Joe,
I propose, to fix our ideas, that we try our hands at the following:
(from Prolegomena to an Apology for Pragmaticism; 1906)
[CP 4.546]
Let us begin with the question of Universes. It is rather a question of an
advisable point of view than of the truth of a doctrine. A logical
universe is,
no doubt, a collection of logical subjects, but not necessarily of
meta-physical
Subjects, or "substances"; for it may be composed of characters, of
elementary
facts, etc. See my definition in Baldwin's Dictionary. Let us first try
whether we may not assume that there is but one kind of Subjects which are
either existing things or else quite fictitious. Let it be asserted that
there
is some married woman who will commit suicide in case her husband fails in
business. Surely that is a very different proposition from the assertion
that
some married woman will commit suicide if all married men fail in
business. Yet
if nothing is real but existing things, then, since in the former
proposition
nothing whatever is said as to what the lady will or will not do if her
husband
does not fail in business, and since of a given married couple this can
only be
false if the fact is contrary to the assertion, it follows it can only be
false
if the husband does fail in business and if the wife then fails to commit
suicide. But the proposition only says that there is some married couple of
which the wife is of that temper. Consequently, there are only two ways in
which
the proposition can be false, namely, first, by there not being any married
couple, and secondly, by every married man failing in business while no
married
woman commits suicide. Consequently, all that is required to make the
proposition true is that there should either be some married man who does
not
fail in business, or else some married woman who commits suicide. That is,
the
proposition amounts merely to asserting that there is a married woman who
will
commit suicide if every married man fails in business. The equivalence of
these
two propositions is the absurd result of admitting no reality but
existence. If,
however, we suppose that to say that a woman will suicide if her husband
fails,
means that every possible course of events would either be one in which the
husband would not fail or one in which the wife would commit suicide,
then, to
make that false it will not be requisite for the husband actually to fail,
but
it will suffice that there are possible circumstances under which he would
fail,
while yet his wife would not commit suicide. Now you will observe that
there is
a great difference between the two following propositions:
First, There is some one married woman who under all possible conditions
would
commit suicide or else her husband would not have failed.
Second, Under all possible circumstances there is some married woman or
other
who would commit suicide, or else her husband would not nave failed.
The former of these is what is really meant by saying that there is some
married
woman who would commit suicide if her husband were to fail, while the
latter is
what the denial of any possible circumstances except those that really take
place logically leads to [our] interpreting (or virtually interpreting),
the
Proposition as asserting.
[CP 4.547]
In other places, I have given many other reasons for my firm belief
that there are real possibilities. I also think, however, that, in
addition to
actuality and possibility, a third mode of reality must be recognized in
that
which, as the gipsy fortune-tellers express it, is "sure to come true,"
or, as
we may say is destined,(n1) although I do not mean to assert that this is
affirmation rather than the negation of this Mode of Reality. I do not see
by
what confusion of thought anybody can persuade himself that he does not
believe
that tomorrow is destined to come. The point is that it is today really
true
that tomorrow the sun will rise; or that, even if it does not, the clocks
or
something, will go on. For if it be not real it can only be fiction: a
Proposition is either True or False. But we are too apt to confound
destiny with
the impossibility of the opposite. I see no impossibility in the sudden
stoppage
of everything. In order to show the difference, I remind you that
"impossibility" is that which, for example, describes the mode of falsity
of the
idea that there should be a collection of objects so multitudinous that
there
would not be characters enough in the universe of characters to
distinguish all
those things from one another. Is there anything of that sort about the
stoppage
of all motion? There is, perhaps, a Law of nature against it; but that is
all.
However, I will postpone the consideration of that point. Let us, at least,
provide for such a mode of being in our system of diagrammatization, since
it
may turn out to be needed and, as I think, surely will.
Thomas.
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