Are There Limits to Cognition? 105distinct from one another. Dualism then seeks the explan-
atory principles for one world in the other.
Dualism rests on a false conception of what we call
cognition. It separates the whole of existence into two re-
gions, each of which has its own laws, and lets those re-
gions confront one another outwardly.
The distinction between the perceived object and the
thing-in-itself, which Kant introduced into science and
which has not been overcome to this day, originates from
this kind of dualism. Following what we have said, the
nature of our spiritual organization is such that a separate
thing can be given only as percept. Thinking then over-
comes this separation by assigning to each percept its
lawful place in the world totality. As long as the separated
parts of the world totality are designated as percepts, we
are simply following a law of our subjectivity when we
make this separation. But if we consider the sum of all
percepts as one part of the world, and then oppose to these
percepts a second part, the “things-in-themselves,” we are
philosophizing into thin air. We are just playing a game
with concepts. We construct an artificial contrast and then
can find no content for its second term—since such con-
tent can be created for a separate, particular thing only out
of perception.
Every kind of existence assumed outside the realm of
percepts and concepts must be relegated to the sphere of
unjustified hypotheses. The “thing-in-itself” belongs to
this category. It is only too understandable if dualistic
thinkers can find no link between the world principle as-
sumed hypothetically and what is given by experience.