Phenomenalism or Common Sense? Comments on Jan Sniadecki's 'Philosophy of Perception'

The aim of this article is to prove that, contrary to what is generally believed, Jan Sniadecki does not deny the possibility of direct cognition of reality independent of the mind. What he clearly denies is the existence of images in mind regarded as objects that are intermediaries between the cognitive subject and the external world in perception. On the other hand, he frequently emphasizes the argument that human cognition is limited to phenomena. Does it mean that his conception is internally incoherent? The author believes it is not the case, since phenomena as he sees them are not subjective states of mind but objective facts. The intuition underlaying Sniadecki's conception can be, in his view, characterized as follows: in acts of perception we capture objects directly, yet never separately or as a whole, but always within a network of relationships with other objects and ourselves as cognitive subjects, that is in the context of certain facts.