{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 3/l06/p004","lang":"en","edition":"MP1993","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"text":"Let us look back over s*Fichte train of thought once more. On closer inspection a gap appears in it, a gap, in fact, that calls into question the correctness of Fichte's view of the original deed of the “I.” What is it then actually that is absolute in the positing of the “I”? The judgment is made: If a is, then a is. The a is posited by the “I.” About this positing, therefore, no doubt can prevail. But even if this activity is unconditional, the “I” can only posit *something or other*. It cannot posit “activity in and for itself,” but only a particular activity. In short: Positing must have a content. But it cannot take this content out of itself, for otherwise it could do nothing more than eternally posit the activity of positing. Thus for positing, for the absolute activity of the there must be something that is realized through this activity. If the “I” does not take hold of some “given” that it posits, then it can posit *nothing* at all and consequently *cannot* posit. This is also apparent in Fichte's statement: The “I” posits its existence. This existence is a category. We are back again at our statement: The activity of the “I” depends upon the fact that the “I,” out of its own free decision, posits the concepts and ideas of the “given.” Fichte comes to this result by unconsciously setting out to show the “I” as “something existing.” If he had developed the concept of our activity of knowing, he would have arrived at the true starting point of epistemology: The “I” posits knowing activity. Since Fichte did not make clear to himself the determinants of the “I's” activity, he simply designated the character of this activity to lie in the positing of existence. By doing so, however, he limited the absolute activity of the “I.” For if only the “I's” “positing of existence” is unconditional, then everything else that goes forth from the “I” is conditional. But every path by which to go from the unconditional to the conditional is also cut off. If the “I” is only unconditional in the direction just described, then the “I” immediately loses all possibility of positing, by an original act, anything other than its own existence. Thus the necessity arises of indicating the basis for all the other activity of the “I.” Fichte sought in vain for such a basis, as we have already seen above.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"6. Epistemology without Presuppositions and Fichte's Theory of Science","site_heading":null,"date":null,"location":null,"word_count":411,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/3/l06/p004?edition=MP1993","alignment_confidence":"medium","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":null,"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["MP1993","RSPI1963","SOL2024"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/3/l06/p004"},{"lang":"en","edition":"RSPI1963","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/3/l06/p004"},{"lang":"en","edition":"MP1993","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/3/l06/p004?edition=MP1993","paragraph_aligned":true},{"lang":"en","edition":"SOL2024","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":false,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/3/l06/p004?edition=SOL2024"}],"german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"l06","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 3/l06/p004","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/3/l06/p004"}],"bead_confidence":"medium","length_check":{"de_words":372,"en_words":411,"ratio":1.1,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. The German original passage(s) above are the edition-invariant anchor — fetch them (lang='de') to verify wording before quoting across editions."},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":1.14,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":4438,"original_word_count":3893,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"status":"unknown","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 3/l06/p004"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"medium","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}