The false idea which we have to get rid of is that of nature as a mere aggregate of independent entities, each capable of isolation. According to this conception these entities, whose characters are capable of isolated defini- tion, come together and by their accidental relations form the system of nature. This system is thus thoroughly accidental; and, even if it be subject to a mechanical fate, it is only accidentally so subject.
With this theory space might be without time, and
time might be without space. The theory admittedly
breaks down when we come to the relations of matter
and space. The relational theory of space is an admission
that we cannot know space without matter or matter
without space. But the seclusion of both from time is
still jealously guarded. The relations between portions
of matter in space are accidental facts owing to the
absence of any coherent account of how space springs
from matter or how matter springs from space. Also
what we really observe in nature, its colours and its
sounds and its touches are secondary qualities; in,
other words, they are not in nature at all but are acci-
dental products of the relations between nature and
mind.
The explanation of nature which I urge as an alter-
native ideal to this accidental view of nature, is that
nothing in nature could be what it is except as an
142 THE CONCEPT OF NATURE [ch. vi
ingredient in nature as it is. The whole which is present
for discrimination is posited in sense-awareness as
necessary for the discriminated parts. An isolated event
is not an event, because every event is a factor in a
larger whole and is significant of that whole. There can
be no time apart from space ; and no space apart from
time ; and no space and no time apart from the passage
of the events of nature. The isolation of an entity in
thought, when we think of it as a bare *it,' has no
counterpart in any corresponding isolation in nature.
Such isolation is merely part of the procedure of intel-
lectual knowledge.
The laws of nature are the outcome of the characters
of the entities which we find in nature. The entities
being what they are, the laws must be what they are;
and conversely the entities follow from the laws. We
are a long way from the attainment of such an ideal;
but it remains as the abiding goal of theoretical science.
Chapter Vii
Objects
The ensuing lecture is concerned with the theory of objects. Objerts are elements in nature which do not pass. The awareness of an object as some factor not sharing in the passage of nature is what I call * recogni- tion.' It is impossible to -recognise an event, because an event is essentially distinct from every other event. Recognition is an awareness of sameness. But to call recognition an awareness of sameness implies an in- tellectual act of comparison accompanied with judgment. I use recognition for the non-intellectual relation of sense-awareness which connects the mind with a factor of nature without passage. On the intellectual side of the mind's experience there are comparisons of things recognised and consequent judgments of sameness or diversity. Probably 'sense-recognition' would be a better term for what I mean by 'recognition.' I have chosen the simpler term because I think that I shall be able to avoid the use of 'recognition' in any other meaning than that of 'sense-recognition.' I am quite willing to believe that recognition, in my sense of the term, is merely an ideal limit, and that there is in fact no recognition without intellectual accompaniments of comparison and judgment. But recognition is that relation of the mind to nature which provides the material for the intellectual activity.
Anpbject is an ingredient in the character of some
event. In fact the character of an event is nothing but
the objects which are ingredient in it and the ways in
144 THE CONCEPT OF NATUKli i^a.
which those objects make their ingression into the
event. Thus the theory of objects is the theory of the
comparison of events. Events are only comparable
because they body forth permanences. We are com-
paring objects in events whenever we can say, 'There
it is again.' Objects are the elements in nature which
can 'be again.'
Sometimes permanences can be proved to exist which evade recognition in the sense in which I am using that term. The permanences which evade recogni- tion appear to us as abstract properties either of events or of objects. All the same they are there for recognition although undiscriminated in our sense-awareness. The demarcation of events, the splitting of nature up into parts is effected by the objects which we recognise as their ingredients. The discrimination of nature is the recognition of objects amid passing events. It is a compound of the awareness of the passage of nature, of the consequent partition of nature, and of the defini- tion of certain parts of nature by the modes of the ingression of objects into them.
You may have noticed that I am using the term 'ingression' to denote the general relation of objects to events. The ingression of an object into an event is the way the character of the event shapes itself in virtue of the being of the object. Namely the event is what it is, because the object is what it is ; and when I am thinking of this modification of the event by the object, I call the relation between the two 'the ingression of the object into the event.' It is equally true to say that objects are what they are because events are whaf they are. Nature is such that there can be no events and no objects without the ingression of objects into events.
Vii] Objects
Although there are events such that the ingredient
objects evade our recognition. These are the events in
empty space. Such events are only analysed for us by
the intellectual probing of science.
Ingression is a relation which has various modes.
There are obviously very various kinds of objects;
and no one kind of object can have the same sort of
relations to events as objects of another kind can have.
We shall have to analyse out some of the different
modes of ingression which different kinds of objects
have into events.
But even if we stick to one and the same kind of
objects, an object of that kind has different modes of
ingression into different events. Science and philo-
sophy have been apt to entangle themselves in a simple-
minded theorythat an object is at one placeat any definite
time, and is in no sense anywhere else. This is in fact
the attitude of common sense thought, though it is not
the attitude of language which is naively expressing the
facts of experience. Every other sentence in a work of
literature which is endeavouring truly to interpret the
facts of experience expresses differences in surrounding
events due to the presence of some object. An object
is ingredient throughout its neighbourhood, and its
neighbourhood is indefinite. Also the modification of
events by ingression is susceptible of quantitative
differences. Finally therefore we are driven to admit
that each object is in some sense ingredient throughout
nature; though its ingression may be quantitatively
irrelevant in the expression of our individual experi-
ences.
This admission is not new either in philosophy or science. It is obviously a necessary axiom for those
W.N.
lO
146 THE CONCEPT OF NATURE [ch.
philosophers who insist that reaUty is a system. In these lectures we are keeping off the profound and vexed question as to what we mean by 'reality.' I am maintaining the humbler thesis that nature is a system. But I suppose that in this case the less follows from the greater, and that I may claim the support of these philosophers. The same doctrine is essentially interwoven in all modern physical speculation. As long ago as 1847 Faraday in a paper in the Philosophical Magazine remarked that his theory of tubes of force implies that in a sense an electric charge is everywhere. The modi- fication of the electromagnetic field at every point of space at each instant owing to the past history of each electron is another way of stating the same fact. We can however illustrate the doctrine by the more familiar facts of life without recourse to the abstruse speculations of theoretical physics.
The waves as they roll on to the Cornish coast tell
of a gale in mid-Atlantic ; and our dinner witnesses to
the ingression of the cook into the dining room. It is
evident that the ingression of objects into events in-
cludes the theory of causation. I prefer to neglect this
aspect of ingression, because causation raises the
memory of discussions based upon theories of nature
which are alien to my own. Also I think that some new
light may be thrown on the subject by viewing it in
this fresh aspect.
The examples which I have given of the ingression
of objects into events remind us that ingression takes
a peculiar form in the case of some events; in a sense,
it is a more concentrated form. For example, the electron
has a certain position in space and a certain shape.
Perhaps it is an extremely small sphere in a certain
vii] OBJECTS
test-tube. The storm is a gale situated in mid- Atlantic with a certain latitude and longitude, and the cook is in the kitchen. I will call this special form of ingression the 'relation of situation'; also, by a double use of the word ' situation,' I will call the event in which an object is situated ' the situation of the object.' Thus a situation is an event which is a relatum in the relation of situation. Now our first impression is that at last we have come to the simple plain fact of where the object really is ; and that the vaguer relation which I call ingression should not be muddled up with the relation of situation, as if including it as a particular case. It seems so obvious that any object is in such and such a position, and that it is influencing other events in a totally different sense. Namely, in a sense an object is the character of the event which is its situation, but it only influences the character of other events. Accordingly the relations of situation and influencing are not generally the same sort of relation, and should not be subsumed under the same term ' ingression.' I believe that this notion is a mistake, and that it is impossible to draw a clear distinction between the two relations.
For example. Where was your toothache? You went to a dentist and pointed out the tooth to him. He pro- nounced it perfectly sound, and cured you by stopping another tooth. Which tooth was the situation of the toothache? Again, a man has an arm amputated, and experiences sensations in the hand which he has lost. The situation of the imaginary hand is in fact merely thin air. You look into a mirror and see a fire. The flames that you see are situated behind the mirror. Again at night you watch the sky ; if some of the stars had vanished from existence hours ago, you would not be any the
148 THE CONCEPT OF NATURE [en.
wiser. Even the situations of the planets differ from those which science would assign to them.
Anyhow you are tempted to exclaim, the cook is in
the kitchen. If you mean her mind, I will not agree
with you on the point ; for I am only talking of nature.
Let us think only of her bodily presence. What do you
mean by this notion? We confine ourselves to typical
manifestations of it. You can see her, touch her, and
hear her. But the examples which I have given you
show that the notions of the situations of what you see,
what you touch, and what you hear are not so sharply
separated out as to defy further questioning. You
cannot cling to the idea that we have two sets of ex-
periences of nature, one of primary qualities which
belong to the objects perceived, and one of secondary
qualities which are the products of our mental excite-
ments. All we know of nature is in the same boat, to
sink or swim together. The constructions of science
are merely expositions of the characters of things per-
ceived. Accordingly to affirm that the cook is a certain
dance of molecules and electrons is merely to affirm
that the things about her which are perceivable have
certain characters. The situations of the perceived
manifestations of her bodily presence have only a very
general relation to the situations of the molecules, to
be determined by discussion of the circumstances of
perception.