Appendix 22.

(667) [Sensations and the meaning of words]

Reid noticed and tried to explain at length that in ordinary language 'odour', 'colour', 'taste', etc. have two totally distinct meanings. They first mean sensations in us, and secondly perceptions of the corresponding powers, present in bodies, to produce these sensations. But he has difficulty in explaining this double meaning because words receive their sense from the general consent of people, a consent which can never, or very rarely, be accused of error. He attempts to explain as follows the lack of clarity he finds in words:

Although this explanation may be satisfactory at first glance, examined more closely it is not altogether satisfactory for the following reasons:

1. We do not use words simply to express our purposes but rather to express our knowledge of things. When we see two different things we give them two names without further ado. What we think as distinct and separate we naturally express and indicate with different words, which are images of our thoughts. In fact our first purpose is precisely for natural truth in our words, that is, that they express faithfully what we conceive in our minds.

2. If Reid's distinction between sensations and perceptions of sensible qualities really exists, how does he show that we gain nothing by expressing the distinction in words, and that confusing the two things does no harm? The confusion would give rise to an infinite number of equivocations: every time we spoke of what we are experiencing, we could mean bodies and not ourselves, or vice versa. Surely this would be a great insult to intelligence and mutual conversation?

Galluppi gives another explanation for making one name serve two ideas. He maintains that every sensation is naturally objective and that consequently we do not mentally jump from the sensation to the corresponding sensible quality in the external body, nor make this jump by a suggestion of nature, as Reid says. Galluppi denies this arbitrary passage suggested by Reid. He establishes an essential connection between sensation and sensible quality so that the two are in themselves indivisible and form a single thing which he calls objective sensation. The theory is ingenious and would explain the assignment of one word to two things, sensation and sensible quality, or rather, one word would signify only a single thing, present in nature but divided and broken down into two by analysis and abstraction.

I believe however that while Galluppi, by retaining Reid's language about the ambiguity of the use of words, failed to maintain sufficient propriety of expression to be coherent with himself. He says:

In my opinion, after establishing objective sensation (which really means extrasubjective sensation, that is, containing something outside the subject), Galluppi could have denied Reid's claim that these words are ambiguous and affirmed that by their nature they indicate a single sensation which is both subjective and extrasubjective. In this way the words could be fittingly applied at one moment to the subject, at another to something foreign to the subject.

I will make another observation about Galluppi's system. I accept extrasubjective sensation but call it sense perception in so far as it is such. However, it seems to me that Galluppi in establishing his opinion has taken a step in which I cannot follow him. His whole theory rests on two propositions:

1. 'All sensations are objective', that is, I perceive something outside me but perceive it intimately united with MYSELF; I cannot perceive it when it is separated from MYSELF.

2. 'Perception of MYSELF is simultaneous with perception of its modifications', that is, I cannot perceive myself in isolation from my modifications (external sensations).

I grant the first proposition but not the word 'objective', which is proper to the intellect alone, a fact hidden from Galluppi by his subjectivism. I would substitute 'extrasubjective'. In other words, I admit that the qualities of bodies cannot be perceived by me without the perception of MYSELF. Consequently there is a fact which is simultaneously subjective and extrasubjective.

I do not grant the second proposition that MYSELF cannot be perceived separate from external sensations. Moreover it is not necessary for the first proposition. I hold that in MYSELF there is a fundamental feeling which may be difficult to observe but is per se perceptible.

Finally I note with St. Thomas himself that the intimate union of foreign substance and subject results in a single thing. St. Thomas makes one thing out of the felt body and sentient organ. According to him the organ is the potency, and the felt body the act of the potency: corpus sensibile est nobilius organo animalis, secundem hoc quod comparatur ad ipsum, ut ens in actu ad ens in potentia: sicut coloratum in actu ad pupillam, quae colorata est in potentia [the sensible body is more noble than the organ of the animal in so far as, compared with it, the body is ens in act relative to ens in potency, in the way that what is coloured is in act relative to the pupil which is coloured in potency] (S.T., I, q. 84, art. 6, ad 2). In another place he says that the actual sensible thing is simply sense itself in act: sensibile in actu est sensus in actu (C. Gent., I, c. 51). However, this teaching, according to St. Thomas, is verified only in the act itself of sensation, when the foreign felt force and the sentient subject are united in such a way that they become a single thing. Whenever the sensible body and the sentient organ are considered separate from each other, they are two distinct things. He writes, 'The actual sensible thing is sense in act. But if they are considered separate from each other, they are each in potency. The visual organ is not sight in act, nor is what is visible actually seen, unless sight is informed by the visible species. IN THIS WAY SIGHT AND WHAT IS VISIBLE BECOME A SINGLE THING': Sensibile in actu est sensus in actu: secundum vero quod (sensibile) ab (sensu) distinguitur, est utrumque in potentia -; neque enim visus est videns actu, neque visibile videtur actu nisi cum visus informatur visibili specie, UT SIC EX VISIBILI ET VISU UNUM FIAT* (C. Gent., I, q. 51).

This union of the sentient (subject) with what is felt (foreign force) is certainly mysterious and obscure. If it had been proposed forty or fifty years ago, when modern philosophy was still at its initial stage among us and in France, it would probably have been treated with derision and rejected as a quirk of scholasticism.

But modern philosophy has now made progress in France and Italy. We have learnt what Reid thought in Scotland, and Kant in Germany. Their serious meditations, although a little late, attracted our attention and exposed the whole weakness of current doctrine (Condillac's). These new meditations spawned others; philosophy expanded and improved. One of the best contributions was Galluppi's here in Italy. He established that something foreign to the subject entered into sensation, although he incorrectly called this foreign element 'object'. These many years of rigorous meditation, aimed at advancing and maturing philosophy, had finally resulted in an observation made by our ancestors six centuries ago! The arrogant philosophy of the past century despised and ignored this observation, which a more mature, humble philosophy now accepts as necessary. It is true that we are deterred by the stern appearance of certain difficult truths, but only for a time. And even if we do neglect them, we take them up again when we finally see our absolute need of them, and we courageously plumb their depths.

I must now make an observation about the difficult truth which initiated this footnote, that is, the perfect unity between what feels and what is felt.

This mysterious unity is found not only between an ens that feels and an ens that is felt, but also in any action by which one ens affects another, when one is passive and the other active. We must carefully observe the fact as it is; I do not wish to enter into an explanation of it. It will be found that the fact happens as follows.

What is being experienced is the term of action of another ens. Now, although the experience, purely as experience, is in the passive ens, it is also term of the action. Considered as term of the action, it is in the active ens. It is impossible to posit two terms of action, one outside, the other inside the agent, as though this were a fact, rather than a product of the imagination. The experience is the effect produced by the agent; an agent must be acting precisely where there is an effect and nowhere else; the agent's action properly terminates in the effect. The term of the action is necessarily joined to the action in precisely the same way as the term or limit of a stick is in the stick. The acting ens is indeed separate from the effect it produces in the experiencing ens, but this occurs when its action ceases. Now, we are considering the ens at the moment of its action. What for one ens (the experiencer) is an experience, is for the other, at that moment, a term of action; the same thing is joined and belongs to two entia in one act, having its own direct relation to each. It is a concept of two entia touching each other, as it were - a difficult, unique concept but nevertheless true. Like any fact, it cannot be dismissed, much less denied; on the contrary, it should be investigated and verified with greater care.

As regards the fact of sensation, which Galluppi found to be composed of two elements, one subjective, the other objective (extrasubjective), I must indicate the sense in which I accept the fusion of these two elements into one single fact. I refer the reader to the footnotes to 453 [cf. App. nos. 3, 4, 5] where I have shown how reflection can break down sensation into two elements, subjective and extrasubjective. Sensation can properly be called sensation in so far as it is subjective, and corporeal sense perception in so far as it is extrasubjective or term of an action outside us. All this demonstrates how extrasubjective sensation, which I admit, must never be confused with intellective perception or with the idea of bodies, because this is formed not only through sense but also through the intellect endowed with the idea of being.

Finally I point out that 'smell', 'taste', 'sound', etc. are words indicating mainly the subjective element, while names of the first qualities of bodies, like extension, indicate solely the extrasubjective element. But later I will have the opportunity to discuss all this at greater length.