The positive outcome of philosophyDietzgen, Joseph
Philosophy
The positive outcome of philosophy
Dietzgen, Joseph
Knowledge, Theory of; Logic; Philosophy
In view of the law which we evolved by our analysis of pure reason and
which showed that all understanding, all thought, is based on some
perceptible object, on some quantity of sense perceptions, it is evident
that everything distinguished by our faculty of distinction is a certain
quantity and that, therefore, all distinctions are only quantitative,
not absolute, only graduated, not irreconcilable. Even the difference
between the reasonable and the unreasonable, or in other words between
that which is momentarily or individually reasonable and that which is
generally reasonable, is merely a quantitative distinction, like all
others, so that the unreasonable may be conditionally reasonable, and
nothing is unreasonable but that which is supposed to be unconditionally
reasonable.
If we understand that reason requires some perceptible object, some
perceptible standard, then we shall no longer try to understand the
absolutely reasonable, the purely reasonable. We shall then limit
ourselves to look for the reasonable, as for all other things, in
concrete objects. The definite, accurate, certain, uniform result of
some understanding depends on the definite formulation of the task, on
the accurate limitation of the perceptible quantity which is to be
understood. If a certain moment, a certain person, a certain class, a
certain nation are given and at the same time an essential need, a
general and predominating purpose, then the question regarding the
reasonable or suitable is easily answered. It is true that we may also
know something of things which are generally reasonable for mankind in
the aggregate, but in that case our standard must be abstract mankind
instead of some concrete part of it. Science may study the anatomical
structure of some concrete body as well as the general type of the human
body, but this again it can do only when it supplies the faculty of
understanding with general instead of individual material. If science
divides the whole human race into four or five races, by establishing a
certain standard of physiognomy, and later on discovers some individuals
or tribes whose characters are so peculiar and rare that they cannot be
classed under any of the established races, the existence of such
exceptions is not a crime against the physical order of the world, but
merely a proof of the inadequacy of our scientific classification. If,
on the other hand, some conventional mode of thought considers a certain
action as universally reasonable or unreasonable and then encounters
opposition in actual life, convention fancies itself exempt from the
work of understanding and assumes to deny civic rights in the moral
order of the world to its opponents. Instead of realizing the limited
applicability of its rules by the existence of opposing practices,
convention seeks to establish an absolute applicability of its rules by
simply ignoring the cause of the opposition. This is a dogmatic
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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