Thinking and doing / by Harry Roberts.

  • Harry Roberts
Date:
1933
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Thinking and doing / by Harry Roberts. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    borne in a head or cluster, on a leafy stem about nine inches or a foot high; that it is of various colours, generally composed of blends of red and white; that the individual flower is a little like a miniature single pink, and that it smells rather like a carnation. With some, or all, of these objects, colours, etc., you will be already familiar; and, consequently, I have been able to give you some idea of a thing of which you may never previously have heard or had any experience. But when I try to puzzle out how I am to define the term ‘mind’, and such related terms as ‘consciousness’, I, like the dictionary compilers, find myself up against very great difficulties. I cannot think of anything, other than themselves, in the least like mind or conscious- ness with which to compare them. I can only assure you that you have a mind; that is, something over and above—or, more correctly, incorporated in— your body, something that you cannot see or touch, yet something that makes you altogether unlike the material objects about you—even those that pre- sent such facsimile appearances as do some of the dressed-up waxworks at Madame Tussaud’s. Mind is a name given to that part of you which includes your thoughts, your feelings, and your wishes, all of which are often spoken of as states of the mind. If, again, you ask me, What is consciousness? I find it even more difficult to think of words that will tell you more than you knew before. If you stop to reflect, you will be aware that you are now sitting in a chair or standing up, and that you are reading a book, and that you are either interested in it or bored by it. This awareness is what we mean by
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