The Subject. Philosophical Foundations.

Andy Blunden 2005/6

Johann Fichte: The Subject as Activity
According to Johann Fichte, Kant had failed to overcome Descartes dualism and failed
to overcome Humes scepticism; the source of experience had been consigned to a
beyond which could not itself be the object of experience. So there was still a
dichotomy between conception and things-in-themselves. Fichte sought to resolve this
dualism by making the substance of his philosophy activity the free, but also
constrained, activity of individual living human beings.
Each of these centres of activity he called the Ego or the I, and Ego was thereafter the
central category of his theory of science [Wissenschaftslehre]. However, Ego was not
the fundamental category of his philosophy, but rather, had to be derived from activity.
Because Fichte tried to resolve the subjective/objective dichotomy in philosophy by
shifting everything onto the side of the subject, that is, the active individual human being,
rather than Nature (Schelling) or Spirit (Hegel), his philosophy has been called
subjective. As part of the current of philosophy known as Transcendental Idealism, he
called himself an idealist, but by idealism he meant simply the critical approach to
philosophy, in opposition to dogmatism (the doctrine that things are as they are
independently of the subjects activity).
So, he has come down to us as a subjective idealist, a label which is also applied to
Bishop Berkeley. But what a misunderstanding of Fichte this would be! Actually, Fichte
saw himself as part of the Kantian school, but regarded Kant as having erred on the side
of scepticism.
The world is made up of human activity, and nothing can be said of a world beyond
human activity other than that it exists. Kants concept of a thing-in-itself beyond
experience he held to be self-contradictory; how can we talk of a thing which is in
principle beyond experience. For Fichte, the world does exist in human activity, but as its
limit, initially unknown to the Ego, but discovered through its activity. Individual human

activity, or practice, is objective, natural and constrained by necessity, just as much as it

is free and determined by the will of the individual. Activity belongs to both the world of
freedom and the world of necessity.
Thus the concept of activity is a unity of the objective and the subjective, of freedom and
necessity, and provides a substance in which it is possible to describe both the material
world and consciousness.
whether philosophy should begin with a fact [ThatSache] or with an Act (i.e., with a
pure activity [Thtigkeit] that presupposes no object but, instead, produces its own object,
and therefore with an acting, that immediately becomes a deed) is by no means so
inconsequential as it may seem to some people to be. If philosophy begins with a fact,
then it places itself in the midst of a world of being and finitude, and it will be difficult
indeed for it to discover any path leading from this world to an infinite and supersensible
one. If, however, philosophy begins with an Act, then it finds itself as the precise point
where these two worlds are connected with each other and from which they can both be
surveyed in a single glance. [Introductions to the Wissensschaftslehre and Other
Writings, 1994, p. 51]
Fichte had been largely ignored by students of philosophy other than as a passing step on
the way from Kant to Hegel until very recent times. Fichte himself subjected his system
to continual revision, and by the time of his later work in Berlin, although he denied it,
the system which he had developed in the 1790s and which was the context in which
Hegel began his work on the System of Ethical Life, had been altered beyond recognition.
However, it is clear that the critique that Fichte made of Kant and the innovations he
made were a major factor driving Hegel in the formulation of his ideas. In recent times
there has been a resurgence of interest in Fichte in his own right, and Fichtes ideas
prefigure a pragmatic reading of Hegel like those of George Herbert Mead or John
Dewey or the Russians of the Vygotsky School, especially A N Leontyev, as well as those
interpretations of Hegel stemming from Alexander Kojve.

Our concern here is with those novel ideas which Fichte introduced to the solution of the
riddle of subjectivity, and which were reflected, positively or negatively, in the work of
Hegel and his later interpreters. These ideas are of great interest in their own right, a fact
which is evidenced by their re-appearance in twentieth century interpretations of Hegel.
But the fact is that Fichte had influence on the way philosophy unfolded after him only
insofar as he had an impact on Hegel.
Fichte came from a dirt-poor background; an anti-religious essay he was able, thanks to
Goethe, to publish anonymously in 1792 attracted widespread attention, initially having
been assumed to have been written by Kant. Overnight, he became a celebrity, renowned
as a radical young democrat and a Jacobin, actively defending in Germany the principles
of the French Revolution. By May 1794, at the age of 32, he published his
Wissenschaftslehre (Doctrine of Science) and was appointed Professor of Critical
Philosophy at the University of Jena, just at the time when Robespierres Great Terror
was at its peak in Paris, with accused being tried and sent to the guillotine in batches of
50. He not only used his lectures to develop a comprehensive new philosophical position,
but addressed himself to a popular audience and tried to reform university life along
democratic lines. Amidst a vicious public controversy in 1798/9, he was removed from
his position as an atheist and nihilist and had to flee to Berlin.
Fichtes philosophy has to be understood as an attempt by an extreme liberal-democrat to
found science and ethics on a consistent, monist foundation. That foundation was the
independent activity of individual human beings. Instead of founding his ethics, like
Kant, in the form of a moral philosophy, Fichtes ethics was based on the concept of
right, and the limitation of individual freedom which is presupposed in social life.
Fichte aimed not only to overcome dualism in epistemology but also the dualism of
natural necessity versus human freedom, and the dualist separation between practical
philosophy (i.e., ethics) and theoretical philosophy (logic and epistemology). Fichte
insisted that it was necessary to found science on a single principle, but held that such a
first principle cannot be derived by philosophical means. Whether you choose a given
principle to be the founding principle of your theory of knowledge or not depends on

what sort of person you are he said. The choice of a theory of knowledge is therefore
also an ethical act.
Fichtes strategy was to work out the conditions of possibility for a freely and
spontaneously acting Ego (or I), something which is given (if that is the sort of person
you are), but still requires explanation what are the conditions for the existence of a free
individual and what are the conditions for a world in which many such free individuals
live in the same time and space?
The I was both a striving moral agent and a cognizing activity of awareness. But the
Ego is not a substance or original thing; it is the consequence of the act of positing of a
self.
Fichte denied that the self-evidence of I think proved the existence of an I which
thinks. He suggested that this concept leads to an infinite regression: if the activity of
perception is conceived of as a subject interpreting incoming sensations, then the
products of this activity create a second order stream of images or ideas or whatever,
which still presuppose an activity of them being interpreted by another subject, and so on
indefinitely in infinite regress. The idea of a thought presenting itself to a separately
existing subject, accepted by all previous philosophers, is therefore a fallacy.
Fichte asked his students to think of themself; then he asked them to think of the wall
opposite them; then he asked them what it was that was thinking of the wall. This was an
impossible question to answer, because so long as they were absorbed in thinking of the
wall, all that existed in their mind was consciousness of the wall, nothing else. On the
other hand, when thinking about themselves all had the conviction that there was an
object that they were thinking about, namely the subject.
Self-consciousness is therefore immediate; what is subjective and what is objective are
inseparably united within self-consciousness and are absolutely one and the same. ... This
immediate consciousness is the intuition of the I ... at once subjective and objective ...
The I should not be considered as a mere subject, which is how it has nearly always been
considered until now; instead, it should be considered as a subject-object in the sense just

indicated. ... I am this intuition and nothing more whatsoever ... [Introductions to the
Wissenschaftslehre, p. 113-4]
That is, the I is the activity of thinking when it is directed back at itself, it is that activity,
just as when we think of the wall, what we are actually conscious of is our own activity
of thinking of the wall. It is absurd to posit the existence of an I prior to and
independently of the act of thinking about oneself. It is equally inadmissible to posit
the existence of a wall in-itself independently of and prior to the wall as a constraint
and component of our activity in connection with the concept of the wall. That something
exists outside our activity is self-evident, but of what things it is composed of, abstracted
from the forms of our activity which are constrained by it, is a question which cannot
even be asked, let alone answered.
The idea of the wall, and the Ego, as things having a continuing existence independently
of the activity of an I, and the necessity for us to conceive of these things as having an
existence independently of our activity, are things which need to be derived and indeed
they can be derived but not things which can be taken as given, as first principles.
Thus Fichte continues Kants usage of the term subject as an individual, cognising
moral agent, but he rejects the conception of a transcendental subject. The subject in the
sense of a knowing moral agent with a sense of its own identity is something which
Fichte regards as a construct, as something which comes about, but is not a fundamental
given. What is given is activity; activity is the opposite, the negation or cancellation of
being. Of course the only activity we know about is that of an I, albeit not necessarily an I
that has yet directed its subjective activity back on itself, not necessarily yet a selfconscious individual, a free person.
Thus in its original Aristotlean sense, the Fichtean substance is activity, and selfconsciousness, or individual subjectivity, is a product or form of that substance, activity.
Thus rather than taking self-consciousness as some kind of first principle or given datum,
Fichte opened up the problem of deducing how it is that a human being can come to
know, and realise itself as a sovereign individual subject.

In the construction of his whole system, the deduction of the Ego is a crucial staging
point. The I is shown to be self-reverting activity, in which subject and object are one and
the same, a subject-object. From this new starting point, Fichte will deduce an
epistemology, a theory of psychology, a system of ethics and morality, a philosophy of
nature, a concept of the state and a theory of natural right. The I has to be present in all
that follows, not as a detestable self-centredness or subjectivism, but rather in the sense of
someone who prefaces everything they say with I think ... The result is a kind of
pragmatism.
In Foundations of Natural Right Fichte shows that the conditions for the development of
a free individual lie, not in the I as such, in some substratum of the existence of the I,
but in intersubjective experience. Further, he shows that for a society in which such free
individuals could co-exist, it is not moral law, but mutual recognition which is required.
Such a society of free individuals presupposes a coercive state to protect peoples
freedom from the intrusion of the activity of other free individuals.
Rather than Kants idea of a transcendental subject as the substratum of an I:
In acting, the rational being does not become conscious of its acting; for it itself is its
acting and nothing else. [Foundations of Natural Right. p. 4.]
Self-consciousness only comes about when this activity is turned inwards making itself
the object, but being aware of oneself is still not to know oneself as a free being.
One cannot discover oneself as a free being by looking inward, because that would
presume that one was already a free being without knowing it, which is a contradiction in
terms. Also:
Since what is required here is an object, it must be given in sensation, and in outer, not
inner, sensation; for all inner sensation arises only through the reproduction of outer
sensation; the former therefore presupposes the latter ... [Foundations of Natural Right,
p. 32]

So, the I must perceive a free being in the outer, sensuous world, before it is capable of
perceiving itself as a free being. To be able to perceive yourself as a free being,
presupposes the perception of other free beings in the world around you. Thus the
impulse to recognise oneself as a free being must come from outside.
But unless the I is already free, it will find everything in the sensuous world constrained
and not free. It lives in a world in which everything is determined for it and sees no
opportunity for free action, and consequently can have no conception of what a free being
is like. So how can the I find a free being in the external world without first knowing
itself as a free being? We have an infinite regress here. How can a free being come about?
Fichtes solution to this conundrum he has posed as follows: the I can only learn that it
is a free being by being summoned by another free being calling upon the I to
exercise and limit its freedom.
... the object is not comprehended, and cannot be other than as a bare summons calling
upon the subject to act. Thus as surely as the subject comprehends the object, so too does
it possess the concept of its own freedom and self-activity, and indeed as a concept
[activity] given to it from the outside. It acquires the concept of its own free efficacy, not
as something that exists in the present moment (for that would be a genuine
contradiction), but rather as something that ought to exist in the future. [Foundations of
Natural Right, p. 32]
This happens because another I recognises the I categorically for example, that they
are a human being, and acts in relation to it as if it were a free and rational being.
Thus the external being that is posited as the cause of the summons must at the very
least presuppose the possibility that the subject is capable of understanding and
comprehending; otherwise its summons to the subject would have no purpose at all.
[Foundations of Natural Right, p. 35]
This summons begins by the other subject limiting its own freedom:

The being outside the subject is posited as free, and thus as a being that could also have
overstepped the sphere that presently determines it, and could have overstepped it such
that the subject would be deprived of its ability to act freely. But the being outside the
subject did not freely overstep this sphere; therefore, it materially limited its freedom
through itself; that is, it limited the sphere of those actions that were possible for it by
virtue of its formal freedom. ...
Furthermore, through its action, the being outside the subject has ... summoned the latter
to act freely; thus it has limited its freedom through a concept of an end in which the
subjects freedom is presupposed (even if only problematically); thus it has limited its
freedom through the concept of the subjects (formal) freedom. [Foundations of Natural
Right, p. 41]
The I is then able to perceive what is a free being, another I in the sensuous world, and
that other I by treating them as a free being, shows them that they are a free being and
makes it possible for the I to perceive itself as a free being.
Further, a plurality of free beings cannot exist in the same time and space except by
limiting their freedom, and giving part of their freedom to other free beings.
In appropriating freedom for myself, I limit myself by leaving some freedom for others
as well. Thus the concept of right is the concept of the necessary relation of free beings to
one another. [Foundations of Natural Right, p. 9]
This is a logical necessity, not a moral law. It is a condition for the existence of free
beings in the same time and space. The co-existence of free beings in a common time and
space is impossible unless they mutually recognise each others freedom.
Thus the relation of free beings to one another is necessarily determined in the following
way, and is posited as thus determined: one individuals knowledge of the other is
conditioned by the fact that the other treats the first as a free being (i.e., limits its freedom
through the concept of the freedom of the first). But this manner of treatment is
conditioned by the firsts treatment of the others treatment and knowledge of the first,

and so on ad infinitum. Thus the relation of free beings to one another is a relation of
reciprocal interaction through intelligence and freedom. One cannot recognise the other if
both do not mutually recognise each other; and one cannot treat the other as a free being,
if both do not mutually treat each other as free. [Foundations of Natural Right, p. 41]
And an I must demonstrate its recognition of another person by their external activity.
Something is given to the [other] individual only by experience, and I give rise to such
experience only by acting. The other cannot know what I think. [Foundations of Natural
Right, p. 41]
So mutual recognition is a form of activity of the Is in relation to one another, not just a
state of mind. In fact a concept is nothing but a form of activity. Such a state of mind
can exist only once the external material activity of Is who mutually recognise one
another exists in the material world. For this, Fichte concludes, an instrument of social
control is necessary in order to enforce peoples rights.
Thus Fichte derives natural right from necessity, from the conditions for existence of
rational beings, not from a moral law or duty. And he proceeds from there to derive a
doctrine of right based on this concept of the individual, free person, who has to limit
her/his freedom in order to live in a community with other free beings. A being which
does not wish to limit its freedom in that way is simply excluded from any community of
free beings.
Fichte in this way derives the need for a state which enforces right by physical force,
since, Fichte claims, there is no other way to guarantee rights in a community of free
individuals whose beliefs and values will differ from one another.
Right must be enforceable, even if there is not a single human being with a good will;
the very aim of the science of right is to sketch out just such an order of things. In this
domain, physical force and it alone give right its sanction. [Foundations of Natural
Right, p. 50]

Such a state is responsible not only for promulgating laws and punishing crime, but also
for ensuring access to health, education and other welfare necessary for the life of a free
being.
For a species of perfected moral beings, there is no law of right. It is already clear that
humankind cannot be such a species, from the fact that the human being must be
educated and must educate himself to the status of morality; for he is not moral by nature,
but must make himself so through his own labour. [Foundations of Natural Right, p.
132]
Summary
In summary then, for Fichte:

The subject is a free, rational individual, but the subject is not given either as a
transcendental subject or as a substrate or substance, but is a form of activity
which can arise only under certain conditions. This activity is not the activity of a
subject, the subject is this activity;

The condition for the existence of a subject lies in intersubjective experience,

specifically, the mutual recognition of their freedom by other subjects,

Such an intersubjective experience can come about only as a result of a

summons to an I to exercise and restrict his/her freedom, from an already
existing free being, that thereby gives up a portion of its freedom;

A subject can exist only in society, that is, in activity in which subjects mutually
recognise each others freedom;

Nothing can exist in a subject which does not first exist in the sensuous world
outside.

Fichte combines an extreme liberalism with elements which are strongly associated with
communitarian trends in ethics and social theory. At the beginning of the third
millennium, as modern societies are becoming ever more atomised and dominated by
individualism, and Right predominates over the Good in legal and ethical theory, Fichtes
philosophy takes on great significance.

It may be useful to make a couple of observations about the concepts of activity and
recognition, which underlay Fichtes thinking.
Recognition
In English, the term recognition originates in 14th century Scottish law, referring to the
resumption of unused land from a vassal by a feudal superior. The word is derived from
the same roots as cognate, co + gnatus (born), meaning related by birth, akin; thus
recognise essentially meant bring back into the family estate. It was later generalised
to mean the registering of something as already known and other derivative usages of this
kind.
In the sixteenth century, recognition turned from being the act of the ruler in relation to
his subjects, to mean the acknowledgment by a subject of a rulers rights over them.
By the early 19th century, at the time that Fichte was writing, it was used as a technical
term in international law to refer to the explicit acknowledgment of the rights of a state
by another state, in particular by a state which formerly exercised sovereignty over the
other state gaining recognition.
It is Fichte who introduced the term recognition into philosophical usage. The original
usage of the term had only been in relation to corporate or social subjects, not
individuals. Fichte was innovating the usage of the term recognition in relation to ego
development. However, his usage of the term in relation to individual subjects was
entirely consistent with its usage in law and international law in particular.
As we shall see, Fichtes term was used by Hegel in his early writings, written while
Hegel was still engaged in a critique of Fichte, but faded out of his language after the
writing of The Phenomenology of Spirit in 1807, though the general idea is still present in
the Philosophy of Right, written in 1821.
The term reappeared in philosophical discourse in the period after World War Two as a
result of Alexander Kojves reading of Hegel and the application of these ideas in the

national liberation movements of that period and new social movements which followed.
It has had a further resurgence from the 1990s in Critical Theory.
Activity
By making activity rather than entities or material substances the foundation of his
philosophy, Fichte prefigured later developments.
Theories of ethics or political economy grounded in the concept of property and value
naively take as their basis the elements of nature or matter which are simply playing a
mediating role in social relations. Property is thereby treated as if it were something
existing independently of activity.
By taking of activity as the fundamental category of his philosophy, Fichte exposed this
ideological prejudice. Hegel subsequently used a similar approach to deconstruct the
concept of property in terms of abstract right in his Philosophy of Right. Marx later
continued this standpoint in making labour the foundation of his critique political
economy and his critique of Hegel. Labour is essentially the same category as activity in
Fichtes philosophy. Later, activity became the key concept in theories of psychology,
linguistics and social theory.
Also, Fichte rejected Kants use of the concept of moral law as the foundation of practical
philosophy, holding instead that both theoretical and practical philosophy should have a
common foundation in activity. Here again Fichte pre-figures Marxs problematic
attempts to found socialism on science without a separate ethical or moral doctrine.
However, all subsequent critiques of Fichte completely pass over the fact that Fichte
made activity the absolute in his system, and instead read Fiche as having made the I
the substance and absolute of his philosophy. Thereby, Fichte was condemned for a bad
subjectivism. Now this criticism is not without foundation, for as we have seen, Fichte
seems to have used the concept of activity as a kind of ruse to avoid giving his
philosophy a subjective foundation, and once having derived the I whose activity is

both subjective and objective, he makes no further use of the concept of activity as such,
and the entirety of his system does indeed rest upon a subjective foundation.
It appears that modern readers of Fichte have presumed that activity is ipso facto the
activity of the I"; all the table of contents in the various English translations of his
works, for example, list activity only as activity of the I". It would appear to be
reasonable question, how can you have activity other than activity of some agency? But
to accept such a proof of the prior existence of the I is exactly the Cartesian
presumption which reasoned from cogito to ergo sum. But Fichte is right here. Ego is the
outcome of a process not its starting point and presupposition; an infant child for example
as yet has no I, but is active, and as a result of its activity, it may gain selfconsciousness.

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