Abstract

This essay attempts to solve the so‐called paradox of analysis: if one is to have any questions about x, one must know x; but if one knows x, one has no questions about x. The obvious solution is this: one can inquire into x if one knows some, but not all, of x's parts. But this solution is erroneous. Let x′ be those parts of x with which one is acquainted, and let S be the percipient in question. As with x, either S knows x′, in which case he has no questions about it; or S does not know x′, in which case he has no questions about it. My solution is this. Perception and cognition give us, not the thing‐in‐itself, but a certain analogue of the thing‐in‐itself. To inquire into x, it is necessary to know not x, but only some analogue of x; and to learn more about x is to become acquainted with increasingly precise analogues of x.