Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 12.djvu/122

 108 CRITICAL NOTICES : the conclusion only should be an explicit content of consciousness," " the premisses being represented by a certain combination of psychological forces from which the conclusion follows ". In the second stage "the process of correlation is comparable to a syllogism in which minor premiss and conclusion are avowed, while the major premiss is suppressed," being "represented by the psychological effect of past experience, which makes the mind draw its inference ". The third stage that of Conceptual Think- ing and Will " is comparable with the completed syllogism with explicit major premiss ; and comparing it with the preceding stage, we see that the pervading identity which was there the central feature of the inexplicit ' process ' has now passed over into the recognised 'content,' leaving outside those general methods and assumptions of thought by which the universal and all other products of intelligence [intellect] are built up ". Finally on the last stage that of Rational System we have " the ap- prehension of the principles and proc'esses underlying thought the process of thinking made conscious. This is the process implicit in all the preceding stages, and in bringing it into con- sciousness so that the whole of the ' thought process ' now passes into one content, the reasoning of this stage is as a syllogism in which the assumption involved in syllogising should be taken into account." How far this syllogistic treatment of the whole range of mental process from the little-differentiated embryo to the mature logical form is helpful, and how far it is likely to lead to misconceptions, must be a matter of opinion. Bearing in mind, as I have already said, the fact that even the cultured reader will be more under the sway of the commonly accepted implications of logical terms than of the author's most carefully guarded definitions, my opinion is that the danger of misconception outweighs the advantage due to unity of treatment. Logic as a normative science belongs espe- cially to the last stage. It deals with the apprehension of the principles and processes underlying systematic thought and for- mulates ideal standards and tests of correct thinking. For logic, major premiss and conclusion, generalisation and inference, are correlative terms ; each implies and is dependent on the other ; without the other each, as such, is non-existent. For those to whom this conception has become part of their mental furniture, the statement that for Mobius's pike any sort of " conclusion " is an "explicit content of consciousness," the premisses being re- presented by "a certain combination of psychological forces from which the conclusion follows," involves an uncomfortable sense of nightmare. One has to reorganise one's conceptions on a new basis. And freely as one admits that an author may, within limits, frame his own definitions of the terms he employs, one may question whether he can reasonably expect his readers to remodel their thought to suit his convenience, or has cause for complaint if his real position is misunderstood.