Self-as-an-End
SAE Marriage Theory · Paper 2

Each Their Own
各自

Han Qin (秦汉) · Independent Researcher · 2026
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.23819224 · Full PDF on Zenodo · CC BY 4.0
Abstract

This paper reads the "we" in marriage. People in a marriage say "we" every day: our household, we decided, our money, we love each other. This series first lays down one sentence: you are you, I am I, and only then is there an us. When "we" is said in marriage, it is divided, as in Relation Theory, into two branches: doing things together, and mutual recognition; which branch occurs is checked case by case. Neither branch comes before the two people, nor stands above them; neither legislates, nor passes final judgment on either party's own law; the binding force of rules the two have agreed on passes separately through each one's own law, or comes from a procedure both have already acknowledged. Each person's commitment is still entered separately, by each one's avowal, where each stands and the effects already left, and does not form a third branch of "we."

The attribution of meaning lies with each person; the outlet of a direction can lie outside oneself. Where the two are headed in the 15DD direction, the meaning of each of the two people in a marriage belongs to each, and the outlet of the direction falls outside oneself: on the other, letting the other grow into the other's own self; on someone who has not yet come, creating conditions for him together. The directions of two people can cross in one matter done together, while each relation remains anchored in its own bearer, and they do not merge into one; "we" and "the household" do not take in, nor replace, each person's meaning. Whether "the household" can come to stand separately as a bearer, this series does not judge.

Recognizing the other as an end too: the other has his own cannot-not, which I only recognize as there, and whose content I cannot read out; I do not make for the other the decisions he can make himself; feelings the other voices I can fail to understand, and I do not deny that he really has them. Even the most intimate marriage has places that cannot be entered: the other's internality, solitude, external relationships and past are the other's own. Non dubito in marriage has both sides: not doubting that oneself is an end, and not doubting that the other is an end; both sides are choices each person makes anew, time after time, not a state a marriage arrives at; non dubito does not require the absence of doubt, nor is it the same as trust. The directions of colonization read from this item are several: entering in the name of intimacy; taking in and replacing one party's direction in the name of "this household" or "for our sake"; borrowing mutual recognition to pass final judgment on something done together; handing one's own meaning to the other for safekeeping, and then demanding it of the other. This paper interfaces with Hegel and Montaigne, and, at the layer of marriage, picks up Nozick, Kant and Baier. This paper does not prove that intimacy requires mutual transparency, nor that keeping places that cannot be entered shows that one loves too little.

Introduction

Zhou Yuan and Lin Xia are in the third year of their marriage. One Sunday evening Zhou Yuan was on the balcony phoning a university classmate, and Lin Xia, inside, heard him say: "We've decided to move to Hangzhou next year."

The two had indeed talked about moving to Hangzhou several times. In Hangzhou there was a post Zhou Yuan had thought about for many years, building bridges; Lin Xia's mother lived in Hangzhou, alone, and was getting old. But none of those talks had been finished: Lin Xia had worked for eight years in a conservation room for old books in this city, and she had not yet made up her mind. When the call ended, she asked him: "Did you decide, or did we decide?"

Zhou Yuan was taken aback for a moment, and said: "I thought we more or less meant the same thing."

What this question asks is what this paper is about. People in a marriage say "we" every day: our household, we decided, our money, we love each other. Paper 1 closed on a sentence left unanswered: that evening a newly married couple said together "We're married"; what is the "we" in this sentence?1 This paper goes on to answer it.

What this paper reads. This series first lays down one sentence: you are you, I am I, and only then is there an us. This sentence is the premise of the papers of this series that follow. In marriage, one person can look toward the other, letting the other grow into the other's own self; that is Paper 3; two people can look together toward someone who has not yet come, creating conditions for him; that is Paper 5. Both kinds of looking-toward start from "you are you, I am I."

This paper reads five things. First, what "we" is, and which two branches it divides into. Second, with whom meaning lies. Third, what recognizing the other as an end too looks like in marriage, and where the places are that cannot be entered, however intimate. Fourth, non dubito: one's own side and the other's side. Fifth, the directions of colonization read from this item.

Shared words. "We," in everyday speech, is sometimes merely speaking of things together, putting what two people each did into one sentence; what this paper speaks of besides is the two branches Relation Theory divides: doing things together, and mutual recognition.2 Neither branch is a "we" standing above the two people and making decisions for them.

"Household," in everyday speech, means the dwelling, one's kin, and the life lived together; this paper uses it in that sense. Whether the household can come to stand separately as a bearer, with a law of its own as a person has, this paper does not judge; see §1.

"Meaning" is taken in Meaning Theory's usage: the relation, within a bearer's cross-temporal carrying-forward, between him and the contents he has avowed. Its attribution endpoints are closed in one person.3

"Non dubito" has two sides in SAE: not doubting that oneself is an end, and not doubting that others are ends. The first side guards against one's own being colonized; the second is the definition of the layer of recognizing others as ends too. This paper uses both sides; see §3. Nor is non dubito "having no doubts," nor is it the same as trust; these too are kept apart in §3.

Method. As in Paper 1: the conclusions of upstream papers are said in plain words; sources, the proposition numbers of other papers and the places where upstream words are carried beyond their original place all go in the notes, and where something is extended, this series takes it on as its own undertaking. What has already been said at the relational layer is used here directly, not rewritten. In an appendix to How Is Institution Possible (Foundational Paper 6; cited as F6) there is a set of SAE Marriage Principles, a working demonstration, not evidentiary; this paper reads the principles contained in its items 0, 1 and 2, written by structure, with the original sentences quoted as they stand; the specific rules serve only as examples. This paper speaks only of structure, not of good and bad, and issues no ought.

One couple, Zhou Yuan and Lin Xia, runs through the whole paper. Both are within scope: Zhou Yuan wants to go to Hangzhou to build bridges, and that is his; whether Lin Xia leaves the conservation room where she has worked for eight years is hers, and Zhou Yuan knows this, and recognizes that it is hers. This is a made-up example, used only to see structure; from outside, a married couple's words and deeds are only clues, and do not certify who is at which layer.

§1 "We"

MA10 You are you, I am I, and only then is there an us. When "we" is said in marriage, it divides into two branches: doing things together, and mutual recognition; which branch occurs is checked case by case. Neither branch comes before the two, nor stands above them; neither legislates, nor passes final judgment on either party's own law; the binding force of rules the two have agreed on passes separately through each one's own law, or comes from a procedure both have already acknowledged. Each person's commitment is still entered separately, by each one's avowal, where each stands and the effects already left; it does not form a third branch of "we": in something done together, it is the share each has avowed, and when it is present together with mutual recognition, it is still not borne by "we" on either party's behalf

"You are you, I am I, and only then is there an us" is the opening sentence of the SAE Marriage Principles. The original goes on: "Each of us exists prior to 'us.' Marriage does not dissolve the individual."4 What this paper reads is the "only then" in this sentence: the two people come first, "we" after. After does not mean arriving later in time; it means that "we" comes from the two people, not the two people from "we."

For this sentence to land, it must first be made clear what "we" is.

Two Branches

Whenever Relation Theory says "we," it must state which branch it means.5 One branch is doing things together; the other is mutual recognition.

Doing things together. Zhou Yuan is for the post; Lin Xia, if she goes, would be for being near her mother; what the two have to do is one and the same thing: move to Hangzhou. Action Theory writes this shape as: "One person is for purpose A, another for purpose B, and the two cannot not do C: C is something both of them avow and both are able to do, whose purpose and adjudication neither side holds alone; it is doing something together, not a shared law."6 The move is C. Zhou Yuan's A is his, Lin Xia's B is hers; C has to be avowed by both, and both have to be able to do it.

In that evening's phone call, C had not yet been avowed by both. Zhou Yuan's saying "we've decided" is one person declaring the adjudication for two. Action Theory has said in the same paper that neither side can declare agreement in the other's place.7 The sentence he said aloud is not the two people's decision; it is his own decision, under the name of "we." Lin Xia's question asks exactly this.

Mutual recognition. That autumn Lin Xia finished repairing a badly worm-eaten Ming printed edition, and took Zhou Yuan to the conservation room to see it. She pointed out a few mended leaves, and did not say much. The example stipulates: standing there, Zhou Yuan sees not only a repaired book; he sees that this work is hers, comes from her side, and is not his to give; Lin Xia, too, makes out that his looking is his own, not politeness. Value Theory writes this as mutual recognition: resonance "is a mutual recognition between two bearers, and what is recognised is that the other has values of his own. It does not constitute a third value, a third source or a third bearer".8 If that moment is like this, there is a "we" between the two; it is the two each recognizing that what is the other's is the other's, not the two merging into one. What can be seen from outside is only two people standing for a while in the conservation room.

What both branches give is only the minimal bound past which "we" does not stand in for anyone, not a sufficient theory of marriage. Which branch a married couple meets in a given matter is checked case by case, and is not assigned in advance because they are husband and wife.9

The "we" of everyday speech is sometimes merely speaking of things together. "We've had a hard time these years" puts what the two each did, and each went through, into one sentence, and still speaks of each one's own affairs; it does not set up a "we," and so is not a third branch. Action Theory reads a sentence that looks similar: in a village that hid many people, someone later looked back and said, "We did what had to be done." That sentence is read in the section of Action Theory on doing things together; it speaks of many people each doing their part in one and the same matter, "not a 'we' standing above those people and deciding for them," and belongs to the branch of doing things together.10 Which branch a sentence falls in, or whether it is merely speaking of things together, is checked case by case.

Not Before the Two, Not Above Them

Neither branch comes before the two people, nor stands above them.

Not before: doing things together exists only when both have avowed it; mutual recognition exists only when each of the two makes out that what is the other's is the other's. Without the two people, there is neither.

Not above: a relation is a construct; "it does not legislate, bears nothing, and does not pass final judgment on either party's own law on their behalf"; a little circle of two does not form a third bearer.11 Doing things together is the same: it "does not automatically produce a position that legislates each side's own law for them."12 In doing things together, "we" does not decide for the two whether to do it; in mutual recognition, "we" does not decide for the two who is right and who is wrong.

Rules the two have agreed on remain valid as usual. Zhou Yuan and Lin Xia later agreed that each month each would put a share of money into a joint account, and household expenses would come out of it. This rule binds the two of them. By what does it bind? Reading the two people who live together as they agree on a household rule, the Conflict Treatise wrote two sentences: "Consensus does not automatically generate a third first-person legislator"; "that rule's binding force must pass separately through each party's own law, or come from a procedure both have acknowledged. It is not a third law above the two."13 The rule of the joint account binds Zhou Yuan by way of his avowing it, and binds Lin Xia by way of her avowing it; or it comes from the way of talking things over that both have acknowledged. It was not handed down by "we" as a third party.

Commitment Is Not a Third Branch

There is one more thing often called "we": commitment. At a wedding the two say their vows together, "We will be together," and it looks like a commitment belonging to the two.

This series follows Relation Theory: commitment is still entered person by person: each one's avowal, where each stands, the effects each has already left.14 It does not form a third branch of "we." In something done together, commitment is the share each has avowed: Zhou Yuan promised that once they were in Hangzhou he would take Lin Xia's mother to her hospital check-ups at weekends; that he avowed, and it is entered with him; Lin Xia promised to move there; that she avowed, and it is entered with her. When vows and mutual recognition are present on one occasion, it is the same: if at that moment the two recognize each other, what each pledged is still borne by each, not borne by "we" on either party's behalf. Paper 1 writes "each person's own commitment" for exactly this.15

Nor is what one has done oneself acknowledged by someone else by way of "we." Later something went wrong with the move: notice on the old flat was given late, and two extra months' rent was paid. Zhou Yuan said: "We didn't talk it through properly." Lin Xia said: "You said you'd handle it." How this item is reckoned is another matter; but what a person has done himself cannot be acknowledged by someone else in his place,16 nor handed over to "we" to acknowledge.

Back to "We're Married"

As the Introduction said, Paper 1 left a question: that evening Chen Mo and Xu Jing said together "We're married"; what is the "we" in this sentence? Read by this section: getting married is something both avow and both are able to do, and belongs to the branch of doing things together. The words each read that evening are each one's commitment, each pledged and each borne; the registration the two went to together that morning, the side that makes the union public to an institution, is read in Paper 1 as endorsement, a matter between persons and a construct. If at that moment the two also recognized each other, that is the other branch, mutual recognition, present on the same occasion as doing things together. The uncle's "You've got the certificate, so now you're one family" speaks of another institution's endorsement; Hegel says that two people consent to make themselves one person; Paper 1 has already interfaced with him, and §5 picks up his sections on the family. In this sentence there is no third party legislating for the two.

MA11 The attribution of meaning lies with each person; the outlet of a direction can lie outside oneself. The directions of two people can cross in one and the same matter done together, while each relation remains anchored in its own bearer, and they do not merge into one; "we" and "the household" do not take in, nor replace, each person's meaning. Whether "the household" can come to stand separately as a bearer is not judged

The last proposition read doing and recognizing. This one reads with whom meaning lies.

Attribution Lies with Each Person

Meaning Theory says that of a bearer's meaning relation, "all the attribution endpoints of the relation as a whole do not pass beyond that one bearer."17 For years Zhou Yuan has built bridges; he avowed this work, and carries it forward day by day; both ends of this relation are Zhou Yuan. Lin Xia repairs books; both ends are Lin Xia. Marrying did not merge these two relations into one.

Yet from attribution's lying with each person, it cannot be inferred that each is self-contained. Meaning Theory guards against this inference right after: since this relation is closed, it should be self-contained, self-sufficient, in no need of an outside: "That does not follow."18 That attribution is closed in one person says only where the endpoints fall; it does not say that this person does not look outward.

So this series says this of meaning in marriage: where the two are headed in the 15DD direction, the meaning of each of the two people in a marriage belongs to each, and the outlet of the direction falls outside oneself: on the other, letting the other grow into the other's own self; on someone who has not yet come, creating conditions for him together. The first is Paper 3, the second Paper 5. Both start from each person; the outlet is outside, and the attribution does not move.

Crossing Is Not Merging

The directions of two people cross, and in marriage they cross very densely. Zhou Yuan goes to Hangzhou for the bridges; Lin Xia, if she goes, for her mother; the two directions cross in the matter of the move, and afterward, under one roof, they cross at the dinner table every day, in the account every month, in whose family to spend New Year with every year.

Crossing is not merging. Reading a group of people who protect a river together, Meaning Theory laid down: "The life-orientations of several bearers can cross and point to one another while each relation remains anchored in its own bearer"; even if each of them has avowed the content that the other too is an end, and their directions cross densely, "each person's meaning relation still has both ends in himself, and it is not fused above them into a collective meaning."19 Carried into marriage it is the same. Zhou Yuan's and Lin Xia's directions cross in the matter of the move, yet Zhou Yuan's bridges are still his, and Lin Xia's mother is still the one she has to look after; crossing, they have not fused into "our meaning."

So "we" and "the household" do not take in, nor replace, each person's meaning. "For the sake of this household" can say this: a person has avowed this household into his own carrying-forward, and the attribution is still his. It cannot run the other way, taking in each person's direction and then replacing it, as if from then on where each is going were decided not by Zhou Yuan, not by Lin Xia, but by "the household." What this proposition of Meaning Theory blocks is exactly "a total orientation that takes in each person's orientation and replaces it."20

"The Household" Is Not Judged

Is "the household," then, a bearer? A household lived in for decades, with children, with the old, with its own customs and its own memory, does look like a person: it has things it wants, it has its temper, it has decisions it makes for the people in it.

This series does not judge. Relation Theory lays down that a little circle of two does not form a third bearer.21 Meaning Theory writes plainly: that another bearer might come to stand separately and coexist with each person "is not within this reductio, and is left undecided as Value Theory leaves it"; "Whether a collective first person can stand must be shown separately, by its own conditions of constitution."22 This series follows this: whether "the household" can come to stand separately as a bearer is registered as a remainder, and not judged.

What is not judged is this question, not another. Even if "the household" did come to stand separately, it would not swallow the meaning of the people it was formed of; Value Theory says in the same place that even if there were one, that would not mean the sources of the original people had been swallowed by it.23 So whatever "the household" is, "for the sake of this household" can neither take in nor replace where Zhou Yuan and Lin Xia are each going.

§2 Recognizing the Other as an End Too

MA12 Recognizing the other as an end too: the other has his own cannot-not, which I only recognize as there, and whose content I cannot read out; I do not make for the other the decisions he can make himself; feelings the other voices I can fail to understand, and I do not deny that he really has them

Love Theory has read what recognizing the other as an end too looks like in love: "She has her own cannot-not; I only recognize that it is there, and cannot read out its content; loving her is not reading her through".24 In marriage two people live together and see each other every day; they know when the other goes to sleep, what he likes to eat, which words will upset him. Knowing this much, one still cannot read out what his cannot-not is. Why Zhou Yuan has to build bridges, even Lin Xia, after all these years with him, cannot fully say; what she recognizes is that there is a cannot-not of his own there, and that it is his.

In the days as they are lived, this recognition takes two shapes. The SAE Marriage Principles writes them under the item on non dubito.

Not Making for Him the Decisions He Can Make Himself

The original: "Do not make decisions for the other that they can make themselves. Do not take over areas of the other's life under the pretext of 'it's for your own good.' The other's career, friendships, hobbies, lifestyle—these are theirs, not 'ours.'"25

Here there is a dividing line: between something done together and the other's own affairs. Moving to Hangzhou is something done together, and has to be avowed by both (MA10). Whether Lin Xia leaves the conservation room, and what she does once in Hangzhou, are her affairs. Zhou Yuan can say what he thinks, and can help her find out where in Hangzhou there is still conservation work; he cannot decide it for her, nor use "we're moving" to take her affair in along with it: the move belongs to the two; her work is still hers.

Why does this not change with closeness? Because in whose law a decision falls is not settled by how close the two are. A relation does not pass final judgment on either party's own law;26 I cannot read out his cannot-not, and to decide for him is to let my reading replace his law. "For your own good" is one name this goes under; the direction is read on this one effect, and the name does not change where it is headed.27

Voiced Feelings: One Can Fail to Understand, and Does Not Deny

The original: "When the other says 'I'm uncomfortable,' 'I'm hurt,' 'I need space,' do not doubt the reality of these feelings. You may not understand why they feel that way, but you may not deny that they do."28

Once Lin Xia said that this weekend she wanted to be by herself and go nowhere. Zhou Yuan did not understand: they had agreed to go and look at flats this weekend. He can fail to understand. He can say "I don't understand; we'd agreed on this weekend"; this is his saying out loud the expectation on his side, a form of questioning.29 If he says "You're not really tired at all; you just don't want to move," and takes this sentence as settled, no longer letting her say how she is, he has judged her feelings for her: what she said no longer counts with him. Merely saying "I think you don't want to move," setting out his view and allowing her not to accept it, is still material.

That one can fail to understand amounts to not certifying; not denying amounts to not cancelling. The Conflict Treatise wrote these two together at the operation layer: the other end appears as what the other bears in the first person; "I do not certify whether it ... and I do not cancel it on the other's behalf for want of such certification."30 Here the same shape is read onto feelings the other voices: I cannot certify whether she is tired, and for being unable to certify it, I do not cancel on her behalf the tiredness she speaks of.

MA13 Even the most intimate marriage has places that cannot be entered: the other's internality, solitude, external relationships and past are the other's own

Item 2 of the SAE Marriage Principles: "Even the most intimate relationship has zones that cannot be entered."31 When F6, in its main text, writes the institution of marriage, it lists this as well: "inviolable zones (even in the closest relationship, there are spaces that cannot be entered)".32 The principles list four: internality, solitude, external relationships, the past.

This proposition is easily read as a rule of manners: intimacy should know its limits. What it speaks of is not limits but attribution: those four are the other's own.

Four Places

Internality. The other's thoughts, beliefs and feelings are his own. The principles write: "You may try to understand them, but you may not try to change them"; the examples given are that one may say "I don't understand why you think that way," may say "the way you think about this hurts me," but does not say "you are wrong to think that."33 The first two sentences speak of my side; they are expression. The principles use these sentences to show the difference between expression and judging on someone's behalf; this paper does not take the sentence forms themselves as the criterion: to say "I think there's an error here," giving him the reasons and allowing him to rebut, still enters as my judgment, as material; only excluding his objection in advance, requiring him to let my judgment replace his own step, heads toward pouring in and occupying. Between this sentence and item 6 of the principles, "actively hope for their growth," there looks to be a tension: one side does not change him, the other wants change. Paper 3 resolves it by its reading of bringing someone into their own: the change is made by the other himself; what I can do is create conditions and question. What is blocked here is changing him toward my side.

Solitude. The principles write: "Needing solitude does not mean not loving. Not needing solitude does not mean loving more."34 That weekend when Lin Xia wanted to be by herself was hers. Once a month Zhou Yuan goes alone early in the morning to fish by the river, and comes back saying nothing; those few hours are his too.

External relationships. The other's relationships with family, friends and colleagues are his own. The principles' example: "'I don't like that friend of yours' is expression. 'You are not allowed to see them' is control."35 Relation Theory reads dealings among three or more by breaking them down into pairs, entered on separate accounts.36 What lies between Lin Xia and a friend from her university years lies between the two of them; Zhou Yuan is not at either end of it. He can say he does not like that friend, and that is his side; he cannot decide for Lin Xia whether that tie is to go on. If a person cuts off all the other's contact with the outside, that is no longer only entering; it has sealed off the other's exit, and Paper 1 has read where that falls.37

The past. The principles write: "The other's past belongs to them. You chose the person who exists now, not every decision they ever made."38 What actually acts is always today alone.39 The years before Zhou Yuan knew Lin Xia, whom she loved, what she did and later regretted, are hers; to bring them out as a reason in the present is another matter, read in Paper 4.

Cannot Be Entered Is Not Cannot Be Known

That these places cannot be entered does not mean that the other's places cannot be known. Lin Xia can read her diary to Zhou Yuan, and can tell him whom she once loved. Once she has said it, those words enter Zhou Yuan's conditions of occurrence from then on, and he knows; yet those places are still hers: her saying it is something she did, not his walking in. Loving her is not reading her through; observation and communication can approach it; reading it out is not possible.40

So this paper does not prove that intimacy requires mutual transparency; nor does it prove that keeping places that cannot be entered shows that one loves too little. Transparency is not the ruler of intimacy. One couple says everything, another leaves much unsaid; this paper does not judge from this which is closer.

§3 The Two Sides of Non Dubito

MA14 Non dubito in marriage has both sides: not doubting that oneself is an end, and not doubting that the other is an end. Both sides are choices each person makes anew, time after time, not a state a marriage arrives at; from outside only words and deeds and structure are read, and minds are not read

Two Sides

SAE speaks of non dubito with two sides: not doubting that oneself is an end; not doubting that others are ends. The first side guards against one's own being colonized: one's own law is not handed over, not replaced by another's ruler. The second is the definition of the layer of recognizing others as ends too.

The SAE Marriage Principles uses both sides. Its opening item, item 0, is one's own side: "Marriage does not dissolve the individual."41 Its closing paragraph is the other's side: "holding non dubito toward the person beside you as an end."42

In marriage both sides press at once. In the year of the move, Lin Xia had two things to hold. One was not doubting that Zhou Yuan is an end: he wants to go and build bridges; that is his cannot-not, and she does not judge for him whether it is worth it. The other was not doubting that she herself is an end: whether she leaves the conservation room is judged by her own law, and is not handed over because "we've decided." Lacking either side, it does not hold. With only the first side, recognizing his cannot-not while not putting forward her own share, that is accommodation, not having stood; with only the second, she recognizes herself, and not him. Accommodation is read in Paper 3.

Made Anew, Time after Time

The principles write: "Non dubito is a continuous choice, not a one-time promise. You do not hold non dubito once at the wedding and call it done. You hold it again after every conflict, every misunderstanding, every hurt."43

This sentence has the same form as the sentence Paper 1 read on commitment: marriage is not one promise; it is the same promise made anew each day.44 Non dubito is likewise. Holding non dubito once at the wedding does not make every day after a day of non dubito. On the phone that day Zhou Yuan said "we've decided"; the next day he asked Lin Xia, "What do you actually think?" What can be read from outside is this: the first sentence declared agreement on Lin Xia's behalf; the later question handed that step back to her. How things were in his heart at those two moments, this paper does not read. Both sides are made anew by each person, time after time; they are not a state a marriage arrives at on some day. Falling back is read as it occurs, and does not overturn the direction.

Non Dubito Is Not the Absence of Doubt

Lin Xia had doubts about the move all along: whether the conservation rooms in Hangzhou needed people, whether her mother really needed her close by, whether Zhou Yuan's post was what he thought it was. Her having doubts does not keep her from not doubting that Zhou Yuan is an end.

Reading Psychoanalysis IV, Relation Theory made this point clear: non dubito is "not 'I have no doubts' but 'doubts are present, remainders are present, the construct's gaps are present, yet I do not doubt'": non dubito does not require the absence of doubt.45 Doubt falls on a matter: whether this plan will work, whether this sentence is true; non dubito falls on a person: that he is an end. The two are not in one place, and can be present at once.

Writing "non dubito toward motive," the SAE Marriage Principles has a sentence: "When the other does something you do not understand or that makes you uncomfortable, default to assuming they have their reasons, rather than defaulting to assuming they are trying to hurt you."46 This paper reads it on the other's side: what is assumed by default is that he has reasons of his own there, that his cannot-not is there; not that those reasons are good, nor that he never hurts anyone. The principles' "Ask first, judge second," given next, is a specific rule, and serves here only as an example.

Non Dubito Is Not Trust

Nor is non dubito the same as trust. Baier says that trust is reliance on others' goodwill: the one who trusts gives something he cares about into the other's keeping, and so trust can be betrayed, not merely disappointed.47 Lin Xia's handing Zhou Yuan her mother's weekend check-ups was putting what she cares about into his hands.

The two fall in different places. Non dubito falls on a person's being an end; trust falls on relying on the other's goodwill, putting what one cares about where he could harm it. The two can come apart: Lin Xia does not doubt that Zhou Yuan is an end, yet those few books in the conservation room she does not let him touch. Once something is handed over, what this series can register is the effects that the handing-over leaves; if Zhou Yuan promised to look after it and did not, that is read by commitment and breach of faith. As to whether trust includes recognizing him as an end too, and how trust is told apart from ordinary reliance, Relation Theory has written plainly that registering in this way does not amount to having explained them;48 this paper does not judge them either.

From Outside

Non dubito is a first-person matter. From outside, only words and deeds and structure are read: what she said, what he did, what arrangements have been left between the two, whether any road has been sealed. Minds are not read. Neighbors who see Lin Xia follow Zhou Yuan to Hangzhou cannot read out whether she chose to go in not doubting herself, or handed herself over; from outside the two can look exactly alike. Nor does mutual knowledge yield mutual non dubito.49

§4 The Directions of Colonization Read from This Item

MA15 The directions of colonization read from this item: entering in the name of intimacy; judging one party's law for her in the name of "this household" or "for our sake," that is, using "we" or "the household" to take in and replace one party's direction, which is a direction of colonization that borrows a construct against a person; marriage, like other institutions, cannot produce a "we" that gathers each person into one; passing final judgment on something done together on the ground that "We love each other, so you have to agree," which borrows mutual recognition as adjudication; which branch "For the sake of this household, you have to ..." actually borrows is checked by its use on that occasion, not assigned by its sentence form; handing one's own meaning to the other for safekeeping, and then demanding it of the other

Several directions of colonization can be read from this item. Each is read, as in Relation Theory, on this one effect: heading toward pouring in and occupying, and whether it took hold is seen in the other party's course afterward.50

Entering in the Name of Intimacy

"There shouldn't be any secrets between us." The day Zhou Yuan said this, he went through Lin Xia's phone.

This sentence takes intimacy as its name, and enters one of the four places MA13 speaks of. The intimacy is real; that the four places are hers is real too; to enter the latter in the name of the former is pouring in and occupying: her external relationships are, from then on, in part something he has looked at and judged. Whether it took hold is seen in her course afterward: if from then on she first thinks whether he will look before deciding what to tell her friends, that direction has taken hold.

Taking In and Replacing in the Name of "This Household" or "For Our Sake"

Zhou Yuan's mother came to stay in Hangzhou for a while. One day she said to Lin Xia: "You're one family now. That book-mending doesn't pay much; for the sake of this household, don't go looking for that conservation room; stay home and make a good life of it."

This sentence uses "this household" to judge Lin Xia's law for her: whether she does conservation work is to be decided by "the household." MA11 has said that "the household" does not take in, nor replace, each person's meaning. What this sentence does is exactly to take in and replace: to take where Lin Xia is going into "the household," and then have "the household" decide it for her.

This one has a particular shape: what it borrows is a construct. The speaker does not say "I want you not to go"; she says "This household wants you not to go." "The household" is treated here as something that can legislate for people, and one person, by way of it, speaks to another. This is a direction of colonization that borrows a construct against a person. Marriage, like other institutions, cannot produce a "we" that gathers each person into one: institutions can let people find each other, but cannot produce a "we" on behalf of both;51 Institution Theory says it more briefly: "An institution cannot produce a 'we.'"52 The one who borrows the construct says "we"; what is done is one person judging for another.

Borrowing Mutual Recognition as Adjudication

"We love each other, so you have to agree to move." Zhou Yuan never said this, but words like these can be heard in marriage. Relation Theory has read this sentence: "this sentence borrows mutual recognition to pass final judgment on a matter done together."53 The mutual recognition can be real: by the stipulation in §1, that autumn in the conservation room the two recognized in each other what was the other's; even so, mutual recognition does not generate a third party that can decide for the two whether something done together is to be done. Whether to move still has to be avowed by each of the two. Love Theory laid down the same between two people who love each other.54

Which Branch Is Borrowed Is Checked Each Time

The sentence form "For the sake of this household, you have to ..." is hard to judge across the board in marriage. Which branch it actually borrows has to be checked by its use on that occasion, not assigned by its sentence form.

It can borrow doing things together. "For the sake of this household, you have to put your share of the money into the account on time." The account is a rule the two agreed on, and Lin Xia avowed it; Zhou Yuan's reminding her speaks from the share she avowed, and is not borrowing a construct to legislate for her. On this occasion the rule's binding force passes through her own law (MA10). If she never avowed that rule, and Zhou Yuan set it alone, then "for the sake of this household" borrows a joint decision that does not exist, and avows it on her behalf.

It can borrow mutual recognition. "For the sake of this household, you have to give way to me a little; don't we love each other?" This is borrowing mutual recognition as adjudication.

It can also borrow "the household" itself, treated as a third party that legislates for people. Zhou Yuan's mother's sentence is of this kind; this is taking in and replacing.

The three have the same sentence form and different structures. So this paper does not say that the words "for the sake of this household" carry the direction of colonization; it says that what they are used to do is read on that occasion.

Handing One's Meaning to the Other for Safekeeping, Then Demanding It of the Other

The last one runs the other way: not judging for the other, but putting where one is going into the other's hands, and then demanding it of the other.

"I've lived my whole life for you; you can't let me have lived for nothing." This sentence can also be no more than something said aloud in a moment of distress, saying how hard things are on his side; that is material. What is read here is another use: the one who says it hands his own meaning to the other for safekeeping, so that where he is going is settled by whether she is there and how she treats him; and then demands it of her: she has to take up this share and settle the accounts for him.

The attribution endpoints of meaning are closed in one person.55 Attribution cannot be handed over: where he is going still has both ends in himself. What is handed over is the step in running: he has put where he is going onto whether she is there and how she treats him. Attribution cannot be handed over; demanding of the other what cannot be handed over is to treat the other as someone who settles one's accounts, requiring her to take up something only he himself can take up.56 This demand heads toward pouring in and occupying: her staying or going is from then on hung on his whole life. If it goes a step further and hangs on it "If you leave, I won't go on living," that raises the cost of her exit outward, which Paper 1 and Love Theory Paper 4 have both read.57

This one also has his own side. When he puts the step in running onto her, how things stand on his own side cannot be seen from outside, and this paper does not judge it.

§5 Interfacing with Tradition

Several have asked, one after another, about the things this paper reads. For each, this paper writes faithfully what he sees and why he looks; where the original presses on this paper, it writes the pressure, and then where they meet and where they part; other traditions appear in their own words. Nozick, Kant and Baier the neighboring series have already interfaced; they are pointed back to here, and only the layer of marriage is picked up.58

The family as a person (Hegel). Paper 1 has already interfaced with Hegel's sections on marriage, reading him to say that two people consent to make themselves one person.59 This paper continues with his sections on the family. §158: the family, as the immediate substantiality of mind, is specifically characterized by love, which is mind's feeling of its own unity; so in the family one has the self-consciousness of one's individuality within this unity, as one's absolute essence, with the result that one is in it not as an independent person but as a member.60 The Addition to this section says (the Additions were compiled from lecture notes, and rank below the main text) that love means in general terms the consciousness of my unity with another, so that I am not in selfish isolation, and I win my self-consciousness only through renouncing my independence and through knowing myself as the unity of myself with another and of the other with me.61 §169: the family, as person, has its real external existence in property; §170: as a universal and enduring person, it requires possessions determined as permanent and secure.62 §171: the family as a legal entity must, in relation to others, be represented by the husband as its head.63 He looks in order to set the family at the starting point of ethical life, as a substance whose bond is love, before the independent persons of civil society. What he sees: people in marriage really do experience themselves within a whole; a household has common, enduring goods; a household can have someone who speaks for it. He presses on this paper at two points. First, if in the family one is not an independent person but a member, and if love is renouncing independence (this half rests on the Addition), then "you are you, I am I" is precisely the step that love goes beyond; MA10 says that "we" does not come before the two, and for him it is the reverse: the unity is the substance, and each person is its member. Second, if the family is a person, with its property and its representative, then "the household" is a bearer, and "for the sake of this household" has a legitimate speaker; what MA11 leaves unjudged, he has already judged. They meet in: the experience of fusion is real; people in a marriage do feel themselves part of a whole; common goods are real too, and they keep their own accounts. They part at three points. First, the experience of fusion this paper, following Love Theory, leaves to each person; in structure, the two are still two, and their directions cross without merging (MA11).64 Second, whether the household is a person this paper does not judge, and registers as a remainder; even if it is, it does not swallow the meaning of the two people it was formed of (MA11). Third, the husband's representing the family as its head, if it is the rule of some institution, is read by Paper 1 as endorsement, acknowledged but not judged; where it lands between two people, one person judging for another in the name of "the household" is read by MA15.

Because it was he, because it was myself (Montaigne). In "Of Friendship" Montaigne writes of his friendship with La Boétie. He sets such friendship above every other union, marriage included: marriage is a covenant in which nothing is free but the entrance, its continuance forced and constrained, depending on things outside our will, and ordinarily concluded for other ends.65 He writes of perfect friendship: two souls mixing and blending into each other, in so complete a mixture that the seam that joined them can no longer be found.66 Pressed to say why he loved that man, he says that it cannot be expressed, and that he can only answer: "Because it was he, because it was my selfe".67 Right after this he says that this indescribable thing seized his whole will and led it to plunge into the other's will and lose itself; the other's will likewise plunged into his and lost itself.68 He also says that if such a truly voluntary acquaintance could be formed within marriage, friendship would be more complete; the sentence that follows is a pronouncement of his about women, which this paper does not take up.69 He looks in order to commemorate a friendship he held to come once in a lifetime, and to set it apart from every other union. What he sees: the reasons for loving a person finally fall on that person and on oneself, cannot be fully said, and cannot be exchanged; the continuance of marriage can hang on things outside the will. He presses on this paper at two points. First, if the highest union is two souls blended until the seam cannot be found, then crossing without merging is a refusal to go that far, and MA11 speaks of a union not yet complete. Second, if nothing in marriage is free but the entrance, and its continuance hangs on things outside the will, then the marriage this series reads, in which both are headed in the direction of recognizing the other as an end too, and there is love, is a self-contradictory object. They meet in: the reasons of love fall on two irreplaceable people, cannot be fully said, and cannot be exchanged, on the same side as Love Theory's this one, irreplaceable.70 They part at three points. First, "Because it was he, because it was my selfe" looks like a "you are you, I am I" said from the side of love, yet in him it moves at once to two wills plunging into each other and losing themselves, the seam no longer to be found; in the "you are you, I am I" this paper reads, the seam is kept: the two are still two, each one's law is not handed to the other, and the experience of fusion is left to each person (MA11). Second, the continuance of marriage this paper does not read as forced: commitment cannot lock tomorrow, it binds by where one stands and by the effects already left, and endorsement only makes it public; if the continuance really were forced, exit sealed off, then by Paper 1 that marriage is not in this series.71 Third, he sets friendship above marriage; this paper does not rank unions; the difference between marriage and friendship lies in exclusivity and deep commitment, not in rank.72

Love's bond (Nozick). Nozick says that romantic love is wanting to form a "we" with that particular person, and that people who form a we transfer some of their rights to make certain decisions unilaterally into a joint pool; he also says that each one's new identity as part of the we is an additional one, while individual identity remains. Love Theory Paper 6 has already interfaced with him, and wrote plainly: the question is whether shared arrangements still pass through each of the two people's own law, or, in the name of "we," avow one party's law on her behalf; only where it goes as far as the latter does he part from this series.73 Marriage is where that joint pool is largest: the dwelling, money, children, whose family to spend New Year with; nearly everything has been put in. This paper picks up the layer of marriage, and answers at two points. First, each thing in the pool is read by MA10 as something done together: C has to be avowed by both, and its binding force passes separately through each one's own law, or comes from a procedure both acknowledge; being put in the pool does not make any of it decided for the two by "we." Second, marriage has endorsement beyond being in love: that institution recognizes these two as husband and wife, which looks like adding a public identity to "we"; this paper reads it by Paper 1: it is a matter between persons and a construct, and is only registered; an institution cannot produce a "we."

Love and respect (Kant). Kant says that love directs people to come closer to one another, and respect directs them to keep a fitting distance from one another; friendship in its perfection is the union of the two in equal measure, and is only an idea. Relation Theory has already interfaced with him: this series' two directions do not lie in nearness and distance; cultivation is not a little more respect, nor is colonization a little more love.74 This paper picks up the layer of marriage: the places that cannot be entered, of which MA13 speaks, look like the distance respect requires. This paper does not read them this way. They cannot be entered not because intimacy has to be balanced by distance, but because those four places are the other's own. A person can be as close to the other as can be, and still not enter the other's internality; he can also be far away, and all the same make for the other a decision the other can make himself. Nor does this paper say what distance ought to be kept; how a person treats others belongs to the critique series.

Trust (Baier). Relation Theory has already interfaced with Baier on trust; this paper, in MA14, only sets trust and non dubito in two places: non dubito falls on a person's being an end; trust falls on relying on the other's goodwill, putting what one cares about where he could harm it; a person can not doubt that the other is an end, and yet in some matter not hand it over to him. As to whether trust includes recognizing him as an end too, and how trust is told apart from ordinary reliance, Relation Theory has written plainly that it has not explained these, and this paper does not judge them either.75

§6 Drawing Together and Downstream

This paper has laid down six propositions. Taken together, they say: you are you, I am I, and only then is there an us. When "we" is said in marriage, it divides into two branches, doing things together and mutual recognition, checked case by case; neither branch comes before the two nor stands above them; neither legislates, nor passes final judgment on either party's own law; the binding force of rules the two have agreed on passes through each one's own law, or through a procedure both acknowledge; commitment is still entered person by person, and is not a third branch of "we." The attribution of meaning lies with each person, and the outlet of the direction is outside: on the other, on someone who has not yet come; the directions of two people cross without merging; "we" and "the household" do not take in, nor replace, each person's meaning, and whether "the household" can come to stand separately as a bearer is not judged. Recognizing the other as an end too: recognizing only that his cannot-not is there, unable to read out its content; not making for him the decisions he can make himself; feelings he voices one can fail to understand, and does not deny. Even the most intimate marriage has places that cannot be entered: internality, solitude, external relationships, the past. Non dubito has both sides, each made anew time after time; non dubito is not the absence of doubt, nor the same as trust. The directions of colonization read from this item are entering in the name of intimacy; borrowing "the household" to take in and replace; borrowing mutual recognition as adjudication; handing one's own meaning to the other for safekeeping and then demanding it of the other; which branch "for the sake of this household" borrows is checked each time.

This paper does not prove that intimacy requires mutual transparency, nor that keeping places that cannot be entered shows that one loves too little.

The question left open. In the end Lin Xia went to Hangzhou. There she found a conservation room; there is less work than before, and she says it was her own choice. In Zhou Yuan's first year in Hangzhou, almost every weekend he looked out old-book markets for her, and helped her find out which library was hiring. Was what he did letting her grow into her own self? If one day he says, "Everything you have in Hangzhou, I found for you," what is that sentence? Looking toward the one beside one is the business of Paper 3. If one day the two look together toward someone who has not yet come, that is Paper 5.

Downstream. What this paper has laid down is used by the papers that follow as follows. "You are you, I am I" is the premise of bringing each other into their own and of preparing for a child, and Papers 3 and 5 use it as it stands. That change is made by the other himself, and that what I can do is create conditions and question, the place between items 2 and 6 of the principles, Paper 3 resolves; accommodation is read in Paper 3. How rules the two have agreed on sediment over the long years, how division of labor slides into a fixed requirement aimed at the other, how the past is brought out as a reason for the present, are read in Paper 4. Preparing for a child is something the two do together, read by that branch of MA10, and Paper 5 picks it up; which branch "for the child's sake" borrows, Paper 6 checks by MA15. The relation between the side of not doubting that oneself is an end and exit is read in Paper 7. The check on shared words, the two branches of "we," "the household," and the two sides of "non dubito," together with the remainder of whether "the household" can come to stand separately as a bearer, is listed together in Paper 0.

Acknowledgments

This paper is signed by Han Qin alone; the author decided every argument and choice and bears sole responsibility for the text. Models from Anthropic and OpenAI assisted with drafting and review; the author thanks them.

Notes

  1. Paper 1, §7, "The question left open." ↩︎
  2. Relation Theory Paper 1, under H3: "Whenever Relation Theory says 'we,' it must state which branch it means." ↩︎
  3. Meaning Theory Paper 0, Section Two: "The attribution endpoints are closed in one person"; Meaning Theory P1 Y10. ↩︎
  4. F6, Appendix D, SAE Marriage Principles, item 0. Below this the original has a few further sentences, including evaluative words such as "should not" and "not worth"; this paper does not take that layer. ↩︎
  5. Relation Theory Paper 1, under H3. ↩︎
  6. Action Theory Paper 8, D47. ↩︎
  7. Action Theory Paper 8, D45: "neither side can declare agreement in the other's place". ↩︎
  8. Value Theory P6 V77, as quoted in Relation Theory Paper 1, under H3. ↩︎
  9. Relation Theory Paper 1, under H3: "What both branches give is only the minimal bound past which 'we' does not stand in for anyone; neither is a sufficient theory of any kind of relation"; "which branch is actually in play is checked case by case, and is not assigned in advance by the kind of relation". ↩︎
  10. Action Theory Paper 8, §5, "Doing Things Together Without Merging into One Subject": "The 'we' in these words is many people's separate deeds spoken of together, not a 'we' standing above those people and deciding for them." The original place reads a coordinator's retrospect from the village of Nieuwlande, as recorded in the Moral Law, in the section on doing things together, and so it belongs to the branch of doing things together; in "We've had a hard time these years" there is no such matter done together, and the two sentences are not of the same form. ↩︎
  11. Relation Theory H3, H12. ↩︎
  12. Action Theory Paper 8, D48: "Doing things together does not automatically produce a position that legislates each side's own law for them; institutions can let people find each other, but cannot produce a 'we' on behalf of both." ↩︎
  13. Conflict Treatise §24. The original place is the rule of the two people living together in its Introduction, made after they sorted household matters into three kinds. ↩︎
  14. Relation Theory H23, H27. ↩︎
  15. Paper 1, MA1, and the scene on Gilbert in §6. ↩︎
  16. Action Theory Paper 8, D49: "What a person has done himself cannot be acknowledged by someone else in his place". ↩︎
  17. Meaning Theory P1 Y10. ↩︎
  18. Meaning Theory P1 Y10: "This proposition blocks an inference that comes easily to hand: since this relation is closed, it should be self-contained, self-sufficient, in no need of an outside. That does not follow." ↩︎
  19. Meaning Theory P3 Y27. The original place stipulates: "even if each of them has avowed the content the other as an end". Carrying it to husband and wife is an extension, this series' own undertaking. ↩︎
  20. Meaning Theory P3 Y27. ↩︎
  21. Relation Theory H12. ↩︎
  22. Meaning Theory P3 Y27. ↩︎
  23. Value Theory P6, under V76: "As to whether another bearer might come to stand on some other conditions, this section does not ask. Even if one did, that would not mean the sources of the original people had been swallowed by it." Meaning Theory P3 Y27 cites the same place. ↩︎
  24. Love Theory L35. Love at this layer is read in Love Theory Paper 5. ↩︎
  25. SAE Marriage Principles, item 1(c), "Non dubito toward capacity." ↩︎
  26. Relation Theory H3. ↩︎
  27. Relation Theory H8: the direction is read on this one effect, and whether it took hold is seen in the other party's later understanding and action. ↩︎
  28. SAE Marriage Principles, item 1(b), "Non dubito toward feeling." The original's "may not" is a normative sentence form; this paper reads it by structure. ↩︎
  29. Relation Theory H37: saying an expectation out loud is a form of questioning; to attach a qualifying condition to an expectation, fixing for the other party what something means to him, is to slide in the direction of colonization. ↩︎
  30. Conflict Treatise §2: "The other end enters as a requirement that the other bears in the first person and by which the other goes on organizing their action. I do not certify whether it has attained the standing of a law of its own, and I do not cancel it on the other's behalf for want of such certification." The original place speaks of the operation layer when two laws collide; carrying it to feelings the other voices is an extension, this series' own undertaking. ↩︎
  31. SAE Marriage Principles, item 2, "Inviolable Zones." ↩︎
  32. F6 §3.1(f). ↩︎
  33. SAE Marriage Principles, item 2(a), "Internality." The original's sentence that "'You shouldn't think that way' should not exist in a marriage" is a normative sentence form; this paper reads it by structure: the last of the three sentences judges the other's thought for him, and heads toward pouring in and occupying (Relation Theory H8, H37). ↩︎
  34. SAE Marriage Principles, item 2(b), "Solitude." ↩︎
  35. SAE Marriage Principles, item 2(c), "External relationships." ↩︎
  36. Relation Theory H12. ↩︎
  37. Paper 1, MA9; Relation Theory Paper 3, under H26, the third kind: "holding back his papers, cutting off all his contact with the outside, shutting him in or raising the cost until he is trapped". ↩︎
  38. SAE Marriage Principles, item 2(d), "The past." ↩︎
  39. Relation Theory H14: "what actually acts is always today alone". ↩︎
  40. Love Theory L35: "loving her is not reading her through: observation and communication can approach it; reading it out is not possible". ↩︎
  41. SAE Marriage Principles, item 0. ↩︎
  42. SAE Marriage Principles, the closing paragraph: "Holding non dubito toward a civilization as an end, and holding non dubito toward the person beside you as an end, are the same act." ↩︎
  43. SAE Marriage Principles, item 1(d). ↩︎
  44. Paper 1, MA4. ↩︎
  45. Relation Theory Paper 0, §2, reading Psychoanalysis IV §2.2. ↩︎
  46. SAE Marriage Principles, item 1(a), "Non dubito toward motive." ↩︎
  47. Relation Theory Paper 0, §14: "Trust is reliance on others' goodwill: the one who trusts gives something he cares about into the other's keeping, and so trust can be betrayed, not merely disappointed" (reporting Baier 1986 after SEP, "Trust," §1). ↩︎
  48. Relation Theory Paper 0, §14: "that this series can register the effects left in it does not mean it has thereby explained the difference between trust and ordinary reliance". ↩︎
  49. Love Theory L47: "mutual knowledge does not yield mutual non dubito". ↩︎
  50. Relation Theory H8. ↩︎
  51. Action Theory Paper 8, D48. ↩︎
  52. Institution Theory Paper 5, Z31, as quoted in Relation Theory Paper 1, under H3. ↩︎
  53. Relation Theory Paper 1, under H3. ↩︎
  54. Love Theory L46: "'We' does not legislate, and does not pass final judgment on either party's own law; 'We love each other, so you have to agree' borrows mutual recognition to pass final judgment on a matter done together." ↩︎
  55. Meaning Theory Paper 0, Section Two; Meaning Theory P1 Y10. ↩︎
  56. Reading, from the closure of the attribution endpoints in one person, that "demanding of the other what cannot be handed over" treats the other as someone who settles one's accounts, is this series' own extension (own undertaking). ↩︎
  57. Paper 1, MA4, the subsection "A Vow Is Not a Lock in the Other Party's Hands"; Love Theory L31. ↩︎
  58. Nozick: Love Theory Paper 6, §6; Kant on love and respect: Relation Theory Paper 0, §8.1; Baier on trust: Relation Theory Paper 0, §14. ↩︎
  59. Paper 1, §6, the scene on Hegel. ↩︎
  60. §158. Knox's translation: "The family, as the immediate substantiality of mind, is specifically characterised by love, which is mind's feeling of its own unity"; "one is in it not as an independent person but as a member". ↩︎
  61. §158, Addition. The Additions were compiled by the editor from students' notes of Hegel's lectures; they are not text Hegel himself published, and rank below the main text. Knox's translation: "Love means in general terms the consciousness of my unity with another, so that I am not in selfish isolation but win my self-consciousness only as the renunciation of my independence and through knowing myself as the unity of myself with another and of the other with me". ↩︎
  62. §169. Knox's translation: "The family, as person, has its real external existence in property". §170: "as a universal and enduring person, it requires possessions specifically determined as permanent and secure". ↩︎
  63. §171. Knox's translation: "The family as a legal entity in relation to others must be represented by the husband as its head". ↩︎
  64. Love Theory L44: "That moment is not fusion: the two are still two; the experience of fusion is left to each person." ↩︎
  65. Florio's translation: "Concerning marriage, besides that it is a covenant which hath nothing free but the entrance, the continuance being forced and constrained, depending else-where than from our will, and a match ordinarily concluded to other ends". ↩︎
  66. Same: "they entermixe and confound themselves one in the other, with so universall a commixture, that they weare out and can no more finde the seame that hath conjoined them together". ↩︎
  67. Same: "If a man urge me to tell wherefore I loved him, I feele it cannot be expressed, but by answering; Because it was he, because it was my selfe". ↩︎
  68. Same, immediately following the last: "It is I wot not what kinde of quintessence, of all this commixture, which having seized all my will, induced the same to plunge and lose it selfe in his, which likewise having seized all his will, brought it to lose and plunge it selfe in mine, with a mutuall greedinesse, and with a semblable concurrance". (from the Florio translation as given on monadnock.net, this sentence checked; the French original has not been checked) ↩︎
  69. Same: "And truly, if without that, such a genuine and voluntarie acquaintance might be contracted ... It is certaine, that friendship would thereby be more compleat and full". ↩︎
  70. Love Theory L1. ↩︎
  71. Paper 1, MA4, MA9. ↩︎
  72. F6 §3.1(g), of friendship: "Subtract exclusivity and deep commitment from marriage". ↩︎
  73. Love Theory Paper 6, §6. What Love Theory relies on is the reprint in the Solomon and Higgins anthology and the account in SEP, "Love," §2; see the references of that paper. ↩︎
  74. Relation Theory Paper 0, §8.1. ↩︎
  75. Relation Theory Paper 0, §14. ↩︎

References

All SAE works below are cited by concept DOI, which always resolves to the latest version. Quotations are checked item by item in the accompanying audit table.

I · SAE works directly cited in this paper

Qin, H. (2026). How Is Institution Possible: From Inter-Ontological Remainder to Co-Constructive Framework (SAE Foundational Paper 6) [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19328662

Qin, H. (2026). On Value and the Other (SAE Value Theory, Paper 6) [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22191071

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Conflict Treatise: How Subjecthood Is Not Swallowed by Conflict Itself [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22313628

Qin, H. (2026). The Jurisdiction of the Question of Meaning (SAE Meaning Theory, Paper 0) [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22802041

Qin, H. (2026). What Kind of Relation Meaning Is (SAE Meaning Theory, Paper 1) [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22652134

Qin, H. (2026). The Half That Is Not Mine to Settle (SAE Meaning Theory, Paper 3) [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22731235

Qin, H. (2026). Finding One Another (SAE Action Theory, Paper 8) [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22970783

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Relation Theory Paper 0: The Place of Relation Theory [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23545115

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Relation Theory Paper 1: What a Relation Is, and What It Is Not [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23545047

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Relation Theory Paper 2: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23541778

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Relation Theory Paper 3: Commitment [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23545023

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Relation Theory Paper 4: Dealings and Expectation [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23545057

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Love Theory Paper 1: At First Sight [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23627762

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Love Theory Paper 4: No Substitute [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23627776

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Love Theory Paper 5: Without Waiting for You [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23627779

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Love Theory Paper 6: That Moment [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23627781

Qin, H. (2026). SAE Marriage Theory Paper 1: Joined [Preprint]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23819212 II · External works

Hegel, G. W. F. Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts (1820), §§158 (with Addition), 169–171. English: Hegel's Philosophy of Right, trans. T. M. Knox. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952. (marxists.org transcription; the German original has not been checked. The Addition was compiled from lecture notes, and ranks below the main text)

Montaigne, Michel de. "De l'amitié", Essais (1580/1588), I.28. English: "Of Friendship", trans. John Florio, 1603. (from the transcription of Florio's translation on monadnock.net; the French original has not been checked)

Interfaces

  • Main upstream: Relation Theory Paper 1 (H3, H12; the two branches of "we," under H3); Action Theory Paper 8 (D45, D47, D48, D49; §5); Value Theory P6 (V76, V77); Meaning Theory P1 (Y10), P3 (Y27), Paper 0 (Section Two); the Conflict Treatise (§2, §24); F6 (§3.1(f)(g); Appendix D, items 0, 1 and 2, and the closing paragraph).
  • Also used: Relation Theory H8, H14, H23, H27, H37; Relation Theory Paper 0 (§2; §8.1; §14); Relation Theory Paper 3, under H26; Love Theory L1, L31, L35, L44, L46, L47, Paper 5, and Paper 6, §6; Institution Theory Paper 5, Z31 (by way of Relation Theory Paper 1); Psychoanalysis IV §2.2 (by way of Relation Theory Paper 0, §2); Moral Law P8 §3.3.6 (by way of Action Theory Paper 8, §5).
  • This series: continues from Paper 1, MA1, MA4, MA9, the scenes on Gilbert and Hegel in §6, and the question left open in §7; Paper 3 takes up bringing someone into their own, accommodation, and the place between items 2 and 6 of the principles; Paper 4 takes up the sediment of rules, and the past; Paper 5 takes up preparing for a child as something done together; Paper 6 takes up "for the child's sake"; Paper 7 takes up the side of not doubting that oneself is an end, and exit; Paper 0 lists together "we," "the household," "non dubito," and the remainder of whether "the household" can come to stand separately as a bearer.