THE FUNCTION OF CONSCIOUSNESS. 507 



judgment is affirmative. If, on the other hand, they 

 arrange themselves in two affirmative and four nega- 

 tive, as in square 2, the judgment is negative. The 

 energy expended in the two cases is the same. So also 

 in forming different concepts from the same set of par- 

 ticular sense-impressions or memories. Is there any dif- 

 ference in the energy expended in forming from them 

 the concept of bigness as compared with that of red- 

 ness? While, therefore, every mental process is ex- 

 pensive as a whole, the mental content is obedient to 

 the forms of thought rather than the correlation of 

 energy. This is what mind is. While it is doubtful 

 whether any animal below man can form a concept 

 (with a very few possible exceptions), the formation 

 of simple judgments is general. Any decision based 

 on experience is a judgment. 



In order to render this proposition clearer, I have 

 formulated it in the following language, although it is 

 possible that the definition of energy will not bear the 

 strain of the statement. 



"The formal statement of this phenomenon may be 

 found in the thesis, that energy can be conscious. If true, 

 this is an ultimate fact, neither more nor less diffi- 

 cult to comprehend than the nature of energy or 

 matter in their ultimate analyses. But how is such a 

 hypothesis to be reconciled with the facts of nature, 

 where consciousness plays a part so infinitesimally 

 small? The explanation lies close at hand, and has 

 been already referred to. Energy become automatic is 

 no longer conscious, or is about to become unconscious. 

 That this is the case is matter of every-day observa- 

 tion on ourselves and on other animals. What the 

 molecular conditions of consciousness are, is one of 

 the problems of the future, and for us a very interest- 



