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The Analysis of Mind

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Title: The Analysis of Mind

Author: Bertrand Russell


        
Release date: February 1, 2001 [eBook #2529]
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Language: English

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THE ANALYSIS OF MIND

By Bertrand Russell

1921




MUIRHEAD LIBRARY OF PHILOSOPHY


An admirable statement of the aims of the Library of Philosophy was
provided by the first editor, the late Professor J. H. Muirhead, in his
description of the original programme printed in Erdmann's History of
Philosophy under the date 1890. This was slightly modified in subsequent
volumes to take the form of the following statement:

"The Muirhead Library of Philosophy was designed as a contribution to
the History of Modern Philosophy under the heads: first of Different
Schools of Thought--Sensationalist, Realist, Idealist, Intuitivist;
secondly of different Subjects--Psychology, Ethics, Aesthetics,
Political Philosophy, Theology. While much had been done in England in
tracing the course of evolution in nature, history, economics, morals
and religion, little had been done in tracing the development of thought
on these subjects. Yet 'the evolution of opinion is part of the whole
evolution'.

"By the co-operation of different writers in carrying out this plan it
was hoped that a thoroughness and completeness of treatment, otherwise
unattainable, might be secured. It was believed also that from writers
mainly British and American fuller consideration of English Philosophy
than it had hitherto received might be looked for. In the earlier series
of books containing, among others, Bosanquet's "History of Aesthetic,"
Pfleiderer's "Rational Theology since Kant," Albee's "History of English
Utilitarianism," Bonar's "Philosophy and Political Economy," Brett's
"History of Psychology," Ritchie's "Natural Rights," these objects were
to a large extent effected.

"In the meantime original work of a high order was being produced both
in England and America by such writers as Bradley, Stout, Bertrand
Russell, Baldwin, Urban, Montague, and others, and a new interest in
foreign works, German, French and Italian, which had either become
classical or were attracting public attention, had developed. The scope
of the Library thus became extended into something more international,
and it is entering on the fifth decade of its existence in the hope that
it may contribute to that mutual understanding between countries which
is so pressing a need of the present time."

The need which Professor Muirhead stressed is no less pressing to-day,
and few will deny that philosophy has much to do with enabling us to
meet it, although no one, least of all Muirhead himself, would regard
that as the sole, or even the main, object of philosophy. As Professor
Muirhead continues to lend the distinction of his name to the Library
of Philosophy it seemed not inappropriate to allow him to recall us to
these aims in his own words. The emphasis on the history of thought also
seemed to me very timely; and the number of important works promised
for the Library in the very near future augur well for the continued
fulfilment, in this and other ways, of the expectations of the original
editor.

H. D. Lewis




PREFACE

This book has grown out of an attempt to harmonize two different
tendencies, one in psychology, the other in physics, with both of which
I find myself in sympathy, although at first sight they might seem
inconsistent. On the one hand, many psychologists, especially those
of the behaviourist school, tend to adopt what is essentially a
materialistic position, as a matter of method if not of metaphysics.
They make psychology increasingly dependent on physiology and external
observation, and tend to think of matter as something much more solid
and indubitable than mind. Meanwhile the physicists, especially Einstein
and other exponents of the theory of relativity, have been making
"matter" less and less material. Their world consists of "events," from
which "matter" is derived by a logical construction. Whoever reads, for
example, Professor Eddington's "Space, Time and Gravitation" (Cambridge
University Press, 1920), will see that an old-fashioned materialism can
receive no support from modern physics. I think that what has permanent
value in the outlook of the behaviourists is the feeling that physics is
the most fundamental science at present in existence. But this position
cannot be called materialistic, if, as seems to be the case, physics
does not assume the existence of matter.

The view that seems to me to reconcile the materialistic tendency of
psychology with the anti-materialistic tendency of physics is the view
of William James and the American new realists, according to which the
"stuff" of the world is neither mental nor material, but a "neutral
stuff," out of which both are constructed. I have endeavoured in this
work to develop this view in some detail as regards the phenomena with
which psychology is concerned.

My thanks are due to Professor John B. Watson and to Dr. T. P. Nunn
for reading my MSS. at an early stage and helping me with many valuable
suggestions; also to Mr. A. Wohlgemuth for much very useful information
as regards important literature. I have also to acknowledge the help
of the editor of this Library of Philosophy, Professor Muirhead, for
several suggestions by which I have profited.

The work has been given in the form of lectures both in London and
Peking, and one lecture, that on Desire, has been published in the
Athenaeum.

There are a few allusions to China in this book, all of which were
written before I had been in China, and are not intended to be taken by
the reader as geographically accurate. I have used "China" merely as
a synonym for "a distant country," when I wanted illustrations of
unfamiliar things.

Peking, January 1921.



CONTENTS

  I.   Recent Criticisms of "Consciousness"
  II.  Instinct and Habit
  III. Desire and Feeling
  IV.  Influence of Past History on Present Occurrences
            in Living Organisms
  V.   Psychological and Physical Causal Laws
  VI.  Introspection
  VII. The Definition of Perception
  VIII.Sensations and Images
  IX.  Memory
  X.   Words and Meaning
  XI.  General Ideas and Thought
  XII. Belief
  XIII.Truth and Falsehood
  XIV. Emotions and Will
  XV.  Characteristics of Mental Phenomena




THE ANALYSIS OF MIND




LECTURE I. RECENT CRITICISMS OF "CONSCIOUSNESS"

There are certain occurrences which we are in the habit of calling
"mental." Among these we may take as typical BELIEVING and DESIRING.
The exact definition of the word "mental" will, I hope, emerge as
the lectures proceed; for the present, I shall mean by it whatever
occurrences would commonly be called mental.

I wish in these lectures to analyse as fully as I can what it is that
really takes place when we, e.g. believe or desire. In this first
lecture I shall be concerned to refute a theory which is widely held,
and which I formerly held myself: the theory that the essence of
everything mental is a certain quite peculiar something called
"consciousness," conceived either as a relation to objects, or as a
pervading quality of psychical phenomena.

The reasons which I shall give against this theory will be mainly
derived from previous authors. There are two sorts of reasons, which
will divide my lecture into two parts:

(1) Direct reasons, derived from analysis and its difficulties;

(2) Indirect reasons, derived from observation of animals (comparative
psychology) and of the insane and hysterical (psycho-analysis).

Few things are more firmly established in popular philosophy than the
distinction between mind and matter. Those who are not professional
metaphysicians are willing to confess that they do not know what mind
actually is, or how matter is constituted; but they remain convinced
that there is an impassable gulf between the two, and that both belong
to what actually exists in the world. Philosophers, on the other hand,
have maintained often that matter is a mere fiction imagined by mind,
and sometimes that mind is a mere property of a certain kind of matter.
Those who maintain that mind is the reality and matter an evil dream are
called "idealists"--a word which has a different meaning in philosophy
from that which it bears in ordinary life. Those who argue that matter
is the reality and mind a mere property of protoplasm are called
"materialists." They have been rare among philosophers, but common,
at certain periods, among men of science. Idealists, materialists, and
ordinary mortals have been in agreement on one point: that they knew
sufficiently what they meant by the words "mind" and "matter" to be able
to conduct their debate intelligently. Yet it was just in this point, as
to which they were at one, that they seem to me to have been all alike
in error.

The stuff of which the world of our experience is composed is, in my
belief, neither mind nor matter, but something more primitive than
either. Both mind and matter seem to be composite, and the stuff of
which they are compounded lies in a sense between the two, in a sense
above them both, like a common ancestor. As regards matter, I have set
forth my reasons for this view on former occasions,* and I shall not now
repeat them. But the question of mind is more difficult, and it is this
question that I propose to discuss in these lectures. A great deal of
what I shall have to say is not original; indeed, much recent work, in
various fields, has tended to show the necessity of such theories as
those which I shall be advocating. Accordingly in this first lecture
I shall try to give a brief description of the systems of ideas within
which our investigation is to be carried on.

     * "Our Knowledge of the External World" (Allen & Unwin),
     Chapters III and IV. Also "Mysticism and Logic," Essays VII
     and VIII.

If there is one thing that may be said, in the popular estimation, to
characterize mind, that one thing is "consciousness." We say that we are
"conscious" of what we see and hear, of what we remember, and of our own
thoughts and feelings. Most of us believe that tables and chairs are
not "conscious." We think that when we sit in a chair, we are aware
of sitting in it, but it is not aware of being sat in. It cannot for
a moment be doubted that we are right in believing that there is SOME
difference between us and the chair in this respect: so much may be
taken as fact, and as a datum for our inquiry. But as soon as we try to
say what exactly the difference is, we become involved in perplexities.
Is "consciousness" ultimate and simple, something to be merely accepted
and contemplated? Or is it something complex, perhaps consisting in our
way of behaving in the presence of objects, or, alternatively, in the
existence in us of things called "ideas," having a certain relation
to objects, though different from them, and only symbolically
representative of them? Such questions are not easy to answer; but until
they are answered we cannot profess to know what we mean by saying that
we are possessed of "consciousness."

Before considering modern theories, let us look first at consciousness
from the standpoint of conventional psychology, since this embodies
views which naturally occur when we begin to reflect upon the subject.
For this purpose, let us as a preliminary consider different ways of
being conscious.

First, there is the way of PERCEPTION. We "perceive" tables and chairs,
horses and dogs, our friends, traffic passing in the street--in short,
anything which we recognize through the senses. I leave on one side for
the present the question whether pure sensation is to be regarded as a
form of consciousness: what I am speaking of now is perception, where,
according to conventional psychology, we go beyond the sensation to the
"thing" which it represents. When you hear a donkey bray, you not only
hear a noise, but realize that it comes from a donkey. When you see a
table, you not only see a coloured surface, but realize that it is hard.
The addition of these elements that go beyond crude sensation is said to
constitute perception. We shall have more to say about this at a later
stage. For the moment, I am merely concerned to note that perception
of objects is one of the most obvious examples of what is called
"consciousness." We are "conscious" of anything that we perceive.

We may take next the way of MEMORY. If I set to work to recall what
I did this morning, that is a form of consciousness different from
perception, since it is concerned with the past. There are various
problems as to how we can be conscious now of what no longer exists.
These will be dealt with incidentally when we come to the analysis of
memory.

From memory it is an easy step to what are called "ideas"--not in the
Platonic sense, but in that of Locke, Berkeley and Hume, in which they
are opposed to "impressions." You may be conscious of a friend either
by seeing him or by "thinking" of him; and by "thought" you can be
conscious of objects which cannot be seen, such as the human race,
or physiology. "Thought" in the narrower sense is that form of
consciousness which consists in "ideas" as opposed to impressions or
mere memories.

We may end our preliminary catalogue with BELIEF, by which I mean that
way of being conscious which may be either true or false. We say that a
man is "conscious of looking a fool," by which we mean that he believes
he looks a fool, and is not mistaken in this belief. This is a different
form of consciousness from any of the earlier ones. It is the form which
gives "knowledge" in the strict sense, and also error. It is, at least
apparently, more complex than our previous forms of consciousness;
though we shall find that they are not so separable from it as they
might appear to be.

Besides ways of being conscious there are other things that would
ordinarily be called "mental," such as desire and pleasure and pain.
These raise problems of their own, which we shall reach in Lecture III.
But the hardest problems are those that arise concerning ways of being
"conscious." These ways, taken together, are called the "cognitive"
elements in mind, and it is these that will occupy us most during the
following lectures.

There is one element which SEEMS obviously in common among the different
ways of being conscious, and that is, that they are all directed to
OBJECTS. We are conscious "of" something. The consciousness, it seems,
is one thing, and that of which we are conscious is another thing.
Unless we are to acquiesce in the view that we can never be conscious
of anything outside our own minds, we must say that the object of
consciousness need not be mental, though the consciousness must be. (I
am speaking within the circle of conventional doctrines, not expressing
my own beliefs.) This direction towards an object is commonly regarded
as typical of every form of cognition, and sometimes of mental life
altogether. We may distinguish two different tendencies in traditional
psychology. There are those who take mental phenomena naively, just as
they would physical phenomena. This school of psychologists tends not to
emphasize the object. On the other hand, there are those whose primary
interest is in the apparent fact that we have KNOWLEDGE, that there is a
world surrounding us of which we are aware. These men are interested in
the mind because of its relation to the world, because knowledge, if
it is a fact, is a very mysterious one. Their interest in psychology
is naturally centred in the relation of consciousness to its object, a
problem which, properly, belongs rather to theory of knowledge. We may
take as one of the best and most typical representatives of this school
the Austrian psychologist Brentano, whose "Psychology from the Empirical
Standpoint,"* though published in 1874, is still influential and was the
starting-point of a great deal of interesting work. He says (p. 115):

     * "Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkte," vol. i, 1874.
     (The second volume was never published.)

"Every psychical phenomenon is characterized by what the scholastics of
the Middle Ages called the intentional (also the mental) inexistence of
an object, and what we, although with not quite unambiguous expressions,
would call relation to a content, direction towards an object (which is
not here to be understood as a reality), or immanent objectivity. Each
contains something in itself as an object, though not each in the same
way. In presentation something is presented, in judgment something is
acknowledged or rejected, in love something is loved, in hatred hated,
in desire desired, and so on.

"This intentional inexistence is exclusively peculiar to psychical
phenomena. No physical phenomenon shows anything similar. And so we
can define psychical phenomena by saying that they are phenomena which
intentionally contain an object in themselves."

The view here expressed, that relation to an object is an ultimate
irreducible characteristic of mental phenomena, is one which I shall be
concerned to combat. Like Brentano, I am interested in psychology, not
so much for its own sake, as for the light that it may throw on the
problem of knowledge. Until very lately I believed, as he did, that
mental phenomena have essential reference to objects, except possibly in
the case of pleasure and pain. Now I no longer believe this, even in
the case of knowledge. I shall try to make my reasons for this rejection
clear as we proceed. It must be evident at first glance that the
analysis of knowledge is rendered more difficult by the rejection; but
the apparent simplicity of Brentano's view of knowledge will be found,
if I am not mistaken, incapable of maintaining itself either against
an analytic scrutiny or against a host of facts in psycho-analysis and
animal psychology. I do not wish to minimize the problems. I will
merely observe, in mitigation of our prospective labours, that thinking,
however it is to be analysed, is in itself a delightful occupation,
and that there is no enemy to thinking so deadly as a false simplicity.
Travelling, whether in the mental or the physical world, is a joy, and
it is good to know that, in the mental world at least, there are vast
countries still very imperfectly explored.

The view expressed by Brentano has been held very generally, and
developed by many writers. Among these we may take as an example his
Austrian successor Meinong.* According to him there are three elements
involved in the thought of an object. These three he calls the act, the
content and the object. The act is the same in any two cases of the same
kind of consciousness; for instance, if I think of Smith or think
of Brown, the act of thinking, in itself, is exactly similar on both
occasions. But the content of my thought, the particular event that
is happening in my mind, is different when I think of Smith and when I
think of Brown. The content, Meinong argues, must not be confounded with
the object, since the content must exist in my mind at the moment when
I have the thought, whereas the object need not do so. The object may
be something past or future; it may be physical, not mental; it may
be something abstract, like equality for example; it may be something
imaginary, like a golden mountain; or it may even be something
self-contradictory, like a round square. But in all these cases, so
he contends, the content exists when the thought exists, and is what
distinguishes it, as an occurrence, from other thoughts.

     * See, e.g. his article: "Ueber Gegenstande hoherer Ordnung
     und deren Verhaltniss zur inneren Wahrnehmung," "Zeitschrift
     fur Psychologie and Physiologie der Sinnesorgane," vol. xxi,
     pp. 182-272 (1899), especially pp. 185-8.

To make this theory concrete, let us suppose that you are thinking of
St. Paul's. Then, according to Meinong, we have to distinguish three
elements which are necessarily combined in constituting the one thought.
First, there is the act of thinking, which would be just the same
whatever you were thinking about. Then there is what makes the character
of the thought as contrasted with other thoughts; this is the content.
And finally there is St. Paul's, which is the object of your thought.
There must be a difference between the content of a thought and what it
is about, since the thought is here and now, whereas what it is about
may not be; hence it is clear that the thought is not identical with St.
Paul's. This seems to show that we must distinguish between content
and object. But if Meinong is right, there can be no thought without an
object: the connection of the two is essential. The object might exist
without the thought, but not the thought without the object: the three
elements of act, content and object are all required to constitute the
one single occurrence called "thinking of St. Paul's."

The above analysis of a thought, though I believe it to be mistaken, is
very useful as affording a schema in terms of which other theories can
be stated. In the remainder of the present lecture I shall state in
outline the view which I advocate, and show how various other views
out of which mine has grown result from modifications of the threefold
analysis into act, content and object.

The first criticism I have to make is that the ACT seems unnecessary and
fictitious. The occurrence of the content of a thought constitutes
the occurrence of the thought. Empirically, I cannot discover anything
corresponding to the supposed act; and theoretically I cannot see that
it is indispensable. We say: "_I_ think so-and-so," and this word "I"
suggests that thinking is the act of a person. Meinong's "act" is the
ghost of the subject, or what once was the full-blooded soul. It is
supposed that thoughts cannot just come and go, but need a person to
think them. Now, of course it is true that thoughts can be collected
into bundles, so that one bundle is my thoughts, another is your
thoughts, and a third is the thoughts of Mr. Jones. But I think
the person is not an ingredient in the single thought: he is rather
constituted by relations of the thoughts to each other and to the body.
This is a large question, which need not, in its entirety, concern us
at present. All that I am concerned with for the moment is that the
grammatical forms "I think," "you think," and "Mr. Jones thinks," are
misleading if regarded as indicating an analysis of a single thought.
It would be better to say "it thinks in me," like "it rains here"; or
better still, "there is a thought in me." This is simply on the
ground that what Meinong calls the act in thinking is not empirically
discoverable, or logically deducible from what we can observe.

The next point of criticism concerns the relation of content and object.
The reference of thoughts to objects is not, I believe, the simple
direct essential thing that Brentano and Meinong represent it as being.
It seems to me to be derivative, and to consist largely in BELIEFS:
beliefs that what constitutes the thought is connected with various
other elements which together make up the object. You have, say, an
image of St. Paul's, or merely the word "St. Paul's" in your head. You
believe, however vaguely and dimly, that this is connected with what
you would see if you went to St. Paul's, or what you would feel if you
touched its walls; it is further connected with what other people see
and feel, with services and the Dean and Chapter and Sir Christopher
Wren. These things are not mere thoughts of yours, but your thought
stands in a relation to them of which you are more or less aware. The
awareness of this relation is a further thought, and constitutes
your feeling that the original thought had an "object." But in pure
imagination you can get very similar thoughts without these accompanying
beliefs; and in this case your thoughts do not have objects or seem to
have them. Thus in such instances you have content without object. On
the other hand, in seeing or hearing it would be less misleading to
say that you have object without content, since what you see or hear is
actually part of the physical world, though not matter in the sense of
physics. Thus the whole question of the relation of mental occurrences
to objects grows very complicated, and cannot be settled by regarding
reference to objects as of the essence of thoughts. All the above
remarks are merely preliminary, and will be expanded later.

Speaking in popular and unphilosophical terms, we may say that the
content of a thought is supposed to be something in your head when you
think the thought, while the object is usually something in the outer
world. It is held that knowledge of the outer world is constituted by
the relation to the object, while the fact that knowledge is different
from what it knows is due to the fact that knowledge comes by way of
contents. We can begin to state the difference between realism and
idealism in terms of this opposition of contents and objects. Speaking
quite roughly and approximately, we may say that idealism tends to
suppress the object, while realism tends to suppress the content.
Idealism, accordingly, says that nothing can be known except thoughts,
and all the reality that we know is mental; while realism maintains that
we know objects directly, in sensation certainly, and perhaps also in
memory and thought. Idealism does not say that nothing can be known
beyond the present thought, but it maintains that the context of vague
belief, which we spoke of in connection with the thought of St. Paul's,
only takes you to other thoughts, never to anything radically different
from thoughts. The difficulty of this view is in regard to sensation,
where it seems as if we came into direct contact with the outer world.
But the Berkeleian way of meeting this difficulty is so familiar that I
need not enlarge upon it now. I shall return to it in a later lecture,
and will only observe, for the present, that there seem to me no valid
grounds for regarding what we see and hear as not part of the physical
world.

Realists, on the other hand, as a rule, suppress the content, and
maintain that a thought consists either of act and object alone, or of
object alone. I have been in the past a realist, and I remain a realist
as regards sensation, but not as regards memory or thought. I will try
to explain what seem to me to be the reasons for and against various
kinds of realism.

Modern idealism professes to be by no means confined to the present
thought or the present thinker in regard to its knowledge; indeed, it
contends that the world is so organic, so dove-tailed, that from any
one portion the whole can be inferred, as the complete skeleton of an
extinct animal can be inferred from one bone. But the logic by which
this supposed organic nature of the world is nominally demonstrated
appears to realists, as it does to me, to be faulty. They argue that,
if we cannot know the physical world directly, we cannot really know
any thing outside our own minds: the rest of the world may be merely our
dream. This is a dreary view, and they there fore seek ways of escaping
from it. Accordingly they maintain that in knowledge we are in direct
contact with objects, which may be, and usually are, outside our own
minds. No doubt they are prompted to this view, in the first place, by
bias, namely, by the desire to think that they can know of the existence
of a world outside themselves. But we have to consider, not what led
them to desire the view, but whether their arguments for it are valid.

There are two different kinds of realism, according as we make a thought
consist of act and object, or of object alone. Their difficulties are
different, but neither seems tenable all through. Take, for the sake of
definiteness, the remembering of a past event. The remembering occurs
now, and is therefore necessarily not identical with the past event.
So long as we retain the act, this need cause no difficulty. The act
of remembering occurs now, and has on this view a certain essential
relation to the past event which it remembers. There is no LOGICAL
objection to this theory, but there is the objection, which we spoke
of earlier, that the act seems mythical, and is not to be found by
observation. If, on the other hand, we try to constitute memory without
the act, we are driven to a content, since we must have something that
happens NOW, as opposed to the event which happened in the past. Thus,
when we reject the act, which I think we must, we are driven to a theory
of memory which is more akin to idealism. These arguments, however, do
not apply to sensation. It is especially sensation, I think, which is
considered by those realists who retain only the object.* Their views,
which are chiefly held in America, are in large measure derived from
William James, and before going further it will be well to consider
the revolutionary doctrine which he advocated. I believe this doctrine
contains important new truth, and what I shall have to say will be in a
considerable measure inspired by it.

     * This is explicitly the case with Mach's "Analysis of
     Sensations," a book of fundamental importance in the present
     connection. (Translation of fifth German edition, Open Court
     Co., 1914. First German edition, 1886.)


William James's view was first set forth in an essay called "Does
'consciousness' exist?"* In this essay he explains how what used to be
the soul has gradually been refined down to the "transcendental ego,"
which, he says, "attenuates itself to a thoroughly ghostly condition,
being only a name for the fact that the 'content' of experience IS
KNOWN. It loses personal form and activity--these passing over to the
content--and becomes a bare Bewusstheit or Bewusstsein uberhaupt, of
which in its own right absolutely nothing can be said. I believe (he
continues) that 'consciousness,' when once it has evaporated to this
estate of pure diaphaneity, is on the point of disappearing altogether.
It is the name of a nonentity, and has no right to a place among first
principles. Those who still cling to it are clinging to a mere echo,
the faint rumour left behind by the disappearing 'soul' upon the air of
philosophy"(p. 2).

     * "Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific
     Methods," vol. i, 1904. Reprinted in "Essays in Radical
     Empiricism" (Longmans, Green & Co., 1912), pp. 1-38, to
     which references in what follows refer.


He explains that this is no sudden change in his opinions. "For twenty
years past," he says, "I have mistrusted 'consciousness' as an entity;
for seven or eight years past I have suggested its non-existence to my
students, and tried to give them its pragmatic equivalent in realities
of experience. It seems to me that the hour is ripe for it to be openly
and universally discarded"(p. 3).

His next concern is to explain away the air of paradox, for James
was never wilfully paradoxical. "Undeniably," he says, "'thoughts' do
exist." "I mean only to deny that the word stands for an entity, but to
insist most emphatically that it does stand for a function. There is, I
mean, no aboriginal stuff or quality of being, contrasted with that of
which material objects are made, out of which our thoughts of them are
made; but there is a function in experience which thoughts perform,
and for the performance of which this quality of being is invoked. That
function is KNOWING"(pp. 3-4).

James's view is that the raw material out of which the world is built
up is not of two sorts, one matter and the other mind, but that it is
arranged in different patterns by its inter-relations, and that some
arrangements may be called mental, while others may be called physical.

"My thesis is," he says, "that if we start with the supposition that
there is only one primal stuff or material in the world, a stuff
of which everything is composed, and if we call that stuff 'pure
experience,' then knowing can easily be explained as a particular sort
of relation towards one another into which portions of pure experience
may enter. The relation itself is a part of pure experience; one of its
'terms' becomes the subject or bearer of the knowledge, the knower, the
other becomes the object known"(p. 4).

After mentioning the duality of subject and object, which is supposed
to constitute consciousness, he proceeds in italics: "EXPERIENCE, I
BELIEVE, HAS NO SUCH INNER DUPLICITY; AND THE SEPARATION OF IT INTO
CONSCIOUSNESS AND CONTENT COMES, NOT BY WAY OF SUBTRACTION, BUT BY WAY
OF ADDITION"(p. 9).

He illustrates his meaning by the analogy of paint as it appears in a
paint-shop and as it appears in a picture: in the one case it is just
"saleable matter," while in the other it "performs a spiritual function.
Just so, I maintain (he continues), does a given undivided portion
of experience, taken in one context of associates, play the part of a
knower, of a state of mind, of 'consciousness'; while in a different
context the same undivided bit of experience plays the part of a thing
known, of an objective 'content.' In a word, in one group it figures as
a thought, in another group as a thing"(pp. 9-10).

He does not believe in the supposed immediate certainty of thought. "Let
the case be what it may in others," he says, "I am as confident as I am
of anything that, in myself, the stream of thinking (which I recognize
emphatically as a phenomenon) is only a careless name for what, when
scrutinized, reveals itself to consist chiefly of the stream of my
breathing. The 'I think' which Kant said must be able to accompany all
my objects, is the 'I breathe' which actually does accompany them"(pp.
36-37).

The same view of "consciousness" is set forth in the succeeding essay,
"A World of Pure Experience" (ib., pp. 39-91). The use of the phrase
"pure experience" in both essays points to a lingering influence of
idealism. "Experience," like "consciousness," must be a product, not
part of the primary stuff of the world. It must be possible, if James is
right in his main contentions, that roughly the same stuff, differently
arranged, would not give rise to anything that could be called
"experience." This word has been dropped by the American realists, among
whom we may mention specially Professor R. B. Perry of Harvard and Mr.
Edwin B. Holt. The interests of this school are in general philosophy
and the philosophy of the sciences, rather than in psychology; they have
derived a strong impulsion from James, but have more interest than he
had in logic and mathematics and the abstract part of philosophy. They
speak of "neutral" entities as the stuff out of which both mind and
matter are constructed. Thus Holt says: "If the terms and propositions
of logic must be substantialized, they are all strictly of one
substance, for which perhaps the least dangerous name is neutral-stuff.
The relation of neutral-stuff to matter and mind we shall have presently
to consider at considerable length." *

     * "The Concept of Consciousness" (Geo. Allen & Co., 1914),
     p. 52.

My own belief--for which the reasons will appear in subsequent
lectures--is that James is right in rejecting consciousness as an
entity, and that the American realists are partly right, though not
wholly, in considering that both mind and matter are composed of a
neutral-stuff which, in isolation, is neither mental nor material. I
should admit this view as regards sensations: what is heard or seen
belongs equally to psychology and to physics. But I should say that
images belong only to the mental world, while those occurrences (if any)
which do not form part of any "experience" belong only to the physical
world. There are, it seems to me, prima facie different kinds of causal
laws, one belonging to physics and the other to psychology. The law
of gravitation, for example, is a physical law, while the law of
association is a psychological law. Sensations are subject to both kinds
of laws, and are therefore truly "neutral" in Holt's sense. But entities
subject only to physical laws, or only to psychological laws, are not
neutral, and may be called respectively purely material and purely
mental. Even those, however, which are purely mental will not have that
intrinsic reference to objects which Brentano assigns to them and which
constitutes the essence of "consciousness" as ordinarily understood. But
it is now time to pass on to other modern tendencies, also hostile to
"consciousness."

There is a psychological school called "Behaviourists," of whom the
protagonist is Professor John B. Watson,* formerly of the Johns Hopkins
University. To them also, on the whole, belongs Professor John Dewey,
who, with James and Dr. Schiller, was one of the three founders of
pragmatism. The view of the "behaviourists" is that nothing can be known
except by external observation. They deny altogether that there is a
separate source of knowledge called "introspection," by which we can
know things about ourselves which we could never observe in others.
They do not by any means deny that all sorts of things MAY go on in
our minds: they only say that such things, if they occur, are not
susceptible of scientific observation, and do not therefore concern
psychology as a science. Psychology as a science, they say, is only
concerned with BEHAVIOUR, i.e. with what we DO; this alone, they
contend, can be accurately observed. Whether we think meanwhile, they
tell us, cannot be known; in their observation of the behaviour of human
beings, they have not so far found any evidence of thought. True, we
talk a great deal, and imagine that in so doing we are showing that we
can think; but behaviourists say that the talk they have to listen to
can be explained without supposing that people think. Where you might
expect a chapter on "thought processes" you come instead upon a chapter
on "The Language Habit." It is humiliating to find how terribly adequate
this hypothesis turns out to be.

     * See especially his "Behavior: an Introduction to
     Comparative Psychology," New York, 1914.

Behaviourism has not, however, sprung from observing the folly of men.
It is the wisdom of animals that has suggested the view. It has always
been a common topic of popular discussion whether animals "think." On
this topic people are prepared to take sides without having the vaguest
idea what they mean by "thinking." Those who desired to investigate such
questions were led to observe the behaviour of animals, in the hope that
their behaviour would throw some light on their mental faculties.
At first sight, it might seem that this is so. People say that a
dog "knows" its name because it comes when it is called, and that it
"remembers" its master, because it looks sad in his absence, but wags
its tail and barks when he returns. That the dog behaves in this way is
matter of observation, but that it "knows" or "remembers" anything is an
inference, and in fact a very doubtful one. The more such inferences are
examined, the more precarious they are seen to be. Hence the study of
animal behaviour has been gradually led to abandon all attempt at mental
interpretation. And it can hardly be doubted that, in many cases of
complicated behaviour very well adapted to its ends, there can be no
prevision of those ends. The first time a bird builds a nest, we can
hardly suppose it knows that there will be eggs to be laid in it, or
that it will sit on the eggs, or that they will hatch into young birds.
It does what it does at each stage because instinct gives it an impulse
to do just that, not because it foresees and desires the result of its
actions.*

     * An interesting discussion of the question whether
     instinctive actions, when first performed, involve any
     prevision, however vague, will be found in Lloyd Morgan's
     "Instinct and Experience" (Methuen, 1912), chap. ii.

Careful observers of animals, being anxious to avoid precarious
inferences, have gradually discovered more and more how to give
an account of the actions of animals without assuming what we call
"consciousness." It has seemed to the behaviourists that similar methods
can be applied to human behaviour, without assuming anything not open
to external observation. Let us give a crude illustration, too crude for
the authors in question, but capable of affording a rough insight into
their meaning. Suppose two children in a school, both of whom are asked
"What is six times nine?" One says fifty-four, the other says fifty-six.
The one, we say, "knows" what six times nine is, the other does not. But
all that we can observe is a certain language-habit. The one child has
acquired the habit of saying "six times nine is fifty-four"; the other
has not. There is no more need of "thought" in this than there is when
a horse turns into his accustomed stable; there are merely more numerous
and complicated habits. There is obviously an observable fact called
"knowing" such-and-such a thing; examinations are experiments for
discovering such facts. But all that is observed or discovered is a
certain set of habits in the use of words. The thoughts (if any) in the
mind of the examinee are of no interest to the examiner; nor has the
examiner any reason to suppose even the most successful examinee capable
of even the smallest amount of thought.

Thus what is called "knowing," in the sense in which we can ascertain
what other people "know," is a phenomenon exemplified in their physical
behaviour, including spoken and written words. There is no reason--so
Watson argues--to suppose that their knowledge IS anything beyond the
habits shown in this behaviour: the inference that other people
have something nonphysical called "mind" or "thought" is therefore
unwarranted.

So far, there is nothing particularly repugnant to our prejudices in the
conclusions of the behaviourists. We are all willing to admit that
other people are thoughtless. But when it comes to ourselves, we feel
convinced that we can actually perceive our own thinking. "Cogito, ergo
sum" would be regarded by most people as having a true premiss. This,
however, the behaviourist denies. He maintains that our knowledge of
ourselves is no different in kind from our knowledge of other people.
We may see MORE, because our own body is easier to observe than that of
other people; but we do not see anything radically unlike what we see
of others. Introspection, as a separate source of knowledge, is entirely
denied by psychologists of this school. I shall discuss this question at
length in a later lecture; for the present I will only observe that
it is by no means simple, and that, though I believe the behaviourists
somewhat overstate their case, yet there is an important element of
truth in their contention, since the things which we can discover by
introspection do not seem to differ in any very fundamental way from the
things which we discover by external observation.

So far, we have been principally concerned with knowing. But it might
well be maintained that desiring is what is really most characteristic
of mind. Human beings are constantly engaged in achieving some end
they feel pleasure in success and pain in failure. In a purely material
world, it may be said, there would be no opposition of pleasant and
unpleasant, good and bad, what is desired and what is feared. A man's
acts are governed by purposes. He decides, let us suppose, to go to a
certain place, whereupon he proceeds to the station, takes his ticket
and enters the train. If the usual route is blocked by an accident,
he goes by some other route. All that he does is determined--or so it
seems--by the end he has in view, by what lies in front of him, rather
than by what lies behind. With dead matter, this is not the case.
A stone at the top of a hill may start rolling, but it shows no
pertinacity in trying to get to the bottom. Any ledge or obstacle will
stop it, and it will exhibit no signs of discontent if this happens. It
is not attracted by the pleasantness of the valley, as a sheep or cow
might be, but propelled by the steepness of the hill at the place
where it is. In all this we have characteristic differences between the
behaviour of animals and the behaviour of matter as studied by physics.

Desire, like knowledge, is, of course, in one sense an observable
phenomenon. An elephant will eat a bun, but not a mutton chop; a duck
will go into the water, but a hen will not. But when we think of our
own desires, most people believe that we can know them by an immediate
self-knowledge which does not depend upon observation of our actions.
Yet if this were the case, it would be odd that people are so often
mistaken as to what they desire. It is matter of common observation that
"so-and-so does not know his own motives," or that "A is envious of B
and malicious about him, but quite unconscious of being so." Such people
are called self-deceivers, and are supposed to have had to go through
some more or less elaborate process of concealing from themselves what
would otherwise have been obvious. I believe that this is an entire
mistake. I believe that the discovery of our own motives can only be
made by the same process by which we discover other people's, namely,
the process of observing our actions and inferring the desire which
could prompt them. A desire is "conscious" when we have told ourselves
that we have it. A hungry man may say to himself: "Oh, I do want my
lunch." Then his desire is "conscious." But it only differs from an
"unconscious" desire by the presence of appropriate words, which is by
no means a fundamental difference.

The belief that a motive is normally conscious makes it easier to be
mistaken as to our own motives than as to other people's. When some
desire that we should be ashamed of is attributed to us, we notice that
we have never had it consciously, in the sense of saying to ourselves,
"I wish that would happen." We therefore look for some other
interpretation of our actions, and regard our friends as very unjust
when they refuse to be convinced by our repudiation of what we hold to
be a calumny. Moral considerations greatly increase the difficulty of
clear thinking in this matter. It is commonly argued that people are not
to blame for unconscious motives, but only for conscious ones. In order,
therefore, to be wholly virtuous it is only necessary to repeat virtuous
formulas. We say: "I desire to be kind to my friends, honourable in
business, philanthropic towards the poor, public-spirited in politics."
So long as we refuse to allow ourselves, even in the watches of the
night, to avow any contrary desires, we may be bullies at home, shady in
the City, skinflints in paying wages and profiteers in dealing with the
public; yet, if only conscious motives are to count in moral valuation,
we shall remain model characters. This is an agreeable doctrine, and
it is not surprising that men are un willing to abandon it. But moral
considerations are the worst enemies of the scientific spirit and we
must dismiss them from our minds if we wish to arrive at truth.

I believe--as I shall try to prove in a later lecture--that desire,
like force in mechanics, is of the nature of a convenient fiction
for describing shortly certain laws of behaviour. A hungry animal is
restless until it finds food; then it becomes quiescent. The thing which
will bring a restless condition to an end is said to be what is desired.
But only experience can show what will have this sedative effect, and it
is easy to make mistakes. We feel dissatisfaction, and think that
such and-such a thing would remove it; but in thinking this, we are
theorizing, not observing a patent fact. Our theorizing is often
mistaken, and when it is mistaken there is a difference between what we
think we desire and what in fact will bring satisfaction. This is such
a common phenomenon that any theory of desire which fails to account for
it must be wrong.

What have been called "unconscious" desires have been brought very much
to the fore in recent years by psycho-analysis. Psycho-analysis, as
every one knows, is primarily a method of understanding hysteria and
certain forms of insanity*; but it has been found that there is much
in the lives of ordinary men and women which bears a humiliating
resemblance to the delusions of the insane. The connection of dreams,
irrational beliefs and foolish actions with unconscious wishes has been
brought to light, though with some exaggeration, by Freud and Jung and
their followers. As regards the nature of these unconscious wishes,
it seems to me--though as a layman I speak with diffidence--that many
psycho-analysts are unduly narrow; no doubt the wishes they emphasize
exist, but others, e.g. for honour and power, are equally operative and
equally liable to concealment. This, however, does not affect the
value of their general theories from the point of view of theoretic
psychology, and it is from this point of view that their results are
important for the analysis of mind.

     * There is a wide field of "unconscious" phenomena which
     does not depend upon psycho-analytic theories. Such
     occurrences as automatic writing lead Dr. Morton Prince to
     say: "As I view this question of the subconscious, far too
     much weight is given to the point of awareness or not
     awareness of our conscious processes. As a matter of fact,
     we find entirely identical phenomena, that is, identical in
     every respect but one-that of awareness in which sometimes
     we are aware of these conscious phenomena and sometimes
     not"(p. 87 of "Subconscious Phenomena," by various authors,
     Rebman). Dr. Morton Price conceives that there may be
     "consciousness" without "awareness." But this is a difficult
     view, and one which makes some definition of "consciousness"
     imperative. For nay part, I cannot see how to separate
     consciousness from awareness.

What, I think, is clearly established, is that a man's actions and
beliefs may be wholly dominated by a desire of which he is quite
unconscious, and which he indignantly repudiates when it is suggested
to him. Such a desire is generally, in morbid cases, of a sort which
the patient would consider wicked; if he had to admit that he had the
desire, he would loathe himself. Yet it is so strong that it must force
an outlet for itself; hence it becomes necessary to entertain whole
systems of false beliefs in order to hide the nature of what is desired.
The resulting delusions in very many cases disappear if the hysteric or
lunatic can be made to face the facts about himself. The consequence
of this is that the treatment of many forms of insanity has grown more
psychological and less physiological than it used to be. Instead of
looking for a physical defect in the brain, those who treat delusions
look for the repressed desire which has found this contorted mode
of expression. For those who do not wish to plunge into the somewhat
repulsive and often rather wild theories of psychoanalytic pioneers, it
will be worth while to read a little book by Dr. Bernard Hart on "The
Psychology of Insanity."* On this question of the mental as opposed to
the physiological study of the causes of insanity, Dr. Hart says:

     * Cambridge, 1912; 2nd edition, 1914. The following
     references are to the second edition.

"The psychological conception [of insanity] is based on the view that
mental processes can be directly studied without any reference to the
accompanying changes which are presumed to take place in the brain, and
that insanity may therefore be properly attacked from the standpoint of
psychology"(p. 9).

This illustrates a point which I am anxious to make clear from the
outset. Any attempt to classify modern views, such as I propose to
advocate, from the old standpoint of materialism and idealism, is only
misleading. In certain respects, the views which I shall be setting
forth approximate to materialism; in certain others, they approximate to
its opposite. On this question of the study of delusions, the practical
effect of the modern theories, as Dr. Hart points out, is emancipation
from the materialist method. On the other hand, as he also points
out (pp. 38-9), imbecility and dementia still have to be considered
physiologically, as caused by defects in the brain. There is no
inconsistency in this If, as we maintain, mind and matter are neither of
them the actual stuff of reality, but different convenient groupings of
an underlying material, then, clearly, the question whether, in regard
to a given phenomenon, we are to seek a physical or a mental cause, is
merely one to be decided by trial. Metaphysicians have argued endlessly
as to the interaction of mind and matter. The followers of Descartes
held that mind and matter are so different as to make any action of the
one on the other impossible. When I will to move my arm, they said,
it is not my will that operates on my arm, but God, who, by His
omnipotence, moves my arm whenever I want it moved. The modern doctrine
of psychophysical parallelism is not appreciably different from this
theory of the Cartesian school. Psycho-physical parallelism is the
theory that mental and physical events each have causes in their own
sphere, but run on side by side owing to the fact that every state of
the brain coexists with a definite state of the mind, and vice versa.
This view of the reciprocal causal independence of mind and matter has
no basis except in metaphysical theory.* For us, there is no necessity
to make any such assumption, which is very difficult to harmonize with
obvious facts. I receive a letter inviting me to dinner: the letter is
a physical fact, but my apprehension of its meaning is mental. Here we
have an effect of matter on mind. In consequence of my apprehension of
the meaning of the letter, I go to the right place at the right time;
here we have an effect of mind on matter. I shall try to persuade you,
in the course of these lectures, that matter is not so material and mind
not so mental as is generally supposed. When we are speaking of matter,
it will seem as if we were inclining to idealism; when we are speaking
of mind, it will seem as if we were inclining to materialism. Neither
is the truth. Our world is to be constructed out of what the American
realists call "neutral" entities, which have neither the hardness and
indestructibility of matter, nor the reference to objects which is
supposed to characterize mind.

     * It would seem, however, that Dr. Hart accepts this theory
     as 8 methodological precept. See his contribution to
     "Subconscious Phenomena" (quoted above), especially pp. 121-2.

There is, it is true, one objection which might be felt, not indeed to
the action of matter on mind, but to the action of mind on matter. The
laws of physics, it may be urged, are apparently adequate to explain
everything that happens to matter, even when it is matter in a man's
brain. This, however, is only a hypothesis, not an established theory.
There is no cogent empirical reason for supposing that the laws
determining the motions of living bodies are exactly the same as those
that apply to dead matter. Sometimes, of course, they are clearly the
same. When a man falls from a precipice or slips on a piece of orange
peel, his body behaves as if it were devoid of life. These are the
occasions that make Bergson laugh. But when a man's bodily movements
are what we call "voluntary," they are, at any rate prima facie, very
different in their laws from the movements of what is devoid of life.
I do not wish to say dogmatically that the difference is irreducible;
I think it highly probable that it is not. I say only that the study of
the behaviour of living bodies, in the present state of our knowledge,
is distinct from physics. The study of gases was originally quite
distinct from that of rigid bodies, and would never have advanced to its
present state if it had not been independently pursued. Nowadays both
the gas and the rigid body are manufactured out of a more primitive and
universal kind of matter. In like manner, as a question of methodology,
the laws of living bodies are to be studied, in the first place, without
any undue haste to subordinate them to the laws of physics. Boyle's law
and the rest had to be discovered before the kinetic theory of gases
became possible. But in psychology we are hardly yet at the stage
of Boyle's law. Meanwhile we need not be held up by the bogey of
the universal rigid exactness of physics. This is, as yet, a mere
hypothesis, to be tested empirically without any preconceptions. It may
be true, or it may not. So far, that is all we can say.

Returning from this digression to our main topic, namely, the criticism
of "consciousness," we observe that Freud and his followers, though they
have demonstrated beyond dispute the immense importance of "unconscious"
desires in determining our actions and beliefs, have not attempted the
task of telling us what an "unconscious" desire actually is, and have
thus invested their doctrine with an air of mystery and mythology which
forms a large part of its popular attractiveness. They speak always as
though it were more normal for a desire to be conscious, and as though
a positive cause had to be assigned for its being unconscious. Thus
"the unconscious" becomes a sort of underground prisoner, living in a
dungeon, breaking in at long intervals upon our daylight respectability
with dark groans and maledictions and strange atavistic lusts. The
ordinary reader, almost inevitably, thinks of this underground person as
another consciousness, prevented by what Freud calls the "censor" from
making his voice heard in company, except on rare and dreadful occasions
when he shouts so loud that every one hears him and there is a scandal.
Most of us like the idea that we could be desperately wicked if only we
let ourselves go. For this reason, the Freudian "unconscious" has been a
consolation to many quiet and well-behaved persons.

I do not think the truth is quite so picturesque as this. I believe an
"unconscious" desire is merely a causal law of our behaviour,* namely,
that we remain restlessly active until a certain state of affairs is
realized, when we achieve temporary equilibrium If we know beforehand
what this state of affairs is, our desire is conscious; if not,
unconscious. The unconscious desire is not something actually existing,
but merely a tendency to a certain behaviour; it has exactly the same
status as a force in dynamics. The unconscious desire is in no way
mysterious; it is the natural primitive form of desire, from which the
other has developed through our habit of observing and theorizing (often
wrongly). It is not necessary to suppose, as Freud seems to do,
that every unconscious wish was once conscious, and was then, in his
terminology, "repressed" because we disapproved of it. On the contrary,
we shall suppose that, although Freudian "repression" undoubtedly occurs
and is important, it is not the usual reason for unconsciousness of our
wishes. The usual reason is merely that wishes are all, to begin with,
unconscious, and only become known when they are actively noticed.
Usually, from laziness, people do not notice, but accept the theory
of human nature which they find current, and attribute to themselves
whatever wishes this theory would lead them to expect. We used to be
full of virtuous wishes, but since Freud our wishes have become, in
the words of the Prophet Jeremiah, "deceitful above all things and
desperately wicked." Both these views, in most of those who have held
them, are the product of theory rather than observation, for observation
requires effort, whereas repeating phrases does not.

     * Cf. Hart, "The Psychology of Insanity," p. 19.

The interpretation of unconscious wishes which I have been advocating
has been set forth briefly by Professor John B. Watson in an article
called "The Psychology of Wish Fulfilment," which appeared in "The
Scientific Monthly" in November, 1916. Two quotations will serve to show
his point of view:

"The Freudians (he says) have made more or less of a 'metaphysical
entity' out of the censor. They suppose that when wishes are repressed
they are repressed into the 'unconscious,' and that this mysterious
censor stands at the trapdoor lying between the conscious and the
unconscious. Many of us do not believe in a world of the unconscious
(a few of us even have grave doubts about the usefulness of the term
consciousness), hence we try to explain censorship along ordinary
biological lines. We believe that one group of habits can 'down' another
group of habits--or instincts. In this case our ordinary system of
habits--those which we call expressive of our 'real selves'--inhibit
or quench (keep inactive or partially inactive) those habits and
instinctive tendencies which belong largely in the past"(p. 483).

Again, after speaking of the frustration of some impulses which is
involved in acquiring the habits of a civilized adult, he continues:

"It is among these frustrated impulses that I would find the biological
basis of the unfulfilled wish. Such 'wishes' need never have been
'conscious,' and NEED NEVER HAVE BEEN SUPPRESSED INTO FREUD'S REALM
OF THE UNCONSCIOUS. It may be inferred from this that there is no
particular reason for applying the term 'wish' to such tendencies"(p.
485).

One of the merits of the general analysis of mind which we shall
be concerned with in the following lectures is that it removes the
atmosphere of mystery from the phenomena brought to light by the
psycho-analysts. Mystery is delightful, but unscientific, since it
depends upon ignorance. Man has developed out of the animals, and
there is no serious gap between him and the amoeba. Something closely
analogous to knowledge and desire, as regards its effects on behaviour,
exists among animals, even where what we call "consciousness" is hard
to believe in; something equally analogous exists in ourselves in cases
where no trace of "consciousness" can be found. It is therefore
natural to suppose that, what ever may be the correct definition of
"consciousness," "consciousness" is not the essence of life or mind. In
the following lectures, accordingly, this term will disappear until we
have dealt with words, when it will re-emerge as mainly a trivial and
unimportant outcome of linguistic habits.




LECTURE II. INSTINCT AND HABIT

In attempting to understand the elements out of which mental phenomena
are compounded, it is of the greatest importance to remember that from
the protozoa to man there is nowhere a very wide gap either in structure
or in behaviour. From this fact it is a highly probable inference that
there is also nowhere a very wide mental gap. It is, of course, POSSIBLE
that there may be, at certain stages in evolution, elements which are
entirely new from the standpoint of analysis, though in their nascent
form they have little influence on behaviour and no very marked
correlatives in structure. But the hypothesis of continuity in mental
development is clearly preferable if no psychological facts make it
impossible. We shall find, if I am not mistaken, that there are no facts
which refute the hypothesis of mental continuity, and that, on the other
hand, this hypothesis affords a useful test of suggested theories as to
the nature of mind.

The hypothesis of mental continuity throughout organic evolution may be
used in two different ways. On the one hand, it may be held that we
have more knowledge of our own minds than those of animals, and that we
should use this knowledge to infer the existence of something similar
to our own mental processes in animals and even in plants. On the other
hand, it may be held that animals and plants present simpler phenomena,
more easily analysed than those of human minds; on this ground it may be
urged that explanations which are adequate in the case of animals ought
not to be lightly rejected in the case of man. The practical effects of
these two views are diametrically opposite: the first leads us to level
up animal intelligence with what we believe ourselves to know about our
own intelligence, while the second leads us to attempt a levelling down
of our own intelligence to something not too remote from what we can
observe in animals. It is therefore important to consider the relative
justification of the two ways of applying the principle of continuity.

It is clear that the question turns upon another, namely, which can we
know best, the psychology of animals or that of human beings? If we
can know most about animals, we shall use this knowledge as a basis for
inference about human beings; if we can know most about human beings, we
shall adopt the opposite procedure. And the question whether we can know
most about the psychology of human beings or about that of animals turns
upon yet another, namely: Is introspection or external observation
the surer method in psychology? This is a question which I propose to
discuss at length in Lecture VI; I shall therefore content myself now
with a statement of the conclusions to be arrived at.

We know a great many things concerning ourselves which we cannot know
nearly so directly concerning animals or even other people. We know when
we have a toothache, what we are thinking of, what dreams we have when
we are asleep, and a host of other occurrences which we only know about
others when they tell us of them, or otherwise make them inferable
by their behaviour. Thus, so far as knowledge of detached facts is
concerned, the advantage is on the side of self-knowledge as against
external observation.

But when we come to the analysis and scientific understanding of the
facts, the advantages on the side of self-knowledge become far less
clear. We know, for example, that we have desires and beliefs, but we
do not know what constitutes a desire or a belief. The phenomena are so
familiar that it is difficult to realize how little we really know about
them. We see in animals, and to a lesser extent in plants, behaviour
more or less similar to that which, in us, is prompted by desires and
beliefs, and we find that, as we descend in the scale of evolution,
behaviour becomes simpler, more easily reducible to rule, more
scientifically analysable and predictable. And just because we are not
misled by familiarity we find it easier to be cautious in interpreting
behaviour when we are dealing with phenomena remote from those of our
own minds: Moreover, introspection, as psychoanalysis has demonstrated,
is extraordinarily fallible even in cases where we feel a high degree of
certainty. The net result seems to be that, though self-knowledge has
a definite and important contribution to make to psychology, it is
exceedingly misleading unless it is constantly checked and controlled
by the test of external observation, and by the theories which such
observation suggests when applied to animal behaviour. On the whole,
therefore, there is probably more to be learnt about human psychology
from animals than about animal psychology from human beings; but this
conclusion is one of degree, and must not be pressed beyond a point.

It is only bodily phenomena that can be directly observed in animals,
or even, strictly speaking, in other human beings. We can observe such
things as their movements, their physiological processes, and the sounds
they emit. Such things as desires and beliefs, which seem obvious
to introspection, are not visible directly to external observation.
Accordingly, if we begin our study of psychology by external
observation, we must not begin by assuming such things as desires and
beliefs, but only such things as external observation can reveal, which
will be characteristics of the movements and physiological processes of
animals. Some animals, for example, always run away from light and hide
themselves in dark places. If you pick up a mossy stone which is lightly
embedded in the earth, you will see a number of small animals scuttling
away from the unwonted daylight and seeking again the darkness of which
you have deprived them. Such animals are sensitive to light, in the
sense that their movements are affected by it; but it would be rash to
infer that they have sensations in any way analogous to our sensations
of sight. Such inferences, which go beyond the observable facts, are to
be avoided with the utmost care.

It is customary to divide human movements into three classes, voluntary,
reflex and mechanical. We may illustrate the distinction by a quotation
from William James ("Psychology," i, 12):

"If I hear the conductor calling 'all aboard' as I enter the depot, my
heart first stops, then palpitates, and my legs respond to the air-waves
falling on my tympanum by quickening their movements. If I stumble as I
run, the sensation of falling provokes a movement of the hands towards
the direction of the fall, the effect of which is to shield the body
from too sudden a shock. If a cinder enter my eye, its lids close
forcibly and a copious flow of tears tends to wash it out.

"These three responses to a sensational stimulus differ, however, in
many respects. The closure of the eye and the lachrymation are quite
involuntary, and so is the disturbance of the heart. Such involuntary
responses we know as 'reflex' acts. The motion of the arms to break the
shock of falling may also be called reflex, since it occurs too quickly
to be deliberately intended. Whether it be instinctive or whether it
result from the pedestrian education of childhood may be doubtful; it
is, at any rate, less automatic than the previous acts, for a man might
by conscious effort learn to perform it more skilfully, or even to
suppress it altogether. Actions of this kind, with which instinct and
volition enter upon equal terms, have been called 'semi-reflex.' The
act of running towards the train, on the other hand, has no instinctive
element about it. It is purely the result of education, and is preceded
by a consciousness of the purpose to be attained and a distinct mandate
of the will. It is a 'voluntary act.' Thus the animal's reflex and
voluntary performances shade into each other gradually, being connected
by acts which may often occur automatically, but may also be modified by
conscious intelligence.

"An outside observer, unable to perceive the accompanying consciousness,
might be wholly at a loss to discriminate between the automatic acts and
those which volition escorted. But if the criterion of mind's existence
be the choice of the proper means for the attainment of a supposed
end, all the acts alike seem to be inspired by intelligence, for
APPROPRIATENESS characterizes them all alike."

There is one movement, among those that James mentions at first, which
is not subsequently classified, namely, the stumbling. This is the
kind of movement which may be called "mechanical"; it is evidently of a
different kind from either reflex or voluntary movements, and more akin
to the movements of dead matter. We may define a movement of an animal's
body as "mechanical" when it proceeds as if only dead matter were
involved. For example, if you fall over a cliff, you move under the
influence of gravitation, and your centre of gravity describes just as
correct a parabola as if you were already dead. Mechanical movements
have not the characteristic of appropriateness, unless by accident, as
when a drunken man falls into a waterbutt and is sobered. But reflex
and voluntary movements are not ALWAYS appropriate, unless in some very
recondite sense. A moth flying into a lamp is not acting sensibly; no
more is a man who is in such a hurry to get his ticket that he cannot
remember the name of his destination. Appropriateness is a complicated
and merely approximate idea, and for the present we shall do well to
dismiss it from our thoughts.

As James states, there is no difference, from the point of view of
the outside observer, between voluntary and reflex movements. The
physiologist can discover that both depend upon the nervous system,
and he may find that the movements which we call voluntary depend upon
higher centres in the brain than those that are reflex. But he
cannot discover anything as to the presence or absence of "will" or
"consciousness," for these things can only be seen from within, if
at all. For the present, we wish to place ourselves resolutely in the
position of outside observers; we will therefore ignore the distinction
between voluntary and reflex movements. We will call the two together
"vital" movements. We may then distinguish "vital" from mechanical
movements by the fact that vital movements depend for their causation
upon the special properties of the nervous system, while mechanical
movements depend only upon the properties which animal bodies share with
matter in general.

There is need for some care if the distinction between mechanical and
vital movements is to be made precise. It is quite likely that, if we
knew more about animal bodies, we could deduce all their movements from
the laws of chemistry and physics. It is already fairly easy to see how
chemistry reduces to physics, i.e. how the differences between different
chemical elements can be accounted for by differences of physical
structure, the constituents of the structure being electrons which are
exactly alike in all kinds of matter. We only know in part how to reduce
physiology to chemistry, but we know enough to make it likely that the
reduction is possible. If we suppose it effected, what would become of
the difference between vital and mechanical movements?

Some analogies will make the difference clear. A shock to a mass of
dynamite produces quite different effects from an equal shock to a mass
of steel: in the one case there is a vast explosion, while in the other
case there is hardly any noticeable disturbance. Similarly, you may
sometimes find on a mountain-side a large rock poised so delicately that
a touch will set it crashing down into the valley, while the rocks all
round are so firm that only a considerable force can dislodge them What
is analogous in these two cases is the existence of a great store of
energy in unstable equilibrium ready to burst into violent motion by
the addition of a very slight disturbance. Similarly, it requires only
a very slight expenditure of energy to send a post-card with the words
"All is discovered; fly!" but the effect in generating kinetic energy
is said to be amazing. A human body, like a mass of dynamite, contains
a store of energy in unstable equilibrium, ready to be directed in this
direction or that by a disturbance which is physically very small,
such as a spoken word. In all such cases the reduction of behaviour to
physical laws can only be effected by entering into great minuteness; so
long as we confine ourselves to the observation of comparatively
large masses, the way in which the equilibrium will be upset cannot be
determined. Physicists distinguish between macroscopic and microscopic
equations: the former determine the visible movements of bodies of
ordinary size, the latter the minute occurrences in the smallest parts.
It is only the microscopic equations that are supposed to be the same
for all sorts of matter. The macroscopic equations result from a process
of averaging out, and may be different in different cases. So, in our
instance, the laws of macroscopic phenomena are different for mechanical
and vital movements, though the laws of microscopic phenomena may be the
same.

We may say, speaking somewhat roughly, that a stimulus applied to the
nervous system, like a spark to dynamite, is able to take advantage of
the stored energy in unstable equilibrium, and thus to produce movements
out of proportion to the proximate cause. Movements produced in this way
are vital movements, while mechanical movements are those in which the
stored energy of a living body is not involved. Similarly dynamite may
be exploded, thereby displaying its characteristic properties, or may
(with due precautions) be carted about like any other mineral. The
explosion is analogous to vital movements, the carting about to
mechanical movements.

Mechanical movements are of no interest to the psychologist, and it has
only been necessary to define them in order to be able to exclude them.
When a psychologist studies behaviour, it is only vital movements
that concern him. We shall, therefore, proceed to ignore mechanical
movements, and study only the properties of the remainder.

The next point is to distinguish between movements that are instinctive
and movements that are acquired by experience. This distinction also is
to some extent one of degree. Professor Lloyd Morgan gives the following
definition of "instinctive behaviour":

"That which is, on its first occurrence, independent of prior
experience; which tends to the well-being of the individual and the
preservation of the race; which is similarly performed by all members
of the same more or less restricted group of animals; and which may be
subject to subsequent modification under the guidance of experience." *

     * "Instinct and Experience" (Methuen, 1912) p. 5.

This definition is framed for the purposes of biology, and is in
some respects unsuited to the needs of psychology. Though perhaps
unavoidable, allusion to "the same more or less restricted group
of animals" makes it impossible to judge what is instinctive in the
behaviour of an isolated individual. Moreover, "the well-being of
the individual and the preservation of the race" is only a usual
characteristic, not a universal one, of the sort of movements that, from
our point of view, are to be called instinctive; instances of harmful
instincts will be given shortly. The essential point of the definition,
from our point of view, is that an instinctive movement is in dependent
of prior experience.

We may say that an "instinctive" movement is a vital movement performed
by an animal the first time that it finds itself in a novel situation;
or, more correctly, one which it would perform if the situation were
novel.* The instincts of an animal are different at different periods of
its growth, and this fact may cause changes of behaviour which are
not due to learning. The maturing and seasonal fluctuation of the
sex-instinct affords a good illustration. When the sex-instinct first
matures, the behaviour of an animal in the presence of a mate is
different from its previous behaviour in similar circumstances, but is
not learnt, since it is just the same if the animal has never previously
been in the presence of a mate.

     * Though this can only be decided by comparison with other
     members of the species, and thus exposes us to the need of
     comparison which we thought an objection to Professor Lloyd
     Morgan's definition.

On the other hand, a movement is "learnt," or embodies a "habit," if it
is due to previous experience of similar situations, and is not what it
would be if the animal had had no such experience.

There are various complications which blur the sharpness of this
distinction in practice. To begin with, many instincts mature gradually,
and while they are immature an animal may act in a fumbling manner which
is very difficult to distinguish from learning. James ("Psychology," ii,
407) maintains that children walk by instinct, and that the awkwardness
of their first attempts is only due to the fact that the instinct has
not yet ripened. He hopes that "some scientific widower, left alone with
his offspring at the critical moment, may ere long test this suggestion
on the living subject." However this may be, he quotes evidence to show
that "birds do not LEARN to fly," but fly by instinct when they reach
the appropriate age (ib., p. 406). In the second place, instinct often
gives only a rough outline of the sort of thing to do, in which case
learning is necessary in order to acquire certainty and precision in
action. In the third place, even in the clearest cases of acquired
habit, such as speaking, some instinct is required to set in motion
the process of learning. In the case of speaking, the chief instinct
involved is commonly supposed to be that of imitation, but this may be
questioned. (See Thorndike's "Animal Intelligence," p. 253 ff.)

In spite of these qualifications, the broad distinction between instinct
and habit is undeniable. To take extreme cases, every animal at birth
can take food by instinct, before it has had opportunity to learn; on
the other hand, no one can ride a bicycle by instinct, though, after
learning, the necessary movements become just as automatic as if they
were instinctive.

The process of learning, which consists in the acquisition of habits,
has been much studied in various animals.* For example: you put a hungry
animal, say a cat, in a cage which has a door that can be opened by
lifting a latch; outside the cage you put food. The cat at first dashes
all round the cage, making frantic efforts to force a way out. At last,
by accident, the latch is lifted and the cat pounces on the food. Next
day you repeat the experiment, and you find that the cat gets out much
more quickly than the first time, although it still makes some random
movements. The third day it gets out still more quickly, and before long
it goes straight to the latch and lifts it at once. Or you make a model
of the Hampton Court maze, and put a rat in the middle, assaulted by the
smell of food on the outside. The rat starts running down the passages,
and is constantly stopped by blind alleys, but at last, by persistent
attempts, it gets out. You repeat this experiment day after day; you
measure the time taken by the rat in reaching the food; you find that
the time rapidly diminishes, and that after a while the rat ceases to
make any wrong turnings. It is by essentially similar processes that we
learn speaking, writing, mathematics, or the government of an empire.

     * The scientific study of this subject may almost be said to
     begin with Thorndike's "Animal Intelligence" (Macmillan,
     1911).

Professor Watson ("Behavior," pp. 262-3) has an ingenious theory as to
the way in which habit arises out of random movements. I think there is
a reason why his theory cannot be regarded as alone sufficient, but it
seems not unlikely that it is partly correct. Suppose, for the sake of
simplicity, that there are just ten random movements which may be made
by the animal--say, ten paths down which it may go--and that only one of
these leads to food, or whatever else represents success in the case in
question. Then the successful movement always occurs during the animal's
attempts, whereas each of the others, on the average, occurs in only
half the attempts. Thus the tendency to repeat a previous performance
(which is easily explicable without the intervention of "consciousness")
leads to a greater emphasis on the successful movement than on any
other, and in time causes it alone to be performed. The objection to
this view, if taken as the sole explanation, is that on improvement
ought to set in till after the SECOND trial, whereas experiment shows
that already at the second attempt the animal does better than the
first time. Something further is, therefore, required to account for the
genesis of habit from random movements; but I see no reason to suppose
that what is further required involves "consciousness."

Mr. Thorndike (op. cit., p. 244) formulates two "provisional laws of
acquired behaviour or learning," as follows:

"The Law of Effect is that: Of several responses made to the same
situation, those which are accompanied or closely followed by
satisfaction to the animal will, other things being equal, be more
firmly connected with the situation, so that, when it recurs, they will
be more likely to recur; those which are accompanied or closely followed
by discomfort to the animal will, other things being equal, have their
connections with that situation weakened, so that, when it recurs,
they will be less likely to occur. The greater the satisfaction or
discomfort, the greater the strengthening or weakening of the bond.

"The Law of Exercise is that: Any response to a situation will, other
things being equal, be more strongly connected with the situation
in proportion to the number of times it has been connected with that
situation and to the average vigour and duration of the connections."

With the explanation to be presently given of the meaning of
"satisfaction" and "discomfort," there seems every reason to accept
these two laws.

What is true of animals, as regards instinct and habit, is equally
true of men. But the higher we rise in the evolutionary scale, broadly
speaking, the greater becomes the power of learning, and the fewer are
the occasions when pure instinct is exhibited unmodified in adult life.
This applies with great force to man, so much so that some have thought
instinct less important in the life of man than in that of animals.
This, however, would be a mistake. Learning is only possible when
instinct supplies the driving-force. The animals in cages, which
gradually learn to get out, perform random movements at first, which
are purely instinctive. But for these random movements, they would never
acquire the experience which afterwards enables them to produce the
right movement. (This is partly questioned by Hobhouse*--wrongly, I
think.) Similarly, children learning to talk make all sorts of sounds,
until one day the right sound comes by accident. It is clear that the
original making of random sounds, without which speech would never be
learnt, is instinctive. I think we may say the same of all the habits
and aptitudes that we acquire in all of them there has been present
throughout some instinctive activity, prompting at first rather
inefficient movements, but supplying the driving force while more and
more effective methods are being acquired. A cat which is hungry smells
fish, and goes to the larder. This is a thoroughly efficient method when
there is fish in the larder, and it is often successfully practised by
children. But in later life it is found that merely going to the larder
does not cause fish to be there; after a series of random movements it
is found that this result is to be caused by going to the City in the
morning and coming back in the evening. No one would have guessed a
priori that this movement of a middle-aged man's body would cause fish
to come out of the sea into his larder, but experience shows that it
does, and the middle-aged man therefore continues to go to the City,
just as the cat in the cage continues to lift the latch when it has once
found it. Of course, in actual fact, human learning is rendered easier,
though psychologically more complex, through language; but at bottom
language does not alter the essential character of learning, or of the
part played by instinct in promoting learning. Language, however, is a
subject upon which I do not wish to speak until a later lecture.

     * "Mind in Evolution" (Macmillan, 1915), pp. 236-237.

The popular conception of instinct errs by imagining it to be infallible
and preternaturally wise, as well as incapable of modification. This is
a complete delusion. Instinct, as a rule, is very rough and ready, able
to achieve its result under ordinary circumstances, but easily misled by
anything unusual. Chicks follow their mother by instinct, but when they
are quite young they will follow with equal readiness any moving
object remotely resembling their mother, or even a human being (James,
"Psychology," ii, 396). Bergson, quoting Fabre, has made play with the
supposed extraordinary accuracy of the solitary wasp Ammophila, which
lays its eggs in a caterpillar. On this subject I will quote from
Drever's "Instinct in Man," p. 92:

"According to Fabre's observations, which Bergson accepts, the Ammophila
stings its prey EXACTLY and UNERRINGLY in EACH of the nervous centres.
The result is that the caterpillar is paralyzed, but not immediately
killed, the advantage of this being that the larva cannot be injured by
any movement of the caterpillar, upon which the egg is deposited, and is
provided with fresh meat when the time comes.

"Now Dr. and Mrs. Peckham have shown that the sting of the wasp is NOT
UNERRING, as Fabre alleges, that the number of stings is NOT CONSTANT,
that sometimes the caterpillar is NOT PARALYZED, and sometimes it is
KILLED OUTRIGHT, and that THE DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES DO NOT APPARENTLY
MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE TO THE LARVA, which is not injured by slight
movements of the caterpillar, nor by consuming food decomposed rather
than fresh caterpillar."

This illustrates how love of the marvellous may mislead even so careful
an observer as Fabre and so eminent a philosopher as Bergson.

In the same chapter of Dr. Drever's book there are some interesting
examples of the mistakes made by instinct. I will quote one as a sample:

"The larva of the Lomechusa beetle eats the young of the ants, in whose
nest it is reared. Nevertheless, the ants tend the Lomechusa larvae
with the same care they bestow on their own young. Not only so, but they
apparently discover that the methods of feeding, which suit their own
larvae, would prove fatal to the guests, and accordingly they change
their whole system of nursing" (loc. cit., p. 106).

Semon ("Die Mneme," pp. 207-9) gives a good illustration of an instinct
growing wiser through experience. He relates how hunters attract stags
by imitating the sounds of other members of their species, male or
female, but find that the older a stag becomes the more difficult it
is to deceive him, and the more accurate the imitation has to be. The
literature of instinct is vast, and illustrations might be multiplied
indefinitely. The main points as regards instinct, which need to be
emphasized as against the popular conceptions of it, are:

(1) That instinct requires no prevision of the biological end which it
serves;

(2) That instinct is only adapted to achieve this end in the usual
circumstances of the animal in question, and has no more precision than
is necessary for success AS A RULE;

(3) That processes initiated by instinct often come to be performed
better after experience;

(4) That instinct supplies the impulses to experimental movements which
are required for the process of learning;

(5) That instincts in their nascent stages are easily modifiable, and
capable of being attached to various sorts of objects.

All the above characteristics of instinct can be established by purely
external observation, except the fact that instinct does not require
prevision. This, though not strictly capable of being PROVED by
observation, is irresistibly suggested by the most obvious phenomena.
Who can believe, for example, that a new-born baby is aware of the
necessity of food for preserving life? Or that insects, in laying eggs,
are concerned for the preservation of their species? The essence of
instinct, one might say, is that it provides a mechanism for
acting without foresight in a manner which is usually advantageous
biologically. It is partly for this reason that it is so important to
understand the fundamental position of instinct in prompting both animal
and human behaviour.




LECTURE III. DESIRE AND FEELING

Desire is a subject upon which, if I am not mistaken, true views can
only be arrived at by an almost complete reversal of the ordinary
unreflecting opinion. It is natural to regard desire as in its essence
an attitude towards something which is imagined, not actual; this
something is called the END or OBJECT of the desire, and is said to be
the PURPOSE of any action resulting from the desire. We think of the
content of the desire as being just like the content of a belief, while
the attitude taken up towards the content is different. According to
this theory, when we say: "I hope it will rain," or "I expect it will
rain," we express, in the first case, a desire, and in the second, a
belief, with an identical content, namely, the image of rain. It would
be easy to say that, just as belief is one kind of feeling in relation
to this content, so desire is another kind. According to this view, what
comes first in desire is something imagined, with a specific feeling
related to it, namely, that specific feeling which we call "desiring"
it. The discomfort associated with unsatisfied desire, and the actions
which aim at satisfying desire, are, in this view, both of them effects
of the desire. I think it is fair to say that this is a view against
which common sense would not rebel; nevertheless, I believe it to be
radically mistaken. It cannot be refuted logically, but various facts
can be adduced which make it gradually less simple and plausible, until
at last it turns out to be easier to abandon it wholly and look at the
matter in a totally different way.

The first set of facts to be adduced against the common sense view of
desire are those studied by psycho-analysis. In all human beings, but
most markedly in those suffering from hysteria and certain forms of
insanity, we find what are called "unconscious" desires, which are
commonly regarded as showing self-deception. Most psycho-analysts
pay little attention to the analysis of desire, being interested in
discovering by observation what it is that people desire, rather than in
discovering what actually constitutes desire. I think the strangeness of
what they report would be greatly diminished if it were expressed in the
language of a behaviourist theory of desire, rather than in the language
of every-day beliefs. The general description of the sort of phenomena
that bear on our present question is as follows: A person states that
his desires are so-and-so, and that it is these desires that inspire his
actions; but the outside observer perceives that his actions are such
as to realize quite different ends from those which he avows, and
that these different ends are such as he might be expected to desire.
Generally they are less virtuous than his professed desires, and are
therefore less agreeable to profess than these are. It is accordingly
supposed that they really exist as desires for ends, but in a
subconscious part of the mind, which the patient refuses to admit into
consciousness for fear of having to think ill of himself. There are
no doubt many cases to which such a supposition is applicable without
obvious artificiality. But the deeper the Freudians delve into the
underground regions of instinct, the further they travel from anything
resembling conscious desire, and the less possible it becomes to believe
that only positive self-deception conceals from us that we really wish
for things which are abhorrent to our explicit life.

In the cases in question we have a conflict between the outside observer
and the patient's consciousness. The whole tendency of psycho-analysis
is to trust the outside observer rather than the testimony of
introspection. I believe this tendency to be entirely right, but to
demand a re-statement of what constitutes desire, exhibiting it as a
causal law of our actions, not as something actually existing in our
minds.

But let us first get a clearer statement of the essential characteristic
of the phenomena.

A person, we find, states that he desires a certain end A, and that he
is acting with a view to achieving it. We observe, however, that his
actions are such as are likely to achieve a quite different end B, and
that B is the sort of end that often seems to be aimed at by animals and
savages, though civilized people are supposed to have discarded it. We
sometimes find also a whole set of false beliefs, of such a kind as to
persuade the patient that his actions are really a means to A, when in
fact they are a means to B. For example, we have an impulse to inflict
pain upon those whom we hate; we therefore believe that they are wicked,
and that punishment will reform them. This belief enables us to act upon
the impulse to inflict pain, while believing that we are acting upon
the desire to lead sinners to repentance. It is for this reason that the
criminal law has been in all ages more severe than it would have been if
the impulse to ameliorate the criminal had been what really inspired
it. It seems simple to explain such a state of affairs as due to
"self-deception," but this explanation is often mythical. Most people,
in thinking about punishment, have had no more need to hide their
vindictive impulses from themselves than they have had to hide
the exponential theorem. Our impulses are not patent to a casual
observation, but are only to be discovered by a scientific study of our
actions, in the course of which we must regard ourselves as objectively
as we should the motions of the planets or the chemical reactions of a
new element.

The study of animals reinforces this conclusion, and is in many ways
the best preparation for the analysis of desire. In animals we are
not troubled by the disturbing influence of ethical considerations. In
dealing with human beings, we are perpetually distracted by being told
that such-and-such a view is gloomy or cynical or pessimistic: ages of
human conceit have built up such a vast myth as to our wisdom and virtue
that any intrusion of the mere scientific desire to know the facts is
instantly resented by those who cling to comfortable illusions. But no
one cares whether animals are virtuous or not, and no one is under the
delusion that they are rational. Moreover, we do not expect them to be
so "conscious," and are prepared to admit that their instincts prompt
useful actions without any prevision of the ends which they achieve. For
all these reasons, there is much in the analysis of mind which is more
easily discovered by the study of animals than by the observation of
human beings.

We all think that, by watching the behaviour of animals, we can discover
more or less what they desire. If this is the case--and I fully agree
that it is--desire must be capable of being exhibited in actions, for it
is only the actions of animals that we can observe. They MAY have minds
in which all sorts of things take place, but we can know nothing about
their minds except by means of inferences from their actions; and the
more such inferences are examined, the more dubious they appear. It
would seem, therefore, that actions alone must be the test of the
desires of animals. From this it is an easy step to the conclusion that
an animal's desire is nothing but a characteristic of a certain series
of actions, namely, those which would be commonly regarded as inspired
by the desire in question. And when it has been shown that this view
affords a satisfactory account of animal desires, it is not difficult
to see that the same explanation is applicable to the desires of human
beings.

We judge easily from the behaviour of an animal of a familiar
kind whether it is hungry or thirsty, or pleased or displeased, or
inquisitive or terrified. The verification of our judgment, so far
as verification is possible, must be derived from the immediately
succeeding actions of the animal. Most people would say that they infer
first something about the animal's state of mind--whether it is hungry
or thirsty and so on--and thence derive their expectations as to its
subsequent conduct. But this detour through the animal's supposed mind
is wholly unnecessary. We can say simply: The animal's behaviour during
the last minute has had those characteristics which distinguish what
is called "hunger," and it is likely that its actions during the next
minute will be similar in this respect, unless it finds food, or is
interrupted by a stronger impulse, such as fear. An animal which is
hungry is restless, it goes to the places where food is often to be
found, it sniffs with its nose or peers with its eyes or otherwise
increases the sensitiveness of its sense-organs; as soon as it is near
enough to food for its sense-organs to be affected, it goes to it with
all speed and proceeds to eat; after which, if the quantity of food has
been sufficient, its whole demeanour changes it may very likely lie
down and go to sleep. These things and others like them are observable
phenomena distinguishing a hungry animal from one which is not hungry.
The characteristic mark by which we recognize a series of actions
which display hunger is not the animal's mental state, which we cannot
observe, but something in its bodily behaviour; it is this observable
trait in the bodily behaviour that I am proposing to call "hunger,"
not some possibly mythical and certainly unknowable ingredient of the
animal's mind.

Generalizing what occurs in the case of hunger, we may say that what
we call a desire in an animal is always displayed in a cycle of actions
having certain fairly well marked characteristics. There is first a
state of activity, consisting, with qualifications to be mentioned
presently, of movements likely to have a certain result; these
movements, unless interrupted, continue until the result is achieved,
after which there is usually a period of comparative quiescence. A cycle
of actions of this sort has marks by which it is broadly distinguished
from the motions of dead matter. The most notable of these marks
are--(1) the appropriateness of the actions for the realization of a
certain result; (2) the continuance of action until that result has been
achieved. Neither of these can be pressed beyond a point. Either may
be (a) to some extent present in dead matter, and (b) to a considerable
extent absent in animals, while vegetable are intermediate, and display
only a much fainter form of the behaviour which leads us to attribute
desire to animals. (a) One might say rivers "desire" the sea water,
roughly speaking, remains in restless motion until it reaches either
the sea or a place from which it cannot issue without going uphill, and
therefore we might say that this is what it wishes while it is flowing.
We do not say so, because we can account for the behaviour of water by
the laws of physics; and if we knew more about animals, we might equally
cease to attribute desires to them, since we might find physical and
chemical reactions sufficient to account for their behaviour. (b) Many
of the movements of animals do not exhibit the characteristics of the
cycles which seem to embody desire. There are first of all the movements
which are "mechanical," such as slipping and falling, where ordinary
physical forces operate upon the animal's body almost as if it were
dead matter. An animal which falls over a cliff may make a number of
desperate struggles while it is in the air, but its centre of gravity
will move exactly as it would if the animal were dead. In this case, if
the animal is killed at the end of the fall, we have, at first sight,
just the characteristics of a cycle of actions embodying desire, namely,
restless movement until the ground is reached, and then quiescence.
Nevertheless, we feel no temptation to say that the animal desired what
occurred, partly because of the obviously mechanical nature of the whole
occurrence, partly because, when an animal survives a fall, it tends not
to repeat the experience.

There may be other reasons also, but of them I do not wish to speak yet.
Besides mechanical movements, there are interrupted movements, as when
a bird, on its way to eat your best peas, is frightened away by the boy
whom you are employing for that purpose. If interruptions are frequent
and completion of cycles rare, the characteristics by which cycles
are observed may become so blurred as to be almost unrecognizable. The
result of these various considerations is that the differences
between animals and dead matter, when we confine ourselves to external
unscientific observation of integral behaviour, are a matter of degree
and not very precise. It is for this reason that it has always been
possible for fanciful people to maintain that even stocks and stones
have some vague kind of soul. The evidence that animals have souls is
so very shaky that, if it is assumed to be conclusive, one might just as
well go a step further and extend the argument by analogy to all matter.
Nevertheless, in spite of vagueness and doubtful cases, the existence
of cycles in the behaviour of animals is a broad characteristic by which
they are prima facie distinguished from ordinary matter; and I think it
is this characteristic which leads us to attribute desires to animals,
since it makes their behaviour resemble what we do when (as we say) we
are acting from desire.

I shall adopt the following definitions for describing the behaviour of
animals:

A "behaviour-cycle" is a series of voluntary or reflex movements of an
animal, tending to cause a certain result, and continuing until that
result is caused, unless they are interrupted by death, accident,
or some new behaviour-cycle. (Here "accident" may be defined as the
intervention of purely physical laws causing mechanical movements.)

The "purpose" of a behaviour-cycle is the result which brings it to an
end, normally by a condition of temporary quiescence-provided there is
no interruption.

An animal is said to "desire" the purpose of a behaviour cycle while the
behaviour-cycle is in progress.

I believe these definitions to be adequate also to human purposes and
desires, but for the present I am only occupied with animals and with
what can be learnt by external observation. I am very anxious that no
ideas should be attached to the words "purpose" and "desire" beyond
those involved in the above definitions.

We have not so far considered what is the nature of the initial stimulus
to a behaviour-cycle. Yet it is here that the usual view of desire seems
on the strongest ground. The hungry animal goes on making movements
until it gets food; it seems natural, therefore, to suppose that the
idea of food is present throughout the process, and that the thought of
the end to be achieved sets the whole process in motion. Such a view,
however, is obviously untenable in many cases, especially where instinct
is concerned. Take, for example, reproduction and the rearing of the
young. Birds mate, build a nest, lay eggs in it, sit on the eggs, feed
the young birds, and care for them until they are fully grown. It
is totally impossible to suppose that this series of actions, which
constitutes one behaviour-cycle, is inspired by any prevision of the
end, at any rate the first time it is performed.* We must suppose that
the stimulus to the performance of each act is an impulsion from behind,
not an attraction from the future. The bird does what it does, at each
stage, because it has an impulse to that particular action, not because
it perceives that the whole cycle of actions will contribute to the
preservation of the species. The same considerations apply to other
instincts. A hungry animal feels restless, and is led by instinctive
impulses to perform the movements which give it nourishment; but the act
of seeking food is not sufficient evidence from which to conclude that
the animal has the thought of food in its "mind."

     * For evidence as to birds' nests, cf. Semon, "Die Mneme,"
     pp. 209, 210.

Coming now to human beings, and to what we know about our own actions,
it seems clear that what, with us, sets a behaviour-cycle in motion is
some sensation of the sort which we call disagreeable. Take the case
of hunger: we have first an uncomfortable feeling inside, producing a
disinclination to sit still, a sensitiveness to savoury smells, and an
attraction towards any food that there may be in our neighbourhood. At
any moment during this process we may become aware that we are hungry,
in the sense of saying to ourselves, "I am hungry"; but we may have been
acting with reference to food for some time before this moment. While we
are talking or reading, we may eat in complete unconsciousness; but we
perform the actions of eating just as we should if we were conscious,
and they cease when our hunger is appeased. What we call "consciousness"
seems to be a mere spectator of the process; even when it issues orders,
they are usually, like those of a wise parent, just such as would have
been obeyed even if they had not been given. This view may seem at first
exaggerated, but the more our so-called volitions and their causes are
examined, the more it is forced upon us. The part played by words in all
this is complicated, and a potent source of confusions; I shall return
to it later. For the present, I am still concerned with primitive
desire, as it exists in man, but in the form in which man shows his
affinity to his animal ancestors.

Conscious desire is made up partly of what is essential to desire,
partly of beliefs as to what we want. It is important to be clear as to
the part which does not consist of beliefs.

The primitive non-cognitive element in desire seems to be a push, not
a pull, an impulsion away from the actual, rather than an attraction
towards the ideal. Certain sensations and other mental occurrences have
a property which we call discomfort; these cause such bodily movements
as are likely to lead to their cessation. When the discomfort ceases,
or even when it appreciably diminishes, we have sensations possessing a
property which we call PLEASURE. Pleasurable sensations either stimulate
no action at all, or at most stimulate such action as is likely to
prolong them. I shall return shortly to the consideration of what
discomfort and pleasure are in themselves; for the present, it is
their connection with action and desire that concerns us. Abandoning
momentarily the standpoint of behaviourism, we may presume that hungry
animals experience sensations involving discomfort, and stimulating such
movements as seem likely to bring them to the food which is outside the
cages. When they have reached the food and eaten it, their discomfort
ceases and their sensations become pleasurable. It SEEMS, mistakenly, as
if the animals had had this situation in mind throughout, when in fact
they have been continually pushed by discomfort. And when an animal
is reflective, like some men, it comes to think that it had the final
situation in mind throughout; sometimes it comes to know what situation
will bring satisfaction, so that in fact the discomfort does bring the
thought of what will allay it. Nevertheless the sensation involving
discomfort remains the prime mover.

This brings us to the question of the nature of discomfort and pleasure.
Since Kant it has been customary to recognize three great divisions of
mental phenomena, which are typified by knowledge, desire and feeling,
where "feeling" is used to mean pleasure and discomfort. Of course,
"knowledge" is too definite a word: the states of mind concerned are
grouped together as "cognitive," and are to embrace not only beliefs,
but perceptions, doubts, and the understanding of concepts. "Desire,"
also, is narrower than what is intended: for example, WILL is to be
included in this category, and in fact every thing that involves any
kind of striving, or "conation" as it is technically called. I do not
myself believe that there is any value in this threefold division of the
contents of mind. I believe that sensations (including images) supply
all the "stuff" of the mind, and that everything else can be analysed
into groups of sensations related in various ways, or characteristics of
sensations or of groups of sensations. As regards belief, I shall give
grounds for this view in later lectures. As regards desires, I have
given some grounds in this lecture. For the present, it is pleasure and
discomfort that concern us. There are broadly three theories that might
be held in regard to them. We may regard them as separate existing
items in those who experience them, or we may regard them as intrinsic
qualities of sensations and other mental occurrences, or we may regard
them as mere names for the causal characteristics of the occurrences
which are uncomfortable or pleasant. The first of these theories,
namely, that which regards discomfort and pleasure as actual contents in
those who experience them, has, I think, nothing conclusive to be said
in its favour.* It is suggested chiefly by an ambiguity in the word
"pain," which has misled many people, including Berkeley, whom it
supplied with one of his arguments for subjective idealism. We may use
"pain" as the opposite of "pleasure," and "painful" as the opposite of
"pleasant," or we may use "pain" to mean a certain sort of sensation, on
a level with the sensations of heat and cold and touch. The latter use
of the word has prevailed in psychological literature, and it is now
no longer used as the opposite of "pleasure." Dr. H. Head, in a recent
publication, has stated this distinction as follows:**

     * Various arguments in its favour are advanced by A.
     Wohlgemuth, "On the feelings and their neural correlate,
     with an examination of the nature of pain," "British Journal
     of Psychology," viii, 4. (1917). But as these arguments are
     largely a reductio ad absurdum of other theories, among
     which that which I am advocating is not included, I cannot
     regard them as establishing their contention.

     ** "Sensation and the Cerebral Cortex," "Brain," vol. xli,
     part ii (September, 1918), p. 90. Cf. also Wohlgemuth, loc.
     cit. pp. 437, 450.

"It is necessary at the outset to distinguish clearly between
'discomfort' and 'pain.' Pain is a distinct sensory quality equivalent
to heat and cold, and its intensity can be roughly graded according to
the force expended in stimulation. Discomfort, on the other hand,
is that feeling-tone which is directly opposed to pleasure. It may
accompany sensations not in themselves essentially painful; as for
instance that produced by tickling the sole of the foot. The reaction
produced by repeated pricking contains both these elements; for it
evokes that sensory quality known as pain, accompanied by a disagreeable
feeling-tone, which we have called discomfort. On the other hand,
excessive pressure, except when applied directly over some nerve-trunk,
tends to excite more discomfort than pain."

The confusion between discomfort and pain has made people regard
discomfort as a more substantial thing than it is, and this in turn has
reacted upon the view taken of pleasure, since discomfort and pleasure
are evidently on a level in this respect. As soon as discomfort is
clearly distinguished from the sensation of pain, it becomes more
natural to regard discomfort and pleasure as properties of mental
occurrences than to regard them as separate mental occurrences on their
own account. I shall therefore dismiss the view that they are separate
mental occurrences, and regard them as properties of such experiences as
would be called respectively uncomfortable and pleasant.

It remains to be examined whether they are actual qualities of such
occurrences, or are merely differences as to causal properties. I do not
myself see any way of deciding this question; either view seems equally
capable of accounting for the facts. If this is true, it is safer to
avoid the assumption that there are such intrinsic qualities of
mental occurrences as are in question, and to assume only the causal
differences which are undeniable. Without condemning the intrinsic
theory, we can define discomfort and pleasure as consisting in causal
properties, and say only what will hold on either of the two theories.
Following this course, we shall say:

"Discomfort" is a property of a sensation or other mental occurrence,
consisting in the fact that the occurrence in question stimulates
voluntary or reflex movements tending to produce some more or less
definite change involving the cessation of the occurrence.

"Pleasure" is a property of a sensation or other mental occurrence,
consisting in the fact that the occurrence in question either does not
stimulate any voluntary or reflex movement, or, if it does, stimulates
only such as tend to prolong the occurrence in question.*

     * Cf. Thorndike, op. cit., p. 243.

"Conscious" desire, which we have now to consider, consists of desire
in the sense hitherto discussed, together with a true belief as to its
"purpose," i.e. as to the state of affairs that will bring quiescence
with cessation of the discomfort. If our theory of desire is correct,
a belief as to its purpose may very well be erroneous, since only
experience can show what causes a discomfort to cease. When the
experience needed is common and simple, as in the case of hunger, a
mistake is not very probable. But in other cases--e.g. erotic desire in
those who have had little or no experience of its satisfaction--mistakes
are to be expected, and do in fact very often occur. The practice of
inhibiting impulses, which is to a great extent necessary to civilized
life, makes mistakes easier, by preventing experience of the actions to
which a desire would otherwise lead, and by often causing the inhibited
impulses themselves to be unnoticed or quickly forgotten. The perfectly
natural mistakes which thus arise constitute a large proportion of what
is, mistakenly in part, called self-deception, and attributed by Freud
to the "censor."

But there is a further point which needs emphasizing, namely, that a
belief that something is desired has often a tendency to cause the very
desire that is believed in. It is this fact that makes the effect of
"consciousness" on desire so complicated.

When we believe that we desire a certain state of affairs, that often
tends to cause a real desire for it. This is due partly to the influence
of words upon our emotions, in rhetoric for example, and partly to the
general fact that discomfort normally belongs to the belief that we
desire such-and-such a thing that we do not possess. Thus what was
originally a false opinion as to the object of a desire acquires a
certain truth: the false opinion generates a secondary subsidiary
desire, which nevertheless becomes real. Let us take an illustration.
Suppose you have been jilted in a way which wounds your vanity. Your
natural impulsive desire will be of the sort expressed in Donne's poem:

     When by thy scorn, O Murderess, I am dead,

in which he explains how he will haunt the poor lady as a ghost, and
prevent her from enjoying a moment's peace. But two things stand in
the way of your expressing yourself so naturally: on the one hand, your
vanity, which will not acknowledge how hard you are hit; on the other
hand, your conviction that you are a civilized and humane person,
who could not possibly indulge so crude a desire as revenge. You will
therefore experience a restlessness which will at first seem quite
aimless, but will finally resolve itself in a conscious desire to change
your profession, or go round the world, or conceal your identity and
live in Putney, like Arnold Bennett's hero. Although the prime cause of
this desire is a false judgment as to your previous unconscious desire,
yet the new conscious desire has its own derivative genuineness, and may
influence your actions to the extent of sending you round the world.
The initial mistake, however, will have effects of two kinds. First,
in uncontrolled moments, under the influence of sleepiness or drink
or delirium, you will say things calculated to injure the faithless
deceiver. Secondly, you will find travel disappointing, and the East
less fascinating than you had hoped--unless, some day, you hear that the
wicked one has in turn been jilted. If this happens, you will believe
that you feel sincere sympathy, but you will suddenly be much more
delighted than before with the beauties of tropical islands or the
wonders of Chinese art. A secondary desire, derived from a false
judgment as to a primary desire, has its own power of influencing
action, and is therefore a real desire according to our definition.
But it has not the same power as a primary desire of bringing thorough
satisfaction when it is realized; so long as the primary desire remains
unsatisfied, restlessness continues in spite of the secondary desire's
success. Hence arises a belief in the vanity of human wishes: the vain
wishes are those that are secondary, but mistaken beliefs prevent us
from realizing that they are secondary.

What may, with some propriety, be called self-deception arises through
the operation of desires for beliefs. We desire many things which it is
not in our power to achieve: that we should be universally popular and
admired, that our work should be the wonder of the age, and that the
universe should be so ordered as to bring ultimate happiness to all,
though not to our enemies until they have repented and been purified
by suffering. Such desires are too large to be achieved through our own
efforts. But it is found that a considerable portion of the satisfaction
which these things would bring us if they were realized is to be
achieved by the much easier operation of believing that they are or
will be realized. This desire for beliefs, as opposed to desire for the
actual facts, is a particular case of secondary desire, and, like all
secondary desire its satisfaction does not lead to a complete cessation
of the initial discomfort. Nevertheless, desire for beliefs, as opposed
to desire for facts, is exceedingly potent both individually and
socially. According to the form of belief desired, it is called vanity,
optimism, or religion. Those who have sufficient power usually imprison
or put to death any one who tries to shake their faith in their own
excellence or in that of the universe; it is for this reason that
seditious libel and blasphemy have always been, and still are, criminal
offences.

It is very largely through desires for beliefs that the primitive
nature of desire has become so hidden, and that the part played by
consciousness has been so confusing and so exaggerated.

We may now summarize our analysis of desire and feeling.

A mental occurrence of any kind--sensation, image, belief, or
emotion--may be a cause of a series of actions, continuing, unless
interrupted, until some more or less definite state of affairs is
realized. Such a series of actions we call a "behaviour-cycle." The
degree of definiteness may vary greatly: hunger requires only food in
general, whereas the sight of a particular piece of food raises a desire
which requires the eating of that piece of food. The property of causing
such a cycle of occurrences is called "discomfort"; the property of the
mental occurrences in which the cycle ends is called "pleasure." The
actions constituting the cycle must not be purely mechanical, i.e. they
must be bodily movements in whose causation the special properties
of nervous tissue are involved. The cycle ends in a condition of
quiescence, or of such action as tends only to preserve the status quo.
The state of affairs in which this condition of quiescence is achieved
is called the "purpose" of the cycle, and the initial mental occurrence
involving discomfort is called a "desire" for the state of affairs that
brings quiescence. A desire is called "conscious" when it is accompanied
by a true belief as to the state of affairs that will bring quiescence;
otherwise it is called "unconscious." All primitive desire is
unconscious, and in human beings beliefs as to the purposes of desires
are often mistaken. These mistaken beliefs generate secondary desires,
which cause various interesting complications in the psychology of human
desire, without fundamentally altering the character which it shares
with animal desire.




LECTURE IV. INFLUENCE OF PAST HISTORY ON PRESENT OCCURRENCES IN LIVING
ORGANISMS

In this lecture we shall be concerned with a very general characteristic
which broadly, though not absolutely, distinguishes the behaviour
of living organisms from that of dead matter. The characteristic in
question is this:

The response of an organism to a given stimulus is very often dependent
upon the past history of the organism, and not merely upon the stimulus
and the HITHERTO DISCOVERABLE present state of the organism.

This characteristic is embodied in the saying "a burnt child fears the
fire." The burn may have left no visible traces, yet it modifies the
reaction of the child in the presence of fire. It is customary to assume
that, in such cases, the past operates by modifying the structure of the
brain, not directly. I have no wish to suggest that this hypothesis is
false; I wish only to point out that it is a hypothesis. At the end of
the present lecture I shall examine the grounds in its favour. If we
confine ourselves to facts which have been actually observed, we must
say that past occurrences, in addition to the present stimulus and
the present ascertainable condition of the organism, enter into the
causation of the response.

The characteristic is not wholly confined to living organisms. For
example, magnetized steel looks just like steel which has not been
magnetized, but its behaviour is in some ways different. In the case
of dead matter, however, such phenomena are less frequent and important
than in the case of living organisms, and it is far less difficult
to invent satisfactory hypotheses as to the microscopic changes of
structure which mediate between the past occurrence and the present
changed response. In the case of living organisms, practically
everything that is distinctive both of their physical and of their
mental behaviour is bound up with this persistent influence of the past.
Further, speaking broadly, the change in response is usually of a kind
that is biologically advantageous to the organism.

Following a suggestion derived from Semon ("Die Mneme," Leipzig, 1904;
2nd edition, 1908, English translation, Allen & Unwin, 1921; "Die
mnemischen Empfindungen," Leipzig, 1909), we will give the name of
"mnemic phenomena" to those responses of an organism which, so far as
hitherto observed facts are concerned, can only be brought under causal
laws by including past occurrences in the history of the organism as
part of the causes of the present response. I do not mean merely--what
would always be the case--that past occurrences are part of a CHAIN of
causes leading to the present event. I mean that, in attempting to state
the PROXIMATE cause of the present event, some past event or events
must be included, unless we take refuge in hypothetical modifications of
brain structure. For example: you smell peat-smoke, and you recall some
occasion when you smelt it before. The cause of your recollection, so
far as hitherto observable phenomena are concerned, consists both
of the peat smoke (present stimulus) and of the former occasion (past
experience). The same stimulus will not produce the same recollection
in another man who did not share your former experience, although the
former experience left no OBSERVABLE traces in the structure of the
brain. According to the maxim "same cause, same effect," we cannot
therefore regard the peat-smoke alone as the cause of your recollection,
since it does not have the same effect in other cases. The cause of
your recollection must be both the peat-smoke and the past occurrence.
Accordingly your recollection is an instance of what we are calling
"mnemic phenomena."

Before going further, it will be well to give illustrations of different
classes of mnemic phenomena.

(a) ACQUIRED HABITS.--In Lecture II we saw how animals can learn by
experience how to get out of cages or mazes, or perform other actions
which are useful to them but not provided for by their instincts alone.
A cat which is put into a cage of which it has had experience behaves
differently from the way in which it behaved at first. We can easily
invent hypotheses, which are quite likely to be true, as to connections
in the brain caused by past experience, and themselves causing the
different response. But the observable fact is that the stimulus of
being in the cage produces differing results with repetition, and that
the ascertainable cause of the cat's behaviour is not merely the cage
and its own ascertainable organization, but also its past history
in regard to the cage. From our present point of view, the matter is
independent of the question whether the cat's behaviour is due to some
mental fact called "knowledge," or displays a merely bodily habit. Our
habitual knowledge is not always in our minds, but is called up by the
appropriate stimuli. If we are asked "What is the capital of France?"
we answer "Paris," because of past experience; the past experience is as
essential as the present question in the causation of our response. Thus
all our habitual knowledge consists of acquired habits, and comes under
the head of mnemic phenomena.

(b) IMAGES.--I shall have much to say about images in a later lecture;
for the present I am merely concerned with them in so far as they are
"copies" of past sensations. When you hear New York spoken of, some
image probably comes into your mind, either of the place itself (if you
have been there), or of some picture of it (if you have not). The image
is due to your past experience, as well as to the present stimulus of
the words "New York." Similarly, the images you have in dreams are
all dependent upon your past experience, as well as upon the present
stimulus to dreaming. It is generally believed that all images, in their
simpler parts, are copies of sensations; if so, their mnemic character
is evident. This is important, not only on its own account, but also
because, as we shall see later, images play an essential part in what is
called "thinking."

(c) ASSOCIATION.--The broad fact of association, on the mental side, is
that when we experience something which we have experienced before,
it tends to call up the context of the former experience. The smell of
peat-smoke recalling a former scene is an instance which we discussed a
moment ago. This is obviously a mnemic phenomenon. There is also a more
purely physical association, which is indistinguishable from physical
habit. This is the kind studied by Mr. Thorndike in animals, where a
certain stimulus is associated with a certain act. This is the sort
which is taught to soldiers in drilling, for example. In such a case
there need not be anything mental, but merely a habit of the body.
There is no essential distinction between association and habit, and the
observations which we made concerning habit as a mnemic phenomenon are
equally applicable to association.

(d) NON-SENSATIONAL ELEMENTS IN PERCEPTION.--When we perceive any object
of a familiar kind, much of what appears subjectively to be immediately
given is really derived from past experience. When we see an object, say
a penny, we seem to be aware of its "real" shape we have the impression
of something circular, not of something elliptical. In learning to draw,
it is necessary to acquire the art of representing things according
to the sensation, not according to the perception. And the visual
appearance is filled out with feeling of what the object would be like
to touch, and so on. This filling out and supplying of the "real" shape
and so on consists of the most usual correlates of the sensational core
in our perception. It may happen that, in the particular case, the real
correlates are unusual; for example, if what we are seeing is a
carpet made to look like tiles. If so, the non-sensational part of our
perception will be illusory, i.e. it will supply qualities which the
object in question does not in fact have. But as a rule objects do
have the qualities added by perception, which is to be expected,
since experience of what is usual is the cause of the addition. If our
experience had been different, we should not fill out sensation in
the same way, except in so far as the filling out is instinctive,
not acquired. It would seem that, in man, all that makes up space
perception, including the correlation of sight and touch and so on, is
almost entirely acquired. In that case there is a large mnemic element
in all the common perceptions by means of which we handle common
objects. And, to take another kind of instance, imagine what our
astonishment would be if we were to hear a cat bark or a dog mew. This
emotion would be dependent upon past experience, and would therefore be
a mnemic phenomenon according to the definition.

(e) MEMORY AS KNOWLEDGE.--The kind of memory of which I am now speaking
is definite knowledge of some past event in one's own experience.
From time to time we remember things that have happened to us, because
something in the present reminds us of them. Exactly the same present
fact would not call up the same memory if our past experience had been
different. Thus our remembering is caused by--

(1) The present stimulus,

(2) The past occurrence.

It is therefore a mnemic phenomenon according to our definition. A
definition of "mnemic phenomena" which did not include memory would,
of course, be a bad one. The point of the definition is not that it
includes memory, but that it includes it as one of a class of phenomena
which embrace all that is characteristic in the subject matter of
psychology.

(f) EXPERIENCE.--The word "experience" is often used very vaguely.
James, as we saw, uses it to cover the whole primal stuff of the world,
but this usage seems objection able, since, in a purely physical world,
things would happen without there being any experience. It is only
mnemic phenomena that embody experience. We may say that an animal
"experiences" an occurrence when this occurrence modifies the animal's
subsequent behaviour, i.e. when it is the mnemic portion of the cause of
future occurrences in the animal's life. The burnt child that fears the
fire has "experienced" the fire, whereas a stick that has been thrown on
and taken off again has not "experienced" anything, since it offers
no more resistance than before to being thrown on. The essence of
"experience" is the modification of behaviour produced by what is
experienced. We might, in fact, define one chain of experience, or one
biography, as a series of occurrences linked by mnemic causation. I
think it is this characteristic, more than any other, that distinguishes
sciences dealing with living organisms from physics.

The best writer on mnemic phenomena known to me is Richard Semon, the
fundamental part of whose theory I shall endeavour to summarize before
going further:

When an organism, either animal or plant, is subjected to a stimulus,
producing in it some state of excitement, the removal of the stimulus
allows it to return to a condition of equilibrium. But the new state
of equilibrium is different from the old, as may be seen by the changed
capacity for reaction. The state of equilibrium before the stimulus may
be called the "primary indifference-state"; that after the cessation
of the stimulus, the "secondary indifference-state." We define the
"engraphic effect" of a stimulus as the effect in making a difference
between the primary and secondary indifference-states, and this
difference itself we define as the "engram" due to the stimulus. "Mnemic
phenomena" are defined as those due to engrams; in animals, they are
specially associated with the nervous system, but not exclusively, even
in man.

When two stimuli occur together, one of them, occurring afterwards,
may call out the reaction for the other also. We call this an "ekphoric
influence," and stimuli having this character are called "ekphoric
stimuli." In such a case we call the engrams of the two stimuli
"associated." All simultaneously generated engrams are associated; there
is also association of successively aroused engrams, though this is
reducible to simultaneous association. In fact, it is not an isolated
stimulus that leaves an engram, but the totality of the stimuli at any
moment; consequently any portion of this totality tends, if it recurs,
to arouse the whole reaction which was aroused before. Semon holds that
engrams can be inherited, and that an animal's innate habits may be due
to the experience of its ancestors; on this subject he refers to Samuel
Butler.

Semon formulates two "mnemic principles." The first, or "Law of
Engraphy," is as follows: "All simultaneous excitements in an organism
form a connected simultaneous excitement-complex, which as such works
engraphically, i.e. leaves behind a connected engram-complex, which
in so far forms a whole" ("Die mnemischen Empfindungen," p. 146).
The second mnemic principle, or "Law of Ekphory," is as follows:
"The partial return of the energetic situation which formerly worked
engraphically operates ekphorically on a simultaneous engram-complex"
(ib., p. 173). These two laws together represent in part a hypothesis
(the engram), and in part an observable fact. The observable fact is
that, when a certain complex of stimuli has originally caused a certain
complex of reactions, the recurrence of part of the stimuli tends to
cause the recurrence of the whole of the reactions.

Semon's applications of his fundamental ideas in various directions are
interesting and ingenious. Some of them will concern us later, but for
the present it is the fundamental character of mnemic phenomena that is
in question.

Concerning the nature of an engram, Semon confesses that at present it
is impossible to say more than that it must consist in some material
alteration in the body of the organism ("Die mnemischen Empfindungen,"
p. 376). It is, in fact, hypothetical, invoked for theoretical uses, and
not an outcome of direct observation. No doubt physiology, especially
the disturbances of memory through lesions in the brain, affords grounds
for this hypothesis; nevertheless it does remain a hypothesis, the
validity of which will be discussed at the end of this lecture.

I am inclined to think that, in the present state of physiology, the
introduction of the engram does not serve to simplify the account of
mnemic phenomena. We can, I think, formulate the known laws of such
phenomena in terms, wholly, of observable facts, by recognizing
provisionally what we may call "mnemic causation." By this I mean that
kind of causation of which I spoke at the beginning of this lecture,
that kind, namely, in which the proximate cause consists not merely of a
present event, but of this together with a past event. I do not wish to
urge that this form of causation is ultimate, but that, in the present
state of our knowledge, it affords a simplification, and enables us
to state laws of behaviour in less hypothetical terms than we should
otherwise have to employ.

The clearest instance of what I mean is recollection of a past event.
What we observe is that certain present stimuli lead us to recollect
certain occurrences, but that at times when we are not recollecting
them, there is nothing discoverable in our minds that could be called
memory of them. Memories, as mental facts, arise from time to time,
but do not, so far as we can see, exist in any shape while they are
"latent." In fact, when we say that they are "latent," we mean merely
that they will exist under certain circumstances. If, then, there is
to be some standing difference between the person who can remember a
certain fact and the person who cannot, that standing difference must
be, not in anything mental, but in the brain. It is quite probable that
there is such a difference in the brain, but its nature is unknown and
it remains hypothetical. Everything that has, so far, been made matter
of observation as regards this question can be put together in the
statement: When a certain complex of sensations has occurred to a man,
the recurrence of part of the complex tends to arouse the recollection
of the whole. In like manner, we can collect all mnemic phenomena in
living organisms under a single law, which contains what is hitherto
verifiable in Semon's two laws. This single law is:

IF A COMPLEX STIMULUS A HAS CAUSED A COMPLEX REACTION B IN AN ORGANISM,
THE OCCURRENCE OF A PART OF A ON A FUTURE OCCASION TENDS TO CAUSE THE
WHOLE REACTION B.

This law would need to be supplemented by some account of the influence
of frequency, and so on; but it seems to contain the essential
characteristic of mnemic phenomena, without admixture of anything
hypothetical.

Whenever the effect resulting from a stimulus to an organism differs
according to the past history of the organism, without our being able
actually to detect any relevant difference in its present structure,
we will speak of "mnemic causation," provided we can discover laws
embodying the influence of the past. In ordinary physical causation,
as it appears to common sense, we have approximate uniformities of
sequence, such as "lightning is followed by thunder," "drunkenness
is followed by headache," and so on. None of these sequences are
theoretically invariable, since something may intervene to disturb
them. In order to obtain invariable physical laws, we have to proceed to
differential equations, showing the direction of change at each moment,
not the integral change after a finite interval, however short. But
for the purposes of daily life many sequences are to all in tents and
purposes invariable. With the behaviour of human beings, however, this
is by no means the case. If you say to an Englishman, "You have a smut
on your nose," he will proceed to remove it, but there will be no such
effect if you say the same thing to a Frenchman who knows no English.
The effect of words upon the hearer is a mnemic phenomena, since it
depends upon the past experience which gave him understanding of the
words. If there are to be purely psychological causal laws, taking no
account of the brain and the rest of the body, they will have to be of
the form, not "X now causes Y now," but--

"A, B, C,... in the past, together with X now, cause Y now." For it
cannot be successfully maintained that our understanding of a word, for
example, is an actual existent content of the mind at times when we
are not thinking of the word. It is merely what may be called a
"disposition," i.e. it is capable of being aroused whenever we hear the
word or happen to think of it. A "disposition" is not something actual,
but merely the mnemic portion of a mnemic causal law.

In such a law as "A, B, C,... in the past, together with X now, cause
Y now," we will call A, B, C,... the mnemic cause, X the occasion or
stimulus, and Y the reaction. All cases in which experience influences
behaviour are instances of mnemic causation.

Believers in psycho-physical parallelism hold that psychology can
theoretically be freed entirely from all dependence on physiology or
physics. That is to say, they believe that every psychical event has
a psychical cause and a physical concomitant. If there is to be
parallelism, it is easy to prove by mathematical logic that the
causation in physical and psychical matters must be of the same sort,
and it is impossible that mnemic causation should exist in psychology
but not in physics. But if psychology is to be independent of
physiology, and if physiology can be reduced to physics, it would seem
that mnemic causation is essential in psychology. Otherwise we shall be
compelled to believe that all our knowledge, all our store of images
and memories, all our mental habits, are at all times existing in some
latent mental form, and are not merely aroused by the stimuli which lead
to their display. This is a very difficult hypothesis. It seems to me
that if, as a matter of method rather than metaphysics, we desire to
obtain as much independence for psychology as is practically feasible,
we shall do better to accept mnemic causation in psychology protem,
and therefore reject parallelism, since there is no good ground for
admitting mnemic causation in physics.

It is perhaps worth while to observe that mnemic causation is what led
Bergson to deny that there is causation at all in the psychical sphere.
He points out, very truly, that the same stimulus, repeated, does not
have the same consequences, and he argues that this is contrary to the
maxim, "same cause, same effect." It is only necessary, however, to take
account of past occurrences and include them with the cause, in order
to re-establish the maxim, and the possibility of psychological causal
laws. The metaphysical conception of a cause lingers in our manner of
viewing causal laws: we want to be able to FEEL a connection between
cause and effect, and to be able to imagine the cause as "operating."
This makes us unwilling to regard causal laws as MERELY observed
uniformities of sequence; yet that is all that science has to offer.
To ask why such-and-such a kind of sequence occurs is either to ask a
meaningless question, or to demand some more general kind of sequence
which includes the one in question. The widest empirical laws of
sequence known at any time can only be "explained" in the sense of being
subsumed by later discoveries under wider laws; but these wider laws,
until they in turn are subsumed, will remain brute facts, resting solely
upon observation, not upon some supposed inherent rationality.

There is therefore no a priori objection to a causal law in which part
of the cause has ceased to exist. To argue against such a law on the
ground that what is past cannot operate now, is to introduce the old
metaphysical notion of cause, for which science can find no place. The
only reason that could be validly alleged against mnemic causation would
be that, in fact, all the phenomena can be explained without it. They
are explained without it by Semon's "engram," or by any theory which
regards the results of experience as embodied in modifications of
the brain and nerves. But they are not explained, unless with extreme
artificiality, by any theory which regards the latent effects of
experience as psychical rather than physical. Those who desire to make
psychology as far as possible independent of physiology would do well,
it seems to me, if they adopted mnemic causation. For my part, however,
I have no such desire, and I shall therefore endeavour to state the
grounds which occur to me in favour of some such view as that of the
"engram."

One of the first points to be urged is that mnemic phenomena are just
as much to be found in physiology as in psychology. They are even to
be found in plants, as Sir Francis Darwin pointed out (cf. Semon, "Die
Mneme," 2nd edition, p. 28 n.). Habit is a characteristic of the body
at least as much as of the mind. We should, therefore, be compelled
to allow the intrusion of mnemic causation, if admitted at all, into
non-psychological regions, which ought, one feels, to be subject only to
causation of the ordinary physical sort. The fact is that a great deal
of what, at first sight, distinguishes psychology from physics is found,
on examination, to be common to psychology and physiology; this whole
question of the influence of experience is a case in point. Now it
is possible, of course, to take the view advocated by Professor J. S.
Haldane, who contends that physiology is not theoretically reducible to
physics and chemistry.* But the weight of opinion among physiologists
appears to be against him on this point; and we ought certainly to
require very strong evidence before admitting any such breach of
continuity as between living and dead matter. The argument from the
existence of mnemic phenomena in physiology must therefore be allowed a
certain weight against the hypothesis that mnemic causation is ultimate.

     * See his "The New Physiology and Other Addresses," Griffin,
     1919, also the symposium, "Are Physical, Biological and
     Psychological Categories Irreducible?" in "Life and Finite
     Individuality," edited for the Aristotelian Society, with an
     Introduction. By H. Wildon Carr, Williams & Norgate, 1918.

The argument from the connection of brain-lesions with loss of memory is
not so strong as it looks, though it has also, some weight. What we
know is that memory, and mnemic phenomena generally, can be disturbed or
destroyed by changes in the brain. This certainly proves that the brain
plays an essential part in the causation of memory, but does not prove
that a certain state of the brain is, by itself, a sufficient condition
for the existence of memory. Yet it is this last that has to be proved.
The theory of the engram, or any similar theory, has to maintain that,
given a body and brain in a suitable state, a man will have a certain
memory, without the need of any further conditions. What is known,
however, is only that he will not have memories if his body and brain
are not in a suitable state. That is to say, the appropriate state
of body and brain is proved to be necessary for memory, but not to be
sufficient. So far, therefore, as our definite knowledge goes, memory
may require for its causation a past occurrence as well as a certain
present state of the brain.

In order to prove conclusively that mnemic phenomena arise whenever
certain physiological conditions are fulfilled, we ought to be able
actually to see differences between the brain of a man who speaks
English and that of a man who speaks French, between the brain of a man
who has seen New York and can recall it, and that of a man who has never
seen that city. It may be that the time will come when this will be
possible, but at present we are very far removed from it. At present,
there is, so far as I am aware, no good evidence that every difference
between the knowledge possessed by A and that possessed by B is
paralleled by some difference in their brains. We may believe that
this is the case, but if we do, our belief is based upon analogies
and general scientific maxims, not upon any foundation of detailed
observation. I am myself inclined, as a working hypothesis, to adopt
the belief in question, and to hold that past experience only affects
present behaviour through modifications of physiological structure. But
the evidence seems not quite conclusive, so that I do not think we ought
to forget the other hypothesis, or to reject entirely the possibility
that mnemic causation may be the ultimate explanation of mnemic
phenomena. I say this, not because I think it LIKELY that mnemic
causation is ultimate, but merely because I think it POSSIBLE, and
because it often turns out important to the progress of science to
remember hypotheses which have previously seemed improbable.




LECTURE V. PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PHYSICAL CAUSAL LAWS

The traditional conception of cause and effect is one which modern
science shows to be fundamentally erroneous, and requiring to be
replaced by a quite different notion, that of LAWS OF CHANGE. In the
traditional conception, a particular event A caused a particular event
B, and by this it was implied that, given any event B, some earlier
event A could be discovered which had a relation to it, such that--

(1) Whenever A occurred, it was followed by B;

(2) In this sequence, there was something "necessary," not a mere de
facto occurrence of A first and then B.

The second point is illustrated by the old discussion as to whether
it can be said that day causes night, on the ground that day is always
followed by night. The orthodox answer was that day could not be called
the cause of night, because it would not be followed by night if the
earth's rotation were to cease, or rather to grow so slow that one
complete rotation would take a year. A cause, it was held, must be such
that under no conceivable circumstances could it fail to be followed by
its effect.

As a matter of fact, such sequences as were sought by believers in the
traditional form of causation have not so far been found in nature.
Everything in nature is apparently in a state of continuous change,* so
that what we call one "event" turns out to be really a process. If this
event is to cause another event, the two will have to be contiguous in
time; for if there is any interval between them, something may happen
during that interval to prevent the expected effect. Cause and effect,
therefore, will have to be temporally contiguous processes. It is
difficult to believe, at any rate where physical laws are concerned,
that the earlier part of the process which is the cause can make any
difference to the effect, so long as the later part of the process which
is the cause remains unchanged. Suppose, for example, that a man dies
of arsenic poisoning, we say that his taking arsenic was the cause
of death. But clearly the process by which he acquired the arsenic
is irrelevant: everything that happened before he swallowed it may be
ignored, since it cannot alter the effect except in so far as it alters
his condition at the moment of taking the dose. But we may go further:
swallowing arsenic is not really the proximate cause of death, since a
man might be shot through the head immediately after taking the dose,
and then it would not be of arsenic that he would die. The arsenic
produces certain physiological changes, which take a finite time before
they end in death. The earlier parts of these changes can be ruled out
in the same way as we can rule out the process by which the arsenic was
acquired. Proceeding in this way, we can shorten the process which we
are calling the cause more and more. Similarly we shall have to shorten
the effect. It may happen that immediately after the man's death his
body is blown to pieces by a bomb. We cannot say what will happen after
the man's death, through merely knowing that he has died as the result
of arsenic poisoning. Thus, if we are to take the cause as one event and
the effect as another, both must be shortened indefinitely. The result
is that we merely have, as the embodiment of our causal law, a certain
direction of change at each moment. Hence we are brought to differential
equations as embodying causal laws. A physical law does not say "A will
be followed by B," but tells us what acceleration a particle will have
under given circumstances, i.e. it tells us how the particle's motion is
changing at each moment, not where the particle will be at some future
moment.

     * The theory of quanta suggests that the continuity is only
     apparent. If so, we shall be able theoretically to reach
     events which are not processes. But in what is directly
     observable there is still apparent continuity, which
     justifies the above remarks for the prevent.

Laws embodied in differential equations may possibly be exact,
but cannot be known to be so. All that we can know empirically is
approximate and liable to exceptions; the exact laws that are assumed in
physics are known to be somewhere near the truth, but are not known to
be true just as they stand. The laws that we actually know empirically
have the form of the traditional causal laws, except that they are not
to be regarded as universal or necessary. "Taking arsenic is followed by
death" is a good empirical generalization; it may have exceptions, but
they will be rare. As against the professedly exact laws of physics,
such empirical generalizations have the advantage that they deal with
observable phenomena. We cannot observe infinitesimals, whether in time
or space; we do not even know whether time and space are infinitely
divisible. Therefore rough empirical generalizations have a definite
place in science, in spite of not being exact of universal. They are the
data for more exact laws, and the grounds for believing that they are
USUALLY true are stronger than the grounds for believing that the more
exact laws are ALWAYS true.

Science starts, therefore, from generalizations of the form, "A is
usually followed by B." This is the nearest approach that can be made
to a causal law of the traditional sort. It may happen in any particular
instance that A is ALWAYS followed by B, but we cannot know this, since
we cannot foresee all the perfectly possible circumstances that might
make the sequence fail, or know that none of them will actually occur.
If, however, we know of a very large number of cases in which A is
followed by B, and few or none in which the sequence fails, we shall in
PRACTICE be justified in saying "A causes B," provided we do not attach
to the notion of cause any of the metaphysical superstitions that have
gathered about the word.

There is another point, besides lack of universality and necessity,
which it is important to realize as regards causes in the above sense,
and that is the lack of uniqueness. It is generally assumed that, given
any event, there is some one phenomenon which is THE cause of the event
in question. This seems to be a mere mistake. Cause, in the only
sense in which it can be practically applied, means "nearly invariable
antecedent." We cannot in practice obtain an antecedent which is QUITE
invariable, for this would require us to take account of the whole
universe, since something not taken account of may prevent the expected
effect. We cannot distinguish, among nearly invariable antecedents, one
as THE cause, and the others as merely its concomitants: the attempt to
do this depends upon a notion of cause which is derived from will, and
will (as we shall see later) is not at all the sort of thing that it is
generally supposed to be, nor is there any reason to think that in the
physical world there is anything even remotely analogous to what will is
supposed to be. If we could find one antecedent, and only one, that was
QUITE invariable, we could call that one THE cause without introducing
any notion derived from mistaken ideas about will. But in fact we cannot
find any antecedent that we know to be quite invariable, and we can find
many that are nearly so. For example, men leave a factory for dinner
when the hooter sounds at twelve o'clock. You may say the hooter is
THE cause of their leaving. But innumerable other hooters in other
factories, which also always sound at twelve o'clock, have just as
good a right to be called the cause. Thus every event has many nearly
invariable antecedents, and therefore many antecedents which may be
called its cause.

The laws of traditional physics, in the form in which they deal with
movements of matter or electricity, have an apparent simplicity which
somewhat conceals the empirical character of what they assert. A piece
of matter, as it is known empirically, is not a single existing thing,
but a system of existing things. When several people simultaneously see
the same table, they all see something different; therefore "the" table,
which they are supposed all to see, must be either a hypothesis or
a construction. "The" table is to be neutral as between different
observers: it does not favour the aspect seen by one man at the expense
of that seen by another. It was natural, though to my mind mistaken, to
regard the "real" table as the common cause of all the appearances which
the table presents (as we say) to different observers. But why should we
suppose that there is some one common cause of all these appearances? As
we have just seen, the notion of "cause" is not so reliable as to allow
us to infer the existence of something that, by its very nature, can
never be observed.

Instead of looking for an impartial source, we can secure neutrality by
the equal representation of all parties. Instead of supposing that there
is some unknown cause, the "real" table, behind the different sensations
of those who are said to be looking at the table, we may take the
whole set of these sensations (together possibly with certain other
particulars) as actually BEING the table. That is to say, the table
which is neutral as between different observers (actual and possible)
is the set of all those particulars which would naturally be called
"aspects" of the table from different points of view. (This is a first
approximation, modified later.)

It may be said: If there is no single existent which is the source of
all these "aspects," how are they collected together? The answer is
simple: Just as they would be if there were such a single existent. The
supposed "real" table underlying its appearances is, in any case, not
itself perceived, but inferred, and the question whether such-and-such
a particular is an "aspect" of this table is only to be settled by
the connection of the particular in question with the one or more
particulars by which the table is defined. That is to say, even if we
assume a "real" table, the particulars which are its aspects have to be
collected together by their relations to each other, not to it, since
it is merely inferred from them. We have only, therefore, to notice how
they are collected together, and we can then keep the collection
without assuming any "real" table as distinct from the collection. When
different people see what they call the same table, they see things
which are not exactly the same, owing to difference of point of view,
but which are sufficiently alike to be described in the same words, so
long as no great accuracy or minuteness is sought. These closely similar
particulars are collected together by their similarity primarily
and, more correctly, by the fact that they are related to each other
approximately according to the laws of perspective and of reflection and
diffraction of light. I suggest, as a first approximation, that these
particulars, together with such correlated others as are unperceived,
jointly ARE the table; and that a similar definition applies to all
physical objects.*

     *See "Our Knowledge of the External World" (Allen & Unwin),
     chaps. iii and iv.

In order to eliminate the reference to our perceptions, which introduces
an irrelevant psychological suggestion, I will take a different
illustration, namely, stellar photography. A photographic plate exposed
on a clear night reproduces the appearance of the portion of the sky
concerned, with more or fewer stars according to the power of the
telescope that is being used. Each separate star which is photographed
produces its separate effect on the plate, just as it would upon
ourselves if we were looking at the sky. If we assume, as science
normally does, the continuity of physical processes, we are forced
to conclude that, at the place where the plate is, and at all places
between it and a star which it photographs, SOMETHING is happening which
is specially connected with that star. In the days when the aether was
less in doubt, we should have said that what was happening was a certain
kind of transverse vibration in the aether. But it is not necessary
or desirable to be so explicit: all that we need say is that SOMETHING
happens which is specially connected with the star in question. It
must be something specially connected with that star, since that star
produces its own special effect upon the plate. Whatever it is must be
the end of a process which starts from the star and radiates outwards,
partly on general grounds of continuity, partly to account for the fact
that light is transmitted with a certain definite velocity. We thus
arrive at the conclusion that, if a certain star is visible at a certain
place, or could be photographed by a sufficiently sensitive plate at
that place, something is happening there which is specially connected
with that star. Therefore in every place at all times a vast multitude
of things must be happening, namely, at least one for every physical
object which can be seen or photographed from that place. We can
classify such happenings on either of two principles:

(1) We can collect together all the happenings in one place, as is done
by photography so far as light is concerned;

(2) We can collect together all the happenings, in different places,
which are connected in the way that common sense regards as being due to
their emanating from one object.

Thus, to return to the stars, we can collect together either--

(1) All the appearances of different stars in a given place, or,

(2) All the appearances of a given star in different places.

But when I speak of "appearances," I do so only for brevity: I do not
mean anything that must "appear" to somebody, but only that happening,
whatever it may be, which is connected, at the place in question, with a
given physical object--according to the old orthodox theory, it would be
a transverse vibration in the aether. Like the different appearances
of the table to a number of simultaneous observers, the different
particulars that belong to one physical object are to be collected
together by continuity and inherent laws of correlation, not by their
supposed causal connection with an unknown assumed existent called a
piece of matter, which would be a mere unnecessary metaphysical thing in
itself. A piece of matter, according to the definition that I propose,
is, as a first approximation,* the collection of all those correlated
particulars which would normally be regarded as its appearances or
effects in different places. Some further elaborations are desirable,
but we can ignore them for the present. I shall return to them at the
end of this lecture.

     *The exact definition of a piece of matter as a construction
     will be given later.

According to the view that I am suggesting, a physical object or piece
of matter is the collection of all those correlated particulars which
would be regarded by common sense as its effects or appearances in
different places. On the other hand, all the happenings in a given place
represent what common sense would regard as the appearances of a number
of different objects as viewed from that place. All the happenings in
one place may be regarded as the view of the world from that place. I
shall call the view of the world from a given place a "perspective." A
photograph represents a perspective. On the other hand, if photographs
of the stars were taken in all points throughout space, and in all such
photographs a certain star, say Sirius, were picked out whenever it
appeared, all the different appearances of Sirius, taken together,
would represent Sirius. For the understanding of the difference between
psychology and physics it is vital to understand these two ways of
classifying particulars, namely:

(1) According to the place where they occur;

(2) According to the system of correlated particulars in different
places to which they belong, such system being defined as a physical
object.

Given a system of particulars which is a physical object, I shall
define that one of the system which is in a given place (if any) as the
"appearance of that object in that place."

When the appearance of an object in a given place changes, it is found
that one or other of two things occurs. The two possibilities may be
illustrated by an example. You are in a room with a man, whom you see:
you may cease to see him either by shutting your eyes or by his going
out of the room. In the first case, his appearance to other people
remains unchanged; in the second, his appearance changes from all
places. In the first case, you say that it is not he who has changed,
but your eyes; in the second, you say that he has changed. Generalizing,
we distinguish--

(1) Cases in which only certain appearances of the object change, while
others, and especially appearances from places very near to the object,
do not change;

(2) Cases where all, or almost all, the appearances of the object
undergo a connected change.

In the first case, the change is attributed to the medium between the
object and the place; in the second, it is attributed to the object
itself.*

     * The application of this distinction to motion raises
     complications due to relativity, but we may ignore these for
     our present purposes.

It is the frequency of the latter kind of change, and the comparatively
simple nature of the laws governing the simultaneous alterations
of appearances in such cases, that have made it possible to treat a
physical object as one thing, and to overlook the fact that it is a
system of particulars. When a number of people at a theatre watch an
actor, the changes in their several perspectives are so similar and so
closely correlated that all are popularly regarded as identical with
each other and with the changes of the actor himself. So long as all
the changes in the appearances of a body are thus correlated there is no
pressing prima facie need to break up the system of appearances, or to
realize that the body in question is not really one thing but a set of
correlated particulars. It is especially and primarily such changes that
physics deals with, i.e. it deals primarily with processes in which
the unity of a physical object need not be broken up because all its
appearances change simultaneously according to the same law--or, if not
all, at any rate all from places sufficiently near to the object, with
in creasing accuracy as we approach the object.

The changes in appearances of an object which are due to changes in the
intervening medium will not affect, or will affect only very slightly,
the appearances from places close to the object. If the appearances
from sufficiently neighbouring places are either wholly un changed,
or changed to a diminishing extent which has zero for its limit, it
is usually found that the changes can be accounted for by changes in
objects which are between the object in question and the places from
which its appearance has changed appreciably. Thus physics is able
to reduce the laws of most changes with which it deals to changes in
physical objects, and to state most of its fundamental laws in terms of
matter. It is only in those cases in which the unity of the system of
appearances constituting a piece of matter has to be broken up, that the
statement of what is happening cannot be made exclusively in terms of
matter. The whole of psychology, we shall find, is included among such
cases; hence their importance for our purposes.

We can now begin to understand one of the fundamental differences
between physics and psychology. Physics treats as a unit the whole
system of appearances of a piece of matter, whereas psychology is
interested in certain of these appearances themselves. Confining
ourselves for the moment to the psychology of perceptions, we observe
that perceptions are certain of the appearances of physical objects.
From the point of view that we have been hitherto adopting, we
might define them as the appearances of objects at places from which
sense-organs and the suitable parts of the nervous system form part
of the intervening medium. Just as a photographic plate receives a
different impression of a cluster of stars when a telescope is part of
the intervening medium, so a brain receives a different impression
when an eye and an optic nerve are part of the intervening medium.
An impression due to this sort of intervening medium is called a
perception, and is interesting to psychology on its own account, not
merely as one of the set of correlated particulars which is the physical
object of which (as we say) we are having a perception.

We spoke earlier of two ways of classifying particulars. One way
collects together the appearances commonly regarded as a given object
from different places; this is, broadly speaking, the way of physics,
leading to the construction of physical objects as sets of such
appearances. The other way collects together the appearances of
different objects from a given place, the result being what we call a
perspective. In the particular case where the place concerned is a
human brain, the perspective belonging to the place consists of all the
perceptions of a certain man at a given time. Thus classification by
perspectives is relevant to psychology, and is essential in defining
what we mean by one mind.

I do not wish to suggest that the way in which I have been defining
perceptions is the only possible way, or even the best way. It is the
way that arose naturally out of our present topic. But when we approach
psychology from a more introspective standpoint, we have to distinguish
sensations and perceptions, if possible, from other mental occurrences,
if any. We have also to consider the psychological effects of
sensations, as opposed to their physical causes and correlates. These
problems are quite distinct from those with which we have been concerned
in the present lecture, and I shall not deal with them until a later
stage.

It is clear that psychology is concerned essentially with actual
particulars, not merely with systems of particulars. In this it differs
from physics, which, broadly speaking, is concerned with the cases
in which all the particulars which make up one physical object can be
treated as a single causal unit, or rather the particulars which are
sufficiently near to the object of which they are appearances can be so
treated. The laws which physics seeks can, broadly speaking, be stated
by treating such systems of particulars as causal units. The laws which
psychology seeks cannot be so stated, since the particulars themselves
are what interests the psychologist. This is one of the fundamental
differences between physics and psychology; and to make it clear has
been the main purpose of this lecture.

I will conclude with an attempt to give a more precise definition of
a piece of matter. The appearances of a piece of matter from different
places change partly according to intrinsic laws (the laws of
perspective, in the case of visual shape), partly according to the
nature of the intervening medium--fog, blue spectacles, telescopes,
microscopes, sense-organs, etc. As we approach nearer to the object, the
effect of the intervening medium grows less. In a generalized sense,
all the intrinsic laws of change of appearance may be called "laws
of perspective." Given any appearance of an object, we can construct
hypothetically a certain system of appearances to which the appearance
in question would belong if the laws of perspective alone were
concerned. If we construct this hypothetical system for each appearance
of the object in turn, the system corresponding to a given appearance
x will be independent of any distortion due to the medium beyond x, and
will only embody such distortion as is due to the medium between x and
the object. Thus, as the appearance by which our hypothetical system
is defined is moved nearer and nearer to the object, the hypothetical
system of appearances defined by its means embodies less and less of the
effect of the medium. The different sets of appearances resulting from
moving x nearer and nearer to the object will approach to a limiting
set, and this limiting set will be that system of appearances which the
object would present if the laws of perspective alone were operative
and the medium exercised no distorting effect. This limiting set of
appearances may be defined, for purposes of physics, as the piece of
matter concerned.




LECTURE VI. INTROSPECTION

One of the main purposes of these lectures is to give grounds for
the belief that the distinction between mind and matter is not so
fundamental as is commonly supposed. In the preceding lecture I dealt in
outline with the physical side of this problem. I attempted to show
that what we call a material object is not itself a substance, but is
a system of particulars analogous in their nature to sensations, and in
fact often including actual sensations among their number. In this
way the stuff of which physical objects are composed is brought into
relation with the stuff of which part, at least, of our mental life is
composed.

There is, however, a converse task which is equally necessary for our
thesis, and that is, to show that the stuff of our mental life is devoid
of many qualities which it is commonly supposed to have, and is not
possessed of any attributes which make it incapable of forming part of
the world of matter. In the present lecture I shall begin the arguments
for this view.

Corresponding to the supposed duality of matter and mind, there are, in
orthodox psychology, two ways of knowing what exists. One of these, the
way of sensation and external perception, is supposed to furnish data
for our knowledge of matter, the other, called "introspection," is
supposed to furnish data for knowledge of our mental processes. To
common sense, this distinction seems clear and easy. When you see a
friend coming along the street, you acquire knowledge of an external,
physical fact; when you realize that you are glad to meet him, you
acquire knowledge of a mental fact. Your dreams and memories and
thoughts, of which you are often conscious, are mental facts, and the
process by which you become aware of them SEEMS to be different from
sensation. Kant calls it the "inner sense"; sometimes it is spoken of
as "consciousness of self"; but its commonest name in modern English
psychology is "introspection." It is this supposed method of acquiring
knowledge of our mental processes that I wish to analyse and examine in
this lecture.

I will state at the outset the view which I shall aim at establishing.
I believe that the stuff of our mental life, as opposed to its relations
and structure, consists wholly of sensations and images. Sensations are
connected with matter in the way that I tried to explain in Lecture V,
i.e. each is a member of a system which is a certain physical object.
Images, though they USUALLY have certain characteristics, especially
lack of vividness, that distinguish them from sensations, are not
INVARIABLY so distinguished, and cannot therefore be defined by these
characteristics. Images, as opposed to sensations, can only be defined
by their different causation: they are caused by association with a
sensation, not by a stimulus external to the nervous system--or perhaps
one should say external to the brain, where the higher animals are
concerned. The occurrence of a sensation or image does not in itself
constitute knowledge but any sensation or image may come to be known
if the conditions are suitable. When a sensation--like the hearing of a
clap of thunder--is normally correlated with closely similar sensations
in our neighbours, we regard it as giving knowledge of the external
world, since we regard the whole set of similar sensations as due to
a common external cause. But images and bodily sensations are not so
correlated. Bodily sensations can be brought into a correlation by
physiology, and thus take their place ultimately among sources of
knowledge of the physical world. But images cannot be made to fit in
with the simultaneous sensations and images of others. Apart from their
hypothetical causes in the brain, they have a causal connection
with physical objects, through the fact that they are copies of past
sensations; but the physical objects with which they are thus connected
are in the past, not in the present. These images remain private in
a sense in which sensations are not. A sensation SEEMS to give us
knowledge of a present physical object, while an image does not, except
when it amounts to a hallucination, and in this case the seeming is
deceptive. Thus the whole context of the two occurrences is different.
But in themselves they do not differ profoundly, and there is no reason
to invoke two different ways of knowing for the one and for the other.
Consequently introspection as a separate kind of knowledge disappears.

The criticism of introspection has been in the main the work of American
psychologists. I will begin by summarizing an article which seems to me
to afford a good specimen of their arguments, namely, "The Case against
Introspection," by Knight Dunlap ("Psychological Review," vol xix, No.
5, pp. 404-413, September, 1912). After a few historical quotations,
he comes to two modern defenders of introspection, Stout and James. He
quotes from Stout such statements as the following: "Psychical states as
such become objects only when we attend to them in an introspective way.
Otherwise they are not themselves objects, but only constituents of the
process by which objects are recognized" ("Manual," 2nd edition, p. 134.
The word "recognized" in Dunlap's quotation should be "cognized.") "The
object itself can never be identified with the present modification of
the individual's consciousness by which it is cognized" (ib. p. 60).
This is to be true even when we are thinking about modifications of
our own consciousness; such modifications are to be always at least
partially distinct from the conscious experience in which we think of
them.

At this point I wish to interrupt the account of Knight Dunlap's article
in order to make some observations on my own account with reference to
the above quotations from Stout. In the first place, the conception of
"psychical states" seems to me one which demands analysis of a somewhat
destructive character. This analysis I shall give in later lectures as
regards cognition; I have already given it as regards desire. In the
second place, the conception of "objects" depends upon a certain view
as to cognition which I believe to be wholly mistaken, namely, the view
which I discussed in my first lecture in connection with Brentano.
In this view a single cognitive occurrence contains both content and
object, the content being essentially mental, while the object is
physical except in introspection and abstract thought. I have already
criticized this view, and will not dwell upon it now, beyond saying
that "the process by which objects are cognized" appears to be a very
slippery phrase. When we "see a table," as common sense would say, the
table as a physical object is not the "object" (in the psychological
sense) of our perception. Our perception is made up of sensations,
images and beliefs, but the supposed "object" is something inferential,
externally related, not logically bound up with what is occurring in us.
This question of the nature of the object also affects the view we take
of self-consciousness. Obviously, a "conscious experience" is different
from a physical object; therefore it is natural to assume that a thought
or perception whose object is a conscious experience must be different
from a thought or perception whose object is a physical object. But if
the relation to the object is inferential and external, as I maintain,
the difference between two thoughts may bear very little relation to
the difference between their objects. And to speak of "the present
modification of the individual's consciousness by which an object is
cognized" is to suggest that the cognition of objects is a far more
direct process, far more intimately bound up with the objects, than I
believe it to be. All these points will be amplified when we come to the
analysis of knowledge, but it is necessary briefly to state them now in
order to suggest the atmosphere in which our analysis of "introspection"
is to be carried on.

Another point in which Stout's remarks seem to me to suggest what I
regard as mistakes is his use of "consciousness." There is a view which
is prevalent among psychologists, to the effect that one can speak of "a
conscious experience" in a curious dual sense, meaning, on the one hand,
an experience which is conscious of something, and, on the other hand,
an experience which has some intrinsic nature characteristic of what
is called "consciousness." That is to say, a "conscious experience" is
characterized on the one hand by relation to its object and on the
other hand by being composed of a certain peculiar stuff, the stuff of
"consciousness." And in many authors there is yet a third confusion: a
"conscious experience," in this third sense, is an experience of
which we are conscious. All these, it seems to me, need to be clearly
separated. To say that one occurrence is "conscious" of another is, to
my mind, to assert an external and rather remote relation between them.
I might illustrate it by the relation of uncle and nephew a man becomes
an uncle through no effort of his own, merely through an occurrence
elsewhere. Similarly, when you are said to be "conscious" of a table,
the question whether this is really the case cannot be decided by
examining only your state of mind: it is necessary also to ascertain
whether your sensation is having those correlates which past experience
causes you to assume, or whether the table happens, in this case, to be
a mirage. And, as I explained in my first lecture, I do not believe that
there is any "stuff" of consciousness, so that there is no intrinsic
character by which a "conscious" experience could be distinguished from
any other.

After these preliminaries, we can return to Knight Dunlap's article.
His criticism of Stout turns on the difficulty of giving any empirical
meaning to such notions as the "mind" or the "subject"; he quotes from
Stout the sentence: "The most important drawback is that the mind, in
watching its own workings, must necessarily have its attention divided
between two objects," and he concludes: "Without question, Stout is
bringing in here illicitly the concept of a single observer, and his
introspection does not provide for the observation of this observer;
for the process observed and the observer are distinct" (p. 407).
The objections to any theory which brings in the single observer were
considered in Lecture I, and were acknowledged to be cogent. In so
far, therefore, as Stout's theory of introspection rests upon this
assumption, we are compelled to reject it. But it is perfectly possible
to believe in introspection without supposing that there is a single
observer.

William James's theory of introspection, which Dunlap next examines,
does not assume a single observer. It changed after the publication
of his "Psychology," in consequence of his abandoning the dualism of
thought and things. Dunlap summarizes his theory as follows:

"The essential points in James's scheme of consciousness are SUBJECT,
OBJECT, and a KNOWING of the object by the subject. The difference
between James's scheme and other schemes involving the same terms is
that James considers subject and object to be the same thing, but at
different times In order to satisfy this requirement James supposes a
realm of existence which he at first called 'states of consciousness' or
'thoughts,' and later, 'pure experience,' the latter term including both
the 'thoughts' and the 'knowing.' This scheme, with all its magnificent
artificiality, James held on to until the end, simply dropping the
term consciousness and the dualism between the thought and an external
reality"(p. 409).

He adds: "All that James's system really amounts to is the
acknowledgment that a succession of things are known, and that they are
known by something. This is all any one can claim, except for the
fact that the things are known together, and that the knower for the
different items is one and the same" (ib.).

In this statement, to my mind, Dunlap concedes far more than James did
in his later theory. I see no reason to suppose that "the knower for
different items is one and the same," and I am convinced that this
proposition could not possibly be ascertained except by introspection of
the sort that Dunlap rejects. The first of these points must wait until
we come to the analysis of belief: the second must be considered now.
Dunlap's view is that there is a dualism of subject and object, but that
the subject can never become object, and therefore there is no awareness
of an awareness. He says in discussing the view that introspection
reveals the occurrence of knowledge: "There can be no denial of the
existence of the thing (knowing) which is alleged to be known or
observed in this sort of 'introspection.' The allegation that the
knowing is observed is that which may be denied. Knowing there certainly
is; known, the knowing certainly is not"(p. 410). And again: "I am
never aware of an awareness" (ib.). And on the next page: "It may sound
paradoxical to say that one cannot observe the process (or relation) of
observation, and yet may be certain that there is such a process: but
there is really no inconsistency in the saying. How do I know that there
is awareness? By being aware of something. There is no meaning in the
term 'awareness' which is not expressed in the statement 'I am aware of
a colour (or what-not).'"

But the paradox cannot be so lightly disposed of. The statement "I am
aware of a colour" is assumed by Knight Dunlap to be known to be true,
but he does not explain how it comes to be known. The argument against
him is not conclusive, since he may be able to show some valid way of
inferring our awareness. But he does not suggest any such way. There is
nothing odd in the hypothesis of beings which are aware of objects, but
not of their own awareness; it is, indeed, highly probable that young
children and the higher animals are such beings. But such beings cannot
make the statement "I am aware of a colour," which WE can make. We have,
therefore, some knowledge which they lack. It is necessary to Knight
Dunlap's position to maintain that this additional knowledge is purely
inferential, but he makes no attempt to show how the inference is
possible. It may, of course, be possible, but I cannot see how. To my
mind the fact (which he admits) that we know there is awareness, is ALL
BUT decisive against his theory, and in favour of the view that we can
be aware of an awareness.

Dunlap asserts (to return to James) that the real ground for James's
original belief in introspection was his belief in two sorts of
objects, namely, thoughts and things. He suggests that it was a
mere inconsistency on James's part to adhere to introspection after
abandoning the dualism of thoughts and things. I do not wholly agree
with this view, but it is difficult to disentangle the difference as to
introspection from the difference as to the nature of knowing. Dunlap
suggests (p. 411) that what is called introspection really consists of
awareness of "images," visceral sensations, and so on. This view, in
essence, seems to me sound. But then I hold that knowing itself consists
of such constituents suitably related, and that in being aware of them
we are sometimes being aware of instances of knowing. For this reason,
much as I agree with his view as to what are the objects of which
there is awareness, I cannot wholly agree with his conclusion as to the
impossibility of introspection.

The behaviourists have challenged introspection even more vigorously
than Knight Dunlap, and have gone so far as to deny the existence of
images. But I think that they have confused various things which
are very commonly confused, and that it is necessary to make several
distinctions before we can arrive at what is true and what false in the
criticism of introspection.

I wish to distinguish three distinct questions, any one of which may be
meant when we ask whether introspection is a source of knowledge. The
three questions are as follows:

(1) Can we observe anything about ourselves which we cannot observe
about other people, or is everything we can observe PUBLIC, in the sense
that another could also observe it if suitably placed?

(2) Does everything that we can observe obey the laws of physics and
form part of the physical world, or can we observe certain things that
lie outside physics?

(3) Can we observe anything which differs in its intrinsic nature from
the constituents of the physical world, or is everything that we can
observe composed of elements intrinsically similar to the constituents
of what is called matter?

Any one of these three questions may be used to define introspection. I
should favour introspection in the sense of the first question, i.e. I
think that some of the things we observe cannot, even theoretically, be
observed by any one else. The second question, tentatively and for
the present, I should answer in favour of introspection; I think that
images, in the actual condition of science, cannot be brought under the
causal laws of physics, though perhaps ultimately they may be. The
third question I should answer adversely to introspection I think that
observation shows us nothing that is not composed of sensations and
images, and that images differ from sensations in their causal laws, not
intrinsically. I shall deal with the three questions successively.

(1) PUBLICITY OR PRIVACY OF WHAT IS OBSERVED. Confining ourselves, for
the moment, to sensations, we find that there are different degrees
of publicity attaching to different sorts of sensations. If you feel a
toothache when the other people in the room do not, you are in no way
surprised; but if you hear a clap of thunder when they do not, you begin
to be alarmed as to your mental condition. Sight and hearing are the
most public of the senses; smell only a trifle less so; touch, again, a
trifle less, since two people can only touch the same spot successively,
not simultaneously. Taste has a sort of semi-publicity, since people
seem to experience similar taste-sensations when they eat similar foods;
but the publicity is incomplete, since two people cannot eat actually
the same piece of food.

But when we pass on to bodily sensations--headache, toothache, hunger,
thirst, the feeling of fatigue, and so on--we get quite away from
publicity, into a region where other people can tell us what they feel,
but we cannot directly observe their feeling. As a natural result of
this state of affairs, it has come to be thought that the public senses
give us knowledge of the outer world, while the private senses only give
us knowledge as to our own bodies. As regards privacy, all images, of
whatever sort, belong with the sensations which only give knowledge of
our own bodies, i.e. each is only observable by one observer. This is
the reason why images of sight and hearing are more obviously different
from sensations of sight and hearing than images of bodily sensations
are from bodily sensations; and that is why the argument in favour of
images is more conclusive in such cases as sight and hearing than in
such cases as inner speech.

The whole distinction of privacy and publicity, however, so long as we
confine ourselves to sensations, is one of degree, not of kind. No
two people, there is good empirical reason to think, ever have exactly
similar sensations related to the same physical object at the same
moment; on the other hand, even the most private sensation has
correlations which would theoretically enable another observer to infer
it.

That no sensation is ever completely public, results from differences of
point of view. Two people looking at the same table do not get the same
sensation, because of perspective and the way the light falls. They get
only correlated sensations. Two people listening to the same sound do
not hear exactly the same thing, because one is nearer to the source of
the sound than the other, one has better hearing than the other, and
so on. Thus publicity in sensations consists, not in having PRECISELY
similar sensations, but in having more or less similar sensations
correlated according to ascertainable laws. The sensations which strike
us as public are those where the correlated sensations are very similar
and the correlations are very easy to discover. But even the most
private sensations have correlations with things that others can
observe. The dentist does not observe your ache, but he can see the
cavity which causes it, and could guess that you are suffering even
if you did not tell him. This fact, however, cannot be used, as Watson
would apparently wish, to extrude from science observations which are
private to one observer, since it is by means of many such observations
that correlations are established, e.g. between toothaches and cavities.
Privacy, therefore does not by itself make a datum unamenable to
scientific treatment. On this point, the argument against introspection
must be rejected.

(2) DOES EVERYTHING OBSERVABLE OBEY THE LAWS OF PHYSICS? We come now to
the second ground of objection to introspection, namely, that its data
do not obey the laws of physics. This, though less emphasized, is,
I think, an objection which is really more strongly felt than the
objection of privacy. And we obtain a definition of introspection more
in harmony with usage if we define it as observation of data not subject
to physical laws than if we define it by means of privacy. No one would
regard a man as introspective because he was conscious of having a
stomach ache. Opponents of introspection do not mean to deny the obvious
fact that we can observe bodily sensations which others cannot observe.
For example, Knight Dunlap contends that images are really muscular
contractions,* and evidently regards our awareness of muscular
contractions as not coming under the head of introspection. I think it
will be found that the essential characteristic of introspective data,
in the sense which now concerns us, has to do with LOCALIZATION: either
they are not localized at all, or they are localized, like visual
images, in a place already physically occupied by something which would
be inconsistent with them if they were regarded as part of the physical
world. If you have a visual image of your friend sitting in a chair
which in fact is empty, you cannot locate the image in your body,
because it is visual, nor (as a physical phenomenon) in the chair,
because the chair, as a physical object, is empty. Thus it seems to
follow that the physical world does not include all that we are aware
of, and that images, which are introspective data, have to be regarded,
for the present, as not obeying the laws of physics; this is, I think,
one of the chief reasons why an attempt is made to reject them. I
shall try to show in Lecture VIII that the purely empirical reasons for
accepting images are overwhelming. But we cannot be nearly so certain
that they will not ultimately be brought under the laws of physics. Even
if this should happen, however, they would still be distinguishable
from sensations by their proximate causal laws, as gases remain
distinguishable from solids.

     * "Psychological Review," 1916, "Thought-Content and
     Feeling," p. 59. See also ib., 1912, "The Nature of
     Perceived Relations," where he says: "'Introspection,'
     divested of its mythological suggestion of the observing of
     consciousness, is really the observation of bodily
     sensations (sensibles) and feelings (feelables)"(p. 427 n.).

(3) CAN WE OBSERVE ANYTHING INTRINSICALLY DIFFERENT FROM SENSATIONS? We
come now to our third question concerning introspection. It is commonly
thought that by looking within we can observe all sorts of things that
are radically different from the constituents of the physical world,
e.g. thoughts, beliefs, desires, pleasures, pains and emotions. The
difference between mind and matter is increased partly by emphasizing
these supposed introspective data, partly by the supposition that matter
is composed of atoms or electrons or whatever units physics may at the
moment prefer. As against this latter supposition, I contend that
the ultimate constituents of matter are not atoms or electrons, but
sensations, and other things similar to sensations as regards extent and
duration. As against the view that introspection reveals a mental world
radically different from sensations, I propose to argue that thoughts,
beliefs, desires, pleasures, pains and emotions are all built up out
of sensations and images alone, and that there is reason to think that
images do not differ from sensations in their intrinsic character. We
thus effect a mutual rapprochement of mind and matter, and reduce the
ultimate data of introspection (in our second sense) to images alone. On
this third view of 

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