THE ORIGIN OF VALUE IN A TRANSCENDENT FUNCTION

THE THEORY OF VALUE OR POSITIVE TRANSCENDENCE

PART TWO: UNCONDITIONED POSITIVE TRANSCENDENCE AS PURPOSIVE VALUE

§2 Schopenhauer

One of the most curious aspects of Schopenhauer's system of metaphysics is his own theory of Ideas [128]. These Ideas are Schopenhauer's conscious attempt, having discarded Kant's notion of reason, to reinstate, mutatis mutandis, the Platonic Forms as contents of the transcendent [129]. This scheme is of great interest and is very close to the view that I will actually present subsequently. In describing it and then translating it out of the peculiar terms of Schopenhauer's system, we will arrive at a good first approximation of positive transcendence.

Schopenhauer's special framework of discourse is given by the Upanishadic doctrine of the unknown subject of knowledge, the [erratum corrected] knower that cannot be immediately reflectively known [130]. Despite its essential and fundamental place in Schopenhauer's system, he does not say much about the subject of knowledge. In the terms of the discussion here, however, the subject of knowledge is internal transcendence, not the metaphysical over-soul that Schopenhauer, or the Upanishads, may have had in mind; and this will play its part in reinterpreting the sense of Schopenhauer's results. The subject of knowledge, or the thing in itself, Schopenhauer does interpret as being the "Will" -- though the Will hardly seems to be presented or characterized as much as a subject of knowledge. The contents of the world of representation are taken to be known by being objectified according to the "principle of sufficient reason" [131], by which he means that the principle of causality is applied in the projection of sensation from the subject to its causes in phenomenal representation [132]. Thus he refers to the spatiotemporal world as the mediate "objectivity of the Will" [133], namely mediated by the principle of sufficient reason.

On the other hand, Schopenhauer characterizes the Ideas as the "immediate objectivity of the Will" [134]. In immediacy, the Ideas are not subject to the principle of sufficient reason and stand apart from space, time, and causality. This is an interesting move, because in this Schopenhauer must distinguish objectivity as such from causality, meaning that he cannot identify the projection of sensation into objectivity with the application of the principle of sufficient reason -- the form of objectivity must be applied as well. If the subject of knowing were able to supply the subject-object form without applying the principle of sufficient reason also, the world, all Being actually, would suddenly stand out as the eternal and unchanging Platonic realm of Forms, containing the exemplars and archetypes in beauty and perfection of all things [135]. Beneath the principle of sufficient reason, the Ideas are, as Schopenhauer sees it, and as Plato imagined, the stuff and substance, the basis of existence, of all the changing objects that we see coming to be and passing away in space and time. Temporal reality as a "moving image of eternity" was Plato's image; and for Schopenhauer all that we see may be said to be eternity as perceived through the revolving and distorting kaleidoscopic mechanism of the principle of sufficient reason.

The great irony and curiosity of Schopenhauer's whole metaphysical system is that the Will, which he unfailingly characterizes as a principle of evil, suffering, and futility, should appear in its "immediate objectivity" as a thing of beauty and perfection. We might expect otherwise. In fact, Schopenhauer's objection to life and the Will seems necessarily to involve the role of time, since it is in time that goals are sought, desires pursued, and the futility of both attained and unattained ends is felt. The principle of sufficient reason, wherever it comes from, not the Will in itself, would consequently seem to be the culprit. Without that mediation of objectivity the subject of knowing would have divine existence, knowing for eternity the bliss of unchanging contemplation of the world of Platonic Forms -- a fate that Plato imagined for the gods and for the most blessed of lesser beings. With different sentiments, Schopenhauer could have derived a very different sense of the world without changing any essential details of his ontology. It is this better sense, indeed, that we should derive from such reasoning.

Schopenhauer's construction of the Ideas as the "immediate objectivity of the Will" does not make any practical difference in how they are known. That is, the Ideas are not perceived in separation from empirical objects; and so it must be said that Ideas can be distinguished in experience only because they constitute some identifiable difference in the objects. Schopenhauer's distinction between the "mediate" and "immediate" objectivity of the Will is possible because of our ability to conceptually dissociate the form of intentionality from the spatiotemporal and causal nexi that unite experience. As treated here, however, all "objectivity" must be collapsed into its concrete representation in experience, or, if dissociated from the forms of knowledge and objectivity, be considered as contents of the subject or the non-intentional transcendent. Thus Schopenhauer's separation between mediate and immediate objectivity must be regarded as artificial and unhelpful. What the separation creates is a false impression: an impression that belongs to the Platonic Forms also, a quality of being eternal and unchanging, which is simply an artifact of the fixed and perfect quality of the concept. That is a matter of metaphysical interest, but it belongs to the theory of immanence and does not have the same importance as in Plato or in Schopenhauer. The perfect aspect of Schopenhauer's Ideas belong to their immanent milieu, not to them in some peculiar and contrary-to-fact state of separation. For us this is an important point, since the perfect aspectual quality which is so conspicuous with Platonic Forms and Schopenhauer's Ideas is precisely what does not belong to positive transcendence, although these things are otherwise ontologically similar.

Schopenhauer's Ideas are principally matters of aesthetic theory: they are beautiful and make empirical things beautiful. Schopenhauer's notion of morality is divorced from this and is far less formal and systematic, though it must be viewed with a thought to its ultimate relation to all value, which would include it with the Ideas. Hume's view on morality rather than Kant's is paradigmatic for Schopenhauer [136]. The Humean "sentiment" of morality, however, Schopenhauer views as arising from a specific condition: the sympathy for others that stays our will to inflict harm is due to a recognition of our underlying metaphysical identity [137]. There is consequently a covert formal aspect to Schopenhauer's view, which just as Kant's rational universality, operates to overcome which Nelson called "the numerical differentiation of person" [138]. Thus, Schopenhauer sees the differences between persons metaphysically erased in the underlying Will, just as Kant in universalizing his maxims moved everything from the individual case to the general law. Schopenhauer does not think of morality in terms of imperatives or formal rules; but his meaning of moral sympathy obtains its sense from an ontological principle which could easily be made into a criterion. In the full articulation of value below, the form of intentionality will be used in a similar spirit to differentiate categories of value.

As a theory of positive transcendence, Schopenhauer's theory of Ideas puts too much into a view of them as distinguishable from empirical objects. Collapsing objectivity back together leaves one wondering what it is in empirical objects that gives one some intimation of the transcendent and a basis for separating out some such things as Plato's or Schopenhauer's Ideas. Here the beautiful is distinguished in empirical objects because, in a sense, as we shall consider, it becomes an object of fascination or desire for the will. The quality of value in an object is not a factual attribute because it exists only in relation to the will and consequently is liable to be characterized as following entirely from a subjective and possibly idiosyncratic projection. Schopenhauer would be less than happy to see beauty as an object of desire -- since that presumably would set one on the treadmill of futile striving -- but the notion of an object of fascination is altogether appropriate even for him.

§3 Jung

Fascination is a quality of the projected Jungian Archetype [139]. Jung's Archetypes need differ in no metaphysical detail from Schopenhauer's Ideas (hence the equivalently Platonic terminology) except for the ambiguity that follows from Jung's desire to withhold metaphysical commitments: so that his views might be seen to hold either in terms of materialism or on the basis of the more sophisticated Kantian approach of Schopenhauer [140]. On the basis of materialism, however, the Archetypes could only be subjective projections of specifically human evolved forms. Jung seems to have wished to provide for that possibility because of a belief that respectable science would expect materialism [141] -- and since the ontological term in the theory was not practically essential to it anyway, there was not much point in making matters more difficult than necessary. Jung's private beliefs, on the other hand, were principally derived from Kant and Schopenhauer, and consequently there is always in his thought the background notion of underlying identity between subject and object [142].

There is much in the Archetypes, however, that would seem to be peculiarly human: the forms of anima, animus, mother, father, Hero, etc. [143] belong to human life as they might not to other kinds of creatures. This aspect of the Archetypes might be said to form a sort of layer over Schopenhauer's more general scheme, and the effect of this in some ways is very contrary to Schopenhauer's views: for instance that the attraction and fascination of woman for man, and vice versa, is due to the presence or projection of an Archetype [144]. To Schopenhauer there seem to have been few more horrifying aspects to human life than that woman should attract or fascinate man. Schopenhauer, in his bizarre misogyny and world-denying rejection of the forces of life, did not even consider the female form to be beautiful [145]: sexual attraction he seems to have set aside as a matter of some dark working of the Will, which strangely is not represented in the beautiful "immediate objectivity" of the Ideas. The force of logical consistency is therefore on the side of Jung, whose theory is able to enter more fully into the explanation of human actions.

For the theory presented here, the peculiarly human content of Jung's Archetypes, male and female, etc., is of secondary interest. The philosophic generality of Schopenhauer's theory as an account of value is the kind of thing we are looking for. Apart from the specifics of human Archetypes, however, we can still see Schopenhauer's general theory as importantly modified by Jung. This is what makes Jung's theory philosophically, as well as psychoanalytically, important. The fascination of the projected Archetypes brings them into relation to human action -- value as the occasion of will, whereas Schopenhauer's aesthetic Ideas are artificially and arbitrarily made to stand aside from the Will. Of equal importance is the fact that the ugly is often as fascinating as the beautiful and may be just as much an occasion of will. It would be a just criticism of Schopenhauer to say that in all consistency his Ideas should reflect the dualism of good and evil just as much as to the events of the world, particularly when he holds the Will to be somehow essentially evil and the Ideas no more than an objectification of that underlying reality.

The question of evil goes beyond the simple theory of value and will be found in detail in the third section of the theory of positive transcendence. It is at that stage that Jung can come into his own in this treatment. The struggle of good with evil is literally and profoundly an Archetypal struggle, a terror of both soul and history as cosmically general as when it first dawned on Zoroaster, a "problem of evil" that Jung in a most important, and certainly less neurotic, sense came to better grips with than did Schopenhauer. Jung is therefore not just important for us out of a perceptive criticism of Schopenhauer or out of a rendering of his system more consistent; he is important because he has adopted aspects of Schopenhauer's system for the same reason that this essay has: it represents a good perception of reality which, with modifications, can be made better. As Schopenhauer erred in making the Will wholly evil, and the Ideas wholly beautiful, Jung undoes the artificial separation and displays the conflict as it is: a self-consuming tension within positive transcendence, which is at once within the unconscious also, a general, and essential, duality of value. The problem of evil is not just another hopeless theological puzzle, it is a practical and awful historical and psychological reality, kicking around in philosophy since its Presocratic inception.

§4 The Friesian Tradition in Otto

As Jung reached out for terms to properly describe his Archetypes, he easily picked up a very suitable one coined by Rudolf Otto -- "numinous." Here the importance of that goes far beyond the actual use Jung made of the complete theory of the numinous, for the complete theory is actually just the Friesian epistemology that I have spoken of from the beginning. This is the last historical layer in the theory positive transcendence, and with its assimilation and reinterpretation, positive transcendence may be set out as a new and independent inference.

At this point it is worth remarking how completely the vague Platonic epistemology of the Forms has been changed. Since the transcendent is not a separate world or order of objects, it is not known in any kind of separate intuition. With more of an "immanentized" Aristotelian Form, the distinction between immanent and transcendent comes down to that between fact, which is purely theoretical, and value, which, as we shall see, engages the will and so our own internal potential for change. Kant's notion of Dialectical reason, which only in a very indirect way reveals the transcendent, is discarded because it is really based on, and is our miserable substitute for, the "intellectual intuition" that we do not possess. The character of things which here I take to bespeak the transcendent finds its antecedent in the Friesian doctrine of Ahndung or "intimation," which is the precise theoretical vehicle for Otto's numinosity [146].

Fries accepted the terms of Kant's system so far as to say that empirical knowledge, for which we possess intuitions, is to be contrasted with the "faith" (Glaube) of reason [147], which represents a negative and abstract cognitive relation to things in themselves, similar to Kant's notion of the transcendent application of pure thought, severely limited by our not possessing a corresponding intuition. Going beyond Kant, however, Fries held that there is no reason to doubt the knowledge represented by Glaube (it is non-intuitively immediate) and that we also possess non-cognitive feelings, the basis of religion, which refer to the transcendent [148]. Thus the Friesian theory has an interesting symmetry: with respect to the immanent, feeling and concept are united in empirical knowledge and understanding, while with respect to the transcendent, feeling (Ahndung) and concept (Glaube) both exist but are separate, i.e. we do not and cannot know how to combine them into the same kind of knowledge of the transcendent that we have of the immanent. What is retained from Kant in this is the notion of things in themselves as a separate order of objects which could be adequately known, uniting Ahndung and Glaube, through an ideal, intellectual intuition. In the context of the theory here, this is of course unacceptable as it stands.

Otto certainly represents the most interesting, and indeed, popular, use to which the Friesian epistemology of Ahndung was ever put. He was an associate of Nelson in the revived "Fries'sche Schule" of the early days of this century, but his notions were regarded by Nelson as too mystical [149]. The "numinous" is, however, in straightforward Friesian terms an "intimation' of the "holy," the terrifying, powerful, divine presence [150]. This may easily be taken as no more than a phenomenological description of what is actually present in religions; and, for from any kind of creative mysticism, draws its examples directly from common, if overlooked and philosophically unappreciated, religious texts and sentiments.

The constant and characteristic use by Jung of the term "numinous" with respect to the Archetypes [151] is in a weaker sense than Otto. The numinosity of the Jungian Archetype is broader and emotionally much weaker than the strictly "holy" object of Otto:" the anima Archetype of the inner, feminine soul of the male may be dreamed or religiously experienced in a terrifying, fully divine and numinous aspect, but in its common projection onto actual women, the aspect of compelling fascination is certainly the salient characteristic, while the terrifying or overpowering aspect of the numen is very lessened or, normally, eliminated [152]. Here for the moment we are less interested in the dream and religious aspect, as well as in the psychological sense of "projection." The "intimation" of the transcendent is to be characterized in general as that quality of an object, and secondarily of an image or concept, which manifests the power to preoccupy the will, either weakly and passively (though taking this as a "weak" sense is really prejudiced and wrong) as an eye-catching fascination or so as to occasion actions (a "strong" sense to us busy and driven moderns).

Unlike Jung, we do not need to worry here about assimilating any of this theory to a paradigm of scientific respectability. The only final philosophic requirement is that the theory be adequate to the phenomena, meaning moral life, aesthetic insight, religious experience, and the great perplexity, fears, and longings that we all must feel about human life in our most open, vulnerable, honest, and questioning moments. Whether there are satisfactory answers to be found or not, the theory must maintain its focus and perspective -- its relevance -- to the meaningful subject of life. As a historical dialectic for the theory presented here, all the philosophers I have mentioned grasp some important and fruitful principle for a complete and non-reductionistic approach. One fundamental thing they all share, which I take to be the great lesson of philosophy in the Kantian tradition, is the final abolition of the Platonic reasons for the separation of the objects which embody value from the objects that we perceive in the phenomenal world while at the same time retaining the Platonic insight and forwarding the Platonic program by using new distinctions to establish a different form of ontological dualism.

§5 Purpose

Here, in what counts as the essence of the theory of positive transcendence, we are concerned with two things: 1) how value is known; and 2) what sort of objective reality value has. In the former respect there are the nature of the non-intuitive cognitive ground of value and the mode of necessity of that ground. These are issues familiar from the theory of immanence. In the latter respect there is the manner in which that cognitive ground enters into empirical object and experience. We have approached closest to this in the theory of negative transcendence. Once the framework of the theory is delineated in this section, the following section will deal with the fundamental articulation of value, where the basic ontological differentiation of value and identification of the corresponding modes of necessity is carried out. That will not consist of any kind of exhaustive list of value or virtues, merely the most general ground and categories which will each embrace very broad realms of discourse.

My approach, again, to the question of knowledge of value is at root Socratic and Platonic. Opinions solicited from conscious understanding concerning value are liable to very to wide and startling extremes. The Socratic insight and, beyond a certain point, faith are that all such opinions, if closely examined, at length appear to be incoherent and then, at great length, begin to resolve themselves into consistent principles which a subject may even deny, yet to which nevertheless the subject has constant recourse. I do not attempt to prove this thesis -- if indeed, as I strongly doubt, it can be proven, unless by a reduction ad absurdum of alternative suggestions. Nelson is properly the spokesman for the Socratic Method [153]. If the Socratic thesis is correct, however, then obviously we are somehow dragging, unawares, a mass of non-intuitive knowledge into experience. That this is in fact possible is now abundantly clear, as I previously noted, from our common use of linguistic rules the nature of which we are usually ignorant and about which we may even hold absurdly erroneous opinions. That most such rules are actually learned, as with many of the social mores that may otherwise be mistaken for truth of ethics (and upon which Aristotle focuses in characterizing the problem of ethics as inculcating worthy habits [154]), is also clear. Our concern thus parallels Chomsky's belief that there is a universal and innate grammar, the existence of which would vindicate the Rationalists' belief in innate knowledge [155].

In directing the dialectical argument towards this juncture in an ontological theory, I have so far been assuming a certain conclusion in value theory, namely that the concept of purpose, as it will be described, will uniquely and definitively illuminate the meaning of value. A connection has already been supposed, also, between value and will such that purpose not only answer questions for us about value but also about the problem of free will. What value might have to do with purpose and will, independently of this theory, however, is something that should be addressed. We cannot simply say, as with pleasure and pain, that these are intuitively matters of value. We also face the implicit challenge of G.E. Moore, who held that value could not be defined and could not be identified with any factual attribute of objects [156]. Indeed, I do not intend to give any kind of analytic definition of value, much less to identify it with any factual attribute of objects or with any pseudo-factual attribute of supernatural objects (as in Plato). In the end we will not wan to say that value is essentially purpose but that value, being what it is, enters into our experience as purpose in one way, as pleasure and pain in another, and perhaps in other ways as well.

With respect to the common definitions of value, that is the object of interest, of desire, of emotion, of feeling, of love and hate, etc. we might hope to be able to say what it is about value that inspires these various definitions yet is somehow not adequately expressed by them. Clearly we can note that each of them somehow involves us, postulating some sort of connection between objects and us that is not purely cognitive. In a purely factual universe it is not difficult to imagine ourselves as merely disembodied, even non-existent, observers, to whom the existence of things has no meaning or bearing beyond that. With objects of interest, desire, etc., on the other hand, we cannot imagine ourselves quite so disinterested and apart. But again, we can imagined ourselves apart and disinterested when we consider that some things are reckoned to have value in themselves and on their own right without reference to us; and so we do like to think that a universe without our presence might still contain value. This consideration confuses the further question of whether our connection with the value of objects results from value in the objects, which appears and engages us, or whether the connection simply means that we impose the value on the object by our own subjective urge or decision. By the subjective approach, there could be no value in an observerless universe, expect in so far as we, in imagining such things, in effect become value attributing observers. At the same time, if the value is in the object yet is not a factual attribute, we are bound to account for the paradox of a thing possessing value and being able to convey knowledge of it to our cognition without it doing so by means of any phenomenally or empirically identifiable characteristic.

The notion of purpose embodies at once the sense of being an object and the sense of being an object of will or of desire, interest, etc. Indeed, "purpose," "end," and "object" can all be used synonymously to represent an object of intent, where the intended object is taken to exist (contingently) in the future in so far as the will can anticipate bringing it about. This in itself does not bespeak any necessary connection to value, but it does run close to it in the same way as the previous notions of interest, etc. do. Nelson certainly sees a connection:

Teleology deals with the purpose or value of things. Objective teleology is the theory of the intrinsic value or purpose of things., i.e. the purpose or value they have by virtue of their mere existence.... Subjective teleology deals with value of things qua objects of our will. Obviously, ethics does not deal with the purpose of the existence of things in general, but only with that which is required of ourselves, of our will [157].

This "objective teleology" obviously embodies the paradoxical notion of an end which is not an end out of any relation to a will, although that very same paradox is found in the beliefs of Aristotle and others in the inherent teleology of nature. What we can derive from such paradox, however, is just the notion of an object in the future whereby this object exercises some influence on the present in order to bring itself about. This could not be a causal influence, especially when we consider that this future object does not even exist. The influence can only be that this object is valuable: it is so inherently worthy of being brought about that this worth acts on the present to do so. This just seems to be piling paradox on paradox, however. Even traditional notions of objective teleology either bring the subjective element back in, by making objective ends the will of God, so that the future objects exist in the intention of God, or they identify some inherent teleological intent in the present object. The former move merely brings us back to the meaning of purpose with respect to will, while the latter only reminds us of what we have been trying to do -- find some non-factual quality in objects -- without actually doing so in any way useful to us.

If we entertain the notion of objective teleology, what we must say about the future object is indeed that it does not exist; but what we mean by that is that the object does not exist factually the way objects in the past or present exist. The future object does exist in a certain factual sense, however, when we make true statements about the future whose truth is only contingent; and this claim on reality we have already said is due to the ontological status of the future as the imperfect aspect of existence. The imperfect, or potential, factuality of future objects means that they do correspond to a facet of reality. Now, if it is the value of future objects that brings about their existence, teleologically, in the present, we can infer that value must be the positive content of what previously we have only conceived as the negative transcendence of the imperfect aspect and the similar, empty, concepts of existence. If we deny that there is any teleological intent in the factual object of the present, and if we deny that there is any teleological intent in the will of God, and if we deny that future objects possess factual existence, then all that seems to remain is that worth is the non-factual quality which, as the positive content of the future, accounts for objective teleological change.

In considering this argument, we need have no reason to believe in objective teleology. On the contrary, it is clearly no part of science, and from our introspective point of view, it is no part of our considerations either. However, the concept of objective teleology is now helpful in our "subjective teleology" or the theory of real purpose as the object of will; and this should not be surprising if we believe that any notion of "teleology" must be relevant to the true means of purposive change that is present to us. We need help because the notion of purposive intent is not enough: the same understanding can have the same intention but act on it in one circumstance and not act on it in another. The difference, indeed, is that the conscious intent must give way to an act of will that realizes the object in existence. Conscious intent cannot display the occasion of will -- the actual impetus of the deed. The occasion of an act of will must, if it is to be free, not be a causal occasion and must, if it is to be rational, not be something merely opaquely arbitrary. A free and rational occasion of will is suitably to be called a purpose, but now this must mean, not the theoretical conscious intent, but the content of positive transcendence that is the teleological object we have just considered. Our neutral and theoretical concept of purpose, which need have no relation to value, merely reflects our non-dynamic theoretical representation of intended objects; but this is representation just like all other conscious, conceptual representation. The difference with purposive intent is that it presents an object of possible will, which must draw in the ontology of will to a full and adequate conception of purpose. The ontological object of will, then, is the intended object in so far as it is a future object and possesses as such the special character of a future object. That character is just the quality of worth or value.

The way in which, thinking of Nietzsche or Existentialists, we imagine value to be created ex nihilo out of the free will may be turned around so that it is the values which create free will. This, in turn, is similar to Heidegger's uncovering of Being, whereby new values are introduced. The Being doing the uncoverings for us, however, is our own internal existence, the ego, and while good or evil may be freely uncovered, the difference between the two is not itself a matter for our decision. It is not a matter of our immediate comprehension either; for the occasion of will, the ontological purpose, is a non-intuitive immediate object. We expect that this will conform to our conscious intent, but it does not always do so; and it is only after serious reflection that we can often sort it out. As positive transcendence, this non-intuitive value can be considered to belong either to the subject or the object. thus we should be able to see why, as interest, etc., value sometimes seems to depend entirely on the relation of a subject to objects of value and other times seems to belong entirely to objects. And it is not enough to recognize an occasion of will in every deed, it is also important to see one in every deliberate inaction. Both activity and passivity can have their intended objects; and while the object affecting the passive subject already exist, the will has as the future object of its own passivity the effect that it intends to produce by receiving the action of the other thing.

As positive transcendence is uncovered on the occasion of will, it is in the fullest sense only an occasional presence. We do not have access to it merely by thinking, without the datum of our own deeds, any more than we have access to pleasure merely by thinking it. Thought is, indeed, an act of will, albeit a subtle one, and greatly clouded by the opinion whose hollowness often can only be adequately demonstrated by their failures in practice. This occasional presence we may take as typical of positive transcendence, whether it be as sensation which provides the plenum to the emptiness of space, the intuitive value of pleasure and pain, or the non-intuitive value of purpose. What produces the occasion of purpose is different from the other two, for it is indeed we who do it by our own free will: and so we are for ourselves thus hidden to our own casual thought. The proof is in the deed, just as in the theory of understanding with which I began this essay the proof is in the linguistic act.

Nothing so fills us with the presence of our own existence, apart from great pain or pleasure, as strenuous activity: those two conditions tell us much about positive transcendence -- on the one hand that we suffer as an object, whether in pleasure or pain, and so come into possession of our Being, or on the other hand that we act as an object to change external objects by our agency. In each respect we belong to the theater of external objects and are bound by the laws of physical necessity, but also in each case we are a focus of reality in the self that stands apart from spatiotemporal objects.

The occasion of will is a felt impetus of action. Purpose as a content of thought is no more than an epiphenomenon of that impetus. As such an impetus, purpose is hidden and mysterious. Much of Schopenhauer's appeal for his thesis of the will as the thing in itself is based on the impenetrability and irreducibility of the moment of action [158]. Kant's formal definition of will, as that whereby we effect changes in external existence [159], is a pale placeholder indeed beside our own subjective experience of even the simplest action. Nothing says so much that we are in possession of ourselves than that we are able to dispose of the small realm and vulnerable fabric of external existence that is around us. What is doing the disposing is not the Cartesian soul, a place of light, pure, clear, and open; instead, that Cartesian consciousness is very much more like Schopenhauer's little rowboat (the "principium individuationis") tossing about on a raging sea. Where Schopenhauer has the raging and fearsome universal Will, however, in whose hands consciousness represents only a pathetic charade and self-deception of self-control, we must take the individuality of existence and the particularization of the will a little more seriously -- we cannot take, as Schopenhauer does, space to represent an imposed form which creates only an illusion of multiplicity.

What is to be well taken in Schopenhauer's theory is this: that consciousness is only an aspect, and often a feeble one, of the self that disposes of action. We have prepared for this with the theory of the preconscious content of states of instantaneous understanding. That becomes important now because the occasion of will is similarly obscured. That is not to say that consciousness is alien or opposed to the preconscious self, as though my conscious self were controlled by some other self. There is only one self, and consciousness is merely an appearance or a sort of distillation of it. The best way to think of the matter is to follow Schopenhauer's undeveloped sense of the Will, or of the unconscious, as the Upanishadic Knower, the unknown Subject of knowledge. That is a paradoxical and most un-Cartesian formulation, but strictly true. Consciousness is the content of the Known; it is projected out of the Knower by the form of intentionality, whose presence leaves the Knower forever empty to theoretical cognition. But each of us is a knower -- our own internal transcendence -- and we are each aware of our existence and our activities, cognitive and otherwise. So while an appealing metaphor for the unconscious is darkness, it is more correct to compare its emptiness, as in the theory of negative transcendence, to lighted transparency. The transcendent content of our purposes belongs to us as a content of the Knower, but involves rather more than can be accounted for in terms of theoretical consciousness alone.

Non-intuitive purpose finds a place in the theory of time from the theory of negative transcendence. Where before the occasion of causal change was found in the intuitive material of perfect aspect, now the occasion of purposive change is found in the non-intuitive content of the imperfect aspect, namely our own internal existence, our own domain of potential. This makes for a pleasing theoretical symmetry between cause and purpose, where the ground of one is in the perfect and the other the imperfect. Those may be simplified into past and future, although strictly speaking each exists only as an aspect dependent on the present. Just as purpose as a teleological "cause" is effective only because of its presence in the imperfect aspect, so is no remote cause of the past effective unless its own consequences are present in the perfect aspect and qualify as causal occasions themselves. We thus do not admit a teleology in nature but do admit it in Being, of which nature is of course, as external negative transcendence, an aspect.

While we may say that purpose, as introducing a change into existence, arises out of internal transcendence, purpose as positive transcendence, like sensation, does not belong exclusively either to internal or external transcendence. In this way the value introduced by purposes, and their cognitive grounds, although at first especially associated with will, belong as much to external transcendence as to internal, although in a particular way. Thus, where I have said that the plenum of sensation belongs to space, but not in any way that is important or even recognizable by science, in the same way do we find an apparent external presence of purposive value. Beauty is the prime example of this external presence. It is also noteworthy that in this positive transcendence seems to contribute both the perfect and factual quality that belongs to sensation in its immanent and phenomenal context and the imperfect and evaluable quality that belongs to purposive value in its external presence. These contrasting perspectives and aspect of reality blend into the same objects and experiences. Indeed, the quality of fixity that Plato and Schopenhauer mistakenly associated with their versions of positive transcendence as belonging to something separate from phenomenal objects actually only belongs to purposive value when it is instantiated in those very phenomenal objects.

While it is an act of will that so far has been most conspicuous to us, a stillness of the will is just a significant. When our attention is fixed on something, when we deliberately dispose ourselves to be acted upon by some impression or some thing, these are also cases of purpose -- a passive rather than an active purpose. Just what the fascinating aspect of numinosity means is its preoccupying and even riveting power; but this belongs to value far beyond numinosity alone. Where value belongs more to the object as such, as with beauty, our typical attitude towards it is a passive contemplation. Such a disposition to appreciate something independently valuable then can shade into a disposition to be passively acted upon by a cause productive of pleasure. The independently valuable object is ontologically significant, and it is of interest for us that Schopenhauer's theory of the beauty of Ideas was directly linked to the ability of beauty to quiet the Will [160]. Since Schopenhauer tended to see that futility and evil of will in its restless activity, he also regards its intentional passivity as its negation or annihilation. We need not be so unfair to the will, or to the value of deliberate passivity.

The theory of the purposive occasion of will here is easily conformable to Jung's notion of the "transcendent function," or the process by which unconscious contents are given and assimilated into conscious life [161]. Jung, however, was mainly viewing the relationship as a theoretical and passive one, that unconscious contents are manifest in dreams, spontaneous fantasies, myths, etc., and of course the contents he was concerned with were Archetypal in the less general sense that suited his purpose. With Jung's help we may extend our perspective on the occasion of will. There seem to be three spontaneous expressions of the "transcendent function" that we may note by combining Jung's theory with that presented here: 1) the simple acts of conscious will, whether trivial activities of daily life or the most heroic needs; and these are paradigmatic for the notion of the purposive occasion of will; 2) the mysterious moments of conscious creativity, whether physically or mentally manifest, when the right "idea" occurs out of the blue to solve the problem at hand or the new aesthetic impulse occurs to set the cultural fashion for months, years, decades, or centuries (this may be taken as a case combining an objective, external value with an activity of the will whereby the external thing is actually produced); and 3) the true Jungian dispensation of the Unconscious, which is unbidden, unexpected, and often unwanted. That is the condition, of greatest psychiatric interest, where the unconscious self seems to be an agent independent of the conscious self; and the more active and independent that unconscious self becomes, obviously the more the conscious self slips into mental disorder and then psychosis.

In looking for a theory of freedom the third alternative is not much help; but it is equally evident, as in the second case, that there are gray areas between the trivial arbitrary freedom of daily choices, between this for lunch or that for lunch, and the curious moments of inspired creativity and, indeed, inspired understanding. Substantive freedom is not trivial arbitrary choices: it is possession of the "means of production" of genuine imaginative alternatives. The Jungian orientation is helpful and illuminating because of its sense that mental health implies a wholeness of self and a close relationship between the conscious ego and the unconscious means of creative production. On the other hand, the unconscious may be driven into opposition to the theoretical consciousness, in which case it becomes a separate and increasingly coherent and disruptive force.

And so to summarize, there have now been three levels of positive transcendence distinguished: 1) that of sensation alone, 2) that of the intuitive value of pleasure and pain, and 3) that of the non-intuitive value of the purposive occasion of will. Sensation as such is no part of the theory of value because it is simply abstracted from a theoretical context. In that context sensation is even the material of the perfect aspect, the polar opposite of the imperfect meaning of positive transcendence. Pleasure and pain are genuinely matters of value, and in the symmetry of the theory they even possess a certain exclusivity and pride of place. They are very limited in that exclusivity, however, for they are opaque causal products, subject to the workings of nature rather than to rational purpose. It is a prime concern of purposive value, however, to protect us from pain and to insure that our worthy pleasures do not mask harmful causes. Where pleasure and pain can be ontologically characterized as the positive transcendence of a fragment of external existence corresponding to an individual internal transcendence, purposive value can be construed in the opposite sense: it is an internal transcendence, the source of potential of an individual will, which corresponds to a fragment of external transcendence. The fragments of external transcendence are different from these opposite perspectives. For pleasure and pain the significant external transcendence is the body, or as much of the body as effectively communicates with the central nervous system and consciousness. For purposive value the significant external transcendence is that consisting of internal space, or the region of our perceptual experience. In that purposive value thus belongs to objects of will in our perception, it comes to be extended to external transcendence in general as we judge that valuable objects pass out of our experience but continue to exist, while other objects of interest to us, while never part of any actual experience, are at least part of a possible experience. This sort of complex symmetry between intuitive and non-intuitive value is also the sort of thing we will now find within purposive value itself

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