Q&A: Two Questions from The First Existent
Two Questions from The First Existent
Question
I’m currently reading The First Existent, and I wanted to understand a few points:
1. Regarding the distinction Anselm makes between two kinds of existence in the mind—if I understand correctly, these are really two sides of the same coin. From the standpoint of what there is: there is a state in which the abstract concept x exists in my mind in a certain way, and there is a state in which the concept x is in my mind as existing.
That is, when I encounter the object x in reality, an abstract concept x is formed in my mind that exists there, and this is different from the way the concept x was in my mind before I encountered it. Did I understand correctly? Does this difference exist only after an encounter with the thing itself in reality, or is it enough just to know that it exists somewhere out there?
2. Kant and the distinction between phenomenon and noumenon.
I didn’t understand why one cannot say that the yellow color is out there exactly like the wall standing in front of me right now. I also didn’t understand why there is no sound when there is no consciousness to hear it.
And regarding shapes too—in the final analysis, it is clear that there is something here outside my consciousness (a wall, for example), and it’s not that everything exists only inside me… So what does he mean by these things? I wasn’t able to understand.
Also, was Kant a solipsist? And if not, what is the difference?
I’m really enjoying your level of precision… Your words convey a pleasant sense of breadth and uncompromising integrity… thank you
Answer
1. That’s a good question. Certainly after the encounter such a difference is created. But it seems to me that Anselm assumes that even without an actual encounter, you can hold in your mind a “picture” of the existing object (I called it there existence-neurons. Think of it as activating the neurons that operate after an encounter, but activating them directly, without the encounter itself taking place).
2. There is no reason to assume that color exists outside, because we know that color is a result of our brain structure. In fact, the statement that the object itself out there is yellow has no meaning at all. Yellowness exists only within our awareness.
There is something outside that is the cause of the sensation of color or shape. But it is not color and not shape. Think, for example, of a red table and a yellow table that are identical in every respect except their color. Clearly there is also some difference outside between the tables. That difference is what causes me to perceive them as different colors (which exist only in my awareness). The claim is that what exists outside is not color, but what causes color. Physicists call this an electromagnetic field of a certain wavelength (each wavelength is perceived by us as a different color).
A solipsist is someone who thinks that nothing exists outside. Kant accepted the existence of the thing-in-itself. Our cognition of it is formulated in the language of our cognition (colors and shapes, etc.).
Many thanks.
Discussion on Answer
And one more thing: who revealed this secret to Kant? Where did he get it from?
What I said applies to all the senses, including touch. Touch too does not grasp the thing-in-itself, but creates an image of it through contact with it. And vision too deals with the thing itself. I look at it, and the picture formed in me is an expression or representation of it.
The cognitive image received from touch coincides with the image received from vision because our consciousness creates from them a shared picture. That overall picture is the expression of the form of the thing-in-itself.
For Kant, this came intellectually as a way to resolve the problem of the synthetic a priori, but today we already know this scientifically. We understand how the brain and senses operate. So, for example, we know that the division into seven colors is not connected to the world in any way. It’s simply that in our brain the spectrum is divided into seven parts (seven sensors). That’s all. For another creature that touched the object through a completely different sense—one that has no vision at all—a completely different picture would be formed. In such a case, we are no more right than it is, and no less. Every observer creates his own representation of the thing-in-itself.
By the way, this whole description of colors and representations is mine, not Kant’s. I’m describing Kant’s view in a language that would not have been familiar to him (I’m making use of scientific findings). The distinction between the yellow color and the wave that produces it is taken from Russell (The Problems of Philosophy).
Continuation moved over from another thread:
You write that the object out there has no shape. How can that be? I understand that its shape may not be exactly like the shape pictured in my consciousness. But no shape at all? What does that mean?
My answer:
It certainly does have shape in itself as well, but formulating it in terms of color, sound, smell, or touch exists only within consciousness. There is something different about the green table as opposed to the red table, even if they are identical in every respect other than color. That something is the form of the thing-in-itself. In our consciousness, that formal difference takes on the image of color.
Thank you for the quick reply!
Forgive me, but again I still didn’t fully understand regarding point 2.
Out there, there is something that, as far as color and maybe sound too are concerned, our consciousness perceives in a subjective, interpretive way. But why is that also true regarding shape? If I feel the table, there will indeed be an identity between the information touch gives me and what the eye saw (the shape of a table). And I assume you’ll say that in touch too consciousness interprets, just as it does in vision. But here I’m already touching the thing itself, its actual body, and we’re not talking about its abstract aspects, where consciousness really can step in and create things… What am I missing?