Autor: Lonergan, Bernard J.F.

Buch: A Third Collection

Titel: A Third Collection

Stichwort: Bewusstsein: Differentierung: Unmittelbarkeit (naiver Realismus, Empirismus), Commonsense, religiöse

Kurzinhalt: scientific, religious, scholarly, modern philosophic differentiation of consciousness; not from objects mediated by 'ordinary' meaning, but from the immediate data of consciousness

Textausschnitt: I. DIFFERENTIATIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS

2/15 For centuries theologians were divided into diverse schools. The schools differed from one another on most points in systematic theology. But all shared a common origin in medieval Scholasticism and so they were able to understand one another and could attempt, if not dialogue, at least refutation. But with the breakdown of Scholasticism, that common ancestry is no longer a bond. Wide divergences in doctrine are being expressed by Catholic theologians. If each abounds in his wisdom, he also tends to be mystified by the existence of views other than his own. (239; Fs)

3/15 If one is to understand such diversity, one must, I believe, advert to the sundry differentiations of human consciousness. A first differentiation arises in the process of growing up. The infant lives in a world of immediacy. The child moves towards a world mediated by meaning. For the adult the real world is the world mediated by meaning, and his philosophic doubts about the reality of that world arise from the fact that he has failed to advert to the difference between the criteria for a world of immediacy and, on the other hand, the criteria for a world mediated by meaning. (239; Fs)

4/15 Such inadvertence seems to be the root of the confusion concerning objects and objectivity that has obtained in Western thought since Kant published his Critique of Pure Reason.1 In the world of immediacy the only objects are objects of immediate experience, where "experience" is understood in the narrow sense and denotes either the outer experience of our senses or the inner experience of our consciousness. But in the world mediated by meaning - i.e., mediated by experiencing, understanding, and judging - objects are what are intended by questions and known by intelligent, correct, conscientious answers. It is by his questions for intelligence (quid sit, cur ita sit), for reflection (an sit), for moral deliberation (an honestum sit), that man intends without yet knowing the intelligible, the true, the real, and the good. By that intending man is immediately related to the objects that he will come to know when he elicits correct acts of meaning. Accordingly, naive realism arises from the assumption that the world mediated by meaning is known by taking a look. Empiricism arises when the world mediated by meaning is emptied of everything except what can be sensed. Idealism retains the empiricist notion of reality, insists that human knowledge is constituted by raising and answering questions, and concludes that human knowledge is not of the real but of the ideal. A critical realism finally claims that human knowledge consists not in experiencing alone but in the threefold compound that embraces experiencing and understanding and judging. (240; Fs)

5/15 Besides the differentiation of consciousness involved in growing up, further differentiations occur with respect to the world mediated by meaning. Here the best known is the eventual separation of scientific from commonsense meaning. (240; Fs)

6/15 Its origins are celebrated in Plato's early dialogues in which Socrates explains what he means by a definition that applies omni et soli, seeks such definitions of courage, sobriety, justice, and the like, shows the inadequacy of every proposed solution, and admits that he himself is unable to answer his own questions. But a generation or so later in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics we find not only general definitions of virtue and vice but also definitions of an array of specific virtues each one flanked by a pair of vices that sin by excess or by defect. But Aristotle was not content merely to answer Socrates' question. By his example he showed how it can be done; he scrutinized linguistic usage; selected the precise meanings that suited his purpose; constructed sets of interrelated terms; and employed such sets to systematize whole regions of inquiry. (240f; Fs)

7/15 In this fashion was effected the differentiation of commonsense meaning and scientific meaning. Socrates and his friends knew perfectly well what they meant by courage, sobriety, justice. But such knowledge does not consist in universal definitions. It consists simply in understanding when a term may be used appropriately; and such understanding is developed by adverting to the response others give to our statements. As common sense does not define, so it does not enounce universal principles; it offers proverbs, i.e., bits of advice it may be well to bear in mind when the occasion arises; hence "Strike the iron while it is hot" and "He who hesitates is lost" are not so much contradicted as complemented by "Look before you leap." Finally, common sense does not syllogize; it argues from analogy; but its analogies resemble, not those constructed by logicians in which the analogue is partly similar and partly dissimilar, but rather Piaget's adaptations which consist of two parts: an assimilation that calls on the insights relevant to somewhat similar situations; and an adjustment that adds insights relevant to the peculiarities of the present situation. (241; Fs)

8/15 But besides the world mediated by commonsense meanings, there is another world mediated by scientific meanings, where terms are defined, systematic relationships are sought, and procedures are governed by logic and methods. This second world was approximated by Plato's distinction between the flux of phenomena and the immutable forms. It was affirmed more soberly in Aristotle's distinction between what is first for us and what is first in itself. It has reappeared in Eddington's two tables: one brown, solid, heavy; the other colorless, mostly empty space, with here and there an unimaginable wavicle. So it is that scientists live in two worlds: at one moment they are with the rest of us in the world of common sense; at another they are apart from us and by themselves with a technical and controlled language of their own with reflectively constructed and controlled procedures. (241; Fs)

9/15 Besides the scientific there is a religious differentiation of consciousness. It begins with asceticism and culminates in mysticism. Both asceticism and mysticism, when genuine, have a common ground that was described by St. Paul when he exclaimed: "[...] God's love has flooded our inmost heart through the Holy Spirit he has given us" (Rom. 5:5). That ground can bear fruit in a consciousness that lives in a world mediated by meaning. But it can also set up a different type of consciousness by withdrawing one from the world mediated by meaning into a cloud of unknowing.2 Then one is for God, belongs to him, gives oneself to him, not by using words, images, concepts, but in a silent, joyous, peaceful surrender to his initiative. (241f; Fs)

10/15 Ordinarily the scientific and the religious differentiations of consciousness occur in different individuals. But they can be found in the same individual as was the case with Thomas of Aquin. At the end of his life his prayer became so intense that it interfered with his theological activity. But earlier there could have been an alternation between religious and theological differentiation, while later still further differentiation might have enabled him to combine prayer and theology as Teresa of Avila combined prayer and business. (242; Fs)

11/15 Besides the scientific and the religious there is the scholarly differentiation of consciousness. It combines the common sense of one's own place and time with a detailed understanding of the common sense of another place and time. It is a specifically modern achievement and it results from nothing less than a lifetime of study. (242; Fs)

12/15 Besides the scientific, the religious, and the scholarly, there is the modern philosophic differentiation. Ancient and medieval philosophers were concerned principally with objects. What differentiation they attained, did not differ from the scientific. But in modern philosophy there has been a sustained tendency to begin, not from objects mediated by 'ordinary' meaning, but from the immediate data of consciousness. In a first phase from Descartes to Kant, the primary focus of attention was cognitional activity. But after the transition, operated by absolute idealism, there was a notable shift in emphasis. Schopenhauer wrote on Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung; Kierkegaard took his stand on faith; Newman took his on conscience; Nietzsche extolled the will to power; Dilthey aimed at a Lebensphilosophie; Blondel at a philosophy of action; Scheler was abundant on feeling; and similar tendencies, reminiscent of Kant's emphasis on practical reason, have been maintained by pragmatists, existentialists, personalists. (242; Fs) (notabene)

13/15 We have distinguished four differentiations of consciousness: the scientific, the religious, the scholarly, and the modern philosophic. We have noted the possibility of one compound differentiation in which the scientific and the religious were combined in a single individual. But there are five other possibilities of a twofold differentiation,3 and there are four possibilities of a threefold differentiation.4 In addition there is one case in which a fourfold differentiation may occur by combining scientific, religious, scholarly, and the modern philosophic differentiation. Similarly, there is a single case of simply undifferentiated consciousness which is at home only in the realm of common sense. (242f; Fs) (notabene)