Within Greek philosophy itself there were foreshadowings of the
Aristotelian doctrine, but nothing so important as to warrant the
conclusion that Aristotle was directly influenced by it. Doubtless the
One and Many, Being and Non-Being, of the Eleatic dialectic, with
their subordinate oppositions, may be called categories, but they are
not so in the Aristotelian sense, and have little or nothing in common
with the later system. Their starting-point and results are wholly
diverse. Nor does it appear necessary to do more than mention the
Pythagorean table of principles, the number of which is supposed to
have given rise to the decuple arrangement adopted by Aristotle. The
two classifications have nothing in common; no term in the one list
appears in the other; and there is absolutely nothing in the
Pythagorean principles which could have led to the theory of the
categories.[2]
Plato.
One naturally turns to Plato when endeavouring to discover the genesis
of any Aristotelian doctrine, and undoubtedly there are in the
Platonic writings many detached discussions in which the matter of the
categories is touched upon. Special terms also are anticipated at
various times, e.g. [Greek: poiotes] in the _Theaetetus_, [Greek:
poiein] and [Greek: paschein] in the _Gorgias_, and [Greek: pros ti]
in the _Sophist._[3] But there does not seem to be anything in Plato
which one could say gave occasion directly and of itself to the
Aristotelian doctrine; and even when we take a more comprehensive view
of the Platonic system and inquire what in it corresponds to the
widest definition of categories, say as ultimate elements of thought
and existence, we receive no very definite answer. The Platonic
dialectic never worked out into system, and only in two dialogues do
we get anything like a list of ultimate or root-notions. In the
_Sophist_, Being, Rest and Motion ([Greek: tho on autho kahi stasis
kahi kinesis]) are laid down as [Greek: megista ton genon].[4] To
these are presently added the Same and the Other ([Greek: tauthon kai
thateron]), and out of the consideration of all five some light is
cast upon the obscure notion of Non-Being [Greek: (to mhe on)]. In the
same dialogue (262 seq.) is found the important distinction of [Greek:
onoma] and [Greek: rhema], noun and verb. The _Philebus_ presents us
with a totally distinct classification into four elements--the
Infinite, the Finite, the Mixture or Unity of both and the Cause of
this unity ([Greek: tho apeiron, tho peras, he summixis, he aitia]).
It is at once apparent that, however these classifications are related
to one another and to the Platonic system, they lie in a different
field from that occupied by the Aristotelian categories, and can
hardly be said to have anything in common with them.
Aristotle.
The Aristotelian doctrine is most distinctly formulated in the short
treatise [Greek: Kategoriai], which generally occupies the first place
among the books of the _Organon_. The authenticity of the treatise was
doubted in early times by some of the commentators, and the doubts
have been revived by such scholars as L. Spengel and Carl Prantl. On
the other hand, C.A. Brandis, H. Bonitz, and Ed. Zeller are of opinion
that the tract is substantially Aristotle's. The matter is hardly one
that can be decided either _pro_ or _con_ with anything like
certainty; but this is of little moment, for the doctrine of the
categories, even of the _ten_ categories, does not stand or fall with
only one portion of Aristotle's works.
It is surprising that there should yet be so much uncertainty as to
the real significance of the categories, and that we should be in
nearly complete ignorance as to the process of thought by which,
Aristotle was led to the doctrine. On both points It is difficult to
extract from the matter before us anything approaching a satisfactory
solution. The terms employed to denote the categories have been
scrutinized with the utmost care, but they give little help. The most
important--[Greek: k. tou ontos] or [Greek: tes ousias, gene tou
ontos] or [Greek: ton onton, gene] simply, [Greek: tha prota] or
[Greek: tha koina prota, ai ptoseis], or [Greek: ai diaireseis]--only
indicate that the categories are general classes into which Being as
such may be divided, that they are _summa genera_. The expressions
[Greek: gene ton kategorion] and [Greek: schemata ton k.], which are
used frequently, seem to lead to another and somewhat different view.
[Greek: kategoria] being taken to mean that which is predicated,
[Greek: gene ton k.] would signify the most general classes of
predicates, the framework into the divisions of which all predicates
must come. To this interpretation there are objections. The categories
must be carefully distinguished from predicables; in the scholastic
phraseology the former refer to _first intentions_, the latter to
_second intentions_, i.e. the one denote real, the other logical
connexion. Further, the categories cannot without careful explanation
be defined as predicates; they are this and something more. The most
important category, [Greek: ousia], in one of its aspects cannot be
predicate at all.
In the [Greek: Kategoriai] Aristotle prefixes to his enumeration a
grammatico-logical disquisition on homonyms and synonyms, and on the
elements of the proposition, i.e. subject and predicate. He draws
attention to the fact that things are spoken of either in the
connexion known as the proposition, e.g. "a man runs," or apart from
such connexion, e.g. "man" and "runs." He then proceeds, "Of things
spoken of apart from their connexion in a proposition ([Greek: ton
katha medemian sumplokhen legomenon]), each signifies either Substance
([Greek: ousia]), or Quantity ([Greek: poson]), or Quality ([Greek:
poion]), or Relation ([Greek: pros ti],) or Where (i.e. Place, [Greek:
pou]), or When (i.e. Time, [Greek: pote]), or Position ([Greek:
keisthai]), or Possession ([Greek: echein]), or Action ([Greek:
poiein]), or Passion ([Greek: paschein]). [Greek: ousia], the first
category, is subdivided into [Greek: prote ousia] or primary
substance, which is defined to be [Greek: tode ti], the singular thing
in which properties inhere, and to which predicates are attached, and
[Greek: deuterai] [Greek: onsiai], genera or species which can be
predicated of primary substances, and are therefore [Greek: onsia].
only in a secondary sense. Nevertheless, they too, after a certain
fashion, signify the singular thing, [Greek: tode ti]" (K. p. 3 b 12,
13). It is this doctrine of [Greek: prote onsia] that has raised
doubts with regard to the authenticity of the [Greek: Kategoriai] But
the tenfold classification, which has also been captiously objected
to, is given in an acknowledged writing of Aristotle's (see Topica, i.
9, p. 103 b 20).[5] At the same time it is at least remarkable that in
two places where the enumeration seems intended to be complete (_Met._
p. 1017 a 25; _An. Pos._ i. 22, p. 83 a 21), only eight are mentioned,
[Greek: exein] and [Greek: keisthai] being omitted. In other
passages[6] six, five, four, and three are given, frequently with some
addition, such as [Greek: kai ai allai k]. It is also to be observed
that, despite of this wavering, distinct intimations are given by
Aristotle that he regarded his list as complete, and he uses phrases
which would seem to indicate that the division had been exhaustively
carried out. He admits certainly that some predicates which come under
one category might be referred to another, but he declines to deduce
all from one highest class, or to recognize any relation of
subordination among the several classes.
The full import of the categories will never be adequately reached
from the point of view taken up in the [Greek: Kategoriai], which
bears all the marks of an early and preliminary study. For true
understanding we must turn to the _Metaphysics_, where the doctrine is
handled at large. The discussion of Being in that work starts with a
distinction that at once gives us a clue. [Greek: tho on] is spoken of
in many ways; of these four are classified--[Greek: tho on katha
sumbebekos, tho om hos alethes, tho on dunamei kai energeia], and
[Greek: tho on kata ta schemata ton kategorion]. It is evident from
this that the categories can be regarded neither as purely logical nor
as purely metaphysical elements. They indicate the general forms or
ways in which Being can be predicated; they are determinations of
Being regarded as an object of thought, and consequently as matter of
speech. It becomes apparent also why the analysis of the categories
starts from the singular thing, for it is the primary form under which
all that is becomes object of knowledge, and the other categories
modify or qualify this real individual. [Greek: Panta de ta gignomena
hupo te tinos gignetai kai ek tinos kai ti. To de ti lego kath
hekasten kategorian e gar tode e poson e poion e pon]. (_Met._ p. 1032
a 13-15) ... The categories, therefore, are not logical forms, but
real predicates; they are the general modes in which Being may be
expressed. The definite thing, that which comes forward in the process
from potentiality to full actuality, can only appear and be spoken of
under forms of individuality, quality, quantity and so on. The nine
later categories all denote entity in a certain imperfect fashion.
The categories then are not to be regarded as heads of predicates, the
framework into which predicates can be thrown. They are real
determinations of Being--_allgemeine Bestimmtheiten_, as Hegel calls
them. They are not _summa genera_ of existences, still less are they
to be explained as a classification of namable things in general. The
objections Mill has taken to the list are entirely irrelevant, and
would only have significance if the categories were really--what they
are not--an exhaustive division of concrete existences. Grote's view
(_Aristotle_, i. 108) that Aristotle drew up his list by examining
Various popular propositions, and throwing the different predicates
into genera, "according as they stood in different logical relation to
the subject," has no foundation. The relation of the predicate
category to the subject is not entirely a logical one; it is a
relation of real existence, and wants the essential marks of the
prepositional form. The logical relations of [Greek: to on] are
provided for otherwise than by the categories.
Aristotle has given no intimation of the course of thought by which he
was led to his tenfold arrangement, and it seems hopeless to discover
it. Trendelenburg in various essays has worked out the idea that the
root of the matter is to be found in grammatical considerations, that
the categories originated from investigations into grammatical
functions, and that a correspondence will be found to obtain between
categories and parts of speech. Thus, Substance corresponds to noun
substantive, Quantity and Quality to the adjective, Relation partly to
the comparative degree and perhaps to the preposition, When and Where
to the adverbs of time and place. Action to the active, Passion to the
passive of the verb, Position [Greek: keisthai] to the intransitive
verb, [Greek: echein] to the peculiar Greek perfect. That there should
be a very close correspondence between the categories and grammatical
elements is by no means surprising; that the one were deduced from the
other is both philosophically and historically improbable. Reference
to the detailed criticisms of Trendelenburg by Ritter, Bonitz, and
Zeller will be sufficient.
Aristotle has also left us in doubt on another point. Why should there
be only _ten_ categories? and why should these be the ten? Kant and
Hegel, it is well known, signalize as the great defect in the
Aristotelian categories the want of a principle, and yet some of
Aristotle's expressions would warrant the inference that he _had_ a
principle, and that he thought his arrangement exhaustive. The leading
idea of all later attempts at reduction to unity of principle, the
division into substance and accident, was undoubtedly not overlooked
by Aristotle, and Fr. Brentano[7] has collected with great diligence
passages which indicate how the complete list might have been deduced
from this primary distinction. His tabular arrangements (pp. 175, 177)
are particularly deserving of attention. The results, however, are
hardly beyond the reach of doubt.
Later Greek.
There was no fundamental change in the doctrine of the categories from
the time of Aristotle to that of Kant, and only two proposed
reclassifications are of such importance as to require notice. The
Stoics adopted a fivefold arrangement of highest classes, [Greek:
genikotata]. [Greek: to on] or [Greek: ti], Being, or somewhat in
general, was subdivided into [Greek: hypokeimena] or subjects, [Greek:
poia] or qualities in general, which give definiteness to the blank
subject, [Greek: pos echonta], modes which further determine the
subject, and [Greek: pros ti pos echonta], definite relative modes.
These categories are so related that each involves the existence of
one higher than itself, thus there cannot be a [Greek: pros ti pos
echon] which does not rest upon or imply a [Greek: pos echon], but
[Greek: pos echon] is impossible without [Greek: poion], which only
exists in [Greek: hypokeimenon], a form or phase of [Greek: to
hon].[8]
Plotinus, after a lengthy critique of Aristotle's categories, sets out
a twofold list. [Greek: to en, kinesis, stasis, tautotes, heterotes]
are the primitive categories ([Greek: prota gene]) of the intelligible
sphere. [Greek: ousia, pros ti, poia, poson, kinesis] are the
categories of the sensible world. The return to the Platonic
classification will not escape notice.
Modern philosophy.
Modern philosophy, neglecting altogether the dry and tasteless
treatment of the Aristotelian doctrine by scholastic writers, gave a
new, a wider and deeper meaning to the categories. They now appear as
ultimate or root notions, the metaphysical or thought elements, which
give coherence and consistency to the material of knowledge, the
necessary and universal relations which obtain among the particulars
of experience. There was thus to some extent a return to Platonism,
but in reality, as might easily be shown, the new interpretation was,
with due allowance for difference in point of view, in strict harmony
with the true doctrine of Aristotle. The modern theory dates in
particular from the time of Kant, who may be said to have reintroduced
the term into philosophy. Naturally there are some anticipations in
earlier thinkers. The Substance, Attribute and Mode of Cartesianism
can hardly be classed among the categories; nor does Leibnitz's chance
suggestion of a fivefold arrangement into Substance, Quantity,
Quality, Action and Passion, and Relations, demand any particular
notice. Locke, too, has a classification into Substances, Modes and
Relations, but in it he has manifestly no intention of drawing up a
table of categories. What in his system corresponds most nearly to the
modern view of these elements is the division of kinds of real
predication. In all judgments of knowledge we predicate either (1)
Identity or Diversity, (2) Relation, (3) Co-existence, or necessary
connexion, or (4) Real existence. From this the transition was easy to
Hume's important classification of _philosophical relations_ into
those of Resemblance, Identity, Time and Place, Quantity or Number,
Quality, Contrariety, Cause and Effect.
These attempts at an exhaustive distribution of the necessary
relations of all objects of knowledge indicate the direction taken by
modern thought, before it received its complete expression from Kant.
Kant.
The doctrine of the categories is the very kernel of the Kantian
system, and, through it, of later German philosophy. To explain it
fully would be to write the history of that philosophy. The categories
are called by Kant Root-notions of the Understanding (_Stammbegriffe
des Verstandes_), and are briefly the specific forms of the a priori
or formal element in rational cognition. It is this distinction of
matter and form in knowledge that marks off the Kantian from the
Aristotelian doctrine. To Kant knowledge was only possible as the
synthesis of the material or a posteriori with the formal or a priori.
The material to which a priori forms of the understanding were applied
was the sensuous content of the pure intuitions, Time and Space. This
content could not be _known_ by sense, but only by intellectual
function. But the understanding in the process of knowledge makes use
of the universal form of synthesis, the judgment; intellectual
function is essentially of the nature of judgment or the reduction of
a manifold to unity through a conception. The specific or type forms
of such function will, therefore, be expressed in judgments; and a
complete classification of the forms of judgments is the key by which
one may hope to discover the system of categories. Such a list of
judgments Kant thought he found in ordinary logic, and from it he drew
up his well-known scheme of the twelve categories. These forms are the
determinations of all objects of experience, for it is only through
them that the manifold of sense can be reduced to the unity of
consciousness, and thereby constituted experience. They are a priori
conditions, subjective in one sense, but objective as being universal,
necessary and constitutive of experience.
The table of logical judgments with corresponding categories is as
follows:--
Judgments. Categories.
Universal \ I. / Unity.
Particular > Of Quantity < Plurality.
Singular / \ Totality.
Affirmative \ II. / Reality.
Negative > Of Quality < Negation.
Infinite / \ Limitation.
Categorical \ / Inherence and Subsistence
| III. | (Substance and Accident).
Hypothetical > Of Relation < Causality and Dependence
| | (Cause and Effect).
Disjunctive / \ Community (Reciprocity).
Problematical \ IV. / Possibility and Impossibility.
Assertoric > Of Modality < Existence and Non-Existence.
Apodictic / \ Necessity and Contingency.
Fichte.
Kant, it is well known, criticizes Aristotle severely for having drawn
up his categories without a principle, and claims to have disclosed
the only possible method by which an exhaustive classification might
be obtained. What he criticized in Aristotle is brought against his
own procedure by the later German thinkers, particularly Fichte and
Hegel. And in point of fact it cannot be denied that Kant has allowed
too much completeness to the ordinary logical distribution of
propositions; he has given no proof that in these forms are contained
all species of synthesis, and in consequence he has failed to show
that in the categories, or pure conceptions, are contained all the
modes of a priori synthesis. Further, his principle has so far the
unity he claimed for it, the unity of a single function, but the
specific forms in which such unity manifests itself are not themselves
accounted for by this principle. Kant himself hints more than once at
the possibility of a completely rational system of the categories, at
an evolution from one single movement of thought, and in his _Remarks
on the Table of the Categories_ gave a pregnant hint as to the method
to be employed. From any complete realization of this suggestion Kant,
however, was precluded by one portion of his theory. The categories,
although the necessary conditions under which alone an object of
experience can be thrown, are merely forms of the mind's own activity;
they apply only to sensuous and consequently subjective material.
Outside of and beyond them lies the thing-in-itself, which to Kant
represented the ultimately real. This subjectivism was a distinct
hiatus in the Kantian system, and against it principally Fichte and
Hegel directed criticism. It was manifest that at the root of the
whole system of categories there lay the synthetizing unity of
self-consciousness, and it was upon this unity that Fichte fixed as
giving the possibility of a more complete and rigorous deduction of
the pure notions of the understanding. Without the act of the Ego,
whereby it is self-conscious, there could be no knowledge, and this
primitive act or function must be, he saw, the _position_ or
affirmation of itself by the Ego. The first principle then must be
that the Ego posits itself as the Ego, that Ego = Ego, a principle
which is unconditioned both in form and matter, and therefore capable
of standing absolutely first, of being the _prius_ in a system.
Metaphysically regarded this act of self-position yields the
categories of Reality. But, so far as matter is concerned, there
cannot be affirmation without negation, _omnis determinatio est
negatio_. The determination of the Ego presupposes or involves the
Non-Ego. The form of the proposition in which this second act takes to
itself expression, the Ego is not = Not-Ego, is unconditioned, not
derivable from the first. It is the absolute antithesis to the
primitive thesis. The category of Negation is the result of this
second act. From these two propositions, involving absolutely opposed
and mutually destructive elements, there results a third which
reconciles both in a higher synthesis. The notion in this third is
determination or limitation; the Ego and Non-Ego limit, and are
opposed to one another. From these three positions Fichte proceeds to
evolve the categories by a series of thesis, antithesis and synthesis.
In thus seizing upon the unity of self-consciousness as the origin for
systematic development, Fichte has clearly taken a step in advance of,
and yet in strict harmony with, the Kantian doctrine. For, after all
that can be said as to the demonstrated character of formal logic,
Kant's procedure was empirical, and only after the list of categories
had been drawn out, did he bring forward into prominence what gave
them coherence and reality. The peculiar method of Fichte, also, was
nothing but a consistent application of Kant's own Remark on the Table
of the Categories. Fichte's doctrine, however, is open to some of the
objections advanced against Kant. His method is too abstract and
external, and wants the unity of a single principle. The first two of
his fundamental propositions stand isolated from one another, not to
be resolved into a primitive unity. With him, too, the whole stands
yet on the plane of subjectivity. He speaks, indeed, of the universal
Ego as distinct from the empirical self-consciousness; but the
universal does not rise with him to concrete spirit. Nevertheless the
_Wissenschaftslehre_ contains the only real advance in the treatment
of the categories from the time of Kant to that of Hegel.[9] This, of
course, does not imply that there were not certain elements in
Schelling, particularly in the _Transcendental Idealism_, that are of
value in the transition to the later system; but on the whole it is
only in Hegel that the whole matter of the Kantian categories has been
assimilated and carried to a higher stage. The Hegelian philosophy, in
brief, is a system of the categories; and, as it is not intended here
to expound that philosophy, it is impossible to give more than a few
general and quite external observations as to the Hegelian mode of
viewing these elements of thought. With Kant, as has been seen, the
categories were still subjective, not as being forms of the individual
subject, but as having over against them the world of _noumena_ to
which they were inapplicable. Self-consciousness, which was, even with
Kant, the _nodus_ or kernel whence the categories sprang, was nothing
but a logical centre,--the reality was concealed. There was thus a
dualism, to overcome which is the first step in the Hegelian system.
The principle, if there is to be one, must be universally applicable,
all-comprehensive. Self-consciousness is precisely the principle
wanted; it is a unity, an identity, containing in itself a
multiplicity. The universal in absolute self-consciousness is just
pure thinking, which in systematic evolution is the categories; the
particular is the natural or multiform, the external as such; the
concrete of both is spirit, or self-consciousness come to itself. The
same law that obtains among the categories is found adequate to an
explanation of the external thing which had so sadly troubled Kant.
The categories themselves are moments of the universal of thought,
type forms, or definite aspects which thought assumes; determinations,
_Bestimmungen_, as Hegel most frequently calls them. They evolve by
the same law that was found to be the essence of ultimate
reality--i.e. of self-consciousness. The complete system is pure
thought, the Universal _par excellence_.
After the Hegelian there can hardly be said to have been a
philosophical treatment of the categories in Germany which is not more
or less a criticism of that system. It does not seem necessary to
mention the unimportant modifications introduced by Kuno Fischer, J.E.
Erdmann, or others belonging to the school. In the strongly-opposed
philosophy of J.F. Herbart the categories can hardly be said to hold a
prominent place. They are, with him, the most general notions which
are psychologically formed, and he classifies them as follows:--(1)
Thing, either as product of thought or as given in experience; (2)
Property, either qualitative or quantitative; (3) Relation; (4) The
Negated. Along with these he posits as categories of inner
process--(1) Sensation, (2) Cognition, (3) Will, (4) Action. Joh. Fr.
L. George (1811-1873),[10] who in the main follows Schleiermacher,
draws out a table of categories which shows, in some points, traces of
Herbartian influence. His arrangement by enneads, or series of nine,
is fanciful, and wanting in inner principle.
Trendelenburg.
The most imposing of more recent attempts at a reconstruction of the
categories is that of F.A. Trendelenburg. To him the first principle,
or primitive reality, is Motion, which is both real as external
movement, and ideal as inner construction. The necessary conditions of
Motion are Time and Space, which are both subjective and objective.
From this point onwards are developed the mathematical (point, line,
&c.) and real (causality, substance, quantity, quality, &c.)
categories which appear as involved in the notion of motion. Matter
cannot be regarded as a product of motion; it is the condition of
motion, we must think something moved. All these categories, "under
the presupposition of motion as the first energy of thought, are ideal
and subjective relations; as also, under the presupposition of motion
as the first energy of Being, real and objective relations."[11] A
serious difficulty presents itself in the next category, that of End
(_Zweck_), which can easily be thought for inner activity, but can
hardly be reconciled with real motion. Trendelenburg solves the
difficulty only empirically, by pointing to the insufficiency of the
merely mechanical to account for the organic. The consideration of
Modality effects the transition to the forms of logical thought. On
the whole, Trendelenburg's unique fact of motion seems rather a
blunder. There is much more involved than he is willing to allow, and
motion _per se_ is by no means adequate to self-consciousness. His
theory has found little favour.
Ulrici.
Hermann Ulrici works out a system of the categories from a
psychological or logical point of view. To him the fundamental fact of
philosophy is the distinguishing activity (_unterscheidende
Tatigkeit_) of thought. Thought is only possible by distinction,
difference. The fixed points in the relations of objects upon which
this activity turns are the categories, which may be called the forms
or laws of thought. They are the aspects of things, notions under
which things must be brought, in order to become objects of thought.
They are thus the most general predicates or heads of predicates. The
categories cannot be completely gathered from experience, nor can they
be evolved a priori; but, by attending to the general relations of
thought and its purely indefinite matter, and examining what we must
predicate in order to know Being, we may attain to a satisfactory
list. Such a list is given in great detail in the _System der Logik_
(1852), and in briefer, preciser form in the _Compendium der Logik_
(2nd ed., 1872); it is in many points well deserving of attention.
Renouvier, Cousin, Hamilton, Mill.
The definition of the categories by the able French logician Charles
Bernard Renouvier in some respects resembles that of Ulrici. To him
the primitive fact is Relation, of which all the categories are but
forms. "The categories," he says, "are the primary and irreducible
laws of knowledge, the fundamental relations which determine its form
and regulate its movements." His table and his criticism of the
Kantian theory are both of interest.[12] The criticism of Kant's
categories by Cousin and his own attempted classification are of no
importance. Of little more value is the elaborate table drawn out by
Sir W. Hamilton.[13] The generalized category of the _Conditioned_ has
but little meaning, and the subordinate categories evolve themselves
by no principle, but are arranged after a formal and quite arbitrary
manner. They are never brought into connexion with thought itself, nor
could they be shown to spring from its nature and relations. J.S. Mill
presented, "as a substitute for the abortive classification of
Existences, termed the categories of Aristotle," the following as an
enumeration of all nameable things:--(1) Feelings, or states of
consciousness; (2) The minds which experience these feelings; (3)
Bodies, or external objects which excite certain of those feelings;
(4) Successions and co-existences, likenesses and unlikenesses,
between feelings or states of consciousness.[14] This classification
proceeds on a quite peculiar view of the categories, and is here
presented only for the sake of completeness.
Modern psychologists.
By modern psychologists the subject has been closely investigated.
Professor G.F. Stout (_Manual of Psychology_, vol. ii. pp. 312 foll.)
defines categories as "forms of cognitive consciousness, universal
principles or relations presupposed either in all cognition or in all
cognition of a certain kind." He then treats External (or Physical)
Reality, Space, Time, Causality and "Thinghood" from the standpoint of
the perceptual consciousness; showing in what sense the categories of
causality, substance and the rest exist in the sphere of perception.
As contrasted with the ideational, the perceptual consciousness is
concerned with practice. Perception tells the child of things as
separate entities, not in their ultimate relations as parts of a
coherent whole. G.T. Ladd (_Psychology Descriptive and Explanatory_,
ch. xxi., on "Space, Time and Causality") defines the categories from
the psychological standpoint as "those highly abstract conceptions
which the mind frames by reflection upon its own most general modes of
behaviour. They are our own notions resulting from co-operation of
imagination and judgment, concerning the ultimate and unanalyzable
forms of our own existence and development." In other words, the
categories are highly abstract, have no content, and are realized as a
kind of thinking which has for its object all the other mental
processes.
AUTHORITIES.--Besides those quoted above, see Eduard v. Hartmann,
_Kategorienlehre_ (Leipzig, 1896), and "Begriff der
Kategorialfunktion", in _Zeitschr. f. Philos. und phil. Krit._ cxv.
(1899), pp. 9-19; E. Konig in the same periodical cxiii. (1889), pp.
232-279, and cxiv. (1899), pp. 78-105; F.A. Trendelenburg, _Geschichte
der Kategorienlehre_ (1846); P. Ragnisco _Storia critica delle
categorie_ (2 vols., Florence, 1871); W. Windelband _Vom System der
Kategorien_ (Tubingen, 1900); R. Eisler, _Worterbuch der
philospphischen Begriffe_ (Berlin, 1899), pp. 400-409; S. Joda,
_Studio critico su le categorie_ (Naples, 1881); H. Vaihinger, _Die
transcendentale Deduktion der Kategorien_ (Halle, 1902); H.W.B.
Joseph, _Introduction to Logic_ (Oxford, 1906), ch. iii.; F.H.
Bradley, _Principles of Logic_ (1883); B. Bosanquet's _Knowledge and
Reality_ (1885, 2nd ed. 1892); histories of philosophy. For further
authorities see works quoted under ARISTOTLE and KANT, and in J.M.
Baldwin's _Dict. Philos. Psych._ vol. iii. pt. 2, p. 685.
(R. Ad.; X.)