To Hägerström, a corollary to his rejection of transcendentalism is that the philosophical causality of consciousness and the object must be reversed. Hence, consciousness must be rejected as the causative principle to the object, and Hägerström replaced this principle with the idea that every consciousness bears reference to an object other than itself.63 All in all, a clean break with subjectivistic epistemology. Once Hägerström rejected subjectivism (transcendentalism), he had then to base the objective standard for knowledge on something other than the consciousness itself, for:“[d]ie Objektivität der Erkenntnis kann nicht in ihrer Eigenschaft liegen, ein Bewußtsein der eigenen inneren objektiven Einheit der Bewußtseins zu sein.”64 Consequently, his denial and rejection of transcendentalism entails that the objectivity of knowledge must thus be restated and reformulated in an object-oriented-direction, and encompass the idea that: “[d]ie Objektivität der Erkenntnis muß in der eigenen Natur des Aufgefaßten, des Objektes liegen.”65 A consequence of Hägerström’s rejection of transcendentalism is that knowledge must be redefined in order to eliminate the infinite regress inherent in the transcendental definition of knowledge, as well as to eliminate the consciousness, that is the subject, as the self-referring standard for objective knowledge. However, p a r t i 1 54 The New Position: The Reversal of Philosophical Causality 63 Ibid. 64 Ibid., pp. 4-5. 65 Ibid. chap te r 2
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