Jon, Gary, list, For my purposes in Turning Signs (other than quoting Peirce), the term “retroduction” works better than “abduction” because its prefix is more metaphorical, so that it integrates better with the central diagram of biosemiosis which I call the meaning cycle <http://gnusystems.ca/TS/mdl.htm#meancyc> . It’s the part of the cycle complementary to the “prediction” practiced by anticipatory systems.
This past week i've been revisiting some variants of that diagram found in my sources, starting with Robert Rosen's “modeling relation” diagram which was the original inspiration for mine. There's a note in the “Comminding” section <http://gnusystems.ca/TS/css.htm#x05> which shows how Rosen's diagram of the modeling process in scientific inquiry also communicates the biosemiotic idea of anticipatory systems. I've added to that a diagram (with explanation) by Floyd Merrell which clarifies, among other things, the Peircean idea that an interpreter is also an interpretant sign – an idea discussed on the list this past week. Merrell's is also the only cyclic process diagram i know of that includes the “tripod” diagram of the O-S-I relation. I thought some list members might be interested in that, hence the link above. (There are also some links within the text itself that might be helpful in exploring the ideas.) Gary f. From: Jon Alan Schmidt <jonalanschm...@gmail.com> Sent: 20-Jun-20 20:07 To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Communicating An Idea Gary R., Gary F., List: Upon reflection, I was indeed too hasty and dismissive in my initial responses, for which I sincerely apologize. As I only belatedly acknowledged, "abduction" may be more suitable in certain contexts than "retroduction," which Peirce himself evidently recognized. In particular, I agree that his preference for the latter applies primarily to the logical notion of "reasoning from consequent to antecedent" (CP 6.469, EP 2:441, 1908) in order to explain something, especially in scientific contexts where "the well-prepared mind has wonderfully soon guessed each secret of nature" (CP 6.476, EP 2:444; presumably this is the quote that Gary R. had in mind). What this has in common with "moments of 'pure inspiration'" in the arts and humanities is that the basis of assurance is instinct, rather than experience or form. Such signs belong to the class that Peirce calls "abducent" in one of the taxonomies that he wrote in his Logic Notebook (R 339:424[285r], 1906 Aug 31), and as far as I know, he never proposes "retroducent" as an alternative. From that standpoint, "abduction" does seem to be potentially broader in meaning than "retroduction," as you both have been suggesting. I was wrong to assert otherwise. Regards, Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt <http://www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt> - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt <http://twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt> On Sat, Jun 20, 2020 at 5:49 PM Gary Richmond <gary.richm...@gmail.com <mailto:gary.richm...@gmail.com> > wrote: Jon, Gary F., List, As a supplement to my last post, I've cut and pasted excerpts from some of the definitions of 'retroduction' which can be found in the Commens Dictionary. I'm putting the last dated definition from the dIctionary first because it tends to make an important point I've been trying to get at, and it does it most simply and plainly, that point being that, as I see it, 'Retroduction' is best thought of as a kind of reasoning, that it works to form "an explanatory hypothesis." And while in the early history of our movement from superstition to science it may have amounted to little more than guessing (but guessing out of experience), that as science advances, it is a "prepared mind" (I looking for a quotation related to that idea of the prepared scientific mind) steeped in the science in which it is making perhaps bold conjectures, say, in quantum theory, that retroductively arrives at a hypothesis. Retroduction is not in and of itself a hypothesis but rather the consequence of retroduction. Or to state it otherwise, retroduction is the type of inference which results in a hypothesis being formed, the actual hypothesis being the product of retroductive inference, an intellectual process. And that is why retroduction is given as one of the three stages of a complete inquiry according to Peirce. nd | Logic: Fragments [R] | MS [R] S64 There are three stages of inquiry, demanding as many different kinds of reasoning governed by different principles. They are, 1, Retroduction, forming an explanatory hypothesis[;] 2, Deduction, tracing out the consequences that would ensue upon the truth or falsity of that hypothesis; and 3, Induction, the experimental testing of the hypothesis by inquiring whether its consequences are born out by fact, or not. Retroduction The recommendations of an explanatory hypothesis are 1st, verifiability; 2nd, simplicity; 3rd, economy. 1898 | Cambridge Lectures on Reasoning and the Logic of Things: The First Rule of Logic | RLT 170; CP 5.581 As for retroduction, it is itself an experiment. A retroductive research is an experimental research; and when we look upon Induction and Deduction from the point of view of Experiment and Observation, we are merely tracing in those types of reasoning their affinity to Retroduction. [—] To return to Retroduction, then, it begins with Colligation. Something corresponding to Iteration may or may not take place. And then comes an Observation. Not, however, an External observation of the objects as in Induction, nor yet an observation made upon the parts of a Diagram, as in Deduction; but for all that just as truly an observation. 1906 [c.] | Reasoning [R] | MS [R] 753:3 Retroductive reasoning is the only one of the three which produces any new idea. It originates a theory. 1906 [c.] | Suggestions for a Course of Entretiens leading up through Philosophy to the Questions of Spiritualism, Ghosts, and finally to that of Religion | MS [R] 876:2-3 Retroduction is the passage of the mind from something observed or attentively considered to the representation of a state of things that may explain it. Its conclusion is usually regarded as a more or less likely conjecture; but it may be a mere suggestion of a question or, on the other hand, it may be the most confident of convictions. The essential point is that the consideration of what is observed or known produces some representation of something not so known. 1907 | Pragmatism | MS 318:21-3 …Retroduction, or that process whereby from a surprising array of facts we are led to a conjectural theory to account for them. Many logicians refuse to call this last ‘inference’, because its conclusion is so extremely problematical as to amount to little more than an interrogation. I am sure they are wrong, however: they have not possessed themselves of the true scientific definition of ‘inference’. The logical justification of a retroduction, of which the proper conclusion is that the conjectured state of things is “likely,” in the vague sense of tending to resemble the real state of things, consists in the two-fold truth that in case the conjectured state of things should closely resemble the real state of things, then the acceptance of the vague proper conclusion will prove of some considerable advantage in the conduct of further inquiry, even if not also (as usually will be the case,) in some future practical conduct; while, on the other hand, should the conjectured state of things be markedly in contrast to the real state of things, the acceptance of the same proper conclusion would bring comparatively little disadvantage.1907 | Pragmatism | MS 318:21-3 …Retroduction, or that process whereby from a surprising array of facts we are led to a conjectural theory to account for them. Many logicians refuse to call this last ‘inference’, because its conclusion is so extremely problematical as to amount to little more than an interrogation. I am sure they are wrong, however: they have not possessed themselves of the true scientific definition of ‘inference’. The logical justification of a retroduction, of which the proper conclusion is that the conjectured state of things is “likely,” in the vague sense of tending to resemble the real state of things, consists in the two-fold truth that in case the conjectured state of things should closely resemble the real state of things, then the acceptance of the vague proper conclusion will prove of some considerable advantage in the conduct of further inquiry, even if not also (as usually will be the case,) in some future practical conduct; while, on the other hand, should the conjectured state of things be markedly in contrast to the real state of things, the acceptance of the same proper conclusion would bring comparatively little disadvantage. 1908 [c.] | A Neglected Argument for the Reality of God (G) | MS [R] 842: 29-30 … Another question to be noted for later consideration is whether this first step in inquiry can conclude, if it can be called “concluding,” otherwise than in the interrogative mood, if grammarians will acknowledge such a mood. Certain it is that if a series of experience does no more than suggest an idea interrogatively, the mere occurrence of the suggestion, warrants us in regarding the movement of thought as having the essential character of this first stage of inquiry. I call this mode of inference, or, if you please, this step toward inference, in which an explanatory hypothesis is first suggested, by the name of retroduction, since it regresses from a consequent to a hypothetical antecedent. But while this explains why I have selected the vocable ‘retroduction’ to express my meaning, I claim the right, as inventor of the term, to make its definition to be, the passage of thought from experiencing something, E, to predicating a concept of the mind’s creating; the subject of the predication being a specified class to which E belongs, or an indefinite part of such class. The second stage of inquiry consists in deducing the consequences of the retroductive hypothesis. The word “retroductive,” however, is surplusage; for every hypothesis, however arbitrary, is suggested by something observed, whether externally or internally and such suggestion is, from a purely logical point of view, retroduction. NOTE: In the following Peirce does connect retroduction to 'guessing', at least in the initial stages of inquiry by humankind, from "primitive notions into modern science." [CSP: . . ."every step in the development of primitive notions into modern science was in the first instance mere guess-work, or at least mere conjecture. But the stimulus to guessing, the hint of the conjecture, was derived from experience.] 1908 [c.] | A Neglected Argument for the Reality of God (G) | CP 2.755 Retroduction and Induction face opposite ways. The function of retroduction is not unlike those fortuitous variations in reproduction which played so important a rôle in Darwin’s original theory. In point of fact, according to him every step in the long history of the development of the moner into the man was first taken in that arbitrary and lawless mode. Whatever truth or error there may be in that, it is quite indubitable, as it appears to me, that every step in the development of primitive notions into modern science was in the first instance mere guess-work, or at least mere conjecture. But the stimulus to guessing, the hint of the conjecture, was derived from experience. The order of the march of suggestion in retroduction is from experience to hypothesis. 1910 [c.] | Letters to Paul Carus | CP 8.227-231. . .The general body of logicians had also at all times come very near recognizing the trichotomy. They only failed to do so by having so narrow and formalistic a conception of inference ( as necessarily having formulated judgments for its premises) that they did not recognize Hypothesis (or, as I now term it, retroduction) as an inference … . When one contemplates a surprising or otherwise perplexing state of things (often so perplexing that he cannot definitely state what the perplexing character is) he may formulate it into a judgment or many apparently connected judgments; he will often finally strike out a hypothesis, or problematical judgment, as a mere possibility, from which he either fully perceives or more or less suspects that the perplexing phenomenon would be a necessary or quite probable consequence. That is a retroduction. Now three lines of reasoning are open to him. [—] Or, second, he may proceed still further to study the phenomenon in order to find other features that the hypothesis will explain (i.e. in the English sense of explain, to deduce the facts from the hypothesis as its necessary or probable consequences). That will be to continue reasoning retroductively, i.e., by hypothesis. 1910 [c.] | On the Three Kinds of Reasoning [R] | MS [R] 755:14 That kind of reasoning by which we are more or less inclined to believe in a theory because it explains facts that without the theory would be very surprising is what I call Retroduction, or reasoning from consequent to antecedent. To understand the legitimacy of this kind of reasoning (often and often as it deceives us,) is to understand the legitimacy, the truth-leading power of all reasoning. 1911 | Letter to J. H. Kehler | NEM 3:177-178 . . .A scientific inquiry must usually, if not always, begin with retroduction. An Induction can hardly be sound or at least is to be suspected usually, unless it has been preceded by a Retroductive reasoning to the same general effect. 1911 | Letter to J. H. Kehler | NEM 3:206 . . .So Retroduction comes first and is the least certain and least complex kind of Reasoning. nd | Lecture I | MS [R] 857: 4-5 . . . But since this, after all, is only conjectural, I have on reflexion decided to give this kind of reasoning the name of retroduction to imply that it turns back and leads from the consequent of an admitted consequence, to its antecedent.
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