Process and Reality — the Gifford Lectures, 1929

‘objective.’ It is the actual entity as a definite, determinate, settled fact, stubborn and with unavoidable consequences. The actual entity as described by the morphology of its satisfaction is the actual entity ‘spatialized, to use Bergson’s term. The actual entity, thus spatialized, is given individual fact actuated by its own ‘substantial form.’ Its own process, which is its own internal existence, has evaporated, worn out and satisfied; but its effects are all to be described in terms of its ‘satisfaction.’ The ‘effects’ of an actual entity are its interventions in concrescent processes other than its own. Any entity, thus intervening in processes transcending itself, is said to be functioning as an ‘object.’ According to the fourth Category of Explanation it is the one general metaphysical character of all entities of all sorts, that they function as objects. It is this metaphysical character which constitutes the solidarity of the universe. The peculiarity of an actual entity is that it can be considered both ‘objectively’ and ‘formally.’ The ‘objective’ aspect is morphological so far as that actual entity is concerned: by this it is meant that the process invelved is transcendent relatively to it, so that the esse of its satisfaction is sentirt. The ‘formal’ aspect is functional so far as that actual entity is concerned: by this it is meant that the process involved is immanent in it. But the objective consideration is pragmatic. It is the consideration of the actual entity in respect to its consequences. In the present chapter the emphasis is laid upon the formal consideration of an actual entity. But this formal consideration of one actual entity requires reference to the objective intervention of other actual entities. This objective intervention of other entities constitutes the creative character which conditions the concrescence in question. The satisfaction of each actual entity is an element in the givenness of the universe: it limits boundless, abstract possibility into the particular real potentiality from which each novel concrescence originates. The ‘boundless, abstract possibility’ means the creativityp. 337 considered solely in reference to the possibilities of the intervention of eternal objects, and in abstraction from the objective intervention of actual entities belonging to any definite actual world, including God among the actualities abstracted from.

SECTION II

SECTION II

The possibility of finite truths depends on the fact that the satisfaction of an actual entity is divisible into a variety of determinate operations. The operations are ‘prehensions.’ But the negative prehensions which consist of exclusions from contribution to the concrescence can be treated in their subordination to the positive prehensions. These positive prehensions are termed ‘feelings. The process of concrescence is divisible into an initial stage of many feelings, and a succession of subsequent phases of more complex feelings integrating the earlier simpler feelings, up to the satisfaction which is one complex unity of feeling. This is the ‘genetic’ analysis of the satisfaction. Its ‘co-ordinate’ analysis will be given later, in Part IV.

Thus a component feeling in the satisfaction is to be assigned, for its origination, to an earlier phase of the concrescence.

This is the general description of the divisible character of the satisfaction, from the genetic standpoint. The extensiveness which underlies the spatio-temporal relations of the universe is another outcome of this divisible character. Also the abstraction from its own full formal constitution involved in objectifications of one actual entity in the constitutions of other actual entities equally depends upon this same divisible character, whereby the actual entity is conveyed in the particularity of some one of its feelings. A feeling—i.e. a positive prehension—is essentially a transition effecting a concrescence. Its complex constitution is analysable into five factors which express what that transition consists of, and effects. The factors are: (i) the ‘subject’ which feels, (ii) the ‘initialp. 338 data’ which are to be felt, (iii) the ‘elimination’ in virtue of negative prehensions, (iv) the ‘objective datum’ which is felt, (v) the ‘subjective form’ which is how that subject feels that objective datum.

A feeling is in all respects determinate, with a determinate subject, determinate initial data, determinate negative prehensions, a determinate objective datum, and a determinate subjective form. There is a transition from the initial data to the objective datum effected by the elimination. The initial data constitute a ‘multiplicity,’ or merely one ‘proper’ entity, while the objective datum is a ‘nexus,’ a proposition, or a ‘proper’ entity of some categoreal type. There is a concrescence of the initial data into the objective datum, made possible by the elimination, and effected by the subjective form. The objective datum is the perspective of the initial datum. The subjective form receives its determination from the negative prehensions, the objective datum, and the conceptual origination of the subject. The negative prehensions are determined by the categoreal conditions governing feelings, by the subjective form, and by the initial data. This mutual determination of the elements involved in a feeling is one expression of the truth that the subject of the feeling is causa sui. The partial nature of a feeling, other than the complete satisfaction, is manifest by the impossibility of understanding its generation without recourse to the whole subject. There is a mutual sensitivity of feelings in one subject, governed by categoreal conditions. This mutual sensitivity expresses the notion of final causation in the guise of a pre-established harmony.

SECTION III

A feeling cannot be abstracted from the actual entity entertaining it. This actual entity is termed the ‘subject’ of the feeling. It is in virtue of its subject that the feeling is one thing. If we abstract the subject from the feeling we are left with many things. Thus a feeling isp. 339 a particular in the same sense in which each actual entity is a particular. It is one aspect of its own subject.

The term ‘subject’ has been retained because in this sense it is familiar in philosophy. But it is misleading. The term ‘superject’ would be better. The subject-superject is the purpose of the process originating the feelings. The feelings are inseparable from the end at which they aim; and this end is the feeler. The feelings aim at the feeler, as their final cause. The feelings are what they are in order that their subject may be what it is. Then transcendently, since the subject is what it is in virtue of its feelings, it is only by means of its feelings that the subject objectively conditions the creativity transcendent beyond itself. In our own relatively high grade of human existence, this doctrine of feelings and their subject is best illustrated by our notion of moral responsibility. The subject is responsible for being what it is in virtue of its feelings. It is also derivatively responsible for the consequences of its existence because they flow from its feelings.