Experience and its Objects

Abstract

The term ‘sense-datum’ has been used in so many different ways that it is perhaps worth pointing out what is necessarily implied by the use of it. A sense-datum must be a datum. That is, it must be given to something or someone; and it must be given by the senses. It is always assumed that sense-data, whatever their nature, are sufficient to provide a complete account of what is sensed. There are two very different approaches to the significance of the term ‘sense-datum’, which I shall explain in reverse historical order.