The Psychology of the Belief Objective Existence, Vol. 1: Objectiva Capable of Presentation (Classic Reprint) - Softcover

Excerpt from The Psychology of the Belief Objective Existence, Vol. 1: Objectiva Capable of Presentation

With the questionable exception of a few philosophers, all mankind entertains the belief in the objective existence of the external world. Any one who has the complex presentation he calls a dog, or the presentation of a dog, will believe himself justified in making two assertions: first, that a dog exists; secondly, that he perceives it: the presentation of a dog is regarded by him as that of a dog objectively existing. It is well known, however, that not every presentation would be interpreted by him in the same twofold manner. Thus if after his perceiving the dog to lie still for a while, a change in the presentation of the dog takes place, such as the dog opening its jaws, his account of this change will still be (1) that he perceives, (2) that the dog opens its jaws; but the change in his mind which may follow this last presentation, such as, for instance, the presentation of terror, or of the memory of a departed friend who had been bitten by a dog, or of a determination to procure a muzzle, will not be described by him as the perception of something objectively existing or happening, but simply as an emotion, a recollection, or a resolution, which arose in him. The presentation of the dog in this example stands for a whole class of presentations - namely, of presentations of external objects, which, in opposition to other classes of presentations, are invariably interpreted in the above twofold manner. Whenever an external object is presented to a man, he believes an external object to exist objectively.

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