Logical Aliens

8/11/2019 Logical Aliens

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Talk for the Internal Critique Workshop

Logical Aliens and Vegetative States

My aim today is to introduce, in a roundabout way, an idea central to the writings of

Sren Kierkegaard. The idea is that if certain truths are to be communicated, the

communication must take an indirect form.Since this idea is caught up in Kierkegaards

writings with many other eccentric things, and since its subject to widely divergent

interpretations, it may be helpful to approach the matter obliquely. In fact, I shall spend much of

the time discussing an argument in Freges The Basic Laws of Arithmetic;an argument that has

to do with whether or not there might be logical aliens. So Ill be trying to approach Kierkegaard

via Frege. To the extent that I dont manage to pull it off, perhaps youd be gracious enough to

view it as a satire on that genre of paper that delights in bringing improbable philosophers

together.

I should confess that this is something I wrote quite some time ago. I think it does have

something to do with internal critique, though perhaps only in the sense of internal critique that

Titus characterized as the one youre likely to get from a quick Google search . Certainly, the

issues Im concerned with here are rather formalones and Ill not do more than hint at their

implications for social critique (we can take up this question in discussion). You might think of

my talk as a rather long appendix to Fabians Internal Resource Number Five (the one about

satire and caricature.) But Im grateful in any case for this opportunity to elicit your help. Im

hoping to use some of this material in a chapter of my projected book on Kierkegaard which has

the projected title, The Art of Communication. (Ive projected this book so many times in

various proformas and declarations of intent that it seems to me now to lack only the relatively

trivial property of existence.)


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Now, one sort of argument in philosophy is often characterised as the attempt to reduce

your opponent to silence, in cases where direct refutation is impossible. Such arguments can

be called indirect insofar as they aim to demonstrate, not , directly, that an opposing view is

false, but rather that it cannot be meaningfully stated. In Aristotles gently comic image, the aim

of such arguments is to lead your opponent into a state of mute inarticulacy similar to that of the

vegetable. In what follows, Illfirst illustrate this indirect argument strategy by presenting an

argument of Freges against the view that the so-called laws of logic merely describe

psychological processes. Illgo on to argue that, construed as an attempt to demonstrate that

his opponents view cannot be meaningfully stated, Freges argument signally fails. The form

that this failure takes will help us to highlight some general worries about how indirect

demonstration is supposed to work.

By contrast with the orthodox notion of indirect demonstration, I want to suggest that the

basic idea behind Kierkegaard conception of indirect communicationis the idea of a means of

eliciting spontaneous agreement in judgement. Since, as I shall argue, the indirect strategy as

traditionally conceived faces intractable problems, and given also the desirability of continuing a

conversation when direct proof is not possible, I hope to show that Kierkegaards distinctive

conception of indirect communication is well-motivated. Finally, Ill outline what I think the

Kierkegaardian alternative comes to: first, by sketching a reading of Freges argumentin terms

of what I shall call the rhetorical reductio; and second, by briefly illustrating Kierkegaards own

use of this same device.

I. Indirect Demonstration

In 1844, Kierkegaard made the following entry in his journals:


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Basic principles can be demonstrated only indirectly (negatively). This idea is frequently

found and developed in Trendlenburgs [sic] Logische Unterschungen [Logical

Investigations]. It is significant to me for the leap.1

Now, its hardly philosophical news that some principles are so basic that they cannot be

directly, proved, justified, demonstrated, grounded. Heres Aristotle in a passage that

Kierkegaard may well have had in mind when he penned the entry Ive just cited:

Some, owing to lack of training, actually demand that...[the Law of Non-Contradiction] be

proved; for it is lack of training not to recognise of which things proof ought to be sought

and of which not. For in general it is impossible that there should be proof of everything,

since it would go on to infinity so that not even thus would it be a proof. But if there are

some things of which proof ought not to be sought, they could not say what they regard

as a principle more fully of that kind.2

According to a familiar line of argument, some principles, such as the Law of Non-Contradiction,

cannot be directly proved since these constitute the very conditions of proof. And generally

speaking, one such condition is that the proof does not depend on an infinite number of steps:

demonstrations must, as they say, come to an end somewhere.3Not to recognize this, Aristotle

says, is simply incompetent.

1JPIII, V A 74 n.d., 1844, p. 16. Cf. CUP,p. 220: The highest principles for all thought can be

demonstrated only indirectly (negatively). Compare also Kierkegaards remark that since the highestprinciples for all thought, or the proof of them, are negative, human reason has a boundary. He goes on:

Boundary engagements are negative, one is forced backwards. But there is a chattering and conceitedconception of human reason, especially in our age when it is never some thinker one has in mind, areasoning human, but pure reason and the like, which simply does not exist, since nobody, whether aprofessor or what have you, can be pure reason. Pure reason is a fantasy, and with it belongs thatfantastic boundlessness wherein there are no negative concepts but which grasps everything, as did thewitch who ended everything by eating her own stomach (JP 50 X 2 A 354 (Hannay), p. 463).2Met. 4 1006a5-11 (Aristotle (1993), p. 8). For discussion see Lear (1980).


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But Aristotle himself certainly felt the pressure of the demand for a demonstration of the

LNC, not least because Heraclitus had apparently denied it.4Indeed, if a direct rebuttal was out

of order in this context, that was by no means the end of it for Aristotle. He continues:

But even this [i.e. denying the LNC] can be proved to be impossible in the manner of a

refutation if only the disputant says something. If he says nothing, it is ridiculous to look

for a statement in response to one who has a statement of nothing, in so far as he has

not; such a person, in so far as he is such, is similar to a veg etable. By proving in the

manner of a refutation [sometimes translated, negative demonstration] I mean

something different from proving, because in proving one might be thought to beg the

original [question], but if someone else is cause of such a thing it must be refutation and

not proof. In response to every case of that kind the original [step] is not to ask him to

state something either to be or not to be (for that might well be believed to beg what was

originally at issue), but at least to signify something both to himself and to someone else;

for that is necessary if he is to say anything.5

So Aristotle evidently wants to deny to the disciples of Heraclitus the luxury of so much as

formulating their denial of the LNC. And since there is little to be gained from talking to a

vegetable, a silent opponent is, Aristotle appears to think, as good as refuted.

Now, in TheBasic Laws of Arithmetic, Frege, too, develops something like an indirect

demonstration. The example is, I think, especially instructive. I will suggest later on that it

sounds a surprisingly Kierkegaardian note, but for now it will serve to illustrate the limitations of

3Cf.An. Post. 71b 26-9 (Aristotle (1994), p. 3) [Proofs must] proceed from items which are primitive and

indemonstrable because otherwise you will not possess a demonstration of these (to understandsomething of which there is a demonstration non-incidentally is to possess a demonstration of it.4Cf. Met 3 1005b22 (Aristotle (1993), pp. 7-8): For it is impossible for anyone to believe that the same

thing is and is not, as some consider Heraclitus said. 5Met. 4 1006a11 (Aristotle (1993), pp. 8-9).


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the indirect strategy. (I should say at the outset that my discussion of Freges argument is much

indebted to James Conants seminal paper The Search for Logically Alien Thought.) As is well

known, a major battleground for Frege was the psychologism he found to be rife amongst his

contemporaries. This, for present purposes, is the doctrine that the so-called laws of logic

simply describe psychological processes. Frege wants to show that this doctrine conflates the

subjective act of taking-to-be-true with the objective truth. Like Aristotle, however, Frege

recognises that a direct proof is out of order here. To prove the psychology-independence of

logic by means of logic, conceived as independent of psychology, would plainly be to beg the

question. Instead, Frege advances a thought-experiment. The strategy, it seems, is by

indirections to find directions out.

Frege invites us to imagine what it would be like to encounter beings that do not accept

a basic law of logicthe Law of Non Contradiction, say. This scenario is at least consistent with

psychologism in that this theory treats logical laws as rules for beings like us: as merely the way

homo sapiensare compelled to think. Indeed, it seems essential to the very formulation of this

view of logic that there could be beings that do not think like us. So lets try to imagine that we

encounter some logical aliens. Now, a natural question that seems to arise in this scenario is:

whose inferences are correct, ours or the logical aliens (or neither)? But, Frege argues, as soon

as his opponent grants this as an intelligible questionas it seems he must, inasmuch as he

thinks we are psychologically compelled to think of our patterns of inference as the right ones

he has also granted the distinction between logic and psychology:

Anyone who understands laws of logic to be laws that prescribe the way in which one

ought to thinkto be laws of truth, and not natural laws of human beings taking a thing

to be truewill ask, who is right? Whose laws of taking-to-be-true are in accord with the


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laws of truth. The psychological logician cannot ask this question: if he did he would be

recognising laws of truth that are not laws of psychology.6

But suppose the psychological logician simply refuses to grant the intelligibility of the normative

question. Then, says Frege, he must also deny the intelligibility of the question whether the

doctrine of psychologism is itself true. And if he does that, he forfeits the resources so much as

to advance his own theoryhis theory is self-defeating in the sense that it cannot allow for

there being any conditions under which it can itself be said to be true.

Like Aristotle, Frege apparently wants to reduce his opponent to silence. But surely the

advocate of psychologism might reason somewhat as follows:

You have shown that I cannot state that my theory is true in any other sense than tha t I am

compelled to think that it is true. And you claim to have shown that, even though I am compelled

to think that the logical aliens are wrong, because Im compelled to think that my inferences are

right, I cannot give any sense to the difference between right and wrong here. But all you

really show is that if my thesis is true, it cannot be meaningfully stated. So much the worse for

the meaningful statement of true theses! Moreover, it is not, in fact, the case that I am

compelled to think that the logical aliens are wrong: I can quite readily purge my talk of

normative commitmentswithout being reduced to silence by distinguishing merely in terms

of the rules that are followed by them, and those that are followed by us.

Freges next gambit anticipates Davidsons line against the very idea of radically

incommensurable conceptual schemes. Insofar as the psychological logician blithely abandons

the resources to distinguish between himself and a logical alien in normative terms, Frege

argues, he abandons the resources to make any kind of distinction between himself and a

6Frege (1967), p. 14.


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logical alien other than that they make noises and movements he does not make. And this, in

turn, is to forfeit the resources to make sense of the very idea of a logical alien in particular: for,

as Conant observes, creatures who moo and eat grass, for example,are not thereby

manifesting a logically alien form of thought.7So psychologism cannot, within its own terms,

make sense of the very possibilitythat there might be logically alien thoughtwhich would

allow it to define itself as a genuine alternative to the Fregean view of logic.

2. Obstacles to Indirect Demonstration

How, then, is Freges internal critique of psychologism supposed to work? We might be

tempted to construe his argument as a reductio ad absurdum, roughly as follows:

(1) Psychologism admits the possibility of logical aliens.

(2) The concept logical aliensis intelligible only on a normative conception of logic.

(3) So, psychologism admits a normative conception of logic.

(4) But, psychologism does not admit a normative conception of logic

(5) So, psychologism both does and does not admit a normative conception of logic.

(6) No intelligible theory both does and does not admit the same conception of logic.

(7) Therefore, psychologism is absurd.

On this reading, (1) should be taken as assumed for the sake of reductio. This assumption is

supported, however, by the observation that commitment to the possibility of logical aliens

appears to be essential to the formulation of psychologism. For what else can capture the

contrast implied by laws that bind those of a particular psychological constitution? Premise (2)

7Conant (1991), p. 147.


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embodies the thought that the concept of logical aliens is hopelessly vague unless conceived in

normative terms. For how else are we to distinguish between logical aliens and, say, creatures

who moo and eat grass? And (4) is simply a statement of psychologism's commitment to a

purely descriptive account of logic. For how can logic prescribe how we ought to think if it is

merely a description of psychological processes?

So far so good. The problems come when we consider what conclusions we are

permitted to draw from these premises. Conclusions (3) and (5) look innocuous enoughthough

its worth noting that these inferences, on a psychologistic view, are nothing more than

psychological processes. But (6) and (7) are obviously illicit. For these plainly rely on a

normative conception of logic, in particular on the LNC. And its open for the advocate of

psychologism simply to deny (6)for the issue whether there are some intelligible theories that

do not conform to the so-called laws of logic is precisely whats at stake in the debate about

logical aliens. (Notice that its also available to Freges opponent to relativize intelligibility to

psychological constitution.) Indeed, perhaps in this respect Freges opponent is living proof, not

only that logical aliens are possible, but that logical aliens exist! As a matter of fact, Frege did

not explicitly formulate his thought-experiment as a reductio. That decision was well motivated.

Instead of using a reductio model, we might try to salvage some kind of quasi-direct

argument from Freges thought-experiment by reading it as an argument to the conclusion that

logical aliens are impossible. For example:

(1) If logical aliens are possible then the concept logical aliens is intelligible.

(2) If the concept logical aliens is intelligible then psychologism is false.

(3) If logical aliens are possible then psychologism is false. (From (1) & (2)).

(4) Either psychologism is false or logical aliens are impossible. (From (3)).

(5) If psychologism is false then logical aliens are impossible.

(6) Therefore, logical aliens are impossible. (From (4) and (5)).


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Clearly (2) and (5) do the main work here. Again, (2) is the conclusion of Freges argument to

the effect that his opponent both must and cannot give normative content to the concept logical

alienshe must because this is the only intelligible conception and he cannot because his

theory does not admit normative concepts. And (5) is supported by the observation that, on any

non-psychologistic view, logic binds all beings and not just beings like us. Now, again, there

are worries about the probative force of this argument for someone who does not accept the

prescriptive force of the laws of logic (notice that it, too, relies on the LNC). But this formulation

brings to the fore a rather different worry to the one about question-begging. Freges thought-

experiment seems to have yielded the conclusion that a certain kind of being is logically

impossible; i.e. a claim of the form:

(x) (Gx)

This of course requires that the concept G ( ) is well formed. But notice that the relevant concept

here is supposed to be logically impossible thought; for logical aliens are supposed to be

thinkers who do not conform to the laws of logic. So the claim can be read: It is logically

impossible that there is any logically impossible thought. And this, of course, is just what the

psychologistic philosopher wants to denyhe maintains that it is (in some sense) possible that

there is logically impossible thought. But if this claim means anything at all it is surely itself an

instance of a logically impossible thought: on Freges own analysis, it is the thought that a

particular logical impossibilitynamely logically impossible thoughtis possible. So it seems

that Frege is guilty of self-contradiction: he wants to deny that there are any instances of

logically impossible thought in order to refute what he wants to recognise as just that.

But perhaps Frege ought therefore to deny that the psychologistic claim does mean

anything at all; to deny its status as the kind of thing, to echo Freges own phrase, for which the


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question of truth or falsity can arise at all.8(Compare Wittgensteins remark that it is not as it

were the sense of a senseless utterance that is senseless.9) If this is the right way to interpret

Freges stance, however, it is clear that he cannot straightforwardly make any claim about the

necessary non-existence of logical aliens. For on this reading, the putative concept logically

alien thought is entirely contentlessand to dismiss a would-be concept as contentless is

surely to say that nothing can be inferred from it. But if the notion of logical aliens is simply

unintelligible rather than necessarily uninstantiated it starts to look very unclear how Freges

thought-experiment is supposed so much as to get off the ground. For how can he expect his

opponent to reflect on the content of, and imaginatively engage with, something unintelligible?

And how, in particular, are we to take the claim that to adequately distinguish the nonsensical

idea of logical aliens from any such notion as the concept of creatures who moo and eat grass

would require a normative determination of the former?!

The prospects for Freges argument do not look good. If weread it as a reductio, it begs

the question by assuming the absurdity of a logical contradiction. If we read it as an argument to

the conclusion that the concept logical alien is necessarily uninstantiated, it is incoherent

because it implies that logically impossible thought is both impossible (in the case of logical

aliens) and actual (in the case of the advocate of psychologism). And if we read it as an

argument that the concept of logical aliens is unintelligible, it is hard to see how it can intelligibly

appeal to this concept in supporting the claims it makes.

These considerations highlight some general worries about how indirect strategies are

supposed to work. For it is not necessary to detail Aristotles argument against Heraclitus to see

that an indirect demonstration of the LNCone that would show that an objection cannot be

meaningfully statedis subject to precisely similar constraints: (i) it must not assume the

absurdity of a contradiction; and (ii) it must show how, if not via reductio, an argument can

8Frege (1984), p. 355.

9Cf. PI, 500.


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intelligibly appeal to the possibility or concept it reveals to be inconceivable or meaningless. In

short it seems that in attempting, as it were, to reduce those they regard as logical aliens to

vegetables, indirect demonstrators are in danger of succumbing to the same fate.

3. Indirect Communication and The Leap

Now, as is testified by the journal entry I cited at the beginning [1], Kierkegaard thought

he saw a connection between the strategy of indirect demonstration and what he calls the leap.

I want now to show how this connection, weird as it might seem, offers a valuable diagnosis of

just whyindirect demonstration faces intractable problems, as traditionally conceived, and

further indicates how the indirect strategy might be reconceived in a more fruitful way.

Why, then, does Kierkegaard link up the image of a leapwithAristotles claim that some

principles can be demonstrated only indirectly? It is well beyond my scope here to explore the

various nuances of the leap motif in Kierkegaards writings. But we mightexpect to find an

emphasis on immediacy or spontaneity. For leaping usually has to do with getting from A to B

without touching the intervening ground; and spontaneous activity usually has to do with the

achievement of some result without the mediation of any external power or influence. And an

emphasis on freedom from mediation is indeed the salient feature of discussions in which

Kierkegaard and his fictional authors apply the image of a leap. This typically reflects the

rhetorical context of Kierkegaards sustained polemic against Hegels theory of dialectical

mediation and logical necessity. What in one place he playfully calls his theory of the leap, gets

worked out in Kierkegaards writings into a complex alternative to the Hegelian treatment of

qualitative transitions as immanent and necessary moments in the self-determining process of

thought thinking itself through.

But why should Kierkegaard link indirect demonstration with the notion of spontaneous

or unmediated activity? The answer, I believe, is his implicit understanding of what my teacher


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David Bell formulates as a general constraint on any theory of judgement. This is what, in the

context of Kantian exegesis, he calls the Principle of Spontaneity:

If the performance of an act of type is learned, or rule-governed, then it cannot be a

general requirement of my performing an arbitrary act of type that I have already

performed an act of that type or, indeed, of any other type that in its turn requires the

prior performance of an act of type .

This principle precludes any theory that implies a vicious regress of conditions on the possibility

of a given thinker performing a judgement of a certain kind. That is, it cannot be a general

condition of ones performing a judgement of a certain kind that one has already performed a

judgement of that self-same kind. (It rules out the kind of regress to which Peter referred

yesterday). But, as Bell goes on to emphasize, the positive import of the Principle of

Spontaneity is that there must be some point, in a given thinkers thinking and judging, at which

the relation between act of judgement and object of thought is immediate and directthat is,

unmediated by any other judgement and in just that sense spontaneous.

What I want to suggest, then, is that the link between indirect demonstration and the

image of a leap comes to this: in K ierkegaards conception, the aim of the indirect method,

properly understood, is to elicit spontaneous, that isnon-coercive but also non-reflective,

agreement in judgement. Crucially, on this conception, indirect communication stands in

contrast with any mode of argumentation that is designed to convince your opponent to

reflectively endorse a proposition (such as the conclusion that his or her professed view is false

or incoherent). Indeed, Kierkegaards conceptionindicates a certain diagnosis of the problems

that beset any attempt to reduce to silence the would-be denier of basic principles. The

problems arise when we construe such arguments as direct arguments to indirect conclusions

(such as the internal incoherence of a given belief-set). For, supposing that what we need in a


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given context of communication is a method of criticism appropriate to the aim to elicit

spontaneousagreement, since the context is one that precludes direct demonstration, it looks

plausible that no direct mode of argumentation is going to fit the bill, however weak or negative

the form of its conclusion. From this perspective, whatever hopes we might have for the strategy

of indirect demonstration, we ought not to be hoping for anything like a discursive justification or

rational grounding of basic principles.

Thus, to conceive the indirect strategy in the way I think Kierkegaard conceives it that

is, as a means of eliciting spontaneous agreement in judgement - is to resist the temptation to

construe this strategy in terms of the provision of any kind of quasi-direct argument whatsoever.

This may indeed explain his shift from talk of indirect demonstrationto talk of indirect

communication. The question, of course, is how indirect communication conceived as a

strategy for eliciting spontaneous agreement in judgementis supposed to work. At one point

in Kierkegaards Concluding Unscientific Postscript, its fictional author one Johannes

Climacus offers the following insight into another pseudonymous book:

[T]he book Repetitionwas called an imaginary psychological construction. That this

was a doubly reflected communication form soon became clear to me. By taking place in

the form of an imaginary construction, the communication ... establishes for itself a

chasmic gap between the reader and the author ... so that a direct understanding is

made impossible. The imaginary construction is the conscious, teasing revocation of the

communication, which is always of importance for existing persons, lest the relation be

changed to that of a rote reciter who writes for rote reciters.

The basic contrast here is between a text that involves the direct transmission of an authors

views and one that denies its readers any such access. The first form of writing, Climacus

claims, encourages learning by rote; the latter can open up the possibility of a genuine


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intellectual exercise. In other words, a text that deploys a strategy of indirect communication is

one that aims to get the reader to spontaneously see something for himself. As Climacus writes

elsewhere: the secret of communication specifically hinges on setting the other free.10

But how, then, can one ensure that an indirect communication will result in spontaneous

agreement as opposed to disagreement? For Kierkegaard, this all depends on the artistryof the

communication and will vary according to the subject-matter at issue. But there are some

general criteria. A Kierkegaardian indirect communicationwith the aim of eliciting spontaneous

agreementwill typically do two things. First it will appeal to certain forms of imaginative

engagement (hence the rubric, imaginative construction) and will therefore involve the use of

examples or paradigms (hence Kierkegaards own prolific use of pseudonymous authors,

stories, parables, diaries and so on). And, second, it will display or manifest the incoherence of

the views to be opposed (hence the prominent roles of parody, satire, irony, humour, in

Kierkegaards texts). The strategy is thus to communicate in such a way that is consistent with

the Principle of Spontaneitywhere the aim is not to directly transmit propositional content (as

though, to use one of Kierkegaards expressions, thoughts were just like real estate) but rather

to engage the inwardness of the thinking subject.

Consider Annie.11Annie used to see herself as cool and detached. Until, that is, during

a conversation with Clarabel, she shouted out I dont care what you think! Clarabel, who had

been looking for a way to correct Annies self-image and had long given up on direct means

(Annie was also stubborn), seized her moment. Well I dont care what you think either! she

screamed. In a flash, Annie saw herself reflected in another. She saw the incongruency

between what she said and how she said it. More generally, she saw the way her actual

practice betrayed her reflectively endorsed self-image. This little interaction (adapted from an

illustration of Katherine Ramslands) has all the ingredients of a Kierkegaardian indirect

10Ibid., p. 74.

11Ramsland (1987), p. 333.


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communication. Clarabel offers herself as an example to engage Annies imagination, an

example that manifests the dissonance between her self-image as cool and detached and her

tendency to be anything but that. In this way, we may suppose, Clarabel secured Annies

spontaneous agreement about her being a little less the person she thought she was.

Of course Clarabel mighthave just carried on trying directly to persuade Annie to give up

her deluded self-image. Besides argumentative contexts in which we reach the limits of proof,

however, Kierkegaard thinks there are other, more widespread, contexts in which we can have

good reasons for an indirect mode of communication. In particular, as he makes clear in his

retrospective The Point of View for My Work as an Author, he thinks indirection is called for

whenever what we are up against is an illusion or delusion of self-understanding (as opposed to

beliefs that are false or inconsistent or otherwise inadequate). From the practical point of view,

he argues that if we try to remove a personsillusion directly we risk antagonizing them and

simply reinforcing their illusion. More fundamentally, however, he also observes that a direct

approach presupposes that the recipients ability to receive is entirely in order, but here that is

simply not the caseindeed an illusion is also an obstacle. Kierkegaards general advice in the

face of such obstacles to communication is, in a word, mimetic: we should begin, he

recommends, by taking the persons self-understanding at face value - as good money-

exaggerating and mimicking the very delusions we are trying to dispel. Only then, he suggests,

though perhaps with great difficulty, might we be able to elicit a moment of spontaneous self-

recognition.

4. The Rhetorical Reductio

Now there are all sorts of further things to be said about Kierkegaard on indirect

communication. Many of these pertain to his distinctive account of the peculiar difficulties of

communicating ethical and religious truths. However, in the interests of a better understanding


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of the formal structure of Kierkegaards conceptionindirect communication, as this is shaped by

his reflections on the limits of direct demonstration, I want to see whether this conception can be

made to do any work in rescuing Freges little discourse about logical aliens from the morass in

which we left it. This was the situation: to the extent that Frege does not beg the question, he

either implies that logical aliens are both impossible and actual or he is arguing from the

normative content of a contentless pseudo-concept. Id like to suggest, however, that Freges

argument canbe broadly described in terms of a Kierkegaardian indirect communication.

Recall that the advocate of psychologism likes to think of himself as open-minded about

logical aliens. Frege, on the other hand, thinks there is no such space for the mind to occupy.

On his understanding his logic, the term logical alien is an oxymoron. But, as we saw, Frege

recognises that this understanding cannot be directly demonstrated. Instead, he proposes a

thought-experimentin Kierkegaards terms, an imaginary construction in which, rather than

directly argue for his view, Frege pretends that the concept of logical aliens is perfectly in order.

That is, he pretends that psychologism is true: for, again, the only way he can begin to make

sense of logical aliens is in terms of that theory. The point of this pretence seems to be by way

of showing that psychologism cannot make sense of logical aliens within its own terms. But, as

we also saw, this purpose is ill served by a formal reductio argument.

My suggestion is that we can regard Fregesargument rather in terms of what I shall call

the rhetorical reductio. Aristotle distinguished between the formal syllogisms of dialectic and the

informal arguments of rhetoric. An important feature of the latter, he observed, is their capacity

to affect decisions and judgements:

But since rhetoric exists to affect the making of decisionsthe hearers decide between

one political speaker and another, and a legal verdict isa decisionthe orator must not


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only try to make the argument of his speech demonstrative and worthy of belief; he must

also ... put his hearers in the right frame of mind.12

So a rhetorical argument aims to elicit a decision of a certain sort by affecting someones frame

of mind, over and above providing reasonsto change their mind. (It is worth noting that

Kierkegaard habitually associates the metaphor of leaping with decision andresolution and

explicitly links his conception of indirect communication with Aristotelian rhetoric.13) With this in

mind, let me introduce what I propose to call the rhetorical reductio. The rhetorical reductiois a

species of argument that, rather thanprovingthat a given assumption implies a contradiction,

manifests the absurdity of the position it attacks by reduplicating and satirising it. The rhetorical

reductioaims to achieve in a target audience a frame of mindin which they will feel, as it were,

pulled in different directions, in which the incoherence in their stance is perceived as an internal

tension. Crucially, however, we need not suppose that the relevant sort of incoherence here can

be explained in terms of ones being committed to incompatibletheses or inconsistent

propositions; for it may be that the tension, rather, is betweenwhatone merely seems to think,

to others and to oneself, and what one actually thinks. Indeed, this is perhaps what is most

distinctive about the way Kierkegaard takes up Hegels conception of internal critique: namely,

his emphasis on the idea of contexts in which what calls for internal critique is not a

contradiction between two determinatepositionswithin a given shape of consciousness,or a

failure to live up to the determinate standards to which one is implicitly or explicitly committed,

but rather the radical lack of fit between what a given thinker merely takes to be his or her

position and how he or she is truly oriented in this regard. Rather than being between

12Bk II, Part I, 1377b (Aristotle, (1952), p. 622).

13Cf. JP III VI A 33, n.d. (1845), 20: In the final analysis what I call a transition of pathos Aristotle called

an enthymeme. Enthymeme is, of course, the name Aristotle gives to a rhetorical proof. Compare alsoKierkegaards reference to the needfor a new science which would develop the Christian art ofspeaking to be constructed admodumAristotles Rhetoric (cited in J. Thomas (1992), p. 121).


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proposition and proposition, or explicit and implicit norms, this sort of contradiction is between

pretence and reality, mere pose and true orientation.

Clarabel deploys a rhetorical reductioagainst Annie by mirroring back the incongruence

between whatshe says and howshe says it, so as to secure her spontaneous agreement. And

Frege can be seen to deploy a similar strategy by reflecting back to the psychologistic logician

the incongruence of wanting to mark a normative distinction without saying anything normative.

If the argument works, Freges opponent will come round to the Fregean view of logic. He will

not have done so solely on the basis of reflection, however, but by means of a spontaneous

leap away from the dissonance of his own internal conflict.

To briefly flesh this out: Frege pretends to seriously entertain (what he himself takes to

be) an internally incoherent perspective. (Just as Clarabel pretends to take Annie seriously by

responding in kind.) This seems to lead Frege into the paradoxical business of denying there

can be any instances of illogical thought in order to refute what he takes to be an instance of

just that. More generally, it draws him into an attempt to rule out logical aliens without saying

anything normative, for he knows he cannot rely on normative distinctions without begging the

question. So Frege wants to rule out logical aliens in a way that precisely mirrors his opponents

attempt to rule them in: both want to mark a normative distinction without saying anything

normative.

Frege, it seems, ends up reducing himself to silence. But that, Im suggesting, is just the

point; namely, to bring his opponent to a spontaneous recognition of the form, Thats like me!.

The hope is that, in thisframe of mindthat of recognising himself in an incongruous position,

of feeling pulled in different directions, of wanting to speak without having the resources so to

speakthe psychologistic logician will change his mind. Clearly, this would disarm any

objection to the effect that Freges own talk about logical aliens is incoherent for, on this

reading, an incoherent impression is exactly what hes aiming for. In this way, Frege might be


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seen as putting into practice the Kierkegaardian wisdom that [f]ixed ideas are like cramp, for

instance in the footyet the best remedy is to stamp on them.14

My claim here is not that Freges argument, quarhetorical reductio, is in fact successful.

Still less of course am I trying to insinuate any historical influence on the author of The Basic

Laws of Arithmeticby the author of Concluding Unscientific Postscript! (As a historical curiosity,

however, we might just note that it was from Trendelenburg - to whom Kierkegaard refers

apropos Aristotle on indirect demonstration - that Frege took the term Begriffsschrift.) What I do

think is that a Kierkegaardian reading of Freges thought-experiment gives it half a chance of

success where no other reading canand that this reading displays the formal structure of an

indirect communication. Finally, then, let me very briefly illustrate Kierkegaards own use of the

rhetorical reductio.

5 Impractical Wisdom

As with the case of Aristotle vis--vis Heraclitus, and Frege vis--vis psychologism,

Kierkegaard evidently thought of himself as confronted, in his own milieu, not in the first

instance by false doctrines to be directly refuted, but by illusions to be indirectly dispelled. Short

of showing how this strategy plays out in works as a whole, a passage from Either / Or may

serve as exemplary. The section of the Diapsalmata entitled Either / Or: An ecstatic lecture

begins famously as follows:

If you marry, you will regret it; if you do not marry you will also regret it; if you marry or if

you do not marry, you will regret both; whether you marry or you do not marry, you will

14JP 6 July 38 II A 230 (Hannay), p. 97.


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regret both. Laugh at the worlds follies, you will regret it . [And so it goes on ad

nauseum] This, gentlemen, is the sum of all practical wisdom.

Commentators often subsume such ironical expressions of disillusionment and detachment

under the rubric of Kierkegaardspoetic characterisation of the internal logic of an aesthetic life-

view. But I think this cannot be quite right. To have a life-viewis, in Kierkegaards quasi-

technical sense of that term, to consistently express in ones life a coherent project or ideal. For

example, Judge William, who we encounter in the second part of Either / Or, embodies and

advocates the life-view of civic virtue in general, and marriage in particular. But the adoption of

any such ground projectis precisely what the so-called aesthete in the first part of the book

declinessince he holds that regret is attendant upon any course of action, no course of action

can constitute a practical identity for him. Indeed, Kierkegaards aestheteseems particular keen

to preclude the impression that he has any positive view to advance:

My practical wisdom is easy to understand, for I have only one principle, which is not

even my starting point. One must distinguish between the successive dialectic in either /

or and the eternal dialectic touched on here. In saying that I do not start from my

principle, the opposite of this is not a starting-out from it, but simply the negative

expression of my principle, the expression for its grasping itself in opposition to a

starting-point or a not-starting out from it. I do not start out from my principle, because

were I to do so, I would regret it. If I were not to start out from it, I would also regret it.

Clearly, then, our ecstatic lecturer is less the representative of a certain life-view than one who

poses as rejecting any such attempt to express a coherent project through ones moment-by-

moment decisions. His is a pose of retreat from the dilemmas of daily life the successive

dialectic in either / or to an eternal dialectic in which no commitments whatsoever are made.


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But having marked his distinction between the dialectics of time and eternity, he draws a

disarming conclusion. Therefore, he declares, if it seemed to any of my highly esteemed

hearers that there was something in what I was saying, he would only prove that his mind was

unsuited to philosophy.

At this juncture it seems to me that any reading in terms of Kierkegaards presentation,

through the voice of the ecstatic lecturer, of a certain weltanschauung or life-view completely

breaks down. To understand the aesthetes practical wisdom - so he himself insists - is to

understand that it literally comes to nothing, that there is no sense to made of it whatsoever, and

that to think otherwise would be to show a singular lack of philosophical acumen. In this light,

one may very well wonder what the import of the ecstatic lecture is at all.

That what is going on here is the rhetorical reductio is indicated by the lecturers claim to

have achieved an eternal perspective: I am, he brags, constantly aeterno modo. Now the first

audience of his lecturehis highly esteemed hearers would of course have been familiar

with such claims. They might even have been inclined to lay claims to such a perspective

themselves. Perhaps, under the influence of Hegel, some regarded themselves as pure,

speculative thinkers, having managed to transcend the either / or structure of the finite

understanding by making a presuppositionless beginning and getting caught up with the eternal

activity of pure thought itself. InPostscript, Kierkegaard will satirise the legacy of such unearthly

achievements as one in which as soonas someone hints at an aut / aut [either / or] a Hegelian

comes riding trip-trap-trap on a horse...and wins a victory and rides home again. And the

aesthetes claim to be aeterno modo a claim he himself insists comes to nothing at allis

surely supposed to mimic the claim to have transcended the realm in which we temporally

situated beings face difficult dilemmas. (Recall the objection to Freges thought-experiment that,

by Freges own lights, logical aliens is meaningless.) In case the speculative thinker should

miss his own reflection in the mirror of the aesthetes empty eternal dialectic, the screw is

turned:


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[F]or those hearers capable of following me, in spite of my not making any movement, I

will now unfold the eternal truth whereby this philosophy remains in itself and admits of

nothing higher Experience has shown that it isnt at all difficult for philosophy to begin.

Far from it: it begins with nothing. What seems so difficult to philosophy and the

philosophers is to stop. This difficulty, too, I have avoided. For if anyone believed that in

stopping at this point I really am stopping, he proves he has no speculative insight. For I

do not stop: I stopped that time I began. My philosophy, therefore, has the advantage of

brevity and irrefutability. For if anyone were to contradict it, I would surely be justified in

pronouncing him insane.

Kierkegaards mimetic irony is hardly subtle: we are to see that the philosophy which, in a

Hegelian trope, remains in itself and admits of nothing higher fails to transcend so much as the

non-project of a fictive non-personlet alone, we might add, the exacting life-view of a

Socrates, say, or an Abraham.

To sum up: Just as Freges indirect strategy reflects his recognition that psychologism

cant be directly refuted, so Kierkegaard evidently thinks there is a sense in which the

Hegeliansclaims to an ecstatic perspective cant bedirectly refuted. Indeed, a Hegelian might

agree to that: he or she may want to say that this is so because the eternal perspective of

speculative thought subsumes all other views within its systematic orbit. For his part,

Kierkegaard thinks that a direct mode of criticism against such claims would already grant too

much. Accordingly, he deploys an indirect form: the rhetorical reductio. If the strategy works,

those inclined to lay claim to the ecstatic perspective of speculative thought will come to

recognize themselves reflected in the aesthetes absurd pose of not commit himself to anything

whatsoeverincluding the very commitment not to commit to anything. Hopefully but there

can be no guaranteea given reader may, as a result, become less inclined to assume the


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pose of existing aeterno modo, beyond the temporality of difficult decision and dilemma. But, if

so, this will not be because he or she has become convinced of any direct or quasi-direct

argument to the conclusion that the content of his or her thought is false or incoherent. Rather, it

will be through a moment of spontaneous self-recognition, in which the reader recognizes the

dissonance in his or her own case between pretence and reality. And it is in this and similar

ways, I think, that Kierkegaard takes up and transforms the notion of internal critique, turning it

against Hegels own claimto have achieved, by way of internal critique, an eternal perspective

on the whole.

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Logical Aliens