ABSTRACT
We have now surveyed in outline the main features of a theory of believing which we have called imagist-mentalism. We have neither accepted nor rejected it. If we are now to turn to a more decisive summing up of its merits and demerits it is important that we keep in mind the nature of the claim which the theory makes for itself. It does not propose an analysis of the exact meaning of sentences in ordinary language containing the word ‘believe’, though it may not be without implications for such an analysis. Rather it sets out to analyse a concept for which there is no one ideal word in ordinary language. The concept in question is that of believing something to be the case, where this refers to an event in consciousness which takes place at a certain time. It could be described as an act of consciously assenting to a proposition, if it were not that this way of putting it has an unduly linguistic air. We have chosen for the most part to call it the experience of believing something. But perhaps it would in some respects be more natural to talk of it as thinking at some particular moment that something is the case, where the thinking in question is something fully conscious, and not simply some bodily reaction. Our choice of terminology has already been explained at greater length.
