  In the 1920s, Ackermann and von Neumann, in pursuit of Hilbert's Programme,
were working on consistency proofs for arithmetical systems. One proposed
method of giving such proofs is Hilbert's epsilon-substitution method. There
was, however, a second approach which was not reflected in the publications of
the Hilbert school in the 1920s, and which is a direct precursor of Hilbert's
first epsilon theorem and a certain 'general consistency result' due to
Bernays. An analysis of the form of this so-called 'failed proof' sheds further
light on an interpretation of Hilbert's Programme as an instrumentalist
enterprise with the aim of showing that whenever a `real' proposition can be
proved by 'ideal' means, it can also be proved by 'real', finitary means.
