Katrechko S.L.

PHILOSOPHY AS METAPHYSICS  <**>

Abstact. The basic thesis of the given research can be so formulated: philosophy is working with a special kind of objects - "totalities". The basic characteristics of this type of objects are their metaphysical, transcendental and total character. On the one hand, the character of these objects determines specificity of language and methods of philosophy. The language of philosophy represents the special "symbolical" language, and the basic method of philosophy is the method of speculation. On the other hand, the indication on objects of this type emphasizes feature of the human being as essences capable to construct such " totalities", that assumes ability of human consciousness to "synthetic acts". On the basis of such understanding of philosophy (philosophy as metaphysics) the original approach to division into periods of a history of philosophy and to analysis of different philosophical systems is offered.

Feature of philosophical activity, as against a science, is the work with special, not "physical" objects — the "totalities", which are constituted by the philosopher. One of such objects is the "world", and, in this sense, we often say that philosophy is a "weltanschauung" (world-outlook). Certainly, the world as some set of things can be studied by "physics" (sciences in a broad sense), but in this case a researcher can miss the point that the world is a totality, not just a simple set of things. As distinct from scientific study the philosophy takes its objects as "totalities", which the subject of knowledge cannot study as ordinary objects, because the including the learning subject character of these "totalities" excludes any standard scientific approach to knowledge in principle. Others examples of the above mentioned objects ("totalities") are "Ego" and "God". Objects of this type (with some reservations) are a lot of human being phenomena, such as "love", "virtue", "conscience", "courage", "bravery", "understanding" and so on. All these  "objects" are those, that the precise fixing of "objective" criteria of their existence is impossible, it is impossible to create the high-grade theory of these phenomena (for example, theory of love or bravery), as they assume not only objective Contemplator (as it occurs in case of objects of scientific knowledge), but also postulate the Actor "inside" them, that causes essentially "twinkling" way of them being [1]. Exactly the character of these "objects" determined essential features of the philosophizing as "metaphysical" activity.

The underlining of metaphysical character of philosophy objects dictates the special procedures of work with them, distinct from methods of scientific knowledge. Metaphysical objects — constructs cannot be given in frameworks of "physical" experience; the study — constructing of these objects occurs by a way of thinking means, procedures of speculation. That is why the one of the most typical mistakes in the researching of these objects is procedures of "naturalization" metaphysical objects, i.e. consideration of "natural" (physical) analogs of these objects. For example, instead of working with the "world" (the world as totality) we consider the world as some sets of physical, chemical, biological etc. objects, and instead of analyzing the phenomenon of consciousness, proper to metaphysical object, we examine the "natural" analog of "consciousness" — brain or mentality of the particular human being.

Specifying the status of these objects, it is possible to say that the content of philosophical activity are metaphysical — transcendental objects, i.e. objects having the boundary status of their existence. The boundary character of these objects allows to specify Kantian distinction of sensible phenomena and transcendent "things in itself". Moreover, metaphysical — transcendental objects are located on border of other known distinctions of classical philosophy [2]. They are, for example, not subjective and not objective, not conscious and not material. It is interesting in this respect appearance of the first proper philosophical category of "being", which, in fact, was entered Parmenid`s as boundary metaphysical — transcendental object "being-thinking" (in this case, alongside with Parmenid`s postulating his first thesis, entering a category of " being", presence of the second his thesis, establishing  the coincidence of an entered category of "being " with another category — the category of "thinking"). In some sense, metaphysical — transcendental objects are Husserl`s phenomenal, from which as a result of procedures of objectivizing and (or) subjectivizing the subjects and objects can be received, i.e. is entered subjective-objective distinction of New time. On the other hand, the boundary character of these objects allows still "to work" with them (I specially avoid the term "to learn", as far as these procedures are applied only for work with usual objects). Above this mode of working with them was named as speculation, which, as a result, the construction of these objects to occur by a way of thinking means.

The creation such "thinking construct" is caused by that the person aspires to understand mode of functioning of the "totalities", which surround him. And just this phenomenon of "surprise" before presence of such "totalities" is a beginning and basic nerve of philosophy. In this sense, philosophizing is possible only as an act of work of the beings, capable to postulate these "totalities", due to "synthetic acts" (Êant), as being, perceiving the environmental world not in itself, but by means of "symbolical function" (Cassirer), through a prism of the "transformed forms" (Marx, Ìàìàrdaschvili).

Another important characteristic of metaphysical objects is their "total — making" nature. It means, that the purpose of designing such  "objects" is the attempt of understanding of some phenomenon of "totality" (for example, the world as whole, totality) in light of a question "how (why) is possible this phenomenon?" The answer to this question assumes revealing "mechanism" of existence of this phenomenon. That is why it is important for the philosopher not to know some "common" aspect, that is allowed at a level of the primary, superficial description of it and other similar objects, but to know "general" (total) principle of functioning of objects of this type. For example, if a row of the plane polygons is given to us, a triangle will act as "general" principle of this variety, because all others plane polygons can be given with the help of a triangle [3]. Thus, philosophical "constructs" act as transcendental condition of seeing of other "physical" objects. That the phenomenon of seeing of a house was possible as some "totality", it is necessary to postulate a row of transcendental conditions of this phenomenon, among them we can allocate necessity "being" of the house (Parmenid), recognition (and taking shape) this "being" by means of "idea of home" (Plato), fixing the house as an object of perception by some subject (Decartes) within spatial — temporary "a priory forms of sensuality" (Êant). On the other hand, a row of such philosophical "constructs" define a horizon, "a way of seeing of subjects" (Wittgenstein), associated with a certain epoch. For example, the mentioned above transcendental conditions of a phenomenon of seeing of a house define "a way of seeing of subjects" within the framework of classical philosophy. In this sense these "constructs" act as total — necessary "cultural machines", that set the cultural way of living activity of the person and made imperceptible but essential "background" of his existence. For example, when a modern man looks at the star sky, he sees not simply separate stars, but constellations — and it is impossible to explain to a person from other culture (and the more so, being, which is not having ability to the synthetic acts). Moreover, developing this example with constructing of constellations, it is possible to tell that exactly it has made possible occurrence of such activity as astrology.

The above mentioned metaphysical character of philosophy objects causes the specification of the language and methods philosophizing. The language of philosophy has not a signal, but symbolical character. Let's stop on it hardly more in detail. Already science differs from the "common sense" description, because it uses some abstraction, "ideal elements", which, in a common case, it is impossible to compare any certain objects of the "physical" validity. For example, as D. Gilbert says, in mathematics, those are "language fictions", and one of the main problems of a substantiation of mathematics is either an exception these "fictions", or imposing some certain restrictions — all that prevent the appearance of negative consequences, while using "language fictions". Any language works with signs, besides that, any theory deals with mentioned "language fictions" (= "symbols"), i.e. such kinds of signs, with which nothing corresponds in sensible reality. For example, in physics has concepts a "material point", an "absolutely black body", etc. They are often called as abstract — ideal objects, which turn out by a way of abstraction (idealization) from any properties of real physical objects. But in physics there are and more "fictitious" objects: "quarks", for example, which not only is evident not imagine, but also until last time have acted only as theoretical constructs essentially of unobservable nature. In this case we can postulate a "metaphysical" mode of existence for these objects. It is important to emphasize that these "metaphysical" objects do not exist in the same sense, as it is for the particular objects of a physical reality, such as "table", "chair", etc. The majority of philosophy terms, its categorical apparatus have such "symbolical" character. It is impossible to give any referents of philosophical categories inside a "physical" reality. We can take as an example of such philosophical categories as "being", "consciousness" etc., for which we can somehow find certain physical analogues (for example, for a philosophical category "being " such analogue is the category "substance" or  "matter"). But there are more humanitarian objects connected with some features of a human being way, for which in general there are no analogues in a nature. These are, for example, concepts of "virtue", "conscience", "love", "debt", "bravery"... This specification of the philosophy language, which "symbols" indicate an existence of a special "metaphysical" dimension of a reality could be expressed by Êànt's exclamation "Excuse me, but this is not what I'm speaking about!" in reply to German poet Schiller`s misunderstanding his categorical imperative.

The "metaphysical" character of the categorical philosophical apparatus predetermines also specification of philosophical reasoning. The postulated non-sense character of perception of objects of the philosophizing assumes the special procedures of work, which were above characterized as a procedure of speculation. The main difficulty thus — is absence of a support on sensible analogy, which often helps us in daily life. The structure a reasoning about " pure being" (or "conscience") is principle different from the reasoning about a "tree", or a "sex", or other objects of the "physical" world. Danger, which here waits us — influence of our vital experience, influence "sensible hooks", which can destroy the ability for the reflex and philosophical analysis. To explain the idea about involuntary influence of our sensible apparatus, M. Ìàìàrdaschvili in lectures about M. Proust, used as an example biblical commandment "when they beat you on the one cheek — put another one" as a vivid example of inhibition (Husserl`s "phenomenological reduction") of a standard human reaction (reflex), imposed to us by sense-figurative thinking (if somebody hearts you — reply with the same). Moreover, it is possible, that some other logic operates in area of speculative objects, distinct from usual, "earthly" logic. In particular, according to the opinion of Russian philosopher and logic N.A. Vasiljev, validity of the logic law of "excluded third", has purely "earthly" an origin and it is connected with primacy, after Àristotel, of individual existing things [4]. If we, following Plato, consider classes of subjects as primary (for instance, subject "a class of tables"), the law of "excluded third" will be incorrect, as the table as one of set of subjects of a class of tables can be simultaneously both white and non-white (for instance, green). Of course, here it is necessary to realize that the opposite properties are attributed to the different individuals of primary "subject" — different things of the same class). The transfer of the point of view from single objects to classes of objects has allowed N. Vasiljev to formulate so-called imagined logic with the law of "excluded fourth". This logic in anything does not concede on its parameters to our habitual logic with the law of "excluded third", but expands possibilities of our thinking. Within the framework of this logic the paradoxical coincidence between maximum and minimum, as it has been revealed by Nicholas from Kuza, does not cause surprise.

The only acceptable procedure for understanding of philosophical categories within of some philosophical framework is the correlation of the different speculative ("metaphysics") objects with the help of the "language game" method [4].

 

<**> — this paper is online correct version of paper Katretchko S.L. “Philosophy as Metaphysics” //XX World Congress of Philosophy, 1998; section: Metaphysics

 

References:

1.    Katretchko S. L. The reflexive approach to studying the phenomenon of consciousness //Humanities in Russia: the Soros laureates (philosophy). Moscow. 1996. pp.139-146.

2.    Katretchko S. L. Ways of being of the objects of consciousness // Problems of management in a context of humanitarian culture. Moscow, "University Humanities Lyceum", 1997. pp.15 - 18.

3.    Katretchko S. L. Philosophy as metaphysics (program of the course). - Moscow. University of RÀE. 1997.

4.    Katretchko S. L  Philosophy as "language game" //Materials of the XI International conference "Logic, methodology, philosophy of science". Moscow — Obninsk. 1995. vol.5. pp. 44 - 48.