Here we must first point out the real significance of the individual to the concept of totality, with which we are most vividly concerned.
The opposition between the particular and the general is probably as old as philosophy herself. And many philosophers, it must be admitted, have held the individual in far higher esteem than Plato did. Some have even considered "general truths" with a good deal more suspicion than they considered "particular truths".
Of course we are here not speaking about the obviously nonsensical caricatures of generalizations contained in the current example of chauvinism, for instance: "Helmut Schmidt is a scoundrel. Helmut Schmidt is also a German. Accordingly, Germans are scoundrels". Quod erat demonstrandum!
No, we are speaking about "general truth" and acknowledged scientific methods of deduction. What abstract reasoning deals with, is precisely general truths. But the question arising is sometimes whether "general truths" exist at all. We mean, do they have an existence of their own, separated from, and quite independent of particular truths?
We do not of course intend to engage in a fruitless strife similar to that between "realists" and "nominalists" way back in the Middle Ages. Whether the general concept in abstract reasoning is a vain breath (flatus vocis) or a higher and eternal reality behind and above the passing phenomena of concrete things, that is not here the essential question.
We are not so much concerned either about John Stuart Mill's criticism of classical deductions, although it may appear to be a pretty hard attack both against Plato's boundless faith in the general reality and against Aristotle's infallible system of logic. Let us have just a look at the object of Mill's criticism.
The classical schema looked like this:
I. All men are mortal.
II. Socrates is a man.
III. Conclusion: Socrates is mortal.
Here one started with the general statement, "All men are mortal". From this point, then, one passed on to the next, in accordance with the Aristotelian pattern of logic. And nobody ever doubted that the end of the road was an equally logical conclusion, namely the particular fact: "Socrates is mortal."
But what is that first general sentence (I) really based upon? Does it not actually assume already that the conclusion (III) is an accepted fact? For how can you even start by saying, in the first place, that all men are mortal, if you have not, in advance, made sure of the empirical fact that the individual Socrates, also, is mortal? In other words, that general idea of mortality for all men, which was credulously--believed to be the point of departure, and a sure point of departure, a sort of independent initial fact--that now turns out to be a most conditional fact, in reality. It depends on what? Well, just on the truth of--among other things--that blessed "conclusion" you hoped to arrive at in the end! That is to say, you find yourself moving backwards rather than forwards. Or expressed in a slightly different way: it is the particular fact of your own personal experience in practical life which actually becomes both alpha and omega in this speculative game.
If we are to believe our contemporary philosopher Bertrand Russell, by the way, things do not look much more encouraging if you want to move in the opposite direction either. According to him, it is just as impossible to arrive at any general conclusion by proceeding from particular facts exclusively.[1]
The general impression may be somewhat disconcerting, to put it mildly. Who could blame you for thinking that there must be an actual gulf between those empirical facts immediately grasped by the sound senses of any man on the street on one hand, and those general ideas belonging to the abstract sciences on the other. The general impression is far from apt to strengthen the common man's belief in the transactions of philosophy.
We seem forced to consider truth from two different angles; or shall we say, from two entirely incongruous angles. In the first place, we do seem to have in front of us a sort of Platonic interiority; that is, Truth with a capital T: you might say a kind of Super-Truth, rising majestically above common lot--abstracted from time and space, from all concrete modes and particular manifestations. In the second place, we have the category of truths with which common folk are familiar in everyday life; obviously they still have their plebeian pleasure of bumping into these peculiar phenomena--truths of a "cheaper order", as it were--truths grasped by almost any simpleton, since such truths have the naive habit of happening at a particular moment, in a particular place, and in a particular manner.
As defenders of these representatives of a certain rustic naiveté making itself felt in everyday human life, we want to treat ourselves to the pleasure, for a brief second, of having that old distinction between Truth and truth quite graphically portrayed, as it happens to be in Clutton-Brock's little book, Essays on Religion (1926, p. 19). He points out the different ways in which we may regard things and people: on one hand they are individuals, on the other they are members of some class.
Our question now would be: Which of those two angles of perception is the more valid? Which is the truer way of considering the persons surrounding us?
The scientist is supposed to be looking for just one thing, truth. But he has a notorious trend towards classification. To the scientific analysis all objects, whether persons or things, tend to become just members of a class, numbers in a series.
Now you and I may not distinguish ourselves as particularly "scientific" in our approach. On the contrary, we may seem to have a delicious weakness for all that is human, all that can be touched and seen, loved or hated. Still, sometimes, we too may have a remarkable tendency to classify our fellow men.
I said sometimes. But just when are we tempted to consider them in that dispassionate, objective manner of "true science"? Just whom among them do we invariably consider in this dignified "scientific" way, this frigidly inhuman way?
Characteristically enough, precisely those whom we do not personally know. So our failure is due to a deplorable lack of knowledge; we are speaking about knowledge in a highly alterocentric sense, to be sure. So do not be surprised if here we imply a most morally serious connotation of the word "failure". A trend of egocentricity causes us to fail miserably. And the result follows immediately: we proceed to operate in terms of barren classification. We have recourse to the impersonal schema, the rigidly scientific schema.
What, on the contrary, actually happens from the very moment when we really learn to know the individuals concerned? Then they suddenly cease to be mere numbers in a system. They become persons to us.
But is that not also exactly the moment when the full truth about those fellow creatures begins to dawn upon our minds? Is not that the moment when dynamic totality in human destiny is allowed to unfold?
Compare to this integrated realism the dumb attitude of apathy we had, the other day, towards a bunch of Chinese, 10,000 in fact, who miserably lost their lives in a natural catastrophe. Was there not a certain "incompleteness" in our registration of that truth there? Of course we did read a small notice in our local paper about these unfortunate ones. But were they real human beings to us? I mean real to our minds and to our hearts? No. To register 10,000 agonized human beings as a mere mass of shadowy greyness is not realism. Something essential must have been lacking in our sense of reality. The totality of living fellowship was lacking. Our personal engagement was practically nil. The living force of integration in human lives which we call inter-human solidarity was inoperative.
Of course, personal feelings are not always preferable to scientific impassibility, that is true. But sometimes--we would say most of the time--they represent a crushing superiority. It requires nothing less than personal feelings, human solidarity, sympathy, and affection--briefly, every little parcel of which vital reality is composed--it requires all this in order to have any chance whatsoever of simply perceiving essential facts in our surrounding world. Among these facts are the living individuals of a suffering humanity. They can only be perceived as individuals. And that demands a personal knowledge of living particulars.
Clutton-Brock shows us man's superiority over the scientist in a few well-chosen words:
While a mathematician cannot value an isosceles triangle in itself, however much he may value the discovery of mathematical truth, we value individuals, in themselves, and as individuals.[2]
He is right. The scientific abstraction falls piteously short in real life. Classifications, however important they may be, become almost a foolery, in cases where the simple wisdom of pulsating everyday life turns out to be of paramount value.
For instance, what is a wife to her husband? Is she a member of the class of wives? Of course not. Even the dryest scientist would probably have much difficulty in considering his wife exclusively--or even essentially--in that very scientific way. And if he managed to do so, he certainly ought not to inform her that this was the way he had come to consider her. She would be mortified, and not without reason.
Of course any husband may, for a moment, give himself up to such fancies just for the sake of some playful experiment--or say, in a report to the municipal authorities. He may consider his dear consort as a member of the class of wives--that is: abstractly, scientifically--or "ideally" (to include Plato's viewpoint). At the same moment, however, he has inevitably emptied her of all the particular qualities she used to have in his personal estimation. His own mind has also been emptied of all the peculiar and precious values it used to possess when he looked upon her as an individual--delightfully different from all other individuals. Now she has suddenly sunk down into the hazy greyness of a desert called the "class of wives". In our mind that once more evokes the Hades of the ancient Greeks, a land of shadows where no human happiness can survive.
By the way, could it be possible to find any better illustration of what a typical woman could hardly ever be suspected of doing? To her a similar abstraction would appear downright disgusting. If a man intends to humiliate a genuine woman (whom we have once shown to be remarkably related to the genuine child), then just let him consider her from that angle of "objective classification", as a member of a category. As far as her own attitude in such matters is concerned, we doubt that she would ever be found guilty of any corresponding tearing asunder of particular values--no, not even when she considers the wash-tubs of her scullery would she commit such a felony against life.
Notes: