Christian Thomas Kohl The Metaphysical Foundations of Buddhism and Modern Science

particular observations. The other order is constituted by our general
way of conceiving the Universe. They will be called, the Observational
Order, and the Conceptual Order. The first point to remember is that
the observational order is invariably interpreted in terms of the
concepts supplied by the conceptual order. The question as to the
priority of one or the other is, for the purpose of this discussion,
academic. We inherit an observational order, namely types of things
which we do in fact discriminate; and we inherit a conceptual order,
namely a rough system of ideas in terms of which we do in fact interpret.
We can point to no epoch in human history, or even in animal history, at
which this interplay began. Also it is true that novel observations modify
the conceptual order. But equally, novel concepts suggest novel
possibilities of observational discrimination.
The history of thought cannot be understood unless we take account of a
grave weakness in the observational order. Observational discrimination
is not dictated by the impartial facts. It selects and discards, and what
it retains is rearranged in a subjective order of prominence. This order
of prominence in observation is in fact a distortion of the facts. Thus we
have to rescue the facts as they are from the facts as they appear. We
have to rescue the facts in the discard, and we have to discard the
subjective order of prominence which is itself a fact of observation. For
example, consider the observed facts in early stages of civilization. The
observed fact was a flat Earth with the arched dome of the Sky. Even to