The Analysis of Mind, Bertrand Russell [best desktop ebook reader .txt] 📗

to minimize

its force. First, images do not, as a rule, have that wealth of

concrete detail that would make it IMPOSSIBLE to express them

fully in words. They are vague and fragmentary: a finite number

of words, though perhaps a large number, would exhaust at least

their SIGNIFICANT features. For—and this is our second

point—images enter into the content of a belief through the fact

that they are capable of meaning, and their meaning does not, as

a rule, have as much complexity as they have: some of their

characteristics are usually devoid of meaning. Thus it may well

be possible to extract in words all that has meaning in an

image-content; in that case the word-content and the

image-content will have exactly the same objective reference.

 

The content of a belief, when expressed in words, is the same

thing (or very nearly the same thing) as what in logic is called

a “proposition.” A proposition is a series of words (or sometimes

a single word) expressing the kind of thing that can be asserted

or denied. “That all men are mortal,” “that Columbus discovered

America,” “that Charles I died in his bed,” “that all

philosophers are wise,” are propositions. Not any series of words

is a proposition, but only such series of words as have

“meaning,” or, in our phraseology, “objective reference.” Given

the meanings of separate words, and the rules of syntax, the

meaning of a proposition is determinate. This is the reason why

we can understand a sentence we never heard before. You probably

never heard before the proposition “that the inhabitants of the

Andaman Islands habitually eat stewed hippopotamus for dinner,”

but there is no difficulty in understanding the proposition. The

question of the relation between the meaning of a sentence and

the meanings of the separate words is difficult, and I shall not

pursue it now; I brought it up solely as being illustrative of

the nature of propositions.

 

We may extend the term “proposition” so as to cover the

image-contents of beliefs consisting of images. Thus, in the case

of remembering a room in which the window is to the left of the

door, when we believe the image-content the proposition will

consist of the image of the window on the left together with the

image of the door on the right. We will distinguish propositions

of this kind as “image-propositions” and propositions in words as

“word-propositions.” We may identify propositions in general with

the contents of actual and possible beliefs, and we may say that

it is propositions that are true or false. In logic we are

concerned with propositions rather than beliefs, since logic is

not interested in what people do in fact believe, but only in the

conditions which determine the truth or falsehood of possible

beliefs. Whenever possible, except when actual beliefs are in

question, it is generally a simplification to deal with

propositions.

 

It would seem that image-propositions are more primitive than

word-propositions, and may well ante-date language. There is no

reason why memory-images, accompanied by that very simple

belief-feeling which we decided to be the essence of memory,

should not have occurred before language arose; indeed, it would

be rash to assert positively that memory of this sort does not

occur among the higher animals. Our more elementary beliefs,

notably those that are added to sensation to make perception,

often remain at the level of images. For example, most of the

visual objects in our neighbourhood rouse tactile images: we have

a different feeling in looking at a sofa from what we have in

looking at a block of marble, and the difference consists chiefly

in different stimulation of our tactile imagination. It may be

said that the tactile images are merely present, without any

accompanying belief; but I think this view, though sometimes

correct, derives its plausibility as a general proposition from

our thinking of explicit conscious belief only. Most of our

beliefs, like most of our wishes, are “unconscious,” in the sense

that we have never told ourselves that we have them. Such beliefs

display themselves when the expectations that they arouse fail in

any way. For example, if someone puts tea (without milk) into a

glass, and you drink it under the impression that it is going to

be beer; or if you walk on what appears to be a tiled floor, and

it turns out to be a soft carpet made to look like tiles. The

shock of surprise on an occasion of this kind makes us aware of

the expectations that habitually enter into our perceptions; and

such expectations must be classed as beliefs, in spite of the

fact that we do not normally take note of them or put them into

words. I remember once watching a cock pigeon running over and

over again to the edge of a looking-glass to try to wreak

vengeance on the particularly obnoxious bird whom he expected to

find there, judging by what he saw in the glass. He must have

experienced each time the sort of surprise on finding nothing,

which is calculated to lead in time to the adoption of Berkeley’s

theory that objects of sense are only in the mind. His

expectation, though not expressed in words, deserved, I think, to

be called a belief.

 

I come now to the question what constitutes believing, as opposed

to the content believed.

 

To begin with, there are various different attitudes that may be

taken towards the same content. Let us suppose, for the sake of

argument, that you have a visual image of your breakfast-table.

You may expect it while you are dressing in the morning; remember

it as you go to your work; feel doubt as to its correctness when

questioned as to your powers of visualizing; merely entertain the

image, without connecting it with anything external, when you are

going to sleep; desire it if you are hungry, or feel aversion for

it if you are ill. Suppose, for the sake of definiteness, that

the content is “an egg for breakfast.” Then you have the

following attitudes “I expect there will be an egg for

breakfast”; “I remember there was an egg for breakfast”; “Was

there an egg for breakfast?” “An egg for breakfast: well, what of

it?” “I hope there will be an egg for breakfast”; “I am afraid

there will be an egg for breakfast and it is sure to be bad.” I

do not suggest that this is a list of all possible attitudes on

the subject; I say only that they are different attitudes, all

concerned with the one content “an egg for breakfast.”

 

These attitudes are not all equally ultimate. Those that involve

desire and aversion have occupied us in Lecture III. For the

present, we are only concerned with such as are cognitive. In

speaking of memory, we distinguished three kinds of belief

directed towards the same content, namely memory, expectation and

bare assent without any time-determination in the belief-feeling.

But before developing this view, we must examine two other

theories which might be held concerning belief, and which, in

some ways, would be more in harmony with a behaviourist outlook

than the theory I wish to advocate.

 

(1) The first theory to be examined is the view that the

differentia of belief consists in its causal efficacy I do not

wish to make any author responsible for this theory: I wish

merely to develop it hypothetically so that we may judge of its

tenability.

 

We defined the meaning of an image or word by causal efficacy,

namely by associations: an image or word acquires meaning, we

said, through having the same associations as what it means.

 

We propose hypothetically to define “belief” by a different kind

of causal efficacy, namely efficacy in causing voluntary

movements. (Voluntary movements are defined as those vital

movements which are distinguished from reflex movements as

involving the higher nervous centres. I do not like to

distinguish them by means of such notions as “consciousness” or

“will,” because I do not think these notions, in any definable

sense, are always applicable. Moreover, the purpose of the theory

we are examining is to be, as far as possible, physiological and

behaviourist, and this purpose is not achieved if we introduce

such a conception as “consciousness” or “will.” Nevertheless, it

is necessary for our purpose to find some way of distinguishing

between voluntary and reflex movements, since the results would

be too paradoxical, if we were to say that reflex movements also

involve beliefs.) According to this definition, a content is said

to be “believed” when it causes us to move. The images aroused

are the same if you say to me, “Suppose there were an escaped

tiger coming along the street,” and if you say to me, “There is

an escaped tiger coming along the street.” But my actions will be

very different in the two cases: in the first, I shall remain

calm; in the second, it is possible that I may not. It is

suggested, by the theory we are considering, that this difference

of effects constitutes what is meant by saying that in the second

case I believe the proposition suggested, while in the first case

I do not. According to this view, images or words are “believed”

when they cause bodily movements.

 

I do not think this theory is adequate, but I think it is

suggestive of truth, and not so easily refutable as it might

appear to be at first sight.

 

It might be objected to the theory that many things which we

certainly believe do not call for any bodily movements. I believe

that Great Britain is an island, that whales are mammals, that

Charles I was executed, and so on; and at first sight it seems

obvious that such beliefs, as a rule, do not call for any action

on my part. But when we investigate the matter more closely, it

becomes more doubtful. To begin with, we must distinguish belief

as a mere DISPOSITION from actual active belief. We speak as if

we always believed that Charles I was executed, but that only

means that we are always ready to believe it when the subject

comes up. The phenomenon we are concerned to analyse is the

active belief, not the permanent disposition. Now, what are the

occasions when, we actively believe that Charles I was executed?

Primarily: examinations, when we perform the bodily movement of

writing it down; conversation, when we assert it to display our

historical erudition; and political discourses, when we are

engaged in showing what Soviet government leads to. In all these

cases bodily movements (writing or speaking) result from our

belief.

 

But there remains the belief which merely occurs in “thinking.”

One may set to work to recall some piece of history one has been

reading, and what one recalls is believed, although it probably

does not cause any bodily movement whatever. It is true that what

we believe always MAY influence action. Suppose I am invited to

become King of Georgia: I find the prospect attractive, and go to

Cook’s to buy a third-class ticket to my new realm. At the last

moment I remember Charles I and all the other monarchs who have

come to a bad end; I change my mind, and walk out without

completing the transaction. But such incidents are rare, and

cannot constitute the whole of my belief that Charles I was

executed. The conclusion seems to be that, although a belief

always MAY influence action if it becomes relevant to a practical

issue, it often exists actively (not as a mere disposition)

without producing any voluntary movement whatever. If this is

true, we cannot define belief by the effect on voluntary

movements.

 

There is another, more theoretical, ground for rejecting the view

we are examining. It is clear that a proposition can be either

believed or merely considered, and that