Page:American Journal of Psychology Volume 21.djvu/502

490 Bewusstseins," and on the other hand, with a quantitative measurement of the degree of consciousness of simultaneous processes. With regard to the latter problem, the author thinks that an immediate or direct estimation of the degree of consciousness by introspection is a priori doomed to failure, and for two reasons. First, the range of possible degrees of consciousness of a given mental process, with the one of its extremes bordering unconsciousness, "is something purely intensive, and therefore involves all the difficulties of the method of what is called supraliminal differences for intensities" (p. 33). The second and more important objection is the inconstancy of degree of consciousness in succeeding mental states, which destroys all hope of a successful application of the direct method. The actual reason, however, for Wirth's refusal to consider this possibility more in detail seems to the reviewer to be the fact that it had not received a place in the Wundtian programme. At any rate, recent experiments by the present writer with the method of direct estimation of degrees of clearness have shown that Wirth's a priori objections do not hold in actual practice. Their rebuttal in this place may therefore be omitted.

In speaking of degrees of consciousness it must be noted that the author distinguishes them sharply from degrees of clearness. "One may best understand the nature of the degree of consciousness by comparing the direct sense-perceptions with the reproduced ideas of memory and imagination referring to like objects" (pp. 34 f.). The difference between them lies in Lebhaftigkeit and Frische, vividness and freshness. The reproduced processes involve, as a rule, a much greater range of vividness and freshness, though in direct sense-perception, especially in the briefer processes, various degrees of vividness reveal themselves in the stages "des An- und Absteigens der Empfindungsfrische" (p. 35). In the case of the Gemütsbewegungen, this vividness manifests itself with great directness "as the real actuality of consciousness" (p. 36). Even so, the author does not commit himself to saying that degree of vividness and freshness is identical with degree of consciousness; they merely "stand in closest relationship to each other" (p. 36). In general, "the degree of consciousness stands so definitely at the centre of all psychical causal developments, that the significance of an element or of any abstract characteristic is always dependent upon it" (p. 36).

In our immediate experience the degree of consciousness reveals its effects in several ways. "The most immediate consequence of a high degree of consciousness in the case of a concrete idea consists primarily in the clear and distinct differentiation of the idea as a whole from the other mental contents, and of its parts and characteristics from one another, while a lower degree of consciousness corresponds to the opposite, an obscure intermingling and confusion" (p. 36). This clearness-effect is much less marked with emotional contents, as they are "very closely fused in content, and less clear than other equally vivid elements can be that are more sharply differentiated from their surroundings" (p. 37). But even in the case of ideational contents, changes in degree of consciousness are only approximately proportional to changes in clearness. Another important consequence of a high degree of consciousness manifests itself in introspection and memory. The degree of consciousness has a determining influence, e. g., upon the duration "des Abklingens eines Inhaltes"