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Dooyeweerd's Transcendental Critique

Dooyeweerd was convinced that theoretical thinking is neither absolute nor even neutral. In this, his thought parallels that of thinkers like Polanyi, Habermas, Adorno and Kuhn. Polanyi spoke of personal knowledge, Habermas of 'human interests' and then power relations that distort ideal discourse, and Kuhn of paradigms. But Dooyeweerd was, perhaps, more radical than many thinkers in his critique of theoretical thought. This page looks at his 'Two Ways' of Transcendental Critique of theoretical thought.

What is 'transcendental critique'? It is a term employed by, for example, Kantian philosophers, to mean a discovery of the conditions that are necessary for the thing under scrutiny to operate or to be - in this case, what is necessary for theoretical thought to operate? While many thinkers presuppose theoretical thought and do not ask this question, Dooyeweerd did not presuppose it and did ask the question.

Contents:

On the Non-Neutrality of Theoretical Thinking
'The First Way of Critique'
Need for Another Way of Critique
'The Second Way of Critique'
Discussion of the Two Ways of Critique
Alternative Versions
References and Notes

On the Non-Neutrality of Theoretical Thinking

With Habermas, he believed that theoretical thinking 'distorts' our picture of the state of things but, while the implication of Habermas is that this distortion is an evil brought about by something external to rationality themselves (viz. by power relations), Dooyeweerd believed that it is in the very nature of theoretical thought to distort and that this distortion is not evil. As Clouser has suggested, it is like a thermometer placed into a liquid that changes the temperature of the thing it measures. Habermas had a notion of ideal rationality and ideal discourse which might never be realized but which emancipates us from the distortion, but Dooyeweerd believed that theoretical thinking would 'distort' knowledge even in its ideal.

With Polanyi, Kuhn and others, Dooyeweerd believed that our personal viewpoint affects the process of our theoretical thinking, but he made a positive proposal that the nature of this viewpoint has a religious root, and is not merely logical or social in origin. Human beings, he believed, are inescapably religious beings (indeed, the whole of reality, even the mud in which trees grow, has a religious root). Our religious side is not, as positivists believed, something to suppress, but something to welcome and take account of. It is this that forms the basis of his transcendental critique.

'The First Way of Critique'

(For a fuller explanation of this, see Choi's account of the First Way.)

The First Way of Critique is made on the basis of what philosophy is. On this basis, Dooyeweerd argued as follows:

Totality. In everyday life there is an "indissoluble coherence" [NC I:3]. But theoretical thinking 'distorts' this coherence by viewing it from the vantage point of a single aspect (e.g. physical, social). To do this is, indeed, the very role of science. But there is a need on occasion to transcend all these separate vantage points, and to reflect on the coherence too. (Since Dooyeweerd presupposed Meaning rather than Being, for him this totality is a totality of meaning in the Cosmos, rather than a totality of things/processes.)
The role of Philosophy. Dooyeweerd's proposed that it is the role of philosophy is to do this, to be concerned with reflecting upon the 'totality' in the Cosmos. While each science concerns itself with a certain aspect, philosophy concerns itself with all aspects. Dooyeweerd's view is reflected in the statement in the Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, that while science tells what is true, philosophy tells us what truth is, and what science is.
Archimedean Point. If philosophy is to have a view of totality that overlooks all the sciences, then it must have a vantage point from which to view totality. This is called an Archimedean Point, after the Greek thinker who claimed he could lift the earth off its foundation if he were given a place to stand and a lever long enough. (The notion of Archimedean Point comes from neo-Kantian thought as well as Dooyeweerd.)
Choice of Archimedean Point. But what Archimedean Point do we choose? We cannot use logic here, because the Point is beyond logic. It is, rather, an a-priori commitment to a view of reality. Put another way, to view totality requires that we start with a notion of what totality is.
Religious Origin. The choice of Archimedean Point is religious, not logical. The type of a-priori commitment necessary here is a religious presupposition that transcends logic. Put another way, the view we take of totality depends on what we most deeply believe about the Origin of that totality and about the nature of the diversity we experience. This depends on our view of what is Divine.
Hence philosophical thinking is deeply influenced by a religious root.
(Ground Motives. Another thread to this argument, that fills out some of the details of types of religious presupposition, is Dooyeweerd's theory of ground motives and standpoints.)

Since (or if we assume) science depends on philosophy, then it follows that scientific theoretical thinking also has a religious root.

(Note: The human self and self-reflective critique also have a place in Dooyeweerd's argument, but they seem to have no clear part to play in this First Way, and perhaps this moved Dooyeweerd to find a 'second way of critique'. Choi includes them in his explanation of Way 1.)

One can find elements of this way of critique in other thinkers. For example Bourdieu [Outline of a Theory of Practice, 1977], coming from anthropology, which will be faced with varied spheres of meaning, refers [p.2] to "limits inherent in his [the anthropologist's] point of view".

Need for Another Way of Critique

Dooyeweerd published his First Way of critique in his (1930s) WdW. But critique of WdW led him to rethink and seek another way of critique, which led to his Second Way of critique below, which was published alongside the First Way in his (1955) NC. As Bruce Wearne put it in an email, "Dooyeweerd in NCTT admits that he had to refine his transcendental critique after WdW lest his philosophy simply endorse a dogmatic anti-dogmatism." However, before looking at his Second Way, it may be instructive to read a step-by-step reasoning he set out for the need for a another way of critique. This is Magnus Verbrugge's 1980 translation of what Dooyeweerd wrote in Part Three of the Reformatie en Scholastiek in de Wijsbegeerte, the first volume of which was published in 1949.

How is philosophic thinking possible as theoretic thinking?
[para 1] Our Cosmonomic Philosophy opens its transcendental critique with this question. But it directs itself to every possible philosophy - it is not restricted to a reformed philosophy. Thus this question first of all confronts current philosophy with a fundamental problem, since this philosophy starts from the assumption that theoretical thought is autonomous vis a vis faith. This is a "transcendental" problem since it concerns the boundaries of philosophy. It touches the pre-existing structure of theoretical philosophic thinking which first makes this thought possible.
[para 2] Now this pre-existing structure itself cannot again be of a philosophic character. It is an idionomic[1] framework upon which all philosophic thought-activity rests. Philosophic thought must move within this framework if it is to maintain its philosophic character. As we have remarked earlier, such a framework is aprioristic. It is given beforehand and has general validity ie it rules philosophic thinking, regardless of the subjective starting point of the thinker.
[para 3] Still, we can only examine this universally valid structural law of philosophic thought in the theoretical-philosophical attitude of thought. We may start out believing in its existence. But that does not yet disclose its real character to our scientific[1] insight. And that is exactly what we need.
[para 4] We must discuss the question whether scientific[1] thought can indeed function without being bound to such a belief. But such a discussion is only possible if we give a scientific[1] account of the nature of philosophic thought. Thus, if philosophy wants to go to work critically it must start with directing its enquiry towards its own presuppositions.
[para 5] In this enquiry we may not parade the dogma of the autonomy of theoretical reason as if it were a self-evident consequence of the structure of philosophic thought. For that would amount to a dogmatic elimination of the basic critical problem we formulated at the onset of this section.
[para 6] Nor may we demand of the believers of this dogma to begin with abandoning it. For that too would amount to eliminating the transcendental problem of philosophy with a magic formula. That would simply replace the dogma of the autonomy of theoretical reason with the dogma that reason is determined by supra-theoretical presuppositions of faith. And, in that case, our critical insight into the nature and structure of philosophic thought would not be enriched in the slightest. We would merely end up with a confrontation of dogmatic points of view.
[para 7] No, when we begin our critical enquiry, we may demand of no thinker that he abandon any dogmatic conviction. We may only postulate one strict condition for a truly critical attitude of thought. The enquirer must be prepared to put aside the dogmatic presupposition postulating the autonomy of philosophy to be of a purely theoretical, scientific[1] character. For only this prejudice stands in the way of a critical investigation of the basic problem we have formulated. It merely passes a dogma, a religious conviction that cannot be reasoned, for a scientific[1], theoretical judgement.
[para 8] The Cosmonomic Philosophy does not claim that we could begin a transcendental critique of philosophic thought independent of a dogmatic religious conviction. For if it did, we ourselves would have to start with accepting the autonomy of theoretic reason as a purely theoretic prejudice. It would then pass that for a criterium as to whether further enquiry is scientific[1] or not. To the contrary. it openly admits that our philosophy starts its transcendental theoretical critique from the Christian religious standpoint. But it does remain critical in this. For it sharply distinguishes its religious conviction from any essentially scientific[1] judgement from the start.
[para 9] In other words, it does not camouflage its starting point. It rather begins with a sharp, critical distinction between theoretic judgement and supra-theoretic prejudice. Thus no-one can become the victim of an artfully camouflaged trap in following our enquiry into the transcendental problems that underlie philosophy. One can be confident that no religious judgement will be paraded here as an essentially scientific [1] thesis. This transcendental critique serves just this very purpose - it forces the thinker to account to himself of the true nature of the prejudice he starts with.

That is, it seemed that the argument in the First Way depends to some extent on accepting certain presuppositions or dogma, whereas in the Second Way Dooyeweerd was seeking a way of understanding philosophy that could apply to philosophers of any kind, whatever their religious starting points.

'The Second Way of Critique'

(For a fuller explanation of this, see Choi's account of the Second Way. For a clarification by Dooyeweerd of his notion of Gegenstand, as a response to criticism by Strauss, see Glenn Friessen's translation of Dooyeweerd's last publication.)

The Second Way of Critique is made on the basis of the very nature of theoretical thought itself. It employs neo-Kantian ways of thinking and, to some extent, the neo-Kantian view of what theoretical thinking is. (Though he disagreed with the neo-Kantians on content and presuppositions, Dooyeweerd believed that they did at least ask the right questions.) Another explanation of this 'second way' is given by Clouser, which some find easier to understand.

What we study. When we think theoretically about some aspect of our life or experience - physics, aesthetics, the social aspect, and so on - we seek to discover generalities relevant to that aspect by means of logical thinking.
Antithesis and Gegenstand. When we think logically about an aspect, our logical thinking 'stands over against' or 'opposes' that aspect, just as two banks of a river stand over against each other. The aspect is the Gegenstand of our logical thinking. To use another term, logical thinking and the aspect become antithetical to each other.
Second Gegenstand. Not only does logic thinking create a Gegenstand between itself and the aspect of interest, but it also creates a Gegenstand between that aspect and all other aspects. (For example, when we study the social aspect, we largely ignore the physical aspect.) Clouser calls this isolation of an aspect.
The Non-Logical. The aspect that is Gegenstand to the logical thinking is non-logical. So will logical thinking handle it appropriately? Logical thinking cannot 'see' beyond its own laws (of non-contradiction etc.) and so is unlikely to be able to 'see' properly the laws of the aspect under scrutiny where these either go beyond the laws of logic or go against them. It is therefore likely to distort what it allows us to discern of that aspect. The only situation in which this will not happen is the highly improbable one that all aspects that we might study happen to have laws that are identical with those of the logical aspect. We cannot assume this to be the case - yet generations of scientists and philosophers have done just that. (Clouser sees this slightly differently: in terms of the isolation causing a rift between the aspect under study and all others.)
Synthesis. Therefore, we must somehow take steps to remedy this distortion. We must take account of the non-logical laws etc. of the aspect under study. To put it another way, we must synthesize the two things that have been made to oppose each other.
Basis for Synthesis: the Human Self. But we must ask, "What allows us to re-integrate the Gegenstand?" Dooyeweerd's answer is: the human self. Human beings must do this; it is cannot done by some automated, 'neutral' logical thinking because it cannot 'see' the non-logical laws. Human beings must take account of the non-logical.
Religious Root. But the human self has a religious root. So how we take account of the non-logical, how we reintegrate the Gegenstand, will depend crucially on our religious orientation.
Hence all theoretical thinking has a religious root, and its operation is fundamentally affected and directed by our religious orientation.

Discussion of the Two Ways of Critique

First, we can thank Dooyeweerd for coming up with two ways of critique, not just one. Most thinkers present only a single thread of argument in support of their beliefs, but Dooyeweerd presents us with two. Two witnesses are always better than one:

the nature and role of philosophy as concerned with totality, and
the nature of theoretical thinking itself

both independently point to the religious root of theoretical thought, and that theoretical thinking is fundamentally non-neutral. This means that even if we find Way 1, based on a notion of philosophy, does not suit us, then we might find Way 2 better, based on a notion of what theoretical thinking itself is. And vice versa.

But, as we might expect, both Ways exhibit problems. One problem with the First Way of Critique is that it depends on Dooyeweerd's view that philosophy is concerned with totality of Meaning. It is widely agreed that philosophy is concerned with totality, but not totality of Meaning. Most presuppose Existence rather than Meaning. Dooyeweerd's First Way was published first in the 1930s, and in response to acknowledging this supposed weakness, and various other criticisms, Dooyeweerd developed Way 2. Various criticisms made of Way 1 are outlined by Choi.

There have also been criticisms of this Second Way of Critique, again as outlined by Choi. Whether we agree with them or not, it is useful at least to notice that Way 2 presupposes two things. One is the notion of aspects that are 'non-logical', but this is not an unreasonable assumption. The other is the neo-Kantian assumption that logical thinking operates by way of a Gegenstand, i.e. it creates an antithesis that must be synthesized. Way 2 is also more difficult to understand than Way 1.

One problem that arises from Way 2 is that it seems to preclude any theory about theory itself, since logical thinking involves an opposition between the logical and non-logical. At first sight, at least, it is self-obviously not the case that we cannot have theory of theory; surely we can and do! Dooyeweerd explicitly says that the logical cannot be Gegenstand for itself (e.g. NC II:463). But, in other places, he does talk about theory of theory and assume that such is possible (e.g. NC I:40). This seems an unresolved problem. But the problem seems to stem from the neo-Kantian assumption rather than how Dooyeweerd uses it. So, if we can replace the neo-Kantian assumption, perhaps Dooyeweerd's Way 2 still stands.

Alternative Versions

One way of doing this is Clouser's alternative exposition of Way 2; it seems to overcome this problem. In place of Gegenstand, Clouser speaks of isolation of an aspect, the severing of ties with the other aspects, as the inevitable result of logical thinking (he calls it higher abstraction). Since nothing - neither an aspect nor any entity - can be fully nor truly understood without reference to all others, this isolation inevitably results in loss of meaning and thus distortion. If this is the source of the problem, then there is no difficulty about having a theory about theory.

Another attempt has been made by Strauss [1983]. He proposed that theoretical thinking is little different from the logical subject-object relationship that we find in everyday living, that is analytical functioning. But it is not clear that this is adequate since it confuses theoretical thinking with analytical distinction-making.

Geertsema [2000] has suggested, after discussing both Ways of Critique, that a modified version of Way 1 is preferable. He modifies Way 1 to give the central place to the human thinker rather than to philosophy itself.

References

Geertsema H (2000) "Dooyeweerd's Transcendental Critique: Transforming it Hermeneutically", pp. 83-108 in Strauss DFM, Botting M (eds.), Contemporary Reflections on the Philosophy of Herman Dooyeweerd, The Edwin Mellen Press, New York.

Strauss DFM (1983) "An analysis of the structure of analysis (The Gegenstand-relation in discussion)" Philosophia Reformata 49:35-56.

Notes

[1] Verbrugge ftn: "Wetmatig" in the original. I cannot find an existing English word for it. Prof P A Verburg proposed the use of idionomic - idios: particular or peculiar, and nomos: law). [NB BCW regular, or regulative seems preferable].

[2] Here 'scientific' seems to mean 'theoretical' in general rather than being of any particular scientific area, which is what we meant at the end of Way 1.

This is part of The Dooyeweerd Pages, which explain, explore and discuss Dooyeweerd's interesting philosophy. Email questions or comments would be welcome.

Number of visitors to these pages: Counter . Written on the Amiga with Protext.

Created: 16 May 2003. Last updated: 10 June 2003 corrections from comments by Henk Geertsema. 2 August 2004 link to Glenn F's translation. 28 June 2005 new section 'need.another' and quot'n from RSP; contents. 2 July 2009 Bourdieu.