and, later, in the enclosure of the faculties of the soul in the soul’s substance. From this belief sprang the notion that the soul was something enclosed from the ‘outer world,’ into which enclosure every impression from without could come only through a putting-in, or ‘introjection’. The whole modern psychology, psycho-physics and most of philosophical theories contain such opinions, and therefore serve to strengthen the artificial wall between the inner and outer experiences which makes the sciences of the ‘inner world’ always more inaccessible to exact methods of investigation, and consequently more sterile.”
The Philosophy of Avenarius attracts more and more attention from thinkers who are striving for new views, and it gains ground steadily. England still holds aloof from it, and this is to some extent strange, since it is in England that we find the origin of the Association Psychology and of a Common-Sense Philosophy; it is true that taken as wholes neither of these has anything to do with Empiriocriticism, but in detail they would find many of their propositions in Empiriocriticism. It must not indeed be concealed that the difficulties of penetrating into Avenarius’ works are very serious, chiefly because of the entirely new terminology introduced by him.
To those who would make themselves acquainted with Empiriocriticism, my Einführung in die Kritik der reinen Erfahrung may perhaps be of use. For other literature about Avenarius I may draw attention to my “Nachruf” in the Vierteljahrsschrift für wissenschaftliche Philosophie, Jahrg. xx. Heft 4, p. 386 seq. Quite recently there have been added to these studies two articles by W. Wundt: “Ueber naiven und kritischen Realismus,” II., “Der Empiriokriticismus” (Philosophische Studien, vol. xiii., pp. 1-105 and pp. 323-433). The answer to these will soon appear in the Vierteljahrsschrift für wissenschaftliche Philosophie.
To those philosophical inquirers of to-day who wish to attain new views, to come forth from the treadmill of former ways of thought, to be freed from the work of the Danaides, the eternal carrying of water in a sieve, to these Empiriocriticism offers a most encouraging inducement, even if they do not agree (or do not yet agree) with the particular details of Empiriocriticism, or if they should at first draw back alarmed by the new, unfamiliar and difficult terminology. With reference to this point I may close this sketch with the consoling words of Ernst Mach:[1] “It is from the new, the unfamiliar, the uncomprehended, that all stimulus to inquiry proceeds”.
- ↑ E. Mach, Die Prinzipien der Wärmelehre, p. 367. Leipzig, 1896.
