Thanks Gary F :-) Actually I don't agree with you about the a priori method being public. The discussions are public, yes, but after they have finished, each thinker makes up their own individual mind, which is why if you have three philosophers in a room you have four opinions. One can call the A priori Method the Method of Consensus if one likes, but it produces the *least* consensus of any of the methods, as Peirce notes.
So this will disrupt my agreement with a lot of the thread following from here. Though Jeff I was interested in the links you traced between the 4 methods and Kant's ethics. But I'm not sure that construing the first three methods as 'instrumental' and the 4th as non-instrumental is quite accurate. For instance, if the method of tenacity is instrumental, it is instrumental to what? It doesn't have an end in view, it is just blind stubbornness against considering other evidence. Whereas OTOH the method of science could be argued to be instrumental to being able to navigate the world without nasty surprises. Cheers, Cathy -----Original Message----- From: Gary Fuhrman [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Saturday, 3 May 2014 1:07 a.m. To: 'Catherine Legg' Subject: RE: Fwd: [PEIRCE-L] RE: de Waal Seminar: Chapter 6, Philosophy of Science Welcome back, Cathy! Your classification of the four methods of fixing belief describes the "A Priori Method" as "private, reasoned". But as Peirce describes it (EP1:118-19), it is no more "private" than the method of Authority; indeed it is more public, in that it recognizes a broader range of other people's ideas as being worthy of consideration. Actually I don't like to call it the "A Priori Method" because that does make it sound private, when actually it's quite social in practice. I think it might better be called the method of Consensus, where beliefs are fixed by agreement rather than tested against experience. It is reasoning prior to experiment, not prior to dialogue and debate with other reasoners. gary f. } A man must not swallow more beliefs than he can digest. [Havelock Ellis] { www.gnusystems.ca/gnoxic.htm }{ gnoxics -----Original Message----- From: Catherine Legg [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 2-May-14 5:59 AM Hi everyone, Having not been able to wrest open my peirce-l inbox for some time, I was able to peruse the chapter 6 thread pretty much in one reading last night. It was very nice to see the various themes unfold and develop before my eyes. Thank you Jeff K for your rich account of Peircean epistemology - informed by your own research career in this area - that you used to put a very lucid context around Kees' treatment. Thank you Jeffrey D for the sophisticated Kantian scholarly framework you brought to bear, and the many probing questions you asked to try to push the discussion deeper. Here are some thoughts I had: Ben pointed out how ethics and aesthetics might be seen to be in the background even of Peirce's remarks at the end of his very early paper FoB. It was possibly even unrecognised by Peirce at that point that these prior sciences were already 'growing there'. This was really interesting to me - thanks, Ben. Jeff K (and others) drew this out by distinguishing between an 'efficiency argument' and an 'ethical argument' in FoB for the method of science over the other three methods, suggesting that Peirce might have vacillated between the two. I wonder if we might put the two back together, though, via the discussion of 'ultimate ends' and 'the only evil is not to have an ultimate end', that took place at the tail-end of Chapter 4 between Stefan, Phyllis, Gary, Matt and others. Sam said we should distinguish between the claim that the 4th method is the only one for which it makes sense to say there is a right and wrong way of applying it, and the claim that science is self-correcting. Jeff D conceded this point, but I'm not sure I agree. What is it to self-correct other than to recognise that one is going about one's chosen task wrongly? This led into a very interesting discussion of whether the 4th method really is the only one that allows self-correction, as Peirce claims. I was thinking perhaps the method of authority also allows for *some* kind of right or wrong way of applying it. For instance we might imagine a group of scholastic philosophers realising that they had 'got Aristotle all wrong'. Peirce may try to get out of this by arguing that in that case the medieval scholars have begun scientific inquiry into the views of Aristotle, but this sounds a bit too easy of a solution, which broadens the concept of scientific inquiry merely to solve the problem. I was thinking that it would be the method of authority that would allow self-correction if any of the other 3 methods did, since that is the other 'public' method. I subscribe to a characterisation of the 4 methods that I can't remember where I picked up, but it goes like this: Method of Tenacity: private, random Method of Authority: public, random A Priori Method: private, reasoned Method of Science: public, reasoned Using this taxonomy I considered Jeff D's fascinating question of whether these 4 methods are the only possible. I was initially inclined to answer yes, because the taxonomy considered this way might be said to cover all of logical space. However, the examples Jeff D gave were very intriguing. With the dialectical method I agreed with Ben that it probably collapsed into the a priori method. The hermeneutic method I think is what the scholastic philosophers are doing with Aristotle above. But the genealogical method.............????? Maybe this breaks the mold? And Peirce seems to be relying on it more and more in his later philosophy insofar as he invokes an evolutionarily developing instinct, rather than ratiocination, as a guiding principle in inquiry.... I don't know. Cathy -----Original Message----- From: Kasser,Jeff [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, 28 April 2014 4:40 a.m. Cc: [email protected] Subject: RE: Fwd: [PEIRCE-L] RE: de Waal Seminar: Chapter 6, Philosophy of Science I agree with everything you say here, Gary. Do you share my sense that the upshot of this discussion is that such questions as whether the a priori method is superior to authority and tenacity are generally not well posed? The a priori method shares with the method of science the important feature of selecting beliefs based on their content rather than on the basis of their convenience and whether they're currently believed. But, given Peirce's rejection of what Kees calls epistemic agnosticism, this strength can, as you put it, prove to be a weakness. What seems like the exercise of reason is often closer to something more like convenience, and so the a priori method lacks a transparency that the earlier methods sometimes possess. And the weaknesses of the earlier methods, genuine though they are, also involve real strengths, since the fact that something is currently believed is a consideration in its favor. Best, Jeff K. ________________________________________ From: Gary Richmond [[email protected]] Sent: Monday, April 21, 2014 3:28 PM To: Kasser,Jeff Cc: [email protected] Subject: Re: Fwd: [PEIRCE-L] RE: de Waal Seminar: Chapter 6, Philosophy of Science Jeff, Jeffrey, List, I want to take a stab at your second question concerning the a priori method, Jeff, and in doing that somewhat obliquely respond to Jeffrey's earlier question as to whether Peirce might have left out some important other methods--especially for 'doing' philosophy--than the three he gave in "Fixation" and, perhaps, in that omission undermined the claims he made for the superiority of the 'scientific method'. [note: I've quoted from "Fixation" at some length below, so those who are familiar with the article may skim or even skip over those quotations. The quoted passages can also be found in EP1:118-123.] Jeff wrote: Kees explains that this third method [the a priori method] of fixing belief "appeals particularly to those who see a strong divide between reason and passions, and who then consider it our main task to free thought from the pernicious influence of the passions" (p. 97). [. . . ] but the other question I want to raise concerns how importantly different the a priori method is from its predecessors. Kees tends to emphasize its distinctness, arguing that the a priori method appeals to the content of the belief in trying to settle opinion. Hence the a priori method is like science and unlike the other two in being a genuine method of inquiry. I think that this is tricky and intriguing stuff. Peirce seems to guide us in both directions, saying in the same paragraph that the a priori method "is far more intellectual and respectable from the point of view of reason" than the other two and also that it "does not differ in a very essential way from that of authority." I agree with you, Jeff, that it is important to get clear on what the strengths and weaknesses of the a priori method are as compared with the other methods, especially the method of science. Early in his discussion of the a priori method Peirce discusses what at first appears to be a strength of it. Even before that, however, he remarks that the first two methods must "both be given up" and that almost in an intellectually developmental sense that a "different new method of settling opinions must be adopted." CP5.382. They will further perceive that such doubts as these must exist in their minds with reference to every belief which seems to be determined by the caprice either of themselves or of those who originated the popular opinions. The willful adherence to a belief, and the arbitrary forcing of it upon others, must, therefore, both be given up. A different new method of settling opinions must be adopted, that shall not only produce an impulse to believe, but shall also decide what proposition it is which is to be believed. Let the action of natural preferences be unimpeded, then, and under their influence let men, conversing together and regarding matters in different lights, gradually develop beliefs in harmony with natural causes. Peirce immediately and quite interestingly, I think, compares the a priori method to the ways in which art has matured, here considering metaphysical philosophies (which, he pointedly remarks, "have not usually rested upon any observed facts") to be one of these art forms: This method resembles that by which conceptions of art have been brought to maturity. The most perfect example of it is to be found in the history of metaphysical philosophy. Systems of this sort have not usually rested upon any observed facts, at least not in any great degree. They have been chiefly adopted because their fundamental propositions seemed "agreeable to reason." This is an apt expression; it does not mean that which agrees with experience, but that which we find ourselves inclined to believe. So, this strength for art turns out not to be a strength for any belief system meant to be built on facticity and in agreement with experience despite its being "far more intellectual" than the others already discussed in "Fixation". Yet, while this method is superior to the others, on the other hand, "its failure has been the most manifest." CP5.383. This method is far more intellectual and respectable from the point of view of reason than either of the others which we have noticed. Indeed, as long as no better method can be applied, it ought to be followed, since it is then the expression of instinct which must be the ultimate cause of belief in all cases. But its failure has been the most manifest. It makes of inquiry something similar to the development of taste; but taste, unfortunately, is always more or less a matter of fashion, and accordingly metaphysicians have never come to any fixed agreement, but the pendulum has swung backward and forward between a more material and a more spiritual philosophy, from the earliest times to the latest. [. . .] We have examined into this a priori method as something which promised to deliver our opinions from their accidental and capricious element. But development, while it is a process which eliminates the effect of some casual circumstances, only magnifies that of others. So we are led back to the essential need to fix our (intellectual) beliefs based on the facts of experience. Now, there are some people [. . .] who, when they see that any belief of theirs is determined by any circumstance extraneous to the facts, will from that moment not merely admit in words that that belief is doubtful, but will experience a real doubt of it, so that it ceases in some degree at least to be a belief. Therefore, a method is needed for fixing belief which is not based on what is agreeable to the reason of any individual or group of individuals, but "determined by nothing human, but by some external permanency -- by something upon which our thinking has no effect [. . .] the method [being] such that the ultimate conclusion of every man shall be the same." Such is the method of science. Its fundamental hypothesis, restated in more familiar language, is this: There are Real things, whose characters are entirely independent of our opinions about them; those Reals affect our senses according to regular laws, and, though our sensations are as different as are our relations to the objects, yet, by taking advantage of the laws of perception, we can ascertain by reasoning how things really and truly are; and any man, if he have sufficient experience and he reason enough about it, will be led to the one True conclusion. The new conception here involved is that of Reality. And the method of science differs from the a priori method, superior though it may be to the other two methods, in precisely this: The very essence of [the a priori method] is to think as one is inclined to think [. . . ] But with the scientific method the case is different. I may start with known and observed facts to proceed to the unknown; and yet the rules which I follow in doing so may not be such as investigation would approve. The test of whether I am truly following the method is not an immediate appeal to my feelings and purposes, but, on the contrary, itself involves the application of the method. And, as we discover in the next article in the series, "How To Make Our Ideas Clear," the "application of the method" involves the application of the pragmatic maxim. So, as to Jeffrey's question as to whether or not there are other legitimate methods of fixing belief which Peirce did not deal with, I would say that the self-correcting method of science will always prove superior if the goal is the truth of some reality based in experience (with the exception, I would say, of those truths which can only be expressed through art--and even a purified religion would be "art completed" according to Peirce, or sentiment, as considered in the first of the 1898 lectures). Peirce concludes with a plea for the "integrity of belief": CP5.387 . . . above all, let it be considered that what is more wholesome than any particular belief is integrity of belief, and that to avoid looking into the support of any belief from a fear that it may turn out rotten is quite as immoral as it is disadvantageous. The person who confesses that there is such a thing as truth, which is distinguished from falsehood simply by this, that if acted on it should, on full consideration, carry us to the point we aim at and not astray, and then, though convinced of this, dares not know the truth and seeks to avoid it, is in a sorry state of mind indeed. And of course that last idea will lead Peirce exactly to the formulation of the pragmatic maxim. Best, Gary Gary Richmond Philosophy and Critical Thinking Communication Studies LaGuardia College of the City University of New York On Mon, Apr 21, 2014 at 1:00 AM, Kasser,Jeff <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: Hi Jeffrey and other Peircers. Your question about the foundations of measurement is above my pay grade, I'm sorry to say. Do I remember correctly that you're a Chapel Hill Ph.D., Jeffrey? Do you have any views about connections between Peirce and John Roberts' work on explaining laws of nature in terms of groundings for measurements? I'm only dimly familiar with Roberts' work, but measurement and laws of nature get pretty close to the heart of Peirce's concerns. I thought I might toss a couple of other questions in before we fully yield to the Chapter 7 folks. Both of these hearken back to my introductory message. First, Kees contrasts the doubt-belief theory with epistemic agnosticism, which he characterizes as the view that inquiry should proceed undisturbed by passions. I think that this is intriguing and insightful and I'd like to hear more about it. Peirce is sometimes contrasted with James precisely in terms of the latter's insistence on the appropriateness and inescapability of our "passional nature." And Peirce's distrust of individual idiosyncrasies in the JSP papers of the 1860's and especially in *Reasoning and the Logic of Things* can seem to stand in some tension with the doubt-belief theory's tolerance for conative influences on belief. I don't think that any of these considerations indicate that Kees is wrong, but I do think that we could learn a thing or two by thinking about how to situation "Fixation" with respect to some of James's provocative statements about temperament and our willing nature, and I think that we could learn a different thing or two by making it explicit how "Fixation" can be reconciled with some of the earlier and later works. Kees uses epistemic agnosticism in his characterization of the a priori method in "Fixation," which brings me to my second question. Kees explains that this third method of fixing belief "appeals particularly to those who see a strong divide between reason and passions, and who then consider it our main task to free thought from the pernicious influence of the passions" (p. 97). Again, this can sound a bit like James engaging Clifford, but the other question I want to raise concerns how importantly different the a priori method is from its predecessors. Kees tends to emphasize its distinctness, arguing that the a priori method appeals to the content of the belief in trying to settle opinion. Hence the a priori method is like science and unlike the other two in being a genuine method of inquiry. I think that this is tricky and intriguing stuff. Peirce seems to guide us in both directions, saying in the same paragraph that the a priori method "is far more intellectual and respectable from the point of view of reason" than the other two and also that it "does not differ in a very essential way from that of authority." I look forward to our discussion of Chapter 7, whether or not we pick up these loose ends from Chapter 6. Jeff K. ________________________________________ From: Jeffrey Brian Downard [[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>] Sent: Thursday, April 17, 2014 11:14 PM To: [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> Subject: RE: Fwd: [PEIRCE-L] RE: de Waal Seminar: Chapter 6, Philosophy of Science List, I'd like to ask another question about the topic of chapter 6. This question is not about the "Fixation of Belief." Rather, it is about a part of the philosophy of science that does not figure prominently in Kees's discussion. In the first half of the 20th century, a methodological dispute arose between those who were engaged in the special sciences of physics and psychology. At the time, physics was considered a "hard" science because it was based on observations involving exact measurements. The second was considered a "soft" science because it appeared to be based on observations that did not seem to be amenable to such an exact treatment. In time, as the debate came to a head, a expert panel of experts in measurement was asked to take a closer look at the issues. See, for instance, Stanley Smith Stevens, "On the theory of scales of measurement" (1946).. In order to sort out a number of the contested issues, Suppes, Luce, Krantz and Tversky engaged in an ambitious attempt to examine the foundations of measurement in a more systematic and thorough manner. Let's state the question in general terms. What position does Peirce take with respect to the foundations of measurement? If we look at Peirce's work in mathematics generally and on measurement theory in particular, we see him trying to provide a coherent framework for understanding foundations of key conceptions, such as quantity, order, magnitude. How does his position compare to the accounts that have been developed in the 20th century by the likes of Stevens, or by Suppes, Luce, Krantz and Tversky? --Jeff ----------------------------- 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]<mailto:[email protected]> . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected]<mailto:[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 .
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