Part 10 (1/2)

In this fact we have, perhaps, the ground of the idealist's disregard of the oft-proffered physical explanation of the difference between the perceptual event and _the_ (so-called) real object. And it is quite possible that some realists who read these lines will feel that in my last paragraphs I have been making a covert argument for idealism. Not so, I repeat; they are an argument for a truly nave realism. The presentative realist, in his appeal to ”common-sense” and the ”plain man,” first sophisticates the umpire and then appeals. He stops a good way short of a genuine navete. The plain man, for a surety, does not regard noises heard, lights seen, etc., as mental existences; but neither does he regard them as things _known_. That they are just things is good enough for him. That they are in relation to mind, or in relation to mind as their ”knower,” no more occurs to him than that they are mental. By this I mean much more than that the formulae of epistemology are foreign to him; I mean that his att.i.tude to these things _as_ things involves their _not_ being in relation to him as a mind or a knower. He is in the att.i.tude of a liker or hater, a doer or an appreciator. When he takes the att.i.tude of a knower he begins to inquire. Once depart from thorough navete, and subst.i.tute for it the psychological theory that perception is a cognitive presentation to a mind of a causal object, and the first step is taken on the road which ends in an idealistic system.

III

For simplicity's sake, I have written as if my main problem were to show how, in the face of a supposed difficulty, a strictly realistic theory of the perceptual event may be maintained. But my interest is primarily in the facts, and in the theory only because of the facts it formulates. The significance of the facts of the case may, perhaps, be indicated by a consideration which has thus far been ignored. In regarding a perception as a case of knowledge, the presentative realist does more than shove into it a relation to mind which then, naturally and inevitably, becomes the explanation of any differences that exist between its subject-matter and some causal object with which it contrasts. In many cases--very important cases, too, in the physical sciences--the contrasting ”real object” becomes known by a logical process, by inference--as the contemporary position of the star is determined by calculations from data, not by perception. This, then, is the situation of the presentative realist: If perception is knowledge of its cause, it stands in unfavorable contrast with another indirect mode of knowledge; _its_ object is less valid than the object of inference. I do not adduce these considerations as showing that the case is hopeless for the presentative realist;[61] I am willing to concede he can find a satisfactory way out. But the difficulty exists; and in existing it calls emphatic attention to a case which is certainly and indisputably a case of knowledge--namely, propositions arrived at through inference, judgments as logical a.s.sertions.

With relation to the unquestionable case of knowledge, the logical or inferential case, perceptions occupy a unique status, one which readily accounts for their being regarded as cases of knowledge, although in themselves they are natural events. (1) They are the sole ultimate data, the sole media, of inference to all natural objects and processes. While we do not, in any intelligible or verifiable sense, know _them_, we know all things that we do know _with_ or _by_ them.

They furnish the only ultimate evidence of the existence and nature of the objects which we infer, and they are the sole ultimate checks and tests of the inferences. The visible light is a necessary part of the evidence on the basis of which we infer the existence, place, and structure of the astronomical star, and some other perception is the verifying check on the value of the inference. Because of this characteristic use of perceptions, the perceptions themselves acquire, by ”second intention,” a knowledge status. They _become_ objects of minute, accurate, and experimental scrutiny. Since the body of propositions that forms natural science hangs upon them, _for scientific purposes_ their nature _as_ evidence, _as_ signs, entirely overshadows their natural status, that of being simply natural events.

The scientific man, as scientific, cares for perceptions not in themselves, but as they throw light upon the nature of some object reached by evidence. And since every such inference tries to terminate in a further perception (as its test of validity), the value of inferential knowing depends on perception. (2) Independently of science, daily life uses perceptions as signs of other perceptions.

When a perception of a certain kind frequently recurs and is constantly used as evidence of some other impending perceptual event, the function of habit (a natural function, be it noted, not a psychical or epistemological function) often brings it about that the perception loses its original quality in acquiring a sign-value.

Language is, of course, the typical case. Noises, in themselves mere natural events, through habitual use as signs of other natural events become integrated with what they mean. What they stand for is telescoped, as it were, into what they are. This happens also with other natural events, colors, tastes, etc. Thus, _for practical purposes_, many perceptual events are cases of knowledge; that is, they have been _used_ as such so often that the habit of so using them is established or automatic.

In this brief reference to facts that are perfectly familiar, I have tried to suggest three points of crucial importance for a nave realism: first, that inferential or evidential knowledge (that involving logical relation) is in the field as an obvious and undisputed case of knowledge; second, that this function, although embodying the logical relation, is itself a natural and specifically detectable process among natural things--it is not a non-natural or epistemological relation; third, that the _use_, practical and scientific, of perceptual events in the evidential or inferential function is such as to make them _become_ objects of inquiry and limits of knowledge, and to such a degree that this acquired characteristic quite overshadows, in many cases, their primary nature.

If we add to what has been said the fact that, like every natural function, the inferential function turns out better in some cases and worse in others, we get a naturalistic or navely realistic conception of the ”_problem_ of knowledge”: Control of the conditions of inference--the only type of knowledge detectable in direct existence--so as to guide it toward better conclusions.

IV

I do not flatter myself that I will receive much grat.i.tude from realists for attempting to rescue them from that error of fact which exposes their doctrine to an idealistic interpretation. The superst.i.tion, growing up in a false physics and physiology and perpetuated by psychology, that sensations-perceptions are cases of knowledge, is too ingrained. But--_crede experto_--let them try the experiment of conceiving perceptions as pure natural events, not as cases of awareness or apprehension, and they will be surprised to see how little they miss--save the burden of carrying traditionary problems. Meantime, while philosophic argument, such as this, will do little to change the state of belief regarding perceptions, the development of biology and the refinement of physiology will, in due season, do the work.

In concluding my article, I ought to refer, in order to guard against misapprehension, to a reply that the presentative realist might make to my objection. He might say that while the seen light is a case of knowledge or presentative awareness, it is not a case of knowledge of the star, but simply of the seen light, just as it is. In this case the appeal to the physical explanations of the difference of the seen light from its objective source is quite legitimate. At first sight, such a position seems innocent and tenable. Even if innocent, it would, however, be ungrounded, since there is no evidence of the existence of a knower, and of its relation to the seen light. But further consideration will reveal that there is a most fundamental objection. If the notion of perception as a case of adequate knowledge of its own object-matter be accepted, the knowledge relation is absolutely ubiquitous; it is an all-inclusive net. The ”ego-centric predicament” is inevitable. This result of making perception a case of knowing will now occupy us.

FOOTNOTES:

[58] I am indebted to Dr. Bush's article on ”Knowledge and Perception,” _Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods_, Vol. VI, p. 393, and to Professor Woodbridge's article on ”Perception and Epistemology” in the _James Memorial Volume_, as well as to his paper on ”Sensations,” read at the 1910 meeting of the American Philosophical a.s.sociation. Since my point of departure and aim are somewhat different, I make this general acknowledgment in lieu of more specific references.

[59] Plato's use of shadows, of reflections in the water, and other ”images” or ”imitations” to prove the presence in nature of non-being was, considering the state of physical science in his day, a much more sensible conclusion than the modern use of certain images as proof that the object in perception is a psychical content. Hobbes expressly treats all images as physical, as on the same plane as reflections in the water and echoes; the comparison is his.

[60] It is impossible, in this brief treatment, to forestall every misapprehension and objection. Yet to many the use of the term ”seen”

will appear to be an admission that a case of knowledge is involved.

But is smelling a case of knowledge? Or (if the superst.i.tion persists as to smell) is gnawing or poking a case of knowledge? My point, of course, is that ”seen” involves a relation to organic activity, not to a knower, or mind.

[61] This is the phase of the matter, of course, which the rationalistic or objective realist, the realist of the type of T. H.

Green, emphasizes. Put in terms of systems, the difficulty is that in escaping the subjectivism latent in treating perception as a case of knowledge, the realist runs into the waiting arms of the objective idealist.

X

EPISTEMOLOGICAL REALISM: THE ALLEGED UBIQUITY OF THE KNOWLEDGE RELATION

I have pointed out that if perception be treated as a case of knowledge, knowledge of every form and kind must be treated as a case of a presentation to a knower. The alleged discipline of epistemology is then inevitable. In common usage, the term ”knowledge” tends to be employed eulogistically; its meaning approaches the connotation of the term ”science.” More loosely, it is used, of course, to designate all beliefs and propositions that are held with a.s.surance, especially with the implication that the a.s.surance is reasonable, or grounded. In its practical sense, it is used as the equivalent of ”knowing _how_,” of skill or ability involving such acquaintance with things and persons as enables one to antic.i.p.ate how they behave under certain conditions and to take steps accordingly. Such usages of the term are all differential; they all involve definite contrasts--with ungrounded conviction, or with doubt and mere guesswork, or with the inexpertness that accompanies lack of familiarity. In its epistemological use, the term ”knowledge” has a blanket value which is absolutely unknown in common life. It covers any and every ”presentation” of any and every thing to a knower, to an ”awarer,” if I may coin a word for the sake of avoiding some of the pitfalls of the term ”consciousness.” And, I repeat, this indiscriminate use of the term ”knowledge,” so foreign to science and daily life, is absolutely unavoidable if perception be regarded as, in itself, a mode of knowledge. And then--and only then--the problem of ”the possibility, nature, and extent of knowledge _in general_” is also inevitable. I hope I shall not be regarded as offensively pragmatic if I suggest that this undesirable consequence is a good reason for not accepting the premise from which it follows, unless that premise be absolutely forced upon us.

At all events, upon the supposition of the ubiquity of the knowledge relation in respect to a self, presentative realism is compelled to accept the genuineness of the epistemological problem, and thus to convert itself into an epistemological realism, getting one more step away from both nave and naturalistic realism. The problem is especially acute for a presentative realism because idealism has made precisely this ubiquity of relations.h.i.+p its axiom, its short-cut. One sample is as good as a thousand. Says Bain: ”There is no possible knowledge of a world except in relation to our minds. Knowledge means a state of mind; the notion of material things is a mental fact. We are incapable even of discussing the existence of an independent material world; the very act is a contradiction. We can speak only of a world presented to our own minds.”

On the supposition of the ubiquity of the relation, realism and idealism exhaust the alternatives; if the ubiquity of the relation is a myth, both doctrines are unreal, because there is no problem of which they are the solution. My first step in indicating the unreality of both ”solutions” is formal. I shall try to show that _if_ the knowledge relation of things to a self is the exhaustive and inclusive relation, there is no intelligible point at issue between idealism and realism; the differences between them are either verbal or else due to a failure on the part of one or the other to stick to their _common_ premise.

I