KARL JASPERS FORUM
TA113
(Shen)
Commentary
3 (to C1, Wallner)
WALLNER’S
CONSTRUCTIVE REALISM AND ZERO-DERIVATION (0-D) STRUCTURING
by Herbert FJ Müller
6 April 2009, posted 11 April 2009
[1]
It is of interest to compare Friedrich Wallner’s ‘Constructive
Realism’ with the zero-derivation view. They have several points in common, and there
are some differences.
[2]
In contrast to logical positivism, which wanted to avoid metaphysics because it
was said to be without meaning, Constructive Realism assumes that it is
necessary to talk about ‘reality’ (and thus about metaphysics). It distinguishes between two kinds of reality : ‘Wirklichkeit’, which is the environment (Umwelt) in which we live and practice science but is
unknowable; and ‘Realität’
(opinions, Meinungen), which is the ‘sum total of microworlds’, which are each ‘constructed by different
kinds of language’, according to kind of knowledge and culture (1). ‘Knowledge’ is related to ‘tentative action’
(Probehandeln, (2) p.108). Constructive Realism does not claim to make
statements about ‘Wirklichkeit’ (Wallner calls this
a ‘renouncement of meta-positions’ or ‘meta-levels’, of normative control, p.109), but instead about
the relation between actions and ‘Realität’ ((2)
p.109). Together they form an ‘ontology’ (1).
In contrast to Kant, the transcendental ego is rejected.
[3]
Wallner proposes a method, ‘Verfremdung’,
as an alternative to logical meta-reflection.
(The term means estrangement, distancing, disassociation, alienation; it has been used in theatre and film by B.
Brecht and others, in Russia in particular, as a method to keep the audience
from being too passive, more critical; but
Wallner himself proposes a more technical English
translation, ‘strangification’,
which he says should be both interdisciplinary and intercultural). It is the deliberate neglect of an implicit
context of thinking (p.110), ‘similar to re-framing in psychotherapy’ (3<11>).
[4]
The method is a further development of ideas proposed by Wittgenstein; a change of context may produce nonsensical
results, but at the same time new aspects can emerge, for consideration ((2) p.86). This is related to creative contradiction
between autonomous partners, e.g., scientists (p.89). The result is situation-dependent and
content-dependent. Wallner prefers
this method to that of a ‘super-observer’ (Maturana) and of ‘showing-itself’ (Wittgenstein). There
are no fixed rules for this technique, only suggestions for strategies
(p.111). There is an ‘uncertainty about objects’, and that
‘becomes a virtue’.
[5]
However, traditional science implies a unity of human thinking, but that unity
cannot be specified and remains unclear, and instead scientists need to use a
language that is comprehensible to the different disciplines (p.87). Wallner nevertheless maintains Plato’s opinion that
MIR-‘Reality’ (his ‘Wirklichkeit’) exists although it
is unknowable.
[6]
The question of unity has actually two main aspects : (a) unity of individual experience (see [14]
below), and
(b) general inter-cultural unity
of experience. The latter means that
eventually everything will be understood by everybody in all cultures ((3)<6>). Wallner says that is an impossible European prejudice, and
it should be given up ((3)<2>). However, the same is also implied in his own notion
of ‘unknowable Wirklichkeit’, which too is a European
product, and identical with metaphysics.
It seems that he does not make this connection, and since he maintains
this MIR-assumption, his view is inconsistent.
Both MIR and inter-individual unity of experience can be transformed to
feedback about the viability (vonGlasersfeld’s term)
of structures.
[7]
He does on the other hand discuss the relation of Constructive Realism to
metaphysics ((2) pp.114-5), which he states has failed to provide (i) a secure
foundation (Letztbegründung), (ii) a
secure dialectic, and (iii) a holistic framework. According
to Wallner, language philosophy has also failed to
deal with these questions in a satisfactory way. He writes that the first two have been
impossible because reality was seen as absolute; but in Constructive Realism it
can be replaced by construction. The ‘whole’
can also be seen as an operational concept.
He proposes that the relation between Holisms and possibilities of
action can be understood in terms of cybernetic regulatory circles.
[8]
Wallner distinguishes between instrumental knowledge
and understanding or interpretation, for instance in particle physics ((3) <7-8,24>). He suggests that for understanding one has
to leave a closed conceptual system and cross the boundaries of one’s specialty. This is certainly important for many
questions, mainly those with sociological content. But there is also a more basic and probably
more important problem which he does not mention : that by understanding we tend to mean (visual-)gestalt-thinking
(‘a picture of the world’ (3<18>)).
And gestalt-thinking has limits and is in fact irrelevant in some areas;
particle physics is one of them. It did
not become clear to me in what way strangification
improves the understanding of the
double-slit experiment.
[9]
He also proposes that there will be ‘a dissolution of philosophy in science
through strangification’ (‘verfremdende
Auflösung der Philosophie in Wissenschaft’; (2)
p.113). The expression ‘dissolution of
philosophy’ apparently means de-construction of metaphysics; it is not likely that as a philosopher he
believes one should cease to reflect on what one thinks and does, which is the
main task of philosophy.
He suggests that Constructive Realism ‘provides a
service for scientists and those concerned by science’ (p.116).
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[10]
The second part, Wallner’s ‘construction’ (Realität), complements the first postulated unknowable
aspect (Wirklichkeit). Because the latter implies an explicit maintenance
of (or return to) belief in unknowable MIR, ‘Constructive Realism’ is a metaphysical view, as is also implied in the word Realism.
A true constructivist view has to exclude the possibility of MIR.
[11]
The reason for the relapse is that mind-independent reality (MIR-) belief had
never been given up, despite many passionate statements by empiricists,
positivists, and others, that metaphysics was meaningless and should be abandoned; and furthermore despite the efforts to
de-construct metaphysics (by Nietzsche,
Heidegger, Derrida, and others). Even the
phenomenologists had maintained ontology-belief in
one way or another. And
mind-independent reality, ontology, is metaphysics.
[12]
We are now witnessing a previously unexpected, and actually rather widespread,
return to metaphysics, after centuries of supposedly non-metaphysical
epistemology. It is evident, however,
that the 2500 year old conceptual problems related to metaphysics have by no
means been resolved (see for instance TA 110 C4). It goes back to a dichotomy expressed in the
proem ‘on nature’ by Parmenides : (a) ‘thinking
and being are the same’ (implying or at
least allowing constructivism), and (b) being
‘is and cannot not be’
(mind-independently, implying metaphysics; the latter has shaped occidental epistemology
until now).
[13]
This MIR-maintenance or -relapse happens here in German-language philosophy,
and parallels the more intense MIR-maintenance or -relapse in the
Anglo-American one (P.F. Strawson, D. Lewis, C.B.
Martin, A. Bird, J. Ladyman and others), which was
discussed in connection with TA110.
There is also a recent French-language effort of this type (Q. Meillassoux, see TA 114).
[14]
But with some relatively minor corrections, Wallner’s
view is compatible with 0-D. His proposal demonstrates, as do many others,
the conflict between the impossibility (that is the inability to know) of MIR
and the need for such a structure (for stability and exploration). The proposal to reduce one’s view to nonsense
(Wittgenstein and Wallner) can be re-interpreted as
an invitation to return to an unstructured matrix, in order to start
structuring afresh. The required
corrections are firstly abandoning MIR-Wirklichkeit; secondly the ‘lack of unity’ in the
individual sense (it cannot be found ready-made) is taken care of by
structuring a self, in the same way as all other structures are structured, by
means of subject-inclusive activity.
And thirdly, the assumption of inter-individual and inter-cultural unity
of the basis of experience is identical with the notion of MIR; both result
from the European history of epistemology, and can be abandoned together.
[15]
The trial action guided by tentative reality-designs is a feature which
Constructive Realism has in common with 0-D.
Like 0-D, it also includes subjects explicitly (p.112) rather than
trying to exclude them, as Wittgenstein did.
[16]
0-D (which was
developed with the specific aim of providing an access to the conceptual
mind-brain relation) is not compatible
with traditional MIR-belief, but it neither accepts nor rejects
metaphysics. A tool of this type is
needed as a stabilizer for thinking and for completion of experience, in
particular to make it suitable for exploration. But 0-D transforms it from an impossible
because inaccessible mind-independent ‘given’,
to a subject-inclusive activity of ‘reality-design’ (or
‘working-metaphysics’), within ongoing experience, which encompasses its
structures (Jaspers).
[17]
This change in view makes all of structuring knowable and simultaneously
eliminates the need for assumptions of mind-independent reality (MIR). It is replaced by the feedback-information about
viability during use of structures; this defines ‘reality’ (if this term
is desired) as : what can we do dealing
with experience ? 0-D explicitly denies the need for (as well
as the possibility of) MIR-Wirklichkeit. A working-reality is designed and tried
out, including structuring of objects; its adequacy is determined by feedback
obtained during trial-action; doubt is always maintained.
[18]
The ‘transcendence’ of metaphysics is maintained in 0-D : it is an aspect of mind-internal reality-design, which ‘goes beyond’ present structured experience. The stability function of MIR-belief is
replaced by feedback-during-use, about the viability
of the used structures. Since every
mental structure is a subject-inclusive product, there is no need for more than
one type of reality, and thus the self-contradiction disappears together with
the MIR-belief.
[19]
Summary of the main differences between Constructive Realism and 0-D
Structuring :
The unknowable MIR-Wirklichkeit,
and the inter-individual unity, are identical with
traditional metaphysics, a European epistemology concept. It is not needed, and causes difficulties in
understanding. When it is abandoned, it is replaced by
feedback-information about the viability of the used structures. This change is required for qualification as
‘constructivism’.
‘Uncertainty about objects, ‘change of context’, and ’Verfremdung’ (strangification) can
be more comprehensively understood and used as
‘return to structuring in the
unstructured’.
‘Knowing’ (understanding) does not only require reflection
and crossing conceptual boundaries, but is also more severely limited by the
limitations of (mainly visual) gestalt-thinking.
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REFERENCES
(1) Shen, V (1996) Confucianism and
Taoism in Response to Constructive Realism. TA113
in Karl Jaspers Forum, 14 March 2009.
(2) Wallner F, (1992) Konstruktion der
Realität. Von Wittgenstein zum
Konstruktiven Realismus. WUV
Universitätsverlag : Wien.
(3) Wallner FG (2004) : Culture and
Science. The
Methodological Approach. C1 to
TA113, in Karl Jaspers Forum,
14 March 2009.
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Herbert FJ Müller
e-mail <herbert.muller
(at) mcgill.ca>