Lenin's Definition of Matter and the "Sensory Cue Theory"

An Qinian    Published: 2011-03-24   

The definition of matter that has been widely used in Marxist philosophical theory so far is a passage from Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, namely: "Matter is a philosophical category that marks objective reality, which is perceived by man through his senses. It exists independently of our senses and is copied, photographed, and reflected by our senses." [1] Chinese Marxist philosophers generally hold a positive attitude towards this definition. [2] However, in fact, the Chinese expression of this definition may not accurately reflect Lenin's relevant thoughts, and it affects our understanding of the ideological connotation and theoretical value of Lenin's definition of matter, and has thus caused a widespread misunderstanding of Lenin's epistemological thoughts. These problems arise from the Chinese translation of Lenin's definition of matter. This article will take the translation of this definition as a starting point to analyze Lenin's relevant thoughts. 

1 .

What is worth discussing is the word "perceived" in the sentence "Matter is a philosophical category that marks objective reality, and this objective reality is perceived by people through their senses." The original text of this sentence is: "Matter is a philosophical category that marks objective reality , and this objective reality is perceived by people through their senses." Corresponding to the expression "perceived", which is also the key to the whole problem, is the translation of the word "dana". "Dana" is the passive form of the Russian verb datь, the feminine short suffix. The basic meaning of datь itself is to give, and it does not mean "feeling". The literal translation of Lenin's words should be: "Matter is the philosophical category that designates objective reality, which is given to man through his senses." The Chinese translation of Lenin's definition of matter quoted at the beginning of this article translates "дана", which means "given to man", as "perceived", which can easily lead people to understand that matter, an objective reality, is felt by people through their sense organs. Its meaning is the same as the passive verb short suffix ощущена of the verb ощутить, which specifically expresses sensation. [3] More specifically, what is felt? There are two possibilities. First, it is the color, hardness, taste, and other properties of matter, an objective reality; second, it is the existence of matter, an objective reality. But the problem is that no matter which possible understanding is adopted, it does not conform to Lenin's thought. 

In Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, Lenin, like the Machists, understood sensation as the sensation obtained through the five sense organs of eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body, that is, color, sound, smell, etc. However, the Machists regarded sensation as the element of the world, and advocated that things are the combination of sensations, denying the existence of material sources outside of sensations, that is, they regarded sensation as a wall separating people from the outside world. On the contrary, Lenin believed that sensation is a bridge connecting people and the outside world. Sensation not only enables people to obtain information about the outside world through colors, sounds, smells, etc., but also enables people to realize that the external world as the source of sensation is an objective existence and has objective reality. Looking through the whole book of Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, Lenin is not concerned with the specific five senses such as color, sound, and smell, but whether there is an objective reality outside of the five senses as the source of sensation. This is the fundamental difference between him and the Machists. 

However, Lenin clearly realized that it was extremely difficult to prove this objective existence, because the Machists grasped a fact: sensation is the starting point of all knowledge. Sensation comes from the five senses of human beings, and its content can only be color, sound, smell, softness and hardness, etc. The objective reality that the concept of matter is meant to mark is indeed something that cannot be sensed by any sense. He quoted Diderot's words: "Those philosophers who only recognize their own existence and the existence of sensations that appear alternately in themselves, and do not recognize anything else, are called idealists. In my opinion, only a blind man can create such a bizarre system! Although this system is absurd, it is the most difficult to refute. It is really a shame for human wisdom and philosophy." [4] It can be seen that to be a materialist, the most important thing is to be able to prove that the objective reality marked by matter exists; the required evidence can only come from knowledge and ultimately from human sensation, but the sensory organs cannot directly make people feel this existence. This is the dilemma of materialistic philosophy. In "Materialism and Empirio-Criticism", Lenin got out of this dilemma through the "theory of sensory suggestion". 

Lenin proposed that although people cannot directly sense the existence of objective reality, they do gain knowledge of this existence through their senses. He said: "When our sense organs are stimulated by certain external objects, 'phenomena' occur; when some obstacle makes it impossible for the object that we know to exist to act on our sense organs, 'phenomena' disappear. From this we can draw the only and inevitable conclusion: objects, things, and bodies exist outside of us and independently of us, and our sensations are reflections of the external world." [5] He also said: "Some people tell us that Mach 'discovered the elements of the world': red, green, hard, soft, loud, long, etc. We have to ask: when people see red, feel hard, etc., is what they perceive objective reality?" [ 6] What Lenin meant was that people can indeed only get specific sensations of red, green, hard, soft, loud, long, etc. through their sense organs, but they can only get these sensations when they come into contact with certain external objects. Once such contact is blocked, these sensations disappear. This shows that sensations are subjective and the source of sensations is objective. In other words, Lenin wants to express that we get the sensation of red instead of green or other sensations, and we get it here instead of elsewhere, which is beyond our control; this shows that while we get the specific sensations of red and green, soft and hard, etc., we also get the knowledge that "the source of these sensations is objective and not subject to our subjective will." It is this knowledge that tells us that there is some objective reality outside of us. The concept of matter is a sign of it. This knowledge itself is not a sensation, but it is related to sensation. Lenin called this phenomenon the suggestion of the senses to man: "The question of accepting or rejecting the concept of matter is a question of whether man believes in the suggestion of his senses, a question of the source of our knowledge." [7] Lenin also proposed that materialists are thorough sensationalists, who not only recognize that knowledge originates from the senses, but also recognize that the senses give people hints about the existence of objective reality: "All knowledge comes from experience, feeling, and perception. This is correct. But let us ask: is what 'belongs to perception', that is, what is the source of perception, objective reality? If you answer yes, then you are a materialist. If you answer no, then you are not thorough and you will inevitably fall into subjectivism and agnosticism." [8] He criticized the Machists, saying: "The Machists like to sing such a high tune: they are philosophers who fully believe in the suggestion of our senses... In fact, the Machists are subjectivists and agnostics because they do not fully believe in the suggestion of our senses and do not thoroughly implement sensationalism. They do not recognize objective reality, which is independent of man, as the source of our sensations." [9] The word “prompt” mentioned in the above discussion is originally показание. This is a gerund derived from the verb показать. Its basic meaning is “to show someone something”. The translation of “prompt” is basically appropriate. Показание and its Chinese translation “prompt” express Lenin’s main idea about objective reality: the existence of this objective reality cannot be directly perceived by people. People can only understand the prompts of their senses when they have specific feelings, because whether the feelings can appear and their nature are not subject to human will: the source and object of the feelings have objective reality and are objective existence. 

The word Показание and the "sensory suggestion theory" can be said to be Lenin's annotations on how to understand the word дана in the "definition of matter", and also his explanation of why he used дать instead of directly using the verb ощутить (feeling). Obviously, translating дана as "perceived" can easily lead to misunderstanding of Lenin's original intention. In fact, people have indeed misunderstood it for a long time. 

II​

The existing translation of the word danā fails to grasp the profound and subtle meaning of Lenin's related philosophical thoughts. This translation, in turn, has greatly affected our understanding of Lenin's philosophical thoughts. First of all, it is our understanding of the theoretical significance of Lenin's thoughts on objective reality, mainly the "sensory suggestion theory".

The "sensory suggestion theory" is very important. Materialists from ancient times to the present have insisted that matter exists objectively and the world is material, but this view is really a shame to human wisdom and cannot be ultimately proved. One of the difficulties is that the existence of this objective reality cannot be directly perceived by human sensory organs. Because it cannot be directly perceived, there is a gap between the objective reality represented by matter and humans that cannot be crossed by the power of sensation and reason. For idealism, such a gap does not exist. Subjective idealists, such as Machists, see the existence of this insurmountable gap and regard sensation as an element of the world. Everything people face becomes a combination of sensory elements. Objective reality outside of sensation is denied, and the gap no longer exists. Objective idealists, such as various religious people, believe in an omnipotent God and believe that everything is God's creation, and the gap does not exist. However, for materialists, it is essential to recognize the existence of objective reality outside of sensation, and it is extremely difficult to prove that something that cannot be directly perceived exists. [10] In the history of philosophy, few materialist philosophers have mentioned this issue, because they only start from common sense and regard material existence as something self-evident. There is no need and no way to analyze, think about and prove it. They are naive materialists. Many philosophers in modern times, especially Hume, Kant and positivists, have pointed out the existence of a gap between sensation and material existence, and believe that this gap is unbridgeable. This is a serious challenge to materialism. Faced with this challenge, the vast majority of materialist philosophers did not respond directly. Marxist Plekhanov was the first to face this issue and put forward his own views. He acknowledged the existence of the gap, but also saw the fundamental significance of crossing this gap for materialist philosophy. So he said: "Hume said that man should act, reason and believe in the existence of the external world. We materialists only need to add one sentence: such 'belief' is an indispensable prerequisite for critical thinking in the best sense, and is the inevitable salto vitale (leap of life) of philosophy." [11] He called this leap "the leap of life" because in his view, if we cannot jump over this gap and confirm the objective existence of matter, the entire materialist theory will lose its foundation and there will be no point in talking about it. How to cross it? Plekhanov agreed with Hume's opinion: here, neither feeling nor reason can help, so we can only resort to faith. Compared with previous materialists, Plekhanov is undoubtedly very profound and has greatly advanced the understanding of materialism. However, Lenin was not satisfied with Plekhanov's work because Plekhanov used the word "belief" here. Lenin specifically examined Plekhanov's idea in "Materialism and Empirio-Criticism". He said: "Plekhanov once wrote such a clumsy phrase that 'belief' in the existence of the external world is 'the inevitable leap of life ( salto vitale ) of philosophy'. The word 'belief' is a repetition of Hume. Although it is in quotation marks, it exposes Plekhanov's confusion of terminology. This is beyond doubt." [12] Lenin's dissatisfaction is justified: if materialists can believe in the existence of matter, then why can't idealists believe in the non-existence of matter or in the existence of God? Compared with idealism, what is more reasonable and therefore worthy of acceptance in materialism? The "sensory suggestion theory" is Lenin's own scientific argument for the objective existence of matter, which is different from belief: as an objectively existing matter, its existence is not the product of belief, but comes from the suggestion of the senses to people when they get sensations in life practice. 

The argument for materialism is the refutation of idealism. Materialism and idealism have been fighting for thousands of years, and there is no final result so far. Because of the existence of the above-mentioned "gap", because the answer to the basic philosophical question concerns the whole world, and the world is infinite, many people believe that this struggle belongs to metaphysics and will never have any results. Because of this, positivism advocates "keeping it in mind" and not wasting energy on such a problem that will not have any results. They believe that both materialism and idealism are based on faith. Such a conclusion is of course unacceptable to materialists like Lenin.

If materialists want to firmly stand on the materialist position, they must respond to the challenges from agnostics and positivists, bid farewell to simplicity, and give materialism a contemporary color. On this issue, Lenin's "theory of sensory suggestion" greatly advanced the materialist theory. He revealed a simple fact to the world: when people get sensations, they do receive a hint because of the nature of sensations and the knowledge that their production is not subject to human will: the source and object of sensations exist objectively outside of people. No one can deny the existence of this hint, which means that we can cross the "chasm" without the help of faith. Such an argument may not satisfy all materialists, because the meaning of the word "hint" is somewhat hesitant and vague, not as decisive as "perceived". But the small step taken by Lenin was never taken by his predecessors, and in terms of the "abilities" that humans have due to their physiological structure, at least now it seems that no one can do better than Lenin on this issue. Compared with naive materialism, which did not see the necessity and possibility of proving the existence of matter, and Plekhanov, who wanted to jump over the gap with the help of faith, the "theory of sensory suggestion" was Lenin's major contribution to materialistic philosophy and one of Lenin's most valuable philosophical ideas.

However, the existing Chinese translation of “the definition of matter” does not reflect the profound connotation of “the theory of sensory suggestion”. Once the “theory of sensory suggestion” is ignored, Lenin’s theoretical contribution to materialistic philosophy will not be reflected, and the difference between him and naive materialists will disappear.

III​

Another negative impact of the Chinese translation of the word Дана is that it leads us to misunderstand Lenin’s epistemological thought.

In various Marxist philosophy textbooks, a sentence from Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism is repeatedly quoted, namely: "The viewpoint of life, practice, should be the primary and fundamental viewpoint in epistemology." [13] Various textbooks have basically given an epistemological interpretation of it. For example, some authors claim: "The viewpoint of practice is an important and fundamental viewpoint in Marxist epistemology. It runs through all the issues in epistemological research, such as the occurrence of cognition, the nature of cognition, and the process of cognition." [14] In fact, what Lenin was talking about was not the role of practice in cognition (such as serving as a criterion of truth), but the objective existence of the object of cognition, the issue of ontology and its important position in epistemology, which is related to his "theory of sensory suggestion." In criticizing the Machist Bazarov, he said: "You are confused, Comrade Bazarov! You change the question of the existence of things outside our senses, perceptions, and representations into the question of the standard of the correctness of our representations of 'these' things 'themselves,' or, to be more precise, you use the latter question to cover up the former. But Engels bluntly and clearly said: The difference between him and the agnostics lies not only in the fact that the agnostics doubt the correctness of the imitations, but also in the fact that the agnostics doubt whether it is possible to talk about things themselves and whether it is possible to know the existence of things 'for sure.' Why did Bazarov change the subject? It is to obscure and confuse the basic question that materialism (and the materialist Engels) talks about, namely, the question of the existence outside our consciousness of things that act on our senses and cause sensations. If you do not answer this question with certainty, you cannot be a materialist, but on the question of the standard of the correctness of the imitations provided by our senses, although you have different views, you can still be a materialist." [15] It can be seen that Lenin was not concerned with how to correctly understand material existence, but whether people recognize that the object of cognition is objective material existence. He was concerned with the opposition between materialism and idealism.

This sentence that people often quote comes from Chapter 2, Section 6 of Materialism and Empirio-Criticism , which is titled "The Problem of the Practical Criterion in Epistemology". A brief examination of the relevant content shows that the "practical criterion" mentioned here also emphasizes the objective existence of the object of cognition, rather than the consistency between cognition and the object. Lenin pointed out that Machists also admit that in order to obtain "useful knowledge for human practice, the preservation of life, and the preservation of species" in life practice, in order to succeed, people must recognize the objective existence of material objects and accept materialism; it is just that when they think about philosophical theoretical issues as philosophers, they close themselves off in sensory experience and deny the existence of everything outside of sensation. He said: "Mach wrote in The Analysis of Sensations: 'In practice, we cannot do without the idea of ​​the self when we are engaged in an activity, just as we cannot do without the idea of ​​the object when we reach out our hand to take something. In physiology, we are often egoists and materialists, just as we often see the sunrise. But in theory, we should never insist on this view.'" [16] It is for this reason that Lenin said: "The Marxists say: If we take the criterion of practice as the basis of epistemology, then we will inevitably arrive at materialism. Mach said: Even if practice is materialistic, theory is quite another matter." [17] Immediately following the sentence that people have quoted repeatedly, Lenin said: "This view inevitably leads to materialism and kicks away the countless conjectures of the professor's scholastic philosophy." [18] This also shows that when Lenin talked about the criterion of practice here, he was not referring to the epistemological issue, but the ontological issue. He aimed to explain that adhering to the criterion of practice will inevitably recognize the objective existence of the object of practice and lead to materialism. 

In Lenin's epistemological thought, the most important issue is to discuss the ontological premise of knowledge and to draw a clear line between the principles of materialism and idealism, that is, whether the source and object of knowledge have objective reality and whether they are material existence. The basic principles of Marxist philosophical epistemology - reflection theory, objective truth, the absoluteness of truth that coexists with relativity, etc., are closely related to the recognition of the objective reality of the objects of knowledge - that is, they are material existence. As is well known, Lenin put forward the famous "Three Conclusions of Epistemology" in "Materialism and Empirio-Criticism", the first of which is to emphasize the objective existence of the objects of knowledge: "Things exist outside of us independently of our consciousness and our senses." [19] Putting the principle of materialism - that is, confirming the objective reality of the objects of knowledge - in the first place is a distinctive feature of Lenin's epistemological thought.

Obviously, to understand the sentence "the viewpoint of life and practice should be the primary and basic viewpoint of epistemology" as emphasizing the important role of practice in the process of cognition - such as it is the purpose, source, standard, driving force, etc. of cognition - is to misunderstand Lenin's epistemological thought. Why does the above misunderstanding occur? The reason is related to the translation of the word "дана". Due to the lack of in-depth understanding of Lenin's "sensory suggestion theory", it is difficult to deeply understand Lenin's argument on the basic premise of materialism - recognizing the source of cognition and the objective reality of the object - and it is impossible to understand Lenin's unique contribution to this issue. Because of this, when translating the word "дана", we only start from the perspective of epistemology, and fail to see its ontological significance and Lenin's good intentions. 

Finally, I would like to point out that it is not only Chinese philosophers who misunderstand Lenin. Russian philosophers, such as Oizerman, who was famous as an expert in Marxist philosophy during the Soviet period and is still the most active Marxist philosopher in Russia, also failed to understand the profound thoughts in Lenin's definition of matter. He said: "The definition of matter proposed by Lenin is not new in either Marxist works or pre-Marxist works. For example, in his essay "Cowardly Idealism" criticizing the Machist Petzoldt, Plekhanov defined matter as "something that directly or indirectly acts on or can act on our external senses under certain conditions." Plekhanov pointed out here that "no amazing discovery in physics in recent years can shake this definition of matter." [20] How wrong it is to equate Lenin's definition of matter with Plekhanov's definition is clear from the criticism of Plekhanov's "faith theory" quoted earlier in this article. There is no need to elaborate here. 

What is the conclusion of this article? Does it mean that the existing translation of Lenin's definition of matter is wrong? It is hard to say. Because although "perceived" is usually misunderstood as "felt", it can also be understood as "known through the senses". If so, it should be said that it is in line with Lenin's original intention. At the same time, even if "дана" is directly translated as "given to people", it may not be able to fully and clearly express the profound connotation of Lenin's "sensory suggestion theory" and thus his definition of matter. How to translate it is still up for discussion. But it is very likely that no matter how it is translated, adding a note after the Chinese translation of "дана" is something that can be considered. 

Note:

[1] Selected Works of Lenin, 3rd edition , Volume 2 , p . 89. The 2nd edition of the Complete Works of Lenin, published in 1988 , the 2nd edition of the Selected Works of Lenin, published in 1972 , and the 2009 edition of Lenin’s Special Works, all use this translation. In the 1960 edition of Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, the translation of the sentence “this objective reality is perceived by man through his senses” is: “this objective reality is felt by man” (see p. 120 of the book ).

[2] The famous Russian Marxist philosopher Oizerman has made a relatively in-depth critical analysis of this definition. See An Qinian (ed.), Marxist Philosophy in the Perspective of Contemporary Scholars: Russian Scholars, Beijing Normal University Press, 2008 , pp . 364-367 .

[3] Please refer to the relevant discussion in various domestic textbooks on the principles of Marxist philosophy. In addition, in the 1960 Chinese translation of Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, the word corresponding to the word "perceived" is "what people feel", which also illustrates this point.

[4] Selected Works of Lenin, 3rd edition , Volume 2 , p. 30 .

[5] Ibid., p. 78 .

[6] The translation here, “When people see red and feel green, is what they perceive objective reality?” is also questionable. The original text is: “When people see red and feel green, is objective reality given to them?” The literal translation should be : “When people see red and feel green, is objective reality given to them?” The current translation says that people’s sensations of red, green, hard, soft, loud, long, etc. are perceptions of the attributes of objective reality, while Lenin is talking about the source of knowledge. He is saying that when people have sensations of red, green, loud, soft, hard, long, etc., they are also “given the knowledge that objective reality exists.” Lenin did not assert that the concrete sensations of red, green, etc. are perceptions of objective reality itself or of its existence. See Selected Works of Lenin, 3rd edition , Volume 2 , p. 89 .

[7] Selected Works of Lenin, 3rd edition , Volume 2 , p. 89 .

[8] Ibid., p. 87 .

[9] Ibid., p. 88 .

[ 10 ] Author : A. L. Nikiforov . Philosophy of Science : V. I. Lenin and E. Mach.// Questions of Philosophy . 2010. No. 1. P. 138. ​

[11] Plekhanov , “Notes on the Russian Translation of Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy” ( 1882 ), see Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy, People’s Publishing House, 1972 , p . 101 .

[12] Selected Works of Lenin, Vol . 2 , 3rd edition , pp. 101-102 .

[13] Ibid., p. 103 .

[14] Li Xiulin et al., eds., Principles of Dialectical and Historical Materialism (College Textbook for Liberal Arts), Renmin University of China Press, 2004 , 5th edition , p. 230. This textbook has a circulation of over 10 million copies and has a wide influence. See also Principles of Marxist Philosophy, the most widely circulated philosophy textbook in China , edited by Xiao Qian et al.

[15] The Collected Works of Lenin, 2nd edition , Vol . 18 , p. 112 .

[16][17] Selected Works of Lenin, 3rd edition , Volume 2 , p. 100 .

[18] Ibid., p. 103 .

[19] Ibid., p. 77 .

[20] An Qinian, ed., Marxist Philosophy in the Perspective of Contemporary Scholars: Russian Scholars, p. 365 .

(Author: Professor of the School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China)