Ancient Philosophy and Modern Philosophy

Published in 2011 by Britannica Educational Publishing (a trademark of Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.) in association with Rosen Educational Services, LLC 29 East 21st Street, New York, NY 10010. Copyright © 2011 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, and the Thistle logo are registered trademarks of Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved. Rosen Educational Services materials copyright © 2011 Rosen Educational Services, LLC. All rights reserved. Distributed exclusively by Rosen Educational Services. For a listing of additional Britannica Educational Publishing titles, call toll free (800) 237-9932. First Edition Britannica Educational Publishing Michael I. Levy: Executive Editor J.E. Luebering: Senior Manager Marilyn L. Barton: Senior Coordinator, Production Control Steven Bosco: Director, Editorial Technologies Lisa S. Braucher: Senior Producer and Data Editor Yvette Charboneau: Senior Copy Editor Kathy Nakamura: Manager, Media Acquisition Brian Duignan: Senior Editor, Philosophy and Religion Rosen Educational Services Alexandra Hanson-Harding: Editor Shalini Saxena: Editor Nelson Sá: Art Director Cindy Reiman: Photography Manager Matthew Cauli: Designer, Cover Design Introduction by Brian Duignan Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Ancient philosophy: from 600 BCE to 500 CE / edited by Brian Duignan. p. cm.—(The history of philosophy) “In association with Britannica Educational Publishing, Rosen Educational Services.” Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-61530-243-7 (eBook) 1. Philosophy, Ancient. I. Duignan, Brian. B108.A53 2010 180—dc22 2009054263 On the cover: Plato was one of the greatest philosophers ever to have lived. Fuelled by a desire to fully comprehend the nature of reality, Plato, along with his teacher, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, largely pioneered the development of Western philosophical thought. Today, everything from metaphysics to ethics to political philosophy owes much the work of Plato and his contemporaries. Hulton Archive/Getty Images On page 16: Thales, shown here, is the first known Greek philosopher and one of the Seven Wise Men of antiquity. His belief that water formed the basis of the universe marked a significant deviation from the more widespread myth-based explanations of the time. Hulton Archive/Getty Images Contents Introduction Chapter 1: Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics Cosmology, Metaphysics, and Epistemology The Early Cosmologists Being and Becoming Appearance and Reality Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism Skepticism and Relativism: The Sophists Chapter 2: The Philosophy of Socrates His Life and Personality Why Was Socrates Hated? The Impression Created by Aristophanes The Human Resistance to Self-Reflection Socrates’ Criticism of Democracy The Legacy of Socrates Chapter 3: The Philosophy of Plato His Life Dialogue Form Happiness and Virtue The Theory of Forms Linguistic and Philosophical Background Forms as Perfect Exemplars Forms as Genera and Species 8 33 17 18 18 24 26 28 30 49 32 33 39 39 41 44 44 51 52 55 57 60 61 64 65 55 85 The Dialogues of Plato Early Dialogues Middle Dialogues Late Dialogues Chapter 4: The Philosophy of Aristotle His Life The Academy Travels The Lyceum His Philosophy Logic Physics and Metaphysics Philosophy of Mind Ethics Political Theory Rhetoric and Poetics The Legacy of Aristotle 123 140 Chapter 5: Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy Stoicism The Nature and Scope of Stoicism Early Greek Stoicism Later Roman Stoicism Epicureanism The Nature of Epicureanism The Works and Doctrine of Epicurus Skepticism Pythagoreanism and Neo-Pythagoreanism Neoplatonism 67 68 73 77 80 80 80 83 85 88 88 94 105 109 114 117 118 120 120 120 122 125 128 128 129 135 138 141 Plotinus and His Philosophy The Later Neoplatonists Chapter 6: Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World Philo Judaeus Life and Background Works The Originality of His Thought Saint Ambrose Early Career Ecclesiastical Administrative Accomplishments Literary and Musical Accomplishments Evaluations and Interpretations Saint Augustine Life Chief Works Augustine’s Spirit and Achievement Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius 144 148 155 154 160 160 164 165 168 169 170 161 171 172 173 175 179 184 186 Conclusion 192 Glossary Bibliography Index 193 195 198 187 Introduction Introduction M ore than 2,500 years ago, in the early 6th century BCE, a few inhabitants of the Greek city of Miletus (on the western coast of what is now Turkey) began to think about the world in a new way. Like many people before them, they wondered how the world was created, what it is made of, and why it changes (or seems to change) as it does. Unlike their predecessors, however, the Milesians attempted to answer these questions in natural rather than religious terms. They appealed to what they thought were causes and principles in the world itself, rather than to the acts of gods or other divine beings. Importantly, they believed that the proper way to understand the world is through reason and observation. Because they speculated about profoundly important questions in a rational and systematic way, the Milesians are recognized as the first Western philosophers. During the 6th century BCE the Greeks also became the first people to practice science and mathematics in the modern sense of those terms. By the middle of the 3rd century BCE the Greeks had produced a finished system of geometrical reasoning (that of Euclid) that would not be significantly amended for more than 2,000 years; by the end of the 4th century they had created nearly all of the basic problems, concepts, methods, and vocabulary of subsequent Western philosophy. Until the late 3rd century CE, other philosophers from the Greek world produced sophisticated and original theories in ethics, epistemology (the study of knowledge), metaphysics (the study of the ultimate nature of reality), and logic. Starting in the first Plato founded the Academy outside Athens in the 380s BCE where followers of his philosophy were taught in subjects like mathematics, dialectics, and natural science. He is shown here speaking with his students. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples, Italy/The Bridgeman Art Library/ Getty Images 9 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE century CE, Jewish and, later, Christian thinkers adopted aspects of the metaphysical system of the Greek philosopher Plato (428–348 BCE) to help them defend and clarify the doctrines of their faiths. What is called the ancient period in the history of Western philosophy is traditionally divided into four periods, or phases: the Pre-Socratic, extending from the early 6th century to about the mid 4th century BCE; the Classical, to the end of the 2nd century BCE; the Hellenistic, up to the late 1st century BCE; and the Roman, or Imperial, to the early 6th century CE, ending with the fall of the Western Roman Empire. The term “Pre-Socratic” refers to philosophers who were not influenced by Socrates (470–399 BCE), in most cases because they lived before him. Unfortunately, no work of any Pre-Socratic philosopher has survived; what is known of their teachings consists of various (mostly critical) references in works by later philosophers, especially Plato and Aristotle. The Milesians, as we have seen, were the first to speculate rationally about the origin and nature of the world; for this reason they and others like them are called “cosmologists.” The first of the Milesians, Thales, held that everything is water, by which he meant that the different substances of which the world appears to be composed are ultimately derived from water. The two other members of the “Milesian school,” Anaximander (610–546 BCE) and Anaximines (flourished 545 BCE), along with later cosmologists from other Greek cities, proposed various numbers and varieties of primordial substances and various processes by which they were transformed into one another. Anaximander was also noteworthy for advancing a theory of the evolution of living things: humans and all other animals, he said, evolved from fishes. Heraclitus of Ephesus asserted that the basic substance is fire and the 10 Introduction basic process “strife”; the apparent unity and permanence of things in the world are the result of the constant conflict of opposites. Thus everything is in a state of flux, or constant change, a view he famously expressed by saying, “You cannot step into the same river twice.” Parmenides, who was born in the Greek city of Elea in southern Italy in 515 BCE, argued to the contrary that nothing changes, and the apparent multiplicity of things in the world is an illusion: “all is one.” His disciple Zeno of Elea (495–430 BCE) is famous for inventing a series of quite sophisticated paradoxes (apparently valid arguments that lead to absurd conclusions) designed to show that all multiplicity and change are impossible; some of these arguments were not definitively refuted until the 20th century. The philosopher and mystic Pythagoras (580–500 BCE), traditionally considered the first great mathematician in history, proposed that “all things are numbers,” by which he appeared to mean that the structure of each thing and of nature as a whole consists of certain numerical ratios, just as a specific musical harmony is a ratio between the lengths of the physical instruments (e.g., strings or pipes) used to produce it. Pythagoras is known to all students of geometry as the discoverer of the Pythagorean theorem, which states that, in a right triangle, the sum of the squares of the sides is equal to the square of the hypotenuse (a2 + b2 = c2). He also made a number of philosophical and religious (or mystical) assertions that would be influential among philosophers of the Classical and Hellenistic periods; for example, he held that the human soul is immortal and is reincarnated into different living things, sometimes human and sometimes animal (it was for this reason that Pythagoras and his followers practiced vegetarianism). The term Pythagoreanism refers both to the doctrines of Pythagoras himself and to the school of thought he founded; the latter, in the form 11 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE of Neo-Pythagoreanism, was influential in the Hellenistic period of ancient philosophy. The Pre-Socratic philosophers also included a group of thinkers whose chief concerns were not cosmological but ethical and political. The Sophists, who were active in the 5th century BCE, were itinerant scholars who taught rhetoric and forensics (the art of argument) for money. Because the usual point of their instruction was not knowledge or truth but victory in court, they tended to be dismissive of the notions of certainty, objective truth, and absolute right or wrong. They were utterly despised by Plato, who went to great lengths in some of his dialogues to refute their skepticism and relativism. The Classical period of ancient philosophy is dominated by three figures of the 5th and 4th centuries BCE, all of them citizens of Athens: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Socrates concerned himself entirely with ethics, what he called the “care of the soul.” In part because he was associated with some of the men who conspired to overthrow the democracy in Athens in 404 BCE, he was brought to trial on charges of impiety and corrupting the young and executed in 399 BCE. His refusal to save himself by agreeing to cease his philosophizing made him a model of intellectual and moral integrity for later ages. Socrates is an enigmatic figure because what is known of his teachings comes almost entirely from the dialogues of his student Plato (Socrates himself wrote nothing). In some of these works a character named Socrates refutes those who pretend to have knowledge of the ethical virtues (e.g., courage), and in others he does this while also putting forth certain ethical, political, and metaphysical doctrines of his own—doctrines that the real, historical Socrates may or may not have held. It is now generally agreed, however, that Plato, not Socrates, is responsible for the theory of ideal properties, or “forms” (such as the 12 Introduction Beautiful and the Hot), which exist separately from the things that have them; for the theory of justice as a harmony between the different parts of the soul; and for the plan, presented in the dialogue Republic, for a utopian city-state ruled by “philosopher-kings.” Plato’s greatest student, Aristotle, made foundational contributions to every branch of philosophy, as well as to what would now be called anatomy, biology, physiology, psychology, political science, and poetics. The discipline of logic was his creation. He made important modifications in Plato’s theory of forms, holding that forms do not exist apart from the things that have them. His notion of the “final cause” of a thing as the purpose it serves or the goal toward which it strives became the basis of the socalled “teleological” (from Greek telos: “end”) argument for the existence of God, which has appeared in various forms from late antiquity to the present day. (The contemporary theory of Intelligent Design is a teleological argument.) In ethics Aristotle is known for his subtle and insightful analyses of the virtues and vices and for his theory of human flourishing (“happiness”) as the practice of intellectual and moral virtue. After the death of Alexander the Great, who as king of Macedonia (336–323 BCE) had conquered the entire eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East, his territories were divided by his former generals into hereditary kingdoms. The Greek city-state was long dead, and with it the possibility of meaningful participation in public affairs by ordinary citizens. Philosophy accordingly turned inward, emphasizing the achievement of individual tranquility, contentment, or salvation in a chaotic world. The philosophical school of Stoicism, founded by Zeno of Citium (335–263 BCE), took to heart Socrates’ conviction that the only thing worth having is virtue; all other supposed goods (e.g., health and wealth) are meaningless. 13 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The Stoics also followed Socrates in holding that virtue is a form of knowledge, in the sense that a person who understands the virtues will automatically act virtuously (morally wrong action, in other words, is the result of a misunderstanding about what is actually good or right). The greatest good for the individual is cultivating ethical wisdom and acting in accordance with the divine Reason, or Logos (Greek: “word”), that governs the universe. Stoic philosophy thus enabled its practitioners to achieve repose and tranquility in the face of life’s inevitable misfortunes and tragedies. Later forms of Stoicism, which emphasized the ethical duty of public service, exerted a profound influence over many eminent Roman scholars and statesman, including Cicero (106–43 BCE), Seneca (4 BCE–65 CE), and the emperor Marcus Aurelius (121–180 CE). In contrast to Stoicism, the Epicurean school of philosophy, founded by Epicurus (341–270 BCE), taught that the only good for human beings is pleasure and the only evil pain. Yet it was not a simple hedonism (the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake), because it advocated virtuous action and the avoidance of unattainable desires, which can only bring frustration. Epicureanism promoted a life of quiet retirement and simple but sublime pleasure, the highest form of which is friendship. During the Hellenistic period the philosophical skepticism of the Sophists and other Pre-Socratics was developed in sophisticated ways by Pyrrhon of Elis (360– 272 BCE) and his followers. Although there were many variations, the basic doctrine of Pyrrhonian skepticism was that nothing can be known with certainty because there are always equally good reasons for believing or denying any positive assertion. Pyrrhonian skepticism was a major current in philosophy during the 18th-century Enlightenment, and in one form or another it is still a viable position in contemporary epistemology. 14 Introduction During the Roman period, which began with the fall of the Roman Republic in 31 BCE, philosophy continued to be largely a Greek enterprise—the Romans made no original contributions to philosophy. Stoicism, because of its adoption by members of the Roman elite, was the most influential school of the period, though other Hellenistic schools continued to attract followers. In the 2nd and especially the 3rd centuries CE the philosophy of Plato was revived and transformed through the introduction of various religious and mystical elements, most notably in the Neoplatonism of Plotinus (205–270). The most significant development of the Roman period, however, was the integration of Christian theology with Neoplatonic philosophy, undertaken by several Christian bishops and other teachers starting in the late 2nd century. The most original and sophisticated of these efforts was that of the 5th-century bishop Saint Augustine. His distinction between the sensible and the intelligible (between what can be known through the senses and what can be known only through the mind), his conception of God and the intelligible realm as existing outside space and time, his understanding of the nature of the soul, his analysis of knowledge, and his treatment of the problem of free will guided philosophical discussion of these topics during the Middle Ages up to about the 13th century, when the philosophy of Aristotle eclipsed that of Plato in medieval universities. Because it was invented by the ancient Greeks, and because it still reflects ancient Greek influences, Western philosophy is impossible to understand without an appreciation of its ancient history. The figures that you will encounter in this book, some of the greatest geniuses who ever lived, deserve special attention, not only from students of philosophy but also from anyone who wishes to understand the intellectual worldview of the West—how all people in the West see the universe, the divine, and themselves. 15 CHAPTER 1 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics W estern philosophy emerged in ancient Greece (which included Miletus and other parts of present-day Turkey) in approximately the 6th century BCE. During that time religious awe among the Greeks was eclipsed by wonder about the origin and nature of the physical world. As Greek populations increasingly left the land to become concentrated in city-states, interest shifted from nature to social living. Questions of law and convention and civic values The map above depicts Greece in the 7th century BCE, prior to the emergence of Western philosophy. The decline of tribal living and the accompanying concentration of Greeks in city-states in the 6th century BCE resulted in the rise of abstract and complex theorizing. Courtesy of the University of Texas Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin 17 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE became paramount, and cosmological speculation partly gave way to moral and political theorizing, best exemplified in the somewhat fragmentary ethical philosophies of Socrates (470–399 BCE) and the Sophists (itinerant lecturers and teachers) and in the great positive philosophical systems of Plato (c. 428–c. 348 BCE) and Aristotle (384–322 BCE). Because they were not influenced by Socrates, the 6th- and 5th-century cosmologists together with the Sophists are often called “pre-Socratic” philosophers, though not all of them lived before Socrates. COSMOLOGY, METAPHYSICS, AND EPISTEMOLOGY The first Greek cosmologists were monists, holding that the universe is derived from, or made up of, only a single substance. Later thinkers adopted pluralistic theories, according to which several ultimate substances are involved. The Early Cosmologists There is a consensus, dating back at least to Aristotle and continuing to the present, that the first Greek philosopher was Thales (flourished 6th century BCE). In Thales’ time the word philosopher (“lover of wisdom”) had not yet been coined. Thales was counted, however, among the legendary Seven Wise Men (Sophoi), whose name derives from a term that then designated inventiveness and practical wisdom rather than speculative insight. Thales demonstrated these qualities by trying to give the mathematical knowledge that he derived from the Babylonians a more exact foundation and by using it for the solution of practical problems—such as the determination of the distance of a ship as seen from the shore or of the height of the Egyptian pyramids. Although he was also credited with 18 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics predicting an eclipse of the Sun, it is likely that he merely gave a natural explanation of one on the basis of Babylonian astronomical knowledge. Thales is considered the first Greek philosopher because he was the first to give a purely natural explanation of the origin of the world, free from mythological ingredients. He held that everything had come out of water—an explanation based on the discovery of fossil sea animals far inland. His tendency (and that of his immediate successors) to give nonmythological explanations was undoubtedly prompted by the fact that all of them lived on the coast of Anatolia (in present-day Turkey), surrounded by a number of nations whose civilizations were much further advanced than that of the Greeks and whose own mythological explanations varied greatly. It appeared necessary, therefore, to make a fresh start on the basis of what a person could observe and infer by looking at the world as it presented itself. This procedure naturally resulted in a tendency to make sweeping generalizations on the basis of rather restricted, though carefully checked, observations. Thales’ disciple and successor, Anaximander (610– 546 BCE), tried to give a more elaborate account of the origin and development of the ordered world (the cosmos). According to him, it developed out of the apeiron (“unlimited”), something both infinite and indefinite (without distinguishable qualities). Within this apeiron, something arose to produce the opposites of hot and cold. These at once began to struggle with each other and produced the cosmos. The cold (and wet) partly dried up to become solid earth, partly remained as water, and—by means of the hot—partly evaporated, becoming air and mist, its evaporating part (by expansion) splitting up the hot into fiery rings, which surround the whole cosmos. Because these rings are enveloped by mist, 19 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE however, there remain only certain breathing holes that are visible to human beings, appearing to them as the Sun, the Moon, and the stars. Anaximander was the first to realize that upward and downward are not absolute but that downward means toward the middle of the Earth and upward away from it, so that the Earth had no need to be supported (as Thales had believed) by anything. Starting from Thales’ observations, Anaximander tried to reconstruct the development of life in more detail. Life, being closely bound up with moisture, originated in the sea. All land animals, he held, are descendants of sea animals; because the first humans as newborn infants could not have survived without parents, Anaximander believed that they were born within an animal of another kind—specifically, a sea animal in which Rendering of Anaximander, one of the first Greek philosophers to develop a cosmology, or theory of the nature and origins of the physical world. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 20 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics they were nurtured until they could fend for themselves. Gradually, however, the moisture will be partly evaporated, until in the end all things will return into the undifferentiated apeiron, “in order to pay the penalty for their injustice”—that of having struggled against one another. Anaximander’s successor, Anaximenes (flourished mid-6th century BCE), taught that air was the origin of all things. His position was for a long time thought to have been a step backward, because, like Thales, he placed a special kind of matter at the beginning of the development of the world. But this criticism missed the point. Neither Thales nor Anaximander appear to have specified the way in which the other things arose out of water or apeiron. Anaximenes, however, declared that the other types of matter arose out of air by condensation and rarefaction. In this way, what to Thales had been merely a beginning became a fundamental principle that remained essentially the same through all of its transmutations. Thus, the term arche, which originally simply meant “beginning,” acquired the new meaning of “principle,” a term that henceforth played an enormous role in philosophy down to the present. This concept of a principle that remains the same through many transmutations is, furthermore, the presupposition of the idea that nothing can come out of nothing and that all of the comings to be and passings away that human beings observe are nothing but transmutations of something that essentially remains the same eternally. In this way it also lies at the bottom of all of the conservation laws—the laws of the conservation of matter, force, and energy—that have been basic in the development of physics. Although Anaximenes of course did not realize all of the implications of his idea, its importance can scarcely be exaggerated. The first three Greek philosophers have often been called “hylozoists” because they seemed to believe in a 21 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE kind of living matter. But this is far from an adequate characterization. It is, rather, characteristic of them that they did not clearly distinguish between kinds of matter, forces, and qualities, nor between physical and emotional qualities. The same entity is sometimes called “fire” and sometimes “the hot.” Heat appears sometimes as a force and sometimes as a quality, and again there is no clear distinction between warm and cold as physical qualities and the warmth of love and the cold of hate. These ambiguities are important to an understanding of certain later developments in Greek philosophy. Xenophanes of Colophon (560–478 BCE), a rhapsodist (reciter of poetry) and philosophical thinker who emigrated from Anatolia to the Greek city of Elea in southern Italy, was the first to articulate more clearly what was implied in Anaximenes’ philosophy. He criticized the popular notions of the gods, saying that people made the gods in their own image. But, more importantly, he argued that there could be only one God, the ruler of the universe, who must be eternal. For, being the strongest of all beings, he could not have come out of something less strong, nor could he be overcome or superseded by something else, because nothing could arise that is stronger than the strongest. The argument clearly rested on the axioms that nothing can come out of nothing and that nothing that exists can vanish. These axioms were made more explicit and carried to their logical (and extreme) conclusions by Parmenides of Elea (born c. 515 BCE), the founder of the so-called school of Eleaticism, of whom Xenophanes has been regarded as the teacher and forerunner. In a philosophical poem, Parmenides insisted that “what is” cannot have come into being and cannot pass away because it would have to have come out of nothing or to become nothing, whereas 22 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics nothing by its very nature does not exist. There can be no motion either, for it would have to be a motion into something that is—which is not possible since it would be blocked—or a motion into something that is not—which is equally impossible since what is not does not exist. Hence, everything is solid, immobile being. The familiar world, in which things move around, come into being, and pass away, is a world of mere belief (doxa). In a second part of the poem, however, Parmenides tried to give an analytical account of this world of belief, showing that it rested on constant distinctions between what is believed to be positive—i.e., to have real being, such as light and warmth—and what is believed to be negative—i.e., the absence of positive being, such as darkness and cold. It is significant that Heracleitus of Ephesus (c. 540–c. 480 BCE), whose philosophy was later considered to be the very opposite of Parmenides’ philosophy of immobile being, came, in some fragments of his work, near to what Parmenides tried to show: the positive and the negative, he said, are merely different views of the same thing; death and life, day and night, and light and darkness are really one. Viewing fire as the essential material uniting all things, Heracleitus wrote that the world order is an “ever-living fire kindling in measures and being extinguished in measures.” He extended the manifestations of fire to include not only fuel, flame, and smoke but also the ether in the upper atmosphere. Part of this air, or pure fire, “turns to” ocean, presumably as rain, and part of the ocean turns to earth. Simultaneously, equal masses of earth and sea everywhere are returning to the respective aspects of sea and fire. The resulting dynamic equilibrium maintains an orderly balance in the world. This persistence of unity despite change is illustrated by Heracleitus’ famous 23 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE analogy of life to a river: “Upon those who step into the same rivers different and ever different waters flow down.” Plato later took this doctrine to mean that all things are in constant flux, regardless of how they appear to the senses. Being and Becoming Parmenides had an enormous influence on the further development of philosophy. Most of the philosophers of the following two generations tried to find a way to reconcile his thesis that nothing comes into being nor passes away with the evidence presented to the senses. Empedocles of Acragas (c. 490–430 BCE) declared that there are four material elements (he called them the roots of everything) and two forces, love and hate, that did not come into being and would never pass away, increase, or diminish. But the elements are constantly mixed with one another by love and again separated by hate. Thus, through mixture and decomposition, composite things come into being and pass away. Because Empedocles conceived of love and hate as blind forces, he had to explain how, through random motion, living beings could emerge. This he did by means of a somewhat crude anticipation of the theory of the survival of the fittest. In the process of mixture and decomposition, the limbs and parts of various animals would be formed by chance. But they could not survive on their own; they would survive only when, by chance, they had come together in such a way that they were able to support and reproduce themselves. It was in this way that the various species were produced and continued to exist. Anaxagoras of Clazomenae (c. 500–c. 428 BCE), a pluralist, believed that because nothing can really come into being, everything must be contained in everything, but in 24 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics the form of infinitely small parts. In the beginning, all of these particles had existed in an even mixture, in which nothing could be distinguished, much like the indefinite apeiron of Anaximander. But then nous, or intelligence, began at one point to set these particles into a whirling motion, foreseeing that in this way they would become separated from one another and then recombine in the most various ways so as to produce gradually the world in which human beings live. In contrast to the forces assumed by Empedocles, the nous of Anaxagoras is not blind but foresees and intends the production of the cosmos, including living and intelligent beings; however, it does not interfere with the process after having started the whirling motion. This is a strange combination of a mechanical and a nonmechanical explanation of the world. By far of greatest importance for the later development of philosophy and physical science was an attempt by Leucippus (flourished 5th century BCE) and Democritus (c. 460–c. 370 BCE) to solve the Parmenidean problem. Leucippus found the solution in the assumption that, contrary to Parmenides’ argument, the nothing does in a way exist—as empty space. There are, then, two fundamental principles of the physical world, empty space and filled space—the latter consisting of atoms that, in contrast to those of modern physics, are real atoms—that is, they are absolutely indivisible because nothing can penetrate to split them. On these foundations, laid by Leucippus, Democritus appears to have built a whole system, aiming at a complete explanation of the varied phenomena of the visible world by means of an analysis of its atomic structure. This system begins with elementary physical problems, such as why a hard body can be lighter than a softer one. The explanation is that the heavier body contains more atoms, which are equally distributed and of 25 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE round shape; the lighter body, however, has fewer atoms, most of which have hooks by which they form rigid gratings. The system ends with educational and ethical questions. A sound and cheerful person, useful to his fellows, is literally well composed. Although destructive passions involve violent, long-distance atomic motions, education can help to contain them, creating a better composure. Democritus also developed a theory of the evolution of culture, which influenced later thinkers. Civilization, he thought, is produced by the needs of life, which compel human beings to work and to make inventions. When life becomes too easy because all needs are met, there is a danger that civilization will decay as people become unruly and negligent. Appearance and Reality All of the post-Parmenidean philosophers, like Parmenides himself, presupposed that the real world is different from the one that human beings perceive. Thus arose the problems of epistemology, or theory of knowledge. According to Anaxagoras, everything is contained in everything. But this is not what people perceive. He solved this problem by postulating that, if there is a much greater amount of one kind of particle in a thing than of all other kinds, the latter are not perceived at all. The observation was then made that sometimes different persons or kinds of animals have different perceptions of the same things. He explained this phenomenon by assuming that like is perceived by like. If, therefore, in the sense organ of one person there is less of one kind of stuff than of another, that person will perceive the former less keenly than the latter. This reasoning was also used to explain why some animals see better at night and others during the day. 26 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics According to Democritus, atoms have no sensible qualities, such as taste, smell, or colour, at all. Thus, he tried to reduce all of them to tactile qualities (explaining a bright white colour, for instance, as sharp atoms hitting the eye like needles), and he made a most elaborate attempt to reconstruct the atomic structure of things on the basis of their apparent sensible qualities. Also of very great importance in the history of epistemology was Zeno of Elea (c. 495–c. 430 BCE), a younger friend of Parmenides. Parmenides had, of course, been severely criticized because of the strange consequences of his doctrine: that in reality there is no motion and no plurality because there is just one solid being. To support him, however, Zeno tried to show that the assumption that there is motion and plurality leads to consequences that are no less strange. This he did by means of his famous paradoxes, saying that the flying arrow rests since it can neither move in the place in which it is nor in a place in which it is not, and that Achilles cannot outrun a turtle because, when he has reached its starting point, the turtle will have moved to a further point, and so on ad infinitum—that, in fact, he cannot even start running, for, before traversing the stretch to the starting point of the turtle, he will have to traverse half of it, and again half of that, and so on ad infinitum. All of these paradoxes are derived from what is known as the problem of the continuum. Although they have often been dismissed as logical nonsense, many attempts have also been made to dispose of them by means of mathematical theorems, such as the theory of convergent series or the theory of sets. In the end, however, the logical difficulties raised in Zeno’s arguments have always come back with a vengeance, for the human mind is so constructed that it can look at a continuum in two ways that are not quite reconcilable. 27 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism All of the philosophies mentioned so far are in various ways historically akin to one another. Toward the end of the 6th century BCE, however, there arose, quite independently, another kind of philosophy, which only later entered into interrelation with the developments just mentioned: the philosophy of Pythagoras of Samos (c. 580–c. 500 BCE). Pythagoras traveled extensively in the Middle East and in Egypt and, after his return to Samos (an island off the coast of Anatolia), emigrated to southern Italy because of his dislike of the tyranny of Polycrates (c. 535–522 BCE). At Croton and Metapontum he founded a philosophical society with strict rules and soon gained considerable political influence. He appears to have brought his doctrine of the transmigration (reincarnation) of souls from the Middle East. Much more important for the history of philosophy and science, however, was his doctrine that “all things are numbers,” which means that the essence and structure of all things can be determined by finding the numerical relations they express. Originally, this, too, was a very broad generalization made on the basis of comparatively few observations: for instance, that the same harmonies can be produced with different instruments—strings, pipes, disks, etc.—by means of the same numerical ratios—1:2, 2:3, 3:4—in one-dimensional extensions; the observation that certain regularities exist in the movements of the celestial bodies; and the discovery that the form of a triangle is determined by the ratio of the lengths of its sides. But because the followers of Pythagoras tried to apply their principle everywhere with the greatest of accuracy, one of them—Hippasus of Metapontum (flourished 5th century BCE)—made one of the most fundamental discoveries in the entire history of science: that the side and diagonal of simple figures such as the square 28 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics and the regular pentagon are incommensurable—i.e., their quantitative relation cannot be expressed as a ratio of integers. At first sight this discovery seemed to destroy the very basis of the Pythagorean philosophy, and the school thus split into two sects, one of which engaged in rather abstruse numerical speculations, while the other succeeded in overcoming the difficulty by ingenious mathematical inventions. Pythagorean philosophy also exerted a great influence on the later development of Plato’s thought. The speculations described so far constitute, in many ways, the most important part of the history of Greek philosophy because all of the most fundamental problems of Western philosophy turned up here for the first time. One also finds here the formation of a great many concepts that have continued to dominate Western philosophy and science to the present day. 1 √2 1 Hippasus, a follower of Pythagoras, was the first to realize that not all quantities can be expressed as a whole number or the ratio of two whole numbers (a fraction). For example, a simple square with sides equal to 1 unit each would have a diagonal equal to √2, an irrational number. 29 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE SKEPTICISM AND RELATIVISM: THE SOPHISTS In the middle of the 5th century BCE, Greek thinking took a somewhat different turn through the advent of the Sophists. The name is derived from the verb sophizesthai, “making a profession of being inventive and clever,” and aptly described the Sophists, who, in contrast to the philosophers mentioned so far, charged fees for their instruction. Philosophically, the Sophists were, in a way, the leaders of a rebellion against the preceding development of philosophy, which increasingly had resulted in the belief that the real world is quite different from the phenomenal world. “What is the sense of such speculations?” they asked, since no one lives in these so-called real worlds. This is the meaning of the pronouncement of Protagoras of Abdera (c. 485–c. 410 BCE) that “man is the measure of all things, of those which are that they are and of those which are not that they are not.” For human beings the world is what it appears to them to be, not something else; Protagoras illustrated his point by saying that it makes no sense to tell a person that it is really warm when he is shivering with cold because for him it is cold—for him, the cold exists, is there. His younger contemporary Gorgias of Leontini (flourished 5th century BCE), famous for his treatise on the art of oratory, made fun of the philosophers in his book Peri tou mē ontos ē peri physeōs (“On That Which Is Not; or, On Nature”), in which—referring to the “truly existing world,” also called “the nature of things”—he tried to prove (1) that nothing exists, (2) that if something existed, one could have no knowledge of it, and (3) that if nevertheless somebody knew something existed, he could not communicate his knowledge to others. 30 Early Greek Philosophy: The Pre-Socratics The Sophists were not only skeptical of what had by then become a philosophical tradition but also of other traditions. On the basis of the observation that different nations have different rules of conduct even in regard to things considered most sacred—such as the relations between the sexes, marriage, and burial—they concluded that most rules of conduct are conventions. What is really important is to be successful in life and to gain influence over others. This they promised to teach. Gorgias was proud of the fact that, having no knowledge of medicine, he was more successful in persuading a patient to undergo a necessary operation than his brother, a physician, who knew when an operation was necessary. The older Sophists, however, were far from openly preaching immoralism. They, nevertheless, gradually came under suspicion because of their sly ways of arguing. One of the later Sophists, Thrasymachus of Chalcedon (flourished 5th century BCE), was bold enough to declare openly that “right is what is beneficial for the stronger or better one”—that is, for the one able to win the power to bend others to his will. 31 CHAPTER 2 The Philosophy of Socrates T he life, character, and thought of Socrates (c. 470–399 BCE ) have exerted a profound influence on Western philosophy from ancient times to the present day. Socrates was a widely recognized and controversial figure in his native Athens, so much so that he was frequently mocked in the plays of comic dramatists. (The Clouds of Aristophanes, produced in 423, is the best-known example.) Although Socrates himself wrote nothing, he is depicted in conversation in compositions by a small circle of his admirers—Plato and Xenophon first among them. He is portrayed in these works as a man of great insight, integrity, self-mastery, and argumentative skill. The impact of his life was all the greater because of the way in which it ended: at age 70, he was brought to trial on a charge of impiety and sentenced to death by poisoning (the poison probably being hemlock) by a jury of his fellow citizens. Plato’s Apology of Socrates purports to be the speech Socrates gave at his trial in response to the accusations made against him (the Greek term apologia means “defense”). Its powerful advocacy of the examined life and its condemnation of Athenian democracy have made it one of the central documents of Western thought and culture. 32 The Philosophy of Socrates HIS LIFE AND PERSONALITY Although literary and philosophical sources provide only a small amount of information about the life and personality of Socrates, a unique and vivid picture is available to us in the works of Plato. We know the names of his father, Sophroniscus (probably a stonemason), his mother, Phaenarete, and his wife, Socrates, herm with a restored nose probably copied from the Greek origiXanthippe, and we know nal by Lysippus, c. 350 BCE. In the that he had three sons. Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Naples. Courtesy of the Soprintendenza alle With a snub nose and bulging eyes, which made Antichita della Campania, Naples him always appear to be staring, he was unattractive by conventional standards. He served as a hoplite (a heavily armed soldier) in the Athenian army and fought bravely in several important battles. Unlike many of the thinkers of his time, he did not travel to other cities in order to pursue his intellectual interests. Although he did not seek high office, did not regularly attend meetings of the Athenian Assembly (Ecclesia), the city’s principal governing body (as was his privilege as an adult male citizen), and was not active in any political faction, he discharged his duties as a citizen, which included not only military service but occasional membership in the Council of Five Hundred, which prepared the Assembly’s agenda. 33 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The Pnyx is a hill west of the Acropolis where the Ecclesia, or Assembly, the centre of the Athenian government, convened regularly. Though Socrates did not actively participate in politics, he held strong views on democracy and the proceedings of the Assembly. Dmitri Kessel/Time & Life Pictures/ Getty Images Socrates was not well-born or wealthy, but many of his admirers were, and they included several of the most politically prominent Athenian citizens. When the democratic constitution of Athens was overthrown for a brief time in 403, four years before his trial, he did not leave the city, as did many devoted supporters of democratic rule, including his friend Chaerephon, who had gone to Delphi many years earlier to ask the oracle whether anyone was wiser than Socrates. (The answer was no.) Socrates’ long fits of abstraction, his courage in battle, his resistance to 34 The Philosophy of Socrates hunger and cold, his ability to consume wine without apparent inebriation, and his extraordinary self-control in the presence of sensual attractions are all described with consummate artistry in the opening and closing pages of the Symposium. Socrates’ personality was in some ways closely connected to his philosophical outlook. He was remarkable for the absolute command he maintained over his emotions and his apparent indifference to physical hardships. Corresponding to these personal qualities was his commitment to the doctrine that reason, properly cultivated, can and ought to be the all-controlling factor in human life. Thus he has no fear of death, he says in Plato’s Apology, because he has no knowledge of what comes after it, and he holds that, if anyone does fear death, his fear can be based only on a pretense of knowledge. The assumption underlying this claim is that, once one has given sufficient thought to some matter, one’s emotions will follow suit. Fear will be dispelled by intellectual clarity. Similarly, according to Socrates, if one believes, upon reflection, that one should act in a particular way, then, necessarily, one’s feelings about the act in question will accommodate themselves to one’s belief—one will desire to act in that way. (Thus, Socrates denies the possibility of what has been called “weakness of will”—knowingly acting in a way one believes to be wrong.) It follows that, once one knows what virtue is, it is impossible not to act virtuously. Anyone who fails to act virtuously does so because he incorrectly identifies virtue with something it is not. This is what is meant by the thesis, attributed to Socrates by Aristotle, that virtue is a form of knowledge. Socrates’ conception of virtue as a form of knowledge explains why he takes it to be of the greatest importance to seek answers to questions such as “What is courage?” and “What is piety?” If we could just discover the answers 35 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE to these questions, we would have all we need to live our lives well. The fact that Socrates achieved a complete rational control of his emotions no doubt encouraged him to suppose that his own case was indicative of what human beings at their best can achieve. But if virtue is a form of knowledge, does that mean that each of the virtues—courage, piety, justice—constitutes a separate branch of knowledge, and should we infer that it is possible to acquire knowledge of one of these branches but not of the others? This is an issue that emerges in several of Plato’s dialogues; it is most fully discussed in Protagoras. It was a piece of conventional Greek wisdom, and is still widely assumed, that one can have some admirable qualities but lack others. One might, for example, be courageous but unjust. Socrates challenges this assumption; he believes that the many virtues form a kind of unity—though, not being able to define any of the virtues, he is in no position to say whether they are all the same thing or instead constitute some looser kind of unification. But he unequivocally rejects the conventional idea that one can possess one virtue without possessing them all. Another prominent feature of the personality of Socrates, one that often creates problems about how best to interpret him, is (to use the ancient Greek term) his eirôneia. Although this is the term from which the English word irony is derived, there is a difference between the two. To speak ironically is to use words to mean the opposite of what they normally convey, but it is not necessarily to aim at deception, for the speaker may expect and even want the audience to recognize this reversal. In contrast, for the ancient Greeks eirôneia meant “dissembling”—a user of eirôneia is trying to hide something. This is the accusation that is made against Socrates several times in Plato’s works (though never in Xenophon’s). Socrates says 36 The Philosophy of Socrates in Plato’s Apology, for example, that the jurors hearing his case will not accept the reason he offers for being unable to stop his philosophizing in the marketplace—that to do so would be to disobey the god who presides at Delphi (Socrates’ audience understood him to be referring to Apollo, though he does not himself use this name. Throughout his speech, he affirms his obedience to the god or to the gods but not specifically to one or more of the familiar gods or goddesses of the Greek pantheon). The cause of their incredulity, he adds, will be their assumption that he is engaging in eirôneia. In effect, Socrates is admitting that he has acquired a reputation for insincerity—for giving people to understand that his words mean what they are ordinarily taken to mean when in fact they do not. Similarly, in Book I of the Republic, Socrates is accused by a hostile interlocutor, Thrasymachus, of “habitual eirôneia.” Although Socrates says that he does The Greek god Apollo, whose temple in Delphi is shown above, earned the devotion of Socrates. Apollo’s oracle at Delphi stated that there was no one wiser than Socrates. Manuel Cohen/Getty Images 37 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE not have a good answer to the question “What is justice?,” Thrasymachus thinks that this is just a pose. Socrates, he alleges, is concealing his favoured answer. And in the Symposium, Alcibiades accuses Socrates of “spending his whole life engaged in eirôneia and playing with people” and compares him to a carved figurine whose outer shell conceals its inner contents. The heart of Alcibiades’ accusation is that Socrates pretends to care about people and to offer them advantages but withholds what he knows because he is full of disdain. Plato’s portrayal of Socrates as an “ironist” shows how conversation with him could easily lead to a frustrating impasse and how the possibility of resentment was ever present. Socrates was in this sense a masked interlocutor—an aspect of his self-presentation that made him more fascinating and alluring to his audiences but that also added to their distrust and suspicion. And readers, who come to know Socrates through the intervention of Plato, are in somewhat the same situation. Our efforts to interpret him are sometimes not as sound as we would like, because we must rely on judgments, often difficult to justify, about when he means what he says and when he does not. Even when Socrates goes to court to defend himself against the most serious of charges, he seems to be engaged in eirôneia. After listening to the speeches given by his accusers, he says, in the opening sentence of Plato’s Apology: “I was almost carried away in spite of myself, so persuasively did they speak.” Is this the habitual eirôneia of Socrates? Or did the speeches of his accusers really have this effect on him? It is difficult to be sure. But, by Socrates’ own admission, the suspicion that anything he says might be a pose undermines his ability to persuade the jurors of his good intentions. His eirôneia may even have lent support to one of the accusations made against him, that he 38 The Philosophy of Socrates corrupted the young. For if Socrates really did engage in eirôneia, and if his youthful followers delighted in and imitated this aspect of his character, then to that extent he encouraged them to become dissembling and untrustworthy, just like himself. WHY WAS SOCRATES HATED? Part of the fascination of Plato’s Apology consists in the fact that it presents a man who takes extraordinary steps throughout his life to be of the greatest possible value to his community but whose efforts, far from earning him the gratitude and honour he thinks he deserves, lead to his condemnation and death at the hands of the very people he seeks to serve. Socrates is painfully aware that he is a hated figure and that this is what has led to the accusations against him. He has little money and no political savvy or influence, and he has paid little attention to his family and household—all in order to serve the public that now reviles him. What went wrong? The Impression Created by Aristophanes Socrates goes to some length to answer this question. Much of his defense consists not merely in refuting the charges but in offering a complex explanation of why such false accusations should have been brought against him in the first place. Part of the explanation, he believes, is that he has long been misunderstood by the general public. The public, he says, has focused its distrust of certain types of people upon him. He claims that the false impressions of his “first accusers” (as he calls them) derive from a play of Aristophanes (he is referring to Clouds) in which a character called Socrates is seen “swinging about, saying he was walking on air and talking a lot of nonsense about 39 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE things of which I know nothing at all.” The Socrates of Aristophanes’ comedy is the head of a school that investigates every sort of empirical phenomenon, regards clouds and air as divine substances, denies the existence of any gods but these, studies language and the art of argument, and uses its knowledge of rhetorical devices to “make the worse into the stronger argument,” as the Socrates of the Apology puts it in his speech. Socrates’ corruption of the young is also a major theme of Clouds: it features a father (Strepsiades) who attends Socrates’ school with his son (Pheidippides) in order to learn how to avoid paying the debts he has incurred because of his son’s extravagance. In the end, Pheidippides learns all too well how to use argumentative skills to his advantage; indeed, he prides himself on his ability to prove that it is right for a son to beat his parents. In the end, Strepsiades denounces Socrates and burns down the building that houses his school. Amphitheatres, like this one in Syracuse, Sicily, often provided the setting for performances of Aristophanes’ Clouds and other plays. Fox Photos/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 40 The Philosophy of Socrates This play, Socrates says, has created the general impression that he studies celestial and geographic phenomena and, like the Sophists who travel from city to city, takes a fee for teaching the young various skills. Not so, says Socrates. He thinks it would be a fine thing to possess the kinds of knowledge these Sophists claim to teach, but he has never discussed these matters with anyone—as his judges should be able to confirm for themselves, because, he says, many of them have heard his conversations. The Human Resistance to Self-Reflection But this can only be the beginning of Socrates’ explanation, for it leads to further questions. Why should Aristophanes have written in this way about Socrates? The latter must have been a well-known figure in 423, when Clouds was produced, for Aristophanes typically wrote about and mocked figures who already were familiar to his audience. Furthermore, if, as Socrates claims, many of his jurors had heard him in discussion and could therefore confirm for themselves that he did not study or teach others about clouds, air, and other such matters and did not take a fee as the Sophists did, then why did they not vote to acquit him of the charges by an overwhelming majority? Socrates provides answers to these questions. Long before Aristophanes wrote about him, he had acquired a reputation among his fellow citizens because he spent his days attempting to fulfill his divine mission to cross-examine them and to puncture their confident belief that they possessed knowledge of the most important matters. Socrates tells the jurors that, as a result of his inquiries, he has learned a bitter lesson about his fellow citizens: not only do they fail to possess the knowledge they claim to have, but they resent having this fact pointed out to them, 41 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE and they hate him for his insistence that his reflective way of life and his disavowal of knowledge make him superior to them. The only people who delight in his conversation are the young and wealthy, who have the leisure to spend their days with him. These people imitate him by carrying out their own cross-examinations of their elders. Socrates does admit, then, that he has, to some degree, set one generation against another—and in making this confession, he makes it apparent why some members of the jury may have been convinced, on the basis of their own acquaintance with him, that he has corrupted the city’s young. One of the most subtle components of Socrates’ explanation for the hatred he has aroused is his point that people hide the shame they feel when they are unable to withstand his destructive arguments. His reputation as a corrupter of the young and as a Sophist and an atheist is sustained because it provides people with an ostensibly reasonable explanation of their hatred of him. No one will say, “I hate Socrates because I cannot answer his questions, and he makes me look foolish in front of the young.” Instead, people hide their shame and the real source of This bas-relief depicts Socrates (second from the right) conversing with other men. Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 42 The Philosophy of Socrates their anger by seizing on the general impression that he is the sort of philosopher who casts doubt on traditional religion and teaches people rhetorical tricks that can be used to make bad arguments look good. These ways of hiding the source of their hatred are all the more potent because they contain at least a grain of truth. Socrates, as both Plato and Xenophon confirm, is a man who loves to argue: in that respect he is like a Sophist. And his conception of piety, as revealed by his devotion to the Delphic oracle, is highly unorthodox: in that respect he is like those who deny the existence of the gods. Socrates believes that this hatred, whose real source is so painful for people to acknowledge, played a crucial role in leading Meletus, Anytus, and Lycon to come forward in court against him; it also makes it so difficult for many members of the jury to acknowledge that he has the highest motives and has done his city a great service. Aristophanes’ mockery of Socrates and the legal indictment against him could not possibly have led to his trial or conviction were it not for something in a large number of his fellow Athenians that wanted to be rid of him. This is a theme to which Socrates returns several times. He compares himself, at one point, to a gadfly who has been assigned by the god to stir a large and sluggish horse. Note what this implies: the bite of the fly cannot be anything but painful, and it is only natural that the horse would like nothing better than to kill it. After the jury has voted in favour of the death penalty, Socrates tells them that their motive has been their desire to avoid giving a defense of their lives. Something in people resists self-examination: they do not want to answer deep questions about themselves, and they hate those who cajole them for not doing so or for doing so poorly. At bottom, Socrates thinks that all but a few people will strike out against those who try to stimulate serious moral reflection in them. That is why he 43 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE thinks that his trial is not merely the result of unfortuitous events—a mere misunderstanding caused by the work of a popular playwright—but the outcome of psychological forces deep within human nature. Socrates’ Criticism of Democracy Socrates’ analysis of the hatred he has incurred is one part of a larger theme that he dwells on throughout his speech. Athens is a democracy, a city in which the many are the dominant power in politics, and it can therefore be expected to have all the vices of the many. Because most people hate to be tested in argument, they will always take action of some sort against those who provoke them with questions. But that is not the only accusation Socrates brings forward against his city and its politics. He tells his democratic audience that he was right to have withdrawn from political life, because a good person who fights for justice in a democracy will be killed. In his cross-examination of Meletus, he insists that only a few people can acquire the knowledge necessary for improving the young of any species, and that the many will inevitably do a poor job. He criticizes the Assembly for its illegal actions and the Athenian courts for the ease with which matters of justice are distorted by emotional pleading. Socrates implies that the very nature of democracy makes it a corrupt political system. Bitter experience has taught him that most people rest content with a superficial understanding of the most urgent human questions. When they are given great power, their shallowness inevitably leads to injustice. THE LEGACY OF SOCRATES Socrates’ thought was so pregnant with possibilities, his mode of life so provocative, that he inspired a remarkable 44 The Philosophy of Socrates variety of responses. One of his associates, Aristippus of Cyrene—his followers were called “Cyrenaics,” and their school flourished for a century and a half—affirmed that pleasure is the highest good. (Socrates seems to endorse this thesis in Plato’s Protagoras, but he attacks it in Gorgias and other dialogues.) Another prominent follower of Socrates in the early 4th century BCE, Antisthenes, emphasized the Socratic doctrine that a good man cannot be harmed; virtue, in other words, is by itself sufficient for happiness. That doctrine played a central role in a school of thought, founded by Diogenes of Sinope, that had an enduring influence on Greek and Roman philosophy: Cynicism. Like Socrates, Diogenes was concerned solely with ethics, practiced his philosophy in the marketplace, and upheld an ideal of indifference to material possessions, political power, and conventional honours. But the Cynics, unlike Socrates, treated all conventional distinctions and cultural traditions as impediments to the life of virtue. They advocated a life in accordance with nature and regarded animals and human beings who did not live in societies as being closer to nature than contemporary human beings. (The term cynic is derived from the Greek word for dog. Cynics, therefore, live like beasts.) Starting from the Socratic premise that virtue is sufficient for happiness, they launched attacks on marriage, the family, national distinctions, authority, and cultural achievements. But the two most important ancient schools of thought that were influenced by Socrates were Stoicism, founded by Zeno of Citium, and skepticism which became, for many centuries, the reigning philosophical stance of Plato’s Academy after Arcesilaus became its leader in 273 BCE. The influence of Socrates on Zeno was mediated by the Cynics, but Roman Stoics—particularly Epictetus— regarded Socrates as the paradigm of sagacious inner 45 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Diogenes of Sinope, founder of the Cynic school of thought, is depicted above with his fabled lantern. It has been said that he would walk with a lit lantern in broad daylight as part of his quest to find an honest man. Hulton Archive/ Getty Images 46 The Philosophy of Socrates strength, and they invented new arguments for the Socratic thesis that virtue is sufficient for happiness. The Stoic doctrine that divine intelligence pervades the world and rules for the best borrows heavily from ideas attributed to Socrates by Xenophon in the Memorabilia. Like Socrates, Arcesilaus wrote nothing. He philosophized by inviting others to state a thesis; he would then prove, by Socratic questioning, that their thesis led to a contradiction. His use of the Socratic method allowed Arcesilaus and his successors in the Academy to hold that they were remaining true to the central theme of Plato’s writings. But, just as Cynicism took Socratic themes in a direction Socrates himself had not developed and indeed would have rejected, so, too, Arcesilaus and his skeptical followers in Plato’s Academy used the Socratic method to advocate a general suspension of all convictions whatsoever and not merely a disavowal of knowledge. The underlying thought of the Academy during its skeptical phase is that, because there is no way to distinguish truth from falsity, we must refrain from believing anything at all. Socrates, by contrast, merely claims to have no knowledge, and he regards certain theses as far more worthy of our credence than their denials. Although Socrates exerted a profound influence on Greek and Roman thought, not every major philosopher of antiquity regarded him as a moral exemplar or a major thinker. Aristotle approves of the Socratic search for definitions but criticizes Socrates for an overintellectualized conception of the human psyche. The followers of Epicurus, who were philosophical rivals of the Stoics and Academics, were contemptuous of him. With the ascendancy of Christianity in the medieval period, the influence of Socrates was at its nadir: he was, for many centuries, little more than an Athenian who had 47 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE been condemned to death. But when Greek texts, and thus the works of Plato, the Stoics, and the skeptics, became increasingly available in the Renaissance, the thought and personality of Socrates began to play an important role in European philosophy. From the 16th to the 19th century the instability and excesses of Athenian democracy became a common motif of political writers; the hostility of Xenophon and Plato, fed by the death of Socrates, played an important role here. Comparisons between Socrates and Christ became commonplace, and they remained so even into the 20th century—though the contrasts drawn between them, and the uses to which their similarities were put, varied greatly from one author and period to another. The divine sign of Socrates became a matter of controversy: was he truly inspired by the voice of God? Or was the sign only an intuitive and natural grasp of virtue? (So thought Montaigne.) Did he intend to undermine the irrational and merely conventional aspects of religious practice and thus to place religion on a scientific footing? (So thought the 18th-century Deists.) In the 19th century Socrates was regarded as a seminal figure in the evolution of European thought or as a Christlike herald of a higher existence. G.W.F. Hegel saw in Socrates a decisive turn from pre-reflective moral habits to a self-consciousness that, tragically, had not yet learned how to reconcile itself to universal civic standards. Søren Kierkegaard, whose dissertation examined Socratic irony, found in Socrates a pagan anticipation of his belief that Christianity is a lived doctrine of almost impossible demands; but he also regarded Socratic irony as a deeply flawed indifference to morality. Friedrich Nietzsche struggled throughout his writings against the one-sided rationalism and the destruction of cultural forms that he found in Socrates. 48 The Philosophy of Socrates Despite the controversies surrounding his philosophy, Socrates maintained a loyal following and was hailed as a martyr by later philosophers. A copy of Jacques-Louis David’s 18th century painting The Death of Socrates (above) depicts Socrates surrounded by a number of followers before his death by poison. Hulton Archive/Getty Images In contrast, in Victorian England Socrates was idealized by utilitarian thinkers as a Christ-like martyr who laid the foundations of a modern, rational, scientific worldview. John Stuart Mill mentions the legal executions of Socrates and of Christ in the same breath in order to call attention to the terrible consequences of allowing common opinion to persecute unorthodox thinkers. Benjamin Jowett, the principal translator of Plato in the late 19th century, told his students at Oxford, “The two biographies about which we are most deeply interested (though not to 49 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE the same degree) are those of Christ and Socrates.” Such comparisons continued into the 20th century: Socrates is treated as a “paradigmatic individual” (along with Buddha, Confucius, and Christ) by the German existentialist philosopher Karl Jaspers. The conflict between Socrates and Athenian democracy shaped the thought of 20th-century political philosophers such as Leo Strauss, Hannah Arendt, and Karl Popper. The tradition of self-reflection and care of the self-initiated by Socrates fascinated the French philosopher Michel Foucault in his later writings. Analytic philosophy, an intellectual tradition that traces its origins to the work of Gottlob Frege, G.E. Moore, and Bertrand Russell in the late 19th and early 20th century, uses, as one of its fundamental tools, a process called “conceptual analysis,” a form of nonempirical inquiry that bears some resemblance to Socrates’ search for definitions. But the influence of Socrates is felt not only among philosophers and others inside the academy. He remains, for all of us, a challenge to complacency and a model of integrity. 50 CHAPTER 3 The Philosophy of Plato P lato, together with his teacher Socrates and his student Aristotle, laid the philosophical foundations of Western culture. Building on the demonstration by Socrates that those regarded as experts in ethical matters did not have the understanding necessary for a good human life, Plato introduced the idea that their mistakes were due to their not engaging properly with a class of entities he called forms, chief examples of which were Justice, Beauty, and Equality. Whereas other thinkers—and Plato himself in certain passages—used the term without any precise technical force, Plato in the course of his career came to devote specialized attention to these entities. As he conceived them, they were accessible not to the senses but to the mind alone, and they were the most important constituents of reality, underlying the existence of the sensible world and giving it what intelligibility it has. In metaphysics Plato envisioned a systematic, rational treatment of the forms and their interrelations, starting with the most fundamental among them (the Good, or the One); in ethics and moral psychology he developed the view that the good life requires not just a certain kind of knowledge (as Socrates had suggested) but also habituation to healthy emotional responses and therefore harmony between the three parts of the soul (according 51 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE to Plato, reason, spirit, and appetite). His works also contain discussions in aesthetics, political philosophy, theology, cosmology, epistemology, and the philosophy of language. His school fostered research not just in philosophy narrowly conceived but in a wide range of endeavours that today would be called mathematical or scientific. Plato, Roman herm probably copied from a Greek original, 4th century BCE; in the Staatliche Museen, Berlin. Courtesy of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin HIS LIFE The son of Ariston (his father) and Perictione (his mother), Plato was born in 428 BCE, the year after the death of the great Athenian statesman Pericles, and died in 348 BCE. His brothers Glaucon and Adeimantus are portrayed as interlocutors in Plato’s masterpiece the Republic, and his half brother Antiphon figures in the Parmenides. Plato’s family was aristocratic and distinguished: his father’s side claimed descent from the god Poseidon, and his mother’s side was related to the lawgiver Solon (c. 630–560 BCE). Less creditably, his mother’s close relatives Critias and Charmides were among the Thirty Tyrants who seized power in Athens and ruled briefly until the restoration of democracy in 403. Plato as a young man was a member of the circle around Socrates. Since the latter wrote nothing, what is 52 The Philosophy of Plato known of his characteristic activity of engaging his fellow citizens (and the occasional itinerant celebrity) in conversation derives wholly from the writings of others, most notably Plato himself. The works of Plato commonly referred to as “Socratic” represent the sort of thing the historical Socrates was doing. He would challenge men who supposedly had expertise about some facet of human excellence to give accounts of these matters—variously of courage, piety, and so on, or at times of the whole of “virtue”—and they typically failed to maintain their position. Plato was profoundly affected by both the life and the death of Socrates. The activity of the older man provided the starting point of Plato’s philosophizing. Moreover, if Plato’s Seventh Letter is to be believed (its authorship is disputed), the treatment of Socrates by both the oligarchy and the democracy made Plato wary of entering public life, as someone of his background would normally have done. After the death of Socrates, Plato may have traveled extensively in Greece, Italy, and Egypt, though on such particulars the evidence is uncertain. The followers of Pythagoras (c. 580–c. 500 BCE) seem to have influenced his philosophical program (they are criticized in the Phaedo and the Republic but receive respectful mention in the Philebus). It is thought that his three trips to Syracuse in Sicily (many of the Letters concern these, though their authenticity is controversial) led to a deep personal attachment to Dion (408–354 BCE), brother-inlaw of Dionysius the Elder (430–367 BCE), the tyrant of Syracuse. Plato, at Dion’s urging, apparently undertook to put into practice the ideal of the “philosopher-king” (described in the Republic) by educating Dionysius the Younger; the project was not a success, and in the ensuing instability Dion was murdered. 53 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Plato’s Academy, founded in the 380s and located on the outskirts of Athens, was the ultimate ancestor of the modern university (hence the English term academic); an influential centre of research and learning, it attracted many men of outstanding ability. The great mathematicians Theaetetus (417–369 BCE) and Eudoxus of Cnidus (c. 395–c. 342 BCE) were associated with it. Although Plato was not a research mathematician, he was aware of the results of those who were, and he made use of them in his own work. For 20 years Aristotle was also a member of the Academy. He started his own school, the Lyceum, only after Plato’s death, when he was passed over as Plato’s successor at the Academy, probably because of his connections to the court of Macedonia, where he tutored Alexander the Great when the future emperor was a boy. Because Aristotle often discusses issues by contrasting his views with those of his teacher, it is easy to be impressed by the ways in which they diverge. Thus, whereas for Plato the crown of ethics is the good in general, or Goodness itself (the Good), for Aristotle it is the good for human beings; and whereas for Plato the genus to which a thing belongs possesses a greater reality than the thing itself, for Aristotle the opposite is true. Plato’s emphasis on the ideal, and Aristotle’s on the worldly, informs Raphael’s depiction of the two philosophers in the School of Athens (1508–11). But if one considers the two philosophers not just in relation to each other but in the context of the whole of Western philosophy, it is clear how much Aristotle’s program is continuous with that of his teacher. (Indeed, the painting may be said to represent this continuity by showing the two men conversing amicably.) In any case, the Academy did not impose a dogmatic orthodoxy and in fact seems to have fostered a spirit of independent inquiry; at a later time it took on a skeptical orientation. 54 The Philosophy of Plato Raphael’s School of Athens shows Plato (centre left) and Aristotle (centre right) and symbolically explores the differences between them. Plato points to the heavens and the realm of forms, Aristotle to the earth and the realm of things. Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images DIALOGUE FORM Glimpsed darkly even through translation’s glass, Plato is a great literary artist. Yet he also made notoriously negative remarks about the value of writing. Similarly, although he believed that at least one of the purposes—if not the main purpose—of philosophy is to enable one to live a good life, by composing dialogues rather than treatises or 55 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE hortatory letters he omitted to tell his readers directly any useful truths to live by. One way of resolving these apparent tensions is to reflect on Plato’s conception of philosophy. An important aspect of this conception, one that has been shared by many philosophers since Plato’s time, is that philosophy aims not so much at discovering facts or establishing dogmas as at achieving wisdom or understanding. This wisdom or understanding is an extremely hard-won possession; it is no exaggeration to say that it is the result of a lifetime’s effort, if it is achieved at all. Moreover, it is a possession that each person must win for himself. The writing or conversation of others may aid philosophical progress but cannot guarantee it. Contact with a living person, however, has certain advantages over an encounter with a piece of writing. As Plato pointed out, writing is limited by its fixity: it cannot modify itself to suit the individual reader or add anything new in response to queries. So it is only natural that Plato had limited expectations about what written works could achieve. On the other hand, he clearly did not believe that writing has no philosophical value. Written works still serve a purpose, as ways of interacting with inhabitants of times and places beyond the author’s own and as a medium in which ideas can be explored and tested. Dialogue form suits a philosopher of Plato’s type. His use of dramatic elements, including humour, draws the reader in. Plato is unmatched in his ability to re-create the experience of conversation. The dialogues contain, in addition to Socrates and other authority figures, huge numbers of additional characters, some of whom act as representatives of certain classes of reader (as Glaucon may be a representative of talented and politically ambitious youth). These characters function not only to carry forward particular lines of thought but also to inspire 56 The Philosophy of Plato readers to do the same—to join imaginatively in the discussion by constructing arguments and objections of their own. Spurring readers to philosophical activity is the primary purpose of the dialogues. HAPPINESS AND VIRTUE The characteristic question of ancient ethics is “How can I be happy?” and the most common answer to it is “by means of virtue.” But in the relevant sense, happiness—the English translation of the ancient Greek eudaimonia—is not a mood or feeling but rather a condition of having things go well. Being happy amounts to living a life of human flourishing. Hence the question “How can I be happy?” is equivalent to “How can I live a good life?” Whereas the notion of happiness in Greek philosophy applies at most to living things, that of arete—“virtue” or “excellence”—applies much more widely. Anything that has a characteristic use, function, or activity has a virtue or excellence, which is whatever disposition enables things of that kind to perform well. Human virtue, accordingly, is whatever enables human beings to live good lives. But it is far from obvious what a good life consists of, and so it is difficult to say what virtue might be. Already by Plato’s time a conventional set of virtues had come to be recognized by the larger culture; they included courage, justice, piety, modesty or temperance, and wisdom. Socrates and Plato undertook to discover what these virtues really amount to. A truly satisfactory account of any virtue would identify what it is, show how possessing it enables one to live well, and indicate how it is best acquired. In Plato’s representation of the activity of the historical Socrates, the interlocutors are examined in a search for definitions of the virtues. It is important to understand, 57 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE however, that the definition sought for is not lexical, merely specifying what a speaker of the language would understand the term to mean as a matter of linguistic competence. Rather, the definition is one that gives an account of the real nature of the thing named by the term; accordingly, it is sometimes called a “real” definition. The real definition of water, for example, is H2O, though speakers in most historical eras did not know this. In the encounters Plato portrays, the interlocutors typically offer an example of the virtue they are asked to define (not the right kind of answer) or give a general account (the right kind of answer) that fails to accord with their intuitions on related matters. Socrates tends to suggest that virtue is not a matter of outward behaviour but is or involves a special kind of knowledge (knowledge of good and evil or knowledge of the use of other things). The Protagoras addresses the question of whether the various commonly recognized virtues are different or really one. Proceeding from the interlocutor’s assertion that the many have nothing to offer as their notion of the good besides pleasure, Socrates develops a picture of the agent according to which the great art necessary for a good human life is measuring and calculation; knowledge of the magnitudes of future pleasures and pains is all that is needed. If pleasure is the only object of desire, it seems unintelligible what, besides simple miscalculation, could cause anyone to behave badly. Thus the whole of virtue would consist of a certain kind of wisdom. The idea that knowledge is all that one needs for a good life, and that there is no aspect of character that is not reducible to cognition (and so no moral or emotional failure that is not a cognitive failure), is the characteristically Socratic position. In the Republic, however, Plato develops a view of happiness and virtue that departs from that of Socrates. According to Plato, there are three parts of the soul, each 58 The Philosophy of Plato with its own object of desire. Reason desires truth and the good of the whole individual, spirit is preoccupied with honour and competitive values, and appetite has the traditional low tastes for food, drink, and sex. Because the soul is complex, erroneous calculation is not the only way it can go wrong. The three parts can pull in different directions, and the low element, in a soul in which it is overdeveloped, can win out. Correspondingly, the good condition of the soul involves more than just cognitive excellence. In the terms of the Republic, the healthy or just soul has psychic harmony—the condition in which each of the three parts does its job properly. Thus, reason understands the Good in general and desires the actual good of the individual, and the other two parts of the soul desire what it is good for them to desire, so that spirit and appetite are activated by things that are healthy and proper. Although the dialogue starts from the question “Why should I be just?,” Socrates proposes that this inquiry can be advanced by examining justice “writ large” in an ideal city. Thus, the political discussion is undertaken to aid the ethical one. One early hint of the existence of the three parts of the soul in the individual is the existence of three classes in the well-functioning state: rulers, guardians, and producers. The wise state is the one in which the rulers understand the good; the courageous state is that in which the guardians can retain in the heat of battle the judgments handed down by the rulers about what is to be feared; the temperate state is that in which all citizens agree about who is to rule; and the just state is that in which each of the three classes does its own work properly. Thus, for the city to be fully virtuous, each citizen must contribute appropriately. Justice as conceived in the Republic is so comprehensive that a person who possessed it would also possess all the other virtues, thereby achieving “the health of that 59 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE whereby we live [the soul].” Yet, lest it be thought that habituation and correct instruction in human affairs alone can lead to this condition, one must keep in view that the Republic also develops the famous doctrine according to which reason cannot properly understand the human good or anything else without grasping the form of the Good itself. Thus the original inquiry, whose starting point was a motivation each individual is presumed to have (to learn how to live well), leads to a highly ambitious educational program. Starting with exposure only to salutary stories, poetry, and music from childhood and continuing with supervised habituation to good action and years of training in a series of mathematical disciplines, this program—and so virtue—would be complete only in the person who was able to grasp the first principle, the Good, and to proceed on that basis to secure accounts of the other realities. There are hints in the Republic, as well as in the tradition concerning Plato’s lecture “On the Good” and in several of the more technical dialogues that this first principle is identical with Unity, or the One. THE THEORY OF FORMS Plato is both famous and infamous for his theory of forms. Just what the theory is, and whether it was ever viable, are matters of extreme controversy. To readers who approach Plato in English, the relationship between forms and sensible particulars, called in translation “participation,” seems purposely mysterious. Moreover, the claim that the sensible realm is not fully real, and that it contrasts in this respect with the “pure being” of the forms, is perplexing. A satisfactory interpretation of the theory must rely on both historical knowledge and philosophical imagination. 60 The Philosophy of Plato Linguistic and Philosophical Background The terms that Plato uses to refer to forms, idea and eidos, ultimately derive from the verb eidô, “to look.” Thus, an idea or eidos would be the look a thing presents, as when one speaks of a vase as having a lovely form. (Because the mentalistic connotation of idea in English is misleading— the Parmenides shows that forms cannot be ideas in a mind—this translation has fallen from favour.) Both terms can also be used in a more general sense to refer to any feature that two or more things have in common or to a kind of thing based on that feature. The English word form is similar. The sentence “The pottery comes in two forms” can be glossed as meaning either that the pottery is made in two shapes or that there are two kinds of pottery. When Plato wants to contrast genus with species, he tends to use the terms genos and eidos, translated as “genus” and “species,” respectively. Although it is appropriate in the context to translate these as “genus” and “species,” respectively, it is important not to lose sight of the continuity provided by the word eidos: even in these passages Plato is referring to the same kind of entities as always, the forms. Another linguistic consideration that should be taken into account is the ambiguity of ancient Greek terms of the sort that would be rendered into unidiomatic English as “the dark” or “the beautiful.” Such terms may refer to a particular individual that exhibits the feature in question, as when “the beautiful [one]” is used to refer to Achilles, but they may also refer to the features themselves, as when “the beautiful” is used to refer to something Achilles has. “The beautiful” in the latter usage may then be thought of as something general that all beautiful particulars have in common. In Plato’s time, unambiguously abstract terms— corresponding to the English words “darkness” and 61 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE “beauty”—came to be used as a way of avoiding the ambiguity inherent in the original terminology. Plato uses both kinds of terms. By Plato’s time there was also important philosophical precedent for using terms such as “the dark” and “the beautiful” to refer to metaphysically fundamental entities. Anaxagoras (c. 500–c. 428 BCE), the great pre-Socratic natural scientist, posited a long list of fundamental stuffs, holding that what are ordinarily understood as individuals are actually composites made up of shares or portions of these stuffs. The properties of sensible composites depend on which of their ingredients are predominant. Change, generation, and destruction in sensible particulars are conceived in terms of shifting combinations of portions of fundamental stuffs, which themselves are eternal and unchanging and accessible to the mind but not to the senses. For Anaxagoras, having a share of something is straightforward: a particular composite possesses as a physical ingredient a material portion of the fundamental stuff in question. For example, a thing is observably hot because it possesses a sufficiently large portion of “the hot,” which is thought of as the totality of heat in the world. The hot is itself hot, and this is why portions of it account for the warmth of composites. (In general, the fundamental stuffs posited by Anaxagoras themselves possessed the qualities they were supposed to account for in sensible particulars.) These portions are qualitatively identical to each other and to portions of the hot that are lost by whatever becomes less warm; they can move around the cosmos, being transferred from one composite to another, as heat may move from hot bathwater to Hector as it warms him up. Plato’s theory can be seen as a successor to that of Anaxagoras. Like Anaxagoras, Plato posits fundamental entities that are eternal and unchanging and accessible to the mind but not to the senses. And, as in Anaxagoras’s 62 The Philosophy of Plato theory, in Plato’s theory sensible particulars display a given feature because they have a portion of the underlying thing itself. The Greek term used by both authors, metechei, is traditionally rendered as “participates in” in translations of Plato but as “has a portion of ” in translations of Anaxagoras. This divergence has had the unfortunate effect of tending to hide from Englishspeaking readers that Plato is taking over a straightforward notion from his predecessor. It is also possible to understand sympathetically the claim that forms have a greater reality than sensible particulars. The claim is certainly not that the sensible realm fails to exist or that it exists only partially or incompletely. Rather, sensibles are simply not ontologically or explanatorily basic: they are constituted of and explained by more fundamental entities, in Plato as in Anaxagoras (and indeed in most scientific theories). It is easy to multiply examples in the spirit of Plato to illustrate that adequate accounts of many of the fundamental entities he is interested in cannot be given in terms of sensible particulars or sensible properties. If someone who wishes to define beauty points at Helen of Troy, he points at a thing both beautiful (physically) and not beautiful (perhaps morally). Equally, if he specifies a sensible property like the gilded, he captures together things that are beautiful and things that are not. Sensible particulars and properties thus exhibit the phenomenon that Plato calls “rolling around between being and not-being”: they are and are not x for values of x he is interested in (beautiful, just, equal, and so on). To understand beauty properly, one needs to capture something that is simply beautiful, however that is to be construed. The middle dialogues do not undertake to help the reader with this task. Notice finally that because Plato was concerned with moral and aesthetic properties such as justice, beauty, and 63 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE goodness, the Anaxagorean interpretation of participation—the idea that sensible composites are made up of physical portions of the fundamental entities—was not available to him. There is no qualitatively identical material constituent that a lyre gains as its sound becomes more beautiful and that Achilles loses as he ages. Plato’s theory of forms would need a new interpretation of participation if it was to be carried out. Forms as Perfect Exemplars According to a view that some scholars have attributed to Plato’s middle dialogues, participation is imitation or resemblance. Each form is approximated by the sensible particulars that display the property in question. Thus, Achilles and Helen are imperfect imitations of the Beautiful, which itself is maximally beautiful. On this interpretation, the “pure being” of the forms consists of their being perfect exemplars of themselves and not exemplars of anything else. Unlike Helen, the form of the Beautiful cannot be said to be both beautiful and not beautiful— similarly for Justice, Equality, and all the other forms. This “super-exemplification” interpretation of participation provides a natural way of understanding the notion of the pure being of the forms and such self-predication sentences as “the Beautiful is beautiful.” Yet it is absurd. In Plato’s theory, forms play the functional role of universals, and most universals, such as greenness, generosity, and largeness, are not exemplars of themselves. (Greenness does not exhibit hue; generosity has no one to whom to give; largeness is not a gigantic object.) Moreover, it is problematic to require forms to exemplify only themselves, because there are properties, such as being and unity, that all things, including all forms, must exhibit. (So Largeness must have a share of Being to be anything at all, 64 The Philosophy of Plato and it must have a share of Unity to be a single form.) Plato was not unaware of the severe difficulties inherent in the super-exemplification view; indeed, in the Parmenides and the Sophist he became the first philosopher to demonstrate these problems. The first part of the Parmenides depicts the failure of the young Socrates to maintain the super-exemplification view of the forms against the critical examination of the older philosopher Parmenides. Since what Socrates there says about forms is reminiscent of the assertions of the character Socrates in the middle dialogues Symposium, Phaedo, and Republic, the exchange is usually interpreted as a negative assessment by Plato of the adequacy of his earlier presentation. Those who consider the first part of the Parmenides in isolation tend to suppose that Plato had heroically come to grips with the unviability of his theory, so that by his late period he was left with only dry and uninspiring exercises, divorced from the exciting program of the great masterpieces. Those who consider the dialogue as a whole, however, are encouraged by Parmenides’ praise for the young Socrates and by his assertion that the exercise constituting the second part of the dialogue will help Socrates to get things right in the future. This suggests that Plato believed that the theory of forms could be developed in a way that would make it immune to the objections raised against the super-exemplification view. Forms as Genera and Species Successful development of the theory of forms depended upon the development of a distinction between two kinds of predication. Plato held that a sentence making a predication about a sensible particular, “A is B,” must be understood as stating that the particular in question, A, displays a certain property, B. There are ordinary predications about the 65 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE forms, which also state that the forms in question display properties. Crucially, however, there is also a special kind of predication that can be used to express a form’s nature. Since Plato envisaged that these natures could be given in terms of genus-species trees, a special predication about a form, “A is B,” is true if B appears above A in its correct tree as a differentia or genus. Equivalently, “A is B” has the force that being a B is (part of) what it is to be an A. This special predication is closely approximated in modern classifications of animals and plants according to a biological taxonomy. “The wolf is a canis,” for example, states that “wolf ” appears below “canis” in a genus-species classification of the animals, or equivalently that being a canis is part of what it is to be a wolf (Canis lupus). Plato’s distinction can be illustrated by examples such as the following. The ordinary predication “Socrates is just” is true, because the individual in question displays the property of being just. Understood as a special predication, however, the assertion is false, because it is false that being just is part of what it is to be Socrates (there is no such thing as what it is to be Socrates). “Man is a vertebrate,” understood as an ordinary predication, is false, since the form Man does not have a backbone. But when treated as a special predication it is true, since part of what it is to be a human is to be a vertebrate. Self-predication sentences are now revealed as trivial but true: “the Beautiful is beautiful” asserts only that being beautiful is (part of) what it is to be beautiful. In general one must be careful not to assume that Plato’s self-predication sentences involve ordinary predication, which would in many cases involve problematic self-exemplification issues. Plato was interested in special predication as a vehicle for providing the real definitions that he had been seeking in earlier dialogues. When one knows in this way what Justice itself really is, one can appreciate its relation to 66 The Philosophy of Plato other entities of the same kind, including how it differs from the other virtues, such as Bravery, and whether it is really the whole of Virtue or only a part of it. By means of special predication it is possible to provide an account of each fundamental nature. Such accounts, moreover, provide a way of understanding the “pure being” of the forms: it consists of the fact that there cannot be a true special predication of the form “A is both B and not-B.” In other words, special predication sentences do not exhibit the phenomenon of rolling around between being and not being. This is because it must be the case that either B appears above A in a correct genusspecies classification or it does not. Moreover, since forms do not function by being exemplars of themselves only, there is nothing to prevent their having other properties, such as being and unity, as appropriate. As Plato expresses it, all forms must participate in Being and Unity. Because the special predications serve to give (in whole or in part) the real definitions that Socrates had been searching for, this interpretation of the forms connects Plato’s most technical dialogues to the literary masterpieces and to the earlier Socratic dialogues. The technical works stress and develop the idea (which is hinted at in the early Euthyphro) that forms should be understood in terms of a genus-species classification. They develop a schema that, with modifications of course, went on to be productive in the work of Aristotle and many later researchers. In this way, Plato’s late theory of the forms grows out of the program of his teacher and leads forward to the research of his students and well beyond. THE DIALOGUES OF PLATO Studies of both content and style have resulted in the division of Plato’s works into three groups. Thus, (1) the early, 67 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE or Socratic, dialogues represent conversations in which Socrates tests others on issues of human importance without discussing metaphysics; (2) the middle dialogues, or literary masterpieces, typically contain views originating with Plato on human issues, together with a sketch of a metaphysical position presented as foundational; and (3) the late dialogues, or technical studies, treat this metaphysical position in a fuller and more direct way. There are also some miscellaneous works, including letters, verses attributed to Plato, and dialogues of contested authenticity. Early Dialogues The works in this group (to be discussed in alphabetical order below) represent Plato’s reception of the legacy of the historical Socrates; many feature his characteristic activity, elenchos, or testing of putative experts. The early dialogues serve well as an introduction to the corpus. They are short and entertaining and fairly accessible, even to readers with no background in philosophy. Indeed, they were probably intended by Plato to draw such readers into the subject. In them, Socrates typically engages a prominent contemporary about some facet of human excellence (virtue) that he is presumed to understand, but by the end of the conversation the participants are reduced to aporia. The discussion often includes as a core component a search for the real definition of a key term. One way of reading the early dialogues is as having the primarily negative purpose of showing that authority figures in society do not have the understanding needed for a good human life (the reading of the skeptics in the Hellenistic Age). Yet there are other readings according to which the primary purpose is to recommend certain views. In Hellenistic times the Stoics regarded emphasis on the 68 The Philosophy of Plato A page from a 15th century Latin manuscript of Plato’s dialogues. De Agostini Picture Library/Getty Images 69 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE paramount importance of virtue, understood as a certain kind of knowledge, as the true heritage of Socrates, and it became foundational for their school. Whether one prefers the skeptical or a more dogmatic interpretation of these dialogues, they function to introduce Plato’s other works by clearing the ground; indeed, for this reason Plato’s longer works sometimes include elenctic episodes as portions of themselves. Such episodes are intended to disabuse the naive, immature, or complacent reader of the comfortable conviction that he—or some authority figure in his community—already understands the deep issues in question and to convince him of the need for philosophical reflection on these matters. The Apology represents the speech that Socrates gave in his defense at his trial, and it gives an interpretation of Socrates’ career: he has been a “gadfly,” trying to awaken the noble horse of Athens to an awareness of virtue, and he is wisest in the sense that he is aware that he knows nothing. Each of the other works in this group represents a particular Socratic encounter. In the Charmides, Socrates discusses temperance and self-knowledge with Critias and Charmides; at the fictional early date of the dialogue, Charmides is still a promising youth. The dialogue moves from an account in terms of behaviour (“temperance is a kind of quietness”) to an attempt to specify the underlying state that accounts for it; the latter effort breaks down in puzzles over the reflexive application of knowledge. The Cratylus (which some do not place in this group of works) discusses the question of whether names are correct by virtue of convention or nature. The Crito shows Socrates in prison, discussing why he chooses not to escape before the death sentence is carried out. The dialogue considers the source and nature of political obligation. The Euthydemus shows Socrates among the eristics (those who engage in showy logical disputation). 70 The Philosophy of Plato The Euthyphro asks, “What is piety?” Euthyphro fails to maintain the successive positions that piety is “what the gods love,” “what the gods all love,” or some sort of service to the gods. Socrates and Euthyphro agree that what they seek is a single form, present in all things that are pious, that makes them so. Socrates suggests that if Euthyphro could specify what part of justice piety is, he would have an account. The more elaborate Gorgias considers, while its Sophist namesake is at Athens, whether orators command a genuine art or merely have a knack of flattery. Socrates holds that the arts of the legislator and the judge address the health of the soul, which orators counterfeit by taking the pleasant instead of the good as their standard. Discussion of whether one should envy the man who can bring about any result he likes leads to a Socratic paradox: it is better to suffer wrong than to do it. Callicles praises the man of natural ability who ignores conventional justice; true justice, according to Callicles, is this person’s triumph. In the Hippias Minor, discussion of Homer by a visiting Sophist leads to an examination by Socrates, which the Sophist fails, on such questions as whether a just person who does wrong on purpose is better than other wrongdoers. The Ion considers professional reciters of poetry and develops the suggestion that neither such performers nor poets have any knowledge. The interlocutors in the Laches are generals. One of them, the historical Laches, displayed less courage in the retreat from Delium (during the Peloponnesian War) than the humble foot soldier Socrates. Likewise, after the fictional date of the dialogue, another of the generals, Nicias, was responsible for the disastrous defeat of the Sicilian expedition because of his dependence on seers. Here the observation that the sons of great men often do not turn out well leads to an examination of what courage is. The 71 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE trend again is from an account in terms of behaviour (“standing fast in battle”) to an attempt to specify the inner state that underlies it (“knowledge of the grounds of hope and fear”), but none of the participants displays adequate understanding of these suggestions. The Lysis is an examination of the nature of friendship; the work introduces the notion of a primary object of love, for whose sake one loves other things. The Menexenus purports to be a funeral oration that Socrates learned from Aspasia, the mistress of Pericles (himself celebrated for the funeral oration assigned to him by Thucydides, one of the most famous set pieces of Greek antiquity). This work may be a satire on the patriotic distortion of history. The Meno takes up the familiar question of whether virtue can be taught, and, if so, why eminent men have not been able to bring up their sons to be virtuous. Concerned with method, the dialogue develops Meno’s problem: how is it possible to search either for what one knows (for one already knows it) or for what one does not know (and so could not look for)? This is answered by the recollection theory of learning. What is called learning is really prompted recollection; one possesses all theoretical knowledge latently at birth, as demonstrated by the slave boy’s ability to solve geometry problems when properly prompted. (This theory will reappear in the Phaedo and in the Phaedrus.) The dialogue is also famous as an early discussion of the distinction between knowledge and true belief. The Protagoras, another discussion with a visiting Sophist, concerns whether virtue can be taught and whether the different virtues are really one. The dialogue contains yet another discussion of the phenomenon that the sons of the great are often undistinguished. This elaborate work showcases the competing approaches of the 72 The Philosophy of Plato Sophists (speechmaking, word analysis, discussion of great poetry) and Socrates. Under the guise of an interpretation of a poem of Simonides of Ceos (c. 556–c. 468 BCE), a distinction (which will become thematic for Plato) is made between being and becoming. Most famously, this dialogue develops the characteristic Socratic suggestion that virtue is identical with wisdom and discusses the Socratic position that akrasia (moral weakness) is impossible. Socrates suggests that, in cases of apparent akrasia, what is really going on is an error of calculation: pursuing pleasure as the good, one incorrectly estimates the magnitude of the overall amount of pleasure that will result from one’s action. Middle Dialogues These longer, elaborate works are grouped together because of the similarity in their agendas: although they are primarily concerned with human issues, they also proclaim the importance of metaphysical inquiry and sketch Plato’s proprietary views on the forms. This group represents the high point of Plato’s literary artistry. Of course, each of Plato’s finished works is an artistic success in the sense of being effectively composed in a way appropriate to its topic and its audience; yet this group possesses as well the more patent literary virtues. Typically much longer than the Socratic dialogues, these works contain sensitive portrayals of characters and their interactions, dazzling displays of rhetoric and attendant suggestions about its limitations, and striking and memorable tropes and myths, all designed to set off their leisurely explorations of philosophy. In the middle dialogues, the character Socrates gives positive accounts, thought to originate with Plato himself, of the sorts of human issues that interlocutors in the 73 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE earlier works had failed to grasp: the nature of Justice and the other virtues, Platonic love, and the soul (psyche). The works typically suggest that the desired understanding, to be properly grounded, requires more-fundamental inquiries, and so Socrates includes in his presentation a sketch of the forms. “Seeking the universal” by taking forms to be the proper objects of definition was already a hallmark of the early dialogues, though without attention to the status and character of these entities. Even the middle works, however, do not fully specify how the forms are to be understood. At the party depicted in the Symposium, each of the guests (including the poets Aristophanes and Agathon) gives an encomium in praise of love. Socrates recalls the teaching of Diotima (a fictional prophetess), according to whom all mortal creatures have an impulse to achieve immortality. This leads to biological offspring with ordinary partners, but Diotima considers such offspring as poetry, scientific discoveries, and philosophy to be better. Ideally, one’s eros (erotic love) should progress from ordinary love objects to Beauty itself. Alcibiades concludes the dialogue by bursting in and giving a drunken encomium of Socrates. The Phaedo culminates in the affecting death of Socrates, before which he discusses a theme apposite to the occasion: the immortality of the soul (treated to some extent following Pythagorean and Orphic precedent). The dialogue features characteristically Platonic elements: the recollection theory of knowledge and the claim that understanding the forms is foundational to all else. The length of this work also accommodates a myth concerning the soul’s career after death. In the very long Republic, Socrates undertakes to show what Justice is and why it is in each person’s best interest to be just. Initial concern for justice in the individual leads 74 The Philosophy of Plato Portions of a Classical manuscript of the Phaedo by Plato, the oldest such manuscript of any considerable size. British Library, London/HIP/Art Resource, NY to a search for justice on a larger scale, as represented in an imaginary ideal city (hence the traditional title of the work). In the Republic the rulers and guardians are forbidden to have private families or property, women perform the same tasks as men, and the rulers are philosophers— those who have knowledge of the Good and the Just. The dialogue contains two discussions—one with each of Plato’s brothers—of the impact of art on moral development. Socrates develops the proposal that Justice in a city or an individual is the condition in which each part performs the task that is proper to it; such an entity will have no motivation to do unjust acts and will be free of internal conflict. The soul consists of reason, spirit, and appetite, just as the city consists of rulers, guardians, and craftsmen or producers. 75 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The middle books of the Republic contain a sketch of Plato’s views on knowledge and reality and feature the famous figures of the Sun and the Cave, among others. The position occupied by the form of the Good in the intelligible world is the same as that occupied by the Sun in the visible world: thus the Good is responsible for the being and intelligibility of the objects of thought. The usual cognitive condition of human beings is likened to that of prisoners chained in an underground cave, with a great fire behind them and a raised wall in between. The prisoners are chained in position and so are able to see only shadows cast on the facing wall by statues moved along the wall behind them. They take these shadows to be reality. The account of the progress that they would achieve if they were to go above ground and see the real world in the light of the Sun features the notion of knowledge as enlightenment. Plato proposes a concrete sequence of mathematical studies, ending with harmonics, that would prepare future rulers to engage in dialectic, whose task is to say of each thing what it is—i.e., to specify its nature by giving a real definition. Contrasting with the portrait of the just man and the city are those of decadent types of personality and regime. The dialogue concludes with a myth concerning the fate of souls after death. The first half of the Phaedrus consists of competitive speeches of seduction. Socrates repents of his first attempt and gives a treatment of love as the impulse to philosophy: Platonic love, as in the Symposium, is eros, here graphically described. The soul is portrayed as made of a white horse (noble), a black horse (base), and a charioteer; Socrates provides an elaborate description of the soul’s discarnate career as a spectator of the vision of the forms, which it may recall in this life. Later in the dialogue, Socrates maintains that philosophical knowledge is necessary to an effective rhetorician, who produces likenesses of truth 76 The Philosophy of Plato adapted to his audience (and so must know both the truth concerning the subject matter and the receptivities of different characters to different kinds of presentation). This part of the dialogue, with its developed interest in genera and species, looks forward to the group of technical studies. It is also notable for its discussion of the limited value of writing. Late Dialogues The Parmenides demonstrates that the sketches of forms presented in the middle dialogues were not adequate; this dialogue and the ones that follow spur readers to develop a more viable understanding of these entities. Thus, the approach to genera and species recommended in the Sophist, the Statesman, and the Philebus (and already discussed in the Phaedrus) represents the late version of Plato’s theory of forms. The Philebus proposes a mathematized version, inspired by Pythagoreanism and corresponding to the cosmology of the Timaeus. But Plato did not neglect human issues in these dialogues. The Phaedrus already combined the new apparatus with a compelling treatment of love; the title topics of the Sophist and the Statesman, to be treated by genus-species division, are important roles in the Greek city; and the Philebus is a consideration of the competing claims of pleasure and knowledge to be the basis of the good life. (The Laws, left unfinished at Plato’s death, seems to represent a practical approach to the planning of a city.) If one combines the hints (in the Republic) associating the Good with the One, or Unity; the treatment (in the Parmenides) of the One as the first principle of everything; and the possibility that the good proportion and harmony featured in the Timaeus and the Philebus are aspects of the One, it is possible to trace the aesthetic and ethical interests of the 77 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE middle dialogues through even the most difficult technical studies. The Theaetetus considers the question “What is knowledge?” Is it perception, true belief, or true belief with an “account”? The dialogue contains a famous “digression” on the difference between the philosophical and worldly mentalities. The work ends inconclusively and may indeed be intended to show the limits of the methods of the historical Socrates with this subject matter, further progress requiring Plato’s distinctive additions. The Parmenides is the key episode in Plato’s treatment of forms. It presents a critique of the super-exemplification view of forms that results from a natural reading of the Symposium, the Phaedo, and the Republic and moves on to a suggestive logical exercise based on a distinction between two kinds of predication and a model of the forms in terms of genera and species. Designed to lead the reader to a more sophisticated and viable theory, the exercise also depicts the One as a principle of everything. The leader of the discussion in the Sophist is an “Eleatic stranger.” Sophistry seems to involve trafficking in falsity, illusion, and not-being. Yet these are puzzling in light of the brilliant use by the historical Parmenides (also an Eleatic) of the slogan that one cannot think or speak of what is not. Plato introduces the idea that a negative assertion of the form “A is not B” should be understood not as invoking any absolute not-being but as having the force that A is other than B. The other crucial content of the dialogue is its distinction between two uses of “is,” which correspond to the two kinds of predication introduced in the Parmenides. Both are connected with the genus-species model of definition that is pervasive in the late dialogues, since the theoretically central use of “is” appears in statements that are true in virtue of the relations represented 78 The Philosophy of Plato in genus-species classifications. The dialogue treats the intermingling of the five “greatest kinds”: Being, Sameness, Difference, Motion, and Rest. Although these kinds are of course not species of each other, they do partake of each other in the ordinary way. The Statesman discusses genusspecies definition in connection with understanding its title notion. The Timaeus concerns the creation of the world by a Demiurge, initially operating on forms and space and assisted after he has created them by lesser gods. Earth, air, fire, and water are analyzed as ultimately consisting of two kinds of triangles, which combine into different characteristic solids. Plato in this work applies mathematical harmonics to produce a cosmology. The Critias is a barely started sequel to the Timaeus; its projected content is the story of the war of ancient Athens and Atlantis. The Philebus develops major apparatuses in methodology and metaphysics. The genus-species treatment of forms is recommended, but now foundational to it is a new fourfold division: limit, the unlimited, the mixed class, and the cause. Forms (members of the mixed class) are analyzed in Pythagorean style as made up of limit and the unlimited. This occurs when desirable ratios govern the balance between members of underlying pairs of opposites—as, for example, Health results when there is a proper balance between the Wet and the Dry. The very lengthy Laws is thought to be Plato’s last composition, since there is generally accepted evidence that it was unrevised at his death. It develops laws to govern a projected state and is apparently meant to be practical in a way that the Republic was not; thus the demands made on human nature are less exacting. This work appears, indirectly, to have left its mark on the great system of Roman jurisprudence. 79 CHAPTER 4 The Philosophy of Aristotle T he thought of Aristotle determined the course of Western intellectual history for more than two millenia. He is generally regarded as one of the two greatest philosophers who ever lived, the other being his teacher, Plato. HIS LIFE The Academy Aristotle was born on the Chalcidic peninsula of Macedonia, in northern Greece, in 384 BCE; he died in 322 in Chalcis, on the island of Euboea. His father, Nicomachus, was the physician of Amyntas III (reigned c. 393–c. 370 BCE), king of Macedonia and grandfather of Alexander the Great (reigned 336–323 BCE). After his father’s death in 367, Aristotle migrated to Athens, where he joined the Academy of Plato. He remained there for 20 years as Plato’s pupil and colleague. Many of Plato’s later dialogues date from these decades, and they may reflect Aristotle’s contributions to philosophical debate at the Academy. Some of Aristotle’s writings also belong to this period, though mostly they survive only in fragments. Like his master, 80 The Philosophy of Aristotle Aristotle wrote initially in dialogue form, and his early ideas show a strong Platonic influence. His dialogue Eudemus, for example, reflects the Platonic view of the soul as imprisoned in the body and as capable of a happier life only when the body has been left behind. According to Aristotle, the dead are more blessed and happier than the living, and Aristotle, marble bust with a restored to die is to return to one’s nose, Roman copy of a Greek original, real home. last quarter of the 4th century BCE. In Another youthful the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Courtesy of the Kunsthistorisches work, the Protrepticus (“Exhortation”), has been Museum, Vienna reconstructed by modern scholars from quotations in various works from late antiquity. Everyone must do philosophy, Aristotle claims, because even arguing against the practice of philosophy is itself a form of philosophizing. The best form of philosophy is the contemplation of the universe of nature; it is for this purpose that God made human beings and gave them a godlike intellect. All else—strength, beauty, power, and honour—is worthless. It is possible that two of Aristotle’s surviving works on logic and disputation, the Topics and the Sophistical Refutations, belong to this early period. The former demonstrates how to construct arguments for a position one has already decided to adopt; the latter shows how to 81 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE detect weaknesses in the arguments of others. Although neither work amounts to a systematic treatise on formal logic, Aristotle can justly say, at the end of the Sophistical Refutations, that he has invented the discipline of logic— nothing at all existed when he started. During Aristotle’s residence at the Academy, King Philip II of Macedonia (reigned 359–336 BCE) waged war on a number of Greek city-states. The Athenians defended their independence only half-heartedly, and, after a series of humiliating concessions, they allowed Philip to become, by 338, master of the Greek world. It cannot have been an easy time to be a Macedonian resident in Athens. Within the Academy, however, relations seem to have remained cordial. Aristotle always acknowledged a great debt to Plato; he took a large part of his philosophical agenda from Plato, and his teaching is more often a modification than a repudiation of Plato’s doctrines. Already, however, Aristotle was beginning to distance himself from Plato’s theory of Forms, or Ideas (eidos). Plato had held that, in addition to particular things, there exists a suprasensible realm of Forms, which are immutable and everlasting. This realm, he maintained, makes particular things intelligible by accounting for their common natures: a thing is a horse, for example, by virtue of the fact that it shares in, or imitates, the Form of “Horse.” In a lost work, On Ideas, Aristotle maintains that the arguments of Plato’s central dialogues establish only that there are, in addition to particulars, certain common objects of the sciences. In his surviving works as well, Aristotle often takes issue with the theory of Forms, sometimes politely and sometimes contemptuously. In his Metaphysics he argues that the theory fails to solve the problems it was meant to address. It does not confer intelligibility on particulars, because immutable and 82 The Philosophy of Aristotle everlasting Forms cannot explain how particulars come into existence and undergo change. All the theory does, according to Aristotle, is introduce new entities equal in number to the entities to be explained—as if one could solve a problem by doubling it. Travels When Plato died about 348, his nephew Speusippus became head of the Academy, and Aristotle left Athens. He migrated to Assus, a city on the northwestern coast of Anatolia (in present-day Turkey), where Hermias, a graduate of the Academy, was ruler. Aristotle became a close friend of Hermias and eventually married his ward Pythias. Aristotle helped Hermias to negotiate an alliance with Macedonia, which angered the Persian king, who had Hermias treacherously arrested and put to death. Aristotle saluted Hermias’s memory in Ode to Virtue, his only surviving poem. While in Assus and during the subsequent few years when he lived in the city of Mytilene on the island of Lesbos, Aristotle carried out extensive scientific research, particularly in zoology and marine biology. This work was summarized in a book later known, misleadingly, as The History of Animals, to which Aristotle added two short treatises, On the Parts of Animals and On the Generation of Animals. Although Aristotle did not claim to have founded the science of zoology, his detailed observations of a wide variety of organisms were quite without precedent. He— or one of his research assistants—must have been gifted with remarkably acute eyesight, since some of the features of insects that he accurately reports were not again observed until the invention of the microscope in the 17th century. 83 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The scope of Aristotle’s scientific research is astonishing. Much of it is concerned with the classification of animals into genus and species; more than 500 species figure in his treatises, many of them described in detail. The myriad items of information about the anatomy, diet, habitat, modes of copulation, and reproductive systems of mammals, reptiles, fish, and insects are a melange of minute investigation and vestiges of superstition. In some cases his unlikely stories about rare species of fish were proved accurate many centuries later. In other places he states clearly and fairly a biological problem that took millennia to solve, such as the nature of embryonic development. Despite an admixture of the fabulous, Aristotle’s biological works must be regarded as a stupendous achievement. His inquiries were conducted in a genuinely scientific spirit, and he was always ready to confess ignorance where evidence was insufficient. Whenever there is a conflict between theory and observation, one must trust observation, he insisted, and theories are to be trusted only if their results conform with the observed phenomena. About eight years after the death of Hermias, in 343 or 342, Aristotle was summoned by Philip II to the Macedonian capital at Pella to act as tutor to Philip’s 13-year-old son, the future Alexander the Great. Little is known of the content of Aristotle’s instruction; although the Rhetoric to Alexander was included in the Aristotelian corpus for centuries, it is now commonly regarded as a forgery. By 326 Alexander had made himself master of an empire that stretched from the Danube to the Indus and included Libya and Egypt. Ancient sources report that during his campaigns Alexander arranged for biological specimens to be sent to his tutor from all parts of Greece and Asia Minor. 84 The Philosophy of Aristotle Aristotle (right) teaches Philip II of Macedonia’s son, who would go on to become Alexander the Great. Bibliothéque Nationale, Paris, France/The Bridgeman Art Library/Getty Images The Lyceum While Alexander was conquering Asia, Aristotle, now 50 years old, was in Athens. Just outside the city boundary, in a grove sacred to Apollo Lyceius (so called because he protected the flocks from wolves [lykoi]), he established his own school, known as the Lyceum. He built a very substantial library and gathered around him a group of brilliant research students, called “peripatetics” from the name of the cloister (peripatos) in which they walked and held their discussions. The Lyceum was not a private club 85 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Archaeologists believe the ruins above to have once been part of Aristotle’s Lyceum. © AP Images 86 The Philosophy of Aristotle like the Academy; many of the lectures there were open to the general public and given free of charge. Most of Aristotle’s surviving works, with the exception of the zoological treatises, probably belong to this second Athenian sojourn. There is no certainty about their chronological order, and indeed it is probable that the main treatises—on physics, metaphysics, psychology, ethics, and politics—were constantly rewritten and updated. Every proposition of Aristotle is fertile of ideas and full of energy, though his prose is commonly neither lucid nor elegant. Aristotle’s works, though not as polished as Plato’s, are systematic in a way that Plato’s never were. Plato’s dialogues shift constantly from one topic to another, always (from a modern perspective) crossing the boundaries between different philosophical or scientific disciplines. Indeed, there was no such thing as an intellectual discipline until Aristotle invented the notion during his Lyceum period. Aristotle divided the sciences into three kinds: productive, practical, and theoretical. The productive sciences, naturally enough, are those that have a product. They include not only engineering and architecture, which have products like bridges and houses, but also disciplines such as strategy and rhetoric, where the product is something less concrete, such as victory on the battlefield or in the courts. The practical sciences, most notably ethics and politics, are those that guide behaviour. The theoretical sciences are those that have no product and no practical goal but in which information and understanding are sought for their own sake. During Aristotle’s years at the Lyceum, his relationship with his former pupil Alexander apparently cooled. Alexander became more and more megalomaniac, finally proclaiming himself divine and demanding that Greeks 87 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE prostrate themselves before him in adoration. Opposition to this demand was led by Aristotle’s nephew Callisthenes (c. 360–327 BCE), who had been appointed historian of Alexander’s Asiatic expedition on Aristotle’s recommendation. For his heroism Callisthenes was falsely implicated in a plot and executed. When Alexander died in 323, democratic Athens became uncomfortable for Macedonians, even those who were anti-imperialist. Saying that he did not wish the city that had executed Socrates “to sin twice against philosophy,” Aristotle fled to Chalcis, where he died the following year. His will, which survives, makes thoughtful provision for a large number of friends and dependents. To Theophrastus (c. 372–c. 287 BCE), his successor as head of the Lyceum, he left his library, including his own writings, which were vast. Aristotle’s surviving works amount to about one million words, though they probably represent only about one-fifth of his total output. HIS PHILOSOPHY Logic Aristotle’s claim to be the founder of logic rests primarily on the Categories, the De interpretatione, and the Prior Analytics, which deal respectively with words, propositions, and syllogisms. These works, along with the Topics, the Sophistical Refutations, and a treatise on scientific method, the Posterior Analytics, were grouped together in a collection known as the Organon, or “tool” of thought. Syllogistic The Prior Analytics is devoted to the theory of the syllogism, a central method of inference that can be illustrated by familiar examples such as the following: 88 The Philosophy of Aristotle Every Greek is human. Every human is mortal. Therefore, every Greek is mortal. Aristotle discusses the various forms that syllogisms can take and identifies which forms constitute reliable inferences. The example above contains three propositions in the indicative mood, which Aristotle calls “propositions.” (Roughly speaking, a proposition is a proposition considered solely with respect to its logical features.) The third proposition, the one beginning with “therefore,” Aristotle calls the conclusion of the syllogism. The other two propositions may be called premises, though Aristotle does not consistently use any particular technical term to distinguish them. The propositions in the example above begin with the word every; Aristotle calls such propositions “universal.” (In English, universal propositions can be expressed by using all rather than every; thus, Every Greek is human is equivalent to All Greeks are human.) Universal propositions may be affirmative, as in this example, or negative, as in No Greek is a horse. Universal propositions differ from “particular” propositions, such as Some Greek is bearded (a particular affirmative) and Some Greek is not bearded (a particular negative). In the Middle Ages it became customary to call the difference between universal and particular propositions a difference of “quantity” and the difference between affirmative and negative propositions a difference of “quality.” In propositions of all these kinds, Aristotle says, something is predicated of something else. The items that enter into predications Aristotle calls “terms.” It is a feature of terms, as conceived by Aristotle, that they can figure either as predicates or as subjects of predication. This means that they can play three distinct roles in a syllogism. The term that is the predicate of the 89 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE conclusion is the “major” term; the term of which the major term is predicated in the conclusion is the “minor” term; and the term that appears in each of the premises is the “middle” term. In addition to inventing this technical vocabulary, Aristotle introduced the practice of using schematic letters to identify particular patterns of argument, a device that is essential for the systematic study of inference and that is ubiquitous in modern mathematical logic. Thus, the pattern of argument exhibited in the example above can be represented in the schematic proposition: If A belongs to every B, and B belongs to every C, A belongs to every C. Because propositions may differ in quantity and quality, and because the middle term may occupy several different places in the premises, many different patterns of syllogistic inference are possible. Additional examples are the following: Every Greek is human. No human is immortal. Therefore, no Greek is immortal. Some animal is a dog. Some dog is white. Therefore, every animal is white. From late antiquity, triads of these different kinds were called “moods” of the syllogism. The two moods illustrated above exhibit an important difference: the first is a valid argument, and the second is an invalid argument, having true premises and a false conclusion. An argument is valid only if its form is such that it will never lead from true premises to a false conclusion. Aristotle sought to determine which forms result in valid inferences. He set 90 The Philosophy of Aristotle out a number of rules giving necessary conditions for the validity of a syllogism, such as the following: At least one premise must be universal. At least one premise must be affirmative. If either premise is negative, the conclusion must be negative. Aristotle’s syllogistic is a remarkable achievement: it is a systematic formulation of an important part of logic. From roughly the Renaissance until the early 19th century, it was widely believed that syllogistic was the whole of logic. But in fact it is only a fragment. It does not deal, for example, with inferences that depend on words such as and, or, and if . . . then, which, instead of attaching to nouns, link whole propositions together. Propositions and Categories Aristotle’s writings show that even he realized that there is more to logic than syllogistic. The De interpretatione, like the Prior Analytics, deals mainly with general propositions beginning with Every, No, or Some. But its main concern is not to link these propositions to each other in syllogisms but to explore the relations of compatibility and incompatibility between them. Every swan is white and No swan is white clearly cannot both be true; Aristotle calls such pairs of propositions “contraries.” They can, however, both be false, if—as is the case—some swans are white and some are not. Every swan is white and Some swan is not white, like the former pair, cannot both be true, but—on the assumption that there are such things as swans—they cannot both be false either. If one of them is true, the other is false; and if one of them is false, the other is true. Aristotle calls such pairs of propositions “contradictories.” 91 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The propositions that enter into syllogisms are all general propositions, whether universal or particular; that is to say, none of them is a proposition about an individual, containing a proper name, such as the proposition Socrates is wise. To find a systematic treatment of singular propositions, one must turn to the Categories. This treatise begins by dividing the “things that are said” (the expressions of speech) into those that are simple and those that are complex. Examples of complex sayings are A man runs, A woman speaks, and An ox drinks; simple sayings are the particular words that enter into such complexes: man, runs, woman, speaks, and so on. Only complex sayings can be statements, true or false; simple sayings are neither true nor false. The Categories identifies 10 different ways in which simple expressions may signify; these are the categories that give the treatise its name. To introduce the categories, Aristotle employs a heterogeneous set of expressions, including nouns (e.g., substance), verbs (e.g., wearing), and interrogatives (e.g., where? or how big?). By the Middle Ages it had become customary to refer to each category by a more or less abstract noun: substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, posture, vesture, activity, and passivity. The categories are intended as a classification of both the kinds of expression that may function as a predicate in a proposition and of the kinds of extralinguistic entity such expressions may signify. One might say of Socrates, for example, that he was human (substance), that he was five feet tall (quantity), that he was wise (quality), that he was older than Plato (relation), and that he lived in Athens (place) in the 5th century BCE (time). On a particular occasion, his friends might have said of him that he was sitting (posture), wearing a cloak (vesture), cutting a piece of cloth (activity), or being warmed by the sun (passivity). 92 The Philosophy of Aristotle If one follows Aristotle’s lead, one will easily be able to classify the predicates in propositions such as Socrates is potbellied and Socrates is wiser than Meletus. But what about the term Socrates in propositions such as Socrates is human? What category does it belong to? Aristotle answers the question by making a distinction between “first substance” and “second substance.” In Socrates is human, Socrates refers to a first substance—an individual—and human to a second substance—a species or kind. Thus, the proposition predicates the species human of an individual, Socrates. Aristotle’s logical writings contain two different conceptions of the structure of a proposition and the nature of its parts. One conception can trace its ancestry to Plato’s dialogue the Sophist. In that work Plato introduces a distinction between nouns and verbs, a verb being the sign of an action and a noun being the sign of an agent of an action. A proposition, he claims, must consist of at least one noun and at least one verb; two nouns in succession or two verbs in succession—as in lion stag and walks runs— will never make a proposition. The simplest kind of proposition is something like A man learns or Theaetetus flies, and only something with this kind of structure can be true or false. It is this conception of a proposition as constructed from two quite heterogeneous elements that is to the fore in the Categories and the De interpretatione, and it is also paramount in modern logic. In the syllogistic of the Prior Analytics, in contrast, the proposition is conceived in quite a different way. The basic elements out of which it is constructed are terms, which are not heterogeneous like nouns and verbs but can occur indifferently, without change of meaning, as either subjects or predicates. One flaw in the doctrine of terms is that it fosters confusion between signs and what they signify. In the proposition Every human is mortal, for example, is mortal predicated of humans or of human? It is 93 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE important to distinguish between use and mention— between the use of a word to talk about what it signifies and the mention of a word to talk about the word itself. This distinction was not always easy to make in ancient Greek, because the language lacked quotation marks. There is no doubt that Aristotle sometimes fell into confusion between use and mention; the wonder is that, given his dysfunctional doctrine of terms, he did not do so more often. Physics and Metaphysics Aristotle divided the theoretical sciences into three groups: physics, mathematics, and theology. Physics as he understood it was equivalent to what would now be called “natural philosophy,” or the study of nature (physis); in this sense it encompasses not only the modern field of physics but also biology, chemistry, geology, psychology, and even meteorology. Metaphysics, or the philosophical study whose object is to determine the ultimate nature of reality, however, is notably absent from Aristotle’s classification; indeed, he never uses the word, which first appears in the posthumous catalog of his writings as a name for the works listed after the Physics. He does, however, recognize the branch of philosophy now called metaphysics: he calls it “first philosophy” and defines it as the discipline that studies “being as being.” Aristotle’s contributions to the physical sciences are less impressive than his researches in the life sciences. In works such as On Generation and Corruption and On the Heavens, he presented a world-picture that included many features inherited from his pre-Socratic predecessors. From Empedocles (c. 490–430 BCE) he adopted the view that the universe is ultimately composed of different combinations of the four fundamental elements of earth, 94 The Philosophy of Aristotle water, air, and fire. Each element is characterized by the possession of a unique pair of the four elementary qualities of heat, cold, wetness, and dryness: earth is cold and dry, water is cold and wet, air is hot and wet, and fire is hot and dry. Each element has a natural place in an ordered cosmos, and each has an innate tendency to move toward this natural place. Thus, earthy solids naturally fall, while fire, unless prevented, rises ever higher. Other motions of the elements are possible but are “violent.” (A relic of Aristotle’s distinction is preserved in the modern-day contrast between natural and violent death.) Aristotle’s vision of the cosmos also owes much to Plato’s dialogue Timaeus. As in that work, the Earth is at the centre of the universe, and around it the Moon, the Sun, and the other planets revolve in a succession of concentric crystalline spheres. The heavenly bodies are not compounds of the four terrestrial elements but are made up of a superior fifth element, or “quintessence.” In addition, the heavenly bodies have souls, or supernatural intellects, which guide them in their travels through the cosmos. Even the best of Aristotle’s scientific work has now only a historical interest. The abiding value of treatises such as the Physics lies not in their particular scientific assertions but in their philosophical analyses of some of the concepts that pervade the physics of different eras— concepts such as place, time, causation, and determinism. Place Every body appears to be in some place, and every body (at least in principle) can move from one place to another. The same place can be occupied at different times by different bodies, as a flask can contain first wine and then air. So a place cannot be identical to the body that occupies it. What, then, is place? According to Aristotle, the place of a thing is the first motionless boundary of whatever body 95 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE is containing it. Thus, the place of a pint of wine is the inner surface of the flask containing it—provided the flask is stationary. But suppose the flask is in motion, perhaps on a punt floating down a river. Then the wine will be moving too, from place to place, and its place must be given by specifying its position relative to the motionless river banks. As is clear from this example, for Aristotle a thing is not only in the place defined by its immediate container but also in whatever contains that container. Thus, all human beings are not only on the Earth but also in the universe; the universe is the place that is common to everything. But the universe itself is not in a place at all, since it has no container outside it. Thus, it is clear that place as described by Aristotle is quite different from space as conceived by Isaac Newton (1643–1727)—as an infinite extension or cosmic grid. Newtonian space would exist whether or not the material universe had been created. For Aristotle, if there were no bodies, there would be no place. Aristotle does, however, allow for the existence of a vacuum, or “void,” but only if it is contained by actually existing bodies. The Continuum Spacial extension, motion, and time are often thought of as continua—as wholes made up of a series of smaller parts. Aristotle develops a subtle analysis of the nature of such continuous quantities. Two entities are continuous, he says, when there is only a single common boundary between them. On the basis of this definition, he seeks to show that a continuum cannot be composed of indivisible atoms. A line, for example, cannot be composed of points that lack magnitude. Since a point has no parts, it cannot have a boundary distinct from itself; two points, therefore, cannot be either adjacent or continuous. Between 96 The Philosophy of Aristotle any two points on a continuous line there will always be other points on the same line. Similar reasoning, Aristotle says, applies to time and to motion. Time cannot be composed of indivisible moments, because between any two moments there is always a period of time. Likewise, an atom of motion would in fact have to be an atom of rest. Moments or points that were indivisible would lack magnitude, and zero magnitude, however often repeated, can never add up to any magnitude. Any magnitude, then, is infinitely divisible. But this means “unendingly divisible,” not “divisible into infinitely many parts.” However often a magnitude has been divided, it can always be divided further. It is infinitely divisible in the sense that there is no end to its divisibility. The continuum does not have an infinite number of parts; indeed, Aristotle regarded the idea of an actually infinite number as incoherent. The infinite, he says, has only a “potential” existence. Motion Motion (kinesis) was for Aristotle a broad term, encompassing changes in several different categories. A paradigm of his theory of motion, which appeals to the key notions of actuality and potentiality, is local motion, or movement from place to place. If a body X is to move from point A to point B, it must be able to do so: when it is at A it is only potentially at B. When this potentiality has been realized, then X is at B. But it is then at rest and not in motion. So motion from A to B is not simply the actualization of a potential at A for being at B. Is it then a partial actualization of that potentiality? That will not do either, because a body stationary at the midpoint between A and B might be said to have partially actualized that potentiality. One must say that motion is an actualization of a potentiality that is still being actualized. In the Physics 97 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Aristotle accordingly defines motion as “the actuality of what is in potentiality, insofar as it is in potentiality.” Motion is a continuum: a mere series of positions between A and B is not a motion from A to B. If X is to move from A to B, however, it must pass through any intermediate point between A and B. But passing through a point is not the same as being located at that point. Aristotle argues that whatever is in motion has already been in motion. If X, traveling from A to B, passes through the intermediate point K, it must have already passed through an earlier point J, intermediate between A and K. But however short the distance between A and J, that too is divisible, and so on ad infinitum. At any point at which X is moving, therefore, there will be an earlier point at which it was already moving. It follows that there is no such thing as a first instant of motion. Time For Aristotle, extension, motion, and time are three fundamental continua in an intimate and ordered relation to each other. Local motion derives its continuity from the continuity of extension, and time derives its continuity from the continuity of motion. Time, Aristotle says, is the number of motion with respect to before and after. Where there is no motion, there is no time. This does not imply that time is identical with motion: motions are motions of particular things, and different kinds of changes are motions of different kinds, but time is universal and uniform. Motions, again, may be faster or slower; not so time. Indeed, it is by the time they take that the speed of motions is determined. Nonetheless, Aristotle says, “we perceive motion and time together.” One observes how much time has passed by observing the process of some change. In particular, for Aristotle, the days, months, and 98 The Philosophy of Aristotle years are measured by observing the Sun, the Moon, and the stars upon their celestial travels. The part of a journey that is nearer its starting point comes before the part that is nearer its end. The spatial relation of nearer and farther underpins the relation of before and after in motion, and the relation of before and after in motion underpins the relation of earlier and later in time. Thus, on Aristotle’s view, temporal order is ultimately derived from the spatial ordering of stretches of motion. Matter Change, for Aristotle, can take place in many different categories. Local motion, as noted above, is change in the category of place. Change in the category of quantity is growth (or shrinkage), and change in the category of quality (e.g., of colour) is what Aristotle calls “alteration.” Change in the category of substance, however—a change of one kind of thing into another—is very special. When a substance undergoes a change of quantity or quality, the same substance remains throughout. But does anything persist when one kind of thing turns into another? Aristotle’s answer is yes: matter. He says, By matter, I mean what in itself is neither of any kind nor of any size nor describable by any of the categories of being. For it is something of which all these things are predicated, and therefore its essence is different from that of all the predicates. An entity that is not of any kind, size, or shape and of which nothing at all can be said may seem highly mysterious, but this is not what Aristotle has in mind. His ultimate matter (he sometimes calls it “prime matter”) is not in itself of any kind. It is not in itself of any particular size, because it can grow or shrink; it is not in itself water or 99 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE steam, because it is both of these in turn. But this does not mean that there is any time at which it is not of any size or any time at which it is neither water nor steam nor anything else. Ordinary life provides many examples of pieces of matter changing from one kind to another. A bottle containing a pint of cream may be found, after shaking, to contain not cream but butter. The stuff that comes out of the bottle is the same as the stuff that went into it; nothing has been added and nothing taken away. But what comes out is different in kind from what went in. It is from cases such as this that the Aristotelian notion of matter is derived. Form Although Aristotle’s system makes room for forms, they differ significantly from Forms as Plato conceived them. For Aristotle, the form of a particular thing is not separate (chorista) from the thing itself—any form is the form of some thing. In Aristotle’s physics, form is always paired with matter, and the paradigm examples of forms are those of material substances. Aristotle distinguishes between “substantial” and “accidental” forms. A substantial form is a second substance (species or kind) considered as a universal; the predicate human, for example, is universal as well as substantial. Thus, Socrates is human may be described as predicating a second substance of a first substance (Socrates) or as predicating a substantial form of a first substance. Whereas substantial forms correspond to the category of substance, accidental forms correspond to categories other than substance; they are nonsubstantial categories considered as universals. Socrates is wise, for example, may be described as predicating a quality (wise) of a first substance or as predicating an accidental form of 100 The Philosophy of Aristotle a first substance. Aristotle calls such forms “accidental” because they may undergo change, or be gained or lost, without thereby changing the first substance into something else or causing it to cease to exist. Substantial forms, in contrast, cannot be gained or lost without changing the nature of the substance of which they are predicated. In the propositions above, wise is an accidental form and human a substantial form; Socrates could survive the loss of the former but not the loss of the latter. When a thing comes into being, neither its matter nor its form is created. When one manufactures a bronze sphere, for example, what comes into existence is not the bronze or the spherical shape but the shaped bronze. Similarly in the case of the human Socrates. But the fact that the forms of things are not created does not mean that they must exist independently of matter, outside space and time, as Plato maintained. The bronze sphere derives its shape not from an ideal Sphere but from its maker, who introduces form into the appropriate matter in the process of his work. Likewise, Socrates’ humanity derives not from an ideal Human but from his parents, who introduce form into the appropriate matter when they conceive him. Thus, Aristotle reverses the question asked by Plato: “What is it that two human beings have in common that makes them both human?” He asks instead, “What makes two human beings two humans rather than one?” And his answer is that what makes Socrates distinct from his friend Callias is not their substantial form, which is the same, nor their accidental forms, which may be the same or different, but their matter. Matter, not form, is the principle of individuation. Causation In several places Aristotle distinguishes four types of cause, or explanation. First, he says, there is that of which 101 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE and out of which a thing is made, such as the bronze of a statue. This is called the material cause. Second, there is the form or pattern of a thing, which may be expressed in its definition; Aristotle’s example is the proportion of the length of two strings in a lyre, which is the formal cause of one note’s being the octave of another. The third type of cause is the origin of a change or state of rest in something; this is often called the “efficient cause.” Aristotle gives as examples a person reaching a decision, a father begetting a child, a sculptor carving a statue, and a doctor healing a patient. The fourth and last type of cause is the end or goal of a thing—that for the sake of which a thing is done. This is known as the “final cause.” Although Aristotle gives mathematical examples of formal causes, the forms whose causation interests him most are the substantial forms of living beings. In these cases substantial form is the structure or organization of the being as a whole, as well as of its various parts; it is this structure that explains the being’s life cycle and characteristic activities. In these cases, in fact, formal and final causes coincide, the mature realization of natural form being the end to which the activities of the organism tend. The growth and development of the various parts of a living being, such as the root of a tree or the heart of a sheep, can be understood only as the actualization of a certain structure for the purpose of performing a certain biological function. Being For Aristotle, “being” is whatever is anything whatever. Whenever Aristotle explains the meaning of being, he does so by explaining the sense of the Greek verb to be. Being contains whatever items can be the subjects of true propositions containing the word is, whether or not the is is followed by a predicate. Thus, both Socrates is and Socrates is wise say 102 The Philosophy of Aristotle something about being. Every being in any category other than substance is a property or a modification of substance. For this reason, Aristotle says that the study of substance is the way to understand the nature of being. The books of the Metaphysics in which he undertakes this investigation, VII through IX, are among the most difficult of his writings. Aristotle gives two superficially conflicting accounts of the subject matter of first philosophy. According to one account, it is the discipline “which theorizes about being qua being, and the things which belong to being taken in itself ”; unlike the special sciences, it deals with the most general features of beings, insofar as they are beings. On the other account, first philosophy deals with a particular kind of being, namely, divine, independent, and immutable substance; for this reason he sometimes calls the discipline “theology.” It is important to note that these accounts are not simply two different descriptions of “being qua being.” There is, indeed, no such thing as being qua being; there are only different ways of studying being. When one studies human physiology, for example, one studies humans qua animals—that is to say, one studies the structures and functions that humans have in common with animals. But of course there is no such entity as a “human qua animal.” Similarly, to study something as a being is to study it in virtue of what it has in common with all other things. To study the universe as being is to study it as a single overarching system, embracing all the causes of things coming into being and remaining in existence. The Unmoved Mover The way in which Aristotle seeks to show that the universe is a single causal system is through an examination of the notion of movement, which finds its culmination in Book XI of the Metaphysics. As noted above, motion, for 103 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Aristotle, refers to change in any of several different categories. Aristotle’s fundamental principle is that everything that is in motion is moved by something else, and he offers a number of (unconvincing) arguments to this effect. He then argues that there cannot be an infinite series of moved movers. If it is true that when A is in motion there must be some B that moves A, then if B is itself in motion there must be some C moving B, and so on. This series cannot go on forever, and so it must come to a halt in some X that is a cause of motion but does not move itself—an unmoved mover. Since the motion it causes is everlasting, this X must itself be an eternal substance. It must lack matter, for it cannot come into existence or go out of existence by turning into anything else. It must also lack potentiality, for the mere power to cause motion would not ensure the sempiternity of motion. It must, therefore, be pure actuality (energeia). Although the revolving heavens, for Aristotle, lack the possibility of substantial change, they possess potentiality, because each heavenly body has the power to move elsewhere in its diurnal round. Since these bodies are in motion, they need a mover, and this is a motionless mover. Such a mover could not act as an efficient cause, because that would involve a change in itself, but it can act as a final cause—an object of love—because being loved does not involve any change in the beloved. The stars and planets seek to imitate the perfection of the unmoved mover by moving about the Earth in a circle, the most perfect of shapes. For this to be the case, of course, the heavenly bodies must have souls capable of feeling love for the unmoved mover. “On such a principle,” Aristotle says, “depend the heavens and the world of nature.” Aristotle is prepared to call the unmoved mover “God.” The life of God, he says, must be like the very best of human lives. The delight that a human being takes in 104 The Philosophy of Aristotle the sublimest moments of philosophical contemplation is in God a perpetual state. What, Aristotle asks, does God think of? He must think of something—otherwise, he is no better than a sleeping human—and whatever he is thinking of, he must think of eternally. Either he thinks about himself, or he thinks about something else. But the value of a thought depends on the value of what it is a thought of, so, if God were thinking of anything other than himself, he would be somehow degraded. So he must be thinking of himself, the supreme being, and his life is a thinking of thinking (noesis noeseos). This conclusion has been much debated. Some have regarded it as a sublime truth; others have thought it a piece of exquisite nonsense. Among those who have taken the latter view, some have considered it the supreme absurdity of Aristotle’s system, and others have held that Aristotle himself intended it as a reductio ad absurdum. Whatever the truth about the object of thought of the unmoved mover, it seems clear that it does not include the contingent affairs of individual human beings. Thus, at the supreme point of Aristotle’s causal hierarchy stand the heavenly movers, moved and unmoved, which are the final cause of all generation and corruption. And this is why metaphysics can be called by two such different names. When Aristotle says that first philosophy studies the whole of being, he is describing it by indicating the field it is to explain; when he says that it is the science of the divine, he is describing it by indicating its ultimate principles of explanation. Thus, first philosophy is both the science of being qua being and also theology. Philosophy of Mind Aristotle regarded psychology as a part of natural philosophy, and he wrote much about the philosophy of mind. 105 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE This material appears in his ethical writings, in a systematic treatise on the nature of the soul (De anima), and in a number of minor monographs on topics such as senseperception, memory, sleep, and dreams. For Aristotle the biologist, the soul is not—as it was in some of Plato’s writings—an exile from a better world illhoused in a base body. The soul’s very essence is defined by its relationship to an organic structure. Not only humans but beasts and plants too have souls, intrinsic principles of animal and vegetable life. A soul, Aristotle says, is “the actuality of a body that has life,” where life means the capacity for self-sustenance, growth, and reproduction. If one regards a living substance as a composite of matter and form, then the soul is the form of a natural—or, as Aristotle sometimes says, organic—body. An organic body is a body that has organs—that is to say, parts that have specific functions, such as the mouths of mammals and the roots of trees. The souls of living beings are ordered by Aristotle in a hierarchy. Plants have a vegetative or nutritive soul, which consists of the powers of growth, nutrition, and reproduction. Animals have, in addition, the powers of perception and locomotion—they possess a sensitive soul, and every animal has at least one sense-faculty, touch being the most universal. Whatever can feel at all can feel pleasure; hence, animals, which have senses, also have desires. Humans, in addition, have the power of reason and thought (logismos kai dianoia), which may be called a rational soul. The way in which Aristotle structured the soul and its faculties influenced not only philosophy but also science for nearly two millennia. Aristotle’s theoretical concept of soul differs from that of Plato before him and René Descartes (1596–1650) after him. A soul, for him, is not an interior immaterial 106 The Philosophy of Aristotle agent acting on a body. Soul and body are no more distinct from each other than the impress of a seal is distinct from the wax on which it is impressed. The parts of the soul, moreover, are faculties, which are distinguished from each other by their operations and their objects. The power of growth is distinct from the power of sensation because growing and feeling are two different activities, and the sense of sight differs from the sense of hearing not because eyes are different from ears but because colours are different from sounds. The objects of sense come in two kinds: those that are proper to particular senses, such as colour, sound, taste, and smell, and those that are perceptible by more than one sense, such as motion, number, shape, and size. One can tell, for example, whether something is moving either by watching it or by feeling it, and so motion is a “common sensible.” Although there is no special organ for detecting common sensibles, there is a faculty that Aristotle calls a “central sense.” When one encounters a horse, for example, one may see, hear, feel, and smell it; it is the central sense that unifies these sensations into perceptions of a single object (though the knowledge that this object is a horse is, for Aristotle, a function of intellect rather than sense). Besides the five senses and the central sense, Aristotle recognizes other faculties that later came to be grouped together as the “inner senses,” notably imagination and memory. Even at the purely philosophical level, however, Aristotle’s accounts of the inner senses are unrewarding. At the same level within the hierarchy as the senses, which are cognitive faculties, there is also an affective faculty, which is the locus of spontaneous feeling. This is a part of the soul that is basically irrational but is capable of being controlled by reason. It is the locus of desire and 107 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE passion; when brought under the sway of reason, it is the seat of the moral virtues, such as courage and temperance. The highest level of the soul is occupied by mind or reason, the locus of thought and understanding. Thought differs from sense-perception and is the prerogative, on earth, of human beings. Thought, like sensation, is a matter of making judgments; but sensation concerns particulars, while intellectual knowledge is of universals. Reasoning may be practical or theoretical, and, accordingly, Aristotle distinguishes between a deliberative and a speculative faculty. In a notoriously difficult passage of De anima, Aristotle introduces a further distinction between two kinds of mind: one passive, which can “become all things,” and one active, which can “make all things.” The active mind, he says, is “separable, impassible, and unmixed.” In antiquity and the Middle Ages, this passage was the subject of sharply different interpretations. Some—particularly among Arab commentators—identified the separable active agent with God or with some other superhuman intelligence. Others—particularly among Latin commentators—took Aristotle to be identifying two different faculties within the human mind: an active intellect, which formed concepts, and a passive intellect, which was a storehouse of ideas and beliefs. If the second interpretation is correct, then Aristotle is here recognizing a part of the human soul that is separable from the body and immortal. Here and elsewhere there is detectable in Aristotle, in addition to his standard biological notion of the soul, a residue of a Platonic vision according to which the intellect is a distinct entity separable from the body. No one has produced a wholly satisfactory reconciliation between the biological and the transcendent strains in Aristotle’s thought. 108 The Philosophy of Aristotle Ethics The surviving works of Aristotle include three treatises on moral philosophy: the Nicomachean Ethics in 10 books, the Eudemian Ethics in 7 books, and the Magna moralia (Latin: “Great Ethics”). The Nicomachean Ethics is generally regarded as the most important of the three; it consists of a series of short treatises, possibly brought together by Aristotle’s son Nicomachus. In the 19th century the Eudemian Ethics was often suspected of being the work of Aristotle’s pupil Eudemus of Rhodes, but there is no good reason to doubt its authenticity. Interestingly, the Nicomachean Ethics and the Eudemian Ethics have three books in common: books V, VI, and VII of the former are the same as books IV, V, and VI of the latter. Although the question has been disputed for centuries, it is most likely that the original home of the common books was the Eudemian Ethics; it is also probable that Aristotle used this work for a course on ethics that he taught at the Lyceum during his mature period. The Magna moralia probably consists of notes taken by an unknown student of such a course. Happiness Aristotle’s approach to ethics is teleological. If life is to be worth living, he argues, it must surely be for the sake of something that is an end in itself—i.e., desirable for its own sake. If there is any single thing that is the highest human good, therefore, it must be desirable for its own sake, and all other goods must be desirable for the sake of it. Traditional Greek conceptions of the good life included the life of prosperity and the life of social position, in which case virtue would be the possession of wealth or nobility (and perhaps physical beauty). The overwhelming tendency 109 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE of ancient philosophy, however, was to conceive of the good life as something that is the accomplishment of an individual—something that an individual does or does not do for himself. Moreover, once won, it is hard to take away. As Aristotle explains in both the Nichomachean Ethics and the Eudemian Ethics, one popular conception of the highest human good is pleasure—the sensual pleasures of food, drink, and sex, combined with pleasures of the mind, including aesthetic and intellectual pleasures. Other people prefer a life of virtuous action in the political sphere (the quintessential example of this kind of life is Pericles [c. 495–429 BCE], the Athenian statesman who was largely responsible for the full development of Athenian democracy and the Athenian empire in the 5th century BCE). A third possible candidate for the highest human good is scientific or philosophical contemplation; an outstanding example of this kind of life is that of Aristotle himself. Aristotle thus reduces the answers to the question “What is a good life?” to a short list of three: the philosophical life, the political life, and the voluptuary life. This triad provides the key to his ethical inquiry. “Happiness,” the term that Aristotle uses to designate the highest human good, is the usual translation of the ancient Greek eudaimonia. Although it is impossible to abandon the English term at this stage of history, it should be borne in mind that what Aristotle means by eudaimonia is something more like well-being or flourishing than any feeling of contentment. (The ancient Greek word eudaimonia means literally “the state of having a good indwelling spirit, a good genius”; thus “happiness” is not at all an adequate translation of this word.) Aristotle argues, in fact, that happiness is activity of the rational soul in accordance with virtue. Thus, the notions of happiness and virtue are linked. According to Aristotle, human beings must have a function, because particular types of humans (e.g., sculptors) 110 The Philosophy of Aristotle do, as do the parts and organs of individual human beings. This function must be unique to humans; thus, it cannot consist of growth and nourishment, for this is shared by plants, or the life of the senses, for this is shared by animals. It must therefore involve the peculiarly human faculty of reason. The highest human good is the same as good human functioning, and good human functioning is the same as the good exercise of the faculty of reason—that is to say, the activity of rational soul in accordance with virtue. There are two kinds of virtue: moral and intellectual. Moral virtues are exemplified by courage, temperance, and liberality; the key intellectual virtues are wisdom, which governs ethical behaviour, and understanding, which is expressed in scientific endeavour and contemplation. Virtue People’s virtues are a subset of their good qualities. They are not innate, like eyesight, but are acquired by practice and lost by disuse. They are abiding states, and they thus differ from momentary passions such as anger and pity. Virtues are states of character that find expression both in purpose and in action. Moral virtue is expressed in good purpose—that is to say, in prescriptions for action in accordance with a good plan of life. It is expressed also in actions that avoid both excess and defect. A temperate person, for example, will avoid eating or drinking too much, but he will also avoid eating or drinking too little. Virtue chooses the mean, or middle ground, between excess and defect. Besides purpose and action, virtue is also concerned with feeling. One may, for example, be excessively concerned with sex or insufficiently interested in it; the temperate person will take the appropriate degree of interest and be neither lustful nor frigid. While all the moral virtues are means of action and passion, it is not the case that every kind of action and passion 111 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE is capable of a virtuous mean. There are some actions of which there is no right amount, because any amount of them is too much; Aristotle gives murder and adultery as examples. The virtues, besides being concerned with means of action and passion, are themselves means in the sense that they occupy a middle ground between two contrary vices. Thus, the virtue of courage is flanked on one side by foolhardiness and on the other by cowardice. Aristotle’s account of virtue as a mean is no truism. It is a distinctive ethical theory that contrasts with other influential systems of various kinds. It contrasts, on the one hand, with religious systems that give a central role to the concept of a moral law, concentrating on the prohibitive aspects of morality. It also differs from moral systems such as utilitarianism that judge the rightness and wrongness of actions in terms of their consequences. Unlike the utilitarian, Aristotle believes that there are some kinds of action that are morally wrong in principle. The mean that is the mark of moral virtue is determined by the intellectual virtue of wisdom. Wisdom is characteristically expressed in the formulation of prescriptions for action—“practical syllogisms,” as Aristotle calls them. A practical syllogism consists of a general recipe for a good life, followed by an accurate description of the agent’s actual circumstances and concluding with a decision about the appropriate action to be carried out. Wisdom, the intellectual virtue that is proper to practical reason, is inseparably linked with the moral virtues of the affective part of the soul. Only if an agent possesses moral virtue will he endorse an appropriate recipe for a good life. Only if he is gifted with intelligence will he make an accurate assessment of the circumstances in which his decision is to be made. It is impossible, Aristotle says, to be really good without wisdom or to be really wise without 112 The Philosophy of Aristotle moral virtue. Only when correct reasoning and right desire come together does truly virtuous action result. Virtuous action, then, is always the result of successful practical reasoning. But practical reasoning may be defective in various ways. Someone may operate from a vicious choice of lifestyle; a glutton, for example, may plan his life around the project of always maximizing the present pleasure. Aristotle calls such a person “intemperate.” Even people who do not endorse such a hedonistic premise may, once in a while, overindulge. This failure to apply to a particular occasion a generally sound plan of life Aristotle calls “incontinence.” Action and Contemplation The pleasures that are the domain of temperance, intemperance, and incontinence are the familiar bodily pleasures of food, drink, and sex. In his treatment of pleasure, however, Aristotle explores a much wider field. There are two classes of aesthetic pleasures: the pleasures of the inferior senses of touch and taste, and the pleasures of the superior senses of sight, hearing, and smell. Finally, at the top of the scale, there are the pleasures of the mind. Plato had posed the question of whether the best life consists in the pursuit of pleasure or the exercise of the intellectual virtues. Aristotle’s answer is that, properly understood, the two are not in competition with each other. The exercise of the highest form of virtue is the very same thing as the truest form of pleasure; each is identical with the other and with happiness. The highest virtues are the intellectual ones, and among them Aristotle distinguished between wisdom and understanding. To the question of whether happiness is to be identified with the pleasure of wisdom or with the pleasure of understanding, Aristotle gives different answers in his main ethical treatises. In the Nicomachean Ethics perfect happiness, though 113 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE it presupposes the moral virtues, is constituted solely by the activity of philosophical contemplation, whereas in the Eudemian Ethics it consists in the harmonious exercise of all the virtues, intellectual and moral. The Eudemian ideal of happiness, given the role it assigns to contemplation, to the moral virtues, and to pleasure, can claim to combine the features of the traditional three lives—the life of the philosopher, the life of the politician, and the life of the pleasure seeker. The happy person will value contemplation above all, but part of his happy life will consist in the exercise of moral virtues in the political sphere and the enjoyment in moderation of the natural human pleasures of body as well as of soul. But even in the Eudemian Ethics it is “the service and contemplation of God” that sets the standard for the appropriate exercise of the moral virtues, and in the Nicomachean Ethics this contemplation is described as a superhuman activity of a divine part of human nature. Aristotle’s final word on ethics is that, despite being mortal, human beings must strive to make themselves immortal as far as they can. Political Theory Turning from the Ethics treatises to their sequel, the Politics, the reader is brought down to earth. “Man is a political animal,” Aristotle observes; human beings are creatures of flesh and blood, rubbing shoulders with each other in cities and communities. Like his work in zoology, Aristotle’s political studies combine observation and theory. He and his students documented the constitutions of 158 states—one of which, The Constitution of Athens, has survived on papyrus. The aim of the Politics, Aristotle says, is to investigate, on the basis of the constitutions collected, what makes for good government 114 The Philosophy of Aristotle and what makes for bad government and to identify the factors favourable or unfavourable to the preservation of a constitution. Aristotle asserts that all communities aim at some good. The state (polis), by which he means a city-state such as Athens, is the highest kind of community, aiming at the highest of goods. The most primitive communities are families of men and women, masters and slaves. Families combine to make a village, and several villages combine to make a state, which is the first self-sufficient community. The state is no less natural than the family; this is proved by the fact that human beings have the power of speech, the purpose of which is “to set forth the expedient and inexpedient, and therefore likewise the just and the unjust.” The foundation of the state was the greatest of benefactions, because only within a state can human beings fulfill their potential. This map shows some of the major city-states of Greece in the 4th century BCE. Aristotle believed the city-state to be the highest form of community. Courtesy of the University of Texas Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin 115 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Government, Aristotle says, must be in the hands of one, of a few, or of the many; and governments may govern for the general good or for the good of the rulers. Government by a single person for the general good is called “monarchy”; for private benefit, “tyranny.” Government by a minority is “aristocracy” if it aims at the state’s best interest and “oligarchy” if it benefits only the ruling minority. Popular government in the common interest Aristotle calls “polity”; he reserves the word “democracy” for anarchic mob rule. If a community contains an individual or family of outstanding excellence, then, Aristotle says, monarchy is the best constitution. But such a case is very rare, and the risk of miscarriage is great, for monarchy corrupts into tyranny, which is the worst constitution of all. Aristocracy, in theory, is the next-best constitution after monarchy (because the ruling minority will be the bestqualified to rule), but in practice Aristotle preferred a kind of constitutional democracy, for what he called “polity” is a state in which rich and poor respect each other’s rights and the best-qualified citizens rule with the consent of all. Two elements of Aristotle’s teaching affected European political institutions for many centuries: his justification of slavery and his condemnation of usury. Some people, Aristotle says, think that the rule of master over slave is contrary to nature and therefore unjust. But they are quite wrong: a slave is someone who is by nature not his own property but someone else’s. Aristotle agrees, however, that in practice much slavery is unjust, and he speculates that, if nonliving machines could be made to carry out menial tasks, there would be no need for slaves as living tools. Nevertheless, some people are so inferior and brutish that it is better for them to be controlled by a master than to be left to their own devices. 116 The Philosophy of Aristotle Although not himself an aristocrat, Aristotle had an aristocratic disdain for commerce. Our possessions, he says, have two uses, proper and improper. Money too has a proper and an improper use; its proper use is to be exchanged for goods and services, not to be lent out at interest. Of all the methods of making money, “taking a breed from barren metal” is the most unnatural. Rhetoric and Poetics Rhetoric, for Aristotle, is a topic-neutral discipline that studies the possible means of persuasion. In advising orators on how to exploit the moods of their audience, Aristotle undertakes a systematic and often insightful treatment of human emotion, dealing in turn with anger, hatred, fear, shame, pity, indignation, envy, and jealousy— in each case offering a definition of the emotion and a list of its objects and causes. The Poetics is much better known than the Rhetoric, though only the first book of the former, a treatment of epic and tragic poetry, survives. The book aims, among other things, to answer Plato’s criticisms of representative art. According to the theory of Forms, material objects are imperfect copies of original, real, Forms; artistic representations of material objects are therefore only copies of copies, at two removes from reality. Moreover, drama has a specially corrupting effect, because it stimulates unworthy emotions in its audience. In response, Aristotle insists that imitation, so far from being the degrading activity that Plato describes, is something natural to humans from childhood and is one of the characteristics that makes humans superior to animals, since it vastly increases the scope of what they may learn. In order to answer Plato’s complaint that playwrights are only imitators of everyday life, which is itself only an 117 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE imitation of the real world of Forms, Aristotle draws a contrast between poetry and history. The poet’s job is to describe not something that has actually happened but something that might well happen—that is to say, something that is possible because it is necessary or likely. For this reason, poetry is more philosophical and more important than history, for poetry speaks of the universal, history of only the particular. Much of what happens to people in everyday life is a matter of sheer accident; only in fiction can one witness character and action work themselves out to their natural consequences. Far from debasing the emotions, as Plato thought, drama has a beneficial effect on them. Tragedy, Aristotle says, must contain episodes arousing pity and fear so as to achieve a “purification” of these emotions. No one is quite sure exactly what Aristotle meant by katharsis, or purification. But perhaps what he meant was that watching tragedy helps people to put their own sorrows and worries in perspective, because in it they observe how catastrophe can overtake even people who are vastly their superiors. THE LEGACY OF ARISTOTLE Since the Renaissance it has been traditional to regard the Academy and the Lyceum as two opposite poles of philosophy. Plato is idealistic, utopian, otherworldly; Aristotle is realistic, utilitarian, commonsensical. In fact, however, the doctrines that Plato and Aristotle share are more important than those that divide them. Many post-Renaissance historians of ideas have been less perceptive than the commentators of late antiquity, who saw it as their duty to construct a harmonious concord between the two greatest philosophers of the known world. By any reckoning, Aristotle’s intellectual achievement is stupendous. He was the first genuine scientist in history. 118 The Philosophy of Aristotle He was the first author whose surviving works contain detailed and extensive observations of natural phenomena, and he was the first philosopher to achieve a sound grasp of the relationship between observation and theory in scientific method. He identified the various scientific disciplines and explored their relationships to each other. He was the first professor to organize his lectures into courses and to assign them a place in a syllabus. His Lyceum was the first research institute in which a number of scholars and investigators joined in collaborative inquiry and documentation. Finally, and not least important, he was the first person in history to build up a research library, a systematic collection of works to be used by his colleagues and to be handed on to posterity. Millennia later, Plato and Aristotle still have a strong claim to being the greatest philosophers who have ever lived. But if their contribution to philosophy is equal, it was Aristotle who made the greater contribution to the intellectual patrimony of the world. Not only every philosopher but also every scientist is in his debt. He deserves the title Dante gave him: “the master of those who know.” 119 CHAPTER 5 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy T he period after the death of Aristotle was characterized by the decay of the Greek city-states, which then became pawns in the power game of the Hellenistic kings who succeeded Alexander. Life became troubled and insecure. It was in this environment that two dogmatic philosophical systems came into being, Stoicism and Epicureanism, which promised to give their adherents something to hold onto and to make them independent of the external world. Other schools that emerged or continued during the Hellenistic and late Roman periods were skepticism, Neo-Pythagoreanism, and Neoplatonism. STOICISM Stoicism was one of the loftiest and most sublime philosophies in the record of Western civilization. In urging participation in human affairs, Stoics believed that the goal of all inquiry is to provide the individual with a mode of conduct characterized by tranquillity of mind and certainty of moral worth. The Nature and Scope of Stoicism For the early Stoic philosopher, as for all the postAristotelian schools, knowledge and its pursuit are 120 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy no longer held to be ends in themselves. The Hellenistic Age was a time of transition, and the Stoic philosopher was perhaps its most influential spokesperson. A new culture was in the making. The heritage of an earlier period, with Athens as its intellectual leader, was to continue, but to undergo many changes. If, as with Socrates, to know is to know oneself, rationality as the sole means by which something outside the self might be achieved may be said to be the hallmark of Stoic belief. As a Hellenistic philosophy, Stoicism presented an ars vitae, a way of accommodation for people to whom the human condition no longer appeared as the mirror of a universal, calm, and ordered existence. Reason alone could reveal the constancy of cosmic order and the originative source of unyielding value; thus, reason became the true model for human existence. To the Stoic, virtue is an inherent feature of the world, no less inexorable in relation to humanity than are the laws of nature. The Stoics believed that perception is the basis of true knowledge. In logic, their comprehensive presentation of the topic is derived from perception, yielding not only the judgment that knowledge is possible but also the judgment that it is possible to have knowledge that is absolutely certain. To them, the world is composed of material things, with some few exceptions (e.g., meaning), and the irreducible element in all things is right reason, which pervades the world as divine fire. Things, such as material, or corporeal, bodies, are governed by this reason or fate, in which virtue is inherent. The world in its awesome entirety is so ruled as to exhibit a grandeur of orderly arrangement that can only serve as a standard for humans in the regulation and ordering of their lives. Thus, the goal of humanity is to live according to nature, in agreement with the world design. Stoic moral theory is also based on the view that the world, as one great city, is a unity. The human 121 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE individual, as a world citizen, has an obligation and loyalty to all things in that city. He or she must play an active role in world affairs, remembering that the world exemplifies virtue and right action. Thus, moral worth, duty, and justice are singularly Stoic emphases, together with a certain sternness of mind. For the moral human neither is merciful nor shows pity, because each suggests a deviation from duty and from the fated necessity that rules the world. Nonetheless—with its loftiness of spirit and its emphasis on the essential worth of all humans—the themes of universal brotherhood and the benevolence of divine nature make Stoicism one of the most appealing of philosophies. Early Greek Stoicism With the death of Aristotle (322 BCE) and that of Alexander the Great (323 BCE), the greatness of the life and thought of the Greek city-state (polis) ended. With Athens no longer the centre of worldly attraction, its claim to urbanity and cultural prominence passed on to other cities—to Rome, to Alexandria, and to Pergamum. The Greek polis gave way to larger political units; local rule was replaced by that of distant governors. The earlier distinction between Greek and barbarian was destroyed; provincial and tribal loyalties were broken apart, first by Alexander and then by Roman legions. The loss of freedom by subject peoples further encouraged a deterioration of the concept of the freeman and resulted in the rendering of obligation and service to a ruler whose moral force held little meaning. The earlier intimacy of order, cosmic and civic, was now replaced by social and political disorder; and traditional mores gave way to uncertain and transient values. Stoicism had its beginnings in a changing world, in which earlier codes of conduct and ways of understanding 122 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy proved no longer suitable. But it was also influenced by tenets of the older schools. Of the several schools of philosophy stemming from Socrates, the Cynic and Megarian schools were influential in the early development of Stoic doctrine: the Cynics for their emphasis on the simple life, unadorned and free of emotional involvement; and the Megarians for their study of dialectic, logical form, and paradoxes. Stoicism takes its name from the place where its founder, Zeno of Citium (Cyprus), customarily lectured— the Stoa Poikile (Painted Colonnade). Zeno, who flourished in the early 3rd century BCE, showed in his own doctrines the influence of earlier Greek attitudes, particularly those mentioned above. He was apparently well versed in Platonic thought, for he had studied at Plato’s Academy both with Xenocrates of Chalcedon and with Polemon of Athens, successive heads of the Academy. Zeno was responsible for the division of philosophy into three parts: logic, physics, and ethics. He also established the central Stoic doctrines in each part, so that later Stoics were to expand rather than to change radically the views of the founder. With some exceptions (in the field of logic), Zeno thus provided the following themes as the essential A bust of Zeno of Citium, the father of Stoicism. Museo Capitolino, Rome, framework of Stoic phi- Italy/The Bridgeman Art Library/ losophy: logic as an Getty Images 123 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE instrument and not as an end in itself; human happiness as a product of life according to nature; physical theory as providing the means by which right actions are to be determined; perception as the basis of certain knowledge; the wise person as the model of human excellence; Platonic forms as being unreal; true knowledge as always accompanied by assent; the fundamental substance of all existing things as being a divine fire, the universal principles of which are (1) passive (matter) and (2) active (reason inherent in matter); belief in a world conflagration and renewal; belief in the corporeality of all things; belief in the fated causality that necessarily binds all things; cosmopolitanism, or cultural outlook transcending narrower loyalties; and the individual’s obligation, or duty, to choose only those acts that are in accord with nature, all other acts being a matter of indifference. Cleanthes of Assos, who succeeded Zeno as head of the school, is best known for his Hymn to Zeus, which movingly describes Stoic reverence for the cosmic order and the power of universal reason and law. The third head of the school, Chrysippus of Soli, who lived to the end of the 3rd century, was perhaps the greatest and certainly the most productive of the early Stoics. He devoted his considerable energies to the almost complete development of the Zenonian themes in logic, physics, and ethics. In logic particularly, he defended against the Megarian logicians and the skeptics such concepts as certain knowledge, comprehensive presentation, proposition and argument, truth and its criterion, and assent. His work in propositional logic, in which unanalyzed propositions joined by connectives are studied, made important contributions to the history of ancient logic and is of particular relevance to more recent developments in logic. In physics, Chrysippus was responsible for the attempt to show that fate and free will are not mutually exclusive 124 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy conceptual features of Stoic doctrine. He further distinguished between “whole” and “all,” or “universe,” arguing that the whole is the world, while the all is the external void together with the world. Zeno’s view of the origin of human beings as providentially generated by “fiery reason” out of matter was expanded by Chrysippus to include the concept of self-preservation, which governs all living things. Another earlier view (Zeno’s), that of nature as a model for life, was amplified first by Cleanthes and then by Chrysippus. The Zenonian appeal to life “according to nature” had evidently been left vague, because to Cleanthes it seemed necessary to speak of life in accord with nature conceived as the world at large (the cosmos), whereas Chrysippus distinguished between world nature and human nature. Thus, to do good is to act in accord with both human and universal nature. Chrysippus also expanded the Stoic view that seminal reasons were the impetus for animate motion. He established firmly that logic and (especially) physics are necessary and are means for the differentiation of goods and evils. Thus, a knowledge of physics (or theology) is required before an ethics can be formulated. Indeed, physics and logic find their value chiefly in this very purpose. Chrysippus covered almost every feature of Stoic doctrine and treated each so thoroughly that the essential features of the school were to change relatively little after his time. Later Roman Stoicism The Middle Stoa, which flourished in the 2nd and early 1st centuries BCE, was dominated chiefly by two men of Rhodes: Panaetius, its founder, and his disciple Poseidonius. Panaetius organized a Stoic school in Rome before returning to Athens, and Poseidonius was largely responsible for an emphasis on the religious features of 125 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE the doctrine. Both were antagonistic to the ethical doctrines of Chrysippus, who, they believed, had strayed too far from the Platonic and Aristotelian roots of Stoicism. It may have been because of the considerable time that Panaetius and Poseidonius lived in Rome that the Stoa there turned so much of its emphasis to the moral and religious themes within the Stoic doctrine. Panaetius was highly regarded by Cicero, who used him as a model for his own work. Poseidonius, who had been a disciple of Panaetius in Athens, taught Cicero at his school at Rhodes and later went to Rome and remained there for a time with Cicero. If Poseidonius admired Plato and Aristotle, he was particularly interested—unlike most of his school—in the study of natural and providential phenomena. In presenting the Stoic system in the second book of De natura deorum (45 BCE), Cicero most probably followed Poseidonius. Because his master, Panaetius, was chiefly concerned with concepts of duty and obligation, it was his studies that served as a model for the De officiis (44 BCE) of Cicero. Hecaton, another of Panaetius’ students and an active Stoic philosopher, also stressed similar ethical themes. If Chrysippus is to be commended for his diligence in defending Stoic logic and epistemology against the skepticism of the New Academy (3rd–2nd century BCE), it was chiefly Panaetius and Poseidonius who were responsible for the widespread popularity of Stoicism in Rome. It was precisely their turning of doctrine to themes in moral philosophy and natural science that appealed to the intensely practical Romans. The times perhaps demanded such interests, and with them Stoicism was to become predominantly a philosophy for the individual, showing how—given the vicissitudes of life—one might be stoical. Law, world citizenship, nature, and the benevolent workings 126 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy of Providence and the divine reason were the principal areas of interest of Stoicism at this time. These tendencies toward practicality are also well illustrated in the later period of the school (in the first two centuries CE) in the writings of Lucius Seneca, a Roman statesman; of Epictetus, a slave freed by the Roman emperor Nero; and of Marcus Aurelius, an emperor of the 2nd century CE. Both style and content in the Libri morales (Moral Essays) and Epistulae morales (Moral Letters) of Seneca reinforce the new direction in Stoic thought. The Encheiridion (Manual) of Epictetus and the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius furthered the sublime and yet personal consolation of the Stoic message and increasingly showed the strength of its rivalry to the burgeoning power of the new Christianity. The mark of a guide, of the religious teacher, is preeminent in these writings. It is difficult to establish with any precision, however, the extent of Stoic influence by the time of the first half of the 2nd century CE. So popular had these ideas become that many specifically Stoic terms (viz., right reason, comprehension, assent, indifference, Logos, natural law, and the notion of the wise person) commonly were Bronze equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, in the Piazza del Campidoglio, used in debate and intel- Rome, c. 173 CE. Height 5.03 m. Alinari—Art Resource/EB Inc. lectual disputes. 127 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE EPICUREANISM The thought of Zeno’s contemporary Epicurus (341–270 BCE) also constituted a philosophy of defense in a troubled world. In a strict sense, Epicureanism is simply the philosophy taught by Epicurus; in a broad sense, it is a system of ethics embracing every conception or form of life that can be traced to the principles of his philosophy. In ancient polemics, as often since, the term was employed with an even more generic (and clearly erroneous) meaning as the equivalent of hedonism, the doctrine that pleasure or happiness is the chief good. In popular parlance, Epicureanism thus means devotion to pleasure, comfort, and high living, with a certain nicety of style. The Nature of Epicureanism Several fundamental concepts characterize the philosophy of Epicurus. In physics, these are atomism, a mechanical conception of causality—limited, however, by the idea of a spontaneous motion, or “swerve,” of the atoms, which interrupts the necessary effect of a cause— the infinity of the universe and the equilibrium of all forces that circularly enclose its phenomena; and the existence of gods conceived as beatified and immortal natures completely extraneous to happenings in the world. In ethics, the basic concepts are the identification of good with pleasure and of the supreme good and ultimate end with the absence of pain from the body and the soul—a limit beyond which pleasure does not grow but changes; the reduction of every human relation to the principle of utility, which finds its highest expression in friendship, in which it is at the same time surmounted; and, in accordance with this end, the limitation of all desire and the 128 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy practice of the virtues, from which pleasure is inseparable, and a withdrawn and quiet life. In principle, Epicurus’ ethic of pleasure is the exact opposite of the Stoic’s ethic of duty. The consequences, however, are the same: in the end, the Epicurean is forced to live with the same temperance and justice as the Stoic. Of utmost importance, however, is one point of divergence: the walls of the Stoic’s city are those of the world, and its law is that of reason; the limits of the Epicurean’s city are those of a garden, and the law is that of friendship. Although this garden can also reach the boundaries of earth, its centre is always a human individual. The Works and Doctrine of Epicurus Epicurus’ predecessors were Leucippus and Democritus in physics and Antiphon Sophista, Aristippus of Cyrene, and Eudoxus of Cnidus (a geometer and astronomer) in ethics. Epicurus differed from all of these in his systematic spirit and in the unity that he tried to give to every part of philosophy. In this respect, he was greatly influenced by the philosophy and teachings of Aristotle—taking over the essentials of his doctrines and pursuing the problems that he posed. In 306 BCE, Epicurus established his school at Athens in his garden, from which it came to be known as The Garden. In accordance with the goal that he assigned to philosophy, Epicurus’ teaching had a dogmatic character, in substance if not in form. He called his treatises dialogismoi, or “conversations.” Since the utility of the doctrines lay in their application, he summarized them in stoicheia, or “elementary propositions,” to be memorized. The number of works produced by Epicurus and his disciples reveals an impressive theoretical activity. But no less important was 129 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE the practical action in living by the virtues taught by him and in honouring the obligations of reciprocal help in the name of friendship. In these endeavours, continuous assistance was rendered by Epicurus himself, who, even when old and ill, was occupied in writing letters of admonishment, guidance, and comfort—everywhere announcing his gospel of peace and, under the name of pleasure, inviting to love. Philosophy was, for Epicurus, the art of living, and it aimed at the same time both to assure happiness and to supply means to achieve it. As for science, Epicurus was concerned only with the practical end in view. If possible, he would have done without it. “If we were not troubled by our suspicions of the phenomena of the sky and about death,” he wrote, “and also by our failure to grasp the limits of pain and desires, we should have no need of natural science.” But this science requires a principle that guarantees its possibilities and its certainty and a method of constructing it. This principle and this method are the object of the “Canon,” which Epicurus substituted for Logic. Since he made the “Canon” an integral introduction to the “Physics,” however, his philosophy falls into two parts, the “Physics” and the “Ethics.” The name canon, Rendering of Epicurus. Hulton which means “rule,” is Archive/Getty Images 130 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy derived from a special work entitled “On the Criterion, or Canon.” It held that all sensations and representations are true and serve as criteria. The same holds for pleasure and pain, the basic feelings to which all others can be traced. Also true, and included among the criteria, are what may be called concepts (prolēpsis), which consist of “a recollection of what has often been presented from without.” Humans, therefore, must always cling to that “which was originally thought” in relation to every single “term” and which constitutes its background. Since the truth attested by each of the criteria is reflected in the phainomena, humans must cling to these, employing them as “signs,” and must “conjecture” whatever “does not appear.” With the use of signs and conjecture, however, the level of judgment is reached, and thought is well advanced into that sphere in which error is possible, a state that begins as soon as single terms are tied into a proposition. Error, which consists of what “our judgment adds” to the evidence, can be of two types, one relative to what is not an object of experience, the other relative to what is such an object but for which the evidence is dubious. Each type has its own method of proof. Following the principles and methods of the “Canon,” Epicurus arrived at an atomism that, like that of the ancient naturalist Democritus, taught that the atoms, the void-space in which they move, and the worlds are all infinite. But in contrast to Democritus, who had followed the deductive route of the intellect, considering the knowledge of the senses to be spurious, Epicurus, following an inductive route, assigned truth to sensation and reduced the intellect to it. On the basis of the totality of problems as Aristotle posed them in his Physics, Epicurus modified entirely the mechanical theory of causes and of motion found in Democritus and added the concept of a natural necessity, which he called nature, and that of free causality, which alone could explain the 131 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE freedom of motion of humans and animals. For this purpose he distinguished three forms of motion in the atoms: a natural one of falling in a straight line, owing to their weight; a forced one due to impacts; and a free motion of declination, or swerving from a straight line. Secondly, he made finite the number of forms of the atoms in order to limit the number of sensible qualities, since each form begets a distinctive quality, and he taught a mathematical as well as a physical atomism. Lest an infinity of sensible qualities be generated, however, by an infinity of aggregations (if not of atomic kinds), Epicurus developed, from just this concept of infinity, the law of universal equilibrium of all the forces, or “isonomy.” Upon it, enclosing the events in a circle, he founded a theory of cyclic returns. As part of his physics, Epicurus’ psychology held that the soul must be a body. It is made of very thin atoms of four different species—motile, quiescent, igneous, and ethereal—the last, thinnest and the most mobile of all, serving to explain sensitivity and thought. Thus constituted, the soul is, from another perspective, bipartite: in part distributed throughout the entire body and in part collected in the chest. The first part is the locus of sensations and of the physical affects of pain and pleasure; the second (entirely dissociated from the first) is the psychē par excellence—the seat of thought, emotions, and will. Thought is due not to the transmission of sense motion but to the perception of images constituted by films that continuously issue from all bodies and, retaining their form, arrive at the psychē through the pores. The full autonomy and freedom of the psychē is assured, as, with an act of apprehension, it seizes at every moment the images it needs, meanwhile remaining master of its own feelings. The object of ethics is to determine the end and the means necessary to reach it. Taking his cue from experience, Epicurus looked to the animal kingdom for his 132 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy answer. He concluded from this cue that the chief end is pleasure. He distinguished two kinds—a “kinetic” pleasure of sense and a “static” pleasure, consisting in the absence of pain—and taught that the pleasure of sense is good, though it is not good merely as motion but rather as a motion favourable to the nature of the receiving sense organ. In essence, pleasure is the equilibrium of the being with itself, existing wherever there is no pain. Epicurus concluded that “freedom from pain in the body and from trouble in the mind” is the ultimate aim of a happy life. The damages and the advantages following the realization of any desire must be measured in a calculus in which even pain must be faced with courage if the consequent pleasure will be of longer duration. Having thus given order to life, however, the wise person must also provide him- or herself with security. This is achieved in two ways—by reducing his or her needs to a minimum and withdrawing, far from human competition and from the noise of the world, to “live hidden”; and by adding the private compact of friendship to the public compact from which laws arise. To be sure, friendship stems from utility; but, once born, it is desirable in itself. Epicurus then added that “for love of friendship one has even to put in jeopardy love itself ”; for every existence, being alone, needs the other. “To eat and drink without a friend,” he wrote, “is to devour like the lion and the wolf.” Thus, the utility sublimates itself and changes into love. But as every love is intrepid, the wise man, “if his friend is put to torture, suffers as if he himself were there” and, if necessary, “will die for his friend.” Thus, into the bloody world of his time, Epicurus could launch the cry: “Friendship runs dancing through the world bringing to us all the summons to wake and sing its praises.” If humans’ unhappiness stemmed only from their own vain desires and from worldly dangers, this wisdom, 133 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE founded upon prudence alone, would suffice. But besides these sources of unhappiness there are two great fears, fear of death and fear of the gods. If science, however, is effective in revealing the bounds of desire and (as already seen) in quelling the fear of the gods, it can also allay the fear of death. Regarding the soul as a body within another body, science envisions it as dissolving when the body dissolves. Death, then, “is nothing to us, so long as we exist, death is not with us; but when death comes, then we do not exist.” But death is feared not only for what may be awaiting man in the beyond but also for itself. “I am not afraid of being dead,” said the comic Epicharmus of Cos: “I just do not want to die.” The very idea of not existing instills a fear that Epicurus considered to be the cause of all the passions that pain the soul and disorder people’s lives. Against it Epicurus argued that if pleasure is perfect within each instant and “infinite time contains no greater pleasure than limited time, if one measures by reason the limits of pleasure,” then all desire of immortality is vain. Thus, Epicurus’ most distinguished pupil, Metrodorus of Lampsacus, could exclaim, “bebiōtai” (“I have lived”), and this would be quite enough. The person who has conquered the fear of death can also despise pain, which “if it is long lasting is light, and if it is intense is short” and brings death nearer. The wise person has only to replace the image of pain present in the flesh with that of blessings enjoyed, and he can be happy even “inside the bull of Phalaris.” The most beautiful example was set by Epicurus at the moment of his death: A happy day is this on which I write to you . . . The pains which I feel . . . could not be greater. But all of this is opposed by the happiness which the soul experiences, remembering our conversations of a bygone time. 134 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy The ultimate concentration of all his wisdom is the Tetrapharmacon, preserved by Philodemus: “The gods are not to be feared. Death is not a thing that one must fear. Good is easy to obtain. Evil is easy to tolerate.” On account of its dogmatic character and its practical end, the philosophy of Epicurus was not subject to development, except in the polemic and in its application to themes that Epicurus either had treated briefly or had never dealt with at all. Epicurus’ philosophy remained essentially unchanged. Once truth has been found, it requires no more discussion, particularly when it completely satisfies the end toward which human nature tends. The main thing is to see this end; all of the rest comes by itself, and there is no longer anything to do but follow Epicurus, “liberator” and “saviour,” and to memorize his “oracular words.” SKEPTICISM Skepticism, which was initiated by another of Zeno’s contemporaries, Pyrrhon of Elis (c. 360–c. 272 BCE), was destined to become of great importance for the preservation of detailed knowledge of Hellenistic philosophy in general. Pyrrhon’s importance for the history of philosophy lies in the fact that one of the later adherents of his doctrine, Sextus Empiricus (flourished 3rd century CE), wrote a large work, Pros dogmatikous (“Against the Dogmatists”), in which he tried to refute all of the philosophers who held positive views, and in so doing he quoted extensively from their works, thus preserving much that would otherwise have been lost. In the West, skeptical philosophical attitudes began to appear in ancient Greece about the 5th century BCE. The Eleatic philosophers (those associated with the Greek city 135 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE of Elea in Italy) rejected the existence of plurality and change, conceiving of reality as a static One, and they denied that reality could be described in terms of the categories of ordinary experience. On the other hand, Heracleitus and his pupil Cratylus thought that the world was in such a state of flux that no permanent, unchangeable truth about it could be found; and Xenophanes, a wandering poet and philosopher, doubted whether humans could distinguish true from false knowledge. A more developed form of skepticism appeared in some of the views attributed to Socrates and in the views of certain Sophists. Socrates, as portrayed in the early dialogues of his pupil Plato, was always questioning the knowledge claims of others; in the Apology, he famously admits that all that he really knows is that he knows nothing. Socrates’ enemy, the Sophist Protagoras, contended that “man is the measure of all things,” a thesis that has been taken to imply a kind of skeptical relativism: no views are ultimately or objectively true, but each is merely one person’s opinion. Another Sophist, Gorgias, advanced the skeptical-nihilist thesis that nothing exists; and, if something did exist, it could not be known; and, if it could be known, it could not be communicated. The putative father of Greek skepticism, however, was Pyrrhon, who undertook the rare effort of trying to live his skepticism. He avoided committing himself to any views about what the world was really like and acted only according to appearances. In this way he sought happiness, or at least mental peace. The first school of skeptical philosophy developed in the Academy, the school founded by Plato, in the 3rd century BCE and was thus called “Academic” skepticism. Starting from the skeptical doctrines of Socrates, its leaders, Arcesilaus and Carneades, set forth a series of epistemological arguments to show that nothing could be 136 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy known, challenging primarily what were then the two foremost schools, Stoicism and Epicureanism. They denied that any criteria could be found for distinguishing the true from the false; instead, only reasonable or probable standards could be established. This limited, or probabilistic, skepticism was the view of the Academy until the 1st century BCE, when the Roman philosopher and orator Cicero was a student there. His Academica and De natura deorum are the main sources of modern knowledge of this movement. (St. Augustine’s Contra academicos, composed some five centuries later, was intended as an answer to Cicero’s views.) The other major form of ancient skepticism was Pyrrhonism, apparently developed by medical skeptics in Alexandria. Beginning with Aenesidemus (1st century BCE), this movement, named after Pyrrhon, criticized the Academic skeptics because they claimed to know too much—namely, that nothing could be known and that some things are more probable than others. The Pyrrhonians advanced a series of tropes, or ways of opposing various kinds of knowledge claims, in order to bring about epochē (suspension of judgment). The Pyrrhonian attitude is preserved in the writings of one of its last leaders, Sextus Empiricus (2nd or 3rd century CE). In his Outlines of Pyrrhonism and Adversus mathematicos, Sextus presented the tropes developed by previous Pyrrhonists. The 10 tropes attributed to Aenesidemus showed the difficulties encountered by attempts to ascertain the truth or reliability of judgments based on sense information, owing to the variability and differences of human and animal perceptions. Other arguments raised difficulties in determining whether there are any reliable criteria or standards—logical, rational, or otherwise—for judging whether anything is true or false. To settle any disagreement, a criterion seems to be required. Any purported 137 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE criterion, however, would have to be based either on another criterion—thus leading to an infinite regress of criteria—or on itself, which would be circular. Sextus offered arguments to challenge any claims of dogmatic philosophers to know more than what is evident, and in so doing he presented, in one form or another, practically all of the skeptical arguments that have ever appeared in subsequent philosophy. Sextus said that his arguments were aimed at leading people to a state of ataraxia (unperturbability). People who thought that they could know reality were constantly disturbed and frustrated. If they could be led to suspend judgment, however, they would find peace of mind. In this state of suspension they would neither affirm nor deny the possibility of knowledge but would remain peaceful, still waiting to see what might develop. The Pyrrhonist did not become inactive in this state of suspense but lived undogmatically according to appearances, customs, and natural inclinations. PYTHAGOREANISM AND NEO-PYTHAGOREANISM In the first half of the 4th century BCE, Tarentum, in southern Italy, rose into considerable significance. Under the political and spiritual leadership of the mathematician Archytas, a friend of Plato, the city became a new centre of Pythagoreanism, from which so-called acousmatics— Pythagoreans who did not sympathize with Archytas—went out travelling as mendicant ascetics all around the Greekspeaking world. The acousmatics seem to have preserved some early Pythagorean Hieroi Logoi (“Sacred Discourses”) and ritual practices. Archytas himself, on the other hand, concentrated on scientific problems, and the organization of his Pythagorean brotherhood was evidently less 138 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy rigorous than that of the early school. After the 380s there was a give-and-take between the school of Archytas and the Academy of Plato, a relationship that makes it almost impossible to disentangle the original achievements of Archytas from joint involvements. Whereas the school of Archytas apparently sank into inactivity after the death of its founder (probably after 350 BCE), the Academics of the next generation continued “Pythagorizing” Platonic doctrines, such as that of the supreme One, the indefinite dyad (a metaphysical principle), and the tripartite soul. At the same time, various Peripatetics of the school of Aristotle, including Aristoxenus, collected Pythagorean legends and applied contemporary ethical notions to them. In the Hellenistic Age, the Academic and Peripatetic views gave rise to a rather fanciful antiquarian literature on Pythagoreanism. There also appeared a large and yet more heterogeneous mass of apocryphal writings falsely attributed to different Pythagoreans, as if attempts were being made to revive the school. The texts fathered on Archytas display Academic and Peripatetic philosophies mixed with some notions that were originally Pythagorean. Other texts were fathered on Pythagoras himself or on his immediate pupils, imagined or real. Some show, for instance, that Pythagoreanism had become confused with Orphism; others suggest that Pythagoras was considered a magician and an astrologist; there are also indications of Pythagoras “the athlete” and “the Dorian nationalist.” But the anonymous authors of this pseudo-Pythagorean literature did not succeed in reestablishing the school, and the “Pythagorean” congregations formed in early imperial Rome seem to have had little in common with the original school of Pythagoreanism established in the late 6th century BCE; they were ritualistic sects that adopted, eclectically, various occult practices. 139 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The acousmatics represent one of many schools of Neo-Pythagorean thought influenced by the works and philosophy of Pythagoras, shown above. SSPL/ Getty Images 140 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy With the ascetic sage Apollonius of Tyana, about the middle of the 1st century CE, a distinct Neo-Pythagorean trend appeared. Apollonius studied the Pythagorean legends of the previous centuries, created and propagated the ideal of a Pythagorean life—of occult wisdom, purity, universal tolerance, and approximation to the divine—and felt himself to be a reincarnation of Pythagoras. Through the activities of Neo-Pythagorean Platonists, such as Moderatus of Gades, a pagan trinitarian, and the arithmetician Nicomachus of Gerasa, both of the 1st century CE, and, in the 2nd or 3rd century, Numenius of Apamea, forerunner of Plotinus (an epoch-making elaborator of Platonism), Neo-Pythagoreanism gradually became a part of the expression of Platonism known as Neoplatonism; and it did so without having achieved a scholastic system of its own. The founder of a Syrian school of Neoplatonism, Iamblichus of Chalcis (c. 250–c. 330), a pupil of Porphyry (who in turn had been a pupil of Plotinus), thought of himself as a Pythagorean sage and about 300 CE wrote the last great synthesis of Pythagoreanism, in which most of the disparate post-classical traditions are reflected. It is characteristic of the Neo-Pythagoreans that they were chiefly interested in the Pythagorean way of life and in the pseudoscience of number mysticism. On a more popular level, Pythagoras and Archytas were remembered as magicians. Moreover, it has been suggested that Pythagorean legends were also influential in guiding the Christian monastic tradition. NEOPLATONISM Neoplatonism is the modern name given to the form of Platonism developed by Plotinus in the 3rd century CE and modified by his successors. It came to dominate the 141 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Greek philosophical schools and remained predominant until the teaching of philosophy by pagans ended in the second half of the 6th century CE. It represents the final form of pagan Greek philosophy. It was not a mere syncretism (or combination of diverse beliefs) but a genuine, if one-sided, development of ideas to be found in Plato and earlier Platonism—though it incorporated important Aristotelian and Stoic elements as well. There is no real evidence for Oriental influence. A certain Gnostic (relating to intuitive knowledge acquired by privileged individuals and immune to empirical verification) tone or colouring sometimes may be discerned in the thought of Plotinus. But he was consciously a passionate opponent of Gnosticism, and in any case there was often a large element of popular Platonism in the Gnostic systems then current. Moreover, the theosophical works of the late 2nd century CE known as the Chaldean Oracles, which were taken as inspired authorities by the later Neoplatonists, seem to have been a hodgepodge of popular Greek religious philosophy. Neoplatonism began as a complex (and in some ways ambiguous) philosophy and grew vigorously in a variety of forms over a long period; it is therefore not easy to generalize about it. But the leading ideas in the thought of philosophers who can properly be described as Neoplatonists seem always to have included the following: 1. There is a plurality of levels of being, arranged in hierarchical descending order, the last and lowest comprising the physical universe, which exists in time and space and is perceptible to the senses. 2. Each level of being is derived from its superior, a derivation that is not a process in time or space. 3. Each derived being is established in its own reality by turning back toward its superior in a movement 142 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy 4. 5. 6. 7. of contemplative desire, which is implicit in the original creative impulse of outgoing that it receives from its superior; thus the Neoplatonic universe is characterized by a double movement of outgoing and return. Each level of being is an image or expression on a lower level of the one above it. The relation of archetype and image runs through all Neoplatonic schemes. Degrees of being are also degrees of unity; as one goes down the scale of being there is greater multiplicity, more separateness, and increasing limitation—until the atomic individualization of the spatiotemporal world is reached. The highest level of being, and through it all of what in any sense exists, derives from the ultimate principle, which is absolutely free from determinations and limitations and utterly transcends any conceivable reality, so that it may be said to be “beyond being.” Because it has no limitations, it has no division, attributes, or qualifications; it cannot really be named, or even properly described as being, but may be called “the One” to designate its complete simplicity. It may also be called “the Good” as the source of all perfections and the ultimate goal of return, for the impulse of outgoing and return that constitutes the hierarchy of derived reality comes from and leads back to the Good. Since this supreme principle is absolutely simple and undetermined (or devoid of specific traits), human knowledge of it must be radically different from any other kind of knowledge. It is not an object (a separate, determined, limited thing) and no predicates can be applied to it; hence it can be known only if it raises the mind to an 143 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE immediate union with itself, which cannot be imagined or described. Plotinus and His Philosophy As far as is known, the originator of this distinctive kind of Platonism was Plotinus (205–270 CE). He had been the pupil at Alexandria of a self-taught philosopher called Ammonius, who also taught the Christian Origen and the latter’s pagan namesake, and whose influence on his pupils seems to have been deep and lasting. But Ammonius wrote nothing; there are few reports of his views, and these are unreliable so that nothing is actually known about his thought. Plotinus must thus be regarded as the first Neoplatonist, and his collected works, the Enneads (Greek enneas, “set of nine”—six sets of nine treatises each, arranged by his disciple Porphyry), are the first and greatest collection of Neoplatonic writings. Plotinus, like most ancient philosophers from Socrates on, was a religious and moral teacher as well as a professional philosopher engaged in the critical interpretation of a long and complicated school tradition. He was an acute critic and arguer, with an exceptional degree of intellectual honesty for his, or any, period; philosophy for him was not only a matter of abstract speculation but also a way of life in which, through an exacting intellectual and moral self-discipline and purification, those who are capable of the ascent can return to the source from which they came. His written works explain how from the eternal creative act—at once spontaneous and necessary—of that transcendent source, the One, or Good, proceeds the world of living reality, constituted by repeated double movements of outgoing and return in contemplation; and this account, showing the way for the human self—which can experience and be active on every level of being—to 144 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy return to the One, is at the same time an exhortation to follow that way. Plotinus always insisted that the One, or Good, is beyond the reach of thought or language; what he said about this supreme principle was intended only to point the mind along the way to it, not to describe or define it. But though no adequate concept or definition of the Good is possible, it was, nonetheless, for Plotinus a positive reality of superabundant excellence. Plotinus often spoke of it in extremely negative language, but his object in doing so was to stress the inadequacy of all of man’s ways of thinking and speaking to express this supreme reality or to clarify the implications of the claim that the Good is absolutely one and undetermined, the source of all defined and limited realities. The original creative or expressive act of the One is the first great derived reality, nous (which can be only rather inadequately translated as “Intellect” or “Spirit”); from this again comes Soul, which forms, orders, and maintains in being the material universe. It must be remembered that, to Plotinus, the whole process of generation is timeless; Nous and Soul are eternal, while time is the life of Soul as active in the physical world, and there never was a time when the material universe did not exist. The “levels of being,” then, though distinct, are not separate but are all intimately present everywhere and in everyone. To ascend from Soul through Intellect to the One is not to travel in space but to awake to a new kind of awareness. Intellect for Plotinus is at one and the same time thinker, thought, and object of thought; it is a mind that is perfectly one with its object. As object, it is the world of forms, the totality of real being in the Platonic sense. These forms, being one with Intellect and therefore with each other, are not merely objects but are living, thinking 145 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE subjects, each not only itself but, in its contemplation, the whole. They are the archetypes and causes of the necessarily imperfect realities on lower levels, souls and the patterns or structures that make bodies what they are. Humans at their highest are intellects, or souls perfectly conformed to Intellect; they become aware of their intellectual nature when, passing not only beyond sense perception but beyond the discursive reasoning characteristic of the life of Soul, they immediately grasp eternal realities. Soul for Plotinus is very much what it was for Plato, the intermediary between the worlds of Intellect and Sense and the representative of the former in the latter. It is produced by Intellect, as Intellect is by the One, by a double movement of outgoing and return in contemplation, but the relationship between the two is more intimate and the frontier less clearly defined. For Plotinus, as for Plato, the characteristic of the life of the Soul is movement, which is the cause of all other movements. The life of the Soul in this movement is time, and on it all physical movement depends. Soul both forms and rules the material universe from above; and in its lower, immanent phase, which Plotinus often calls nature, it acts as an indwelling principle of life and growth and produces the lowest forms, those of bodies. Below these lies the darkness of matter, the final absence of being, the absolute limit at which the expansion of the universe— from the One through diminishing degrees of reality and increasing degrees of multiplicity—comes to an end. Because of its utter negativity, such matter is for Plotinus the principle of evil; and although he does not really believe it to be an independent principle forming, with the Good, a dualism, his language about it often has a strongly dualistic flavour. 146 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy He was not, however, really dualistic in his attitude toward the material universe. He strongly maintained its goodness and beauty as the best possible work of Soul. It is a living organic whole, and its wholeness is the best possible (though very imperfect) reflection on the space-time level of the living unity in diversity of the world of forms in Intellect. It is held together in every part by a universal sympathy and harmony. In this harmony external evil and suffering take their place as necessary elements in the great pattern, the great dance of the universe. Evil and suffering can affect humans’ lower selves but can only exceptionally, in the thoroughly depraved, touch their true, higher selves and so cannot interfere with the real well-being of the philosopher. As souls within bodies, humans can exist on any level of the soul’s experience and activity. (The descent of souls into bodies is for Plotinus—who had some difficulty in reconciling Plato’s various statements on this point—both a fall and a necessary compliance with universal law.) The human individual can ascend through his own intellect to the level of universal Soul, become that whole that he already is potentially, and, in Soul, attain to Intellect itself; or he can isolate himself on the lower level, shutting himself up in the experiences, desires, and concerns of his lower nature. Philosophical conversion—the beginning of the ascent to the One—consists precisely in turning away, by a tremendous intellectual and moral effort, from the life of the body, dominating and rising above its desires, and “waking to another way of seeing, which everyone has but few use.” This, Plotinus insisted, is possible while one is still in an earthly body and without neglecting the duties of one’s embodied state. But the body and bodily life weight a person down and hamper him in his ascent. Plotinus’ language when speaking of the body and the 147 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE senses in this context is strongly dualistic and otherworldly. Platonists in general think much more dualistically about their own bodies than about the material universe as a whole. The physical world is seen positively as a noble image of the intelligible; the individual, earthly, animal body, on the contrary, tends to be regarded negatively as a hindrance to the intellectual and spiritual life. When a person’s philosophical conversion is complete and he has become Intellect, he can rise to that mystical union in which the One manifests his continual presence, carried on the surging current of the impulse of return to the source (in its strongest and final flow), the pure love of Intellect for the Good from which it immediately springs. There is no consciousness of duality in that union; the individual is not aware of himself; but neither is he destroyed or dissolved into the One—because even in the union he is still Intellect, though Intellect “out of itself,” transcending its normal nature and activity. This mystical union for Plotinus was the focus of much of his effort and, for those of similar inclination, the source of the continuing power of his teaching. Philosophy for him was religion, the effort to actualize in oneself the great impulse of return to the Good, which constitutes reality on all its levels; and religion for him was philosophy. There was no room in his thought and practice for special revelation, grace, and repentance in the Christian sense, and little for external rites or ceremonies. For him the combination of moral purification and intellectual enlightenment, which only Platonic philosophy as he understood it could give, was the only way to union with the Good. The Later Neoplatonists Porphyry (c. 234–c. 305 CE), a devout disciple of Plotinus and a careful editor of his works, occupied a special 148 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy position in the development of later Neoplatonism. In some ways his thought paralleled that of the later pagan Neoplatonists, but in others it quite opposed them. The most distinctive features of his thought seem to have been an extreme spiritualism, an insistence, even sharper than that of Plotinus, on the “flight from the body” and—more philosophically important—a greater sympathy with the less sharply defined vertical hierarchies of the Platonists who had preceded Plotinus. Porphyry did not always clearly distinguish the One from Intellect. On the other hand, one may see in him the beginnings of the late Neoplatonic tendency to structure reality in both vertical and “horizontal” triads. Thus Being, Life, and Intellect are phases in the eternal self-determination of the ultimate reality. This triad became one of the most important elements in the complex metaphysical structures of the later Neoplatonists. But perhaps Porphyry’s most important and influential contribution was the incorporation into Neoplatonism of Aristotle’s logic, in particular the doctrine of the categories, with the characteristic Neoplatonic interpretation of them as terms signifying entities. Also of interest is his declaration of ideological war against the Christians, whose doctrines he attacked on both philosophical and exegetical grounds in a work of 15 books entitled Against the Christians. Iamblichus (c. 250–c. 330 CE) seems to have been the originator of the type of Neoplatonism that came to dominate the Platonic schools in the 5th and 6th centuries CE. This kind of Neoplatonism sharpened and multiplied the distinctions between the levels of being. The basic position underlying its elaborations is one of extreme philosophical realism: it is assumed that the structure of reality corresponds so exactly to the way in which the mind works that there is a separate real entity corresponding to every distinction that it can make. In 149 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE the fully developed late Neoplatonic system the first principle of reality, the ultimate One, was removed to an altogether ineffable transcendence, mitigated by two factors: the presence of the expressions or manifestations of its unifying power, the “henads”—identified with the gods of paganism—at every level of reality; and the possibility of return to absolute unification through the henad with which one is linked. Below the One a vast structure of triads, or trinities, reached down to the physical world; this was constructed by combining Plotinus’ vertical succession of the levels of Being, Intellect, and Soul (much complicated by internal subdivision and the interposition at every stage of mediating hypostases, or underlying orders of nonmaterial reality) with another horizontal triadic structure, giving a timeless dynamic rhythm of outgoing and return, such as that already encountered in Porphyry. Nearly all of Iamblichus’ works have been lost, and his thought must be recovered from other sources. At present the main authority for this type of Platonism, and also for some of the later Neoplatonists, is Proclus (410– 485 CE). Proclus appears to have codified later Platonism, but it is often impossible to tell which parts of his thought are original and which derive from his teachers Plutarch and Syrianus on the one hand and Porphyry and Iamblichus, from whom he quotes copiously but not always identifiably, and other earlier Platonists on the other hand. A carefully argued summary of the basic metaphysics of this kind of Neoplatonism may be found in Proclus’ Elements of Theology, which exhibits the causal relationships of the several hierarchies that constituted his intelligible universe. This later Neoplatonism aspired to be not only a complete and coherent metaphysical system but also a complete pagan theology, which is perhaps best seen in 150 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy Proclus’ Platonic Theology. The maintenance and defense of the old religion in a world more and more intolerantly dominated by its triumphant rival, Christianity, was one of the main concerns of the Platonists after Plotinus. By the study and sometimes forced exegesis of Aristotle and then Plato, culminating in the Timaeus and Parmenides, of which they offered a variety of highly metaphysical interpretations totally unacceptable to Plato scholars, they believed it possible to arrive at a complete understanding of divine truth. This truth they held to be cryptically revealed by the gods themselves through the so-called theologians— the inspired authors of the Orphic poems and of the Chaldean Oracles, published in the second half of the 2nd century CE. Porphyry first gave some guarded and qualified recognition to them, but they were inspired scripture to Iamblichus, who wrote a work of at least 28 books on the subject, and his successors. Their view of the human soul was humbler than that of Plotinus. It was for them a spiritual being of lower rank, which had descended altogether into the material world, while for Plotinus a part remained above; they could not therefore aspire, like Plotinus, through philosophy alone, to that return to and unification with the divine that remained for them the goal of human life. Help from the gods was needed, and they believed that the gods in their love for men had provided it, giving to all things the power of return in prayer and implanting even in inanimate material things—herbs and stones and the like—sympathies and communications with the divine, which made possible the secret rites of theurgy, through which the divine gave the needed spiritual help by material means. Theurgy, though its procedures were generally those of late Greek magic, was thus not thought of merely as magic; in fact a higher and more intellectual theurgy was also practiced. The degree of attention paid to external rites varied considerably from 151 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE philosopher to philosopher; there seem to have been thinkers even in the last generation of pagan Neoplatonists who had little use for or interest in such things and followed a mystical way much like that of Plotinus. The different schools of late Neoplatonism seem to have differed less from each other than has sometimes been supposed. The school of Pergamum, founded by Aedesius, a pupil of Iamblichus, made perhaps the least contribution to the philosophical development of Neoplatonism, but it was not entirely given over to theurgy. Its greatest convert was the emperor Julian the Apostate, though he was not himself a distinguished philosopher. By the end of the 4th century CE the Platonic Academy at Athens had been reestablished and had become an institute for Neoplatonic teaching and research following the tradition of Iamblichus. It was particularly fervent and open in its paganism and attracted Christian hostility. Although maintaining itself for a surprisingly long time against this hostility, it eventually yielded to it and was probably closed by the Eastern Roman emperor Justinian in 529 CE. In the interim, however, it had produced the greatest and most influential systematic expositor of later Neoplatonism, Proclus. The head of the school at the time of its closing, Damascius, was also a notable philosopher. Another centre of Neoplatonism flourished at Gaza during the 5th and early 6th centuries; it was already Christian in its inspiration, though some of its members studied with the pagan Ammonius. The school of Alexandria in the 5th and 6th centuries does not seem to have differed very much from that of Athens, either in its fundamental philosophical outlook or in the main outline of its doctrines. In fact there was much interchange between the two. The Athenian Syrianus taught the Alexandrian Hermias, whose son Ammonius was taught by Proclus. Ammonius was the most influential of the Alexandrian 152 Hellenistic and Roman Philosophy Platonists. His expositions of Aristotle were published mainly in the commentaries of the Christian heretic John Philoponus (late 5th to mid-6th century). Simplicius, the other great Aristotelian commentator, worked at Athens but, like Damascius, had studied with Ammonius. The Alexandrian concentration on Aristotle, which produced a vast body of learned but Neoplatonically coloured commentary on his treatises, has often been attributed to Christian pressure and attempts to compromise with the church; it may equally well have been due to the quality and extent of Proclus’ published work on Plato. Although Philoponus’ later philosophical work contains important Christian modifications, an openly pagan (and very inferior) philosopher, Olympiodorus, was still teaching at Alexandria well into the second half of the 6th century. Finally, in the 7th century, under Heraclius, after philosophical teaching had passed peacefully into Christian hands, the last known Alexandrian philosopher, the Christian Stephanus, was called to teach in the University of Constantinople. 153 CHAPTER 6 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World W ell before the beginning of the Common Era, Jews with some Greek education had begun to make casual use of popular Greek philosophy in expounding their revealed religion: there are traces of this in the wisdom literature of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). In Paul’s speech to the Areopagus in Acts 17, commonplaces of Stoic philosophy were employed for apologetic purposes. But, as far as is known, the first Jew who was really well-read in Greek philosophy and used it extensively in the exposition and defense of his traditional religion was Philo Judaeus (Philo of Alexandria [c. 15 BCE–after 45 CE]), an older contemporary of St. Paul. Philo expressed his philosophical religion in the form of lengthy allegorical commentaries on the Jewish Scriptures, especially on Genesis. In these he showed to his own satisfaction that the ancient revelation given to Moses accorded with the teaching of the best Greek philosophers, which, in his view, was later and derivative. The Greek philosophy that he preferred and found to be most in accordance with revelation was Platonism. Philo was neither approved of nor read by later orthodox Jews, but his influence on Greek-speaking and Greek-educated Christians from the 2nd century CE was great; and in 154 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World Paul, a convert to Christianity, was an active missionary during the 1st century CE. He was a significant Christian thinker whose writings and teachings resonate in the works of other philosophers like those of St. Augustine. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 155 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE important ways he determined the tone of their religious speculation. Like Philo, the Christian Platonists gave primacy to revelation and regarded Platonic philosophy as the best available instrument for understanding and defending the teachings of Scripture and church tradition. Although Stoicism had exerted a considerable influence on Christian ethical thinking (which has persisted to modern times), Stoic corporealism—the belief that God and the soul are bodies of a subtle and peculiar kind— repelled most Christians, and Stoic pantheism was incompatible with Christianity. The Platonism that the first Christian thinkers knew was of course Middle Platonism, not yet Neoplatonism. Its relatively straightforward theism and high moral tone suited their purposes excellently; and the influence of this older form of Platonism persisted through the 4th century and beyond, even after the works of Plotinus and Porphyry began to be read by Christians. The first Christian to use Greek philosophy in the service of the Christian faith was Justin Martyr (martyred c. 165), whose passionate rejection of Greek polytheism, combined with an open and positive acceptance of the essentials of Platonic religious philosophy and an unshakable confidence in its harmony with Christian teaching, was to remain characteristic of the Christian Platonist tradition. This was carried on in the Greek-speaking world by Clement of Alexandria (c. 150–c. 215), a persuasive Christian humanist, and by the greatest of the Alexandrian Christian teachers, Origen (c. 185–254). Although Origen was consciously more hostile to and critical of Platonic philosophy than either Justin or Clement, he was, nonetheless, more deeply affected by it. He produced a synthesis of Christianity and late Middle Platonism of remarkable originality and power, which is the first great 156 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World Christian philosophical theology. In spite of subsequent condemnations of some of his alleged views, his influence on Christian thought was strong and lasting. The Greek philosophical theology that developed during the Trinitarian controversies over the relationships among the persons of the Godhead, which were settled at the ecumenical councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381), owed a great deal to Origen on both sides, orthodox and heretical. Its most important representatives on the orthodox side were the three Christian Platonist theologians of Cappadocia, Basil of Caesarea (c. 329– 379), Gregory of Nazianzus (c. 330–c. 389), and Basil’s brother Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335–c. 394). Of these three, Gregory of Nyssa was the most powerful and original thinker (as well as the closest to Origen). He was the first great theologian of mystical experience, at once Platonic and profoundly Christian, and he exerted a strong influence on later Greek Christian thought. At some time between the period of the Cappadocian Fathers and the early years of the 6th century, a new turn was given to Christian Platonism by the remarkable writer who chose to publish his works under the name of St. Paul’s convert at Athens, Dionysius the Areopagite. The kind of Platonism that the Pseudo-Dionysius employed for his theological purposes was the 5th-century Neoplatonism that is best represented by Proclus. Almost everything about this mysterious author is vigorously disputed by scholars. But there can be no doubt about the influence that his system of the hierarchic universe exerted upon later Christian thought; his vision of human ascent through it—carried up by divine love, to pass beyond all hierarchy and all knowledge into the darkness of the mystical union with God—had its impact both in the East, where one of the greatest of Greek Christian Platonist thinkers, Maximus the Confessor (c. 580–662), was deeply 157 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Overhead view of the church of St. Gregory of Nazianzus in the Nevsehir province of Turkey (once known as Cappadocia), the region where all three Cappadocian Fathers once lived and defended orthodoxy against Arianism. John Elk III/Lonely Planet Images/Getty Images 158 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World influenced by the Dionysian writings and commented extensively upon them, and in the West, where they became known and were translated into Latin in the 9th century. In the Latin West there was more than one kind of Christian Platonism. An impressive and extremely difficult philosophical theology, employing ideas approximating Porphyry’s version of Neoplatonism to explain and defend the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity, was produced in the second half of the 4th century by the rhetorician and grammarian Marius Victorinus. A strong and simple Platonic theism and morality, which had a great influence in the Middle Ages, was nobly expressed in the final work of the last great philosopher-statesman of the ancient world, Boethius (c. 470–524). This was the Consolation of Philosophy, written in prison while its author was under sentence of death. Boethius was also influential in the medieval West through his translations of Aristotle’s logical works, especially the Categories together with Porphyry’s Isagoge (“Introduction”), on which he in turn produced two commentaries. But the Christian Platonism that had the widest, deepest, and most lasting influence in the West was that of St. Augustine of Hippo (354–430). Each of the great Christian Platonists understood Platonism and applied it to the understanding of his faith in his own individual way, and of no one of them was this truer than of Augustine with his extremely strong personality and distinctive religious history. Augustine’s thought was not merely a subspecies of Christian Platonism but something unique—Augustinianism. Nonetheless, the reading of Plotinus and Porphyry (in Latin translations) had a decisive influence on his religious and intellectual development, and he was more deeply and directly affected by Neoplatonism than any of his Western contemporaries and successors. 159 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE PHILO JUDAEUS Philo Judaeus, a Greek-speaking Jewish philosopher and the most important representative of Hellenistic Judaism, was born in Alexandria, Egypt, between 15 and 10 BCE and died there between 45 and 50 CE. His writings provide the clearest view of this development of Judaism in the Diaspora. As the first to attempt to synthesize revealed faith and philosophical reason, he occupies a unique position in the history of philosophy. He is also regarded by Christians as a forerunner of Christian theology. Life and Background Little is known of the life of Philo. Josephus, the historian of the Jews who also lived in the 1st century, says that Philo’s family surpassed all others in the nobility of its lineage. His father had apparently played a prominent role in Palestine before moving to Alexandria. Philo’s brother Alexander Lysimachus, who was a general tax administrator in charge of customs in Alexandria, was the richest man in the city and indeed must have been one of the richest men in the Hellenistic world, because Josephus says that he gave a huge loan to the wife of the Jewish king Agrippa I and that he contributed the gold and silver with which nine huge gates of the Temple in Jerusalem were overlaid. Alexander was also extremely influential in Roman imperial circles, being an old friend of the emperor Claudius and having acted as guardian for the Emperor’s mother. The Jewish community of Alexandria, to judge from the language of the Jewish papyri and inscriptions, had for nearly three centuries been almost exclusively Greek-speaking and indeed regarded the Septuagint (the 3rd-century-BCE translation of the Hebrew Bible into 160 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World Philo Judaeus, whose works were unique in their attempt to reconcile Judaism and Greek philosophy and were significant also for their influence on Christian theology. Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division 161 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Greek) as divinely inspired. During the century and a half before Philo’s birth, Alexandria had been the home of a number of Jewish writers whose works exist now only in fragments. These men were often influenced by the Greek culture in which they lived and wrote apologies for Judaism. The Alexandrian Jews were eager to enroll their children of secondary school age in Greek gymnasiums; in them, Jews were certainly called upon to make compromises with their traditions. It may be assumed that Philo was a product of such an education: he mentions a wide range of Greek writers, especially the epic and dramatic poets; he was intimately acquainted with the techniques of the Greek rhetorical schools; and he praises the gymnasium. Philo’s education, like that which he ascribes to Moses, most probably consisted of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, harmonics, philosophy, grammar, rhetoric, and logic. Like the cultured Greeks of his day, Philo often attended the theatre, though it had distinctly religious connotations, and he noted the different effects of the same music on various members of the audience and the enthusiasm of the audience for a tragedy of Euripides. He was a keen observer of boxing contests and attended chariot races as well. He also mentions the frequency with which he attended costly suppers with their lavish entertainment. Philo says nothing of his own Jewish education. The only mention of Jewish education in his work indicates how relatively weak it must have been, because he speaks only of Jewish schools that met on the Sabbath for lectures on ethics. That he was far from the Palestinian Hellenizers and that he regarded himself as an observant Jew is clear, however, from his statement that one should not omit the observance of any of the Jewish customs that have been 162 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World divinely ordained. Philo is critical both of those who took the Bible too literally and thus encountered theological difficulties, particularly anthropomorphisms—describing God in terms of human characteristics—and those who went to excesses in their allegorical interpretation of the laws, with the resulting conclusion, anticipating St. Paul, that because the ceremonial laws were only a parable, they need no longer be obeyed. Philo says nothing of his own religious practices, except that he made a festival pilgrimage to Jerusalem, though he nowhere indicates whether he made more than one such visit. In the eyes of the Palestinian rabbis, the Alexandrian Jews were particularly known for their cleverness in posing puzzles and for their sharp replies. As the largest repository of Jewish law apart from the Talmud before the Middle Ages, Philo’s work is of special importance to those who wish to discern the relationship of Palestine and the Diaspora in the realm of law (halakah) and ritual observance. Philo’s exposition of the law may represent either an academic discussion giving an ideal description of Jewish law or the actual practice in the Jewish courts in Egypt. On the whole, Philo is in accord with the prevailing Palestinian point of view; nonetheless he differs from it in numerous details and is often dependent upon Greek and Roman law. That Philo experienced some sort of identity crisis is indicated by a passage in his On the Special Laws. In this work, he describes his longing to escape from worldly cares to the contemplative life, his joy at having succeeded in doing so (perhaps with the Egyptian Jewish ascetic sect of the Therapeutae described in his treatise On the Contemplative Life), and his renewed pain at being forced once again to participate in civic turmoil. Philo appears to have been dissatisfied with his life in the bustling metropolis of Alexandria: he praises the Essenes—a Jewish sect 163 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE who lived in monastic communities in the Dead Sea area— for avoiding large cities because of the iniquities that had become inveterate among city dwellers, for living an agricultural life, and for disdaining wealth. The one identifiable event in Philo’s life occurred in the year 39 or 40, when, after a pogrom against the Jews in Alexandria, he headed an embassy to the emperor Caligula asking him to reassert Jewish rights granted by the Ptolemies (rulers of Egypt) and confirmed by the emperor Augustus. Philo was prepared to answer the charge of disloyalty levelled against the Jews by the notorious antiSemite Apion, a Greek grammarian, when the emperor cut him short. Thereupon Philo told his fellow delegates not to be discouraged because God would punish Caligula, who, shortly thereafter, was indeed assassinated. Works Philo’s genuine works may be classified into three groups: 1. Scriptural essays and homilies based on specific verses or topics of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Bible), especially Genesis. The most important of the 25 extant treatises in this group are Allegories of the Laws, a commentary on Genesis, and On the Special Laws, an exposition of the laws in the Pentateuch. 2. General philosophical and religious essays. These include That Every Good Man Is Free, proving the Stoic paradox that only the wise person is free; On the Eternity of the World, perhaps not genuine, proving, particularly in opposition to the Stoics, that the world is uncreated and indestructible; On Providence, extant in Armenian, a dialogue between Philo, who argues that God is providential in his 164 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World concern for the world, and Alexander, presumably Philo’s nephew Tiberius Julius Alexander, who raises doubts; and On Alexander, extant in Armenian, concerning the irrational souls of animals. 3. Essays on contemporary subjects. These include On the Contemplative Life, a eulogy of the Therapeutae sect; the fragmentary Hypothetica (“Suppositions”), actually a defense of the Jews against anti-Semitic charges to which Josephus’ treatise Against Apion bears many similarities; Against Flaccus, on the crimes of Aulus Avillius Flaccus, the Roman governor of Egypt, against the Alexandrian Jews and on his punishment; and On the Embassy to Gaius, an attack on the emperor Caligula (i.e., Gaius) for his hostility toward the Alexandrian Jews and an account of the unsuccessful embassy to the emperor headed by Philo. A number of works ascribed to Philo are almost certainly spurious. Most important of these is Biblical Antiquities, an imaginative reconstruction of Jewish history from Adam to the death of Saul, the first king of Israel. Philo’s works are rambling, having little sense of form; repetitious; artificially rhetorical; and almost devoid of a sense of humour. His style is generally involved, allusive, strongly tinged with mysticism, and often obscure; this may be a result of a deliberate attempt on his part to discourage all but the initiated few. The Originality of His Thought The key influences on Philo’s philosophy were Plato, Aristotle, the Neo-Pythagoreans, the Cynics, and the Stoics. Philo’s basic philosophic outlook is Platonic, so much so that Jerome and other Church Fathers quote the 165 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE apparently widespread saying: “Either Plato philonizes or Philo platonizes.” Philo’s reverence for Plato, particularly for the Symposium and the Timaeus, is such that he never took open issue with him, as he did with the Stoics and other philosophers. But Philo is hardly a plagiarist; he made modifications in Plato’s theories. To Aristotle he was indebted primarily in matters of cosmology and ethics. To the Neo-Pythagoreans, who had grown in importance during the century before Philo, he was particularly indebted for his views on the mystic significance of numbers, especially the number seven, and the scheme of a peculiar, self-disciplined way of life as a preparation for immortality. The Cynics, with their diatribes, influenced him in the form of his sermons. Although Philo more often employed the terminology of the Stoics than that of any other school, he was critical of their thoughts. In the past, scholars attempted to diminish Philo’s importance as a theological thinker and to present him merely as a preacher, but in the mid-20th century H.A. Wolfson, an American scholar, demonstrated Philo’s originality as a thinker. In particular, Philo was the first to show the difference between the knowability of God’s existence and the unknowability of his essence. Again, in his view of God, Philo was original in insisting on an individual Providence able to suspend the laws of nature in contrast to the prevailing Greek philosophical view of a universal Providence who is himself subject to the unchanging laws of nature. As a Creator, God made use of assistants: hence the plural “Let us make man” in Genesis, chapter 1. Philo did not reject the Platonic view of a preexistent matter but insisted that this matter too was created. Similarly, Philo reconciled his Jewish theology with Plato’s theory of forms in an original way: he posited the forms as God’s eternal thoughts, which God then created as real beings before he created the world. 166 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World Philo saw the cosmos as a great chain of being presided over by the Logos, a term going back to pre-Socratic philosophy, which is the mediator between God and the world, though at one point he identifies the Logos as a second God. Philo departed from Plato principally in using the term Logos for the form of forms and for the forms as a whole and in his statement that the Logos is the place of the intelligible world. In anticipation of Christian doctrine he called the Logos the first-begotten Son of God, the man of God, the image of God, and second to God. Philo was also novel in his exposition of the mystic love of God that God has implanted in humans and through which humans become Godlike. According to some scholars, Philo used the terminology of the pagan religions and mystery cults, including the term enthousiasmos (“having God within one”), merely because it was part of the common speech of the day; but there is nothing inherently contradictory in Judaism in the combination of mysticism and legalism in the same thinker. The influence of the mystic notions of Platonism, especially of the Symposium, and of the popular mystery cults on Philo’s attempt to present Judaism as the one true mystery is hardly superficial; indeed, Philo is a major source of knowledge of the doctrines of these mystery cults, notably that of rebirth. Perhaps, through his mystic presentation of Judaism, Philo hoped to enable Judaism in the Diaspora to compete with the mystery religions in its proselyting efforts, as well as in its attempts to hold on to its adherents. That he was essentially in the mainstream of Judaism, however, is indicated by his respect for the literal interpretation of the Bible, his denunciation of the extreme allegorists, and his failure to mention any specific rites of initiation for proselytes, as well as the lack of evidence that he was himself a devotee of a particular mystery cult. 167 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE The purpose of what Philo called mystic “sober intoxication” was to lead one out of the material into the eternal world. Like Plato, Philo regarded the body as the prison house of the soul, and in his dualism of body and soul, as in his description of the flight from the self, the contrast between God and the world, and the yearning for a direct experience of God, he anticipated much of Gnosticism, a dualistic religion that became important in the 2nd century BCE. But unlike all the Greek philosophers, with the exception of the Epicureans, who believed in limited freedom of will, Philo held that humans are completely free to act against all the laws of their own nature. In his ethical theory Philo described two virtues, under the heading of justice, that are otherwise unknown in Greek philosophical literature—religious faith and humanity. Again, for him repentance was a virtue, whereas for other Greek philosophers it was a weakness. Perfect happiness comes, however, not through humans’ own efforts to achieve virtue but only through the grace of God. In his political theory Philo often said that the best form of government is democracy; but for him democracy was far from mob rule, which he denounced as the worst of polities, perhaps because he saw the Alexandrian mob in action. For Philo democracy meant not a particular form of government but due order under any form of government in which everyone is equal before the law. From this point of view, the Mosaic constitution, which embodies the best elements of all forms of government, is the ideal. Indeed, the ultimate goal of history is that the whole world be a single state under a democratic constitution. SAINT AMBROSE St. Ambrose (Latin: Ambrosius) was born in 339 CE in Augusta Treverorum in Gaul (present-day Trier, in 168 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World southwestern Germany) and died in 397 in Milan. He was a bishop of Milan, a theologian and biblical critic who incorporated Neoplatonic doctrines into his exegesis of Scripture, and an initiator of ideas that provided a model for medieval conceptions of church-state relations. His literary works have been acclaimed as masterpieces of Latin St. Ambrose, detail of a fresco by eloquence, and his musiPinturicchio, 1480s; in Santa Maria del cal accomplishments are Popolo, Rome. Alinari/Art Resource, remembered in his hymns. New York Ambrose is also remembered as the teacher who converted and baptized St. Augustine of Hippo, the great Christian theologian, and as a model bishop who viewed the church as rising above the ruins of the Roman Empire. Early Career Although Ambrose, the second son of the Roman prefect (viceroy) of Gaul, was born in the official residence at Augusta Treverorum, his father died soon afterward, and Ambrose was reared in Rome, in a palace frequented by the clergy, by his widowed mother and his elder sister Marcellina, a nun. Duly promoted to the governorship of Aemilia-Liguria in c. 370, he lived at Milan and was unexpectedly acclaimed as their bishop by the people of the city in 374. 169 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Ambrose, a popular outsider, chosen as a compromise candidate to avoid a disputed election, changed from an unbaptized layman to a bishop in eight days. Coming from a well-connected but obscure senatorial family, Ambrose could be ignored as a provincial governor; as bishop of Milan he was able to dominate the cultural and political life of his age. Ecclesiastical Administrative Accomplishments An imperial court frequently sat in Milan. In confrontations with this court, Ambrose showed a directness that combined the republican ideal of the prerogatives of a Roman senator with a sinister vein of demagoguery. In 384 he secured the rejection of an appeal for tolerance by pagan members of the Roman senate, whose spokesman, Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, was his relative. In 385–386 he refused to surrender a church for the use of Arian heretics. In 388 he rebuked the emperor Theodosius for having punished a bishop who had burnt a Jewish synagogue. In 390 he imposed public penance on Theodosius for having punished a riot in Thessalonica by a massacre of its citizens. These unprecedented interventions were palliated by Ambrose’s loyalty and resourcefulness as a diplomat, notably in 383 and 386 by his official visits to the usurper Maximus at Trier. In his letters and in his funeral orations on the emperors Valentinian II and Theodosius—De obitu Valentiniani consolatio (392) and De obitu Theodosii (395)—Ambrose established the medieval concept of a Christian emperor as a dutiful son of the church “serving under orders from Christ,” and so subject to the advice and strictures of his bishop. 170 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World Literary and Musical Accomplishments Ambrose’s relations with the emperors formed only part of his commanding position among the lay governing class of Italy. He rapidly absorbed the most up-to-date Greek learning, Christian and pagan alike—notably the works of Philo, Origen, and St. Basil of Caesarea and of the pagan Neoplatonist Plotinus. This learning he used in sermons expounding the Bible and, especially, in defending the “spiritual” meaning of the Hebrew Bible by erudite philosophical allegory—notably in the Hexaëmeron (“On the Six Days of Creation”) and in sermons on the patriarchs (of which De Isaac et anima [“On Isaac and the Soul”] and De bono mortis [“On the Goodness of Death”] betray a deep acquaintance with Neoplatonic mystical language). Sermons, the dating of which unfortunately remains uncertain, were Ambrose’s main literary output. They were acclaimed as masterpieces of Latin eloquence, and they remain a quarry for students of the transmission of Greek philosophy and theology in the West. By such sermons Ambrose gained his most notable convert, Augustine, afterward bishop of Hippo in North Africa and destined, like Ambrose, to be revered as a doctor (teacher) of the church. Augustine went to Milan as a skeptical professor of rhetoric in 384; when he left, in 388, he had been baptized by Ambrose and was indebted to Ambrose’s Catholic Neoplatonism, which provided a philosophical base that eventually transformed Christian theology. Ambrose provided educated Latins with an impeccably classical version of Christianity. His work on the moral obligations of the clergy, De officiis ministrorum (386), is skillfully modelled on Cicero’s De officiis. He sought to replace the heroes of Rome with Hebrew Bible saints as 171 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE models of behaviour for a Christianized aristocracy. By letters, visitations, and nominations he strengthened this aristocratic Christianity in the northern Italian towns that he had once ruled as a Roman governor. In Milan, Ambrose “bewitched” the populace by introducing new Eastern melodies and by composing beautiful hymns, notably “Aeterne rerum Conditor” (“Framer of the earth and sky”) and “Deus Creator omnium” (“Maker of all things, God most high”). He spared no pains in instructing candidates for Baptism. He denounced social abuses (notably in the sermons De Nabuthe [“On Naboth”]) and frequently secured pardon for condemned men. He advocated the most austere asceticism: noble families were reluctant to let their marriageable daughters attend the sermons in which he urged upon them the crowning virtue of virginity. Evaluations and Interpretations Ambrose’s reputation after his death was unchallenged. For Augustine, he was the model bishop: a biography was written in 412 by Paulinus, deacon of Milan, at Augustine’s instigation. To Augustine’s opponent, Pelagius, Ambrose was “the flower of Latin eloquence.” Of his sermons, the Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam (390; “Exposition of the Gospel According to Luke”) was widely circulated. Yet, Ambrose is a Janus-like figure. He imposed his will on emperors. But he never considered himself as a precursor of a polity in which the church dominated the state: for he acted from a traditional fear that Christianity might yet be eclipsed by a pagan nobility and Catholicism uprooted in Milan by Arian courtiers. His attitude to the learning he used was similarly old-fashioned. Pagans and heretics, he said, “dyed their impieties in the vats of philosophy”; yet his sermons betray the pagan mysticism of Plotinus in its 172 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World most unmuted tints. In a near-contemporary mosaic in the chapel of St. Satiro in the church of St. Ambrogio, Milan, Ambrose appears as he wished to be seen: a simple Christian bishop clasping the book of Gospels. Yet the manner in which he set about his duties as a bishop ensured that, to use his own image, the Catholic Church would rise “like a growing moon” above the ruins of the Roman Empire. SAINT AUGUSTINE St. Augustine, also known as St. Augustine of Hippo, was born on Nov. 13, 354, in Tagaste, Numidia (now Souk Ahras, Algeria), and died on Aug. 28, 430, in Hippo Regius (now Annaba, Algeria). He was bishop of Hippo from 396 to 430, one of the Latin Fathers of the Church, one of the Doctors of the Church, and perhaps the most significant Christian thinker after St. Paul. Augustine’s adaptation of classical thought to Christian teaching created a theological system of great power and lasting influence. His numerous written works, the most important of which are Confessions and City of God, shaped the practice of biblical exegesis and helped lay the foundation for much of medieval and modern Christian thought. Augustine is remarkable for what he did and extraordinary for what he wrote. If none of his written works had survived, he would still have been a figure to be reckoned with, but his stature would have been more nearly that of some of his contemporaries. However, more than five million words of his writings survive, virtually all displaying the strength and sharpness of his mind (and some limitations of range and learning) and some possessing the rare power to attract and hold the attention of readers in both his day and ours. His distinctive theological style shaped Latin Christianity in a way surpassed only by scripture 173 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE St. Augustine working in his study. SuperStock/Getty Images 174 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World itself. His work continues to hold contemporary relevance, in part because of his membership in a religious group that was dominant in the West in his time and remains so today. Intellectually, Augustine represents the most influential adaptation of the ancient Platonic tradition with Christian ideas that ever occurred in the Latin Christian world. Augustine received the Platonic past in a far more limited and diluted way than did many of his Greekspeaking contemporaries, but his writings were so widely read and imitated throughout Latin Christendom that his particular synthesis of Christian, Roman, and Platonic traditions defined the terms for much later tradition and debate. Both modern Roman Catholic and Protestant Christianity owe much to Augustine, though in some ways each community has at times been embarrassed to own up to that allegiance in the face of irreconcilable elements in his thought. For example, Augustine has been cited as both a champion of human freedom and an articulate defender of divine predestination, and his views on sexuality were humane in intent but have often been received as oppressive in effect. Life Augustine’s birthplace, Tagaste, was a modest Roman community in a river valley 40 miles (64 km) from the African coast. It lay just a few miles short of the point where the veneer of Roman civilization thinned out in the highlands of Numidia in the way the American West opens before a traveler leaving the Mississippi River valley. Augustine’s parents were of the respectable class of Roman society, free to live on the work of others, but their means were sometimes straitened. They managed, sometimes on 175 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE borrowed money, to acquire a first-class education for Augustine, and, although he had at least one brother and one sister, he seems to have been the only child sent off to be educated. He studied first in Tagaste, then in the nearby university town of Madauros, and finally at Carthage, the great city of Roman Africa. After a brief stint teaching in Tagaste, he returned to Carthage to teach rhetoric, the premier science for the Roman gentleman, and he was evidently very good at it. While still at Carthage, he wrote a short philosophical book aimed at displaying his own merits and advancing his career; unfortunately, it is lost. At the age of 28, restless and ambitious, Augustine left Africa in 383 to make his career in Rome. He taught there briefly before landing a plum appointment as imperial professor of rhetoric at Milan. The customary residence of the emperor at the time, Milan was the de facto capital of the Western Roman Empire and the place where careers were best made. Augustine tells us that he, and the many family members with him, expected no less than a provincial governorship as the eventual—and lucrative—reward for his merits. Augustine’s career, however, ran aground in Milan. After only two years there, he resigned his teaching post and, after some soul-searching and apparent idleness, made his way back to his native town of Tagaste. There he passed the time as a cultured squire, looking after his family property, raising the son, Adeodatus, left him by his long-term lover (her name is unknown) taken from the lower classes, and continuing his literary pastimes. The death of that son while still an adolescent left Augustine with no obligation to hand on the family property, and so he disposed of it and found himself, at age 36, literally pressed into service against his will as a junior clergyman in the coastal city of Hippo, north of Tagaste. 176 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World The transformation was not entirely surprising. Augustine had always been a dabbler in one form or another of the Christian religion, and the collapse of his career at Milan was associated with an intensification of religiosity. All his writings from that time onward were driven by his allegiance to a particular form of Christianity both orthodox and intellectual. His coreligionists in North Africa accepted his distinctive stance and style with some difficulty, and Augustine chose to associate himself with the “official” branch of Christianity, approved by emperors and reviled by the most enthusiastic and numerous branches of the African church. Augustine’s literary and intellectual abilities, however, gave him the power to articulate his vision of Christianity in a way that set him apart from his African contemporaries. His unique gift was the ability to write at a high theoretical level for the most discerning readers and still be able to deliver sermons with fire and fierceness in an idiom that a less cultured audience could admire. Made a “presbyter” (roughly, a priest, but with less authority than modern clergy of that title) at Hippo in 391, Augustine became bishop there in 395 or 396 and spent the rest of his life in that office. Hippo was a trading city, without the wealth and culture of Carthage or Rome, and Augustine was never entirely at home there. He would travel to Carthage for several months of the year to pursue ecclesiastical business in a milieu more welcoming to his talents than that of his adopted home city. Augustine’s educational background and cultural milieu trained him for the art of rhetoric: declaring the power of the self through speech that differentiated the speaker from his fellows and swayed the crowd to follow his views. That Augustine’s training and natural talent coincided is best seen in an episode when he was in his 177 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE early 60s and found himself quelling by force of personality and words an incipient riot while visiting the town of Caesarea Mauretanensis. The style of the rhetorician carried over in his ecclesiastical persona throughout his career. He was never without controversies to fight, usually with others of his own religion. In his years of rustication and early in his time at Hippo, he wrote book after book attacking Manichaeism, a Christian sect he had joined in his late teens and left 10 years later when it became impolitic to remain with them. For the next 20 years, from the 390s to the 410s, he was preoccupied with the struggle to make his own brand of Christianity prevail over all others in Africa. The native African Christian tradition had fallen afoul of the Christian emperors who succeeded Constantine (reigned 305–337) and was reviled as schismatic; it was branded with the name of Donatism after Donatus, one of its early leaders. Augustine and his chief colleague in the official church, Bishop Aurelius of Carthage, fought a canny and relentless campaign against it with their books, with their recruitment of support among church leaders, and with careful appeal to Roman officialdom. In 411 the reigning emperor sent an official representative to Carthage to settle the quarrel. A public debate held in three sessions during June 1–8 and attended by hundreds of bishops on each side ended with a ruling in favour of the official church. The ensuing legal restrictions on Donatism decided the struggle in favour of Augustine’s party. Even then, approaching his 60th year, Augustine found—or manufactured—a last great challenge for himself. Taking umbrage at the implications of the teachings of a traveling society preacher named Pelagius, Augustine gradually worked himself up to a polemical fever over ideas that Pelagius may or may not have espoused. Other churchmen of the time were perplexed and reacted with 178 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World some caution to Augustine, but he persisted, even reviving the battle against austere monks and dignified bishops through the 420s. At the time of his death, he was at work on a vast and shapeless attack on the last and most urbane of his opponents, the Italian bishop Julian of Eclanum. Through these years, Augustine had carefully built for himself a reputation as a writer throughout Africa and beyond. His careful cultivation of selected correspondents had made his name known in Gaul, Spain, Italy, and the Middle East, and his books were widely circulated throughout the Mediterranean world. In his last years he compiled a careful catalog of his books, annotating them with bristling defensiveness to deter charges of inconsistency. He had opponents, many of them heated in their attacks on him, but he usually retained their respect by the power and effectiveness of his writing. Chief Works Two of Augustine’s works stand out above the others for their lasting influence, but they have had very different fates. City of God was widely read in Augustine’s time and throughout the Middle Ages and still demands attention today, but it is impossible to read without a determined effort to place it in its historical context. The Confessions was not much read in the first centuries of the Middle Ages, but from the 12th century onward it has been continuously read as a vivid portrayal of an individual’s struggle for self-definition in the presence of a powerful God. CONFESSIONS Although autobiographical narrative makes up much of the first 9 of the 13 books of Augustine’s Confessiones (397; Confessions), autobiography is incidental to the main purpose of the work. For Augustine confessions is a catchall 179 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE term for acts of religiously authorized speech: praise of God, blame of self, confession of faith. The book is a richly textured meditation by a middle-aged man (Augustine was in his early 40s when he wrote it) on the course and meaning of his own life. The dichotomy between past odyssey and present position of authority as bishop is emphasized in numerous ways in the book, not least in that what begins as a narrative of childhood ends with an extended and very churchy discussion of the book of Genesis—the progression is from the beginnings of a man’s life to the beginnings of human society. Between those two points the narrative of sin and redemption holds most readers’ attention. Those who seek to find in it the memoirs of a great sinner are invariably disappointed, indeed often puzzled at the minutiae of failure that preoccupy the author. Of greater significance is the account of redemption. Augustine is especially influenced by the powerful intellectual preaching of the suave and diplomatic Bishop Ambrose, who reconciles for him the attractions of the intellectual and social culture of antiquity, in which Augustine was brought up and of which he was a master, and the spiritual teachings of Christianity. The link between the two was Ambrose’s exposition, and Augustine’s reception, of a selection of the doctrines of Plato, as mediated in late antiquity by the school of Neoplatonism. Augustine heard Ambrose and read, in Latin translation, some of the exceedingly difficult works of Plotinus and Porphyry; he acquired from them an intellectual vision of the fall and rise of the soul of man, a vision he found confirmed in the reading of the Bible proposed by Ambrose. Religion for Augustine, however, was never merely a matter of the intellect. The seventh book of the Confessions recounts a perfectly satisfactory intellectual conversion, but the extraordinary eighth book takes him one necessary 180 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World step further. Augustine could not bring himself to seek the ritual purity of baptism without cleansing himself of the desires of the flesh to an extreme degree. For him, baptism required renunciation of sexuality in all its express manifestations. The narrative of the Confessions shows Augustine forming the will to renounce sexuality through a reading of the letters of Paul. The decisive scene occurs in a garden in Milan, where a child’s voice seems to bid Augustine to “take up and read,” whereupon he finds in Paul’s writings the inspiration to adopt a life of chastity. The rest of the Confessions is mainly a meditation on how the continued study of scripture and pursuit of divine wisdom are still inadequate for attaining perfection and how, as bishop, Augustine makes peace with his imperfections. It is drenched in language from the Bible and is a work of great force and artistry. CITY OF GOD Fifteen years after Augustine wrote the Confessions, at a time when he was bringing to a close (and invoking government power to do so) his long struggle with the Donatists but before he had worked himself up to action against the Pelagians, the Roman world was shaken by news of a military action in Italy. A ragtag army under the leadership of Alaric, a general of Germanic ancestry and thus credited with leading a “barbarian” band, had been seeking privileges from the empire for many years, making from time to time extortionate raids against populous and prosperous areas. Finally, in 410, his forces attacked and seized the city of Rome itself, holding it for several days before decamping to the south of Italy. The military significance of the event was nil—such was the disorder of Roman government that other war bands would hold provinces hostage more and more frequently, and this particular band would wander for another decade before 181 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE settling mainly in Spain and the south of France. But the symbolic effect of seeing the city of Rome taken by outsiders for the first time since the Gauls had done so in 390 BCE shook the secular confidence of many thoughtful people across the Mediterranean. Coming as it did less than 20 years after the decisive edict against “paganism” by the emperor Theodosius I in 391, it was followed by speculation that perhaps the Roman Empire had mistaken its way with the gods. Perhaps the new Christian god was not as powerful as he seemed. Perhaps the old gods had done a better job of protecting their followers. It is hard to tell how seriously or widely such arguments were made; paganism by this time was in disarray, and Christianity’s hold on the reins of government was unshakable. But Augustine saw in the murmured doubts a splendid polemical occasion he had long sought, and so he leapt to the defense of God’s ways. That his readers and the doubters whose murmurs he had heard were themselves pagans is unlikely. At the very least, it is clear that his intended audience comprised many people who were at least outwardly affiliated with the Christian church. During the next 15 years, working meticulously through a lofty architecture of argument, he outlined a new way to understand human society, setting up the City of God over and against the City of Man. Rome was dethroned— and the sack of the city shown to be of no spiritual importance—in favour of the heavenly Jerusalem, the true home and source of citizenship for all Christians. The City of Man was doomed to disarray, and wise men would, as it were, keep their passports in order as citizens of the City above, living in this world as pilgrims longing to return home. De civitate Dei contra paganos (413–426/427; City of God) is divided into 22 books. The first 10 refute the claims to divine power of various pagan communities. The last 12 182 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World retell the biblical story of mankind from Genesis to the Last Judgment, offering what Augustine presents as the true history of the City of God against which, and only against which, the history of the City of Man, including the history of Rome, can be properly understood. The work is too long and at times, particularly in the last books, too discursive to make entirely satisfactory reading today, but it remains impressive as a whole and fascinating in its parts. The stinging attack on paganism in the first books is memorable and effective, the encounter with Platonism in books 8–10 is of great philosophical significance, and the last books (especially book 19, with a vision of true peace) offer a view of human destiny that would be widely persuasive for at least a thousand years. In a way, Augustine’s City of God is (even consciously) the Christian rejoinder to Plato’s Republic and Cicero’s imitation of Plato, his own Republic. City of God would be read in various ways throughout the Middle Ages, at some points virtually as a founding document for a political order of kings and popes that Augustine could hardly have imagined. At its heart is a powerful contrarian vision of human life, one which accepts the place of disaster, death, and disappointment while holding out hope of a better life to come, a hope that in turn eases and gives direction to life in this world. RECONSIDERATIONS In many ways no less unusual a book than his Confessions, the Retractationes (426–427; Reconsiderations), written in the last years of his life, offers a retrospective rereading of Augustine’s career. In form, the book is a catalog of his writings with comments on the circumstances of their composition and with the retractions or rectifications he would make in hindsight. (One effect of the book was to make it much easier for medieval readers to find and identify authentic works of Augustine, and this was surely a 183 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE factor in the remarkable survival of so much of what he wrote.) Another effect of the book is to imprint even more deeply on readers Augustine’s own views of his life. There is very little in the work that is false or inaccurate, but the shaping and presentation make it a work of propaganda. The Augustine who emerges has been faithful, consistent, and unwavering in his doctrine and life. Many who knew him would have seen instead either progress or outright desertion, depending on their point of view. Augustine’s Spirit and Achievement Augustine’s impact on the Middle Ages cannot be overestimated. Thousands of manuscripts survive, and many serious medieval libraries—possessing no more than a few hundred books in all—had more works of Augustine than of any other writer. His achievement is paradoxical inasmuch as—like a modern artist who makes more money posthumously than in life—most of it was gained after his death and in lands and societies far removed from his own. Augustine was read avidly in a world where Christian orthodoxy prevailed in a way he could barely have dreamed of, hence a world unlike that to which his books were meant to apply. Some of his success is owed to the undeniable power of his writing, some to his good luck in having maintained a reputation for orthodoxy unblemished even by debates about some of his most extreme views, but, above all, Augustine found his voice in a few themes which he espoused eloquently throughout his career. When he asks himself in his early Soliloquies what he desires to know, he replies, “Two things only, God and the soul.” Accordingly, he speaks of his reverence for a God who is remote, distant, and mysterious as well as powerfully and unceasingly present in all times and places. “Totus ubique” 184 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World was Augustine’s oft-repeated mantra for this doctrine, “The whole of him everywhere.” At the same time, Augustine captures the poignancy and tentativeness of the human condition, centred on the isolated and individual experience of the person. For all he writes of the Christian community, his Christian stands alone before God and is imprisoned in a unique body and soul painfully aware of the different way he knows himself and knows—at a distance and with difficulty— other people. But Augustine achieves a greater poignancy. His isolated self in the presence of God is denied even the satisfaction of solipsism: the self does not know itself until God deigns to reveal to human beings their identity, and even then no confidence, no rest is possible in this life. At one point in the Confessions the mature bishop ruefully admits that “I do not know to what temptation I will surrender next”—and sees in that uncertainty the peril of his soul unending until God should call him home. The soul experiences freedom of choice and ensuing slavery to sin but knows that divine predestination will prevail. Thousands upon thousands of pages have been written on Augustine and his views. Given his influence, he is often canvassed for his opinion on controversies (from the Immaculate Conception of Mary to the ethics of contraception) that he barely imagined or could have spoken to. But the themes of imperial God and contingent self run deep and go far to explain his refusal to accept Manichaean doctrines of a powerful devil at war with God, Donatist particularism in the face of universal religion, or Pelagian claims of human autonomy and confidence. His views on sexuality and the place of women in society have been searchingly tested and found wanting in recent years, but they, too, have roots in the loneliness of a man terrified of his father—or his God. 185 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE In the end, Augustine and his own experience, so vividly displayed and at the same time veiled in his Confessions, disappear from view, to be replaced by the serene teacher depicted in medieval and Renaissance art. It is worth remembering that Augustine ended his life in the midst of a community that feared for its material well-being and chose to spend his last days in a room by himself, posting on a wall where he could see them the texts of the seven penitential Psalms, to wrestle one last time with his sins before meeting his maker. ANICIUS MANLIUS SEVERINUS BOETHIUS Boethius was a Roman scholar, a Christian philosopher, a statesman, and the author of the celebrated De consolatione philosophiae (Consolation of Philosophy), a largely Neoplatonic work in which the pursuit of wisdom and the love of God are described as the true sources of human happiness. He was born in Rome in 475 and died in Pavia in 524. The most succinct biography of Boethius, and the oldest, was written by Cassiodorus, his senatorial colleague, who cited him as an accomplished orator who delivered a fine eulogy of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths who made himself king of Italy. Cassiodorus also mentioned that Boethius wrote on theology, composed a pastoral poem, and was most famous as a translator of works of Greek logic and mathematics. Other ancient sources, including Boethius’ own De consolatione philosophiae, give more details. He belonged to the ancient Roman family of the Anicii, which had been Christian for about a century and of which Emperor Olybrius had been a member. Boethius’ father had been consul in 487 but died soon afterward, and Boethius was 186 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World raised by Quintus Aurelius Memmius Symmachus, whose daughter Rusticiana he married. He became consul in 510 under the Ostrogothic king Theodoric. Although little of Boethius’ education is known, he was evidently well trained in Greek. His early works on arithmetic and music are extant, both based on Greek handbooks by Nicomachus of Gerasa, a 1st-century-CE Palestinian mathematician. There is little that survives of Boethius’ geometry, and there is nothing of his astronomy. It was Boethius’ scholarly aim to translate into Latin the complete works of Aristotle with commentary and all the works of Plato “perhaps with commentary,” to be followed by a “restoration of their ideas into a single harmony.” Boethius’ dedicated Hellenism, modeled on that of the Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius. © Photos.com/Jupiterimages 187 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Roman orator Cicero, supported his long labour of translating Aristotle’s Organon (six treatises on logic) and the Greek glosses on the work. Boethius had begun before 510 to translate Porphyry’s Isagoge, a 3rd-century Greek introduction to Aristotle’s logic, and elaborated it in a double commentary. He then translated the Katēgoriai, wrote a commentary in 511 in the year of his consulship, and also translated and wrote two commentaries on the second of Aristotle’s six treatises, the Peri hermeneias (“On Interpretation”). A brief ancient commentary on Aristotle’s Analytika Protera (“Prior Analytics”) may be his too; he also wrote two short works on the syllogism. About 520 Boethius put his close study of Aristotle to use in four short treatises in letter form on the ecclesiastical doctrines of the Trinity and the nature of Christ; these are basically an attempt to solve disputes that had resulted from the Arian heresy, which denied the divinity of Christ. Using the terminology of the Aristotelian categories, Boethius described the unity of God in terms of substance and the three divine persons in terms of relation. He also tried to solve dilemmas arising from the traditional description of Christ as both human and divine, by deploying precise definitions of “substance,” “nature,” and “person.” Notwithstanding these works, doubt has at times been cast on Boethius’ theological writings because in his logical works and in the later Consolation, the Christian idiom is nowhere apparent. The 19th-century discovery of the biography written by Cassiodorus, however, confirmed Boethius as a Christian writer, even if his philosophical sources were non-Christian. In about 520 Boethius became magister officiorum (head of all the government and court services) under Theodoric. His two sons were consuls together in 522. Eventually Boethius fell out of favour with Theodoric. The Consolation 188 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World contains the main extant evidence of his fall but does not clearly describe the actual accusation against him. After the healing of a schism between Rome and the church of Constantinople in 520, Boethius and other senators may have been suspected of communicating with the Byzantine emperor Justin I, who was orthodox in faith whereas Theodoric was Arian. Boethius openly defended the senator Albinus, who was accused of treason “for having written to the emperor Justin against the rule of Theodoric.” The charge of treason brought against Boethius was aggravated by a further accusation of the practice of magic, or of sacrilege, which the accused was at great pains to reject. Sentence was passed and was ratified by the Senate, probably under duress. In prison, while he was awaiting execution, Boethius wrote his masterwork, De consolatione philosophiae. The Consolation is the most personal of Boethius’ writings, the crown of his philosophical endeavours. Its style, a welcome change from the Aristotelian idiom that provided the basis for the jargon of medieval Scholasticism, seemed to the 18th-century English historian Edward Gibbon “not unworthy of the leisure of Plato or Tully.” The argument of the Consolation is basically Platonic. Philosophy, personified as a woman, converts the prisoner Boethius to the Platonic notion of Good and so nurses him back to the recollection that, despite the apparent injustice of his enforced exile, there does exist a summum bonum (“highest good”), which “strongly and sweetly” controls and orders the universe. Fortune and misfortune must be subordinate to that central Providence, and the real existence of evil is excluded. Humans have free will, but it is no obstacle to divine order and foreknowledge. Virtue, whatever the appearances, never goes unrewarded. The prisoner is finally consoled by the hope of reparation and reward beyond death. Through the five books of this argument, in which poetry alternates with prose, there is 189 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE no specifically Christian tenet. It is the creed of a Platonist, though nowhere glaringly incongruous with Christian faith. The most widely read book in medieval times, after the Vulgate Bible, it transmitted the main doctrines of Platonism to the Middle Ages. The modern reader may not be so readily consoled by its ancient modes of argument, but he may be impressed by Boethius’ emphasis on the possibility of other grades of Being beyond the one humanly known and of other dimensions to the human experience of time. After his detention, probably at Pavia, he was executed in 524. His remains were later placed in the church of San Pietro in Ciel d’Oro in Pavia, where, possibly through a confusion with his namesake, St. Severinus of Noricum, they received the veneration due to a martyr and a memorable salute from Dante. When Cassiodorus founded a monastery at Vivarium, in Campania, he installed there his Roman library and Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, woodcut, 1537. © Photos.com/ Jupiterimages 190 Jewish and Christian Philosophy in the Ancient World included Boethius’ works on the liberal arts in the annotated reading list (Institutiones) that he composed for the education of his monks. Thus, some of the literary habits of the ancient aristocracy entered the monastic tradition. Boethian logic dominated the training of the medieval clergy and the work of the cloister and court schools. His translations and commentaries, particularly those of the Katēgoriai and Peri hermeneias, became basic texts in medieval Scholasticism. The great controversy over nominalism (denial of the existence of universals) and realism (belief in the existence of universals) was incited by a passage in his commentary on Porphyry. Translations of the Consolation appeared early in the great vernacular literatures, with King Alfred (9th century) and Chaucer (14th century) in English, Jean de Meun (a 13th-century poet) in French, and Notker Labeo (a monk of around the turn of the 11th century) in German. There was a Byzantine version in the 13th century by Planudes and a 16th-century English one by Elizabeth I. Thus the resolute intellectual activity of Boethius in an age of change and catastrophe affected later, very different ages; and the subtle and precise terminology of Greek antiquity survived in Latin when Greek itself was little known. 191 Conclusion T he ancient philosophers are distinguished as the inventors of philosophy and as the originators of the basic conceptual framework within which Western philosophy has been practiced from the Middle Ages down to the present day. Their most important legacy, however, must be their conviction that human beings are capable on their own of understanding the deepest mysteries of the universe and of human existence and that the proper road to this achievement is not through religion or magic but through careful empirical observation and the application of reason. A related belief, characteristic of most ancient Greek philosophy, is that this kind of rational investigation is worthwhile and important not merely because it satisfies human beings’ natural intellectual curiosity but because it makes human life richer and more meaningful through the understanding and wisdom that it yields. Socrates’ dictum “the unexamined life is not worth living” is a famous example of this attitude as it applies to reflection on individual moral character. These assumptions have not been shared by all Western societies in all ages, of course, and even today they are questioned or dismissed in some segments of Western intellectual and religious culture. In this respect these venerable intellectual ideals are still not secure; indeed, some more pessimistic thinkers have argued that they are in peril. Lest they be lost or forgotten altogether, therefore, we would do well to remember the profound thinkers of ancient philosophy. 192 Glossary acousmatic Members of a group of followers of Pythagoras. akrasia Moral weakness, wherein one acts against what one knows to be morally right. apeiron According to Anaximander, the infinite and indefinite source of the physical world. aporia The state of being at a loss, often expressed by the interlocutors of Socrates in the dialogues of Plato. atomism Belief that small indivisible and indestructible particles form the basis of the entire universe. demagoguery The practice of exploiting popular sentiments and prejudices in order to gain political power. doxa Belief or opinion, as opposed to knowledge. elenchos Technique of testing of putative experts involving questioning issues suitably related to the expert’s original claim. encomium An expression of praise or admiration. epistemology The study of the nature, origin, and limits of human knowledge. eristic One who partakes in argument or dispute. ethics Philosophical discipline that addresses morality and questions of right and wrong, good and bad. exegesis Critical examination or analysis of a text, especially of Scripture. henad According to the Neoplatonists, an expression or manifestation of the unifying power of the One identified with a particular pagan god. homily A discourse on religious or moral themes delivered during the course of a church service. hoplite Ancient Greek infantry soldier outfitted with heavy armour. hylozoism Philosophical belief system that views all matter as living. 193 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE isonomy Equality or equilibrium. Logos An ordering principle that gives the cosmos meaning and structure and serves as mediator between the divine and physical world. metaphysics The philosophical study of the ultimate nature of reality. nous The human faculty of intellectual apprehension or a transcendent or divine intellect or organizing principle; according to Plotinus it is the first creation of the One. ontology The metaphysical study of the nature of existence or being. Peripatetic A student at the Lyceum, the school founded by Aristotle. putative Commonly viewed as or supposed. rhapsodist A singer who recited poetry in ancient Greece. sensible particular An object that can be perceived through one or more of the senses. solipsism Theory that the self is capable of knowing only itself or that the self alone is real. sophistry Misleading argumentation meant to deceive others. syllogistic System of logical inference from whole declarative statements, originally developed by Aristotle. syncretism The fusion of varying belief systems. teleological Concerning explanation by appeal to purpose, goal, design, or function. theurgy The practice of certain rituals or methods, sometimes deemed magical in nature, designed to persuade supernatural powers to intervene on behalf of humans. trinitarian Composed of three parts. trope Figurative use of language. voluptuary One concerned primarily with luxury and sensual pleasure. 194 Bibliography Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle Overviews of Socrates’ life are presented in C.C.W. Taylor, Socrates (1998; also reissued as C.C.W. Taylor, R.M. Hare, and Jonathan Barnes, Greek Philosophers: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, 1999); and Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith, The Philosophy of Socrates (2000). A large scholarly literature focuses on the seminal work of Gregory Vlastos, including his Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher (1991), and his Socratic Studies (1994). Discussions of many diverse aspects of the Socrates of Plato’s early dialogues are included in Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith, Plato’s Socrates (1994); and Terence Irwin, Plato’s Ethics, chapters 1–9 (1995), pp. 3–147. Socratic irony is discussed in Alexander Nehamas, The Art of Living: Socratic Reflections from Plato to Foucault (1998), pp. 19–98. Paul A. Vander Waerdt (ed.), The Socratic Movement (1994), contains many essays on the non-Platonic “Socratic discourses” and the philosophical movements inspired by Socrates in antiquity. An unusual perspective is presented in John Beversluis, Cross-Examining Socrates: A Defense of the Interlocutors in Plato’s Early Dialogues (2000). Hugh H. Benson, Socratic Wisdom: The Model of Knowledge in Plato’s Early Dialogues (2000) examines Socratic method and epistemology. George Grote, Plato and the Other Companions of Sokrates, new ed., 4 vol. (1885, reissued 1992), is a venerable study. The order of composition of the dialogues is discussed in Leonard Brandwood, The Chronology of Plato’s Dialogues (1990). R.B. Rutherford, The Art of Plato: Ten Essays in Platonic Interpretation (1995), examines Plato’s use of literary elements; while Debra Nails, The People of Plato (2002), gives full information on the historical characters on whom Plato’s are based. 195 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Good introductory studies of Aristotle’s thought include J.L. Ackrill, Aristotle the Philosopher (1981, reprinted 1986); Jonathan Barnes, Aristotle (1982, reissued 1996; also published as Aristotle: A Very Short Introduction, 2000); and W.D. Ross, Aristotle, 6th ed. (1995). Two of the most influential books on Aristotle written in the 20th century are Werner W. Jaeger, Aristotle: Fundamentals of the History of His Development, 2nd ed. (1948, reissued 1968; originally published in German, 1923); and Harold Cherniss, Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato and the Academy (1944, reissued 1962). Most scholarly work on Aristotle appears in articles rather than in books. Jonathan Barnes (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle (1995), is a useful anthology with an extensive bibliography. The proceedings of the triennial Symposium Aristotelicum contain some of the most up-to-date work. The best general biography of Aristotle is Ingemar Düring, Aristotle in the Ancient Biographical Tradition (1957, reprinted 1987). The classic study of Aristotle’s syllogistic is Jan Lukasiewicz, Aristotle’s Syllogistic from the Standpoint of Modern Formal Logic, 2nd ed. enlarged (1957, reprinted 1987). An insightful study of Aristotle’s metaphysics is Richard Sorabji, Necessity, Cause, and Blame: Perspectives on Aristotle’s Theory (1980). Amélie Oksenberg Rorty (ed.), Essays on Aristotle’s “Ethics” (1980, reissued 1996), is a valuable collection of papers. John M. Cooper, Reason and Human Good in Aristotle (1975, reprinted 1986), also is important. Other notable works are Anthony Kenny, The Aristotelian Ethics: A Study of the Relationship Between the Eudemian and Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle (1978), Aristotle’s Theory of the Will (1979), and Aristotle on the Perfect Life (1992, reissued 1995); Sarah Broadie, Ethics with Aristotle (1991); and Richard Kraut, Aristotle: Political Philosophy (2002), on Aristotle’s politics and ethics. Classical philosophical influences on early Christianity are discussed in Christopher Stead, Philosophy in Christian 196 Bibliography Antiquity (1994); and Robert Louis Wilken, The Spirit of Early Christian Thought (2003). Histories Detailed histories of the whole course of Greek and Roman philosophy can be found in Eduard Zeller, Die Philosophie der Griechen, 6th ed., 3 vol. in 6 (1919), also available in English translation from parts of various editions. Equally thorough is the great work by W.K.C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy, 6 vol. (1962–81, reissued 1986). Short introductions to Greek philosophy in English are Margaret E.J. Taylor, Greek Philosophy (1921, reissued 1947); Rex Warner, The Greek Philosophers (1958, reissued 1986); and the excellent survey by W.K.C. Guthrie, The Greek Philosophers: From Thales to Aristotle (1950, reissued 1994). Also valuable are Reginald E. Allen (ed.), Greek Philosophy: Thales to Aristotle, 3rd ed. rev. and expanded (1991); and Jason L. Saunders (ed.), Greek and Roman Philosophy After Aristotle (1966, reissued 1994). Texts An influential source from perhaps the 3rd century is Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, trans. from the Greek by R.D. Hicks, 2 vol. (1925, reissued 1991). The best comprehensive collection of the fragments of the preSocratic philosophers is still Hermann Diels and Walther Kranz, The Older Sophists: A Complete Translation by Several Hands of the Fragments in Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, ed. by Rosamund Kent Sprague (1972, reissued 2001), made more readily accessible for English-speaking readers by Hermann Diels, Ancilla to the Pre-Socratic Philosophers, trans. by Kathleen Freeman (1948, reissued 1983). A good selection of texts is C.J. de Vogel, Greek Philosophy: A Collection of Texts, 4th ed. (1969– ). 197 Index A Academica (Cicero), 137 Academic skepticism, 136–137 Academy, Plato’s, 45, 47, 54, 80–83, 118, 123, 136–137, 139, 152 accidental forms, 100–101 acousmatics, 138 actions, virtuous or right, 113–114, 122, 124 Adeimantus, 52 Adversus mathematicos (Sextus), 137 Aedesius, 152 Aemilia-Liguria, 169 Aenesidemus, 137 “Aeterne rerum Conditor” (Ambrose), 172 African Christianity, 176–179 Against Apion (Josephus), 165 Against Flaccus (Philo), 165 Against the Christians (Porphyry), 149 Agathon, 74 air as origin of all things, 21 akrasia, 73 Alaric, 181 Albinus, 189 Alcibiades, 38, 74 Alexander, Tiberius Julius, 165 Alexander Lysimachus, 160 Alexander the Great, 54, 80, 84, 85, 87–88, 122 Alexandria, 122, 137, 144, 152, 153, 160, 162–164 Alfred (king), 191 Allegories of the Laws (Philo), 164 Ambrose, Saint, 168–173, 180 Ammonius, 144, 152, 153 Amyntas III, 80 analytic philosophy, 50 Analytika Protera (Aristotle), 188 Anatolia, 19, 22, 83 Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, 24–25, 26, 62–64 Anaximander, 19–21 Anaximenes, 21 Anicii, family of, 186 Antiphon (half-brother of Plato), 52 Antiphon Sophista, 129 Antisthenes, 45 apeiron, 19, 21 Apion, 164 Apollo, 37, 85 Apollonius of Tyana, 141 Apology of Socrates (Plato), 32, 35, 36–37, 38, 39, 40, 70, 136 appearance and reality, 26–27, 30 appetite as part of soul (Plato), 52, 59, 75 Arcesilaus, 45, 47, 136–137 arche, 21 archetype and image, 143 Archytas, 138–139, 141 Arendt, Hannah, 50 Areopagus, Paul’s speech to, 154 arete, 57 Arians, 170, 172, 188, 189 198 Index Aristippus of Cyrene, 45, 129 Aristophanes, 32, 39–40, 41, 43, 74 Aristotle, 18, 47, 51, 54, 67, 122, 139, 151, 153 and ethics, 109–114 legacy of, 118–119, 126, 129, 142, 149, 165, 166 life of, 80–88 and logic, 88–94, 149, 192 philosophy of mind, 105–108 physics and metaphysics, 94–104 political theory of, 114–117 rhetoric and poetics, 117–118 translations by Boethius, 187, 188, 191 Aristoxenus, 139 assent and true knowledge, 124 Assus, 83 astronomy, 19 ataraxia, 138 Athenian Assembly, 33, 44 Athens, 32, 54, 80, 82, 85, 88, 121, 125, 126, 152, 153 atomism, 25–26, 128, 131–132 Augusta Treverorum, 168, 169 Augustine of Hippo, Saint, 137, 159, 169, 171, 172, 173–186 Augustus, 164 Aurelius of Carthage (bishop), 178 B Babylonians, 18–19 Baptism, 172, 181 Basil of Caesarea, Saint, 157, 171 beauty as a form, 51, 74 becoming, 24–26, 73 behaviour and underlying state, 70, 72 being, 24–26, 27, 63, 64, 67, 73, 79, 94, 102–103, 105, 143, 149, 150, 190 Bible, 154, 160–161, 163, 167, 171, 180, 181, 190 Biblical Antiquities, 165 bipartite soul, 132 Boethius, Anicius Manlius Severinus, 159, 186–191 brotherhood, universal, 122 C Caesarea Mauretanensis, 178 Caligula, 164, 165 Callicles, 71 Callisthenes, 82 “Canon” (Epicurus), 130, 131 Cappadocia, theologians of, 157 Carneades, 136–137 Carthage, 176, 177 Cassiodorus, 186, 188, 190–191 Categories (Aristotle), 88, 92, 93, 159, 188, 191 categories, doctrine of, 92–93, 99, 149 Catholicism, 171, 172–173, 175 causality, 124, 128, 131–132 causation, 95, 101–102 Cave, 76 Chaerephon, 34 Chalcis, 80, 88 Chaldean Oracles, 142, 151 Charmides, 52, 70 Charmides (Plato), 70 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 191 199 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Chopinel, Jean (Jean de Meun), 191 Christ, 48–50, 170, 188 Christianity and Boethius, 186–191 influence of Platonism, 154–159, 175 influence of Pythagoreanism, 141 influence of Socrates, 47–50 rivalry of Stoicism, 127 rivalry with Neoplatonism, 149, 151, 152, 153 and St. Ambrose, 168–173 and St. Augustine, 173–186 Christian Platonists, 154–159, 190 Chrysippus of Soli, 124–125, 126 church-state relations, 169, 172 Cicero, Marcus Tullius, 126, 137, 171, 183, 187 citizenship, world, 122, 126–127, 129 City of God (Augustine), 173, 179, 181–183 City of Man, 182–183 city-states, Greek, 17, 59, 75, 77, 82, 114, 115, 116, 120, 122 Cleanthes of Assos, 124, 125 Clement of Alexandria, 156 Clouds (Aristophanes), 32, 39–41 concepts of Epicureanism, 131 conceptual analysis, 50 Confessions (Augustine), 173, 179–181, 185, 186 conservation laws, 21 Consolation of Philosophy (Boethius), 159, 186, 188–189, 191 Constantine, 178 Constantinople, 156, 157, 189 Constitution of Athens, The, 114 constitutions of states, 114–117, 168 contemplation, 81, 105, 110, 111, 113–114 continuum, 96–99 Contra academicos (Augustine), 137 contradictories, 91 contraries, 91 corporealism, 124, 156 cosmic order, 121, 124 cosmologists, early, 18–24 cosmopolitanism, 124 cosmos, origin of, 19–20, 25 Council of Five Hundred, 33 courage, 71 Cratylus, 136 Cratylus (Plato), 70 criteria for judging reality, 137–138 Critias, 52, 70 Critias (Plato), 79 Crito (Plato), 70 Croton, 28 Cynicism, 45, 47, 123, 165, 166 Cyrenaics, 45 D Damascius, 152, 153 Dante Alighieri, 119, 190 De Anima (Aristotle), 106, 108 death, fear of, 134–135 De bono mortis (Ambrose), 171 De civitate Dei contra paganos (Augustine), 182–183 200 Index De consolatione philosophiae (Boethius), 159, 186, 188–189, 191 De interpretatione (Aristotle), 88, 91, 93 De Isaac et anima (Ambrose), 171 Deists, 48 Delphi, 34, 37 Delphic oracle, 43 Demiurge, 79 democracy, 32, 44, 48, 50, 52, 53, 116, 168 Democritus, 25–26, 27, 129, 131 De Nabuthe (Ambrose), 172 De natura deorum (Cicero), 126, 137 De obitu Theodosii (Ambrose), 170 De obitu Valentiniani consolatio (Ambrose), 170 De officiis (Cicero), 126, 171 De officiis ministrorum (Ambrose), 171 Descartes, René, 106 desire, limitation of, 128 “Deus Creator omnium” (Ambrose), 172 dialogue form, 55–57, 81 dialogues of Plato, 67–79 Diaspora, 160, 163, 167 Diogenes of Sinope, 45 Dion, 53 Dionysius, Pseudo-, 157 Dionysius the Areopagite, 157 Dionysius the Elder, 53 Dionysius the Younger, 53 Diotima, 74 divine fire, 121, 124 divine nature, 122 Donatism, 178, 181, 185 double movement of outgoing and return, 143, 144, 150 doxa, 23 drama, 117–118 duty in Stoicism, 122, 124, 126, 129 E early (Socratic) dialogues of Plato, 67–73, 136 Ecclesia, 33 eclipse of Sun, prediction of, 19 eidos, 61, 82 eirôneia (Socratic irony), 36–39, 48 Elea, 22, 136 Eleaticism, 22, 78, 135–136 Elements of Theology (Proclus), 150 elenchos, 68–70 Elizabeth I (queen), 191 Empedocles of Acragas, 24, 94 emperors, Christian, 170–171, 178 Encheiridion (Epictetus), 127 England, Victorian, 49 Enneads (Plotinus), 144 enthousiasmos, 167 Epicharmus of Cos, 134 Epictetus, 45–47, 127 Epicurus and Epicureanism, 47, 120, 128–135, 137, 168 epistemology, 26–27, 126 Epistulae morales (Seneca), 127 epochē, 137 equality, 51 equilibrium of earth, sea, and fire, 23 201 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE forms (Platonic), 51, 73, 74, 77, 79, 82–83, 124, 145 forms, theory of, 60–67, 77, 78, 82 forms according to Aristotle, 100–101 Foucault, Michel, 50 France, 182 free will, 124–125, 168, 185, 189 Frege, Gottlob, 50 friendship in Epicureanism, 128, 129, 130, 133 function of human beings, 110–111 fundamental stuffs (entities), 62–64 equilibrium of forces, law of universal, 128, 132 eristics, 70 eros (erotic love), 74, 76 error in Epicureanism, 131 Essenes, 163–164 ethics, 51–52, 109–114, 123, 124, 125, 128–129, 132–133 “Ethics” (Epicurus), 130 eudaimonia, 57, 110 Eudemian Ethics (Aristotle), 109, 110, 114 Eudemus (Aristotle), 81 Eudoxus of Cnidus, 54, 129 Euthydemus (Plato), 70 Euthyphro (Plato), 67, 71 everything contained in everything, 24–25, 26 evil, 125, 135, 146, 147, 189 evolution of culture theory, 26 exemplars, perfect, 64–65 Expositio evangelii secundum Lucam (Ambrose), 172 expressions, simple and complex, 92 extension, spacial, 96–97 G F faith, religious, 156, 159, 160, 168, 180, 189, 190 fate, 121, 122, 124–125 fear of death and gods, 134–135 fire, divine, 121, 124 fire as origin of all things, 23 first philosophy, 94, 102–105 Flaccus, Aulus Avillus, 165 forces of love and hate, 24 Garden, The, of Epicurus, 129 Gaul(s), 168, 169, 179, 182 Gaza, 152 Genesis, 164, 166, 180, 183 genos, 61 genus-species interpretation of forms, 65–67, 77–79 Gibbon, Edward, 189 Glaucon, 52, 56 Gnosticism, 142, 168 God of Aristotle, 81, 104–105, 108, 114 Judeo-Christian, 48, 156, 157, 163, 164, 166, 167, 168, 179, 180, 182, 184–185, 186, 188 of Xenophanes, 22 gods, pagan, 22, 37, 40, 43, 52, 71, 79, 128, 134, 135, 150, 151, 182 202 Index Good, the, 51, 54, 60, 75, 76, 77, 143, 144–148, 189 good life, 51–52, 55–56, 58, 77, 109–110, 112 Gorgias (Plato), 45, 71 Gorgias of Leontini, 30–31, 136 Gospels, 173 government, 114–117, 168, 182 Greece, 17, 53, 80, 84, 135 Greek city-states, 17, 59, 75, 77, 82, 114, 115, 116, 120, 122 Greek philosophy, early, 17–31 Gregory of Nazianzus, 157 Gregory of Nyssa, 157 guardians of city-states, 59, 75 gymnasiums, Greek, 162 H happiness, 45, 47, 57–58, 109–111, 124, 130, 134, 136, 186 harmonics, mathematical, 76, 79 health, 79 Hecaton, 126 Hegel, G. W. F., 48 Hellenism and Hellenistic Age, 120, 121–125, 135, 139, 162, 187–188 henads, 150 Heracleitus of Ephesus, 23, 136 Heraclius, 153 heresy, Arian, 170, 172, 188 Hermias (father of Ammonius), 152 Hermias (friend of Aristotle), 83, 84 Hexaëmeron (Ambrose), 171 Hieroi Logoi, 138 Hippasus of Metapontum, 28–29 Hippias Minor (Plato), 71 Hippo, 173, 176, 177, 178 History of Animals, The (Aristotle), 83 humanity, 168 hylozoists, 21–22 hymns of Saint Ambrose, 172 Hymn to Zeus (Cleanthes), 124 Hypothetica (Philo), 165 I Iamblichus of Chalcis, 141, 149–150, 151, 152 idea, 61, 82 immobile being philosophy, 23, 27 immortality, 74, 114, 134, 166 incontinence, 113 indefinite dyad, 139 infinity, 128, 132 Institutiones of Boethius, 191 intellect, 145–148, 149, 150 intellectual discipline, 87 intellectual virtues, 111–114 intemperance, 113 Ion (Plato), 71 Isagoge (Porphyry), 159, 188 isonomy, 132 Italy, 22, 28, 53, 136, 138, 171, 179, 181, 186 J Jasper, Karl, 50 Jean de Meun, 191 Jerome, Saint, 165–166 Jerusalem, 160, 163, 182 203 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Jewish law, 163 Jewish Scriptures, 154 Jews of Alexandria, 160–164 John Philoponus, 153 Josephus, 160, 165 Jowett, Benjamin, 49 Judaism, Hellenistic, 160–168 Judeo-Christian paradigm, 192 Julian of Eclanum, 179 Julian the Apostate, 152 jurisprudence, Roman, 79 justice, 51, 59–60, 74–75, 122, 129, 168 Justin I (emperor), 189 Justinian, 152 Justin Martyr, 156 K Katēgoriai (Categories of Aristotle), 88, 92, 93, 159, 188, 191 katharsis, 118 Kierkegaard, Søren, 48 kinds, five greatest, 79 knowledge and Aristotle, 107, 108 in Epicureanism, 131 in Neoplatonism, 143 in Platonism, 51, 58, 70–78 in Skepticism, 136, 137, 138 and Socrates, 35–36, 40–42, 44, 47 in Stoicsm, 120, 121, 124, 125 L Labeo, Notker, 191 Laches (Plato), 71 Last Judgment, 183 late dialogues of Plato, 68, 77–79, 80 Latin Christianity, 173 law, Jewish, 163 law in Stoicism, 124, 126 law of universal equilibrium of forces, 128, 132 Laws (Plato), 77, 79 laws of conservation, 21 Letters (Plato), 53 letters, schematic, in logic, 90 Leucippus, 25, 129 library, first research, 119 Libri morales (Seneca), 127 life as phase in reality, 149 literary masterpieces (middle dialogues) of Plato, 68, 73–77 locus of spontaneous feeling, 107–108 logic, discipline of, 81–82, 88–94, 121, 123–124, 125, 126, 130, 192 Logos, 127, 167 love, 22, 24, 104, 148 divine, 151, 157, 167, 186 Epicurean, 130, 133 Platonic, 72, 74, 76, 77 Lyceum, 54, 85–88, 118, 119 lykoi, 85 Lysis (Plato), 72 M Macedonia, 80, 83 Madauros, 176 Magna Moralia (Aristotle), 109 man as measure of all things, 30 Manichaeism, 178, 185 Marcus Aurelius, 127 204 Index Marius Victorinus, 159 mathematics, 18, 132, 192 Aristotle, 90, 94, 102 Boethius, 186, 187 Plato, 52, 54, 60, 76, 79 pre-Socratics, 27, 29 matter, 99–100, 101, 166 Maximus at Trier, 170 Maximus Planudes, 191 Maximus the Confessor, 157–158 Meditations (Marcus Aurelius), 127 Megarians, 123, 124 Meletus, 43, 44 Memorabilia (Xenophon), 47 Menexenus (Plato), 72 Meno (Plato), 72 metaphysics, 51, 68, 73, 79, 94, 102–105, 149–152 Metaphysics (Aristotle), 82–83, 103–105 Metapontum, 28 metechei, 63 Metrodorus of Lampsacus, 134 Middle Ages, 159, 179, 183, 184, 190 middle dialogues of Plato, 68, 73–77 Middle Stoa, 125–127 Milan, 169, 170, 171, 172, 176, 181 Miletus, 17 Mill, John Stuart, 49 mind, passive and active, 108 mixture and decomposition, 24 Moderatus of Gades, 141 monarchy, 116 monistic vs. pluralistic theories, 18 Montaigne, Michel Eyquem de, 48 Moore, G. E., 50 moral psychology of Plato, 51–52 Mosaic constitution, 168 Moses, 154, 162 motion, 97–98, 103–104, 131–132 Mytilene, 83 N natural necessity, 131 natural philosophy, 94–102, 105 nature, importance in Stoicism, 121, 124, 125, 126–127 negative vs. positive, 23 Neoplatonism and Christianity, 157–159, 169, 171, 180, 186 defined, 141–144 later Neoplatonists, 142, 148–153 Plotinus, 141, 142, 144–148, 151, 152 Neo-Pythagoreanism, 141, 165, 166 Nero, 127 New Academy, 126 Newton, Isaac, 96 Nicaea, ecumenical councils of, 157 Nicias, 71 Nicomachean Ethics (Aristotle), 109, 110, 113–114 Nicomachus, 80 Nicomachus of Gerasa, 141, 187 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 48 nominalism, 191 nothing, existence of, 23, 25, 136 nothing comes into being nor passes away, 21, 22–23, 24 nous, 25, 145–148 205 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE numbers, significance of, 28–29, 166 O obligations to help, 130 Ode to Virtue (Aristotle), 83 Olybrius (emperor), 186 Olympiodorus, 153 On Alexander (Philo), 165 One, the, 77, 78, 139, 143, 144– 148, 149, 150 On Generation and Corruption (Aristotle), 94 On Ideas (Aristotle), 82 On Providence (Philo), 164 On the Contemplative Life (Philo), 163, 165 “On the Criterion, or Canon” (Epicurus), 131 On the Embassay to Gaius (Philo), 165 On the Eternity of the World (Philo), 164 On the Generation of Animals (Aristotle), 83 “On the Good” (Plato), 60 On the Heavens (Aristotle), 94 On the Parts of Animals (Aristotle), 83 On the Special Laws (Philo), 163, 164 order, cosmic, 121, 124 Organon (Aristotle), 88, 188 Origen, 144, 156, 157, 171 Orphism, 74, 139, 151 Ostrogoths, 186, 187 Outlines of Pyrrhonism (Sextus), 137 P paganism, 48, 141, 142, 149, 167, 170, 171, 172 attack on, 182–183 Neoplatonist theology, 150–153 pain in Epicureanism, 131, 133, 134 Palestine, 160, 163 Palestinian Hellenizers, 162 Panaetius of Rhodes, 125–126 pantheism, Stoic, 156 paradoxes of Zeno, 27 Parmenides (Plato), 52, 61, 65, 77, 78, 151 Parmenides of Elea, 22, 24, 27, 65, 78 participation, 63–64 particular propositions, 89 Paul, Saint, 154, 157, 163, 181 Paulinus, 172 Pavia, 186, 190 peace, 130, 136, 138, 183 Pelagius/Pelagians, 172, 178, 181, 185 Pentateuch, 164 perception, 24, 26–27, 121, 124, 137 perfect exemplars, 64–65 Pergamum, 122, 152 Pericles, 52, 72 Peri hermeneias (Aristotle), 188, 191 Peripatetics, 85, 139 Peri tou mē ontos ē peri physeōs (Gorgias), 30 Phaedo (Plato), 53, 65, 72, 74, 78 Phaedrus (Plato), 72, 76–77 206 Index Philebus (Plato), 53, 77, 79 Philip II (king), 82, 84 Philodemus, 135 Philo Judaeus, 154, 156, 160–168, 171 philosopher-king, 53 philosophy of mind, 105–108 physical theory, 124 physics, 94–102, 123, 124–125, 128, 129, 132 Physics (Aristotle), 94, 95, 97–98, 131 “Physics” (Epicurus), 130 piety, 35, 36, 43, 53, 57, 71 place according to Aristotle, 95–96 Plato and Platonism, 18, 24, 29, 32, 43, 48, 106, 123, 126 Christian Platonism, 154–159, 190 compared to Aristotle, 118–119 dialogue form, 55–57 early dialogues, 67–73, 136 influence on Aristotle, 80–83, 95 influence on Boethius, 187, 189–190 influence on Philo, 165–168 late dialogues, 68, 77–79, 80 Letters, 53 life of, 52–54 and love, 74, 76, 77 middle dialogues, 68, 73–77 Neoplatonism, 141–153 “On the Good,” 60 and St. Augustine, 180, 183 theory of forms, 60–67, 77, 78, 82–83, 166 virtue, 57–60 Platonic Theology (Proclus), 151 Plato’s Academy, 45, 47, 54, 80–83, 118, 123, 136–137, 139, 152 pleasures, 77, 113–114, 128–129, 130, 131, 133, 134 Plotinus, 141, 142, 144–148, 151, 152, 156, 159, 171, 172, 180 pluralistic vs. monist theories, 18 plurality of levels of being, 142 Plutarch, 150 Poetics (Aristotle), 117–118 poetry, 117–118 pogroms against Jews, 164 Polemon of Athens, 123 Politics (Aristotle), 114–117 polity, 116 Polycrates, 28 Popper, Karl, 50 Porphyry, 141, 144, 148–149, 150, 151, 156, 159, 180, 191 Poseidon, 52 Poseidonius of Rhodes, 125–126 positive vs. negative, 23 Posterior Analytics (Aristotle), 88 power over others, 31 practical sciences, 87 predestination, divine, 175, 185, 189 predication, two types of, 65–67, 78 Pre-Socratic philosophers, 17–31, 62–64 principle, ultimate, of Neoplatonism, 143 Prior Analytics (Aristotle), 88, 91, 93 problem of the continuum, 27 Proclus, 150–151, 152, 153, 157 207 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE producers of city-states, 59, 75 productive sciences, 87 propositions, 89, 91–94 propositional logic, 124 Pros dogmatikous (Sextus), 135 Protagoras (Plato), 36, 45, 58, 72–73 Protagoras of Abdera, 30, 136 Protestant Christianity, 175 Protrepticus (Aristotle), 81 Providence, 126–127, 166, 189 Psalms, 186 Pseudo-Dionysius, 157–158 psyche, 74 psychē par excellence, 132 psychology, 51–52, 94, 105, 132 Ptolemies, 164 pure being of forms, 60, 64–65, 67 Pyrrhon of Elis, and Pyrrhonism, 135, 136, 137–138 Pythagoras of Samos, and Pythagoreanism, 28–29, 53, 77, 79, 138–141 R Raphael, 54 rationality, 121 rational soul, 106, 110, 111 real definitions of virtues, 58, 68, 76 realism, philosophical, 149–150, 191 reality, 26–27, 30, 76, 136, 138, 149–152, 192 reality as river analogy, 23–24 reason as all controlling factor in life, 35 and Aristotle, 107–108, 111, 113 divine, 127 fiery, 125 as model for human existence, 121, 124, 129 as a part of soul, 52, 59, 75 recollection theory of learning (knowledge), 72, 74 Reconsiderations (Augustine), 183–184 redemption, 180 reincarnation, 28 Relativism, 30–31 religion, philosophy as, 148 Renaissance, 48 renewal, 124 repentance, 168 Republic (Plato), 37, 52, 53, 58–60, 65, 74–75, 77, 78, 79, 183 Rhetoric (Aristotle), 117 rhetoric, art of, defined, 177 Rhetoric to Alexander, 84 Rhodes, 125, 126 river, life as, 23–24 rolling around between being and not-being, 63, 67 Roman jurisprudence, 79 Roman legions, 122 Roman Stoicism, 45–47, 125–127 Rome, 122, 125, 126, 139, 169, 176, 177, 181, 182, 183, 189 rulers of city-states, 59, 75, 76, 116 Russell, Bertrand, 50 S San Pietro, church of, 190 Scholasticism, medieval, 189, 191 School of Athens (Raphael), 54 208 Index science, natural, Epicurus on, 130 sciences, Aristotle’s three kinds of, 87 sea as origin of life, 20–21 seeking the universal, 74 self-preservation, 125 self-reflection, resistance to, 41–44 Seneca, Lucius, 127 senses, perception by, 24, 26–27, 107–108, 131, 132, 137 sensible particulars, 62–64 Septuagint, 160–161 sermons of St. Ambrose, 171, 172 Seventh Letter (Plato), 53 Seven Wise Men (Sophoi), 18 Sextus Empiricus, 135, 137–138 sexuality, views of St. Augustine on, 181, 185 Simonides of Ceos, 73 Simplicius, 153 sin, 180, 185, 186 Skepticism, 30–31, 45, 47, 48, 68–70, 124, 135–138 slavery, Aristotle on, 116 sober intoxication, 168 Socrates hatred of, 39–44 influence on Plato, 51, 52–53, 56, 57–59, 67 introduced, 18, 32 legacy of, 44–50, 121, 123 life and personality, 33–39 in Plato’s early dialogues, 68–73, 136 in Plato’s late dialogues, 65, 78 in Plato’s middle dialogues, 73–77 Socratic dialogues, 67–73 Socratic method of questioning, 41–42, 47, 192 Socratic works of Plato, 53 Soliloquies (Augustine), 184 solipsism, 185 Solon, 52 Sophist (Plato), 65, 77, 78, 93 Sophistical Refutations (Aristotle), 81–82, 88 Sophists, 18, 30–31, 41, 42, 43, 71, 72–73, 78, 136 soul and Aristotle, 81, 106–108, 110, 111 in Christianity, 180, 184–185 and Epicurus, 132 and Philo, 168 and Plato, 51–52, 58–59, 74, 76, 81, 139, 146 and Plotinus, 145–148, 150, 151 in Stoic corporealism, 156 space, empty and filled, 25 Spain, 179, 182 Speusippus, 83 spirit, as part of soul (Plato), 52, 59, 75 spiritualism, extreme, of Porphyry, 149 spontaneous feeling, locus of, 107–108 states (Greek city-states), 17, 59, 75, 77, 82, 114, 115, 116, 120, 122 Statesman (Plato), 77, 79 Stephanus, 153 Stoa Poikile, 123 209 Ancient Philosophy: From 600 BCE to 500 CE Stoicism, 137, 142 early Greek, 122–125 in Jewish and Christian philosophy, 154, 156, 165–166 later Roman, 45, 47, 48, 68–70, 125–127 nature and scope, 120–122 Strauss, Leo, 50 substantial forms, 100–101, 102 success in life, 31 suffering, 147 Sun, 76 super-exemplification view of forms, 64–65, 78 survival of the fittest, 24 syllogisms, 88–91, 112, 188 Symmachus, Quintus Aurelius, 170 Symmachus, Quintus Aurelius Memmius, 187 Symposium (Plato), 35, 38, 65, 74, 76, 78, 166, 167 Syracuse, 53 Syrianus, 150, 152 T Tagaste, Numidia, 173, 175, 176 Talmud, 163 Tarentum, 138 technical studies of Plato, 68, 77–79 temperance, 111, 113, 129 terms, doctrine of, 93–94 Tetrapharmacon (Epicurus), 135 Thales, 18–19, 20, 21 That Every Good Man Is Free (Philo), 164 Theaetetus, 54, 78 theatre, Greek, 162 Theodoric, 186, 187, 188, 189 Theodosius, 170 theology, 94, 103, 105, 192 Christian, 157, 159, 160, 171, 186, 192 Jewish, 165–168 Neoplatonist, 150–153 Theophrastus, 88 theorems, mathematical, 27 theoretical sciences, 87, 94 theory of cyclic returns, 132 theory of evolution of culture, 26 theory of forms, 60–67, 77, 78, 82–83, 117–118, 166 theory of knowledge (epistemology), 26–27 Therapeutae, 163, 165 Thessalonica, 170 theurgy, 151–152 thinking of thinking, 105 Thirty Tyrants, 52 Thrasymachus (in Republic), 37–38 Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, 31 Thucydides, 72 Timaeus (Plato), 77, 79, 95, 151, 166 time, 97, 98–99 Topics (Aristotle), 81, 88 tragedy (drama), 118 transmigration, 28 transmutations, 21 triad structure of reality, 149, 150 Trinitarian controversies, 157 Trinity, 159, 188 tripartite soul, 139 tyranny, 116 210 Index U W unity, 23, 36, 60, 64, 65, 67, 77, 121–122, 143, 147, 188 universal, seeking the, 74 universals, 64, 100, 108, 191 universe, 94–95, 128, 142–143, 145–148, 150 unmoved mover, 103–105 usury, Aristotle on, 116–117 utilitarianism, 49, 112, 118 utility, principle of, 128 water as origin of all things, 19 weakness of will, 35 Western philosophy, origins of, 17–18 wisdom, 56, 57, 58, 73, 111–113, 141, 154, 181, 186 withdrawal in Epicureanism, 129, 133 writing, Plato on value of, 56, 77 V Valentinian II, 170 Victorian England, 49 Victorinus, Gaius Marius, 159 virginity, views of Ambrose on, 172 virtues, 35–36, 45–47, 57–60, 72–73, 110–114, 121–122, 129–130, 168, 172, 189 Vivarium, monastery at, 190 Vulgate Bible, 190 X Xenocrates of Chalcedon, 123 Xenophanes of Colophon, 22, 136 Xenophon, 32, 36, 43, 47, 48 Z Zeno of Citium, 45, 123, 124 Zeno of Elea, 27 zoological studies of Aristotle, 83–84 211 

Published in 2011 by Britannica Educational Publishing (a trademark of Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.) in association with Rosen Educational Services, LLC 29 East 21st Street, New York, NY 10010. Copyright © 2011 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, and the Thistle logo are registered trademarks of Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved. Rosen Educational Services materials copyright © 2011 Rosen Educational Services, LLC. All rights reserved. Distributed exclusively by Rosen Educational Services. For a listing of additional Britannica Educational Publishing titles, call toll free (800) 237-9932. First Edition Britannica Educational Publishing Michael I. Levy: Executive Editor J.E. Luebering: Senior Manager Marilyn L. Barton: Senior Coordinator, Production Control Steven Bosco: Director, Editorial Technologies Lisa S. Braucher: Senior Producer and Data Editor Yvette Charboneau: Senior Copy Editor Kathy Nakamura: Manager, Media Acquisition Brian Duignan: Senior Editor, Philosophy and Religion Rosen Educational Services Heather M. Moore Niver: Rosen Editor Nelson Sá: Art Director Cindy Reiman: Photography Manager Matthew Cauli: Designer, Cover Design Introduction by Brian Duignan Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Modern philosophy : from 1500 CE to the present / edited by Brian Duignan.—1st ed. p. cm. -- (The history of philosophy) “In association with Britannica Educational Publishing, Rosen Educational Services.” Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-61530-245-1 (eBook) 1. Philosophy, Modern. I. Duignan, Brian. B791.M655 2011 190—dc22 2010011553 On the cover: Preeminent Western philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche enriched modern philosophy, making it more pertinent than ever. Hulton Archive/Getty Images On page 18: Sir Isaac Newton was the paramount figure of the scientific revolution of the 17th century. Photos.com Contents Introduction 8 Chapter 1: Philosophy in the Renaissance 19 The Humanistic Background 22 The Ideal of Humanitas 25 Basic Principles and Attitudes 28 Humanist Themes in Renaissance Thought 34 Northern Humanism 42 Humanism and Philosophy 44 Political Philosophy 46 Philosophy of Nature 48 Giovanni Pico della Mirandola 53 Niccolò Machiavelli 54 Early Life and Political Career 55 Writings 59 Jean Bodin 66 Giordano Bruno 67 Early Life 68 Works 70 Final Years 72 Chapter 2: Early Modern Philosophy 75 The Empiricism of Francis Bacon 75 Bacon’s Scheme 76 The Idols of the Mind 79 The New Method 81 The Materialism of Thomas Hobbes 82 Hobbes’s System 84 Political Philosophy 85 The Rationalism of René Descartes 90 Descartes’s System 92 Meditations 94 56 88 91 101 129 161 The Rationalism of Benedict de Spinoza 97 The Rationalism of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz 100 Chapter 3: Philosophy in the Enlightenment 103 Sources and Development of Enlightenment Thought 103 Classical British Empiricism 107 John Locke 109 George Berkeley 112 David Hume 116 Nonepistemological Movements 123 Materialism and Scientific Discovery 124 Social and Political Philosophy 125 Immanuel Kant 138 Chapter 4: The 19th Century 143 German Idealism 146 Johann Gottlieb Fichte 147 Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel 148 Social and Political Theory 152 The Positivism of Auguste Comte 153 The Utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill 156 Karl Marx 160 Independent and Irrationalist Movements 164 Arthur Schopenhauer 166 Søren Kierkegaard 167 Friedrich Nietzsche 168 Wilhelm Dilthey and Henri Bergson 173 Chapter 5: Contemporary Philosophy 176 John Dewey and Alfred North Whitehead 176 Marxist Thought 178 Vladimir Ilich Lenin 179 György Lukács and Antonio Gramsci 181 Critical Theory 183 Non-Marxist Political Philosophy 186 Hannah Arendt 187 John Rawls 189 Critiques of Philosophical Liberalism 192 Analytic Philosophy 194 The Formalist Tradition 195 The Informalist Tradition 200 Continental Philosophy 203 The Phenomenology of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger 203 The Existentialism of Karl Jaspers and Jean-Paul Sartre 206 Continental Philosophy Since the 1950s 208 The Relevance of Contemporary Philosophy 212 177 188 Glossary 214 Bibliogrphy 216 Index 218 193 Introduction Introduction D uring the 14th century, European society suffered an unprecedented series of natural and humanmade disasters, including famine, the Black Death, and numerous devastating and expensive wars. By the end of the century, the continent was a great deal poorer and much less populous than it had been in 1300. According to some historians, these calamities were the death knell of the Middle Ages: the drastic changes they brought about hastened the disappearance of characteristically medieval forms of political authority and social organization. More important, they also served to undermine confidence among late-medieval thinkers in dogmatic Christian and Aristotelian doctrines concerning the principles of the natural world, the proper structure and governance of human society, and the capacities and moral worth of human beings. Other scholars see the 14th century as merely a temporary interruption in processes of social and intellectual transformation that had begun several centuries earlier and would have continued as they did whether or not the disasters of the period had ever occurred. However this may be, it is clear that by the late- 15th century European society and intellectual culture had changed in significant ways. The national monarchies had completely eclipsed the power of the German “Holy Roman Empire,” whose leader had been crowned by the pope since the early Middle Ages as the supreme secular authority on earth. In Italy, independent city-states such as Florence, Venice, and Milan were economically and militarily powerful, and In 1664 René Descartes published Principles of Philosophy, a compilation of his physics and metaphysics. Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 9 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present elsewhere the growth of commerce and manufacturing further increased the importance of cities and the merchant classes at the expense of the landed nobility. This period was also marked by the rise of humanism, an intellectual movement that emphasized the dignity of the human individual. The humanists were responsible for the rediscovery and translation of a wealth of ancient Greek and Roman literary and philosophical texts, including the complete dialogues of Plato. They revered the “ancients,” as they called the Greeks and Romans, for their intellectual rigour and integrity and for the freedom with which they pursued philosophical and scientific problems. In the latter respect ancient philosophers, in the estimation of the humanists, were far superior to the academic philosophers of previous centuries, the “Schoolmen” or Scholastics,” who had been bound in their investigations to support, or at least not to contradict, the theology of the Roman Catholic Church. Indeed, the humanists regarded the Middle Ages (a term they invented) as a long period during which significant philosophical and literary activity had simply ceased. They understood themselves as the inheritors and standardbearers of Classical ideals against stultifying medieval orthodoxies. The term Renaissance was the somewhat judgmental invention of humanist sympathizers of the 19th century; nevertheless, it aptly conveys the intellectual renewal and reawakening that the humanists brought about. Thus the humanists self-consciously took up where the ancients had left off. In philosophy, this is apparent not only in the new influence of ancient philosophical doctrines such as atomism and Stoicism but also in the revival of whole areas of philosophy that had been well developed in ancient times but relatively neglected during the Middle Ages—particularly political philosophy, epistemology (the study of knowledge), and ethics. 10 Introduction Modern Western philosophy conventionally begins in about 1500 and continues to the present day. This span of more than 500 years comprises four or five smaller periods: the Renaissance (1500–1600), the early modern period (1600–1700), the modern period (1700–1900)—sometimes subdivided into the Enlightenment (1700–1800) and the 19th century—and the contemporary period (1900–present). Starting in the Renaissance, and especially in the 17th and early 18th centuries, political philosophy was developed in sophisticated ways—and from a purely secular perspective—to address the responsibilities of rulers and the justification of political authority in the new nationstates. The first major figure in this field was the Florentine statesman Niccòlo Machiavelli (1469–1527). He is often called the first political scientist because his analysis of statecraft and governance was realistic rather than idealistic. It took for granted the ways in which states (in his case, the city-states of Italy) and humans actually behave and prescribed on that basis certain guidelines that rulers should follow to acquire or maintain political power. Not since Aristotle had a philosopher considered states as they really are rather than as they ought to be. Not surprisingly, Machiavelli’s frank advice, set forth in Il Principe (The Prince) and other works, was regarded by most readers as an endorsement of immorality and evil in the political sphere. The philosophical and empirical value of his work remained unrecognized for centuries. Subsequent political philosophy in the early modern period was concerned with justifying the state and setting limits (however few) to the legitimate powers of the monarch or other ruler. In England, Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) proposed a hypothetical “state of nature,” assumed to precede the establishment of any political authority, in which the necessity of survival compelled 11 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present each individual to be in constant violent conflict with every other. Human life was thus “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” To safeguard their lives, individuals entered into a “social contract” in which each agreed to surrender his natural right to govern himself to a sovereign authority on the condition that every other did the same. The sovereign, what Hobbes called the “Leviathan,” would ensure peace and order by punishing those who committed violent acts. In essence, then, the absolute power of actual sovereigns is justified because without it human society would descend into an anarchic state of nature, a “war of all against all.” Later social-contract theorists, most importantly John Locke (1632–1704) in England and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78) in France, also saw the state as resulting from an agreement among individuals—or, in Rousseau’s version, small groups of individuals—in a state of nature. For Locke, individuals are subject to a natural law of equality and have natural rights to life, liberty, and property; the contract creates a state with the power to protect these rights. More important, for Locke this function is the sole justification of the state’s existence. It follows that citizens have a right of revolution against any state that fails to protect their rights. This view is the essence of the doctrine of political liberalism, which is embodied in the American Declaration of Independence (1776) as well as the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789). Rousseau differed from Hobbes and Locke in holding that in the state of nature people were happy. With the gradual development of private property came inequality, envy, and strife. The state was accordingly created, by an essentially false social contract, by groups of rich individuals to protect their property and privileges against the poor. A true social contract, according to 12 Introduction Rousseau, would ensure the liberty and equality of all by enforcing the “general will” of all moral individuals. After nearly two centuries, during which political philosophy was dominated by utilitarianism, the American political philosopher John Rawls employed the notion of a social contract as the basis of a new form of political liberalism. According to Rawls, fundamental political rights and freedoms, as well as minimal levels of social and economic equality, are guaranteed by political principles that people would agree to from behind a “veil of ignorance,” where by hypothesis they do not know what positions in society they will occupy. The modern development of epistemology was motivated by the rediscovery during the Renaissance of the historical works of Sextus Empiricus (flourished 3rd century CE), which summarized the Skeptical doctrines of the Hellenistic philosopher Pyrrhon of Elis (360–272 BCE) and his followers. The effort to solve the intractable problems of ancient Skepticism became one of the dominant themes of European philosophy. Eventually, two broad approaches developed, one influenced by Aristotle’s emphasis on empirical observation and Sir Francis Bacon’s (1561–1626) conception of human knowledge as founded upon the proper application of scientific method; the other by the mathematical metaphysics of Pythagoras and Plato and the spectacular successes of mathematical physics in the 16th and 17th centuries. According to empiricists, all (or nearly all) human knowledge is a posteriori, or derived from experience; according to rationalists, at least some human knowledge is a priori, or obtainable independently of experience. The task of epistemology, therefore, is to justify knowledge claims either by showing how their elements (e.g., concepts) are connected to something real in the outside world 13 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present (empiricism) or by showing how knowledge claims are ultimately inferable from a set of basic propositions that are innate or otherwise knowable by the mind alone (rationalism). The most influential form of rationalism was that of René Descartes (1596–1650), who proposed to reconstruct the entire edifice of human knowledge on the foundation of the a priori proposition that for as long as he thinks, he must exist. (This proposition is often misleadingly interpreted as an inference: “I think, therefore I am.” Strictly speaking, the radical skeptical position from which Descartes began would not have allowed him to be certain that this inference was carried out correctly.) The first well-developed empiricist theory of knowledge was that of Locke. Unfortunately, the basic empiricist assumption that all knowledge derives from experience, combined with gradually more rigorous analyses of what experience consists in, led to more consistent but also more extreme forms of empiricism in the philosophies of George Berkeley (1685–1753) and David Hume (1711–76). Hume, in fact, concluded that knowledge of a real connection between cause and effect is impossible and that therefore all scientific theories are rationally unfounded. Except for a brief period in the late 19th century, empiricism remained the dominant position in British and, later, American philosophy through the end of the 20th century. After a period of some 300 years, rationalism enjoyed a revival in the mid-20th century in the wake of scientific research on the innate mental structures that allow young children to learn new languages quickly and without apparent effort. The gulf between rationalism and empiricism was bridged by the philosophy of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804). Kant argued that the common mistake of the two schools lay in the way the problem of knowledge was conceived: the problem was not how the mind conforms itself to 14 Introduction objects but rather how objects conform themselves to the mind. A priori knowledge of broad features of the empirical world (such as the existence of causal relations) is possible because such features are part of the structure of the mind itself. Kant’s philosophy became the foundation of later German idealism, in which the mind, self, or “Spirit” encompassed many more features of reality than Kant would have allowed, gradually blurring and eventually erasing the distinction between subject and object, knower and known. Kant’s epistemology, recast in logical and linguistic terms, enjoyed a revival in the mid-20th century and remains an influential position in present-day discussions. Although some philosophers of the Middle Ages made notable contributions to ethics, the field did not recover its ancient range and vitality until the rediscovery of Stoic and Epicurean texts during the Renaissance. Stoicism, which conceived of virtue and the human good in intellectual terms and emphasized a cultivated indifference to the travails of ordinary life, profoundly influenced the ethical views of many Renaissance and early modern philosophers, including Benedict de Spinoza (1632–77). The utilitarian ethics of Epicurus, who held that the only good is pleasure and the only evil pain, became the basis of utilitarianism, a major theoretical position in normative ethics since the 17th century. In the late 18th century, the philosopher and social reformer Jeremy Bentham articulated a utilitarian ethics that was noteworthy for its great consistency and rigour; it was developed and refined by his student and friend John Stuart Mill (1806–73) and later by Henry Sidgwick (1838–1900). In the 18th century, a normative-ethical school later known as deontology opposed broadly utilitarian theories of conduct. According to deontology, the rightness or wrongness of an action depends solely on whether or not 15 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present it conforms to a given moral rule—its actual or likely consequences are irrelevant. The supreme exponent of deontological ethics was Kant, who held that an action is right only if it is universalizable (i.e., only if one can will without contradiction that it become a universal law, or a law that is followed by everyone). The field of normative ethics was dominated by utilitarian and deontological theories until the mid-20th century, when the ethical philosophy of Aristotle became the basis of a school known as virtue ethics. At about the same time, the interest of philosophers in real-world issues such as war and peace, abortion, and the human treatment of animals spurred the growth of the new field of applied ethics. Work in applied ethics inspired social activism, entered discussions and debates on public policy, and in general made ethical philosophy influential in practical affairs to an extent not seen since the American and French revolutions. In the pages of this book, the reader will be introduced to the greatest minds of modern Western philosophy. Their enormous contributions have made philosophy as it exists today richer, more historically informed, and more practically relevant than it has been in any period of its history. 16 17 CHAPTER 1 Philosophy in the Renaissance T he philosophy of a period arises as a response to social need, and the development of philosophy in the history of Western civilization since the Renaissance has, thus, reflected the process in which creative philosophers have responded to the unique challenges of each stage in the development of Western culture itself. The career of philosophy—how it views its tasks and functions, how it defines itself, the special methods it invents for the achievement of philosophical knowledge, the literary forms it adopts and uses, its conception of the scope of its subject matter, and its changing criteria of meaning and truth—hinges on the mode of its successive responses to the challenges of the social structure within which it arises. Thus, Western philosophy in the Middle Ages was primarily a Christian philosophy, complementing the divine revelation, reflecting the feudal order in its cosmology, and devoting itself in no small measure to the institutional tasks of the Roman Catholic Church. It was no accident that the major philosophical achievements of the 13th and 14th centuries were the work of churchmen who also happened to be professors of theology at the Universities of Oxford and Paris. The Renaissance of the late 15th and 16th centuries presented a different set of problems and therefore 19 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present The University of Oxford proved to be fertile ground for significant philosophical achievements. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 20 Philosophy in the Renaissance suggested different lines of philosophical endeavour. What is called the European Renaissance followed the introduction of three novel mechanical inventions from the East: gunpowder, block printing from movable type, and the compass. The first was used to explode the massive fortifications of the feudal order and thus became an agent of the new spirit of nationalism that threatened the rule of churchmen—and, indeed, the universalist emphasis of the church itself—with a competing secular power. The second, printing, widely propagated knowledge, secularized learning, reduced the intellectual monopoly of an ecclesiastical elite, and restored the literary and philosophical classics of Greece and Rome. The third, the compass, increased the safety and scope of navigation, produced the voyages of discovery that opened up the Western Hemisphere, and symbolized a new spirit of physical adventure and a new scientific interest in the structure of the natural world. Each invention, with its wider cultural consequences, presented new intellectual problems and novel philosophical tasks within a changing political and social environment. As the power of a single religious authority slowly eroded under the influence of the Protestant Reformation and as the prestige of the universal Latin language gave way to vernacular tongues, philosophers became less and less identified with their positions in the ecclesiastical hierarchy and more and more identified with their national origins. The works of Albertus Magnus (c. 1200–80), Thomas Aquinas (c. 1224–74), Bonaventure (c. 1217–74), and John Duns Scotus (1266–1308) were basically unrelated to the countries of their birth. The philosophy of Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) was directly related to Italian experience, however, and that of Francis Bacon (1561–1626) was English to the core, as was that of Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) in the early modern period. Likewise, 21 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present the thought of René Descartes (1596–1650) set the standard and tone of intellectual life in France for 200 years. Knowledge in the contemporary world is conventionally divided among the natural sciences, the social sciences, and the humanities. In the Renaissance, however, fields of learning had not yet become so sharply departmentalized. In fact, each division arose in the comprehensive and broadly inclusive area of philosophy. As the Renaissance mounted its revolt against the reign of religion and therefore reacted against the church, against authority, against Scholasticism, and against Aristotle (384–322 BCE), there was a sudden blossoming of interest in problems centring on humankind, civil society, and nature. These three areas corresponded exactly to the three dominant strands of Renaissance philosophy: humanism, political philosophy, and the philosophy of nature. THE HUMANISTIC BACKGROUND The term Middle Ages was coined by scholars in the 15th century to designate the interval between the downfall of the Classical world of Greece and Rome and its rediscovery at the beginning of their own century, a revival in which they felt they were participating. Indeed, the notion of a long period of cultural darkness had been expressed by Petrarch (1304–74) even earlier. Events during the last three centuries of the Middle Ages, particularly beginning in the 12th century, set in motion a series of social, political, and intellectual transformations that culminated in the Renaissance. These included the increasing failure of the Roman Catholic Church and the Holy Roman Empire to provide a stable and unifying framework for the organization of spiritual and material life, the rise in importance of city-states and national monarchies, the development 22 Philosophy in the Renaissance of national languages, and the breakup of the old feudal structures. Although the spirit of the Renaissance ultimately took many forms, it was expressed earliest by the intellectual movement called humanism. Humanism was initiated by secular men of letters rather than by the scholar-clerics who had dominated medieval intellectual life and had developed the Scholastic philosophy. Humanism began and achieved fruition first in Italy. Its predecessors were men like Dante (1265–1321) and Petrarch, and its chief protagonists included Gianozzo Manetti (1396–1459), Leonardo Bruni (c. 1370–1444), Marsilio Ficino (1433–99), Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–94), Lorenzo Valla (1407–57), and Coluccio Salutati (1331–1406). The fall of Constantinople in 1453 provided humanism with a major boost, for many eastern scholars fled to Italy, bringing with them important books and manuscripts and a tradition of Greek scholarship. Humanism had several significant features. First, it took human nature in all of its various manifestations and achievements as its subject. Second, it stressed the unity and compatibility of the truth found in all philosophical and theological schools and systems, a doctrine known as syncretism. Third, it emphasized the dignity of human beings. In place of the medieval ideal of a life of penance as the highest and noblest form of human activity, the humanists looked to the struggle of creation and the attempt to exert mastery over nature. Finally, humanism looked forward to a rebirth of a lost human spirit and wisdom. In the course of striving to recover it, however, the humanists assisted in the consolidation of a new spiritual and intellectual outlook and in the development of a new body of knowledge. The effect of humanism was to help people break free from the mental strictures imposed by religious orthodoxy, to inspire free inquiry and criticism, 23 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Much to his chagrin, the work of Desiderius Erasmus helped spark the Reformation. Kean Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 24 Philosophy in the Renaissance and to inspire a new confidence in the possibilities of human thought and creations. From Italy the new humanist spirit and the Renaissance it engendered spread north to all parts of Europe, aided by the invention of printing, which allowed the explosive growth of literacy and the greater availability of Classical texts. Foremost among northern humanists was Desiderius Erasmus (1469–1536), whose Praise of Folly (1509) epitomized the moral essence of humanism in its insistence on heartfelt goodness as opposed to formalistic piety. The intellectual stimulation provided by humanists helped spark the Reformation, from which, however, many humanists, including Erasmus, recoiled. By the end of the 16th century, the battle of Reformation and Counter-Reformation had commanded much of Europe’s energy and attention, while the intellectual life was poised on the brink of the Enlightenment. The Ideal of Humanitas The history of the term humanism is complex but enlightening. It was first employed (as humanismus) by 19th-century German scholars to designate the Renaissance emphasis on classical studies in education. These studies were pursued and endorsed by educators known, as early as the late 15th century, as umanisti—that is, professors or students of Classical literature. The word umanisti derives from the studia humanitatis, a course of classical studies that, in the early 15th century, consisted of grammar, poetry, rhetoric, history, and moral philosophy. The studia humanitatis were held to be the equivalent of the Greek paideia. Their name was itself based on the Latin humanitas, an educational and political ideal that was the intellectual basis of the entire movement. Renaissance humanism in all its forms defined itself 25 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present in its straining toward this ideal. No discussion of humanism, therefore, can have validity without an understanding of humanitas. Humanitas meant the development of human virtue, in all its forms, to its fullest extent. The term thus implied not only such qualities as are associated with the modern word humanity—understanding, benevolence, compassion, mercy—but also more aggressive characteristics such as fortitude, judgment, prudence, eloquence, and even love of honour. Consequently, the possessor of humanitas could not be merely a sedentary and isolated philosopher or man of letters but was of necessity a participant in active life. Just as action without insight was held to be aimless and barbaric, insight without action was rejected as barren and imperfect. Humanitas called for a fine balance of action and contemplation, a balance born not of compromise but of complementarity. The goal of such fulfilled and balanced virtue was political, in the broadest sense of the word. The purview of Renaissance humanism included not only the education of the young but also the guidance of adults (including rulers) via philosophical poetry and strategic rhetoric. It included not only realistic social criticism but also utopian hypotheses, not only painstaking reassessments of history but also bold reshapings of the future. In short, humanism called for the comprehensive reform of culture, the transfiguration of what humanists termed the passive and ignorant society of the “dark” ages into a new order that would reflect and encourage the grandest human potentialities. Humanism had an evangelical dimension: it sought to project humanitas from the individual into the state at large. The wellspring of humanitas was Classical literature. Greek and Roman thought, available in a flood of rediscovered or newly translated manuscripts, provided humanism 26 Philosophy in the Renaissance with much of its basic structure and method. For Renaissance humanists, there was nothing dated or outworn about the writings of Plato (c. 428–348 BCE), Cicero (106–43 BCE), or Livy (59/64 BCE–17 CE). Compared with the typical productions of medieval Christianity, these pagan works had a fresh, radical, almost avant-garde tonality. Indeed, recovering the classics was to humanism tantamount to recovering reality. Classical philosophy, rhetoric, and history were seen as models of proper method—efforts to come to terms, systematically and without preconceptions of any kind, with perceived experience. Moreover, Classical thought considered ethics qua ethics, politics qua politics: it lacked the inhibiting dualism occasioned in medieval thought by the often-conflicting demands of secularism and Christian spirituality. Classical virtue, in examples of which the literature abounded, was not an abstract essence but a quality that could be tested in the forum or on the battlefield. Finally, Classical literature was rich in eloquence. In particular (because humanists were normally better at Latin than they were at Greek), Cicero was considered to be the pattern of refined and copious discourse. In eloquence humanists found far more than an exclusively aesthetic quality. As an effective means of moving leaders or fellow citizens toward one political course or another, eloquence was akin to pure power. Humanists cultivated rhetoric, consequently, as the medium through which all other virtues could be communicated and fulfilled. Humanism, then, may be accurately defined as that Renaissance movement that had as its central focus the ideal of humanitas. The narrower definition of the Italian term umanisti notwithstanding, all the Renaissance writers who cultivated humanitas, and all their direct “descendants,” may be correctly termed humanists. 27 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Basic Principles and Attitudes Underlying the early expressions of humanism were principles and attitudes that gave the movement a unique character and would shape its future development. Classicism Early humanists returned to the classics less with nostalgia or awe than with a sense of deep familiarity, an impression of having been brought newly into contact with expressions of an intrinsic and permanent human reality. Petrarch dramatized his feeling of intimacy with the classics by writing “letters” to Cicero and Livy. Salutati remarked with pleasure that possession of a copy of Cicero’s letters would make it possible for him to talk with Cicero. Machiavelli would later immortalize this experience in a letter that described his own reading habits in ritualistic terms: Evenings I return home and enter my study; and at its entrance I take off my everyday clothes, full of mud and dust, and don royal and courtly garments; decorously reattired, I enter into the ancient sessions of ancient men. Received amicably by them, I partake of such food as is mine only and for which I was born. There, without shame, I speak with them and ask them about the reason for their actions; and they in their humanity respond to me. Machiavelli’s term umanità (“humanity”), meaning more than simply kindness, is a direct translation of the Latin humanitas. In addition to implying that he shared with the ancients a sovereign wisdom of human affairs, Machiavelli also describes that theory of reading as an active, and even aggressive, pursuit common among humanists. Possessing a text and understanding its words 28 Philosophy in the Renaissance were insufficient. Analytic ability and a questioning attitude were essential before a reader could truly enter the councils of the great. These councils, moreover, were not merely serious and ennobling. They held secrets available only to the astute, secrets the knowledge of which could transform life from a chaotic miscellany into a crucially heroic experience. Classical thought offered insight into the heart of things. In addition, the classics suggested methods by which, once known, human reality could be transformed from an accident of history into an artifact of will. Antiquity was rich in examples—actual or poetic—of epic action, victorious eloquence, and applied understanding. Carefully studied and well employed, Classical rhetoric could implement enlightened policy, while Classical poetics could carry enlightenment into the very souls of human beings. In a manner that might seem paradoxical to more modern minds, humanists associated Classicism with the future. Realism Early humanists shared in large part a realism that rejected traditional assumptions and aimed instead at the objective analysis of perceived experience. To humanism is owed the rise of modern social science, which emerged not as an academic discipline but rather as a practical instrument of social self-inquiry. Humanists avidly read history, taught it to their young, and, perhaps most important, wrote it themselves. They were confident that proper historical method, by extending across time their grasp of human reality, would enhance their active role in the present. For Machiavelli, who avowed to present people as they were and not as they ought to be, history would become the basis of a new political science. Similarly, direct experience took precedence over traditional wisdom. Francesco Guicciardini (1483–1540) later echoed the 29 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present dictum of Leon Battista Alberti (1404–72), that an essential form of wisdom could be found only “at the public marketplace, in the theatre, and in people’s homes”: I, for my part, know no greater pleasure than listening to an old man of uncommon prudence speaking of public and political matters that he has not learnt from books of philosophers but from experience and action; for the latter are the only genuine methods of learning anything. Renaissance realism also involved the unblinking examination of human uncertainty, folly, and immorality. Petrarch’s honest investigation of his own doubts and mixed motives is born of the same impulse that led Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–75) to conduct in the Decameron (1348–53) an encyclopaedic survey of human vices and disorders. Similarly critical treatments of society from a humanistic perspective would be produced later by Erasmus, Thomas More (1478–1535), Baldassare Castiglione (1478–1529), François Rabelais (c. 1494–1553), and Michel de Montaigne (1533–92). But it was typical of humanism that this moral criticism did not, conversely, postulate an ideal of absolute purity. Humanists asserted the dignity of normal earthly activities and even endorsed the pursuit of fame and the acquisition of wealth. The emphasis on a mature and healthy balance between mind and body, first implicit in Boccaccio, is evident in the work of Giannozzo Manetti, Francesco Filelfo (1398–1481), and Paracelsus (1493–1541) and eloquently embodied in Montaigne’s final essay, “Of Experience.” Humanistic tradition, rather than revolutionary inspiration, eventually led Francis Bacon to assert that the passions should become objects of systematic investigation. The realism of the humanists was, finally, brought to bear on the Roman Catholic Church, which they called 30 Philosophy in the Renaissance into question not as a theological structure but as a political institution. Here as elsewhere, however, the intention was neither radical nor destructive. Humanism did not aim to remake humanity but rather aimed to reform social order through an understanding of what was basically and inalienably human. Critical Scrutiny and Concern with Detail Humanistic realism bespoke a comprehensively critical attitude. Indeed, the productions of early humanism constituted a manifesto of independence, at least in the secular world, from all preconceptions and all inherited programs. The same critical self-reliance shown by Salutati in his textual emendations and Boccaccio in his interpretations of myth was evident in almost the whole range of humanistic endeavour. It was cognate with a new specificity, a profound concern with the precise details of perceived phenomena, that took hold across the arts and the literary and historical disciplines and would have profound effects on the rise of modern science. The increasing prominence of mathematics as an artistic principle and academic discipline was a testament to this development. The Emergence of the Individual and the Idea of the Dignity of Humanity These attitudes took shape in concord with a sense of personal autonomy that first was evident in Petrarch and later came to characterize humanism as a whole. An intelligence capable of critical scrutiny and self-inquiry was by definition a free intelligence. The intellectual virtue that could analyze experience was an integral part of that more extensive virtue that could, according to many humanists, go far in conquering fortune. The emergence of Renaissance individualism was not without its darker aspects. Petrarch and Alberti were alert to the sense of estrangement that 31 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present accompanies intellectual and moral autonomy, while Machiavelli would depict, in Il Principe (1513; The Prince), a grim world in which the individual must exploit the weakness of the crowd or fall victim to its indignities. But happy or sad, the experience of the individual had taken on a heroic tone. Parallel with individualism arose, as a favourite humanistic theme, the idea of human dignity. Backed by medieval sources but more sweeping and insistent in their approach, spokesmen such as Petrarch, Manetti, Valla, and Ficino asserted humans’ earthly preeminence and unique potentialities. In his noted De hominis dignitate oratio (1486; Oration on the Dignity of Man), Pico della Mirandola conveyed this notion with unprecedented vigour. Pico asserted that humanity had been assigned no fixed character or limit by God but instead was free to seek its own level and create its own future. No dignity, not even divinity itself, was forbidden to human aspiration. Pico’s radical affirmation of human capacity shows the influence of Ficino’s contemporary translations of the Hermetic writings—the purported works of the Egyptian god Hermes Trismegistos. Together with the even bolder 16th-century formulations of this position by Paracelsus and Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), the Oratio betrays a rejection of the early humanists’ emphasis on balance and moderation. Rather, it suggests the straining toward absolutes that would characterize major elements of later humanism. Active Virtue The emphasis on virtuous action as the goal of learning was a founding principle of humanism and (although sometimes sharply challenged) continued to exert a strong influence throughout the course of the movement. Salutati, the learned chancellor of Florence whose words could batter cities, represented in word and deed the 32 Philosophy in the Renaissance humanistic ideal of an armed wisdom, that combination of philosophical understanding and powerful rhetoric that alone could effect virtuous policy and reconcile the rival claims of action and contemplation. In De ingenuis moribus et liberalibus studiis (1402–03; “On the Manners of a Gentleman and Liberal Studies”), a treatise that influenced Guarino Veronese (1374–1460) and Vittorino da Feltre (1378–1446), Pietro Paolo Vergerio (c. 1369–1444) maintained that just and beneficent action was the purpose of humanistic education. His words were echoed by Alberti in Della famiglia (1435–44; “On the Family”): As I have said, happiness cannot be gained without good works and just and righteous deeds…. The best works are those that benefit many people. Those are most virtuous, perhaps, that cannot be pursued without strength and nobility. We must give ourselves to manly effort, then, and follow the noblest pursuits. Matteo Palmieri (1406–75) wrote that the true merit of virtue lies in effective action, and effective action is impossible without the faculties that are necessary for it. He who has nothing to give cannot be generous. And he who loves solitude can be neither just, nor strong, nor experienced in those things that are of importance in government and in the affairs of the majority. Palmieri’s philosophical poem, La città di vita (1465; “The City of Life”), developed the idea that the world was divinely ordained to test human virtue in action. Later humanism would broaden and diversify the theme of active virtue. Machiavelli saw action not only as the goal of virtue but also (via historical understanding of great deeds of the past) as the basis for wisdom. Castiglione, in 33 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present his highly influential Il cortegiano (1528; The Courtier), developed in his ideal courtier a psychological model for active virtue, stressing moral awareness as a key element in just action. Rabelais used the idea of active virtue as the basis for anticlerical satire. In his profusely humanistic Gargantua (1534), he has the active hero Friar John save a monastery from enemy attack while the monks sit uselessly in the church choir, chanting meaningless Latin syllables. John later asserts that had he been present, he would have used his manly strength to save Jesus from crucifixion, and he castigates the Apostles for betraying Christ “after a good meal.” Endorsements of active virtue, as will be shown, would also characterize the work of English humanists from Sir Thomas Elyot (c. 1490–1546) to John Milton (1608–74). They typify the sense of social responsibility—the instinctive association of learning with politics and morality—that stood at the heart of the movement. As Salutati put it, “One must stand in the line of battle, engage in close combat, struggle for justice, for truth, for honour.” Humanist Themes in Renaissance Thought Although the humanists were not primarily philosophers and belonged to no single school of formal thought, they had a great deal of influence on philosophy. They searched out and copied the works of ancient authors, developed critical tools for establishing accurate texts from variant manuscripts, made translations from Latin and Greek, and wrote commentaries that reflected their broad learning as well as their new standards and points of view. Aristotle’s authority remained preeminent, especially in logic and physics, but humanists were instrumental in the revival of other Greek scientists and other ancient philosophies, including Stoicism, Skepticism, and various forms of 34 Philosophy in the Renaissance Platonism (such as the eclectic Neoplatonist and gnostic doctrines of the Alexandrian schools known as Hermetic philosophy). All of these were to have far-reaching effects on the subsequent development of European thought. While humanists had a variety of intellectual and scholarly aims, it is fair to say that, like the ancient Romans, they preferred moral philosophy to metaphysics. Their faith in the moral benefits of poetry and rhetoric inspired generations of scholars and educators. Their emphasis on eloquence, worldly achievement, and fame brought them readers and patrons among merchants and princes and employment in government chancelleries and embassies. Humanists were secularists in the sense that language, literature, politics, and history, rather than “sacred subjects,” were their central interests. They defended themselves against charges from conservatives that their preference for classical authors was ruining Christian morals and faith, arguing that a solid grounding in the classics was the best preparation for the Christian life. This was already a perennial debate, almost as old as Christianity itself, with neither side able to sway the other. There seems to have been little atheism or dechristianization among the humanists or their pupils, but there were efforts to redefine the relationship between religious and secular culture. Petrarch struggled with the problem in his book Secretum meum (1342–43, revised 1353–58), in which he imagines himself chastized by St. Augustine of Hippo (354–430) for his pursuit of worldly fame. Even the most celebrated of Renaissance themes, the dignity of humanity, best known in Pico della Mirandola’s Oration, was derived in part from the Church Fathers. Created in the image and likeness of God, people were free to shape their destiny, but human destiny was defined within a Christian, Neoplatonic context of contemplative thought. 35 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present You will have the power to sink to the lower forms of life, which are brutish. You will have the power, through your own judgment, to be reborn into the higher forms, which are divine. Perhaps because Italian politics were so intense and innovative, the tension between traditional Christian teachings and actual behaviour was more frankly acknowledged in political thought than in most other fields. The leading spokesman of the new approach to politics was Machiavelli. Best known as the author of The Prince, a short treatise on how to acquire power, create a state, and keep it, Machiavelli dared to argue that success in politics had its own rules. This so shocked his readers that they coined his name into synonyms for the Devil (“Old Nick”) and for crafty, unscrupulous tactics (Machiavellian). No other name, except perhaps that of the Borgias, so readily evokes the image of the wicked Renaissance, and, indeed, Cesare Borgia (c. 1475–1507) was one of Machiavelli’s chief models for The Prince. Machiavelli began with the not unchristian axiom that people are immoderate in their ambitions and desires and likely to oppress each other whenever free to do so. To get them to limit their selfishness and act for the common good should be the lofty, almost holy, purpose of governments. How to establish and maintain governments that do this was the central problem of politics, made acute for Machiavelli by the twin disasters of his time, the decline of free government in the city-states and the overrunning of Italy by French, German, and Spanish armies. In The Prince he advocated his emergency solution: Italy needed a new leader, who would unify the people, drive out “the barbarians,” and reestablish civic virtue. In the more detached and extended discussion of Discorsi sopra la prima deca di Tito Livio (1517; Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy), however, he analyzed the foundations and practice of republican 36 Philosophy in the Renaissance government, still trying to explain how stubborn and defective human material was transformed into political community. Machiavelli was influenced by humanist culture in many ways, including his reverence for classical antiquity, concern with politics, and effort to evaluate the impact of fortune as against free choice in human life. The “new path” in politics that he announced in The Prince was an effort to provide a guide for political action based on the lessons of history and his own experience as a foreign secretary in Florence. In his passionate republicanism he showed himself to be the heir of the great humanists of a century earlier who had expounded the ideals of free citizenship and explored the uses of classicism for the public life. At the beginning of the 15th century, when the Visconti rulers of Milan were threatening to overrun Florence, Salutati had rallied the Florentines by reminding them that their city was “the daughter of Rome” and the legatee of Roman justice and liberty. Salutati’s pupil, Leonardo Bruni, who also served as chancellor, took up this line in his panegyrics of Florence and in his Historiarum Florentini populi libri XII (“Twelve Books of Histories of the Florentine People”). Even before the rise of Rome, according to Bruni, the Etruscans had founded free cities in Tuscany, so the roots of Florentine liberty went very deep. There equality was recognized in justice and opportunity for all citizens, and the claims of individual excellence were rewarded in public offices and public honours. This close relation between freedom and achievement, argued Bruni, explained Florence’s superiority in culture as well as in politics. Florence was the home of Italy’s greatest poets, the pioneer in both vernacular and Latin literature, and the seat of the Greek revival and of eloquence. In short, Florence was the centre of the studia humanitatis. 37 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present As political rhetoric, Bruni’s version of Florentine superiority was magnificent and no doubt effective. It inspired the Florentines to hold out against Milanese aggression and to reshape their identity as the seat of “the rebirth of letters” and the champions of freedom. But as a theory of political culture, this “civic humanism” represented the ideal rather than the reality of 15th-century communal history. Even in Florence, where after 1434 the Medici family held a grip on the city’s republican government, opportunities for the active life began to fade. The emphasis in thought began to shift from civic humanism to Neoplatonist idealism and to the kind of utopian mysticism represented by Pico della Mirandola’s Oration. At the end of the century, Florentines briefly put themselves into the hands of the millennialist Dominican preacher Girolamo Savonarola (1452–98), who envisioned the city as the “New Jerusalem” rather than as a reincarnation of ancient Rome. Still, even Savonarola borrowed from the civic tradition of the humanists for his political reforms (and for his idea of Florentine superiority) and in so doing created a bridge between the republican past and the crisis years of the early 16th century. Machiavelli got his first job in the Florentine chancellery in 1498, the year of Savonarola’s fall from power. Dismissing the friar as one of history’s “unarmed prophets” who are bound to fail, Machiavelli was convinced that the precepts of Christianity had helped make the Italian states sluggish and weak. He regarded religion as an indispensable component of human life, but statecraft as a discipline based on its own rules and no more to be subordinated to Christianity than were jurisprudence or medicine. The simplest example of the difference between Christian and political morality is provided by warfare, where the use of deception, so detestable in 38 Philosophy in the Renaissance every other kind of action, is necessary, praiseworthy, even glorious. In the Discourses, Machiavelli commented upon a Roman defeat: This is worth noting by every citizen who is called upon to give counsel to his country, for when the very safety of the country is at stake there should be no question of justice or injustice, of mercy or cruelty, of honour or disgrace, but putting every other consideration aside, that course should be followed which will save her life and liberty. Machiavelli’s own country was Florence. When he wrote that he loved his country more than he loved his soul, he was consciously forsaking Christian ethics for the morality of civic virtue. His friend and countryman Francesco Guicciardini shared his political morality and concern for politics but lacked his faith that a knowledge of ancient political wisdom would redeem the liberty of Italy. Guicciardini was an upper-class Florentine who chose a career in public administration and devoted his leisure to writing history and reflecting on politics. He was steeped in the humanist traditions of Florence and was a dedicated republican, notwithstanding the fact—or perhaps because of it—that he spent his entire career in the service of the Medici and rose to high positions under them. But Guicciardini, more skeptical and aristocratic than Machiavelli, was also half a generation younger, and he was schooled in an age that was already witnessing the decline of Italian autonomy. In 1527 Florence revolted against the Medici a second time and established a republic. As a confidant of the Medici, Guicciardini was passed over for public office and retired to his estate. One of the fruits of this enforced leisure was the so-called Cose fiorentine (Florentine Affairs), an 39 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Francesco Guicciardini doubted that people could learn from the past and shape the course of events. Private Collection/Alinari/The Bridgeman Art Library 40 Philosophy in the Renaissance unfinished manuscript on Florentine history. Although it generally follows the classic form of humanist civic history, the fragment contains some significant departures from this tradition. No longer is the history of the city treated in isolation. Guicciardini was becoming aware that the political fortunes of Florence were interwoven with those of Italy as a whole and that the French invasion of Italy in 1494 was a turning point in Italian history. He returned to public life with the restoration of the Medici in 1530 and was involved in the events leading to the tightening of the imperial grip upon Italy, the humbling of the papacy, and the final transformation of the republic of Florence into a hereditary Medici dukedom. Frustrated in his efforts to influence the rulers of Florence, he again retired to his villa to write. But instead of taking up the unfinished manuscript on Florentine history, he chose a subject commensurate with his changed perspective on Italian affairs. The result was his Storia d’Italia (History of Italy). Although still in the humanist form and style, it was in substance a fulfillment of the new tendencies already evident in the earlier work: criticism of sources, great attention to detail, avoidance of moral generalizations, and shrewd analysis of character and motive. The History of Italy has rightly been called a tragedy, for it demonstrates how, out of stupidity and weakness, people make mistakes that gradually narrow the range of their freedom to choose alternative courses and thus influence events until, finally, they are trapped in the web of fortune. This view of history was already far from the world of Machiavelli, not to mention that of the civic humanists. Where Machiavelli believed that virtù—bold and intelligent initiative—could shape, if not totally control, fortuna—the play of external forces—Guicciardini was skeptical about people’s ability to learn from the past and pessimistic about the individual’s power to shape the 41 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present course of events. All that was left, he believed, was to understand. Guicciardini wrote his histories of Florence and of Italy to show what people were like and explain how they had reached their present circumstances. Human dignity, then, consisted not in the exercise of will to shape destiny but in the use of reason to contemplate and perhaps to tolerate fate. In taking a new, hard look at the human condition, Guicciardini represents the decline of humanist optimism. Northern Humanism The resumption of urban growth in the second half of the 15th century coincided with the diffusion of Renaissance ideas and educational values. Humanism offered linguistic and rhetorical skills that were becoming indispensable for nobles and commoners seeking careers in diplomacy and government administration, while the Renaissance ideal of the perfect gentleman was a cultural style that had great appeal in this age of growing courtly refinement. At first many who wanted a humanist education went to Italy, and many foreign names appear on the rosters of the Italian universities. By the end of the century, however, such northern cities as London, Paris, Antwerp, and Augsburg were becoming centres of humanist activity rivaling Italy’s. The development of printing, by making books cheaper and more plentiful, also quickened the diffusion of humanism. A textbook convention, heavily armoured against truth by constant reiteration, states that northern humanism (i.e., humanism outside Italy) was essentially Christian in spirit and purpose, in contrast to the essentially secular nature of Italian humanism. In fact, however, the program of Christian humanism had been laid out by Italian humanists of the stamp of Lorenzo Valla, one of the founders of 42 Philosophy in the Renaissance classical philology, who showed how the critical methods used to study the classics ought to be applied to problems of biblical exegesis and translation as well as church history. That this program only began to be carried out in the 16th century, particularly in the countries of northern Europe (and Spain), is a matter of chronology rather than of geography. In the 15th century, the necessary skills, particularly the knowledge of Greek, were possessed by a few scholars. A century later, Greek was a regular part of the humanist curriculum, and Hebrew was becoming much better known, particularly after Johannes Reuchlin (1455– 1522) published his Hebrew grammar in 1506. Here, too, printing was a crucial factor, for it made available a host of lexicographical and grammatical handbooks and allowed the establishment of normative biblical texts and the comparison of different versions of the Bible. Christian humanism was more than a program of scholarship, however; it was fundamentally a conception of the Christian life that was grounded in the rhetorical, historical, and ethical orientation of humanism itself. That it came to the fore in the early 16th century was the result of a variety of factors, including the spiritual stresses of rapid social change and the inability of the ecclesiastical establishment to cope with the religious needs of an increasingly literate and self-confident laity. By restoring the gospel to the centre of Christian piety, the humanists believed they were better serving the needs of ordinary people. They attacked Scholastic theology as an arid intellectualization of simple faith and deplored the tendency of religion to become a ritual practiced vicariously through a priest. Humanists also despised the whole late-medieval apparatus of relic mongering, hagiology, indulgences, and image worship and ridiculed it in their writings, sometimes with devastating effect. According to the Christian humanists, the fundamental law of Christianity was the 43 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present law of love as revealed by Jesus Christ in the Gospel. Love, peace, and simplicity should be the aims of the good Christian, and the life of Christ his perfect model. The chief spokesman for this point of view was Desiderius Erasmus, the most influential humanist of his day. Erasmus and his colleagues were uninterested in dogmatic differences and were early champions of religious toleration. In this they were out of tune with the changing times. The outbreak of the Reformation polarized European society along confessional lines, with the paradoxical result that the Christian humanists, who had done so much to lay the groundwork for religious reform, ended by being suspect on both sides—by the Roman Catholics as subversives who (as it was said of Erasmus) had “laid the egg that [Martin] Luther hatched” and by the Protestants as hypocrites who had abandoned the cause of reformation out of cowardice or ambition. Toleration belonged to the future, after the killing in the name of Christ sickened and passions had cooled. Humanism and Philosophy Renaissance humanism was predicated upon the victory of rhetoric over dialectic and of Plato over Aristotle as the cramped format of Scholastic philosophical method gave way to a Platonic discursiveness. Much of this transformation had been prepared by Italian scholarly initiative in the early 15th century. Lorenzo Valla used the recently discovered manuscript of Institutio oratoria by Quintilian (35–c. 96) to create new forms of rhetoric and textual criticism. But even more important was the rebirth of an enthusiasm for the philosophy of Plato in Medici Florence and at the cultivated court of Urbino. Precisely to service this enthusiasm, Marsilio Ficino, head of the Platonic 44 Philosophy in the Renaissance Academy, translated the entire Platonic corpus into Latin by the end of the 15th century. Except in the writings of Pico della Mirandola and Giordano Bruno, the direct influence of Platonism on Renaissance metaphysics is difficult to trace. The Platonic account of the moral virtues, however, was admirably adapted to the requirements of Renaissance education, serving as a philosophical foundation of the Renaissance ideal of the courtier and gentleman. Yet Plato also represented the importance of mathematics and the Pythagorean attempt to discover the secrets of the heavens, the earth, and the world of nature in terms of number and exact calculation. This aspect of Platonism influenced Renaissance science as well as philosophy. The scientists Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543), Johannes Kepler (1571– 1630), and Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) owe a great deal to the general climate of Pythagorean confidence in the explanatory power of number. Platonism also affected the literary forms in which Renaissance philosophy was written. Although the earliest medieval Platonists, such as Augustine and John Scotus Erigena (810–c. 877), occasionally used the dialogue form, later Scholastics abandoned it in favour of the formal treatise, of which the great “summae” of Alexander of Hales (c. 1170–1245) and Thomas Aquinas were pristine examples. The Renaissance rediscovery of the Platonic dialogues suggested the literary charm of this conversational method to humanists, scientists, and political philosophers alike. Bruno put forth his central insights in a dialogue, De la causa, principio e uno (1584; Concerning the Cause, Principle, and One); Galileo presented his novel mechanics in his Dialogo sopra i due massimi sistemi del mondo, tolemaico e copernicano (1632; Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems—Ptolemaic and Copernican); and even Machiavelli’s 45 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Dell’arte della guerra (1521; The Art of War) takes the form of a genteel conversation in a quiet Florentine garden. The recovery of the Greek and Latin classics, which was the work of humanism, profoundly affected the entire field of Renaissance and early modern philosophy and science through the ancient schools of philosophy to which it once more directed attention. In addition to Platonism, the most notable of these schools were atomism, Skepticism, and Stoicism. De rerum natura, by the Epicurean philosopher Lucretius (flourished 1st century BCE), influenced Galileo, Bruno, and later Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655), a modern follower of Epicurus (341–270 BCE), through the insights into nature reflected in this work. The recovery of Outlines of Pyrrhonism, by Sextus Empiricus (flourished 3rd century CE), reprinted in 1562, produced a skeptical crisis in French philosophy that dominated the period from Montaigne to Descartes. And the Stoicism of Seneca (4 BCE–65 CE) and Epictetus (55–c. 135) became almost the official ethics of the Renaissance, figuring prominently in the Essays (1580–88) of Montaigne, in the letters that Descartes wrote to Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia (1618–79) and to Queen Christina of Sweden (1626–89), and in the later sections of the Ethics (1675) of the Dutch-Jewish philosopher Benedict de Spinoza (1632–77). POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY As secular authority replaced ecclesiastical authority and the dominant interest of the age shifted from religion to politics, it was natural that the rivalries of the national states and their persistent crises of internal order should raise with renewed urgency philosophical problems, practically dormant since pre-Christian times, about the nature and the moral status of political power. This new 46 Philosophy in the Renaissance preoccupation with national unity, internal security, state power, and international justice stimulated the growth of political philosophy in Italy, France, England, and Holland. Machiavelli, sometime state secretary of the Florentine republic, explored techniques for the seizure and retention of power in ways that seemed to exalt “reasons of state” above morality. His The Prince and Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy codified the actual practices of Renaissance diplomacy for the next 100 years. In fact, Machiavelli was motivated by patriotic hopes for the ultimate unification of Italy and by the conviction that the moral standards of contemporary Italians needed to be elevated by restoring the ancient Roman virtues. More than half a century later, the French political philosopher Jean Bodin (1530–96) insisted that the state must possess a single, unified, and absolute power. He thus developed in detail the doctrine of national sovereignty as the source of all legal legitimacy. In England, Thomas Hobbes, who was to become tutor to the future king Charles II (1630–85), developed the fiction that in the “state of nature” that preceded civilization, “every man’s hand [was] raised against every other” and human life was accordingly “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” A social contract was thus agreed upon to convey all private rights to a single sovereign in return for general protection and the institution of a reign of law. Because law is simply “the command of the sovereign,” Hobbes at once turned justice into a by-product of power and denied any right of rebellion except when the sovereign becomes too weak to protect the commonwealth or to hold it together. In Holland, a prosperous and tolerant commercial republic in the 17th century, the issues of political philosophy took a different form. The Dutch East India Company commissioned a great jurist, Hugo Grotius (1583–1645), to 47 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present write a defense of their trading rights and their free access to the seas, and the resulting two treatises, The Freedom of the Seas (1609) and On the Law of War and Peace (1625), were the first significant codifications of international law. Their philosophical originality lay, however, in the fact that, in defending the rights of a small, militarily weak nation against the powerful states of England, France, and Spain, Grotius was led to a preliminary investigation of the sources and validity of the concept of natural law—the notion that inherent in human reason and immutable even against the willfulness of sovereign states are imperative considerations of natural justice and moral responsibility, which must serve as a check against the arbitrary exercise of vast political power. In general, the political philosophy of the Renaissance and the early modern period was dualistic: it was haunted, even confused, by the conflict between political necessity and general moral responsibility. Machiavelli, Bodin, and Hobbes asserted claims that justified the actions of Italian despotism and the absolutism of the Bourbon and Stuart dynasties. Yet Machiavelli was obsessed with the problem of human virtue, Bodin insisted that even the sovereign ought to obey the law of nature (that is, to govern in accordance with the dictates of natural justice), and Hobbes found in natural law the rational motivation that causes a person to seek security and peace. In the end, Renaissance and early modern political philosophy advocated the doctrines of Thrasymachus, who held that right is what is in the interests of the strong, but it could never finally escape a twinge of Socratic conscience. PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE Philosophy in the modern world is a self-conscious discipline. It has managed to define itself narrowly, 48 Philosophy in the Renaissance distinguishing itself on the one hand from religion and on the other from exact science. But this narrowing of focus came about quite late in its history—certainly not before the 18th century. The earliest philosophers of ancient Greece were theorists of the physical world. Pythagoras and Plato were at once philosophers and mathematicians, and in Aristotle there is no clear distinction between philosophy and natural science. The Renaissance and early modern period continued this breadth of conception characteristic of the Greeks. Galileo and Descartes were at once mathematicians, physicists, and philosophers, while physics retained the name natural philosophy at least until the death of Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727). Had the thinkers of the Renaissance been painstaking in the matter of definition (which they were not), they might have defined philosophy, on the basis of its actual practice, as “the rational, methodical, and systematic consideration of humankind, civil society, and the natural world.” Philosophy’s areas of interest would thus not have been in doubt, but the issue of what constitutes “rational, methodical, and systematic consideration” would have been extremely controversial. Because knowledge advances through the discovery and advocacy of new philosophical methods and because these diverse methods depend for their validity on prevailing philosophical criteria of truth, meaning, and importance, the crucial philosophical quarrels of the 16th and 17th centuries were at bottom quarrels about method. It is this issue, rather than any disagreement over subject matter or areas of interest, that divided the greatest Renaissance philosophers. The great new fact that confronted the Renaissance was the immediacy, the immensity, and the uniformity of the natural world. But what was of primary importance was the new perspective through which this fact was 49 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Self-portrait by Leonardo da Vinci, chalk drawing, 1512; in the Palazzo Reale, Turin, Italy. Alinari/Art Resource, New York 50 Philosophy in the Renaissance interpreted. To the Schoolmen of the Middle Ages, the universe was hierarchical, organic, and God-ordained. To the philosophers of the Renaissance, it was pluralistic, machinelike, and mathematically ordered. In the Middle Ages, scholars thought in terms of purposes, goals, and divine intentions. Renaissance scholars thought in terms of forces, mechanical agencies, and physical causes. All this was clarified by the end of the 15th century. Within the early pages of the Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519), the great Florentine artist and polymath, occur the following three propositions: 1. Since experience has been the mistress of whoever has written well, I take her as my mistress, and to her on all points make my appeal. 2. Instrumental or mechanical science is the noblest and above all others the most useful, seeing that by means of it all animated bodies which have movement perform all their actions. 3. There is no certainty where one can neither apply any of the mathematical sciences, nor any of those which are based upon the mathematical sciences. Here are enunciated respectively (1) the principle of empiricism, (2) the primacy of mechanistic science, and (3) faith in mathematical explanation. It is upon these three doctrines, as upon a rock, that Renaissance and early modern science and philosophy were built. From each of Leonardo’s theses descended one of the great streams of Renaissance and early modern philosophy: from the empirical principle the work of Bacon, from mechanism the work of Hobbes, and from mathematical explanation the work of Descartes. 51 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Any adequate philosophical treatment of scientific method recognizes that the explanations offered by science are both empirical and mathematical. In Leonardo’s thinking, as in scientific procedure generally, although there need be no conflict between these two ideals, they do represent two opposite poles, each capable of excluding the other. The peculiar accidents of Renaissance scientific achievement did mistakenly suggest their incompatibility, for the revival of medical studies on the one hand and the blooming of mathematical physics on the other emphasized opposite virtues in scientific methodology. This polarity was represented by the figures of Andreas Vesalius (1514–64) and Galileo. Vesalius, a Flemish physician, astounded all of Europe with the unbelievable precision of his anatomical dissections and drawings. Having invented new tools for this precise purpose, he successively laid bare the vascular, neural, and muscular systems of the human body. This procedure seemed to demonstrate the virtues of empirical method, of experimentation, and of inductive generalization on the basis of precise and disciplined observation. Only slightly later, Galileo, following in the tradition already established by Copernicus and Kepler, attempted to do for terrestrial and sidereal movement what Vesalius had managed for the structure of the human body—creating his physical dynamics, however, on the basis of hypotheses derived from mathematics. In Galileo’s work, all the most original scientific impulses of the Renaissance were united: the interest in Hellenistic mathematics, experimental use of new instruments such as the telescope, and underlying faith that the search for certainty in science is reasonable because the motions of all physical bodies are comprehensible in mathematical terms. Galileo’s work also deals with some of the recurrent themes of 16th- and 17th-century philosophy: atomism 52 Philosophy in the Renaissance (which describes the changes of gross physical bodies in terms of the motions of their parts), the reduction of qualitative differences to quantitative differences, and the resultant important distinction between “primary” and “secondary” qualities. The former qualities—including shape, extension, and specific gravity—were deemed part of nature and therefore real. The latter—such as colour, odour, taste, and relative position—were taken to be simply the effect of the motions of physical bodies on perceiving minds and therefore ephemeral, subjective, and essentially irrelevant to the nature of physical reality. The remainder of this chapter discusses in detail the lives and work of the most important philosophers of the Renaissance. GIOVANNI PICO DELLA MIRANDOLA (b. Feb. 24, 1463, Mirandola, duchy of Ferrara [Italy]—d. Nov. 17, 1494, Florence [Italy]) Giovanni Pico della Mirandola was an Italian scholar and Platonist philosopher who was known for his syncretistic method of taking the best elements from other philosophies and combining them in his own work, as illustrated in his “Oration on the Dignity of Man.” His father, Giovanni Francesco Pico, prince of the small territory of Mirandola, provided for his precocious child’s thorough humanistic education at home. Pico then studied canon law at Bologna and Aristotelian philosophy at Padua and visited Paris and Florence, where he learned Hebrew, Aramaic, and Arabic. At Florence he met the leading Platonist philosopher Marsilio Ficino. Introduced to Kabbala (Jewish mysticism), Pico became the first Christian scholar to use Kabbalistic doctrine in support of Christian theology. In 1486, planning to defend 53 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present 900 theses he had drawn from diverse Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Latin writers, he invited scholars from all of Europe to Rome for a public disputation. For the occasion he composed his celebrated Oratio. A papal commission, however, denounced 13 of the theses as heretical, and the assembly was prohibited by Pope Innocent VIII. Despite his ensuing Apologia for the theses, Pico thought it prudent to flee to France but was arrested there. After a brief imprisonment he settled in Florence, where he became associated with the Platonic Academy, under the protection of the Florentine prince Lorenzo de’ Medici. Except for short trips to Ferrara, Pico spent the rest of his life there. He was absolved from the charge of heresy by Pope Alexander VI in 1492. Toward the end of his life, he came under the influence of the strictly orthodox Girolamo Savonarola, the enemy of Lorenzo and eventually a martyr. Pico’s unfinished treatise against enemies of the church includes a discussion of the deficiencies of astrology. Although this critique was religious rather than scientific in its foundation, it influenced the astronomer Johannes Kepler, whose studies of planetary movements underlie modern astronomy. Pico’s other works include an exposition of Genesis under the title Heptaplus (Greek hepta, “seven”), indicating his seven points of argument, and a synoptic treatment of Plato and Aristotle, of which the completed work De ente et uno (Of Being and Unity) is a portion. Pico’s works were first collected in Commentationes Joannis Pici Mirandulae (1495–96). NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI (b. May 3, 1469, Florence, Italy—d. June 21, 1527, Florence) Niccolò Machiavelli was an Italian political philosopher, statesman, and secretary of the Florentine republic whose 54 Philosophy in the Renaissance most famous work, The Prince, brought him a reputation as an atheist and an immoral cynic. Early Life and Political Career From the 13th century onward, Machiavelli’s family was wealthy and prominent, holding on occasion Florence’s most important offices. His father, Bernardo, a doctor of laws, was nevertheless among the family’s poorest members. Barred from public office in Florence as an insolvent debtor, Bernardo lived frugally, administering his small landed property near the city and supplementing his meagre income from it with earnings from the restricted and almost clandestine exercise of his profession. Bernardo kept a library in which Niccolò must have read, but little is known of Niccolò’s education and early life in Florence, at that time a thriving centre of philosophy and a brilliant showcase of the arts. He attended lectures by Marcello Virgilio Adriani, who chaired the Studio Fiorentino. He learned Latin well and probably knew some Greek, and he seems to have acquired the typical humanist education that was expected of officials of the Florentine Chancery. In a letter to a friend in 1498, Machiavelli writes of listening to the sermons of Girolamo Savonarola, a Dominican friar who moved to Florence in 1482 and in the 1490s attracted a party of popular supporters with his thinly veiled accusations against the government, the clergy, and the pope. Although Savonarola, who effectively ruled Florence for several years after 1494, was featured in The Prince (1513) as an example of an “unarmed prophet” who must fail, Machiavelli was impressed with his learning and rhetorical skill. On May 24, 1498, Savonarola was hanged as a heretic and his body burned in the public square. Several days later, emerging from obscurity at the 55 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Although Niccolò Machiavelli was branded as an atheist and an immoral cynic, the final chapter of The Prince has led many to deem him a patriot. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 56 Philosophy in the Renaissance age of 29, Machiavelli became head of the second chancery (cancelleria), a post that placed him in charge of the republic’s foreign affairs in subject territories. How so young a man could be entrusted with so high an office remains a mystery, particularly because Machiavelli apparently never served an apprenticeship in the chancery. He held the post until 1512, having gained the confidence of Piero Soderini (1452–1522), the gonfalonier (chief magistrate) for life in Florence from 1502. During his tenure at the second chancery, Machiavelli persuaded Soderini to reduce the city’s reliance on mercenary forces by establishing a militia (1505), which Machiavelli subsequently organized. He also undertook diplomatic and military missions to the court of France; to Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander VI (reigned 1492–1503); to Pope Julius II (reigned 1503–13), Alexander’s successor; to the court of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (reigned 1493–1519); and to Pisa (1509 and 1511). In 1503, one year after his missions to Cesare Borgia, Machiavelli wrote a short work, Del modo di trattare i sudditi della Val di Chiana ribellati (On the Way to Deal with the Rebel Subjects of the Valdichiana). Anticipating his later Discourses on the First Ten Books of Livy, a commentary on the ancient Roman historian, in this work he contrasts the errors of Florence with the wisdom of the Romans and declares that in dealing with rebellious peoples one must either benefit them or eliminate them. Machiavelli also was a witness to the bloody vengeance taken by Cesare on his mutinous captains at the town of Sinigaglia (Dec. 31, 1502), of which he wrote a famous account. In much of his early writings, Machiavelli argues that “one should not offend a prince and later put faith in him.” In 1503 Machiavelli was sent to Rome for the duration of the conclave that elected Pope Julius II, an enemy of the Borgias, whose election Cesare had unwisely aided. 57 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Machiavelli watched Cesare’s decline and, in a poem (the first Decennali), celebrated his imprisonment, a burden that “he deserved as a rebel against Christ.” Altogether, Machiavelli embarked on more than 40 diplomatic missions during his 14 years at the chancery. In 1512 the Florentine republic was overthrown and the gonfalonier deposed by a Spanish army that Julius II had enlisted into his Holy League. The Medici family returned to rule Florence, and Machiavelli, suspected of conspiracy, was imprisoned, tortured, and sent into exile in 1513 to his father’s small property in San Casciano, just south of Florence. There he wrote his two major works, The Prince and Discourses on Livy, both of which were published after his death. He dedicated The Prince to Lorenzo di Piero de’ Medici (1492–1519), ruler of Florence from 1513 and grandson of Lorenzo de’ Medici (1449–92). When, on Lorenzo’s death, Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici (1478–1534) came to govern Florence, Machiavelli was presented to the cardinal by Lorenzo Strozzi (1488–1538), scion of one of Florence’s wealthiest families, to whom he dedicated the dialogue The Art of War. Machiavelli was first employed in 1520 by the cardinal to resolve a case of bankruptcy in Lucca, where he took the occasion to write a sketch of its government and to compose his La vita di Castruccio Castracani da Lucca (1520; The Life of Castruccio Castracani of Lucca). Later that year the cardinal agreed to have Machiavelli elected official historian of the republic, a post to which he was appointed in November 1520 with a salary of 57 gold florins a year, later increased to 100. In the meantime, he was commissioned by the Medici pope Leo X (reigned 1513–21) to write a discourse on the organization of the government of Florence. Machiavelli criticized both the Medici regime and the succeeding republic he had served and boldly advised the pope to restore the republic, replacing the unstable 58 Philosophy in the Renaissance mixture of republic and principality then prevailing. Shortly thereafter, in May 1521, he was sent for two weeks to the Franciscan chapter at Carpi, where he improved his ability to “reason about silence.” Machiavelli faced a dilemma about how to tell the truth about the rise of the Medici in Florence without offending his Medici patron. After the death of Pope Leo X in 1521, Cardinal Giulio, Florence’s sole master, was inclined to reform the city’s government and sought out the advice of Machiavelli, who replied with the proposal he had made to Leo X. In 1523, following the death of Pope Adrian VI, the cardinal became Pope Clement VII, and Machiavelli worked with renewed enthusiasm on an official history of Florence. In June 1525 he presented his Istorie Fiorentine (Florentine Histories) to the pope, receiving in return a gift of 120 ducats. In April 1526, Machiavelli was made chancellor of the Procuratori delle Mura to superintend Florence’s fortifications. At this time the pope had formed a Holy League at Cognac against Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (reigned 1519–56), and Machiavelli went with the army to join his friend Francesco Guicciardini (1482–1540), the pope’s lieutenant, with whom he remained until the sack of Rome by the emperor’s forces brought the war to an end in May 1527. Now that Florence had cast off the Medici, Machiavelli hoped to be restored to his old post at the chancery. But the few favours that the Medici had doled out to him caused the supporters of the free republic to look upon him with suspicion. Denied the post, he fell ill and died within a month. Writings In office Machiavelli wrote a number of short political discourses and poems (the Decennali) on Florentine history. It was while he was out of office and in exile, however, that 59 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present the “Florentine Secretary,” as Machiavelli came to be called, wrote the works of political philosophy for which he is remembered. In his most noted letter (Dec. 10, 1513), he described one of his days: in the morning walking in the woods, in the afternoon drinking and gambling with friends at the inn, and in the evening reading and reflecting in his study, where, he says, “I feed on the food that alone is mine and that I was born for.” In the same letter, Machiavelli remarks that he has just composed a little work on princes—a “whimsy”—and thus lightly introduces arguably the most famous book on politics ever written, the work that was to give the name Machiavellian to the teaching of worldly success through scheming deceit. About the same time that Machiavelli wrote The Prince (1513, published in 1532), he was also writing a completely different book, Discourses on Livy (published in 1531). They are distinguished from his other works by the fact that in the dedicatory letter to each he says that it contains everything he knows. The dedication of the Discourses on Livy presents the work to two of Machiavelli’s friends, who he says are not princes but deserve to be, and criticizes the sort of begging letter he appears to have written in dedicating The Prince. The two works differ also in substance and manner. The Prince is mostly concerned with princes—particularly new princes—and is short, easy to read, and, according to many, dangerously wicked, whereas the Discourses on Livy is a “reasoning” that is long, difficult, and full of advice on how to preserve republics. Every thoughtful treatment of Machiavelli has had to come to terms with the differences between his two most important works. THE PRINCE The first and most persistent view of Machiavelli is that of a teacher of evil. The German-born American philosopher 60 Philosophy in the Renaissance Leo Strauss (1899–1973) begins his interpretation from this point. The Prince is in the tradition of the “Mirror for Princes” (i.e., books of advice that enabled princes to see themselves as though reflected in a mirror), which began with the Cyropaedia by the Greek historian Xenophon (431–350 BCE) and continued into the Middle Ages. Prior to Machiavelli, works in this genre advised princes to adopt the best prince as their model, but Machiavelli’s version recommends that a prince go to the “effectual truth” of things and forgo the standard of “what should be done” lest he bring about his ruin. To maintain himself, a prince must learn how not to be good and use or not use this knowledge “according to necessity.” An observer would see such a prince as guided by necessity, and from this standpoint Machiavelli can be interpreted as the founder of modern political science, a discipline based on the actual state of the world as opposed to how the world might be in utopias such as Plato’s Republic of Plato or Augustine’s City of God. This second, amoral interpretation can be found in works by the German historian Friedrich Meinecke (1862–1954) and the German philosopher Ernst Cassirer (1874–1945). The amoral interpretation fastens on Machiavelli’s frequent resort to “necessity” to excuse actions that might otherwise be condemned as immoral. Machiavelli also advises the use of prudence in particular circumstances, however; and although he sometimes offers rules or remedies for princes to adopt, he does not seek to establish exact or universal laws of politics in the manner of modern political science. Machiavelli divides principalities into those that are acquired and those that are inherited. In general, he argues that the more difficult it is to acquire control over a state, the easier it is to hold on to it. The reason for this is that the fear of a new prince is stronger than the love for a hereditary prince; hence, the new prince, who relies 61 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present on “a dread of punishment that never forsakes you,” will succeed, but a prince who expects his subjects to keep their promises of support will be disappointed. The prince will find that “each wants to die for him when death is at a distance,” but, when the prince needs his subjects, they generally decline to serve as promised. Thus, every prince, whether new or old, must look upon himself as a new prince and learn to rely on “one’s own arms,” both literally in raising one’s own army and metaphorically in not relying on the goodwill of others. The new prince relies on his own virtue, but if virtue is to enable him to acquire a state, it must have a new meaning distinct from the New Testament virtue of seeking peace. Machiavelli’s notion of virtù requires the prince to be concerned foremost with the art of war and to seek not merely security but also glory, for glory is included in necessity. Virtù for Machiavelli is virtue not for its own sake but rather for the sake of the reputation it enables princes to acquire. For example, liberality does not aid a prince, because the recipients may not be grateful, and lavish displays necessitate taxing of the prince’s subjects, who will despise him for it. Thus, a prince should not be concerned if he is considered stingy, because this vice enables him to rule. Similarly, a prince should not care about being deemed cruel as long as the cruelty is “well used.” Machiavelli sometimes uses virtù in the traditional sense, too, as in a famous passage on Agathocles (361–289 BCE), the self-styled king of Sicily, whom Machiavelli describes as a “most excellent captain” but one who came to power by criminal means. Of Agathocles, Machiavelli writes that “one cannot call it virtue to kill one’s citizens, betray one’s friends, to be without faith, without mercy and without religion.” Yet in the very next sentence he speaks of “the virtue of Agathocles,” who did all these 62 Philosophy in the Renaissance things. Virtue, according to Machiavelli, aims to reduce the power of fortune over human affairs because fortune keeps men from relying on themselves. At first Machiavelli admits that fortune rules half of men’s lives, but then, in an infamous metaphor, he compares fortune to a woman who lets herself be won more by the impetuous and the young, “who command her with more audacity,” than by those who proceed cautiously. Machiavelli cannot simply dismiss or replace the traditional notion of moral virtue, which gets its strength from the religious beliefs of ordinary people. His own virtue of mastery coexists with traditional moral virtue yet also makes use of it. A prince who possesses the virtue of mastery can command fortune and manage people to a degree never before thought possible. In the last chapter of The Prince, Machiavelli writes a passionate “exhortation to seize Italy and to free her from the barbarians”—apparently France and Spain, which had been overrunning the disunited peninsula. He calls for a redeemer, mentioning the miracles that occurred as Moses led the Israelites to the promised land, and closes with a quotation from a patriotic poem by Petrarch (1304–74). The final chapter has led many to a third interpretation of Machiavelli as a patriot rather than as a disinterested scientist. THE DISCOURSES ON LIVY Like The Prince, the Discourses on Livy admits of various interpretations. One view, elaborated separately in works by the political theorists J.G.A. Pocock and Quentin Skinner in the 1970s, stresses the work’s republicanism and locates Machiavelli in a republican tradition that starts with Aristotle and continues through the organization of the medieval city-states, the renewal of classical 63 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present political philosophy in Renaissance humanism, and the establishment of the contemporary American republic. This interpretation focuses on Machiavelli’s various pro-republican remarks, such as his statement that the multitude is wiser and more constant than a prince and his emphasis in the Discourses on Livy on the republican virtue of self-sacrifice as a way of combating corruption. Yet Machiavelli’s republicanism does not rest on the usual republican premise that power is safer in the hands of many than it is in the hands of one. To the contrary, he asserts that to found or reform a republic, it is necessary to “be alone.” Any ordering must depend on a single mind. Thus, Romulus “deserves excuse” for killing Remus, his brother and partner in the founding of Rome, because it was for the common good. This statement is as close as Machiavelli ever came to saying “the end justifies the means,” a phrase closely associated with interpretations of The Prince. Republics need the kind of leaders that Machiavelli describes in The Prince. These “princes in a republic” cannot govern in accordance with justice, because those who get what they deserve from them do not feel any obligation. Nor do those who are left alone feel grateful. Thus, a prince in a republic will have no “partisan friends” unless he learns “to kill the sons of Brutus,” using violence to make examples of enemies of the republic and, not incidentally, of himself. To reform a corrupt state presupposes a good man, but to become a prince presupposes a bad man. Good men, Machiavelli claims, will almost never get power, and bad men will almost never use power for a good end. Yet, because republics become corrupt when the people lose the fear that compels them to obey, the people must be led back to their original virtue by sensational executions reminding them of punishment and reviving their fear. The apparent solution to the problem is to let 64 Philosophy in the Renaissance bad men gain glory through actions that have a good outcome, if not a good motive. In the Discourses on Livy, Machiavelli favours the deeds of the ancients above their philosophy, reproaching his contemporaries for consulting ancient jurists for political wisdom rather than looking to the actual history of Rome. He argues that the factional tumults of the Roman republic, which were condemned by many ancient writers, actually made Rome free and great. Moreover, although Machiavelli was a product of the Renaissance (and is often portrayed as its leading exponent) he also criticized it, particularly for the humanism it derived from Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero. He called for “new modes and orders” and compared himself to the explorers of unknown lands in his time. His emphasis on the effectual truth led him to seek the hidden springs of politics in fraud and conspiracy, examples of which he discussed with apparent relish. It is notable that, in both The Prince and the Discourses on Livy, the longest chapters are on conspiracy. Throughout his two chief works, Machiavelli sees politics as defined by the difference between the ancients and the moderns: the ancients are strong, the moderns weak. The moderns are weak because they have been formed by Christianity, and, in three places in the Discourses on Livy, Machiavelli boldly and impudently criticizes the Roman Catholic church and Christianity itself. For Machiavelli the church is the cause of Italy’s disunity; the clergy is dishonest and leads people to believe “that it is evil to say evil of evil”; and Christianity glorifies suffering and makes the world effeminate. But Machiavelli leaves it unclear whether he prefers atheism, paganism, or a reformed Christianity, writing later, in a letter dated April 16, 1527 (only two months before his death): “I love my country more than my soul.” 65 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present JEAN BODIN (b. 1530, Angers, France—d. June 1596, Laon, France) Jean Bodin was a French political philosopher whose exposition of the principles of stable government was widely influential in Europe at a time when medieval systems were giving way to centralized states. He is widely credited with introducing the concept of sovereignty into legal and political thought. In 1551 Bodin went to the University of Toulouse to study civil law. He remained there as a student and later as a teacher until 1561, when he abandoned the teaching of law for its practice and returned to Paris as avocat du roi (“king’s advocate”) just as the civil wars between Roman Catholics and Huguenots were beginning. In 1571 he entered the household of the king’s brother, François, duc d’Alençon, as master of requests and councillor. He appeared only once on the public scene, as deputy of the third estate for Vermandois at the Estates-General of Blois in 1576. His uninterested conduct on that occasion lost him royal favour. He opposed the projected resumption of war on the Huguenots in favour of negotiation, and he also opposed the suggested alienation, or sale, of royal domains by the French king Henry III (reigned 1574–89) as damaging to the monarchy. When the duc d’Alençon died in 1583, Bodin retired to Laon as procurateur to the presidial court. He remained there until his death from the plague 13 years later. Bodin’s principal writing, The Six Bookes of a Commonweale (1576), won him immediate fame and was influential in western Europe into the 17th century. The bitter experience of civil war and its attendant anarchy in France had turned Bodin’s attention to the problem of how to secure order and authority. Bodin thought that the 66 Philosophy in the Renaissance secret lay in recognition of the sovereignty of the state and argued that the distinctive mark of the state is supreme power. This power is unique; absolute, in that no limits of time or competence can be placed upon it; and self-subsisting, in that it does not depend for its validity on the consent of the subject. Bodin assumed that governments command by divine right because government is instituted by providence for the well-being of humanity. Government consists essentially of the power to command, as expressed in the making of laws. In a well-ordered state, this power is exercised subject to the principles of divine and natural law. In other words, the Ten Commandments are enforced, and certain fundamental rights, chiefly liberty and property, are extended to those governed. But should these conditions be violated, the sovereign still commands and may not be resisted by his subjects, whose whole duty is obedience to their ruler. Bodin distinguished only three types of political systems—monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy—according to whether sovereign power rests in one person, in a minority, or in a majority. Bodin himself preferred a monarchy that was kept informed of the people’s needs by a parliament or representative assembly. GIORDANO BRUNO (b. 1548, Nola, near Naples—d. Feb. 17, 1600, Rome) Giordano Bruno was an Italian philosopher, astronomer, mathematician, and occultist whose theories anticipated modern science. The most notable of these were his theories of the infinite universe and the multiplicity of worlds, in which he rejected the traditional geocentric (or Earthcentred) astronomy and intuitively went beyond the Copernican heliocentric (Sun-centred) theory, which still 67 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present maintained a finite universe with a sphere of fixed stars. Bruno is, perhaps, chiefly remembered for the tragic death he suffered at the stake because of the tenacity with which he maintained his unorthodox ideas at a time when both the Roman Catholic and the Reformed churches were reaffirming rigid Aristotelian and Scholastic principles in their struggle for the evangelization of Europe. Early Life Bruno was the son of a professional soldier. He was named Filippo at his baptism and was later called “il Nolano,” after the place of his birth. In 1562 Bruno went to Naples to study the humanities, logic, and dialectics (argumentation). He was impressed by the lectures of G.V. de Colle, who was known for his tendencies toward Averroism (i.e., the thought of a number of Western Christian philosophers who drew their inspiration from the interpretation of Aristotle put forward by the Arabic philosopher Averroës) and by his own reading of works on memory devices and the arts of memory (mnemotechnical works). In 1565 he entered the Dominican convent of San Domenico Maggiore in Naples and assumed the name Giordano, but his unorthodox attitudes spurred suspicions of heresy. Nevertheless, in 1572 he was ordained a priest. During the same year he was sent back to the Neapolitan convent to continue his study of theology. In July 1575 Bruno completed the prescribed course, which generated in him an annoyance at theological subtleties. After he read two forbidden commentaries by Erasmus and freely discussing the Arian heresy, which denied the divinity of Christ, a trial for heresy was prepared against him by the provincial father of the order. So he fled to Rome in February 1576. There he found himself unjustly accused of a murder. A second excommunication process 68 Philosophy in the Renaissance was started, and in April 1576 he fled again. He abandoned the Dominican Order, and, after wandering in northern Italy, he went in 1578 to Geneva, where he earned his living by proofreading. Bruno formally embraced Calvinism. After publishing a broadsheet against a Calvinist professor, however, he discovered that the Reformed Church was no less intolerant than the Catholic. He was arrested, excommunicated, rehabilitated after retraction, and finally allowed to leave the city. He moved to France, first to Toulouse—where he unsuccessfully sought to be absolved by the Catholic Church but was nevertheless appointed to a lectureship in philosophy—and then in 1581 to Paris. In Paris Bruno at last found a congenial place to work and teach. Despite the strife between the Catholics and the Huguenots (French Protestants), the court of Henry III was then dominated by the tolerant faction of the Politiques (moderate Catholics, sympathizers of the Protestant king of Navarre, Henry of Bourbon, who became the heir apparent to the throne of France in 1584). Bruno’s religious attitude was compatible with this group, and he received the protection of the French king, who appointed him one of his temporary lecteurs royaux. In 1582 Bruno published three works in which he explored new means to attain an intimate knowledge of reality. He also published a vernacular comedy, Il candelaio (1582; “The Candlemaker”), which, through a vivid representation of contemporary Neapolitan society, constituted a protest against the moral and social corruption of the time. In the spring of 1583 Bruno moved to London with an introductory letter from Henry III for his ambassador Michel de Castelnau. He was soon attracted to Oxford, where, during the summer, he started a series of lectures in which he expounded the Copernican theory maintaining the reality of the movement of the Earth. Because of the 69 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present hostile reception of the Oxonians, however, he went back to London as the guest of the French ambassador. He frequented the court of Elizabeth I (reigned 1558–1603) and became associated with such influential figures as the statesman and poet Sir Philip Sidney (1554–86) and Robert Dudley (1532–88), the earl of Leicester. Works In February 1584, Bruno was invited to discuss his theory of the movement of the Earth with some Oxonian doctors, but the encounter degenerated into a quarrel. A few days later he started writing his Italian dialogues, which constitute the first systematic exposition of his philosophy. There are six dialogues, three cosmological—on the theory of the universe—and three moral. In the Cena de le Ceneri (1584; “The Ash Wednesday Supper”), he not only reaffirmed the reality of the heliocentric theory but also suggested that the universe is infinite, constituted of innumerable worlds substantially similar to those of the solar system. In the same dialogue he anticipated his fellow Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei by maintaining that the Bible should be followed for its moral teaching but not for its astronomical implications. He also strongly criticized the manners of English society and the pedantry of the Oxonian doctors. In the De la causa, principio e uno (1584; Concerning the Cause, Principle, and One) he elaborated the physical theory on which his conception of the universe was based: “form” and “matter” are intimately united and constitute the “one.” Thus, the traditional dualism of the Aristotelian physics was reduced by him to a monistic conception of the world, implying the basic unity of all substances and the coincidence of opposites in the infinite unity of Being. In the De l’infinito universo e mondi (1584; On the Infinite Universe and Worlds), he developed 70 Philosophy in the Renaissance his cosmological theory by systematically criticizing Aristotelian physics. He also formulated his Averroistic view of the relation between philosophy and religion, according to which religion is considered as a means to instruct and govern ignorant people, philosophy as the discipline of the elect who are able to behave themselves and govern others. The Spaccio de la bestia trionfante (1584; The Expulsion of the Triumphant Beast), the first dialogue of his moral trilogy, is a satire on contemporary superstitions and vices, embodying a strong criticism of Christian ethics (particularly the Calvinistic principle of salvation by faith alone, to which Bruno opposes an exalted view of the dignity of all human activities). The Cabala del cavallo Pegaseo (1585; Cabal of the Horse Pegasus), similar to but more pessimistic than the previous work, includes a discussion of the relationship between the human soul and the universal soul, concluding with the negation of the absolute individuality of the former. In the De gli eroici furori (1585; The Heroic Frenzies), Bruno, making use of Neoplatonic imagery, treats the attainment of union with the infinite One by the human soul and exhorts humanity to the conquest of virtue and truth. In October 1585 Bruno returned to Paris, where he found a changed political atmosphere. Henry III had abrogated the edict of pacification with the Protestants, and the King of Navarre had been excommunicated. Far from adopting a cautious line of behaviour, however, Bruno entered into a polemic with a protégé of the Catholic party, the mathematician Fabrizio Mordente, whom he ridiculed in four Dialogi, and in May 1586 he dared to attack Aristotle publicly in his Centum et viginti articuli de natura et mundo adversus Peripateticos (“120 Articles on Nature and the World Against the Peripatetics”). The Politiques disavowed him, and Bruno left Paris. 71 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present He went to Germany, where he wandered from one university city to another, lecturing and publishing a variety of minor works, including the Articuli centum et sexaginta (1588; “160 Articles”) against contemporary mathematicians and philosophers, in which he expounded his conception of religion—a theory of the peaceful coexistence of all religions based upon mutual understanding and the freedom of reciprocal discussion. At Helmstedt, however, in January 1589 he was excommunicated by the local Lutheran Church. He remained in Helmstedt until the spring, completing works on natural and mathematical magic (posthumously published) and working on three Latin poems: De triplici minimo et mensura (“On the Threefold Minimum and Measure”), De monade, numero et figura (“On the Monad, Number, and Figure”), and De immenso, innumerabilibus et infigurabilibus (“On the Immeasurable and Innumerable”). The trio of poems reelaborate the theories expounded in the Italian dialogues and develop Bruno’s concept of an atomic basis of matter and being. To publish these, he went in 1590 to Frankfurt am Main, where the senate rejected his application to stay. Nevertheless, he took up residence in the Carmelite convent, lecturing to Protestant doctors and acquiring a reputation of being a “universal man” who, the Prior thought, “did not possess a trace of religion” and who “was chiefly occupied in writing and in the vain and chimerical imagining of novelties.” Final Years In August 1591, at the invitation of the Venetian patrician Giovanni Mocenigo, Bruno made the fatal move of returning to Italy. At the time such a move did not seem to be too much of a risk: Venice was by far the most liberal of the Italian states; the European tension had been temporarily 72 Philosophy in the Renaissance eased after the death of the intransigent pope Sixtus V in 1590; the Protestant Henry of Bourbon was now on the throne of France, and a religious pacification seemed to be imminent. Furthermore, Bruno was still looking for an academic platform from which to expound his theories, and he must have known that the chair of mathematics at the University of Padua was then vacant. Indeed, he went almost immediately to Padua and, during the late summer of 1591, started a private course of lectures for German students and composed the Praelectiones geometricae (“Lectures on Geometry”) and Ars deformationum (“Art of Deformation”). At the beginning of the winter, when it appeared that he was not going to receive the chair (it was offered to Galileo in 1592), he returned to Venice, as the guest of Mocenigo, and took part in the discussions of progressive Venetian aristocrats who, like Bruno, favoured philosophical investigation irrespective of its theological implications. Bruno’s liberty came to an end when Mocenigo, disappointed by his private lessons from Bruno on the art of memory and resentful of Bruno’s intention to go back to Frankfurt to have a new work published, denounced him to the Venetian Inquisition in May 1592 for his heretical theories. Bruno was arrested and tried. He defended himself by admitting minor theological errors, emphasizing, however, the philosophical rather than the theological character of his basic tenets. Just as the Venetian stage of the trial seemed to be proceeding in a way that was favourable to Bruno, the Roman Inquisition demanded his extradition. On Jan. 27, 1593, Bruno entered the jail of the Roman palace of the Sant’Uffizio (Holy Office). During the seven-year Roman period of the trial, Bruno at first developed his previous defensive line, disclaiming any particular interest in theological matters and reaffirming the philosophical character of his speculation. 73 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present This distinction did not satisfy the inquisitors, who demanded an unconditional retraction of his theories. Bruno then made a desperate attempt to demonstrate that his views were compatible with the Christian conception of God and creation. The inquisitors rejected his arguments and pressed him for a formal retraction. Bruno finally declared that he had nothing to retract and that he did not even know what he was expected to retract. At that point, Pope Clement VIII ordered that he be sentenced as an impenitent and pertinacious heretic. On Feb. 8, 1600, when the death sentence was formally read to him, he addressed his judges, saying, “Perhaps your fear in passing judgment on me is greater than mine in receiving it.” Not long after, he was brought to the Campo de’ Fiori, his tongue in a gag, and burned alive. 74 CHAPTER 2 Early Modern Philosophy T he scientific contrast between Vesalius’s rigorous observational techniques and Galileo’s reliance on mathematics was similar to the philosophical contrast between the experimental method of Francis Bacon (1561–1626) and the emphasis on a priori reasoning (reasoning independently of experience) of René Descartes (1596–1650). Indeed, these differences can be conceived in more abstract terms as the contrast between empiricism (the view that human knowledge ultimately originates in or is justified by experience) and rationalism (the view that human knowledge ultimately originates in or is justified by reason). This theme dominated the philosophical controversies of the 17th and 18th centuries and was hardly resolved before the advent of the German Enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804). The earliest empiricist philosophers of the modern period were Bacon and the English materialist Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679). The great rationalist philosophers were Descartes, the Dutch-Jewish thinker Benedict de Spinoza (1632–77), and the German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1714). THE EMPIRICISM OF FRANCIS BACON Sir Francis Bacon was the outstanding apostle of early modern empiricism. Less an original metaphysi75 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present cian or cosmologist than the advocate of a vast new program for the advancement of learning and the reformation of scientific method, Bacon conceived of philosophy as a new technique of reasoning that would reestablish natural science on a firm foundation. In the Advancement of Learning (1605), he charted the map of knowledge: history, which depends on the human faculty of memory; poetry, which depends on imagination; and philosophy, which depends on reason. To reason, however, Bacon assigned a completely experiential function. Fifteen years later, in his Novum Organum, he made this clear. Because, he said, “we have as yet no natural philosophy which is pure, . . . the true business of philosophy must be . . . to apply the understanding . . . to a fresh examination of particulars.” A technique for “the fresh examination of particulars” thus constituted his chief contribution to philosophy. Bacon’s empiricism was not raw or unsophisticated. His concept of fact and his belief in the primacy of observation led him to formulate laws and generalizations. His enduring place in the history of philosophy lies, however, in his single-minded advocacy of experience as the only source of valid knowledge and in his profound enthusiasm for the perfection of natural science. It is in this sense that “the Baconian spirit” was a source of inspiration for generations of later philosophers and scientists. Bacon’s Scheme Bacon drew up an ambitious plan for a comprehensive work that was to appear under the title of Instauratio Magna (“The Great Instauration”), but like many of his literary schemes, it was never completed. Its first part, De Augmentis Scientiarum, appeared in 1623 and is an expanded, Latinized version of the Advancement of Learning (the first really important philosophical book to be written in 76 Early Modern Philosophy Francis Bacon, oil painting by an unknown artist. In the National Portrait Gallery, London. Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, London 77 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present English). The De Augmentis Scientiarum contains a division of the sciences, a project that had not been embarked on to any great purpose since Aristotle and, in a smaller way, since the Stoics. The second part of Bacon’s scheme, the Novum Organum, which had already appeared in 1620, gives “true directions concerning the interpretation of nature”—in other words, an account of the correct method of acquiring natural knowledge. This is what Bacon believed to be his most important contribution and is the body of ideas with which his name is most closely associated. The fields of possible knowledge having been charted in De Augmentis Scientiarum, the proper method for their cultivation was set out in Novum Organum. Third, there is natural history, the register of matters of observed natural fact, which is the indispensable raw material for the inductive method. Bacon wrote “histories,” in this sense, of the wind, life and death, and the dense as well as the rare. Near the end of his life he was working on his Sylva Sylvarum: Or A Natural Historie (“Forest of Forests”), in effect, a collection of collections, a somewhat uncritical miscellany. Fourth, there is the “ladder of the intellect,” consisting of thoroughly formulated examples of the Baconian method in application, the most successful one being the exemplary account in Novum Organum of how his inductive “tables” show heat to be a kind of motion of particles. (Bacon distinguished three kinds of such tables: tables of presence, absence, and degree—i.e., in the case of any two properties, such as heat and friction, instances in which they appear together, instances in which one appears without the other, and instances in which their amounts vary proportionately. The ultimate purpose of these tables was to order facts in such a way that the true causes of phenomena [the subject of physics] and the true “forms” of things [the subject of metaphysics—the study of the nature of being] could be inductively established.) 78 Early Modern Philosophy Fifth, there are the “forerunners,” or pieces of scientific knowledge arrived at by pre-Baconian, commonsense methods. Sixth and finally, there is the new philosophy, or science itself, seen by Bacon as a task for later generations armed with his method, advancing into all the regions of possible discovery set out in the Advancement of Learning. The wonder is not so much that Bacon did not complete this immense design but that he got as far with it as he did. The Idols of the Mind In the first book of Novum Organum, Bacon discusses the causes of human error in the pursuit of knowledge. Aristotle had discussed logical fallacies, commonly found in human reasoning, but Bacon was original in looking behind the forms of reasoning to underlying psychological causes. He invented the metaphor of “idol” to refer to such causes of human error. Bacon distinguishes four idols, or main varieties of proneness to error. The idols of the tribe are certain intellectual faults that are universal to humankind, or, at any rate, particularly common. One, for example, is a tendency toward oversimplification—that is, supposing, for the sake of tidiness, that there exists more order in a field of inquiry than there actually is. Another is a propensity to be overly influenced by particularly sudden or exciting occurrences that are in fact unrepresentative. The idols of the cave are the intellectual peculiarities of individuals. One person may concentrate on the likenesses, another on the differences, between things. One may fasten on detail, another on the totality. The idols of the marketplace are the kinds of error for which language is responsible. It has always been a distinguishing feature of English philosophy to emphasize the unreliable nature of language, which is seen, 79 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present nominalistically, as a human improvisation. Nominalists argue that even if the power of speech is given by God, it was Adam who named the beasts and thereby gave that power its concrete realization. But language, like other human achievements, partakes of human imperfections. Bacon was particularly concerned with the superficiality of distinctions drawn in everyday language, by which things fundamentally different are classed together (whales and fishes as fish, for example) and things fundamentally similar are distinguished (ice, water, and steam). But he was also concerned, like later critics of language, with the capacity of words to embroil people in the discussion of the meaningless (as, for example, in discussions of the deity Fortune). This aspect of Bacon’s thought has been almost as influential as his account of natural knowledge, inspiring a long tradition of skeptical rationalism, from the Enlightenment to the positivism of the 19th century and the logical positivism of the 20th century. The fourth and final group of idols is that of the idols of the theatre, that is to say mistaken systems of philosophy in the broadest, Baconian sense of the term, in which it embraces all beliefs of any degree of generality. Bacon’s critical polemic in discussing the idols of the theatre is lively but not philosophically penetrating. He speaks, for example, of the vain affectations of the humanists, but they were not an apt subject for his criticism. Humanists were really anti-philosophers who not unreasonably turned their attention to nonphilosophical matters because of the apparent inability of philosophers to arrive at conclusions that were either generally agreed upon or useful. Bacon does have something to say about the skeptical philosophy to which humanists appealed when they felt the need for it. Insofar as skepticism involves doubts about deductive reasoning, he has no quarrel with it. Insofar as it is applied not to reason but to the ability of 80 Early Modern Philosophy the senses to supply the reason with reliable premises to work from, he brushes it aside too easily. Bacon’s attack on Scholastic orthodoxy is surprisingly rhetorical. It may be that he supposed it to be already sufficiently discredited by its incurably contentious or disputatious character. In his view it was a largely verbal technique for the indefinite prolongation of inconclusive argument by the drawing of artificial distinctions. He has some awareness of the central weakness of Aristotelian science, namely its attempt to derive substantial conclusions from premises that are intuitively evident, and argues that the apparently obvious axioms are neither clear nor indisputable. Perhaps Bacon’s most fruitful disagreement with Scholasticism is his belief that natural knowledge is cumulative, a process of discovery, not of conservation. Living in a time when new worlds were being found on Earth, he was able to free himself from the view that everything people needed to know had already been revealed in the Bible or by Aristotle. Against the fantastic learning of the occultists Bacon argued that individual reports are insufficient, especially because people are emotionally predisposed to credit the interestingly strange. Observations worthy to substantiate theories must be repeatable. Bacon defended the study of nature against those who considered it as either base or dangerous. He argued for a cooperative and methodical procedure and against individualism and intuition. The New Method The core of Bacon’s philosophy of science is the account of inductive reasoning given in Book II of Novum Organum. The defect of all previous systems of beliefs about nature, he argued, lay in the inadequate treatment of the general propositions from which the deductions were made. 81 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Either they were the result of precipitate generalization from one or two cases, or they were uncritically assumed to be self-evident on the basis of their familiarity and general acceptance. To avoid hasty generalization Bacon urges a technique of “gradual ascent,” that is, the patient accumulation of well-founded generalizations of steadily increasing degrees of generality. This method would have the benefit of freeing people’s minds from ill-constructed everyday concepts that obliterate important differences and fail to register important similarities. The crucial point, Bacon realized, is that induction must work by elimination not, as it does in common life and the defective scientific tradition, by simple enumeration. Thus he stressed “the greater force of the negative instance”: the fact that while “all As are Bs” is only weakly confirmed by “this A is a B,” it is shown conclusively to be false by “this A is not a B.” His tables were formal devices for the presentation of singular pieces of evidence to facilitate the rapid discovery of false generalizations. What survives this eliminative screening, Bacon assumes, may be taken to be true. The conception of a scientific research establishment, which Bacon developed in his utopia, The New Atlantis, may be a more important contribution to science than his theory of induction. Here the idea of science as a collaborative undertaking, conducted in an impersonally methodical fashion and animated by the intention to give material benefits to mankind, is set out with literary force. THE MATERIALISM OF THOMAS HOBBES Thomas Hobbes was acquainted with both Bacon and Galileo. With the first he shared a strong concern for 82 Early Modern Philosophy philosophical method, with the second an overwhelming interest in matter in motion. His philosophical efforts, however, were more inclusive and more complete than those of his contemporaries. He was a comprehensive thinker within the scope of an exceedingly narrow set of presuppositions, and he produced one of the most systematic philosophies of the early modern period: an almost completely consistent description of humankind, civil society, and nature according to the tenets of mechanistic materialism. Hobbes’s account of what philosophy is and ought to be clearly distinguished between content and method. As method, philosophy is simply reasoning or calculating by the use of words as to the causes or effects of phenomena. When a person reasons from causes to effects, he reasons synthetically; when he reasons from effects to causes, he reasons analytically. (Hobbes’s strong inclination toward deduction and geometric proofs favoured arguments of the former type.) His dogmatic metaphysical assumption was that physical reality consists entirely of matter in motion. The real world is a corporeal universe in constant movement, and phenomena, or events, the causes and effects of which it is the business of philosophy to lay bare, consist of either the action of physical bodies on each other or the quaint effects of physical bodies upon minds. From this assumption follows Hobbes’s classification of the fields that form the content of philosophy: (1) physics, (2) moral philosophy, and (3) civil philosophy. Physics is the science of the motions and actions of physical bodies conceived in terms of cause and effect. Moral philosophy (or, more accurately, psychology) is the detailed study of “the passions and perturbations of the mind”— that is, how minds are “moved” by desire, aversion, appetite, fear, anger, and envy. And civil philosophy deals 83 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present with the concerted actions of people in a commonwealth—how, in detail, the wayward wills of human beings can be constrained by power (i.e., force) to prevent civil disorder and maintain peace. Hobbes’s philosophy was a bold restatement of Greek atomistic materialism, with applications to the realities of early modern politics that would have seemed strange to its ancient authors. But there are also elements in it that make it characteristically English. Hobbes’s account of language led him to adopt nominalism and deny the reality of universals. (A universal is a quality or property that each individual member of a class of things must possess if the same general word is to apply to all the things in that class. Redness, for example, is a universal possessed by all red objects.) The problem of universals is the question of whether universals are concepts, verbal expressions, or a special kind of entity that exists independently, outside space and time. Bacon’s general emphasis on experience also had its analogue in Hobbes’s theory that all knowledge arises from sense experiences, all of which are caused by the actions of physical bodies on the sense organs. Empiricism has been a basic and recurrent feature of British intellectual life, and its nominalist and sensationalist roots were already clearly evident in both Bacon and Hobbes. Hobbes’s System Theories that trace all observed effects to matter and motion are called mechanical. Hobbes was thus a mechanical materialist: he held that nothing but material things are real, and he thought that the subject matter of all the natural sciences consists of the motions of material things at different levels of generality. Geometry considers the effects of the motions of points, lines, and solids; pure 84 Early Modern Philosophy mechanics deals with the motions of three-dimensional bodies in a full space, or plenum; physics deals with the motions of the parts of inanimate bodies insofar as they contribute to observed phenomena; and psychology deals with the effects of the internal motions of animate bodies on behaviour. The system of the natural sciences described in Hobbes’s trilogy represents his understanding of the materialist principles on which all science is based. The fact that Hobbes included politics as well as psychology within his system, however, has tended to overshadow his insistence on the autonomy of political understanding from natural-scientific understanding. According to Hobbes, politics need not need be understood in terms of the motions of material things (although, ultimately, it can be). A certain kind of widely available self-knowledge is evidence enough of the human propensity to war. Although Hobbes is routinely read as having discerned the “laws of motion” for both human beings and human societies, the most that can plausibly be claimed is that he based his political philosophy on psychological principles that he thought could be illuminated by general laws of motion. Political Philosophy Hobbes presented his political philosophy in different forms for different audiences. De Cive states his theory in what he regarded as its most scientific form. Unlike The Elements of Law, which was composed in English for English parliamentarians—and written with local political challenges to Charles I in mind—De Cive was a Latin work for an audience of Continental savants who were interested in the “new” science: the sort of science that did not appeal to the authority of the ancients but approached various problems with fresh principles of explanation. 85 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present De Cive’s break from the ancient authority par excellence—Aristotle—could not have been more loudly advertised. After only a few paragraphs, Hobbes rejects one of the most famous theses of Aristotle’s politics, namely that human beings are naturally suited to life in a polis and do not fully realize their natures until they exercise the role of citizen. Hobbes turns Aristotle’s claim on its head: human beings, he insists, are by nature unsuited to political life. They naturally denigrate and compete with each other, are quite easily swayed by the rhetoric of ambitious men, and think much more highly of themselves than of other people. In short, their passions magnify the value they place on their own interests, especially their near-term interests. At the same time, most people, in pursuing their own interests, do not have the ability to prevail over competitors. Nor can they appeal to some natural common standard of behaviour that everyone will feel obliged to respect. There is no natural self-restraint, even when human beings are moderate in their appetites, for a ruthless and bloodthirsty few can make even the moderate feel forced to take violent preemptive action to avoid losing everything. The self-restraint even of the moderate, then, easily turns into aggression. In other words, no human being is above aggression and the anarchy that goes with it. War comes more naturally to human beings than political order. Indeed, political order is possible only when human beings abandon their natural condition of judging and pursuing what seems best to each and delegate this judgment to someone else. This delegation is effected when the many contract together to submit to a sovereign in return for physical safety and a modicum of well-being. Each of the many essentially says to the other: “I transfer my right of governing myself to X (the sovereign) if you do too.” And the transfer is collectively entered into only on 86 Early Modern Philosophy the understanding that it makes one less of a target of attack or dispossession than one would be in one’s natural state. Although Hobbes did not assume that there was ever a real historical event in which a mutual promise was made to delegate self-government to a sovereign, he claimed that the best way to understand the state was to conceive of it as having resulted from such an agreement. In Hobbes’s social contract, the many trade liberty for safety. Liberty, with its standing invitation to local conflict and finally all-out war—a “war of every man against every man”—is overvalued in traditional political philosophy and popular opinion, according to Hobbes. It is better for people to transfer the right of governing themselves to the sovereign. Once transferred, however, this right of government is absolute, unless the many feel that their lives are threatened by submission. The sovereign determines who owns what, who will hold which public offices, how the economy will be regulated, what acts will be crimes, and what punishments criminals should receive. The sovereign is the supreme commander of the army, supreme interpreter of law, and supreme interpreter of scripture, with authority over any national church. It is unjust—a case of reneging on what one has agreed—for any subject to take issue with these arrangements, for, in the act of creating the state or by receiving its protection, one agrees to leave judgments about the means of collective well-being and security to the sovereign. The sovereign’s laws and decrees and appointments to public office may be unpopular, and they may even be wrong. But unless the sovereign fails so utterly that subjects feel that their condition would be no worse in the free-for-all outside the state, it is better for the subjects to endure the sovereign’s rule. It is better both prudentially and morally. Because no one can prudently welcome a greater risk of death, no one 87 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present In Hobbes’s social contract, the many exchange liberty for safety, and a sovereign (Queen Elizabeth I, for instance, illustrated here) wields absolute power. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 88 Early Modern Philosophy can prudently prefer total liberty to submission. Total liberty invites war, and submission is the best insurance against war. Morality too supports this conclusion, for, according to Hobbes, all the moral precepts enjoining virtuous behaviour can be understood as derivable from the fundamental moral precept that one should seek peace— that is to say, freedom from war—if it is safe to do so. Without peace, he observed, man lives in “continual fear, and danger of violent death,” and what life he has is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” What Hobbes calls the “laws of nature,” the system of moral rules by which everyone is bound, cannot be safely complied with outside the state, for the total liberty that people have outside the state includes the liberty to flout the moral requirements if one’s survival seems to depend on it. The sovereign is not a party to the social contract. He receives the obedience of the many as a free gift in their hope that he will see to their safety. The sovereign makes no promises to the many to win their submission. Indeed, because he does not transfer his right of self-government to anyone, he retains the total liberty that his subjects trade for safety. He is not bound by law, including his own laws. Nor does he do anything unjustly if he makes decisions about his subjects’s safety and well-being that they do not like. Although the sovereign is in a position to judge the means of survival and well-being for the many more dispassionately than they are able to do themselves, he is not immune to self-interested passions. Hobbes realizes that the sovereign may behave iniquitously. He insists that it is utterly imprudent for a sovereign to act so unjustly that he disappoints his subjects’s expectation of safety and makes them feel insecure. Subjects who are in fear of their lives lose their obligations to obey and, with that, deprive the sovereign of his power. Reduced to the status of one 89 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present among many by the defection of his subjects, the unseated sovereign is likely to feel the wrath of those who submitted to him in vain. Hobbes’s masterpiece, Leviathan (1651), does not significantly depart from the view of De Cive concerning the relation between protection and obedience, but it devotes much more attention to the civil obligations of Christian believers and the proper and improper roles of a church within a state. Hobbes argues that believers do not endanger their prospects of salvation by obeying a sovereign’s decrees to the letter, and he maintains that churches do not have any authority that is not granted by the civil sovereign. THE RATIONALISM OF RENÉ DESCARTES The dominant philosophy of the last half of the 17th century was that of the French rationalist thinker René Descartes. A crucial figure in the history of philosophy, Descartes combined (however unconsciously or even unwillingly) the influences of the past into a synthesis that was striking in its originality and yet congenial to the scientific temper of the age. In the minds of all later historians, he counts as the progenitor of the modern spirit of philosophy. Each of the maxims of Leonardo da Vinci, which constitute the Renaissance worldview, found its place in Descartes: empiricism in the physiological researches described in the Discours de la méthode (1637; Discourse on Method); a mechanistic interpretation of the physical world and of human action in the Principia Philosophiae (1644; Principles of Philosophy) and Les Passions de l’âme (1649; The Passions of the Soul); and a mathematical bias that dominates the theory of method in Regulae ad 90 Early Modern Philosophy Lauded as the father of the modern philosophy, René Descartes amalgamated influences of the past with the more scientific constitution of the day.Hulton Archive/Getty Images Directionem Ingenii (Rules for the Direction of the Mind), published posthumously in 1701; and the metaphysics of the Meditationes de Prima Philosophia (1641; Meditations on the First Philosophy). But it is the mathematical theme that clearly predominates in Descartes’s philosophy. From the past there seeped into the Cartesian synthesis doctrines about God from Anselm of Canterbury (c. 1033–1109) and Thomas Aquinas, a theory of the will from Augustine, a deep sympathy with the Stoicism of the Romans, and a skeptical method taken indirectly from Pyrrhon of Elis (c. 360–c. 272 BCE) and Sextus 91 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Empiricus. But Descartes was also a great mathematician—he invented analytic geometry—and the author of many important physical and anatomical experiments. He knew and profoundly respected the work of Galileo. Indeed, he withdrew from publication his own cosmological treatise, Le Monde (The World), after Galileo’s condemnation by the Inquisition in 1633. Descartes’s System Bacon and Descartes, the founders of modern empiricism and rationalism, respectively, both subscribed to two pervasive tenets of the Renaissance: an enormous enthusiasm for physical science and the belief that knowledge means power—that the ultimate purpose of theoretical science is to serve the practical needs of human beings. In his Principles, Descartes defined philosophy as “the study of wisdom” or “the perfect knowledge of all one can know.” Its chief utility is “for the conduct of life” (morals), “the conservation of health” (medicine), and “the invention of all the arts” (mechanics). Using the famous metaphor of the “tree,” he expressed the relation of philosophy to practical endeavours: the roots are metaphysics; the trunk is physics; and the branches are morals, medicine, and mechanics. The metaphor is revealing, because it indicates that for Descartes—as for Bacon and Galileo— the most important part of the tree was the trunk. In other words, Descartes busied himself with metaphysics only to provide a firm foundation for physics. Thus, the Discourse on Method, which provides a synoptic view of the Cartesian philosophy, shows it to be not a metaphysics founded on physics (as was the case with Aristotle) but rather a physics founded on metaphysics. Descartes’s mathematical bias was reflected in his determination to ground natural science not in sensation 92 Early Modern Philosophy and probability (as did Bacon) but in premises that could be known with absolute certainty. Thus his metaphysics in essence consisted of three principles: 1. To employ the procedure of complete and systematic doubt to eliminate every belief that does not pass the test of indubitability (skepticism). 2. To accept no idea as certain that is not clear, distinct, and free of contradiction (mathematicism). 3. To found all knowledge upon the bedrock certainty of self-consciousness, so that “I think, therefore I am” becomes the only innate idea unshakable by doubt (subjectivism). From the indubitability of the self, Descartes inferred the existence of a perfect God. From the fact that a perfect being is incapable of falsification or deception, he concluded that the ideas about the physical world that God has implanted in human beings must be true. The achievement of certainty about the natural world was thus guaranteed by the perfection of God and by the “clear and distinct” ideas that are his gift. Cartesian metaphysics is the fountainhead of rationalism in modern philosophy, for it suggests that the mathematical criteria of clarity, distinctness, and logical consistency are the ultimate test of meaningfulness and truth. This stance is profoundly antiempirical. Bacon, who remarked that “reasoners resemble spiders who make cobwebs out of their own substance,” might well have said the same of Descartes, for the Cartesian self is just such a substance. Yet for Descartes the understanding is vastly superior to the senses, and only reason can ultimately decide what constitutes truth in science. 93 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Cartesianism dominated the intellectual life of continental Europe until the end of the 17th century. It was a fashionable philosophy, appealing to learned gentlemen and highborn ladies alike, and it was one of the few philosophical alternatives to the Scholasticism still being taught in the universities. Precisely for this reason it constituted a serious threat to established religious authority. In 1663 the Roman Catholic Church placed Descartes’s works on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum (“Index of Forbidden Books”), and the University of Oxford forbade the teaching of his doctrines. Only in the liberal Dutch universities, such as those of Groningen and Utrecht, did Cartesianism make serious headway. Certain features of Cartesian philosophy made it an important starting point for subsequent philosophical speculation. As a kind of meeting point for medieval and modern worldviews, it accepted the doctrines of Renaissance science while attempting to ground them metaphysically in medieval notions of God and the human mind. Thus, a certain dualism between God the Creator and the mechanistic world of his creation, between mind as a spiritual principle and matter as mere spatial extension, was inherent in the Cartesian position. An entire generation of Cartesians—among them Arnold Geulincx (1624–69), Nicolas Malebranche (1638–1715), and Pierre Bayle (1647–1706)—wrestled with the resulting problem of how interaction between two such radically different entities is possible. Meditations Descartes’s Meditations on First Philosophy was written in Latin and dedicated to the Jesuit professors at the Sorbonne in Paris. The work includes critical responses by several eminent thinkers—collected by the French 94 Early Modern Philosophy theologian and mathematician Marin Mersenne (1588– 1648) from the French philosopher and theologian Antoine Arnauld (1612–94), Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679), and the Epicurean atomist Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655)— as well as Descartes’s replies. The second edition (1642) includes a response by the Jesuit priest Pierre Bourdin (1595–1653), who Descartes said was a fool. These objections and replies constitute a landmark of cooperative discussion in philosophy and science at a time when dogmatism was the rule. The Meditations is characterized by Descartes’s use of methodic doubt, a systematic procedure of rejecting as though false all types of belief in which one has ever been, or could ever be, deceived. His arguments derive from the skepticism of Sextus Empiricus as reflected in the work of the Michel de Montaigne and the Catholic theologian Pierre Charron (1541–1603). Thus, Descartes’s apparent knowledge based on authority is set aside, because even experts are sometimes wrong. His beliefs from sensory experience are declared untrustworthy, because such experience is sometimes misleading, as when a square tower appears round from a distance. Even his beliefs about the objects in his immediate vicinity may be mistaken, because, as he notes, he often has dreams about objects that do not exist, and he has no way of knowing with certainty whether he is dreaming or awake. Finally, his apparent knowledge of simple and general truths of reasoning that do not depend on sense experience (such as “2 + 3 = 5” or “a square has four sides”) is also unreliable, because God could have made him in such a way that, for example, he goes wrong every time he counts. As a way of summarizing the universal doubt into which he has fallen, Descartes supposes that an “evil genius of the utmost power and cunning has employed all his energies in order to deceive me.” 95 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Although at this stage there is seemingly no belief about which he cannot entertain doubt, Descartes finds certainty in the intuition that when he is thinking (even if he is being deceived), he must exist. In the Discourse, Descartes expresses this intuition in the dictum “I think, therefore I am.” Because “therefore” suggests that the intuition is an argument (though it is not) in the Meditations he says merely, “I think, I am” (“Cogito, sum”). The cogito is a logically self-evident truth that also gives intuitively certain knowledge of a particular thing’s existence—that is, one’s self. Nevertheless, it justifies accepting as certain only the existence of the person who thinks it. If all one ever knew for certain was that one exists, and if one adhered to Descartes’s method of doubting all that is uncertain, one would be reduced to solipsism, the view that nothing exists but one’s self and thoughts. To escape solipsism, Descartes argues that all ideas that are as “clear and distinct” as the cogito must be true, for, if they were not, the cogito also, as a member of the class of clear and distinct ideas, could be doubted. Because “I think, I am” cannot be doubted, all clear and distinct ideas must be true. On the basis of clear and distinct innate ideas, Descartes then establishes that each mind is a mental substance and each body a part of one material substance. The mind or soul is immortal, because it is unextended and cannot be broken into parts, as can extended bodies. Descartes also advances a proof for the existence of God. He begins with the proposition that he has an innate idea of God as a perfect being and then concludes that God necessarily exists, because, if he did not, he would not be perfect. This ontological argument for God’s existence, originally due to Anselm, is at the heart of Descartes’s rationalism, because it establishes certain knowledge about an existing thing solely on the basis of reasoning from innate ideas, with no help from sensory experience. 96 Early Modern Philosophy Descartes then argues that, because God is perfect, he does not deceive human beings; and therefore, because God leads us to believe that the material world exists, it does exist. In this way Descartes claims to establish metaphysical foundations for the existence of his own mind, of God, and of the material world. The inherent circularity of Descartes’s reasoning was exposed by Arnauld, whose objection has come to be known as the Cartesian Circle. According to Descartes, God’s existence is established by the fact that Descartes has a clear and distinct idea of God. But the truth of Descartes’s clear and distinct ideas are guaranteed by the fact that God exists and is not a deceiver. Thus, to show that God exists, Descartes must assume that God exists. THE RATIONALISM OF BENEDICT DE SPINOZA The tradition of Continental rationalism was carried on by two philosophers of genius: the Dutch Jewish philosopher Benedict de Spinoza and his younger contemporary Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Whereas Bacon’s philosophy had been a search for method in science and Descartes’s basic aim had been the achievement of scientific certainty, Spinoza’s speculative system was one of the most comprehensive of the early modern period. In certain respects Spinoza had much in common with Hobbes: a mechanistic worldview and even a political philosophy that sought political stability in centralized power. Yet Spinoza introduced a conception of philosophizing that was new to the Renaissance; philosophy became a personal and moralquest for wisdom and the achievement of human perfection. Spinoza’s magnum opus, the Ethica (Ethics), published posthumously in 1677, is written as a geometric proof in 97 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present the style of Euclid (flourished c. 300 BCE). Spinoza apparently believed that a geometric presentation of his ideas would be clearer than the conventional narrative style of his earlier works. Accordingly, he begins with a set of definitions of key terms and a series of self-evident “axioms” and proceeds to derive from these a number of “theorems,” or propositions. The early portion of the work contains no introductory or explanatory material to aid the reader, apparently because Spinoza initially thought it unnecessary. By the middle of Part I, however, he had added various notes and observations to ensure that the reader would understand the significance of the conclusions being developed. By the end of Part I, he had also added polemical essays and introductions to various topics. The form of the work as a whole is therefore a mixture of axiomatic proof and philosophical narrative. Spinoza begins by stating a set of definitions of eight terms: self-caused, finite of its own kind, substance, attribute, mode, God, freedom, and eternity. These definitions are followed by a series of axioms, one of which supposedly guarantees that the results of Spinoza’s logical demonstrations will be true about reality. Spinoza quickly establishes that substance must be existent, self-caused, and unlimited. From this he proves that there cannot be two substances with the same attribute, because each would limit the other. This leads to the monumental conclusion of Proposition 11: “God, or substance consisting of infinite attributes, each of which expresses eternal and infinite essence, necessarily exists.” From the definition of God as a substance with infinite attributes and other propositions about substance, it follows that “there can be, or be conceived, no other substance but God” (Proposition 14) and that “whatever is, is in God, and nothing can be or be conceived without God” (Proposition 15). This constitutes the core of Spinoza’s pantheism: God 98 Early Modern Philosophy is everywhere, and everything that exists is a modification of God. God is known by human beings through only two of his attributes—thought and extension (the quality of having spatial dimensions)—though the number of God’s attributes is infinite. Later in Part I, Spinoza established that everything that occurs necessarily follows from the nature of God and that there can be no contingencies in nature. Part I concludes with an appended polemic about the misreading of the world by religious and superstitious people who think that God can change the course of events and that the course of events sometimes reflects a divine judgment of human behaviour. Part II explores the two attributes through which human beings understand the world, thought and extension. The latter form of understanding is developed in natural science, the former in logic and psychology. For Spinoza, there is no problem, as there is for Descartes, of explaining the interaction between mind and body. The two are not distinct entities causally interacting with each other but merely different aspects of the same events. Spinoza accepted the mechanistic physics of Descartes as the right way of understanding the world in terms of extension. Individual physical or mental entities are “modes” of substance: physical entities are modes of substance understood in terms of the attribute of extension, and mental entities are modes of substance understood in terms of the attribute of thought. Because God is the only substance, all physical and mental entities are modes of God. Modes are natura naturata (“nature-created”) and transitory, whereas God, or substance, is natura naturans (“nature-creating”) and eternal. Physical modes that are biological have a feature beyond simple extension, namely, conatus (Latin: “exertion” or “effort”), a desire and drive for self-preservation. Unconsciously, biological modes are also driven by 99 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present emotions of fear and pleasure to act in certain ways. Human beings, as biological modes, are in a state of bondage as long as they act solely from emotions. In Part V of the Ethics, “Of Human Freedom,” Spinoza explains that freedom is achieved by understanding the power of the emotions over human actions, rationally accepting things and events over which one has no control, and increasing one’s knowledge and cultivating one’s intellect. The highest form of knowledge consists of an intellectual intuition of things in their existence as modes and attributes of eternal substance, or God, which is what it means to see the world from the aspect of eternity. This kind of knowledge leads to a deeper understanding of God, who is all things, and ultimately to an intellectual love of God (amor Dei intellectualis), a form of blessedness amounting to a kind of rational-mystical experience. THE RATIONALISM OF GOTTFRIED WILHELM LEIBNIZ Whereas the basic elements of the Spinozistic worldview are given in the Ethics, Leibniz’s philosophy must be pieced together from numerous brief expositions, which seem to be mere philosophical interludes in an otherwise busy life. But the philosophical form is deceptive. Leibniz was a mathematician (he and Isaac Newton independently invented the infinitesimal calculus), jurist (he codified the laws of Mainz, Ger.), diplomat, historian to royalty, and court librarian in a princely house. Yet he was also one of the most original philosophers of the early modern period. His chief contributions were in the fields of logic, in which he was a truly brilliant innovator, and metaphysics, in which he provided a rationalist alternative to the philosophies of Descartes and Spinoza. Leibniz conceived of logic as a mathematical calculus. He was the first to 100 Early Modern Philosophy Voltaire’s novel Candide soundly and satirically spurned Leibniz’s heedlessly sanguine worldview. AFP/Getty Images 101 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present distinguish “truths of reason” from “truths of fact” and to contrast the necessary propositions of logic and mathematics, which hold in all “possible worlds,” with the contingent propositions of science, which hold only in some possible worlds (including the actual world). He saw clearly that, as the first kind of proposition is governed by the principle of contradiction (a proposition and its negation cannot both be true), the second is governed by the principle of sufficient reason (nothing exists or is the case without a sufficient reason). This principle was the basis of Leibniz’s claim that the actual world is the “best of all possible worlds” that God could have created: his choice of this world over the others required a sufficient reason, which, for Leibniz, was the fact that this world was the best, despite the existence of evident evils. Any other possible world would have had evils of its own sort of even greater magnitude. (Leibniz’s blindly optimistic view of the world was satirically rejected in the novel Candide [1759] by Voltaire [1694–1788].) In metaphysics, Leibniz’s pluralism contrasted with Descartes’s dualism and Spinoza’s monism. Leibniz posited the existence of an infinite number of spiritual substances, which he called “monads,” each different, each a percipient of the universe around it, and each mirroring that universe from its own point of view. However, the differences between Leibniz’s philosophy and that of Descartes and Spinoza are less significant than their similarities, in particular their extreme rationalism. In the Principes de la nature et de la grâce fondés en raison (1714; “Principles of Nature and of Grace Founded in Reason”), Leibniz stated a maxim that could fairly represent the entire school: True reasoning depends upon necessary or eternal truths, such as those of logic, numbers, geometry, which establish an indubitable connection of ideas and unfailing consequences. 102 CHAPTER 3 Philosophy in the Enlightenment T he European Enlightenment was an intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th centuries in which ideas concerning God, reason, nature, and humanity were synthesized into a worldview that gained wide assent and instigated revolutionary developments in art, philosophy, and politics. Central to Enlightenment thought were the use and celebration of reason, the power by which humans understand the universe and improve their own condition. The goals of rational man were considered to be knowledge, freedom, and happiness. SOURCES AND DEVELOPMENT OF ENLIGHTENMENT THOUGHT The powers and uses of reason had first been explored by the philosophers of ancient Greece, who discerned in the ordered regularity of nature the workings of an intelligent mind. Rome adopted and preserved much of Greek culture, notably including the ideas of a rational natural order and natural law. Amid the turmoil of empire, however, a new concern arose for personal salvation, and the way was paved for the triumph of the Christian religion. Christian thinkers gradually found uses for their Greco-Roman heritage. The system of thought known as Scholasticism, culminating in the 103 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present work of Thomas Aquinas, resurrected reason as a tool of understanding but subordinated it to spiritual revelation and the revealed truths of Christianity. The intellectual and political edifice of Christianity, seemingly impregnable in the Middle Ages, fell in turn to the assaults made on it by humanism, the Renaissance, and the Protestant Reformation. Humanism bred the experimental science of Bacon, Copernicus, and Galileo and the mathematical rigour of Descartes, Leibniz, and Newton. The Renaissance rediscovered much of Classical culture and revived the notion of humans as creative beings, while the Reformation, more directly but in the long run no less effectively, challenged the monolithic authority of the Roman Catholic Church. For the German Reformer Martin Luther as for Bacon or Descartes, the way to truth lay in the application of human reason. Received authority, whether of Ptolemy (c. 100–c. 170 CE), the originator of the Earth-centred model of the universe, in the sciences or of the church in matters of the spirit, was to be subject to the probings of unfettered minds. The successful application of reason to any question depended on its correct application—on the development of a methodology of reasoning that would serve as its own guarantee of validity. Such a methodology was most spectacularly achieved in the sciences and mathematics, where the logics of induction and deduction made possible the creation of a sweeping new cosmology. The success of Newton, in particular, in capturing in a few mathematical equations the laws that govern the motions of the planets gave great impetus to a growing faith in the human capacity to attain knowledge. At the same time, the idea of the universe as a mechanism governed by a few simple (and discoverable) laws had a subversive effect on the concepts of a personal God and individual salvation that were central to Christianity. 104 Philosophy in the Enlightenment Humanism led the likes of scientists such as Isaac Newton to foster experimentation in the Enlightenment. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 105 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Inevitably, the method of reason was applied to religion itself. The product of a search for a natural— rational—religion was Deism, which, although never an organized cult or movement, conflicted with Christianity for two centuries, especially in England and France. For the Deist a small number of religious truths sufficed, and they were truths felt to be manifest to all rational beings: the existence of one God, often conceived of as architect or mechanician, the existence of a system of rewards and punishments administered by that God, and the obligation to be virtuous and pious. Beyond the natural religion of the Deists lay the more radical products of the application of reason to religion: skepticism, atheism, and materialism. The Enlightenment produced the first modern secularized theories of psychology and ethics. The English empiricist John Locke (1632–1704) conceived of the human mind as being at birth a “tabula rasa,” a blank slate on which experience wrote freely and boldly, creating individual character according to the individual’s experience of the world. Supposed innate qualities, such as goodness or original sin, had no reality. In a darker vein, Hobbes portrayed humans as moved solely by considerations of their own pleasure and pain. The notion of humans as neither good nor bad but interested principally in survival and the maximization of pleasure led to radical political theories. Where the state had once been viewed as an earthly approximation of an eternal order, with the City of Man modeled on the City of God, now it came to be seen as a mutually beneficial arrangement, among individuals, conceived as a social contract, aimed at protecting the natural rights and self-interest of each. This conception of society, however, contrasted sharply with the realities of actual societies. Thus the Enlightenment became critical, reforming, and eventually 106 Philosophy in the Enlightenment revolutionary. Locke and Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) ) in England, Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78), Montesquieu (1689–1755), and Voltaire in France, and Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) in America all contributed to an evolving critique of the arbitrary, authoritarian state and to sketching the outline of a higher form of social organization, based on natural rights and functioning as a political democracy. Such powerful ideas found expression as reform in England and as revolution in France (1789) and America (1775–83). The Enlightenment expired as the victim of its own excesses. The more rarefied the religion of the Deists became, the less it offered those who sought solace or salvation. The celebration of abstract reason provoked contrary spirits to begin exploring the world of sensation and emotion in the cultural movement known as Romanticism. The Reign of Terror that followed the French Revolution severely tested the belief that people could govern themselves. The high optimism that marked much of Enlightenment thought, however, survived as one of the movement’s most enduring legacies: the belief that human history is a record of general moral and intellectual progress. CLASSICAL BRITISH EMPIRICISM Although they both lived and worked in the late 17th century, Isaac Newton and John Locke were arguably the true fathers of the Enlightenment. Newton was the last of the scientific geniuses of the age, and his great Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687; Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy) was the culmination of the movement that had begun with Copernicus and Galileo— the first scientific synthesis based on the application of mathematics to nature in every detail. The basic idea of the authority and autonomy of reason, which dominated 107 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present all philosophizing in the 18th century, was, at bottom, the consequence of Newton’s work. Copernicus, Kepler, Bacon, Galileo, and Descartes, scientists and methodologists of science, performed like people urgently attempting to persuade nature to reveal its secrets. Newton’s comprehensive mechanistic system made it seem as if at last nature had done so. It is impossible to exaggerate the enormous enthusiasm that this assumption kindled in all of the major thinkers of the late 17th and 18th centuries, from Locke to Kant. The new enthusiasm for reason that they all instinctively shared was based not on the mere advocacy of philosophers such as Descartes and Leibniz but on their conviction that, in the spectacular achievement of Newton, reason had succeeded in conquering the natural world. Two major philosophical problems remained: to provide an account of the origins and extent of human knowledge and to shift the application of reason from the physical universe to human nature. The Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690), by Locke, was devoted to the first, and the Treatise of Human Nature (1739–40), by the Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711–76)—“being an attempt to apply the method of experimental reasoning to moral subjects”—was devoted to the second. These two basic tasks represented a new direction for philosophy since the late Renaissance. The Renaissance preoccupation with the natural world had constituted a certain “realistic” bias. Hobbes and Spinoza had each produced a metaphysics. They had been interested in the real constitution of the physical world. Moreover, the Renaissance enthusiasm for mathematics had resulted in a profound interest in rational principles, necessary propositions, and innate ideas. As attention was turned from the realities of nature to the structure of the mind that knows it so successfully, philosophers 108 Philosophy in the Enlightenment of the Enlightenment focused on the sensory and experiential components of knowledge rather than on the merely mathematical components. Thus, whereas the philosophy of the late Renaissance had been metaphysical and for the most part rationalistic, that of the Enlightenment was epistemological and empiricist. The school of British empiricism—whose major representatives are Locke, the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkeley (1685–1753), and Hume—dominated the perspective of Enlightenment philosophy until the time of Kant. John Locke As mentioned earlier, whereas rationalist philosophers such as Descartes held that the ultimate source of human knowledge is reason, empiricists such as Locke argued that it is experience. Rationalist accounts of knowledge also typically involved the claim that at least some kinds of ideas are “innate,” or present in the mind at (or even before) birth. For philosophers such as Descartes and Leibniz, the hypothesis of innateness is required to explain how humans come to have ideas of certain kinds. These ideas include not only mathematical concepts such as numbers, which appear not to be derived from sense experience, but also, according to some thinkers, certain general metaphysical principles, such as “every event has a cause.” Locke claimed that this line of argument has no force. He held that all ideas (except those that are “trifling”) can be explained in terms of experience. Instead of attacking the doctrine of innate ideas directly, however, his strategy was to refute it by showing that it is explanatorily otiose and hence dispensable. There are two kinds of experience, according to Locke: observation of external objects (i.e., sensation) 109 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present and observation of the internal operations of the mind. Locke called this latter kind of experience, for which there is no natural word in English, “reflection.” Some examples of reflection are perceiving, thinking, doubting, believing, reasoning, knowing, and willing. As Locke uses the term, a “simple idea” is anything that is an “immediate object of perception” (i.e., an object as it is perceived by the mind) or anything that the mind “perceives in itself” through reflection. Simple ideas, whether they are ideas of perception or ideas of reflection, may be combined or repeated to produce “compound ideas,” as when the compound idea of an apple is produced by bringing together simple ideas of a certain colour, texture, odour, and figure. Abstract ideas are created when “ideas taken from particular beings become general representatives of all of the same kind.” The “qualities” of an object are its powers to cause ideas in the mind. One consequence of this definition is that, in Locke’s epistemology, words designating the sensible properties of objects are systematically ambiguous. The word red, for example, can mean either the idea of red in the mind or the quality in an object that causes that idea. Locke distinguished between primary and secondary qualities, as Galileo did. According to Locke, primary qualities, but not secondary qualities, are represented in the mind as they exist in the object itself. The primary qualities of an object, in other words, resemble the ideas they cause in the mind. Examples of primary qualities include “solidity, extension, figure, motion, or rest, and number.” Secondary qualities are configurations or arrangements of primary qualities that cause sensible ideas such as sounds, colours, odours, and tastes. Thus, according to Locke’s view, the phenomenal redness of a fire engine is not in the fire engine itself, but its phenomenal solidity is. Similarly, the phenomenal 110 Philosophy in the Enlightenment sweet odour of a rose is not in the rose itself, but its phenomenal extension is. In Book IV of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke defines knowledge as “the perception of the connexion of and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy of any of our ideas.” Knowledge so defined admits of three degrees, according to Locke. The first is what he calls “intuitive knowledge,” in which the mind “perceives the agreement or disagreement of two ideas immediately by themselves, without the intervention of any other.” Although Locke’s first examples of intuitive knowledge are analytic propositions such as “white is not black,” “a circle is not a triangle,” and “three are more than two,” later he says that “the knowledge of our own being we have by intuition.” Relying on the metaphor of light as Augustine and others had, Locke says of this knowledge that “the mind is presently filled with the clear light of it. It is on this intuition that depends all the certainty and evidence of all our knowledge.” The second degree of knowledge obtains when “the mind perceives the agreement or disagreement of…ideas, but not immediately.” In these cases, some mediating idea makes it possible to see the connection between two other ideas. In a demonstration (or proof), for example, the connection between any premise and the conclusion is mediated by other premises and by the laws of logic. Demonstrative knowledge, although certain, is less certain than intuitive knowledge, according to Locke, because it requires effort and attention to go through the steps needed to recognize the certainty of the conclusion. A third degree of knowledge, “sensitive knowledge,” is roughly the same as what John Duns Scotus (c. 1266–1308) called “intuitive cognition,” namely, the perception of “the particular existence of finite beings without us.” Unlike intuitive cognition, however, Locke’s sensitive knowledge is not the most certain kind of knowledge it is possible to 111 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present have. For him, it is less certain than intuitive or demonstrative knowledge. Next in certainty to knowledge is probability, which Locke defines as the appearance of agreement or disagreement of ideas with each other. Like knowledge, probability admits of degrees, the highest of which attaches to propositions endorsed by the general consent of all people in all ages. Locke may have had in mind the virtually general consent of his contemporaries in the proposition that God exists, but he also explicitly mentions beliefs about causal relations. The next-highest degree of probability belongs to propositions that hold not universally but for the most part, such as “people prefer their own private advantage to the public good.” This sort of proposition is typically derived from history. A still lower degree of probability attaches to claims about specific facts, for example, that a man named Julius Caesar lived a long time ago. Problems arise when testimonies conflict, as they often do, but there is no simple rule or set of rules that determines how one ought to resolve such controversies. Probability can concern not only objects of possible sense experience, as most of the foregoing examples do, but also things that are outside the sensible realm, such as angels, devils, magnetism, and molecules. George Berkeley It was precisely this dualism of primary and secondary qualities that Locke’s successor, George Berkeley, sought to overcome. Although Berkeley was a bishop in the Anglican church who professed a desire to combat atheistic materialism, his importance for the theory of knowledge lies rather in the way in which he demonstrated that, in the end, primary qualities are reducible to 112 Philosophy in the Enlightenment secondary qualities. His empiricism led to a denial of abstract ideas because he believed that general notions are simply fictions of the mind. Science, he argued, can easily dispense with the concept of matter: nature is simply that which human beings perceive through their sense faculties. This means that sense experiences themselves can be considered “objects for the mind.” A physical object, therefore, is simply a recurrent group of sense qualities. With this important reduction of substance to quality, Berkeley became the father of the epistemological position known as phenomenalism. In his major work, Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge (1710), Berkeley asserted that nothing exists except ideas and spirits (minds or souls). He distinguished three kinds of ideas: those that come from sense experience correspond to Locke’s simple ideas of perception; those that come from “attending to the passions and operations of the mind” correspond to Locke’s ideas of reflection; and those that come from compounding, dividing, or otherwise representing ideas correspond to Locke’s compound ideas. By “spirit” Berkeley meant “one simple, undivided, active being.” The activity of spirits consists of both understanding and willing: understanding is spirit perceiving ideas, and will is spirit producing ideas. For Berkeley, ostensibly physical objects like tables and chairs are really nothing more than collections of sensible ideas. Because no idea can exist outside a mind, it follows that tables and chairs, as well all the other furniture of the physical world, exist only insofar as they are in the mind of someone (i.e., only insofar as they are perceived). For any nonthinking being, esse est percipi (“to be is to be perceived”). The clichéd question of whether a tree falling in an uninhabited forest makes a sound is inspired by Berkeley’s philosophy, though he never considered it in these terms. 113 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Everyday objects such as tables and chairs might seem like physical things, but George Berkeley argued that they are only ideas. Shutterstock.com He did, however, consider the implicit objection and gave various answers to it. He sometimes says that a table in an unperceived room would be perceived if someone were there. This conditional response, however, is inadequate. Granted that the table would exist if it were perceived, does it exist when it is not perceived? Berkeley’s more pertinent answer is that, when no human is perceiving a table or other such object, God is; and it is God’s thinking that keeps the otherwise unperceived object in existence. Although this doctrine initially strikes most people as strange, Berkeley claimed that he was merely describing the commonsense view of reality. To say that colours, sounds, trees, dogs, and tables are ideas is not to say that 114 Philosophy in the Enlightenment they do not really exist, it is merely to say what they really are. Moreover, to say that animals and pieces of furniture are ideas is not to say that they are diaphanous, gossamer, and evanescent. Opacity, density, and permanence are also ideas that partially constitute these objects. Berkeley supports his main thesis with a syllogistic argument: physical things such as trees, dogs, and houses are things perceived by sense; things perceived by sense are ideas; therefore, physical things are ideas. If one objects that the second premise of the syllogism is false—people sense things, not ideas—Berkeley would reply that there are no sensations without ideas and that it makes no sense to speak of some additional thing that ideas are supposed to represent or resemble. Unlike Locke, Berkeley did not believe that there is anything “behind” or “underlying” ideas in a world external to the mind. Indeed, Berkeley claims that no clear idea can be attached to this notion. One consequence of this view is that Locke’s distinction between primary and secondary qualities is spurious. Extension, figure, motion, rest, and solidity are as much ideas as green, loud, and bitter are; there is nothing special about the former kind of idea. Furthermore, matter, as philosophers conceive it, does not exist, and indeed it is contradictory. Although matter is supposedly unsensed extension, figure, and motion, because extension, figure, and motion are ideas, they must be sensed. Berkeley’s doctrine that things unperceived by human beings continue to exist in the thought of God was not novel. It was part of the traditional belief of Christian philosophers from Augustine through Aquinas and at least to Descartes that God not only creates all things but also keeps them in existence by thinking of them. According to this view, if God were ever to stop thinking of a creature, it would immediately be annihilated. 115 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present David Hume The third, and in many ways the most important, of the British empiricists was the skeptic David Hume. Hume’s philosophical intention was to reap, humanistically, the harvest sowed by Newtonian physics, to apply the method of natural science to human nature. The paradoxical result of this admirable goal, however, was a devastating skeptical crisis. Kinds of Perception Although Berkeley rejected the Lockean notions of primary and secondary qualities and matter, he retained Locke’s beliefs in the existence of mind, substance, and causation as an unseen force or power in objects. Hume, in contrast, rejected all these notions. Hume recognized two kinds of perception: impressions and ideas. Impressions are perceptions that the mind experiences with the “most force and violence,” and ideas are the “faint images” of impressions. Hume considered this distinction so obvious that he demurred from explaining it at any length: as he indicates in a summary explication in A Treatise of Human Nature, impressions are felt, and ideas are thought. Nevertheless, he concedes that sometimes sleep, fever, or madness can produce ideas that approximate to the force of impressions, and some impressions can approach the weakness of ideas. But such occasions are rare. The distinction between impressions and ideas is problematic in a way that Hume did not notice. The impression (experience) of anger, for example, has an unmistakable quality and intensity. But the idea of anger is not the same as a “weaker” experience of anger. Thinking of anger no more guarantees being angry than thinking of happiness guarantees being happy. So there seems to be a 116 Philosophy in the Enlightenment David Hume, oil painting by Allan Ramsay, 1766, in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh. Courtesy of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery 117 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present difference between the impression of anger and the idea of anger that Hume’s theory does not capture. All perceptions, whether impressions or ideas, can be either simple or complex. Although simple perceptions are not subject to further separation or distinction, complex perceptions are. To return to an example mentioned earlier, the perception of an apple is complex, insofar as it consists of a combination of simple perceptions of a certain shape, colour, texture, and aroma. It is noteworthy that, according to Hume, for every simple impression there is a simple idea that corresponds to it and differs from it only in force and vivacity, and vice versa. Thus, corresponding to the impression of red is the idea of red. This correlation does not hold true in general for complex perceptions. Although there is a correspondence between the complex impression of an apple and the complex idea of an apple, there is no impression that corresponds to the idea of Pegasus or the idea of a unicorn. These complex ideas do not have a correlate in reality. Similarly, there is no complex idea corresponding to the complex impression of, say, an extensive vista of the city of Rome. Because the formation of every simple idea is always preceded by the experience of a corresponding simple impression, and because the experience of every simple impression is always followed by the formation of a corresponding simple idea, it follows, according to Hume, that simple impressions are the causes of their corresponding simple ideas. There are two kinds of impressions: those of sensation and those of reflection. Regarding the former, Hume says little more than that sensation “arises in the soul originally from unknown causes.” Impressions of reflection arise from a complicated series of mental operations. First, one experiences impressions of heat or cold, thirst or hunger, pleasure or pain. Second, one forms corresponding 118 Philosophy in the Enlightenment ideas of heat or cold, thirst or hunger, pleasure or pain. And third, one’s reflection on these ideas produces impressions of “desire and aversion, hope and fear.” Because the faculty of imagination can divide and assemble disparate ideas at will, some explanation is needed for the fact that people tend to think in regular and predictable patterns. Hume says that the production of thoughts in the mind is guided by three principles: resemblance, contiguity, and cause and effect. Thus, a person who thinks of one idea is likely to think of another idea that resembles it. His thought is likely to run from red to pink to white or from dog to wolf to coyote. Concerning contiguity, people are inclined to think of things that are next to each other in space and time. Finally and most importantly, people tend to create associations between ideas of things that are causally related. The ideas of fire and smoke, parent and child, and disease and death are connected in the mind for this reason. Hume uses the principle of resemblance for another purpose: to explain the nature of general ideas. Holding that there are no abstract ideas, Hume affirms that all ideas are particular. Some of them, however, function as general ideas (i.e., ideas that represent many objects of a certain kind) because they incline the mind to think of other ideas that they resemble. Relations of Ideas and Matters of Fact According to Hume, the mind is capable of apprehending two kinds of proposition or truth: those expressing “relations of ideas” and those expressing “matters of fact.” The former can be intuited (i.e.,apprehended directly) or deduced from other propositions. That a is identical with a, that b resembles c, and that d is larger than e are examples of propositions that are intuited. The negations of true propositions expressing relations of ideas are contradictory. 119 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Because the propositions of arithmetic and algebra are exclusively about relations of ideas, these disciplines are more certain than others. In the Treatise, Hume says that geometry is not quite as certain as arithmetic and algebra, because its original principles derive from sensation, and about sensation there can never be absolute certainty. He revised his views later, however, and in the An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748) he put geometry on an equal footing with the other mathematical sciences. Unlike propositions about relations of ideas, propositions about matters of fact are known only through experience. By far the most important of these propositions are those that express or presuppose causal relations (e.g., “Fire causes heat” and “A moving billiard ball communicates its motion to any stationary ball it strikes”). But how is it possible to know through experience that one kind of object or event causes another? What kind of experience would justify such a claim? Cause and Effect In the Treatise, Hume observes that the idea of causation contains three components: contiguity (i.e., near proximity) of time and place, temporal priority of the cause, and a more mysterious component that he calls “necessary connection.” In other words, when one says that x is a cause of y, one means that instances of x and instances of y are always near each other in time and space, instances of x occur before instances of y, and there is some connection between x’s and y’s that makes it necessary that an instance of y occurs if an instance of x does. It is easy to explain the origin in experience of the first two components of the idea of causation. In past experience, all events consisting of a moving billiard ball striking a stationary one were quickly followed by events consisting of the movement of the formerly stationary ball. In 120 Philosophy in the Enlightenment addition, the first sort of event always preceded the second, and never the reverse. But whence the third component of the idea of causation, whereby one thinks that the striking of the stationary ball somehow necessitates that it will move? Unlike the contiguity and temporal order of the striking and moving of billiard balls, no one has seen or otherwise directly observed this necessity in past experience. It is important to note that, were it not for the idea of necessary connection, one would have no reason to believe that a currently observed cause will produce an unseen effect in the future or that a currently observed effect was produced by an unseen cause in the past. For the mere fact that past instances of the cause and effect were contiguous and temporally ordered in a certain way does not logically imply that present and future instances will display the same relations. (Such an inference could be justified only if one assumed a principle such as “instances, of which we have had no experience, must resemble those, of which we have had experience, and that the course of nature continues always uniformly the same.” The problem with this principle is that it too stands in need of justification, and the only possible justification is question-begging. That is, one could argue that present and future experience will resemble past experience, because, in the past, present and future experience resembled past experience. But this argument clearly assumes what it sets out to prove.) Hume offers a “skeptical solution” of the problem of the origin of the idea of necessary connection. According to him, it arises from the feeling of “determination” that is created in the mind when it experiences the first member of a pair of events that it is long accustomed to experiencing together. When the mind observes the moving billiard ball strike the stationary one, it is moved by force of habit and custom to form an idea of the movement of the 121 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present stationary ball (i.e., to believe that the stationary ball will move). The feeling of being “carried along” in this process is the impression from which the idea of necessary connection is derived. Hume’s solution is “skeptical” in the sense that, though it accounts for the origins of the idea of necessary connection, it does not make causal inferences any more rational than they were before. The solution explains why people are psychologically compelled to form beliefs about future effects and past causes, but it does not justify those beliefs logically. It remains true that the only evidence for such beliefs is past experience of contiguity and temporal precedence. “All inferences from experience, therefore, are effects of custom, not of reasoning.” Thus, it is that custom, not reason, is the great guide of life. Substance From the time of Plato, one of the most basic notions in philosophy has been substance—that whose existence does not depend upon anything else. For Locke, the substance of an object is the hidden substratum in which the object’s properties inhere and on which they depend for their existence. One of the reasons for Hume’s importance in the history of philosophy is that he rejected this notion. In keeping with his strict empiricism, he held that the idea of substance, if it answers to anything genuine, must arise from experience. But what kind of experience can this be? By its proponents’ own definition, substance is that which underlies an object’s properties, including its sensible properties. It is therefore in principle unobservable. Hume concludes, “We have therefore no idea of substance, distinct from that of a collection of particular qualities, nor have we any other meaning when we either talk or reason concerning it.” 122 Philosophy in the Enlightenment Furthermore, the things that earlier philosophers had assumed were substances are in fact “nothing but a collection of simple ideas, that are united by the imagination, and have a particular name assigned to them.” Gold, to take Hume’s example, is nothing but the collection of the ideas of yellow, malleable, fusible, and so on. Even the mind, or the “self,” is only a “heap or collection of different perceptions united together by certain relations and suppos’d tho’ falsely, to be endow’d with a perfect simplicity or identity.” This conclusion had important consequences for the problem of personal identity, to which Locke had devoted considerable attention. For if there is nothing to the mind but a collection of perceptions, there is no self that persists as the subject of these perceptions. Therefore, it does not make sense to speak of the subject of certain perceptions yesterday as the “same self,” or the “same person,” as the subject of certain perceptions today or in the future. There is no self or person there. NONEPISTEMOLOGICAL MOVEMENTS Although the school of British empiricism represented the mainstream of Enlightenment philosophy until the time of Kant, it was by no means the only type of philosophy that the 18th century produced. The Enlightenment, which was based on a few great fundamental ideas (such as the dedication to reason, the belief in moral and intellectual progress, the confidence in nature as a source of inspiration and value, and the search for tolerance and freedom in political and social institutions), generated many crosscurrents of intellectual and philosophical expression. 123 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Materialism and Scientific Discovery The profound influence of Locke spread to France, where it not only resulted in the skeptical empiricism of Voltaire but also united with mechanistic aspects of Cartesianism to produce an entire school of sensationalistic materialism, a combination of materialism and a form of empiricism according to which sense perception is the only kind of experience from which genuine knowledge derives. This position even found its way into many of the articles of the great French Encyclopédie, edited by Denis Diderot (1713–84) and Jean d’Alembert (1717–83), which was almost a complete compendium of the scientific and humanistic accomplishments of the 18th century. Although the terms Middle Ages and Renaissance were not invented until well after the historical periods they designate, scholars of the 18th century called their age “the Enlightenment” with self-conscious enthusiasm and pride. It was an age of optimism and expectations of new beginnings. Great strides were made in chemistry and biological science. Jean-Baptiste de Monet, chevalier de Lamarck (1744–1829), Georges, Baron Cuvier (1769– 1832), and Georges-Louis Leclerc, comte de Buffon (1707–88), introduced a new system of animal classification. In the eight years between 1766 and 1774, the chemical elements hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen were discovered. Foundations were being laid in psychology and the social sciences and in ethics and aesthetics. The work of Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot, baron de L’Aulne (1727–81), and Montesquieu in France, Giambattista Vico (1668– 1744) in Italy, and Adam Smith (1723–90) in Scotland marked the beginning of economics, politics, history, sociology, and jurisprudence as sciences. Hume, Bentham, and the British “moral sense” theorists were turning ethics 124 Philosophy in the Enlightenment into a specialized field of philosophical inquiry. And Anthony Ashley, 3rd earl of Shaftesbury (1671–1713), Edmund Burke (1729–97), Johann Gottsched (1700–66), and Alexander Baumgarten (1714–62) were laying the foundations for a systematic aesthetics, the philosophical study of beauty and taste. Social and Political Philosophy Apart from epistemology, the most significant philosophical contributions of the Enlightenment were made in the fields of social and political philosophy. The Two Treatises of Civil Government (1690) by Locke and The Social Contract (1762) by Rousseau proposed justifications of political association grounded in the newer political requirements of the age. The Renaissance political philosophies of Machiavelli, Bodin, and Hobbes had presupposed or defended the absolute power of kings and rulers. But the Enlightenment theories of Locke and Rousseau championed the freedom and equality of citizens. It was a natural historical transformation. The 16th and 17th centuries were the age of absolutism; the chief problem of politics was that of maintaining internal order, and political theory was conducted in the language of national sovereignty. But the 18th century was the age of the democratic revolutions; the chief political problem was that of securing freedom and revolting against injustice, and political theory was expressed in the idiom of natural and inalienable rights. John Locke Locke’s political philosophy explicitly denied the divine right of kings and the absolute power of the sovereign. Instead, he insisted on a natural and universal right to 125 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present freedom and equality. The state of nature in which human beings originally lived was not, as Hobbes imagined, intolerable, but it did have certain inconveniences. Therefore, people banded together to form society—as Aristotle taught, “not simply to live, but to live well.” Political power, Locke argued, can never be exercised apart from its ultimate purpose, which is the common good, for the political contract is undertaken in order to preserve life, liberty, and property. It follows from Locke’s view that that there can be no subjection to power without consent, a fundamental principle of political liberalism (the doctrine according to which the central problem of politics is the protection and enhancement of individual freedom). Once political society has been founded, however, citizens are obligated to accept the decisions of a majority of their number. Such decisions are made on behalf of the majority by the legislature, but the ultimate power of choosing the legislature rests with the people. Even the powers of the legislature are not absolute, because the law of nature remains as a permanent standard and as a principle of protection against arbitrary authority. Locke’s importance as a political philosopher lies in the argument of the second treatise. He begins by defining political power as a right of making Laws with Penalties of Death, and consequently all less Penalties, for the Regulating and Preserving of Property, and of employing the force of the Community, in the Execution of such Laws and in defence of the Common-wealth from Foreign Injury, and all this only for the Publick Good. Much of the remainder of the Treatise is a commentary on this paragraph. 126 Philosophy in the Enlightenment John Locke’s political thought was grounded in the notion of a social contract and in the importance of toleration, particularly concerning religion. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 127 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present The State of Nature and the Social Contract Locke’s definition of political power has an immediate moral dimension. It is a “right” of making laws and enforcing them for “the public good.” Power for Locke never simply means “capacity” but always “morally sanctioned capacity.” Morality pervades the whole arrangement of society, and it is this fact, tautologically, that makes society legitimate. Locke’s account of political society is based on a hypothetical consideration of the human condition before the beginning of communal life. In this “state of nature,” humans are entirely free. But this freedom is not a state of complete license, because it is set within the bounds of the law of nature. It is a state of equality, which is itself a central element of Locke’s account. In marked contrast to Filmer’s world, there is no natural hierarchy among humans. Each person is naturally free and equal under the law of nature, subject only to the will of “the infinitely wise Maker.” Each person, moreover, is required to enforce as well as to obey this law. It is this duty that gives to humans the right to punish offenders. But in such a state of nature, it is obvious that placing the right to punish in each person’s hands may lead to injustice and violence. This can be remedied if humans enter into a contract with each other to recognize by common consent a civil government with the power to enforce the law of nature among the citizens of that state. Although any contract is legitimate as long as it does not infringe upon the law of nature, it often happens that a contract can be enforced only if there is some higher human authority to require compliance with it. It is a primary function of society to set up the framework in which legitimate contracts, freely entered into, may be enforced, a state of affairs much more difficult to guarantee in the state of nature and outside civil society. 128 Philosophy in the Enlightenment Property Before discussing the creation of political society in greater detail, Locke provides a lengthy account of his notion of property, which is of central importance to his political theory. Each person, according to Locke, has property in his own person—that is, each person literally owns his own body. Other people may not use a person’s body for any purpose without his permission. But one can acquire property beyond one’s own body through labour. By mixing one’s labour with objects in the world, one acquires a right to the fruits of that work. If one’s labour turns a barren field into crops or a pile of wood into a house, then the valuable product of that labour, the crops According to John Locke, if one sows crops from a previously barren field, the products of that labor are one’s property. Wallace Kirkland/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images 129 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present or the house, becomes one’s property. Locke’s view was a forerunner of the labour theory of value, which was expounded in different forms by the 19th-century economists David Ricardo (1772–1823) and Karl Marx (1818–83). Clearly, each person is entitled to as much of the product of his labour as he needs to survive. But, according to Locke, in the state of nature one is not entitled to hoard surplus produce. One must share it with those less fortunate. God has “given the World to Men in common . . . to make use of to the best advantage of Life, and convenience.” The introduction of money, while radically changing the economic base of society, was itself a contingent development, for money has no intrinsic value but depends for its utility only on convention. Locke’s account of property and how it comes to be owned faces difficult problems. For example, it is far from clear how much labour is required to turn any given unowned object into a piece of private property. In the case of a piece of land, for example, is it sufficient merely to put a fence around it? Or must it be plowed as well? There is, nevertheless, something intuitively powerful in the notion that it is activity, or work, that grants one a property right in something. Organization of Government Locke returns to political society in Chapter VIII of the second treatise. In the community created by the social contract, the will of the majority should prevail, subject to the law of nature. The legislative body is central, but it cannot create laws that violate the law of nature, because the enforcement of the natural law regarding life, liberty, and property is the rationale of the whole system. Laws must apply equitably to all citizens and not favour particular sectional interests, and there should be a division of legislative, executive, and judicial powers. The legislature 130 Philosophy in the Enlightenment may, with the agreement of the majority, impose such taxes as are required to fulfill the ends of the state (including, of course, its defense). If the executive power fails to provide the conditions under which the people can enjoy their rights under natural law, the people are entitled to remove him, by force if necessary. Thus, revolution, in extremis, is permissible. Locke obviously thought so in 1688–89, when the Glorious Revolution resulted in the deposition of the English king, James II. The significance of Locke’s vision of political society can scarcely be exaggerated. His integration of individualism within the framework of the law of nature and his account of the origins and limits of legitimate government authority inspired the U.S. Declaration of Independence (1776) and the broad outlines of the system of government adopted in the U.S. Constitution. George Washington (1732–99), the first president of the United States, once described Locke as “the greatest man who had ever lived.” In France too, Lockean principles found clear expression in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789) and other justifications of the French Revolution. Jean-Jacques Rousseau Rousseau’s more radical political doctrines, as developed in his Discours sur l’origine de l’inegalité (1755; Discourse on the Origin of Inequality) and Du Contrat social (1762; The Social Contract), were built upon Lockean foundations. For him, too, the convention of the social contract formed the basis of all legitimate political authority, but his conception of citizenship was much more organic and much less individualistic than Locke’s. The surrender of natural liberty for civil liberty means that all individual rights (among them property rights) become subordinate to the general will. For Rousseau the state is a moral person whose life is the union of its members, whose laws are acts of the 131 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Rousseau, drawing in pastels by Maurice-Quentin de La Tour, 1753, from the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire, Geneva. Courtesy of the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire, Geneva; photograph, Jean Arlaud 132 Philosophy in the Enlightenment general will, and whose end is the liberty and equality of its citizens. It follows that when any government usurps the power of the people, the social contract is broken. And not only are the citizens no longer compelled to obey, but they also have an obligation to rebel. Rousseau’s defiant collectivism was clearly a revolt against Locke’s systematic individualism; for Rousseau the fundamental category was not “natural person” but “citizen.” Discourse on the Origin of Inequality Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origin of Inequality was written in response to a question set by the Academy of Dijon: “What is the origin of the inequality among men and is it justified by natural law?” His answer was a masterpiece of speculative anthropology. The argument follows on that of an earlier work, the Discours sur les sciences et les arts (1750; Discourse on the Sciences and the Arts), by developing the proposition that humanity is naturally good and then tracing the successive stages by which humans have descended from primitive innocence to corrupt sophistication. Rousseau begins by distinguishing two kinds of inequality, natural and artificial, the first arising from differences in strength, intelligence, and so forth, the second from the conventions that govern societies. He sets out to explain the inequalities of the latter sort. Adopting what he thought the properly “scientific” method of investigating origins, he attempts to reconstruct the earliest phases of human experience of life on Earth. He suggests that the first humans were not social beings but entirely solitary, and to this extent he agrees with Hobbes’s account of the state of nature. But in contrast to the English pessimist’s view that the life of people in such a condition must have been “poor, nasty, brutish and short,” Rousseau claims that the first humans, while admittedly solitary, were 133 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present healthy, happy, good, and free. Human vice, he argues, dates from the time when societies were formed. Rousseau thus exonerates nature and blames society for the emergence of vices. He says that passions that generate vices hardly exist in the state of nature but begin to develop as soon as societies are formed. Rousseau goes on to suggest that societies started with the building of the first huts, a development that facilitated cohabitation of males and females, which in turn produced the habit of living as a family and associating with neighbours. This “nascent society,” as Rousseau calls it, was good while it lasted. Indeed it was the “golden age” of human history. Only it did not endure. With the tender passion of love there was also born the destructive passion of jealousy. Neighbours started to compare their abilities and achievements with one another, and this “marked the first step towards inequality and at the same time towards vice.” People started to demand consideration and respect. Their innocent self-love turned into culpable pride, as each person wanted to be better than everyone else. The introduction of property marked a further step toward inequality because it made it necessary to institute law and government to protect property. Rousseau laments the “fatal” concept of property in one of his more eloquent passages, describing the “horrors” that have resulted from humanity’s departure from a condition in which the Earth belonged to no one. These passages in his second Discourse excited later revolutionaries such as Marx and Vladimir Ilich Lenin (1870–1924), but Rousseau did not think that the past could be undone in any way. There was no point in dreaming of a return to the golden age. Civil society, as Rousseau describes it, comes into being to serve two purposes: provide peace for everyone and ensure the right to property for anyone lucky enough to have possessions. It is thus of some advantage to everyone, 134 Philosophy in the Enlightenment but mostly to the advantage of the rich, because it transforms their de facto ownership into rightful ownership and keeps the poor dispossessed. It is a somewhat fraudulent social contract that introduces government because the poor get so much less out of it than do the rich. Even so, the rich are no happier in civil society than are the poor because in society people are never satisfied. Society leads people to hate one another to the extent that their interests conflict, and at best they are able to hide their hostility behind a mask of courtesy. Thus Rousseau regards inequality not as a separate problem but as one of the features of the long process by which people became alienated from nature and from innocence. The Social Contract Like Plato, Rousseau always believed that a just society was one in which everyone was in his right place. And having written the Discourse to explain how people had lost their liberty in the past, he went on to write another book, The Social Contract, to suggest how they might recover their liberty in the future. The Social Contract begins with the sensational sentence, “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains,” and proceeds to argue that he need not be in chains. If a civil society, or state, could be based on a genuine social contract, as opposed to the fraudulent social contract depicted in the Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, people would receive in exchange for their independence a better kind of freedom, namely true political, or republican, liberty. Such liberty is to be found in obedience to a selfimposed law. Rousseau’s definition of political liberty raises an obvious problem. For while it can be readily agreed that an individual is free if he obeys only rules he prescribes for himself. This is so because an individual is a person with a 135 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present single will. A society, by contrast, is a set of persons with a set of individual wills, and conflict between separate wills is a fact of universal experience. Rousseau’s response to the problem is to define his civil society as an artificial person united by a volonté générale, or “general will.” The social contract that brings society into being is a pledge, and the society remains in being as a pledged group. Rousseau’s republic is a creation of the general will—of a will that never falters in each and every member to further the public, common, or national interest—even though it may conflict at times with personal interest. Rousseau sounds much like Hobbes when he says that under the pact by which individuals enter civil society each person totally alienates himself and all his rights to the whole community. Rousseau, however, represents this act as a form of exchange of rights whereby individuals give up natural rights in return for civil rights. The bargain is a good one because what is surrendered are rights of dubious value, whose realization depends solely on an individual’s own might, and what is obtained in return are rights that are both legitimate and enforced by the collective force of the community. There is no more haunting paragraph in The Social Contract than that in which Rousseau speaks of “forcing a man to be free.” But it would be wrong to interpret these words in the manner of those critics who see Rousseau as a prophet of modern totalitarianism. He does not claim that a whole society can be forced to be free but only that an occasional individual, who is enslaved by his passions to the extent of disobeying the law, can be restored by force to obedience to the voice of the general will that exists inside of him. The person who is coerced by society for a breach of the law is, in Rousseau’s view, being brought back to an awareness of his own true interests. 136 Philosophy in the Enlightenment For Rousseau there is a radical dichotomy between true law and actual law. Actual law, which he describes in the Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, simply protects the status quo. True law, as described in The Social Contract, is just law, and what ensures its being just is that it is made by the people in its collective capacity as sovereign and obeyed by the same people in their individual capacities as subjects. Rousseau is confident that such laws could not be unjust because it is inconceivable that any people would make unjust laws for itself. Rousseau is, however, troubled by the fact that the majority of a people does not necessarily represent its most intelligent citizens. Indeed, he agrees with Plato that most people are stupid. Thus the general will, while always morally sound, is sometimes mistaken. Hence Rousseau suggests the people need a lawgiver—a great mind like the Athenian statesmen Solon (c. 630–c. 560 BCE) and Lycurgus (c. 390–c. 324 BCE) or the Reformer John Calvin (1509–64)—to draw up a constitution and system of laws. He even suggests that such lawgivers need to claim divine inspiration to persuade the dim-witted multitude to accept and endorse the laws it is offered. This suggestion echoes a similar proposal by Machiavelli, whom Rousseau greatly admired and whose love of republican government he shared. An even more conspicuously Machiavellian influence can be discerned in Rousseau’s chapter on civil religion, where he argues that Christianity, despite its truth, is useless as a republican religion on the grounds that it is directed to the unseen world and does nothing to teach citizens the virtues that are needed in the service of the state: namely, courage, virility, and patriotism. Rousseau does not go so far as Machiavelli in proposing a revival of pagan cults, but he does propose a civil religion with minimal theological 137 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present content designed to fortify and not impede (as Christianity impedes) the cultivation of martial virtues. IMMANUEL KANT The epistemological theories of the British empiricists led directly to the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, the most important philosopher of the modern period, whose works mark the true culmination of the philosophy of the Enlightenment. Kant acknowledged that Hume had awakened him from a “dogmatic slumber.” Although Kant’s subsequent “critical” philosophy emphasized the limitations of human reason, it did so in a manner that ultimately vindicated the claims to knowledge that more traditional philosophers had made on its behalf. The problem of knowledge, according to Kant, is to explain how some judgments about the world can be necessarily true and therefore knowable a priori, or independently of experience. Until Kant’s time, all empirical judgments were regarded as vulnerable to skeptical doubt, because human experience is inherently fallible. Furthermore, all a priori judgments, such as “All bachelors are unmarried,” were regarded as empty of content, because they did not present any information that was not already contained in the concepts with which they were composed (being unmarried is part of what it is to be a bachelor). If human knowledge of the world was to be possible, therefore, there would have to be judgments that were both empirical and a priori. The genius and originality of Kant’s philosophy lay in the means by which he made room for such judgments. In what he described, in the preface to the second edition (1787) of the Kritik der reinen Vernunft (Critique of Pure Reason), as his “Copernican” revolution, he proposed that knowledge should not depend on the conformity of a 138 Philosophy in the Enlightenment Immanuel Kant, print published in London, 1812. Photos.com/ Jupiterimages 139 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present judgment to an object in experience. Rather, the existence of an object in experience should depend on its conformity to human knowledge. Hitherto it has been assumed that all our knowledge must conform to objects. But all attempts to extend our knowledge of objects by establishing something in regard to them a priori, by means of concepts, have, on this assumption, ended in failure. We must therefore make trial whether we may not have more success in the tasks of metaphysics, if we suppose that objects must conform to our knowledge. That is to say, a thing can be an “object of possible experience” for human beings only if it conforms to human knowledge in certain respects. This is because the faculty of intuition—which receives the appearances (“phenomena”) of experience—is structured by the concepts of space and time, and because the faculty of understanding—which orders the phenomena received through intuition—is structured by concepts grouped under the general headings of quantity, quality, relation, and modality. The fact that space and time are forms of possible experience, rather than generalizations derived from experience, explains how the judgments of geometry, for example, can be both empirical (about experience) and knowable a priori. Similarly, a judgment such as “Every event has a cause,” is both empirical and a priori, because causality (under the heading “relation”) is one of the concepts imposed on experience by the understanding, not a generalization derived by the understanding from experience. Behind the phenomena of experience, according to Kant, there is a realm of “noumena” (e.g., “things in themselves”) that is in principle unknowable. Traditional philosophers mistakenly assumed that reason could use a priori principles to derive metaphysical knowledge of 140 Philosophy in the Enlightenment things outside or beyond any possible experience. In this respect the skeptical philosophers had been right to criticize the traditional proofs of the existence of God or of the immortality of the soul as so much empty dogmatism. Not surprisingly, neither of Kant’s chief philosophical antagonists was satisfied with the new critical philosophy. For the skeptics, Kant’s distinction between phenomena and noumena was redolent of earlier metaphysics. If knowledge of the noumenal realm is impossible, on what basis could Kant claim that it exists? Why refer to it at all? For the dogmatists, however, Kant’s supposed defense of the powers of reason ceded far too much ground to the antimetaphysical camp. Kant’s moral philosophy, as elaborated in the Kritik der practischen Vernunft (1788; Critique of Practical Reason) and the Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten (1785; Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals), also proved extremely influential. In these works his central concern was human freedom, or the autonomy of the will, just as the autonomy of reason had been the focus of the first critique. The immediate problem for Kant was to reconcile the idea of freedom with the evident causal determinism operative in the phenomenal world, a determinism that the first critique itself had endorsed. Against the champions of determinism, Kant insisted on the autonomous capacities of the human will: by universalizing one’s maxims (or reasons) for action in accordance with the categorical imperative, “Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law,” one acts freely, or autonomously. By following universal imperatives, the will escapes the contingencies and determinism of the phenomenal or empirical realm. Thereby, its actions obtain an ethical dignity or moral purity that 141 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present approximates the sublimity of what Kant called the “kingdom of ends”: a noumenal realm of pure morality, unaffected by the vagaries of experience. In Kant’s ethical theory, the kingdom of ends possesses the sublimity of an idea of pure reason, inasmuch as it is free of empirical taint. Kant’s formula for autonomy is thus opposed to utilitarianism, the view that actions are right or wrong by virtue of their consequences. Whereas utilitarian moral theories suggest that morally right actions are properly motivated by desires or interests (e.g., to maximize consequences that are good, such as pleasure or happiness) Kant’s brand of moral rigorism is predicated on reason alone. Yet, Kant openly admitted that, according to the letter of his approach, human freedom possesses a merely “formal” or “noumenal” character. Once one tries to act freely in a phenomenal world dominated by the principle of causality, or to act morally in a world in which human action is always motivated by interests, “rational” or “free” outcomes cannot be guaranteed. Thus, Kant’s practical philosophy is beset by the antinomy (contradiction) between freedom and necessity: human beings are inwardly free but outwardly subject to the laws of causality. This Pyrrhic vindication of freedom left many of Kant’s heirs dissatisfied and striving vigorously to transcend the oppositions and limitations his philosophy had bequeathed. 142 CHAPTER 4 The 19th Century K ant’s death in 1804 formally marked the end of the Enlightenment. The 19th century ushered in new philosophical problems and new conceptions of what philosophy ought to do. It was a century of great philosophical diversity. In the Renaissance, the chief intellectual fact had been the rise of mathematics and natural science, and the tasks that this fact imposed upon philosophy determined its direction for two centuries. In the Enlightenment, attention had turned to the character of the mind that had so successfully mastered the natural world, and rationalists and empiricists had contended for mastery until the Kantian synthesis. As for the 19th century, however, if one single feature of its thought could be singled out for emphasis, it might be called the discovery of the irrational. But many philosophical schools were present, and they contended with each other in a series of distinct and powerful oppositions: pragmatism against idealism, positivism against irrationalism, Marxism against liberalism. Western philosophy in the 19th century was influenced by several changes in European and American intellectual culture and society. These changes were chiefly the Romantic Movement of the early 19th century, which was a poetic revolt against reason in favour of feeling; the maturation of the Industrial 143 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Revolution, which caused untold misery as well as prosperity and prompted a multitude of philosophies of social reform; the revolutions of 1848 in Paris, Germany, and Vienna, which reflected stark class divisions and first implanted in the European consciousness the concepts of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat; and, finally, the great surge in biological science following the publication of work by Charles Darwin (1809–82) on the theory of evolution. Romanticism influenced both German idealists and philosophers of irrationalism. Experiences of economic discord and social unrest produced the ameliorative social philosophy of English utilitarianism and the revolutionary doctrines of Karl Marx. And the developmental ideas of Darwin provided the prerequisites for American pragmatism. A synoptic view of Western philosophy in the 19th century reveals an interesting chronology. The early century was dominated by the German school of absolute idealism, whose main representatives were Johann Fichte (1762–1814), Friedrich Schelling (1775–1854), and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831). The mid-century was marked by a rebirth of interest in science and its methods, as reflected in the work of Auguste Comte (1798–1857) in France and John Stuart Mill (1806–73) in England, and by liberal (Mill) and radical (Marx) social theory. The late century experienced a second flowering of idealism, this time led by the English philosophers T.H. Green (1836–82), F.H. Bradley (1846–1924), and Bernard Bosanquet (1848–1923), and the rise of American pragmatism, represented by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) and William James (1842–1910). The new philosophies of the irrational, produced by the highly idiosyncratic thinkers Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860), Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55), and Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900), ran through the century in its entirety. 144 The 19th Century Søren Kierkegaard’s emphasis on the desolate human condition and the uncertainty of salvation made him a major influence on existentialism and Protestant theology. Hulton Archive/Getty Images 145 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present GERMAN IDEALISM The Enlightenment, inspired by the example of natural science, had accepted certain boundaries to human knowledge. That is, it had recognized certain limits to reason’s ability to penetrate ultimate reality because that would require methods that surpass the capabilities of scientific method. In this particular modesty, the philosophies of Hume and Kant were much alike. But in the early 19th century, the metaphysical spirit returned in a most ambitious and extravagant form. German idealism reinstated the most speculative pretensions of Leibniz and Spinoza. This development resulted in part from the influence of Romanticism but also, and more importantly, from a new alliance of philosophy with religion. It was not a coincidence that all the great German idealists were either former students of theology (Fichte at Jena and Leipzig, Schelling and Hegel at the Tübingen seminary) or the sons of Protestant pastors. It is probably this circumstance that gave to German idealism its intensely serious, quasireligious, and dedicated character. The consequence of this religious alignment was that philosophical interest shifted from Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (in which he attempted to account for natural science and denied the possibility of certainty in metaphysics) to his Critique of Practical Reason (in which he explored the nature of the moral self) and his Critique of Judgment (in which he treated of the purposiveness of the universe as a whole). Absolute idealism was based on three premises: 1. The chief datum of philosophy is the human self and its self-consciousness. 2. The world as a whole is spiritual through and through (that it is, in fact, something like a cosmic self). 146 The 19th Century 3. In both the self and the world, it is not primarily the intellectual element that counts but, rather, the volitional and the moral. Thus, for idealistic metaphysics, the primary task of philosophy was understanding the self, self-consciousness, and the spiritual universe. Johann Gottlieb Fichte Johann Gottlieb Fichte conceived of human selfconsciousness as the primary metaphysical fact. Taking Kant’s Critique of Practical Reason as his starting point, he held that, just as the moral will is the chief characteristic of the self, so it is also the activating principle of the world. According to Fichte, all being is posited by the ego, which posits itself. As he stated in Das System der Sittenlehre nach den Prinzipien der Wissenschaftslehre (1798; The Science of Ethics as Based on the Science of Knowledge), “That whose being (essence) consists merely in the fact that it posits itself as existent is the ego as absolute subject. As it posits itself, so it is; and as it is, so it posits itself.” In Fichte’s view, if the ego is in reality the basis of all experience, it qualifies as “unconditioned”: it is free of empirical taint and no longer subject to the limitations of causality emanating from the external world. In this way, Kant’s antithesis or opposition between the noumenal and phenomenal realms disappears. Fichte gave a practical or voluntarist cast to the dictum cogito, ergo sum, which Descartes had proposed as the bedrock of certainty on which the edifice of human knowledge could be constructed. As the German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) would remark, in a Fichtean spirit, in Faust (1808), “In the beginning was the deed.” However, on the whole Fichte’s heirs remained 147 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present unsatisfied with his voluntaristic resolution of the tension between subject and object, will and experience. They perceived his claims as little more than an abstract declaration rather than a substantive resolution or authentic working through of the problem. Subsequent thinkers also wondered whether his elevation of the subject to the position of an absolute did not result in an impoverishment of experience. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Kant’s most important successor, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, attempted to transcend systematically all the antinomies of Kantian thought: noumenon and phenomenon, freedom and necessity, subject and object. Kant had claimed that humans could aspire only to knowledge of phenomena, whereas Hegel set out to prove that, as in the metaphysics of old, reason was in fact capable of an “absolute knowledge” that penetrated into essences, or things-in-themselves. For Kant the ideas of pure reason possessed merely a noumenal status: they could serve as regulative ideals for human thought or achievement, yet, insofar as they transcended the bounds of experience, they could never be verified or redeemed by the understanding. In Hegel’s thought the limitations to knowledge repeatedly stressed by Kant had become nothing less than a scandal. As Hegel declared polemically in the Wissenschaft der Logik (1812, 1816; Science of Logic), “The Kantian philosophy becomes a pillow for intellectual sloth, which soothes itself with the idea that everything has been already proved and done with.” Hegel’s major works, including, in addition to the Science of Logic, the Phänomenologie des Geistes (1807; Phenomenology of Spirit) and the Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts (1821; Eng. 148 The 19th Century G.W.F. Hegel, oil painting by Jakob von Schlesinger, c. 1825, in the Staatliche Museum, Berlin. Deutsche Fotothek, Dresden 149 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present trans. The Philosophy of Right), all contain detailed and powerful rejoinders to Kantian conceptions of knowledge, truth, and freedom. For Hegel the challenge was to articulate a philosophy that went beyond Kant without regressing behind him by relapsing into dogmatic metaphysics. In the Phenomenology of Spirit, Hegel undertook a genuinely novel approach to the problem of knowledge, tracing the immanent movement of the “shapes of consciousness” (the different historical conceptions of knowledge) from “sense certainty” through “perception,” “force,” “consciousness,” “self-consciousness,” “reason,” “spirit,” and finally “absolute knowing.” At the final stage, “otherness” has been eliminated, and consciousness has reached the plane of unconditional truth. At this point a conception of knowledge is obtained (which Hegel called the Begriff, or idea) that is free of the aforementioned Kantian oppositions and thus suitable for producing a “first philosophy”: a doctrine of essences that accurately captures the rational structure of reality. No longer limited, as with Kant, to knowledge of appearances, consciousness is at last able to obtain genuine knowledge of the way things truly are. Announcing his philosophical program in the Phenomenology of Spirit, Hegel declared that “substance must become subject.” This terse formula characterized one of his main philosophical goals: to reconcile classical and modern philosophy. In Hegel’s view, Greek philosophy had attained an adequate notion of substance yet for historical reasons had fallen short of the modern concept of subjectivity. Conversely, modern philosophy, beginning with Descartes, appreciated the value of subjectivity as a philosophical starting point but failed to develop an adequate notion of objective truth. Hegel’s philosophy sought to combine the virtues of both approaches by linking 150 The 19th Century ontology (the philosophical study of being, or existence) and epistemology (the philosophical study of knowledge). At the same time, Hegel believed that by embracing subjectivity Kant and other modern philosophers had prematurely abandoned the claims of ontology. By making truth inordinately dependent on the standpoint of the knowing subject, they failed to give “essence,” or the intrinsic nature of objective reality, its due. Consequently, their philosophies were tainted by “subjectivism.” In Kant’s case, this defect was evident in his conclusion that phenomena are the only possible objects of knowledge as well as in the solipsistic implications of his moral doctrine, which posited mutually isolated subjects who formulate universal laws valid for all moral agents. The Kantian moral subject, which prized autonomy above all else, radically devalued habit, custom, and tradition: what Hegel described as substantial ethical life, or Sittlichkeit. In Hegel’s view, these modern approaches placed a burden on the idea of subjectivity that was more than the concept could bear. In this regard as well, Hegel sought a compromise between modernity’s extreme devaluation of tradition and the elements of rootedness and continuity that it could provide, thereby preventing the autonomous subject from spinning out of control as it were. Hegel thought that he discerned the disastrous consequences of such willfulness in the rise of bourgeois society—which he perceived, following Thomas Hobbes, as a competitive “war of all against all”—and in the despotic outcome of the French Revolution. Because bourgeois society, whose doctrine of “rights” had elevated the modern subject to a virtual absolute, gave unfettered rein to individual liberty, it invited anarchy, with tyranny as the only stopgap. Hegel held Kant’s philosophy to be the consummate expression of this modern standpoint, 151 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present with all its debilities and risks. Consequently, in his political philosophy Hegel argued that substantial ethical life resided in the state. In his view, the state alone was capable of reconciling the antagonisms and contradictions of bourgeois society. The quietistic (if not reactionary) implications of his political thought were epitomized by his famous declaration in The Philosophy of Right that “what is rational is actual, and what is actual is rational.” Moreover, it became increasingly difficult for Hegel’s followers to defend his later philosophy against the charge of having regressed to a pre-Kantian metaphysical dogmatism. In the Science of Logic, Hegel presumptuously claimed that his treatise contained “the thoughts of God before He created the world.” Later critics would strongly object to his “pan-logism”: his a priori assumption that the categories of reason necessarily underlay the whole of reality, or being. Although Hegel optimistically proclaimed that history demonstrated “progress in the consciousness of freedom,” his doctrine of the “cunning of reason”— according to which the aims of the World Spirit are willy-nilly realized behind the backs of individual actors— appeared to justify misery and injustice in the world as part of a larger plan visible only to Hegel himself. “History,” he observed unapologetically, is “the slaughter-bench on which the happiness of peoples, the wisdom of states, and the virtue of individuals have been sacrificed.” SOCIAL AND POLITICAL THEORY The absolute idealists wrote as if the Renaissance methodologists of the sciences had never existed. But if in Germany the empirical and scientific tradition in philosophy lay dormant, in France and England in the middle of the 19th century it was very much alive. 152 The 19th Century The Positivism of Auguste Comte In France, the philosopher and social theorist Auguste Comte wrote his great philosophical history of science, Cours de philosophie positive (1830–42; Eng. trans. The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte), in six volumes. Influenced by Francis Bacon and the entire school of British empiricism, by the doctrine of progress put forward by the marquis de Condorcet (1743–94) and others during the 18th century, and by the original social reformer Henri de Saint-Simon (1760–1825), Comte called his philosophy “positivism,” by which he meant a philosophy of science so narrow that it denied any validity whatsoever to “knowledge” not derived through the accepted methods of science. Comte lived through the aftermath of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods, at a time when a new, stable social order—without despotism—was sought. Modern science and technology and the Industrial Revolution had begun transforming the societies of Europe in directions no one yet understood. People experienced violent conflict but were adrift in feeling, thought, and action. They lacked confidence in established sentiments, beliefs, and institutions but had nothing with which to replace them. Comte thought that this condition was not only significant for France and Europe but was one of the decisive junctures of human history. Comte’s particular ability was as a synthesizer of the most diverse intellectual currents. He took his ideas mainly from writers of the 18th and early 19th centuries. From David Hume and Immanuel Kant he derived his conception of positivism (i.e., the theory that theology and metaphysics are earlier imperfect modes of knowledge and that positive knowledge is based on natural 153 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present phenomena and their properties and relations as verified by the empirical sciences). From various French clericalist thinkers Comte took the notion of a hypothetical framework for social organization that would imitate the hierarchy and discipline found in the Roman Catholic Church. From various Enlightenment philosophers he adopted the notion of historical progress. Most important, from Saint-Simon he came to appreciate the need for a basic and unifying social science that would both explain existing social organizations and guide social planning for a better future. This new science he called “sociology” for the first time. Comte shared Saint-Simon’s appreciation of the growing importance of modern science and the potential application of scientific methods to the study and improvement of society. Comte believed that social phenomena could be reduced to laws in the same way that the revolutions of the heavenly bodies had been made explicable by gravitational theory. Furthermore, he believed that the purpose of the new scientific analysis of society should be ameliorative and that the ultimate outcome of all innovation and systematization in the new science should be the guidance of social planning. Comte also thought a new and secularized spiritual order was needed to supplant what he viewed as the outdated supernaturalism of Christian theology. Comte’s main contribution to positivist philosophy falls into five parts: his rigorous adoption of the scientific method; his law of the three states or stages of intellectual development; his classification of the sciences; his conception of the incomplete philosophy of each of these sciences anterior to sociology; and his synthesis of a positivist social philosophy in a unified form. He sought a system of philosophy that could form a basis for political organization appropriate to modern industrial society. 154 The 19th Century Comte’s “law of the three stages” maintained that human intellectual development had moved historically from a theological stage, in which the world and human destiny within it were explained in terms of gods and spirits; through a transitional metaphysical stage, in which explanations were in terms of essences, final causes, and other abstractions; and finally to the modern positive stage. This last stage was distinguished by an awareness of the limitations of human knowledge. Knowledge could only be relative to man’s nature as a species and to his varying social and historical situations. Absolute explanations were therefore better abandoned for the more sensible discovery of laws based on the observable relations between phenomena. Comte’s classification of the sciences was based on the hypothesis that the sciences had developed from the understanding of simple and abstract principles to the understanding of complex and concrete phenomena. Hence, the sciences developed as follows: from mathematics, astronomy, physics, and chemistry to biology and finally to sociology. According to Comte, this last discipline not only concluded the series but would also reduce social facts to laws and synthesize the whole of human knowledge, thus rendering the discipline equipped to guide the reconstruction of society. Although Comte did not originate the concept of sociology or its area of study, he greatly extended and elaborated the field and systematized its content. Comte divided sociology into two main fields, or branches: social statics, or the study of the forces that hold society together; and social dynamics, or the study of the causes of social change. He held that the underlying principles of society are individual egoism, which is encouraged by the division of labour, and the combination of efforts and the maintenance of social cohesion by means of government and the state. 155 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Comte revealed his conception of the ideal positivist society in his Système de politique positive, 4 vol. (1851–54; System of Positive Polity). He believed that the organization of the Roman Catholic church, divorced from Christian theology, could provide a structural and symbolic model for the new society, though Comte substituted a “religion of humanity” for the worship of God. A spiritual priesthood of secular sociologists would guide society and control education and public morality. The actual administration of the government and of the economy would be in the hands of businessmen and bankers, and the maintenance of private morality would be the province of women as wives and mothers. Although unquestionably a man of genius, Comte inspired discipleship on the one hand and derision on the other. His plans for a future society have been described as ludicrous, and Comte was deeply reactionary in his rejection of democracy, his emphasis on hierarchy and obedience, and his opinion that the ideal government would be made up of an intellectual elite. But his ideas influenced such notable social scientists as Émile Durkheim (1858–1917) of France and Herbert Spencer (1820–1903) and Sir Edward Burnett Tylor (1832–1917) of Britain. Comte’s belief in the importance of sociology as the scientific study of human society remains an article of faith among contemporary sociologists, and the work he accomplished remains a remarkable synthesis and an important system of thought. The Utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill A major force in the political and social thought of the 19th century was utilitarianism, the doctrine that the actions of governments, as well as individuals, should be 156 The 19th Century judged simply by the extent to which they promoted the “greatest happiness of the greatest number.” The founder of the utilitarian school was Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832), an English philosopher, economist, and theoretical jurist. Bentham judged all laws and institutions by their utility thus defined. “The Fabric of Felicity,” he wrote, “must be reared by the hands of reason and Law.” Bentham’s Fragment, on Government (1776) and Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789) elaborated a utilitarian political philosophy. Bentham was an atheist and an exponent of the new laissez-faire economics of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, but he inspired the spate of legislation that, after the Reform Bill of 1832, had tackled the worst consequences of 18th-century inefficiency and of the Industrial Revolution. His influence, moreover, spread widely abroad. At first a simple reformer of law, Bentham attacked notions of contract and natural law as superfluous. “The indestructible prerogatives of mankind,” he wrote, “have no need to be supported upon the sandy foundation of a fiction.” The justification of government is pragmatic, its aim improvement and the release of the free choice of individuals and the play of market forces that will create prosperity. Bentham thought society could advance by calculation of pleasure and pain, and his Introduction even tries to work out “the value of a lot of pleasure and pain, how now to be measured.” He compared the relative gratifications of health, wealth, power, friendship, and benevolence, as well as those of “irascible appetite” and “antipathy.” He also thought of punishment purely as a deterrent, not as retribution, and graded offenses on the harm they did to happiness, not on how much they offended God or tradition. If Bentham’s psychology was naïve, that of his disciple James Mill was philistine. Mill postulated an economic individual whose decisions, if freely taken, would always 157 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present be in his own interest, and he believed that universal suffrage, along with utilitarian legislation by a sovereign parliament, would produce the kind of happiness and well-being that Bentham desired. In his Essay on Government (1828) Mill thus shows a doctrinaire faith in a literate electorate as the means to good government and in laissez-faire economics as a means to social harmony. This utilitarian tradition was humanized by James Mill’s son, John Stuart Mill, one of the most influential of mid-Victorian liberals. Whereas James Mill had been entirely pragmatic, his son tried to enhance more sophisticated values. He thought that civilization depended on a tiny minority of creative minds and on the free play of speculative intelligence. He detested conventional public opinion and feared that complete democracy, far from emancipating opinion, would make it more restrictive. Amid the dogmatic and strident voices of mid–19th-century nationalists, utopians, and revolutionaries, the quiet, if sometimes priggish, voice of mid-Victorian liberalism proved extremely influential in the ruling circles of Victorian England. Accepting democracy as inevitable, John Stuart Mill expressed the still optimistic and progressive views of an intellectual elite. Without complete liberty of opinion, he insisted, civilizations ossify. The quality of progress results not merely from the blind forces of economic competition but from the free play of mind. The worth of the state in the long run is only the worth of the individuals composing it, and without people of genius society would become a “stagnant pool.” This militant humanist, unlike his father, was aware of the dangers of even benevolent bureaucratic power and declared that a state that “dwarfs its men” is culturally insignificant. Mill also advocated the legal and social emancipation of women, holding that ability was wasted by 158 The 19th Century John Stuart Mill, 1884. Library of Congres, Neg. Co. LC-USZ62-76491 159 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present mid-Victorian conventions. He believed that the masses could be educated into accepting the values of liberal civilization, but he defended private property and was as wary of rapid extensions of the franchise as of bureaucratic power. In addition to his work in ethics and political philosophy, Mill also made important contributions to logic and the philosophy of science. In his enormously influential A System of Logic (1843), Mill made the fundamental distinction between deduction and induction, defined induction as the process for discovering and proving general propositions, and presented his “four methods of experimental inquiry” as the heart of the inductive method. These methods were, in fact, only an enlarged and refined version of Francis Bacon’s tables of discovery. Mill took the experience of the uniformity of nature as the warrant of induction. Here he reaffirmed the belief of Hume that it is possible to apply the principle of causation and the methods of physical science to moral and social phenomena. These may be so complex as to yield only “conditional predictions,” but in this sense there are “social laws.” Thus Comte and Mill agreed on the possibility of a genuine social science. KARL MARX In the 1840s a new generation of Hegelians—the so-called “left” or “young” Hegelians—became disillusioned with Hegel’s philosophy as a result of the philosopher’s open flirtation with political reaction in the Philosophy of Right and other texts. They came to regard Hegelian idealism as merely the philosophical window dressing of Prussian authoritarianism. From a similar point of view, Karl Marx (1818–83) famously criticized his fellow Germans for achieving in thought what other peoples—notably the 160 The 19th Century Karl Marx’s views became the basis of modern Marxism. Henry Guttmann/ Hulton Archive/Getty Images 161 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present French—had accomplished in reality. It seemed unlikely that a philosophy such as Hegel’s could ever serve progressive political ends. The Young Hegelians—especially Bruno Bauer (1809–82) and David Friedrich Strauss (1808–74)—vigorously criticized Hegel’s complacent defense of state religion and his monarchism, and they emphatically endorsed the ideal of a secular constitutional republic. In The Essence of Christianity and other works, Ludwig Feuerbach (1804–72), another Young Hegelian, tried to substitute an “anthropological humanism” for Hegel’s speculative dialectic. Hegel’s philosophy claimed primacy for the “idea,” whereas Feuerbach tried to show, in an Enlightenment spirit, how thinking was a derivative or second-order activity with regard to human existence. German idealism claimed that concepts form the basis of existence or actually constitute reality. However, Feuerbach, stressing the materialist dimension of philosophy in a manner reminiscent of high Enlightenment materialism, reversed this claim. Instead, he contended that concrete human existence is fundamental. Ideas themselves are an outgrowth or efflux of man’s nature as a sensuous, anthropological being. Feuerbach’s method of “transformative criticism,” which replaced the Hegelian “idea” with the notion of “man,” had a significant impact on the development of Marx’s philosophy. Although a Young Hegelian during his student days, Marx soon developed significant philosophical and political differences with other members of the group. Already in his early, Rousseau-inspired work On the Jewish Question, Marx had emphasized that in the constitutional state desired by his fellow Left Hegelians, political problems would merely shift to another plane. Religion and bourgeois self-absorption, Marx argued, would merely be transposed to the private sphere of civil society. Society, 162 The 19th Century moreover, would still be riven by the separation between bourgeois and citizen. Still under Hegel’s influence, Marx believed that all such instances of separation or alienation must be transcended for human emancipation—as opposed to mere political emancipation—to be achieved. Although the young Marx wished to supplant idealist dialectics with a sociohistorical approach, his initial deduction of the world-historical role of the proletariat was reminiscent of Hegel in its decidedly speculative and philosophical character: A class must be formed which has radical chains, a class in civil society which is not a class of civil society, a class which is the dissolution of all classes, a sphere of society which has a universal character because its sufferings are universal, and which does not claim a particular redress because the wrong which is done to it is not a particular wrong but wrong in general. The philosophical project of German idealism, a reconciliation of idea and reality, thought and being, remained a primary inspiration for Marx. Nevertheless, Marx believed that Hegel, because of his speculative biases, had provided an inadequate grounding in reality for this utopian goal. Marx’s concept of the proletariat would reveal how, practically speaking, this ideal could become reality. In 1843–44 Marx described communism in Hegelian terms as a dialectical transcendence of “alienation,” an ultimate union between subject and object: [Communism] is the genuine resolution of the conflict between man and nature and between man and man—the true resolution of the strife between existence and essence, between objectification and self-confirmation, between freedom and necessity, between the individual and the species. Communism 163 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present is the riddle of history solved, and it knows itself to be this solution. Thereafter, Marx became convinced that communism had less to do with “realizing philosophy” than with the laws of capitalist development. Correspondingly, traces of his early Hegelianism became less visible in his later work. Marx’s revolutionary fervour tended to harm his philosophical reputation in the West, and his philosophical achievement remains a matter of controversy. But certain Marxian ideas (some Hegelian in inspiration, some original) have endured. Among these are: 1. That society is a moving balance (dialectic) of antithetical forces that produce social change. 2. That there is no conflict between a rigid economic determinism and a program of revolutionary action. 3. That ideas (including philosophical theories) are not purely rational and thus cannot be independent of external circumstances but depend upon the nature of the social order in which they arise. INDEPENDENT AND IRRATIONALIST MOVEMENTS The end of the 19th century was marked by a flowering of many independent philosophical movements. Although by then Hegel had been nearly forgotten in Germany, a Hegelian renaissance was under way in England, led by T.H. Green (1836–82), F.H. Bradley (1846–1924), and Bernard Bosanquet (1848–1923). Bradley’s Appearance and Reality (1893) constituted the high-water mark of the rediscovery of Hegel’s dialectical method. In the United States, 164 The 19th Century a strong reaction against idealism fostered the pragmatic movement, led by Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) and William James (1842–1910). Peirce, a logician, held that the function of all inquiry is to eradicate doubt and that the meaning of a concept consists of its practical consequences. James transformed Peirce’s pragmatic theory of meaning into a pragmatic theory of truth. In The Will to Believe (1897), he asserted that human beings have a right to believe even in the face of inconclusive evidence and that, because knowledge is essentially an instrument, the practical consequences of a belief are the real test of its truth: true beliefs are those that work. Meanwhile, in Austria, Franz Brentano (1838–1917), who taught at the University of Vienna from 1874 to 1895, and Alexius Meinong (1853–1920), who taught at Graz, Austria, were developing an empirical psychology and a theory of intentional objects (objects considered as the contents of a mental state) that were to have considerable influence upon the new movement of phenomenology. It was not any of these late 19th-century developments, however, but rather the emphasis on the irrational, which started almost at the century’s beginning, that gave the philosophy of the period its peculiar flavour. Hegel, despite his commitment to systematic metaphysics, had nevertheless carried on the Enlightenment tradition of faith in human rationality. But soon his influence was challenged from two different directions. One of Hegel’s contemporaries, Arthur Schopenhauer, himself a German idealist and constructor of a bold and imaginative system, contradicted Hegel by asserting that the irrational is the truly real. And the Danish Christian thinker Søren Kierkegaard criticized what he considered the logical pretensions of the Hegelian system. Kierkegaard, Schopenhauer, and, later in the 19th century, Nietzsche provided a new, nonrational conception of 165 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present human nature. And they viewed the mind not as open to rational introspection but as dark, obscure, hidden, and deep. Above all they initiated a new style of philosophizing. Schopenhauer wrote like an 18th-century essayist, Kierkegaard was a master of the methods of irony and paradox, and Nietzsche used aphorism and epigram in a self-consciously literary manner. For them, the philosopher should be less a crabbed academician than a man of letters. Arthur Schopenhauer For a short time Schopenhauer unsuccessfully competed with Hegel at the University of Berlin. Thereafter he withdrew to spend the rest of his life in battle against academic philosophy. His own system, though orderly and carefully worked out, was expressed in vivid and engaging language. Schopenhauer’s philosophy returned to the Kantian distinction between appearances and things-in-themselves, or between phenomena and noumena, to stress the limitations of reason. In his major philosophical work, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung (1819; The World as Will and Representation), Schopenhauer reiterated Kant’s claim that, given the structure of human cognition, knowledge of things as they really are is impossible; the best that can be obtained are comparatively superficial representations of things. But the most influential aspect of Schopenhauer’s philosophy was his recasting of the concept of the will. He viewed the will as a quasi-mystical life force that underlay all of reality: “This word [will] indicates that which is the being-in-itself of everything in the world, and is the sole kernel of every phenomenon.” Although the will remained inaccessible to ideas or concepts, its nature 166 The 19th Century could be fathomed or glimpsed through nonrational aesthetic experience—an insight that was clearly indebted to Schelling’s philosophy as well as to the romantic concept of “genius.” Although The World as Will and Representation had little effect when it was first published, Schopenhauer’s pessimism—his devaluation of the capacities of the intellect and his corresponding conviction that reality is ultimately unknowable—became a virtual credo for a subsequent generation of European intellectuals whose hopes for democratic reform across the continent were dashed by the failure of the Revolutions of 1848. His belief in the ability of art, particularly music, to afford metaphysical insight profoundly influenced the aesthetic theories of the German composer Richard Wagner. And his philosophy of the will, as well as his stark view of reason as incapable of grasping the true nature of reality, had a considerable impact on the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. Søren Kierkegaard Kierkegaard’s criticism of Hegel was an appeal to the concrete as against the abstract. He satirized Hegelian rationalism as a perfect example of “the academic in philosophy”—of detached, objective, abstract theorizing, and system building that was blind to the realities of human existence and to its subjective, living, emotional character. What a human being requires in life, said Kierkegaard, is not infinite inquiry but the boldness of resolute decision and commitment. The human essence is not to be found in thinking but in the existential conditions of emotional life, in anxiety and despair. The titles of three of Kierkegaard’s books—Frygt og baeven (1843; Fear and Trembling), Begrebet angest (1844; The Concept of Anxiety), and Sygdommen til døden (1849; The Sickness unto 167 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Death)—indicate his preoccupation with states of consciousness quite unlike cognition. Kierkegaard frequently wrote pseudonymously and ironically, self-consciously adopting a literary rather than a scientific idiom in which he mercilessly indicted his contemporaries for their faithlessness and ethical conformity. As a Protestant thinker, Kierkegaard believed he was returning to the concerns of Pauline Christianity, and he viewed the Confessions of St. Augustine (354–430) as an important literary precedent. Only by probing the recesses of his own inner self or subjectivity can the individual accede to truth. In one of his best-known works, Fear and Trembling, he reconstructed the biblical tale of Abraham, praising the protagonist’s “teleological suspension of the ethical” for his willingness to sacrifice his only son on the basis of his unshakable faith. Kierkegaard’s stress on the forlornness of the human condition, as well as on the absence of certainty concerning the possibility of salvation, made him an important forerunner of 20thcentury existentialism. Friedrich Nietzsche As a youthful disciple of Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche was influenced by the older philosopher’s critique of reason and by his suggestion that art, as an expression of genius, afforded a glimpse of being-in-itself. Trained as a classicist, Nietzsche’s encounter with Attic tragedy led him to a reevaluation of Greek culture that would have a momentous effect on modern thought and literature. In a pathbreaking dissertation that was ultimately published in 1872 as Die Geburt der Tragödie (1872; The Birth of Tragedy), Nietzsche claimed that the dramas of Aeschylus and Sophocles represented the high point of Greek culture, whereas the philosophy of Plato and Platonism 168 The 19th Century Friedrich Nietzsche, 1888. Louis Held/Deutsche Fotothek, Dresden 169 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present constituted a decline. Nietzsche’s study culminated in a withering critique of Socrates and the Western philosophical tradition engendered by his method of logical analysis and argumentation—elenchos, or dialectic. “Our whole modern world,” Nietzsche laments, “is caught in the net of Alexandrian [Hellenistic] culture and recognizes as its ideal the man of theory, equipped with the highest cognitive powers, working in the service of science, and whose archetype and progenitor is Socrates.” Nietzsche was disturbed by the Enlightenment’s unswerving allegiance to the concept of scientific truth. In a brilliant early text, Über Wahrheit und Lüge im aussermoralischen Sinn (1873; On Truth and Lies in a Non-Moral Sense), he offered many insightful observations about the vocation of philosophy that would ultimately find their way into his mature thought of the 1880s. The will to philosophy, with its pretensions to objectivity, should not be taken at face value, suggests Nietzsche, for its veil of impartiality conceals an array of specific biological functions. The intellect is a practical instrument employed by the human species to master a complex and hostile environment. Despite pious insistences to the contrary by philosophers, there is nothing sacrosanct about their vocation. “What is a word?” Nietzsche asks. “It is the copy in sound of a nerve stimulus.” Like other biological phenomena, thought stands in the service of life as a means of self-preservation. “As a means for the preserving of the individual, the intellect unfolds its principle powers in dissimulation, which is the means by which weaker, less robust individuals preserve themselves,” Nietzsche observes. Nietzsche couples these criticisms with astute observations concerning the relationship between philosophy and language. For centuries philosophers have claimed 170 The 19th Century that they possess access to absolute truth. Yet such pretensions belie the extent to which philosophical discourse, like all human communication, is mediated by the rhetorical and representational contingencies of language. With language as an instrument or intermediary apparatus, human conceptual access to the “in-itself,” or real being, of objects is unavoidably mediated, hence never direct or pristine. Without the rhetorical approximations of metaphor, trope, and figuration, the philosophical enterprise would languish and wither. Truth, regarded by the philosophers’ guild as something magical and sacred, is, claims Nietzsche, merely a series of metaphors, or imprecise rhetorical approximations, mobilized to achieve a certain effect or a set of desired ends. It is a movable host of metaphors, metonymies, and anthropomorphisms: in short, a sum of human relations which have been poetically and rhetorically intensified, transferred, and embellished, and which, after long usage, seem to a people to be fixed, canonical, and blind. Truths are illusions which we have forgotten are illusions. Ultimately, and contrary to what philosophers have perennially contended, the relationship between concepts and the things they designate, far from being necessary or intrinsic, is merely a matter of convention and habit. Truth does not yield a “view from nowhere.” As Nietzsche insinuates, it inevitably involves an “anthropomorphic” dimension: it is both a reflection of custom and a projection of human need. Nietzsche’s later doctrine of the “will to power”—which characterizes philosophy, like all human undertakings, as a quest for world mastery—systematized many of these early insights concerning the finite and conditioned nature of 171 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present truth. His emphasis on truth’s inescapable linguistic and rhetorical components would, a century later, profoundly influenced the views of the French philosophers Michel Foucault (1926–84) and Jacques Derrida (1930–2004). Despite his questioning of traditional philosophical concepts such as truth, Nietzsche remained committed to the goals of serious philosophical inquiry. Indeed, his prodigious philosophical musings are informed by two precepts handed down by Socrates: (1) the unexamined life is not worth living; and (2) virtue is a kind of knowledge (that is, being virtuous consists of knowing what virtue is in general and what the virtues are in particular). Although Nietzsche emphatically rejected Plato’s theory that the properties of earthly objects are merely imperfect copies of abstract, celestial Forms, he remained convinced that wisdom, and therefore possession of the truth, was the key to human flourishing. Nor did his later “perspectivism”—the idea that all knowledge is situated and partial—amount to a shallow relativism. Instead, Nietzsche intended his “transvaluation of all values”—his reversal or inversion of all received conceptions of truth— as a way station on the path to a set of higher, more robust and affirmative ethical ideals. The same impassioned concern for the welfare of the soul that one finds in Socrates and Plato one also discovers in Nietzsche. Moreover, Nietzsche’s philosophy was motivated at every turn by Aristotle’s distinction between mere life and the “good life”—a life lived in accordance with virtue. Not only did Nietzsche never relinquish his interest in “first philosophy,” but he approached metaphysical problems in a manner that was remarkably consistent and rigorous. To be sure, his aphoristic and fragmentary writing style makes it difficult to develop a systematic interpretation of his thought. It is clear, however, that 172 The 19th Century Nietzsche embraced the fundamental questions of metaphysics and sought to provide them with compelling and original answers. After all, were not his doctrines of the will to power and “eternal recurrence”—the idea that life must be lived emphatically, as if one might be condemned in perpetuity to repeat a given action—in essence attempts to come to grips with the essential nature of being and, as such, metaphysics at its purest? What was his theory of the “superman”—of a superior being or nature who transcends the timidity and foibles of the merely human—if not an earnest attempt to redefine virtue or the good life in an era in which cultural philistinism seemed to have gained the upper hand? And what motivated Nietzsche’s perspectivism if not a desire to arrive at a less-limited, more robust understanding of the nature of truth in all its richness and multiplicity? In Lieder des Prinzen Vogelfrei (1887; The Gay Science), Nietzsche proclaims that it is still a metaphysical faith upon which our faith in knowledge rests—that even we knowers today, we godless anti-metaphysicians still take our fire from the flame lit by a faith that is thousands of years old, that Christian faith which was also the faith of Plato, that God is truth, that truth is divine. This passage could hardly have been written by someone who was not a “lover of wisdom” (i.e., a philosopher). Wilhelm Dilthey and Henri Bergson Nietzsche’s skepticism about the capacities of reason, as well as his belief in the inherent limitations of a predominantly scientific culture, was shared by many late 173 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present 19th-century thinkers and writers. One consequence of his wide-ranging influence was the popularity of the concept of “life” as an antidote to the rise of scientific positivism. In Germany an early opponent of this trend, the philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey (1833–1911), argued that, whereas the natural sciences aimed to explain all of physical reality in terms of unchanging, general laws, the “human sciences” (Geisteswissenschaften), such as history, sought to capture unique individuals or events from the past. The latter undertaking, therefore, required a different epistemological approach. Dilthey distinguished between the styles of explanation characteristic of the natural sciences and the human sciences: the one seeks objective, impersonal, causal knowledge, the other seeks “understanding” (Verstehen), which is ultimately based on the motivations and intentions of historical actors. “Understanding always has as its object something individual,” argued Dilthey in Der Aufbau der geschichtlichen Welt in den Geisteswissenschaften (1910; The Structure of the Historical World in the Human Sciences). A similar movement was afoot in France under the inspiration of Henri Bergson (1859–1941), whose philosophy of vitalism sought to contrast the subjective notion of “duration” with the objective conception of time proper to the natural sciences. As he remarked in L’Évolution créatrice (1907; Creative Evolution): “Anticipated time is not mathematical time . . . It coincides with duration, which is not subject to being prolonged or retracted at will. It is no longer something thought but something lived.” In France Bergson’s views made few inroads among more traditional philosophers, in part because of the mechanistic orientation of Cartesianism and in part because of a general sympathy toward science inherited 174 The 19th Century from the Enlightenment. Instead, his influence was greatest among novelists (e.g., Marcel Proust, 1871–1922) and political theorists (e.g., Charles Péguy, 1873–1914, and Georges Sorel, 1847–1922). In Germany the corresponding school, known as Lebensphilosophie (“philosophy of life”), began to take on aspects of a political ideology in the years immediately preceding World War I. The work of Hans Driesch (1867– 1941) and Ludwig Klages (1872–1956), for example, openly condemned the superficial intellectualism of Western civilization. In associating “reason” with the shortcomings of “civilization” and “the West,” Lebensphilosophie spurred many German thinkers to reject intellection in favour of the irrational forces of blood and life. 175 CHAPTER 5 Contemporary Philosophy P hilosophy in the 20th century was characterized by a sharpening of the divisions between two longstanding traditions. The tradition of clear logical analysis, inaugurated by Locke and Hume, dominated the English-speaking world, whereas a speculative and broadly historical tradition, begun by Hegel but later diverging radically from him, held sway on the European continent. From the early decades of the century, the substantive as well as stylistic differences between the two approaches—known after World War II as analytic and Continental philosophy, respectively—gradually became more pronounced, and until the 1990s few serious attempts were made to find common ground between them. Other less significant currents in 20th-century philosophy were the speculative philosophies of John Dewey (1859–1952) of the United States and Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947) of England—each of whom evades easy classification—and the philosophical Marxism practiced in the Soviet Union and eastern Europe until the collapse of communism there in 1990–91. JOHN DEWEY AND ALFRED NORTH WHITEHEAD John Dewey was a generalist who stressed the unity, interrelationship, and organicity of all forms of 176 Contemporary Philosophy philosophical knowledge. He is chiefly notable for the fact that his conception of philosophy stressed so powerfully the notions of practicality and moral purpose. One of the guiding aims of Dewey’s philosophizing was the effort to find the same warranted assertibility for ethical and political judgements as for scientific ones. Philosophy, he said, should be oriented not to professional pride but to human need. Dewey’s approach to the social problems of the 20th century emphasized not revolution but the continuous application of the intellect to social affairs. He believed in social planning—conscious, intelligent intervention to produce desirable social change—and he proposed a new “experimentalism” as a guide to enlightened public action to promote the aims of a democratic community. His Alfred North Whitehead. 177 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present pragmatic social theory is the first major political philosophy produced by modern liberal democracy. For Whitehead, in contrast, philosophy was primarily metaphysics, or “speculative philosophy,” which he described as the effort “to frame a coherent, logical, necessary system of general ideas in terms of which every element of our experience can be interpreted.” Whitehead’s philosophy was thus an attempt to survey the world with a large generality of understanding, an end toward which his great trilogy, Science and the Modern World (1925), Process and Reality (1929), and Adventures of Ideas (1933), was directed. MARXIST THOUGHT The framework of 19th-century Marxism, augmented by philosophical suggestions from Vladimir Ilich Lenin (1870–1924), served as the starting point of all philosophizing in the Soviet Union and its Eastern European satellites. Much of Lenin’s thinking was also devoted to more practical issues, however, such as tactics of violence and the role of the Communist Party in bringing about and consolidating the proletarian revolution. Later Marxism continued this practical concern, largely because it retained the basic Marxist conception of what philosophy is and ought to be. Marxism (like pragmatism) assimilated theoretical issues to practical needs. It asserted the basic unity of theory and practice by finding that the function of the former was to serve the latter. Marx and Lenin both held that theory was always, in fact, expressive of class interests. Consequently, they wished philosophy to be transformed into a tool for furthering the class struggle. The task of philosophy was not abstractly to discover the truth but concretely to forge the intellectual 178 Contemporary Philosophy weapons of the proletariat. Thus, philosophy became inseparable from ideology. Vladimir Ilich Lenin Vladimir Ilich Lenin’s interpretation of Marx’s philosophy, realized in the Soviet Union by Lenin and developed by Joseph Stalin (1879–1953), was entirely authoritarian. According to Marx and his colleague Friedrich Engels (1820–95), the revolution could occur in Russia only after the bourgeois phase of production had “contradicted” the tsarist order, but Lenin was determined to take advantage of the opportunities provided by the upheaval of World War I to settle accounts directly with the “accursed heritage of serfdom.” In the Russian Revolution of 1917, he engineered a coup that secured the support of the peasantry and the industrial workers. He also adopted the revolutionary theorist Leon Trotsky’s idea of a “permanent revolution” from above by a small revolutionary elite. Already in Chto delat? (1902; What Is to Be Done?), Lenin had argued that an educated elite had to direct the proletarian revolution, and, when he came to power, he dissolved the constituent assembly and ruled through a “revolutionary and democratic dictatorship supported by the state power of the armed workers.” In asserting the need for an elite of professional revolutionaries to seize power, Lenin reverted to Marx’s program in Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei (1848; commonly known as The Communist Manifesto) rather than conform to the fated pattern of economic development worked out by Marx in Das Kapital (“Capital”), 3 vol. (1867, 1885, 1894). In 1921 he further adapted theory to the times. His New Economic Policy sanctioned the development of a class of prosperous peasantry to keep the economy 179 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Vladimir Ilich Lenin, 1918. Tass/Sovfoto 180 Contemporary Philosophy viable. For Lenin always thought in terms of world revolution, and, in spite of the failure of the Marxists in central Europe and the defeat of the Red armies in Poland, he died in the expectation of a global sequel. Thus, in Imperializm, kak vysshaya stadiya kapitalizma (1917; Imperialism, the Latest Stage in the Development of Capitalism), he had extended the class war into an inevitable conflict between European imperialism and the colonial peoples involved. He had been influenced by Imperialism, a Study (1902), by the English historian J.A. Hobson (1858–1940), which alleged that decadent capitalism was bound to turn from glutted markets at home to exploit the toil of “reluctant and unassimilated peoples.” György Lukács and Antonio Gramsci Many revisionist interpreters of Marx tended toward anarchism (the doctrine that government is both harmful and unnecessary), stressing the Hegelian and utopian elements of his theory. The Hungarian philosopher György Lukács (1885–1971), for example, and the German-born American philosopher Herbert Marcuse (1898–1979), who fled Nazi Germany in 1934, won some following in the mid-20th century among those in revolt against both authoritarian “peoples’ democracies” and the diffused capitalism and meritocracy of the managerial welfare state. In Geschichte und Klassenbewusstsein (1923; History and Class Consciousness), a neo-Hegelian work, Lukács claimed that only the intuition of the proletariat can properly apprehend the totality of history. But world revolution is contingent, not inevitable, and Marxism is an instrument, not a prediction. Lukács renounced this heresy after residence in the Soviet Union under Stalin, but he maintained influence through literary and dramatic criticism. After the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev 181 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present (1894–1971) denounced Stalin in 1956, Lukács advocated peaceful coexistence and intellectual rather than political subversion. In Wider den missverstandenen Realismus (1963; The Meaning of Contemporary Realism), he again related Marx to Hegel and even to Aristotle, against the Stalinist claim that Marx had made a radically new departure. Lukács’s neo-Hegelian insights, strikingly expressed, appealed to those eager to salvage the more humane aspects of Marxism and to promote revolution, even against a modified capitalism and social democracy, by intellectual rather than political means. The Italian communist philosopher Antonio Gramsci (1891–1937) deployed a vivid rhetorical talent in attacking existing society. Gramsci was alarmed that the proletariat was being assimilated by the capitalist order. He took his stand on the already obsolescent Marxist doctrine of irreconcilable class war between bourgeois and proletariat. He aimed to unmask the bourgeois idea of liberty and to replace parliaments by an “implacable machine” of workers’ councils, which would destroy the current social order through a dictatorship of the proletariat. “Democracy,” he wrote, “is our worst enemy. We must be ready to fight it because it blurs the clear separation of classes.” Not only would parliamentary democracy and established law be unmasked, but culture too would be transformed. A workers’ civilization, with its great industry, large cities, and “tumultuous and intense life,” would create a new civilization with new poetry, art, drama, fashions, and language. Gramsci insisted that the old culture should be destroyed and that education should be wrenched from the grip of the ruling classes and the church. But this militant revolutionary was also a utopian. He turned bitterly hostile to Stalin’s regime, for he believed, 182 Contemporary Philosophy like Engels, that the dictatorship of the workers’ state would wither away. “We do not wish,” he wrote, “to freeze the dictatorship.” Following world revolution, a classless society would emerge, and humankind would be free to master nature instead of being involved in a class war. Gramsci was arrested by the Fascist government of Benito Mussolini (1883–1945) in 1926 and spent the next 11 years in prison, dying shortly after his release for medical care in 1937. Critical Theory Critical theory, a broad-based Marxist-oriented approach to the study of society, was first developed in the 1920s by the philosophers Max Horkheimer (1895–1973), Theodor Adorno (1903–69), and Herbert Marcuse at the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt, Ger. They and other members of the Frankfurt School, as this group came to be called, fled Germany after the Nazis came to power in 1933. The institute was relocated to Columbia University in the United States and remained there until 1949, when it was reestablished in Frankfurt. The most prominent representatives of the Frankfurt School and of critical theory from the mid-20th century were Marcuse and Jürgen Habermas. The question initially addressed by critical theorists was why the working classes in advanced capitalist countries were generally unmotivated to press for radical social change in their own interests. They attempted to develop a theory of capitalist social relations and analyze the various forms of cultural and ideological oppression arising from them. Critical theorists also undertook major studies of fascism and later of dictatorial communist regimes. After World War II, during the era of the Cold War, critical theorists viewed the world as divided 183 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Herbert Marcuse was a member of the Frankfurt School of critical social analysis, whose Marxist and Freudian theories influenced leftist student movements. Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 184 Contemporary Philosophy between two inherently oppressive models of social development. In these historical circumstances, questions concerning human liberation—what it consists of and how it can be attained—seemed especially urgent. In Dialektik der Aufklärung (1947; Dialectic of Enlightenment), Horkheimer and Adorno argued that the celebration of reason by thinkers of the 18th-century Enlightenment had led to the development of technologically sophisticated but oppressive and inhumane modes of governance, exemplified in the 20th century by fascism and totalitarianism. In works published in the 1950s and ’60s, Marcuse attacked both the ideological conformism of managerial capitalism and the bureaucratic oppression of the communist “peoples’ democracies.” In his bestknown and most influential work, One-Dimensional Man (1964), he argued that the modern capitalist “affluent” society oppresses even those who are successful within it while maintaining their complacency through the ersatz satisfactions of consumer culture. By cultivating such shallow forms of experience and by blocking critical understanding of the real workings of the system, the affluent society condemns its members to a “one-dimensional” existence of intellectual and spiritual poverty. Seeing human freedom as everywhere in retreat, Marcuse later transferred the redeeming mission of the proletariat to a relative fringe of radical minorities, including (in the United States) the student New Left and militant groups such as the Black Panther Party. Critical theorists initially believed that they could liberate people from false beliefs, or “false consciousness,” and in particular from ideologies that served to maintain the political and economic status quo, by pointing out to them that they had acquired these beliefs in irrational ways (e.g., through indoctrination). In the end, however, some theorists, notably Marcuse, wondered whether the 185 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present forces tending to promote ideological conformity in modern capitalist societies had so compromised the perceptions and reasoning powers of most individuals that no rational critique would ever be effective. NON-MARXIST POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY Notwithstanding John Dewey’s important contributions to the theory of democracy, political philosophy in English-speaking countries in the first half of the 20th century was inhibited to some extent by the advent in the 1920s of logical positivism, a doctrine that conceived of knowledge claims on the model of the hypotheses of natural science. According to the simplest version of logical positivism, genuine knowledge claims can be divided into two groups: (1) those that can be verified or falsified on the basis of observation, or sense experience (empirical claims); and (2) those that are true or false simply by virtue of the conventional meanings assigned to the words they contain (tautologies or contradictions), along with their logical implications. All other claims, including the evaluative assertions made by traditional political and ethical philosophers, are literally meaningless, hence not worth discussing. A complementary view held by some logical positivists was that an evaluative assertion, properly understood, is not a statement of fact but either an expression of the speaker’s attitude (e.g., of approval or disapproval) or an imperative—a speech act aimed at influencing the behaviour of others. This view of the language of ethical and political philosophy tended to limit serious study in those fields until the 1960s, when logical positivism came to be regarded as simplistic in its conceptions of linguistic meaning and scientific practice. 186 Contemporary Philosophy There were, in addition to Dewey, other exceptions to this trend, the most notable being the German-born philosopher Hannah Arendt (1906–75), who became a U.S. citizen in 1951. In the second half of the 20th century, American philosopher John Rawls (1921–2002) developed a sophisticated defense of political liberalism, which provoked challenging responses from libertarians, communitarians, and others. Hannah Arendt Hannah Arendt’s reputation as a major political thinker was established by her Origins of Totalitarianism (1951), which also treated 19th-century anti-Semitism, imperialism, and racism. Arendt viewed the growth of totalitarianism as the outcome of the disintegration of the traditional nationstate. She argued that totalitarian regimes, through their pursuit of raw political power and their neglect of material or utilitarian considerations, had revolutionized the social structure and made contemporary politics nearly impossible to predict. The Human Condition, published in 1958, was a wideranging and systematic treatment of what Arendt called the vita activa (Latin: “active life”). She defended the classical ideals of work, citizenship, and political action against what she considered a debased obsession with mere welfare. Like most of her work, it owed a great deal to the philosophical style of her former teacher, Martin Heidegger (1889–1976). In a highly controversial work, Eichmann in Jerusalem (1963), based on her reportage of the trial of the Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann in 1961, Arendt argued that Eichmann’s crimes resulted not from a wicked or depraved character but from sheer “thoughtlessness”: 187 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Hannah Arendt gained prestige as a major political force with her critical writing on Jewish affairs and her study of totalitarianism. Apic/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 188 Contemporary Philosophy he was simply an ambitious bureaucrat who failed to reflect on the enormity of what he was doing. His role in the mass extermination of Jews epitomized “the fearsome, word-and-thought-defying banality of evil” that had spread across Europe at the time. Arendt’s refusal to recognize Eichmann as “inwardly” evil prompted fierce denunciations from both Jewish and non-Jewish intellectuals. John Rawls The publication of John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice (1971) spurred a revival of interest in the philosophical foundations of political liberalism. The viability of liberalism was thereafter a major theme of political philosophy in English-speaking countries. According to the American philosopher Thomas Nagel, liberalism is the conjunction of two ideals: (1) individuals should have liberty of thought and speech and wide freedom to live their lives as they choose (so long as they do not harm others in certain ways), and (2) through majority rule individuals in any society should be able to determine the laws by which they are governed and should not be so unequal in status or wealth that they have unequal opportunities to participate in democratic decision making. Various traditional and modern versions of liberalism differ from each other in their interpretation of these ideals and in the relative importance they assign to them. In A Theory of Justice, Rawls observed that a necessary condition of justice in any society is that each individual should be the equal bearer of certain rights that cannot be disregarded under any circumstances, even if doing so would advance the general welfare or satisfy the demands of a majority. This condition cannot 189 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present John Rawls. Harvard University News Office be met by utilitarianism, because that ethical theory would countenance forms of government in which the greater happiness of a majority is achieved by neglecting the rights and interests of a minority. Hence, utilitarianism is unsatisfactory as a theory of justice, and another theory must be sought. According to Rawls, a just society is one whose major political, social, and economic institutions, taken together, satisfy the following two principles: 1. Each person has an equal claim to a scheme of basic rights and liberties that is the maximum consistent with the same scheme for all. 190 Contemporary Philosophy 2. Social and economic inequalities are permissible only if: (a) they confer the greatest benefit to the least-advantaged members of society, and (b) they are attached to positions and offices open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity. The basic rights and liberties in principle 1 include the rights and liberties of democratic citizenship, such as the right to vote; the right to run for office in free elections; freedom of speech, assembly, and religion; the right to a fair trial; and, more generally, the right to the rule of law. Principle 1 is accorded strict priority over principle 2, which regulates social and economic inequalities. Principle 2 combines two ideals. The first, known as the “difference principle,” requires that any unequal distribution of social or economic goods (e.g., wealth) must be such that the least advantaged members of society would be better off under that distribution than they would be under any other distribution consistent with principle 1, including an equal distribution. (A slightly unequal distribution might benefit the least advantaged by encouraging greater overall productivity.) The second ideal is meritocracy, understood in an extremely demanding way. According to Rawls, fair equality of opportunity obtains in a society when all persons with the same native talent (genetic inheritance) and the same degree of ambition have the same prospects for success in all competitions for positions that confer special economic and social advantages. Why suppose with Rawls that justice requires an approximately egalitarian redistribution of social and economic goods? After all, a person who prospers in a market economy might plausibly say, “I earned my wealth. Therefore, I am entitled to keep it.” But how one fares in 191 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present a market economy depends on luck as well as effort. There is the luck of being in the right place at the right time and of benefiting from unpredictable shifts in supply and demand, but there is also the luck of being born with greater or lesser intelligence and other desirable traits, along with the luck of growing up in a nurturing environment. No one can take credit for this kind of luck, but it decisively influences how one fares in the many competitions by which social and economic goods are distributed. Indeed, sheer brute luck is so thoroughly intermixed with the contributions one makes to one’s own success (or failure) that it is ultimately impossible to distinguish what a person is responsible for from what he is not. Given this fact, Rawls urged, the only plausible justification of inequality is that it serves to render everyone better off, especially those who have the least. Rawls tried to accommodate his theory of justice to what he took to be the important fact that reasonable people disagree deeply about the nature of morality and the good life and will continue to do so in any nontyrannical society that respects freedom of speech. He aimed to render his theory noncommittal on these controversial matters and to posit a set of principles of justice that all reasonable persons could accept as valid, despite their disagreements. Critiques of Philosophical Liberalism Despite its wide appeal, Rawls’s liberal egalitarianism soon faced challengers. An early conservative rival was libertarianism. According to this view, because each person is literally the sole rightful owner of himself, no one has property rights in anyone else (no person can own another person), and no one owes anything to anyone else. By “appropriating” unowned things, an individual may 192 Contemporary Philosophy acquire over them full private ownership rights, which he may give away or exchange. One has the right to do whatever one chooses with whatever one legitimately owns, as long as one does not harm others in specified ways (i.e., by coercion, force, violence, fraud, theft, extortion, or physical damage to another’s property). According to libertarians, Rawlsian liberal egalitarianism is unjust because it would allow (indeed, require) the state to redistribute social and economic goods without their owners’ consent, in violation of their private ownership rights. The most spirited and sophisticated presentation of the libertarian critique was Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974), by the American philosopher Robert Nozick (1938–2002). Nozick also argued that a “minimal state,” Robert Nozick. Harvard University News Office 193 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present one that limited its activities to the enforcement of people’s basic libertarian rights, could have arisen in a hypothetical “state of nature” through a process in which no one’s basic libertarian rights are violated. He regarded this demonstration as a refutation of anarchism, the doctrine that the state is inherently unjustified. Rawls’s theory of justice was challenged from other theoretical perspectives as well. Adherents of communitarianism, such as Michael Sandel and Michael Walzer, urged that the shared understanding of a community concerning how it is appropriate to live should outweigh the abstract and putatively impartial requirements of universal justice. Even liberal egalitarians criticized some aspects of Rawls’s theory. Ronald Dworkin, for example, argued that understanding egalitarian justice requires striking the correct balance between an individual’s responsibility for his own life and society’s collective responsibility to provide genuine equal opportunity for all citizens. ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY As noted earlier, contemporary analytic philosophy—also sometimes called “Anglo-American” philosophy (a term that is no longer culturally or geographically accurate)—is a descendant of the tradition of logical analysis inaugurated by the British empiricists, particularly Locke and Hume. It is difficult to give a precise definition of analytic philosophy, however, because it is not so much a specific doctrine as an overlapping set of approaches to philosophical problems. Its origin at the turn of the 20th century is often located in the work of two English philosophers, G.E. Moore (1873–1958) and Bertrand Russell (1872–1970). The development of analytic philosophy was significantly influenced by the creation of symbolic (or mathematical) logic at the beginning of the century. 194 Contemporary Philosophy Although there are anticipations of this kind of logic in the Stoics, its modern forms are without exact parallel in Western thought, a fact that is made apparent by its close affinities with mathematics and science. Many philosophers thus regarded the combination of logic and science as a model that philosophical inquiry should follow, though others rejected the model or minimized its usefulness for dealing with philosophical problems. The 20th century thus witnessed the development of two diverse streams of analysis, one emphasizing formal (logical) techniques and the other informal (ordinary-language) ones. There were, of course, many philosophers whose work was influenced by both approaches. Although analysis can in principle be applied to any subject matter, its central focus for most of the century was language, especially the notions of meaning and reference. Ethics, aesthetics, religion, and law also were fields of interest, though to a lesser degree. The last quarter of the century exhibited a profound shift in emphasis from the topics of meaning and reference to issues about the human mind, including the nature of mental processes such as thinking, judging, perceiving, believing, and intending, as well as the products or objects of such processes, including representations, meanings, and visual images. At the same time, intensive work continued on the theory of reference, and the results obtained in that domain were transferred to the analysis of mind. Both formalist and informalist approaches exhibited this shift in interest. The Formalist Tradition Russell, whose general approach would be adopted by philosophers in the formalist tradition, was a major influence on those who believed that philosophical problems could be clarified, if not solved, by using the technical 195 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present equipment of formal logic and who saw the physical sciences as the only means of gaining knowledge of the world. They regarded philosophy—if as a science at all— as a deductive and a priori enterprise on a par with mathematics. Russell’s contributions to this side of the analytic tradition have been important and, in great part, lasting. Logical Atomism The first major development in the formalist tradition was a metaphysical theory known as logical atomism, which was derived from Russell’s work in mathematical logic. His work, in turn, was based in part on early notebooks written before World War I by his former pupil Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1953). In “The Philosophy of Logical Atomism,” a monograph published in 1918, Russell gave credit to Wittgenstein for supplying “many of the theories” contained in it. Wittgenstein had joined the Austrian army when the war broke out, and Russell had been out of contact with him ever since. Wittgenstein thus did not become aware of Russell’s version of logical atomism until after the war. Wittgenstein’s polished and extremely sophisticated version appeared in the Tractatus LogicoPhilosophicus, which he wrote during the war but did not publish until 1922. Both Russell and Wittgenstein believed that mathematical logic could reveal the basic structure of reality, a structure that is hidden beneath the cloak of ordinary language. In their view, the new logic showed that the world is made up of simple, or “atomic,” facts, which in turn are made up of particular objects. Atomic facts are complex, mind-independent features of reality, such as the fact that a particular rock is white or the fact that the Moon is a satellite of the Earth. As Wittgenstein says in the Tractatus, “The world is determined by the facts, and by their being 196 Contemporary Philosophy all the facts.” Both Russell and Wittgenstein held that the basic propositions of logic, which Wittgenstein called “elementary propositions,” refer to atomic facts. There is thus an immediate connection between formal languages, such as the logical system of Russell’s Principia Mathematica (written with Alfred North Whitehead and published between 1910 and 1913), and the structure of the real world: elementary propositions represent atomic facts, which are constituted by particular objects, which are the meanings of logically proper names. Russell differed from Wittgenstein in that he held that the meanings of proper names are “sense data,” or immediate perceptual experiences, rather than particular objects. Furthermore, for Wittgenstein but not for Russell, elementary propositions are connected to the world by being structurally isomorphic to atomic facts (i.e., by being a “picture” of them). Wittgenstein’s view thus came to be known as the “picture theory” of meaning. Logical atomism rested on many theses. It was realistic, as distinct from idealistic, in its contention that there are mind-independent facts. But it presupposed that language is mind-dependent (i.e., that language would not exist unless there were sentient beings who used sounds and marks to refer and to communicate). Logical atomism was thus a dualistic metaphysics that described both the structure of the world and the conditions that any particular language must satisfy to represent it. Although its career was brief, its guiding principle—that philosophy should be scientific and grounded in mathematical logic— was widely acknowledged throughout the century. Logical Positivism Logical positivism was developed in the early 1920s by a group of Austrian intellectuals, mostly scientists and mathematicians, who named their association the Wiener 197 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Kreis (Vienna Circle). The logical positivists accepted the logical atomist conception of philosophy as properly scientific and grounded in mathematical logic. By “scientific,” however, they had in mind the classical empiricism handed down from Locke and Hume, in particular the view that all factual knowledge is based on experience. Unlike logical atomists, the logical positivists, as noted earlier, held that only logic, mathematics, and the special sciences can make statements that are meaningful, or cognitively significant. They thus regarded metaphysical, religious, ethical, literary, and aesthetic pronouncements as literally nonsense. Significantly, because logical atomism was a metaphysics purporting to convey true information about the structure of reality, it too was disavowed. The positivists also held that there is a fundamental distinction to be made between “analytic” statements (such as “All husbands are married”), which can be known to be true independently of any experience, and “synthetic” statements (such as “It is raining now”), which are knowable only through observation. The main proponents of logical positivism—Rudolf Carnap (1891–1970), Herbert Feigl (1902–88), Philipp Frank (1884–1966), and Gustav Bergmann (1906–87)—all immigrated to the United States from Germany and Austria to escape Nazism. Their influence on American philosophy was profound, and, with various modifications after the 1960s, logical positivism was still a vital force on the American scene at the beginning of the 21st century. Naturalized Epistemology The philosophical psychology and philosophy of mind developed since the 1950s by the American philosopher Willard Van Orman Quine (1908–2000), known generally as naturalized epistemology, was influenced both by Russell’s work in logic and by logical positivism. Quine’s 198 Contemporary Philosophy philosophy forms a comprehensive system that is scientistic, empiricist, and behaviourist. Indeed, for Quine, the basic task of an empiricist philosophy is simply to describe how our scientific theories about the world—as well as our prescientific, or intuitive, picture of it—are derived from experience. As he wrote: The stimulation of his sensory receptors is all the evidence anybody has had to go on, ultimately, in arriving at his picture of the world. Why not just see how this construction really proceeds? Why not settle for psychology? Although Quine shared the logical postivists’ scientism and empiricism, he crucially differed from them in rejecting the traditional analytic-synthetic distinction. For Quine, this distinction is ill-founded because it is not required by any adequate psychological account of how scientific (or prescientific) theories are formulated. Quine’s views had an enormous impact on analytic philosophy, and until his death at the end of the century he was generally regarded as the dominant figure in the movement. Theories in the Philosophy of Mind Logical positivism and naturalized epistemology were forms of materialism. Beginning about 1970, these approaches were applied to the human mind, giving rise to three general viewpoints: identity theory, functionalism, and eliminative materialism. Identity theory is the view that mental states are identical to physical states of the brain. According to functionalism, a particular mental state is any type of (physical) state that plays a certain causal role with respect to other mental and physical states. For example, pain can be functionally defined as any state that is an effect of events such as cuts and burns 199 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present and that is a cause of mental states such as fear and behaviour such as saying “Ouch!” Eliminative materialism is the view that the familiar categories of “folk psychology”— such as belief, intention, and desire—do not refer to anything real. In other words, there are no such things as beliefs, intentions, or desires. Instead, there is simply neural activity in the brain. According to the eliminative materialist, a modern scientific account of the mind no more requires the categories of folk psychology than modern chemistry requires the discarded notion of phlogiston. A complete account of human mental experience can be achieved simply by describing how the brain operates. The Informalist Tradition Generally speaking, philosophers in the informalist tradition viewed philosophy as an autonomous activity that should acknowledge the importance of logic and science but not treat either or both as models for dealing with conceptual problems. The 20th century witnessed the development of three such approaches, each of which had sustained influence: common sense philosophy, ordinary language philosophy, and speech act theory. Common Sense Philosophy Originating as a reaction against the forms of idealism and skepticism that were prevalent in England at about the turn of the 20th century, the first major work of common sense philosophy was Moore’s paper “A Defense of Common Sense” (1925). Against skepticism, Moore argued that he and other human beings have known many propositions about the world to be true with certainty. Among these propositions are: “The Earth has existed for many years” and “Many human beings have existed in the past and some still exist.” Because skepticism maintains that 200 Contemporary Philosophy nobody knows any proposition to be true, it can be dismissed. Furthermore, because these propositions entail the existence of material objects, idealism, according to which the world is wholly mental, can also be rejected. Moore called this outlook “the common sense view of the world,” and he insisted that any philosophical system whose propositions contravene it can be rejected out of hand without further analysis. Ordinary Language Philosophy The two major proponents of ordinary language philosophy were the English philosophers Gilbert Ryle (1900–76) and J.L. Austin (1911–60). Although for different reasons, both held that philosophical problems frequently arise through a misuse or misunderstanding of ordinary speech. In The Concept of Mind (1949), Ryle argued that the traditional conception of the human mind—that it is an invisible, ghostlike entity occupying a physical body—is based on what he called a “category mistake.” The mistake is to interpret the term mind as though it were analogous to the term body and thus to assume that both terms denote entities, one visible (body) and the other invisible (mind). His diagnosis of this error involved an elaborate description of how mental epithets actually work in ordinary speech. To speak of intelligence, for example, is to describe how human beings respond to certain kinds of problematic situations. Despite the behaviourist flavour of his analyses, Ryle insisted that he was not a behaviourist and that he was instead “charting the logical geography” of the mental concepts used in everyday life. Austin’s emphasis was somewhat different. In a celebrated paper, “A Plea for Excuses” (1956), he explained that the appeal to ordinary language in philosophy should be regarded as the first word but not the last word. That is, one should be sensitive to the nuances of everyday speech 201 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present in approaching conceptual problems, but in certain circumstances everyday speech can, and should, be augmented by technical concepts. According to the “first-word” principle, because certain distinctions have been drawn in ordinary language for eons (e.g., males from females, friends from enemies, and so forth) one can conclude not only that the drawing of such distinctions is essential to everyday life but also that such distinctions are more than merely verbal. They pick out, or discriminate, actual features of the world. Starting from this principle, Austin dealt with major philosophical difficulties, such as the problem of other minds, the nature of truth, and the nature of responsibility. Speech Act Theory Austin was also the creator of one of the most original philosophical theories of the 20th century: speech act theory. A speech act is an utterance that is grammatically similar to a statement but is neither true nor false, though it is perfectly meaningful. For example, the utterance “I do,” performed in the normal circumstances of marrying, is neither true nor false. It is not a statement but an action—a speech act—the primary effect of which is to complete the marriage ceremony. Similar considerations apply to utterances such as “I christen thee the Joseph Stalin,” performed in the normal circumstances of christening a ship. Austin called such utterances “performatives” to indicate that, in making them, one is not only saying something but also doing something. The theory of speech acts was, in effect, a profound criticism of the positivist thesis that every meaningful sentence is either true or false. The positivist view, according to Austin, embodies a “descriptive fallacy,” in the sense that it treats the descriptive function of language as 202 Contemporary Philosophy primary and more or less ignores other functions. Austin’s account of speech acts was thus a corrective to that tendency. After Austin’s death in 1960, speech act theory was deepened and refined by his American student John R. Searle. In The Construction of Social Reality (1995), Searle argued that many social and political institutions are created through speech acts. Money, for example, is created through a declaration by a government to the effect that pieces of paper or metal of a certain manufacture and design are to count as money. Many institutions, such as banks, universities, and police departments, are social entities created through similar speech acts. Searle’s development of speech act theory was thus an unexpected extension of the philosophy of language into social and political theory. CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY Until the late 20th century, analytic philosophy had comparatively little influence on the European continent, where the speculative and historical tradition remained strong. Dominated by phenomenology and existentialism during the first half of the 20th century, after World War II Continental philosophy came to embrace increasingly far-reaching structuralist and post-structuralist critiques of metaphysics and philosophical rationality. The Phenomenology of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger Considered the father of phenomenology, Edmund Husserl (1859–1938), a German mathematician-turnedphilosopher, was an extremely complicated and technical 203 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Edmund Husserl, c. 1930. Archiv für Kunst und Geschichte, Berlin 204 Contemporary Philosophy thinker whose views changed considerably over the years. His chief contributions were the phenomenological method, which he developed early in his career, and the concept of the “life-world,” which appeared only in his later writings. As a technique of phenomenological analysis, the phenomenological method was to make possible “a descriptive account of the essential structures of the directly given.” It was to isolate and lay bare the intrinsic structure of conscious experience by focusing the philosopher’s attention on the pure data of consciousness, uncontaminated by metaphysical theories or scientific or empirical assumptions of any kind. Husserl’s concept of the life-world is similarly concerned with immediate experience. It is the individual’s personal world as he directly experiences it, with the ego at the centre and with all of its vital and emotional colourings. With the appearance of the Jahrbuch für Philosophie und phänomenologische Forschung (1913–30; “Annual for Philosophical and Phenomenological Research”) under Husserl’s chief editorship, his philosophy flowered into an international movement. Its most notable adherent was Martin Heidegger (1889–1976), whose masterpiece, Sein und Zeit (Being and Time), appeared in the Jahrbuch in 1927. The influence of the phenomenological method is clear in Heidegger’s work; throughout his startlingly original investigations of human existence—with their unique dimensions of “being-in-the-world,” dread, care, and “being-toward-death”—Heidegger adheres to the phenomenological principle that philosophy is not empirical but is the strictly self-evident insight into the structure of experience. Later, the French philosophical psychologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–61), building on the concept of the life-world, used the notions of the lived body and its “facticity” to create a hierarchy of human-lived experience. 205 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present The Existentialism of Karl Jaspers and Jean-Paul Sartre Existentialism, true to its roots in Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, was oriented toward two major themes: the analysis of human existence, or Being, and the centrality of human choice. Thus its chief theoretical energies were devoted to ontology and decision. Existentialism as a philosophy of human existence was best expressed in the work of the German philosopher Karl Jaspers (1883–1969), who came to philosophy from medicine and psychology. For Jaspers as for Dewey, the aim of philosophy is practical. But whereas for Dewey philosophy is to guide human action, for Jaspers its purpose is the revelation of Being, “the illumination of existence,” the answering of the questions of what human beings are and what they can become. This illumination is achieved, and Being is revealed most profoundly, through the experience of “extreme” situations that define the human condition—conflict, guilt, suffering, and death. It is through a confrontation with these extremes that the individual realizes his existential humanity. The chief representative of existentialism as a philosophy of human decision was the French philosopher and man of letters Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–80). Sartre too was concerned with Being and with the dread experienced before the threat of Nothingness. But he found the essence of this Being in liberty: in freedom of choice and the duty of self-determination. He therefore devoted much effort to describing the human tendency toward “bad faith,” reflected in perverse attempts to deny one’s own responsibility and to flee from the truth of one’s inescapable freedom. Sartre did not overlook the legitimate obstacles to freedom presented by the facts of place, past, environment, society, and death. However, he demanded 206 Contemporary Philosophy Jean-Paul Sartre, photograph by Gisèle Freund, 1968. Gisèle Freund 207 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present that one surmount these limitations through acts of conscious decision, for only in acts of freedom does human existence achieve authenticity. In Le Deuxième Sexe, 2 vol. (1949; The Second Sex), Simone de Beauvoir (1908–86), Sartre’s fellow philosopher and lifelong companion, attempted to mobilize the existentialist concept of freedom for the ends of modern feminism. After World War II Sartre came to believe that his philosophy of freedom had wrongly ignored problems of social justice. In his later work, especially the Critique de la raison dialectique (1960; Critique of Dialectical Reason), he sought to reconcile existentialism with Marxism. Continental Philosophy Since the 1950s The main theme of postwar Continental philosophy was the enthusiastic reception in France of Nietzsche and Heidegger and the consequent rejection of metaphysics and the Cartesian rationalism inherited by Sartre and his fellow existentialists. For millennia the goal of metaphysics, or “first philosophy,” had been to discern the ultimate nature of reality. Postwar Continental philosophy, recoiling from omnipresent images of mass annihilation, increasingly held metaphysical holism itself responsible for the catastrophes of 20th-century history. The critics of metaphysics argued that only a relentless castigation of such excesses could produce a philosophy that was genuinely open toward Being, “thinghood,” and world. In the 1950s, French philosophy faced a series of major challenges arising from structuralism, the new movement in anthropology that analyzed cultures as systems of structurally related elements and attempted to discern universal patterns underlying all such systems. In his Tristes tropiques (1955; Eng. trans. A World on the Wane), for example, the anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss (1908–2009) issued a 208 Contemporary Philosophy pointed indictment of philosophical method, claiming that it lacked empirical grounding and was so arbitrary as to be capable of proving or disproving anything. Sartre’s political missteps during the early 1950s, when he had been an enthusiastic fellow traveler of the French Communist Party, did little to enhance the credibility of his philosophical rationalism. In his influential book Les Mots et les choses (1966; Eng. trans. The Order of Things), Michel Foucault paradoxically employed structuralist methods to criticize the scientific pretensions of natural history, linguistics, and political economy, the disciplines known in France as the “human sciences.” But the main target of his critique was the anthropocentric orientation of the humanities, notably including philosophy. Foucault argued provocatively that “man” was an artificial notion, an invention of the 19th century, and that its obsolescence had become apparent in the postwar era. In later books such as Surveiller et punir: naissance de la prison (1975; Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison) and Histoire de la sexualité, 3 vols. (1976–84; The History of Sexuality), Foucault’s gaze shifted to systems of power. In a Nietzschean spirit, he coined the term power-knowledge to indicate the involvement of knowledge in the maintenance of power relations. As he argued in the essay “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” (1977), an examination of the notion of truth reveals that all knowledge rests upon injustice, that there is no right, not even in the act of knowing, to truth or a foundation for truth, and that the instinct for knowledge is malicious (something murderous, opposed to the happiness of mankind). The movement known as deconstruction, derived mainly from work begun in the 1960s by Jacques Derrida, 209 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present displayed a similar hostility to metaphysics and its quest for totality and absolute truth. Under the sway of Heidegger’s call for “a destruction of the history of ontology,” Derrida endorsed the deconstruction of Western philosophy (i.e., the uncovering and undoing of the false dichotomies, or “oppositions,” inherent in philosophical thinking since the time of the ancient Greeks). In Derrida’s view, these oppositions result from the misguided assumption, which he called “logocentrism,” that there is a realm of truth that exists prior to and independently of its representation by linguistic and other signs. Logocentrism in turn derives from the “metaphysics of presence,” or the tendency to conceive of fundamental philosophical concepts such as truth, reality, and being in terms of ideas such as identity, presence, and essence and to limit or ignore the equally valid notions of otherness, absence, and difference. Because of this tendency, Derrida concluded, there is a necessary relationship between the metaphysical quest for “totality” and political “totalitarianism.” As he wrote in an early essay, “Violence and Metaphysics” (1967): Incapable of respecting the Being and meaning of the other, phenomenology and ontology would be philosophies of violence. Through them, the entire philosophical tradition… would make common cause with oppression and technicopolitical possession. The French philosopher Emmanuel Lévinas (1905–95) attributed the misguided quest for totality to a defect in reason itself. In his major work, Totalité et infini (1961; Totality and Infinity), he contended that, as it is used in Western philosophy, reason enforces “domination” and “sameness” and destroys plurality and otherness. He called for the transcendence of reason in a first philosophy based 210 Contemporary Philosophy on ethics—and in particular on the biblical commandment “You shall not kill” (Exodus 20:13)—rather than on logic. It is no small irony, then, that Continental philosophy, whose roots lay in the attempt by Kant, Hegel, and their successors to defend reason against the twin excesses of dogmatism and epistemological skepticism, should come to equate reason with domination and to insist that reason’s hegemony be overthrown. A powerful alternative to this view appeared in work from the 1970s by the German philosopher Jürgen Habermas. Although agreeing with the French Nietzscheans that traditional metaphysics was obsolete and, in particular, that it did not provide a path to absolute truth, Habermas did not reject the notion of truth entirely, nor did he accept the Nietzscheans’ call for a “farewell to reason.” While acknowledging that the notion of truth is often used to mask unjust power relations and partisan class interests, he insisted that the very possibility of such an insight presupposes that one can conceive of social relations that are just and interests that are held in common by all members of society. Habermas’s Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, 2 vols. (1981; Theory of Communicative Action) was devoted in part to developing an account of truth in terms that did not imply that there exists an “absolute” truth of the kind traditionally posited by metaphysics. Following the doctrines of pragmatism and reinterpreting Austin’s earlier work on speech acts, Habermas contended that ordinary communication differs from other forms of human action in that it is oriented toward mutual agreement rather than “success.” That is, it aims at reaching “intersubjective” understanding rather than at mastering the world through instrumental action. The process of constructing such an understanding, however, requires that each individual assume that the utterances of the other are for the most 211 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present part “true” and that the other can provide reasons to support the truth or validity of his utterance if called upon to do so. Specifically, individuals must interpret each other’s utterances as true assertions about objects and events in an “external world,” as descriptions of morally “right” actions in a social world of shared norms, or as “sincere” expressions of thoughts and feelings in the speaker’s “inner world.” In this “discourse theory of truth,” the notion of truth, far from being a misguided fiction of metaphysics, is a regulative ideal without which communication itself would be impossible. THE RELEVANCE OF CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY Despite the tradition of philosophical professionalism established during the Enlightenment, philosophy in the 19th century was still created largely outside the universities. Comte, Mill, Marx, Schopenhauer, and Kierkegaard were not professors, and only the German idealist school was rooted in academic life. Since the early 20th century, however, most well-known philosophers have been associated with academia. It is perhaps not surprising, therefore, that philosophers in both the analytic and the Continental traditions have come to employ a technical vocabulary and to deal with narrow, specialized, or esoteric problems and that their strictly philosophical work has been addressed not to a broad intellectual public but to one another. Professionalism also has sharpened the divisions between philosophical schools and made the question of what philosophy is and what it ought to be a matter of the sharpest controversy. Philosophy has become extremely self-conscious about its own methods and nature. These trends, among others, have seemed to lend support to intellectual critics of contemporary philosophy 212 Contemporary Philosophy who argue that it has lost sight of its purpose—that it fails to address deep human problems and concerns, that it does little if anything to make the universe or human life more intelligible or meaningful. These complaints are distinct from (but obviously related to) the age-old accusation that philosophy is of no “practical” benefit or import (a charge that is easily refuted, as there would have been no Declaration of Independence without Locke). Although it is true that specialization—a concentration on “small” questions—has become a common phenomenon within philosophy since the early 20th century, as it has in nearly all other academic disciplines, it would be a gross exaggeration to say that philosophy is no longer concerned with the “big” questions traditionally associated with it—questions about the ultimate nature of reality; the scope and limits of human knowledge; the nature of moral right and wrong, good and bad; the extent of people’s moral rights, duties, and obligations; the relation of the mind to the body (or the mental to the material); and so on. These problems continue to be addressed by both analytic and Continental philosophers, albeit sometimes in language that is difficult for non-philosophers to understand. Philosophy continues to offer enriching insight into these deep issues, and for that reason it remains— as it always was—a fundamentally important human endeavour. 213 Glossary anarchism Doctrines and attitudes rooted in the belief that government is harmful as well as unnecessary. atomism Any theory that attempts to explain changes of gross physical bodies in terms of the motions of minute indivisible particles. Averroists A group of masters in the faculty of arts at Paris who based their interpretations of Aristotle’s philosophy on the commentaries of the Arabic philosopher Averroës. axiom A principle or maxim accepted without proof that serves as a basis for further analysis. Cartesianism Philosophical and scientific traditions based on the writings Descartes. Deism Religious attitude that accepted the following: principles the existence of one God, often conceived of as architect or mechanician, the existence of a system of rewards and punishments administered by that God, and the obligation to be virtuous and pious. empirical claim Claim that is about something that can in principle be experienced. fortuna Play of external forces. humanism System of education and mode of inquiry that emphasized human concerns. perspectivism The view that all knowledge is situated and partial. Platonism Any philosophy that derives its ultimate inspiration from Plato. primary qualities Properties of a thing that resemble the ideas they cause in the mind (size, shape, weight, and solidity). Pyrrhic Accomplished at exorbitant sacrifice, often cancelling out or overriding anticipated benefits. 214 Glossary satire Artistic form that holds up vices, follies, abuses, or shortcomings to censure with ridicule, derision, burlesque, irony, parody, caricature, or other methods. Scholasticism Philosophical systems and speculative tendencies of various medieval Christian thinkers from the 11th through the 14th century. secondary qualities Properties of a thing that cause sensible ideas but do not resemble them. skepticism The doctrine or practice of systematic doubt of knowledge claims set forth in various areas. social dynamics Study of the causes of social change. social responsibility Any general moral obligation to others or to society as a whole. social statics Study of the forces that hold society together. solipsism In epistemology, the view that the mind or subject has no good reason to believe in the existence of anything other than itself. Stoicism Belief that the goal of all inquiry is to provide a mode of conduct characterized by tranquility of mind and certainty of moral worth. syncretism In philosophy and religion, doctrine that stresses the unity and compatibility of different schools and systems. tautology Statement that it cannot be denied without inconsistency. universal Quality or property that each individual member of a class of things must possess if the same general word is to apply to all the things in that class. utilitarianism In ethics, doctrine that actions should be judged by the extent to which they promote the greatest happiness of the greatest number. utopian An ideal or perfect society. virtù Bold and intelligent initiative. 215 Bibliography RENAISSANCE PHILOSOPHY Ernst Cassirer, The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy, trans. by Mario Domandi (1963, reissued 2000; originally published in German, 1927), is an important study. Ernst Cassirer, John H. Randall, and Paul O. Kristeller (eds.), Renaissance Philosophy of Man (1948, reprinted 1993), is a collection of important Renaissance philosophical statements translated into English, some for the first time. The author of the following works, Paul O. Kristeller, was one of the leading 20th-century scholars of the Renaissance: The Classics and Renaissance Thought, rev. ed. (1961, reissued 1969); Eight Philosophers of the Italian Renaissance (1964, reprinted 1966); Medieval Aspects of Renaissance Learning, ed. and trans. by Edward P. Mahoney (1974, reissued 1992); and Renaissance Concepts of Man, and Other Essays, ed. by Michael Mooney (1972, reissued 1979). Brian P. Copenhaver and Charles B. Schmitt, Renaissance Philosophy (1992, reissued 1997), a fine exposition of many aspects of Renaissance philosophy, was drafted by Schmitt and finished after his death by Copenhaver. Charles B. Schmitt et al. (eds.), Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (1988), is a collection of essays by leading scholars. EARLY MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY Noteworthy studies include Kuno Fischer, History of Modern Philosophy: Descartes and His School, ed. by Noah Porter and trans. by J.P. Goody (1887, reissued 1992; originally published as vol. 1 of his Geschichte der neuern Philosophie, 11 vol., 1878); Richard H. Popkin (ed.), The 216 Bibliography Philosophy of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (1966); Tom Sorell (ed.), The Rise of Modern Philosophy: The Tension Between the New and Traditional Philosophies from Machiavelli to Leibniz (1993), a collection of essays by various scholars; Ernst Cassirer, The Philosophy of the Enlightenment, trans. by J. Pettigrove and F. Koelin (1951, reissued 1979; originally published in German, 1932); Johann Eduard Erdmann, A History of Philosophy, trans. by Williston S. Hough, 3 vol. (1890, reissued 1997; originally published in German, 2 vol., 1878); and Harald Høffding, A History of Modern Philosophy, trans. by B.E. Meyer, 2 vol. (1900, reissued 1958; trans. from the 1895–96 German ed.; originally published in Danish, 1894–95). More contemporary works include Raymond Klibansky (ed.), Philosophy in the Mid-Century: A Survey, 3rd ed., 4 vol. (1967), and Contemporary Philosophy: A Survey, 4 vol. (1968, reissued 1971), a collection of essays by leading scholars; Albert William Levi, Philosophy and the Modern World (1959, reissued 1977), a broad treatment, and Philosophy as Social Expression (1974); Wolfgang Stegmüller, Main Currents in Contemporary German, British, and American Philosophy, trans. by Albert L. Blumberg (1970; originally published in German, 4th ed., 1969), a narrower, more technical treatment; Walter Kaufmann (ed.), Existentialism from Dostoevsky to Sartre, rev. and expanded ed. (1975, reissued 2004), selections with introductions; and Marvin Farber (ed.), Philosophic Thought in France and the United States: Essays Representing Major Trends in Contemporary French and American Philosophy, 2nd ed. (1968; originally published in French, 1950). 217 Index Novum Organum, 76, 78, 79, 81–82 Beauvoir, Simone de, 208 The Second Sex, 208 Bentham, Jeremy, 107, 124, 157–158 Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, 157 Bergson, Henri, 174–175 Berkeley, George, 109, 112–115 Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, 113 Boccaccio, Giovanni, 30, 31 Bodin, Jean, 47, 48, 66–67, 125 Bradley, F.H., 144, 164 Bruni, Leonardo, 37–38 Bruno, Giordano, 32, 45, 67–74 dialogues, 70–71 A Adorno, Theodor, 183 Dialectic of Enlightenment, 185 Alberti, Leon Battista, 30, 31, 33 analytic philosophy, 176 formalist tradition, 195–200 informalist tradition, 195, 200–203 overview of, 194–195 Aquinas, Saint Thomas, 21, 45, 91, 104, 115 Arendt, Hannah, 187–189 Eichmann in Jerusalem, 187–189 The Human Condition, 187 Origins of Totalitarianism, 187 Aristotle, 22, 34, 44, 49, 53, 54, 63, 65, 68, 70, 71, 78, 79, 81, 92, 126, 172, 182 Arnauld, Antoine, 95, 97 astronomy, 54, 67–68, 70, 79, 104, 155 Augustine, Saint, 35, 45, 61, 91, 111, 115, 168 Austin, J.L., 201–203, 211 “A Plea for Excuses,” 201–202 Averroës, Ibn-Rushd, 68, 71 C B Bacon, Sir Francis, 21, 30, 51, 75–82, 84, 92, 93, 97, 104, 108, 153 Advancement of Learning, 76, 79 idols of the mind, 79–81 inductive reasoning, 81–82, 160 Cartesian Circle, 97 Castiglione, Baldassare, 30, 33–34 Christianity, 19, 35–36, 38, 39, 42–44, 53, 65, 68–69, 71, 74, 103–104, 115, 137, 138, 154, 156 Cicero, 27, 65 common sense philosophy, 200–201 communism, 163, 178, 182, 209 communitarianism, 194 Comte, Auguste, 144, 153–156, 160, 212 The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte, 153 218 Index contemporary philosophy, overview of, 176, 186–187, 212–213 Continental philosophy, 176, 203–213 Copernicus, 45, 52, 67, 69, 104, 107, 108, 138 critical theory, 183–186 D deconstruction, 209–210 Deism, 106, 107 Derrida, Jacques, 172, 209–210 Descartes, René, 22, 46, 49, 51, 75, 90–97, 99, 100, 102, 104, 108, 109, 115, 124, 147, 150, 174, 208 Discourse on Method, 90, 92, 96 Meditations on the First Philosophy, 91, 94–97 Principles of Philosophy, 90, 92 Dewey, John, 176–178, 186, 187, 206 Dilthey, Wilhelm, 174 E early modern philosophy, overview of, 75 Elyot, Sir Thomas, 34 empiricism, 51, 75–90, 92, 152, 199, 205 classical British empiricism, 106, 107–123, 124, 138, 153, 194, 198 Engels, Friedrich, 179, 182 Epictetus, 46 epistemology, 110, 125, 138, 151 naturalized epistemology, 198–199 Erasmus, Desiderius, 25, 30, 44, 68 Praise of Folly, 25 ethics, 27, 39, 71, 106, 124–125, 141–142, 160, 172, 195, 211 European Enlightenment, the, 25, 75, 80, 107–123, 138–142, 143, 146, 154, 162, 165, 170, 175, 185, 212 history and sources, 103–107 scientific discovery in, 124–125 social and political philosophy, 125–138 existentialism, 168, 206–208 F Feltre, Vittorino da, 33 Feuerbach, Ludwig, 162 The Essence of Christianity, 162 Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 144, 146, 147–148 Ficino, Marsilio, 23, 32, 44–45, 53 Foucault, Michel, 172, 209 “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History,” 209 The Order of Things, 209 Frankfurt School, 183–186 French Revolution, 107, 131, 151, 153 G Galileo Galilei, 45, 46, 49, 52–53, 70, 73, 75, 82, 92, 104, 107, 108, 110 German idealism, 144,146–152, 162, 163, 165, 212 Gramsci, Antonio, 182–183 Grotius, Hugo, 47–48 219 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Guicciardini, Francesco, 39–42, 59 History of Italy, 41–42 H Habermas, Jürgen, 183, 211–212 Theory of Communicative Action, 211–212 Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 144, 146, 148–152, 160, 162–164, 165, 166, 167, 176, 181, 182, 211 Phenomenology of Spirit, 148, 150 Philosophy of Right, 148–150, 152, 160 Science of Logic, 148, 152 Heidegger, Martin, 187, 205, 208, 210 Being and Time, 205 Hobbes, Thomas, 21, 47, 48, 51, 75, 82–90, 95, 97, 106, 108, 125, 126, 136, 151 De Cive, 85–90 Leviathan, 90 Hobson, J.A., 181 Horkheimer, Max, 183 Dialectic of Enlightenment, 185 humanism, 22–25, 64, 80–81 concept of humanitas, 25–27, 28 Northern humanism, 42–44 principles and attitudes, 28–34 in Renaissance thought, 34–42, 44–46 Hume, David, 108, 109, 116–123, 124, 146, 153, 160, 176, 194, 198 An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, 120 A Treatise of Human Nature, 108, 116, 120 Husserl, Edmund, 203–205 J James, William, 165 The Will to Believe, 165 Jaspers, Karl, 206 K Kant, Immanuel, 75, 108, 109, 123, 138–142, 143, 146–147, 148, 150, 151, 152, 153, 166, 211 Critique of Practical Reason, 141, 146, 147 Critique of Pure Reason, 138–141, 146 Kierkegaard, Søren, 144, 165–166, 167–168, 206, 212 Fear and Trembling, 167–168 L Lebensphilosophie, 175 Leibniz, Wilhelm, 75, 97, 100– 102, 104, 108, 109, 146 Lenin, Vladimir Ilich, 134, 178, 179–181 Leonardo da Vinci, 51, 52, 90 Lévinas, Emmanuel, 210–211 Totality and Infinity, 210–211 Lévi-Strauss, Claude, 208–209 A World on the Wane, 208–209 liberalism, 126, 143, 158 187, 189–194 Livy, 27, 28 Locke, John, 106, 107, 108, 109–112, 116, 122, 123, 124, 125–131, 133, 176, 194, 198, 213 Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 108, 111 Two Treatises of Civil Government, 125, 126–131 220 Index logic, 100–102, 111, 160, 200 symbolic logic, 194–196 logical atomism, 196–197, 198 logical positivism, 80, 186, 197–198, 199 logocentrism, 210 Lucretius, 46 Lukács, György, 181–182 mind, philosophy of, 199–200 Montaigne, Michel de, 30, 46, 95 Montesquieu, Charles-Louis de Secondat, 107, 124 Moore, G.E., 194, “A Defense of Common Sense,” 200–201 More, Sir Thomas, 30 M N Machiavelli, Niccolò, 21, 28, 29, 32, 33, 36–37, 38–39, 41, 45–46, 47, 48, 54–66, 125, 137 Discourses on Livy, 36–37, 39, 47, 57, 58, 60, 63–65 The Prince, 32, 36, 37, 47, 55, 58, 60–63, 64, 65 Manetti, Gianozzo, 23, 30, 32 Marcuse, Herbert, 181, 183, 185–186 One-Dimensional Man, 185 Marx, Karl, 130, 134, 144, 160–164, 179, 181, 182, 212 Marxism, 143, 176, 178–186, 208 materialism, 75, 83–90, 124–125, 143, 162, 199–200 Medici family, 38, 39–41, 44, 54, 58, 59 medieval philosophy, 19, 21, 22, 27, 51 Merleau-Ponty, Maurice, 205 metaphysics, 35, 45, 78, 83, 91, 92–93, 100, 102 108, 109, 140, 141, 146, 147, 148, 152, 153, 155, 165, 166–167, 172, 173, 178, 196, 197, 203, 205, 208, 210, 211, 212 Mill, James, 157–158 Mill, John Stuart, 144, 158–160, 212 Milton, John, 34 Newton, Sir Isaac, 49, 100, 104, 107–108, 116 Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, 107–108 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 144, 165–166, 167, 168–173, 206, 208, 209, 211 The Birth of Tragedy, 168–170 The Gay Science, 173 On Truth and Lies in a NonMoral Sense, 170–171 19th century philosophy overview of, 143–146, 212 social and political philosophy, 152–164 nominalism, 80, 84 Nozick, Robert, 193–194 Anarchy, State, and Utopia, 193 O ordinary language philosophy, 195, 200, 201–202 P Palmieri, Matteo, 33 Paracelsus, 30, 32 Peirce, Charles Sanders, 144, 165 221 Modern Philosophy: From 1500 ce to the Present Inequality, 131, 133–135, 137 The Social Contract, 125, 131, 135–137 Russell, Bertrand, 194, 195–197, 198 Principia Mathematica, 197 Ryle, Gilbert, 201 The Concept of Mind, 201 Petrarch, 23, 28, 31, 32, 35, 63 phenomenology, 165, 203–205 Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, 23, 32, 35, 45, 53–54 Oration on the Dignity of Man, 32, 35, 38, 53, 54 Plato, 27, 35, 44–45, 49, 53, 54, 61, 65, 122, 135, 137, 168–170, 172 positivism, 80, 143, 153–156, 174 post-structuralism, 203 pragmatism, 165, 176–178 printing, development of, 21, 42, 43 Protestant Reformation, 21, 25, 44, 104 Pythagoras, 45, 49 S Q Quine, William Van Orman, 198 R Rabelais, François, 30, 34 rationalism, 75, 80, 90–102, 109, 143 Rawls, John, 187, 189–194 A Theory of Justice, 189–192 Renaissance, the, 23–45, 53–74, 90, 92, 94, 97, 104, 124, 125, 143, 152 overview of philosophy in, 19–22, 108, 109 philosophy of nature in, 48–53 political philosophy in, 46–48 Ricardo, David, 130, 157 Romanticism, 107, 143, 144, 146, 167 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 107, 131–138, 162 Discourse on the Origin of Saint-Simon, Henri de, 153, 154 Salutati, Coluccio, 23, 28, 31, 32–33, 34, 37 Sandel, Michael, 194 Sartre, Jean-Paul, 206–208, 209 Critique of Dialectical Reason, 208 Savonarola, Girolamo, 38, 54, 55 Schelling, Friedrich, 144, 146 Scholasticism, 22, 23, 43, 44, 45, 51, 68, 81, 94, 103–104 Schopenhauer, Arthur, 144, 165–167, 168, 212 The World as Will and Representation, 166–167 scientific method, 52, 154 Searle, John R., 203 The Construction of Social Reality, 203 Seneca, 46 Sextus Empiricus, 46, 91–92, 95 Smith, Adam, 124, 157 social contract, 128, 131–133, 135–137 sociology, 155, 156 Socrates, 170, 172 speech act theory, 200, 202–203 Spinoza, Benedict de, 46, 75, 97–100, 102, 108, 146 Ethics, 46, 97–100 Stalin, Joseph, 179, 181, 182 222 Index stoicism, 34, 46, 78, 91, 195 structuralism, 201, 208–209 T Trotsky, Leon, 179 U umanisti, 25, 27 universals, problem of, 84 utilitarianism, 144, 156–160, 190 V Valla, Lorenzo, 23, 32, 42–43, 44 Vergerio, Pietro Paolo, 33 “On the Manners of a Gentleman and Liberal Studies,” 33 Veronese, Guarino, 33 Vesalius, Andreas, 52, 75 Voltaire, 102, 107, 124 W Walzer, Michael, 194 Whitehead, Alfred North, 176, 178, 197 Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 196–197 Tractacus Logico-Philosophicus, 196–197 223