This is one of several posts which are based on my reading of The Philosophy of Freedom by Rudolf Steiner. For other posts, see below.
What happens in consciousness when we face another person? Rudolf Steiner writes:
What, then, do I have before me when I face another person? I look at what is immediately apparent. …it sets my thinking activity in motion. …when perceiving another person, what replaces my own content of consciousness is not unconsciousness (as in sleep) but rather the content of the other person’s consciousness… Thinkers ought to seek the path to unprejudiced, spiritually-oriented observation, but instead they slide an artificial conceptual construction in front of reality.
—Rudolf Steiner, Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path: The Philosophy of Freedom, Appendices (1918).
“Thinkers”, in other words, “ought to seek” to be present to reality, instead of creating “an artificial conceptual” re-presentation of reality. Rudolf Steiner continues:
When three people sit at a table, how many instances of the table are present? There is only one table present. … As soon as they switch over to the table as grasped in their thinking, the one reality of the table reveals itself to them. They are united in that reality with their three contents of consciousness. …each person reaches beyond his or her own sphere of consciousness; in it, both one’s own and the other person’s consciousness comes to life. …the consciousness of each person grasps both itself and the other person. …naive realism retains its validity in the case of thinking that is experienced. Transcendental realists [e.g., Eduard von Hartmann] by no means experience the true state of affairs in the cognitive process; they cut themselves off from it by a web of thoughts in which they then become entangled.
—Rudolf Steiner, Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path: The Philosophy of Freedom, Appendices (1918).
We risk cutting ourselves off from reality by “a web of thoughts” in which we “become entangled”. This is ironically why I am critical of Rudolf Steiner’s focus on conceptual thinking. Thinking, for me, is always a “cognitive process”.
Update 2024-11-04:
Related posts added.
Related posts:
Rudof Steiner on Freedom
Rudolf Steiner on Gender
Rudolf Steiner on Natural Objects
Rudolf Steiner on Thinking, Feeling, and Willing
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