which they now possess. So, in like manner, the intellect, by its native strength, makes for itself intellectual instruments, whereby it acquires strength for performing other intellectual operations, and from these operations gets again fresh instruments, or the power of pushing its investigations further, and thus gradually proceeds till it reaches the summit of wisdom.

The methodological current to which Binswanger belongs also admits that the production of tools and that of creative work are, in principle, not two separate processes in science, but two sides of the same process which go hand in hand. Following Rickert, he defines each science as the processing [Bearbeitung] of material, and therefore for him two problems arise in every science—one with respect to the material and the other concerning its processing. One cannot, however, draw such a sharp dividing line, since the concept of the object of the empirical science already contains a good deal of processing. And he (Binswanger, 1922, pp. 7-8) distinguishes between the raw material, the real object [wirklichen Gegenstand] and the scientific object [wissenschafthichen Gegenstand]. The latter is created by science from the real object via concepts. When we raise a third cluster of problems—about the relation between the material and its processing, i.e., between the object and the method of science—the debate must again focus on what is determined by what:

the object by the method, or vice versa. Some, like Stumpf, suppose that all differences in method are rooted in differences between the objects. Others, like Rickert, are of the opinion that various objects, both physical and mental, require one and the same method. [12] But, as we see, we do not find grounds for a demarcation of the general from the special science here either..

All this only indicates that we can give no absolute definition of the concept of a general science and that it can only be defined relative to the special science. From the latter it is distinguished not by its object, nor by the method, goal, or result of the investigation. But for a number of special sciences which study related realms of reality from a single viewpoint it accomplishes the same work and by the same method and with the same goal as each of these sciences accomplish for their own material. We have seen that no science confines itself to the simple accumulation of material, but rather that it subjects this material to diverse and prolonged processing, that it groups and generalizes the material, creates a theory and hypotheses which help to get a wider petspective on reality than the one which follows from the various uncoordinated facts. The general science continues the work of the special sciences. When the material is carried to the highest degree of generalization possible in that science, further generalization is possible only beyond the boundaries of the given science and by comparing it with the material of a number of adjacent sciences. This is what the general science does. Its single difference from the special sciences is that it carries out its work with respect to a number of sciences. If it carried out the same work with respect to a single science it would never come to the fore as an independent science, but would remain a part of that single science. The general science can therefore be defined as a science that receives its material from a number of special sciences and carries out the further processing and generalization of the material which is impossible within each of the various disciplines.

The general science therefore stands to the special one as the theory of this special science to the number of its special laws, i.e., according to the degree of generalization of the phenomena studied. The general science develops out of the need to continue the work of the special sciences where these end. The general science stands to the theories, laws, hypotheses and methods of the special sciences as the special science stands to the facts of the reality it studies. Biology receives material from various sciences and processes it in the way each special science does