Stephen, list, Ben Udell and I take up these quotations and this theme in a chapter of an upcoming booked edited by Torkild Thellefsen, et. al., "Charles S. Peirce in his own Words: 100 years of Semiotics, Communication and Cognition" to be published, hopefully, just before the Lowell Centennial Congress. For the book, a number of Peirce scholars were invited to choose a quotation from Peirce's writings which had most inspired them. I chose the passage which concludes "Logic is rooted in the social principle" (EP1:149) from "The Doctrine of Chances" (1878), the third in the* Illustrations of the Logic of Science* series of articles, preceded by the famous articles, "The Fixation of Belief" and "How to Make Our Ideas Clear."
Of course I immediately recognized the conclusion of the quoted paragraph, namely, "Logic is rooted in the social principle," to have been preceded about a decade earlier in "Grounds of Validity of the Laws of Logic" (1869) by a passage having a reverse variant of that quoted sentence, namely, "So, the social principle is rooted intrinsically in logic" (EP1:81). I asked Ben if he might consider writing a section of the chapter on that earlier passage and, while he was not overly familiar with "Grounds of Validity" (neither was I), he consented to do so. In any event, I've personally been thinking about these passages for a very long time. For now the point I'd like to make is that this theme--that logic is rooted in the social principle which is rooted in logic--cannot be overstated, especially when one considers that, as we know, logic for Peirce *is* semiotic. The principle just mentioned is introduced early in his philosophical career and he never abandons it, restating it in many ways, especially in later discussions of pragmatism/pragmaticism. Thanks for reminding us of this, Stephen. (Btw, it's been discussed on at least two occasions on the list how the two 'reverse' phrases do not represent a logical circularity.) Best, Gary *Gary Richmond* *Philosophy and Critical Thinking* *Communication Studies* *LaGuardia College of the City University of New York* On Thu, Jun 26, 2014 at 8:30 AM, Stephen C. Rose <stever...@gmail.com> wrote: > "... logicality inexorably requires that our interests shall not be > limited. They must not stop at our own fate, but must embrace the whole > community. This community, again, must not be limited, but must extend to > all races of beings with whom we can come into immediate or mediate > intellectual relation. It must reach, however vaguely, beyond this > geological epoch, beyond all bounds. He who would not sacrifice his own > soul to save the whole world, is, as it seems to me, illogical in all his > inferences, collectively. Logic is rooted in the social principle."Peirce: > CP 2.654 Cross-Ref:†† > > > What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his > own soul? If a man has a transcendent personal interest infinitely > outweighing all others, then, upon the theory of validity of inference just > developed, he is devoid of all security, and can make no valid inference > whatever. What follows? That logic rigidly requires, before all else, that > no determinate fact, nothing which can happen to a man's self, should be of > more consequence to him than everything else. He who would not sacrifice > his own soul to save the whole world, is illogical in all his inferences, > collectively. So the social principle is rooted intrinsically in logic.†1 > Peirce: CP 5.355 Cross-Ref:†† > > > > *@stephencrose <https://twitter.com/stephencrose>* > > > ----------------------------- > PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON > PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to > peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L > but to l...@list.iupui.edu 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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