Gary, list,
Regarding the Kehler letter, it's true that it may be tailored to its
singular audience, but I also had in mind MS 675, also from 1911, where
Peirce defines logic not as the science of all"vehicles of psychic
influence" but "as the science of a certain kind of signs alone" (the
logons/representamens, which seem similar to legisigns). To do the
former instead of the latter would be, says Peirce, to "cut monstrous
canticles out of the realms of the other two critical branches of
philosophy" - which earlier in the manuscript he had discussed as "the
Critical, or Normative Sciences" ethetics and ethics.*** This suggests a
classificatory expansion of semiotic beyond logic to encompass the
previous normative disciplines as well, and one wonders whether he had
in mind some sort of 'esthetons' and 'ethons' as well as logons (as I
mentioned on 2/24/2014
http://web.archive.org/web/20140225042621/http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.science.philosophy.peirce/11899
). Maybe one of the late manuscripts has more hints about this.
*** From the first versions of pages 12-13 in G.E.P.'s PDF of MS 675:
"[...] then ethics is the only one of the Critical, or Normative
Sciences that can be said, with propriety to have yet been born into the
world of actualilties [....]."
You wrote,
[GR] >> Finally, in passing (but considering that the present
chapter discussion concerns pragmatism which Peirce places in
methodeutic), I found it interesting that the quotation you gave
concluded:
Methodeutic, which shows how to conduct an inquiry . . . is what
the greater part of my life has been devoted to. . . (CSP)
[GR] > So, this is the branch of logic as semeiotic, not speculative
grammar, which Peirce suggests has been his central interest; and
that makes sense to me
Yes, indeed. It's true. Furthermore, Peirce had long regarded the study
of inquiry method as logic's culmination and crowning glory. In 1882 he
called logic "the art of devising methods of research" and quoted Peter
of Spain's definition of logic which had held sway for a very long time:
"_/Dialectica est ars artium et scientia scientiarum, ad omnium
methodorum principia viam habens./_" Here's a fuller version of Peter's
words:
_/Dialectica est ars artium, scientia scientiarum, ad omnium
methodorum principia viam habens; sola enim dialectica probabiliter
disputat de principiis omnium aliarum scientiarum, et ideo in
acquisitione omnium aliarum scientiarum dialectica debet esse prior./_
which I translate as:
Dialectic [that is, logic, in Peter's terminology] is the art of
arts, science of sciences, having the way to the principles of all
methods; for in fact dialectic alone credibly argues about the
principles of all other sciences, and therefore in [one's]
acquisition [learning] of all other sciences dialectic must be prior.
Obviously Peirce didn't think that logic was all that for pure
mathematics, but he liked being able to connect his view of logic with
such long tradition.
See "Introductory Lecture on the Study of Logic" delivered September
1882, _Johns Hopkins University Circulars_, v. 2, n. 19, pp. 11–12,
November 1882.
http://books.google.com/books?id=E0YFAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA11&dq=%22art+of+devising+methods+of+research%22
Reprinted (EP 1:210–14; W 4:378–82; CP 7.59–76).
Best, Ben
On 4/24/2014 2:29 PM, Gary Richmond wrote:
Ben, List,
Well, I hope we are now both mea culpa-ed out.
Just a couple of points as your message was overall quite clear. You
wrote:
BU: I find it quite difficult to think of phanerscopic issues
without applying ideas as principles such as universality from
logical quantification, difficult because the logical structure of
such ideas seems pertinent to me. It's one thing to think that all
phenomena are such-and-such, it's another to address generality,
'all-ness' etc., as a phenomenon.
I suppose this sort of thing--not a do-over--is what I was earlier
suggesting, and I recall Kees suggesting something similar for
mathematics, namely, that concepts, ideas, principles will be
discussed by mathematicians; the same is the case for
phenomenologists, as well as for theoretical estheticians and
theoretical ethicists (if there are such folk). It's not so much that
these pre-logical sciences are built upon such principles as you
mentioned (although I think that's a bit of a thorny issue, for
example when considering the history of the growth of these sciences),
but that it's quite the ordinary thing for men and women to discuss
aspects of the sciences with which they are involved, especially if
they are purposefully intending to contribute to the growth of them.
On the matter of the presuppositions of reasoning and my question as
to what you meant by this "clarified at or near his logic's start" you
wrote:
BU: In the Carnegie application (1902), he discusses [the
presuppositions of reasoning] at or near the start of his memoirs
on logic. THEN he gets into stechiology (a.k.a. speculative
grammar, signs, objects, interpretants, and their
classifications). So it's quite as if logic begins on a general
level, covering presuppositions, belief, doubt, etc., then gets
into the three subdivisions of logic. Then in 1911 instead of
stechiology or speculative grammar, he puts a division called
'analytic' first in logic, and it covers topics such as belief and
doubt. Does this include classification of signs? Who knows.
I would doubt that Peirce would drop the classification of signs from
logic's first branch whether he calls it stechiology or analytic or
speculative grammar. Yet this is at best only hinted at in the 1911
quotation you offered to the effect that the purpose of this first
branch is to examine "the nature of thought, not psychologically," but
logically. Still, that his examples of the definitions upon which
critic is to be based, viz., doubt, belief, learning, etc. doesn't
include or make reference to the classification of signs does seem
peculiar.
So, since he'd done so very much work on the classification of signs,
and even late in life, it's difficult for me to imagine that that
which figured so prominently in earlier descriptions of the first
branch of logic wouldn't still factor, and in a significant way. Well,
the quotation is from a letter, not a formal essay or paper, and what
one chooses to include in a letter can be pretty arbitrary in the
interest of making a few particular points to the /audience of one/
that you're addressing.
Finally, in passing (but considering that the present chapter
discussion concerns pragmatism which Peirce places in methodeutic), I
found it interesting that the quotation you gave concluded:
Methodeutic, which shows how to conduct an inquiry . . . is what
the greater part of my life has been devoted to. . . (CSP)
So, this is the branch of logic as semeiotic, not speculative grammar,
which Peirce suggests has been his central interest; and that makes
sense to me.
Best,
Gary
*Gary Richmond
Philosophy and Critical Thinking
Communication Studies
LaGuardia College of the City University of New York*
On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 9:57 AM, Benjamin Udell wrote:
Gary R., list,
This seems to be error-confession month. I've a few new ones of my
own now to mention.
As regards _/logica utens/_ and _/logica docens/_, I confused things
a bit, for example by asking whether mathematical reasoning IS one or
IS the other, rather than asking, on which of them does mathematical
reasoning rely.
I also mischaracterized the dependence on _/logica utens/_ in special
sciences by attributing it to unfamiliarity with Peirce. There's
quite a bit of methodological theory that addresses scientific
method, and idioscopic scientists are not entirely unfamiliar with
it. Some of it is in statistics (design of experiments, etc.) Really,
we all swim in a sea of _/logica utens/_ and occasionally apply (or,
more rarely, originate) some _/logica-docens/_ crystallization and
enrichment of some of it. I suspect that Peirce's methodeutic will
gain increased attention, partly because of the Internet.
As regards Kees's view of Peirce's view of pragamatism's
classificational place (in methodeutic a.k.a. speculative rhetoric),
you and he have well covered it now in other posts.
You wrote,
[GR] > It is my sense that this "methodeutically based enrichment
of the presuppostional conception" suggests the way in which once
logica docens, and especially methodeutic, is on a solid footing,
that there is good reason to go back to what was early
presupposed, to go back also to the sciences preceding logic as
semeiotic, etc. and now consider them from the standpoint of the
findings and the methods of a developed and purified formal logic
in Peirce's broad sense. Should the pre-logical sciences never
benefit from the advances of formal logic? Of course they should!
In the sense in which you probably mean that, yes. I don't think that
they get a 'do-over' in the Peircean system. They get applied in
examples in ways that help flesh them out. Phaneroscopy can't take
principles from probability theory or mathematical logic, but only
from pure maths, e.g., measure theory and order theory. I find it
quite difficult to think of phanerscopic issues without applying
ideas as principles such as universality from logical quantification,
difficult because the logical structure of such ideas seems pertinent
to me. It's one thing to think that all phenomena are such-and-such,
it's another to address generality, 'all-ness' etc., as a phenomenon.
[GR] > [...] I'm not certain what you mean by "clarified at or
near his logic's start" in what immediately follows in your post.
Do you mean in logical grammar? [....]
[BU] >> [....] But the presupposition of truth as the
predestinate end of sufficient inquiry, as clarified at or
near his logic's start [....]
He discusses the presuppositions of reasoning in various places. In
the Carnegie application (1902), he discusses it at or near the start
of his memoirs on logic. THEN he gets into stechiology (a.k.a.
speculative grammar, signs, objects, interpretants, and their
classifications). So it's quite as if logic begins on a general
level, covering presuppositions, belief, doubt, etc., then gets into
the three subdivisions of logic. Then in 1911 instead of stechiology
or speculative grammar, he puts a division called 'analytic' first in
logic, and it covers topics such as belief and doubt. Does this
include classification of signs? Who knows. The passage is in a 1911
letter (draft or not, I don't know) to J. H. Kehler, printed in _The
New Elements of Mathematics_ v.3, p. 207. Peirce wrote the following
which I found at the _Commens Dictionary of Peirce's Terms_ under
"Analytic" http://www.helsinki.fi/science/commens/terms/analytic.html :
[CSP] I have now sketched my doctrine of Logical Critic, skipping
a good deal. I recognize two other parts of Logic. One which may
be called Analytic examines the nature of thought, not
psychologically but simply to define what it is to doubt, to
believe, to learn, etc., and then to base critic on these
definitions is my real method, though in this letter I have taken
the third branch of logic, Methodeutic, which shows how to
conduct an inquiry. This is what the greater part of my life has
been devoted to, though I base it upon Critic.
Best, Ben
On 4/23/2014 5:47 PM, Gary Richmond wrote:
-----------------------------
PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L
to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to [email protected] . To
UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected] with the
line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the BODY of the message. More at
http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm .
