Suteerth, List, Welcome to the Peirce-L forum. If you've read the notes by the founder and first moderator of the forum, Joe Ransdell, then you know that this is a very democratic place -- exactly an intellectual forum -- where both seasoned scholars, philosophical novices, and students are equally welcome should they have an interest in Peirce's work or Peirce-related topics. They are especially encouraged to contribute to on-going discussions, or to introduce new ones.
Regarding your brief philosophical paragraph (in the future I'd suggest that, for readability, you consider breaking up long paragraphs into much shorter ones). For now I'll just paste some of what I wrote to you (slightly modified) shortly after you sent it to me off List as perhaps a kind of motivation for others here to discuss your thesis with you and others. GR: You outline what you see to be the practical consequence of the understanding that abstract entities -- viz., these four: moral values, scientific laws, educational processes, and economic principles -- are *real*, even though they don't have physical existence. While this is well enough understood among Peirce scholars, I think your outline is of potential interest to some here. As to morality you argue that this understanding -- -- supports universal human rights and provides an objective basis for justice, thus potentially strengthening the moral and legal framework of societies. In science it is an aid to investigating non-material phenomena, encouraging an ever more open-minded approach to understanding this aspect of reality. In education it emphasizes inquiry-based learning wherein authentic doubt and vital curiosity lead to better understanding. And finally, in economics, it tends to reveal the human behavioral underpinnings of economic cycles, suggesting that understanding feelings and actions can help in better predicting and managing economic outcomes. Overall, you appear to be suggesting that Peirce's philosophy aids us in appreciating the reality of abstract relationships and processes, promoting a deeper, more integrated grasp and appreciation of the world across disciplines. I agree! And I would especially like to emphasize its 'promoting a deeper, more integrated grasp and appreciation of the world *across disciplines*'. When I -- hopefully -- find the time, it is this transdisciplinary idea that I'd like to further explore with you. [You will notice that I modified the Subject of this thread to emphasize your thesis.] Gary Richmond (writing as moderator of Peirce-L) On Sun, Sep 29, 2024 at 1:11 AM suteerth vajpeyi <[email protected]> wrote: > I have written a small philosophical paragraph as contribution for the > forum in the hope that it may help me have a fulfilling philosophical > discussion with other like minds. > While reading Bernard Bolzano's "wissenschaftslehre" in its > english translation, I was bewildered by a certain remark made > there.Bolzano says that there are entities like "ideas in themselves", " > propositions in themselves" that have reality but do not actually exist ! > What could he possibly mean by that ? How can a non-existent thing be real > ? I found its answer in the writings of charles s. peirce. It is important > to understand what these two philosophers have in mind when they speak of > the real and the existent. By real, Peirce means that which exists > independently of thought or imagination and hence anything which can be > objectively discovered or determined. What is existent on the other hand, > is what enters into relations with other things. It is related by way of > spatial location and temporal relation to various other things. With this > definition, it becomes easy to make sense of Bolzano's remark. > "Propositions in themselves" such as 'the gravitational force between two > masses varies inversely with the square of their distance' are real. They > can be discovered objectively but it would be absurd to say that the law of > gravitation exists at a particular location and time or in a certain > relation to other physical things. > Peirce's three categories make this distinction clearer. By > firstness, peirce means quality, by secondness relation and by thirdness > representation. A quality like redness is real. It can be objectively > discovered. Does redness have relation to other objects? No. So it does not > exist in the sense just discussed. Take a relation now. A relation such as > 'being taller than' is impossible without two or more relata. Indeed space > and time are simply the discovery of relations between things determined by > various forms of measurement. So relations are real and exist. Finally, a > representation may be either real or unreal. For example, the facade of a > house in the form of a rectangular face serves as a representation in our > minds of an object which we know to have a pentagonal cross-section. If by > the rectangular aspect we are deceived into thinking that the house is > cuboidal then our representation is unreal. It cannot be discovered > independently by another observer standing at some other location with > respect to our house. > We can now also see why peirce seems to represent seemingly different > things by the terms firstness, secondness and thirdness. Other things > designated by these terms include possibility, reality and law. A quality > does not exist inspite of being real. So it is a possibility, waiting to be > exemplified in a specific object. Relations occur only in the outside world > where the relata exist. Finally a representation whether real or unreal is > something that will determine the future course of our actions and hence > become a law or habit depending on whether it is real or unreal > respectively. Similiarly firstness is said to be associated with feeling > (that is detecting qualities of things), secondness with action (changing > the relations of things) and thirdness with thought (as per peirce all > thought proceeds via using signs). Some authors (like the distinguished > philosopher of science - ernest nagel) have taken peirce to task in their > writings, arguing that what peirce exactly means by his three categories is > hopelessly vague. That peirce seems to divide everything un-necessarily > into threes. But there is method to this seeming madness. The great > philosopher of the twentieth century, alfred north whitehead distinguished > three modes of thought. The mode of presentational immediacy or feeling, > the mode of causal efficacy or action and the mixed mode of sign-reference > or thought. If one applies these three modes of thought to every possible > subject matter then one naturally ends up dividing things into threes. For > example signs which resemble their objects work by communicating a thing's > qualities to us, apealing to feeling and are called icons, signs which work > by being interlocked in a close relation with their objects, appealing to > action and are called indices and symbols which work by representing their > objects by convention or in other words by appealing to thought. > Ok, now why should we be interested in this discussion? Or in > Peirce's words, what are the practical consequences of this small bit of > philosophy? Let us start with morality. Moral values are real (objectively > discoverable) but non-existent (because they transcend the particularities > of a location or an age). This means that a person's fundamental rights, > his right to life, property and liberty can be discovered and defended > independently of whether they have been granted by one's rulers or not. > This (the discoverability of justice) is the basis of the judiciary system > of our modern day democracies. Moving over to science, there was great > perplexity in the 19th century regarding the nature of light. For a long > time, scientists sought to explain electromagnetic waves as the oscillation > of an electric ether that was massless. People just refused to believe that > there could exist firstness or in other words, pure possibilities like > lines of electromagnetic force in a vacuum. They could not understand that > undulations in electromagnetic force could exist independently of whether > there is or is not an object affected by the force.They were two-category > metaphysicians. One can at this point also see why Peirce supported realism > as opposed to nominalism. He realised that scientific laws for example, are > real but non-existent. Hence universals or abstractions must be real. But > what about people who are not scientists or moral philosophers ? Let us > turn now to pedagogy. Mrs. phyllis chiasson has ably written an article for > the relevance of peirce's metaphysics to educational theory in the commens > encyclopedia. Self education and inquiry employ the same modes of thought > as enunciated by Peirce. First we are made aware of our ignorance by an > unexpected event. This makes us curious. We have a feeling of doubt. To > quench this doubt we come up with a hypothesis, checking it by our actions > except in mathematics although if we count construction of models and > performance of algebraic operations as actions then we have no exceptions. > Finally we think and modify the firmness of our beliefs accordingly along > with our future habits as well. Economics- economists of the keynesian > school vs economists of the austrian school have contrasting views on the > effects of mild inflation on economic growth. One side contends that mild > inflation has been found to be strongly associated statistically, with > economic growth. The other contends that the 'growth' triggered by mild > inflation is made up of malinvestments which when they become liquidated > result in a cycle of boom and bust in stock markets. Who is right ? > Economic laws are an example of thirdness. If we agree that the laws of > economics are due to the tendency of man to take up habits with each action > taken by a person then what actions drive the growth seen in association > with mild inflation ? It so happens that human beings are fond of their > earnings. So when they find their savings pool deteriorating in value, they > seek to augment their wealth to compensate the decline in value of their > savings. The most common way to do this is via investments. The threshold > for making unsafe investments gets lowered when people face inflation. It > also triggers people to consume their savings faster before they > deteriorate in value. When these malinvestments at the micro level > liquidate, we face a recession at the macro level. Thus we explain economic > laws by action and action by feelings of human beings, employing the three > different modes of the mind as stated by peirce and whitehead all the while > checking our results by observing reality. > > _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ > ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY is now at > https://cspeirce.com and, just as well, at > https://www.cspeirce.com . It'll take a while to repair / update all the > links! > ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON > PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to > [email protected] . > ► To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message NOT to PEIRCE-L but to > [email protected] with UNSUBSCRIBE PEIRCE-L in the SUBJECT LINE of the > message and nothing in the body. More at > https://list.iupui.edu/sympa/help/user-signoff.html . > ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and > co-managed by him and Ben Udell.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY is now at https://cspeirce.com and, just as well, at https://www.cspeirce.com . It'll take a while to repair / update all the links! ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to [email protected] . ► To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message NOT to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected] with UNSUBSCRIBE PEIRCE-L in the SUBJECT LINE of the message and nothing in the body. More at https://list.iupui.edu/sympa/help/user-signoff.html . ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and co-managed by him and Ben Udell.
