Jul 17 2008
Rosmini’s Skectch of His Own Philosophy: 2. Ideas Are Not Nothing. They Have A Mode Of Existence Proper To Themselves.
2. Ideas are not nothing. They have a mode of existence proper to themselves.
We have seen that the objects of our cognitions are essentially distinct from ourselves, who are the subjects of the cognitions. This distinction of the object from the subject of cognition is proper to all objects whatever, whether they are only possible (ideas) or are also subsistent (things). But not only are all such objects distinct from the cognizing subject, they are also independent of it. By this observation a new light is thrown on the nature of ideas, for they compel us to conclude by the logic of facts:
1st. That ideas are not nothing.
2nd. That they are not ourselves or any modification of ourselves.
3rd. That they have a mode of existence of their own, entirely different from that of real or subsistent things.
This mode of existence belonging to the ideal objects or ideas is such that it does not fall under our bodily sense, and hence it is that it has entirely escaped the observation of many philosophers, who began their philosophical investigations with a foregone conclusion, or assumption that whatever did not fall under our senses was nothing. Yet it is a fact that though the possible objects truly exist they do not fall under sense, and hence that we can in no way account for them by recurring to corporeal sense only; which is a fresh and self-evident confutation of sensism.
