Reading Notes: October 3rd, 2024

“What is implied in [the unity of mind]? It is clear that whatever else it implies, it at least involves the interconnexion of different cognitions, feelings, and conations with each other as entering into a complex unity of an altogether unique kind….[At] any rate, there is a complex mental life—a mind-complex….We must then analyze the mind-complex, so as to determine wherein its unity consists, and what is and is not included in the unity of the manifold. We have first to note that there are two sides to our mental life, distinct though inseparable, which are broadly distinguishable as (1) knowledge of objects, and (2) interest in them. In discussing the unity of the mind-complex, it is necessary for the sake of clearness to deal first with cognitive unity and then with unity of interest. (For reasons which will appear as we proceed, it would be impossible to reverse this order).” (Stout, God & Nature, 264-265)

“What is the unity of knowledge?....Unity of knowledge is identical with knowledge of unity. [Unity of knowledge] is actual or potentially present if and so far as items in any way diverse are or can be known or thought of as in any way connected or related, or as partial features or aspects of any kind of whole….If such relations [between diverse items] are not actually known or thought of, yet, in so far as it is possible that they may be so, the cognitive unity is potential. On the other hand, where distinct items are severally apprehended but without any cognisance, actual or potential, of relation between them, there is no cognitive unity….[This analysis must be expanded to] account for cognitive unity, actual or potential, as coextensive with the unity of the individual “I” or “self”….We have, then, still to account for cognitive unity as necessarily pervading and connecting, potentially or actually, all stages and phases in the life-history of an individual [mind-complex]….We can do this only in one way. There must be for the knowing individual [mind-complex], one all-inclusive object, comprehending all other objects—whether particular or universal, actual, possible or impossible—as its partial and essentially incomplete features and aspects. It follows that whatever else the individual knows he must in some measure and degree, however rudimentary, be cognisant of the universe in its unity. But how? In very different ways and degrees, varying with the special conditions of individual existence and stages of mental development; different for us…and for the cat watching a mouse-hole. Yet the cat’s knowledge, just as much as ours, presupposes the unity of the universe; otherwise it could never go beyond the content of its own immediate experience, and could not even know this.” (Stout, God & Nature, 265-267)

“Cognitive unity includes not only what is commonly called knowledge, but also what is commonly called ignorance. This would be impossible if the ignorance consisted in the absolute absence of all cognitive relation between the [mind-complex] and what it is ignorant of. But this is not so. We may indeed, by straining the use of language, say that a stone is absolutely ignorant in this sense. It is so because it is also incapable of knowledge. The stone does not know what is happening at the center of the earth; neither do I. But the stone’s ignorance, if we may use the word at all, is essentially different from mine. What I say that I am ignorant of, I at least know as being unknown to me, and as connected with what I do know. In this sense my ignorance has an object, and the stone’s has none. In this sense it is equally true to say that the stone is ignorant of everything, and that it is ignorant of nothing. But if I said that I was ignorant of nothing, I could only mean that I know everything. Now we have seen that the cognitive unity of the individual [mind-complex], as pervading, potentially or actually, all phases of his life-history, implies the unity of the universe as the form of all his knowledge. But if this be so, all ignorance on the part of an individual knower must be of the relative type, and not at all comparable with the nescience of a stone. He must at least refer to what he is ignorant of as belonging to the domain of the unknown, and as connected with what he otherwise knows. Thus his cognitive unity will include both his knowledge and his ignorance.” (Stout, God & Nature, 267-268)

“[The fact that cognitive unity includes knowledge and ignorance becomes] plain enough when we consider the mental attitude of questioning or inquiring, of seeking to know what we do not know already. When we raise a question, we do not, indeed, know what the answer is. None the less, in the very act of questioning, we define what it is that we are ignorant of. We define it as related in a more or less determinate way to what is presupposed in the question itself. What is thus presupposed is apprehended as essentially incomplete, and the answer is apprehended as what is required to complete it. But if knowledge of the unknown, as such, is implied in the ignorance which takes shape in actual questions, it must also be implied in the ignorance which does not. It is implied in the mere possibility of asking questions, so far as this depends on the nature of the object, and not on the subjective interest or other special conditions of individual existence. There must be a field for inquiry offered to the cognitive subject—a field apprehended as unknown, an object therefore of relative and not absolute ignorance. But what we know and what, in this relative sense, we do not know, constitute together one universe of being, which is the correlate and counterpart of the unity of knowledge….The unity of knowledge is essential to the unity and identity of every cognitive individual….[and] consists throughout in apprehension of relation and connexion, it embraces the field of what we call ignorance, and is essentially correlated with the unity of the universe.” (Stout, God & Nature, 268-271)