Two Pieces: A 'Commentary' on the Oldest Systematic Program of German idealism & A Discussion on the Meaning of Life

Said the Tailor to the Bishop:
Believe me, I can fly.
Watch me while I try.
And he stood with things
That looked like wings
On the great church roof-
That is quite absurd
A wicked, foolish lie,
For man will never fly,
A man is not a bird,
Said the Bishop to the Tailor.

Said the People to the Bishop:
The Tailor is quite dead,
He was a stupid head.
His wings are rumpled
And he lies all crumpled
On the hard church square.

The bells ring out in praise
That man is not a bird
It was a wicked, foolish lie,
Mankind will never fly,
Said the Bishop to the People

-Bertol Brecht

A 'commentary' on the oldest systematic program of German idealism

The Oldest Systematic Program of German Idealism was written by an unknown author and is about 700 words long. The safest bet for the author, on the basis of handwriting rather than speculation about intellectual development, seems to be Hegel. It was written in the mid to late 1790’s. I’m going through a bit of a continental philosophy reading phase at the moment and this very short work caught my imagination as forerunners and transitional forms so often do. I thought it would be cute to do a little ‘commentary’ here. I put commentary in inverted quotation marks because, to be frank, I don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m just exploring ideas and I thought I’d invite you along, I’m no expert.

I use here the translation made by Daniel Fidel Ferrer because it is creative commons licensed.

Let’s begin:

Ethics and metaphysics

“-an ethics. Since the whole of metaphysics henceforth falls into morality - of which Kant, with his two practical postulates, has given only an example, has exhausted nothing - this ethics will be nothing but a complete system of all ideas, or, what is the same thing, of all practical postulates.”

Kant and practical postulation

By the time this short work was written, Kant has attempted to articulate the limits of reason through a theory of the architecture of the understanding in The Critique of Pure Reason. In Kant’s view, the understanding does what it does, and is built as it is, for grasping the world we encounter. Reasoning past what it was built for is thought to be spurious, a kind of category error, like trying to use a hammer as a key or trying to determine which color the number three is. Thus metaphysics is impossible…

Sort of. But Kant is a good protestant boy! So he works out an exception for God, freedom and the immortality of the soul. We haven’t got a reason to disbelieve these, and practical reason requires them, ergo we can allow this little bit of metaphysics out of a practical ‘need’. Kant’s practical postulates.

The author looks at Kant’s methodological innovation of practical postulation for ethical reasons. However, the author draws out a very different moral to Kant. Whereas Kant was trying to salvage a bit of (religious) metaphysics on the basis of our practical needs, but damn metaphysics as a whole, the author of the fragment draws the opposite lesson. We can do all sorts of wild and crazy metaphysics on the basis of the practical needs of our orientation to the world. Metaphysics is an expression of ethical practice. God, freedom and immortality are just the beginning. The boundary between philosophical theorizing and ethical reasoning will collapse, “ethics will be nothing but a complete system of all ideas”

If pragmatism is anything but a philosophical school that Americans invented to convince themselves they have their own philosophical school, this is pragmatism. There’s also something curiously unmetaphysical about this ‘practical’ approach. True, it allows practically postulated metaphysics, but even Carnap allowed a kind of pragmatic metaphysics (albeit in quite a different sense). The anti-metaphysics (in a sense) of the author’s approach is ironic because German idealism is normally held up as the paradigmatic example of high church metaphysics and this is, after all, the first systematic program of German idealism.

If one describes the difference between Analytic and Continental philosophy in terms of a split in what is read, this is one of the first major and canonical works of Continental philosophy. Kant doesn’t count- both Analytic and Continental philosophers read him. Of course there are others- e.g., Vico, but German idealism seems to start the stream in some sense. That’s interesting because this work already contains the aspect of Continental philosophy that has generated the most public controversy the refusal to bend the knee to capital E, capital T External Truth(1). This, even more so than the prose style, has been a major source of angst, especially in recent years.

The author’s approach to practical postulation inverts Kantian humility. Kant says reason can’t go beyond limits. He is trying to claw back some relatively orthodox sense of German Protestantism. In some sense then he is, as I understand it, trying to reconcile a double humility- humility before the majesty of religion and humility before the majesty of science.

The author of this piece goes in the other direction- if only reasoning tied to practical postulation to enable action -praxis in modern terms- can go into the realms of metaphysics, well let’s go nutty with it. Let’s invent a whole metaphysical realm to suit our practical/ethical needs. Doesn’t this make us, in a curious sense, a kind of god? Yes! And the author will turn to that now.

The idea of freedom

“The first idea is, of course, the idea of myself as an absolutely free being (Wesen). With the free, selfconscious being (Wesen) there emerges at the same time a whole world - out of nothing - the only true and conceivable creation out of nothing.”

Ex nihilo

What I think the author is talking about here via the metaphor of God’s ex-nihilo creation is, again, the creation of metaphysics on the basis of practical needs, the practical needs of a “free, selfconcious being”. Man, through the basis of the practical postulation of metaphysics, has become God. If Marx stood Hegel on his head then we can just as well say the author ( presumably Hegel) is standing Kantian humility on its head.

Also interesting- the author’s belief in the metaphysical freedom of the agent is clearly connected to his demand that the agent ought to be politically free. In contemporary philosophy metaphysical freedom and support for political freedom are generally seen as unconnected. I wonder what young Hegel would make of that.

Ethical physics

“- Here I shall descend to the fields of physics; the question is this: what must a world be like for a moral being (Wesen)? For once I would like to give wings again to our slow physics, which is tediously striding along on experiments. Thus, if philosophy gives the ideas, and experience (Erfahrung) the data, we may at last get the physics on a large scale which I expect from later ages. It does not seem that the present physics can satisfy a creative spirit such as ours is or should be”

A curious maneuver

Here, something I don’t fully understand has happened. Kant was able to engage in his odd form of practical metaphysics about God, freedom, and the immortality of the soul because they lay beyond the bounds of his conception of the understanding. Physics, though, does not belong beyond the bounds of Kantian understanding, at least not normally anyway.

The young Hegel however seems to think that the process of practical postulation applies to physics too. He finds physics as it is too restraining and he fantasizes about a physics that can satisfy a creative spirit like him, or at least like he aspires to me.

Heisenberg, Einstein and many other originators of modern physics were influenced by Kant and Kant’s intellectual descendants (among these intellectual descendants were both the logical positivists and German idealists). I wonder if the young Hegel would have been satisfied with these. Presumably, he would have been drawn to an idealist reading of the Copenhagen interpretation with the observer playing a role in creation, although I suspect even this may not have been wild enough for him.

Politics

“From nature I come to the work of man. I will show that there is no idea of the state, because the state is something mechanical, just as little as there is an idea of a machine. Only that which is the object of freedom is called an idea. We must therefore also go beyond the state! - For every state must treat free men as mechanical gear mechanism (Räderwerk); and this it should not to do; therefore, it should stop. You see of your own accord that here all the ideas, from eternal peace, etc., are only subordinate ideas of a higher idea: at the same time, I want to lay down here the principles for a history of mankind, and to bare to the skin the whole wretched human work of state, constitution, government, legislation.”

Man and politics, Hegel and Marx, analysis and history

There’s a curious cast to the rhetoric here. He’s so keen to let us know that politics is the work of man and this seems to be linked to his criticism “bare to the skin the whole wretched human work of…” but elsewhere he’s been so positive about the idea of human creation! Perhaps there’s something quite individualist going on here, at least at the level of rhetoric. The work of a man might be quite noble, but the works of ‘man’, that collective noun, do not impress. Individuals, maybe even every individual, might be quite divine, but the mass of humanity is wretched and artificial in the prerogative sense. This thought “I like individuals, maybe even all individuals, but I hate humanity as a whole” is a very old thought. Jonathan Swift said something along these lines but I can’t seem to dig up the quote at the moment.

The problem is not just that the state was made by a collective noun, ‘man’ but that it treats us as a collective noun. I read once that the political ideal of these romantic early German idealists was a society in which we were all, first and foremost, friends. imagine if we all related to each other not as citizens, still less as subjects of the sovereign, but as friends. What a pretty dream!

And yet, not so easily dismissed. I won’t go into details because it’s too sad, disgusting and infuriating, but I read, recently, of a teenager who was placed in solitary confinement for a month and may yet have her whole life ruined, for breaking a law that was intended to protect her, and that, honestly, most people around her age probably break. In the comments, many shared similar, revolting stories, and it was clear that similar circumstances have played out at least thousands of times. As fury tightened around me, it occurred to me that, this was only possible because she was caught in machinery that did not recognize her humanity and that was comfortable doing horrible things to her if it ticked the right boxes. I refuse to accept this as the inevitable collateral damage of an ordered society.

It’s hard not to read this passage through the lens of Marx, for it is pretty clearly not just the first systematic work of German idealism, but also the first work of leftwing Hegelianism.

To use terms that are quite anachronistic, this is a phase of radical liberalism so early, so undifferentiated, that it could just as easily represent anarcho-capitalism or communism. There is no reference to economic form here.

Still, it’s pretty plain to see how the thoughts here eventually lead to Marx. Why don’t we just treat each other all as individuals? Why are we reduced to social rules and rigidly applied forms. I think there are many reasons. Sheer complexity alone surely has something to do with it. However one of the primary causes must be social antagonism. The numerous reasons we have to fight each other are based on inherently conflicting social positions.

To arbitrate that maneuvering between people with different interests, to be seen as a fair umpire, and to keep a lid on social conflict, mechanical rules are needed. It’s like when children are just mucking around with a ball, no umpire or rules are needed, but as the competition becomes more and more serious, rules are implemented and finally, an umpire is added.

I do think that if we could create a post-scarcity society, and if we could ascend- if we could become vastly more cognitively competent then we are now, to the point where we could be simultaneously aware of many many things, the increased cognitive powers and the lack of a material basis for conflicts of interest might- it is just conceivable- make a society of billions of friends possible.

Religion and Society

“Finally, come the ideas of a moral world, deity, immortality, - subversion (Umsturz) after faith (Afterglaubens), persecution of the priesthood, which lately feigns reason, through reason itself. - Absolute freedom of all spirits, who carry the intellectual world within themselves and must seek neither God nor immortality apart from (outside) oneself.”

Lastly, the idea which unites all, the idea of beauty, the word taken in a higher Platonic sense. I am now convinced that the highest act of reason, which, embracing all ideas, is an aesthetic act, and that truth and goodness are only conjoined in beauty. The philosopher must possess as much aesthetic power as the poet. Men without an aesthetic sense are our philosophers of letters (Buchstabenphilosophen). The philosophy of spirit is an aesthetic philosophy. One cannot be witty in anything; one cannot even reason wittily about history - without an aesthetic sense. Here it shall be revealed what is actually lacking in people who do not understand ideas - and confess faithfully enough that everything is obscure to them as soon as it goes beyond tables and registers.

Poetry (Die Poesie) thus acquires a higher dignity, it becomes again in the end what it was in the beginning - teacher of mankind; for there is no more philosophy, no more history, poetry alone will outlive all other sciences and arts.

Mythology of reason

We’ll take up, albeit from an oblique angle, some of the ideas here in the second essay. In particular, we’ll consider aesthetic comprehension as an under-theorized part of properly grasping the world.

The sensual religion

At the same time, we hear so often that the great multitude must have a sensual religion. Not only the great multitude, also the philosopher needs it. Monotheism of reason and of the heart, polytheism of imagination and of art, this is what we need!

“First of all, I shall speak here of an idea which, as far as I know, as far as I know, has not yet come to mind - we must have a new mythology, but this mythology must be in the service of ideas, it must become a mythology of reason.”

Before we make ideas aesthetic, that is, mythological, it has no interest for the people (Volks); and conversely, before mythology is sensible, the philosopher must be ashamed of it. Thus, at last the enlightened and the unenlightened (Unaufgeklärte) must join hands; mythology must become philosophical and the people reasonable, and philosophy must become mythological in order to make the philosophers sensuous. Then there is eternal unity among us. Never the contemptuous look, never the blind trembling of the people (Volks) before their sages and priests.

Plato?

Permit me to wonder. Why are reason and the heart, after all this, monotheistic? Is it because the individual is one, and the individual, contemplating their ex-nihil creation of the universe sees themselves gazing back when they call the name of God? Is it because the first idea is singular, the idea of the free, creating being Wesen? Thus if the first idea is singular then reason is a monotheism.

Plato also imagined a society with a foundational, philosophical myth. I know Plato’s idea is quite different- not a mythology of reason, but instead mythology in service of society in service of reason. Still, it seems a bit cheeky to talk about being the first person to invent a particular kind of myth for philosophical-sociological purposes and not mention Plato at all.

What the author wants to do is, I guess, invert Plato. Whereas Plato’s myth was designed to veil reason from those who might chafe under the open rule of (Plato’s) conception of reason, this myth is intended to unveil reason. Whereas Plato’s myth was intended to help make the folk specialize in the senses and the sages on reason, this myth is intended to help end specialization.

There’s a very interesting definition of myth here- “Before we make ideas aesthetic, that is, mythological,” this passage implicitly defines a myth as an aestheticized idea.

The development of all forces

“Only then will same development of all forces, of the individual as well as of all individuals. No forces will be oppressed any more. Then there will be general freedom and equality of spirits! - A higher spirit, sent from heaven, must found this new religion among us; it will be the last, greatest work of mankind.”

Freedom

I think there is something to be said for a definition of freedom- political & social freedom- similar to what is said here: “Only then will same development of all forces, of the individual as well as of all individuals”. As I read it, this means freedom is the ability to develop in a self-directed way without oppression. The negative definition of freedom in terms of the non-violation of rights is absurd- the woman who has fallen into a pit isn’t free, even if no one dug the pit or pushed her in there. Yet positive concepts of freedom are too often paternalistic, with no real ‘freedom’ at all. This concept, whether or not it is ultimately fully adequate as an account of freedom, is useful. It tells us that the woman in the pit isn’t free (she lacks the capacity for self-development) but also, the ‘beneficent’ tyrant who molds our development according to their own design for how we should develop is not a bringer of freedom.

Once again exposing my Marxist biases I will note that it is astonishing that, writing in the time they did, there is no recognition whatsoever of the materiality of inequality. We have spoken purely of ideas and (anti)political form. Nothing whatsoever of labor or bread! This paper for example states that the average workday in German industry in 1800 was 10-12 hours, and judging by the other columns, that’s with a 6 day work week. What sort of conditions are they for the ‘general freedom and equality of spirits’. Facing such hardship you’re not going to bring about the free and equal development of powers with a new religion alone.

Let’s go back to transhumanism. The author had a belief in a kind of immortality inside himself. If we lack this belief, but if we believe in something like his idea of freedom as self-directed development, then we must conclude that (involuntary) death is the greatest tyrant and the quest for freedom will never be complete till it is abolished.

Footnote

(1)- this is why it’s so funny that Jordan Peterson gets worked up about Postmodernism- he’s a pure pragmatist about metaphysics himself, far, far closer to postmodernism than almost all the Marxists I know. I on the other hand believe in a realm of truth that does not give a whit about us, but which we are nonetheless well advised to investigate.

The meaning of life

1. I never understood the problem of the meaning of life until recently.

1.1. What is this problem even meant to be? I want things. Many things. Many things I even want intrinsically, for their own sake. Here’s a partial list of things I want for their own sake, as well as for any other benefits they may provide: A) For things to turn out well for everyone. B) To be happy C) To learn a lot D) To create important, useful and beautiful things. These are only some of my ‘big’ desires, some of my intrinsic desires are very fine-grained and would be a matter of indifference to others (e.g., seeking sex and romance regardless of whether it makes me happy).

1.2. Naturally, I pursue those objects. That I want them gives me reason enough to do so. Isn’t that meaning enough?

1.3. Maybe the problem is “why should I want them”. But this seems like a pseudo-problem to me- “I want that because it will let me do X”. “Why do you want X?” “Because it will let me do Y”. Just like the problem of grounding beliefs, it will end in either A) An infinite regression [infinitism] B) A circle [coherentism] or C) Wants that are not justified by any other want [foundationalism]. Unlike in the case of beliefs though, it is not clear there is anything paradoxical or unbecoming about wants not grounded in other wants. Where is the problem?

1.4. Even more so, where is the dread specter of nihilism that is often been said to be lurking around these parts?

2. I have finally found a way to understand the problem. The problem of the meaning of life is best understood as an aesthetic problem of philosophy.

2.1. We humans don’t just live a life, we also live a representation of a life, which is inextricable from that life. To live as a human is to live, to represent living and to view that representation.

2.2. We must build -live and think- a life that is aesthetically satisfying. Finding a design that can do this- a design not just of actions, but of the way we think about actions- is the problem of the meaning of life. How can I, through both actions I take externally, and through internal acts of representation, make my life a narrative or an artistic piece in which I can feel satisfied? How can I create harmony between all that I am and all that I do.

2.3. This is why modern Anglo-American philosophers like myself have traditionally had difficulty ‘finding’ the problem of the meaning of life. It is not a question of facts, obviously, but it is also not a question of practical or ethical values in any direct or uncomplicated way, because it is mediated by aesthetic questions of how we perceive and appreciate what we have done, as much as what we are to do.

2.4. The problem of nihilism is also an aesthetic problem, a special instantion of the problem of the meaning of life. The particular void left after the aesthetic ordering of the Christian religion was removed. Once Christianity was gone, we lost access to a ready-made scheme for the aesthetic understanding of our lives.

3. Lots of philosophical problems beyond the meaning of life are aesthetic or have an aesthetic counterpart- e.g. the problem of free will.

3.1. The semantics of the concept of free will are vague, and thus the debate is unlikely to be resolved through thought experiments alone. Some philosophers have suggested bringing in ethical considerations- consequentialist and otherwise- to break the tie.

3.2. I am not at all opposed to the idea of bringing in ethics, but I also think the right way to look at the question “what is the best concept of free will” is that it is not just an ethical question, it is also an aesthetic question, or perhaps instead it is both ethical and aesthetic in a kind of blended way.

3.3. Here is the aesthetic problem of free will. Of the scientifically available options (the various kinds of compatibilism and hard determinism) which fit with us living with ourselves with dignity? Being proud of ourselves? Giving meaning to ourselves?

3.3. Similar arguments could be made about many other metaphysical problems were both reality and language allow us to pick from different options- for example, the meaning of personhood over time. The best possible answer to this question would not just satisfy the ways we use language, not just satisfy our ethical beliefs, but also satisfy a kind of blended ethical-aesthetic concern- a concern that human concepts should glorify humans.

4. These considerations point to another, related and profoundly difficult task- how to integrate the ethical and the aesthetic?

4.1. To my mind the most profound objection to utilitarianism has always been the tiling objection. Suppose, for example, that welfare is happiness, then if utilitarianism is true, a universe that consisted in people reliving their happiest moments, again and again, would be an improvement on this universe. However, this seems wrong, even monstrous.

4.2. It seems to me, and perhaps this is a misguided hunch, that the ethical problem with this tiled world is inextricable from the aesthetic disgust it evokes in us. This disgust is why I prefer a eudaimonic theory of welfare, which seems immune to this objection, and allows us to salvage utilitarianism.

4.3. But all this hits, hard, against another thing I’ve long believed very strongly, viz the aestheticization of ethics and metaphysics is an intrinsic component of some of the most monstrous rightwing ideologies, including Nazism, a point made by Walter Benjamin. I don’t know the right way forward here.

4.4. Conservatives revel in aesthetics, but we could too. The familiar has a certain aesthetic power, as do nostalgia, the remembered past, etc. But there have always been aesthetics of wonder and hope for something better too. A world of freedom for all is not just good, it’s beautiful. Striving for it is not just good, it’s beautiful. We need to start showing this beauty, or we’ll always lose.

No more deluded by reaction
On tyrants only we’ll make war
The soldiers too will take strike action
They’ll break ranks and fight no more

4.5. John Stuart Mill, in his discussion of Coleridge and Bentham, in his reflections on pushpin and poetry, and in other places grasped better than anyone the need for a rational, anti-obscurantist, progressive philosophy that was nonetheless alive to the beautiful and the sublime. I don’t know if he ever resolved this or if he just kept these parts of himself in tension.