CHAPTER VIIOBJECTS22. Types of Objects.22.1We have now to consider natural elements which are objects of various types. There are in fact an indefinite number of such types corresponding to the types of recognisable permanences in nature of various grades of subtlety. It is only necessary here to attempt a rough classification of those which are essential to scientific thought.The consideration of objects introduces the concepts of 'matter'—or more vaguely, 'material'—of 'transmission' and of 'causation.' These concepts express certain relations of objects to events, but the relations are too complex to be fully expressed in such simple terms.22.2The essence of the perception of an object is recognition. There is the primary recognition which is the awareness of permanence within the specious present; there is the indefinite recognition (which we may term 'recollection') which is the awareness of other perceptions of the object as related to other events separate from the specious present, but without any precise designation of the events; and there is the definite recognition (which we may term 'memory') which is an awareness of perception of the object as related to certain other definite events separate from the specious present.22.3The awareness of external nature is an awareness of a duration, which is the being of nature throughout the specious present, and of a complex of events, each being part of the present duration. These events fall into two sets. In one set is the percipient event and in the other are the external events whose peculiar property, which has led to their discernment, is that they are the situations of sense-objects.22.4The percipient event is discerned as the locus of a recognisable permanence which is the 'percipient object.' This object is the unity of the awareness whose recognition leads to the classification of a train of percipient events as the natural life associated with one consciousness. The discussion of the percipient object leads us beyond the scope of this enquiry. Owing to the temporal duration of the immediate present the self-knowledge of the percipient object is a knowledge of the unity of the consciousness within other parts of the immediate present. Thus, though it is a knowledge of what is immediately present, it is not a knowledge knowing itself.23. Sense-Objects.23.1The sense-object is the simplest permanence which we trace as self-identical in external events. It is some definite sense-datum, such as the colour red of a definite shade. We see redness here and the same redness there, redness then and the same redness now. In other words, we perceive redness in the same relation to various definite events, and it is the same redness which we perceive. Tastes, colours, sounds, and every variety of sensation are objects of this sort.23.2There is no apprehension of external events apart from recognitions of sense-objects as related to them, and there is no recognition of sense-objects except as in relation to external events.In so far as recognition of a sense-object is confined to primary recognition within the present duration, the sense-object and the event do not clearly disentangle themselves; recollection and memory are the chief agents in producing a clear consciousness of a sense-object. But apart from recollection and memory, any factor, perceived as situated in an external event, which might occur again and which is not a relation between other such factors, is a sense-object. Sense-objects form the ultimate type of perceived objects (other than percipient objects) and do not express any permanence of relatedness between perceived objects of yet more fundamental types.23.3A sense-object, such as a particular shade of redness, has a variety of relations to the events of nature. These relations are not explicable in terms of the two-termed relations to which attention is ordinarily confined.The events which (in addition to the sense-object) enter as terms into such a relation can be classified into three sets (not mutually exclusive), namely (i) percipient events, (ii) events which are 'situations' of the sense-object, (iii) conditioning events.23.4A percipient event in the polyadic relation of a sense-object to nature is the percipient event of an awareness which includes the recognition of that sense-object. An eventis a situation of the sense-object for that percipient event when for the associated awareness the sense-object is a quality of. Now perception involves essentially both a percipient event and an associated duration within which that percipient event is set and with which it is cogredient. A situation of a sense-object in respect to a given percipient event occurs within the associated duration of the percipient event. In fact the content of the awareness derived from a given percipient event is merely the associated duration as extending over a complex of events which are situations of sense-objects of perception and also as extending over the percipient event itself. For example, an astronomer looks through a telescope and sees a new red star burst into existence. He sees redness situated in some event which is happening now and whose spatial relations to other events, though fairly determinate as to direction from him, are very vague as to distance.23.5We say that what he really sees is a star coming into being two centuries previously. But the relation of the event 'really seen' to the percipient event and to the redness is an entirely different one from that of the event 'seen' to these same entities. It is only the incurable poverty of language which blurs the distinction.This distinction between what is 'perceived' and what is 'really perceived' does not solely arise from time differences. For example Alciphron, in Berkeley's dialogue, sees a crimson cloud. Suppose that he had seen the cloud in a mirror. He would have 'seen' crimson as situated in an event behind the mirror, but he would have 'really seen' the cloud behind him.These examples show that the property of being the situation of a sense-object for a given percipient event is in some respects a trivial property of an event. Yet, in other respects, it is very important; namely, it is important for the consciousness associated with the percipient event. The situations of sense-objects form the whole basis of our knowledge of nature, and the whole structure of natural knowledge is founded on the analysis of their relations.23.6The definiteness for human percipients of the situations of sense-objects varies greatly for different types of such objects. The sound of a bell is in the bell, it fills the room, and jars the brain. The feeling a push against a hard rock is associated with the rock as hardness and with the body as effort, where hardness and effort are objects of sense. This duplication of sense-objects is a normal fact in perception, though one of the two associated pair, either the one in the body or the one in a situation separated from the body, is usually faintly perceived and indeterminate as to situation.23.7The relationship between a sense-object and nature, so far as it is restricted to one percipient event and one situation, is completed by the conditioning events. The special characters in which they enter into that relationship depend on the particular case under consideration. Conditioning events may be divided into two main classes which are not strictly discriminated from each other. Namely, there are the events which are 'passive' conditions and the events which are 'active' conditions. An event which is an active condition is a cause of the occurrence of the sense-object in its situation for the percipient event; at least, it can be so termed in one of the many meanings of the word 'cause.' Also space and time are presupposed as the setting within which the particular events occur. But space and time are merely expressive of the relations of extension among the whole ether of events. Thus this presupposition of space and time really calls in all events of all nature as passive conditions for that particular perception of the sense-object. The laws of nature express the characters of the active conditioning events and of the percipient events, which issue in the recognition of a definite sense-object in an assigned situation.23.8The discovery of laws of nature depends on the fact that in general certain simple types of character of active conditioning events repeat themselves. These are the normal causes of the recognitions of sense-objects. But there are abnormal causes and part of the task in the analysis of natural law is to understand how the abnormal causes are consistent with those laws. For example, the normal cause of the sight of a colour in a situation (near by) is the rectilinear transmission of light (during the specious present) from the situation to the percipient event through intervening events. The introduction of a mirror introduces abnormality. This is an abnormality of a minor sort. An example of major abnormality is when there is no transmission of light at all. The excessive consumption of alcohol produces delirium and illusions of sight. In this example the active conditioning events are of a totally different character from those involving the transmission of light. The perception is a delusion in the sense that it suggests the normal conditioning events instead of the abnormal conditioning events which have actually occurred. Abnormal conditioning events are in no way necessarily associated with error. For example, recollection and memory are perceptions with abnormal conditioning events; and indeed in any abnormal circumstances error only arises when the circumstances are not recognised for what they are.23.9Whereas the situations of a sense-object are always simultaneous with the associated percipient event, the active conditioning events are in general antecedent to it. These active conditioning events in general are divisible into two classes not very clearly separated, namely the generating events and the transmitting events. This classification is especially possible in the case of perception under normal circumstances.24. Perceptual Objects.24.1Perceptual objects are the ordinary objects of common experience—chairs, tables, stones, trees. They have been termed 'permanent possibilities of sensation.' These objects are—at least for human beings—the most insistent of all natural objects. They are the 'things' which we see, touch, taste, and hear. The fact of the existence of such objects is among the greatest of all laws of nature, ranking with those from which space and time emerge.A perceptual object is recognised as an association of sense-objects in the same situation. The permanence of the association is the object which is recognised. It is not the case however that sense-objects are only perceived as associated in perceptual objects. There is always a perception of sense-objects—some sounds, for instance—not so associated. Furthermore, a sense-object associated in a perceptual object is perceived both as itself and as 'conveying' the perceptual object. For example, we see both the horse and the colour of the horse, but what we see (in the strict sense of the term) is simply colour in a situation.24.2This property of 'conveying' an object is fundamental in the recognition of perceptual objects. It is the chief example of abnormal perception of sense-objects. It is already well-known in the theory of art-criticism, as is evidenced in such phrases as 'tactile-values' or again in such simple phrases as 'painting water so that it looks wet.'The conveyance of a perceptual object by a sense-object is not primarily a judgment. It is a sensuous perception of sense-objects, definite as to situation but not very determinate as to exact character. Judgments quickly supervene and form an important ingredient of what may be termed 'completed recognition.' These judgments will be called 'perceptual judgments.'24.3Thus in the completed recognition of a perceptual object we discern (i) the primary recognition of one or more sense-objects in the same situation, (ii) the conveyance of other sense-objects by these primary recognitions, and (iii) the perceptual judgment as to the character of the perceptual object which in its turn influences the character of the sense-objects conveyed.The content of the perceptual judgment is (i) that an analogous association of sense-objects, with 'legal' modifications and in the same situation as that actually apprehended, is recognisable from other percipient events, and (ii) that the event which is the common situation of these associations of sense-objects, recognised or recognisable, is an active condition for these recognitions.24.4 The situation of a perceptual object is what we call the 'generating' event among the active conditions for the associated sense-objects, provided that the perceptual judgment is correct.If the perceptual judgment is false, the perceptual object as perceived is a delusion.The situation of a non-delusive perceptual object is independent of any particular percipient event.24.5Amid the development of events the same non-delusive perceptual object may be perceived in a developed situation, again with 'legal' modifications of the association of perceived sense-objects. The verbal analysis of what constitutes a legal modification of the association without breach of the essence of the observed permanence would be impossibly complex in each particular case; but the judgment as to what is allowable in modification is immediate in practice, apart from exceptional cases.A non-delusive perceptual object will be called a 'physical object.'It is an essential characteristic of a physical object that its situation is an active condition for its perception. For this reason the object itself is often named as the cause. But the object is only derivatively the cause by its relation to its situation. Primarily a cause is always an event, namely, an active condition.24.6The apprehension of an event as the situation of a physical object is our most complete perception of the character of an event. It represents a fundamental perception of a primary law of nature. It is solely by means of physical objects that our knowledge of events as active conditions is obtained, whether as generating conditions or as transmitting conditions. For example, the mirror is recognised as a physical object and its situation is the generating condition for that association of sense-objects; but its situation is also a transmitting condition for the sense-objects and delusive perceptual objects which are perceived as images behind it. Again, the prism is a physical object and its situation is a transmitting condition for the sense-object which is the spectrum.So far as it is directly perceived in its various situations, a physical object is a group of associations of sense-objects, each association being perceived or perceivable by a percipient object with an appropriate percipient event as its locus. But the object is more than the logical group; it is the recognisable permanent character of its various situations.24.7In spite of their insistence in perception these physical objects are infected with an incurable vagueness which had led speculative physics practically to cut them out of its scheme of fundamental entities. In the first place this vagueness arises from the unique situation of such an object within any small duration. The result is that the object is confounded with the event which is its situation. But a situation is prolonged in time, and a temporal part of that event is not the event itself. Now the object during ten seconds is not part of the object during one of these seconds. The object is always wholly itself during ten seconds or during one second. It is this train of thought which led to the introduction of the durationless instant of time as a fundamental fact, thus fatally confusing the philosophy of science. The error arose from not discriminating the object from its situation. The train of events which is the situation of the object through a prolonged stretch of time is not the unique object; it is the set of events with which the object has its unique association. The difficulty of this point of view arises from the fact that a temporal succession of events, each very similar to the others, ceases to mark for us the time-flux in comparison with the rhythmic changes of our bodies. The result is that in perceiving an unchanging cliff the recognition of permanence, i.e. of the object, overwhelms all other perception, the flux of events becoming a vague background owing to the absence of their demarcation in our perceptual experience.24.8The essential unity of the object amid the spatial parts of its situation is more difficult to grasp. The derivation of space and time by the method of extensive analysis, as explained inPart IIIof this enquiry, exhibits the essential identity of extension in time and extension in space. Thus the reasons for denying temporal parts of an object are also reasons for denying to it spatial parts. Again, it is true that the leg of a chair occupies part of the space which is occupied by the chair. But in appealing to space we are appealing to relations between events. What we are saying is, that the situation of the leg of the chair is part of the situation of the chair. This fact only makes the leg to be part of the chair in a mediate derivative sense, by way of their relations to their situations. But the leg is one object with a recognisable permanence of association, and the chair is another, with recognisable permanence of association distinct from that of the leg, and their situations in all circumstances have certain definite relations to each other expressible[5]in temporal and spatial terms.24.9The second reason for the vagueness of physical objects is the impossibility of submitting the group of associations, forming the object, to any process of determination with a progressive approximation to precision. A physical object is one of those entities of ordinary experience which refuse to be pressed into the service of science by way of a progressive exactness of determination. Consider for example a definite object such as a certain woollen sock. It wears thin, but it remains the same object; it is darned, and remains the same object; finally after successive repairs no part of the original wool is left, but it is the same sock. The truth is that each time we affirm the self-identity of this object we are construing the group of associations, which we recognise, in a more and more attenuated sense. The object which is both the sock at the end and the sock at the beginning is a very attenuated complex type of permanence, which would not be what we meant by the sock merely at the beginning of its career or as perceived merely at the end of its career. By insisting on the continued identity of the sock, we are in fact continually juggling with what we mean by the sock, always retaining the most complete associations which we can trace through the whole continuous series of events forming the successive situations of the sock. The physical object 'works' perfectly for the ordinary usage of life, and is thus fully justified for that purpose in the eyes of the pragmatic philosopher.24.91But these objects do represent essential facts of nature; sometimes, as it may seem to us, trivial facts not worth disentangling from the events which are their situations, sometimes useful facts. But their essential character is exemplified when we reach biological facts. A living organism exhibits a certain unity of being which is merely the exhibition of the enhanced importance of the unity of the physical object.25. Scientific Objects.25.1The various types of scientific objects arise from the determination of the characters of the active conditioning events which are essential factors in the recognition of sense-objects.The perceptual judgment which is present in the completed recognition of physical objects introduces the notion of hypothetical perceptions by percipient objects, located for an indefinite number of hypothetical percipient events. In other words, it is a judgment on the events of the universe as being favourable active conditions for the perception of the physical object, granting the correspondingly favourable percipient events. There are an indefinite number of such percipient events, actual or imaginary. The characters of events as active conditions are to be inferred from their adjustment to these innumerable possibilities of perception of each physical object.25.2Also in another way physical objects are the links connecting nature as perceived with nature as conditioning its own perception. Physical objects are often termed the causes of the perception of sense-objects, other than the sense-objects which are among their own components. For example, the telescope is the cause of the astronomer's seeing the star. But a physical object is a cause only in an indirect mediate sense. The fact of the telescope being in the right position at the right time was an active condition for the astronomer's sight of the star. Now this fact is an event which is a 'situation' of the telescope. Thus in our experience the situations of physical objects are discovered to be active conditions for the perception of sense-objects. In this way a knowledge of the characters of events, in so far as they are active conditions, can be observed and inferred; and the passage from perception to causation is effected.25.3At once the question arises, In what terms are the characters of the conditioning events to be expressed? The unanimous answer has been, that the expression is to be in terms of 'matter,' or—allowing for the more subtle ether—in terms of 'material.' In so deciding none of the distinctions made above have been consistently held in view. The result has been the persistent lapses into confusion which have been exhibited in a brief abstract in the first part of this enquiry.Matter has been classified into the various kinds of matter which are the chemical substances; thence the atomic theory of matter has been established; and thence some form of electromagnetic theory of molecules is emerging. It is in the last degree unlikely that the present form of this theory will represent its final stage. All novel theories emerge with a childlike simplicity which they ultimately shed. But, apart from specific details, it can as little be doubted that in its main concepts the theory is true.25.4We will accordingly pass by the elaborate task of tracking down and interpreting intermediate stages of scientific concepts—important though they are—and pass at once to the consideration of molecules and electrons. The characters of events in their capacity of active conditioning events for sense-objects are expressed by their relations to scientific objects. Scientific objects are not directly perceived, they are inferred by reason of their capacity to express these characters, namely, they express how it is that events are conditions. In other words they express the causal characters of events.25.5At the present epoch the ultimate scientific objects are electrons. Each such scientific object has its special relation to each event in nature. Events as thus related to a definite electron are called the 'field' of that object. The relations of the object to different parts of the field are interconnected; and, when the relationship of the object to certain parts of the field is known, its relationship to the remaining parts can be calculated.As here defined the field of an electron extends through all time and all space, each event bearing a certain character expressed by its relation to the electron. As in the case of other objects, the electron is an atomic unity, only mediately in space and in time by reason of its specific relations to events. This field is divisible into two parts, namely, the 'occupied' events and the 'unoccupied' events. The occupied event corresponds to the situation of a physical object. In order to express these relations of an electron to events with sufficient simplicity, the method of extensive abstraction [cf.Part III] has to be employed. The success of this method depends on the principle of convergence to simplicity with diminution of extent. The result is to separate off the temporal and spatial properties of events. The relations of electrons to events can be expressed in terms of spatial positions and spatial motions at all instants throughout the whole of time.25.6In terms of space and time (as derived by the method of extensive abstraction) the situation of a physical object shrinks into its spatial position at an instant together with its associated motion. Also an event occupied by an electron shrinks into the position at an instant of the electric charge forming its nucleus, together with its associated motion. But the quantitative charge is entirely devoid of character apart from its associated field; it expresses the character of the occupied events which is due to their relation to the electron. Its permanence of quantity reflects the permanence which is recognised in the electron, considered for itself alone.25.7The 'unoccupied' events possess a definite character expressive of the reign of law in the creative advance of nature, i.e. in the passage of events. This type of character of events unoccupied by the electron is also shared by the occupied events. It expresses the rôle of the electron as an agency in the passage of events. In fact the electron is nothing else than the expression of certain permanent recognisable features in this creative advance.Thus the character of event e which it receives from electron, which does not occupy it, is one of the influences which govern the change of electron, which does occupy, into the occupation of other events succeeding. The complete rule of change forcan be expressed in terms of the complete character which e receives from its relations to all the electrons in the universe.25.8The connectedness of the characters which events receive from a given electron is expressed by the notion of transmission, namely the characters are transmitted from the occupied events according to a regular rule, which depends on the continuity of events arising from their mutual relations of extension. This transmission through events is expressible as a transmission through space with finite velocity.25.9Thus in an event unoccupied by it an electron is discerned only as an agent modifying the character of that event; whereas in an event occupied by it the electron is discerned as itself acted on, namely the character of that event governs the fate of the electron. Thus in a sense there is no action at a distance; for the fate of each electron is wholly determined by the event it occupies. But in a sense there is action at a distance, since the character of any event is modified (to however slight a degree) by any other electron, however separated by intervening events. This action at a distance is in its turn limited to being a transmission through the intervening events.26. Duality of Nature.26.1There are two sides to nature, as it were, antagonistic the one to the other, and yet each essential. The one side is development in creative advance, the essential becomingness of nature. The other side is the permanence of things, the fact that nature can be recognised. Thus nature is always a newness relating objects which are neither new nor old.26.2Perception fades unless it is equally stimulated from both sides of nature. It is essentially apprehension of the becomingness of nature. It requires transition, contrast, and newness, and immediacy of happening. Thus essentially perception is an awareness of events in the act of passing into what has never yet been. But equally perception requires recognition. Now electrons—in so far as they are ultimate scientific objects and if they are such objects—do not satisfy the complete condition for recognisability.26.3Such ultimate scientific objects embody what is ultimately permanent in nature. Thus they are the objects whose relations in events are the unanalysable expression of the order of nature. But the recognition in perception requires the recurrence of the ways in which events pass. This involves the rhythmic repetition of the characters of events. This permanence of rhythmic repetition is the essential character of molecules, which are complex scientific objects. There is no such thing as a molecule at an instant. A molecule requires a minimum of duration in which to display its character. Similarly physical objects are steady complexes of molecules with an average permanence of character throughout certain minimum durations.26.4Thus the recognition which is involved in perception is the reason for the importance in physical science of Lorentz's hierarchy of microscopic and macroscopic equations.26.5The further consideration of objects, in particular their instantaneous spatial positions and the quantitative distribution of material through space, is resumed inPart IV, after the theory of space and time has been established.[5]Cf.Chapters XIVandXVof Part IV.
22. Types of Objects.22.1We have now to consider natural elements which are objects of various types. There are in fact an indefinite number of such types corresponding to the types of recognisable permanences in nature of various grades of subtlety. It is only necessary here to attempt a rough classification of those which are essential to scientific thought.
The consideration of objects introduces the concepts of 'matter'—or more vaguely, 'material'—of 'transmission' and of 'causation.' These concepts express certain relations of objects to events, but the relations are too complex to be fully expressed in such simple terms.
22.2The essence of the perception of an object is recognition. There is the primary recognition which is the awareness of permanence within the specious present; there is the indefinite recognition (which we may term 'recollection') which is the awareness of other perceptions of the object as related to other events separate from the specious present, but without any precise designation of the events; and there is the definite recognition (which we may term 'memory') which is an awareness of perception of the object as related to certain other definite events separate from the specious present.
22.3The awareness of external nature is an awareness of a duration, which is the being of nature throughout the specious present, and of a complex of events, each being part of the present duration. These events fall into two sets. In one set is the percipient event and in the other are the external events whose peculiar property, which has led to their discernment, is that they are the situations of sense-objects.
22.4The percipient event is discerned as the locus of a recognisable permanence which is the 'percipient object.' This object is the unity of the awareness whose recognition leads to the classification of a train of percipient events as the natural life associated with one consciousness. The discussion of the percipient object leads us beyond the scope of this enquiry. Owing to the temporal duration of the immediate present the self-knowledge of the percipient object is a knowledge of the unity of the consciousness within other parts of the immediate present. Thus, though it is a knowledge of what is immediately present, it is not a knowledge knowing itself.
23. Sense-Objects.23.1The sense-object is the simplest permanence which we trace as self-identical in external events. It is some definite sense-datum, such as the colour red of a definite shade. We see redness here and the same redness there, redness then and the same redness now. In other words, we perceive redness in the same relation to various definite events, and it is the same redness which we perceive. Tastes, colours, sounds, and every variety of sensation are objects of this sort.
23.2There is no apprehension of external events apart from recognitions of sense-objects as related to them, and there is no recognition of sense-objects except as in relation to external events.
In so far as recognition of a sense-object is confined to primary recognition within the present duration, the sense-object and the event do not clearly disentangle themselves; recollection and memory are the chief agents in producing a clear consciousness of a sense-object. But apart from recollection and memory, any factor, perceived as situated in an external event, which might occur again and which is not a relation between other such factors, is a sense-object. Sense-objects form the ultimate type of perceived objects (other than percipient objects) and do not express any permanence of relatedness between perceived objects of yet more fundamental types.
23.3A sense-object, such as a particular shade of redness, has a variety of relations to the events of nature. These relations are not explicable in terms of the two-termed relations to which attention is ordinarily confined.
The events which (in addition to the sense-object) enter as terms into such a relation can be classified into three sets (not mutually exclusive), namely (i) percipient events, (ii) events which are 'situations' of the sense-object, (iii) conditioning events.
23.4A percipient event in the polyadic relation of a sense-object to nature is the percipient event of an awareness which includes the recognition of that sense-object. An eventis a situation of the sense-object for that percipient event when for the associated awareness the sense-object is a quality of. Now perception involves essentially both a percipient event and an associated duration within which that percipient event is set and with which it is cogredient. A situation of a sense-object in respect to a given percipient event occurs within the associated duration of the percipient event. In fact the content of the awareness derived from a given percipient event is merely the associated duration as extending over a complex of events which are situations of sense-objects of perception and also as extending over the percipient event itself. For example, an astronomer looks through a telescope and sees a new red star burst into existence. He sees redness situated in some event which is happening now and whose spatial relations to other events, though fairly determinate as to direction from him, are very vague as to distance.
23.5We say that what he really sees is a star coming into being two centuries previously. But the relation of the event 'really seen' to the percipient event and to the redness is an entirely different one from that of the event 'seen' to these same entities. It is only the incurable poverty of language which blurs the distinction.
This distinction between what is 'perceived' and what is 'really perceived' does not solely arise from time differences. For example Alciphron, in Berkeley's dialogue, sees a crimson cloud. Suppose that he had seen the cloud in a mirror. He would have 'seen' crimson as situated in an event behind the mirror, but he would have 'really seen' the cloud behind him.
These examples show that the property of being the situation of a sense-object for a given percipient event is in some respects a trivial property of an event. Yet, in other respects, it is very important; namely, it is important for the consciousness associated with the percipient event. The situations of sense-objects form the whole basis of our knowledge of nature, and the whole structure of natural knowledge is founded on the analysis of their relations.
23.6The definiteness for human percipients of the situations of sense-objects varies greatly for different types of such objects. The sound of a bell is in the bell, it fills the room, and jars the brain. The feeling a push against a hard rock is associated with the rock as hardness and with the body as effort, where hardness and effort are objects of sense. This duplication of sense-objects is a normal fact in perception, though one of the two associated pair, either the one in the body or the one in a situation separated from the body, is usually faintly perceived and indeterminate as to situation.
23.7The relationship between a sense-object and nature, so far as it is restricted to one percipient event and one situation, is completed by the conditioning events. The special characters in which they enter into that relationship depend on the particular case under consideration. Conditioning events may be divided into two main classes which are not strictly discriminated from each other. Namely, there are the events which are 'passive' conditions and the events which are 'active' conditions. An event which is an active condition is a cause of the occurrence of the sense-object in its situation for the percipient event; at least, it can be so termed in one of the many meanings of the word 'cause.' Also space and time are presupposed as the setting within which the particular events occur. But space and time are merely expressive of the relations of extension among the whole ether of events. Thus this presupposition of space and time really calls in all events of all nature as passive conditions for that particular perception of the sense-object. The laws of nature express the characters of the active conditioning events and of the percipient events, which issue in the recognition of a definite sense-object in an assigned situation.
23.8The discovery of laws of nature depends on the fact that in general certain simple types of character of active conditioning events repeat themselves. These are the normal causes of the recognitions of sense-objects. But there are abnormal causes and part of the task in the analysis of natural law is to understand how the abnormal causes are consistent with those laws. For example, the normal cause of the sight of a colour in a situation (near by) is the rectilinear transmission of light (during the specious present) from the situation to the percipient event through intervening events. The introduction of a mirror introduces abnormality. This is an abnormality of a minor sort. An example of major abnormality is when there is no transmission of light at all. The excessive consumption of alcohol produces delirium and illusions of sight. In this example the active conditioning events are of a totally different character from those involving the transmission of light. The perception is a delusion in the sense that it suggests the normal conditioning events instead of the abnormal conditioning events which have actually occurred. Abnormal conditioning events are in no way necessarily associated with error. For example, recollection and memory are perceptions with abnormal conditioning events; and indeed in any abnormal circumstances error only arises when the circumstances are not recognised for what they are.
23.9Whereas the situations of a sense-object are always simultaneous with the associated percipient event, the active conditioning events are in general antecedent to it. These active conditioning events in general are divisible into two classes not very clearly separated, namely the generating events and the transmitting events. This classification is especially possible in the case of perception under normal circumstances.
24. Perceptual Objects.24.1Perceptual objects are the ordinary objects of common experience—chairs, tables, stones, trees. They have been termed 'permanent possibilities of sensation.' These objects are—at least for human beings—the most insistent of all natural objects. They are the 'things' which we see, touch, taste, and hear. The fact of the existence of such objects is among the greatest of all laws of nature, ranking with those from which space and time emerge.
A perceptual object is recognised as an association of sense-objects in the same situation. The permanence of the association is the object which is recognised. It is not the case however that sense-objects are only perceived as associated in perceptual objects. There is always a perception of sense-objects—some sounds, for instance—not so associated. Furthermore, a sense-object associated in a perceptual object is perceived both as itself and as 'conveying' the perceptual object. For example, we see both the horse and the colour of the horse, but what we see (in the strict sense of the term) is simply colour in a situation.
24.2This property of 'conveying' an object is fundamental in the recognition of perceptual objects. It is the chief example of abnormal perception of sense-objects. It is already well-known in the theory of art-criticism, as is evidenced in such phrases as 'tactile-values' or again in such simple phrases as 'painting water so that it looks wet.'
The conveyance of a perceptual object by a sense-object is not primarily a judgment. It is a sensuous perception of sense-objects, definite as to situation but not very determinate as to exact character. Judgments quickly supervene and form an important ingredient of what may be termed 'completed recognition.' These judgments will be called 'perceptual judgments.'
24.3Thus in the completed recognition of a perceptual object we discern (i) the primary recognition of one or more sense-objects in the same situation, (ii) the conveyance of other sense-objects by these primary recognitions, and (iii) the perceptual judgment as to the character of the perceptual object which in its turn influences the character of the sense-objects conveyed.
The content of the perceptual judgment is (i) that an analogous association of sense-objects, with 'legal' modifications and in the same situation as that actually apprehended, is recognisable from other percipient events, and (ii) that the event which is the common situation of these associations of sense-objects, recognised or recognisable, is an active condition for these recognitions.
24.4 The situation of a perceptual object is what we call the 'generating' event among the active conditions for the associated sense-objects, provided that the perceptual judgment is correct.
If the perceptual judgment is false, the perceptual object as perceived is a delusion.
The situation of a non-delusive perceptual object is independent of any particular percipient event.
24.5Amid the development of events the same non-delusive perceptual object may be perceived in a developed situation, again with 'legal' modifications of the association of perceived sense-objects. The verbal analysis of what constitutes a legal modification of the association without breach of the essence of the observed permanence would be impossibly complex in each particular case; but the judgment as to what is allowable in modification is immediate in practice, apart from exceptional cases.
A non-delusive perceptual object will be called a 'physical object.'
It is an essential characteristic of a physical object that its situation is an active condition for its perception. For this reason the object itself is often named as the cause. But the object is only derivatively the cause by its relation to its situation. Primarily a cause is always an event, namely, an active condition.
24.6The apprehension of an event as the situation of a physical object is our most complete perception of the character of an event. It represents a fundamental perception of a primary law of nature. It is solely by means of physical objects that our knowledge of events as active conditions is obtained, whether as generating conditions or as transmitting conditions. For example, the mirror is recognised as a physical object and its situation is the generating condition for that association of sense-objects; but its situation is also a transmitting condition for the sense-objects and delusive perceptual objects which are perceived as images behind it. Again, the prism is a physical object and its situation is a transmitting condition for the sense-object which is the spectrum.
So far as it is directly perceived in its various situations, a physical object is a group of associations of sense-objects, each association being perceived or perceivable by a percipient object with an appropriate percipient event as its locus. But the object is more than the logical group; it is the recognisable permanent character of its various situations.
24.7In spite of their insistence in perception these physical objects are infected with an incurable vagueness which had led speculative physics practically to cut them out of its scheme of fundamental entities. In the first place this vagueness arises from the unique situation of such an object within any small duration. The result is that the object is confounded with the event which is its situation. But a situation is prolonged in time, and a temporal part of that event is not the event itself. Now the object during ten seconds is not part of the object during one of these seconds. The object is always wholly itself during ten seconds or during one second. It is this train of thought which led to the introduction of the durationless instant of time as a fundamental fact, thus fatally confusing the philosophy of science. The error arose from not discriminating the object from its situation. The train of events which is the situation of the object through a prolonged stretch of time is not the unique object; it is the set of events with which the object has its unique association. The difficulty of this point of view arises from the fact that a temporal succession of events, each very similar to the others, ceases to mark for us the time-flux in comparison with the rhythmic changes of our bodies. The result is that in perceiving an unchanging cliff the recognition of permanence, i.e. of the object, overwhelms all other perception, the flux of events becoming a vague background owing to the absence of their demarcation in our perceptual experience.
24.8The essential unity of the object amid the spatial parts of its situation is more difficult to grasp. The derivation of space and time by the method of extensive analysis, as explained inPart IIIof this enquiry, exhibits the essential identity of extension in time and extension in space. Thus the reasons for denying temporal parts of an object are also reasons for denying to it spatial parts. Again, it is true that the leg of a chair occupies part of the space which is occupied by the chair. But in appealing to space we are appealing to relations between events. What we are saying is, that the situation of the leg of the chair is part of the situation of the chair. This fact only makes the leg to be part of the chair in a mediate derivative sense, by way of their relations to their situations. But the leg is one object with a recognisable permanence of association, and the chair is another, with recognisable permanence of association distinct from that of the leg, and their situations in all circumstances have certain definite relations to each other expressible[5]in temporal and spatial terms.
24.9The second reason for the vagueness of physical objects is the impossibility of submitting the group of associations, forming the object, to any process of determination with a progressive approximation to precision. A physical object is one of those entities of ordinary experience which refuse to be pressed into the service of science by way of a progressive exactness of determination. Consider for example a definite object such as a certain woollen sock. It wears thin, but it remains the same object; it is darned, and remains the same object; finally after successive repairs no part of the original wool is left, but it is the same sock. The truth is that each time we affirm the self-identity of this object we are construing the group of associations, which we recognise, in a more and more attenuated sense. The object which is both the sock at the end and the sock at the beginning is a very attenuated complex type of permanence, which would not be what we meant by the sock merely at the beginning of its career or as perceived merely at the end of its career. By insisting on the continued identity of the sock, we are in fact continually juggling with what we mean by the sock, always retaining the most complete associations which we can trace through the whole continuous series of events forming the successive situations of the sock. The physical object 'works' perfectly for the ordinary usage of life, and is thus fully justified for that purpose in the eyes of the pragmatic philosopher.
24.91But these objects do represent essential facts of nature; sometimes, as it may seem to us, trivial facts not worth disentangling from the events which are their situations, sometimes useful facts. But their essential character is exemplified when we reach biological facts. A living organism exhibits a certain unity of being which is merely the exhibition of the enhanced importance of the unity of the physical object.
25. Scientific Objects.25.1The various types of scientific objects arise from the determination of the characters of the active conditioning events which are essential factors in the recognition of sense-objects.
The perceptual judgment which is present in the completed recognition of physical objects introduces the notion of hypothetical perceptions by percipient objects, located for an indefinite number of hypothetical percipient events. In other words, it is a judgment on the events of the universe as being favourable active conditions for the perception of the physical object, granting the correspondingly favourable percipient events. There are an indefinite number of such percipient events, actual or imaginary. The characters of events as active conditions are to be inferred from their adjustment to these innumerable possibilities of perception of each physical object.
25.2Also in another way physical objects are the links connecting nature as perceived with nature as conditioning its own perception. Physical objects are often termed the causes of the perception of sense-objects, other than the sense-objects which are among their own components. For example, the telescope is the cause of the astronomer's seeing the star. But a physical object is a cause only in an indirect mediate sense. The fact of the telescope being in the right position at the right time was an active condition for the astronomer's sight of the star. Now this fact is an event which is a 'situation' of the telescope. Thus in our experience the situations of physical objects are discovered to be active conditions for the perception of sense-objects. In this way a knowledge of the characters of events, in so far as they are active conditions, can be observed and inferred; and the passage from perception to causation is effected.
25.3At once the question arises, In what terms are the characters of the conditioning events to be expressed? The unanimous answer has been, that the expression is to be in terms of 'matter,' or—allowing for the more subtle ether—in terms of 'material.' In so deciding none of the distinctions made above have been consistently held in view. The result has been the persistent lapses into confusion which have been exhibited in a brief abstract in the first part of this enquiry.
Matter has been classified into the various kinds of matter which are the chemical substances; thence the atomic theory of matter has been established; and thence some form of electromagnetic theory of molecules is emerging. It is in the last degree unlikely that the present form of this theory will represent its final stage. All novel theories emerge with a childlike simplicity which they ultimately shed. But, apart from specific details, it can as little be doubted that in its main concepts the theory is true.
25.4We will accordingly pass by the elaborate task of tracking down and interpreting intermediate stages of scientific concepts—important though they are—and pass at once to the consideration of molecules and electrons. The characters of events in their capacity of active conditioning events for sense-objects are expressed by their relations to scientific objects. Scientific objects are not directly perceived, they are inferred by reason of their capacity to express these characters, namely, they express how it is that events are conditions. In other words they express the causal characters of events.
25.5At the present epoch the ultimate scientific objects are electrons. Each such scientific object has its special relation to each event in nature. Events as thus related to a definite electron are called the 'field' of that object. The relations of the object to different parts of the field are interconnected; and, when the relationship of the object to certain parts of the field is known, its relationship to the remaining parts can be calculated.
As here defined the field of an electron extends through all time and all space, each event bearing a certain character expressed by its relation to the electron. As in the case of other objects, the electron is an atomic unity, only mediately in space and in time by reason of its specific relations to events. This field is divisible into two parts, namely, the 'occupied' events and the 'unoccupied' events. The occupied event corresponds to the situation of a physical object. In order to express these relations of an electron to events with sufficient simplicity, the method of extensive abstraction [cf.Part III] has to be employed. The success of this method depends on the principle of convergence to simplicity with diminution of extent. The result is to separate off the temporal and spatial properties of events. The relations of electrons to events can be expressed in terms of spatial positions and spatial motions at all instants throughout the whole of time.
25.6In terms of space and time (as derived by the method of extensive abstraction) the situation of a physical object shrinks into its spatial position at an instant together with its associated motion. Also an event occupied by an electron shrinks into the position at an instant of the electric charge forming its nucleus, together with its associated motion. But the quantitative charge is entirely devoid of character apart from its associated field; it expresses the character of the occupied events which is due to their relation to the electron. Its permanence of quantity reflects the permanence which is recognised in the electron, considered for itself alone.
25.7The 'unoccupied' events possess a definite character expressive of the reign of law in the creative advance of nature, i.e. in the passage of events. This type of character of events unoccupied by the electron is also shared by the occupied events. It expresses the rôle of the electron as an agency in the passage of events. In fact the electron is nothing else than the expression of certain permanent recognisable features in this creative advance.
Thus the character of event e which it receives from electron, which does not occupy it, is one of the influences which govern the change of electron, which does occupy, into the occupation of other events succeeding. The complete rule of change forcan be expressed in terms of the complete character which e receives from its relations to all the electrons in the universe.
25.8The connectedness of the characters which events receive from a given electron is expressed by the notion of transmission, namely the characters are transmitted from the occupied events according to a regular rule, which depends on the continuity of events arising from their mutual relations of extension. This transmission through events is expressible as a transmission through space with finite velocity.
25.9Thus in an event unoccupied by it an electron is discerned only as an agent modifying the character of that event; whereas in an event occupied by it the electron is discerned as itself acted on, namely the character of that event governs the fate of the electron. Thus in a sense there is no action at a distance; for the fate of each electron is wholly determined by the event it occupies. But in a sense there is action at a distance, since the character of any event is modified (to however slight a degree) by any other electron, however separated by intervening events. This action at a distance is in its turn limited to being a transmission through the intervening events.
26. Duality of Nature.26.1There are two sides to nature, as it were, antagonistic the one to the other, and yet each essential. The one side is development in creative advance, the essential becomingness of nature. The other side is the permanence of things, the fact that nature can be recognised. Thus nature is always a newness relating objects which are neither new nor old.
26.2Perception fades unless it is equally stimulated from both sides of nature. It is essentially apprehension of the becomingness of nature. It requires transition, contrast, and newness, and immediacy of happening. Thus essentially perception is an awareness of events in the act of passing into what has never yet been. But equally perception requires recognition. Now electrons—in so far as they are ultimate scientific objects and if they are such objects—do not satisfy the complete condition for recognisability.
26.3Such ultimate scientific objects embody what is ultimately permanent in nature. Thus they are the objects whose relations in events are the unanalysable expression of the order of nature. But the recognition in perception requires the recurrence of the ways in which events pass. This involves the rhythmic repetition of the characters of events. This permanence of rhythmic repetition is the essential character of molecules, which are complex scientific objects. There is no such thing as a molecule at an instant. A molecule requires a minimum of duration in which to display its character. Similarly physical objects are steady complexes of molecules with an average permanence of character throughout certain minimum durations.
26.4Thus the recognition which is involved in perception is the reason for the importance in physical science of Lorentz's hierarchy of microscopic and macroscopic equations.
26.5The further consideration of objects, in particular their instantaneous spatial positions and the quantitative distribution of material through space, is resumed inPart IV, after the theory of space and time has been established.
[5]Cf.Chapters XIVandXVof Part IV.
[5]Cf.Chapters XIVandXVof Part IV.