Process and Reality — the Gifford Lectures, 1929

The antithetical terms ‘universals’ and ‘particulars’ are the usual words employed to denote respectively entities which nearly, though not quite,’ correspond to the entities here termed ‘eternal objects,’ and ‘actual entities.’ These terms, ‘universals’ and ‘particulars,’ both in the suggestiveness of the two words and in their current philosophical use, are somewhat misleading. The ontological principle, and the wider doctrine of universal relativity, on which the present metaphysical discussion is founded, blur the sharp distinction between what is universal and what is particular. The notion of a universal is of that which can enter into the description of many particulars; whereas the notion of a particular is that it is described by universals, and does not itself enter into the description of any other particular. According to the doctrine of relativity which is the basis of the metaphysical system of the present lectures, both these notions involve a misconception. An actual entity cannot be described, even inadequately, by universals; because other actual entities do enter into the description of any one actual entity. Thus every so-called ‘universal’ is particular in the sense of being just what it is, diverse from everything else; and every so-called ‘particular’ is universal in the sense of entering into the constitutions of other actual entities. The contrary opinion led to the collapse of Descartes’ many substances into Spinoza’s one substance; to Leibniz’s windowless monads with their pre-established harmony; to the sceptical reduction of Hume’s philosophy—a reduction first effected by Hume himself,

° For example, prehensions and subjective forms are also ‘particulars.’

FACT AND FORM re

and reissued with the most beautiful exposition by Santayana in his Scepticism and Animal Faith.

The point is that the current view of universals and particulars inevitably leads to the epistemological position stated by Descartes:

“From this I should conclude that I knew the wax by means of vision and not simply by the intuition of the mind; unless by chance I remember that, when looking from a window and saying I see men who pass in the street, I really do not see them, but infer that what I see is men, just as I say that I see wax. And yet what do I see from the window but hats and coats which may cover automatic machines? Yet I judge these to be men. And similarly solely by the faculty of judgment (judicand?) which rests in my mind, I comprehend that which I believed I saw with my eyes.” *°

In this passage it is assumed ** that Descartes—the Ego in question—is a particular, characterized only by universals. Thus his impressions—to use Hume’s word— are characterizations by universals. Thus there is no perception of a particular actual entity. He arrives at the belief in the actual entity by ‘the faculty of judgment.’ But on this theory he has absolutely no analogy upon which to found any such inference with the faintest shred of probability. Hume, accepting Descartes’ account of perception (in this passage), which also belongs to Locke in some sections of his Hssay, easily draws the sceptical conclusion. Santayana irrefutably exposes the full extent to which this scepticism must be carried. The philosophy of organism recurs to Descartes’ alternative theory of ‘realitas objectiva, and endeavours to interpret it in terms of a consistent ontology. Descartes endeayoured to combine the two theories; but his unquestioned acceptance of the subject-predicate dogma forced him

1° Cf. Meditation II.

11 Perhaps inconsistently with what Descartes says elsewhere: in other passages the mental activity involved seems to be analysis which discovers ‘realitas objectiva’ as a component element of the idea in question. There is thus ‘inspectio’ rather than ‘judicvum,’

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into a representative theory of perception, involving a ‘judicium’ validated by our assurance of the power and the goodness of God. The philosophy of organism in its account of prehension takes its stand upon the Cartesian terms ‘realitas objectiva, ‘inspectio, and ‘intuitio.’ The two latter terms are transformed into the notion of a ‘positive prehension,’ and into operations described in the various categories of physical and conceptual origination. KOR M 87 togetherness in an exterior thing, holds for the same set of simple ideas. Again, the philosophy of organism agrees that this description is true for moments of immediate experience. But Locke, owing to the fact that he veils his second premise under the phrase ‘go constantly together,’ omits to consider the question whether the ‘exterior things’ of the successive moments are to be identified.

The answer of the philosophy of organism is that, in the sense in which Locke is here speaking, the exterior things of successive moments are not to be identified with each other. Each exterior thing is either one actual entity, or (more frequently) is a nexus of actual entities with immediacies mutually contemporary. For the sake of simplicity we will speak only of the simpler case where the ‘exterior thing’ means one actual entity at the moment in question. But what Locke is explicitly concerned with is the notion of the self-identity of the one enduring physical body which lasts for years, or for seconds, or for ages. He is considering the current philosophical notion of an individualized particular substance (in the Aristotelian sense) which undergoes adventures of change, retaining its substantial form amid transition or accidents. Throughout his Essay, he in effect retains this notion while rightly insisting on its vagueness and obscurity. The philosophy of organism agrees with Locke and Hume, that the non-individualized substantial form is nothing else than the collection of universals—or, more accurately, the one complex universal—common to the succession of ‘exterior things’ at successive moments respectively. In other words, an ‘exterior thing’ is either one ‘actual entity,’ or is a ‘society’ with a ‘defining characteristic.’ For the organic philosophy, these ‘exterior things’ (in the former sense) are the final concrete actualities. The individualized substance (of Locke) must be construed to be the historic route constituted by some society of fundamental ‘exterior things,’ stretching from the first ‘thing’ to the last ‘thing.’

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