Acknowledgments
This study addresses Thoreau from an unusual vantage point. As a historian and philosopher of science, I note that my own discipline has paid scant attention to him, but here I wish to claim Thoreau—or, better, to “borrow” him. He offers a rich grist for the philosopher's mill and, by extension, to those current cultural studies that begin with the philosophical questions he poses: the character of the self, the grounding of moral agency, the nature of knowledge. Thoreau was no postmodern, but he faced many of the same challenges we do, and in studying his life, I have come to value the ethical example he offered. While philosophical readings might enrich the literary approaches that have dominated Thoreauvian scholarship for a century, I believe structuring his project on a philosophical edifice also offers critical insights into certain quandaries that reach into the very mainstream of contemporary science studies.
For me, Thoreau is a fascinating “hinge” character residing between an ebbing Romanticism and a rising positivism. Stretching from early Romanticism to the contemporary molecular revolution, my own endeavor is to better understand the tension generated by science's positivist leanings against both the humane demands of its knowledge and the role of the participating scientist. In this respect, Thoreau, usually seen as a naturalist and champion of the environment, is of interest to me because of the clear fashion in which his life and work have focused the problem of the observer in this scientific setting. More generally, he exemplifies the difficulty of assigning value to our science that seeks dispassionate objectivity, yet remains firmly tied to humane understanding. We assign value to our knowledge; we require placing the self in its world; we seek to use our knowledge for humane purposes. Each requires the assignment of value and the exercise of choice.
But the roots of my interest in Thoreau reach to older issues than my professional concerns, in fact to the awakening of my intellect as an adolescent, when I first read Walden. It made a lasting impression on me, and I am well aware that its challenge beckoned for a thorough response. In part, this has been accomplished in the writing of this study, for I have come to articulate the meaning of that work, which had such a profound influence on how I thought of individuality and my own personhood. At about the same time I was introduced to Thoreau, I also began reading Freud and guides to his work. Of these, the most memorable was Philip Rieff's Freud: The Mind of the Moralist (1959), a book that impressed me in many ways, not the least of which was the intimation that a scientific project might reflect a moral attitude or program. Although I abandoned a serious interest in Freudian psychology, the interpretative point has apparently been internalized, and in my own work I find interesting parallels in reading Thoreau's life as Rieff read Freud's. Rieff's sequel, The Triumph of the Therapeutic (1966), was written in a similar vein but lacked, at least to my current recollection, the same moral verve exhibited by the earlier text. But there is an interesting parallel regarding Thoreau, inasmuch as I think he too exhibited a “therapeutic triumph”—for himself and for us all. Although he claimed that “I love nature partly because she is not man, but a retreat from him” (January 3, 1853, Journal 5, 1997, p. 422), he reaches out to each of us in the most intimate fashion, and we respond. Despite the all too apparent failings, Thoreau indeed did prevail in his own struggle and, in doing so, provided us with a moral example we might emulate.
My exploration freely draws on previous essays that are related to the overall themes treated here but were written in other contexts. The discussion on Romanticism, and specifically Goethe, is based on Tauber 1993; on history and memory, Tauber 1999a; on the aesthetic elements of science, Tauber 1996a; on the philosophical characterization of modern science, the introduction to Tauber 1997 and Tauber 1999b; on the relation of science and ethics, Tauber 1998a; on the historical evolution of the self concept and its philosophical standing, Tauber 1992, 1994, 1999c. There are other issues that have served as the organizing subjects of my writing—reductionism and positivism; the limits of analysis in philosophy; the ethics of history; the character of moral philosophy in our postmodern age; the subject-object relationship in science generally. In a sense, this study of Thoreau ties together what at first glance represents apparently far-flung issues that I have considered in different formats and that are drawn together here by the attempt to outline an understanding of the self and, more specifically, of how a moral voice might guide an epistemology. It is in this last context
Seven editors refused even to send this book out for review: “too interdisciplinary,” “too unorthodox,” “won't fit into our list,” “won't sell” were the typical responses. Not until Stan Holwitz embraced this project did the manuscript enjoy the prospect of publication. He ensured that my efforts were realized, and I am especially grateful to him. I am also indebted to the University of California Press staff, especially Jean McAneny and Nicholas Goodhue, who so ably took my manuscript through production. Various readers have generously offered important critical comment to me, so to Rick Adler, Dan Dahlstrom, Menachem Fisch, Erazim Kohak, Leo Marx, Emanuel Papper, David Roochnik, Stanley Rosen, and Jan Zwicky, thank you. Dan Peck has been most intimate with my own project, I think largely because we regard Thoreau from several shared perspectives, and I am especially indebted to his insights and criticisms of my own work. My wife, Paula Fredriksen, has, as always, been my most enthusiastic reader. Beyond patiently teaching me Augustine's philosophy—which was to become a main pillar of this study—her editorial suggestions, critical acumen, and abiding emotional support sustain me. Naturally, I alone am responsible for the interpretation offered here, but such a work is influenced in acknowledged and in unconscious fashion by many sources that I cannot enumerate. This book has been a joy to write, one that has flowed easily, and on that basis alone, I trust, at least, that I have given fair expression to my own dialogue with Thoreau. I can only hope that this essay contributes to our understanding of him—and thereby of ourselves.
A.I.T.
Boscawen, New Hampshire
November 1999