Ideas from 'The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed]' by Johann Fichte [1794], by Theme Structure

[found in 'The Science of Knowing' by Fichte,Johann G. (ed/tr Wright,Walter E.) [SUNY 2005,0-7914-6450-4]].

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2. Reason / A. Nature of Reason / 5. Objectivity
Fichte's subjectivity struggles to then give any account of objectivity
                        Full Idea: For Fichte 'subjectivity' came first, and he was then stuck with the (impossible) task of showing how 'objectivity' arose out of it.
                        From: comment on Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 06
                        A reaction: The best available answer to this problem (for idealists) is, I think, Nietzsche's perspectives, in which multiple subjectivities are summed to produce a blurred picture which has a degree of consensus. Fichte later embraced other minds.
5. Theory of Logic / E. Structures of Logic / 2. Logical Connectives / c. not
Normativity needs the possibility of negation, in affirmation and denial
                        Full Idea: To adopt any kind of normative stance is to commit oneself necessarily to the possibility of negation. It involves doing something correctly or incorrectly, so there must exist the possibility of denying or affirming.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 05
                        A reaction: This seems to be the key idea for understanding Hegel's logic. Personally I think animals have a non-verbal experience of negation - when a partner dies, for example.
10. Modality / C. Sources of Modality / 4. Necessity from Concepts
Necessary truths derive from basic assertion and negation
                        Full Idea: Fichte thought that everything that involves necessary truths - even mathematics and logic - should be shown to follow from the more basic principles involved in assertion and negation.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 05
                        A reaction: An interesting proposal, though I am struggling to see how it works. Fichte sees assertion and negation as foundational (Idea 22017), but I take them to be responses to the real world.
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 3. Idealism / b. Transcendental idealism
Fichte's logic is much too narrow, and doesn't deduce ethics, art, society or life
                        Full Idea: Only Fichte's principles are deduced in his book, that is, the logical ones, and not even these completely. And what about the practical, the moral and ethical ones. Society, learning, wit, art, and so on are also entitled to be deduced here.
                        From: comment on Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Friedrich Schlegel - works Vol 18 p.34
                        A reaction: This is the beginnings of the romantic rebellion against a rather narrowly rationalist approach to philosophy. Schlegel also objects to the fact that Fichte only had one axiom (presumably the idea of the not-Self).
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 3. Idealism / d. Absolute idealism
Fichte's key claim was that the subjective-objective distinction must itself be subjective
                        Full Idea: Fichte's key claim was that the difference between the subjective and the objective points of view had to be itself a subjective distinction, something that the 'I' posits.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 09
                        A reaction: This seems to lock us firmly into the idealist mental prison and throw away the key.
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 4. Other Minds / a. Other minds
We only see ourselves as self-conscious and rational in relation to other rationalities
                        Full Idea: A rational creature cannot posit itself as such a creature with self-consciousness without positing itself as an individual, as one among many rational creatures.
                        From: Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794], p.8), quoted by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 05 n25
                        A reaction: [1796 book about his Wissenschaftlehre] This is the transcendental (Kantian) approach to other minds. Wittgenstein's private language argument is similar. Hegel was impressed by this idea (I think).
16. Persons / B. Nature of the Self / 4. Presupposition of Self
The Self is the spontaneity, self-relatedness and unity needed for knowledge
                        Full Idea: According to Fichte, spontaneity, self-relatedness, and unity are the basic traits of knowledge (which includes conscience). ...This principle of all knowledge is what he calls the 'I' or the Self.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Ludwig Siep - Fichte p.58
                        A reaction: This is the idealist view. He gets 'spontaneity' from Kant, which is the mind's contribution to experience. Self-relatedness is the distinctive Fichte idea. Unity presumably means total coherence, which is typical of idealists.
Novalis sought a much wider concept of the ego than Fichte's proposal
                        Full Idea: Novalis aimed to create a theory of the ego with a much wider scope than Fichte's doctrine of knowledge had been able to establish. ....Without philosophy, imperfect poet - without poetry, imperfect thinker.
                        From: comment on Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Novalis - Logological Fragments I vol.3 p.531
                        A reaction: [in his 'Fichte Studies] Since this is at the heart of early romanticism, I take the concept to embrace nature, as well as creative imagination. There is a general rebellion against the narrowness of Fichte.
The self is not a 'thing', but what emerges from an assertion of normativity
                        Full Idea: Fichte said the self is not a natural 'thing' but is itself a normative status, and 'it' can obtain this status, so it seems, only by an act of attributing it to itself. ...He continually identified the 'I' with 'reason' itself.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 05
                        A reaction: Pinkard says Fichte gradually qualified this claim. Fichte struggled to state his view in a way that avoided obvious paradoxes. 'My mind produces decisions, so there must be someone in charge of them'? Is this transcendental?
16. Persons / B. Nature of the Self / 6. Self as Higher Awareness
Consciousness of an object always entails awareness of the self
                        Full Idea: I can be conscious of any object only on the condition that I am also conscious of myself, that is, of the conscious subject. This proposition is incontrovertible.
                        From: Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794], p.112), quoted by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 05
                        A reaction: [from the 1797/8 version of Wissenschaftslehre] Russell might be cross to find that his idea on this was anticipated by Fichte. I still approve of the idea.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 6. Judgement / a. Nature of Judgement
Judgement is distinguishing concepts, and seeing their relations
                        Full Idea: For Fichte, to judge means to distinguish concepts from one another and to place them in relationship to one another.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Ludwig Siep - Fichte p.59
                        A reaction: This idea of Fichte's seems to be the key one for Hegel, and hence (I presume) it is the lynchpin of German Idealism. It seems to describe mathematical knowledge quite well. I don't think it fits judging whether there is a snake in the grass.
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / d. Subjective value
Fichte's idea of spontaneity implied that nothing counts unless we give it status
                        Full Idea: Fichte placed emphasis on human spontaneity, on nothing 'counting' for us unless we somehow bestowed some kind of status on it.
                        From: report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 06
                        A reaction: This idea evidentally arises from Kant's account of thought. Pinkard says this idea inspired the early Romantics. I would have thought the drive to exist (Spinoza's conatus) would make things count whether we liked it or not.
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 1. Nature
Fichte reduces nature to a lifeless immobility
                        Full Idea: Fichte reduces the non-Ego or nature to a state of constant calm, standstill, immobility, lack of all change, movement and life, that is death.
                        From: comment on Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Friedrich Schlegel - works vol 12 p.190
                        A reaction: The point is that Fichte's nature is a merely logical or conceptual deduction from the spontaneous reason of the self, so it can't have the lively diversity we find in nature.