Continuing from Lowell 2.10,

https://fromthepage.com/jeffdown1/c-s-peirce-manuscripts/ms-455-456-1903-low
ell-lecture-ii/display/13650

 

By combining the two parts of the definition of the scroll we get the highly
useful graphical form of the principle of contraposition. Namely, suppose
that a replica of the graph x, were it scribed on the sheet of assertion,
would be permissively transformable into a replica of the graph, y, and
suppose that the scroll 



were permissively placed on the sheet of assertion. Then, by the predication
of the definition concerning the definitum, y, if scribed on the sheet of
assertion, would be transformable into z. So x being transformable into y
and y in its turn into z, it follows that x would on the sheet of assertion
be transformable into z. Hence by the predication of the definitum
concerning the definition, it would be permitted to place on the sheet of
assertion the scroll 



That is to say, the permissibility of the transformation on the sheet of
assertion of x into y, carries with it the permissibility of the
transformation on the bottom of a cut placed on the sheet of assertion, of
the reverse transformation of y into x. Here is a principle which involves
many permissions. 

Permission No 5
The Principle of Contraposition.
Of whatever transformation is permissible on the sheet of assertion, the
reverse transformation is permissible within a single cut. 

Thus if 



and so on indefinitely. In short, whatever transformation is permissible on
the sheet of assertion is permissible within any even number of cuts while
the reverse transformation is permissible within any odd number of cuts. For
example, since any graph can be erased on the sheet of assertion any graph
can be erased within any even number of cuts while any graph can be inserted
within any add number of cuts. Since any graph already scribed on the sheet
of assertion can by Permission No 2 be iterated on the sheet of assertion,
that can have another replica of it placed on the sheet; it follows that if
one replica of a graph is on the sheet of assertion and another replica of
the same graph is oddly enclosed, the latter can be erased. Thus, 



can be transformed into 



and thence by Permission No 3 into x y, and thence by Permission No 1 into
y. Thus what the logic books call the modus ponens 



gives successively 





it is cold.

The fact that our system breaks this up into three steps goes to show that
our main purpose, that of dissecting reasoning into its simplest elements,
has been, in some measure, at least, attained. 

It still remains to treat the blank and the blot in the same manner. 

 

 

http://gnusystems.ca/Lowell2.htm }{ Peirce's Lowell Lectures of 1903

https://fromthepage.com/jeffdown1/c-s-peirce-manuscripts/ms-455-456-1903-low
ell-lecture-ii

 

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