British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 25, No. _j.Summer 'ETHICS AND AESTHETICS ARE ONE' Dian£ Collinson Wittgenstein mean when he said that 'Ethics and aesthetics are one'?1 Once the usual acknowledgement is made that ethics and aesthetics are one in that both have to do with values, it is customary to explore their differences rather than their affinities. The ethical, it has been pointed out, has to do with human actions while the aesthetic is concerned with contemplation, with seeing or beholding something. Moreover, it is possible, we arc told, to bypass the aesthetic in a way in which we cannot bypass the ethical: aesthetic awareness is rarely forced upon us and aesthetic situations do not seem to affect our lives significantly but ethical situations, in Sartre's words, 'spring up around us like partridges' and even if a person decides to ignore an ethical matter then that decision is itself an ethical one. There are other well-known contrasts. Ethicaljudgements are said to be made by reference to general rules and principles whereas aesthetic judgements are made by reference to the particular features of what is judged. In an ethical matter we act towards some end whereas in an aesthetic matter we experience something for its own sake.2 In the light of these considerations, it might be asked, is it not perverse to suggest that ethics and aesthetics are one? One way to counter that objection would be to argue that Wittgenstein held an idiosyncratic view of ethics and that once his view is understood we shall see what he meant in asserting its oneness with aesthetics. Professor Phillips Griffiths, for instance, has maintained that 'for Wittgenstein ethics seems absolutely not to be about what most of us would take it to be about' and that he did not concern himself with the particular attitudes that constitute 'most people's conception of ethics' but only with attitudes to life as a whole.3 It is undoubtedly true that Wittgenstein's preponderate concern was with attitudes to life or the world as a whole. But I question whether that concern means that his view of ethics was not about 'what most of us would take it to be about'. Our particular judgements of good and evil are not independent of our attitudes to life as a whole, nor of our views as to its meaning or lack of meaning, and Wittgenstein's remarks about ethics reveal that he was mindful of such connections.4 Thus I shall not argue that his view of ethics was idiosyncratic. Instead, I shall try to show something of what he meant by the gnomic 'ethics and aesthetics are one' and I shall maintain that his view of ethics was very much part of a mainstream in ethical thinking. Wittgenstein's most succinct general description of the oneness of ethics and WHAT DID 266 Downloaded from bjaesthetics.oxfordjournals.org at Monash University on April 18, 2011 that something is ethically good is not one that states that something is good for some purpose or end but that it is good simpliciter. 2011 The attitude that is common to ethics and aesthetics is a way of seeing. is brought into philosophy because 'the world is my world'. The view that ethical value is intrinsic aligns Wittgenstein's ethical thinking in the Kantian strand. and the good life is the world seen sub specie aetemitatis.10.16 Notebooks entry tells us more about this attitude.7 It is a logical presupposition of the world and also of the aesthetic and ethical attitude that sees things 'from outside'. with the meaning of life or 'what makes life worth living'. as the phrase 'as it were' indicates. We read: . is not one of the facts of the world but a limit of the world. irrespective of any purpose it may fulfil. Any differences are between the objects to which the attitude is directed.16 entry we read: The work of art is the object seen sub specie aetemitatis. rather. Here we have.org at Monash University on April 18. rejecting from the outset the contrast. There he stipulates that he will use the term 'ethics' in a sense 'which includes what I believe to be the most essential part of what is generally called Aesthetics'. for example. The latter part of the 7. Downloaded from bjaesthetics.10. or into what makes life worth living. That doctrine states that the world is the totality of facts in logical space and that the metaphysical self.6 The values into which ethics enquires are to be regarded as absolutes. is 'the enquiry into what is valuable. Wittgenstein says. and also in that the values of both are intrinsic. . an account that is certainly familiar as a description of aesthetic perception. We are to think of the ethical as sharing this attitude. The judgement. In the first part of the 7. between the ethical as action towards some end and the aesthetic as 'for its own sake'. Ethics. he says. This self. practical relationship with what is perceived so that the object is seen and known in a way which is at once more vivid and more detached than the everyday relationship. or. as distinct from the empirical self. into what is really important. What does require closer attention is the attitude Wittgenstein says they share. . So the unity claimed thus far for ethics and aesthetics is not of an exceptional or original kind: they are one in having to do with values. 'from outside'. the view sub specie aetemitatis from outside. already noted.oxfordjournals. This is the connexion between art and ethics. The passage has to be placed in the context of the logical doctrine of the Notebooks and the Tractatus. Looking at things 'from the outside' is to see them 'in such a way that they have the whole world as background'.DIAN£ COLLINSON 5 267 aesthetics is given in his 1929 'A Lecture on Ethics'. the enquiry into the meaning of life. Something seen from the standpoint of eternity is seen not 'from the midst of things' but. simile but as yet no deep puzzlement. or into the right way of living'. Wittgenstein says. The usual way of looking at things sees objects as it were from the midst of them. It receives some detailed treatment in the Notebooks. characterizing it as a shift away from the everyday. in whose philosophy Wittgenstein was steeped. . the whole logical space. not insofar as we imagine h i m present but insofar as w e understand God to be eternal. . is 'seen together with the w h o l e logical space' in that it occupies. T h e aesthetic object.' 1 0 Significantly for this present enquiry. relate closely to this. my result does indeed seem trivial. inasmuch as he loses himself in this object. and only continues to exist as the pure subject.org at Monash University on April 18. for its percipient. i. Schopenhauer cites the following w o r d s from Spinoza's Ethics: 'Mens aeterna est. that k n o w l e d g e which is eternal and from which 'follows the greatest possible satisfaction of m i n d ' and 'necessarily the intellectual love of G o d ' which is 'the love of God. as a world each one equally significant. But if I was contemplating the stove it was my world. This is again consistent with traditional accounts of aesthetic contemplation where it is typically one in which the w h o l e of consciousness is inhabited by the object contemplated. forgets even his individuality. For this represents the matter as if I had studied the stove as one among the many things in the world. and then am told: but now all you know is the stove. and 'the whole logical space' occupied b y the one object is ' m y ' whole world. . I venture the following understanding of that entry. the whole logical space.' 1 1 A n o t h e r passage from The World as Will and Idea has bearing on Wittgenstein's remark that 'Each thing modifies the whole logical w o r l d . 9 For Schopenhauer this fusion of percipient and object entails a special kind of k n o w l e d g e in which the individual will and the individual object are replaced by a Platonic Idea which is both pure k n o w i n g subject and the k n o w n Idea. or the object seen aesthetically. quatenus res sub aeternitatis specie concipit. . (The thought forces itself upon one): the thing seen sub tpede aeternitatis is the thing seen together with the whole logical space. since we k n o w that Wittgenstein read and admired h i m . Schopenhauer is expounding his idea that an Downloaded from bjaesthetics.oxfordjournals. the whole oflogical space.e. the clear mirror of the object. . This is well substantiated by Wittgenstein's next entry in the Notebooks: As a thing among things. so to speak. H e likens it to Spinoza's third class of knowledge. he can no longer separate the perceiver from the perception. .268 'ETHICS AND AESTHETICS ARE ONE' Is it this perhaps—in this view the object is seen together with space and time instead of in space and time? Each thing modifies the whole logical world. so to speak'. . If I have been contemplating the stove. 2011 . . 8 Some w o r d s of Schopenhauer. and everything else colourless by contrast with it. so that it is as if the object alone where there . but both have become one because the whole consciousness is filled and occupied. In TTie World as Will and Idea he speaks of the whole of a person's consciousness being filled by the contemplated object: . his will. each thing is equally insignificant. etc. is a part of the world among others. 2011 . in ethical contemplation the multiplicity of the world is seen as a whole and is 'my whole world'.. so that there is no individuation of any particular empirical self.' And in the 2. Aristotle saw the highest good in intellectual contemplation. however. Whoever realizes this will not want to procure a pre-eminent place for his own body or for the human body. The particular thing. the body of a beast. my body in particular.16. my body. on the contrary . so the ethical object. and which is consequently able to view the world as a limited whole. [it] is present entire and undivided in every object of nature and in every living being. In the case of the aesthetic object the empirical self disappears because the aesthetic object is one's whole world: there is no logical space for an empirical self. .16 entry Wittgenstein wrote: 'A stone.org at Monash University on April 18. Consider some of the recurring features of mainstream ethics in relation to features of Wittgenstein's remarks. there is some kind of contemplative apprehension of the Good. is markedly similar in form to accounts of the ethical in much mainstream philosophy. In aesthetic contemplation the single object is 'my whole world'. plants. In both cases the world that is 'my world' is the world of the metaphysical self. Just as the aesthetic object is the single thing seen as if it were a whole world. And in each of these sets of circumstances the empirical self disappears in a conceptually appropriate way. so the following may perhaps be said. This whole characterization of the ethical. the world or life itself. . In the Notebooks 12. among animals. cannot have its true self spread out ind dispensed .9. etc. hi the case of the ethical the empirical self disappears in that it becomes just one among the facts of the world which are seen as a whole. as well as resembling that of the aesthetic. or meaning. For Wittgenstein.oxfordjournals.10. he says. is the multiplicity of the world seen as a single object. all stand on the same level. or value.DIAN£ COLLINSON 269 indivisibility underlies the apparent multiplicity of ordinary perception. That is consistent with the typical aesthetic experience in which we seem to inhabit or become what is contemplated. entry: 'the good life is the world seen sub specie aetemitatis'? At 24. And that is consistent with the typically ethical attitude in which a special place is never given to oneself.10.'12 Can we now fill out the remark about ethics in the 7. First. occupying or 'together with' the whole of logical space. or life. a holy will is the product of reason unaffected by the desires and aversions of heteronomy.16. Therefore we lose nothing by standing still beside any individual thing. the self that is a hmit but not a part of the world. the body of a man. . In Kant.7. stones. .16 entry: The human body. when Downloaded from bjaesthetics. in the Notebooks Wittgenstein states that 'the World and Life are one'. Plato saw the highest good in the direct intuition of the Form of Good. a knowledge untainted by sense experience. ethics for Wittgenstein turns out to be very much what it was for a number of mainstream philosophers. decisions. has absolute value. 'the absolute good'. and judgements. That remark does not mean that anything goes as long as you love God. with logical necessity.org at Monash University on April 18. would necessarily bring about or feel guilty for not bringing about. in Kant.' 15 Wittgenstein's thought at this stage of his philosophical development is as firmly lodged as many of his predecessors' in a profound dualism. Like them he found himself faced with an unbridgeable rift between two realms at just the point where a connection is required. . For there is nothing that his metaphysical will can do in the empirical world: '. have to go. we find accounts of some sort of necessity connected with the apprehension of the good: something that 'follows from' the experience of a metaphysical reality. And Wittgenstein encountered a difficulty of a similar form in his reflections. that part which is not correlated with any part of the body. He says: 'I think it would be a road which everybody on seeing it would.'14 The same kind of necessity is expressed in the dictum. Third. For them. or non-empirical self as the logical condition of the apprehension of the Good. not the facts. the noumenal self. in Wittgenstein the metaphysical will or self. A difference between Wittgenstein's account and the other accounts referred to is that Wittgenstein did not attempt to forge a connection between the transcendental and the empirical. only some form of metaphysical dualism was capable of supporting certain deeply felt and widely shared intuitions about the existence and nature of a transcendental self and a transcendental good.270 'ETHICS AND AESTHETICS ARE ONE1 beheld independently of one's empirical participation in it. or be ashamed for not going. It is the difficulty of showing how the disengagement from the empirical world that is the condition of apprehending the Good is the ground of particular good deeds. would be a state of affairs 'which everybody. . 'Love God and do as you please'. a characteristic that is also a difficulty and which occurs not only in ethics and aesthetics but in the broader spectrum of philosophy of mind as well. In this respect. Kant failed to show how the noumenal will could determine the phenomenal will. in Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer merely asserted an undemonstrable knowledge of the identity of body and will. or metaphysical. independent of his tastes and inclinations. The difference has perhaps some Downloaded from bjaesthetics. he says. In the 'Lecture on Ethics' Wittgenstein mentions this when he talks of'the absolutely right road'. 2011 . But this brings us to the fourth characteristic shared by Wittgenstein's account and mainstream ethical philosophy. and in the ways shown in the other comparisons already made. if good or evil willing affects the world it can only affect the boundaries of the world. Next we have the concept of a transcendental. but that if you love God you cannot go wrong in so far as you act out of that love: loving God necessarily shows a person the perfect way. . . in Plato it is the soul itself. In Aristotle it is the highest part of the soul. Plato could not convincingly relate the Form of Good to particular goods.'13 Similarly. the will-in-itself.oxfordjournals. as for him. . To follow the numerous threads of his thoughts on these matters is to come always to a confrontation. 7. I have been able here to explore only a small part of what underlies Wittgenstein's claim that ethics and aesthetics are one. tion'.7. cit. and Ethics'. G. for a radically new approach. Phillips Griffiths. William 'A. salutary because it enforces a deep realization of the requirement. with the failings of traditional dualism: baulking because those failings. It is the conditions of value. 74 (1965). p. 2. Vol. 'A Lecture on Ethics'. The World as Will and Idea. Notebooks 1914-1916.421. 6 Kegan Paul. E. seen and understood by Wittgenstein. The remark Wittgenstein. Aesthetically speaking this stance enables us to see and know another person or object as a whole world.9. same'. that are established in the sub specie aetemitatis attitude. K. 1974). as they present themselves. C. Elton (Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Royal Institute of Philosophy also occurs in Wittgenstein's Tracuttus LogicoLectures. 98. 1933) is the same as Professor Op. and slow cure is all-important. I think. Anscombe (Oxford: Basil BlackSchopenhauer. 1969) entry for 24. where everybody is on the same level. For him that oneness had its source in the sub specie aetemitatis attitude: an attentive seeing that is unimpeded by any manifestation of the empirical self. Haldane and J. as a sovereign. ch.org at Monash University on April 18. and NoteThese and other distinctions are discussed by books. 7 Anscombe's. aesthetic and ethical. 1972/3 (London: MacmilPhilosophicus at 6. The German. Ethically speaking it enables us to see and know that each one of us belongs with the world as a whole. 7. Aesthetics and Language.16. R. In the Pears/McGuinIan.'16 Wittgenstein's early reflections on ethics and aesthetics led him into paradox and contradiction in his concepts of the self and the will. vol. 'Wittgenstein. Kemp (London: Downloaded from bjaesthetics. logical background provided by the Tractatus Ogden's translation (London: Routledge and and the Notebooks 1914-1916.Schopenhauer. a perspicuous exemplification of a remark in Zettch 'In philosophizing we may not terminate a disease of thought. ed. A. pp. 5. Routledge and Kegan Paul. ness edition of the Tractatus (New York: * Sec. I do not think that has to mean that everything has the same value.16.. The 'Ethik und Asthetik sind Eins': there are no Lecture docs not discuss or presuppose the words to be translated as 'and the same'. is simply Philosophical Review.DIANE COLLINSON 271 significance in the history of the slow and painful movement away from philosophical dualism. 1961) the transla29. one that is both baulking and salutary. that ascriptions of value are possible. but that everything is of account. Wittgenstein. This does not mean that he was wrong in asserting a oneness of ethics and aesthetics. 2011 2 . J. Stuart Hampshire in 'Logic and Apprecia'Notebooks. REFERENCES 1 3 L. It is. Wittgenstein. 8. 4. trans.641. Understanding well.7. M. however. It must run its natural course. for example.10. are incorrigible. It does mean that any insights derived from reflecting on the assertion have to be detached from the metaphysical framework in which they are presented. B. 1967). Notebooks 1914-1916. 97. Tractatus (See Reference 1). p.16.oxfordjournals.16. trans. 5 tion is 'Ethics and aesthetics are one and the L. G. Notebooks. Zettet. M. Andrew Boyle (Lon.272 'ETHICS AND AESTHETICS ARE O N E ' u u M 1S 16 10 11 Kegan Paul. Trench. E. Spinoza.oxfordjournals. 382. V. XXXI: "The mind is eternal insofar as it conceives things under the aspect of eternity. Anscombe (Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Op.. 2011 .org at Monash University on April 18. Ltd. Wittgenstein. 1963). p. V. 231. p. I. trans. Ibid. 'A Lecture on Ethics'.7. L. Downloaded from bjaesthetics. I. cit. Prop. 168. 5. 1896). trans. 7. Trubner and Co. 1967).• don: Everyman's Library.16.. p. Vol. Ethics.' The World as Will and Idea. XXXII.