sensualism holds that we have no objective foundation for classifying our perceptions along conceptual or universal lines. Hence, sensualism rejects the idea that it is possible to uphold and have any discernable or coherent view of reality. And yet, sensualism nevertheless claims to constitute a valid scientific theory, according to which only the non-subjective perception of objective circumstances may lay the foundation to knowledge proper.330 Hägerström’s critique goes along the following line of argumentation: It is only when a subject is active that universals can be created, discerned, and maintained, as only the subject has the subjective capability to make formal distinctions and classifications of the material content of our perceptions and the perceptions themselves.Accordingly,Hägerström asks:How is the sensualistic program possible at all? How is it possible to assert that perception is objective (in the understanding that perception is non-subjective)? Does not the formation of knowledge itself depend upon subjective as well as objective elements? Hägerström’s theory of universals is not realistic in the sense that it holds that concepts and universals are considered to be either pre-existent or causal, or both, to our apprehension of them. Hägerström’s realism lies in another direction, in which the real concept is the object and vice versa.331 Concepts are based upon perceptions, but established through induction.332 A concept can thus be constructed for every occasion (on the basis of given perceptions). If one chooses to formulate a new synthetic concept, the true representation of objective realityautomatically restricts its determinative qualities to supporting facts (objective determinants) rather than to subjective determinants, hence providing conceptual construction, formulation with a real, objective content. p a r t i 1 , c h a p t e r 6 148 330 See, e.g., ibid., pp. 28-29; Fries, Verklighetsbegreppet, pp. 74-94 and 230-255. 331 Fries, Verklighetsbegreppet, pp. 230-255. 332 Cf. Hägerström, Selbstdarstellungen, p. 24; “B. o. F.,” pp. 96-99. 6 . 2 re i f icated conce pts
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