Dear list members,
I am not sure if this helps: I think, to say: "All beans from the bag are white, these beans are white, so these beans are from the bag" is an abduction. But to say: "All beans from the bag are white, these beans are white, so it is possible that they are from the bag" is sort of a deduction, isnt it, because the statement is necessarily true. So making an abduction is not pragmaticism (given that pragmaticism is deductive). But talking about abduction is, because it includes a deduction. With this view it may be not necessary to distinguish between pragmaticism and the pragmatic maxim concerning the matter of abduction.
Best,
Helmut
Gary R., List:
----------------------------- 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 .GR: But, in fact, Peirce does call the pragmatic maxim (PM) the "rule of pragmatism" in this essay.
Yes, but my point is that he does not call the PM the "rule of abduction"; so again, I am positing a distinction between Peirce's pragmatism (i.e., pragmaticism) as the "logic of abduction" and the PM as the "rule of pragmatism." Pragmaticism as a whole--i.e., all three Stages of Inquiry, taken together--includes the PM, but the PM is not all there is to it. The PM pertains primarily to deduction (explication), not abduction; which is why it contributes to security, but not to uberty. I wonder if another way to highlight the distinction is to assign the PM to logical critic, but pragmaticism as a whole to methodeutic.
Frankly, Houser misquoted Peirce when he wrote, "Peirce had come to see that pragmatism has the limitations that come with choosing security over uberty: '[it] does not bestow a single smile upon beauty, upon moral virtue, or upon abstract truth, the three things that alone raise Humanity above Animality'" (EP 2.xxxii, emphasis added). What Peirce actually wrote is, "Yet the maxim of Pragmatism does not bestow a single smile upon beauty, upon moral virtue, or upon abstract truth, the three things that alone raise Humanity above Animality" (EP 2.465, emphasis added).
Regards,
Jon
On Tue, Sep 27, 2016 at 11:23 PM, Gary Richmond <[email protected]> wrote:
Jon, List,Jon, I think I am tending to agree with your conclusion, that "Houser's comment wrongly equates pragmatism with its maxim, when the latter is only one aspect of pragmat[ic]ism as a whole."On the other hand, you wrote: JS: "I have been mulling this over, and I keep landing on the thought that there is only a "possible contradiction" if we conflate pragmatism as the "logic of abduction" with the pragmatic maxim (PM) as the "rule of pragmatism"; Peirce does not call it the "rule of abduction," as you did."But, in fact, Peirce does call the pragmatic maxim (PM) the "rule of pragmatism" in this essay. He writes:"That maxim is, roughly speaking, equivalent to the one that I used in 1871 to call the rule of "pragmatism" (EP2:465).So, there is this sense in which Houser may not be entirely incorrect, at least about what Peirce wrote here (although I am still tending to imagine, as I earlier did, and with you, that the PM and pragmaticism ought not be conflated and, further, that Peirce has developed his pragmaticism far beyond that 1871 maxim, so that he "used. . .to call" it the rule of pragmatism).As for 'security' and 'uberty', the editors of EP direct us in a footnote to this passage, which offers another definition of 'uberty' somewhat different from the one I gave in my first post on this topic (Houser's "rich suggestiveness").In a letter to Frederic Adams Woods, written in the fall of 1913, Peirce wrote: "I think logicians should have two principal aims: to bring out the amount and kind of security (approach to certainty) of each kind of reasoning, and second, to bring out the possible and esperable uberty, or value in productiveness (emphasis added) of each kind (CP 8.384). [EP2:553, fn 7]As I am now seeing it, this definition of 'uberty' tends to support our argument that, given the "value in productiveness" which pragmaticism (seen as involving a theory of inquiry) would seem to offer, that while the PM in itself offers but security, pragmaticism as a whole offers uberty, and to some considerable degree.Best,Gary RGary RichmondPhilosophy and Critical ThinkingCommunication StudiesLaGuardia College of the City University of New YorkC 745On Tue, Sep 27, 2016 at 10:57 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt <[email protected]> wrote:Gary R., List:GR: But what Peirce actually says in the article is that it is the pragmatic maxim, the "rule of 'pragmatism'," which "certainly aids our approximation to [the] security of reasoning. But it does not contribute to the uberty of reasoning, which far more calls for solicitous care" (EP2:465). So, I take this "far more. . .solicitous care" to suggest that it is not pragmatism itself that offers little uberty, but the PM, what Peirce tended to refer to as but "a maxim of logical analysis." In my thinking, pragmatism involves an entire theory of inquiry (including all three stages of a complete inquiry).GR: So, if pragmatism is the "logic of abduction" (1903), and the PM provides the rule to abduction. I see a possible contradiction in the 1913 text (or at least in Houser's comment) which I've never been able to resolve in my thinking on the matter every time I read this short draft.I have been mulling this over, and I keep landing on the thought that there is only a "possible contradiction" if we conflate pragmatism as the "logic of abduction" with the pragmatic maxim (PM) as the "rule of pragmatism"; Peirce does not call it the "rule of abduction," as you did. The two notions are distinct, and both are necessary; as you said, "pragmatism involves an entire theory of inquiry (including all three stages of a complete inquiry)." Abduction, when employed with "solicitous care," provides uberty as the only type of reasoning that "contributes the smallest positive item to the final conclusion of the inquiry" (CP 6.475, EP 2.443); but at the same time, it "does not afford security. The hypothesis must be tested" (CP 6.470, EP 2.441). The PM, on the other hand, "certainly aids our approximation to [the] security of reasoning. But it does not contribute to the uberty of reasoning" (EP 2.465).GR: The matter of security vs uberty seems clear enough when one takes up each of the three forms of reasoning, deduction having the most security and abduction the least with induction somewhere in between. But how should we think of pragmatism itself in consideration of security and uberty?To summarize my suggested answer--abduction provides uberty, by generating new hypotheses; deduction provides security, by explicating those hypotheses in accordance with the PM; and induction provides both, by evaluating those hypotheses against experience. As you hinted, Houser's comment wrongly equates pragmatism with its maxim, when the latter is only one aspect of pragmat[ic]ism as a whole.Regards,Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USAProfessional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran LaymanOn Mon, Sep 26, 2016 at 4:03 PM, Gary Richmond <[email protected]> wrote:Ben, Jeff D., Clark, Jon S, List,Ben concluded his argument (over several messages) by writing: "Peirce made plausibility a question of logical critic, and testability, potential fruitfulness, etc., questions of methodeutic. Thus he separated them not just as separate issues of abduction, but as pertaining to different levels of logic - very apples versus oranges "I tend to agree with this and the whole thrust of your argumentation, all nicely supported by the texts you've quoted, Ben. But I have one question which keeps gnawing and deeply related to this.Nathan Houser comments in his introduction to the very late article (1913), "An Essay toward Improving our Reasoning in Security and Uberty" (EP2:463; note: "uberty" defined as "rich suggestiveness") that in this text, written just months before Peirce died, that he is arguing that "reasoning involves a trade-off between security and uberty," and that "deductive reasoning provides the most security, but little uberty, which abduction provides much uberty but almost no security." "Pragmatism, it seems," Houser writes, "falls in on the side of security."But what Peirce actually says in the article is that it is the pragmatic maxim, the "rule of 'pragmatism'," which "certainly aids our approximation to [the] security of reasoning. But it does not contribute to the uberty of reasoning, which far more calls for solicitous care" (EP2:465). So, I take this "far more. . .solicitous care" to suggest that it is not pragmatism itself that offers little uberty, but the PM, what Peirce tended to refer to as but "a maxim of logical analysis." In my thinking, pragmatism involves an entire theory of inquiry (including all three stages of a complete inquiry).So, if pragmatism is the "logic of abduction" (1903), and the PM provides the rule to abduction. I see a possible contradiction in the 1913 text (or at least in Houser's comment) which I've never been able to resolve in my thinking on the matter every time I read this short draft.The matter of security vs uberty seems clear enough when one takes up each of the three forms of reasoning, deduction having the most security and abduction the least with induction somewhere in between. But how should we think of pragmatism itself in consideration of security and uberty?Best,Gary RGary RichmondPhilosophy and Critical ThinkingCommunication StudiesLaGuardia College of the City University of New YorkC 745
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