Leaving on one side the vagueness and inaccuracy of words, let us ask ourselves; in what circumstances do we feel convinced that we know a statement to be true or false as the case may be? A present statement will be regarded as true if, e.g. it agrees with recollection or perception; a past statement, if it raised expectations now confirmed. I do not mean to say that these are the only grounds upon which we regard statements as true; I mean that they are simple and typical, and worth examining. If you say “it was raining this morning”, I may recollect that it was or that it wasn’t. One may perhaps say that the words “this morning” are associated for me with the word “raining” or with the words “not raining”. According to which occurs, I judge your statement true or false. If I have neither association, I do not judge your statement either true or false unless I have material for an inference; and I do not wish to consider inference yet. If you say “the lights have gone out”, when I can see the lights shining, I judge that you speak falsely, because my perception is associated with the words “lights shining”. If you say “the lights will go out in a minute”, you produce a certain familiar kind of tension called “expectation”, and after a time you produce a judgment that you spoke falsely (if the lights do not go out). These are the ordinary direct ways of deciding on the truth or falsehood of statements about past, present, or future.
It is necessary to distinguish between direct and indirect grounds for accepting or rejecting statements. Pragmatism considers only indirect grounds. Broadly speaking, it considers a statement false when the consequences of accepting it are unfortunate. But this belongs to the region of inference. I ask you the way to the station, you tell me wrong, and I miss my train; I then infer that you told me wrong. But if you say “the lights are out” when I see them shining, I reject your statement without inference. In this case, something in my present circumstances is associated with words different from yours, and different in ways which I have learnt to regard as involving incompatibility. The ultimate test of falsehood is never, so I think, the nature of the consequences of a belief, but the association between words and sensible or remembered facts. A belief is “verified” when a situation arises which gives a feeling of expectedness in connection with it; it is falsified when the feeling is one of surprise. But this only applies to beliefs which await some future contingency for verification or refutation. A belief which is an immediate reaction to a situation—e.g. when you are waiting for a race to begin and presently you say “they’re off”—has no need of verification, but verifies other beliefs. And even where the confirmation of a belief is in the future, it is the expectedness, not the pleasantness, of the consequences that confirms the truth of the belief.
I think it is a mistake to treat “belief” as one kind of occurrence, as is done in traditional psychology. The sort of belief which is based upon memory or perception alone differs from the sort which involves expectation. When you find in the time-table that a train leaves King’s Cross at ten, your belief that this statement occurs in the time-table does not await future confirmation, but your belief about the train does: you may go to King’s Cross and see the train start. A belief which concerns an event may be a recollection, a perception, or an expectation. It may be none of these, in the case of an event which you have not seen and do not expect to see—e.g. Cæsar crossing the Rubicon, or the abolition of the House of Lords. But such beliefs always involve inference. I do not at this stage consider logical and mathematical beliefs, some of which must be, in a sense, non-inferential. But I think we shall find that this sense is different from that in which memories and perceptions are non-inferential.
A belief, I should say, interpreted narrowly, is a form of words related to an emotion of one of several kinds. (I shall give a broader meaning later.) The emotion is different according as the belief embodies a reminiscence, a perception, an expectation, or something outside the experience of the believer. Moreover, a form of words is not essential. Where the emotion is present, and leads to action relevant to some feature of the environment, there may be said to be a belief. The fundamental test of a belief, of no matter what sort, is that it causes some event which actually takes place to arouse the emotion of expectedness or its opposite. I do not now attempt to decide what an emotion is. Dr. Watson gives a behaviouristic account of emotions, which would, if adopted, make my definition of “belief” purely behaviouristic. I have framed the definition so as not to involve a decision on the question of introspection.
The subject of truth and falsehood may be subdivided as follows:
A. Formal Theory.—Given the meanings of the component words, what decides whether a sentence is true or false?
B. Causal Theory.—Can we distinguish between truth and falsehood by (a) their causes, (b) their effects?
C. Individual and Social Elements.—A statement is a social occurrence, a belief is something individual.
How can we define a belief, and what is it when not composed of words?
D. Consistency and Truth.—Can we get outside the circle of beliefs or statements to something else which shows them true, not merely consistent? In other words, what possible relation is there between propositions and facts?