consideration of the two kinds, and establishes no presumption against the value of such consideration. The case is precisely the same as in the discussion of sensation as such. At the present time, however, there seems to be no practical advantage in the lengthy discussion of these or other hypothetical sorts of experience.
Consciousness varies in degree. One extreme of the range of variation is commonly known as a high degree of attention, or concentration of attention. The other extreme is inattention, to which the term subconsciousness is also applied. The general designation of attention is thus given only to the higher degrees of consciousness. If referred to the content, the degrees of consciousness are degrees of vividness, which is sometimes called clearness. Thus, to say that I attend to a sensation or percept is equivalent to saying that the sensation or per- cept is vivid. The content not attended to is non- vivid. In a somewhat better use of the term we speak of a high degree of vividness and a low degree of vividness in the two cases mentioned. Whether any content may properly be said to be not vivid at all is a matter which we will consider later.
The term attention properly signifies a condition or state of consciousness itself. Sometimes it is ap-
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Publication Information: Book Title: A System of Psychology. Contributors: Knight Dunlap - author. Publisher: C. Scribner's Sons. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 1912. Page Number: 293.
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