The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage der gesamten Wissenschaftslehre Michael Kolkman University of Warwick

The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage der gesamten Wissenschaftslehre Michael Kolkman University of Warwick 1. Introduction The Tathandlung with which the Grundlage der gesamten Wissenschaftslehre may properly be said to start (GWL, 91) 1 was a term Fichte coined in his discussion with Reinhold to denote the performative rather than factual nature of consciousness and experience. 2 Where Reinhold took the Tatsache or fact of consciousness as a first principle, Fichte stressed that consciousness is not a thing, but an activity, and hence it should be seen as a Tathandlung (Aen., 8, 11). It is this Tathandlung, its structure and mode of functioning, on which we will focus in our discussion of the Grundlage. The mode of argumentation in the Grundlage, although having all the appearances of a linear deduction from first principles, has rather, as Fichte himself stresses on several occasions, a circular form. 3 One aim of this paper is to criticise interpretations of the Grundlage as having provided a linear deduction from first principles, where these principles in turn are to be perceived as some kind of unshakeable foundation. Rather, it is the case that Fichte, in being faithful to transcendental philosophy, made the reflection on the limitations of philosophy itself an integral part of doing philosophy. 4 Although Kant had shown that we must assume an irreducible spontaneous transcendental act of synthesis, 5 Fichte will attempt to demonstrate that this can only take 1 All in-text referencing will be to Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Sämmtliche Werke I (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1845). Abbreviations used: WL: Wissenschaftslehre SW: Sämmtliche Werke GWL: Grundlage der gesamten Wissenschaftslehre Aen: Aenesidemus 1. Einl: 1. Einleitung 2. Einl: 2. Einleitung Translation of the GWL in Johann Gottlieb Fichte, The Science of Knowledge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1794). 2 Interestingly and contrary to what is commonly assumed, the term did already exist as a legal term, although it is not sure whether Fichte was aware of this. See the entry Tathandlung in Gründer Ritter, Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie (im 13 Bände) (Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 1971) 3 On circularity see a.o. GWL, 1; Über den Begriff der Wissenschaftslehre, 7. 4 See also Bernard Bourgeois, L'idéalisme de Fichte (Paris: Vrin, 1968), p. 1-2 5 See Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) B 16. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 1

place under the form of an equally original division of an opposable I and an opposable not I. It is in demonstrating that a subject always already finds itself both in relation to and fundamentally different from a "not I" that Fichte sought to deduce the precise role and function of Kant's thing it itself from within the conditions of possibility of experience itself. Far from that this commits him to philosophical solipsism, the I and not I are shown to be two sides of the same coin: different, yet inseparable. It is equally in clarifying the nature of this not I that the relation between the transcendental and the empirical is clarified. This is a second aim of this paper. 2. The three principles of the Grundlage. The development of the three sections of Part I of the Grundlage we may summarise as follows: The first section shows us the absolutely positive nature of the Tathandlung. It is a productive activity, in that it is both "the active" and "what the activity brings about" (GWL, 96). The Tathandlung is thus "self positing", which is the First Principle. This productive activity at the same time is, or contains, a plurality of positing and an equally positive or absolute counterpositing. This gives us the Second Principle. The Third Section then relates this plurality and it does so through the principle of reciprocal determination (Wechselbestimmung). The reciprocal determination of positing and counterpositing is what brings us the limited I and limited not I. Therefore the Third Principle is also known as the "material principle". 6 2a. The First Principle of Self Positing Let us look at this development more closely. Fichte writes in 1.6: The I posits itself, and in virtue of this mere positing of itself it exists; and conversely: The I is, and it posits its being, in virtue of its mere being. It is at once the agent and the product of the action; the active, and what the activity brings about; action [Handlung] 6 See W. Schrader, Empirisches und absolutes Ich. Geschichte des Begriffs Leben in de Philosophie J.G.Fichtes (Stuttgart, 1972), p. 52. See also (GWL, 123) where Fichte calls the Third Principle "den des Grundes". "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 2

and deed [Tat] are one and the same, and hence the I am expresses an Act [Tathandlung] (GWL, 96). 7 The self positing I is the transcendental I. As Kant had shown, we must assume an original act of synthesis that results in experience. For Fichte this original or spontaneous (selbsttätiges) act posits itself and in positing itself, in being active, it exists. It exists as activity. This activity, as synthetic unification of intuitions and concepts, is what first bring about experience and it is only with this experience that an I as individual consciousness may first be spoken of. The empirical I only appears with the empirical not I and both presuppose the absolute or selfpositing I. The absolute I is a self positing I. It exists as positing because positing is what it does. This absolute I is an activity, namely the activity of synthetically unifying intuitions and concepts. But this act that unifies also divides. This becomes clear when, after the passage quoted above, Fichte responds to the question "What was the I before it posited itself?" (GWL, 97). The absolute I is a self positing I and it exists because it posits itself. What was I before I posited myself? Well, Fichte says, I was not! 8 The question implies a confusion between the I as subject and the I as object of reflection for the absolute subject (GWL, 97) 9. What is this difference between the I as subject and the I taken as object of reflection for the absolute subject? Fichte writes: The I presents itself to itself, to that extent it imposes on itself the form of a presentation [Vorstellung], and is now for the first time a something, namely an object; in this form consciousness acquires a substrate, which exists (GWL, 97). 10 The absolute I, or self caused and productive transcendental activity, posits itself and this positing results in a Vorstellung. But a Vor stellung immediately entails a fundamental duality of something, erected in opposition to something else. The absolute I "imposes" a presentation on 7 Das Ich setzt sich selbst, und es ist, vermöge dieses bloßen Setzens durch sich selbst; und umgekehrt: Das Ich ist, und es setzt sein Sein, vermöge seines bloßen Seins. Es ist zugleich das Handelnde, und das Produkt der Handlung; das Tätige, und das, was durch die Tätigkeit hervorgebracht wird; Handlung, und Tat sind Eins und ebendasselbe; und daher ist das: Ich bin Ausdruck einer Tathandlung. 8 "ich war gar nicht; denn ich war nicht Ich" (GWL, 97); "ich" as a personal I, is not "Ich", the transcendental I. 9 eine Verwirrung zwischen dem Ich als Subjekt; und dem Ich als Objekt der Reflexion des absoluten Subjekts. 10 Das Ich stellt sich selbst vor, nimmt insofern sich selbst in die Form der Vorstellung auf, und ist erst nun etwas, ein Objekt; das Bewußtsein bekommt in dieser Form ein Substrat, welches ist. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 3

itself and it itself becomes a "something", ein Etwas. This passage contains the entire WL in nucce. Fichte writes: "The absolute I of the first principle is not something (it has, and can have, no predicate)" (GWL, 109). This absolute I is activity. But such activity is nothing outside its material conditions. It is not some abstract activity, but always specific and always actual. It is the activity of synthesising intuitions and concepts and this results in experience. Hence: no intuitions, no activity. This is the point Fichte criticises Kant for not having properly explained (See 2. Einl, 464). There is no such thing as consciousness in abstraction from what it does, hence no consciousness in abstraction from empirical intuitions. All we ever find is "completed consciousness", which means, the totality of empirical intuitions, concepts and spontaneous synthetic activity (loc. cit.). Only when these are all in play, only in the actual performance of consciousness can I have an intuition of consciousness. Such an intellectual intuition must always be a possibility whenever there is consciousness. It is illuminating to contrast this with the well known yet obscure footnote to B 422 of the Critique of Pure Reason. There Kant wrote: For it is to be noted that if I have called the proposition I think an empirical proposition, I would not say by this that the I in this proposition is an empirical representation; for it is rather purely intellectual, because it belongs to thinking in general. Only without any empirical representation, which provides the material [Stoff] for thinking, the act "I think" would not take place, and the empirical is only the condition of the application, or use, of the pure intellectual faculty (emp. added). As Kant says, the I of the I think is purely intellectual, it pertains only to thought, it is the synthetic a priori activity of the understanding and as such is not empirical. But this "I think", as synthetic activity, needs some material or Stoff for it to take place. The "I think" is nothing, can do nothing, without empirical representation. The "I think" is the combination of intuitions with concepts. The I is thus empirical in that, without some material for it to apply itself to, it would not be doing anything, hence it would not be anything, although in itself, or as Fichte would say, as transcendental activity schlechthin, it has nothing of the empirical. Hence we may infer that Kant had also understood the simultaneity of subject and object consciousness. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 4

To understand the possibility of experience both Kant and Fichte assume a spontaneous act of synthesis. Because experience first only becomes possible on the basis of this act, this act cannot be counted amongst the facts of empirical consciousness (GWL, 91). It is properly a first principle, since (for the purposes of philosophical exposition) we may abstract even from "the thing", but never from consciousness itself (See 1. Einl., 4). It is absolute and unbedingt because all limitation or determination only first comes after it. But as we now begin to see, limitation is in fact already internal to it. This internal limitation is best understood when we take serious the productive nature of this activity. The absolute I is not a thing but an activity and this activity cannot straightforwardly be reduced to any empirical activity. It alone is absolute, whereas the individuated I and opposing not I are crucially limited and relative to each other. But this should not lead one to surreptitiously assume an absolute I as actually existing in abstraction from the limited I and not I. This would turn the WL into a transcendent system. What, then, constitutes the productive nature of synthetic activity? As Kant wrote, as act, the I think is purely intellectual, hence not empirical. But without some stuff given to it, it would not take place, it would not be anything. Activity only exists in an actual state, in a determinate and never general form. Otherwise it would not be activity but a mere machine, the inert husk of a Handlung. This activity results in a Vorstellung and it is only with such a presentation that we may start to speak of an individual I to whom the presentation is Vorgestellt. One finds oneself either as passively determined by outside presentations, or as actively determining outside influences. It is this essential duality of passivity and activity that lets us understand Section Two and Three. 2b. Second and Third Principles: The Plurality and Reciprocity of Positing. If the Grundlage were indeed a linear deduction of principles the Second Principle of Counterpositing would be hard to make sense of. If the First Principle shows us an I that, in positing itself, as it were, constructs or creates itself, then what would be the need for an equally absolute principle of counterpositing? If it is indeed absolute, then why is it nonetheless a second or secondary principle? How can we have more than one absolute "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 5

principle? Does this mean there is some kind of Manicheism of an absolute I and an absolute not I who then war to create a limited I and a limited not I? But in fact, an absolute not I is only used in a hypothetical sense or as what we may call a positive noumenon whose impossibility we understand. 11 The confusion results from reading the Grundlage as a linear sequence of principles: As though there is first some pure origin in spontaneous self positing, then, equally out of nowhere a not I that opposes this self positing and out of this clash two I's appear that limit each other. But if we take serious what Fichte says about the self positing I then we see that the plurality of positing and counterpositing is already contained within the Tathandlung. The individual I is dependent on an original distinction between I and not I. This distinction can only be understood if we assume spontaneous determination (Bestimmung). Whether we think it is a good term or not, in the Grundlage Fichte refers to such spontaneous determination with the notion of an "absolute I". Determination itself assumes a difference between activity and passivity, between what determines and what is determined thereby. To the extent that I determine the world, this world must be understood as passive. To the extent that the world determines my sense impressions, it is I who is passive and the world, the not I, that is active. The act of determination itself can only be understood as absolute, because it is irreducible to the passive interaction of things (see also 1. Einl., 440). Hence Fichte states that counterpositing too is absolute (GWL, 102). Positing, as activity schlechthin, is absolute and in no sense determined. But such pure activity can only exist in an actual state, that is, as an actual determination of intuitions under concepts. It is not only an actual determination of intuitions, but it is itself determined by those intuitions; otherwise it would not be this specific determination. Hence it is determined by the not I. As activity schlechthin it is absolute and undetermined (unbedingt) but pure activity as such is nothing without some material given to it. The intuitions of the I thus 11 This may be deduced from two important passages in the GWL that may only be indicated here: 1.) p. 109-110, where Fichte writes: "[T]he not-i is what the I is not and vice versa. As opposed to the absolute I (though as will be shown in due course it can only be opposed insofar as it is presented, not as it is in itself), the not-i is simply nothing; as opposed to the limitable I it is a negative quantity." An absolute not-i, outside of any relation to an I (absolute or otherwise) would not be anything, but it only exists in opposition to a limitable I. 2.) p. 135: "Passivity is the mere negation of the pure concept of activity just established; and more so a quantitative one, since it is itself quantitative; for mere negation of activity, without regard to its quantity = 0, would be rest" (GWL, 135, tr. mod.). Only a quantitative, hence relative negation is affirmed here. An qualitative or absolute negation of activity would be rest. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 6

indicate the I's passivity. It is the I who is determined by the not I. Because passivity only makes sense when we assume an opposing activity, where this activity determines the passivity of the I, Fichte is thus lead to posit an equally absolute principle of counterpositing. If not, then Fichte's I would indeed be some world creative I. The world is not merely passive but it can also actively resist my determinations. 12 The plurality of positing consists in the fact that the activity of positing in and of itself assumes the passivity of what is determined thereby. What Fichte understood very clearly is that this passivity must be seen as a form of activity, albeit of a lower degree (see GWL, 144 145). 13 This thus immediately gives us the Third Principle of Reciprocal Determination (Wechselbestimmung). The passivity of the I is the activity of the not I and vice versa. The confusion we must guard ourselves against is to equate the absolute I of self positing with a limited I that is always somewhere inbetween passivity and activity. Fichte's warning at 1.7 we may now understand. What is the I before self positing? Nothing. We confuse the limited I, which is always already in reciprocity with a not I, with the activity of the absolute I. It is determination or self positing that as activity schlechthin is always positive and absolute. But such absolute positing assumes a plurality of positing and counterpositing, of passivity and activity. I as individual consciousness find myself both actively determining my intuitions and passively being determined by these intuitions. 3. All Three Principles At Once. We thus see that all three principles work together and that any one implies the other two. Self positing as activity schlechthin is absolute because only on the basis of it can we understand the empirical relations of I and not I. Spontaneous determination cannot be derived from the mechanical interaction of things. Hence this is properly our First Principle. But such self positing does not and cannot exist in a pure state, because as determination it must be engaged in the determination of something. It needs some Stoff given to it. To 12 See e.g. GWL, 214, and in Foundation of Practical Knowledge: counterstriving. 13 It is interesting to compare this with Immanuel Kant, Attempt to introduce the concept of negative magnitudes into philosophy, in Theoretical philosophy, 1755-1770 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992) where the notion of an absolute negative magnitude is denied in favour of a notion of relative negativity. Negativity is dependent upon positivity, hence can only ever be relative. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 7

determine something is to assume a distinction between passivity and activity. I determine the not I but the intuitions themselves are a determination of myself by the not I. Passivity and activity are not absolute terms but relative terms. Passivity is also a form of activity, hence their reciprocal determination. For Fichte then, the I and the not I are not first and foremost things, but relata. The not I is not some inert object and the I some de materialised pure activity, but together they express the direction of determination. Hence I also find the not I within me, in the passivity of the body. We can see that it is the interlocking nature of the three principles that forced Fichte to discuss as early as at 1.7 the relation between the absolute I and the limited I, even though the limited I would not be properly introduced until after the third principle. This is not always easy to see because Fichte does present his argument as though it were a linear deduction. 14 This interlocking nature not only follows out of the principles themselves but also ties in with an important aim of the WL, namely to demonstrate more clearly the role and place of the thing in itself within transcendental philosophy. Jacobi's critique of the thing in itself, though indirectly responded to by Kant in the B version of the Phenomenal Noumenal distinction, prepared his later charge of nihilism. 15 there is something out there of which we may never claim any knowledge then how are we to distinguish knowledge from illusion? What guarantees that our knowledge is about this world? What needed to be shown more clearly was how we are always already in contact with the world, without, however, falling into solipsism. A part of the solution that Fichte proposes is to see the relation between I and world as one of ever shifting limits or horizons. To the extent that I determine the world, this world becomes part of the I. But to the extent that I do not determine it, or that it determines me, this world is a not I. Both I and not I no longer function as things but are more properly understood as processes or activities. The notion of reciprocal determination, and later of Schweben is thus crucial to the argument. The other part of the solution is more difficult to explain. It concerns the precise relation between the transcendental and the empirical. How precisely is the world supposed to 14 See for instance his affirmation at the start of the Foundation of Theoretical Knowledge, where he writes that as all three principles have now been established we may now proceed to develop or unrol (entwickeln) the remainder of the WL (GWL, 123) 15 See the appendix on Transcendental Idealism in Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, David Hume über den Glauben, oder Idealismus und Realismus. Ein Gespräch., in Werke 2,1 (Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 2004), 191-260. For Kant compare A 249 253 with B 305 309 on this point. If "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 8

be transcendentally ideal yet empirically real? How are we to understand that I can never make any positive claims about the world as such, and yet that what I know does concern this world? This distinction is essential to overcoming the debate between dogmatists and sceptics but can be easily misunderstood. One misunderstanding that comes readily enough is to see the transcendental and the empirical as two worlds: a real world and a world of mere appearance. On such a reading our knowledge indeed falls pray to Jacobi's charge of nihilism. It is thus important to show that there are not two different world and really only one, without, however, conflating this important distinction. With Fichte the transcendental and the empirical become different standpoints or aspects. 16 To understand how I always already find myself both in communication with, and in separation from, a not I, I need to raise myself to the "philosophical point of view" to see that determination always entail the spontaneity of consciousness. This spontaneity is thus a first principle because it alone cannot be reduced. But this spontaneity is not a transcendent act and the world is not a mere manifestation of it, as this would lead us back to a two world theory. Rather, such spontaneous activity is, in and of itself, productive, and I as individual consciousness, am as much actively determining the world as determined by it. In that sense Fichte cannot but agree with Kant that there is no immediate empirical knowledge of my consciousness. All knowledge of myself already entails this reciprocal determination of I and not I. The confusion appears when after first having separated this absolute or spontaneous activity we now think of it as the act of an individual consciousness, hence confusing the I as subject with the I as object of reflection for an absolute subject. The Tathandlung is both das Handelnde and what this activity bring about. From a transcendental point of view determination must be seen as "self active" hence absolute and unbedingt. But transcendental activity schlechthin is but an abstraction necessary to understand the empirical relations of I and not I. It is not anyone's activity, it is not the individual I's activity. Rather, it is determination considered as determination, as such or on its own. Such determination, as we have seen, is always a specific or determinate act, and this is to posit an I and not I. The act of synthesis I effect on my intuitions is, as act, not reducible to the mere impression of the senses. The interaction of things alone can never give experience. But this act of synthesis does not 16 See 2. Einl., 482-3n esp. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 9

exist in abstraction but concerns an I engaged with a not I. This is no longer to consider it as act alone, or from a transcendental perspective, but as a determinate act, that is, from an empirical perspective. Hence it is really one and the same, but understood with different purposes in mind. We need the transcendental perspective to make sense of the empirical but without the empirical the transcendental becomes mere speculation. References used: Beck, Jakob Sigismund. The Standpoint from which Critical Philosophy is to be Judged (excerpt). In Between Kant and Hegel, edited by George di Giovanni, 204 249. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 2000. Bourgeois, Bernard. L'idéalisme de Fichte. Paris: Vrin, 1968. about:blank. Fichte, Johann Gottlieb. Sämmtliche Werke. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1845.. The Science of Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1794. Jacobi, Friedrich Heinrich. David Hume über den Glauben, oder Idealismus und Realismus. Ein Gespräch. In Werke 2,1, 191 260. Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 2004. Kant, Immanuel. Attempt to introduce the concept of negative magnitudes into philosophy. In Theoretical philosophy, 1755 1770. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.. Critique of Pure Reason. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1781. Ritter, Gründer. Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie (im 13 Bände). Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 1971. Schrader, W. Empirisches und absolutes Ich. Geschichte des Begriffs Leben in de Philosophie J.G.Fichtes. Stuttgart, 1972. "The Simultaneity of the Three Principles in the Grundlage", Michael Kolkman, University of Warwick. 10