The problem of "Existence Exists"

The most common criticism of the Objectivist axiom -- Existence Exists -- is that it's not meaningful. The people who launch this criticism are usually unfamiliar with the centuries-old discussion on how we should understand "existence." Unfortunately, Objectivists are usually unfamiliar with it, too -- lots of shooting back and forth in the dark.

I think that for "Existence Exists" to be meaningful, Objectivists should address that centuries-old discussion. Here's a pretty good review of it: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/existence/. After reading it (and I congratulate you if you got through the whole thing, even most of it!), you should find that "existence" can be meaningful (so there's hope!) in various ways, but it's not clear to me which version (if any) Objectivism adopts. I want to know where the Objectivist view fits in. I look forward to comments.

Jordan

Post 1

Sunday, May 23, 2004 - 8:45pm

Jordan,

Here are some responses. First a word of caution: I consider myself a neo-objectivist with Aristotelian leanings. I do not claim to speak for your conception of Objectivism - indeed, I do not yet have a clear and adequate understanding what you are meaning when you use the word Objectivism. So use these initial responses for a mere "springboard" to get the ball rolling toward a truly enlightened, sufficient understanding. That is all that I will claim (to be able to provide excellent "start-points" - not final end-points - for a clear, adequate understanding).

I have used the Tennis Ball method (point --> counterpoint) and picked some relevant quotes from the Stanford article. I have put my name on the responses (the counterpoints), but I do not imply that I deserve credit, as much of the words are direct quotes from Rand - I only deserve credit for being able to bring all these words together for a directed rational inquiry (besides, you brought it up!).

I have not used quotes EVEN IF DIRECTLY QUOTING RAND for 3 reasons, one reason is to limit the space required for citation and referencing (flows better). The second reason is to limit confusion, as I use quotes to quote the Stanford article (to clarify that I am indeed using their exact words). My third reason for this peculiar behavior is that you have not yet limited your desired answers to "exactly what Rand said" or to "exactly what Peikoff said," and if that were the case then I'd tell you to buy more books, rather than to have me do your research for you.

One more final plea for sanity here: This response from me is introductory (ie. the "springboard effect") please CONSULT THE ORIGINAL STANFORD HYPERLINK (and take me to task for any potential faulty objectivist misrepresentations) before making any definitive conclusions on the matter.

Stanford: "... there is more than a little difficulty in saying just what existence is."

Ed: The units of the concept "existence" are every entity, attribute, action, event, or phenomenon that exists, has ever existed or will ever exist. These "units" can be indicated ostensibly. Existence includes the subjective contents of the human mind, as well as the intentional objects of human thought that exist for 2 or more minds (which allow us to both be talking about one and the same thing).

Stanford: "... we know what it is like to be hungry or to walk, but what is it like to exist, what kind of experience is that?

Ed: My admittedly glib answer is that it depends on the kind of creature that you are. The answer is teleologically built-in to your Identity. There can be no other answer. Existence is Identity. Humans will have a definite sense of psychological continuity which, being volitionally-conscious, they may try to blank out; they will have a sense of pleasure when meeting truly-human needs; and a sense pain when these human needs are not met.

Stanford: "... we can readily indicate what is meant by Tom's walking, but surely Tom's existing is not something we can indicate to anyone. On the face of it, there would seem to be no way at all in which we can explain what existing is."

Ed: As I just said above his existence above will be explained, and only explained, by human acts (because that's what he is - because those acts are what it means to be a human "being")

Stanford: "It would be a relief to discover that ‘exists’ attributes nothing positive to him at all."

Ed: No, not if existence is identity - it wouldn't (see above for details).

Stanford: "Promising as it may have seemed, therefore, ‘Tom exists’ is not to be understood simply as ‘Tom is real’."

Ed: Accepting your premises, this is a valid inference. But only because - having failed to integrate identity with existence - you have vacuously defined existence as an abstraction without connection to the concrete (ie. as merely "not a non-existent," and not, instead, as a "something").

Stanford: "It is probably now reasonably clear that the question of existence is inextricably intertwined with the question of ‘exists’."

Ed: To beat a dead horse here, "exists" means existence as a "something" (with identity).

Stanford: "The second thesis commonly, though not universally, held by analytic philosophers might be summed up in the familiar dictum, ‘Existence is not a predicate’. More accurately, it should be written either as ‘Existence is not a (first-level) property’ or as ‘"Exists" is not a (first-level) predicate’."

Ed: Inextricably intertwined with Identity, Existence is perhaps more adequately understood as a relation (a relation to your identity), and not a (first-level) property.

Stanford: "Before discussing current views on this and the earlier thesis, it will therefore be useful to be reminded of what some earlier philosophers have had to say about existence and, correlatively, about ‘is’ and ‘exists’ as verbs of being."

Ed: Okay, but "is" and "exists" will necessarily be verbs of being something, not being in some abstract sense not tied or related to concrete "beings."

Stanford: "For the preceding view, G. E. L. Owens claims support from Aristotle's saying that to be is to be something or other."

Ed: Agreed. I have found it impossible to think of "an opposite" view on this matter.

Stanford: "Hintikka, however, reminds us of several passsages that would seem to conflict with the ellipsis hypothesis, among them the following.

For it is not the same thing not to be something and not to be simpliciter, though owing to the similarity of language to be something appears to differ only a little from to be, and not to be something from not to be. (De Soph. El. 167a4-6)
Having undermined the ellipsis hypothesis to account for the lack of the Frege-Russell ambiguity in Aristotle, Hintikka suggests that what distinguishes different uses of ‘is’ in Aristotle is not a difference in sense but merely a difference in force - predicative, existential, and identificatory, respectively."

Ed: First of all, as stated above (but not in so many words!), "to be" without an identity is an arbitrary rambling, the reason that it is different from "to be something" is because "to be something" has existential import, while "to be" does not - the one with import, and the one "begging" for import via identity. In short, Hintikka has not "undermined the ellipsis hypothesis."

Stanford: "So, the immediate explanation of the reality of Socrates would be in terms of his being man. One might then ask what would explain the reality of being a man, with the answer being that it would stem from being an animal, and so on. At each point, the explanation of Socrates' existence would be in terms of what it is essentially. The point would be reached, however, when the explanation would be in terms of the category to which he belongs, which is substance. But, this could not be the ultimate explanation of his reality, since the same question could be asked of substance."

Ed: Critical error: the reality of "being a man" does not stem from "being an animal," it stems from "being a rational animal." Consciousness is an irreducible primary. Man cannot be reduced to "substance" (materialism is intractably problematic, and irremediably so).

Stanford: "With Averroes (1126-1196), Avicenna was one of the pre-eminent Arabian philosophers of the middle ages. I mention him because, unlike Aristotle, he was insistent on existence being an ontological constituent that was quite distinct from essence. Essences, he noted, can be present either in things or (intentionally) in intellect: in the former case they are engaged in the reality of things, in the latter they are conceived of by intellect. Considered in se, however, they are in neither; for if, in themselves, they were in things, they could never be in intellect, nor vice versa."

Ed: Intentional existence is merely a mental existence: that which can be shared between 2 minds. But all mental existents originate from "the reality of things" (from perception), so there is no necessary dichotomy. Existence, reflected on by an informed consciousness (informed via perception) which itself has identity, leads to further existence - ie. leads to mental existents.

Stanford: "Here, therefore, he has introduced a new element into the ontological scheme of things, an innovation that was later to earn him the reproach of his compatriot Averroes. The new element is existence, which Avicenna regarded as an accident, a property of things."

Ed: Well, Avicenna has earned my reproach then, as well. Existence is Identity, and not a mere accidental "property" of Identity, or of "things," if you prefer that term.

Stanford: "As for the ambiguity of ‘is’, Aquinas' position would seem to be:

1. There is systematic ambiguity between the uses of ‘is’ to express the actuality of what falls under any of the ten categories.
2. There is no ambiguity at all between the actuality use of ‘is’ and its use in substantial predication: they are the same.
3. There is no ambiguity at all between the there-is use of ‘is’ and its use in accidental predication: they are the same.
4. There is systematic ambiguity between the actuality and the there-is senses of ‘is’, and this is founded on the supposition that the truth of what we say is founded upon the actual existence of what we talk about."

Ed: Numbers 2 and 3 are uncontroversial. Numbers 1 and 4 can be collapsed into an understanding that is rendered irrelevant by a return to the original wording of Aristotle's O (particular negative) in his Square of Opposition from the contemporary misrepresentation of "There exists some P which is not Q" to "Not all P are Q" which abrogates the responsibility of checking for existential import in order to alleviate ambiguity. Indeed, this has already be done ON THE STANFORD WEBSITE!:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/square/

Stanford: "Aquinas' distinction between essence and existence was not long unchallenged even among the Scholastics, being rejected early by Scotus and much later by Suarez. Descartes and Leibniz also denied it, and Hume took the same view, though for reasons peculiar to his own impression-based epistemology. Thus, he argued that ‘the idea of existence must either be derived from a distinct impression, conjoined with every perception or object of our thought, or must be the very same with the idea of the perception or object’. (Treatise of Human Nature, Bk.I, Part II, sect. vi) There being nothing to indicate the presence of any impression at all that is ‘conjoined with every perception or object of our thought’, he concludes that there is no distinct impression from which the idea of existence is derived. Rather, it is ‘the very same with the idea of what we conceive to be existent’. Any one dissenting from this, suggests Hume, has the task of indicating just what is the distinct idea from which the idea of existence derives."

Ed: First of all, and as I said above, Aquinas' distinction (which could have been prevented if he had listened to Abelard, by the way) is invalid - it stems from reading Aristotle's "O" the wrong way (so the rest is all "water under the bridge"). But to say something positively negative about Hume (so that critics have something to "chew on"), I'll continue. Hume's "impression-based epistemology" and consequent nominalism allowed him to make the error of cleaving the tie from his "impressions" to his "relations of ideas." In short, things did not have any intentional existence for him, "man" was a being without the distinctive powers of the intellect, and objectivity and (along with it) communication with others, was thereby made impossible (for him; and it must have been awful lonely for the poor soul - being the only one that knows what you are talking about!).

Stanford: "Hume's contention that the idea of existence ‘makes no addition’ to the idea of any object was to be reaffirmed in Kant"

Ed: And Kant's claim that there would be 2 kinds of philosophy - that which came before him, and that which would come later - was unfortunately prophetic (enter Ontological Idealism). In the spirit of contempt for Kant so characteristic of objectivists, allow me to claim that this was a man whose very psychological continuity was not real (noumenal) to him. In other words, his internal impressions of things were not "really" his internal impressions of things, but merely impressions of his impressions.

Jordan, it's getting late. I'll say more later. Anyway, I hope that what I have said so far has illuminated at least some of the aspects of an "Objectivist" view which you were seeking to understand.

Ed

Post 2

Monday, May 24, 2004 - 7:34am

Hi Ed,

Thanks for your response. Please don't worry about what my concept of Objectivism is. If you use Objectivist rhetoric and Objectivist principles to argue your case, I'll probably regard yours as an Objectivist viewpoint. Yours qualifies. But even if it didn't qualify, I would still consider your argument if it were reasonable. And it is. =)

Anyway, I appreciate that you hammered down the point that Existence is Identity. I think that was helpful. But it's still not clear to me how to treat Existence. Specifically: Is it a property? If it is, then are we saying that a property can be a property of itself -- that existence can be a property of existence? How does this make sense, and doesn't this lead to an infinite regress: existence is a property of existence, which is a property of existence, which is a property of existence... ? And we are led to this regress, is it a problem? And if it's not a property, then what is it?

Thanks again Ed,

Jordan

Post 3

Monday, May 24, 2004 - 7:22pm

Jordan,

If you check above then you will find that I do make a bold claim in this regard - a claim that existence is a relation, and not a property. Analogy would bring us to the concept of the good - which is also not a property, but a relation (good - or value - presuppose an answer to questions "Good for what?" and "For whom"). In the same way - and for the same reasons - existence presupposes an answer to the question "Existence of what?"

Well, I hope that is helpful to you. I warn you that I may take some time to finish devouring the Stanford article.

Part humor/part despair:
Jordan, as you alluded to, it's darn hard to read through this thing. I have come to believe that it's harder to "read on" when you see the integration of error - and when you know that the truth of the matter or any hope of understanding has been bypassed or forsaken - and the guy who's writing still thinks he's really on to something - and he's full of philosophical wind and enamoration of his own vocabulation!

Jordan, I'm begging you. Please don't make me read much more of these long University articles! I just can't take the altruistic guilt (or the algebraically-determined, geometrically-graphed calculation of diversified benefit - for all you skew-litarians out there!) and I'm about to blow a corpus callosum ("brain bridge" connecting the 2 brain hemispheres) on this thing already!

Ed

Post 4

Monday, May 24, 2004 - 7:31pm

Hi Jordan, Ed,

You said:

But it's still not clear to me how to treat Existence. Specifically: Is it a property? If it is, then are we saying that a property can be a property of itself -- that existence can be a property of existence? How does this make sense, and doesn't this lead to an infinite regress: existence is a property of existence, which is a property of existence, which is a property of existence... ? And we are led to this regress, is it a problem? And if it's not a property, then what is it?

The problem is partly due to the fact we use the word existence to designate two different concepts, and we are not usually very careful to distinguish between them. Ayn Rand, herself, I think, made that mistake. In fact, her famous "existence exists" uses both meanings.

Existence, as a concept for, "something," is the concept for all that is, without regard to what actually is or that nature of anything that is. It is exactly what Ed described, "every entity, attribute, action, event, or phenomenon (which would include phenomena of consciousness, for example) that exists," though I do not agree it includes, "has ever existed or will ever exist," because some past things exist no longer, and future things do not yet exist, and cannot be part of what now exists, even though they were or will be, respectively. It is very important and must be emphasized that existence only means all that is, which means, all existents. There is no existence apart from existents.

The other meaning of existence is the universal quality or attribute (what you call a property) of everything that exists, and pertains to every existent, and nothing else. Now the question is, what, exactly, is this attribute called existence.

The interesting thing is, it is an attribute that describes nothing about existents themselves, its meaning is not ontological, but epistemological. It has two functions.

The first is to distinguishes between concepts that have actual ontological extension (units or referents) and those concepts which exist as concepts but have no ontological extension. Concepts without ontological extension are always synthetic. They include such obvious concepts as the phoenix, Pegasus, and unicorns. They are constructed of components (attributes and characteristics) derived from concepts with real ontological extension, such as the qualities of a horse and the qualities of a bird (wings) to produce the synthetic concept Pegasus. Existence is used, in this context, to answer the question, does such'n'such exist? If the such'n'such in question is a synthetic concept, the answer is it does not exist, that is, there is no such existent, ontologically, identified by the concept, The concept has no referents or "units."

The other function of the concept for the attribute of existence pertains to things that do (or possibly) exist, but, within a certain context, may not or cannot exist. In this case, the word exist only means, "to be," or, if we say something exists (has the quality existence) we only mean it is. In this sense, the context must always be specified (or understood) and the existents in question must be possible ontological existents. This meaning is so common, we almost do not notice it, and frequently use other words to mean the same thing.

For example. If there is a cookie jar full of cookies everyone has been helping themselves to, someone might ask, are there any cookies left. If there are not, one might correctly say, "none exist," (within the context of the cookie jar) which is perfectly correct, if somewhat awkward. In a more serious way, scientist make many tests for the "existence" of things, chemists for trace elements, nuclear scientist for certain particles, astronomers for new heavenly bodies or phenomena. These things are all either actual existents or possible existents, but the fact of their existence within the specified context is in question.

Both uses of existence (the attribute), however, require there first to be a concept about which there is a question, "is there actually an ontological extension of this concept (for synthetic concepts) or for this concept limited to a particular context (do any more planets exist?)." The concept actually serves no purpose except where the existence of something is in question.

But, how, then, can we say existence (meaning something, i.e. all existents) exist (meaning, having the attribute of existence)? Remember, all existents is what the concept existence (the something) identifies and means. To say existence exists only means existence is a concept that has real ontological extension. It just so happens that everything is a unit or referent of that concept.

Ayn Rand's use of the expression, "existence exists," is one of the most incredible of all her marvelous insights. It says in these two words, everything that is, is identified by the concept existence, which is a legitimate concept, because that which it identifies are real ontological existents. Its significance is not ontological, it is epistemological. It simply says, existence is not a synthetic concept and there is no context in which what it identifies is not a fact.

Regi

(Edited by Reginald Firehammer on 5/25, 7:30am)

Post 5

Monday, May 24, 2004 - 7:39pm

Hi Ed,

Heh. No worries. I'll likely spare you further Stanford articles in the future (and I don't expect you to keep wading through this one). I included this one to bring people into the nature of the problem.

I should've been more astute in seeing that you treated existence as a relation, not a property. Would you elaborate on this? A relation between what? Between a thing and itself? Between me and the thing? Between the constituent parts of the thing which constitute the thing? Something else?

I'm having difficult grasping this idea. Perhaps you would discuss existence as a relation by examing the proposition, 'This table exists'. And of course, OTHERS ARE WELCOME TO JOIN THIS DISCUSSION.

Jordan

Post 6

Tuesday, May 25, 2004 - 6:46am

Jordan, Regi,

First of all Regi, I must say your post above is the clearest exposition of existence exists that I've seen in almost 3 years searching! Bravo.

Jordan,

Basically what I'm arguing is that if you were to replace the word "existence" with the word "something," well then "existence exists" is the universal proposition, and "something exists" becomes the "contextual instantiation" - or particular affirmative, if you will! - of that universal proposition without a change in meaning of the concept.

What is perceptual is always particular, and what is conceptual is always universal (or: we "see" the particular things, but "think" in universals).

The proposition "something exists" is a simple noun-verb proposition, so "exists" here must be a verb, but here's the rub - due to the inextricable intertwining of existence and identiity, it's not a "universal" verb that can be abstracted away from this noun and managed on its own (it's a verb that must always be related to its subject)!

"To be" IS "to be something." For clarity here, let me alter the words without changing meaning:

"To be" is ALWAYS AND ONLY "to be something."

The relation of the phrase "to be" cannot be separated from its subject or, forgive the counter-intuitive term, context. In other words, in this context "to be" MUST ALWAYS be related to a something. When Rand says existence exists, she merely means "every something" exists (and, because of Identity, which is inescapable, it exists AS ITS NATURE dictates).

In this respect, it can be said without contradiction that thoughts exists, but not in the same way that matter exists (thoughts exist as thoughts must, matter as matter must).

Notice how this solves the paradox of Cartesian Dualism and we are left with the unimpeachable dualism of Objectivism. The mental and the physical both exist, but not IN THE SAME WAY - they have to exist but, because Identity cannot be abstracted away from Existence (they are universally and perpetually related), they must do so ALWAYS AND ONLY as the type of thing that they are.

Couter-intuition: Saying that "my thought exists" and that "my dog exists" requires 2 senses of the term "exists." In each case, the verb "exists" must be kept IN RELATION TO the thing existing. The identity of a "thing" dictates the meaning of "exists" in context of their inseparable relation.

Ed

Post 7

Tuesday, May 25, 2004 - 6:35pm

Here's an afterthought that I thought was quite profound:

"Existing" is nothing other than the temporal expression of Identity. In the case of existing physical matter, it may be further differentiated to the spatio-temporal expression of Identity.

Now, is that truly profound - or am I just slipping off the deep end here (doing a "Hegel")??

Ed

Post 8

Tuesday, May 25, 2004 - 8:12pm

Ed, Jordan,

First, thank you Ed for the nice comment.

A couple of quick observations/questions for clarification. (Mine, I mean.)

Ed said: What is perceptual is always particular, and what is conceptual is always universal (or: we "see" the particular things, but "think" in universals).

Neat, but I'm either not sure what you mean, or I'm not sure it is true, particularly the, what is conceptual is always universal part. There are at least two cases that come to mind that seem to conflict with this: 1. concepts themselves are particulars and the units of other concepts (red, blue, green are units of the concept colors), and 2. what about concepts for particulars, e.g. proper names and concepts for things of which there is only one particular unit, such as complex concepts, e.g. "my book."

The rest of what you said might be reduced to this, I think: Since to say something exists is identical to saying something is, and since existence means whatever is,
existence exists can be restated, whatever is is. The restatement makes the axiomatic nature of the proposition obvious. It could only be false if some whatever that is is not, or some whatever that is not is, which both sure seem self-contradictory.

(There is a point at which these things become word games.)

Regi

Post 9

Wednesday, May 26, 2004 - 7:34am

Thank you Reg and Ed,

Let me recap Reg. Reg explains that Rand intended "existence" to mean (1) all that is, which underscores a metaphysical plurality (i.e., only existents exist), or (2a) an epistemic designation of concepts which lack ontological extension (e.g., a pegasus or unicorm) or (2b) an epistemic designation of the ontological extension of a possible referent in a specific context (e.g., the cookies in the cookie jar). Do I have this right? And Ed, where exactly do you fit in here (I'd guess a reformulation of (1)), or is your view distinct from these?

Ed, I think Objectivism would stay away from Existence as a temporal or spatio-temporal expression of Identity. It sounds like you're venturing into cosmology, which is a matter for science, not philosophy. It might be the case that certain existents lack a temporal (and thus, a spatio-temporal) dimension, e.g., centers of black holes, singularities, maybe photons and electrons. Philosophy determines what is possible; science, what is actual. Would you agree? Also, certain existents (at least according to Objectivism) seem clearly to lack a spatio-temporal dimension, e.g., concepts and consciousness.

*

This brings me back to the popular question: How is Existence Exists meaningful? That is, how does it steer us toward Objectivism and away from all else. It would help me to see (1) how some actual philosophies that lack this axiom go astray, and (2) how this axiom adds an important element to Objectivism.

Jordan

Post 10

Wednesday, May 26, 2004 - 2:17pm

Regi,

… I'm not sure it is true, particularly the, what is conceptual is always universal part. There are at least two cases that come to mind that seem to conflict with this: 1. concepts themselves are particulars and the units of other concepts (red, blue, green are units of the concept colors),

Regi, I'd be lying if I didn’t say that the concepts - themselves - are merely that BY WHICH we truly come to know and understand the particulars of the world. Particular concepts aren't THAT WHICH we are understanding when we say that we understand something in the world, they're that BY WHICH we're achieving this otherwise impossible task.

In sum, we use them as a means - and only as a means - to truly know the world. Using concepts - in the way understood here - as units of other concepts merely abstracts one more level from the concrete, that's all (no contradiction). I actually think our difference is merely semantic/pedantic.

and 2. what about concepts for particulars, e.g. proper names and concepts for things of which there is only one particular unit, such as complex concepts, e.g. "my book."

Regi, I disagree with you on holding proper names/nouns as concepts. My supportive reasoning is that they are that which can only be present to the mind when they are either "perceptually present" or "remembered" (and not integrated with anything).

Regarding your mention of complexity, the PARTICULAR details of the individual in question would be kept together by mere association, rather than a logical integration, per se.

Ed

Post 11

Wednesday, May 26, 2004 - 3:04pm

Jordan,

Reg explains that Rand intended "existence" to mean (1) all that is, which underscores a metaphysical plurality (i.e., only existents exist), ...

Right!

... or (2a) an epistemic designation of concepts which lack ontological extension (e.g., a pegasus or unicorm) ...

Jordan, these have a different mode of existence (allowable only in relation to the existence of thinking entities, such as ourselves - their existence is contingent upon our existence). I mentioned Subjective and Intentional existence above. My view on it is that there are 4 somewhat overlapping modes of existence:

1) existents: everything that exists, including the entities AND that which exists ALWAYS AND ONLY via relation to the entities (non-entity existents are contingent on the existence of the primary entities)

2) subjective existents: an existent which can only be apprehended by a single mind - of a living conscious entity; exists ALWAYS AND ONLY via relation to the conscious entities (temporal; contingent on the existence of conscious entities; e.g. toothaches)

3) intentional existents: an existent which can be present before 2 minds as an object of thought and conversation (objective; e.g. shared conceptions, including those with and without ontological extension, such as the unicorns and centaurs that we can still converse about)

4) entity: that which has primary existence (spatio-temporal)

Ed

Post 12

Wednesday, May 26, 2004 - 10:25pm

Jordan,

"This brings me back to the popular question: How is Existence Exists meaningful? That is, how does it steer us toward Objectivism and away from all else. It would help me to see (1) how some actual philosophies that lack this axiom go astray ..."

Jordan, I understand that your question regarding the value of "existence exists" was couched in language appealing to an academic answer. If my assumption is correct with this, then you may not appreciate my rhetorical appeal to the moral consequences of a lacking or incorrect metaphysics - and for this I preemptively apologize. I just couldn't hold my tongue regarding the importance of correct philosophy!

Here are examples of philosophical inferiority (along with consequences) stemming from failure to identify & integrate [things like] "existence exists" (failure to identify correct metaphysics, something perhaps best exemplified by the "Lost Philosophers" I have jestered about on another thread).

I give you 4 examples which, when taken in isolation, are admittedly weak cases - but when integrated and taken as a sum, provide a strong case for the solicitation to identify and reproach metaphysical errors where we find them.

However, final judgment is left to the reader (the context of reproach/shaming people is admittedly a personal issue - my stance is merely rationally persuasive and meant to appeal to individual reason).

Example 1 - "The likely link between Heidegger's incorrect metaphysics AND one of the most vile and systematic plans for human viciousness ever recorded."

----------
In his path-breaking work, Historical Destiny and National Socialism in Heidegger's Being and Time, Johannes Fritsche demonstrates that not only are the categories discussed in Being and Time not apolitical, but on the contrary, “When one reads Sein und Zeit in its context, one sees that, as Scheler put it, in the kairos [crisis] of the twenties Sein und Zeit was a highly political and ethical work, that it belonged to the revolutionary Right, and that it contained an argument for the most radical group on the revolutionary Right, namely, the National Socialists.”[3]

Fritsche's point is that Heidegger's idiom and use of language were part of a shared tradition of right-wing thought that emerged in the 1920s in Germany. The political content of Being and Time would have been clear to Heidegger's German contemporaries. However, to readers of the French and English translations that circulated a generation or two later, this political content is completely obscured. Instead as Fritsche mockingly puts it, “You see in Being and Time the terrifying face of the old witch of the loneliness of the isolated bourgeois subjects, or the un-erotic groupings in their Gesellschaft [society], and you see the desire for a leap out of the Gesellschaft.”
----------
----------
Fritsche's argument for reading Heidegger as the philosopher of National Socialism is impossible to summarize here. It relies on a very sophisticated historical and philological analysis of the textof Being and Time. After reconstructing the actual content of Being and Time, Fritsche compares it with the writings of two other notorious right-wing authors who were contemporaries, namely Max Scheler and Adolf Hitler. Fritsche demonstrates that the political content of Being and Time and Mein Kampf are identical, notwithstanding the fact that the first book was written by a world renowned philosopher and the second by a sociopath from the gutters of Vienna.
----------
----------
For Heidegger, fate had a definite political content. The fate of the patriotic German was identified with the Volksgemeinschaft, a term that was used polemically by the Nazis to denote a community of the people bound by race and heritage. The idea of a Volksgemeinschaft was, in the right-wing literature of the time, often counterposed to that of Gesellschaft, a reference to the Enlightenment notion of a shared community of interests based on universal human values.
----------
----------
In plain language, “the cancellation of the world of inauthentic Dasein” is a reference to the fascist counterrevolution. It entails the destruction of bourgeois democracy and its institutions, the persecution and murder of socialists, the emasculation of all independent working class organizations, a concerted and systematic attack on the culture of the Enlightenment, and of course the persecution and eventual elimination of alien forces in the midst of the Volk, most notably the Jews.
----------
----------
One can add the observation made by Lukacs, that official National Socialist "philosophy" could never have gained a mass audience without years of irrationalist culture paving the way.

“But for a ‘philosophy' with so little foundation or coherence, so profoundly unscientific and coarsely dilettantish to become prevalent, what were needed were a specific philosophical mood, a disintegration of confidence in understanding and reason, the destruction of human faith in progress, and credulity towards irrationalism, myth and mysticism.”[14]

Perhaps then Heidegger's biggest crime was not his enlistment in the Nazi Party and assumption of the rectorship of Freiburg. These were merely political crimes, of the sort committed by many thousands of yes-men. Perhaps his crime against philosophy is more fundamental. Through it he contributed in no small degree to the culture of barbarism that nourished the Nazi beast.
----------

The relevant excerpts above were taken from:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/apr2000/heid-a05.shtml

Example 2 - "Positivism AND setting the stage for Totalitarian policy - foreign and domestic."

First: A contradiction ...

----------
Civil or political rights are those included in constitutions or in the bills of rights. They are the rights stated in the Constitution of the United States, its amendments, and particularly in the first ten amendments that are called our American Bill of Rights.

These rights are either granted or not granted by the state, and since they are within the power of the state to grant, they can be countermanded by the state when in the course of history fundamental changes in policy are contemplated.

The Ninth Amendment contains an implicit reference to natural rights by declaring that "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." Jurists who deny the existence of natural rights think that this Ninth Amendment is an unfortunate blemish in our Constitution because it appears to be an affirmation of natural rights.

Why? Because in 1793, when this amendment was adopted, the other rights retained by the people were probably the natural rights mentioned in the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, such as the inalienable right to life and liberty.

Natural rights are inherent in human nature. They are, therefore, inalienable and belong to every human being with no exceptions. They are specifically human rights. Now that they have become part of our government's declared foreign policy, it becomes self-contradictory for legal positivists to deny the existence of natural law and natural rights, and yet to subscribe to our government's foreign policy with regard to human rights. [final italics added]
----------

Second: Associated, horrific, historical consequences ...

----------
You ask whether natural law is relevant to modern conditions. My answer is that if justice is still relevant, then natural law is. Indeed, interest in natural law has increased especially during the past half century, with its experience of the kind of positive laws which have been imposed by totalitarian regimes. On what grounds could a decent German citizen in Nazi times justify his opposition to the laws of the land? On private sentiments or merely personal opinion? Even purely inner resistance to iniquity must be rooted in firmer grounds. "A law which is not just is a law in name only," says Augustine. And Aquinas adds: "Every human law has just so much of the nature of law as it is derived from the law of nature. But if in any point it departs from the law of nature, it is no longer a law but a perversion of the law."

The naturalists, as that name indicates, affirm the existence of natural justice, of natural and unalienable rights, of the natural moral law, and of valid prescriptive oughts that elicit our assent, both independently of and prior to the existence of positive law. The positivists deny all this and affirm the opposite. For them, the positive law -- the man-made law of the state -- provides the only prescriptive oughts that human beings are compelled to obey. According to them, nothing is just or unjust until it has been declared so by a command or prohibition of positive law.

If this is a fundamentally erroneous view, as I think it is, its ultimate roots lie very deep. They rise from the most profound mistake that can be made in our thinking about good and evil. It is the mistake made by those who embrace an unattenuated subjectivism and relativism with respect to what is good and bad, right and wrong.

Neglecting or rejecting the distinction between real and apparent goods, together with that between natural needs and acquired wants, the positivists can find no basis for the distinction between what "ought" to be desired or done and what is desired or done. From that flows the further consequence that there is no natural moral law, no natural rights, no natural justice, ending up with the conclusion that man-made law alone determines what is just and unjust, right and wrong.

This positivist view is as ancient as the despotisms that existed in antiquity. It was first eloquently expressed in the opening book of Plato's "Republic" where Thrasymachus, responding to Socrates' mention of the view that justice consists in rendering what is due, declared and defended the opposite view -- that justice is the interest of the stronger. Spelled out, this means that what is just or unjust is determined solely by whoever has the power to lay down the law of the land.

The positivist view is recurrent in later centuries with the recurrence of later despotisms. It was expressed by the Roman jurisconsult, Ulpian, who, defending the absolutism of the Caesars, declared that whatever pleases the prince has the force of law. Still later, in the sixteenth century, the same view was set forth by another defender of absolute government, Thomas Hobbes, in "The Leviathan"; and later, in the nineteenth century, by John Austin, in his "Analytical Jurisprudence."

Neither Austin nor the twentieth-century legal positivists who follow him regard themselves as defenders of absolute government or despotism. That is what they are, however -- perhaps not as explicitly as their predecessors, but by implication at least. The denial of natural rights, the natural moral law, and natural justice leads not only to the positivist conclusion that man made law alone determines what is just and unjust. It also leads to a corollary which inexorably attaches itself to that conclusion -- "that might makes right" -- this is the very essence of absolute or despotic government.
----------

The relevant excerpts above were taken from the following sources:

http://www.thegreatideas.org/apd-righ.html

http://www.cooperativeindividualism.org/adler_naturallaw.html

Example 3 - "The worst thing that 2 humans could do? How could you bring yourself to do such heinous things to children? Ask Myra Hindley, who helped the serial child-rapist/child-killer, Ian Brady. She says that he has some philosophical answers for us to contemplate."

----------
Culpability
"I knew I'd never be able to come to any kind of terms with this [the murder of John Kilbride]; that it would haunt me for the rest of my life, as would the murder of Pauline Reade. That is why I've said several times that I am more culpable than Brady is, even though he committed the crimes.

"Not only did I help procure the victims for him, I knew it was wrong, to put it mildly, that what we were doing was evil and depraved, whereas he subscribed to de Sade's philosophy, that murder was for pleasure. [italics added]

"To him it had become a hobby, something one did to get absorbed into, interested and often fascinated with, and it had become literally a deadly obsession. And I knew that I was a part of his hobby and obsession."

No going back
"With the killing of John Kilbride, a child, I felt I'd crossed the Rubicon.

"He [Brady] said good, admit ting to having crossed the Rubicon was tantamount to admitting what he'd tried to drum into my head: that what was done was done, and couldn't be undone, there was no going back and even after the first murder we were irrevocably bound together and more so after the second one.

"Just then he looked up at the TV - there was either a football match on or late sports news. He said: 'Look at that massive crowd. Who would miss one person, two, three, etc, from all the millions of people in this country?' I didn't say their parents and family - he never gave them a thought and I knew I'd really have to steel myself to do the same."

Power over life
"The following Sunday we were watching Sunday Night at the London Palladium. I can't remember if the host was Bruce Forsyth or Norman someone, but whoever it was his catchword was: 'I'm in charge.' Brady casually said to me: 'What do you think I get out of doing what we've done?' And I immediately said because he was in charge. It was having the power over someone's life and death. He smiled and said good, you know where I'm coming from now."
----------

The relevant excerpts above were taken from:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,3968648-104770,00.html

Example 4 - "Admittedly the weakest case of the four, but the most recent"

Something that I noted:
The Columbine killers chose their rampage during the hour of their Eastern Philosophy class - the effect of this class itself (perhaps with appeals to embracing contradictions) or the choice of the timing (as a reaction to irrationality - by fighting "fire with fire") are plausibly more than coincidence.

Ed

Post 13

Thursday, May 27, 2004 - 7:26am

Jordan,

Now that I've alluded to the scope of the issue here, allow me to answer your previous question more directly. My interpretation of what you were really asking is the following:

How does the success or failure to identify and logically integrate basic metaphysical axioms, in particular: "existence exists," direct various philosophies into truth or error?

Jordan, here is my view in a nutshell:

A logical integration of "existence exists" is synonymous with the logical integration of "every something exists"

and ... "to be" is always and only "to be something"

and ... "being something" entails the aspect of identity (or "a nature")

and ... (on the assumption that a volitionally-conscious human is a "something"), then "having identity (or 'a nature')" entails the possibility of acting in accordance with - or acting against - your nature (volition is key here; nonvolitional entities ALWAYS act in accordance with their nature)

and ... denying the self-evident nature of humans opens the door to atrocities (see above)
____________________

Therefore ... the explicit denial (or implicit nonacceptance) of metaphysical axioms such as "existence exists" is inherently wrong in the sphere of human action (where we "do" philosophy)

and ... philosophies that fail in this regard are not only incorrect, but also (on the assumption that thought is always and only that which informs the actions of volitional creatures) a disservice to humanity (ie. they are reproachable).

Jordan, "existence exists" can be viewed - from the limited perspective of positivists - as a mere uninstructive tautology. The error of this view is in the abstraction of logic from experience.

The purpose of logic is for thinking creatures to truly understand what needs to be done (thought and action are the 2 fundamental ways we relate to reality).

Logic, applied to experience (and against the backdrop of "the natures of things") informs human action. In short, it allows for us to do what is truly right and good in this world.

Even tautologies can be "instructive" (but only when integrated logically with the 2 sides of the "life coin" - an organism with a given nature AND its environment, which also has a nature).

Ed

Post 14

Thursday, May 27, 2004 - 6:28pm