The Hidden God by Lucien Goldmann

Author:Lucien Goldmann
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Verso Books

Pascal ends by a new statement of the tragic position: ‘These extremes meet and are joined together by force of distance’, but, he adds, ‘in God and in God alone’.

I still have to deal with yet another point at which Pascal’s ideas coincide with those of Kant. The critique of ‘first principles’ is universally valid, and applies to any type of knowledge. However, it is especially significant when it applies to the formal sciences—of geometry in Pascal, of transcendental analysis in Kant—or to knowledge of content. Neither Pascal nor Kant ever questioned the practical validity either of geometrical first principles or of the categories. They both noted, however, that this validity is theoretically unjustifiable as far as these or those particular principles or categories are concerned.

The fragment on the geometrical mind is wholly dedicated to proving the excellence of geometry. However, Pascal feels constantly obliged, in order to avoid any misunderstanding, to recall at several points that this science is not perfect, since it can never prove its axioms.

But I must, first of all, give the idea of a method which is still more eminent and accomplished, but which men can never reach. For what goes beyond geometry also surpasses us; and yet something must be said about it although it be impossible to practise it.

If it were possible to arrive at this true method which would form demonstrations of the highest excellence, it would consist principally in two things: the first in using no term whose meaning had not already been clearly explained; the second in putting forward no proposition which had not been demonstrated by already known truths. That is to say, in fine, in defining all our terms and in proving all our propositions.

Thus, as we carry our research further and further into the principles that we use, we inevitably arrive at basic words that can admit of no further definition, and at principles which are so clear that no clearer ones can be found to provide any further proof of their validity. From which it appears that men are naturally and permanently unable to treat of any science whatsoever in a wholly perfect order.

But it does not follow from this that we should give up all types of order. For there is one suited to geometry, which is indeed inferior in that it is less convincing, but not because it is less certain (De l’esprit géométrique. Pensées et Opuscules, Brunschvicg edition p. 164. Section XV.)

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.