Brian: Whitehead could--and probably did--know about Peirce through Russell, who knew both James and Royce as far back as 1896, and who was at Harvard in 1914. Russell wasn't particularly impressed by Peirce's categories... his remarks suggest he did not understand the point of them, which makes me think he must have pretty well missed the point of Peirce's philosophy more generally. And indeed, Russell and Peirce have very different visions of philosophy. So Russell probably wouldn't have urged Peirce onto ANW's attention.
More to the point, I'm not aware of any evidence that ANW had much actual knowledge of Peirce before his own arrival at Harvard. Could be overlooking something obvious but that's my impression. It would be an interesting history to research if it hasn't already been done. Off topic... but maybe somebody could start a side list, McDermott-L, just for people to share McD stories? -- Kelly A. Parker, Ph.D. Professor of Philosophy, Environmental Studies, & Liberal Studies Grand Valley State University phone (616) 331-3257 Allendale, MI 49401 [USA] fax (616) 331-2601 http://agora.phi.gvsu.edu ________________________________________ From: Brian Burtt [[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, August 07, 2014 2:00 AM To: Peirce List Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Peirce Trumps Whitehead? There's some of what came later in Whitehead's work to be found in The Concept of Nature, written while he was still in England. Am I correct that he would have had fairly little chance to have run into Peirce's work at that point? -- Brian Burtt > On Aug 6, 2014, at 8:39 PM, Kelly Parker <[email protected]> wrote: > > Jack: > > When I took a Whitehead seminar with Donald Sherburne in grad school I was > likewise struck by the similarities between Peirce and Whitehead, and asked > him about it. The fact that ANW was at Harvard was especially > interesting--Peirce had to be in the air, at least, but as far as I know, ANW > scarcely mentions CSP by name. > > Sherburne told me a story from the time Hartshorne and Weiss were editing > Collected Papers. They brought some manuscripts to ANW to get his advice on > their meaning, or their importance, to determine whether they ought to be > included in the edition. I was under the impression these were some of > Peirce's writings on synechism and cosmic evolution, but I'm not sure that's > a correct impression--it's what I was working on at the time so I may have > heard what I expected to hear. Sherburne said that Whitehead looked over the > pages, set them down, and asked Hartshorne and Weiss to tell the world that > this was the first time he had ever seen these papers. He recognized the > similarity to his own thought, and how it might look to posterity. Some > others at the recent Peirce Congress said they had heard versions of this > same story. > > A similar story, which I heard at the Congress, tells that H & W had brought > a Peirce manuscript to ANW for his advice, but he was not in. They left it on > his desk assuming he would know what it was and why they had left it. When > ANW came in he mistook it for a student paper, read it, and got very excited > to think that some undetected genius in one of his classes had written it! > > I don't know whether either of these stories is documented anywhere--though I > hope they are, and that they are related better than I can do, by somebody > closer to the source. > > My own conclusion on the matter, after long consideration, was that the > similarities between ANW and CSP are real, but that there was no > unacknowledged influence from CSP to ANW. ANW was brilliant, knowledgeable, > and original in his own right, and he was no plagiarist. I think both > philosophers were seeking to solve some similar problems using similar > resources, at about the same historical time. As a result of this they > arrived at very similar solutions. Peirce actually remarks on this kind of > simultaneous discovery in science, and considers it as supporting his view > that knowledge belongs to the community rather than the isolated individual > inquirer. > > -- > Kelly A. Parker, Ph.D. > Professor of Philosophy, Environmental Studies, & Liberal Studies > Grand Valley State University phone (616) 331-3257 > Allendale, MI 49401 [USA] fax (616) 331-2601 > http://agora.phi.gvsu.edu > ________________________________________ > From: Jack Curtis [[email protected]] > Sent: Sunday, August 03, 2014 6:30 PM > To: [email protected] > Subject: [PEIRCE-L] Peirce Trumps Whitehead? > > On reading a collection of Peirce's writings in parallel with Whitehead's > "Process & Reality" I'm struck with the similarities between them, even to > the point of suspecting Whitehead cribbed most of his ideas from Peirce, > perhaps desperate to salvage his reputation after the "Principia Mathematica" > fiasco with Russell, altho his only reference to Peirce in P&R is to dismiss > the idea that we think in symbols as "absurd" & diss Peirce as a pea-brained > logician who can only see the world in black & white, rather than the > colorful rainbow emerging out of a myriad of miniscule relationships that it > is. Recognizing that the similarities I see may, at least in part, be a > result of reading the 2 in parallel, interpreting what Whitehead says in the > light of my interpretation of what Peirce has just said, & vice-versa, I'm > wondering what you all might think of Peirce v Whitehead? > > ----------------------------- > 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 . > > > >
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