Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature

12Ideasfor a Philosophy ofNatureIntroduction 13for himself the most worthy place by this service, which, although itremains negative, may be respected equally with the highest, even ifhe were not himself to have the satisfaction of seeing philosophy in itsabsolute form resurrect itself self-consciously out of the dismemberingactivities of reflection." The simplest expression of complicatedproblems is always the best. He who first attended to the fact that hecould distinguish himself from external things, and therewith hisideas from the objects, and conversely, the latter from the former, wasthe first philosopher. He first interrupted the mechanics of his thinking,upset the equilibrium of consciousness, in which subject and objectare most intimately united.In that I envisage the object, object and idea are one and the same.And only in this inability to distinguish the object from the idea duringthe envisaging itself lies the conviction, for the ordinary understanding,of the reality of external things, which become known to it,after all, only through ideas.This identity of object and idea the philosopher now does awaywith, by asking: How do ideas of external things arise in us? By thisquestion we displace the things outside of ourselves, suppose them tobe independent of our ideas. At the same time there ought to beconnection between them and our ideas. But we are acquainted withno real connection between dIfferent things other than that of cause andeffect. So the first endeavor of philosophy is to put object and idea intothe relationship of cause and effect.But now we have expressly posited things as independent of ourselves.On the other hand, we feel ourselves to be dependent upon the objects.For our idea is itself only real insofar as we are compelled to assumeagreement between it and the things. So we cannot make the thingsthe effects of our ideas. Nothing remains, therefore, but to make theideas dependent upon the things and to regard the latter as causes,the former as effects.Now, however, one can see at first glance that by this move weessentially cannot achieve what we wanted. We wanted to explain howit comes about that in us the object and the idea are inseparablyunited. For only in this union lies the reality of our knowledge ofexternal things. And it is just this reality that the philosopher is sup­5 The philosopher who spends his life, or part of it, pursuing speculative philosophyinto its bottomless abysses, in order there to dig out its deepest foundation, bringsto humanity an offering which, because it is the sacrifice of the noblest that he has,may perhaps be respected as much as most others. It is fortunate enough if hebrings philosophy to the point at which even the ultimate necessity for it as a specialscience, and therewith his own name, vanishes forever from the memory of mankind.[First edition.]d to establish. But if the things are causes of ideas, then they:e the ideas. Consequently the separation between the two bespermanent. But we wanted, after we had separated object andthrough freedom, to unite them again through freedom, weted to know that, and why, there is originally no separation benthem.rther, we know the things only through and in our ideas. There­, what they are, insofar as they precede our ideas, and so are notnted - of that we have no conception whatever.ain, in asking: How does it come about that I have ideas? I raiseIf above the idea and become, through this very question, a beingfeels itself to be free ab origine with respect to all ideation, whoys the ideation itself and the whole fabric of his ideas beneath. Through this question itself I become an entity which, indepenofexternal things, has being in itself:us, with this question itself, I step out of the series of my ideas,e myself from connection with the things, adopt a positione no external force can reach me any longer; now, for the first, the two hostile beings mind and matter separate. I place each ofin different worlds, between which no further connection isible. In that I step out of the series of my ideas, even cause andare concepts which I survey from above. For they both arise onlye necessary succession of my ideas, from which I have releasedIf. How, then, can I subordinate myself again to these concepts,allow things external to me to affect me?"'r let us make the attempt the other way round, allow externals to affect us, and now explain how, despite this, we come to thetion how ideas are possible in us.deed, how things affect me (a free being) is not at all conceivable. Ieive only how things affect things. So far as I am free, howeverI am free, in that I raise myself above the interconneccion ofs and ask how this interconnection itself has become possible), Iot a thing at all, not an object. I live in a world entirely my own; Ibeing that exists, not for other beings, butfor itself There can bedeed and act in me; from me effects can only proceed; there cano passivity in me, for there is passivity only where there is effectcountereffect, and this is only in the interconnection of things,ve which I have raised myself. But let it be the case that I am aSome ingenious members of the Kantian school have opposed this from the start.This philosophy allows all concepts ofcause and effect to arise only in our minds, inour ideas, and yet the ideas themselves again, to be caused in me, according to thelaw of causality, by external tltings. Nobody wanted to hear of it at the time; butnow surely it must be heard.