Hello Ben U., List,
I, too, assume we're discussing what Peirce thought, rather than what we variously may
think for our own parts. Having said that, my general aim is to draw from other sources,
such as the lectures concerning the first principle of logic and the conception of
continuity that are collected in Reasoning and the Logic of Things, as resources for
interpreting "The Neglected Argument for the Reality of God." As such, it is
possible that I might go too far at times when reading some of these ideas and arguments
from earlier lectures and essays into what Peirce seems be saying, either explicitly or
implicitly, in the Humble Argument and the Neglected Argument.
For my part, I'm not yet able to see what you appear to be saying--which is that these passages
from the Carnegie application and "Pragmatism as the Logic of Abduction" run at odds with
the interpretative suggestions I am trying to explore. I'm starting to wonder if we might be
working with different notions of what is, on Peirce's account, more instinctive in our habits of
feeling, action and thought. The reason I suspect this might be the case is because I'm not yet
able to get a clear idea of what you seem to be emphasizing when you talk about Peirce's account of
"instinctual plausibility." I'll keep working on it in the hopes of clearing up some of
the vagueness in my ideas.
For my part, I think grounds of Peirce's the division between speculative
grammar, critical logic, and methodeutic can be interpreted in a number of
ways. Jeff Kasser has offered some nice explanations of what Peirce means when
he talks about methodeutical considerations pertaining to the economy of
research. Recently, I've been looking at Mats Bergman's Peirce's Philosophy of
Communication: The Rhetorical Underpinnings of the Theory of Signs and have
found his sorting of some of the competing lines of interpretation to be
helpful.
As I have suggested in earlier posts, I think that Peirce's emphasis on the
relations between signs, object and interpretants that we need to focus our
attention on in each of these areas of semiotics can be used to help steer the
inquiries. When it comes to matters of the assurance of different forms of
inference, I am drawn to the idea that the sort of mediation that is at work
here involves relations of determination between the dynamical object and sign
(typically the focus of inquiry in critical logic) and between the sign and
normal interpretant (typically the focus of inquiry in methodeutic). My
interpretative suggestion is that the relation between the dynamical object and
the final interpretant (so that we have some assurance that the final
interpretant is in a relation to the same object that was the object of the
sign) should be understood as mediated by these two relations. As such, the
mediation involves a triadic relationship between the three dyadic relations as
well as a triadic relation between three triads. Gary F. has indicated that he
finds the diagrams I've offered hard to make out, so I suspect that others
might find them similarly puzzling. Having said that, I'll continue to look at
the textual support for this interpretative hypothesis--and I'll see what might
be done to make the diagrams clearer.
--Jeff
Jeffrey Downard
Associate Professor
Department of Philosophy
Northern Arizona University
(o) 928 523-8354
________________________________________
From: Benjamin Udell [baud...@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 25, 2016 12:15 PM
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Peirce's Theory of Thinking
Jeff D., Gary R., list,
I assume we're discussing what Peirce thought, rather than what we variously may think for
our own parts. Peirce spells out the difference between critical and methodeutical
justifications in the Carnegie application _New Elements of Mathematics_ passage that I
quoted earlier. The fuller passage can be seen both by Google preview
https://books.google.com/books?id=aLxTkSob9UMC&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=%22Methodeutic+has+a+special+interest+in+Abduction%22
in Joe Ransdell's reconstruction at Arisbe (although it looks like Joe missed some
italicizations) http://www.iupui.edu/~arisbe/menu/library/bycsp/L75/ver1/l75v1-08.htm#m27 :
MEMOIR 27: OF METHODEUTIC
[....]
>From Draft B - MS L75.279-280
The first business of this memoir is to develop a precise conception of the
nature of methodeutical logic. In methodeutic, it is assumed that the signs
considered will conform to the conditions of critic, and be true. But just as
critical logic inquires whether and how a sign corresponds to its intended
ultimate object, the reality, so methodeutic looks to the purposed ultimate
interpretant and inquires what conditions a sign must conform to in order to be
pertinent to the purpose. Methodeutic has a special interest in abduction, or
the inference which starts a scientific hypothesis. For it is not sufficient
that a hypothesis should be a justifiable one. Any hypothesis which explains
the facts is justified critically. But among justifiable hypotheses we have to
select that one which is suitable for being tested by experiment. There is no
such need of a subsequent choice after drawing deductive and inductive
conclusions. Yet although methodeutic has not the same special concern with
them, it has to develop the principles which are to guide us in the invention
of proofs, those which are to govern the general course of an investigation,
and those which determine what problems shall engage our energies. It is,
therefore, throughout of an economic character. Two other problems of
methodeutic which the old logics usually made almost its only business are,
first, the principles of definition, and of rendering ideas clear; and second,
the principles of classification.
[End quote]
Note, that he is also saying that the principles of definition, and of
rendering ideas clear, i.e., the principles of pragmatism, are part of
methodeutic. The consideration of conceivable experimental consequences is how
the logic of pragmatism is the logic of abductive inference. Methodeutic does
not have the same special interest in deduction and induction; the specific
justifications of deductions and inductions as valid are topics of critical
logic.
The difference matters because instinctual plausibility has to do with how much
one thinks a hypothesis true. That a hypothesis is conceivably testable does
not lend assurance of its truth. More specific concerns of methodeutic
including the economics of resarch - the suitability of a hypothesis for
testing because of cheapness, or because of its bearing on other hypotheses,
i.e., its caution (as in 20 Questions), incomplexity, or breadth, have no
direct bearing on one's assurance, going in, that the hypothesis is true. A
hypothesis, merely by being easier or more promising to test, does not become a
more plausible and naturally simple explanation of a phenomenon.
In "Pragmatism as the Logic of Abduction" (Lecture VII of the 1903 Harvard
lectures on pragmatism), see CP 5 196–200 http://www.textlog.de/7663.html , and somewhere
in EP 2:226–241
.... What is good abduction? What should an explanatory hypothesis be to be
worthy to rank as a hypothesis? Of course, it must explain the facts. But what
other conditions ought it to fulfill to be good? .... Any hypothesis,
therefore, may be admissible, in the absence of any special reasons to the
contrary, provided it be capable of experimental verification, and only insofar
as it is capable of such verification. This is approximately the doctrine of
pragmatism.
[End quote]
Moreover, pragmatism is the logic of abductive inference to the extent that
rules need to be specified for abductive inference at all. Peirce does not
offer rules for instinct.
Best, Ben
On 9/25/2016 1:56 PM, Jeffrey Brian Downard wrote:
Ben U., Gary R., List,
The following remarks seem--at least to my ear--to bear on the some
relationships between plausibility and methodeutical justification.
Peirce says: "As I phrase it, he provisionally holds it to be "Plausible"; this
acceptance ranges in different cases -- and reasonably so -- from a mere expression of it in the
interrogative mood, as a question meriting attention and reply, up through all appraisals of
Plausibility, to uncontrollable inclination to believe."
The inference to a hypothesis expressed in the interrogative mood suggests that the
holding of the question to be "plausible" (e.g., well-fitted to the surprising
phenomena, well-formed as having great uberty, etc.) does seem to derive its plausibility
from the first rule of reason. At the very least, the idea that the question has been
formulated by a sincere desire to learn, and in a manner that does not embody undue bias
or prejudice, and that it does not close the door of inquiry all seem to provide some
justification to the claim that the question is plausible.
What is more, the suggestion that plausibility comes in varying degrees, ranging from the lowest
levels of assurance up to the "high peaks" of plausibility does suggest that the
principle of continuity applies to the manner in which seek and then provide degrees of assurance.
For instance, the efforts to rid one’s estimations of plausibility of the undue effects of bias and
prejudice are something that one might seek to improve on an incremental basis. What is more, the
manner in which one might assure that the door of inquiry is kept open might vary from something
like a door that is barely cracked open to one that is wide open. Furthermore, the way in which the
door is held open might vary from a door that swings uncontrollably due to the "winds" of
vicissitude, to one that is firmly held open with a wedge.
Finally, the remark that "where conjecture mounts the high peaks of Plausibility --
and is really most worthy of confidence" suggest that what makes a conjecture really
worthy of confidence is that the many estimations of the suitability of the hypothesis as
an explanation is a process that has effectively been guided by the pragmatic maxim. If
the leading conceptions in the hypothesis have been clarified up to the third degree,
then it really is most worthy of our confidence as a hypothetical explanation of a set of
surprising phenomena. The fact that the surprising character fades the more worthy it is
of our confidence does suggest that the fit is one with a large system of our other
beliefs that are relatively well settled as habits--and that the hypothesis is sufficient
to explain all that was, initially, quite surprising.
--Jeff
Jeffrey Downard
Associate Professor
Department of Philosophy
Northern Arizona University
(o) 928 523-8354
From: Benjamin Udell <baud...@gmail.com><mailto:baud...@gmail.com>
Sent: Sunday, September 25, 2016 9:50 AM
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu<mailto:peirce-l@list.iupui.edu>
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Peirce's Theory of Thinking
Jeff D., Gary R., list,
Your quote from "A Neglected Argument..." bears on plausibility, which Peirce
elsewhere in the same essay discusses as natural, instinctual simplicity; it bears upon
assurance by instinct; I don't find him discussing methodeutical justification (e.g.,
testability) of abductive inference in the passage that you quoted. I've had some further
thoughts on the nature of assurance by form, but they would just lead us further into
byways.
You get into some of the bigger question that you raised in earlier posts,
including the idea that Peirce's Humble Argument may be the only game in town
(my words) on the questions that it concerns. I have lots of half-formed
remarks that I could offer on that, and when I try to get started, I digress.
Maybe I should just mention topics that occur to me but that I'm unsure of how
to address:
• Only game in town - is the assurance of the Humble Argument's being the only
game in town to be acheived by instinctual plausibility, by experience, or by
form? Probably by a combination, but would one kind of assurance be foremost in
the overall assurance? For example, suppose that string theory were proven
mathematically to be the only consistent way to unite general relativity with
quantum field theory. It would still have to have assurance by experience by
accordance with all observations, but it would still lack confirmation of
predictions that distinguish it from general relativity per se and quantum
field theory per se, which predictions, since they are about quantum gravity,
would currently require a particle collider the size of the known universe - a
conceivable practical test, but contingently fantastically impractical for us.
So, if it were to be found, I'd call such an assurance of string theory (as
sole possible mathematico-physical unifier of GR and QFT) an assurance by form.
See what I mean about my digressions? More to the point, I should just ask, how
does one strengthen the assurance that the Humble Argument is the only game in
town?
• Common elements in theological ideals of various religions - how alike are
those ideals, really?
Best, Ben
On 9/25/2016 12:06 AM, Jeffrey Brian Downard wrote:
