 Contrast 1 and 2 with claims like 3 and 4. In claim 3, the causal verb “influences” is not flanked by token happenings, nor types of happenings. Instead, it is flanked by what we can call variable expressions. Variable expressions are interrogative clauses like “how much I weigh”, “what the scale reads”, “when the game ends”, and “whether I catch the bus”. We can call the denotation of variable expressions variables. Just as we distinguish between token happenings and types of happenings, we may distinguish between token variables and type variables. For instance, how much I weigh is a token variable whose value depends upon my weight. How much Barack Obama weighs is a different token variable whose value depends upon Obama’s weight. We may say that how much I exercise affects how much I weigh. And we may say that how much Obama exercises affects how much Obama weighs. These are two different claims are about causal relations between token variables. Alternatively, we could claim that how much one exercises affects how much one weighs. On its face, this is not a claim about any particular variable. Instead, it is talking about how exercise affects weight in general. It asserts a relationship between two types of variables. Likewise, 4 doesn’t make a claim about the relationship between any particular individual’s novocaine and sensation. Instead, it says something about how novocaine affects sensation in general.