XIV.—SYMPOSIUM: ARE THE MATERIALS OF SENSE AFFECTIONS OF THE MIND? By G. E. MOORE, W. E. JOHNSON, G. DAWES HICKS, I.-By G. E. MOORE. I THINK that, on the whole, the clearest way of naming shortly the class of entities, with regard to which I propose to discuss whether they are "affections of the mind," is to call them " presented sensations." I propose to call them so, and to trust to luck that people will understand what the entities are to which I am giving this name. Presented sensations are, of course, by no means the only class of entities which some people would be inclined to call "materials of sense." It may be, for instance, that we have sensations which are not presented at any time to anybody, although they are sensations in the same sense in which the presented entities of which I am going to speak are so; and some people might say that such unpresented sensations are just as much "materials of sense as those which are presented. Then again, some people might be inclined to say that presented images ought also to be reckoned among" the materials of sense": those who use the term "sense-data" seem in fact, so far as I can make out, generally to use it to include presented images as well as the entities which I am calling presented sensations; and the term "sensedata" ought, of course, to be so used, that everything which is a sense-datum could also be called a "material of sense." Then again, some people might be inclined to include under "materials of sense" not only presented sensations and presented images, but perceived facts of a certain sort-such, for instance, as the fact which we perceive when we perceive that two presented sensations have a certain spatial relation to one another. And others again might be inclined to treat as "materials of sense" not only entities of all those kinds, but also certain universals or concepts, which might be called sense-qualities," since they are qualities which belong to sensations such, for instance, as the qualities for which the words red" and "blue" stand, when these words are used in their most fundamental sense. The words: "Are the materials of sense affections of the mind?" might, therefore, be understood in such a sense that they would stand for a much wider question than that which I propose to discuss. And, just as some people might think that they ought to stand for a wider question, so others, I think it is possible, may think that they ought to stand for a narrower one. For when I talk of "presented sensations" I mean to include under that term sensations which are not only presented, but also "localised " and" referred to some physical object "-these being, in fact, the class of presented sensations with which I am most familiar and with regard to which I am most anxious to know whether they are "affections of the mind"; and I think it is possible some people might say that such sensations, just because they are "localised" and "referred to some physical object," have been "worked up" by the mind and are not, therefore, materials given by sense. It might, therefore, be held that the phrase 66 the materials of sense" ought properly to stand for a class much narrower than that with which I propose to deal-for a class which will include only those among presented sensations, which are neither localised nor referred to any physical object, and perhaps not all even of these. And I do not for a moment wish to deny that the phrase might be legitimately used in any one of these different senses, either wider or narrower. But it seems to me that the question whether the entities which I am calling "presented sensations" are affections of the mind is the most interesting and important of all the different questions which might be meant by the words "are the materials of sense affections of the mind?" and that it is also the question which these words would first suggest to the minds of most people. I propose, therefore, to confine myself to the question: "Are presented sensations affections of the mind?" But the assertion that they are, might have two very different meanings which it is, I think, important to distinguish. It might mean only that all presented sensations are affections of some mind; or it might mean that every presented sensation is an affection of the mind of any individual to whom it is presented-every sensation presented to me an affection of my mind; every sensation presented to A an affection of A's mind; and so on. Of these two assertions it will be seen that the latter asserts much more than the former: if the latter is true, the former must be; but the former might, conceivably, be true, even if the latter were not. The latter is, I think, the sense in which the words would be most naturally understood; and I propose to confine myself to discussing whether it is true. There may, for all I know, be people, who, while not venturing to assert this latter proposition or even being prepared to deny it, would yet assert that every presented sensation is an affection of some mind; just as Berkeley, in an analogous case, though not venturing to assert that every sensation presented to me exists only while it is presented to me, yet thought himself entitled to assert that every such sensation exists only while it is presented to someone. Still, I think there are probably few people who would take this line; and, for my part, if I cannot be sure that all the sensations presented to me are affections of my mind, I do not see how I could possibly be sure that they are all affections of some mind. I am, therefore, going to confine myself to the question: Are all the sensations presented to me affections of my mind? And with regard even to this question, I am not sure that what I am going to discuss constitutes the whole of what it means. I am, in fact, only going to discuss a proposition which seems to me to be always implied by the assertion that they are affections of my mind, and to be the most important and interesting part of what is implied by this assertion, but with regard to which I do not feel at all sure that it is the whole of what would naturally be meant by this assertion. The proposition in question seems to me to be also implied by the assertion that all the sensations presented to me are “modifications" of my mind, and to be the most important and interesting part of what is implied by that assertion also; but, for all I know, the assertion that they are "modifications" of my mind may mean something slightly different from the assertion that they are "affections" of it, and possibly the meaning of neither expression is simply identical with this proposition, which I take to be implied by both. The same proposition seems to me to be also implied by the view which Stout, in the third edition of his Manual of Psychology, means to express, by saying that all the sensations presented to me "immediate experiences" of mine. It seems to me, indeed, that from the mere phrase "immediate experiences" of mine, we could not safely infer that what he means implies any such thing. For the expression " is an immediate experience of mine" might, I think, be quite naturally used as identical in meaning with " is immediately apprehended by me," and this again might be used as identical in meaning with "x is presented to me," so that the expression "All the sensations presented to me are immediate experiences of mine" might simply stand for the pure tautology, "All the sensations presented to me are presented to me." Indeed, unless the verb "to experience" is used in some sense in which (as is often the case) it stands for some form of apprehension, the addition to it of the adverb "immediately" seems to me to be quite meaningless. It is quite certain that there is some sense in which we can be said to apprehend some things immediately and others only mediately. But if by x is are experienced" you mean (as you very well may, for this highly ambiguous word is used in such a sense) something which does not imply that x is apprehended at all, then, it seems to me, there are no two ways in which a thing can be "experienced," such that the one could be called "immediate " and the other "mediate." Nevertheless, I cannot help thinking that Stout is not using the phrase " is an immediate experience of mine" in such a sense that the proposition "All the sensations presented to me are immediate experiences of mine" would be a pure tautology, and that he is using it in such a sense that x is an immediate experience of mine" does not imply that x is apprehended by me in any way whatever. For he explains what he does mean by the phrase, by telling us that it is identical in meaning with each of the two phrases" is lived through by me" (p. 3) and " forms part of the life-history of my mind" (p. 7). And he makes clearer the sense in which he is using the phrase " is lived through by me" by telling us that he is using it in such a sense (and this, I think, is obviously the natural sense of the phrase) that whenever I attend to anything, or make any judgment, or desire anything, or feel pleased or pained, then my act of attention, my act of judgment, my desire or my feeling, are "lived through" by me. Now, that there is a most important sense in which any act of attention or judgment, or any feeling, which is an act or a feeling of mine, is "lived through" by me, just because it is so, is, I think, plain; and also that exactly the same meaning can be expressed by saying that it is "experienced" by me or is "an experience of mine." This meaning of "experienced" or "lived through" is of such a nature that from the assertion that an act of attention is an act of mine, it logically follows that it is "lived through by me or "experienced" by me. What, therefore, I take Stout to be asserting of all the sensations presented to me is that they are "lived through" by me in just this same sense in which all my "subjective" states or acts certainly |