Herbart proceeds as follows. As we have seen, insofar as representations conflict with each other in their struggle to find a place in consciousness, they inhibit (hemmen)[14]  each other; an inhibited representation is correspondingly dimmed or obscured (verdunkelt); and to the degree that a representation is inhibited from full expression, it is transformed into a striving (Streben) (cf. esp. PsW: 133–4). Thus, it is reasonable, he argues, to think of the interplay of representations as psychological analogues of physical forces (Kräfte) (LPs: 369; cf. Boudewijnse, et al. 1999: 163; Weiss 1928: 74). When a representation dims, one can also say that it “falls” or “sinks” from awareness; when it brightens, that it “rises” into awareness (Weiss 1928: 75). It is important, however, to note that he does not say that a representation really is a “force”.[15]  Rather, several representations in opposition behave in force-like ways.[16] A representation, then, expresses force only to the degree to which it is inhibited; and it is inhibited by another representation only if the latter is opposed to it in some way. Hence, just as this opposition does not belong essentially to either representation, so too their force-like behavior is only formal and contingent (“Gradweise”, PsW: 134–5; cf. SW V: 278).