Abstract
Quite remarkably, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling uses the notion of “drive” (and related notions, such as “instinct”) in analysing important cognitive achievements: An important instance of this attitude can be found in his characterizing Kant as a philosopher who operates in the basis of instincts. His key argument in adopting “drives” as key to the cognitive faculties of humans derives from the conviction that cognitive endeavours need to be open and directed towards grasping reality not in individual items, but as a totality. He arrives, in employing these terms, at an understanding of science, and of cognition in general, as an open, future-directed, and dynamic process. This chapter presents an overview of Schelling’s usage of “drive”-related terms, discusses his rather detailed description of the mechanics of drives within the structure of human faculties (paying attention to the key term of a “sollicitation” towards motion), and draws some conclusions as to Schelling’s understanding of “science” and the dynamics of science.
This chapter builds forth upon results of my research project on “Structuring the world of ideas around 1800” that was financed by NWO, the “Dutch research council”. Many thanks go to NWO and to my colleagues in this project.
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Notes
- 1.
Etymologically, these terms are related (see the Grimms’ dictionary (Grimm & Grimm 1854–1961) entry “drive”), so “drive” can be used as a fully adequate translation for “Trieb” here. Unless indicated otherwise, all translations in this chapter are my own. A nice illustration of the richness of the semantics of “drive” in this period can be found in Pénisson (2002).
- 2.
- 3.
This discourse itself is part of, and it engenders, a debate about whether we can ascribe to animals capacities that are analogous to human capacities, or that can be put in a continuous connection with higher capacities (e.g. AA I,9,1, 196–209; AA I,8, 31). Paradigm examples, repeated stereotypically in the debate, are spiderwebs, beehives, and beavers’ lodges. On the context, see Richards (2002), as well as the articles by Zammito and Cooper in this volume.
- 4.
Frequently, the terms “hunger” and “addiction” are used in close connection. Some significant passages for these terms and for their connection: AA I,11,1, 66, 71; AA I,17, 133, 157, 169; SW I,7, 466–467; SW I,8, 235, 254, 266, 352–353, 355, 361, 378–379; SW II,1, 294, 462; SW II,2, 631; SW II,3, 206, 447; SW II,4, 271, 283. See also Berg (2003) on a comparison between Schelling and Schopenhauer that highlights the importance of drive-related terms.
- 5.
The abbreviation “AA” refers to the historical-critical edition of Schelling’s works, “SW” to the edition in the Sämmtliche Werke. On the “Kristallisationstrieb”, see also Lind (1992, 272) on the usage of this term and of drive-terms in general as non-causal descriptors in Jakob Friedrich Fries’ writings.
- 6.
In the secondary literature (cf. König 2016), this term is used to summarize Schleiermacher’s more extensive description of the human soul as being a “product of two opposing drives”, one of which is the “striving to attract everything that surrounds the soul towards itself”, the other being the “longing [“Sehnsucht”] to extend its own inner self, starting from the inside, ever further” (Schleiermacher [1799], 191).
- 7.
- 8.
On “irritability” and “sensibility”, see, for example, Durner et al. (1994, 375–498).
- 9.
Schelling’s discussion of the specific terms “Bildungstrieb” and “Kunsttrieb” will not be analysed here; however, the cognitive programme that Schelling develops in using the term “drive” is perfectly compatible with the way how Schelling deals with these more specific issues.
- 10.
The Grimms’ dictionary, interestingly, already has an entry “Instinkt”, thereby showing that this term is no longer standardly perceived as stemming from foreign languages (Grimm & Grimm 1854–1961).
- 11.
A. Bowie’s translation gives 1833–1834 as the most probable date for the version in SW that is standardly used for this text (Schelling 1994).
- 12.
On the importance of inherently heuristic notions in Kant’s oeuvre, see Ziche (2016).
- 13.
Schelling uses the same terminology in remarks upon the emergence of early Greek philosophy, and upon the links between philosophy and the mysteries: “From Pythagoras (and even farther back) down to Plato, philosophers felt [German original: “erkennt sich die Philosophie selbst als eine exotische Pflanze im griechischen Boden, ein Gefühl”] that they were an exotic growth on Greek soil. The feeling is expressed, for example, in the fact that all those who were initiated into higher doctrines, either by the wisdom of the early philosophers or by the mysteries, instinctively turned [German original: “ein Gefühl, das schon in dem allgemeinen Trieb sich ausdrückte”] to the East, the motherland of the Ideas” (SW I,5, 346; Schelling 1966, 145).
- 14.
But see Baader (1797, 36) on drives as regulative principles.
- 15.
Because instincts can be “certain” and philosophically productive, Schelling can more frequently couple the term “drive” with positive epistemic characteristics constructively: “richtig fühlender Instinkt”, an instinct that is, interestingly, “feeling correctly” (SW II,2, 105), or more simply a “correct instinct”, a “richtiger Instinkt” (SW II,2, 355).
- 16.
Schelling goes to some lengths to provide a general definition of “drive” that clearly relates to this term’s epistemic functionality. In his philosophy of nature , he keeps rather close to the biological context of this term: “Trieb zur Bewegung, durch Sensibilität bestimmt, ist Instinct” (AA I,6, 249), an “instinct is a drive towards motion that is determined by sensibility”, here explicitly subordinated to “drive”. In a later text, he gives a far more abstract definition of drives: “Bloß partiales Einsseyn des Subjekts und des objektiven Grundes (der Identität und der Totalität) ist Instinkt”/“instinct is a merely partial identity of the subject and the objective ground (of identity and totality)”; “Was im Instinkt des Thiers handelt, ist noch ein ganz Objektives, aber es ist als dieses Objektive, ohne den Charakter des Objektiven abzulegen, zugleich ein Subjektives, was auch nachher an den Thieren mit einem Schein wirklicher, ihnen eigner Vernunft täuscht”, that is: “what is active in the instinct of an animal still is completely objective; but in its being objective it also is subjective, without thereby losing the character of being objective. This subjective aspect then becomes deceptive when animals appear to command a genuine form of reason that is peculiar to them” (SW I,6, 457, 459). When Schelling links up the notion of “drives” to human scientific practice, he explicitly goes beyond the epistemic limitations that these passages state.
- 17.
Interestingly, Schelling, in this context, also gives a qualified discussion as to whether, and to which extent, animals are able to have even “sublime representations”—not quite, but there also is no categorical difference in the way their cognitive apparatus operates as compared to higher cognitive capacities.
- 18.
Schelling uses a beautifully metaphorical term here. The “presentiment”, which in this passage is anticipatively related to a threatening destruction, will “ausbrechen” if it is faced with the right kind of stimulus. “Ausbrechen” can be rendered as “escape from”, but also as “starting to blossom”, “break out into full bloom”, mark the beginning of a new season or epoch, “erupt” with the violent force of a volcano.
- 19.
Cf. also Oken (1843, 387), where the “Ergänzungstrieb” is identified with the “Geschlechtstrieb”. In Schelling, cf. AA I,7, 103–104, where he describes the “Geschlechtstrieb” as a predecessor to the “Kunsttrieb”. This ordering is as much an ordering in which higher levels replace the lower or earlier ones, as one where the higher is coming forth from, and incorporating, the lower.
- 20.
In his System of Transcendental Idealism, Schelling concedes that scientific discoveries may be due to the scientist being a genius, but this is not necessarily so (AA I,9,1, 323–324)—he echoes here Kant’s insistence that science does not require genius. Later, however, Schelling presents Johannes Kepler as the prototype of a genius (Ziche and Rezvykh 2013, 19, 41–48). Again, the traditional link between genius and aesthetic production is still present here: Kepler’s science can be characterized both in terms of scientific achievements and of aesthetic production. In any case, we here find a very early statement to the effect that scientists can, and should, be genius. On the tradition of adopting the term “genius” for activities in the realm of science, see Yeo (1988). Note, however, that typical eighteenth-century discussions of “philosophers” (the term “scientist” did not yet exist) and researchers in the field of the sciences as being “geniuses” balance the creative force of imagination with the controlling influence of careful judgement (this discussion is still present in Kant’s Critique of the Power of Judgment). Given this background, Schelling’s adoption of the label “genius” for science is only the more remarkable.
- 21.
Many thanks to Michael Gutfleisch for discussions about the pervasive importance of the notion of “pressure”, the links between this notion and that of an equilibrium of forces, and the imagery related to this concept.
- 22.
Note, however, that this image is not fully adequate because the source of motion is not in the object itself, but derives from its position in the gravitational field, and because this image cannot capture a state of being solicited towards movement. For the terminology in Schelling’s times, see the entries in Gehler (1787–1796, vol. II, 567, vol. I, 606). On this term and the relevant context, see Bonsiepen (1995), Jammer (1957), Boudri (2002), Ziche (1996).
- 23.
This translation loses the deliberate ambiguity of a centre that sets eruptive motion going and that itself wells up. Cf. again Böhme (1656, 42): “trieb und wallen Gottes”. The term “wallen” already features in the full title of Böhme’s text.
- 24.
See also SW I,2, 178, where Schelling combines “Sollicitiation”, “Streben”/“striving”, and “Zuckung”/“convulsion”, thus highlighting the infinitesimal, fit-like connotations of this term.
- 25.
Baader (1808, 117); he also uses the term “Sollizitation” (Baader 1808, 114). Interestingly, in comparing cognitive and sexual drives, he emphasized the hermaphroditic character of cognitive drives (Baader 1808, 118–119), thus again arriving at an integrative form of drive. See also Ffytche (2012, 131).
- 26.
See also AA I,11,1, 354, where Schelling renders the classical topos of the poets’ being driven by divine inspirations in drive-terms; see also SW I,7, 49.
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Ziche, P. (2022). Drives in Schelling: Drives as Cognitive Faculties. In: Kisner, M., Noller, J. (eds) The Concept of Drive in Classical German Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-84160-7_13
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