Helmut,

 

The information “that it is cold because it hails” is not “lost” because it was 
never implied by the scroll in the first place. Remember the scroll expresses a 
conditional de inesse, not a causal relation. So all we know (about this wholly 
imaginary universe) is that If it hails, it is cold, or no hail without cold, 
as Jon A. put it; we don’t know why. (Actually, in what we call empirical 
reality — which has nothing to do with “necessary reasoning” — hail usually 
occurs in summer, when it is not cold!)

 

Gary f.

 

From: Helmut Raulien [mailto:[email protected]] 
Sent: 12-Nov-17 14:21
To: [email protected]
Cc: 'Peirce List' <[email protected]>
Subject: Aw: [PEIRCE-L] Lowell Lecture 2.11

 

List,

I understand, that "it hails, and if it hails it is cold" implies that "it 
hails and it is cold". But is both the same? I think, that information is lost: 
That it is cold because it hails, and that it does hail not because it is cold, 
but because in this sheet of assertion it just hails.

Best,

Helmut

 Sonntag, 12. November 2017 um 16:21 Uhr
 [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> 
 

Continuing from Lowell 2.10,

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

 

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