PHILOSOPHY
READINGS
AD MMII
UNITS 3& 4
It is not for nothing that I have been a philologist. Philology is that venerable
art which demands of its votaries one thing above all: to go aside, to take
time, to become still, to become slow … It teaches to read well, that is to say,
to read slowly, deeply, looking cautiously fore and aft, with reservations,
with doors left open, with delicate eyes and fingers.
Nietzsche Daybreak.
Aristotle Ethics
Aristotle
NICOMACHEAN ETHICS
Book I
[Extract drawn from Aristotle, Ethics, translated by J.A.K. Thomson, Penguin, 1976.
Footnotes not directly relevant to our purposes have been removed. Those added are marked
DV.]
Every rational activity aims at some end or good. One end (like one activity) may be
subordinate to another.
i Every art and every investigation, and similarly every action and pursuit, is considered to
aim at some good. Hence the Good has been rightly defined as ‘that at which all things aim.
Clearly, however, there is some difference between the ends at which they aim: some are
activities and others results distinct from the activities. Where there are ends distinct from the
actions, the results are by nature superior to the activities. Since there are many actions, arts
and sciences, it follows that their ends are many too – the end of medical science is health; of
military science, victory; economic science,1 wealth. In the case of all skills of this kind that
come under a single ‘faculty’2 - as a skill in making bridles or any other part of a horse’s
trappings comes under horsemanship, while this and every kind of military action comes
under military science, so in the same way other skills subordinate to yet others - in all these
the ends of the directive arts are to be preferred in every case to those of the subordinate ones,
because it is for the sake of the former that latter are pursued also. It makes no difference
whether ends of the actions are the activities themselves or something apart from them, as in
the case of the sciences we have mentioned.
If, then, our activities have some end which we want for its own sake, and for the sake of
which we want all the other ends - if we do not choose everything for the sake of something
else (for this will involve an infinite progression, so that our aim will be pointless and
ineffectual) - it is clear that this must be the Good, that is the supreme good. Does it not
follow, then, that a knowledge of the Good is of great importance to us for the conduct of our
lives? Are we not more likely to achieve our aim if we have a target? If this is so, we must try
to describe at least in outline what the Good really is, and by which of the sciences or
faculties3 it is studied.
The science that studies the supreme Good for man is politics
ii. Presumably this would be the most authoritative and directive science. Clearly this
description fits the science of politics; for it is political science that prescribes what subjects
are to be taught in states, and which of these the different sections of the community are to
learn, and up to what point.4 We see also that under this science come those faculties which
are most highly esteemed; e.g. the arts of war, of property management, and of public
speaking. But if politics makes use of the other sciences, and also lays down what we should
do and from what we should refrain, its end must include theirs; and this end must be the
good for man. For even if the good of the community coincides with that of the individual, it
is clearly a greater and more perfect thing to achieve and preserve that of a community; for
1
i.e. household or property management.
For dunamis see Glossary.
3
Here ‘faculty’ (dunamis) means ‘art’ or ‘practical science’.
4
Or perhaps ‘up to what age’.
2
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Aristotle Ethics
while it is desirable to secure what is good in the case of an individual, to do so in the case of
a people or a state is something finer and more sublime.
Such, then, is the aim of our investigation; and it is a kind of political science.5
Politics is not an exact science
iii. Our account of this science will be adequate if it achieves such clarity as the subjectmatter allows; for the same degree of precision is not to be expected in all discussions. Any
more than in all the products of handicraft. Instances of morally fine and just conduct - which
is what politics investigates - involve so much difference and variety that they are widely
believed to be such only by convention and not by nature. Instances of goods involve a
similar kind of variety, for the reason that they often have hurtful consequences. People have
been destroyed before now by their money, and others by their courage. Therefore in
discussing subjects, and arguing from evidence, conditioned in this way, we must be satisfied
with a broad outline of the truth; that is, in arguing about what is for the most part so from
premisses which are for the most part true we must be content to draw conclusions that are
similarly qualified. The same procedure, then, should be observed in receiving our several
types of statement; for it is a mark of the trained mind never to expect more precision in the
treatment of any subject than the nature of that subject permits; for demanding logical
demonstrations from a teacher of rhetoric is clearly about as reasonable as accepting mere
plausibility from a mathematician.
The student should have some general knowledge and experience of life
Since in every case a man judges rightly what he understands, and of this only is a good
critic, it follows that while in a special field the good critic is a specialist, the good critic in
general is the man with a general education. That is why a young man is not a fit person to
attend lectures on political science, because he is not versed in the practical business of life
from which politics draws its premisses and subject-matter. Besides, he tends to follow his
feelings, with the result that he will make no headway and derive no benefit from his course,
since the object of it is not knowledge but action. It makes no difference whether he is young
in age or youthful in character; the defect is due not to lack of years but to living, and
pursuing one’s various aims, under sway of the feelings; for to people like this knowledge
becomes as unprofitable as it is for the incontinent.6 On the other hand for those who regulate
their impulses and act in accordance with principle7 a knowledge of these subjects will be of
great advantage.
So much by way of introductory remarks about the student, the proper attitude towards
instruction, and the proposed course.
The end is no doubt happiness, but views of happiness differ
iv. To resume. Since all knowledge and every pursuit aims at some good, what do we take to
be the end of political science - what is the highest of all practical goods? Well, so far as the
name goes there is pretty general agreement. ‘It is happiness’, say both ordinary and cultured
people; and they identify happiness with living well or doing well.8 But when it comes to
saying in what happiness consists, opinions differ, and the account given by the generality of
mankind is not at all like that of the wise. The former take it to be something obvious and
5
A. seems to regard ethics not as a species of politics but as a sort of introduction to it.
Those who know what is right but fail to do it; cf 1145b8ff.
7
The difficult word logos; see Glossary.
8
The Greek phrases are ambiguous, connoting both prosperity and right conduct.
6
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familiar, like pleasure or money or eminence, and there are various other views; and often the
same person actually changes his opinion: when he falls ill he says that it is health, and when
he is hard up that it is money. Conscious of their own ignorance, most people are impressed
by anyone who pontificates and says something that is over their heads. Some,9 however,
have held the view that over and above these particular goods there is another which is good
in itself and the cause of whatever goodness there is in all these others. It would no doubt be
rather futile to examine all these opinions; enough if we consider those which are most
prevalent or seem to have something to be said for them.
Learners must start from beliefs that are, accepted or at least familiar
We must not overlook the difference that it makes whether we argue from or to first
principles. Plato too used very properly to raise this question, inquiring whether the procedure was from or to first principles - just as on a racetrack they run either from the judges’
stand to the far end, or in the reverse direction.10 We must start from what is known. But
things are known in two senses: known to us and known absolutely. Presumably we must
start from what is known to us. So if anyone wants to make a serious study of ethics, 11 or of
political science generally, he must have been well trained in his habits. For the starting-point
is the fact; and if this is sufficiently clear there will be no need to ascertain the reason why.
Such a person can easily grasp the first principles12 if he is not in possession of them already;
but one who has neither of these qualifications had better take to heart what Hesiod says: 13
That man is best who sees the truth himself;
Good too is he who listens to wise counsel.
But who is neither wise himself nor willing
To ponder wisdom is not worth a straw.
The three types of life. Neither pleasure nor public honour seem to be an adequate end; the
contemplative life will be considered later
v. But let us resume from the point at which we digressed. To judge by their lives, the masses
and the most vulgar seem - not unreasonably - to believe that the Good or happiness is
pleasure. Accordingly they ask for nothing better than the life of enjoyment. (Broadly
speaking, there are three main types of life: the one just mentioned, the political, and thirdly
the contemplative.14) The utter servility of the masses comes out in their preference for a
bovine existence; still, their view obtains consideration from the fact that many of those who
are in positions of power share the tastes of Sardanapalus. 15 Cultured people, however, and
men of affairs identify the Good with honour, because this is (broadly speaking) the goal of
political life. Yet it appears to be too superficial to be the required answer. Honour is felt to
depend more on those who confer than on him who receives it; and we feel instinctively that
the Good is something proper to its possessor and not easily taken from him. Again, people
seem to seek honour in order to convince themselves of their own goodness; at any rate it is
by intelligent men, and in a community where they are known, and for their goodness, that
they seek to be honoured; so evidently in their view goodness is superior to honour. One
might even be inclined to suppose that goodness rather than honour is the end pursued in
9
Plato and his followers in the Academy.
According as the race is one length of the stadium or two (‘there and back’).
11
‘Fine and just things’.
12
Moral values.
13
Works and Days 291-4.
14
Cf. Plato, Republic 581c; the division is attributed to Pythagoras.
15
An Assyrian king of legendary sensuality.
10
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public life. But even this appears to be somewhat deficient as an end, because the possession
of goodness is thought to be compatible even with being asleep, or with leading a life of
inactivity, and also with incurring the most atrocious suffering and misfortune; and nobody
would call such a life happy - unless he was defending a paradox.16 So much for these views:
they have been fully treated in current discussions.17 The third type of life is the
contemplative, and this we shall examine later.’
As for the life of the business man, it does not give him much freedom of action. Besides,
wealth is obviously not the good that we are seeking, because it serves only as a means; i.e.
for getting something else. Hence the earlier suggestions might be supposed to be more likely
ends, because they are appreciated on their own account; but evidently they too are
inadequate, and many attacks on them have been published.18
What is the Good for man? It must be the ultimate end or object of human life: something that
is in itself completely satisfying. Happiness fits this description.
vii. Let us now turn back again to the good which is the object of our search, and ask what it
can possibly be; because it appears to vary with the action or art. It is one thing in medicine
and another in strategy, and similarly in all the other sciences. What, then, is the good of each
particular one? Surely it is that for the sake of which everything else is done. In medicine this
is health; in strategy, victory; in architecture, a building - different things in different arts, but
in every action and pursuit it is the end, since it is for the sake of this that everything else is
done. Consequently if there is any one thing that is the end of all actions, this will be the
practical good - or goods, if there are more than one. Thus while changing its ground the
argument has reached the same conclusion as before.19
We must try, however, to make our meaning still clearer. Since there are evidently more ends
than one, and of these we choose some (e.g. wealth or musical instruments or tools generally)
as means to something else, it is clear that not all of them are final ends, whereas the supreme
good is obviously something final. So if there is only one final end, this will be the good of
which we are in search; and if there are more than one, it will be the most final of these. Now
we call an object pursued for its own sake more final than one pursued because of something
else, and one which is never choosable because of another more final than those which are
choosable because of it as well as for their own sakes; and that which is always choosable for
its own sake and never because of something else we call final without any qualification.
Well, happiness more than anything else is thought to be just such an end, because we always
choose it for itself, and never for any other reason. It is different with honour, pleasure,
intelligence and good qualities20 generally. We do choose them partly for themselves
(because we should choose each one of them irrespectively of any consequences); but we
choose them also for the sake of our happiness, in the belief that they will be instrumental in
promoting it. On the other hand nobody chooses happiness for their sake, or in general for
any other reason.
16
A thesis, i.e. a paradoxical generalization by a leading philosopher; cf Topics 104b19ff., where
examples are quoted. [DV: Note that the ‘paradox’ or ‘thesis’ criticised here by Aristotle is very
similar to the claim that drew Callicles into the argument with Socrates in the Gorgias.
17
Apparently at a popular level.
18
In Book X.
19
In the first two chapters.
20
Or ‘virtues’.
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Aristotle Ethics
The same conclusion seems to follow from another consideration. It is a generally accepted
view that the perfect good is self-sufficient. By self-sufficient we mean not what is sufficient
for oneself alone living a solitary life,21 but something that includes parents, wife and
children, friends and fellow-citizens in general; for man is by nature a social being. (We must
set some limit to these, for if we extend the application to grandparents and grandchildren and
friends of friends it will proceed to infinity; but we must consider this point later.22) A selfsufficient thing, then, we take to be one which by itself makes life desirable’ and in no way
deficient; and we believe that happiness is such a thing. What is more, we regard it as the
most desirable of all things, not reckoned as one item among many; if it were so reckoned,
happiness would obviously be more desirable23 by the addition of even the least good,
because the addition makes the sum of goods greater, and the greater of two goods is always
more desirable. Happiness, then, is found to be something perfect and self-sufficient, being
the end to which our actions are directed.
But what is happiness? If we consider what the function of man is, we find that happiness is a
virtuous activity of the soul.
But presumably to say that happiness is the supreme good seems a platitude, and some more
distinctive account of it is still required. This might perhaps be achieved by grasping what is
the function of man. If we take a flautist24 or a sculptor or any artist - or in general any class
of men who have a specific function or activity - his goodness and proficiency is considered
to lie in the performance of that function; and the same will be true of man, assuming that
man has a function. But is it likely that whereas joiners and shoemakers have certain
functions or activities, man as such has none, but has been left by nature a functionless being?
Just as we can see that eye and hand and foot and every one of our members has some
function, should we not assume that in like manner a human being has a function over and
above these particular functions? What, then, can this possibly be? Clearly life is a thing
shared also by plants, and we are looking for man’s proper function; so we must exclude
from our definition the life that consists in nutrition and growth. Next in order would be a sort
of sentient life; but this too we see is shared by horses and cattle and animals of all kinds.
There remains, then, a practical life of the rational part. As this life also has two meanings,
we must lay down that we intend here life determined by activity, because this is accepted as
the stricter sense.25 Now if the function of man is an activity of the soul in accordance with,
or implying, a rational principle; and if we hold that the function of an individual and of a
good individual of the same kind - e.g. of a harpist and of a good harpist, and so on generally
– is generically the same, the latter’s distinctive excellence being attached to the name of the
function (because the function of the harpist is. to play the harp, but that of the good harpist is
to play it well); and if we assume that the function of man is a kind of life, viz., an activity or
series of actions of the soul, implying a rational principle; and if the function of a good man
is to perform these well and rightly; and if every function is performed well when performed
in accordance with its proper excellence: if all this is so, the conclusion is that the good for
man is an activity of soul in accordance with virtue, or if there are more kinds of virtue than
one, in accordance with the best and most perfect kind.
21
The Greek word (autarkis) normally carries the sense of independence.
In chs. ix and x, and in Book IX. ch. x.
23
Here and in the following lines the meaning is really ‘choosable’, hairetos.
24
The Greek aulos was not a flute but a reed instrument.
25
The other being life as a state, implying no more than the possession of reason.
22
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There is a further qualification: in a complete lifetime. One swallow does not make a
summer; neither does one day. Similarly neither can one day, or a brief space of time, make a
man blessed26 and happy.
This sketch can be elaborated later, but great precision is not to be expected
This may stand as an outline account of the Good; for presumably we should first rough out a
sketch and then fill in the details afterwards. When the outline has been satisfactorily drawn,
it may be supposed that anybody can carry on the work and fill in the detail; 27 and that in
such a case time is a good source of invention or cooperation. In fact this is how progress in
the arts has been made; for anyone can fill in the gaps. But we must still remember the
caution given above, and not look for the same degree of exactness in all our studies, but only
for as much as the subject-matter in each case allows, and so far as is appropriate to the
investigation. For example, a carpenter’s interest in the right angle is different from a
geometrician’s: the former is concerned with it only so far as it is useful for his work, but the
other wants to know what it is or what its properties are, because his gaze is set on the truth.
We ought to follow this procedure in other studies as well, in order to prevent the swamping
of main by side issues.
We must not even demand to know the explanation in all cases alike; there are some in which
it is quite enough if the fact itself is exhibited, e.g. in the case of first principles; the fact is
primary and a starting-point.28 Some starting points are grasped by induction, some by
perception,29 some by a kind of habituation, others in other ways. We must try to investigate
each type in accordance with its nature. We must also make a point of formulating them
correctly, because they have a great importance for the understanding of what follows. By
common consent the beginning is more than half the whole task,30 and throws a flood of light
on many of the aspects of the inquiry.
Our view of happiness is supported by popular beliefs
viii. We must examine our principle not only as reached logically, from a conclusion and
premisses, but also in the light of what is commonly said about it; because if a statement is
true all the data are in harmony with it, while if it is false they soon reveal a discrepancy.
Now goods have been classified31 under three heads, as (a) external, (b) of the soul, and (c) of
the body. Of these we say that goods of the soul are good in the strictest and fullest sense, and
we rank actions and activities of soul as goods of the soul; so that according to this view,
which is of long standing and accepted by philosophers, our definition will be correct. We are
right, too, in saying that the end consists in certain actions or activities, because this puts it
among goods of the soul and not among external goods. Our definition is also supported by
the belief that the happy man lives and fares well; because what we have described is
26
makarios
The metaphor is taken from architecture or large-scale sculpture, in which the master supplies only
the overall design.
28
The same Greek word arche means ‘beginning’ or ‘starting-point’ and ‘first principle’. In every
science a first principle is primary because it is the cause or ground of all that follows from it, while
being itself indemonstrable because there is no higher principle to which it can be referred.
29
aisthesis usually means ‘sensation’, but it can, and probably does here convey the sense of direct
perception or intuition, which perceives the truth immediately.
30
The phrase is proverbial.
31
By Plato: Euthydemus 279A-B, Philebus 48E, Laws 743E.
27
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virtually a kind of good life or prosperity.32 Again, our definition seems to include all the
required constituents of happiness; for some think that it is virtue, others prudence, 33 and
others wisdom;34 others that it is these, or one of these, with the addition of pleasure, or not in
total separation from it; and others further include favourable external conditions. Some of
these views are popular beliefs of long standing; others are those of a few distinguished men.
It is reasonable to suppose that neither group is entirely mistaken, but is right in some respect,
or even in most.
Now our definition is in harmony with those who say that happiness is virtue, or a particular
virtue; because an activity in accordance with virtue implies virtue. But presumably it makes
no little difference whether we think of the supreme good as consisting in the possession or in
the exercise of virtue: in a state of mind or in an activity. For it is possible for the state to be
present in a person without effecting any good result (e.g. if he is asleep or quiescent in some
other way), but not for the activity: he will necessarily act, and act well. Just as at the
Olympic Games it is not the best-looking or the strongest men present that are crowned with
wreaths, but the competitors (because it is from them that the winners come), so it is those
who act that rightly win the honours and rewards in life.
Moreover, the life of such people is in itself pleasant. For pleasure is an experience of the
soul,35 and each individual finds pleasure in that of which he is said to be fond. For example,
a horse gives pleasure to one who is fond of horses, and a spectacle to one who is fond of
sight-seeing. In the same way just acts give pleasure to a lover of justice, and virtuous
conduct generally to the lover of virtue. Now most people find that the things which give
them pleasure conflict, because they are not pleasant by nature; but lovers of beauty find
pleasure in things that are pleasant by nature, and virtuous actions are of this kind, so that
they are pleasant not only to this type of person but also in themselves. So their life does not
need to have pleasure attached to it as a sort of accessory, but contains its own pleasure in
itself Indeed, we may go further and assert that anyone who does not delight in fine actions is
not even a good man; for nobody would say that a man is just unless he enjoys acting justly,
nor liberal unless he enjoys liberal actions, and similarly in all the other cases. If this is so,
virtuous actions must be pleasurable in themselves. What is more, they are both good and
fine, and each in the highest degree, assuming that the good man is right in his judgement of
them; and his judgement is as we have described.36 So happiness is the best, the finest, the
most pleasurable thing of all; and these qualities are not separated as the inscription at
Delos37 suggests:
justice is loveliest, and health is best,
But sweetest to obtain is heart’s desire.
All these attributes belong to the best activities; and it is these, or the one that is best of them,
that we identify with happiness.
The Greek phrase can mean ‘acting well’ or ‘faring well’.
phronesis: see Glossary.
34
sophia: see Glossary.
35
Of the conscious self.
36
In the preceding lines.
37
On the entrance to the temple of Leto. The lines (which are quoted at the beginning of the
Eudemian Ethics) are also found, slightly altered, in Theognis 225f., and paraphrased in Sophocles
(Creusa), fr. 326. [DECV: Delos is an Aegean island which was significant for a shrine to Apollo
which was second in importance only to the Oracle at Delphi.]
32
33
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Nevertheless it seems clear that happiness needs the addition of external goods, as we have
said; for it is difficult if not impossible to do fine deeds without any resources. Many can only
be done by the help of friends, or wealth, or political influence. There are also certain advantages, such as good ancestry or good children, or personal beauty, the lack of which mars our
felicity; for a man is scarcely happy if he is very ugly to look at, or of low birth, or solitary
and childless; and presumably even less so if he has children or friends who are quite
worthless, or if he had good ones who are now dead. So, as we said, happiness seems to
require this sort of prosperity too; which is why some identify it with good fortune, although
others identify it with virtue.
How is happiness acquired?
ix. From this springs another problem. Is happiness something that can be learnt, or acquired
by habituation, or cultivated in some other way, or does it come to us by a sort of divine
dispensation, or even by chance? Well, in the first place, if anything is a gift of the gods to
men, it is reasonable that happiness should be such a gift, especially since of all human
possessions it is the best. This point, however, would perhaps be considered more
appropriately by another branch of study.38 Yet even if happiness is not sent by a divine
power, but is acquired by moral goodness and by some kind of study or training, it seems
clearly to be one of our most divine possessions; for the crown and end of goodness is surely
of all things the best: something divine and blissful. Also on this view39 happiness will be
something widely shared; for it can attach, through some form of study or application, to
anyone who is not handicapped by some incapacity for goodness. And, assuming that it is
better to win happiness by the means described than by chance, it is reasonable that this
should in fact be so, since it is natural for nature’s effects to be the finest possible, and
similarly for the effects of art and of any other cause,40 especially those of the best kind.41
That the most important and finest thing of all should be left to chance would be a gross
disharmony.
The problem also receives some light from our definition, for in it happiness has been
described as a kind of virtuous activity of soul; whereas all the other goods either are
necessary preconditions of happiness or naturally contribute to it and serve as its instruments.
This will agree with what we said at the outset:’ we suggested that the end of political science
is the highest good; and the chief concern of this science is to endue the citizens with certain
qualities, namely virtue and the readiness to do fine deeds. Naturally, therefore, we do not
speak of an ox or a horse or any other animal as happy, because none of them can take part in
this sort of activity. For the same reason no child is happy either, because its age debars it as
yet from such activities; if children are so described, it is by way of congratulation on their
future promise. For, as we said above, happiness demands not only complete goodness but a
complete life. In the course of life we encounter many reverses and all kinds of vicissitudes,
and in old age even the most prosperous of men may be involved in great misfortunes, as we
are told about Priam in the Trojan poems.42 Nobody calls happy a man who suffered fortunes
like his and met a miserable end.
i.e. what A. calls ‘first philosophy’: a combination of theology and metaphysics.
That it is acquired by human effort.
40
i.e. efficient cause.
41
Of cause, viz. mind or intelligence.
42
i.e. the epics about the Trojan War; cf. Iliad xxii. 37-78, xxiv. 160ff., and for the account of Priam’s death
(derived from the lost Iliu Persis) Virgil, Aeneid ii. 506-58. (Appendix V)
38
39
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Book X
Recapitulation: the nature of happiness
vi. Now that we have finished our discussion of the virtues, of friendship, and of pleasures, it
remains for us to give an outline account of happiness, since we hold it to be the end of
human conduct. It may make our treatment of the subject more concise if we recapitulate
what has been said already.
We said, then, that happiness is not a state, since if it were it might belong even to a man who
slept all through his life, passing a vegetable existence; or to a victim of the greatest
misfortunes. So if this is unacceptable, and we ought rather to refer happiness to some
activity, as we said earlier; and if activities are either necessary and to be chosen for the sake
of something else, or to be chosen for themselves: clearly we must class happiness as one of
those to be chosen for themselves, and not as one of the other kind, because it does not need
anything else: it is self sufficient. The activities that are to be chosen for themselves are those
from which nothing is required beyond the exercise of the activity; and such a description is
thought to fit actions that accord with goodness; because the doing of fine and good actions is
one of the things that are to be chosen for themselves.
Happiness must be distinguished from amusement
Pleasant amusements are also thought to belong to this class, because they are not chosen as
means to something else: in fact their effects are more harmful than beneficial, since they
make people neglect their bodies and their property. However, most of those who are
regarded as happy have recourse to such occupations, and that is why those who show some
dexterity in them are highly esteemed at the courts of tyrants; they make themselves
agreeable by providing the sort of entertainment that their patrons want, and such persons are
in demand. So these amusements are thought to be conducive to happiness, because men in
positions of power devote their leisure to them. But what people of this kind do is probably
no evidence, because virtue and intelligence, which are the sources of serious activities, do
not depend upon positions of power; and if these persons, never having tasted pure and
refined pleasure, have recourse to physical pleasures, that is no reason why the latter should
be regarded as worthier of choice. Children, too, believe that the things they prize are the
most important; so it is natural that just as different things seem valuable to children and
adults, so they should seem different also to good and bad men. Thus, as we have often said,
it is the things that seem valuable and pleasant to the good man that are really such. But to
each individual it is the activity in accordance with his own disposition that is most desirable,
and therefore to the good man virtuous activity is most desirable. It follows that happiness
does not consist in amusement. Indeed it would be paradoxical if the end were amusement; if
we toiled and suffered all our lives long to amuse ourselves. For we choose practically everything for the sake of something else, except happiness, because it is the end. To spend effort
and toil for the sake of amusement seems silly and unduly childish; but on the other hand the
maxim of Anacharsis,43 ‘Play to work harder’, seems to be on the right lines, because
amusement is a form of relaxation, and people need relaxation because they cannot exert
themselves continuously. Therefore relaxation is not an end, because it is taken for the sake
of the activity. But the happy life seems to be lived in accordance with goodness, and such a
43
A Scythian sage who visited Greece in the early sixth century, and to whom a number of maxims
were attributed. [DV: Scythians were a semi-nomadic people to the North, inhabitants of what is now
Russia.]
11
Aristotle Ethics
life implies seriousness and does not consist in amusing oneself. Also we maintain that
serious things are better than those that are merely comical and amusing, and that the activity
of a man, or part of a man, is always more serious in proportion as it is better. Therefore the
activity of the better part is superior, and eo ipso more conducive to happiness.
Anybody can enjoy bodily pleasures - a slave no less than the best of men - but nobody
attributes a part in happiness to a slave, unless he also attributes to him a life of his own. 44
Therefore happiness does not consist in occupations of this kind, but in activities in
accordance with virtue, as we have said before.
Happiness and contemplation
vii. If happiness is an activity in accordance with virtue, it is reasonable to assume that it is in
accordance with the highest virtue, and this will be the virtue of the best part of us. Whether
this is the intellect or something else that we regard as naturally ruling and guiding us, and
possessing insight into things noble and divine – either as being actually divine itself or as
being more divine than any other part of us – it is the activity of this part, in accordance with
the virtue proper to it, that will be perfect happiness.
We have already said that it is a contemplative activity. This may be regarded as consonant
both with our earlier arguments and with the truth. For contemplation is both the highest form
of activity (since the intellect is the highest thing in us, and the objects that it apprehends are
the highest things that can be known), and also it is the most continuous, because we are
more capable of continuous contemplation than we are of any practical activity. Also we
assume that happiness must contain an admixture of pleasure; now activity in accordance
with philosophic wisdom is admittedly the most pleasant of the virtuous activities; at any rate
philosophy is held to entail pleasures that are marvellous in purity and permanence; and it
stands to reason that those who possess knowledge pass their time more pleasantly than those
who are still in pursuit of it. Again, the quality that we call self-sufficiency will belong in the
highest degree to the contemplative activity. The wise man, no less than the just one and all
the rest, requires the necessaries of life; but, given an adequate supply of these, the just man
also needs people with and towards whom he can perform just actions, and similarly with the
temperate man, the brave man, and each of the others; but the wise man can practise
contemplation by himself, and the wiser he is, the more he can do it. No doubt he does it
better with the help of fellow-workers; but for all that he is the most self-sufficient of men.
Again, contemplation would seem to be the only activity that is appreciated for its own sake;
because nothing is gained from it except the act of contemplation, whereas from practical
activities we expect to gain something more or less over and above the action.
Since happiness is thought to imply leisure, it must be an intellectual, not a practical activity
Also it is commonly believed that happiness depends on leisure; because we occupy
ourselves so that we may have leisure, just as we make war in order that we may live at
peace. Now the exercise of the practical virtues takes place in politics or in warfare, and these
professions seem to have no place for leisure. This is certainly true of the military profession,
for nobody chooses to make war or provokes it for the sake of making war; a man would be
regarded as a bloodthirsty monster if he made his friends45 into enemies in order to bring
about battles and slaughter. The politician’s profession also makes leisure impossible, since
besides the business of politics it aims at securing positions of power and honour, or the
44
45
Which he does not; cf. Politics I 280a32.
i.e. friendly states (cf. I 157a26).
12
Aristotle Ethics
happiness of the politician himself and of his fellow-citizens - a happiness separate from
politics, and one which we clearly pursue as separate.
If, then, politics and warfare, although pre-eminent in nobility and grandeur among practical
activities in accordance with goodness, are incompatible with leisure and, not being desirable
in themselves, are directed towards some other end, whereas the activity of the intellect is
considered to excel46 in seriousness, taking as it does the form of contemplation, and to aim at
no other end beyond itself, and to possess a pleasure peculiar to itself, which intensifies its
activity; and if it is evident that self-sufficiency and leisuredness and such freedom from
fatigue as is humanly possible, together with all the other attributes assigned to the supremely
happy man, are those that accord with this activity; then this activity will be the perfect
happiness for man - provided that it is allowed a full span of life; for nothing that pertains to
happiness is incomplete.
Life on this plane is not too high for the divine element
But such a life will be too high for human attainment; for any man who lives it will do so not
as a human being but in virtue of something divine within him, and in proportion as this
divine element is superior to the composite being,47 so will its activity be superior to that of
the other kind of virtue.48 So if the intellect is divine compared with man, the life of the
intellect must be divine compared with the life of a human being. And we ought not to listen
to those who warn us that ‘man should think the thoughts of man’, or ‘mortal thoughts fit
mortal minds’;49 but we ought, so far as in us lies, to put on immortality, and do all that we
can to, live in conformity with the highest that is in us; for even if it is small in bulk, in power
and preciousness it far excels all the rest. Indeed it would seem that this is the true self of the
individual, since it is the authoritative and better part of him; so it would be an odd thing if a
man chose to live someone else’s life instead of his own. Moreover what we said above will
apply here too: that what is best and most pleasant for any given creature-is that which is
proper to it. Therefore for man, too, the best and most pleasant life is the life of the intellect,
since the intellect is in the fullest sense the man. So this life will also be the happiest.
46
To excel other leisured occupations.
Probably composite soul, although the word (suntheton) is generally used of the composite whole
consisting of soul and body.
48
Moral virtue.
49
Cf. Rhetoric 1394b24, Pindar, Isthmians v.20; similar maxims are common in the Greek dramatists.
47
13
Epicurus Letter to Menoeceus
Epicurus
LETTER TO MENOECEUS
Epicurus to Menoeceus, greetings:
Let no one be slow to seek wisdom when he is young nor weary in the search of it when he
has grown old. For no age is too early or too late for the health of the soul. And to say that the
season for studying philosophy has not yet come, or that it is past and gone, is like saying that
the season for happiness is not yet or that it is now no more. Therefore, both old and young
alike ought to seek wisdom, the former in order that, as age comes over him, he may be
young in good things because of the grace of what has been, and the latter in order that, while
he is young, he may at the same time be old, because he has no fear of the things which are to
come. So we must exercise ourselves in the things which bring happiness, since, if that be
present, we have everything, and, if that be absent, all our actions are directed towards
attaining it.
Those things which without ceasing I have declared unto you, do them, and exercise yourself
in them, holding them to be the elements of right life. First believe that God is a living being
immortal and blessed, according to the notion of a god indicated by the common sense of
mankind; and so believing, you shall not affirm of him anything that is foreign to his
immortality or that is repugnant to his blessedness. Believe about him whatever may uphold
both his blessedness and his immortality. For there are gods, and the knowledge of them is
manifest; but they are not such as the multitude believe, seeing that men do not steadfastly
maintain the notions they form respecting them. Not the man who denies the gods
worshipped by the multitude, but he who affirms of the gods what the multitude believes
about them is truly impious. For the utterances of the multitude about the gods are not true
preconceptions but false assumptions; hence it is that the greatest evils happen to the wicked
and the greatest blessings happen to the good from the hand of the gods, seeing that they are
always favourable to their own good qualities and take pleasure in men like themselves, but
reject as alien whatever is not of their kind.
Accustom yourself to believing that death is nothing to us, for good and evil imply the
capacity for sensation, and death is the privation of all sentience; therefore a correct
understanding that death is nothing to us makes the mortality of life enjoyable, not by adding
to life a limitless time, but by taking away the yearning after immortality. For life has no
terrors for him who has thoroughly understood that there are no terrors for him in ceasing to
live. Foolish, therefore, is the man who says that he fears death, not because it will pain when
it comes, but because it pains in the prospect. Whatever causes no annoyance when it is
present, causes only a groundless pain in the expectation. Death, therefore, the most awful of
evils, is nothing to us, seeing that, when we are, death is not come, and, when death is come,
we are not. It is nothing, then, either to the living or to the dead, for with the living it is not
and the dead exist no longer.
But in the world, at one time men shun death as the greatest of all evils, and at another time
choose it as a respite from the evils in life. The wise man does not deprecate life nor does he
fear the cessation of life. The thought of life is no offence to him, nor is the cessation of life
regarded as an evil. And even as men choose of food not merely and simply the larger
portion, but the more pleasant, so the wise seek to enjoy the time which is most pleasant and
not merely that which is longest. And he who admonishes the young to live well and the old
to make a good end speaks foolishly, not merely because of the desirability of life, but
14
Epicurus Letter to Menoeceus
because the same exercise at once teaches to live well and to die well. Much worse is he who
says that it were good not to be born, but when once one is born to pass quickly through the
gates of Hades. For if he truly believes this, why does he not depart from life? It would be
easy for him to do so once he were firmly convinced. If he speaks only in jest, his words are
foolishness as those who hear him do not believe. We must remember that the future is
neither wholly ours nor wholly not ours, so that neither must we count upon it as quite certain
to come nor despair of it as quite certain not to come.
We must also reflect that of desires some are natural, others are groundless; and that of the
natural some are necessary as well as natural, and some natural only. And of the necessary
desires some are necessary if we are to be happy, some if the body is to be rid of uneasiness,
some if we are even to live. He who has a clear and certain understanding of these things will
direct every preference and aversion toward securing health of body and tranquillity of mind,
seeing that this is the sum and end of a blessed life. For the end of all our actions is to be free
from pain and fear, and, when once we have attained all this, the tempest of the soul is laid;
seeing that the living creature has no need to go in search of something that is lacking, nor to
look for anything else by which the good of the soul and of the body will be fulfilled. When
we are pained because of the absence of pleasure, then, and then only, do we feel the need of
pleasure. Wherefore we call pleasure the alpha and omega of a blessed life. Pleasure is our
first and kindred good. It is the starting-point of every choice and of every aversion, and to it
we come back, inasmuch as we make feeling the rule by which to judge of every good thing.
And since pleasure is our first and native good, for that reason we do not choose every
pleasure whatsoever, but will often pass over many pleasures when a greater annoyance
ensues from them. And often we consider pains superior to pleasures when submission to the
pains for a long time brings us as a consequence a greater pleasure. While therefore all
pleasure because it is naturally akin to us is good, not all pleasure is should be chosen, just as
all pain is an evil and yet not all pain is to be shunned. It is, however, by measuring one
against another, and by looking at the conveniences and inconveniences, that all these matters
must be judged. Sometimes we treat the good as an evil, and the evil, on the contrary, as a
good.
Again, we regard independence of outward things as a great good, not so as in all cases to use
little, but so as to be contented with little if we have not much, being honestly persuaded that
they have the sweetest enjoyment of luxury who stand least in need of it, and that whatever is
natural is easily procured and only the vain and worthless hard to win. Plain fare gives as
much pleasure as a costly diet, when once the pain of want has been removed, while bread
and water confer the highest possible pleasure when they are brought to hungry lips. To
habituate one’s self, therefore, to simple and inexpensive diet supplies all that is needful for
health, and enables a man to meet the necessary requirements of life without shrinking, and it
places us in a better condition when we approach at intervals a costly fare and renders us
fearless of fortune.
When we say, then, that pleasure is the end and aim, we do not mean the pleasures of the
prodigal or the pleasures of sensuality, as we are understood to do by some through
ignorance, prejudice, or willful misrepresentation. By pleasure we mean the absence of pain
in the body and of trouble in the soul. It is not an unbroken succession of drinking-bouts and
of revelry, not sexual lust, not the enjoyment of the fish and other delicacies of a luxurious
table, which produce a pleasant life; it is sober reasoning, searching out the grounds of every
choice and avoidance, and banishing those beliefs through which the greatest tumults take
15
Epicurus Letter to Menoeceus
possession of the soul. Of all this, the beginning and the greatest good is wisdom. Therefore
wisdom is a more precious thing even than philosophy; from it spring all the other virtues, for
it teaches that we cannot live pleasantly without living wisely, honourably, and justly; nor
live wisely, honourably, and justly without living pleasantly. For the virtues have grown into
one with a pleasant life, and a pleasant life is inseparable from them. Who, then, is superior in
your judgment to such a man? He holds a holy belief concerning the gods, and is altogether
free from the fear of death. He has diligently considered the end fixed by nature, and
understands how easily the limit of good things can be reached and attained, and how either
the duration or the intensity of evils is but slight. Fate, which some introduce as sovereign
over all things, he scorns, affirming rather that some things happen of necessity, others by
chance, others through our own agency. For he sees that necessity destroys responsibility and
that chance is inconstant; whereas our own actions are autonomous, and it is to them that
praise and blame naturally attach. It were better, indeed, to accept the legends of the gods
than to bow beneath that yoke of destiny which the natural philosophers have imposed. The
one holds out some faint hope that we may escape if we honour the gods, while the necessity
of the naturalists is deaf to all entreaties. Nor does he hold chance to be a god, as the world in
general does, for in the acts of a god there is no disorder; nor to be a cause, though an
uncertain one, for he believes that no good or evil is dispensed by chance to men so as to
make life blessed, though it supplies the starting-point of great good and great evil. He
believes that the misfortune of the wise is better than the prosperity of the fool. It is better, in
short, that what is well judged in action should not owe its successful issue to the aid of
chance. Exercise yourself in these and related precepts day and night, both by yourself and
with one who is like-minded; then never, either in waking or in dream, will you be disturbed,
but will live as a god among men. For man loses all semblance of mortality by living in the
midst of immortal blessings.
16
Cicero De Finibus
Marcus Tullius Cicero
DE FINIBUS (On Ends or Goals)
[Extracts drawn from B. Inwood and C. P. Gerson, Hellenistic Philosophy, second edition. Hackett Publishing,
1997.]
Cicero On Goals 3.16 – 34
16. The school whose views I follow [a Stoic speaks – Cato] holds that every animal, as soon
as it is born (for this should be our starting point), is congenial to itself and inclined to
preserve itself and its constitution, and to like those things which preserve that constitution;
but it finds uncongenial its own death and those things which seem to threaten it. They
confirm this by [noting] that before pleasure or pain can affect them, babies seek what is
salutary and spurn what is not, and this would not happen unless they loved their constitution
and feared death. They could not, however, desire anything unless they had a perception of
themselves and consequently loved themselves. From this one ought to see that the principle
[of human action] is derived from self-love. 17. Most Stoics do not think that pleasure should
be classed among the primary natural things; and I strongly agree with them, for fear that, if
nature seemed to have classed pleasure among the primary objects of impulse, then many
shameful consequences would follow. It seems, however, to be a sufficient argument as to
why we love those things which were first accepted because of nature (to say) that there is no
one (when he has a choice) who would not prefer to have all the parts of his body in a sound
condition to having them dwarfed or twisted, though equally useful.
They think, moreover, that acts of cognition (which we may call grasps or perceptions or, if
these terms are either displeasing or harder to understand, katalepseis) are, then, to be
accepted for their own sake, since they have in themselves something which as it were
includes and contains the truth. And this can be seen in babies, who, we see, are delighted if
they figure something out for themselves, even if it does not do them any good. 18. We also
think that the crafts are to be taken for their own sake, both because there is in them
something worth taking and also because these consist of acts of cognition and contain
something which is rational and methodical. They think, though, that we find false assent
more uncongenial than anything else which is contrary to nature....
20. Let us move on, then, since we began from these natural principles and what follows
should be consistent with them. There follows this primary division: them, say that what has
value (we are to call it that, I think) is that which is either itself in accordance with nature or
productive of it, so that it is worthy of selection because it has a certain ‘weight’ which is
worth valuing (and this value they call axia); by contrast, what is opposite to the above is
disvalued. The starting point being, then, so constituted that what is natural is to be taken for
its own sake and what is unnatural is to be rejected, the first appropriate action (for that is
what I call kathekon) is that it should preserve itself in its natural constitution; and then that it
should retain what is according to nature and reject what is contrary to nature. After this
[pattern of] selection and rejection is discovered, there then follows appropriate selection, and
then constant [appropriate] selection, and finally [selection] which is stable and in agreement
with nature; and here for the first time we begin to have and to understand something which
can truly be called good. 21. For man’s first sense of congeniality is to what is according to
nature; but as soon as he gets an understanding, or rather a conception (which they call an
ennoia) and sees the ordering and, I might say, concord of things which are to be done, he
then values that more highly than all those things which he loved in the beginning, and he
17
Cicero De Finibus
comes to a conclusion by intelligence and reasoning, with the result that he decides that this
is what the highest good for man consists in, which is to be praised and chosen for its own
sake. And since it is placed in what the Stoics call homologia, let us call it agreement, if you
please. Since, therefore, this constitutes the good, to which all things are to be referred,
honourable actions and the honourable itself – which is considered to be the only good –
although it arises later [in our lives], nevertheless it is the only thing which is to be chosen in
virtue of its own character and value; but none of the primary natural things is to be chosen
for its own sake. 22. Since, however, those things which I called appropriate actions proceed
from the starting points [established] by nature, it is necessary that they be referred to them;
so it is right to say all appropriate actions are referred to acquisition of the natural principles,
not however in the sense that this is the highest good, since honourable action is not among
the primarily and naturally congenial things. That, as I said, is posterior and arises later. But
[such action) is natural and encourages us to choose it much earlier than all the earlier
mentioned things.
But here one must first remove a misunderstanding, so that no one might think that there are
two highest goods. For just as, if it is someone’s purpose to direct a spear or arrow at
something, we say that his highest goal is to do everything he can in order to direct it at [the
target], in the same sense that we say that our highest goal is a good. The archer in this
comparison is to do all that he can to direct [his arrow at the target]; and yet doing all that he
can to attain his purpose would be like the highest goal of the sort which we say is the highest
good in life; actually striking [the target], though, is as it were to be selected and not to be
chosen.
23. Since all appropriate actions proceed from the natural principles, it is necessary that
wisdom itself proceed from them as well. But just as it often happens that he who is
introduced to someone puts a higher value on the man to whom he is introduced than on the
man by whom he was introduced, just so it is in no way surprising that we are first introduced
to wisdom by the starting points [established] by nature, but that later on wisdom itself
becomes dearer to us than the things which brought us to wisdom. And just as our limbs were
given us in such a way that they seem to have been given for the sake of a certain way of life,
similarly the impulse in our soul, which is called horme in Greek, seems not to have been
given for the sake of any old type of life but for a certain kind of living; and similarly for
reason and perfected reason.
24. Just as an actor or dancer has not been assigned just any old [type of delivery or
movement but rather a certain definite [type], so too life is to be lived in a certain definite
manner, not in any old [manner]. And we call that manner ‘in agreement’ and consonant. And
we do not think that wisdom is like navigation or medicine, but rather like the craft of acting
or dancing which I just mentioned; thus its goal, i.e., the [proper] execution of the craft,
depends on it itself and is not sought outside itself. There is also another point of dissimilarity
between wisdom and these crafts, viz. that in them proper actions do not contain all the
components [lit. parts] which constitute the art; but things called ‘right’ or ‘rightly done’, if I
may call them that, though the Greeks call them katorthomata [morally perfect actions],
contain all the features of virtue. Only wisdom is totally self-contained, and this is not the
case with the other crafts.
25. But it is misguided to compare the highest goal of medicine or navigation with that of
wisdom; for wisdom embraces magnanimity and justice and an ability to judge that
everything which happens to a [mere] human being is beneath it – and this does not apply to
18
Cicero De Finibus
the rest of the crafts. But no one can possess the very virtues which I just mentioned unless he
has firmly decided that there is nothing except what is honourable or shameful which makes a
difference or distinguishes one [thing or situation] from another.
26. Let us now see how splendidly, these further points follow from what we have already
expounded. So, since the goal is to live consistently and in agreement with nature, it follows
necessarily that all wise men always live happy, perfect and fortunate lives, that they are
impeded by nothing, hindered by nothing and in need of nothing. The key not only to the
doctrines of which I am speaking, but also to our life and fortune is that we should judge that
only what is honourable is good. This point can be elaborated and developed fully and
copiously, with all the choicest words and profoundest sentiments which rhetorical art can
produce; but I prefer the short and pointed syllogisms of the Stoics.
29. What? Could anyone deny that we could never have a man who is of steadfast and
reliable spirit, a man you could call brave, unless it is firmly established that pain is not a bad
thing? For just as someone who regards death as a bad thing cannot help but fear it, in the
same way, no one can be indifferent to and despise something which he regards as bad. Once
this point is established and assented to, our next premiss is that magnanimous and stronghearted men are able to despise and ignore everything which fortune can bring to bear against
man. Consequently, it is proven that there is nothing bad which is not also shameful.
But the man we refer to is lofty and superior, magnanimous, truly brave, looks down on all
merely human concerns; the man, I say, whom we wish to produce, whom we are looking for,
should certainly have faith in himself and his life, both past and future, and should think well
of himself, believing that nothing bad can happen to a wise man. And from this one can again
prove the same old point, that only the honourable is good, i.e., that to live happily is to live
honourably, i.e., virtuously.
30. I am not unaware that there is a variety of views held by philosophers, by which I mean
those who place the highest good, which I call the goal, in the mind. Even though some of
them have gone wrong, still I prefer them, whatever their views, who locate the highest good
in the mind and virtue, to those three who have separated the highest good from virtue by
placing either pleasure or freedom from pain or the primary natural things among the highest
goods; I even prefer them to the other three who thought that virtue would be deficient
without some addition and so added to it one or other of the three things mentioned above.
31. But those who think that the highest good is to live with knowledge and who claim that
things are absolutely indifferent and that this was why the wise man would be happy, because
he did not prefer one thing to any other in even the slightest degree – they are particularly
absurd; so too are those who, as certain Academics are said to have held, believe that the
highest good and greatest duty of the wise man is to resist his presentations and steadfastly to
withhold his assent. Normally one gives a full answer to each of these views separately. But
there is no need to prolong what is perfectly clear; and what is more obvious than that the
very prudence which we are seeking and praising would he utterly destroyed if there were no
grounds for choosing between those which are contrary to nature and those which are
according to nature. When we eliminate, therefore, those views I have mentioned and those
which are similar to them, all that is left is [the view] that the highest good is to live by
making use of a knowledge of what happens naturally, selecting what is according to nature
and rejecting what is contrary to nature, i.e., to live consistently and in agreement with nature.
32. When in the other crafts something is said to be craftsmanlike, one must suppose that
what is meant is something which is, in a way posterior and consequent, which they [the
19
Cicero De Finibus
Greeks] call epigennematikon [supervenient]; but when we say that something is done wisely
we mean that it is from the outset thoroughly right. For whatever is undertaken by a wise man
must immediately be complete in all its parts; for it is in this that we find what we call that
which is worth choosing. For just as it is a [moral] mistake to betray one’s country, to attack
one’s parents, to rob temples (and these are [moral] mistakes because of the outcome [of the
action]), so too it is a [moral] mistake to fear, to grieve, and to suffer desire, even quite
independently of their outcome. Rather, just as the latter are not dependent on their posterior
consequences, but are [moral] mistakes right from the outset, similarly the actions which
proceed from virtue are to be judged to be right from the outset and not by their ultimate
completion.
…
62. Again, they think it important to understand that nature has brought it about that children
are loved by their parents. For from this starting point we can follow the development of the
shared society which unites the human race. One ought to see this first of all from the form
and organs of the body which show that nature has a rational scheme for reproduction; but it
would be inconsistent for nature to want offspring to be born and yet not to see to it that they
are loved once they are born. The power of nature can be seen even in the beasts; when we
see the effort they go to in bearing and rearing their offspring, we seem to be listening to the
voice of nature herself. So, just as it is obvious that we naturally shrink from pain, so too it is
apparent that we are driven by nature herself to love those whom we bear. 63. From this it
develops naturally that there is among men a common and natural congeniality of men with
each other, with the result that it is right for them to feel that other men, just because they are
men, are not alien to them.... So we are naturally suited to [living in] gatherings, groups and
states.
64. They also hold that the cosmos is ruled by the will of the gods, that it is like a city or state
shared by gods and men, and that each and every one of us is a part of this cosmos. From
which it naturally follows that we put the common advantage ahead of our own. For just as
the laws put the well-being of all ahead of the well-being of individuals, so too the good and
wise man, who is obedient to the laws and not unaware of his civic duty, looks out for the
advantage of all more than for that of any one person or his own.
67. But just as they think that the bonds of justice unite men with each other, so too they deny
that there is any bond of justice between man and beast. Chrysippus expressed it well, saying
that everything else was born for the sake of men and gods, but they were born for the sake of
their own community and society, with the result that men can use beasts for their own
advantage without injustice…
70. They also think that friendship should be cultivated because it falls into the class of
beneficial things. Although some [Stoics] say that in a friendship a friend’s reason is just as
dear to the wise man as is his own, while others say that each man’s reason is dearer to
himself, even this latter group admits that to deprive someone of something in order to
appropriate it for oneself is inconsistent with justice, which is a virtue we are naturally
committed to. So the school I am speaking of does not at all approve of the view that justice
or friendship should be welcomed or approved of because of its advantages. For the very
same advantages could just as well undermine and overthrow them. Indeed, neither justice
nor friendship can exist at all unless they are chosen for their own sake.
20
Martin Luther King What is Man?
Martin Luther King
‘What is Man?’
From ‘THE MEASURE OF A MAN’ (Fortress Press, Philadelphia, 1959)
[Number within square brackets refer to page numbers in this edition.]
he question “What is man?” is one of the most important questions confronting any
generation. The whole political, social, and economic structure of a society is largely
determined by its answer to this pressing question. Indeed, the conflict which we
witness in the world today between totalitarianism and democracy is at bottom a conflict over
the question “What is man?”1
T
In our generation the asking of this question has risen to extensive proportions. But although
there is widespread agreement in asking the question, there is fantastic disagreement in
answering it. For instance, there are those who look upon man as little more than an animal.
They would say that man is a cosmic accident, that his whole life can be explained by matter
in motion. Then there are those who would lift man almost to the position of a god. They
would probably agree with Shakespeare’s Hamlet, [11]
What a piece of work is man! How noble in faculty! How infinite in reason; in
form and moving how express and admirable; in apprehension how like a God;
in action how like an angel! The beauty of the world, the paragon of animals.2
There are still others who would seek to be a little more realistic about man. They would
avoid the extremes of a pessimistic naturalism and an optimistic humanism and seek to
combine the truths of both. They see within man a strange dualism, something of a
dichotomy. So they would cry out with Carlyle, “There are depths in man that go down to the
lowest hell, and heights that reach the highest heaven, for are not both heaven and hell made
out of him everlasting miracle and mystery that he is?”3
1
King is preaching in the context of the Cold War and consequently when he speaks of
‘totalitarianism’ he presumably has communism principally in mind. He may also be thinking of
Fascism and the Second World War. Communism and fascism have in common collectivist accounts
of human nature; by contrast, democracy tends to be individualistic. King may have other differences
in mind.
2
King makes no acknowledgement of Hamlet’s irony in this speech. It is a disconcerting characteristic
of this style of preaching to quote Biblical and other texts with scant regard for the original meaning
or context. Here is a more representative selection from Hamlet’s speech:
I have of late – whereof I know not – lost all my mirth, foregone all custom of
exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame
the earth, seems to me like a sterile promontory; the most excellent canopy the air,
look you, this proud o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden
fire, why it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of
vapours. What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason! How infinite in
faculty! In form and moving, how express and admirable! In action how like an
angel! In apprehension, how like a god! The beauty of the world! The paragon of
animals! And yet to me, what is this quintessence of dust? (Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act
II, sc 2).
Hardly a ringing endorsement of human nature! This raises a difficulty. Where are we to
find the optimistic humanism that King identifies in his sermon? Presumably it is the same
Renaissance humanism that is Hamlet’s target.
3
“There are depths in man that go the length of lowest Hell, as there are heights that reach highest
Heaven; – for are not both Heaven and Hell made out of him, made by him, everlasting Miracle
21
Martin Luther King What is Man?
One day the psalmist4 looked up and noticed the vastness of the cosmic order. He noticed the
infinite expanse of the solar [12] system; he noticed the beautiful stars; he gazed at the moon
with all its scintillating beauty, and he said in the midst of all of this, “What is man?” He
comes forth with an answer: “Thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and crowned
him with glory and honour.” Goodspeed, Moffatt, and the Revised Standard Version would
say, “Thou hast made him a little less than divine, a little less than God, and crowned him
with glory and honour.”5 It is this realistic position that I would like to use as a basis of our
thinking together and our meditation on the question “What is man?
Now let us notice first that man is a biological being with a physical body. This is why the
psalmist says, “Thou hast made him less than God.” We don’t think of God as a being with a
body. God is a being of pure spirit, lifted above the categories of [13] time and space; but
man, being less than God, is in time. He is in nature, and he can never disown his kinship with
animate nature.
The psalmist goes on to say that God made man that way. Since God made him that way there
is nothing wrong with it. We read in the book of Genesis that everything God makes is good;
therefore there is nothing wrong with having a body.6 This is one of the things that distinguish
the Christian doctrine of man from the Greek doctrine. The Greeks, under the impetus of
Plato, felt that the body was evil, almost inherently depraved, and the soul could never reach
its full maturity until it broke loose from the prison of the body.7 This is not Christian
doctrine, for Christianity does not see the body as the principle of evil; it says the will is the
principle of evil.
So the body in Christianity is sacred and [14] significant. That means in any doctrine of man
that we must be concerned with man’s physical well-being. It may be true that man cannot
live by bread alone, but the mere fact that Jesus added the “alone” means that man cannot live
without bread.8 Religion must never overlook this, and any religion that professes to be
concerned about the souls of men and is not concerned about the economic conditions that
damn the soul, the social conditions that corrupt men, and the city governments that cripple
them, is a dry, dead, do-nothing religion in need of new blood.9 For it overlooks the basic fact
that man is a biological being with a physical body. This must stand as a principle in any
doctrine of man.
But this isn’t the only part, and we must never stop here if our doctrine of man is to be
realistic and thoroughly Christian. Some people stop here. They are the naturalists or [15] the
materialists; they are the Marxists; and they would see man merely as an animal.
Some years ago a group of chemists who had a flair for statistics decided to work out the
worth of man’s body in terms of the market values of that day. They got together and did a lot
and Mystery as he is?” Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881), The French Revolution, Book II, chapter
3.I.iv.
4
Psalmist = the author of the biblical Book of Psalms. Traditionally King David is the author of most
of the Psalms, including this one. Martin Luther King is referring to Psalm 8, verse 5.
5
Good speed and Moffatt are commentators on the Bible. The Revised Standard Version is a
commonly used English translation of the Bible.
6
King has his sights trained on certain strains within Christianity – Protestant and Catholic – that seem
to regard the body as intrinsically evil. This, he claims, is a corruption of genuine Christianity. He is
surely right and yet the view would not be so persistent if it did not have some Biblical support.
7
While there is some justice in this as an account of Plato, it is a gross oversimplification to attribute
this view to the Greeks in general.
8
“Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”
(Matthew 4: 4; cf. Luke 4: 4).
9
Again King has his sights trained on certain of his fellow Christians. He is critical of the view that
religion has no business with political action.
22
Martin Luther King What is Man?
of work, and finally they came to this conclusion: The average man has enough fat in him to
make about seven bars of soap, enough iron to make a medium-sized nail, enough sugar to fill
a shaker, enough lime to whitewash a chicken coop, enough phosphorus for about 2,220
match tips, and enough magnesium for a dose of magnesia. When all of this was added up in
terms of the market values of that day it came to about ninety-eight cents. Now, I guess, since
the standards of living are a little higher today, you could get about a dollar ninety-eight for
the average man.
This is interesting. Think about it. Man’s [16] bodily stuff is worth only ninety-eight cents.
But can we explain the whole of man in terms of ninety-eight cents? Can we explain the
artistic genius of a Michelangelo in terms of ninety-eight cents? Can we explain the poetic
genius of a Shakespeare in terms of ninety-eight cents? Can we explain the spiritual genius of
Jesus of Nazareth in terms of ninety-eight cents? Can we explain the mystery of the human
soul in terms of ninety-eight cents? Oh, no. There is something within man that cannot be
explained in terms of dollars and cents. There is something within man that cannot be reduced
to chemical and biological terms, for man is more than a tiny vagary of whirling electrons. He
is more than a wisp of smoke from a limitless smouldering. Man is a child of God.
This brings us to another basic point in the doctrine of man – that man is a being of [17] spirit.
This is what the psalmist means when he says, “Thou hast crowned him with glory and
honour.” Man has rational capacity; man has a mind; man can reason. This distinguishes him
from the lower animals. And so, somehow, man is in nature, and yet he is above nature; he is
in time, and yet he is above time; he is in space, and yet he is above space. This means that he
can do things that lower animals could never do. He can think a poem and write it; he can
think a symphony and compose it; he can think up a great civilization and create it.
Man is God’s marvellous creation, crowned with glory and honour, and because of this you
can’t quite hem him in. You can put him in Bedford’s prison, but somehow his mind will
break out through the bars to scratch across the pages of history a Pilgrim’s Progress.10 You
can bring him down in his wretched old age, with his body broken [18] down and his vision
all but gone, and yet in the form of a Handel, he will look up and imagine that he hears the
very angels singing, and he will come back and scratch across the pages of history a
“Hallelujah Chorus”.11
This is man. He is God’s marvellous creation. Through his mind he can leap oceans, break
through walls, and transcend the categories of time and space. The stars may be marvellous,
but not so marvellous as the mind of man that comprehended them.
This is what the biblical writers mean when they say that man is made in the image of God.
Man has rational capacity; he has the unique ability to have fellowship with God. Man is a
being of spirit.
There is another principle that must go in any doctrine of man that is realistic. It is the
recognition that man is a sinner. Man is a free being made in the image of God. He is [21]
different from lower animals. He is not guided merely by instinct. He has the ability to choose
between alternatives, so he can choose the good or the evil, the high or the low.
As we look at man, we must admit that he has misused his freedom. Some of the image of
God is gone. Therefore, man is a sinner in need of God’s divine grace. So often we try to deny
A classic work of English devotional literature, Pilgrim’s Progress was written by John Bunyan
(1628-1688). It is the classic expression of Puritan spirituality – incidentally, a severe version of that
‘anti-body’ strain of Christianity that King criticized earlier in the sermon. After the end of the
English Civil War and the Restoration of the Monarchy under Charles II, Bunyan spent 12 years in
prison as a ‘non-conformist’ – for holding a service not in accordance with the practices of the
Church of England.
11
A famous chorus from the oratorio Messiah, written by George Frederic Handel.
10
23
Martin Luther King What is Man?
this fact. We hate to face it. There are times even in our theological thinking when we have
become all too sentimental about man. We have explained his shortcomings in terms of errors
or lags of nature. We have sometimes felt that progress was inevitable, and that man was
gradually evolving into a higher state of perfection. But if we are honest and realistic, we
must admit that it isn’t like that, for man is a sinner. We take the new depth psychology, and
misuse it to explain our bad [22] deeds. We find ourselves saying that they are due to phobias,
to inner conflicts. Or, in Freudian terms, we say that man’s misdeeds are due to a conflict
between the id and the superego.12
But when we look at ourselves hard enough we come to see that the conflict is between God
and man. There is something within all of us that causes us to see the truth in Plato’s
statement that the personality is like a charioteer with two headstrong horses, each wanting to
go in different directions.13 There is something within all of us that causes us to cry out with
Augustine, “Lord, make me pure, but not yet.”14 There is something within all of us that
causes us to affirm with the apostle Paul, “The good that I would, I do not; and the evil that I
would not, I do.”15 And so in a real sense the “isness” of our present nature is out of harmony
with the eternal “oughtness” that forever confronts us. We know how to love, and yet we hate.
We take the precious lives that God has given us and throw them away in riotous living. We
are unfaithful to those to whom we should be faithful.16 We are disloyal to those ideals to
which we should be loyal. “All we like sheep have gone as astray”.17
I don’t know about you, but when I look at myself hard enough I don’t feel like crying with
the Pharisee, “Lord, I thank thee that I am not like other men,” but I find myself crying out,
“Lord, be merciful unto me, a sinner.”18 We are sinners in need of God’s divine grace. When
12
Freud distinguished the mind into three parts, the ego, the superego and the id. The Ego is our
familiar self – the person that you call ‘I’. The Id is the realm of instincts and desires – these
desires are generally unconscious. The Superego is the part of mind that has internalised moral and
social norms. If you like, it is the Freudian equivalent of the conscience. To put it very crudely,
who we are – our Ego – is a compromise between the forces of the Id and the Superego.
13
Plato introduces this image in the Phaedrus (246aff). Plato’s three-part division of the soul is clearly
an inspiration for Freud’s division of the mind.
14
Augustine Confessions, Book 8, chapter 7. “Give me chastity and continence but not yet”.
Augustine (354-430CE) was the greatest of the Latin Church Fathers. The so-called Fathers of the
Church are influential writers who worked during the first 1,000 years of the Christian Church. It
was during this period that many of the Church’s central doctrines were formulated. Consequently,
these writers have a special authority within the mainstream Christian Churches, Orthodox,
Catholic and Protestant. Most of the important Church Fathers were Greek speakers from the
Eastern Mediterranean but a few wrote in Latin.
Augustine was born in Hippo in North Africa and his Confessions chronicle his search for the
truth from the Manichaean faith through Neo-Platonist philosophy to Christianity. During his youth
he kept a mistress and chastity was a major obstacle to his conversion.
Augustine’s doctrines were very influential during the Reformation. The anti body strand of
Christianity that King has already criticized owes much to Augustine.
15
Romans 7: 19. “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.”
16
There have been persistent claims that, like Augustine, King had personal difficulties with the
Seventh Commandment – “Thou shalt not commit adultery”.
17
Isaiah 53: 6. This text is used in another chorus from Handel’s Messiah.
18
King is referring to one of Jesus’ parables. Here is the full text:
“(10) Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. (11)
The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, `God, I thank thee that I am not like other men,
extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. (12) I fast twice a week, I give tithes
of all that I get.’ (13) But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to
heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ (14) I tell you, this man went
down to his house justified rather than the other; for every one who exalts himself will be humbled,
but he who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18: 10-14)
24
Martin Luther King What is Man?
we come to our collective lives, our sin is even greater. One theologian could write a book
entitled Moral Man and Immoral Society.19 In our collective lives our sin rises to even greater
heights. See how we treat each other. Races trample over races; nations trample over [26]
nations. We go to war and destroy the values and the lives that God has given us. We leave
the battlefields of the world painted with blood, and we end up with wars that burden us with
national debts higher than mountains of gold, filling our nations with orphans and widows,
sending thousands of men home psychologically deranged and physically handicapped.
This is the tragic plight of man. As we look at all of that, we know that man isn’t made for
that. We know that man is made for the stars, created for the everlasting, born for eternity. We
know that man is crowned with glory and honour, and so long as he lives on the low level he
will be frustrated, disillusioned, and bewildered.
Jesus told a parable one day, the parable of the prodigal son. 20 He talked about a boy who left
home and went away into a far country, where he wasted his substance and even his character.
Then a famine broke out, and this boy ended up in a hog pen.
There are many insights to be gained from this parable. One, I think, is this: that man is not
made for the far country of evil. Whenever he moves away from his Father’s house he finds
himself facing a famine, and he finds himself frustrated and disillusioned. But the parable
does not end there. That’s the beauty of it. We read that one day the boy came to himself and
decided to rise up and go back home. We watch him as he travels up the dusty road that he
had once come down. He had a little speech that he had made up: “I am not worthy of being
called thy son.” But he did not get a chance to make that speech, because a loving father saw
him from afar and ran out to the boy with outstretched arms, saying, “I am happy to have you
back home. Come home, I still love you.”
[29] This is the glory of our religion: that when man decides to rise up from his mistakes,
from his sin, from his evil, there is a loving God saying, “Come home, I still love you.”
Oh, I can hear a voice crying out today, saying to Western civilization: “You strayed away to
the far country of colonialism and imperialism. You have trampled over one billion six
hundred million of your coloured brothers in Africa and Asia. But, O Western Civilization, if
you will come to yourself, rise up, and come back home, I will take you in.”
It seems that I can hear a voice saying to America: “You started out right. You wrote in your
Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with
certain inalienable rights. Among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.’ But,
America, you [30] strayed away from that sublime principle. You left the house of your great
heritage and strayed away into a far country of segregation and discrimination. 21 You have
trampled over sixteen million of your brothers. You have deprived them of the basic goods of
life. You have taken from them their self-respect and their sense of dignity. You have treated
them as if they were things rather than persons.22 Because of this a famine has broken out in
By the influential U.S. theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, published in 1932. “In this classic study,
Niebuhr draws a sharp distinction between the moral and social behaviour of individuals versus
social groups – national, racial, and economic. He shows how this distinction then requires political
policies which a purely individualistic ethic will necessarily find embarrassing.”
http://www.religion-online.org/
20
Luke 15: 11 – 32.
21
Not surprisingly, King concludes with his own spiritual and political mission – the abolition of
segregation and discrimination. There is also an implicit exhortation to his fellow Blacks to act in a
spirit of forgiveness and non-violence.
22
This turn of phrase echoes one version of Kant’s Categorical Imperative: “So act as to treat
humanity … as an end and never as a means only.” (Groundwork towards a Metaphysic of Morals)
19
25
Martin Luther King What is Man?
your land. In the midst of all your material wealth, you are spiritually and morally povertystricken, unable to speak to the conscience of this world. America, in this famine situation, if
ill come to yourself and rise up and you will decide to come back home, I will take you in, for
you are made for something high and something noble and something good.”
To every man there openeth
A Way, and Ways, and a Way,
And the High Soul climbs the High Way,
And the Low Soul gropes the Low,
And in between, on the misty flats,
The rest drift to and fro.
But to every man there openeth
A High Way, and a Low,
And every man decideth
The Way his soul shall go.
(John Oxenham23)
0 God, our gracious heavenly Father, we thank thee for the inspiration of Jesus the
Christ, who came to this world to show us the way. And grant that we will see in that
life the fact that we are made for that which is high and noble and good. Help us to live
in line with that high calling, that great destiny. In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen.24
23
24
According to Kant, to treat someone as a means is to treat them as a thing. We will consider Kant
further when we read Sartre and Murdoch.
Pseudonym of William Arthur Dunkerley, English poet, 1852-1941.
It is traditional for a Christian sermon to end with a prayer. Non-Christians may also be puzzled by
the phrase ‘Jesus the Christ’. Christ is not a surname but a title meaning ‘Anointed’.
26
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
Friedrich Nietzsche
THE GAY SCIENCE
Book V: We Fearless Ones
[Translated by Walter Kaufman. Vintage Books, 1974. Unless otherwise noted, footnotes derive from
this edition.]
§343: The meaning of our cheerfulness.1 – The greatest recent event – that “God is dead,”2
that the belief in the Christian god has become unbelievable3 – is already beginning to cast its
first shadows over Europe. For the few at least, whose eyes – the suspicion in whose eyes is
strong and subtle enough for this spectacle, some sun seems to have set and some ancient and
profound trust has been turned into doubt; to them our old world must appear daily more like
evening, more mistrustful, stranger, “older.” But in the main one may say: The event itself is
far too great, too distant, too remote from the multitude’s capacity for comprehension even for
the tidings of it to be thought of as having arrived as yet. Much less may one suppose that
many people know as yet what this event really means – and how much must collapse now
that this faith has been undermined because it was built upon this faith, propped up by it,
grown into it; for example, the whole of our European morality. This long plenitude and
sequence of breakdown, destruction, ruin, and cataclysm that is now impending – who could
guess enough of it today to be compelled to play the teacher and advance proclaimer of this
monstrous logic of terror, the prophet of a gloom and an eclipse of the sun whose like has
probably never yet occurred on earth?
Even we born guessers of riddles who are, as it were, waiting on the mountains,4 posted
between today and tomorrow, stretched in the contradiction between today and tomorrow, we
firstlings and premature births of the coming century, to whom the shadows that must soon
envelop Europe really should have appeared by now – why is it that even we look forward to
the approaching gloom without any real sense of involvement and above all without any
worry and fear for ourselves?5 Are we perhaps still too much under the impression of the
initial consequences of this event – and these initial consequences, the consequences for
ourselves, are quite the opposite of what one might perhaps expect: They are not at all sad and
gloomy but rather like a new and scarcely describable kind of light, happiness, relief,
exhilaration, encouragement, dawn.
Indeed, we philosophers and “free spirits” feel, when we hear the news that “the old god is
dead,” as if a new dawn shone on us; our heart overflows with gratitude, amazement,
premonitions, expectation. At long last the horizon appears free to us again, even if it should
not be bright; at long last our ships may venture out again, venture out to face any danger; all
the daring of the lover of knowledge is permitted again; the sea, our sea, lies open again;
perhaps there has never yet been such an “open sea.” –
§344: How we, too, are still pious. – In science convictions have no rights of citizenship, as
one says with good reason. Only when they decide to descend to the modesty of hypotheses,
of a provisional experimental point of view, of a regulative fiction, they may be granted
admission and even a certain value in the that realm of knowledge – though always with the
restriction that they remain under police supervision, under the police of mistrust. – But does
this not mean, if you consider it more precisely, that a conviction may obtain admission to
1
2
3
Heiterkeit: a reference to the title and tenor of The Gay Science.
Cf. sections 108fr. and 125 above, as well as 108n.
This clause is clearly offered as an explanation of “God is dead.”
4
Posted in high places so that they will see as soon as possible what is approaching from a distance.
5
A gloss on the title of Book V.
27
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
science only when it ceases to be a conviction? Would it not be the first step in the discipline
of the scientific spirit that one would not permit oneself any more convictions?
Probably this is so; only we still have to ask: To make it possible for this discipline to begin,
must there not be some commanding and prior conviction – even one that is so commanding
and unconditional that it sacrifices all other convictions to itself? We see that science also
rests on a faith; there simply is no science “without presuppositions.” The question whether
truth is needed must not only have been affirmed in advance, but affirmed to such a degree
that the principle, the faith, the conviction finds expression: “Nothing is needed more than
truth, and in relation to it everything else has only second-rate value.”
This unconditional will to truth – what is it? Is it the will not to allow oneself to be deceived?
Or is it the will not to deceive? For the will to truth could be interpreted in the second way,
too – if only the special case “I do not want to deceive myself” is subsumed under the
generalization “I do not want to deceive.” But why not deceive? But why not allow oneself to
be deceived?
Note that the reasons for the former principle belong to an altogether different realm from
those for the second. One does not want to allow oneself to be deceived because one assumes
that it is harmful; dangerous, calamitous to be deceived. In this sense, science would be a
long-range prudence, a caution, a utility; but one could object in all fairness: How is that? Is
wanting not to allow oneself to be deceived really less harmful, less dangerous, less
calamitous? What do you know in advance of the character of existence to be able to decide
whether the greater advantage is on the side of the unconditionally mistrustful or of the
unconditionally trusting? But if both should be required, much trust as well as much mistrust,
from where would science then be permitted to take its unconditional faith or conviction on
which it rests, that truth is more important than any other thing, including every other
conviction? Precisely this conviction could never have come into being if both truth and
untruth constantly proved to be useful which is the case. Thus – the faith in science, which
after all exists undeniably, cannot owe its origin to such a calculus of utility; it must have
originated in spite of the fact that the disutility and dangerousness of “the will to truth,” of
“truth at any price” is proved to it constantly. “At any price”: how well we understand these
words once we have offered and slaughtered one faith after another on this altar!
Consequently, “will to truth” does not mean “I will not allow myself to be deceived” but –
there is no alternative – “I will not deceive, not even myself”; and with that we stand on
moral ground. For you only have to ask yourself carefully, “Why do you not want to
deceive?” especially if it should seem – and it does seem! – as if life aimed at semblance,
meaning error, deception, simulation, delusion, self-delusion, and when the great sweep of life
has actually always shown itself to be on the side of the most unscrupulous polytropoi.6
6
This Greek word (Nietzsche uses the Greek characters) is applied to Odysseus in the first line of the
Odyssey. There is no English equivalent. The meaning ranges from ‘much turned’ to ‘much traveled,
versatile, wily, and manifold’.
Nietzsche’s point is, of course, that Odysseus owed his survival on many occasions to his virtuosity
in deception: At this point we should remember the arguments in sections 110 and 111 above.
If life often depends on deception – on deceiving oneself as well as others then the unconditional
desire for truth, truth at any price, depends on a standard independent of our survival – a standard to
which we willingly sacrifice ourselves. To that extent we am still “pious.”
Without a doubt, Nietzsche includes himself when he says, a few lines later, “we seekers after
knowledge today, we godless anti-metaphysicians.” Cf. his impassioned insistence on the intellectual
conscience in sections 2, 319, and 335.
28
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
Charitably interpreted, such a resolve might perhaps be a quixotism,7 a minor slightly mad
enthusiasm; but it might also be something more serious, namely, a principle that is hostile to
life and destructive. – “Will to truth” – that might be a concealed will to death.8
Thus the question “Why science?” leads back to the moral problem: Why have morality at all
when life, nature, and history are “not moral”? No doubt, those who are truthful in that
audacious and ultimate sense that is presupposed by the faith in science thus affirm another
world than the world of life, nature, and history; and insofar as they affirm this “other world”
- look, must they not by the same token negate its counterpart, this world, our world? – But
you will have gathered what I am driving at, namely, that it is still a metaphysical faith upon
which our faith in science rests – that even we seekers after knowledge today, we godless
anti-metaphysicians still take our fire, too, from the flame lit by a faith that is thousands of
years old, that Christian faith which was also the faith of Plato, that God is the truth, that truth
is divine. – But what if this should become more and more incredible, if nothing should prove
to be divine any more unless it were error, blindness, the lie – if God himself should prove to
be our most enduring lie? – 9
§345: Morality as a problem. – The lack of personality always takes its revenge: A weakened,
thin, extinguished personality that denies itself is no longer fit for anything good-least of all
for philosophy. “Selflessness” has no value either in heaven or on earth. All great problems
demand great love, and of that only strong, round, secure spirits who have a firm grip on
themselves are capable. It makes the most telling difference whether a thinker has a personal
relationship to his problems and finds in them his destiny, his distress, and his greatest
happiness, or an “impersonal” one, meaning that he can do no better than to touch them and
grasp them with the antennae of cold, curious thought. In the latter case nothing will come of
it; that much one can promise in advance, for even if great problems should allow themselves
to be grasped by them they would not permit frogs and weaklings to hold on to them; such
has been their taste from time immemorial – a taste, incidentally, that they share with all
redoubtable females.
Why is it then that I have never yet encountered anybody, not even in books, who approached
morality in this personal way and who knew morality as a problem, and this problem as his
own personal distress, torment, voluptuousness, and passion? It is evident that up to now
morality was no problem at all but, on the contrary, precisely that on which after all mistrust,
discord, and contradiction one could agree – the hallowed place of peace where our thinkers
took a rest even from themselves, took a deep breath, and felt revived. I see nobody who
ventured a critique of moral valuations; I miss even the slightest attempts of scientific
curiosity, of the refined, experimental imagination of psychologists and historians that readily
anticipates a problem and catches it in flight without quite knowing what it has caught. I have
scarcely detected a few meagre preliminary efforts to explore the history of the origins of
these feelings and valuations (which is something quite different from a critique and again
different from a history of ethical systems). In one particular case I have done everything to
encourage a sympathy and talent for this kind of history – in vain, as it seems to me today.10
7
It is relevant that Nietzsche loved Don Quixote and tended to identify himself with him. See
Kaufmann, 71.
8
The notion of a will to death was resurrected by Freud in Beyond the Pleasure Principle, in 1920.
9
Nietzsche quotes from this section in the third essay of his Genealogy of Morals, section 24 (BWN,
588), and says at the end of section 24. “Whoever feels that this has been stated too briefly should read
the section of The Gay Science entitled ‘How we, too, are still pious’ (section 344), or preferably the
entire fifth book ...”
10
The preface to the Genealogy of Morals (BWN, 453f. and 457) shows that Nietzsche is alluding to
Paul Rée, the author of The Source of Moral Perception (1877) and The Origin of Knowledge (1885).
29
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
These historians of morality (mostly Englishmen) do not amount to much. Usually they
themselves are still quite unsuspectingly obedient to one particular morality and, without
knowing it, serve that as shield-bearers and followers – for example, by sharing that popular
superstition of Christian Europe which people keep mouthing so guilelessly to this day, that
what is characteristic of moral actions is selflessness, self-sacrifice, or sympathy and pity.
Their usual mistaken premise is that they affirm some consensus of the nations, at least of
tame nations, concerning certain principles of morals, and then they infer from this that these
principles must be unconditionally binding also for you and me; or, conversely, they see the
truth that among different nations moral valuations are necessarily different and then infer
from this that no morality is at all binding. Both procedures are equally childish.
The mistake made by the more refined among them is that they uncover and criticize the
perhaps foolish opinions of a people about their morality, or of humanity about all human
morality – opinions about its origin, religious sanction, the superstition of free will, 11 and
things of that sort-and then suppose that they have criticized the morality itself. But the value
of a command “thou shalt” is still fundamentally different from and independent of such
opinions about it and the weeds of error that may have overgrown it-just as certainly as the
value of a medication for a sick person is completely independent of whether he thinks about
medicine scientifically or the way old women do. Even if a morality has grown out of an
error, the realization of this fact would not as much as touch the problem of its value.12
Thus nobody up to now has examined the value of that most famous of all medicines which is
called morality; and the first step would be – for once to question it. Well then, precisely this
is our task. – 13
§346: Our question mark. – But you do not understand this? Indeed, people will have trouble
understanding us. We are looking for words; perhaps we are also looking for ears. Who are
we anyway? If we simply called ourselves, using an old expression, godless, or unbelievers,
or perhaps immoralists, we do not believe that this would even come close to designating us:
We are all three in such an advanced stage that one – that you, my curious friends – could
never comprehend how we feel at this point. Ours is no longer the bitterness and passion of
the person who has torn himself away and still feels compelled to turn his unbelief into a new
belief, a purpose, a martyrdom. We have become cold, hard, and tough in the realization that
the way of this world is anything but divine; even by human standards it is not rational,
merciful, or just. We know it well, the world in which we live is ungodly, immoral,
“inhuman”; we have interpreted it far too long in a false and mendacious way, in accordance
with the wishes of our reverence, which is to say, according to our needs. For man is a
reverent animal. But he is also mistrustful; and that the world is not worth what we thought it
was, that is about as certain as anything of which our mistrust has finally got hold. The more
mistrust, the more philosophy.
We are far from claiming that the world is worth less; indeed it would seem laughable to us
today if man were to insist on inventing values that were supposed to excel the value of the
actual world. This is precisely what we have turned our backs on as an extravagant aberration
of human vanity and unreason that for a long time was not recognized as such. It found its
Cf. the section on “The error of free will” in Twilight of the Idols (VPN, 499ff.) and Beyond Good
and Evil, section 19 (BWN, 215-17). APPENDIX II.
12
What is here suggested is that the value of a morality depends on its relation to health, or life, or
ultimately power.
13
The task is to question whether the effects of morality on those who are moral are beneficial. This
question, of course, does not commit one to the assumption that there is only one standard of value.
One might make a start by comparing what has become of man under different moralities and by
asking what might become of him without any morality.
11
30
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
final expression in modern pessimism,14 and a more ancient and stronger expression in the
teaching of Buddha; but it is part of Christianity also, if more doubtfully and ambiguously so
but not for that reason any less seductive.
The whole pose of “man against the world,” of man as a “world-negating” principle, of man
as the measure of the value of things, as judge of the world who in the end places existence
itself upon his scales and finds it wanting – the monstrous insipidity of this pose has finally
come home to us and we are sick of it. We laugh as soon as we encounter the juxtaposition of
“man and world,” separated by the sublime presumption of the little word “and.” But look,
when we laugh like that, have we not simply carried the contempt for man one step further?
And thus also pessimism, the contempt for that existence which is knowable by us? Have we
not exposed ourselves to the suspicion of an opposition – an opposition between the world in
which we were at home up to now with our reverences that perhaps made it possible for us to
endure life, and another world that consists of us – an inexorable, fundamental, and deepest
suspicion about ourselves that is more and more gaining worse and worse control of us
Europeans and that could easily confront coming generations with the terrifying Either/Or:
“Either abolish your reverences or – yourselves!” The latter would be nihilism; but would not
the former also be-nihilism?15 – This is our question mark.
§347: Believers and their need to believe. – How much one needs a faith16 in order to
flourish, how much that is “firm” and that one does not wish to be shaken because one clings
to it, that is a measure of the degree of one’s strength (or, to put the point more clearly, of
one’s weakness).17 Christianity, it seems to me, is still needed by most people in old Europe
even today;18 therefore it still finds believers. For this is how man is: An article of faith could
be refuted before him a thousand times - if he needed it, he would consider it “true” again and
again, in accordance with that famous “proof of strength” of which the Bible speaks.19
Metaphysics is still needed by some; but so is that impetuous demand for certainty20 that
today discharges itself among large numbers of people in a scientific-positivistic form. The
Schopenhauer’s philosophy.
A few interpreters of Nietzsche have claimed that he was, by his own lights, a nihilist; but they have
generally failed to specify the meaning of this term. Here two forms of nihilism are mentioned, and it
is clear that Nietzsche is not a nihilist in either sense.
16
In German there is only one word for belief and faith, Glaube; and to believe is glauben.
17
This crucial point, which recurs elsewhere in Nietzsche’s writings, makes clear, we might say, “how
he is not pious,” and thus needs to be considered in interpreting section 50 above.
18
This was written in 1886.
19
Nietzsche also refers to the “proof of strength” in section 50 of The Antichrist and in notes 171 and
452 of The Will to Power. But it is only in the passage above that Nietzsche claims that “the Bible
speaks” of it. The reference is to I Corinthians 2:4. Here is the whole passage I Corinthians 2: 1-5:
14
15
When I came to you, brethren, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God in
lofty words or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing except Jesus Christ and him
crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in much fear and trembling and my speech
and message were not in the plausible words of wisdom but in demonstration of the Spirit
and of power, that you faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
(Revised Standard Version)
At first glance, this critique of the “demand for certainty” may seem to be at odds with section 2
above where “the desire for certainty” is what “separates the higher human beings from the lower.”
But when both passages are read in context, the contradiction disappears. Section 2 deals with “The
intellectual conscience” and the importance of giving ourselves an account of what speaks for and
against our beliefs. What is attacked is the easy certainty of those who fail to consider objections.
Actually, “the desire for certainty” is not the best phrase for what is clearly meant; “the desire for
intellectual cleanliness” would be better: what counts is the desire to determine whether one is entitled
to feel certain.
20
31
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
demand that one wants by all means that something should be firm (while on account of the
ardour of this demand one is easier and more negligent about the demonstration of this
certainty) – this, too, is still the demand for a support, a prop, in short, that instinct of
weakness which, to be sure, does not create religious, metaphysical systems, and convictions
of all kinds but-conserves them.
Actually, what is steaming around all of these positivistic systems is the vapour of a certain
pessimistic gloom, something that smells of weariness, fatalism, disappointment, and fear of
new disappointments-or else ostentatious wrath, a bad mood, the anarchism of indignation,
and whatever other symptoms and masquerades of the feeling of weakness there may be.
Even the vehemence with which our most intelligent contemporaries lose themselves in
wretched nooks and crannies, for example, into patriotism (I mean what the French call
chauvinisme and the Germans “German”) or into petty aesthetic creeds after the manner of
French naturalisme (which drags up and bares only that part of nature which inspires nausea
and simultaneous amazement – today people like to call this part la verite vraie21) or into
nihilism a la Petersburg (meaning the belief in unbelief even to the point of martyrdom22)
always manifests above all the need for a faith, a support, backbone, something to fall back
on.
Faith is always coveted most and needed most urgently where will is lacking; for will, as the
affect of command, is the decisive sign of sovereignty and strength. In other words, the less
one knows how to command, the more urgently one covets someone who commands, who
commands severely – a god, prince, class, physician, father confessor, dogma, or party
conscience. From this one might perhaps gather that the two world religions, Buddhism and
Christianity, may have owed their origin and above all their sudden spread to a tremendous
collapse and disease of the will. And that is what actually happened: both religions
encountered a situation in which the will had become diseased, giving rise to a demand that
had become utterly desperate for some “thou shalt.” Both religions taught fanaticism in ages
in which the will had become exhausted, and thus they offered innumerable people some
support, a new possibility of willing, some delight in willing. For fanaticism is the only
“strength of the will” that even the weak and insecure can be brought to attain, being a sort of
hypnotism of the whole system of the senses and the intellect for the benefit of an excessive
nourishment (hypertrophy) of a single point of view and feeling that henceforth becomes
dominant-which the Christian calls his faith. Once a human being reaches the fundamental
conviction that he must be commanded, he becomes “a believer.” Conversely, one could
conceive of such a pleasure and power of self-determination, such a freedom of the will23 that
he spirit would take leave of all faith and every wish for certainty, being practiced in
maintaining himself on insubstantial ropes and possibilities and dancing even near abysses.
Such a spirit would be the free spirit par excellence.24
§348: On the origin of scholars. – In Europe scholars grow out of all kinds of classes and
social conditions, like plants that require no particular soil. Therefore they belong by their
very nature and quite involuntarily to the carriers of the democratic idea. But this origin
betrays itself. Once one has trained one’s eyes to recognize in a scholarly treatise the scholar’s
intellectual idiosyncrasy – every scholar has one – and to catch it in the act, one will almost
21
the true truth
22
Again it is clear that Nietzsche dissociates himself from nihilism.
This conception of “freedom of the will” (alias, autonomy) does not involve any belief in what
Nietzsche called “the superstition of free will” in section 345 (alias, the exemption of human actions
from an otherwise universal determinism). See Appendix II.
24
Nietzsche still wants to be a free spirit in the best sense of that word – a liberated, autonomous
spirit. Cf. Twilight, section 49 (VPN, 554). Cf. also The Antichrist, sections 50-55 (VPN, 631-42).
23
32
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
always behold behind this the scholar’s “Preoccupations and history,” his family, and
especially their crafts.
Where the feeling finds expression “Now this has been proved and I am done with it,” it is
generally the ancestor in the blood and instinct of the scholar who approves from his point of
view “the finished job”; the faith in a proof is merely a symptom of what in a hard-working
family has for ages been considered “good workmanship.” One example: When the sons of
clerks and office workers of every kind, whose main task it has always been to bring order
into diverse materials, to distribute it over different files, and in general to schematise things,
become scholars, they manifest a tendency to consider a problem almost as solved when they
have merely schematised it. There are philosophers who are fundamentally merely
schematises; for them the formal aspect of their fathers’ occupation has become content. The
talent for classifications, for tables of categories,25 betrays something; one pays a price for
being the child of one’s parents.
The son of an advocate will have to be an advocate as a scholar, too; he wants above all that
his cause should be judged right, and next to that perhaps also that it should be right. The sons
of Protestant ministers26 and school teachers may be recognized by their naive certainty when,
as scholars, they consider their cause proved when they have merely stated it with vigour and
warmth; they are thoroughly used to being believed, as that was part of their fathers’ job. A
Jew, on the other hand, in keeping with the business circles and the past of his people, is least
of all used to being believed. Consider Jewish scholars in this light: All of them have a high
regard for logic, that is for compelling agreement by force of reasons; they know, with that
they are bound to win even where they encounter race and class prejudices and where one
does not like to believe them. For nothing is more democratic than logic; it is no respecter of
persons and makes no distinction between crooked and straight noses. (Incidentally, Europe
owes the Jews no small thanks for making people think more logically and for establishing
cleanlier intellectual habits – nobody more so than the Germans who are a lamentably
deraisonnable”27 race who to this day are still in need of having their “heads washed” first.
Wherever Jews have won influence they have taught men to make finer distinctions, more
rigorous inferences, and to write in a more luminous and cleanly fashion; their task was ever
to bring a people “to listen to raison.28)
§349: Once more the origin of scholars. – The wish to preserve oneself is the symptom of a
condition of distress, of a limitation of the really fundamental instinct of life which aims at the
expansion of power and, wishing for that, frequently risks and even sacrifices selfpreservation.29 It should be considered symptomatic when some philosophers – for example,
Spinoza who was consumptive – considered the instinct of self-preservation decisive and had
to see it that way; for they were individuals in conditions of distress.
That our modern natural sciences have become so thoroughly entangled in this Spinozistic
dogma (most recently and worst of all, Darwinism with its incomprehensibly one-sided
doctrine of the “struggle for existence”) is probably due to the origins of most natural
scientists: In this respect they belong to the “common people” their ancestors were poor and
undistinguished people who knew the difficulties of survival only too well at firsthand. The
whole of English Darwinism breathes something like the musty air of English overpopulation,
25
An allusion to Kant.
Nietzsche’s father and grandfathers had been Protestant ministers. He may not have realized that
further back many of his ancestors had been butchers.
27
unreasonable.
28
reason. The French words underline Nietzsche’s determination to dissociate himself from the
Germans – and from German anti-Semitism.
29
This whole section provides some reasons for Nietzsche’s doctrine of the will to power as opposed
to the more fashionable notion of a will to life or survival.
26
33
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
like the smell of the distress and overcrowding of small people.30 But a natural scientist
should come out of his human nook; and in nature it is not conditions of distress that are
dominant but overflow and squandering, even to the point of absurdity. The struggle for
existence is only an exception, a temporary restriction of the will to life. The great and small
struggle always revolves around superiority, around growth and expansion, around power-in
accordance with the will to power which is the will of life.
§350: In honor of the homines religiosi.31 – The fight against the church is certainly among
other things – for it means many things – also the fight of the more common, merrier, more
familiar, ingenuous, and superficial type against the dominion of the graver, deeper, more
meditative, that is, more evil and suspicious human beings who brood with an enduring
suspicion about the value of existence and also about their own value; the common instinct of
the People, their sensuous jollity, their “good heart” rebelled against them. The entire Roman
church rests upon a southern suspicion about the nature of man, and this is always
misunderstood in the north. The European south has inherited this suspicion from the depths
of the Orient, from primeval and mysterious Asia and its contemplation. Protestantism already
is a people’s rebellion for the benefit of the ingenuous, guileless, and superficial (the north has
always been more good-natured and shallower than the south); but it was only the French
Revolution that actually and solemnly placed the sceptre in the hands of “the good human
being” (the sheep, the ass, the goose, and all who are incurably shallow squallers, ripe for the
nut house of “modern ideas”).
§351: In honour of the priestly type. – I rather think that it is precisely from what the common
people32 take for wisdom (and who today is not “common people”?) – this clever, bovine
piety, peace of mind, and meekness of country pastors that lies in the meadow and observes
life seriously while ruminating – that the philosophers have always felt most remote, probably
because they were not sufficiently “common people” or country pastors for that. It is likely
that they of all people will be the last to learn to believe that the common people could
possibly understand anything of what is most remote from them: the great passion of the
seeker after knowledge who lives and must live continually in the thundercloud of the highest
problems and the heaviest responsibilities (by no means as an observer, outside, indifferent,
secure, and objective).
The common people revere an altogether different human type when they construct their ideal
of “the sage,” and they are amply entitled to lavish the best words and honours on this type –
namely, the mild, serious and simple-minded, chaste priestly type and what is related to it.
When the common people stand in awe of wisdom, their praise is intended for this type. And
to whom would the common people have more reason to show gratitude than these men who
belong to them and come from among them but as men who are consecrated, selected, and
sacrificed for the welfare of the common people-they themselves believe that they are being
sacrificed to God. It is to these men that the common people can spill their hearts with impunity, to them one can get rid of one’s secrets, worries, and worse matters (for as a human
being “communicates himself” he gets rid of himself, and when one “has confessed” one
forgets).
It is a deep need that commands this; for the filth of the soul also requires sewers with pure
and purifying waters in them, it requires rapid streams of love and strong, humble, pure hearts
who are willing to perform such a service of non-public hygiene, sacrificing themselves – for
this does involve a sacrifice, and a priest is and remains a human sacrifice.
Cf. “Anti-Darwin” in Twilight (VPN, 522f.): “One should not mistake Malthus for nature.” Thomas
Robert Malthus (1766 -1834) had published his immensely influential An Essay on the Principle of
Population in 1798.
31
the religious, or the religious type.
32
Throughout this section Volk is rendered as common people. Quotation marks are Nietzsche’s.
30
34
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
The common people attribute wisdom to such serious men of “faith” who have become quiet,
meaning that they have acquired knowledge and are “certain”33 compared to one’s own
uncertainty. Who would want to deny them this word and this reverence? – But it is also fair,
conversely, when philosophers consider priests as still common people” and not men of
knowledge – above all, because they simply do not believe in any “men of knowledge”; in
this belief, or rather superstition, they smell the “common people.” It was modesty that
invented the word “philosopher” in Greece and left the magnificent overweening presumption
in calling oneself wise to the actors of the spirit - the modesty of such monsters of pride and
sovereignty as Pythagoras, as Plato – .34
§352: How morality is scarcely dispensable. – A naked human being is generally a shameful
sight. I am speaking of us Europeans (and not even of female Europeans!). Suppose that,
owing to some magician’s malice, the most cheerful company at table suddenly saw itself
disrobed and undressed; I believe that not only their cheerfulness would vanish and that the
strongest appetite would be discouraged –35 it seems that we Europeans simply cannot
dispense with that masquerade which one calls clothes.
Now consider the way “moral man” is dressed up, how he is veiled behind moral formulas
and concepts of decency – the way our actions are benevolently concealed by the concepts of
duty, virtue, sense of community; honourableness, self-denial – should the reasons for all this
not be equally good? I am not suggesting that all this is meant to mask human malice and
villainy – the wild animal in us; my idea is, on the contrary, that it is precisely as tame
animals that we are a shameful sight and in need of the moral disguise, that the “inner man” in
Europe is not by a long shot bad enough to show himself without shame (or to be beautiful).
The European disguises himself with morality because he has become a sick, sickly, crippled
animal that has good reasons for being “tame”; for he is almost an abortion, scarce half made
up,36 weak, awkward.
It is not the ferocity of the beast of prey that requires a moral disguise but the herd animal
with its profound mediocrity, timidity, and boredom with itself. With morality the European
dresses up – let us confess it – to look nobler, more important, respectable, “divine” – 37
§353: On the origin of religions. – The distinctive invention of the founders of religions is,
first: to posit a particular kind of life and everyday customs that have the effect of a discipline
voluntatis and at the same time abolish boredom – and then to bestow on this life style an
interpretation that makes it appear to be illuminated by the highest value so that this life style
becomes something for which one fights and under certain circumstances sacrifices one’s life.
sicher means secure as well as certain, and Unsicherheit means insecurity as well as
uncertainty.
33
34
The claim here is that not only Socrates made a point of not knowing matters of which many others
falsely claimed to have knowledge but that even such “monsters of pride” as Plato did not believe they
had knowledge. This claim is at the very least debatable.
35
Here the dash marks a real break; one is led to expect a continuation that does not materialize. It
should be kept in mind that this was written in 1886, during the Victorian era.
36
etwas Halbes. literally, something half. The translation alludes to the opening monologue of Richard
III: ...
I, that am curtail’d of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling Nature,
Deform’d, unfinish’d, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up ...
37
There is no period, as if the thought broke off as in a note. The central idea is close to Zarathustra’s
“I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws” (“On
those who are sublime,” VPN, 230): instead of standing revealed as a creature without claws, one
pretends that one is ferocious and that only a high regard for morality keeps one from doing terrible
things. Cf. also the section on “Whether we have become more moral” in Twilight (VPN, 538f.).
35
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
Actually, the second of these two inventions is more essential. The first, the Way of life, was
usually there before, but alongside other ways of life and without any sense of its special
value. The significance and originality of the founder of a religion usually consists of his
seeing it, selecting it, and guessing for the first time to what use it can be put, how it can be
interpreted.
Jesus (or Paul), for example, found how small people lived in the Roman provinces modest,
virtuous, pinched life. He offered an exegesis, he read the highest meaning and value into it –
and with this also the courage to despise every other way of life, the quiet Herrnhut38
fanaticism, the secret, subterranean self-confidence that grows and grows and finally is ready
“to overcome the world” (that is, Rome and the upper classes throughout the Empire). Buddha
likewise found a human type, in his case scattered through all classes and social strata of his
people, that was good and good-natured from inertia (and above all inoffensive); also from
inertia, this type lived abstinently, almost without needs. He understood how such a human
type must inevitably roll, with its whole vis inertiae,39 into a faith that promises to prevent the
recurrence of terrestrial troubles (meaning work and action in general). To understand that
was his genius. To become the founder of a religion one must be psychologically infallible in
one’s knowledge of a certain average type of souls who have not yet recognized that they
belong together. It is he that brings them together. The founding of a religion therefore always
becomes a long festival of recognition. –
§354: On the “genius of the species.”40 – The problem of consciousness (more precisely, of
becoming conscious of something) confronts us only when we begin to comprehend how we
could dispense with it; and now physiology and the history of animals place us at the
beginning of such comprehension (it took them two centuries to catch up with Leibniz’s
suspicion which soared ahead). For we could think, feel, will, and remember, and we could
also “act” in every sense of that word, and yet none of all this would have to “enter our
consciousness” (as one says metaphorically). The whole of life would be possible without, as
it were, seeing itself in a mirror. Even now, for that matter, by far the greatest portion of our
life actually takes place without this mirror effect; and this is true even of our thinking,
feeling, and willing life, however offensive this may sound to older philosophers. For what
purpose, then, any consciousness at all when it is in the main superfluous?
Now, if you are willing to listen to my answer and the perhaps extravagant surmise that it
involves, it seems to me as if the subtlety and strength of consciousness always were proportionate” to a man’s (or animal’s) capacity for communication, and as if this capacity in turn
were proportionate to the need for communication. But this last point is not to be understood
as if the individual human being who happens to be a master in communicating and making
understandable his needs must also be most dependent on others in his needs. But it does
seem to me as if it were that way when we consider whole races and chains of generations:
Where need and distress have forced men for a long time to communicate and to understand
each other quickly and subtly, the ultimate result is an excess of this strength and art of
communication – as it were, a capacity that has gradually been accumulated and now waits
for an heir who might squander it. (Those who are called artists are these heirs; so are orators,
preachers, writers – all of them people who always come at the end of a long chain, “late
born” every one of them in the best sense of that word and, as I have said, by their nature
squanderers.)
38
The Moravian brotherhood; cf. Will to Power, section 911 and 911n.
force of inertia.
40
In the 1950s and 1960s many English speaking philosophers discussed the possibility of a “private
language.” The literature on the subject was dominated by the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein (18891951) but might have profited from some attention to this section. Whether Wittgenstein knew it is
uncertain; but the opening of the following section (355) reminds one of Wittgenstein’s style.
39
36
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
Supposing that this observation is correct, I may now proceed to the surmise that
consciousness has developed only under the pressure of the need for communication; that
from the start it was needed and useful only between human beings (particularly between
those who commanded and those who obeyed); and that it also developed only in proportion
to the degree of this utility. Consciousness is really only a net of communication between
human beings; it is only as such that it had to develop; a solitary human being who lived like
a beast of prey would not have needed it. That our actions, thoughts, feelings, and movements
enter our own consciousness – at least a part of them – that is the result of a “must” that for a
terribly long time lorded it over man. As the most endangered animal, he needed help and
protection, he needed his peers, he had to learn to express his distress and to make himself
understood; and for all of this he needed “consciousness” first of all, he needed to “know”
himself what distressed him, he needed to “know” how he felt, he needed to “know” what he
thought. For, to say it once more: Man, like every living being, thinks continually without
knowing it; the thinking that rises to consciousness is only the smallest part of all this – the
most superficial and worst part – for only this conscious thinking takes the form of words,
which is to say signs of communication, and this fact uncovers the origin of consciousness.
In brief, the development of language and the development of consciousness (not of reason
but merely of the way reason enters consciousness) go hand in hand. Add to this that not only
language serves as a bridge between human beings but also a mien, a pressure, a gesture. The
emergence of our sense impressions into our own consciousness, the ability to fix them and,
as it were, exhibit them externally, increased proportionately with the need to communicate
them to others by means of signs. The human being inventing signs is at the same time the
human being who becomes ever more keenly conscious of himself. It was only as a social
animal that man acquired self-consciousness – which he is still in the process of doing, more
and more.
My idea is, as you see, that consciousness does not really belong to man’s individual
existence but rather to his social or herd nature; that, as follows from this, it has developed
subtlety only insofar as this is required by social or herd utility. Consequently, given the best
will in the world to understand ourselves as individually as possible, “to know ourselves,”
each of us will always succeed in becoming conscious only of what is not individual but
“average.” Our thoughts themselves are continually governed by the character of
consciousness – by the “genius of the species” that commands it – and translated back into the
perspective of the herd. Fundamentally, all our actions are altogether incomparably personal,
unique, and infinitely individual; there is no doubt of that. But as soon as we translate them
into consciousness they no longer seem to be.
This is the essence of phenomenalism and perspectivism as I understand them: Owing to the
nature of animal consciousness, the world of which we can become conscious is only a
surface and sign-world, a world that is made common and meaner; whatever becomes
conscious becomes by the same token shallow, thin, relatively stupid, general, sign, herd
signal; all becoming conscious involves a great and thorough corruption, falsification,
reduction to superficialities, and generalization. Ultimately, the growth of consciousness
becomes a danger; and anyone who lives among the most conscious Europeans even knows
that it is a disease.
You will guess that it is not the opposition of subject and object that concerns me here: This
distinction I leave to the epistemologists who have become entangled in the snares of
grammar (the metaphysics of the people). It is even less the opposition of “thing-in-itself” and
appearance; for we do not “know” nearly enough to be entitled to any such distinction. We
simply lack any organ for knowledge,” for “truth”: we “know” (or believe or imagine) just as
much as may be useful in the interests of the human herd, the species; and even what is here
37
Friedrich Nietzsche The Gay Science
called “utility” is ultimately also a mere belief, something imaginary, and perhaps precisely
that most calamitous stupidity of which we shall perish some day.
38
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
Jean-Paul Sartre
‘EXISTENTIALISM IS A HUMANISM’
My purpose here is to offer a defence of existentialism against several reproaches that have
been laid against it.
First, it has been reproached as an invitation to people to dwell in quietism of despair. For if
every way to a solution is barred, one would have to regard any action in this world as entirely
ineffective, and one would arrive finally at a contemplative philosophy. Moreover, since
contemplation is a luxury, this would be only another bourgeois philosophy. This is,
especially, the reproach made by the Communists.
From another quarter we are reproached for having underlined all that is ignominious in the
human situation, for depicting what is mean, sordid or base to the neglect of certain things
that possess charm and beauty and belong to the brighter side of human nature: for example,
according to the Catholic critic, Mlle. Mercier, we forget how an infant smiles. Both from this
side and from the other we are also reproached for leaving out of account the solidarity of
mankind and considering man in isolation. And this, say the Communists, is because we base
our doctrine upon pure subjectivity — upon the Cartesian “I think”: which is the moment in
which solitary man attains to himself; a position from which it is impossible to regain
solidarity with other men who exist outside of the self. The ego cannot reach them through the
cogito.
From the Christian side, we are reproached as people who deny the reality and seriousness of
human affairs. For since we ignore the commandments of God and all values prescribed as
eternal, nothing remains but what is strictly voluntary. Everyone can do what he likes, and
will be incapable, from such a point of view, of condemning either the point of view or the
action of anyone else.
It is to these various reproaches that I shall endeavour to reply today; that is why I have
entitled this brief exposition “Existentialism is a Humanism.” Many may be surprised at the
mention of humanism in this connection, but we shall try to see in what sense we understand
it. In any case, we can begin by saying that existentialism, in our sense of the word, is a
doctrine that does render human life possible; a doctrine, also, which affirms that every truth
and every action imply both an environment and a human subjectivity. The essential charge
laid against us is, of course, that of over-emphasis upon the evil side of human life. I have
lately been told of a lady who, whenever she lets slip a vulgar expression in a moment of
nervousness, excuses herself by exclaiming, ‘I believe I am becoming an existentialist.” So it
appears that ugliness is being identified with existentialism. That is why some people say we
are “naturalistic,” and if we are, it is strange to see how much we scandalise and horrify them,
for no one seems to be much frightened or humiliated nowadays by what is properly called
naturalism. Those who can quite well keep down a novel by Zola such as La Terre are
sickened as soon as they read an existentialist novel.1 Those who appeal to the wisdom of the
people — which is a sad wisdom — find ours sadder still. And yet, what could be more
disillusioned than such sayings as “Charity begins at home” or “Promote a rogue and he’ll sue
you for damage, knock him down and he’ll do you homage”? We all know how many
common sayings can be quoted to this effect, and they all mean much the same — that you
must not oppose the powers that be; that you must not fight against superior force; must not
meddle in matters that are above your station. Or that any action not in accordance with some
tradition is mere romanticism; or that any undertaking which has not the support of proven
experience is foredoomed to frustration; and that since experience has shown men to be
invariably inclined to evil, there must be firm rules to restrain them, otherwise we shall have
1
Emile Zola (1840-1902) was the leading ‘naturalist’ novelist.
39
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
anarchy. It is, however, the people who are forever mouthing these dismal proverbs and,
whenever they are told of some more or less repulsive action, say “How like human nature!”
— it is these very people, always harping upon realism, who complain that existentialism is
too gloomy a view of things. Indeed their excessive protests make me suspect that what is
annoying them is not so much our pessimism, but, much more likely, our optimism. For at
bottom, what is alarming in the doctrine that I am about to try to explain to you is — is it not?
— that it confronts man with a possibility of choice. To verify this, let us review the whole
question upon the strictly philosophic level. What, then, is this that we call existentialism?
Most of those who are making use of this word would be highly confused if required to
explain its meaning. For since it has become fashionable, people cheerfully declare that this
musician or that painter is “existentialist.” A columnist in Clartes signs himself “The
Existentialist,” and, indeed, the word is now so loosely applied to so many things that it no
longer means anything at all. It would appear that, for the lack of any novel doctrine such as
that of surrealism,2 all those who are eager to join in the latest scandal or movement now seize
upon this philosophy in which, however, they can find nothing to their purpose. For in truth
this is of all teachings the least scandalous and the most austere: it is intended strictly for
technicians and philosophers. All the same, it can easily be defined.
The question is only complicated because there are two kinds of existentialists. There are, on
the one hand, the Christians, amongst whom I shall name Jaspers and Gabriel Marcel, both
professed Catholics; and on the other the existential atheists, amongst whom we must place
Heidegger as well as the French existentialists and myself.3 What they have in common is
simply the fact that they believe that existence comes before essence — or, if you will, that we
must begin from the subjective. What exactly do we mean by that?
If one considers an article of manufacture as, for example, a book or a paper-knife — one sees
that it has been made by an artisan who had a conception of it; and he has paid attention,
equally, to the conception of a paper-knife and to the pre-existent technique of production
which is a part of that conception and is, at bottom, a formula. Thus the paper-knife is at the
same time an article producible in a certain manner and one which, on the other hand, serve a
definite purpose, for one cannot suppose that a man would produce a paper-knife without
knowing what it was for. Let us say, then, of the paperknife that its essence — that is to say
the sum of the formulae and the qualities which made its production and its definition
possible — precedes its existence. The presence of such-and-such a paper-knife or book is
thus determined before my eyes. Here, then, we are viewing the world from a technical
standpoint, and we can say that production precedes existence.
When we think of God as the creator, we are thinking of him, most of the time, as a supernal
artisan. Whatever doctrine we may be considering, whether it be a doctrine like that of
Descartes, or of Leibnitz himself, we always imply that the will follows, more or less, from
the understanding or at least accompanies it, so that when God creates he knows precisely
2
Surrealism had been the rage in Paris on either side of the previous war. Surrealists sought to
produce art that sprang from the unconscious mind “in the absence of all control exercised by the
reason and outside all aesthetic and moral considerations” (Andre Breton, ‘What is Surrealism?’
Theories of Modern Art, ed. Herschel B. Chipp University of California Press, 1968).
Surrealism was primarily an artistic movement with philosophical pretensions. In contrast,
existentialism was a philosophical movement with artistic implications. Sartre is saying that in the
absence of a new artistic movement, existentialism had been seized upon as a label for much that
was going on in the arts.
3
Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), German existentialist. His most famous work was Being and Time
(1927). He was a major influence on the young Sartre.
40
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
what he is creating.4 Thus, the conception of man in the mind of God is comparable to that of
the paper-knife in the mind of the artisan: God makes man according to a procedure and a
conception, exactly as the artisan manufactures a paper-knife, following a definition and a
formula. Thus each individual man is the realisation of a certain conception which dwells in
the divine understanding. In the philosophic atheism of the eighteenth century, the notion of
God is suppressed, but not, for all that, the idea that essence is prior to existence; something
of that idea we still find everywhere, in Diderot, in Voltaire and even in Kant. 5 Man possesses
a human nature; that “human nature,” which is the conception of human being, is found in
every man; which means that each man is a particular example of a universal conception, the
conception of Man. In Kant, this universality goes so far that the wild man of the woods, man
in the state of nature and the bourgeois are all contained in the same definition and have the
same fundamental qualities. Here again, the essence of man precedes that historic existence
which we confront in experience.
Atheistic existentialism, of which I am a representative, declares with greater consistency that
if God does not exist there is at least one being whose existence comes before its essence, a
being which exists before it can be defined by any conception of it. That being is man or, as
Heidegger has it, the human reality. What do we mean by saying that existence precedes
essence? We mean that man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world —
and defines himself afterwards. If man as the existentialist sees him is not definable, it is
because to begin with he is nothing. He will not be anything until later, and then he will be
what he makes of himself. Thus, there is no human nature, because there is no God to have a
conception of it. Man simply is. Not that he is simply what he conceives himself to be, but he
is what he wills, and as he conceives himself after already existing — as he wills to be after
that leap towards existence. Man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself. That is
the first principle of existentialism. And this is what people call its “subjectivity,” using the
word as a reproach against us. But what do we mean to say by this, but that man is of a greater
dignity than a stone or a table? For we mean to say that man primarily exists — that man is,
before all else, something which propels itself towards a future and is aware that it is doing
so. Man is, indeed, a project which possesses a subjective life, instead of being a kind of
moss, or a fungus or a cauliflower. Before that projection of the self nothing exists; not even
in the heaven of intelligence: man will only attain existence when he is what he purposes to
be. Not, however, what he may wish to be. For what we usually understand by wishing or
willing is a conscious decision taken — much more often than not — after we have made
ourselves what we are. I may wish to join a party, to write a book or to marry — but in such a
case what is usually called my will is probably a manifestation of a prior and more
spontaneous decision. If, however, it is true that existence is prior to essence, man is
responsible for what he is. Thus, the first effect of existentialism is that it puts every man in
possession of himself as he is, and places the entire responsibility for his existence squarely
upon his own shoulders. And, when we say that man is responsible for himself, we do not
mean that he is responsible only for his own individuality, but that he is responsible for all
men. The word “subjectivism” is to be understood in two senses, and our adversaries play
upon only one of them. Subjectivism means, on the one hand, the freedom of the individual
subject and, on the other, that man cannot pass beyond human subjectivity. It is the latter
which is the deeper meaning of existentialism. When we say that man chooses himself, we do
4
5
Gottlob Liebniz (1646-1716) is famous (or infamous) for the doctrine that this is ‘the best of all
possible worlds’. This is the idea that a good God must have chosen the best of all possible worlds.
To put this very crudely, this doctrine imagines God choosing a world from the possible options
like a person choosing an outfit from their wardrobe. Leibniz’s view was parodied mercilessly in
Voltaire’s novelette, Candide.
Denis Diderot (1713-1784) and Voltaire (pseudonym of Francois-Marie Arouet, 1694-1778). Both
men were leading writers of the French Enlightenment.
41
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
mean that every one of us must choose himself; but by that we also mean that in choosing for
himself he chooses for all men. For in effect, of all the actions a man may take in order to
create himself as he wills to be, there is not one which is not creative, at the same time, of an
image of man such as he believes he ought to be. To choose between this or that is at the same
time to affirm the value of that which is chosen; for we are unable ever to choose the worse.
What we choose is always the better; and nothing can be better for us unless it is better for all.
If, moreover, existence precedes essence and we will to exist at the same time as we fashion
our image, that image is valid for all and for the entire epoch in which we find ourselves. Our
responsibility is thus much greater than we had supposed, for it concerns mankind as a whole.
If I am a worker, for instance, I may choose to join a Christian rather than a Communist trade
union. And if, by that membership, I choose to signify that resignation is, after all, the attitude
that best becomes a man, that man’s kingdom is not upon this earth, I do not commit myself
alone to that view. Resignation is my will for everyone, and my action is, in consequence, a
commitment on behalf of all mankind. Or if, to take a more personal case, I decide to marry
and to have children, even though this decision proceeds simply from my situation, from my
passion or my desire, I am thereby committing not only myself, but humanity as a whole, to
the practice of monogamy. I am thus responsible for myself and for all men, and I am creating
a certain image of man as I would have him to be. In fashioning myself I fashion man.
This may enable us to understand what is meant by such terms — perhaps a little
grandiloquent — as anguish, abandonment and despair. As you will soon see, it is very
simple. First, what do we mean by anguish? — The existentialist frankly states that man is in
anguish. His meaning is as follows: When a man commits himself to anything, fully realising
that he is not only choosing what he will be, but is thereby at the same time a legislator
deciding for the whole of mankind — in such a moment a man cannot escape from the sense
of complete and profound responsibility. There are many, indeed, who show no such anxiety.
But we affirm that they are merely disguising their anguish or are in flight from it. Certainly,
many people think that in what they are doing they commit no one but themselves to
anything: and if you ask them, “What would happen if everyone did so?” they shrug their
shoulders and reply, “Everyone does not do so.” But in truth, one ought always to ask oneself
what would happen if everyone did as one is doing; nor can one escape from that disturbing
thought except by a kind of self-deception. The man who lies in self-excuse, by saying
“Everyone will not do it” must be ill at ease in his conscience, for the act of lying implies the
universal value which it denies. By its very disguise his anguish reveals itself. This is the
anguish that Kierkegaard called “the anguish of Abraham.” You know the story6: An angel
commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son: and obedience was obligatory, if it really was an
angel who had appeared and said, “Thou, Abraham, shalt sacrifice thy son.” But anyone in
such a case would wonder, first, whether it was indeed an angel and secondly, whether I am
really Abraham. Where are the proofs? A certain mad woman who suffered from
hallucinations said that people were telephoning to her, and giving her orders. The doctor
asked, “But who is it that speaks to you?” She replied: “He says it is God.” And what, indeed,
could prove to her that it was God? If an angel appears to me, what is the proof that it is an
angel; or, if I hear voices, who can prove that they proceed from heaven and not from hell, or
from my own subconsciousness or some pathological condition? Who can prove that they are
really addressed to me?
Who, then, can prove that I am the proper person to impose, by my own choice, my
conception of man upon mankind? I shall never find any proof whatever; there will be no sign
to convince me of it. If a voice speaks to me, it is still I myself who must decide whether the
voice is or is not that of an angel. If I regard a certain course of action as good, it is only I who
6
Genesis chapter 22. Those who do not know the story may be interested to know that this was a test
of Abraham’s faith. At the last moment, an angel intervened and told Abraham to substitute a ram.
42
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
choose to say that it is good and not bad. There is nothing to show that I am Abraham:
nevertheless I also am obliged at every instant to perform actions which are examples.
Everything happens to every man as though the whole human race had its eyes fixed upon
what he is doing and regulated its conduct accordingly. So every man ought to say, “Am I
really a man who has the right to act in such a manner that humanity regulates itself by what I
do.” If a man does not say that, he is dissembling his anguish. Clearly, the anguish with which
we are concerned here is not one that could lead to quietism or inaction. It is anguish pure and
simple, of the kind well known to all those who have borne responsibilities. When, for
instance, a military leader takes upon himself the responsibility for the attack and sends a
number of men to their death, he chooses to do it and at bottom he alone chooses. No doubt
under a higher command, but its orders, which are more general, require interpretation by him
and upon that interpretation depends the life of ten, fourteen or twenty men. In making the
decision, he cannot but feel a certain anguish. All leaders know that anguish. It does not
prevent their acting, on the contrary it is the very condition of their action, for the action
presupposes that there is a plurality of possibilities, and in choosing one of these, they realize
that it has value only because it is chosen. Now it is anguish of that kind which existentialism
describes, and moreover, as we shall see, makes explicit through direct responsibility towards
other men who are concerned. Far from being a screen which could separate us from action, it
is a condition of action itself.
And when we speak of “abandonment” — a favourite word of Heidegger — we only mean to
say that God does not exist, and that it is necessary to draw the consequences of his absence
right to the end. The existentialist is strongly opposed to a certain type of secular moralism
which seeks to suppress God at the least possible expense. Towards 1880, when the French
professors endeavoured to formulate a secular morality, they said something like this: God is
a useless and costly hypothesis, so we will do without it. However, if we are to have morality,
a society and a law-abiding world, it is essential that certain values should be taken seriously;
they must have an a priori existence ascribed to them. It must be considered obligatory a
priori to be honest, not to lie, not to beat one’s wife, to bring up children and so forth; so we
are going to do a little work on this subject, which will enable us to show that these values
exist all the same, inscribed in an intelligible heaven although, of course, there is no God. In
other words — and this is, I believe, the purport of all that we in France call radicalism —
nothing will be changed if God does not exist; we shall rediscover the same norms of honesty,
progress and humanity, and we shall have disposed of God as an out-of-date hypothesis which
will die away quietly of itself. The existentialist, on the contrary, finds it extremely
embarrassing that God does not exist, for there disappears with Him all possibility of finding
values in an intelligible heaven. There can no longer be any good a priori, since there is no
infinite and perfect consciousness to think it. It is nowhere written that “the good” exists, that
one must be honest or must not lie, since we are now upon the plane where there are only
men. Dostoyevsky once wrote “if God did not exist, everything would be permitted” 7; and
that, for existentialism, is the starting point. Everything is indeed permitted if God does not
exist, and man is in consequence forlorn, for he cannot find anything to depend upon either
within or outside himself. He discovers forthwith, that he is without excuse. For if indeed
existence precedes essence, one will never be able to explain one’s action by reference to a
given and specific human nature; in other words, there is no determinism — man is free, man
is freedom. Nor, on the other hand, if God does not exist, are we provided with any values or
commands that could legitimise our behaviour. Thus we have neither behind us, nor before us
in a luminous realm of values, any means of justification or excuse. — We are left alone,
without excuse. That is what I mean when I say that man is condemned to be free.
This quote is generally thought to be found in Dostoyevsky’s The Brother’s Karamazov. Although it
is a sentiment that is in keeping with the character of Ivan Karamazov, the phrase does not appear in
the novel.
7
43
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
Condemned, because he did not create himself, yet is nevertheless at liberty, and from the
moment that he is thrown into this world he is responsible for everything he does. The
existentialist does not believe in the power of passion. He will never regard a grand passion as
a destructive torrent upon which a man is swept into certain actions as by fate, and which,
therefore, is an excuse for them. He thinks that man is responsible for his passion. Neither
will an existentialist think that a man can find help through some sign being vouchsafed upon
earth for his orientation: for he thinks that the man himself interprets the sign as he chooses.
He thinks that every man, without any support or help whatever, is condemned at every
instant to invent man. As Ponge has written in a very fine article, “Man is the future of man.”
That is exactly true. Only, if one took this to mean that the future is laid up in Heaven, that
God knows what it is, it would be false, for then it would no longer even be a future. If,
however, it means that, whatever man may now appear to be, there is a future to be fashioned,
a virgin future that awaits him — then it is a true saying. But in the present one is forsaken.
As an example by which you may the better understand this state of abandonment, I will refer
to the case of a pupil of mine, who sought me out in the following circumstances. His father
was quarrelling with his mother and was also inclined to be a “collaborator”; his elder brother
had been killed in the German offensive of 1940 and this young man, with a sentiment
somewhat primitive but generous, burned to avenge him. His mother was living alone with
him, deeply afflicted by the semi-treason of his father and by the death of her eldest son, and
her one consolation was in this young man. But he, at this moment, had the choice between
going to England to join the Free French Forces or of staying near his mother and helping her
to live. He fully realised that this woman lived only for him and that his disappearance — or
perhaps his death — would plunge her into despair. He also realised that, concretely and in
fact, every action he performed on his mother’s behalf would be sure of effect in the sense of
aiding her to live, whereas anything he did in order to go and fight would be an ambiguous
action which might vanish like water into sand and serve no purpose. For instance, to set out
for England he would have to wait indefinitely in a Spanish camp on the way through Spain;
or, on arriving in England or in Algiers he might be put into an office to fill up forms.
Consequently, he found himself confronted by two very different modes of action; the one
concrete, immediate, but directed towards only one individual; and the other an action
addressed to an end infinitely greater, a national collectivity, but for that very reason
ambiguous — and it might be frustrated on the way. At the same time, he was hesitating
between two kinds of morality; on the one side the morality of sympathy, of personal
devotion and, on the other side, a morality of wider scope but of more debatable validity. He
had to choose between those two. What could help him to choose? Could the Christian
doctrine? No. Christian doctrine says: Act with charity, love your neighbour, deny yourself
for others, choose the way which is hardest, and so forth. But which is the harder road? To
whom does one owe the more brotherly love, the patriot or the mother? Which is the more
useful aim, the general one of fighting in and for the whole community, or the precise aim of
helping one particular person to live? Who can give an answer to that a priori? No one. Nor is
it given in any ethical scripture. The Kantian ethic says, Never regard another as a means, but
always as an end. Very well; if I remain with my mother, I shall be regarding her as the end
and not as a means: but by the same token I am in danger of treating as means those who are
fighting on my behalf; and the converse is also true, that if I go to the aid of the combatants I
shall be treating them as the end at the risk of treating my mother as a means. If values are
uncertain, if they are still too abstract to determine the particular, concrete case under
consideration, nothing remains but to trust in our instincts. That is what this young man tried
to do; and when I saw him he said, “In the end, it is feeling that counts; the direction in which
it is really pushing me is the one I ought to choose. If I feel that I love my mother enough to
sacrifice everything else for her — my will to be avenged, all my longings for action and
adventure then I stay with her. If, on the contrary, I feel that my love for her is not enough, I
44
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
go.” But how does one estimate the strength of a feeling? The value of his feeling for his
mother was determined precisely by the fact that he was standing by her. I may say that I love
a certain friend enough to sacrifice such or such a sum of money for him, but I cannot prove
that unless I have done it. I may say, “I love my mother enough to remain with her,” if
actually I have remained with her. I can only estimate the strength of this affection if I have
performed an action by which it is defined and ratified. But if I then appeal to this affection to
justify my action, I find myself drawn into a vicious circle.
Moreover, as Gide8 has very well said, a sentiment which is play-acting and one which is vital
are two things that are hardly distinguishable one from another. To decide that I love my
mother by staying beside her, and to play a comedy the upshot of which is that I do so —
these are nearly the same thing. In other words, feeling is formed by the deeds that one does;
therefore I cannot consult it as a guide to action. And that is to say that I can neither seek
within myself for an authentic impulse to action, nor can I expect, from some ethic, formulae
that will enable me to act. You may say that the youth did, at least, go to a professor to ask for
advice. But if you seek counsel — from a priest, for example you have selected that priest;
and at bottom you already knew, more or less, what he would advise. In other words, to
choose an adviser is nevertheless to commit oneself by that choice. If you are a Christian, you
will say, Consult a priest; but there are collaborationists, priests who are resisters and priests
who wait for the tide to turn: which will you choose? Had this young man chosen a priest of
the resistance, or one of the collaboration, he would have decided beforehand the kind of
advice he was to receive. Similarly, in coming to me, he knew what advice I should give him,
and I had but one reply to make. You are free, therefore choose that is to say, invent. No rule
of general morality can show you what you ought to do: no signs are vouchsafed in this
world. The Catholics will reply, “Oh, but they are!” Very well; still, it is I myself, in every
case, who have to interpret the signs. While I was imprisoned, I made the acquaintance of a
somewhat remarkable man, a Jesuit, who had become a member of that order in the following
manner. In his life he had suffered a succession of rather severe setbacks. His father had died
when he was a child, leaving him in poverty, and he had been awarded a free scholarship in a
religious institution, where he had been made continually to feel that he was accepted for
charity’s sake, and, in consequence, he had been denied several of those distinctions and
honours which gratify children. Later, about the age of eighteen, he came to grief in a
sentimental affair; and finally, at twenty-two — this was a trifle in itself, but it was the last
drop that overflowed his cup — he failed in his military examination. This young man, then,
could regard himself as a total failure: it was a sign — but a sign of what? He might have
taken refuge in bitterness or despair. But he took it — very cleverly for him as a sign that he
was not intended for secular success, and that only the attainments of religion, those of
sanctity and of faith, were accessible to him. He interpreted his record as a message from
God, and became a member of the Order. Who can doubt but that this decision as to the
meaning of the sign was his, and his alone? One could have drawn quite different conclusions
from such a series of reverses — as, for example, that he had better become a carpenter or a
revolutionary. For the decipherment of the sign, however, he bears the entire responsibility.
That is what “abandonment” implies, that we ourselves decide our being. And with this
abandonment goes anguish.
As for “despair,” the meaning of this expression is extremely simple. It merely means that we
limit ourselves to a reliance upon that which is within our wills, or within the sum of the
probabilities which render our action feasible. Whenever one wills anything, there are always
these elements of probability. If I am counting upon a visit from a friend, who may be coming
by train or by tram, I presuppose that the train will arrive at the appointed time, or that the
tram will not be derailed. I remain in the realm of possibilities; but one does not rely upon any
8
French novelist Andre Gide (1869-1951).
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Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
possibilities beyond those that are strictly concerned in one’s action. Beyond the point at
which the possibilities under consideration cease to affect my action, I ought to disinterest
myself. For there is no God and no prevenient design, which can adapt the world and all its
possibilities to my will. When Descartes said, “Conquer yourself rather than the world,” what
he meant was, at bottom, the same — that we should act without hope.
Marxists, to whom I have said this, have answered: “Your action is limited, obviously, by
your death; but you can rely upon the help of others. That is, you can count both upon what
the others are doing to help you elsewhere, as in China and in Russia, and upon what they will
do later, after your death, to take up your action and carry it forward to its final
accomplishment which will be the revolution. Moreover you must rely upon this; not to do so
is immoral.” To this I rejoin, first, that I shall always count upon my comrades-in-arms in the
struggle, in so far as they are committed, as I am, to a definite, common cause; and in the
unity of a party or a group which I can more or less control — that is, in which I am enrolled
as a militant and whose movements at every moment are known to me. In that respect, to rely
upon the unity and the will of the party is exactly like my reckoning that the train will run to
time or that the tram will not be derailed. But I cannot count upon men whom I do not know, I
cannot base my confidence upon human goodness or upon man’s interest in the good of
society, seeing that man is free and that there is no human nature which I can take as
foundational. I do not know where the Russian revolution will lead. I can admire it and take it
as an example in so far as it is evident, today, that the proletariat plays a part in Russia which
it has attained in no other nation. But I cannot affirm that this will necessarily lead to the
triumph of the proletariat: I must confine myself to what I can see. Nor can I be sure that
comrades-in-arms will take up my work after my death and carry it to the maximum
perfection, seeing that those men are free agents and will freely decide, tomorrow, what man
is then to be. Tomorrow, after my death, some men may decide to establish Fascism, and the
others may be so cowardly or so slack as to let them do so. If so, Fascism will then be the
truth of man, and so much the worse for us. In reality, things will be such as men have
decided they shall be. Does that mean that I should abandon myself to quietism? No. First I
ought to commit myself and then act my commitment, according to the time-honoured
formula that “one need not hope in order to undertake one’s work.” Nor does this mean that I
should not belong to a party, but only that I should be without illusion and that I should do
what I can. For instance, if I ask myself “Will the social ideal as such, ever become a reality?”
I cannot tell, I only know that whatever may be in my power to make it so, I shall do; beyond
that, I can count upon nothing.
Quietism is the attitude of people who say, “let others do what I cannot do.” The doctrine I am
presenting before you is precisely the opposite of this, since it declares that there is no reality
except in action. It goes further, indeed, and adds, “Man is nothing else but what he purposes,
he exists only in so far as he realises himself, he is therefore nothing else but the sum of his
actions, nothing else but what his life is.” Hence we can well understand why some people are
horrified by our teaching. For many have but one resource to sustain them in their misery, and
that is to think, “Circumstances have been against me, I was worthy to be something much
better than I have been. I admit I have never had a great love or a great friendship; but that is
because I never met a man or a woman who were worthy of it; if I have not written any very
good books, it is because I had not the leisure to do so; or, if I have had no children to whom I
could devote myself it is because I did not find the man I could have lived with. So there
remains within me a wide range of abilities, inclinations and potentialities, unused but
perfectly viable, which endow me with a worthiness that could never be inferred from the
mere history of my actions.” But in reality and for the existentialist, there is no love apart
from the deeds of love; no potentiality of love other than that which is manifested in loving;
there is no genius other than that which is expressed in works of art. The genius of Proust is
the totality of the works of Proust; the genius of Racine is the series of his tragedies, outside
46
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
of which there is nothing.9 Why should we attribute to Racine the capacity to write yet
another tragedy when that is precisely what he — did not write? In life, a man commits
himself, draws his own portrait and there is nothing but that portrait. No doubt this thought
may seem comfortless to one who has not made a success of his life. On the other hand, it
puts everyone in a position to understand that reality alone is reliable; that dreams,
expectations and hopes serve to define a man only as deceptive dreams abortive hopes,
expectations unfulfilled; that is to say, they define him negatively, not positively.
Nevertheless, when one says, “You are nothing else but what you live,” it does not imply that
an artist is to be judged solely by his works of art, for a thousand other things contribute no
less to his definition as a man. What we mean to say is that a man is no other than a series of
undertakings, that he is the sum, the organisation, the set of relations that constitute these
undertakings.
In the light of all this, what people reproach us with is not, after all, our pessimism, but the
sternness of our optimism. If people condemn our works of fiction, in which we describe
characters that are base, weak, cowardly and sometimes even frankly evil, it is not only
because those characters are base, weak, cowardly or evil. For suppose that, like Zola, we
showed that the behaviour of these characters was caused by their heredity, or by the action of
their environment upon them, or by determining factors, psychic or organic. People would be
reassured, they would say, “You see, that is what we are like, no one can do anything about
it.” But the existentialist, when he portrays a coward, shows him as responsible for his
cowardice. He is not like that on account of a cowardly heart or lungs or cerebrum, he has not
become like that through his physiological organism; he is like that because he has made
himself into a coward through cowardly actions. There is no such thing as a cowardly
temperament. There are nervous temperaments; there is what is called impoverished blood,
and there are also rich temperaments. But the man whose blood is poor is not a coward for all
that, for what produces cowardice is the act of giving up or giving way; and a temperament is
not an action. A coward is defined by the deed that he has done. What people feel obscurely,
and with horror, is that the coward as we present him is guilty of being a coward. What people
would prefer would be to be born either a coward or a hero. One of the charges most often
laid against the Chemins de la Liberte is something like this “But, after all, these people being
so base, how can you make them into heroes?”10 That objection is really rather comic, for it
implies that people are born heroes: and that is, at bottom, what such people would like to
think. If you are born cowards, you can be quite content. You can do nothing about it and you
will be cowards all your lives whatever you do; and if you are born heroes you can again be
quite content; you will be heroes all your lives eating and drinking heroically. Whereas the
existentialist says that the coward makes himself cowardly, the hero makes himself heroic;
and that there is always a possibility for the coward to give up cowardice and for the hero to
stop being a hero. What counts is the total commitment, and it is not by a particular case or
particular action that you are committed altogether.
We have now, I think, dealt with a certain number of the reproaches against existentialism.
You have seen that it cannot be regarded as a philosophy of quietism since it defines man by
his action; nor as a pessimistic description of man, for no doctrine is more optimistic, the
destiny of man is placed within himself. Nor is it an attempt to discourage man from action
since it tells him that there is no hope except in his action, and that the one thing which
permits him to have life is the deed. Upon this level therefore, what we are considering is an
ethic of action and self-commitment. However, we are still reproached, upon these few data,
9
Marcel Proust (1871-1922), great modernist novelist, most famous for À la Recherche du temps
perdu (Remembrance of Things Past); Jean Racine (1639-1699), French dramatist author of classic
tragedies. Arguably, these two are the greatest exponents of French modernism and classicism
respectively.
10
Chemins de la liberte is Sartre’s trilogy of novels set during the Nazi occupation of France.
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Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
for confining man within his individual subjectivity. There again people badly misunderstand
us.
Our point of departure is, indeed, the subjectivity of the individual, and that for strictly
philosophic reasons. It is not because we are bourgeois, but because we seek to base our
teaching upon the truth, and not upon a collection of fine theories, full of hope but lacking real
foundations. And at the point of departure there cannot be any other truth than this, I think,
therefore I am, which is the absolute truth of consciousness as it attains to itself. Every theory
which begins with man, outside of this moment of self-attainment, is a theory which thereby
suppresses the truth, for outside of the Cartesian cogito, all objects are no more than probable,
and any doctrine of probabilities which is not attached to a truth will crumble into nothing. In
order to define the probable one must possess the true. Before there can be any truth
whatever, then, there must be an absolute truth, and there is such a truth which is simple,
easily attained and within the reach of everybody; it consists in one’s immediate sense of
one’s self.
In the second place, this theory alone is compatible with the dignity of man, it is the only one
which does not make man into an object. All kinds of materialism lead one to treat every man
including oneself as an object — that is, as a set of pre-determined reactions, in no way
different from the patterns of qualities and phenomena which constitute a table, or a chair or a
stone. Our aim is precisely to establish the human kingdom as a pattern of values in
distinction from the material world. But the subjectivity which we thus postulate as the
standard of truth is no narrowly individual subjectivism, for as we have demonstrated, it is not
only one’s own self that one discovers in the cogito, but those of others too. Contrary to the
philosophy of Descartes, contrary to that of Kant, when we say “I think” we are attaining to
ourselves in the presence of the other, and we are just as certain of the other as we are of
ourselves. Thus the man who discovers himself directly in the cogito also discovers all the
others, and discovers them as the condition of his own existence. He recognises that he cannot
be anything (in the sense in which one says one is spiritual, or that one is wicked or jealous)
unless others recognise him as such. I cannot obtain any truth whatsoever about myself,
except through the mediation of another. The other is indispensable to my existence, and
equally so to any knowledge I can have of myself. Under these conditions, the intimate
discovery of myself is at the same time the revelation of the other as a freedom which
confronts mine. and which cannot think or will without doing so either for or against me.
Thus, at once, we find ourselves in a world which is, let us say, that of “inter-subjectivity”. It
is in this world that man has to decide what he is and what others are.
Furthermore, although it is impossible to find in each and every man a universal essence that
can be called human nature, there is nevertheless a human universality of condition. It is not
by chance that the thinkers of today are so much more ready to speak of the condition than of
the nature of man. By his condition they understand, with more or less clarity, all the
limitations which a priori define man’s fundamental situation in the universe. His historical
situations are variable: man may be born a slave in a pagan society or may be a feudal baron,
or a proletarian. But what never vary are the necessities of being in the world, of having to
labour and to die there. These limitations are neither subjective nor objective, or rather there is
both a subjective and an objective aspect of them. Objective, because we meet with them
everywhere and they are everywhere recognisable: and subjective because they are lived and
are nothing if man does not live them — if, that is to say, he does not freely determine himself
and his existence in relation to them. And, diverse though man’s purpose may be, at least
none of them is wholly foreign to me, since every human purpose presents itself as an attempt
either to surpass these limitations, or to widen them, or else to deny or to accommodate
oneself to them. Consequently every purpose, however individual it may be, is of universal
value. Every purpose, even that of a Chinese, an Indian or a Negro, can be understood by a
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Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
European. To say it can be understood, means that the European of 1945 may be striving out
of a certain situation towards the same limitations in the same way, and that he may
reconceive in himself the purpose of the Chinese, of the Indian or the African. In every
purpose there is universality, in this sense that every purpose is comprehensible to every man.
Not that this or that purpose defines man for ever, but that it may be entertained again and
again. There is always some way of understanding an idiot, a child, a primitive man or a
foreigner if one has sufficient information. In this sense we may say that there is a human
universality, but it is not something given; it is being perpetually made. I make this
universality in choosing myself; I also make it by understanding the purpose of any other
man, of whatever epoch. This absoluteness of the act of choice does not alter the relativity of
each epoch.
What is at the very heart and centre of existentialism, is the absolute character of the free
commitment, by which every man realises himself in realising a type of humanity — a
commitment always understandable, no matter to whom in no matter what epoch — and its
bearing upon the relativity of the cultural pattern which may result from such absolute
commitment. One must observe equally the relativity of Cartesianism and the absolute
character of the Cartesian commitment. In this sense you may say, if you like, that every one
of us makes the absolute by breathing, by eating, by sleeping or by behaving in any fashion
whatsoever. There is no difference between free being — being as self-committal, as
existence choosing its essence — and absolute being And there is no difference whatever
between being as an absolute, temporarily localised that is, localised in history — and
universally intelligible being.
This does not completely refute the charge of subjectivism. Indeed that objection appears in
several other forms, of which the first is as follows. People say to us, “Then it does not matter
what you do,” and they say this in various ways.
First they tax us with anarchy; then they say, “You cannot judge others, for there is no reason
for preferring one purpose to another”; finally, they may say, “Everything being merely
voluntary in this choice of yours, you give away with one hand what you pretend to gain with
the other.” These three are not very serious objections. As to the first, to say that it does not
matter what you choose is not correct. In one sense choice is possible, but what is not possible
is not to choose. I can always choose, but I must know that if I do not choose, that is still a
choice. This, although it may appear merely formal, is of great importance as a limit to
fantasy and caprice. For, when I confront a real situation — for example, that I am a sexual
being, able to have relations with a being of the other sex and able to have children — I am
obliged to choose my attitude to it, and in every respect I bear the responsibility of the choice
which, in committing myself, also commits the whole of humanity. Even if my choice is
determined by no a priori value whatever, it can have nothing to do with caprice: and if
anyone thinks that this is only Gide’s theory of the acte gratuit over again, he has failed to see
the enormous difference between this theory and that of Gide. Gide does not know what a
situation is, his “act” is one of pure caprice. In our view, on the contrary, man finds himself in
an organised situation in which he is himself involved: his choice involves mankind in its
entirety, and he cannot avoid choosing. Either he must remain single, or he must marry
without having children, or he must marry and have children. In any case, and whichever he
may choose, it is impossible for him, in respect of this situation, not to take complete
responsibility. Doubtless he chooses without reference to any pre-established value, but it is
unjust to tax him with caprice. Rather let us say that the moral choice is comparable to the
construction of a work of art.
But here I must at once digress to make it quite clear that we are not propounding an aesthetic
morality, for our adversaries are disingenuous enough to reproach us even with that. I mention
the work of art only by way of comparison. That being understood, does anyone reproach an
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Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
artist, when he paints a picture, for not following rules established a priori. Does one ever ask
what is the picture that he ought to paint? As everyone knows, there is no pre-defined picture
for him to make; the artist applies himself to the composition of a picture, and the picture that
ought to be made is precisely that which he will have made. As everyone knows, there are no
aesthetic values a priori, but there are values which will appear in due course in the coherence
of the picture, in the relation between the will to create and the finished work. No one can tell
what the painting of tomorrow will be like; one cannot judge a painting until it is done. What
has that to do with morality? We are in the same creative situation. We never speak of a work
of art as irresponsible; when we are discussing a canvas by Picasso, we understand very well
that the composition became what it is at the time when he was painting it, and that his works
are part and parcel of his entire life.
It is the same upon the plane of morality. There is this in common between art and morality,
that in both we have to do with creation and invention. We cannot decide a priori what it is
that should be done. I think it was made sufficiently clear to you in the case of that student
who came to see me, that to whatever ethical system he might appeal, the Kantian or any
other, he could find no sort of guidance whatever; he was obliged to invent the law for
himself. Certainly we cannot say that this man, in choosing to remain with his mother — that
is, in taking sentiment, personal devotion and concrete charity as his moral foundations —
would be making an irresponsible choice, nor could we do so if he preferred the sacrifice of
going away to England. Man makes himself; he is not found ready-made; he makes himself
by the choice of his morality, and he cannot but choose a morality, such is the pressure of
circumstances upon him. We define man only in relation to his commitments; it is therefore
absurd to reproach us for irresponsibility in our choice.
In the second place, people say to us, “You are unable to judge others.” This is true in one
sense and false in another. It is true in this sense, that whenever a man chooses his purpose
and his commitment in all clearness and in all sincerity, whatever that purpose may be, it is
impossible for him to prefer another. It is true in the sense that we do not believe in progress.
Progress implies amelioration; but man is always the same, facing a situation which is always
changing. and choice remains always a choice in the situation. The moral problem has not
changed since the time when it was a choice between slavery and anti-slavery — from the
time of the war of Secession, for example, until the present moment when one chooses
between the M.R.P. [Mouvement Republicain Populaire] 11 and the Communists.
We can judge, nevertheless, for, as I have said, one chooses in view of others, and in view of
others one chooses himself. One can judge, first – and perhaps this is not a judgment of value,
but it is a logical judgment – that in certain cases choice is founded upon an error, and in
others upon the truth. One can judge a man by saying that he deceives himself. Since we have
defined the situation of man as one of free choice, without excuse and without help, any man
who takes refuge behind the excuse of his passions, or by inventing some deterministic
doctrine, is a self-deceiver. One may object: “But why should he not choose to deceive
himself?” I reply that it is not for me to judge him morally, but I define his self-deception as
an error. Here one cannot avoid pronouncing a judgment of truth. The self-deception is
evidently a falsehood, because it is a dissimulation of man’s complete liberty of commitment.
Upon this same level, I say that it is also a self-deception if I choose to declare that certain
values are incumbent upon me; I am in contradiction with myself if I will these values and at
the same time say that they impose themselves upon me. If anyone says to me, “And what if I
wish to deceive myself?” I answer, “There is no reason why you should not, but I declare that
you are doing so, and that the attitude of strict consistency alone is that of good faith.”
Furthermore, I can pronounce a moral judgment. For I declare that freedom, in respect of
concrete circumstances, can have no other end and aim but itself; and when once a man has
11
= the political party of the Catholic Left.
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Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
seen that values depend upon himself, in that state of forsakenness he can will only one thing,
and that is freedom as the foundation of all values. That does not mean that he wills it in the
abstract: it simply means that the actions of men of good faith have, as their ultimate
significance, the quest of freedom itself as such. A man who belongs to some communist or
revolutionary society wills certain concrete ends, which imply the will to freedom, but that
freedom is willed in community. We will freedom for freedom’s sake, in and through
particular circumstances. And in thus willing freedom, we discover that it depends entirely
upon the freedom of others and that the freedom of others depends upon our own. Obviously,
freedom as the definition of a man does not depend upon others, but as soon as there is a
commitment, I am obliged to will the liberty of others at the same time as my own. I cannot
make liberty my aim unless I make that of others equally my aim. Consequently, when I
recognise, as entirely authentic, that man is a being whose existence precedes his essence, and
that he is a free being who cannot, in any circumstances, but will his freedom, at the same
time I realize that I cannot not will the freedom of others. Thus, in the name of that will to
freedom which is implied in freedom itself, I can form judgments upon those who seek to
hide from themselves the wholly voluntary nature of their existence and its complete freedom.
Those who hide from this total freedom, in a guise of solemnity or with deterministic excuses,
I shall call cowards. Others, who try to show that their existence is necessary, when it is
merely an accident of the appearance of the human race on earth — I shall call scum. But
neither cowards nor scum can be identified except upon the plane of strict authenticity. Thus,
although the content of morality is variable, a certain form of this morality is universal. Kant
declared that freedom is a will both to itself and to the freedom of others. Agreed: but he
thinks that the formal and the universal suffice for the constitution of a morality. We think, on
the contrary, that principles that are too abstract break down when we come to defining
action. To take once again the case of that student; by what authority, in the name of what
golden rule of morality, do you think he could have decided, in perfect peace of mind, either
to abandon his mother or to remain with her? There are no means of judging. The content is
always concrete, and therefore unpredictable; it has always to be invented. The one thing that
counts, is to know whether the invention is made in the name of freedom.
Let us, for example, examine the two following cases, and you will see how far they are
similar in spite of their difference. Let us take The Mill on the Floss. We find here a certain
young woman, Maggie Tulliver, who is an incarnation of the value of passion and is aware of
it. She is in love with a young man, Stephen, who is engaged to another, an insignificant
young woman. This Maggie Tulliver, instead of heedlessly seeking her own happiness,
chooses in the name of human solidarity to sacrifice herself and to give up the man she loves.
On the other hand, La Sanseverina in Stendhal’s Chartreuse de Parme, believing that it is
passion which endows man with his real value, would have declared that a grand passion
justifies its sacrifices, and must be preferred to the banality of such conjugal love as would
unite Stephen to the little goose he was engaged to marry. It is the latter that she would have
chosen to sacrifice in realising her own happiness, and, as Stendhal shows, she would also
sacrifice herself upon the plane of passion if life made that demand upon her. Here we are
facing two clearly opposed moralities; but I claim that they are equivalent, seeing that in both
cases the overruling aim is freedom. You can imagine two attitudes exactly similar in effect,
in that one girl might prefer, in resignation, to give up her lover while the other preferred, in
fulfilment of sexual desire, to ignore the prior engagement of the man she loved; and,
externally, these two cases might appear the same as the two we have just cited, while being
in fact entirely different. The attitude of La Sanseverina is much nearer to that of Maggie
Tulliver than to one of careless greed. Thus, you see, the second objection is at once true and
false. One can choose anything, but only if it is upon the plane of free commitment.
The third objection, stated by saying, “You take with one hand what you give with the other,”
means, at bottom, “your values are not serious, since you choose them yourselves.” To that I
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Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
can only say that I am very sorry that it should be so; but if I have excluded God the Father,
there must be somebody to invent values. We have to take things as they are. And moreover,
to say that we invent values means neither more nor less than this; that there is no sense in life
a priori. Life is nothing until it is lived; but it is yours to make sense of, and the value of it is
nothing else but the sense that you choose. Therefore, you can see that there is a possibility of
creating a human community. I have been reproached for suggesting that existentialism is a
form of humanism: people have said to me, “But you have written in your Nausée that the
humanists are wrong, you have even ridiculed a certain type of humanism, why do you now
go back upon that?” In reality, the word humanism has two very different meanings. One may
understand by humanism a theory which upholds man as the end-in-itself and as the supreme
value. Humanism in this sense appears, for instance, in Cocteau’s story Round the World in
80 Hours, in which one of the characters declares, because he is flying over mountains in an
airplane, “Man is magnificent!” This signifies that although I, personally have not built
aeroplanes I have the benefit of those particular inventions and that I personally, being a man,
can consider myself responsible for, and honoured by, achievements that are peculiar to some
men. It is to assume that we can ascribe value to man according to the most distinguished
deeds of certain men. That kind of humanism is absurd, for only the dog or the horse would
be in a position to pronounce a general judgment upon man and declare that he is magnificent,
which they have never been such fools as to do — at least, not as far as I know. But neither is
it admissible that a man should pronounce judgment upon Man. Existentialism dispenses with
any judgment of this sort: an existentialist will never take man as the end, since man is still to
be determined. And we have no right to believe that humanity is something to which we could
set up a cult, after the manner of Auguste Comte. The cult of humanity ends in Comtian
humanism, shut in upon itself, and — this must be said — in Fascism. We do not want a
humanism like that.
But there is another sense of the word, of which the fundamental meaning is this: Man is all
the time outside of himself: it is in projecting and losing himself beyond himself that he
makes man to exist; and, on the other band, it is by pursuing transcendent aims that he himself
is able to exist. Since man is thus self-surpassing, and can grasp objects only in relation to his
self-surpassing, he is himself the heart and centre of his transcendence. There is no other
universe except the human universe, the universe of human subjectivity. This relation of
transcendence as constitutive of man (not in the sense that God is transcendent, but in the
sense of self-surpassing) with subjectivity (in such a sense that man is not shut up in himself
but forever present in a human universe) — it is this that we call existential humanism. This is
humanism, because we remind man that there is no legislator but himself; that he himself,
thus abandoned, must decide for himself; also because we show that it is not by turning back
upon himself, but always by seeking, beyond himself, an aim which is one of liberation or of
some particular realisation, that man can realize himself as truly human.
You can see from these few reflections that nothing could be more unjust than the objections
people raise against us. Existentialism is nothing else but an attempt to draw the full
conclusions from a consistently atheistic position. Its intention is not in the least that of
plunging men into despair. And if by despair one means as the Christians do — any attitude
of unbelief, the despair of the existentialists is something different. Existentialism is not
atheist in the sense that it would exhaust itself in demonstrations of the non-existence of God.
It declares, rather, that even if God existed that would make no difference from its point of
view. Not that we believe God does exist, but we think that the real problem is not that of His
existence; what man needs is to find himself again and to understand that nothing can save
him from himself, not even a valid proof of the existence of God. In this sense existentialism
is optimistic. It is a doctrine of action, and it is only by self-deception, by confounding their
own despair with ours that Christians can describe us as without hope.
52
Jean Paul Sartre Existentialism is a Humanism
Jean-Paul Sartre 1946
Source: Existentialism from Dostoyevsky to Sartre
Translator: Walter Kaufman
53
Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
Iris Murdoch
‘The Sovereignty of Good over other concepts’
THE SOVEREIGNTY OF GOOD (Extract)
(Ark Paperbacks, 1985)
[Numbers in Square brackets refer to pagination in this edition.]
[78] Moral philosophy is the examination of the most important of all human activities, and I
think that two things are required of it. The examination should be realistic. Human nature, as
opposed to the natures of other hypothetical spiritual beings, has certain discoverable attributes, and these should be suitably considered in any discussion of morality. Secondly, since
an ethical system cannot but commend an ideal, it should commend a worthy ideal. Ethics
should not be merely an analysis of ordinary mediocre conduct, it should be a hypothesis
about good conduct and about how this can be achieved. How can we make ourselves better?
is a question moral philosophers should attempt to answer. And if I am right the answer will
come partly at least in the form of explanatory and persuasive metaphors. The metaphors
which I myself favour and the philosopher under whose banner I am fighting I will make
clear shortly.
First, however, I wish to mention very briefly two fundamental assumptions of my argument.
If either of these is denied what follows will be less convincing. I assume that human beings
are naturally selfish and that human life has no external point or telos. That human beings are
naturally selfish seems true on the evidence, whenever and wherever we look at them, in spite
of a very small number of apparent exceptions. About the quality of this selfishness modern
psychology has had something to tell us. The psyche is a historically determined individual
relentlessly looking after itself. In some ways it resembles a machine; in order to operate it
needs sources of energy, and it is predisposed to certain patterns of activity. 1 The area of its
vaunted freedom of choice is not usually very great. One of its main pastimes is daydreaming. It is reluctant to face unpleasant realities. Its consciousness is not normally a
transparent glass through which [79] it views the world, but a cloud of more or less fantastic
reverie designed to protect the psyche from pain. It constantly seeks consolation, either
through imagined inflation of self or through fictions of a theological nature. Even its loving
is more often than not an assertion of self. I think we can probably recognize ourselves in this
rather depressing description.
That human life has no external point or telos is a view as difficult to argue as its opposite,
and I shall simply assert it. I can see no evidence to suggest that human life is not something
self-contained. There are properly many patterns and purposes within life, but there is no
general and as it were externally guaranteed pattern or purpose of the kind for which
philosophers and theologians used to search. We are what we seem to be, transient mortal
creatures subject to necessity and chance. This is to say that there is, in my view, no God in
the traditional sense of that term; and the traditional sense is perhaps the only sense. When
Bonhoeffer says that God wants us to live as if there were no God, I suspect he is misusing
words.2 Equally the various metaphysical substitutes for God – Reason, Science, History are
1
Here Murdoch is alluding particularly to Freud, according to whom the psyche re-enacts certain
patterns of behaviour and whose energy is provided by the instinctive drives of the id.
2
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a German Protestant theologian active in German resistance against the
Nazis. He was arrested and imprisoned in 1943 and executed in 1945 for involvement in a plot against
54
Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
false deities. Our destiny can be examined but it cannot be justified or totally explained. We
are simply here. And if there is any kind of sense or unity in human life, and the dream of this
does not cease to haunt us, it is of some other kind and must be sought within a human
experience which has nothing outside it.
The idea of life as self-enclosed and purposeless is of course not simply a product of the
despair of our own age. It is the natural product of the advance of science and has developed
over a long period. It has already in fact occasioned a whole era in the history of philosophy,
beginning with Kant and leading on to the existentialism and the analytic philosophy of the
present day. The chief characteristic of this phase of philosophy can be briefly stated: Kant
[80] abolished God and made man God in His stead. We are still living in the age of the
Kantian man, or Kantian man-god. Kant’s conclusive exposure of the so-called proofs of the
existence of God, his analysis of the limitations of speculative reason, together with his
eloquent portrayal of the dignity of rational man, has had results which might possibly
dismay him. How recognizable, how familiar to us, is the man so beautifully portrayed in the
Grundlegung, who confronted even with Christ turns away to consider the judgment of his
own conscience and to hear the voice of his own reason.3
Stripped of the exiguous metaphysical background which Kant was prepared to allow him,
this man is with us still, free, independent, lonely, powerful, rational, responsible, brave the
hero of so many novels and books of moral philosophy. The raison d’etre of this attractive
but misleading creature is not far to seek. He is the offspring of the age of science,
confidently rational and yet increasingly aware of his alienation from the material universe
which his discoveries reveal; and since he is not a Hegelian (Kant, not Hegel, has provided
Western ethics with its dominating image) his alienation is without cure. He is the ideal
citizen of the liberal state, a warning held up to tyrants. He has the virtue which the age
requires and admires, courage. It is not such a very long step from Kant to Nietzsche, and
from Nietzsche to existentialism and the Anglo-Saxon ethical doctrines which in some ways
closely resemble it. In fact Kant’s man had already received a glorious incarnation nearly a
century earlier in the work of Milton: his proper name is Lucifer.4
The centre of this type of post-Kantian moral philosophy is the notion of the will as the
creator of value. Values which were previously in some sense inscribed in the heavens and
guaranteed by God collapse into the human will. There is no transcendent reality. The idea of
the good remains indefinable and empty so that human choice may fill it. The sovereign
moral concept is freedom, or possibly courage in a [81] sense which identifies it with
freedom, will, power. This concept inhabits a quite separate top level of human activity since
it is the guarantor of the secondary values created by choice. Act, choice, decision,
responsibility, independence are emphasized in this philosophy of puritanical origin and
apparent austerity. It must be said in its favour that this image of human nature has been the
the life of Adolf Hitler. Theologically, he advocated a convergence between religious and secular
views of life and Christian involvement in secular problems. His works include Ethics, The Cost of
Discipleship and Letters and Papers from Prison.
3
Grundlegung refers to Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals. From the Second Section
of that work, “… every example of it that is set before me must first itself be tested by principles of
morality, whether it is worthy to serve as an original example, i.e., as a pattern … Even the Holy One
of the Gospels must first be compared with our own ideal of moral perfection before we can recognize
him as such …” Immanuel Kant, Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals, translated
Thomas Kingsmill Abbott. P 263.
4
Lucifer = Satan. Murdoch is referring to Milton’s Paradise Lost.
55
Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
inspiration of political liberalism. However, as Hume once wisely observed, good political
philosophy is not necessarily good moral philosophy.
This impression is indeed an austere one, but there is something still to be added to it. What
place, one might ask, is left in this stern picture of solitary all-responsible man for the life of
the emotions? In fact the emotions have a rather significant place. They enter through a back
door left open by Kant and the whole romantic movement has followed after. Puritanism and
romanticism are natural partners and we are still living with their partnership. Kant held a
very interesting theory about the relation of the emotions to the reason. He did not officially
recognize the emotions as part of the structure of morality. When he speaks of love he tells us
to distinguish between practical love which is a matter of rational actions, and pathological
love which is a mere matter of feeling. He wants to segregate the messy warm empirical
psyche from the clean operations of the reason. However, in a footnote in the Grundlegung
he allows a subordinate place to a particular emotion, that of Achtung, or respect for the
moral law. This emotion is a kind of suffering pride which accompanies, though it does not
motivate, the recognition of duty. It is an actual experience of freedom (akin to the
existentialist Angst), the realization that although swayed by passions we are also capable of
rational conduct. A close relation of this concept is Kant’s handsome conception of the
Sublime.5 We experience the Sublime when we confront the awful contingency of nature or
of human fate [82] and return into ourselves with a proud shudder of rational power.6 How
abject we are, and yet our consciousness is of an infinite value. Here it is Belial not Satan
who speaks.
For who would lose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being,
Those thoughts that wander through eternity ...7
The emotions are allowed to return to the scene as a kind of allowable, rather painful, thrill
which is a by-product of our status as dignified rational beings.
What appears in Kant as a footnote and a side-issue takes, however, a central place in the
development which his philosophy underwent in the romantic movement. I would sum this
up by saying that romanticism tended to transform the idea of death into the idea of suffering.
To do this is of course an age-old human temptation. Few ideas invented by humanity have
more power to console than the idea of purgatory. To buy back evil by suffering in the
embrace of Good: what could be more satisfying, or as a romantic might say, more thrilling?
5
Kant discusses the ‘Sublime’ in his Critique of Judgement (1791).
6
Probably the most famous expression of this notion of the Sublime is from the Pensées of Blaise
Pascal:
Man is a mere reed, the weakest thing in nature; but he is a thinking reed. The entire universe
need not arm itself to crush him; a vapour, a drop of water, is sufficient to cause his death. But
if the universe were to crush him, man would still be nobler than his destroyer, because he
knows that he dies, and also the advantage that the universe has over him; but the universe
knows nothing of this. Our whole dignity, therefore, consists in thought. From this we must
rise, not from space and time which we cannot fill. Let us endeavour then to think aright, this is
the principle of morality.
7
Pascal, Pensées 391 [I74-347] H. 3. (trans. John Warrington, Everyman, 1960).
John Milton, Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 146
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Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
Indeed the central image of Christianity lends itself just this illegitimate transformation. The
Imitatio Christi in the later work of Kierkegaard is a distinguished instance of romantic selfindulgence on this theme, though it may seem unkind to say this of a great and most
endearing writer who really did suffer for telling his society some truths. 8 The idea of a rather
exciting suffering freedom soon began to enliven the austerity of the puritan half of the
Kantian picture, and with this went a taming and beautifying of the idea of death, a cult of
pseudo-death and pseudo-transience. Death becomes Liebestöd, painful and exhilarating, or
at worst charming and sweetly tearful.9 I speak here of course, not of the great romantic
artists and thinkers at their best, but of the general beaten track which leads from Kant to the
popular philosophies of the present day. When the neo-Kantian Lucifer gets a glimpse of real
death and real chance [83] he takes refuge in sublime emotions and veils with an image of
tortured freedom that which has been rightly said to be the proper study of philosophers.
When Kant wanted to find something clean and pure outside the mess of the selfish empirical
psyche he followed a sound instinct but, in my view, looked in the wrong place. His inquiry
led him back again into the self, now pictured as angelic, and inside this angel-self his
followers have tended to remain. I want now to return to the beginning and look again at the
powerful energy system of the self-defensive psyche in the light of the question, How can we
make ourselves better? With such an opponent to deal with one may doubt whether the idea
of the proud, naked will directed towards right action is a realistic and sufficient formula. I
think that the ordinary man, with the simple religious conceptions which make sense for him,
has usually held a more just view of the matter than the voluntaristic philosopher,10 and a
view incidentally which is in better accord with the findings of modern psychology. Religion
normally emphasizes states of mind as well as actions and regards states of mind as the
genetic background of action: pureness of heart, meekness of spirit. Religion provides
devices for the purification of states of mind. The believer feels that he needs, and can
receive, extra help. ‘Not I, but Christ.’11 The real existence of such help is often used as an
argument for the truth of religious doctrines. Of course prayer and sacraments may be
‘misused’ by the believer as mere instruments of consolation. But, whatever one thinks of its
theological context, it does seem that prayer can actually induce a better quality of
consciousness and provide an energy for good action which would not otherwise be available.
Modern psychology here supports the ordinary person’s, or ordinary believer’s, instinctive
sense of the importance of his states of mind and the availability of supplementary energy.
Psychology might indeed prompt contemporary behaviouristic [84] philosophers to reexamine their discarded concepts of experience’ and ‘consciousness’. By opening our eyes
we do not necessarily see what confronts us. We are anxiety-ridden animals. Our minds are
continually active, fabricating an anxious, usually self-preoccupied, often falsifying veil
which partially conceals the world. Our states of consciousness differ in quality, our fantasies
and reveries are not trivial and unimportant, they are profoundly connected with our energies
and our ability to choose and act. And if quality of consciousness matters, then anything
8
Imitatio Christi = the imitation of Christ. Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), Danish philosopher and
theologian regarded as a pre-cursor of existentialism.
9
Liebestod, literally ‘love’s death’. In the first instance, it refers to Richard Wagner’s Tristan und
Isolde which climaxes in the death of both lovers. More generally, it refers to the romantic notion that
love is only genuine if it is fatal to one or both parties.
10
I.e., in this context, a philosopher who regards the will as the source of value. Callicles, Nietzsche
and Sartre are all voluntarists.
11
Cf. “I have been crucified with Christ, it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me....”
Galatians 2:20
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Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
which alters consciousness in the direction of unselfishness, objectivity and realism is to be
connected with virtue.
Following a hint in Plato (Phaedrus 250) I shall start by speaking of what is perhaps the most
obvious thing in our surroundings which is an occasion of ‘unselfing’, and that is what is
popularly called beauty. Recent philosophers tend to avoid this term because they prefer to
talk of reasons rather than of experiences. But the implication of experience with beauty
seems to me to be something of great importance which should not be by-passed in favour of
analysis of critical vocabularies.12 Beauty is the convenient and traditional name of
something which art and nature share, and which gives a fairly clear sense to the idea of
quality of experience and change of consciousness. I am looking out of window in an anxious
and resentful state of mind, oblivious of my surroundings, brooding perhaps on some damage
done to my prestige. Then suddenly I observe a hovering kestrel. In a moment everything is
altered. The brooding self with its hurt vanity has disappeared. There is nothing now but
kestrel. And when I return to thinking of the other matter it seems less important. And of
course this is something which we may also do deliberately: give attention to nature in order
to clear our minds of selfish care. It may seem odd to start the argument against what I have
roughly labelled as ‘romanticism’ by using the case of attention to [85] nature. In fact I do not
think that any of the great romantics really believed that we receive but what we give and in
our life alone does nature live,13 although the lesser ones tended to follow Kant’s lead and use
nature as an occasion for exalted self-feeling. The great romantics, including the one I have
just quoted, transcended ‘romanticism’. A self-directed enjoyment of nature seems to me to
be something forced. More naturally, as well as more properly, we take a self-forgetful
pleasure in the sheer alien pointless independent existence of animals, birds, stones and trees.
‘Not how the world is, but that it is, is the mystical.’14
I take this starting-point, not because I think it is the most important place of moral change,
but because I think it is the most accessible one. It is so patently a good thing to take delight
in flowers and animals that people who bring home potted plants and watch kestrels might
even be surprised at the notion that these things have anything to do with virtue. The surprise
is a product of the fact that, as Plato pointed out, beauty is the only spiritual thing which we
love by instinct. When we move from beauty in nature to beauty in art we are already in a
more difficult region. The experience of art is more easily degraded than the experience of
nature. A great deal of art, perhaps most art, actually is self-consoling fantasy, and even great
art cannot guarantee the quality of its consumer’s consciousness. However, great art exists
and is sometimes properly experienced and even a shallow experience of what is great can
have its effect. Art, and by ‘art’ from now on I mean good art, not fantasy art, affords us a
pure delight in the independent existence of what is excellent. Both in its genesis and its
enjoyment it is a thing totally opposed to selfish obsession. It invigorates our best faculties
and, to use Platonic language, inspires love in the highest part of the soul. It is able to do this
partly by virtue of something which it shares with nature: a perfection of form which invites
“analysis of critical vocabularies” was the focus of aesthetics at the time and remains the focus of
much aesthetics. However in more recent years, some aestheticians have begun to write about beauty,
which was a central topic of aesthetics in the 18th and 19th centuries.
13
Murdoch is quoting directly from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem Dejection: An Ode (1802): “O
Lady! we receive but what we give,/ And in our life alone does Nature live”. Her reference to Kant
alludes again to his idea of the Sublime.
14
Murdoch is quoting Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 6.44.
12
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Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
unpossessive contemplation [86] and resists absorption into the selfish dream life of the consciousness.
Art however, considered as a sacrament or a source of good energy, possesses an extra
dimension. Art is less accessible than nature but also more edifying since it is actually a
human product, and certain arts are actually ‘about’ human affairs in a direct sense. Art is a
human product and virtues as well as talents are required of the artist. The good artist, in
relation to his art, is brave, truthful, patient, humble; and even in non-representational art we
may receive intuitions of these qualities.15 One may also suggest, more cautiously, that nonrepresentational art does seem to express more positively something which is to do with
virtue. The spiritual role of music has often been acknowledged, though theorists have been
chary of analysing it. However that may be, the representational arts, which more evidently
hold the mirror up to nature, seem to be concerned with morality in a way which is not
simply an effect of our intuition of the artist’s discipline.
These arts, especially literature and painting, show us the peculiar sense in which the concept
of virtue is tied on to the human condition. They show us the absolute pointlessness of virtue
while exhibiting its supreme importance; the enjoyment of art is a training in the love of
virtue. The pointlessness of art is not the pointlessness of a game; it is the pointlessness of
human life itself, and form in art is properly the simulation of the self-contained aimlessness
of the universe. Good art reveals what we are usually too selfish and too timid to recognize,
the minute and absolutely random detail of the world, and reveals it together with a sense of
unity and form. This form often seems to us mysterious because it resists the easy patterns of
the fantasy, whereas there is nothing mysterious about the forms of bad art since they are the
recognizable and familiar rat-runs of selfish day-dreaming. Good art shows us how difficult it
is to be objective by showing us how differently the world looks to an objective vision.
[87] We are presented with a truthful image of the human condition in a form which can be
steadily contemplated; and indeed this is the only context in which many of us are capable of
contemplating it at all. Art transcends selfish and obsessive limitations of personality and can
enlarge the sensibility of its consumer. It is a kind of goodness by proxy. Most of all it
exhibits to us the connection, in human beings, of clear realistic vision with compassion. The
realism of a great artist is not a photographic realism, it is essentially both pity and justice.
Herein we find a remarkable redemption of our tendency to conceal death and chance by the
invention of forms. Any story which we tell about ourselves consoles us since it imposes
pattern upon something which might otherwise seem intolerably chancy and incomplete.
However, human life is chancy and incomplete. It is the role of tragedy, and also of comedy,
and of painting to show us suffering without a thrill and death without a consolation. Or if
there is any consolation it is the austere consolation of a beauty which teaches that nothing in
life is of any value except the attempt to be virtuous. Masochism is the artist’s greatest and
most subtle enemy. It is not easy to portray death, real death, not fake prettified death. Even
Tolstoy did not really manage it in Ivan Ilyich,16 although he did elsewhere. The great deaths
of literature are few, but they show us with an exemplary clarity the way in which art
invigorates us by a juxtaposition, almost an identification, of pointlessness and value. The
15
Representational arts = painting, sculpture, literature; Non-representational arts = music,
architecture.
16
Murdoch refers to Tolstoy’s novella The Death of Ivan Ilyich (1886).
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Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
death of Patroclus, the death of Cordelia, the death of Petya Rostov.17 All is vanity. The only
thing which is of real importance is the ability to see it all clearly and respond to it justly
which is inseparable from virtue. Perhaps one of the greatest achievements of all is to join
this sense of absolute mortality not to the tragic but to the comic. Shallow and Silence. Stefan
Trofimovich Verhovensky.18
Art then is not a diversion or a side-issue, it is the most [88] educational of all human
activities and a place in which the nature of morality can be seen. Art gives a clear sense to
many ideas which seem more puzzling when we meet with them elsewhere, and it is a clue to
what happens elsewhere. An understanding of any art involves a recognition of hierarchy and
authority. There are very evident degrees of merit, there are heights and distances; even
Shakespeare is not perfect. Good art, unlike bad art, unlike ‘happenings’, 19 is something preeminently outside us and resistant to our consciousness. We surrender ourselves to its
authority with a love which is unpossessive and unselfish. Art shows us the only sense in
which the permanent and incorruptible is compatible with the transient; and whether
representational or not it reveals to us aspects of our world which our ordinary dull dreamconsciousness is unable to see. Art pierces the veil and gives sense to the notion of a reality
which lies beyond appearance; it exhibits virtue in its true guise in the context of death and
chance.
Plato held that beauty could be a starting-point of the good life, but he came to mistrust art
and we can see played out in that great spirit the peculiarly distressing struggle between the
artist and the saint. Plato allowed to the beauty of the lovely boy an awakening power which
he denied to the beauty of nature or of art. He seems to have come to believe that all art is bad
art, a mere fiction and consolation which distorts reality. About nature he seems, in the
context of the theory of forms, to have been at least once in doubt. Are there forms of mud,
hair and dirt? If there are then nature is redeemed into the area of truthful vision. (My
previous argument assumes of course, in Platonic terms, that there are.) Another startingpoint, or road, which Plato speaks of more often however is the way of the technai, the
sciences, crafts, and intellectual disciplines excluding the arts. I think there is a way of the
intellect, a sense in which intellectual disciplines are moral disciplines, and this is not too
difficult [89] to discern. There are important bridge ideas between morality and other at first
sight different human activities, and these ideas are perhaps most clearly seen in the context
of the technai. And as when we use the nature of art as a clue, we may be able to learn more
about the central area of morality if we examine what are essentially the same concepts more
simply on display elsewhere. I mean such concepts as justice, accuracy, truthfulness, realism,
humility, courage as the ability to sustain clear vision, love as attachment or even passion
without sentiment or self.
The techne which Plato thought was most important was mathematics, because it was most
rigorous and abstract. I shall take an example of a techne more congenial to myself: learning
a language. If I am learning, for instance, Russian, I am confronted by an authoritative
structure which commands my respect. The task is difficult and the goal is distant and
perhaps never entirely attainable. My work is a progressive revelation of something which
exists independently of me. Attention is rewarded by a knowledge of reality. Love of Russian
The death of Patroclus – Homer, Iliad, Book 16; the death of Cordelia – Shakespeare, King Lear
Act 5, scene 3; the death of Petya Rostov – Tolstoy, War and Peace Book 14, chapter 11.
18
Main character of Dostoyevsky’s The Devils, also known in English as The Possessed.
19
‘Happenings’ is species of ‘performance art’.
17
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Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
leads me away from myself towards something alien to me, something which my
consciousness cannot take over, swallow up, deny or make unreal. The honesty and humility
required of the student-not to pretend to know what one does not know – is the preparation
for the honesty and humility of the scholar who does not even feel tempted to suppress the
fact which damns his theory. Of course a techne can be misused; a scientist might feel he
ought to give up a certain branch of study if he knew that his discoveries would be used
wickedly. But apart from special contexts, studying is normally an exercise of virtue as well
as of talent, and shows us a fundamental way in which virtue is related to the real world.
I suggested that we could see most clearly in the case of the technai, the nature of concepts
very central to morality such as justice, truthfulness or humility. We can see too the [90]
growth and the inter-connection of these concepts, as when what looks like mere accuracy at
one end looks more like justice or courage or even love at the other. Developing a
Sprachefuhl20 is developing a judicious respectful sensibility to something which is very like
another organism. An intellectual discipline can play the same kind of role as that which I
have attributed to art, it can stretch the imagination, enlarge the vision and strengthen the
judgment. When Plato made mathematics the king techne he was regarding mathematical
thought as leading the mind away from the material world and enabling it to perceive a reality
of a new kind, very unlike ordinary appearances. And one might regard other disciplines,
history, philology, chemistry, as presenting us with a new kind of subject-matter and showing
us a new reality behind appearance. These studies are not only an exercise in virtue, they
might be thought of as introductory images of the spiritual life. But they are not the spiritual
life itself and the mind which has ascended no farther has not achieved the whole of virtue.
I want now to make a closer approach to the central subject of my argument, the Good.
Beauty and the technai are, to use Plato’s image, the text written in large letters. The concept
Good itself is the much harder to discern but essentially similar text written in small letters.
In intellectual disciplines and in the enjoyment of art and nature we discover value in our
ability to forget self, to be realistic, to perceive justly. We use our imagination not to escape
the world but to join it, and this exhilarates us because of the distance between our ordinary
dulled consciousness and an apprehension of the real. The value concepts are here patently
tied on to the world, they are stretched as it were between the truth-seeking mind and the
world, they are not moving about on their own as adjuncts of the personal will. The authority
of morals is the authority of truth, that is of reality. We can see the length, the extension, of
these concepts as patient attention [91] transforms accuracy without interval into just
discernment. Here too we can see it as natural to the particular kind of creatures that we are
that love should be inseparable from justice, and clear vision from respect for the real.
That virtue operates in exactly the same kind of way in the central area of morality is less
easy to perceive. Human beings are far more complicated and enigmatic and ambiguous than
languages or mathematical concepts, and selfishness operates in a much more devious and
frenzied manner in our relations with them. Ignorance, muddle, fear, wishful thinking, lack of
tests often make us feel that moral choice is something arbitrary, a matter for personal will
rather than for attentive study. Our attachments tend to be selfish and strong, and the
transformation of our loves from selfishness to unselfishness is sometimes hard even to
conceive of. Yet is the situation really so different? Should a retarded child be kept at home
or sent to an institution? Should an elderly relation who is a trouble-maker be cared for or
asked to go away? Should an unhappy marriage be continued for the sake of the children?
20
a feel for a language.
61
Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
Should I leave my family in order to do political work? Should I neglect them in order to
practise my art? The love which brings the right answer is an exercise of justice and realism
and really looking. The difficulty is to keep the attention fixed upon the real situation and to
prevent it from returning surreptitiously to the self with consolations of self-pity, resentment,
fantasy and despair. The refusal to attend may even induce a fictitious sense of freedom: I
may as well toss a coin. Of course virtue is good habit and dutiful action. But the background
condition of such habit and such action, in human beings, is a just mode of vision and a good
quality of consciousness. It is a task to come to see the world as it is. A philosophy which
leaves duty without a context and exalts the idea of freedom and power as a separate top level
value ignores this task and obscures the relation between virtue and reality. We act [92]
rightly ‘when the time comes’ not out of strength of will but out of the quality of our usual
attachments and with the kind of energy and discernment which we have available. And to
this the whole activity of our consciousness is relevant.
The central explanatory image which joins together the different aspects of the picture which
I have been trying to exhibit is the concept of Good. It is a concept which is not easy to
understand partly because it has so many false doubles, jumped-up intermediaries invented
by human selfishness to make the difficult task of virtue look easier and more attractive:
History, God, Lucifer, Ideas of power, freedom, purpose, reward, even judgment are
irrelevant. Mystics of all kinds have usually known this and have attempted by extremities of
language to portray the nakedness and aloneness of Good, its absolute for-nothingness. One
might say that true morality is a sort of unesoteric mysticism, having its source in an austere
and unconsoled love of the Good. When Plato wants to explain Good he uses the image of the
sun. The moral pilgrim emerges from the cave and begins to see the real world in the light of
the sun, and last of all is able to look at the sun itself. I want now to comment on various
aspects of this extremely rich metaphor.21
The sun is seen at the end of a long quest which involves a reorientation (the prisoners have
to turn round) and an ascent. It is real, it is out there, but very distant. It gives light and
energy and enables us to know truth. In its light we see the things of the world in their true
relationships. Looking at it itself is supremely difficult and is unlike looking at things in its
light. It is a different kind of thing from what it illuminates. Note the metaphor of ‘thing’
here. Good is a concept about which, and not only in philosophical language, we naturally
use a Platonic terminology, when we speak about seeking the Good, or loving the Good. We
may also speak seriously of ordinary things, people, works [93] of art, as being good,
although we are also well aware of their imperfections. Good lives as it were on both sides of
the barrier and we can combine the aspiration to complete goodness with a realistic sense of
achievement within our limitations. For all our frailty the command ‘be perfect’ has sense for
us. The concept Good resists collapse into the selfish empirical consciousness. It is not a
mere value tag of the choosing will, and functional and casual uses of ‘good’ (a good knife, a
good fellow) are not, as some philosophers have wished to argue, clues to the structure of the
concept. The proper and serious use of the term refers us to a perfection which is perhaps
never exemplified in the world we know (‘There is no good in us’) and which carries with it
the ideas of hierarchy and transcendence. How do we know that the very great are not the
perfect? We see differences, we sense directions, and we know that the Good is still
somewhere beyond. The self, the place where we live, is a place of illusion. Goodness is
21
In the Myth of the Cave, Plato likens our situation to prisoners who have been chained in a Cave
and are forced to look at shadows cast upon the wall of the cave rather than real objects. We will
study this text in some detail in Unit 4.
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Iris Murdoch The Sovereignty of Good
connected with the attempt to see the unself, to see and to respond to the real world in the
light of a virtuous consciousness. This is the non-metaphysical meaning of the idea of
transcendence to which philosophers have so constantly resorted in their explanations of
goodness. ‘Good is a transcendent reality’ means that virtue is the attempt to pierce the veil
of selfish consciousness and join the world as it really is. It is an empirical fact about human
nature that this attempt cannot be entirely successful.
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Plato Phaedo
Plato
PHAEDO
[This translation is taken from Plato, The Last Days of Socrates, Penguin 1959.]
[105a] ‘Well, see whether you accept this definition: Not only does an opposite not admit its
opposite, but if anything is accompanied by a Form which has an opposite, and meets that
opposite, then the thing which is accompanied never admits the opposite of the Form by
which it is accompanied. Let me refresh your memory; there is no harm in hearing a thing
several times. Five will not admit the Form of Even, nor will ten, which is double five, admit
the Form of Odd. Twin has an opposite of its own, but [105b] at the same time it will not
admit the Form of Odd. Nor will one and a half, or other fractions such as a half or threequarters and so on, admit the form of Whole, assuming that you follow me and agree.’
‘I follow and agree perfectly,’ said Cebes.
‘Then run over the same ground with me from the beginning; and don’t answer in the exact
terms of the question, but follow my example. I say this because besides the “safe answer”
that I described at first, as the result of this discussion I now see another means of safety.
Suppose, for instance, that you ask me what must become present in a body to make it hot, I
shall not return the safe but simplistic answer that it is heat, but a more sophisticated one,
[105c] based on the results of our discussion - namely that it is fire. And if you ask what must
become present in a body to make it diseased, I shall say not disease but fever. Similarly if
you ask what must become present in a number to make it odd, I shall say not oddness but
unity; and so on. See whether you have a sufficient grasp now of what I want from you.’
‘Quite sufficient.’
Socrates argues that the soul is such a thing which always brings a quality to that which it
occupies, and cannot itself be coupled with the opposite quality. It must retire or perish.
‘Then tell me, what must be present in a body to make it alive?’
‘Soul.’
‘Is this always so?’
[105d] ‘Of course.’
‘So whenever soul takes possession of a body, it always brings living with it?’
‘Yes, it does.’
‘Is there an opposite to living, or not?’
‘Yes, there is.’
‘What?’
‘Dying.’
‘Does it follow, then, from our earlier agreement, that soul will never admit the opposite of
that which accompanies it?’
‘Most definitely,’ said Cebes.
‘Well, now, what name did we apply just now to that which does not admit the Form of
even?’
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Plato Phaedo
‘Uneven.’
‘And what do we call that which does not admit justice, or culture?’
[105e] ‘Uncultured; and the other unjust.’
‘Very good. And what do we call that which does not admit dying?’
‘Un-dying.’
‘And soul does not admit death?’ ‘No.
‘So soul is un-dying.’
‘Yes, it is un-dying.’
‘Well,’ said Socrates, ‘can we say that that has been proved? What do you think?’
‘Most completely, Socrates.’
The argument is concluded. What is ‘un-dying’ cannot surely perish; therefore it must
withdraw.
‘Here is another question for you, Cebes. If the uneven were [106a] necessarily imperishable,
would not three be imperishable?’
‘Of course.’
‘Then again, if what is un-hot were necessarily imperishable, when you applied heat to snow,
would not the snow withdraw still intact and unmelted? It could not cease to exist, nor on the
other hand could it remain where it was and admit the heat.’
‘That is true.’
‘In the same way I assume that if what is un-cold were imperishable, when anything cold
approached fire, it could never go out or cease to exist; it would depart and be gone
unharmed.’
‘That must be so.’
[106b] ‘Are we not bound to say the same of the un-dying? If what is un-dying is also
imperishable, it is impossible that at the approach of death soul should cease to be. It follows
from what we have already said that it cannot admit death, or be dead; just as we said that
three cannot be even, nor can odd; nor can fire be cold, nor can the heat which is in the fire.
“But,” it may be objected, “granting (as has been agreed) that odd does not become even at
[106c] the approach of even, why should it not cease to exist, and something even take its
place?” In reply to this we could not insist that the odd does not cease to exist - because what
is un-even is not imperishable; but if this were conceded, we could easily insist that, at the
approach of even, odd and three retire and depart. And we could be equally insistent about
fire and heat and all the rest of them, could we not?’
‘Certainly.’
‘So now in the case of the un-dying, if it is conceded that this is also imperishable, soul will
be imperishable as well as un-dying.
[106d] ‘Otherwise we shall need another argument.’
‘There is no need on that account,’ said Cebes. ‘If what is undying and eternal cannot avoid
destruction, it is hard to see how anything else can.’
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Plato Phaedo
‘And I imagine that it would be admitted by everyone,’ said Socrates, ‘that God at any rate,
and the Form of Life, and anything else that is un-dying, can never cease to exist.’
‘Yes indeed; by all men certainly, and even more, I suppose, by the gods.’
[106e] ‘Then since what is un-dying is also indestructible, if soul is really un-dying, surely it
must be imperishable too.’ ‘Quite inevitably.’
‘So it appears that when death comes to a man, the mortal part of him dies, but the un-dying
part retires at the approach of death and escapes unharmed and indestructible.’
‘Evidently.’
‘Then it is as certain as anything can be, Cebes, that soul is undying and imperishable, and
that our souls will really exist in the next world.’
‘Well, Socrates,’ said Cebes, ‘for my part I have no criticisms, [107a] and no doubt about the
truth of your argument. But if Simmias here or anyone else has any criticism to make, he had
better not keep it to himself; because if anyone wants to say or hear any more about this
subject, I don’t see to what other occasion he is to defer it.’
Socrates gives his view of the nature of the universe and of the soul’s fate after death. The
material is myth-like, and comparable with ‘myths’ of the after-life with which the Gorgias
and Republic conclude. It makes no profession of ascertainable literal truth. It has clearly
been composed specifically for the Phaedo, in such a way as to reflect the gulf between the
hazy world of sensation and the clear world of the intellect that the rest of the work has
already pointed to. It also suggests an enormous gap between the painful or at least
unattractive environment which awaits the common man after death and the bright visions of
a higher world which await the philosopher. It therefore performs a protreptic purpose,
encouraging Socrates’ followers to go on with their mission after his death so that they may
look forward to the day when they may follow him.
‘As a matter of fact,’ said Simmias, I have no doubts myself either now, in view of what you
have just been saying. All the [107b] same, the subject is so vast, and I have such a poor
opinion of our weak human nature, that I can’t help still feeling some misgivings.’
‘Quite right, Simmias,’ said Socrates, land what is more, even if you find our original
assumptions convincing, they still need more accurate consideration. If you and your friends
examine them closely enough, I believe that you will arrive at the truth of the matter, in so far
as it is possible for the human mind to attain it; and if you are sure that you have done this,
you will not need to inquire further.’
‘That is true,’ said Simmias.
[107c] ‘But there is a further point, gentlemen,’ said Socrates, ‘which deserves your attention.
If the soul is immortal, it demands our care not only for that part of time which we call life,
but for all time; and indeed it would seem now’ that it will be extremely dangerous to neglect
it. If death were a release from everything, it would be a boon for the wicked, because by
dying they would be released not only from the body but also from their own wicked-ness
together with the soul; but as it is, since the soul has emerged as something immortal, it can
have no escape or security from evil [107d] except by becoming as good and wise as it
possibly can. For it takes nothing with it to the next world except its education and training;
and these, we are told are of supreme importance in helping or harming those who have died
at the very beginning of their journey to the other world.
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Descartes Discourse on Method
Rene Descartes
THE DISCOURSE ON METHOD, PART V
[Numbers in brackets refer to page numbers in Rene Descartes, The Philosophical Writings of
Rene Descartes, edited by John Cottingham et al. Cambridge University Press, 1985)]
I explained all these matters in sufficient detail in the treatise I previously intended to publish.
And then I showed what structure the nerves and muscles of the human body must have in
order to make the animal spirits inside them strong enough to move its limbs - as when we
see severed heads continue to move about and bite the earth although they are no longer
alive. I also indicated what changes must occur in the brain in order to cause waking, sleep
and dreams; how light, sounds, smells, tastes, heat and the other qualities of external objects
can imprint various ideas on the brain through the mediation of the senses; and how hunger,
thirst, and the other internal passions can also send their ideas there. And I explained which
part of the brain must be taken to be the ‘common sense,’ where these ideas are received; the
memory, which preserves them; and the corporeal imagination, which can change them in
various ways, form them into new ideas, and, by distributing the animal spirits to the
muscles, make the parts of this body move in as many different ways as the parts of our
bodies can move without being guided by the will, and in a manner which is just as
appropriate to the objects of the senses and the internal passions. This will not seem at all
strange to those who know how many kinds of automatons, or moving machines, the skill of
man can construct with the use of very few parts, in comparison with the great multitude of
bones, muscles, nerves, arteries, veins and all the other parts that are in the body of any
animal. For they will regard this body as a machine which, having been made by the hands of
God, is incomparably better ordered than any machine that can be devised by man, and
contains in itself movements more wonderful than those in any such machine.
I made special efforts to show that if any such machines had the organs and outward shape of
a monkey or of some other animal that lacks reason, we should have no means of knowing
that they did not possess entirely the same nature as these animals; whereas if any such
machines bore a resemblance to our bodies and imitated our actions as closely as possible for
all practical purposes, we should still have two very certain [140] means of recognizing that
they were not real men. The first is that they could never use words, or put together other
signs, as we do in order to declare our thoughts to others. For we can certainly conceive of a
machine so constructed that it utters words, and even utters words which correspond to bodily
actions causing a change in its organs (e.g. if you touch it in one spot it asks what you want of
it, if you touch it in another it cries out that you are hurting it, and so on). But it is not
conceivable that such a machine should produce different arrangements of words so as to
give an appropriately meaningful answer to whatever is said in its presence, as the dullest of
men can do. Secondly, even though such machines might do some things as well as we do
them, or perhaps even better, they would inevitably fail in others, which would reveal that
they were acting not through understanding but only from the disposition of their organs. For
whereas reason is a universal instrument which can be used in all kinds of situations, these
organs need some particular disposition for each particular action; hence it is for all practical
purposes impossible for a machine to have enough different organs to make it act in all the
contingencies of life in the way in which our reason makes us act.
Now in just these two ways we can also know the difference between man and beast. For it is
quite remarkable that there are no men so dull-witted or stupid – and this includes even
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Descartes Discourse on Method
madmen – that they are incapable of arranging various words together and forming an
utterance from them in order to make their thoughts understood; whereas there is no other
animal, however perfect and well-endowed it may be, that can do the like. This does not
happen because they lack the necessary organs, for we see that magpies and parrots can utter
words as we do, and yet they cannot speak as we do: that is, they cannot show that they are
thinking what they are saying. On the other hand, men born deaf and dumb, and thus
deprived of speech-organs as much as the beasts or even more so, normally invent their own
signs to make themselves understood by those who, being regularly in their company, have
the time to learn their language. This shows not merely that the beasts have less reason than
men, but that they have no reason at all. For it patently requires very little reason to be able to
speak; and since as much inequality can be observed among the animals of a given species as
among human beings, and some animals are more easily trained than others, it would be
incredible that a superior specimen of the monkey or parrot species should not be able to
speak as well as the stupidest child – or at least as well as a child with a defective brain – if
their souls were not completely different in nature from ours. And we must not confuse
speech with the natural movements which express passions and which can be imitated by
[141] machines as well as by animals. Nor should we think, like some of the ancients, that the
beasts speak, although we do not understand their language. For if that were true, then since
they have many organs that correspond to ours, they could make themselves understood by us
as well as by their fellows. It is also a very remarkable fact that although many animals show
more skill than we do in some of their actions, yet the same animals show none at all in many
others; so what they do better does not prove that they have any intelligence, for if it did then
they would have more intelligence than any of us and would excel us in everything. It proves
rather that they have no intelligence at all, and that it is nature which acts in them according
to the disposition of their organs. In the same way a clock, consisting only of wheels and
springs, can count the hours and measure time more accurately than we can with all our
wisdom.
After that, I described the rational soul, and showed that, unlike the other things of which I
had spoken, it cannot be derived in any way from the potentiality of matter, but must be
specially created. And I showed how it is not sufficient for it to be lodged in the human body
like a helmsman in his ship, except perhaps to move its limbs, but that it must be more
closely joined and united with the body in order to have, besides this power of movement,
feelings and appetites like ours and so constitute a real man. Here I dwelt a little upon the
subject of the soul, because it is of the greatest importance. For after the error of those who
deny God, which I believe I have already adequately refuted, there is none that leads weak
minds further from the straight path of virtue than that of imagining that the souls of the
beasts are of the same nature as ours, and hence that after this present life we have nothing to
fear or to hope for, any more than flies and ants. But when we know how much the beasts
differ from us, we understand much better the arguments which prove that our soul is of a
nature entirely independent of the body, and consequently that it is not bound to die with it.
And since we cannot see any other causes which destroy the soul, we are naturally led to
conclude that it is immortal.
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Alan Turing Computing Machinery and Intelligence
A.M. Turing (1912 – 54)
COMPUTING MACHINERY AND INTELLIGENCE
[Originally published in Mind 59, no. 236 (1950), pp. 4-30. This extract follows Douglas Hofstadter
& Daniel Dennett (eds), The Mind’s I (Penguin, 1974)]
1. The Imitation Game
I propose to consider the question “Can machines think?” This should begin with definitions
of the meaning of the terms “machine” and “think.” The definitions might be framed so as to
reflect so far as possible the normal use of the words, but this attitude is dangerous. If the
meaning of the words “machine” and “think” are to be found by examining how they are
commonly used it is difficult to escape the conclusion that the meaning and the answer to the
question, “Can machines think?” is to be sought in a statistical survey such as a Gallup poll.
But this is absurd. Instead of attempting such a definition I shall replace the question by
another, which is closely related to it and is expressed in relatively unambiguous words.
The new form of the problem can be described in terms of a game which we call the
“imitation game.” It is played with three people, a man (A), a woman (B), and an interrogator
(C) who may be of either sex. The interrogator stays in a room apart from the other two. The
object of the game for the interrogator is to determine which of the other two is the man and
which is the woman. He knows them by labels X and Y, and at the end of the game he says
either “X is A and Y is B” or “X is B and Y is A.” The interrogator is allowed to put
questions to A and B thus:
C:
Will X please tell me the length of his or her hair?
Now suppose X is actually A, then A must answer. It is A’s object in the game to try to cause
C to make the wrong identification. His answer might therefore be
“My hair is shingled, and the longest strands are about nine inches long.”
In order that tones of voice may not help the interrogator the answers should be written, or
better still, typewritten. The ideal arrangement is to have a teleprinter communicating
between the two rooms. Alternatively the question and answers can be repeated by an
intermediary. The object of the game for the third player (B) is to help the interrogator. The
best strategy for her is probably to give truthful answers. She can add such things as “I am the
woman, don’t listen to him!” to her answers, but it will avail nothing as the man can make
similar remarks.
We now ask the question, “What will happen when a machine takes the part of A in this
game?” Will the interrogator decide wrongly as often when the game is played like this as he
does when the game is played between a man and a woman? These questions replace our
original, “Can machines think?”
2. Critique of the New Problem
As well as asking, “What is the answer to this new form of the question,” one may ask, “Is
this new question a worthy one to investigate?” This latter question we investigate without
further ado, thereby cutting short an infinite regress.
The new problem has the advantage of drawing a fairly sharp line between the physical and
the intellectual capacities of a man. No engineer or chemist claims to be able to produce a
material which is indistinguishable from the human skin. It is possible that at some time this
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Alan Turing Computing Machinery and Intelligence
might be done, but even supposing this invention available we should feel there was little
point in trying to make a “thinking machine” more human by dressing it up in such artificial
flesh. The form in which we have set the problem reflects this fact in the condition which
prevents the interrogator from seeing or touching the other competitors, or hearing their
voices. Some other advantages of the proposed criterion may be shown up by specimen
questions and answers. Thus:
Q:
Please write me a sonnet on the subject of the Forth Bridge.
A:
Count me out on this one. I never could write poetry.
Q:
Add 34957 to 70764.
A:
(Pause about 30 seconds and then give as answer) 105621.
Q:
Do you play chess?
A:
Yes.
Q:
I have K at my K 1, and no other pieces. You have only K at K6 and R at R1. It
is your move. What do you play?
A:
(After a pause of 15 seconds) R-R8 mate.
The question and answer method seems to be suitable for introducing almost any one of the
fields of human endeavour that we wish to include. We do not wish to penalize the machine
for its inability to shine in beauty competitions, nor to penalize a man for losing in a race
against an airplane. The conditions of our game make these disabilities irrelevant. The
“witnesses” can brag, if they consider it advisable, as much as they please about their charms,
strength or heroism, but the interrogator cannot demand practical demonstrations.
The game may perhaps be criticized on the ground that the odds are weighted too heavily
against the machine. If the man were to try and pretend to be the machine he would clearly
make a very poor showing. He would be given away at once by slowness and inaccuracy in
arithmetic. May not machines carry out something which ought to be described as thinking
but which is very different from what a man does? This objection is a very strong one, but at
least we can say that if, nevertheless, a machine can be constructed to play the imitation game
satisfactorily, we need not be troubled by this objection.
It might be urged that when playing the “imitation game” the best strategy for the machine
may possibly be something other than imitation of the behaviour of a man. This may be, but I
think it is unlikely that there is any great effect of this kind. In any case there is no intention
to investigate here the theory of the game, and it will be assumed that the best strategy is to
try to provide answers that would naturally be given by a man.
3. The Machines Concerned in the Came
The question which we put in §1 will not be quite definite until we have specified what we
mean by the word “machine.” It is natural that we should wish to permit every kind of
engineering technique to be used in our machines. We also wish to allow the possibility that
an engineer or team of engineers may construct a machine which works, but whose manner of
operation cannot be satisfactorily described by its constructors because they have applied a
method which is largely experimental. Finally, we wish to exclude from the machines men
born in the usual manner. It is difficult to frame the definitions so as to satisfy these three
conditions. One might for instance insist that the team of engineers should be all of one sex,
but this would not really be satisfactory, for it is probably possible to rear a complete in-
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dividual from a single cell of the skin (say) of a man. To do so would be a feat of biological
technique deserving of the very highest praise, but we would not be inclined to regard it as a
case of “constructing a thinking machine.” This prompts us to abandon the requirement that
every kind of technique should be permitted. We are the more ready to do so in view of the
fact that the present interest in “thinking machines” has been aroused by a particular kind of
machine, usually called an “electronic computer” or “digital computer.” Following this
suggestion we only permit digital computers to take part in our game. …
This special property of digital computers, that they can mimic any discrete state machine, is
described by saying that they are universal machines. The existence of machines with this
property has the important consequence that, considerations of speed apart, it is unnecessary
to design various new machines to do various computing processes. They can all be done
with one digital computer, suitably programmed for each case. It will be seen that as a
consequence of this all digital computers are in a sense equivalent.
6. Contrary Views on the Main Question
We may now consider the ground to have been cleared and we are ready to proceed to the
debate on our question, “Can machines think?” … We cannot altogether abandon the original
form of the problem, for opinions will differ as to the appropriateness of the substitution and
we must at least listen to what has to be said in this connection.
It will simplify matters for the reader if I explain first my own beliefs in the matter. Consider
first the more accurate form of the question. I believe that in about fifty years’ time it will be
possible to program computers, with a storage capacity of about 109, to make them play the
imitation game so well that an average interrogator will not have more than 70 per cent
chance of making the right identification after five minutes of questioning. The original
question, “Can machines think?” I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion.
Nevertheless I believe that at the end of the century the use of words and general educated
opinion will have altered so much that one will be able to speak of machines thinking without
expecting to be contradicted. I believe further that no useful purpose is served by concealing
these beliefs. The popular view that scientists proceed inexorably from well-established fact
to well-established fact, never being influenced by any unproved conjecture, is quite
mistaken. Provided it is made clear which are proved facts and which are conjectures, no
harm can result. Conjectures are of great importance since they suggest useful lines of
research.
I now proceed to consider opinions opposed to my own.
(1) The Theological Objection. Thinking is a function of man’s immortal soul. God has given
an immortal soul to every man and woman, but not to any other animal or to machines.
Hence no animal or machine can think.1
I am unable to accept any part of this, but will attempt to reply in theological terms. I should
find the argument more convincing if animals were classed with men, for there is a greater
difference, to my mind, between the typical animate and the inanimate than there is between
man and the other animals. The arbitrary character of the orthodox view becomes clearer if
we consider how it might appear to a member of some other religious community. How do
1
Possibly this view is heretical. Saint Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologica, quoted by Bertrand Russell, A
History of Western Philosophy [New York: Simon & Schuster, 19451, p. 458) states that God cannot make a
man to have no soul. But this may not be a real restriction on His powers, but only a result of the fact that men's,
souls are immortal, and therefore indestructible.
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Christians regard the Moslem view that women have no souls? But let us leave this point
aside and return to the main argument. It appears to me that the argument quoted above
implies a serious restriction of the omnipotence of the Almighty. It is admitted that [381]
there are certain things that He cannot do such as making one equal to two, but should we not
believe that He has freedom to confer a soul on an elephant if He sees fit? We might expect
that He would only exercise this power in conjunction with a mutation which provided the
elephant with an appropriately improved brain to minister to the needs of this soul. An
argument of exactly similar form may be made for the case of machines. It may seem
different because it is more difficult to “swallow.” But this really only means that we think it
would be less likely that He would consider the circumstances suitable for conferring a soul.
The circumstances in question are discussed in the rest of this paper. In attempting to
construct such machines we should not be irreverently usurping His power of creating souls,
any more than we are in the procreation of children: rather we are, in either case, instruments
of His will providing mansions for the souls that He creates.
However, this is mere speculation. I am not very impressed with theological arguments whatever they may be used to support. Such arguments have often been found unsatisfactory in
the past. In the time of Galileo it was argued that the texts, “And the sun stood still . . . and
hasted not to go down about a whole day” (Joshua 10: 13) and “He laid the foundations of the
earth, that it should not move at any time” (Psalm 105: 5) were an adequate refutation of the
Copernican theory. With our present knowledge such an argument appears futile. When that
knowledge was not available it made a quite different impression.
(2) The “Heads in the Sand” Objection. “The consequences of machines thinking would be
too dreadful. Let us hope and believe that they cannot do so.”
This argument is seldom expressed quite so openly as in the form above. But it affects most
of us who think about it at all. We like to believe that Man is in some subtle way superior to
the rest of creation. It is best if he can be shown to be necessarily superior, for then there is
no danger of him losing his commanding position. The popularity of the theological argument
is clearly connected with this feeling. It is likely to be quite strong in intellectual people,
since they value the power of thinking more highly than others, and are more inclined to base
their belief in the superiority of Man on this power.
I do not think that this argument is sufficiently substantial to require refutation. Consolation
would be more appropriate: perhaps this should be sought in the transmigration of souls.
(3) The Mathematical Objection. There are a number of results of mathematical logic which
can be used to show that there are limitations to the powers of discrete state machines. The
best known of these results is known as Gödel’s theorem, and shows that in any sufficiently
powerful logical system statements can be formulated which can neither be proved nor
disproved within the system, unless possibly the system itself is inconsistent. There are other,
in some respects similar, results due to Church, Kleene, Rosser, and Turing. The latter result
is the most convenient to consider, since it refers directly to machines, whereas the others can
only be used in a comparatively indirect argument: for instance if Gödel’s theorem is to be
used we need in addition to have some means of describing logical systems in terms of
machines, and machines in terms of logical systems. The result in question refers to a type of
machine which is essentially a digital computer with an infinite capacity. It states that there
are certain things that such a machine cannot do. If it is rigged up to give answers to questions as in the imitation game, there will be some questions to which it will either give a
wrong answer, or fail to give an answer at all however much time is allowed for a reply.
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There may, of course, be many such questions, and questions which cannot be answered by
one machine may be satisfactorily answered by another. We are of course supposing for the
present that the questions are of the kind to which an answer “Yes” or “No” is appropriate,
rather than questions such as “What do you think of Picasso?” The questions that we know
the machines must fail on are of this type, “Consider the machine specified as follows …
Will this machine ever answer ‘Yes’ to any question?” The dots are to be replaced by a
description of some machine in a standard form, which could be something like that used in
§5. When the machine described bears a certain comparatively simple relation to the machine
which is under interrogation, it can be shown that the answer is either wrong or not
forthcoming. This is the mathematical result: it is argued that it proves a disability of
machines to which the human intellect is not subject.
The short answer to this argument is that although it is established that there are limitations to
the powers of any particular machine, it has only been stated, without any sort of proof that
no such limitations apply to the human intellect. But I do not think this view can be dismissed
quite so lightly. Whenever one of these machines is asked the appropriate critical question,
and gives a definite answer, we know that this answer must be wrong, and this gives us a
certain feeling of superiority. Is this feeling illusory? It is no doubt quite genuine, but I do not
think too much importance should be attached to it. We too often give wrong answers to
questions ourselves to be justified in being very pleased at such evidence of fallibility on the
part of the machines. Further, our superiority can only be felt on such an occasion in relation
to the one machine over which we have scored our petty triumph. There would be no
question of triumphing simultaneously over all machines. In short, then, there might be men
cleverer than any given machine, but then again there might be other machines cleverer
again, and so on.
Those who hold to the mathematical argument would, I think, mostly be willing to accept the
imitation game as a basis for discussion. Those who believe in the two previous objections
would probably not be interested in any criteria.
(4) The Argument from Consciousness. This argument is very well expressed in Professor Jefferson’s Lister Oration for 1949, from which I quote. “Not until a machine can write a sonnet
or compose a concerto because of thoughts and emotions felt, and not by the chance fall of
symbols, could we agree that machine equals brain that is, not only write it but know that it
had written it. No mechanism could feel (and not merely artificially signal, an easy
contrivance) pleasure at its successes, grief when its valves fuse, be warmed by flattery, be
made miserable by its mistakes, be charmed by sex, be angry or depressed when it cannot get
what it wants.”
This argument appears to be a denial of the validity of our test. According to the most
extreme form of this view the only way by which one could be sure that a machine thinks is
to be the machine and to feel oneself thinking. One could then describe these feelings to the
world, but of course no one would be justified in taking any notice. Likewise according to
this view the only way to know that a man thinks is to be that particular man. It is in fact the
solipsist point of view. It may be the most logical view to hold but it makes communication
of ideas difficult. A is liable to believe “A thinks but B does not” while B believes “B thinks
but A does not. “ Instead of arguing continually over this point it is usual to have the polite
convention that everyone thinks. I am sure that Professor Jefferson does not wish to adopt the
extreme and solipsist point of view. Probably he would be quite willing to accept the
imitation game as a test. The game (with the player B omitted) is frequently used in practice
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under the name of viva voce to discover whether someone really understands something or
has ‘learned it parrot fashion.” Let us listen in to a part of such a viva voce:
INTERROGATOR: In the first line of your sonnet which reads “Shall I compare thee to
a summer’s day,” would not “a spring day” do as well or better?
WITNESS: It wouldn’t scan.
INTERROGATOR: How about “a winter’s day.” That would scan all right.
WITNESS: Yes, but nobody wants to be compared to a winter’s day.
INTERROGATOR: Would you say Mr. Pickwick reminded you of Christmas?
WITNESS: In a way.
INTERROGATOR: Yet Christmas is a winter’s day, and I do not think Mr. Pickwick
would mind the comparison.
WITNESS: I don’t think you’re serious. By a winter’s day one means a typical winter’s
day, rather than a special one like Christmas.
And so on. What would Professor Jefferson say if the sonnet-writing machine was able to
answer like this in the viva voce? I do not know whether he would regard the machine as
“merely artificially signalling” these answers, but if the answers were as satisfactory and
sustained as in the above passage I do not think he would describe it as “an easy
contrivance”. This phrase is, I think, intended to cover such devices as the inclusion [383] in
the machine of a record of someone reading a sonnet, with appropriate switching to turn it on
from time to time.
In short then, I think that most of those who support the argument from consciousness could
be persuaded to abandon it rather than be forced into the solipsist position. They will then
probably be willing to accept our test.
I do not wish to give the impression that I think there is no mystery about consciousness.
There is, for instance, something of a paradox connected with any attempt to localize it. But I
do not think these mysteries necessarily need to be solved before we can answer the question
with which we are concerned in this paper.
(5) Arguments from Various Disabilities. These arguments take the form, “I grant you that
you can make machines do all the things you have mentioned but you will never be able to
make one to do X.” Numerous features X are suggested in this connection. I offer a selection:
Be kind, resourceful, beautiful, friendly . . . have initiative, have a sense of
humour, tell right from wrong, make mistakes..... fall in love, enjoy strawberries
and cream..... I make someone fall in love with it, learn from experience . . . . use
words properly, be the subject of its own thought . . . , have as much diversity of
behaviour as a man, do something really new. . . .
No support is usually offered for these statements. I believe they are mostly founded on the
principle of scientific induction. A man has seen thousands of machines in his lifetime. From
what he sees of them he draws a number of general conclusions. They are ugly, each is
designed for a very limited purpose, when required for a minutely different purpose they are
useless, the variety of behaviour of any one of them is very small, etc., etc. Naturally he
concludes that these are necessary properties of machines in general. Many of these
limitations are associated with the very small storage capacity of most machines. (I am
assuming that the idea of storage capacity is extended in some way to cover machines other
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than discrete state machines. The exact definition does not matter as no mathematical
accuracy is claimed in the present discussion.) A few years ago, when very little had been
heard of digital computers, it was possible to elicit much incredulity concerning them, if one
mentioned their properties without describing their construction. That was presumably due to
a similar application of the principle of scientific induction. These applications of the
principle are of course largely unconscious. When a burned child fears the fire and shows that
he fears it by avoiding it, I should say that he was applying scientific induction. (I could of
course also describe his behaviour in many other ways.) The works or customs of mankind do
not seem to be very suitable material to which to apply scientific induction. A very large part
of space-time must be investigated if reliable results are to be obtained. Otherwise we may
(as most English children do) decide that everybody speaks English, and that it is silly to
learn French.
There are, however, special remarks to be made about many of the disabilities that have been
mentioned. The inability to enjoy strawberries and cream may [strike] the reader as frivolous.
Possibly a machine might be made to enjoy this delicious dish, but any attempt to make one
do so would be idiotic. What is important about this disability is that it contributes to some of
the other disabilities, e.g., to the difficulty of the same kind of friendliness occurring between
man and machine as between white man and white man, or between black man and black
man.
The claim that “machines cannot make mistakes” seems a curious one. One is tempted to
retort, “Are they any worse for that?” But let us adopt a more sympathetic attitude, and try to
see what is really meant. I think this criticism can be explained in terms of the imitation
game. It is claimed that the interrogator could distinguish the machine from the man simply
by setting them a number of problems in arithmetic. The machine would be unmasked
because of its deadly accuracy. The reply to this is simple. The machine (programmed for
playing the game) would not attempt to give the right answers to the arithmetic problems. It
would deliberately introduce mistakes in a manner calculated to confuse the interrogator. A
mechanical fault would probably show itself through an unsuitable decision as to what sort of
a mistake to make in the arithmetic. Even this interpretation of the criticism is not sufficiently
sympathetic. But we cannot afford the [384] space to go into it much further. It seems to me
that this criticism depends on a confusion between two kinds of mistakes. We may call them
“errors of functioning” and “errors of conclusion. “ Errors of functioning are due to some mechanical or electrical fault which causes the machine to behave otherwise than it was
designed to do. In philosophical discussions one likes to ignore the possibility of such errors;
one is therefore discussing “abstract machines.” These abstract machines are mathematical
fictions rather than physical objects. By definition they are incapable of errors of functioning.
In this sense we can truly say that “machines can never make mistakes.” Errors of conclusion
can only arise when some meaning is attached to the output signals from the machine. The
machine might, for instance, type out mathematical equations, or sentences in English. When
a false proposition is typed we say that the machine has committed an error of conclusion.
There is clearly no reason at all for saying that a machine cannot make this kind of mistake. It
might do nothing but type out repeatedly “O = 1. “ To take a less perverse example, it might
have some method for drawing conclusions by scientific induction. We must expect such a
method to lead occasionally to erroneous results.
The claim that a machine cannot be the subject of its own thought can of course only be answered if it can be shown that the machine has some thought with some matter. Nevertheless,
“the subject matter of a machine’s operations” does seem to mean something, at least to the
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people who deal with it. If, for instance, the machine was trying to find a solution of the
equation x2 - 40x - 11 = 0 one would be tempted to describe this equation as part of the
machine’s subject matter at that moment. In this sort of sense a machine undoubtedly can be
its own subject matter. It may be used to help in making up its own programs, or to predict
the effect of alterations in its own structure. By observing the results of its own behaviour it
can modify its own programs so as to achieve some purpose more effectively. These are
possibilities of the near future, rather than Utopian dreams.
The criticism that a machine cannot have much diversity of behaviour is just a way of saying
that it cannot have much storage capacity. Until fairly recently a storage capacity of even a
thousand digits was very rare.
The criticisms that we are considering here are often disguised forms of the argument from
consciousness. Usually if one maintains that a machine can do one of these things, and
describes the kind of method that the machine could use, one will not make much of an
impression. It is thought that the method (whatever it may be, for it must be mechanical) is
really rather base. Compare the parenthesis of Jefferson’s statement quoted above.
(6) Lady Lovelace’s Objection. Our most detailed information of Babbage’s Analytical Engine comes from a memoir by Lady Lovelace. In it she states, “The Analytical Engine has no
pretensions to originate anything. It can do whatever we know how to order it to perform”
(her italics). This statement is quoted by Hartree who adds: “This does not imply that it may
not be possible to construct electronic equipment which will ‘think for itself,’ or in which, in
biological terms, one could set up a conditioned reflex, which would serve as a basis for
‘learning.’ Whether this is possible in principle or not is a stimulating and exciting question,
suggested by some of these recent developments. But it did not seem that the machines
constructed or projected at the time had this property.”
I am in thorough agreement with Hartree over this. It will be noticed that he does not assert
that the machines in question had not got the property, but rather that the evidence available
to Lady Lovelace did not encourage her to believe that they had it. It is quite possible that the
machines in question had in a sense got this property. For suppose that some discrete state
machine has the property. The Analytical Engine was a universal digital computer, so that, if
its storage capacity and speed were adequate, it could by suitable programming be made to
mimic the machine in question. Probably this argument did not occur to the Countess or to
Babbage. In any case, there was no obligation on them to claim all that could be claimed.
This whole question will be considered again under the heading of learning machines.
A variant of Lady Lovelace’s objection states that a machine can “never do anything really
new. This may be parried for a moment with the saw, “There is nothing new under the sun”.
Who can be certain that “original work” that he has done was not simply the growth of the
seed planted in him by teaching, or the effect of following well-known general principles. A
better variant of the objection says that a machine can never “take us by surprise.” This
statement is a more direct challenge and can be met directly. Machines take me by surprise
with great frequency. This is largely because I do not do sufficient calculation to decide what
to expect them to do, or rather because, although I do a calculation, I do it in a hurried,
slipshod fashion, taking risks. Perhaps I say to myself, “I suppose the voltage here ought to
be the same as there: anyway let’s assume it is.” Naturally I am often wrong, and the result is
a surprise for me, for by the time the experiment is done these assumptions have been
forgotten. These admissions lay me open to lectures on the subject of my vicious ways, but
do not throw any doubt on my credibility when I testify to the surprises I experience.
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I do not expect this reply to silence my critic. He will probably say that such surprises are due
to some creative mental act on my part, and reflect no credit on the machine. This leads us
back to the argument from consciousness, and far from the idea of surprise. It is a line of
argument we must consider closed, but it is perhaps worth remarking that the appreciation of
something as surprising requires as much of a “creative mental act” whether the surprising
event originates from a man a book, a machine or anything else.
The view that machines cannot give rise to surprises is due, I believe, to a fallacy to which
philosophers and mathematicians are particularly subject. This is the assumption that as soon
as a fact is presented to a mind all consequences of that fact spring into the mind
simultaneously with it. It is a very useful assumption under many circumstances, but one too
easily forgets that it is false. A natural consequence of doing so is that one then assumes that
there is no virtue in the mere working out of consequences from data and general principles.
(7) Argument from Continuity in the Nervous System. The nervous system is certainly not a
discrete state machine. A small error in the information about the size of a nervous impulse
impinging on a neuron, may make a large difference to the size of the outgoing impulse. It
may be argued that, this being so, one cannot expect to be able to mimic the behaviour of the
nervous system with a discrete state system.
It is true that a discrete state machine must be different from a continuous machine. But if we
adhere to the conditions of the imitation game, the interrogator will not be able to take any
advantage of this difference. The situation can be made clearer if we consider some other
simpler continuous machine. A differential analyzer will do very well. (A differential
analyzer is a certain kind of machine not of the discrete state type used for some kinds of
calculation.) Some of these provide their answers in a typed form, and so are suitable for
taking part in the game. It would not be possible for a digital computer to predict exactly
what answers the differential analyzer would give to a problem, but it would be, quite capable
of giving the right sort of answer. For instance, if asked to give the value of  (actually about
3.1416) it would be reasonable to choose at random between the values 3.12, 3.13, 3.14, 3.15,
3.16 with the probabilities of 0.05 0.15, 0.55, 0.19, 0.06 (say). Under these circumstances it
would be very difficult for the interrogator to distinguish the differential analyzer from the
digital computer.
(8) The Argument from Informality of Behaviour. It is not possible to produce a set of rules
purporting to describe what a man should do in every conceivable set of circumstances. One
might for instance have a rule that one is to stop when one sees a red traffic light, and to go if
one sees a green one, but what if by some fault both appear together? One may perhaps
decide that it is safest to stop. But some further difficulty may well arise from this decision
later. To attempt to provide rules of conduct to cover every eventuality, even those arising
from traffic lights, appears to be impossible. With all this I agree.
From this it is argued that we cannot be machines. I shall try to reproduce the argument, but I
fear I shall hardly do it justice. It seems to run something like this. “If each man had a
definite set of rules of conduct by which he regulated his life he would be no better than a
machine. But there are no such rules, so men cannot be machines.” The undistributed middle
is glaring. I do not think the argument is ever put quite like [386] this, but I believe this is the
argument used nevertheless. There may however be a certain confusion between “rules of
conduct” and “laws of behaviour” to cloud the issue. By “rules of conduct” I mean precepts
such as “Stop if you see red lights,” on which one can act, and of which one can be
conscious. By “laws of behaviour” I mean laws of nature as applied to a man’s body such as
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“if you pinch him he will squeak.” If we substitute “laws of behaviour which regulate his
life” for “laws of conduct by which he regulates his life” in the argument quoted the
undistributed middle is no longer insuperable. For we believe that it is not only true that
being regulated by laws of behaviour implies being some sort of machine (though not
necessarily a discrete state machine), but that conversely being such a machine implies being
regulated by such laws. However, we cannot so easily convince ourselves of the absence of
complete laws of behaviour as of complete rules of conduct. The only way we know of for
finding such laws is scientific observation, and we certainly know of no circumstances under
which we could say, “We have searched enough. There are no such laws.
We can demonstrate more forcibly that any such statement would be unjustified. For suppose
we could be sure of finding such laws if they existed. Then given a discrete state machine it
should certainly be possible to discover by observation sufficient about it to predict its future
behavior, and this within a reasonable time, say a thousand years. But this does not seem to
be the case. I have set up on the Manchester computer a small program using only 1000 units
of storage, whereby the machine supplied with one sixteen-figure number replies with
another within two seconds. I would defy anyone to learn from these replies sufficient about
the program to be able to predict any replies to untried values.
(9) The Argument from Extra-Sensory-Perception. I assume that the reader is familiar with
the idea of extra-sensory perception, and the meaning of the four items of it, viz., telepathy,
clairvoyance, precognition and psychokinesis. These disturbing phenomena seem to deny all
our usual scientific ideas. How we would like to discredit them! Unfortunately the statistical
evidence, at least for telepathy, is overwhelming. It is very difficult to rearrange one’s ideas
so as to fit these new facts in. Once one has accepted them it does not seem a very big step to
believe in ghosts and bogies. The idea that our bodies move simply according to the known
laws of physics, together with some others not yet discovered but somewhat similar, would
be one of the first to go.
This argument is to my mind quite a strong one. One can say in reply that many scientific
theories seem to remain workable in practice, in spite of clashing with E.S.P.; that in fact one
can get along very nicely if one forgets about it. This is rather cold comfort, and one fears
that thinking is just the kind of phenomenon where E.S.P. may be especially relevant.
A more specific argument based on E.S.P. might run as follows: “Let us play the imitation
game, using a witnesses a man who is good as a telepathic receiver, and a digital computer.
The interrogator can ask such questions as ‘What suit does the card in my right hand belong
to?’ The man by telepathy or clairvoyance gives the right answer 130 times out of 400 cards.
The machine can only guess at random, and perhaps get 104 right, so the interrogator makes
the right identification.” There is an interesting possibility which opens here. Suppose the
digital computer contains a random number generator. Then it will be natural to use this to
decide what answer to give. But then the random number of generator will be subject to the
psychokinetic powers of the interrogator. Perhaps this psychokinesis might cause the machine
to guess right more often than would be expected on a probability calculation, so that the
interrogator might still be unable to make the right identification. On the other hand, he might
be able to guess right without any questioning, by clairvoyance. With E.S.P. anything may
happen.
If telepathy is admitted it will be necessary to tighten our test. The situation could be
regarded as analogous to that which would occur if the interrogator were talking to himself
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and one of the competitors was listening with his ear to the wall. To put the competitors into
a “telepathy-proof room” would satisfy all requirements.
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D.M. Armstrong The Nature of Mind
D.M. Armstrong
THE NATURE OF MIND
[D.M. Armstrong, The Nature of Mind and other essays, University of Queensland Press,
1980)]
1. Men have minds, that is to say, they perceive, they have sensations, emotions,
beliefs, thoughts, purposes and desires. What is it to have a mind? What is it to
perceive, to feel emotion, to have a belief or to have a purpose? Many
contemporary philosophers think that the best clue we have to the nature of mind is
furnished by the discoveries and hypotheses of modern science concerning the
nature of man.
2. What does modern science have to say about the nature of man? There are, of course,
all sorts of disagreements and divergencies in the views of individual scientists. But I
think it is true to say that one view is steadily gaining ground, so that it bids fair to
become established scientific doctrine. This is the view that we can give a complete
account of man in purely physico-chemical terms. This view has received a
tremendous impetus in recent decades from the new subject of molecular biology, a
subject that promises to unravel the physical and chemical mechanisms that lie at the
basis of life. Before that time, it received great encouragement from pioneering work
in neurophysiology pointing to the likelihood of a purely electro-chemical account of
the working of the brain. I think it is fair to say that those scientists who still reject the
physico-chemical account of man do so primarily for philosophical, or moral or
religious reasons, and only secondarily, and half-heartedly, for reasons of scientific
detail. This is not to say that in the future new evidence and new problems may not to
light that will force science to reconsider the physico-chemical view of man. But at
present the drift of scientific thought is clearly set towards the physico-chemical
hypothesis. And we have nothing better to go on than the present.
3. For me, then, and for many philosophers who think like me, the moral is clear. We
must try to work out an account of the nature of mind which is compatible with the
view that man is nothing but a physico-chemical mechanism.
4. And in this paper, I shall be concerned to do just this: to sketch (in barest outline)
what may be called a Materialist or Physicalist account of the mind.
THE AUTHORITY OF SCIENCE
5. But before doing this, I should like to go back and consider a criticism of my position
that must inevitably occur to some. What reason have I, it may be asked, for taking
my stand on science? Even granting that I am right about what is the currently
dominant scientific view of man, why should we concede science a special authority
to decide questions about the nature of man? What of the authority of philosophy, of
religion, of morality, or even of literature and art? Why do I set the authority of
science above all these? Why this “scientism”?
6. It seems to me that the answer to this question is very simple. If we consider the
search for truth, in all its fields, we find that it is only in science that men versed in
their subject can, after investigation that is more or less prolonged, and which may in
some cases extend beyond a single human lifetime, reach substantial agreement about
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what is the case. It is only as a result of scientific investigation that we ever seem to
reach an intellectual consensus about controversial matters.
7. In the Epistle Dedicatory to De Corpore, Hobbes wrote of William Harvey, the
discoverer of the circulation of the blood, that he was: “the only man I know, that
conquering envy, hath established a new doctrine in his life-time.”
8. Before Copernicus, Galileo and Harvey, Hobbes remarks: “there was nothing certain
in natural philosophy.” And we might add, with the exception of mathematics, there
was nothing certain in any other learned discipline.
9. These remarks of Hobbes are incredibly revealing. They show us what a watershed in
the intellectual history of the human race the seventeenth century was. Before that
time, enquiry proceeded, as it were, in the dark. Men could not hope to see their
doctrine established, that is to say, accepted by the vast majority of those properly
versed in the subject under discussion. There was no intellectual consensus. Since that
time, it has become a commonplace to see new doctrines, sometimes of the most farreaching kind, established to the satisfaction of the learned, often within the lifetime
of their first proponents. Science has provided us with a method of deciding disputed
questions. This is not to say, of course, that the consensus of those who are learned
and competent in a subject cannot be mistaken. Of course such a consensus can be
mistaken. Sometimes it has been mistaken. But, granting fallibility, what better
authority have we than such a consensus?
10. Now this is of the utmost importance. For in philosophy, in religion, in such
disciplines as literary criticism, in moral questions in so far as they are thought to be
matters of truth and falsity, there has been a notable failure to achieve an intellectual
consensus about disputed questions among the learned. Must we not then attach a
peculiar authority to the discipline that can achieve a consensus? And if it presents us
with a certain vision of the nature of man, is this not a powerful reason for accepting
that vision?
11. I will not take up here the deeper question why it is that the methods of science have
enabled us to achieve an intellectual consensus about so many disputed matters. That
question, I think, could receive no brief or uncontroversial answer. I am resting my
argument on the simple fact that, as a result of scientific investigation, such a
consensus has been achieved.
12. It may be replied – it often is replied – that while science is all very well in its own
sphere – the sphere of the physical, perhaps – there are matters of fact on which it is
not competent to pronounce. And among such matters, it may be claimed, is the question: what is the whole nature of man? But I cannot see that this reply has much force.
Science has provided us with an island of truths, or, perhaps one should say, a raft of
truths, to bear us up on the sea of our disputatious ignorance. There may have to be
revisions and refinements, new results may set old findings in a new perspective, but
what science has given us will not be altogether superseded. Must we not therefore
appeal to these relative certainties for guidance when we come to consider
uncertainties elsewhere? Perhaps science cannot help us to decide whether or not
there is a God, whether or not human beings have immortal souls, or whether or not
the will is free. But if science cannot assist us, what can? I conclude that it is the
scientific vision of man, and not the philosophical or religious or artistic or moral
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vision of man, that is the best clue we have to the nature of man. And it is rational to
argue from the best evidence we have.1
DEFINING THE MENTAL
13. Having in this way attempted to justify my procedure, I turn back to my subject: the
attempt to work out an account of mind, or, if you prefer, of mental process, within
the framework of the physico-chemical, or, as we may call it, the Materialist view of
man.
14. Now there is one account of mental process that is at once attractive to any
philosopher sympathetic to a Materialist view of man: this is Behaviourism.
Formulated originally by a psychologist, J.B. Watson, it attracted widespread interest
and considerable support from scientifically oriented philosophers. Traditional
philosophy had tended to think of the mind as a rather mysterious inward arena that
lay behind, and was responsible for, the outward or physical behaviour of our bodies.
Descartes thought of this inner arena as a spiritual substance, and it was this
conception of the mind as spiritual object that Gilbert Ryle attacked, apparently in the
interest of Behaviourism, in his important book The Concept of Mind (1949). He
ridiculed the Cartesian view as the dogma of “the ghost in the machine”. The mind
was not something behind the behaviour of the body, it was simply part of that
physical behaviour. My anger with you is not some modification of a spiritual
substance that somehow brings about aggressive behaviour; rather it is the aggressive
behaviour itself; my addressing strong words to you, striking you, turning m on you,
and so on. Thought is not an inner process that lies behind, and brings about, the
words I speak and write: it is my speaking and writing. The mind is not an inner
arena, it is outward act.
15. It is clear that such a view of mind fits in very well with completely Materialistic or
Physicalist view of man. If there is no need to draw a distinction between mental
processes and their expression in physical behaviour, but if instead the mental
processes are identified with their so-called “expressions”, then the existence of mind
stands in no conflict with the view that man is nothing but a physico-chemical
mechanism.
16. However, the version of Behaviourism that I have just sketched is a very crude
version, and its crudity lays it open to objections. One obvious difficulty is that it is
our common experience that there can be mental processes going on although there is
no behaviour occurring that could possibly be treated as expressions of those
processes. A man may be angry, but give no bodily sign; he may think, but say or do
nothing at all.
17. In my view, the most plausible attempt to refine Behaviourism with a view to meeting
this objection was made by introducing the notion of a disposition to behave.
(Dispositions to behave are particularly important part in Ryle’s account of the mind.)
Let us consider the general notion of disposition first. Brittleness is a disposition, a
disposition possessed by materials like glass. Brittle materials are those that, when
subjected to relatively small forces break or shatter easily. But breaking and shattering
1
The view of science presented here has been challenged in recent years by new Irrationalist philosophies of
science. See, in particular, Thomas Kuhn (1962) and Paul Feyerabend (1975). A complete treatment of the
problem would involve answering their contentions.
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easily is not brittleness, rather it is the manifestation of brittleness. Brittleness itself is
the tendency or liability of the material to break or easily. A piece of glass may never
shatter or break throughout its whole history, but it is still the case that it is brittle: it is
liable to shatter or break if dropped quite a small way or hit quite lightly. Now a
disposition to behave is simply a tendency or liability of a person to behave in a
certain way under certain circumstances. The brittleness of glass is a disposition that
the glass retains throughout its history, but clearly there also could be dispositions that
come and go. The dispositions to behave that are of interest to [6] the Behaviourist
are, for the most part, of this temporary character.
18. Now how did Ryle and others use the notion of a disposition to behave to meet the
obvious objection to Behaviourism that there can be mental process going on although
the subject is engaging in no relevant behaviour? Their strategy was to argue that in
such cases, although the subject was not behaving in any relevant way, he or she was
disposed to behave in some relevant way. The glass does not shatter, but it is still
brittle. The man does not behave, but he does have a disposition to behave. We can
say he thinks although he does not speak or act because at that time he was disposed
to speak or act in a certain way. If he had been asked, perhaps, he would have spoken
or acted. We can say he is angry although he does not behave angrily, because he is
disposed so to behave. If only one more word had been addressed to him, he would
have burst out. And so on. In this way it was hoped that Behaviourism could be
squared with the obvious facts.
19. It is very important to see just how these thinkers conceived of dispositions. I quote
from Ryle:
To possess a dispositional property is not to be in a particular state, or
to undergo a particular change; it is to be bound or liable to be in a
particular state, or to undergo a particular change, when a particular
condition is realized.2
20. So to explain the breaking of a lightly struck glass on a particular occasion by saying
it was brittle is, on this view of dispositions, simply to say that the glass broke
because it is the sort of thing that regularly breaks when quite lightly struck. The
breaking was the normal behaviour, or not abnormal behaviour, of such a thing. The
brittleness is not to be conceived of as a cause for the breakage, or even, more
vaguely, a factor in bringing about the breaking. Brittleness is just the fact that things
of that sort break easily.
21. But although in this way the Behaviourists did something to deal with the objection
that mental processes can occur in the absence of behaviour, it seems clear, now that
the shouting and the dust have died, that they did not do enough. When I think, but
my thoughts do not issue in any action, it seems as obvious as anything is obvious that
there is something actually going on in me that constitutes my thought. It is not
simply that I would speak or act if some conditions that are unfulfilled were to be
fulfilled. Something is currently going on, in the strongest and most literal sense of
“going on”, and this something is my thought. Rylean Behaviourism denies this, and
so it is unsatisfactory as a theory of mind. Yet I know of no version of Behaviourism
that is more satisfactory. The moral for those of us who wish to take physicalistic
2
Ryle, 1949: 43; emphasis added.
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view of man is that we must look for some other account of the nature of mind and of
mental processes.
22. But perhaps we need not grieve too deeply about the failure of Behaviourism to
produce a satisfactory theory of mind. Behaviourism is a profoundly unnatural
account of mental processes. If somebody speaks and acts in certain ways, it is natural
to speak of this speech and action as the expression of his thought. It is not at all
natural to speak of his speech and action as identical with his thought. We naturally
think of the thought as something quite distinct from the speech and action that, under
suitable circumstances, brings the speech and action about. Thoughts are not to be
identified with behaviour, we think; they lie behind behaviour. A man’s behaviour
constitutes the reason we have for attributing certain mental processes to him, but the
behaviour cannot be identified with the mental processes.
23. This suggests a very interesting line of thought about the mind. Behaviourism is
certainly wrong, but perhaps it is not altogether wrong. Perhaps the Behaviourists are
wrong in identifying the mind and mental occurrences with behaviour, but perhaps
right in thinking that our notion of a mind and of individual mental states is logically
tied to behaviour. For perhaps what we mean by a mental state is some state of the
person that, under suitable circumstances, brings about a certain range of behaviour.
Perhaps mind can be defined not as behaviour, but rather as the inner cause of certain
behaviour. Thought is not speech under suitable circumstances, rather it is something
within the person that, in suitable circumstances, brings about speech. And, in fact, I
believe that this is the true account, or, at any rate, a true first account of what we
mean by a mental state.
24. How does this line of thought link up with a purely Physicalist view of man? The
position is that while it does not make such a Physicalist view inevitable, it does stake
it possible. It does not entail, but it is compatible with, a purely Physicalist view of
man. For if our notion of the mind and of mental states is nothing but that of a cause
within the person of certain ranges of behaviour, then it becomes a scientific question,
and not a question of logical analysis, what in fact the intrinsic nature of that cause is.
The cause might be, as Descartes thought it was, a spiritual substance working
through the pineal gland to produce the complex bodily behaviour of which men are,
capable. It might be breath, or specially smooth and mobile atoms dispersed
throughout the body; it might be many other things. But in fact the verdict of modern
science seems to be that the sole cause of mind-betokening behaviour in man and the
higher animals is the physicochemical workings of the central nervous system. And
so, assuming we have correctly characterized our concept of a mental state as nothing
but the cause of certain sorts of behaviour, then we can identify these mental states
with purely physical states of the central nervous system.
25. At this point we may stop and go back to the Behaviourist’s dispositions. We saw
that, according to him, the brittleness of glass or, to take another example, the
elasticity of rubber, is not a state of the glass or the rubber, but is simply the fact that
things of that sort behave in the way they do. But now let us consider how a scientist
would think about brittleness or elasticity. Faced with the phenomenon of breakage
under relatively small impacts, or the phenomenon of stretching when a force is
applied followed by contraction when the force is removed, he will assume that there
is some current state of the glass or the rubber that is responsible for the characteristic
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behaviour of samples of these two materials. At the beginning, he will not know what
this state is, but he will endeavour to find out, and he may succeed in finding out. And
when he has found out, he will very likely make remarks of. this sort: “We have
discovered that the brittleness of glass is in fact a certain sort of pattern in the
molecules of the glass.” That is to say, he will identify brittleness with the state of the
glass that is responsible for the liability of the glass to break. For him, a disposition of
an object is a state of the object. What makes the state a state of brittleness is the fact
that it gives rise to the characteristic manifestations of brittleness. But the disposition
itself is distinct from its manifestations: it is the state of the glass that gives rise to
these manifestations in suitable circumstances.
26. This way of looking at dispositions is very different from Ryle and the Behaviourists.
The great difference is this: If we treat dispositions as actual states, as I have
suggested that scientists do, even if states the intrinsic nature of which may yet have
to be discovered, then we can say that dispositions are actual causes, or causal factors,
which, in suitable circumstances, actually bring about those happenings that are the
manifestations of the disposition. A certain molecular constitution of glass that
constitutes brittleness is actually responsible for the fact that, when the glass is struck,
it breaks.
27. Now I cannot argue the matter here, because the detail of the argument is technical
and difficult, but I believe that the view of dispositions as states, which is the view
that is natural to science, is the correct one.3 I believe it can be shown quite strictly
that to the extent that we admit the notion of dispositions at all, we are committed to
the view that they are actual states of the object that has the disposition. I may add
that I think that the same holds for the closely connected notions of capacities and
powers. Here I will simply have to assume this step in my argument.
28. But perhaps it will be seen that the rejection of the idea mind is simply a certain range
of man’s behaviour in favour of the view that mind is rather the inner cause of that
range of man’s behaviour, is bound up with the rejection of the Rylean dispositions in
favour of one that treats dispositions as states of objects and so as having actual causal
power. The Behaviourists were wrong to identify the mind with behaviour. They were
not so far off the mark when they tried to deal with cases where mental happenings
occur in the absence of behaviour by saying that these are dispositions to behave. But
in order to reach a correct view, I am suggesting, they would have to conceive of
these dispositions as actual states of the person who has the disposition, states that
have actual causal power to bring about behaviour in suitable circumstances. But to
do this is to abandon the central inspiration of Behaviourism: that in talking about the
mind we do not have to go behind outward behaviour to inner states.
29. And so two separate but interlocking lines of thought have pushed me in the same
direction. The first line of thought is that it goes profoundly against the grain to think
of the mind as behaviour. The mind is, rather, that which stands behind and brings
about our complex behaviour. The second line of thought is that the Behaviourist’s
dispositions, properly conceived, are really states that underlie behaviour and, under
suitable circumstances, bring about behaviour. Putting these two together, we reach
the conception of a mental state as a state of the person apt for producing certain
ranges of behaviour. This formula: a mental state is a state of the person apt for
3
I develop the argument in Belief, Truth and Knowledge (1973), ch. 2, sect. 2.
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producing certain ranges of behaviour, I believe to be a very illuminating way of
looking at the concept of a mental state. I have found it fruitful in the search for
detailed logical analyses of the individual mental concepts.
30. I do not think that Hegel’s Dialectic has much to tell us about the nature of reality.
But I think that human thought often moves in a dialectical way, from thesis to
antithesis and then to the synthesis. Perhaps thought about the mind is a case in point.
I have already said that classical philosophy has tended to think of the mind as an
inner arena of some sort. This we may call the Thesis. Behaviourism moves to the
opposite extreme: the mind is seen as outward behaviour. This is the Antithesis. My
proposed Synthesis is that the mind is properly conceived as an inner principle, but a
principle that is identified in terms of the outward behaviour it is apt for bringing
about. This way of looking at the mind and mental states does not itself entail a
Materialist or Physicalist view of man, for nothing is said in this analysis about the
intrinsic nature of these mental states. But if we have, as I have argued that we do
have, general scientific grounds for thinking that man is nothing but a physical
mechanism, we can go on to argue that the mental states are in fact nothing but
physical states of the central nervous system.
THE PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
31. Along these lines, then, I would look for an account of the mind that is compatible
with a purely Materialist theory of man. There are, as may be imagined, all sorts of
powerful objections be made to my view. But in the rest of this paper, I propose to do
only one thing: I will develop one very important object objection to my view of the
mind - an objection felt by many philosophers - then try to show how the objection
should be met.
32. The view that our notion of mind is nothing but that of an inner principle apt for
bringing about certain sorts of behaviour may be thought to share a certain weakness
with Behaviourism. Modern philosophers have put the point about Behaviourism by
saying that, although Behaviourism may be a satisfactory account of the mind from an
other-person point of view, it will not do as a first-person account. To explain. In my
encounters with other people, all I ever observe is their behaviour: their actions, their
speech and so on. And so, if we simply consider other people, Behaviourism might
seem to do full justice to the facts. But the trouble with Behaviourism is that it seems
so unsatisfactory as applied to own case. In our own case, we seem to be aware of so
much more than mere behaviour.
33. Suppose that now we conceive of the mind as an inner principle apt for bringing about
certain sorts of behaviour. This again fits the other-person cases very well. Bodily
behaviour of a very sophisticated sort is observed, quite different from the behaviour
that ordinary physical objects display. It is inferred that this behaviour must spring
from a very special sort of inner cause in the object that exhibits this behaviour. This
inner cause is christened “the mind”, and those who take a Physicalist view of man
argue that it is simply the central nervous system of the body observed. Compare this
with the case of glass. Certain characteristic behaviour is observed: the breaking and
shattering of the material when acted upon by relatively small forces. A special inner
state of the glass is postulated to explain this behaviour. Those who take a purely
Physicalist view of glass then argue that this state is a state of the glass. It is, perhaps,
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an arrangement of its molecules and not, say, the peculiarly malevolent disposition of
the demons that dwell in glass.
34. But when we turn to our own case, the position may seem less plausible. We are
conscious, we have experiences. Now can we say that to be conscious, to have
experiences, is simply for something to go on within us apt for the causing of certain
sorts of behaviour? Such an account does not seem to do any justice to the
phenomena. And so it seems that our account of the mind, like Behaviourism, will fail
to do justice to the first-person case.
35. In order to understand the objection better, it may be helpful to consider a particular
case. If you have driven for a very long distance without a break, you may have had
experience of a curious state of automatism, which can occur in these conditions. One
can suddenly “come to” and realize that one has driven for long distances without
being aware of what one was doing, or, indeed, without being aware of anything. One
has kept the car on the road, used the brake and the clutch perhaps, yet all without any
awareness of what one was doing.
36. Now if we consider this case, it is obvious that in some sense mental processes are
still going on when one is in such an automatic state. Unless one’s will was still
operating in some way, and unless one was still perceiving in some way, the car
would not still be on the road. Yet, of course, something mental is lacking. Now, I
think, when it is alleged that an account of mind as an inner principle apt for the
production of certain sorts of behaviour leaves out consciousness or experience, what
is alleged to have been left out is just whatever is missing in the automatic driving
case. It is conceded that an account of mental processes as states of the person apt for
the production of certain sorts of behaviour very possibly may be adequate to deal
with such cases as that of automatic driving. It may be adequate to deal with most of
the mental processes of animals, which perhaps spend most of their lives in this state
of automatism. But, it is contended, it cannot deal with the consciousness that we
normally enjoy.
37. I will now try to sketch an answer to this important and powerful objection. Let us
begin in an apparently unlikely place and consider the way that an account of mental
processes of the sort I am giving would deal with sense-perception.
38. Now psychologists, in particular, have long realized that there is a very close logical
tie between sense-perception and selective behaviour. Suppose we want to decide
whether an animal can perceive the difference between red and green. We might give
the animal a choice between two pathways, over one of which a red light shines and
over the other of which a green light shines. If the animal happens by chance to
choose the green pathway, we reward it; if it happens to choose the other pathway, we
do not reward it. If, after some trials, the animal systematically takes the green-lighted
pathway, and if we become assured that the only relevant differences in the two
pathways are the differences in the colour of the lights, we are entitled to say that the
animal can see this colour difference. Using its eyes, it selects between red-lighted
and green-lighted pathways. So we say it can see the difference between red and
green.
39. Now a Behaviourist would be tempted to say that the animal’s regular selection of the
green-lighted pathway was its perception of the colour difference. But this is
unsatisfactory, because we all want to say that perception is something that goes on
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within the person or animal - within its mind - although, of course, this mental event
is normally caused by the operation of the environment upon the organism. Suppose,
however, that we speak instead of capacities for selective behaviour towards the
current environment, and suppose we think of these capacities, like dispositions, as
actual inner states of the organism. We can then think of the animal’s perception as a
state within the animal apt, if the animal is so impelled, for selective behaviour
between the red- and green-lighted pathways.
40. In general, we can think of perceptions as inner states or events apt for the production
of certain sorts of selective behaviour towards our environment. To perceive is like
acquiring a key to a door. You do not have to use the key: you can put it in your
pocket and never bother about the door. But if you do want to open the door, the key
may be essential. The blind man is a man who does not acquire certain keys and, as a
result, is not able to operate in his environment in the way that somebody who has his
sight can operate. It seems, then, a very promising view to take of perceptions that
they are inner states defined by the sorts of selective behaviour that they enable the
perceiver to exhibit, if so impelled.
41. Now how is this discussion of perception related to the question of consciousness or
experience, the sort of thing that the driver who is in a state of automatism has not
got, but which we normally do have? Simply this. My proposal is that consciousness,
in this sense of the word, is nothing but perception or awareness of the state of our
own mind. The driver in a state of automatism perceives, or is aware of, the road. If he
did not, the car would be in a ditch. But he is not currently aware of his awareness of
the road. He perceives the road, but he does not perceive his perceiving, or anything
else that is going on in his mind. He is not, as we normally are, conscious of what is
going on in his mind.
42. And so I conceive of consciousness or experience, in this sense of the words, in the
way that Locke and Kant conceived it, as like perception. Kant, in a striking phrase,
spoke of “Inner sense”. We cannot directly observe the minds of others, but each of us
has the power to observe directly our own minds, and “perceive” what is going on
there. The driver in the automatic state is one whose “inner eye” is shut: who is not
currently aware of what is going on in his own mind.
43. Now if this account is along the right lines, why should we not give an account of this
inner observation along the same lines as we have already given of perception? Why
should we not conceive of it as an inner state, a state in this case directed towards
other inner states and not to the environment, which enables us, if we are so impelled,
to behave in a selective way towards our own states of mind? One who is aware, or
conscious, of his thoughts or his emotions is one who has the capacity to make
discriminations between his different mental states. His capacity might be exhibited in
words. He might say that he was in an angry state of mind, when, and only when, he
was in an angry state of mind. But such verbal behaviour would be the mere
expression or result of the awareness. The awareness itself would be an inner state:
the sort of inner state that gave the man a capacity for such behavioural expressions.
44. So I have argued that consciousness of our own mental state may be assimilated to
perception of our own mental state, and that, like other perceptions, it may then be
conceived of as an inner state or event giving a capacity for selective behaviour, in
this case selective behaviour towards our own mental state. All this is meant to be
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simply a logical analysis of consciousness, and none of it entails, although it does not
rule out, a purely Physicalist account of what these inner states are. But if we are
convinced, on general scientific grounds, that a purely physical account of man is
likely to be the true one, then there seems to be no bar to our identifying these inner
states with purely physical states of the central nervous system. And so consciousness
of our own mental state becomes simply the scanning of one part of our central
nervous system by another. Consciousness is a self-scanning mechanism in the central
nervous system.
45. As I have emphasized before, I have done no more than sketch a programme for a
philosophy of mind. There are all sorts of expansions and elucidations to be made,
and all sorts of doubts and difficulties to be stated and overcome. But I hope I have
done enough to show that a purely Physicalist theory of the mind is an exciting and
plausible intellectual option.
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Plato
REPUBLIC
[Translated by Robin Waterfield. Oxford World’s Classics, 1993.]
Chapter 8
In a very important argument, Plato describes a philosopher as one who perceives things ‘in
themselves’. A philosopher is awake rather than asleep; he has knowledge, while everyone
else has mere belief or opinion, which is fallible and has less access to reality, because it can
see no further than the sensible world, which is deceptive and deficient. Knowledge is
correlated with the truth of things, which is a property of what each thing is itself, and which
never changes; belief is correlated with the less real aspect of things, in which they are no
more beautiful (say) than ugly.
[475d] ‘Then a motley crowd of people will be philosophers,’ Glaucon said. ‘For instance,
sightseers all do what they do because they enjoy learning, I suppose; and it would be very
odd to count theatre-goers as philosophers, when they’d never go of their own accord to hear
a lecture or spend time over anything like that, but they rush around the festivals of Dionysus
to hear every theatrical troupe, as if they were getting paid for the use of their ears,1 and never
miss a single festival, whether it’s being held in town or out of town. Are we to describe all
these people and the disciples of other amusements as philosophers? And what about students
of trivial branches of [475e] expertise?’
‘No,’ I replied, ‘they’re not philosophers, but they resemble philosophers.’
‘Who are the true philosophers you have in mind?’ he asked.
‘Sightseers of the truth,’ I answered.
‘That must be right, but what exactly does it mean?’ he asked.
‘It wouldn’t be easy to explain to anyone else,’ I said. ‘But you’ll grant me this, surely.’
‘What?’
‘Since beautiful is the opposite of ugly, they are two things.’
[476a] ‘Of course.’
‘In so far as they are two, each of them is single?’
‘Yes.’
‘And the same principle applies to moral and immoral, good and bad, and everything of any
type: in itself, each of them is single, but each of them has a plurality of manifestations
because they appear all over the place, as they become associated with actions and bodies and
one another.’
‘You’re right,’ he said.
1
use of their ears: theatre-going counts as use of ears rather than eyes because that was the emphasis
in Greek theatre. At one of the really big theatres, like that of Epidauros, from the back seats the
actors would appear tiny. Festivals of Dionysus were the occasions of dramatic performances.
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‘Well,’ I continued, ‘this is what enables me to distinguish the sightseers2 (to borrow your
term) and the ones who want to acquire some expertise or other and the men of action from
the [476b] people in question, the ones who are philosophers in the true sense of the term.’
‘What do you mean?’ he asked.
‘Theatre-goers and sightseers are devoted to beautiful sounds and colours and shapes, and to
works of art which consist of these elements, but their minds are constitutionally incapable of
seeing and devoting themselves to beauty itself.’
‘Yes, that’s certainly right,’ he said.
‘However, people with the ability to approach beauty itself and see beauty as it actually is are
bound to be few and far between, aren’t they?’
‘Definitely.’
[476c] ‘So does someone whose horizon is limited to beautiful things, with no conception of beauty
itself, and who is incapable of following guidance as to how to gain knowledge of beauty itself, strike
you as living in a dream-world or in the real world? Look at it this way. Isn’t dreaming precisely the
state, whether one is asleep or awake, of taking something to be the real thing, when it is actually only
a likeness?’
‘Yes, that’s what I’d say dreaming is,’ he said.
‘And what about someone who does the opposite – who does [476d] think that there is such a
thing as beauty itself, and has the ability to see it as well as the things which partake in it,3
and never gets them muddled up? Do you think he’s living in the real world or in a dreamworld?’
‘Definitely in the real world,’ he said.
‘So wouldn’t we be right to describe the difference between their mental states by saying that
while this person has knowledge, the other one has beliefs?’
‘Yes.’
‘Now, suppose this other person – the one we’re saying has beliefs, not knowledge – were to
get cross with us and query the truth of our assertions. Will we be able to calm him down
[476e] and gently convince him of our point of view, while keeping him in the dark about the
poor state of his health?’
‘We really ought to,’ he said.
sightseers: literally ‘lovers of spectacles’. There has been controversy over whether ‘the many
beautifuls’ (the literal translation) that this class of people is said to recognize are beautiful things or
conceptions of beauty. … Plato is usually, however, concerned to contrast types with the things of this
world. In fact, I am not sure the distinction between particulars and conceptions would have interested
Plato much in this context, since his primary distinction is between an unchanging realm and a
changing one, whatever its inhabitants. Thus at 479d he does suddenly mention conventional views
about beauty. Adherence to convention is, in its way, just as unreliable a guide to truth as adherence to
sense-impression, since convention is equally subject to alteration.
2
partake in it: this is one of the metaphors Plato tries out for the relation between ‘things in
themselves’ or ‘types’ or ‘characters’ and their instances. Other metaphors are that the type is ‘present
in’ the instances, and that the instances ‘imitate’ the type. The difficulty is the difficulty of explaining
how a single thing can appear all over the place and yet remain single.
3
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‘All right, but what shall we say to him, do you think? Perhaps this is what we should ask
him. We’ll tell him that we don’t resent any knowledge he might have – indeed, we’d be
delighted to see that he does know something-and then we’ll say, “But can you tell us, please,
whether someone with knowledge knows something or nothing?” You’d better answer my
questions for him.’
‘My answer will be that he knows something,’ he said.
‘Something real or something unreal?’
[477a ] ‘Real. How could something unreal be known?’4
‘We could look at the matter from more angles, but we’re happy enough with the idea that
something completely real is completely accessible to knowledge, and something utterly
unreal is entirely inaccessible to knowledge. Yes?’
‘Perfectly happy.’
‘All right. But if something is in a state of both reality and unreality, then it falls between that
which is perfectly real and that which is utterly unreal, doesn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘So since the field of knowledge is reality, and since it must be incomprehension whose field is
unreality, then we need to find out if there is in fact something which falls between [477b]
incomprehension and knowledge, whose field is this intermediate, don’t we?’
‘Yes.’
‘Now, we acknowledge the existence of belief, don’t we?’
‘Of course.’
‘Is it a different faculty from knowledge, or is it the same?’
‘Different.’
‘Every faculty has its own distinctive abilities, so belief and knowledge must have different
domains.’
‘Yes.’
4
be known: as commonly interpreted, Plato is thinking of knowing as a kind of direct apprehension
of an object, as in ‘I know Joan.’ He is therefore overlooking the other main kind of knowing –
propositional knowledge, as in ‘I know that two and two make four’ – because it is far from clear that
talk of reality and unreality makes any sense in this case: is a ‘that …’ clause real or unreal?
However, whether or not Plato was aware of these distinctions (he almost certainly was not), there is
still plenty of value in the discussion. There is nothing to prevent one thinking along the following
lines: whatever knowledge (of any kind) encompasses is real in the senses that (a) it fills me with
certainty; (b) it allows me to give a coherent account of it; (c) its features which enable me to be
certain about it are unchanging features. I could not be said to know that two and two make four, if
they occasionally make some other number; and I could not be said to know Joan, if she even
occasionally resembled someone else; and I could not he a know how to mend cars if their structure
was unstable. However, even if all these things were unstable, I could believe that two and two make
four, that the person I am seeing is Joan, and that this bolt goes in that hole. In other words, it is a
sufficient interpretation of the passage to see that Plato is working with a portmanteau conception of
knowledge, which covers aspects of the various subspecies of knowledge.
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‘Now, since the natural field of knowledge is reality-its function is to know reality as reality
... Actually, I think there’s something else we need to get dear about first.’
‘What?’
[477c] ‘Shall we count as a distinct class of things the faculties which give human beings and
all other creatures their abilities? By “faculties” I mean things like sight and hearing. Do you
understand the type of thing I have in mind?’
‘Yes, I do,’ he said.
‘Let me tell you something that strikes me about them. I can’t distinguish one faculty from
another the way I commonly distinguish other things, by looking at their colours or shapes or
anything like that, because faculties don’t have any of those sorts of qualities for me to look
at. The only aspect of a faculty [477d] I can look at is its field, its effect. This is what enables
me to identify each of them as a particular faculty. Where I find a single domain and a single
effect, I say there is a single faculty; and I distinguish faculties which have different fields
and different effects. What about you? What do you do?’
‘The same as you,’ he said.
‘Let’s go back to where we were before, then, Glaucon,’ I said. ‘Do you think that knowledge
is a faculty, or does it belong in your opinion to some other class?’
‘I think it belongs to that class,’ he said, ‘and is the most powerful of all the faculties.
[477e] ‘And shall we classify belief as a faculty, or what?’ ‘As a faculty,’ he said. ‘Belief is
precisely that which enables us to entertain beliefs.’
‘Not long ago, however, you agreed that knowledge and belief were different.’
‘Of course,’ he said. ‘One is infallible and the other is fallible, so anyone with any sense
would keep them separate.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘There can be no doubt of our position: [478a] knowledge and belief are
different.’
‘Yes.’
‘Since they’re different faculties, then, they have different natural fields, don’t they?’
‘Necessarily.’
‘The field of knowledge is reality, isn’t it? Its function is to know the reality of anything
real?’
‘Yes.’
‘And the function of belief, we’re saying, is to entertain beliefs?’
‘Yes.’
‘Does it entertain beliefs about the same thing which knowledge knows? Will what is
accessible to know ledge and what is accessible to belief be identical? Or is that out of the
question?’
‘It’s ruled out by what we’ve already agreed,’ he said. ‘If different faculties naturally have
different fields, and if both [478b] knowledge and belief are faculties, and different faculties
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too, as we said, then it follows that it is impossible for what is accessible to knowledge and
what is accessible to belief to be identical.’
‘So if it is reality that is accessible to knowledge, then it is something else, not reality, that is
accessible to belief, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Does it entertain beliefs about what is unreal? Or is it also impossible for that to happen?
Think about this: isn’t it the case that someone who is entertaining a belief is bringing his
believing mind to bear on something? I mean, is it possible to have a belief, and to be
believing nothing?’
‘That’s impossible.’
‘In fact, someone who has a belief has some single thing in mind, doesn’t he?’
‘Yes.’
‘But the most accurate way to refer to something unreal [478c] would be to say that it is
nothing, not that it is a single thing, wouldn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Didn’t we find ourselves forced to relate incomprehension to unreality and knowledge to
reality?’
‘That’s right,’ he said.
‘So the field of belief is neither reality nor unreality?’
‘No.’
‘Belief can’t be incomprehension or knowledge, then?’
‘So it seems.’
‘Well, does it lie beyond their limits? Does it shed more light than knowledge or spread more
obscurity than incomprehension?’
‘It does neither.’
‘Alternatively, does belief strike you as more opaque than knowledge and more lucid than
incomprehension?’
‘Considerably more,’ he said.
[478d] ‘It lies within their limits?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then belief must fall between them.’
‘Absolutely.’
‘Now, didn’t we say earlier that something which is simultaneously real and unreal (were
such a thing to be shown to exist) would fall between the perfectly real and the wholly unreal,
and wouldn’t he the field of either knowledge or incomprehension, but of an intermediate
(again, if such a thing were shown to exist) between incomprehension and knowledge?’
‘Right.’
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‘And now we’ve found that what we call belief is such an intermediate, haven’t we?’
‘We have.’
[478e] ‘So the only thing left for us to discover, apparently, is whether there’s anything
which partakes of both reality and unreality, and cannot he said to be perfectly real or
perfectly unreal. If we were to come across such a thing, we’d be fully justified in describing
it as the field of belief, on the principle that extremes belong together, and so do
intermediates. Do you agree?’
‘Yes.’
‘Let’s return, on this basis, to the give and take of [479a] conversation with that fine fellow
who doesn’t acknowledge the existence of beauty itself or think that beauty itself has any
permanent and unvarying character,5 but takes the plurality of beautiful things as his normthat sightseer who can’t under lily circumstances abide the notion that beauty, morality, and
so on are each a single entity. What we’ll say to him is, “My friend, is there one beautiful
thing, in this welter of beautiful things, which won’t turn out to be ugly? Is there one moral
deed which won’t turn out to be immoral? Is there one just act which won’t turn out to be
unjust?”‘
[479b] ‘No, there isn’t,’ he said. ‘It’s inevitable for these things to turn out to be both
beautiful and ugly, in a sense, and the same goes for all the other qualities you mentioned in
your question.’6
permanent and unvarying character: Plato’s technical usages of the Greek word idea and its
cognate eidos are usually nowadays translated ‘Form’ – as in Plato’s famous Theory of Forms. This is
unsatisfactory, however: the word ‘form’ is opaque in contexts like ‘the form of beauty’; and it
implies physical appearance alone, whereas the Greek word implies ‘what enables us to identify
something’, which is far broader than just physical appearance.
5
There is no finally satisfying translation; I use ‘character’ for idea and ‘type’ for eidos. The following
definitions of ‘type’ from my dictionary are relevant: ‘a distinguishing mark; a foreshadowing’ an
exemplar; a model or pattern; a kind; the general character of a class.’ The philosophical type-token
distinction is also useful: in the word ‘aardvark’ there is one type of the letter ‘a’, but three tokens.
The words have occurred in Republic before this, the first clearly technical usage: they have most
commonly been translated ‘category’ (or synonyms), as at 357c, or ‘appearance’, as at 380d. As often
as possible, ‘type’ has been used as a synonym of ‘category’, because that points up the evolutionary
background of the technical term: ‘type’ in the technical metaphysical sense is originally a short form
for ‘type of thing’ (see especially 435b and 476a, where the familiar sense of the word almost breaks
through into the technical sense).
The connection between these various senses of the words can easily be seen by thinking about
identification: a physical thing’s appearance’ enables us to identify it, and it, is things of a certain
‘type’ or ‘character’ that we put together into a single set and identify as belonging together.
6
in your question: since this is the main point of contrast between particular things and the reality of
the types, then Plato is committed to thinking that the type is a kind of super-particular: it really and
unalterably is beautiful (or whatever), whereas nothing else is absolutely beautiful (or whatever).
This is Plato’s notorious ‘self-predication assumption’ which (as he came to see by the time he wrote
Parmenides) may lead to a vicious regress: if the type of beauty is itself beautiful, and if the presence
of beauty in anything is to be explained as the presence of a type, then the beauty of the type of beauty
itself must be explained by a further type of beauty, and so on.
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‘And there are doubles galore - but they turn out to be halves just as much as doubles, don’t
they?’
‘Yes.’
‘And do things which are large, small, light, and heavy deserve these attributes any more than
they deserve the opposite attributes?’
‘No, each of them is bound to have both qualities,’ he said.
‘So isn’t it the case, then, that any member of a plurality no more is whatever it is said to he
than it is not whatever it is said to be?’
‘This is like those double entendres one hears at parties,’ he [479c] said, ‘or the riddle
children tell about the eunuch and his hitting a bat – they make a riddle by asking what he hit
it with and what it was on7 – in the sense that the members of the plurality are also
ambiguous: it is impossible to form a stable conception of any of them as either being what it
is, or not being what it is, or being both, or being neither.’
‘How are you going to cope with them, then?’ I asked. ‘Can you find a better place to locate
them than between real being and unreality? I mean, they can’t rum out to be more opaque
[479d] and unreal than unreality, or more lucid and real than reality.’
‘True,’ he said.
‘So there we are. We’ve discovered that the welter of things which the masses conventionally
regard as beautiful and so on mill around somewhere between unreality and perfect reality.’
‘Yes, we have.’
‘But we have a prior agreement that were such a thing to turn up, we’d have to call it the
field of belief, not of knowledge, since the realm which occupies some uncertain intermediate
point must be accessible to the intermediate faculty.’
‘Yes, we do.’
[479e] ‘What shall we say about those spectators, then, who can see a plurality of beautiful
things, but not beauty itself, and are incapable of following if someone else tries to lead them
to it, and who can see many moral actions, but not morality itself. and so on? That they only
ever entertain beliefs, and do not know any of the things they believe?’
‘That’s what we have to say,’ he said.
Recent intense study of self-predication has revealed a number of senses in which Plato might have
said that F-ness is an F thing’ (to use the convenient jargon); however, most of them are not without
their difficulties (Malcolm, Self-Predication; Heinemann). And the only sense that survives (as in the
above paragraph) seems absurd. In the famous words of R. E. Allen (in Allen (ed.), Studies in Plato’s
Metaphysics, 43), ‘Oddness is not odd; justice is not just; Equality is equal to nothing at all. No one
can curl up for a nap in the Divine Bedsteadity; not even God can scratch Doghood behind the Ears.’
It seems that Plato had not thought through all the implications of what he was saying. One must
always remember that he does not really have a theory of types: types are introduced from time to
time, in different contexts, but they are never expounded and explained. They are a theme, not a
theory. Therefore, there seems to me to be little point in asking what exactly Plato meant by
statements implying that F-ness is F: if Plato had been interested in the subject, he might have told us.
what it was on: the riddle is: ‘A man who was not a man hit a bird which was not a bird with a stone
which was not a stone as it was sitting on a twig which was not a twig.’ The solution is: ‘A eunuch hit
a bat with a pumice-stone as it was sitting on a reed.’
7
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‘As for those who can see each of these things in itself, in its permanent and unvarying
nature, we’ll say they have knowledge and are not merely entertaining beliefs, won’t we?’
‘Again, we have to.’
‘And won’t our position be that they’re devoted to and love [480a] the domain of knowledge,
as opposed to the others, who are devoted to and love the domain of belief? I mean, surely we
haven’t forgotten our claim that these others love and art spectators of beautiful sounds and
colours and so on, but can’t abide the idea that there is such a thing as beauty itself?’8
‘No, we haven’t forgotten.’
‘They won’t think us nasty if we refer to them as “lovers of belief” rather than as
philosophers, who love knowledge, will they? Are they going to get very cross with us if we
say that now?’
‘Not if they listen to me,’ he replied. ‘It’s not right to get angry at the truth.’
‘But the term “believers” is inappropriate for those who are devoted to everything that is real:
they should be called philosophers, shouldn’t they?’
‘Absolutely.’
A philosopher’s inherent virtues are displayed. Though they stem from his or her love of
knowledge, they coincide with commonly recognized virtues, and are far from incompatible
with rulership.
[484a] ‘It’s taken a long and thorough discussion, Glaucon,’ I said, and it’s not been easy, but
we’ve now demonstrated the difference between philosophers and non-philosophers.’
‘A short discussion probably wouldn’t have been enough,’ he replied.
‘I suppose you’re right,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I think the conclusion would have been clearer if
that had been the only subject we’d had to discuss, and there weren’t plenty of topics left for
us to cover if we’re to see the difference between a [484b] moral and an immoral life.’
‘What’s the next issue for us to look into?’ he asked.
‘The next one’s the one that follows, of course,’ I replied. ‘Given that philosophers are those
who are capable of apprehending that which is permanent and unvarying, while those who
can’t, those who wander erratically in the midst of plurality and variety, are not lovers of
knowledge, which set of people ought to be rulers of a community?’
‘What would be a sensible answer for us to give?’ he asked.
‘That the position of guardianship should be given to whichever set we find capable of
guarding the laws and customs [484c] of a community,’ I said.
‘Right,’ he said.
‘I assume it’s clear whether someone who’s going to guard something should be blind or
have good eyesight?’ I said.
8
beauty itself. Plato believes that our usual view of things is unsatisfactory because it makes them no
more F (where F is some predicate such as ‘big’) than not-F. He has argued for this, but he merely
assumes the next step – that there must therefore be something which is perfectly F. The assumption
seems natural to him because the underlying issue is one of identification (see note on 479a): there
must be something which is securely F, otherwise I would not have a paradigm to enable me to
recognize even unsatisfactorily F things as F.
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‘Of course it is,’ he answered.
‘Well, imagine someone who really lacks the ability to recognize any and every real thing
and has no paradigm to shed light for his mind’s eye. He has nothing absolutely authentic to
contemplate, as painters do, and use as a reference-point whenever he needs to, and gain a
completely accurate picture [484d] of, before establishing human norms of right, morality,
and goodness (if establishing is what is required), and before guarding and protecting the
norms that have already been established.9 Do you think there’s any difference between is
condition and blindness?’
‘No, there’s hardly any difference at all,’ he said.
‘Is this the type of person you’d prefer us to appoint as guardians? Or shall we appoint those
who can recognize every reality, and who not only have just as much practical experience as
the others, but are also at least as good as them in every other respect?’10
‘If they really are at least equal in every other sphere,’ he said, and since they are pre-eminent
in the sphere you’ve mentioned, which is just about the most important one there is, then it
would be ridiculous to choose anyone else.’
[485a] ‘So what we’d better explain is how a single person can combine both sets of
qualities, hadn’t we?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, right at the beginning of this argument we said that the first thing we had to grasp was
what it is to he a philosopher. I’m sure that if we reached a satisfactory agreement on that
point, we’d also agree that despite being a single person, he can combine both sets of
qualities, and that philosophers are the only ones who should rule over communities.’
‘Let’s start by agreeing that it’s natural for philosophers to [485b] love every field of study
which reveals to them something of that reality which is eternal and is not subject to the
vicissitudes of generation and destruction.’11
‘All right.’
9
established: there is an implied reference back to 412c, where it was argued that the best rulers are
the best guardians of a community. The concern of philosophers with paradigms is effectively the
main theme of Chapters 9 and 10.
10
practical experience: because philosophers do not live in some other world, even if their concerns
sometimes seem other-worldly. It has in fact been assumed so far that philosophic intelligence is
practical intelligence, of the kind that might be required for ruling a community (428b-429a; see also
488a-489a). Later, however, when it has been argued that philosophers are really interested in abstract
thinking (e.g. 500b), we will find that they have to be forced to gain practical experience (e.g. 539e540a). ‘In Plato’s educational theory, as in his own life, there is a certain wavering between the ideal
of action and that of contemplation’ (Barker, 203).
vicissitudes of generation and destruction: very literally, ‘and does not wander as a result of
coming-to-be and ceasing-to-be’. By 508d, Plato feels he can characterize the whole of the visible
world as subject to these processes. Since the things of the visible world do not bear their predicates
reliably, Plato is hesitant to say that they are big or beautiful or whatever; he says instead that they
come to be or become big etc. for some person in some respect. In shorthand, he talks of the world of
‘becoming’ or ‘coming-to-be’ or ‘generation’.
11
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‘Moreover,’ I said, ‘we can agree that they’re in love with reality as a whole, and that
therefore their behaviour is just like that of ambitious people and lovers, as we explained
before, in that they won’t willingly give up even minor or worthless parts of it.’12
‘You’re right,’ he said.
‘The next thing for you to think about is whether there’s a [485c] further feature they must
have, if they’re going to live up to our description of them.’
‘What feature?’
‘Honesty – the inability consciously to tolerate falsehood, rather than loathing it, and loving
truth.’
‘It makes sense that they should,’ he said.
‘It doesn’t only make sense, my friend: a lover is absolutely bound to love everything which
is related and belongs to his beloved.’
‘Right,’ he said.
‘Well, can you conceive of anything more closely related to knowledge than truth?’
‘Of course not,’ he replied.
‘Is it possible, then, for love of knowledge and love of [485d] falsehood to be found in the
same nature?’
‘Definitely not.’
‘Then a genuine lover of knowledge will from his earliest years find nothing more attractive
than truth of every kind.’
‘Indisputably.’
‘And we know that anyone whose predilection tends strongly in a single direction has
correspondingly less desire for other things, like a stream whose flow has been diverted into
another channel.’
‘Of course.’
‘So when a person’s desires are channelled towards learning and so on, that person is
concerned with the pleasure the mind feels of its own accord, and has nothing to do with the
pleasures which reach the mind through the agency of the [485e] body, if the person is a
genuine philosopher, not a fake one.’13
12
explained before: 474c-475b. The idea that philosophers are intellectual omnivores paves the way
for the transition from practical wisdom to theoretical knowledge.
13
not a fake one: this (with an equivalent passage at 588c-589b) is a very important paragraph. It
enables us to go some way towards reconciling a conflict, and at the same time to see an important
way in which these central chapters of the book deepen Plato’s views on morality.
The conflict is … between whether Plato expects the desires/workers to need controlling or to
acquiesce in being ruled. The answer is that the more energy is diverted into the activities of the
rational mind (the more the philosophers’ role in the community is valued), the less actual heavyhanded control of one’s baser desires (the workers) will be required, and the more the situation is
describable as acquiescence.
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‘Inevitably.’
‘He’ll be self-disciplined, then, and not mercenary, since he’s constitutionally incapable of
taking seriously the things which money can buy – at considerable cost-and which cause
others to take money seriously.’
‘Yes.’
[486a] ‘And here’s another point you’d better take into consideration, to help you distinguish
a philosophical from a non-philosophical character.’
‘What?’
‘You must watch out for the presence of small-mindedness. Nothing stops a mind
constantly striving for an overview of the totality of things human and divine more
effectively than involvement in petty details.’
‘Very true,’ he said.
‘When a mind has broadness of vision and contemplates all time and all existence, do you
think it can place much importance on human life?’
‘Impossible,’ he said.
[486b] ‘So it won’t find death terrifying either, will it?’
‘Not at all.’
‘Then a cowardly and small-minded person is excluded from true philosophy, it seems.’
‘I agree.’
‘Well now, take a person who’s restrained and uninterested in money, and who isn’t smallminded or specious or cowardly.
‘Could he possibly drive hard bargains or act immorally?’
‘No.’
‘So when you’re trying to see whether or not someone has e philosophical mind, you’ll watch
out for whether, from his earliest years, he shows himself to be moral and well mannered, or
antisocial and uncouth.’
‘Yes.’
[486c] ‘And there’s something else you won’t forget to look out for as well, I imagine.’
‘What?’
‘Whether he’s quick or slow at learning. I mean, you wouldn’t expect someone to be
particularly fond of something it hurt him to do and where slight gains were hard to win,
would you?’
‘I’d never do that.’
‘What about if he’s incapable of retaining anything he’s learnt? Is there any way he can have
room for knowledge, when he’s full of forgetfulness?’
‘Of course not.’
‘In the end, don’t you think, after all his thankless toil, he’s bound to loathe both himself and
intellectual activity?’
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‘Yes.’
[487d] ‘So we’d better count forgetfulness as a factor which precludes a mind from being
good enough at philosophy. We’d better make a good memory a prerequisite.’
‘Absolutely.’
‘Now, isn’t it the case that lack of culture and grace in someone can only lead him to lack a
sense of proportion?’
‘Of course.’
‘And do you think that truth is closely related to proportion or to its opposite?’
‘To proportion.’
‘So we need to look for a mind which, in addition to the qualities we’ve already mentioned,
has an inherent sense of proportion and elegance, and which makes a person instinctively
inclined towards anything’s essential character.’14
‘Of course we do.’
[487e] ‘All right. Surely you don’t think that any of the interconnected qualities we’ve
mentioned are at all inessential for a competent and complete mental grasp of reality?’
‘No, they’re absolutely essential,’ he said.
‘Can you find any flaw, then, in an occupation like this, which in order to be competently
practised requires the following inherent qualities in a person: a good memory, quickness at
learning, broadness of vision, elegance, and love of and affiliation to truth, morality, courage,
and self-discipline?’
‘Not even Momus could criticize this occupation,’ he replied.15
‘Now, aren’t people who, thanks to their education and their age, have these qualities in full
the only ones to whom you would entrust your community?’
14
essential character: see note on 479a. Since the type of anything is its truest feature, and since
proportion and truth are related (in plain terms, a truthful person doesn’t exaggerate, but sees things as
they are), then the sequence of thought of this sentence becomes clear.
15
Momus: the personification of criticism.
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CHAPTER 9
Socrates professes himself incapable of defining goodness and proposes a simile instead.
This is the Simile of the Sun, the first of the three images which Plato uses to convey some of
his core views. The Sun consists of an extended analogy between the visible and intelligible
realms: just as the sun is the source of light and growth, and is responsible for sight and
seeing and is the acme of the visible realm, so goodness is the source of truth and reality, and
is responsible for knowledge and knowing, and is the acme of the intelligible realm. Belief, on
the other band, is like partial sight.
[506d] ‘Socrates, said Glaucon, ‘Please don’t back away from the finishing-line, so to speak.
We’d be happy with the kind of description of goodness that you gave of morality, selfdiscipline, and so on.’
‘So would I, Glaucon,’ I said, ‘very happy. But I’m afraid it’ll be more than I can manage,
and that my malformed efforts will make me ridiculous.1 What I suggest, my friends, is that
we [506e] forget about trying to define goodness itself for the time being. You see, I don’t at
the moment think that our current impulse is enough to take us to where I’d like to see us go.
However, I am prepared to talk about something which seems to me to be the child of
goodness and to bear a very strong resemblance to it.’ Would you like me to do that? If not,
we can just forget it.’
‘Please do,’ he said. ‘You can settle your account by discussing the father another time.’
[507a] ‘I hope I can make the repayment,’ I said, ‘and you can recover the debt, rather than
just the interest, as you are now.2 Anyway, as interest on your account, here’s an account of
the child of goodness. But please be careful that I don’t cheat you – not that I intend to – by
giving you a counterfeit description of the child.’
‘We’ll watch out for that as best we can,’ he replied. ‘Just go ahead, please.’
‘First I want to make sure that we’re not at cross purposes,’ I said, ‘and to remind you of
something that came up earlier, though you’ve often heard it on other occasions as well.’
[507b] ‘What?’ he asked.
‘As we talk,’ I said, ‘we mention and differentiate between a lot of beautiful things and a lot
of good things and so on we do.’
‘And we also talk about beauty itself, goodness itself and so on. All the things we refer to as a
plurality on those occasions we also conversely count as belonging to a single class by virtue of the
fact that they have a single particular character, and we say that the x itself is “what really is”.’
‘And we say that the first lot is visible rather than intelligible whereas characters are
intelligible rather than visible.’
‘Absolutely.’
[507c] ‘With what aspect of ourselves do we see the things we see?’
more than I can manage: it may also be worth remembering that Plato’s thoughts on goodness were
notoriously obscure. He once gave a public lecture on the subject, which was so concerned with
mathematics (and arithmology?) that it left the audience baffled and disappointed.
1
interest: the Greek word also means ‘child’ – a debt bears interest as a parent bears a child. But the
pun is untranslatable. The pun in the next line is not Plato’s, but is meant to capture the tone of the
interchange for an English reader.
2
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‘With our sight, he replied.
‘And we use hearing for the things we hear, and so on for all the other senses and the things
we perceive. Yes?’
‘Of course.’
‘Well, have you ever stopped to consider’, I asked, ‘how generous the creator of the senses
was when he created the domain of seeing and being seen?’
‘No, not really,’ he said.
‘Look at it this way. Are hearing and sound deficient? Do they need an extra something to
make the one hear and the [507d] other be heard – some third thing without which hearing
won’t hear and sound won’t be heard?’
‘No,’ he answered.
‘And in my opinion’, I went on, ‘the same goes for many other domains, if not all: they don’t
need anything like this. Or can you point to one that does?’
‘I can’t,’ he said.
‘But do you realize that sight and the visible realm are deficient?’
‘How?’
‘Even if a person’s eyes are capable of sight, and he’s trying to use it, and what he’s trying to
look at is coloured, the sight will see nothing and the colours will remain unseen, surely,
[507e] unless there is also present an extra third thing which is made specifically for this
purpose,’
‘What is this thing you’re getting at?’ he asked.
‘It’s what we call light,’ I said.
‘You’re right,’ he said.
‘So if light has value, then because it links the sense of sight and the ability to be seen, it is
far and away the most valuable link there is.’
‘Well, it certainly does have value,’ he said.
‘Which of the heavenly gods would you say is responsible for this? Whose light makes it
possible for our sight to see and for the things we see to be seen?’
‘My reply will he no different from what yours or anyone else’s would be,’ he said. ‘I mean,
you’re obviously expecting the answer, “the sun”.’
‘Now, there are certain conclusions to be drawn from comparing sight to this god.’
‘What?’
‘Sight and the sun aren’t to be identified: neither the sense [508b] itself nor its location-which
we call the eye is the same as the sun.’
‘True.’
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‘Nevertheless, there’s no sense-organ which more closely resembles the sun, in my opinion,
than the eye.’3
‘The resemblance is striking.’
‘Moreover, the eye’s ability to see has been bestowed upon it and channelled into it, as it
were, by the sun.’
‘Yes.’
‘So the sun is not to he identified with sight, but is responsible for sight and is itself within
the visible realm. Right?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘The sun is the child of goodness I was talking about, then,’ I said. ‘It is a counterpart to its
father, goodness. As goodness [508c] stands in the intelligible realm to intelligence and the
things we know, so in the visible realm the sun stands to sight and the things we see.’
‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘I need more detail, please.’
‘As you know,’ I explained, ‘when our eyes are directed towards things whose colours are no
longer bathed in daylight, but in artificial light instead, then they’re less effective and seem to
he virtually blind, as if they didn’t even have the potential for seeing clearly.’
‘Certainly, he said.
[508d] ‘But when they’re directed towards things which are lit up by the sun, then they see
clearly and obviously do have that potential.’
‘Of course.’
‘Well, here’s how you can think about the mind as well. When its object is something which
is lit up by truth and reality, then it has – and obviously has – intelligent awareness and
knowledge. However, when its object is permeated with darkness (that is, when its object is
something which is subject to generation and decay), then it has beliefs and is less effective,
because its beliefs chop and change, and under these circumstances it comes across as devoid
of intelligence.’
‘Yes, it does.’
[508e] ‘Well, what I’m saying is that it’s goodness which gives the things we know their
truth and makes it possible for people to have knowledge.4 It is responsible for knowledge
than the eye: the eye was commonly regarded as containing a good proportion of fire – it flashes and
twinkles. Moreover, since it takes like to see like and we need light to see, then the eye must contain
light.
3
4
people to have knowledge: what is the meaning of the assertion that goodness is responsible for truth
and knowledge? (Truth means little more than just knowability here: see also 585c.) It cannot be
merely that to know a thing is to know in what way it is good, because Plato envisages knowable
types of immorality and evil (476a); nevertheless, this does seem to be part of his point – the rulers
must be able to relate morality to goodness. But we have also seen that the types are perfect examples
(notes on 476e, 479b), so Plato’s general meaning may well be that each type is good in this sense: it
is a good example of what it is. (See also the connection at 38od -38iib between being a good case of
something and permanence: we know that the types are permanently what they are.) This also makes
sense of the idea that they are fully knowable because they fully are what they are. Still, there is the
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and truth, and you should think of it as being within the intelligible realm, but you shouldn’t
identify it with knowledge and truth, otherwise you’ll he wrong: for all their value, it is even
more [509a] valuable. In the other realm, it is right to regard light and sight as resembling the
sun, but not to identify either of them with the sun; so in this realm it is right to regard
knowledge and truth as resembling goodness, but not to identify either of them with
goodness, which should be rated even more highly.’
‘You’re talking about something of inestimable value,’ he said, ‘if it’s not only the source of
knowledge and truth, but is also more valuable than them. I mean, you certainly don’t seem
to be identifying it with pleasure!’
‘How could you even think it?’ I exclaimed. ‘But we can take our analogy even further.’
[509b] ‘How?’
‘I think you’ll agree that the ability to be seen is not the only gift the sun gives to the things
we see. It is also the source of their generation, growth, and nourishment, although it isn’t
actually the process of generation.’
‘Of course it isn’t.’
‘And it isn’t only the known-ness of the things we know which is conferred upon them by
goodness, but also their reality and their being, although goodness isn’t actually the state of
being, but surpasses being in majesty and might.’5
[509c] ‘It’s way beyond human comprehension, all right,’ was Glaucon’s quite amusing
comment.6
‘It’s your fault for forcing me to express my views on the subject,’ I replied.
‘Yes, and please don’t stop,’ he said. ‘If you’ve left anything out of your explanation of the
simile of the sun, then the least you could do is continue with it.’
‘There are plenty of omissions, in fact,’ I said.
‘Don’t leave any gaps,’ he said, ‘however small.’
‘I think I’ll have to leave a lot out,’ I said, ‘but I’ll try to make it as complete as I can at the
moment.’
usual equivocation of ‘good’, as meaning ‘morally good’ or ‘beneficial’ or ‘skilful’ or (now) ‘good of
its kind’.
Note too that knowledge and goodness are also related in Plato’s mind in less metaphysical ways than
in this passage. It is only where there is room for improvement that a branch of knowledge is
developed, to work for its objects’ improvement.
majesty and might: goodness is responsible for the ‘being’ of the types in the same sense that it is
responsible for their knowability (note on 508e). Things are knowable as true if they are perfectly and
permanently what they are; this is also their being and their reality. The notion that goodness
‘surpasses being’ is hyperbole: it does not mean that we cannot talk of goodness ‘being’ and have to
think of it as somehow beyond the intelligible realm of types (otherwise we would have to think of the
sun as beyond the visible realm); it just stresses the exalted status of goodness within the intelligible
realm.
5
6
quite amusing comment: the joke lies, of course, in whether Glaucon is commenting on the
condition of goodness, or on Socrates’ argument. Socrates plays along by responding as if Glaucon
had meant the latter alternative.
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‘All right,’ he said.
The image of the Line, which now follows, is expressly (509c) supposed to supplement the
Sun.
|------------------|-----------------------|-----------------------|---------------------------------|
A
B
C
D
As A stands to B in terms of clarity and opacity, so C stands to D as well. A consists of
likenesses, Which are identified by conjecture; B consists of the solid things of the material
world, which are identified confidently; C and D consist of the types, which are knowable,
but the two sections are distinguished because of a difference in methodology. As B stands to
A in terms of truth, so C and D together stand to A and B together. A and B together
constitute the visible realm, which is the realm of belief; C and D together constitute the
intelligible realm, which is the realm of knowledge.
[509d] ‘So bear in mind the two things we’ve been talking about,’ I said, ‘one of which rules
over the intelligible realm and its inhabitants, while the other rules over the visible realm – I
won’t say over the heavens in case you think I’m playing clever word-games.7 Anyway, do
you understand this distinction between visible things and intelligible things?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, picture them as a line cut into two unequal sections and, following the same
proportion, subdivide both the section of the visible realm and that of the intelligible realm.
Now you can compare the sections in terms of clarity and unclarity. The [509e] first section
in the visible realm consists of likenesses, by which [501a] I mean a number of things:
shadows, reflections (on the surface of water or on anything else which is inherently compact,
smooth, and bright), and so on. Do you see what I’m getting at?’
‘I do.’
‘And you should count the other section of the visible realm as consisting of the things whose
likenesses are found in the first section: all the flora and fauna there are in the world, and
every kind of artefact too.’
‘All right.’
‘I wonder whether you’d agree,’ I said, ‘that truth and lack of truth have been the criteria for
distinguishing these sections, and that the image stands to the original as the realm of beliefs
stands to the realm of knowledge?’8
[510b] ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I certainly agree.’
‘Now have a look at how to subdivide the section which belongs to the intelligible realm.’
7
word-games: However, at Cratylus 396b-c, Plato succumbs to the temptation and derives ouranos
(‘heavens’) from horan ano (‘look upwards’). Horan is cognate with horatos, ‘visible’.
8
realm of beliefs: the shift from talk of sense-perception to talk of belief is startling, but not
outrageous, given the background of 475e-480a, where again belief and sensible objects were
correlated (and where we learnt that ‘belief’ was a portmanteau word for ‘unreliable thinking or
apprehension’). Plato appreciates that all identification is due to the mind: the sense-impression is, so
to speak, passed on to the mind for identification (see Philebus 38c-39c).
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‘How?’
‘Like this. If the mind wants to explore the first subdivision, it can do so only by using those
former originals as likenesses and by taking things for granted on its journey, which leads it
to an end-point, rather than to a starting-point.9 If it wants to explore the second subdivision,
however, it takes things for granted in order to travel to a starting-point where nothing needs
to be taken for granted, and it has no involvement with likenesses, as before, but makes its
approach by means of types alone, in and of themselves.’
‘I don’t quite understand what you’re saying,’ he said.
[510c] You will if I repeat it,’ I said, ‘because this preamble will make it easier to
understand. I’m sure you’re aware that practitioners of geometry, arithmetic, and so on take
for granted things like numerical oddness and evenness, the geometrical figures, the three
kinds of angle, and any other things of that sort which are relevant to a given subject.10 They
act as if they know about these things, treat them as basic, and don’t feel any further need to
explain them either to themselves or to anyone else, on the grounds that there is nothing
unclear [510d] about them. They make them the starting-points for their subsequent
investigations, which end after a coherent chain of reasoning at the point they’d set out to
reach in their research.’
‘Yes, I’m certainly well aware of this,’ he said.
‘So you must also he aware that in the course of their discussions they make use of visible
forms, despite the fact that they’re not interested in visible forms as such, but in the things of
which the visible forms are likenesses: that is, their discussions are concerned with what it is
to be a square, and with what it is to be a diagonal (and so on), rather than with [510e] the
diagonal (and so on) which occurs in their diagrams. They treat their models and diagrams as
9
originals as likenesses: it is important to notice that here and at 5iiob 5iod-e we are told that things
within the material world are within the purview of the mathematical sciences. We already know that
things of the material world are the contents of section B of the line: they are also the contents of
section C (and note also the necessary equality of sections B and C, given Plato’s instructions for
dividing and subdividing the line). Therefore, the Line is not based on a fourfold division of objects:
there are three kinds of object – shadows and so on, actual things, and types; and there are four mental
states. The Line is merely a convenient tool, to pull together a number of points under the headings of
the fourfold division of mental states. These differ in clarity or access to truth, but it should be noted
that they do not represent any kind of gradual mental development: no one starts life with his sole
objects of perception being reflections in puddles, before moving on to solid objects.
a given subject: this proves that ‘taking things for granted’ does not mean quite ‘assuming’, since
there is nothing tentative about the existence of odd and even numbers, for instance: it is a given, a
fact. Plato is delineating – in a highly condensed fashion – a certain approach to facts, which uses
them deductively, to reach conclusions, and does not form them into coherent abstract systems, but
takes each fact (or proposition, or concept) as a separate starting-point in a separate argument. This
will shortly be contrasted with the approach of dialectic, which refers factual propositions upwards to
ever higher principles, until any lingering unclarity in the facts is altogether eliminated: they are
ultimately referred to something self-evident, ‘where nothing needs to be taken for granted’, and
formed into coherent systems, each part of which may be taken to be true given the self-evident truth
of the starting-point. This interpretation, apart from making good sense of the text here (and fitting in
with 531dff. and 537eff.), has the advantage of being in accord with Plato’s use of the term ‘dialectic’
in the early dialogues and even in late dialogues, like Sophist, which concentrate on the systems of
types.
10
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likenesses, when these things have likenesses themselves, in fact (that is, shadows and
reflections on water); but they’re actually trying to see squares [511a] and so on in
themselves, which only thought can see.’11
‘You’re right,’ he said.
‘So it was objects of this type that I was describing as belonging to the intelligible realm, with
the rider that the mind can explore them only by taking things for granted, and that its goal is
not a starting-point, because it is incapable of changing direction and rising above the things
it is taking for granted. And I went on to say that it used as likenesses those very things which
are themselves the originals of a lower order of likenesses, and that relative to the likenesses,
the originals command respect and admiration for their distinctness.’
[511b] ‘I see,’ he said. ‘You’re talking about the objects of geometry and related
occupations.’
‘Now, can you see what I mean by the second subdivision of the intelligible realm? It is what
reason grasps by itself, thanks to its ability to practise dialectic. 12 When it takes things for
granted, it doesn’t treat them as starting-points, but as basic in the strict sense – as platforms
and rungs, for example. These serve it until it reaches a point where nothing needs to be taken
for granted, and which is the starting-point for everything.13 Once it has grasped this startingpoint, it turns around and by a process of depending on the things which depend from the
starting-point, it descends to an end-point. It makes absolutely [511c] no use of anything
11
only thought can see: this paragraph should not be read (as it often is) as criticizing geometers for
drawing diagrams: that would be an idiotic criticism. Plato is only pointing out that, despite
geometry’s use of diagrams, it is properly seen as concerned with the intelligible realm (this is exactly
the point Plato claims in the next paragraph to have made). No criticism is intended: it is just that use
of diagrams obscures the mathematical sciences’ true domain. For further examples of this obscuring
see 527a-531c (where Plato is critical, because in these cases the scientists themselves have forgotten
their true domain).
12
dialectic: dialectic means philosophical discussion (with others or with oneself) whose goal is
knowledge and truth. It is the name given to Socrates’ philosophical method, as exemplified
particularly in Plato’s early dialogues such as Laches and Charmides. But what has what Plato is
saying here (see note on 510c) to do with Socratic practice? It is, in fact, a perfect condensed outline
of Socratic dialectic. Socrates asks, for instance, ‘What is courage?’ He is given the reply, ‘Courage is
endurance in the face of danger.’ This proposition is then tested by being referred to other
propositions. Sooner or later, a supposedly self-evident general proposition is formulated, such as
‘Courage is good.’ In order to prove or disprove ‘Courage is endurance in the face of danger’, then,
Socrates only has to test it (and/or its consequences) in the light of the self-evident proposition. If it
survives the test, it forms part of a coherent system under the self-evident proposition; if it fails, it is
rejected.
13
starting-point for everything. the generality of this kind of statement, and the contrast with the
method of mathematics, has led some commentators to believe that Plato means that knowledge of
goodness (which it is reasonable to suppose is the most ultimate starting-point possible) enables
someone to deduce mathematical truths from it. But this is absurd. We should distinguish between the
common properties which all types have (permanence, everlastingness, singleness, etc.) and the
peculiar properties which particular types have (circularity is circular, and so on): Plato may mean
that the former set of properties are deducible from goodness (see notes on 508e and 509b), but not
the latter.
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perceptible to the senses: it aims for types by means of types alone, in and of themselves, and
it ends its journey with types.’14
‘I don’t quite understand,’ he said. ‘I mean, you’re talking about crucial matters here, I think.
I do understand, however, that you want to mark off that part of the real and intelligible realm
– which is before the eyes of anyone who knows how to practise dialectic as more dear than
the other part, which is before the eyes of practitioners of the various branches of expertise,
as we call them. The latter make the things they take for granted their starting-points, and
although they inevitably use thought, not the senses, to observe what they observe, yet
because of their failure to ascend to a starting-point-because d their enquiries rely on taking
things for granted – you’re saying that they don’t understand these things, even though they
are intelligible, when related to a starting-point. I take you to be describing what geometers
and so on do as thinking rather than knowing, on the grounds that thinking is the intermediate
state between believing and knowing.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with your understanding,’ I said. ‘And you should appreciate that
there are four states of mind, one for each of the four sections. There’s knowledge for the
highest section and thought for the second one; and you’d [511c] better assign confidence to
the third one and conjecture to the final one.15 You can make an orderly progression out of
them, and you should regard them as possessing as much clarity as their objects possess
truth.’
‘I see,’ he said. ‘That’s fine with me. I’ll order them in the way you suggest.’
The final image, the Allegory of the Cave, is the longest and most famous of the three. It is
introduced rather abruptly, but is meant to fit in with the preceding two images (517b-c,
532a-d). Further details of the fit are a matter of dispute, although the broad outlines are
clear enough. Like all the great images of the world’s greatest literature, Plato’s Cave
manages simultaneously to appear transparent and yet unexpectedly rich and surprising.
Those readers who believe that philosophy is a dry academic pursuit will be surprised at its
presentation here as a pursuit which frees us from a terrible slavery; but for Plato and his
peers philosophy is a way of life, not just a course of study.
[514a] ‘Next,’ I said, ‘here’s a situation which you can use as an analogy for the human
condition – for our education or lack of it. Imagine people living in a cavernous cell down
under the ground; at the far end of the cave, a long way off, there’s an entrance open to the
outside world. They’ve been there since childhood, with their legs and necks tied up in a way
which b keeps them in one place and allows them to look only straight ahead, but not to turn
their heads. There’s firelight burning a long way further up the cave behind them, and up the
slope between the fire and the prisoners there’s a road, beside which you should imagine a
14
types: why has dialectic as outlined (notes on 510c and 511b) to do with types? Because it relies
entirely on abstract statements, and never ‘descends’ to examples like ‘repaying gifts’. It works with
propositions like ‘morality is good’, even before checking whether everything we can properly
identify as belonging to the class or type of morality is good.
15
to the final one: conjecture is assigned to shadows and reflections because we have to be hesitant
before identifying what the likeness is of, and because the details will be far from clear (remember
that ancient Greek mirrors were no where near as good as ours!). Confidence is the mental state
appropriate for the material world: as 505e shows, it is the state in which I assume unreflectively that I
know all there is to know about something. Because the material world is clear to our senses, we do
have this confidence.
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low wall has been built-like the partition which conjurors place between themselves and their
audience and above which they show their tricks.’
‘All right,’ he said.
‘Imagine also that there are people on the other side of this wall who are carrying all sorts of
artefacts. These artefacts, [514c] human statuettes, and animal models carved in stone and
wood [515a] and all kinds of materials stick out over the wall; and as you’d expect, some of
the people talk as they carry these objects along, while others are silent.’
‘This is a strange picture you’re painting,’ he said,’ with strange prisoners.’
‘They’re no different from us,’ I said.16 ‘I mean, in the first place, do you think they’d see
anything of themselves and one another except the shadows cast by the fire on to the cave
wall directly opposite them?’17
‘Of course not,’ he said. ‘They’re forced to spend their lives [515b] without moving their
heads.’
‘And what about the objects which were being carried along? Won’t they only see their
shadows as well?’
‘Naturally.’
‘Now, suppose they were able to talk to one another: don’t you think they’d assume that their
words applied to what they saw passing by in front of them?’18
16
no different from us: this statement is unequivocal evidence that the Cave is an allegory. The
prisoners are said to be like us, but we do not spend our lives literally gazing at shadows of artefacts.
Although there are almost as many interpretations of the relation between the Cave and the Line as
there are writers on it, this consideration rules out one common set of interpretations, which tries to
find an exact correspondence between the four main objects in the Cave (shadows on the wall,
artefacts in the cave, reflections outside the cave, real things outside the cave) and the four divisions
of the Line. However, as we have seen, the Line is not a figure for mental development, as the Cave
is, and in any case there are only three sets of objects in the Line (see note on 510b). Nor is it at all
clear that the Cave settles on four stages: 506a-b alone could be seen as talking of five ‘stages’ outside
the cave. In short, it is probably better to see the Cave as illustrating and expanding certain aspects of
what has gone before, rather than looking for exact fits.
17
opposite them: the crucial factor for interpreting the Cave is to see that the shadows are cast by
things which are themselves effigies of real things. We know from 517b that real things outside the
cave stand for types. Therefore the effigies are reflections of types, and the shadows are reflections of
reflections of types. (One’s mind jumps to 596aff. and the castigation of artistic products as copies of
copies of types; but this is correct only in so far as there is an equivalence of delusion.) But what
kinds of things are reflections of reflections of types? They should be things within our everyday
experience, since the prisoners symbolize the common human condition. I argue … that in Republic
Plato is taking for granted two different kinds of types: one kind (‘bed’, ‘finger’) is perfectly
instantiated directly in the physical world, with hardly any need for dispute and doubt about their
identification; the other kind (described by incomplete predicates such as ‘big’ and ‘moral’) has to be
mediated by our minds, in the sense that we have to think about what objects deserve these predicates.
The Cave is concerned (as Plato usually is, but particularly here in the context of determining what
knowledge philosopher kings need) with this latter variety: the effigies are my mental impressions or
thoughts of morality and so on; the shadows on the wall are moral actions, big rocks, and all the
physical things of the world. Thus the bearers of the effigies behind the wall may be the ‘doubles’ of
the chained prisoners, or may be the poets, politicians, and so on who have formed the prisoners’
views about morality and similar matters.
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‘They couldn’t think otherwise.’
‘And what if sound echoed off the prison wall opposite them? When any of the passers-by
spoke, don’t you think they’d he bound to assume that the sound came from a passing
shadow?’
‘I’m absolutely certain of it,’ he said.
[515c] ‘All in all, then,’ I said, ‘the shadows of artefacts would constitute the only reality
people in this situation would recognize.’
‘That’s absolutely inevitable,’ he agreed.
‘What do you think would happen, then,’ I asked, ‘if they were set free from their bonds and
cured of their inanity?19 What would it he like if they found that happening to them? Imagine
that one of them has been set free and is suddenly made to stand up, to turn his head and walk
and to look towards the firelight.20 It hurts him to do all this and he’s too dazzled to he
capable of making out the objects whose shadows [515d] he’d formerly been looking at. And
suppose someone tells him that what he’s been seeing all this time has no substance, and that
he’s now closer to reality and is seeing more accurately, because of the greater reality of the
things in front of his eyes – what do you imagine his reaction would be? And what do you
think he’d say if he were shown any of the passing objects and had to respond to being asked
what it was? Don’t you think he’d he bewildered and would think that there was, more reality
in what he’d been seeing before than in what he was being shown now?’
‘Far more,’ he said.
[515e] ‘And if he were forced to look at the actual firelight, don’t you think it would hurt his
eyes? Don’t you think he’d turn away and run back to the things he could make out, and
would take the truth of the matter to he that these things are clearer than what he was being
shown?’
‘Yes,’ he agreed.
‘And imagine him being dragged forcibly away from there up the rough, steep slope,’ I went
on, ‘without being released until he’s been pulled out into the sunlight. Wouldn’t this
treatment [516a] cause him pain and distress? And once he’s reached the sunlight, he
wouldn’t be able to see a single one of the things which are currently taken to he real, would
he, because his eyes would be overwhelmed by the sun’s beams?’
‘No, he wouldn’t,’ he answered, ‘not straight away.’
in front of them: in Platonic terms, this shows the extent of the prisoners’ delusion, since our words
really refer to types (596a).
19
inanity: the kind of reorientation Plato envisages here is later typified, in an educational
curriculum, by the effect of the mathematical sciences (521dff.). But we need not suppose that
mathematics is the only thing which can reorient one to break out of the shackles.
18
towards the firelight: we are undoubtedly meant to remember the artificial lights’ Of 508c. On my
interpretation of the Cave, the effect of firelight may, in a moral and political context, be convention
or the views of others (the bearers of the effigies). Seeing the dependence of one’s cherished views on
convention blinds one to things in the sense of 537c-539a: having seen that they were merely
conventional, one is tempted to dismiss and despise them, or (the alternative stressed here) to run back
to the safety of not challenging them.
20
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‘He wouldn’t be able to see things up on the surface of the earth, I suppose, until he’d got
used to his situation. At first, it would be shadows that he could most easily make out, then
he’d move on to the reflections of people and so on in water, and later he’d he able to see the
actual things themselves.21 Next, he’d feast his eyes on the heavenly bodies and the heavens
themselves, which would be easier at night: he’d look at the [516b] light of the stars and the
moon, rather than at the sun and sunlight during the daytime.’
‘Of course.’
‘And at last, I imagine, he’d be able to discern and feast his eyes on the sun – not the
displaced image of the sun in water or elsewhere, but the sun on its own, in its proper
place.’22
‘Yes, he’d inevitably come to that,’ he said.
‘After that, he’d start to think about the sun and he’d deduce that it is the source of the
seasons and the yearly cycle, that the whole of the visible realm is its domain, and that in a
sense [516c] everything which he and his peers used to see is its responsibility.’
‘Yes, that would obviously be the next point he’d come to,’ he agreed.
‘Now, if he recalled the cell where he’d originally lived and what passed for knowledge there
and his former fellow prisoners, don’t you, think he d feel happy about his own altered
circumstances, and sorry for them?’
‘Definitely.’
‘Suppose that the prisoners used to assign prestige and credit to one another, in the sense that
they rewarded speed at recognizing the shadows as they passed, and the ability to remember
which ones normally come earlier and later and at [516d] the same time as which other ones,
and expertise at using this as a basis for guessing which ones would arrive next. Do you think
our former prisoner would covet these honours and would envy the people who had status
and power there, or would he much prefer, as Homer describes it, “being a slave labouring
for someone else-someone without property”, and would put up with anything at all, in fact,
rather than share their beliefs and their life?’23
[516e] ‘Yes, I think he’d go through anything rather than live that way,’ he said.
‘Here’s something else I’d like your opinion about,’ I said. ‘If he went back underground and
sat down again in the same spot, wouldn’t the sudden transition from the sunlight mean that
his eyes would be overwhelmed by darkness?’
‘Certainly,’ he replied.
‘Now, the process of adjustment would be quite long this time, and suppose that before his
eyes had settled down and [517a] while he wasn’t seeing well, he had once again to compete
against those same old prisoners at identifying those shadows. Wouldn’t he make a fool of
21
in water: the stage of looking at reflections and so on outside the cave does not differ in terms of
objects from the stage of looking at the effigies in the cave (compare the identity of objects in sections
B and C of the Line – see note on 510b). But it differs in that it is now more difficult for one to return
to the safety of convention (see note on 515c).
22
23
in its proper place: the sun in the allegory is, of course, goodness, as it was in the Sun.
without property: Odyssey II. 489, also quoted at 386c.
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himself? Wouldn’t they say that he’d come back from his upward journey with his eyes
ruined, and that it wasn’t even worth trying to go up there? And wouldn’t they – if they could
– grab hold of anyone who tried to set them free and take them up there, and kill him?’24
‘They certainly would,’ he said.
‘Well, my dear Glaucon,’ I said, ‘you should, apply this [517ba] allegory, as a whole, to what
we were talking about before. The region which is accessible to sight should be equated with
the prison cell, and the firelight there with the light of the sun. And if you think of the upward
journey and the sight of things up on the surface of the earth as the mind’s ascent to the
intelligible realm, you won’t he wrong – at least, I don’t think you’d be wrong, and it’s my
impression that you want to hear. Only God knows if it’s actually true, however. Anyway,
it’s my opinion that the last thing to be seen – and it isn’t easy to see [517c] either – in the
realm of knowledge is goodness; and the sight of the character of goodness leads one to
deduce that it is responsible for everything that is right and fine, whatever the circumstances,
and that in the visible realm it is the progenitor of light and of the source of light, and in the
intelligible realm it is the source and provider of truth and knowledge. And I also think that
the sight of it is a prerequisite for intelligent conduct either of one’s own private affairs or of
public business.’
‘I couldn’t agree more,’ he said.
‘All right, then,’ I said. ‘I wonder if you also agree with me in not finding it strange that
people who’ve travelled there don’t want to engage in human business: there’s nowhere else
their minds would ever rather be than in the upper region – which is [517d] hardly surprising,
if our allegory has got this aspect right as well.’
‘No, it’s not surprising,’ he agreed.
‘Well, what about this?’ I asked. ‘Imagine someone returning to the human world and all its
misery after contemplating the divine realm. Do you think it’s surprising if he seems
awkward and ridiculous while he’s still not seeing well, before he’s had time to adjust to the
darkness of his situation, and he’s forced into a contest (in a law court or wherever) about the
shadows of morality or the statuettes which cast the shadows, and into a [517e] competition
whose terms are the conceptions of morality held by people who have never seen morality
itself?’
‘No, that’s not surprising in the slightest,’ he said.
[518a] ‘In fact anyone with any sense,’ I said, ‘would remember that the eyes can become
confused in two different ways, as a result of two different sets of circumstances: it can
happen in the transition from light to darkness, and also in the transition from darkness to
light. If he took the same facts into consideration when he also noticed someone’s mind in
such a state of confusion that it was incapable of making anything out, his reaction wouldn’t
be unthinking ridicule. Instead, he’d try to find out whether this person’s mind was returning
from a mode of existence which involves greater lucidity and had been blinded by the
unfamiliar darkness, or whether it was moving from relative ignorance to relative lucidity and
had been overwhelmed and dazzled by the increased brightness. Once he’d distinguished
between the two conditions and modes of [518b] existence, he’d congratulate anyone he
found in the second state, and feel sorry for anyone in the first state. If he did choose to laugh
24
and kill him: as Socrates was killed. Cf. the ‘prophecy’ in the Gorgias.
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at someone in the second state, his amusement would be less absurd than when laughter is
directed at someone returning from the light above.’25
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘you’re making a lot of sense.’
Since the Cave was expressly introduced as being relevant to education, its immediate
educational implications are now drawn out. We all have the capacity for knowledge (in the
Platonic sense, not just information), and education should develop that potential But since it
requires knowledge of goodness to manage a community web, then those who gain such
knowledge have to ‘return to the cave’: paradoxically, those who least want power are the
ones who should have it.
‘Now, if this is true,’ I said, ‘we must bear in mind that education is not capable of doing
what some people promise. They claim to introduce knowledge into a mind which doesn’t
[518c] have it, as if they were introducing sight into eyes which are blind.’26
‘Yes, they do,’ he said.
‘An implication of what we’re saying at the moment, however,’ I pointed out, ‘is that the
capacity for knowledge is present in everyone’s mind. If you can imagine an eye that can turn
from darkness to brightness only if the body as a whole turns, then our organ of
understanding is like that. Its orientation has to he accompanied by turning the mind as a
whole away from the world of becoming, until it becomes capable of bearing the sight of real
being and reality at its most bright, which we’re saying is goodness. Yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s what education should be,’ I said, ‘the art of orientation. Educators should devise the
simplest and most effective methods of turning minds around. It shouldn’t he the art of
implanting sight in the organ, but should proceed on the understanding that the organ already
has the capacity, but is improperly aligned and isn’t facing the right way.’
‘I suppose you’re right,’ he said.
‘So although the mental states which are described as good generally seem to resemble good
physical states, in the sense [518e] that habituation and training do in fact implant them
where they didn’t use to be, yet understanding (as it trims out) is undoubtedly, a property of
something which is more divine: it never loses its power, and it is useful and beneficial, or
useless [519a] and harmful, depending on its orientation. For example, surely you’ve noticed
how the petty minds of those who are acknowledged to be bad, but clever, are sharp-eyed and
perceptive enough to gain insights into matters they direct their attention towards. It’s not as
if they weren’t sharp-sighted, but their minds are forced to serve evil, and consequently the
keener their vision is, the greater the evil they accomplish.’
‘Yes, I’ve noticed this,’ he said.
25
the light above: because (as Theaetetus 175b-d shows) he finds the antics of those unfamiliar with
the upper regions somewhat amusing.
26
which are blind: many commentators have seen here a hint of the famous theory of recollection,
according to which all so-called learning is in fact recollection of knowledge acquired before one’s
present incarnation. If that is the case, nothing is made of it in Republic. And in Socrates’ next
sentence he mentions only the capacity for knowledge, which is quite different from how the theory is
presented in Meno and Phaedo.
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‘However,’ I went on, ‘if this aspect of that kind of person is hammered at from an early age,
until the inevitable consequences of incarnation have been knocked off it – the [519b] leaden
weights, so to speak, which are grafted on to it as a result of eating and similar pleasures and
indulgences and which turn the sight of the mind downwards-if it sheds these weights and is
reoriented towards the truth, then (and we’re talking about the same organ and the same
people) it would see the truth just as clearly as it sees the objects it faces at the moment.’
‘Yes, that makes sense.’ he said.
‘Well, doesn’t this make sense as well?’ I asked. ‘Or rather, isn’t it an inevitable consequence
of what we’ve been saying that uneducated people, who have no experience of truth, [519c]
would make incompetent administrators of a community, and that the same goes for people –
who are allowed to spend their whole fives educating themselves? The first group would be
no good because their lives lack direction: they’ve got no single point of reference to guide
them in all their affairs, whether private or public. The second group would be no good
because their hearts wouldn’t be in the business: they think they’ve been transported to the
Isles of the Blessed even while they’re still alive.’27
‘True,’ he said.
‘Our job as founders, then,’ I said, ‘is to make sure that the best people come to that
fundamental field of study (as we called it earlier): we must have them make the ascent we’ve
been talking about and see goodness. And afterwards, once [519d] they’ve been up there and
had a good look, we mustn’t let them get away with what they do at the moment.’
‘Which is what?’
‘Staying there,’ I replied, ‘and refusing to come back down again to those prisoners, to share
their work and their rewards, no matter whether those rewards are trivial or significant.’
‘But in that case,’ he protested, ‘we’ll be wronging them: we’ll be making the quality of their
lives worse and denying them the better life they could be living, won’t we?’
[519e] ‘You’re again forgetting, my friend,’ I said, ‘that the point of legislation is not to make
one section of a community better off than the rest, but to engineer this for the community as
a whole. Legislators should persuade or compel the members of a community to mesh
together, should make every individual [520a] share with his fellows the benefit which he is
capable of contributing to the common welfare, and should ensure that the community does
contain people with this capacity; and the purpose of all this is not for legislators to leave
people to choose their own directions, but for them to use people to bind the community
together.’
‘Yes, you’re right,’ he said. ‘I was forgetting.’
‘I think you’ll also find, Glaucon,’ I said, ‘that we won’t be wronging any philosophers who
arise in our community. Our remarks, as we force them to take care of their fellow citizens
and be their guardians, will be perfectly fair. We’ll tell them [520b] that it’s reasonable for
philosophers who happen to occur in other communities not to share the work of those
communities, since their occurrence was spontaneous, rather than planned by the political
system of any of the communities m question, and it’s fair for anything which arises
spontaneously and doesn’t owe its nurture to anyone or anything to have no interest in
27
still alive: the Isles of the Blessed were that part of the underworld reserved for people, after their
death, who had lived particularly virtuous lives.
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repaying anyone for having provided its nourishment. “We’ve bred you, however,” we’ll say,
“to act, as it were, as the hive’s leaders and kings, for your own good as well as that of the
rest of the community. You’ve received a better and more thorough education than those
other philosophers, and you’re more [520c] capable of playing a part in both spheres. So each
of you must, when your time comes, descend to where the rest of the community lives, and
get used to looking at things in the dark. The point is that once you become acclimatized,
you’ll see infinitely better than the others there; your experience of genuine right, morality,
and goodness will enable you to identify every one of the images and recognize what it is an
image of. And then the administration of our community – ours as well as yours – will be in
the hands of people who are awake, as distinct from the norm nowadays of communities
being governed by people who shadow-box and fall out with one another in their dreams over
who should rule, as if that [520d] were a highly desirable thing to do. No, the truth of the
matter is this: the less keen the would-be rulers of a community are to rule, the better and less
divided the administration of that community is bound to be, but where the rulers feel the
opposite, the administration is bound to be the opposite.’28
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘And do you think our wards will greet these views of ours with scepticism and will refuse to
join in the work of government when their time comes, when they can still spend most of
their time living with one another in the untainted realm?’
‘No, they couldn’t,’ he answered. ‘They’re fair-minded people, and the instructions we’re
giving them are fair. However, they’ll undoubtedly approach rulership as an inescapable duty
– an attitude which is the opposite of the one held by the people who have power in
communities at the moment.
‘You’re right, Glaucon,’ I said. ‘You’ll only have a well [521a] governed community if you
can come up with a way of life for your prospective rulers that is preferable to ruling! The
point is that this is the only kind of community where the rulers will be genuinely well off
(not in material terms, but they’ll possess the wealth which is a prerequisite of happiness – a
life of virtue and intelligence), whereas if government falls into the hands of people who are
impoverished and starved of any good things of their own, and who expect to wrest some
28
at the moment: Plato never makes completely clear what will induce the philosophers to take up
politics: he obscures the issue under the conceit of himself and his fellow interlocutors forcing them to
do so. The compulsion is probably a combination of (a) the fact that the rulers have been specifically
chosen from among those who feel that their own good and the good of the community as a whole
coincide (412cff.), and like everyone else they want to see their own good happen (505d-e); (b) horror
at the prospect of worse people than themselves gaining power (347a-d; in the ideal state, however,
they themselves will take turns at ruling (540b), so this motivation will be excluded); (c)
understanding the importance of debt-repayment (520d-e). Of these, (a) is by far the most important,
and it raises the question as to why philosophers should think that their good and that of the
community as a whole coincide.
Plato has to talk of compulsion now, because he has made contemplation of types seem so attractive
that it is unclear why the philosophers should want to end it. This is related to an important issue. He
has driven a huge wedge between the philosopher’s experiences and knowledge and everyday life.
Yet he is still maintaining that philosophic contemplation is to be of practical benefit to the
community. What is the relation between the practical work of reason and its contemplation of
unchanging types? Plato does not tell us in so many words, but the gap can be closed to some extent:
see the next note.
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good for themselves from political office, a well-governed community is an impossibility. I
mean, when rulership becomes something to fight for, a domestic and internal war like this
destroys not only the perpetrators,’ but also the rest of the community.’
‘You’re absolutely right,’ he said.
[521b] ‘Apart from the philosophical life,’ I said, ‘is there any way of life, in your opinion,
which looks down on political office?’29
‘No, definitely not,’ he answered.
‘In fact, political power should be in the hands of people who aren’t enamoured of it.
Otherwise their rivals in love will fight them for it.’
‘Of course.’
‘There’s no one you’d rather force to undertake the guarding of your community, then, than
those who are experts in the factors which contribute towards the good government of a
community, who don’t look to politics for their rewards, and whose life is better than the
political life. Agreed?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
Political office: ‘Philosophizing is essential to ruling because it is the activity that is preferable to
ruling, and so the activity that the ruler must have available to him if he is to wish not to rule, where
wishing not to rule is, paradoxically, what makes it possible for him to rule well. Thus the total task
of ruling, properly construed, must include the activity of philosophy, both as a lure from the practical
side of actually managing the affairs of the city, and as a source of that knowledge by which the
managing is guided. ‘The upshot is that philosophizing is not thought of by Plato as a task somehow
additional to that of ruling, but as an essential part of effective ruling’ (White, A Companion to
Plato’s Republic, 190).
29
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Newton, Principia
Isaac Newton
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
OF THE PRINCIPIA1
[From H.S. Thayer (ed) Newton’s Philosophy of Nature: Selections from his Writings (New
York, 1953)]
ince the ancients (as we are told by Pappus2) esteemed the science of mechanics3 of
greatest importance in the investigation of natural things, and the moderns, rejecting
substantial forms and occult qualities,4 have endeavoured to subject the phenomena of
nature to the laws of mathematics, I have in this treatise cultivated mathematics as far as it
relates to philosophy. The ancients considered mechanics in a twofold respect: as rational,
which proceeds accurately by demonstration, and practical. 5 To practical mechanics all the
manual arts belong, from which mechanics took its name. But as artificers do not work with
perfect accuracy, it comes to pass that mechanics is so distinguished from geometry that what
is perfectly accurate is called geometrical; what is less so is called mechanical. However, the
errors are not in the art, but in the artificers. He that works with less accuracy is an imperfect
mechanic; and if any could work with perfect accuracy, he would be the most perfect
mechanic of all; for the description of right lines and circles, upon which geometry is
founded, belongs to mechanics. Geometry does not teach us to draw these lines, but requires
them to be drawn; for it requires that the learner should first be taught to describe these
accurately before he enters upon geometry,6 then it shows how by these operations problems
may be solved. To describe right lines and circles are problems, but not geometrical
problems. The solution of these problems is required from mechanics, and by geometry the
use of them, when so solved, is shown; and it is the glory of geometry that from those few
principles, brought from without, it is able to produce so many things.7 Therefore geometry is
founded in mechanical practice and is nothing but that part of universal mechanics which
accurately proposes and demonstrates the art of measuring; But since the manual arts are
S
1
Written at Cambridge, Trinity College, May 8, 1686, the year of publication of the first edition.
Pappus was the author of the Synagoge (“Collection”), the last great treatise of the Alexandrian
mathematicians, end of the third century. The Synagoge was a guide to the study of Greek geometry.
Many important Greek mathematical results have been preserved for later ages only through the work
of Pappus. The Synagoge was written about 320 A.D.; Latin translation, 589.
2
3
science of mechanics = the branch of mathematics concerned with forces and movement.
4
Newton is referring here to the terminology of scholastic (mediaeval) natural philosophy, which
was based on Aristotle. Scholasticism explained natural phenomena by appealing to the essential
properties of things (substantial forms) and to hidden and unexplained forces (occult qualities). These
occult qualities are ridiculed by Moliere, who has a character explain why opium sends you to sleep
by saying that it has a vis dormitiva (that is, the power of sending you to sleep). This explains nothing.
5
rational mechanics = a branch of mathematics; practical mechanics = what we might call
engineering. Newton is marking the distinction between pure and applied science.
6
describe = draw
This is the axiomatic method, discussed last week in connection with Plato: starting with a few basic
axioms or principles, the scientist can explain and predict natural phenomena.
7
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Newton, Principia
chiefly employed in the moving of bodies, it happens that geometry is commonly referred to
their magnitude, and mechanics to their motion.8 In this sense rational mechanics will be the
science of motions resulting from any forces whatsoever and of the forces required to
produce any motions, accurately proposed and demonstrated. This part of mechanics, as far
as it extended to the five powers which relate to manual arts, was cultivated by the ancients,
who considered gravity (it not being a manual power) not otherwise than in moving weights
by those powers. But I consider philosophy rather than arts,9 and write not concerning manual
but natural powers, and consider chiefly those things which relate to gravity, levity, elastic
force, the resistance of fluids, and the like forces, whether attractive or impulsive – and
therefore I offer this work as the mathematical principles of philosophy, for the whole burden
of philosophy seems to consist in this: from the phenomena of motions to investigate the
forces of nature, and then from these forces to demonstrate the other phenomena; and to this
end the general propositions in the First and Second Books are directed. In the Third Book I
give an example of this in the explication of the System of the World; for by the propositions
mathematically demonstrated in the former books, in the third I derive from the celestial
phenomena the forces of gravity with which bodies tend to the sun and the several planets.
Then from these forces, by other propositions which are also mathematical, I deduce the
motions of the planets, the comets, the moon, and the sea. I wish we could derive the rest of
the phenomena of Nature by the same kind of reasoning from mechanical principles, for I am
induced by many reasons to suspect that they may all depend upon certain forces by which
the particles of bodies, by some causes hitherto unknown, are either mutually impelled
toward one another and cohere in regular figures, or are repelled and recede from one
another. These forces being unknown, philosophers have hitherto attempted the search of
Nature in vain; but I hope the principles here laid down will afford some light either to this or
some truer method of philosophy.
In the publication of this work the most acute and universally learned Mr. Edmund Halley not
only assisted me in correcting the errors of the press and preparing the geometrical figures,
but it was through his solicitations that it came to be published;10 for when he had obtained of
me my demonstrations of the figure of the celestial orbits, he continually pressed me to
communicate the same to the Royal Society, who afterward, by their kind encouragement and
entreaties, engaged me to think of publishing them. But after I had begun to consider the
inequalities of the lunar motions, and had entered upon some other things relating to the laws
and measures of gravity and other, forces; and the figures that would be described by bodies
attracted according to given laws; and the motion of several bodies moving among
themselves; the motion of bodies in resisting mediums; the forces, densities, and motions of
mediums; the orbits of the comets, and suchlike, I deferred that publication till I had made a
search into those matters and could put forth the whole together. What relates to the lunar
motions (being imperfect), I have put all together in the corollaries of Proposition LXVI, to
avoid being obliged to propose and distinctly demonstrate the several things there contained
in a method more prolix than the subject deserved and interrupt the series of the other
propositions. Some things, found out after the rest, I chose to insert in places less suitable,
8
manual arts = engineering and the like
Newton’s distinction between ‘philosophy’ and ‘art’ corresponds with the distinction between pure
and applied science. He is saying that ancient mechanics (such as the work of Archimedes) was
concerned more with engineering applications than understanding the fundamental forces at work.
9
10
Edmund Halley = an eminent astronomer, most famous for identifying the orbit of the comet that
bears his name.
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Newton, Principia
rather than change the number of the propositions and the citations. I heartily beg that what I
have here done may be read with forbearance and that my labors in a subject so difficult may
be examined, not so much with the view to censure, as to remedy their defects.
Is. NEWTON
Cambridge, Trinity College, May 8, 1686
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Popper, Conjectures and Refutations
Karl R. Popper
SCIENCE: CONJECTURES AND REFUTATIONS1
Mr. Turnbull had predicted evil consequences, and was now doing the best in his power to
bring about the verification of his own prophecies.
ANTHONY TROLLOPE
[From Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963), pp 33-38.]
W
HEN I received the list of participants in this course and realized that I had been
asked to speak to philosophical colleagues I thought after some hesitation and
consultation, that you would probably prefer me to speak about those problems
which interest me most, and about those developments with which 1 am most intimately
acquainted. 1 therefore decided to do what 1 have never done before: to give you a report on
my own work in the philosophy of science, since the autumn of 1919 when I first began to
grapple with the problem, ‘When should a theory be ranked as scientific?’ or ‘Is there a
criterion for the scientific character or status of a theory?’
The problem which troubled me at the time was neither, ‘When is a theory true?,’ nor, ‘When
is a theory acceptable?’ My problem was different. I wished to distinguish between science
and pseudo-science; knowing very well that science often errs, and that pseudo-science may
happen to stumble on the truth.
I knew, of course, the most widely accepted answer to my problem: that science is
distinguished from pseudo-science - or from ‘metaphysics’ - by its empirical method, which
is essentially inductive, proceeding from observation or experiment. But this did not satisfy
me. On the contrary, I often formulated my problem as one of distinguishing between a
genuinely empirical method and a non-empirical or even a pseudo-empirical method-that is to
say, a method which, although it appeals to observation and experiment, nevertheless [34]
does not come up to scientific standards. The latter method may be exemplified by astrology,
with its stupendous, mass of empirical evidence based on observation-on horoscopes and on
biographies.
But as it was not the example of astrology which led me to my problem I should perhaps
briefly describe the atmosphere in which my problem arose and the examples by which it was
stimulated. After the collapse of the Austrian Empire there had been a revolution in Austria:
the air was full of revolutionary slogans and ideas, and new and often wild theories. Among
the theories which interested me Einstein’s theory of relativity was no doubt by far the most
important. Three others were Marx’s theory of history, Freud’s psycho-analysis, and Alfred
Adler’s so-called ‘individual psychology’.
There was a lot of popular nonsense talked about these theories, and especially about
relativity (as still happens even today), but 1 was fortunate in those who introduced me to the
study of this theory. We all - the small circle of students to which I belonged - were thrilled
with the result of Eddington’s eclipse observations which in 1919 brought the first important
confirmation of Einstein’s theory of gravitation. It was a great experience for us, and one
which had a lasting influence on my intellectual development.
1
A lecture given at Peterhouse, Cambridge, in Summer 1953, as part of a course, on developments and trends in
contemporary British philosophy, organized by the British Council; originally published under the title
‘Philosophy of Science: a Personal Report’ in British Philosophy in Mid-Century, ed. C. A. Mace, 1957.
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Popper, Conjectures and Refutations
The three other theories I have mentioned were also widely discussed among students at that
time. I myself happened to come into personal contact with Alfred Adler, and even to cooperate with him in his social work among the children and young people in the workingclass districts of Vienna where he had established social guidance Clinics.
It was during the summer of 1919 that I began to feel more and more dissatisfied with these
three theories – the Marxist theory of history, psychoanalysis, and individual, psychology;
and began to feel dubious about their claims to scientific status. My problem perhaps first
took the simple form, ‘What is wrong with Marxism, psycho-analysis, and individual
psychology? Why are they so different from physical theories, from Newton’s theory, and
especially from the theory of relativity?’
To make this contrast clear I should explain that few of us at the time would. have said that
we believed in the truth of Einstein’s theory of gravitation. This shows that it was not my
doubting the truth of those other three theories which bothered me, but something else. Yet
neither was it that I merely felt mathematical physics to be more exact than the sociological
or psychological type of theory. Thus what worried me was neither the problem of truth, at
that stage at least, nor the problem of exactness or measurability. It was rather that I felt that
these other three theories, though posing as sciences. had in fact more in common with
primitive myths than with science; that they resembled astrology rather than astronomy.
I found that those of my friends who were admirers of Marx, Freud, and Adler, were
impressed by a number of points common to these theories, and especially by their apparent
explanatory power. These theories appeared to be able to explain practically everything that
happened within the fields to which they referred. The study of any of them seemed to have
the effect of an [35] intellectual conversion or revelation, opening your eyes to a new truth
hidden, from those not yet initiated. Once your eyes were thus opened you saw confirming
instances everywhere: the world was full of verifications of the theory. Whatever happened
always confirmed it. Thus its truth appeared manifest; and unbelievers were clearly people
who did not want to see the manifest truth; who refused to see it, either because it was against
their class interest, or because of their repressions which were still ‘un-analysed’ and crying
aloud for treatment.
The most characteristic element in this situation seemed to me the incessant stream of
confirmations, of observations which ‘verified’ the theories in question; and this point was
constantly emphasized by their adherents. A Marxist could not open a newspaper without
finding on every page confirming evidence for his interpretation of history; not only in the
news, but also in its presentation-which revealed the class bias of the paper-and especially of
course in what the paper did not say. The Freudian analysts emphasized that their theories
were constantly verified by their ‘clinical observations’. As for Adler, I was much impressed
by a personal experience. Once, in 1919, 1 reported to him a case which to me did not seem
particularly Adlerian, but which he found no difficulty in analysing in terms of his theory of
inferiority feelings, although he had not even seen the child. Slightly shocked, I asked him
how he could be so sure. ‘Because of my thousandfold experience,’ he replied; whereupon 1
could not help saying: ‘And with this new case, I suppose, your experience has become
thousand-and-one-fold.’
What I had in mind was that his previous observations may not have been much sounder than
this new one; that each in its turn had been interpreted in the light of ‘previous experience’,
and at the same time counted as additional confirmation. What, I asked myself, did it
confirm? No more than that a case could be interpreted in the light of the theory. But this
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Popper, Conjectures and Refutations
meant very little, I reflected, since every conceivable case could be interpreted in the light of
Adler’s theory, or equally of Freud’s. I may illustrate this by two very different examples of
human behaviour: that of a man who pushes a child into the water with the intention of
drowning it; and that of a man who sacrifices his life in an attempt to save the child. Each of
these two cases can be explained with equal ease in Freudian and in Adlerian terms.
According to Freud the first man suffered from repression (say, of some component of his
Oedipus complex), while the second man had achieved sublimation. According to Adler the
first man suffered from feelings of inferiority (producing perhaps the need to prove to himself
that he dared to commit some crime), and so did the second man (whose need was to prove to
himself that he dared to rescue the child). I could not think of any human behaviour which
could not be interpreted in terms of either theory. It was precisely this fact-that they always
fitted, that they were always confirmed-which in the eyes of their admirers constituted the
strongest argument in favour of these theories. It began to dawn on me that this apparent
strength was in fact their weakness.
With Einstein’s theory the situation was strikingly different. Take one [36] typical instance Einstein’s prediction, just then confirmed by the findings of Eddington’s expedition.
Einstein’s gravitational theory had led to the result that light must be attracted by heavy
bodies (such as the sun), precisely as material bodies were attracted. As a consequence it
could be calculated that light from a distant fixed star whose apparent position was close to
the sun would reach the earth from such a direction that the star would seem to be slightly
shifted away from the sun; or, in other words, that stars close to the sun would look as if they
had moved a little away from the sun, and from one another. This is a thing which cannot
normally be observed since such stars are rendered invisible in daytime by the sun’s
overwhelming brightness; but during an eclipse it is possible to take photographs of them. If
the same constellation is photographed at night one can measure the distances on the two
photographs, and cheek the predicted effect.
Now the impressive thing about this case is the risk involved in a prediction of this kind. If
observation shows that the predicted effect is definitely absent, then the theory is simply
refuted. The theory is incompatible with certain possible results of observation - in fact with
results which everybody before Einstein would have expected.2 This is quite different from
the situation I have previously described, when it turned out that the theories in question were
compatible with the most divergent human behaviour, so that it was practically impossible to
describe any human behaviour that might not be claimed to be a verification of these theories.
These considerations led me in the winter of 1919-20 to conclusions which I may now
reformulate as follows:
1) It is easy to obtain confirmations, or verifications, for nearly every theory - if we
look for confirmations.
2) Confirmations should count only if they are the result of risky predictions; that is
to say, if, unenlightened by the theory in question, we should have expected an
event which was incompatible with the theory-an event which would have refuted
the theory.
3) Every ‘good’ scientific theory is a prohibition: it forbids certain things to happen.
The more a theory forbids, the better it is.
2
This is a slight oversimplification, for about half of the Einstein effect may be derived from the classical
theory, provided we assume a ballistic theory of light.
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4) A theory which is not refutable by any conceivable event is non-scientific.
Irrefutability is not a virtue of a theory (as people often think) but a vice.
5) Every genuine test of a theory is an attempt to falsify it, or to refute it. Testability
is falsifiability; but there are degrees of testability: some theories are more
testable, more exposed to refutation, than others; they take, as it were, greater
risks.
6) Confirming evidence should not count except when it is the result of a genuine
test of the theory; and I this means that it can be presented as a serious but
unsuccessful attempt to falsify the theory. (I now speak in such cases of
‘corroborating evidence’.)
7) Some genuinely testable theories, when found to be false, are still
held
by
their admirers - for example by introducing ad hoc some auxiliary assumption, or
by re-interpreting the theory ad hoc in such a way that it escapes refutation. Such
a procedure is always possible, but it rescues the theory from refutation only at
the price of destroying, or at least lowering, its scientific status. (I later described
such a rescuing operation as a ‘conventionalist twist’ or a ‘conventionalist
stratagem’.)
One can sum up all this by saying that the criterion of the scientific status of a theory is its
falsifiability, or refutability, or testability.
I may perhaps exemplify this with the help of the various theories so far mentioned.
Einstein’s theory of gravitation clearly satisfied the criterion of falsifiability. Even if our
measuring instruments at the time did not allow us to pronounce on the results of the tests
with complete assurance, there was clearly a possibility of refuting the theory.
Astrology did not pass the test. Astrologers were greatly impressed, and misled, by what they
believed to be confirming evidence-so much so that they were quite unimpressed by any
unfavourable evidence. Moreover, by making their interpretations and prophecies sufficiently
vague they were able to explain away anything that might have been a refutation of the theory
had the theory and the prophecies been more precise. In order to escape falsification they
destroyed the testability of their theory. It is a typical soothsayer’s trick to predict things so
vaguely that the predictions can hardly fail: that they become irrefutable.
The Marxist theory of history, in spite of the serious efforts of some of its founders and
followers, ultimately adopted this soothsaying practice. In some of its earlier formulations
(for example in Marx’s analysis of the character of the ‘coining social revolution’) their
predictions were testable, and in fact falsified.3 Yet instead of accepting the refutations the
followers of Marx re-interpreted both the theory and the evidence in order to make them
agree. In this way they rescued the theory from refutation; but they did so at the price of
adopting a device which made it irrefutable. They thus gave ‘conventionalist twist’ to the
theory; and by this stratagem they destroyed it much advertised claim to scientific status.
The two psycho-analytic theories were in a different class. They were simply non-testable,
irrefutable. There was no conceivable human behaviour which could contradict them. This
does not mean that Freud and Adler were not seeing certain things correctly. I personally do
not doubt that much what they say is of considerable importance, and may well play its part
one day in a psychological science which is testable. But it does mean that the clinical
3
See, for example, my Open Society and Its Enemies, ch. 15, section iii, and not 13-14.
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observations’ which analysts naively believe confirm their theory cannot do this any more
than the daily confirmations which astrologers find [38] in their practice.4 And as for Freud’s
epic of the Ego, the Super-ego, and the Id, ‘no substantially stronger claim, to scientificstatus can be made for it than for Homer’s collected stories from Olympus. These theories
describe some facts but in the manner of myths. They contain most interesting psychological
suggestions, but not in a testable form.
At the same time I realized that such myths may be developed, and become testable; that
historically speaking all – or very nearly all – scientific theories originate from myths, and
that a myth may contain important anticipations of scientific theories. Examples are
Empedocles’ theory of evolution by trial and error, or Parmenides’ myth of the unchanging
block universe in which nothing ever happens and which, if we add another dimension,
becomes Einstein’s block universe (in which, too, nothing ever happens, since everything is,
four-dimensionally speaking, determined and laid down from the beginning). I thus felt that if
a theory is found to be non-scientific, or ‘metaphysical’ (as we might say), it is not thereby
found to be unimportant, or insignificant, or ‘meaningless’, or ‘nonsensical’.5 But it cannot
‘Clinical observations’, like all other observations, are interpretations in the light of theories
(see below, sections iv ff.); and for this reason alone they are apt to seem to support those
theories in the light of which they were interpreted. But real support can be obtained only
from observations undertaken as tests (by ‘attempted refutations’); and for this purpose
criteria of refutation have to be laid down beforehand: it must be agreed which observable
situations, if actually observed, mean that the theory is refuted. But what kind of clinical
responses would refute to the satisfaction of the analyst not merely a particular analytic
diagnosis but psycho-analysis itself? And have such criteria ever been discussed or agreed
upon by analysts? Is there not, on the contrary, a whole family of analytic concepts, such as
‘ambivalence’ (I do not suggest that there is no such thing as ambivalence), which would
make it difficult, if not impossible, to agree upon such criteria? Moreover, how much
headway has been made in investigating the question of the extent to which the (conscious or
unconscious) expectations and theories held by the analyst influence the clinical responses of
the patient? (To say nothing about the conscious attempts to influence the patient by
proposing interpretations to him, etc.) Years ago I introduced the term ‘Oedipus effect’ to
describe the influence of a theory or expectation or prediction upon the event which it
predicts or describes: it will be remembered that the causal chain leading to Oedipus’
parricide was started by the oracle’s prediction of this event. This is a characteristic and
recurrent theme of such myths, but one which seems to have failed to attract the interest of
the analysts, perhaps not accidentally. (The problem of confirmatory dreams suggested by the
analyst is discussed by Freud, for example in Gesammelte Schriften, in, 1925, where he says
on p. 314: ‘If anybody asserts that most of the dreams which can be utilized in an analysis ...
owe their origin to [the analyst’s] suggestion, then no objection can be made from the point
of view of analytic theory. Yet there is nothing in this fact’, he surprisingly adds, ‘which
would detract from the reliability of our results.)
5
The case of astrology, nowadays a typical pseudo-science, may illustrate this point. It was
attacked, by Aristotelians and other rationalists, down to Newton’s day, for the wrong reasonfor its now Accepted assertion that the planets had an ‘influence’ upon terrestrial (‘sublunar’)
events. In fact Newton’s theory of gravity, and especially the lunar theory of the tides, was
historically speaking an offspring of astrological lore. Newt6n, it seems, was most reluctant
to adopt a theory which came from the same stable as for example the theory that ‘influenza’
epidemics are due to an astral ‘influence’. And Galileo, no doubt for the same reason,
4
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Popper, Conjectures and Refutations
claim to be backed by empirical evidence in the scientific sense-although it may easily be, in
some genetic sense, the ‘result of observation’.
(There were a great many other theories of this pre-scientific or pseudo-scientific [38]
character, some of them, unfortunately, as influential as the Marx. interpretation of history;
for example, the racialist interpretation of history another of those impressive and allexplanatory theories which act upon weak minds like revelations.)
Thus the problem which I tried to solve by proposing the criterion of falsifiability was neither
a problem of meaningfulness or significance, nor a problem of truth or acceptability. It was
the problem of drawing a line (as well as this can be done) between the statements, or
systems of statements, of the empirical sciences, and all other statements-whether they are of
a religious or of a metaphysical character, or simply pseudo-scientific. Years later – it must
have been in 1928 or 1929 – I called this first problem of mine the ‘problem of demarcation’.
The criterion of falsifiability is a solution to this problem of demarcation, for it says that
statements or systems of statements, in order to be ranked as scientific, must be capable of
conflicting with possible, or conceivable, observations.
actually rejected the lunar theory of the tides; and his misgivings about Kepler may easily be
explained by his misgivings about astrology.
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Thomas S. Kuhn
THE STRUCTURE OF SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTIONS
[Second Edition; University of Chicago Press, 1970]
CHAPTER 7: Crisis and the Emergence of Scientific Theories
All the discoveries considered in Section VI were causes of or contributors to paradigm
change. Furthermore, the changes in which these discoveries were implicated were all
destructive as well as constructive. After the discovery had been assimilated, scientists were
able to account for a wider range of natural phenomena or to account with greater precision
for some of those previously known. But that gain was achieved only by discarding some
previously standard beliefs or procedures and, simultaneously, by replacing those
components of the previous paradigm with others. Shifts of this sort are. I have argued,
associated with all discoveries achieved through normal science, excepting only the
unsurprising ones that had been anticipated in all but their details. Discoveries are not,
however, the only sources of these destructive-constructive paradigm changes. In this section
we shall begin to consider the similar, but usually far larger, shifts that result from the
invention of new theories.
Having argued already that in the sciences fact and theory, discovery and invention, are not
categorically and permanently distinct, we can anticipate overlap between this section and the
last. (The impossible suggestion that Priestley first discovered oxygen and Lavoisier then
invented it has its attractions. Oxygen has already been encountered as discovery; we shall
shortly meet it again as invention.) In taking up the emergence of new theories we shall
inevitably extend our understanding of discovery as well. Still, overlap is not identity. The
sorts of discoveries considered in the last section were not, at least singly, responsible for
such paradigm shifts as the Copernican, Newtonian, chemical, and Einsteinian revolutions.
Nor were they responsible for the somewhat smaller, because more exclusively professional,
changes in paradigm produced by the wave theory of light, the dynamical theory of heat, or
Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory. How can theories like these arise from normal science, an
activity even less directed to their pursuit than to that of discoveries?
If awareness of anomaly plays a role in the emergence of new sorts of phenomena, it should
surprise no one that a similar but more profound awareness is prerequisite to all acceptable
changes of theory. On this point historical evidence is, I think, entirely unequivocal. The state
of Ptolemaic astronomy was a scandal before Copernicus’ announcement. 1 Galileo’s
contributions to the study of motion depended closely upon difficulties discovered in
Aristotle’s theory by scholastic critics.2 Newton’s new theory of light and colour originated in
the discovery that none of the existing pre-paradigm theories would account for the length of
the spectrum, and the wave theory that replaced Newton’s was announced in the midst of
growing concern about anomalies in the relation of diffraction and polarization effects to
Newton’s theory.3 Thermodynamics was born from the collision of two existing nineteenth1
A. R. Hall, The Scientific Revolution, 1500-1800 (London, 1954), p. 16.
Marshall Clagett, The Science of Mechanics in the Middle Ages (Madison, Wis., 1959), Parts II-III.
A. Koyré displays a number of medieval elements in Galileo’s thought in his Etudes Galiléennes
(Paris, 1939), particularly Vol. I.
3
For Newton, see T. S. Kuhn, ‘Newton’s Optical Papers,’ in Isaac Newton’s Papers and Letters in
Natural Philosophy 1958), pp. 27-45. For the prelude to the wave theory, see E.T. Whittaker, A
2
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Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
century physical theories, and quantum mechanics from a variety of difficulties surrounding
black-body radiation, specific heats, and the photoelectric effect.4 Furthermore, in all these
cases except that of Newton the awareness of anomaly had lasted so long and penetrated so
deep that one can appropriately describe the fields affected by it as in a state of growing
crisis. Because it demands large-scale paradigm destruction and major shifts in the problems
and techniques of normal science, the emergence of new theories is generally preceded by a
period of pronounced professional insecurity. As one might expect, that insecurity is
generated by the persistent failure of the puzzles of normal science to come out as they
should. Failure of existing rules is the prelude to a search for new ones.
Look first at a particularly famous case of paradigm change, the emergence of Copernican
astronomy. When its predecessor, the Ptolemaic system, was first developed during the last
two centuries before Christ and the first two after, it was admirably successful in predicting
the changing positions of both stars and planets. No other ancient system had performed so
well; for the stars, Ptolemaic astronomy is still widely used today as an engineering
approximation; for the planets, Ptolemy’s predictions were as good as Copernicus’. But to be
admirably successful is never, for a scientific theory, to be completely successful. With
respect both to planetary position and to precession of the equinoxes, predictions made with
Ptolemy’s system never quite conformed with the best available observations. Further reduction of those minor discrepancies constituted many of the principal problems of normal
astronomical research for many of Ptolemy’s successors, just as a similar attempt to bring
celestial observation and Newtonian theory together provided normal research problems for
Newton’s eighteenth-century successors. For some time astronomers had every reason to
suppose that these attempts would be as successful as those that had led to Ptolemy’s system.
Given a particular discrepancy, astronomers were invariably able to eliminate it by making
some particular adjustment in Ptolemy’s system of compounded circles. But as time went on,
a man looking at the net result of the normal research effort of many astronomers could
observe that astronomy’s complexity was increasing far more rapidly than its accuracy and
that a discrepancy corrected in one place was likely to show up in another.5
Because the astronomical tradition was repeatedly interrupted from outside and because, in
the absence of printing, communication between astronomers was restricted, these difficulties
were only slowly recognized. But awareness did come. By the thirteenth century Alfonso X
could proclaim that if God had consulted him when creating the universe, he would have
received good advice. In the sixteenth century, Copernicus’ co-worker, Domenico da Novara,
held that no system so cumbersome and inaccurate as the Ptolemaic had become could
possibly be true of nature. And Copernicus himself wrote in the Preface to the De
Revolutionibus that the astronomical tradition he inherited had finally created only a monster.
By the early sixteenth century an increasing number of Europe’s best astronomers were
realizing that the astronomical paradigm was failing in application to its own traditional
problems. That recognition was prerequisite to Copernicus’ rejection of the Ptolemaic
History of the Theories of Aether and Electricity, I (2nd ed; London, 1951), 94-109; and W.
Whewell, History of the Inductive Sciences (rev. ed,; London, 1847), II, 396-466.
4
For thermodynamics, see Silvanus P. Thompson, Life of William Thomson Baron Kelvin of Largs
(London, 1910), I, 266-81. For the quantum theory, see Fritz Reiche, The Quantum Theory, trans. H.
S. Hatfield and II. L. Brose (London, 1922), chaps. i-ii.
5
L. E. Dreyer, A History of Astronomy from Thales to Kepler (2d ed.; New York, 1953), chaps. xi-xii.
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Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
paradigm and his search for a new one. His famous preface still provides one of the classic
descriptions of a crisis state.6
Breakdown of the normal technical puzzle-solving activity is not, of course, the only
ingredient of the astronomical crisis that faced Copernicus. An extended treatment would also
discuss the social pressure for calendar reform, a pressure that made the puzzle of precession
particularly urgent. In addition, a fuller account would consider medieval criticism of
Aristotle, the rise of Renaissance Neoplatonism, and other significant historical elements
besides. But technical breakdown would still remain the core of the crisis. In a mature science
– and astronomy had become that in antiquity – external factors like those cited above are
principally significant in determining the timing of breakdown, the ease with which it can be
recognized, and the area in which, because it is given particular attention, the breakdown first
occurs. Though immensely important, issues of that sort are out of bounds for this essay.
If that much is clear in the case of the Copernican revolution, let us turn from it to a second
and rather different example, the crisis that preceded the emergence of Lavoisier’s oxygen
theory of combustion. In the 1770’s many factors combined to generate a crisis in chemistry,
and historians are not altogether agreed about either their nature or their relative importance.
But two of them are generally accepted as of first-rate significance the rise of pneumatic
chemistry and the question of weight relations. The history of the first begins in the
seventeenth century with development of the air pump and its deployment in chemical
experimentation. During the following century, using that pump and a number of other
pneumatic devices, chemists came increasingly to realize that air must be an active ingredient
in chemical reactions. But with a few exceptions – so equivocal that they may not be
exceptions at all – chemists continued to believe that air was the only sort of gas. Until 1756,
when Joseph Black showed that fixed air (CO2) was consistently distinguishable from normal
air, two samples of gas were thought to be distinct only in their impurities.7
After Black’s work the investigation of gases proceeded rapidly, most notably in the hands of
Cavendish, Priestley, and Scheele, who together developed a number of new techniques
capable of distinguishing one sample of gas from another. All these men, from Black through
Scheele, believed in the phlogiston theory and often employed it in their design and
interpretation of experiments. Scheele actually first produced oxygen by an elaborate chain of
experiments designed to dephlogisticate heat. Yet the net result of their experiments was a
variety of gas samples and gas properties so elaborate that the phlogiston theory proved
increasingly little able to cope with laboratory experience. Though none of these chemists
suggested that the theory should be replaced, they were unable to apply it consistently. By the
time Lavoisier began his experiments on airs in the early 1770’s, there were almost as many
versions of the phlogiston theory as there were pneumatic chemists.8 That proliferation of
versions of a theory is a very usual symptom of crisis. In his preface, Copernicus complained
of it as well.
The increasing vagueness and decreasing utility of the phlogiston theory for pneumatic
chemistry were not, however, the source of the crisis that confronted Lavoisier. He was also
much concerned to explain the gain in weight that most bodies experience when burned or
6
T. S. Kuhn, The Copernican Revolution (Cambridge, Mass., 1957), pp. 135-43.
J. R. Partington, A Short History of Chemistry (2d ed.; London, 1951), pp. 48-51, 73-85, 90-120.
8
Though their main concern is with a slightly later period, much relevant material is scattered
throughout J. R. Partington and Douglas McKie’s ‘Historical Studies on the Phlogiston Theory,’
Annals of Science, II (1937), 361404; III (1938), 1-58, 337-71; and IV (1939), 337-71.
7
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Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
roasted, and that again is a problem with a long prehistory. At least a few Islamic chemists
had known that some metals gain weight when roasted. In the seventeenth century several
investigators had concluded from this same fact that a roasted metal takes up some ingredient
from the atmosphere. But in the seventeenth century that conclusion seemed unnecessary to
most chemists. If chemical reactions could alter the volume, colour, and texture of the
ingredients, why should they not alter weight as well? Weight was not always taken to be the
measure of quantity of matter. Besides, weight-gain on roasting remained an isolated
phenomenon. Most natural bodies (e.g., wood) lose weight on roasting as the phlogiston
theory was later to say they should.
During the eighteenth century, however, these initially adequate responses to the problem of
weight-gain became increasingly difficult to maintain. Partly because the balance was increasingly used as a standard chemical tool and partly because the development of pneumatic
chemistry made it possible and desirable to retain the gaseous products of reactions, chemists
discovered more and more cases in which weight-gain accompanied roasting.
Simultaneously, the gradual assimilation of Newton’s gravitational theory led chemists to
insist that gain in weight must mean gain in quantity of matter. Those conclusions did not
result in rejection of the phlogiston theory, for that theory could be adjusted in many ways.
Perhaps phlogiston had negative weight, or perhaps fire particles or something else entered
the roasted body as phlogiston left it. There were other explanations besides. But if the
problem of weight-gain did not lead to rejection, it did lead to an increasing number of
special studies in which this problem bulked large. One of them, “On phlogiston considered
as a substance with weight and [analyzed] in terms of the weight changes it produces in
bodies with which it unites,” was read to the French Academy early in 1772, the year which
closed with Lavoisier’s delivery of his famous sealed note to the Academy’s Secretary.
Before that note was written a problem that had been at the edge of the chemist’s
consciousness for many years had become an outstanding unsolved puzzle.9 Many different
versions of the phlogiston theory were being elaborated to meet it. Like the problems of
pneumatic chemistry, those of weight-gain were making it harder and harder to know what
the phlogiston theory was. Though still believed and trusted as a working tool, a paradigm of
eighteenth-century chemistry was gradually losing its unique status. Increasingly, the
research it guided resembled that conducted under the competing schools of the pre-paradigm
period, another typical effect of crisis.
Consider now, as a third and final example, the late nineteenth century crisis in physics that
prepared the way for the emergence of relativity theory. One root of that crisis can be traced
to the late seventeenth century when a number of natural philosophers, most notably Leibniz,
criticized Newton’s retention of an updated version of the classic conception of absolute
space.10 They were very nearly, though never quite, able to show that absolute positions and
absolute motions were without any function at all in Newton’s system; and they did succeed
in hinting at the considerable aesthetic appeal a fully relativistic conception of space and
motion would later come to display. But their critique was purely logical. Like the early
Copernicans who criticized Aristotle’s proofs of the earth’s stability, they did not dream that
transition to a relativistic system could have observational consequences. At no point did they
H. Guerlac, Lavoisier – the Crucial Year (Ithaca, N.Y., 1961). The entire book documents the
evolution and first recognition of a crisis. For a clear statement of the situation with respect to
Lavoisier, see p. 35.
10
Max Tammer, Concepts of Space: The History of Theories of Space in Physics (Cambridge, Mass.,
1954), pp. 114-24.
9
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Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
relate their views to any problems that arose when applying Newtonian theory to nature. As a
result, their views died with them during the early decades of the eighteenth century to be
resurrected only in the last decades of the nineteenth when they lead a very different relation
to the practice of physics.
The technical problems to which a relativistic philosophy of space was ultimately to be
related began to enter normal science with the acceptance of the wave theory of light after
about 1815, though they evoked no crisis until the 1890’s. If light is wave motion propagated
in a mechanical ether governed by Newton’s Laws, then both celestial observation and
terrestrial experiment become potentially capable of detecting drift through the ether. Of the
celestial observations, only those of aberration promised sufficient accuracy to provide
relevant information, and the detection of ether-drift by aberration measurements therefore
became a recognized problem for normal research. Much special equipment was built to
resolve it. That equipment, however, detected no observable drift, and the problem was
therefore transferred from the experimentalists and observers to the theoreticians. During the
central decades of the century Fresnel, Stokes, and others devised numerous articulations of
the ether theory designed to explain the failure to observe drift. Each of these articulations
assumed that a moving body drags some fraction of the ether with it. And each was
sufficiently successful to explain the negative results not only of celestial observation but also
of terrestrial experimentation, including the famous experiment of Michelson and Morley.11
There was still no conflict excepting that between the various articulations. In the absence of
relevant experimental techniques, that conflict never became acute.
The situation changed again only with the gradual acceptance of Maxwell’s electromagnetic
theory in the last two decades of the nineteenth century. Maxwell himself was a Newtonian
who believed that light and electromagnetism in general were due to variable displacements
of the particles of a mechanical ether. His earliest versions of a theory for electricity and
magnetism made direct use of hypothetical properties with which he endowed this medium.
These were dropped from his final version, but he still believed his electromagnetic theory
compatible with some articulation of the Newtonian mechanical view.12 Developing a
suitable articulation was a challenge for him and his successors. In practice, however, as has
happened again and again in scientific development, the required articulation proved
immensely difficult to produce, just as Copernicus’ astronomical proposal, despite the
optimism of its author, created an increasing crisis for existing theories of motion, so
Maxwell’s theory, despite its Newtonian origin, ultimately produced a crisis for the paradigm
from which it had sprung.13 Furthermore, the locus at which that crisis became most acute
was provided by the problems we have just been considering, those of motion with respect to
the ether.
Maxwell’s discussion of the electromagnetic behaviour of bodies in motion had made no
reference to ether drag, and it proved very difficult to introduce such drag into his theory. As
a result, a whole series of earlier observations designed to detect drift through the ether
became anomalous. The years after 1890 therefore witnessed a long series of attempts, both
experimental and theoretical, to detect motion with respect to the ether and to work ether drag
Joseph Larmor, Aether and Matter ... Including a Discussion of the Influence of the Earth’s Motion
on Optical Phenomena (Cambridge, 1900), pp. 6-20, 320-22.
12
R. T. Clazebrook, James Clerk Maxwell and Modem Physics (London, 1896), chap. ix. For
Maxwell’s final attitude, see his own book, A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism (3d ed.; Oxford,
1892), p. 470.
13
For astronomy’s role in the development of mechanics, see Kuhn, op. cit., chap. vii.
11
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Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
into Maxwell’s theory. The former were uniformly unsuccessful, though some analysts
thought their results equivocal. The latter produced a number of. promising starts, particularly
those of Lorentz and Fitzgerald, but they also disclosed still other puzzles and finally resulted
in just that proliferation of competing theories that we have previously found to be the
concomitant of crisis.14 It is against that historical setting that Einstein’s special theory of
relativity emerged in 1905.
These three examples are almost entirely typical. In each case a novel theory emerged only
after a pronounced failure in the normal problem-solving activity. Furthermore, except for the
case of Copernicus in which factors external to science, played a particularly large role, that
breakdown and the proliferation of theories that is its sign occurred no more than a decade or
two before the new theory’s enunciation. The novel theory seems a direct response to crisis.
Note also, though this may not be quite so typical, that the problems with respect to which
breakdown occurred were all of a type that had long been recognized. Previous practice of
normal science had given every reason to consider them solved or all but solved, which helps
to explain why the sense of failure, when it came, could be so acute. Failure with a new sort
of problem is often disappointing but never surprising. Neither problems nor puzzles yield
often to the first attack. Finally, these examples share another characteristic that may help to
make the case for the role of crisis impressive: the solution to each of them had been at least
partially anticipated during a period when there was no crisis in the corresponding science;
and in the absence of crisis those anticipations had been ignored.
The only complete anticipation is also the most famous, that of Copernicus by Aristarchus in
the third century B.C. It is often said that if Creek science had been less deductive and less
ridden by dogma, heliocentric astronomy might have begun its development eighteen
centuries earlier than it did.15 But that, is to ignore all historical context. When Aristarchus’
suggestion was made, the vastly more reasonable geocentric system had no needs that a
heliocentric system might even conceivably have fulfilled. The whole development of
Ptolemaic astronomy, both its triumphs and its breakdown, falls in the centuries after Aristarchus’ proposal. Besides, there were no obvious reasons for taking Aristarchus seriously.
Even Copernicus’ more elaborate proposal was neither simpler nor more accurate than
Ptolemy’s system. Available observational tests, as we shall see more clearly below, provided
no basis for a choice between them. Under those circumstances, one of the factors that led
astronomers to Copernicus (and one that could not have led them to Aristarchus) was the
recognized crisis that had been responsible for innovation in the first place. Ptolemaic
astronomy had failed to solve its problems; the time had come to give a competitor a chance.
Our other two examples provide no similarly full anticipations. But surely one reason why
the theories of combustion by absorption from the atmosphere – theories developed in the
seventeenth century by Rey, Hooke, and Mayow – failed to get a sufficient hearing was that
they made no contact with a recognized trouble spot in normal scientific practice.16 And the
long neglect by eighteenth- and nineteenth-century scientists of Newton’s relativistic critics
must largely have been due to a similar failure in confrontation.
14
Whittaker, op. cit., I, 386-410; and II (London, 1953), 27-40.
For Aristarchus’ work, see T. L. Heath, Aristarchus of Samos: The Ancient Copernicus (Oxford,
1913), Part II. For an extreme statement of the traditional position about the neglect of Aristarchus’
achievement, see Arthur Koestler, The Sleepwalkers: A History of Man’s Changing Vision of the
Universe (London, 1959), p 50.
16
Partington, op. cit., pp. 78-85.
15
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Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
Philosophers of science have repeatedly demonstrated that more than one theoretical
construction can always be placed upon a given collection of data. History of science
indicates that, particularly in the early developmental stages of a new paradigm, it is not even
very difficult to invent such alternates. But that invention of alternates is just what scientists
seldom undertake except during the pre-paradigm stage of their science’s development and at
very special occasions during its subsequent evolution. So long as the tools a paradigm
supplies continue to prove capable of solving the problems it defines, science moves fastest
and penetrates most deeply through confident employment of those tools. The reason is clear.
As in manufacture so in science - retooling is an extravagance to be reserved for the occasion
that demands it. The significance of crises is the indication they provide that an occasion for
retooling has arrived.
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CHAPTER 13: Progress through Revolutions
The preceding pages have carried my schematic description of scientific development as far
as it can go in this essay. Nevertheless, they cannot quite provide a conclusion. If this
description has at all caught the essential structure of a science’s continuing evolution, it will
simultaneously have posed a special problem: Why should the enterprise sketched above
move steadily ahead in ways that, say, art, political theory, or philosophy does not? Why is
progress a perquisite reserved almost exclusively for the activities we call science? The most
usual answers to that question have been denied in the body of this essay. We must conclude
it by asking whether substitutes can be found.
Notice immediately that part of the question is entirely semantic. To a very great extent the
term ‘science’ is reserved for fields that do progress in obvious ways. Nowhere does this
show more clearly than in the recurrent debates about whether one or another of the
contemporary social sciences is really a science. These debates have parallels in the preparadigm periods of fields that are today unhesitatingly labelled science. Their ostensible
issue throughout is a definition of that vexing term. Men argue that psychology, for example,
is a science because it possesses such and such characteristics. Others counter that those
characteristics are either unnecessary or not sufficient to make a field a science. Often great
energy is invested, great passion aroused, and the outsider is at a loss to know why. Can very
much depend upon a definition of ‘science’? Can a definition tell a man whether he is a
scientist or not? If so, why do not natural scientists or artists worry about the definition of the
term? Inevitably one suspects that the issue is more fundamental. Probably questions like the
following are really being asked: Why does my field fail to move ahead in the way that, say,
physics does? What changes in technique or method or ideology would enable it to do so?
These are not, however, questions that could respond to an agreement on definition.
Furthermore, if precedent from the natural sciences serves, they will cease to be a source of
concern not when a definition is found, but when the groups that now doubt their own status
achieve consensus about their past and present accomplishments. It may, for example, be
significant that economists argue less about whether their field is a science than do
practitioners of some other fields of social science. Is that because economists know what
science is? Or is it rather economics about which they agree?
That point has a converse that, though no longer simply semantic, may help to display the
inextricable connections between our notions of science and of progress. For many centuries,
both in antiquity and again in early modem Europe, painting was regarded as the cumulative
discipline. During those years the artist’s goal was assumed to be representation. Critics and
historians, like Pliny and Vasari, then recorded with veneration the series of inventions from
foreshortening through chiaroscuro that had made possible successively more perfect
representations of nature.1 But those are also the years, particularly during the Renaissance,
when little cleavage was felt between the sciences and the arts. Leonardo was only one of
many men who passed freely back and forth between fields that only later became
categorically distinct.2 Furthermore, even after that steady exchange had ceased, the term ‘are
continued to apply as much to technology and the crafts, which were also seen as
progressive) as to painting and sculpture. Only when the latter unequivocally renounced
1
E. H. Gombrich, Art and Illusion: A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation (New York,
1960), pp. 11-12.
2
Ibid., p. 97; and Giorgio de Santillana, ‘The Role of Art in the Scientific Renaissance,’ in Critical
Problems in the History of Science, ed. M. Clagett (Madison, Wis., 1959), pp. 33-65.
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representation as their goal and began to learn again from primitive models did the cleavage
we now take for granted assume anything like its present depth. And even today, to switch
fields once more, part of our difficulty in seeing the profound differences between science
and technology must relate to the fact that progress is an obvious attribute of both fields.
It can, however, only clarify, not solve, our present difficulty to recognize that we tend to see
as science any field in which progress is marked. There remains the problem of
understanding why progress should be so noteworthy a characteristic of an enterprise
conducted with the techniques and goals this essay has described. That question proves to be
several in one, and we shall have to consider each of them separately. In all cases but the last,
however, their resolution will depend in part upon an inversion of our normal view of the
relation between scientific activity and the community that practices it. We must learn to
recognize as causes what have ordinarily been taken to be effects. If we can do that, the
phrases ‘scientific progress’ and even ‘scientific objectivity’ may come to seem in part
redundant. In fact, one aspect of the redundancy has just been illustrated. Does a field make
progress because it is a science, or is it a science because it makes progress?
Ask now why an enterprise like normal science should progress, and begin by recalling a few
of its most salient characteristics. Normally, the members of a mature scientific community
work from a single paradigm or from a closely related set. Very rarely do different scientific
communities investigate the same problems. In those exceptional cases the groups hold
several major paradigms in common. Viewed from within any single community, however,
whether of scientists or of non-scientists, the result of successful creative work is progress.
How could it possibly be anything else? We have, for example, just noted that while artists
aimed at representation as their goal, both critics and historians chronicled the progress of the
apparently united group. Other creative fields display progress of the same sort. The
theologian who articulates dogma or the philosopher who refines the Kantian imperatives
contributes to progress, if only to that of the group that shares his premises. No creative
school recognizes a category of work that is, on the one hand, a creative success, but is not,
on the other, an addition to the collective achievement of the group. If we doubt, as many do,
that non-scientific fields make progress, that cannot be because individual schools make
none. Rather, it must be because there are always competing schools, each of which
constantly questions the very foundations of the others. The man who argues that philosophy,
for example, has made no progress emphasizes that there are still Aristotelians, not that
Aristotelianism has failed to progress.
These doubts about progress arise, however, in the sciences too. Throughout the preparadigm period when there is a multiplicity of competing schools, evidence of progress,
except within schools, is very hard to find. This is the period described in Section 11 as one
during which individuals practice science, but in which the results of their enterprise do not
add up to science as we know it. And again, during periods of revolution when the
fundamental tenets of a field are once more at issue, doubts are repeatedly expressed about
the very possibility of continued progress if one or another of the opposed paradigms is
adopted. Those who rejected Newtonianism proclaimed that its reliance upon innate forces
would return science to the Dark Ages. Those who opposed Lavoisier’s chemistry held that
the rejection of chemical “principles” in favour of laboratory elements was the rejection of
achieved chemical explanation by those who would take refuge in a mere name. A similar,
though more moderately expressed, feeling seems to underlie the opposition of Einstein,
Bohm, and others, to the dominant probabilistic interpretation of quantum mechanics. In
short, it is only during periods of normal science that progress seems both obvious and
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assured. During those periods, however, the scientific community could view the fruits of its
work in no other way.
With respect to normal science then, part of the answer to the problem of progress lies simply
in the eye of the beholder. Scientific progress is not different in kind from progress in other
fields, but the absence at most times of competing schools that question each other’s aims and
standards makes the progress of a normal-scientific community far easier to see. That,
however, is only part of the answer and by no means the most important part. We have, for
example, already noted that once the reception of a common paradigm has freed the scientific
community from the need constantly to re-examine its first principles, the members of that
community can concentrate exclusively upon the subtlest and most esoteric of the phenomena
that concern It. Inevitably, that does increase both the effectiveness and the efficiency with
which the group as a whole solves new problems. Other aspects of professional life in the
sciences enhance this very special efficiency still further.
Some of these are consequences of the unparalleled insulation of mature scientific
communities from the demands of the laity and of everyday life. That insulation has never
been complete – we are now discussing matters of degree. Nevertheless, there are no other
professional communities in which individual creative work is so exclusively addressed to
and evaluated by other members of the profession. The most esoteric of poets or the most
abstract of theologians is far more concerned than the scientist with lay approbation of his
creative work, though he may be even less concerned with approbation in general. That
difference proves consequential. Just because he is working only for an audience of
colleagues, an audience that shares his own values and beliefs, the scientist can take a single
set of standards for granted. He need not worry about what some other group or school will
think and can therefore dispose of one problem and get on to the next more quickly than
those who work for a more heterodox group. Even more important, the insulation of the
scientific community from society permits the individual scientist to concentrate his attention
upon problems that he has good reason to believe he will be able to solve. Unlike the
engineer, and many doctors, and most theologians, the scientist need not choose problems
because they urgently need solution and without regard for the tools available to solve them.
In this respect, also, the contrast between natural scientists and many social scientists proves
instructive. The latter often tend, as the former almost never do, to def end their choice of a
research problem – e.g., the effects of racial discrimination or the causes of the business cycle
– chiefly in terms of the social importance of achieving a solution. Which group would one
then expect to solve problems at a more rapid rate?
The effects of insulation from the larger society are greatly intensified by another
characteristic of the professional scientific community, the nature of its educational initiation.
In music, the graphic arts, and literature, the practitioner gains his education by exposure to
the works of other artists, principally earlier artists. Textbooks, except compendia of or
handbooks to original creations, have only a secondary role. In history, philosophy, and the
social sciences, textbook literature has a greater significance. But even in these fields the
elementary college course employs parallel readings in original sources, some of them the
“classics” of the field, others the contemporary research reports that practitioners write for
each other. As a result, the student in any one of these disciplines is constantly made aware of
the immense variety of problems that the members of his future group have, in the course of
time, attempted to solve. Even more important, he has constantly before him a number of
competing and incommensurable solutions to these problems solutions that he must
ultimately evaluate for himself.
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Contrast this situation with that in at least the contemporary natural sciences. In these fields
the student relies mainly on in his third or fourth year of graduate works he textbooks until,
begins his own research. Many science curricula do not ask even graduate students to read in
works not written specially for students. The few that do assign supplementary reading in
research papers and monographs restrict such assignments to the most advanced courses and
to materials that take up more or less where the available texts leave off. Until the very last
stages in the education of a scientist, textbooks are systematically substituted for the creative
scientific literature that made them possible. Given the confidence in their paradigms) which
makes this educational technique possible, few scientists would wish to change it. Why, after
all, should the student of physics, for example, read the works of Newton, Faraday, Einstein,
or Schrödinger, when everything he needs to know about these works is recapitulated in a far
briefer, more precise, and more systematic form in a number of up-to-date textbooks?
Without wishing to defend the excessive lengths to which this type of education has
occasionally been carried, one cannot help but notice that in general it has been immensely
effective. Of course, it is a narrow and rigid education, probably more so than any other
except perhaps in orthodox theology. But for normal-scientific work, for puzzle-solving
within the tradition that the textbooks define, the scientist is almost perfectly equipped.
Furthermore, he is well equipped for another task as well-the generation through normal
science of significant crises. When they arise, the scientist is not, of course, equally well
prepared. Even though prolonged crises are probably reflected in less rigid educational
practice, scientific training is not well designed to produce the man who will easily discover a
fresh approach. But so long as somebody appears with a new candidate for paradigm-usually
a young man or one new to the field-the loss due to rigidity accrues only to the individual.
Given a generation in which to effect the change, individual rigidity is compatible with a
community that can switch from paradigm to paradigm when the occasion demands.
Particularly, it is compatible when that very rigidity provides the community with a sensitive
indicator that something has gone wrong.
In its normal state, then, a scientific community is an immensely efficient instrument for
solving the problems or puzzles that its paradigms define. Furthermore, the result of solving
those problems must inevitably be progress. There is no problem here. Seeing that much,
however, only highlights the second main part of the problem of progress in the sciences. Let
us therefore turn to it and ask about progress through extraordinary science. Why should
progress also be the apparently universal concomitant of scientific revolutions? Once again,
there is much to be learned by asking what else the result of a revolution could be.
Revolutions close with a total victory for one of the two opposing camps. Will that group
ever say that the result of its victory has been something less than progress? That would be
rather like admitting that they had been wrong and their opponents right. To them, at least,
the outcome of revolution must be progress, and they are in an excellent position to make
certain that future members of their community will see past history in the same way. Section
XI described in detail the techniques by which this is accomplished, and we have just recurred to a closely related aspect of professional scientific life. When it repudiates a past
paradigm, a scientific community simultaneously renounces, as a fit subject for professional
scrutiny, most of the books and articles in which that paradigm had been embodied. Scientific
education makes use of no equivalent for the art museum or the library of classics, and the
result is a sometimes drastic distortion in the scientist’s perception of his discipline’s past.
More than the practitioners of other creative fields, he comes to see it as leading in a straight
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line to the discipline’s present vantage. In short, he comes to see it as progress. No alternative
is available to him while he remains in the field.
Inevitably those remarks will suggest that the member of a mature scientific community is,
like the typical character of Orwell’s 1984, the victim of a history rewritten by the powers
that be. Furthermore, that suggestion is not altogether inappropriate. There are losses as well
as gains in scientific revolutions, and scientists tend to be peculiarly blind to the former.3 On
the other hand, no explanation of progress through revolutions may stop at this point. To do
so would be to imply that in the sciences might makes right, a formulation which would again
not be entirely wrong if it did not suppress the nature of the process and of the authority by
which the choice between paradigms is made. If authority alone, and particularly if nonprofessional authority, were the arbiter of paradigm debates, the outcome of those debates
might still be revolution, but it would not be scientific revolution. The very existence of
science depends upon vesting the power to choose between paradigms in the members of a
special kind of community. Just how special that community must he if science is to survive
and grow may be indicated by the very tenuousness of humanity’s hold on the scientific
enterprise. Every civilization of which we have records has possessed a technology, an art, a
religion, a political system, laws, and so on. In many cases those facets of civilization have
been as developed as our own. But only the civilizations that descend from Hellenic Greece
have possessed more than the most rudimentary science. The bulk of scientific knowledge is
a product of Europe in the last four centuries. No other place and time has supported the very
special communities from which scientific productivity comes.
What are the essential characteristics of these communities? Obviously, they need vastly
more study. In this area only the most tentative generalizations are possible. Nevertheless, a
number of requisites for membership in a professional scientific group must already be
strikingly clear. The scientist must, for example, be concerned to solve problems about the
behaviour of nature. In addition, though his concern with nature may be global in its extent,
the problems on which he works must be problems of detail. More important, the solutions
that satisfy him may not be merely personal but must instead be accepted as solutions by
many. The group that shares them may not, however, be drawn at random from society as a
whole, but is rather the well-defined community of the scientist’s professional compeers. One
of the strongest, if still unwritten, rules of scientific life is the prohibition of appeals to heads
of state or to the populace at large in matters scientific. Recognition of the existence of a
uniquely competent professional group and acceptance of its role as the exclusive arbiter of
professional achievement has further implications. The group’s members, as individuals and
by virtue of their shared training and experience, must be seen as the sole possessors of the
rules of the game or of some equivalent basis for unequivocal judgments. To doubt that they
shared some such basis for evaluations would be to admit the existence of incompatible
standards of scientific achievement. That admission would inevitably raise the question
whether truth in the sciences can be one.
This small list of characteristics common to scientific communities has been drawn entirely
from the practice of normal science, and it should have been. That is the activity for which
the scientist is ordinarily trained. Note, however, that despite its small size the list is already
3
Historians of science often encounter this blindness in a particularly striking form. The group of
students who come to them from the sciences is very often the most rewarding group they teach. But
it is also usually the most frustrating at the start. Because science students “know the right answers,” it
is particularly difficult to make them analyse an older science in its own terms.
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sufficient to set such communities apart from all other professional groups. And note, in
addition, that despite its source in normal science the list accounts for many special features
of the group’s response during revolutions and particularly during paradigm debates. We
have already observed that a group of this sort must see a paradigm change as progress. Now
we may recognize that the perception is, in important respects, self-fulfilling. The scientific
community is a supremely efficient instrument for maximizing the number and precision of
the problem solved through paradigm change.
Because the unit of scientific achievement is the solved problem and because the group
knows well which problems have already been solved, few scientists will easily be persuaded
to adopt a viewpoint that again opens to question many problems that had previously been
solved. Nature itself must first under mine professional security by making prior
achievements seem problematic. Furthermore, even when that has occurred and a new
candidate for paradigm has been evoked, scientists will be reluctant to embrace it unless
convinced that two all-important conditions are being met. First, the new candidate must
seem to resolve some outstanding and generally recognized problem that can be met in no
other way. Second, the new paradigm must promise to preserve a relatively large part of the
concrete problem-solving ability that has accrued to science through its predecessors. Novelty
for its own sake is not a desideratum in the sciences as it is in so many other creative fields.
As a result, though new paradigms seldom or never possess all the capabilities of their
predecessors, they usually preserve a great deal of the most concrete parts of past
achievement and they always permit additional concrete problem-solutions besides. To say
this much is not to suggest that the ability to solve problems is either the unique or an
unequivocal basis for paradigm choice. We have already noted many reasons why there can
be no criterion of that sort. But it does suggest that a community of scientific specialists will
do all that it can to ensure the continuing growth of the assembled data that it can treat with
precision and detail. In the process the community will sustain losses. Often some old
problems must be banished. Frequently, in addition, revolution narrows the scope of the
community’s professional concerns, increases the extent of its specialization, and attenuates
its communication with other groups, both scientific and lay. Though science surely grows in
depth, it may not grow in breadth as well. If it does so, that breadth is manifest mainly in the
proliferation of scientific specialties, not in the scope of any single specialty alone. Yet
despite these and other losses to the individual communities, the nature of such communities
provides a virtual guarantee that both the list of problems solved by science and the precision
of individual problem-solutions will grow and grow. At least, the nature of the community
provides such a guarantee if there is any way at all in which it can be provided. What better
criterion than the decision of the scientific group could there be?
These last paragraphs point the directions in which I believe a more refined solution of the
problem of progress in the sciences must be sought. Perhaps they indicate that scientific
progress is not quite what we had taken it to be. But they simultaneously show that a sort of
progress will inevitably characterize the scientific enterprise so long as such an enterprise
survives. In the sciences there need not be progress of another sort. We may, to be more
precise, have to relinquish the notion, explicit or implicit, that changes of paradigm carry
scientists and those learn from them closer and closer to the truth.
It is now time to notice that until the last very few pages the term ‘truth’ had entered this
essay only in a quotation from Francis Bacon. And even in those pages it entered only as a
source for the scientist’s conviction that incompatible rules for doing science cannot coexist
except during revolutions when the profession’s main task is to eliminate all sets but one. The
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developmental process described in this essay has been a process of evolution from primitive
beginnings-a process whose successive stages are characterized by an increasingly detailed
and refined understanding of nature. But nothing that has been or will be said makes it a
process of evolution toward anything. Inevitably that lacuna will have disturbed many
readers. We are all deeply accustomed to seeing science as the one enterprise that draws
constantly nearer to some goal set by nature in advance.
But need there be any such goal? Can we not account for both science’s existence and its
success in terms of evolution from the community’s state of knowledge at any given time?
Does it really help to imagine that there is some one full, objective, true account of nature and
that the proper measure of scientific achievement is the extent to which it brings us closer to
that ultimate goal? If we can learn to substitute evolution-from-what-we-do-know for
evolution-toward-what-we-wish-to-now, a number of vexing problems may vanish in the
process. Somewhere in this maze, for example, must lie the problem of induction.
I cannot yet specify in any detail the consequences of this alternate view of scientific
advance. But it helps to recognize that the conceptual transposition here recommended is very
close to one that the West undertook just a century ago. It is particularly helpful because in
both cases the main obstacle to transposition is the same. When Darwin first published his
theory of evolution by natural selection in 1859, what most bothered many professionals was
neither the notion of species change nor the possible descent of man from apes. The evidence
pointing to evolution, including the evolution of man, had been accumulating for decades,
and the idea of evolution had been suggested and widely disseminated before. Though
evolution, as such, did encounter resistance, particularly from some religious groups, it was
by no means the greatest of the difficulties the Darwinians faced. That difficulty stemmed
from an idea that was more nearly Darwin’s own. All the well-known pre-Darwinian
evolutionary theories – those of Lamarck, Chambers, Spencer, and the German
Naturphilosophen – had taken evolution to be a goal-directed process. The ‘Idea’ of man and
of the contemporary flora and fauna was thought to have been present from the first creation
of life, perhaps in the mind of God. That idea or plan had provided the direction and the
guiding force to the entire evolutionary process. Each new stage of evolutionary development
was a more perfect realization of a plan that had been present from the start.4
For many men the abolition of that teleological kind of evolution was the most significant
and least palatable of Darwin’s suggestions.5 The Origin of Species recognized no goal set
either by God or nature. Instead, natural selection, operating in the given environment and
with the actual organisms presently at hand, was responsible for the gradual but steady
emergence of more elaborate, further articulated, and vastly more specialized organisms.
Even such marvellously adapted organs as the eye and hand of man-organs whose design had
previously provided powerful arguments for the existence of a supreme artificer and an
advance plan-were products of a process that moved steadily from primitive beginnings but
toward no goal. The belief that natural selection, resulting from mere competition between
organisms for survival, could have produced man together with the higher animals and plants
was the most difficult and disturbing aspect of Darwin’s theory. What could ‘evolution,’
Loren Eiseley, Darwin’s Century: Evolution and the Men Who Discovered It (New York, 1958),
chaps. ii, iv-v.
5
For a particularly acute account of one prominent Darwinian’s struggle with this problem, see A.
Hunter Dupree, Asa Gray, 1810-1888 (Cambridge, Mass., 1959), pp. 295-306, 355-83.
4
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‘development,’ and ‘progress’ mean in the absence of a specified goal? To many people, such
terms suddenly seemed self-contradictory.
The analogy that relates the evolution of organisms to the evolution of scientific ideas can
easily be pushed too far. But with respect to the issues of this closing section it is very nearly
perfect. The process described in Section XII as the resolution of revolutions is the selection
by conflict within the scientific community of the fittest way to practice future science. The
net result of a sequence of such revolutionary selections, separated by periods of normal
research, is the wonderfully adapted set of instruments we call modern scientific knowledge.
Successive stages in that developmental process are marked by an increase in articulation and
specialization. And the entire process may have occurred, as we now suppose biological
evolution did, without benefit of a set goal, a permanent fixed scientific truth, of which each
stage in the development of scientific knowledge is a better exemplar.
Anyone who has followed the argument this far will nevertheless feel the need to ask why the
evolutionary process should work. What must nature, including man, be like in order that
science be possible at all? Why should scientific communities be able to reach a firm
consensus unattainable in other fields? Why should consensus endure across one paradigm
change after another? And why should paradigm change invariably produce an instrument
more perfect in any sense than those known before? From one point of view those questions,
excepting the first, have already been answered. But from another they are as open as they
were when this essay began. It is not only the scientific community that must be special. The
world of which that community is a part must also possess quite special characteristics, and
we are no closer than we were at the start to knowing what these must be. That problem –
What must the world be like in order that man may know it? – was not, however, created by
this essay. On the contrary, it is as old as science itself, and it remains unanswered. But it
need not be answered in this place. Any conception of nature compatible with the growth of
science by proof is compatible with the evolutionary view of science developed here. Since
this view is also compatible with close observation of scientific life, there are strong
arguments for employing it in attempts to solve the host of problems that still remain.
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