Gate Seven: Against Analyticity — First Move

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This is an AI-generated English translation of a chapter from the book Two Wagons and a Hot Air Balloon (שתי עגלות וכדור פורח) by Rabbi Michael Avraham. Translated by OpenAI’s GPT-5.4 model with high reasoning effort. Read the original Hebrew (PDF).

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From the book Two Wagons and a Hot Air Balloon by Rabbi Michael Avraham. Translated from Hebrew using gpt-5.4 (reasoning_effort=high, batch API).

Against Analyticity: First Move

This gate has two chapters.

Chapter 1: Analyticity and Concepts of Truth

Introduction

We begin by presenting a general formulation of the basic position of analyticity, as proposed above:

A proposition is acceptable, or possesses binding validity, only if it is a sensory observation, a logical tautology,¹ or a combination of the two.

The first argument against the position expressed in this sentence is simple: is this sentence itself a sensory observation, a logical tautology, or perhaps a combination of the two? It is obvious to any reasonable person that this sentence is none of those three. Therefore, according to the analytic approach, it is itself unacceptable. In other words, the proposition that determines what counts, in the eyes of the analytic philosopher, as an acceptable proposition (or one with binding validity) is itself unacceptable. This claim closely resembles the common attack on skeptical positions: how is skepticism itself exempt from doubt, on its own terms? ²

If we try to examine what kinds of defense are open to the analytic philosopher against this claim and others like it, they can usually be classified into two categories:

The analytic-conventionalist defense.
The technique of transcendental arguments.

In this gate we will examine both of these directions in detail. Their importance lies in the fact that, as we shall later see, they constitute two fundamental models of argument and of analytic thought in general, not only in relation to defense against this particular attack. For that reason, both will accompany us quite a bit later on as well.

The Analytic-Conventionalist Defense

One possible analytic-conventionalist solution to this problem is to define the term “acceptable,” or “valid,” in such a way that the highlighted sentence above comes out true. What I mean is that the term “true” will be defined formally as follows: “true” means “derivable from empirical observation, or from the analysis of such observation, or from a logical tautology.” This is, of course, a classic case of begging the question. We adopt this principle about truth as an arbitrary formal (analytic) definition of the concept “truth,” instead of viewing it as a (synthetic) proposition that determines the content of the concept “truth.”

To the question, what about the criteria for determining the truth of propositions in the ordinary sense in which we all understand the concept “truth,” the analytic philosopher will answer that there is no such thing. In his view, terms in language have use but not meaning. An analytic philosopher who takes this route will claim that proper use of the term “true” in language is when that term appears within a proposition that connects “true” with a claim derived from observation or from analytic consideration. Formally stated: a sentence in language that includes the term “true,” and is of the form “___ is true,” is proper if and only if the blank is filled by a proposition that follows from logical reasoning, empirical observations, or analytic analysis of such observations. In the analytic approach, propositions, like terms, have no meaning, but only proper and improper forms of use. Incidentally, what does “proper” itself mean in this very sentence? See the next section.

In fact, one can say that according to this view, propositions are assessed by the criteria of proper or improper, rather than true or false. Here we arrive at conventionalism. Already in the second gate we pointed to the connection between it and the analytic position.

Difficulties in the Analytic-Conventionalist Proposal

At first glance, a solution of this kind seems formally useful. What is being offered here is a formal definition of the concept “true,” or “acceptable,” that allows us to use language in a proper, agreed-upon, and intelligible way. On the other hand, we are giving up the intuitive use of the term “acceptable,” which can serve us in far broader contexts, as we shall see below.

Beyond that, the question arises whether this solution can also be applied to the definition of “acceptable” use of terms in language. True, we have replaced the term “acceptable” with the term “proper,” but clearly the intention is the same. There is right and wrong use of language, and because of the problem of lacking a definition we replaced it with the term “proper.” That is, “acceptable” with respect to linguistic usage becomes “proper.” But as a result of this definition, the general term “acceptable” itself really becomes “proper,” since the fact that some proposition is true indicates nothing beyond its proper formulation in language, and not some content in the world to which the proposition points. If so, there is again circularity here in the definition of the term “acceptable” or “true.”

We should note that according to the synthetic position, the term “true” refers to correspondence with reality, in a sense to be defined below, whereas the term “proper” really does have merely a grammatical meaning. The analytic identification of these two levels, the substantive and the linguistic, turns the definition above into a proposition that contains self-reference. In the next note we will clarify somewhat the problematic nature of self-reference and briefly discuss the analytic solution to this type of problem, namely the theory of types.

Note 19: Russell’s Theory of Types and a Parallel Analytic Consideration in Talmudic Discussions

A good example of an analytic solution of this kind can be found in Russell, who, as noted, was one of the fathers of analytic philosophy. In philosophy one distinguishes a group of paradoxes that all stem from what is called self-reference, that is, propositions that refer to themselves. In different contexts this self-reference leads to infinite loops and paradoxes.³ In the introduction to his monumental Principia Mathematica, Russell proposed solving all these paradoxes by means of a logical doctrine called the theory of types. This doctrine holds that we must divide propositions in language according to a certain hierarchy of logical levels, and the constitutive principle of language will be the following: a proposition that belongs to a certain logical level, or type, may refer only to propositions located below it in the hierarchy. In this way, no proposition can refer to propositions that belong to its own type. Thus self-reference is prevented, and with it the paradoxes that arise from it.

Already in the third gate we pointed out that analytic solutions of this kind give up many propositions in language that quite clearly do have meaning, even though there appears to be no reason for this. By accepting a brutal rule such as this, we give up many reasonable propositions of that type, for example: “All the propositions written in this gate are written in Hebrew.” This is a conspicuous deficiency of Russell’s theory of types. In some respects, it throws out the baby with the bathwater.

One should note that the theory of types is a classic analytic mode of solution to philosophical problems, paradoxes in our case. Russell, being an analytic thinker, conceived the problem as a problem of language rather than a substantive problem. Therefore the solution he proposed was likewise located on the linguistic plane. The devastation that such a solution brings upon language, and upon its ability to express contents of reality, was not especially important in his eyes.

By contrast, according to proponents of the synthetic position, most philosophical problems are substantive, and therefore cannot be solved by arbitrary linguistic agreements. From a synthetic point of view, the question of the meaning of a proposition is addressed not to a dictionary but to the person who utters or hears it. Within the synthetic framework, propositions and terms have meaning, and not only use. Meaning is not something that can be fixed arbitrarily at will, even though the sounds by which different meanings are expressed in a given language are indeed arbitrary. We could, for example, call the term “heap” by some other arbitrary sound in our language, but, as we have seen, we cannot alter the meaning, that is, the matter, of this concept.

If so, within the framework of a synthetic position, paradoxes of self-reference cannot be solved by arbitrary linguistic rules. Anyone who proposes a solution must try to convince me what the correct and non-paradoxical meaning of the self-referential proposition is, or alternatively convince me that it is a meaningless proposition. Only then can I give up the legitimacy of uttering it.

This description recalls two Talmudic problems for which the medieval commentators proposed similar solutions. The first concerns the halakha (Jewish law) of the red heifer, and the second the laws of the Sabbath. The Torah rules that a red heifer on which a yoke was placed, that is, one that was used for some purpose, is disqualified from use in purifying the impure. The Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzia 30a, states that only a red heifer on which the yoke was placed with the owner’s consent becomes disqualified. The medieval commentators ask there, see Tosafot and Shitah Mekubetzet in the name of Ran, ad loc., how, according to that criterion, there could ever be a disqualified red heifer. No one wants his heifer to become disqualified, not only for religious and ideological reasons, but for far more prosaic ones as well: disqualification significantly lowers its monetary value. If so, whenever a yoke is placed on it, this is not done with the owner’s consent, and therefore it should not be disqualified. How, then, can there ever be a case in which a red heifer becomes disqualified because a yoke was placed on it?

Tosafot answer that the Talmud means that any use done with the owner’s consent disqualifies the heifer, except for this particular case itself—that is, except where the owner’s lack of consent arises from the disqualification itself. If the owner wanted the work done with the heifer, that will disqualify it, even if he did not want the disqualification. Here, of course, the question arises: what is the difference between not wanting the yoke placed on it because that would disqualify it, and any other reason for not wanting it? After all, the owner really did not want work to be done with his animal.

A similar question arises in the laws of the Sabbath. There is a rule that prohibited labor done unintentionally does not count as a Torah-level transgression of the Sabbath labors. For example, if a person drags a bench from place to place and in the process makes a furrow in the ground and thereby plows it, that plowing, which is prohibited labor on the Sabbath, is not considered a transgression. This is the exemption known in halakhic terminology as an unintended act. The Talmud qualifies this rule and states that if the furrow is made with certainty, that is, if it was clear in advance that dragging the bench would necessarily produce it, then there is a violation of the Sabbath and one is punished for it. In standard halakhic terminology, when an unintended act has an inevitable result, it becomes a transgression.

Some of the medieval authorities, with the author of the Arukh, Rabbi Nathan of Rome, regarded as the founder of this approach, held that this qualification exists only if the person benefits from the labor that was done, even though it was done unintentionally. But if the labor done unintentionally is not beneficial to him, then even if the result was inevitable, there is no transgression of the Sabbath labors.

Now, of course, a question similar to the one we encountered above with regard to the red heifer arises here as well: who is pleased to violate the Sabbath? Clearly, no one is pleased with the labor that was done, here the furrowing of the ground, since this would make him a transgressor and expose him to a very severe punishment, namely stoning. It therefore seems that in every case in which labor is done unintentionally, even if it is done inevitably, the person should be exempt from punishment, since he is not pleased by that labor. The qualification of the author of the Arukh completely removes the ground from beneath the rule that imposes punishment on one who performed labor in a case of inevitable consequence.

Here too solutions are proposed like that of Tosafot above. According to these proposals, the intention of the author of the Arukh is that if the labor is displeasing to the person, but this is independently of the prohibition involved in it, only then does this qualification apply. We should note that in the present case the question seems even more severe than before. If the person’s satisfaction with the labor serves as a sufficient substitute for intention, which was absent to begin with, why is his dissatisfaction with the labor, when that dissatisfaction stems from the fact that the act will count against him as a transgression, not relevant dissatisfaction? After all, the labor being done is displeasing to him, so how can it be regarded as though it were done willingly?

How is all this connected to our discussion of the theory of types? One should note that in both of these cases the person’s dissatisfaction is a result of the halakha that determines that satisfaction can create liability. This is a reference to the same type, or self-reference in the sense of the theory of types, and therefore, according to Russell’s theory, it is impermissible. This is how the medieval commentators solve these two problems: they determine that the term “dissatisfaction” does not refer to a case in which the dissatisfaction is generated by the consequence of the proposition itself. These solutions are analytic in character, and in that respect parallel Russell’s proposal for solving problems of self-reference. It is a kind of halakhic theory of types.

We have seen that such a solution does not yield understanding, and is merely formal. What we asked above regarding Russell’s proposal—why forbid propositions with an obvious meaning merely because the formal solution is convenient—we may ask Tosafot as well: why exclude dissatisfaction of this kind from the discussion? To be convinced of this, one would have to understand what truly distinguishes this dissatisfaction from ordinary dissatisfaction, and this is not the place for that.⁴

This is not the place to enter a more detailed discussion of these issues, so we will conclude with one further comment. In Shitah Mekubetzet on Bava Metzia there, Ran, Rabbeinu Nissim, proposes a circular solution that apparently applies to both problems. If we were indeed to adopt the position proposed in these objections, the reverse state of affairs would arise. For example, if we really exempted from punishment any labor done unintentionally but inevitably, on the grounds that a person does not like being a transgressor, then it would turn out that he is not in fact a transgressor, since we have permitted such a mode of performing the labor. If so, he would then be pleased with the labor, and we would return to a case in which there is no dissatisfaction that exempts from punishment. But if we punish him, then once again he would not be pleased, and so on ad infinitum. In this way Ran rejects the objection of Tosafot.

We should note that in Ran’s words there is at most an indication of a logical difficulty, but no explanation of why we should stop the logical loop specifically at the stage of the answer to the objection and not at the stage of the objection itself. In other words, why is the person in fact punished in a case of inevitable consequence? It therefore seems that Ran’s remarks are insufficient to provide a genuine solution to these problems.

These forms of solution, like Russell’s theory of types or the answer of Tosafot, do not truly solve the substantive problem. They are technical-formal solutions that at most succeed in bypassing it. A real problem cannot be solved simply by preventing us from encountering it, by adopting an arbitrary formal rule. For a principled discussion of logical loops in halakha, see below in the ninth gate.

The Difficulty Arising from the Meanings of Concepts

The glaring absurdity in this type of solution becomes easier to see if one examines it on the substantive plane and not only on the formal one. According to this interpretation, the term “true” connects a number of things that have no substantive connection between them. According to the analytic thinker, the term “true” itself has no meaning, only uses. And by chance, as it happens, it has several such uses, which, according to the analytic thinker, have no connection to one another. One use is: “everything that is derived from some logical rules.” Another is: “derived from various sensory observations.” In fact, one can specify even further: “everything derived from logical rule A,” or “everything derived from logical rule B,” and so on, or “what is derived from empirical observations,” and this too can be subdivided further into “from visual observation,” “auditory observation,” “touch,” and so forth.

Ordinarily we do not tend to offer one definition, or place under one heading, a random collection of objects or things that bear no substantive connection to one another. The word “table” describes, or signifies, a collection of objects among which there must be some connection. A collection of objects wholly different from one another would not ordinarily receive a common designation from us. If so, the analytic thinker must point to the connection that exists among all the uses of the word “truth.” Why are “derived from observation,” “provable,” “conforms to logical rule A,” “conforms to logical rule B,” and the like—all these uses that fall under the heading “true”? What do they share? Clearly, what they share is that they all point to a sense of truth, whether as a state of consciousness or as correspondence to some state of affairs in the world, and not merely as a conventionalist label.

It is therefore entirely clear that the term “correct,” or “true,” has meaning and not only use, and from that meaning its various uses are derived.⁵ “Correct,” or “true,” means one thing, and has one meaning, not merely use. According to the synthetic position, this multiplicity is not merely a multiplicity of uses. All the definitions above are ways in which we can arrive at the decision that a proposition is true, and therefore the meaning of the concepts “true” or “acceptable” is one.⁶

Only an explanation grounded in the synthetic position can explain why all these senses are gathered under one roof. What they all share is that all propositions that obey these rules are “true” in the substantive sense—not merely that attaching the term “true,” or “acceptable,” to them is proper according to the rules of language. It is important to emphasize that in order to explain things this way we must adopt the position that concepts and propositions also have meaning, and not only use—that is, the synthetic-essentialist position.

In the second gate we saw that the meaning of concepts is built on two layers: the matter of the concept and its form. The matter of the concept is its objective meaning, shared by all the forms in which it appears to us. It is the feeling, or inner understanding, that accompanies us when we use that concept. The form of the concept can vary according to the person who uses it, that is, according to the observer. The concept “correct,” or “true,” also has matter and form. The matter of the concept is represented by the feeling of certainty that accompanies us when we use it, what Descartes called evidence, that is, clarity.

Even the truth of a formal logical consideration, which we regard as standing above all doubt, derives from that same inner feeling of certainty that accompanies us when we think about such an argument. Therefore this feeling is what stands at the top of the scale of criteria for truth, and not, as may superficially seem, the logical arguments themselves. This feeling points to the matter of the concept “true,” and it is what defines its different uses, that is, its form.

Let us now return to the critique of the analytic defense. Up to this point we have indicated the absurdity of the analytic solution described above, but more can be said. If indeed there is no such thing as “true,” and this is merely an agreed-upon and arbitrary abbreviation for the combination “derived from observations, or a logical tautology, or a combination of the two,” then the analytic thinker is forced to settle for a definition afflicted by self-reference. He will also be unable to explain in any reasonable way why all these rules of use have been joined together under one heading, “acceptable” or “true,” that is, why they are all represented in language by one common term.

If the analytic thinker persists and insists that none of these problems troubles him, and that he really does adhere to the claim that concepts have no meaning but only use, then he must at least withdraw into himself. That is, even if I see no problem with the analytic approach, after all every person has the right to define terms arbitrarily and use them as he pleases, a problem arises when the analytic thinker—as he usually does—comes and argues against the use by others of terms such as “valid,” “correct,” “true,” and the like. Here he can no longer fortify himself behind the analytic position, for here he is making a fully synthetic claim. He is claiming that the meaning of the term “correct” does not include describing the validity of synthetic propositions. Beneath the ostensibly arbitrary cloak of the analytic position there hides a critique of the synthetic position that is itself synthetic in essence.

Let us clarify. The analytic thinker claims not only that:

“true” has a certain use in language,

but also that:

it has no meaning, like every other concept, but only use.

This is a statement that contains, beyond the expression of the analytic position, a critique of the synthetic position. A statement that argues against the meaning of a concept is itself dealing with its meaning, not with its use. The meaning of the concept is under discussion precisely in the proposition that denies it. Therefore such a proposition itself presupposes an understanding of the term “meaning,” which it denies. For exactly the same reason, criticism of essentialism is itself essentialist. The conventionalist has no way to formulate a proposition or an argument that attacks essentialism. In exactly the same way, criticism of the synthetic position is itself a synthetic statement. The statement “one should not use the term ‘valid’ to evaluate synthetic propositions,” like the statement “the term ‘true’ has only use and not meaning,” is itself a statement with content and meaning, and therefore is not analytic but synthetic.

These arguments are simply another aspect of the attack presented in the introduction: granting unquestioned validity to the skeptical position itself. Here again we encounter a Copernican revolution, or Bokononism, this time on the abstract philosophical plane. This is the philosophical phenomenon that underlies the paradoxes described in the fifth gate, especially in Chapter 1, on the cultural-ideological plane.

Back to a General Critique of Analyticity

A similar critique can be directed against postmodernism, which accepts as valid the proposition that there is no objective standard by which to measure or evaluate art, culture, or, more generally, the certainty of any claims whatsoever. Here too we must ask: by what standard was this proposition itself accepted? Is it an objectively binding proposition, or merely the speaker’s personal position? In sum, the terror known as “political correctness” indicates that postmodernists themselves view their own postmodernity as a position possessing objectively binding validity. But such validity exists only within a synthetic framework of discussion.

In light of all this, in order to be consistent and intellectually honest, the analytic thinker and the postmodernist ought to withdraw into themselves and cease criticizing opposing positions. In fact, the analytic thinker now becomes a skeptic. For lack of choice he indeed acts on the basis of one or another subjective hallucination, but these hallucinations have meaning and validity only within his own monad. We have already seen above that analyticity and postmodernity are more up-to-date and sophisticated garments, at least on the rhetorical level,⁷ for the classical skeptical position. Here we have merely stripped off the garment and left the analytic position standing in its skeptical nakedness. The consistent skeptic admits that the skeptical position itself is also doubtful in his own eyes, and it would be proper for the proponents of these positions to do the same.

In the next chapter we will discuss the second form of defense available to the analytic thinker: the technique of transcendental arguments.

Chapter 2: The Analyticity of Transcendental Arguments

The Role of the Transcendental Form of Defense

We have seen that if the analytic thinker nevertheless wishes to remain active and attack synthetic positions, the analytic-conventionalist route cannot serve him. But in the introduction we mentioned that there remains one further possibility for defending his position, namely through transcendental arguments.

If so, his final defensive, or offensive, position may be the following: analyticity is indeed a synthetic position, but it is synthetic a priori. As we saw in the first gate, the synthetic a priori is a proposition that is valid a priori, even though it has no analytic proof. It purports to be a proposition whose truth does not depend on any assumptions whatsoever. It is important to clarify that the analytic thinker who chooses this line of defense abandons analyticity in favor of apriority; we will distinguish more sharply between these two in the twelfth gate. After he has failed in the conventionalist defense, whose purpose was to defend the analytic position, only the a priori option remains open to him.

At this point the analytic thinker pulls from the hat the Kantian rabbit called “the transcendental argument.” According to Kant, this is a form of argument that can lead us to accept synthetic claims as valid even not on the basis of observation. Such an argument can ostensibly justify synthetic claims, like the analytic proposition itself, that have no empirical justification whatsoever. Already in the first gate we remarked that arguments of this sort, if they indeed exist, are the dream of every analytic thinker.⁸

What Is a Transcendental Argument?

Let us demonstrate the character of transcendental argument in relation to the problem before us, the problem of the meaning of the concept “true,” or in practice the meaning of propositions of the form “___ is true.” In this form of defense we accept the fact that concepts have meaning and not only use, but the meaning of the term “valid proposition” becomes clear to us through observation of the structure of our own cognition. This is the way a transcendental argument works. The meaning of the concept “true” yielded by such observation is: a proposition that emerges from sensory observation, or from analytic manipulation of such observations.⁹ Such a statement resembles, and not by accident, the analytic solution discussed above, namely the first form of defense. This is connected to the relationship between Kant’s philosophy and the analytic position, on which more below.

But Kant also justified by means of transcendental arguments other truths, such as the structure and validity of space and time, the principle of causality and the very concept of causality, induction, the categorical imperative, which is the foundation of Kantian ethics, and more. None of these claims is the result of sensory observation, nor are they logical tautologies. They are synthetic, in that they make claims about the world, unlike logical tautologies, yet at the same time they are also a priori, in that they are not the result of empirical observation.

Transcendentality is another path by which one may become convinced of the truth of claims or principles, a path based on those principles being conditions for any possible human cognition. The way to become convinced that such principles are conditions of all possible human cognition is by the person’s observation inward, into his own cognition and intellect. As we proceed, we will also examine the structure, validity, and meaning of transcendental argument in general.

Kant is regarded by modern analytic philosophers as representing a metaphysical approach. In their eyes he is not one of their own. This classification is apparently based on the fact that he proposes a way of arriving at synthetic truths, which, as is “well known,” are metaphysical speculation, something unacceptable to analytic thinkers. We will want to argue that Kant, too, is an analytic thinker, and further, that even he, despite his more moderate approach, does not succeed in rescuing the analytic position from the straits in which it finds itself. To show this, we will return to Hume’s problems and Kant’s solution to them, as described in the first chapter of the first gate.

How Transcendental Considerations Work

Two of the central problems raised by Hume concerned the validity of scientific induction and the principle of causality. In Kantian language, we said that Hume did not recognize the existence of synthetic a priori propositions. Kant, according to the accepted view, saved the rational-scientific world from Hume’s attacks.

Kant distinguished between the world of things in themselves, the noumena, and the world of things as they appear to us, the world of phenomena. Kant held that all synthetic claims are about the world of phenomena and not about the world of things as they are in themselves. He further argued that since the phenomena themselves are shaped out of reality in cooperation with the cognition that observes them, they receive certain forms from cognition that accompany them. Therefore one can infer certain conclusions about the world of phenomena a priori, merely from the properties of human cognition itself. In this way, according to Kant’s proposal, synthetic claims are obtained a priori, without the need for experience. This mode of inference was called by Kant a “transcendental consideration.”

But as can be seen from this description, Kant leaves human cognition inside its own bubble. After Hume and Kant, a human being can no longer know the world as it is in itself. Instead of the dogmatic approach that preceded him, what in the terminology of the third gate we called the stage of childhood, which believed that the world in itself could be known and which Hume refuted and rejected, Kant claimed the reverse: he brought even the world of phenomena into cognition. This is his Copernican revolution.

But what, in fact, have we gained by this Kantian maneuver? Not much. Kant concedes to Hume that we have no possibility of knowing the world itself. He merely grants our cognition some meaning, and does not present it as altogether worthless or meaningless. In light of this, it seems quite evident that Kant is still an analytic thinker; he belongs to the stage of adolescence.

The difference between Kant and an ordinary analytic thinker is that Kant bases the meanings of concepts on reflection upon cognition rather than on conventions. That is, despite his analytic orientation, he is not a conventionalist in the usual sense. According to Kant, concepts are forced upon us and are not fixed by arbitrary social agreements. They are imposed by the structure of our cognition, and not by the world as it is in itself, as the synthetic-essentialist position maintains.

Therefore none of this should mislead us regarding Kant’s basic approach, which is decidedly analytic. What Kant succeeded in doing, if at all, was to sever the connection between conventionalism and analyticity, the connection to which we pointed in the second gate. He was an analytic thinker, but not a conventionalist. At first glance, this approach resembles what we defined as the synthetic position, since it too speaks of meanings that are not arbitrary. Nevertheless, there are significant differences between the two positions.

In his original transcendental argument Kant claims that we are compelled to think in terms of causality and induction because of the structure of our cognition, and therefore we are permitted to use them. That was his response to the problems raised by Hume. There is no claim here that the principles of induction and causality are actually true as descriptions of the world. Causality is not a property of the world as it is in itself; in this Kant completely agrees with Hume. It is a property of our cognition. Kant simply says that there is no such thing as “properties of the world as it is in itself.”

Critique from Common Sense

Kant’s basic claim is speculative, and it can easily be challenged. It seems that we have no real impediment to thinking in non-causal categories, or at least in conceptions of causality different from those Kant himself possessed.¹⁰ A similar question has been asked concerning space and time, which Kant conceived as absolute, in accordance with the Newtonian conception dominant in his day, whereas today, at least in modern physics, there are other conceptions. In such a situation, in what sense can it be said that concepts such as space and time, or causality, are imposed upon us and necessarily derived from our cognition?

Common sense clearly says that causality is a property of the world. It would not be too rash a wager to say that almost every person, and especially every scientist, feels this way. The fact that there are philosophical problems with justifying this conception, as Hume points out, means that certain underlying assumptions probably need to be examined and rejected—but not necessarily the assumptions Kant rejected. That is what we will do later.¹¹

The claim that the form of objects, such as color, appearance, and other properties, exists only in the cognition that observes them, as explained in the second gate, certainly seems plausible. But even so, it is difficult to derive from this the Kantian determination that principles of thought, such as causality and induction, also exist only in cognition. In the discussion in the second gate concerning the form of objects, we noted that the properties too exist, in some sense, in the world as it is in itself. Only the modes of describing them, and their concrete appearance before our cognition, exist solely within cognition. We argued this on the grounds that it is implausible to assume that two identical objects would appear to us differently. If they appear differently in cognition, it stands to reason that there are differences between them in the world itself as well. The description of those differences and their appearance to us, that is, their characterization in terms of shape, color, strength, and so forth, is what takes place within the observing cognition and in its own terms.

The same is true with regard to concepts. The concept of “causality,” for example, exists in the world itself and not only in human cognition. It is true that the form of concepts, that is, our understanding and description of them, and the feeling that accompanies the activity of the intellect when it thinks about them, exists only in the knowing and thinking subject. In the case of causality, we would say that the causal relation itself exists in the objective external world. Its characterizations and our insights concerning it are what exist only in our cognition.

From this we see that Kant, too, shares with Hume the conception that knowledge of the world is possible only through the senses. All the principles found in the intellect are products of its own structure. The image of an object is indeed found in the cognition that observes it, but it is caused by the object as it is in itself. Concepts, by contrast, according to Kant’s assumption, are found in cognition alone. Here Kant comes close to a conventionalist approach, in that, like it, he assumes that we do not observe concepts that exist in the world external to us. Kant differs from the standard analytic thinker only in that he is willing to analyze cognition itself and not only sensory data, and in that he makes additional claims about its structure. Below we will see that these claims really have no reasonable justification, not even in Kant’s own terms.

Let us now examine the principled problematic in the Kantian type of argument or consideration. We will do so on the general level, that is, we will discuss the fundamental structure of transcendental consideration as such. It goes without saying that if we show that this argument itself assumes synthetic premises, meaning that it cannot provide an adequate foundation for an analytic position, then we have in particular shown this with regard to the transcendental argument concerning the concept “truth,” which is the direct subject of our discussion here.

Shlomo Maimon’s Critique

Shlomo Maimon,¹² a German-Jewish neo-Kantian philosopher, raised against Kant’s distinction between noumena and phenomena a criticism that is really just a different, more specific angle on the critique we have advanced here.

Maimon challenges Kant as follows: what is the relation between the world of noumena and the world of phenomena? Do things as they are in themselves serve as a cause that creates and generates the world of phenomena? Apparently the relation between them is one of cause and effect: cognition observes the world as it is in itself and from it creates the picture that appears before us.

But if causality itself is nothing but a transcendental product of the structure of our thought, that is, if it itself belongs to the world of phenomena, then how can it explain the relation between phenomena and noumena?

Apparently we are forced to conclude that there are two levels of noumena. After all, the division between phenomena and noumena is itself carried out within our thought. If so, the noumenon with which we are dealing is itself only a reflection of the idea of noumenon within cognition. So there is the world of noumena as we understand it in our thought or cognition, and there is the world as it is in itself. But then we must ask again: what is the relation between these two strata? Clearly there is no acceptable way to stop this logical loop, except by analytic-conventional means of the sort we discussed above.

Critique of the Transcendental Consideration

A general transcendental consideration assumes two premises:

The structure of cognition is X.
If that is the structure of cognition, then one may infer from it a priori propositions that follow from it, even if they are synthetic in character.¹³

In this section we will criticize both of these premises and show that they erase the very category Kant tried to create through them, namely the synthetic a priori. Let us begin with premise 2.

Premise 2 says, in effect, that the concept “synthetic,” which Kant himself placed at the center of philosophical discussion, loses most of its meaning. From Kant’s transcendental logic it follows that every proposition, whether analytic or synthetic a priori, is contained within its subject, once one takes into account the structure of the cognition that observes it. This is merely an expansion, and not a particularly significant one, of the analytic.

The propositions classified by Kant as analytic use logical tools to expose what we know in the subject itself. But the rules of logic, too, are not found in the subject itself but in our cognition, certainly according to Kant. If so, in what way, according to Kant, does the analytic differ from the synthetic a priori?¹⁴ The analytic proposition analyzes the concept with the help of the logical part of our cognition, whereas the synthetic a priori proposition analyzes it with the help of another part of cognition, the cognitive-transcendental part. In both cases this is analysis of the concept using tools that are properties of the knowing system. It follows that, in principle, synthetic a priori propositions are also the result of analysis rather than synthesis. If so, they are analytic propositions, in a somewhat broader sense. In the final analysis, Kant saws off the branch on which he himself tried to sit: he identifies, at least in principle, the synthetic a priori with the analytic. There is no longer a separate category of synthetic a priori.

If we now carry our line of thought one further step backward, we will see that in light of Kant’s claims here, the two pairs of concepts—a priori versus a posteriori, which lays out the epistemological axis, and analytic versus synthetic, which lays out the logical axis—are indeed identical to one another. They express the same division, exactly as had been accepted in pre-Kantian philosophy. The whole purpose of Kant’s analysis, as we presented it in the first gate, was to sever the Gordian knot that seems to connect these two pairs, or the epistemological axis to the logical axis. Here we see that he does not really succeed.

Up to this point we have dealt with premise 2 of the structure of transcendental argument. Let us now return to premise 1, the premise concerning a specific structure of our cognition. The main problem with this premise is that a claim such as “human cognition has the structure X” is an ungrounded metaphysical assertion. Let us take, for example, the transcendental grounding that Kant offers for the principle of causality. In order to determine the validity of this principle, Kant must claim empirically that the very structure of our cognition necessarily implies that causality is a condition of cognition. In other words, human cognition must necessarily have a causal character.

Quite apart from the fact that, on the factual level, this specific determination does not seem correct, as already noted above, there is here another problem, and it is general to all transcendental arguments: the problem of an unjustified leap from what is the case to what is necessary. In logic one distinguishes between propositions that are true and propositions that are necessarily true, or in the terminology of modal logic, true in every possible world. From where does Kant derive the justification for the claim that a certain structure of cognition is necessarily X, always and in every human being? If a person discerns causality in the world, how can one infer from this that he is compelled to do so?

Similarly, and perhaps more simply, one may challenge Kant by asking: even if this is indeed the structure of his own cognition, how does he know that the structure of the cognition of all people is identical to his own? Kant argued that synthetic a priori propositions are shared by all possessors of human cognition. That is, they are not objective, but they are intersubjective. Yet this is precisely the kind of leap Hume claimed we make in scientific generalizations. In order to solve the problem of scientific generalization raised by Hume, Kant makes use of yet another generalization, and one that itself does not appear justified at all. It therefore seems that Kant’s approach does not offer a genuine solution to the Humean problems.¹⁵

One can ask about premise 1 of the transcendental argument in another way, indeed the reverse way. Why is a person’s reflection upon cognition not itself an observational act, and therefore a posteriori in character? Kant reflects on cognition in many places in his writings and tries to infer transcendental conclusions from that reflection. He brings proofs that space and time are transcendental, and infers from this conclusions about their structure and meaning. He argues against other philosophical approaches by adducing evidence from the way in which we know various things. In principle, cognition, as an object of observation, is no different from any other object. When we observe it, this is an act of observation “from the outside.” If so, the act of observing cognition, which is itself empirical and therefore a posteriori, cannot provide a basis for synthetic a priori propositions. A proposition that emerges from such an act will be a posteriori, not a priori, and consequently not synthetic a priori either.

Kant’s intuition was that cognition’s reflection upon itself is an analytic act because it does not go outside the person himself. But this is not a convincing argument, and certainly cannot serve as a basis for the distinction between a priori and a posteriori. It is perfectly clear that our philosophical inquiry, and above all our logical inquiry, suffers from a problem of circularity. Every such inquiry is in fact observation and analysis of cognition and intellect themselves. That still does not mean that there is no observation here, like any other observation, which is likewise subject to the a priori structures embedded in us. This inquiry too is carried out under the transcendental umbrella.

Earlier we saw that in light of the structure of transcendental argument, that is, premise 2 at its basis, the difference Kant created between the analytic and the synthetic is erased. Now we see, in light of premise 1, that the distinction between a priori and a posteriori also no longer exists. If before our critique showed that transcendental consideration identifies the two axes that Kant tried to separate—the epistemological axis and the logical axis—now it erases each of them separately. The epistemological axis, which is built on the distinction between a priori and a posteriori, contracts to a single point: the a priori becomes identical with the a posteriori. We have already seen that the logical axis is contracted in the same way: the analytic becomes identical with the synthetic.

If so, in the reasoning Kant proposed as a solution to Hume’s problems, he cut off the branches on which he himself sought to sit, and on which he sought to seat us with him.

In summary, according to Kant we still cannot accumulate information about the world beyond what we already know. Even synthetic propositions do not add knowledge for us, but merely unfold for us the concepts and structure of our own cognition. According to Kant, one would have to say that quantum theory, like every other scientific theory, is a product of the structure of our cognition, and in effect we implicitly knew it all along. This resembles Winnie-the-Pooh following the tracks he found in the sand until he returns to the places where he had been before and discovers that he is walking in circles and tracking his own tracks.

But this picture does not reflect our simple intuitions. On the contrary, we continuously feel the struggle of our ordinary modes of cognition against the results of quantum theory, as well as relativity, and therefore it is wholly implausible that such theories arise from the structure of our cognition itself.

One may therefore summarize and say that, ironically, Kant’s transcendental method yields the conclusion that all interesting propositions belong to one category, precisely the one category that does not exist at all in his system: the analytic a posteriori.

Note 20: Mathematical Thought and the Structure of the World

One of the astonishing phenomena in science,¹⁶ a phenomenon much discussed in the philosophy of science, is the mathematical structure of the world. What is meant is the surprising fact that scientific phenomena can be described in the language of mathematics. The Pythagoreans in ancient Greece inferred from this that numbers are the fundamental building blocks of the universe. Today that sounds more like a metaphor, more or less successful, but the fundamental wonder remains.

The heart of the problem may be formulated as follows: mathematics deals with and describes, or represents, structures of thought and modes of operation of the human intellect. It is an a priori, indeed even an analytic, domain of knowledge, and therefore it is not generated from observations. Its foundation lies in the structure of our logic. On the other hand, the world of phenomena seemingly has no connection whatsoever to the human intellect, since intellect and cognition merely observe it passively, at least according to the pre-Kantian and pre-quantum conception. If so, how is it possible that we succeed in describing the laws by which nature, or the external universe, operates, by means of mathematics? The same question can be raised regarding the fit between human syntax and the events described by language, among which, of course, are also events in the world outside us.

Here too Kant can ostensibly come and say that this points to a fit between the structure of cognition and the structure of the world. Such a fit can be explained a priori in the three ways described in Chapter 1 of the first gate: the world influences cognition, cognition influences the world, or some factor coordinates the two. Of course, one can continue in the same way, rule out the various alternatives, and remain with the Kantian claim that science deals with the world of phenomena and not with the world as it is in itself. According to Kant, this transcendental consideration would explain that remarkable fit.

It seems, however, that here the difficulty is much greater than in the general case discussed in the main text. Even if we were willing to accept the claim that our intellect cannot think in a non-mathematical way, since on Kant’s view mathematics is simply the description of human thought, the epistemological difficulty would still remain: why can our cognition not discern phenomena that do not conform to mathematical rules? For example, can our cognition not discern a force that is not proportional to acceleration, contrary to Newton’s second law? The claim that our cognition is incapable of discerning a state of affairs in the world that is not the solution to a mathematical equation—and all the more so to a specific mathematical equation, such as Newton’s second law—is very far-reaching, and on its face does not seem true.

Such an argument assumes that there is no difference between perception and cognition.¹⁷ But awareness does not operate under the same constraints that govern thought. The eyes can undoubtedly see a body accelerating in a way not proportional to the force applied to it, even if we were to accept the Kantian claim that human thought cannot relate to and think about such a phenomenon.

Beyond that, one can point to many cases in which the development of an abstract mathematical theory, with no apparent relation to reality or to any scientific need, suddenly turns out to be highly relevant and important for the scientific description of the world. There are many examples of this: Hilbert spaces and group theory, which serve in quantum theory and in modern physics generally, and non-Euclidean geometries, which serve as important mathematical tools in relativity. These examples show that pure mathematics, which ostensibly represents only the structure of human reason, suddenly proves to represent with great success a segment of objective reality itself. This points to a fit that exists between the structure of human reason and objective reality.

To summarize this brief and far from exhaustive discussion, here too we see that a sober reading of reality through the tools of common sense forces us to conclude that there is some mechanism, different from Kant’s, that creates a fit between knowing consciousness and the world of phenomena. We will elaborate on this point later, especially in the next note.

Summary of the Arguments Against Kant: Back to Hume’s Dilemma

Already in the first gate we pointed to a hidden assumption that both Kant and Hume accepted without explicitly identifying it. In their view, it is impossible that the fit between cognition and the world is created by a third factor that coordinates them, or that coordinated them in the past. Since this possibility was not even raised, Kant’s solution appears to save the “rational” worldview from crisis. If one assumes in advance that this “mystical” possibility is off the table, then there is no escape except analytic skepticism, or at most Kantian transcendentalism. As we have seen, these are the only three alternatives on the map. If so, as we have seen, and will continue to see, Kant’s proposal is nothing more than intellectual contortion that stands in direct opposition to common sense, and in itself is not essentially different from classical skepticism and Humean skepticism. If that is so, then the only remaining possible explanation for the fit between human cognition and the world as it is in itself is the existence of a coordinating factor. Leibniz already pointed to such a coordinating factor, namely the being called God.

In light of what has been said here, it appears that what Kant did, even if this were indeed an acceptable philosophical consideration, was merely to offer a strained excuse for someone who is in no way willing to accept the thesis of a coordinating factor. Contrary to the prevailing opinion, belief in God, philosophically understood and not necessarily religiously, is not opposed to common sense but is actually supported by it. It is precisely the position that denies His existence that requires strange and rather mystical contortions in order to evade the simple conclusions. Common sense says that there is a factor that coordinates reason, or cognition, with the world. That factor is what religious conceptions call “God.”¹⁸

This fit is what causes us to assume, as a matter of course, that there is causality in the world itself. We are not compelled to assume this because of the structure of our cognition; rather, we arrive at this conclusion in the same way that we arrive at every other conclusion. As a result of this fit, we also allow ourselves to use inductive generalizations, or the principle of causality, and to trust our senses when they observe the world.

According to the synthetic proposal, we know the concept of causality not from observing the world of phenomena, as Hume and Kant assumed, their outlook, as noted, being analytic at its root, and not from Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology either. We arrive at these principles by contemplating concepts that exist in themselves in the world, and especially the concept of cause.

Already in the second gate we saw that the synthetic position also requires an epistemology different from analytic epistemology, especially with regard to the cognition of concepts. Thus the essentialism to which we pointed there is required as an accompanying addition to syntheticity. This epistemology begins with a different ontology, one in which concepts also have existence. The epistemic faculty that makes it possible to know such concepts is called intellectual contemplation. The claim of essentialism is that we know concepts, and do not merely think about them, or understand them.

If we free ourselves from our superstitions that assume the existence of objects alone, and not of concepts, this sentence will not sound so strange. Every reasonable person feels exactly this within himself. There is a clear and almost objective meaning to nearly every concept, just as there are also incorrect meanings of concepts. These meanings do not arise from arbitrary agreements about the use of language, but simply from contemplation of the concept, even if most of us do not perceive it that way. Many of us suppress this for various reasons, such as materialism or a mere unwillingness to believe in the existence of abstract entities. These reasons cause people to seek out strained excuses, like Kant’s, or to hold a skeptical view, like Hume’s. The truth, as each person feels it, is that we “observe” concepts in a manner similar to the way we observe objects. In this sense, there is a part of the intellect that is a knowing faculty, a kind of additional sense. This part is related to what everyday language calls the “sixth sense.”

In the coming gates we will see that concepts are found not only in the world itself but also within cognition. They are present there in potential form and are actualized in the process of study and contemplation of the external world, which includes both objects and concepts. Such contemplation is possible only because there is a factor that coordinates the external world and the cognition that observes it. This factor creates the very fit that Hume and Kant search for without success. The parallel existence of concepts also within our cognition creates the feeling that contemplation of concepts and principles is directed inward rather than outward. That is the feeling that leads us to determine that concepts have no existence outside human cognition, and thus to wonder at the marvelous fit that exists between human cognition and the world outside it.

For this reason as well, there arises the feeling that there is a difference between the activity of the intellect and the activity of the senses. The senses are perceived as “observing” the world, whereas the intellect is perceived as “thinking” about the world and as withdrawn into itself, or as “observing” cognition, as we saw in the Kantian description. It is not considered an observing or knowing faculty. On the other hand, the senses somehow seem to us to operate without any assumptions of fit between themselves and the world. Therefore we all accept sensory data as clear testimony about the external world. Trust in the intellect, even if we grant that it observes the world and is not merely turned inward, requires an additional assumption concerning the existence of a fit between it and the world. To conclude the chapter we will present the following note, which will clarify well why this distinction between intellect and senses is an illusion. It is worth reading even for readers who, on this pass, skip the notes.

Note 21: The Train to Scotland: God as a Coordinating Factor

In the last paragraphs we moved from describing the fit between the human being and the world to the existence of God as the coordinating factor. In Richard Taylor’s Metaphysics,¹⁹ one finds a clear and elegant illustration of the line of argument of the present chapter. We will try here to summarize briefly the main points relevant to our discussion, to generalize them, and to discuss various objections that might be raised against them. This note is long, and we will therefore divide it into subheadings.

Taylor’s Argument

One of the common proofs for the existence of God is the argument from design. That is, from the fact that the world is complex and ordered, or from the fact that it appears purposive and directed toward various ends, we infer that there is someone who arranged and organized it. The assumption is that a complex organized structure cannot arise by chance or by itself.²⁰ There are several lines of defense against this kind of proof. What all these defenses share is their acceptance of the claim that a complex thing may indeed arise by chance. Taylor proposes a different variation on this kind of proof, one that remains valid even for those who reject the ordinary argument from design, that is, those who believe it reasonable that a complex thing arise by chance. He does so through the following example:

Suppose you are traveling in a railway carriage, and at one of the stations you look through the window and see on the side of a small hill near the train a large number of white stones scattered in a pattern resembling the following: “Welcome to Scotland.” Clearly, you would not doubt for even a moment that it is no accident that the stones form this pattern. In truth, you would be entirely certain that they were arranged in this way with the intention of conveying a meaningful message. Yet you are unable to prove, solely on the basis of observing their arrangement, that they were arranged by an intentional being. It is entirely possible, at least logically, that behind this pattern there stands no directing hand, and that it is merely the product of lifeless nature. It may be that the stones came to this interesting arrangement completely by chance: for example, that over hundreds of years each stone rolled down the hill until finally it found its special position relative to the others. For it is clear that the mere fact that something has an interesting and impressive shape or structure, and therefore seems as though it was planned in advance, is no proof that it really was planned. There can always be another explanation… ²¹

But here we encounter the important point, which is easy to miss. If, upon seeing through the train window the group of stones arranged as described, you were to conclude that you were standing at the gateway to Scotland, and the only basis for that conclusion, whether or not it constituted good proof, was that the stones formed the pattern they formed—then you could not, without contradiction, assume that the arrangement of the stones was a matter of chance. In truth, you would be assuming that they were arranged in this way by one or more intelligent and purposive beings in order to convey a certain message having nothing to do with the stones themselves. Another way to express the same idea is to say that it would be irrational on your part to regard this arrangement of stones as evidence that you were at the entrance to Scotland, and at the same time to assume that they came to this arrangement accidentally, that is, as the result of the ordinary operation of natural forces of a physical kind. For if, for example, they came to this arrangement after each stone rolled for years down the hill until by chance it arrived where it did, or if they were simply scattered in this way by an earthquake, a storm, or the like, then their arrangement cannot in any way serve as evidence that you are at the gateway to Scotland, or as proof of anything else not connected with the stones themselves.

Later in his discussion Taylor offers another example. He describes archaeological excavations in which a stone covered with interesting signs is discovered. These signs can be interpreted either as having arisen by chance or as having been produced intentionally. Then an expert arrives who claims to identify the language in which the signs on the stone are written, and proposes the following translation: “Here fell Cimon, leading a handful of Athenians in battle against the armies of Cyrus.” In this case two theoretical possibilities are open to us. Either we continue to claim that the marks on the stone arose by chance, in which case we cannot infer from these findings the existence of a man named Cimon; or we infer that this is indeed the content of the inscription, in which case we must assume that the signs were not produced by chance but were written in order to convey that information. Clearly, there is no way to assume that the signs arose by chance and yet still learn from the stone that there was a man named Cimon who fought against Cyrus and his armies.

From there Taylor moves to the analogue. Our sense organs are astonishingly complex and sensitive. In addition, they are strikingly similar to things designed by human beings, though they surpass all human products immeasurably in their sensitivity. He then goes on to argue that the route of natural selection and long-term chance processes still remains open to us in principle, and therefore it is theoretically possible to assume that despite their complexity they arose by chance. Let us continue the quotation:

Consequently, the complexity, refinement, and apparently purposive organization of our sense organs do not constitute decisive grounds for the assumption that they are the result of some intentional activity. A natural and non-teleological explanation of them remains possible, and in the opinion of many it is already in our hands, namely the theory of evolution.

But the main point, to which attention is only rarely paid, is that we do not merely marvel at these structures and wonder how it came about that they are as they are. We do not merely see in them astonishing and wondrous things and construct hypotheses about their origin. In fact, rightly or wrongly, we rely on them for the discovery of those things we take to be true and to exist independently of these organs themselves… Our senses and all our faculties could have been accidental in origin, but then they also would tell us nothing. Yet the fact remains that we trust them without even reflecting on it. Seeing something is often taken, almost by itself, as a good reason to believe that the thing exists, and it would be absurd to claim that we infer this from the structure of our eyes or from hypotheses about their evolutionary origin. And the same is true of our other faculties…

We are not arguing here that our senses cannot err, or even that we ought to rely on their testimony. The point is that we do in fact rely on them. We do not merely believe that our senses are extraordinarily interesting. We do not merely believe that they produce interesting phenomena within us, or that they merely generate beliefs in us. We assume, rightly or wrongly, that they are reliable guides for discovering truth and for discovering what exists independently of our senses and of their origin. And we continue to hold this assumption even when they are the only guides available to us…

If we do indeed assume that they are guides for discovering truths that have nothing to do with the senses themselves, then it is hard to see how we can consistently believe, in a way compatible with that assumption, that they sprang up by chance, or that they are the ordinary result of the operation of non-intentional forces, even if those forces operated over ages upon ages.

To sum up, we have here a kind of distilled version of the argument we presented at length in the main text. Even analytic philosophers, as we noted already in the first gate, generally recognize sensory data as certainties on which one may rely. Berkeley’s friends, the philosophical idealists, are a negligible minority, and probably even they do not really believe the fantastic theory they preach. The fit between the senses and cognition, on the one hand, and the world, on the other, cannot be explained except either in a transcendental manner, which is at best a flimsy excuse, or by positing some factor that produces that fit.

Of course, some analytic sophistry may explain that certainty means, or that its use in language is, conformity to sensory data. With that, as we already said, we have no argument at all.²² That is simply an expression of complete skepticism.

A Generalization: The Argument from Epistemology

The same is true of principles and concepts, such as causality and induction. They too exist in our cognition and in the world. There is a fit between cognition and the world of concepts, and the generator of this fit is the same mechanism that generates the fit between the world of objects and sensory cognition. This factor is usually called “God.” This is an extension of Taylor’s argument from the stones to the whole epistemological domain. The only reasonable basis for our trust in cognition in general, sensory and intellectual alike, if indeed we possess such trust, is belief in God. In Note 25 we will call this “the argument from epistemology.”

Bergman, in his book Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge,²³ argues that there is no other acceptable philosophical foundation for our trust in the senses. The three possibilities proposed in the first gate, and to be discussed further below, for understanding the fit between the human being and the world are the only ones available on the map. If one rejects empiricism, following Hume, and understands that transcendentalism is of no help to us at all, following our arguments above and many others, there remains only the possibility of a coordinating factor. In Chapter 9 of that book, Bergman offers a striking description of the philosophical writhing around the “miracle” of the fit between cognition and the world. There is no satisfactory philosophical answer to it. All thinkers, including Kant himself, define it as a “miracle” or a special “grace.” They are simply unwilling to acknowledge the giver of the grace. Concerning such a case the Sages said: “The beneficiary of a miracle does not recognize his miracle.”

Many people feel as though there are many diverse philosophical methods, and that each person can adopt whichever seems right to him. Here I want to sharpen and focus this point. With regard to the profoundly fundamental question of the fit between the human intellect and the world, there are not many philosophies. Only the Kantian answer seriously attempts to respond to this question, and it itself fails, as we have seen. Many others challenge Kant’s determinations, which indeed seem speculative, as we have seen here as well, but I know of none who offers an alternative to those determinations—that is, another explanation for that marvelous fit between human cognition and the world. Astonishingly, in the history of philosophy no other alternative foundation for human epistemology has been proposed.

Bergman, in Chapter 9 of his book, describes how the world of epistemological thought remains in incomprehensible puzzlement at this point, yet even there the point of a coordinating factor arises only once in the entire chapter, and even there merely as a remark by way of negation. He writes there, on page 182:

But if all these attempts have failed, then Hume’s claim remains in full force. The principle of the uniformity of nature, the supreme principle of science in general, and of natural science in particular, this principle that underlies every search, that is, induction, in science, remains without proof.

If we do not wish to cut the Gordian knot of proving the rationality of the world by means of a metaphysical assumption, such as the guarantee of God, as in Descartes, or a pre-established harmony, as in Leibniz, or the action of the intellect upon the pre-conscious sensation, as in subjective idealism, then no path remains open to us other than to regard the rationality of the world as a merely guiding, regulative assumption for the path of science.

His conclusion, according to which this is merely a guiding assumption and not a claim about the world as it is in itself, obviously does not solve the question of why this assumption in fact “works” and proves itself anew every time.

It is interesting to note that in his book Thinkers of the Age, Bergman retracts this view and argues that only belief in God can provide a reasonable basis for the fit between cognition and the world—that is, it is the only reasonable basis for epistemology. There he truly understands that there is no other rational solution to this issue apart from the solutions of Descartes and Leibniz. See the outline of Bergman’s argument in the introduction to that book.

Summary

We have thus seen Taylor’s proof for the existence of God as a coordinating factor. We expanded it and argued that all trust in cognition and in its basic principles, induction and causality, cannot be justified without belief in a coordinating factor. In fact, we see that among the three possibilities we raised in the first gate for the fit between the human being and the world, only one can survive.

Possible Objections

Two directions of objection to the proof for the existence of a coordinating factor are possible:

Trust in the senses and cognition because of accumulated experience.
Evolutionary arguments.

We will now address both of these briefly.

1. Trust Based on Accumulated Experience

The first objection claims that my trust in the senses is based on accumulated experience: I see that trust in the senses indeed “works.” On this basis, one might ostensibly justify trust in the senses and in cognition generally, without recourse to belief in a coordinating factor.

It seems that this objection can be answered by three counterarguments:

A. It does not appear that trust in the senses grows with the years. A young child, who has very little experience, ought to have less trust in the senses if that trust were really a result of experience.
B. Every experience that succeeds and confirms trust in the senses is itself the result of that very trust. I see that my sense of sight works when I touch the object I saw and realize that it is indeed there. But then there is reliance on an additional assumption, namely trust in the sense of touch. If we regard the whole cognitive system as one unit and ask what grounds trust in that system, then of course we cannot bring any experiential proof that is independent of the senses themselves.
C. Reliance on experience is an application of the principle of induction. If so, Hume’s objection returns: what is the basis for trusting the principle of induction itself?

Perhaps one can also say that this objection does not even amount to a refutation of the argument from epistemology, because of the following consideration: even if it is true that experience brings us to trust the senses, we must still ask ourselves why this in fact happens. How is it that the senses reflect reality correctly? How does this miracle happen? The fact that we believe in sensory data is not enough by itself to make them work. This itself is the argument from epistemology. It may appear that here we have moved from the argument from epistemology back to the argument from design, but this is not the place to discuss that.

Let us now move to the second objection.

2. Evolutionary Arguments

Trust in the senses, and in cognition in general, is based on the evolutionary process. Evolution is the process that ensures coordination between human cognition and the world. Correct sensation and correct cognition have the highest survival value, and therefore one may assume that if we have survived until now, our cognition reflects reality correctly. Evolution is what directs the random process and gives it direction. It “takes care” of the fit between us and the world.

This objection can be answered by four counterarguments:

A. All that this objection offers is a possible escape route from the argument from epistemology. Evolution itself also requires justification. Why is the synthetic thinker expected to bring proofs for his claims while the analytic thinker is not? Even if there are two acceptable possibilities for explaining the fit between the human being and the world, each person must still choose the one that seems more reasonable to him. This certainly weakens the force of the “proof,” but it leaves the evolutionary option merely as a possible explanation. It is interesting only to note the general attitude that usually exempts the denier of God from producing proofs for his claims, and requires this only from the believer. In light of the argument from epistemology, it seems that one can infer at least symmetry, which imposes a burden of proof on the one who claims an evolutionary grounding as well.

In addition, it should be noted that even if the theory of evolution is correct, this in no way contradicts the understanding that God is the factor behind it, ensuring that evolution operates. That is precisely the way in which He ensures the existence of the fit between the human being and the world.²⁴

B. Our trust in the senses and in cognition is so absolute that it is implausible to base it on an evolutionary process. Evolution is a chance process, even if a long-term one. The result of a chance process cannot be so airtight and unequivocal. If I arrived in an area about which the only datum available to me was that evolution had operated there, there is no doubt that I would not stake all my money on the assumption that the product of that process was completely reliable. Any other expected shape of the outcome of such a developmental process could still be considered. But trust in sight is perfect. A person is simply unwilling to accept the possibility that what he sees does not really exist. Therefore the conclusion is that such trust cannot be based on an evolutionary process.

Beyond that, there is the consideration of the time scale. By every scientific measure and line of evidence—physics, geology, and so on—the time that has elapsed since the beginning of the evolutionary process is minuscule relative to the complexity and sophistication of the results, as expressed in the complexity of the world and the human being who lives in it. One who has no other option accepts the evolutionary explanation, but at best it is a strained excuse in the absence of another possibility. He will still have to answer how he grants such perfect trust to his cognition, which developed through an evolutionary process in such a relatively short time. The strained evolutionary explanation may be accepted, for lack of an alternative, with regard to the very creation of the universe. But trust in the senses still ought to have remained qualified.

More than that: who determined that the human being in fact possesses high survival value? We have no proof that he will not become extinct at some stage. Every mutation existed at some point and then disappeared. It too could have thought itself highly adaptive, and for that reason trusted its senses, and precisely because of that have vanished, since they were unreliable. It seems that there is no sufficient basis for the assumption that our structure indeed has high survival value. In any case, it certainly does not justify so perfect a trust.

At this point one may raise the question of perceptual errors—for example the phenomenon called a fata morgana, in which a person in the desert sees sights that do not exist in reality. If so, trust in the senses is not in fact so perfect. The same is true of distant vision, or vision at night, where we know our sight is not so perfect.

But this is mistaken. Even when a fata morgana occurs, every person always looks for explanations of why his vision failed. Darkness and distance are rational explanations of this, not the result of an evolutionary failure. That is, our basic assumption is that vision ought always to work, and only certain problems cause failures in vision. On the evolutionary assumption, a person ought to accept with equanimity the fact that his senses sometimes deceive him, as a result of the evolutionary process not having reached completion. Such failures would also have to appear under changing circumstances, and not always in the desert, or in darkness, or at a distance, or in any other specific situation. On an evolutionary description, such failures ought to occur even in the normal structure of the senses, without any special problem.

C. Maximum survival value is obtained not by correct perception but by useful perception. Correct perception does not always have the highest survival value. Sometimes a person survives better if he does not know reality as it truly is. A sick person will sometimes survive better if he does not know his real condition. A person whose loved one has died may sometimes be better off, at least from the standpoint of survival, not knowing this. A person walking at a great height and afraid, though there is no chance at all that he will fall, ought perhaps not to see the depth below him. In such circumstances, do our senses actually stop presenting reality to us appropriately, as ought to happen in light of an evolutionary process based on survival considerations?
D. Someone who does not know the theory of evolution, or alternatively someone who lived five hundred years ago when this theory was still unknown to the world, obviously did not trust his senses and cognition any less than we do today.

It is worth noting that Darwin’s own trust in his cognition, before he discovered evolution, is what gave us the theory of evolution itself. That means that this trust underlies evolution, and certainly preceded it, rather than evolution constituting the basis of our epistemic trust.

The other side of the same coin is that if we teach that same person the theory of evolution, it will be perfectly clear that the intensity and basis of his trust in his cognitive faculties will not change. It follows that the reliability of epistemology does not depend on a person’s belief in the theory of evolution.

To be sure, one might say that the trust is based on the theory of evolution, but it need not be consciously known to the person. We, as observers from the side, know that this person’s trust in his senses is based on evolutionary processes, even if he himself is not aware of it.

It seems to me that if we say this, we portray all the generations that preceded Darwin as irrational. What did they think when they tried to account for their trust in their senses? The evolutionary answer was not available to them. Rational people in that period should then have decided that they had no trust in their senses. But it seems that no one among them could deny that he did in fact trust them. My assumption is that those generations were no less rational, but only less educated in certain respects, namely that they did not know the theory of evolution. Therefore my conclusion is that even if none of them explicitly accounted for this, the very fact that the question did not trouble them indicates that belief in some coordinating factor was present within them, even if only implicitly.

Of course, one may raise the argument that even when belief in God is not consciously present, belief in the senses is not damaged.²⁵ If so, what advantage does the explanation that attributes epistemic trust to belief in God as a coordinating factor have over the evolutionary explanation?

Here lies an important difference between the two explanations. Belief in God is present, according to the Torah conception, in every person, even if he denies it. By contrast, belief in evolution would seemingly have to depend on conscious knowledge of it.

This is in fact the heart of the argument with which we are engaged here. We are trying to show the person—in Note 25 we will call this a “theological” mode of argument—that belief in God as a coordinating factor is already present within him. We are not persuading him to begin believing, which would be a “philosophical” mode of argument, in the terminology of Note 25.

The conclusion that emerges from all these arguments is that every person who is not a complete skeptic, and apparently almost no one is, implicitly assumes belief in God as a coordinating factor at the basis of the trust he has in his senses and in his own cognition. After the theory of evolution was discovered, those who wish to rid themselves of the need to believe in God began to cling to the evolutionary tree.²⁶

A Methodological Note on the Relationship Between Syntheticity and Faith

It should be noted that here the hierarchy established in the introduction to the book between the cars of the analytic and synthetic trains is reversed. There we saw that the first car, perhaps even the locomotive, of the two trains is the modernist-postmodernist axis. The claim was that a person’s very willingness to believe in any certainty at all is more fundamental than belief in God, which is only a particular case of the possibility of believing in something. The conclusion was that the discussion on the analytic-synthetic axis underlies all the confrontations between the cars of the two trains, including the confrontation between the religious and the non-religious.

But here we see that the theistic-atheistic axis is the most fundamental. Belief in God constitutes the basis for a person’s other beliefs, including the very ability to believe anything at all, that is, trust in epistemology in general. It is the basis for syntheticity and the essentialism that accompanies it. What, then, is the relation between these two inverted descriptions?

Further reflection shows that this is only an apparent contradiction. On the logical plane, the modernist-postmodernist axis is more fundamental. But on the philosophical plane, the axis of theism is more fundamental, because it is the philosophical basis for our trust in our thinking, in our cognition, and even in our logic, as we shall see in the next gate.

This effect resembles the difference between cause and purpose. Belief in God provides a rational basis for the other beliefs, whereas those beliefs provide only an indication that points toward it. It is true that belief in God implicitly presupposes a willingness to believe in something at all, but not necessarily trust in the senses or in cognition, which are more external.

The discussion of this issue will continue later, especially in Note 25.

Summary of the Discussion in This Gate

In this gate we opened by presenting the critique of the analytic approach. The basis of the attack was that the analytic demand for proof of every assertion is nothing but a cover for total skepticism. This can be seen from the central claim that was also raised against the ancient skeptics: why is the principle of skepticism itself not also placed in doubt, according to them?

We then discussed the possibility of making transcendental arguments, and the question whether they are suited to proponents of a synthetic approach. We also considered whether Kant, who formulated and grounded this mode of argument, is not himself an analytic thinker. We tried to show that although Kant is usually classified as a dogmatic metaphysician, he in fact holds a position that is a softened version of ordinary analyticity. We saw that even his doctrine concerning the acceptability of synthetic a priori claims, which on the surface appears to be a metaphysical doctrine, and indeed is usually classified that way by analytic philosophers, is in fact a certain kind of analytic claim.

In summary, the analytic approach, although it appears highly “rational,” is in fact mystical speculation whose purpose is to evade the conclusions of common sense. As we sharpened in the final note, those conclusions point to belief in a coordinating factor as the only reasonable basis for trust in cognition in general, that is, as the most reasonable explanation for the fit that exists between human cognition and the world. Therefore belief in the coordinating factor is the most reasonable basis for trust in scientific progress and in the ability to accumulate knowledge about the world in general. Contrary to common opinion, the idea of the “death of God” and the placing of the private individual at the center do not assist the accumulation of scientific knowledge but rather hinder it, on the philosophical-epistemological plane. More generally, this means that belief in God, in the philosophical sense, is the most reasonable foundation for science and for modernism.

Footnotes

A logical tautology is a term that usually denotes necessary equivalence, and is sometimes used to denote logical necessity in general. For example: “if P is true then Q is true as well” is logically equivalent to the claim “it cannot be that P is true and Q is not true.” Or another example: either P is true or P is not true. Another example: it cannot be that P is true and at the same time P is not true. All of these, along with many other examples, are tautological statements—necessarily true, analytic statements. ↩
Let us note here, as we saw above in Gate Five, that this is indeed the attitude of those who hold the analytic approach, which we there called “Bokononism” (and, in an ironic paraphrase of Kant, “the Copernican revolution”). There, and also in Gate Six, we pointed to the attitude toward democracy and pluralism, which represent an absence of values—or perhaps more accurately, in light of the discussion in the previous gate, passive or negative values—as absolute values in themselves. For the sake of these “values,” we saw that modern society also performs acts that do not suit a pluralistic outlook. In fact, it seems that whereas a true skeptic would say that skepticism itself is in doubt for him, those who hold the analytic position, who are its direct continuation, answer positively to the claim raised above: for them, analyticity—or skepticism—is truly above all doubt. More than that: for the values of analyticity, and only for them, they are willing to take intolerant actions as well, such as coercion. One application of this Bokononism, as we saw above, is the statement that establishes the analytic position itself, which is itself a synthetic statement. Later we will see in greater detail what we saw in the previous gate, namely, that analyticity is a superficial and unconvincing cover for skepticism. Gadi Taub, in his book The Crouching Rebellion, mentioned in the introduction to Gate One and discussed extensively in the previous gate as well, dwells on this point and on the problem it creates. ↩
See above in Gate Eight for a more detailed treatment of the subject of paradoxes and self-reference among proponents of the analytic and synthetic positions. ↩
In general, within halakha (Jewish law), objections of this sort are less problematic, because there is also the possibility that such a formal rule arises from the verses, and that gives it halakhic force even if we do not understand why. Russell, of course, cannot use a “scriptural decree” as an explanatory principle for his formal rules. It is true that in the halakhic cases brought here—at least in the example of the laws of Sabbath observance—there appears to be no source in the Torah that would allow us to understand this as a scriptural decree, and therefore these objections seemingly remain in force. ↩
This is an example of two kinds of definition of a term: definition by extension and by intension. This topic will be discussed in greater detail in Observation 23 below. ↩
For examples of the phenomenon of multiple appearances of a concept with one meaning, see note 8 above regarding the concept “good.” The discussion there is fully parallel to the present one. ↩
See the end of the second part of Gadi Taub’s book The Crouching Rebellion, where he discusses the rhetorical methods of postmodernism. ↩
It should be noted that we are speaking here about a claim that is logically valid with no underlying assumption. A true statement—not logically valid—that is not based on foundational premises is an expression of the synthetic position, and certainly not of an analytic thinker’s dreams. ↩
It is worth noting that we are performing a circular procedure here. On behalf of the analytic thinker, I propose a transcendental argument dealing with the concept “true” or “valid.” One of the criteria for the truth of something is its being derived from a transcendental argument. The concept of truth precedes the transcendental method and in fact participates in grounding it, and therefore it is hard to see how a transcendental argument can serve to understand this concept itself. Analytic conventionalism regularly accepts such arguments. Later on, this claim will be directed against analyticity as a whole. ↩
For example, Hume himself claimed that he had succeeded in thinking in non-causal ways, although personally I am not inclined to believe him on that point. In quantum theory too, the concept of causality takes on a different meaning from the one previously accepted. If so, how can one say that these concepts are imposed on us by the very structure of our cognition? It seems that the very fact that we manage to conduct a discussion about these principles also contradicts the Kantian claim that they are imposed on us. In order to conduct a discussion, we must have at least a hypothetical ability to imagine a world without those principles. In order to discuss any principle, we must have at least in principle the possibility of looking at it from the outside. ↩
Later on, our critique will address only the general approach of Hume and Kant. For an explicit discussion of Hume’s mistakes in his critique of causality, see the appendix. ↩
My attention to this critique was drawn by one of the readers of the first edition of this book, Rabbi Hashin of Breslov in Jerusalem, in a telephone conversation. It appears in Hillel Zeitlin’s book On the Border of Two Worlds, Yavne, Tel Aviv 1997 (third printing), p. 77 and following. I thank him for this. ↩
Implicitly he assumes an additional premise: that we have no other way to arrive at general synthetic truths. That is, observation is possible only of a particular object or a specific event; principles or concepts cannot be observed. We will discuss this assumption later. ↩
One of Kant’s famous—and controversial—examples of a synthetic a priori statement is the algebraic equation 12 = 7 + 5. Here his motivation for saying so is clear, for he wants to show that one can add scientific or mathematical knowledge about the world. But, as we noted in the main text here, beyond statements of this sort, Kant is left with almost no statements that he would call analytic. ↩
For a critique of this kind, see Stephen Körner’s two articles: “The Impossibility of Transcendental Deductions,” Monist, LI (1967), no. 3; “Transcendental Tendencies in Recent Philosophy,” Journal of Philosophy, LXIII (1966), no. 19. ↩
See Marc Steiner’s book The Applicability of Mathematics as a Philosophical Problem, which is devoted entirely to this problem. ↩
If there really is no such difference, then Kant may be regarded as one of the rationalists. Usually Kant’s doctrine is considered different both from empiricism and from ordinary rationalism. See the discussion at the beginning of Bergmann’s book on Kant mentioned in Gate One. ↩
I do not wish to claim here that the obligation to observe mitzvot (commandments) is also derived from this argument. Here we are only observing the plausibility, and the fit with common sense, of the metaphysical assumption regarding the existence of God. In the terms of The Kuzari, this is a “philosophical” God, not a “religious” God. We will return to this point later. ↩
Richard Taylor, Metaphysics, translated by Yael Cohen, Adam Press, Free University, Jerusalem 1983. The relevant discussion appears there in the second half of Chapter 10. ↩
Kant called this family of proofs “the physico-theological proof.” See Critique of Pure Reason, translated by Bergmann and Rotenstreich, Bialik Institute, Jerusalem 1982. See there Part I, Second Division, Third Section, especially Chapter 6. Kant criticizes this family of proofs, as well as all the others. It is interesting to note that even the variation presented here, although he does not address it there, it is highly likely that Kant would not accept. This is implicit in the very foundation of his transcendental doctrine, as we saw in the main text and as we will explain further below. ↩
Several examples are brought here that I will skip because of lack of space. I will only note that his assumption that there is another explanation exists only on the analytic level. There is no doubt that it is more reasonable that someone arranged the stones. Of course, the conclusion that someone arranged this inscription does not arise analytically from observing it, and in fact this is the basis of most objections, including the Kantian one. Already here there is a hint of the analyticity of the opponents of the proof for God’s existence. In Taylor, the assumption that this was arranged by chance is only a methodological assumption, intended to present his variation immediately afterward. ↩
Beyond that, it is obvious that nobody truly thinks this way. This is an approach that prefers to bury its head in the sand and not allow facts to disturb the theory in which it believes. It reflects a fanatical, almost religious faith in unbelief. A blatant expression of Bokononism on the philosophical plane. ↩
Hugo Bergmann, Introduction to Epistemology, Magnes Press, Jerusalem 1976. See there Chapter 9. ↩
In fact every law of nature is only a description and not an explanation, but this is not the place to elaborate. ↩
This statement is not entirely precise. Above we saw that after the “death of God,” skepticism began to spread in the world. It is true that it related mainly to abstract cognition and not to trust in the senses. If so, this phenomenon refutes only our variation on Taylor’s proof. The proof from the reliability of the senses remains intact. The proof from epistemology may be somewhat weakened. ↩
It may be that the evolutionary process is what caused us to believe in such a factor, as a condition for trust in our senses. I hinted at the relation between these two planes earlier when I said that God stands behind the evolutionary process. ↩

← Introduction to Part ThreeContentsGate Eight: Against Analyticity — Second Move →

Against Analyticity: First Move

Chapter 1: Analyticity and Concepts of Truth

Introduction

The Analytic-Conventionalist Defense

Difficulties in the Analytic-Conventionalist Proposal

Note 19: Russell’s Theory of Types and a Parallel Analytic Consideration in Talmudic Discussions

The Difficulty Arising from the Meanings of Concepts

Back to a General Critique of Analyticity

Chapter 2: The Analyticity of Transcendental Arguments

The Role of the Transcendental Form of Defense

What Is a Transcendental Argument?

How Transcendental Considerations Work

Critique from Common Sense

Shlomo Maimon’s Critique

Critique of the Transcendental Consideration

Note 20: Mathematical Thought and the Structure of the World

Summary of the Arguments Against Kant: Back to Hume’s Dilemma

Note 21: The Train to Scotland: God as a Coordinating Factor

Taylor’s Argument

A Generalization: The Argument from Epistemology

Summary

Possible Objections

1. Trust Based on Accumulated Experience

2. Evolutionary Arguments

A Methodological Note on the Relationship Between Syntheticity and Faith

Summary of the Discussion in This Gate

Footnotes

שתף