THE TRANSITION TO
POSITIVISM

The
second half of the nineteenth century is marked by a broad new movement of
thought called Positivism. This movement arose in opposition to the
abstractionism and formalism of the transcendental Idealists, who had made
nature a "representation" of the ego. The purpose of the new school
of thought was to lay greater stress upon immediate experience, upon the positive
data obtained through the senses.

Positivism
found a precedent for its doctrines in English Empiricism, which had acclaimed
experience as the sole source of human knowledge. At the same time, however,
because of the new interpretation it gives to reality, Positivism differs from
Empiricism. The new school of thought held that the sole reality is matter
which, through internal energy, is mechanically evolved from inferior forms
until it attains consciousness in man.

Thus,
notwithstanding the intention it had of opposing Idealism, Positivism is
closely allied to Idealism in its immanentist concept
of reality. For this reason, Positivism, like Idealism, has a distinctly
Kantian origin, although Positivism and Idealism went their separate ways in
applying Kant's teachings to the problem under investigation.

Idealism
had developed the thinking ego and had transformed it into an ego endowed with
the power of creating reality; Positivism starts with the concept of the thing
in itself, divinizes it, and considers it a kind of energy which is able to
create all reality, including man. Thus, although Positivism attempts a reversal
of the Idealist position, both are occupied with the "creative force"
of matter. This "force" Positivism utilizes in formulating its
doctrine of evolution.

The
great advances made by the biological, social and economic sciences of the age,
and particularly the discoveries concerning electrical energy, favored this
movement. Certainly great progress was made in the physical and social sciences
during this period. But it was a gross error to apply the methods of the
physical sciences to philosophy and in effect to reduce philosophy to the
status of a physical science. Philosophy should have limited itself to its task
of coordinating the results or findings of the sciences in an over-all picture
of reality.

Of
particularly great impact upon the development of thought during this period
was the hypothesis of the origin of species of Charles Darwin (1809-1882). Darwin's theory is that matter,
mechanically and without any intervention of superior forces, developed itself
into a multiplicity of living beings by virtue of certain laws inherent in
matter itself (the struggle for existence; natural selection). Darwin's theory, together with Mayer's
law of the conservation of energy (work is transformed into motion without loss
of energy), on being applied to the field of philosophical inquiry, gave rise
to the belief that the sciences, through the concept of evolution, would at
last solve the problem of reality. The result was a metaphysics limited to the
field of physics, a thoroughly empiricist theory of knowledge, and a
utilitarian and hedonistic ethics.

Even
politics and economics were influenced by Positivism. An extreme form of
democracy arose, proclaiming the absolute rule of the people; freedom was
understood as the full liberty of the individual so long as there was no lesion
of the rights of others; the laissez-faire doctrine in economics led to Manchesterism, a theory based on a liberal principle of
economic freedom which allowed the employer to pay the lowest possible wage
without any moral responsibility toward the worker.

Positivism
had its beginnings in France, and Auguste
Comte was its founder. It reached its fullest development in England under John Stuart Mill and
Herbert Spencer. In Germany it was decidedly materialistic
and atheistic. In Italy it met with little enthusiasm.