KNOWLEDGE AND "KNOWLEDGE"
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that it follows in the least that a universe in which the principle of
inertia holds is one in which no interactions or transaction between
different things is possible. Nor do I see that the alleged consequence
of such an initial principle-"that there would be no intrinsic causal–
ity like that exercised by form"-constitutes a
reductio ad absurdum.
The evidence for the principle of inertia is much stronger than that
for the belief in intrinsic causality and for the view that form by
itself has any influence in the executive order of nature.
The philosophy of nature seems to me to be a composite of
Greek physics .and Aristotelian metaphysics and to the degree that
it is accepted is likely to constitute a psychological obstacle to the
experimental study of nature. To object to the latter on the ground
that it yields some, but not all, of the secrets of matter, would
be
permissible if we possessed a science that yielded all knowledge of
nature's secrets. But philosophical physics yields no knowledge of na–
ture's secrets whatsoever because it yields no knowledge at all, cer–
tainly no genuinely new knowledge. It claims to take its departure
from the world of experience, which would make it empirical, but
what it actually does is to use illustrations from experience as alleged
truths which it maintains would constitute knowledge no matter what
the world was like. It speaks of proof, but systematically confuses
illustration with proof. Thus it raises and settles questions such as
whether a compound is a complex individual body and has an "es–
sential unity" by arbitrary definition, rather than by specific inquiry
into chemical elements, mixtures and compounds.
If
the elements of
a compound are "virtually" present in a substance, it is a genuine
complex individual body;
if
not, not. Such distinctions throw ab–
solutely no light on our knowledge of chemical elements and
compounds.
As
one Thomistic philosopher, Bonnet, puts it (in
The Modern
Schoo/man
for January 1944), the philosophy of Aquinas "furnishes
us with the metaphysical 'rules' which govern the intimate being of
any complex individual body." Whether such a complex individual
body exists in
fact,
he adds, is not its concern.
If
it does exist, it can
be cited as an illustration. The philosophy of nature, he holds, "has
limited itself as it should, to establishing and elaborating the necessary
laws of the being of such a (possible) body." All that has been
established, however, is a certain way of talking about things, not
