THE DEVELOPING CONCEPT AND ITS FUNCTIONS 1 67 



In opposition to this statement we would assert that no object 

 ever can mean any particular sensations or any particular re- 

 actions. What particular sensations and what particular re- 

 actions constitute, for example, our conception of the winter 

 overcoat of daily wear? It has, to be sure, a certain familiar 

 and recognized aspect when we see it hanging in the hall; but 

 its identity is perhaps never a simple identity of visual sensations. 

 Never twice on such occasions, in all probability, have we re- 

 ceived the same visual sensations from it. Other sensations, 

 which we might be supposed to expect from it are, it need scarcely 

 be added, equally uncertain. The case is similar as regards our 

 reactions toward it. It is true, we usually put it on in the 

 morning; but if, when we try to button it up, we find a button 

 missing, we may take it off and wear another for the day. Again, 

 we may turn the collar up if it is snowing, or if we have a sore 

 throat; but we may unbutton it when the day is mild, or if we 

 wish to pay our car-fare. All these reactions the coat may in- 

 volve in winter, while it is an object of daily wear. But what 

 conduct does it demand on the return of spring? Packing away 

 in moth-balls? Giving it to the Salvation Army? In short, the 

 object as such is only a conditional determinant of any specific re- 

 action, just as it is only a conditional determinant of any specific 

 sensations. And it is the nature of the conditions under which 

 an object may determine sensation on the one hand, and reaction 

 on the other that is, its relations to other objects which con- 

 stitutes in a large measure our conception of it. What does deter- 

 mine conduct in any case is the total situation. The relation of 

 the object to the situation is that of a factor recognized as a 

 possible factor in other situations. 



In order to gain a better understanding of the functional sig- 

 nificance of the concept of an object, it may be profitable to 

 inquire into its probable origin in a more primitive type of exper- 

 ience. Under what general conditions may we suppose such a 

 concept to have been derived from the type of experience which 

 we considered in the preceding analysis of a simple learning- 



