Man-In-Nature as a Phenomenological Datum

Abstract

By the word “nature” we may mean the “essence” of a thing, its essential or substantial core or reality. The essence is what makes the thing what it is and distinguishes it from other things which also have their “essence.” We may distinguish between the “essential” and “accidental” features or characters of things; and we may take the accidental features or characters of things to be those of its features or characters which do not at all affect its essential or substantial core. Things of our experience may be sorted out into different classes or kinds according to their “essences” or nature. “Essence” is that in terms of which we may define a thing. By the Platonists, it was taken to be the “concept” of a thing. They meant thereby that the essence or the substance of the thing is its concept. It is the concept which is to be principally understood if one wants to understand a thing: the concept is the principal thing and so the thing is the concept. The concept was no replica or image of any existent thing, for the existent thing itself was what it was in virtue of the concept or essence. It follows, then, that according to the Platonists essence was no existent thing, such as we might experience in space and time. It belongs to a realm of its own and is to be grasped through an act of intellection.