Part 8 (1/2)
Concepts represent condensations of knowledge, which make further study and the division of cognitive labor possible.
[Ibid., 87.]
Conceptualization is a method of expanding man's consciousness by reducing the number of its content's units-a systematic means to an unlimited integration of cognitive data.
[Ibid., 85.]
It is crucially important to grasp the fact that a concept is an ”open-end” cla.s.sification which includes the yet-to-be-discovered characteristics of a given group of existents. All of man's knowledge rests on that fact.
[Ibid., 87.]
Concepts and, therefore, language are primarily a tool of cognition-not of communication, as is usually a.s.sumed. Communication is merely the consequence, not the cause nor the primary purpose of concept-formation-a crucial consequence, of invaluable importance to men, but still only a consequence. Cognition precedes communication; the necessary precondition of communication is that one have something to communicate....
The primary purpose of concepts and of language is to provide man with a system of cognitive cla.s.sification and organization, which enables him to acquire knowledge on an unlimited scale; this means: to keep order in man's mind and enable him to think.
[Ibid., 92.]
Abstract ideas are conceptual integrations which subsume an incalculable number of concretes-and ... without abstract ideas you would not be able to deal with concrete, particular, real-life problems. You would be in the position of a newborn infant, to whom every object is a unique, unprecedented phenomenon. The difference between his mental state and yours lies in the number of conceptual integrations your mind has performed.
[”Philosophy: Who Needs It,” PWNI, 6; pb 5.]
Conceptual awareness is the only type of awareness capable of integrating past, present and future. Sensations are merely an awareness of the present and cannot be retained beyond the immediate moment; percepts are retained and, through automatic memory, provide a certain rudimentary link to the past, but cannot project the future. It is only conceptual awareness that can grasp and hold the total of its experience-extrospectivety, the continuity of existence; introspectively, the continuity of consciousness-and thus enable its possessor to project his course long-range.
[ITOE, 75.].
There are many special or ”cross-filed” chains of abstractions (of interconnected concepts) in man's mind. Cognitive abstractions are the fundamental chain, on which all the others depend. Such chains are mental integrations, serving a special purpose and formed accordingly by a special criterion.
Cognitive abstractions are formed by the criterion of: what is essential? (epistemologically essential to distinguish one cla.s.s of existents from all others). Normative abstractions are formed by the criterion of: what is good? Esthetic abstractions are formed by the criterion of: what is important?
[”Art and Sense of Life,” RM, 45; pb 36.]
See also ”ANTI-CONCEPTS”; ANTI-CONCEPTUAL MENTALITY; AXIOMATIC CONCEPTS; COMMUNICATION; DEFINITIONS; ESTHETIC ABSTRACTIONS; ”FROZEN ABSTRACTION,” FALLACY of; INTEGRATION (MENTAL); INVALID CONCEPTS; LANGUAGE; MATERIALS, CONCEPTS of; MEANING (of CONCEPTS); METHOD, CONCEPTS of; NORMATIVE ABSTRACTIONS; ”PACKAGE-DEALING,” FALLACY of; PERCEPTION; PLATONIC REALISM; ”RAND'S RAZOR”; REASON; ”STOLEN CONCEPT,” FALLACY of; UNIT; UNIT-ECONOMY; WORDS.
Conceptual Common Denominator. A commensurable characteristic (such as shape in the case of tables, or hue in the case of colors) is an essential element in the process of concept-formation. I shall designate it as the ”Conceptual Common Denominator” and define it as ”The characteristic(s) reducible to a unit of measurement, by means of which man differentiates two or more existents from other existents possessing it.”
The distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic(s) of a concept represents a specified category of measurements within the ”Conceptual Common Denominator” involved.
[ITOE, 18.].
Two fundamental attributes are involved in every state, aspect or function of man's consciousness: content and action-the content of awareness, and the action of consciousness in regard to that content. These two attributes are the fundamental Conceptual Common Denominator of all concepts pertaining to consciousness.
[Ibid., 38.]
When concepts are integrated into a wider one, the new concept includes all the characteristics of its const.i.tuent units; but their distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristics are regarded as omitted measurements, and one of their common characteristics determines the distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic of the new concept: the one representing their ”Conceptual Common Denominator” with the existents from which they are being differentiated.
When a concept is subdivided into narrower ones, its distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic is taken as their ”Conceptual Common Denominator”-and is given a narrower range of specified measurements or is combined with an additional characteristic(s), to form the individual distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristics of the new concepts.
[Ibid., 30.]
The rules of correct definition are derived from the process of concept-formation. The units of a concept were differentiated-by means of a distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic(s)-from other existents possessing a commensurable characteristic, a Conceptual Common Denominator. A definition follows the same principle: it specifies the distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic (s) of the units, and indicates the category of existents from which they were differentiated.
The distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic(s) of the units becomes the differentia of the concept's definition; the existents possessing a Conceptual Common Denominator become the genus.
[Ibid., 53.]
Since axiomatic concepts are not formed by differentiating one group of existents from others, but represent an integration of all existents, they have no Conceptual Common Denominator with anything else. They have no contraries, no alternatives.
[Ibid., 77.]
See also AXIOMATIC CONCEPTS; CONCEPT-FORMATION; DEFINITIONS ; GENUS and SPECIES; MEASUREMENT; UNIT.
Concretes. See Abstractions and Concretes.
Confidence. See Courage and Confidence; Self-Esteem.
Consciousness. Existence exists-and the act of grasping that statement implies two corollary axioms: that something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness, consciousness being the faculty of perceiving that which exists.
If nothing exists, there can be no consciousness: a consciousness with nothing to be conscious of is a contradiction in terms. A consciousness conscious of nothing but itself is a contradiction in terms: before it could identify itself as consciousness, it had to be conscious of something. If that which you claim to perceive does not exist, what you possess is not consciousness.
Whatever the degree of your knowledge, these two-existence and consciousness-are axioms you cannot escape, these two are the irreducible primaries implied in any action you undertake, in any part of your knowledge and in its sum, from the first ray of light you perceive at the start of your life to the widest erudition you might acquire at its end. Whether you know the shape of a pebble or the structure of a solar system, the axioms remain the same: that it exists and that you know it.... Existence is Ident.i.ty, Consciousness is Identification.
[GS, FNI, 152; pb 124.]
Consciousness is the faculty of awareness-the faculty of perceiving that which exists.
Awareness is not a pa.s.sive state, but an active process. On the lower levels of awareness, a complex neurological process is required to enable man to experience a sensation and to integrate sensations into percepts; that process is automatic and non-volitional: man is aware of its results, but not of the process itself. On the higher, conceptual level, the process is psychological, conscious and volitional. In either case, awareness is achieved and maintained by continuous action.
Directly or indirectly, every phenomenon of consciousness is derived from one's awareness of the external world. Some object, i.e., some content, is involved in every state of awareness. Extrospection is a process of cognition directed outward-a process of apprehending some existent (s) of the external world. Introspection is a process of cognition directed inward-a process of apprehending one's own psychological actions in regard to some existent(s) of the external world, such actions as thinking, feeling, reminiscing, etc. It is only in relation to the external world that the various actions of a consciousness can be experienced, grasped, defined or communicated. Awareness is awareness of something. A content-less state of consciousness is a contradiction in terms.
[ITOE, 37.1.
The first and primary axiomatic concepts are ”existence,” ”ident.i.ty” (which is a corollary of ”existence”) and ”consciousness.” One can study what exists and how consciousness functions; but one cannot a.n.a.lyze (or ”prove”) existence as such, or consciousness as such. These are irreducible primaries. (An attempt to ”prove” them is self-contradictory: it is an attempt to ”prove” existence by means of non-existence, and consciousness by means of unconsciousness.) [Ibid., 73.]
Consciousness-for those living organisms which possess it-is the basic means of survival.
[”The Objectivist Ethics,” VOS, 9: pb 18.]
Man's consciousness is his least known and most abused vital organ. Most people believe that consciousness as such is some sort of indeterminate faculty which has no nature, no specific ident.i.ty and, therefore, no requirements, no needs, no rules for being properly or improperly used. The simplest example of this belief is people's willingness to lie or cheat, to fake reality on the premise that ”I'm the only one who'll know” or ”It's only in my mind”-without any concern for what this does to one's mind, what complex, untraceable, disastrous impairments it produces, what crippling damage may result.
The loss of control over one's consciousness is the most terrifying of human experiences: a consciousness that doubts its own efficacy is in a monstrously intolerable state. Yet men abuse, subvert and starve their consciousness in a manner they would not dream of applying to their hair, toenails or stomachs. They know that these things have a specific ident.i.ty and specific requirements, and, if one wishes to preserve them, one must comb one's hair, trim one's toenails and refrain from swallowing rat poison. But one's mind? Aw, it needs nothing and can swallow anything. Or so most people believe. And they go on believing it while they toss in agony on a psychologist's couch, screaming that their mind keeps them in a state of chronic terror for no reason whatever....
The fact [is] that man's consciousness possesses a specific nature with specific cognitive needs, that it is not infinitely malleable and cannot be twisted, like a piece of putty, to fit any private evasions or any public ”conditioning.”
[”Our Cultural Value-Deprivation,” TO, April 1966, 1.]
Just as man's physical existence was liberated when he grasped the principle that ”nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed,” so his consciousness will be liberated when he grasps that nature, to be apprehended, must be obeyed-that the rules of cognition must be derived from the nature of existence and the nature, the ident.i.ty, of his cognitive faculty.
[ITOE, 110.].
The hallmark of a mystic is the savagely stubborn refusal to accept the fact that consciousness, like any other existent, possesses ident.i.ty, that it is a faculty of a specific nature, functioning through specific means. While the advance of civilization has been eliminating one area of magic after another, the last stand of the believers in the miraculous consists of their frantic attempts to regard ident.i.ty as the disqualifying element of consciousness.