In order to attempt progress in this situation, we must establish what we regard as acceptable foundations. This implies establishing some description of ourselves as experiencing subjects.

  1.3.3. The metaphysical observer

  As stated above, one view of philosophy is to regard it as a tool to achieve true knowledge about the world and the role of mind in this. However, in order to derive anything from anything, we must have a solid foundation from which to progress. We have to take something for granted before we start the argument. Cartesius took the “thinking” as certain and later logical world constructions have attempted a start from pure sensational impressions as objects of direct acquaintance.

  (p.19) Carnap and his followers hoped to logically construct the world as we know it. The process was never completed, and today it seems to be abandoned as just as hopeless as the behavioristic approach to mind. The exactly opposite view is inherited from Plato: The objects constructed from pure thought must necessarily manifest themselves in the world albeit in a distorted shape. This approach is widely recognized as invalid except by modern mathematical physicists. For them, abstract groups and other formal structures are naively taken to offer a valid foundation for description of experiments. However, the only proved case is the general theory of gravitation. Here Einstein's pure thought created a framework apparently describing empirical reality adequately. The emergence of quantum physics was much more contorted and less amenable to analysis.

  There are two contrary approaches to the individual as an experiencing entity. First the world of experience is created by the mind and all concepts relating to the external world lack reality. Such an idealistic interpretation of knowledge cannot be refuted, but it carries little conviction and leads to absurdities when pushed to its ultimate limits. Secondly, a purely materialistic view is that the brain is a complicated informational processor, and the subjective feeling of consciousness is an epiphenomenon without independent existence. Even this approach lacks conviction; how are we supposed to convince an epiphenomenon that this is all it is?

  In spite of all progress in brain science, consciousness is just as far from an explanation as it ever was. Even if we clinically find that a certain signal in the brain indicates “red” and another indicates “horse”, how are we to explain the experience of a red horse? Measurements can only correlate physical quantities but no systematic approach has been able to convert them into subjective experiences. We cannot satisfactorily explain consciousness from any theory we know. It also seems that no progress in the physiology of the brain is able to explain it. Here we encounter a situation analogous to the one in physics: We can successfully apply quantum theory to all observed processes of physics. But even so, we cannot explain the emergence of the everyday “classical” world where we live. At best, we may show that it is possible without inconsistency, but its evident necessity has remained beyond reach.

  Let us see what implications we may find for the starting of philosophical enquiry. We are all conscious of being conscious. Thus it seems impossible to “explain consciousness” to itself. If that is so, let us take the consciousness as a primitive concept to start from: the entity performing our analysis is a mind receiving impressions and processing these, possibly deciding to act on the information received or the conclusions drawn. This simple change of view avoids many problems; the character of mental experience and the existence of free will pose no enigmas. I do not claim that this move is unavoidable but only that it delivers fruitful results. The ultimate foundations for building reality can only be known to gods and not to humans.

  So what kind of information can the conscious subject take cognizance of? On the one hand, we have the sense impressions entering through the sense organs. (p.20) In the world as experienced these are based on repeatable observations. Without a theoretical interpretation, they are only based on Humean expectations and carry no causal implications. For the sound mind, illusions and dreams can be eliminated by their ephemeral character. On the other hand, we become aware of impressions from our mental activities. We feel emotions, communicate verbally, and erect complicated theoretical structures in science and society. Such processes derive from our subconscious apparatus, whose existence has to be part of the reality of the observer. The fundamental basis of this is not known; we do not know why we experience things the way we do, but instincts act on us, problems are solved, and relations are forged; we do not know how. The activity of the subconscious cannot be observed. Only its manifestations in consciousness can be experienced. Then it appears to be of equal character as the knowledge received about the external world.

  I thus postulate a conscious entity, an archetypical observer, who receives information from the external world through sense impressions and from the internal psyche as mental experiences. In his mind, the two types of information are correlated and merge to form concepts: The objects of everyday experience call up ordinary words, results of experiments are interpreted in terms of physical theories, and physiological observations are related to psychic symptoms. We lack full knowledge about the deep sources of these observations. They may ultimately derive from some universal source beyond our present understanding. This eliminates all duality. The information entering the mind derives from mechanisms we can only try to depict from our limited knowledge.

  However, to help us construct a world view, the conscious observer has access to some formal tools: This allows him to formulate symbolic representations of the experienced ambience. The child learns to navigate in an Euclidean three‐ dimensional space. We have an instinctive ability to learn languages for communication, and last but not least, the construction of mathematical complexes carries our symbolic manipulations far beyond the limits of our naive expectations. The existence of these built‐in abilities must be taken to form part of the starting point for our inquiry.

  The existence of the physical world and its experimental manifestations have led to the development of physical theories which, in spite of their abstractness, provide us with an amazingly efficient tool to describe and manipulate our environment. The symbolic machine has worked remarkably well here.

  The theoretical understanding of our subconscious processes is less clear. Behaviorism is not sufficient; the mind insists on influencing us in unexpected and sometimes irrational ways. The sovereignty of the subconscious mind has been recognized by Carl Gustav Jung. His work is a systematic effort to find concepts describing the functioning of the common mind. This may ultimately also allow an understanding of aberrations now labelled as illness.

  Investigating the workings of the psyche, Jung found that its subconscious material can be described by certain universal concepts which he named Archetypes. These are rational terms telling about a substructure common to all (p.21) mankind. Its symbols carry meaning beyond the individual, it is the “collective unconscious”. Its origin and mechanisms are hidden from us; we do not know to what extent it operates through our genetic heritage or forms in our interaction with the social surroundings. It, however, influences both our use of language and our actions in the world. It bears witness about the meaning of a world of mental entities just as real as the external world [16]:

  But how do we assign meaning? From what source, in the last analysis, do we derive meanings? The forms we use for assigning meaning are historical categories that reach back into the mists of time ‐ a fact we do not take sufficiently into account. Interpretations make use of certain linguistic matrices that are themselves derived from primordial images. From whatever side we approach the question, everywhere we find ourselves confronted with the history of language, with images and motifs that lead straight back to the primitive wonder world.

  Thus the linguistic framework of humans plays an essential role in Jung's description of the inner realms. But his categories are not fixed and rigid as Kant's. They have formed dynamically during the evolution of man and they will adjust and reorganize with the extension of the sphere of human activity and knowledge. Like Feyerabend, Jung finds it difficult to fit the landscape of this inner world into the structure experienced as the external world. To start the discourse, less rational parts of the inherited language have to be used until more of the inner relations have been mapped [17]:

  It is possible to describe this content in rational, scientific language, but in this way one entirely fails to express its living character. Therefore, in describing the living processes of the psyche, I deliberately and consciously give preference to a dramatic, mythological way of thinking and speaking, because this is not only more expressive, but also more exact than an abstract scientific terminology, which is wont to toy with the notion that its theoretic formulations may one fine day be resolved into algebraic equations.

  Could it be possible that the myth of quantum theory was transformed into equations too early to admit our understanding to follow?

  To conclude: The conscious observer receives information from both an external and an internal reality. These enter consciousness from sources not directly available to the observer, but together they form the totality of experienced reality. On the basis of this information, the observer makes up theoretical descriptions using his capacity to introduce symbols and formal languages encompassing also abstract mathematical structures.

  Notes:

  (1) L. Wittgenstein, Vermischte Bemerkungen.

  (2) W. B. Yates, The Second Coming.

  (3) What we cannot speak about, we must pass over in silence.

  2 Twilight of the gods

  2.1. The dawn of darkness

  My aim in this text is to treat two of the intellectual pioneers of the twentieth century: Ludwig Wittgenstein and Niels Bohr. The former has been influential in at least two major directions of philosophy and the latter stands for the currently accepted interpretation of the formalism of quantum theory. I want to compare them, spotlight similarities and differences, but foremost, I want to put them up as exemplars of intellectual originality and leadership. In their contexts, their lives will hopefully illuminate two trends of modern culture and society. The ultimate conclusions must be left to the reader; the issues are too complex to be condensed into precise statements.

  The task set up seems to be impossible: Niels Bohr had no formal education in philosophy, and his writings on such topics are contorted and unattractive. The interpretations of his attitudes from the point of view of academic philosophy have been difficult and controversial. Likewise, Wittgenstein had a basic training only in classical physics. There is no indication in his writings of familiarity with modern physics nor any reports of verbal references to it. Thus this cannot be a book on philosophy or physics; there is not enough of factual material to satisfy either expert in these fields. It is only an attempt to see their activities as parts of a unitary whole in the evolution of human culture.

  The text is written from my personal point of view; it is my reading of the textual material. As a physicist, I have some knowledge of the use and success of modern quantum theory. This gives me an advantage in reading Bohr, but it also poses a danger. As the so‐called Copenhagen interpretation of the theory is not based on any consensus among its practitioners, the view of Bohr is not easily extracted. My knowledge of the various applications and the role of theory therein, may well confuse my judgement concerning Bohr's contributions. On the other hand, my insight into philosophy is based on extensive amateur reading, and the obvious danger is that I do not know enough of the literature, and what I know may be based on misunderstanding. When it comes to reading Wittgenstein, this may not entirely be a disadvantage. Not knowing most of the professional analyses of his contributions, may well keep my mind open to the task I have set up: to divine how much his approach to knowledge concurs with that of modern physics. As he himself used to claim, nobody is going to understand him. Thus I may be entitled to my own version of misunderstanding.

  (p.23) As personalities, Bohr and Wittgenstein were universes apart. The latter was immersed in a mystic feeling for the world, and he had a strong sense of personal moral responsibility in his life. He was acutely aware of his, partly hidden and forgotten, Jewish roots. The confessional religions seem to have had little impact on his attitudes. Towards fellow humans, Wittgenstein was short‐tempered and sometimes positively rude. He was a rather unhappy person, who periodically lingered at the edge of committing suicide. Bohr, on the other hand, was pleasant and friendly towards colleagues and acquaintances. He grew up without any strong bonds to religion; possibly a reflection of the more liberal Nordic moral atmosphere as compared to the restricting Catholic milieu of Vienna. He lived in a lifelong happy marriage, and there are no indications of crises in his personal life. The drowning of his eldest son in 1934 caused grief but no lasting depression. He was periodically overworked and had to take a period of rest. This, however, was a natural consequence of his many commitments and huge amount of work.

  In spite of their different religious upbringings, Bohr and Wittgenstein both stemmed from partly Jewish ancestry. I do not regard this as any cause for common mental attitude. It presumably only reflects the fact that the educated and creative part of the population in eighteenth‐century Europe, with few exceptions, had Jewish relations.

  Bohr and Wittgenstein do, however, share many features of similarity. Both came from wealthy families, where immersion in the culture of the day was characterizing the very atmosphere where they grew up. And this culture was that of the European continental scene when the nineteenth century turned into the twentieth. This differed from the cultural tradition in Great Britain and the still‐emerging American cultural stage. Here I see the common roots of the method of approach used by both thinkers. New approaches were emerging in art, literature, psychology, science, and philosophy. The mood can best be characterized by the ill‐defined word “existentialism”. A revolution was going on, and the results are clearly seen in the world today. The human condition and its relation to authorities and freedom acquired new perspectives in this period. I find it significant that Bohr and Wittgenstein imbibed these trends from their childhood. The human individual is cast into the world, and it is, to a large extent, up to him to define his conception of this world.

  Both Bohr and Wittgenstein put great emphasis on the role played by language in our approach to reality. They experienced a strong feeling of responsibility, when thoughts are transformed into texts. Both realized that intuitively divined insights about the world were not easily put down into words; in fact both despaired of an ultimate possibility to express anything essential in words, “Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen.” As a consequence, both liked to work by oral communications. Some of the Nachlass by Wittgenstein is in the form of notes he dictated to collaborators, mostly younger ones but also to his senior colleague G. E. Moore (1873–1958). Bohr also is well known to have worked through his many articles by reading them to his younger disciples. They went through a multitude of versions, and the finally (p.24)published articles bear clear traces of the difficult process leading to their birth. It seems that both men felt it easier to watch the line of their argument when an actual listener was present. It is also characteristic that both men exerted an immense influence on those who came in personal contact with them. This is not easy to comprehend when one bears in mind the public image of the two men.

  Bohr published a lot during his lifetime, but this does not necessarily make it easy to discern his ideas clearly. Wittgenstein published only one book during his lifetime, the famous Tractatus, but he collected another manuscript into nearly publishable form. Both men left a voluminous collection of manuscripts and notes. This material has been subjected to extensive research. As far as I know, this is the first comprehensive effort to join the two manifestations of twentieth century culture into one concept.1 As such it can only be incomplete and preliminary. But I am convinced of my opinion that they are but branches on the same tree. It lies in the nature of the issue, that I may not be able to present this conviction in a logically closed or scientifically compelling form.

  2.2. Cultural backgrounds

  2.2.1. Wittgenstein's Vienna

  At the dawn of the twentieth century, the Habsburg double monarchy was something of a unicum [18]. Encompassing the lands of Hungary and Austria it stretched over many cultures and folks, which in itself guaranteed that it was full of internal tensions. The earlier Habsburg possessions in Spain and the Netherlands were no longer included, but the nationalistic movements of the nineteenth century had made the artificial entity an anachronism. Of its many languages, the Hungarian and Check tongues developed their unique identities taking over two of the three leading cities of the union: Budapest and Prague. The Balkan Slavic populations remained dispersed, which in time constituted the seed for the First World War.

  Life, however, seemed to flow in its customary ways without any danger in sight. The dynasty was powerful but it persisted by ruling with moderation. There had been no great Habsburg heroes, the expansion had mainly occurred by politics and marriage. The people seemed satisfied with their rulers and their rulers with them.

  When the artificial unity was shattered by the First World War, only fragments of the original greatness lingered on; in particular the center, Vienna, survived only as a relic of its former greatness. Those that had experienced the Habsburg Empire on the spot sorely missed it; nobody, however, seemed to want it back.

  (p.25) Things changed slowly in Habsburg country; in many ways it appeared that time stood still. This was emphasized by the fact that the Emperor Franz Josef seemed to endure for ever. He became emperor of Austria in 1848 at the age of 18, brought to power by the revolutionary unrest of that time. He became king of Hungary in 1862. His very existence seemed to guarantee that nothing would change. He was to rule to 1916, and in that whole time all seemed to endure. The Austro‐Hungarian double monarchy was unshakable. It was called Kaiserlich und Königlich which induced the author Robert Musil (1880‐1942) [19] to dub it “Kakania”, a word with childish fecal associations in most European languages. It was even more befitting as the Empire had no proper name of its own. Neither did it have a cultural unity.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35