Nikolai I. Zhinkin: Form of mythical consciousness

Nikolai Zhinkin’s review of Ernst Cassirer is so far the earliest document of the discussion in Russia about Cassirer’s conception of myth and his theory of symbolic forms. The text is published from Zhinkin’s archive. Zhinkin here notes a reorientation of Neo-Kantianism that reveals its hidden relativism and stands as a symptom of its downfall.

typical of today's culture, but, for the history of philosophy, it is a sign of the coming dialectical supersession.
Thus, Nicolai Hartmann frankly writes, "Metaphysics of knowledge is a new name for theory of knowledge-better than critique of knowledge. It is not a new metaphysics, the basis of which would be theory of knowledge, but only a theory of knowledge based on metaphysics" (Hartmann 1921, p. iii). Nicolai Hartmann's assertion with regard to Kantianism itself is more than paradoxical, but at the same time it is quite correct, since the traditional so-called theory of knowledge has actually always been based on metaphysics. If this has now become clear, then, for Kantianism, there are no further paths to proceed along in this direction.
Volkelt's book, 1 as well as the new work by , which is of immediate interest to us, belongs in this context. Ernst Cassirer, known to us mainly as the author of the interesting book Knowledge and Reality, 2 poses in this new work the problem of expanding logic, a problem that is a completely natural development of his earlier thoughts.
He believes that the development of logic goes along with the development of science and is guided by it. Thus, Plato, Kant, and Neo-Kantianism oriented logic toward natural science and mathematics. Cassirer himself also reformed Aristotelian logic, relying on mathematics, although the fruit of such a convergence was not a reform of logic, but the emergence of a new branch of formal ontology in the face of the so-called logic of relations. But be that as it may, the logic of the natural sciences, according to Cassirer, has a fairly clear outline as opposed to the logic of the historical sciences. This last problem, already posed by Vico, passes through Hegel's dialectical metaphysics into contemporary philosophy in the form of the methodological differences between the nomothetic and idiographic sciences. But no matter how interesting these questions are in themselves and, at the same time, no matter how different the logics of the natural sciences and those of the spirit are, they are, nevertheless, similar in one respect, namely, that they are the logics of science. Here, for Cassirer, the fundamentally new problem of expanding logic into the sphere of nonscientific or extra-scientific knowledge arises in the form of a question: What are the forms of concept formation in the spheres of language, religion, art, and myth?
The very designation "logic" reveals that we are dealing here not only with reflection on thought, but also on language as a way of expressing thought. As a science of thinking in general, it cannot help but speak of the conceptual forms by which language and art live. It cannot help but pose the question of a special regularity of language, of a classification in this sphere, of the relation of judgment to verbal expression. This is how Cassirer justifies the extension of logic into the linguistic sphere. As for art and aesthetics, Kantianism never had any particular difficulties here regarding aesthetic intuition as a special kind of cognition and treating aesthetics as a "gnoseologia inferior," and thereby expanding logic. But it may seem quite paradoxical, Cassirer exclaims, to speak of logic in myth, where the primitiveness of sensations, feelings, and affects reigns. The proof of such a critique is Cassirer's presentation of the specific formation of concepts in this small book. He demonstrates that it is possible to establish a certain principle of unity as the form of concepts in the midst of the diversity that occurs in mythical thinking.
This unity of the series is established by that point of view from which the unchanging contents of consciousness are considered in themselves. Cassirer supports his argument with a theory of concept formation, known from his other work and which is common to Kantianism, as well as by the so-called philosophy of the "point of view." By virtue of the latter, a similarity and a difference cannot be considered as lying in the things themselves. A concept is not the product of the similarity of things, but a condition for the conscious positing of this similarity. The things themselves are not similar; any one of them can be conceptually united with any other in terms of similarity and difference. There is a creative principle that combines the individual members of a number of concepts into a functional totality. Thus, one can speak of a special point of view regarding the formation of physical, biological, historical, and other concepts, but all of them together can be opposed to the point of view of the mythical formation of concepts.
Thus, having justified his formulation of the question, Cassirer proceeds to elucidate the principles of the formation of concepts in language, choosing here the problem of dividing words into classes according to their gender. Indeed, neither the mentioned thing itself nor any relation whatsoever to the anatomical and physiological sex makes such a division in any way intelligible. Attempts to solve this problem solely within the bounds of the Indo-European languages have repeatedly failed. One must draw on material from the languages of indigenous peoples. Studying the Bantu language, we see that here any substantivum belongs to a special class by the presence in it of a special class prefix. Any word that is placed in one or another relationship (attributive, predicative) acquires the corresponding prefix. 3 At first glance, falling into one or another class seems to be completely random and indeterminate, but upon closer examination, we can notice two principles in the formation of classes. As a first principle, there is sense intuitiveness. Thus, the nouns referring to things of more or less the same size fall into one class with a certain prefix; the same applies to words referring to symmetrical parts of the body or number, spatial position, etc. In the Melanesian language, nouns referring to round or long things have different prefixes. The grammar of North American Indians does not recognize gender at all, but nouns are divided according to whether the reference is to things that are inanimate or animate, sitting or standing, floating, etc.
Secondly, we can find the principle of value. Thus, one and the same word denoting the same object, depending on the meaning and weight that is given to it in a given speech, falls either into the one, more significant class-that of persons-or into the other, the class simply of things (see Cassirer 2013, p. 14). As a result, in a myth, a cow can serve either as a person or as a thing. Falling into the class of nouns that refer to men is associated with special significance and importance, whereas, on the contrary, those referring to women are associated with weakness, small size, and passivity.
Therefore, Cassirer believes he has found the principles of concept formation with the division of words into classes and has justified the possibility of expanding logic into this sphere. But he is more interested in the task of extending logic to the sphere of myth. Here he obviously makes use of the material collected by Durkheim (1995), starting with examples from the field of totemistic representations about the division of the world by native Australians.
The social division of the studied tribe is along two exogamous groups, divided in turn into subgroups, according to their totem. Parallel to the social division, the idea arises of a similar division of the whole world. Thus, all things, including the sun, the moon, stars, caiman, alligator, kangaroo, trees, flowers, wind, rain, etc., are distributed among the totems of their group. Not only things, but also actions, and all behavior, and life are regulated by such a distribution, and this assignment of a thing to the totems of the group is not just conditional, not a sign or symbol, but is understood as a real belonging. Space, time, number, color are also distributed according to this basic division. The Zuni tribe in New Mexico has seven clans. There arises correspondingly a division of the world into 7 parts: North, South, East, West, Top, Bottom, and Middle. Each clan owns its own part of the world; everything else is arranged in the respective order: the North is yellow; the West is blue; the South is red; the East is white; the Bottom is black; the Top is multicolored. Furthermore, the North is the place of winter, air, war; the West is the place of spring, water, hunting; the South is the place of summer, fire, agriculture, healing; the East is the place of autumn, earth, magic, religion, etc.
Such is a mythical representation as a special point of view on the world. Being on the whole similar in content to a late astrological point of view, it differs from the latter in the principle of its construction. By virtue of the recognition of a magical connection between different things, it is well-known that a change in one explains and produces changes in another. The basis here is an attempt to causally explain the whole world, as a complete unity, where everything is connected with everything and affects each other in turn. Therefore, guessing by the stars, by cards, etc., appears here as a special method of cognizing the inaccessible in space and time through what is nearby and clear. In terms of form, this is the same natural science that attempts to systematically construct the world.
Cassirer, comparing astrology and myth, finds that myth also answers the question, "Why?," but the induction here is even less adequate than in astrology. The answer given here to the question, "Why?" is given in the form of a historical story, in the form of a theogony and a cosmogony. The genuine, present composition and construction of the world is understood as a development from previous fantastic assumed stages, but the latter do not fundamentally differ from the former. They have the same sensible character. A sensible thing is here considered to be the product of another thing, the cause and effect equally of a thing. Therefore, there is no transition from one thing to something more abstract, explanatory. Rather, a concrete thing explains another similar concrete thing.
With the development of consciousness and with the transition to an astrological explanation, an attempt arises to understand the form of the transition of one thing into another, to grasp the general rule of the succession itself. An idea arises of some special forces and connections, essentially other than the things themselves that bring order to the diversity of nature. Thus, Cassirer poses astrology and its logic as an intermediate link between myth and science. In astrology, in contrast to science, there is a lack of a close connection with the individual. The middle term here is omitted in the deduction, so the conclusion turns out to be shaky. In a theory from mathematical natural science, an explanation emerges for each separate, individual phenomenon in terms of their mutual dependency by establishing a certain quantity that determines the extent of this dependency. And if the values of these conditions that determine the given phenomenon are known and can be expressed in equations as functions of time, then it is possible to formulate the law of the unfolding series of events.
Therefore, according to Cassirer, sense imagery in a causal explanation is entirely characteristic of myth, partly in astrology, and completely absent in science. We find a similar fundamental difference in relation to space and time.
If in science the relationship of cause and effect is not given in sense experience, then the transition from this categorical relation to phenomena occurs through the schema of time. All numerical relations are reduced to the schema of time, as is usually thought in the doctrine of the schematism. In myth, on the contrary, causality is inextricably merged with sensibility itself, and it is based not on time, but on real space. Even in theogony and cosmogony, there is no genuine variability of forms; the basic principle is the spatial continuity of things; the main rule is "pars pro toto" (see Cassirer 2013, pp. 22, 45).
Furthermore, if today's physics explains physical space through the form of movement and through force, then myth, on the contrary, explains force through space. That is, this or that arrangement of things arouses certain magical forces. Physics understands color as the sum of movements, whereas myth considers it to be a real property of a certain place, and so on. But the most important difference lies in the fact that although it may have a fundamentum in re, a similarity in science is simply a relation that needs spiritual activity for its determination. That is, conscious activity is needed for it to come about. To put it in another way, a similarity is not an absolute quality of things, but a product of consciousness and exists through and for consciousness. Cassirer argues, on the contrary, that in myth similarity is a sign of the things themselves, on the basis of which the real affinity of the things themselves and their interaction is established. By virtue of this, in myth, and especially in astrology, there is an amazing connection between mathematics and belief in demons; everything is regulated by a mysterious law of numerical relations. However, a number here is a fate, one that binds the spirit and intimidates with its immutability, whereas in science a number is a creation of the spirit, its clarity and discovery, its freedom, since through a number its creativity is manifested.
Such, briefly stated, is Cassirer's reasoning. This exhausted idealism sounds a fading note in philosophy today. I think that Cassirer quite clearly demonstrates the limit that we spoke about at the beginning. Indeed, what does Cassirer's extension of logic offer science and logic that is new? Is there really a way out here from the indistinguishability between logic and ontology that for Kant is fundamental? Is there really a clear contrast here between the problem of formal logic and the "logic of content"? No, only old wine is to be poured into old wineskins, and the wine that flows from these skins flows along the decayed seams.
Above all, it is clear that Cassirer does not distinguish consciousness from cognition on the one hand, logic from ontology on another, and metaphysics from philosophy on a third. After all, Cassirer's entire problem about the expansion of logic arises precisely on the basis of the Kantian system of categories and the pure forms of sensibility. Language, myth, astrology, and science are considered only in terms of a transcendental aesthetics and analytics, i.e., in terms of the basic forms of cognition, assuming already in advance that mythical and astrological consciousness is a cognizing consciousness. And, therefore, one must also look for a special combination of such forms here. Along with the usual logic of the mind, a logic of the ethical will and a logic of the aesthetic sense, Cassirer now, following the Kantian scheme, invents a logic of sensibility, taking his argument to its limit.
Furthermore, it is strikingly clear that Cassirer, speaking of logic, is always talking about ontological forms of space and time, causality and force, genera and species, and so on. It is significant that he is sincerely convinced that all of these are questions of logic are very important for its expansion. All of this obviously stems from the fact that Cassirer cannot in any way renounce the worldly outlook of the metaphysical formulations of the question, recognizing them as philosophical ones. Actually, his theory of concept formation, which explains similarities and differences from the peculiarities of the cognizing consciousness, his philosophy of the "point of view," which explains the world from individual isolated instances of consciousness, is an explanatory theory. But it is relevant only within the limits of positive science, provided the empirical material is complete and evident, i.e., for the most part within the bounds of social psychology. However, as soon as it is elevated to a universal principle of any consciousness, of any world, it acquires the character of an explanatory construction in metaphysical terms. In this form, it is devoid of scientific justification. Cassirer himself is like an alchemist who is looking for a philosopher's stone and finds its falsification in a theory of concept formation. Seizing it, he solves all problems from this "point of view," but he overlooks the phenomenological substantiality of the phenomena themselves.
Cassirer sets in one row what is different and distinguishes what fundamentally lies in one row.
1. Consciousness can take on various structural forms: scientific, aesthetic, poetic, mythical and, perhaps, others. This fact is reflected in the various forms of logic, aesthetics, poetry, and mythology.
The forms of logic are determined by the objective evidence of truth, aesthetics by the detached intuition of the beautiful, poetry by the figurativeness of embodiment, mythology by the practical cogency of a worldview. All the material cited by Cassirer from the sphere of myth shows that mythical views of the world are in no way objectively justified, are not at all aesthetic in themselves, are real, and not figurative. A symbol in myth is a real magical dependence; a myth is justified only by faith, confidence, and conviction. Perhaps, therefore, the so-called rhetorical forms are closest of all to mythical ones. This does not prevent the fact that a myth, which happens to be in a special context, sometimes gives rise to knowledge and judgments, as in Plato, sometimes becomes an aesthetic expression, as in tragedy, and sometime finds expression in poetry. Of course, the myth itself, depending on the general context, then undergoes a complex modification. In analyzing Dostoevsky's novel Demons, Vyacheslav Ivanov (1916, pp. 60-66) finds the chief myth of eternal femininity to be in the suffering of the Russian soul from the dominance and violence of "demons." By virtue of such an understanding, the work becomes not just artistic, but prophetic, persuasive, and rhetorical. It reveals, in the words of Dostoevsky himself, "realism in the highest sense." In the words of V. Ivanov, it is "a realistic symbolism" (which) "raises the perceiver of a work of art a realibus ad realiora, from the lowest reality to the most real reality" (Ivanov 1916, p. 61). This is the most real reality and is magical, based only on faith and prophetically proclaimed. Here, it appears in the complex structure of a special cultural and aesthetic environment.
There is not enough space here to develop this interesting topic. It is important only to show that the question is not about the expansion of logic, but about entering specifically into a quite special sphere of consciousness. But Cassirer does not make this distinction.
2. On the other hand, we find in a single, essentially, general set such social phenomena as science, art, myth, etc. As relatively concrete parts of culture, they each have their own history and characteristic stages of development, depending on the social background at the time. It is impossible, as Cassirer thinks, to establish some kind of series that improves passing from myth to astrology to science. Indeed, we can find in native peoples the rudiments of science, not in their myths, but simply in their judgments, which, obviously, are also characteristic of them, as well as of civilized peoples, when one distinguishes red from black, right from left, etc., and in this sort of reasoning. Even if not collected into a system, these judgments, certainly, have great social significance for native peoples. They have science, myth, religion, and art, just like a modern civilized people, and all this is given all at once, not in some imaginary sequence. Myth, as a pragmatic worldview based on faith, is the same powerful lever of our culture, the best example of this is Cassirer himself, for whom, as in the examples he cites, everything is distributed under the headings of the Kantian categories according to the traditions of an idealistic worldview, ultimately taken dogmatically and justified only by faith. Different myths in different eras differ from each other not by their form, but by their content. Every epoch creates its own myths, just as it has its own stage of science and art. As can be seen, in this understanding, there is a certain convergence of myth and worldview. One could show all the fruitfulness of such a convergence, but, certainly, myth as a verbal product of a people clearly differs from the worldview expressed by it. Both science and art reveal a worldview, though not primarily and directly, but through a myth; a worldview can sometimes be hidden, lurking in a work between the lines. Once the myth is understood, however, we understand the corresponding worldview. 4 Therefore, Cassirer did not try to reanalyze the phenomena under study, but connected what was different and distinguished what was the same. The reason for this has already been noted.
Here, for lack of space, we should end by noting the interest of Cassirer's book: on the one hand, as a provocative reflection on the most fundamental questions of modern philosophy, and on the other, as a symptom of the collapse of Kantianism.
It is interesting to note that Cassirer, like Nicolai Hartmann, frankly now recognizes what, in any case, the Marburg School carefully concealed, namely, its relativism, which is obvious in Cassirer's exposition. 11 November 1924 Moscow Funding Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. The text was transcribed, translated and annotated as part of the research project "Artistic Research in Between Stenogram and Encyclopaedia. Strategies of Gaining and Documenting Knowledge at the State Academy of Artistic Sciences (1921)(1922)(1923)(1924)(1925)(1926)(1927)(1928)(1929)(1930)" funded by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, Grant # 386757512).

Competing Interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
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