questioned and the mind turns back upon the meaning which it has
unhesitatingly used, analyzing, investigating, constructing, laying bare
the method and function of its tools. Thus arises a new and distinctive
type of judgment, viz., the reflective.
2. _The reflective judgment._--By the reflective judgment is to be
understood that form of meaning whose structure and function have become
a problem to itself. The days of naïve trust and spontaneous action have
gone by. Inquiry, criticism, aloofness, stay the tendency to immediate
action. Meaning has grown worldly wise and demands that each situation
shall explain itself and that the general principles and concrete
applications of its own instruments shall be made manifest. Hence in the
various forms of reflective thought we find the progressive steps in
which meaning comes to full consciousness of its function in experience.
The demonstrative judgment (the simplest of the reflective type) carries
doubt, criticism, construction, and assertion written on the face of it.
For example, in the expression, "That is hot," we do not find the
directness and immediacy of response characteristic of the simpler
impersonal "hot." Instead, we note a clash of tendencies, a suspension
of the proposed action, a demand for and a carrying out of a
reconsideration of the course of action, the emergence of a new meaning,
and the consequent redirection of activities. An iron lies upon the
hearth; I stretch out my hand to return it to its place; I stop
suddenly, having become conscious of signs of warmth; the thought arises
in my mind, "That is hot;" I experiment and find my judgment correct; I
search for a cloth, and thus protected carry out my first intention.
Again, a hunter notes a movement in the thicket, quickly raises his gun,
and is about to fire. Something in the movement of the object arrests
him. He stops, thinking, "That is a man, perhaps." What has caught the
eye has arrested his action, has become a demand, and not until the
situation has become clear can the hunter determine what to do. In other
words, he must reflectively assure himself what the object is before he
can satisfy himself as to how he should act. Subject and predicate have
arisen and have consciously played their parts in the passage from doubt
to decision.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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