On Sep 26, 2006, at 3:23 PM, Burke Johnson wrote:
Did Peirce ever give his own working definition of the word
"knowledge?"
I "know" that Peirce thought that our knowledge is fallible,
truth is
something we only approach in the long run, that scientific knowledge
has a social nature, etc., but, again, would anyone on the list
tell me
more about how you think he would define that concept?
Thanks in advance.
Burke Johnson
Check out the entry on Fallibilism in the Peirce Dictionary:
http://www.helsinki.fi/science/commens/terms/fallibilism.html
There isn't an entry for knowledge but many of the quotes end up
getting at the point.
I'd add that I think knowledge for the individual in Peirce ends up
being that belief which we can't doubt which is thus a habit.
Knowledge in the sense of the community of inquirers is obviously a
bit more.
I'd add that this quote from CP 2.773 might be helpful as well.
"Reasoning is a process in which the reasoner is conscious that a
judgment, the conclusion, is determined by other judgment or
judgments, the premisses, according to a general habit of thought,
which he may not be able precisely to formulate, but which he
approves as conducive to true knowledge. By true knowledge he means,
though he is not usually able to analyse his meaning, the ultimate
knowledge in which he hopes that belief may ultimately rest,
undisturbed by doubt, in regard to the particular subject to which
his conclusion relates. Without this logical approval, the process,
although it may be closely analogous to reasoning in other respects,
lacks the essence of reasoning. Every reasoner, therefore, since he
approves certain habits, and consequently methods, of reasoning,
accepts a logical doctrine, called his logica utens. Reasoning does
not begin until a judgment has been formed; for the antecedent
cognitive operations are not subject to logical approval or
disapproval, being subconscious, or not sufficiently near the surface
of consciousness, and therefore uncontrollable. Reasoning, therefore,
begins with premisses which are adopted as representing percepts, or
generalizations of such percepts." ('Dictionary of Philosophy and
Psychology' vol. 2, CP 2.773, 1902)
I'd add this one as well.
But since symbols rest exclusively on habits already definitely
formed but not furnishing any observation even of themselves, and
since knowledge is habit, they do not enable us to add to our
knowledge even so much as a necessary consequent, unless by means of
a definite preformed habit." ('Prolegomena to an Apology for
Pragmaticism', CP 4.531, 1906)
---
Message from peirce-l forum to subscriber archive@mail-archive.com
