Sophie's World

by Jostein Gaarder

In the question of all the ideas we have about outer reality – for example, the sun and the moon – there is the possibility that they are fantasies. But outer reality also has certain characteristics that we can perceive with our reason. These are the mathematical properties, or, in other words, the kinds of things that are measurable, such as length, breadth, and depth. Such “quantitative” properties are just as clear and distinct to my reason as the fact that I am a thinking being. “Qualitative” properties such as color, smell, and taste, on the other hand, are linked to our sense perception and as such do not describe outer reality.’

but the outer reality is essentially different from the reality of thought. Descartes now maintains that there are two different forms of reality – or two “substances.” One substance is thought, or the “mind,” the other is extension, or matter. The mind is purely conscious, it takes up no room in space and can therefore not be subdivided into smaller parts. Matter, however, is purely extension, it takes up room in space and can therefore always be subdivided into smaller and smaller parts – but it has no consciousness. Descartes maintained that both substances originate from God, because only God himself exists independently of anything else. But although both thought and extension come from God, the two substances have no contact with each other. Thought is quite independent of matter, and conversely, the material processes are quite independent of thought.’ ‘So he divided God’s creation into two.’

Descartes came to the conclusion that man is a dual creature that both thinks and takes up room in space. Man has thus both a mind and an extended body. St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas had already said something similar, namely, that man had a body like the animals and a soul like the angels. According to Descartes, the human body is a perfect machine. But man also has a mind which can operate quite independently of the body. The bodily processes do not have the same freedom, they obey their own laws. But what we think with our reason does not happen in the body – it happens in the mind, which is completely independent of extended reality. I should add, by the way, that Descartes did not reject the possibility that animals could think. But if they have that faculty, the same dualism between thought and extension must also apply to them.’

Thus

Reason doesn’t become bowed and weak. It is the body that ages.

He wanted his ethics to show that human life is subject to the universal laws of nature. We must therefore free ourselves from our feelings and our passions. Only then will we find contentment and be happy, he believed.’

‘The word “substance” can be interpreted as “that which something consists of,” or that which something basically is or can be reduced to. Descartes operated then with two of these substances. Everything was either thought or extension. ‘However, Spinoza rejected this split. He believed that there was only one substance. Everything that exists can be reduced to one single reality which he simply called Substance. At times he calls it God or nature. Thus Spinoza does not have the dualistic view of reality that Descartes had. We say he is a monist. That is, he reduces nature and the condition of all things to one single substance.’ ‘They could hardly have disagreed more.’ ‘Ah, but the difference between Descartes and Spinoza is not as deep-seated as many have often claimed. Descartes also pointed out that only God exists independently. It’s only when Spinoza identifies God with nature – or God and creation – that he distances himself a good way from both Descartes and from the Jewish and Christian doctrines.’

a rationalist believes in reason as the primary source of knowledge, and he may also believe that man has certain innate ideas that exist in the mind prior to all experience. And the clearer such ideas may be, the more certain it is that they correspond to reality. You recall how Descartes had a clear and distinct idea of a “perfect entity,” on the basis of which he concluded that God exists.’

‘An empiricist will derive all knowledge of the world from what the senses tell us. The classic formulation of an empirical approach came from Aristotle. He said: “There is nothing in the mind except what was first in the senses.” This view implied a pointed criticism of Plato, who had held that man brought with him a set of innate “ideas” from the world of ideas. Locke repeats Aristotle’s words, and when Locke uses them, they are aimed at Descartes.’

Locke’s claim is that all our thoughts and ideas issue from that which we have taken in through the senses. Before we perceive anything, the mind is a “tabula rasa” – or an empty slate.’

The single sense ideas are worked on by thinking, reasoning, believing, and doubting, thus giving rise to what he calls reflection. So he distinguished between “sensation” and “reflection.” The mind is not merely a passive receiver. It classifies and processes all sensations as they come streaming in. And this is just where one must be on guard.’ ‘On guard?’ ‘Locke emphasized that the only things we can perceive are simple sensations. When I eat an apple, for example, I do not sense the whole apple in one single sensation. In actual fact I receive a whole series of simple sensations – such as that something is green, smells fresh, and tastes juicy and sharp. Only after I have eaten an apple many times do I think: Now I am eating an “apple.” As Locke would say, we have formed a complex idea of an “apple.” When we were infants, tasting an apple for the first time, we had no such complex idea. But we saw something green, we tasted something fresh and juicy, yummy … It was a bit sour too. Little by little we bundle many similar sensations together and form concepts like “apple,” “pear,” “orange.” But in the final analysis, all the material for our knowledge of the world comes to us through sensations. Knowledge that cannot be traced back to a simple sensation is therefore false knowledge and must consequently be rejected.’ ‘At any rate we can be sure that what we see, hear, smell, and taste are the way we sense it.’ ‘Both yes and no. And that brings us to the second question L...

when it was a question of “extended” reality, Locke agreed with Descartes that it does have certain qualities that man is able to understand with his reason.’ ‘It shouldn’t be so difficult to agree on that.’ ‘Locke admitted what he called intuitive, or “demonstrative,” knowledge in other areas too. For instance, he held that certain ethical principles applied to everyone. In other words, he believed in the idea of a natural right, and that was a rationalistic feature of his thought. An equally rationalistic feature was that Locke believed that it was inherent in human reason to be able to know that God exists.’

believed that the idea of God was born of human reason. That was a rationalistic feature. I should add that he spoke out for intellectual liberty and tolerance. He was also preoccupied with equality of the sexes, maintaining that the subjugation of women to men was “manmade.” Therefore it could be altered.’ ‘I can’t disagree there.’ ‘Locke was one of the first philosophers in more recent times to be interested in sexual roles. He had a great influence on John Stuart Mill, who in turn had a key role in the struggle for equality of the sexes. All in all, Locke was a forerunner of many liberal ideas which later, during the period of the French Enlightenment in the eighteenth century, came into full flower. It was he who first advocated the principle of division of powers …’

‘Hume begins by establishing that man has two different types of perceptions, namely impressions and ideas. By “impressions” he means the immediate sensation of external reality. By “ideas” he means the recollection of such impressions.’

‘If you burn yourself on a hot oven, you get an immediate “impression.” Afterward you can recollect that you burned yourself. That impression insofar as it is recalled is what Hume calls an “idea.” The difference is that an impression is stronger and livelier than your reflective memory of that impression. You could say that the sensation is the original and that the idea, or reflection, is only a pale imitation. It is the impression which is the direct cause of the idea stored in the mind.’

‘Hume emphasizes further that both an impression and an idea can be either simple or complex. You remember we talked about an apple in connection with Locke. The direct experience of an apple is an example of a complex impression.’

Hume would probably agree with Descartes that it is essential to construct a thought process right from the ground.’

‘Hume’s point is that we sometimes form complex ideas for which there is no corresponding object in the physical world. We’ve already talked about angels. Previously we referred to crocophants. Another example is Pegasus, a winged horse. In all these cases we have to admit that the mind has done a good job of cutting out and pasting together all on its own. Each element was once sensed, and entered the theater of the mind in the form of a real “impression.” Nothing is ever actually invented by the mind. The mind puts things together and constructs false “ideas.”’

Hume emphasizes that all the elements we put together in our ideas must at some time have entered the mind in the form of “simple impressions.” A person who has never seen gold will never be able to visualize streets of gold.’

What about Descartes having a clear and distinct idea of God?’ ‘Hume had an answer to that too. Let’s say we imagine God as an infinitely “intelligent, wise, and good being.” We have thus a “complex idea” that consists of something infinitely intelligent, something infinitely wise, and something infinitely good. If we had never known intelligence, wisdom, and goodness, we would never have such an idea of God. Our idea of God might also be that he is a “severe but just Father” – that is to say, a concept made up of “severity,” “justice,” and “father.” Many critics of religion since Hume have claimed that such ideas of God can be associated with how we experienced our own father when we were little. It was said that the idea of a father led to the idea of a “heavenly father.”’

Hume opposed all thoughts and ideas that could not be traced back to corresponding sense perceptions. He said he wanted to “dismiss all this meaningless nonsense which long has dominated metaphysical thought and brought it into disrepute.”

The perception of the ego is in reality a long chain of simple impressions that you have never experienced simultaneously. It is “nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed one another with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement,” as Hume expressed it. The mind is “a kind of theater, where several perceptions successively make their appearance; pass, re-pass, slide away, and mingle in an infinite variety of postures and situations.” Hume pointed out that we have no underlying “personal identity” beneath or behind these perceptions and feelings which come and go. It is just like the images on a movie screen. They change so rapidly we do not register that the film is made up of single pictures. In reality the pictures are not connected. The film is a collection of instants.’

‘By Buddha. It’s almost uncanny how similarly the two formulate their ideas. Buddha saw life as an unbroken succession of mental and physical processes which keep people in a continual state of change. The infant is not the same as the adult; I am not the same today as I was yesterday. There is nothing of which I can say “this is mine,” said Buddha, and nothing of which I can say “this is me.” There is thus no “I” or unalterable ego.’ ‘Yes, that was typically Hume.’ ‘In continuation of the idea of an unalterable ego, many rationalists had taken it for granted that man had an eternal soul.’ ‘Is that a false perception too?’ ‘According to Hume and Buddha, yes. Do you know what Buddha said to his followers just before he died?’ ‘No, how could I?’ ‘“Decay is inherent in all compound things. Work out your own salvation with diligence.” Hume could have said the same thing. Or Democritus, for that matter. We know at all events that Hume rejected any attempt to prove the immortality of the soul or the existence of God. That does not mean that he ruled out either one, but to prove religious faith by human reason was rationalistic claptrap, he thought. Hume was not a Christian, neither was he a confirmed atheist. He was what we call an agnostic.’

‘When Hume discusses the force of habit, he concentrates on “the law of causation.” This law establishes that everything that happens must have a cause. Hume used two billiard balls for his example. If you roll a black billiard ball against a white one that is at rest, what will the white one do?’ ‘If the black ball hits the white one, the white one will start to move.’ ‘I see, and why will it do that?’ ‘Because it was hit by the black one.’ ‘So we usually say that the impact of the black ball is the cause of the white ball’s starting to move. But remember now, we can only talk of what we have actually experienced.’ ‘I have actually experienced it lots of times. Joanna has a pool table in her basement.’ ‘Hume would say the only thing you have experienced is that the white ball begins to roll across the table. You have not experienced the actual cause of it beginning to roll. You have experienced that one event comes after the other, but you have not experienced that the other event happens because of the first one.’

Hume emphasized that the expectation of one thing following another does not lie in the things themselves, but in our mind. And expectation, as we have seen, is associated with habit. Going back to the child again, it would not have stared in amazement if when one billiard ball struck the other, both had remained perfectly motionless. When we speak of the “laws of nature” or of “cause and effect,” we are actually speaking of what we expect, rather than what is “reasonable.” The laws of nature are neither reasonable nor unreasonable, they simply are. The expectation that the white billiard ball will move when it is struck by the black billiard ball is therefore not innate. We are not born with a set of expectations as to what the world is like or how things in the world behave. The world is like it is, and it’s something we get to know.’ ‘I’m beginning to feel as if we’re getting off the track again.’ ‘Not if our expectations cause us to jump to conclusions. Hume did not deny the existence of unbreakable “natural laws,” but he held that because we are not in a position to experience the natural laws themselves, we can easily come to the wrong conclusions.’

‘What you did was to draw a conclusion from a descriptive sentence – “That person wants to live too” – to what we call a normative sentence: “Therefore you ought not to kill them.” From the point of view of reason this is nonsense. You might just as well say “There are lots of people who cheat on their taxes, therefore I ought to cheat on my taxes too.” Hume said you can never draw conclusions from is sentences to ought sentences. Nevertheless it is exceedingly common, not least in newspaper articles, political party programs, and speeches. Would you like some examples?’

hume

‘So “to be or not to be” is not the whole question. The question is also who we are. Are we really human beings of flesh and blood? Does our world consist of real things – or are we encircled by the mind?’

How would things go for them now that they knew it was Hilde’s father who decided everything? Although ‘knew’ was perhaps an exaggeration. It was nonsense to think they knew anything at all. Wasn’t it only her father who let them know things?

‘I am scared that nothing is real.’ ‘That’s called existential angst, or dread, and is as a rule only a stage on the way to new consciousness.’

‘With regard to our own methodical doubt, we are right now starting from scratch. We don’t even know whether we think. It may turn out that we are thoughts, and that is quite different from thinking. We

‘How can we do that if we don’t even exist?’ ‘Who said we don’t exist? The question is not whether we are, but what we are and who we are. Even if it turns out that we are merely impulses in the major’s dual personality, that need not take our little bit of existence away from us.’

‘An Archimedian point?’ ‘Archimedes was a Greek scientist who said “Give me a firm point on which to stand and I will move the earth.” That’s the kind of point we must find to move ourselves out of the major’s inner universe.’

the French Enlightenment. He will concentrate on seven points. They are: 1. Opposition to authority 2. Rationalism 3. The enlightenment movement 4. Cultural optimism 5. The return to nature 6. Natural religion 7. Human rights

‘After Hume, the next great philosopher was the German, Immanuel Kant. But France also had many important thinkers in the eighteenth century. We could say that the philosophical center of gravity in Europe in the eighteenth century was in England in the first half, in France in the middle, and in Germany toward the end of it.’ ‘A shift from west to east, in other words.’ ‘Precisely. Let me outline some of the ideas that many of the French Enlightenment philosophers had in common. The important names are Montesquieu, Voltaire, and Rousseau, but there were many, many others. I shall concentrate on seven points.’

Many of the French Enlightenment philosophers visited England, which was in many ways more liberal than their home country, and were intrigued by the English natural sciences, especially Newton and his universal physics. But they were also inspired by British philosophy, in particular by Locke and his political philosophy. Once back in France, they became increasingly opposed to the old authority. They thought it was essential to remain skeptical of all inherited truths, the idea being that the individual must find his own answer to every question. The tradition of Descartes was very inspiring in this respect.’ ‘Because he was the one who built everything up from the ground.’ ‘Quite so. The opposition to authority was not least directed against the power of the clergy, the king, and the nobility. During the eighteenth century, these institutions had far more power in France than they had in England.’ ‘Then came the French Revolution.’ ‘Yes, in 1789. But the revolutionary ideas arose much earlier. The next key word is rationalism.’ ‘I thought rationalism went out with Hume.’ ‘Hume himself did not die until 1776. That was about twenty years after Montesquieu and only two years before Voltaire and Rousseau, who both died in 1778. But all three had been to England and were familiar with the philosophy of Locke. You may recall that Locke was not consistent in his empiricism. He believed, for example, that faith in God and certain moral norms were inherent in human reason. This ...

‘One of those who fought hardest for the rights of women during the French Revolution was Olympe de Gouges. In 1791 – two years after the revolution – she published a declaration on the rights of women. The declaration on the rights of the citizen had not included any article on women’s natural rights. Olympe de Gouges now demanded all the same rights for women as for men.’ ‘What happened?’ ‘She was beheaded in 1793. And all political activity for women was banned.’ ‘How shameful!’ ‘It was not until the nineteenth century that feminism really got under way, not only in France but also in the rest of Europe. Little by little this struggle began to bear fruit. But in Norway, for example, women did not get the right to vote until 1913. And women in many parts of the world still have a lot to fight for.’

Two hundred years ago, the slogan ‘Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity’ helped unite the people of France. Today the same words should unite the whole world. It is more important now than ever before to be one big Family of Man. Our descendants are our own children and grandchildren. What kind of world are they inheriting from us?

Gouges, Marie Olympe (1748–1793),

‘Immanuel Kant was born in 1724 in the East Prussian town of Königsberg, the son of a master saddler. He lived there practically all his life until he died at the age of eighty. His family was deeply pious, and his own religious conviction formed a significant background to his philosophy. Like Berkeley, he felt it was essential to preserve the foundations of Christian belief.’

‘There are two kinds of philosopher. One is a person who seeks his own answers to philosophical questions. The other is someone who is an expert on the history of philosophy but does not necessarily construct his own philosophy.’

But it is important to note that Kant had a solid grounding in the philosophic tradition of the past. He was familiar both with the rationalism of Descartes and Spinoza and the empiricism of Locke, Berkeley, and Hume.’ ‘I asked you not to mention Berkeley again.’ ‘Remember that the rationalists believed that the basis for all human knowledge lay in the mind. And that the empiricists believed all knowledge of the world proceeded from the senses. Moreover, Hume had pointed out that there are clear limits regarding which conclusions we could reach through our sense perceptions.’ ‘And who did Kant agree with?’ ‘He thought both views were partly right, but he thought both were partly wrong, too. The question everybody was concerned with was what we can know about the world. This philosophical project had been preoccupying all philosophers since Descartes. ‘Two main possibilities were drawn up: either the world is exactly as we perceive it, or it is the way it appears to our reason.’ ‘And what did Kant think?’ ‘Kant thought that both “sensing” and “reason” come into play in our conception of the world. But he thought the rationalists went too far in their claims as to how much reason can contribute, and he also thought the empiricists placed too much emphasis on sensory experience.’ ‘If you don’t give me an example soon, it will all be just a bunch of words.’ ‘In his point of departure Kant agrees with Hume and the empiricists that all our knowledge of the world comes from our s...

‘So now let’s sum up. According to Kant, there are two elements that contribute to man’s knowledge of the world. One is the external conditions that we cannot know of before we have perceived them through the senses. We can call this the material of knowledge. The other is the internal conditions in man himself – such as the perception of events as happening in time and space and as processes conforming to an unbreakable law of causality. We can call this the form of knowledge.’

‘Kant believed that there are clear limits to what we can know. You could perhaps say that the mind’s “glasses” set these limits.’

philosophers before Kant had discussed the really “big” questions – for instance, whether man has an immortal soul, whether there is a God, whether nature consists of tiny indivisible particles, and whether the universe is finite or infinite.’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Kant believed there was no certain knowledge to be obtained on these questions. Not that he rejected this type of argument. On the contrary. If he had just brushed these questions aside, he could hardly have been called a philosopher.’

In such great philosophical questions, Kant believed that reason operates beyond the limits of what we humans can comprehend. At the same time, there is in our nature a basic desire to pose these same questions. But when, for example, we ask whether the universe is finite or infinite, we are asking about a totality of which we ourselves are a tiny part. We can therefore never completely know this totality.’ ‘Why not?’ ‘When you put the red glasses on, we demonstrated that according to Kant there are two elements that contribute to our knowledge of the world.’ ‘Sensory perception and reason.’ ‘Yes, the material of our knowledge comes to us through the senses, but this material must conform to the attributes of reason. For example, one of the attributes of reason is to seek the cause of an event.’ ‘Like the ball rolling across the floor.’ ‘If you like. But when we wonder where the world came from – and then discuss possible answers – reason is in a sense “on hold.” For it has no sensory material to process, no experience to make use of, because we have never experienced the whole of the great reality that we are a tiny part of.’ ‘We are – in a way – a tiny part of the ball that comes rolling across the floor. So we can’t know where it came from.’ ‘But it will always be an attribute of human reason to ask where the ball comes from. That’s why we ask and ask, we exert ourselves to the fullest to find answers to all the deepest questions. But we never get anything firm to bite ...

He believed that it is essential for morality to presuppose that man has an immortal soul, that God exists, and that man has a free will.’ ‘So he does the same as Descartes. First he is very critical of everything we can understand. And then he smuggles God in by the back door.’ ‘But unlike Descartes, he emphasizes most particularly that it is not reason which brought him to this point but faith. He himself called faith in the immortal soul, in God’s existence, and in man’s free will practical postulates.’ ‘Which means?’ ‘To “postulate” something is to assume something that cannot be proved. By a “practical postulate,” Kant meant something that had to be assumed for the sake of “praxis,” or practice; that is to say, for man’s morality. “It is a moral necessity to assume the existence of God,” he said.’

If the human brain was simple enough for us to understand, we would still be so stupid that we couldn’t understand it. Love, Dad. Alberto nodded. ‘True enough. I believe Kant said something to that effect. We cannot expect to understand what we are. Maybe we can comprehend a flower or an insect, but we can never comprehend ourselves. Even less can we expect to comprehend the universe.’

‘Hume’s skepticism with regard to what reason and the senses can tell us forced Kant to think through many of life’s important questions again. Not least in the area of ethics.’ ‘Didn’t Hume say that you can never prove what is right and what is wrong? You can’t draw conclusions from is-sentences to oughtsentences.’ ‘For Hume it was neither our reason nor our experience that determined the difference between right and wrong. It was simply our sentiments. This was too tenuous a basis for Kant.’ ‘I can imagine.’ ‘Kant had always felt that the difference between right and wrong was a matter of reason, not sentiment. In this he agreed with the rationalists, who said the ability to distinguish between right and wrong is inherent in human reason. Everybody knows what is right or wrong, not because we have learned it but because it is born in the mind. According to Kant, everybody has “practical reason,” that is, the intelligence that gives us the capacity to discern what is right or wrong in every case.’ ‘And that is innate?’ ‘The ability to tell right from wrong is just as innate as all the other attributes of reason. Just as we are all intelligent beings, for example, perceiving everything as having a causal relation, we all have access to the same universal moral law. ‘This moral law has the same absolute validity as the physical laws. It is just as basic to our morality as the statements that everything has a cause, or that seven plus five is twelve, are basic to our intelli...

Kant had established that there was a limit to what we can know of “das Ding an sich.” On the other hand, he had underlined the importance of the ego’s contribution to knowledge, or cognition. The individual was now completely free to interpret life in his own way. The Romantics exploited this in an almost unrestrained “ego-worship,” which led to the exaltation of artistic genius.’

the artist can provide something philosophers can’t express?’