The Main Trends in Philosophy: A Theoretical Analysis of the History of Philosophy

337 Pages·1988·11.459 MB·English

by  Theodor I. Oizerman | Ойзерман, Теодор Ильич.

T.1O izerman
TheMa inT rends
inP hilosophy
PROGRESS PUBLISHERS
T.1 Oizerman
The Main Trends
in Philosophy
A Theoretical Analysis
of the History of Philosophy
Translated by H. Campbell Creighton, M. A. (Oxon)
l�lnl
PROGRESS PUBLISHERS
Moscow
Designed by Yuri Yegorov
Otl3EPMAH T. H.
l'JIABHblE <l>HJIOCO<l>CKHE HADPABJIEHllll
Ha a1tz.1tuii.cKOM R3blKe
Printed in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
0 0301030000-464 19-88 (C) 11311,aTeJibCTBO «MbJCJtb», 1984
014(01 )-88
English translation of the revised
Russian text
ISBN 5-01-000506-9 (Cl Progress Publishers 1988
CONTENTS
Page
INTRODUCTION 5
Part One. THE BASIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUESTION AS A PRO­
BLEM OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY
THE SENSE AND MEANING OF THE BASIC PHILOSOPHICAL
I. QUESTION . . . . . . . . . 19
1. The Basic Philosophical Question and the Problematic of Philo-
sophy . 19
2. Self-Awa• reness and the .E xt.e rn•a l •W orld. The Epistemological Ne-
cessity of the Basic Philosophical Question . . . . . . . 22
On the Origin and Development of the Basic Philosophical Que-
3. stion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
4. The Basic Philosophical Question: Objective Content and Subjec�
tive Form of Expression. The Real Starting Point of Philosophical
Inquiry . . . . . . . . . 37
11. THE TWO SIDES OF THE BASIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUES-
TION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
1. The Ontologi1.:af Aspect: the Materialist Answer to the Basic
Question . . . . 54
2. The Ontological Aspect: a Contribution to the Delineation of the
Idealist Answer to the Basic Philosophical Question .
. . . 74
3. The Bpistetnological Aspect. The Principle of Reflection and the
Idealist Interpretation of the Knowability of the World . . . 87
4. The Epistemological Aspect. The Principle of the Knowability of
the World and Philosophical Scepticism . . . . . . 104
Part Two. PHILOSOPHICAL TRENDS AS AN OBJECT OF RE­
SEARCH IN THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY
THE DIVERGENCE OF PHILOSOPHICAL DOCTRINES AND
Ill.
ITS INTERPRETATION. METAPHYSICAL SYSTEMS AND
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ANTITHESIS BETWEEN MA-
TERIAL!S M AND IDEALISM . . . . . . . . . . . 138
I. Dispute about Trends or _Dispute of Trends? . . . . . . . 138
2. Metaphysical Systems. Spiritualism and the Naturalist Ten-
dency 155
3. Materialism-the Sole Consistent Opponent of Speculative Me-
taphysical Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
3
4. Kant's Transcendental Dualist Metaphysics 17
5. Toward a Critique of Irrationalist Speculative Metaphysics 1834
6. The Dispute between Materialism and Idealism and Differences
in Understanding Speculative Metaphysics 195
IV. THE GREAT CONFRONTATION: MATERIALISM VS IDEA-
LISM. THE ARGUMENTS AND COUNTERARGUMENTS 215
I. The Struggle of Materialism and Idealis1n as an Epochal Cul-
tural and Historical Phenomenon 215
2. Idealism vs Materialism. Materialis1n vs ldealisn1. Results and
Prospects 234
3. The Dialectical-Materialist Critique of ldealisn1. The Episte-
mological Roots Idealist Fallacies 262
4. The Dialectical-Mofat erialist Critique of Idealism. The Principle of
the Partisanship of Philosophy 274
CONCLUSION 296
LITERATURE 306
NAME INDEX
SUBJECT INDEX
INTRODUCTION
There is no doubt about the ideological significance of a the­
oretical analysis of the history of philosophy. For philosophy
is the sole field of knowledge in which agreement among
its leading spokesmen is the exception rather than the rule.
In the sciences usually called exact or special, the area of
disagreement is a comparatively small part of the vast ter­
ritory already mastered, in which peace and harmony seemingly
reign.' Whoever studies any of these sciences to some extent
lacks choice; he assimilates established truths that will, of
course, be refined, supplemented, and in part even revised,
but hardly refuted. It is not so in philosophy, in which there
is a host ·Of doctrines, trends, and directions each of which, as
a rule, has not only historical justification but also a certain
actual sense. In philosophy one has to choose, to soak oneself
in a specific atmosphere of philosophical thinking, by nature
polemical, so as to find one's point of view, refuting all others
that are incompatible with it. But a search of that kind
presupposes study of the whole variety of philosophical doc­
trines, a condition that is obviously not practicable.
In concrete historical social conditions this situation of
course has a certain, obligatory character. He who studies
philosophy (or is beginning to) is not, of course, like the
person browsing in a secondhand bookshop looking for some­
thing suitable for himself. The moment of choice is inseparable
from the purposive activity by which any science is mastered.
Since the history of philosophy investigates the real gains of
philosophy, this choice becomes an intellectual conviction
and ideological decision.
The aim of my book is to investigate the initial propositions
of the history of philosophy. This concerns the basic philo-
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sophical question and the main trends and directions in philo­
sophy, themes that are organically connected with one ano­
ther; special study of them makes it possible to understand
philosophy as law-governed developing knowledge whose final
result is dialectical and historical materialism.
The present work is a direct continuation of my Problem�
'
of the History of Philosophy, the subject of which was such
inadequately studied (in the general view) and largely debatable
problems as the specific nature of the philosophical form of
knowledge, the distinguishing feature and ideological function
of the problematic of philosophy, and the nature of philosophical
argument and dispute. In this new monograph, at least in its
first part, on the contrary, I examine problems that are usually
only treated in textbooks, i.e. that do not constitute the subject
of research at all. But since these problems are of fundamental
significance, they deserve more than the attention just of
teachers. Problems that are usually called elementary are
basic ones, the starting point of research, and the answers to
them in no small way predetermine its direction and results.
Lenin, stressing that politics 'is a concentrated expression of
economics' and that 'it must take precedence over economics',
noted in this connection that 'it is strange that we should have
to return to such elementary questions' (142:83). It is well
known that this elementary question has proved to be not
so simple, so matter-of-fact as not to need investigation.
Roughly the same can be said of the basic philosophical question.
The Marxian proposition 'Truth is a process' (143:201) also
relates to elementary but, I should say, fundamental truths
that do not remain invariable since they are enriched by new
scientific data.
Textbooks that expound the main philosophical question
in popular form and provide a correct idea of the struggle
of trends in philosophy, do a very useful job. But they often,
unfortunately, create a deceptive impression of excessive sim­
plicity and very nearly absolute clarity aboul matters that are
by no means simple and clear. This fault is seemingly the obverse
of the methods standards that a textbook has to meet, since
it is limited lo exposition of simply the fundamentals of the
science."' The sole means of overcoming these shortcomings of
popular expositions is to investigate the theoretical fundamen­
tals of the science. It was not just these general considerations,
however, whose importance should not be overestimated, that
determined my theme. The point is that the basic philosophical
question, and likewise the problem of the main trends in philo-
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sophy, are not truisms but quite special problems for research
in the history of philosophy. What makes them so? The aim
of my introduction is to provide a preliminary answer to that,
which will, at the same time, pose the problem.
First of all, let me point out the indisputable but far from
always realised truth that the Marxian proposition about
the basic philosophical question is not simply a statement of an
empirically obvious fact, but a theoretical formulation of a
definite discovery made . by Frederick Engels. Only a few
pre-Marxian philosophers came near to theoretical awareness
hat there is a basic question common to various philosophical
1
doctrines, including opposing ones. Most of them rather assumed
lhat each doctrine was characterised by its own main philo­
sophical question precisely because it largely diverged from
others. That is also, and even more so, true of contemporary
non-Marxian philosophers. Albert Camus, for instance, claims
hat
I
there is only one l�uly serious philosophical problem, that of suicide.
To decide whether life is, or is not worth the trouble of living, is to
answer the fundamental question of philosophy (28:15).-1
The separate exceptions only confirm this prevailing tendency.
The question posed by Camus must not be underestimated,
c·ven if only because it forms part of a definite philosophic­
al tradition whose beginning was laid by thinkers of the Ancient
East and philosophers of the Hellenistic era. The alienation
of human activity and of ils product, and the alienation of
nature regularly engender it and give it profound sense. Yet
ii is not the basic phiiosophical question, if only because
ii is not such for the majority of philosophical doctrines. But
perhaps it is a transmuted form of it, since it is a matter of the
attitude of human consciousness to human existence? Or is it
lhe basic issue of existentialist philosophy'? It is still incumbent
on us, however, to investigate whether each philosophy has its
special basic question.
Neopositivists, having got rid of philosophical problems
imaginary and in fact not real problems, long ago concluded
as
that the question of the relation of the spiritual to the ma­
terial was a typical pseudoproblem, since it was quite unclear
whether what are called matter and spirit existed and whether
these verbal names were abstractions without meaning.
Mind and matter alike are logical constructions I.Bertrand Russell,
for example, wrote I, the particulars out of which they are constructed,
or fron1 which they are inferred, have various relations, some of
which are studied by physics. by psychology (230:307).
11!11�'rs
This point of view, expressed half-a-century ago, has received
unexpected support in our day from those who suggest that
no psyche exists, as cybernetics is alleged to demonstrate.
Among those who share this conviction one must also name the
adherents of the philosophy of linguistic analysis, who try
to show that the material and spiritual are not facts that theory
should be guided by, but only logical spectres. As for the philo­
sophical question that they call basic, it (in the opinion of the
analytic philosophers) was generated by incorrect word-use:
meanings were ascribed to words of the ordinary common
language that did not belong to them, with the consequence
that disputes arose about the sense of words that was quite
clear until they became philosophical terms.
Contemporary idealist philosophy, especially in its existen­
tialist and neopositivist variants, has had considerable influence
on some who think themselves Marxist philosophers, and who
have undertaken revision of dialectical and historical mate­
a
rialism. The fact that the basic philosophical question does not
lie on the surface serves them as convenient grounds for denying
its real signif1cance. But ii is found here that those who claim
lo have created a 'neo-Marxisl' philosophy have not engaged
in serious research. They simply proclaim il. The Yugoslav
philosopher Gajo Petrovic, for instance, declares:
I do not 1naintaitt that the basic philosophical question, as unders1nod
by Engels, Plekhanov, and Lenin, is meanin les. But everything !hal
g s
is 1neaningful is not 'basic' (204:331 ).
That quite common idea is supplemented by a consideration
of an onlological characler:
Divi:i:;ion i1110 mailer and spirit is nol fhe basic division of lhe world
we livl' in, 11or is Ibis basic division wilhin n1a11. How lhen can lhe
basic question of philosophy he lhe qul'siion of the relationship
be1wee11 1naHer and :-pirit? (204:332),
The 'spirit-mailer' relationship is nol, in fact, the primary,
initial one; it presupposes the rise of the spiritual, which, !hough
a result of the material, is not a property of matter in any of
its states. It is that circumstance, in spite of PetroviC's conviclion,
thal makes it possible to realise the significance of the question
of the relationship of the spiritual and material, the sense of
which consists in formulating the dilemma: which is primary,
the material or the spiritual?
Petrovic, however, does not allow for the fact that the basic
philosophical question demarcates two main, mutually exclusive
trends in philosophical research. He proclaims that only the
problem of man has fundamental philosophical significance.
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