cafeteria. b. What John is reading is Ulysses. c. ??Who gave you the flowers was your advisor. d. *Which book John is reading is Ulysses. e. *How much Sue weighs is 130 pounds. So, they conclude, the subject of a specificational pseudo-cleft is a free relative, not an interrogative. I agree that there is a distributional difference here, and I am happy to assume that, as far as syntax is concerned, the subject of a specificational pseudo-cleft is a free relative rather than an interrogative. In fact, making this assumption may strengthen a point I made in Chapter 1. I observed there that many 'questions' can be intersubstituted with descriptions but that 'which'-questions were a notable exception. If the subject position of a specificational pseudo-cleft only allows free relatives, not interrogatives, that explains the exception for the case I am interested in. Moreover, Caponigro (2003, p. 10) defines the category of free relatives by observing that free relatives can be intersubstituted with descriptions without change of truth conditions. He argues that this is part of what distinguishes free relatives from interrogatives, which cannot always be intersubstituted with descriptions. If Caponigro is right about this, I can then strengthen my claim: a specificational sentence with a 'question' (i.e., free relative) in the subject position is always equivalent to one with a description in the subject position. In light of this syntactic point, I shall henceforth be more careful with my terminology. As I will use the terms, 'free relative' and 'interrogative' are strictly syntactic categories, which have different distributions. I will reserve the term 'question' for a semantic category. Interrogatives paradigmatically express, or are interpreted as, questions. The issue here is whether free relatives, descriptions, and other kinds of specificational subjects can also express or be interpreted as questions, and if they can, in what sense they can. Caponigro and Heller (2007, § 7.5.2) think that specificational subjects cannot be interpreted as questions, but their argument here is much weaker. They argue for two claims. First, they argue that free relatives 96 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION cannot be complements of concealed-question verbs. Second, they argue that some descriptions which can occur as specificational subjects cannot be complements of concealed-question verbs. Together, these claims show that there is a distributional difference between the arguments of concealed-question verbs and the subject position in specificational sentences. They take this to show that, since the arguments of concealedquestion verbs are interpreted as questions, specificational subjects cannot be. To support the claim that free relatives cannot be complements of concealed question verbs, Caponigro and Heller again appeal to data from languages that distinguish free relatives and interrogatives. They show that in Hebrew, Wolof, and Hungarian, free relatives cannot appear as the complement of concealed question verbs, while interrogatives can. Their second claim is that some descriptions can be specificational subjects, but cannot be concealed questions. To support this claim, they appeal to data from English. I reproduce their examples (41)–(43) in full (Caponigro & Heller, 2007, p. 258): (52) a. The president of the United States is G.W. Bush. b. Tell me the president of the United States. c. The boy who ran over my pet snake was John. d.*??Tell me the boy who ran over my pet snake. (53) a. The capital of France is Paris. b. Tell me the capital of France. c. The city I live in is Paris. d. ??Tell me the city you live in. (54) a. The candy Jill wants to buy is jelly beans. b. Tell me the candy Jill wants to buy. c. The money that was stolen was Swiss Francs. d. *Tell me the money that was stolen. Each of these examples purports to contrast two types of definite description. The first type is headed by what they call a functional noun, like 'president' or 'capital'; the other is headed by a non-functional noun, like 'boy' or 'city'. They propose that while both types of description can be specificational subjects (as we see in the aand c-examples), only descriptions headed by functional nouns can be interpreted as questions, and serve as arguments of concealed-questions verbs (as we see in the b97 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION and d-examples). Unfortunately, I simply disagree with their grammaticality judgments here, so I do not see the purported contrasts. I do find (52-d) slightly awkward on its own, but it seems completely acceptable in a context like this: (55) Tell me the boy who ran over my pet snake, and who put him up to it, or else it's detention for you! Thus, I do not see that (52-d) contrasts with (52-b). Likewise, (53-d) is totally acceptable to my ear-I can imagine using this sentence in a police interview, for example-so there is no contrast with (53-b). As for (54-c), I cannot get a specificational reading of this sentence; it seems ungrammatical when read specificationally (though it's better when read predicationally). Thus, it's no surprise that (54-d) would be ungrammatical too, if 'the money that was stolen' is interpreted as a question. It seems to me that the problem with both (54-c) and (54-d) is that it is just not clear what question 'the money that was stolen' is supposed to express. When the intended question is clearer, both concealed question verbs and specificational sentences admit descriptions headed by 'money' just fine: (56) First we need a clear budget. You tell me the money we need to start up, and then I'll take care of finding investors. (57) The money we need to start up is two hundred thousand dollars. So again, I see no reason to think that descriptions headed by 'money' contrast with descriptions headed by 'candy' with respect to their behavior as specificational subjects and as concealed questions. But perhaps you disagree with my judgments, or perhaps Caponigro and Heller could come up with better examples. Even if that is so, there is a more significant problem with the argument: it is simply not probative for the issue at hand. The issue here is precisely whether differences in syntactic distribution should lead us to conclude that there is a semantic difference between specificational subjects and the arguments of concealed question verbs. Even if there are some specificational subjects that cannot serve as arguments of concealed question verbs, it is clear that many can. In order to claim that there is a semantic difference between the two positions, Caponigro and Heller need to show that when 98 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION a given phrase can appear in both positions, it is nevertheless interpreted differently. Caponigro and Heller (2007, §7.5.3) make a final argument for this claim, using 'what the capital of France is' as an example of an expression that can appear both as a specificational subject and as an argument of a concealed question verb. They claim that this phrase admits of different answers in the two contexts, which shows that it is interpreted differently. When it appears as an argument of 'to tell', 'Paris' is a felicitous answer, while 'beautiful' is not: (58) Tell me what the capital of France is. a. Paris. b. #Beautiful. But the opposite pattern occurs when it appears as a specificational subject: (59) What the capital of France is is . . . a. *Paris. b. beautiful. Since 'what the capital of France is' is interpreted differently in the two positions, Caponigro and Heller conclude that the subject position of a specificational sentence is not a concealed question environment, so treating a free relative in this position as expressing a question is at best stipulative. This still seems like quite weak evidence against the question-answer analysis. First of all, as we observed above23, 'what'-questions are ambiguous, so it is not surprising in general if string-identical 'what'-questions can be interpreted differently in different contexts. If we look at 'where'questions, which are much less ambiguous, we see that appropriate answers in the two kinds of case do not come apart: (60) a. Tell me where Paris is. Paris is {in France/in Europe/northeast of Le Mans. . . }. b. Where Paris is is {in France/in Europe/northeast of Le Mans. . . }. 23See the discussion of example (3) in Chapter 2. 99 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION This parallel needs to be explained, and suggests that analyzing specificational subjects as questions is not merely stipulative. Second of all, when the context disambiguates between the different senses of the 'what'-question, the contrast between (58) and (59) vanishes. In a context which makes clear that it is the qualities of the capital of France which are being asked for, 'beautiful' would be a perfectly felicitous answer to (58), and 'Paris' would be infelicitous. Likewise, in a context which makes clear that it is the name of the capital of France which is wanted, 'Paris' can be felicitous in the complement of (59), while 'beautiful' would not be.24 While I agree that 'what the capital of France is' is by default interpreted differently in the two constructions, the difference seems to lie in which question it is interpreted as expressing, not in whether it is interpreted as a question at all. So I do not think Caponigro and Heller have successfully challenged the claim that the subject of a specificational sentence functions semantically as a question, or that it is interpreted as one. 3.3.3 Symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role I now want to argue that the question-answer analysis can succeed where the inversion analysis and the equative analysis both fail. The questionanswer analysis can account for the fact that the subject and complement of a specificational sentence simultaneously exhibit symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role. Combined with its empirical strengths, this makes the question-answer analysis the best candidate for a unified and satisfactory analysis of specification, according to the criteria guiding my discussion here. At the level of complete sentences in discourse, there is a clear and intuitive sense in which questions and their answers exhibit both symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role. When someone asks a question, and someone else in the conversation answers it, the question and the answer are 'about the same thing' in the sense that they address the same topic. At the same time, it is obvious that questions and their answers play different roles in a conversation. They convey different 24I admit, though, that it would be unusual for a speaker to use a 'what' pseudo-cleft in such a context at all. More likely, she would simply use 'the capital of France' as the subject in (59). Still, using the free relative version of this sentence to specify the name of the capital of France does not strike me as impossible. 100 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION information to the audience, and are governed by different norms. So questions and answers provide a model of how two sentences can be about the same thing when they are used in a particular context, yet differ in their role, impact, and meaning. The question-answer analysis of specification extends this model to the subsentential level, in order to account for the relationship between the subject and complement in specificational sentences. Specificational subjects and complements exhibit symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role for the same reasons that sentential questions and answers do. To see that this is so, let's look more closely at how sentential questions and answers are interpreted. In what sense do they exhibit symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role? Consider first their symmetry of subject matter. Here is a brief question-answer dialogue: (61) a. Where did Marcus eat? b. Marcus ate at the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue. In what sense are (61-a) and (61-b) 'about the same thing'? To count as the answer to a certain question, a claim must be relevant to that question. (61-b) makes a claim that is obviously relevant to the question asked by (61-a). It is a felicitous answer to (61-a) because both the question and the claim are 'about' where Marcus ate. Compare this to the claim made by (62): (62) Bill picked up the dry-cleaning today. It is equally obvious that (62) is not relevant to the question expressed by (61-a), unless the context is rather peculiar. It is not about where Marcus ate, but something else. For that reason, asserting it in response to (61-a) generally would not answer the question; it would change the subject. So an answer is 'about the same thing' as a question, and shares a subject matter with it, in the sense that it is relevant to the question. On the other hand, the question expressed by (61-a) and the answer expressed by (61-b) differ in several respects, which reflect their different roles and purposes in the conversation. For one thing, the question and the answer have different conditions of correct use. Most importantly, they differ in the epistemic requirements they place on their speakers. The questioner does not need to know where Marcus ate in order to correctly ask his question, for he can ask this question in order to acquire 101 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION such knowledge. But to correctly answer the question, the speaker does need to know where Marcus ate, since she is aiming to inform the questioner, not to mislead him. This pragmatic difference points to a semantic one: assuming the speakers correctly use the sentences expressing the question and the answer, the answer supplies information that the question does not. The question does not tell the audience where Marcus ate, but the answer does. Thus, the question and the answer differ both with respect to what their speakers must know in order to use them, and in what their expressions convey to the audience. These same features also characterize questions and answers when they are expressed by subsentential expressions. One clear case involves interrogatives and 'that'-clauses embedded under verbs like 'to discover': (63) a. Audrey discovered where Marcus ate. b. Audrey discovered that Marcus ate at the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue. The relationship between the interrogative 'where Marcus ate' in (63-a) and the clause 'that Marcus ate at the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue' in (63-b) exactly parallels the relationship between the sentences in (61). The answer expressed by the 'that'-clause is relevant to, and shares a subject matter with, the question expressed by the embedded interrogative. But using the 'that'-clause in (63-b) as opposed to the interrogative requires the speaker to know more, and conveys more to the audience. One way to observe the relevance of the 'that'-clause in (63-b) to the embedded interrogative is to contrast it with an irrelevant one in sentences where the interrogative is explicitly topicalized: (64) a. As for where Marcus ate, Audrey discovered that Marcus ate at the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue. b. #As for where Marcus ate, Audrey discovered that Bill picked up the dry-cleaning today. The fact that (64-a) is felicitous, while (64-b) is not, indicates that the 'that'-clause in (63-b) is relevant to the question expressed by the embedded interrogative in (63-a). The asymmetry between the 'that'-clause and the embedded interrogative in (63) also clearly parallels the asymmetry in (61). Notice that a 102 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION speaker who asserts (63-a) does not himself need to know where Marcus ate, whereas a speaker who asserts (63-b) does. Likewise, the speaker of (63-a) does not inform his audience where Marcus ate, whereas the speaker of (63-b) does. I shall put the point like this: an embedded interrogative leaves open the question it expresses. I mean by this that using it in discourse raises the question, but it does not convey the answer, and does not require the speaker to know the answer. The interrogative in (63-a) leaves open where Marcus ate. The 'that'-clause in (63-b) does not leave open where Marcus ate; I shall say it closes off this question. Thus, the relationship of relevance, and the differences in the knowledge required by the speaker and conveyed to the audience, characterize the symmetry and asymmetry between questions and answers. This is so both when they are expressed by complete sentences and when they are expressed by subsentential expressions. These are the central features of how questions and answers are interpreted, and they are features which most semantic analyses of questions and answers attempt to capture. Semantic analyses of questions and answers generally represent these features as follows. A question presents a set of alternatives, or possible answers, while an answer to that question selects among these alternatives. The alternatives represent the subject matter shared by the question and its answers. A claim is relevant to a question, and counts as an answer to it, just in case it selects among the alternatives presented by the question; if it does not select among those alternatives, it is about something else. The asymmetry between questions and answers is represented as the difference between presenting alternatives and selecting among them. By selecting among the alternatives which a question presents, an answer closes off some alternatives that the question left open, so it conveys more information to the audience than the question itself does. Assuming that a speaker generally should not convey information which he doesn't know to be true, this implies that a speaker who expresses an answer to a question is epistemically constrained in a way that the speaker who expresses the question is not. A typical analysis of questions would thus describe the examples in (63) like this. The embedded interrogative in (63-a) presents a set of alternatives: the sentence is true if Audrey discovered that Marcus ate at the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue, or at the ballpark, or in his bedroom, or . . . . There are indefinitely many such alternatives, any of which would 103 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION be one in which Audrey discovered where Marcus ate; (63-a) is true just in case one of these alternatives obtains. By contrast, the 'that'-clause in (63-b) selects one of these alternatives, excluding any others which are incompatible with it. This sentence is true just in case Audrey discovered that Marcus ate at the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue, which implies she did not discover that he ate in his bedroom (unless 'the Ethiopian place on Grand Avenue' can be interpreted as a veiled reference to Marcus' quarters). How does this picture apply to specificational sentences? The crucial observation we need is this: the kinds of expressions which can be specificational subjects and complements systematically exhibit the same features as other subsentential expressions of questions and answers, such as embedded interrogatives and 'that'-clauses. Like embedded interrogatives, specificational subjects leave open a certain question; like 'that'clauses, their corresponding complements are relevant to that question, but do not leave it open. This observation holds of these expressions quite generally, both when they appear in specificational sentences and outside them. Thus, it makes sense to apply a semantic analysis of questions and answers to them. We can analyze specificational subjects as presenting a set of alternatives; and we can analyze specificational complements as selecting among such alternatives. Let's look first at free relatives, which appear as subjects in specificational pseudo-clefts. We observed in Section 3.3.2 that free relatives differ syntactically from interrogatives. But semantically, there is a clear parallel between them: a free relative leaves open the same question that the corresponding embedded interrogative does, and that would be asked by the corresponding sentential interrogative. Here are some examples of interrogatives, parallel to the example in (63-a): (65) a. Nora discovered what James read. b. Nora discovered what James is. c. Nora discovered how James traveled. And here are some examples in which the corresponding free relatives appear: (66) a. Nora read what James read. b. Nora is what James is. c. Nora traveled how James traveled. 104 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION Each of the free relatives in (66) leaves open the same question as the corresponding interrogative in (65). The free relative in (66-a), for example, is like the interrogative in (65-a) in that it leaves open the question expressed by "What did James read?" A speaker who uses this free relative in (66-a) raises this question to salience. But she does not need to know the answer to this question in order to make her assertion, and her assertion does not convey the answer to her audience. Similarly, the free relative in (66-b) leaves open "What is James?" and the free relative in (66-c) leaves open "How did James travel?". Free relatives are just like interrogatives with respect to the epistemic constraints they place on the speaker and the information they convey to the audience when used to make an assertion. To see this more clearly, it helps to compare the sentences in (66) with parallel examples where the questions left open by the free relatives are closed off: (67) a. James read Ulysses, and Nora read it, too. b. James is an elephant, and Nora is, too. c. James traveled on a barge, and Nora did too. Each of these sentences, like the sentences in (66), links something true of Nora to something true of James, but it closes off what its counterpart in (66) leaves open. For example, (67-a), like (66-a), tells the audience that James and Nora read the same thing. But it also tells us something more: it tells us what James read, namely, Ulysses. A speaker who asserts this sentence must be able to directly answer "What did James read?", while a speaker who asserts (66-a) need not. The sentences in (67-b) and (67-c) similarly contrast with (66-b) and (66-c). Each sentence in (67) closes off the question left open by the free relative in its counterpart in (66) because its first clause expresses a relevant answer to that question. We can confirm this by noticing that the sentences in (67) remain felicitous when the question they answer is explicitly topicalized: (68) a. As for what James read, James read Ulysses, and Nora read it, too. b. As for what James is, James is an elephant, and Nora is, too. c. As for how James traveled, James traveled on a barge, and Nora did too. 105 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION Thus, the same features characterize the relationship between the free relatives in (66) and the initial clauses in (67) as we found between embedded interrogatives and 'that'-clauses in examples like (63), and between interrogative and declarative sentences in examples like (61). They are related as questions and answers. In each case, the latter expressions are relevant to the questions that the former leave open, but correctly using them requires the speaker to know more, and conveys more to the audience. We can therefore capture the relationships in (66) and (67) with the same sort of analysis. Like interrogatives, the free relatives in (66) present a set of alternatives. (66-a) is true just in case James read Ulysses, or the evening Post, or a new translation of Homer's poetry, or . . . , and Nora read it, too. (66-b) is true just in case James is an elephant, or happy, or extremely infectious, or . . . , and Nora is that, too. And (66-c) is true just in case James traveled on a barge, or along the Rhine, or without luggage, or . . . , and Nora did so, too. The sentences in (67) differ from their counterparts in (66) by selecting among these alternatives. In each case, we can isolate the selection made by the closed-off sentence to a single expression. In (67-a), it is 'Ulysses' which tells us what James read. Likewise, in (67-b), 'an elephant' tells us what James is, and in (67-c), 'on a barge' tells us how he traveled. These expressions are the foci of answerhood in (67), the expressions which tell us something above and beyond what the sentences in (66) do. Suppose we now pair the free relatives from (66) with the answering expressions from (67) around a copula: (69) a. What James read was Ulysses. b. What James is is an elephant. c. How James traveled was on a barge. The resulting sentences, of course, are specificational pseudo-clefts, and they mirror the question-answer relationships between the sentences in (66) and (67). Their complements express relevant answers to the questions left open by their subjects, just as the initial clauses in (67) do for the questions left open by the free relatives in (66). And their complements close off what their subjects leave open, just as the sentences in (67) close off what those in (66) leave open. In light of this parallel, we may analyze these specificational pseudo-clefts as follows. The free relative in 106 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION the subject position presents a set of alternatives, just as it does in the corresponding sentence in (66). The expression in the complement position selects among these alternatives, just as it does in the corresponding sentence in (67). This is how the question-answer analysis explains the distinctive semantic features of specificational sentences. It assimilates the symmetry and asymmetry between the expressions within specificational sentences to the symmetry and asymmetry these expressions exhibit when used outside specificational sentences, in examples like (66) and (67). Since the subject and the complement deal with the same set of alternatives, they exhibit symmetry of subject matter. But because the subject presents these alternatives while the complement selects among them, they exhibit asymmetry of role. Once we recognize that the symmetry and asymmetry in specificational sentences is an instance of a broader phenomenon, this explanation seems simple, natural, and what a principle of compositionality would lead us to expect. The same considerations apply, with only minor adjustments, to specificational sentences which are not pseudo-clefts. Consider versions of the examples in (66), (67), and (69) that exchange free relatives for definite descriptions: (70) a. Nora read the book James read. b. Nora is the kind of animal James is. c. Nora traveled the way James traveled. (71) a. James read Ulysses, and Nora read it, too. b. James is an elephant, and Nora is, too. c. James traveled on a barge, and Nora did too. (72) a. The book James read was Ulysses. b. The kind of animal James is is an elephant. c. The way James traveled was on a barge. The relationships in these examples are just the same as those in (66)– (69).25 The definite description in each sentence in (70) leaves open a certain question. The initial clause in its counterpart in (71) is relevant to this question, and supplies an answer to it. Placing the definite description and the focus of the answer on either side of a copula yields 25I have repeated the examples from (67) in (71) for clarity, though they are unaltered. 107 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION a specificational sentence in (72). The symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role in that specificational sentence mirrors the questionanswer relationship of the sentences in (70) and (71). Perhaps it does not seem obvious that there are any questions involved here, now that the wh-words 'what' and 'how' are gone from view.26 But the important point is that each of the definite descriptions in (70) expresses a question in the sense that it is interpreted as presenting a set of alternatives. It thus leaves a certain question open, just like the free relatives in (66) do, and the sentences in (71) do not. Which questions do they leave open? As a first approximation, we can try the same questions that the free relatives leave open, the questions expressed by "What did James read?", "What is James?" and "How did James travel?" But this is not quite right, because the sentences in (70) do not leave these questions quite as open as the sentences in (66) do. The speaker who asserts (70-a), for example, must at least know that what James read was a book, and her assertion conveys this fact to her audience. So we have to be a little more refined: the questions left open by the descriptions in (70) are more like "Which book did James read?", "Which kind of animal is James?" and "Which way did James travel?" The question-answer analysis offers a natural way to understand this difference. The definite descriptions in (70) present a different set of alternatives than the free relatives in (66) do. (70-a) is true just in case James read Ulysses, or Ivanhoe, or Great Expectations, or . . . , and Nora read it, too. But it cannot be true in cases where James and Nora merely both read yesterday's newspaper or a short poem, while (66-a) can. Similarly, (70-b) is true just in case James is an elephant, or a tree frog, or a musk ox, or . . . , and Nora is that, too. But it cannot be true in cases where Nora and James are merely both happy or both extremely infectious, while (66-b) can. There does not seem to be any real barrier, then, to analyzing the symmetry and asymmetry in the specificational sentences in (72) as the question-answer analysis does: their definite-description subjects present a set of alternatives, and their complement phrases select among these alternatives. One may still feel some hesitation. In a sentence like (70-a), doesn't the definite description 'the book James read' refer to a certain book? It 26Remember, though, that definite descriptions are standardly analyzed as expressing questions in some contexts. See the discussion of examples (46)–(46) in Section 3.3.1. 108 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION seems to be doing just the same work that the title 'Ulysses' would do in the same position, namely, picking out an individual thing. It does not then express or leave open a question, and it should not be analyzed as presenting a set of alternatives, either in (70-a) or in (72-a). The only 'alternative' it could present is a single object, namely, the book James read. But this picture is too simple, as the history of debate about definite descriptions makes clear. Unlike the title 'Ulysses', the description merely 'denotes' the book (to use Russell's terminology). A speaker may correctly assert (70-a), and her audience may perfectly well understand what she has said, without either of them knowing which particular book it was that James and Nora read. That is not true of a sentence which refers to the book by its title, such as (71-a). Picking out a particular individual book thus cannot be an essential part of the description's contribution toward what is said and understood. I prefer Strawson's way of making the point in this case: the description does not refer, though the speaker of (70-a) may be using it to refer. What she says does not determine which particular book Nora read, but by describing it as the book James read, she may be giving her audience enough information to discern which book it was, based on their knowledge of James' reading history. In using the definite description, she is offering her audience a refined set of alternatives, leaving it to them to choose among them if they can. When they can, their choice can be made explicit by a specificational sentence like (72-a). Which book was it? The book James read was (not Ivanhoe, not Great Expectations, but) Ulysses. Such a sentence presents and selects from the same alternatives that the speaker of (70-a) offers to her audience, and that they implicitly select from in interpreting her assertion. I have now described how the question-answer analysis applies to specificational sentences whose subjects are free relatives or definite descriptions. To summarize: the subjects of these sentences leave open a certain question, and may be analyzed as presenting a set of alternatives. Their complements close off that question, by selecting among the alternatives the subjects present. This analysis is plausible because it treats the two expressions in a specificational sentence as having the same relationship which they exhibit outside it. The features of this relationship are the semantic features which characterize the relationship between expressions of questions and answers generally: their symmetry of subject matter, thought of in terms of relevance; and their asymmetry 109 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION of role, thought of in terms of the different information the expressions convey when used, and the different epistemic requirements a speaker must meet to use them correctly. These two cases-specificational sentences with free relatives or definite descriptions for subjects-have received the most attention in the literature. The inversion and equative analyses target these cases, and have plausible stories to tell about them. I argued above that these stories were not entirely satisfying, because they cannot simultaneously account for the symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role in specificational sentences. Thus, the fact that the question-answer analysis can account for both of these features within the scope of a single account is enough to recommend it over the others. 3.3.4 Extending the analysis Once we recognize specificational sentences as presenting and selecting among alternatives, though, the question-answer analysis also extends naturally to some other cases. I want to briefly examine these cases to further demonstrate the virtues of the question-answer analysis, and to show how it can accommodate the insights of the other two. To extend the question-answer analysis, we need one further observation about questions and answers. Questions can impose different sorts of constraints on how their answers must select among the alternatives they present. To make this vivid, imagine facing each of the following questions on a history exam: (73) a. Which Roman emperor invaded Britain? b. Which Roman emperors invaded Britain? (74) a. Who was one Roman emperor that invaded Britain? b. Who were some Roman emperors that invaded Britain? Correctly answering each of these questions requires naming Roman emperors who invaded Britain. In that respect, the questions are similar, and intuitively concern the same subject matter. Thus, we can analyze them as presenting the same alternatives-namely, that Claudius was a Roman emperor who invaded Britain; that Septimius Severus was a Roman emperor who invaded Britain; and so on. But some of these questions are more demanding than others. The questions differ with respect to 110 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION how many such emperors their answers must give, and whether answering correctly requires listing all of them. I shall say they make different requests. (73-a) and (73-b) both request answers which select all the alternatives which are true, while (74-a) and (74-b) can be correctly answered by providing an incomplete list of true alternatives. Within each of these pairs, the two questions also differ with respect to how many alternatives they request their answers to select. The first question requests a single alternative, while the second question gives no upper bound on how many selections are appropriate.27 These same distinctions can be applied to the questions left open by specificational subjects. Consider how the question-answer analysis would describe the following specificational sentences: (75) a. The Roman emperor who invaded Britain was Claudius. b. The Roman emperors who invaded Britain were Claudius and Septimius Severus. (76) a. One Roman emperor who invaded Britain was Claudius. b. Some Roman emperors who invaded Britain were Claudius and Septimius Severus. Like the specificational sentences we looked at above, their subjects leave open a question to which their complements provide an answer. But the questions left open by the definite descriptions in (75) differ from those left open by the indefinite descriptions in (76), in the same way that the questions in (73) differ from those in (74): they request an exhaustive set of alternatives. At the same time, the questions left open by the singular subjects in the (75-a) and (76-a) differ from the questions left open by the plural subjects in (75-b) and (76-b). They request a single alternative as opposed to several. The complements of these specificational sentences make selections which purport to satisfy these different requests. For that reason, speak27I should point out that this way of describing the questions in (73)–(74) is not compatible with every semantic analysis of questions. In particular, it is incompatible with analyses that treat the alternatives presented by any question as mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive, as in the partition semantics for questions developed by Groenendijk and Stokhof (1997). But analyses which allow more than one of the alternatives presented by a question to be true can represent these questions as presenting a common set of alternatives, and differing only in their requests. Such an analysis is developed by Belnap and Steel (1976), from whom the terminology of 'requests' derives. 111 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION ers who assert these sentences must know different things, and they convey different information to their audiences. A speaker who asserts (75-a) must know that Claudius was the only Roman emperor who invaded Britain, because that is what her assertion conveys to her audience. But a speaker who asserts (76-a) does not need to know this, and claims only that Claudius was a Roman emperor who invaded Britain, without excluding the possibility that others did the same. Similarly, a speaker who asserts (76-b) conveys that several Roman emperors invaded Britain, but without claiming to have provided an exhaustive list of them. Thus, by appealing to the concept of a question's request, the question-answer analysis can accommodate specificational sentences whose subjects are indefinite descriptions. By distinguishing a question's request from the alternatives it presents, we can also see what made the inversion and equative analyses tempting. The questions expressed by (73)–(74) and the subjects of (75)–(76) all present a set of alternatives with a common form, namely: x is a Roman emperor∧ x invaded Britain The presented alternatives are those claims which are instances of this logical form, the propositions which result from giving an appropriate value to x. In other words, we may think of these questions as presenting a set of alternatives by displaying what each alternative must claim to be true of some individual. This is an open proposition of type 〈e, t〉- that is, a predicate of exactly the sort that the inversion analysis would identify as expressed by the subjects in (75)–(76). Seen through the lens of the question-answer analysis, the kernel of truth in the inversion analysis is that it identifies the predicate which determines the alternatives presented and selected among in a specificational sentence. We can also see more clearly why an equative analysis of a sentence like (75-a) looks appealing, but ultimately comes up short. Recall that the equative analysis explains the symmetry of subject matter in specificational sentences that have definite description subjects by assigning the subject and complement in such sentences the same denotation. This is a plausible strategy when the question left open by the subject is one that requests a unique true alternative, like the question in (73-a). In that case, it is possible to take both the question and the answer as concerned with exactly one alternative, assign this alternative as their common denotation, and leave the difference between them to be explained in terms 112 SEMANTIC ANALYSES OF SPECIFICATION of some other concept, like that of information packaging, discriminability, or Frege's notion of Sinn. This strategy seems less plausible, though, once we recognize that some questions permit non-exhaustive selections, and selections of multiple alternatives.28 The equative analysis pays too little attention to cases like (76-b), where symmetry of subject matter is not easily construed as concern for just one particular alternative. So in addition to accounting for their symmetry of subject matter and asymmetry of role, the question-answer analysis affords us a wider perspective on specificational sentences. From this perspective, we can account for some specificational sentences which previous literature has often ignored, namely, specificational sentences whose subjects are indefinite and plural descriptions. We can also accommodate the insights of the other two analyses, seeing what is right about each. I conclude that the question-answer analysis is an excellent candidate for a general, unified account of specification. Going forward, I shall take it that the question-answer analysis as I have described it here is broadly correct. To achieve this wider perspective, we had to distinguish between the alternatives presented by a question and the request that it makes about how to select among those alternatives. The examples in (75)–(76) suggest that this distinction is closely related to the two parts of a description when it appears as a specificational subject: the determiner or quantifier is related to the request, and the noun phrase it modifies is related to the alternatives presented. The next chapter will examine this relationship in more depth, offering an account of how these two parts of a description function which is in line with the basic insight I have argued for here: a description is interpreted as expressing, or leaving open, a question. 28For example, to analyze specificational sentences which make multiple selections, such as (75-b), proponents of the equative analysis like Heycock and Kroch (1999) typically follow Link (1983), treating both the plural description 'the Roman emperors who invaded Britain' and the entire complement phrase as denoting a single plural entity, namely, the entity which is the sum of Claudius and Septimius Severus. This seems at best non-perspicuous, and at worst like it gives the wrong truth conditions: if (75-b) is true, then Britain was invaded by two Roman emperors, not one emperor-sum. 113 Part II Investigation 114 Chapter 4 Investigation I have argued that a specificational sentence pairs a question with its answer. Its subject is interpreted as presenting a set of alternatives, while its complement is interpreted as selecting among those alternatives. But this conclusion raises a puzzle, which I now want to address in more detail. We have seen that descriptions are one important class of specificational subjects.1 Here is one example: (1) Two of the British students are Audrey and Bert. The puzzle stems from the fact that descriptions like 'two of the British students' could in most contexts be analyzed using the resources of ordinary first-order logic. Outside of specificational sentences, this description occurs in nominal position: (2) a. John met two of the British students. b. Two of the British students won medals in the competition. The contribution of the description to the truth-conditions of such sentences can be given by a first-order schema like this: (3) ∃x∃y(Sx ∧ Sy ∧ x 6= y ∧ φ(x, y)) Here, Sx translates 'x is a British student', while φ(x, y) schematically stands for a translation of the rest of the sentence in which the description occurs. In the translation of (2-a), for example, φ(x, y) will encode 'John 1See the discussion in Section 2.2. 115 INVESTIGATION met x and John met y'. Thus, all we need to adequately represent the logical contribution of the description 'two of the British students' are a pair of existential quantifiers, the predicate S, a relation of identity, and the usual sentential connectives. The puzzle is, if such descriptions normally just express first-order quantification over individuals, why think they express questions in the subject of a specificational sentence? To make this sharp, consider that we might just analyze (1) as an instance of (3), as follows: (4) ∃x∃y(Sx ∧ Sy ∧ x 6= y ∧ x = a ∧ y = b) Where in this formula can we find the question presented by 'two of the British students'? It doesn't seem to be there anywhere: the formula just asserts the existence of two distinct British students who satisfy a certain open formula, namely, x = a ∧ y = b. But if that is an adequate representation of the truth conditions of (1), where do questions and answers enter the picture? On the basis of this example, it might seem that the question-answer analysis is an unnecessarily complicated strategy for representing the semantics of specification. Theoretical simplicity, someone might say, demands that we stick with the first-order analysis if we can. The puzzle is only puzzling because it assumes that the questionanswer analysis and the first-order analysis are incompatible alternatives. This assumption is natural given a certain understanding of firstorder logic, and in particular first-order quantification. Philosophers are used to thinking of first-order quantifiers as generalizing over a domain of objects, and we are not used to thinking of them as having anything to do with asking and answering questions. If we hold that descriptions express first-order quantification over a domain of individuals, there seems to be little room to say that they present questions, and vice versa. But that is not the only way of understanding first-order quantification, and rather than assuming it is correct, I want to solve the puzzle by arguing that first-order analyses and question-answer analyses of specificational sentences are compatible. To do so, I will articulate a conception of first-order quantification that aligns better with the question-answer analysis than the usual referential conception does. This 'investigatory' conception of quantification is interesting because it illuminates the special role that specificational sentences play in our language. It also has 116 INVESTIGATION interesting consequences for the claim that numbers are objects, which I will discuss in the next chapter. Roughly, the idea behind the investigatory conception is that the meaning of first-order quantifiers is importantly connected with practices of asking and answering questions-practices of inquiry, or as I shall call it, investigation. An investigation is an activity with a structure imposed by a question. It is undertaken, or performed, or carried out, for the sake of answering a certain question; finding the answer to that question is the end, or aim, of the activity. This may sound rather esoteric and abstract, but I mean to be talking about a process that is humdrum and familiar. A clear model of the kind of activity I am talking about is the act of solving an elementary algebra problem. Consider, for example, a simple polynomial equation of the form: x2 − 6x + 9 = 0 (4.1) In a beginning algebra course, an equation like (4.1) is typically used to give a problem or exercise. To solve this problem, a student might proceed by writing: (x− 3)(x− 3) = 0 (4.2) x− 3 = 0 (4.3) x = 3 (4.4) The process of moving from the first equation to the last is an investigation. The first equation gives a problem because it invokes an implicit question: which number makes the equation true? The last equation answers this question, by giving such a number as the value of x. This solves the problem and concludes the investigation. The intervening lines represent the steps the student takes with the aim of finding that answer. The relevance of this example becomes clear when we recognize that (4.4) functions as a specificational sentence in the derivation above. Unlike the other equations in that derivation, it gives, or specifies the value of x; it says which number makes equation (4.1) true. Indeed, we might translate what this equation says into English by means of a specificational sentence like (5) The number x such that x2 − 6x + 9 = 0 is three. 117 INVESTIGATION This suggests a hypothesis: we can understand specificational sentences in terms of the role they play in practices of investigation. A sentence counts as specificational because it plays this role, because it gives the value of a variable and thereby completes an investigation. I am not the first to suggest this hypothesis. When linguists give an intuitive characterization of the category of specificational sentences in natural language, they often spontaneously resort to a comparison with algebraic equations like (4.4). Mikkelsen (2011, pp. 1809–1810) says, for example, that in a specificational sentence, "the subject phrase introduces a variable. . . and the predicate complement provides the value for that variable". Similar ideas appear in Akmajian (1970), Higgins (1979), and Heycock and Kroch (1999). In these discussions, though, it is simply taken for granted that we know what it means to 'give the value of a variable'. But this is far from clear: why does (4.4) count as giving the value of x, for example, while (4.2) does not? I aim to fill that gap here, by describing 'giving the value of a variable' as a role in practices of investigation, and stating criteria for a statement to play that role. Here, then, is the plan. I will begin by describing the structure of investigations in more detail, and asking what it means to 'give the value of a variable', using elementary algebra problems as a model. I will then show how to give a semantics for first-order languages which is stated in terms of this practice. This semantics will vindicate the idea that specificational sentences occupy a special role in practices of asking and answering questions, and will solve the puzzle I laid out above: since firstorder languages can be understood in terms of investigations, and investigations are structured by questions, the first-order and question-answer analyses of a specificational sentence are compatible. I will conclude by returning to specification in natural language, showing that by thinking of specificational sentences in terms of their role in practices of investigation, we can better understand some of their features. 4.1 THE STRUCTURE OF INVESTIGATIONS 4.1.1 Two perspectives on investigations An investigation is an activity with a certain teleological and epistemological structure. This structure is imposed by a question. At the start of an investigation, the question is understood, but its answer is not known. 118 INVESTIGATION By the end, the answer has become known. To move from the one state to the other, one or more investigators must usually take a series of steps. These steps make progress toward the discovery of the answer. The specific nature of these steps depends on the subject matter of the question: when the question is an algebra problem, the intervening steps will involve manipulating equations; when the question is about the physical world, they might involve running an experiment; when the question is what I ate for breakfast, they will involve consulting my memory or the dishes in my sink. But in all cases, the basic structure of the activity is the same: once the question is understood, the investigators use suitable means to try to find an answer. They conclude when they have succeeded in this aim. One way to look at an investigation, then, is as an attempt to answer a question; but the example of solving algebra problems shows that there is sometimes another perspective we can adopt. As the student solves the problem above, she is attempting to find a certain number. The equation on line (4.4) solves the problem because it gives the number which satisfies equation (4.1), namely, the number 3. The process of solving an algebra problem is thus not just an attempt to answer a certain question; it is a process of finding the value of a variable which ranges over a certain class of numbers. Understanding the relationship between these two perspectives is important, because they are intimately linked. It is helpful in this connection to draw a distinction between two types of questions which may structure an investigation. As noted in Chapter 3, literature on the logic of questions characterizes questions as presenting a class of alternatives, or possible answers; the distinction concerns how they do so. Belnap and Steel (1976) call the two types of questions whether-questions and which-questions, and characterize them as follows. A whether-question presents an explicit, finite list of alternatives. Here are some examples: (6) Is Alec in Germany? a. (Yes,) Alec is in Germany. b. (No,) Alec is not in Germany. (7) Is Alec in Germany, or France? a. Alec is in Germany. b. Alec is in France. 119 INVESTIGATION I mention this class only to distinguish it from which-questions and put it aside. Although a whether-question can still structure an investigation, it is not usually helpful to view such an investigation from the second perspective, as an attempt to find and give the value of a variable. Unlike a whether-question, a which-question presents an indefinitely large, perhaps infinite, class of alternatives. In general, the particular alternatives cannot be explicitly listed. Instead, a which-question presents its alternatives by giving their common form, which Belnap and Steel (1976) call the matrix of the question. The matrix is a statement containing an 'unknown'. In natural language, such an unknown is expressed by a 'wh'-word; in formal analyses, we represent it with an algebraic variable. Because it contains a variable, the matrix gives the form of an unknown truth. What's unknown is which value, or values, of the variable will make the matrix true. A which-question thus asks, which statements of this form are true? An elementary algebra problem is a prototypical which-question. Its matrix is the polynomial equation used to state the problem. The alternatives presented by the question are the statements that result from assigning a value to the variable in the matrix. For example, the alternatives presented by (4.1) are: that 02 − 6 * 0 + 9 = 0 that 12 − 6 * 1 + 9 = 0 that 22 − 6 * 2 + 9 = 0 and so on. Similarly, most questions expressed by 'wh'-words (except 'whether') in natural language are which-questions, and their alternatives can be represented using a matrix containing an algebraic variable. Here are some examples of such questions, together with some examples of the alternatives they present and a matrix giving their common form: (8) Who is in Germany? a. x is in Germany. b. {Alec is in Germany, Fiedler is in Germany, Liz is in Germany, . . . } (9) Where is Alec? a. Alec is in x. 120 INVESTIGATION b. {Alec is in Germany, Alec is in France, Alec is in Spain, . . . } Because a which-question presents its alternatives by giving their general form, rather than listing particular alternatives explicitly, an investigation structured by a which-question can be viewed from the second perspective: it is an attempt to find and give the value (or values) of a variable. One can give the answer to such a question by giving the values of a variable. To answer a question is to claim that some of the alternatives it presents are true. Giving values for the variable in a whichquestion suffices to determine such a claim, because the question itself gives its general form; to answer the question, all that's needed is to indicate which particular instances of this general form are true. Thus, saying "George" in response to (8) suffices to claim that George is in Germany, that the person in Germany is George. Similarly, writing down the equation x = 3 in the context of the derivation (4.1)–(4.4) suffices to claim that 32 − 6 * 3 + 9 = 0, that the number x such that x2 − 6 * x + 9 = 0 is 3. Thus, we may look at an investigation structured by a which-question from two perspectives, or levels: it is both an attempt to find the answer to a certain question, and an attempt to find the value of a variable. Giving the value of a variable is a means of answering the question. This duality of perspectives will be important later on, because it is at the center of the solution to the puzzle I described above: it is because we can see an investigation both as a search for the value of a variable and as an attempt to answer a which-question that the first-order and questionanswer analyses are compatible, and even mutually supporting. But before we get there, it is necessary to reflect in more detail on what it means to 'give', or specify, the value of a variable, since that is the crucial step in answering a which-question and completing the investigation which it structures. This will further explicate the hypothesis that a specificational sentence gives the value of a variable and therefore plays a distinctive role in a practice of investigation. 4.1.2 Giving the value of a variable Let's turn our attention, then, to the language and practice of elementary algebra, since that is where our standards for what counts as giving the value of a variable are sharpest. Consider again the derivation in (4.1)– 121 INVESTIGATION (4.4). x2 − 6x + 9 = 0 (4.1) (x− 3)(x− 3) = 0 (4.2) x− 3 = 0 (4.3) x = 3 (4.4) Notice that (4.4) is the only line in this derivation that counts as giving the value of x, and answering the problem posed by (4.1). A student who stops at line (4.2) or line (4.3) at best provides a partial answer, and a student who merely copies down (4.1) does not give any answer at all. On the other hand, once a student derives the equation on line (4.4), no more work can be done: this equation fully answers the question, and any further manipulations would carry the student further away from a complete answer to the question. The status of this equation with respect to the problem posed by (4.1) is therefore somewhat special, because it alone gives the value of x. The other equations in the derivation are like the one used to state the problem, in that they do not give the value of x, though they do describe or constrain it. What confers this special status on (4.4)? Why does it count as giving the value of a variable and concluding the investigation, while the other equations in the derivation do not? This is the question we have to answer if we want to understand specificational sentences by analogy with such equations. As a preliminary step toward answering this question, we should notice that in the derivation in (4.1)–(4.4), each line is materially equivalent to the others. Each is true if, and only if, the value of x is three. Thus, to understand why only the final equation counts as giving the value of x, we need to look beyond its material truth conditions. What else, then, could explain its unique meaning and role? There are four different features of the equation in this final line which are crucial for it to count as giving the value of x and as answering the question structuring an investigation. These are: that the variable is in the same scope as the variable introduced by the problem statement; that the value given is in the range of the variable; that the equation represents a complete solution; and that the equation is in a canonical form. These are not features of the expressions in the equation themselves; they are features of how those expressions are used and understood in this particu122 INVESTIGATION lar context. Each of them is individually necessary for this equation to be understood as giving the value of x. Together, they provide a reasonably complete account of why this equation gives a solution to the problem, but the earlier equations do not. Let me describe each in turn. It is easiest to see what I mean by 'scope' if we ask: why does the equation x = 3, as it is used on line (4.4), give the solution to the problem given on line (4.1), as opposed to some other problem? The obvious answer is that the equations on these two lines of the derivation employ the same variable. But what is it for the variable to be 'the same' in these two lines? This is obviously not a purely typographical matter. The symbol 'x' can be used to express a variable in many different problems. I might introduce a new problem to you with an equation like x2 − 4x + 4 = 0 (4.5) without causing any confusion. Students of elementary algebra have to learn that the symbol 'x' is being used differently here than in (4.1), and that its use in (4.4) is connected with its use in (4.1) but not in (4.5). This is what I mean by scope: a variable's scope includes just those statements in which the expression for the variable is used in the same way.2 In the language of elementary algebra, the scope of a variable always extends exactly as far as the statements belonging to a single investigation, and no further. This is because an algebraic variable originates in the matrix of a which-question. To understand a statement containing a variable requires recognizing it as part of an attempt to answer that question by finding the variable's value. A variable's scope thus opens with a statement of a problem, using one or more equations; it closes with a statement of its solution, which gives the value (or values) of that variable; and it includes whatever statements occur between the problem statement and the solution statement that are part of the problemsolver's effort to move from the former to the latter. 2I avoid saying that a variable's scope includes just those statements in which it has the same value or denotation. This is true in a sense, but potentially misleading. One can understand that two occurrences of 'x' are within the same scope without knowing their value or denotation. This is just the position that a student is in, for example, when she has derived an equation on the way to a solution, but without having arrived at the solution itself yet. It would be misleading to describe this student as knowing that the occurrences of 'x' in her partial derivation have the same value, or stand for the same thing, because this invites the inference that she knows what value they stand for-which is something she won't know until she solves the problem. 123 INVESTIGATION Furthermore, there is no sense in asking for the value of a variable apart from some scope or other. A variable only has a value relative to the question which introduces it. To say that an equation gives the value of a variable is therefore to connect that equation with an attempt to answer a particular problem or question. It is to place the use of that equation in the context of some investigation or other. For an equation to count as giving the value of a variable, the variable in that equation must occur in the same scope as in the problem to which the equation gives the solution. Of course, the problem which introduces a variable must actually have a solution if its value is to be given. This depends on the second feature of how the variable is understood in the context of the problem: its range. Take, for example, the problem given by the following equation: x2 + 5x + 6 = 0 (4.6) If x is taken to range over the natural numbers in this problem, then it has no solution, as you can see once it has been factored: (x + 2)(x + 3) = 0 (4.7) The roots of (4.6) are−2 and−3. They are both negative integers, so they are not among the natural numbers. So whether or not this problem has solutions depends on whether x ranges over just the natural numbers, or over some more inclusive set, like the integers. Thus, it is only possible to give a value for x in this case when x is understood as ranging over some set that includes at least−2 or−3. For an equation to count as giving the value of a variable, that variable must be understood as having a certain range, and the value given must be within that range. This example raises another important point. Because it gives the value of x, the equation (4.4) is a complete solution to the problem in (4.1). In that problem, the equation only has one root, and so giving that root necessarily means completely solving the problem: after that value has been given, no more work remains to be done. But many polynomial equations, unlike (4.1), have more than one root (at least on some ways of understanding the range of the variable). For this reason, it is in general too simple to ask under what conditions a statement gives the value of a variable. When x is understood to range over the integers in (4.6), an equation like x = −2 124 INVESTIGATION could be said to give 'a' value of x, but not 'the' value of x, since no value in that range uniquely satisfies the equation. For an algebraic statement to count as a solution statement, it must give at least one value for the problem's variable. But in general, there is a further question as to how many such values must be given before a complete solution which marks the end of an investigation has been obtained. For equations with multiple distinct roots, we need to distinguish among several possible understandings of the problem in order to answer this question. Because it has multiple roots, an equation like (4.6) actually underdetermines which question is being asked. If the question is "What are all the numbers x such that x2 + 5x + 6 = 0?", then a complete solution must give both roots. A student solving this problem would have to write something like x = −2 or x = −3 (4.8) to completely answer this question and achieve the end of her investigation. On the other hand, if the question is "What is one number x such that x2 + 5x + 6 = 0?" then x = −3 (4.9) gives a complete solution to the problem. Even though it does not exhaustively list the roots of the equation, the problem-solver can stop at this point, since this equation provides everything the question asks for. Belnap and Steel's terminology (which I introduced in Section 3.3.4) is helpful for understanding what is going on here. As I noted above, an equation like (4.6) is the matrix of a which-question: it gives the general form of the alternatives presented by that question. But there is more to a question than just the alternatives it presents. Two questions may present the same set of alternatives, but make different requests. A question's request determines how many alternatives an answer should select, and whether a correct answer should provide an exhaustive list of them. In general, an answer is not complete unless it fulfills this request. The different understandings of the problem in (4.6) correspond to two different requests. We can express these requests in natural language using two different quantifiers, as the difference between "What is one number x. . . ?" and "What are all the numbers x. . . ?" In the first case, we are interpreting the problem as requesting just one true alternative, and hence just one value of x, so (4.9) counts as a complete solution statement. 125 INVESTIGATION In the second case, we are interpreting the problem as requesting an exhaustive set of true alternatives, and hence an exhaustive set of roots. Since there is more than one true alternative, a statement like (4.8) is required to complete the investigation structured by this problem. This shows that we should distinguish between giving a value of a variable and giving the solution to a problem. When the problem requests more than one true alternative, it is necessary to give more than one value for the variable to give its solution and complete the investigation. The same distinction is needed when we look at the more general class of algebra problems given by systems of equations in multiple variables, such as the problem given by (4.10) and (4.11): x2 + y2 = 25 (4.10) x− y = 1 (4.11) Here is one solution to this problem: x = 4, y = 3 (4.12) This solution statement contains two equations as parts, each of which gives a different value for a different variable. Giving a value for a variable is necessary, but not sufficient, for completing an investigation. An investigation is only complete when we have given as many values as requested for each of the variables introduced by the problem. The final criterion concerns which kinds of expressions are suitable for giving the value of a variable. I call these criteria of 'canonical form'. When an equation is suitable for giving the value of a variable, it must also be in canonical form. To see the importance of canonical form, consider again the final two lines from the derivation in (4.1)–(4.4): x− 3 = 0 x = 3 As we noted earlier, these equations are materially equivalent. What then is the difference between them? Why is it that only the second of these equations counts as giving the value of x, and thereby giving the solution to the problem in (4.1)? The point I want to emphasize here is that some standard or other is always required in a problem-solving practice to distinguish among 126 INVESTIGATION equations like these. Part of understanding a problem is grasping the criteria that distinguish those statements which can be used to give values for the problem's variables from those which, though otherwise equivalent, cannot. In the absence of such criteria, we have no grounds for distinguishing equations that are used to give problems from those that are used to give solutions, and so no possibility of a problem-solving activity at all. Thus, for an equation to count as giving a value of a variable, some such criteria must be in place, and the equation must fulfill them. What are those criteria? Looking at the two equations above, a natural first thought is that the second equation is syntactically and arithmetically simpler than the first. This can't be the whole story about canonical form, though, because there are certain pairs of equations in which one equation is no simpler than the other, but only one counts as giving the value of x. Here are two examples: 2x = 1 −x = 2 x = 1 2 x = −2 At least in the classrooms where I was taught, only the second equation in each pair would have counted as a complete solution to a problem, even though it is no syntactically or arithmetically simpler than the first. Usually, we can say that for an equation to be in canonical form, the variable should be arithmetically isolated, and purely numerical expressions should be fully computed. But even these generalizations are not exceptionless, and apart from them, whether an expression counts as being in canonical form is a fairly local matter. Consider, for example, the problem given by 18x = 8 Here are two possible ways of writing a solution to this problem: x = 4 9 x = 0.4 Neither of these equations is 'more canonical' than the other in any global sense. A teacher who assigns this problem as an exercise might accept one equation as a solution but not the other depending on his pedagogical purposes. For example, he might accept the second as a complete solution, but the first as only a partial solution, in a lesson emphasizing 127 INVESTIGATION decimal expansions of rational numbers. In a lesson emphasizing exact expressions of ratios, or where calculators are not permitted, the standard might be the other way around. Criteria of canonical form, then, are inherently local and purposerelative, even if there are some general rules that apply in most problemsolving settings. So what, if anything, unifies the various standards we might have? Is there any general account of what it is for an expression to be in canonical form? Here is my answer: a standard of canonical form determines a distinguished class of expressions such that, when one of these expressions is used to give the value of a variable, no further question can be appropriate about which value is meant. This becomes clearer if we imagine an algebraic investigation formulated as an explicit question and a series of attempted answers: (10) What is the number x such that 4x2 − 4x + 1 = 0? If you were to ask someone this question, it would obviously be unsatisfying to be told, in reply, that (11) It is the number x such that 4x2 − 4x + 1 = 0. even though this answer is in a sense perfectly true. This 'answer' merely repeats the problem; it is unsatisfying because it invites the rejoinder, "But which number is that? That's what I wanted to know." It would only be slightly more satisfying if the reply was (12) It is the number x such that (2x− 1)2 = 0. Here again, it can be appropriate to ask "But which number is that?", and insofar as it is, the respondent has not fully answered the original question. But this question is no longer appropriate if the respondent says: (13) It is the number x such that x = 12 . A further 'Which number is that?' question in this case would indicate a misunderstanding on the part of the questioner. Our practices of giving numbers simply do not allow any further request here; the expression 'x = 12 ' makes it as clear which number is meant as anyone has any right 128 INVESTIGATION to demand. This equation, unlike those in the other answers, is in canonical form. Its being in canonical form just consists in the fact that no such demand is appropriate. The criteria for when such a demand is or is not appropriate may vary from one problem-solving context to the next. But the important point is that we do in fact have such criteria, and some criteria or other are always in play during an algebraic investigation, because it is by applying such criteria that we recognize that the problem has been solved, and the investigation is concluded.3 One further distinction concerning canonical form will be helpful later on. I have spoken of canonical form in terms of standards that apply to statements, or sentences. Very often, though, these sentence-level standards will be articulated into standards or rules concerning their subsentential parts. For example, in most classrooms, x = 2 4 is not in canonical form, while x = 1 2 is. But the only difference between these equations concerns the expression on the right-hand side, and it is most natural to say that the former is not in canonical form because the fraction is not fully reduced. The former equation fails to meet the standards of canonical form because it fails to present a canonical expression for the value of x. I will reserve 'canonical form' for standards governing complete sentences, and 'canonical 3Dummett (1981, pp. 67–69) puts a similar thought to a slightly different purpose. As part of a series of criteria designed to distinguish genuine from spurious singular terms, he proposes that we can use such repeated 'But which do you mean?' questions to distinguish expressions of first-level generality from those of higher-level generality. The details of his proposal are not important here; the important point is just that Dummett also recognizes that such "requests for specification" are sometimes grammatically well-formed, but inappropriate because they express a misunderstanding. In such cases we must therefore implicitly grasp the criteria I am here calling criteria of canonical form: criteria by which we recognize that a request for specification has been completely fulfilled, and can't be improved upon. Our grasp of such criteria also underlies the 'directness' test I proposed in Chapter 2 for distinguishing specificational from non-specificational readings of copular sentences. 129 INVESTIGATION expression' for standards governing subsentential expressions, particularly those that stand for values in the range of a variable. Our standards about which expressions for values are canonical are included in of our standards of canonical form. But the two are in general distinct, since we might have standards of canonical form that go beyond the rules about which expressions a sentence may contain. For example, standards of canonical form might include rules about the order in which expressions should appear (such as 'Write the variable on the left'). Here is a summary of the above observations. Algebraic practice is a practice of investigation, of posing questions or problems and seeking their solutions. When we say that an equation like x = 3 'gives the value of a variable', we are assigning it a certain role within that practice. To say that an equation gives a value for a variable is to say that it is part of a solution statement, which concludes an investigation by fulfilling its aim. It determines the answer to the question structuring the investigation, and so gives what was sought. This distinguishes it from equations which state problems, or mark intermediate steps between a problem and a solution, which do not give a value for the variable and cannot be part of a solution statement. In order for an equation to play that role, it must be understood in a certain way. Its variable must be in the same scope as the variable introduced by the problem statement, and it must give a value within the range that the variable is understood to have. To count as giving a value, rather than just describing it, the equation must satisfy some criteria for being in canonical form, using an expression for the value which is not subject to a 'But which do you mean?' question by the standards of the problem-solving practice. When a polynomial used to give a problem has more than one root, or contains more than one variable, more than one such equation might be necessary to solve the problem and complete the investigation. How many such equations are necessary is a matter of how the question structuring the investigation is understood: how many variables its matrix contains, how many true alternatives it requests, and whether or not it requests an exhaustive list of true alternatives. 130 INVESTIGATION 4.2 INVESTIGATORY SEMANTICS 4.2.1 From investigations to truth conditions In the previous section, I described investigations as practices or activities which aim at answering a question. In the case of which-questions, they can be viewed as attempts to find and give the value of one or more variables. I then described four criteria for a statement to count as giving the value of a variable, and thus playing the role of concluding an investigation. I have not yet said anything about how investigations relate to truth, though. In order to solve the puzzle with which I began, we need to connect first-order analyses of the truth conditions of specificational sentences with practices of asking and answering questions-that is, investigations. We can state the truth-conditional contributions of definite, indefinite, and numerically-quantified descriptions schematically using firstorder quantifiers. When those descriptions appear as subjects of specificational sentences, we can analyze those sentences as instances of those schemas. On this strategy of analysis, a specificational subject will always introduce one or more existential quantifiers as the outermost connectives, and its complement will always translate into a conjunction of identity statements, in which an existentially-bound variables appears on one side, and a constant appears on the other. Thus, in the simplest case, a specificational sentence with an indefinite subject like (14) A good book to read is Waverley. has a first-order analysis like ∃x(B(x) ∧ x = w) where B is a predicate true of good books, and w is an individual constant denoting Waverley. Definite descriptions can be accommodated via Russell's theory of descriptions, simply by adding a uniqueness condition: (15) The author is Scott. may be analyzed as ∃x(A(x) ∧ ∀y(A(y)→ y = x) ∧ x = s) 131 INVESTIGATION If, like many theorists, we are willing to analyze free relatives as definite descriptions, such that for example 'where . . . ' is synonymous with 'the place . . . ' and 'when . . . ' is synonymous with 'the time . . . ', we can extend this analysis to specificational pseudo-clefts. Finally, numericallyquantified descriptions can be analyzed by introducing further existential quantifiers and adding distinctness conditions: (16) Two of the characters are Edward Waverley and Baron Bradwardine. may be analyzed as ∃x∃y(C(x) ∧ C(y) ∧ x 6= y ∧ x = e ∧ y = b) Thus, this strategy of analysis can apparently accommodate the vast majority of specificational subjects surveyed in Chapter 2. There are many refinements we might want to make on this basic semantic program. For example, we might want to distinguish the asserted content in a specificational sentence from what it presupposes or implicates, or require that the first-order representations be derived compositionally from the syntax and basic lexicon of their natural language counterparts. Even with such refinements, though, the basic strategy will remain the same: the goal is to analyze the meaning of specificational sentences by representing their content in a formal language equipped with the resources of (at least) first-order logic. My question is whether this kind of analysis is compatible with the question-answer analysis which I argued for in Chapter 3. So I will leave the refinements aside, and assume, for the moment, that the strategy of analysis just outlined is basically correct, and provides an accurate representation of the truth conditions of specificational sentences like (14), (15), and (16). The trouble is that the usual semantics for first-order languages makes it difficult to see what connection there could be between such analyses and practices of investigation. According to the usual semantics, an existentially quantified statement is true just in case some object satisfies the formula to which the quantifier attaches. The truth conditions of firstorder existential statements are usually described using a clause like this one: ∃xφ(x) is true in a model M under assignment g iff there is an 132 INVESTIGATION object a in the domain of M such that φ(x) is true in M under gx→a, where gx→a is just like g except that it maps x to a. There is, apparently, no reference to asking and answering questions, or 'finding' or 'giving' the value of a variable, in this explanation. This is what gives rise to the puzzle. We saw in the last section how to connect answering questions with finding and giving the value of a variable; but we have not yet connected giving the value of a variable with first-order quantification. My response, therefore, is to describe an alternative semantics for first-order languages which explicitly draws that connection. Fortunately, such a semantics is ready to hand, in the form of the game-theoretical semantics for first-order logic developed by Jaakko Hintikka, in work that begins with Hintikka (1973).4 This semantics is formally equivalent to the usual semantics, so it raises no new questions about the adequacy of firstorder analyses: a first-order sentence used to present the truth conditions of an English specificational sentence will be true in all the same models under both the usual and the game-theoretical semantics. But under the game-theoretical semantics, quantification is described in terms of practices of investigation, of finding and giving individual objects as the values of variables. I will therefore present the game-theoretical semantics, and show how, under this semantics, the apparent tension between the question-answer and first-order analyses of specificational sentences disappears. 4.2.2 Game-theoretical semantics I will first present the game semantics in its original setting, as a definition of truth for a first-order language. In the next section, I will turn to showing that the question-answer analysis of specification is compatible with a first-order analysis, when we think of the first-order quantifiers as they are interpreted by the game semantics. The game semantics defines truth for sentences in a first-order language L in terms of a certain game played using sentences of the language. Here is how the game is played. We need two players, an initial sentence S of L, and an interpretation or model M of the non-logical constants in L. The two players are called the Verifier and the Falsifier. They 4For a recent overview, see Hintikka and Sandu (2011). 133 INVESTIGATION have opposing goals: the Verifier is trying to produce a sentence which is verified by M, and the Falsifier is trying to produce a sentence which is falsified by M. For simplicity, we shall assume that L contains only the propositional connectives ¬, ∧, and ∨, and the quantifiers ∃ and ∀. (Thus, every connective in L except negation has a dual.) The play proceeds in rounds. Each round destructures the initial sentence S into a new sentence. The game stops, and one of the two players wins, when a closed atomic sentence is reached. Before that point, the move made in each round is determined by the main connective of S, in accordance with the following rules (Hintikka, 1974, p. 156): G.∃. If S is of the form ∃xS′, the move is made by the Verifier. She goes to the domain of individuals in M, chooses an individual, and gives it a name 'a'. The name is substituted for 'x' in S′. The resulting sentence is called 'S′(a/x)'. The game continues in the next round with respect to S′(a/x). G.∀. If S is of the form ∀xS′, the same thing happens as in G.∃, except that the individual is chosen and named by the Falsifier. G.∨. If S is of the form (S′ ∨ S′′), the Verifier chooses one of the disjuncts S′ or S′′, and the game continues with respect to that disjunct. G.∧. Similarly, if S is of the form (S′ ∧ S′′), the Falsifier chooses one of the conjuncts, and the game continues with respect to that conjunct. G.¬. If S is of the form ¬S′, the two players switch roles, and the game continues with respect to S′. These rules define the game G(S, M). Here are the conditions for winning G(S, M). After the last move, which produces a closed atomic sentence S′, we consult the model M. If S′ is true in M, then the player who was initially the Verifier wins; otherwise, the initial Falsifier wins. Thus, we are assuming a definition of truth-in-a-model for atomic sentences, in order to state the winning conditions for the game. The usual denotational semantics will do: 'F(a)' is true in M iff the object denoted by 'a' in M is in the extension of 'F' in M; 'R(a, b)' is true in M iff the pair of objects denoted by 'a' and 'b' is in the extension of 'R' in M; and so on. We use the game to obtain a definition of truth-in-a-model for all sentences of the language L: 134 INVESTIGATION Game-theoretical truth. A sentence S of L is true in a model M if and only if the Verifier has a winning strategy in the game played with respect to S and M. That is, S is true in M if and only if, at every round, the Verifier can choose her moves such that the game will end with some atomic sentence or other which is true in M, no matter what the Falsifier does on other rounds. This definition has a number of important features that we might expect for a definition of first-order truth. The semantics is classical: the Verifier has a winning strategy in exactly one of G(S, M) and G(¬S, M), so exactly one of S and ¬S is true in M.5 More importantly, the game semantics is in a certain sense conservative. It can be proven that gametheoretical truth agrees with the standard Tarski-style definition of truth for a first-order language. That is, any sentence in a first-order language is true in a model M according to one semantics if and only if it is true in M according to the other.6 Thus, choosing between a game semantics and the standard definition of truth-in-a-model is not a matter of giving sentences of L different truth conditions, but only a matter of choosing how to describe those truth conditions. The differences between the two styles of semantics concern the auxiliary concepts they make use of. When we choose between the two styles of semantics, we are choosing between two different sets of auxiliary concepts, based on how well they align with our particular theoretical purposes. For example, the Tarski-style recursive definition makes use of the concept of satisfaction of a formula by a sequence of objects. The concept of satisfaction is used to give the recursive clauses for the truth of quantified sentences, since their immediate subformulas are open formulas, rather than sentences with a truth value. The game semantics does not need the concept of satisfaction, because the game is structured so that every round is played with respect to a closed sentence. On the other hand, the most important auxiliary concept in the game semantics is the concept of a strategy, which does not appear in the Tarski-style semantics. 5This is because the game is a finite, zero-sum game of perfect information, so the Gale-Stewart theorem implies that it is determined; whenever the Verifier has a winning strategy, the Falsifier lacks one, and vice versa. See Hodges (2013). 6For a proof sketch, see Hintikka and Kulas (1985, pp. 6–7). 135 INVESTIGATION The appeal to strategies is important partly because it is necessary for the formal adequacy of the game-theoretical definition of truth. Imagine we had defined truth without the notion of strategy, just in terms of whether the Verifier does in fact win the game played with a sentence S on a model M. To see that this would be an inadequate definition, it suffices to notice that in any particular play of the game, the Verifier might win not because she succeeds in verifying the sentence, but just because the Falsifier fails to make optimal moves. For example, consider the sentence ∀x∃yP(y, x) and a model MN which interprets P as the predecessor relation on the domain of natural numbers. The Falsifier moves first in the game; suppose she chooses 3 for x. Then in the second round, starting from ∃yP(y, 3), the Verifier can choose 2 for y, producing P(2, 3). This results in a win for the Verifier, because 2 does precede 3 in MN. But that does not show that the sentence is true in this model; it only shows that the Falsifier played badly. If the Falsifier had instead chosen 0 for x, the Verifier would not have been able to win, since there then is nothing she can choose for y to produce a true atomic sentence: no natural number precedes 0. This shows that the Verifier does not have a winning strategy in the game with respect to this sentence and MN, despite being able to win in some (indeed, almost all) possible plays of that game. The game-theoretical definition of truth requires that the Verifier can always choose an appropriate number for y, no matter what the Falsifier chooses for x. Since she cannot, the sentence is not true in MN, as expected. 4.2.3 Quantifier moves as investigations The concept of strategy is also important for another reason: it draws our attention to the fact that the game may be thought of as an activity governed by practical rationality. Playing the game is a matter of making choices at each round, within the confines of the rules. Formally, we may think of those choices as given by an arbitrary mapping from one game state to another (legal) game state. But informally, it is appropriate to call such a mapping a strategy just because some mappings are better than others with respect to a player's goal of winning the game. Thus, the concept of strategy highlights the teleological structure of playing the 136 INVESTIGATION game. It licenses a perspective from which we think of the players as choosing some actions for the sake of others, and ultimately for the sake of winning the game. In the case of the quantifier rules, the actions connected with making a move in the game have the structure of an investigation. Consider again the rules G.∃ and G.∀. A player must do several things in order to make a move in the game in accordance with one of these rules: she must search for an object, choose a suitable one, and give it a name. How should she do this? Obviously, she should not merely select an object at random. Since she is aiming to win, she must think about which object she should choose. This is a strategic problem: she must ask herself which object will best enable her to win, considering what her opponent will do on subsequent rounds. Because of how the conditions for winning are defined, this strategic problem is just like an algebra problem, in that it induces an investigation structured by a which-question. Consider the case for the Verifier.7 The Verifier wins if she can force the game to end with a true atomic sentence. So when she is facing a statement of the form ∃xφ(x) she should find and name an object that satisfies φ(x), since the sentence which ends the game will be a subformula of this formula. Thus, φ(x) acts like the matrix of a which-question structuring her investigation: to make a strategically optimal move, she should attempt to answer the question, which objects are φ? She finds and gives a value for x as a means to answering this which-question, which in turn is a means to winning the game. It is easiest to see this in the context of a specific example. Suppose I am playing as the Verifier in the game with respect to a model M whose domain consists of the pieces on a chessboard in front of me. The sentence I am given is ∃x(P(x) ∧ B(x)) 7To keep things simple in what follows, I will just focus on the Verifier's moves in accordance with G.∃. All the same considerations apply symmetrically to the Falsifier's moves in accordance with G.∀; we just have to view him as undertaking investigations in which he tries to find an object that makes a certain matrix false, i.e., one that makes its negation true. This symmetry follows from the fact that the game semantics is classical, so the two quantifiers are duals: ∀xφ(x) is equivalent to ¬∃x¬φ(x). 137 INVESTIGATION where P is interpreted as a predicate of the pawns, and B is interpreted as a predicate of the black pieces; the sentence thus says that some pawns in the domain are black. It is my turn to select an object for x, in accordance with G.∃. Which object should I choose, given that I am the Verifier and that I am aiming to win the game? The Falsifier will make the next choice, which will determine whether the game ends with an atomic sentence of the form P(x) or one of the form B(x). So the question I must answer is, what is an object x that is both P(x) and B(x)? That is, which object or objects are both pawns and black pieces? To answer this question, I must undertake an investigation: I must try to find such an object, to give as the value of x. My method of searching in this case will obviously be different than the one I use to solve algebra problems. Instead of manipulating equations, I will have to survey the pieces on the chessboard. But the structure of my search is largely the same. I start from an understanding of the problem: I am seeking at least one object among those in a given range that satisfies a certain condition. I take certain steps to look for such an object. If those steps lead me to recognize an object as satisfying the condition, I conclude my search successfully. In this case, I must use empirical rather than mathematical means to search for and recognize the object I am seeking. But that is obviously inessential: my investigation would have this same structure if the model M offered a mathematical, rather than empirical, interpretation of the predicates P and B. To further cement the parallel between this kind of investigation and the activity of solving an algebra problem, it is helpful to see how the four criteria for 'giving the value of a variable' apply to the moves made by the Verifier in accordance with G.∃. First, scope. The Verifier's choice of a value for x obviously occurs in the context of a particular problem or question. When she is facing a statement of the form ∃xφ(x), this is the question, which objects are φ? How she should choose, and whether her choice is strategically correct, depends on the particular formula φ(x). The strategic problem she faces in the game played on a different formula ψ(x) is a different problem, even if the variable is typographically the same, just as two different polynomials give different algebra problems, even if they are both expressed using 'x'. Next, range. The Verifier is constrained by the rule G.∃ to choose an object from the domain of M to be the value of the variable bound by the quantifier. An understanding of this range is necessary for correct play 138 INVESTIGATION in the game. In the chessboard case, if I try to choose, say, a pear from the adjacent fruit bowl to be the value of x, I am not making a legal move, but revealing a misunderstanding: I have not grasped that my choice must be from the pieces on the board. As in an algebra problem, the range affects whether or not there are solutions to the Verifier's strategic problem, and how many solutions there are. There might be no black pawns on the board, or one, or several; this will affect what I can choose, and thus whether or not I have a winning strategy in the game. Next, completeness. The question structuring the Verifier's investigation for a single quantifier move always requests just a single alternative. It is like the algebraic question 'What is one number x such that. . . ?'; it does not require giving more than one alternative or an exhaustive list. She completely answers this question, and the game moves on to the next round, once she has given any one value for the variable bound by the quantifier. This just follows from the way the rule G.∃ is written. Thus we have no need to distinguish, here, between giving a value for a variable and giving a complete solution statement.8 Finally, canonical form. Notice that the rule G.∃ requires the Verifier to give a name for the object she selects. In effect, this part of the rule states a standard of canonical form for the Verifier's moves. It is not enough for the Verifier to select an object; she must make it known which object she has selected to be the value of the quantified variable, using a canonical expression for it. To really see the significance of this requirement, we have to reflect on what counts as a 'name' in a first-order language L. Since L is a firstorder language, it is equipped with a category of terms, which in general can be divided into three classes: individual variables, individual constants, and terms constructed out of these by means of function symbols or other operators. Names are obviously terms, since the players substitute names for individual variables when making a quantifier move. But which terms count as names? Do the names include just the individual constants, such as 'a' or '1'? Or could they include functional terms, like ' f (a)' or '1 + 1'? What if the language includes other term-forming op8It is interesting to consider how to generalize the game semantics to languages containing other types of quantifiers, such as numerical quantifiers, by adding rules to allow or require selecting multiple objects. But since most of the quantifiers I am interested in here are definable in terms of the standard first-order quantifiers, I leave this question for further research. 139 INVESTIGATION erators, like a definite description operator? Does '(ιx)φ(x)' count as a name, or not? There is no general syntactic answer to these questions. Whether or not a given term counts as a name is a matter of how and for what purpose the language is being used. In the context of the game semantics, the category of names is used in opposition to the category of individual variables. A variable represents a choice that a player has yet to make; a name represents the outcome of a choice. The purpose of these choices is to move the game closer to its final state, where a winner can be determined by consulting the model. Thus, how we conceive of names is linked with how we conceive of the models or interpretations of the language L with respect to which the game is played. From this we may deduce a few things about the category of names. First, the notion of model we are working with requires that a model directly determines a truth value for atomic sentences, so that at the end of the game, the model is sufficient to determine who has won. Assuming the usual denotational semantics for atomic sentences, all that really matters is that names are given a fixed interpretation in the model, which is to say that at the end of the game, the model itself contains all the information needed to determine which individual in the domain each name picks out, without any further input from the players. This is the paradigm of a canonical expression: what's important is that at the end of the game, no question can arise about which object a player selected, since such questions would prevent determination of whether the final sentence is true or false. In the context of the game semantics, a 'name' is thus simply a canonical expression. In fact, we can go further than this. Since the scope properties of the quantifiers depend on the order in which players' choices are made, it is important that names have a fixed interpretation in the model as soon as they are introduced, not just at the end of the game.9 Players 9This is not to say that every name must have a fixed interpretation before it is introduced by a player's choice. We must allow for some objects in the domain to lack names (for example, when the language is countable but the domain is uncountable). Such objects can still be chosen and given names by players. In such cases, we should picture the player's choice of a name for an object as simultaneously extending the language and the model: the effect of the player's choice is to add the name to the language and the mapping to the model. This depends in turn on the players' background ability to indicate which object is meant without using a name. 140 INVESTIGATION must not be able to 'put off' choices by using expressions whose interpretation depends on choices to be made in subsequent rounds. This excludes any terms which are semantically variable, such as open functional terms, from serving as names. Likewise, it means that terms containing quantifier-like operators, such as a description operator, must be interpreted as having a fixed, determinate interpretation when they are introduced by a player's choice during a quantifier move. To see this, suppose the language L contains both a unary function symbol 's' and a binary relation symbol '<', and consider the game for ∃x∀y(y < x) on the model N, which interprets '<' as the usual ordering relation on the domain of natural numbers, and 's' as the usual successor function. This sentence is of course false in N, since no natural number is greater than every natural number. But if the Verifier is permitted to use an expression like 's(y)' as the name she substitutes for x, she will have a winning strategy and the sentence will turn out to be true: there is no number that the Falsifier could choose for y to make ∀y(y < s(y)) false. The problem here is that the expression 's(y)' does not have a fixed interpretation at the time the Verifier makes her choice, since its interpretation depends on the value of y; there is no determinate answer to the question of which particular number she is choosing, so 's(y)' cannot be a canonical expression or name. Similarly, we cannot in general admit terms like '(ιz)∀w(w < z)' or 'the successor of the Falsifier's next choice' as names. Even if we treat these as syntactically closed terms, the relevant semantic feature of a name is that it is a canonical expression, so that no question can arise about which individual it is associated with at any point in the game.10 10It is even alright if we include among names expressions which are syntactically variables, so long as we think of the quantifier moves in the game as fixing their interpretations. Imagine, for example, that in the game played on the chessboard model we make moves by hanging tags on the chess pieces, on which we have inscribed the variable whose interpretation the choice fixes. Thus, I hang a tag labeled 'x' on the pawn in front of the black queen, say, to mark that pawn as my choice for the value of x. What's important is not the syntactic category of the label, but that each syntactic variable in the final formula corresponds to a tag which has been hung by the end of the game, and that the tags were hung in a certain order without changing. 141 INVESTIGATION Within those bounds, there's plenty of room for different standards about which expressions count as names, which will in turn depend on how we conceive of the language and its models. The important point is that some such standard governs each quantifier move in the game, that there is a distinction between those expressions in the language which signify a determinate choice of individual and those which do not. For until such a choice is expressed, the move is not complete and the game cannot continue; and if the choice is not determinate, the game will not assign the correct truth conditions to the original sentence. Thus, each quantifier move satisfies all four criteria for giving the value of a variable. The strategic problem a player is faced with when she makes a quantifier move is to find a value for a variable which makes a certain formula true. She must find at least one such value within a certain range, the domain of the model. To complete her move, she must give that value by means of a canonical expression. Her action therefore has just the same structure as the act of solving an elementary algebra problem: it is an investigation, an attempt to answer a which-question. 4.2.4 Solving the puzzle It's time to return to the opening puzzle of this chapter: how are the first-order and question-answer analyses of a specificational sentence related? Are they competing theoretical alternatives, or are they somehow compatible? I will now argue that they are best seen as compatible, by showing that the question and answer in a specificational sentence can be found in the first-order formula which analyzes it, if we interpret that formula using the game semantics. This is easiest to see if we reflect a little more on the general strategy of analysis I outlined above. The first-order formula which analyses a specificational sentence, which I will call a specification-formula, takes the form of a statement with one or more leading existential quantifiers. The open formula beneath those quantifiers will consist of a conjunction of two main parts, corresponding to the subject and the complement of the natural language sentence. Let us call the part corresponding to the complement the specifier clause. It consists of a conjunction of identity statements, each of which has one of the existentially-bound variables on one side, and a constant term on the other. Let us call the part corresponding to the subject the question clause. The question clause will itself 142 INVESTIGATION be a conjunction of two parts, which following Belnap and Steel (1976) I will call its matrix and its request. The matrix clause represents the contribution of the noun phrase in the subject. The request represents the contribution of the determiner in the subject; it expresses the uniqueness and distinctness conditions (if any) imposed by the natural language determiner. Thus, the general first-order form of a specificational sentence will be: ∃x1 . . . ∃xn((M(x1, . . . , xn) ∧ R(x1, . . . , xn)) ∧ S(x1, . . . , xn)) Here, M schematizes the matrix, R the request, and S the specifier clause. For example, consider again the specificational sentences (14)–(16), together with their first-order analyses: (17) a. A good book to read is Waverley. b. ∃x(B(x) ∧ x = w) (18) a. The author is Scott. b. ∃x((A(x) ∧ ∀y(A(y)→ y = x)) ∧ x = s) (19) a. Two of the characters are Edward Waverley and Baron Bradwardine. b. ∃x∃y((C(x) ∧ C(y) ∧ x 6= y) ∧ x = e ∧ y = b) In (17-b), the specifier clause is x = w, and the question clause contains only the matrix B(x); the request is null or empty, since the indefinite article carries no uniqueness or distinctness condition. In (18-b), the request contains the uniqueness or exhaustivity condition ∀y(A(y) → y = x), in order to capture the additional contribution of the definite article. In (19-b), which has multiple leading existential quantifiers, the specifier clause contains a conjunct for both existentially bound variables, and the request x 6= y captures the distinctness (but non-exhaustivity) condition of the English numerical quantifier 'two'. There are a few important things to notice about analyses of this form. First, consider the specifier clause, which corresponds to the complement of the natural language sentence. To capture the distinction between specification and predication, the specifier clause relies on the same device as we use in the language of elementary algebra: it gives the values of the variables introduced by the subject using equations in canonical form. It would not do to allow an arbitrary first-order formula in the 143 INVESTIGATION specifier clause. If in (18-b) we replace x = s with an arbitrary formula H(x), the result is suitable for analyzing predicational sentences like (20) The author is much hated. but not specificational sentences like (18-a). We cannot even allow arbitrary formulae whose predicates are restricted to the identity predicate, for that would not rule out expressions like x = x2. This again is suitable to analyze predicational sentences like (21) The number is its own square. so if we allow it, we fail to capture the distinction between specification and predication. It is important for the adequacy of the analysis as an analysis of specification that we be able to think of the terms that appear on the right hand side of the equations in the specifier clause as names or canonical expressions, so that the clause does not merely constrain the values of the variables, but actually gives or specifies them. The second important point is that the first-order form of a specificational sentence trivially entails a formula in which the specifier clause has been dropped, i.e., a formula of the form ∃x1 . . . ∃xn(M(x1, . . . , xn) ∧ R(x1, . . . , xn)) consisting of just the existential closure of the question clause. Let us call such a formula the corresponding question-formula of a specificationformula. In what sense does such a formula 'correspond to a question'? This is where the game semantics is most revealing. An existential formula is true when the Verifier has a winning strategy in the associated game, which will begin with a series of quantifier moves made by the Verifier. In order to find such a strategy, the Verifier must undertake an investigation (or a series of nested investigations) structured by the question: which objects are M and R? Or more colloquially, since R plays the role of a determiner: what are R objects that are M? The Verifier will have such a strategy, and the sentence will be true, if and only if there is an answer to that question. This question is exactly the one left open by the subject of the original specificational sentence. A few examples suffice to illustrate this. Intu144 INVESTIGATION itively, the questions left open by the specificational subjects in (17-a)– (19-a) are: (22) What is a good book to read? (23) Who is the author? (24) Who are two of the characters? These questions are colloquial expressions of the following more cumbersome questions, which are exactly the corresponding questions for (17-b)–(19-b): (25) a. What is (at least one example of) an individual that is a good book to read? b. ∃xB(x) (26) a. What is (at least one example of) the unique individual that is an author? b. ∃x(A(x) ∧ ∀y(A(y)→ y = x)) (27) a. What are two (examples of) distinct individuals that are characters? b. ∃x∃y(C(x) ∧ C(y) ∧ x 6= y) A specification-formula entails its corresponding question-formula. Under the game semantics, that means that if the Verifier has a winning strategy in the game associated with a specification-formula, she also has one in the game associated with its corresponding question-formula. Of course, many first-order formulae will have this property, not all of which will be specification-formulae. The interesting property of the specification-formula is that its truth not only guarantees that there is a winning strategy for the Verifier in the game for the question-formula, but it also encodes or displays such a strategy, or rather the part of the strategy governing the Verifier's initial quantifier moves. She can just choose for each variable xi the individual given for xi in the specifier clause. As we just observed, the specifier clause gives this individual by means of a canonical expression, in an equation in canonical form. So it tells the Verifier everything she needs to know to make her initial moves in the game for the corresponding question-formula: it tells her how to answer the strategic question of which objects are M and R. 145 INVESTIGATION Notice, then, what we have achieved: we have rendered the questionanswer analysis of specification compatible with the first-order analysis using the game semantics. Analyzing a specificational sentence in a firstorder language yields a specification-formula. This formula is true just in case its specifier clause answers the strategic question faced by the Verifier in the game for the corresponding question-formula. This is the question we intuitively associate with the specificational sentence's subject. The specifier clause is derived from its complement. So, a specificational sentence is true just in case its complement answers the question presented by its subject. At least, that is so to the extent that we take the analysis to successfully capture and explicate the intuitive truth conditions of the sentence. This solves the puzzle: a specificational sentence is true just in case a certain first-order formula is true, and that formula is true just in case one part of it answers the question contained in the other part. There is no tension between the first-order and question-answer analyses. None of this, I hope, seems particularly surprising. The value of the discussion above does not consist in presenting a novel analysis of specification, or a new technical approach. The logical tools we have used are in fact rather simplistic, and the analyses are the sort one would be trained to produce in an elementary logic course. Greater sophistication is possible in both respects, though more sophisticated approaches will still have these basic tools at their core. Instead, the value lies in having made explicit, step by step, the connection between these tools and practices of asking and answering questions. The intuition that a specificational sentence 'gives the value of a variable', or some values of some variables, is commonly accepted, but it is not usually further explored. I have tried, here, to articulate what lies behind this intuition, by describing what it means to 'give' the value of a variable within an investigation, and then describing the truth conditions of specificational sentences in terms of investigations, by means of the game semantics. In logic, as in algebra, a variable is best seen as an interrogative device, an expression whose role and purpose derives from our activities of formulating which-questions and finding their answers. To say that a specificational sentence gives a value for a variable is to assign it a special role within that activity. This is the role of connecting a question with its answer, of connecting the start of an investigation to its end. 146 INVESTIGATION 4.3 BACK TO NATURAL LANGUAGE With these insights in hand, we are in a better position to explain some of the properties of natural language specifications. I would like to conclude this chapter by revisiting some of those properties, and seeing what light we can shed on them by viewing specificational sentences as playing an analogous role in natural language as their counterparts play in elementary algebra. One of the features of specificational sentences that supported the question-answer analysis was their sensitivity to prior questions in discourse.11 This is clearest in the case of specificational sentences that have anaphoric pronouns or demonstratives as subjects, such as (28) It was Cameron. When such a sentence is asserted, its meaning obviously depends on some antecedent question. If the question is "Who was at the door?" then it specifies the person who was at the door; if it is "Who received the mysterious envelope?", it specifies the person who received the mysterious envelope. But it makes no sense to 'specify' a person apart from some question being asked about who satisfies a certain condition. Similarly, a specificational sentence sounds odd when the question left open by its subject does not agree with one asked in prior discourse: (29) Who was at the door? (30) ??The person who received the mysterious envelope was Cameron. Unless it is clear from the context how the question of who received the mysterious envelope is related to the question of who was at the door, it sounds terrible to assert (30) after (29). A speaker who does so is felt to be inexplicably changing the subject. This sensitivity to prior questions is easily understood when we view specificational sentences in terms of their role in investigations. A specificational sentence has a scope; it only makes sense in the context of an investigation structured by a question. It makes no more sense to utter (28) when no question is salient than it does to offer x = 2 as a solution when no algebra problem has been given. Similarly, uttering (30) after 11See the discussion in Section 2.2.2. 147 INVESTIGATION (29) is like using x = 2 as part of a derivation for the problem given by y2− 9 = 0: it just isn't clear how giving a value for x is relevant to finding the values of y. The sensitivity of specifications to prior questions reflects the fact that a specificational sentence is part of an activity structured by the goal of answering a certain question. When it is not clear what the goal is, or how it advances that goal, a specificational sentence becomes unacceptable.12 Another interesting feature of specificational sentences concerns the distinction between specification and pure equation.13 There is an intuitively felt asymmetry in specificational sentences like (31) which is absent from pure equatives like (32): (31) The month I got married was May. (32) The month I got married was my uncle's favorite month. We saw in Section 3.2 that the main problem with the equative analysis of specification is that it does not have a plausible account of this distinction. In assimilating specificational sentences to algebraic solution statements, am I not inviting the same objection? It is true that algebraic solution statements are made using equations, and I have proposed that we can make a similar use of equations in first-order analyses of specifications. But the important idea behind the assimilation is that specifications play a certain role in investigations, and only a special kind of equation can play that role. By inquiring into that role, we have arrived at better criteria to distinguish specification from pure equation: a specification occurs in the context of a problem which introduces the variable, it gives a value in the variable's range, it completely satisfies the request of the problem, and it is in canonical form. Pure equations in general do not satisfy these criteria-after all, some equations give problems, rather than solutions-so they don't count as specifications. 12It is worth pointing out that there is a rich literature on dynamic semantics, beginning with Heim (1983/2002), which deals in part with the problem of how to represent inter-sentential anaphoric relationships like those I have pointed to in (28)–(30). I believe the techniques developed in this literature will prove useful for giving a formal representation of specificational sentences like (28), which will elude the strategy of first-order analysis I explained above because the scope needed to make sense of 'it' extends beyond the sentence itself. I do not pursue this issue here, though. 13For the distinction, see the discussion in Section 2.1.3. The distinction plays an important role in my criticism of the equative analysis in Section 3.2. 148 INVESTIGATION These criteria, especially those concerning range and canonical form, are just as useful for distinguishing specification and pure equation in natural language. The difference between (31) and (32) is that 'May' is a canonical expression for a month, but 'my uncle's favorite month' is not. This is hardly an isolated example. There are general, stable conventions in natural language about which sorts of expressions are suitable for specifying values in the range determined by a certain noun. Consider the following examples: (33) The month I got married was . . . a. {January, February, March, . . . } b. {my uncle's favorite month, the last month of the Alaskan summer, the month before my divorce, . . . } (34) The color of the paint is . . . a. {red, yellow, blue, . . . } b. {the color symbolizing our Glorious Revolution, the color which attracts the bees, the cheapest color the store sold, . . . } (35) The way she traveled was . . . a. {by caravan, in an armored car, along the Rhine, . . . } b. {the way her father had expressly forbidden, however she liked, the way everyone travels in Stockholm, . . . } (36) The tournament winner was . . . a. {Armando, Beatrice, Christine, Deep Blue, . . . } b. {last year's champion, the mysterious newcomer, the best European player, . . . } In each of these cases, the continuations in the (a)-group will yield a specificational sentence, while those in the (b)-group generally yield a pure equative. This shows that we distinguish in practice between expressions which can and cannot be used to specify months, colors, ways of traveling, or tournament winners. It is a stable feature of the (a)-group expressions that they are canonical expressions for values in these ranges, while the (b)-group expressions are not. That is, the (a)-group expressions are immune to further 'But which do you mean?' questions, while the (b)-group expressions by default are not. Moreover, it is clear that the (a)-group expressions do not have this property absolutely, but only 149 INVESTIGATION relative to a certain conception of a range: 'January' cannot be used as a canonical expression for a color or a way of traveling, for example; and 'Deep Blue' can be used to specify a tournament winner, but not a person. It would be easy to multiply such examples. The contrast between specificational sentences and pure equatives reflects our knowledge of which expressions are canonical for the values in a given range.14 There is a subtle point here concerning the role of the head noun in indicating a range of values. Suppose I ask: (37) When did you get married? You might respond in two different ways: (38) a. I got married in May. b. I got married in 1982. Just given the form of my 'When?'-question, both responses are open to you, and to give a helpful answer you must think about my reason for asking. If you think I am interested in what a good time of year to get married would be, you will use the first sentence rather than the second. If you think I am interested in what sort of gift to buy for your anniversary, you will use the second rather than the first. As we observed already in Chapter 1, it is often communicatively useful to be more explicit about what is at issue in such exchanges. Thus, to express your understanding of my question, you might instead answer using a specificational sentence containing a noun that indicating the type of answer you thought I wanted: (39) a. The month I got married was May. b. The year I got married was 1982. 14Similar ideas have been put forward by several other philosophers. Brandom (1994, Ch. 7), whose account of existential quantification in natural language has influenced the story I've told in this chapter, speaks of canonical designators as being organized into addressed spaces; which 'space' a designator belongs to would be made explicit by a noun such as 'month' or 'color'. Similarly, Moltmann (2013, p. 533) gives a quasi-fictionalist account of reference to numbers, describing number terms as akin to names for fictional characters like 'Hamlet'. She thinks of claims made with such terms as being true or false relative to different strategies of evaluation, and thinks of nouns like 'number' or 'character' as indicating such a strategy. 150 INVESTIGATION What's interesting about these answers is that, while they are largely equivalent to the ones in (38), the different nouns import different restrictions on the class of canonical expressions available for specifying when you got married. While an answer like (40) The month I got married was September. is merely false, an answer like (41) #The month I got married was 1982. seems ill-formed and uninterpretable, even though '1982' would be a perfectly fine (short) answer to the original question. There is a natural representation of these facts on the strategy of analysis I have pursued in this chapter. In effect, the head nouns in (39) alter how the language is to be interpreted in this context. We can think of them, in the game semantics, as marking a difference in how the game can be correctly played. The restriction introduced by 'month' or 'year' is not merely an additional condition on what the Verifier must be able to find for the sentence to be true; it is a condition on the range where she may search-that is, on the domain of the model. Consequently, it restricts the expressions which the Verifier may use to give a value in that range without stipulatively altering the language when making a quantifier move. The difference between (39-a) and (40) is that they declare different strategies for the Verifier in the same model. The difference between (39-a) and (39-b) is that they require models with different domains. This is one way to explain why (41) is not merely false, but uninterpretable.15 These examples point toward a final interesting feature of specificational sentences: their logical relationship to 'reduced', non-copular paraphrases. Many specificational sentences seem to be logically equivalent to such a paraphrase, or at least entail it. For example, the specificational sentences in (39) seem equivalent to their counterparts in (38). 15Hintikka (1973, Ch. 3) makes a similar claim to explain the communicative difference between logically-equivalent statements like 'All swans are black' and 'No nonblack things are swans'. His idea is that the head noun of the subject specifies the domain of the model, which forms the players' field of search in the game. We prefer the former sentence in communication because it is much more determinate what counts as seeking and finding a swan than a non-black 'thing'. 151 INVESTIGATION Similarly, (42-a) is equivalent to (42-b), and (43-a) is equivalent to (43-b) (supposing that only one person can win the tournament): (42) a. One good book to read is Waverley. b. Waverley is a good book to read. (43) a. The tournament winner was Armando. b. Armando won the tournament. There is no great mystery about why this is so. To explain the equivalence, we can simply appeal to the logic of identity. The first-order form of these specificational sentences, according to the analysis outlined above, is ∃x(φ(x) ∧ x = c) This is materially equivalent to φ(c) which corresponds to the form of the 'reduced' paraphrase. At the same time, the game semantics provides some resources to account for the felt differences between the two forms. It is easy to see that, despite their material equivalence, the forms are practically nonequivalent. The game for the reduced form of these sentences is trivial; the Verifier has won or lost after zero rounds. By contrast, the game for the specificational form begins with a choice by the Verifier and lasts two rounds, and so it will require the Verifier to have a non-trivial strategy. In this game, the Verifier faces the same strategic problem as in the game for the corresponding question-formula: ∃xφ(x) Determining a winning strategy for this game is, in general, a non-trivial problem; it's just that the specificational form already encodes its solution. In other words, the specificational form represents a practical situation intermediate between a difficult problem, and no problem at all: it is the situation of facing a problem that has already been solved. Insofar as we can see our own practical and informational situation as we learn about our world reflected in the Verifier's situation as she investigates a model, the game semantics provides an illuminating description of the unique position of specificational sentences in our investigations. 152 INVESTIGATION These observations permit me to answer a final methodological question about specificational sentences in natural language. What makes a sentence count as 'specificational'? Is the category of specificational sentences a syntactic, semantic, or pragmatic category? In the first instance, the category of specificational sentences is a pragmatic category. A sentence ultimately counts as specificational because it plays a certain role in practices of investigation: it links an investigatory problem to its solution. This role is related to, but distinct from, the pragmatic role of sentences which present the problem without presenting the solution, and of sentences which present the solution without explicitly linking it to the problem. In the second instance, though, a sentence may be particularly wellsuited to play this pragmatic role because it has certain syntactic properties. For example, a language might encode the distinction between the roles of canonical and non-canonical expressions for values in a certain range as a distinction between two syntactic categories. Since differences in pragmatic role may explain the syntactic differences between specificational and non-specificational sentences, specificational sentences may form a syntactic category in a derivative sense. They may also form a semantic category, though this depends on how we characterize semantics. On the analysis I have given, a specificational sentence is materially equivalent to a reduced, non-specificational sentence. If semantics is narrowly construed as concerned only with material truth conditions, then there is no semantic category of specificational sentences. But if semantics is construed more broadly, as concerned with general facts about how sentences are interpreted, then specificational sentences do form a semantic category, and the game-theoretical semantics gives us the resources to say what is distinctive of that category. Specificational sentences differ from their reduced forms by requiring the Verifier to make additional quantifier moves; they differ from the corresponding question sentences by displaying the terms she should use in those moves. Our troubles are not over yet, however. The most famous example of an equivalence between a specificational sentence and its reduced form is the one with which I began this dissertation: (44) a. The number of moons of Jupiter is four. b. Jupiter has four moons. 153 INVESTIGATION I am not quite ready to say that we understand the relationship these sentences exhibit. In this chapter, I have focused on specificational sentences where the complement is a clear case of a name or singular term. These are the specificational sentences that have a straightforward firstorder analysis. But as we saw in earlier chapters, and again in examples like (34) and (35), English contains many examples of specificational sentences where the complement contains a different kind of expression, such as an adjective or adverb, which is not obviously a semantically singular term. 'Four' is one such complement. Should we treat these expressions as names, or not? Should we say they denote objects, or something else? That is the puzzle with which I began, and it is still outstanding. The problem presented by such sentences is that the specificational forms appear to involve first-order quantification over individuals, but in the reduced form, the specified individuals function as predicates or other modifiers. Yet the two forms seem equivalent. So can we give them a first-order analysis, in the manner I've suggested? Or do we need further logical resources? I shall take up these questions in the next chapter. 154 Chapter 5 Numbers, again It is time to return to the puzzle about Frege's famous sentence: (1) The number of Jupiter's moons is four. If the analysis of specificational sentences in Chapter 4 is right, this sentence has a form which can be represented like this: ∃x((x is a number of Jupiter's moons ∧ ∀y(y is a number of Jupiter's moons→ y = x)) ∧ x = 4) The important feature of this analysis is that '4' is treated as a canonical expression for a number, the kind of expression you can use to say which number you mean without being liable to a request for clarification. This differentiates the specifier clause 'x = 4' from a predicational clause like 'x is even', or a non-specificational equation like '4x = x2'. This analysis treats the definite description as introducing a first-order variable. Accordingly, it treats '. . . is a number of Jupiter's moons' as a first-level predicate, and '4' as a semantically singular term. So if the analysis can be applied to this case, it entails that numbers are objects. We have not yet decided, though, whether we can follow Frege that far. Should we say that numbers are objects, or not? In Chapter 1, we saw some reasons for doubt. Frege himself noted that (1) is equivalent to (2) Jupiter has four moons. 155 NUMBERS, AGAIN Here, 'four' appears attributively, as an adjective or determiner, and the concept of number does not appear. If we follow the analysis above, we don't seem to have a way to capture this equivalence. It is hard to see how we could read the formula above, or anything logically equivalent to it, back into English as (2). Precisely because we have taken 'four' as a singular term in our first-order analysis, it seems we cannot treat it as an adjective or determiner, which are expressions that require an argument. Here is the trouble. Within the confines of first-order logic, no one expression can be interpreted as both a singular term and a predicate-in Frege's terms, as an expression that stands both for an object and for a concept.1 The syntactic categories of terms and predicates are exclusive in formal languages, as are the corresponding semantic categories of objects and concepts. That means that when giving an analysis of (1), we have to choose between representing 'four' as a term, or representing it as a predicate (of some level or other).2 At the same time, because (1) and (2) are non-accidentally equivalent, it is natural to think that 'four' makes the same contribution in each, and its role in the two sentences should be analyzed in the same way. Yet in (1), 'four' appears to be a term, while in (2), it appears to be a predicate. Logical analysis forces us to choose between these options. If we represent it as a term, we can use the firstorder analysis for (1), but we can't represent the equivalence between (1) and (2). If we represent it as a predicate, there is still hope for representing the equivalence, but only if we give up the first-order analysis of specification developed in Chapter 4 for one that allows higher-order expressions in specifier clauses. 1To avoid prolixity, and to remain as close as possible to Frege's own terminology in a crucial passage in Grundlagen §27, I will use 'concept' in a slightly wider sense than Frege himself usually does. Frege distinguishes concepts (what monadic predicates stand for) from relations (what polyadic predicates stand for). I will essentially use 'concept' as he would have used 'concept or relation', that is, as a term for what predicates stand for in general. It is harmless to paper over this distinction, because I am interested in the way that both concepts and relations contrast with objects, and nothing in my argument depends on the contrast between the monadic and polyadic cases. 2It would be open to us to analyze 'four' as a quantifier, since in a Fregean logical system, quantifiers are second-level predicates-that is, predicates of first-level concepts. In the type theory standardly used by linguists, the analogous choice is between assigning 'four' to type e, on the one hand, or to a higher type such as 〈e, t〉 or 〈〈e, t〉, t〉 on the other. 156 NUMBERS, AGAIN In Grundlagen §57, Frege responds to this puzzle by taking (1) as the more revealing form, opting to analyze it as an identity statement, in which 'four' occurs as a singular term: I have already drawn attention above to the fact that we speak of "the number 1", where the definite article serves to class it as an object.. . . what we have is an identity, stating that the expression "the number of Jupiter's moons" signifies the same object as the word "four". (Frege, 1884/1980, §57) He says we should not be bothered by the fact that 'four' occurs as an adjective in (2), since "that can always be got round" via its equivalence with (1). Frege's response looks increasingly unsatisfying, though, once we see that the puzzle is not limited to number words like 'four'. As the previous chapters have emphasized, the relationship between (1) and (2) is just one example of a general pattern. A specificational sentence is generally equivalent to a corresponding reduced sentence. The equivalence holds even when the head noun of the subject disappears in the reduced sentence, and the complement appears as an adjective, adverb, clause, or other non-nominal constituent. Here are three more examples: (3) a. The color of Io's surface is yellow. b. Io's surface is yellow. (4) a. The way I'm losing weight is by giving up sweets. b. I'm losing weight by giving up sweets. (5) a. The reason Henry fled was that the cops had found his stash. b. Henry fled because the cops had found his stash. Adopting Frege's attitude in these cases would apparently lead us to conclude that the adjective 'yellow', the adverbial phrase 'by giving up sweets', and the clause 'the cops had found his stash' each stand for an object. On any ordinary understanding of what it means to be an object, this result is unintuitive, and might make us hesitant to adopt Frege's response to the puzzle. The unintuitive consequences are not the most serious problem. More worrisome is that Frege's response threatens to obliterate any distinction between the semantic roles of adjectives, adverbs, complete clauses, and 157 NUMBERS, AGAIN other non-nominal expressions. If the fact that an expression can appear opposite a definite description in a specificational sentence is reason enough to analyze it as a singular term, then it appears that just about any kind of expression can be a singular term. Frege himself would surely want to resist this conclusion, and regard at least adjectives and adverbs as predicates or concept-words.3 But once we recognize the general pattern, we have just as much reason to treat 'four' as standing for an object in (1) as 'yellow' in (3-a) and 'by giving up sweets' in (4-a). What we'd like is a general analysis of specification, one that more easily accommodates the equivalence between a specificational sentence and its reduced form, even when the specificational complement appears to be a non-nominal expression. As things stand, (1) and (2) and the pairs of sentences in (3)–(5) pull us in two different directions. If we focus on the specificational sentences, we'll be drawn (with Frege) toward treating their complements as terms. If we focus on the reduced forms, we'll be drawn toward treating them as predicates. It would be nice to have an analysis that avoids this tension, or at least provides clear criteria for going in one direction rather than the other. As I've suggested, the tension arises because our contemporary logical systems treat the distinction between objects and concepts as exclusive. These systems ultimately derive from Frege's Begriffsschrift and are based on his function-argument analysis of propositions. The functionargument analysis is one of Frege's major achievements. It is what allowed him to abandon the subject-predicate analysis of the earlier logical tradition, which in turn allowed him to represent sentences containing multiple levels of generality-that is, nested quantifiers. This was the key innovation that made Frege's logical system adequate for representing mathematical reasoning in a way that no previous system was. In the most basic case, the function-argument analysis of propositions just is an analysis into objects and concepts. So it is not too much of an overstatement to say that Frege's distinction between objects and concepts 3In the Grundlagen, for example, he argues that numbers are importantly different from colors in that they are not properties, either of external things or of concepts; he therefore supposes that color words are predicates while number words are not (Frege, 1884/1980, Cf. §§21–27, 45–57). On the other hand, Frege did later come to accept that a sentence or clause stands for an object. After he drew his distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung, he held that a sentence generally stands for a truth value, which he regards as an object. 158 NUMBERS, AGAIN made modern logic possible. But it is also the source of our present problem, because on Frege's understanding of analysis, the roles of function and argument are exclusive. Any logical system that shares the functionargument analysis of the Begriffsschrift will force us to choose between representing 'four' as a term or as a predicate, as standing for an object or for a concept. A radical solution to this problem would involve developing a whole new logical system for the analysis of natural language, one that did not force the choice on us.4 I think it is possible that we might need such a system to fully resolve the problem, one that is not based on the functionargument analysis. But the radical solution is far outside the scope of what I hope to accomplish here. In this chapter, I will argue that even within a basically-Fregean framework, there is a way of thinking about the choice that makes it less puzzling. Although the roles of objects and concepts are exclusive within a given proposition or thought, we should recognize that one and the same thing can be both an object and a concept with respect to different propositions. My strategy will be to interpret Frege's understanding of the conceptobject distinction, and the reasons he took it to be exclusive. The distinction is often understood in ontological terms, as an exclusive distinction between two kinds of entity, or being. This reading faces serious interpretive challenges, however. It also makes the puzzle very urgent: if 'four' necessarily stands for two different entities in (1) and (2), it is unclear how or why these sentences are equivalent, since they seem to be talking about different things. On my interpretation, the concept-object distinction should instead be understood as a distinction between two logical or epistemological roles. To call something an object or concept is to say something about the role it plays in a system of scientific thought. By recognizing the distinction as a distinction between two different epistemological roles, I leave room for the possibility that one and the same thing may play both roles at different times or places in our system of thought. There is then no tension between saying that 'four' stands for something that plays the 4I have some sympathy for this idea, because I think it not only could help us understand the semantics of specification, but also the semantics of predication and quantification. These devices are intimately connected, and there are deep puzzles associated with how we represent each of them in the logical systems we have today, because each of those representations depends on Frege's function-argument analysis. 159 NUMBERS, AGAIN role of an object in (1), but plays the role of a concept in (2). This simply reflects the fact that these sentences do different work in our language. What are these two roles, and when does something play one role rather than the other? Although Frege himself does not provide clear answers to these questions, I will suggest that we can derive clearer criteria from the game semantics introduced in Chapter 4. Roughly, an object is something that can be sought, found, and specified by the players as they make quantifier moves in the semantic game. A concept is what guides a player as she makes such moves: it is how she distinguishes a strategic choice from a non-strategic one. It thus plays the role of constraining her search. We will see that this way of thinking about the distinction preserves the important features of Frege's understanding, and can even be motivated by his early views. In particular, it preserves the idea that the distinction is exclusive with respect to a given interpretation of the language, and it allows us to endorse the claim that numbers are objects. At the same time, it divests that claim of the ontological consequences it is often felt to have. Numbers are objects, as are colors, ways, and reasons-but platonism about these things does not follow. 5.1 FREGE'S UNDERSTANDING OF OBJECTS AND CONCEPTS A standard reading of Frege's concept-object distinction construes it in ontological terms. According to this reading, Frege's distinction is on a par with the traditional distinctions between particulars and universals, or substances and attributes, although it is importantly different from them. This ontological distinction corresponds to a syntactic one. There are two different kinds of expressions in language: proper names, and concept words. Proper names denote, or refer to, or stand for, objects; concept words denote, or refer to, or stand for, concepts (of various levels). At least in a logically-ideal language, there will be a perfect mapping between the types of expressions in the language and the kinds of beings that they stand for in the world. I will refer to this reading as the Ontic Picture. On the Ontic Picture, to classify something as an object or a concept is to make a metaphysical claim about the kind of being it is, and it is appropriate to analyze an expression as a proper name or concept word 160 NUMBERS, AGAIN just in case it stands for the corresponding kind of entity.5 My main goal in this section is to show that Frege does not hold the Ontic Picture. This is because he does not understand the concept-object distinction primarily as a distinction between ontological categories. Instead, he understands it as a distinction between epistemological categories, between different roles things can play in thought. There is good textual evidence for this interpretation in the Grundlagen, where Frege makes his claim that numbers are objects. I will also argue, more tentatively, that Frege maintains this view throughout his career. We should not think of Frege's concept-object distinction in ontological terms, even after he draws his distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung in 1891. What do I mean by 'ontological' and 'epistemological' in this context? I don't want to quibble too much over the terminology. Here is the issue, in terms that would have been familiar to Frege: does the concept-object distinction apply to things as they are in themselves, just as a matter of what they are, and independently of their relationship to us? Or does it apply to things in virtue of how we grasp them, or understand them? If it is the former, then Frege's distinction is an ontological distinction, and the Ontic Picture remains a viable interpretive option. If it is the latter, then it is an epistemological distinction, and we must find an alternative to the Ontic Picture to interpret Frege. I should say that I am not trying to construct a comprehensive interpretation or a maximally-consistent reading of Frege's remarks about concepts, objects, or the distinction between them. I don't have the space for this task here, and it has already been carried out in more detail by others. In fact, much of what I have to say here is anticipated by other interpreters, such as Tugendhat (1970), Sluga (1977, 1-4), and Sluga (1980). Instead, I want to extract one line of thought from Frege's writing that I think is particularly relevant for understanding his claim in the Grundlagen that numbers are objects, and that sheds light on the logical form of specificational sentences. This is what's needed to show that there is a sense of 'object' such that both we and Frege can endorse the claim 5Versions of the Ontic Picture can be found in, for example, Dummett (1981), Wright (1983), Burge (1992), and Hale and Wright (2001). Dummett, for example, says: "Frege's use of the ontological term 'object' is strictly correlative to his use of the linguistic term 'proper name': whatever a proper name stands for is an object, and to speak of something as an object is to say that there is, or at least could be, a proper name which stands for it" (Dummett, 1981, p. 55). 161 NUMBERS, AGAIN that numbers are objects, without having to endorse any particular metaphysics. 5.1.1 Concepts and objects in the Grundlagen The main evidence for my interpretation of the concept-object distinction comes from several passages in the early parts of the Grundlagen. I will begin with these passages, and then relate them to other claims Frege makes about the distinction in his early work. In the introduction to the Grundlagen, Frege states three principles that have guided him throughout the work: In the enquiry that follows, I have kept to three fundamental principles: 1. always to separate sharply the psychological from the logical, the subjective from the objective; 2. never to ask for the meaning of a word in isolation, but only in the context of a proposition; 3. never to lose sight of the distinction between concept and object. (Frege, 1884/1980, p. X) The third principle is most immediately relevant, though as we will see, it is importantly related to the first two. Frege thinks the distinction between concepts and objects is fundamental, and crucial. He goes on to argue that numbers are neither concepts nor subjective, that we must take them to be objects if we are to understand arithmetic, and that various other writers have erred because they have failed to recognize these facts in one way or another. It's a bit puzzling, then, why Frege does not immediately tell us how he is thinking of these two categories. What are objects, as opposed to concepts? Are they species of a common genus? What is it for something to belong to one category or the other? Frege answers these questions in a footnote to §27. There, he classifies concepts and objects as species of 'objective ideas', which he contrasts with subjective ideas: An idea (Vorstellung) in the subjective sense is what is governed by the psychological laws of association; it is of a sensible, pictorial character. An idea in the objective sense belongs 162 NUMBERS, AGAIN to logic and is in principle non-sensible, although the word which means (bedeutet) an objective idea is often accompanied by a subjective idea, which nevertheless is not its meaning. Subjective ideas are often demonstrably different in different men, objective ideas are the same for all. Objective ideas can be divided into objects and concepts. I shall myself, to avoid confusion, use 'idea' only in the subjective sense. It is because Kant associated both meanings with the word that his doctrine assumed such a very subjective, idealist complexion, and his true view was made so difficult to discover. The distinction here drawn stands or falls with that between psychology and logic. If only these themselves were to be kept always rigidly distinct! (Frege, 1884/1980, §27 n. 1, my emphasis) So concepts and objects are each a kind of idea, though they are to be distinguished from subjective ideas like sensations or imaginings. The taxonomy Frege is giving us in the passage therefore looks like this: Ideas  subjective objective { objects concepts True to his word, Frege refrains from calling objects and concepts 'ideas' hereafter. But this passage is the only place in the Grundlagen where Frege explains what he means by 'object' and 'concept', and the point is that this explanation is very puzzling if he is thinking of objects and concepts as ontological categories, categories that things belong to independently of how we think about them and represent them. Why would he call them 'ideas', and take pains to distinguish them from subjective ideas, if he didn't think the distinction had anything to do with how we think and know about things? It seems that if Frege were thinking of objects and concepts as ontological categories, he could simply say: there's two kinds of stuff in the world, and this is what they're like. Our ideas about them, or representations of them, have nothing to do with their status. One might feel that Frege is emphasizing that concepts and objects are objective, but not that they are ideas. That is certainly true. But he makes it clear that he does not understand this objectivity as being grounded in 163 NUMBERS, AGAIN ontology. In §26, he gives a detailed characterization of his understanding of objectivity. He begins by comparing the objectivity of numbers to that of physical objects, saying that "number is no whit more an object of psychology or a product of mental processes than, let us say, the North Sea is." But the analogy is somewhat misleading, because he does not think of objectivity as confined to physical reality: I distinguish what I call objective from what is handleable or spatial or actual (Wirklichen). The axis of the earth is objective, so is the centre of mass of the solar system, but I should not call them actual in the way the earth itself is so. We often speak of the equator as an imaginary line; but it would be wrong to call it a fictitious line; it is not a creature of thought, the product of a psychological process, but is only recognized or apprehended by thought. (Frege, 1884/1980, §26) In this passage, Frege is trying to convince us that there is a third category, in addition to the objective realm of natural or physical or empirical things, and the subjective realm of things created purely by thought, such as impressions or imaginings. This third category consists of things that are objective, but not 'actual'. This is the category to which numbers belong. But what is it to be objective, if being objective is not limited to natural or physical or 'actual' things? Frege begins to give his positive characterization of objectivity in the following paragraph, using the example of geometry: What is objective in [geometry] is what is subject to laws, what can be conceived and judged, what is expressible in words. (Frege, 1884/1980, §26) He continues: I understand objective to mean what is independent of our sensation, intuition and imagination, and of all construction of mental pictures out of memories of earlier sensation, but not what is independent of reason-for what are things independent 164 NUMBERS, AGAIN of reason?6 To answer that would be as much as to judge without judging, or to wash the fur without wetting it. (Frege, 1884/1980, §26, my emphasis) His picture, then, is that objectivity does not derive from 'actuality', but from having a certain relationship to reasoning and judgment. We should distinguish what is objective from what is subjective or psychological, and different for different people. But for Frege, this does not banish what is objective from the realm of thought entirely. Instead, things are objective because they are grasped in a certain way in thought, the way we grasp things when we reason and make judgments, which is different from how we grasp things in our subjective sensations or imaginings. Frege is here expressing a Kantian or neo-Kantian understanding of the objective. What is objective is not simply what's 'out there', as it is in itself, apart from our capacity to recognize it and form judgments about it. He regards that kind of objectivity as out of reach for us, as impossible as 'washing the fur without wetting it'. Instead, objectivity concerns how we grasp things, or the role they play in our cognition. That is why it is appropriate for Frege to speak of objective 'ideas' in his footnote on the following page. Since the distinction between objects and concepts is a distinction among objective ideas, it is a division of things insofar as they play a certain role in our cognition. This makes it an epistemological rather than ontological distinction. It follows that Frege's claim that numbers are objects should not be understood as a claim about the kind of entity they are. Frege makes it clear that his main concern is with grounding our knowledge of arithmetic, not with locating numbers in a particular ontological category. This point emerges clearly in §57, the crucial passage in which Frege finally decides that numbers are objects, as opposed to concepts, and considers the relationship between sentences (1) and (2). It's worth quoting his reasoning there more fully than I did above: It is time to get a clearer view of what we mean by our expression "the content of a statement of number is an assertion about a concept". In the proposition "the number 0 belongs 6Austin's translation uses 'the reason' here for der Vernunft; but it seems pretty clear that Frege intends something more like Reason with a capital 'R', not 'the' reason. He is speaking of our capacity for reasoning, not some particular reason. 165 NUMBERS, AGAIN to the concept F", 0 is only an element in the predicate (taking the concept F to be the real subject). For this reason I have avoided calling a number such as 0 or 1 a property of a concept. Precisely because it forms only an element in what is asserted, the individual number shows itself for what it is, a self-subsistent object. I have already drawn attention above to the fact that we speak of "the number 1", where the definite article serves to class it as an object. In arithmetic this self-subsistence comes out at every turn, as for example in the identity 1 + 1 = 2. Now our concern here is to arrive at a concept of number usable for the purposes of science; we should not, therefore, be deterred by the fact that in the language of everyday life number appears also in attributive constructions. That can always be got round. For example, the proposition "Jupiter has four moons" can be converted into "the number of Jupiter's moons is four". . . . what we have is an identity, stating that the expression "the number of Jupiter's moons" signifies the same object as the word "four". And identities are, of all forms of proposition, the most typical of arithmetic. (Frege, 1884/1980, §57, my emphasis) Here is what is happening in this passage. Frege has previously argued, starting in §46, that a judgment as to how many things are F is a judgment about the concept F. In this passage, Frege is rejecting the view that numbers are the predicates of such judgments, that is, higher-order concepts (what he here calls a "property of a concept"), in favor of the view that they are objects.7 Notably, he gives no substantive metaphysical argument for this conclusion. Instead, he reasons that our use of the definite article with number words provides evidence that we treat numbers as objects. This evidence is not misleading, because in fact, numbers must be objects if they are to be "usable for the purposes of science". Only the assumption that numbers are objects can ground our knowledge of arithmetical propositions, such as 1 + 1 = 2. This is because 7In the earlier parts of the Grundlagen, Frege rejects the view that numbers are firstlevel concepts, or "properties of external things", as well as the view that numbers are subjective. So by also rejecting the view that numbers are higher-level concepts in this passage, he leaves only one place for them in the taxonomy of ideas given in §27: they are objects, as opposed to any kind of concepts. 166 NUMBERS, AGAIN numbers appear as objects in such propositions, and numerals appear as proper names in our ways of expressing them. To some interpreters, Frege's reasoning here is too simple. Dummett (1991, Ch. 9), for example, thinks Frege's choice to treat numbers as objects is completely unjustified. He shows that it is possible to develop arithmetic consistently using the 'adjectival strategy', treating number words instead as expressing higher-level concepts. Thus, Frege has failed to provide any strong support for the position he has chosen. For Dummett, a weightier argument is required, because he thinks Frege accepts the Ontic Picture. Dummett writes that "ontologically expressed, [Frege] is trying to establish that numbers must be regarded as objects" (Dummett, 1991, p. 101). Because he thinks an ontological conclusion hangs on the argument in §57, Dummett sees Frege's failure to rule out the alternative position as philosophically costly, and unsatisfactory. On my reading, by contrast, Frege's reasoning here is perfectly adequate. Frege is choosing between two different reconstructions of the role of numbers in the science of arithmetic. One of those roles makes sense of the form of our actual arithmetical knowledge and our usual way of expressing it; the other doesn't. Dummett is correct that an arithmetic based on concepts can be made to work. But such an arithmetic would not be our arithmetic, in which we use number-words as proper names for objects. It would thus leave us puzzled about the ground of our actual arithmetical knowledge. In this sense, Dummett's conceptarithmetic is not 'usable for the purposes of science', even if it is more faithful to the way we use number words outside of arithmetic proper. Frege dismisses the alternative position so casually because he sees the issue in epistemological terms, and to him, it is clear that our actual arithmetical knowledge is possible only if we regard numbers as objects. There is a natural objection to my reading, though, that can be raised at this point. In §57 and in many other passages, Frege speaks of the 'selfsubsistence' or 'independence' (selbständigkeit) of numbers in connection with their status as objects. Doesn't that show that he regards numbers as something external to us, and their status as objects as independent of our way of thinking about them? No. Frege explicitly qualifies this language a few pages later: The self-subsistence which I am claiming for number is not to be taken to mean that a number word signifies something 167 NUMBERS, AGAIN when removed from the context of a proposition, but only to preclude the use of such words as predicates or attributes, which appreciably alters their meaning. (Frege, 1884/1980, §60, my emphasis) His appeal here to the Context Principle, the second of the fundamental principles set out in the introduction, provides further evidence for my reading. Frege is saying that his claim that numbers are 'self-subsistent' should not be understood in a way that is independent of their role in arithmetical thought. Instead, it is intended to mark the contrast between their actual role as objects from the role of concepts.8 A remark in the Begriffsschrift further supports this response. In §9, where Frege introduces his function-argument analysis of propositions, he says that 'the number 20', a proper name, "gives rise to an independent idea (selbständige Vorstellung)", unlike quantifier expressions like 'every positive whole number' (Frege, 1879/1967, §9). This explicit combination of selbständig with Vorstellung shows that for the early Frege, something's being 'self-subsistent' or 'independent' is entirely consistent with its being an idea in the objective sense. Frege is here, as in Grundlagen §57, using selbständig to mark the contrast between the roles of objects and higher-order concepts within thought, not to imply something about the ontological status of objects apart from their role in thought. Thus, the objection is misguided. Frege's talk of the 'independence' of objects does not straightforwardly imply that when something is an object, it has this status independently of how we grasp it in thought. 5.1.2 Three theses about the distinction So far, I have argued that the concept-object distinction should be understood as a distinction between two different roles things can play in thought, based on passages in the Grundlagen. We can bolster this argument if we look at three theses about the concept-object distinction which 8Why does Frege use terminology that has such an ontological ring to it? A native German speaker has suggested an explanation to me: perhaps Frege uses 'selfsubsistence' (selbständigkeit) because it shares the common root -stand with 'object' (Gegenstand). Since it bears this etymological relationship to 'object' but not to 'concept' (Begriff ), Frege's remark in §60 might indicate that he is simply using 'self-subsistence' as a term for whatever it is that differentiates the role of an object from that of a concept. 168 NUMBERS, AGAIN are at work in the Grundlagen, but articulated more clearly elsewhere in Frege's writing. They are: Exclusivity. The distinction between concepts and objects is exclusive, and the two roles are complementary. Priority of the proposition. Concepts and objects are obtained by splitting up or analyzing complete thoughts. Multiple analysis. Thoughts can be analyzed in multiple ways; there is no uniquely correct analysis of a thought into objects and concepts. Taken together, these three theses yield a straightforward argument that Frege's concept-object distinction should be seen in epistemological rather than ontological terms. I will first explicate the three theses, then give the argument. It is pretty clear that Frege thinks the roles of concepts and objects are exclusive. As we saw above, Frege takes it as a fundamental principle in the Grundlagen "never to lose sight of the distinction between concept and object", and he adds that "it is a mere illusion to suppose that a concept can be made into an object without altering it" (Frege, 1884/1980, p. X). Later, in 'On concept and object', he is more explicit. He criticizes Kerry for misunderstanding his view that nothing can be both an object and a concept, and says clearly that on his way of understanding these categories, an expression that stands for an object cannot stand for a concept: the three words 'the concept "horse" ' do designate an object, but on that very account they do not designate a concept, as I am using the word. (Frege, 1892/1997e, 184, my emphasis) Why does Frege think the distinction is exclusive? The answer lies in the second thesis, his doctrine of the priority of the proposition. Frege thinks of concepts and objects as being obtained by analyzing, or splitting up, a complete thought. Complete thoughts are explanatorily prior to objects and concepts. Identifying an object or a concept within a thought is something we do after, and in virtue of, grasping the thought as a whole. A particularly explicit formulation of this doctrine appears in a letter Frege sent to Anton Marty, shortly before the Grundlagen was published: 169 NUMBERS, AGAIN Now, I do not believe that concept formation can precede judgement, because this would presuppose the independent existence of concepts, but I think of a concept as having arisen by decomposition from a judgeable content. I do not believe that for any judgeable content there is only one way it can be decomposed, or that one of these possible ways can always claim objective pre-eminence. (Frege, 1882/1997d, p. 81) Notice that Frege immediately follows his statement of the priority of the proposition with a statement of the doctrine of multiple analysis. The two doctrines are closely related: it is in some sense because we grasp a complete thought prior to splitting it into parts that we are able to split it up in multiple ways. These two theses can be traced all the way back to the Begriffsschrift. There, in §3, Frege identifies a criterion for the sameness of thoughts (or 'judgeable contents'), namely, that they have all the same possible consequences. Thus, for example, while "The Greeks defeated the Persians at Plataea" differs grammatically from "At Plataea the Persians were defeated by the Greeks", they express the same thought, because they have all the same consequences. This gives us a grip on what it is for two thoughts to be the same or different, prior to and independent of any way of splitting them up into objects and concepts. He then goes on to describe that process in §9, where he introduces the function-argument analysis of propositions: Let us suppose that the circumstance that hydrogen is lighter than carbon dioxide is expressed in our formula language. Then in the place of the symbol for hydrogen we can insert the symbol for oxygen or that for nitrogen. This changes the sense in such a way that 'oxygen' or 'nitrogen' enters into the relations in which 'hydrogen' stood before. If an expression is thought of as variable in this way, it splits up into a constant component, which represents (darstellt) the totality of relations, and a symbol which can be thought of as replaceable by others and which denotes (bedeutet) the object that stands in these relations. The former I call a function, the latter its argument. This distinction has nothing to do with the conceptual content, but only with our way of grasping it. (Frege, 1879/1967, §9, my emphasis) 170 NUMBERS, AGAIN Frege is here operating at the level of syntax, assuming that a complete thought has been expressed in the notation of the Begriffsschrift and then considering how it can be parsed into a function and an argument by regarding one or another of its symbols as replaceable by others. But he already clearly has the idea that these symbols stand for something, speaking of the symbol we regard as replaceable as denoting an object, and the function symbol (what he will later call a 'concept word') as representing the relations it stands in. So we may pass from the level of syntax to the level of content, or what the symbols mean. Frege's picture is then that we obtain a concept from a complete thought by thinking of some part of that thought as replaceable, or letting it vary. The concept is what's 'left over' when we regard an object position as variable within a thought. This explains why the roles of concept and object are exclusive: to vary a part of something, you have to isolate that part from something else that you hold fixed. The roles are exclusive because they represent complementary parts of a complete whole; they are not independent constituents, but instead have a kind of figure-ground relationship within a thought. Concepts and objects are exclusive, and complementary, because of how we recover them from thoughts which we grasp antecedently, by understanding their logical relationships to other thoughts. Importantly, Frege thinks that analysis into objects and concepts is something we do to thoughts. As the last sentence in the passage shows, thoughts do not come with a structure; we impose a structure on them, through our choices about how to express them in language, and which parts of those expressions to regard as variable. Frege thinks we are free to do this in different ways. This is the doctrine of multiple analysis, which he asserts frequently throughout his career, from the Begriffsschrift onward. Another clear statement of it appears in 'On Concept and Object', which was published after the Grundlagen, in 1892: In the sentence 'There is at least one square root of 4', we are saying something, not about (say) the definite number 2, nor about−2, but about a concept, square root of 4; viz. that it is not empty. But if I express the same thought thus: 'The concept square root of 4 is realized', the first six words form the proper name of an object, and it is about this object that something is being said. But notice carefully that what is being said here is 171 NUMBERS, AGAIN not the same thing as was being said about the concept. This will be surprising only to somebody who fails to see that a thought can be split up in many ways, so that now one thing, now another, appears as subject or predicate. The thought itself does not yet determine what is to be regarded as the subject. (Frege, 1892/1997e, pp. 187–188) Furthermore, it is clear that Frege maintained the doctrine of multiple analysis in the Grundlagen itself. The doctrine is at work in §§64–66, where Frege asserts that we can 'recarve' a proposition about parallel lines into one about directions. Frege is also applying it in §57, to relate "Jupiter has four moons" and "The number of Jupiter's moons is four". Why is the doctrine of multiple analysis important to Frege? Because we grasp the logical relations of a thought by analyzing it in different ways. Consider again the example from Begriffsschrift §9, that hydrogen is lighter than carbon dioxide. By splitting this thought up in one way, regarding hydrogen as an object and being lighter than carbon dioxide as the concept, we identify the common concept in this thought and certain other thoughts, such as the thought that something is lighter than carbon dioxide, or that everything lighter than carbon dioxide is lighter than silicon dioxide. Identifying this common element is what we need to grasp the logical relationship of the original thought to a certain family of other thoughts, and to represent those relationships in a formal language. But of course, the relationships that this analysis allows us to grasp do not exhaust the logical relationships of the original thought. It also has relationships to the thought that hydrogen is lighter than nitrogen, or that hydrogen is lighter than everything heavier than helium. To grasp those relationships, we need to split the original thought up differently, regarding carbon dioxide as the object, and being heavier than hydrogen as the concept. The doctrine of multiple analysis ensures that it is possible and legitimate to do this, and therefore to represent the logical relationships of a thought to different families of other thoughts. In effect, the point of the doctrine of multiple analysis is to give us the flexibility needed to represent all the logical relationships of a thought in a system like the one of Begriffsschrift. So much for the three theses. Now that we understand them, we can give a straightforward argument that Frege's distinction between concepts and objects is not an ontological distinction. Call this the argument 172 NUMBERS, AGAIN from analysis: 1. Concepts and objects are obtained by splitting up thoughts. 2. The way in which a thought is split up is not a feature of the thought itself, but of how we grasp it. 3. So: the division of a thought into concepts and objects is a matter of how we grasp it. 4. So: something's being an object or a concept is a matter of how we grasp the thought in which it occurs, not a feature that it has independently of us. The first premise is just the doctrine of the priority of the proposition. The second premise is part of Frege's understanding of the doctrine of multiple analysis. These two premises imply the intermediate conclusion (3), that analysis of a thought into objects and concepts depends on how we grasp that thought. But if that is right, it follows that (4) things count as objects or concepts in virtue of how we analyze the thoughts in which they occur. Note that this conclusion concerns why things count as objects or concepts, regardless of what such things are, or whether anything plays both roles. The point is that a thing's status as an object or a concept is an epistemological matter, a matter of how we grasp it in thought, not an ontological feature it has independently of us. Here, then, is the picture that emerges. When Frege emphasizes that "Jupiter has four moons" can be converted into "The number of Jupiter's moons is four" in Grundlagen §57, he is thinking of these sentences as expressing the same thought, which is independent of its analysis, and which we are free to express in either way. How we analyze it will depend on our choice of expression, and the point of analyzing it in some particular way is to exhibit its logical relationships to certain other thoughts. This particular thought obviously has relationships to other thoughts in, say, the science of astronomy; but in the Grundlagen, Frege is concerned to bring out its relationships to arithmetical propositions. Arithmetical propositions have a standard means of expression, in which terms for numbers are always regarded as arguments, not as function symbols. So standard arithmetical practice analyzes arithmetical thoughts in a way that assigns numbers to the object role, rather than the concept 173 NUMBERS, AGAIN role, within them. For the purpose of exhibiting its logical connections to arithmetical thoughts, the best choice for an expression of the thought about Jupiter's moons is therefore one that also treats 'four' as a proper name. For Frege, this is the specificational sentence: "The number of Jupiter's moons is four." So in §57, Frege is arguing that we can and should analyze thoughts involving numbers in such a way that assigns numbers to the object-role, as opposed to the concept-role, given that we want to make their logical relationships to arithmetical thoughts and our usual means of expressing them clear. Other analyses of thoughts involving numbers are possible, and appropriate, for other purposes. His claim that numbers are objects is not a claim about their ontological status, but about how arithmetical thoughts are standardly grasped and analyzed by us. We could develop arithmetic based on a different analysis, as Dummett shows. But as long as we haven't in fact done so, the best way to make it intelligible why arithmetical knowledge is relevant to claims with non-arithmetical content is to assign numbers the same epistemological role in the latter as in the former. 5.1.3 Concepts and objects after the distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung So at least in Frege's early work, concepts and objects should be thought of as exclusive epistemological categories. The distinction between them is a functional distinction, between two complementary roles that result from the analysis of complete thoughts. Specifically, it is a distinction between two roles found in objective thoughts, the kind of thoughts that can be shared between different people, and that we grasp and use in science. To call something an object or a concept is to say it plays one kind of role in scientific thought, rather than the other. I would now like to address an objection to the line of interpretation I have offered so far. The objection is based on Frege's later work, and runs as follows. In the Begriffsschrift and the Grundlagen, Frege had not yet made his distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung. Once he does make the distinction, he speaks of two different levels, or realms. Thoughts and their parts belong to the realm of Sinn; these are what we grasp and express in language. But the realm of Sinn should be sharply distinguished from the realm of Bedeutung. Frege thinks of the realm of Bedeutung as 174 NUMBERS, AGAIN a realm of entities 'out there', the things we study in science, things like planets or protons. It is the realm of things we think about, and which make thoughts true or false. Having distinguished these two realms, Frege faces a choice about where to place objects and concepts, and it is very clear that he places them both in the realm of Bedeutung. This shows, according to the objector, that the Ontic Picture must be correct: concepts and objects are two different sorts of entities out there in the world. In light of this, Frege should be seen as jettisoning the epistemological remarks about concepts and objects from the earlier period, such as his classification of them as species of 'ideas' and his claim that they are obtained from our choices about how to analyze thoughts. These remarks translate most naturally to claims about the realm of Sinn. Since objects and concepts themselves belong to the realm of Bedeutung rather than Sinn, my thesis cannot be right, at least for the post-1891 Frege. In his later thinking, the conceptobject distinction is an ontological, rather than epistemological, distinction. In response, I first want to note that reading the distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung back into the Grundlagen is a bad idea. Perhaps it is true that the later Frege thinks objects form an ontological category, and takes the claim that numbers are objects as an ontological claim. But if so, that just means Frege needs a much stronger argument for this claim than the one he gives in Grundlagen §57 from considerations about grammar and the purposes of science. The interpretation I have offered so far is still preferable for understanding that passage, because it does not construe the argument as a weak argument for a strong ontological conclusion, but a sound argument for a weaker epistemological conclusion. Thus, thinking of concepts and objects in terms of epistemological roles still makes better sense of how Frege understands his claim in the Grundlagen that numbers are objects, and the equivalence between (1) and (2). Still, I think a case can be made that Frege continues to think of the categories of concepts and objects as epistemological roles even after he draws the distinction between Sinn and Bedeutung. There is no denying that later on, Frege places both objects and concepts in the realm of Bedeutung. He says that proper names bedeuten objects, while concept words bedeuten concepts. But the crucial premise in the objection is that Frege thinks of the realm of Bedeutung in ontological terms, as the realm of stuff 'out there' that our thoughts are about, and that make thoughts true or 175 NUMBERS, AGAIN false. I think we have good reason to resist this premise as a characterization of Frege's official view of Bedeutung. My interpretation here is more tentative, but let me try to spell it out briefly. Frege's habit of classifying ordinary physical objects as the Bedeutungen of proper names is what makes the crucial premise in the objection look plausible. Here is just one example of a passage where he does so, from a 1906 diary entry Frege titled 'Introduction to Logic': If we say 'Jupiter is larger than Mars', what are we talking about? About the heavenly bodies themselves, the Bedeutungen of the proper names 'Jupiter' and 'Mars'. (Frege, 1906/ 1997c, p. 295) Remarks like this motivate the translation of Bedeutung as 'reference', and lead us toward thinking of the relationship between an expression and its Bedeutung along the lines of the Ontic Picture, as a kind of correspondence between expressions and independent entities in the world. Frege is saying here that 'Mars' refers to Mars, the planet itself. Since 'Mars' is a proper name, it refers to an object; so Frege is thinking of planets, at least, as examples of objects. It is natural to read Frege as saying that objects, and perhaps all Bedeutungen, have the kind of ontological status that planets have: they exist, independently of us and how we think of them. But such remarks are probably misleading when we look at them in the context of what Frege says about Bedeutung in general. When Frege argues that other kinds of expressions also have Bedeutungen, he does not picture the relationship as a correspondence between expressions and independent entities. He does not try to establish that concept words, for example, have Bedeutung by identifying any entities to which they correspond. Instead, there is an important continuity between the kind of reasoning he employs in these arguments and in Grundlagen §57: he argues that they must have Bedeutungen, on the basis of what's needed to understand scientific practice and thought. The passage I just quoted occurs in the context of one such argument. Frege argues that since words like 'Mars' and 'Venus' have Bedeutungen, we must take concept words to have them as well. Here is the complete argument: 176 NUMBERS, AGAIN As far as the mere thought-content is concerned it is indeed a matter of indifference whether a proper name has a Bedeutung, but in any other regard it is of the greatest importance; at least it is so if we are concerned with the acquisition of knowledge. It is this which determines whether we are in the realm of fiction or truth. Now it is surely unlikely that a proper name should behave so differently from from the rest of a singular sentence that it is only in its case that the existence of a Bedeutung should be of importance. If the thought as a whole is to belong to the realm of truth, we must rather assume that something in the realm of Bedeutung must correspond to the rest of the sentence. . . If we say 'Jupiter is larger than Mars', what are we talking about? About the heavenly bodies themselves, the Bedeutungen of the proper names 'Jupiter' and 'Mars'. We are saying that they stand in a certain relation to one another, and this we do by means of the words 'is larger than'. This relation holds between the Bedeutungen of proper names, and so must itself belong to the realm of Bedeutungen. (Frege, 1906/1997c, 295, my emphasis) In short, concept words must have Bedeutungen because if they did not, it would be impossible to understand how 'Jupiter is larger than Mars' as a whole could express something that is true or false. The fact that the names of the planets and 'is larger than' each have a Bedeutung distinguishes this thought from mere fiction or poetry, such as 'Odysseus observed Mars', or 'Mars vorshooned upon the Jabberwock'. Notice that this argument is quite weak if we understand Bedeutungen in ontological terms. Why would we insist that every scientific expression bedeutet an independent entity? Consider words like 'the' or 'all'. They are clearly important for science, and Frege would count them as concept words. But what is important about these words is that they are meaningful or significant, not that they correspond to some entity. That is, it's important that they make a clear contribution to a scientific thought- or, once we separate the content of the thought from its Bedeutung, that they play a clear role in determining its truth. That requirement can be satisfied by treating these terms syncategorematically, by giving a rule for computing the Bedeutung of the expressions in which they occur from the Bedeutung of the other constituents, without assigning any entity as 177 NUMBERS, AGAIN the Bedeutung of 'the' or 'all' itself. So if Frege is insisting in this passage on a categorematic treatment of words like 'the' or 'all', on which they are conceived as standing for certain entities in addition to merely making a determinate contribution toward the truth value of a complete thought, his conclusion is clearly unjustified. Instead, we should read this argument as telling us something about what the concept of Bedeutung is for. Frege is clearly saying here that all the expressions in a statement must have Bedeutungen if that statement is to express something truth-evaluable, something that is a candidate for knowledge. It seems to me that this is the best way to understand Bedeutung in general: having a Bedeutung is what's required for an expression to contribute to the statement of a scientific thought. Frege says this succinctly in 'Comments on Sinn and Bedeutung': Of course in fiction words have only a sense, but in science and wherever we are concerned about truth, we are not prepared to rest content with the sense, we also attach a Bedeutung to proper names and concept words; and if through some oversight, say, we fail to do this, then we are making a mistake that can easily vitiate our thinking. (Frege, 1891/1997a, p. 173) Thus, even the later Frege should be read as thinking of Bedeutung in primarily epistemological terms. The point of claiming that an expression has a Bedeutung is to say it is suitable for making truth-evaluable claims, claims that are candidates for knowledge and scientific demonstration. Such claims are objective, but as we saw already in Grundlagen §26, there is no need to understand this objectivity as a correspondence between each part of the claim and an entity 'out there'. For an expression to have a Bedeutung is simply for it to have a determinate semantic role in scientific language. Accordingly, the categories of concepts and objects represent two different kinds of semantic role, two different kinds of contribution that an expression can make in the expression of a truth-evaluable thought. Why does Frege so often insist that the Bedeutung of a proper name like 'Mars' is something like Mars, a physical object in the ordinary sense? After all, if all that is required for an expression to have Bedeutung is that it makes a clear contribution toward the truth value of statements in 178 NUMBERS, AGAIN which it occurs, we could assign it a very different Bedeutung. For example, we could say that 'Mars' bedeutet λP.[P(Mars)], as Montague does. Does Frege's preference for Mars as the Bedeutung of 'Mars' reveal that there is more to his notion of Bedeutung than semantic role? At this point, Frege's interpreters divide. Dummett (1981), for example, sees a tension in Frege's thinking about Bedeutung. He thinks Frege conceives of it both in terms of semantic role, in the way I have been suggesting, and in terms of what he calls the 'name/bearer' model. It is the name/bearer model that leads Frege to say that 'Mars' bedeutet Mars, a real entity in the world, rather than something like λP.[P(Mars)]. For Dummett, the two ways of thinking about Bedeutung are complementary, and both are essential to Frege's view of Bedeutung in the case of proper names, but they are in tension in the case of concept words, precisely because concept words do not seem to name any entity. Interpreters like Tugendhat (1970), on the other hand, think that Frege is only committed to thinking of Bedeutung in terms of semantic role. Either we can derive the fact that 'Mars' bedeutet Mars from this idea, or this is simply an extra assumption on Frege's part, unjustified by his official characterization of Bedeutung. I will not try to settle this dispute. I simply want to note that to be faithful to Frege, we must at least allow that an object in the ordinary, physical sense could play the role of an object in Frege's official, epistemological sense. This is an appealing idea, because it helps us see why scientific claims give us knowledge about physical things in the world, and why their truth or falsity depends on those things. Still, I think it would be a mistake to read Frege's characterizations of Bedeutung as requiring that objects or concepts have the kind of ontological status that planets do. Although objects and concepts belong to the realm of Bedeutung, that is compatible with thinking of them in epistemological terms, as two different roles to be played in determining the truth of a scientific thought. 5.1.4 What are the two roles? I have now argued at some length that Frege's distinction between concepts and objects should be thought of as a distinction between two epistemological categories. This interpretation follows naturally from remarks that he makes in the Begriffsschrift and the Grundlagen, and it ap179 NUMBERS, AGAIN pears that he maintains this view even in his later work, after he distinguishes Sinn from Bedeutung and classifies concepts and objects as belonging to the realm of Bedeutung. I have not yet said much about how we should think about these two roles, though. What kind of contribution to thought is associated with each role? When does something play the role of an object, as opposed to a concept? This is the question we need to answer to really understand Frege's claim that numbers are objects. So far, we mostly seem to have learned that if numbers are objects, then they do not play the role of concepts in (arithmetical) thought. Without an independent grip on each of the two roles, this does not get us very far. I began by asking whether Frege is correct to classify numbers as objects. How can we decide which role numbers really play? In order to answer this question, we need some criteria that will tell us how to apply his notions of 'concept' and 'object' in the case of numbers. Unfortunately, this is the point at which Frege's own explanations become unsatisfying, because his official position is that we cannot define what it is to be an object. He says as much in 'Function and Concept': the question arises what it is that we are here calling an object. I regard a regular definition as impossible, since we have here something too simple to admit of logical analysis. (Frege, 1891/1997b, p. 140) Frege does think it is possible to give a definition of concepts: in the same essay, Frege characterizes them as functions whose values are truth values. But because the truth values are merely a special sort of object for Frege, this definition cannot be understood apart from the idea that functions relate things to objects, so it presupposes that we already have an understanding of what objects are. Unless we know what it means to be an object, we don't know what it means to be a concept, either.9 Frege does say some things in various places to try to help his readers understand how he thinks of the two roles. Most of these remarks do 9Dummett (1981), Wright (1983) and Hale (2001a) criticize Frege on just this point. If we don't know what it is to be an object, then we don't know what it is to be a first-level concept, since a first-level concept is a function from objects to truth values. They conclude that unless we have some satisfactory criteria for what it means to be an object, Frege's whole hierarchy of levels is threatened, since each level consists of functions whose domain is the functions defined at the previous level. 180 NUMBERS, AGAIN little more than characterize concepts and objects in terms of each other, though. For example, Frege in several places characterizes objects and concepts in terms of singular predication. He says that "a concept is for me a possible predicate of a singular judgement-content, an object that which can be subject of the same", and that "with a concept the question is always whether anything, and if so what, falls under it", while the question of what falls under an object makes no sense-an object is, rather, what falls under a first-level concept. (Frege, 1884/1980, §66 n. 2 and §51). But in Frege's view, predication is the fundamental logical relationship. He offers no independent account of it; the claim that singular predication is the relationship of an object falling under a concept is his account. Thus, knowing that concepts are essentially predicative while objects are not will not help us apply the distinction. There are two ideas in Frege's work, though, that may seem to characterize the roles of objects and concepts in more informative terms. The first is the idea that objects are the Bedeutungen of proper names, while concepts are the Bedeutungen of concept words or incomplete expressions. The second is the idea that objects, unlike concepts, have identity conditions. Let's see if either is any help. The first idea is to characterize the roles of concepts and objects by leveraging Frege's claim that they are the Bedeutungen of concept words and proper names. Provided we can classify expressions into these two syntactic categories, we can then use our general understanding of Bedeutung to say what the roles of concepts and objects are more specifically. Call this the syntactic priority strategy for characterizing the distinction between the two roles. This strategy immediately runs into a problem. According to the strategy, if we want to understand what an object is, we must first understand what a proper name is. But what is a proper name? Frege does not give a theoretical answer to this question. He mostly seems to rely on intuitions about whether or not an expression is 'complete', as well as a few grammatical heuristics like the use of the definite article, to identify proper names. Dummett (1981, Ch. 4), Wright (1983, Ch. 2), and Hale (2001a, 2001b) all criticize Frege for failing to provide satisfactory theoretical criteria for an expression to be a proper name, and attempt to develop a better account. In their view, the main problem is to distinguish genuine proper names from other expressions that can occupy the same grammatical po181 NUMBERS, AGAIN sitions, such as quantifier expressions like 'nobody'. Dummett supplies some tests to distinguish proper names from such expressions by their behavior in inferences. Wright and Hale both argue that Dummett's criteria are not sufficient on their own, but can be made to work if appropriately supplemented. These efforts are not an unqualified success, even by their authors' own lights.10 Even if we could find satisfactory criteria, though, there is a bigger problem with the syntactic priority strategy. Frege does think that the categories of objects and concepts are correlated with the categories of proper names and concept words, but that is not because he thinks the syntactic distinction is prior. Here's an intuitive way to see the point. It is true that Mars is an object and 'Mars' is a proper name, and these facts correspond to each other; but it is hard to imagine Frege saying that Mars is an object because 'Mars' is a proper name. Instead, Frege takes the syntactic and epistemological distinctions to be correlated because he is a reformist about syntax: he wants to design a formal language whose syntax will reflect the distinction between concepts and objects. This is something we can only guarantee by artifice, after careful analysis of the logical relationships between complete thoughts in some scientific domain. In a logically-ideal language, we use a term like 'Mars' as a proper name because that is what allows us to express thoughts about Mars in a way that makes their logical relationships to other thoughts clear and explicit. It can happen that natural languages are already ideal in this respect: perhaps the syntax of 'Mars' in English is already wellsuited to helping us grasp the relationships between, say, thoughts about Mars and thoughts about Jupiter. But Frege is not committed to the idea that we can always discover the correct category for an expression's Bedeutung in a logically-ideal language based on its syntax in an existing language, as his remarks about the ordinary attributive use of 'four' in Grundlagen §57 show. Thus, the first idea is not going to work. We cannot characterize con10Wright, for example, remains unsettled by the possibility that we will not be able to state the criteria in a language-independent way, and that there will consequently be no language-independent characterization of objects. There will then be no such thing as "International Platonism" about numbers, no conclusion that numbers are objects tout court (Wright, 1983, p. 63). Unless the criteria can be made more universal, we would only be able to say that numbers are objects for speakers of this or that language. 182 NUMBERS, AGAIN cepts and objects by the fact that they are the Bedeutungen of concept words and proper names except with respect to a logically-ideal language, and we are not in a position to call any language logically ideal before we have done the work of analyzing the thoughts it can be used to express. To decide whether numbers play the role of objects or concepts, we have to ask which way of analyzing and expressing thoughts containing numbers makes the logical relationships between them clear. It is not sufficient to show that 'four' occurs in a particular syntactic category in an English sentence; we also need to know whether that sentence has a syntax suitable for representing those relationships. What about the second idea, that objects have identity conditions while concepts do not? In the famous passage in Grundlagen §62, Frege writes: How, then, are numbers to be given to us, if we cannot have any ideas or intuitions of them? Since it is only in the context of a proposition that words have any meaning, our problem becomes this: To define the sense of a proposition in which a number word occurs. But we have already settled that number words are to be understood as standing for self-subsistent objects. And that is enough to give us a class of propositions which must have a sense, namely those which express our recognition of a number as the same again . . . In doing this, we shall be giving a general criterion for the identity of numbers. (Frege, 1884/1980, §62, my emphasis) Frege is saying that it is a necessary condition on our using words as proper names of objects that they can figure in a special kind of statement. This is a statement that expresses our recognition of the object as 'the same again', the judgment that the object is identical with itself. Elsewhere, Frege claims that concepts cannot stand in the identity relation (though they can stand in the analogous relation of being co-extensive). So it appears to be necessary and sufficient for something to be an object that it makes sense to judge it to be the same as, or different from, another object. More succinctly, objects, but not concepts, have identity conditions. If we could establish that numbers have identity conditions, we would establish that they play the role of objects. This thought is less helpful than it seems. The trouble here is parallel to the trouble with the first idea: we have no prior grip on recognition 183 NUMBERS, AGAIN judgments or the concept of identity, just as we have no prior grip on the syntactic categories of proper names and concept words. As Wright (1983, p. 55) emphasizes, the only plausible way to pick out the concept of identity is by its logical behavior, as a predicate R such that for any terms X and Y and any context Φ, R(X, X) is true, and if R(X, Y) is true, then Φ(X) is true if and only if Φ(Y) is true. The problem is that this criterion does not distinguish identity from the analogous relation of coextensiveness for first-level concepts, unless we already know whether X and Y are proper names or concept words. And as I have just argued, we won't know that prior to logical analysis of the thoughts we can express in the language. This should not be surprising in light of Frege's doctrines of the priority of the proposition and multiple analysis. Frege explicitly holds that some judgments can be analyzed both as identities and as non-identities. In Grundlagen §64, for example, Frege asserts that the thought expressed by "line a is parallel to line b" is the same as that expressed by "the direction of line a is identical with the direction of line b". Thus, there is no fact of the matter about whether such judgments are 'really' identities or not; for Frege, a judgment is not a recognition judgment independently of a particular analysis into objects and concepts. This means that we will not be able to use the idea that objects have identity conditions to characterize the role of objects in a way that helps us decide whether numbers play the role of objects in the thoughts expressed by statements like "The number of Jupiter's moons is four". We cannot decide whether this statement expresses an identity prior to deciding whether four is an object, or 'the number of Jupiter's moons' and 'four' are proper names. So both ideas fail to tell us much about how to apply Frege's distinction between concepts and objects in the troublesome cases, and I am not aware of anything Frege says that might be more helpful. The situation we are in is something like that of an unfortunate physiology student, who has learned that the liver produces bile and the gall bladder stores it, but when dissecting a specimen finds herself unable to say which organ is which. She knows they are different and functionally related; but without some additional information, she will not be able to apply what she knows to decide whether this bilious organ is a liver or a gall bladder. Likewise, we still need some additional information that will help us apply the concept-object distinction to the case of numbers. I turn now to deriving this additional information from game-theoretical semantics 184 NUMBERS, AGAIN and the concept of an investigation. 5.2 THE INVESTIGATORY CONCEPTION OF CONCEPTS AND OBJECTS The discussion in the previous section has given us some desiderata for an explication of Frege's concept-object distinction. To align with Frege's understanding of the distinction, any interpretation of it should at least do the following: 1. It should interpret the distinction between objects and concepts as a distinction between two epistemological roles, or between two ways that things are apprehended in thought. 2. It should explain why the distinction is exclusive, and the two roles are complementary. 3. It should preserve the idea that objects and concepts are objective, because they represent two roles in objective (truth-evaluable, scientific) thoughts. 4. It should be intuitive, allowing us to say that things like planets or persons, which are 'objects' in the ordinary physical sense, can play the role of objects in the official epistemological sense. 5. It should be applicable, in the sense that it helps us see whether something is playing the role of an object or a concept, and why. In particular, it should be applicable even when we do not know whether our existing language for talking about that thing is logically ideal. 6. Finally, it should be analytical, respecting the doctrines of the priority of the proposition and multiple analysis. In particular, it should preserve the idea that pairs of sentences like (1) and (2) can express the same thought, independently of its analysis into objects and concepts. I now want to argue that an interpretation of the distinction based on the concept of an investigation can satisfy all of these desiderata. I therefore call this interpretation the investigatory conception of concepts 185 NUMBERS, AGAIN and objects. Because it satisfies these desiderata, the investigatory conception agrees with Frege's own. It also improves on his explanation of the distinction, because it provides us with an account of what it means to be an object that we can apply to the case of numbers. According to this account, there is a clear sense in which numbers are objects. We may therefore agree with Frege, and accept the first-order analysis of (1). I will first explain the investigatory conception of concepts and objects using game-theoretical semantics, which was introduced in Chapter 4. I will then argue that this interpretation satisfies the first four desiderata: it conceives of concepts and objects as epistemological roles, and makes the roles exclusive, objective, and intuitive. It requires more work to show how this interpretation applies to the case of numbers, and that it is analytical, so I will discuss those issues separately. 5.2.1 Concepts and objects in game-theoretical semantics To see how we can derive an interpretation of the concept-object distinction from the game semantics, recall the rules for the quantifiers in the game for a sentence S played on model M: G.∃. If S is of the form (∃x)S′, the move is made by the Verifier. She goes to the domain of individuals in M, chooses an individual, and gives it a name 'a'. The name is substituted for 'x' in S′. The resulting sentence is called 'S′(a/x)'. The game continues in the next round with respect to S′(a/x). G.∀. If S is of the form (∀x)S′, the same thing happens as in G.∃, except that the individual is chosen and named by the Falsifier. These two rules connect players' moves in the game with the objects in the domain of M, and they are the only two rules that do so. Thus, they characterize the role of objects in the semantic game. Essentially, I propose that we take this role as constituting what it means to be an object. An object is what a player searches for and finds in the domain of a model, and specifies with the name 'a', when making a move in accordance with one of these rules. Coordinately, if an object is what a player searches for and specifies, a concept constrains such a search. It is what determines whether a particular choice of an object is strategic or unstrategic in the game. This is an 186 NUMBERS, AGAIN appropriate characterization of concepts because of the relationship between strategic play and truth. To see this, notice that a formula with one free variable will express a concept. In the game for '∃xφ(x)', the choice of object that the Verifier specifies with 'a' is strategic just in case 'φ(a)' is true in the model.11 Thus, 'φ' expresses a constraint on her search for this object, so it signifies a concept in the sense I have identified. We may therefore say that an expression for a concept is true or false of an object, and that a concept is predicative. We can also say that a player grasps a concept to the extent that she knows how to play strategically during quantifier moves. To play strategically, the Verifier must choose an object that forces the game to end with an atomic sentence which is true in the model, regardless of what other choices the Falsifier makes in the meantime. These considerations constrain her search in the sense that they determine what she should choose. But they also determine what she will choose-provided that she is playing to win, and can recognize her choices as complying or failing to comply with them. Insofar as she understands the constraints, she will be guided in her search for an object and will know how to play strategically. Characterizing objects and concepts in terms of their roles in the semantic game suffices to characterize them more generally, in terms of their roles in investigations structured by which-questions. I developed the ideas which are crucial for this characterization of objects and concepts in Chapter 4. Recall that an investigation is an activity structured by a question, and that we can view an investigation structured by a which-question from two perspectives: it is an attempt to answer this question, but also an attempt to find and give the value of a variable (or some values of some variables). One answers a which-question by finding and specifying that value. These two perspectives set up a correspondence between investigations and instances of the semantic game. On the one hand, quantifier moves in the semantic game can be seen as investigations. Making a strategic choice during a quantifier move requires the player to undertake an investigation. For example, to make a strategic move in accor11Again, the Falsifier's case is symmetric: the choice of object that the Falsifier specifies with 'a' in the game for ∀xφ(x) is strategic just in case 'φ(a)' is false in the model. Because of the symmetry, I leave the Falsifier's role aside in what follows. 187 NUMBERS, AGAIN dance with G.∃ for a formula of the form ∃xφ(x) the Verifier should undertake an investigation structured by the question, which objects are φ? On the other hand, for any investigation structured by a which-question, there is a corresponding instance of the semantic game. A which-question has the general form, which Fs are φ? This question is exactly the question that structures the investigation the Verifier should undertake to determine her initial moves in the game for ∃xφ(x) on a model whose domain consists of the Fs.12 So for every quantifier move in the semantic game, there is a corresponding investigation structured by a which-question, and for every investigation structured by a which-question, there is a corresponding instance of the semantic game. Thus, to characterize objects in terms of their role in the game just is to characterize them in terms of their role in investigations. Something plays the role of an object when it can be sought, found and specified in an investigation. Something plays the role of a concept when it constrains such a search. So that is how to derive an investigatory conception of the conceptobject distinction from game-theoretical semantics. Let's see now why this interpretation makes sense, and satisfies the desiderata laid out above. First of all, notice that like Frege, the investigatory interpretation understands the concept-object distinction in functional terms. What it means for something to be a concept or an object is for it to play a certain role in investigations. We have characterized concepts and objects in terms of how they are used in a certain kind of activity, not in terms of what kind of entities they are. 12I have here used the notation x as an abbreviation for x1, . . . xn. This notation is convenient because it permits both collective and distributive readings for the predicate φ; we may read the formula ∃xφ(x) either as ∃x1, . . . ∃xn(φ(x1)∧ . . .∧ φ(xn)), requiring the Verifier to select n objects, each of which is φ, or as ∃x1, . . . ∃xnφ(x1, . . . xn), requiring her to select n objects that together stand in the relation φ. The former case can be viewed as a series of individual 'nested' investigations; but it is also a special case of the latter, which is best viewed as a single investigation requiring multiple specifications of objects, like an algebra problem with multiple unknowns. 188 NUMBERS, AGAIN The distinction between the roles is an epistemological distinction, as I argued that it was for Frege. An investigation is an activity characterized by its epistemological structure. The distinction between concepts and objects corresponds to the epistemological distinction between questions and answers, between an investigator's different epistemic states at the beginning and end of an investigation. To begin an investigation, you must understand the question that structures it. That is, you must understand the constraints on its possible answers, which is to say that you must grasp a certain concept. To conclude an investigation, you must select among these possible answers, which is to say that you must specify which object you take to answer the question. Thus we may say that the concept-object distinction concerns how we apprehend things in thought. It is not a division between things in virtue of what they are in themselves, but in virtue of their possible epistemic relations to we who carry out investigations and can play the semantic game. This shows that my interpretation satisfies the first desideratum. The epistemological structure of an investigation also implies that the two roles are exclusive, and complementary, within a given investigation. A concept is something known, which constrains and guides players as they search for an object; an object is something unknown, which the search aims to make known. Searching for an object, as opposed to merely guessing or casting about at random, is a deliberate, goal-directed process. An investigator cannot search without some idea of what she is looking for, that is, without knowing how to tell when the aim of her search is fulfilled. On the other hand, a player cannot search for something she already knows or grasps.13 So something playing the role of a concept cannot at the same time play the role of an object within a given investigation; the two roles are exclusive. But the structure of an investigation always involves both, so the two roles are complementary. This takes care of the second desideratum. Concepts and objects are objective under the investigatory conception. Their objectivity derives from the fact that the game semantics, like any logical semantics in the Fregean tradition, is centered around the concept of truth. Claims are objective insofar as they admit of being true or false, that is, insofar as they have truth conditions. The game semantics describes the truth conditions of claims using the notion of a win13Readers of Plato will recognize the Meno problem here. 189 NUMBERS, AGAIN ning strategy in the game. We have characterized concepts and objects by their roles in that game; so we may consider them objective insofar as they form part of the conditions under which a claim is true or false. At any rate, it is no more (or less) doubtful that objects and concepts are objective as characterized by the game semantics than as characterized by a standard Tarski-style semantics, since the two styles of semantics are extensionally equivalent. The game semantics also allows us to describe both objects and concepts as objective in the broadly Kantian terms underlying Frege's understanding of objectivity in the Grundlagen. Objects are objective in the sense of being intersubjective, both at the level of the language and at the level of a model or interpretation. The domain of the model is shared in the game; there are no objects that one player can choose but the other player cannot. Likewise, the canonical expressions used to specify objects are shared. A player does not count as making a choice of object unless she uses an expression which makes it clear to the other player which object she has chosen. This precludes private, subjective mental entities from being objects, and precludes using a private language to specify objects. Thoughts are objective because they are expressed in a shared language that speaks about objects in a shared world. The objectivity of concepts might raise more worries. I have spoken of concepts as 'guiding' a player's search for an object, and this might make it seem as if concepts exist only in the minds of the players. I have been careful to qualify this language for this reason. According to the investigatory conception, a concept determines what is correct for a player to choose, in the sense that it determines what is strategic. Correctness, like truth, is an objective notion. A concept only 'guides' a player, in the sense of determining what she actually will choose, insofar as she grasps the concept and understands it as constraining what she should choose. The concept is independent of any particular player's grasp of it, or ability to be guided by it when searching. Thus, both objects and concepts are objective, satisfying the third desideratum. Finally, it is clear that the role of objects is 'intuitive' in the sense I laid out above: ordinary physical objects can play the role of what the players seek, find, and specify in the game. We have already seen examples of this, in Chapter 4. The domain of a model may consist of physical objects in some part of the physical world, like pieces on a chessboard, or planets in the solar system, because it is possible to search for one of 190 NUMBERS, AGAIN these things, and to say which of them one is choosing. But so long as we can conceive of investigations that are not physical explorations, we do not have to think that all objects are physical (or spatial, or 'actual'). Anything that can be sought, found and specified in an investigation- anything we might speak of when answering a which-question-plays the role of an object, according to the investigatory conception. 5.2.2 Numbers as objects These observations at last put us in a position to answer my opening question: are numbers objects? That is, do they play the object role in scientific thought? According to the investigatory conception, the answer is a resounding yes. Numbers are a clear example of something we seek, find and specify in investigations. Indeed, they are a paradigm case. In Chapter 4, I introduced the concept of an investigation through examples of elementary algebra problems. The practice of solving such problems makes a distinction between what does and does not count as finding and specifying a number. An equation like x = 1 2 can be used to specify a number and thereby provide the solution to a problem, because it is in canonical form. Equations like 4x2 − 4x + 1 = 0 or 2x− 1 = 0 do not specify numbers; that is why they are used to give problems, not solutions. Elementary algebra can even be axiomatized into a deductivelycomplete first-order theory (Tarski, 1967), which can be interpreted via the game semantics. So it hardly seems possible to doubt that numbers play the role of objects according to the investigatory conception. It follows that a first-order analysis of specificational sentences like (1) The number of Jupiter's moons is four. is correct and appropriate on the investigatory conception. Like an algebraic solution statement, this sentence specifies a number. A first-order 191 NUMBERS, AGAIN analysis requires that numbers are objects, but we are now taking objects to be defined as what can be specified at the conclusion of an investigation. So we may say that 'four' stands for an object in (1), just because it is doing the work of specifying a number. Under the investigatory conception of objects, the first-order analysis of this sentence simply makes explicit what we established by other means in Chapters 1–3: that 'four' answers the which-question left open by 'the number of Jupiter's moons', a question we might otherwise express as "Which number is the number of Jupiter's moons?" or, more colloquially, "How many moons does Jupiter have?" Our puzzle, though, was that canonical expressions like 'four' do not appear to belong to a grammatical category of names or singular terms. They instead belong to the category of adjectives, or determiners, or some other syntactic category in natural language. The virtue of the investigatory conception of objects is that this does not matter. We do not decide whether something plays the role of an object by looking at the syntax of the expression used for it in natural language. Instead, we ask whether it is the kind of thing that can be sought in an investigation, and whether that expression is canonical. That is, we ask whether our expression for it is being used to indicate which thing it is, in a way that is not subject to a reply of 'But which do you mean?'. For the purposes of logical analysis, we might design a language where all such expressions belong to the same syntactic category, but we have no reason to assume that the syntax of natural language is already structured that way. Fortunately, on the investigatory conception, we have no need to make that assumption in order to apply the concept-object distinction. To conclude that the number four plays the role of an object, we need only observe that 'four' is a canonical expression for it. 'Four' can be used to indicate a choice of the number four, and thereby complete an investigation structured by a 'How many?' question in a sentence like (1). This is so even if 'four' is an adjective or a determiner or something else as far as syntax is concerned. It is worth stressing how different this approach is from the approach of neo-Fregean logicists like Wright (1983) and Hale and Wright (2001). Both approaches agree with Frege that numbers play the role of objects, but they take very different routes to that conclusion. Wright's route requires a particular understanding of the syntax of expressions for numbers, while the route provided by the investigatory conception of objects does not. This means the investigatory interpretation of the concept192 NUMBERS, AGAIN object distinction is more readily applicable to the case of numbers. Thus, it satisfies the fifth desideratum better than Wright's interpretation, which is the main alternative available in the literature. Let me explain this point in detail. On Wright's interpretation, Frege holds the thesis of the priority of syntax over ontology. According to this thesis, the category of singular terms is explanatorily prior to the category of objects; what it means to be an object should be explained in terms of what it means to be a singular term, not the other way around. He writes: The really fundamental aspect of Frege's notions of object and concept is that they are notions whose proper explanation proceeds through linguistic notions. . . . For Frege it is the syntactic category [of singular terms] which is primary, the ontological one [of objects] derivative. It is because Frege holds this primacy of syntactic categories that he believes that he can legitimately argue that the syntactic behavior of numerical expressions immediately settles that numbers are if anything a kind of object. (Wright, 1983, p. 13) On this way of conceiving of objects, to be an object is to be the referent of a singular term. Thus, we explain why numbers are objects by showing that our expressions for them are singular terms, and that they occur in certain true sentences. Because the sentences are true, these numerical expressions refer, and because they are singular terms, their referents are objects. I explained above why I don't think we can read Frege as treating the category of singular terms as prior to the category of objects, though he does think the two categories are in correspondence in a logicallyideal language. My present point is that Wright's interpretation faces a problem in reaching the conclusion that numbers are objects which the investigatory interpretation does not. On Wright's approach, the syntax of the language we use to talk about numbers is fundamental. Under the syntactic priority thesis, we cannot apply the concept-object distinction in the case of numbers unless and until we have an account of the syntax of number words. Wright never really doubts that (1) has the syntax of an identity statement in which 'four' appears as a singular term, but that is exactly what comparing (1) with other specificational sentences 193 NUMBERS, AGAIN leads us to doubt. It appears that 'four' is an adjective or determiner in that sentence, just as much as in "Jupiter has four moons". And as long as some of our uses of number words do not appear to be singular terms, then Wright's strategy for arguing that numbers are objects is threatened. Someone who adopts the syntactic priority thesis either must explain that those uses really do count as singular terms after all, or explain why those uses can be ignored when applying the concept-object distinction. The investigatory conception of objects does not take syntax as fundamental, so it does not face this worry. Instead, it takes investigations as fundamental. We recognize numbers as objects by recognizing them as the kind of thing we can search for and specify. It is obvious that we do search for and specify numbers; so it is obvious that they play the role of objects. A great advantage of the investigatory conception of objects is that this conclusion is not beholden to changes in the syntax of the language we use to talk about numbers, or changes in our understanding of that syntax. It is only beholden to our practice of asking and answering a certain kind of mathematical question, the kind of question asked in elementary problems in arithmetic and algebra. 5.2.3 Specification without syntax I have argued that under the investigatory conception, numbers play the role of objects, and the roles of concepts and objects are exclusive. Does this mean that numbers do not play the role of concepts? Not in general. We have reached a vantage point from which we can apply the distinction between concepts and objects independently of the syntax of natural language. To decide whether something is a concept or an object, we ask about its role in thought. Under the investigatory conception, this question becomes: is it something we search for and specify in investigations, or is it something that constrains such a search? But now that we have learned to think of concepts and objects in terms of their roles, it would be better to ask this question in a slightly different way. We should not presuppose that things always play the same roles across different thoughts. Rather than asking whether numbers or anything else play the role of concepts in thought, we should ask whether they ever play the concept role in a thought. I will argue that they do. To reach that conclusion, we have to revisit Frege's doctrines of the priority of the proposition and multiple analysis. We saw earlier that 194 NUMBERS, AGAIN Frege thinks of concepts and objects as having been obtained by splitting up or analyzing a thought, and that this is something we are free to do in different ways, so something does not play the role of a concept or an object independently of how we analyze the thought in which it occurs. I called this the argument from analysis. Given these doctrines, my argument is simple: in general, it is possible for one and the same thing to play the object role under one way of splitting up a thought, and the concept role under another way. This is no less true for numbers than for other kinds of things. Thus, by seeing how to accommodate the doctrine of multiple analysis under the investigatory conception, we will be led to see why numbers can play both roles. The only question that will remain is how we can best represent this insight in a language of analysis like that of the Begriffsschrift, a language which is designed to express the relationships between different ways of splitting up a thought. First of all, to narrow our focus, let's make a distinction. Frege gives several different kinds of examples of how a thought can be analyzed in multiple ways. Here are a few: (6) Passivization (Frege, 1879/1967, §3) a. The Greeks defeated the Persians at Plataea. b. The Persians were defeated by the Greeks at Plataea. (7) Clause nominalization (Frege, 1879/1967, §3) a. Archimedes perished at the capture of Syracuse. b. The violent death of Archimedes at the capture of Syracuse is a fact. (8) Abstraction (Frege, 1884/1980, §64) a. Line a is parallel to line b. b. The direction of a is identical to the direction of b. (9) Concept-extension conversion (Frege, 1892/1997e, pp. 187–188) a. There is at least one square root of 4. b. The concept square root of 4 is realized. (10) Specification (Frege, 1884/1980, §57) a. Jupiter has four moons. b. The number of Jupiter's moons is four. Frege's normal way of explaining the relationships in pairs of sentences 195 NUMBERS, AGAIN like these is that the two sentences express the same thought. There is a common thread that runs through them: in each pair, there is something the same (the thought, the content, the truth-conditions) but also something different (the expression, the emphasis, the 'coloring'). The sentences in each pair are equivalent for certain purposes, which we can broadly characterize as logical or scientific purposes. They are not equivalent for others, such as communicative or rhetorical purposes. I will focus on the relationship in the last pair. It is clear from the text of the Grundlagen that Frege thinks of this relationship as comparable to the one in (8), which he characterizes by saying "we carve up the content in a different way"; so it is clear that Frege thinks these sentences represent or correspond to two different ways of carving up a single thought. Still, it is not obvious that the relationships in all five pairs are instances of the same idea, or the same kind of intellectual process.14 For this reason, I will be satisfied to explain why the sentences in the last pair count as two ways of expressing the same thought under the investigatory interpretation. I hope what I say might eventually shed light on the other examples, but I leave that task for another occasion. So we have to explain why 'specificational recarving' counts as expressing the same thought in a different way. This is straightforward, given the strategy of analysis for specificational sentences I developed in Chapter 4, and the interpretation of the concept-object distinction I have offered here. The explanation centers on two ideas. The first comes from Frege's discussion of analysis in Begriffsschrift §9. As we saw above, Frege's model for splitting a thought into a concept and an object involves regarding a part of that thought as variable, while holding the remainder fixed; it involves seeing that part as one among several possibilities in a range. The part that we conceive as variable plays the role of an object. The part we hold fixed plays the role of a concept. The second idea comes from the argument in Section 5.2.2. As we saw there, numbers play the role of objects because they are the kind of thing we can seek, find and specify. In fact, there was nothing special about the case of numbers. In general, when we express a thought using a specificational sentence, what is specified in the complement is playing the role of an object, precisely because it is being specified. This just follows from the role of specificational sentences in investigations. It is more or less 14See Dummett (1991, Ch. 14) for further discussion of this issue. 196 NUMBERS, AGAIN true by definition, under the investigatory conception of objects. Both ideas are implemented in the strategy of analysis for specificational sentences I developed in Chapter 4. It's easiest to see all this in the context of a particular example, and it will be helpful to shift away from the example of numbers for a moment. Instead, I will work with the example of colors. Consider the thought we might express as: (11) Io is yellow. One way to carve up this thought is to regard Io as variable, thereby assigning it the role of an object. Suppose we are thinking of it as part of the range of Galilean moons (the others being Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto). Since Io is the only yellow moon in that range, the following specificational sentence expresses this way of analyzing the thought: (12) The Galilean moon which is yellow is Io. This sentence presents the thought as one in which Io is the object selected and specified in answer to the question, which Galilean moon is yellow? Under the strategy of analysis given in Chapter 4, this becomes: (13) ∃!x(x is yellow∧ x = Io) where we think of the Galilean moons as forming the domain of quantification. Here we have used the syntax of a first-order language to represent the process Frege describes in Begriffsschrift §9, by replacing 'Io' with a variable with a certain range. By regarding Io's position as variable, we take the concept in the thought as that of being yellow, contrasting the possibility that Europa or Callisto is yellow with the fact that Io is. The formula in (13) is the same as the one in (11) in the sense that they are logically equivalent. On the other hand, as I observed in Chapter 4, they are practically non-equivalent. Under the game semantics, (13) is true just in case the Verifier has a non-trivial winning strategy in a game of at least two rounds, while the game for (11) is trivial. Thus, a first-order language under the game semantics enables us to explicate the sense in which (12) is a recarving of (11). They express the same thought, but in different ways; they are logically equivalent, but not equivalent for other purposes. 197 NUMBERS, AGAIN This strategy of analysis allows for multiple analysis because exactly parallel reasoning applies to the color. Suppose, in the thought expressed by (11), we instead regard yellow as variable, thinking of it as part of a range of colors including red, silver, and so on. We thus regard yellow as an object; the concept is that of being Io's color. We can express this way of analyzing the thought with a different specificational sentence: (14) The color of Io is yellow. This sentence presents the thought as one in which the color yellow is the object selected and specified in answer to the question, which color is Io? Represented in a first-order syntax, this becomes: (15) ∃!x(Io is x ∧ x = yellow) where the domain of quantification consists of colors. Again, under the game semantics, this formula is logically equivalent to (11), but practically non-equivalent. So the first-order analysis of (14) again vindicates the idea that it represents a recarving of the thought expressed by (11). And since (13) and (15) differ in both their syntax and their semantics- for example, a winning strategy for the Verifier will involve choosing a moon as the value of x in the game for (13), but a color in the game for (15)-they represent different analyses of the same thought. Admittedly, the formula or quasi-formula in (15) will look strange to anyone trained in the Fregean hierarchy and the way it is standardly applied to natural language. Haven't I made a mistake by placing a first-order variable in the position of 'yellow', which is a grammatical predicate? This objection is the central challenge which I have struggled against in this chapter. My answer is no, the first-order analysis is correct and entirely appropriate. But it is only now, with significant interpretive work behind us, that we are in a position to see why. First-order variables represent the role of objects, as opposed to concepts. Now that we understand those roles in epistemological terms, we can see that one and the same color may play the object role in addition to the concept role, depending on how we carve up the thought in which it occurs. This point emerges vividly from examples (12) and (14). Frege would regard these sentences as expressing two different ways of splitting up one thought, which is the same thought as (11) expresses. But it is obviously the very same color which is specified in (14) that is predicated 198 NUMBERS, AGAIN of the moon in (12). If it were not, one or the other sentence's equivalence with (11) would appear to rest on a fallacy of equivocation. The word 'yellow' does not pick out or correspond to different things in these sentences; rather, we use these different sentences to express different epistemological relationships to a single color. Moreover, under the investigatory interpretation of the concept-object distinction, it is easy to see why a color can play both roles. It is possible to search for something on the basis of its color, but equally, it is possible to search for the color of something. That is exactly what will happen in the semantic games for (13) and (15). In the first game, the Verifier must search for an object among the Galilean moons, and her choice will be strategic just in case the moon she chooses is yellow. But in the second, the Verifier must search for an object among the colors, and her choice will be strategic just in case Io is the color she chooses. The conclusion that yellow may play both the role of a concept and the role of an object may still make some readers uneasy. I will reply to some objections in a moment. But before we consider them, notice that the argument I have just given for the case of colors can be repeated, mutatis mutandis, for the case of numbers. Just like "Io is yellow", the thought expressed by "Jupiter has four moons" can be carved up in different ways, including both (16) The planet with four moons is Jupiter. and (1) The number of Jupiter's moons is four. And just like colors, it is possible both to search for a number, and to search for other things on the basis of that same number. When we ask "How many moons does Jupiter have?", and answer with (1), we are searching for and specifying a number, and thus treating it as an object. But it makes just as much sense to ask "Which planet has four moons?", and answer with (16). In that case, we are using the number as a constraint on a search for a planet, and thus treating it as a concept. Thus numbers, like colors, are things which can play both roles, and we ought to adopt a language of analysis that is capable of representing this idea. Frege was right that numbers most often play the object role in our usual ways of carving up mathematical thoughts. But I see no reason why that 199 NUMBERS, AGAIN excludes numbers from playing the role of concepts under other analyses, such as the one expressed by (16). If Frege believed that numbers must always play the object role, I do not see that he gave any good reason to follow him in that respect, in Grundlagen §57 or elsewhere. The investigatory conception gives us room to expand this conclusion beyond numbers to other things, too. Reasons or ways, for example, can be said to be objects in the same investigatory sense that we have found for numbers and colors.15 Our practices of seeking, finding and specifying are just as determinate in the case of reasons or ways as in the case of planets, numbers, or colors. These things can all play a common epistemological role, the role of objects in the investigatory sense. But they may also play the role of concepts; and which role they play is not a matter of the syntax of our expressions for them in natural language, but of whether they are being sought or are constraining a search. Now for the objections. First, how can it be appropriate to use a first-order variable to take the place of 'yellow' in (11)? Instead of (15), wouldn't it be better to analyze the specificational sentence in (14) using a formula like this, (17) ∃!F(F(Io) ∧ ∀x(F(x)↔ x is yellow)) where a second-order variable takes the place of 'yellow'? A second-order variable is a kind of hybrid. The values of second-order variables are like objects insofar as they are alternatives to one another; they are quantified over, and could be chosen and specified during a quantifier move in a semantic game. But they are like concepts insofar as they are predicated of other things. A second-order variable thus signifies both roles in a single form of expression. This may look like exactly what we need in the case of yellow: a kind of expression which stands for something that plays both roles. Perhaps that was part of Frege's motivation for introducing this kind of variable into his language of analysis. But it is not quite what we need. The point of using a formal language to represent a particular way of carving up a thought is to exhibit that thought's logical relationships, which need not follow the syntax of any 15Consider for example that a way is specified in (4-a), while a reason is specified in (5-a), so they count as objects in the investigatory sense. At the same time, there are other specificational recarvings of (4-b) and (5-b) where they would play the role of concepts. 200 NUMBERS, AGAIN particular way of expressing the thought in natural language. When we are deciding how to represent the analysis that corresponds to (14) in a formal language, we should not consider the grammatical role of 'yellow' in English, but the logical relationships that this representation can help us see and understand. It is clear that we will want to use some sort of variable to capture the fact that in (14), yellow is being presented as one among several colors. This way of carving up the thought presents it as logically related to the thoughts that Io is red, or that Io is silver, to the general thought that Io is some color or other, and so on. The question is whether the hybrid role that a second-order variable signifies is the right device to make these relationships explicit. I am not convinced that it is. Just considered as a piece of notation, the second-order form in (17) obscures the symmetry in the two ways of carving up the thought. If we represent the two analyses as (13) and (15), then the first-order notation makes clear that we use the same process to arrive at each analysis from the neutral expression (11): we let one part of that thought vary, and hold the rest fixed. Using a second-order variable, as in (17), introduces a notational distinction between the two cases, but we have no real logical difference for that distinction to express. Colors and moons are both things that we seek, find and specify in language. Our canonical expressions for them have different grammatical properties; but that is entirely beside the point, as Frege would be the first to point out. They also seem to belong to different ontological categories, but I have argued that Frege was not interested in representing this difference in his language of analysis, either. Using a second-order variable would not just be a benign notational quirk, though. The problem is that a second-order variable seems to be a sign which indicates that its value plays both roles. Specifically, it plays them 'simultaneously', under a single way of carving up the thought, since that is what the formal representation depicts. That is not what we need in order to capture what is happening with the color yellow in (12) and (14). What we need is a way to express that something playing the object role in this way of carving up a thought can also play the concept role in that way of carving it up. We need a notation that is neutral between the two roles, not one that combines them, as second-order variables do. This is already adequately achieved by the quasi-formal first-order notation in (13) and (15). The important feature of this notation is that, 201 NUMBERS, AGAIN unlike the second-order notation, the syntax representing predication is orthogonal to the syntax representing variation and specification. Because it uses a distinct sign (the copula 'is') to represent predication, a variable always represents something playing purely the role of an object-something to be specified, at the outcome of an investigation, by means of a canonical expression. Likewise, a canonical expression is neutral between uses which specify something and uses which predicate that thing of something else. For example, yellow is specified in 'x = yellow', but predicated in 'x is yellow'. In this way, the notation is able to represent the idea that one and the same thing can play both the role of an object and of a concept. That one and the same color can play both roles is captured by the common element 'yellow' in these signs; that it plays distinct roles is captured by the different elements '=' and 'is'.16 In (15), the expression 'is x' captures the potential for something playing the object role to take on the concept role under a different analysis: placing the variable to the right of the copula expresses the idea that, given a specific value for that variable, we may go on to hold that value fixed and let another part of the thought vary, such as the part expressed by the grammatical subject. In other words, if there are things which play the role of objects, but never play the role of concepts, this will be reflected in the fact that variables ranging over them never appear to the right of the copula.17 The color yellow, because it is specified as the value of the post-copular variable in (15), is not such a thing, but that is no reason to think it does not play the object role. 16This is not to say that we have to recognize 'is' and '=' as significant parts of these expressions in the sense that they must be treated categorematically, as symbols that stand for something. They are just pieces of syntax used to depict a certain distinction between predication and specification. They could be eliminated in favor of syntactic conventions that don't treat them as distinct symbols, such as putting a canonical expression in boldface when it is used specificationally, and italics when it is used predicationally. I am therefore not suggesting a departure from Frege's view that the copula is "a mere verbal sign of predication" (Frege, 1892/1997e). 17This is basically how Aristotle identifies primary substances in the Categories: primary substances are those things which are not predicated of anything else. This makes primary substances a special kind of individual, but not the only kind. The notation I am suggesting is therefore capable of making a distinction like Aristotle's distinction between primary substances and other kinds of individuals. An object, or individual, is the value of a variable; primary substances are those individuals in a model that can never be specified as the value of a post-copular variable without making the sentence false. 202 NUMBERS, AGAIN Still, the objector may press further: doesn't this proposal obliterate Frege's insights? Have I not simply eliminated the idea that a concept is 'essentially predicative' and 'unsaturated', or that "a concept cannot be made into an object without altering it"? In allowing that a color can play both roles, and seeking to accommodate that idea in logical notation, am I not making exactly the proposal that Benno Kerry made, which Frege assailed in 'On Concept and Object'? Any such objection can be answered, I think, by reminding the reader that the concept-object distinction is not a distinction between ontological categories, but between epistemological roles. Being essentially predicative or 'unsaturated' is not a property of the color yellow insofar it is a certain kind of entity or thing; instead, yellow is predicative or unsaturated insofar as it plays the role of a concept. That is, yellow is essentially predicative qua concept, not qua color, and the argument from analysis implies that it only plays the role of a concept with respect to a given analysis of a thought. Its role as a concept is adequately represented in the notation I have proposed by the fact that 'is yellow' is an incomplete expression, a predicate suitable for forming a complete truth-evaluable sentence when completed by an expression like 'Io'. Similarly, the notation represents the alteration that occurs between taking yellow as a concept and taking it as an object as the transformation from 'is yellow' to '= yellow'. This is not to be thought of as a mysterious change in the ontological status of a color. It is an ordinary change in our epistemological relationship to that color, the kind of change that occurs between asking "Which of these fruits is yellow?" and "What color is the lemon?" Here is another way to put the point. The function-argument notation that Frege developed in the Begriffsschrift and that has evolved into our modern notation was designed to express his epistemological distinction between concepts and objects, which it does very well. I am not recommending that we abandon the insights which led to it; I am only recommending that we recognize its limitations. Because it is so sharply focused on representing the distinction between two epistemological roles, Frege's notation is inadequate for representing the idea that one thing can play both roles. The reason for this is that Frege's notation represents the distinction between the roles using mutually exclusive syntactic categories. Frege's notation represents yellow in its object role using a term like 'yellow', and in its concept role using a predicate like 'Yellow(ζ)', and recognizes no common element in the semantics of these expressions. 203 NUMBERS, AGAIN I am proposing that, by adopting a syntax for canonical expressions which is neutral between specificational and predicational uses, we can escape this limitation, and so increase the expressive power of our language of analysis. Though it remains possible to distinguish the two roles, it also becomes possible to represent how a single thing plays one role under one way of carving up a thought, and another role under another carving. The example of colors shows that such a language is intuitively desirable, and well-suited to expressing the different ways we 'specificationally recarve' thoughts in natural language. So what is to stop us from adopting such a language for the purpose of analyzing what sentences like (12) and (14) say? Furthermore, once such a language is available, it will make just as much sense to apply it to the case of numbers, for the reasons given above: like colors, numbers play both roles, and we ought to represent both the distinction between those roles and the common semantic element between them in our language of analysis. Much more needs to be said, of course, to work these insights into a complete formal system, and show that this system is consistent and adequate for the purposes of logical analysis. I am not worried that this can be done successfully.18 But I cannot carry out that project here, and must leave it for future research. So here is where we have ended up. By taking Frege's doctrines of the priority of the proposition and of multiple analysis seriously, as well as his idea that a specificational sentence articulates one way of carving up a thought, we are led to the conclusion that things like numbers and colors can play the roles of both objects and concepts. We have thus avoided the forced choice that puzzled us at the beginning of the chapter: we do not have to assign numbers or colors to one role or the other once and for all; we can instead recognize that they play both, and devise a language of analysis which is capable of expressing this fact. Once 18Famous last words, perhaps. But I am optimistic because the notation I have used in (13) and (15) to represent the different ways of carving the thought in (11) is not so different from the language of first-order set theory, except that I have used 'is' instead of '∈', and made use of canonical expressions other than '∅'. There is every reason to think that a fully-specified formal language suitable for representing the logical relationship of specificational recarving will have a natural translation into the language of set theory. I expect that a consistency proof for a plausible theory in this language, relative to the consistency of the background set theory, would in most cases probably only require a straightforward set-theoretic construction. 204 NUMBERS, AGAIN we free ourselves from the idea that we can tell which role something plays in a thought just by looking at the syntax of the expression we use for it in natural language, this conclusion is not surprising or puzzling. Discovering a number's or color's role is a matter of grasping the logical relationships of the thought in which it occurs. The relationships which lead us to assign it to one role or the other may or may not correspond with distinctions between our natural language expressions. We are able to abandon the tight link between syntax and the conceptobject distinction because the investigatory conception of concepts and objects gives us a different way to apply the distinction. Thus, the investigatory conception is the linchpin of the solution to the puzzle. By reorienting our attention, away from syntax and toward epistemology, the investigatory conception gives us a substantive sense in which numbers are objects-but also a substantive sense in which they are concepts. Since it satisfies the other desiderata for a Fregean understanding of concepts and objects, it provides a desirable and correct interpretation of Frege's claim that numbers are objects, one that we can agree with. But since it also implies that numbers may play the role of concepts, few ontological conclusions follow directly from this claim. I will turn to that discussion in Section 5.3, after a brief detour. 5.2.4 A further consideration: specifying what predicates denote In arguing that numbers and colors play both the object role and the concept role, I relied on the idea that when we use words in both ways, we are not using them equivocally. When we use the word 'yellow' as a predicate in (12) and as a canonical expression in (14), we are talking about one and the same thing, namely, the color yellow. Similarly, when we use the word 'four' attributively in (16) and as a canonical expression in (1), we are talking about one and the same thing, the number four. This seems to me the most natural and intuitive way of describing these cases. Still, a Fregean who adopts the Ontic Picture might deny this intuition, and protest that, precisely because these words function as predicates in some cases and as terms for objects others, there is no one thing that each is about. That is, we do use these words equivocally, or at least polysemously. This 'Ontic Fregean' takes his general theoretical commitments to rule out the intuitive idea, and so he simply bites the bullet: 205 NUMBERS, AGAIN since concepts and objects are exclusive ontological categories, it simply cannot be the case that when we use, say, 'yellow' as a predicate and as a term, we are in both cases talking about the same thing, a certain color. Perhaps, following Frege (1892/1997e), we can say that we sometimes speak about objects which 'go proxy for' concepts. But strictly speaking, the two different uses never have a common denotation. In response to this objection, I would like to point out that there is also a good theoretical reason for avoiding the Ontic Fregean's picture. The Ontic Fregean's theoretical commitments prevent him from ever being able to specify what predicates denote. This is a position we should avoid if we want to give a systematic semantics, for either a natural language or a formal language of analysis. I will follow a discussion of this problem for the Ontic Fregean in Rieppel (2013a, 2016). To see the problem, consider the following simple predicational sentence: (18) Oscar is happy. What does 'happy' denote in this sentence? A natural answer is that it denotes the property of being happy. Likewise, when we existentially generalize into the position of 'happy', as in (19) There is something Oscar is. it is natural to say that the quantifier ranges over properties. Properties therefore seem like the perfect candidates for the denotation of predicative adjectives like 'happy' or 'yellow'. On the other hand, it is also natural to assume that 'the property of being happy' denotes the property of being happy. But now we have a problem: even if (18) is true, it is obviously incorrect to say (20) Oscar is the property of being happy. Substituting 'the property of being happy' for 'happy' does not preserve truth. Thus it appears that 'happy' cannot denote the same thing as 'the property of being happy'. So perhaps 'happy' does not denote a property after all. For our Ontic Fregean, there is a seemingly straightforward response to this substitution failure. He will explain the substitution failure by distinguishing the kinds of things that the post-copular phrases in these 206 NUMBERS, AGAIN two sentences denote: while 'happy' denotes a concept, 'the property of being happy' does not. Instead, it denotes an object, which is a fundamentally different kind of thing. The difference between the kinds of things denoted by the post-copular phrases 'happy' and 'the property of being happy' make for different kinds of truth conditions for (18) and (20). Since 'happy' denotes a concept, and concepts are essentially predicative, (18) is a predicational sentence. But since 'the property of being happy' denotes an object, and this object cannot be predicated of Oscar, the 'is' in (20) must express identity: this sentence is true just in case 'Oscar' and 'the property of being happy' denote the same object. But as Rieppel points out, there is a serious problem with this strategy for explaining the substitution failure. The explanation apparently leaves the Fregean with no way to say what concept-words like 'happy' denote at all. For whenever he tries to say what they denote, by completing a clause like (21) 'Happy' denotes . . . he will not be able to fill in the blank. If he fills it with a predicative expression, the attempt does not result in a well-formed sentence. In particular, (22) 'Happy' denotes happy. is ungrammatical and makes no sense.19 Syntactically, the only way to complete the clause is to fill in the blank with a nominal expression of some sort. But if he fills in the blank with a nominal expression, then by his own lights, the result will inevitably say the wrong thing. Since a nominal expression will denote an object, it will not denote a concept, so it cannot be used to specify the denotation of concept-words like 'happy'. The Ontic Fregean cannot even say that 'happy' denotes the concept of being happy! For like 'the property of being happy', 'the concept of be19Admittedly, with both 'yellow' and 'four', this problem is less compelling: " 'Yellow' denotes yellow" and " 'Four' denotes four" do not feel as ungrammatical as (22), perhaps because these words shift to the object role more readily than 'happy' does. This may explain Rieppel's choice of example. On the other hand, the problem is a general one, and it is arguably even worse in some cases where disquoting the object language expression does result in a grammatical sentence, such as with adverbs like 'occasionally'. For while " 'Occasionally' denotes occasionally" is well-formed, it has the wrong meaning. 207 NUMBERS, AGAIN ing happy' is a nominal expression. It therefore denotes an object, not a concept, and gives rise to the same substitution problem as above. Besides giving his view a whiff of paradox20, this conclusion leaves the Ontic Fregean in a dilemma. Neither a nominal nor predicative expression can be used to fill the gap in (21), and since those are his only options, he has no way to say what 'happy' denotes. The problem clearly arises from the Fregean's adoption of the Ontic Picture: because he assumes there is a strict correspondence between the syntactic categories of expressions and the kinds of things they denote, and that objects and concepts are fundamentally different kinds of things, he is unable to specify the concept he intends. Accordingly, Rieppel argues that we ought to abandon these assumptions. Instead of distinguishing predicative and nominal expressions at the level of what they denote, he proposes that we distinguish how they denote. When we distinguish predicative and nominal expressions at the level of how they denote things, we are then free to say that they denote the same things, in different ways. For example, we may say that 'happy' and 'the property of being happy' both denote the property of being happy; the difference is that 'happy' ascribes that property, while 'the property of being happy' refers to it. On Rieppel's proposal, ascribing and referring are two different semantic relations-two different ways that words denote things. This proposal allows us to specify the semantics of 'happy' while avoiding the substitution problem. 'Happy' denotes the property of being happy, by ascribing it. It ascribes this property to Oscar in (18). But 'the property of being happy' refers to the property rather than ascribing it, and for that reason (20) has the form of an identity statement, rather than a predicational sentence. Since Oscar may have the property of being happy without being identical to it, the substitution isn't truth-preserving. And because this approach to the substitution problem does not bar us from specifying what 'happy' denotes, it leaves us in a better theoretical position than the Ontic Fregean's. If Rieppel is correct that this is the best solution, there is independent theoretical motivation for a picture very similar to the one I have offered. Rieppel's idea that nominal and predicative expressions can bear differ20The paradox here is the same as the one in Frege's original claim that "the three words 'the concept horse'. . . do not designate a concept" (Frege, 1892/1997e, p. 184). 208 NUMBERS, AGAIN ent semantic relations to the same things is akin to my claim that some things can play both the concept role and the object role. Where Rieppel would say that properties like being happy, or being yellow, or being four in number, can be both ascribed and referred to, I would say that they can play both roles. Regardless of how we put it, the point is that we need to give up the idea that nominal and predicative expressions denote fundamentally different kinds of things. If we are to get a systematic semantics for predicates off the ground, we should instead think of the distinction as reflecting two different ways our words can be related to things. Our words can sometimes be related to one and the same thing in different ways; one and the same thing can play different roles for us in our language and thought. I don't wish to over-emphasize the parallel. Rieppel's proposal differs from the position I am taking here in several ways. First, Rieppel sees his proposal primarily as a methodological proposal about how to do semantics, and remains neutral about its extra-linguistic grounds. By contrast, I see the semantic proposal as grounded in an epistemological distinction, the distinction between concepts and objects in the investigatory sense. On the other hand, I wish to remain more neutral than Rieppel about whether adjectives like 'happy', 'yellow', or 'four' denote properties. If 'property' is just a piece of technical terminology for whatever such words denote, then I am happy to say that they denote properties, though I think we should first establish that their denotations really form a univocal semantic category. But if 'property' is a piece of metaphysical terminology, say for an ontological category of universals, then the thesis that properties play both the object role and the concept role represents a particular metaphysical position about our epistemic relationship to universals. This is one possible position about the metaphysics of properties-perhaps an attractive one. Still, I think the investigatory conception of the concept-object distinction is compatible with other metaphysical positions, and doesn't decide between them. I will conclude by spelling out this idea. 5.3 PLATONISM AND THE INDEPENDENCE OF OBJECTS I concluded above that we can agree with Frege: numbers are objects-or at least, they play the role of objects, given our usual analyses of math209 NUMBERS, AGAIN ematical thoughts. When this claim is interpreted as I have argued it should be, it means that numbers are answers to which-questions. When we say that numbers are objects, we are not saying anything more surprising than that we give them in answer to the questions we ask with 'How many?'. They share this epistemological role with things we call 'objects' in the ordinary, physical sense: numbers are things we can seek, find and specify in investigations. That is the conclusion of this dissertation. Its main work, of articulating and justifying a conception of objects that applies equally to numbers, other abstracta, and physical things, is now completed. At the same time, I concluded that we have no reason to think that numbers do not also play the role of concepts. A number can be something we seek, find, and specify; but it can also be something that constrains a search for something else. The temptation to deny this stems from the Ontic Picture, from the thought that concepts and objects are two exclusive ontological categories. But the Ontic Picture is not the right interpretation of Frege's theoretical commitments, and it also faces serious theoretical problems. So we should reject this picture, and once we do, nothing bars us from saying that numbers play both roles. In this final section, as a kind of epilogue, I would like to explore whether there are any further consequences we can draw from these conclusions about the ontology of numbers. I have argued that such consequences are not part of Frege's concerns. But they are interesting to consider nonetheless, now that we have a clearer view of the content of his claim that numbers are objects. How far do my conclusions carry us toward an account of the ontology of numbers, and especially toward mathematical realism or platonism, positions that Frege at least sometimes appears to endorse? I will argue that the investigatory conception permits us to endorse a moderate and commonsense mathematical realism. It does not, however, imply anything like a platonist position. As I shall understand it, the distinctive claim of platonism is that numbers are independent in an ontological sense. There is nothing in the investigatory conception of objects to encourage us to adopt platonism in contrast to a position on which numbers exist, but not independently, such as an aristotelian21 position, 21I am using 'platonism' and 'aristotelianism' as labels for these positions because I take them to be inspired by the views of Plato and Aristotle. But I am not making 210 NUMBERS, AGAIN or even a kind of idealism. Let me start by saying what I think we clearly can say in the direction of realism. First, are there numbers? Yes, of course: the previous sentence contains four words; so there is a number of words belonging to the previous sentence, namely, the number 4. We make claims which existentially generalize over numbers, and by specifying the numbers which witness those existential quantifiers, we show that such claims are true. Nothing more is required to see that there are numbers, that numbers exist. The investigatory conception of objects vindicates this most basic realist claim about numbers because it takes such existential generalizations at face value, and assigns them truth conditions which obviously obtain.22 Furthermore, it is clear that we make claims about numbers, and that such claims are objective. For example: the positive square root of 16 is even, and it divides 64. In making this claim, I am making a claim about certain numbers. (What else could it be about?) Specifically, I am making a claim about the number 4, because the positive square root of 16 is 4. This shows that the claim is about a number in the same sense in which any singular predicational sentence is about what its pre-copular phrase denotes: when I specify which object it denotes, I give a number. Furthermore, the claim is objective, just as claims about physical objects are objective. Indeed, one of the desiderata I gave for the investigatory conception was that concepts and objects in general are objective. Numbers follow suit, for the reasons I gave above. Numbers are objective in the sense that they are intersubjective, part of a shared language and shared world. And whether they play the object role or the concept role, the claims we make about them have truth as a standard of correctness: they have truth conditions and truth values; we offer evidence for their truth, and retract them if they are proven false. In short, thinking of numbers according to the investigatory conception yields a moderate mathematical realism. Nothing I have said challenges the theses that numbers exist, that we talk about them, and that the historical claims that Plato was a platonist or that Aristotle was an aristotelian; so I leave the labels uncapitalized. 22Thus, as I am understanding it here, moderate mathematical realism takes an 'internal' reading of existential quantification over numbers, in the sense of Carnap (1956). The platonist, aristotelian, and idealist positions I discuss below go beyond moderate mathematical realism by saying more about the truth conditions of such quantifications from an 'external' point of view. 211 NUMBERS, AGAIN our claims about them are objectively true or false. I see no reason to deny those theses, and every reason to endorse them. And yet. One might still feel there is a nagging question to be answered: do numbers really exist? Are they real in the same way that planets and paramecia and protons are? That is, do they exist independently, somewhere 'out there', independent of and uncreated by our thought and talk about them? Mathematical platonism, as I shall understand it here, is a position that gives affirmative answers to these questions. It goes beyond moderate realism in insisting that while numbers are abstract rather than concrete, they are nevertheless beings in exactly the same sense that concrete objects are. Although numbers are not in space and time, they exist, they are real, in just the same sense as planets and protons. We didn't create or imagine them; we only come upon them already existing, and discover facts about them which would still hold true if they remained undiscovered. What's distinctive of platonism is a certain way of understanding what makes for objective truth. For the platonist, the objectivity of a true claim is tied to the independent existence of the objects that claim is about. When I say "Jupiter is a gas giant", what I say is true because Jupiter makes it true; but it is objective because Jupiter is an object with an independent existence. Such objective claims contrast with subjective claims (like, perhaps, "I am in pain") on the one hand, and fictional claims (like "Sherlock Holmes was a detective") on the other, in that they are about independently existing things. Because Jupiter is a thing 'out there', it would exist, and it would be a gas giant, whether or not anyone knew about that planet or knew it was a gas giant; not so for pains or fictional characters. Similarly, when I say that "Four is even", what I say is true because the number 4 makes it true, and it is objective because that number exists independently, and would be an even number whether or not anyone knew it. The investigatory conception of numbers as objects is compatible with the platonist's understanding of objects as independently existing things. Certainly, any example that one could give of an independently existing thing would count as an object under the investigatory conception. The issue between the moderate realist and the platonist is just about the converse claim: if something counts as an object in the investigatory sense, does it exist independently? Here, I think, we can reasonably answer in the negative. There is room, under the investigatory conception, to hold 212 NUMBERS, AGAIN that not everything which plays the role of an object exists independently. In particular, there is room to hold that while numbers are objects in the investigatory sense, they do not exist independently. So while mathematical platonism is compatible with the investigatory conception of objects, it does not follow from it. What does it mean for something to exist 'independently'? I will consider two ways of understanding this idea, and two corresponding ways of rejecting mathematical platonism: a kind of aristotelianism, and a kind of idealism. Both positions, like platonism, are motivated by a desire to preserve realism about the truth of mathematical claims, while rejecting the platonist's strong ontological stance about numbers. And both positions are compatible with thinking of numbers as objects in the investigatory sense. First, aristotelianism. We have seen that the platonist spells out his position by drawing an analogy between numbers and concrete things. The platonist's models for independent existence are things like stars, or icebergs, or lemons. These are things an aristotelian would consider independent because they are primary substances. Aristotle himself describes primary substances in terms of an asymmetry in the predication relations among things: "a substance-that which is called a substance most strictly, primarily, and most of all-is that which is neither said of a subject nor in a subject, e.g. the individual man or the individual horse" (Aristotle, 1963, 2a11 ff.). In more modern terms, primary substances are those things which are not properties of anything else; everything else, rather, is ultimately a property of them. For an aristotelian, this means that other things are dependent on primary substances: the existence of properties depends on the things they are properties of. Without the lemon, for example, its particular color would not exist. Primary substances are independent in the sense that they don't depend on anything else in this way. Thus, on the aristotelian way of understanding independence, the platonist's claim that numbers are independently existing beings amounts to the claim that they are primary substances. From the aristotelian perspective, this claim is too strong, and misjudges what is required for mathematical realism. Like the platonist, the aristotelian wants to see numbers as real, objective, mind-independent features of the world. But that is compatible with the idea that numbers are not primary substances, because an aristotelian holds that there are things other than primary 213 NUMBERS, AGAIN substances which are real, objective, and mind-independent. Aristotelianism about numbers is the thesis that numbers are not primary substances, but properties of other things, and therefore dependent beings. It is easy to see that this aristotelian position is compatible with thinking of numbers as objects in the investigatory sense. We have seen already that some things the aristotelian would count as properties can play the role of objects in the investigatory sense. Colors are one example: they are qualities of substances, not substances themselves; yet they are specifiable individuals, things which occur as one among many values in a range, things that can be sought, found, and given as the value of a variable. So if the argument I gave above is correct, something can be an object and yet still be a dependent being in the aristotelian ontology. We have only to add that the same is also true for numbers. An aristotelian may take numbers, like colors, to be properties of other things without denying that they are objects in the investigatory sense.23 Any resistance to this idea, I think, would ultimately derive from the Ontic Picture, and a tendency to align the epistemological distinction between objects and concepts with an ontological distinction between primary substances and properties. By rejecting this picture above, we have already made room for the idea that properties may play the role of objects, and so for aristotelianism about numbers. Of course, if the platonist is making the claim that numbers are primary substances, he is asserting a particularly strong ontological thesis. Thus, the aristotelian who denies it is not making a particularly strong claim. But there is also a weaker and more plausible way of understanding the platonist's thesis: numbers are mind-independent. Denying this weaker version of platonism requires making a stronger claim, one that is more difficult to reconcile with realism. Can a moderate realist hold that mathematical truths are objective, and that numbers are objects, yet 23In spelling out her position, though, a modern-day aristotelian about numbers would have to take up Frege's arguments that numbers are not properties of 'external things', at least not in the same sense that colors are (Frege, 1884/1980, Cf. §§21–25). Unlike colors, numbers only belong to things with respect to the concept we regard those things under: the same external thing may be regarded as 1000 leaves or one pile, one book or 24 chapters. An aristotelian can answer these objections, I think, by holding that numbers are properties which belong to primary substances only in virtue of some part or aspect of their form. There is even an aristotelian idiom to express this idea: 1000 is a property of this thing qua leaves, but not qua pile; 24 is a property of this thing qua chapters, but not qua book. 214 NUMBERS, AGAIN hold that numbers are mind-dependent? I believe she can. The resulting position is a kind of idealism. Against the idea that numbers are mind-dependent, the platonist emphasizes that mathematical truths are discovered rather than created. This is just part of the phenomenology of mathematics: in mathematics, we find truths which are new to us, but we feel they were 'already' true somehow. They are not like the claims in a work of fiction, which are products of human imagination, and were not in any sense true before they were authored. Instead, mathematical truths seem more like the truths of empirical science: we accumulate evidence for them, often hypothesizing that they are true before anyone actually proves them; and their truth can sometimes surprise us. The platonist takes this as evidence that mathematical claims are made true by independently existing things, things which are akin to the objects of the empirical sciences in that they are external to us and exist 'already', things which are not products of our imagination or will. Frege himself often voices this sort of intuition. Thus we find him saying in the Grundlagen, for example, that the mathematician cannot create things at will, any more than the geographer can; he too can only discover what is there and give it a name. (Frege, 1884/1980, §96) Such remarks seem like grounds for putting Frege in the platonist camp. But there is another line of thought in Frege that points to a subtler position. A few pages later, in §105, Frege writes: In arithmetic we are not concerned with objects which we come to know as something alien from without through the medium of the senses, but with objects given directly to our reason and, as its nearest kin, utterly transparent to it. And yet, or rather for that very reason, these objects are not subjective fantasies. There is nothing more objective than the laws of arithmetic. (Frege, 1884/1980, §105, my emphasis) This passage tells against attributing platonism to Frege. Frege is saying in this passage that the objectivity of numbers is in fact a consequence of their 'being given directly to our reason': it is because of their intimate 215 NUMBERS, AGAIN connection with reason that they are objective. In other words, it is precisely not their existence independent from minds which gives them objectivity (unlike things that we "come to know as something alien from without"), but something like their dependence on our cognitive capacities which affords them their status. Frege's thought here is in keeping with the Kantian characterization of objectivity he gives in §26 and §27, which I discussed above. To be sure, Frege is not going so far here as to say that numbers are ontologically dependent on us. But the point is that for Frege, the kind of ontological independence that external things have is not necessary for something to be an object, or to be objective. Frege is not, therefore, committed to platonism, at least in the sense in which I am understanding it here. Frege says that numbers are objective because they are "given directly" to reason, and therefore "transparent" to it. What does this mean? One sense in which numbers might be transparent to reason is that they are created by reason. They are known so intimately because they are, in Dedekind's phrase, "free creations of the human mind" (Dedekind, 1963, p. 31): we know them not as a traveler knows a foreign landscape, but as a carpenter knows the house he builds. That is clearly not Frege's position; as we have seen, he explicitly denies that we create the numbers. But perhaps there is room here for a distinction. When Frege rejects the idea that the numbers are created by us, he is rejecting the idea that they are fictional, or imagined-that they are products of human creative acts. But there is a looser sense in which they might be 'created' by reason, the same sense in which any law-governed phenomenon creates things. The movement of tectonic plates creates mountains; the orbits of the Earth and Moon create eclipses. These things are created in the sense that they are causal consequences of other things. Their existence and nature is explained by those things, and they couldn't exist without those things. It seems to me that for Frege, the numbers could be like that: they are created by reason in the sense that they are products of the laws governing reason; their existence and nature are consequences of those laws. In that sense, they are created by reason, though they are not authored by it. Whether or not this is in fact Frege's position, it looks like the start of a moderate realism on which numbers are mind-dependent. According to this idealist position, numbers are ontologically dependent on our capacity for reason, and therefore on our minds, because their existence is a consequence of the laws governing reason. We have to be careful 216 NUMBERS, AGAIN here: to understand this claim as Frege would, we should not conceive of the laws that give rise to numbers as the descriptive laws of human psychology, but as normative, logical laws. The way that numbers are products of the laws governing reason is less like the way that mountains are products of the laws of plate tectonics, and more like the way that a duty to serve on a jury is a product of the laws of the state. This does not mean that the numbers are products of human convention or authorship. It means that their existence depends on a certain normative status: just as the existence of a duty to serve on a jury depends on the existence of citizens, people with the normative status of being subject to the laws of the state, the existence of numbers depends on the existence of reasoners, minds with the status of being subject to logical laws. So numbers do not exist independently; but given that we are reasoners subject to certain laws, they do nevertheless exist. What is interesting about this position is that it can accommodate our intuitions about the phenomenology of mathematics. While the idealist holds that numbers are created by the laws governing reason, this is compatible with saying that numbers and the truths about them are discovered by reason in another sense. For one of the special features of reason is its ability to reflect on itself, to come to know its own laws as well as their consequences. Mathematical truths are perhaps discovered in something like the way that I discover that I have jury duty: even though this duty is the consequence of a law to which I am already subject, I may not know the details of the law, or its particular consequences for me, until an envelope arrives in the mail. In the same way, I may be ignorant of the laws governing reason, even though I am subject to them; and I can discover their particular consequences, even if an omniscient reasoner could see that those consequences held all along. From this perspective, numbers and the truths about them are 'transparent' to reason in the sense that they are accessible to reason via reflection. But that does not mean that such truths are immediate, or that reflection requires no intellectual effort. Mathematical discovery is a process of using reason to understand itself, in all its fine detail, by drawing out and becoming aware of the consequences of its governing laws. Some of those consequences concern particular mathematical objects; the intellectual effort to discover which objects those are is ultimately to be understood as an investigation by reason into the products of its own laws. For example, a beginning number theorist may not know what the 217 NUMBERS, AGAIN greatest prime number less than 100 is, and she can discover through a process of investigation that it is 97. She has here come to know an objective truth about a mathematical object, and will experience this as a discovery, not an act of creation. But for all that, the number 97 and its unique properties ontologically depend on reasoners and minds like her own. I have, of course, only sketched the idealist's ontological position. But if it is coherent, then it seems clear that it is compatible with the claim that numbers are objects in the investigatory sense. For articulating the position even as roughly as I have done makes it clear why the ontological dependence of numbers on minds does not undermine their objectivity, or the phenomena of mathematical discovery. Reasoners have only a limited capacity to survey the laws governing their own minds and the consequences of those laws. It is this limitation that makes it possible to conduct mathematical investigations and make mathematical discoveries; and it is the possibility of such mathematical investigations that implies that numbers are objects in the investigatory sense. I think we may take it, too, that the position is coherent. Although I can hardly hope to prove this, I take comfort in the fact that much greater minds have thought so. I turn again to Frege's own words: On this view of numbers the charm of work on arithmetic and analysis is, it seems to me, easily accounted for. We might say. . . : the reason's proper study is itself. (Frege, 1884/1980, §105, my emphasis) So the conclusion of this epilogue is that the investigatory conception of objects implies very little about the ontology of numbers. The old debate between the platonist, the aristotelian, and the idealist can carry on. Each has a position that is compatible with the claim that numbers are objects. I see this conclusion as a positive result, for it means that the status of mathematical objects as objects and as what makes mathematical claims objectively true is under no threat from metaphysics. Mathematicians, I am told, never really had any doubt about this. 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Pablo García Castillo, Eduardo Quinata Salzar, Cuauhtémoc Alberto Mayorga Madrigal, Rómulo Ramírez Daza y García, Luis Aarón Patiño Palafox, Eugenio Echeverría, José Francisco Barrón Tovar, David Sumiacher, Stefano Santasilia, Ana Cecilia Valencia Aguirre y Raúl Trejo Villalobos Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea Pablo García Castillo, Eduardo Quinata Salzar, Cuauhtémoc Alberto Mayorga Madrigal, Rómulo Ramírez Daza y García, Luis Aarón Patiño Palafox, Eugenio Echeverría, José Francisco Barrón Tovar, David Sumiacher, Stefano Santasilia, Ana Cecilia Valencia Aguirre y Raúl Trejo Villalobos Voces para la filosofía. Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón Editorial UNACH® ISBN: 978-607-561-021-4 Primera edición, 2019 © Editorial UNACH Licenciatura en Filosofía Facultad de Humanidades, Campus VI Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas Boulevard Belisario Domínguez Kilómetro 1081, Sin Número, Terán, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México, C.P. 29050 ISBN: 978-607-561-021-4 Ésta obra fue revisada por pares académicos Coordinadora: Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón Prólogo: Luis Ernesto Cruz Ocaña| Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas Diseño Editorial: Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón Diseño de Portada: ® Tequio, Creación Colectiva Tabla de contenido Agradecimientos..................................................... Prólogo..................................................................... Introducción............................................................. 9 10 13 19 33 46 56 74 89 99 129 150 162 178 PRIMER PARTE: Disciplinas filosóficas Platón o el destino de la filosofía .............................. Pablo García Castillo Ni, tlamatiliz tlaçotla o motlamatiliztlaçoliztla piquiani.................................................................... Eduardo Quintana Salazar Filosofía aplicada. La utilidad de la inutilidad...... Alberto Cuauthémoc Mayorga Madrigal La ética y la verdad como ideas rectoras en la teoría de la argumentación de Aristóteles.............. Rómulo Ramírez-Daza y García ¿Para qué las prácticas filosóficas? El papel de la divulgación en la filosofía actual............................ Luis Aarón Jesús Patiño Palafox El papel de la filosofía en el proyecto de vida de niños y adolescentes................................................. Eugenio Echeverría Genealogía del filósofo mexicano como académico................................................................ José Francisco Barrón Tovar Actos, procesos, pensamiento y acción en la práctica filosófica..................................................... David Sumiacher Capítulo 1: Capítulo 2: Capítulo 3: Capítulo 4: Capítulo 5: Capítulo 6: Capítulo 7: Capítulo 8: SEGUNDA PARTE: Ejercicio de la filosofía El fenómeno del cuerpo entre medicina y sociedad. Una nueva frontera de la filosofía..................................................................... Stefano Santasilia El acercamiento de los adolescentes a la filosofía a través de escenarios dialógicos.............................. Ana Cecilia Valencia Aguirre Wilhem Dilthey: la esencia de la filosofía................ Raúl Trejo Villalobos Capítulo 9 Capítulo 10: Capítulo 11: Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 99 Genealogía del filósofo mexicano como académico José Francisco Barrón Tovar* Problema: no existe un discurso Comencemos con una pregunta que de principio puede parecernos ya retórica: ¿Cuál es la función (social, política, cultural, humana, etcétera) del filósofo mexicano? Suponiendo que tiene sentido y es pertinente, la cuestión tiende a parecernos baladí. Ciertos discursos corrientes dan una respuesta aún antes de formular la pregunta -por eso nos parece retórica-, nos la presentan como un adorno literario, y a la respuesta como un hecho antes que como un problema (Pereda, 1990; Vargas Lozano, 2008 y 2019; Vargas Lozano, Beuchot, Hurtado y Torres, 2008; Dussel, 2017; Rovira, 2018; Hurtado, 2018). Desplacemos mejor la pregunta un poco. Evitemos esas maquinarias discursivas que nos imponen ya una función políticoeducativa del filósofo mexicano: fungir como educador de la nación y como animador de un espacio público. Leamos bien, la pregunta se centra en la historia de la figura del filósofo mexicano, no en la historia del ejercicio de la filosofía en México -suponiendo que podemos separarlos. Repetir la pregunta, desplazada ya en su foco de atención, nos fuerza a mostrar como funcionan estos discursos que toman la historia del ejercicio Capítulo 7 * Profesor de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, UNAM. Candidato a Doctor en Filosofía por el Programa de Doctorado en Filosofía, UNAM. Ha participado en varios proyectos de investigación como: "Memoria y Escritura", "Políticas de la memoria", "La cuestión del sujeto en el relato", "Diccionario para el debate: Alteridad y exclusiones" (http://ae.filos.unam.mx/), "Estrategias contemporáneas de lectura de la Antigüedad grecorromana" (http://elea.unam.mx/) y "Herramientas digitales para la investigación en humanidades". Se ha dedicado al estudio del pensamiento griego antiguo, francés contemporáneo (Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Derrida, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, etcétera) y de los filósofos alemanes Friedrich Nietzsche y Walter Benjamin. Sus intereses son las relaciones entre la estética y la política, y los problemas especulativos sobre la relación entre la técnica, el arte, el lenguaje y el cuerpo. Actualmente coordina el Proyecto de Investigación Seminario de tecnologías Filosóficas (http://stf. filos.unam.mx/) y es vocal en el Comité Ejecutivo de la Red de humanistas digitales (http://www. humanidadesdigitales.net/). Además, se dedica a la planeación, desarrollo, creación de contenidos y coordinador de asesores de la plataforma digital de acompañamiento en los bachilleratos tecnológicos del país, para la Coordinación Sectorial de Desarrollo Académico de la Subsecretaría de Educación Media Superior, de la Secretaría de Educación Pública (http://humanidades.cosdac.sems.gob.mx/ plataformas.html). Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 100 en México, suponiendo que podemos separarlos. Repetir la pregunta, desplazada ya en su foco de atención, nos fuerza a mostrar cómo funcionan estos discursos que toman la historia del ejercicio de la filosofía en México por historia de la figura del filósofo mexicano, estos discursos catacréticos.1 Esos discursos se encuentran entrelazados y conformados en los dos tipos de trabajos historiográficos que ahora nos cuentan la historia de la filosofía en México. Para poder elaborar un discurso que responda a la pregunta sobre la función del filósofo mexicano: • contamos con trabajos que relatan las maneras en que el pensamiento filosófico, la filosofía en México fue constituyéndose institucionalmente -Escuela Nacional de Altos Estudios (ENAE), los diferentes Institutos y Facultades de Filosofía, etcéteraen nuestro país (Cano, 2008; Menéndez, 1996; González, 1994; Gaytán, 1954), y • contamos con trabajos historiográficos centrados en el recuento del pensamiento de los grandes personajes que ejercieron de una u otra manera la filosofía mexicana (Magallón, 2010 y 2013; Muñoz Rosales, 2015; Hurtado, 2016). Y de eso está construida la historia de la filosofía en México. Lo interesante de esta manera en que nos contamos a nosotros mismos en México el relato de cómo el ejercicio de la filosofía llegó hasta nuestros días.2 Interesante es que si queremos resaltar la figura del filósofo mexicano es muy complicado desenmarañarla de entre los discursos de su autoría y las instituciones en relación con las que los elaboró. La figura del filósofo mexicano queda configurada como un efecto de autoría (Foucault, 2009) producido por esos discursos que enunció en determinados procesos históricos 1. Escribe Laclau (2003): Una catacresis es un término figural para el cual no existe un término literal correspondiente. Por ejemplo, cuando Homero escribe acerca de la innumerable sonrisa del mar, eso no es una catacresis; es una metáfora porque hay una forma literal de la sonrisa del mar, es decir, las olas. En cambio, si yo hablo de las alas de un edificio, eso es una figura porque realmente el edificio no tiene alas, pero no hay otro término que pueda reemplazar al término figural. O sea, la eliminación de la referencia literal directa es lo que constituye una catacresis. Es decir, en lugar de atacar la figura del filósofo mexicano, se prefiere eliminar su referencia y se habla, escribe e investiga sobre la historia del ejercicio de la filosofía en México. El problema es que no existe el discurso para la figura del filosófico mexicano, no se le ha hecho aún. 2. Lo que se propone aquí es continuación de un ejercicio de historización de la filosofía en México que se niega a seguir las formas reinantes actualmente. Es sabido que este ejercicio de historización tiene como punto de origen el interés de los alumnos de José Gaos -y de éste mismopara poder saber cuál era el tipo de filosofía que se hacía en México y en Latino e Iberoamérica. Puede revisarse Gaos, 1954; Zea, 1956; Frost, 1972; Rovira, 1998; Vargas Lozano, 2014; Muñoz Rosales, 2015; o Hurtado, 2016. He tratado de discutir a grandes esas maneras de historizar el pensamiento filosófico mexicano (Barrón, 2018). Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 101 institucionales.3 Especie de historia de las ideas institucionales, el filósofo en México es narrado como un gran personaje que enuncia verdades en ciertas circunstancias institucionales. Como si ese gran personaje estuviera hecho de lo que dijo y de las instituciones en donde lo dijo y escribió.4 La historia de la conformación institucional y autoral del ejercicio de la filosofía en México se usa como respuesta a la pregunta por la historia del filósofo mexicano.5 Es así porque esas formas de historizar la filosofía en México obvian y dejan de lado todo elemento o rasgo que las pongan en cuestión. De allí que dejen fuera: procesos administrativos en que se configuró la figura del filósofo mexicano, las génesis abyectas de sus problemas, las emergencias mezquinas de sus formas de discurso, sus procesos sensibles de individuación, las fuerzas sociales y políticas que moldearon al filósofo mexicano, los mecanismos burocráticos que lo conformaron, las decisiones azarosas que lo llevaron a hacer o afirmar tal cosa o tal otra. En lugar de generar genealogías sobre estas líneas problemáticas para investigar la historia del filósofo mexicano, los acontecimientos históricos, en la historia de la filosofía corriente en México, aparecen como si estuvieran conformados por el engarce de un individuo con instituciones. Incluso es una característica que en los trabajos en donde se historiza los procesos institucionales, las instituciones emergen y se conforman gracias a oposiciones y confrontaciones históricas limpios y prístinos que pueden enunciarse sin problema (Cano, 2008). Es decir, para los comunes discursos los filósofos en la historia de México deben ser presentados como grandes personajes que sortean de manera competente, usando sus habilidades discursivas críticas, acontecimientos adversos perfectamente determinados (el positivismo, la revolución, lo mexicano, entre otros), ello mientras construyen instituciones donde pueden ejercer su consabida labor político-educativa de ciudadanización del pueblo mexicano. La postulación de la función educadora e intelectual del filósofo se desdobla en un tipo de narración histórica, que necesita para elaborarse, con una función perfectamente propagandística y legitimadora de aquel supuesto ejercicio institucional y autoral de la 3. Hay pocas excepciones a ello, una es Tomasini, 1998. 4. Cfr. las reseñas de filósofos mexicanos relacionados con la FFyL, UNAM: http://ru.ffyl.unam.mx/ handle/10391/3341 5. En este sentido la verdadera novedad del libro La filosofía en México en el siglo XX de Gustavo Leyva es que, al recuento tradicional, de uso corriente, lo vuelve una "reconstrucción histórica-sistemática". Añade elementos académicos a un ejercicio de historización al uso. Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 102 filosofía mexicana. Esta constelación conceptual deja fuera una cantidad de materiales, documentos, personajes, trabajos, que no se le adecuan. Lo que queda fuera. El carácter colectivo del ejercicio filosófico en México Es arduo no caer en la tentación de los discursos que nos postulan al filósofo mexicano en relación con una figura -por no decir fantasmagoríade un autor con una función político-educativa en relación con instituciones estatales. Historizar de esa manera impide ciertamente valorar las maneras en que se ha ejercido la filosofía en México. Se trata de todo aquello -acontecimientos, documentos, formas de trabajo, personajes, etceteraque queda fuera en nuestras narraciones históricas comunes. Es arduo hacer historia de lo que no se adecua para esa imagen institucional y autoral del ejercicio de la filosofía en México. Un caso problemático como ejemplo. En la base de datos de tesis la Dirección General de Bibliotecas de la Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)6 hasta el lunes 13 de marzo de 2017, aparecen 3840 trabajos terminales de filosofía de diversos grados desde 1928 hasta 2017. 2102 son de licenciatura, 1211 de maestría y 514 de doctorado. Aparecen 3229 autores de los trabajos y 827 asesores. ¿Cómo poder estudiar todo esto? ¿Estos documentos deben entrar en una historia de la producción de discurso filosófico en México? La mayoría de los autores de estos trabajos recepcionales no entran en la caracterización de las historias de la filosofía corrientes en México, tampoco los textos entran en la categoría de obras de autores filosóficos. ¿Deberíamos abandonar la tarea de estudiarlas como parte de la historia de la filosofía en México? ¿Pertenecen a la historia de una institución educativa? ¿Este tipo de labor de asesoría y de escritos de grado podríamos concebirlos dentro del ejercicio de la filosofía mexicana? Pues de lo que aún no nos hemos preocupado los filósofos mexicanos es de producir formas de hacer -técnicas, metodologías, enfoques, formas de discurso, etcéterahistorias a partir de los documentos y el material generado en relación con un cúmulo de acontecimientos que han constituido y que han permitido llevarse a cabo el ejercicio de la filosofía en México. Echamos en falta, por ejemplo, genealogías e historias de: 6. Puede revisarse acá: http://tesis.unam.mx Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 103 • las técnicas y tecnologías didácticas para enseñar filosofía • los materiales didácticos usados para transmitir la filosofía • las prácticas y los medios de publicación de los discursos filosóficos • los tipos y las dinámicas de los grupos de investigación • los problemas y autores más usados en los discursos y en la enseñanza • los manuales usados para transmitir la filosofía • los formatos preferentes en la práctica de la escritura filosófica • los tipos de cursos, seminario y talleres mediante los cuales se reproduce el cuerpo filosófico • los estilos de los discursos en los que se ejerce el pensamiento filosófico • los mecanismos burocráticos-institucioles vinculados al ejercicio de la filosofía • las formas de financiamiento a proyectos y de becas para el ejercicio de la filosofía • las relaciones que los filósofos mantienen con el mercado laboral • los vínculos que mantienen los profesores de Facultades con el cuerpo docente que enseña filosofía en los bachilleratos • los tratos y desencuentros con el Estado • los nexos entre los movimientos sociales y políticos y el sentido de la práctica filosófica • las maneras en que los filósofos mexicanos realizan su práctica en los medios de comunicación tecnológicos Que estas historias no hayan aparecido aún sucede hasta cierto punto porque el ejercicio al uso de la historia de la filosofía, en términos de autores en instituciones, en términos de una función político-educativa, desprecia ciertos materiales como documentos -planes y programas de estudio, formatos administrativos, artículos periodísticos, trabajos recepcionales7-; sólo es posible historizar a partir de las obras de un 7. Una excepción es la tesis "Escuela Nacional de Altos Estudios y Facultad de Filosofía y Letras. Planes de Estudios, Títulos y grados. 1910-1994" de Libertad Menéndez Menéndez (1996). Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 104 autor.8 Dándole valor a los discursos realizados por grandes personajes en contextos institucionales históricamente determinados, se pierde la riqueza del carácter colectivo del trabajo filosófico en México. Si bien se trataría de historias menores, de genealogías singulares, lo cierto es que presentarían de manera más rica -fuera de funciones propagandísticas o legitimadorasla historia colectiva y múltiple del ejercicio mexicano de la filosofía.9 El filósofo mexicano, el filósofo académico Las formas corrientes de hacer la historia del ejercicio de la filosofía en México se muestran insuficientes. El problema se torna entonces: ¿Cómo comenzar esa historia colectiva y múltiple del ejercicio de la filosofía en México? Para nuestro problema aquí: ¿Cómo comenzar a historizar la figura del filósofo mexicano de otro modo que como autor que busca tener efectos políticos y educativos en instituciones nacionales? Se trata del problema de lo que podemos decir sobre el filósofo mexicano, de poder decir y valorar sus prácticas efectivas, sus productos e impactos. Es claro que lo que queda disimulado son las múltiples maneras en que se ha configurado y ha trabajado el filósofo mexicano: como funcionario público, como político, como académico, como profesionista, como individuo que trabaja, que recibe un sueldo, labora, actúa, milita. En este sentido hagamos un pequeño experimento genealógico. Destaquemos mejor una figura histórica del ejercicio mexicano de la filosofía, y una figura reciente: el filósofo como académico.10 Situemos 8. Puede tomarse como un ejemplo la "Cronología de la filosofía mexicana del siglo XX" aparecido en el libro Esbozo histórico de la filosofía en México (Siglo XX) y otros ensayos. Puede revisarse en el siguiente enlace: http://dcsh.izt.uam.mx/cen_doc/cefilibe/images/banners/enciclopedia/Cronologia/ cronologia.pdf 9. Cuando se intenta evitar esas funciones en su lugar se prefiere hacer un recuento exhaustivo de las obras, las instituciones y los autores, cf. Leyva, 2018. 10.Hay una valoración corriente -construida con fragmentos y lecturas sesgadas de discursos históricos de filósofosusada como sentido común hasta por filósofos profesionales en la actualidad en la que se jerarquiza las figuras que el filósofo ha adquirido en México. En la cúspide de la valoración jerárquica se coloca a un supuesto filósofo inmaculado de institución, de metodologías o de procesos administrativos y burocráticos, que vive según una vida filosófica y postula verdades para el porvenir. Jerárquicamente abajo aparecería el profesor de filosofía, si bien institucionalizado y dependiente del estado, cumple una función mayor de educar a la humanidad. Al final de la jerarquía se encontraría el filósofo como académico; suerte de sofista hiperespecializado en procesos burocráticos que sólo se preocuparía por su éxito personal. Cada una de estas figuras acarrea toda una constelación conceptual de cuestiones políticas, sociales, económicas, etcéteras. Fantasmagorías, figuras deshistorizadas, figuras que se usan catacreticamente. Así lo que afirman Concheiro y Rodríguez (2015): Los intelectuales públicos han sido sustituidos por otros actores sociales, entendidos estos últimos a la manera de los tipos ideales weberianos -categorías explicativas que no tienen por qué corresponder empíricamente con la realidad y que permiten las excepciones-. Por un lado, su lugar está siendo ocupado por los expertos (experts) y los tecnócratas, seres especializados en ciertas ramas del saber, a Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 105 este experimento genealógico en la UNAM, en su Facultad de Filosofía y Letras (FFyL). Diferente al filósofo mexicano como profesor estatal (Uranga, 2016) configurado entre el inicio del siglo XX y los años treinta -cuya reproducción de su función político-educativa vinculada a la sistema educativo mexicano estaba asegurada por un sueldo estatal-, el filósofo mexicano tendiente a lo académico comienza a aparecer a partir de los años cincuenta y continúa en nuestros días -recordemos el paso en 1967 del Centro de Estudios Filosóficos, fundado en 1940, a Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas. Comienza a configurarse con la apertura del campus central de la Ciudad Universitaria 11-un espacio donde la filosofía en México ha podido resguardarse para ejercitarse de manera profesionaly al ser sustituido en sus funciones político-estatales por intelectuales y cuadros de funcionarios públicos formados por el partido gobernante. Caractericemos al filósofo mexicano en su función académica como quien ha heredado las potencialidades de las tecnologías de la filosofía histórica y las cuida en un contexto institucional. Se trata de un individuo que ejerce las potencias críticas del lenguaje en un contexto de procesos administrativos y burocráticos de los que depende su supervivencia. Estos procesos administrativos y burocráticos institucionales tienen la finalidad de proteger el ejercicio de la filosofía, buscarían conformar unas circunstancias que permitieran al filósofo académico librarse de los obstáculos y de actividades diferentes al puro ejercicio de la filosofía. En este sentido la figura del filósofo académico no se encuentra dependiente directamente de alguna utilidad -educativa, política, social, etcéterapara el estado mexicano puesto que su práctica y finalidad se asumen como valiosas en sí mismas. De allí su articulación con procesos de evaluación, producción través de las cuales intervienen en aspectos particulares de la problemática social. Por otro lado, están los académicos, también portadores y defensores del conocimiento especializado, pero desconectados del resto de la sociedad tanto por sus temas como por el tipo de discurso que producen. 11. Puede revisarse el "Reglamento de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras" de 1957. Allí aparece en su artículo 1° las siguientes finalidades de la FFyL: I. Impartir una educación de tipo humanístico en un ambiente que permita la expresión de todas las corrientes del pensamiento y el respeto pleno a la dignidad de la persona humana; II. Estimular el estudio de las lenguas clásicas, de acuerdo con nuestra tradición greco-latina; III. Preparar maestros que atiendan la enseñanza de las escuelas secundarias, preparatorias y normales del país y de catedráticos en el nivel facultativo, así como de técnicos e investigadores especializados en las disciplinas que integran el plan de estudios de la Facultad; IV. Impartir los estudios para los grados académicos de maestro y doctor en las diferentes especialidades a que se refiere este reglamento; V. Realizar investigaciones en los ramos de su competencia, orientadas al estudio de los problemas nacionales; VI. Resolver las consultas que el Estado y las instituciones públicas y privadas formulen a la facultad en asuntos de su jurisdicción, y VII. Contribuir a formar el espíritu público, en los problemas de la alta cultura. Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 106 y difusión de instancias académicas internacionales. Efectivamente la función académica se trata de la práctica, generación y fortalecimiento de la filosofía misma.12 Investigar para un filósofo académico mexicano se trata de afinar el instrumental y el armamento conceptual heredado. Las relaciones que esta práctica de investigación académica pudiera tener con otras prácticas -políticas, sociales, económicas, etcéterasiempre quedan abiertas, flexibles, aunque siempre supeditadas al cuidado de refinar el instrumental conceptual. En términos históricos, más de sesenta años de alianzas y negociaciones con otras fuerzas político-sociales posibilitaron que en la FFyL de la UNAM comenzara un proceso de autonomización del ejercicio de la filosofía, y con ello comienza a configurarse la figura del filósofo académico. La educación de un filósofo académico Comencemos un esfuerzo por seguir la relación entre documentos institucionales que señalan un devenir didáctico y la conformación de la figura del filósofo mexicano académico. Poder hacer la genealogía del filósofo mexicano como académico se trata de una tarea mayor: desde la figura del filósofo autodidacta, a la del filósofo abogado, la del filósofo político, la del filósofo profesor, pasando por la figura del filósofo militante, hasta llegar a la del filósofo profesionista de nuestro tiempo. Para no incentivar más fantasmagorías sobre el ejercicio académico de la filosofía en México, mejor centremos la pesquisa en algo de lo que sí tenemos documentos que nos sirvan como indicios y pruebas: los planes de estudio de la FFyL de la UNAM. No se trata de un puro recuento histórico o por hacer patente la tendencia filosófica a partir de la cual se concibieron, sino se trata de encontrar cómo se fueron estructurando los planes de estudio hacia su sentido académico actual. Recordemos que es en 1913 cuando Antonio Caso imparte en la Escuela de Altos Estudios la cátedra de "Introducción a los Estudios filosóficos" (Cano, 2008). Nuestro filósofo imparte la asignatura como 12. Un rasgo de esto puede hallarse en el acta del 15 de junio de 1954 del Consejo Técnico de la FFyL en donde puede leerse: Los Consejeros Julio Jiménez y José Luis Curiel propusieron que el Consejo Técnico protestara también ante la Rectoría porque en el mismo Anuario de 1954 no aparece en primer término la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, sino la de ciencias, negándose con esto la jerarquía académica más alta y respetable que por ley y por antigüedad corresponde a nuestra Facultad dentro de todas las dependencias univer¬sitarias. (p. 2) Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 107 "profesor libre".13 La sola existencia de esta figura señala la emergencia del ejercicio institucional de la filosofía en México. Ausencia de estructura para la investigación, profesores cuya función no se articula a un cuerpo académico. Tal figura se vuelve necesaria sólo en un momento muy singular, por "disposiciones especiales". Por otra parte, en 1910 encontramos en el documento "Creación de la Facultad de Humanidades en la Escuela de Altos Estudios" los siguientes planes: "CURSOS DE LA LICENCIATURA" 1er. Año: a) FILOSOFÍA: Filosofía general (2 clases a la semana), Lógica y metodología de las ciencias (una clase). [...] Total: 12 clases por semana. 2 horas al día. 2do. Año: a) FILOSOFÍA: Historia de la filosofía antigua y medieval (una clase a la semana), psicología (dos clases) [...] Total: 12 clases por semana. 3er Año: a) FILOSOFÍA: Historia de la filosofía moderna (una clase a la semana), pedagogía (una clase) [...] 13. La "Ley Constitutiva de la Escuela Nacional de Altos Estudios" de 1910 postula los tipos de profesores, en los que aparece la figura del "profesor libre", de la siguiente manera: Art. 8o. Los profesores de la Escuela Nacional de Altos Estudios serán ordinarios, extraordinarios y libres: ordinarios, los que ocupen los puestos docentes de planta; extraordinarios, los que, por medio de un contrato, se encarguen de una o más enseñanzas especiales que entren en el programa general de la Escuela; y libres, los que, mediante los requisitos que señalen disposiciones especiales, establezcan en las dependencias de la misma Escuela una enseñanza determinada. Art. 9o. Los profesores libres podrán exigir de sus alumnos los emolumentos que juzguen debidos. Para obtener una certificación escolar del buen éxito de sus enseñanzas y del aprovechamiento de los estudiantes, tendrán que someterlos á las pruebas que prescriban disposiciones reglamentarias. Vale la pena señalar que esa figura desaparece en el "Reglamento de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras" de 1956. Así, en el Capítulo VII, llamado "De los profesores", se menciona: ARTÍCULO 66.Los profesores de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras son ordinarios y extraordinarios. Los primeros tienen a su cargo los servicios normales de la docencia en la Facultad. Los segundos son llamados por el Rector, de acuerdo con los artículos 47fracción VI y 63 del estatuto. ARTÍCULO 67.Los profesores son: I. Ordinarios, y II. De carrera. ARTÍCULO 68. Las categorías de profesores ordinarios son: I. Titulares de cátedra, y II. Interinos encargados de curso. Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 108 Total: 12 clases por semana. DOCTORADO Cursos Obligatorios: I. FILOSOFÍA. 1. Filosofía: Curso más approfondi que el de la Licenciatura. Cada año puede escogerse un tema distinto, como se hace en las Universidades europeas: por ejemplo, un año el curso versará sobre la Crítica de la razón pura, de Kant; otro sobre la moral judaica, o sobre Platón, o sobre la historia del materialismo, o sobre las cosmologías presocráticas, o sobre el cartesianismo etc." Recordemos que en ese momento los grados que se otorgaban eran licenciado y doctor. Como se notará además de ser pocos, no hay especificidad en los cursos. Se trata de un acercamiento panorámico e introductorio al ejercicio de la filosofía. Un acercamiento que no aspira a abordar la totalidad de temas o elaborar las metodologías que la filosofía había conformado hasta ese momento. Sólo la referencia a las horas de trabajo a la semana y el señalamiento de una revisión de los temas exhaustiva o de mayor profundidad (approfondi) permiten diferenciar entre licenciatura y doctorado. Se podría argumentar aquí que como desconocemos los planes reales no podemos saber si existe un elemento académico en ellos. Pero podemos igualmente sostener que como apenas comenzaba el ejercicio académico de la filosofía -confundido en ese momento con una función político-educativa y en donde la figura del académico no se diferencia cabalmente de la del filósofo abogado, la del filósofo político o la del filósofo profesorno era necesario aún plantear la cuestión didáctica de manera ostensible. En el "Proyecto de plan de estudios de la Escuela Nacional Preparatoria" propuesto por Ezequiel A. Chávez el 12 de octubre de 1920, encontramos las siguientes asignaturas del plan de estudios. En el área "III.De ciencias filosóficas y sus aplicaciones a la práctica" los estudiantes cursaban: Psicología, Lógica, Moral, Historia de las doctrinas filosóficas y Nociones de organización cívica y de encaminamiento de las vocaciones y encuestas relativas. Lo interesante de contrastar los documentos de estos dos niveles educativos -bachillerato y superioren los que se imparte filosofía es que el enfoque Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 109 es prácticamente el mismo: panorámico e introductorio. 14 En el documento de 1924 "Memorandum relativo a grupos de enseñanza indispensables en la Facultad de Altos Estudios de la Universidad Nacional y a profesores que os desempeñen" Ezequiel A. Chávez escribe un apartado llamado "De la enseñanza de la filosofía y de las ciencias filosóficas". Allí detalla: En fin, corona en cierta manera con puntos de vista generales el trabajo de la Facultad de Altos Estudios, el pequeño conjunto de clases de filosofía que en la misma existen, y que son también las únicas que en el grado que tienen, existen en la República; por lo mismo, es de desear se mantengan: de esas clases deben citarse la de historia de las doctrinas filosóficas, ética y estética, a cargo del Dr. don Antonio Caso, y la de epistemología y lógica que desempeña don Alfonso Caso. En las palabras de Chávez es claro el entendimiento del alcance del ejercicio de la filosofía en ese momento. Habría que señalar la lucha para mantener este "pequeño conjunto de clases de filosofía" es prioritario en relación con una especialización académica en su estudio y ejercicio. Recordemos aquí que en 1930 se da la separación entre FFyL y la Escuela Normal Superior unidas desde la aparición de las Escuela Nacional de Altos Estudios. Ya el 23 de septiembre de 1924, por decreto del presidente Álvaro Obregón, se había disuelto la ENAE y en su lugar se crearon la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, la Facultad de Graduados y la Escuela Normal Superior. Proceso de abandono, en la manera en que se concebía, de la función políticoeducativa y emergencia de un devenir profesionalizante. 14. Si las técnicas y contenidos de enseñanza en la licenciatura de filosofía en la FFyL se han dirigido hacia la conformación de un filósofo académico, en los bachilleratos mexicanos la tendencia es hacia la adecuación de los contenidos y las técnicas didácticas tanto a la edad y capacidades de los estudiantes como a los temas y formas de abordar los problemas filosóficos. Adecuados a una supuesta finalidad diferente a la especializar a un filósofo académico: la de formar habilidades críticas de un ciudadano. De allí que se busquen formas didácticas donde las técnicas filosóficas se adecuen a supuestos temas singulares y problemas vitales conocidos por los estudiantes. En este sentido se puede comparar el programa de la asignatura de "Filosofía" del bachillerato general mexicano de 1998 que aparece en el libro Análisis de los Currículos de Filosofía a Nivel Medio en Iberoamérica, con los programas del bachillerato tecnológico del país de 2018. En los programas de 1998 se nota un enfoque histórico que quiere abordar todos los temas que se han trabajado en la institución filosófica mexicana hasta ese momento. Lo interesante es la distinción entre núcleo básico y núcleo de formación profesional que señala una necesidad de fortalecer en estudiantes de bachillerato ciertas metodologías de la filosofía. Pero la perspectiva es igualmente panorámica e introductoria. Ciertamente se puede acercar el enfoque histórico del plan con las maneras corrientes de historiar el ejercicio de la filosofía en México. Por el contrario, los programas del bachillerato tecnológico de 2018 proponen, temas, metodologías, actividades didácticas y formas de transmisión de la filosofía, preocupados por los estudiantes. Pueden revisarse estos últimos programas en el siguiente enlace: http://www.sems.gob. mx/curriculoems/programas-de-estudio. Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 110 Es en 1927 que aparece un plan de estudios mucho más elaborado. Se trata del plan de la licenciatura en Filosofía. El plan se estructura de la siguiente manera (Menéndez, 1998, pp. 352-353): Para obtener el grado de Licenciado en Filosofía, se requiere; 1. Ser bachiller en ciencias y letras o haber concluido los estudios de maestro en las escuelas normales. 2. Hacer un curso sintético anual y dos analíticos semestrales de EPISTEMOLOGIA. Profesores: Abog. Alfonso Caso, (curso sintético) de 18.10 a 19, martes y jueves, Adalberto García de Mendoza (curso analítico), de 17 a 18, martes y jueves. 3. Hacer un curso sintético y uno analítico semestrales de ESTÉTICA. Profesores: Abog. Antonio Caso (curso sintético) de 18.10 a 19, jueves y sábados; curso analítico, pendiente. 4. Hacer un curso sintético y uno analítico semestrales de ÉTICA. Profesores: Abog. Antonio Caso, (curso sintético), de 18.10 a 19, jueves y sábados; curso analítico, pendiente. 5. Hacer un curso sintético anual y dos analíticos semestrales de PSICOLOGÍA. Profesor: Dr. Enrique O. Aragón, ambos cursos; (el sintético) de 19.10 a 20, miércoles y viernes y el analítico los mismos días y a la misma hora. 6. Hacer dos cursos analíticos anuales de HISTORIA DE LA FILOSOFÍA. Profesor: Abog. Antonio Caso, de 19. l0 a 20, los martes. 7. Hacer dos cursos semestrales de dos de las siguientes materias a elección del alumno: FILOSOFÍA DE LA EDUCACIÓN, profesor pendiente; HISTORIA DEL ARTE. Arq. Carlos M. Lazo, de 19.10 a 20 los lunes y los miércoles y de 17.10 a l8 los viernes; HISTORIA DE LA MÚSICA. Profesora Alba Herrera y Ogazón, en el Conservatorio Nacional de Música, de9 a l0 y de 16a 17, los lunes y de 9 a 10, los jueves. 8. Hacer dos cursos analíticos semestrales de HISTORIA UNIVERSAL. Ing. José Luis Osorio Mondragón, de 16.10 a 17, lunes y miércoles. 9. Hacer un curso práctico superior anual de ESPAÑOL. Profesor Santiago Argüelles, de 19 a 20, lunes y viernes. 10. Traducir dos de las siguientes lenguas: Griego, Latín, Francés, Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 111 Italiano, Inglés, Alemán. Como se aprecia, la distinción entre un curso analítico y otro sintético15, entre exposición e investigación, señalan ese devenir académico que quisiéramos enfatizar aquí. Esto es posible notarlo igualmente en la cantidad y variedad de materias que comienza a aparecer comparado con el de 1910. Pero realmente el proceso de profesionalización académica del ejercicio de la filosofía en la UNAM podría relacionarse con el cambio del Edificio Mascarones a la Ciudad Universitaria en 1954. En 1956 José Gaos escribía sobre el plan de estudios de ese momento: "El plan de estudios de Filosofía de la Facultad es prácticamente perfecto" (p. 13). La afirmación de Gaos se refiere a una reciente modificación de los planes de estudio de maestría en filosofía. Se refiere a este plan: A. MATERIAS OBLIGATORIAS HISTÓRICAS Historia de la Filosofía De los Presocráticos hasta Platón (1 semestre) Aristóteles y el Helenismo (1 semestre) Filosofía Medieval (1 semestre) Filosofía del Humanismo y del Renacimiento (1 semestre) Filosofía de la Ilustración de Kant a Hegel (1 semestre) La Filosofía de los siglos XIX y XX (1 semestre) Historia de la Filosofía en México hasta el siglo XVIII (1 semestre) Historia de la Filosofía en México hasta la época actual (1 semestre) B. MATERIAS OBLIGATORIAS GENERALES Teoría del conocimiento (dos semestres) Metafísica (dos semestres) Estética (dos semestres) Filosofía de la Historia (dos semestres) Filosofía de la Religión (dos semestres) 16. En el documento "Plan de estudios formado por la comisión. Facultad de Filosofía y Letras" se caracteriza así la distinción: Son cursos sintéticos aquellos en los que se exponen los conocimientos ya adquiridos en ciencia, historia, arte o filosofía. Son cursos analíticos aquellos en los que se prosigue una investigación sobre algún punto, de ciencia, arte, filosofía o historia. Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 112 C. MATERIAS MONOGRÁFICAS OBLIGATORIAS Lógica (dos semestres) Ética (dos semestres) Axiología (l semestre) Valores Lógicos (1er. semestre) Curso Sistemático (2do. semestre) Antropología Filosófica, Lecciones sobre las exclusivas del hombre. Lectura y Explicación de "El Ser y el Tiempo" de Heidegger (1 semestre) Antropología Filosófica (1 semestre) Psicología Contemporánea (dos semestres) D. MATERIAS PEDAGÓGICAS OBLIGATORIAS Teoría Pedagógica (1 semestre) Conocimiento de la Adolescencia (1 semestre) Didáctica de la Filosofía (1 semestre) E. SEMINARIOS De Composición de Tesis (dos semestres) De Metafísica (dos semestres) De Estética (dos semestres) Sobre Descartes: Las meditaciones metafísicas (1 semestre) Sobre las Obras de Aristóteles Sobre Kant (dos semestres) Sobre la Historia de las Ideas en Iberoamérica (dos semestres) De traducción de textos Clásicos F. MATERIAS OPTATIVAS Psicología del Arte La "Crítica de la Razón Pura" de Kant (Lectura y Comentarios) Filosofía de las Ciencias (dos semestres) Filosofía Política (dos semestres) Filosofía de la Música (dos semestres) Historia de las Ciencias (dos semestres) Sociología General (dos semestres) Recordemos que en la historia de los estudios de filosofía en la UNAM el grado de licenciatura ha aparecido y desaparecido -ello quizás señala un ímpetu y esfuerzo hacia la profesionalización del ejercicio de la filosofía: Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 113 saltarse un grado. Así, en el documento "Creación de la Facultad de Humanidades en la Escuela de Altos Estudios" de 1910 los grados que aparecen son los de Licenciatura y Doctorado. En febrero de 1927 aparece el documento "Plan de estudios formado por la comisión. Facultad de Filosofía y Letras", en el que desaparece el grado de licenciado y los grados que se otorgaban en la Facultad eran agregado, maestro y doctor. La licenciatura desaparecía de nuevo en 1931 después de haberse instalado en 1927, y los grados que otorgaba la FFyL serían solamente maestro y doctor. El grado de licenciatura volverá a aparecer en la FFyL hasta el año de 1960 (Menéndez, 1996). Así que el plan de estudios que Gaos llama perfecto es el de maestría. Los anteriores planes de maestría eran de 1951, que a su vez habían modificado los planes de estudios que habían operado desde 1939. Los planes de 1951 no se organizaban por semestre, antes bien exigían a los estudiantes 16 horas efectivas de clases y establecer los seminarios como modalidad de enseñanza obligatoria. La idea detrás de esto era propiciar el análisis racional (Menéndez, 1996). Con los planes de 1956 se regresa aparece la distinción entre asignaturas dedicadas a la exposición del docente y seminarios. Aquí parece claro que la distinción entre un curso analítico y otro sintético, propuesta en 1927 se sistematizará en los planes de 1956. En estos planes ya son claros ciertos rasgos que llegarán hasta nuestros días y que conforman un devenir académico del ejercicio de la filosofía: • La distinción de funciones y habilidades del filósofo: lo expositivo, lo pedagógico, la investigación, la traducción. • La fuerte estructuración de los cursos en semestres continuos. • El énfasis en una perspectiva que busca abarcar la totalidad de la historia y de las metodologías filosóficas. • La aparición de seminarios exclusivamente para incitar el trabajo de investigación -en esos años se abrieron los seminarios de ontología, de estética y de investigaciones para tesis dirigidas por Eduardo Nicol, Samuel Ramos y José Gaos. • La intención de generar producción filosófica al momento asignar cursos exclusivos de lectura de textos importantes en la historia de la filosofía. • La emergencia de una reflexión sobre el ejercicio propio de la Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 114 filosofía en México y la región. • Esto último provocará la necesidad de pensar históricamente el ejercicio de la filosofía. Esta necesidad llegará hasta la conformación de los discursos que nos postulan el día de hoy al filósofo mexicano en relación con una fantasmagoría de un autor con una función político-educativa en relación con instituciones estatales. La estructuración de estos planes de estudio, determinaron la perspectiva con que se concibió el devenir del ejercicio de la filosofía en la FFyL. Algo interesante aquí es que, de acuerdo a Libertad Menéndez, el nuevo grado de licenciatura en filosofía de la FFyL era el mismo, con excepción de las asignaturas pedagógicas y los seminarios, de la maestría de 1956. Relevantes es que un plan de estudios concebido para un grado superior pudiera adecuarse para la licenciatura. Las condiciones de posibilidad de que eso haya ocurrido es posible caracterizarlas como un devenir profesionalizante del ejercicio de la filosofía. Sigamos con Gaos. Después de llamar perfecto al plan de estudios de la maestría de 1956 agrega: "Lo que parece susceptible aún de perfeccionamiento son más bien los métodos de trabajo. En la enseñanza de la Filosofía en la Facultad prevalece, poco menos que exclusivamente, el método de la conferencia. [...] La enseñanza universitaria debe, sobre todo, formar en dichas disciplinas, enseñar a trabajar personalmente, originalmente, en ellas. Y sabido es que a trabajar solo se enseña, y sólo se aprende, trabajando juntos quienes ya saben hacerlo y quienes quieren llegar a saberlo. Esta formación, sumo imperativo de la enseñanza universitaria, requiere, en lo relativo a la Filosofía, que no se enseñe sólo ésta, sino a filosofar, y que para ello se inicien los estudiantes en el filosofar mismo con los grandes filósofos y con sus profesores. Tal es la misión de los seminarios. Los seminarios son a las Facultades y Escuelas de Humanidades lo que a las de Ciencias son los laboratorios. Los seminarios de una Facultad de Filosofía deben ser de dos clases, que pueden llamase respectivamente seminarios de textos y seminarios de tesis." (pp. 13-15) La sola mención de una cuestión de método -la diferencia postulada Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 115 por Gaos entre la enseñanza y seminario, montada sobre la diferencia entre curso analítico y sintéticoen relación con el ejercicio de la filosofía señala ya un espacio de discusión. Y esta discusión señala el problema del surgimiento de un ejercicio de la filosofía cuya práctica y finalidad de afinar conceptos y discursos críticos se asumen como valiosas en sí mismas. Veintiún años después de las afirmaciones de Gaos, en una entrevista de 1977 para el Boletín de la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras el Lic. Carlos Pereyra, coordinador de la carrera, y el Mtro. José Ignacio Palencia, secretario de la coordinación, respondían así a la cuestión "¿Se revisan periódicamente los planes de estudios? ¿Hay algún cambio necesario que pudiera mejorar el plan actual?": "No hay un periodo fijo. Se revisó en 1967, y posteriormente, sin llegar a modificarse. Hay varios cambios necesarios: la supresión de materias didácticas, al menos bajo su enfoque actual, o la revisión de éste" (p. 11) De hecho las modificaciones son de 1966 y 1972. Un poco después en el texto aparece la cuestión: "Es opinión de algunos que muchas reformas parecen destinadas a facilitar excesivamente la carrera al alumno, a costa de un empobrecimiento del nivel académico. ¿Es así en el caso de Filosofía?" (p. 11) La pregunta señala sin citar una discusión, a la que se le da el nombre de "El sentido actual de la filosofía", mantenida en 1967 entre Leopoldo Zea, Luis Villoro, Alejandro Rossi, José Luis Balcárcel y Abelardo Villegas -Ramón Xirau intervino como moderador. La discusión versa sobre si la modificación del plan de estudios repercute en la tarea y el quehacer de la filosofía en México. El problema que articula la discusión, si la reforma ponía en crisis el sentido mismo de la labor filosófica, sólo puede tener sentido realmente si se la concibe como un efecto de la especialización de la práctica filosófica. Es decir, el sentido actual del ejercicio de la filosofía en la FFyL en 1967 era académico. Regresemos a la entrevista a Pereyra y a Palencia. A la pregunta sobre la discusión de que la modificación de 1967 del plan de estudios producía un empobrecimiento del nivel académico, los filósofos de la FFyL responden: No es el caso en la carrera de Filosofía, puesto que no ha habido tales reformas. La última reforma (1967) aumentó un año la carrera y el número de créditos. Los resultados serían los contrarios, por lo que puede juzgarse; al menos, no ha habido Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 116 empobrecimiento. Se nota más preparación en los alumnos de ahora. Antes éramos alumnos de un profesor, y ahora -fuera de algunos casosson alumnos de la Facultad. (p. 11) Esa distinción postulada entre "alumno de profesor" y "alumno de la facultad" que aparece en relación a una revisión de las asignaturas que forman parte del programa de la licenciatura y en relación con las maneras de enseñar y el sentido del ejercicio de la filosofía en la FFyL, tiene alcances mayores: señalaría una modificación en la reproducción del ejercicio de la filosofía que pasaría por mecanismos académicos. Ser un alumno de la facultad quiere decir ser formado como académico. Es la institución misma, con sus procesos institucionales y administrativos los que cuidan de que se reproduzcan y afinen los procedimientos y las técnicas conceptuales de la filosofía. La institución académica se ha convertido las condiciones en que se puede conformar un filósofo académico mexicano. Esto podría corroborarse con la respuesta que los filósofos dan a la pregunta "¿Cuáles son los objetivos de la carrera de Filosofía? ": Los objetivos generales de la carrera son la formación de profesorado de enseñanza media y la creación de investigadores de alto nivel. Por un lado, formar a los estudiantes con los elementos necesarios para que puedan realizar labor docente en enseñanza media y a la vez dotarlos de los elementos para poder continuar estudios superiores y eventualmente formar parte del equipo docente de la propia Facultad; realizar investigación filosófica y colaborar en la difusión de los conocimientos y problemas filosóficos, aún más allá del ámbito de sus propios alumnos y egresados. (p. 11) La enunciación de que la carrera de filosofía tiene como una de sus finalidades la creación de investigadores de alto nivel, de un filósofo académico, sólo puede hacerse cuando existen procesos institucionales en donde se aseguraran las condiciones para que eso se lleve a cabo. Estos procesos institucionales también tratan de los métodos y técnicas didácticos, los planes de estudio. El plan de estudios del que hablan Pereyra y Palencia es el siguiente: Primero año: Primero y segundo semestre Introducción a la Filosofía Principios y técnicas de la Investigación Filosófica Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 117 Lógica I Estética Filosofía en México Segundo año: Tercer y cuarto semestre Historia de la Filosofía: Presocráticos a Platón (3er semestre) Historia de la Filosofía: Aristóteles y el Helenismo. (Se imparte en el 4o. semestre) Teoría del Conocimiento Lógica II Ontología (o) Metafísica Filosofía de la Ciencia Tercer año: Quinto semestre Historia de la Filosofía: Edad Media y Renacimiento Materia Pedagógica (Según cursos de Pedagogía) Didáctica de la Filosofía 3 materias optativas Sexto semestre Historia de la Filosofía: Siglos XVII y XVIII Práctica docente dirigida Cuarto año: Séptimo semestre Historia de la Filosofía: de Kant a Hegel 5 materias optativas (hasta 6, con autorización del coordinador) Octavo semestre Historia de la Filosofía: De Hegel a nuestros días 5 materias optativas (hasta 6 con autorización del coordinador) Materias optativas Filosofía de la Educación Filosofía Política Filosofía de la Lógica (Lógica y significado) Problemas de Estética Inducción y Probabilidad, La inferencia científica Antropología Filosófica Filosofía Tomista (Platón y Sto. Tomás) Ontología Contemporánea Filosofía del Lenguaje Ideología y Sociedad Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 118 Axiología El Método de las Ciencias Sociales Filosofía y Literatura Semántica Filosófica (Relaciones entre los Conceptos de "Praxis" y "Verdad") Lectura de Textos Filosóficos Medievales Estética Contemporánea (Estética marxista) Economía y Filosofía Filosofía de la Religión (Kant-Hegel-Feuerbach) Cursos monográficos optativos Etica Nicomaquea. (Tratado del Alma) La Filosofía de Platón (I) Filosofía Alemana (Fenomenología del Espíritu) Filosofía Francesa (Bergson) La Filosofía de Hegel La Filosofía de Marx Filosofía Contemporánea (Husserl) Seminarios Sem. de Filosofía Moderna (Hegel) Sem. de Filosofía Moderna (Heidegger) Sem. de Semántica y Epistemología Sem. de Filosofía en México Sem. de Filosofía Griega. (La Evolución de la Teoría de las Ideas en Platón) Sem. de Metafísica Sem. de Estética Sem. de Filosofía y Literatura (Poesía) Sem. de Filosofía Política Sem. de Metodología Sem. de Kant (Crítica de la Razón Pura) Sem. de Filosofía de las Ciencias Sociales Sem. de Filosofía Latinoamericana Sem. de Ideologías Políticas en América Latina Sem. de Problemas de Lógica y Ciencia Factual Sem. sobre el Ensayo en América Latina (pp. 13-15) Como es ostensible, lo que diferencia al plan de 1956 de este de los Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 119 setenta es la acentuación del devenir académico, de especialización de las habilidades y potencias críticas, del ejercicio de la filosofía. Esto poco a poco tomará cuerpo en discusiones más específicas y detalladas. Dieciséis años después de las afirmaciones de Pereyra y Palencia, en el documento de 1993 del "Proyecto de modificación del Plan de estudios de la Licenciatura en Filosofía", propuesta que en 1999 se puso en operación, se enuncian los problemas y deficiencias metodológicos y didácticos del plan de 1982 al que sustituyó: 4°. No se desarrollan de manera adecuada las habilidades argumentativas, discursivas y expositivas, lo cual dificulta el desempeño escolar de los alumnos y, posteriormente, su ejercicio profesional. Específicamente, el plan no habilita al alumno de manera suficiente para la investigación, pues para este fin sólo existen las asignaturas obligatorias: Principios y técnicas de la investigación filosófica 1 y 2 y las asignaturas optativas: Seminario 1 y 2 y Seminario de investigación y tesis 1 y 2. 5°. Las asignaturas pedagógicas Didáctica de la filosofía y Práctica docente dirigida perdieron su sentido original al concentrarse en exposiciones temáticas, más que en el desarrollo de habilidades. La práctica docente se redujo a la exposición oral del estudiante ante su propio grupo. Se ha reconocido que esto constituye una situación artificial que no favorece el desarrollo efectivo de las habilidades docentes y la reflexión sobre sus problemas. 6°. El plan vigente no promueve de modo adecuado la titulación, pues los Seminarios de investigación y tesis tienen un carácter optativo, por lo cual los alumnos no están obligados a inscribirse. Además, estos seminarios se han impartido de manera irregular y sin perseguir un resultado efectivo al término del mismo que se concrete, al menos, en el avance del trabajo recepcional de los alumnos. (pp. 15-16) Las deficiencias del plan de 1982 que el diagnóstico encontró se pueden resumir en que "no habilita al alumno de manera suficiente para la investigación". Se trata de un problema con lo que Gaos llamaba los métodos, las metodologías y técnicas didácticas adecuadas para formar Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 120 un filósofo académico. Incluso el aspecto pedagógico o las técnicas para la titulación se conciben en esta relación con un ejercicio profesional de la filosofía. En ese documento para "atender de manera sistemática al desarrollo de habilidades de investigación, argumentación, exposición y enseñanza: a) se crea el área: Propedéutica y método que agrupa las siguientes asignaturas: Introducción a la investigación filosófica, Enseñanza de la filosofía y Textos filosóficos 1 a 8" (p.18) Más adelante se afirma que "El objetivo de estas asignaturas [del área de Propedéutica y método] es el desarrollo de habilidades para la lectura comprensiva y crítica de los textos filosóficos, así como el estudio detallado de las obras fundamentales de la historia de la filosofía" (p. 32). El plan de estudios diseñado en ese momento es el siguiente: PRIMER SEMESTRE Clave y Asignatura 3113 Historia de la Filosofía 1 3114 Textos filosóficos 1* 3115 Ética 1 3116 Lógica 1 3117 Teoría del conocimiento 1 3118 Introducción a la investigación filosófica SEGUNDO SEMESTRE 3213 Historia de la Filosofía 2 3214 Textos filosóficos 2* 3215 Ética 2 3216 Lógica 2 3217 Teoría del conocimiento 2 3218 Filosofía de la historia TERCER SEMESTRE 3313 Historia de la Filosofía 3 3314 Textos filosóficos 3* 3317 Estética 1 3319/3315 Metafísica u Ontología 1 3318 Filosofía Política Lógica 3* CUARTO SEMESTRE 3413 Historia de la Filosofía 4 Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 121 3414 Textos filosóficos 4* 3417 Estética 2 3416 Filosofía del Lenguaje 3419/3415 Metafísica u Ontología 2 3418 Filosofía en México QUINTO SEMESTRE 3513 Historia de la Filosofía 5 3514 Textos filosóficos 5* 3515 Filosofía de la ciencia 3516 Enseñanza de la filosofía 0685 Seminario optativo Optativa SEXTO SEMESTRE 3613 Historia de la Filosofía 6 3614 Textos filosóficos 6 * 0686 Seminario optativo Temas contemporáneos de * Optativa Optativa SÉPTIMO SEMESTRE 3713 Historia de la Filosofía 7 3714 Textos filosóficos 7* 3715 Seminario de tesis 1* Optativa Optativa Optativa OCTAVO SEMESTRE 3813 Historia de la Filosofía 8 3814 Textos filosóficos 8* 3815 Seminario de tesis 2 * Optativa Optativa Optativa *materias optativas restringidas a cursarse dentro del Plan ASIGNATURAS OPTATIVAS (Libres y restringidas) 0676 Lógica 3 Teoría de conjuntos Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 122 0677 Lógica 3 Axiomatización 0678 Lógica 3 Filosofía de la lógica 0679 Lógica 3 Análisis lógico de argumentos Temas contemporáneos de ... (Ética, Estética, Historia de la filosofía, Filosofía del lenguaje, Filosofía en México, Lógica, Metafísica-ontología, Teoría del conocimiento y filosofía de la ciencia, Filosofía de la historia y de las ciencias sociales) Problemas de estética Problemas de ética Problemas de filosofía del lenguaje Problemas de filosofía México-Latinoamérica Problemas de Historia de la filosofía Problemas de lógica Problemas de Metafísica y Ontología Problemas de Teoría del Conocimiento y filosofía de la ciencia Problemas de Filosofía de la historia y de las ciencias sociales Optativa Textos filosóficos Seminario optativo El devenir académico de este plan de estudios de la licenciatura se puede muy bien caracterizar en varios rasgos: • Enunciación explícita de que lo que se busca en el plan es poner las asignaturas en función de la profesionalización del ejercicio de la filosofía. • Desplazamiento de una perspectiva que busca abarcar la historia de la filosofía occidental o regional por una más allegada hacia las capacidades y funciones de un filósofo académico. • Interés por desglosar detalladamente las habilidades de tal filósofo académico -lectura, escritura, investigación, argumentación, exposición, enseñanza, etcétera. • Necesidad imperiosa por articular las asignaturas y la forma de abordar sus contenidos y problemas en relación con el desarrollo de estas habilidades de un filósofo profesional. • Apertura de un área dedicada específicamente para ese cometido. Pasaron 37 años desde las afirmaciones de Gaos de enseñar a filosofar, pasando por las afirmaciones de un supuesto "alumno de la facultad" Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 123 de Pereyra y Palencia, hasta los planes de estudio actuales en los que explícitamente se busca desarrollar las habilidades para un ejercicio profesional. Son las prácticas de enseñanza, su sentido y las técnicas para llevarse a cabo, las que se encuentran en el centro de la discusión. Pero las prácticas y técnicas de enseñanza en relación con un sentido académico del ejercicio de la filosofía. Desde la aparición moderna de los estudios filosóficos en la FFyL ha habido 26 planes de estudios, cuatro de licenciatura, once de maestría y once de doctorado (Menéndez, 1996). Actualmente los planes de estudio de filosofía de la UNAM se encuentran en proceso de actualización. De acuerdo a la genealogía que hemos esbozado aquí es dable esperar que los nuevos planes acendren este devenir académico tratando de organizar didácticamente los estudios hacia la potenciación de las habilidades y técnicas de un filósofo profesional. Esto permite prever que el próximo ejercicio de la filosofía en México tendrá como uno de sus problemas articuladores sus propias técnicas, prácticas y metodologías de producción y reproducción. Otras genealogías del ejercicio de la filosofía en México El pequeño experimento genealógico realizado en este texto buscaba historizar la figura del filósofo mexicano de otro modo que como autor que busca tener efectos políticos y educativos en instituciones nacionales históricamente determinadas. Esa figura del filósofo como un gran personaje que enuncia verdades en ciertas circunstancias institucionales postulada por las formas corrientes de hacer la historia del ejercicio de la filosofía en México nos parece una fantasmagoría útil para la legitimación y la propaganda. Afirmamos que, por privilegiar ciertas funciones político-educativas, esa manera de historizar deja de lado una multitud de acontecimientos y documentos históricos que marcaron y dieron sentido el ejercicio de la filosofía. Determina como insignificantes y anecdóticos una multitud de prácticas, personajes, documentos y acontecimientos. Al contrario, esas prácticas, personajes, documentos y acontecimientos deben adquirir sentido en genealogías singulares. Así un carácter colectivo y múltiple del ejercicio de la filosofía mexicana emerge, ciertamente. De allí que nuestro experimento genealógico mostró una constelación problemática del ejercicio de la filosofía en la FFyL de Voces para la filosofía Diálogos de la académia filosófica contemporánea 124 la UNAM. Una constelación conformada por planes de estudio, técnicas didácticas, ejercicio colectivo de la filosofía, figuras históricas del filósofo. La constelación problemática producida buscaba hacer patente un devenir académico del ejercicio de la filosofía mexicana. Y esto se buscaba mediante la genealogía de la figura del filósofo mexicano como académico. El devenir y su genealogía se rastreó en las marcas dejadas en los planes de estudio de la FFyL de la UNAM. De allí que podamos postular ciertos rasgos del ejercicio de la filosofía y de la figura del filósofo en México, al menos en los que emergieron en la FFyL de la UNAM: • El esfuerzo didáctico de transmisión de la filosofía y de formación de un filósofo profesional que se deja rastrear por más de un siglo en documentos institucionales de la FFyL, nos muestra un ejercicio de la filosofía muy diferente a la de las historias al uso. Se trata de un ejercicio preocupado por consolidarse y por poder reproducirse, por hacerse una institución autónoma. • La pesquisa en relación con los planes de estudio de la FFyL nos muestra una preocupación por las técnicas y prácticas que permitirían el ejercicio mismo de la filosofía en México. • La constelación problemática postulada aquí nos hace aparecer como ejercicio colectivo filosófico la elaboración misma y la puesta en operación de los planes de estudio. Es decir, ¿quién sería el autor de un plan de estudio? ¿Quién sería el responsable de formar a un filósofo profesional? • La genealogía del filósofo académico elaborada aquí permite señalar una finalidad que no pasaría por aquella políticaeducativa encargada de formar ciudadanos críticos, sino por la de una afirmación del ejercicio mismo de la filosofía, valioso en sí mismo. Lo interesante de una genealogía como la anterior es que nos permite reconocer los límites de este ejercicio histórico mexicano de la filosofía practicado en la FFyL de la UNAM. Y es que deja de lado la vertiente de poder ejercer sus potencias conceptuales, sus vitalidades técnicas críticas, más allá, fuera de su preocupación por poder reproducirse. Coord. Diana Lizbeth Ruiz Rincón 125 Bibliografía Acta del Consejo Técnico de la FFyL. (15 de junio de 1954) Recuperado de http://ru.ffyl.unam.mx/handle/10391/7275 Agencia Informativa Conacyt. (17 de agosto de 2018). 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PB June 2010406 REVIEWS For review in Prabuddha bharata, publishers need to send two copies of their latest publications. Vivekanandar Illam: Vivekananda House Ed. Swami atmashraddhananda Ramakrishna Math, Mylapore, Chennai 600 004. 2009. Website: sriramakrishnamath.org. viii + 248 pp. Rs 200. Each of the five sections of this 'pilgrim-book' is a tirtha one would not feel like leaving in a hurry. The first section displays monuments and memorials dedicated to Swami Vivekananda in India and the US, with a full chapter devoted to Tamil Nadu. The second section deals with Swamiji's visit to Madras and his nine days' stay at Castle Kernan-renamed by the government of Tamil Nadu as Vivekanandar Illam (illam means house in Tamil) in 1997. The third narrates the early history of the castle, the eleven years of Swami Ramakrishnananda's presence there- when the castle served as the first centre of the Ramakrishna movement in South India-and the visits of other direct disciples of Sri Ramakrishna, monks, and eminent persons. The fourth section briefly recounts the uses the castle was put to between 1907 and 1993, and the remodelling it underwent under the aegis of the Ramakrishna Math after this period. The last section presents an architectural study of the Illam and explains its present activities and the permanent exhibition it houses. The thoughtful conception and structure of the book as well as the painstaking and thorough research it has necessitated-all done by Swami Atmashraddhananda, present editor of Vedanta Kesari, and his team- is reflected in each of its eighteen chapters and twelve most informative appendices. The sober but gracious design, large typeface, and copious historical and recent images, enhance the value of a presentation that is mounted on high quality art paper. It deserves to be highlighted that a book measuring 22 x 28.5 cm and weighing 1.3 kg is offered to the public at a nominal price, thanks to the generous subsidies of a few institutions, mainly from Chennai. This volume would find pride of place in any personal or public library. PB Srimad Bhagavata- Condensed in the Poet's Own Words Pandit a M Srinivasachariar; trans. dr V raghavan Kuppuswami Sastri Research Institute, Chennai 600 004. 2008. xxxii + 444 pp. Rs 200. The Mahabharata- Condensed in the Poet's Own Words Pandit a M Srinivasachariar; trans. dr V raghavan Kuppuswami Sastri Research Institute. 2008. xxxii + 470 pp. Rs 200. he Mahabharata and the Bhagavata contain almost all the wisdom essential for everyday living. However, their huge size is a deterrent to their study. If only someone could cull the essence of these epics without distorting them, these volumes would be within the grasp of all. This is exactly what the Kuppuswami Sastri Research Institute has accomplished. Known for its contribution to preserving and propagating Indian heritage, this institute has published a revised edition of these books which have been out of print for more than five decades. First published in 1937, these pocket-size volumes are the fruits of the labour of love of Pandit A M Srinivasachariar, who has made an extraordinary selection of verses from the original texts. These have been translated by Dr V Raghavan, a great scholar in his own right. With incisive forewords by Sir P S Sivaswami Aiyer and Dr S Radhakrishnan, these handy volumes keep intact the schema of the original works and succeed in bringing out their crux. Furnished with indices of proper names at the end, these books will prove to be a ready reference and a source of inspiration for venturing into the study of the originals. Swami Narasimhananda Advaita Ashrama, Kolkata T

The unmysterious behavior of the photons in the double-slit experiment Mehran Shaghaghi [email protected] University of Illinois-Chicago, 60608-1264, IL, USA Abstract: Simultaneous observation of the wave-like and particle-like aspects of the photon in the double-slit experiment is unallowed. The underlying reason behind this limitation is not understood. In this work we propose an explanation for the impossibility of detecting the complimentary aspect of the photons by considering the information capacity of the photons. We show the single photons in the double-slit experiment have a very limited communication capacity that forbids them from carrying more than one message. In such systems only measurements associated with one proposition can obtain a physical result and the later measurements associated with independent propositions must necessarily contain an element of randomness. The elucidation we offer is based on the mathematics of information theory and does not make use of Heisenberg's uncertainty relation in any form. 1. Introduction The single-photon Young's double-slit experiment is described as the experiment that "has in it the heart of quantum mechanics" (1). In the basic version of this experiment, a light beam illuminates a plate pierced by two parallel slits, and the light passing through the slits is observed on a screen behind the plate forming an interference pattern. The experiments performed by sending single photons show that they also collectively form an interference pattern (2-5) which is incompatible with the pattern of single particles that go through either of the slits. One may wonder what path the single photons take when they form an interference pattern. However, any attempt to determine the path of the photons destroys the interference pattern. Many studies have confirmed this feature that an experiment designed to observe the wave-like interference necessarily gives up the option of observing the particle-like trajectories and vice versa (6, 7). Any effort to force the observation of both effects introduces an element of randomness that makes the results non-conclusive (8). Thus presenting a fundamental limitation on what aspects of the behavior of a quantum particle can be measured: obtaining the which-way information of the photons inhibits observing their wave-like property and observing their wavelike property inhibits obtaining the which-way information of the photons. 2 The underlying truth behind such strange behavior is not understood and the wave-particle duality is considered as the main point of demarcation between quantum and classical physics. Here, we propose an explanation for this limitation on obtaining complementary information about the behavior of the single photons in the double-slit experiment by taking into account that physical systems not only carry energy, momentum, etc. but also carry information. 2. Information capacity of physical systems Physical systems can store data on their adjustable properties and convey messages. Any person who has played an "escape room" game knows that the needed information could be loaded even on the shape of a paper, or it's color. An adjustable property of a physical system with d distinguishable states can be loaded to carry a message worth up to log2 d bits of data. The information capacity of a physical system can be calculated by summing up all independently adjustable properties of the system. A physical system with N number of adjustable properties, each with dn distinguishable states, can carry N independent messages each containing up to log2 dn bits of data. The messages and pieces of information loaded on those physical properties can be read later using appropriate physical measurements. One should note that once a measurement on a property of a system is done and the stored message on that property is read (say the color), an additional measurement on the same property (say the wavelength of the incoming light) does not give away any independent piece of information; the new result provides a measure of the mutual dependence between the two correlated measurements. Generally, the capacity of macroscopic physical systems for storing information is huge, while bounded (9). A macroscopic object, like a token, can have many adjustable properties, such as temperature, color, and radius. Many such attributes, however, cease to exist in a well-defined manner in the microscopic realm. Therefore, the microscopic physical systems usually have a much less number of independently adjustable properties and accordingly, a much lower information capacity compared to macroscopic physical systems. For example, attributes such as color or temperature are not well-defined for an elementary particle like an electron, and it has only a few independently adjustable properties: energy, position, and spin. As in other physical 3 systems, the degrees of freedom of the electrons may also be used for the storage and transmission of information. 3. Photons in the double-slit setup A photon is a physical system with only a few numbers of degrees of freedom which makes its capacity to transmit messages very limited. Photons have only three independently adjustable properties that may be used as information carriers to convey messages: position, frequency, and spin. These properties of photons are those utilized in many 3D movie theatres using 'polarized 3D systems' to respectively convey the shape, color, and depth perception of the moving pictures. In any case, a single photon can at most convey three independent messages1. Earlier we mentioned the strange behavior of single photons in the double-slit experiment. Setting up a double-slit experiment however, requires certain arrangements. For example, an ordinary light source, like a candle, would not produce an interference pattern. To observe the interference, all of the incoming photons must be highly directional, originate from the same location, and also be coherent so their energies are the same. Using a laser source provides these conditions and has made demonstrating such experiments more readily possible in physics' department labs (10). In other words, when performing the double-slit experiment one needs to use a stream of photons that all come from the same source and have equal energy. These prerequisites fix the position and energy of the incoming photons and leave the interacting photons with only one non-fixed degree of freedom. Thus the photons in the double-slit experiment are physical systems with a single degree of freedom and can convey at most one message. This explains the nature of the unique behavior of the photons in the double-slit experiment and the reason why the photons cannot carry two independent pieces of information. The photons in the double-slit experiment setup are physical systems that are left with only one degree of freedom, and thus they can convey at most one message. Once a measurement is performed on them, a second measurement associated with any other independent proposition must necessarily contain an element of randomness. Randomness indicates the measurement is performed on a system that has reached the state of zero information content (see Appendix II). This explains the observed 1 One may encode much more than three different pieces of information on a photon: see appendix I for a discussion about physical information (carried by the system) vs. semantic information (inferred from the message), in which the latter benefits from a wealth of shared background knowledge. 4 randomness in the experiment when the observation of the complementary effects is forced. Furthermore, this means such randomness is ontological and not removable. 4. Conclusion In classical physics, the dynamics of a particle's evolution is governed by its position and velocity. In quantum mechanics, the uncertainty principle forbids simultaneous determination of the trajectory and momentum of a quantum particle, as in the photons in the double-slit experiment. No further explanation is offered for this fundamental limitation. Our approach for explaining the photon's behavior in the double-slit experiment does not make use of Heisenberg's uncertainty relation in any form. We based the discussion on the fact that physical systems can store data and convey messages. With this aspect of physical systems being not unbounded, we found that in certain cases, such as the case of the photons in the double-slit experiment setup, the physical system can reach the lowest limit of their capacity to hold just one message. The same argument can be made for each of the macroscopic molecules in the carefully prepared homogeneous beam of the macromolecule selected for performing the interference experiments with large molecules (11, 12). The unfamiliar case of single photons in the double-slit experiment is thus due to the situation that involves performing measurements on a system that can convey no more than one message: one can perform an experiment to find out about either which slit the photon has gone through or about its wave properties. This is far different from our classical experiences with systems that can simultaneously store and convey many different messages. Nevertheless, it shouldn't be surprising that an elementary particle like a photon would not have a large capacity to simultaneously hold different pieces of information. It has not been unknown that physical systems can be used as communication devices or data storages (9), however, it appeared that information considerations do not affect the behavior of the physical systems. We discussed that in the extreme case of reaching very low information capacity, such as the photons in the double-slit experiment, mathematics forbids obtaining two informationally distinct outcomes. Furthermore, reaching the bottommost limit of information capacity, i.e. zero information, must necessarily contain an element of randomness, which is suggestive for quantum randomness. 5 The picture we presented in this paper, single photons as the physical systems with very limited communication capacity, can explain where the strange behavior of the photons in the double-slit experiment comes from; the experiment that Feynman called an experiment "has in it the heart of quantum mechanics" (1). This picture can potentially have more implications in interpreting quantum physics and can be a first step in grasping the physical meaning of the theory. References: 1. Feynman L. Sands. The Feynman Lectures on Physics-Quantum Mechanics, vol. III. AddisonWesley Publishing Company, Massachusetts; 1966. 2. Grangier P, Roger G, Aspect A. Experimental evidence for a photon anticorrelation effect on a beam splitter: a new light on single-photon interferences. EPL (Europhysics Letters). 1986;1(4):173. 3. Jelezko F, Volkmer A, Popa I, Rebane K, Wrachtrup J. Coherence length of photons from a single quantum system. Physical Review A. 2003;67(4):041802. 4. Jacques V, Wu E, Toury T, Treussart Fo, Aspect A, Grangier P, et al. Single-photon wavefrontsplitting interference. The European Physical Journal D-Atomic, Molecular, Optical and Plasma Physics. 2005;35(3):561-5. 5. Zeilinger A, Weihs G, Jennewein T, Aspelmeyer M. Happy centenary, photon. Nature. 2005;433(7023):230-8. 6. Scully MO, Englert B-G, Walther H. Quantum optical tests of complementarity. Nature. 1991;351(6322):111-6. 7. Jacques V, Wu E, Grosshans F, Treussart F, Grangier P, Aspect A, et al. Experimental realization of Wheeler's delayed-choice gedanken experiment. Science. 2007;315(5814):966-8. 8. Wootters WK, Zurek WH. COMPLEMENTARITY IN THE DOUBLE-SLIT EXPERIMENT QUANTUM NON-SEPARABILITY AND A QUANTITATIVE STATEMENT OF BOHRS PRINCIPLE. Physical Review D. 1979;19(2):473-84. 9. Lloyd S. Ultimate physical limits to computation. Nature. 2000;406(6799):1047. 10. Schneider MB, LaPuma IA. A simple experiment for discussion of quantum interference and which-way measurement. American Journal of Physics. 2002;70(3):266-71. 11. Arndt M, Nairz O, Vos-Andreae J, Keller C, Van der Zouw G, Zeilinger A. Wave–particle duality of C 60 molecules. nature. 1999;401(6754):680. 12. Gerlich S, Eibenberger S, Tomandl M, Nimmrichter S, Hornberger K, Fagan PJ, et al. Quantum interference of large organic molecules. Nature communications. 2011;2:263. 13. Shannon CE. A mathematical theory of communication. Bell system technical journal. 1948;27(3):379-423. 6 Appendix I: Information vs. inference One may wonder about a claim such that an electron can convey at most three distinct messages on its position, momentum, and spin. Is it not that possible to load, for example, three messages just on the different components of its momentum? Here we should differentiate between our notion of information (semantic information) in contrast to physical information (information carried by physical objects). In short, our semantic information is what gets inferred and interpreted in a web of shared background knowledge and implied assumptions, but physical information bears no such references and comes in one chunk. For example, one may use a beam of laser with adjustable wavelength –say sharply with values between 100 to 999 nm– to send a message to the other party. The information to be sent will be encoded on the wavelength of the light. With this setup, the physical carrier conveys a message worth up to log2 899 = 9.8 bits of data. In the receiving end, however, the wavelength measured in nm can be converted to binary (a number between 0001100100 and 1111100111) in which the value on each placing can represent the answer to a different pre-assigned yes/no question, 9 in total. With such encodings and wise choice of the questions, one can transmit a wealth of information just by using the wavelength of a laser. So it seems that the energy of photons can convey a lot more than just one message. One should, however, not confuse this human ability to encode many pieces of information on the wavelength of a beam of light, that benefits from many shared background knowledge, with the physical messages that bear the information. In such encodings we implicitly or explicitly benefit from myriads of shared background knowledge between the agents at the ends, e.g. they both know what is a wavelength, nm, number bases, the choice of the questions, their order, the language in which the questions are in, etc. which are none part of the transmitted physical message. Similarly, a single electron does not carry on itself per se the background knowledge of e.g. spatial directions, so that the observer at the receiving end be able to project and read the momentum in specific directions. In practice, the physical information is what is transmitted physically between the two ends and therefore the physical messages are distinguishable only based on possible distinct physical properties of the message carrier. Meaning, that a physical property with a huge 7 number of states for example, physically bears messages in only one chunk; a big chunk though as it contains a large amount of data equal to log2(#states) bits. Appendix II: What does zero information means in physics Physical information is extracted from physical objects with the act of measurement. When we perform a measurement we always get a reading; even a 'zero' reading is still a result and obtained information. Thus in physical world zero information cannot be assumed to be equivalent to zero data. Physical zero information means that the collected data represent zero information. The information content of a message, which is composed of bits of data, can be evaluated mathematically. In the mathematical language of the information theory, as we show, physical zero information means that the result we collect should be either the same old reading or, a random reading since randomness is an expression of zero information. Mathematically the expected information gain in a process involving possible outcomes of X = {x1, x2, x3, ... . . }, is defined as the change in the Shannon entropy (13) I = H2(X) − H1(X), (1) in which the Shannon entropy is defined as Ht(X) = − ∑ Pt(xi) log2 Pt(xi), (2) where Pt(xi) are the probabilities of the outcomes. We can easily verify the two cases in which the information gain is zero. In the case of no new data, when one keeps getting the same result r, we have Pt(r) = 1 and hence Ht(X) = 0 and I = 0. In the case of randomness, the outcomes do not follow a deterministic pattern and the probability distribution of the outcomes remains the same regardless of the previous outcomes, that is P1(xi) = P2(xi). In this case, the Shannon entropy stays constant, H1(X) = H2(X), therefore I = 0 and the information gain is also zero. In layman terms, zero information means either no new data/results, or receiving random data/results; basically, either no news or conflicting news.

Originally published in Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 2014, 1-15 [DOI 10.1007/s11097-0149366-y]. Please quote from published version. SHADOWS OF CONSCIOUSNESS THE PROBLEM OF PHENOMENAL PROPERTIES Jason M. Costanzo ABSTRACT: The aim of this essay is to show that phenomenal properties are contentless modes of appearances of representational properties. The essay initiates with examination of the first-person perspective of the conscious observer according to which a "reference to I" with respect to the observation of experience is determined. A distinction is then drawn between the conscious observer and experience as observed, according to which, three distinct modifications of experience are delineated. These modifications are then analyzed with respect to the content of experience and from this the ground of the distinction between phenomenal and representational properties is identified. Keywords: phenomenal properties, representational properties, pre-reflective consciousness, reflectiveconsciousness, experience, mode, appearance 1 Introduction: The Problem of Phenomenal Properties In general, we might say that each conscious state involves representation of a specific "intentional content" corresponding to that conscious state. A perception state involves representation of either a visualcontent or an auditory-content, and so on, for the five senses. Alternatively, corresponding to a belief state there is a belief-content, and to a pain state, a pain-content. So each conscious state has its corresponding intentional content and that content likewise corresponds to that conscious state. We cannot speak of a pain-content for a belief state, although we can speak of an association of states in the formation of more complex conscious states, for example, the feeling of guilt as a combination of belief and emotive feeling. A distinction might furthermore be formulated between the intentional content of any conscious state and consciousness of the experience of that state, so that we might in turn speak of what it is like to experience (Nagel 1974), and this latter addition, commonly referred to as the subjective or "phenomenal character" of experience, may lead to the further supposition that, over and above the intentional content of experience, there is a specific "phenomenal content" pertaining to consciousness of what our experiences are like. Within the philosophy of mind today, few would deny to experience its phenomenal character. In spite of this, there is hardly any agreement regarding the nature and relationship between the phenomenal and intentional content of experience. For some (i.e., "representationalists" such as Dretske 1995, Lycan 1996 and Tye 1995), there really is no fundamental difference between the two. The phenomenal content of experience is, at best, attributable to the way the intentional content is represented within experience. 2 Among others (so-called "anti-materialists" such as Block 1995, Chalmers 1995 and Levine 2001), phenomenal character is the result of the way in which we are conscious of our experience and entails a distinct phenomenal content over and above intentional content.1 These two positions might likewise be considered in relation to the problem of phenomenal properties. So we might speak not only of intentional and phenomenal content but also of the properties of that content. A "representational property" would then be a property resulting from the intentional content of experience (Chalmers 2004), as a represented red-content or pain-content. On the other hand, a "phenomenal property" would be a property resulting from either the phenomenal content of experience (anti-materialism) or the way the representational property is represented (representationalism). In either case, the phenomenal property would express what the experience of red is like or what pain experience is like.2 So along with the content of experience, whereas anti-materialists affirm the separate instantiation of phenomenal properties within consciousness, representationalists deny their separate instantiation. Within this essay, my primary aim will be to consider the phenomenal character of experience through examination of the problem of phenomenal properties. Indeed, this latter problem is ultimately tied to phenomenal character so that if an answer can be given to the question, "What is a phenomenal property?" then in the main we have likewise supplied an answer to the question, "What is phenomenal character?" In addressing the question and problem of phenomenal properties, I shall likewise do so according to the following three suppositions: First, I affirm that there is something it is like to experience, thus upholding the phenomenal character of experience. Second, with representationalists, I reject the antimaterialist position that there is a separate phenomenal content over and above the intentional content of our experience. Third, I reject the representationalist position that phenomenal properties are the result of the way the intentional content is represented within experience and instead uphold the anti-materialist position that such properties are the result of the way in which we are conscious of our experience. 1 I well recognize that the above distinction is a simplification of the varied and often complex positions and arguments offered by each side and likewise omits otherwise mediating points of view. For instance, we might further distinguish pure from impure representationalism (Chalmers 2004). My aim here, however, is not to offer a survey of the various positions on the issue, but instead, to offer a solution to the problem of phenomenal properties. From this latter perspective, the above distinction serves to establish the context according to which the solution to the problem of phenomenal properties here given may be understood and as such, need not necessarily apply, in all points, to those identified with such positions. 2 We here restrict discussion of phenomenal properties to the perceptible properties of our experience. We can of course speak of what it is like to think, suppose, believe, and so on, and in such cases, we might identify an intentional content in relation to experience of one's own acts of consciousness, and alternatively, a phenomenal content in relation to consciousness of what the experience of one's own acts of consciousness is like. In spite of our focus upon perceptible properties, the solution here offered is understood to apply globally to the whole of consciousness of experience. 3 From the above three suppositions, we obtain what might at first appear as a great hydra: phenomenal character, minus phenomenal content, coupled with the view that consciousness contributes something over and above the intentional content of our experience. Upon closer inspection, however, our solution to the problem of phenomenal properties involves what is here called property hylomorphism, which is to say, the view that consciousness and intentionality (representational experience) constitute an irreducible unity. In classical terms, intentional content contributes the matter of experience, consciousness the form. Through the union of matter and form, consciousness and intentionality, we then obtain a basis for discussion of the way in which we are conscious of our experience. As will likewise be seen, the peculiar form of consciousness, which is to say, what consciousness adds over and above experience, finds its principle through the "reference to I" with respect to the relationship between the conscious observer and experience as observed. In what follows, I begin (section 2) with a number of arguments against the anti-materialist position that phenomenal properties are separate content-bearing properties and likewise against the representationalist position that phenomenal character is accountable solely on the basis of the intentional content of representational experience. Following this (section 3), I examine the relationship between consciousness and experience according to which a "reference to I" stands forth as an essential component in the discussion of our experience. The nature of pre-reflective and reflective consciousness is then considered, and through the latter, recognition of the relationship between the conscious observer and experience as observed follows. Further analysis (section 4) of this relationship yields three distinct modifications or modes of experience. In the first place, experience is modified in terms of the whole relation that holds between the observer and the observed (nominative). In the second place, experience is modified according to the reference of experience as observed, to the observer (dative). Finally, according to a third modification, experience is modified according to the observer's reference of experience to oneself as observer (genitive). Following this (section 5), we conclude that phenomenal properties are contentless appearances within consciousness as the result of a comparison formed for the same representational property according to distinct modifications of it within consciousness. 2 Three Arguments Against the Instantiation and Representation of Phenomenal Properties As above noted, we uphold the view that there is something it is like to experience and that the phenomenal character of experience is attributable to consciousness of our experience. What must then be considered is first the question of why we ought to deny to phenomenal character any content over and above the intentional content of representational experience, and second, why representational experience itself cannot be the source of phenomenal character. In what follows, I offer three arguments. The first two arguments are targeted in the main at the anti-materialist position that consciousness involves instantiation of a separate phenomenal content over and above the representational content of experience. The third 4 argument is targeted at the representationalist position that phenomenal properties are the result of the way in which the intentional content is represented within experience. I. The Knowledge Argument Against Property Dualism If as anti-materialists we assert that for every representational property r we have the separate instantiation within consciousness of a phenomenal property p pertaining to what the experience of r is like, then it seems that knowledge of r is impossible. For knowing r implies that I also know p, which is to say, what it is like to know r, so that my knowledge of r mutually entails p in each case. But upon what basis may I then affirm that p is like r (in the sense of what it is like to experience)? Here it seems that we must appeal to a prior experiential knowledge of r and in consequence, we are compelled to admit that r must be knowable first and foremost in relation to itself and only secondarily in relation to p. So supposition of the separate instantiation of phenomenal properties results in a contradiction and likewise leaves the basis of our knowledge of even representational properties open to question. II. The Redundancy Argument There is then a second difficulty. We suppose, as anti-materialists, that a phenomenal property p is instantiated within consciousness in relation to some representational property r. In consequence, experience necessarily entails two distinct kinds of content, an intentional content R in relation r and a phenomenal content P in relation to p. But since P also expresses what R is like, then P must include R with the addition of some difference, say *, so that we might in turn express the phenomenal content P as R*. From this it follows that the phenomenal content R* is distinct from R on the basis of an added content * that is anything but R. In other words, consciousness of say, what red is like, differs from the representation of red on the basis of a content and difference that is, at bottom, anything but red. III. Argument From the Unnecessary Duplication of Experience Supposing that, as representationalists, we reject the view that phenomenal properties involve instantiation of a separate phenomenal content over and above the intentional content of experience, while upholding the phenomenal character of experience. In consequence, a phenomenal property p would be the result of the way in which the intentional content R is represented. So then the way in which p is represented must itself be some form of content-bearing experience. For any identifiable content must be translatable into an experience of that content. But p is an identifiable content pertaining to the way experience is represented. So p is a content-bearing experience. This in turn implies that every represented property r includes both an intentional content R coupled with an added experiential content D in relation to the way p is represented. In consequence, it would appear that the representationalist position leads to an unnecessary duplication of 5 experience. For to every R for which there is some p, we may assert the added content-bearing experience of D. We are in turn compelled to inquire into the relationship, in content, between D and R, and in consequence, we inevitably face the redundancy argument. Addendum: We might of course object that the way a property is represented is not an experiential content, but is instead a feature of representational consciousness itself. But unless that feature stand over and above representational experience, it must in each case be reducible to some added content for our experience, for otherwise, how could we know of it? Observations If we accept the results of the above three arguments, at least tentatively, then we are compelled to conclude that phenomenal properties lack content and alternatively that experience apart from consciousness of experience is insufficient to account for the nature of phenomenal properties and in turn phenomenal character. We are therefore faced with a dilemma. On the one hand, we deny anything positive to the content of phenomenal properties, and on the other hand, we uphold the view that the phenomenal character of experience is the result of the addition of consciousness over and above experience which in turn includes the notion of phenomenal properties insofar as phenomenal character implies consciousness of what the experience of any representational property is like. This dilemma inevitably points to a third possibility and so to our own argument and solution, viz., that phenomenal properties are contentless modes of appearances within consciousness of the experience of representational properties. 3 Reference to I Now a principal characterization of the phenomenal character of experience is undoubtedly the fact that such experience arises according to the first-person perspective of the "I" and ego for whom there is said to be an experience.3 This is evident from the fact that in the everyday consideration of our experience, we do not say, "There was an experience of x", but instead, "I experienced x". Still more, the reference to I is inherently immune to error through misidentification (Shoemaker 1968). I could never be mistaken regarding the reference of my experience to myself, nor mistake the experience of another for my own. Still more, far from implying that I am a conscious observer in the sense of a detached spectator viewing experience from afar within the theater of consciousness (Dennett 1991), the reference to I likewise includes the immersion of the observer within the undergoing of this experience. As both observer and as one who undergoes experience as the observer of it, I am in consequence the referential focal point of the relationship between consciousness and the conscious observation of experience. Experience is referred to me as observed and alternatively I refer experience to myself as the conscious observer of my experience. 3 "One generally agreed upon fact about phenomenal states is that they are perspectivally subjective...knowing what it is like to feel pain requires one to have a certain experiential point of view or perspective, namely the one conferred upon one by being the subject of pain." (Tye 1999, 706) 6 The observation of experience is further determined according to the specific restriction that it take place here now. This implies that all other determinations of observed experience find always some reference to I as the here and now observer of that experience. In consequence, I here and now perceive, sense, judge, assume, hope for and likewise expect and recollect. This last determination is of particular interest insofar as it reveals the way in which we refer temporal experience to our here and now consideration of it. For example, I might recall an experience from the past. In so doing, I bring to mind some past experience. As is evident, the act of recollection itself takes place according to my present observing act of recollection. For this reason, in recalling any past experience, I refer the past-now to my present-now in such a way that the former is called then in reference to the now of the latter. Alternatively, I might speak of the spatial locality of an object in the room, e.g., the lamp on the other side of my desk. In doing so, I refer it to my here and now observation and so say that the lamp is there now. Later on, I may speak of the lamp and in this case, I again refer the experience of it to my here and now consideration and so speak of the lamp as there before. Such spatiotemporal indicators are essential to the human experience and likewise serve to reveal that fact that every observed experience in each case finds its focal point according to the reference to I. Even as the observer is restricted to the here and now observation of experience, the observer need not be restricted to the immediate "pre-reflective" undergoing of this experience. To the contrary, we may at any moment redirect our observing I and reflect upon the pre-reflective immediacy of our experience as though one step removed from it. So by "reflection" I mean the higher-order act of observing my own consciousness and the experience of consciousness.4 Reflection is in turn a derivative state of consciousness that follows upon the more primordial pre-reflective state of consciousness where the observer is immersed within the immediate undergoing of experience. To offer a simple example, we might consider an experience of being frightened, for instance, believing we are in a room alone only to be suddenly tapped upon the shoulder, and distinguish this from the consideration that follows afterward of what the experience of fear was like. In the first instance, even as we are caught within the pre-reflective immediacy of feeling fear, we are observers of our experience. On the other hand, when we later reflect 4 For example, in his Language, Thoughts and Consciousness (1996, pp. 154-155), Peter Carruthers states, "Even if knowing what an experience is like is a special sort of capacity...still it is a capacity which will involve the ability to recognise, to imagine, and to remember a given type of experience, all of which presuppose a capacity for reflective self-awareness. In order to be able to recognise a pain, you have to be capable of knowing that you are in pain, when you are; and similarly for imagination and memory. So the conclusion is established: in order to know what an experience is like, you have to be capable of higher-order awareness of the occurrence of that experience." So too, in The Transcendence of the Ego (1960, pp. 40-41), Jean-Paul Sartre states of pre-reflective consciousness, "We should add that this consciousness of consciousness-except in the case of reflective consciousness which we shall dwell on later-is not positional, which is to say that consciousness is not for itself its own object. Its object is by nature outside of it, and that is why consciousness posits and grasps the object in the same act. Consciousness knows itself only as absolute inwardness. We shall call such a consciousness: consciousness in the first degree, or unreflected consciousness." For further discussion of this distinction, see Zahavi (2008). 7 upon this experience, we are no longer observers in the same sense. Indeed, we do not observe from within the undergoing of fear but now as outside observers of that undergoing. This is then what is here understood with respect to the distinction between pre-reflective and reflective consciousness. According to the former, we observe within the immediacy of experience. According to the latter, we observe as though one step removed from it.5 Within pre-reflective consciousness the reference to I is only implicit, which is to say, a relationship between observer and observed holds for pre-reflective consciousness, but we do not explicitly recognize this relationship. At best, we only know that "I experience x". Following upon the reflective consideration of our experience, however, we quickly discover that there is an experience of x only insofar as we are the conscious observers of x. In consequence, through reflection, the reference to I now stands forth explicitly (i.e., as an objectifying relation) and in such a way that a distinction may then be drawn between the conscious observer and experience as observed. 4 The Nominative, Dative and Genitive Modes So in everyday pre-reflective consciousness, whether walking, talking, eating, thinking, etc., the observer is in each case immersed within the undergoing of an experience. We interact with the world and the objects of our experience without any explicit re-cognition of the way in which such experience arises and so apart from any direct consideration of the part that we play as observers of this experience. In a way, we forget that we are actors within the play of experience and instead simply play the role of working, thinking, feeling, sensing, wondering, wanting and so on. At other times, however, we do indeed depart from the prereflective immediacy of experience into reflective consideration of it. We now view our own consciousness and the experience of consciousness one step removed from it. We clearly see our own act of observation as it occurs. We recognize the relationship between this observing act, the corresponding observation of experience and we likewise recognize the reference to I with respect to both. For the sake of argument, let us presume ourselves to now adopt this higher standpoint of reflection. Let us cease to be immersed within the pre-reflective immediacy of experience and instead consider experience one step removed from it. What is brought forth from this higher standpoint is then the following: Where before we recognized, if but obscurely, that within the pre-reflective immediacy of experience "I experience x", we now discover the precise nature and relationship between I and x. From the reflective standpoint, we discover that the observer is the very condition for the recognition of x. This we 5 Of course, observation implies awareness as well as self-awareness. From this we might initially conclude that observation and awareness are one and the same. There is, however, an important difference. By awareness is in general meant the abiding recognition of one's own consciousness (pre-reflective or reflective) that is carried along with and accompanies experience. On the other hand, observation includes within itself awareness and further implies a relationship between the observer and the observed. In other words, whereas awareness refers to a feature of the observer itself within consciousness, observation refers to a relationship between the observer and the observed. 8 determine from the fact that we cannot speak of an observed experience apart from the observation of it. Of course, this need not imply that I am always at this moment observing every experience within consciousness, but only that, in order to speak of the phenomenal character of experience, of what it is like to experience, which is here our primary concern, it is necessary that experience be in some sense observed by me. If we further examine the nature of our experience according to the various ways in which the observer relates to experience as observed, we discover three distinct modifications of it. These three modifications correspond to three reflective standpoints taken with respect to the observer and the observed within experience. Again, it is important to note that within pre-reflective consciousness although the relationship between the observer and the observed holds, that relation is known to us at best implicitly. Through reflection, this relationship is then brought forth explicitly (as an object) for our knowledge. Turning to the three modifications of experience, there is first the "nominative mode" as a result of reflective recognition upon the whole relation that holds between the observer and the observed according to the reference to I. With respect to this modification, experience is now qualified with the addition that it is an experience of the observer, and in consequence we say: (4.1) I observe x.6 So we can never speak of what an experience is like apart from the observation of it, and insofar as we do, we immediately assert a relationship, through I, between experience as observed and the conscious observer of it. The relationship is absolutely primitive. Apart from the reference to I we simply cannot speak of the observation of experience. The nominative mode in turn presents the simple and undeniable modification of the conscious observer as an essential condition inherent in consciousness of what it is like to experience. Following the nominative mode, we have two further modes. These two additional modes pertain to the relationship between the observer and the observed according as we consider each respective side of that relation. So in the first place, there is the relative side of experience as observed. From this standpoint, experience is viewed according to the modification of being to and for me as an observer of it. It is important to understand both how and why this occurs. Within pre-reflective consciousness, we are caught within the immediacy of our experience. From this standpoint, we know only that "I experience x". On the other hand, through reflection, the reference to I of experience immediately stands forth so that experience is now modified according to the addition that, "I observe x". This observation of x may then be considered according to each respective side. From the side of experience as observed, the experience of x is now viewed according to the reference of being to and for me as the observer of it. In effect, I now reflectively view my own observed experience with an added vector, where I, as the observer, serve as the focal point toward which that vector is directed. The determination of the direction of the vector is likewise asserted on 6 The addition that the observation take place "here now" is understood and left unstated. 9 the basis of the reference to I. Experience is then viewed according to the modification of being directed toward me and for me. This particular modification of experience I call the "dative mode", which is further expressed as follows: (4.2) x is given to me (as observed).7 The dative mode is essentially receptive in character, akin to reaching out to take a gift that another offers to us. Through the dative mode, we discover the fact that experience is given and in consequence, experience is recognized as both distinct from and yet related to I as the observer. So the dative mode serves in some sense as the very basis for recognition of the distinction between subject and object, self and other, etc., insofar as that which is given does not yet belong to me and so is not yet properly my own. This last point will be further considered following examination of the third mode. There is then a third and final modification according to the relative side of the observer. According to this third mode, I now view the reference to I from the perspective of myself as observer. In consequence, I refer the observation of experience to myself as the observer of it. This in turn leads to the recognition that the observed experience is my own. Still more, whereas through the dative mode, the observer and observed are divided, according to the third mode, that division in some sense collapses into an indistinguishable unity. What is now recognized is that as the observer of experience, I am the one for whom there is said to be an experience. I am accordingly not only an observer of an experience that is other to me, that is then referred back to me; but alternatively, I refer experience to myself in such a way that I become the possessor of it. Insofar as the observation of experience now belongs to me, the distinction between the observer and the observed thereby collapses into one another. This third mode is in consequence appropriative. By way of analogy to the dative, we might say that the object that was offered to me as a gift I now claim as my own. We have likewise a transition from reception to appropriation, and as appropriation implies both ownership and possession, to that extent I call this third mode the genitive mode, expressed as follows: (4.3) x is my own (as observer). So from the standpoint of the genitive mode, experience obtains the appropriative modification of 7 For further discussion of the role of referential indicators such as I, he, they, etc., see Castaneda (1966 & 1967), Bermudez (1998) and more recently, Hank (2013). It is worth noting that most discussions of such indicators in relation to consciousness tend to center around the nominative "I", whereas less emphasis in general is focused upon the dative "to/for me" and genitive "my own/mine" structures here developed. We do find some initial inquiry, however, into the concept of "me-ishness" in Block (1995). 10 possession and ownership, which is to say of being mine and my own.8 Indeed, as observed, experience is undeniably my own, and this determination arises prior to any further modification with respect to the objects of my experience, including my own body. For even though my body is certainly the most proximate (closest and most intimate) possession, we nonetheless experience the body as a datum. So I can view my hands and legs as objects other to me and for me (according to the dative mode) and even to some extent the inner sensations of pain and pleasure insofar as they each arise objectively as data within experience. For this reason, although the body is the most proximate possession, the body is not the foundation of the recognition of ownership. Rather, the principle of ownership is rooted in the reference to I according to the genitive mode of appropriation. Secondarily, the body serves as the most proximate appropriation that follows from this mode. Finally, through the body, we refer possessively to other objects encountered within the world of our experience. As a further point, it is worth noting that we cannot reduce experience to the objectivity of its dative modification, but instead, a complete account requires that we include in each case what is genitive within it. Thus experience is not only something that happens over and above me as a datum that I might study. Rather, I also undergo and abide within my experience as the subjective possessor of it (for which reason the conscious observer is often referred to as a "subject" of experience). This can readily be seen through consideration of pain experience. As is well known, cognitive scientists make use of pain reports derived from experiencing subjects themselves (Chapman et al. 2002) and from this attempt to causally model pain in such a way that it appears that we might now exclude the subjective foundation inherent in pain experience from any such model. But if we examine pain experience more fully, we find that such models fall far short of offering an adequate account of the nature of pain inasmuch as they omit the primary way in which we experience pain, which is at bottom genitive.9 For example, I might light a flame and hold my hand close to it. At first, I observe only heat and perhaps a dull sensation of discomfort. At this point, I might likewise attempt to reflect upon this experience and consider this discomfort in its dative modification (as given) only. But as I further draw my hand closer to the flame, something happens. The intensity of this discomfort increases until it is transformed into a raw and vigorous experience of pain. Pain now appears inwardly and aggressively and the closer and longer that I hold my hand over the flame, the more unbearable it becomes up unto the point that, no longer able to withstand the experience of pain, in an abrupt motion, I remove my hand away from the flame. Two important points may be drawn from this example. First, as pain increases, we note that the ability to stand apart and reflect upon our experience quickly recedes into the distance, so that pain 8 The genitive mode is the definitive mode expressed by Martin Heidegger within his Sein und Zeit in relation to Dasein, viz., "We are ourselves the entities to be analyzed. The Being of any such entity is in each case mine." (Heidegger 2001, 42) 9 Among such approaches, however, there is some tacit admission of the role of phenomenal experience in at least the recognition and production of our subjective reports about pain (Nakamura et al. 2002). 11 inevitably draws us into the pre-reflective immediacy of experience. Excepting the most intrepid of souls, no reflection upon the experience of pain occurs within the throes of intense pain inasmuch as I simply cannot just stand upon the sidelines, as it were, and simply watch pain, but I am instead forced to reckon with my pain. At the same time, when the pain ceases to be, we may return to it through an act of reflective recollection. In so doing, as we consider the moment in which pain was at its most unbearable, we realize that the distinction between observer and observed was in some sense lost entirely within the experience and what remained was just a being in the possession and being possessed by pain, as though the observer and observed mutually swallowed up one another akin to a great Ouroboros swallowing its own tail. So within everyday experience, the relationship between observer and observed is in a way harmonized so that the nominative mode is also the "normative" mode of experience. We go about our day relating to observed objects normally, perceiving, thinking, desiring and so on. On the other hand, certain encounters, pain serving as a primary example, draw out the other modifications of experience from within the pre-reflective state of consciousness, to such an extent that either the dative or genitive mode is emphasized. For this reason, we experience intense pain as though entirely consumed by it, as though we have swallowed it and it has swallowed us. But what we here experience, as determined afterward through reflecting upon it, was in fact a distinct modification of our experience. In other words, we experienced pain genitively, as a possession that we then refer to ourselves as our own. As it is, the above example and the genitive nature of pain serves to confirm the fact that there are features of consciousness that are simply intractable to the methods of objective scientific scrutiny pointing to an explanatory gap (Levine 1983) with respect to the study of consciousness. As is evident from the explanations here given, the primary basis for this explanatory gap involves the various ways (modifications) in which the observer is said to be conscious of experience. Indeed, we cannot study these ways apart from the inner observation of them. In the attempt to omit the observer, which is to say, to omit the phenomenal and quite subjective character of experience, we end up tearing out the very roots according to which such experience is known to us. For a further and final point, we might consider an experience where the dative mode is in this case emphasized. For example, we might feel sympathetic in relation to the grief that a friend experiences over the death of a loved one. In the first place, the feeling of sympathy involves a state of belief that the other is in grief and second, this belief is coupled with a state of emotive feeling. In the state of sympathy, we feel the pain of the other, but as the hand that is held neither too close nor too far from the flame, we keep the feeling of pain at a distance. In relating to that other, we do so from the standpoint of pre-reflective immediacy of experience. That is not to say that we cannot at this moment reflect upon our sympathy, but in so doing, we depart from the underlying immediacy and, in a way, cease to be sympathetic. On the other hand, if we do so afterward, if we later reflect upon that feeling, we realize that sympathy is itself an experience modified according to emphasis upon the dative mode that is nonetheless coupled to the genitive. Furthermore, as we feel sympathy, the object of sympathy is no longer something that I just observe in the sense of indifferently looking at. Rather, the grieving person is now seen in the dative 12 relation as an "Other" that is given to me. I in turn receive the other, coupled with their grief, and in consequence feel sympathetic. Within sympathy, there is therefore a greater pull in terms of the dative, insofar as belief (i.e., that the other is in fact grieving and not dissembling grief) serves as the primary motivation for that feeling. That pull is further grounded, however, within the genitive pain (in an emotive sense) that accompanies it, but again, such pain is kept at a bare minimum. In consequence, with sympathy, I do not appropriate the grief of the other. To the contrary, I keep genitive appropriation at a distance and stand within emphasis upon the dative reception of belief and the pain of the other as a given object. If I proceed further to then appropriate this grief, as it were, to really feel and possess the pain of the other, I then exchange my state of sympathy for a new state of empathy and this in turn translates into emphasis first upon the dative mode of reception (receiving grief sympathetically) into the genitive mode of appropriation (appropriating grief empathetically). 5 Phenomenal Properties as the Shadows of Consciousness Following analysis of above three modes of experience, we now turn to an account of the nature and distinction between representational and phenomenal properties. In the first place, representational properties pertain to the pre-reflective immersion of the observer within experience according to which there is experience of some intentional content. Accordingly, we might speak of the experience of some visual-content from which we obtain the representational property r, as the perception of red. Now phenomenal properties express the phenomenal character inherent in what the experience of some representational property is like. In the above example, we would then speak of the phenomenal property p, pertaining to consciousness of what the experience of r is like. According to the view taken here, phenomenal properties are not per se distinct from representational properties nor are they the same. Alternatively, phenomenal properties cannot be reduced to representational experience. The reason for this has to do with the fact that consciousness appears to add something quite specific, and the problem and basis for much of the difficulties centered round discussion of the nature of phenomenal properties, has to do with the fact that while consciousness adds something, it adds nothing to the specific content of experience itself. Instead, phenomenal properties are the result of the way in which the observer observes experience. For this reason, we understand and speak of phenomenal properties as "contentless modes of appearances" of our experience of representational properties. So a phenomenal property is an appearance in the sense of a modified presentation of the experience of some representational property according to the reference to I of the conscious observer. Such properties are contentless inasmuch as, in and of themselves, they do not add anything to the content of our experience. As we have seen, there are three modifications, viz., nominative, dative and genitive. These modifications are intertwined from the perspective of the prereflective immediacy of experience. Still more, the distinction between these modes cannot be known explicitly from within the pre-reflective state but only following upon an act of reflection. For this reason, 13 according to our view, pre-reflective consciousness involves an experiential undergoing of intentional content and does not yet include the phenomenal. On the other hand, through reflection, we obtain explicit access to these modes according to another sense, which is to say, according to the higher-order reflective observation of what it is like to experience pre-reflectively. We then form a phenomenal identity with respect to the immediate pre-reflective experience of some property coupled with a re-consideration of the ways in which that same property is then referred to I through reflective observation of it. In general, it is this identity within and through reflective observation that gives us the sense of what it is like to experience. For through such an identity, the same experienced property is related to itself according to different modifications of our experience of it. What results from this is at best an apparent property, which is in turn called phenomenal. Having stated our solution to the problem of phenomenal properties generally, we turn now to a more specific explanation of that solution. In the first place, we here understand the phenomenal property to be the result of a phenomenal identity, but it is important to further understand the precise nature of this. To illustrate, we consider a subject S, blind from birth who, following surgery, is able to see for the first time. After acclimating to the this new condition, S is asked to answer the question, "What is the experience of red like?" The task is to offer an explanation of the phenomenal property inherent in consciousness of what the experience of the representational property red is like. If we examine the possible answers that might be given, we find two interesting and diverse points of view. Although we admittedly cannot predict with accuracy the specific details of S's description of what the experience of red is like, we can nonetheless identify the type of description that ought to be given. The question inquires into what the experience was like, and in turn establishes the requirement that S respond through the use of some form of comparative example (whether analogy, simile, metaphor, and so on). In effect, the proper response to the question ought to then take on the following exemplary form-"x is like y". So we might imagine the description offered by S to be along the following lines: "Prior to my operation, I used to imagine what the experience of color might be like. In so doing, I would often make use of the description of others coupled with my other senses as a basis for comparison. In particular, since color, I was told, involves contrariety between black and white and as I supposed that the nothing that I "saw" while blind was akin to black, I supposed that white would then represent a certain fullness with respect to its opposite. Alternatively, in the sensation of heat, I noticed that in extremely cold weather my fingers and toes would become numb so that I thought of cold as "empty" akin to the color black. Alternatively, heat fills the emptiness of the cold and brings back sensation and there are degrees to heat from the lukewarm to the hot to the scalding. In turn, I imagined that the most extreme heat would be something like white as the opposite of black, and between the extremes of hot and cold I then imagined all the colors would therein find a place. Following my operation, however, I now realize that although there is indeed a similarity of proportion between the various colors and the various sensations of hot and cold, the actual experience of red and indeed any other color for that matter is quite unlike anything I could have 14 ever possibly imagined. Indeed, there is nothing it is like to experience red apart from the experience red, so that what it is like to experience red is more akin to what it is like to encounter something or someone unknown to us for the first time. Still more, the thing or person is not the same as the encounter of that thing or person and this implies that the encounter itself is not nothing, but instead relates to the fact that there is someone for whom there is said to be an encounter. So to answer your question, I would say that what it is like to experience red is like the experience of red coupled with the fact that red is something that I encounter in the sense of a first introduction." So what we here discover is that prior to experiencing red, S attempts to imagine what it is like to experience red through drawing a comparison between one representational property (red) and another representational property (a degree of heat) of an entirely different kind. Following the experience of red, however, S realizes that although the comparison was adequate in one sense it was inadequate in another. Indeed, it was adequate as a proportion but inadequate insofar as the actual experience of red includes the addition that red is an encounter for S, akin to being introduced to someone or something for the first time. There is thus something about the experiential encounter with red that holds over and above any knowledge that S could have prior to that encounter. If we further understand reflection to involve, in a way, a constant re-introduction of our experience to ourselves, according as I now stand one step removed from my experience and reflect upon the reference to I within it, then we appear to have determined the very foundation of the phenomenal character of what it is like to experience. Indeed, every experienced representational property is known first and foremost within and through the pre-reflective immediacy of experience. Through reflection, we re-introduce experience to ourselves so that the observer and the observed now stand forth as an experiential encounter in their mutual reference to I. From the reflective standpoint, a comparison is then formed, a phenomenal identity, for the representational content and its encounter within and through reflective consideration of it. This encounter may likewise occur according to three modifications. So according to the nominative mode, we identify a relationship between consciousness and experience through I. According to the dative mode, experience is given to and for me. According finally to the genitive mode, as the observer of experience, I now recognize that experience is in some sense my own. We are accordingly in a position to determine the foundation of the relationship between representational and phenomenal properties. In the first place, in contradistinction to the representationalist position, we conclude that phenomenal properties are not the result of the way in which the intentional content of experience is represented, but instead are the result of the way in which we are conscious of our experience. Phenomenal properties are founded upon a comparison and indeed a phenomenal identity formed with respect to the pre-reflective immediacy of experience, according to which we first undergo an experienced property, coupled with reflection upon that experience from which there is now re-cognition of the experiential encounter with respect to the observer and the observed in their mutual reference to I. In effect, for any representational property r and phenomenal property p, we obtain the following: 15 (5.1.) I experience r. {Pre-reflective Consciousness} And alternatively, (5.2) I observe r. = p-nominative (5.3) r is given to me. = p-dative {Reflective consciousness} (5.4) r is my own. = p-genitive We have in each case one and the same representational property according to three distinct modifications of the observation of our experience of it, thereby yielding the appearance of that property, which is then what we understand to be a phenomenal property. Finally, we say that the observation, reception and appropriation of the representational property is what it is like to experience that property, and in general: (5.5) p is like r. As is evident from the above, in contradistinction to the anti-materialist position, the phenomenal property p is not at all distinct in content from the representational property r but is a result of the relation that holds between the pre-reflective experience of some representational property and its reflective re-consideration within consciousness. We may in turn conclude that phenomenal properties are the result of the form of consciousness, which is to say, the reference to I of the conscious observer and observed experience. Indeed, phenomenal properties are contentless shadows of consciousness. Akin to the shadows of perceptible experience which, while devoid of content, yet retain the form and figure of the bodies of which they are the shadow, so too phenomenal properties retain the form of the peculiar modification of the matter of the content of an experienced representational property, according to the various relations that hold with respect to the conscious observer and the observation of experience. We have accordingly identified what a phenomenal property is, and so resolved or at least shed some further light upon the problem of phenomenal properties. As is evident from our solution, the phenomenal character of consciousness, akin to phenomenal properties, must likewise be the result of the relationship that holds between the conscious observer and observed experience according to the reference to I. We therefore speak of the phenomenal character of experience on account of the fact that through reflective observation upon pre-reflective experience, the various modifications of experience in relation to the observer now stand forth phenomenally as an encounter for the observer. Following this, by way of comparison and phenomenal identity, we accordingly speak of what it is like to experience. REFERENCES 16 Bermudez, J.L. (1998). The Paradox of Self-Consciousness (Representation and Mind). Cambridge MA: MIT Press. Block, N. (1995). On a Confusion About a Function of Consciousness. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18: 227-87. Carruthers, P. (1996). Language, Thoughts, and Consciousness: An Essay in Philosophical Psychology. 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Macquarrie & E. Robinson, Oxford: Basil Blackwell (2004). Levine, J. (1983). Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 64: 354–61. Levine, J. (2001). Purple Haze: The Puzzle of Consciousness. New York: Oxford University Press. Lycan, W. (1996). Consciousness and Experience. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Nagel, T. (1974). What is it like to be a Bat?. Philosophical Review, 83: 435–56. Nakamura, Y., Chapman, C.R. (2002). Measuring pain: An introspective look at introspection. Consciousness and Cognition, 11: 582-92 Sartre, J. P. (1960). The Transcendence of the Ego: An Existentialist Theory of Consciousness. Tran. Williams, F., Kirkpatrick, R. New York: Hill and Wang. Shoemaker, S. (1968). Self-Reference and Self-Awareness. Journal of Philosophy, 65(19): 555-67. Tye, M. (1995). Ten Problems of Consciousness. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 17 Tye, M. (1999). Phenomenal Consciousness: The Explanatory Gap as Cognitive Illusion. Mind, 108: 70525. Zahavi, D. (2008). Subjectivity and Selfhood: Investigating the First-Person Perspective. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî: Phenomenological Critique of Cultural Relativism KOSHY THAKARAN ABSTRACT The concept of cultural relativism enabled anthropologists to overcome ethnocentrism. Nevertheless, if we hold that every culture is valid on its own terms or all cultures are equally worthy of approbation, then it douses the spirit of a critique of culture. Husserl in his earlier writings deploys the self-contradictory nature of relativism as one of the central arguments against the thesis of relativism and argues for a concept of philosophy that is absolutistic, a viewpoint that is equally problematic. However, in his later writings one can discern a more balanced perspective, one that accepts the challenge of relativism but does not succumb to the same. By making use of the concept of multiculturalism, we argue that each culture is always plural in its constitution and that the plurality of culture is desirable. However, this plurality is not to be understood as engendering relativism, rather multiculturalism undercuts the possibility of any such radical relativism. The Husserlian overcoming of relativism, akin to multiculturalism, is not by dismissing the differences out rightly, rather by traversing the path of relativism through dialogue and mutual understanding that finally one could point to the regulative concept of one world as the correlate of plurality of world-noemata. © Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research, OctoberñDecember 2010, Vol. XXVII, No. 4, 61ñ74. KOSHY THAKARAN62 It is philosophically uninteresting that there are on this globe of ours many societies and cultures, a staggering variety of sub-cultures, subgroups, fragments of societies, etc. But what is philosophically important and worth examining is how these culture groups or societies relate to each other or confront one another1. ñBimal Krishna Matilal Cultural relativism is a central notion in anthropological discourse. The realization that there are different cultures in different societies and even within a society, there are intra-cultural differences is what made the advancement of ethnography as an important tool of anthropological research. The concept of cultural relativism enabled anthropologists to overcome ethnocentrism, particularly the Eurocentrism of earlier Western scholars. Nevertheless, from a philosophical perspective cultural relativism seems to be problematic. If we hold that every culture is valid on its own terms or all cultures are equally worthy of approbation, then it douses the spirit of a critique of culture. The motivation for change or cultural transformation both from within and outside seems to be seriously jeopardized. Every culture is justified in perpetuating the status quo. It precludes any genuine sense of ìEmancipationî or ìLiberationî and socio-cultural change is at best seen as a ìPlayî or the outcome of a pervasive ìPowerî. Husserl in his earlier writings deploys the self-contradictory nature of relativism as one of the central arguments against the thesis of relativism. Thus in Prolegomena, Husserl criticizes relativists as making claims that are seemingly objective and then uses it to show the very impossibility of such claims. In other words, the relativist takes for granted the non-relative validity of his own concepts in trying to demonstrate the relativity of concepts. In his Logos article, Husserl discusses the implications of ëHistoricismí and Weltanschauung philosophy and criticizes it for its relativistic conclusions. In these writings, Husserl by rejecting relativism argues for a concept of philosophy that is absolutistic2, a viewpoint that is equally problematic. However, in his later writings one can discern a more balanced perspective, one that accepts the challenge of relativism but does not succumb to the same. Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî 63 The concept of the life-world seems to hold the key to our understanding of Husserlís later thought. Although the notion appears even as early as Ideas II, a systematic exposition of the same is seen in his Crisis of European Sciences. Life-world is the world that we come across in our common, ordinary and everyday experience. As the world of everyday experience, it is prior to the world of theoretical attitude. The theoretical attitude idealizes entities in the life-world and thereby paves the way to the objective sciences. In other words, science is an ideal construct or a theoretical superstructure that has life-world as its foundation. There may be a people who have never come across a ìscientific worldî, as such a derivative world of science is alien to their culture. However, it is inconceivable that there exists a human community that does not have a life-world, for a life-world is a pre-given world that exists for all. It is always taken for granted in all human life, in all human activities. The life-world is a realm of original self-evidences. Hence, any verification of our experience presupposes these modes of self-givenness. An object of knowledge in this given mode of self-evidence is amenable to inter-subjective experience. Thus we have life-world and objective-scientific world that is obtained by idealization. However, the knowledge of the objective-scientific world is grounded in the life-world, and the very idea of ëobjectivityí presupposes the inter-subjective experiences of the life-world. In other words, the very meaning of science becomes intelligible only when one explores the relatedness of the scientific world to the life-world. Mohanty distinguishes between two senses of life-world, lifeworld as a perceptual world relative to a subject and life-world as the horizon within which all other worlds are constituted. In this second sense, life-world in itself is not another world but the very condition of possibility of all other worlds3. Life-world understood in the first sense, as a perceptual relative world, comprises multiplicity and relativity. It is a subjective relative world. To each one of us the objects in the world at large appear under the varying perspectives, according to oneís point of view. Hence, the life-world implies a community of individuals who interact with each other. It is a historical community. Thus, a life-world is relative to a certain KOSHY THAKARAN64 culture at a given moment of its history. That is to say that there is a plurality of life-worlds and not just one concrete life-world. Given that life-world is not a monolithic stratum of experience, but consists of a variety of experiences, cultural relativism seems to be vindicated. Even the scientific world that takes off from such a variegated life-world then seems to be inflected with relativism4. However, Husserl is quick to salvage science from the clutches of relativism in his Crisis of European Sciences. Thus, he argues that there may be invariant structure of the life-world, a common structure that contains the seemingly relative life-worlds. Husserl even claims that there is a logic or system of principles that precedes science, one that gives norms even within the sphere of relativity5. So as to grasp the essential features of the life-world, Husserl subjects it to a series of epoche. Phenomenological bracketing reveals that the life-world objects despite its relative features have the same spatial structure, motion and sense quality. This general structure of the life-world itself is not relative. Husserl says: As life-world the world has, even prior to science, the ìsameî structures that the objective sciences presuppose in their substruction of a world which exists ìin itselfî and is determined through ìtruths in themselvesî ...these are the same structures that they presuppose as a priori structures and systematically unfold in a priori sciences, sciences of the logos, the universal methodical norms by which any knowledge of the world existing ìin itself, objectivelyî must be bound.6 Nevertheless, the spatio-temporal world that is prior to the theoretical attitude is not one of ideal mathematical points or the straight lines or planes. The bodies in the life-world are actual bodies, yet not in the sense of the physicistsí actual bodies. In other words, these general features of the life-world, though they share the same names, are not concerned with theoretical idealizations and hypothetical substructions. Thus, we have to make a separation in principle of the a priori of the life-world from the objective a priori. This is achieved by the bracketing of all objective sciences. It provides us the insight that the universal a priori of the objective sciences itself is grounded in a universal a priori of the life-world. In the search for the general structure of the life-world, we come Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî 65 across the world as the universe of things, distributed within the world-form of space and time. It is the universal field of all actual and possible praxis as horizon. It is to be conscious of the world and of oneself as living in the world. The pre-givenness of the world effects a givenness of the individual things. Though things (objects) and world are inseparably united, there is a difference in the way we are conscious of them. We are conscious of things as objects within world-horizon. Each object is an object of the world-horizon. We are conscious of this world horizon only as a horizon for existing objects. Thus, relativity and multiplicity presuppose the worldhorizon. Over and against the seeming relativity of the life-world, it exhibits an invariant structural framework or a universal conceptual scheme that incorporates the relative and changeable. Nevertheless, such an attempt to overcome relativism may look trivial. Mohanty points out that what Husserl has achieved is only a formal essence. The relativity that was there at the level of contents is overcome only at the level of form7. That is to say that these general features of the life-world do not preclude the multiplicity and relativity of concrete life-world. Husserl himself realizes this and even asserts the relativity of the concrete life-world in many of his manuscripts. Thus, Gail Soffer notes: ...insofar as the lifeworld is understood as the concrete lifeworld, Husserl unquestionably maintains that the lifeworld is relative: there is not one concrete lifeworld, but a plurality of them, and each is intentionally referenced (ërelativizedí) to a specific intersubjective community as the group for which this world is ëthereí.8 Does that make Husserlian phenomenology inevitably relativistic? I think one need not draw that conclusion. Here the second sense of the life-world as pointed out by Mohanty assumes crucial significance: life-world as the horizon for the constitution of all other worlds. In this sense, life-world is not another world besides scientific world or everyday world, but is the very condition of possibility of any world. This understanding of life-world is in accordance with the transcendental move that Husserl makes to overcome relativism. By virtue of transcendental intersubjectivity, Husserl tries to get around the problem of relativism. Intersubjectivity is the coincidence or KOSHY THAKARAN66 consensus of simultaneous but different intending of the same object or state of affairs. Of course, there are concrete life-worlds wherein only a limited intersubjectivity is obtained. Thus as Husserl himself points out: We do not share the same lifeworld with all human beings. Not all humans ëon the face of the earthí have in common with us all the objects, which constitute our lifeworld and determine our personal acting and striving.... Objects which are there for us although admittedly in changing, now harmonious, now conflicting apprehensions ñ are not there for them, and this means, the others have no apprehension of them, no experience at all of them as these objects. This is the case even when they see them, and as we say, see these same objects of ours.... If we add a Bantu to this human community, then it is clear that faced with any of our works of art, he does see a thing, but not the object of our surrounding world, the art work. He has no opinion, no apprehension of it ñ as this object, the art work ñ that is in ëourí world as the David of Michelangelo with the ëobjectiveí determinations belonging to this work.... Thus we have to distinguish among various human ëworldsí, the world of the Europeans, the world of the Bantu, etc., and these worlds are themselves changeable in their personal (ëwe-í) reference.9 Does this relativity of life-world suggest that the different lifeworlds are ever to be incommensurable? Here I wish to suggest that though perceptual evidence does not guarantee intersubjective agreement, it nevertheless appeals to it. Further experience makes it forthcoming. Husserl emphasizes the role of communication of what one has perceived. Such a possibility of being able to communicate and consequently to understand what is being communicated is never ruled out. The very fact that the life-world is constituted by the transcendental intersubjectivity as its intentional correlate gives credence to the possibility of intersubjective agreement10. The socalled relativism is only an initial response of reflection. Mohanty observes: [The] thesis of relativity has to be limited by the thesis of the common horizon within which these many standpoints are after all possible. The one world is not the common content to which the different worlds or versions provide or apply different conceptual schemes. The one world is Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî 67 rather the regulative ideal, which is being constituted through the mutually overlapping, coinciding, conflicting plethora of world-noemata.11 In order to explicate this notion of the regulative ideal that is being constituted in Husserlian phenomenology, one may look into the phenomenon of ìmulticulturalismî. The recent debate about multiculturalism in Britain12 seems to have a bearing on an interpretation of it as an unmitigated form of relativism. Trevor Philips, the Chairman of Britainís Commission for Racial Equality has called for scrapping the British policy of multiculturalism. His understanding of multiculturalism is questionable from the Husserlian perspective of culture. Philips seems to equate multiculturalism with cultural relativism when he remarks that multiculturalism encourages separateness and thus should be given up in favour of greater cultural integration13. The opposition to multiculturalism springs from the mistaken belief that each culture is autonomous and radically different from the other, such that no overarching thread holds them together. However, the notion of an overarching element may surreptitiously place the majority culture or the dominant culture as the overarching and tend to interpret other cultures in terms of the dominant one. This possibility then makes it imperative for all participants in a multicultural society to be in a continuous dialogue. According to Bhiku Parekh, multiculturalism is the view that no culture is wholly worthless just as no culture is perfect in every aspects and that every culture deserves some respect. Multiculturalist perspective, Parekh notes, comprises the insights that human beings are culturally embedded, that each culture is always plural in its constitution and that the plurality of culture is desirable14. However this plurality is not to be understood as engendering relativism, rather as he points out multiculturalism undercuts the possibility of any such radical relativism. Parekh writes: Each doctrine carries bits of the others within it, and is as a result internally diverse...This mutual fusion of ideas and sensibilities has given rise to a broadly shared cultural vocabulary, no doubt varied and messy but for that very reason capable of providing a common framework of discourse15. KOSHY THAKARAN68 The Husserlian overcoming of relativism, akin to multiculturalism, is not by dismissing the differences out rightly, rather by traversing the path of relativism through dialogue and mutual understanding that finally one could point to the regulative concept of one world as the correlate of plurality of world-noemata. In this context, it may be worth focusing our attention on the question how the problem of understanding ëthe otherí is related to the problem of understanding the ëother cultureí, a problem anthropologists grapple with. According to Mohanty, the other is as much a part of my own world as the strange and unfamiliar are. Thus, he rejects the idea of purely ëmy owní world. The immediate consequence of the denial of a purely ëmy owní world is that there can be no way of formulating the problem of the other culture in a fashion similar to that of Husserlís approach in constituting the sense of an ëalter egoí as shown in the Cartesian Meditations.16 Mohanty distinguishes between three levels of problems with regard to the constitution of the sense of alter ego. At the first level, we are concerned with the question regarding oneís knowledge of the other as having a particular mental state. One may answer this question by a theory of analogical inference or by a direct empathy. However, this question presupposes that one already has the knowledge that the other is another ego with its own inner experiences. Thus, we come to the second level of the problem, namely: ì...[H]ow do we at all know that that body over there has a mind, an inner life, like mine, that it is not a mere body with no inner life, a painted wax figure for example?î17 This question presupposes that I am an ego having various mental states and intentional activities. That is, the question presumes my knowledge of the concept of ego and also the concept of ëalter egoí. It does raise, then, the question of on what grounds can I apply the concept of ego to the body over there. Thus, we come to the third level of questioning that concerns itself with the very sense of the ascription of the predicate ìegoî to the other. The questions raised at the first two levels are about the truth of certain cognitive claims that one makes with regard to the other, whereas the import of the third question is much more basic. As Mohanty points out, ì...if my concept of the ìegoî is from my own case, then it would appear as if it belongs to the very concept of Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî 69 ego that it is mine, in which case to ascribe ego to an other would involve a contradiction.î18 Husserl has addressed this problem in his Cartesian Meditations. When we ask how the sense of ëother cultureí is constituted for one who belongs to a ëhome cultureí, we seem to be raising a methodological question. However, as Mohanty points out, social scientists, when raising such a methodological question regarding knowing other cultures, are indeed raising questions about the epistemological basis of social sciences. The social scientist, in essence, is asking how one belonging to a particular culture, i.e., his own home culture, forges access to the otherís culture. Mohanty says: The concern is analogous, on an individual level, to the skeptical worry, how can I know what is transpiring in his mind? Just as the last worry presupposes that I already have available to me the sense ìother mind,î so does the social scientistís epistemological concern presuppose that he has already available to him the sense ìother culture.î19 Now, one may think that, as in the case of the knowledge of ëalter ego,í we may proceed with a transcendental question regarding the other culture too, namely ìhow does the sense of ëother cultureí get constituted?î However, Mohanty shows that here, in order to explicate the sense of other culture we cannot follow the same transcendental move. In other words, we cannot take the transcendental reduction in the case of culture so as to reduce it to ëmy own sphere of ownnessí as in the case of ëalter egoí. Such a reduction would require one to eliminate from oneís own cultural experience all factors that derive from other cultures. Thus, in order to carry out such a reduction, I should be sure of the elements in my culture as unique to my own culture. But this is an impossible demand on me. ìOnly the myth of purity of a culture may mislead one to believe that one can have such a sphere of oneís ownness at this level.î20 As Mohanty says, at the level of ego such a transcendental reduction to the sphere of ownness is meaningful as there is an undeniable discontinuity, irrespective of any overlap in terms of the contents, between my ego and that of another. However, the same cannot be argued for in the case of culture as ì...the identity of a culture consists in its unique historical development, what guarantee is there, as we go back to KOSHY THAKARAN70 historical and prehistorical origins, that there are not discernible common ancestors and mingling of diverse routes of influence?î21 In other words, even though we are justified in speaking of the ëhome cultureí as one speaks of the native language, home culture cannot be conceived as totally mine, without any influence from other cultures. Moreover, Mohanty points out that the home culture itself need not be a monolithic structure as it may contain different strata that are ëforeigní to each other. Nevertheless, the question as to how one apprehends a foreign culture as such is still a pertinent one. Social scientists have grappled with this epistemological problem and have advanced notions such as ëparticipant observationí and ëempathyí. In order to understand the other, it is often suggested that one must empathize with the other. However, this way of approaching the problem begs the question, as empathizing with the other is to place oneself in otherís place. Unless one has already gained some understanding of the other, one does not know how to put oneself in otherís position. As Mrinal Miri points out, this is to project an understanding of ìmyselfî rather than an understanding of the ìotherî22. Thus, a genuine understanding of the ìotherî can be fraught only with openness to the other through dialogue and communication. However, what is of equal significance to our present concern is the question as to how the sense of ëforeign cultureí gets constituted. As Mohanty observes, the meaning of constitution can be construed as follows: ... to exhibit the constitution of a concept φ is to show what are the sorts of intentional experiences in which objects instantiating φ are originally presented. Thus, to exhibit the constitution of the concept ìmaterial objectî is to identify the type of intentional experiences which originarily present something as a material object.23 Thus in the context of the constitution of the sense of ëother cultureí, the question is, what experiences we have would present a culture as foreign to our culture. According to Mohanty, the recognition of another culture as foreign to our own is possible only because the differences show themselves only within a large common framework. Thus, the different cultures belong to the same Nature Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî 71 as parts or territories of the same spatio-temporal continuum. Again the members of the other culture are like us beings embodied with a similar body structure. Thus, we may safely assume that we, as well as them, share the same mental structure at some level though the cultural differences may show differences in mental lives at some other level. This is plausible because at some level our bodily needs and basic human drives are all the same. Thus, ì...it is only reasonable to expect that no culture can be totally different from ours.î24 Thus, Mohanty shows that the ëotherí is very much a part of oneís own home world. He is an ëotherí because he is different, and he is different because he is not understood. ìEven when the social scientist, or the empathetic traveller understands the native, this understanding can overcome the foreignness... only when it is based on mutual communication.î25 In other words, only when there is a mutual participation and not just one-sided interpretation by the observer that a common world begins to constitute itself. As he points out, Husserl raises the question as to how does one, through understanding the otherís experiential structures, progress towards a synthesis of their native world with his/her. In Husserlian phenomenology, this is achieved by a transcendental move in which one projects the idea of ì...an experience ñ and experiential worldstructure of all mankind... which is to serve as the norm of the critique of relatively consistent experiential worlds and meaningworlds of any community of humans.î26 Thus Mohanty says that there is an irreducible element of intentionality in the idea of culture and reiterates the idea that the higher order noemata, a noema of noema, captures this idea within a Husserlian conceptual framework. To quote Mohanty: The fact is, interpretation is, theoretically and in principle, a two-way, or perhaps, a many-way track....This complex situation obliterates the priority accorded to oneís home language (culture, world). The other is translating mine to his, while I am translating his into mine. In and through this complicated many-layered work, we discover points of agreement as well as of difference ñ also an increasingly accumulating vocabulary in which to state them.27 KOSHY THAKARAN72 This line of thought undercuts the possibility of any radical differences that may amount to the notion of incommensurability between cultures. Even when we accept that there are different cultures, this acceptance does not make us to commit to a view that endangers inter-cultural understanding and adjudication. Perhaps, it is this realization that made even a cultural relativist like Feyerabend to remark in his polemic Farewell to Reason that he does not hold incommensurability as an everyday occurrence between two different theories. Interestingly, Feyerabend in one of his last writings claims, ìEvery culture is potentially all cultures.î28 This I submit is the spirit of Husserlís later recognition of relativism and his conviction of transcending the same. KOSHY THARAKAN, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, Visat-Gandhinagar Highway, VGE College Campus, Chandkheda, Ahmedabad, Gujarat. NOTES AND REFERENCES 1. B.K. Matilal, Confrontation of Cultures, Kolkatta: K.P.Bagchi & Company, 1988, p. 7. 2. Rom Harre and Michael Krausz in their Varieties of Relativism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996.) recognize three forms of absolutism: universalism, foundationalism and objectivism. In his earlier writings Husserl even though adheres to the first two kinds of absolutism never ever endorses objectivism. 3. See J.N. Mohanty, ëìLife-worldî and ìA prioriî in Husserlís Later Thoughtí in The Possibility of Transcendental Philosophy, Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1985, pp. 101-119. 4. Thus, a Kuhnian conception of science may be drawn from the relativity of the life-worlds that engender scientific world. For Kuhn natural sciences, as much as social sciences are dependent on cultural categories. See in this regard Thomas Kuhn, ëThe Natural and the Human Sciencesí in David R. Hiley et al. (ed.): The Interpretative Turn: Philosophy, Science, Culture, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991. 5. See Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology, (tr.) David Carr, Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970, p. 135. Making Sense of ìOther Cultureî 73 6. Ibid, p. 139. 7. J.N. Mohanty, Transcendental Phenomenology, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1989, p. 136. 8. Gail Soffer, Husserl and the Question of Relativism, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1991, p. 151. 9. Edmund Husserl, ëZur Beschreibung der Umweltí (manuscript A V 10 of 1925). Quoted in Gail Soffer, Op.cit, p. 151-152. 10. See in this regard Koshy Tharakan: ìHusserlís Notion of Objectivity: A Phenomenological Analysisî, Indian Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. XXV, No.2, 1998. 11. J.N. Mohanty, The Possibility of Transcendental Philosophy, p. xxviii. 12. I have cited the case of Britain purely because of the political repercussions the debate on multiculturalism acquired in the recent past in Britain; the same arguments in more or less similar fashion are applicable in the case of most other nations including India though traditional scholarship on multiculturalism revolves around western nations having composite racial makeup and with sizable immigrant population. A case for Indiaís multiculturalism has been stated by many scholars though they seem to plot Indiaís multiculturalism differently. For example, while Gurpreet Mahajan emphasizes that multiculturalism in India came along with the arrival of democracy and constitutional governance, Aloka Parasher-Sen holds that multiculturalism in India can be described by treating the subcontinent as a civilisational entity in pre-modern times. Again, T.N. Madan reads the relevance of multiculturalism in the Indian context not primarily in terms of religious and regional differences but in terms of relations between Dalit and upper caste Hindus while many advocates of multiculturalism in India draws it along the religious and regional divide. See in this regard Seminar, No. 484, December 1999; Rajeev Bhargava et al. (ed.): Multiculturalism, Liberalism and Democracy, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999; Kushal Deb (ed.): Mapping Multiculturalism, Jaipur: Rawat Publications, 2002. 13. Hassan Suroor, ìBritianís Multiculturalism Debateî in The Hindu, April 13, 2004. 14. Bhiku Parekh, ìWhat is Multiculturalism?î in Seminar, No: 484, December 1999. For a treatment of Multiculturalismís complex relation with Pluralism, see Sasheej Hegde: ìMulticultaralismís Wake: Charles Taylor, Pluralism and Beyondî in Kushal Deb (ed.): Mapping Multiculturalism, Jaipur: Rawat Publications, 2002. KOSHY THAKARAN74 15. Bhiku Parekh, Rethinking Multiculturalism: Cultural Diversity and Political Theory, Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2000, p.339. 16. In Cartesian Meditations, Husserl tries to show how one may phenomenologically arrive at the sense of ëother egosí through analogical apperception. Though many of his followers criticize Husserl precisely for this, I think the importance of this lies precisely in the difficulties pertaining to such an attempt. To me it points out the significant fact, which Husserl himself acknowledges when he remarks that, ì...that I can become aware of someone else (who is not I but someone other than I), presupposes that not all my own modes of consciousness are modes of my self-consciousness.î Cartesian Meditations, (tr.) Dorion Cairns, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1960, p. 105. 17. J.N. Mohanty, ëThe Other Cultureí in Mano Daniel and Lester Embree (ed.): Phenomenology of the Cultural Disciplines, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1994, p. 136. 18. Ibid, pp. 136-137. 19. Ibid, p. 137. 20. Ibid, p. 138. 21. Ibid, p. 139. Bernard Williams also acknowledges that it is not possible to hold any culture as completely individuated or as selfcontained. As he says, ì social practices could never come forward with a certificate saying that they belonged to a genuinely different culture, so that they are guaranteed immunity to other judgements and reactionsî (Bernard Williams, Ethics and Limits of Knowledge, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1985, p. 158.) Quoted in Matilal, Op.cit, p. 15. 22. Mrinal Miri, ìUnderstanding Other Culturesî, Seminar, No.484, December 1999. 23. J.N. Mohanty, ìThe Other Cultureî in Mano Daniel and Lester Embree (ed.): Phenomenology of the Cultural Disciplines, pp. 140-141. 24. Ibid, p. 141. 25. Ibid, p. 142 26. Ibid, p. 143. 27. Ibid, p. 145. 28. Paul Feyerabend, ìEvery Culture is Potentially All Culturesî, Common Knowledge, Vol.3, No.2, Fall 1994.

THE ARGUMENT FROM EVIL A Socratic Dialogue by BRENT SILBY My wonderful friend, Paul, visited me yesterday. He was most excited to share his proof that God does not exist. As it happens, he found his proof on the Stanford University Philosophy webpage. We sat together for the afternoon to examine his proof. It was a hot day. The following is a recollection of our dialogue. -Socrates SOCRATES: Welcome Paul. It is good to see you my friend. To what do I owe the honor of this unexpected visit? PAUL: I have been thinking about our frequent discussions about God. After our last discussion I found myself perplexed. I thought I had good reason to deny the existence of God, but you refuted my argument and concluded that the most I can say is that I don't know whether or not God exists. Since then I have been reading through some philosophy websites. I think I have finally found proof that God does not exist. SOCRATES: My goodness, this is exciting news. The discovery that God does not exist would be a most significant metaphysical advancement. I am eager to hear your proof. Please, teach me. PAUL: I'll be glad to, Socrates. I found my proof on the Stanford University Philosophy page. SOCRATES: A worthy institution. PAUL: Yes, indeed. They have several arguments, but my favorite is the first one. SOCRATES: Please don't hold out on me, my fine fellow. What is the proof? PAUL: Well, it runs like this. If God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect, he would eliminate all the evil in the world. But evil exists, so there is no God. SOCRATES: A somewhat shorter argument than I expected for such a significant metaphysical conclusion. Are you convinced by this argument? PAUL: Very much so, Socrates. I think this proves that there is no God. SOCRATES: I am not so sure, Paul. Something seems to be missing from the argument. As you have stated it, the most you could deduce from your premises is that God, if he exists, is not omnipotent, omniscience, and morally perfect. PAUL: But God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. SOCRATES: Ah, a definition. This is music to my ears. The best way to start is by defining our terms. Shall we proceed, then, with the definition of God as a thing that is, if he exists, omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect? PAUL: Of course. Perhaps I took for granted that you would know that. This is indeed how the argument begins on the Stanford webpage. SOCRATES: About this argument I can only know what you tell me. Clarity is important. This is your first premise then: P1. (premise) If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. PAUL: That sounds right to me. SOCRATES: Are we happy with our understanding of the terms "omnipotent" and "omniscient"? PAUL: I take "omnipotent" to mean all-powerful. God can do anything. There is nothing that God cannot do. And "omniscient" means all-knowing. In other words, God knows everything there is to know about everything. If he exists, He can see the future and the past. SOCRATES: Two fine definitions indeed. Let us proceed. Shall we break your main premise down into its component parts so that we may see the logic more clearly? PAUL: Okay. SOCRATES: You said that "if God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect, he would eliminate all the evil in the world". The first part of your premise involves omnipotence. Tell me, how exactly do you think God's omnipotence connects with the existence of evil? PAUL: It is quite simple, Socrates. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil. SOCRATES: Very precisely put, Paul. This is a worthy second premise. Let's continue. How does God's omniscience connect with the existence of evil? PAUL: If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists. SOCRATES: Another fine premise. PAUL: That is how it is worded on the Stanford webpage too. SOCRATES: Now then, my good friend, how does God's moral perfection connect with the existence of evil? PAUL: Well, a morally perfect God would not want evil to exist, so if God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil. SOCRATES: These three premises form the basis of the argument, correct? PAUL: Yes, Socrates. SOCRATES: Allow me to summarize the argument thus far: P1. (premise) If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. P2. (premise) If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil. P3. (premise) If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists. P4. (premise) If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil. PAUL: This summary matches the first few premises on the Stanford webpage. Now, evil exists in the world, right? SOCRATES: I am not sure about that, but please continue. PAUL: Well evil does exist and because it does, if God exists then either God doesn't have the power to eliminate it, doesn't know that it's happening, or doesn't want to eliminate it. But God is defined as knowing when evil exists, having the power to eliminate it, and wanting to eliminate it. So, God does not exist. SOCRATES: It seems you have identified the remaining premises and conclusion of your argument. Your statement that evil exists is a crucial premise, as is the following premise. You suggest that if evil exists and God exists, then God doesn't have one or more of the properties he is defined as having. From there you conclude that God doesn't exist. For clarity, let us construct the entire argument: P1. (premise) If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. P2. (premise) If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil. P3. (premise) If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists. P4. (premise) If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil. P5. (premise) Evil exists. P6. (premise) If evil exists and God exists, then either God does not have the power to eliminate evil, OR doesn't know when evil exists, OR doesn't have the desire to eliminate evil. C. (conclusion) Therefore, God does not exist. PAUL: Yes. This is the argument. This is what I read on the Stanford website. You can see that the premises lead to the conclusion that God does not exist. This is a concise and beautiful proof. SOCRATES: Concise, yes. But perhaps not as beautiful as you think. May I ask you a question? PAUL: Certainly. SOCRATES: If I told you that a supermarket was selling everything half price from 12pm to 1pm tomorrow, what would be the first thing you'd want to know? PAUL: I'd want to know what supermarket. SOCRATES: Is it not enough to know when the half price sale will take place? PAUL: Of course not. I need to know where to go. SOCRATES: Well, consider your third premise. It seems incomplete, does it not? PAUL: Oh, Socrates, you're just being foolish. SOCRATES: An interesting response, Paul. Is this a new type of logical refutation? PAUL: Look, I understand what you're saying. But it's obvious, isn't it? If God is omniscient, he knows when and where evil exists. SOCRATES: We can only examine the argument provided using the words provided. As it stands, if evil exists, God would know when it exists; he would have the power and desire to remove it; but he may be unable to do so because he might not know where it exists. The conclusion that God doesn't exist does not follow from your premises. Precision is important, is it not? After all, you are using this argument to deduce a significant metaphysical conclusion. Shall we adjust premise #3 and premise #6? PAUL: Go ahead. SOCRATES: You are as enthusiastic as ever, Paul. Our argument now runs as follows, emphasis on our new wording: P1. (premise) If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. P2. (premise) If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil. P3. (premise) If God is omniscient, then God knows when and where evil exists. P4. (premise) If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil. P5. (premise) Evil exists. P6. (premise) If evil exists and God exists, then either God does not have the power to eliminate evil, OR doesn't know when and where evil exists, OR doesn't have the desire to eliminate evil. C. (conclusion) Therefore, God does not exist. PAUL: Okay. Are you now happy to accept the proof this argument provides? This version is even more precise than the version I read online. Evil exists, so surely God doesn't. SOCRATES: Does evil exist? I am not exactly sure what you mean by "evil". We have left this term undefined. For all I know God may have already eliminated evil from the world, in which case premise #5 would be false and the argument unsound. PAUL: You're being deliberately difficult as usual. SOCRATES: If being difficult leads to a more precise argument, then I make no apology. You are a teacher, Paul. Come now. Teach me. What is "evil"? PAUL: Pain and suffering, Socrates. How's that for a definition? SOCRATES: Forgive me for again seeking clarity. Are you saying that evil is pain and suffering? Or are you saying that pain and suffering are a subset of the things we call evil? PAUL: I don't know what you mean. SOCRATES: Imagine a person who is betrayed by a friend, but she never finds out. Would we not think an evil has occurred? PAUL: We would indeed. SOCRATES: But there is no pain or suffering because the person never finds out. Would we expect God to intervene in situations of this sort? PAUL: I don't think so, Socrates. The event sounds trivial. I'm considering scenarios that involve pain and suffering. SOCRATES: Very good, then. So, you consider pain and suffering as a subset of things we call evil. Let us then use the term "pain and suffering" instead of evil, since this is what you intend to talk about. PAUL: That sounds fine to me, Socrates. If it helps prove the point I am happy to use the term. SOCRATES: Let us again review the argument in revised form, with emphasis on our new words: P1. (premise) If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. P2. (premise) If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all pain and suffering. P3. (premise) If God is omniscient, then God knows when and where pain and suffering exists. P4. (premise) If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all pain and suffering. P5. (premise) Pain and suffering exists. P6. (premise) If pain and suffering exists and God exists, then either God does not have the power to eliminate pain and suffering, OR doesn't know when and where pain and suffering exists, OR doesn't have the desire to eliminate pain and suffering. C. (conclusion) Therefore, God does not exist. PAUL: Finally. We are finished. SOCRATES: Not quite, Paul. You seem to be in a hurry. Are you willing to continue our examination of the argument? I do not want you to become exhausted on this hot afternoon. The temperature is so high that our thoughts may evaporate. You know that I am interested in coming to understand our subject and that is why I persist in my examination. If you are the same kind of person as me, I'd be pleased to continue our inquiry. I am the kind of person who is pleased to be refuted if I say anything untrue. And I am pleased to refute anyone who says anything untrue. Being refuted, in my view, is a greater good because it delivers one from the worst thing: False belief. I can't imagine there could be anything worse than holding a false belief about the thing we are now discussing. So, shall we continue, or shall we drop it? PAUL: Socrates, I am willing if you are willing. SOCRATES: Then let us continue. Tell me, climate change is an issue that you moderns are most concerned with, am I right? PAUL: Yes. That is true. SOCRATES: I have been told that a partial solution to climate change is to eliminate all the cars that use fossil fuels. Now, will you answer me this: what does it mean to suggest that we eliminate all the cars that use fossil fuels? PAUL: Another question with an obvious answer, Socrates? I get nervous that such questions will lead me somewhere I don't want to go. SOCRATES: You want to get to the truth, do you not? PAUL: Of course. SOCRATES: Then if my question gets you to the truth you should be happy to go where it leads you. So, I ask again, what does it mean to suggest that we eliminate all the cars that use fossil fuels? PAUL: It means taking them off the road. Removing them. Perhaps destroying them. SOCRATES: Nicely put, Paul. Now, if I asked you to eliminate all the ghosts from the world, what would you do? PAUL: Nothing. There are no ghosts. I can't eliminate something that doesn't exist. SOCRATES: Again, a nicely put answer. And I suppose that if there were no cars and I asked you to eliminate all the cars, you would think I had made a strange request. Am I right? PAUL: Yes. As I said, I can't eliminate something that isn't there. SOCRATES: It follows then that pain and suffering must exist in order for God to eliminate it, does it not? After all, God cannot eliminate something that isn't there. PAUL: Yes, that does seem to follow from what we have said. SOCRATES: Isn't your argument therefore invalid? We can't conclude from the existence of pain and suffering that God doesn't exist. Perhaps it takes a billion years to eliminate pain and suffering. What do you think? PAUL: I think something has gone wrong somewhere in the argument. But it came from the Stanford website, so I am surprised to hear you say it is invalid. SOCRATES: We have improved upon the Stanford version of the argument, my friend, and it seems that it is in need of further improvement. The problem is with the word "eliminate", is it not? PAUL: It is indeed. God should stop pain and suffering from occurring rather than eliminating existing pain and suffering. I'm sure that is what is meant by the argument. SOCRATES: Well, we can only know what is stated, regardless of what is meant. Let us adjust the argument again and make it say what it means to say. We'll use the word "prevent" in place of "eliminate". P1. (premise) If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. P2. (premise) If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to prevent all pain and suffering. P3. (premise) If God is omniscient, then God knows when and where pain and suffering will exist. P4. (premise) If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to prevent all pain and suffering. P5. (premise) Pain and suffering exists. P6. (premise) If pain and suffering exists and God exists, then either God does not have the power to prevent pain and suffering, OR doesn't know when and where pain and suffering will exist, OR doesn't have the desire to prevent pain and suffering. C. (conclusion) Therefore, God does not exist. How does this sound? PAUL: This is much better. I think we are getting there. SOCRATES: Shall we examine your second premise? Earlier in our discussion we defined "omnipotent" as all-powerful, did we not? There is nothing God cannot do, right? PAUL: That is correct. SOCRATES: So, if God wanted to make the world such that rocks fall towards the heavens instead of towards the ground, he could do so? PAUL: Yes. If God is omnipotent, he can make rocks fall upwards. SOCRATES: And if God wanted to make it the case that there are no insects on Earth, he could do so, right? PAUL: Yes, again. This fits with our definition of omnipotence. SOCRATES: Could God destroy the world? PAUL: If he wanted to, of course he could, because he is all-powerful. But he is also defined as morally perfect, so he would not choose to do so because that decision would cause pain and suffering. SOCRATES: Each of these are logically possible actions. And presumably God's omnipotence only pertains to the logically possible, right? In saying that God is all-powerful, we are not suggesting that he can do the logically absurd. Am I correct? PAUL: I'm not sure what you mean by "logically absurd". SOCRATES: For example, we would not expect God to be able to produce a square circle. PAUL: Why not? If God is all-powerful then surely he could make a square circle, if he so desired. SOCRATES: But Paul, consider what we would be asking of God. By definition a square is not a circle. We would be asking God to create a circle that has four straight sides of equal length that sit at right angles to each other. But that is a nonsense request, is it not? A circle, by definition, does not have those properties. PAUL: Ah yes, Socrates. I believe you are right. A square circle would be an impossible object. SOCRATES. Now consider the famous question: if God is all-powerful, can God create a rock that God cannot lift? Putting aside the presumption of gravity and muscular, skeletal limitations which seem irrelevant to God, this appears to be an absurd question, does it not? We can reword the question to: Can God create an unmovable object that is movable? Is this not a nonsense question? It is like asking: is God capable of being incapable? Or, can God tell a true falsehood? Or, can God exist and not exist? These are logical contradictions and therefore sit outside the realm of logical possibility. They are word tricks and have no bearing on God's omnipotence. Do you agree, my marvellous friend, or do you think a thing can at once be both itself and its opposite? PAUL: Your point is well made. A thing cannot be itself and its opposite. So I agree that these questions do not show us anything about God's omnipotence. They are foolish questions. SOCRATES: You must agree, then, that an all-powerful God would work within the realm of logical possibility. Don't hold out on me, my friend, answer me with what you really think. PAUL: Your examples are legitimate, Socrates. I would be a fool not to agree with you based on what you have said. I agree that an omnipotent God would work within the bounds of logical possibility. SOCRATES: Shall we proceed then? Tell me: is it not true that people believe God has given us all freewill? PAUL: This is what they believe. SOCRATES: And according to those who believe God has given us freewill, we are able to choose our actions. We are not restricted. Am I correct? PAUL: Again, this is what they believe. SOCRATES: Now, if people do indeed have freewill, is it not possible that they will sometimes choose actions that result in pain and suffering? PAUL: I understand what you are saying, Socrates. But if God is all-powerful, he could prevent people from choosing actions that hurt others. SOCRATES: But then people wouldn't have freewill, would they? The ability to decide to cause pain and suffering comes with freewill, does it not? It seems that you think that God could give people freewill while also withholding freewill. Is this not a nonsense suggestion akin to those we were just discussing? And if it is nonsense, have we not demonstrated that your second premise is false? PAUL: It is only nonsense if we assume that God would give people complete freewill. Many believers do indeed think this is true. But I think that is a bad assumption. I think an allknowing God would know that complete freewill would result in pain and suffering. He would therefore not allow this level of freedom. If an all-knowing, all-powerful God exists, he would not give people complete freewill. SOCRATES: You are a splendid fellow. Are you proposing that God would restrict some actions, such as those that result in pain and suffering, while allowing freewill when it comes to other actions? PAUL: Yes. That is what I would expect from an all-knowing, all-powerful, morally perfect being. But this is not the case, is it? Therefore, there is no such being. SOCRATES: But wouldn't this restriction mean that people are not truly free? Again, you appear to be arguing for a situation in which people are free but not free, a contradictory state of affairs. PAUL: Let me put it another way. If God is all-powerful, he could have created a world in which people simply do not have the ability to cause pain and suffering. People can be completely free in such a world, but because causing pain and suffering would be beyond their reach, people would be unable to bring about their occurrence. Just as people do not have the ability to fly unaided, God could make it that they do not have the ability to cause pain and suffering. SOCRATES: Is this not a restriction? PAUL: Not in the same way as God actively preventing people from causing pain and suffering. I'm imagining a world in which the ability to cause pain and suffering is beyond our reach. We don't complain that people are not free just because they can't fly. So why would we complain that people are not free simply because God did not allow for them to cause pain and suffering? SOCRATES: You are teaching this old man gently, Paul. Perhaps I should enrol in your school. Would you please teach me some more? Let us examine your current claim by testing the truth of your fourth premise, that a morally perfect being would have the desire to prevent all pain and suffering. I have a question about the morally perfect being. What sort of world would a morally perfect being create? PAUL: A good world, of course. A morally good world. SOCRATES: Then if God could choose between creating two possible worlds that differ only in the degree of moral goodness, he would create the morally better of the two? PAUL: Yes, and clearly this is not the world we live in. SOCRATES: Whether this is clear is yet to be decided. It will be decided by following our common master. PAUL: Our common master? SOCRATES: I used to call it my daimonion. It is a voice that speaks to me and it can speak to us all. It is our inner reason. Our logic. PAUL: You speak in riddles, Socrates. What is that term you use? Sophistry? You talk like a sophist. Fancy words, but no substance. SOCRATES: The substance is yet to emerge my friend. Its current obscurity does not entail its non-existence. PAUL: More riddles! SOCRATES: No more riddles then. Come now, let us continue. Imagine two houses, each containing a three-year-old child and a cookie. In the first house, the cookie is hidden high in a cupboard, completely out of reach. That child cannot possibly eat the cookie. In the second house, the cookie is sitting in plain view on the kitchen table. The child can eat that cookie if he so wishes, but he decides not to because doing so would violate his parents' trust. Can you answer me this, and please answer with what you really think so that our dialogue doesn't break down for the wrong reason. In which situation is the child's action most morally admirable: the one in which the child is restricted and cannot possibly eat the cookie, or the one in which the child decides for good reasons not to eat the cookie? PAUL: The second one, of course. SOCRATES: Is it not true that the same applies to possible worlds? Imagine a world in which God has placed restrictions on people so that they cannot cause pain and suffering. Now, imagine another world in which no such restriction exists, but people decide not to cause pain and suffering because doing so is morally problematic. Which of the two possible worlds contain people who make the most morally admirable decisions about pain and suffering? PAUL: Again, it would be the second one. SOCRATES: Would not a world containing the most morally admirable people be considered a world of the highest moral worth? PAUL: Yes, it would seem so. SOCRATES: And would not a morally perfect God create a world that is of the highest moral worth? PAUL: Sure. But people usually don't choose not to cause pain and suffering. Quite the contrary. People choose to cause pain and suffering all the time. So our world isn't like the world you described. SOCRATES: Well Paul, presumably it would take time for the child to learn that it is wrong to violate his parents' trust. But when he does, we have agreed that the resulting situation is better than the alternative restricted situation, have we not? PAUL: Yes, we agreed to that. SOCRATES: Is it not the same in our world? Perhaps it takes time for free beings to learn. But is it not true that a world in which people choose freely not to cause pain and suffering is of higher moral worth than a world in which people are unable to cause pain and suffering due to restrictions put in place by God? PAUL: I suppose so. SOCRATES: So, we are agreed that a morally perfect God would not desire to prevent people from causing pain and suffering because doing so would result in a world of lower moral worth than one in which people are free to decide. PAUL: If having the ability to cause pain and suffering, but choosing not to, makes for a morally better world, then I agree. But you are forgetting that not all pain and suffering is caused by human choice. Much suffering is caused by natural events; for example, famine, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunami. God could surely prevent these from occurring. SOCRATES: Why is there famine in the world? PAUL: It can be caused by drought, ongoing crop failures, and over population in certain areas. SOCRATES: Which means there isn't enough food to feed everyone? PAUL: That's right. SOCRATES: But is it not the case that some countries produce surplus food? I have heard of large stockpiles of grain. I have also read that a country called the United States disposes of surplus milk. You can read about it too: "Dairy Farmers Dump Milk"; "Got Milk? Too much of it"; "America has 1.2 billion pounds of excess cheese". If food was distributed differently, is it not possible that there would be no famine? If so, is it not the case that famine is the result of wealth distribution, which is a product of the moral decisions of free people? PAUL: Okay, I accept that famine can be caused by human decisions. SOCRATES: Now, there are many examples in which people have freely decided to give money to help reduce famine, are there not? Is it not true that such cases illustrate morally good choices? PAUL: Yes, I agree to that point. SOCRATES: And because we agreed earlier that God would favor a world in which humans are free to make such choices over a restricted world, this world must contain the possibility of famine. PAUL: This would seem to be correct. But what about the other causes of pain and suffering I mentioned? God could, and would, surely prevent them. SOCRATES: Would he prevent these other causes of pain and suffering if doing so meant losing something that contributes to a morally better world? PAUL: No, but what would such a thing be? SOCRATES: Let us consider this: What happens when disaster strikes? PAUL: Lots of people suffer and die. SOCRATES: What happens next? PAUL: Survivors rebuild their lives. SOCRATES: Do they do this in isolation? PAUL: No. They tend to help each other. And the rest of society usually donates time and money to help. SOCRATES: Why would people do this? What prompts action? PAUL: They feel moved to help because they don't like seeing people suffer. SOCRATES: Would it be correct to label their feeling as compassion? PAUL: Sure. Compassion, sympathy, or empathy. Maybe a combination of these. SOCRATES: In a world with no natural disasters and no pain and suffering, there would be no compassion, sympathy, or empathy, right? PAUL: Probably not. They wouldn't be needed. SOCRATES: But they are valued, are they not? PAUL: They are only valued because pain and suffering exist. SOCRATES: Well, it may be true that these feelings only occur because of pain and suffering, but are they not valued in and of themselves? If we imagine a world without these values, would we not say that such a world is inferior to this world? Even if people survive perfectly well without those values? PAUL: That might be simply a matter of opinion, Socrates. SOCRATES: Again, let us consider which of two possible worlds is of higher moral worth; a world with no pain and suffering, no compassion, no sympathy, and no empathy; or a world in which pain and suffering causes people to experience compassion, sympathy, and empathy -feelings which prompt them to work together to help people through their difficult situation? If God is morally perfect, he would create the morally better world, would he not? PAUL: When you word it like that I have to agree that the second world is more worthy of moral praise. But I still don't think God exists. Your argument hasn't convinced me of that. SOCRATES: Was I trying to convince you that God exists? PAUL: Weren't you? SOCRATES: Refuting an argument against the existence of God is not the same as arguing that God exists. I am merely asking questions about the argument you found on the Stanford website. I am trying to learn. PAUL: You always tell me you're trying to learn, but I think you're being ironic. SOCRATES: Well, what conclusion should we draw from our discussion? Did your argument succeed in demonstrating the non-existence of God. PAUL: I am still convinced that an all-powerful, all-knowing, morally perfect God would not create a world like this, full of pain and suffering. But your points are good and I shall work to address them. It seems that my second and fourth premises need to be re-worked. SOCRATES: Ah, my friend, you have a conclusion in mind and you now want to develop premises that properly support your conclusion. Is that the best way of proceeding? PAUL: It just seems implausible that God exists. SOCRATES: Implausible? You must have great wisdom to be able to state the probability of God's existence with such certainty. We are a fine pair, my friend. We have discovered that your argument can be refuted but we still don't know whether or not God exists. And yet you now admit that you have a strong belief that he doesn't exist and you will re-work your argument to support your belief. Shall we meet again to examine your new argument? PAUL: Do I have a choice? SOCRATES: You have freewill, do you not? Of course you have a choice. ------------- COMPOSED BY BRENT SILBY (2017) -------------- References Chan, M., (2016, October 13), "Dairy Farmers Dump 43 Million Gallons of Milk Due to Surplus", Time, Retrieved from: http://time.com/4530659/farmers-dump-milk-glut-surplus/ Hadden, H., (2017, May 21), "Got Milk? Too much of it, say U.S. dairy farmers", Market Watch, Retrieved from: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/got-milk-too-much-of-it-say-usdairy-farmers-2017-05-21 Plumer, B., (2016, October 17), "America now has 1.2 billion pounds of excess cheese", Vox, Retrieved from: https://www.vox.com/2016/10/13/13268980/cheese-glut-united-states Silby, B., (2014), "The Atheist and the Agnostic", Socrates: Examiner of Life, http://socrates21c.blogspot.co.nz/2016/12/the-atheist-and-agnostic.html (2016 edit) Tooley, M, "The Problem of Evil", Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (fall 2015 edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), Retrieved from: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evil/ See also Lewis, C. S. (1957). The Problem of Pain, London: Fontana Books. Plantinga, Alvin (1974a). God, Freedom, and Evil, New York: Harper and Row.

Recibido: 11 de Noviembre de 2017│ Modificado: 15 de Mayo de 2017│Aceptado: 20 de Mayo de 2017 Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 212 - APROXIMACIONES A LA COMPRENSIÓN DE LA (VkA) Y SUS POSIBLES VÍNCULOS CON LA FILOSOFÍA Jorge Ordóñez Burgos1 Resumen El pensamiento de los pueblos de la Antigüedad se compuso de lenguajes, sistemas de valores y planteamientos que escapan no sólo a los convencionalismos lingüísticos actuales, también resultan ajenos a las categorías propias de la filosofía, la religión y la mitología misma. Un caso revelador es la (VkA) egipcia, traducida a lenguas contemporáneas como magia, magic, Zauber o Magie; en dicho traslado, se le adhiere una serie de connotaciones propias de la mentalidad judeocristiana y evolucionista. Una magia sin más, producto del hombre crédulo, perezoso de mente y supersticioso. Sin embargo, tal reducción no se preocupa en estudiar aspectos de gran trascendencia como el proceso de transmisión que la palabra sufrió al cabo de los siglos, omitiendo el papel que jugó la magia persa dentro de la reflexión de filósofos, historiadores y poetas de la Hélade. La (VkA)fue una manera de concebir el universo que no puede reducirse sólo a creencias pseudoreligiosas, fue una sofisticada estructura para entender las cosas que, sencillamente, desconocemos. El presente artículo es una invitación a revisar los productos culturales de siglos lejanos, sin perder de vista que la incomprensión no se da exclusivamente con lo distante, sino en las entrañas mismas de nuestro tiempo. Palabras clave Filosofia antigua; pensamiento egipcio; magia. 1 Professor Doctor, Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juárez – Ciudad Juárez, México. email: [email protected] Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 213 - Resumo O pensamento dos povos da Antiguidade é composto de linguagens, sistemas de valores e proposições que escapam não só aos convencionalismos linguísticos atuais, mas também se distanciam das categorias próprias da filosofia, da religião e até mesmo da mitologia. Um caso ilustrativo é a (VkA) egípcia, cuja tradução nas línguas contemporâneas é magia, magic, Zauber e Magie; nessa tradução, vincula-se uma série de conotações próprias da mentalidade judaico-cristã e evolucionista. Uma simples magia, fruto do homem crédulo, supersticioso e detentor de uma mente preguiçosa. Tal simplificação, entretanto, não se preocupa em estudar aspectos de grande relevância como o processo de transmissão que a palavra sofreu ao longo dos séculos, omitindo o papel desempenhado pela magia persa no interior da reflexão de filósofos, historiadores e poetas da Hélade. A (VkA)foi uma forma de conceber o universo que não pode se limitar somente a crenças pseudo-religiosas; foi uma sofisticada estrutura para entender as coisas que, simplesmente, não conhecemos. Este artigo é um convite a uma revisão dos produtos culturais de séculos distantes, sem perder de vista que a incompreensão não se localiza exclusivamente nesse distante, mas nas próprias entranhas do nosso tempo. Palavras-chave Filosofia antiga; pensamento egípcio; magia. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 214 - La traducción cultural El ser humano es inquieto, posee una curiosidad expansiva cuyos límites se redefinen constantemente. Es un animal que gusta de buscar aquí y allá, en sí mismo y en los demás; especula sobre el futuro, revisa el presente desde diversos ángulos y escarba en el pasado con vigor casi infatigable. Hace falta mucho más que entusiasmo para sostener tan extenuante vocación. Salir al mundo con actitud de descubridor, exige saber qué se está buscando -tanto al internarse en las profundidades de la naturaleza como en la complejidad de las civilizaciones-. Es en este segundo contexto donde quiero poner especial atención. Para el presente estudio, será observada una práctica muy arraigada en el antiguo Egipto, la (VkA), llevada a idiomas contemporáneos como "magia". Desde la época de los antiguos griegos, han corrido ríos de tinta para intentar captar su significado más profundo. En ciertos momentos se le abordó con admiración, quizá hasta con la devoción que se trata a la Verdad revelada. En otros, con desprecio y entendiéndola llanamente como superstición y expresión máxima de irracionalidad, perteneciente a un estamento evolutivo inferior a otros donde han campeado la ciencia y la "razón". A partir de las condiciones descritas, surgen inquietudes sobre el tratamiento que reciben ésta y otras manifestaciones culturales. ¿Con qué herramientas conceptuales nos disponemos a revisar una actividad tan importante para los egipcios?, ¿qué se busca cuando se le ausculta?, ¿se pretende conocer el pasado o justificar la forma de proceder en el presente? Al voltear la mirada a la Antigüedad, ¿se dispone de los medios para entender las cosas en su nicho humano original o se les juzga con cierto aire de superioridad? En nuestro artículo, usaremos la expresión traducción cultural para referir el proceso a través del cual un lector, valiéndose del marco referencial propio, establece vínculos entre prácticas más o menos equivalentes desarrolladas por civilizaciones diferentes. Por ejemplo, algunos procesos curativos seguidos por pueblos indígenas son nombrados por nosotros como "curación popular", "medicina alternativa" o "tradicional". Al llamarlas así se deja claro que sus tratamientos no están plenamente apegados a las ciencias y los métodos racionales aprobados por nosotros; además, se puede ver que nuestras categorías no coinciden con las suyas, siendo insuficientes para captar su mentalidad y propósitos. Podría pensarse que la soberbia con que se denigra lo irracional o pseudocientífico es un signo de superioridad y sólo señala las carencias de lo ajeno, sin embargo, exhibe también los vacíos de nuestro marco base. Todo depende del ángulo desde el que se vean las cosas. Sea lo que sea aquello que los otros hacen, no alcanzamos a asimilarlo Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 215 - del todo, siendo nuestra racionalidad excesiva un impedimento más que una ayuda. La traducción es una versión de las cosas que nunca es perfecta y certera, empero, no contamos con otro recurso para tener cierta cercanía con lo otro. En medio de la disparidad, se hace necesario construir puentes para saltar obstáculos. El puente es un camino que se erige sobre acantilados, ríos o vados, dejando geografía debajo de sí. Salva la caminata entre lajas filosas que lastiman el pie del andariego. Aguas turbias y profundas son vistas desde alturas altaneras, andar sobre ellas proporciona un sentimiento de superioridad y seguridad, a veces ilusorio. Se concreta el tránsito de ida, quizá el de vuelta, pero, es mucho lo que se pasa por alto. Al completar la primera parte del recorrido, se consigue llegar a un destino que podría ser hasta ininteligible. Si existiera una máquina del tiempo para transportarse a un ágora griega o a un templo egipcio, posiblemente el choque cultural sería tan fuerte que se llegaría a la conclusión de estar frente a un espejismo o que la realidad se equivoca. Egipto y la Hélade en colores, aromas y sonidos vivos serían discordantes con las reconstrucciones hechas a partir de tratados antiguos tocados por muchas manos, por vasijas vacías exhibidas en vitrinas y pálidos templos a medio derruir. Aun contando con los medios para observar en primera fila la dinámica de un pasado tan distante, sería imposible comprender a plenitud el palpitar de la vida de los antiguos. Se nos exige desarrollar categorías-puente para conectarnos de alguna manera con ellos, sin embargo, a pesar de las facilidades conseguidas, hay aspectos que pasan, por decirlo en una palabra, desapercibidos. Las innumerables limitantes que tenemos para acercarnos a la Antigüedad no quedarían zanjadas con abundante evidencia material y empírica, la comprensión de los antiguos tiene mucho que ver con la actitud seguida para leerlos en su hábitat. La noción de tiempo que los antiguos tenían hace que las diferencias con nosotros se agudicen. Ciudades con escasa densidad poblacional comparada con la actualalbergaban comunidades concentradas en actividades diarias distintas a las nuestras. El solo hecho de desplazarse de un sitio a otro dentro de la misma ciudad era un proceso simple, no sucedía lo mismo con los viajes a otra población o país; empresa en la que no pocos dejaron la vida cuando se enfrentaron a innumerables dificultades como epidemias, inclemencias climáticas, o el asalto de piratas y salteadores. El desplazamiento redundaba en la noción cotidiana y teórica de espacio y tiempo. Para nosotros es difícil dejar de ver con naturalidad la posibilidad de hacer viajes transcontinentales en unas cuantas horas, proeza divina para Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 216 - los arcaicos. En este contexto, diversas prácticas culturales como el comercio, la religión, la guerra, la alimentación o el ahorro, adquirían otras notas y sentidos. La noción de espacio, sin mayores pretensiones y elucubraciones filosóficas era entonces, como es hoy, marco y ancla donde la cultura florece. La irrupción en la Antigüedad, un medio tan extraño al propio, se completa a partir de la omisión de detalles sencillos y comunes que componen la cotidianidad. Al buscar otros aspectos más sofisticados, e. gr. los grandes ideales, abstracciones o los desarrollos tecnológicos, se dejan de lado los elementos "intrascendentes" que determinan ideas, creencias y formas de allegarse al mundo, enraizadas en lo inmediato y tangible. Perfilando la traducción cultural: los bemoles del presente Aún la comprensión del mundo contemporáneo ofrece innumerables dificultades. Pongamos por caso el deporte olímpico a nivel mundial. La preparación de atletas para algunas economías africanas no tiene paralelo con la que se sigue en Estados Unidos o China. El significado que el deporte tiene en cada una de estas naciones nos conduce, en los hechos, a escenarios incompatibles entre sí. Sin embargo, cada cuatro años se habla del deporte olímpico como vínculo de unión y buena voluntad. La realidad tangible nos dice que en cada sociedad el papel del atleta y el deporte se modifican dramáticamente. Mientras que en algunas economías son la figura central en la que convergen los más novedosos avances científicos, tecnológicos y educativos (como el sofisticado diseño de ropa deportiva elaborada con materiales ultraligeros y resultado de investigaciones multimillonarias exportadas a todo el planeta o la explotación del talento de brillantes ingenieros que se vuelca en construir jabalinas, trineos, balones, remos y flechas). Por el contrario, en los países del tercer mundo es el reflejo de los privilegios de ciertas élites que se benefician con dádivas burdas e insultantes. Regímenes pegados con alfileres envían delegaciones de deportistas sin el nivel suficiente para competir con las grandes luminarias. Parecería que al participar en encuentros mundiales automáticamente se recibe la legitimación de la comunidad internacional. Entonces, ¿qué es el deporte olímpico en nuestro mundo contemporáneo? No es una pregunta que pueda responderse con facilidad, para lograrlo habría que recurrir a un proceso de traducción cultural. Un ejercicio arduo que exige tener gran conocimiento de las circunstancias de los países del orbe. En procesos más complejos, caracterizados por la interiorización de ideas y creencias, es todavía más difícil unificar criterios. Por ejemplo, la Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 217 - convivencia pacífica de diferentes religiones, ondea como estandarte de la tolerancia en nuestros días. Vemos a patriarcas, pastores, rabinos y cardenales juntarse a orar, protagonizando una danza de la humanidad civilizada, sin embargo, cabe preguntarse ¿a quién o a qué le están orando? Este es otro campo en el que la traducción cultural puede brindarnos cierta ayuda. Cuando se decreta que existe respeto para todas las creencias religiosas de los ciudadanos de un país, es sencillo imaginar en teoría la imposición de dignidad a las creencias, ritos e ideas sobre lo sagrado. No obstante, con gran frecuencia se descalifican prácticas ubicándolas en el terreno de lo "primitivo" o "popular". En el mejor de los casos, dicha etiqueta significa que quienes abrazan tal o cual esquema de creencias son ignorantes y están al margen de una teología racional bien elaborada. Es decir, de un aparato fundante que articule conceptualmente una doctrina, una liturgia, o una soteriología en particular. Por ello, procesiones, adoración de santos e imágenes –no autorizadas por una jerarquía ilustrada- , la fe en milagros o la aparición de seres divinos, son sacados de los dominios internos del fiel para ser objeto de auscultación minuciosa. El "experto" determinará si son producto de la superstición o de la religiosidad racional e higiénica. ¿Cuándo es un rito magia y cuándo el ejercicio de una clara revelación divina? ¿Cuándo la teología es tal y cuándo se convierte en fundamentalismo? La tolerancia religiosa, -concesión de la misma dignidad a las creencias y prácticas religiosas ajenas que a las propias-, se desdibuja en el preciso momento en el que se evalúa al ajeno o se intenta atraerlo hacia la propia fe. Es entonces cuando se minimiza lo diferente para sobreponerle algo mejor a criterio del evangelizador-árbitro. ¿Qué es en sentido amplio la religión, la fe?, ¿prácticas cotidianas que involucran todos los aspectos de la vida del individuo? ¿Un arsenal de respuestas a todas las posibles preguntas que puedan salirle al paso al hombre?, ¿una vía sobrenatural para explicar hechos naturales? ¿Es posible opinar sobre creencias personalísimas del hombre llevándolas a un lenguaje antropológico-psicológico que no siempre logra adentrarse en la naturaleza de la fe? En encrucijadas como estas es cuando la traducción cultural puede brindar ciertas aportaciones. Un esfuerzo más o menos completo de comprensión; sin duda, un proceso de interconexión y exploración, pero, también, y en honor a la verdad, una simplificación que siempre deja residuos en el camino. Al incursionar en estudios sobre religiones es importante aceptar que, de origen, es fallida la asimilación plena de la fe del otro, por superficial que ésta sea. Aún la banalidad huye de ser captada plenamente. Quiero enfatizar que acercarse a religiones vivas e incrustadas Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 218 - en el mismo ámbito social, significa un reto importante para el investigador. ¿Qué puede esperarse de creencias tan lejanas como las de los egipcios? Hacer historia de las religiones es complicado, de ninguna manera ocioso, pero exige un esfuerzo que resultará incompleto siempre, así son los límites del saber humano. No es exclusivo de este campo, en los estudios culturales existen fronteras infranqueables que deben asumirse más que negarse o minimizarse. Sucede algo similar con las investigaciones comparativas de filosofía, detectando excesos preocupantes en los últimos cien años; en el pasado y en el presente, en América y Europa, una tradición anula a otra, considerándola fincada en falacias o baladí. Buena parte de la historia de la filosofía del siglo pasado se desarrolló a través de la denigración de unas escuelas a otras. La reflexión se concentraba en elaborar argumentos que pusieran contra la pared al oponente, más que en construir pensamiento original. Hoy en día es complicado hacer coincidir en el mismo planeta y momento a la filosofía geopolítica contemporánea de Estados Unidos y a algunas variantes del neokantianismo europeo actual. La primera, creada por estadistas y politólogos, la segunda erudita y apuntalada por recursos poderosos tomados de la filología, el psicoanálisis, lecturas tardías del marxismo y el neotomismo. Caricaturizando la pluralidad del pensamiento, llamamos a ambas "filosofía" sin precisar que se hace una abstracción o reducción, sin atender las variantes que cualquier práctica humana tiene por naturaleza. La cuestión es más profunda, dado que el significado social y práctico de las reflexiones del norteamericano parten de una base que, si bien comparte algunos elementos de su correlato europeo de los últimos dos siglos, en esencia, renuncia a ceñirse a procedimientos "especulativos estériles", según sus propósitos utilitarios. Es una filosofía cuyos engranes son la ofensiva comercial mundial, el manejo estratégico de medios de comunicación, además de la apertura de nuevos mercados que validarán el ajedrez político jugado de manera correcta. Un filosofar que, sencillamente pasa de los griegos, los medievales y la Escuela de Frankfurt. A su vez, los europeos calificarán de filosofastros a los americanos por no ser partícipes de la filosofía. En este contexto, el estudio de la Antigüedad no es el único medio que ofrece problemas de comprensión cultural. Si a las religiones y a la filosofía del Occidente contemporáneo, es difícil abordárseles sin toparse con problemas de incompatibilidad ¿se tiene autoridad para juzgar a los antiguos, menospreciando su forma de pensar y creer? Señalo las paradojas para comprender las religiones y la filosofía porque es en ese contexto donde podría encuadrarse a la para estudiarla. Es imposible conseguir Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 219 - integridad absoluta en los métodos de investigación, quizá la actitud más racional a seguir consistiría en aceptar las propias inconsistencias. Quisiera proponer algunos principios que podrían servir para tener un acercamiento mínimo con el pensamiento que no es propio. I) Plantear la idea de "otredad" bajo la convicción que se "dignifica" al otro, es, más bien, adoptar una postura un tanto soberbia. Todo aquello que "no soy yo" existe con independencia de mí –sin importar como yo lo denigre o enaltezcay ofrecerá cierta resistencia a ser entendido. La primera barrera se da en mí, puesto que en cierta medida, siempre intentaré conectar lo desconocido, lo "no propio" al universo personal. Por mucha objetividad que pretenda conseguirse, las vivencias, creencias, ideas y costumbres del otro se harán accesibles mediante las categorías del que observa. La otredad no sólo se da con el habitante de tierras lejanas, poseedor de reglas de convivencia diferentes a las mías, también con un vecino o miembro de mi familia, quien, a pesar de tener marcos referenciales más o menos cercanos, ha elaborado un universo autónomo distinto al mío. Es decir, tendrá un código de traducción diferente al que yo tengo. II) Es verdad que al acercarse a otras civilizaciones se hace una valoración de ellas, pero es preciso eliminar calificativos como "libre", "evolucionado", "pagano", "científico", "tecnológico", "popular", "precientífico", "irracional", "mítico", "supersticioso", "democrático" y todos aquellos que tengan una fuerte carga axiológica para nosotros. Adjetivos que comprometan la concepción de los otros, al grado de denigrarlos considerándolos en un estamento inferior al nuestro. Rechazaríamos que unos confucianos echaran por la borda milenios de filosofía occidental porque nuestros pensadores no contemplan el término 善 (jen/ren)2 como 2 Simon Leys en su comentario a las Analectas (4.1) de Confucio señala sobre esta palabra: "...la virtud suprema, a menudo traducida como "bondad", "benevolencia" o "virtud". La persona que la practica es "el hombre bueno", "el hombre virtuoso", "el hombre plenamente humano". Normalmente he traducido este término por "humanidad", pero en ocasiones he utilizado "bondad"... Huelga decir que todas estas traducciones han sido irremediablemente inadecuadas; el peor error sería describir a Confucio con los pálidos colores de una especie de filántropo benigno o de trabajador social bienintencionado. Ninguna otra imagen podría estar más lejos de la realidad histórica. Para Confucio, ren, la plenitud de la humanidad, es verdaderamente un absoluto de inexpresable y cegador esplendor; este absoluto es lo que exige heroicidades a cada persona, pero permanece cercano y a mano en la vida cotidiana; nadie lo posee, pero informa todos nuestros actos aunque nunca puede ser totalmente captado, está constantemente revelándose en sus diversas manifestaciones."( 1998: 203-204). El trabajo de Paul Lüth, Die japanische Philosophie (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1944), puede brindarnos más elementos para acercarnos a la problemática de otras filosofías cuyos referentes e intereses no tienen paralelo con las nuestras. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 220 - parte sustancial de la ética y la cosmología. ¿Qué nos justifica, entonces, a desacreditar esquemas de pensamiento que no se sujetan a la "razón"? Es imposible deshacerse por entero de prejuicios, prenociones y categorías culturales, empero, ayudaría a evitar el alejamiento abstenerse de usar lo más posible de las etiquetas señaladas. Asumir una actitud de esta naturaleza, podría asfaltar el camino hacia otras culturas. III) Por estrategia metodológica, se asume que los "demás", entiéndase los antiguos, son muy diferentes a nosotros. Pueden serlo, pero, dentro del proceso de traducción cultural es importante encontrar aspectos que nos sean comunes. La cotidianidad puede ser una fuente significativa de vinculación. Relacionarse con algunos aspectos de la vida diaria de pueblos tan distantes, es un gran esfuerzo para el investigador; la subsistencia, la alimentación, la convivencia o la manera en que la muerte se acepta son áreas en las que pueden encontrarse algunas coincidencias con nosotros. A partir de allí podría empezarse con la traducción cultural. Es inevitable cometer anacronismos, sin embargo, no debe pasarse por alto que lo que se busca es un acercamiento a sociedades que estuvieron vivas en su momento. IV) En el caso concreto del pensamiento y las diferentes denominaciones que los pueblos le dan (filosofía, sabiduría, reflexión, memoria o iluminación) es necesario comprender que siempre se estará sujeto a un marco regulatorio. Ya sea a una tradición ritual, una religión, el estado, la magia o la oralidad, nótese que echo mano del material conceptual que dispongo para expresarme. Lo cual, no significa que las meditaciones que se hayan conseguido en ámbitos diferentes no puedan brindar una aportación relevante para nuestro filosofar. V) Es necesario asumir que la filosofía occidental contemporánea también está suscrita a marcos que, dentro de las sociedades vivas resultan ser lo más viable y obvio. Nuestra filosofía es racional, remitiéndonos al complejo y ambiguo universo de la razón occidental. Es científica, democrática, humana, abierta, tolerante... cada adjetivo abre espacios que no son del todo conscientes para nosotros. Espacios que no son unánimemente aceptados hoy por todos los habitantes de este planeta. VI) Como ejercicio historiográfico, es conveniente imaginar cómo serían estudiadas nuestras civilizaciones en algunos milenios. Quizá, nuestros colegas del futuro –me valgo de la traducción cultural para invocarlosni siquiera consideren importante el tema de la tecnología, la ciencia, la democracia o el cristianismo. Posiblemente, nuestras sociedades tendrán Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 221 - otros atractivos para ellos, otros, ocultos en lo más profundo de nuestra inmediatez, vedados a nuestros ojos. VII) En las circunstancias particulares de la Antigüedad, es importante asumir que nos enfrentamos a un mundo en movimiento constante cuya dinámica probablemente no alcanzamos siquiera a dimensionar. Hay tantos pueblos que nos pasan inadvertidos y a otros los conocemos por referencias fugaces, ergo, es irresponsable y arriesgado elaborar juicios categóricos sobre ellos. Por ejemplo, Etruria, enclavada en la Europa "familiar", cercana a romanos y griegos, constituye un duro golpe para nuestra arqueología. Una civilización casi tangible pero distante y enigmática nos recuerda que a Europa antigua la perfilamos en sombras. Se dictamina con rapidez que las sociedades fuera del ámbito grecorromano fueron primitivas y carentes de complejidad. Celtas, jutos, eslavos, íberos, bretones, escitas y germanos son minimizados a aldeas gobernadas por hechiceros. Es incorrecto que milenios sean juzgados bajo los cerrados parámetros de lo que entendemos por "Grecia" y "Roma". Dicho lo anterior, iniciemos nuestro intento por traducir la idea de . La conformación del término "magia": un problema de traducción cultural Una de las primeras menciones griegas que se hace del (mago persa) la encontramos en la Historia del viejo Heródoto. Aunque su referencia no se reduce a un pasaje único, es en I, 132,2 donde se le define con mayor detalle, a saber, una especie de sacerdote oficiante perteneciente a una de las etnias que componían el imperio persa3. En III, 70-79 se describen las intrigas y tensiones políticas que protagonizaron algunos magos, encuadrándolos en las más altas esferas del poder imperial, añadiendo un elemento mundano al religioso para redondear su perfil. Siguiendo la lógica que se aplica con Pitágoras como creador de la palabra filosofía a partir de identificarse a sí mismo como filósofo, la serían las prácticas, creencias e ideas propias 3 Walter Burrkert comenta sobre el término mãGuis (maguš) dentro del contexto persa: "...el término "mago" está prácticamente ausente en el Avesta [aparece sólo en Yasna 65,7]. Pero una documentación auténtica sobre los magos como funcionarios religiosos existe en las tablillas elamitas de Persépolis de la época de Darío [Koch, 1992: 279 s]... De la zona fronteriza entre helenismo e iranismo, es decir, de la Capadocia, proviene una inscripción bilingüe, greco-aramea, de un hombre que fue para Mithra, mʾgjs l mitrh, que pertence quizá al siglo I d.C." (2002: 135). –Para una revisión histórica del término maguš, Cf. el artículo "Magi" de Muhammad A. Dandamayev (2012), disponible en http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/magi. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 222 - de los magos persas4. Es importante recordar que la exposición de Heródoto sobre cultos religiosos extranjeros no siempre despeja dudas, por el contrario, deja con la inquietud respecto a si se está ante un ejercicio de pedagogía consistente en helenizar lo foráneo con el objeto de hacerlo más comprensible para el público; si es una reducción de creencias y divinidades que no tienen la estatura de lo griego o, el desarrollo de una traducción cultural en la que muchas cosas se quedan en el camino, pero, no puede concretarse de otra manera más que a través del lenguaje que Heródoto y su gente hablaban5. ¿A qué se referiría el de Halicarnaso cuando afirmaba que los magos entonaban una durante los sacrificios (I, 132,2)? ¿En realidad era una pieza que hablaba del origen de los dioses iranios o eran ensalmos, conjuros o tal vez un género que no tiene paralelo dentro de nuestras tradiciones como sucede, por ejemplo, con los "himnos" sumerios? Lo que sí puede concluirse es que Heródoto tenía una buena opinión de los persas y sus instituciones, haciendo eco de la mentalidad de su tiempo. En algunos círculos, el no era un personaje nefasto; el sentido del término cambió, pasando de ser un cuasi gentilicio bárbaro a una manera de referirse a sacerdotes griegos relacionados con los misterios y las iniciaciones. Así lo explica Raquel Martín Hernández (2008: 805), apoyándose en un pasaje del Papiro Derveni (Col. VI) y en un fragmento de Heráclito (Clem. Al. Prot. 2.22.2)6: ...no es necesario pensar que los expertos que realizan dichos ritos sean profesionales venidos de fuera, por mucho que pueda despistar el nombre de origen iranio que se les aplica. Dicho término, creemos, puede ser fácilmente explicado como un tecnicismo religioso, en concreto, un término técnico para denominar a los expertos en rituales de ciertas ceremonias mistéricas, posiblemente relacionadas con el dionisismo... 4 De acuerdo con SUDA x, 9, un artículo dedicado a Janto, se dice que él escribió una historia de Lidia en 4 libros ( ). Guido Schepens, en su comentario al FGrH 765, menciona la posibilidad que el catálogo de obras de Janto se compusiera, además del texto citado, de un estudio sobre Empédocles y una Sobre esto hay polémica, dado que algunos estudiosos especulan que la era unos de los libros de la historia de los lidios.Cf. Jacoby (1998: 34, N. 16) 5 Considero que la interpretación de Momigliano (1999: 206-210) es la más atinada. Él hace una lectura de la Historia de Heródoto como un ejercicio de comprensión de los persas. 6 Cabe citar el comentario de Calvo Martínez (2007: 306), donde afirma que es el primer texto griego donde aparece el término pero sólo conectándolo con las tradiciones iniciáticas presumiblemente dionisíacas. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 223 - Sin embargo, dentro de la literatura filosófica griega se mantiene la identificación del mago con el sabio persa, como un filósofo oriental cuya agudeza no necesariamente estaba por debajo de los helenos. Posiblemente debida a una tendencia "orientófila" presente en Grecia -iniciada con timidez desde el siglo VIII a.C. 7 y vigente hasta pasado el Helenismopuede entenderse la asimilación de la idea del mago-sabio. En dicho apego, no sólo lo persa fue estimado, sino también las tradiciones egipcias, hebreas 8 e indias. En lo que respecta a los persas, Momigliano (1999: 201 y 206) afirma: Indudablemente es tentador explicar ciertos aspectos de los inicios de la filosofía griega a través de las influencias iranias. La repentina elevación del Tiempo a dios primitivo en Ferécides; la identificación del Fuego con la justicia, en Heráclito; la astronomía de Anaximandro, que sitúa a las estrellas más cercanas a la Tierra que a la Luna; estas y otras ideas nos traen a la mente teorías que nos han enseñado a considerar zoroastrianas, o en todo caso persas, o por lo menos orientales... Por extravagantes que se haga aparecer a los persas en Esquilo, no son bárbaros consumados, como los egipcios de Las suplicantes. Más enfático que Esquilo, Heródoto respeta a los persas y los considera capaces de pensar como los griegos9. Una variante de esta tradición consiste en concebir al como una persona capaz de operar cambios extraordinarios en el medio ambiente, un iniciado10 que conoce secretos muy profundos del universo. Las diferentes 7 Cf. Feldman (1996). –El comentario de Álvarez Pedrosa (2008: 1002) sirve para matizar el vínculo político-cultural que se produjo entre griegos y persas a raíz de diversos hechos históricos: "...suscitaron un interés singular de la cultura persa entre los griegos, que oscilaba entre el aborrecimiento y la fascinación..." 8 Sobre este particular cf. el capítulo "El descubrimiento helenístico del judaísmo" en Momigliano (1999: 122-155). 9 Álvarez-Pedrosa (2008: 1002-1012) es un poco menos entusiasta al momento hablar sobre los préstamos e influencias persas en la Hélade, no por ello, descarta la posibilidad de relaciones de ida y vuelta entre ambos pueblos. Su revisión se apega a la evidencia lingüística rastreable entre textos como los Gāthās y el Avesta, y diálogos platónicos, uno pseudo platónico (Axíoco), comedias aristofánicas y laminillas órficas. –Sobre la dignidad que Esquilo otorga a los persas Cf. García Novo (2005: 50-53). 10 En este punto, Álvarez-Pedroza hace de nuevo una exhortación a la prudencia histórica, "...los autores tienden a considerar que el zoroastrismo es una religión de iniciados, aunque el concepto no se ajuste a los términos más rigurosos que se dan en la religión griega." (2008: 992, N. 4) -La magia como iniciación es una noción que se mantuvo vigente durante muchos siglos, por ejemplo, en el Papiro Griego de Magia I, 127 puede leerse " ". –Otro autor tardío, Numenio de Apamea, incurre en un apresuramiento cuando habla de la religión del antiguo Irán: "...los persas inician en los misterios adoctrinando al iniciado sobre el descenso de las almas y su subida y llamando [a este] lugar caverna. Según dice Eubolo, fue Zoroastro el primero que consagró en las montañas cercanas a Persia una caverna natural, florida y regada de fuentes, en honor a Mitra, creador y padre de todas las cosas, ya que la caverna le procuraba una imagen del Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 224 - fuentes griegas y romanas adjudican distinción de grado en las capacidades de los sabios orientales; las hay desde las que los hacen semidioses, hasta las más conservadoras que los muestran muy cercanos a la filosofía y la liturgia. Eudoxo11 y Aristóteles12 son quizá quienes más difusión dieron a la idea del mago-filósofo. Filón de Alejandría (1977: XI), comenta sobre los magos: En el mundo exterior, donde se hallan los que estiman las obras más que las palabras, encontramos amplias asociaciones de la más alta virtud y excelencia. Entre los persas está la orden de los magos, quienes investigan calladamente los hechos de la naturaleza13, a fin de alcanzar el conocimiento de la verdad, y por medio de visiones más claras que el lenguaje, dan y reciben revelaciones de la divina excelencia. En la India, también, existe la orden de los gimnosofistas, que estudian tanto la filosofía ética como la física y hacen de todas sus vidas una exhibición de virtud. Por este camino sigue Apuleyo (2003: 26), expresándose de la siguiente manera: Magia es en verdad lo que Platón entiende, cuando recuerda qué disciplinas inculcan los persas al niño destinado a reinar. Tengo en la memoria las palabras mismas de este divino varón, que tú Máximo puedes recordar conmigo: Cuando llega a los catorce años, reciben al muchacho aquellos que los persas llaman pedagogos reales. Son escogidos en número de cuatro, entre los persas de edad madura que gozan de mejor fama: el más sabio, el más justo, el más prudente y el más valeroso. Uno de ellos le enseña la magia [magei/an] de Zoroastro, hijo de Oromasdes. Ésta consiste en el culto de los dioses. Le enseñan también el arte de reinar.14 Más adelante, Apuleyo hace otras referencias de la magia y los magos, e. gr.: en 26 critica la idea popular que consiste en creer que el mago es mundo, el que Mitra fabricó, en tanto que los objetos en su interior dispuestos a distancias simétricas serían símbolos de los elementos y zonas del cosmos. Después del aludido Zoroastro la costumbre de celebrar sus iniciaciones en grutas y cavernas, naturales o artificiales." Fr. 60. 11 Quien afirmaba que los magos eran "la más excelente y valiosa de las sectas filosóficas", además de datar el nacimiento de Zoroastro seis mil años antes de la muerte de Platón. Cf. Plinio, XXX, 5. 12 Las reconstrucciones de su obra Sobre la filosofía recogen algunos comentarios al respecto, a saber: i) que los magos son más antiguos que los sacerdotes egipcios, ii) que hay dos principios regidores del universo: Arimano y Oromasdes y iii) proporciona otras fuentes que hablan sobre los magos: Hermipio Sobre los magos (este dato se encuentra también el Plinio, XXX, 4), Eudoxo Viaje y Teopompo, Filípicas VIII. Cf. D.L. I, 8. Sobre la opinión que Aristóteles tenía de los sabios orientales, recuérdese que en Metafísica 918b 21-23 también habla de los sacerdotes egipcios. 13 El subrayado es mío. Nótese cómo describe a los magos. 14 Las palabras citadas de Platón aparecen en griego en medio del texto latino. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 225 - omnipotente gracias a que se vale de conjuros y cánticos dirigidos a los dioses; en 31 alude una creencia compartida por "muchísimos" consistente en considerar a Pitágoras seguidor de Zoroastro y diestro en la magia; en 38 menciona cierta creencia de su tiempo que vincula a los babilonios y egipcios con ensalmos y conjuros; en 40 establece con cautela vínculos entre el filósofo, el médico y el mago, siendo el conocimiento de la naturaleza el común denominador entre los tres. Por último, en 90 cita un catálogo de magos eminentes compuesto por Carmendas, Dárdano, Moisés, Iannes, Apolobex, Ostanen y Zoroastro15. Encontramos un par de entradas en la SUDA, posiblemente influidas por tradiciones neoplatónicas y pitagóricas tardías, en las que se toca el tema de los magos. En 447 se habla sobre Demócrito enlistando sus mentores: ; además visitó a y de quienes tomó lo mejor de su sabiduría para esparcirla entre los griegos. En 159, dedicada a Zoroastro, se le define como un y creador del término mago: , datando su existencia histórica quinientos años antes de la guerra de Troya. Los célebres Oráculos caldeos constituyen una fuente importante para comprender la transmisión del término mago. En ellos confluyen elementos de un neoplatonismo muy particular con matices gnósticos y pitagóricos, una fuerte orientofilia, así como tintes de religiones mistéricas griegas, en particular el orfismo y los cultos eleusinos. Los Oráculos suelen traslapar el término con . El primero vinculado con tradiciones babilónicas relativas al conocimiento físico y espiritual de las estrellas, la adivinación, la interpretación de los sueños y, en algunos casos, con el manejo de ensalmos capaces de alterar el funcionamiento de la naturaleza. Según la tradición erudita bizantina, fue Juliano el Teúrgo18, hijo de Juliano 15 A propósito del texto de Apuleyo, donde se defiende contra acusaciones por practicar magia, debe mencionarse que dentro del egipcio copto el término hik, derivado de HkA pasó al ámbito jurídico grecorromano interpretado como "impius and ilegal sorcery" Cf. Ritner (2001: 321). Aunque, cabe mencionar que, simultáneamente, en otros círculos se le consideraba a la magia . 16 Según el diccionario bizantino, su saber destacaba especialmente en astronomía, aunque su conocimiento de la naturaleza era muy amplio. –Según afirma Bremmer (1999: 5), Janto de Lidia fue el primer griego que mencionó a Zoroastro. 17 ¿Paralelos con SUDA D, 447? 18 Cf. SUDA, 434. –En el artículo se mencionan detalles que lo insertan en la tradición orientalizante greco-romana de época a caballo entre el final del Helenismo y el inicio de la Antigüedad Tardía. V. gr.: se le adjudica la redacción de un par de obras, así como unos textos que se han interpretado tradicionalmente como los Oráculos, Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 226 - el Caldeo ( )19, quien compiló los célebres Oráculos. El comentario de García Bazán en la introducción de los Oráculos caldeos (1991: 14-15), clarifica la visión que entonces se tenía de los caldeos y los magos: Los caldeos constituían tanto una agrupación iniciática dirigida por sus hierofantes, en este caso concreto Juliano el Caldeo, como practicantes de ritos y conservadores de doctrinas, indicadas por símbolos orales (los lógia di epȏn o fórmulas versificadas) y físicos, de naturaleza tradicional, es decir, de origen divino y regularmente transmitidos, para poder poseer un carácter eficaz o teúrgico. Este tipo de asociación mistérica está emparentada en su aspecto litúrgico y en los puntos fundamentales de sus creencias... con los magos (mágoi) anatólicos de origen medo-persa, una vez configurada cosmográficamente su doctrina por la ciencia astral del clero babilonio... Es también común a los miembros de estos grupos esotéricos la incorporación de rasgos propios de las prácticas de los magos-caldeos en tierras siríacas (trashumancia ramificadora y uso de encantos y conjuros), así como la adopción filosófica de un platonismo difuso, pero de orientación pitagorizante. Dado que la Hélade fue una sociedad viva, hemos de entender que el idioma era cambiante y estaba en constante movimiento, los significados de no estaban consensados, dándose al mismo tiempo acepciones denigrantes y meritorias, su uso dependía de la comunidad. En una dimensión peyorativa se le emparenta con (hechicero, brujo, mago20 , embaucador, charlatán, impostor21)/ (hechicería, brujería, hechizo22, seducción23, charlatanería24, ¿Estará entendiéndose entremezclando su conexión con la antigua épica heroica (una forma de rendir culto a los muertos) y con los conjuros? Dentro de este mismo artículo se narra que Juliano hizo llover mediante un saber secreto, sin embargo, también se dice que algunos adjudicaban a , un filósofo egipcio, tal maravilla. De nuevo aparecen elementos de la mentalidad de la época, es difícil determinar hasta qué punto nos encontramos ante una tendencia orientalizante y en qué medida se narran hechos y personas reales. 19 Cf. SUDA, 433, –El Caldeo es definido como filósofo, se menciona una obra suya sobre los daímones, compuesta por cuatro libros. 20 Calvo Martínez señala sobre el término : "...muy a menudo sirve como insulto, es una palabra siempre cargada de valores puramente negativos..." (2007: 304) -Estas tres acepciones pueden encontrarse en Historia II, 33 de Heródoto; Hipólito, 1038 y Bacantes, 234 de Eurípides; en República, 380d de Platón; en Marco Aurelio Antonino, 1,6; Historia de los animales de Eliano, III, 17; y, Eneadas, IV, 4, 40 de Plotino. 21 Con estos significados puede encontrársele en Banquete 203d de Platón. En Demóstenes XVIII, 276, en este pasaje utiliza el término como sinónimos de , talvez por el rechazo a las importaciones de imperios hegemónicos como lo fue primero el persa y luego el macedonio. En Preparación al Evangelio V, 18,6 de Eusebio. En un fragmento de un papiro erótico griego, Hermes, 55, 1920,191; en 77/78, 33 de Dío Crisóstomo; en Oraciones XXVIII, 11 de Arístides, y en Contra Celso II, 49 de Orígenes. En Edipo rey, 387 parecería tener dicha acepción, sin embargo Clavo Martínez considera que se trata de una referencia a los magos persas (1999: 308-309). Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 227 - atracción engañosa25). Se le vincula también con (conjurador, quien canta ensalmos mágicos27, saludador) y con hechicero, preparador de pócimas, y las prácticas por él desarrolladas 28. más que ser un término cuyo sentido fue perdiendo su significado original al pasar de los siglos, fue una palabra que sumó giros, dependiendo de los propósitos de los autores. Sin embargo, cabe puntualizar que no es tan sencillo identificar a la magia y al mago con la irracionalidad, las tradiciones populares, creencias supersticiosas o la charlatanería sin explicar toda la complejidad que envuelve la recepción del concepto en nuestras lenguas contemporáneas. El cristianismo contribuyó significativamente a fijar el sentido de magia en tanto que una práctica pseudoreligiosa contraria a los mandamientos. El islam, debido a sus raíces cristianas, adopta en parte dicha concepción 29 ; en árabe سحر (sḥr), magia, reúne las acepciones peyorativas ya expuestas. Sin embargo, existe una aleya (II, 102) que nos invita a poner atención especial en la transmisión del concepto: Siguen lo que practicaron los demonios en el reinado de Sulayman. Pero no fue Sulayman quien cayó en la incredulidad, sino que fueron los demonios al enseñar a los hombres la magia que le había sido revelada a los dos ángeles... La magia constituye el saber de misterios que no pueden ser revelados al hombre, cuando esto sucede se comente una transgresión de los límites 22 Cf. Gorgias B 11,10, donde se le hace sinónimo de ; Banquete 202e y República 582a de Platón; en Crisipo, III, 96, y Eneadas IV, 4, 43 de Plotino. 23 Cf. República, 413d de Platón; Iambi ad Seleucum, 179 de Anfiloquio y Cartas a Ático, 180, 4 de Cicerón. 24 Cf. Sobre la enfermedad sagrada, XXI, 26, dónde se le hace paralela a las purificaciones fraudulentas. 25 Cf. Eneadas, IV, 44, 4 de Plotino y Stromata, II, 20, 120 de Clemente de Alejandría. –Emparentado posiblemente con el término "prestidigitador", que luego será una forma de referirse a los magos egipcios contra los que Moisés se enfrentó. 26 Deriva del término , palabra, narración, canto a los héroes. 27 Dentro de la literatura tardía, pueden encontrarse diferentes clases de conjuros, a saber: para alejar un mal, PGM XX, 5 y 13; ensalmo para pedir la intervención de un dios a través de un daimon, PGM, I, 296 y 317, hechizo con fines eróticos, PGM, IV, 295, VII, 992 y XX, 3. 28 Sobre este término, Kingsley (2008: 295) comenta: "...la palabra pharmakon poseía también la acepción de "encantamiento", y en el caso del fragmento empedocleo [Diels, III] designa los remedios, pero también, de modo implícito, los conjuros ( ) que eran recitados durante la preparación de plantas". Bremmer comenta sobre el femenino de (1999: 5): "the term pharmakis was probably once limited to a woman who collected herbs for magic, but gradually in must have absorbed (or: benn ascribed) qualities from the male sorcerers". 29 En el Noble Corán pueden encontrarse diversas aleyas en las que la magia es vista como charlatanería o prestidigitación, por ejemplo: VI, 8, VII 108, 111 y en 115 se juega con los sentidos del término llevándolo de lo maravilloso a la prestidigitación. X, 77, XI, 7, XX,56, XXI, 3, XXV, 8, XXVI, 33 y 34, 36 y 37, 39 y 40, 45; XXVII, 13, XLIII, 29, LI, 39, LII, 13, LIV, 2, LXI, 6 y LXXIV, 24. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 228 - impuestos por Allāh, empero, el sufismo contempla el conocimiento moderado de dichos secretos. Las observaciones de Ibn Jaldún sobre el tema sirven para clarificar parte de la interpretación de la سحر dentro del islam. Afirma (2011: 927) "los hombres de sólida inteligencia jamás han tenido la menor duda respecto a la existencia de la magia. Han advertido los efectos que ella produce... [empero] La ley divina no hace ninguna distinción entre la magia, el arte talismánico y sus respectivos influjos; todo lo incluye dentro de las cosas proscritas. (p. 933)." La excepción la constituyen los sufistas, quienes "...por un don de Dios, desarrollando la facultad de ejercer una influencia sobre las cosas del mundo, influencia que no debe confundirse con la magia [porque ésta es animada por los demonios] (p. 932)"30. Podría aventurarse una distinción con Ibn Jaldún, pues, entre magia negra y "magia blanca". La , un intento más por aproximarse a su significado Uno de los aspectos más importantes que hay que tomar en cuenta para abordar el pensamiento egipcio, es asumir que carecemos de las categorías culturales que logren captar con total precisión la naturaleza de tradiciones y prácticas tan arraigadas. Es frecuente prejuzgar a los egipcios, tildándolos de ser extremadamente religiosos, al extremo de profesar una superstición ingenua. Se les llega a definir pragmáticos siendo lo contrario de la "mentalidad griega", dedicada a la teorización. Para iniciar con el ejercicio de traducción cultural, quisiera evocar el caso del olimpismo citado páginas atrás. ¿Aceptaríamos que fuera encasillado por estudiosos foráneos sólo en el campo de los negocios, de la política, de la tecnología? En realidad, es una mezcla de todo, lograda en el contexto de un mundo "democrático" y "libre". De la misma manera, debe actuarse con prudencia cuando se habla del antiguo Egipto, aunque sus matemáticas y liturgia parezcan cercanas a las nuestras, es necesario comprenderlas en el marco que se dieron. Wieleitner (1927: 13) cuestiona nuestro entendimiento de la "ciencia" egipcia: 30 La sección VI, 22 de Al-Muqaddimah está dedicada a la desacreditación de la magia demoníaca, exhibiéndola como una práctica que se vale de talismanes y cuyas fuentes pueden ser, la manipulación maligna, la prestidigitación o la persuasión psicológica. También es importante señalar que Ibn Jaldún identifica a caldeos, asirios y coptos como los practicantes de la talismánica de la Antigüedad. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 229 - Wenn man die Wissenschaft der alten Ägypter als "praktisch" oder "rein empirisch" hinstellt, wird man in vielen Fällen natürlich nicht Unrecht haben. Jedoch scheint mir damit meist ein Unterton des Herabsetzenden verbunden zu sein, den ich nicht für berechtigt halte. Si con la "ciencia" egipcia tan "cercana" a nuestra mentalidad occidental hay problemas para encuadrar con precisión su dimensión original, mayor será la complejidad para entender la . Para empezar, considero pertinente puntualizar que no existe una palabra en egipcio jeroglífico que corresponda a lo que nosotros entendemos por magia31, tampoco había un paralelo de la . El vocablo contiene dos componentes que es menester revisar. 1 2 1) kA: brazos, posiblemente en gesto de alabanza, se conectan con la idea de adoración, quizá hasta algo cercano a la contemplación; pero, también, con una "energía espiritual personal-cósmica", Betrò comenta: "...eine Lebenskraft, die sowohl Menschen wie Götter besitzen. Er überträgt sich vom Vater auf den Sohn und gehört, da er mehr ist als ein Element der individuellen Persönlichkeit." (2004: 58)32. 2) determinativo que tiene que ver con actividades vinculadas con la boca: hablar, callar, beber, comer, contar. También se relaciona semánticamente con aspectos relativos al pensamiento y al gusto. En el caso de la VkA se relaciona con pronunciar conjuros, no sin dejar de lado el aspecto cósmico que los fundamenta y valida. En TdP encontramos una frase que refleja el poder del conjuro: "Whenever I speak to you, gods, you see and hear my speech." (Pared norte, antecámara, 753). Es frecuente que se establezcan vínculos apresurados identificando sin más un conjuro o un exorcismo con la HkA33. Ritner (2001: 321-336) apunta algunas 31 Existía vocabulario de "expresiones mágicas", por ejemplo (Snt) conjuro, blasfemar contra un dios, criticar. (sXnw) conjuro o encantamiento, (wAD) amuleto, (sStA) misterios o rituales secretos (mta) ritual o (sHri) exorcizar. 32 La HkA constituía un factor para definir la identidad de la persona, así puede verse en Textos de las Pirámides (TdP), Unis, corredor-paredes oeste y este, 316; TdP, Pepi I, pared oeste de la antecámara, 472; TdP, Pepi I, pared sur del vestíbulo, 539. 33 Hans Fischer, dentro de su estudio introductorio a textos mágicos egipcios (2005: 9), comenta sobre el problema para interpretar la "magia egipcia": "Im Deken der Alten Ägypter hat der Demiurg seinen Geschöpfen neben anderen elementaren Dingen wie Luft, Nahrung, Himmel und Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 230 - acepciones que facilitan la traducción cultural: i) "force that once animated, compeled, and protect the gods and subsequent creation34. Antecedent to the creative word (Hu) [ (Hu)]. Heka infuses the creator s projected images or ka-spirits, with his "magical" vitality" 35 . En ocasiones es personificada36, un ejemplo muy claro es Libro de los Muertos (LdM) 84: Faulkner traduce: "I don t know the magician, but I hear his words", las siguientes versiones coinciden en la idea central: Budge: "I know Ḥeka, I hear his words", Lara Peinado "No conozco (tampoco) a Heka, (si bien, solamente) oigo sus palabras mágicas", Barguet: "no conozco a Heka, oigo (solamente) sus palabras mágicas". La HkA está compuesta, según, Ritner, por tres elementos constitutivos, a saber: el habla (conjuro), las propiedades inherentes37 (comprensión del ente y las condiciones que lo rodean, ¿una de las posibilidades del kA?) y el rito (acto de vinculación con los principios que rigen el cosmos). Quizá ésta sea una de las interpretaciones que más nos interese, dado que aquí está impreso un proyecto cósmico, pudiendo tener conexiones con nuestra idea de estética (teoría de la harmonía) y metafísica (teoría sobre la Realidad). El proyecto cósmico está marcado por (MAAt)38, síntesis de orden expresado en la legalidad, la belleza, la salud y el equilibrio. De tal forma que la HkA no es un principio sobrenatural arbitrario, debiéndose adaptar a las proporciones y ritmos que rigen la Realidad. Allen, en su léxico comentado TdP, señala: "The term HkA generally refers to the force itself, while HkAw [mago] denotes the medium through wich the force is excersised, usually "magic spells" (2015: 360). ii) Rituales y conjuros que Erde sowie einem Königtum als ägyptisch hekaw und im späteren Koptisch hik lautet. Diesen Begriff übersetzen wir Modernen leichtfertig, wie "Zauber" oder "Magie", ohne dabei zu bedenken, wir sehr westlichem Deken klassisch-antiker und besonders jüdisch-christlicher Prägung verpflichtet sind" 34 Cf. TdP, Teti, cámara funeraria, 324. 35 Cf. Textos de los sarcófagos, 261. 36 A propósito de la personificación de la HkA, a algunos dioses se les identificaba con el epíteto "El Grande de la HkA" o "El Gran Mago" (wrt-HkAw), regularmente eran Seth y Horus a quienes se les asignaba dicho título, sin embargo, no eran los únicos en recibirlo. Cf. TdP, Pepi I, cámara funeraria, lado sur, 220, 222, y extremo oeste de la cámara funeraria, 443; TdP, Merene, extemo oeste de la cámara funeraria, 592. – En Pepi II, en la pared norte de la antecámara, 692 B se le llama a Thot "Señor de la Magia". 37 James (2001: 76) afirma al respecto: "The Doctrines of the universal distribution of the atoms, and their emanation from external objects are derived from magic: These doctrines are magical and express the magical principle "that the qualities of animals or things are distributed throughout all their parts." 38 Para tener una perspectiva más clara de MAAt, Cf. LdM, 15 (vinculada con la magia como poder protector), 31 (ritmo), 39 (destrucción), 41 (justicia), 50 (creación del mundo), 79 (purificación moral del difunto), 130 (equilibrio integral del individuo), 145 y183 (justicia y verdad), 165 "País de MAAt," (el Más Allá, tierra de los justos). Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 231 - tenían como objetivo alterar el orden de las cosas, destruir enemigos39 , alterar la apariencia para evadir los ataques de genios en el Más Allá40 o atraer al ser deseado o amado 41 . Lo anterior era sólo una de tantas aplicaciones que podía tener la fuerza neutral HkA, es decir, no existía una concepción de magia negra o blanca. La mayoría de los textos que plasman rituales y ensalmos datan de época tardía42, por lo que es muy difícil saber a ciencia cierta la manera en que se produjo la fijación de tradiciones ancestrales en soportes materiales. iii) Emanación de Ra (bAw) que acompañaba actividades como la agricultura, la medicina, los rituales de estado, la arquitectura (fundación de ciudades y erección de construcciones). iv) la funeraria aplicada en la conservación de cadáveres por medio del embalsamamiento (wt), compuesto por un momento material y otro de procesos "espirituales", "sobrenaturales", "divinos" -por expresarlo de alguna manera-. El sacerdote funerario recitaba ensalmos y conjuros a la par de tratar al cadáver con elaborados métodos de preservación en los que se veían involucrados saberes que hoy ubicaríamos en la química, la biología y la medicina43. El cuerpo momificado era, según la mentalidad egipcia, la herencia sagrada obsequiada por los dioses –particularmente por Osiris-; era, arriesgándome a cometer una trasgresión cultural, el misterio por excelencia que daba significado a rituales y pensamiento egipcios. En un pasaje de los TdP (Cámara funeraria de Unis, 39 Se ha conservado un volumen importante de textos destinados a ahuyentar animales peligrosos. A continuación unos ejemplos: Fórmulas contra las cobras, conjuros 226, 228 y 230 TdP, Unis. Fórmula contra las serpientes, contenida en el P. de Turín 54003, conjuro III (ca. 2000). El P. del BM 9997 contiene conjuros contra serpientes que deben usarse con un amuleto de fayenza. Hay una imagen del papiro disponible en: http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectI d=113679&partId=1&searchText=papyrus+9997&page=1 . En el P. de Harris BM EA 10042, 4-9, al final de un himno –nótese la complejidad para clasificar los textos en nuestras categorías literariasaparece un ensalmo que ahuyenta cocodrilos del río y leones del desierto. 40 Esto hizo que algunos estudiosos pensaran que los egipcios creían en la reencarnación en organismos animales. 41 Por ejemplo, un conjuro de amor escrito en el óstrakon Deir el Medina 1057 (ca. 1100 a.C.). 42 E. gr.: el Papiro Bremner Rhind, perteneciente BM, EA 10188, 17 (Cantos de Isis y Neftis) datado en el 350 a.C., puede verse una imagen del papiro en https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?object Id=113956&partId=1&searchText=papyrus+10188&page=1; 43 Budge (1988: 185) comenta al respecto: "But for an account of the manner in which the body was bandaged, and the list of unguents and other materials employed in the process, and the words of power which are spoken as recourse to a very interesting papyrus which has been edited and translated by M. Maspero under the title of Le Rituel de l Embaumement. The first part of the papyrus, which probably gave instructions for the evisceration of the body in wanting..."En TdP Unis, faldete y pared este, 273-274 se habla ingerir la HkA como una de las cosas que debe hacer quien pretenda ser inmortal en el Más Allá. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 232 - lado sur, 213) encontramos un conjuro que involucra la consagración del cuerpo: Ho, Unis! You have not gone away dead: you have gone away alive. Sit on Osiris chair, with your baton in your arm, and govern the living with your lotus scepter in your arm, and govern those of the remote places. Your lower arms are of Atum, your upper arms of Atum, your belly of Atum, your back of Atum, your rear of Atum, your legs of Atum, your face of Anubis44. v) Un sentido implícito que tenía la HkA-conjuro, es ser una especie de historia oral en la que se recogen evidencias de la relación con pueblos extranjeros o de un léxico obsoleto que se conserva en expresiones ininteligibles que revisten de misticismo las palabras del mago. Lewis Spence (1990: 265) comenta: A great many of these seemingly nonsensical spells consist of foreign words and expressions, some of them of Syrian origin. It is well know that the shamanistic class in savage communities is prone to invent a secret language or dialect of its own, and that the vocabulary of such a jargon is usually either archaic or else borrowed from the neighbouring language.45 44 Una consagración del cuerpo más detallada puede encontrarse en LdM, XLII: "My hair is Nun; my face is Re; my eyes are Hathor; my ears are Wepwawet; my Nose is Shu who presides over her lotus-leaf; my lips are Anubis; my molars are Selket; my incisors are Isis the goddess; my arms are the Ram, the Lord of Mendes; my breast is Neith, Lady of Sais; my back is Seth; my phallus is Osiris; my muscles are the Lords of Kheraha; my chest is He who is greatly majestic; my belly and my spine are Sakhmet; my buttocks are the Eye of Horus; my thighs and my claves are Nut; my feet are Ptah; my toes are living falcons; there in no member of mine devoid of a god, and Thot is the protection of all my flesh." -En TdP, Pepi I, pared sur del vestíbulo, 539, encontramos un conjuro similar. 45 Se han conservado diversos textos egipcios en los que aparecen palabras que los estudiosos no logran descifrar, términos que cayeron en desuso o son, posiblemente, parte de un "léxico mágico" cuya etimología se remonta a idiomas arcaicos. En el P. de Leiden I, 348, 4,1 se menciona un tejido nedj, en 8,6 se habla de la sangre del pez Abdju. En el P. BM 10059, 5 (ca. 1200 a.C.) puede leerse lo siguiente: "Beschwörung der Asiaten (krankheit) bestehend aus dem, was Kreta dazu (=zur Beschwörung) sagt: s-n-t-k-p-p-w-y-j-y-m-n-t-r-k-k-r". Puede verse una imagen de este papiro en http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_i mage_gallery.aspx?assetId=35790001&objectId=110335&partId=1. En el LdM se refieren varios nombres mágicos (secretos) de los dioses, por ejemplo 165, 166, 167. En el P. BM 9997, VI 2, se refiere una serpiente de nombre schepu-ib. –En el P. Edwin Smith XXI, 9 se menciona la fruta hmAyt que no logra ser identificada. En sus comentarios, Breasted sugiere que puede tratarse de una nuez (p. 496). En el mismo texto, XX, 8 se menciona la planta Sams.-En TdP, Teti, pared este de la antecámara, 377 se habla de la serpiente hpjw y se identifica al difunto con una fuerza llamada Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 233 - vi) Los conjuros como terapia médica.46 Suponemos que los egipcios creían en la efectividad de los conjuros, sin embargo, se especula cuando se les reduce a mera superstición. Según los registros que se han conservado, la palabra mágica acompañaba a procedimientos médicos en casos como mordedura de ofidios, padecimientos de la matriz o en el combate a la infertilidad. Era frecuente también que se empleara en padecimientos psicosomáticos o en otros que no eran muy bien conocidos, como las pestes47. Los facultativos egipcios sabían reducir fracturas, hacer cirugías y prescribir remedios en base a la farmacopea; su práctica no tenía los avances tecnológicos que hoy disfrutamos, no por ello, podemos considerar que sus terapias pecaban de candidez o pereza mental. A manera de conclusión Considero que la actitud más pertinente que puede seguirse con la es mantenerla apegada, en lo posible, al contexto donde se produjo. Introducirla a nuestra escala espiritual evolutiva, en un peldaño por debajo de la religión, es atentar contra su unidad originaria. Sin embargo, al llevar a cabo una traducción cultural, cabe la posibilidad de encontrar puntos de coincidencia con nuestra idea de filosofía, sin reducirla a ella. La HkA estaba constituida a partir de una axiología que no es compatible con la occidental, no lo es porque constituya un abandono a la reflexión crítica del mundo, sino porque sus propósitos fundantes parten de una sensibilidad diferente48. Daamw, 382-383. –TdP, Pepi II, extremo este de la cámara ritual, 180-191, contiene una serie de palabras mágicas para nombrar vasijas y panes. 46 Cf. P. de Leiden I, 348, 3,8-8,7. (ca. 1200 a.C.) donde se compendian cuatro conjuros contra la migraña y un exorcismo para sacar los demonios que atormentan al paciente. –En el P. de Atenas 1826, 7,11-8,5 (ca. 1200 a.C.) se recoge un conjuro contra una "enfermedad extranjera y demonios", posiblemente una clase de peste; así comodos ensalmos para ser pronunciados con amuletos, destinados a resolver el mismo padecimiento. 47 En el de P. Edwin Smith hay una pequeña sección (XVIII-XX) integrada por ocho encantamientos (exorcismos) contra la peste del año, destinados de combatir el viento maligno, una especie de peste periódica que cada año volvía a causar estragos entre la población. ¿Podríamos estar ante purificaciones colectivas, "medicina social", profilaxis, higiene en su sentido etimológico más lejano? 48 Egipto, al igual que otras grandes civilizaciones de la Antigüedad, no puede ser limitado a un puñado de aspectos culturales ni a una tipología racial única. Existía un Egipto negro, uno con raíces en Anatolia, otro mediterráneo, constituyendo cada uno un pequeño universo en miniatura. Respecto del Egipto negro, y, en general de la negritud africana, el ensayo de Souleymane Bachir Diayne (2011) nos invita a pensar en la estructura que guía mentalidades distintas a las nuestras. "...the expression of African philosophy itself, that is to say, the way of seeing, thinking and feeling that integrates fields of human activity as different as medicine, law, religion, logic and wisdom by serving as raison d être and the key to truly understanding them. Among these fields, artistic Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 234 - James (2001: 103) considera: "Magic is the key to the interpretation of ancient religions and philosophy." Más adelante dice "...since it was the method of the Egyptians to conceal the truth by the use of myths, parables, magical principles (primitive scientific method), number philosophy and hieroglyphics, we can easily see what methods might be involved before we could arrive at better translation of the Memphite Theology" (p. 147). Desde su creación en la Hélade, la palabra es insuficiente. Primero, para captar lo que hacían los persas, luego al aplicarla a la dándole una fuerte carga de platonismo pitagorizante. Es necesario reconsiderar el papel que juega un esquema tan complejo dentro del tejido multicolor de los pueblos antiguos. Podemos o no estar de acuerdo con los prolegómenos que apoyaban esta manifestación cultural, pero, merece la pena estudiar algo que estuvo tan arraigado en aquellos siglos. Para expresarlo de alguna manera, la revisión de los vestigios egipcios que han llegado a nosotros, dan razones suficientes para creer que la era un componente importante de la identidad nacional. Entendida en diferentes niveles y asignándole varios roles, según la clase social que la cultivara. Así como los hebreos asignaban valor múltiple a sus profetas, como los babilonios concebían la metalurgia, como los griegos hacían teatro, o como los germanos fincaban sus sociedades en la guerra; así, la era para los egipcios esencial en su vida. Al revisar el pensamiento egipcio en busca de "filosofía", se tocan casi siempre los mismos temas49. No se llega más lejos de comentarios mecánicos de las cosmogonías, impresas en las teologías llegadas nosotros. El común denominador es ubicarlas en el terreno de la religiosidad exagerada y, en los casos más moderados, calificarlas de preciencia, prefilosofía o pensamiento racional embrionario. Sin embargo, conceptos como la son simplificados al ámbito religioso sin abrir la mente para explorar sus activity is primary, even before religion: because, where orality reings, art constitutes the writing which allows us to read the metaphysics it transcribes" (p. 54). Cita unas palabras del filósofo Sénar Senghor: "What is rhythm? Is the architecture of being, the internal dynamism that gives it form, the system of waves it gives off toward Others, the pure expression of vital force. Rhythm is the vibrating shock, the power which, through the senses, seizes us at roots of our Being. It expresses itself through the most material and sensual means: lines, surfaces, colors, and volumes in architecture, sculpture and painting, accents in poetry and music; movements in dance. But it doing this, it organizes all this concreteness toward the light of the Spirit. For the Negro African, it is insofar as it incarnate in sensuality that rhythm illuminates the Spirit." (pp. 78-79) 49 Hornung (2000: 113-115) es de los pocos egiptólogos que aborda con más de detalle la esencia e historiografía del pensamiento egipcio. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 235 - posibilidades y fundamentos que los articulaban. Asante (2000: 1-12) revisa con atención los prolegómenos del pensamiento nilótico: It is not trite for the African to say: "everything is everything". And to the mind of the ancient Kemetic [Egyptian] people this idea was thought to represent the whole universe as one. From the beginning it was oneness of everything that became the key with which the Egyptian mind unlocked many secrets of the world. Thus, one s world, whether from the personal or the collective perspective, was based upon the actual quest to make the world one, to establish the interconnections of all things, to reconstruct the universe as it was in the beginning (pp. 2-3). Cualquier texto o discurso que sea estudiado aisladamente conducirá a una visión distorsionada de sus autores. Las reputadas Críticas de Kant, los escritos de fenomenología de Husserl o las meditaciones de Antonio Machado, no están exentas de tales lecturas. Cualquier escrito puede ser reducido a "mera literatura", letra muerta –según el giro denigrante que le han dado algunos filósofos contemporáneos a la expresión-. Los conjuros egipcios son el blanco de tal simplificación; aun si la sólo se compusiera por dichas piezas, merecería un tratamiento más completo y tolerante. A menudo se pierde de vista que las "palabras mágicas" pertenecían a un complejo sistema de ideas donde lo divino, lo natural y lo humano convivían estrechamente. Un esquema de ideas que debería considerarse tan digno como el producido por Platón y Aristóteles, sólo que acotando las claras diferencias que los distinguen. Para nuestra mentalidad significa un esfuerzo titánico imaginar que existen otras maneras de pensar, equipadas con otros cimientos y propósitos. Aquí surge la pregunta incómoda ¿qué tan plural es nuestra filosofía? ¿Por qué no emprender un ejercicio de traducción cultural como el que se ha hecho con abstracciones griegas como o ? Propongo que a la se le dé el calificativo de "afilosófica", por tener una naturaleza diferente a nuestras ideas de filosofía y evadiendo la actitud de "dignificarla". Lo que no implica que no plantee reflexiones esenciales como la idea de unidad, existencia, divinidad, humanidad –condición de ser humano-, lenguaje, equilibrio, ritmo, "religión", orden, "naturaleza" o "energía", entre muchas más. En estas coordenadas es a donde debemos dirigir nuestra atención. Quizá los filósofos griegos tuvieron más acercamiento con esta manera de pensar de lo que estamos dispuestos a aceptar. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 236 - Apéndice: lenguas habladas por los persas Para mayor información al respecto cf. Adrados, Bernabé, Mendoza (1995: pp. 108-110) BIBLIOGRAFÍA ADRADOS, Francisco; BERNABÉ, Alberto; MENDOZA, Julia. Manual de lingüística indoeuropea, Tomo I. 1 ed. Madrid: Ediciones Clásicas, 1995, 402 pp. ALTÄGYPTISCHE DICHTUNG. Traducción de Erik Hornung. 1 ed. Stuttgart, Reclam, 2006, 189 pp. ALTÄGYPTISCHE ZAUBERSPRÜCHE. Traducción de Hans Fischer Elfert. 1 ed. Stuttgart, Reclam Verlag, 2005, 187 pp. ÁLVAREZ-PEDROSA NÚÑEZ, Juan Antonio. "Muerte, tránsito del alma y juicio particular en el zoroastrismo en comparación con textos órficos." En Avéstico, cuyo vestigio lingüístico más característico es el Avesta, escrito en alfabeto pehlevi. El texto presenta dos grandes variantes en su composición. 17 Gāthās o cánticos, adjudicados por la tradición a Zoroastro, plagados de arcaísmos y datados alrededor del siglo VIII a.C. Compuestos por estrofas análogas a las hechas en véd –dialecto indio-. El resto del Avesta está escrito en av, un dialecto más reciente, se distinguía por ser docto y menos arcaizante. Se presume que estos pasajes se escribieron primero en alfabeto arameo para luego pasarse al pehlevi, la transcripción ha traído consigo confuisiones e imprecisiones en la comprensión de los textos. Persa antiguo, inscripciones de la época imperial (Dario I y Jerjes ss. VI-V a.C.). La lengua cayó en desuso al declinar el poder de los aqueménidas. Medo y escita, no se han conservado textos escritos en estas lenguas, se sabe de ellas por referencias de autores griegos. Lenguas del Irán antiguo Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 237 - BERNABÉ, Alberto; CASADESÚS, Francesc (coordinadores). Orfeo y la tradición órfica: II Un reencuentro. Madrid. Akal, 2008, pp. 991-1013. THE EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD. Edición interlineal egipcio-inglés, traducción de Wallis Budge. 3 ed. Nueva York, 2006, 377 pp. THE ANCIENT EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD. Traducción de Raymond O. Faulkner. 1 ed. Nueva York, 2005, 223 pp. THE ANCIENT EGYPTIAN PYRAMID TEXTS. Traducción de James P. Allen. 2 ed.. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2015, 381 pp. ANTIKE ZAUBERSPRÜCHE. Traducción de Alf Önnerfors. 1 ed. Stuttgart: Reclam Verlag, 1991, 72 pp. APULEYO. Apología o discurso sobre la magia en defensa propia. Edición bilingüe latín-castellano, traducción de Roberto Heredia Correa. 1 ed. México: UNAM, 2003, 135 pp. ARISTÓTELES. Fragmentos. Traducción de Álvaro Vallejo Campos. 1 ed. Madrid: Gredos, 2005, 499 pp. ASANTE, Kete Asante. The Egyptian Philosophers: Ancient African voices from Imhotep to Akhenaten.1 ed. Chicago: African-American Images, 2000, 126 pp. BETRÒ, Carmela. Heilige Zeichen. Traducción de Christiane von Bechtolsheim. Köln: Marixverlag, 2004, 251 pp. BREMMER Jan. "The birth of the term Magic ". Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik. Bonn, Rudolf Habelt GmbH, Band 126, 1999, pp. 1-12. BUDGE, Wallis. Egyotian Magic. 1 ed. Londres: Arkana, 1988, 234 pp. BURKERT, Walter: De Homero a los magos: La tradición oriental en la cultura griega. Traducción de Xavier Riu. 1 ed. Barcelona: El Acantilado, 2002, 172 pp. CALVO MARTÍNEZ, José Luis. "¿Magos griegos o persas? Los usos más antiguos del término magos: Heráclito, Sófocles, Eurípides y el Papiro Derveni". MHNH, Revista Internacional sobre Magia y Astrología Antiguas. Malaga: Editorial Canales Siete, Vol. 7, 2007, pp. 301-314. CONFUCIO: Analectas. Traducción de Alonso Colodrón. Madrid: EDAF, 1998. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 238 - CHEN Yong, ¿Es el confucianismo una religión?: La controversia sobre la religiosidad confuciana, su significado y trascendencia. México: El Colegio de México, 2012. THE EDWIN SMITH SURGICAL PAPYRUS: TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY, VOL. 1. Traductor James Henry Breasted. 1 ed. Chicago: The University of Chicago Oriental Institute Publications, 1930, 596 pp. THE EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD: (PAPYRUS OF ANI). Traducción y transliteración de Wallis Budge. Edición bilingüe egipcio jeroglífico-inglés. Nueva York: Dover Books, 377 pp. FELDMAN, Louis. "Homer and the Near East: The Rise of the Greek Genius". The Biblical Archeologist, Vol. 59, No. 1 (Mar. 1996). The Oriental Schools of Oriental Research, 1996, pp. 13-21. FILÓN. Todo hombre bueno es libre. Traducción de Francisco de P. Samaranch. 2 ed. Buenos Aires: Aguilar, 1977, 86 pp. FISCHER-ELFERT, Hans. "Two Oracle Petitions adressed to Horus-Khau with some notes on the oracular amuletic drecrees". The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 82. Egyptian Exploration Society, 1996. Pp. 129-144. GARCÍA NOVO, Elsa. "Las dos caras del protagonist en Los Persas de Esquilo". Cuadernos de Filología Clásica, Estudios Griegos e Indeuropeos, No. 15, 2005. UCM, pp. 49-62. DIE GOLDENEN WEISHEITEN VON ZARATHUSTRA. Traducción y compilación de Aria Homayoun. Edición bilingüe farsí-alemán. Berlín: Gardoon Verlag, 2012, 156 pp. HERÓDOTO, Historia: Libros I y II. Traducción de Carlos Schrader. Madrid. Gredos, 2000. HERÓDOTO, Historia: Libros III y IV. Traducción de Carlos Schrader. Madrid. Gredos, 2000. HORNUNG, Erik. Introducción a la egiptología: Estado, métodos, tareas. 1 ed. Traducción de Francesc Ballesteros. Madrid, Trotta, 169 pp. IBN JALDÚN, Introducción a la historia universal. Traducción de Elías Trabulse. México. FCE, 2011.1164 pp. JACOBY, Felix. Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker: Continued. Part four, Biography and Antiquarian Literature. Edición de Guido Schepens. Leiden: Brill, 1998, 392 pp. Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 239 - JAMES, George, Stolen legacy. Estados Unidos. African American Images, 2001. 191 pp. JOHNSON Sarah; GAGER John; HIMMELFARB Martha; MEYER Martin; SCHMIDT Brian; FRANKFURTER David; Graf Fritz. "Magic in the Ancient World". Numen. Leiden. Vol. 46, No. 3, 1999, pp. 291-325. KINGSLEY, Peter: Filosofía Antigua, misterios y magia: Empédocles y la tradición pitagórica. Traducción de Alejandro Coroleu. 1 ed. Girona: Atalanta, 2008. 564 pp. LÜTH Paul. Die japanische Philosophie. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1944. LIBRO DE LOS MUERTOS. Traducción de Federico Lara Peinado. 2 ed. Madrid: Tecnos, 1993. 401pp. EL LIBRO DE LOS MUERTOS DE LOS ANTIGUOS EGIPCIOS. 1 ed. Traducción de Paul Braguet. Traducción al castellano de Ramón Alfonso Díez Aragón y Ma. Del Carmen Blanco Moreno. Bilbao. Desclee, 2000, 308 pp. MARTÍN HERNÁNDEZ, Raquel. "Literatura mágica y pseudocientífica atribuida a Orfeo". En BERNABÉ, Alberto; CASADESÚS, Francesc (coordinadores). Orfeo y la tradición órfica: I Un reencuentro. Madrid. Akal, 2008, pp. 437-458. -----------------------------------------. "Ritual órfico y acciones mágicas". En BERNABÉ, Alberto; CASADESÚS, Francesc (coordinadores). Orfeo y la tradición órfica: I Un reencuentro. Madrid. Akal, 2008, pp. 801-814. MOMIGLIANO, Arnaldo. La sabiduría bárbara: los límites de la helenización. Traducción de Gabriela Ordiales. 2 ed. México, FCE, 1999, 280 pp. MUÑOZ DELGADO, Luis. Léxico de magia y religión en los papiros mágicos griegos. 1 ed. Madrid: CSIC, 2001, 183 pp. ONFRAY Michel. Las sabidurías de la antigüedad: Contrahistoria de la filosofía, I. Traducción de Marco Aurelio Galmarini. 1 ed. Barcelona: Anagrama., 2013, 330 pp. ORÁCULOS CALDEOS/ NUMENIO DE APAMEA: FRAGMENTOS Y TESTIMONIOS. Traducción de Francisco García Bazán. 1 ed. Madrid: Gredos, 1991. 312 pp. SUDA ON LINE: http://www.stoa.org/sol-bin/search.pl Revista Heródoto, Unifesp, Guarulhos, v. 2, n. 1, Maio, 2017. p. 212-240 240 - RITNER K. Robert. "Magic". The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. New York, 2001. Pp. 321-336. SPENCE, Lewis: Ancient Egypt: Myhts and legends. 1 ed. Nueva York: Dover, 1990, 369 pp. Wieleitner Heinrich: "War die Wissenschaft der alten Ägypter wirklich nur praktisch?" Isis, The University of Chicago Press. No. 1, Vol 9, pp. 11-28.

Maria Teresa Pringle1 Elementos de una filosofí a realistapersonalista: Me todo fenomenolo gico con seguimiento iterativo triple Abstracto: Notas introductorias a la fenomenología realista de la persona, fundada en el seguimiento del saber del corazón y de la voluntad además del intelecto. Se presenta un método iterativo triple de seguimiento filosófico que corresponde con las facultades humanas y la vida intencional. Sentido trascendente de la verdad, valor y virtud y visión espiritual de la persona. Escrito inspirado en la filosofía de von Hildebrand. La fenomenología realista de nuestra consideración sigue la escuela iniciada por Edmund Husserl, Franz Brentano, Adolf Reinach, Max Scheler, Alexander Pfänder, Edith Stein y especialmente Dietrich von Hildebrand. No se trata única o principalmente de entender las contribuciones e ideas de otros filósofos, con métodos de la historia de la filosofía, incluso con los métodos y nuevas hermenéuticas de la filosofía fenomenológica realista sino de filosofar sobre las cosas mismas. El método fenomenológico realista que consiste en una pluralidad de tres tipos generales de método, que se funda en un acordar con los autores invitados.2 El seguimiento del método enfatiza especialmente la estructura vincular iterativa en la naturaleza intencional de las experiencias humanas. De modo que se reitera y actualiza la experiencia de la realidad para llegar a las cosas en sí mismas. Lo que se busca es la intuición de las esencias necesarias, profundizando en la estructura intencional de 1 Este escrito es parte de las investigaciones tentativas del interés de la autora 2012-2014. Se presenta versión preliminar abierta a consideración académica. MARIA T. PRINGLE, es candidata Doctoral en la International Academy of Philosophy en España Instituto de Filosofía Edith Stein. Recibió su masters de filosofía cum Laude en Holy Apostles College & Seminary, Connecticut, USA donde participa de mentora académica y en el programa MOOC de cursos de postgrado. 2 Expuestos en forma sencilla en Josef Seifert: Discurso sobre los métodos. Filosofía y fenomenología realista, (Madrid: Encuentro, 2008); Back to Things in Themselves A Phenomenological Foundation for Classical Realism (London: Routledge, 1987). 2 las respuestas afectivas espirituales para reconocer los valores en sí mismos,3 avanzando el entendimiento en virtud de lo que Pascal y Scheler llamaron "lógica del corazón" como contribución al conocimiento objetivo del intelecto. Remitiéndonos a Edith Stein,4 nuestro estudio no se trata de una recolección histórica por cuanto nuestro rol no es el de criticar selectivamente en una capacidad que carecemos para abarcar todo lo que se ha dicho sobre el tema. Tampoco nos aferramos a una doctrina especifica por cuando nuestro interés es acercarnos a la "cosa misma" evitando sistematizaciones apresuradas y poseyendo la libertad de establecer distintas posiciones a las presentadas por nuestros pensadores. El método fenomenológico implica la atención a las cosas mismas como base sobre la cual desarrollar nuestro pensamiento sistemáticamente, en un descubrir de lo esencial, asimilando lo que nos ofrece la intuición inmediata. Si bien, en modo original, al tratarse de la experiencia intuitiva de la persona, esta misma nos sirve de marco fundamental del estudio. Dicha metodología contrasta con el idealismo trascendental, el positivismo y la filosofía analítica, sobre todo con todas las formas del constructivismo. Aunque teniendo varios elementos en común con el método escolástico que, con su "dicitur," "contra dicitur," y "respondeo dicendum" también busca una intuición, elaboración, y argumentación en el servicio de entender las esencias inteligibles de las cosas, difiere de este método sobre todo por la intención fenomenológica estricta y rigurosa de abstenerse de cualquier sistematización prematura y construcciones o deducciones abstractas que obscurecen. Por lo tanto, el estudio fenomenológico no se basa en conclusiones puramente deductivas y abstractas, sino que busca llegar a un conocimiento cierto de la cosa misma. Aunque, siendo que un conocimiento implica cierta postura del entendimiento, la metodología se complementa con elementos de reflexión para comunicar la experiencia, sin una limitación terminológica especifica. Este principio comunicativo se aplica en el estudio de las obras de referencia; como Seifert lo expone en "Texts and Things", es importante escapar al inmanentismo en el uso de textos, porque no se trata de leer en el mismo escrito sino que se da un movimiento trascendente, un escape al logos, a la realidad vital que se esconde tras lo impreso. Con la fenomenología participamos en lo posible de la existencia de lo que trata 3 Expuesto por von Hildebrand, en Ética. Moralidad y conocimiento ético de los valores. 4 Expuesta con palabras similares en: Stein, Edith. La Estructura de la Persona Humana. (Der Afbau Der Menschlichen Person.)Trad. Jose Mardomingo. Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos: Madrid, 1998. 3 para captar su esencia. Sin olvidar, que esto implica el reconocimiento de la intuición del autor mentado y la dimensión moral de la personas con la que nos relacionamos en el vivir del espíritu. Metodología elemental en seguimiento de paso, vuelta e iteración Inspirada en las introducciones al método fenomenológico de Adolf Reinach, Jan Patočka, y de Dietrich von Hildebrand5 el seguimiento realista que presentamos pretende asegurar una filosofía auténtica mediante un seguimiento fenomenológico consistente en tres pasos graduales y un cuarto paso fundamental que vuelve a los anteriores. En modo gradual y sistemático dichos pasos buscan llegar a la verdad que es la cosa misma. Cada paso presupone a los anteriores. En el primer paso, se observa la aparición del objeto en su darse de la experiencia. Este paso delimita el contexto de la investigación. Para esto, además de consultar espiritualmente con nuestra propia experiencia, contamos con la experiencia de otras personas como se manifiesta en obras de literatura etc., y textos filosóficos, usados principalmente en nuestro propio esfuerzo de filosofar con los autores, señalando descripciones, y ejemplos relevantes. Donde la descripción ofrecida por las distintas citaciones sirve para identificar características objetivas del tema. Las características son aquellos elementos y componentes que se muestran unidos de modo integral y necesario. De este modo, distinguimos la esfera de la experiencia del darse del fenómeno. En el segundo paso, analizamos los modos eventuales o temporales y características inteligibles de lo dado, considerando la forma sintética, necesaria, que presenta nuestro objeto los modos. Donde, identificando los términos utilizados y los razonamientos dados, tratamos de captar los vínculos internos del estado de hechos, aquello que explique la unidad inteligible de lo que trata. En el tercer paso, el seguimiento compara las diferencias para distinguir el hilo que las une, el carácter propio y significancia esencial del hecho dado en la realidad de la experiencia. Se pretende establecer un criterio para reconocer lo que es el modo originario y principal de darse. Aquí se comparan los sentidos de la intencionalidad descubiertos. El cuarto paso 5 Como se expone en: Patočka, Jan. Introducción a la Fenomenología. Ed. Herder: Barcelona, 2005. Así como en: Reinach, Adolf. Introducción a la fenomenología. Trad. Rogelio Rovira. Ed. Encuentro: Madrid, 1986. Hildebrand, Dietrich von, Cap. VII, El Caballo de Troya, y What is philosophy?. 4 persigue verificar el valor esencial de lo dado y aclarar con certitud el concepto intuido. En la verificación del hecho, distinguimos el hecho existencial por cuanto se da una integridad concreta de carácter propio y de actividad original. Asimismo, este seguimiento permite distinguir el carácter inteligible por cuanto contamos con la unidad esencial y el concepto claro de su valor. Entonces, en la correspondencia entre la cosa y su valor realizamos la verdad esencial del conocimiento dado, del bien presentado al entendimiento. Esta metodología nos permite un conocimiento cierto ya que se distinguen y se verifican los aspectos necesarios e inteligibles que no pueden darse de otro modo. Es decir, que a diferencia de constructivismo abstracto lo que pretendemos con la fenomenología realista es un seguimiento a través de la experiencia que llega a la "cosa misma." Por lo tanto, se da la certeza del conocimiento. 6 En la fenomenología vemos que el conocimiento se nos da en la actualización de la experiencia esencial del fenómeno, el recibir intencional del valor donado cuyo don transformativo enriquece la realidad del vivir espiritual. La esencia del fenómeno se caracteriza como un conocimiento objetivo, inteligible y necesario. Entonces, partimos del algo de que trata el fenómeno y avanzamos en los tres aspectos esenciales de la experiencia por los que el fenómeno se nos da con plenitud que despierta el entendimiento. Consciencia del vivir y del actuar y constitución modal de la vida intencional Cuando hablamos del corazón y de la voluntad así como del entendimiento, nos referimos a distintas facultades espirituales con las que la persona responde a la realidad. La experiencia distingue modos en que la persona está despierta y responde hacia sí misma y el mundo que la rodea, permaneciendo en todos esos actos la misma idéntica persona, el mismo sujeto personal espiritual. En la persona humana, lo espiritual se muestra en la actividad intencional trascendente, y persistencia del yo. Es un mismo yo el que ama, el que piensa y el que decide. Además, todas las experiencias y respuestas psíquicas de la persona, al tratarse de una misma persona, forman parte de una unidad que denominamos la vida consciente de una persona individual. A través de la historia la filosofía intenta explicar la vida consciente del hombre. 6 Punto de insistencia de von Hildebrand para llegar al conocimiento, en cuanto al seguimiento y la distinción de las esencias irreducibles que no pueden ser de otro modo, como se explica en: Hildebrand, Dietrich von, What is philosophy? Franciscan Herald Press: Chicago 1973. 5 El avance de la psicología moderna distingue tres actos diferentes dentro de la actividad consciente intencional: el de la inteligencia, la voluntad y la afectividad.7 Cada una de las respuestas tiene un carácter irreducible que confirma su diferencia. Para empezar, distinguimos que las respuestas conscientes implican distintos momentos relacionados intrínsecamente. Hay momentos en que gozamos de un espectáculo, momentos en que nos enfrascamos en una idea y momentos en que realizamos actividades. Es más, se da un discurrir que revela distintos estratos de realidad. En un momento, se da la apertura a la realidad con el conocimiento objetivo y la respuesta afectiva del corazón. El corazón responde a la realidad con sentimientos de agrado o desagrado y muchos otros sentimientos ante distintos objetos. En otro momento, se da el acto del intelecto y después la respuesta cognitiva de la inteligencia. La inteligencia recibe cognitivamente un ser o su esencia y responde cognitivamente procurando un orden formal al objeto conocido. En otro momento, se da la dirección y respuesta volitiva de la voluntad. La voluntad decide entre los objetos presentados por el corazón y por la inteligencia para proceder a la acción. Esta dinámica continúa, en cuanto que el corazón y la voluntad a su vez responden al objeto realizado por la voluntad. Por lo tanto, la experiencia de la realidad procede en una dinámica triple que implica el sentimiento de cierto objeto, su orden racional y la interacción libre con el mismo, esto es la intención de la voluntad. Por ejemplo, ante una acción bondadosa, el intelecto distingue el objeto de la acción con certeza, mientras que el corazón se alegra apreciando y participando de su valor; a su vez, la inteligencia distingue el valor que caracteriza a la acción, y la voluntad motivada por el valor puede actuar sancionando la vivencia intencional y asumiendo su valor en la persona, para que con su actualización continua se refleje en virtud personal. Como vemos, los tres tipos de actos tienen un rol primordial en el conocimiento objetivo, el desarrollo del carácter y la autodeterminación práctica y moral de la persona. Correspondencia del método con las facultades constitutivas del entendimiento humano Consideramos que los pasos del seguimiento fenomenológico, en sus tres pasos de avance y tres perspectivas principales, nos revelan la dimensión espiritual en 7 Por ejemplo ver: Franz Brentano, Psychology from an empirical standpoint. 6 correspondencia con las tres facultades espirituales de la persona, según interpretamos a continuación. Por ejemplo, en el paso de distinción de lo dado se emplea fundamentalmente la facultad del intelecto, la que se dirige a la verdad. En el paso de profundizar en lo dado, contamos con la facultad intuitiva del corazón, la que se orienta al valor. En el paso de demarcar lo esencial, recurrimos a la facultad actualizadora y realizadora de la voluntad, cuya intención fundamental y de asentimiento a lo esencial, actualiza la verdad y el valor del bien querido, realizando la virtud del entendimiento en la persona. Así, el conocimiento esencial de lo dado se convierte en una propiedad moral transformativa de la persona. 8 Los tres términos principales para empezar todo estudio Nuestro método personalista de avance fenomenológico implica un principio, un orden a seguir y una razón -o tema principal. Como von Hildebrand lo expresa, para filosofar se empieza con una verdad conocida, un principio evidente. Quizá el punto objetivo más difícil de determinar en el comienzo de todo estudio Consideramos por nuestra parte que un principio, puede distinguirse en objetivo, condicional y necesario. Sin embargo, para que se considere como principio inicial correcto, esto significa distinguir lo que se da primero en orden de precedencia. En principio de precedencia, la necesidad obliga un inicio a partir de un dato original, de un objeto percibido, algo que distinguimos intelectualmente y – un biena lo que nos dirigirnos en busca de verdad. Así, en principio objetivo por ejemplo, no podemos negar la realidad evidente de nuestra propia persona.9 En segundo término, un principio puede referirse a algo condicional, algo que a su vez depende de un principio o principalidad diferente. En este caso, no podemos hablar del intelecto, corazón o la voluntad sin considerar que estos pertenecen constitutivamente y dependen principalmente de la persona. Asimismo, tampoco podemos hablar del intelecto, el corazón y la voluntad sin referirnos a la experiencia consciente de la persona. Lo 8 Si bien von Hildebrand reconoce la virtud como propiedad personal, no como hábito inconsciente sino como actitud del ser moral consciente (ver en Ética). De distinto modo, aquí nos inspiramos en la noción clásica Tomista de virtud en el sentido de conocimiento intelectual, virtud de ciencia y entendimiento principal. (Summa Theologiae II) El saber funcional de la persona. 9Aquí nos referimos simplemente a la realidad de lo dado en la experiencia; principio fundamental de un estudio fenomenológico. Sin embargo, al considerar a nuestra persona hablamos justamente del ser que busca recibir conocimiento y su modo de aprehenderlo. Al considerar la persona como principio y la experiencia autentica del vivir como persona, esto nos revela una realidad interior especial del vivir que corresponde a cada ser humano en su vivir entre personas. La llamada alma espiritual que por su significancia y valor superactual no se puede reducir a un tener consciencia o entendimiento. 7 condicional implica aprehender las características propias e importancia de lo dado como principio. Un principio constitutivo previo implica distinguir las partes características y su calidad principal, en orden secuencial, debido a la necesidad material y formal, esto es estructural y funcional, en la producción de lo dado. En el principio constitutivo, por necesidad nos enfrentamos con los hechos que circunscriben la realidad objetiva, el carácter particular – dependiente y relativo del hecho aprehendido en la consciencia. Lo condicional explica la perspectiva primaria y el contexto del estudio. Reconocemos el principio condicional analizando la experiencia particular.10 En tercer término, el principio necesario implica una razón lógica o temática y posible, que explique específicamente lo dado, proveyendo la inteligibilidad esencial que reconocemos como verdad. Por ejemplo, nuestro estudio fenomenológico de la persona se dirige a esclarecer la vida del corazón y la voluntad y su influencia e impacto en el entendimiento. Sabemos que se trata de la persona como ente principal, en el contexto de la experiencia consciente de la actividad afectiva y volitiva, pero el centro del estudio va más allá de los actos intencionales particulares para enfocarse en la relación de respuesta al valor y la virtud, y el rol de esta relación en la realidad moral de la persona, -esto es, la actitud de la persona en función al bien. Es decir, anticipamos que el estudio del vivir intencional del corazón y la voluntad ofrece una verdad de importancia esencial y liberador para la persona. El principio necesario, del enfoque, considera la perspectiva objetiva y el contexto de los hechos principales, pero se concentra en esclarecer la función u operación esencial y la realidad del tema, del rol o papel que algo posee en verdad. El tema central establece un principio necesario.11 El orden estructural del seguimiento fenomenológico Luego del principio, nos encontramos con el orden a seguir. Si bien el principio se dirige a un punto como objetivo específico. No podemos llegar a dicho punto sin seguir el 10 Aquí analizamos la particularidad de la experiencia. Las características de contexto implicadas que distinguen esta experiencia de otras experiencias. El avance profundo en la experiencia, que al tratar de experiencia de persona implica asimismo distinguir y determinar el criterio de valor característico y selecto que distingue la relevancia de las experiencias de otras personas dándoles importancia, relacionándose en paralelo del vivir y del entendimiento de todos los tiempos. 11 Aquí el estudio demarca los aspectos significantes para la persona. Aquello que no se limita a distinguir un mero facto sino que aprehende una realidad esencial, una verdad principal que implica fundamentalmente al entendimiento moral de la persona. Un fundamento del saber que transforma la dimensión espiritual de la persona. 8 camino de la experiencia para orientarnos y aclarar el sentido lógico y significado filosófico de los distintos términos y palabras empleadas en el estudio. Aquí nos encontramos con el problema del uso del lenguaje, a lo que respondemos con nuestra experiencia en traducción, la que indica que además de las palabras, es necesario dar importancia a la unidad de pensamiento encerrada en cada expresión, según el contexto, el que incluye las aclaraciones y referencias disponibles del mismo autor. En la aclaración de términos del estudio, el orden se refiere al análisis constitutivo, comparativo y de secuencia, profundizando en las particularidades, propiedades y cualidades. Lo que revela categorías de orden de distintos términos y con dimensiones variadas. Empezando por el orden objetivo del intelecto, en la distinción de lo objetivo, lo condicional y lo necesario. En segundo orden, aparece lo constitutivo, lo particular, y lo dependiente. Que reconoce comparativamente la estructura particular de los hechos en secuencia material y formal, esto es las propiedades, las características y las cualidades. En tercer orden, llegamos a lo necesario de todo orden, que establece lo funcional, lo operativo, y lo esencial. Las propiedades actuales del estado de hechos en la secuencia de lo potencial, lo actual, y lo principal; esto es en un reconocer integral de los bienes, la naturaleza de sus valores y la expresión eficiente de sus virtudes. Como vemos, el orden implica los términos de la estructura filosófica del estudio.12 Los modos temporales del vivir humano y trascendencia espiritual de Personas Un punto interesante de destacar en el tema de nuestra metodología de estudio fenomenológico realista personalista trata de la distinción temporal de los distintos actos y relaciones intencionales. Sin olvidar que las dimensiones temporales se pierden en el contexto mayor del entendimiento. Aquí usamos el marco de lo temporal para explicar el alcance de las dimensiones humanas de la vida y de la libertad de la persona. Por ejemplo, la relación con la verdad del bien implica que la persona se dirige intencionalmente a un dato original, objeto con actualidad ya existente, el hecho de la realidad que, facto que por así decirlo, nos llega del pasado. Donde la relación objetiva del intelecto, se funda en la realidad natural que liga a la persona con su pasado histórico, la actualidad temporal a la que la persona pertenece concretamente, como ser humano físico. Por otro lado, la relación con 12 Nos enfrentamos con el problema principal de la verdad y la persona, de lo conceptual abstracto y lo actual espiritual. La diferencia entre el criterio del saber y la virtud del entendimiento. Recurriendo a Sócrates, en su origen filosófico, con Platón apuntamos al principio del Bien que marca lo real de la filosofía y de la persona. 9 el valor del bien implica la participación afectiva de la persona en el hecho intencional, enlazando la realidad significante del momento, el presente actual que transforma cualitativamente la consciencia interior. Donde la relación intuitiva del corazón, se funda en la realidad profunda del alma que liga a la persona con su presente psíquico, la actualidad particular que pertenece a la realidad del vivir espiritual de la persona. Tercero, encontramos la relación con la virtud del bien, la que implica la actitud voluntaria de la persona, cuya agencia actual está dirigida trascendentalmente al bien, en su actuar intencional de realidad futura. Donde la relación moral de la voluntad, se funda en la realidad principal del alma espiritual de la persona, la que liga la actualidad futura de la persona con la realidad eterna de Dios,13 la actualidad perfecta en comunión con el Bien, que corresponde específicamente a la persona en realidad espiritual de persona viviente. Entonces, dentro de los modos de relacionarnos que nos corresponden en el vivir humano, consideramos al intelecto en relación con el pasado, el corazón en relación con el presente y la voluntad en relación con el futuro.14 La visión espiritual de la verdad, el valor y la virtud Por consiguiente, los elementos fundamentales de la metodología expuesta son tres, los que, a su vez, implican tres actos distintos, establecen tres relaciones, y determinan tres características esenciales de provecho filosófico para la persona. Consideramos por nuestra parte, que a partir del dato original, el acto del intelecto establece la relación objetiva, el modo de conocer el bien, y la realidad inteligible de la persona, distinguiendo la esfera de la verdad. Por su lado, el acto el corazón establece la relación afectiva, el modo de participar del bien, y la realidad interior de la persona, comprendiendo la esfera del valor. Asimismo, el acto de la voluntad establece la relación funcional, el modo de actualizar los valores del bien en el vivir trascendente de la persona, realizando la esfera de la virtud como atributo moral de la persona. 13 Lo que justifica la "religio" el afán existencial inherente en el ser humano hacia la vida trascendente. Aquel querer reconectarse con la realidad misma del amor y del entendimiento, los que se revelan misteriosamente -en los valores donados por lo sagradocon plenitud, identidad y realidad de personas ofreciendo liberación eterna. Puntos de estudio fundamentales considerados por la fenomenología de la religión. 14 Si bien trataremos de lo temporal merece separadamente puesto que las distinciones temporales son dimensionales limitantes de lo que llamamos espacio eterno. Consideración nuestra, que distingue la actualidad correspondiente a las facultades espirituales de la persona. La interpretación de lo actual en la experiencia consciente que adelantamos como perspectiva importante de nuestra tesis, la. Especialmente, este punto tiene que ver con la distinción de von Hildebrand de la voluntad dirigida a algo no real pero realizable por mí. 10 La libertad espiritual de la persona por el amor con von Hildebrand Un presupuesto fundamental de nuestra visión fenomenológica afirma la espiritualidad de la vida afectiva del hombre; punto que von Hildebrand procede en desarrollar con objetividad, mediante la distinción fenomenológica de las marcas de lo espiritual: trascendencia, inteligibilidad y el sentido intencional de la persona. Aquello que distingue la libertad del ser humano escapando del determinismo causal de lo meramente material. Asimismo, el contexto de nuestros estudios interpreta al hombre como persona espiritual y reconoce la individualidad que explica al hombre, el logos esencial.15 Alice von Hildebrand nos dice: "el hombre es una persona" el mismo centro de la filosofía de von Hildebrand se contiene en estas pocas palabras. Las características básicas de la persona humana son justamente: su intelecto, su libre voluntad y su capacidad de amar.16 El amor juega un rol definitivo en la persona, la falta del amor es un endurecimiento del corazón resultado del orgullo que en última instancia no es otra cosa que el rechazo a trascender. Nos encontramos con una visión metafísica del hombre quien posee un objetivo trascendente. En esta visión se da una convicción de la bondad original de la naturaleza humana y la libertad del hombre implica su entrega espiritual en colaboración con la verdad, valor y virtud que atraen al espíritu humano con su llamado a la bondad y el bien.17 MARIA T PRINGLE, es candidata Doctoral en la International Academy of Philosophy en España Instituto de Filosofía Edith Stein. Recibió su masters de filosofía cum Laude en Holy Apostles College & Seminary, Connecticut, USA donde participa de mentora académica y en el programa MOOC de cursos de postgrado. 15 Stein, Edith, La Estructura de la Persona Humana, 38-40. 16 Jourdain, Alice, "Von Hildebrand and Marcel: A Parallel" en The Human Person and the World of Values, 28-29. 17 Se ve al ser humano a imagen y semejanza divina con una libertad que no se puede conocer y alcanzar plenamente, sin un amor profundo y comprometido que responde moralmente a la dignidad de la verdad, valor y virtud propios de un Dios con identidad intrínseca de Personas increadas, quien se dona libremente en amor al ser creado. Observamos que esta visión del hombre es patente en la obra de von Hildebrand, como lo demuestra en su obra Nuestra transformación en Cristo. El hombre como imago Dei implica la relación del hombre con Dios, por lo tanto, el estudio filosófico, no limita el estudio al ser creado del hombre, sino que se contempla también el ser increado de Dios. Sin entrar de lleno en el campo de la teología, tampoco se renuncia a la verdad revelada que constituye una fuente real de conocimiento del hombre como persona, por cuanto el hombre en su corazón y voluntad apunta fundamentalmente a Dios.

Veritas Revista de Filosofia da PUCRS ISSN 0042-3955 e-ISSN 1984-6746 Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 EpistEmologia ContEmporânEa Em DEbatE http://dx.doi.org/10.15448/1984-6746.2015.3.24284 Este artigo está licenciado sob forma de uma licença Creative Commons Atribuição 4.0 Internacional, que permite uso irrestrito, distribuição e reprodução em qualquer meio, desde que a publicação original seja corretamente citada. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.pt_BR Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada: Fortalecendo a visão de Foley True Belief plus Adequate Information: Strengthening Foley's View *Tiegue Vieira Rodrigues Resumo: No livro When is Knowledge True Belief? (2012), Richard Foley apresenta uma teoria do conhecimento bastante simples e original, que pretende desbancar as rivais e reorientar a teoria do conhecimento: um sujeito S sabe alguma proposição p se e somente se S verdadeiramente crê que p e não lhe falta nenhuma informação importante. Michael Hannon, em seu artigo "Is Knowledge True Belief Plus Adequate Information?" (2013), faz uma objeção à visão de Foley, acusando-o de oferecer um argumento circular que, ao não diferenciar informação importante de informação não importante, acaba, em última instância, por fazer referência à própria noção de conhecimento. Acredito que a teoria apresentada por Foley está no caminho certo; porém, apresentase de forma incompleta. Neste artigo, apresento uma interpretação subjetivista de relevância epistêmica, proposta originalmente por Floridi, que complementa a visão proposta por Foley e rechaça as objeções levantadas por Hannon. Palavras-chave: Conhecimento. Informação. Relevância. Abstract: In When is Knowledge True Belief? (2012), Richard Foley offers an original and extraordinarily simple theory of knowledge which intends to overcome its rivals and reorient the theory of knowledge: a subject S knows some proposition p if and only if S truly believes that p and does not lack any important information. Michael Hannon, in his article "Is True Belief Knowledge Plus Adequate Information?" (2013), puts forward an objection to Foley's view which charges him of offering a circular argument that fails to distinguish important information from unimportant information without ultimately making reference to knowledge. I believe the theory presented by Foley is on the right * Doutor em Filosofia pela Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul; Professor de Filosofia na Universidade Federal do Mato Grosso. <[email protected]>. track; however, it is incomplete. In this article I present a subjective interpretation of epistemic relevance, originally proposed by Floridi, which is capable of complementing the view proposed by Foley and to reject the objection presented by Hannon. Keywords: Knowledge. Information. Relevance. O que é o conhecimento? Ou melhor, qual a natureza do conhecimento? Tradicionalmente, a epistemologia analítica tem se debruçado sobre esta questão de forma incansável, na tentativa de fornecer condições individualmente necessárias e conjuntamente suficientes para o conhecimento. Embora haja muita controvérsia sobre quais as condições que satisfazem tal noção de conhecimento, duas condições são virtualmente incontestáveis, a saber, a condição da verdade e a condição da crença. Primeiramente, S sabe que p somente se p for verdadeira (a condição da verdade). A necessidade desta condição pode facilmente ser reconhecida, ao percebermos casos de crença falsa. Nenhum deles, sejam quais forem os detalhes que possam ser exibidos, qualificam-se enquanto casos de conhecimento. Segundo, S sabe que p somente se S tem a crença de que p (a condição da crença)1. É difícil perceber como seria possível atribuir conhecimento a um sujeito sobre uma determinada proposição quando esse sujeito sequer crê nessa proposição2. Infelizmente, essas duas condições não são conjuntamente suficientes para o conhecimento. Considere o seguinte contraexemplo. Carla está em uma viagem de férias e crê que a sua casa foi assaltada. Imagine que a crença de que a sua casa foi assaltada é fruto de paranoia provocada por antidepressivos que Carla necessita ingerir. Imagine ainda que, de fato, um ladrão invadiu a sua casa e roubou o seu computador – ou seja, a crença de Carla é verdadeira –, mas a sua mãe resolveu não contar-lhe o ocorrido para não estragar a sua viagem. Claramente, como podemos observar neste exemplo, Clara não tem conhecimento de que a sua casa foi assaltada, embora ela tenha uma crença verdadeira. O motivo de considerarmos que Carla não sabe que a sua casa foi assaltada é que a sua crença verdadeira parece ser uma questão de mera coincidência 1 Saber que p sem crer que p é uma tese que recebeu pouca atenção; cf. RADFORD, Colin, Knowledge – By Examples, in: Analysis, 27 (1966), p. 1-11. Por isso mesmo, podemos dizer, seguramente, que a condição da crença é amplamente aceita. 2 Cf. LEHRER, Keith, Theory of Knowledge, Boulder, CO: Westview, 1990, sugere que o conhecimento não requer crença, mas apenas aceitação. Nesse caso, a sua proposta pode ser vista mais como uma modificação da condição da crença do que propriamente uma rejeição. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 549 ou, como os epistemólogos costumam chamar, sorte epistêmica. A comunidade epistemológica amplamente concorda que casos de sorte acidental como o de Carla são incompatíveis com uma noção adequada de conhecimento3. Assim, para garantir que a crença verdadeira de S em p não seja acidentalmente verdadeira, uma terceira condição faz-se necessária. Mas, o que pode tornar uma crença verdadeira de modo não acidental? Não há uma resposta unânime para esta questão e não há como respondê-la sem que entremos em terreno pantanoso. Conforme o que conhecemos por Análise Tradicional do Conhecimento (ATC), aquilo que torna uma crença verdadeira não acidental um caso de conhecimento é o fato de S estar justificado em crer que p, o que requer que S esteja de posse de boas razões para crer que p4. Ao combinar esta condição da justificação com as duas condições vistas anteriormente, chegamos à tradicional definição tripartite do conhecimento (DTC): S Sabe que p se e somente se: (i) p é verdadeira, (ii) S crê que p e (iii) S está justificado em crer que p. Infelizmente, as condições (i)-(iii) não são suficientes para garantir o conhecimento. Não trataremos especificamente sobre os problemas de DTC5. Contudo, cabe mencionar algumas alternativas não tradicionais que pretendem capturar a ideia de não acidentalidade e fornecer uma definição adequada para o conhecimento. Alguns epistemólogos alegam que, para uma crença verdadeira tornar-se um caso de conhecimento, ela deveria ser produto de um processo cognitivo confiável. Outros afirmam que uma crença verdadeira só representa um caso de conhecimento quando ela é dita segura, ou seja, quando a crença de um sujeito não poderia facilmente ter sido falsa. Outros, ainda, pensam que uma crença verdadeira é um caso de conhecimento quando ela pode ser creditada às habilidades cognitivas ou virtudes intelectuais de um sujeito. Esses são apenas alguns exemplos de tentativas de fornecer uma definição adequada para o conhecimento, e está-se longe de possuir uma lista exaustiva. Independentemente da visão tradicional ou das abordagens não tradicionais para o conhecimento, podemos perceber algo que é comum a todas elas, a saber, todas compreendem que, embora seja algo distinto, o conhecimento é algo diretamente relacionado à crença verdadeira. Assim, o ponto de partida de qualquer tentativa de construir uma nova teoria ou 3 Cf. PRITCHARD, D., Epistemic Luck, New York: Oxford University Press, 2014, para uma discussão detalhada sobre sorte epistêmica. 4 Alguns filósofos estariam dispostos a negar isso. Para eles, crenças fundacionais são justificadas apesar de não haver nenhuma outra razão que dê suporte a elas. 5 Para isso, cf. GETTIER, Edmund, Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?, in: Analysis, 23 (1963), p. 121-123. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 550 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 definição de conhecimento deve ser responder à seguinte questão: O que deve ser adicionado à crença verdadeira para obtermos conhecimento? No seu livro When is True Belief Knowledge?6, Richard Foley rejeita todas as definições contemporâneas sobre o conhecimento em favor de uma nova abordagem epistêmica que, conforme as suas próprias palavras, "tem a capacidade de reorientar a teoria do conhecimento"7. Neste ensaio, pretendemos analisar a visão apresentada por Foley, bem como algumas críticas a ela apresentadas, para, finalmente, oferecermos uma maneira de torná-la mais forte e imune a tais criticas. Na primeira parte, será apresentada a teoria como proposta por Foley. Em seguida, na segunda parte, apresentaremos uma crítica à visão de Foley, segundo a qual há uma inescapável circularidade viciosa em seu pensamento, uma vez que ele não consegue explicar a diferença entre uma informação importante e uma informação não importante. Na terceira parte, apresento uma interpretação subjetivista de relevância epistêmica, apresentada originalmente por Floridi8, que melhora a visão proposta por Foley, além de rebater as objeções levantadas contra ela. 1 A visão de Foley No livro When is True Belief Knowledge (2012), Richard Foley oferece uma teoria do conhecimento bastante original e extremamente simples, baseada em uma noção de informação, que pode ser especificada do seguinte modo: A Visão de Foley (VF): • Um sujeito S sabe uma proposição p se e somente se: (i) p é ver- dadeira, (ii) S crê que p, e (iii) S tem informação adequada sobre p. Antes de prosseguirmos, algumas clarificações são importantes. Primeiramente, devemos entender a noção de informação em termos de crença verdadeira, como sugerido por Foley: "ter informação é uma questão de ter crenças verdadeiras"9. Segundo, a noção de adequação não 6 Cf. FOLEY, Richard, When is True Belief Knowledge?, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2012. 7 Id. ibid., p. 3. Não discutirei, aqui, sobre as características que tornam a tese de Foley superior às teses rivais. O meu interesse é apenas apresentar um melhoramento da proposta de Foley no tocante à distinção entre informação importante e não importante. 8 Cf. FLORIDI, L., Understanding Epistemic Relevance, in: Erkenntnis, 69 (2008), p. 69-92. 9 Cf. FOLEY, Richard, op. cit., p. 3. A definição de informação que está por de trás do pensamento oferecido por Foley é uma definição que já pode ser encontrada in: DRETSKE, Fred, Knowledge and the Flow of Information, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1981, e in: FLORIDI, L., Information, in: FLORIDI, L. (Ed.), The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of Computing and Information, Oxford: Blackwell, 2004, p. 40-61. Para esses autores, informação é definida como dados semânticos, bem formados, com significado e verdadeiros. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 551 deve ser entendida em termos de quantidade, pois mesmo uma pequena quantidade de informação sobre p pode ser suficiente para que se saiba que p. O que é importante, nesse sentido, é a qualidade da informação10. Terceiro, a "informação adequada", presente em (VF), é definida, por Foley, de modo negativo, em termos da informação que falta ao sujeito, isto é, que ele não possui. De acordo com a proposta de Foley, sempre que um sujeito estiver de posse de uma crença verdadeira, mas que não se configura enquanto um caso de conhecimento, haverá uma informação importante que lhe falta e que explica a sua ausência de conhecimento. Considere de novo o exemplo visto anteriormente, em que Carla crê verdadeiramente que o seu apartamento foi assaltado. Nesse caso, parece ficar claro que há uma informação que ela não possui, a saber, que um ladrão invadiu a sua casa e roubou o seu computador. Portanto, segundo Foley, para um sujeito saber que p, não poderia haver nenhuma falha importante com relação às suas informações. Foley reconhece que existem inúmeras verdades que podem ser associadas com qualquer situação em particular, portanto, mesmo o sujeito mais bem informado poderia não estar de posse de todas as verdades sobre uma determinada situação. Nesse sentido, para uma crença verdadeira ser qualificada como um caso de conhecimento dependerá da importância da informação que o sujeito não possui. Tanto o caso de Carla quanto qualquer outro caso normal em que um sujeito tenha uma crença verdadeira de que p e não sabe que p, encontraremos a importante informação faltante. O que é uma informação importante? Foley não oferece uma definição precisa, ele apenas diz que não há uma característica comum às informações importantes. Tampouco essa parece ser uma questão que o preocupe, uma vez que ele considera que identificar informações importantes é uma tarefa simples. De qualquer modo, como sugerido pelo caso de Carla e como o último ponto sugere, há um modo fácil que pode ser aplicado para testar a tese de Foley: Teste de Foley (TF): • Se um sujeito S tem uma crença verdadeira sobre uma proposição p e não sabe que p, então deve ser possível identificar uma proposição q de modo que q é uma informação importante e S não crê que q. A fim de tornar a argumentação mais persuasiva e ilustrar o funcionamento desse teste, Foley sugere o seguinte caso: 10 Dizer que algo é informação já é, dada a sua definição, qualificá-la positivamente como algo que pode produzir conhecimento. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 552 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 Antes de sair do seu escritório, Joan sempre coloca o seu laptop no canto da sua mesa. Sem que ela tenha notícia, o laptop acaba de ser roubado e encontra-se no canto da mesa na casa do ladrão. Joan crê que o seu laptop está no canto de uma mesa e, de fato, ele está, mas ela não sabe disso11. Aplicando o Teste de Foley ao exemplo recém mencionado, temos a seguinte análise. Parece, claramente, que Joan possui uma crença verdadeira, mas que não é um caso de conhecimento. Isso por que, de fato, parece faltar-lhe uma importante informação sobre a sua situação epistêmica. Em particular, ela não está ciente de que o seu laptop foi roubado e que a mesa na qual ele se encontra agora é a mesa do ladrão. Dessa maneira, a sua crença verdadeira é apenas um golpe de sorte e não pode ser considerada um caso de conhecimento. Porém, se a importante informação fosse adicionada ao sistema de crenças de Joan (se ela tivesse a crença de que o seu laptop foi roubado e se encontra na mesa do ladrão), ela estaria em posição de saber que o seu laptop está no canto de uma mesa. Alguns exemplos adicionais podem ajudar a clarificar a visão de Foley. Considere outro exemplo, o caso dos falsos celeiros, proposto originalmente por Ginet. Henry está dirigindo pelo campo, olhando para algumas construções edificadas ao longo da estrada. Ele vê algo que parece exatamente com um celeiro. Henry, assim, forma a crença de que aquela construção que ele vê é um celeiro. Imagine agora que aquela construção que ele vê é, de fato, um celeiro. Contudo, sem que Henry tenha notícia, inúmeras fachadas de celeiros – falsos celeiros, que se parecem exatamente com celeiros reais quando vistos da estrada – foram erguidas para uma filmagem cinematográfica. Se Henry tivesse olhado para o celeiro ao lado, ele teria facilmente sido enganado ao acreditar que ele estava vendo um celeiro. Felizmente, ele não fez isso12. Quando aplicamos o Teste de Foley a esse caso, teremos uma explicação adequada de por que Henry tem uma crença verdadeira e não tem conhecimento. Henry não tem conhecimento porque lhe falta ao menos uma informação importante sobre a situação em que ele se encontra, a saber, que há inúmeras fachadas de celeiro na região. Outro exemplo bastante conhecido que podemos citar é um caso típico de loteria. Considere um sujeito que possui o bilhete "345" de uma loteria, em que há apenas um único bilhete vencedor. Imagine que esse sujeito forma uma crença verdadeira e altamente justificada de que ele não será 11 Cf. FOLEY, Richard, op. cit., p. 6. 12 Cf. GOLDMAN, Alvin, Discrimination and Perceptual Knowledge, in: The Journal of Philosophy, 73 (1976), p. 771-791. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 553 o vencedor. Imagine ainda que o bilhete já tenha sido sorteado, mas que o sujeito ainda não tenha checado o resultado. Esse sujeito, de acordo com a visão de Foley, novamente falha em ter conhecimento, porque há uma informação importante sobre a sua situação que lhe falta, a saber, ele não possui a informação de que o bilhete vencedor foi o "9.435". Exemplos desse tipo são abundantes na literatura epistemológica, e o motivo de serem tão comuns parece se dever ao fato de que há uma característica essencial que lhes é compartilhada: eles se utilizam de um artifício literário muito particular, que se caracteriza por fornecer ao leitor importantes informações que o sujeito principal da história não possui. É o que poderíamos chamar, a partir de uma inspiração contextualista, de "contexto" ou "situação do atribuidor"13. Para Foley, quando tais exemplos são apresentados de modo a sugerir que a informação faltante é importante, julgamos que o sujeito, por essa razão, não possui conhecimento14. Como podemos perceber, a visão defendida por Foley possui bastante poder explicativo. Ela fornece uma nova teoria do conhecimento, elegante e bastante intuitiva, que promete resolver problemas tais como o problema de Gettier, o paradoxo da loteria e o assim chamado problema do valor (epistêmico)15. De forma bastante direta, ele resolve esses problemas do seguinte modo. Primeiramente, à vítima de gettierização faltará uma importante informação que a impede de conhecer (como ilustrado no caso do laptop roubado). Em segundo lugar, o portador do bilhete de loteria não sabe que perdeu, apesar da enorme evidência ao seu dispor, pois ele não possui uma informação importante sobre o bilhete vencedor. Em terceiro lugar, saber que p é mais valioso do que crer verdadeiramente que p; a base para essa afirmação é a suposição de que uma crença 13 WILLIAMS, Bernard, Deciding to Believe, in: WILLIAMS, Bernard (ed.), Problems of the Self, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973, p. 146, descreve essa situação como a "situação do examinador": a situação na qual nós sabemos que p é verdadeira (ou falsa), algum sujeito S afirmou que p é verdadeira e nós nos perguntamos se S realmente sabe que p. 14 Parece ser o caso que, quando uma informação será ou não importante, isso pode depender de ponderações de cunho intelectual ou prático, o que acaba por deixar uma porta aberta para visões como o invariantismo-sensível-ao-sujeito e o contextualismo. Contudo, Foley, não toma nenhum partido em definitivo; cf. FOLEY, Richard, op. cit., p. 21-30. O que pode ser concluído a partir de seu texto é que, se a sua visão deve implicar alguma forma de contextualismo, isso dependerá da possibilidade de uma versão invariantista plausível para tratar de informação adequada. 15 Além disso, Foley considera um ponto positivo de sua visão a ruptura entre conhecimento e racionalidade/justificação. Na seguinte passagem, cf. id. ibid., p. 126, ele explica a força de uma visão que rompe com a ideia de haver uma estreita ligação entre conhecimento e racionalidade/justificação: "Ela liberta a teoria do conhecimento a partir do dilema de ou ter que insistir em uma concepção excessivamente intelectual do conhecimento, segundo a qual é capaz de fornecer uma defesa intelectual de tudo o que se sabe, ou esforçar-se para introduzir uma noção não-tradicional de crença justificada, devido à definição de conhecimento ser pensada como exigindo isso". T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 554 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 verdadeira é valiosa e que o sujeito possui ao menos um pouco mais (e normalmente muito mais) dessa valiosa mercadoria quando ele sabe que p do que quando apenas crê verdadeiramente16. 2 Objeção da circularidade Como vimos na seção anterior, um componente central da tese apresentada por Foley é que um sujeito tem conhecimento somente se não lhe falta nenhuma informação importante. Para sustentar essa tese, deve-se assumir que é possível distinguir informação importante de informação não importante sem que se faça referência ao conhecimento. Como o próprio Foley admite, logo no início do seu livro, a sua tese principal só assume importância filosófica se informação puder ser entendida de maneira independente de conhecimento. No entanto, alguns epistemólogos entendem que há um problema na tese apresentada por Foley, justamente nessa última questão. Eles afirmam que Foley acaba por tratar informação e conhecimento como sinônimos, noções não independentes. Além disso, acusam Foley de não fornecer uma explicação adequada para distinguir uma informação importante de uma informação não importante. Na verdade, a acusação é ainda mais séria: não há como fazer tal distinção sem, em última instância, fazer referência ao conhecimento. Michael Hannom apresenta o seguinte exemplo para ilustrar a sua crítica17. Imagine que um sujeito S compra um bilhete de uma loteria que possui um milhão de bilhetes. Imagine que não é uma loteria viciada, que o bilhete (B543) já foi sorteado e que S ainda não teve ciência do bilhete vencedor. S acredita, justificadamente (baseado em evidência probabilística), que o seu bilhete (B345) não é o vencedor. Além disso, a crença de S é verdadeira, a saber, o bilhete (B345) não é o vencedor. No entanto, S não sabe que o bilhete (B345) não é o vencedor. Seguindo a análise de Foley, deve haver alguma informação importante que falta para S, e que é responsável por explicar por que ele não tem conhecimento. Ao aplicarmos o Teste de Foley, temos o seguinte diagnóstico: deve haver uma proposição q, de modo que q é uma informação importante e S não crê que q. Aparentemente, tudo está certo, mas – dado que um grande número de informações pode ser associado com qualquer situação particular e dificilmente alguém estará de posse de todas elas – Hannon coloca a seguinte questão: qual proposição (informação) faltante causou a importante falha no sistema epistêmico 16 Ibid., p. 72. 17 Cf. HANNOM, Michael, Is True Belief Knoeldeg Plus Adequate Information?, in: Erkenntnis, 79:5 (2014), p. 1069-1076. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 555 de S? Para Foley, S não sabe que o (seu) bilhete (B345) não é o vencedor porque ele não possui a seguinte informação importante: (1) O bilhete (B543) é o vencedor. S não sabe, especificamente, qual bilhete é o vencedor e, portanto, não sabe que perdeu. Mas, o que seria necessário para S saber que o seu bilhete não é o vencedor? Bem, uma forma bastante comum através da qual pessoas têm conhecimento de que perderam (ou ganharam) é checando os números jogados com algum anunciante oficial. Caso S tome conhecimento a partir de um anunciante oficial que o bilhete (B543) foi o sorteado, então S poderá saber que o (seu) bilhete (B345) não é o vencedor. Entretanto, essa não parece ser a única maneira para se adquirir conhecimento de que o seu bilhete é o perdedor. Hannon sugere que imaginemos um mundo onde o anúncio sobre a loteria não disponibiliza os números sorteados, apenas informa que o bilhete (B345) não foi o sorteado (talvez S seja uma importante celebridade, e o público anseia saber se S é o vencedor)18. Nessas circunstâncias, parece que S poderia vir a saber que o (seu) bilhete (B345) não é o vencedor. Se isso está correto, então parece que S preencheu a ausência de informação que o impedia de saber. Contudo, qual é a informação importante que S adquiriu e que lhe faltava anteriormente ao anúncio? A importante informação que lhe faltava não era a de que o bilhete de S não era o vencedor. Por que não? Porque Foley define informação como crença verdadeira, e S já acreditava verdadeiramente que o seu bilhete não era o vencedor. Se essa análise está correta, então, de acordo com Foley, S poderia saber que o seu bilhete é o perdedor, ainda que ele não tenha tido ciência sobre qual bilhete é, especificamente, o vencedor. Esse seria, segundo Hannon, um contraexemplo à tese de Foley. Para Hannon, não poderíamos assumir com antecedência que há alguma informação importante sem, consequentemente, assumir a conclusão que Foley está defendendo, a saber, que um sujeito não tem conhecimento, uma vez que lhe falta uma informação importante. A importância de uma informação não pode ser determinada porque alguém não possui conhecimento. Isso acabaria, como sugere Hannon, na obtenção de uma ordem contrária de explicação: (I) No tempo T1 (antes do anúncio) S não sabia, mas agora em T2 (depois do anúncio) S sabe. (II) S adquiriu uma verdade, q, em T2, que lhe faltava em T1. (III) Logo, q deve ser uma verdade importante. 18 LITTLE-JOHN, Clayton, Review: When is True Belief Knowledge?, in: Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, (2012), faz uma colocação semelhante. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 556 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 Hannon pretende mostrar que, ao classificar a importância de qualquer informação retroativamente, estar-se-ia cometendo petição de princípio, pois informações importantes seriam definidas em relação ao conhecimento. Além disso, Foley não manteria a independência do conceito de informação em relação à noção de conhecimento. Hannon não tem a intenção de trivializar a visão proposta por Foley oferecendo a seguinte definição: Informação importante = df qualquer informação próxima adquirida no processo de aquisição de conhecimento. No entanto, ele afirma não enxergar que outro resultado seja possível a partir da explicação oferecida por Foley. Para ele, ainda que existam outras informações que S pode obter durante o processo de aquisição de conhecimento, simplesmente estipular que qualquer informação é importante acaba por incorrer em uma circularidade viciosa. Foley reconhece que existem inúmeras maneiras de determinar a importância de uma informação e que a tal importância seria derivada de uma complexa rede ou de ligações relacionadas com valores, preocupações, riscos, etc. Entretanto, não deixa claro como explicar por que o desconhecimento de S acerca de qual bilhete é o vencedor adquire importância na situação anterior ao anúncio, mas não na situação posterior, sem que se volte para o conhecimento de S. Imaginemos como Foley poderia, inicialmente, responder a isso. Uma primeira sugestão seria dizer que S, na verdade, não adquiriu nenhuma (nova) informação como resultado do anúncio. Mas, contrariamente, poderia ser o caso que a falta de ciência acerca de qual bilhete foi o sorteado não seja mais importante depois que o anúncio foi feito. Hannon critica uma saída dessa natureza, pois afirma que seria necessário explicar por que tal informação não seria mais importante, e de uma maneira que não fizesse referência ao conhecimento. Para ele, o fato de S não estar de posse da informação acerca de qual bilhete é o vencedor não pode deixar de ser importante simplesmente porque agora S sabe que o seu bilhete é o perdedor, o que corresponderia a definir informações importantes em termos de conhecimento. 3 Relevância epistêmica: determinando a importância da informação Até agora foi possível perceber que a ideia central da tese sustentada por Foley é que considerar uma crença verdadeira como um caso de conhecimento depende da importância da informação que falta ao agente T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 557 epistêmico. No entanto, Foley não oferece uma explicação acerca de qual critério deveríamos utilizar para classificarmos ou diferenciarmos as informações importantes das informações não importantes. A falta desse critério levou alguns epistemólogos a acusarem a visão de Foley de circularmente viciosa, afirmando que não há como distinguir, de modo não circular, uma informação importante de uma informação não importante, sem que, em última instância, faça-se referência ao conhecimento. Acredito que os seus críticos estão equivocados sobre esse ponto. É possível, sim, definir uma informação importante sem fazer referência ao conhecimento. No que segue, apresento uma interpretação subjetivista da relevância epistêmica, originalmente proposta por Floridi19, capaz de fornecer um critério objetivo para distinguirmos a qualidade da informação. Trata-se de uma tese baseada em uma análise contrafactual e metateorética do grau de relevância de uma informação i em relação a um agente a, a partir de uma função entre a precisão i entendida como resposta a uma pergunta q, dada a probabilidade de q ser perguntada por a. Não é tão surpreendente quanto possa parecer, pelo menos não inicialmente , o fato de Foley não se preocupar em oferecer uma caracterização precisa para identificar informações importantes, por pensar que essa é uma tarefa bastante simples. Como sugere Strawson, "fazer afirmações não é uma atividade humana gratuita e aleatória. Não oferecemos, a não ser em casos de desespero social, partes isoladas e desconectadas de informações uns aos outros"20. Ao invés disso, de acordo com o seu princípio de relevância, "temos a intenção de fornecer ou adicionar informações sobre o que está em jogo ou é de interesse imediato"21. Strawson parece estar correto sobre esse ponto, e, se esse é o caso, então, como podemos notar, o meio mais comum a partir do qual identificamos o fornecimento ou a adição de informações é através de interações de perguntas e respostas. Nesse sentido, podemos pensar em uma definição inicial a partir de um caso muito básico sobre a relevância de informação. É comumente entendido que alguma informação i é relevante (R) para um agente a, com relação a um domínio d, em um contexto c, dado um nível de abstração n, se e somente se (i) Um agente a pergunta (Q) uma questão q sobre d em c dado n, isto é, Q(a, q, d, c, n) e (ii) Uma informação i satisfaz (S)q enquanto resposta sobre d em c dado n, isto é, Q(a, q, d, c, n) 19 Cf. FLORIDI, L., Understanding Epistemic Relevance, op. cit., p. 69-92. 20 Cf. STRAWSON, P., Identifying Reference and Truth-Value, in: Theoria, 30 (2), p. 96-118; reimpresso in: STRAWSON, P., Logicolinguistic Papers, London: Methuen, 1971, p. 75-95. 21 Id. ibid. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 558 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 Resumindo: (1) R (i) ↔ (Q(a, q, d, c, n) ∧ S(a, q, d, c, n)) A ideia central em (1) é bastante simples: a informação i, "a aula começa as 13:15h", é relevante para Luís se e somente se Luís se perguntar (ou for perguntado) sobre esse item de informação em uma determinada circunstância, com as convenções linguísticas normais, e i satisfizer o seu questionamento. Essa formulação inicial de relevância é bastante popular e possui algumas motivações importantes22. Primeiramente, ela identifica informação (semântica) como sendo o item portador de relevância23. Em segundo lugar, ela transforma a relevância em um conceito orientado pelo agente, ou seja, leva em consideração os interesses (epistêmicos) do agente tornando explícito que a relevância de i é dependente de seus questionamentos q, visto que nenhuma informação é relevante per se. Em terceiro lugar, ela casa a relevância com o domínio, o contexto e os níveis de abstração nos quais a relevância da informação é analisada – uma informação pode ser relevante, ou não, dependendo da situação em que um agente se encontra. Em quarto lugar, fornece um sentido objetivo de relevância na medida em que i não é qualquer informação, mas apenas aquela informação que realmente satisfaz q. E, por último, restringe o grau de subjetividade envolvido na análise da relevância, pois assume que um determinado agente a é uma espécie de agente racional que satisfaz a ideia da "suposição prévia comum" (common prior assumption)24. Além de popular, esse modelo é bastante controverso. No entanto, não nos interessa aqui reconstruir ou discutir essa controvérsia. O que 22 A fórmula (1) é tão popular que a encontramos aplicada a diversos serviços, tais como o Ebay e a Amazon, quando esses sugerem aos usuários novos itens que podem ser relevantes (do seu interesse), dadas as suas pesquisas passadas. Outros exemplos são as bases de dados que utilizam pesquisas booleanas, tal como o Google. 23 Cf. COHEN, J., Some Steps Towards a General Theory of Relevance, in: Synthese, 101 (1994), p. 171-185, para uma convincente defesa de que relevância deve ser entendida em termos proposicionais. 24 De acordo com a ideia da suposição prévia comum ou doutrina Harsanyi (cf. HARSANYI, J., Games with Incomplete Information Played by 'Bayesian' Players – Parts 1, 2, 3, in: Management Science, 14 (1968), p. 159-182, 320-334, 486-502), se dois ou mais agentes racionais compartilham um conjunto de crenças, a suposição prévia comum sobre um possível estado do mundo (expressada por meio de uma distribuição de probabilidades sobre todos os estados possíveis), então, se algum agente receber alguma informação nova sobre o mundo e atualizar o seu conjunto de crenças, tornando-o condicional (aprendizagem bayesiana) à informação recebida, ele obtém a mesma probabilidade revista (a probabilidade posterior). Então, se as suas novas crenças atualizadas diferem, a conclusão é que isso ocorre porque os agentes receberam informações diferentes. Como AUMANN, R. J., Agreeing to Disagree, in: Annals of Statistics, 4:6 (1976), p. 1236-1239, sinteticamente colocou: "diferenças nas probabilidades subjetivas devem ser rastreadas exclusivamente pelas diferenças de informação". T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 559 nos interessa é que ainda que tal definição de relevância seja um modelo abstrato e idealizado, podemos tê-lo como um caso realista (aplicável) acerca de como deveria ser o comportamento de agentes epistêmicos. Essa proposta também pretende definir a como pertencendo à classe de agentes (racionais) que – em compartilhando as mesmas informações acerca da provável realização de um evento (uma conclusão) – deveriam manter as mesmas crenças sobre ele (ambos deveriam alcançar a mesma atribuição de probabilidade subjetiva). Isso permite que a diferença de crenças entre agentes racionais, e em seus processos inquisitórios, seja totalmente explicável a partir de diferenças em suas informações25. Devemos ser cuidadosos ao interpretar essa posição e notar que ela não faz nenhuma referência a quaisquer possíveis inclinações idiossincráticas de um determinado agente epistêmico, tampouco de suas análises fenomenológicas. Pelo contrário, a conexão entre uma explicação baseada na orientação-do-informante e na satisfação-inquisitória é capaz de explicar como (1) suporta uma interpretação subjetivista da relevância epistêmica em termos do grau de interesse de um agente a em uma informação i. Contudo, (1) não se apresenta como uma definição completamente satisfatória, pois deixa algumas questões importantes não respondidas. Primeiramente, ela parece carecer de mais força explanatória, dado que a relação entre i e q parece não ser mencionada: o quão adequada i deve ser para caracterizar-se como resposta para q, a fim de que seja computada enquanto informação relevante? Em segundo lugar, ela é pouco refinada, pois falha em distinguir entre graus de relevância: pode ser relevante, para um agente a, a informação de que a aula está atrasada em uma hora ao invés de 10 minutos. Terceiro, ela é frágil, pois nos força a declarar irrelevante uma informação i quando a condição Q(a, q, d, c, l) não é satisfeita. Por exemplo, obviamente, mesmo que a não inquira sobre q, i ainda pode ser muito relevante para q (mantendo-se inalterada a questão q, sobre d, em c, com l). Uma maneira de revisar (1) é tentar tornar mais explícita a relação entre q e i, e isso pode ser feito mediante uma revisão probabilística. Move-se, portanto, de uma noção rígida de implicação dupla para uma noção mais flexível e funcional entre o grau de relevância e o grau de probabilidade das duas condições de inquisição e resposta. Para fazer 25 Na teoria dos jogos, esse fenômeno é entendido como um procedimento através do qual é possível alcançar um consistente alinhamento de crenças. Além disso, podemos mencionar duas consequências adicionais que são implicadas por essa nocão: (i) agentes racionais não podem possuir a mesma informação e concordar em discordar sobre a probabilidade de algum evento passado ou futuro. Na verdade, eles devem chegar, de modo independente, às mesmas conclusões, e (ii) eles não podem surpreender um ao outro com novas informações. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 560 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 isso, é preciso fazer uso de algumas noções comumente usadas em análises estatísticas, a saber, "validade" (validity), "conformação" (accuracy) e "precisão" (precision). Para começar, devemos considerar A como o grau de conformação/adequação da resposta, isto é, o grau em que i satisfaz q sobre d, em c, com l. Depois, podemos definir A adaptando a noção estatística de validade, que é a combinação da conformidade com a precisão26. Nesse sentido, portanto, diríamos que i é uma resposta adequada para q na medida em que ela seja uma resposta válida para q, isto é, desde que ela seja uma resposta precisa e conformada. A partir disso, podemos reformular (1) tornando-a mais flexível e adequada às nuances desse processo inquisitório: (2) R (i) = P (Q(a, q, d, c, n)) × S (A(i, q, d, c, n)) Em (2), portanto, está sendo considerada a probabilidade de a perguntar por q e a probabilidade de i ser uma resposta adequada para q. Infelizmente, a probabilidade de se fazer ou colocar uma questão não tem relação com a probabilidade de se receber uma resposta adequada. Desse modo, os dois eventos são independentes um do outro e a sua conjunção teve de ser traduzida em uma simples multiplicação. Obtemos, como resultado positivo a partir de (2), que quanto mais provável for para a perguntar por q e mais adequado for i enquanto resposta para q, mais relevante i se torna para a. Infelizmente, (2) também exibe uma dificuldade grave, a saber, a relevância epistêmica de i diminui muito rapidamente em comparação com a diminuição da probabilidade de Q, tornando-se, em alguns casos, completamente contraintuitiva27. O problema se apresenta quando a probabilidade de q ser perguntada por a tende a 0, enquanto a probabilidade de i ser uma resposta adequada para q tende a 1. Nesse caso, i torna-se cada vez mais irrelevante epistemicamente, porque cada vez mais torna-se improvável que a pergunte por q, mesmo quando a conformidade de i seja cada vez mais próxima, ou igual, a 1. Para resolver esse problema, uma solução é adotar uma análise contrafactual para (2). Assim, ao invés de analisarmos a probabilidade de a perguntar por q, deveríamos considerar dois cenários: 26 "Conformidade" (accuracy) é o grau de concordância de uma medida ou de um parâmetro calculado em relação ao seu valor factual (verdadeiro). "Precisão" (precision), também chamada de "repetitividade" ou "reprodutibilidade", é o grau com o qual medições e cálculos posteriores demonstram os mesmos, ou similares, resultados. 27 De modo bastante realista, um agente a não pode ser considerado onisciente, mesmo que a fosse considerado um ser logicamente modal; cf. FLORIDI, L., The Logic of Being Informed, in: Logique et Analyse, 49:196 (2006), p. 433-460. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 561 (a) a situação na qual a pergunta por q, isto é, P(Q) = 1, e (b) a situação na qual a não pergunta, mas poderia perguntar por q, isto é, 0 ≤ P(Q) < 1. Em (a), a única variável que conta é a probabilidade de i ser ou não adequada. Já em (b), pode-se considerar a probabilidade de que a poderia ter perguntado sobre q se a tivesse sido suficientemente informado28. Considere a seguinte formulação revisada (em que utilizaremos o símbolo "�" para implicação contrafactual e simplificaremos a notação omitindo (q, d, c, n)): (3) R(i) = P(A(i)) se P(Q(a) = 1, e P(Ia(i) � Q(a)) × P(A(i)) se 0 ≤ P(Q(a)) < 1 Como pode ser presumido, a segunda linha em (3) afirma que a relevância epistêmica de i é uma função da probabilidade de i ser uma resposta adequada para q, multiplicada pela probabilidade de q ser perguntada por a, caso a fosse suficientemente informado sobre a disponibilidade de i. Essa reformulação resolve um problema encontrado em (2), que diz respeito à opacidade da relevância epistêmica: o mundo é informativamente opaco para a, pelo menos empiricamente. Por isso mesmo, alguém pode, frequentemente, falhar em solicitar as informações que, na verdade, seriam epistemologicamente relevantes para ela – quando a situação é vista a partir de uma espécie de olhar divino. Contudo, uma última revisão ainda precisa ser feita em (3), para evitar dois problemas: o que podemos chamar de circularidade contrafactual29 e o paradoxo contrafactual da informação semântica (uma versão do paradoxo de Menon). Considere que ainda poder-se-ia contar com a racionalidade de um agente a para avaliar a relevância epistêmica de i em relação a ele próprio, sem fornecer o conteúdo de i, mas apenas algumas informações sobre a sua disponibilidade. Afinal, caso tivesse sido dito que novas informações (ni) sobre d estavam disponíveis, então, na medida em que a tivesse uma pergunta para adquirir i, segue-se que i teria sido mais ou menos epistemologicamente relevante para a. Agora, uma forma simples de construir (ni) é mudando o nível de abstração n. Por exemplo, caso a tivesse sido informado de que algo havia mudado em relação ao calendário da reunião (n superior), provavelmente a teria perguntado o 28 Estar "suficientemente informado", nesse caso, significa ter alguma informação sobre a disponibilidade de i. 29 Para isso, deve-se adotar uma posição semântica para tratar de mundos possíveis à la Stalnaker-Lewis, ao invés de uma interpretação metalinguística aos moldes de Goodman.    T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 562 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 que havia mudado, e a informação de que a reunião tinha sido cancelada (n inferior) seria, então, corretamente analisada como altamente relevante para a. Mas, na maioria dos casos, o agente não está informado de que existe (ni) disponível. Ao invés disso, ele pode estar informado apenas de que pode haver (ni) disponível. Assim, ao invés de analisar a probabilidade de a perguntar por q (em d, c, n), caso a fosse avisado de que existe informação nova (ni) disponível acerca de d em n, deveria ser considerado, de forma mais realista, o caso em que se é informado de que há uma probabilidade P > 0 de que possa haver nova informação (ni) sobre d em n, ou seja, P(IaP(ni,n') � Q(a,n''))30. A fórmula revista é a seguinte, com as simplificações usuais: (4) R(i) = P(A(i,n")) se P(Q(a,n") = 1, P(IaP(ni,n') � Q(a,n")) × P(A(i,n'')) se 0 ≤ P(Q(a,n")) < 1 Devemos considerar que a disponibilidade de novas informações sobre d, adquiridas em um nível de abstração superior, é como um envelope selado : a está informado de que novas informações estão disponíveis no seu interior, mas não possui o conteúdo informativo específico (compare isso com a mensagem "Você recebeu um e-mail", enviado por um cliente de e-mail). Desse modo, nenhuma versão do paradoxo de Menon pode instalar-se. Considerações finais Como vimos, Foley nos oferece uma análise sobre o conhecimento bastante original e simples, que pretende explicar de forma mais intuitiva antigos e novos problemas epistemológicos, empregando uma noção de informação. Embora seja realmente muito atraente a visão por ele apresentada, algumas explicações não foram suficientemente desenvolvidas ao longo do seu livro. Isso faz com que a sua visão seja colocada sob suspeita, além de deixá-la suscetível a algumas objeções importantes. Nesse texto, focamo-nos mais detalhadamente sobre uma objeção levantada contra a tese de Foley, conforme apresentada por Hannon. Para ele, não há uma maneira não circular de distinguir informação importante de informação não importante, sem que se faça, em última instância, referência à própria noção de conhecimento. 30 Deve-se atentar para o escopo das duas probabilidades: a fórmula não deve ser interpretada como um caso problemático sobre probabilidade de segunda ordem (cf. GAIFMAN, H., A Theory of Higher-Order Probabilities, in: SKYRMS, B. & HARPER, W. (eds.), Causation, Chance and Credence, London-Ontario: University of Western Ontario Press, 1988), ou seja, tal como se o contrafactual dependesse da probabilidade acerca da probabilidade de a estar informado. Na verdade, a é que está informado sobre a probabilidade de ni.    T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 563 Essa objeção pode ser entendida como sendo motivada por duas falhas cometidas por Foley na apresentação de sua visão. Primeiramente, diz respeito à definição de informação que ele oferece. Foley diz que informação é crença verdadeira. Sim, mas o problema é que essa definição está incompleta. O sentido de informação que está por trás do pensamento de Foley já pode ser encontrado em Dretske31 e em Floridi32. Para esses autores, informação é definida como dados semânticos, bem formados, com significado e verdadeiros. Nesse sentido, quando consideramos que Foley está, na verdade, de acordo com essa definição, podemos perceber que não há, à primeira vista, nenhuma identificação com a noção de conhecimento, isto é, não são sinônimos. Em segundo lugar, Foley realmente não oferece uma explicação adequada para a distinção entre informação importante e informação não importante. E essa lacuna realmente promove algumas dificuldades para a sua tese. Para resolver esse problema e fornecer uma distinção adequada para informação importante e informação não importante, buscamos uma interpretação de relevância epistêmica de informação que foi originalmente proposta por Floridi, embora em um contexto não relacionado diretamente à questão do conhecimento. Segundo essa interpretação, foi possível distinguir uma informação importante de uma não importante, através de uma explicação baseada em uma análise contrafactual e metateorética do grau de relevância de uma informação i em relação a um agente a, a partir de uma função entre a precisão i entendida como resposta a uma pergunta q, dada a probabilidade de q ser perguntada por a. Embora essa interpretação possa inicialmente parecer demasiadamente idealizada, ela pode muito bem ser aplicada e entendida como um caso realista acerca de como deveria ser o comportamento de agentes epistêmicos. Ao adicionarmos essa interpretação subjetivista de relevância epistêmica da informação à visão apresentada por Foley, acabamos por fortalecê-la, além de torná-la imune frente às objeções que contenham o mesmo teor da objeção apresentada por Hannon. A visão apresentada por Foley, dessa forma, ganha mais plausibilidade e um maior apelo explicativo. Referências AUMANN, R. J. Agreeing to Disagree. In: Annals of Statistics, 4:6 (1976), p. 1236-1239. COHEN, J. Some Steps Towards a General Theory of Relevance. In: Synthese, 101 (1994), p. 171-185. 31 Cf. DRETSKE, Fred, op. cit., 1981. 32 Cf. FLORIDI, L., Information, in: FLORIDI, L. (ed.), op. cit., p. 40-61; IDEM, Outline of a Theory of Strongly Semantic Information, in: Minds and Machines, 14:2 (2004), p. 197-222. T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada 564 Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565 DRETSKE Fred. Knowledge and the Flow of Information. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1981. FLORIDI, L. Information. In: FLORIDI, L. (ed.). The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of Computing and Information. Oxford: Blackwell, 2004. p. 40-61. ______. Outline of a Theory of Strongly Semantic Information. In: Minds and Machines, 14:2 (2004), p. 197-222. ______. The Logic of Being Informed. In: Logique et Analyse, 49:196 (2006), p. 433-460. ______. Understanding Epistemic Relevance. In: Erkenntnis, 69 (2008), p. 69-92. FOLEY, R. When is True Belief Knowledge? Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2012. GAIFMAN, H. A Theory of Higher-Order Probabilities. In: SKYRMS, B.; HARPER, W. (eds.). Causation, Chance and Credence. London-Ontario: University of Western Ontario Press, 1988. GETTIER, Edmund. Is Justified True Belief Knowledge? In: Analysis, 23 (1963), p. 121-123. GOLDMAN, Alvin. Discrimination and Perceptual Knowledge. In: The Journal of Philosophy, 73 (1976), p. 771-791. HANNOM, Michael. Is True Belief Knoeldeg Plus Adequate Information? In: Erkenntnis, 79:5 (2014), p. 1069-1076. HARSANYI, J. Games with Incomplete Information Played by 'Bayesian' Players – Parts 1, 2, 3. In: Management Science, 14 (1968), p. 159-182, 320-334, 486-502. JAMES, W. The Will to Believe. In: New World, 5 (1896), p. 327-347. LEHRER, Keith. Theory of Knowledge. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1990. LITTLE-JOHN, Clayton. Review: When is True Belief Knowledge? In: Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, (2012). PRITCHARD, D. Epistemic Luck. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007. (Also PRITCHARD, D. Epistemic Luck. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.) RADFORD, Colin. Knowledge – By Examples. In: Analysis, 27 (1966), p. 1-11. STRAWSON, P. Identifying Reference and Truth-Value. In: Theoria, 30 (2), p. 96-118. Reimpresso in: STRAWSON, P. Logicolinguistic papers. London: Methuen, 1971. p. 75-95.) WILLIAMS, B. Deciding to Believe. In: WILLIAMS, B. (ed.). Problems of the Self. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973. p. 136-151. Recebido em: 04.03.2015 Aprovado em: 09.06.2015 T. V. Rodrigues – Crença verdadeira mais informação adequada Veritas | Porto Alegre, v. 60, n. 3, set.-dez. 2015, p. 548-565

When Does Evidence Suffice for Conviction? MARTIN SMITH University of Edinburgh [email protected] There is something puzzling about statistical evidence. One place this manifests is in the law, where courts are reluctant to base affirmative verdicts on evidence that is purely statistical, in spite of the fact that it is perfectly capable of meeting the standards of proof enshrined in legal doctrine. After surveying some proposed explanations for this, I shall outline a new approach – one that makes use of a notion of normalcy that is distinct from the idea of statistical frequency. The puzzle is not, however, merely a legal one. Our unwillingness to base beliefs on statistical evidence is by no means limited to the courtroom, and is at odds with almost every general principle that epistemologists have proposed as to how we ought to manage our beliefs. 1. Statistical evidence in epistemology and the law In February 1941, Betty Smith, a resident of Massachusetts, was driving along a street in the town of Winthrop, when a bus travelling in the opposite direction forced her to swerve into a parked car. The bus did not stop, Smith did not get a clear look at either the bus or driver and there were no other witnesses. In spite of this paucity of evidence, Smith brought a civil lawsuit against Rapid Transit Inc. – one of the companies that operated buses in the town (Smith v Rapid Transit Inc., 317 Mass. 469, 470, 58 N.E 2d 754, 755 (1945)). According to information obtained from the department of public utilities, Rapid Transit Inc. was the only bus company that operated a line on the street in question and, as such, the majority of buses travelling along the street on any given day would be Rapid Transit buses, with the remainder being private or chartered buses. The trial court ruled that Rapid Transit Inc. could not be 2 held liable on this basis – a verdict that was upheld, on appeal, by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts. Flimsy lawsuits that are likely to fail are not uncommon, of course. What is remarkable about this case, though, is that the prevailing legal doctrine – both then and now, both in the United States and elsewhere – suggests that it should have succeeded. Legal doctrine distinguishes a number of different standards of proof that courts might apply. The standard of proof that is supposed to be applied in civil trials is the preponderance of evidence standard – also known as the 'balance of probabilities'. As any textbook on evidence law will attest, this standard is met when a proposition is shown to be more likely true than false – when its probability, given the evidence, exceeds 50%1. Clearly, though, the evidence presented in Smith v Rapid Transit Inc. does make it more likely true than false that the bus involved was a Rapid Transit bus. Given that evidence, we would sooner bet on the bus being a Rapid Transit bus than a bus of another sort. The standards of proof are more stringent in criminal trials, where a conviction famously requires that guilt be established beyond reasonable doubt. But this turn of phrase may also be interpreted in terms of a probability threshold – merely one much higher than 50%2. Why, then, did the courts find in favour of Rapid Transit Inc. and not in favour of Smith? If not the preponderance of evidence standard enshrined in legal doctrine, what standard of proof were these courts actually applying? In explaining the Supreme Court 1 See, for instance, Elliott (1987, chap. 4, section B), Keane (1996, chap. 3, section B) and Dennis (2002, chap. 11, section F). For some well known commentary on this standard, see the remarks of Gibbs J and Murphy J in T.N.T Management Pty. Ltd. v Brooks 53 A.L.J.R. 267 (1979) and Lord Brandon in Rhesa Shipping Co. SA v Edmunds and another (The Popi M) 2 All E.R. 712 (H|L) (1985). 2 See for instance Simon (1969), Simon and Mahan (1971). An early example of this interpretation is advanced by Bernoulli (1713), part IV, chap. II. In Miller v Minister of Pensions 2 All E.R. 372; 63 T.L.R. 474 KBD (1947) Denning J gave what is sometimes regarded as a definitive statement of the beyond reasonable doubt standard: 'the ... degree of cogency ... required in a criminal case before an accused is found guilty ... is well settled. It need not reach certainty, but it must carry a high degree of probability... If the evidence is so strong against a man as to leave only a remote possibility in his favour which can be dismissed with the sentence 'of course it is possible but not in the least probable' the case is proved but nothing short of that will suffice.' Denning continued 'The ... degree of cogency ... required to discharge a burden in a civil case ... is well settled. It must carry a reasonable degree of probability, but not so high as is required in a criminal case. If the evidence is such that the tribunal can say: 'We think it more probable than not' the burden is discharged...'. 3 verdict in Smith v Rapid Transit Inc., Justice Spalding remarked 'The most that can be said of the evidence in the instant case is that perhaps the mathematical chances somewhat favour the proposition that a bus of the defendant caused the accident. This was not enough.' The idea that a finding of liability cannot rest solely on 'mathematical' chances seems apt – but there is something puzzling about it also. After all, what other sorts of chances are there? Smith v Rapid Transit Inc. is not the only case in which purely statistical evidence has been treated with suspicion at trial, in apparent disregard for legal doctrine. Indeed, it seems generally true that courts are reluctant to base affirmative verdicts – verdicts of guilt or liability – on evidence that is purely statistical in nature3. But Smith v Rapid Transit Inc. seems a particularly clear counterexample to the legal doctrine – almost like a case that a philosopher might dream up. And Smith v Rapid Transit Inc. has served as the inspiration behind several imaginary cases, such as the well-known Blue-Bus example: Suppose a bus causes harm on a city street. Suppose there are no witnesses to the incident, but we have evidence to the effect that 90% of the buses operating in the area, on the day in question, were owned by the Blue-Bus company. Should a court find the Blue-Bus company liable for the damage caused? The balance of probabilities would seem to weigh overwhelmingly in 3 Other cases that are sometimes cited in this regard include Virginia & S.W. Ry. Co. v Hawk, 160 F 348, 352 (6th Cir. 1908), Evans v Ely, 13 F.2d 62, 64 (3rd Cir, 1926), Sargent v Massachusetts Accident Co. 307, 246, 250, 29 N.E. 2d 825, 827 (Mass. 1940), Commercial Standards Insurance Co. v Gordon Transports Inc., 154 F.2d 390, 396 (1946), People v Collins, 438 P.2d 33 40-41 (Cal. 1968), Guenther v Armstrong Rubber Co. 406 F.2d 1315, 1318 (3d Cir. 1969), State v Carlson, 267 N.W. 170, 176 (Minn. 1978), United States v Shonubi, 103, F.3d 1085 (2d Cir. 1997), R v Watters, All ER (D) 1469 (2000). The situation with the case law is not, however, unequivocal. In Kaminsky v Hertz Corp., 288 N.W. 2d 426 (Mich. Ct. App., 1980), Hertz was found to be liable for the damage caused by a truck on the grounds that it was yellow and bore a Hertz logo and that 90% of the yellow trucks bearing Hertz logos are owned by Hertz. This is sometimes put forward as an example of a case in which purely statistical evidence was allowed to carry the day (Enoch and Fisher, 2015, pp561-562). It may well be that the legal treatment of statistical evidence has not been entirely consistent – but we should be cautious in drawing this lesson from Kaminsky v Hertz Corp. One thing that has hampered much of the discussion of statistical evidence in legal theory and the philosophy of law is the lack of any clear criteria for determining when a body of evidence counts as 'purely statistical'. It is often assumed that any evidence pertaining explicitly to frequencies or proportions must be purely statistical in nature – but this cannot in general be the case. While the evidence put forward in Kaminsky v Hertz Corp does include information about a proportion, we should not be too quick to conclude that it is an example of purely statistical evidence. I shall return to this in n19. 4 favour of the proposition that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus – indeed the evidence might even meet the beyond reasonable doubt standard, if interpreted probabilistically. And yet, it seems that the court should not make any such finding. To hold the Blue-Bus company liable, purely on the basis of its large market share, would seem palpably unjust (Kaye, 1982, section I, Redmayne, 2008, Allensworth, 2009, section IIB). But to judge the Blue-Bus company not liable – which is the only alternative – would now seem to be in flagrant contravention of the textbook standard. This mismatch between doctrine and practice seems curious enough – but there is yet more to find puzzling here. For a court surely would – and surely should – find the Blue-Bus company liable on the basis of other kinds of defeasible evidence. Suppose that, instead of the market share evidence, an eyewitness to the incident testifies that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus. Provided this testimony is not contradicted or called into question, it would generally be deemed sufficient for a finding of liability. But eyewitnesses are fallible. The fact that a witness testifies that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus does not guarantee that it was. The witness might have suffered a hallucination, or another sort of bus might have been sporting a Blue-Bus logo, or the witness might have been simply lying in order to smear the company etc. If we were forced to come up with some numerical estimate of how likely it is that the bus really was a Blue-Bus bus, given the witness testimony, it's doubtful that we would go quite as high as 90% – that would seem overly trusting. But 90% is, of course, precisely how likely it is that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus, given the statistical evidence about which we were so apprehensive. A verdict of liability based on this testimonial evidence would actually run a greater risk of error than a verdict of liability based upon the statistical evidence. And yet the former verdict would seem acceptable, while the latter would not. 5 Consider also the following example (based on Cohen, 1977, §24 and Nesson, 1979): Suppose an electronics store is struck by looters during a riot – 100 people walk out of the store carrying televisions, while the transaction record at the cash register indicates that only one television was paid for, though no receipt was issued. Suppose Joe is apprehended carrying a television from the store, but we have no other information about him. Should Joe be prosecuted for theft? Should he be convicted? Should he be punished? If our only evidence against Joe is that he carried a television from the store and that 99 out of the 100 televisions carried from the store were stolen, while one was legitimately purchased, then, by launching into such actions against Joe, we would do him a serious wrong. Once again, we might contrast this with a case in which the statistical evidence is substituted for eyewitness testimony. Suppose only one television is stolen and a witness fingers Joe as the culprit. The testimony of a single eyewitness may not be deemed sufficient for a criminal conviction4, but we might imagine that the testimony is corroborated by further evidence that comes to light – perhaps the stolen television is found in Joe's possession. But even if these two pieces of evidence were enough to secure a conviction, they wouldn't remove all doubt as to Joe's guilt. There are various possibilities that we might still imagine: Perhaps the witness is lying and the television was planted in an attempt to frame Joe. Such a turn of events may be very unlikely, but if we had to make some guess as to the probability of Joe's guilt – to come up with some figure – 99% may seem too high. But this is just how likely Joe's guilt is made by the statistical evidence available in the first case. In one sense the statistical evidence is more probative – more indicative of Joe's guilt. And yet it would 4 Whether a single piece of eyewitness testimony is capable of meeting the criminal standard of proof is a question generally left, in any given case, to the discretion of judges and juries. In Scots law, the so called 'corroboration rule' explicitly prohibits criminal convictions based solely on the testimony of a single eyewitness. The rule has long aroused controversy, and the Scottish government is now committed, on the basis of a 2011 review of Scots law, to its abolition. The rule continues, at present, to be supported by the majority of Scotland's High Court judges and criminal lawyers. 6 be less acceptable – far less acceptable – to base a finding of guilt upon it5. Why should this be? This is a puzzle in evidence law. But an epistemological puzzle lies in the near vicinity. Not only would it be wrong for a court to condemn Joe purely on the basis of the statistical evidence against him, it would be wrong for an epistemic subject to do so. Suppose I'm not involved in any criminal proceedings against Joe, but I simply start asserting that he is a thief and a looter – telling his family, his friends, his employer etc. – all the while my only evidence against him being that he carried a television from the store and that 99 out of the 100 televisions carried from the store were stolen. In their own way such actions are no less unjust than a criminal conviction would be. And even if I merely believed that Joe committed theft without ever acting upon this belief or even voicing it, still I do him an injustice, albeit one of which he'll remain forever oblivious. Perhaps I could justifiably believe that Joe is very likely to have committed theft – but to conclude that he has done so is a further step that I'm just not entitled to take. If, on the other hand, I spoke to an eyewitness, who swears that she saw Joe stealing a television, then there need be nothing wrong with my taking this testimony at face value. There need be nothing wrong with me believing that Joe stole a television and, perhaps, taking certain consequent actions against him. Consider, then, the two scenarios before us: In the first I believe that Joe stole a television on the basis of the statistical evidence, while in the second I believe that Joe stole a television on the testimony of an eyewitness. The evidence in the first scenario makes it more likely that Joe stole a television than the evidence in the second scenario – if I were to bet on Joe's innocence I'd ask for longer odds in the first 5 One might insist that 99% would actually be a reasonable figure for the probability of Joe's guilt, given the testimony and the recovery of the stolen item. Though I do suspect this would be an overestimate, it's important to note that nothing essential hinges on this – if needs be, we can simply strengthen the statistical evidence available in the first case in order to restore the intended structure of the example. 7 scenario than the second. In spite of this, my belief in the second scenario is more justified than my belief in the first – indeed, my belief in the first scenario seems not to be justified at all. When it comes to the standards of proof that we ought to meet when forming beliefs, there's no 'official doctrine' that we can refer to. The closest thing we have are general accounts, proposed by epistemologists, of what it takes for a belief to be justified. But existing accounts of justification tend not to offer much help when it comes to this puzzle – and, through no accident perhaps, tend to be rather reminiscent of the standards of proof found in legal doctrine. Though they differ over the details, many epistemologists agree that securing justification for believing a proposition is a matter of ensuring that it is sufficiently probable, given one's evidence6. Such a view offers no explanation as to why we would privilege testimonial over statistical evidence – both kinds of evidence are equally capable of making propositions probable. It may be possible to solve the epistemological puzzle of statistical evidence in a way that is consistent with a probabilistic approach to justification. According to the knowledge account of evidence (Williamson, 2000, chap. 9), a proposition P will be part of one's body of evidence just in case one knows P. One who accepts this account, and combines it with a generous epistemology of testimony, might argue as follows: When an eyewitness tells me that Joe stole a television I come to know that he did, at which point this proposition becomes part of my evidence and, thus, certain given that evidence. In this case, my evidence in the second scenario does make it more likely that Joe stole a television, contrary to the alleged set up of the puzzle (see Williamson, 2000, section 11.3). 6 This view seems to be shared even by epistemologists who otherwise disagree quite profoundly about the nature of justification (see, for instance, Russell, 1948, chap. VI, Chisholm, 1957, pp28, Derksen, 1978, Alston, 1988, Fumerton, 1995, pp18-19, Lewis, 1996, pp551, Conee and Feldman, 2004, n32, Pryor, 2005, BonJour, 2010). 8 Intriguingly, this kind of manoeuvre seems to have no real analogue when it comes to the legal puzzle. The notion of evidence at play in the legal puzzle is, in effect, a kind of institutional one – whether something should be considered as evidence at trial is prescribed by explicit rules7. I don't mean to suggest that these rules will settle all difficult cases – but when it comes to the mechanics of the legal puzzle, the nature of legal evidence seems not to be one of the moving parts. In the cases considered, the evidence simply consists of the facts that have been admitted and are accepted by all parties. While the notion of evidence at play in the epistemological puzzle is more open textured, the present reflections may suggest that it is not, after all, the key to its resolution8. In any case, my primary concern here is not with the epistemological puzzle, but with the legal one. What the legal puzzle requires for its resolution is a new standard of proof, unlike anything found in the textbooks or the legal doctrine more broadly; a standard that demands more than probability, though less than certainty, a standard that cannot be satisfied by statistical evidence, though testimonial evidence, and evidence of other kinds, can somehow meet it. In this paper, I will describe such a standard9. In the next two sections, I will 7 See, for instance, the Federal Rules of Evidence for the US Federal Court system, particularly articles 4 and 610 or part 11 of the Criminal Justice Act (2003) for English and Welsh law. 8 I am inclined to think that many epistemological puzzles have legal analogues that are, in various ways, more tightly constrained. As such, enforcing a principle of uniform solution across the legal and epistemological domains could serve as a certain check on the potential excesses of epistemological theorising. I won't discuss this methodology further here, but will briefly employ it once more at the end of §2. 9 Statistical evidence is sometimes taken not only to be insufficient for meeting the standards of proof in civil and criminal trials, but to be inadmissible – something that the trier of fact should not even take into consideration (see Koehler, 2002). I am not attempting to account for this feature of legal practice here – though what I say may have some relevance for it. Sometimes when statistical evidence has been deemed inadmissible, this is because the evidence is thought to have a dubious or questionable basis (State v Sneed 414 P.2d 858 (N.Mex 1966)) – a reason which can often be taken at face value. Other times, though the evidence is regarded as solid, it is excluded on the grounds that its strength is likely to be overestimated by the jury (State v Carlson, 267 N.W. 170, 176 (Minn. 1978)). In cases of this sort, the decision to exclude the statistical evidence in question rests on assumptions about its 'real' strength, and questions about its capacity to meet the legal standards of proof are thereby implicated. Some remarks of Justice Todd in State v Carlson seem, for instance, to cast doubt on whether statistical evidence may be capable of meeting the beyond reasonable doubt standard. In yet other cases, statistical evidence appears to have been excluded on the grounds of irrelevance – excluded because it allegedly has no bearing on the question of innocence or guilt (Stephens v State 774 P.2d 60, 64 (Wyo. 1989)). These cases raise a more difficult interpretative challenge. It may be that some of the resources I deploy in developing a new standard of proof could offer a possible interpretation of such decisions 9 develop my account by contrasting it with some existing approaches to the puzzle – in particular, a recent proposal due to Enoch, Fisher and Spectre (2012) that exploits the notion of sensitivity. My primary aim here is to interpret the existing legal practice – to outline a standard that makes sense of the way in which statistical evidence is actually treated in the law. Having said this, however, the standard I put forward may have some revisionary implications – or may, at the very least, force a stand on certain contentious aspects of current legal practice. I take up these issues in §4, though without attempting to arrive at any final judgment about them. 2. Sensitivity Consider the following familiar case, due to Chisholm (1989, pp93): Suppose I'm walking through the countryside and pass a meadow in which I spot a dog that has been cunningly disguised to look like a sheep. Taken in by the ruse, I come to believe that there is a sheep in the meadow. My belief would seem justified – there does appear to be a sheep in the meadow and I have no inkling of anything suspicious. Furthermore, as chance would have it, my belief is true – there really is a sheep in the meadow, grazing behind a hill, out of view. This was originally put forward as a Gettier case, showing that knowledge is more than justified, true belief. I don't know that there is a sheep in the meadow even though I justifiably and truly believe that there is. One observation we might make about this case is that the evidence for my belief seems disconnected from the fact that makes it true. What makes me believe that there is a (though not necessarily a legitimisation of them) and of the notion of 'relevance' at work. I won't attempt to engage with this in detail here – but I will say a little more on this topic in n12 and n18. 10 sheep in the meadow is the animal before my eyes. What makes it true that there is a sheep in the meadow is the animal behind the hill. Say that a body of evidence E is sensitive to a proposition P just in case, had P been false, E would also have been false. Following Lewis (1973), this may be spelled out in terms of possible worlds – E is false in all of the most similar possible worlds in which P is false. A belief based upon sensitive evidence might be described as a sensitive belief. If there hadn't been a sheep in the meadow, my evidence would have been unchanged. It would still have appeared as though there was a sheep in the meadow and I would still have believed, now erroneously, that there was. My belief that there is a sheep in the meadow is not sensitive. This pattern can be found in many Gettier cases, prompting some epistemologists to conjecture that sensitivity may be a necessary condition for knowledge (Dretske, 1971, Nozick, 1980, chap. 3) or that it may have some correlation with knowledge (DeRose, 2004). Whatever one makes of these claims, we can agree that sensitivity is, at least, a notable feature for a belief or a piece of evidence to possess. According to a recent proposal made by Enoch, Fisher and Spectre (2012), the notion of sensitivity holds the key to resolving the legal puzzle of statistical evidence. Suppose a court does find the Blue-Bus company liable on the grounds that 90% of the buses operating in the area on the day in question were Blue-Bus buses. This evidence might make it highly probable that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus, but it could not, it seems, be sensitive to this proposition. If the bus had not been a Blue-Bus bus, 90% of the buses operating in the area would still have been Blue-Bus buses and the court would still have found the Blue-Bus company liable. The most similar possible worlds in which the bus involved was not a BlueBus bus are worlds in which the Blue-Bus company has the same market share and the court verdict is the same. 11 Now suppose that a court finds the Blue-Bus company liable on the basis of eyewitness testimony. While not as probabilistically strong as the statistical evidence, this testimonial evidence may be sensitive to the proposition that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus. If the bus involved had not been a Blue-Bus bus, the eyewitness would not have said that it was, and the court would not have found the Blue-Bus company liable (or so we are invited to suppose). According to Enoch, Fisher and Spectre, it is the insensitivity of statistical evidence that explains our reluctance to base an affirmative legal verdict upon it. There is something striking about this story – but I suspect that it is not ultimately correct. While it's true that the testimonial evidence in the Blue-Bus case may be sensitive to the proposition that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus, whether it really is sensitive depends on further features of the case – features that have yet to be spelled out. In the original description of the case, it was never specified, for instance, that the witness testimony was truthful. Suppose instead that the witness testimony is false and that the bus involved belonged to another company. Perhaps the witness really did hallucinate or really was lying in order to smear the company etc. In this case, the witness testimony is clearly not sensitive to the proposition that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus. There is a very similar possible world – the actual world – in which the bus involved was not a Blue-Bus bus, even though the witness testified that it was. In spite of this, it would still be acceptable for a court to find the Blue-Bus company liable. Such a verdict would not, of course, be correct, and could perhaps be overturned if further evidence came to light – but this is beside the point. The court has to base its verdict on whatever evidence is available – and the only evidence that is available is the unchallenged testimony of an eyewitness. Testimonial evidence may be insensitive, but it can still be acceptable to rest an affirmative verdict upon it10. 10 Enoch, Fisher and Spectre also consider a qualified sensitivity condition of the following sort: Evidence E is sensitive to proposition P just in case had P been false, E would most probably have been false – a condition that 12 In general, evidence can never be sensitive to a false proposition – and, as such, the sensitivity account cannot accommodate the possibility of incorrect, though acceptable, affirmative legal verdicts (see Blome-Tillmann, 2015, section 6). In fact, in order to make trouble for the sensitivity account, we needn't even imagine that the court verdict in question is incorrect. Suppose the bus involved really was a Blue-Bus bus, and the witness saw it but, if it hadn't been a Blue-Bus bus, she would still have said that it was, due to a private gripe against the company. That is, suppose the witness was secretly prepared to lie in order to smear the company but, as things turned out, she didn't have to. A verdict of liability based on this testimony would be correct and acceptable – and yet the testimony is insensitive. As these possibilities show, the sensitivity or otherwise of the testimonial evidence depends on how we fill in further details of the Blue-Bus case. The acceptability or otherwise of finding the company liable does not depend on these details however – it depends only on the evidence before the court. While Enoch, Fisher and Spectre don't suppose that sensitivity is a necessary condition on knowledge, as I noted above it was with this role in mind in that the notion was first brought into epistemology. And, in a way, this should already make us suspicious of the idea that sensitivity is required in order for an affirmative verdict to be acceptable. There is a kind of misfire here – for an acceptable affirmative verdict would seem the legal analogue of a justified belief, rather than a piece of knowledge11. And sensitivity has little promise as a is taken to be met iff E is false in the majority of the most similar worlds in which P is false (Enoch, Fisher and Spectre, 2012, pp204). It's worth noting that even this qualified sensitivity condition is not satisfied in the case described. Arguably, no other world is as similar to the actual world as it is to itself. As such, if the bus involved was not a Blue-Bus bus, then the actual world is the only most similar world in which the bus involved was not a Blue-Bus bus – and it is a world in which the witness testifies that it was. Further, even if we do allow other worlds to be included in this set – worlds that differ minutely from the actual world perhaps – there is no reason at all to think that the witness would do something different at the majority of these worlds. A similar problem besets Thomson's attempt to distinguish statistical and testimonial evidence by using a causal condition, which is also unsatisfied in cases of the kind described (see Thomson, 1986). 11 Epistemologists often regard belief as a threefold affair – for any proposition P one can either believe P, believe ~P or suspend judgment. Court decisions exhibit the same threefold structure. An affirmative verdict is the analogue of a belief that the defendant is guilty/liable. A negative verdict covers the two remaining 13 necessary condition on justified belief. As noted, insensitivity is widely regarded as being a distinctive feature of at least the first generation of Gettier cases – and Gettier cases are supposed to be cases of justified belief. If our final story about knowledge does find some part for sensitivity, it will be in bridging the gap between justified belief and knowledge, and not the gap between belief and justified belief. Enoch, Fisher and Spectre do briefly consider cases in which testimony is insensitive because the testifier is lying or mistaken (fn 23). What they suggest is that, although testimonial evidence is not always sensitive, what sets it apart from statistical evidence is that it is sensitive in the best cases – and this explains why it can be acceptable to base affirmative verdicts upon it. It may be that Enoch, Fisher and Spectre could avoid the foregoing problem in this way – but the proposal would need to be developed more fully. If the claim is simply that testimonial evidence has the potential to be sensitive, when the conditions are right, while statistical evidence does not, then that claim seems incorrect. For insensitivity is no more an essential feature of statistical evidence than sensitivity is an essential feature of testimonial evidence. Consider the Joe case again. Suppose a court did convict Joe of theft purely on the grounds that he carried a television from the store and that 99 out of the 100 televisions carried from the store were stolen. Is this evidence sensitive to the proposition that Joe stole a television? Assume Joe really did steal a television. Assume, further, that he never set out to acquire a television, but committed an opportunistic crime when he noticed that the store was being looted. In this case, if Joe had not stolen a television, he would have simply left possibilities; a belief that the defendant is not guilty/not liable or a suspension of judgment on the issue. This asymmetry between affirmative and negative verdicts owes to the way in which the burden of proof is allocated in civil and criminal trials – to the plaintiff and prosecution, respectively (see Laudan, 2006, pp96-97). The threefold structure underlying court verdicts is more transparent in Scots law, which permits a third verdict in criminal trials – a verdict of 'not proven' in addition to the verdicts of 'guilty' and 'not guilty'. In California, a defendant found not guilty in a criminal trial can seek from the judge a ruling of 'factual innocence'. 14 the area without one. If Joe had not stolen a television, the evidence would have been different. Presumably only 98 out of 99 televisions carried from the store would have been stolen and, more importantly, Joe would not have been found carrying a television from the store. That is, if Joe had not stolen a television, the evidence on which he was convicted would not have obtained. But these further facts hardly make the court verdict into an acceptable one. It remains the case that the court should never have convicted Joe on the grounds that it did. Statistical evidence can be sensitive, but it is still unacceptable to rest an affirmative verdict upon it (for further cases of this type see Blome-Tillmann, 2015). There are cases in which testimonial evidence is insensitive but it is still acceptable to base an affirmative verdict upon it and cases in which statistical evidence is sensitive but it is still unacceptable to base an affirmative verdict upon it. What this shows is that neither the property of sensitivity, nor the property of potential sensitivity, draws the line in the right place. As I mentioned, Enoch, Fisher and Spectre's notion of 'sensitivity in the best cases' may be developed in an alternative way that fares better – but I won't speculate about this further here. I will conclude this section with some more general remarks about the connection between sensitivity and the acceptability of a legal verdict. Taken together, what the foregoing examples appear to show is that considerations of sensitivity are not what's ultimately driving our judgments of acceptability. But the game here is not just one of comparing predictions with intuitions and noting mismatches. These mismatches are I think indicative of something deeper. I suggested in §1 that an adequate solution to the legal puzzle must provide a new standard of proof that demands more than probability, but less than certainty. Sensitivity is a feature of certain pieces of evidence that does meet these conditions. In a very real sense, though, it is not, and could not be, a standard of proof. 15 The Joe case provides a vivid illustration of how questions about the sensitivity of presented evidence can fail to offer any guidance or leverage on the primary question of fact that a court is to decide. If we suppose that Joe is one of the 99 who did steal a television then, as discussed, the evidence against him may well be sensitive to his guilt. If, on the other hand, we suppose that Joe is the one innocent who purchased a television that day, then the evidence would be insensitive to his guilt. In this case, the most similar possible world in which Joe does not steal a television will be the actual world, and this is a world in which the statistical evidence holds. In trying to decide whether or not Joe is guilty it is no use asking whether the presented evidence is sensitive to his guilt. In effect, the evidence will be sensitive on the condition that Joe is guilty and it will be insensitive on the condition that Joe is innocent. We cannot take a view on the sensitivity or otherwise of the evidence without already taking a view on Joe's guilt. Whether the evidence that is presented to a court is sensitive to a given proposition is not, in general, something that can be discerned by inspecting the evidence itself – it is determined by further facts that have not been presented to the court. And yet, these further facts can have no bearing on what verdict the court should reach. The court must reach a verdict on the basis of the evidence before it – and the acceptability or otherwise of the verdict is purely a function of this evidence12. 12 Enoch, Fisher and Spectre put forward the sensitivity condition first and foremost as a way of distinguishing statistical evidence from testimonial and other kinds of evidence which may serve as an adequate basis for an affirmative verdict. If the preceding examples are on the right track, the sensitivity condition does not divide up the cases in the right way. Nowhere, however, do Enoch, Fisher and Spectre suggest that the sensitivity condition should be understood as a standard of proof – and they may take it to relate more closely to the issue of admissibility than proof (Enoch, Fisher and Spectre, 2012, section V(B)). For what it's worth, I think that standards of admissibility must be transparent in just the same way as standards of proof. Much as a jury in a criminal trial has to reach its verdict based upon the presented evidence, so too does a judge at a pre-trial hearing have to make an admissibility decision based on the presented evidence. It is also important to note that, if our focus is not on sensitivity itself but on potential sensitivity or sensitivity in the best cases, then these may be properties that can be discerned by inspecting a piece of evidence – though this will depend on precisely how these notions are spelled out. 16 Some epistemologists have, of course, advanced 'externalist' theories of epistemic justification, on which the justificatory status of a belief is not wholly determined by the evidence on which it is based, but may depend on certain external, extra-evidential factors. This may be an available position in epistemology – but could we take seriously a corresponding view about the acceptability of legal verdicts? If two courts were presented with equivalent bodies of evidence against two individuals charged with equivalent crimes, could it really be acceptable for them to reach different verdicts – for one individual to be found guilty and the other innocent – even if there was some variation in external circumstances? No doubt we can persuade ourselves to say all manner of things about epistemological thought experiments, but there seems to be something almost viscerally bad about such a turn of events13. 3. Normic support Some philosophers have claimed that, alongside standard Gettier cases, lottery cases provide further counterexamples to the analysis of knowledge as justified, true belief (see Hawthorne, 2003, pp9, Pritchard, 2007, pp4). Suppose I hold a single ticket – ticket #72 say – in a fair lottery of 100 tickets with a single guaranteed winner. Suppose the lottery has been drawn, and my ticket is not the winner, but I'm yet to hear the result. Suppose that, in spite of this, I'm convinced that ticket #72 is not the winner, purely on the basis of the odds involved. Surely I don't know that ticket #72 has lost, even though this happens to be true. Presumably, 13 Such a pattern of verdicts would, arguably, violate the principle of precedent – foundational to common law systems – according to which judges are bound by previous decisions on questions of law. It is generally true that common law systems place great emphasis on deciding cases in such a way as to ensure that similar bodies of evidence lead to consistent and predictable outcomes. This kind of consideration does, I'm inclined to think, apply in epistemology as well (though there it is much less stark). 17 though, my belief that ticket #72 has lost is justified. After all, the belief is based on some very strong evidence – evidence that makes it 99% likely to be true. Here, then, is another kind of example of a justified, true belief that falls short of knowledge. This reasoning can seem compelling – but these cases have a very different 'feel' to standard Gettier cases. Think again of Chisholm's sheep case. I noted, in discussing this case, that the evidence on which I believe that there's a sheep in the meadow seems disconnected from the fact that makes the belief true. But this is not a criticism of the evidence per se. Rather, it seems to belie a problem with the circumstances in which I find myself. If the circumstances had been more obliging – if the animal before me really had been a sheep rather than a disguised dog – then this evidence would have been sufficient for me to know that there is a sheep in the meadow. In the lottery case, though, it's difficult to see how the external circumstances could have been any more obliging than they already are. Things pan out much as expected – the lottery is drawn, everything is fair and above board, ticket #72 does indeed lose etc. It seems that I could never know that ticket #72 has lost purely on the grounds that there are 100 tickets in the lottery and only one winner, irrespective of what the external circumstances are like. In the lottery case, the failure of my belief to qualify as knowledge really must be down to some shortcoming of my evidence, which immediately calls into question the supposition that this belief is justified. We know there is no question about the probabilistic strength of the evidence I possess – so what could the problem be? An observation by Jonathan Vogel may provide a clue: '...although winning a lottery on a particular ticket is unlikely or improbable, it would not be abnormal in some intuitive sense, for the ticket one holds to turn out to be a winner' (Vogel, 1990, pp16). In some sense, there would be nothing abnormal about ticket #72 winning the lottery, despite the odds against it. After all, some ticket has to win, and it might just as well be ticket #72 as 18 any other. If I believe that ticket #72 has lost the lottery, based just on the odds involved, then my belief could turn out to be false without anything abnormal having transpired. In contrast, if there appears to be a sheep in the meadow, but there isn't one, then there must be something abnormal happening. If I believe that there is a sheep in the meadow, based on the appearance of a sheep in the meadow, then only some kind of abnormal circumstance could part my belief from the truth. This is a genuine disanalogy between the evidence available in the lottery case, and the evidence available in the sheep case – but what is this notion of normalcy that is being appealed to? One attractive thought is that normalcy is just a statistical notion – normal circumstances are circumstances that frequently obtain while abnormal circumstances are circumstances that infrequently obtain. Perhaps we do use the words 'normal' and 'abnormal' in this way on occasion. But this seems not to capture Vogel's notion of abnormality – after all, the situation in which ticket #72 wins a 100 ticket lottery is, presumably, infrequent. Another attractive thought is that abnormal circumstances require more explanation than normal circumstances do. This may be more helpful in the present case. If ticket #72 really did win the lottery, in spite of the odds, then, while I may be surprised and delighted, I wouldn't try to find some special explanation as to how this could possibly have occurred. It could 'just so happen' that ticket #72 is the winning ticket and there's no more to be said on the matter. If, on the other hand, there was no sheep in the meadow, in spite of the fact that there appeared to be a sheep in the meadow, then there really would have to be some special explanation as to how this came about. Perhaps I'm looking at a dog disguised as a sheep, or I'm taken in by some strange trick of the light or I'm hallucinating etc. Whatever the truth, there is more to be said. 19 Say, at a first pass, that a body of evidence E normically supports a proposition P just in case the circumstance in which E is true and P is false would be less normal, in the sense of requiring more explanation, than the circumstance in which E and P are both true (Smith, 2010, 2016). Given that there appears to be a sheep in the meadow, the situation in which there is no sheep in the meadow requires more explanation than the situation in which there is a sheep in the meadow. The appearance of a sheep in the meadow normically supports the proposition that there is a sheep in the meadow. Given that there are 100 tickets in the lottery and only one winner, the situation in which ticket #72 is the winner requires no more explanation than the situation in which ticket #45 is the winner or ticket #12 is the winner etc. The fact that there are 100 tickets in the lottery and only one winner does not normically support the proposition that ticket #72 has lost. We can draw a similar contrast between the two kinds of evidence at play in the BlueBus example. Given that an eyewitness testified that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus, if it turned out that the bus involved was not a Blue-Bus bus, then there would have to be some accompanying explanation. Possible explanations have already been floated above – perhaps the witness was hallucinating, or a bus owned by another company was sporting a Blue-Bus logo or the witness concocted a story to smear the company etc. It can't 'just so happen' that the testimony was wrong. But it could just so happen that the bus involved was not a BlueBus bus, in spite of the fact that 90% of the buses operating in the area on the day in question were Blue-Bus buses. While this might in a sense be surprising, given the proportions involved, it clearly wouldn't demand any kind of further explanation. Given the statistical evidence it would frequently be the case that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus. Given the testimonial evidence it would normally be the case that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus. The testimonial evidence normically supports this proposition, while the statistical evidence does not. Furthermore, the testimonial evidence 20 normically supports this proposition irrespective of how we fill in the external facts and details of the case14. It makes no difference, for instance, whether the bus involved really was a Blue-Bus bus or a bus of another kind – what is important is that the bus could not have been a bus of another kind without there being some associated explanation. Similar remarks apply to the Joe case. In one scenario, an eyewitness claims that she saw Joe stealing the television and the television is found in Joe's possession. If it still turns out that Joe is innocent of this crime, then explanation is needed. In the other scenario, what we have is the information that Joe carried a television from the store and that 99 of the 100 televisions carried from the store were stolen. This evidence does make it very likely that Joe is guilty – but if we choose to wield it against Joe we effectively know, going in, that he could simply be the one innocent person and that's that. The former body of evidence normically supports the proposition that Joe stole a television, while the latter body of evidence does not. Once again, these claims are independent of any further details of the case that are yet to be specified. Whether Joe is guilty, whether Joe is innocent, the statistical evidence leaves it open that he be innocent without any special explanation being required. The question of whether the statistical evidence normically supports Joe's guilt can perfectly well be 14 If, however, there was additional evidence available in this case, then the conclusion that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus may no longer be normically supported. Normic support is defeasible – just because a given body of evidence normically supports a proposition, it does not automatically follow that an expanded or enriched body of evidence will continue to do so. If the witness admits, under cross examination, that she is prone to colour hallucinations, then the normic support for the proposition that the bus involved was a Blue-Bus bus would be defeated. Given the expanded body of evidence, the falsity of this proposition would no longer require more explanation that its truth. More plausibly, if we learned that the witness had changed her initial story, or if another witness took the stand and denied that the bus was a Blue-Bus bus, then this would arguably have the same effect. I give a more detailed discussion of the defeasibility of normic support in (Smith, 2016, particularly sections 4.3 and 7.2). In some cases there may be a kind of 'standing defeater' for testimony offered in court – this may be so, for instance, in the case of testimony that a defendant offers on his own behalf, or testimony offered by an eyewitness with an obvious interest in fabricating a story so as to avoid incrimination. In any case with this structure, the standing defeater would itself need to be defeated or neutralised before the testimony would supply normic support for its content. I won't pursue these issues further here. 21 answered without our taking any prior view on Joe's guilt. It is straightforwardly answered in the negative. In the cases considered, our judgments about the presence or absence of normic support track our judgments about whether an affirmative legal verdict would be acceptable or unacceptable. What I suggest is a standard of proof that is met only if a proposition is normically supported by the evidence – only if the evidence makes the falsity of that proposition less normal, in the sense of calling for more explanation, than its truth. What I suggest is that a verdict of guilt or liability is only acceptable in so far as this normic standard is met. This is my proposed solution to the legal puzzle of statistical evidence15. A few points of immediate clarification: First, the proposed normic standard is not meant to be applied to each individual item of evidence presented in a trial but, like the probabilistic standards found in legal doctrine, is to be applied to the total evidence presented. Second, the normic standard is being proposed only as a necessary condition for the acceptability of an affirmative verdict. It is compatible with the proposal that a normically supportive body of evidence be deemed insufficient for an affirmative verdict. Third, and relatedly, the normic standard is not being put forward as an alternative to probabilistic standards of proof, but can exist alongside such standards. If we imagine a legal system that 15 To give a corresponding solution to the epistemic puzzle of statistical evidence, we would need to accept a normic standard for justified belief – a view on which one only has justification to believe a proposition if it is normically supported by one's evidence. While I am inclined to accept this view, it does raise a number of issues which I haven't attempted to address here. The idea that we cannot justifiably believe, on the basis of the odds involved, that a single ticket has lost a fair lottery is non-standard, though it has been defended, often as a response to the lottery paradox (see, for instance Ryan (1996), Nelkin (2000), Smithies (2012), Littlejohn (2012)). Further, in Knowledge and Lotteries, John Hawthorne famously argues that many of the things we ordinarily believe, particularly about the future, entail propositions about lottery outcomes. If, for instance, I believe that I won't be able to afford an African safari holiday next year, this entails that I'm not about to win a large cash prize in the lottery. If I lack justification for believing the latter, as the normic view would seem to imply, and justification is closed under single premise deductive consequence, then I must lack justification for believing the former – a concession which might seem to invite a more general sceptical threat. I think that the normic view has the resources to meet this threat (Smith, 2016, section 3.2), but I won't attempt to engage with this issue here. In any case, this problem does not appear to beset the normic solution to the legal puzzle of statistical evidence – at least not in the same form. 22 really did operate with purely probabilistic standards of proof – with, say, one threshold for civil trials and a higher threshold for criminal trials – then a normic standard could be introduced while leaving the existing probabilistic standards in place. This would never make verdicts of guilt or liability any easier to secure. Rather, it would place further limits on such verdicts – and would do so, or so it is hoped, in such a way as to bring the imagined system closer to our own. As this discussion illustrates, the existence of a normic standard for civil and criminal trials is still compatible with the overall standards of proof being higher in criminal trials. One way to achieve this is to conjoin a normic standard with a more demanding probabilistic standard for criminal trials and a less demanding probabilistic standard for civil trials. It is worth noting, however, that the notion of normic support may enable a more radical departure from the standard conception of legal standards of proof. The above definition of normic support is naturally extended to comparisons: Say that a body of evidence E1 normically supports a proposition P more strongly than a body of evidence E2 just in case the circumstance in which E1 is true and P is false is less normal, in the sense of requiring more explanation, than the circumstance in which E2 is true and P is false. While I won't attempt to develop such an account here, it may be possible to make sense of different standards of proof, of varying strength, from within a purely normic framework, without any appeal to probabilistic standards whatsoever16. 16 I've considered a number of cases in which evidence provides strong probabilistic support for liability or guilt but no normic support, and used such cases to argue against purely probabilistic standards of proof. But cases of the reverse sort are also possible – and might weigh against the idea of purely normic standards of proof. It is possible for a body of evidence E to provide normic support for a proposition P, whilst providing only weak probabilistic support. One way in which this can occur is if the falsity of P, given E would require more explanation that its truth but there are numerous independent factors that could potentially explain falsity, and a significant likelihood that some such factor obtains, though none has been identified. In this case the probability of P, given E may be relatively low, even though P is normically supported by E. This is not merely an abstract possibility – there are cases of eyewitness testimony that arguably fit this pattern. Much of the psychological research on the reliability of eyewitnesses has served to highlight the sheer range of factors that can potentially interfere with the accurate reporting of a witnessed event (Loftus, 1996). 23 4. Some difficulties: The case of DNA evidence I have put forward a normic standard of proof as a way of interpreting what would otherwise be a puzzling feature of our legal practice – namely, the legal preference for testimonial over statistical evidence. If we accept that normic support is also a necessary condition for ordinary justified belief, it may go some way towards rationalising the legal preference – testimonial evidence can give rise to justified belief while statistical evidence cannot17. For all I have said, though, it may be that the normic standard clashes with other aspects of our legal practice. Even if eyewitness testimony is capable of meeting the normic standard, it may be that other kinds of evidence routinely appealed to in civil and criminal trials – and sometimes treated as a sufficient basis for an affirmative verdict – cannot. At first glance, the remarks that I've made about testimonial evidence would seem to carry over to many other categories of incriminating evidence. If we have, say, photographs or video footage that appears to show a defendant in the act of committing a crime, or a defendant is shown to have lied about his whereabouts at the time a crime took place, or we have a signed confession etc. then these kinds of evidence clearly do more than simply 'stack the odds' in favour of guilt. In the event that a defendant is innocent, the existence of such evidence is a circumstance that would demand special explanation. There may well be circumstances in which some kind of interference with a piece of eyewitness testimony should be regarded as significantly likely, although no evidence of actual interference has been presented. In such circumstances, it would seem highly questionable to base a criminal conviction on the testimony in question – which speaks in favour of operating with probabilistic as well as normic standards of proof. It may be that such convictions could also be blocked by utilising stronger normic standards of proof – but I won't pursue this here. 17 It's plausible to think that it could not be acceptable to base a verdict of guilt or liability on evidence that would be insufficient to ground justified belief in guilt or liability (see for instance Ho, 2008, chap. 3). However, Enoch, Fisher and Spectre argue that the law should not care about epistemological niceties such as knowledge or justified belief – at least not as ends in themselves (Enoch, Fisher and Spectre, 2012, section V). I won't pursue this topic here but, suffice it to say, if Enoch, Fisher and Spectre are correct, then the normic standard may offer only an interpretation of the legal practice, and one that effectively leaves questions about its legitimacy open. 24 There will be more difficult cases, though – and I will focus here on one: DNA evidence. Suppose a DNA sample is lifted from a crime scene and identified as belonging to the perpetrator. When run against a database the sample yields a 'cold hit' – a matching DNA profile belonging to some member if the population, with no other known connection to the crime. Suppose this individual is arrested and charged with the crime. Suppose that no further evidence against the individual emerges, but an expert witness testifies that the chance of two individuals in the population sharing the same profile is exceedingly slim. Should the individual be convicted of the crime, just on the basis of the DNA match? Whatever our feeling about this, it seems that a conviction in a case like this may violate a normic standard. While it may be very unlikely that there is another person in the population who matches the profile, and is the source of the sample at the crime scene, this would not, or not obviously, be a circumstance requiring special explanation. To put it differently, the individual in this case may be innocent and his profile match the sample as a result of sheer chance. A few points are immediately worth making. First, most uses of DNA evidence in criminal prosecution are, at present, not like the case described. DNA evidence often takes the form of a match between a crime scene sample and the profile of a person upon whom suspicion has already fallen for independent reasons, such as eyewitness testimony. These 'confirmatory' uses of DNA evidence may often result in successful conviction, and a normic standard is in no conflict with this – for the standard could easily be met by the total evidence presented. And if, as suggested above, we understand 'beyond reasonable doubt' to incorporate both a normic and a probabilistic standard, then the DNA evidence may even play a pivotal role in ensuring that a conviction is acceptable18. 18 Given a mixed normic/probabilistic standard of proof, we would expect DNA evidence to be deemed relevant and admissible in criminal trials, consistent with the actual practice – but would face a residual puzzle of explaining why statistical evidence of other kinds is often deemed to be inadmissible. In contrast, a pure normic standard of proof, of the kind suggested at the end of §3, would serve to raise doubts about the relevance and 25 Similar remarks apply to cases in which a suspect, initially identified via a cold hit, is subsequently linked to a crime in independent ways. In these cases, too, conviction may be consistent with a normic standard. But there are real cases that come closer to the above description – cases in which a conviction has been secured based on nothing more, or little more, than a DNA cold hit19. Further, there is some indication that such 'pure cold hit' convictions will become increasingly common, driven partly by improvements in DNA recovery techniques and by the massive expansion of offender databases (see Roth, 2010, section IB, section II)20. This practice remains controversial amongst legal theorists, however (see Semikhodskii, 2007, Roth, 2010), and there are also examples of cold hit DNA prosecutions that have resulted in acquittals or reversals on appeal. admissibility of (normically inert) statistical evidence, but such doubts would appear to extend to DNA evidence as well. As I mentioned in n9 admissibility is not my primary concern here – but I hope to pursue these questions elsewhere. 19 See, for instance, State v Toomes, 191 S.W.3d 122, 129 (Tenn. Crim. App. 2005), State v Hunter, 861 N. E.2d 898, 901 (Ohio Ct. App., 2006), People v Puckett, No. A121368 (Cal. Ct. App. 2009)). Cold hit DNA convictions are sometimes presented as an exception to courts' general reluctance to rely on purely statistical evidence. The claim that DNA evidence is just a kind of statistical evidence seems widely accepted (see, for instance, Roth, 2010, Enoch and Fisher, 2015, part III) though it is seldom defended in any detail. It is true enough that the provision of DNA evidence tends to be accompanied by some numerical estimate, from an expert witness, of the probability of error. But it doesn't follow from this alone that the evidence is purely statistical in nature. After all, any sort of evidence – testimony included – could in principle be accompanied by a probability estimate from an expert. Even if a piece of eyewitness testimony came with an attached probability value based on extensive research into the reliability of eyewitnesses, that would not make it into purely statistical evidence. The normic support that the testimony provides for its content is not lost simply because probability has been allowed to enter the picture. While I think it may ultimately be correct to categorise DNA evidence as statistical, there may be other cases in which the salience of probability estimates has led to evidence being mischaracterised. In n3 I mentioned a well known case – Kaminsky v Hertz Corp. – in which a finding of liability was, allegedly, based on evidence that is purely statistical. In this case, once again, the evidence presented had a very clear probability attached, and the supposition that the evidence was purely statistical seems based on nothing more than this. Arguably, though, the fact that a truck bears a Hertz logo does provide normic support for the proposition that it is owned by Hertz – normic support which is not diminished by learning of the precise frequency with which this is borne out. In this case, the presented evidence would meet a normic standard of proof. Some suggestive commentary in Kaminsky v Hertz Corp. suggests that the evidence was not taken to be purely probabilistic: 'We find...that the Hertz color scheme and logo establish a prima facie showing of ownership or control...The named firm may introduce evidence indicting lack of control or ownership. But such explanations are for the jury to evaluate and appraise in light of all the surrounding circumstances'. The 'descriptive' question of what it means for evidence to be purely statistical and the 'normative' question of what it takes for evidence to support an acceptable affirmative verdict cannot be completely disentangled from one another. 20 There are political reasons also. In the United States, local authorities have received large federal grants to expand the use of DNA evidence in resolving backlogged cases. See National Research Council, Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward (2009). 26 A normic standard of proof would block pure cold hit DNA convictions. If an individual is innocent of a crime, and is not the source of a DNA sample found at a crime scene, there may be an explanation as to why it matched his profile in a database – the sample was compromised, the test results were tampered with, someone was trying to frame him – but, equally, there may not be. Even if nothing like this has taken place, the individual may still be innocent, and the match a result of sheer chance21. This is one respect in which pure cold hit DNA convictions depart from pre-existing legal practice. None of this is to say that cold hit DNA convictions are illegitimate. The clash with the normic standard could be portrayed as a reason for being critical of such convictions – but could also be seen as a reason for resisting the standard, and seeking an alternative solution to the legal puzzle of statistical evidence. I have argued that Enoch, Fisher and Spectre's sensitivity-based solution to the puzzle is not effective. But it is nevertheless instructive to note that it does appear to offer a different verdict on pure cold hit DNA evidence (Enoch and Fisher, 2015, part III). If an individual identified via a cold hit really is the source of a DNA sample found at a crime scene then, had he not committed to crime, there would have been no cold hit. The evidence is sensitive to his guilt22. In so far as the normic standard is supported by its capacity to make sense of certain aspects of legal practice, the fact that it conflicts with other aspects, even contentious ones, can carry only limited weight against them. One potential way to take the argument against cold hit DNA convictions further would be to offer a principled reason as to why the law should care about normic support – about ensuring that convictions are normically supported. 21 Cases in which a match results from laboratory error or tampering or interference of some other kind are sometimes referred to as 'false' matches. While a cold hit DNA conviction may be wrongful as a result of a false match, the crucial point is that the conviction may be wrongful even if the match is 'true'. 22 Naturally, if the individual in question is not the source of the DNA at the crime scene, and the match is a false one or a coincidental true one, the evidence will not be sensitive to his guilt. This is another instance in which the sensitivity or insensitivity of the evidence hinges upon the guilt or innocence of the defendant. 27 If it could be shown that a normic standard is important for the overarching aims or purposes of the legal system, then this could increase the pressure on such convictions. Enoch, Fisher and Spectre do provide a principled account of why the law should care about sensitivity and, in that respect, my theory is less complete than theirs23. I won't attempt to pursue this here however. Legal adjudication is one setting in which we are made acutely aware of our own uncertainty – and the notion of probability offers us a powerful way in which our uncertainty can be quantified, and made more tractable. Perhaps it is understandable, in this setting, that we should always try and view our uncertainty through this lens – to take the significance of evidence to be exhausted by its probabilistic significance. As some commentators on the legal puzzle of statistical evidence have claimed 'all factual evidence is ultimately 'statistical' and all legal proof ultimately 'probabilistic'' (Tribe, 1971, pp1130, n2) and that 'all information is probability information' (Saks and Kidd, 1980-81, pp153). And yet, there is nothing God-given about the notion of probability. When it comes to managing our uncertainty, all that we have are a number of human contrivances, better and worse suited to different purposes. If we are open, from the outset, to a range of different ways of managing 23 Enoch, Fisher and Spectre's account appeals to the aim of deterring criminal or negligent behaviour, which undoubtedly has a strong claim to being one of the aims of the legal system. Put roughly, if courts were willing to base affirmative verdicts on insensitive evidence then, according to Enoch, Fisher and Spectre, this might lead people to reason that they could be convicted or found liable irrespective of what they do – thus removing an important incentive for responsible or law abiding behaviour. If, for instance, courts were prepared to find the Blue-Bus company liable for any bus related incident, purely in virtue of its large market share, then that could make rival companies, and perhaps even the Blue-Bus company itself, less inclined to take proper precautions, maintain high safety standards etc. It may be that a willingness to base affirmative verdicts on statistical evidence would have the adverse consequences that Enoch, Fisher and Spectre suggest – but, once again, I doubt that the insensitivity of such evidence could adequately explain this. After all, courts already do base affirmative verdicts on evidence that is insensitive. This is just a consequence of the fact that courts sometimes arrive at affirmative verdicts that are incorrect. This doesn't dampen the capacity of the legal system to deter crime – or, if it does, then it does so unavoidably. 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Euclidean Geometry is a Priori Boris ƒulina Department of Mathematics, University of Applied Sciences Velika Gorica, Zagreba£ka cesta 5, Velika Gorica, CROATIA email: [email protected] I come more and more to the conviction, that the necessity of our [Euclidean] geometry cannot be proven, at least not by human understanding nor for human understanding. Perhaps in another life we come to dierent insights into the essence of space, that are now impossible for us to reach. Until then, we should not put geometry on the same rank with arithmetic, which stands purely a priori, but say with mechanics. Carl Friedrich Gauss, in a letter to Olbers from 1817 Abstract. in the article, an argument is given that Euclidean geometry is a priori in the same way that numbers are a priori, the result of modelling, not the world, but our activities in the world. keywords: symmetry, Euclidean geometry, axioms, Weyl's axioms, philosophy of geometry Until the appearance of non-Euclidean geometries, Euclidean geometry and numbers had an equal status in mathematics. Indeed, until then, mathematics was described as the science of numbers and space. Whether it was thought that mathematical objects belong to a special world of ideas(Plato), or that they are ultimate abstractions drawn from the real world (Aristotle),or that they are a priori forms of our rational cognition (Kant), mathematical truths were considered, because of the clarity of their subject matter, a priori objective truths that are not subject to experimental verication. Descartes in Meditations (1641) writes: I counted as the most certain the truths which I concieved clearly as regards gures, numbers, and other matters which pertain to arithmetic and geometry, and, in general to pure and abstract mathematics.. Even Hume considered mathematics to be a non-empirical science that deals not with facts but with relations of ideas. It seems that Euclid himself, judging by the way he formulated the fth postulate, considered that the postulate does not have the status of obvious truth like other postulates because the postulate speaks of very distant parts of the plane about which we have no clear idea. Unsuccessful attempts to prove the fth postulate from the remaining postulates (Saccheri, Lambert), which would establish its unquestionability, eventually resulted in the development of non-Euclidean geometries (Lobachevsky, Bolyai, Gauss) (see [Tor78]). In the 19th century, it became clear that non-Euclidean geometries were equal to Euclidean 1 geometry both in their internal consistency and as candidates for the true geometry of the world. Mathematics ceases to be a set of unquestionable truths about the world and an era of a dierent understanding of its nature begins. The view of Euclidean geometry is also changing it loses its mathematical status equal to numbers. Plato's motto "God geometrizes" turns into Dedekind's motto "Man arithmetizes". The period of arithmetization of mathematics begins  the dierential and integral calculus is separated from the hitherto dominant geometric intuition and is logically based on number systems and sets. In Riemann's work, geometry is also arithmetized. It is no longer seen as a priori truth but as a mathematical basis for examining real physical space. Arithmetic and set theory are becoming mathematically well-founded theories, primarily in the works of Dedekind and Cantor. The numbers themselves are beginning to be seen as human creations, and the mathematics based on sets is beginning to be considered a priori in a new sense, as a free creation of the human mind. The beginning of this transformation of mathematics as well as the view of its nature can be most strongly connected with the Göttingen circle (Gauss, Dirichlet, Riemann, Dedekind, and even Cantor see [Fer07]). In parallel, geometry is increasingly seen as part of physics, the science of real space (Riemann, Helmholtz) in which mathematics has the same role as it does in all natural sciences  it considers various mathematical models for the theoretical description of physical phenomena. Thus Euclidean geometry loses the status of a priori mathematical theory and becomes only one of the possible models for physical space distinguished only by the fact that it is a good approximation of the space in which practical science takes place. Contrary to the proclaimed separation of the mathematical status of Euclidean geometry and numbers, in real mathematical practice they still have equal status. Geometric intuition is still an inexhaustible source of mathematical ideas, and it is certainly not the intuition of non-Euclidean but of Euclidean geometry. Euclidean structures permeate modern mathematics as much as number structures. For example, to visualize the various abstract spaces of functions, we look for an Euclidean structure in them rather than a structure of non-Euclidean geometry. Note that this is the Euclidean structure determined by Weyl's vector axioms and not Euclidean axioms. The geometry that is present in this way in mathematical practice and which permeates the mathematical way of thinking, and which I will term mathematical geometry here, should be distinguished from physical geometry as the science of real physical space. Of course, mathematical models of physical geometry are very important, but Euclidean geometry is only one of the models. Contrary to this, Euclidean geometry forms the very core of mathematical geometry. I think that we cannot explain this by the fact that very important notions of linearity and approximation have a simple formulation in Euclidean structures, nor by Poincare's conventionalism according to which Euclidean geometry has a prominent role because it is the simplest geometry. In my opinion, such a situation can arise only if Euclidean geometry is a priori. Furthermore, in mathematical Euclidean geometry the Weyl's system of axioms is dominant to the Euclid's system. Although the Euclid's system of axioms for Euclidean geometry is taught in school, the Weyl's system of axioms is used in modern mathematics, physics and engineering.1 Today, the Weyl's system of axioms is one of the essential synthesizing tools of modern mathematics while Euclid's system is of a secondary importance. My thesis, which I will argue below, 1It follows from this fact that an appropriate reform of school geometry needs to be made. 2 is that this happens because the original Euclidean system of axioms reects a posteriori intuition (hence physical intuition) about Euclidean geometry while the Weyl's system of axioms reects a priori intuition (hence mathematical intuition) about Euclidean geometry. My aim is to show that Euclidean geometry is a priori in the same sense in which numbers are a priori, and that its a priori nature is expressed precisely by Weyl's axioms. This will explain why the core of mathematical geometry is precisely Euclidean geometry in Weyl's axiomatics. I will show that just as number systems are idealized conceptions derived from intuition about our internal activities of counting and measuring, so too is Euclidean geometry an idealized conception derived from intuition about our internal spatial activities. By our internal activities, I mean activities that we organize and design according to our human measure. In [ƒ20] I argued that our internal world of activities is the source of all mathematics and that mathematics is precisely in this sense a priori  it is the result of modelling not the world but our activities in the world. The basic intuition about our internal spatial activities is an a priori ignorant approach to space: all places are the same to us (the homogeneity of space), all directions are the same to us (the isotropy of space) and all units of length we use for constructions in space are the same to us (the scale invariance of space). In [ƒ17] I developed a system of axioms which on the one hand is directly based on these three principles of symmetry and on the other hand, through the process of algebraic simplication, entails the equivalent Weyl system of axioms of Euclidean geometry. In this way I have shown that the nature of Euclidean geometry is a priori: Euclidean geometry is an idealization of our a priori ignorant approach to space, expressed in an algebraically simplied form by Weyl's axioms. This argument could satisfy Gauss who expressed in the quote from the beginning of the article his dissatisfaction with the epistemic status of Euclidean geometry I will sketch this argument below. All details can be found in [ƒ17]. The connection of Euclidean geometry with the three symmetry principles has a long history. In 17th century John Wallis proved, assuming other Euclid's postulates, that the scale invariance principle "For every gure there exists similar gure of arbitrary magnitude." is equivalent to the Euclid's fth postulate [Wal99]. Wallis considered his postulate to be more convincing than Euclid's fth postulate. Tracing back to the famous Riemann lecture Über die Hypothesen welche der Geometrie zu Grunde liegen" ([Rie67]) at Göttingen in 1854 , it is well known that among all Riemann manifolds Euclidean geometry is characterized by the three symmetry principles. However, this characterisation is not an elementary one because it presupposes the whole machinery of Riemann manifolds. As I am aware, there is no an elementary description (a description in terms of intuitive relations between points) of Euclidean geometry that is based on the three symmetry principles. In [ƒ17] I developed a system of axioms that provides such an elementary description. The importance and validity of the three symmetry principles has been recognized also a long time ago. William Kingdon Cliord in [Cli73] and [Cli85] considers the three symmetry principles as the most essential geometrical assumptions. He considers that the principles are based on observations of the real space. Hermann von Helmholtz has the same opinion for the rst two symmetry principles which he unies in his principle of the free mobility of rigid bodies ([Hel68]). Henri Poincaré, in his analysis of the real space [Poi02], comes to the conclusion that the rst two symmetry principles are the most essential properties of the so 3 called geometric space which for him is not the real space but a conventional space  the most convenient description of the real space. An interesting explanation of the validity of the three symmetry principles comes from Joseph Delboeuf ([Del60]). He considers what remains when we ignore all dierences of things caused by their movements and mutual interactions. According to Delboeuf, in the ultimate abstraction from all diversities of real things we gain the homogeneous, isotropic, and scale invariant space the true geometric space which is Euclidean and which is dierent from the real space. However, for my argument about the a priori nature of Euclidean geometry, it is crucial that my interpretation of these principles is a dierent one: they are not a posteriori principles, the result of analysing the real space, but they are a priori principles in a sense that they express our a priori ignorant approach to space. As far as I know, there is only one elaborate attempt to establish the a priori nature of Euclidean geometry. This is the protogeometry of Lorenzen that has its roots in Dingler's ideas. This geometry is conceived as a theory about the conditions under which spatial measurements are possible [Lor87]. Protogeometry is also based on symmetry. However, this symmetry is not an expression of our basic geometric intuition, which is equal in its depth to arithmetic intuition, but a special intuition about plane, parallelism and orthogonality. Lorenzen shows how plane, parallelism, and orthogonality can be dened using symmetry, and how these concepts lead to Euclidean geometry. However, in his derivation, he uses existence axioms: For each plane E and each point P there exists a unique plane parallel to E through P , and similarly there exists a unique line through P and orthogonal to E. [Lor87]. These axioms are not justied by anything, and that devalues his a priori foundation of Euclidean geometry. Furthermore, Lorenzen himself writes that other standards of length measurement are possible [Lor87], ie that other (non-Euclidean) a priori constructions are also possible as preconditions for spatial measurements.The conclusion is that, even if the a priori nature of Euclidean geometry were shown in such a way, that a priori nature would be of a specialized nature for mathematics and not the core of mathematical geometry. Now I will gradually introduce an elementary system of axioms about space of points which have an immediate support (i) in intuitive ideas about a relation between two points, (ii) in the three symmetry principles, and (iii) in the idea of continuity of space. The primitive terms of the system of axioms are: (i) equivalence of pairs of points (arrows), (ii) multiplication of a pair of points by a real number and (iii ) distance between points. The multiplication could be avoided. Although, from the point of view of the foundation of the theory, it is better to dene multiplication, the procedure is somewhat lengthy and I prefer to introduce the multiplication as a new primitive term. Also, it is more simple to introduce the distance function (to add an arbitrary unit of measurement) as a new primitive term than to introduce congruence between pairs of points as a new primitive term and dene the distance function relative to the choice of a unit of measurement. Geometrical space S will be modelled as a non empty set of objects termed points. The basic geometrical relation is the position of one point relative to another (not necessarily dierent) point. That the position of a point B relative to a point A is the same as the position of a point B′ relative to a point A′ we will denote AB ∼ A′B′ and we will say that pairs or arrows AB and A′B′ are equivalent. This is the rst primitive term of our system. It expresses a basic intuitive idea about the relative positions of points. The idea itself to be 4 in the same relative position implies that it is a relation of equivalence. This is the content of the rst axiom. Axiom (A1). ∼ is an equivalence relation. In more detail, it means: Axiom (A1.1). AB ∼ AB (reexivity) Axiom (A1.2). AB ∼ A′B′ → A′B′ ∼ AB (symmetry) Axiom (A1.3). AB ∼ A′B′ ∧ A′B′ ∼ A′′B′′ → AB ∼ A′′B′′ (transitivity) Concerning the relative positions of points to a given point A we can easily describe the equivalence relation ∼: by the very idea of the relative position of points, dierent points have dierent relative positions to A: Axiom (A2). AB ∼ AC → B = C. Basic operations with arrows are to invert an arrow and to add an arrow to another arrow. The denitions follow: inverting arrow: AB 7→ −AB = BA addition of arrows; AB, BC 7→ AB +BC = AC Because of axiom A2 we can extend addition of arrows: generalized addition of arrows; AB +CD = AB +BX, where BX ∼ CD, under the condition that there is such a point X. By the homogeneity principle, the operations are invariant under the equivalence of arrows: Axiom (A3.1). AB ∼ A′B′ → BA ∼ B′A′. Axiom (A3.2). AB ∼ A′B′ ∧ BC ∼ B′C ′ → AC ∼ A′C ′ Until now, we know only that AB is equivalent to itself (reexivity of ∼) and to no other arrow from the point A (axiom A2). All other axioms are conditional statements. It remains to describe the equivalence of arrows originating from dierent points. Multiplication of an arrow by a real number will give us a description of the equivalence of arrows originating from dierent points. It is a new primitive operation based on an idea of stretching arrows and of an idea of iterative addition of the same arrow (numbers will be labelled with letters from the Greek alphabet): * : R× S2 → S2 λ,AB 7→ λ * AB Sometimes, since it is a common convention, we will not write the multiplication sign at all. The very idea of the multiplication as stretching arrows is formulated in the next axiom: Axiom (A4). ∀λ,A,B ∃C λ * AB = AC. 5 By the homogeneity principle, multiplication of an arrow by a number is invariant under the equivalence of arrows: Axiom (A5). AB ∼ CD → λAB ∼ λCD. For a point C such that AC = λ * AB we will say that it is along AB. Also, for arrow AC we will say that it is along AB. The very idea of the multiplication as addition of the same arrow leads to the next axiom: Axiom (A6.1). 1 * AB = AB. By the homogeneity principle, we can translate any arrow along AB to any point along AB. So, we can add such arrows. Specially, we can add λ * AB and μ * AB and the result will be λ * AB + μ * AB = ν * AB for some number ν. Moreover, by the very idea of the multiplication as iterative addition of the same arrow, ν = λ+ μ. This is the content of the next axiom: Axiom (A6.2). λ * AB + μ * AB = (λ+ μ) * AB. Let's note that with this equation we postulate also that the left side of the equation is dened. If we stretch an arrow along AB the result will be an arrow along AB, too. So, λ * (μ * AB) = ν * AB, for some number ν. Moreover, from the very idea of the multiplication as iterative addition of the same (stretched) arrow it follows that ν = λ * μ. This is the content of the next axiom: Axiom (A6.3). λ * (μ * AB) = (λ * μ) * AB. Let's note that with this equation we postulate also that λ * (μ * AB) is along AB. The last axiom (and the most important one) expresses the scale invariance principle. Axiom (A7). (the scale invariance axiom) If AC = λ * AB and AC ′ = λ * AB′ then CC ′ ∼ λ *BB′. (Fig.1) Figure 1: Of the special interest is a somewhat modied special case of the scale invariance axiom, for λ = 2: 6 Theorem (A'5). (the elementary scale invariance law) AB ∼ BC and AB′ ∼ B′C ′ → ∃ P CP ∼ PC ′ ∼ BB′. (Fig.2) Figure 2: This theorem has two important consequences: Theorem (T3). (the unique translation of arrows law) ∀B,B′, C ∃!P BB′ ∼ CP . Figure 2 gives a hint for the construction of point P . The unique translation of arrows law enables us to add arbitrary arrows, without any condition, as we have done before. AB + CD = AB +BX, where BX ∼ CD Theorem (T4). (the parallelogram law) AB ∼ A′B′ → AA′ ∼ BB′. (Fig.3) Figure 3: Remark 1. Assuming only axioms A1 to A3 and that ∀A,B ∃D AB ∼ BD, without any axiom on the multiplication, we can prove that the elementary scale invariance law is equivalent to the conjunction of the unique translation of arrows law and parallelogram law. Remark 2. Until now we haven't used axiom A1.1 (reexivity). Indeed we can prove it now. 7 Remark 3. The parallelogram law is algebraically very ecient in proofs. For example, assuming only the parallelogram law, we can prove the equivalence of: (i) A1.1 (reexivity of ∼) and that ∀A,B AA ∼ BB (all arrows of the type AA are equivalent), (ii) A1.2 (symmetry of ∼) and A3.1 (invariance under ∼ of inverting arrows) , (iii) A1.3 (transitivity of ∼) and A3.2 (invariance under ∼ of adding arrows). Axiom A1 enables us to dene vectors. Since, by A1, ∼ is an equivalence relation, it classies arrows (pairs of points) into classes of mutually equivalent arrows. We dene vectors as these equivalence classes. The set of all vectors will be denoted −→ S . To every pair of points AB we will associate the vector −→ AB, the equivalence class to which AB belongs: −→ AB = {CD|CD ∼ AB} So, −→ maps pairs of points to vectors: −→ : S2 → −→ S . For every pair of points (arrows) belonging to a vector (an equivalence class) we say that it represents the vector. Thus, for example, a pair AB represents the vector −→ AB. Introduced axioms allow to transfer operations with arrows into operations with corresponding vectors, in a way invariant under relation ∼: null vector: −→ 0 = −→ AA inverse vector: − −→ AB = −→ BA Addition of vectors: −→ AB + −−→ BC = −→ AC Multiplication of a vector by a number: λ * −→ AB = −−−−→ λ * AB In [ƒ17] is proved that the space of vectors −→ S together with operations of addition of vectors and multiplication of a vector by a number has the structure of vector space, and that the space of points S together with the space of vectors −→ S and the mapping AB 7→ −→ AB, that is to say, the structure (S, −→ S , −→,+, *), where −→ : S2 → −→ S , + : −→ S 2 → −→ S , * : R× −→ S → −→ S , is Weyl's structure of ane space. Conversely, starting from Weyl's structure of ane space we could dene in a standard way the equivalence of arrows, addition of arrows and multiplication of an arrow by a number, and prove that for such a dened structure (S,∼,+, *), where S 6= ∅, ∼⊆ S2 × S2, + : S2 × S2 → S2, * : R× S2 → S2 all A propositions are valid. Hence, A axioms are equivalent to Weyl's axioms in this ane layer of Euclidean geometry. Let's note that in the structure (S,∼,+, *) addition + is dened and multiplication * can be dened if we choose to introduce multiplication of a vector gradually, rst by natural numbers, then by integers and rational numbers, and nally by real numbers. It means that there is essentially only one primitive term, the relation of equivalence ∼ between ordered 8 pairs of points. The basic geometric measure is a measure of the distance between points, the function | | : S2 → R. This is the next and the nal primitive term. The real number |AB| will be termed the length of the arrow AB or distance from the point A to the point B. By the homogeneity of space the length of an arrow must be invariant under equivalence relation ∼: Axiom (A8). AB ∼ CD → |AB| = |CD|. By the very idea of measuring distance: Axiom (A9.1). |AA| = 0. Every point B 6= A determines a direction in which we can go from A. Because of the isotropy of space, the algebraic sign of distance must be always the same  distance must be always negative or always positive or always zero. The zero case gives a trivial measure which does not make any dierence between arrows, so, it is a useless measure. Thus, the two other possibilities remain. Technically speaking they are mutually equivalent choices, but by the very idea of measuring it is natural to choose a positive algebraic sign: Axiom (A9.2). B 6= A → |AB| > 0. (positive deniteness) By the isotropy of space we also have: Axiom (A9.3). |AB| = |BA|. For every direction from a point A determined with a point B 6= A we already have a measure of distance. If we take AB as a unit of measure, than we can take the number λ > 0 as a measure of distance of AC where AC = λAB. Note that such a choice of measure along every direction need not be isotropic. However, along every direction the measure of distance A,B 7→ |AB| must be in accordance with this λ measuring (although it must be more than this): Axiom (A10). |λAB| = λ|AB|, for λ > 0, We can express axioms A9.1, A9.3 and A10 in a uniform way by the next equivalent proposition: Theorem (7). (compatibility of distance with multiplication) |λAB| = |λ||AB|, for every real number λ. The description of distance function we have achieved until now enables us to compare distances in a given direction with distances in the opposite direction and with distances in parallel directions. What remains is to solve the main problem: how to compare distances along arbitrary directions in an isotropic way. Let's take, in a given plane, along every direction from a point S, a point at a xed distance r > 0 from S. The set of such points is the circle with center S and radius r, C(S, r) = {T : |ST | = r}. Let's choose two points A and B on the circle and consider the unique line p(A,B) through these points (Fig.4): 9 Figure 4: Let's take an arbitrary point T on the line p(A,B) and consider how the distance d(T ) from T to the center S of the circle varies with the choice of T . Thereby, we will use the idea of continuity of space and of continuity of function d(T ). Because of the isotropy of space, the function d(T ) must be symmetrical with respect to the relative position of the point T to the points A and B (directions SA and SB). For example, the values of the function in the points A and B are the same (equal to r). Also, the function must have the same value in a point we reach when we move a certain distance from A to B as well as in the point we reach when we move the same distance from B to A (d(A+ λ −→ AB) = d(B + λ −→ BA)) (Fig.5): Figure 5: Because of this symmetry, the function d(T ) must have a local extreme value in the midpoint of AB. To determine more precisely the character of the extreme point we will exploit knowledge of a special case, when the points A and B are diametrically opposite on the circle, that is to say, when the center S of the circle lies on p(A,B). In that case, if we move a point T from A to B (or from B to A), the distance d(T ) from the center S of the circle decreases and it is smallest in the midpoint (S). Furthermore, if we move T from A in the direction opposite to the direction to B (or from B in the direction opposite to the direction to A), the distance increases. Therefore, the midpoint S is a unique point of the global minimum of the function d(T ). If we drag the point B slightly along the circle into the point B′, the center S of the circle will no longer be on the line p(AB′), but, because of continuity, the behaviour of the function d(T ) will remain the same. That is to say, the midpoint P of AB′ will remain a unique global minimum of the function on the line (Fig.6): 10 Figure 6: Because of continuity, for every two points A and B′ on the circle the function d(T ) will have a unique global minimum on line p(AB′) exactly in the midpoint of AB′. Thus, by the isotropy principle and the idea of continuity of space it follows: Axiom (A11). If a line has two common points with a circle, points A and B, then the midpoint P of AB is the point on the line nearest to the center of the circle. (Fig.7) Figure 7: From the axiom it follows immediately that a line can not have more than two common points with a circle. Let a line p have exactly one common point with a circle, a point A. If we drag the point A slightly along the circle in one direction onto a point Al, and in another direction onto a point Ad, then the line p is dragged onto the line p(Al,Ad). By axiom A11 the midpoint P of AB is the point on p(Al,Ad) nearest to the center of the circle. By continuity of space, the point A must be the point on p nearest to the center of the circle (Fig.8). Thus, by the isotropy principle and the idea of continuity of space it follows: 11 Figure 8: Axiom (A12). If a line has exactly one common point with a circle, then the common point is the point on the line nearest to the center of the circle. (Fig.9) Figure 9: Theorem (7'). For every point S not on a line p there is a unique point P on p which is the point on p nearest to S. The point on the line p nearest to the point S we term orthogonal projection of the point S on the line p. Orthogonal projection enables us to dene the scalar orthogonal projection of an arrow onto another arrow. Let C 6= D, and let points A and B be orthogonally projected on line p(CD) into points A′ and B′ (Fig.10). Then A′B′ ∼ αCD for some real number α. Figure 10: 12 We dene the scalar orthogonal projection of the arrow AB onto the arrow CD to be the number α|CD|. In simpler terms, it is just the ± length of the orthogonal projection of the arrow AB onto the line p(CD), where the sign is + if the projection is in the direction of CD, − otherwise. In the extreme case of null arrow CC it is convenient to take zero for the value of the scalar projection on CC. We will denote ABCD as the scalar projection of AB onto CD. For two equally long arrows with the same initial point, because of the isotropy of space, the scalar projection of the rst arrow on the second arrow must be the same as the scalar projection of the second arrow on the rst arrow. This is the content of the last axiom: Axiom (A13). |AB| = |AC| → ABAC = ACAB. (Fig.11) Figure 11: Now, we can dene the scalar product of arrows AB and CD. It is the product of the scalar projection of the arrow AB onto CD and the length of the arrow CD. More formally: AB * CD = ABCD * |CD| This operation is invariant under ∼ relation. The scalar product of vectors is dened by arrows which represent vectors: −→ AB * −−→ CD = AB * CD Since scalar product of arrows is invariant under ∼ the denition is correct, that is to say, it doesn't depend on the choice of arrows representing vectors. In [ƒ17] is shown that the scalar product of vectors, together with the ane structure of space, satisfy Weyl's axioms of Euclidean geometry. Conversely, by Weyl's axioms we can dene in a standard way the length of an arrow and deduce all A axioms about length. This means that A axioms of the structure of set of points S with relation ∼ between pairs of points, addition of pairs, multiplication of a pair by a number and distance function of a pair: (S,∼,+, *, | |), where S 6= ∅, ∼⊆ S2 × S2, + : S2 × S2 → S2, * : R× S2 → S2, | | : S2 → R, 13 are equivalent to Weyl's axioms of the corresponding structure of the set of points and the set of vectors together with the operation from pairs of points to vectors, addition of vectors, multiplication of a vector by a number and the scalar product of vectors: (S, −→ S , −→,+, *, *), where S 6= ∅, −→ : S2 → −→ S , +, * : −→ S 2 → −→ S , * : R× −→ S → −→ S Thus, showing that (i) the a priori ignorant approach to space gives three principles of symmetry, (ii) that the three principles of symmetry immediately support the introduced axioms, and that (iii) the introduced axioms, through algebraic simplication, entail Weyl's axioms of Euclidean geometry, I argued that Euclidean geometry is a priori. References [Cli73] William Kingdon Cliord. The Postulates of the Science of Space. 1873. the third in a series of lectures Cliord delivered at the Royal Institution in London. [Cli85] William Kingdon Cliord. The Common Sense of the Exact Sciences. Kegan, Paul, Trench, 1885. [Del60] Joseph Rémi Léopold Delboeuf. Proiegomenes Philosophiques de la Geometrie et Solution des Postulats. J. Desoer, 1860. [Fer07] José Ferreirós. Labyrinth of Thought: A History of Set Theory and Its Role in Modern Mathematics. Birkhäuser, 2 edition, 2007. [Hel68] Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand Helmholtz. Über die tatsachen, die der geometrie zu grunde liegen. Nachrichten der Königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften und der Georg Augustus Universität, (9):193  221, 1868. [Lor87] Paul Lorenzen. Constructive Philosophy. University of Massachusetts Press, 1987. [Poi02] Jules Henri Poincaré. La Science et l'Hypothèse. Flammarion, 1902. [Rie67] Georg Friedrich Bernhard Riemann. Über die Hypothesen, welche der Geometrie zu Grunde liegen, volume 13 of Abhandlungen der Königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen. 1867. [Tor78] Roberto Torretti. Philosophy of geometry from Riemann to Poincaré. Springer, 1978. [ƒ17] Boris ƒulina. An elementary system of axioms for euclidean geometry based on symmetry principle. Axiomathes, 2017. DOI 10.1007/s10516-017-9358-y. [ƒ20] Boris ƒulina. Mathematics as an imagined tool for rational cognition. unpublished, 2020. [Wal99] John Wallis. Opera Mathematica. E Theatro Sheldoniano, 1695-1699. 3 Vols.

A C T A U N I V E R S I T A T I S L O D Z I E N S I S FO L IA G E R M A N IC A 1, 1997 Alfred Tarantowicz W O RTB ILD EN D E A LTER N A TIO N EN IM D EU TSC H EN UND PO L N ISC H E N Wegen ihrer Bedeutung für die Lösung allgemeinlinguistischer Problem e ziehen die A lternationen schon seit langem die A ufm erksam keit der Linguististen au f sich. M orphonologischc Fragestellungen und besonders die Erforschung m orphonologischcr A lternationcn haben in den letzten Jahren in der Linguistik zunehmendes Gewicht erhalten. Die Prinzipien sowie auch konkrete Problem e der m orphonologischcn Analyse werden für den Linguisten wieder interessant, wobei die konfrontative M orphonologie dom iniert. Der vorliegende Beitrag verfolgt vor allem das Ziel, die morphonologischcn M öglichkeiten der deutschen und polnischen Sprache am Beispiel der w ortbildenden A lternation aufzuzeigen. Es werden hier einige theoretische und praktische A spekte der K onfron tation der W ortbildungsm orphologie im D eutschen und Polnischen diskutiert, um die Zusam m enhänge der hier aufgeworfenen Problem atik zu verdeutlichen. Jede K onfron tation basiert au f der Prämisse, dass bei der linguistischen Gegenüberstellung einzelne Problem e in einem neuen Licht gesehen werden können. Und ein neues Licht kann auch für eine konfrontative A uffassung von A lternationcn im Deutschen und Polnischen aufschlussreich sein, wie schon bisherige konfrontative Studien gezeigt haben. M an kann sagen, dass auch eine ganze Reihe von A lternationsphänom enen besser verstanden wird, wenn sie konfrontativ analysiert werden. In diesem Sinne wird dem Artikel von der K onfron tation G ebrauch gemacht. Im folgenden können wir keinen detaillierten Vergleich zwischen den deutschen und polnischen A ltem ationen und deren V ertretung vor allem im Bereich der Derivation angeben, sondern wir wollen nur einige Aspekte besprechen, die sich bei einer ersten Übersicht ergeben haben. Die für das Deutsche aufgestellten Alternationstypen ähneln in bestimmten Fällen den m orphologischen A lternationen des Polnischen, obwohl gerade das m orphonologische System beider Sprachen recht unterschiedlich ist. D och wurde das m orphonologische System des Deutschen nach ähnlichen Erscheinungen untersucht. Im Deutschunterricht m it Polnischsprachigen müssen noch viele Einzelfälle der Verwendung der A lternationen berücksichtigt werden. Es m uss noch aufgezeigt und vermittelt werden, welche Unterschiede und Ähnlichkeiten in dieser H insicht deutsche und polnische D erivate aufweisen. Typologisch wichtig ist dabei auch, welche m orphonologischen A lternationen in den beiden Sprachen besonders aktiv sind. Es geht und dabei um die Beschreibung und Interpretation von Phanem alternationen , die sich innerhalb der M orphem e oder an der M orphem grenze bei der K om bination von M orphem en in der deutschen und polnischen W ortb ildung ergeben. Sie werden als m orphonologische A lternationen bezeichnet und durch m orphonologische Regeln erfasst. Diese A lternationen haben in der W ortbildungsstruktur eine gewisse P riorität, obwohl sie nicht im m er das eigentliche1 M ittel der W ortbildung sind, das die syntaktische T ransform ation oder die semantische M odifikation bewirkt. W ir behandeln im folgenden nur die Derivation, da bei diesem W ortbildungstypus die meisten m orphonologischen A lternationen Vorkommen. D erivationclle A lternationen in der deutschen und polnischen W ortbildung treten dann auf, wenn alternierende Segmente Teil von zwei oder m ehreren Derivationen sind, die durch die Regeln der W ortbildung aus einer lexikalischen Einheit abgeleitet werden. Die so gebildeten A bleitungen unterscheiden sich von ihrer Basis nur durch das Spezifikum der neuen K ategorie. Wie haben also vor uns A lternationen , die aus A ffigierung und M odifizierung bzw. nur aus der M odifizierung der Basis durch A blaut oder U m laut kom binierbar sind. Vom m orphonologischen S tandpunkt aus könnte m an die K onsonantenalternationen in korrodieren K orrosion, kollidieren Kollision, Analyse analytisch, Syntax syntak tisch als m orphonologisch geregelte V eränderungen bezeichnen, bei denen es sich um ein aktives Bildungsmittel handelt. D iachronisch betrach tet, haben wir es hier m it entlehnten M orphem en zu tun , die in nichtnativen W örtern bei den W ortbildungsprozessen zum grössten Teil m it anderen entlehnten M orphem en und Affixen verknüpft werden. D er technische W ortschatz des Deutschen und des Polnischen wurde natürlich durch Entlehnungen erw eitert. D adurch steht in der F achsprache ein grosses R eservoir an allom orphischen derivationellen A lterna tionen zur Verfügung. Es handelt sich im weiteren um die V ariabilität der M orphem e, die in m orphonologischcn A lternationen zum A usdruck kom m t. M orphonologische A lternationcn sind somit A lternationen, deren G rundlage die V ariabilität der M orphem e bei der Flexion oder D erivation bildet. Die M öglichkeiten und Grenzen der V ariabilität von M orphem en werden von den spezifischen Bedingungen der sprachlichen Systeme bestim m t. D ie V ariab ilitä t des K onsonantism us und Vokalismus der M orphem e in der deutschen und polnischen Sprache unterliegt bei der W ortbildung verschiedenartigen und ungleich motivierten Beschränkungen. Der morphonologischcn Determinierung der Basislexemc durch Affixe und Alternationcn entspricht die m orphonologischc D istribution der W ortbildungskategorien, an die bestimmte A ltem ationen gebunden wurden, ln den meisten Fällen werden für die Bildungen aus dem dcrivationellen Bereich morphonologisch bedingte A ltem ationen vorgenommen. Fine solche m orphologisch konditionierte A lternation zwischen Segmenten des Basislexems spielt in der W ortbildung die wichtigste Rolle. M o rphonologisch geregelt können im Deutschen folgende A lternationen auftreten: Fabrik - fabrizieren, Praktik - praktizieren, M usik musizieren, Neurose ~ neurotisch, Chaos chaotisch, Eros erotisch, industriell industrialisieren, materiell materialisieren, rationell rationalisieren. ln diesen Beispielen bedingen Suffixe bestim mte A lternationen der Basis, das m orphonologische M aterial der deutschen Sprache bietet zahlreiche Belege derartiger K onsonantenaltcrnationen, z.B. die oben zitierten A lternationen von /dl m it /2/, von /*/ m it /s/, von /k t/ m it /ks/, von /g/ m it /s/. Um diesen Typ von A lternationen illustrieren zu können, bedienen wir uns der folgenden Beispiele: explodieren Explosion, expandieren Expansion, elliptisch Ellipse, emulgieren Emulsion. W eitere Beispiele für A lternation an der Basis, die sich durch V ariabilität der Basism orphem e auszeichen, sind die Form en des Typs: Duplikat duplizieren, Infektion infizieren, Produktion Produzent, Indikation Indiz. Dem gegenüber treten im Polnischen folgende K onsonantenalternationen als gewisse Ä quivalente auf. D er analoge A lternationstyp wie im Deutschen kom m t im Polnischen in solchen Form en vor wie z.B. korodować korozja, kolidować kolizja, analiza - analityczna, elipsa eliptyczny. H ier haben wir es also m it einem direkten Pendant zu tun. In verschiedenen Form ationen beider Sprachen gibt es die schon erwähnte A lternation k l с, z.B. dt. Publikum Publizist, poln. publika publicysta. In der polnischen W ortbildung alternieren auch, gemäss der Palatalitätskorrelation , die K onsonanten /* /- / // , /* /- / f / (d/), /*/-/.?/, /k /- /ts /, /g H d z /, wie z.B. in der Diminutivbildung: ję zy k ję zyczek , oko oczko, droga dróżka, mucha muszka. In verschiedenen expressiven Form ationen, z.B. ręka rączyna, und ferner in verschiedenen W ortbildungstypen wie z.B. znak znaczyć, krzyk krzyczeć oder vor bestimmten derivationcllen Suffixen wie -ny, z.B. rok roczny, strach straszny, -any, z.B. blacha blaszany, -arz/-arka, mleczarz mleczarka, -ysty, wiek wieczysty. F ür diese A lternationen des Polnischen haben wir im Deutschen keine direkten Entsprechungen. W ir beobachten in der polnischen Sprache sowohl m der Basis als auch an der M orphemgrenze verschiedene m ehr oder weniger kom plizierte A rten der derivationcllen A ltcrnationen , die aber unterschiedliche Verteilung und funktionelle A usnutzung aufweisen und nur das Polnische charakterisieren. Weit verbreitet ist in der polnischen W ortbildung die A usnutzung der K onsonan tenaltcrnationcn vom Typ palatal /nichtpalatal (Palatalitätsaltcrnationen) des Lautwechsels also, der im D eutschen praktisch nicht existiert. W ir wollen jetzt genauer die A lternation der Vokale im Basisinneren untersuchen, die in den W ortbildungsmustern der deutschen Sprache auftaucht. Die im Deutschen vorkom m enden vokalischcn A lternationen lassen sich in einem U m plauttyp und einem A blauttyp klassifizieren. ln der Derivation erscheint der Um laut als A lternation, meistens mit einem Affix kom biniert, bei einer Vielzahl von W ortbildungen, u.a. bei der Bildung von e-A bstrakta, von K ollcktiva m it Ge-, von Dem inutiven, von denom inalcn, verbalen und dcadjektivischen Substantiven und Verben, von Adjektiven au f -isch, -ig und -lieh. Als Illustrationsbeispiele sollen nur folgende U m lautalternationen genannt werden: hart Härte, warm Wärme, Blase Gebläse, backen Gebäck, Kanal Kanälchen, Buch Büchlein, tragen Träger, backen Bäcker, Stadt Städter, A rzt Ärztin, Bund Bündnis, Glas gläsern, L u ft lüften, falsch fälschen, fallen fällen, Sachse sächsisch, voll völlig, Wasser wässrig, fa llen fällig, D orf dörflich, kaufen käuflich, nutzen nützlich. Schon eine flüchtige Betrachtung der aufgezeigten Beispiele von Im lautaltcrnationen veranlasst uns, au f einige Besonderheiten hinzuweisen. Der Um laut lässt sich in diesen Fällen als eine die W ortbildung begleitende m orphonologische Erscheinung bezeichnen, die die m orphonologischcn Prozesse kosignalisiert. Das Suffix allein rcicht nicht aus, um das D erivat lautlich von einer flexivischen Form der Basis zu unterscheiden. Die G ruppe der Farbadjektive ist z.B. für Illustrationszwecke gut geeignet: schwarz Schwärze, blau Bläue, braun Bräune, rot Röte. Die D istribution der deutschen Dim inutivsuffixe -lein und -chen ist zweifellos phonologisch konditioniert. Deutsche -cAe/z-Präfcrcnzcn sprechen für eine scgmental-phonologischc Beschränkung der -/m -Suffigierung, vgl. z.B. Ställchen, Stühlchen, Kanälchen. Nach W. Fleischer gibt es Substantive au f (/), die zum indest alternativ m it -lein verträglich sind, vgl. z.B. Mäntelchen M änt(e)lein , Schnäbelchen Schnäb(e)lein, Nägelchen N äg(e)lein. Die Statistik weist auch im Bercich der derivationellen Umlautalternationen sehr unterschiedliche Verhältnisse auf. Wir haben z.B. solche Form en wie: gläubig glaublich, nordisch nördlich, affig-äffisch, örtlich andersartig, märkisch - markig. Als um lauthem m end wirken vorletzte Basissilben, z.B. hochzeitlich, mit D iphthongen, vor unbetonter Silbe m it K urzvokal, z.B. sonderlich und bäuerlich oder hoffentlich und öffentlich. Adjcltive mit den Suffixen -ig und -lieh werden nicht gleich behandelt. D er U m laut vor -ig oder -lieh steht ohne Regel ganz willkürlich, z.B. rötlich, säuerlich aber rundlich, bekanntlich. Charakteristisch für derivationelle Verhältnisse des D eutschen sind ferner reguläre und irreguläre A blautalternationen. Im Rahm en des verbalen Ablautsystem s können auch Substantive aus verben abgeleitet werden. Hierbei erscheinen entweder im Flexionsparadigm a vorkom m ende Vokale, wie dies die A lternationen. greifen Griff, schneiden Schnitt, treiben Trieb, schliessen Schloss, messen Mass, trinken Trank Trunk, schwingen Schwung bezeugen oder im Paradigm a nicht m ehr vorkom m ende Vokale, also völlig irreguläre A lternationen, z.B. werfen Wurf, giessen Guss, ziehen Zug, schiessen Schuss. Die Suffigierung und die Stam m vokalalternation nach A rt des A blauts erzeugen die Bildungen des Typs beissen Biss - bissig, fliessen ßüssig, streiten strittig. So sind auch unabhängig von ihrer semantischen M otivation m o rphologisch aufeinander bezogen: geniessen genüsslich Genuss, erziehen züchtig Zucht, sprechen sprachlich Sprache, bieten erbötig Gebot. Die letzten A lternationcn lassen sich nach generellen Prinzipien des deutschen Ablautsystem s erklären. Diese V okalaltem ationen haben m ateriell zur Folge, dass sich hier bis zu drei S tam m allom orphe ergeben: funktionell zeigt sich dies darin , dass die betreffenden W örter intern gegliedert sind und durch A blautaltcrnationcn stärker hervorgehoben werden. D er deutsche A blaut ist heute nicht m ehr produktiv als T räger gram matischer Unterschiede, sowohl in der Derivation als auch in der Frombildung, wo er m it Tem pusterscheidung belastet wird. Die W ortbildung des Deutschen bedient sich noch einer dem U m laut ähnlichen, wenngleich in ihrem A uftreten viel stärker eingeschränkten V okalaltem ation. Diese A lternation, die den Vokalismus betrifft, ist im D eutschen als 'e-i-W echscľ bzw. 'e-H ebung' bekannt. D as m orphonologische M aterial der deutschen Sprache bietet eindeutige Belege für derartige A lternationen in der W ortbildung, von denen nur eine Auswahl genannt werden kann. Die folgenden Reihen von (e)-(/)-Alternationen besitzt das Deutsche in der W ortbildung, z.B. bei der Bildung der Substantive wie helfen Hilfe geschehen Geschichte geben Gift sehen Sicht treten Tritt Feder Gefieder Berg Gebirge Feld Gefilde Stern Gestirn Schwester - Geschwister D aneben sind auch A lternationen zwischen den Vokalen (e) und (i) belegt, die jedoch nur in Einzelfällen wie gelb vergilben Erde irdisch Recht richten vorliegen. Auftreten, F unktion und interne R elationen dieser A lternation sind synchronisch bedingt und durch Gesetzm ässigkeiten des W ortbildungssystems au f bestimmte A rt geregelt. Die hier behandelten Bildungstypen bei denen die (e)-(/)-Alternationen auftreten, sind von der m orphologischen Um gebung abhängig. Im Bereich der W ortbildung werden m orphologische V okalaltem ationen dieses Typs, wie auch U m lautund A blau talternationen, von den entsprechenden W ortbildungsmorphemen verursacht und ausschliesslich m orphologisch konditioniert. W ir haben in unserem beitrag verschiedene Aspekte der W ortbildungsm orphonologie und somit verschiedene A lternationsarten beschrieben, um einige Einsichten in das Funktionieren dieser A lternationcn in der W ortbildung des Deutschen und Polonischcn zu gewinnen. Es ist klar, dass die genannten derivationcllen A lternationen im Polnischen m anche V oraussetzungen m it den deutschen A lternationen teilen, aber gegenüber diesen auch viele Unterschiede aufweisen und somit einen anderen Sachverhalt bezeichnen können. Z ur Eigenart des Polnischen gegenüber dem D eutschen tragen also in erster Linie strukturelle Unterschiede bei, da sich das Polnische durch grundlegende m orphonologische, diese Sprache von dem D eutschen differenzierende M erkm ale kennzeichnet. Die H auptursachen für die w ortbildenden A lternationcn in den beiden konfrontierten Sprachen sind strukturbedingt. Vergleicht m an also die deutschen und polnischen A ltcrnationen in der W ortbildung, so wird deutlich, dass die Ausfüllung der A ltcrnationsm odelle im Polnischen m it einer weitaus grösseren Regelmässigkeit erfolgt als im Deutschen. Das Polnische nutzt seine W ortbildungsmöglichkeiten m it grösserer Systematik aus. Die erörterten deutschen und polnischen A lternationen realisieren sich vornehmlich in der W ortbildung, wo sie zur Exposition bzw. Ko-Signalisierung gram m atischer D ichotom ien dienen. Die A lternationen bilden somit ein wichtiges zusätzliches Elem ent, das die sprachliche K om m unikation erleichtern kann. LITERATUR A ugst G.: Untersuchungen zum Morpheminventar der deutschen gegenwartssprache. Tübingen 1975. D ressier W. U.: Grundfragen der M orphologie, W ien 1977. Fleischer W.: Wortbildung der deutschen Gegenwartssprache. Leipzig 1983. M orciniec N .: Allophonischer und phonologischer Wechsel im Deutschen und Niederländischen, „G erm anica W ratislaviensia" 1972, N r. 16, S. 73-87. T arantow icz A.: Formbildende Alternationen im deutschen und Polnischen. Ł ódź 1980. Z ifonun 1.: Alternationen in der W ortbildung des heutigen Deutsch. G roos. Heidelberg 1970. Alfred Tarantowicz A LTER N A C JE SŁO W O TW Ó R C ZE W JĘ Z Y K U N IE M IE C K IM I PO LSK IM Celem niniejszego artykułu jest szczegółowa analiza altem acji słowotwórczych, zachodzących w obrębie słow otw órstw a niem ieckiego i polskiego w aspekcie porów naw czym . Inny zespół alternacji wokalicznych i konsonantycznych charaklerystyczny jest dla słownictwa rodzim ego, a inny d la wyrazów pochodzenia obcego. Alternacje słowotwórcze odgryw ają bardzo ważną rolę i pełnią isto tne funkcje w derywacji obu języków, towarzysząc w wielu kontekstach m orfem om fleksyjnym i słowotwórczym . Rów nież zakres i stopień produktyw ności alternacji jes t różny w konfron tow anych językach i zależy od tego, czy m am y d o czynienia z derywacją im ienną czy czasownikową.

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=urce20 Download by: [Sabrina D. MisirHiralall] Date: 16 August 2017, At: 10:07 Journal of Research on Christian Education ISSN: 1065-6219 (Print) 1934-4945 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/urce20 The Theological Misappropriation of Christianity as a Civilizing Force Sabrina D. MisirHiralall To cite this article: Sabrina D. MisirHiralall (2017) The Theological Misappropriation of Christianity as a Civilizing Force, Journal of Research on Christian Education, 26:2, 79-104, DOI: 10.1080/10656219.2017.1331413 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10656219.2017.1331413 Published online: 16 Aug 2017. Submit your article to this journal View related articles View Crossmark data JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 2017, VOL. 26, NO. 2, 79–104 https://doi.org/10.1080/10656219.2017.1331413 BORDER CROSSINGS The Theological Misappropriation of Christianity as a Civilizing Force Sabrina D. MisirHiralall Educational Foundations Department, Montclair State University, Montclair, NJ, USA ABSTRACT The theological misappropriation of Christianity as a civilizing force occurs when individuals convert to Christianity due to deception that ignores the faith-based aspect of Christianity. The history of Western education in India illustrates the hidden curriculum that Christian missionaries employed to disrupt the Indian educational system. This unnerving pedagogy points to the need for a postcolonial theoretical framework that relates the inescapable hybridity of religion and culture where Orientalism has the potential to occur. To press the ongoing urgency of this discussion, I convey how the history of British India connects to my lived-reality as an American Hindu. Overall, I point to hybridity as a lived paradox of ambiguous conflict that embraces interfaith relations. I offer implications for Christian missionaries today to foster authentic interfaith connections without engaging in colonizing ideologies. At the Mid-Atlantic Region of the American Academy of Religion (MAR-AAR) conference one year, I met a Catholic theologian whose belief in Christ sparked my interest. In the past, I encountered many people who seemed to ignore my identity as a faith-based Hindu and instead aim to proselyte me into Christianity. My colleague at MAR-AAR was different because he was interested in learning about my identity as a faith-based Kuchipudi (Suresh, 2003), Indian classical Hindu dancer, and he also shared his identity as a Catholic respectfully. Through this encounter, I began to explore Christianity within the research world. Soon, I gravitated towards Catholic services as I developed a love for Jesus Christ that resonates with the Catholic tradition. As a graduate student at Montclair State University, I began to attend mass weekly at the Newman Catholic Center, where Father Jim taught me the daily mysteries. I could not partake in Communion because I was not baptized as a Catholic. Yet, tears would fill my eyes during Communion, as I would watch others partake. I faced ambiguity because of my lived paradox as I found myself to be a faith-based Hindu who genuinely had a desire to partake in a sacred Christian none defined CONTACT Sabrina D. MisirHiralall [email protected] Montclair State University, Educational Foundations Department, 1 Normal Avenue, Montclair, NJ 07043, USA. © 2017 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC and Andrews University D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 ritual because of a strong belief in Jesus Christ. Someone once told me that I should go to a Protestant Church because all are permitted to partake in Communion regardless of baptism. However, I would not do so because, after exploring many avenues of Christianity, I felt that this action would offend the Catholic tradition, which I believe in. I soon realized that Catholicism focuses on love for humanity as opposed to forcefully proselyting in the name of Christ. As a faith-based Hindu, I believe in One Supreme Being who manifests in different forms at different times for different purposes. Hinduism (Vidyarthi, 1988) is a monist religion where One Supreme Being manifests in many different forms. Thus, I believe in Jesus Christ as a manifestation of the One Supreme Being who manifested in a particular form, at a particular time, with a particular purpose. This set of beliefs often creates ambiguous conflict for me because many do not comprehend how I as a faith-based Hindu could believe in Christ. Christians often say that I am not a true believer because if I were, I would only believe in Christ. My Hindu family and friends often worry that my gravitation towards Christianity would cause me to lose myself as a Hindu. Yet, my soul feels spiritually rejuvenated whether I attend Catholic Church or Hindu Mandir1 as I sincerely pray. At any rate, many Hindus welcomed the missionaries of British India who shared their beliefs in Christ. In fact, some Hindus adorned their homes with murtis2 of Christ and even performed puja (worship) onto Christ just as they would perform puja to Hindu murtis. Unfortunately, some of the missionaries of British India were not interested in embracing the religious identity of Hindus through interfaith connections. Instead, these missionaries wished to deceptively proselyte Hindus into converting to solely Christianity. Here, I refer to missionaries of the Catholic, Protestant, Baptist, Calvinist, Anglican, Wesleyan, and Presbyterian tradition (Piggin, Bogue, Buck, & Smith, 1984; Potts, 1967; Singh, 1990). Because of the varying denominations of Christian missionaries in British India, I will use the term Christianity to refer to missionaries regardless of denomination. The Global Dictionary of Theology points to different types of missionary typology. Jacques Dupuis (1998): "Ecclesiocentrism" suggest religions are not salvific in themselves, rather a personal response of faith is needed to the church's proclamation of the gospel. "Christocentrism" refers to an inclusive approach according to which Christ is the Savior but the benefits of saving work may be found outside the Christian Church and Christian religion. "Theocentrism" is the pluralistic paradigm according to which Christ is one Savior among other savior figures and not an exclusive one (Dyrness & Kärkkäinen, 2008). These missionary approaches do not endorse Christianity as a civilizing force that needs to colonize the world. On the contrary, these approaches respect non-Christian religions that uphold humanistic principles. I urge 80 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 Christian missionaries to consider one of these missionary approaches to uphold the theological integrity of Christianity. Christian missionaries should not dishonor Christianity by misusing the religion with deceptive methods of conversion to serve primarily social and political agendas. Thus, I request Christian missionaries to reflect on the theological purpose of Christianity with integrity as they move forward with educating non-Christians about Christianity and exploring faith-based conversion. Missionaries who use deceptive means for conversion ignore the religious identity of Hindus in a manner that endorses theological misappropriation. It is my contention that theological misappropriation occurs when religions or religious practices are used for the primary purpose of social and political agendas. Christianity was often theologically misappropriated as a civilizing force in British India and is sometimes still misappropriated today. This misappropriation is problematic because missionaries who forcefully employ Christianity theologically dishonor the very tradition they claim to represent. Theological misappropriation often ignores the individual's authentic spiritual connection to the manifestation of the Supreme Being. In other words, someone who converts to Christianity does not need to believe in Jesus Christ to identify as Christian. As long as the individual participates in Christian religious rituals, the individual is seemingly Christian. In many cases, theological misappropriation dismisses the individual's religious belief in the religious rituals that accompany the tradition. It is imperative to maintain awareness for the theological misappropriation of religion for social and political purposes. The history of British India points to the troublesome way that some Christian missionaries ignored the sacredness of the Christian tradition and instead focused on personal and political agendas. This history presents an issue of concern for Christian missionaries who wish to help non-Christians explore their connection to Christianity from a theological perspective. There were some Christian missionaries who had a genuine interest in a missionary approach that was sensitive to the needs of Indian society in British India. These missionaries engaged in humanitarian outreach to provide basic education, medical services, social welfare services, charity services, pastoral services, and contemporaneous relief services in an effort to help those within Indian society (Singh, 1990, p. 237). Singh indicates that many Indians respected this approach to missionary work in India: Indian people have been a lover of the social and spiritual Gospel of Christianity and of its value to Indian life and thought but they regard conversion not only as most obnoxious but also consider it often short-lived and skin-deep, and, in many cases a disguised function of colonialism. They do not cast their votes in favour of such Christian missionaries who make attempt to convert the Indian people into their own faith. Nevertheless, they love, regard and venerate those Christian missionaries who preach the dignity of humanity in such a lofty strain as Hinduism (Singh, 1990, p. 312). JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 81 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 Many Indians across the nation were grateful for these services that focused more on the common threads of humanitarianism as opposed to the forceful conversion to Christianity. In this article, I engage in a dramatic philosophical plea to prevent the theological misappropriation of Christianity as a civilizing force. I shed light on this topic as I turn to a postcolonial theoretical framework to relate the inescapable hybridity (Bhabha, 1994) of religion and culture where Orientalism (Said, 1978/1979) has the potential to occur. The long history of Western education in India illustrates the hidden curriculum that Christian missionaries employed to disrupt the Indian educational system that had a history of its own beyond Western antiquity. To press the ongoing urgency of this discussion, I will share a profound interfaith experience that I had with an Anglican priest at the University of South Carolina Aiken (USCA). This interfaith interaction prompted me to confront a colonizing gaze from an Evangelical Christian who I also met at USCA. Overall, I point to hybridity as a lived paradox of ambiguous conflict that embraces interfaith connections. As I relate the history of British India that connects to my lived-reality as a faith-based American Hindu, I offer implications for Christian missionaries today to foster authentic interfaith connections that honor the individual without engaging in colonizing ideologies filled with social and political agendas. Postcolonial theoretical framework Before continuing, I must briefly relate the postcolonial theoretical framework that influences this project. I will begin with Edward Said (1978/1979) who coins the term Orientalism as he points to the way false knowledge develops misrepresentations of religions and cultures and in turn further misconceptions. Said writes The idea of representation is a theatrical one: the Orient is the stage on which the whole East is confined. On this stage will appear figures whose role it is to represent the larger whole from which they emanate. The Orient then seems to be, not an unlimited extension beyond the familiar European world, but rather a closed field, a theatrical stage affixed to Europe. An Orientalist is but the particular specialist in knowledge for which Europe at large is responsible, in the way that an audience is historically and culturally responsible for (and responsive to) dramas technically put together by the dramatist (Said, 1978, p. 63). Overall, Said's notion of Orientalism focuses attention on how the West often confines the East to rigid boundaries where the East becomes what the West wishes the East to be. This confinement is a farce of a theatrical space where some Easterners mock their very own Eastern religion and culture as they dramatically fulfill the theatrical desires of the West, which causes an imagined version of Eastern religions and cultures to develop. Simultaneously, this places Western religions and cultures on a pedestal as real. 82 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 As a faith-based Hindu who believes in Christ, I face the ambiguity of my lived paradox in this space where East meets West. I face difficulty because I must maintain fidelity to who I am as a faith-based Hindu as I embrace the Christian faith with respect. For example, clothing for each respective venue differs significantly. The attire for Hindu mandir includes clothing almost the entire body. I usually wear a saari (Banerjee & Miller, 2003) with a piece of shawl to cover my head as I pray. On the contrary, the dress code for Catholic mass, in today's society, does not seem to require the clothing of the full body. I often wear fitted knee-length dresses and leave my hair down as I kneel in prayer. I noticed that I as I sit cross-legged in a Hindu mandir with my hands clasped by my chest and my eyes closed as I sing chants and slokas,3 I feel that my soul lifts from my body and moves into a spiritual abode where One Supreme Being manifests to shower me with Divine blessings. Similarly, as I kneel during a Catholic mass in prayer with my hands clasped to my chest, my eyes closed, and my head bent, I feel that my soul raises to a spiritual realm where One Supreme Being again manifests to shower me with Divine blessings. I do acknowledge that clothing is a representation of our cultural background and often is symbolic. However, in religious settings, I respectfully move with sensitivity beyond clothing as I focus on a connection to One Supreme Being through prayer. Overall, clothing is a lived paradox for me because I am Eastern and Western simultaneously. The binary of the West and the East is problematic because it creates this illusionary boundary that does not exist. Yet, Said is forced to use the terms West and East because humankind has segregated themselves into these illusionary binaries to make a distinction between the way we live and the way they live. This prevents society from the urgent interreligious dialogue needed to develop interfaith and intercultural interactions that concentrate on the way we are all interconnected, regardless of whether Western or Eastern. I do not wish to mock Hinduism or become what the West demands me to be. Nevertheless, religion and culture does not remain static. Therefore, there is a need to move beyond the cultural boundaries of East and West and into a space of sensitive interfaith connection. I must point to Homi Bhabha (1994) who focuses his attention on hybridity as the inevitable way that cultures are entangled. Hybridity is the sign of the productivity of colonial power, its shifting forces and fixities; it is the name for the strategic reversal of the process of domination through disavowal (that is, the production of discriminatory identities that secure the "pure" and original identity of authority). Hybridity is the revaluation of the assumption of colonial identity through the repetition of discriminatory identity effects. It displays the necessary deformation and displacement of all sites of discrimination and domination. It unsettles the mimetic or narcissistic demands of colonial power but reimplicates its identifications in strategies of subversion that turn the gaze of the discriminated back upon the eye of power. For the colonial hybrid is the JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 83 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 articulation of the ambivalent space where the rite of power is enacted on the site of desire making its objects at once disciplinary and disseminatory-or, in my mixed metaphor, a negative transparency (Bhabha, 1994, p. 112). Bhabha does not refer to an international culture of supremacy where one religion or culture reigns supreme over the other. Instead, Bhabha illustrates the importance of a third space as a place to explore the inevitable entanglement of religion and culture as a part of a global society. Here, cultures do not remain in isolation from one another. On the contrary, there is an intercultural interaction that causes cultures to enter the unavoidable space of hybridity. An ethic of responsibility needs to be present in the space of hybridity as religion and culture interact. Without an ethic of responsibility, there is a danger of supremacist ideals that further colonization along with the misrepresentation of culture. My lived paradox forces me to ask myself what it means to live as a faith-based Hindu in an undeniable interreligious and intercultural world. As I explore this question, I turn to relate the legacy of my Indian ancestors. Western education in India There is a long history of how Western education developed in British India. The British aimed to overturn the Guru/shishya system and replace it with Western education. The Guru/shishya (Ratnam, 2013) Hindu system provided education in India since ancient times. Despite this, the British overlooked this system as a viable method of education. During the colonial era in British India, Western education was often synonymous with the concealed goal to provide Christian teachings. Initially, education was a matter for the East India Company, which ran India until the Mutiny of 1857. Thereafter, education became the responsibility of the Indian Government based in Calcutta, which was, in turn, answerable to the India Office in London. In reality the day-to-day administration of education was devolved to the various Indian provincial governments. In 1921, constitutional changes brought about by the Government of India Act of December 1919 resulted in provincial governments being popularly elected for the first time and henceforth assuming formal responsibility for most aspects of education policy (Whitehead, 2005, p. 318). At first, the private joint-stock East India Company (Golant, 1975) controlled Western education in British India whose curriculum included Oriental culture and science (Whitehead, 2005). The educational system maintained religious neutrality, which prevented the governmental endorsement of Christian missionary education. Some members of the Supreme Council of the East India Company believed that Indians should learn their own religion and culture as opposed to adopting a Western system, which is why the council endorsed religious neutrality. With religious neutrality in mind, the British claimed that the main goal was to develop a trading empire 84 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 that focused on commerce. This notion of religious neutrality is problematic because it points to mere tolerance as opposed to genuine appreciation. Moreover, the government endorsed the "us" versus "them" mentality as they isolated Westerners from Easterners. This endorsement created a division that did not embrace the interfaith connections that were necessary for a harmonious society. Drawing on the explanations of Viswanathan (1989, p. 80), the British government maintained that it did not teach Christianity, but yet there were several Christian references in English education. There was a hidden agenda to impart Christian scriptural teachings that would serve to lead Indians to convert to Christianity. If not in quite the same colorful terms, other missionaries pointed out that though the government claimed it taught no Christianity, a great deal was actually taught, for English education was so replete with Christian references that much more of scriptural teaching was imparted than generally admitted (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 80). It is evident that this hidden curriculum aimed to destroy Hinduism and universalize Christianity. Orientalists such as Jones (Jones & Murray, 2006), Colebrooke (Colebrooke & Colebrooke, 1873), and Charles Wilkins (Wilkins, 1830) felt obligated to reintroduce Indians to Indian heritage. At any rate, after the Charter Act of 1813 (Webster, 1990) of the East India Company, Christian missionaries were permitted, after a long banishment, to preach Christianity in India. This is where Christian missionary education (Murdoch, 1899) developed in India. From a theological perspective, it was deceptive to use concealed methods to push Indians to convert to Christianity. This deceptive method paid little attention to the complexity of interreligious contact. In one regard, the introduction of Christianity in India opened the eyes of Indians to Christianity as a valid world religion. In another, the introduction of Christianity in India caused Christian missionaries to engage in dominant behaviors that oppressed Hinduism. In turn, this prevented a harmonious interreligious dialogue in a space of hybridity that had the potential to foster humanistic relations. To continue, Thomas Macaulay's Minute on Indian Education (Macaulay & Woodrow, 1862) refuted religious neutrality in 1835 as Macaulay pointed to the so-called need to uplift the heathens. It is important to note that the term heathen refers to anyone who is not baptized or does not believe in Christ. The underlying implication speaks to the need to civilize Indians. Macaulay convinced the majority of the council that a Western educational system serves to civilize Indians. Moreover, the council believed that they had a responsibility to educate Indians. William Bentinck, Governor-General of India in 1835, endorsed the English Education Act of 1835 (Viswanathan, 1989, pp. 43–45) with the goal to reallocate funds from the East India Company for a Western education of Indians. JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 85 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 A few years before this political decision, Alexander Duff (Vermilye & Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A, 1890) diagnosed India with a so-called problem when he arrived in 1830. Christian missionaries were only successful with securing converts to Christianity from the lower Indian castes but were unsuccessful with the Indian middle and elite classes. For this reason, Duff prescribed the need for an educational system that would attract the middle and upper classes in his schools. He developed an educational reform plan (Emmott, 1965) that would appeal to the middle and upper classes that wished to maintain their status. They were told that they would gain upward mobility through employment in the Western governmental system (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 164). The British used the Hindu caste system (Jois, 2002) to their advantage as they created an alliance with the indigenous elite who became displaced in British India. They expected the indigenous elite of the upper classes to persuade the middle and lower classes to pursue British educational opportunities, which as mentioned earlier was infused with Christian references. The upper classes were told that these supposed opportunities would teach Indians about different cultures in an effort to create a more harmonious society. The Western education system validated a hidden curriculum (Giroux & Purpel, 1983) that served to control the education of Indians who became public servants to the British despite the longstanding Indian traditions. The British aimed to stratify Indian classes through education that would create a middle class to initiate social change, according to Western ideals, as a part of an imperialist economy (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 146). Indians were taught by the British to emulate European ideals as it pertained to the land of India and Indian people. My issue concerns the uncritical method used to deceptively persuade Indians to convert to Christianity for status in society. I view Christianity as a philosophical world religion that endorses critical thought as part of Christian ethics. Yet, some missionaries overlooked the need to teach Indians in a straightforward manner about Christianity with conversion in mind. On the contrary, these missionaries did not pay attention to the authentic relationship between Indians and Christ, but rather was just focused on enforcing a Christian worldview for the purposes of managing the society. The educational reform eventually included a curriculum (Viswanathan, 1989, pp. 62, 70, 129–132) that taught English literature, Western history, and endorsed Christianity as a valid religion, while rejecting Hinduism as a fictitious myth. William Carey (Carey & Carter, 2000) compared the Mahabharata, a Hindu epic that endorses Hindu ethics, to the Iliad by Homer (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 105). Carey believed that readers needed to use a literary lens to read both texts, and detested the fact that Hindus had faith in the Mahabharata as Divine authority of history. Unlike Carey, Alexander Duff saw no comparison between the Hindu epics and Western literature. 86 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 Duff made a distinction between Western literatures that came from a literary tradition versus the Hindu epics that were read by Hindus as a part of Divine authority (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 109). The educational reform system of British India had a goal to change the Hindu epistemological system to a Western epistemological framework that used a Western lens to read the Hindu epics as mythology as opposed to a Divine authority that stimulated ethical thinking. The British made a distinction between the Hindu epics that they believed pretended to relate history as opposed to Western literature that used imagination non-pretentiously. Aside from the genre of literature that the British placed the Hindu epics in, the British had a moral issue at stake. With morality in mind, the British desecrated the Hindu texts because they felt the texts were a source of immorality (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 6). For example, the British could not understand why Draupadi had five husbands, who were brothers, in the Mahabharata (Vyāsa, 2004) In her past life, Draupadi performed penance to Shivaji, a manifestation of the Supreme Being. Draupadi asked for the boon of five characteristics in her future husband. She asked for a husband who is the epitome of Truth, has incredible strength, is an ace archer, most handsome, and is patient. Shivaji explained to Draupadi that it is difficult for a mortal man to have all of these character traits. Nevertheless, to fulfill Draupadi's wishes, Shivaji granted her request. Thus, Draupadi married the five Pandava brothers who each exemplify the character traits she desired in a husband (Vyāsa, 2004). The British lacked the epistemological framework to comprehend the depth of Draupadi's marriage to the five Pandava brothers. At any rate, the British began to develop poor translations that could not reconcile the structure of Eastern writings with a Western literary style. Indian children were taught that the Hindu scriptures were mythology and not a part of a historical tradition of India (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 110). Western educators wished to destroy the faith-based Hindu epistemological framework that Indians had. An imagined Hinduism began to take shape as the West began to reshape the Hindu literary tradition. The underlying premise points to the acceptance of a supreme Western, epistemological framework. My main concern here is that some of the British dismissed any critical examination of Hinduism as a viable world religion. Instead, these individuals focused on dismantling the Hindu epics so that these epics would make sense. Here, instead of aiming to learn about the Hindu epics from a Hindu epistemological perspective to understand Hindu ethics, the British labeled Hindus as delusional, heathens who needed to be civilized. Essentially, the educational reform of the time was based on the view of India, Indians, and Hinduism. Many of the council members of the East India Company believed Indians were sinful beings who could not comprehend the difference between decency and indecency, due to the mental capability of their native mind that caused a lack of understanding. Moreover, the council JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 87 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 members believed the Hindu texts taught impurities that caused the need for the British to intervene and morally regenerate Indians as a part of society. The British saw Indians as humans with a low intellectual capacity with minds adequate for minor trade but not governmental administration, especially because of their so-called unstable, volatile nature. Yet, the British resisted endorsing Christian missionary work in India because of the fear that threatened Indians would rebel. Thus, the British used the disguise of a liberal education to trick Indians into believing that they would gain empowerment with the advancement of upward mobility. Eventually, obedient Indians were admitted to governmental positions-not for the purpose of governing but rather to fulfill the orders of the British bureaucracy (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 69). The British manipulatively appropriated Indian land as a part of the goal to increase territorial control. It is unfortunate that the British saw India as fertile soil for engaging in experimentation that observed and recorded the progress of colonial conquests that aimed to acquire land and civilize Indians (Viswanathan, 1989, pp. 25, 65). Indians unveiled the disguise that prompted a national response to the fears of missionary endeavors that aimed to colonize rather than phenomenologically share the theological aspect of Christianity that honors interfaith interaction. For this reason, the Raigarh State Conversion Act of 1936 required Indians to submit an application to the government if there was a desire to convert religions (Jenkins, 2008). Although India became a secular state in 1976 when the Constitution (Constitution of India, 2015) was amended, there is still a sense of fear that provokes religious intolerance (Radhakrishnan, 1993) as each religious group feels the need to protect its boundaries. Religious intolerance is an unfortunate residual effect of the legacy of colonization that compartmentalized India into religious groups instead of embracing the opportunity for an educational interfaith interaction. The undertaking of the British to resocialize Indians by attempting to change the previous history of Hinduism and Indian culture is the Orientalist (Said, 1978/1979) phase of British rule in India. The British began to prune the Hindu epics to get rid of their unfavorable components as they separated so-called legend from fact, which created imagined knowledge of Hinduism (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 34). To reteach Indians with an Orientalist epistemology, the British set up colleges and universities across India. Hindu College, currently now known as Presidency University (Brief History of Presidency, 2016), was founded in 1817 followed by Sanskrit College (Sanskrit College: Home, 2016) in 1824. When originally established, Hindu College admitted boys of all castes on the contingency that they would pay five rupees per month. The students would learn the English language and literatures. In contrast, at that time, the British paid Brahmin boys a stipend to attend Sanskrit College (Viswanathan, 1989, 88 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 p. 151). The students at Sanskrit College would relearn the Hindu epics from a Western perspective as well as grammar, law, arithmetic, and theology. Orientalism served as a form of administration that helped the British pursue their mission in India to civilize Indians. Indian parents who realized this pursuit withdrew their children immediately from the tyranny of British education (Viswanathan, 1989. 58). Yet, missionaries aroused curiosity of Christianity in India. Some Hindus believed that Christianity consisted solely of facts to remember and not an experience that needed engagement (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 84). Eventually, Indians realized that the upward mobility that the British promised consisted of limited opportunities. There was a functionalist system in place that aimed to educate Indians to serve British imperialist needs. Some Indians humored the British by pretending to believe in Christianity and Western epistemology for the sole purpose of protecting their social privilege. For example, Michael Madhusudan Datta4 did not accept the theological aspect of Christianity although he was baptized: "Though Dutt was himself a Christian convert, he had clearly less concern for the theological side of Christianity in this essay than with Christianity as a civilizing force" (Dutt & Seely, 2004, p. 10). Others, such as Banerjea (Banerjea, 1861) who became Reverend Banerjee (Dutt & Seely, 2004, p. 10), came to truly believe in Christian theology and Western epistemology as a new part of Indian religion and culture. As mentioned earlier, some Indian parents pulled their children out of school where Christianity was taught, whereas, others realized that it was either a Western education for their children or no education. Indians who had a distinguished knowledge of European literature was promoted to offices under a resolution passed in 1844 by Lord Hardinge (Great Britain, 1909; Viswanathan, 1989, p. 84). Monier-Williams complained that the British could not overeducate Indians because then they would rebel against their assigned life position that was part of a functionalist system (Viswanathan, 1989, p. 143). The British aimed to teach English exclusively to cause the extinction of native languages and literature. There was an attempt to destroy the Indian social structure by denying the traditional authority of the upper classes. The religious caste system was reduced to an archaic institution that the British wished would decay. Christianity was the sole authority that influenced what constitutes knowledge. Missionaries missed the aesthetics of the complex Hindu epics that endorsed humanistic ethics. Based on a sociological study by Singh (1990), Indians today appreciate the spirituality of Christianity as many respect Christians who endorse the humanitarian principles of Christianity. However, conversion is often still seen as a part of colonialism. Christian missionaries do not gain respect by endorsing conversion but rather gain appreciation from Indians by preaching Christian principles and showing Indians what it means "'to be with Jesus', 'to work with Jesus,' and 'to work like Jesus'" (Singh, 1990, p. 312). JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 89 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 Many Indians embraced Christianity because of the humanistic value of the Christian tradition. However, Indians often regarded conversion as a deceptive method used to colonize India to adhere to a Western religious and cultural lifestyle. Nevertheless, some missionaries maintained a humanistic approach to missionary work that helped to provide hope through social service work. They also have high regard for those missionaries who have imparted cheer and hope to the poor and the low man engaged themselves in social services. They also show high regard for those missionaries who harbour strong regard or cultivate an attitude of reverence to other faiths, and their religious leaders and saints (Singh, 1990, p. 312). Missionaries were not always deceptive individuals who focused on colonizing ideologies. Some missionaries theologically lived as Christians who concentrated on the need for humanitarian action to fight the injustices of society. These types of missionaries are often forgotten in postcolonial studies. De-Orientalization Christian missionaries need to pursue de-Orientalized knowledge of nonChristian religions and cultures. I use the term de-Orientalize (MisirHiralall, 2015) to refer to knowledge that develops based on primary sources read from the intention of the authors of those sources. For example, a de-Orientalized reading of Hinduism includes reading the primary version of the Hindu epics with the goal to understand the epics from a Hindu epistemological perspective. Also, I use the phrase non-Christian religions and cultures to refer to religions and cultures that Christians do not believe resonate with Christianity although these seemingly non-Christian religions may maintain similar humanistic values. Once Christian missionaries maintain a de-Orientalized epistemological framework of non-Christian religions and cultures, then they may enter a pedagogical space of hybridity (MisirHiralall, 2015). In this space, I urge Christian missionaries to engage in interreligious and intercultural contact to help non-Christians gain an authentic understanding of Christianity from a theological perspective while at the same time considering the religious and cultural identity of the individuals. There needs to be sensitivity for the ancestry and the complex social ties that surround the individual. Christian missionaries should guide the individual to engage in self-reflection to think about a relationship with a Divine Entity, family, the community, and the world at large. After critical thought and dialogue, non-Christians should decide whether or not to convert. The decision to convert is not a decision that should be made based on social, political, and personal agendas but rather needs to consider the individual's relationship to Christ. 90 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 With the theological aspect of Christianity in mind, I also ask nonChristians to think about the theological and cultural aspect of religious traditions. Here, I will speak primarily about Hinduism since this paper points to the theological misappropriation of Christianity in India. Hinduism is not just an individual religion, but rather is a religion that has strong ties to family. Contemporary time does not consider the Yugas (time periods) of Hinduism that begins before the Roman calendar. Since ancient times in Hinduism, familial ties were a crucial part of religious worship. For example, the manifestation of Shri Rama (Tulasīdāsa & Prasad, 1990) even points to the way a son must perform the sacred pitri (ancestral) puja for his departed father regardless of geographical location. In other words, Shri Rama performed the pitri puja while in the forest region although his father's body was miles away in the kingdom of Ayodhya. My point is that each member in a Hindu family has a theological role to fulfill not as a part of culture but as part of a religious tradition. Hindu children fulfill the Shrad5 rites for their parents. Brothers offer the sacred Raksha Bandhan protection to their sisters. There is a list of many sanskaars (religious rites) that each family member fulfills or guides one another to engage in. Thus, if a Hindu converts to a non-Hindu religion, then the entire family system is disrupted. The Christian missionaries ruptured this system during the British era in India. Instead of this approach, missionaries should seek to share Christianity and learn about other religious traditions in search for the common thread that runs across. The task of the missionary should be to pool his religion along with others. Perhaps the chief hope for an important deepening of self-knowledge on the port of Christendom is by way of a more thorough-going sharing of its life with the life of the Orient. The relations between religions must take increasingly hereafter the form of a common search for truth (Singh, 1990, pp. 312–313). I am not saying that Hindus must not convert to Christianity. What I am saying is that there needs to be consideration to all of the familial aspects of Hinduism when considering such a life-changing decision that will impact on the departed ancestors and future generations to come. Although there is an attempt to isolate religion and culture into secluded spheres, hybridity is inescapable. With a genuine interest to learn about religion in mind, there is an urgent need for sensitivity in the pedagogical space of hybridity. Hindus and Christians engaged in religious and cultural contact in British India. Some Christian missionaries learned the ancient practice of yoga in India. It is no doubt true that today Christian Yoga has developed parallel to Indian Yoga. Now Christian Yoga is being practiced by many Catholic missionaries. Some Catholic missionaries have received formal training, under competent guidance, JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 91 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 in the ancient Indian discipline of Yoga and, in turn, impart instruction in the discipline to a growing number of Christian students (Singh, 1990, p. 301). These Christian missionaries used the main concept of Yoga, an ancient practice of Hinduism, to develop an integrative Christian Yoga practice to add to the Christian tradition. There are deep questions here such as whether or not Yoga is appropriate within the Christian tradition based on Christian views of the body. I will not delve into that issue because it is not the purpose of this article. My point is that these Christian missionaries did not aim to merely convert Hindus to Christianity. Instead, they tried to understand Hinduism, learn from Hinduism, and integrate concepts of Hinduism into Christianity to enrich the Christian tradition. My point here is that Christianity and Hinduism were not limited to isolated spheres but rather inevitably engaged in contact. Since contact is unavoidable, it is imperative to engage in interreligious dialogue to foster sensitive interfaith connections. Pope John Paul II acknowledges the harm of some missionaries to nonChristian religions and repents for this sin. The Vatican II Council shows respect for non-Christian religions as the council relates the need to understand non-Christian religions. Christians should not persecute or discriminate against their fellowmen because they are of another race or class or because of their non-Christian religion (4, 8). Rather they should treat them as brothers (5, 1) for the sake of Christ who died 'because of the sins of all men, so that all might attain salvation' (4, 9) and for the sake of God 'who is the Father of all' (5, 1). Because of the partial truth more or less visible in the non-Christian religions (as rays of that Truth which enlightens all men, 2, 5) these religions are to be respected as expressions of the universal longing for this truth (1, 3; 2, 1–4). Therefore Christians should cultivate dialogue and joint projects with them (2, 1; 4, 6). But the Church must never cease to proclaim Christ to them as the way, the truth, and the life, as the fullness of the religious life, as the one in whom God reconciled the world to himself (2, 5), and whose cross is a sign of God's all embracing love (4, 9) (Barth, 1968). The term universal here does not mean supremacy. It also does not endorse the impulse to colonize. On the contrary, universal here refers to a quest to find the truth, which is a life-long search that may never have a philosophical end. Non-Christians need to understand the heart of Christians who strongly believe in Christ as the One, the Way, and the Truth. However, Christians must understand that seemingly non-Christians may believe in similar universal values though not explicitly clear to Christians. If there is One Supreme Being who manifests in different forms, at different times, and for different purposes, then this One Supreme Being may manifest in the form of Christ, Shri Krishna, Allah, Addonai, and so forth. I believe that all of these manifestations primarily manifested in different historical eras. Although I am a faith-based Hindu who will not convert to Christianity, I wholeheartedly believe in Christ just as I believe in Shri 92 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 Krishna. Yet, I respect the rituals of the Catholic Church that do not allow me to partake in Communion during mass since I am not baptized. I must add that many of my non-Hindu friends and colleagues also respect the Hindu rituals when they view or attend Hindu services. There is a mutual respect and love between my non-Hindu friends, colleagues, and me. Interfaith connections Now, I consider it necessary to share my lived paradox that is full of ambiguous conflict to reveal the difficulties that I endure as a faith-based Hindu who embraces an interfaith connection to Christianity. Here, I will point specifically to my campus visit to University of South Carolina Aiken (USCA) during Fall 2015. David Dillard-Wright invited me to present and dance for a campus-wide lecture, Experiencing Shri Ganesha Through Hindu Dance. This example has a two-fold purpose. First, it is important to note the colonizing gaze I experienced from an Evangelical Christian student. Second, it is crucial to acknowledge the interfaith encounter that I had with an Anglican priest who provides an example for Christian missionaries interested in interfaith connections. After I completed the contemplative dressing process to transform into the dancer, Dillard-Wright and I went for a mindful walk before the lecture. As we walked the quiet campus, we saw a young man with a sign around his neck. I read the sign as Dillard-Wright and I walked past. When the student noticed me reading the sign, he began to walk behind me. He proceeded to ask, "Do you know that Jesus loves you?" I smiled and then responded, "Yes. I do know that Jesus loves me." He asked me why I was dressed the way that I was. I told him about the upcoming lecture and invited him to attend. Although I smiled, I was not oblivious to the colonizing gaze from the student. I knew that if I stopped to talk to the student, I would open myself up to confrontation as he would attempt to convert me. However, it is precisely this confrontation that is necessary for interfaith connections. I cannot isolate myself into a protective sphere that shields myself off from non-Hindus. On the contrary, I need to immerse myself in the confrontation to share who I am as a faith-based Hindu in the hopes of sparking the opportunity for a harmonious interfaith connection that moves beyond the divisions that religious compartments create. To continue, Dillard-Wright began the lecture as he shared excerpts from his book At Ganapati's Feet: Daily Life with the Elephant-Headed Deity before he introduced me. I then explained my epistemological framework of Hinduism. I shared that as a Hindu, I believe that One Supreme Being manifests in different forms, at different times, for different purposes. With this belief in mind, I go to Catholic mass and engage in sincere prayer to Jesus Christ. Tears often fill my eyes during the Eucharist because although I believe in Christ, I do not partake in Communion since I am not baptized. Not only JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 93 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 do I attend Catholic mass, but in the past, I also accompanied my professors to synagogue where I was not just an observer but a spiritual being who engaged in prayer. Next, I explained Edward Said's notion of Orientalism, the creation of Hindu dance, and how I engage in contemplative practices of mindfulness before, during, and after the dance. Soon I moved onto relate the dance moves of a sloka, Mangalam Ganesham, and Mushikavahana followed by the dance series, which played to a PowerPoint with timed transitions to guide the viewers. In many cases in the Mid-Atlantic and New England regions, I often feel directly connected to the viewers of the dance as we share a phenomenological experience together. However, with this small audience in the Southeast, I sensed a division. Some individuals seemed to genuinely open themselves up to an interfaith connection with me, while others seemed resistant. My sense of this division did not prevent me from moving forward with the presentation. I focused on sharing my phenomenological experience as a faith-based Hindu as I danced and connected to One Supreme Being. At any rate, one student during the question and answer session said that she is a dancer on the dance team. She said that she wishes she could put as much passion in her dances as I did in mine. This sparked a series of questions that focused on the purpose of dance. Most of the question and answer session concentrated on expressing love through phenomenology. After the presentation and dance, Reverend Professor Beau McLaurin Davis, an Anglican priest who serves the Southeast part of the United States, approached me. We met briefly prior to the start of the lecture. Father Davis told me that he liked and respected the way I did not use the term priest to describe my brother, who is a Hindu pandit.6 He said it was great that I acknowledge that the term priest has its own history and meaning. As we talked for about 30 minutes in the lecture hall, I felt that his spirit shone so brightly almost as if radiating towards me and drawing me towards him spiritually in the most beautiful, organic manner. At the end of the conversation, he asked if it would offend me to receive the blessing of Christ. I asked if there is any reason that I should be offended. He said he does not feel it would offend me because of my spirituality. I smiled and bent my head down as he gestured and blessed me. "May the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit always be with you." I feel that he gave me another blessing too. I was in so much joy that I feel that I could barely recollect the precious, spiritual, religious experience. After I explained to Father Davis that Hindus often touch the feet of spiritual leaders. I asked him if I may touch his feet. When he smiled as he said yes, I kneeled down on my knees and rested my head at his feet with hands clasped in a prayer posture. It was like he was constantly blessing me without attempting to convert me. This was a profound interfaith moment that had a great impact on me phenomenologically. Here, I experienced a reciprocal moment of an interfaith 94 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 connection where I was drawn to a spiritual divinity within a spiritual being and this spiritual being acknowledged the divinity within me. Through this encounter, I experienced the transcendence of the illusionary boundaries between religions as the interfaith encounter concentrated on the divinity within one another. Father Davis felt that I was worthy of the blessing of Christ not because he wanted to convert me but because he wished to bless me in the way he knew how. I felt such great respect for Father Davis as an Anglican priest that I wished to touch his feet in the manner in which I would touch the feet of a Hindu pandit. I did not wish to convert Father Davis to Hinduism but rather wanted to honor him as a spiritual leader in a manner that was familiar to me as a faith-based Hindu. Hybridity is a lived paradox for me, as I must consistently reflect on how to engage in interfaith encounters. I asked myself how should I react as a faithbased Hindu with sensitivity to Christianity? Father Davis offered to bless me and as a Hindu I accepted his blessing. I responded to his blessing by touching his feet in the manner in which I would touch the feet of a Hindu pandit. My lived paradox is complex as there are no easy answers, but I do believe that I acted as a faith-based Hindu who embraced an interfaith encounter. Some may say that I was submissive as I placed my head at Father Davis's feet. I confess that submission here is both a recapitulation of an Orientalized projection of the East as submissive to the West and yet a necessary ethical action that helps to create an opening for interfaith connections. Submission is also a component of humility as Hindus honor those worthy of such honorable respect. Thus, it is a sign of respect to engage in such an interaction with someone who has great spiritual divinity. Yet, not all individuals are capable of embracing one another in interfaith connections that foster harmonious relationships. When I arrived back to New Jersey, I received a colonizing, angry email from the student who I met in the quad before the presentation. I consider it necessary to respond to the student publicly dissecting the nearly two-page email piece by piece. This illustrates how colonization is still alive today as some Christians still aim to dominate the world through a Christian supremacy that is so far from Christianity that I hesitate to use the term Christian. I hesitate because Christianity is a beautiful religion of love as opposed to a religion of anger and hatred that bitterly aims to force all global citizens to believe in Christ. Hello Dr. Sabrina ... This is-, the boy you saw holding the "Jesus sign" while you were in University of South Carolina Aiken prior to your presentation on religious Hindu-dance. Hope the conference on Saturday went well? I honestly wish you all the best in the academic field and also in your religious pursuits. But if I may continue ma'am, and please forgive me if I may offend you but while you were walking around the campus of USC-Aiken, you read the Jesus poster I hung on myself, I asked and you told me you have Jesus-Christ, that you believed JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 95 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 He died for your sins. But ma'am, If that were true then you wouldn't be living a lie of idol-worship, " ... Who changed the truth of God into a LIE, and worshiped and served the CREATURE more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen ... ." (Romans.1: 24, [25], 26). As I stated during the lecture, I believe as a faith-based Hindu that One Supreme Being manifests in different forms, at different times, for different purposes. Because I believe in One Supreme Being, I believe the Supreme Being manifests as God. Thus, I believe in Jesus Christ. I explained during the lecture that murtis (statues) are not mere idols but rather provide a focus point for devotees to spiritually focus on. The Supreme Being is beyond the comprehension of mortal human beings. Consequently, murtis serve as a concentration point for Hindus to focus spiritual energy towards in prayer to the One Supreme Being. This student did not attempt to understand this portion of the lecture, but rather insists that I engage in a "lie of idol-worship." Moreover, this student does not comprehend my relationship with Jesus Christ. As I mentioned, my epistemological framework as a faith-based Hindu causes me to believe in Jesus Christ. Not only do I believe in Jesus Christ, but I often feel Christ's right hand above me in a blessing posture when I attend Catholic mass and Hindu pujas. In many instances, I often spiritually feel Christ and Shri Krishna interchange images as I have religious experiences that point to a monist epistemological framework. If indeed Jesus Christ is Your Lord and Savior then you would walk in His light " ... I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life." (John.8:12). But " ... If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we LIE, and do not the truth ... " (1John.1:6). " ... the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked." (1John.2:6) The student assumes that I walk in darkness because I am a faith-based Hindu. Yet, many often describe me as a ray of sunshine. I often feel a spiritual glow as I move through my day. How can this be darkness if the light of my soul shines brightly? Mother Lakshmi keeps the light of my soul burning brightly, which provides me with the ability to see with clarity. If One Supreme Being lights the path, then Mother Lakshmi7 is a part of the One and so is Christ. They are all a part of a monist entity. Furthermore, Christ walked a Holy path that honored humanity. To spread hatred as this individual does as he ignores the light of my soul is to dishonor Christ, whereas to embrace love for humanity is to honor Christ. The Lord Jesus Said it Himself "No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other." I say this with deepest love and respect Professor, Christianity is not a 'Religion' it is a Person and it is Christ Jesus, "Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God." (1John.4:15) "Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." (2Cor.5:17). "Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" 96 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 (Rom.8:1). "I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing." (John.15:5) It is evident that the student did not comprehend when I said that I believe in One Supreme Being. The individual assumes that I "serve two masters" without realizing that "two masters" in this sense is actually One master. The student personifies Christ without the realization that it is beyond the capacity of mortal beings to comprehend the nature of Christ. I do not sense that this student understands that Christ is not a dictator who demands followers but rather Christ is a profound religious entity beyond human comprehension. Beloved Dr. Sabrina, Christianity is not a "Religious Belief/Belief System," it is Faith; "The assurance of Things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (Heb.11:1) in "religion" man seeks God through all sorts of practices, traditions and ceremonies but in Christianity, God is seeking Man. Not because man is good " ... There is none who does good, not even one" (Ps.14:3) but because God is good and Loving, "This Is true Love, not that we loved God, but that He first loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1John.4:10). On the contrary, Christianity, like many religions, is based on a faith-based religious epistemological framework. This individual dismisses rituals although rituals are an essential component to Christianity. There is a ritual for mass, communion, and baptism, for example. Religious rituals often help humans understand how to live life. In Hinduism, the ritual of puja teaches Hindus how to serve humanity not in a passive manner but with a wholehearted love that wishes to benefit humankind. It is one thing to be in church and a very different thing to be in Christ. Many, many Preachers, ministers, deacons, Priests, Bishops, Cardinals and even Popes are just "playing church" they only practiced their religious routines, traditions and protocols but refused to accept the life giving Truth in Christ Jesus. [ ... "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh/ human efforts profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are SPIRIT and they are LIFE." (John.6: 63)]. Jesus Said, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles? Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Get away from me, you who practice evil!" (Matt. 7:23). But for those who truly Believe in Christ Jesus "Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom.8:1). It is quite arrogant that this student condemns religious clergy as merely "playing church" whereas it seems to me that this individual is the one who creates a misguided farce out sacred religious quotes for his own colonizing purposes. There is a distinction here between those who engage in a genuine, religious framework that aims to embrace humankind with a love for humanity and those who employ religion as a dictatorship, which is a colonizing evil that forsakes the love of humankind. My relationship with the One JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 97 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 Supreme Being causes me to realize that the Supreme Being is a forgiving entity based on intention. Therefore, if an individual unknowingly commits evil and seeks forgiveness, the One Supreme Being by nature will forgive. This epistemological framework causes me to forgive this misguided boy since I sense that he strongly believes his intentions are Christian-like. I acknowledge that he as an individual does not represent the vast majority of Christians. The Fact remains Dr. Sabrina, you cannot say you have Jesus and also live in Hinduism. Jesus said "I am THE WAY, and THE TRUTH, and THE LIFE. No one comes to the Father except through me." Jesus was not just one of many manifestations of "Svayam Bhagavan," He is God Himself made known to us. "No one has ever seen God. But the unique One, who is himself God, is near to the Father's heart. He has revealed God to us" (John.1:18) "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation." (Col.1:15). "For in Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily" (Col.2:9). "And without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory" (1Tim.3:16). Earlier in the message, the student points to the term religion as he says that Christ is not about religion but is about faith. Yet the argument is flawed because the student now focuses on Jesus and Hinduism as distinctive religions. It is my contention that the term religion often causes an illusionary division that faith-based individuals are aware of as they transcend this false boundary. This student is not willing to understand a monist epistemological framework but rather insists that, "Jesus was not just one of many manifestations." The student's lack of philosophical capacity illustrates the danger of close-mindedness that refuses to comprehend the religious epistemological framework of anyone who differs although he himself maintains a dangerous religious epistemological outlook that has the potential to lead to danger. This type of perspective has the potential to lead to genocide because such closemindedness does not even want to listen and understand other perspectives. As a reminder, we do not live in a Christian world but rather we live a world of many religious traditions. For this reason, it behooves society to learn to live through interfaith connections that embrace humanity to prevent the dangers that accompany religious supremacy. Please forgive me if I offended you, it is in love and respect I wrote this, I know how deep and devoted you are in your religious dances and lifestyle. But remember this, Jesus said "Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me," (Matt.10:38) "Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me." (Matt.16:24) "If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it." (Matt.16:25). Once Again, All the very best. Jesus loves you. Yes He does, with an Undying Love. The student did not deny my devotion as a faith-based Hindu dancer and how that impacts on my lifestyle. Yet, the student believes that Christianity is the sole 98 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 path that all must follow. This here is a clear example of how some individuals, who claim to be religious, theologically misuse Christianity as a civilizing force. This student wants to discipline me into conforming to a so-called Christian ideal to save my soul from sin. In one regard, I was hurt as I initially read this email as a fearful shock ran up and down my body as I imagined what my ancestors went through when colonization was at its height in British India and in Guyana. In another regard, I do feel this individual saw a light in me that compelled him to write such a long email because he felt that I already had a desire to have a relationship with Christ and he wanted to forcefully push me towards that. As I mentioned, I had a profound interfaith moment with Father Beau Davis, an Anglican priest, who I met at the lecture. Because I felt that I needed spiritual guidance from someone who I respected as a Christian, I corresponded with Father Davis about this student's message. Father Davis8 stated: Christ told us that there are two Commandments that we need to follow: to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind; and secondly to love your neighbor as yourself. This young man seems to have forgotten that second part. I have only known you for a short while, but I believe that you are an ardent follower of these two commandments. You obviously love God (our language and understanding may differ at times, but your love is true) and I witnessed you treat a room of strangers like good friends. The rest is commentary. As for what you should do: love those who persecute you. That is something that was difficult for me to undertake ... but I see the truth in it now. If you show that misguided boy mercy, then it is my understanding that you are closer to Christ than he is. However, I don't believe that responding to him will do much good either way. If it is the boy that I ran into, his thoughts are not his own yet. He is only repeating his programming. Age will teach him how to think on his own, and hopefully he will learn to love his neighbor in time. I did not respond to the student because he did not seem to attempt to use the lecture and dance as an educational opportunity to learn about Hinduism. Moreover, I do agree with Father Davis that his thoughts are not his own. It feels that he is repeating a standard speech that is scripted and designed to convert non-Christians to Christianity. I do believe that I am close to a Supreme Being and by extension close to Christ. Father Davis's words helped to reaffirm that for me. Interfaith interaction is how we learn to make the world better, and I think that what you are doing is the best way to go about it. You probably greatly disturbed that boy's thinking by being nice to him and showing him that Hindu faith is not some bizarre evil and its followers are not demons. Keep up the good fight. You always have a blessing from me. I do believe that spiritual beings will embrace interfaith interaction to move beyond the illusionary boundaries of religions. We are a part of one race-the JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 99 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 human race. Yet, we each are individuals with different ways of coming to know what we know and believe what we believe. It is imperative to engage in interfaith interactions that aim to understand one another's religious epistemological framework that will influence how we live with one another in society. Each religion may be a different path up the mountain that leads ultimately to One Supreme Being. I took comfort in hoping that, as Father Davis said, I disturbed the student's thinking as I shared Hinduism as a faith-based religion that is not based on evil or demonic worship. Overall, I took great comfort in knowing that Father Davis, as an Anglican priest, will always bless me because he acknowledges the spiritual divinity within me as a faith-based Hindu without attempting to convert me to Christianity. Conclusion: Interfaith interactions In sum, Christian missionaries must not theologically misappropriate Christianity as a civilizing force. Christianity is not a religion about a global supremacy based on social and political issues but rather is a religion about love for humanity. "To love thy neighbor," means to respect thy neighbor's religion and culture. Christians must acknowledge the hybridity of religion and culture that causes individuals of diverse backgrounds to intertwine. It is necessary to note that hybridity is not a simple solution to the problem of interfaith interactions but rather is a complex lived paradox. With this lived paradox in mind, it is imperative to ensure that Christians do not Orientalize unfamiliar religions and cultures to become what Christians would like these religions and cultures to be. History in British India illustrates how Christian missionaries employed a hidden curriculum that engaged in Orientalism and sought to convert Indians to Christianity for social and political purposes. This blatantly disregards the opportunity for interfaith interactions that embraces humanity regardless of religious or cultural background. I emphasize the need for interfaith interactions in an inevitable hybrid space where individuals have the opportunity to learn about one another as a part of humanity. These interfaith interactions will each have their own unique struggles and complexities. However, this is necessary to endure as a part of the human race. I understand the need for Christian missionaries to spread the word of God, but this must occur with sensitivity. Instead of employing deceptive means to push non-Christians to convert to Christianity, I ask Christian missionaries to concentrate on interfaith interactions with an ethic of responsibility. Christian missionaries must not deceptively push non-Christians to convert to Christianity but rather must guide nonChristians to genuinely find themselves as theologically oriented Christians or spiritual beings. When the student approached me at USCA in the quad, I wish he took the time to ask who I was and what my religious framework was with a 100 S. D. MISIRHIRALALL D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 de-Orientalized gaze (MisirHiralall, 2015) in mind. If he did, he may have had the opportunity to learn about Hindu philosophy that influences my epistemological framework, which helps me to develop my own sense of ethics that I engage in as I live in the world. He could have used the opportunity to teach me about Christianity in terms of Christian philosophy that influences his epistemological framework, which provokes him to develop his sense of ethics as he lives in the world. We could have taught each other through an interfaith interaction that might have helped us to heighten our spirituality as spiritual beings. However, this student had no interest in embracing me as a part of humanity but instead saw me as "living a lie of idol-worship". All he saw was his views and my views, probably because of the fear of the challenges that would arise from an interfaith connection. In the beginning of this article, I point to my colleague who prompted me to develop a genuine theological love for Christianity. My colleague is an example to Christian missionaries who aim to help individuals discover the beauty of Christianity. He had a genuine interest in learning about who I am as a faith-based Hindu. He expressed his thoughts and perceptions of Hinduism to me, which was based on an Orientalized framework. We had many dialogues as I helped to de-Orientalize Hinduism, and he assisted me as I learned about Christianity from a Catholic perspective. We would send each other scriptural verses as we would dissect and discuss the philosophical implications. Soon, I began to see that Christianity is not a dangerous religion that will corrupt me but rather is a religion that blends with Hinduism since the underlying moral implications are similar. My colleague and I formed a deep bond of friendship as we learned more about each other though our lived paradox in a hybrid space. Now, I find myself in Catholic mass often as I pray to Jesus Christ as a faith-based Hindu who genuinely loves Christianity. That is because my colleague shared Christianity with me in a powerful manner that respected who I am as a faith-based Hindu as he taught me that Christianity is one path up the mountain of Divinity. Overall, individuals need to maintain a de-Orientalized gaze (MisirHiralall, 2015) that seeks to genuinely learn about religion and culture. This creates an opportunity to engage in philosophical dialogue that moves beneath the surface in an attempt to inquire into the epistemological framework of religion and culture. Individuals should aim to learn about religion and culture through de-Orientalized sources that further philosophical inquiry. Moreover, individuals cannot just be observers observing a religious and cultural tradition. Instead, individuals need to create an opening within themselves for interfaith encounters that point to the complexities of a lived paradox in a hybrid space despite the fear of the challenges. This openness has the potential to lead to interfaith interactions that may help us acknowledge that we are a part of one race-the human race. As a part of the human race, it is JOURNAL OF RESEARCH ON CHRISTIAN EDUCATION 101 D ow nl oa de d by [ Sa br in a D . M is ir H ir al al l] a t 1 0: 07 1 6 A ug us t 2 01 7 imperative to diffuse colonizing ideologies filled with social and political agendas that dishonor the individual. Instead, we as a society need to engage in interfaith connections that move beyond the illusionary boundaries of religion as we embrace the complexities of our lived paradoxes in a hybrid space. Notes 1. Mandir is the term used by Hindus to describe a place for community worship. 2. A murti is an image, often in the form of a statue, which helps Hindus to maintain focus during prayer. 3. A sloka is a Hindu prayer. 4. For the purposes of this project, I will use the spelling "Madhusudana Datta" because that is the way Datta's signature appears in his letters. Some scholars use the spelling "Dutt" to refer to this author. See Michael Madhusudan Datta: A sketch of his life and works. 1916. Madras: G.A. Natesan. 5. Religious worship for the souls of immediate family members who pass away, especially parents. 6. 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Why Rational People Polarize Kevin Dorst U.S. politics is beset by increasing polarization. Ideological clustering is common; partisan antipathy is increasing; extremity is becoming the norm (Dimock et al. 2014). This poses a serious collective problem. Why is it happening? There are two common strands of explanation. The first is psychological: people exhibit a number of "reasoning biases" that predictably lead them to strengthen their initial opinions on a given subject matter (Kahneman et al. 1982; Fine 2005). They tend to interpret conflicting evidence as supporting their opinions (Lord et al. 1979); to seek out arguments that confirm their prior beliefs (Nickerson 1998); to become more confident of the opinions shared by their subgroups (Myers and Lamm 1976); and so on. The second strand of explanation is sociological: the modern information age has made it easier for people to fall into informational traps. They are now able to use social media to curate their interlocutors and wind up in "echo chambers" (Sunstein 2017; Nguyen 2018); to customize their web browsers to construct a "Daily Me" (Sunstein 2009, 2017); to uncritically consume exciting (but often fake) news that supports their views (Vosoughi et al. 2018; Lazer et al. 2018; Robson 2018); and so on. So we have two strands of explanation for the rise of American polarization. We need both. The psychological strand on its own is not enough: in its reliance on fully general reasoning tendencies, it cannot explain what has changed, leading to the recent rise of polarization. But neither is the sociological strand enough: informational traps are only dangerous for those susceptible to them. Imagine a group of people who were completely impartial in searching for new information, in weighing conflicting studies, in assessing the opinions of their peers, etc. The modern internet wouldn't force them to end up in echo chambers or filter bubbles-in fact, with its unlimited access to information, it would free them to form opinions based on ever more diverse and impartial bodies of evidence. We should not expect impartial reasoners to polarize, even when placed in the modern information age. In short, I agree with the standard story: the above-mentioned "reasoning biases" are an important component of the polarization process-they are the tendencies which make us susceptible to modern informational traps (Sunstein 2009, 2017; Lazer et al. 2018; Robson 2018). What I disagree with is the claim that these "reasoning biases" are biases. Rather: I'll argue that these tendencies-to interpret conflicting evidence as confirmatory; to search for confirming arguments; and to react to discussion by becoming more extreme -may be the result of fully rational processes. In particular, they can all arise when rational people are sensitive to the fact that some forms of evidence are systematically more ambiguous than others. Now, I can't establish that the way people actually exhibit these tendencies is rational. But I can establish that it could be-that our explanation of the rise of polarization doesn't require individual irrationality. Why does this matter? Because it changes the nature of the collective problem we face. Step back. Whenever we observe a collectively bad outcome for a group of interacting people, there are two quite different kinds of explanations we can give: we can locate the problem in the choices of the individuals or the structure of their interaction. To illustrate, contrast two cases: Case 1: We face a heart disease epidemic-we would all be better off if we all ate better. Case 2: Our fisheries are being depleted-we would all be better off it we all fished less. The bad outcome in Case 1 is due to individual failings: each of us would have a better outcome if we unilaterally ate better-we are irrational to overeat. Thus the collectively bad outcome "filters up" from suboptimal choices of the individuals. Call this an individual problem. In contrast, the bad outcome in Case 2 is due to structural failings: none of us could get a better outcome by unilaterally changing our decision-we are rational to overfish. The problem is that we are caught in a tragedy of the commons: although the total fish population would be larger (and so fishers more productive) if everyone fished less, the best way for an individual to maximize their catch is to overfish (Hardin 1968). Thus the collectively bad outcome "filters down" from the suboptimal structure of the group. Call this a structural problem. To put it bluntly: individual problems arise because people are dumb; structural problems arise because people are smart. You solve an individual problem by getting people to make better choices-for example, by educating them about nutrition. You solve a structural problem by changing the choices they face-for example, imposing fines for overfishing. Back to politics. As commonly articulated, the standard story represents polarization as an individual problem: it implies that polarization arises, ultimately, from irrational informational choices on behalf of individuals. It therefore predicts that the solution will require teaching people to make better ones. Educate them; inform them; improve them. If I'm right, this is a mistake. The informational choices that drive polarization are not irrational or suboptimal. Like the tragedy of the commons, polarization is a structural problem. It arises because people are exquisitely sensitive to the informational problems they face-because they are smart. It doesn't require educating them; it requires altering the choices they face. So much for motivation; here are the three reasoning tendencies I will focus on: Biased assimilation: People tend to interpret conflicting evidence as supporting their prior beliefs (Lord et al. 1979) Confirmation bias: People tend to seek out new arguments that confirm their prior beliefs (Nickerson 1998). Group polarization: When people discuss their opinions in groups, their opinions tend to become more extreme in the direction of the group's initial inclination (Myers and Lamm 1976). How could these tendencies be rational? The answer I'll give relies on three epistemological facts. Fact 1: Some types of evidence are more ambiguous than others: it is harder (even for rational people) to know the rational way to react to them. To illustrate, compare two cases. The question is whether the coin I just flipped landed heads. First case: all you know is that it's a fair coin. It's obvious that this evidence should lead you to be 50-50 on whether the coin will land heads-the evidence is unambiguous. Second case: you know it's a fair coin; after flipping it, with a slight grin I say, "You might want to think about heads." This might be evidence that it landed heads. But maybe the grin indicates that I'm trying to trick you, and it's actually evidence that it landed tails. But maybe I'm thinking that you'll think that, and the grin indicates that I'm trying to double-trick you-in which case it's actually evidence for heads! But maybe... You see where this is going. In short, it's far from obvious whether my comment should lead you to be more or less than 50-50 confident that the coin landed heads-in other words, this evidence is ambiguous. Why does evidential ambiguity matter? Because of the second epistemological fact: Fact 2: The more ambiguous a piece of evidence is, the weaker it is: if you should be quite unsure how you should react to a piece of evidence, then that evidence shouldn't lead to a radical shift in your opinion. For example, in response to my comment that "You might want to think about heads," it might be reasonable to be more confident than not that it landed heads-but it is certainly not reasonable to be very confident it landed heads. Contrast this with a third case: I flatly say "It landed heads." In this third case, you should be very confident it landed heads. The reason for the difference in strength of evidence is due to the fact that in the former case the evidence is ambiguous, while in the latter case it's not. Why are Facts 1 and 2 important? Because rational people can use them to guide their choices: Fact 3: Some information-gathering strategies will predictably yield more ambiguous (hence weaker) evidence than others. For example, suppose you can choose whether (1) I make a comment about the coin in person-with all the facial and inflectional subtleties that involves-or (2) I simply send either the word 'heads' or 'tails' over text message. You can expect that the evidence you'd receive from (1) will be more ambiguous-and so, by Fact 2, weaker-than the evidence you'd receive from (2). So it could be rational to prefer (2) to (1). Philosophers and economists have given various models of ambiguous evidence (Levi 1974; Joyce 2005; Dorst 2018), but they all agree on Facts 1–3. Here's why these facts are important: the ambiguity of a piece of evidence is correlated with whether it confirms or disconfirms your prior beliefs. That is, there are fairly general settings in which rational people can expect that receiving evidence that (probably) confirms their opinion will result in less evidential ambiguity than receiving evidence that (probably) disconfirms their opinions. Since the former will (other things equal) be stronger, it can thereby be rational to choose to receive it-even though doing so predictably leads to strengthening prior beliefs. I'll first explain two general reasoning scenarios in which 1 this dynamic occurs, and then discuss how our analysis of them can rationalize biased assimilation, confirmation bias, and group polarization. First reasoning scenario: exploring explanations. You believe something-say, that lowering the corporate tax doesn't help the economy. You are presented with conflicting pieces of evidence (studies, news items, etc.) E1 and E2-the former tells in favor of this belief, the latter tells against it. For example, suppose E1 is a study of five countries that lowered the corporate tax but didn't see significant changes in economic growth; meanwhile E2 is a study of five countries that lowered the corporate tax and did see a rise in economic growth. You only have time to scrutinize one of these studies more closely- to examine it for methodological flaws, mistaken assumptions, and to (more generally) explore alternative explanations that may remove the study's support for its conclusion. This can be given a rigorous formulation in a Bayesian setting-Salow (2017) shows how. He offers a 1 strategy to avoid the result, but it can be shown that this strategy works only if it rules out evidential ambiguity entirely (Dorst 2018). For example, you might look closer at E2 to see what other economic changes were happening during the time studied that could account for the rise in growth. Which strategy-scrutinizing E1 or E2-is rational, given your background beliefs? Here's the crucial fact about this reasoning scenario: successfully finding an alternative explanation leads to evidence that is less ambiguous than trying and failing to find such an explanation. Start with an example. You are scrutinizing E2. Case One: you find an alternative explanation-you realize that the study took place during a global economic boom. Upon discovering this, you should think, "Of course economic growth was rising -there's no reason to think it was the lowering of corporate taxes that did it." In other words, when you successfully debunk the study, you wind up with unambiguous evidence -you know exactly how to react. Case Two: you think about the study for a while, but come up with no good alternative explanation of the rising economic growth. Upon failing to discover an explanation, you should think, "Maybe there's no other explanation -in which case this study does support cutting the corporate tax. But on the other hand, maybe there's a perfectly good explanation and I just haven't thought of it yet." In other words, when you fail to debunk the study, you wind up with ambiguous evidence: you should be unsure whether (1) there is no available alternative explanation, or (2) there is one that you should have (but didn't) think of. More generally, when you set out to debunk a piece of evidence, there are two possibilities: either (1) there is an available alternative explanation, or (2) there is none. If (1), then the evidence doesn't actually support its conclusion; if (2), then it does. Crucially, if you find an alternative explanation, then you know that you're in possibility (1)-you have unambiguous evidence. But if you fail to find an alternative explanation, you don't know whether that's because you're in case (2)-where there is none-or instead because you're in case (1)-where there is one, but you've (irrationally) failed to generate it. So if you fail to find an alternative explanation, you wind up with ambiguous evidence. By Fact 2, that means that trying and failing to find an alternative explanation provides you with weaker evidence than successfully finding one. Where does this leave us? You can try to debunk either E1 or E2. If your attempt is successful, that'll give you less ambiguous-hence stronger-evidence than if your attempt is unsuccessful. Since rational people try to get the strongest evidence possible, you should try to debunk the one that you think you're most likely to succeed at debunking . Which one is that? The one that tells against your belief, of course! (You have reason to think that evidence against your belief is more likely to be misleading than evidence in its favor-otherwise you wouldn't believe it!) Upshot: if you're sensitive to evidential ambiguity, then when presented with conflicting studies it is rational-other things equal-to try to debunk the one that conflicts with your prior beliefs. That covers exploring explanations-our first general reasoning scenario where evidential ambiguity is predictably correlated with your prior beliefs. The second scenario is assessing arguments. Observation: when you are presented with (minimally reasonable) arguments for a claim, this tends to provide you with more evidence in favor of that claim than against it. This may seem obvious-that's the point of arguments, after all. But the reason is actually quite subtle-it hinges on evidential ambiguity. You might think that hearing an argument for a claim C always provides you with evidence in favor of C. But that's not right-sometimes it provides evidence against C. Example: we know that a lawyer will try to construct the best argument possible for the claim that her client is innocent. Suppose that upon hearing her argument we can tell that it's quite a bad one. Then it actually provides evidence that her client is guilty-for upon hearing it we should think, "That's a bad argument. If he was innocent, she could probably construct a better one. So he's probably not innocent." In short, the mere fact that you're hearing an argument in favor of a claim doesn't mean that you're getting evidence for it. The real reason why arguments tend to provide evidence for their conclusions has to do with the differing levels of evidential ambiguity that they generate-and, in particular, with our (in)ability to recognize whether they are good or bad arguments. The issue is that bad arguments tend to masquerade as good ones-and thereby mislead you into thinking that they're good ones-whereas good arguments rarely masquerade as bad ones. So when you come across a good argument, you'll have relatively little reason to think that it's a bad one; but when you come across a bad one, you'll have relatively more (misleading) reason to think that it's a good one. Now consider what happens when you are presented with an argument for claim C. Either (1) it's a good argument, or (2) it's a bad one. If (1), then it provides evidence for C; if (2), then it provides evidence against C. The crucial asymmetry is your (in)ability to recognize whether you're in case (1) or (2). If (1) it's a good argument, you should be relatively sure that it's good-thus you have relatively unambiguous evidence in favor of C. But if (2) it's a bad argument, then since it will be masquerading as a good one, you should be relatively unsure that it's bad-thus you have relatively ambiguous evidence against C. By Fact 2, ambiguous evidence is weaker than unambiguous evidence. So being presented with a good argument for C provides relatively strong evidence for C, whereas being presented with a bad argument provides relatively weak evidence against it. This is why, on the whole, hearing arguments for C tends to give you more evidence in favor of C than against it. Where does this leave us? Suppose you face a choice between hearing one of two arguments, A1 or A2-one in favor of your prior belief, one against it. If the one you choose is good, being presented with it will provide less ambiguous (so stronger) evidence than if it's bad. Since you should try to get the strongest evidence possible, you should choose to be presented with the argument that you think is most likely to be good. Which one is that? The one that argues in favor of your prior belief, of course! (You have reason to think there are more good arguments for your belief than against it- otherwise you wouldn't believe it!) Upshot: if you're sensitive to evidential ambiguity and can choose between hearing two arguments, it is rational-other things equal-to listen to the one that supports your prior beliefs. I've argued that there are two general reasoning scenarios-exploring explanations and assessing arguments-in which rational sensitivity to evidential ambiguity can lead you to prefer an information-search strategy that can be expected to confirm your prior beliefs. Suppose this is right. Then our psychological biases are rational. First, biased assimilation-people's tendency to interpret conflicting evidence as supporting their prior beliefs. The empirical regularity appears to be due to the fact that people spend more energy trying to debunk the piece of evidence that tells against their prior opinions than the piece tells in favor of them (Lord et al. 1979; Kelly 2008). This should sound familiar: it is precisely this strategy which I argued is rational in the context of exploring explanations. Finding an explanation results in less ambiguity than failing to find one. A rational person who's interested in the truth should be trying to get strong evidence, and so to avoid ambiguity. That means-other things equal-they should search for alternative explanations in the place they expect to find them, focusing on debunking the evidence that conflicts with their prior beliefs. So rational people exhibit biased assimilation. Second, confirmation bias-people's tendency to seek out new arguments that confirm their prior beliefs. That is, if people are given a choice of which slant of argument to hear (or-what comes to the same thing-which news source to watch), they will tend to choose the one that agrees with their opinion. This should sound familiar: it is precisely the strategy I argued is rational in the context of argument assessment. Hearing a good argument results in less ambiguity than hearing a bad one. A rational person who's interested in the truth should be trying to get strong evidence, and so to avoid ambiguity. That means-other things equal-they should prefer hearing arguments that they expect to be good, rather than those they expect to be bad. And, in general, they should expect arguments that agree with their beliefs to be better than those that disagree with them. So rational people exhibit confirmation bias. Third, group polarization-the tendency for a group's opinion to become more extreme after discussion, in the same direction as the group's initial tendency. The empirical regularity appears to be due to two mechanisms: first, people discuss more arguments in favor of the group's initial opinion than against it; and second, people are influenced by merely hearing of the opinions of others (Isenberg 1986; Baron et al. 1996). We can also use our results to explain why these effects could be rational. The first one is easy. We've seen that evidential ambiguity explains why being presented with arguments in favor of a claim C tends to provide you with evidence in its favor. Since groups that have an initial tendency to believe C will tend to know more arguments in favor of it than against it, sharing them will tend to provide more evidence for C than against it. What about the effect of others' opinions? In general, learning that others believe some claim C provides evidence for C. However, in our political context it's common knowledge that loads of people agree with your views and loads of people disagree with them. So shouldn't these conflicting bits of evidence balance out? No-for we're back in our exploring-explanations scenario. You're presented with two pieces of conflicting evidence: these people all agree with your belief; but these people all disagree with it. When you have conflicting evidence and other things are equal, what's the rational thing to do? Spend more energy debunking the evidence that conflicts with your prior beliefs! It's therefore rational to spend time coming up with alternative explanations for why your political opponents disagree with you-and thus (upon coming up with such explanations) rational to give more weight to the political opinions of those who agree with you. So rational people also exhibit group polarization. In short: there's reason to think that even fully rational people-those who are exquisitely sensitive to the potential ambiguity of their evidence-would tend to interpret conflicting evidence as confirmatory, tend to search for confirming arguments, and tend to react to group discussion by becoming more extreme. If that's right, then the fact that you and I exhibit these tendencies is no indictment. Rather, it may reveal just how exquisitely sensitive to our evidential situation we are. Let's pull the strands together. We need to appeal to both new sociological trends and general psychological tendencies in order to explain the recent rise of political polarization. Many construe this rise as an individual problem-as a case where suboptimal individual choices explain the suboptimal collective outcome. I've argued that this may be a mistake. When we pay close attention to the subtle informational choices people face-in particular, the way in which they must navigate ambiguous evidence- we see that the relevant psychological tendencies may reveal optimal individual choices. If that's right, then we face a structural problem: the modern internet has created a socialinformational situation in which optimal individual choices give rise to suboptimal collective outcomes. If this is right, we should think of political polarization less as a health epidemic and more as a tragedy of the commons. That means two things. 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IMPORTANT: When citing this article, please refer to the print-version: Gehirn, Geist, Gott. Quaestiones Disputatae 240, Diesseits des Schweigens. Wie von Gott sprechen?, Freiburg 2011: Herder, 64-86. „Ich nenne euch nicht mehr Sklaven, denn der Sklave weiss nicht, was sein Herr tut" (Joh 15,15) Gehirn, Geist, Gott von Godehard Brüntrup SJ Die gewagte Verbindung von „Gehirn, Geist und Gott" als Thema eines Vortrags überrascht heute wahrscheinlich weniger als früher. Viele werden dabei allerdings zunächst an die heute viel diskutierte neurophysiologische Erforschung der religiösen Erfahrung denken. Ein Thema, das wegen eines populären Fehlschlusses breites Interesse in den Medien gefunden hat. Dieser Fehlschluss besagt, dass sich die Nichtexistenz Gottes logisch aufdrängt, wenn es nachweislich ein neurophysiologisches Korrelat der Erfahrung Gottes gibt. Das ist aber nicht der Fall. Niemand würde aus der These, dass der Erfahrung eines Baumes ein neurophysiologisches Korrelat entspricht, die These folgern, dass Bäume nicht existieren. Viele, wenn nicht die meisten Mathematiker sind so genannte Realisten oder Platonisten, sie nehmen die Existenz abstrakter Entitäten ausserhalb von Raum und Zeit an. Kein Mathematiker, der einen solchen metaphysischen Realismus vertritt, würde behaupten, dass aus der Tatsache, dass jeder konkreten mathematischen Einsicht eines Mathematikers ein neuronales Korrelat zugeordnet werden kann, bereits folgt, dass es keine abstrakten Entitäten gibt. Zwischen diesen beiden Thesen gibt es keinen direkten logischen Zusammenhang. Die Debatte um die neurologischen Grundlagen der religiösen Erfahrung hilft uns also für unsere Fragestellung nicht wirklich weiter. Um den Zusammenhang von Gehirn, Geist und Gott wenigstens ansatzweise zu beleuchten, müssen wir vielmehr unsere Aufmerksamkeit auf den Zusammenhang von Materie und Geist richten. Dieser Zusammenhang ist natürlich gerade im Gehirn für unser Selbstverständnis von zentraler Bedeutung. Insbesondere bei der Frage, ob das Gehirn eine durch letztlich physikalische kausale Sukzessionsgesetze determinierte biologische Maschine ist, oder ob der Geist eine eigenständige kausale Rolle spielt. Im Folgenden soll diese immer noch sehr allgemeine Frage anfangs exemplarisch zugespitzt werden auf einige Aspekte des Problems der Willensfreiheit. Von diesem Problem und seiner empirischen Erforschung ausgehend 1 soll in einem zweiten, allgemeineren Schritt die Metaphysik des Geistes behandelt werden, bevor ganz am Ende die „letzte" Frage, die Gottesfrage, mit dem Erreichten in Verbindung gebracht wird. Dabei wird die These verteidigt, dass es gerade die geistigen Akte der Spontaneität und Freiheit sind, die Gott ermöglichen in die Welt einzugreifen, ohne die innerweltlichen wirkursächlichen Zusammenhänge auseinander reissen zu müssen. Die Pointe der hier entwickelten Position ist also, dass Gottes Wirken in der Welt finalursächlich geistig und nicht wirkursächlich materiell ist, und dass die Welt gegenüber dem göttlichen Wirken nicht passiv ist. Vielmehr wird argumentiert, dass Gott wirkt, indem er der Schöpfung Möglichkeiten und Werte anbietet, die dann von dieser ergriffen und realisiert werden können. Gottes Wirken in der Welt geschieht also meist so, dass er der kreatürlichen Spontaneität und Freiheit ein Angebot macht. Man darf die Gott-Welt-Interaktion daher nicht primär nach dem Modell von unstrukturierter Materie und strukturierender Form verstehen. Nach dieser Vorstellung wäre die Welt eine passive, erleidende Materie, in die der aktive Gestaltungswille Gottes formal strukturierend eingreift: wie ein Künstler, der aus Ton eine Figur formt. In dem Masse wie die Schöpfung selbst geistig ist, appelliert Gott an den geistigen Vollzug der Spontaneität und Freiheit im Geschöpf, um dadurch vermittelt in der Welt zu wirken. Es wird weiter unten argumentiert, dass dieses geistige Element in analoger Weise die Schöpfung auf allen Ebenen durchzieht. Das Verhältnis von Gott zu Welt kann daher durch das Wort Jesu „Ich nenne euch nicht mehr Sklaven, denn der Sklave weiss nicht, was sein Herr tut" (Joh 15,15) metaphorisch bestimmt werden. Dies soll im Folgenden in einem weiten argumentativen Bogen näher bestimmt und entfaltet werden. TEIL I: GEHIRN Zeigt die Hirnforschung, dass es keinen Geist gibt? Verdeutlicht am Beispiel eines geistigen Aktes: der Willensfreiheit Dieses Thema wurde in den letzten Jahren in Deutschland in breiter Öffentlichkeit und mit grosser Resonanz in den Massenmedien diskutiert. Charakteristisch für diese Debatte war wiederum, dass um der medialen Aufmerksamkeit willen weitreichende Schlussfolgerungen gezogen wurden, die sich aus der Datenbasis gar nicht direkt ableiten liessen. Einige Experimente scheinen nämlich prima facie zu belegen, dass das Gehirn eine Handlung schon bestimmt, bevor das selbstbewusste Subjekt dessen gewahr wird. Die stärkste Evidenz für diesen illusionären Charakter des bewussten Wollens wird aus dem sogenannten Libet-Experiment gewonnen. Das Ergebnis dieses Versuchs 2 war, dass bei Personen, die willkürlich eine Hand bewegten, schon einen Sekundenbruchteil vor der bewussten Einleitung der Bewegung im Gehirn ein Potential messbar war, das für sich allein genommen schon hinreichte, die Handlung auszulösen. Daraus wurde geschlossen, dass das positive, bewusste Wollen in unserer Welt keine kausale Rolle spiele. Man beobachtet bewusst nur, was das Gehirn vorher schon unbewusst determiniert hat. Die Betonung liegt hier auf positivem Wollen, da Libet davon ausging, dass der bewusste Wille, selbst wenn das Bereitschaftspotential da ist und der Impuls zu handeln „hervorstrudelt"1, wie er sich ausdrückt, immer noch die Handlung verhindern kann; er hat sozusagen ein Vetorecht. Das ist dennoch ein merkwürdiges Ergebnis. Warum hat die Evolution dann überhaupt die Erfahrung des bewussten positiven freien Willens hervorgebracht, wenn das Wollen doch nichts bewegt? Die gängige Antwort ist, dass die Überzeugung, einen freien Willen zu haben, etwas in der Welt bewirkt; zum Beispiel: uns vor völlig lethargischem Nichthandeln zu bewahren. Man kann nicht leicht verstehen, wie das funktionieren soll. Die Überzeugung, frei zu sein, könnte in der Welt etwas verändern, wenn sie den bewussten Willen bestimmte, nicht passiv zu bleiben, sondern etwas tun zu wollen. Da der bewusste Wille aber gemäss der Annahme sowie nichts tut, ist auch die falsche Überzeugung, frei zu sein, machtlos, da sie nicht vermittels des Willens kausal wirksam werden kann. Doch nun zum Experiment selbst. Im naturwissenschaftlichen Experiment wird die Natur befragt und sie gibt eine Antwort. Man muss aber zwei Dinge beachten: In die Formulierung der Frage gehen Vorentscheidungen ein und die Antwort ergibt sich erst durch eine Interpretation der Daten. Ein Beispiel für eine methodische Vorentscheidung, die in dieses Experiment einging, ist die folgende: Der Willensakt ist nur aus der Innenperspektive des Subjekts wahrnehmbar, die Gehirnzustände sind auch aus der Perspektive des externen Beobachters wahrnehmbar. Wie können wir nun eine Gleichzeitigkeit oder ein Früher oder Später feststellen, wenn dem externen Beobachter die innere Perspektive nicht zugänglich ist? Er muss sich auf einen Report der Versuchsperson verlassen. In unserem Experiment schauten die Teilnehmer auf eine sehr genaue Uhr und datierten durch den Blick darauf den Moment, in dem im Bewusstsein die Handlung ausgelöst wurde. Woher wissen wir aber, wie viel Zeit dieser komplexe Prozess der Selbstbeobachtung und die dann notwendige Korrelation mit der Uhr in Anspruch nimmt? Wir müssen für den Messvorgang irgendwie die Innenperspektive und die Aussenperspektive aufeinander abstimmen, die Zeitabläufe eichen, sonst ist er wertlos. Dazu reizte Libet bei den Versuchspersonen die Haut und liess sie mit Hilfe der erwähnten Uhr berichten, wann sie sich dieser Hautreizung bewusst wurden. Somit konnte der Zeitunterschied zwischen äusserer Reizung und berichteter Uhrzeit bestimmt werden und Innenund 1 Libet, Benjamin: Mind Time (dt. Ausgabe), Frankfurt 2005: Suhrkamp, 179. 3 Aussenperspektive zueinander in ein geeichtes Verhältnis gesetzt werden. Das ist eine findige Methode. Aber kann man dadurch sicher sein, dass man auch im Falle der Handbewegung richtig misst? Vielleicht geschieht die bewusste Wahrnehmung einer äusseren Reizung der Haut schneller als die bewusste Selbstreflexion auf das Bedürfnis, die Hand zu bewegen? Letzteres ist ein künstliches, unnatürliches Verhalten, ersteres ein evolutionär sehr wichtiges Geschehen, um Verletzungen vom Körper fernzuhalten. Neueste Experimente von William Banks scheinen in der Tat zu belegen, dass die Versuchspersonen den Zeitpunkt der bewussten Entscheidung nicht verlässlich berichten können. Wenn man beispielsweise die Fingerbewegung mit einem Signalton bestätigt und diesen dann absichtlich verzögert, also ein klein wenig nach der Bewegung erklingen lässt, dann datieren die Versuchspersonen ihre bewusste Entscheidung, den Finger zu bewegen, entsprechend der Verzögerung nach vorne. Sie beziehen also das Ergebnis der bewussten Entscheidung in die Bestimmung des Zeitpunktes der bewussten Entscheidung mit ein. Ein weiterer Hinweis darauf, dass die zeitliche Bestimmung eines Willensaktes ein komplexer Akt der Konstruktion ist, keine direkte Wahrnehmung.2 Bei genauem Hinsehen sind die Dinge also nicht mehr so klar. Die ermittelten Daten beruhen in der Regel auf etwa 40 Durchgängen. Bei Libet liegen die Schwankungen zwischen 422 und 54 Millisekunden. Andere Autoren, die das Experiment wiederholten, fanden zum Teil erheblich abweichende Ergebnisse. Interessanterweise zeigte sich bei einigen Versuchsreihen das Bereitschaftspotential statistisch signifikant häufig nach der bewussten Einleitung der Bewegung und nicht vorher.3 Ein wesentlicher Gesichtspunkt ist hier, dass die bewusste Aufmerksamkeit die Zeitwahrnehmung verändert. Je nachdem, ob die Person sich mehr auf den optischen Reiz der Uhr oder auf die bewusste Selbstwahrnehmung konzentriert hat, können unterschiedliche subjektive Datierungen berichtet werden. Aber lassen wir das auf sich beruhen, es ist nicht das philosophisch relevante Problem bei Libets Experimenten. Das philosophische Problem liegt in der Interpretation des Experiments; genauer liegt es darin, dass Libet die Freiheit der Handlung an der falschen Stelle sucht. Um dies zu erläutern, benötigen wir eine begriffliche Unterscheidung. Handlungsverursachung unterscheidet sich von gewöhnlichen Kausalerklärungen. Die logische Form einer gewöhnlichen Kausalerklärung ist: Ereignis A verursacht Ereignis B. Die Form einer Handlungserklärung ist: Eine Person P 2 Banks, William, et al.: We infer rather than perceive the moment of decision to act in Libet's measurement of the time of conscious decision, in: Towards a science of consciousness April 8-12 (2008). Research abstracts. A service from the Journal of Consciousness Studies, Tucson 2008, 69f. 3 Keller, I. / Heckhausen, H.: Readiness Potentials Preceding Spontaneous Motor Acts: Voluntary vs. Involuntary Control, in: Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology 76 (1990), 351-61. Haggard, P. / Eimer, M.: On the Relation Between Brain Potentials and the Awareness of Voluntary Movements, in: Experimental Brain Research 126 (1999), 128-33. 4 vollzieht die Handlung H aus dem Grund G. Schauen wir nochmal auf Libets Experiment: Libet bat die Versuchsteilnehmer, die Handlung nicht bewusst zu planen, sondern die Handbewegung „von sich aus"4, also völlig undeterminiert und grundlos auftreten zu lassen. Allein dadurch fehlt dieser Körperbewegung schon ein wesentliches Charakteristikum einer freien Handlung. Libet hat bei der Instruktion der Versuchsteilnehmer die Begriffe „Drang", „Verlangen", „Wunsch" und „Absicht" als untereinander austauschbar benutzt, als handele es sich um dieselben Phänomene5. Wir wissen also nicht, ob die Teilnehmer einen Drang, ein Verlangen, einen Wunsch oder eine Absicht erlebten, die Hand zu bewegen, oder vielleicht eine Mischung einiger dieser mentalen Zustände. Dabei handelt es sich hierbei doch um höchst unterschiedliche Phänomene. Das Gefühl, eine Handlung vollziehen zu wollen, ein Drang, ein Verlangen oder ein Wunsch zu handeln ist abzusetzen von der absichtlichen Entscheidung, jetzt oder auch in der Zukunft unter den geeigneten Umständen eine Handlung ausführen zu wollen. Der Anschaulichkeit halber soll dies an einem Beispiel verdeutlicht werden: Ich weiss, dass mein Freund am nächsten Morgen um sechs in der Frühe mit einem langen interkontinentalen Flug am Flughafen landet. Ich habe einen gefüllten, langen Arbeitstag vor mir. Ich überlege, ob ich trotzdem um fünf Uhr aufstehen soll, um zum Flughafen zu fahren. Nach einiger Abwägung entscheide ich mich, die Fahrt morgen anzutreten, um so dieser Freundschaft, die mir viel bedeutet, Ausdruck zu verleihen. Um kurz vor fünf klingelt der Wecker, ich erwache und erinnere mich wieder an den Entschluss, den Freund abzuholen. Ich sage mir, dass ich aber noch einige Minuten liegen bleiben kann. Während ich so liege, baut sich in mir mit der davon eilenden Zeit eine innere Spannung auf, so dass ich mich plötzlich fast ruckartig aus dem Bett erhebe. Trotz dieses Automatismus, der nicht unter der vollständigen bewussten Kontrolle des Handelnden liegt, sprechen wir im oben genannten Zusammenhang von einer freien Handlung. Nicht weil ich mich plötzlich ganz wie von selbst aus dem Bett erhoben habe, sondern ganz offensichtlich, weil ich mich in einer Abwägung unter Alternativen aus Gründen entschieden habe, meinen Freund abzuholen. Es kann durchaus sein, dass ich in dem Moment, wo ich mir bewusst gemacht habe, dass ich spätestens in einigen Minuten aufstehen muss, einen Prozess in meinem Gehirn ausgelöst habe, der mit fortschreitender Zeit eine innere Spannung aufbaut, die dann irgendwann eine kritische Schwelle erreicht, die zur Handlung führt. Entscheidend ist, dass ich durch meine Entscheidung, zum Flughafen zu fahren, diesen Prozess in Gang gesetzt habe und dass es in meiner Macht steht, ihn jederzeit wieder abzubrechen. Es macht dann nichts, wenn er, einmal in Gang gesetzt, innerhalb gewisser Grenzen, die für die intendierte Handlung irrelevant sind, seine Eigendynamik entwickelt. 4 Libet, Benjamin: Mind Time (dt. Ausgabe), Frankfurt 2005: Suhrkamp, 163. 5 cf. Mele, Al: Strength of Motivation and Being in Control: Learning from Libet, in: American Philosophical Quarterly 34 (1997), 319-32. 5 Die Parallele zum Libet-Fall ist offensichtlich: Der Versuchsteilnehmer entschliesst sich, aus irgendeinem Grund (Neugierde, Unterstützung der Wissenschaften oder auch nur des Geldes wegen) an dem Libet-Experiment teilzunehmen. Er weiss, dass er in den nächsten, sagen wir 30, Sekunden die Hand bewegen soll. In ihm baut sich eine innere Spannung auf, die sich nach einigen Sekunden in einer spontanen Handbewegung entlädt. Selbst wenn er sich vornähme, genau nach 17 Sekunden die Hand zu bewegen und angespannt auf eine Uhr starrte, wäre zu erwarten, dass sich kurz vor der gewählten Zeit ein Bereitschaftspotential aufbaut, dass dann sein Eigenleben führt. Man denke an einen Sportler, der starten darf, wenn der Countdown bei Null angekommen ist. Wenn dieser Start nicht in gewisser Weise autonom durchgeführt würde, er sich also bewusst entscheiden müsste, zu starten, würde er immer nur verlieren. Daraus schliessen wir aber nicht, dass der Sportler von einem unbewussten Prozess zur Teilnahme am Rennen gezwungen worden ist, das wäre eine absurde Konsequenz. Dies ist nach meiner Auffassung die korrekte Beschreibung des Libet-Experiments. Libet hat die Freiheit an der falschen Stelle gesucht. Er hielt eine sich plötzlich wie von selbst ergebende Körperbewegung für den Inbegriff einer freien Handlung. Die Freiheit ist aber in der bewussten Entscheidung des Versuchsteilnehmers zu finden, in der er sich aus Gründen entschied, am Versuch teilzunehmen und dann in sich einen Prozess in Gang gesetzt hat, der durchaus in einer gewissen Autonomie innerhalb des durch die Entscheidung gesetzten zeitlichen Rahmens die Handlung auslöste. Die Handlung wird allerdings nicht dadurch unfrei, dass an ihrer Auslösung ein Prozess beteiligt war, der nicht vollständig unter meiner bewussten Kontrolle stand. Sie wird nicht einmal dadurch unfrei, dass es nicht unter meiner direkten Kontrolle lag, ob die Handlung nach, sagen wir, 15 oder 19 Sekunden ausgelöst wurde. Freiheitsbegriff und wissenschaftliches Weltbild Der Grund dafür, dass viele meinen, die Freiheit des Willens als geistiger Akt habe in unserem naturwissenschaftlichen Weltbild keinen Platz, muss tiefer liegen. Der Zweifel liegt in der Überzeugung begründet, dass es keine natürliche Erklärung für einige wesentliche Bestandteile des Phänomens des freien Willens gibt. Ohne allzu viel philosophische Detailarbeit sind für einen freien Willen folgende Elemente als zentral anzunehmen: (1) Ein freies Wesen handelt aus Gründen. Sein Verstand erfasst intentional einen Begründungszusammenhang. Es hat also mentale Zustände wie Überzeugungen und Wünsche. Philosophen sprechen von intentionalen Zuständen. 6 (2) Ein freies Wesen muss in der Lage sein, normative Zusammenhänge zu erfassen. Wesen, die nicht zwischen normativ richtig und falsch und moralisch gut und böse unterscheiden können, können nicht im vollen Sinne frei sein. (3) Der Prozess, der von einer freien Entscheidung zu einer freien Tat führt, muss in seinen wesentlichen Teilen bewusst erfolgen. Ein Wertempfinden ist konstitutiv für ein freies Wesen. Ein Wesen, das nicht über eine bewusste Innenperspektive verfügt, kann nicht im relevanten Sinne frei sein. (4) Ein freies Wesen muss in der Lage sein, sich (innerhalb von Grenzen) durch seine bewussten mentalen Zustände selbst zu bestimmen. Wir haben also die Elemente Intentionalität, Normativität, Bewusstsein und Selbstbestimmung. Betrachten wir nun die Grundstrukturen des klassischen wissenschaftlichen Weltbildes, d.h. ohne Berücksichtigung der Quantenmechanik. Danach besteht die Welt aus einer Menge von kleinsten physikalischen Elementarteilchen und Feldern. Diese Elementarteilchen stehen untereinander in einem Beziehungsgeflecht von Wechselwirkungen: der starken und der schwachen Kernkraft, der elektromagnetischen Wechselwirkung und der Gravitation. Es gibt Gesetze, die einen regelmässigen Ablauf dieser Wechselwirkungen garantieren. Jede Art von Elementarteilchen wird durch die funktionale Rolle definiert, die es in diesem kausalen Netz einnimmt, das sich im Prinzip mathematisch, vor allem durch Differentialgleichungen, beschreiben lässt. In diesem Prozess der Wechselwirkungen entstehen komplexere Muster wie Sterne und Galaxien. In einigen Regionen entwickeln sich allein durch das Zusammenspiel der Grundbausteine noch komplexere Muster, das Leben entsteht und schliesslich der Mensch. Wir haben also einen Stufenbau der Welt. Die Elementarteilchen verbinden sich so, dass wir über der Ebene der Physik die Ebene der Chemie haben, darüber die Biologie, darüber die Psychologie. Das Entscheidende ist, dass die Fakten auf der untersten Ebene alle Fakten auf den höheren Ebenen festlegen. Was sich daher in meinem Gehirn ereignet, wird determiniert durch das Verhalten der Elementarteilchen. Man kann dieses Weltbild heute sehr elegant in einem Computerprogramm modellhaft veranschaulichen. Dieses Programm erzeugt eine Matrix, ein schachbrettartiges Gitter und jedes kleine Kästchen im Gitter, man nennt es Zelle, ist ein elementarer Baustein. Jede Zelle kann bestimmte Eigenschaften haben, die sich nach Regeln in der Zeit verändern können. Ein primitives Beispiel: die Zellen kennen nur die Eigenschaften „an" und „aus". Eine Regel besagt: Wenn eine Zelle drei Nachbarn hat, die „an" sind, dann ist sie im nächsten Schritt auch „an". Wäre also eine Zelle, die „aus" ist, zum Zeitpunkt 1 von drei Nachbarn umgeben, die „an" sind, dann ist sie zum Zeitpunkt 2 auch „an". Für eine komplexes Programm dieser Art benötigt man natürlich mehrere 7 fundamentale Eigenschaften und eine Vielzahl von Regeln. Wenn man etwa Eigenschaften wie Ladung und Masse und ebenso entsprechende Gesetze angibt, kann man eine Welt der klassischen Physik im Computer simulieren. In der Tat bilden die Zellen schon nach wenigen Schritten vielzellige, komplexe Muster aus, die sich durchhalten und weiter entwickeln. Der Mathematiker John Conway hat nachgewiesen, dass man auf diese Weise sogar sehr komplizierte Muster erzeugen kann. Es entstehen auch selbstreplikative Strukturen, die der DNA ähnlich sind. Ein evolutionärer Prozess der Entstehung komplexer Muster ist in diesem Modell simulierbar. Man nennt diese zellulären Automaten daher auch „Lifeworlds", da sie Entwicklung komplexer Strukturen aus einfachen Bausteinen bis hin zu den Grundstufen des Lebendigen simulieren können. Gemäss dem oben beschriebenen Weltbild ist unser ganzer Kosmos ein solcher, wenn auch viel komplizierterer und grösserer zellulärer Automat, der letztendlich nur aus einigen fundamentalen Bausteinchen, ihren Eigenschaften, Wechselwirkungen und ein paar Gesetzen besteht. Das ist das mechanistische Bild der Welt, die welt als eine grosse, komplexe Maschine, und wir nur ein Rädchen darin. Ein Gehirn ist nur ein relativ kurzfristig stabiles Muster innerhalb dieses riesigen Automaten. Diese materialistische Weltsicht nennt man heute Physikalismus, weil die physikalischen Fakten alle anderen Fakten bestimmen. Im beschriebenen Fall ist es ein klassischer Physikalismus, da dieses Modell die Quantenmechanik nicht einbezieht. Es ist ein reduktionistisches Verständnis der Welt. Kehren wir nun zurück zum Problem der Willensfreiheit. Erinnern wir uns, dass die Elemente Intentionalität, Normativität, bewusste Innenperspektive und Selbstbestimmung sind. Lassen diese Elemente sich im Bild des zellulären Automaten erklären? Beginnen wir mit einem intentionalen Zustand. Wählen wir als intentionalen Gehalt den Satzes des Pythagoras: a2 + b2 = c2. Wie ist es möglich, dass der Geist einen solchen abstrakten Inhalt, der wahr oder falsch sein kann, in philosophischer Terminologie eine „Proposition", erfasst? Wie kann sich eine komplexe Anordnung von Elementarteilchen, und das ist ja laut der Hypothese unser Gehirn, auf einen solchen abstrakten Gehalt beziehen? Was für eine Art von Beziehung ist das? Das zweite Problem ist die Normativität: Wie kann eine komplexe Anordnung von Elementarteilchen erfassen, dass etwas nicht bloss ist, sondern gesollt wird, ein sittliches Gut darstellt? Wie kann sich der rein faktische Zustand des Systems in den Bereich des Sollens erheben? Das dritte Problem ist das Bewusstsein: Warum erlebt ein komplexes Bündel von Elementarteilchen etwas? Erleben kommt in dem zellulären Automaten nicht vor. Wie bringt ein Kosmos, der nach dem Modell des zellulären Automaten abläuft, es zustande, bewusste Erlebnisse hervorzubringen? Das vierte Problem ist die Selbstbestimmung: Der Zustand eines komplexen Musters von Elementarteilchen wird vollständig durch seine Einzelteile bestimmt. Das Muster ist nicht mehr als die Summe seiner Teile. Wie kann ein komplexes Muster, wie beispielsweise ein Mensch, also einen eigenständigen Einfluss ausüben? 8 Trotz grosser Anstrengungen und beeindruckender Theorien, ist es doch nicht falsch zu sagen, dass es im Rahmen des reduktionistischen Physikalismus bisher nicht gelungen ist, diese Probleme auf eine befriedigende Weise zu lösen. Es kann daher nicht verwundern, dass derjenige, der dieses Weltbild im Grossen und Ganzen für richtig hält, sich mit der Freiheit als geistigem Akt schwer tut. Sie passt nicht ins Bild. Man muss sie letztendlich leugnen oder sie auf einer Art Prokrustesbett so zurecht schneiden, bis sie wieder ins Bild passt. Freiheit ist dann nichts anderes als die Abwesenheit von äusserem Zwang. Das ist ohne Zweifel der Weg, den viele heute gehen. Die entscheidende Frage ist: Gibt es Alternativen? Man könnte an diesem klassischen physikalistischen Bild festhalten und den Geist einfach in einem unabhängig daneben existierenden Bereich ansiedeln. Ein solcher extremer Dualismus ist aber heute für viele kaum mehr überzeugend, weil er nur schwer die intime Verbindung von Körper und Geist erklären kann, für die uns die empirische Erforschung des Gehirns heute eine Fülle von Belegen liefert. Diese Auffassung kann nicht verständlich machen, warum der Geist in der Natur zuhause ist. Ich möchte mich im heutigen Vortrag zwei anderen Modellen zuwenden: Geist als emergentes Phänomen und Geist als fundamentales Phänomen, da sie uns immerhin versprechen zu erklären, warum der Geist in der Natur zuhause ist. TEIL II: GEIST Geist als emergentes Phänomen Selbst einige führende Physikalisten erkennen an, dass sie im Rahmen ihres Modells das Entstehen von bewusstem Erleben nicht erklären können6. Bei jeder noch so komplexen materiellen Konfiguration, sagen wir in unserem Gehirn, können wir uns vorstellen, dass isomorph das gleiche Muster irgendwo existieren könnte, ohne etwas zu empfinden. Wir können einfach nicht verstehen, wie eine funktionale Struktur von Teilchen oder auch Zellen, die selbst nichts empfinden, plötzlich eine Empfindung hervorbringen kann. Jemand, der farbenblind ist, könnte auch durch noch so langes Studium des Gehirns niemals ableiten, wie es sich anfühlt, blau zu sehen. Hier klafft eine Erklärungslücke. Empfindungen haben einen qualitativen Charakter, es fühlt sich irgendwie an, Schokoladeneis zu essen. Keine funktionale Beschreibung dessen, was im Gehirn des Eisgeniessers vor sich geht, kann jemals diesen qualitativen Gehalt der Empfindung erfassen. Deshalb, so hat Thomas Nagel in einem berühmten Aufsatz argumentiert, können wir zwar das Gehirn einer Fledermaus erforschen, wir werden aber nie genau herausfinden, wie es sich anfühlt, eine 6 cf. Kim, Jaegwon: Physicalism or Something Near Enough, Princeton 2005: Princeton University Press, 170. 9 Fledermaus zu sein7. Die Emergentisten behaupten nun, dass diese Undurchsichtigkeit von unten nach oben zu den Grundstrukturen der Natur selbst gehört. In der Natur tauchen auf höheren Ebenen der Komplexität plötzlich völlig neuartige Phänomene auf, die auch aus einer vollständigen Kenntnis der unteren Ebene nicht ableitbar sind. Die untere Ebene erzwingt dieses Hervorbringen nicht mit logischer Notwendigkeit, sondern nur, weil es in unserer Welt diese speziellen Emergenzgesetze gibt. Aber diese Gesetze kommen zu fundamentalen physikalischen Gesetzen dazu, sie lassen sich daraus nicht ableiten. Man könnte sagen, die Natur macht systematisch Sprünge. Immer wenn eine komplexe Struktur wie unser Gehirn entsteht, dann bringt sie in unserer Welt Bewusstsein hervor. Man erkennt unmittelbar, dass eine solche, starke Emergenzthese eigentlich schon nicht mehr streng physikalistisch ist, denn das Auftreten der emergenten Phänomene wird nur durch die physische Ebene plus der darin nicht notwendig enthaltenen Emergenzgesetze erzwungen. Wenn man nun noch zwei weitere Annahmen hinzunimmt, hat man einen Rahmen, in dem Freiheit verständlicher wird. Die erste Annahme ist, dass die Welt auf der untersten Ebene nicht völlig deterministisch abläuft, sondern es einen gewissen Spielraum gibt, die Zukunft also nicht vollständig feststeht. Die zweite Annahme ist, dass die Phänomene, die sich auf einer höheren, emergenten Ebene entwickelt haben, einen kausalen Einfluss auf die unteren Schichten nehmen können, aus denen sie hervorgegangen sind. Wenn dies der Fall wäre, dann könnte ein aus dem Gehirn hervorgegangener mentaler Zustand auf das Gehirn zurückwirken und eine Indetermination ausnutzen, die dort z. B. aus Gründen der Quantenmechanik besteht, und die Wahrscheinlichkeiten in eine bestimmte Richtung lenken. Ein solcher Ansatz ist nicht mehr mit dem oben dargestellten reduktionistisch-physikalistischen Weltbild vereinbar. Dennoch ist diese Sichtweise nach einer Blütezeit besonders in England zu Beginn des letzten Jahrhunderts in den letzten Jahren erneut diskutiert worden. In einer seiner letzten Veröffentlichungen vor seinem Tod hat beispielsweise Karl Popper nochmals für eine Emergenztheorie argumentiert8. Seine Theorie unterscheidet sich nur wenig von der, die nun auch Libet seit einigen Jahren vorträgt. Libet argumentiert dafür, dass Bewusstsein ein emergentes Feldphänomen sei, dass sich nicht aus den physischen Prozessen ableiten lasse9. Und Libet wäre nicht der geniale Experimentator, der er ist, wenn er nicht auch schon Experimente vorgeschlagen hätte, mit denen sich diese Hypothese in Zukunft vielleicht einmal empirisch beweisen liesse. Auch ein Klassiker der zeitgenössischen 7 cf. Nagel, Thomas: What it is like to be bat?, in: Philosophical Review 83 (1974), 435-450. 8 cf. Popper, Karl / Lindahl, B. / Århem, P.: A discussion of the mind-brain problem, in: Theoretical Medicine 14 (1993), 167-180. 9 cf. Libet, Benjamin: A testable field-theory of mind-brain interaction, in: Journal of Consciousness Studies 1 (1994), 119-126. 10 Philosophie des Geistes, John Searle, hat sich vor kurzem erneut zum Problem der Willensfreiheit geäussert und jeden Reduktionismus abgelehnt. In den Vorlesungen, die er 2004 unter dem Titel „Freiheit und Neurobiologie" an der Sorbonne in Paris hielt, hat er die These vertreten, dass sowohl der einfache Materialismus wie der einfache Dualismus falsch seien, und das bewusste Selbst eine kausal wirksame Systemeigenschaft des Gehirns sei, die sich aufgrund der Quantenmechanik indeterministisch entwickle10. Der Emergenzbegriff ist aber vieldeutig. In einem schwachen Sinne sind ja schon die Muster, die sich in einem zellulären Automaten ergeben, die wie erwähnt bis hin zu komplexen Strukturen der Selbstreplikation reichen, emergent. Sie haben neue Systemeigenschaften. Sie sind aber nicht wirklich rätselhaft, sondern können aus dem Zusammenspiel der Bausteinchen erklärt werden. Wenn etwas im starken Sinne emergent ist, wie das bewusste Erleben, dann gibt es keine solche Erklärung. Die starke Emergenz macht Aufwärts-Unerklärbarkeit zu einer Grundkonstante der Natur. Die naheliegende Kritik ist folgende: Wenn man sagt, das Bewusstsein werde durch Emergenz hervorgebracht, dann hat man eigentlich nur das völlige Unverständnis mit einen Namen etikettiert. Die klassischen britischen Emergentisten sagten, man müsse die Emergenz mit „natural piety", natürlicher Frömmigkeit, einfach als factum brutum hinnehmen. Aus diesem Grunde, so scheint mir, hat der Theologe Karl Rahner die These vertreten, dass radikale Emergenz, die er „Selbstüberbietung" nannte, nicht aus sich selbst verständlich gemacht, sondern nur durch eine göttliche Mitwirkung erklärt werden kann. Aber bevor ich zu Gott komme, will ich noch eine zweite Metaphysik des Geistes erwähnen. Geist als fundamentales Phänomen Wenn das reduktionistische Modell den Geist und die Freiheit nicht erklären kann, radikal starke Emergenz nur ein Name für eine Erklärungslücke ist, dann drängt sich eine dritte überraschende Lösung auf: Das Mentale, der Geist sind bereits auf einer so fundamentalen Ebene im Universum anwesend, dass der Aufstieg zu höheren, neuartigen mentalen Phänomenen keine starke, sondern nur noch eine harmlosere schwache Emergenz benötigt. Das ist das genealogische Argument für die These, dass das Geistige in unserer Welt nicht vom Nicht-Geistigen abgeleitet werden kann. Vereinfacht gesagt: Eine auch noch so komplexe Anordnung von Nicht-Mentalem kann niemals etwas Mentales hervorbringen. Die Evolution des Geistigen kann nur ohne radikale Sprünge verlaufen, wenn Vorformen des Mentalen von Anfang an zu den fundamentalen Eigenschaften der 10 cf. Searle, John: Freiheit und Neurobiologie, Frankfurt 2004: Suhrkamp. 11 Welt gehören. Die These, dass die Natur einen fundamental geistig-mentalen Aspekt hat, ist so alt wie die Philosophie selbst und wurde von vielen grossen Denkern vertreten11. Hier soll die Grundintuition exemplarisch an einem Theoriestrang verdeutlicht werden, den man die LeibnizWhitehead Variante der „Geist-als-fundamental-Theorie" nennen könnte. Denn gerade von hierher lässt sich zum Schluss die Linie zu Gott ziehen. Die Leibniz-Whitehead Frage Die Grundfragestellung von Leibniz und Whitehead war: Was ist eigentlich ein konkretes Einzelding? Der klarste Fall für uns sind wir selber, eine einzelne Person. Auffällig ist hier, dass es bei der Person eine Innenund Aussenperspektive gibt, die Person erspürt die Aussenwelt von einem Standpunkt her. Schauen wir nochmals auf den zellulären Automaten. Jede einzelne Zelle darin wurde vollständig dadurch definiert, in welchen Beziehungen sie zu ihrer Umwelt steht. Über ihre innere Natur erfahren wir nichts. In der Welt der klassischen Physik gibt es keine Innenperspektive, es gibt nur ein Aussen. Das liegt daran, dass in der Physik nur abstrakte formale Strukturen wichtig sind. Das Wesen eines Dings wird dadurch bestimmt, welchen Ort es in diesem komplexen Netzwerk einnimmt. Eine der Grundintuitionen der Monadologie des Universalgenies Leibniz liegt darin, dass eine solche Struktur nicht seinsmässig fundamental sein kann. Die kartesische Konzeption, dass die materielle Welt bloss eine komplexe funktionale Struktur eines ausgedehnten Raumes sei, führt niemals zu einem konkreten Seienden. Die formale Struktur ist, wieder, zu „hohl", zu abstrakt, um ein konkretes Einzelding hervorzubringen; der Raum als blosse Ausdehnung ist andererseits, wie Leibniz argumentierte, nichts anderes als die schiere Wiederholung von etwas und ebenfalls zu abstrakt, um die innere Einheit eines Dinges zu konstituieren12. Die Einheit eines Dinges wird dadurch gestiftet, dass es ein Innen hat, eine wie auch immer geartete Weise, die Welt in sich zu erfahren. Das war die Grundeinsicht, die Leibniz zu seiner Monadologie führte. Bertrand Russell argumentierte, dass die Physik uns die Welt als ein grosses dynamisches Beziehungsgeflecht von Ereignissen beschreibe. Er fährt fort, dass wir dadurch nichts über die innere Natur dieser Ereignisse wüssten. Nur in einem einzigen Fall könnten wir die intrinsischen Qualitäten der physischen Ereignisse erkennen, im Falle unseres eigenen phänomenalen Erlebens, unseres eigenen Bewusstseins13. Fast zeitgleich formuliert der englische Astronom Sir Arthur Eddington in seinem 11 cf. Skribina, David: Panpsychism in the West, Cambridge MA 2005: MIT Press. 12 cf. Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm: Monadologie. 13 cf. Russell, Bertrand: The Analysis of Matter, London 1927: Kegan Paul, Trench and Trubner, 402. 12 Werk „Raum, Zeit und Gravitation" dieselbe Einsicht: „Physik ist die Kenntnis der strukturellen Form, nicht die Kenntnis des Gehalts. Durch die ganze physische Welt zieht sich ein unbekannter Gehalt, und das ist zweifellos der Stoff unseres Bewusstseins"14. Die rein physikalische Beschreibungsweise ist unvollständig. Es gibt fundamentale Eigenschaften, die sie ausklammert. Verbindet man diesen Gedanken mit der Idee Leibnizens, dass es gerade diese Eigenschaften sind, die wesentlich sind für die Konstitution eines echten Individuums, eines Einzeldings, dann wird die ganze Tragweite dieses Gedankens unmittelbar klar. Ein mögliches Missverständnis muss an dieser Stelle gleich abgewehrt werden: Obwohl der Gedanke vom menschlichen Erleben her entwickelt wurde, darf man hier nicht in einen primitiven anthropomorphen Panpsychismus verfallen. Leibniz machte diesen Punkt sehr klar, indem er unterschied zwischen dem, was man eine fundamentale Rezeptivität für Information nennen könnte und dem, was das hochentwickelte Vorhandensein bewussten Erlebens ausmacht. Die Konzeption ist durchaus offen für Höherentwicklung, für Emergenz von Neuartigem, sie verneint nur die radikale Emergenz von absolut Neuartigem. Eine weitere Unterscheidung von Leibniz ist wichtig, um das Bild der Konzeption „Geist-alsfundamental " besser zu verstehen: die Unterscheidung zwischen echten Individuen und blossen Konglomeraten. Nehmen Sie zum Beispiel einen Haufen Sand. Er ist kein echtes Individuum, sondern bloss ein Haufen, ein Konglomerat von Individuen. Man könnte nun meinen, dass wenn ich den Sand etwas anfeuchte und dann kunstvoll zu einer Statue forme, dass dann ein Individuum entsteht durch die Form, die Konfiguration. Die Leibnizsche Intuition wäre, dass die Konfiguration nicht ausreicht. Solange die Statue keine Innenperspektive hat, das heisst eine gewisse Rezeptivität für Information und auch eine gewisse innere Gerichtetheit, eine Art innere Spontaneität, solange ist kein Individuum entstanden. Ein Lebewesen ist hingegen ein echtes Individuum. An dieser Stelle möchte ich Leibniz verlassen. Sein statisches und isoliertes Bild von Substanzen erlaubt ihm nicht ein wirklich überzeugendes Bild der evolutiven Höherentwicklung zu entwerfen. Ich mache daher einen schnellen Sprung zu Whitehead, dem grossen Logiker, Mathematiker und Philosophen vom Anfang des letzten Jahrhunderts. Er warf Leibniz' Idealismus über Bord und verortete das Mentale als Innenperspektive der Materie selbst, ganz im Sinne des erwähnten Gedankens von Russell. Er dynamisierte Leibnizens Bild und ersetzte die Monaden durch prozesshafte Ereignisse. Schliesslich erlaubte er den Ereignissen, ihre Innenperspektiven in einem Nexus zu verbinden und so ein neues Individuum mit einer reicheren Innenperspektive zu erzeugen. Ein berühmter Satz in seinem Hauptwerk „Process and Reality" lautet: „Die vielen Einzelnen werden eins, und so entsteht ein 14 Eddington, Arthur: Space, Time and Gravitation, Cambridge 1920: Cambridge University Press, 200. Übersetzung des Autors. 13 neues Einzelnes."15 Der entscheidende Punkt ist, dass ein höherstufiges Ereignis sich als neues Einzelding erweist, gerade dadurch, weil niedrige Ereignisse ihre rezeptiven Felder verbunden haben. Das Ganze ist also mehr als die Summe seiner Teile. Das steht im Widerspruch zum klassischen physikalischen Weltbild, wo die Summe blosse Addition der Teile ist. Überall in der Welt, wo wir es mit blossen Konglomeraten zu tun haben, Sternen, Galaxien, Bergen und Flüssen etwa, sollten wir eine klassisch mechanisch erklärbare Welt vorfinden. Sollten wir aber tiefer in die Struktur dieser Konglomerate schauen, so müssen sie aus elementaren Ereignissen aufgebaut sein. Diese dürfen sich nicht mehr rein mechanisch verhalten, denn hier treffen wir auf Protomentalität. Gehen wir hinauf zu höherstufigen echten Individuen, die also keine Konglomerate sind, beispielsweise Lebewesen, so müsste wieder die rein mechanische Betrachtungsweise versagen, weil wir auf voll entwickelte Mentalität stossen.16 Nun fällt auf, dass dies erstaunlich genau unserem modernen physikalischen Weltbild entspricht. Auf der untersten Ebene versagt die klassische Mechanik, wir können diese Ebene nicht mehr mechanistisch erklären. Hier benötigen wir die Quantenmechanik. Auf der Ebene makroskopischer Objekte können wir fast alles mechanistisch erklären, solange wir es mit Sternen, Bergen oder Kristallen zu tun haben. Haben wir es hingegen mit einem höherstufigen Individuum zu tun, einem Lebewesen, versagt wiederum eine rein mechanistische Betrachtungsweise. Das ist genau das, was im Rahmen einer Whiteheadschen Ontologie zu erwarten ist. In der Quantenmechanik ist ganz offensichtlich das Ganze mehr als seine Teile; anders sind nonlokale Wechselwirkungen nicht zu denken und anders ist Quantenverschränkung nicht zu denken. Man spricht deshalb vom „Quantenholismus". Eine völlig beobachterunabhängige Realität macht nach der Standardinterpretation der Quantenmechanik ebenfalls keinen Sinn. Allerdings gibt es „Beobachter", wenn das, was ich ausgeführt habe, richtig ist, nicht erst seit wir die Welt beobachten. Perspektivität ist grundlegend in die Wirklichkeit eingebaut. Nimmt man nun noch den Indeterminismus der Quantenmechanik hinzu, so kann man wenigstens beginnen, Freiheit in der Natur verorten. Sokrates und das Bereitschaftspotential 15 Whitehead, Alfred N.: Process and Reality – An Essay in Cosmology, New York 1985: The Free Press (second, revised edition by David R. Griffin and Donald W. Sherburne), 32. 16 Vgl. dazu: Brüntrup, Godehard: Das Leib-Seele-Problem, 3. Auflage, Stuttgart 2008: Kohlhammer, Kapitel 8. Ebenso: Brüntrup, Godehard: Natural Individuals and Intrinsic Properties, in: Honnefelder, Ludger / Runggaldier, Edmund / Schick, Benedikt: Unity and Time as Problem in Metaphysics – Persistence and Individuality. Im Erscheinen begriffen. 14 Kehren wir nun zur Veranschaulichung wieder zu der anfangs erzählten Geschichte zurück: Ich hole also meinen Freund morgens in aller Herrgottsfrühe vom Flughafen ab. Ein imaginärer Neurophysiologe schaut alle Prozesse in meinem Gehirn während der Fahrt an. Ein noch so penibles Studium der neurophysiologischen Prozesse kann jedoch nie den Sinn der gesamten Handlung und deren Motivation verständlich machen. Das erschliesst sich nur aus der Innenperspektive. Nach dem hier diskutierten Modell ist meine Innenperspektive das rezeptive mentale Feld eines höherstufigen Individuums, das sich dadurch ergibt, dass die niedrigeren Individuuen in meinem Körper, vor allem in meinem Gehirn, ein Ganzes gebildet haben. Ich bin kein Konglomerat. Dieses Ganze hat nun in dem Masse, wie es der eng begrenzte Indeterminismus in unserer Welt zulässt, einen Einfluss auf die Individuen, aus denen es zusammengesetzt ist. Diese Verursachung von Oben nach Unten kann man eine final oder auch formal strukturierende Verursachung nennen, um sie von der auslösenden Wirkursächlichkeit abzusetzen, die wir von aussen beobachten können. Diese Frage diskutierte schon Sokrates mit seinen Schülern kurz vor seinem Tod17. Warum bleibt er trotz der sicheren Todesstrafe im Gefängnis sitzen und ergreift nicht die Fluchtmöglichkeit, die ihm geboten wurde? Die Naturphilosophen, wir würden heute sagen, die Naturwissenschaftler, so sagt Sokrates, behaupten, er bliebe sitzen, weil die Sehnen in seinen Knien gelockert sind. Heute würden wir sagen, weil kein Bereitschaftspotential zum Aufstehen gegeben war. Das ist aber eine absurde Erklärung, sagt Sokrates. Er bleibt sitzen, weil er ein gesetzestreuer Mann ist, der nicht aus dem Gefängnis fliehen will. In dem eben entwickelten Modell greifen beide Erklärungen einen Teil des gesamten natürlichen Geschehens heraus, die sich nicht widersprechen. TEIL III: GOTT Abschliessend nun einige Gedanken zu Gott. Wenn man annimmt, dass der Geist eine Grundgegebenheit des Universums ist, dann nimmt man damit auch an, dass die Dimension des Geistigen weit über den Bereich des Menschlichen hinausreicht, ja dass der menschliche Geist nur ein sehr kleiner Ausschnitt aus der gesamten Realität des Geistigen ist. Unter Annahme der Kontingenz des Universums stellt sich dann die Frage nach der notwendigen Realität, der sich das Universum verdankt. Diese muss dann auch geistig gedacht werden. Auf diese Frage der klassischen philosophischen Gotteslehre nach den Argumenten für ein geistiges Absolutes will ich aber in diesem Kontext nicht eingehen. Im Kontext der gegebenen Fragestellung „Gehirn, Geist, Gott" soll die Frage gestellt werden, ob die vorgestellten nicht-materialistischen Sichten des Universums Raum bieten für eine Einwirkung Gottes auf die Welt, ohne die Autonomie der 17 cf. Platon: Phaidon, 99a. 15 Naturwissenschaften im Reich der Wirkursachen zu gefährden. In unserer Zeit stellt sich dieses Problem verschärft, weil es den Anschein hat, dass es für Gott im darwinistischen Weltbild nichts mehr zu tun gibt. Das ist zweifellos richtig, wenn man Gott als eine Wirkursache unter all den anderen Wirkursachen in der Welt denkt. Dieser angebliche „Gott" wäre dann jemand, der zum Beispiel sich eine neue Spezies zusammenbaut, um den Reichtum an Lebewesen zu erhöhen. Ein solches Wesen wäre allerdings kein Gott, sondern eher ein gentechnisch versierter hochintelligenter Ausserirdischer, der in den Lauf der Evolution eingreifen kann. Wir haben gute Gründe, um auf diesen Gott zu verzichten. Er ist sicher nicht der Gott des Christentums. Betrachten wir zunächst noch einmal das naturwissenschaftliche Weltbild. Es definiert eine Entität, wie oben dargestellt, einfach durch die kausale Rolle, die diese in der Welt einnimmt. Naturwissenschaftler sind kausale Funktionalisten. Sie definieren die Gegenstände ihrer Forschung durch ihre kausale Einbettung in der Welt. Es bleibt dann aber die Frage, was die Träger all dieser Relationen sind. Was sind die „Dinge an sich" unabhängig von all den (kausalen) Relationen, in die sie eintreten? Die Standardantwort, die wir auf diese Frage erhalten, ist auch heute oft noch der alte atomistische Materialismus des Demokrit. Der Materialismus geht, einfach gesprochen, davon aus, dass die Welt aus einer Menge von kleinsten Teilchen besteht. Sie sind das, was die klassische Philosophie eine „Substanz" genannt hat. Etwas, das durch die Veränderung hindurch wesentlich gleich bleibt. Diese Teilchen sind in Bewegung, sie verändern ihre Position im Universum. Dabei können, zumindest vorübergehend, sehr komplexe Konfigurationen von diesen kleinsten Bausteinchen entstehen. Wir Menschen sind nach dieser Auffassung nichts anderes als eine solche Konfiguration. Alles, was sich hier ändert, sind die externen Relationen, die zwischen diesen kleinsten Bauteilchen bestehen. Oder man stelle sich eine Menge von Legosteinchen vor, die auf ganz verschiedene Weise zusammengesetzt werden können, also in verschiedenen externen Relationen zueinander stehen können. Kann dieser Haufen von Legosteinen modellhaft Evolution verständlich machen? Jede beliebige Konfiguration, also jede beliebige Menge externer Relationen dieser Bausteine, ist so gut wie jede andere. Denn was in dieser Sicht wirklich die Substanz der Welt ausmacht, sind eben nur diese Steine, und für sie ist es egal, wie sie angeordnet sind. Vielleicht könnte man sagen, dass manche Konfigurationen aus unseren Legosteinen komplexer sind als andere. Beispielsweise ist die Konfiguration eines Würfels komplexer als ein blosser Haufen genauso vieler Steine. Aber, was könnte eine rein materialistische Definition von Komplexität sein? Es soll doch heissen, dass hier eine ideale Form, ein Bauplan, oder eine Information realisiert wurde, und damit verlässt man den Bereich des rein Materiellen. Wie soll dann jedoch der Zuwachs an Komplexität rein materiell erklärt werden, wenn er doch nichts rein Materielles ist? Noch schwieriger wird es, wenn man Produkten der Evolution einen Wert zurechnet. Kaum jemand würde im Alltagsverständnis daran 16 zweifeln, dass ein Mensch einen höheren Wert darstellt als ein Einzeller. Aber wie ist das innerhalb der materialistischen Sicht zu erklären? Man ist geneigt, wieder auf Komplexität zurückzugreifen, aber das ist – wie gesehen – innerhalb eines strikt materialistischen Ansatzes wenig überzeugend. Hinzu kommt das ebenfalls weiter oben schon eingeführte Problem des phänomenalen Erlebens: Nehmen wir an, wir könnten einen Computer bauen, der ebenso komplex wäre wie das menschliche Gehirn, der aber kein Bewusstsein hätte, also nichts erlebte. Würde dieser Rechner denselben Wert realisieren wie eine menschliche Person? Offensichtlich nicht. Was dem Menschen den höheren Wert verleiht, ist auch seine Innenperspektive, sein Erleben, Fühlen und Denken. Jeder Mensch repräsentiert und erlebt die Welt auf einzigartige Weise, daher kommt ihm Wert zu. Wie können wir aber in unserer Lego-Welt aus reinen materiellen Bausteinchen das Entstehen einer erlebten Innenperspektive erklären? Das scheint unmöglich. Man kann die Steinchen anordnen, wie man will, sie werden nichts erleben. Die Konsequenz liegt jetzt auf der Hand: Wenn die Evolution eine doppelte Höherentwicklung ist, nämlich eine Höherentwicklung der Komplexität und Information einerseits und eine Höherentwicklung der geistigen Innenperspektive andererseits, dann kann man Evolution nicht rein materialistisch verstehen. Materie in Bewegung ist aus sich heraus nicht zur Höherentwicklung fähig, sondern nur zur Positionsveränderung. Wenn wir aber annehmen, dass das Geistige in seiner Doppelgestalt, als Form und Struktur einerseits und als erlebte Innenperspektive andererseits Teil unserer Wirklichkeit ist, dann wird die Möglichkeit von Evolution als Höherentwicklung eher verständlich. Betrachten wir nun unsere beiden Modelle des Geistes: Geist als emergentes Phänomen und Geist als fundamental. Aus der Sicht der radikalen Emergentisten ist die Evolution ein schöpferischer, ein kreativer Prozess, der immer neue Formen hervorbringt, und sich auch in die Richtung neuer, komplexerer Phänomene weiter entwickelt. Die Evolution macht dabei echte, unableitbare Sprünge, etwa bei erstmaligem Auftauchen von bewusstem Erleben aus völlig erlebnisfreier Materie. Karl Rahner hat in seinem berühmten Argument über die Möglichkeit von „Selbstüberbietung" dafür argumentiert, dass das Auftreten von radikal Neuem ohne eine göttliche Mitwirkung nicht verständlich sei.18 Im evolutionären Prozess wachsen die Entitäten in einem schleppend langsamen Prozess des Ausprobierens der Überlebensfähigkeit neuer Formen über sich hinaus. Aus Elementarteilchen entsteht irgendwann eine Person. Rahner bestreitet nicht diesen Mechanismus der Evolution, sondern fragt vielmehr nach seinen metaphysischen Voraussetzungen. Nichts kann allein aus sich selbst heraus etwas bewirken, was nicht in seiner Macht liegt. Rahner meint nun, 18 Rahner, Karl: Die Hominisation als theologische Frage, in: Overhage, Paul / Rahner, Karl: Das Problem der Hominisation, Freiburg 1961: Herder, 13-90. 17 dass keine Entität allein aus sich heraus zum Schaffen von etwas qualitativ Neuem fähig sei. Erkenntnisleitend ist für ihn dabei eine Intuition eines Prinzips vom zureichenden Grund. Etwas, das keinerlei Bewusstsein enthält kann nicht allein der zureichende Grund für eine Entität mit Bewusstsein sein. Aus Nichts wird nichts. Nicht kann etwas geben, das es nicht besitzt. Während also der Mechanismus der Evolution hinreichend von der darwinistischen Evolutionstheorie beschrieben wird, muss diese Analyse doch ergänzt werden um eine metaphysische Analyse der Bedingungen der Möglichkeit von echter Emergenz oder Selbstüberbietung. Nach dem Prinzip, dass jede Möglichkeit in einer Aktualität begründet sein muss, lässt sich fragen, in welcher Aktualität die Möglichkeiten begründet sind, die Entitäten bei ihrer Selbstüberbietung, dem Entstehen von Neuem ergreifen. Rahners Antwort ist: Gott. Ohne Gott wäre das Universum eine komplexer Mechanismus, der zu keiner kreativen Selbstüberbietung fähig wäre. In Gott existiert der logische Raum der Möglichkeiten, welche das Universum im langsamen Tasten des evolutionären Prozesses realisiert. Gott ist nicht ein deistischer Demiurg, sondern der metaphysische Garant von Kreativität im Universum: In diesem Sinne ist er in einer creatio continua immer schöpferisch beteiligt, ohne jeweils in die wirkursächlichen Mechanismen spezifisch einzugreifen zu müssen. Die These, dass sich der evolutive Prozess nicht ohne Gott als metaphysischen Garanten denken lässt, ist einem doppelten Angriff ausgesetzt. Materialisten sehen darin eine subtile Form des „Intelligent Design", manche Christen sehen darin eine Art des Pantheismus. Der letztere Einwand greift insofern nicht, weil diese These allenfalls eine pan-en-theistische These der folgenden Art enthält: Gott ist auf eine empirisch nicht direkt zugängliche Weise immer und überall in seiner Schöpfung wirksam. Die These der Immanenz Gottes selbst in den kleinsten Elementen seiner Schöpfung impliziert aber nicht zwingend die Verneinung der Transzendenz Gottes: Non coerceri maximo, contineri tamen a minimo, divinum est (Ignatius von Loyola). Die Frage bei diesem Modell ist allerdings, wie man sich diese göttliche Aktivität vorstellen soll, ohne wieder in ein wirkursächliches Eingreifen bei jedem Emergenzsprung zurückzufallen. Das käme eigentlich einer Art Lückenbüssergott gleich. Ist man hier dann nicht doch wieder bei einer die Autonomie der Naturwissenschaften untergrabenden These des „intelligent Design" angelangt? Hier hilft Whiteheads Denken weiter. In der Tradition Leibnizens kennt er einen Begriff der Finalursächlichkeit, der sich nur erschliesst, wenn die geistige Dimension des Universums betrachtet wird. Auch für Whitehead ist der ganze Kosmos ein kreativer Prozess. Whitehead denkt evolutionär. Für Aristoteles mögen alle möglichen Spezies von Tieren und Pflanzen bereits aktualisiert sein. Im modernen evolutionären Paradigma wissen wir, dass dies nicht der Fall ist. Es gibt zu jedem Zeitpunkt des Universums eine offene Zukunft mit einer Vielzahl von unrealisierten Möglichkeiten. Das gilt für jeden Einzelnen von uns als metaphysische Grundlage der Freiheit, es gilt aber auch für 18 den evolutionären Prozess als Ganzen. Nach dem Prinzip, dass jede Möglichkeit in einer Aktualität gründen muss, fragt sich auch Whitehead, wie diese unrealisierten Möglichkeiten metaphysisch begründet sind. Und er, der früh in seiner Karriere ein überzeugter Atheist war, gelangte aus philosophischen Gründen zur Annahme der Existenz Gottes. Kurioserweise führte ihn das konsequente Durchdenken des evolutionären Weltbildes zu dieser Einsicht. Er beklagt sich, dass viele religiöse Menschen einen Konflikt sähen zwischen der Darwinschen Evolutionstheorie und ihren religiösen Überzeugungen, wo doch genau das Gegenteil der Fall sei.19 Durch seine These von der Fundamentalität des Geistes kann Whitehead erklären, warum Gott in der Welt wirken kann, ohne wirkursächlich in sie eingreifen zu müssen. Alle Entitäten haben für Whitehead einen physischen und einen mentalen Pol. Jede Entität ist prozesshaft im Werden, sie dauert nur einen kurzen Moment an. Und indem sie die Vergangenheit erfährt, sich von ihr bestimmen lässt und sich zugleich auf die Zukunft und die unrealisierten Möglichkeiten als ihre Ziele ausrichtet, schafft sie sich jeden Moment selbst neu. Das gilt in Whiteheads System für alle Entitäten, vom kleinsten Baustein der Materie bis hin zur Person, wobei der Grad der Freiheit dabei zunimmt, weil die höheren Ebenen über einen ausgeprägteren mentalen Pol verfügen. Wie wirkt Gott in dieser Welt? Nicht durch Intervention in die kausalen Wechselwirkungen, sondern indem er den Entitäten die für sie adäquaten Möglichkeiten und Werte präsentiert. Gott wirkt, indem er dem mentalen Pol einer Entität einen Möglichkeitsraum präsentiert. Das Erfassen dieser Möglichkeiten wird den Entitäten aber nicht aufgezwungen, sondern es ist Teil ihrer prozessualen Selbstkonstitution. Und weil dieser Möglichkeitsraum für beispielsweise ein einfaches Lebewesen nur sehr begrenzt variable Ziele, Teloi, anbietet, geht der Prozess der Evolution einen langsamen Gang der Höherentwicklung. Ein in den Anfängen dumpfes Herumstochern stösst erst sehr langsam zu komplexeren mentalen Repräsentationen und damit zum Erfassen eines weiteren Möglichkeitsraums vor. Die Evolution der Natur ist deshalb aber auch immer eine Evolution des Geistes. Je mehr der geistige Aspekt in diesem Prozess sich entwickelt, umso mehr beschleunigt sich auch der Prozess der Evolution. Ein Gedanke, der auf andere, aber in den Ergebnissen ganz erstaunlich ähnliche Weise auch von Teilhard de Chardin entwickelt wurde. In diesem Prozess zwingt Gott nichts und niemanden, er macht den Prozess allererst möglich, indem er jede Entität zur Realisierung ihrer Möglichkeiten verlockt. Ignatius von Loyola hat einmal gesagt, dass kaum ein Mensch ahnt, was Gott aus ihm machen würde, wenn er sich ihm nur ganz überliesse. Im Geiste des eben entwickelten Modells sollte man besser sagen: Kaum ein Mensch ahnt, was er selbst aus sich machen könne, wenn er sich Gott ganz überliesse. Und damit erreichen wir das Ende des Gedankengangs. Ich habe dafür argumentiert, dass die 19 Whitehead, Alfred N.: Science and the Modern World, New York 1925 (1967): The Free Press, 107. 19 Naturwissenschaft selbst keine Metaphysik der Natur mitliefert. Die Sicht der Natur als alles versklavender Mechanismus ist mit den Ergebnissen der Naturwissenschaft ebenso verträglich wie die Sicht der Natur als kreativer Prozess, der zunehmend Freiheit hervorbringt. Ein Stück weit liegt es bei Ihnen, der Leserin oder dem Leser, wie Sie sich selber sehen wollen. Unsere Metaphysik der Natur ist immer ein spekulatives Abenteuer, ein Versuch, die Welt im Ganzen zu interpretieren. Die empirischen Daten zwingen uns keine Interpretation auf, sie sind multipel interpretierbar. Nichts und niemand zwingt uns zu einer bestimmten metaphysischen Weltsicht, schon gar nicht Gott. Ich bin mir aber sicher, dass er uns einlädt, sich selbst auf eine bestimmte Weise zu sehen, nämlich als freies und schöpferisches Wesen. Er tut dies mit – wie Whitehead sich ausdrückte – „unendlicher Geduld".