How Might Camus Critique Fichte's Notion of God and the Religion of

I

In his essay, “On the Basis of Our Belief in a Divine Governance of the World,” Fichte claims that belief in what religion calls God is really belief in a moral principle (e.g., Kant’s Categorical Imperative). Fichte also claims that the true religion is that of “joyful right action.” In this paper, I will explain why Camus rejects Fichte’s notion of God as a moral principle as well as Fichte’s religion of joyful right action. In the first part of this paper, I will explain how Fichte unites the sensible world and the intelligible world, thereby grounding the belief in a moral principle in the intellect. Next, I will present Fichte’s analysis of why the God of religion must be a moral principle, and why this moral principle always results in right action. I will conclude with Camus’ criticism of Fichte’s notion of God and his religion of joyful right action.

II

Fichte’s method of inquiry starts with assuming a first principle as the explanation of whatever is in question. If we want to know the basis, or ground for the belief in a moral principle (or the God of religion), we cannot start with the sensible world and infer the moral principle. Fichte says that “[o]ne can ask for the basis or foundation only in the case of something one judges to be contingent, i.e., only if one presupposes that the thing in question could also have been different from the way it is.” The sensible world can, and has been, modified – it is contingent. Thus, using the sensible world as a first principle is erroneous for Fichte. To locate the basis of belief, “one has to look toward something else, something determinate, whose determinacy explains why what is based upon it is determined the way it is.” Beginning with the sensible world would not explain why the sensible world is the arena for moral action. We must, Fichte asserts, begin with the concept of a supersensible world. A concept is “never anything other than the very activity of intuiting – simply grasped, not as agility, but as a state of repose and determinacy.” Hence, we need a concept of intuition that is not a sensible intuition.

Fichte says we possess a concept of a supersensible world in our discovery that we are “free of any influence from the sensible world, absolutely active in and through [our]selves.” What we discover is a faculty of the mind that is “elevated above everything sensible.” One first principle is this absolutely active “I”, or the self-active “I”. This self-active “I” is the power (or capacity, or function) of the mind to “initiate and accomplish an action on one’s own or ‘spontaneously’.” Insofar as the freedom exercised in this instance is indeterminate, freedom is not another first principle. However, the goal of freedom is determinate (Fichte claims). Thus, the supersensible world is this absolute “I” (or self-active “I”) plus the goal of freedom. How do we become aware of this self-active “I” and the goal of freedom? Our concept of the supersensible world is revealed through intellectual intuition. First, I will explain how intellectual intuition reveals this self-active “I”.

Fichte defines intellectual intuition as “the act required by the philosopher: an act of intuiting himself while simultaneously performing the act by means of which the I originates for him. Intellectual intuition is the immediate consciousness that I act and of what I do when I act.” With regard to belief, intellectual intuition is the immediate consciousness that we believe (belief is an activity of the mind), and of what we are doing when we believe. This makes it “possible to know something because I do it.” Thus, we know that we believe in a moral principle because we act in accordance with this principle.

The knowledge that we have this faculty , or power, of the mind is not “demonstrated by concepts.” For Fichte, a demonstration must be based on something that cannot be demonstrated. Demonstration provides nothing more than “a conditioned, mediated certainty. Something becomes certain in consequence of a demonstration only if something else is certain.” Moreover, concepts do not produce intellectual intuition. Intellectual intuition can be revealed in two ways: immediately or by an inference from sensory intuition. Immediately, intellectual intuition is easy to establish. We are aware of this in every moment of consciousness, in every movement we make. When we act, it is intellectual intuition that tells us it is “I” who am performing a particular act. For example, when I walk, I know that it is I who walks. It is only by means of intellectual intuition that we can distinguish our own activity (and thus, our own self) from the object we are acting on (e.g., the sensible world, other people, etc.). Everyone who claims “I do this” appeals to intellectual intuition: “It contains within it the source of life, and apart from it there is nothing but death.” We might think of Aristotle’s concept of the soul, that which animates all things. Fichte’s notion of intellectual intuition, as the source of life, is that which animates humans.

Fichte says there are two worlds available to us – the sensible world and the intelligible world. Thus, there are two kinds of intuition – sensory intuition and intellectual intuition. Sensory intuition never “occurs by itself or constitutes a complete state of consciousness. Although intellectual intuition can occur by itself, like sensory intuition, it never constitutes a complete act of consciousness.” Although intellectual intuition is not demonstrated by, nor is it produced by, concepts, both kinds of intuition must be “grasped by means of concepts, or ‘comprehended’.”

In addition, “intellectual intuition is always conjoined with some sensory intuition.” In order to discover oneself as acting, there must also be an object that one acts upon. This object is discovered through sensory intuition, and sensory intuition is grasped through a concept. Similarly, we cannot discover ourselves acting without a representation (an image or mental picture) of what we desire to produce through our acting. This representation is also understood through a concept. Thus, we have a concept of an object that we act upon (in the sensible world) and a concept of the representation of our act (which exists in the intelligible world). For example, if I want to think of a house, I first have to be aware of myself engaged in the act of thinking that I want to think of a house, then I have to be aware of myself thinking the house.

Consciousness is complete only when sensory intuition and intellectual intuition are conjoined. We do not, however, become conscious of these intuitions, but only of the concepts – the concept of the object (sensory intuition and the concept of the goal (intellectual intuition). The intuitions are the basis (or explanation) for these concepts. (If we attempt to infer a first principle from the sensible world, we have only that which is acted upon. We need both that which is acted upon and that which does the acting, that is, both intellectual intuition and sensory intuition).

In sum, with regard to immediate awareness of intellectual intuition, “intellectual intuition … is possible only in connection with a sensory intuition” and “sensory intuition is possible only in conjunction with intellectual intuition, since everything that is supposed to be my representation (that which is placed before the mind) must be referred to me.”

If we are not immediately aware of intellectual intuition, we can discover it in the same way we become aware of sensory intuition, namely, “by means of an inference from the obvious facts of consciousness.” Fichte explains a fact of consciousness as follows:
First I resolve to think of some determinate thing, and then the desired thought ensues; I resolve to do some determinate thing, and the representation of its occurrence then ensues. This is a fact of consciousness.

As a fact of sensory consciousness, this fact reveals nothing more than a series of representations. All one can claim to be conscious of is “a particular temporal sequence of representations.” First, we decide to think of a moral principle, and this thought results. Next, we decide to do something determinate such as act on the moral principle. The result is a representation of this acting. We have not yet inferred intellectual intuition. All we can say at this point is:
I know that the representation of this specific thought, characterized as something that was supposed to come into existence, was immediately succeeded in time by another representation of this same thought, now characterized as something that actually does exist, i.e., I know that the representation of this determinate appearance as one that ought to exist was immediately succeeded by the representation of this same appearance as one that actually does exist.

What we cannot say is that the first representation is the ground for the second representation, or that the second representation “came into being for me as a result of my thought of the former.” Here, the “I” is passive. For Fichte, intellectual intuition is active (specifically, self-active). At this point, intellectual intuition is not the “active principle that produced these representations.” How, then, do we make the inference from sensory intuition to intellectual intuition?

Quite simply, we assume intellectual intuition. We must make this assumption, since to deny intellectual intuition is to deny the self. There is no basis for this assumption in sensory intuition. That is, sensory intuition does not explain intellectual intuition (just as the sensible world does not explain the intelligible world). Thus, intellectual intuition “must have its basis in a special type of consciousness, indeed, in an immediate consciousness, and hence, in intuition.” This intuition cannot be sensory intuition, which reveals the object acted upon by the absolute “I”. This intuition “must be an intuition of sheer activity – not an activity that has been brought to a halt [as is the case with sensory intuition which occurs temporally], but one that continues; not a being but something living.” “Being,” for Fichte, is the world, other people, basically the object that is acted upon by the intellect. “Something living” is what acts upon “Being.” Thus, intellectual intuition is an activity of the mind (or intellect). By making the assumption of intellectual intuition (from the facts of consciousness), the philosopher realizes intellectual intuition as another fact of consciousness. Intellectual intuition is a fact for the philosopher, but an “Act” for the “I”.

Thus far, I have explained Fichte’s notion of the self-active “I”, one part what makes up the concept of the supersensible world. With the self-active “I”, we have that which acts upon something. The second component of the supersensible world is the goal of freedom – that which is acted upon. How does Fichte unite the self-active “I” with the goal of freedom?

Fichte “presupposed the fact of intellectual intuition” in order to “explain its possibility.” Locating the ground for the belief in the fact of intellectual intuition is not as easy. Nor is it an easy feat to “show the presence within reason itself of the very interest upon which this belief is based.” Fichte claims that the only way to find the basis for the belief in the fact of intellectual intuition is to show evidence of “the ethical law within us, within the context of which the I is represented as something sublime and elevated about all of the original modifications accomplished through this law.” Moreover, the “I” is “challenged to act in an absolute manner, the sole foundation of which should lie in the I itself and nowhere else.” What Fichte wants to show is that the belief in the moral law is grounded in the intellect. Through the moral law, the “I” is characterized as something absolutely active.”

Fichte contends that our intuition of the “I” as self-active is grounded in our awareness of the moral law (or a moral principle). Our intuition of freedom is also grounded in this moral principle. The moral law (principle) is not “a type of consciousness derived from anything else, but is instead an immediate consciousness.” That is, the moral law is a fact of consciousness. Fichte explains this principle (law) as follows:
Here I am given to myself, by myself, as something that is obligated to be active in a certain way. Accordingly, I am given to myself, by myself, as “active in an overall sense” or “as such.” I possess life within myself and draw it from myself. It is only through the medium of the ethical law that I catch a glimpse of myself; and insofar as I view myself through this medium, I necessarily view myself as self-active.

Through the ethical law, we become aware of our own real ability to produce a desired effect (the task of intellectual intuition). Without this, the immediate consciousness of the ethical law would be sensory intuition – a series of representations.

In the above passage, Fichte attributes a sense of obligation to the self. We give ourselves the obligation of acting in a certain way (a moral way), and we do this by ourselves – the obligation does not come from the God of religion, which is supposed to be distinct from us and the world. This God would be, for Fichte, a “Being,” something that is acted upon.

Fichte summarizes his discussion of intellectual intuition by restating that this type of intuition is the “only firm standpoint for any philosophy. Everything that occurs in consciousness can be explained upon the basis of intellectual intuition – and only upon this basis.” Thus, belief, an activity of consciousness, cannot be explained by anything other than intellectual intuition.

At this point, theoretical philosophy becomes practical philosophy. Transcendental idealism, which has intellectual intuition as its starting point, is “the only type of philosophical thinking that accords with duty. It is the mode of thinking in which speculation and the ethical law are most intimately united.” Fichte says that “I ought to begin my thinking with the thought of the pure I, and I ought to think of this pure I as absolutely self-active – not as determined by things, but rather as determining them.” Clearly, Fichte is of the opinion that ethics falls within the realm of practical philosophy (and thus, the sensible world). Here we have the relationship between the self-active “I” and the moral law. Moreover, we see that, for Fichte, this “I” determines moral action – it is not determined by the God of religion.

The concept of acting is only possible “by means of this intellectual intuition of the self-active I.” It is this concept alone that “unites the two worlds that exist for us: the sensible world and the intelligible world.” As finite beings, we must “posit something in opposition” to the intelligible world. We ought to bring the intelligible world into being through our acting. That is, the intelligible world is the explanation of the sensible world. Insofar as the self-posited moral law acts on/within the sensible world, the moral law is an activity of the intellect.

Thus far, I have examined the conditions that must be in place in order to posit a supersensible world. We see how intellectual intuition unites the components of the supersensible world: the self-active “I” and the goal of freedom (which is the moral law, posited by oneself). How is it that this goal of freedom always results in right action? We need to look closer at the moral law.

Fichte says we cannot doubt the freedom that reveals the self-active “I” or the self-active “I” itself without “renouncing myself.” Reason, the intellect, cannot go further. We have “reached the limit of all interpretation and explanation.” This is “absolutely positive and categorical.” Fichte says that “[f]or the idealist, nothing is positive but freedom.” It seems, then, that although the freedom that reveals the self-active “I” is indeterminate, the supersensible world (the self-active “I” in conjunction with the goal of freedom) is this categorical freedom.

Why must we posit this goal of freedom for ourselves, and how does this always result in right action? The obligation to act in a certain way is our “moral determination or vocation,” and is “the result of a moral disposition … a matter of belief or of faith … belief or faith is the element of all certainty.” Thus, morality is “constituted only through itself and not by means of any sort of logically coercive thought.” This is the goal of freedom.

Now, if we accept that this goal, or morality, is something we posit for ourselves, by ourselves, we “make it the goal of [our] real acting.” In doing this, we also infer that it is “possible to accomplish this goal through real acting.” Morality, we have seen, is determinate. I resolve to act morally, and the representation of its occurrence follows. Recall, this is a fact of consciousness. Fichte says that to resolve to act is the same as saying “I posit it as actual at some future time.” The activity does not end, but continues – it originates in a living thing, not in being. To claim that it is possible to act is the same activity of the mind as the actuality of the act. If one resolves to act morally (to adhere to the self-posited moral law), “the assumption that this goal can be accomplished is utterly necessary.”

When making an inference from sensory intuition to the assumption of intellectual intuition, Fichte explained the sequence of thoughts. Here, we also have a proper sequence of thoughts. In terms of moral action, we do not “infer actuality from possibility, but just the reverse: not ‘I ought because I can,’ but ‘I can because I ought’.” Just as we ought to start our thinking with the self-active “I” because we can, we ought to act morally because we can. The question is not, for Fichte whether “can” implies “ought.”

Fichte we must put forward this goal of morality (i.e., freedom) for ourselves – the goal is possible through the self. Every action one ought to accomplish, and the states necessary for accomplishing these acts “are related to the goal” we set ourselves “as a means to” that goal. Other moral persons, the sensible world, and our own existence reveal a new world order – a replacement for God. “The compulsion with which belief in the reality of the world forces itself upon us is a moral compulsion – the only kind of compulsion that is possible for a free being.” It is in the recognition that our belief in the sensible world is the result of a moral law that our duty is revealed. “This is the true faith. This moral order is what we take to be divine.” The God of religion is the moral law within. To “joyfully and innocently accomplish whatever duty commands in every circumstance, without doubting and without pettifogging over the consequences … is the only possible confession of faith.” The divine, God, becomes “living and actual for us.” Recall that for Fichte, that which is living is in the intellect (being is in the sensible world). The self-active “I” (myself) is living and actual. We have the intellectual intuition of a self-active “I”. This intuition is exhibited in the moral law. Hence, the absolute “I” is the moral law.
How does obeying the moral law within guarantee right action? Fichte says that the “true atheist” is one with “genuine unbelief, godlessness.” The atheist quibbles over the consequences of her actions. The atheist will not listen to her own consciences without evidence of the results of her actions. That is, without some indication of the consequences. The atheist, Fichte says, “elevates one’s own judgment above that of God, and makes oneself into God.” The atheist willingly performs evil acts in order to “obtain good results.” For Fichte, the world is governed by the divine. The divine is the moral law within. In this world, “good can never come from evil.” So, for Fichte, adherence to the moral law cannot result in evil, and one cannot perform evil acts when one is acting in agreement with the divine. Fichte says that “[r]eason is the common possession of everyone and is entirely the same in every rational being.” Thus, the person who accepts that what religion calls God is really the moral law within, must accept that all actions are for good.

Based on the explanation of how we can even begin to think about a moral world order (or God), Fichte concludes that we cannot infer the existence of the God posited by religion as the origin of the moral law. This God is understood as being distinct from humans and the sensible world. The Supreme Being is “supposed to act efficaciously within the world, and it is supposed to do so in accordance with concepts.” Recall that for Fichte, concepts are nothing more than the activity of intuitions (sensible or intellectual). Thus, the God of religion must be able to contemplate concepts – this God “must possess personality and consciousness.” The personality traits attributed to God are nothing more than human traits, albeit on a grander scale. However, humans are limited and finite. We cannot, Fichte claims, think of limitation and finitude apart from personality and consciousness. So, what we think, when we think about God is the moral law.

For Fichte, the only valid, objective [truth] is this: that there is a moral world order; that every rational individual is assigned his own specific place in this order and has a contribution to make to it through his own labor; that the fate of such an individual, to the extent that it is not, as it were, the product of his own endeavors, is the result of this plan … that every genuinely good action will succeed and every evil one will surely fail; that that, for him who really loves good, all things must serve the best.

This is the true religion of joyful right action.

I will turn, finally, to a consideration of why Camus will reject Fichte’s replacement of God with a moral principle.

III

Camus does not directly criticize Fichte. However, he includes Fichte’s assumption of the absolute “I” and replacement of God with the moral law in his criticism of Rousseau’s attempt to replace God with the general will. The issues that Camus finds problematic in Rousseau will apply equally to Fichte. I will digress briefly to explain the issues with Rousseau.

In The Social Contract, Rousseau introduces a “new God” in the form of the general will. The most frequent words in Rousseau’s work are “absolute, sacred, inviolable.” The laws of the political body are sacred commandments, which Camus thinks is “only a by-product of the mystic body of temporal Christianity.” Rousseau’s religion is a “civil religion,” which offers justification for capital punishment – something Camus thinks of as a “logical crime.” Moreover, Rousseau’s civil religion advocates the “absolute submission of the subject to the authority of the sovereign.” The general will is comprised of the people. Thus, the people become God (the sovereign). The general will preserves the properties of the Christian God - as absolute, sacred, and inviolable, the general will is infallible and always aimed at right action.

We can see the similarities with Fichte’s moral law. Camus is critical of the infallibility of the general will. The general will is made up of humans who are, by their very nature, fallible. Will Camus accept Fichte’s replacement of God with the moral world order? Simply stated, no he will not. His criticisms of Rousseau will apply to Fichte as well. Whether we call God the general will or the moral law within, it depends on humans. If the “I” is infallible, and the “I” is myself, then I, myself, am infallible. Just as Rousseau’s general will justifies evil (for Camus, capital punishment is an evil), so too, the moral law within can justify evil. If one’s moral conscience dictates that capital punishment is for some good, it is justifying an evil.

Camus will reject the notion of an absolute (in both Rousseau and Fichte). This especially true for Fichte’s notion of absolute freedom. If freedom is absolute, everything is permissible. Again, evil can be justified. Now, Fichte will say that “[w]henever it acts, the intellect assigns a law to itself,” and “as a consequence of its very nature, it [the intellect] can act only in a certain, specific manner.” For Fichte, the intellect can only act for the good, if it is obeying the moral law within. Thus, for both Camus and Fichte, there are limits on freedom. However, Fichte assumes that whatever the act is, it is for good. Camus says we must impose limits on our freedom in order to control our acts. Basically, there is complete disagreement on how limitations work for Camus and Fichte.

The infallibility of the moral law and the notion of the absolute “I” – which is infallible – are objectionable for Camus. Not only is infallibility a property of the Christian God (so what has been replaced?), humans are fallible. Unless we make ourselves God, we cannot make ourselves infallible. Again, for Fichte, it is the person who is “godless” – without belief in the moral law – who commits evil and makes herself God. Of course, Camus is going to reject this in that the evildoer is infallible.

The most significant criticism of Fichte concerns consequences. For Fichte, only those who worry about consequences can do evil. For Camus, it is the failure to examine consequences to their logical conclusion that results in evil. For Fichte, evil is a result of thinking of consequences before acting.

Camus does not object to replacing God with a principle. This principle would be justice, equality, or even moral. The issue for Camus is in transposing the properties of God onto these principles. Christianity says God acts for the good. Thus, when God allows evil (e.g., the suffering of children), and especially if we say that it is God’s will that this evil is present, God is acting for the good. For Camus, God’s ultimate crime is Christ’s crucifixion. God willed suffering. When we transpose the properties of God onto either the general will or the absolute “I”, for Camus, we mirror divine crime when we claim that evil acts are for the good. Again, for Camus the logical crime of capital punishment, war, or allowing others to suffer when we could relieve that suffering are acts of evil. For Camus, “human crime [is] man’s answer to divine crime.” In addition, we make the general will or the absolute “I” infallible. Every act is permissible. Thus, it is not Fichte’s intention that is problematic for Camus – that intention being to replace the Christian God. It is in preserving the properties of God that Camus rejects. What is called for is a principle for living that does not possess the properties of God, namely, the notion that the principle is absolute, infallible, and thus always right. It is not a religion of joyful right action, but a an ethics without God that Camus is looking for.

IV

In this paper I have explained how Fichte reduces God to a moral principle, and how he grounds the belief in this moral principle in the intellect by uniting the sensible world and the intelligible world. I have explained why God must be the moral law within for Fichte, and why this results in right action. I have briefly addressed the reasons Camus will reject Fichte’s replacement of God with his moral world order. I have not argued for either position, however, this discussion does broaden our understanding of Fichte and certain problems in accepting his system.

Article Source: http://journal.ilovephilosophy.com

Fichte, J. G. Introductions to the Wissenschaftslehre and Other Writings, Daniel Breaseale, translator. Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 1994, p. 56 and p. 152. Ibid., p. 9. Ibid. Ibid., p. 118. Ibid., p. 146-147. Ibid., p. 147. Ibid., p. 37, footnote 1. Ibid., p. 46. Ibid. Ibid., p. 46. Ibid., p. 93. Ibid., p. 47. Ibid., p. 50. Ibid., p. 47. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., p. 48. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. Ib

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