Abstract
Beck proceeds to explain the categories as original modes of representing and the principle of the original-synthetic, objective-unity, of consciousness. My discussion of Beck’s unique doctrine emphasizes the fact that it has two aspects: one pertaining to the relation between sensibility and the understanding and the other pertaining to the relation of a representation to an object. The heart of Beck’s unique doctrine is the claim that the relation between a representation and its object is explicable only in terms of an original activity of our own cognition, through which we combine representations and posit them as an object. We can only understand what we mean by ‘an object’ by appealing to the objectifying function of our own understanding. It follows that the thing-in-itself is irrelevant for Kant’s theoretical philosophy, at least for its positive, constitutive part.
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Notes
- 1.
Unlike Kant, Beck does not discuss the role of the categories in judgment but starts immediately from their role in the construction of experience, an exposition, which corresponds to Kant’s discussion of the Principles of Pure Reason. This already shows his tendency to refer to the categories in their schematic rather than pure meaning.
- 2.
The German term ‘Haltung’ in this context means either status or validity.
- 3.
Cf. the corresponding discussion of the nature of pure concepts in Kant’s original doctrine, in Sect. 12.2.2 below.
- 4.
Beck uses the term ‘Größe’ (magnitude) instead of ‘Quantität’ (quantity), although later in his exposition he also uses the term “Quantität” for the same purpose.
- 5.
The identification of the category of quantity with space itself makes explicit Beck’s view of the categories as schematic forms rather as ‘mere categories’ (what Kant terms ‘die bloße Kategorie’), that is, the category in its mere logical form. I shall address this issue in further details as part of the comparison of Beck’s and Kant’s views in Part IV.
- 6.
Beck uses alternatively the terms ‘bestimmen’, ‘festmachen’ or ‘fixieren’ (EmS, 143). The appropriate English terms are ‘determining’, ‘securing’ (in the sense of solidifying), or ‘fixating’, respectively.
- 7.
According to this presentation of the category of quantity, time, unlike space, is not identified with the original synthesis of the homogeneous, which proceeds from the parts to the whole. Rather, time has a role only within the original recognition, equally present in all categories. It should, nevertheless, be noted that in another passage (Grundriß, §10, 8) Beck does mention time, as well as space, as belonging to the original synthesis in the category of quantity: “Time itself is hence an original synthesis of the homogeneous which proceeds from the parts to the whole.” All English translations from the Grundriß are my own.
- 8.
- 9.
Beck refers here to reality, which in Kant’s table of categories is the positive aspect of quality. In the Grundriß Beck refers to this category also as thing-hood (Sachheit). Compare with the Critique of Pure Reason (KrV, A143/B182) where Kant, as well, refers to reality as thing-hood.
- 10.
Once more it should be noted that Beck’s identification of the category of reality with sensation itself (in a similar manner to his identification of the category of quantity with space), shows his schematic, or even outright sensible, understanding of the categories. Cf. note 5 above.
- 11.
The German term used by Beck is “verbundenes Mannigfaltiges”. Note also that the term ‘prior’ should be understood as logically prior.
- 12.
I am not arguing that these two aspects are totally disconnected but only that we can distinguish between them.
- 13.
Beiser’s entire discussion of Kant and the way of ideas (Beiser 2002, 132–147) is in my view an excellent exposition of Kant’s position on these matters.
- 14.
If space, time and the real in things were something prior to the introduction of the original representing they would exist in complete independence of the activity of cognition and thus they would be things ‘in-themselves’.
- 15.
Beck refers to the categories as “ursprüngliche Vorstellungsarten” (original modes of representation) or “ursprüngliche Verstandsgebrauch” (original employment of the understanding). When referring to the categories as modes we do not err if we say that they are modes of representation instead of representing. As modes it is clear that they are not themselves representations but only a way to achieve representations.
- 16.
Compare with Kant’s discussion of the same distinction (KrV, B133f., footnote).
- 17.
This is reminiscent of Kant’s distinction between judgments of perception and judgments of experience in the Prolegomena §18 (AA 04: 298). However, in making the above distinction, Beck does not intend judgments, concepts and objects, which, in his view, properly pertain to discursive, derived representation only. Cf. also note 18 below. Beck views the function of the original recognition as expressing the “transcendental schematism of the category” (EmS, 142).
- 18.
One must note that by the above distinction between the subjective and the objective unity of consciousness Beck refers only to the determinacy of our synthesis. The objective character obtained through the original recognition should be distinguished from the positing of a certain synthesis as something persistent or as a cause, a result achieved by the categories of relation, to be discussed in the following paragraphs. In my view, such confusion occasioned Adickes’ criticism of Beck, which – regardless of its validity – should be directed at Beck’s doctrine of the act of positing rather than against his notion of original recognition. Adickes argues that “The original recognition, and the creation of the concrete which it affects are the darkest points in Beck’s theory […] It is not readily intelligible how Beck, with this standpoint in theoretical philosophy, could reject the Fichtean conclusion, that the understanding makes the thing […]” (Adickes 1920, 610; 1970, 175). The English translation of Adickes is my own. Another author, who similarly conflates the function of original recognition and that of original positing, is Dilthey, (1889, 647). Moreover, the objective character obtained through the original recognition should not be confused with a representation of an object, which is obtained only through conceptual, discursive representing rather that within the primitive stage of original representing. We must take care not to be misled by the terminology used and be attentive to the inner structure of Beck’s thought (for such a confusion followed by a criticism of Beck, cf. Edmund Heller (1993, 93f.)). Beck himself constantly reminds us that although we cannot but discuss the original representing by resorting to words and thus to concepts, the subject of our discussion is an original mode of representing in which there is yet no distinction between the representation itself and a distinct object.
- 19.
Cf. also in the Grundriß (§12, 9f.), where Beck describes all three categories of relation in a single paragraph.
- 20.
Cf. Kant’s distinction between the figurative synthesis (synthesis speciosa) and the intellectual synthesis (synthesis intellectualis), (KrV, §24, B151).
- 21.
The example of the geometer also demonstrates the growing difficulties with this view as we move from the mathematical to the dynamical categories. It is one thing to think of the synthesis of space as united with space itself but it is quite another to think of substance, causality and reciprocity as something sensible. Beck later explains this discrepancy between his view and Kant’s text by the method used by Kant to bring the reader slowly to the highest point of his critical philosophy. The detailed comparison between Kant’s and Beck’s views shall be done in Part IV. At this stage of the discussion I wish to focus on the presentation of Beck’s doctrine and I only note these aspects to enable better understanding of Beck’s own intentions.
- 22.
Strangely Beck describes the original synthesis in the category of substance by referring to predicates or properties. These terms seem more appropriate to conceptual thought rather than to the original mode of representing. I think that this aberration indicates Beck’s difficulties in referring to substance in sensible terms.
- 23.
Compare KrV, B110, where Kant distinguishes the categories of quantity and quality, which he calls ‘mathematical’, from those of relation and modality, which he calls “dynamic”. The mathematical categories are “concerned with objects of intuition (pure as well as empirical)” while the dynamical categories are “directed at the existence of these objects (either in relation to each other or to the understanding)”.
- 24.
In order to understand what is meant by a relation to an object “in general” Beck suggests to us to imagine that we are transposed into a world completely unknown to us. Nothing we see can be described in the terms known to us. In such a situation we could not refer to the objects in front of us by using concepts for no concepts in our possession would apply to them. However, these objects would still be objects to us. They would be objects simply due to our ability to represent whatever appears to us as an object or something in general. I must note that such a drastic situation is quite impossible. As strange as this world would be we could always use some basic and general concepts to refer to whatever we encounter there (one could still characterize what he sees in terms of shape, color, etc.). Still I think that this example is useful to understand Beck’s intentions. He means something, which we find very hard (even if not impossible) to characterize and yet it is an object for us.
- 25.
Compare my reading of Beck against the view of Angelica Nuzzo (2007). She argues that similarly to Maimon, “Beck rejects the idea of all true “affection” […] For Beck, there are no things in themselves, and hence no affection through them is possible.” This way of posing the problem already makes clear that Nuzzo understands the issue of affection in metaphysical terms. Otherwise she would not have deduced from Beck’s rejection of the thing-in-itself the strange conclusion that Beck allegedly rejects all “true affection”. She then continues: “And yet, since there must be (somehow) an affection in order for representations to be produced, Beck concludes that this affection must come from appearance. This is a clear circle: we produce appearances through the “original act of representing”, and we are affected by appearance, whereby representations are produced in us.” (Nuzzo 2007, 163). Beck’s account seems to Nuzzo to express a vicious circle since she expects the transcendental account to justify the empirical appeal to an object distinguished from our representations by anchoring this appeal in a thing-in-itself, wholly independent of cognition. However, once we recognize that on Beck’s view, the role of the transcendental account it not to justify the empirical account but merely to explain its inner structure, then the circularity involved is no longer an obstacle. A similar view to Nuzzo was held by Friedrich Ueberweg (1866, 191). Ingrid M. Wallner also addresses this issue by asking whether “Beck’s solution of ‘empirical affection’ – of appearances causing appearances – entail that the cause of the given is itself something given, does not lead to an infinite regress (and consequently to a ‘bottomless transcendental idealism’, as Fichte would have it)?” (Wallner 1984, 308). Wallner thinks that the difficulty is avoided by recognizing that the complete elimination of the thing-in-itself in Beck’s doctrine results in viewing the phenomenal object as not merely a shadow of the thing-in-itself but as a “full-bodied sensible object, which is not reducible to our consciousness of it” (Wallner 1984, 308). Although more needs to be said, I believe that Wallner’s view is an important step in the right direction. On the charge of circularity and of subjective idealism cf. Sect. 12.2.4 below.
- 26.
I completely reject di Giovanni’s labeling of Beck’s doctrine as “immanentism”, and even, “absolute immanentism” by which di Giovanni intends a doctrine which confines knowledge to the inner circle of consciousness (di Giovanni 2000, 40). In this light di Giovanni claims that “Beck’s project […] is as consistent an attempt to reduce critical philosophy to phenomenalism as possible” (di Giovanni 2000, 41). The view of Beck’s doctrine as “immanentism” and as consistent “phenomenalism” is also found in Wallner (1979). I also reject di Giovanni’s interpretation of Beck’s doctrine of original representing as “unwillingness to grant that any content is given to consciousness” and similarly denying that mere thought is dependent on sensibility in that respect (di Giovanni 2000, 40). First, we must remember that according to Beck, mere thought – that is, conceptual-derived representation – is indeed empty when it cannot be traced back to the original-synthetic, objective-unity of consciousness. Beck’s latter claim corresponds to Kant’s claim that thought is empty without the content supplied to it by sensibility. Second, Beck’s explication of the real, which fills time and space, as a form of original representing does not mean that we literally create this real out of thin air. It only means that we become aware of such content within our original synthesis and not in complete abstraction from any cognitive activity. Third, there is nothing in Beck’s Standpunctslehre, which prevents him from referring to the empirical intuitive content, as well as the object of cognition, as given. The latter statement should only be qualified to mean that the reference to an external object implied by the term ‘given’ should be understood in light of the positing included in the categories of relation. Indeed in sensation “we feel our sense being impinged upon by external things” and di Giovanni recognizes that Beck intended to save this fact. However, di Giovanni argues that according to Beck the saving of this fact “cannot be done by appealing to some supposed factor external to consciousness, as if the impinging began outside it” (di Giovanni 2000, 41). Di Giovanni similarly argues that Beck failed to recognize that “consciousness […] is constantly transcending itself” (di Giovanni 2000, 41f.). On di Giovanni’s view Beck never explained how “in the synthesis of ‘reality’ we find ourselves affected by external things […] this is the heart of the problem of consciousness, and Beck ends up ignoring it altogether” (di Giovanni 2000, 42). On the contrary, I think that Beck only rejects an appeal to a factor completely independent of any contribution on behalf of cognition and he upholds an appeal to an object external to consciousness as long as the latter is understood as external in space and its independence from consciousness is understood as the result of being posited within the application of the categories of relation. On these issues cf. also Sects. 12.1.1 and 12.1.2 where Beck’s view of contrasted with the views of Reinhold and Fichte respectively as well as Sect. 12.2.4 which presents my understanding of Kant’s defense against the charge of subjective idealism.
- 27.
- 28.
Cf. Sect. 12.2.4.1 below.
- 29.
It must be admitted, though, that if a question is meaningful then it is in principle answerable, even if only remotely so. The distinction, to be more precise, should be made between a question, which seems, at the current time, to be unanswerable, and a question, which is, in principle, unanswerable and therefore, as Beck says, it is a question that aims at nothing. Take for example the question regarding the constitution of the matter at the center of the earth, or a similar question offered by Beck as an example of the same sort regarding whether there are inhabitants on the moon (EmS, 158). These questions are, in Beck’s terminology unanswerable. Both questions may have sounded far beyond the reach of science at the eighteenth century although they would not look the same way even to a layman in the twenty-first century. Moreover, it must be borne in mind that scientists need no more reach the center of the earth or the moon to make an intelligible conclusion about what lies there, than historians need to go back in time to make empirically reasonable statements about past events. We can infer from that which is offered for observation to other realities not directly observed, as long as all of our judgments can cohere together under universal empirical laws (cf. KrV, A225f./B273; Prol, AA 04: 290f.). This note is not intended as a criticism of Beck. I assume that he would accept this minor adjustment had it been presented to him since it does not affect the main issue at hand according to which we need to distinguish a question which aims at something meaningful but cannot yet be answered and a meaningless question. The latter is a question, which aims at nothing since we do not even understand what it could be about.
- 30.
For further discussion regarding the question of whether Beck’s view leads to radical idealism, according to which the object is “created” by cognition, cf. also Sect. 12.1.2, in which I compare Beck’s and Fichte’s views. Compare my above arguments in defense of Beck’s view against the charge of subjective idealism, with the analysis of Ingrid M. Wallner. She does not emphasize the act of positing in the categories of relation and she fails to recognize the significance of Beck’s highly important statement that the transcendental account is only intended to explain the empirical account (this claim of Beck’s is mentioned by Wallner as a matter of fact (Wallner 1979, 227–237) but she fails to see its importance).
- 31.
“If appearances were things-in-themselves, then no human being would be able to assess from the succession of representations how the manifold is combined in the object. For we have to do with our representations; how things-in-themselves may be (without regard to representations through which they affect us) is entirely beyond our cognitive sphere.” (KrV, A190/B235). Note that by the words in the brackets, Kant does not mean to imply that things-in-themselves affect us. He only intends to say that regardless of our representations, through which objects affect us, we can say nothing about these objects. Therefore what we call objects cannot be things-in-themselves.
- 32.
Cf. also the text surrounding the above citation (EmS, 172f.).
- 33.
As I already stated, my current discussion is focused at the presentation of Beck’s views rather than on their evaluation. Nevertheless, in order to better serve the purpose of understanding Beck’s views, I wish to note the following. Although I think that Beck properly interprets Kant when he argues that any distinction between truth and falsehood can only be decided within the realm of empirical experience (and consequently that any question whether experience as a whole conforms to a world ‘in-itself’ is meaningless and irrelevant), I nevertheless think that Beck does not properly explains the criterion according to which the distinction between truth and falsehood is made in each particular case. Beck attempts to address this issue (EmS, 163), but I think that his explanation is lacking, especially since a better account can be found in Kant’s own work. This issue shall be analyzed in details in Sect. 12.2.6.
- 34.
Beck also explains himself clearly in his commentary of the Critique of Pure Reason in the fourth part of the Einzig möglicher Standpunct (EmS, 347ff., as well as EmS, 367f.). Cf. also: “Thus the object, which produces sensations in us, is the appearance, and this whole ‘production’ is the original positing of a something, (cause), which stands for the fixation of the original synthesis of my perceptions.” (EmS, 369). Cf. also EmS, 397 as well as Beck’s letter to Kant June 20, 1797 (AA 12: 165): “the object that affects me must therefore be an appearance and not a thing-in-itself”.
- 35.
Beck’s distinction corresponds to Kant’s distinction between a logical distinction and a real distinction. When I say that we know objects only as appearances, it therefore logically follows that these objects are not things-in-themselves. This logical distinction, however, implies no real distinction. For more details, cf. Sect. 12.2.2 below, especially the discussion of the noumenon in its mere negative sense.
- 36.
At this stage of this work I focus on presenting Beck’s doctrine and the arguments he himself brings forward in its defense. In Part IV, as part of the comparative discussion of Beck and his two major contemporaries (Reinhold and Fichte) and as part of the evaluation of Beck’s doctrine against Kant’s original views, I shall bring out more arguments to support Beck’s view regarding the status of the object and the alleged roles of the thing-in-itself.
- 37.
Notice that Beck does not differentiate between the general conditions of intuition on the one hand and those of thought on the other. This is so since Beck views the categories as originally unified with the forms of intuition.
- 38.
Regarding the distinction between original representing and the original-synthetic objective-unity of consciousness, cf. above in this chapter and also in more details in Chap. 9 below.
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Nitzan, L. (2014). Original Representing and the Categories. In: Jacob Sigismund Beck’s Standpunctslehre and the Kantian Thing-in-itself Debate. Studies in German Idealism, vol 16. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05984-6_8
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