Pathway to Japanese Literature

Our Philosophy

I. Preface

When preparing to publish this new edition of the book, we received a request from the publisher to include as many additional manuscripts as possible; however, since all articles contributed to various journals since the previous edition had already been separately published under the title “Anxiety and Freedom,” there remained hardly anything left to add to this volume.
However, when going through the effort of publishing this new edition, we could not help feeling that leaving it entirely unchanged from the old version would somehow miss a prime opportunity to present our ideas; hence, following the precedent of appending a particular essay at the end of “Anxiety and Freedom,” we decided to newly write and add one final text to this volume’s conclusion.

Here we have chosen the title “Our Philosophy,” but this is by no means something newly conceived today.
In truth, this had been a dream since thirty-six years ago; the hope to someday organize all of our thoughts into a single philosophical system had already existed within us since that time.
At other times, we contemplated using titles like “(独孤遺書) 想邪乃話” to thoroughly excavate and debate matters that people accept without question, simply believing what they are told.
These were all mere fantasies of youth, and while it is clear that such things can no longer be achieved today, our foundational philosophical concepts remain entirely unchanged even now; moreover, having found no identical ideas in the few philosophy books we have read thus far, we shall next outline their key points and present several perspectives based on this foundation.

We read several philosophy books up to today.
Among them were some that we found interesting and reread multiple times.
Yet not a single book could be taken as-is to become our own philosophy.
This was probably because we already had our own philosophy before reading them.
Just as one can pour water into an empty sake flask but cannot add more to one already filled to the brim, so too will those who have stored within themselves a full measure of philosophy—even upon reading others’ philosophies—merely find them interesting or dull, never having their intellectual realm occupied thereby.
The essence of our philosophy was as outlined in the following three sections; however, since we first began contemplating such matters, no matter what we saw or heard, we had always passed judgment from that perspective, and to this day, our way of thinking has not changed significantly.
The reason we could never swallow any book whole nor come to worship any scholar was entirely because we measured others’ theories against the yardstick of our own philosophy.
Moreover, when actually examined, theories that appeared erroneous from our philosophical perspective—even if temporarily celebrated by society—proved to be increasingly exposed as fallacious over time, with a great many such cases.
In contrast, the arguments we formulated based on our philosophy, despite being fiercely criticized at the time, were later steadily proven by facts.
Thus, from our own perspective, our philosophy naturally seemed the most correct; yet when we further turned to observe ourselves from a third-party standpoint, we had to fully acknowledge that the probability of drawing the correct lot was exceedingly slim—for we were merely one among thousands upon tens of thousands of human beings who firmly believed their own philosophy alone was right while all others were entirely mistaken.

II. Starting Point

Philosophy unfolds as an unbroken lineage of thought extending ever forward, yet most philosophers first seek out a foundational basis to serve as their starting point for discourse, endeavoring to erect logical structures upon this footing.
When building an iron bridge across a river, they drive piers ever deeper until reaching bedrock that would never shift; reassured by this stability, they place girders upon these supports and install railings—a perfectly sound practice, for no weight can rest upon unsettled foundations.
As all know, none build castles upon sand.
Philosophers too seem to emulate this approach—they seek something unshakable through any trial, attempting to establish it as thought’s foundation. Yet most matters permit doubt; existence and non-existence alike may be asserted through perspective alone. Thus when one insistently pursues the indubitable, they inevitably arrive at positions like Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am.”
Though each person’s way of thinking differs as uniquely as their face, this urge to systematize philosophy upon immovable bedrock appears nearly universal among philosophers.
Yet from our perspective, this very impulse breeds multitudinous fallacies.

The closer things were to hand, the more certainly they could be known.
For example, when measuring an object's dimensions—if dealing with desks or bookcases—one could apply a ruler directly; thus, within the limits of what that ruler indicated, it could be measured with considerable accuracy.
That was to say, no matter how many people measured it or how many times they measured it, the results were generally consistent; the same desk never measured two shaku five sun one time and two shaku six sun another.
However, when measuring the length of a road, since one could not apply a long ruler all at once, one had to measure small sections successively with a relatively short ruler and later sum these to determine the total length; yet even this slight additional effort already rendered the result somewhat inaccurate—for measuring twice yielded two different lengths, and measuring thrice yielded three—ultimately leaving no choice but to adopt an averaged length.
When measurement was conducted using other methods without directly applying a ruler, the degree of accuracy diminished further as the effort required merely became even more excessive.
Even if calculations showed Mount Fuji’s height as so many thousands of *shaku* above sea level with so many *sun* and *bu*, the last three or four digits actually held no meaning.
If tailors were to take measurements for basting by hauling out sextants and levels like in the land of scholars from *Gulliver’s Travels*—calculating angles to determine dimensions—one could never predict what sort of Western garments might result.

The same applies to smaller things; when we cannot apply a ruler directly, we must resort to indirect measurement methods—but as methods grow more indirect, results inevitably become less accurate.
Statements may record a bacterium’s length as 0.0035 millimeters or a particle’s diameter as 0.0008 millimeters—measurements requiring the highest-grade microscopes—but in actual practice during such measurements, light rays from both specimen and micrometer pass through multiple refracting glass elements and reflect off numerous mirrors; thus even minimal errors immediately distort results beyond precise determination.
Moreover when calculations emerge after repeated additions/subtractions/multiplications/divisions—their accuracy becomes profoundly suspect.
This principle equally governs weight measurements: stating beef by the pound or bread by half-pound proves reliable enough—yet Earth’s weight calculations involving thousands/millions of tons rest upon layered conjectures leaving their credibility unmeasurable.

In other cases as well—whether in space, time, or the chain of cause and effect—what can be known most accurately remains always limited to those parts closest to oneself and most readily accessible.
Compared to what lies visible before our eyes, what remains hidden proves poorly understood, while what lies distant and unseen grows still more obscure.
Separate matters by towns and countries—the farther removed they become, the less accurately they may be known.
Though it stands clear that actual events can only unfold one way, reports of them vary remarkably.
No sooner does one account state someone was captured by a radical faction than others claim they've already crossed national borders into hiding.
Where some report a strike peacefully resolved at a certain location, others insist it grows ever more intense with no end in sight.
Since no person can occupy two places at once nor any strike be both settled and ongoing simultaneously, one account must surely err—yet distance renders verification impossible.
Time follows this same pattern: while means exist to discern truth from falsehood in yesterday's or today's affairs, ancient matters become difficult to parse between occurrence and fabrication.
There stand frequent cases where historians erase figures long believed real—proving through research they never existed.
They say one man tore his history book upon hearing news-vendors' conflicting accounts beneath windows, declaring if even today's reports vary so wildly then ancient tales prove worthless—yet this truth persists unavoidable: our knowledge grows ever more inaccurate as events recede from present immediacy.
Since even concluded history follows this law, predictive knowledge of future matters must inherently prove uncertain beyond all need for stating.

Thus human knowledge was most certain where closest to oneself; as it moved away from oneself, it became increasingly inaccurate, and beyond a certain distance ceased entirely.
The state of affairs differed not from standing in dark night holding a lantern.
As light moved from its source diminishing inversely with distance squared, knowledge's certainty appeared to decrease at equal or greater rates when distancing from oneself.
Particularly when tracing cause-effect chains link by link, each transition allowed error infiltration making unavoidable contamination through several links.
Even imagining ten percent error per reasoning step—yielding half error by fifth step—reality saw errors rarely confined thus; continuing through steps risked total corruption unbeknownst.
Reading traditional philosophy thus revealed all erring in starting point selection.
Though argument methods differed completely, every philosopher built systems upon painstakingly reached foundations through forward reasoning.
From our perspective—seeing knowledge as lantern-light growing dubious with distance—this inverted approach labored to comprehend all by uncertain foundations.
Why such folly? The reason lay clearly in analogical error.
As iron bridges required solid foundations first, people assumed knowledge must follow suit.
We termed such philosophies bridge-pier type—yet while real piers strengthened with depth reaching bedrock, philosophical ones weakened until cloud-grasping; equating them proved grave error.
Future philosophy must recommence from lantern's brightest point, striving to expand radius into surrounding darkness.

Now then, where lay the brightest part of this light? According to our view, this was none other than the child's mind not yet captured by philosophy.
Regarding matters that children—before contemplating philosophy—believed everyone accepted as existing, we should first take them as given; regarding matters they never considered problematic at all—whether they existed or not—we should first set them aside without question. By taking such a state as our starting point and gradually supplementing knowledge while correcting errors, we would likely advance without falling into grave fallacies.
Not a single child among them troubled their head with needless matters like questioning whether the person visible before their eyes truly existed or whether that person might not actually exist beyond their mere perception.
They firmly believed that the person visible before their eyes was truly there, never even dreaming there could exist such a fool as to doubt this.
Whether it be a blue tree, a red flower, a hard stone, or soft tofu, they firmly believed—without the slightest doubt—that each thing they saw existed there exactly as perceived.
The brightest part of the lantern's light lay precisely here.
While what people chose to believe or doubt remained their own affair, from our perspective this state of children appeared to contain far fewer errors than conclusions reached by philosophers through multiple stages of reasoning.
Christ had taught that to enter heaven one must return to a child's heart; but to enter philosophy too, one must first return to the child's mind that contemplated no philosophy and start anew from there.
Just as one who became lost at Yawata's Impenetrable Grove had no choice but to retreat and try another path when reaching an impasse, would it not be wise for philosophers too to once return to the entrance and begin their research anew from a different starting point?
Our philosophy asserted only that we should take the child's mind as our starting point and expand our thoughts upward, downward, leftward, rightward, forward, and backward from there—since we sought no unshakable foundation, one might even call it balloon philosophy for lacking a base. Yet when considered carefully, Earth itself was but a kind of balloon; thus we saw no need for deference when comparing it to traditional bridge-pier philosophy.

III. Method

Now then, while we have established the child’s mind as our starting point, when it comes to gradually extending this radius to expand our thoughts outward—as to what method we should employ—according to our view, what requires utmost caution here is liberation from the shackles of language.
Since modern humans cannot think without using language, speaking of liberation from the shackles of language is in truth a matter of degree—absolute liberation is not something one could ever hope to attain.
However, if one uses language with that mindset from the very beginning, one could think somewhat more freely.
Earlier we stated that it is advisable to place our starting point in the child’s mind; but even when gradually advancing our thoughts from there, we must first return to the child’s circumstances, use language with the same attitude as children do, and thereafter merely add new words only as necessary—by doing so, we may manage to avoid introducing superfluous errors.
Ideally, if we could once return to an era when language did not yet exist and start anew—thinking entirely without its aid—this would be most splendid; but as this seems a slightly unreasonable demand, we must at least imitate the way children, whose entrapment by language remains shallow, use words, advancing our thoughts while taking care never to be ensnared by language.

The first mistake arising from being ensnared by language was mistakenly believing boundaries existed where there were none.
Originally, the names of things had been given to distinguish them from others; it went without saying they were based on distinction.
Assigning distinct names to things that differed from one another was both convenient and necessary in daily life.
When children used words, they merely expressed distinctions without considering whether boundaries existed.
They spoke of stomachaches, itchy backs, sprained ankles, and scraped knees—conveying meaning without inconvenience—yet never considered where the stomach began and ended, where the boundary between stomach and back lay, or how far the knee extended and where the leg’s domain started.
Children used the names of things merely as an expedient to distinguish them from others, and as long as they did so, no grave errors arose.
However, when humans began engaging in philosophy, they refused to accept things as they were and inevitably insisted on defining every single word—this marked the very genesis of fallacy.
For creating definitions was nothing other than establishing boundaries where none existed for convenience, but as one continued using them, one easily came to assume such boundaries had existed from the very beginning.
If one opened an anatomy textbook, one would find the human body’s surface divided into several regions—each boundary delineated with red lines and assigned names like the epigastric region, mesogastric region, hypogastric region, mammary region, sternal region, and anterior cervical region—but on the actual human body’s surface, there were of course no such boundaries.
No matter how meticulously one searched, no distinct boundary lines could ever be found between the epigastric and mesogastric regions, nor between the mesogastric and hypogastric regions.
This state of affairs was akin to there being no boundary line between Shitaya Ward and Asakusa Ward no matter how one searched the ground, and no boundary line between Nihonbashi Ward and Honjo Ward no matter how one examined the bed of the Sumida River.
If asked where the neck began and ended, or where the arm began and ended, one might answer based on anatomical textbook illustrations—yet when confronted with an actual specimen, they would immediately be at a loss.
In this way, all definitions of things’ names amounted to nothing more than boundaries arbitrarily set by humans according to their own convenience; yet when confronted with a real object, this fact became immediately apparent.
In contrast, when dealing with abstract words that offered no convenience for inspecting actual objects, one developed a habit of thinking that the boundary lines one had drawn truly existed there—a habit not easily shed—and this was already a symptom of being ensnared by language.
They could not rest until establishing clear boundary lines between their own land and their neighbor’s, nor feel secure without digging ditches to demarcate borders between their nation and neighboring countries—yet this same mentality extended to the realm of words, compelling them to demarcate boundaries between each term lest they feel unable to organize their concepts, hence their strenuous efforts to formulate definitions above all else.
Thus, once they demarcated territories between the domains of each word, they became ensnared by them, ultimately believing without doubt that wherever such demarcations existed, there must indeed be corresponding natural boundaries in reality.
The reason philosophers had engaged in endless disputes over the territorial boundaries of words since ancient times was that, though ensnared by language themselves, they remained unaware of this fact.

The second mistake arising from being ensnared by language was modeling things while remaining unaware of doing so.
When one took natural objects in hand and examined them, not a single one was absolutely identical to another; however, since distinguishing them by assigning separate names to each and every one proved utterly impossible, we had no choice but to gather those that were somewhat similar to each other up to a certain degree into a group and assign a single name to it.
Terms like "dog," "cat," "pine," and "bamboo" were names of categories created in this manner; however, when one continued using such designations, they eventually came to think all things called by the same name were identical, readily forgetting the fact that each individual within them differed from the others.
Furthermore, as a result of forgetting the differences among things called by the same name, they came to regard the differences between things called by different names as always amounting to a fixed quantity.
For instance, even though each individual dog differed from another, when they used the word “dog,” they tended to regard all dogs as identical and ignore their differences; similarly, when employing the word “cat,” they tended to consider all cats identical and felt as though the degree of difference between any dog and any cat remained constant.
This reshaped what actually differed into a form without differences and transformed uneven areas into a flat plane; thus, it was clearly a modeling of reality.
When differences among things called by the same name became conspicuous, we further subdivided them and assigned individual names; yet even then, it merely descended one step on the staircase—the mindset in handling them remained entirely unchanged.
That is, if one divided dogs into Setters, Pointers, Terriers, Greyhounds, and so forth and used these names, a tendency arose to regard all Setters as identical and all Pointers as identical; thus, the act of modeling reality remained unchanged from before.
A slope that continuously descended from one high end to another low end contained no sections of identical height; however, since it was impossible to assign names to every single part, one could only select a few of the most distinctive points from among them and be satisfied with assigning those names.
Since things with infinite variation could not be named as they were, there was no way but to divide them into several parts for convenience and assign names—this was equivalent to reshaping a slope into a staircase.
The fruit shop owner who categorized numerous apples—gradually shifting from largest to smallest—into several convenient groups at his discretion, such as six-sen-per-piece and seven-sen-per-piece categories; and the railway official who divided human ages—progressing from newborns to the elderly—into three convenient groups: free-of-charge up to this point, half-fare up to this point, and full-fare from this point onward—both employed precisely the same treatment.
Dividing the colors of a rainbow into seven—if one were to define the range of each color—would amount to creating boundaries where none existed, thereby converting it into a kind of model.

Moreover, when we assign names to things, there arises a tendency to immobilize and fixate them.
Since things that ceaselessly move and change cannot be named as they are, we have no choice but to capture a given moment, assume it remains momentarily stationary, and assign a name accordingly.
By thus capturing several discrete moments and assigning them names, then demarcating boundaries between adjacent names, we come to perceive movement only within these bounded domains, thereby modeling the flow of time as if it alternates between static periods and sudden leaps.
By dividing history into several eras and assigning each era a name, we risk evoking such an impression.
All things between heaven and earth are subject to change; yet since names remain fixed, once something is named and referred to as such, the thing itself inevitably comes to be regarded as fixed.
There have been a great many examples since ancient times of things that are constantly changing coming to be thought of as temporarily fixed—we can surmise that language played no small role in this.

As discussed above, when we use language to contemplate things, we inevitably create boundaries where none exist and model phenomena according to linguistic constructs. This principle applies not merely to tangible matter but equally permeates intangible, abstract domains.
In tangible objects' case, since we could directly inspect actual instances to verify boundaries' existence and models' correspondence with reality, discovering errors proved relatively easy. However, with intangible matters—where such verification became exceedingly difficult—even flawed arguments could maintain their deceptive facades indefinitely.
While we naturally refrained from naming nonexistent entities in tangible contexts, intangible discussions frequently saw us imagining unreal concepts and assigning them names—whereupon we began feeling these named phantoms possessed actual existence.
When observing how these purely imaginary constructs—which would never have merited discussion unnamed—became hotly debated by multitudes solely through nominal existence's alchemy, we clearly perceived modern scholars' enslavement to language.
Therefore, when reasoning about phenomena's nature, one had to exercise utmost caution—shedding language's shackles completely while vigilantly avoiding mental entanglements through verbal traps.

IV. Caution

Our philosophy, as outlined above, asserts that we should take the child’s mind as our starting point and advance our arguments while taking care not to become ensnared by language; yet when considering what mindset one ought to adopt in observing phenomena, this requires taking an attitude diametrically opposed to that of the child’s mind.
Children will ask their parents or accompanying adults about anything they do not understand, but they become satisfied simply by receiving any answer at all.
In other words, they possess a disposition to believe everything they hear without question—a tendency that is absolutely forbidden in philosophy.
Religion, proclaiming "Blessed are those who believe without seeing," demands belief from the outset, but philosophy must approach all things with the intent to critique and study.
According to our view, those who would construct a school of philosophy must adopt an attitude of believing nothing at face value—as though having spent fifty years of life in perpetual deception, or like an old man who has already exhausted all capacity for love and hatred in this world.
If one considers that the history of human knowledge up to the present day has been a continuous process of erring and correcting errors, then it is highly questionable to affirm anything with undue haste; but particularly in philosophy—which reasons from premise to premise—even a single error introduced anywhere can render all subsequent conclusions invalid; therefore, one must exercise utmost caution at each step of the argument.

We must not only refrain from taking at face value what people say or what is written in books but also verify even what we think we have directly seen or touched.
If we open a physiology textbook, we find numerous examples of illusions and hallucinations; but should we neglect special caution, we may well end up believing quite erroneous things as they are.
Even parallel lines will appear non-parallel if one adds diagonal lines to them, and even a single pea will feel like two if placed between crossed fingers and stroked.
However, if one measures with a ruler observes with their eyes or touches with their palm they can easily discern that the lines remain parallel and there is only one pea; thus they will not persist in mistakenly believing the illusion.
Even rubber balls of the same size will feel larger when stroked with a short stick and smaller when stroked with a long stick but if you open your eyes you can immediately correct this error.
Because humans possess several types of sensory organs even if they perceive an error through one sense organ by examining it with another they will recognize the mistake and it will never persist as an error.
However if one becomes careless in their attention there are countless examples where a rope appears as a snake or mist as a ghost and the person who witnessed this firmly believes they have indeed seen a snake or ghost.

A hallucination occurs when one sees what does not exist or fails to see what does exist; however, this phenomenon proves far from rare when suffering from feverish conditions.
Were all people worldwide to contract identical fevers and share matching hallucinations, there would exist no means of correction—yet such uniform pathology could never manifest in reality. Around any fevered patient stand dozens to hundreds of healthy individuals, enabling immediate verification of the patient's perceptual errors through comparative observation.
Inhaling gases or ingesting medications induces nervous system alterations that may produce hallucinations—a mechanism comprehensible to any rational mind—yet countless hallucinatory instances arise independent of illness or pharmacology.
Should one immerse themselves in circumstances radically diverging from ordinary life, or persistently undertake abnormal activities beyond habitual patterns, their nervous system's condition might shift—granting perception of phenomena invisible to others or sensitivity to imperceptible stimuli.
In such cases, individuals often mistake hallucinations for reality, constructing capricious worldviews upon these false foundations; from our perspective, such visions warrant identical treatment to febrile delusions.
Through severe ascetic practices like those of Indian religious devotees, practitioners might behold vivid apparitions of radiant Buddhas—yet these luminous visions remain personal phantoms, compelling no universal belief.
The peculiar neural state attained through specialized training by particular individuals differs from ordinary healthy humans precisely as does the condition of fever patients—in both cases representing deviations from normative neurological functioning.

If we then ask what we ought to believe, according to our view, it remains safest to trust what has been observed through paying due attention—where ordinary healthy humans in ordinary circumstances inspect sensory organ A’s error through sensory organs B, C, and D.
Once doubt begins, it knows no bounds; thus we must resign ourselves to believing at some juncture. Yet considering the previously discussed hallucinations caused by illness or medication, we have no choice but to take as our standard ordinary healthy individuals—unafflicted by disease and untainted by pharmaceutical influence—and collectively trust what these humans believe they have seen and heard.
Our philosophy takes the child’s mind as its starting point, strives to break free from language’s shackles, and intends to advance step by step with vigilance against error’s infiltration; but this amounts to disregarding conventional philosophy entirely and proceeding along an untrodden path.
We attempt to wipe clean a blackboard wholly covered with intricate terminology before making fresh markings upon it.
We have now demolished all idols people have worshipped until now, and if possible would prefer to dispense with idols henceforth—but how might this be received?
In any case, were one to construct a philosophical system under this policy, something distinct from conventional frameworks might take shape; however, we ourselves no longer possess either time or inclination for such undertakings.
Therefore we shall merely set down a few thoughts conceived under this policy before proceeding to what follows.

V. Human Beings

First, when attempting to discuss human beings—if we returned to the child’s mind—what seemed certain was as follows.
There existed many human beings similar to ourselves.
When comparing them one by one, there were certainly differences, but on the whole, they were similar.
Not only their physical forms but also their daily activities were mostly similar.
Such human beings lived in houses built upon the ground and survived by eating food every day.
If they did not eat, their stomachs grew unbearably empty.
Apart from human beings, there were animals such as dogs and cats, and they ate food every day.
They too could not live without eating food.
Such matters were firmly believed without doubt by children, but according to our philosophy, this was considered far more certain than the conclusions traditional philosophers reached after racking their brains.
The fact that through sexual intercourse between men and women a woman became pregnant and a child was born was something adults did not inform children of, so children remained unaware; however, if children had been granted the same experiences as adults possessed, they would undoubtedly have believed it without question.
The same applied to the reproduction of dogs and cats.
That human beings, dogs, and cats alike were killed and died, died from illness, and died of old age was something children certainly knew.
There were indeed many things that children knew about human beings, dogs, and cats; but if we took these pieces of knowledge as our starting point and experimentally investigated them step by step, we ultimately came to know the following.

The beginning of each human individual arises from a single cell formed by the combination of a sperm detached from the male parent's testicular tissue and an egg cell detached from the female parent's ovarian tissue.
This cell divides into numerous cells; these cells gradually combine to form various organs, ultimately taking on the shape of a small human being.
Remaining within the uterus and nourished by the mother’s body, the initially minuscule fetus gradually grows, becoming an infant of appropriate size by the time of birth when fully developed.
After birth, they first grow vigorously through breast milk and later through food; when their reproductive glands mature, men and women naturally seek each other out, bear several children, and while crying and laughing all the while, eventually grow old and die from some trivial illness.
As for what becomes of them after dying in this manner—whether burned to ashes or buried to decompose—in either case they cease to be their former human selves.
If we briefly describe each human individual’s entire course from beginning to end as outlined above; this much at least appears reasonably certain.

Now as to how humanity—this aggregation of human beings—came into existence: in former times people had no conception whatsoever, but through biological advances we can now make reasonable conjectures.
This discussion belongs to biological evolutionary theory—to explain it thoroughly would require an entire volume by itself—but extracting only its essence here yields the following.
That is to say, both humans and other animals all originate from a common ancestor.
Whether dogs, cats, horses or cattle—trace them back far enough and they share ancestors; just as within a human family there exist siblings, cousins, children of cousins and grandchildren of cousins, so too among animal species exist both close and distant relations.
By close relation we mean those that diverged from a shared ancestor relatively recently; distant relation indicates those separated from a common ancestor long ago.
The closer the relation between organisms, the more similar their bodily forms and structures.
Those distantly related show markedly greater differences in physical structure.
Now among creatures, apes most resemble humans—specifically Eastern Hemisphere apes over American ones, with great apes like orangutans and chimpanzees bearing closest resemblance.
Thus among all animals, apes share closest kinship with humans—orangutans in particular being our nearest relatives.
To rephrase—go back but a short time and apes and humans converge upon a single ancestor.
That is to say: humankind constitutes one species among many animals that diverged relatively recently from a shared ancestor with apes, subsequently surpassing all others to attain its present dominant status.
Of course there were no eyewitnesses to this process—yet evidence compelling such conclusions abounds throughout biology's domains—all tangible proofs that even children could grasp through patient explanation—and thus we must recognize this as containing fewest errors at present.

VI. Soul

Many people appear to believe that even when a human body dies and decays, the soul alone endures long afterward; but from our perspective, this constitutes an error wholly ensnared by language.
When comparing living humans and corpses, living humans exhibit warm bodies, active movement, respiration, pulse, and discernment.
The corpse conversely lies cold and motionless; respiration and pulse cease entirely, with no apparent capacity for discernment.
They say the living possess life while the dead have lost it.
So long as terms like "alive," "dead," "having life," or "lacking life" merely express differences between these states, one avoids error; but when crafting definitions for "life," demarcating its boundaries with ropes to partition neighboring concepts—there begins the fallacy.
And in this endeavor, arithmetic lends substantial aid.

In nature, there existed neither numbers nor addition and subtraction.
Adding, subtracting, and calculating numbers were arbitrary acts performed by humans.
When people became accustomed to numerical calculations—as in how subtracting three from ten left seven, or subtracting two from seven left five—they developed a habit of applying this method to all things. Upon observing certain differences between living and dead humans, they immediately began subtracting and adding: concluding that a living person minus a dead person equaled life, or a dead person plus life equaled a living person; and when a living person became a dead person, they regarded life alone as having fled somewhere.
This arbitrarily created boundaries where none existed and forcibly separated what should not have been separated—thus constituting a grave error.
If one used words merely to express the distinction between awake and sleeping people, no error arose; but should someone arithmetically subtract consciousness from an awake person to conceive of a sleeping person—thereby imagining consciousness as something that could exist independently—they again fell into the same error as before.
Once, upon encountering a passage in some book stating that removing color from an object left form, and removing form left essence, I had felt terrified at what renowned arguments might emerge from such thinking—for this stood as a prime specimen of being ensnared by plus and minus.
Perhaps those who observed dyers coloring white cloth indigo or bleaching indigo cloth white had conceived such notions, but stripping away form to leave only essence would have proven exceedingly difficult.
Those who imagined souls escaping bodies at death regarded lived existence as akin to dyeing a corpse’s soul—yet this notion’s origin lay, as previously stated, in linguistic entrapment: creating boundaries where none existed and becoming entangled in the very ropes they themselves had stretched.

Upon such a foundation, there came to be numerous circumstances that made it seem as though souls existed separately; thus, everyone came to think in this manner.
Those circumstances referred to the existence of countless phenomena throughout heaven and earth that defied interpretation by human knowledge.
When considering humanity’s origins and reflecting on how until yesterday we were akin to apes, it was naturally expected that there were countless things beyond human wisdom’s comprehension. Yet failing to recognize this, people yearned to rationalize the incomprehensible until they felt they’d grasped it—hence the growing necessity for souls.
When something mysterious occurred, if one attributed it to the work of souls, they could then feel as though they’d grasped the reason—at least provisionally.
Even if a tree fell, a house burned down, a child got injured, or a dog died—if they attributed it all to the work of souls—an explanation could be found.
Especially when it concerned something that the deceased, had they been alive, would surely have concealed, it sounded all the more plausible.
For instance, if on the day a wine-loving old man died, the stopper of a sake barrel naturally came loose and spilled its contents, or if on the seventh day after a spiteful mother-in-law’s death, a shelf’s sake bottle fell and struck her daughter-in-law’s head, people felt as though the soul still lingered within the house—and if such occurrences repeated, they grew convinced that souls must indeed exist.
It was said that even if one were to predict clear skies every day throughout the year, over half would prove accurate; yet since coincidental hits were naturally bound to occur in abundance, if one disregarded the misses and tallied only the hits, it appeared as splendid evidence indeed.
Given such circumstances, the existence of souls had been widely believed since barbaric times; and as long as people believed that souls remained even after death, various rituals and customs based on this belief arose.
Since souls were neither visible to the eye nor responsive when called, people came to believe that souls must reside in some distant land, and that upon death, one must journey there. Thus, they dressed the deceased in traveling attire, made them carry a staff, put straw sandals on their feet, and even provided some travel expenses for their departure.
If this were today, they would add a trunk and hatbox, equipping them with express train tickets and consulate-endorsed travel documents.
While believing them to be in such distant lands, yet also thinking of them as being by their side, they calmly continued making daily offerings of food and music, paying no heed to the contradiction between these notions.
Even if it was said that civilization had advanced, the minds of ordinary people had not progressed much; such childish ideas had been passed down almost unchanged to the present day, and a great variety of rituals and customs still remained.

As long as people believed souls existed, situations would occasionally arise where they wished to exchange views with the dead; when this occurred, there gradually emerged special humans who served as intermediaries.
In barbaric countries and semi-civilized nations, there were always shamans or magicians who served as interpreters, translating and conveying the words of souls to the living.
Of course, some of these pronouncements hit the mark while others missed, but if one gathered even those that were fifty percent accurate or thirty percent accurate, there was no shortage of cases sufficient to astonish unsophisticated people with minds prone to credulously believing anything.
Thus belief in the existence of souls grew ever more deeply entrenched.
Even in today’s so-called civilized nations, there are several people who publicly report on what they call spiritual research—studying the work of souls, claiming to have conversed with the dead or taken photographs of ghosts.

As we had previously stated, our view remained that belief in souls resulted from misapplying subtraction where it should not be applied—a consequence of language's entrapment. Were we to apply the same logic to candles, we had to consider them thus: When comparing a burning candle with an extinguished one, the burning candle possessed both flame and light emission while its extinguished counterpart lacked both. Therefore, subtracting light from a burning candle rendered it extinguished; adding light to an extinguished candle made it burn anew. Subtracting an extinguished candle from a burning one left only light behind—thus proving light's independent existence persisting eternally beyond the candle's disappearance.

Yet people persistently ignored this necessary logic. Though extinguishing a candle's flame transformed visible light into invisible light they never considered eternal, this disregard stemmed from light's indirect personal relevance and their lack of encounters suggesting invisible light's existence. By pure logical comparison, asserting souls' survival beyond bodily death differed not at all from claiming invisible light's endurance beyond candle extinction. Terms like "burning candle" or "extinguished candle" merely described states of candle existence; calculating their difference through arithmetic subtraction constituted profound error. Similarly, phrases like "living human" and "dead human" simply indicated bodily existence states—terms requiring strict adherence to this limited conceptual scope.

It was said that with the first cup, the person drinks the sake; with the second, the sake drinks the sake; and with the third, the sake drinks the person. Language followed precisely this pattern: while people held the reins and controlled it, matters stood well enough, but all too readily they found themselves dragged along by words—until ultimately becoming complete slaves to language, prone to thinking and believing everything exactly as language dictated.

Believing in souls separated from the body constituted the inevitable outcome of such progression.

VII. Universe

A certain philosophy book contained the following analogy.
Two Chinese men who spoke no French came to Paris and attended a theater performance.
One of them walked about intently observing the stage and backstage mechanisms, endeavoring to thoroughly understand matters such as how the curtain was raised, where the light came from, what moved the waves, and what produced the sound of wind.
The other remained quietly seated in his chair, intently observing the actors’ movements and attempting to comprehend the play’s plot.
The former exemplified how natural scientists approach the universe; the latter exemplified how philosophers approach it.
At first glance this appears a remarkably apt analogy, but from our perspective—given the fundamental fallacy in its analogical reasoning—it cannot be considered truthful.
This metaphor first presupposes that the universe inherently contains a fixed narrative like a theatrical play—but how valid is this foundational assumption?
To one who approaches all things with cautious skepticism from the outset, this constitutes the primary doubt.
Moreover, even were we to provisionally accept that the cosmic drama possesses such a plot, it remains profoundly questionable whether human comprehension could ever grasp its nature.
As becomes evident from reading even one of Maeterlinck’s entomological works, the non-human world appears governed by forms of understanding fundamentally alien to ours—given this reality, does it not constitute rash presumption to treat comprehension as humanity’s exclusive domain while dogmatically denying alternative modes of understanding?
Though debating such infinite matters may seem utterly futile, since many persist in believing the universe progresses toward fixed purposes like some cosmic narrative, we shall simply state this: those who begin from the child’s mind and reason stepwise with scrupulous care against error will never reach such definitive conclusions.

There are exceedingly many people who believe that besides the visible universe, there exists yet another invisible universe.
I once read a book titled *The Invisible Universe*; those who believe souls exist likely have no choice but to acknowledge an invisible universe as the dwelling place of souls.
If one believes there exists something formless, immaterial, and transcending the laws of physics and chemistry that uniformly governs the visible universe, then they must posit another universe distinct in nature from this visible one—for there would otherwise be nowhere to place such an entity.
People who imagine an invisible universe beyond the visible one are picturing a two-story universe in their minds.
That is to say, the lower room constitutes the visible universe where we actually reside; the second-floor room constitutes the invisible universe where numerous souls lodge.
When humans die, their bodies alone decay and vanish, but their souls promptly climb the ladder to the second floor, joining the company of those who have been there all along.
Once they have climbed up to the second floor, they cannot come back down again.
Therefore, it can also be said that they have embarked on a journey from which there is no return by ascending to the second floor.
The ancient Egyptians, believing that souls would descend again from the second floor, preserved their corpses with utmost care out of concern that their bodies might be gone when that time came.
These are none other than the mummies that have remained until today, thousands of years later.
If one considers how flustered they become when unable to find their coat or shoes upon returning from a banquet, they can fully comprehend the soul’s predicament when its matching-tag body cannot be located.
In any case, as long as they believe there exists something called a soul separate from the body, they cannot avoid conceiving of the universe as dual.

Whether called the afterlife, the future, Heaven, or the spirit world—despite their varied names—the invisible universe ultimately amounts to nothing more than the second floor of the visible universe.
Interestingly, this upper chamber always closely resembles the lower one.
Though people may combine known elements through imagination in various ways, they appear incapable of conceiving truly novel things; thus every nation's heaven is built solely from materials found in the earthly realm below—merely idealized versions of them.
A certain farmer reportedly declared, "Were I king, I'd fashion manure-bucket hoops from gold"—and heavens follow this pattern: in Eskimo heavens swim seals resplendent as brocade cloth, while Indian heavens bloom lotus flowers large as wagon wheels.
In African heavens, gorillas and lions likely grow docile, while South Seas heavens probably dangle bananas filling the very sky.
In every such case, the spirit world's materials are drawn from the visible universe close at hand.
This state of affairs differs not at all from how an inept author—however strenuously they labor—cannot produce anything beyond an inept novel.
Therefore, should one dispassionately conduct comparative studies of heavens conceived by diverse world cultures, their nature as imaginative constructs would become plain.

As we had previously stated, according to our view, it was a mistake to believe there existed something called a soul separate from the body. If one did not believe such a thing existed, the need to imagine a dual universe completely disappeared. When one took as their starting point the child's mind that believed only in visible things, constructed arguments while guarding against linguistic entrapment and considering only what could be known with certainty, not the slightest reason emerged to imagine another universe beyond the visible one. To tell the truth, if one had completely forgotten all traditional ways of thinking and started afresh from the beginning, the question of whether the universe was single-layered or double-layered would not have even arisen. When we said there was no need for us to conceive of the universe as dual here, this did not mean we had taken up the question of whether the universe was single-layered or double-layered as a worthy subject of study, thoroughly investigated it, and concluded that it need not be considered dual. We were merely maintaining a continuation of the child’s mind that did not keep such matters in mind, simply not keeping them in consideration.

VIII. Gods

There were various kinds of gods.
There were places that worshiped stones and trees as gods, and countries that enshrined foxes and wolves as deities.
There were races that revered living humans as gods, and ethnic groups that worshiped the souls of deceased chieftains as deities.
However, omitting here any discussion of the gods of such barbarian nations and semi-civilized peoples, let us consider solely the creator God of heaven and earth long believed in by so-called civilized peoples.

What would you think if you woke in the morning and saw an apple by your pillow?
Would you think the apple had appeared there naturally, or would you think someone had brought it while you slept?
Consider this carefully.
Since an apple could not appear there by itself, this must surely have been brought by one's mother or sister.
Even a single apple could not be there unless someone had brought it.
Then what of this world?
Could this world that provides us food, provides us clothing, and provides us shelter possibly be thought to have come into being by itself?
Thus, if there existed a being who created this vast, boundless universe, that being must indeed have been a God who knew all things and was capable of all things.
The above was what we had been told by zealous Christian believers in our childhood; however, the faith in a creator's existence likely originated from such reasoning.
Yet according to our view, this too—like those Chinese theatergoers of before—was a completely mistaken analogy.

The belief in an invisible god was of course closely related to the belief in an invisible soul. Had there been no belief that souls remained after death, believing solely in an invisible god's existence would have been far more difficult. This was because there existed nothing else with which to compare it. Conversely, as long as one believed there was something called an invisible soul, believing in an invisible god posed no difficulty whatsoever. Particularly when people constructed the universe as a two-story structure and made souls reside in the upper room, placing the invisible god there to coexist became extremely convenient. Through this process, where god dwelled always coincided with where souls resided, and when humans died, only their souls would go to god's side. Indeed, Western children were taught by parents and teachers to believe exactly this way, though most adult conceptions differed little. They imagined god always inhabiting the heaven above their heads, decreed that souls ascended to heaven upon death, and when invoking god would say "Our God who art in heaven" before each offering their prayers.

In Europe and America, from ancient times to the present day, all had believed in the existence of such a creator god of heaven and earth, and both daily lives and occasional rituals were established based on this faith.
Therefore, today’s civilization appeared to have an almost inseparable relationship with belief in god.
Since nothing arises without cause, the fact that belief in god had persisted so widely and for so long must naturally have had substantial reasons; however, according to our view, this did not mean god actually existed, but rather stemmed from how the human mind was structured to enable such belief and from circumstances that compelled it.
However, in any case, precisely because people had believed this for so long, the faith had already permeated deeply into human minds; even if they now thought through reason that there were no grounds to maintain such belief, they might have felt as though an emptiness lingered in its wake, unable to suppress unease.

While this was an unavoidable consequence of a sort of inertia, in philosophy that advances progressively through pure reason, it would be proper to disregard it entirely.

IX. Society

Having briefly outlined our thoughts on the soul and God above, when we now turn to say a word about human society—discarding all conventional ways of thinking and attempting to fundamentally reconsider the matter as if returning to a time when we had heard nothing—we arrive at conclusions significantly different from what the majority of people currently believe.
Regarding this matter, we have already presented our views once or twice, but summarizing the key points, they are as follows.

In the present world, there exists not a single animal species capable of competing with humans on equal terms.
That humans have been able to occupy this position of absolute dominance stems from cerebral development and the power of solidarity.
When comparing human physiology with that of other animals, we find countless creatures far superior in claws, fangs, lungs, or stomachs.
Yet regarding the brain alone, humans stand incomparably advanced, with no other species approaching this attainment.
Equipped with such an exceptional brain, humans conceive ideas, devise tools and machinery, and vanquish formidable adversaries that claws or fangs could never subdue.
While hands capable of crafting and manipulating tools are indeed necessary, numerous beasts besides humans possess such appendages.
All simians naturally qualify, but even prosimians, certain insectivores, and select marsupials bear hands resembling ours.
Had humans lacked hands altogether, they could never have prevailed against other animals; yet hands alone would prove useless without acute cerebral function.
Even with developed brains and functional hands, isolated individuals would have stood no chance against powerful foes.
Modern humans at peak development remain surprisingly vulnerable when separated—their efficacy deriving wholly from collective strength.
In essence, humanity's conquest of all fauna and attainment of current supremacy must be attributed to superior intellect and unity.

However, nothing splendid ever arises suddenly. There was inevitably an initial period when it was not yet splendid, and then, advancing step by step, it finally became something splendid. As for both the human brain and unity, this may indeed hold true; but as to what caused them to progress continuously, according to our view, it was primarily natural selection that eliminated the inferior and allowed only the superior to survive. In particular, regarding unity, as long as competition between groups persisted over time, only the superior groups would inevitably triumph and survive, while all inferior groups were destined to be defeated and perish; thus, there could have been no path other than continuous progress as years passed. When we examine animals that actually live in groups, we find that in all cases their unity only continues to advance, with each individual inevitably becoming a fully integrated member of the group to which they belong.

Amidst such group-living animals where unity advanced unceasingly, there existed but one species in which this cohesiveness showed no progress.
That was, needless to say, humans; but due to special circumstances affecting humanity, the advancement of this trait had ceased.
The special circumstances referred to the fact that through the development of tools and instruments, each group had become extremely large, and as a result, natural selection operating on groups as units had ceased to occur.
Were we to diagram the path humanity had traversed up to that day using the degree of cohesiveness as our standard, it would have taken the shape of a parabola: beginning with a steep ascent that gradually leveled off, remaining at its peak for a time before transitioning into a gradual descent whose slope grew ever steeper as it progressed.
Thus, since human unity had manifested from the very beginning in the form of obedience and advanced in that manner, the relaxation of unity appeared precisely as a decline in obedience—a phenomenon seen with utmost clarity across various aspects of society.
In January of the year before last, we had published two essays titled "The Origin of Freedom and Equality" and "The Age of Anguish," in which we presented the aforementioned ideas; therefore, we omitted repeating them there. However, according to our view, to understand the true nature of present-day human society, it was first and foremost necessary to acknowledge the facts we had elucidated there.
If this was not acknowledged, everything remained incomprehensible; yet if this was acknowledged, one could only nod in agreement that all these things must be as they were.

If there had been eras in human history when obedience increased and eras when it decreased, then it was no wonder that contemporary human society abounded with contradictions.
In what humans did then, there were continuations from when obedience had been prevalent, as well as things newly conceived after obedience had diminished.
The former proved unbearable to new people with diminished obedience, while the latter remained utterly displeasing to old people still rich in obedience.
The contentious issues across all spheres at that time all stemmed from the rebellion of people with diminished obedience against regulations established during obedience's heyday.
In a society that had come to think "they too are human, we too are human," they could not possibly endure treaties that placed others' feet upon their heads; thus, demanding revision became only natural.
Moreover, until then, absolute obedience to superiors' words had been enforced—children toward parents, wives toward husbands, disciples toward masters, servants toward employers—all bound from the outset to never hold their heads up. Yet under such conditions, those who began wondering "Are we humans or mere machines?" increasingly emerged, crying out above all else: "Recognize us too as human."
This too had to be acknowledged as reasonable through certain perspectives, but granting this demand—rendering everyone equal—produced profound contradictions with longstanding customs.
When inquiring into actual problems, each differed in content, but investigating their origins revealed complete identity.

In short, human society of old was tightly united through obedience.
However, as time passed and groups grew larger, natural selection ceased to operate on them as units, causing obedience to begin declining.
As obedience declined, people's ways of thinking changed until they reached the point of vociferously demanding reforms to existing institutions and customs.
Given that natural selection acting upon groups will not recur hereafter, obedience can only continue to decline further, making human unity increasingly tenuous.
The orderliness of past society stemmed from humanity's abundant obedience; therefore, restoring such order requires reviving obedience above all else.
Pre-revolutionary Russia exemplified societies devoting full efforts to this very aim.
Should this prove unachievable, we must abandon obedience and devise new methods for unity through freedom and equality—though judging by humanity's historical record, such success appears profoundly doubtful.

X. Conclusion

The above was merely an exceedingly incomplete account of two or three points selected from what we had habitually considered; however, as we had stated at the beginning of this essay, there existed significant differences from other people's ideas. Neither regarding the starting point of reasoning nor the method of advancing thought had we concerned ourselves in the slightest with how people of the past had approached them; we had simply adopted what we ourselves deemed most excellent. Philosophy being an intensely personal matter—since ten people gathered would produce ten varieties—each found it necessary to devise some name for their own philosophy to distinguish it from others'. Just as beers bore individual names like Kirin, Ebisu, Asahi, and Sapporo, so too in philosophy various names—Empiricism, Rationalism, Pragmatism, Intuitionism—had been affixed; ultimately, however, it all came down to the fact that any conclusion could be reached depending on one's approach to thinking. We did not particularly feel compelled to compare our own ideas with those of others; however, since readers of what we had articulated here might possibly consider this to belong to one of the such-and-such theories or such-and-such doctrines previously known in the world, we would briefly clarify its characteristics.

If we stated there was no need for us to believe in God, some might have called this atheism.
Of course, there would have been no issue with that either.
Yet we had not taken up the question of God's existence nor judged evidence for His being insufficient.
Our reasoning's starting point differed; our method of advancing thought differed—thus we simply never encountered such problems.
When smoke appears during a fire, one discerns direction but not distance; Shinjuku's flames might be mistaken for Edo River's blaze. People often positioned discordant ideas at polar extremes and refuted them accordingly.
We neither engaged debates about God's existence nor absence—merely observed sidelong—yet would likely have been deemed extreme atheists by theists.

Moreover, upon hearing that we do not need to believe in the existence of a soul, some people may name this materialism.
This too was as before—we did not mind being called such.
However, even in this case, we had by no means compared idealism and materialism and adopted the latter.
Because our starting point of thought differed and our method of thinking differed, we had not been placed in a position where we must adopt either idealism or materialism; thus, we simply remained unaware of such necessities.
Moreover, when hearing us explain that the universe need not be considered a two-storied structure, some people may call this monism.
If such a way of thinking was to be named monism, then I would never refuse to be called a monist.
However, our monism was not a monism that arose by rejecting dualism; it was a monism that naturally extended from the child’s mind, and we did not consider it to be in opposition to dualism in the slightest.
Moreover, by taking sufficient care to prevent errors from creeping in step by step and refusing to advance our thoughts unless we acknowledged there was credible evidence, in this regard, it might well be regarded as positivism.
Moreover, in that we left what could not be known as unknown, it might well be called agnosticism.
We had not created a systematic philosophy; we had merely proposed the idea that if one were to start from such a point and advance through such methods, a novel philosophy might emerge.
Although it was an extremely insufficient explanation, if this could serve as even a slight hint for young earnest scholars who wished to deeply contemplate the universe, then the purpose of writing this essay would have been sufficiently achieved.

(Taishō 10, April)