The Rudolf Steiner Archive

27. The Unity of the World

Discussion at the “Giordano Bruno Association for a Unified Worldview” featuring remarks by Rudolf Steiner

[ 1 ] The Bruno League aims to promote a unified worldview. It does not regard this as a task that has been definitively accomplished, but rather as a challenge to which it seeks to contribute through research and education, organization, and inspiration. In doing so, it is particularly important to the Society to bring the various viewpoints into mutual understanding and, if possible, to some degree of balance. It also strives for unity by seeking to harmoniously unite the natural sciences, philosophy, art, and devotion. As one of the means to this end, the Society considers not only major public lectures but also discussions on questions of worldview within smaller circles, as well as the publication of such Society proceedings in print.

[ 2 ] The first attempt to systematically discuss a unified worldview took place in March 1902. The topic under discussion was: “What does a unified worldview mean in terms of its concept and values?” The new secretary of the Federation, Dr. Hermann Friedmann, had been scheduled to give the introductory presentation but was temporarily unable to do so due to illness. Mr. Wolfgang Kirchbach kindly stepped in for him to present his own views off the cuff. After the Federation’s chairman, Dr. Bruno Wille, had outlined the purpose of the discussion evenings, Miss Maria Holgers recited Hölderlin’s moving poem “To Nature.” Wolfgang Kirchbach then took the floor:

[ 3 ] “The Chair has just emphasized that establishing and pursuing a monistic worldview is a task that is as difficult as it is appealing and significant. That is why, in our first discussion today, I will attempt to outline for you the full extent of the difficulty of the problem we face. However, this reference to the difficulty of our task is intended to be purely academic.

[ 4 ] The question I wish to address is phrased as follows: What does a “unified worldview”—in terms of its concept and values—mean to us, or rather, to me? I would like to briefly outline the problem as it affects me. For those who may not yet be familiar with it, I emphasize that the term “unified worldview” here is merely a translation of the word “monistic,” which expresses the synthesis of all conceptual and other knowledge into a worldview of the nature of unity—of the world’s existence as a unity. The term “unified worldview” would probably describe the meaning more accurately.

[ 5 ] However, when we establish a unified worldview, we cannot avoid asking ourselves about its value, about the areas in which it is valuable, and in which it breaks down.

[ 6 ] Seeking the unity of all phenomena within the realm of the “cosmos”—as nature, with its inherent laws, is popularly called—would constitute one aspect of unified research and thought. However, natural science, as it currently stands, does not yet give those who have delved deeper into it the right to speak objectively of a unity in the cosmos. We are commonly accustomed to conceiving of this whole world, when represented quantitatively, as matter and, in connection with it, the concept of force. The dualism inherent in this conceptual pairing has led to attempts to resolve it into a unity. It was said that force is a function, a manifestation of matter, and in this way a certain unity was achieved by conceiving of matter as something essentially one. Actual natural science, however, has developed the concept of matter in an entirely different way. With the help of its analytical methods, it has increasingly isolated elements from the surrounding cosmos and, through empirical work, has thus discovered—in place of a monistic matter—some seventy different elements, that is, forms of matter. Thus, the concept of “matter” now has only the value of a linguistic abstraction, much like the concept of “animal.” It does not correspond to any real individual entity; rather, the unity of these seventy elements is, for the time being, merely a hypothesis.

[ 7 ] We find the same to be true regarding the concept of force since Robert Mayer’s discovery of the unity of force and the convertibility of energy. We are faced with the immense mystery that mechanical force—and perhaps the very same force that maintains the constant relationship between the Earth and the Sun and causes the rotation of the celestial bodies—that perhaps this very same force, when converted and transformed, gives rise to the phenomena we observe, for example, in a thunderstorm. But the fact remains that this phenomenon of electricity manifests itself differently than, say, the force that drives a stone toward the center of the Earth. Thus, science has not yet demonstrated that we must assume a unity of nature in the sense that the various forms of energy are one. The different phenomena have simply not yet been reconciled; here, too, we are still dealing only with hypotheses.

[ 8 ] The same applies to a whole range of other phenomena. For example, it is not clear where to draw the line between the higher concept of life in the organic realm and the concept of the inorganic. The entire field of natural science is currently embroiled in a lively debate on this issue.

[ 9 ] Since, in this aspect of our worldview, we must rely on the evidence provided by the natural sciences, we must therefore admit that the unity of the universe has not yet been objectively proven as a fact.

[ 10 ] But what about the other question that must be addressed in our broader inquiry into a unified worldview? The question is: How does our own thinking—which is oriented toward unity—relate to its object, the world? Here we are faced with an apparent dualism. We see: there is something outside, and here is something that encompasses this outside within itself. Here we have, at first, a duality. But we now ask: To what extent can and should we assume that the functions of our brain, the forms of expression, and the categories of our mind form a unity with the world? The fact that you relate all the functions of your mind to a single unity could, at best, be inferred from the fact that you locate them collectively within your body. To begin with, the mental activity you engage in when you investigate the cause that causes a stone to fall to the ground is quite different from when you ask: Is it possible, under the current conditions, for this fall to occur? It could well be that the ideas produced by the various mental activities conflict with one another, and thus no unity would exist even within you. Another question would be how the unified picture of the world that you carry within yourself corresponds to objective reality. To what extent do the laws that govern my mind also operate in the external world? In addressing this, we will first have to think in dualistic terms. Resolving this dualism into monism is, however, a supreme impulse within thought itself; but epistemology faces a major problem here. Since Kant, engaging with this problem has been a duty for anyone concerned with questions of worldview.

[ 11 ] Thus, in constructing a unified worldview, we must carry out two operations: on the one hand, to trace the infinite diversity of the world down to its smallest distinctions through empirical means; and on the other hand, to constantly shape our thinking—in an epistemological sense—toward monism, that is, toward synthesizing that diversity into unity.

[ 12 ] If we were to approach the material from this perspective, we would soon encounter no less significant difficulties in the ethical realm. We would soon be faced with the question of to what extent we can evaluate human moral life itself and the processes in the cosmos from the standpoint of uniform moral laws. For we cannot allow any event in this world to affect us without simultaneously processing it ethically. The joy of the cosmos, the contemplation of harmony in infinite diversity, is at the same time a moral engagement. The question would therefore arise: Can we arrive at a monism in ethical thought itself and connect it with the rest of our monistic perspective? — This simultaneously raises the question for us: Could our moral sensibility not also find satisfaction through a different mode of contemplation? Why, for example, does the Christian who thinks in terms of the Church consider his doctrine—which recognizes only one God—to be something infinitely superior to paganism, which has multiple deities? And how has the Christian nevertheless come to embrace dualism, indeed, to accept an even greater multiplicity in the supernatural world?

[ 13 ] If scientific considerations were to provide proof of dualism, we would have to be satisfied with that. Establishing monism merely for the sake of being monistic would be pointless. But we have in our minds a “monon,” an essence of things themselves, by which we can measure the value of all our views: the True, the Truth. For every individual science, for every form of knowledge, there is only one enduring criterion: that its statements are true—that is, that they correspond to objective processes. This criterion of value must also apply to a worldview. Only if a monistic mode of explanation were to prove itself true in all objective circumstances as well as in our subjective actions, in all manifestations of the diversity of life, would it be valuable; I could regard nothing else as the criterion of value for this worldview. This “monon” of truth, which can never become untrue, is, to date, the only discernible eternal unity with which objective phenomena, in their multiplicity and transience, interact with the spirit.”

[ 14 ] Following these remarks by Kirchbach, Dr. Rudolf Steiner rose to make the following remarks:

[ 15 ] “I would like to stick strictly to the question: What does a unified worldview mean in terms of its concept and values? In this regard, I stand in direct opposition to the previous speaker. When I ask myself: From the standpoint of our modern natural and human sciences, are we justified in regarding the world as a unity? I must say that we are; in any case, we are compelled to seek it. In the face of the diversity into which the specialization of the sciences has undoubtedly led us, I ask: Where should we seek this unity? To claim from the outset that this or that must first be proven as a unity strikes me as an exaggerated demand of an extreme theory of knowledge. For me, the pursuit of a unified worldview is justified simply because it is an indelible need of the human spirit that has existed at all times—perhaps more clearly in pre-Christian times, when it had not yet been suppressed by the dogmas and views of the Church, against which it is, above all, the duty of a federation that seeks to carry on the legacy of Giordano Bruno to fight.

[ 16 ] However, I find that the findings of the natural sciences also meet this need. Although chemistry has identified seventy elements and may yet increase this diversity, it has also revealed something quite remarkable: for example, it has discovered certain relationships among these elements with regard to atomic weight, according to which a scale of elements can be constructed—a scale that simultaneously classifies these elements according to their acoustic, optical, and other physical properties. Based on a gap in this scale, scientists have inferred the existence of missing elements, predicted some of their properties, and subsequently discovered them. Thus, the elements—which are indeed phenomenally diverse—nevertheless constitute a great unity that we can trace through calculation.

[ 17 ] However, the chemist is compelled to seek unity elsewhere than in the crude concept of a substance with a uniform essence—namely, in a system of lawful relationships. Professor Ostwald spoke out in this vein at a natural scientists’ congress. A journal has also recently been founded to further develop outdated materialism in this new sense of natural philosophy. Thus, we are faced with a new worldview that, while we cannot yet finalize it, opens up a perspective for us—namely, a perspective toward unity.

[ 18 ] The same is true of the unity of force. Phenomenally speaking, we will probably never be able to reduce electricity to pure gravity, but in the mathematical formula by which we calculate and convert it, we have something real and fundamental; and thus a perspective on the unity of force is also opened up to us.

[ 19 ] Without wishing to adopt exactly the same standpoint as Goethe’s theory of metamorphosis—which, in the realm of biology, sought a principle of unity for the first time—I nevertheless believe that it, too, represents a significant step toward a unified worldview. Added to this is the biogenetic law, according to which every organism, during its embryonic development, passes once more through the forms of the species from which it descends. Since it has now been fully successful in synthesizing organic substances in the laboratory, we are also offered a clear prospect of unity in this area.

[ 20 ] Unless one wishes to demand unity directly within the phenomenal realm, this perspective shows us where to look for the One. And what was beyond doubt for all the great philosophers is becoming increasingly clear: That what we experience in the external world is equivalent to what we experience in the mind. As we progress from external to internal experience, we will arrive at a unified worldview. For those seeking unity, the last few decades of science have been quite encouraging, for elements are pouring in from all fields, opening up a unified worldview.

[ 21 ] “Their value lies in the fact that they satisfy an intellectual need that is just as essential to the happiness of a mind that cultivates this need within itself as air and light are.”

[ 22 ] Mr. Kirchbach responded as follows: “Regarding the question: How do we arrive at a unified worldview, and how do we envision it? — Dr. Steiner has offered many insights with which I am in complete agreement. However, there are individual points that are open to debate. For example, Goethe’s theory of plant metamorphosis, mentioned by the previous speaker, illustrates how even such a great mind could believe he had found a principle of unity in a matter that later proved to be questionable. Goethe believed that the same morphological principle governed the chlorophyll-bearing leaf as the stem, and he saw this principle of the leaves recurring in the form of the petals and the pistil, so that to him all parts of the plant were merely modifications of one and the same morphological principle of form. In contrast, it is a fact that in the rose, the stem leaf has only one central canal, while the petal has three; thus, there is indeed a fundamental difference in the morphological structure of the rose, just as there is an underlying chemical difference.

[ 23 ] The more recent cell theory, after all, also seeks unity in a field entirely different from that of this pseudo-morphology. Here, the cell is the organizing principle and gives rise to the overall structure through the sum of all the factors to which it is subject. Perhaps the same will be true of some concepts of Darwinism.

[ 24 ] I have used this example to show how difficult it is to find unity even in the natural world, because we must first learn to group phenomena correctly based on mere observation before we can infer their essential unity through mathematical or other logical means.»

[ 25 ] Dr. Bruno Wille: “You have just heard two representatives of worldviews which, in my opinion, despite a few points of difference, are essentially in agreement. Certain difficulties have been pointed out that seemingly stand in the way of developing a unified worldview. However, we initially experience nature as a multiplicity, as an immense array of different sensations. Only when we compare this diversity in a spirit that seeks unity—and partly bridge the differences and partly resolve them—can we come closer to a unified worldview.

[ 26 ] Seeking such unity is, in fact, as Dr. Steiner says, a universal human need; first and foremost, a logical need. Our cognitive apparatus, which seeks to understand the world, has a tendency to synthesize all that is diverse into a single unity. Thus, despite all their differences, we see a certain commonality in the trees of our Markish forests and group them together into a single unit, for example, under the concept of “pine.” We, in turn, group the pines together with the birches, oaks, and aspens, along with the blueberries, ferns, and mosses, into an even higher unity: the concept of “plant.” If we compare a plant to ourselves, a unity is present here as well; we are dealing with organic living beings. Thus, our thinking is constantly in search of higher-order groupings and connections. Here, of course, the significant question of epistemology arises: Does the world, independent of us, correspond to our thinking? Is the unity of nature more than a merely subjective, intellectual experience? The answer is highly complex. Today I will content myself with a simple “yes,” while noting that I also seek monism in the fact that, unlike Kant, I conceive of subject and object, mind and nature, as an inseparable unity and, like the medieval “realists,” see in the concept a real—not merely nominal—identity.

[ 27 ] Even in our moral pursuits, doubt regarding what is morally true, right, and wholesome can only be dispelled if we can derive individual moral ideas from a supreme unity. If there were two or more world principles that stood in absolute opposition to one another, contradictory principles for our moral life could also be derived from them; and in all areas of our lives, we would find ourselves caught in irreconcilable contradictions. Thus, our entire idealism points us toward monism, toward the search for the eternally One.

[ 28 ] Natural science, of course, does not yet provide a clear-cut answer as to where we are to seek the One in the seemingly diverse world; but the magnificent development of natural science in the previous century was, as Dr. Steiner quite rightly emphasized, so fruitful for the cause of a unified worldview that the monist philosopher must not fail to reap the full benefits of these fruits. However, the natural scientist should not look down upon the millennia-old work of philosophy; rather, he should take the doubts raised by philosophy seriously and seek to answer them. I am pleased that Dr. Steiner has acknowledged that the old materialism has become untenable. This insight is a fruit of philosophical criticism. And so philosophy and natural science belong together as modes of inquiry that complement one another.

[ 29 ] To supplement the scientific facts in which Dr. Steiner rightly discerns important aspects of monism, I would like to draw attention to the following aspects of my unified worldview. Above all, I would like to emphasize that we find a comprehensive natural law in all worldly processes and phenomena, for which we have never been able to identify an exception: the law of causality. It is a fact that every process necessarily follows from another, which we can call the cause of the subsequent one. I believe, then, that cause and effect in this context mean nothing other than what we call development. Indeed, we can understand the emergence of the effect from the system of its conditions as the further development of the cause. The law of causality thus permeates all worldly processes, for which we can in turn identify specific rules—the particular laws of nature. According to such “eternal, ironclad, great laws,” the world coalesces into a unity for us, in contrast to the dualistic worldview, which admits of miracles—that is, exceptions to the laws of nature—which it cannot make plausible without a “higher decree,” that is, without an admission of human ignorance.

[ 30 ] I find another unity of the world in the fact that everything I know about the universe is an experience—either an experience for me, an experience for other beings, or an experience of the self. If by this we do not mean solely the experience of ideas—which would bring us closer to the idealist view that regards only the idea as the reality of the world—then I believe we can all agree on this statement; for no one could probably prove that there is any existence that is not an experience. In this fundamental principle of my worldview, I have achieved a balance between significant opposites that give cause for concern in any one-sidedly materialistic or mechanistic monism. Thus, I have overcome the opposition between matter and spirit, which I reconcile by conceiving of everything physical as experience—not, of course, as a mere phenomenon for our senses, but as a mode in which the eternally One is experienced. — In general, my monism denies all absolute opposites. For me, death represents another aspect of life. I can only conceive of the emergence of the organic from the inorganic if there is no absolute opposition between the two realms of nature. In moral life, I regard evil merely as an immature form, a lower stage of the good; thus, I acknowledge no absolute evil, only a relative evil. Similarly, error is merely an immature truth, a specific stage of development on the path to knowledge.

[ 31 ] As you can see, I am seeking a unified worldview, including in the sense that I strive for a subjective unity—a unity among my various intellectual pursuits, my diverse experiences, and the forces of my personality. For me, the opposition between head and heart, emotion and reason, between true religiosity and scientific knowledge has been overcome, as has the view that art is merely an illusion, a sweet delusion that stands in the way of cool insight. Thus, as I emphasized when our association was founded, in fostering a unified worldview, one should guide people to transform the tearing hostilities within their inner lives into harmony—into a reconciliation; not, of course, into sentimental reconciliation, but into the clear unity of their highest spiritual deliberations.”

[ 32 ] Wolfgang Kirchbach: “To conclude this discussion, I would like to ask you to consider the conversation that took place among the three gentlemen as a preface to the discussions that will follow. In the upcoming discussions, we may refrain from continuing in this general manner. Guidelines have been outlined along which an internal consensus can be pursued. In the next discussions, we want to focus on specific questions. All speakers agree, after all, that a unified worldview is an undeniable necessity. Thus, our main task would be to determine how far these efforts have progressed and to limit the discussion to specific points. I don’t want to go into further detail just yet, so I’ll conclude today’s discussion with a “To be continued,” to keep you eager to find out: “How will this unfold?”