2. _The reflective judgment._--By the reflective judgment is to be understood that form of meaning whose structure and function have become a problem to itself. The days of naïve trust and spontaneous action have gone by. Inquiry, criticism, aloofness, stay the tendency to immediate action. Meaning has grown worldly wise and demands that each situation shall explain itself and that the general principles and concrete applications of its own instruments shall be made manifest. Hence in the various forms of reflective thought we find the progressive steps in which meaning comes to full consciousness of its function in experience.
The demonstrative judgment (the simplest of the reflective type) carries doubt, criticism, construction, and assertion written on the face of it. For example, in the expression, "That is hot," we do not find the directness and immediacy of response characteristic of the simpler impersonal "hot." Instead, we note a clash of tendencies, a suspension of the proposed action, a demand for and a carrying out of a reconsideration of the course of action, the emergence of a new meaning, and the consequent redirection of activities. An iron lies upon the hearth; I stretch out my hand to return it to its place; I stop suddenly, having become conscious of signs of warmth; the thought arises in my mind, "That is hot;" I experiment and find my judgment correct; I search for a cloth, and thus protected carry out my first intention. Again, a hunter notes a movement in the thicket, quickly raises his gun, and is about to fire. Something in the movement of the object arrests him. He stops, thinking, "That is a man, perhaps." What has caught the eye has arrested his action, has become a demand, and not until the situation has become clear can the hunter determine what to do. In other words, he must reflectively assure himself what the object is before he can satisfy himself as to how he should act. Subject and predicate have arisen and have consciously played their parts in the passage from doubt to decision.
Under the heading "individual judgments" are classed such expressions as, "That ship is a man-o'-war," "Russia opposes the policy of the open door in China." In both these cases it is evident that an advance in definiteness of conception and of complexity of meaning has been made, while at the same time we recognize that the instrumental characteristics of the thought-movement remain the same. In considering the subject of the judgment we note that the stimulus presents itself partly as a determinate factor and partly as a problem--an insistent demand. The expression, "That ship is a man-o'-war," might be written, "That is a ship and of the kind man-o'-war," and it thus constitutes what Sigwart calls a "double synthesis." As used in actual judgment, however, the two are held together and constitute the statement of a single stimulus of which a certain portion is evident and a certain portion is in doubt. The working out of the difficulty is given in the predicate "is a man-o'-war," in which we at once detect the instrumental characteristics fundamental to all judgment. To illustrate: At the close of the battle of Santiago, in the Spanish-American war, smoke appeared upon the horizon revealing the presence of a strange ship. Instantly attention was directed to it, and it became a problem for action--a demand for instrumental information. Soon it was identified as a man-o'-war, and the American ships were cleared for action. Closer approach raised a further question with reference to its nationality. After some debate this also was resolved, and hostile demonstrations were abandoned.