[peirce-l] Re: What "fundamenal psychological laws" is Peirce referring to?

[martin lefebvre]

Title: [peirce-l] Re: What "fundamenal psychological laws" is Pei

Joe, Kristi, list,

At the risk of offering a post hoc, ergo propter hoc argument, I'll try looking at the issue from the prespective of Peirce's more mature views.

I consider the "Fixation" essay to be organized around a sort of development/growth principle that leads to the scientific method as the method of choice of reason. I believe that growth here can be thought of categorially. The method of tenacity "works" as long as the individual is considered monadically (the social impulse must be held in check) and as long as there is no attempt to examine a belief against experience. A "monadic" mind (what could that be???) would think what it thinks, irrespective of anything else. Of course, the individual (the self) is not a monad (see Colapietro's work on this) and the social impulse cannot be held in check forever. With the method of authority belief is achieved in relation to the belief of others (those in authority) -- not in relation to experience. There is a growing sense of dualism here with the introduction of "others". With the third, a priori, method we find something interesting. This third method is "far more intellectual and respectable from the point of view of reason than either of the others which we have noticed", says Peirce (italics mine). He adds, however: "It makes of inquiry something similar to the development of taste". Now, as you know, Peirce (much) later introduced esthetics to the normative sciences and saw both ethics and logic as requiring the help of esthetics. Esthetics being concerned with the formation of the summum bonum and of ideals or ends. Now there is a strong connection in Peirce between esthetics and abduction (and agapasticism), in the sense that the formation of ideals and the summum bonum lies on the latter's ability to attract us before we can even consider the consequences of adopting them with regards to conduct or thought ‹ either by way of imagination through deduction or concretely through induction. This requires insight (il lume naturale), the very principle for the (very) weak form of assurance we can get from abduction. Peirce tells us, in short, that it is rational for us to trust our guesses. Moreover, the Law of Mind explains that instinct, our ability to guess right, is itself subject to growth in concrete reasonableness. (The mind of God, for Peirce, is a mind whose "guesses" are all right guesses). All this to say that, in his later years, Peirce will be brought to recognize the third method of fixing belief (agreeableness to reason) as a keystone to the scientific method of experience. The problem is that this method, on its own, cannot distinguish between accidents and reality. This is why Peirce concludes that the only method likely to obtain a controlled (and growing) representation of reality is the scientific method. However, it seems that both the 3rd and 4th methods are related to the object (reality) through the mediation of reason (the 3rd method, however, only in a somewhat degenerate manner, through insight). Another way of saying it is to consider that neither of the first two methods imply indefinite growth whereas only the scientific method can approximate reality by mimicking (iconically) and being affected (indexically) by it (and not by "accidents" of another nature), understood that reality is that which is independent from us while idefinitely growing in concrete reasonableness (in kalos).

At the time of writing "Fixation" it seems Peirce was not quite ready to see the full impact of the rationality of the 3rd method. Thus his rejection of it as relating to "taste" and his criticism of "taste" as being a matter of fashion. However, his realization that esthetics belongs to the normative sciences and that ethics and logic require its help ‹ a realization prepared in part by his cosmological writings -- may impact our retroactive reading of the "Fixation" essay. Thus it could be argued (here might lie the post hoc turn of the argument) that Peirce, in the way he ordered the 4 methods, was already manifesting some insight with regards to esthetics's connection to logic (though somewhat unwittingly)...

Martin Lefebvre

Dear Joe,

Thanks for your response and the quote. On second thoughts, informed with the quote you provided, some kind of evolution seems to be involved. But, being evolution of a conception, it must be of logical nature. I can't see how it could hold as a hypothesis of evolution of either individual or social development. Social comes first, no question about it.

But it might be fruitful to think of the principle of ordering the methods this way in terms of critical thought involved. The method of tenacity, by definition, involves none. The method of authority may involve some, though not necessarily by the believer, but by the authority. It is not excluded, by definition, that the authority in question may have arrived at the belief by a process involving critical thought, as well as having gained the authority for a reason.

Well, I don't know. Don't remember Peirce ever writing along these lines. But it is an ordering of "intellectual enditions". So the method of tenacity would imply a conscious belief, in contrast to all the beliefs forced upon us by experience which we are not aware we are holding.

CP 5.524 ""...For belief, while it lasts, is a strong habit, and, as such forces the man to believe until some surprise breaks the habit."

Kirsti Määttänen

<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

 

25.9.2006 kello 02:02, Joseph Ransdell kirjoitti:

 Dear Kirsti::

 I'm short on time today and can't  really answer you until tomorrow, but I ran across a llater passage in Peirce in wihch  he describes what he was doing earlier, in the Fixation article, as follows.   (I'm just quotting it, for what \it's worth , at the moment and will get back with  you  tomorrow, when I have some free time again.

 In a manuscript c. 1906 which was printed in the Collected Papers at 5.564, Peirce describes "The Fixation of Bellief" (1877) as starting out from the proposition that "the agitation of a question" ceases only when satisfaction is attaned with the settlement of belief, and then goes on to consider how:

 "...the conception of truth gradually  develops from that principle under the action of experience; beginning with willful belief, or self-mendacity [i.e. the method of tenacity], the most degraded of all intellectual cnditions; thence rising to the imposition of beliefs by the authority of organized society [the method of authority]; then to the idea of a settlement of opinion as the result of a fermentation of ideas [the a priori method]; and finally reaching the idea of truth as overwelmingly forced upon the mind in experience as the effect of an independent reality [the method of reason or science, or, as he also calls it,in How to Make Our Ideas Clear, the method of  experience]."

 My words are in brackets

 Joe Ransdell

 [EMAIL PROTECTED]

----- Original Message ----

From: Kirsti Määttänen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: Peirce Discussion Forum <peirce-l@lyris.ttu.edu>

Sent: Sunday, September 24, 2006 8:50:46 AM

Subject: [peirce-l] Re: What "fundamenal psychological laws" is Peirce referring to?

Joe & Bill,

Joe, I agree with Bill in that I do not see any reason why the order of

the methods of tenacity and that of authority should be reversed. But

that wasn't the impulse which caused me to start writing this response

:). It was "the two fundamental psychological laws" on the title you

gave, which caught my attention. Anyway, you wrote:

> JR: "...exactly what accounts for the transition from the first to the

> second method.   One might wonder, too,whether Peirce might not have

> the order wrong:  might it not be argued that method #1 should be

> authority and method #2 tenacity?  I wonder if anyone has ever tried

> to justify his ordering of the methods in the way he does? I don't

> recall anyone ever trying to do that, but then I don't trust my memory

> on this since it has not always been a topic in which I had much

> interest until fairly recently.  That he has somehow got hold of

> something right in distinguishing the methods can be argued, I

> believe, but can the ordering really be argued for as plausible?

And later in the discussion you wrote:

JR:  Well, I was thinking of the argument one might make that social

consciousness is prior to consciousness of self, and the method of

tenacity seems to me to be motivated by the value of self-integrity,

the instinctive tendency not to give up on any part of oneself, and

one's beliefs are an important aspect of what one tends to think of

when one thinks of one's identity.

To my mind the logic in the order Peirce is here following is based on

the degree of 'goodness' of methods, not on motives, or order in

evolution, or any other kind of (logical) order. And the goodness has

to do with 'summum bonum", the ultimate aim and purpose, which is not

necessarily an aim or a purpose held by any (one) individual person.

So, the method of tenacity, in spite of being the lowest in degree of

goodness,  IS STILL A CONSISTENT METHOD. Which, if persisted in, will,

in the long run (if the person persisting will live long enough), show

to the person its truth or falsity.

If false, it will be some kind of a nasty surprise to the person. If

still persisted in, more nasty surprised are to follow.  - Well, it

might as well be a pleasant surprise. For example with the (common)

belief that humans beings are by nature evil and egoistic. Being

surprised in this way, according to my somewhat systematic

observations, follows a different course. But Peirce does not give

examples of this kind.

But I do not see any justification given in this particular paper to:

CSP:  In judging this method of fixing belief, which may be called the

method of authority, we must, in the first place, allow its

immeasurable mental and moral superiority to the method of tenacity.

It can only be the 'summum bonum', which could act as an (ultimate)

justification in considering the method of authority as far superior to

the method of tenacity. But Peirce does not take that up here.

Anyway, the IF's in the following may be worth considering:

CSP:  "If the settlement of opinion is the sole object of inquiry, and

if belief is of the nature of a habit"

How I find, is, that these are the premisses from which Peirce proceeds

in this chapter. So these give the perspective Peirce is here taking in

view of the answers he offers, pertaining as well to the logic of the

order of the methods in presenting them.

As to the "two fundamental psychological laws", I assume Peirce is

referring to the laws he himself had arrived at & stated. A relevant

quote on this might be the following, where Peirce puts the question:

How do we know that a belief is nothing but

    CP 5.28    ²... the deliberate preparedness to act according to the

formula believed? My original article carried this back to a

    psychological principle. The conception of truth, according to me, was

developed out of an original impulse to act consistently, to have     a

definite intention.²

Which, by the time of writing, Peirce does not find satisfactory. For

the reasons you stated in your later post, with which I agree.

Best,

Kirsti

­

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Joe & Bill,

Joe, I agree with Bill in that I do not see any reason why the order

of the methods of tenacity and that of authority should be reversed.

But that wasn't the impulse which caused me to start writing this

response :). It was "the two fundamental psychological laws" on the

title you gave, which caught my attention. Anyway, you wrote:

<excerpt><fontfamily><param>Times New Roman</param><bigger><bigger>JR:

"...exactly what accounts for the transition from the first to the

second method.   One might wonder, too,whether Peirce might not have

the order wrong:  might it not be argued that method #1 should be

authority and method #2 tenacity?  I wonder if anyone has ever tried

to justify his ordering of the methods in the way he does? I don't

recall anyone ever trying to do that, but then I don't trust my memory

on this since it has not always been a topic in which I had much

interest until fairly recently.  That he has somehow got hold of

something right in distinguishing the methods can be argued, I

believe, but can the ordering really be argued for as plausible? </bigger></bigger></fontfamily>

</excerpt>

And later in the discussion you wrote:

<fontfamily><param>New York</param><bigger><bigger>JR:  Well, I was

thinking of the argument one might make that social consciousness is

prior to consciousness of self, and the method of tenacity seems to me

to be motivated by the value of self-integrity, the instinctive

tendency not to give up on any part of oneself, and one's beliefs are

an important aspect  of what one tends to think of when one thinks of

one's identity.</bigger></bigger></fontfamily>

To my mind the logic in the order Peirce is here following is based on

the degree of 'goodness' of methods, not on motives, or order in

evolution, or any other kind of (logical) order. And the goodness has

to do with 'summum bonum", the ultimate aim and purpose, which is not

necessarily an aim or a purpose held by any (one) individual person.

So, the method of tenacity, in spite of being the lowest in degree of

goodness,  IS STILL A CONSISTENT METHOD. Which, if persisted in, will,

in the long run (if the person persisting will live long enough), show

to the person its truth or falsity.

If false, it will be some kind of a nasty surprise to the person. If

still persisted in, more nasty surprised are to follow.  - Well, it

might as well be a pleasant surprise. For example with  the (common)

belief that humans beings are by nature evil and egoistic. Being

surprised in this way, according to my somewhat systematic

observations, follows a different course. But Peirce does not give

examples of this kind.

But I do not see any justification given in this particular paper to:

<bold><fontfamily><param>Times New Roman</param><bigger><bigger>CSP:

 In judging this method of fixing belief, which may be called the

method of authority, we must, in the first place, allow its

immeasurable mental and moral superiority to the method of tenacity.

</bigger></bigger></fontfamily></bold>It can only be the 'summum

bonum', which could act as an (ultimate) justification in considering

the method of authority as far superior to the method of tenacity. But

Peirce does not take that up here.

Anyway, the IF's in the following may be worth considering:

<bold><fontfamily><param>Times New Roman</param><bigger><bigger>CSP:

 "If the settlement of opinion is the sole object of inquiry, and if

belief is of the nature of a habit"

</bigger></bigger></fontfamily></bold>

How I find, is, that these are the premisses from which Peirce

proceeds in this chapter. So these give the perspective Peirce is here

taking in view of the answers he offers, pertaining as well to the

logic of the order of the methods in presenting them.

As to the "two fundamental psychological laws", I assume Peirce is

referring to the laws he himself had arrived at & stated. A relevant

quote on this might be the following, where Peirce puts the question:

How do we know that a belief is nothing but

<fontfamily><param>Times New Roman</param>    CP 5.28    ²... the deliberate

preparedness to act according to the formula believed? My original

article carried this back to a     psychological principle. The

conception of truth, according to me, was developed out of an original

impulse to act consistently, to have     a definite intention.²

Which, by the time of writing, Peirce does not find satisfactory. For

the reasons you stated in your later post, with which I agree.

Best,

Kirsti

­</fontfamily>

<fontfamily><param>Helvetica</param>Kirsti Määttänen

<<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

</fontfamily>

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Kirsti Määttänen

040-568 4906

013-663 401

Pippurimäentie 37, 82310 Oravisalo

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