Wannamaker Summary - Chapter 4

Chapter Summary Of The Philosophy Of Freedom
Olin D. Wannamaker

Chapter 4 The World As Percept
To answer the question whether thinking is alien to the perception we must ask: What, then, does the world present to our senses for observation and, therefore, to our thinking? Single stimulants of sensation --of the sensations of colors, forms, sounds, odors, etc.-- which we will call perceptions, and which are instantly grouped by the mind into what the uncritical näive person calls objects in space, assumed to be wholly independent of himself. Immediately there arises in consciousness a mental counterpart of the perception (or groups of perceptons), which we call a concept --considered by the uncritical person to be a mere reflection of the perception. But we have an inner perception also of the self, as observing subject.

When the object is removed, the mental counterpart remains --for instance, when the organ of observation is the eye, a mental picture remains-- as part of the content of the self, the observing subject. This after-impression we call a representation. As part of the self, or subject, it is obviously subjective. Modern critical science, confused by this fact, has dogmatically called the perception itself also subjective. But thinking, which creates the concepts of both subject and object, and which must, therefore, be a power within us above the level of both subject and object, clearly associates the perception with the object, thus declaring it to be objective.

This fact, however, is not sufficient to establish beyond doubt the objective nature of the perception. We must proceed further in the effort to determine whether it is truly objective or only subjective. Thus far we have taken only the first step in considering that which the world offers to us for observation and thinking.

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