William James

William James appears as a philosophical interlocutor in an account of how images are recognized, rather than as a figure with a narrated biography or personal plot. His decisive contribution is an objection to associationist theories: resemblance cannot act as a hidden force that retrieves an absent mental image. The argument uses this objection to distinguish recognition from a sequence in which one perception mechanically calls another to mind.

Role in the Argument

James’s objection is introduced in the discussion of a portrait of Pierre. The portrait resembles Pierre, but that resemblance does not cause Pierre’s mental image to reappear. As the text explains through James’s criticism of associationism, perceiving a resemblance between two things requires both to be given at once; resemblance cannot first operate unconsciously and then produce the second term in awareness.

This point shifts the explanation away from an image stored in the mind and retrieved by likeness. The portrait instead tends to present itself as Pierre, soliciting a perceptual synthesis of the living person. When the observer recognizes it as Pierre, the portrait becomes the material through which consciousness intends the absent person. James’s objection thus helps clarify what resemblance cannot explain, while the account locates recognition in the observer’s directed relation to the portrait.

Application to Imitation

The same objection is brought to bear on a music-hall performance by Franconay, who imitates Maurice Chevalier. One proposed explanation says that the imitation produces an image of Chevalier in the observer, who then compares the two. The text rejects this sequence as another form of the illusion that an unnoticed resemblance can go searching through the unconscious for an image to awaken.

The difficulty remains even if the explanation replaces resemblance with contiguity, such as the name Maurice Chevalier evoking his image. Franconay can suggest him without saying his name, for example by putting on a straw hat; posters, newspapers, and caricatures have also established signs associated with him. These examples extend the problem beyond a simple likeness or verbal cue: recognition can occur through signs without an image first being summoned for comparison.

Significance

James’s role is precise and methodological. His objection exposes a hidden assumption shared by two accounts of recognition: that resemblance, or an associated cue, can unconsciously retrieve a mental image before the observer recognizes what is present. The portrait and imitation examples show why the text refuses that causal model. James is not offered as the complete explanation of image-consciousness; his critique clears conceptual ground for an account centered on the consciousness’s relation to the portrait, performance, or other sign.