The given in thought is the complex situation in which we find ourselves in the first moments of consciousness. There is nothing immediate or ‘natural’ in contrast to what is mediate or sophisticated; there are only degrees of sophistication… . I take it, then, that the common view of sensation and perception of experience which fall below the condition of thought, is a prejudice which we can no longer allow.
Michael Oakeshott, Experience and Its Modes
STEVEN WEXLER 