Brown Book: Difference between revisions

(Note: Objection: The word “brick” in language 1) has not the meaning which it has in ''our'' language. ‒ ‒ This is true if it means that in our language there are usages of the word “brick!” different from our usages of this word in language 1). But don't we sometimes use the word “brick!” in just this way? Or should we say that when we use it, it is an elliptical sentence, a shorthand for “Bring me a brick”? Is it right to say that if ''we'' say “brick!” we ''mean'' “Bring me a brick”? Why should I translate the expression “brick!” into the expression, “Bring me a brick”? And if they are synonymous, why shouldn't I say: If he says “brick!” he means “brick!” … ? Or: Why shouldn't he be able to mean just “brick!” if he is able to mean “Bring me a brick”, unless you wish to assert that while he says aloud “brick!” he as a matter of fact always says in his mind, to himself, “Bring me a brick”? But what reason could we have to assert this? Suppose someone asked: If a man gives the order, “Bring me a brick”, must he mean it as four words, or can't he mean it as one composite word synonymous with the one word “brick!”? One is tempted to answer: He ''means'' all four words if in his language he uses that sentence in contrast with other {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,3}} sentences in which these words are used, such as, for instance, “Take these two bricks away”. But what if I asked, “But how is his sentence contrasted with these others? Must he have thought them simultaneously, or shortly before or after, or is it sufficient that he should have one time learnt them, etc.?” When we have asked ourselves this question, it appears that it is irrelevant which of these alternatives is the case. And we are inclined to say that all that is really relevant is that these contrasts should exist in the system of language which he is using, and that they need not in any sense be present in his mind when he utters his sentence. Now compare this conclusion with our original question. When we asked it, we seemed to ask a question about the state of mind of the man who says the sentence, whereas the idea of meaning which we arrived at in the end was not that of a state of mind. We think of the meaning of signs sometimes as states of mind of the man using them, sometimes as the role which these signs are playing in a system of language.The connection between these two ideas is that the mental experiences which accompany the use of a sign undoubtedly are caused by our usage of the sign in a particular system of language. William James speaks of specific feelings accompanying the use of such words as “&”, “if”, “or”. And there is no doubt that at least certain gestures are often connected with such words, as a collecting gesture with “and”, & a dismissing gesture with “not”. And there obviously are visual and muscular sensations connected with these gestures. On the other hand it is clear enough that these sensations do not accompany every use of the word “not”, and “&”. If in some language the word “but” meant what “not” means in English, it is clear that we should not compare the meanings of these two {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,4}} words by comparing the sensations which they produce. Ask yourself what means we have of finding out the feelings which they produce in different people and on different occasions. Ask yourself: “When I said, ‘Give me an apple ''&'' a pear, ''&'' leave the room’, had I the same feeling when I pronounced the two words ‘&’?” But we do not deny that the people who use the word “but” as “not” is used in English will broadly speaking have similar sensations accompanying the word “but” as the English have when they use “not”. And the word “but” in the two languages will on the whole be accompanied by different sets of experiences.)

(Remark: This difference does not lie, however, in the act of pointing and pronouncing the word or in any mental act (meaning)﹖ accompanying it, but in the role which the demonstration (pointing & pronouncing) plays in the whole training and in the use which is made of it in the practice of communication by means of this language. One might think that the difference could be described by saying that in the different cases we point to different kinds of objects. But suppose I point with {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,6}} my hand to a blue jersey. How does pointing to its colour differ from pointing to its shape? ‒ ‒ We are inclined to say the difference is that we ''mean'' something different in the two cases. And “meaning” here is to be some sort of process taking place while we point. What particularly tempts us to this view is that a man on being asked whether he pointed to the colour or the shape is, at least in most cases, able to answer this & to be certain that his answer is correct. If on the other hand, we look for two such characteristic mental acts as meaning the colour and meaning the shape, etc., we aren't able to find any, or at least none which must always accompany pointing to colour, pointing to shape, respectively. We have only a ''rough'' idea of what it means to concentrate one's attention on the colour as opposed to the shape, or vice versa. The difference one might say does not lie in the act of demonstration, but rather in the surrounding of that act in the use of the language.)

(Remark: Think of the reasons for and against classifying “0” with the other cardinals. “Are black and white colours?” In which cases would you be inclined to say so & which not? ‒ ‒ Words can in many ways be compared to chess men. Think of the several ways of distinguishing different kind of pieces in the game of chess (e.g., pawns & “officers”).

If our case 14c) troubles you, you may be inclined to say: “But ''why'' did he bring just this bolt of material? How has he {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,18}} recognized it as the right one? What by? ‒ ‒ If you ask “why”, do you ask for the cause or for the reason? If for the cause, it is easy enough to think up a physiological or psychological hypothesis which explains this choice under the given conditions. It is the task of the experimental sciences to test such hypotheses. If on the other hand you ask for a reason the answer is, “There need not have been a reason for the choice. A reason is a step preceding the step of the choice. But why should every step be preceded by another one?”

“But then B didn't really ''recognize'' the material as the right one”. ‒ ‒ You needn't reckon 14c) among the cases of recognizing, but if you have become aware of the fact that the processes which we call processes of recognition form a vast family with overlapping similarities, you will probably feel not disinclined to include 14c) in this family, too. ‒ ‒ “But doesn't B in this case lack the criterion by which he can recognize the material? In 14a), e.g., he had the memory image and he recognized the material he looked for by its agreement with the image”. ‒ ‒ But had he also a picture of this agreement before him, a picture with which he could compare the agreement between the pattern and the bolt to see whether it was the right one? And, on the other hand, couldn't he have been given such a picture? Suppose, e.g., that A wished B to remember that what was wanted was a bolt exactly like the sample, not, as perhaps in other cases, a material slightly darker than the pattern. Couldn't A in this case have given to B an example of the agreement required by giving him two pieces of the same colour (e.g., {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,19}} as a kind of reminder)? Is any such link between the order & its execution necessarily the last one? ‒ ‒ And if you say that in 14b) at least he had the relaxing of the tension by which to recognize the right material, had he to have an image of this relaxation about him to recognize it as that by which the right material was to be recognized? ‒ ‒

“But supposing B brings the bolt, as in 14c), & on comparing it with the pattern it turns out to be the wrong one?” ‒ ‒ But couldn't that have happened in all the other cases as well? Suppose in 14a) the bolt which B brought back was found not to match with the pattern. Wouldn't we in some such cases say that his memory image had changed, in others that the pattern or the material had changed, in others again that the light had changed? It is not difficult to invent cases, imagine circumstances, in which each of these judgements would be made. ‒ ‒ “But isn't there after all an essential difference between the cases 14a) & 14c)?”‒ ‒ Certainly! Just that pointed out in the description of these cases. ‒ ‒

In 1) B learnt to bring a building stone on hearing the word “column!” called out. We could imagine what happened in such a case to be this: In B's mind the word called out brought up an image of a column, say; the training had, as we should say, established this association. B takes up that building stone which conforms to his image. ‒ ‒ But was this ''necessarily'' what happened? If the training could bring it about that the idea or image – – automatically – – arose in B's mind, why shouldn't it bring about B's ''actions'' without the intervention of an image?

{{parBB|31}} Another tribe. Its language is like that in 30). The highest numeral observed in use is 159. In the life of this tribe the numeral 159 plays a peculiar role. Supposing I said, “They treat this number as their highest”, – – but what does this mean? Could we answer: “They just say that it is the highest”? ‒ ‒ They say certain words, but how do we know what they mean by them? A criterion for what they mean would be the occasions {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,27}} on which the word we are inclined to translate into our word “highest” is used, the role, we might say, which we observe this word to play in the life of the tribe. In fact we could easily imagine the numeral 159 to be used on such occasions, in connection with such gestures and forms of behaviour as would make us say that this numeral plays the role of an unsurmountable limit, even if the tribe had no word corresponding to our “highest”, and the criteria for numeral 159 being the highest numeral did not consist of anything that was ''said'' about the numeral.

{{parBB|42}} A gives orders to B: they are written signs consisting of dots and dashes and B executes them by doing a figure in dancing with a particular step. Thus the order “– ·” is to be carried out by taking a step and a hop alternately; the order “· · – – –” by alternately taking two hops and three steps, etc. The training in this game is “general” in the sense explained in 41); and I should like to say, “the orders given don't move in a limited range. They comprise combinations of any number of dots and dashes”. ‒ ‒ But what does it mean to say that the orders don't move in a limited range? Isn't this nonsense? Whatever orders are given in the practice of the game constitute the limited range. ‒ ‒ Well, what I meant to say by “the orders don't move in a limited range” was that neither in the teaching of the game nor in the practice of it a limitation of the range plays a “predominant” role (see 30)) or, as we might say, the range of the game (it is superfluous to say {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,35}} limited) is just the extent of its actual (“accidental”) practice. (Our game is in this way like 30)) Cf. with this game the following:

We could make these cases clearer if we imagine that the “reading word by word” consisted in pointing to each word of the sentence in turn with one's finger as opposed to pointing at the whole sentence at once, say by pointing to the beginning of the sentence. And the “acting according to the words” we shall for the sake of simplicity imagine to consist in acting (stepping or hopping) after each word of the sentence in turn. ‒ ‒ ''b'') B is guided if he goes through a conscious process which makes a connection between the pointing to a word and the act of hopping and stepping. Such a connection could be imagined in many different ways. E.g., B has a table in which a dash {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,36}} is correlated to the picture of a man making a step and a dot to a picture of a man hopping. Then the conscious acts connecting reading the order and carrying it out might consist in consulting the table, or in consulting a memory image of it “with one's mind's eye”. ''c'') B is guided if he does not just react to looking at each word of the order, but experiences the peculiar strain of “trying to remember what the sign means”, & further, the relaxing of this strain when the meaning, the right action, comes before his mind.

Thus it can come about that we aren't able to rid ourselves of the implications of our symbolism, which seems to admit of a question like, “where does the flame of a candle go to when it's blown out?”, “Where does the light go to?”, “Where does the past go to?”. We have become obsessed with our symbolism. We may say that we are led into puzzlement by an analogy which irresistibly drags us on. ‒ ‒ And this also happens when the meaning of the word “now” appears to us in a mysterious light. In our example 55) it appears that the function of “now” is in no way comparable to the function of an expression like “five o'clock”, “midday”, “the time when the sun sets”, etc. This latter group of expressions I might call “specifications || “determinations of times”. But our ordinary language uses the word “now” and determinations of time in similar contexts. Thus we say “The sun sets now”. || “The sun sets at six o' clock”. We are inclined to say that both “now” and “six o'clock” “refer to points of time”. This use of words produces a puzzlement which one might express in the question, “What is the ‘now’? – – for it is a moment of time and yet it can't be said to be either the ‘moment at which I speak’ or the ‘moment at which the clock strikes’ etc., etc.”‒ ‒ Our answer is: The function of the word “now” is entirely different from that of a specification of time. ‒ ‒ This can easily be seen if we look at the role this word really plays in our usage of language, but it is obscured when instead of looking at the ''whole language-game'', we only look at the contexts, the phrases {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,50}} of language in which the word is used. (The word “today” is not a date, but it isn't anything like it either. It doesn't differ from a date as a hammer differs from a mallet, but as a hammer differs from a nail; and surely we may say there is both a connection between a hammer and a mallet and between a hammer and a nail.)

One has been tempted to say that “now” is the name of an instant of time, and this, of course, would be like saying that “here” is the name of a place, “this” the name of a thing, and “I” the name of a man. (One could of course also have said “a year ago” was the name of a time, “over there” the name of a place, and “you” the name of a person.) But nothing is more unlike than the use of the word “this” and the use of a proper name, – – I mean ''the games'' played with these words, not the phrases in which they are used. For we do say, “This is short” and “Jack is short”; but remember that “This is short” without the pointing gesture and without the thing we are pointing to would be meaningless. ‒ ‒ What can be compared with a name is not the word “this” but, if you like, the symbol consisting of this word, the gesture, and the sample. We might say: Nothing is more characteristic of a proper name A than that we can use it in such a phrase as, “This is A”; & it makes no sense to say, “This is this” or “Now is now” or “Here is here”.

Now one might say || suggest that giving reasons in this way for {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,54}} laying their bets certainly presupposes that they have observed causal connections between the result of a fight, say, and certain features of the bodies of the fighters, or of their training. But this is an assumption which, whether reasonable or not, I certainly have not made in the description of our case. (Nor have I made the assumption that the bettors give reasons for their reasons.) We should in a case like that just described not be surprised if the language of the tribe contained what we should call expressions of degrees of belief, conviction, certainty. These expressions we could imagine to consist in the use of a particular word spoken with different intonations, or a series of words. (I am not thinking however of the use of a scale of probabilities.) ‒ ‒ It is also easy to imagine that the people of our tribe accompany their betting by verbal expressions which we translate into, “I believe that so-and-so ''can'' beat so-and-so in wrestling”, etc.

{{parBB|62}} Let the game be this: A writes down a row of numbers. B watches him and tries to find a system in the sequence of these numbers. When he has done so he says: “Now I can go on”. This example is particularly instructive because “being able to {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,56}} go on” here seems to be something setting in suddenly in the form of a clearly outlined event. ‒ ‒ Suppose then that A had written down the row 1, 5, 11, 19, 29. At that point B shouts, “Now I can go on”. What was it that happened when suddenly he saw how to go on? A great many different things might have happened. Let us assume then that in the present case while A wrote one number after the other B busied himself with trying out several algebraic formulae to see whether they fitted. When A had written “19” B had been led to try the formula a_n = n² + n ‒ 1. A's writing 29 confirms his guess.

Now, should we say that the proposition, “B can continue the series”, means that one of the occurrences just described takes place? Isn't it clear that the statement, “B can continue … ” {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,57}} is not the same as the statement that the formula a_n = n² + n ‒ 1 comes into B's mind? This occurrence might have been all that actually took place. (It is clear, by the way, that it can make no difference to us here whether B has the experience of this formula appearing before his mind's eye, or the experience of writing or speaking the formula, or of picking it out with his eyes from amongst several formulae written down beforehand.) If a parrot had uttered the formula, we should not have said that he could continue the series. ‒ ‒ Therefore, we are inclined to say “to be able to … ” must mean more than just uttering the formula, – – and in fact more than any one of the occurrences we have described. And this, we go on, shows that saying the formula was only a symptom of B's being able to go on, and that it was not the ability of going on itself. Now what is misleading in this is that we seem to intimate that there is one peculiar activity, process, or state called “being able to go on” which somehow is hidden from our eyes but manifests itself in these occurrents which we call symptoms (as an inflammation of the mucous membranes of the nose produces the symptom of sneezing). This is the way talking of symptoms, in this case, misleads us. When we say, “Surely there must be something else behind the mere uttering of the formula, as this alone we should not call ‘being able to … ’”, the word “behind” here is certainly used metaphorically, and “behind” the utterance of the formula may be the circumstances under which it is uttered. It is true, “B can continue … ” is not the same as to say, “B says the formula … ”, but it {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,58}} doesn't follow from this that the expression, “B can continue … ” refers to an activity other than that of saying the formula, in the way in which “B says the formula” refers to the well-known activity. The error we are in is analogous to this: Someone is told the word “chair” does not mean this particular chair I am pointing to, upon which he looks round the room for the object which the word “chair” does denote. (The case would be even more a striking illustration if he tried to look inside the chair in order to find the real meaning of the word “chair”.) It is clear that when with reference to the act of writing or speaking the formula etc., we use the sentence, “He can continue the series”, this must be because of some connection between writing down a formula and actually continuing the series. And the connection in experience of these two processes or activities is clear enough. But this connection tempts us to suggest that the sentence, “B can continue … ” means something like, “B does something which, experience has shown us, generally leads to his continuing the series.” But does B, when he says, “Now I can go on” really mean, “Now I am doing something which, as experience has shown us, etc., etc.”? Do you mean that he had this phrase in his mind or that he would have been prepared to give it as an explanation of what he had said?! To say the phrase, “B can continue … ” is correctly used when prompted by such occurrences as described in 62), 63), 64) but that these occurrences justify its use only under certain circumstances (e.g. when experience has shown certain connections) is not to say that the sentence, “B can continue … ” {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,59}} is short for the sentence which describes all these circumstances, i.e. the whole situation which is the background of our game.

On the other hand we should ''under certain circumstances'' be ready to substitute “B knows the formula”, “B has said the formula” for “B can continue the series”. As when we ask a doctor, “Can the patient walk?”, we shall sometimes be ready to substitute for this, “Is his leg healed?” – – “Can he speak?” under certain circumstances means, “Is his throat all right?”, under others (e.g. if he is a small child) it means, “Has he learned to speak?” ‒ ‒ To the question, “Can the patient walk?”, the doctor's answer may be, “His leg is all right”. ‒ ‒ We use the phrase, “He can walk, as far as the state of his leg is concerned”, especially when we wish to oppose this condition for his walking to some other condition, say the state of his spine. Here we must beware of thinking that there is in the nature of the case something which we might call a || the complete set of conditions, e.g. for his walking; so that the patient, as it were, ''must'' walk || can't help walking if all these conditions are fulfilled.

The question whether “He can continue … ” means the same as “He knows the formula” can be answered in several different ways: We can say, “They don't mean the same, i.e., they are not in general used as synonyms as, e.g., the phrases, ‘I am well’ and ‘I am in good health’”; or we may say, “''Under certain circumstances''” ‘He can continue … ’ means he knows the formula”. Imagine the case of a language (somewhat analogous to 49)) in which two forms of expression, two different sentences, are used to say that a person's legs are in working order. The one form of expression is exclusively used under circumstances when preparations are going on for an expedition, a walking tour, or the like; the other is used in cases when there is no question of such preparations. We shall here be doubtful whether to say the two sentences have the same meaning or different meanings. In any case the true state of affairs can only be seen when we look into the detail of the usage of our expressions. ‒ ‒ And it is clear that if in our present case we should decide on saying || to say that the two expressions have different meanings, we shall certainly not be able to say that the difference is that the fact which makes the second sentence true is a different one from the fact which makes the first sentence true.

Let us ask the following question: Suppose that, on one ground or another, B has said, “I can continue the series”, but on being asked to continue it he had shown himself unable to do so, – – should we say that this proved that his statement, that he could continue, was wrong, or should we say that he was able to continue when he said he was? Would B himself say, “I see I was wrong”, or “What I said was true, I could do it then but I can't now”? ‒ ‒ There are cases in which he would correctly say the one and cases in which he would correctly say the other. Suppose ''a'') when he said he could continue he saw the formula before his mind, but when he was asked to continue he found he had forgotten it; – – or, ''b'') when he said he could continue he had said to himself the next five terms of the series, but now finds that they don't come into his mind; – – or ''c'') before, he had continued the series calculating five more places, now he still remembers these five numbers but has forgotten how he had calculated them; – – or ''d'') he says, “Then I felt I could continue, now I can't”; – – or ''e''), “When I said I could lift the weight my arm didn't hurt, now it does”; etc.

Let us study the use of the expression, “to be guided”, by studying the use of the word “reading”. By “reading” I here mean the activity of translating script into sounds, also of writing according to dictation or of copying in writing a page of print, and such like; reading in this sense does not involve any such thing as understanding what you read. The use of the word “reading” is, of course, extremely familiar to us in the circumstances of our ordinary life (it would be extremely difficult to describe these circumstances even roughly). A person, say an Englishman, has as a child gone through one of the normal ways of training in school or at home, he has learned to read his language, later on he reads books, newspapers, letters, etc. What happens when he reads the newspaper? ‒ ‒ His eyes glide along the printed words, he pronounces them aloud or to himself, but he pronounces certain words just taking their pattern in as a whole, other words which he pronounces after having seen their first few letters only, others again he reads out letter by letter. We should also say that he had read a sentence if while letting his eyes glide along it he had said nothing aloud or to himself, but on being asked afterwards what he had read he was able to reproduce the sentence verbatim or in slightly different words. He may also act as what we might call a mere reading machine, I mean, paying no attention to {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,68}} what he spoke, perhaps concentrating his attention on something totally different. We should in this case say that he read if he acted faultlessly like a reliable machine. ‒ ‒ Compare with this case the case of a beginner. He reads the words by spelling them out painfully. Some of the words however, he just guesses from their contexts, or possibly he knows the piece by heart. The teacher then says that he is pretending to read the words, or just that he is not really reading them. If, looking at this example, we asked ourselves what reading was, we should be inclined to say that it was a particular conscious mental act. This is the case in which we say, “Only he knows whether he is reading; nobody else can really know it”. Yet we must admit that as far as the reading of a particular word goes, exactly the same thing might have happened in the beginner's mind when he “pretended” to read as what happened in the mind of the fluent reader when he read the word. We are using the word “reading” in a different way when we talk about the accomplished reader on the one hand and the beginner on the other hand. What in the one case we call an instance of reading we don't call an instance of reading in the other. ‒ ‒ Of course we are inclined to say that what happened in the accomplished reader and in the beginner when they pronounced the word could not have been the same. The difference lying, if not in their conscious states, then in the unconscious regions of their minds, or in their brains. We here imagine two mechanisms, the internal working of which we can see, and this internal working is the real criterion for a person's reading or not {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,69}} reading. But in fact no such mechanisms are known to us in these cases. Look at it in this way:

{{parBB|67}} Imagine that human beings or animals were used as reading machines, assume that in order to become reading machines they need a particular training. The man who trains them says of some of them that they already can read, of others that they can't. Take a case of one who has so far not responded to the training. If you put before him a printed word he will sometimes make sounds, and every now and then it happens “accidentally” that these sounds more or less agree with || correspond to the printed word. A third person hears the pupil || creature under training uttering the right sound on looking at the word “table”. The third person says, “He reads”, but the teacher answers, “No, he doesn't, it is mere accident”. But supposing now that the pupil on being shown other words and sentences goes on reading them correctly. After a time the teacher says, “Now he can read”. ‒ ‒ But what about the first word “table”? Should the teacher say, “I was wrong; he read that, too”, or should he say, “No, he only started reading later”? When did he really begin to read, or: Which was the first word, or the first letter, which he read? It is clear that this question here makes no sense unless I give an “artificial” explanation such as: “The first word which he reads = the first word of the first hundred consecutive words he reads correctly”. ‒ ‒ Suppose on the other hand that we used the word “reading” to distinguish between the case when a particular conscious process of spelling out the words takes place in a person's mind from the case in which this does not happen: {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,70}} – – Then, at least the person who is reading could say that such-and-such a word was the first which he actually read. ‒ ‒ Also, in the different case of a reading machine which is a mechanism connecting signs with the reactions to these signs, e.g., a pianola, we could say, “only after such-and-such a thing has been done to the machine, e.g., certain parts had been connected by wires, the machine actually read; the first letter which it read was a ''d''”. ‒ ‒

though he actually when looking up the table passed with his eyes or finger horizontally from left to right. ‒ ‒ But let us suppose now

{{parBB|72}} that going through the normal processes of “looking up”, he transcribed an “A” into an “n”, a “B” into an “x”, in short, acted, as we might say, according to a scheme of arrows which showed no simple regularity. Couldn't we call this “deriving” too? ‒ ‒ But suppose that

“But when he said, ‘Oh, this is a pencil’, how did he know that it was if he didn't recognize it as something?” ‒ ‒ This really comes to saying, “How did he recognize ‘pencil’ as the name of this sort of thing?” Well, how did he recognize it? He just reacted in this particular way by saying this word.

One might be inclined to say, “Surely a similarity must strike us, or we shouldn't be { inclined || driven || moved to use the same word”. ‒ ‒ Compare this statement with that: “A similarity between these cases must strike us in order that we should be inclined to use the same picture to represent both”. This says that some act must precede the act of using this picture. But why shouldn't {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,82}} what we call “the similarity striking us” consist partially or wholly in our using the same picture? And why shouldn't it consist partially or wholly in our being prompted to use the same phrase?

Let us ask the question: Suppose I had explained to someone the word “red” (or the meaning of the word “red”) by having pointed to various red objects and given the ostensive explanation. ‒ ‒ What does it mean to say, “Now if he has understood the meaning, he will bring me a red object if I ask him to”? This seems to say: If he has really got hold of what is in common between || to all the objects I have shewn him, he will be in the position to follow my order. But what is it that is in common to these objects?

Now consider this explanation: I give someone two boxes containing various things, and say, “The object which both these boxes have in common is called a toasting fork”. The person I give this explanation to has to sort out the objects in the two boxes until he finds the one they have in common, and thereby we may say, he arrives at the ostensive explanation. Or, this explanation: “In these two pictures you see patches of many colours; the one colour which you find in both is called ‘mauve’”. ‒ ‒ In this case it makes a clear sense to say, “If he has seen (or found) what is in common between these two pictures, he can now bring me a mauve object.”

There is this case || game: I say to someone, “I shall explain to you the word ‘w’ by shewing you various objects. What's in common to them all is what ‘w’ means.” I first shew him two books, and he asks himself, “Does ‘w’ mean ‘book’?” I then point to a brick, and he says to himself, “Perhaps ‘w’ means ‘parallelepiped’”. Finally I point to glowing coal, and he says to himself, “Oh, it's ‘red’ he means, for all these objects had something red about them.” It would be interesting to consider another form of this game where the person has at each stage to ''draw'' or ''paint'' what he thinks I mean. The interest of this version lies in this, that in some cases it would be quite obvious what he has got to draw, say, when he sees that all the objects I have shewn him so far bear a certain trademark (; he'd draw the trademark). ‒ ‒ What, on the other hand, should he paint if he recognizes that there is something red on each object?

There are cases where experience teaches us that a person is not able to carry out an order, say, of the form, “Bring me x” if he did not see what was in common between the various objects to which I pointed as an explanation of “x”. And “seeing what they have in common” in some cases consisted in pointing to it, in letting one's glance rest on a coloured patch after a process of scrutiny and comparing, in saying to oneself, “Oh, it's red he means,” and perhaps at the same time glancing at all the red patches on the various objects, and so on. ‒ ‒ There are cases, on the other hand, in which no process takes place comparable with this intermediary “seeing what's in common”, and where we still use this phrase, though this time we ought to say, “If after shewing him these things he brings me another red object, then ''I shall say'' that he has seen the common feature of the objects I shewed him.” Carrying out the order is now the ''criterion'' for his having understood.

“Why do you call ‘strain’ all these different experiences?” ‒ ‒ “Because they have some element in common.” ‒ ‒ “What is it {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,85}} that bodily and mental strain have in common?” ‒ ‒ “I don't know, but obviously there is some similarity.”

“But surely I wouldn't say they are similar if I had no experience of their similarity.” ‒ ‒ But must this experience be anything you should call a feeling? Suppose for a moment {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,86}} it were the experience that the word “similar” suggested itself to you. Would you call this a feeling?

“But is there no feeling of similarity?” ‒ ‒ I think there are feelings which one might call feelings of similarity. But you don't always have any such feeling if you “notice similarity”. Consider some of the different experiences which you have if you do so.

“But when two colours are similar, the experience of similarity should surely consist in noticing the similarity which there ''is'' between them.” ‒ ‒ But is a bluish green similar to a yellowish green or not? In certain cases we should say they are similar and in others that they are most dissimilar. Would it be correct to say that in the two cases we noticed different relations between them? Suppose I observed a process in which a bluish green gradually changed into a pure green, into a yellowish green, into yellow, and into orange. I say, “It only takes a short time from bluish green to yellowish green, because these colours are similar.” ‒ ‒ But mustn't you have had some experience of similarity to be able to say this? ‒ ‒ The experience may be this, of seeing the two colours and saying that they are both green. Or it may be this, of seeing a band whose colour changes from one end to the other in the way described, and having some one of the experiences which one may call noticing how close to each other bluish green and yellowish green are, compared to bluish green and orange.

Consider such a proposition || an explanation as, “I mean by ‘blue’ what these two colours have in common.” ‒ ‒ Now isn't it possible that someone should understand this explanation? He would, e.g., on being ordered to bring another blue object, carry out this order satisfactorily. But perhaps he will bring a red object and we shall be inclined to say: “He seems to notice some sort {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,90}} of similarity between samples we shewed him and that red thing.

Now should we say that a mental strain and a bodily strain were “strains” in the same sense of the word or in different (or “slightly different”) senses of the word? ‒ ‒ There are cases of this sort in which we should not be doubtful about the answer.

Suppose you look at two faces and say, “They are similar, but I don't know what it is that's similar about them.” And suppose that after a while you said: “Now I know; their eyes have the same shape”, I should say, “Now your experience of their similarity is different from what it was when you saw similarity and didn't know what it consisted in.” Now to the question “What made you use the word ‘darker’ … ?” the answer may be, “Nothing made me use the word ‘darker’, – – that is, if you ask me for a ''reason'' why I use it. I just used it, and what is more I used it with the same intonation of voice, and perhaps with the same facial expression and gesture which I should in certain cases be inclined to use when applying the word to colours.” ‒ ‒ It is easier to see this when we speak of a ''deep'' sorrow, a ''deep'' sound, a ''deep'' well. Some people are able to distinguish between fat and lean days of the week. And their experience when they conceive a day as a fat one consists in applying this word together perhaps with a gesture expressive of fatness and a certain comfort.

Consider the following case: B has been taught a use of the words “lighter” and “darker”. He has been shewn objects of various colours and has been taught that one calls this a darker colour than that, trained to bring an object on being ordered, “Bring something darker than this”, and to describe the colour of an object by saying that it is darker or lighter than a certain sample, etc., etc. Now he is given the order to put down a series of objects, arranging them in the order of their darkness. He does this by laying out a row of books, writing down a series of names of animals, and by writing down the five vowels in the order u, o, a, e, i. We ask him why he put down that latter series, and he says, “Well ''o'' is lighter than ''u'', and ''e'' lighter than ''o''.” ‒ ‒ We shall be astonished at his attitude, and at the same time admit that there is something in what he says. Perhaps we shall say: “But look, surely ''e'' isn't lighter than ''o'' in the way this book is lighter than that.” ‒ ‒ But he may shrug his shoulders and say, “I don't know, but ''e'' ''is'' lighter than ''o'', isn't it?” {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,96}} We may be inclined to treat this case as some kind of abnormality, and to say, “B must have a different sense, with the help of which he arranges both coloured objects and vowels.” And if we tried to make this idea of ours (quite) explicit, it would come to this: The normal person registers lightness and darkness of visual objects on one instrument, and, what one might call the lightness and darkness of sounds (vowels) on another, in the sense in which one might say that we record rays of a certain wave length with the eyes, and rays of another range of wave length by || with our sense of temperature. B on the other hand, we wish to say, arranges both sounds and colours by the readings of one instrument (sense organ) only (in the sense in which a photographic plate might record rays of a range which we could only cover with two of our senses).

This roughly is the picture standing behind our idea that B must have “understood” the word “darker” differently from the normal person. On the other hand let us put side by side with this picture the fact that there is in our case no evidence for “another sense”. ‒ ‒ And in fact the use of the word “must” when we say, “B must have understood the word differently”, already shews us that this sentence (really) expresses our determination to look at the phenomena we have observed after the picture outlined in this sentence.

“But surely he used ‘lighter’ in a different sense when he said ''e'' was lighter than ''u''”. ‒ ‒ What does this mean? Are you distinguishing between the sense in which he used the word and his usage of the word? That is, do you wish to say that if someone uses the word as he does, some other difference, say in {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,97}} his mind, must go along with the difference in usage? Or is all you want to say that surely the usage of “lighter” was a different one when he applied it to vowels?

What if somebody said, pointing to two patches which I had called red, “Surely you are using the word ‘red’ in two different ways.” ‒ ‒ I should say, “This is light red and the other dark red, – – but why should I have to talk of two different usages?”‒ ‒

“But don't I perceive that the relation between a lighter and a darker bit of material is a different one than that between the vowels ''e'' and ''u'', – – as on the other hand I perceive that the relation between ''u'' and ''e'' is the same as that between ''e'' and ''i''?” ‒ ‒ Under certain circumstances we shall in these cases be inclined to talk of different relations, under certain others to talk of the same relation. One might say, “It depends how {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,98}} one compares them.”

Let us ask the question, “Should we say that the arrows ⟶ and ⟵ point in the same direction or in different directions?” ‒ ‒ At first sight you might be inclined to say, “Of course, in different directions.” But look at it this way: If I look into a looking glass and see the reflection of my face, I can take this as a criterion for seeing my own head. If on the other hand, I saw in it the back of a head I might say, “It can't be my own head I am seeing, but a head looking in the opposite direction.” Now this could lead me on to say that an arrow and the reflection of an arrow in a glass have the same direction when they point at || towards each other, and opposite directions when the head of the one points to the tail end of the other. Imagine the case that a man had been taught the ordinary use of the word “the same” in the cases of “the same colour”, “the same shape”, “the same length.” He had also been taught the use of the word “to point to” in such contexts as, “The arrow points to the tree.” Now we shew him two arrows facing each other, and two arrows one following the other, and ask him in which of these two cases he'd apply the phrase, “The arrows point the same way.” Isn't it easy to imagine that if certain applications were uppermost in his mind, he would be inclined to say that the arrows ⟶ ⟵ point “the same way”?

When we hear the diatonic scale we are inclined to say that after every seven notes the same note recurs, and, asked why we call it the same note again one might answer, “Well it's a ''c'' again.” But this isn't the explanation I want, for I should ask, “What made one call it a ''c'' again?” And the answer to this {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,99}} would seem to be, “Well, don't you hear that it's the same tone only an octave higher?” ‒ ‒ Here too we could imagine that a man had been taught our use of the word “the same” when applied to colours, lengths, directions, etc., and that we now played the diatonic scale for him and asked him whether he'd say that he heard the same notes again and again at certain intervals, and we could easily imagine several answers, in particular for instance, this, that he heard the same note alternately after every four or three notes (he calls the tonic, the dominant, and the octave the same tone).

If we had made this experiment with two people A and B, and A had applied the expression “the same tone” to the octave only, B to the dominant and octave, should we have a right to say that the two hear different things when we play to them the diatonic scale? ‒ ‒ If we say they do, let us be clear whether we wish to assert that there must be some other difference between the two cases besides the one we have observed, or whether we wish to make no such statement.

All the questions considered here link up with this problem: Suppose you had taught someone to write down series of numbers according to rules of the form: Always write down a number ''n'' greater than the preceding. (This rule is abbreviated to “Add ''n''”). The numerals in this game are to be groups of dashes -, --, ---, etc. What I call teaching this game of course consisted in giving general explanations and doing examples. ‒ ‒ These examples are taken from the range, say, between 1 and 85. We now give the pupil the order, “Add 1”. After some time we observe that after passing 100 he did what we should call {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,100}} adding 2; after passing 300 he does what we should call adding 3. We have him up for this: “Didn't I tell you always to add 1? Look what you have done before you got to 100!” ‒ ‒ Suppose the pupil said, pointing to the numbers 102, 104, etc. “Well, didn't I do the same here? I thought this was what you wanted me to do”. ‒ ‒ You see that it would get us no further here again to say, “But don't you see … ?”, pointing out to him again the rules and examples we had given to him. We might in such a case, say that this person naturally understands (interprets) the rule (and examples) we have given as we should understand the rule (and examples) telling us: “Add 1 up to 100, then 2 up to 200, etc.”

“I suppose what you say comes to this, that in order to follow the rule “Add 1” correctly a new insight, intuition, is needed at every step.” ‒ ‒ But what does it mean to follow the rule ''correctly''? How and when is it to be decided which at a particular point is the correct step to take? – “The correct step at every point is” that which is in accordance with the rule as it was ''meant'', intended.” … with the ''meaning'', intention, of the rule.” ‒ ‒ I suppose the idea is this: When you gave the rule, “Add 1”, and meant it, you meant him to write 101 after 100, 199 after 198, 1041 after 1040, and so on. But how did you do all these acts of meaning (I suppose an infinite number of them) when you gave him the rule? Or is this misrepresenting {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,101}} it? And would you say that there was only one act of meaning, from which, however, all these others, or any one of them, followed in turn? But isn't the point just: “what does follow from the general rule?” You might say, “Surely I knew when I gave him the rule that I meant him to follow up 100 by 101.” But here you are misled by the grammar of the word “to know”. Was knowing this some mental act by which you at the time made the transition from 100 to 101, e.g., some act like saying to yourself: “I want him to write 101 after 100”? In this case ask yourself how many such acts you performed when you gave him the rule. Or do you mean by knowing some kind of disposition, – – then only experience can teach us what it was a disposition for. ‒ ‒ “But surely if one had asked me which number he should write after 1568, I should have answered ‘1569’.” ‒ ‒ I dare say you would, but how can you be sure of it? Your idea really is that somehow in the mysterious act of ''meaning'' the rule you made the transitions without really making them. You crossed all the bridges before you were there. ‒ ‒ This queer idea is connected with a peculiar use of the word “to mean”. Suppose our man got the number 100 and followed it up by 102. We should then say, “I ''meant'' you to write 101.” Now the past tense in the word “to mean” suggests that a particular act of meaning had been performed when the rule was given, though as a matter of fact this expression alludes to no such act. The past tense could be explained by putting the sentence into the form, “Had you asked me before what I wanted you to do at this stage, I should have said … ” But it is a hypothesis that you would have said that.

{{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,102}} To get this clearer, think of this example: Someone says, “Napoleon was crowned in 1804.” I ask him, “Did you mean the man who won the battle of Austerlitz?” He says, “Yes, I meant him.” ‒ ‒ Does this mean that when he “meant him” he in some way thought of Napoleon's winning the battle of Austerlitz? ‒ ‒

Now compare these sentences: “Surely it is using the rule ‘Add 1’ in a different way if after 100 you go on to 102, 104, etc.” and “Surely it is using the word ‘darker’ in a new || different way if after applying it to coloured patches we apply it to the vowels.” ‒ ‒ I should say: “That depends on what you call a ‘different way’”. ‒ ‒

And here we say, “But surely designing a new shape isn't in itself changing one's taste, – – and saying a word isn't meaning it, – – and saying that I believe isn't believing; there must be feelings, mental acts, going along with these lines and these words.” ‒ ‒ And the reason we give for saying this is {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,104}} that a man certainly could design a new shape without having changed his taste, say that he believes something without believing it, etc. And this obviously is true. But it doesn't follow that what distinguishes a case of having changed one's taste from a case of not having done so isn't under certain circumstances just designing what one hasn't designed before. Nor does it follow that in cases in which designing a new shape is not the criterion for a change of taste, the criterion must be a change in some particular region of our mind.

Let us then consider the proposition, “Believing something can not merely consist in saying that you believe it, you must {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,105}} say it with a particular facial expression, gesture, and tone of voice.” Now it cannot be doubted that we regard certain facial expressions, gestures, etc. as characteristic for the expression of belief. We speak of a “tone of conviction”. And yet it is clear that this tone of conviction isn't always present whenever we rightly speak of conviction wherever we should say there was conviction. “Just so”, you might say, “this shews that there is something else, something behind these gestures, etc. which is the real belief as opposed to mere expressions of belief.” ‒ ‒ “Not at all”, I should say, “many different criteria distinguish, under different circumstances, cases of believing what you say from those of not believing what you say.” There may be cases where the presence of a sensation other than those bound up with gestures, tone of voice, etc. distinguishes meaning what you say from not meaning it. But sometimes what distinguishes these two is nothing that happens while we speak, but a variety of actions and experiences of different kinds before and after.

To understand this family of cases it will again be helpful to consider an analogous case drawn from facial expressions. There is a family of friendly facial expressions. Suppose we had asked, “What feature is it that characterizes a friendly face?” At first one might think that there are certain traits which one might call friendly traits, each of which makes the face look friendly to a certain degree, and which when present in a large number constitute the friendly expression. This idea would seem to be borne out by our common speech, talking {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,106}} of “friendly eyes”, “friendly mouth”, etc. But it is easy to see that the same eyes of which we say they make a face look friendly, do not look friendly, or even look unfriendly, with certain other wrinkles of the forehead, lines round the mouth, etc. Why then do we ever say that it is these eyes which look friendly? Isn't it wrong to say that they characterize the face as friendly, for if we say they do so “under certain circumstances” (these circumstances being the other features of the face) why did we single out the one feature from amongst the others? The answer is that in the wide family of friendly faces there is what one might call a main branch characterized by a certain kind of eyes, another by a certain kind of mouth, etc.; although in the large family of unfriendly faces we meet these same eyes when they don't mitigate the unfriendliness of the expression. ‒ ‒ There is further the fact that when we notice the friendly expression of a face, our attention, our gaze, is drawn to a particular feature in the face, the “friendly eyes” or the “friendly mouth”, etc., and that it does not rest on other features although these too are responsible for the friendly expression.

“But is there no difference between saying something and meaning it, and saying it without meaning it?” ‒ ‒ There needn't be a difference while he says it, and if there is, this difference may be of all sorts of different kinds according to the surrounding circumstances. It does not follow from the fact that there is what we call a friendly and an unfriendly expression of the eye that there must be a difference between the eye {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,107}} of a friendly and the eye of an unfriendly face.

It is such phrases as, “He said it and meant it”, which are most liable to mislead us. ‒ ‒ Compare meaning “I shall be delighted to see you” with meaning “The train leaves at 3.30”. Suppose you had said the first sentence to someone and were asked afterwards, “Did you mean it?”, you would then probably think of the feelings, the experiences, which you had while you said it. And accordingly you would in this case be inclined to say, “Didn't you see that I meant it?” Suppose that on the other hand, after having given someone the information, “The train leaves at 3.30”, he asked you, “Did you mean it?”, you might be inclined to answer, “Certainly. Why shouldn't I have meant it?”

It is interesting to consider an objection to this: What if I said, “I believe it will rain” (meaning what I say) and someone wanted to explain to a Frenchman who doesn't understand English what it was I believed. Then, you might say, if all that happened when I believed what I did was that I said the sentence, the Frenchman ought to know what I believe if you tell him the exact words I used, or say, “Il croit ‘It will rain’”. Now it is clear that this will not tell him what I believe and consequently, you might say, we failed to convey just that to him which was essential, my real mental act of believing. ‒ ‒ But the answer is that even if my words had been accompanied by {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,109}} all sorts of experiences, and if we could have transmitted these experiences to the Frenchman, he would still not have known what I believed. For “knowing what I believe” just doesn't mean: feel what I do just while I say it; just as knowing what I intend with this move in our game of chess doesn't mean knowing my exact state of mind while I'm making the move. Though, at the same time, in certain cases, knowing this state of mind might furnish you with very exact information about my intention.

We use the words “meaning”, “believing”, “intending” in such a way that they refer to certain acts, states of mind given certain circumstances; as by the expression “checkmating somebody” we refer to the act of taking his king. If on the other hand someone, say a child, playing about with chessmen, placed a few of them on a chess board and went through the motions of taking a king, we should not say the child had checkmated anyone. ‒ ‒ And here too one might think that what distinguished this {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,110}} case from real checkmating was what happened in the child's mind.

What holds for “meaning” holds for “thinking”. ‒ ‒ We very often find it impossible to think without speaking to ourselves half aloud, – – and nobody asked to describe what happened in this case would ever say that something – – the thinking – – accompanied the || his speaking, were they || he not led into doing so by the pair of verbs, “speaking”: :“thinking”, and by many of our common phrases in which their uses run parallel. Consider these examples: “Think before you speak!”, “He speaks without thinking”, “What I said didn't quite express my thought”, “He says one thing and thinks just the opposite”, “I didn't mean a word of what I said”, “The French language uses its words in that order in which we think them.”

Now it is very remarkable that when in a philosophical conversation we say: “The name of a colour comes in a particular way”, we don't trouble to think of the many different cases and ways in which such a name comes. ‒ ‒ And our chief argument is really that naming the colour is different from just pronouncing a word on some different occasion while looking at a colour. Thus one might say: “Suppose we counted some objects lying on our table, a blue one, a red one, a white one, and a black one, – – looking at each in turn we say: ‘One, two, three, {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,113}} four’. Isn't it easy to see that something different happens in this case when we pronounce the words than what would happen if we had to tell someone the colours of the objects? And couldn't we, with the same right as before, have said, ‘Nothing happens when we say the numerals than just saying them while looking at the object’?” ‒ ‒ Now two answers can be given to this: First, undoubtedly, at least in the great majority of cases, counting the objects will be accompanied by different experiences from naming their colours. And it is easy to describe roughly what the difference will be. In counting we know a certain gesture, as it were, beating the number out with one's finger or by nodding one's head. There is on the other hand an experience which one might call “concentrating one's attention on the colour”, getting the full impression of it. And these are the sort of things one recalls when one says, “It is easy to see that something different happens when we count the objects and when we name their colours.” But it is in no way necessary that certain peculiar experiences more or less characteristic for counting take place while we are counting, nor that the peculiar phenomenon of gazing at the colour takes place when we look at the object and name its colour. It is true that the processes of counting four objects and of naming their colours will, in most cases at any rate, be different taken as a whole, and ''this'' is what strikes us; but that doesn't mean at all that we know that something different happens every time in these two cases when we pronounce a numeral on the one hand and a name of a colour on the other.

The problem which we are concerned with we also encounter in thinking about volition, deliberate and involuntary action. Think, say, of these examples: I deliberate whether to lift a certain heavyish weight, decide to do it, I then apply my force to it and lift it. Here, you might say, you have a full-fledged case of willing and intentional action. Compare with this such a case as reaching a man a lighted match after having lit with it one's own cigarette and seeing that he wishes to light his; or again the case of moving your hand while writing a letter, or moving your mouth, larynx, etc. while speaking. ‒ ‒ Now when I called the first example a full fledged case of willing, I deliberately used this misleading expression. For this expression indicates that one is inclined in thinking about volition to regard this sort of example as one exhibiting most clearly the typical characteristic of willing. One takes one's ideas, and one's language, about volition from this kind of example and thinks that they must apply – – if not in such an {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,115}} obvious way – – to all cases which one can properly call cases of willing. ‒ ‒ It is the same case that we have met over and over again: The forms of expression of our ordinary language fit most obviously certain very special applications of the words “willing”, “thinking”, “meaning”, “reading”, etc. etc. And thus we might have called the case in which a man “first thinks and then speaks” as the full fledged case of thinking and the case in which a man spells out the words he is reading as the full fledged case of reading. We speak of an “act of volition” as different from the action which is willed, and in our first example there are lots of different acts clearly distinguishing this case from one in which all that happens is that the hand and the weight lift: there are the preparations of deliberation and decision, there is the effort of lifting. But where do we find the analogues to these processes in our other examples and in innumerable ones we might have given?

Now on the other hand it has been said that when a man, say, gets out of bed in the morning, all that happens may be this: he deliberates, “Is it time to get up?”, he tries to make up his mind, and then suddenly ''he finds himself getting up''. Describing it this way emphasizes the absence of an act of volition. Now first: where do we find the paradigm || prototype of such a thing, i.e., how did we come by the idea of such an act? I think the prototype of the act of volition is the experience of muscular effort. ‒ ‒ Now there is something in this above description which tempts us to contradict it; we say: “We don't just {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,116}} ‘find’, observe, ourselves getting up, as though we were observing someone else: It isn't like, say, watching certain reflex actions. If, e.g., I place myself sideways close to a wall, my wall side arm hanging down outstretched, the back of the hand touching the wall, and if now keeping the arm rigid I press the back of the hand hard against the wall, doing it all by means of the delta muscle, if then I quickly step away from the wall, letting my arm hang down loosely, my arm without any action of mine, of its own accord begins to rise; this is the sort of case in which it would be proper to say, ‘I ''find'' my arm rising’.”

Let us consider various characteristics of voluntary and involuntary acts. In the case of lifting the heavy weight, the various experiences of effort are obviously most characteristic for lifting the weight voluntarily. On the other hand, compare with this the case of writing, voluntarily, here in most {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,118}} of the ordinary cases there will be no effort; and even if we feel that the writing tires our hands and strains their muscles, this is not the experience of “pulling” and “pushing” which we would call typical voluntary actions. Further compare the lifting of your hand when you lift a weight with lifting your hand when, e.g., you point to some object above you. This will certainly be regarded as a voluntary act, though the element of effort will most likely be entirely absent; in fact this raising of the arm to point at an object is very much like raising the eye to look at it, and here we can hardly conceive of an effort. ‒ ‒ Now let us describe an act of involuntary raising your arm. There is the case of our experiment, and this was characterized by the utter absence of muscular strain and also by our observant attitude towards the lifting of the arm. But we have just seen a case in which muscular strain was absent, and there are cases in which we should call an action voluntary although we take an observant attitude towards it. But in a large class of cases it is the peculiar impossibility of taking an observant attitude towards a certain action which characterizes it as a voluntary one: Try, e.g., to observe your hand rising when you voluntarily raise it. Of course you ''see'' it rising as you do, say, in the experiment; but you can't somehow follow it in the same way with your eye. This might get clearer if you compare two different cases of following lines on a piece of paper with your eye; ''A'') some irregular line like this: [[File:Brown Book 2-Ts310,118.png|60px|link=]], ''B'') a written sentence. You will find that in ''A'') the eye, as it were, alternately slips and gets stuck, whereas {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,119}} in reading a sentence it glides along smoothly.

Now consider a case in which we do take up an observant attitude towards a voluntary action, I mean the very instructive case of trying to draw a square with its diagonals by placing a mirror on your drawing paper and directing your hand by what you see by looking at it in the mirror. And here one is inclined to say that our real ''actions'', the ones to which volition ''immediately'' applies || for which volition is ''immediately'' responsible, are not the movements of our hand but something further back, say, the actions of our muscles. We are inclined to compare the case with this: Imagine we had a series of levers before us, through which, by a hidden mechanism, we could direct a pencil drawing on a sheet of paper. We might then be in doubt which levers to pull in order to get the desired movement of the pencil; and we could say that ''we deliberately'' pulled this particular lever, although we didn't deliberately produce the wrong result that we thereby produced. But this comparison, though it easily suggests itself, is very misleading. For in the case of the levers which we saw before us, there was such a thing as deciding which one we were going to pull before pulling it. But does our volition, as it were, play on a keyboard of muscles, choosing which one it was going to use next? ‒ ‒ For some actions which we call deliberate it is characteristic that we, in some sense, “know what we are going to do” before we do it. In this sense we say that we know what object we are going to point to, and what we might call “the act of knowing” might consist in looking at the object before we point to it or in describing its position by words or {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,120}} pictures. Now we could describe our drawing the square through the mirror by saying that our acts were deliberate as far as their motor aspect is concerned but not as far as their visual aspect is concerned. This could || would, e.g., be demonstrated by our ability to repeat a movement of the hand which had produced a wrong result, on being told to do so. But it would obviously be absurd to say that this motor character of voluntary motion consisted in our knowing beforehand what we were going to do, as though we had had a picture of the kinaesthetic sensation before our mind and decided to bring about this sensation. Remember the experiment (?) p. 62; if here, instead of pointing from a distance to the finger which you order the subject to move, you touch that finger, the subject will always move it without the slightest difficulty. And here it is tempting to say, “Of course I can move it now, because now I know which finger it is I'm asked to move.” This makes it appear as though I had now shown you which muscle to contract in order to bring about the desired result. The word “of course” makes it appear as though by touching your finger I had given you an item of information telling you what to do. (As though normally when you tell a man to move such-and-such a finger he could follow your order because he knew how to bring the movement about.)

Consider now the following example, which is of great help in all these considerations: In order to see what happens when one understands a word, we play this game: You have a list of words, partly these words are words of my native language, partly words of foreign languages more or less familiar to me, partly words of languages entirely unknown to me, (or, which comes to the same, nonsensical words invented for the occasion.) Some of the words of my native tongue, again, are words of ordinary, everyday usage; and some of these, like “house”, “table”, “man”, are what we might call primitive words, being among the first words a child learns, and some of these again, words of baby talk like “Mamma”, “Papa”. Again there are more or less common technical terms such as “carburetor”, “dynamo”, “fuse”; etc. etc. All these words are read out to me, and after each one I have to say “Yes” or “No” according to whether I understand the word or {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,123}} not. I then try to remember what happened in my mind when I understood the words I did understand, and when I didn't understand the others. And here again it will be useful to consider the particular tone of voice and facial expression with which I say “Yes” and “No”, alongside of the so-called mental events. ‒ ‒ Now it may surprise us to find that although this experiment will shew us a multitude of different characteristic experiences, it will not shew us any one experience which we should be inclined to call the experience of understanding. There will be such experiences as these: I hear the word “tree” and say “Yes” with the tone of voice and sensation of “Of course”. Or I hear “corroboration” – – I say to myself, “Let me see”, vaguely remember a case of helping, and say “Yes”. I hear “gadget”, I imagine the man who always used this word, and say “Yes”. I hear “Mamma”, this strikes me as funny and childish, – – “Yes”. A foreign word I shall very often translate in my mind into English before answering. I hear “spinthariscope”, and say to myself, “Must be some sort of scientific instrument”, perhaps try to think up its meaning from its derivation and fail, and say “No”. In another case I might say to myself, “Sounds like Chinese” – – “No”. Etc. There will on the other hand be a large class of cases in which I am not aware of anything happening except hearing the word and saying the answer. And there will also be cases in which I remember experiences (sensations, thoughts), which, as I should say, had nothing to do with the word at all. Thus amongst the experiences which I can describe there will be a class which I might call typical experiences of understanding and some typical experiences of {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,124}} not understanding. But opposed to these there will be a large class of cases in which I should have to say, “I know of no particular experience at all, I just said ‘Yes’, or ‘No’.”

Of course in our experiment we might call saying “Yes” or “No” characteristic experiences of understanding or not understanding, but what if we just hear a word in a sentence where there isn't even a question of this reaction to it? ‒ ‒ We are here in a curious difficulty: on the one hand it seems we have no reason to say that in all cases in which we understand a word one particular experience – – or even one of a set – – is present. On the other hand we may feel it's plainly wrong to say that in such a case all that happens may be that I hear or say the word. For that seems to be saying that part of the time we act as mere automatons. And the answer is that in a sense we do and in a sense we don't.

{{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,125}} If someone talked to me with a kindly play of facial expressions, is it necessary that in any short interval his face should have been || looked such that seeing it at any other time || under any other circumstances I should have called its expression distinctly kindly? And if not, does this mean that his “kindly play of expression” was interrupted by periods of inexpressiveness? ‒ ‒ We certainly should not say this under the circumstances which I am assuming, and we don't feel that the look at this moment interrupts || interrupted the expressiveness, although taken alone we should call it inexpressive.

We might ask, “Did you say it had a peculiar smell, as {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,127}} opposed to no peculiar smell, or that it had this smell, as opposed to some other smell, or did you wish to say both the first and the second?” ‒ ‒ Now what was it like when, philosophizing, I said that the word “red” came in a particular way when I described something I saw as red? Was it that I was going to describe the way in which the word “red” came, like saying, “It always comes quicker than the word ‘two’ when I'm counting coloured objects” or “It always comes with a shock,” etc.? ‒ ‒ Or was it that I wished to say that “red” comes in a striking way? ‒ ‒ Not exactly that either. But certainly rather the second than the first. To see this more clearly, consider another example: You are, of course, constantly changing the position of your body throughout the day; arrest yourself in any such attitude (while writing, reading, talking, etc. etc.) and say to yourself in the way in which you say, “‘Red’ comes in a particular way … ”, “I am now in a particular attitude.” You will find that you can quite naturally say this. But aren't you always in a particular attitude? And of course you didn't mean that you were just then in a particularly striking attitude. What was it that happened? You concentrated, as it were stared at, your sensations. And this is exactly what you did when you said that “red” came in a particular way.

“But didn't I mean that ‘red’ came in a different way from ‘two’?” ‒ ‒ You may have meant this, but the phrase, “They come in different ways”, is itself liable to cause confusion. Suppose I said, “Smith and Jones always enter my room in different ways”: I might go on and say, “Smith enters quickly, Jones

{{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,128}} slowly”, I am specifying the ways. I might on the other hand say, “I don't know what the difference is”, intimating that I'm ''trying'' to specify the difference, and perhaps later on I shall say, “Now I know what it is; it is … ” ‒ ‒ I could on the other hand tell you that they came in different ways, and you wouldn't know what to make of this statement, and perhaps answer, “Of course they come in different ways; they just ''are'' different.” ‒ ‒ We could describe our trouble by saying that we feel as though we could give an experience a name without at the same time committing ourselves about its use, and in fact without any intention to use it at all. Thus when I say “red” comes in a particular way … , I feel that I might now give this way a name if it hasn't already got one, say “A”. But at the same time I am not at all prepared to say that I recognize this to be the way “red” has always come on such occasions, nor even to say that there are, say, four ways, say A, B, C, D, in one of which it always comes. You might say that the two ways in which “red” and “two” come can be identified by, say, exchanging the meaning of the two words, using “red” as the second cardinal numeral, “two” as the name of a colour. Thus, on being asked how many eyes I had, I should answer “red”, and to the question, “What is the colour of blood?”, “two”. But the question now arises whether you can identify the “way in which these words come” independently of the ways in which they are used, – – I mean the ways just described. Did you wish to say that as a matter of experience, the word when used in ''this'' way always comes in the way A, but may, the next time, come in the way “two” usually comes? You will see then that {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,129}} you meant nothing of the sort.

What is ''particular'' about the way “red” comes is that it comes while you're philosophizing about it, as what is particular about the position of your body when you concentrated on it was concentration. We appear to ourselves to be on the verge of giving a characterization of the “way” || describing the way, whereas we aren't really opposing it to any other way. We are emphasizing, not comparing, but we express ourselves as though this emphasis was really a comparison of the object with itself; there seems to be a reflexive comparison. Let me express myself in this way: suppose I speak of the way in which A enters the room, I may say, “I have noticed the way in which A enters the room”, and on being asked, “What is it?”, I may answer, “He always sticks his head into the room before coming in.” Here I'm referring to a definite feature, and I could say that B had the same way, or that A no longer had it. Consider on the other hand the statement, “I've now been observing the way A sits and smokes.” I want to draw him like this. In this case I needn't be ready to give any description of a particular feature of his attitude, and my statement may just mean, “I've been observing A as he sat and smoked.” ‒ ‒ “The way” can't in this case be separated from him. Now if I wished to draw him as he sat there, and was contemplating, studying, his attitude, I should while doing so be inclined to say and repeat to myself, “He has a particular way of sitting.” But the answer to the question, “What way?” would be, “Well, ''this'' way”, and perhaps one would give it by drawing the characteristic outlines of his attitude. On the other hand, my phrase, “He has a particular way … ”, might {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,130}} just have to be translated into, “I'm contemplating his attitude.” Putting it in this form we have, as it were, straightened out the proposition; || our expression; whereas in its first form its meaning seems to describe a loop, that is to say, the word “particular” here seems to be used transitively and, more particularly, reflexively, i.e., we are regarding its use as a special case of the transitive use. We are inclined to answer the question, “What way do you mean?” by “''This'' way”, instead of answering: “I didn't refer to any particular feature; I was just contemplating his position.” My expression made it appear as though I was pointing out something ''about'' his way of sitting, or, in our previous case, about the way the word “red” came, whereas what makes me use the word “particular” here is that by my attitude towards the phenomenon I am laying an emphasis on it: I am concentrating on it, or retracing it in my mind, or drawing it, etc.

“This face has a particular expression.” ‒ ‒ I am inclined to say this when I am letting it make || trying to let it make its full impression upon me.

as a swastika” is of special interest because this expression might mean being, somehow, under the optical delusion that the square is not quite closed, that there are the gaps which distinguish the swastika from our drawing. On the other hand it is quite clear that this was not what we meant by “seeing our drawing as a swastika”. We saw it in a way which suggested the description, “I see it as a swastika.” One might suggest that we ought to have said, “I see it as a closed swastika”; – – but then, what is the difference between a closed swastika and a square with diagonals? I think that in this case it is easy to recognize “what happens when we see our figure as a swastika.” I believe it is that we retrace the figure with our eyes in a particular way, viz., by starting at the centre, looking along a radius, and along a side adjacent to it, starting at the centre again, taking the next radius and the next side, say in a right handed sense of rotation, etc. But this ''explanation'' of the phenomenon of seeing the figure as a swastika is of no fundamental interest to us. It is of interest to us only in so far as it helps one to see that the expression, “seeing the figure as a swastika” did not mean seeing ''this'' as ''that'', seeing one thing as something else, when, essentially, ''two'' visual objects entered the process of doing so. ‒ ‒ Thus also seeing the first figure as a cube did not mean “taking it to be a cube.” (For we might never have seen a cube and still have this experience of “seeing it as a cube”).

I will here again describe the ''kind'' of thing that happens in your mind and otherwise when you recognize a person coming into your room by means of what you might ''say'' when you recognize him. Now this may just be: “Hello!” And thus we may say that one kind of event of recognizing a thing we see consists in saying “Hello!” to it in words, gestures, facial expressions, etc. ‒ ‒ And thus also we may think that when we look at our drawing and see it as a face, we compare it with some paradigm, and it agrees with it, or it fits into a mould ready for it in our mind. But no such mould or comparison enters into our experience, there is only this shape, not any other to compare it with, and as it were, say “Of course!” to it. As when in putting together a jig-saw puzzle, somewhere a small space is left unfilled and I see a piece obviously fitting it and put it in the place saying to myself “Of course!” But here we say, “Of course!” ''because'' the piece fits the mould {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,138}} whereas in our case of seeing the drawing as a face, we have the same attitude for ''no'' reason.

The same strange illusion which we are under when we seem to seek the something which a face expresses whereas, in reality, we are giving ourselves up to the features before us,– – that same illusion possesses us even more strongly if repeating a tune to ourselves and letting it make its full impression on us, we say, “This tune says ''something''”, and it is as though I had to find ''what'' it says. And yet I know that it doesn't say anything in which I might express in words or pictures what it says. And if, recognizing this, I resign myself to saying, “It just expresses a musical thought”, this would mean no more than saying, “It expresses itself.” ‒ ‒ “But surely when you play it you don't play it ''anyhow'', you play it in this particular way, making a crescendo here, a diminuendo there, a caesura in this place, etc.”‒ ‒ Precisely, and that's all I can say about it, or may be all that I can say about it. For in certain cases I can justify, explain the particular expression with which I play it by a comparison, as when I say, “At this point of the theme, there is, as it were, a colon”, or, “This is, as it were, the answer to what came before”, etc. (This, by the way, shews what a “justification” and an “explanation” in aesthetics is like.) It is true I may hear a tune played and say, “This is not how it ought to be played, it goes like this”; and I whistle it in a different tempo. Here one is inclined to ask, “What is it like to know the tempo in which a piece of music should be played?” And the idea suggests itself that there ''must'' be a paradigm somewhere in our mind, and that we have {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,139}} adjusted the tempo to conform to that paradigm. But in most cases if someone asked me, “How do you think this melody should be played?”, I will as an answer just whistle it in a particular way, and nothing will have been present to my mind but the tune ''actually whistled'' (not an image of ''that'').

We may now return to the ideas of “recognizing” and “familiarity”, and in fact to that example of recognition and familiarity which started our reflections on the use of these terms and of a multitude of terms connected with them. I mean the {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,140}} example of reading, say, a written sentence in a well-known language. ‒ ‒ I read such a sentence to see what the experience of reading is like, what “really happens” when one reads, and I get a particular experience which I take to be the experience of reading. And, it seems, this doesn't simply consist in seeing and pronouncing the words, but, besides, in an experience of what I might call an intimate character || experience of an intimate character, as I should like to say. (I am || am as it were on an intimate footing with the words “I read”).

Now we have used a misleading expression when we said that besides the experiences of seeing and speaking in reading there was another experience, etc. This is saying that to certain experiences another experience is added. ‒ ‒ Now take the experience of seeing a sad face, say, in drawing, – – we can say that to see the drawing as a sad face is not “just” to see it as some complex of strokes, (think of a puzzle picture). But the word “just” here seems to intimate that in seeing the drawing as a face some experience is added to the experience of seeing it as mere strokes; as though I had to say that seeing the drawing as a face consisted of two experiences, elements.

I am tempted to say, “This isn't just a scribble, but it's ''this'' particular face.” ‒ ‒ But I can't say, “I see ''this'' as ''this'' face”, but ought to say, “I see this as ''a'' face.” But I feel I want to say, “I don't see this as ''a'' face, I see it as ''this'' face!” But in the second half of this sentence the word “face” is redundant, and it should have run, “I don't see this as a face, I see it like ''this''.”

Suppose I said, “I see this scribble like ''this''”, and while saying “this scribble” I look at it as a mere scribble, and while saying “like ''this''”, I see the face, – – this would come to something like saying, “What at one time appears to me like this at another appears to me like that”, and here the “this” and the “that” would be accompanied by the two different ways of seeing. ‒ ‒ But we must ask ourselves in what game is this sentence with the processes accompanying it to be used. E.g., whom am I telling this? Suppose the answer is, “I'm saying it to myself.” But that is not enough. We are here in the grave danger of believing that we know what to do with a sentence if it looks more or less like one of the common sentences of our language. But here in order not to be deluded we have to ask ourselves: What is the use, say, of the words “this” and “that”? – – or rather, What are the different uses which we make of them? What we call their meaning the meaning of these words is {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,145}} not anything which they have got in them or which is fastened to them irrespective of what use we make of them. Thus it is one use of the word “this” to go along with a gesture pointing to something: We say, “I am seeing the square with the diagonals like this”, pointing to a swastika. And referring to the square with diagonals I might have said, “What at one time appears to me like this [[File:Brown Book 2-Ts310,134c.png|80px|link=]] at another time appears to me like that [[File:Brown Book 2-Ts310,134d.png|80px|link=]].” And this is certainly not the use we made of the sentence in the above case. ‒ ‒ One might think the whole difference between the two cases is this, that in the first the pictures are mental, in the second, real drawings. We should here ask ourselves in what sense we can call mental images pictures, for in some ways they are comparable to drawn or painted pictures, and in others not. It is, e.g., one of the essential points about the use of a “material” picture that we say that it remains the same not only on the ground that it seems to us to be the same, that we remember that it looked before as it looks now. In fact we shall say under certain circumstances that the picture hasn't changed although it seems to have changed; and we say it hasn't changed because it has been kept in a certain way, certain influences have been kept out. Therefore the expression, “The picture hasn't changed”, is used in a different way when we talk of a material picture on the one hand, and of a mental one on the other. Just as the statement, “These ticks follow at equal intervals”, has got one grammar if the ticks are the tick of a pendulum and the criterion for their regularity is the result of measurements which we have made on our apparatus, and another grammar if the ticks are ticks which {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,146}} we imagine. I might for instance ask the question: When I said to myself, “What at one time appears to me like this, at another … ”, did I recognize the two aspects, this and that, as the same which I got on previous occasions? Or were they new to me and I tried to remember them for future occasions? Or was all that I meant to say, “I can change the aspect of this figure”?

What now is the relation between a name and the object named, say, the house and its name? I suppose we could give either of two answers. The one is that the relation consists in certain strokes having been painted on to the door of the house. The second answer I meant is that the relation we are concerned with is established, not just by painting these strokes on the door, but by the particular role which they play in the practice of our language as we have been sketching it. ‒ ‒ Again, the relation of the name of a person to the person in ) consists in the person having been trained to run up to someone who calls out the name; or again, we might say that it consists in this and the whole of the usage of the name in the language-game.

Look into this language-game and see if you can find the mysterious relation of the object and its name. ‒ ‒ The relation of name and object we may say, consists in a scribble being written on an object (or some other such very trivial relation), and that's all there is to it. But we are not satisfied with that, for we feel that a scribble written on an object in itself is of no importance to us, and interests us in no way. And this is true; the whole importance lies in the particular use {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,148}} we make of the scribble written on the object, and we, in a sense, simplify matters by saying that the name has a peculiar relation to its object, a relation other than that, say, of being written on the object, or of being spoken by a person pointing to an object with his finger. A primitive philosophy condenses the whole usage of the name into the idea of a relation, which thereby becomes a mysterious relation. (Compare the ideas of mental activities, wishing, believing, thinking etc., which for the same reason have something mysterious and inexplicable about them.)

When I say, “I don't see mere dashes (a mere scribble) but a face (or word) with this particular physiognomy”, I don't wish to assert any general characteristic of what I see, but to assert that I see that particular physiognomy which I do see. And it is obvious that here my expression is moving in a circle. But this is so because really the particular physiognomy which I saw ought to have entered my proposition. ‒ ‒ When I find that, “In reading a sentence, a peculiar experience goes on all the while”, I have actually to read over a fairly long stretch to get the peculiar impression uttered in this way || which makes one say this.

I might then have said, “I find that the same experience goes on all the time”, but I wished to say: “I don't just notice that it's the same experience throughout, I notice a particular experience.” Looking at a uniformly coloured wall I might say, “I don't just see that it has the same colour all over, but I see the || a particular colour.” But in saying this I am mistaking the function of a sentence. ‒ ‒ It seems that you wish to specify the colour you see, but not by saying anything about it, nor by comparing it with a sample, – – but by pointing to it; using it at the same time as the sample and that which {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,150}} the sample is compared with.

Consider this example: You tell me to write a few lines, and while I am doing so you ask, “Do you feel something in your hand || notice a feeling in your hand while you are writing?” I say, “Yes, I have a peculiar feeling.” ‒ ‒ Can't I say to myself when I write, “I have ''this'' feeling”? Of course I can say it, and while saying “this feeling”, I concentrate on the feeling. ‒ ‒ But what do I do with this sentence? What use is it to me? It seems that I am pointing out to myself what I am feeling, – – as though my act of concentration was an “inward” act of pointing, one which no one else but me is aware of, this however is unimportant. But I don't point to the feeling by attending to it. Rather, attending to the feeling means producing or modifying it. (On the other hand, observing a chair does not mean producing or modifying the chair.)

Suppose I said to someone: “Observe the particular lighting of this room.” ‒ ‒ Under certain circumstances the sense of this order || imperative will be quite clear, e.g., if the walls of the room were red with the setting sun. But suppose at any other time when there is nothing striking about the lighting I said, “Observe the particular lighting of this room”: – – Well, isn't there a particular lighting? So what is the difficulty about observing it? But the person who was told to observe the lighting when there was nothing striking about it would probably look about the room and say, “Well, what about it?” Now I might go on and say, “It is exactly the same lighting as yesterday at this hour”, or “It is just this slightly dim light which you see in this picture of the room.”

You could have been given a sample, e.g., a piece of colour material, and been asked: “Observe the colour of this patch.” ‒ ‒ And we can draw a distinction between observing, attending to, the shape of the sample and attending to its colour. But, attending to the colour can't be described as looking at a thing which is connected with the sample, rather, as looking at the sample in a peculiar way.

What has to be explained is this: Why do we talk to our impression? ‒ ‒ You read, put yourself into a state of attention || particular state of attention and say: “Something peculiar happens undoubtedly.” You are inclined to go on: “There is a certain smoothness about it”; but you feel that this is only an inadequate description and that the experience can only stand for itself. “Something peculiar happens undoubtedly” is like saying, “I have had an experience.” But you don't wish to make a general statement independent of the particular experience you have had but rather a statement into which this experience enters.

It has sometimes been said that what music conveys to us are feelings of joyfulness, melancholy, triumph, etc. etc. and what repels us in this account is that it seems to say that music is a means to || an instrument for producing in us sequences of feelings. And from this one might gather that any other means of producing such feelings would do for us instead of music. ‒ ‒ To this || such an account we are tempted to reply “Music conveys to us ''itself''!”

It is similar with such expressions as, “Each of these {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,157}} colour patterns impresses one.” We feel we wish to guard against the idea that a colour pattern is a means to producing in us a certain impression – – the colour pattern being like a drug and we interested merely in the effect this drug produces. ‒ ‒ We wish to avoid any form of expression which would seem to refer to an effect produced by an object on a subject. (Here we are bordering on the problem of idealism and realism and on the problem whether statements of aesthetics are subjective or objective.) Saying, “I see this and am impressed” is apt to make it seem as though || that the impression was some feeling accompanying the seeing, and that the sentence said something like, “I see this and feel a pressure.”

When, trying to see what reading consisted in, I read a written sentence, let it || the reading of it impress itself upon me, and said that {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,159}} I had a particular impression, one could have asked me such a question as whether my impression was not due to the particular handwriting || whether it was not, say, the handwriting which had given me the particular impression. This would be asking me whether my impression would not be a different one if the writing had been a different one, or say, if each word of the sentence were written in a different handwriting. In this sense we could also ask whether that impression wasn't due after all to the ''sense'' of the particular sentence which I read. One might suggest: Read a different sentence (or the same one in a different handwriting) and see if you would still say that you had the same impression. And the answer might be: “Yes, the impression I had was really due to the handwriting.” ‒ ‒ But this would ''not'' imply that when I first said the sentence gave me a particular impression I had contrasted one impression with another, or that my statement had not been of the kind, “This sentence has ''its own expression'' || character.” This will get clearer by considering the following example: Suppose we have three faces drawn side by side: a) [[File:Brown Book 2-Ts310,159a.png|40px|link=]], b) [[File:Brown Book 2-Ts310,159b.png|40px|link=]], c) [[File:Brown Book 2-Ts310,159c.png|40px|link=]]. They should be absolutely identical, but for an additional stroke in b) and two dots in c). I contemplate the first one, saying to myself, “This face has a peculiar expression.” Then I am shewn the second one and asked whether it has the same expression. I answer “Yes”. Then the third one is shewn to me and I say, “It has a different expression.” In my two answers I might be said to have distinguished the face and its expression: for b) is different from a) and still I say they have the same expression, whereas the difference between c) and a) corresponds to a {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,160}} difference of expression; and this may make us think that also in my first utterance I distinguished between the face and its expression.

“But is there no such thing as a feeling of familiarity?” ‒ ‒ I should say that there are a great many different experiences, some of them feelings, which we might call “experiences (feelings) of familiarity.”

Different experiences of familiarity: ''a'') Someone enters my room, I haven't seen him for a long time, and didn't expect him. I look at him, say or feel, “Oh, it's you.” ‒ ‒ (Why did I in giving this example say that I hadn't seen the man for a long time? Wasn't I setting out to describe ''experiences of'' familiarity? And whatever the experience was I alluded to, couldn't I have had it even if I had seen the man half an hour ago? I mean, I gave the circumstances of recognizing the man as a means to the end of describing the precise situation of the recognition. One might object to this way of describing the ''experience'', saying that it brought in irrelevant things, and in {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,161}} fact wasn't a ''description'' of the feeling at all. In saying this one takes as the prototype of a description, say, the description of a table, which tells you the exact shape, dimensions, the material which it is made of, and its colour. Such a description one might say pieces the table together. There is on the other hand a different kind of description of a table, such as you might find in a novel, e.g., “It was a small, rickety table decorated in Moorish style, the sort that is used for smoker's requisites.” Such a description might be called an indirect one; but if the purpose of it is to bring a vivid image of the table before your mind in a flash, it might serve this purpose incomparably better than a detailed “direct” description. ‒ ‒ Now if I am to give the description of a feeling of familiarity or recognition, – – what do you expect me to do? Can I piece the feeling together? In a sense of course I could, giving you many different stages and the way my feelings changed. Such detailed descriptions you can find in some of the great novels. Now if you think of descriptions of pieces of furniture as you might find them in a novel, you see that to this kind of description you can oppose another making use of drawings, measures such as one should give to a cabinet maker. This latter kind one is inclined to call the only direct and complete description (though this way of expressing ourselves shews that we forget that there are certain purposes which the “real” description does not fulfil). These considerations should warn you not to think that there is one real and direct description of, say, the feeling of recognition as opposed to {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,162}} the “indirect” one which I have given.)

Consider this example: What is the difference between a memory image, an image that comes with expectation, and say, an image of a day dream. You may be inclined to answer, “There is an intrinsic difference between the images”. ‒ ‒ Did you notice that difference, or did you only say there was one because you thought there had to be one? || think there must be one?

“But surely I recognize a memory image as a memory image, an image of a day dream as an image of a day dream, etc.” ‒ ‒ Remember that you are sometimes doubtful whether you actually saw a certain event happening or whether you dreamt it, or just had heard of it and imagined it vividly. But apart from that, what do you mean by “recognizing an image as a memory image”? I agree that (at least in most cases) while an image is before your mind's eye you are not in a state of doubt as to whether it is a memory image, etc. Also, if asked whether your image was a memory image, you would (in most cases) answer the question without hesitation. Now what if I asked you, “''When'' do you know what sort of an image it is?”? Do you call knowing what sort of image it is not being in a state of doubt, not wondering about it? Does introspection make you see a state or activity of mind which you would call knowing that the image was a memory image, and which takes place while the image is before {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,164}} your mind? ‒ ‒ Further, if you answer the question, what sort of image it was you had, do you do so by, as it were, looking at the image and discovering a certain characteristic in it? (as though you had been asked by whom a picture was painted, looked at it, recognized the style, and said it was a Rembrandt.)

It is easy, on the other hand, to point out experiences characteristic of remembering, expecting, etc. accompanying the images, and further differences in the immediate or more remote surrounding of them. Thus we certainly ''say'' different things in the different cases, e.g., “I remember his coming into my room”, “I expect his coming into my room”, “I imagine his coming into my room.” ‒ ‒ “But surely this can't be all the difference there is!” It isn't all: There are the three different games played with these three words surrounding these statements.

Imagine two different games both played with chess men on a chess board. The initial positions of both are alike. One of the games is always played with red and green pieces, the other with black and white. Two people are beginning to play, they have the chess board between them with the red and green {{BBB TS reference|Ts-310,165}} pieces in position. Someone asks them, “Do you know what game you're intending to play?” A player answers, “Of course; we are playing No.2.” “What is the difference now between playing no.2 and no.1?” ‒ ‒ “Well, there are red and green pieces on the board and not black and white ones, also we say that we are playing no.2.” ‒ ‒ “But this couldn't be the only difference; don't you ''understand'' what ‘no.2’ means and what game the red and green pieces stand for?” Here we are inclined to say, “Certainly I do” and to prove this to ourselves we actually begin to move the pieces according to the rules of game no.2. This is what I should call moving in the immediate surrounding of our initial position.

But isn't there also a peculiar feeling of pastness characteristic of images as memory images? There certainly are experiences which I should be inclined to call feelings of pastness, although not always when I remember something is one of these feelings present. ‒ ‒ To get clear about the nature of these feelings it is again very || most useful to remember that there are gestures of pastness and inflexions of pastness which we can regard as representing the experiences of pastness. (Aristotle).