Forms and Events

Abstract

In a paper of some years ago,1 I argued about the usefulness of thinking of events in terms of forms. As a student of perception in visual and auditory domains, I referred to those minute facts that are perceptual events, like stroboscopic movements, short melodies, and so on. The conceptual tool I am accustomed to use is Gestalttheorie,and my operational method is experimental phenomenology.2 This tool and method seem well able to provide a reasonable account of the way of appearance (Erscheinungsweise) of objects (events) in the behavioural world, in the sense of the famous question asked by Koffka: “Why do things [events] look as they do”?3 In this paper I shall examine the matter more closely, pointing out some aspects that are relevant to current psychological enquiry into subjective time.