IMG40

Ernst Mach

sensations surcly wcre what thcy were, and liencc, in a tautological sense might bc “ccrtain,” all statcmcnts and claims jibout sensations were falliblc and subject to crror.^P0 In otlicr words, Kiiipe rcjcctcd what logical positivists would latcr cali “protocol" or “incorrigiblc” statements.

Kulpę s sccond major thrust rcsultcd from bis own cxpcrimcntal work and that of his students. Mach was awarc of Kiilpc’s opposition to many of his ideas, but both Kiilpc (1915) and Mach (1916) died bc-forc the devastating rcsults of those experimcnts had bccn fully put together and applied to pltilosophical problcms. Patrick J. Caprctta has written:

Kiilpc and his assoeiatcs (Ach, Marbe, Mayer, Orth, and Watt) under-took a rcscarch program involving a dircct introspcctive assault upon think-ing, which yicldcd surprising, if not embarrassing, rcsults for the contcnt psychologists. Unlikc the Wundtians (and followcrs of Mach], who asserted that all thought could l>c rcduccd to sensory, and conscqucntly imaginal elements, the psychologists at Wurzburg found that somc thoughts^ occur wiłhout any noticcablc sensory or imaginal contcnt.¹'¹

Edwin G. Boring continucd:

Watt discovcrcd that the thonght-process would mu itsclf off at the presentation of the stimulus-word, provided the task or Aufgcibc had bccn adccjuatcly acccptcd by the observer in the preparatory period. This was really a rcmarkable result. So far as consciousness goes, one docs one’$ ihinking bcforc one knows what hc is to think about; that is to say, with the proper preparalion the thought runs off automatically, when rclcascd with very littlc contcnt.⁹-

What had happened? In the first place, the work of the school sccincd to havc tailed of its positive purposc. It harl yicldcd determining tcndcncies and imagclcss thought. . . . For many ycars the discovcry of irnagclcss thoughts was regarded as a puicly ncgatlYc discovcry.⁹³

If thcrc were jmagclcss thoughts,” that is, nonscusory rcalitics, then Mach's oniological phenomenalism, monism, and psychophysical paral-Iclism were undermined along with his theory' of elements and his purpose of science. If other than sensations existed and could bc sci-cntifically dcterrnined to cxist, then no "dcscribe-and-relatc thc-appcar-anccs" purposc of science could be a satisfactorily indusive purposc of science, unlcss “appearanccs” were understood to include other than sensations or ‘ elements.”

I herc was a lag of from ten to twenty years bcforc Mach’s disciplcs and most fcllow pbilosophers reacted to the discovcry of "irnageless

thoughts.’’ Bertrand Russell, Rudolf Carnap, and Ludwig Wittgenstein all wrotc books in the tradition of Mach’s theory of elements. “Logical atomism,” "atomie facts,” and also Victor Lenzens "aspeets" all sccm to havc bcen bascd on ignorancc of "imagcless thoughts." By the 1930S, howcver, at least verbal corrcctions had bccn madę. Philosophers.camc to agrcc that "phenomenalism' had Bcen refuted, but their definition of (liisTcrm ternie J to be sonie what slngular. In ctTcct, they rejectcd immanent and clcmcntist phenomenalism, but retained Gestaltist ex-pcricncc phenomenalism, that is, continuccTto holcf a prcsentationalist epistemology which includcd vaguc psychic referents in addition to sensations. Furdicrmore. they rcdefincd “phenomenalism" as if it were a merę mcthodology or linguistic approach, thereby obfuscating the extcnt to which they retained the csscntials of epistcmological and/or ontological phenomenalism.

In short, whilc Mach, himsclf, diod bcforc he could make adjust-ments in his philosophy to accommodatc the discovery of “imagcless thoughts," the adjustments that most Iatcr philosophers havc madę havc tended to bc morc linguistic than substantivc. Most “professional’’ philosophers rcmain prcsentationalist in their identification of the physical world, whilc most practical pcoplc and many scientists con-tinuc to acccpt a reprcsentatiónalist approach. “Imagcless thoughts’’ havc undonc elementist phenomenalism, but it is possible that one day they may also be understood to refutc the entire Humean tradition and physical presentationalism as well, including all philosophy based on trying to redtice different epistcmologics and ontologies to mere linguistic variations of each other.