Pathway to Japanese Literature

I intend to confine the issue to the domain of knowledge—cognition.
Yet this does not mean I aim to first demarcate the world of knowledge from what lies beyond it, then vigilantly remain within those bounds.
To do so would likely require us to already possess a complete system beforehand.
Needless to say, we cannot commence from such conclusions.
Should one try to impartially treat all established problems as neighbors of equal standing, they would conversely forfeit any foothold for engaging with specific issues.
To avert this peril, I find it imperative in this instance to restrict problems to the sphere of knowledge.

The very concept of knowledge may first be called into question.
However, since determining it to some extent is precisely my purpose, if this concept gains currency among people as a common-sense concept that can endorse my subsequent words, then that suffices.
Therefore, regarding this concept, I wish to state the following: knowledge has two markers—first, the reality that we consider to be communicated through knowledge; second, the pathway through which such reality is thought to be communicated.
And that this second pathway is specifically called by the name of knowledge.
At this point, people would likely hit upon selecting two terms from classical philosophy to express these two concepts.
That is the distinction between "existence as existence" and "existence as truth."
Admittedly, in this case, instead of the word "truth" being used twice, the word "existence" is used doubly.
However, in providing these two distinctions, this poses no obstacle whatsoever.
On one hand, that which exists as existence; on the other hand, that which exists as truth—reality and the pathway to it.
People, at any rate, cannot help but accept this relationship.

At present, it is not my purpose to first speak of reality in general terms.
And invariably, such kinds of things are not necessarily required.
Modern metaphysics distinguished at least two things in substance or concerning substance—for such metaphysics, reality was none other than substance itself.
*mens* and *corpus*, or *cogitatio* and *extensio*.
I now intend to further limit the scope of my inquiry into reality to the world of objects or extension.
On the other hand, the concept that expresses reality thus limited must be what we today commonly—and of course within the realm of knowledge—call nature.
Philosophers may have each used the word “nature” in their own unique senses; however, what I speak of is not a technical term but a common one.
Reality, in this case, is nature in this sense.
So how are we to approach Nature?

I delimited the meaning of nature and acquired a certain natural concept.
In this delimitation and acquisition, this concept* was already given its prescribed direction; this concept, as all concepts must in fact be, only came into being by bearing the motive** of its formation.
We did not merely construct a certain concept and observe it; rather, we had no other purpose than to use this very act of construction to draw out what followed.
And this purpose of the concept directly returned to the beginning—for telos is arche—thereby constituting the motive of this concept.
The current concept of nature, too, had to possess a certain direction motivated by certain (though not yet determined) motives; otherwise, it would have been useless to us.
Therefore, what became clear by following this direction must indeed have been none other than the true nature of this concept.
Through this, the natural concept clarified how it was required and how it was constituted, thereby revealing its own character.
What is the character of nature?
But what is character?

＊ I will clarify later that concepts are fundamentally divided into two types.
At present, I am using one of them.

＊＊ By “motive” here, I mean neither a psychological cause nor a logical foundation. It can be nothing other than a conceptual motive—here, people must at least conceive that concepts should not unconditionally be called logical.

——See the conclusion.

A tree possesses a character; through knowing this character, we can know it not as an object, not as a living thing, not as a plant—but precisely as a tree, and indeed as *this* tree.
When we remember a person, we always remember their face—and moreover, we likely remember the front view rather than the profile.
That is because the front view most prominently represents that person.
Such a front view reveals that person’s character to us.
Of course, this does not mean that person is constituted solely by their front view—by this, I mean their front view is not a logical presupposition of their existence (as in Cohen’s case), nor can it be a subjective constraint that unifies the consciousness of their existence (as in Windelband’s case), nor is it an objective form that sustains their existence (as in Lask’s case).
We cannot express character through a concept of epistemological category—one that can only be motivated by borrowing such oppositional subjective concepts.
Character means the focal point of understanding wherein, through our pursuit of it—that is, through our clarification of it—what it belongs to simultaneously becomes clear.
However, if one were to use, for example, the term “essence” instead of “character,” it would likely exist independently of us.
Such an essence is conceived as existing beyond us.
At the very least, it is not guaranteed to contain the process by which it becomes clear to us.
Therefore, such essence must be the exact opposite of character (see later).
Character must be a definite task given to us as a single process encompassing both the motive for a concept’s formation and the direction of its development.
What is the character of nature?

That is space, I think.
By explaining my motive for characterizing nature's visage as space, I will thereby simultaneously clarify space's character.

When people were actually living their lives, they found nature—not according to scholarly inquiry but in accordance with convention—as the most trustworthy entity.
Whether that world was constituted by the transcendental ego or not, or whether it was a developmental stage of some absolute entity or not, people trusted nature as reality without being bound by such considerations.
It was thus in reality, and they believed it was thus in reality.
If this trust had deceived them, it would have been their trust that deceived them—not reality that deceived them.
Therefore, they still trusted reality.
For people, the concept of nature was nothing other than their trust in reality.
This became the motive behind the formation of the common-sense concept of nature—and consequently constituted this concept’s first step in character.
The concept of substance was often—and quite rightly—understood naturalistically as such a character of nature.
Even the phrase “considered as the cause of mind” had to express substance first as the foundational ground where all trust in daily life converged—before signifying a metaphysics grounded in a psychophysical standpoint.
For the common-sense concept, substance needed first and foremost to be an entity visible to the eye and tangible to the hand—rather than being mind’s cause.
The character of nature manifested its first step as matter in this sense.
Nature was material.
Yet matter could not be *substantia*.
For according to metaphysics, *Substantia* had to be *das Daseiende*—and yet must not be its *Daseinsweise*.
According to metaphysics, first there existed a real entity from whose cause the mode of existence called reality presumably resulted; it was by no means that first reality’s mode of existence served as motive to establish the concept of real entity.
Such a real entity as this cause—not as a motivated process—would have been *substantia*.
Our concept of matter had instead meant a character—a motivated process.
Therefore, this matter was not substance.
Thus matter had precisely to be a mode of existence—existing as matter.
The motive that developed the natural concept into the material concept had been the pursuit of “character as mode of existence”—*Dacharakter*.

In retrospect, nature was originally nothing other than such a mode of existence.
The reality and actuality that garnered people’s trust were, in fact, such modes of existence—reality and actuality.
Therefore, as is now evident, the character of nature—that is, matter—and thus the character of matter—for character is a process—is a single *Dacharakter*.
This motive that led to the material concept through seeking nature’s character, this direction that pursues *Dacharakter*, and this process demand that they immediately determine the character of matter next.
And that which characterizes the mode of existence by which matter exists as matter is none other than space.
Space is the character of nature (or matter)—that is, it expresses nature’s (or matter’s) character as *Dacharakter*—and is itself a *Dacharakter*.
Space must be, above all else, the “character of existence” that is space itself.
And this is also the character of space.
What else could Aristotle’s *being qua being* be if not a phrase articulating the “character of existence”?

There is no theory concerning space that does not, in some sense, clarify its character.
If that were not so, it would not qualify as a theory of space from the very outset.
Yet there must indeed be a fundamental difference between theories that make their own pursuit of space’s character the core content of their framework and those that do not.
Needless to say, people would naturally recognize from the start that the former constitutes a more comprehensive theory than the latter.
The approach I have articulated thus far has at least sought to align with this former case.
Nevertheless, to demonstrate this approach’s superiority more concretely, I shall now attempt to delineate the difficulties inherent in its opposite—the latter case.
To avoid excessive breadth, I will omit historically dense metaphysical or theological perspectives—many space theories could be thus categorized—＊.
I must also exclude psychological research＊＊.
It seems to me that both [approaches] diverge somewhat from our present inquiry.

＊ Here, for example, issues such as the relationship between substance and space or the deduction of space come into question.

＊＊ Here, what commands the most serious attention is the morphological theory of space.
I think other issues would likely not attract philosophical interest to this extent.

Now, the remaining approaches—all of which depart from the concept of nature or reality—I believe I can divide into two categories.
The first is an approach that views space as the essence within nature; the second is one that views it as a constraint of nature.
The first strives to discover an eternal, form-like essence through things that factually exist or occur within nature; according to this method, space is found precisely as such a form—that is, as essence.
If I state this, many people will likely object as follows.
The essence of nature cannot necessarily be considered to be space; is it not rather something among matter, time, motion, force, or action that constitutes nature’s essence?
However, even those who say this would be unable to discover any special reason to refuse considering space as a kind of essence of nature.
Moreover, regarding initial matter—as I have already stated—according to our understanding, matter was nothing other than a single feature already contained within the concept of space.
Even if natural scientists understand matter as the essence of nature constituting their research object, whether this material concept immediately qualifies as a philosophical concept—and we are interrogating this very point—remains questionable; moreover, what they deem essence likely differs from what we call essence.
If we are to speak, we bracket all natural standpoints—and consequently the natural scientific standpoint—and now aim to seek what we call essence upon this foundation.
Even if we take time next, time in general is by no means the essence of nature.
The concept of time appearing in history and consciousness cannot be called nature’s essence.
To be that [essence], time must be limited as a particular kind—namely, time within nature.
That which limits time in general to this must be none other than something beyond time itself.
And as a single mathematical dimension—in other words, as something related to a measurable quantity—we in fact understand physical time.
This is nature’s time.
Since what constitutes nature’s essence is precisely our current problem, positing time as nature’s essence becomes not an answer but merely a reformulation.
Whether we take motion (consider Aristotle’s remarkably broad conception), force, or action—unless first limited as particular instances within nature—the very motivation to call them nature’s essence would vanish.
Therefore, space in particular must be posited as nature’s essence.
This is because all essence-like things are subsumed into it, and we cannot imagine space being subsumed into another essence.
Thus, we acknowledge that space is nature’s essence.

However, precisely because of this, we cannot unconditionally accept the converse statement that space is the essence of nature.
This is because choosing the phrase "essence of nature" as either the most superior or adequate predicate to characterize space does not logically follow from the present proposition.
In other words, no theory of space could be condensed into this proposition.
Why is this?
To clarify this point, I shall now undertake a brief analysis of said proposition.

When speaking of nature's essence, two meanings had to be distinguished.
The first would refer to using "essence" commonsensically to denote what represented nature's reason for existing or being understood as itself.
Were natural scientists to call matter or electromagnetism nature's essence—or were natural philosophers to regard God as such—this would operate within that first sense.
Yet this was not what we meant by essence.
What we meant was essence in a second distinct sense.
That is—as previously indicated—the convention had been that nature's essence meant permanent forms discovered through what factually existed or occurred within nature.
Space was this permanent immutable relation discovered within what deserved to be called nature—the initial proposition set forth.
But if so, this proposition already presupposed as settled both what fundamentally deserved to be called nature and exactly what made nature deserve that designation.
Put differently—with nature's concept given as known commonsensically and academically—the essence termed space was being derived from this foundation.
Thus following this method meant failing to grasp why nature's concept formed—for nature's concept was already given.
Consequently we also failed to grasp why space's concept formed—since motivating space's concept proved impossible without presupposing nature's conceptual motivation (see earlier).
Therefore using "essence" left space's concept incomprehensible.
Through this approach research efficacy could only concern space's morphological structure＊—not space's concept itself.
Yet why we conceptualized such structures as space—this constituted our primary task.
Our fundamental question was never what a tree *was*, but always what it meant that we understood trees *as trees*.
Hence proclaiming nature's essence as space remained itself entirely valid.
But inversely—when asserting space as nature's essence—if one thereby sought to comprehend space's concept itself or worse posited this as spatial theory's thesis—such efforts became simultaneously deficient and excessive.
This subject-object exchange concerned methods more fundamental than formal logic.
Here lay the distinction between essence and concept.
What existed was whether processes possessed motive or not.

It is a distinction between presence and absence of character.
While stating that space is essence constitutes one expression about space—and in that sense does elucidate space's character—we must nevertheless assert that essence is not a concept whose content consists in expressing its own character.

* It bears noting that spatial discourse has predominantly addressed space qua morphological structure.
"Is space void or substantial? Finite or infinite?"—such questions persist.
Yet this remains distinct from the problem concerning the spatial concept itself: what space *is*.

Secondly, we examined the view that regarded space as nature's constraint.
We began by dividing constraints into two categories.
Epistemological constraints and ontological constraints.
The former generally acknowledged the opposition between subjectivity and objectivity, constituting the condition where either subjectivity became objectivity's condition or vice versa.
The latter involved discovering conditions enabling phenomena without acknowledging subject-object opposition—thus excluding their unity—(since constraints differed from causes, being logical antecedents).
However, consequently declaring constraints as logical alone explained nothing.
Whether defining nature epistemologically or ontologically—following our current definitions—we could posit space as nature's enabling condition.
This was undoubtedly space's superior interpretation.
Regarding space, we owed at least half this interpretation to Leibniz's and Kant's fundamental ideas.
Yet what demanded attention was how constraints immediately opposed what they constrained.
While requiring distinctions and oppositions for conceptualization, specifically equating constraints with space forced the constrained to correspond to non-space—likely matter.
Here they didn't solve space's problem through constrainer/constrained concepts—form/content—but constructed this opposition ab initio, inserting space as one term.
By utilizing space-as-form while supplementing content, certain extra-spatial problems would resolve.
Yet space itself remained employed but unexamined.
Some might claim form-content inseparability from inception—that their boundary was indeterminable.
But then space-as-form became unsayable.
If unclear where constraint lay within form-content—where space began/ended—space grew elusive.
Asserting space-as-form required conceiving space/non-space distinction regarding space itself—even amid general form-content indistinction.
Here already lurked form-content's absolute distinction—an *Atomismus*.
Nevertheless extending this indistinction beyond abstract form-content concepts—impossible as abstract concepts—to concrete spatial concepts amounted to sophistry.

For in general, there could not exist even a single abstract oppositional concept where absolute distinction were possible.
This is not limited solely to form-content or constraint-constrained.
Yet if through employing such abstract oppositions even concrete antitheses become relativized, these conceptual pairs would prove too perilous for use.
Therefore, though the form-content opposition in this context may not be absolute as abstract concepts themselves, they demand application as absolute antitheses.
The form fulfilling this role must be called static.
Neither epistemological nor ontological constraints lie beyond this.
Space as constraint constitutes a static form—an *a priori* expanded beyond Kant’s original meaning.
Now, history shows such forms (constraint, *a priori*) have always entailed fundamental difficulties.
This manifests as the problem of how such static forms might connect with equally static content.
The sole path to avoiding this impasse likely lies in comprehending form and content through motion’s conceptual lens.
Through this approach, matter clarifies itself by becoming form.
Form comes to indicate the direction of such motion.
By “direction” we mean not the metaphorical usage common in philosophical explanations—as when subjectivity and objectivity are called two directions—but rather the actual trajectory inherent to moving entities.
Nor does this direction resemble poles in correlation; it is motion’s true course.
A form possessing such direction becomes a characteristic discerned within processual understanding, not a concept expressing static opposition.
This constitutes dynamic form.
Thus even were one to express this dynamic form through “constraint”—though improbable—such constraint must differ entirely from constraints signifying static forms of old.
The latter inherently bears difficulties; the former avoids them from inception.
Hence the former surpasses the latter.
Within this superior latter category lies what we might call space as character.

For it was through gradually clarifying the motives behind its formation that the concept of nature was supposed to process into the concept of space, thereby revealing its character.
Therefore, characterizing space as the character of nature surpasses characterizing it as a constraint of nature—whether epistemologically or ontologically.

I explained at its foundation why viewing space as the essence or constraint of nature does not reach viewing it as nature’s character.
However, this is not to say that the previous two are mistaken; it is merely that they are inadequate.
Nor does it mean that both [positions] encompass all possible stances; it is merely that I theoretically generalized and pointed out representative positions.
Space must above all else first express the character of nature; space is a character of existence.
This has been my sole assertion up to now.
And this is believed to be the most definitive approach to space in its ultimate significance.

Space had been sought as the character of nature's existence, but the reason that seeking it immediately came to determine space's own character stemmed from the very concept of character itself.
I therefore resolved to examine the character of space in greater depth.
Space—which ought to express nature's mode of existence—must first and foremost belong to reality (the term *reality*, as initially defined, standing in opposition to *pathway*).
I had previously articulated why people place their trust in nature as reality.
This reality was of course not the thing-in-itself; rather, it constituted precisely that motive which allows the concept of the thing-in-itself—though declared ultimately untenable—to nevertheless be provisionally conceived as factual.
Nature belongs to reality.
The second imperative therefore became determining what pathway communicates with it.
Admittedly, some might dismiss this problem by asserting:
"If space thus belongs to reality—and since reality remains reality regardless of how one communicates with it—then pathway cannot constitute a fundamental concern for spatial theory."
Yet unless we communicate with reality, we could never comprehend what reality truly is.
While we might indeed utter the term "reality"—this abstract concept—divorced from any pathway,
the problem must concern not terminology but reality itself.
Consequently, reality's content determination must necessarily shift according to our mode of access.
The formation of concepts belonging to reality must differ depending on the pathway employed.
The concept of space would remain mere verbal definition unless explicated through pathway.
What then is pathway?
The present issue does not concern space existing as essence and how we might render this essence into cognitive content,
for I had already demonstrated why considering space as essence proves inadequate.
Nor can we evade this question of pathway by claiming space belongs not to objectivity itself (the thing-in-itself) but rather constitutes constraints and conditions for cognition's establishment,
since asserting space as a condition for natural concept formation never represented its most profound interpretation.

When I discarded those two claims, what had consistently served as their rallying cry was always the concept of space.
People would imagine on this basis: space is reality itself, and the pathway communicating with it must be none other than concept.
Space exists as space, they would argue*, and what we possess in relation to it is not space itself but rather the concept of "space"—distinct from the formal spatial concept.

* Let us once again note that the concept has two meanings.
In this case, people mean something different by this than what I intend.

This type of thinking is most frequently employed; however, the fundamental difficulty inherent in such thought lies precisely in opposing space and *the concept of space*.
One term denotes space itself while the other appears to be nothing more than a single conceptual construct.
If the pathway to cognizing space were not space itself but rather *the concept of space*, then such space would have to resemble Kant’s *thing-in-itself*.
Many have already identified this category of difficulty.
Yet this is not all.
If we suppose that the opposition between what is spatial and non-spatial—as commonly imagined—maps onto the reality-pathway dichotomy, then this reality-pathway opposition must be said to commit a fallacy in its use of opposing concepts, just as we observed in the form-content dichotomy.
This follows because opposing concepts exist solely as tools motivated to resolve problems through their very opposition; once a problem’s resolution proves unsuccessful to any degree, we lose justification for clinging to the opposition’s original meaning.
Therefore, if statically opposing reality and pathway in this manner proves inadequate for solving the problem of space—not *the problem of the concept of space*—then such opposition cannot be permitted as our starting point.
Indeed, through this static reality-pathway opposition, the problem of space remains unsolved—space becomes merely one term inserted into this dichotomy.
Consequently, if our initial reality-pathway opposition—like the form-content opposition before it—was static from the start, then that opposition proves futile.
Thus, opposing space and *the concept of space* in accordance with this framework must also be unnecessary.
Therefore, even when we state that space belongs to reality, this does not preclude its belonging to the pathway.
However, what I term *spatial concept*—distinct from *the concept of space*—is likewise not a concept that statically opposes reality as pathway.
In a certain sense, that which is simultaneously reality itself and the pathway to it—this being dynamic opposition’s defining trait—must constitute precisely my concept of space.
Having tentatively grasped space’s character through this reality-pathway framework, I shall now examine it against a representative perspective to further clarify its concrete nature.

In order to sublate this static opposition between reality and pathway that ought to be negated—and consequently， in this case， the opposition between space itself and the concept of space—people often introduced judgment．
For judgment—if adhered to by people—enabled them to appropriately comprehend the relationship between reality and pathway， thereby sufficiently understanding the connection between space and what constituted the concept of space．
For judgment firstly possessed the ability to reduce all cognitive content to itself； this was because all cognitive content could be characterized as having been judged．
Let us call this the reductivity of judgment．
According to this property， reality could only exist as that which had been judged as reality．
In that sense， judgment instead possessed reality．
And within that judgment which judged reality—whether it was the act of judgment or something else， we would address that later—the pathway nature of judgment was found．
Thus， judgment mediated between reality and pathway through its reductivity＊．

* Consciousness too would possess a property precisely analogous to judgment in this respect.
As for consciousness, I shall address it on another occasion.

Since judgment generally mediates between reality and pathway, it consequently appears capable of linking space with what constitutes the concept of space. For space—that is, what exists there as spatial—is judged as such, such that the reality of judgment is none other than this very space; conversely, the pathway nature of judgment appears to reside in judgment itself.
If approached thus, space must inevitably be reduced to judgment.
And if one acknowledges judgment’s reductivity, this conclusion would seem logically necessary.
Proceeding accordingly, spatial theory might take shape as a specialized subset of judgment theory.
Yet what measure of validity does judgment’s reductivity truly hold?

The term *judgment* is already polysemous.
I find it necessary to make distinctions here to extract the meaning I intend to employ.
What people immediately notice is the distinction between judgment and the act of judging (Urteil u. Urteilen).
This involves differentiating between the actual act of judging and—conversely—the judged content* (or rather object), which is non-actual.
The former signifies a function; the latter signifies a matter.
Even if we posit that both exist in an inseparable relationship, this does not negate their distinction as conceptual contents—indeed, we have no choice but to think according to conceptual content.
At present, I do not call this former element judgment.

* What Rickert terms "content" (Gehalt) corresponds rather to Husserl’s "object"—though this does not mean these two concepts, differing in their formative motives, are equivalent or otherwise.

A certain sense of judgment could be conceived—one distinguished both from psychological acts of judgment (the former) and from logical judgmental content (the latter)*.
Neither being the act of judging nor the judged matter itself, but as an independent conceptual determination encompassed by both, we had good reason to specifically designate as "judgment" the mode of what judges or is judged.
The mode-state-relation called judgment: this was the judgment I sought.
Judgment had to first be a certain mode of a phenomenon’s existence.

* The distinction between judgment as act and judgment consciousness merits attention.
Dr. Nishida Kitarō,* see *Torinokosaretaru Ishiki no Mondai* ("The Problem of Residual Consciousness").
However,* broadly speaking,* I cannot address consciousness issues here.*

Judgment constitutes a mode of existence.
It represents how what we call logic—thought itself—exists.
Judgment must indeed stand,* as many assert,* as logical phenomena’s most eminent manifestation.*
To clarify:* While Lask and others argue judgment holds no primacy within logical phenomena,* our inquiry fundamentally concerns cognition—specifically,* how objects are cognized—(having begun from premises like cognition emerging through reality-pathway relations),* not merely cognition’s objects.
Yet Lask relegates judgment to secondary status precisely through his motive to define cognition’s object.
Rather,* why Lask’s targeted position persisted historically finds explanation precisely in judgment’s status as logical phenomena’s supreme mode.
Judgment forms logic’s very character.
Returning to conventional views:* all cognitive content reduces to judgment.
Rephrased through our earlier terms:* all cognitive content must bear judgment’s character—thereby becoming logical.
This constituted judgment’s reductivity.
But what authority does this reductivity hold?

＊ If we take an example from among the many that most clearly articulates this way of thinking, Schuppe is one such instance (cf. *Grundriss der Erkenntnistheorie und Logik*, p. 38).

What is now called reductivity must first and foremost be distinguished from superiority. For instance, in that all humans are citizens, the concept of "citizen" possesses universal reductivity. However, just because that is so does not mean all people consider being citizens their primary characteristic. He would be a poet and traveler first rather than a citizen. Unless occupying a special position, within him the citizen cannot possess superiority over other manifestations. Yet the citizen still retains reductivity; he remains, after all, a citizen. All cognition may indeed be reducible to judgment. However, this does not mean judgment must thereby be cognition's superior character. Since spatial cognition is cognition after all, it may—as people claim—be reducible to judgment. It is not erroneous to call what is judged as something existing there, as something possessing length, as here and there, or as inside/outside/above/below "space." Yet this does not mean judgment can substitute for space itself. One might say it constitutes not space but judgment concerning space. However, space cannot originally be conceived as some object—Kant's *thing-in-itself*. Space is, so to speak, a relation first actualized within a cognitive system called Nature; to re-cognize this relational cognition through judgment becomes an unnecessary duplication. Space was meant to be not merely what belongs to Reality but also a pathway communicating with it. Space was itself a character. Were it reduced to judgment—itself a character—and were reductivity accompanied by superiority, space would vanish into judgment. For if one character is reduced to and surpassed by another, the former must disappear while only the latter remains. This is nothing but a property directly derived from the concept of character itself. Therefore, even if space were reducible to judgment, judgment could not properly replace space.

The proposition that spatiality's essential quality is actually judgment—as thought is said to be—cannot be sustained.
Next, reductivity must be rigorously distinguished from constitutivity.
For even if all cognition might be reducible to judgment, this does not entail that all cognition is constituted through judgment.
In this sense, it cannot properly be called logical.
To claim that space is logical—in its constitutive aspect—solely because space admits of reduction to judgment would amount to baseless assertion, unless it forcibly violates a particular preestablished system of thought＊.
Space cannot be constituted from judgment; or more broadly stated, there exists no rationale for space being constituted from logical elements at all.

* Roughly speaking, what corresponds to this system would be Natorp’s *Die Grundlagend. exakten Wissenschaften*.

Space was thus a character—and indeed, a character of existence independent even from judgment, which was ordinarily considered the most universal and fundamental.

I knew that this conclusion would meet with much disbelief.
People would undoubtedly ask: Did space truly possess the qualifications to stand alongside judgment—that judgment which had reigned as sovereign over the problem of cognition?
However, let us suppose that we acknowledged the superiority of judgment over space.
If we did so, people would come to notice that an intractable problem arose within judgment itself.
The existential judgment was that very problem (for the fundamental judgments concerning space belonged to existential judgment, and it was spatial judgment that represented existential judgment).
Certainly, if one were to attribute the essence of all judgment to validity—as Windelband did—the problem of existential judgment would appear to vanish＊; however, since validity—the essence of judgment—was none other than an expression of judgment’s reductivity, it was by no means surprising that all judgment was reduced to validity.
And this had no relation to the superiority that validity was perceived to hold over space.
Lask regarded “existence” as a category, stating it was “something that was merely logically valid”＊＊; however, if one placed emphasis on “logical” or “valid,” this statement would serve to unwittingly transform the reductivity of logic into superiority.
Therefore, the establishment of our problem demanded that we place the accent rather on “something.”
And this something that appeared to be known was, for us, something of a question.
In contrast to this, Brentano claimed that all judgments could be reduced to existential judgments.
However, the capacity for something and its inherent necessity were distinct.
And now we could not rely on reductivity; we had instead always to target superiority.

Therefore, the problem of existential judgment—the problem rooted in the necessity to distinguish existential judgment from other judgments (attribute judgments)—could not be avoided.
Existential judgment had to possess a unique marker; that which posited existence needed to manifest within the judgment itself—even if said judgment was not mere positing but positing augmented by determination.
Let us call this marker π＊＊＊.
Now, this π could not originally arise from judgment itself; nor could it be constituted by logic itself.
Furthermore, since the marker π became a marker only within judgment—for the term “marker” was employed precisely because it was judgment—it did indeed hold within judgment; however, the positing expressed by π was not judgment (or determination, following Windelband).
Judgment was judgment added to what had been posited (I was now following J. Bergmann’s words).
Positing remained positing even when reduced to judgment; that which was positing reduced to judgment had been π.
Therefore, positing was not surpassed by judgment.
Thus, in existential judgment, judgment could possess neither constitutivity nor superiority over positing.
Space could only be reduced to judgment as such an existential judgment.
Let me repeat: Space=positing was not judgment; judgment was the determination of space, not positing—and this determination was specifically counted as existential judgment.

＊ Windelband, *Beiträge zur Lehre vom negativen Urteil*.

＊＊ Lask, *Gesammelte Schriften*, 2ter Bd., S. 347 u. a. O.

*** See J. Bergmann, *Grundzüge der Lehre vom Urteil*.

Space cannot belong to judgment.
The two are entirely independent phenomena—Nature and thought, existence and logic—as modes of existence.
This is precisely why they are called characters.
I can say that I find the distinction between “existence as existence” and “existence as truth” here as well.
When cognition was always bound to truth and struggled to connect with existence, we can now understand why cognition—having enthroned judgment as sovereign—banished space.

People might still not have believed this claim of the coexistence of space and judgment.
By determining the character of space one step further,I would simultaneously clarify this claim as well.
If we permitted the phrase “thinking judges,”then in parallel with this,nature spatialized.
What was ordinarily referred to as “within space”or“in a place”could now be rephrased in this manner.
One might have said that the phrase“we judge”was permitted,but the phrase“we spatialize”was not.
But did we not in fact act and engage in practice?
Acts and the judging of acts had to be strictly distinguished.
That which did not manifest as movement in space—of which rest was also a part—could not be termed an act.
What sharply distinguished mere ideas from practice was precisely whether it spatialized or not.
If one claimed it was strange to say that Nature spatialized and that we spatialized，then in the case of judgment as well，were thought and we identical?
To understand Nature as independent from“we”could only be a misunderstanding of this essay’s starting point.
Nature was a concept established as our trust in existence.
One might have argued that things spatializing and we spatializing were distinct;however,fundamentally，anything we could not touch with our hands or move and observe—or at the very least,could not even be imagined as such—could not hold validity as a common-sense concept of“things.”
Things were not external to what we engaged with in our daily lives.
That such things spatialized was in fact one with our spatializing—though I was not considering anything like a transcendental ego here;it was not the ego but“we”—.
Our spatializing formed the foundation of things’spatializing—but I had to reiterate that this had no relation to the idealist ego concept.
Thus，space came into direct contact with us just as judgment did.
However，we did not mean in the slightest—as Kant does—to subordinate space to some form of subjectivity.
We could say that it was a moment in the mode of existence of phenomena—space and judgment，for instance.
Space was spatializing.

If we acknowledge that space is immediately in contact with us, then the problem of the pathway to space now touches upon itself.
It had already been generally established that space must belong to existence while also possessing pathway nature.
The path through which we reach space—and that by which space comes into contact with us—this is the pathway to space.
And this pathway is first and foremost most clearly indicated by the phrase “we spatialize.”
Space does not come into being independently of us—it is not something we subsequently handle—but rather is established precisely within us because it first comes into being through us.
Judgment has been considered the representative of cognition by virtue of a pathway nature resembling this.
Now, space too must be granted that capacity.
Space possesses its own independent course; without troubling judgment, it can directly reach us.
Space as character possesses pathway nature itself.
However, it must not be forgotten that the problem of pathways is not exhausted by this.
There exists an important relationship between our acting/practicing and understanding it.
It has already been clarified that acts must be distinguished from judgments on acts—the will to act, the awareness of acting, the recollection of having acted—*but* in the present case, this relationship stands apart from such a distinction.
For judgment on practice has already lost the character of space and taken on the character of judgment; their distinction lies in being two separate characters.
Yet understanding practice does not annihilate its character as practice.
Were understanding to utterly destroy what it comprehends’ character, we could never grasp things as they truly are—in accordance with their inherent nature.
I would consequently find myself unable to understand space and thus incapable of theorizing it.
Understanding stands apart from judgment.
The latter names a character; by contrast, the former lacks character altogether.
Now action/practice—space—must not merely spatialize but also maintain its spatial character while being understood precisely *as* space through its very act of spatializing.
Conversely, where space fails to be understood *as* space, its character cannot take form.

I need not state here that while understanding itself has no character, the characters of other things cannot exist apart from understanding.
This is why I have chosen to call character-space not simply “space” but rather “space-concept.”
Such understanding becomes the second pathway.
Thus space—as judgment likewise does—possesses dual pathway nature:
as that which we spatialize and as that which must be understood.

I will now conclude this essay by explaining the meaning of the term "concept" in "space-concept"—for space had to have been a space-concept from the start.
Concepts are ordinarily spoken of in connection with judgment (or inference).
Judgment is said to be the expansion of concepts; concepts are said to be the compression of judgment.
Judgment, in logic—particularly in what might appropriately be termed "judgment logic"—is nearly always viewed in this manner.
However, the concept I wish to employ is entirely different in nature from this.
For people’s concepts are ultimately of the same character as judgment and thus cannot shed judgment’s character.
It possesses superiority over others as judgment—realism being one manifestation of this—and has constitutiveness toward others—panlogicism being one manifestation of this.
Therefore, in this sense, such concepts must indeed be logical.
The term "logical" is an adjective that particularly expresses the superiority or constitutiveness of logic.
If one considers the system formed by logical concepts, it would differ from what people imagine—not a system of thought (philosophy) but rather something akin to mathematics (a system of cognition).
I do not think that thought can be characterized by cognition.
In contrast to space itself, the concept I have called not "space" but "the concept of space" is precisely this.
I had already made it clear in that case that using concepts in this sense cannot solve the problem.
In contrast, because my concept expresses the form of understanding, and because understanding that uses its own character to overshadow others' cannot be called understanding, it must be characterless.
It is not a form that retains its own shape like bronze but an empty material like sealing wax.
Of course, it does not possess superiority as judgment either.
Because it does not even possess its own character.
Therefore, such concepts are not logical in the sense now being discussed.
I had already noted that concepts are not necessarily logical in a certain sense.
Therefore, the space-concept is not one that negates the character that space inherently possesses as space, but rather a concept that accepts space as it is and enables its understanding.

It was not that space came to be understood—mediated—as another entity called the space-concept; the space-concept had to be space itself from the very beginning. Precisely because of this, there existed a superior reason for space to be treated as a space-concept. Precisely because it was a concept in this sense that space could be a character. For the character of a thing was the indicator that most representatively and effectively enabled its understanding, expression, and interpretation. And a concept was nothing other than the path taken by the process through which character revealed itself. In the process through which the natural concept clarified itself, that which revealed its own character—while following the motive that established this concept and thereby generated this process—was space. Space was once again the space-concept. Therefore, this had to once again contain the motive to clarify its character.

Space must be the character of nature’s mode of existence in the sense discussed thus far. And at the same time, this constitutes space’s fundamental character.

(August 30, 1927)