Abstract

In his article “The refutation of idealism” G.E. Moore makes a distinction between mental act and its object. My aim is to introduce his conception of consciousness in “The refutation of idealism”. In addition, I argue that scientific psychology had an impact on Moore’s view about consciousness. Moore introduces the distinction between a mental act and its object in his theory about judgment, which he presents in the second version of his fellowship dissertation The metaphysical basis of ethics. For him, the object of a mental act is independent of the act. In his article “The refutation of idealism”, Moore defends the same distinction. First, I introduce Moore conception of consciousness in “The refutation of idealism”. Van der Schaar, Hanna, Preti and Baldwin refer to the connection between scientific psychology and Moore’s early philosophy. However, no one has studied the impact that scientific psychology had on Moore’s early philosophy. Second, I argue that scientific psychology had an impact on his view about consciousness because no one has earlier done this.