V.I. Lenin

MATERIALISM and EMPIRIO-CRITICISM

Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy ( Chapter Four: The Philosophical Idealists as Comrades-In-Arms and Successors of Empirio-Criticism )

6. The “Theory of Symbols” (or
Hieroglyphs) and the Criticism of Helmholtz

As a supplement to what has been said above of the idealists
as the comrades-in-arms and successors of empirio-criticism,
it will be appropriate to dwell on the character of the
Machian criticism of certain philosophical propositions
touched upon in our literature. For instance, our Machian
would-be Marxists fastened with glee on Plekhanov’s “hieroglyphs,” that is, on the theory that
man’s sensations and ideas are not copies of real things
and processes of nature, not their images, but conventional
signs, symbols, hieroglyphs, and so on. [4] Bazarov ridicules this
hieroglyphic materialism; and, it should be stated, he would be right in doing so if he rejected hieroglyphic
materialism in favour of non-hieroglyphic materialism . But Bazarov here again resorts to a
sleight-of-hand and palms off his renunciation of materialism
as a criticism of “hieroglyphism.” Engels speaks neither of symbols nor of hieroglyphs, but of copies,
photographs, images, mirror-reflections of things. Instead of
pointing out the erroneousness of Plekhanov’s deviation
from Engels’ formulation of materialism, Bazarov uses
Plekhanov’s error in order to conceal Engels’ truth from the reader.

To make clear both Plekhanov’s error and Bazarov’s confusion we shall refer to an important advocate of the
“theory of symbols” (calling a symbol a hieroglyph changes nothing), Helmholtz, and shall see how he was
criticised by the materialists and by the idealists in conjunction with the Machians.

Helmholtz, a scientist of the first magnitude, was as inconsistent in philosophy as are the great majority of
scientists. He tended towards Kantianism, but in his epistemology he did not adhere even to these views
consistently. Here for instance are some passages on the
subject of the correspondance of ideas and objects from his
Handbook of Physiological Optics : [1] “I have
. . . designated sensations as merely symbols for the relations of the external world and I have denied that they
have any similarity or equivalence to what they represent” (French translation, p. 579; German original,
p. 442). This is agnosticism, but on the same further on we read: “Our concepts and ideas
are effects wrought on our nervous system and our consciousness by the objects that are perceived and
apprehended.”

This is materialism. But Helmholtz is not clear as to the
relation between absolute and relative truth, as is evident from
his subsequent remarks. For instances, a little further on he
says: “I therefore think that there can be no possible meaning
in speaking of the truth of our ideas save as a practical truth. Our ideas of things cannot be
anything but symbols, naturally given signs for things, which we
learn to use in order to regulate our movements and actions. When we have learned to read these symbols rightly we
are in a position with their aid to direct our actions so as to
achieve the desired result...”

This is not correct. Helmholtz here lapses into subjectivism,
into a denial of objective reality and objective truth. And he
arrives at a flagrant untruth when he concludes the paragraph
with the words: “An idea and the object it represents obviously
belong to two entirely different worlds....” Only the Kantians
thus divorce idea from reality, consciousness from nature. However, a little further on we read: “As to the
properties of the objects of the external world, a little
reflection will show that all the properties we may attribute to
them merely signify the effects wrought by them either on our senses or on other natural objects” (French ed., p. 581;
German original, p. 445; I translate from the French).

Here again Helmholtz reverts to the materialist position. Helmholtz was an inconsistent Kantian, now
recognising a priori laws of thought, now tending towards the “transcendental reality” of time and
space (i.e., to a materialist conception of them); now deriving human sensations from external objects, which act
upon our sense organs, and now declaring sensations to be only
symbols, i.e., certain arbitrary signs divorced from the “entirely different” world of the things
signified (cf. Viktor Heyfelder, Ueber den Begriff der Erfahrung bei Helmholtz [Helmholtz’s Conception of Experience], Berlin 1897).

This is how Helmholtz expressed his views in a speech delivered in 1878 on “Facts in Perception” (“a
noteworthy pronouncement from the realistic camp,” as
Leclair characterised this speech): “Our sensations are
indeed effects wrought by external causes in our organs, and
the manner in which such effects manifest themselves, of
course, depends very essentially on the nature of the apparatus on which these effects are wrought. Inasmuch as the
quality of our sensation informs us of the properties of the
external action by which this sensation is produced, the
latter can be regarded as its sign (Zeichen), but not as its image . For a certain resemblance to the object
imaged is demanded of an image. . . . But a sign need not
resemble that of which it is a sign. . .”
(Vorträge und Reden [Lectures and Speeches], 1884, Bd. II, S. 226). If sensations are not images of things,
but only signs or symbols which do “not resemble” them, then Helmholtz’s initial materialist premise is
undermined; the existence of external objects becomes subject
to doubt; for signs or symbols may quite possibly indicate
imaginary objects, and everybody is familiar with instances of
such signs or symbols. Helmholtz, following Kant, attempts to draw something like an absolute boundary between
the “phenomenon” and the “thing-in itself.” Helmholtz harbours an insuperable prejudice
against straightforward, clear, and open materialism. But a
little further on he says: “I do not see how one could refute a system even of the most extreme subjective idealism that chose to regard life as a dream. One might declare it to
be highly improbable and unsatisfactory—I myself would in this case subscribe to the severest expressions of
dissent—yet it could be constructed consistently. . . . The realistic hypothesis, on the contrary,
trusts the evidence (Aussage) of ordinary self-observation, according to which the changes of perception
that follow a certain action have no psychical connection with
the preceding impulse of volition. This hypothesis regards
everything that seems to be substantiated by our everyday
perception, viz ., the material world outside of us, as existing independently of our ideas.” (pp. 242-43.)
“Undoubtedly, the realistic hypothesis is the simplest we can construct; it has been tested and verified in an
extremely broad field of application; it is sharply defined in
its several parts and, therefore, it is in the highest degree
useful and fruitful as a basis of action” (p. 243). Helmholtz’s agnosticism also resembles
“shamefaced materialism,” with certain Kantian twists, in distinction to Huxley’s Berkeleian twists.

Albrecht Rau, a follower of Feuerbach, therefore vigorously
criticises Helmholtz’s theory of symbols as an inconsistent deviation from “realism.”
Helmholtz’s basic view, says Rau, is a realistic hypothesis, according to which “we apprehend the
objective properties of things with the help of our senses”. [2]

The theory of symbols cannot be reconciled with such a view
(which, as we have seen, is wholly materialist), for it
implies a certain distrust of perception, a distrust of the
evidence of our sense-organs. It is beyond doubt that an image
cannot wholly resemble the model, but an image is one thing, a
symbol, a conventional sign, another. The image inevitably and of necessity implies the objective reality of
that which it “images.” “Conventional sign,” symbol, hieroglyph are concepts which introduce
an entirely unnecessary element of agnosticism. Albrecht Rau,
therefore, is perfectly right in saying that Helmholtz’s
theory of symbols pays tribute to Kantianism. “Had
Helmholtz,” says Rau, “remained true to his realistic conception, had he consistently adhered to the basic
principle that the properties of bodies express the relations
of bodies to each other and also to us, he obviously would
have had no need of the whole theory of symbols; he could then
have said, briefly and clearly: the sensations which are
produced in us by things are reflections of the nature of
those things” (ibid ., p. 320).

That is the way a materialist criticises Helmholtz. He rejects
Helmholtz’s hieroglyphic or symbolic materialism or semi-materialism in favour of Feuerbach’s consistent
materialism.

The idealist Leclair (a representative of the “immanentist school,” so dear to Mach’s
heart and mind) also accuses Helmholtz of inconsistency, of
wavering between materialism and spiritualism. (Der Realismus, etc ., S. 154.) But for Leclair the
theory of symbols is not insufficiently materialistic but too
materialistic. Leclair says: “Helmholtz thinks that the
perceptions of our consciousness offer sufficient support for
the cognition of sequence in time as well as of the identity
or non-identity of transcendental causes. This in
Helmholtz’s opinion is sufficient for the assumption and
cognition of law in the realm of the transcendental” (i.e., in the realm of the objectively real)
(p. 33). And Leclair thunders against this “dogmatic prejudice of Helmholtz’s”: “Berkeley’s
God,” he exclaims, “as the hypothetical cause of the conformity to natural law of the ideas in our
mind is at least just as capable of satisfying our need of
causality as a world of external objects” (p. 31). “A consistent application of the theory of
symbols. . . can achieve nothing without a generous admixture
of vulgar realism” (i.e., materialism)
(p. 35).

This is how a “critical idealist” criticised
Helmholtz for his materialism in 1879. Twenty years later, in
his article “The Fundamental Views of Ernst Mach and
Heinrich Hertz on
Physics,” [3]

Kleinpeter, the disciple of Mach so highly praised by his teacher, refuted in
the following way the “antiquated” Helmholtz with the aid of Mach’s “recent” philosophy. Let
us for the moment leave aside Hertz (who, in fact, was as
inconsistent as Helmholtz) and examine Kleinpeter’s comparison of Mach and Helmholtz. Having quoted a number of
passages from the works of both writers, and having particularly stressed Mach’s well-known statements to
the effect that bodies are mental symbols for complexes of
sensations and so on, Kleinpeter says:

“ If we follow Helmholtz’s line of thought, we shall encounter the following fundamental premises:

“1) There exist objects of the external world.

“2) A change in these objects is inconceivable without the action of some cause (which is thought of as real).

“3) ‘ Cause, according to the original meaning of the word, is the unchangeable residue or being behind the
changing phenomena, namely, substance and the law of its
action, force.’ [The quotation is taken by Kleinpeter from Helmholtz.] “4) It is possible to deduce all phenomena from their
causes in a logically strict and uniquely determined manner.

“5) The achievement of this end is equivalent to the possession of objective truth, the acquisition
(Erlangung) of which is thus regarded as conceivable” (p. 163).

Rendered indignant by these premises, by their contradictoriness and their creation of insoluble problems,
Kleinpeter remarks that Helmholtz does not hold strictly to
these views and sometimes employs “turns of speech which
are somewhat suggestive of Mach’s purely logical understanding of such words” as matter, force,
causality, etc.

“ It is not difficult to find the source of our dissatisfaction with Helmholtz, if we recall Mach’s
fine, clear words. The false understanding of the words mass,
force, etc., is the basic weakness of Helmholtz’s whole
argument. These are only concepts, products of our imagination
and not realities existing outside of thought. We are not even
in a position to know such things. From the observation of our
senses we are in general unable, owing to their imperfection,
to make even a single uniquely determined conclusion. We can
never assert, for instance, that upon reading a certain scale
(durch Ablesen einer Skala) we shall obtain a definite figure: there are always, within certain limits, an
infinite number of possible figures all equally compatible
with the facts of the observation. And to have knowledge of
something real lying outside us—that is for us impossible. Let us assume, however, that it were possible, and
that we did get to know reality; in that case we would have no
right to apply the laws of logic to it, for they are our laws, applicable only to our conceptions, to
our mental products [Kleinpeter’s italics]. Between facts there is no logical connection, but
only a simple succession; apodictic assertions are here
unthinkable. It is therefore incorrect to say that one fact is
the cause of another and, consequently, the whole deduction
built up by Helmholtz on this conception falls to the ground. Finally, the attainment of objective truth,
i.e., truth existing independently of any subject, is impossible, not only because of the nature of our senses, but
also because as men (als Menschen) we can in general have no notion of what exists quite independently of us
(p. 164).

As the reader sees, our disciple of Mach, repeating the
favourite phrases of his teacher and of Bogdanov, who does not
own himself a Machian, rejects Helmholtz’s whole philosophy, rejects it from the idealist standpoint. The
theory of symbols is not even especially singled out by the
idealist, who regards it as an unimportant and perhaps accidental deviation from materialism. And Helmholtz is chosen
by Kleinpeter as a representative of the “traditional views in physics,” “views shared to this day by
the majority of phys icists” (p. 160).

The result we have arrived at is that Plekhanov was guilty of
an obvious mistake in his exposition of materialism, but that
Bazarov completely muddled the matter, mixed up materialism
with idealism and advanced in opposition to the “theory
of symbols,” or “hieroglyphic materialism,” the idealist nonsense that “sense-perception is the
reality existing out side us.” From the Kantian
Helmholtz, just as from Kant himself, the materialists went to
the Left, the Machians to the Right.

---
Notes:
[1]
Helmholtz, Handbuch der physiologischen Optik .— Ed .

[2]
Albrecht Rau, Empfinden und Denken [Sensation and Thought], Giessen, 1896, S. 304.
— Lenin

[3]
Archiv für Philosophie , [5] II, Systematische Philosophie, Bd. V., 1899, S. 163-64.
— Lenin

“ Our sensations are in their way hieroglyphs which inform us of what is taking place in reality. The hieroglyphs
do not resemble the events convoyed by them. But they can
with complete fidelity convey both the events themselves, and—what is the main thing—the
relations existing between them” (G. V. Plekhanov, Selected Philosophical Works, Vol. 1, Moscow,
p. 536). In 1905, in the notes to the second edition of
Engels’ work, Plekhanov admitted: “I also failed to express myself quite exactly” (ibid.,
p. 545). Plekhanov’s error, although appearing to be a
question of terminology, was a concession to agnosticism and
bore witness to his insufficiently profound understanding of
the dialectics of the process of cognition.

[5]
Archiv für Philosophie (Philosophical Archives) —a German philosophical journal of an
idealist tendency, organ of the neo-Kantians and Machists. It
was published in Berlin from 1895 to 1931 in two parallel
editions: the first, entitled Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie (Archives of the History of Philosophy)
was edited by L. Stein; the second, entitled Archiv für systemsatische Philosaphic (Archives of Systematic Philosophy), was edited by Paul Natorp. From 1925 the
journal appeared under the title of Archiv für systematische Philosophie und Soziologic (Archives of Systematic Philosophy and Sociology).

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