The world riddles

Title page of the first edition

Ernst Haeckel

Die Weltträtsel , in outdated spelling Die Weltträthsel , is the title of a non-fiction book penned by the biologist and philosopher Ernst Haeckel in 1899, it is subtitled “Commonly Understandable Studies on Monistic Philosophy”. In this work, Haeckel presents his monistic worldview as a solution to the world riddle to a broad public; Darwin's theory of evolution is understood as the basic principle of every development. He is particularly hard on the Catholic Church , but sees the ethical foundations of early Christianity as a point of contact with monism and wants to see this as a link between religion and natural science .

construction

The 500-page book is divided into 20 chapters, followed by a concluding discussion and a few appendices. From the tenth, revised edition, an afterword by the author was added in 1907, and the individual chapters were expanded by a few paragraphs.

• I. Anthropological part. The human being
  • Chapter 1: Setting the World Puzzles
  • Chapter 2: Our Physique
  • Chapter 3: Our Lives
  • Chapter 4: Our Germination Story
  • Chapter 5: Our Tribal History
• II. Psychological part. The soul
  • Chapter 6: The essence of the soul
  • Chapter 7: Scale of the Soul
  • Chapter 8: germ history of the soul
  • Chapter 9: Tribal History of the Soul
  • Chapter 10: Consciousness of the Soul
  • Chapter 11: Immortality of the Soul
• III. Cosmological part. The world
  • Chapter 12: The Substance Law
  • Chapter 13: History of the Development of the World
  • Chapter 14: Unity of Nature
  • Chapter 15: God and the World
• IV. Theological part. The God
  • Chapter 16: Knowledge and Belief
  • Chapter 17: Science and Christianity
  • Chapter 18: Our Monistic Religion
  • Chapter 19: Our Monistic Morality
  • Chapter 20: Solving the World Puzzles
• Final consideration
• Attachments
  • Immanuel Kant's antinomies
  • Epistemology
  • Position of psychology in the system of biological sciences
  • Contrast of Fundamental Principles
  • Notes and explanations
  • epilogue

content

The essential starting point for the monistic worldview presented in this work is Darwin's theory of evolution . This and especially the related descent of people, which are a matter of course subject matter at schools of the 21st century, were far removed from social acceptance at Haeckel's time. They were either unknown or discussed controversially and met with fierce opposition, especially from the church. The content, which despite the use of many biological specialist terms, can be described as generally understood, is given in the following in broad outline with a few characteristic quotes in order to give an impression of Haeckel's monistic worldview on the one hand and his attacks against the churches on the other.

Haeckel begins in the first chapter with the achievements of technology and natural science of the 19th century. From biology the cell theory , Darwin's theory of evolution and the overcoming of vitalism are called, from physics the electromagnetism , the unity of natural forces in the entire universe and the principles of matter and energy conservation , which in the age of traffic lead to applications such as telegraphy , steam power , Electricity and improvements in agriculture and medicine ( chloroform ) resulted. In contrast, he complains about the social grievances and the conditions in education and justice as well as the role of the churches in them. Finally, he presents the seven world riddles formulated by Emil du Bois-Reymond in 1880 . In this context, it welcomes the collaboration between philosophy and science, and advocates, citing Goethe and Spinoza to monism as his world view.

In the chapter "Our Body" Haeckel, the affiliation of the people zoological classes such as vertebrates , catarrhines and apes after. In the following chapter he attacks the doctrine of the vis vitalis and contrasts the unity of nature, especially the results of the comparative physiology of Johannes Müller and Kölliker's cell theory. In this way, the integration of humans into zoology is also supported physiologically.

In “Our Germ History” the author refutes the theory of preformation , especially the theory of nesting . He refers to Kölliker's discovery that human eggs and semen are also cells, introduces his gastra theory ( germinal leaf theory ) and concludes from the similarity of the embryonic development of all vertebrates that they have a common ancestry, which in the following chapter with the presentation of the history of the theory of evolution, in particular below Human involvement is deepened based on recently found evidence. The so-called Pithekometra theorem , according to which humans are descended from apes, more precisely from ape-like ancestors, is supported by further evidence in the addition to the chapter.

The following chapters are devoted to the concept of the soul, which is understood in the monistic sense as the sum of all physiological functions (brain activity, sensory activity, language) of an organism and whose research is also methodically placed on a scientific basis. Haeckel quotes from his work Cell Souls and Soul Cells (1878):

“The most wonderful of all natural phenomena, which we conventionally designate with the one word 'spirit' or 'soul', is a very general quality of life. In all living matter, in all protoplasm , we have to accept the first elements of soul life, the simple form of feeling of pleasure and displeasure , the simple form of movement of attraction and repulsion - only the stages of formation and composition of this 'soul' are in the various living creatures different; they gradually lead us from the silent cell soul through a long series of ascending intermediate stages to the conscious and rational human soul. "

In the chapters on the germ and tribal history, Haeckel explains that the soul is subject to the same laws of development as other organs. It begins with the cell soul of the unicellular organisms and describes the increasing complexity of ever higher levels of development, through cell clusters and nerveless metazoa to the vertebrates with their nerve soul and the development of the brain; the human soul is also the product of a long history of development.

The consciousness of the soul is an inner perception that can be compared to a mirror. A distinction is made between self-consciousness (inner reflection) and world-consciousness (sum of all phenomena of the outside world). From the point of view of several scientific approaches, now a smaller, now a larger number of organisms is ascribed an awareness. Haeckel defends himself against the assumption made by du Bois-Reymond that he even adheres to the view held by the atomists that atoms also have a consciousness; he takes the position that consciousness only belongs to the higher mammals and thus also to humans.

In the chapter on the immortality of the soul, the terms athanism, which stands for the belief in personal immortality, and thanatism, which expresses the conviction that life is completely ended with the cessation of life's manifestations, are coined. Athanism, which can be found in Christianity in a special form, but is completely absent in some other religions, is shown by a monistic analysis to be incompatible with modern scientific knowledge, and widespread arguments for athanism are exposed as an illusion.

After the six chapters on the soul, Haeckel now turns to the physical principles. He places the laws of the conservation of matter ( Lavoisier ) and the conservation of energy ( Mayer , Helmholtz ) at the top of his monistic cosmology . The theory of vibration sees the vibrations of the smallest particles as the causes of natural phenomena. Even if the densation theory advocated by Vogt is not subordinate to this vibration theory of modern physics, he calls the following three basic principles "indispensable for a real monistic view of substance":

I. “The two main components of substance, mass and ether , are not dead and can only be moved by external forces, but they have sensation and will (of course the lowest degree!); they feel pleasure in compression, discomfort in tension; they strive for the former and fight against the latter. "

II. “There is no empty space; that part of the infinite space which is not occupied by the mass atoms is filled with ether. "

III. “There is no sudden action at a distance through empty space; all effects of the body masses on each other are either due to direct contact ... or they are mediated by the ether. "

He rejects the dualistic substance theories, which divide the world into spirit and matter, with only the latter subject to the laws of nature, stating that immaterial substances have never been observed. The ether is a "positive fact", it is the imponderable matter of the universe, which mediates all apparent remote effects such as gravitation or electricity through close effects . Finally, he subordinates the concepts of vitality and spiritual life to the “omnipotence of the law of substance” and thus gives a clear rejection of vitalism.

In the chapter on the history of the development of the world, Haeckel postulates an infinite universe with an infinitely long existence in order to avoid the problem of a beginning or a creation in cosmogeny . With emphasis on the universality of the laws of nature, he assumes that processes have been periodically repeated for an infinitely long time, and Clausius' law of entropy , which is incompatible with it, is rejected. For the origin of the earth he refers to the geology that emerged in the 18th century through pioneering work by Hoff and Lyell , for biology and anthropogeny to Lamarck and Darwin , the latter is emphasized as the "Copernicus of the organic world".

Haeckel understands by the “unity of nature”, the title of the following chapter, that life processes are also subject to the same laws as they prevail in the inorganic world; Reinke 's teleological worldview is rejected. Kant's statement: “It is absurd for people to even grasp such an attack or to hope that someday a Newton will be able to stand up who will make understandable even the creation of a blade of grass according to natural laws that have no intention of ordering, but one absolutely has to deny this insight to man. ”it is countered that this“ impossible Newton of organic nature really appeared in Darwin ”; "His ingenious selection theory gives the full solution."

In the chapter "God and the World" different types of religion are presented. The monotheism is the purest still in Islam represented the Amphitheismus (Zweigötterei) is often dualistic as "God and the Devil" trained. “ Catholic polytheism is on a much lower level , in which numerous 'saints' (often of very dubious reputation!) Are worshiped as subordinate deities and seek benevolent mediation with the supreme God (or with his girlfriend and daughter, the 'Virgin Mary') become - a pathetic caricature of Christian 'monotheism'! ”Haeckel also rejects the belief in a trinity of God and the idea of ​​a resurrection of Jesus or the dead. The pantheism proclaimed the unity of God and nature, "the belief of our modern science." Haeckel stands behind Schopenhauer's statement, "Pantheism is only a polite form of atheism , the truth of pantheism consists in the abolition of the dualistic opposition between God and the world." In order to spread the "monistic conviction of the unity of God and nature", one must in the coming 20th century, the "liberate schools from the shackles of the church" and the "modern state detach itself from the gangs of the church regiment".

Knowledge arises through scientific work using sensory organs, with which humans are neither quantitatively nor qualitatively optimally equipped, and the mind. In contrast to this is belief, the uncritical reception of which has led to much disaster.

The following chapter “Science and Christianity” describes the crimes committed by the Catholic Church and the brutal suppression of science. “The papal power raged at its height against everything that stood in the way of its rule.” With the Reformation , the “rebirth of bound reason” begins. In the 19th century, science accumulated so many truths that the “religious worldview of educated circles can only be described as pseudo-Christianity.” Rome opposes this with the following “three punches in the face of reason”: infallibility (July 13, 1870 ), the encyclical Quanta Cura and Syllabus (December 1864), in which “reason and science in general are denied any independent activity”, and the dogma of the immaculate conception (December 1854), which Haeckel goes into in the following text.

“Our monistic religion” should take the place of Christianity. The three goddesses of this religion are truth, beauty and virtue. Truth can only be obtained through natural science, the virtues are the “humanity commandments of love and tolerance, compassion and help”, as they can be found in early Christianity. The beauty in art should no longer be oriented towards a god or a hereafter, but should serve the people now living in this world. The church of monistic religion is nature itself.

In the penultimate chapter “Our monistic moral doctrine”, Haeckel rejects Kant's distinction between practical and pure reason as dualistic. The golden moral law “ Whatever you want people to do to you, do it to them too! "Is derived from the thesis of" man as a social vertebrate "in the balance between egoism and altruism and compared with Jesus' saying" You should love your neighbor as yourself ". Haeckel also proves that this golden moral law is much older and has been partially repealed by current Christianity through contradicting teachings. Once again he deduces a strict separation between church and state. In schools, “Christian sagas and legends should not be taught as truth”, natural history lessons should be given greater weight, and the main goal of schools must be “training in independent thinking”.

In the final chapter the scientific and monistic answers to the questions about the nature of the cosmos, the origin of the earth and the development of life up to and including man are compiled again. The world puzzles have steadily diminished, the "substance problem" remains, the question of the "innermost essence of nature".

Remarks

The first edition was published by Emil Strauss (Bonn) in 1899 and quickly reached an edition of several hundred thousand copies. In 1908 Haeckel added some additions to the chapters and updated the literature. The work formed the first number in the book series Kröner's pocket edition . It has been translated into several languages, such as English and French. The content of the book is now in the public domain and available online, for example at Zeno.org . A short version in Hebrew with the title חידות העולם (hhidoth ha'olam) is available at archive.org .

"With his turn-of-the-century book 'Die Weltträtsel', Ernst Haeckel achieved by far the greatest success in popular science in German book history." It belongs to the ZEIT library of 100 non-fiction books .

The work has made the state of the art in the natural sciences accessible to a broad readership and “above all helped the theory of evolution to make a breakthrough on a broad front”, “a number of its prognoses have been confirmed by later natural sciences, but without their research principles on a monistic-evolutionist worldview to have raised. "

"The anti-clerical character of the book provoked a storm of indignation, especially since Haeckel repeatedly called for the separation of state and church." Haeckel himself commented: "The flood of insults and slander of all kinds, which the 'pious papers' - above all the Lutheran imperial messengers and the Roman Germania - poured over me, surpassed everything that has existed before. "

literature

• Hermann Helbig : World riddle from the point of view of modern science: emergence in nature, society, psychology, technology and religion . Springer, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-662-56288-8 (XX, 787, [1] - reading sample).

Individual evidence

1. ^ Ernst Haeckel: Die Weltträtsel , Books on Demand; Edition: 2 (February 16, 2009), ISBN 3-83705-419-5
2. ^ Ernst Haeckel: The Riddle of the Universe , Prometheus Books (1992), Great Minds Series, ISBN 0-8797-5746-9
3. ↑ Ernst Haeckel: Les Enigmes de L'Univers , Rarebooksclub.com (2012), ISBN 1235017486
4. ↑ The World Riddles at Zeno.org
5. ↑ hhidoth ha'ola, a Hebrew summary
6. ↑ Wolfgang Hogrebe: Borders and Transgressions, XIX. German Congress for Philosophy, 2002, Bonn. Lectures and colloquia , Akademie-Verlag 2004, ISBN 3-05-003835-7 , page 216
7. ↑ Kindlers Neues Literatur-Lexikon , Vol. 7, Ernst Haeckel, Die Welträtsel , p. 151, Kindler, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-89836-214-0
8. ↑ Angelika Weiß-Merklein: Ernst Haeckel ( Memento of the original from October 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.