Process and Reality — the Gifford Lectures, 1929

at the point of view of the philosophy of organism. What he does say, is “perpetually perishing parts of succession.” * Here, as elsewhere, Locke’s neglect of ultimate questions revenges itself upon him. Nothing can make the various parts of his Hssay mutually consistent. He never revises the substance-quality categories which remain presupposed throughout his Essay. In the first two books of the Essay, he professes to lay the foundations of his doctrine of ideas. These books are implicitly dominated by the notion of the ideas as mere qualifications of the substrate mind. In the third book of the Essay he is apparently passing on to the application of his established doctrine of ideas to the subordinate question of the function of language. But he tacitly introduces a new doctrine of ideas, which is difficult to conciliate with the sensationalist doctrine of the preceding books. Hume concentrates upon the doctrine of Locke’s earlier books; the philosophy of organism concentrates upon that of the later books in the Essay. If Locke’s Essay is to be interpreted as a consistent scheme of thought, undoubtedly Hume is right; but such an interpretation offers violence to Locke’s contribution to philosophy.

SECTION III

In the philosophy of organism it is assumed that an actual entity is composite. ‘Actuality’ is the fundamental exemplification of composition; all other meanings of ‘composition’ are referent to this root-meaning. But ‘actuality’ is a general term, which merely indicates this ultimate type of composite unity: there are many composite unities to which this general term applies. There is no general fact of composition, not expressible in terms of the composite constitutions of the individual occasions. Every proposition is entertained in the constitution of some one actual entity, or severally in the constitutions of many actual entities. This is only

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another rendering of the ‘ontological principle.’ It follows from the ontological principle, thus interpreted, that the notion of a ‘common world’ must find its exemplification in the constitution of each actual entity, taken by itself for analysis. For an actual entity cannot be a member of a ‘common world,’ except in the sense that the ‘common world’ is a constituent of its own constitution. It follows that every item of the universe, including all the other actual entities, are constituents in the constitution of any one actual entity. This conclusion has already been employed under the title of the ‘principle of relativity.’ This principle of relativity is the axiom by which the ontological principle is rescued from issuing in an extreme monism. Hume adumbrates this principle in his notion of ‘repetition.’

Some principle is now required to rescue actual entities from being undifferentiated repetitions, each of the other, with mere numerical diversity. This requisite is supplied by the ‘principle of intensive relevance.’ The notion of intensive relevance is fundamental for the meaning of such concepts as ‘alternative possibilities,’ ‘more or less,’ ‘important or negligible.’ The principle asserts that any item of the universe, however preposterous as an abstract thought, or however remote as an actual entity, has its own gradation of relevance, as prehended, in the constitution of any one actual entity: it might have had more relevance; and it might have had less relevance, including the zero of relevance involved in the negative prehension; but in fact it has just that relevance whereby it finds its status in the constitution of that actual entity. It will be remembered that Hume finds it necessary to introduce the notion of variations in ‘force and vivacity.’ He is here making a particular application—and, as I believe, an unsuccessful application—of the general principle of intensive relevance.

There is interconnection between the degrees of relevance of different items in the same actual entity. This fact of interconnection is asserted in the ‘principle of

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compatibility and contrariety.’ There are items which, in certain respective gradations of relevance, are contraries to each other; so that those items, with their respective intensities of relevance, cannot coexist in the constitution of one actual entity. If some group of items, with their variety of relevance, can coexist in one actual entity, then the group, as thus variously relevant, is a compatible group. The various specific essences of one genus, whereby an actual entity may belong to one or other of the species but cannot belong to more than one, illustrate the incompatibility between two groups of items. Also in so far as a specific essence is complex, the specific essence is necessarily composed of compatible items, if there has been any exemplification of that species. But ‘feelings’ are the entities which are primarily ‘compatible’ or ‘incompatible.’ All other usages of these terms are derivative.

The words ‘real’ and ‘potential’ are, in this exposition, taken in senses which are antithetical. In their primary senses, they qualify the ‘eternal objects.’ These eternal objects determine how the world of actual entities enters into the constitution of each one of its members via its feelings. And they also express how the constitution of any one actual entity is analysable into phases, related as presupposed and presupposing. Eternal objects express how the predecessor-phase is absorbed into the successor phase without limitation of itself, but with additions necessary for the determination of an actual unity in the form of individual satisfaction. The actual entities enter into each others’ constitutions under limitations imposed by incompatibilities ‘ of feelings. Such incompatibilities relegate various elements in the constitutions of felt objects to the intensive zero, which is termed ‘irrelevance.’ The preceding phases enter into their successors with additions which eliminate the inde-

“Dr. H. M. Sheffer has pointed out the fundamental logical importance of the notion of ‘incompatibility’; cf. Trans. Amer. Math. Soc., Vol. XIV, pp. 481-488; and Introduction to Vol. I of Principia Mathematica (2nd edition).

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