at statements of "ideal constructions" (in a Platonic fashion) but one must concern oneself with real occurrences, with events that take place in time, and in which the making of judgments consists, hence with psychic acts of thought, or physical acts of speaking or writing. These acts of judgment are suitable for establishing inter-subjectively valid knowledge when translated into verbal or written expressions. Protocol statements come to be regarded as certain phrases which are not meaningful. When we retrace the path by which we arrive at all our knowledge, we always come up again the same source: sensory experiences and through the opinions of other people. On this view protocol statements would be real happenings in the world and would temporally precede the other real processes in which the production of an individual's knowledge consists. He is not concerned who expressed the correct view, but what the correct view is. The two views, that statements register simple data of observation and stand temporally at the beginning could also be those that by virtue of their structure would have to constitute the logical starting-point of science.A.J. Ayer seeks in his article "Verification and Experience" to determine the truth or falsehood of empirical propositions. The customary answer is that it is their agreement or disagreement with reality. He draws a distinction between "...those empirical propositions can be determined by ascertaining the truth or falsehood of other propositions, and those whose truth or falsehood can be determined directly by observation." (3) One can test an individual proposition by establishing the truth or falsehood relating to the object of the statement. One may also deduce one universal proposition from another, and infer it by analogy, but one must arrive at a proposition for which the evidence consists solely in the truth or falsehood of certain singular propositions. No matter how many sing...
