Will and Impression

The traditional Empiricist concept of an 'impression' is of a passive atomic experiential event. Peirce, among others, challenges the presumed Atomism of the concept, by arguing that even the barest sense-datum is the product of a synthesis of a manifold of neural vibrations. Furthermore, since, following Kant, such a synthesis is an internally generated process, Peirce's analysis also reveals that an impression is not entirely passive. However, insofar as the neural manifold is the effect of an external stimulus, it remains partly passive. In contrast, according to the formulation here, that Will is the immediate matter of Comprehension, the manifold of an impression is Motility conforming to an encountered object, which Comprehension represents as a unified sequence of motions. In other words, on this model, an impression is not something that is received, but is something that is taken.