IMG 03

Notes

Journal, 7 (1967), 477-565.) We do not know what Mach’s "intcresting observa-tion frotn the yenr t868" was.

25.    Hcrncck, op. cit., p. 216.

26.    Robert Bomicr, La Pensće (1’Ernst Mach (Pnris, 1923), p. 245.

27.    The fund a u ten tul wcakncss of uli presentationalist philosophics, including Ruddlusm and positivism, has aluays bccn dcfcctivc causa] cxplanation. Common sense "forcc" cxplanation works in both narrativc history and cveryday life. The usc of “laws” or "iunctional relations" as "causcs’’ may havc valuc in hclping to unćcrstand idea! typcs of bchavior, but in the practica! world they lead to dis-tortion by oversimplification and irrdcvancc. In the rcal, that is, in the worki of historical cvcnt$, suflkient and variablc causcs arc morę important than necessary causcs; particular comc bcforc univcrsal considcrations. Napoleon did not losc the battlc of Waterloo bccausc of "the law of falling bodics” or bccausc “all phenomena are rclativc." He lost it bccausc General Grouchy failed to kecp the Prussians away front the battlcficld, bccausc hc started the battlc too latc in the day, bccausc hc had not carefully cxamincd the "typical” way that Wellington organi/.cd and uscd his forccs, and bccausc he failed to cxcrcisc sufficicnt supervision ovcr General Ncy who authorized too many unwisc cava!ry attacks. Rcalistic cxplanation looks for agents as causes, that is, particular forccs at particular places and times. To be surę, "General laws" arc assumed and taken for granicd, but they tend to be simplc and obviou> c.g., gencrals who try to takc advantagc of interior lines in fighting battlcs had better be quick about it or they will get crushcd bctwccn opposing forccs, a "maxim" known to all gencrals sińce Thucydidcs the Greek thousands of ycars ago.

It is prccisely dcfcctivc causal cxplanation which is rcsponsiblc for the inability of prcscntationalists to solvc practical problcms in an cfTcctivc way and which tcrr.pts them to rcject practical life itsclf in favor of Buddhist cscapism. The price of rcjecting forcc in physics or redefining it in presentationalist terms is failure to understand dynamie bchavior in a plausiblc way. The price of re-jccting particular forccs as causal dctcrminnnts in practical life is practical failure.

28.    The immediate quotatioit is frotn George Bernard Shaw, but prcsumably, it was uscd by others bcforc him.

29.    Bouvicr, op. cit., p. 242.

30.    Richard Hcnigswald, "Empirist. und kritisch. Idcalismus," AJlgemcinc Zcitung: BciJagc (Munich), Sept. 5. 1903. pp. 449 and 453.

31.    Hermann Bahr, "Mach," Berliner Tagęblatt, no. 116, March 3, 1916; Carl Haas, Hofrat Dr. Ernst Mach (Yicnna, 1916), p. 13; Kurt Schmidt, "Die Lehre des Buddha." Dat Frcic Wort, 16 (1916), 43; Fred, op. cit., col. 431.

32.    Anton Lampa, Ernst Mach (Praguc, 1918), p. 53.

33.    Ibid., p. 58.

34.    Ibid., p. 60.

35.    For a morc adcqttatc analysis sec Sidney Bradshaw Fay, The Origins of the World War (New York, 1936).

36.    The Isracli preemptivc attack on its Arab ncighbors in 1967 rcscmblcd the German World War I situaiion doscly cnough that morc sympnihy for the German response dtould gradually dcvelop. On the other hand, it may be argucd that Germany had not cxhaustcd all hrr optiont in trying to persuade Russia to demobil izc.

37.    The limitations of presentationalist causa! cxplanation, cspcci.illy its dc pcndcncc on so-callcd mathemaiical functions, arc nowhcrc better dcmonstrated ihan in trying to undcrstand diplomaiic or military affairj. A positiyistic or presentationalist military historian is almost a contradiction in terrm.

38.    Lampa, op. cit.; Wilhelm Jcrusalcm, Der Krieg im Uckte der GeselL schaftslehre (Stuttgart, 1015).

39.    Philipp Frank, Einstein: His IJfe and Times (New York, 1947), pp. _U9-121.

40.    Buuvicr, "Rapprochemcnt avec Ic Bouddhismc," in op. cit.. pp. 240-247.

41.    Ibid., pp. 241-242.

42.    I am indebted to Thcodorc Kneupper for mentioning Kcyscrling's identi-fication of Mach’s ideas with aspects of Buddhist thought.

43.    I am generalizing in a broad way herc. Tommaso Campandla (1568-«<*39)> who w rotę a defense of Galileo in 1616, emphasized not unrclatcd sers of valucs under the exprcssions power, tmsdom, and \ove.

44.    This is something of an cxaggeration. By ‘'agreement" I mcan the gradual actcptancc of Isaac Nc\vton's Principia Mathematica.

45.    I am again rclying on Newton, but on his physical rather than mathe-matical conccptions of mass, wcight, and forcc. For dctails sec chap. 7, especially Ne\vton's distinction betwcen physical and mathcmatical causcs.

46.    1 do not mcan to imply that it is impossiblc to be “hcroic" in a "non-aristocratic" socicty. States under siege or surroundcd by łiostilc ncighbors frcqucntly dcvclop a sense of heroism rcgardlcss of their form of govcrnmcnt, and cach system of valu.es defines "humanity," “practicality," and "heroism” in its own terms, i.e., Aristorle, for examplc, who often thought in practical terms, dcfincd "heroism" differendy than tlić notion appeared to be dchncd in an "heroic" pocm such as the Iliad.

47.    Causal, rcprcsentalional rcalists undcrstand "dynamics" in terms of forcc .is an ontological primary quality ncithcr consciously cxpcricnceablc nor anal-ogous to what can be consciously cxpericnccd and moving physical bodics as ontological realitics which whilc not consciously cxpcricnccable arc analngous in many respeets to consciously cxpericnccable primary quałitics.

Phcmomenalists, positivists, and Buddhists undcrstand "dynamics" in tertus of forcc as a particular typc of relation betwcen groups of sensations or appear ances and movińg physical bodics as the groups of sensations themsclvcs. For rcprcscutaiionaUSts what prcscntationalists cali "dynamics" is mercly a form of mentalistie kinematics. For prcscntationalists what representationalists ca l "dynamics" is mercly a form of "mctaphysics."

48.    A good way of distinguishing betwcen prcsentational and reprcsentational understanding would be to remember that what prcscntationalists considcr physical is rcjcctcd as mcntal by representationalists and what representationa is.N considcr physical is rcjcctcd as mctaphysical by prcsemationalists, that is, w len they arc capablc of understanding what representationalists mcan at alk

49- A!cxandrc Koyr*, "Influence of Philosophic Trends on the Formulation ot Scicntific Theories," The Yalidction of Scientific Theortes. Philipp I rank. cd., (Boston, 1956), p. 202.

50.    Max Born, Naturnl Philosophy (Osford, 1951). P- 207.

51.    E & I, p. 265.

52.    Ibid.

53.    Ernst Mach, "Somc Qucstions of Psycho-Physics," The Monut.

>⁸9i), 398-399-

357