Introduction to philosophy

Introduction To Philosophy

INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY

BY GEORGE THOMAS WHITE PATRICK, Ph.D.

PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA

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Preface

Tus book is intended as an introductory text in philosophy for college and university students, and as a guide book for the general reader who would like to find his way into this interesting field of inquiry. It sets forth no system of philosophy — at least I hope not. The purpose of philosophy is to impel to thought, not to satisfy inquiry with a ‘“‘system.”

Nevertheless, the book is not wholly impersonal. Theoretically, perhaps, one who writes an elementary introduction to philosophy should place impartially before the reader the various theories, reserving any comment of hisown. But I doubt whether people like to read a wholly impersonal book. They enjoy an impartial book, but not an impersonal one. Readers usually like to get the viewpoint of the author, if only in a footnote. Ihave, therefore, not hesitated to indicate my own views, or at least to point out the direction from which the light seems tome to come. In this critical and individualistic age such a method is not likely to lead the reader astray. He will think for himself anyway.

The general standpoint of the book is, I suppose, realistic and pluralistic, and I hope theistic; certainly idealistic, and quite unmistakably optimistic. Furthermore, the validity of the realistic standpoint of the special sciences is quite shamelessly assumed, and it is taken for granted that they deal with realities and not with appearances. In accordance with this plan I have left to a late chapter the whole subject of epistemology, believing that much confusion and discouragement may be avoided by beginning objectively after the manner of the special sciences. Finally, I have dwelt upon the similarities among philosophical systems rather than upon their differences; for while the study of philosophy must stimulate thought, it should not discourage persistent thinking by engendering a cynical skepticism. And, indeed, I think it is quite time to call vi PREFACE attention to the agreements rather than the disagreements in philosophy.

The divergence of philosophical systems is a theme dear to the critics of philosophy, ancient and modern. But certainly in these later years a most encouraging convergence is beginning to manifest itself, giving promise of a real progress comparable with that of the physical sciences. Rationalism and Empiricism, for instance, as genetically approached by Professor Dewey, are now seen in friendly converse; Mechanism and Vitalism seem about to merge into some theory of creative evolution; while even Idealism and Naturalism, of old the most uncompromising of enemies, no longer appear wholly irreconcilable. If, with Norman Kemp Smith in his recent Prologomena to an Idealistic Theory of Knowledge, we define Idealism as a term covering all those philosophies which agree in maintaining that spiritual values have a determining voice in the ordering of the Universe; and Naturalism as the view that all these values emerge and begin to vindicate their reality at some late stage in the process of evolution, it is only at first sight that these two theories appear contradictory. Why may not spiritual values emerge late in evolution and yet have a determining voice in the ordering of the Universe? If we think of the whole world as a movement in the realization of these values, then the various steps in the evolutionary program would be regarded simply as indispensable stages in this realization.

The differences between Idealism and Naturalism appear still further softened by our newer knowledge of matter and our newer conception of mind. Some one, quoted by Hoernlé, says, ‘‘We know too much about matter now to be materialists.”’ Perhaps he should have said, ‘‘We know too much about matter now to have any fear of Materialism.” If still held, this theory would apparently have lost its reputation for being mechanistic, atheistic, irreligious, or even monistic. And as for Naturalism, we are finding Nature to be an immensely more complicated affair than in the innocent days of Herbert Spencer and the early Darwinians, so that there might be

PREFACE vii room in it for almost anything — for instance, secondary qualities, universals, even Platonic Ideas. Thus, if the antithesis between Naturalism and Idealism has not melted away, at any rate the alleged leanness and meagerness of the former are no longer in evidence.

Idealism, too, is changing its character and losing its harsher aspects. Its subjectivistic forms are harder and harder to maintain. Many now call themselves idealists who claim neither that the world is dependent upon mind, nor the product of mind, nor a manifestation of the absolute, nor made of mind-stuff. It is sufficient to say that spiritual values are the significant things, that is, the real things in the Universe, and that perhaps they have a determining voice in its ordering.

I have just been reading the thoughtful article by Professor Urban in the Philosophical Review for September, 1923, on “Origin and Value.” The author is much troubled by the attitude of philosophical modernism in its dissociation of hitherto faithful connections of ideas, the most serious of which is the dissociation of origin and value, or value and reality; and among modernisms he finds the doctrine of emergents, creative resultants, and epigenesis, the most flagrant offenders against these faithful connections.

I agree with Professor Urban that the dissociation of value and reality would indicate the decadence of philosophy, but I cannot agree that the dissociation of origin and value would be equally fatal. The views indicated in this book as promising paths for the reader to explore are certainly sympathetic with the epigenetic and emergent theories — but surely this does not indicate a divorce of value and reality. I cannot believe that all values and all realities are to be packed into origins, nor do I see any reason why the world may not be a blossoming-out process, in which new values are constantly realized. Even if we speak of these new values as novelties, there is no necessary divorce of value and reality. But if there are laid up somewhere in the heavens patterns by which we measure these values, even then there is no reason why they may not emerge in any given local program of evolution,

Vill PREFACE

But I wonder whether there is not some profounder truth than is expressed in either of these views. Could we not think of the world as “biocentric” and “psychotropic,” as hungering and thirsting after righteousness, as longing for beauty and truth and goodness, without thinking of these values as envisaged, or willed, or created after any type or pattern? Reflecting much on Aristotle, some such view as this has been often in my mind while writing the pages which follow. Matter is taking on form, and the form is life and mind and social organization and art and science and philosophy and religion; and all these are values, and they have a determining voice in the ordering of the world, because all which precedes them is indispensable to them. Hence I do not believe that there need be any divorce of reality and value in the emergent and epigenetic views. In fact I think that S. Alexander and Lloyd Morgan have done philosophy a real service in introducing the word emergence to designate the relation in which spiritual values stand to the organization of material elements.

A glance at the footnotes in the chapters which follow will show my indebtedness to many writers. It is a little difficult to single out those to whom I am most indebted, but I am sure that I owe much to Professors John Dewey, 8. Alexander, Edward Gleason Spaulding, and Ralph Barton Perry. We all owe so much to James that special acknowledgment is unnecessary save by way of tribute; and I at least owe much to Bergson. I wish to thank Professor J. C. Manry for his painstaking reading of my manuscript and his wise suggestions, and Dr. H. Heath Bawden for his sometimes caustic criticisms, which I have found useful. I am much indebted also to Professor C. F. Taeusch for many suggestions and to Mr. H. J. Phillips for assistance in reading the proofs. J. Arthur Thomson has instructed me with his science and comforted me with his philosophy. I have to thank Charles Scribner’s Sons for permission to print the quotation from Santayana facing the first page, and many other publishers for permission to quote from their books.

Gal owes

Contents

* WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? . 6 «ees oe . PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE . . . . . . PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION Abie Be ears

. M&THOD IN PHILOSOPHY

. SYNOPSIS OF SUBJECTS . .

CHAPTER I WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? Preliminary definition

THOSE who enter for the first time upon the study of philosophy are often puzzled to know what it is all about. The other sciences leave no doubt as to their subject-matter. Astronomy is about the stars; geology is about the rocks; botany is about the plants; psychology is about the mind. But what is philosophy about? It does not seem to have for its theme a perfectly definite group of facts. So at first one feels somewhat lost in this subject and wishes that it could be explained quite clearly just what philosophy is.

Let us see whether this very reasonable demand for a clear definition of philosophy can be satisfied. It is just possible that it may turn out to be an advantage that philosophy does not have a perfectly definite group of facts for its subject-matter, such as stars, rocks, plants, and mental processes. One gets tired sometimes of studying facts, and longs for meanings and values. Who is there that has not at some time or other thrown down his textbook and found himself wondering — Oh! What’s the use? What’s the difference? What’s it allfor? What’s the value of it all?

Now, philosophy has just this for its most engaging task — to try to answer these insistent and persistent questionings of the human mind, as to the use, meaning, purpose, and value of life. Philosophy has been defined as the cultural study of meanings and values, or more briefly as the interpretation of life. Or, adopting the oft-quoted phrase of Matthew Arnold, we may say that Philosophy is the attempt to see life steadily and see it whole.

1 Arnold said of the Greek tragic poet, Sophocles, that he saw life steadily and saw it whole.

In this telling phrase both the aim and the method of philosophy are given. The aim is to see life as a whole, not with the slant of the scientist or the business man or the clubman or the artist or poet or preacher or the university professor, nor with any slant at all; but to see it as it would be seen by “ the spectator of all time and all existence”;!and the method is to see it steadily, with neither prejudice nor bias nor half knowledge.

A world view

Again, philosophy has been defined as the attempt by use of scientific methods to understand the world in which we live.

This attempt to understand the world, to combine the results of the special sciences into some kind of consistent world view, has always been the aim of philosophy from the days of Thales, the first Greek philosopher, to the present. But just what do we mean by the world? Among the Greeks it meant the Cosmos, or, as we should say, the Universe; and philosophers of all ages have courageously set themselves to this tremendous task of getting a theory of the Universe, its extent and duration (space and time), its creator (God), its purpose, its primary stuff or material, its relation to man and to his soul and destiny. To this end labored Democritus and Plato and Aristotle and Saint Augustine and Bruno and Descartes and Spinoza and Kant and Hegel and Herbert Spencer and others of the great “philosophers,” and these immense world problems still haunt us and must be studied.

But at the present time this astronomical meaning of ‘‘the world” is less in our thoughts. With our modern individualistic, humanistic, and romantic moods we turn more to immediate interests, and ‘‘the world” means something else to us. With our northern climate, our indoor living, our big cities, eur crowded populations, and our social life, the world we live in is not an astronomical world; it is rather a social, political, literary, moral, and religious world.

The ancient Greeks were much troubled by the problem of per-

1 Plato said that the philosopher is the spectator of all time and all existence, and that he is one who sets his affections on that which really exists. — The Republic, v1, p. 486.

WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? 3 manence and change; but by change they meant physical change, the motion of material atoms and particles and the phenomena of growth and decay. These questions are still unanswered; but our interests now are with another kind of changing world — changing social customs, changing political relations, changing morals, changing religion, and changing literary standards. But this kind of ‘‘world”’ is quite as much in need of interpretation as the other — and so philosophy remains with us; only now it becomes the interpretation of life, its value and meaning, its source and its destiny. Hence, evolution, progress, knowledge, the ways of the mind, problems of conduct and society have come into the foreground; butit is as true as ever that philosophy is an attempt to understand the world we live in.

Despite the rather strenuous life that we lead now, busied as most of us are with athletics and social activities, with books and magazines, with college routine, with recreations and amusements, I believe that we are more thoughtful and inwardly serious than in former times; and that the philosophic impulse dawns earlier in our lives. Old philosophies and established traditions are no longer received without question. The spirit of fresh inquiry is everywhere; but the trouble is that, owing to our intensely social life, time is lacking for careful and persistent study of the life problems. In the study of philosophy we simply take time to think some of our problems through.

Probably there are very few of us who have not seriously asked just such questions as these: Can we any longer hold a religious view of the world? Is there any God at all, or is there nothing but matter and energy? Whatismattermade of? Ismy mind, which is now thinking and wondering, something different from matter, or is it just a grouping of atoms or a function of my body? I am alive. What is life? Sometime I shall die. What is death, and is there any part of me which may survive it? To-morrow I shall do many things. Some of them will be right and some wrong. What is right and whatis wrong? All about meI see men striving for money and fame and pleasure. Are these really the highest values, or are there other values that are higher and better, such as peace, simplicity, faith, love, work, the enjoyment of art, the pursuit of science? What is most worth while? I can ask all these questions. Is it possible to find an answer to them? What are the limits of knowledge?

Again, objects of beauty surround us in nature and in art. Some of the buildings in our city or on our college campus are beautiful and some are ugly. Just what is beauty? What is it that we enjoy in classical music and what is it that we admire in the old masters, in the Gothic cathedrals, in the Greek temples? I admire the sunset, the moon seen through the clouds, the wild flowers, the autumn leaves. Would nature be beautiful if there were no eye to see it or no mind to appreciate it? I walk through the crowded city and see men striving and straining for wealth, position, power. Some of them are loudly declaiming against injustice, and I long to know what justice is and why men struggle and strive. All these are philosophical problems.

To ask these big questions, to reflect upon them, to study them in a scientific way and to try to answer them — this is philosophy. Or, as James said, philosophy is after all just ‘an unusually persistent effort to think clearly.”

The search for unity

Herbert Spencer defined philosophy as completely wnified knowledge, contrasting it with science, which is partially unified knowledge. His notion was that philosophy tries to unite the several sciences into a unified system, just as each special science tries to unite the particular facts within its own field into a unified system. This was a very ambitious conception of philosophy; we do not hope now to realize it. But it was defective in another way. It was formulated in the last century when our hopes were bright that the natural sciences, physics, biology, psychology, sociology, would solve the world riddle. These hopes have been somewhat disappointed. There is an unexplained residue — a romantic element in life, even an element of tragedy — which must be taken account of in any true philosophy. And, besides, philosophy is something far more than the unification of the special sciences; it must satisfy not only our scientific interests but our moral and religious needs, our long-

WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? 5 ings and aspirations; these too are facts, which any system of thought must consider. If we could take all these facts and think them together, that would be philosophy.

Still again, philosophy has been defined as an attempt to gain unity in our thinking. This definition seems to differ only in form from the others. A theory of the world as a whole, of life as a whole, a world view, introduces unity into our thinking at once. We are very often perplexed and disturbed by the different and conflicting views of life which we get from the several groups to which we belong. At home we get one view of life, at school perhaps another. What we learn at church seems, it may be, quite inconsistent with what we learn in our science classes; while in our high-school groups or our college fraternities we get still another view of life. Which one is the true one? Or does each of these views contain some element of truth? If so, how can these various aspects of truth be distinguished and brought together into a consistent whole?

But young people are not the only ones who are worried and perplexed by the lack of unity. It is not, for instance, conducive to mental peace to be obliged to keep one’s science and religion in separate water-tight compartments, nor to have one code of ethics for Sunday and another for week days, nor one set of principles for politics and another for business.

Wonder

But we must not think that philosophy has its origin in any kind of doubt or despair, or even in perplexity. Doubts and perplexities there are a plenty — and I hope that the earnest and persistent study of philosophy will remove some of them — but the source of philosophy goes back of all doubt and all perplexity and has its origin in simple wonder. Plato said that philosophy begins in wonder. The Greeks were devoted to philosophy, but as compared with us they were naive and childlike in their outlook on the world, and free from disturbing doubts; but they were much given to wonder, and their wonder soon became serious and thoughtful.

Philosophy may, indeed, be defined as wonder which has turned to serious and reflective thought. A little girl stood looking out the window, very thoughtful. Presently she turned and said, “Mother, what I don’t understand is how there came to be any world.’ With this reflection she became a philosopher. Most children just take the world for granted; most men and women doalso. Butsome children and some grown-ups are very thoughtful and reflective; they wonder what the world is, how it came to be, what it is made of, and what it isfor. When their wonder becomes serious and reflective inquiry, they are philosophers.

Wisdom

Finally, philosophy has been defined as wisdom. The word philosophy is from the Greek word, sophia, wisdom, and the verb philein, to love. It is just the love of wisdom. Socrates disclaimed having wisdom, but said he had the love of it. But wisdom is precisely what he seemed to his contemporaries to have; he is the typical wise man and the world philosopher. It might prove troublesome to try to explain just how wisdom differs from knowledge; we can feel the difference, but we cannot express it. Perhaps taste and appreciation are involved. Is philosophy something like intellectual good taste? And is intellectual good taste something which enables us to appraise rightly the various values which are offered to us so freely in this rich and wonderful modern world of ours? We have become pretty well convinced that neither wealth nor pleasure is the highest value; and we are trying to find out what the highest values are. Every one seems to be pursuing something — but why? We seem to need a key to this puzzle of the relative worth of things — work, play, amusement, study, eating, drinking, love-making, science, art, music, poetry, social service, politics, business, and all the rest.

Metaphysics

In recent years this humanistic aspect of philosophy, this attempt to interpret life, to see things in the large, to gain the right perspective, has been emphasized much more than the older metaphysical problems, such as the nature of reality, of God, and

WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? a the world. In the philosophy of the present we hear a great deal about life and the self and evolution and the pragmatic values. The theory of knowledge and quest of reality, while they still hold us captive, yet are surpassed in interest by the theory of values. So it comes about that the word Metaphysics is now less commonly used. When used, it is often quite synonymous with Philosophy. Strictly, however, Metaphysics is a narrower term applied to problems of the world, of reality, of God, of purpose, of causality, and of mind; while Philosophy is a broader term, including first, all these subjects; second, Epistemology, or the theory of knowledge; and, third, the so-called normative sciences, Logic, Ethics, and Asthetics.

Poetry and philosophy

In this connection Perry’s distinction between, the philosopher-poets and the poets who are not philosophers is illuminating.! This will help us still further to understand what philosophy is, especially in its newer aspects. Some of the great poets seek merely to describe life; others seek to interpret it. The latter are the philosopher-poets. One thinks of Lucretius, Omar Khayyam, Dante, Goethe, Wordsworth, Browning, and the Greek dramatists. Consider Aschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, or even Aristophanes, the comic poet. These men were dreadfully in earnest. They were moralists, thinkers, prophets, reflecting the national consciousness of their people. The prophet is a man who brings a message; and if the prophet is a poet, he is a philosopher-poet. Aischylus, for instance, depicts in majestic language the tempestuous power of fate against those who disregard the ancient laws of morals and religion. The immutable moral law and the fateful suffering of men constitute the burden of Sophocles’ exquisite dramas; while Aristophanes in comic vein upholds the old traditions of Greece. Lucretius in Rome wrote a long poem in hexameter verse to set forth a materialistic theory of the world and save men from the fear of the gods; he would still be celebrated as a philosopher, had he written only in prose. Omar Khayy4m in his exquisite quatrains presents a distinct philoso-

1 Ralph Barton Perry, The Approach to Philosophy, chap. 11.

phy of life. Itis partly the felicitous form of his stanzas as translated by Fitzgerald that makes Omar so popular; but it is partly his strange philosophy and his conclusions, so repugnant to our reason, so agreeable to our fancy.

Into this Universe, and Why not knowing, Nor Whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing;

And out of it, as Wind along the Waste, I know not Whither, willy-nilly blowing.

Strange, is it not? that of the myriads who Before us pass’d the door of Darkness through,

Not one returns to tell us of the Road, Which to discover we must travel too.

Ah, Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire

To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire, Would not we shatter it to bits — and then

Remould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire?

It is Dante, however, who is the supreme philosopher-poet. He tells us in the Divine Comedy of the very shape and substance of the universe, of the origin of man and his destiny, and of the beginning of evil andits cure. In the beautiful lines of the Paradiso we read that from the very heart of the universe there streams forth the dazzling brightness of divine love, whose purpose is the redemption of manfrom sin. Goethe also is a thinker and a philosopher. The redemption of man is likewise his theme; but it comes now from experience, not from sacrifice and obedience. Wordsworth is burdened with “the heavy and the weary weight of all this unintelligible world,’ and Browning, ‘‘the soul dissector,’’ comforts us with his belief in God and truth and love.

The wonderful appeal of all these philosopher-poets reveals the eternal demand in the human heart for a solution of the riddle of the world. We have our lyric and our epic moods and our dramatic and romantic moods, in which we delight in Sappho and Homer and Virgil and Horace and Shakespeare and Shelley and Keats and Byron and Swinburne; but perhaps over all prevail our philosophic moods, in which we turn to the philosopher-poets for light and consolation.

It is significant, in illustrating the philosophical tendencies of

WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? 9 the present time, to notice how even the drama has become philosophical. The modern dramatist wrestles with the problems of life. Ibsen is the fountain head of this new drama, in which the poet and painter have given place to the thinker and the teacher. Emancipation from outgrown and offensive traditions is Ibsen’s theme and the feelings which he awakens in the reader or spectator are not so much those of «esthetic enjoyment as of thought and protest.

In the so-called problem plays, the author takes advantage of the prevailing philosophic mood to awaken interest in his play. Finally, in Bernard Shaw the esthetic attitude is reduced to its lowest limits and there is little left but a preachment. The feverish interest with which we read the plays of Ibsen and Shaw and Galsworthy and the Russian school of writers reveals the longing we feel to have our doubis settled and to penetrate life’s mysteries, even though we recognize that the beauty of poetry and the drama is somewhat dulled when they become too heavily Jaden with thought. But this philosophic tendency of poetry is one of the signs of the deep and prevailing interest in philosophy.

Finally, President Hibben says in his comprehensive way:

The problems of philosophy are, in fact, the problems of life, the burden and the mystery of existence, the origin and destiny of man, the relations which he sustains to the world of which he 1s a part, and to the unseen universe which lies round about him.

It was in the time of Socrates that the word philosophy first came into general use. With Plato and Aristotle the word assumed the more technical meaning of real knowledge, or knowledge of ultimate reality, somewhat like the German word Wissenschaft, or our own word science when used in its broader meaning. In later Greek times, among the Stoics and Epicureans, the word came to have a narrower meaning, as the guide of life. In periods of political turmoil or religious perplexity, such as

1 John Grier Hibben, The Problems of Philosophy (Charles Scribner’s Sons), p. 3.

those preceding the Christian era, men have little time or taste for pursuing deep philosophical speculations; but they need a philosophy as a guide of life and usually adopt some philosophical system which seems suited to this end. Philosophy thus becomes the art of living; to the Stoic the art of living wisely, to the Episurean the art of living happily. Even now the word is often used popularly in this sense, as when we speak of “‘a philosophic attitude,” or of taking anything, particularly any calamity, “philosophically”; calm or fortitude is evidently what is meant. Philosophy in its true meaning, as wisdom and the search for truth, although it may very well lead to such calm and fortitude, should not be confused with this practical end.

Another misconception of philosophy arises when we confuse it with applied science. Francis Bacon is sometimes ranked among the philosophers; but his conception of philosophy was wholly utilitarian. Bacon thought that the primary aim of knowledge is to enable us to gain power over nature to the end of human utility. Although many people still think of science in this way, as existing to minister to our technical interests in its many applications to arts and industries, it is doubtful whether any thoughtful person would so regard philosophy now. Recently, however, the attempt has been made to reconstruct philosophy so that it shall find its sole justification in its contributions to social welfare. In these days of social uncertainty a person’s interest in social welfare may become so absorbing that he would wish to see all knowledge, even philosophy, subordinated to that practical end. But no matter how strong our practical and social interests are, we have moments and hours when we thirst for knowledge for its own sake. We wonder about God, the soul, and the world; we even wonder whether knowledge itself is possible. This wonder when it issues in serious and reflective thought is philosophy. William James, whose name will appear so often in the following pages, because he did so much . to turn philosophy away from barren metaphysical discussions to richer human interests, said in a letter written at the age of twenty-three, “I am going to study philosophy all my days.”