A fundamental distinction follows from observable experience: reality manifests for a human being as two layers, inner and outer. This is not an abstract philosophical hypothesis but the structure of immediate experience.
1. Observable Structure of Experience
Every act of experience contains two kinds of content.
External Reality
That which is perceived as existing outside the subject.
Examples:
– physical objects;
– other people;
– sound, light, temperature;
– events in the external world;
– the body as an object of perception.
Features of the external layer:
– it appears independent of the subject’s will;
– it has stability;
– it is accessible to multiple observers;
– it is described in the language of physics and empirical sciences.
Internal Reality
That which is experienced as happening within the subject.
Examples:
– thoughts;
– feelings;
– images;
– intentions;
– memories;
– meanings;
– the experience of “I.”
Features of the inner layer:
– it is directly accessible only to the subject;
– it is not externally observable in its original form;
– as experience, it is not reducible to physical measurements;
– it exists in the form of subjective experience.
2. Why This Is Not Simply a Theory
This distinction is not a conclusion of one philosophical school. It arises in the very fact of experience.
A person can doubt the structure of the world, but cannot eliminate the basic distinction:
– there is what is experienced as inner;
– there is what is experienced as outer.
That is why the distinction between inner and outer can be called a primary fact of consciousness.
3. Even Materialism Encounters This Distinction
Materialism asserts that everything consists of physical processes. But even within that framework, two levels of description remain:
– neuronal processes (external description);
– subjective experience (internal fact).
In brief:
brain — external object
experience — internal fact
This gives rise to the classical problem of consciousness: how physical processes relate to subjective experience.
4. Why the Distinction Is Fundamental
If there is a subject, a basic structure arises:
subject → inner world
object → outer world
This is the minimal architecture of any human experience.
5. The Moving Boundary Between the Layers
The boundary is not always rigid:
– the body can be experienced as both “me” and an object;
– emotions are internal in form, but often caused by external events;
– during sleep, the external world may disappear as a present perception, while the inner stream of experience persists.
This shows that the relation between the layers is close but not identical.
6. Philosophical Positions Grow Out of This
- Materialism: the internal as a product of the external.
- Idealism: the external as a manifestation of the internal.
- Dualism: the internal and external as different types of reality.
- Panpsychism: the presence of an inner dimension at the foundation of the world.
7. Final Formulation
Immediate experience shows reality manifesting as two distinguishable layers:
1. the external layer: objects and events perceived as existing outside the subject;
2. the internal layer: the subject’s experiences, thoughts, and meanings.
This distinction is a primary fact of experience, while philosophical theories begin only afterward.
