2006-03-05T08:21:00.000-08:00

PHILOSOPHY AND QUOTATIONS OF
PHILOSOPHERS BY PAUL JANET

INTRODUCTION

OBJECT AND DIVISION OF PHILOSOPHY

1.Sens usual of the word philosophy

In the ordinary language, the philosophical word is often employed to
designate a man who supports with courage the pain and the adversity,
and which can also act with moderation in prosperity: Aequam mememto
rebus in arduis servare mentem not secus in profits (Horace, Odes II,
3). In this very practical direction, the philosopher is wise, and
philosophy is other thing only WISDOM.

Another point of view, a philosopher is a spirit curious, difficult,
which realizes of its ideas, which does not believe slightly in the
word of others, but refers itself some to its own reason, which in a
word examines before judging. Thus heard, philosophy is the FREE
EXAMINATION.

One calls still philosophy, and it is consequence of direction
preceding, spirit which thinks, which meditates, which reflects, which
seeks the direction of the things and the human life. Philosophy is the
REFLEXION.

One as generally agrees as that which, in the various orders of
knowledge, rises higher than the facts, conceives reports/ratios,
links, class, sees top, which finally generalizes or goes up with the
principles, is a philosophical spirit. Philosophy is the research of
the GENERAL IDEES or the PRINCIPLES.

By summarizing and gathering these various ideas, one will say:
Philosophy is the wisdom based on principles acquired by the free
reflexion.

2.La philosophy like science.

Such will be the definition of philosophy, such as it arises from the
popular use of the word; let us see now if the scientific and
methodical analysis will lead us to a similar result. The popular use
has especially report/ratio with the practice, and indicates a frame of
the mind rather that a science itself. We have to now ask us what it is
that the philosophy considered as a science. But initially, what a
science?

3.Définition of science.

Science has as an aim the investigation into the causes (To know, known
as Aristote, it is to know by the cause.(Anal.post, II, X.)). It is
thus knowto know it why things. Thus, the vulgar one knows that the
thunder occurs when the weather is very hot and that there are thick
clouds, and usually a strong rain. The scientist is that which knows
why that takes place, and for example that the lightning is an electric
spark produced by the meeting of two clouds in charge of contrary
electricity.

Science does not seek only it why things; it seeks also it how. Thus
the vulgar one sees well that the bodies fall, but the physicist
teaches us how it fall, for example, according to the law of the
uniformly accelerated movement.

How phenomena or things is what is called their law; why is what one
calls their causes. Science taken generally is thus the RESEARCH OF the
CAUSES AND the LAWS.

Science in general being defined as we have just said it, various
sciences are distinguished the ones from the others by their object. At
once that one can announce an object distinct, likely to be studied and
known, it is necessary to recognize the existence of a special science.

4.Méthode to determine the object of philosophy.

To determine the object or the objects (because there can be several)
philosophical science, our method will be to review the various objects
of our knowledge, as well as universally recognized sciences which are
occupied of these objects. That if, after having exhausted the
enumeration of all these sciences, there remains still some object
which was not named, this object could be regarded as a bonum vacans
which will belong to which will want to seize some. The need for a
science moreover will be shown, and it will not any more be a question
but of knowing if this new science is not precisely philosophy itself.

5.Objets of various sciences. The alive bodies;corps and rough bodies.

The first objects which are presented at us and on which attention of
the men had to go, they are the bodies; and like there are two kinds of
body, the rough or inorganic bodies, and the organized or alive bodies,
there will be two kinds of sciences: the science of the alive beings or
BIOLOGY, and the science of the nonalive bodies, which we will call
PHYSICS.

There are two kinds of beings which live, the plants and the animals;
there will be thus two biological sciences, BOTANY and the ZOOLOGY.

6.Choses and phenomena.

As for science, or with sciences of what does not live division is more
delicate.

We will say initially that in nature one can distinguish two points of
view: or things themselves, or phenomena. Thus a stone is a thing, a
metal is a thing; water the air are things, but the sound, the light,
heat are only phenomena. So that there is its, light, heat, is needed
that there are sound things, luminous, overheated. Thus the phenomena
are not by themselves and suppose things. However they can be observed
and studied independently of the things. The science of the general
phenomena of nature is PHYSICS itself; the scientists who occupy
themselves of these phenomena, their causes and their laws are called
physicists.

7.Les stars. Ground. Minerals. Elements and made up.

As for the study of the things, it is subdivided in its turn as it
follows:

If we raise the eyes above our heads, we see a multitude of luminous
element of which the number and the movements astonish us; they are the
stars: the science of these bodies is called ASTRONOMY.

Among these stars, the only one that we know directly, it is the
ground, and the science who corresponds to it is the GEOLOGIE. The
various material objects which are on the surface of the ground or
which forms the composition of it, are what one calls of minerals, and
they are the object of the MINERALOGIE. Maintaining the experiment
teaches us that these bodies change structure and properties, according
to whether one associates some or that one separates the elements from
them. The science which has as an aim the compositions and the
decompositions of the bodies, which by the analysis goes down again of
made up to their elements, and by the synthesis goes up these elements
with the compounds, is called CHEMISTRY.

8.Objets mathematical. Measurable numbers and things.

The preceding enumeration includes/understands all the kinds of objects
significant, which fall under our experiment, and it seems that the
circle of sciences is exhausted. It is lacking some much. Thanks to a
certain faculty called abstraction, that we will study later, we can
apply our spirit either only to real and concrete things (trees, stone,
horse), but to qualities who, while being extracted from realities, do
not correspond however to realities, and seem to be only designs of our
spirit. We explain.

When we have in front of the eyes several objects, for example several
trees, several stones, we distinguish each one of these trees and each
one of these stones, in particular, of their meeting or multitude, and
we say: a tree, a stone, several trees, several stones. Up to now,
nothing which exceeds seemingly the field of the directions, but if we
want to know how much there are trees, how much there are stones, the
directions are not enough more. One needs a certain number of
operations, helped of signs; and the science which learns how to us to
practise these operations and to include/understand these signs is the
ARITHMETIQUE. One can thus define arithmetic the science of how much,
or the science of the numbers: because the number is precisely what
expresses how much the things. The number is an abstract quality which
does not fall under the direction and which never separates from the
things where it meets.

The science of the numbers forms part of a group of sciences which one
calls the MATHEMATIQUES, which very have as an aim the study of the
measurable quantities.

What quantity? It is, say to us, the mathematicians, all that is
suitable for increase and reduction. Thus a time, a way, an amount of
money, is quantities, because time, the way, the sum, can be more or
less large. But it is not enough that a thing is more or less large to
be the object of mathematics; it is necessary, moreover, that it is
suitable for measurement. What be-that measurement? To measure, it is
to compare a multitude of object with one of these objects taken as
term of comparison, which one calls unit, and to determine how much
time the unit is contained in the multitude; for example, to measure a
field, it is to seek how much time it contains a certain unit called
meter. All the times gifts which an object is such as one can take one
of these parts like unit, and to say how much the whole contains these
parts, such an object is measurable, and it can become the object of
mathematics. This kind are: space or extent, object of the GEOMETRIE;
the movement, object of the MECANIQUE. Such are, with the arithmetic
one, two primarily mathematical sciences: because the algebra is only
one arithmetic generalized; the integral calculus and differential is
only one extension of the algebra, and the theory of probability is
only one particular case.

Annotations of Apj: (the division of the physical sciences is not very
precise. Two paragraphs 6 and 7 would be to remake. I think that the
algebra is arithmetic that one tried to generalize. The algebra is
arithmetic of trade which uses the zero, which is one its principal
characteristics. I think that there is another arithmetic without zero
with an exponential model for sciences with for application the health
or the body of the man. I also think that there is third arithmetic
always exponential directed towards the spirit of the man thus towards
God.

9.Le moral world. The mankind.

All preceding sciences have as an aim the physical world, because the
mathematical concepts themselves are drawn from the physical world or
apply to it. But is the physical world all? There is not another order
of facts and truths which one calls the moral world, and which deserves
as much as the first, and perhaps, the study of the scientists?

Among the beings which cover the surface of the ground, it is one which
interests us particularly, since they is ourselves. This class of
beings is what one calls the mankind, mankind, the man. Considered
outside, the man presents himself at us as similar to the other beings
which surround it; it is a body; it resembles the animals, saw, is born
and dies, like them. When his body is opened, it is seen that it is
organized same manner as the higher animals: it is a mammal,
vertebrate. For this reason, it belongs, like object, with a science
already known and mentioned above, the zoology. Up to now nothing again.

But if the man, by his physical organization, fact part of the animal
world, it is certain that it is distinguished from the other animals by
essential characters: and besides, in the animal itself, there are
qualities, aptitudes, which are not purely physical. These aptitude,
which in the man is well differently developed, are what we will call
the moral one.

The man, being moral, can be considered from several different points
of view:

1° While, in the animals, the individuals differ little the ones
from the others, and carries out consequently a life almost entirely
similar and uniform, in humanity, on the contrary, the individual
having taken a great importance, it follows a great diversity in the
life of each one, and like resultant of all these various actions, a
great diversity of events. Then, the man being endowed with the
considered memory and faculty to measure time, of the attribute of the
word and the writing, it starts by telling orally, then to consign in
writing all the events which interest it or which interest its family,
her tribe, her nation, and finally humanity: from there a science, or
rather a group of science which one calls HISTORICAL HISTORY or
SCIENCES (history, archaeology, épigragie, numismatics,
geography).

2° While the animal has only the inarticulate language or the cry,
the man has the articulated language or the word. The word changes
according to times and the places and gives rise to so that one calls
the languages. From there a new group of sciences, or PHILOLOGICAL
SCIENCES (philology, etymology, paleography, etc)

3° Enfin, while the animal, or saw isolated, or it lives in group,
does not appear gifted faculty to reflect on the company in which it
lives, the man lives in company; it forms States, cities, republics. It
gives itself to itself laws. Institutions, laws, public and deprived
richness, as many facts giving rise to a third group of sciences:
SOCIAL SCIENCES AND POLICIES (policy, jurisprudence, political economy).

10.L' human spirit.

Sciences which we have just announced, namely, sciences historical,
philological, political, are what one calls sciences morals, but they
are not yet philosophy itself. We ask now if there is not yet a point
of view under which the human nature can be considered, and who is
distinguished from the preceding points of view.

We distinguished the moral one from the physique, but what does one
have to call the moral one? One calls made moral of the human nature
those which can never be reached directly by the directions and which
are known only internally by that which tests them, by the thought, the
feeling, the will. However preceding sciences study yet only the
demonstrations external of the moral facts, but do not study them in
themselves. The language, expression of the thought, are not however
the thought. The historical events, effects of passions and the wills
of the men, are however neither these passions, nor these wills. The
human societies, manifestations of the instinct of sociability and
bodies of justice, are however neither sociability, nor justice.
Finally all the social facts, history, are the outside of the human
spirit, they are not the human spirit.

One calls human spirit the whole of intellectual faculties and morals
of the man, such that they appear internally with each one of us as it
exerts them. When I think, I know that I think; when I suffer, I know
that I suffer; when I want, I know that I want; and no one other knows
it only me, or by me; otherwise the lie would be impossible. This
interior warning which accompanies each one of our interior acts (and
that we will study later) is called the conscience or the intimate
direction. The interior principle which S ' allot these interior acts,
and which grammatically results in the pronoun of the first anybody, I
or I, are called it Me, or the subject, or finally the heart. All that
has report/ratio on the subject, i.e. with ego, i.e. with the interior
principle which is aware of him even, is called subjective;
reciprocally, all that is apart from ego is for him objective, is used
to him as object. All sciences morals which study the man by the
outside (language, facts historical or social) still place from the
objective point of view. It thus remains to make the study of the man
from the subjective point of view, i.e. the study of the heart itself.

From there a science or a group of sciences which we will call
PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCES.

11. First principles and first causes.

It thus had already only this first object, namely, the human spirit,
philosophy would have a reason to exist and to confuse with no other
science; but this first object is not the only one which remains free;
there is still a type of question which sciences themselves leave apart
from their field, or which they cannot approach without leaving their
clean limiting.

We saw that each science is made up when it has a distinct and
determined object. To establish particular sciences we are obliged to
divide, to separate nature in compartments. Each science being thus
placed from an exclusive and special point of view, the unit of the
thing escapes to him; the sets are erased; the reports/ratios and the
bonds are sacrificed. There is thus a legitimate need for the spirit
which is not satisfied by special sciences and which requires
satisfaction, namely: the need for synthesis. With which conditions
this need for synthesis will be it satisfies?

1° Everyone knows that in any science the facts and the laws which
constitute the positive part of science suppose or suggest a certain
number of theoretical and general considerations which one usually
calls the philosophy of this science; it is the connection of these
considerations between them, it is the reduction of these principles of
each science to more raised principles, it is that even which can
constitute the object of a science superior.

2° When one reflects on these principles of sciences, one realizes
that it imply certain numbers general concepts, fundamental, which are
to some extent the gasoline even of the human spirit. They are common
to all sciences and inherent with the human thought. They are involved
in all our judgements, as they are also frays with any reality. They
are, for example, the concepts of existence, substance, cause, force,
action and reaction, law, goal, movement, to become, etc. Thus these
principles, which one finds with the root of all sciences, are at the
same time the principles of the human reason, and either that one
considers one or the others, there is a science of first principles.

3° It is not all. Not only sciences study the laws or principles,
but they study the causes. However each science studies only particular
causes, and these causes themselves must have their causes. But can one
rise of cause in question without never meeting some of last? If we
seek the cause of all the things of the universe, catches separately,
isn't it necessary to seek the cause of the entire universe? If thus
there is a science of the first principles, there are of them also
first causes: or rather it is the same one, because principles and
causes differ only by abstraction.

Thus science that we seek will be thus the science of what there is of
more general in all the others, the science of the fundamental designs
of the human spirit, science to be it as being, the science of the
first principles and the first causes. It is this science which one
agreed to call, since Aristote, the METAPHYSIQUE.

12.Double object of philosophy. The man and God. Unit of these two
objects.

It results from preceding research that there are at least two objects
which remained apart from the framework of sciences themselves. These
two objects are: 1° the human spirit, present at itself by the
conscience; 2° the highest possible general information, that we
called, with Aristote, first principles and first causes. One calls
PHILOSOPHY science or sciences which are occupied of these two objects;
and there will be consequently two kinds of philosophy: 1° the
philosophy of the human spirit; 2° philosophy first.

We up to now presented the object of methaphysic sciences like one
makes Aristote and the scolatique one, in the most abstract form:
(first principles and first causes), but doesn't this supreme object
have a more concrete name and more alive, than mankind knows, respects
and adores, namely God? Isn't God the principle of being it, to be it
in oneself, to be as being it? Isn't this as a God that at the same
time the first principles and the first causes are summarized? Also
Aristote does not fear it to call the metaphysics of the name of
THEOLOGIE. Undoubtedly, there are several parts and to some extent
several degrees in metaphysics, but the point more culminating of this
science, it is the science of God, called now théodicée.

Thus, while the base of philosophy is the man, its term and its last
word are God. How these two terms would not be plain in only one and
even science? Because it is the only being which thinks of God (the man
is distinguished from the animal, said Hegel, in what this one does not
have of religion) In addition, the man is incomplete without God; it is
by God that it is completed and that it is included/understood. As it
is seen as from Socrate to Descartes, and Descartes until Kant and
Hegel, the problem, for all the philosophical schools without
exception, was always double; what the man? what God? According to
these considerations, one will be able to simplify the double
definition given higher and to bring back it to only one, while saying
with Bossuet (that it is the knowledge of God and oneself), or the
social science like introduction to the science of God.

If we bring closer the preceding definition that which we higher drew
from the vulgar concepts (voy.chp1), we will see that they are answered
and been complementary one with the other, because (wisdom) does not
have surer condition than (the knowledge of us even), and them
(principles) which melt wisdom have them-even for last base (the
knowledge of God). Lastly, (the free reflexion), which is the condition
of all sciences is with stronger reason of the science of sciences,
namely, philosophy.

We have to ask us, which of these two parts (the social science and the
science of God) must precede the other. Without exaggerating, as one
did, the importance of this question, we however believe to be in
conformity with the spirit of modern science while starting by most
known raising us at least known. However, if not very known that us is
the human spirit, it is it however more to us than the first principles
and the first causes. It will be thus of the man that we will leave to
raise us with God, and psychology will be for us the base of
théodicée.

13.Subdivisions.

It remains us to subdivide the great parts of the philosophy which we
have just distinguished, namely, the philosophy of the human spirit and
philosophy first.

The philosophy of the human spirit is the science which treats natural
laws. However, these laws are of two kinds: the ones are human spirit
such as it is; , others the laws of the human spirit, such as it should
be. , ones are empirical, i.e. express the results of the experiment;
the others are ideal and express the goal towards which must tighten
our faculties. There will be thus initially a science which will study
our faculties in their real state and it is what one calls PSYCHOLOGY.
There will be moreover several other sciences having their roots in
this primitive science, but being distinguished some in what they study
our faculties in an ideal state; for example, the study of the ideal
laws of the understanding is called LOGIC; the study of the ideal laws
of the will is called MORALS. An understanding ideal would be an
infallible understanding; an ideal will would be an impeccable will.
Logic is the science of the infallible understanding. Morals is the
science of the impeccable will.

The understanding and the will are not only faculties which have an
ideal rule. It is the same for imagination. In fact, imagination can
conceive all that she, as the understanding to think all that it wants
likes, like wanting all that approved to him, but the understanding
should not all think, nor the will all to want; in the same way,
imagination should not all conceive. From there the third science which
for object ideal laws of imagination: it is the ESTHETIQUE.

With the result that the understanding, the will, imagination have
rules which impose direction rather to them than such other, it is that
they have a goal, an object which is apart from it and which exceeds
them, and consequently their order. The goal of the understanding, it
is truth; the goal of the will, it is the good; the goal of imagination
it is the beautiful one. Truth, the good and the beautiful one are thus
the three object of logic, morals and esthetics. This is why these
three sciences, while being attached to the philosophy of the human
spirit, since they study human faculties, however tend to cross the
limits of this philosophy, because, studying these faculties from the
ideal point of view, it bring back to their principle, and are thus the
bond and to some extent the passage of psychology to metaphysics.

According to the preceding considerations, we will divide the
philosophy of the human spirit into four parts: psychology, logic,
morals and esthetics; and on the basis of the same principle as higher,
namely, than it is necessary to go from most known at least known, we
will start with psychology, because the real state is more known and
more easily recognizable for us than the ideal state; and it is only of
the knowledge of reality that one can rise with the knowledge of the
ideal.

When with the second part of philosophy, or philosophy first, it was
itself in the old school subdivided in several parts. Let us say only
that as it in general treats principles and in an abstracted way, it is
called metaphysics, and that as it treats to be it supreme and of the
first cause, it is called théodicée. One will be used to
us as introduction to the other.

Hypothesis on time

Philosophy and quotations