The positive outcome of philosophyDietzgen, Joseph
Philosophy
The positive outcome of philosophy
Dietzgen, Joseph
Knowledge, Theory of; Logic; Philosophy
Special truths enlighten the intellect. But the understanding that all
specialties are connected with one another by one monad or unit which is
truth itself gives us a certain general enlightenment which certainly
does not render any special research unnecessary, or take the place of
it, but which may well serve as the foundation of all research, which
may therefore be called a fundamental assistance.
I may remark in passing that the understanding of logical science is
rendered especially difficult by the fact that the unpracticed
understands all terms and concepts only in their narrow popular meaning,
while the subject matter leads up continually into the widest fields.
When I speak of parts of the world, you must not think merely of
geographical parts, but you must think farther until you arrive at the
insight that stars and bricks, matter and force, in short all parts of
the world are world parts.
The logical difficulty may be principally traced to the lack of
familiarity with the comprehensive categories. It will be clear to you
that thinking and being, phenomenon and truth, etc., are conceptions of
the widest scope. So you may have some difficulty in distinguishing
between concepts of truth, and true concepts. And yet this is the same
as making a distinction between the general class of herbs and its
individual species. The mere intercourse with such comprehensive
concepts as truth, existence, universe, is an excellent school of
intellectual enlightenment.
Perhaps you may object to the deviation of a science devoted to the
special study of the faculty of thought into such fields as existence or
truth. But a logic confined to an analysis of the faculty of
understanding would be narrow compared to one representing this faculty
of understanding at work in real life. If the science of the eye were to
treat only of the various parts of the eye without considering the
things outside connected with its function, the light, the objects, in
short, the vision of the eye, it would be more an anatomy of the eye
than a general science of the eye. At all events a science which
represents not alone the subjective faculty of vision, but also the
living activity of the eye, the objective field of vision inseparable
from the subjective faculty, is a far more comprehensive instruction, a
higher enlightenment of the human brain.
In my opinion, logic should not so much treat of the analysis of the
intellectual subject as of the purpose and object of the faculty of
thought, its culture, which is not accomplished by the intellect itself,
but by its connection with the world of truth, its interrelation with
the universal existence.
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