CHAPTER VII 

 MEASUREMENTS 



THE following notes were suggested by an interesting 

 essay, under the title Can there be a sum of pleasures ? 

 which was contributed by Mr. Hastings Rashdall to No. 31 

 of the new series of Mind (July, 1899). Their relevance 

 consists in the light they throw on the methods of ethical 

 inquiry, and especially on a claim which has been put 

 forward on its behalf to a place among the exact sciences. 



In order to decide whether pleasures and pains can 

 be measured, it is necessary to determine with some exact 

 ness what is meant by measurement. The first step in the 

 inquiry will be to distinguish between two processes which 

 are not infrequently confused, though, as will appear later 

 on, the distinction is of general importance, and marks the 

 boundary-line between philosophy and science. The first of 

 these processes is comparison, the second measurement. 



Comparison takes place when two objects are presented 

 either simultaneously, or in close succession, in our con 

 sciousness. When we compare them, we either discriminate 

 or do not discriminate them. If we discriminate them, 

 we say that they are unlike ; if not, that they are like. 

 When we say that they are unlike, we mean that one is 

 greater than another in point of size, or longer in point of 

 duration, or more in point of intensity, or disparate in point 

 of quality. In all these judgements of discrimination, 

 measurement, in the strict sense of the word, does not enter. 

 They are involuntary, and occur to our consciousness 

 directly on the presentation of the two objects, or, if they 

 do not, we find them there directly when we fix our attention 

 on the objects presented. 



Measurements differ from comparisons in that they involve 

 a conscious calculation, the basis of which is rhythm. By 



