Behaviorism vs.

Mentalism: Integration or Dissolution

Zhao Dunhua (Peking University)

The early 20th century witnessed the rise of behaviorism in psychology against the
mentalist tradition in philosophy. Russell and Wittgenstein in their later period both encountered
the dispute between behaviorism and mentalism. Nevertheless, their positions were so different
that a comparison enables us to see two different models of the philosophy of mind since then
namely, the integration-model as represented by Russell and dissolution- model by Wittgenstein.

Part One: Russell’s Integration of Behaviorism and Mentalism 1

The whole tendency of Russell's Analysis of Mind is to prove that all human mental
phenomena are built up out of sensations and images. Though Russell conceded that much of
human life is susceptible to an experiential interpretation on the line of a full-blooded
behaviorism, he argued that some mental phenomena are accessible to introspection and cannot
be understood in purely behaviorist terms. He thus had sought an interpretation in terms of self-
consciousness or the ego. Later on, when he was convinced by James' article "Does
`Consciousness' Exist?" of the dispensability of consciousness; he began to adopt the basic
position of neutral monism. Nevertheless, his conversion to neutral monism was never complete,
for he felt that he could not explain away all mental phenomena by neutral stuffs without some
reservations. He did not endorse the practice of using a single concept, whether it is James' "pure
experience" or Mach's "sensation", in his analysis of mind. He never allowed the introspective
and speculative aspects of the mental phenomena to be reduced to sensations alone. The detailed
program of Analysis of Mind is intended to show that all the generally recognized forms of
mental life, such as desire, emotion, perception, memory, thought and belief, are such states that
involve not only habits or laws of behavior, but also images as well.

1. The distinction between sensations and images

The distinction between sensations and images makes the largest contribution to
Russell's monistic program. According to Russell's definition, “sensation is a theoretical core in
the actual experience; the actual experience is the perception” (AM.P.132). The expression of a
sensation is usually an observable bodily movement. When we see or hear something, we react to
the stimulation of the light or sound by a certain facial expression. When we feel a pain, we show
pain-behavior. But, on the other hand, an image is not necessarily expressed by evident bodily
movement.
At this point, Russell introduces his notion of inner speech. He stresses,“The point is
important, because what is called ‘thought’ consists mainly (though I think not wholly) of inner
speech” (AM.P.152). The expression of images is "inner speech". And inner speech is
exemplified by the activity of reading a poem only in imagination.
The notion of inner speech is taken over by Russell from behaviorists who treated inner
speech as behavior; and it was, for them, the behavior to which a thought is reducible. In
disagreement with behaviorism, Russell emphasizes that inner speech characterizes a private
expression for two reasons. First, the bodily movement connected with images is much smaller
than that of seeing and feeling, and in most cases, it is invisible to the naked eye. And secondly,
inner speech is not a common behavior. On the other hand, we do have common pain-behavior
1
Quotations from Russell’s works use following abbreviations.
AM The Analysis of Mind, George Allen & Unwin, 1921.
L&K Logical and Knowledge: Essays 1901-1950, ed. by Robert C. Marsh, George Allen & Unwin, 1956.
HK Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits, George Allen & Unwin, 1948.

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and visual or auditory behavior. Those characteristics of inner speech point to the privacy of
images.
Russell distinguished between the perceptual (auditory, visual, olfactory) sensations and
bodily sensations (itches, twitches, pangs, pains, heat, cold, dizziness, etc.). The former category
has public character in various degrees, while the bodily sensations are private in the sense that
they occur only in my body, "other people can tell us what they feel, but we cannot directly
observe their feeling" (AM.P.118). A bodily sensation is that "which only gives knowledge of our
own bodies," and "is only observable by one observer" (AM.P.118).

2. The meaning of introspection

The behaviorist's argument against introspection was based upon the assumption that
every mental occurrence is identical with its external expression which turns out to be a certain
observable and common behavior. Russell rejects this by saying that the privacy of inner speech
could hardly be explained away on the line of behaviorism. Introspection is such a mental
phenomenon that has images as its data. Russell's new notion of introspection is not a ghost of an
ego or self-consciousness in the old sense. Introspection, conceived as such, is not intrinsically
different from the sensation, insofar as introspective data are images which are copies of
sensations. And, because of the fallibility of images, introspection is not, like the Cartesian
Cogito, the most trustworthy source of knowledge, but is subject to error and vagueness.

3. A theory of memory

Russell's theory of memory aims at a justification of the claim that images are copies of
sensations. He is fully aware of the problem of how we could be in a position to determine the
required similarity between past sensations and present images. He notes,”For the understanding
of memory, and of knowledge generally, the recognizable resemblance of images and sensations
is of fundamental importance” (AM.P.155).
Russell's solution to this problem, generally speaking, is to treat memory as a form of
knowledge. Though its credibility is less than that of logical inference, memory as knowledge can
still be trusted to fill in the gap between past sensations and present images and be used as the
testimony of the resemblance images have with their prototypes.
To treat memory as a sort of knowledge is an effort against the behaviorist’s attempt to
reduce memory to an acquired habit. Russell says that habit is not the occurrence that constitutes
the essence of memory. Habit can be known only through the memory of similar events at
different times in the past. We are confident of having a habit only if memory can be trusted as
knowledge. Though the presence of images distinguishes memory as knowledge from memory as
habit, memory as knowledge does not wholly consist in images, and necessarily involves a belief.
"Images without beliefs are insufficient to constitute memory" (AM.P.160). The keystone of
analyzing memory is then to explain what kind of belief is at issue. Russell professes that the
kind of belief peculiar to memory is connected with two sorts of feelings.
The first is the feeling of familiarity. When an image occurs to us together with the
feeling of familiarity, a belief arises in us that the image is, approximately or exactly, a copy of a
past event. Paradoxically, the feeling of familiarity is evoked by the feeling of unfamiliarity. For
example, when we come into a familiar room and find that something has been changed, the
change gives the impression of unfamiliarity, which in turn prompts us to remember what the
room was like in the past. The more images of the past room appear, the more strength the feeling
of familiarity gains in the present, until finally the feeling of unfamiliarity is dispelled.
Between memory and the feeling of familiarity there is an intermediate stage which can
be called recognition. Recognition is nearer to memory as knowledge than to the feeling of
familiarity. The feeling of familiarity occurs without a definite object. It does not constitute
knowledge of the past, but leads us to search the environment until we recognize exactly what
familiar object is in question. Recognition is expressed in the form of judgment, and thus makes

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knowledge of the past.

4. The analysis of desire and will

Russell's general tendency is to distinguish between knowledge, on the one hand, and
desire and will on the other. The latter can be interpreted in terms of instinct and habit; while
knowledge involves something more than behaviorism alone can understand.
Russell says that the natural view about desire is drawn from an analogy between a
desire and a belief. By the two sentences "I hope it will rain", and "I expect it will rain", our
common language suggests that we express in the first sentence a desire, and in the second
sentence a belief. The similar grammar of the two tempts us to think that the content of the desire
is just like that of a belief. The difference between them lies only in the attitude taken towards the
content. This is however, Russell believes, radically mistaken (though he admits that it cannot be
refuted logically) (AM.P.58-9).
In Russell’s opinion, the content of a belief consists in a proposition which is
introspectively understood and expressed. The content of a desire, on the other hand, is on most
occasions "unconscious", in the sense that it is caused instinctively or habitually by the past
sensations. Some sensations can, by their intrinsic nature, cause biological or physiological
discomfort or pleasure in animals or human beings. The images of those sensations could
stimulate some voluntary or reflexive bodily movements, tending to avoid or diminish the
harmful sensations, and to produce or prolong the pleasant sensation. The movements have the
characteristic of continuity unless they are interrupted by other causes, or reach the aim of
satisfaction. Such a series of bodily actions is called a "behavior-cycle". The behavior-circle
brings about the cessation of the discomfort and the prolongation of pleasure. The stimulus for
the behavior-circle is a mental occurrence of any kind -- perception, image, belief or emotion --
which provides the driving force towards the purpose. Russell does not deny that the stimulus
could be a "conscious" state of mind. This is clear from the fact that people are often driven by
their religious or political beliefs towards certain ends. In those cases, we see a conscious desire.
But Russell tends to treat the conscious desire as a secondary desire. The belief which we desire
to affirm, if it is true, is a manifestation or development of the sensations which could cause
satisfaction; if it is false, it is simply a self-deception which conceals the real purpose of human
desire. The stimulus to the behavior-circle, in the primary and ordinary situations, is the
"primitive non-cognitive element". (AM.P.68)
The analysis of will is similar to the above analysis of desire, insofar as both are to be
analyzed into a content, a driving force and a resulting action. The stimulus of the will is said to
be a kinesthetic sensation. The concept of kinesthetic sensation is derived from James. It signifies
the dynamic elements in the sensation which tends to cause a bodily movement. The content of a
will is the image of a kinesthetic sensation. This image, by physiological or biological reasons,
causes a decision of intimating the original sensation. And lastly, the act of willing is a voluntary
movement.

5. Two theories of meaning

In connection with the scientific research into the causal relation between our mental
mechanism and the external world, there is in Russell's late philosophy a semantic inquiry into
the meaning of discourses about ourselves and the external world. The pivotal ideas in the
scientific research are those of the mind-family: perceptions (images and sensations), memories,
and beliefs. On the other hand, the pivotal ideas in the semantic inquiry are those of the language-
family: meanings, propositions and inferences. Russell never separated the two tendencies of his
philosophy, but grounded his account of meaning on the results of his analysis of mind. We have
just seen that Russell makes a great effort to differentiate the intellectual elements from the
instinctive ones in his account of the mental mechanism. Correspondingly, we find two theories
of meaning in his later philosophy: one is derived from his analysis of belief, the other is based

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on his account of habit. I shall name the first the mentalist theory of meaning, as distinguished
from the other which was called by Russell himself the associative theory of meaning.
In the essay, "On Propositions", Russell first raises the question: ”Can the relation called
‘meaning’ be a direct relation between the word as a physical occurrence and the object itself, or
must the relation pass through a "mental" intermediary which could be called the ‘idea’ of the
object?” (L&K.P.290). According to the behaviorist theory of meaning the latter, the meaning of
a word consists in a "physical occurrence", or in the "process of leading", an "implicit behavior",
which is involved in the speech mechanism (L&K.PP.290-1). Russell discussed behaviorism at
length, coming to the conclusion that "the behaviorist theory of language is inadequate, in spite of
the fact that it suggests much that is true and important" (L&K.PP299-300). It is inadequate
because it reduces the meaning to a bodily attitude or, more specifically, to a "faint kinesthetic
sensation". This blurs a fundamental distinction between the psychological and the physical.
The reason for Russell's criticism of behaviorism is his acceptance of a mental
intermediary holding between a word and the object it names. It does seem clear that Russell's
acceptance of the "ideas" of objects marks a fundamental change in his thought. In the early stage
of his realism, the correlation between words and objects was taken for granted. With his shift of
interest from logic to psychology, he forced himself to justify what he had earlier recognized to
stand in no need of justification. That is, to answer such questions as: Why should there be a
correlation between a word and an object? What is the condition of the possibility for the
correlation? Perhaps, it is for the sake of the justification of the correlation between language and
reality that Russell feels he needs to invoke the mental intermediary to account for meaning. His
old theory of meaning is still there in the background: the word means the object for which it
stands. But, in order to explain how this is possible, Russell assumes that images are, on the one
hand, ideas of objects, and, on the other hand, contents of words. Images, like a bridge, link a
sign to an object.
Following Russell's justification of the correlation between words and objects, there
raises a problem concerning the correspondence between a sentence and a fact. Russell found the
ground of the correspondence in a mental phenomenon--a belief. The notion of a belief is
regarded by Russell as "the central problem in the analysis of mind." He explains: “The whole
intellectual life consists of beliefs, and of the passage from one belief to another by what is called
‘reasoning.’ Beliefs give knowledge and error; they are the vehicles of truth and falsehood.
Psychology, theory of knowledge and metaphysics revolve about belief, and on the view we take
of belief our philosophical outlook largely depends” (AM.P.231).
Belief, realized as such, is a mental phenomenon which cannot be reduced to an external
behavior. The content of a belief is composed, either partly or wholly, of images, and is an
"image-proposition". In contrast to this, the sentence, which expresses the mental content of a
belief, is called a "word-proposition".
Apart from the content and the corresponding fact, a belief is also accompanied by a
feeling, or attitude, towards the image-content. A belief-feeling is essentially an activity of giving
assent to the existence of what is believed. The aim of introducing the feeling is to prevent
behaviorists from reducing a belief to a behavior. At this point, Russell reveals a difference
between human intelligence and animal mechanism. Consider the following example from
Russell: "It is not difficult to suppose that a dog has images (possible olfactory) of his absent
master, or of the rabbit that he dreams of hunting. But it is very difficult to suppose that he can
entertain mere imagination-images to which no assent is given” (AM.P.249).
What makes belief "the most mental thing" is not the image-content of it (for it is not
difficult to suppose a dog can also have images), but belief-feeling (for it is very difficult to
suppose a dog can give assent to its image). Due to the lack of a belief-feeling, a dog cannot
entertain its images as a mental content and, therefore, it is not ordinarily said that a dog has a
belief.
Although Russell maintains that the meaning of a word is an image, he does not require
that an image always be present to the mind when we are uttering or understanding the word. On
the contrary, he develops a theory to explain how we can dispense with the images in the ordinary

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use of words. This theory is particularly effective regarding the primary use of words. Russell
says that the object-language is a primary language which consists wholly of "object-words".
This is a language which excludes logical constants such as "not", "or", "and", "some", "all",
"the", as well as purely syntactical words such as "is", "than" etc. The object-words are such that
they could be defined by perceptual experience in ostensive definitions.
Ostensive definition, on Russell's account, is our primary means of learning the meaning
of object-words. By stressing the priority of ostensive definition in the use of the language,
Russell develops what he sometimes calls an "associative theory of meaning". According to this
theory, to mean something is to be associated with it by a causal relation. Hence, an image
"means" an object, because it is caused by the latter in accordance with the mnemic law. By the
same token, a word "means" an image. The use of a word to mean an object is a matter of habit
acquired in the repeated association of the word with the object via the image of it. The
telescoped relation between object, image and word is called by Russell physiological inference.
Physiological inference enables us to use a word to mean an object without being accompanied
by its image, or to mean an image without the presence of its object. Russell says that the
association of a word with an object is a skill similar to playing a game. "Understanding language
is more like understanding cricket" (AM.P.197). And, "`meaning' can only be understood if we
treat language as a bodily habit, which is learnt just as we learn football or bicycling."
Russell was aware that the associative theory of meaning is one of the strongest points in
his philosophy in favor of behaviorism. But he never accepted a thorough behaviorist view of
meaning. Nevertheless, Russell did lay more stress on this theory in the 1920's than he did later.
In his latest philosophical work, Human Knowledge, he claimed that the behaviorist aspect of
meaning is "of less philosophic interest". (HK.P.80) Dog and parrots can, through training,
possess certain semi-linguistic habits; they can nevertheless never learn how to use language. The
peculiarity of meaning has to be sought in accordance with the psychological nature of human
beings and the epistemological facts peculiar to them.

Part Two: Wittgenstein’s Dissolution of Behaviorism and Mentalism 2

Some commentators have read what they called "Wittgenstein's remarks on

psychological concepts" as unfocused and unpolished ideas, as complications or ramifications of
what had already been said before, or, as subsidiaries, a great deal of which could be suppressed
or replaced. For my part, I believe that the latter sections of the Investigations are as well-
structured as, if not even more than, the preceding sections which are subjected to some single
headings, such as criticism of the theory of the simple, the rule-following problem, the private
language argument, etc. And they are in no way less essential than any other portions of that
work.
Those remarks take the form of considerations of psychological problems, presumably
because it is the same set of problems that leads Russell to perform an analysis of mind and to
formulate a theory of meaning. By dissolving those problems, Wittgenstein shows readers how
the relationship between language, thought and reality could be displayed through descriptions of
the uses of ordinary language without engaging in any scientific, epistemological or semantic
theory. To outline the structure of the later sections of the Investigations, we can classify the
philosophical problems in reference to Russell's treatment of the dispute between behaviorism
and mentalism.

1. Dissolution of the distinction between mental and behavioral

Wittgenstein in his private language argument rejects the possibility of a private

2
Quotations from Wittgenstein’s works use following abbreviations.
PI Philosophical Investigations, ed. by G. E. M. Anscombe, et al, Basil Blackwell, 1953.
RFM Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics, 2nd. ed., ed. by G. H. von Wright, R. Rhees and G. E. M.
Anscombe, Basil Blackwell, 1967.

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description of a sensation. To display the proper uses of sensation-words, he treats the first-
person use and the third-person use differently, and concludes that neither of these two uses is
subject to the denotation or description of a private experience.
The first-person use of a sensation-word serves as an expression of the sensation in
oneself, but the expression of a private impression is not a description of it to the others. There is
simply no point to describe it. Wittgenstein employs an example to illustrate why the first-person
use of a sensation-word is not a description of a sensation. Suppose that everyone has a box with
a beetle in it and that no one can look into anyone else's box. In this situation everyone can no
doubt talk about the beetle in his or the other's box. By using the same word "beetle", do they
mean that all of the beetles in their boxes have to be the same? Of course not. For, “Here it would
be quite possible for everyone to have something different in his box. One might even imagine
such a thing constantly changing... The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all;
nor even as a something: for the box might even be empty” (PI.293).
Wittgenstein likens the pain in one's body to the unobservable beetle in a box. Both
cannot be named by pointing. They are not things in the ordinary sense of the word, not even
"something". For, the word "something" can be used as synonymous with "existence of an
object", but, Wittgenstein says, “If we construct the grammar of the expression of sensation on
the model of "object and name" (Gegenstand und Bezeichnung) the object drops out of
consideration as irrelevant” (PI.293). The model of "object and name" is a kind of talk which
asks about the existence or non-existence of what is being talked about. The existence or non-
existence of a pain, however, is irrelevant to the first-person use of the word "pain".
The sentence "he is in pain" does not describe an inner object in that person.
Wittgenstein shows this through the use of another metaphor. “if water boils in a pot, steam
comes out of the pot and also pictured steam comes out of the pictured pot. But what if one
insisted on saying that there must also be something boiling in the picture of the pot?” (PI.297).
The boiling water inside the pot is compared to the inner experience of a pain in a
person, the steam to his pain-behavior, and the third-person use of the word "pain" to the picture
of a pot with steam. The insight to be drawn from this comparison is that the third-person use of
the word "pain" is a picture of a pain-behavior, not that of the inner experience of pain, just as
one can only picture the pot with steam, but not something boiling in it. The reason why we do
not picture the pain is not that it does not exist in the person's body (as boiling water is certainly
inside a pot with steam), but because the pain-behavior is the only thing that can be described
with the word "pain". The occurrence of the pain is not described, but presupposed, by a
description or report of the other's pain-behavior.
The distinction between what is described and what is presupposed is put in this passage:
“It is a misunderstanding to say "The picture (Bild) of pain enters into the language-game with
the word "pain". The image (Vorstellung) of pain is not a picture and this image is not replaceable
in the language-game by anything that we should call a picture.--The image of pain certainly
enters into the language-game in a sense; only not as a picture” (PI.300). If we replace the term
"picture" with "description", and "image" with "a private experience", then the contrast between
an image of pain and a picture of pain amounts to this. What is described with the words "he is in
pain" is his pain-behavior, not a private experience of pain in him. The privacy of pain is implied
in the grammar of the word "pain", as it is stated in the grammatical proposition "I have my
pain", or "a sensation is private". The grammar of "pain" enters into the third-person use of the
word without being expressed explicitly; it is presupposed as a rule, a criterion, for the use of the
word. The privacy of pain is never introduced into language by a description.
With the denial that the sensation-words, whether in the first-person use or the third-
person use, describe inner experience, and the assertion that the only thing they can describe is
the other's behavior, Wittgenstein seems in danger of being misinterpreted as a behaviorist. The
key to an understanding of his position is to see that he is not talking about private experience in
general terms. He clarifies what could be meant by a private experience. If it means that a
sensation occurs only to one person, that every person has his own exemplar of a sensation, then
it is concerned with the grammar. Such meanings of the privacy of a sensation is permitted by the

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grammar of the sensation-word. If the privacy means that only I can have or know my pain, or
that I can exhibit or describe my pain privately, then it is an illusion, because one cannot abandon
the common use of language to talk about the private knowledge and private exhibition.
Wittgenstein's private language argument is not necessarily an argument against the privacy of
sensations; and it is certainly not in favor of behaviorism.
Wittgenstein is aware that his criticism gives the impression that he is denying the
existence of mental and private sensations. Wittgenstein says, "naturally, we don't want to deny
them" (PI.308). He will not deny them because he wants to admit various other ways of talking
about mental processes, only not on the model of descriptions of objects, but on the model of
expressions (in the case of first-person use), or, descriptions of expressions (in the case of third-
person use).
The alternative between mentalism and behaviorism characterizes the nature of
philosophical problems. Philosophical problems arise from the assumption that mental
phenomena are either objects, or nothing at all. If they are, they are "inner objects"; if they are
not, there is only behavior in man. Wittgenstein in a famous remark concludes his private
language argument, saying that his aim is "to show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle" (PI.309).
Recall his previous remark: "A philosophical problem has the form: 'I don't know my way about'"
(PI.123). It is clear that Wittgenstein's way of philosophizing is to get rid of various paradoxes,
dilemmas and antinomies of two opposite positions by dissolving the assumptions with which
both are preoccupied. The private language argument is an example which shows how the dispute
between mentalism and behaviorism vanishes if one stops viewing the phenomena of sensations
according to the model of objects.

2. Dissolution of the dissolution of the paradox of speaking with and without thinking

The opposition between mentalism and behaviorism, with respect to the relation between
language and thought, gives rise to a paradox. For the mentalist, one can be in an inner state of
thinking which differs from the external act of speaking, while the behaviorist maintains that
thinking is entirely reducible to a kind of speaking, aloud or to oneself. We seem to be forced to
choose between a thinking without speaking and a speaking without thinking. As Wittgenstein
puts it, “Here it happens that our thinking plays a queer trick. We want, that is, to quote the law of
excluded middle and to say: "Either such an image is in his mind, or it is not; there is no third
possibility!" (PI.352) The dominant picture presupposed by both parties in the dispute is that
thinking and speaking are two independent processes.
Wittgenstein first casts doubt on the behaviorist idea of inner speech: “Would it be
imaginable that people should never speak an audible language, but should still say things to
themselves in the imagination?” (PI.344). He concedes that the notion of talking to oneself does
have a legitimate use in ordinary language. It may mean the same thing as what I "sing inwardly,
or read silently, or calculate in my head, and beat time with my hand as I do so" (PI.II.P.220). In
all those cases, what I talk to myself can always be spoken out loud. To understand correctly the
grammar of "saying inwardly", Wittgenstein suggests, “Imagine people who could only think
aloud. (As there are people who can only read aloud.)” (PI.331) According to Wittgenstein,
“talking to oneself” is only a special use of common language. It is different from the language
uses which express thinking. To reduce thinking to inner speech is to confuse different language
games.
As for the grammar of the words "talking to oneself", Wittgenstein says, “Our criterion
for someone's saying something to himself is what he tells us and the rest of his behavior; and we
only say that someone speaks to himself if, in the ordinary sense of the word, he can speak. And
we do not say it of a parrot; nor of a gramophone” (PI.344). Speech is an activity common to all
human beings. When we assign the capacity of inner speech to a being, we presuppose that it
behaves as a human being (PI.357) and, therefore, that it thinks. "We only say of a human being
and what is like one that it thinks" (PI.360). We do not say that a dog talks to itself, because a dog
cannot think in the ordinary sense of the word (PI.357). By the same token, we do not say that a

7
machine thinks (PI.359), or a chair thinks (PI.361), because a machine and a chair cannot speak
in the ordinary sense of the word. Due to the grammar of the words "speech" and "thought", it is
nonsense to analogize my "inner talk" to human thought, since talk and thought are in unity,
rather than in separation.
The unity between thought and speech consists in the grammatical unity of criteria and
symptoms: speech is the symptom of thought while thought is the criterion of speech. The
grammar fluctuates between symptom and criterion, but without ever separating the two. The
concept of "inner speech" may be used in certain circumstances to emphasize that the criterion of
speech is thought, but it should not lead to the mentalist view that thinking is an inner state of the
mind isolated from speech. Similarly, the outer symptom of "talking to oneself" should not give
support to the behaviorist view that there is nothing in the mind but speech-acts.

3. A criticism of Russell's analysis of memory as an example of mentalism

Russell's analysis of memory is considered by Wittgenstein as a typical example showing

where mentalism slips in. As we have seen, the central task for Russell's analysis is to explain
how we can remember past events. Wittgenstein transforms this psychological problem into a
linguistic one: “You were interrupted a while ago, do you still know what you were going to
say?” (PI.633) Within our linguistic practice, it is out of the question that we are able to continue
our talk in spite of the lapse of an interval of time.
The problem of the justification of the identity of the intentions before and after the
interruption of a talk is raised only when one is confined to a psychological account of memory.
Russell says that the presence of feelings of familiarity and remoteness enables us to trust our
memory. This view is formulated and criticized by Wittgenstein in the following words. " ‘This
thought ties on to thoughts I had before.’ How does it do so? Through a feeling of such a time?
But how can a feeling really tie thoughts together?--The word "feeling" is very misleading here”
(PI.640) The familiarity and remoteness, as present in the feelings, are concerned with the details
of past events. But Wittgenstein argues that the details are irrelevant to the criterion of a memory.
On the contrary, the details can be remembered or guessed only because we have remembered the
circumstances in which the past event happened. For example, if I had the intention to deceive
somebody and tried to pretend the intention, the evidence for my trick might be too rudimentary
or scanty to be remembered. If I am still able to remember my intention, this is only because I
remember the circumstances in which the intention was generated. And later on, when I am
ashamed of the intention I had, what makes my shame is "the whole history of the incident"
(PI.644), not simply the details of deceiving I am able to remember now.
The circumstances of past events are identified by Wittgenstein with linguistic situations,
because they bear the atmosphere surrounding the use of the words. For example, the criterion of
having an intention in the past is the situation in which the intention was expressed. A memory
without words is like, in Wittgenstein's metaphor, the act of following a private map like this: “I
tell someone that I walked a certain route, going by a map which I had prepared beforehand.
Thereupon I show him the map, and it consists of lines on a piece of paper; but I cannot explain
how these lines are the map of my movements, I cannot tell him any rule for interpreting the map.
Yet I did follow the drawing with all the characteristic token of reading a map” (PI.653).
Needless to say, the notion "following a private map" is similar to that of following a
rule privately. The above passage reminds us of Wittgenstein's argument against private language:
just as one cannot say that he could mark out his pain with a private sign, one cannot say that he
could memorize all the characteristics of a past event without describing what it was.
Wittgenstein seems to maintain that it is necessary for human memory to be a verbal
memory. Russell says that it is the belief-feeling that differentiates human images from, for
example, a dog's images. Contrary to this view, Wittgenstein says that what is lacking in a dog's
images is a verbal form. This is the reason why we say that a dog "is afraid his master will beat
him; but not, he is afraid his master will beat him to-morrow" (PI.650); or that a dog believes his
master is at the door, but not that he can believe his master will come the day after tomorrow

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(PI.II.P.174). This is so simply because the notion "tomorrow", like "yesterday", is present in
thought only through a language. To understand what we human beings regard as the past, we
need to look at what language-games were played with respect to it, not to explain it by
postulating a wordless mental process.

4. A criticism of behaviorist misconception of the criterion of the term of will

Along with criticizing the mentalist misconception of the criteria of using term of
memory, Wittgenstein criticized the behaviorist view which reduces willing to a voluntary
movement of body. Wittgenstein denies this view by saying, " ‘Willing’ is not the name of an
action; and so not the name of any voluntary action either” (PI.613).
Wittgenstein says that the notion of willing as a voluntary act is drawn from "a contrast
between the movement of my arm and, say, the fact that the violent thudding of my heart will
subside" (PI.612). Voluntary action, however, is not the characteristic of a will. Because a
voluntary action belongs to what we can try to do in contrast with what we cannot try. But when
we are willing we never try. For trying implies failing while we never fail to will. As Wittgenstein
argues, “in the sense in which I cannot fail to will, I cannot try to will either” (PI.618). And,
“When I raise my arm I do not usually try to raise it” (PI.622).
The behaviorist notion of willing contradicts the ordinary use of the word. It is borrowed
from the psychological notion of kinesthetic sensation. Out of a psychological interest one could
design an experiment to show the connection between a kinesthetic feeling and a bodily
movement. Suppose that in the experiment an electric current causes a small movement in one's
muscles and joints. When the subject shuts his eyes he may feel the same as when he is moving
his arm up and down voluntarily. Wittgenstein asks: "Are kinesthetic sensations my willing?"
(PI.621). His answer is negative. Because what psychologists mean by the notion of kinesthetic
sensation is different from what we ordinarily mean by the word "will". To illustrate the
difference, suppose that one is unable to move his fingers. The reason for the inability could be
one of two kinds. The first is that someone else is holding his fingers, so that one needs to evoke
a kinesthetic sensation to overcome the external obstacle. The second is due to the inertia in
oneself, so that one needs a will to dispel the inertia. To define will in terms of kinesthetic
sensation is a confusion which Wittgenstein would call "crossing of different pictures". It comes
like this: we try to overcome a withholding force by a driving force; yet the inertial in us is also
to be overcome, therefore we also try to overcome it by a driving force, and the driving force is
identical with willing. But, what a will really overcomes is not an external obstacle; it is therefore
not the same driving force as kinesthetic sensation.
Behaviorists put their emphasis on bodily experience because they attempt to describe
willing in the framework of the human mechanism. This is, according to Wittgenstein, a
fundamental mistake: “A misleading analogy lies at the root of this idea; the causal nexus seems
to be established by a mechanism connecting two parts of a machine. The connection may be
broken if the mechanism is disturbed” (PI.613). According to this conception, willing is a
response without external stimuli (as if the mechanism were disturbed). Yet, it still belongs to a
machine and, therefore, must have a cause in itself. In this way, behaviorists define the cause
within a body in terms of kinesthetic sensation.
What is wrong with the behaviorist notion of will is, again, a mistake about the criterion
of using the word "will". For behaviorists, the criterion is a bodily experience specified as a
kinesthetic sensation. To show that the bodily experience is irrelevant to the criterion,
Wittgenstein uses the following illustration. When I touch an object with a stick, my feeling of
the hardness is meaningfully expressed in reference to the object, but not to a bodily experience. I
say "I feel the hardness of the object over there", but not "I feel a pressure against the tip of my
fingers" (PI.626).
Wittgenstein asks us to observe the difference in language-games, rather than in causes,
because the language-games concerning will are different from the language-games played with
respect to the causal nexus. "There is an evident kinship between these two language-games and

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also a fundamental difference" (PI.630). Both serve as predictions of the future. Predictions by
cause are based upon observations of a regular process; but, predications by willing are drawn
according to one's expression of his own decision. For example, the expression, "I am going to
take two powders now and in half-an-hour I shall be sick" is a prediction by decision. My
decision to take two powders is not the cause of my sickness. The cause can be observed through
the effect of the powders on the human body. The antecedent is related to the consequence in the
language-game of willing in a way different from the causal connection. Due to the difference,
the meaning of willing cannot be conceived in the framework of the human mechanism. The
explanation of willing in terms of a behavior or a sensation is at bottom a mistake which confuses
different sorts of language-games.

5. The dissolution of the conflict between physiologist and psychologist views of language

In my opinion, Wittgenstein's idea “Meaning is a physiognomy” (PI.569) is the most

mystical part of his later philosophy. Like the mysticism in his early philosophy, it was never fully
explicated, though it is probably related to the complication of "seeing as" in the Part II of the
Investigations. One thing, however, remains clear to me at present; that is, the account of meaning as
physiognomy is the anti-thesis of two conflicting accounts of meaning: one given by behaviorism that
meaning is a physiological process and, the other by mentalism that meaning is a psychological one.
The opposition between the two consists not only in the strange use of the word "physiognomy",
which seems to be contrasted to both psychology and physiology, but also in Wittgenstein's criticism
of both behaviorist and mentalist accounts of the essence of language.
Behaviorist view of the essence of language is a new version of associative theory of
meaning. It assumes that a word, if it is uttered in association with a response of the human body, can
provoke the same response later in a suitable situation. Wittgenstein admits that the association of
signs with certain physiological responses is a fact belonging to organisms, found in both human
beings and animals. (PI.495) Nevertheless, linguistic practice is not merely based on the physiological
responses of organisms. The cock calls the hens by crowing, and the crowing could be explained as a
physical cause that sets the hens in motion. But, the words "come to me!", even if they fail to cause
any physiological response, are always understandable and meaningful (PI.493). We react to words in
a different way than we respond to a physical or physiological stimulus. To show the difference,
Wittgenstein uses the following example. “Suppose I substitute the signs ‘abcd’ for the sentence ‘the
weather is fine’. The signs would not cause the same reaction as the words. This is so, not because I
am not used to an association of the word ‘the’ with ‘a’, ‘weather’ with ‘b’, etc., but because ‘I have
not mastered this language’.” (PI.508) It is due to the social practice of learning and training that I can
respond to words. The physiological response to signs, though it can be observed in human behavior,
is not characteristic of linguistic practice.
In Wittgenstein time, a typically mentalist account of the essence of language, as we
have seen, was given by Russell. According to this account, a sentence is correlated with an
image-content. Russell's idea is that, prior to language, memory can supply images and that
images are more primary than words. He said that, despite the vagueness of the image of a
friend's face, the image can still mean him, due to the credibility of memory. Wittgenstein
challenges Russell to answer the question: "What makes my image of him into an image of him?"
(PI.II. P.177). "How does he call HIM to mind?" (PI.691). This is a question of how to specify an
image as the image of a definite object. If any image, as far as Russell could agree, is inherently
and unavoidably vague, then, given an image of an object, no matter how detailed, there will
always be some object, actual or possible, that will also fit. An image by itself fails to specify the
object it is supposed to mean.
The criterion of remembering a friend for Wittgenstein is not the presence of an image. It
is simply to recall his name, because the name is surrounded by a familiar atmosphere, a
particular set of circumstances in which I saw him, talked with him, kept contact with him, and so
on. What the name appears to me is not merely a sign, but it conveys a meaning that is the same
as what the person means to me.

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 A more general conclusion could be drawn as such: if we use a word properly, the word
conveys by itself a meaning to us. This position is stressed, repeatedly and emphatically, as a
criticism of Russell's idea that the meaning of a word is an image. The last passage of Part I can
be understood in the light of the criticism of the mentalist theory of meaning: “nothing is more
wrong-headed than calling meaning a mental activity! Unless, that is, one is setting out to
produce confusion” (PI.693).
The later Wittgenstein employed the term “picture” used in his early time to
explain the essence of language. “If we compare a proposition to a picture we must think whether
we are comparing it to a portrait (a historical representation) or to a genre-picture. And both
comparisons have point.” (PI.522) And, "Concept is something like a picture with which we
compare objects" (RFM.V.50).
Nevertheless, the meaning of picture is no longer a logical picture. It is now compared to the
interpretation of a face. A face could be interpreted differently in different situations and for different
purposes. For example, a smiling face might be interpreted either as a kind one or as a malicious one.
There is no absolutely correct interpretation of a face. Different interpretations are like different styles
of painting, of performing music. Each of them represents a genre-picture. They are made according to
what is important to us at different times in different situations.
Following the analogy between a concept and a picture or a face, Wittgenstein introduces the
idea that meaning is physiognomy. Just as a facial feature is an indicator of the character of a person,
so an aspect of a picture represents one meaning of a concept. When we see a different aspect of the
picture from another perspective, the picture changes its meaning to us, and then we play a different
language-game.
But, does this account of the essence, or more precisely, essences, make the grammar
of language arbitrary? To this, Wittgenstein answers, “The rules of grammar may be called "arbitrary",
if that is to mean that the aim of grammar is nothing but that of the language.” (PI.497) Whatever
could be arbitrarily thought about must subordinate itself to the grammar. The concept "arbitrary",
therefore, cannot be in turn applied to grammar, except if it means that the grammar is not external to
the use of language. Language and concepts are both instruments for dealing with reality. The
purposes of this sort of instruments are immanent to the interest of our life. As Wittgenstein confirms,
“Concepts lead us to make investigations; are the expression of our interest, and direct our interest .”
(PI.570)
Wittgenstein’s dissolution of the single essence of language into characters of language-
games reflects, in effect, his view about the connection between language and life, a view
running throughout the Investigations. His notion of the relation between language and life is
closer to pragmatism than to behaviorism. He said, “Not: ‘without language we could not
communicate with one another’--but for sure: without language we cannot influence other people
in such-and-such ways; cannot build roads and machines, etc. And also: without the use of speech
and writing people could not communicate.” (PI.491). Wittgenstein denies here the prevailing
view that the primary function of language is communication. The importance of language is,
first and foremost, to conduct our behavior and action. This account echoes what he said before
that the justification of following a rule cannot be found in interpretation, but in the social
practice and form of life.
Along the same line of thinking, Wittgenstein says here that language was invented to
serve certain practical purposes and that it is only for the purpose of influencing another's action
that we use language to interpret, report, explain and justify our experience. “To invent a
language could mean to invent an instrument for a particular purpose on the basis of the laws of
nature (or consistently with them); but it also has the other sense, analogous to that in which we
speak of the invention of a game.” (PI.492) To invent a language as an instrument, the inventor
must have a definite goal and interest in mind, whether the goal be practical or theoretical, and
the interest of daily life be mental or behavioral. Both mentalism and behaviorism focus only on
one single purpose of language, and restrict themselves to a special interest. Language-games are
used to address the various purposes and interests of inventing and using language.
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