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課題集 ザクロ の山

○自由な題名 / 池新
○ゴミ / 池新

★分析とは外から見る立場(感) / 池新
 【1】分析とは外から見る立場です。というよりも、外からものを知る方法として、分析という仕方が生まれたのです。(中略)
 分析的方法の確立者とも言えるデカルトは「研究しようとする問題のおのおのを出来る限りの、そうして、それを最もよく解決するために要求される限りの、部分に分けること」と言っております。【2】そうして、それこそ、対象、あるいは問題の要素と言われるものなのです。その意味で、分析とは要素への還元であるとも言われるのです。
 例えば、水は水素と酸素からなるという場合、水はたしかに水素とか酸素とか私達が名づけるものから成り立っているのでありますが、【3】私達はそのもの自体を知るのではなく、水素とか酸素とか名づけることによって、それを理解するのです。もちろん、それは水素とか酸素とかいう言葉で示されるとは限らず、ドルトンが行ったように、【4】すべての原子を白い丸とか黒い丸とか、中に線を引いた丸とか中心に黒点を書き入れた丸とかいった図形的記号で示すことも出来ますし、さらにOとかCとかNとかHとかいういわゆる化学記号を用いることも出来ます。【5】そうして、科学の記号としては、一切が数学的記号で示されるのが理想でありましょう。が、ともかくいわゆる物質の要素も、分析的認識としては記号的認識以上には出ないのです。もっとも、ここにはさらに次のような疑問が起るかも知れません。【6】それは、水素、酸素などの原子ではまだ最後の要素ではないとしても、その原子を原子核と電子にわけ、さらに核を陽子とか中性子とか中間子とかに分けてゆけば最後には真の物質的要素に到達するのではないかという疑問です。【7】しかし、物質の成分をどんなに小さく分割していっても問題は少しも変りません。というのは、認識の対象が外にある限り、言い換えれば、外からものを眺める限り、やはりそれをとらえるためには、立場と記号が必要であるということには変わりはないからです。【8】むしろ、今述べたような極微の世界では、それを知るのはもはや、日常的な感覚や知性では不十分で、数学的表現のみがそれを正確に表わしうるのであることを思う時、分析的認識は記号的認識であるということは、一層明らかとなるのです。
 【9】以上お話ししましたことによって、分析するとは対象を記号と∵しての要素にわけることであることは明らかになったと思いますが、そこで注意しなければなりませんことは、その分析の要素とは、単にその対象だけにあるものではなく、他の多くのものにある一般的要素であるということです。【0】例えば、水素や酸素は水にだけ含まれているものではなく、アルコールにも、空気の中にもあるのです。ということは、つまり、分析するとは、特殊なものを一般的なもので理解するということなのです。そうして、それは、逆に言えば、もしユニークなもの、唯一独自なものがあるとすれば、そのようなものは、分析出来ないということなのです。――このことは、動きと分析についても言えることで、刻々に変化するものは分析出来ないものなのです。なぜかと言いますと、分析するとは要素つまり、単位に分けることでありますが、単位とは、それが不変なもの変わらないものであればこそ単位と言えるのですが、対象が刻々に変っているとすれば、それらすべてに共通な単位というものは有りえないのです。もし、一刻の休みもなく変わっているものを何らかの記号で示そうとするなら、逆にその記号が次々に変わらなければならない。それは単位が変わるということである。しかし、それでは、それはもはや単位ではありません。
 このように考えてきますと、分析という認識方法は、すべての対象に適用出来るものではないことが明らかとなります。全く個性的な、絶対に他のものによって置き換えられない唯一独自な、オリジナルなものと、刻々に新たになるもの、すなわち正しい意味の「時間」の認識には、分析的方法は適用出来ないのです。

澤瀉久敬おもだかひさゆき「哲学と科学」)

○All human communities(感) / 池新
All human communities have involved animals. Those present in them always include, for a start, some dogs, with which our association seems to be an incredibly ancient one: we have lived together and helped each other for a long time. But besides them an enormous variety of other creatures, ranging from reindeer to foxes and from elephants to shags, has for ages also been domesticated. Of course they were largely there for use -- for draught and riding, for meat, milk, wool and hides, for feathers and eggs, as catchers of small harmful animals or as aids to fishing and hunting. In principle, it might seem reasonable to expect that these forms of exploitation would have produced no personal or emotional involvement at all. From a position of ignorance, we might have expected that people would view their animals simply as machines. If we impose the sharp distinction made by some philosophers between persons and things, and insist that everything must be considered as simply one or the other, we might have expected that they would be viewed quite clearly as things. But in fact, if people had viewed them like this, the domestication could probably never have worked. The animals, with the best will in the world, could not have reacted like machines. They became tame or domesticated, not just through the fear of violence, but because they were able to form individual bonds with those who tamed them by coming to understand the social signals addressed to them. They learned to obey human beings personally. They were able to do this, not only because the people taming them were social beings, but because they themselves were so as well.
All creatures which have been successfully domesticated are ones which were originally social. They have transferred to human beings the trust and obedience which, in a wild state, they would have developed towards their parents, and in adult life towards the leaders of their pack or herd. There are other, and perhaps equally intelligent, creatures which it is quite impossible to tame, because they simply do not have the natural capacity to respond to social signals in their own species, and therefore cannot reach those which come from outside. The various kinds of wild cat are an impressive example. Even their youngest kittens are quite untamable. Egyptian cats, from which all our domestic ones are descended, are unique among the small-cat group in their friendliness both to humans and to other cats. It is interesting that they do not seem to have been domesticated in Egypt before about 1600 BC, and after that time they quickly became extremely popular. Unless they were only discovered then -- which would be odd -- it seems that there may have been an actual mutation at that point producing a more responsive character.
Cats, however, are notoriously still not friendly or obedient in quite the same way as dogs. Circus people do not usually waste their time trying to train cats. Similarly, there are important differences between the social natures, as well as physical appearances, of horses, donkeys, camels and the like. Both as species and as individuals, they react variously to training; they cannot be treated simply as physical machines. People who succeed well with them do not do so just by some abstract, magical human superiority, but by interacting socially with them -- by attending to them and coming to understand how various things appear from each animal's point of view. To ignore or disbelieve in the existence of that point of view would be fatal to the attempt. The traditional assumption behind the domestication of animals has been that there is something in being a bat, and similarly there is something in being a horse or a donkey, and in being this horse or this donkey. There is not, by contrast, any such experience as being a stone, or a car, or even an airplane. There is no being which could have that experience, and therefore we do not have to bother about this problem.
I am saying that this has been the traditional assumption. Some researchers in animal behaviour today think that it is a false one, and can of course argue against it. My present point is simply that their opinion is a recent and sophisticated one. It is not the view which has been taken for granted during the long centuries in which animals have been domesticated. If an Indian farmer were asked whether the ox being beaten could feel it, that farmer would probably reply, 'Certainly it can, otherwise why would I bother?' A skilled horseman needs to respond to his horse as an individual, to follow the workings of its feelings, to use his imagination in understanding how things are likely to affect it, what frightens it and what attracts it, as much as someone who wants to control human beings needs to do the same thing. Horses and dogs are addressed by name, and are expected to understand what is said to them. Nobody tries this with stones or hammers or airplanes. The treatment of domestic animals has never been impersonal. We can say that they are not 'persons', because that word does generally signify Homo sapiens. But they are certainly not viewed just as things. They are animals, a category which, as far as thinking goes, is closer to human beings than to things.
This point is important because it shows what may seem rather surprising -- a direct capacity in humans for attending to, and to some extent understanding, the moods and reactions of other species. No doubt this capacity is limited. People's harshness makes some of its limitations obvious. But then, similar harshness is also often found in our dealings with other human beings. The question what suffering is being caused is difficult to answer in either case. The indifferent person may not positively know, because there is no willingness to know. Looking at the evidence, however, would give the answer. This seems to be equally true in either case. The reason for overworking an ox or a horse is usually much the same as that for overworking a human slave -- not that one does not believe that they mind it, or supposes that they cannot even notice it, but that one is putting one's own interest first. The treatment of domestic animals resembles that of slaves in being extremely inconsistent and variable. There is not normally a steady, unvarying disregard, such as should follow if one genuinely supposed that the creature did not possess any of the five senses at all, or if one was quite unable to guess what its feeling might be. Disregard is varied by partial occasional kindness, and also by sudden cruelty. And cruelty is something which could have no point for a person who really did not believe the victim to have definite feelings. (There is very little comfort in showing one's anger at a cushion.) Family pigs are often treated with real pride and affection during their lives, they may even be genuinely mourned -- only this will not protect them from being eaten. Horses, Lapp reindeer, and the cattle of the Masai can similarly receive real regard, can be treated as dear companions and personally cherished, can form part of human households in a different way from any machine or material treasure -- only they will still on suitable occasions be killed or otherwise ill-treated if human purposes demand it. But we should notice too a similar unreasonable attitude often appearing in the treatment of human dependants, so that we can scarcely argue that there is no real capacity for sympathy towards the animals. In the treatment of other people, of course, one naturally changes one's mind without reason, and therefore one is constantly disciplined by morality. We know that we must not eat our grandmothers or our children merely because they annoy US. This rule applies less to animals; they have more freedom than people do in this respect. That does not mean that they are taken not to be conscious. Belief in the fact that they do have the five senses and some kind of feelings is essential even for exploiting them successfully.

hsags ウ(鵜)
mutation 突然変異
Lapp ラップ(スカンジナビア半島北部のトナカイ飼養民)の
the Masai マサイ(東アフリカの遊牧民)