ITSELF

I. "Thing"

I. A thing is not a non-thing

The most important thing is the essence of things, the self of the thing, its itself. Whoever knows the essence, the very essence of things, knows everything. The most important thing is to know not just the external and accidental, but to know the basic and essential, without which a thing does not exist. That which abides in things, and not merely changes and becomes, is what philosophy and life itself strive for. But what is the essence of things? What is a thing, namely the thing itself, is in a thing that is not reducible to anything else, to any other thing, that is only itself, itself, and nothing else?

1. A thing is not the consciousness of a thing

1.

One of the usual answers is: "A thing is that which we feel, that which affects our external senses." This answer radically distorts reality and does not explain anything about what a thing is in itself.

(a) First, there is not only what is felt. There is even something sensual that I, for example, do not feel. For example, I have not been to Australia and have never felt it with my external organs. Nevertheless, it exists, and, by the way, it exists sensuously.

(b) Consequently, it would make some sense to say that there is only what is felt in general, what is felt in principle, that which is felt by someone and at some time in general, not only by me now. But this is tantamount to asserting that everything that exists is an object for sensation in general, that it always has a correlate in one or another sentient consciousness. Such a statement, however, does not explain at all what a thing is in itself, since it presupposes that things already exist in themselves. At first, the thing must exist on its own, and then it will be felt by someone.

(c) But even if a thing first comes into being with someone's sensation, it is still not sensation itself. If a seed sown on dry soil germinates with watering or rain, it does not mean that cloves are water or rye seeds are rain. Whoever asserts that things arise with sensation does not distinguish seeds from weather, weather from clouds and clouds, clouds from the celestial background on which they appear, i.e., he does not really distinguish anything from anything. But this is how it should be, for sensations are sheer chaos. It can also be said that absolute sensationalism is based on the logical fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc, since it understands the temporal and factual connection of the object of sensation with sensation itself as causal connection.