THE UNITY OF IDENTITY AND DIFFERENCE AS THE ...

object and the different ways we cognize it. If we can cognize the object as it is in itself,
then the object itself must either (1) exist as unity and plurality, or (2) as unity, or (3) as
plurality. Here we will consider each option in further detail
The object in itself exists as unity and plurality. If the object exists as unity
and plurality, then both ways that we cognize the object correspond to some genuine way
that the object is. However, this introduces various modes or ways of existing into the
object itself. Thus, on this option, the relationship between the ways we consider the
object and the object as it is in itself does not explain the relationship between (a) the
sense in which the object is one, (b) the sense in which it is many, and (c) the object of
these two senses. Ultimately, this view collapses into the second option – the option that
considers the “two senses” of the object as two ways in which the object exists.
The object in itself exists as unity. If we assume that the object in itself is a
unity, then only one aspect of the judgment and only one way of considering the object
actually correspond to the object in itself. Since judgment does contain plurality,
however, we must explain this plurality, this sense in which the object is many, in terms
of some feature of our mind. One obvious possibility is the following: (1) the object
itself is one; (2) as the object appears to us in perception, the object is many; (3) the
purpose of judgment or cognition is to restore the original unity of the object, to move
from the plurality of perception to the unity found in cognition, a unity that corresponds
to the object in itself.
Hegel considers a closely related conception in the “Perception” chapter of the
Phenomenology of Spirit. He says:
At first, then, I become aware of the Thing as a One, and have to hold fast to it in
this its true character; if, in the course of perceiving it, something turns up which
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