362 METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCE 



term, "Recognition." This term, however, is to be taken only in the 

 sense called for by the foregoing statements; for the rationalistic 

 presuppositions and consequences which mark Kant's "Synthesis 

 of Recognition " are far removed from the present line of thought. 



We may, then, sum up our results as follows: In the presuppo- 

 sition of a uniform sequence of events, which we have accepted 

 from tradition as the necessary condition of the possibility of the 

 causal relation, there lies the thought that the contents of perception 

 given us through repeated sense stimulation are related to one 

 another through a reproductive recognition. 



The assumption of such reproductive recognition is not justified 

 merely in the cases so far considered. It is already necessary in the 

 course of the individual perceptions a and b, and hence in the appre- 

 hension- of an occurrence. It makes the sequence itself in which a 

 and b are joined possible; for in order to apprehend b as following 

 upon a, in case the perception of a has not persisted in its original 

 form, a must be as far revived and recognized upon b's entrance into 

 the field of perception as it has itself passed out of that field. Other- 

 wise, instead of b following upon a and being related to a, there 

 would be only the relationless change from a to 6. This holds gen- 

 erally and not merely in the cases where the perception of a has 

 disappeared before that of b begins, for example, in the case of light- 

 ning and thunder, or where it has in part disappeared, for example, 

 in the throwing of a stone. 



We have represented a as an event or change, in order that uniform 

 sequences of events may alone come into consideration as the pre- 

 supposition of the causal relation. But every event has its course in 

 time, and is accordingly divisible into many, ultimately into infinitely 

 many, shorter events. Now if 6 comes only an infinitely short interval 

 later than a, and by hypothesis it must come later than a, then a 

 corresponding part of a must have disappeared by the time b appears. 

 But the infinitesimal part of a perception is just as much out of all 

 consideration as would be an infinitely long perception; all which only 

 goes to show that we have to substitute intervals of finite length in 

 place of this purely conceptual analysis of a continuous time inter- 

 val. This leaves the foregoing discussion as it stands. If b follows a 

 after a perceptible finite interval, then the flow or development 

 of a by the time of b's appearance must have covered a course cor- 

 responding to that interval; and all this is true even though the 

 earlier stages of a remain unchanged throughout the interval pre- 

 ceding 6's appearance. The present instant of flow is distinct from 

 the one that has passed, even though it takes place in precisely the 

 same way. The former, not the latter, gives the basis of relation which 

 is here required, and therefore the former must be reproduced and 

 recognized. This thought also is included in the foregoing summary 



