242 INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 



as the attempt to determine the operational derivation of 

 symbols, or as the task of describing the techniques of the 

 verification of symbols. Both of these formulations consider 

 the symbols from the point of view of the routes by which 

 they are connected with events, and attempt to relate the 

 symbols as employed in science with their empirical founda- 

 tions. The object of this correlation is to reveal any dis- 

 crepancies between the two, and to prepare the way either 

 for showing how the scientific notion could be obtained from 

 its empirical foundation by the employment of certain de- 

 scribable operational techniques, or for showing how the 

 scientific notion could be verified in terms of its empirical 

 foundation by the use of certain techniques of verification. 

 The differences between the derivational techniques which 

 are psychological and those which are logical are not im- 

 portant. In general those which are unconscious, spontane- 

 ous, and varying from individual to individual are consid- 

 ered to be psychological, while those which are at least 

 partly reflective, more or less deliberate, and relatively 

 common to many minds are considered to be logical. The 

 logical in this connection is only the psychological which 

 has attained a certain standardization, deliberateness, and 

 social approval. Logical techniques are psychological tech- 

 niques which have achieved a certain formulation and thus 

 are available as tools for the attainment of ends. Verifica- 

 tion techniques may also, of course, be either psychological 

 or logical, though the logical techniques are usually em- 

 phasized. In the discussion which follows, the derivational 

 as over against the verificatory techniques will be empha- 

 sized. The justification for this approach to the problem lies 

 in the fact that verification is never possible unless some mean- 

 ing has already been given to the symbol in question. Hence 

 the derivational problem is not only temporally prior but also, 

 in a sense, logically prior to the problem of verification. 



Though the proper formulation of the problem is an im- 

 portant step toward the determination of its solution, it is 

 only a first step; the difficulties to be encountered in the 



