Читать книгу Logic as the Science of the Pure Concept - Benedetto Croce - Страница 12

Non-existence of subdivisions of the concept as a logic at form.

Logically, the concept does not give rise to distinctions, for there are not several forms of concept, but one only. This is a perfectly analogous result in Logic to that which we reached in Æsthetic, when we established the uniqueness of intuition or expression, and the non-existence of special modes or classes of expressions (except in the empirical sense, in which we can always establish as many classes as we wish). In distinguishing the forms of the spirit, the two principal forms, theoretic and practical, having been divided, and the theoretic having been subdivided into intuition and concept, there is no place for a further subdivision of the theoretic forms, since intuition and concept are each of them indivisible forms. The reason for this indivisibility cannot be clearly understood, save by the complete development of the Philosophy of the spirit; and it is only to be remarked here in passing, that the division of intuition and concept has as its foundation the distinction between individual and universal. And since in this distinction there is no medium quid nor an ulterius, a third or fourth intermediate form, so there is no subdivision; since we pass from the concept of individuality to single individuality, which is not a concept, and from the concept of the concept to the single act of thought, which is no longer the simple definition of logical thinking, but effective logical thinking itself.

The distinctions of the concept not logical, but real.

Since all subdivision of the logical form of the concept has been excluded, the multiplicity of concepts can be referred only to the variety of the objects, which are thought in the logical form of the concept. The concept of goodness is not that of beauty; or rather, both are logically the same thing, since both are logical form; but the aspect of reality designated by the first is not the same aspect of reality as is designated by the second.

Multiplicity of the concepts, and the logical difficulty arising therefrom. Necessity of overcoming it.

But here arises the difficulty. How can it be that since in the concept we deal with reality, in its universal aspect, we yet obtain so many various forms of reality, that is, so many distinct concepts (for example, passion, will, morality, imagination, thought, and so on), so many universals, whereas the concept should give us the universal. If this variety were not overcome or capable of being overcome by the concept, we should have to conclude that the true universal is not attainable by thought, and to return to scepticism, or at least to that peculiar form of logical scepticism which makes the consciousness of unity an act of the inner life, which cannot be stated in terms of logic; that is, mysticism. The distinction of the concepts, one from another, in the absence of unity, is separation and atomism; and it would certainly not be worth while getting out of the multiplicity of representations if we were then to fall into that of the concepts. For this, no less than the other, would issue in a progressus ad infinitum, for who would ever be able to affirm that the concepts which were discovered and enumerated were all the concepts? If they be ten, why should they not be, if better observed, twenty, a hundred, or fifty thousand? Why, indeed, should they not be just as numerous as the representations, that is to say, infinite? Spinoza, who counted, without mediating between them, two attributes of substance, thought and extension, admitted, with perfect coherence, that two are known to us, but that the attributes of Substance must in reality be considered infinite in number.

Impossibility of eliminating it.

The concept, then, demands that this multiplicity be denied; and we can affirm that the real is one, because the concept, by means of which alone we know it, is one; the content is one, because the form of thought is one. But in accepting this claim, we run into another difficulty. If we jettison distinction, the unity that we attain is an empty unity, deprived of organic character, a whole without parts, a simple beyond the representations, and therefore inexpressible so that we should return to mysticism by another route. A whole is a whole, only because and in so far as it has parts, indeed is parts; an organism is such, because it has and is organs and functions; a unity is thinkable only in so far as it has distinctions in itself, and is the unity of the distinctions. Unity without distinction is as repugnant to thought as distinction without unity.

Unify as distinction.

It follows, therefore, that both terms are reciprocally indispensable, and that the distinctions of the concept are not the negation of the concept, nor something outside the concept, but the concept itself, understood in its truth; the one-distinct; one, only because distinct, and distinct only because one. Unity and distinction are correlative and therefore inseparable.

Inadequateness of the numerical concept of multiplicity.

The distinct concepts, constituting in their distinction unity, cannot, above all, be infinite in number, for in that case they would be equivalent to the representations. Not indeed that they are finite in number, as if they were all alike equally arranged upon one and the same plane, and capable of being placed in any other sort of order, without alteration in their being. The Beautiful, the True, the Useful, the Good, are not the first steps in a numerical series, nor do they permit themselves to be arranged at pleasure, so that we may place the beautiful after the true, or the good before the useful, or the useful before the true, and so on. They have a necessary order, and mutually imply one another; and from this we learn that they are not to be described as finite in number, since number is altogether incapable of expressing such a relation. To count implies having objects separate from one another before us; and here, on the contrary, we have terms that are distinct, but inseparable, of which the second is not only second, but, in a certain sense, also first, and the first not only first, but, in a certain way, also second. We cannot dispense with numbers, when treating of these concepts of the spirit, owing to their convenience for handling the subject; hence we talk, for example, of the ten categories, or of the three terms of the concept, or of the four forms of the spirit. But in this case the numbers are mere symbols; and we must beware of understanding the objects which they enumerate, as though they were ten sheep, three oxen, and four cows.

Relation of the distinct concepts as ideal history.

This relation of the distinct concepts in the unity which they constitute, can be compared to the spectacle of life, in which every fact is in relation with all other facts, and the fact which comes after is certainly different from that which precedes, but is also the same; since the consequent fact contains in itself the preceding, as, in a certain sense, the preceding virtually contained the consequent, and was what it was, just because it possessed the power of producing the consequent. This is called history; and therefore (continuing to develop the comparison) the relation of the concepts, which are distinct in the unity of the concept, can be called and has been called ideal history; and the logical theory of such ideal history has been regarded as the theory of the degrees of the concept, just as real history is conceived as a series of degrees of civilization. And since the theory of the degrees of the concept is the theory of its distinction, and its distinction is not different from its unity, it is clear that this theory can be separated from the general doctrine of the concept with which it is substantially one, only with a view to greater facility of exposition.

Distinction between ideal and real history.

Metaphors and comparisons are metaphors and comparisons and (like all forms of language) their effectiveness for the purposes of dissertation is accompanied, as we know, by the danger of misunderstanding. In order to avoid this, without at the same time renouncing the convenience of such modes of expression, it will be well to insist that the historical series, where the distinct concepts appear connected, is ideal, and therefore outside space and time, and eternal; so that it would be erroneous to conceive that in any smallest fragment of reality, or in any most fugitive instant of it, one degree is found without the other, the first without the second, or the first and the second without the third. Here too, we must allow for the exigencies of exposition, whereby, sometimes, when we intend to emphasize the distinction, we are led to speak of the relation of one degree to another, as if they were distinct existences; as if the practical man really existed side by side with the theoretic man, or the poet side by side with the philosopher, or as if the work of Art stood separate from the labour of reflection, and so on. But if a particular historical fact can in a certain sense be considered as essentially distinct in time and space, the grades of the concept are not existentially, temporally, and spatially distinct.

Ideal and abstract distinction.

An opposite, but not less serious error, would be to conceive the grades of the concept as distinct only abstractly, thus making abstract concepts of distinct concepts. The abstract distinction is unreal; and that of the concept is real; and the reality of the distinction (since here we are dealing with the concept) is precisely ideality, not abstraction. The universal, and therefore also all the forms of the universal, are found in every minutest fragment of life, in the so-called physical atom of the physicists, or in the psychical atom of the psychologists; the concept is therefore all distinct concepts. But each one of them is, as it were, distinct in that union; and in the same way as man is man, in so far as he affirms all his activities and his entire humanity, and yet cannot do this, save by specializing as a scientific man, a politician, a poet, and so on. In the same way the thinker, when thinking reality, can think it only in its distinct aspects, and in this way only he thinks it in its unity. A work of Art and a philosophical work, an act of thought or of will, cannot be taken up in the hand or pointed out with the finger; and it can be affirmed only in a practical and approximate sense that this book is poetry, and that philosophy, that this movement is a theoretic or practical, a utilitarian or a moral act. It is well understood that this book is also philosophy; and that it is also a practical act; just as that useful act is also moral, and also theoretic; and vice versa. But to think a certain intuitive datum and to recognize it as an affirmation of the whole spirit, is not possible save by thinking its different aspects distinctly. This renders possible, for example, a criticism of Art, conducted exclusively from the point of view of Art; or a philosophical criticism, from the exclusive point of view of philosophy; or a moral judgment, which considers exclusively the moral initiative of the individual, and so on. And therefore, here as in the preceding case, it is needful to guard against forcing the comparison with history too far, and conceiving, in history, the possibility of divisions as rigorous as in the concept. If distinct concepts be not existences, existences are not distinct concepts; a fact cannot be placed in the same relation to another fact, as one grade of the concept to another, precisely because in every fact there are all the determinations of the concept, and a fact in relation to another fact is not a conceptual determination.

Certainly distinct concepts can become simple abstractions; but this only happens when they are taken in an abstract way, and so separated from one another, co-ordinated and made parallel, by means of an arbitrary operation, which can be applied even to the pure concepts. The distinct concepts then become changed into pseudoconcepts, and the character of abstraction belongs to these last, not to the distinct concepts as such, which are always at once distinct and united.

Other usual distinctions of the concept, and their meaning, identicals, disparates, primitives, and derivatives, etc.

This is not the place to dwell upon the other forms of concepts met with in Logic, known as identical concepts, which cannot be anything but synonyms, or words;—or upon disparate concepts, which are simply distinct concepts, in so far as they are taken in a relation, which is not that given in the distinction, and is therefore arbitrary, so that the concepts, thus presented without the necessary intermediaries, appear disparate;—or primitive and derived concepts, or simple and compound concepts; a distinction which does not exist for the pure concepts, since they are always simple and primitive, never compound or derived.

Universals, particulars, and singulars. Intension and extension.

But the distinction of concepts into universal, particular, and singular deserves elucidation, for the reason that we are now giving. Concepts, which are only universal, or only particular, or only singular, or to which any one of these determinations is wanting, are not conceivable. Indeed, universality only means that the distinct concept is also the unique concept, of which it is a distinction and which is composed of such distinctions; particularity means that the distinct concept is in a determinate! relation with another distinct concept; and singularity that in this particularity and in that universality it is also itself. Thus the distinct concept is always singular, and therefore universal and particular; and the universal concept would be abstract were it not also particular and singular. In every concept there is the whole concept, and all other concepts; but there is also one determinate concept. For example, beauty is spirit (universality), theoretic spirit (particularity), and intuitive spirit (singularity); that is to say, the whole spirit, in so far as it is intuition. Owing to this distinction into universal, particular, and singular, it is self-evident that intension and extension are, as the phrase is, in inverse ratio, since this amounts to repeating that the universal is universal, the particular particular, and the singular singular.

Logical definition.

The interest of this distinction of universality, particularity, and singularity lies in this, that upon it is founded the doctrine of definition, since it is not possible to define, that is, to think a concept, save by thinking its singularity (peculiarity), nor to think this, save by determining it as particularity (relation with the other distinct concepts) and universality (relation with the whole). Conversely, it is not possible to think universality without determining its particularity and singularity; otherwise that universal would be empty. The distinct concepts are defined by means of the one, and the one by means of the distinct. This doctrine, thus made clear, is also in harmony with that of the nature of the concepts.

Unity, distinction as circle.

But the theory of the distinct concepts and that of their unity still present something irrational and give rise to a new difficulty. Because, if it be true that the distinct concepts constitute an ideal history or series of grades, it is also true that in such a history and series there is a first and last, the concept a, which opens the series, and, let us say, the concept d, which concludes it. Commencement and end thus remain both without motive. But in order that the concept be unity in distinction and that it may be compared to an organism, it is necessary that it have no other commencement save itself, and that none of its single distinct terms be an absolute commencement. For, in fact, in the organism no member has priority over the others; but each is reciprocally first and last. Now this means that the symbol of linear series is inadequate to the concept; and that its true symbol is the circle, in which a and d function, in turn, as first and last. And indeed the distinct concepts, as eternal ideal history, are an eternal going and returning, in which a, b, c, d arise from d, without possibility of pause or stay, and in which each one, whether a or b or c or d, being unable to change its place, is to be designated, in turn, as first or as last. For example, in the Philosophy of Spirit it can be said with equal truth or error that the end or final goal of the spirit is to know or to act, art or philosophy; in truth, neither in particular, but only their totality is the end; or only the Spirit is the end of the Spirit. Thus is eliminated the rational difficulty, which might be urged in relation to this part.

Distinction in the pseudoconcepts.

It is still better eliminated, and the whole doctrine of the pure concepts which we have been expounding is thereby illumined and thrown into clearer outline when we observe the transformation (which we will not call either inversion or perversion), to which it is submitted in the doctrine of the pseudoconcepts. It is therefore expedient to refer rapidly to this for the sake of contrast and emphasis.

Above all, certain distinctions, which in the doctrine of the pure concepts have been seen to be without significance or importance, find their significance in the doctrine of the pseudoconcepts. We understand, for instance, how and why identical concepts can be discussed; since, in the field of caprice, one and the same thing, or one and the same not-thing, can be defined in different ways and give rise to two or more concepts which, owing to the identity of their matter, are thus identical. The concept of a figure having three angles, or that of a figure having three sides, are identical concepts, alike applicable to the triangle; the concept of 3 x 4 and that of 6 x 2 are identical, since both are definitions of the number 12; the concept of a feline domestic animal and that of a domestic animal that eats mice are identical, both being definitions of the cat. It is likewise clear how and why primary and derived, simple and compound concepts are discussed; for our arbitrary choice, by forming certain concepts and making use of these to form others, comes to posit the first as simple and primitive in relation to the second, which are, in their turn, to be considered as compound or secondary.

The subordination and co-ordination of the empirical concepts.

We have already seen that the arbitrary concept differs from the pure concept in that, of necessity, it produces two forms by the two acts of empiricism and emptiness and thereby gives rise to two different types of formations, empirical and abstract concepts. Empirical concepts have this property, that in them unity is outside distinction and distinction outside unity. And it is natural: for if it were the case that these two determinations penetrated one another, the concepts would be, as we have already noted, not arbitrary, but necessary and true. If the distinction is placed outside the unity, every division that is given of it is, like the concepts themselves, arbitrary; and every enumeration is also arbitrary, because those concepts can be infinitely multiplied. In exchange for the rationally determined and completely unified distinctions of the pure concepts, the pseudoconcepts offer multiple groups, arbitrarily formed, and sometimes also unified in a single group, which embraces the entire field of the knowable, but in such a way as not to exclude an infinite number of other ways of apprehending it.

In these groups the empirical concepts simulate the arrangement of the pure concepts, reducing the particular to the universal, that is to say, a certain number of concepts beneath another concept. But it is impossible in any way to think these subordinate concepts, as actualizations of the fundamental concept, which are developed from one another and return into themselves; hence we are compelled to leave them external to one another, simply co-ordinated. The scheme of subordination and co-ordination, and its relative spatial symbol (the symbol of classification), which is a right line, on the upper side of which falls perpendicularly another right line, and from whose lower side descend other perpendicular and therefore parallel right lines, is opposed to the circle and is the most evident ocular demonstration of the profound diversity of the two procedures. It will always be impossible to dispose a nexus of pure concepts in that classificatory scheme without falsifying them; it will always be impossible to transform empirical concepts into a series of grades without destroying them.

The definition in the empirical concepts, and the notes of the concept.

In consequence of the scheme of classification, the definition which, in the case of pure concepts, has the three moments of universality, particularity, and singularity, in the case of empirical concepts has only two, which are called genus and species; and is applied according to the rule, by means of the proximate genus and the specific difference. Its object indeed is simply to record, not to understand and to think, a given empirical formation; and this is fully attained when its position is determined by means of the indication of what is above and what is beside it. In order to determine it yet more accurately, the doctrine of the definition has been gradually enriched with other marks or predicables, which, in traditional Logic, are five: genus, species, differentia, property, accident. But it is a question of caprice upon caprice, of which it is not advisable to take too much account. And as it would be barbaric to apply the classificatory scheme to the pure concepts, so it would be equally barbaric to define the pure concepts by means of marks, that is, by means of characteristics mechanically arranged.

Series in the abstract concepts.

Where the thinker forgets the true function of the empirical concepts and is seized with the desire to develop them rationally, and thus to overcome the atomism of the scheme of classification and of extrinsic definition, he is led to refine them into abstract concepts, in which that scheme and that method of definition are overcome: the classification becomes a series (numerical series, series of geometrical forms, etc.), and the definition becomes genetic. But this improvement not only makes the empirical concepts disappear, and is therefore not improvement but death (like the death which the empirical concepts find in true knowledge when they return or mount up again to pure thought); but such improvement substitutes for empiricism emptiness. Series and genetic definitions answer without doubt to demands of the practical spirit; but, as we know, they do not yield truth, not even the truth which lies at the bottom of an empirical concept or of a falsified and mutilated representation. Hence, here as elsewhere, empirical concepts and abstract concepts reveal their double one-sidedness, and exhibit more significantly the value of the unity which they break up; the distinction, which is not classification, but circle and unity; the definition, which is not an aggregate of intuitive data; the series, which is a complete series; the genesis, which is not abstract but ideal.