Sex & Character: Authorised Translation from the Sixth German EditionWeininger, Otto
Philosophy
Sex & Character: Authorised Translation from the Sixth German Edition
Weininger, Otto
Character; Sex; Sex (Psychology); Sexual ethics
I have already shown that the continuous memory is the vanquisher of
time, and, indeed, is necessary even for the idea of time to be formed.
And so the continuous memory is the psychological expression of the
logical proposition of identity. The absolute woman, in whom memory is
absent, cannot take the proposition of identity, or its contradictory,
or the exclusion of the alternative, as axiomatic.
Besides these three conditions of logical thought, the fourth condition,
the containing of the conclusion in the major premiss, is possible only
through memory. That proposition is the groundwork of the syllogism. The
premisses psychologically precede the conclusion, and must be retained
by the thinking person whilst the minor premiss applies the law of
identity or of non-identity. The grounds for the conclusion must lie in
the past. And for this reason continuity which dominates the mental
processes of man is bound up with causality. Every psychological
application of the relation of a conclusion to its premisses implies the
continuity of memory to guarantee the identity of the propositions. As
woman has no continuous memory she can have no _principium rationis
sufficientis_.
And so it appears that woman is without logic.
George Simmel has held this familiar statement to be erroneous, inasmuch
as women have been known to draw conclusions with the strongest
consistency. That a woman in a concrete case can unrelentingly pursue a
given course at the stimulation of some object is no more a proof that
she understands the syllogism, than is her habit of perpetually
recurring to disproved arguments a proof that the law of identity is an
axiom for her. The point at issue is whether or no they recognise the
logical axioms as the criteria of the validity of their thoughts, as
the directors of their process of thinking, whether they make or do not
make these the rule of conduct and the principle of judgment. A woman
cannot grasp that one must act from principle; as she has no continuity
she does not experience the necessity for logical support of her mental
processes. Hence the ease with which women assume opinions. If a woman
gives vent to an opinion, or statement, and a man is so foolish as to
take it seriously and to ask her for the proof of it, she regards the
request as unkind and offensive, and as impugning her character. A man
feels ashamed of himself, feels himself guilty if he has neglected to
verify a thought, whether or no that thought has been uttered by him; he
feels the obligation to keep to the logical standard which he has set up
for himself. Woman resents any attempt to require from her that her
thoughts should be logical. She may be regarded as “logically insane.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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