|
Final Version - MS L75.361-362
|
MEMOIR 10
ON THE PRESUPPOSITIONS OF LOGIC
I here show that much that is generally set down as presupposed
in logic is neither needed nor warranted. The true presuppositions of
logic are merely hopes and as such, when we consider their
consequences collectively, we cannot condemn scepticism as to how far
they may be borne out by facts. But when we come down to specific
cases, these hopes are so completely justified that the smallest
conflict with them suffices to condemn the doctrine that involves that
conflict. This is one of the places where logic comes in contact with
ethics. I examine the matter of these hopes, showing that they are,
among other things which I enumerate, that any given question is
susceptible of a true answer, and that this answer is discoverable,
that being and being represented are different, that there is a
reality, and that the real world is governed by ideas. Doubt and
everyday belief are analyzed; and the difference between the latter
and scientific acceptance is shown. Other doctrines are examined.
[This discussion concerns] what it is that the sincere student
of logic must certainly already believe beyond all doubt. He must
believe, or at least hope, that there is such a thing as The Truth, at
least with reference to some questions. He must therefore think that
there is some reality which is independently of its being represented
to be. He must therefore think that there is an external world,
however intimately it may be connected with himself, or he with it.
He must agree that things happen, and that there is some such thing as
compulsion, or at least as force. He must agree that there is such a
thing as the influence of abstract ideas, such as The Truth, upon hard
facts. That it is really true, and no mere metaphor, that The Truth
is a great power. All these things it will be shown that the student
of logic, if he is sincerely such, does believe.
|
From Draft D - MS L75.230-231
|
Most logicians, if not all, hold that there are certain
"presuppositions," or postulates, which logic must assume to be true;
but they differ much as to what these presuppositions are, and even as
to their forming a definite list or code. I find that most logicians
have outrageously exaggerated these presuppositions, but that there
nevertheless are certain beliefs which a man must hold firmly or at
least hope are true; otherwise there would be no sense in his studying
logic. These I endeavor to catalogue and define. It is obvious that
precision in this matter is quite indispensable. My position here
seems to be secured by the fact that all the differences between me
and other logicians consist in my holding propositions not to be
presupposed which they hold are so. Now if they say that these things
are presupposed by everybody, I oppose to that the fact that I do not
presuppose them. If they say they ought to be presupposed, in the
first place, they cannot say definitely how, and in the second place,
I offer a proof which, if not demonstrative, is very strong, that
there can be no argument establishing such an ought.
|
From Draft C - MS L75.110-118
|
Logicians generally, and especially the Germans, hold that the
mere fact of reasoning, or endeavoring to reason, commits us to the
categorical assertion of a considerable body of doctrine. But I
undertake to show that in this instance, as in innumerable others,
those philosophical minds who have had no training in a progressive
and living science exaggerate enormously, if not infinitely, the
conclusions which they are really entitled to draw. In this number, I
propose to examine with care, first, in what sense anything is
"presupposed" in merely entering upon an inquiry, and just what it is;
and secondly, whether there is anything additional which a person is
committed to by the act of inquiring into logic, and if so, what it
is, and how he is committed to it.
I undertake to show beyond the possibility of any attentive
reader's doubt, that the bulk of the propositions which the logicians
say we are bound to affirm, we are really, at most, only bound in
consistency to hope for or expect, and that instead of our being bound
to assert universal propositions, we merely hope that certain quite
narrowly personal propositions may be true. At the same time, among
the propositions that are said to be "presupposed," there are some
which, though the reasoner may not be bound to adhere to them, it is
quite clear that he does hold them to be evident or undoubted facts.
I further undertake to show that operations of which we are
unconscious are beyond our direct control, and that it is idle to ask
whether an operation over which we have no control has been properly
performed or not. For example, I open my eyes and look; and I
thereupon say "There seems to be a bay horse". This is a proposition.
A percept is not a proposition. But the proposition is supposed truly
to represent the seeming of the percept. It is, as I hold, quite idle
to inquire whether this is correct or not. It is conceivable that it
should not be correct; but the operation of forming that perceptual
judgment from the percept being utterly beyond our control, at
present, it must go unquestioned. It is out of our power to doubt it.
It appears evidently. Propositions which we cannot doubt have to be
accepted without criticism. Genuine criticism of them is impossible.
It is true that we believe that among the propositions which seem
evident to us there are some that are false and that we shall
ultimately discover to be false. That is a good reason for not
hastily pronouncing that a proposition is indubitable by us today.
Still, until we can contrive to doubt a proposition no real inquiry
into its truth can take place.
Having put these principles into a clear light, and examined all
other possible objections to them, it will behoove me to admit that
they are not free from the defect common to almost all propositions in
philosophy, that of being more or less vague and open to unwarrantable
exaggeration. To be able to doubt a proposition, if it means to doubt
it this instant, can include only actual doubt. If the time be
extended changes of mind may take place. Doubt may also be so slight
that it is not decidedly recognizable. It is easy to find
propositions of which we cannot positively say whether they can be
doubted or not. Nevertheless, I undertake to show that the principles
are sufficiently definite for the purposes of logic.
I next undertake something like an enumeration of the
indubitable propositions. I shall not affirm that my enumeration is
complete, but shall only mention those which must be taken account of
in logic. Nor shall I name all the individual propositions; for they
will be different for different persons and even for the same person
at different times. But I shall enumerate categories of them. These
will be enumerated in the form of propositions which are not
themselves indubitable in advance of the proofs of them which I shall
adduce. Nor can these proofs be apodictic. They will leave room for
hypothetical doubts; but I do not think they will leave any really
possible doubt in the reader's mind.
I have not decided upon the order of my enumeration; nor will I
be positive that upon reconsideration I may not slightly alter my
present statement. But the propositions which I shall show to be
beyond criticism will be pretty nearly as follows.
I will first mention judgments descriptive of one's own state of
thought. These will include perceptual judgments, that is, judgments
as to the character of present percepts, such as "The sky is blue".
They will also include judgments as to the meanings which the person
making the judgment himself attaches to words and other signs. Thus,
if I say to myself "There seems to be a horse", then, that being true
in the sense I attach to the word "horse", I am quite sure that there
is an animal. For I am quite sure that by a horse I mean a kind of
animal. It is true that I am sometimes in doubt exactly what I do
mean. Precisely where shall I draw the line between "many persons"
and "not many persons"? Moreover, I may blunder about my meaning. I
may declare that in saying the sky is blue I therein imply that it is
not orange-colored, although, in fact, when I said the sky was blue I
was not referring at all to the possibility of its being orange-
colored. But I shall show that nevertheless all judgments concerning
one's own thought are in the only reasonable sense of the words beyond
criticism.
The proposition here laid down, that all judgments concerning
the contents of our own thought are beyond criticism, is not itself
beyond criticism. It is a matter to be argued out; and some logicians
virtually deny it. Their doctrine is that it is only the first
impressions of sense or other immediate consciousness that are to be
accepted without criticism. But I deny both branches of this opinion,
and hold that the first impressions of sense and all immediate
consciousness are of the most dubious character, while certain
propositions whose psychological genesis may be traced are
nevertheless quite indubitable. I will undertake to put this beyond
all real doubt.
Another class of propositions beyond criticism results from the
application of one indubitable judgment to another. For example, if I
say that a judgment is false, I am referring to something out of
thought. For what I mean is that the proposition refers to a subject
and misrepresents it, which it could not do if it referred only to the
contents of thought. Consequently, the following proposition is not
confined to the thought of the person who judges it: "There is such a
thing as a false proposition." Now two things are indubitable; first,
that to say that that proposition, if it were enunciated, would be
false would imply that that proposition was not enunciated, and
second, the perceptual judgment that one hears that proposition
enunciated. Consequently, the proposition is beyond criticism; and
this is an important result. It will be observed that I do not deny
that its being beyond criticism is itself a proposition requiring
careful examination. Various objections might be made to it. For
example, it may be said that Hegel does not admit it, so that it
cannot be so incapable of doubt. I reply that it might be doubted if
we overlooked what we actually perceive, as Hegel does. But if he
would open his eyes to the fact that his own opinion is denied, it
would at once become impossible for him to retain that opinion.
Another class of judgments exempt from criticism refers to
objects of the mind's own creations.
|
From Draft C - MS L75.65-90
|
{65} German logicians generally maintain that the mere incipiescence
of reasoning commits the reasoner to the categorical assertion of a
highly important body of doctrine concerning all things. I show that
in this instance, as in innumerable others, philosophical minds
untrained in the life of any progressive science fall into enormous,
not to say infinite, exaggeration. For "assertion", read "hope", and
"concerning all things", read "concerning the matter in hand", and
[the logicians'] doctrine becomes true.
Logic, however, does make positive assertions of a very general
nature. What do they rest upon? I undertake to show that certain
kinds of judgments are indubitable, that they appear evident and are
beyond all criticism, and that accepting these as certain, it becomes
evident that certain methods of procedure must in the long run lead
science to the truth, supposing that |66| they lead to any results at all,
and supposing that there is any such thing as the truth; and that this
remains true no matter how the universe is constituted, and whether we
instinctively approve of the reasoning or not. I thus oppose both the
English logicians, who hold that the validity of empirical reasoning
depends upon the universe having a special constitution, and the
German logicians, who hold that the validity of all reasoning
ultimately consists in a feeling of rationality. But it will be
observed that I limit my position, for the present, to the reasoning
of science, leaving the practical reasonings of the individual for
further consideration. Of this programme of my logic (a very partial
view of it) I limit myself in this memoir to satisfying every
attentive reader of the truth of the first part; namely that some
judgments are exempt |67| from criticism and that certain specified kinds
of judgments belong to that class. I do not in this number profess to
lay open the whole theory of such judgments nor to render their
indubitable character perfectly clear and comprehensible; because to
do that would require certain conceptions which it is not necessary
here to develop in order to show that the fact is as I say, however it
may come about.
The paper, in order to be convincing, as I mean that it shall
be, will necessarily be largely occupied with matters really
irrelevant, although to nearly every reader they will appear to be
most pertinent. For the ground here fairly bristles with sophistical
objections which, at this stage of the investigation, I shall have
developed no logical method for dispatching. I shall not in this
prospectus of the paper allude to them further.
My general principle, which I easily prove, is that |68| so far as
operations are beyond our ken, we cannot control them; and so far as
we cannot control them it is idle to inquire whether they are
performed well or performed ill; and so far as this inquiry is idle,
"ought" and "ought not" have no meaning, and criticism, in the
philosophical sense, is out of the question.
There is one of those irrelevant apparent difficulties that
perhaps I had better just touch upon. Namely, to say that a judgment
is beyond criticism is to say that it not only ought to be [but]
forcibly must be treated as infallible. But, of course, no judgment
really is literally infallible. Although such judgments are not
subject to external criticism, they may be drawn with so much
deliberation as greatly to diminish the chance of a judgment not of
that class being mistaken for one of that class. This is a specimen
of the kind of objection which will require elucidation.
|69| I shall go on to apply my principle to show the following
classes of judgments are exempt from logical criticism:
First, judgments to the effect that the content of our
consciousness includes certain elements, or in other words analyses of
consciousness in the form of judgments. In particular, there are two
important varieties of such judgments. One of these consists of
perceptual judgments. For example, when I say "The sky is blue", I am
not speaking of any external reality but mean only that when I look up
I have a sensation of blueness. It is conceivable that this judgment,
being an entirely different sort of mental product from a sensation,
should misrepresent the sensation. But if we cannot help making that
judgment, and up to date there is not the slightest ground for a
suspicion that we ever can make it otherwise than we do, it is utter
nonsense to inquire whether it is made right or wrong. Whether we can
judge |70| otherwise or not of the percept before us is, no doubt, a
question to be carefully considered. But as soon as it is settled
that we cannot, criticism is silenced. Should it be proved that we
cannot help judging as we do within the next three months, then until
that time had elapsed we should have to treat the judgment as
infallible. The other variety of this class of judgments which merits
mention consists of judgments concerning our own meaning. Suppose,
for example, I have convinced myself that I am looking at a horse, and
that I explicitly make this judgment. Then, I conclude that I am
looking at a perissid ungulate. For what I mean by a horse is a
perissid ungulate. In other words, I analyze the meaning of the word
horse, in the sense in which I use it. It is certain that blunders
are frequently committed in such analyses. Yet if I am persuaded that
no amount of deliberation could cause me to judge |71| otherwise than that
what I now mean be a horse is necessarily a perissid ungulate, then
that powerlessness to judge otherwise must cut off all dispute. The
following dialogue might be imagined:
|
"How do you know that A is A?"
| |
| |
"Because that is involved in what I mean by
'is'."
| |
| |
"How do you know it is involved?"
| |
| |
"Because, torture my imagination as I will, I
cannot think of anything that I could call A
and not judge that A is A."
| |
| |
"Perhaps that is because you have not hit on
the right kind of a subject to substitute for
A."
| |
| |
"Possibly. But as long as I cannot help
thinking that that is what I mean by 'is', it
is nonsense to question it." |
A second class of judgments that are beyond criticism consist of
those which would answer the question, what would you do under such
and such circumstances, supposing you were to act so as to be
deliberately satisfied with what you were doing? A man might reply,
If I were to undergo such an experience, in the light |72| of it I might
change my mind; but supposing I remained as I now am, and acted
deliberately, I cannot help thinking that I should do so and so.
Intentions are sunk deep in the dark lake of consciousness. A man may
not descry his own, accurately. Figures on the surface of
consciousness may interfere with his insight into himself. Still, if
he really cannot otherwise judge his present deliberate intent, there
is nothing for it but to accept his judgment of that present
intention. Such judgments of how one would behave under circumstances
of a general description occur every time a man reasons. For in all
reasoning, there is an accompanying judgment that from analogous
premisses one would, if he considered the matter sufficiently, draw an
analogous conclusion. Whether the facts would bear him out or not is,
of course, another question.
A third class of judgments not open to criticism are judgments
concerning objects created by one's |73| own imagination. Imagine, for
example, an endless succession of objects. Then there will be there
two distinct endless sequences; namely that of the objects in the
oddly numbered places, and that of the objects in the evenly numbered
places. That this is so is not to be discovered by merely analyzing
what one had in mind. The judgment is the result of a psychical
process of experimentation, considerably like an induction. But it
differs from any kind of reasoning in not being subject to control.
It is true that after one has once lit up the idea that there are two
endless series whose members so alternate, the analysis of that idea
does show that it will be applicable to any endless series; and this
analysis can be thrown into the form of a proof that it will be so.
Yet this proof will rest on some proposition which is simply self-
evident. But as long as one only has the idea of the simple endless
series, one may think forever, and not discover the theorem, until
something suggests that other idea to the mind. What I call the
theorematic reasoning |74| of mathematics consists in so introducing a
foreign idea, using it, and finally deducing a conclusion from which
it is eliminated. Every such proof rests, however, upon judgments in
which the foreign idea is first introduced, and which are simply self-
evident. As such, they are exempt from criticism. Judgments of this
kind are the very foundation of logic except insofar as it is an
experiential science. If a proposition appears to us, after the most
deliberate review, to be quite self-evident, and leave no room for
doubt, it certainly cannot be rendered more evident; for its evidence
is perfect already. Neither can it be rendered less evident, until
some loophole for doubt is discovered. It is, therefore, exempt from
all criticism. True, the whole thing may be a mistake. The sixteenth
proposition of the first book of Euclid affords an example. The
second postulate was that every terminated right line can be
continuously prolonged. Kai peperasmenên eutheian kata to suneches
ep' eutheias ekballein. This |75| is by no means saying that it can be
prolonged to an indefinitely great length. He, however, virtually has
proved (in prop. 2) that from the extremity of a straight line can be
drawn continuously with that line a line of any given length. He
imagines, then,a triangle  .
 
He prolongs the side  a little
beyond  to a point  ; and he then proposes to prove that the angle
 is greater than the angle  . For that purpose, he bisects  in  , draws 
and prolongs it, through to  , making  . He then joins to
by a straight line, and argues that the angle  is greater than the angle 
because the whole is greater than its part. He is thinking of Fig. 1;
but he has not proved that cannot fall as in Fig. 2; so that the
whole demonstration falls to the ground. He |76| ought to have appealed to
the third postulate to show that would be the center of a circle
passing through  and , and therefore by definition IS within the
circle (why else then for such purposes should the center's being
within have been so emphatically insisted on?), to prove that Fig. 2
was inadmissible. It is curious that there is not one downright
fallacy in the first Book of the Elements (the only part of the work
drawn up with supreme circumspection) into which Euclid is not drawn
by that axiom that the whole is greater than its part; nor is this
axiom ever appealed to without resulting in a fallacy. We know now,
as Euclid himself half-knew, that the axiom is false. Yet it is not
its falsity which causes Euclid's fallacies. It is always as here
because it tempts him to draw a figure and judge by the looks of it
what is part and what whole. Though this first book of Euclid has
been for twenty centuries under a fire of criticism in comparison with
which the strictures of professed logicians are blank cartridges
pointed by babes, yet to this day its real faults have escaped
detection, as |77| its real merits, which are phenomenal. It simply shows
how rare a thing correct reasoning is among men.
If Euclid had not been able to save his sixteenth proposition by
means of the third postulate about the circle, he could not have saved
it at all. For his first postulate is not that only one right line
can join two points as its terminals, but merely that there is a right
line from one point to the other. Êitêsthô apo pantos sêmeiou epi
pan sêmeion eutheian grammên agagein. He does not postulate that
only one straight line can be drawn through two points, but only that
all right angles are equal. That postulate would have enabled him to
prove that only one unlimited straight line cannot be drawn between
two points (a proposition he does not give because he deals only with
what is limited), but not that there were not two limited straight
lines having those points as terminals. Had he omitted from his
definition of the circle the clause represented in our language by the
single word 'within' (tôn entos |78| tou schêmatos keimenôn), as some
moderns would have had him do, he would have had no logical way of
proving that the sum of the angles of a plane triangle do not exceed
two right angles. Still, as long as he continued to overlook the
possibility of Fig.2, his proof would have appeared convincing, and
there would have been no criticism to make upon it. In all these
cases, of whatever class, it is only the act of judging that is exempt
from criticism in the strict sense of an inquiry whether an operation
has been performed rightly or wrongly. There is nothing to prevent
the resulting proposition from being confronted with objections
showing that there is something wrong somewhere. For example, though
the act of judging that the sky looks blue is itself exempt from
criticism, yet one can imagine a person to be so thoroughly persuaded
of the falsity of Goethe's theory of colors that, not seeing any other
way of accounting |79| for the sky's seeming blue, that he might suspect
that it does not seem blue. Again if a man analyzing his idea of
matter deliberately judges that he means by 'matter' something which
in its nature is not a representation of anything, his judgment would,
as an act, not be open to any criticism; but still, that would not
prevent a Berkeley from raising the difficulty that since we can have
no experience or imagination of anything but representations, there
does not seem to be any possible way in which a man ever could attach
such a meaning to a word consistently. So again, certain saints have
declared that they would go voluntarily and deliberately to Hell, if
such were the will and good pleasure of the Lord; but a Hobbes would
not be prevented from suspecting that they had deceived themselves,
since Hell means a state of utter dissatisfaction, and it is absurd to
say that a person could find any |80| satisfaction in complete
dissatisfaction. So in the present case, had Euclid omitted the word
'within' or rather the corresponding Greek phrase, from his definition
of the circle, it might have occurred to him that he was provided with
no postulates about straight lines in a plane that were not equally
true of great circles on a sphere, and therefore, since a spherical
triangle may have the sum of its angles anything up to six right
angles, or even ten, if you please, there must be something wrong with
the proof that this is impossible in a plane.
This third class of judgments exempt from criticism coincides
with that of evident judgments or judgments of evident propositions.
For 'evident' means manifest to any mind who clearly apprehends the
proposition, no matter how lacking in experience he may be. The truth
of a perceptual judgment, analysis of meaning, |81| or declaration of
intention, is manifest only to the one person whose experience it
concerns. It is only when we judge concerning creatures of the
imagination that all minds are on a par, however devoid of experience
some of them may be.
When a mathematical demonstration is clearly apprehended, we are
forced to admit the conclusion. It is evident; and we cannot think
otherwise. It is, therefore, beyond all logical criticism; and the
forms of syllogism cannot lend it any support. Pure mathematics,
therefore, stands in no need of a science of logic. Methodeutically,
mathematics is its own logic; and the notion that a calculus of logic
can be of any help to mathematics, unless merely as another
mathematical method supplying a speedier process of demonstration
(which is just what a logical calculus rather opposes), is futile.
Mathematics, however, is of great aid to logic. The reasoning of
mathe|82|matics is also an instructive subject for logical analysis,
teaching us many things about the nature of reasoning. But although a
mathematical demonstration, once completely apprehended, is evident,
indubitable, beyond control, and beyond criticism, yet the process of
arriving at it is certainly a matter of skill and art, subject to
criticism, and controlled by anticipated criticism. This control
implies that different ways of proceeding are considered hesitatingly;
and until the demonstration is found there is doubt of the conclusion.
The theorem is not self-evident or it could not really be proved. But
over what elements of the process is the control exercised? Over two:
the invention of the proof, and the acceptance of the proof. But the
process of invention of the proof is not of the nature of that
demonstrative reasoning which we call mathematical. There is nothing
evident about it except that, as it turns out, it evidently answers
the purpose. |83| It is, in fact, a piece of probable reasoning in regard
to which a good logical methodeutic may be a great aid. As to the
acceptance of the proof, after it is framed all the artifices which
may be employed to assist it are of the nature of checks. That is to
say, they are merely equivalent to a careful review of the proof
itself in which some minor details may be varied in order to diminish
the chances of error. In short, this is an operation by which the
proof is brought fully and clearly before the mind. That the proof is
absolute is evident and beyond criticism. The theorem which was not
evident before the proof was apprehended, now becomes itself entirely
evident, in view of the proof. Such reasoning forms the principal
stage of logic. It is not itself amenable to logic for any
justification; and although logic may aid in the discovery of the
proof, yet its result is tested in another way. This disposes of the
German objection that to use reasoning in order to deter|84|mine what
methods of probable reasoning will lead to the truth begs the whole
question, so that the only way is to admit that the validity of
reasoning consists in a feeling of reasonableness.
A fourth kind of judgment which must be regarded as beyond
criticism, although they are reached by a sort of process of
reasoning, are those in which a proposition is presented to
perception, the meaning of which proposition either supports or
conflicts with what is presented to sense. I will give a couple of
examples to show what I mean, because such propositions throw much
light upon logic. Take the proposition, "Some actually enunciated
proposition is false". The meaning of this proposition is such that
the falsity of that meaning, that is, the non-enunciation of any false
proposition, would conflict with this proposition's enunciating what
we perceive that it does enunciate. Therefore, the proposition must
be true, |85| that a false proposition is actually enunciated. Yet it is
quite possible to imagine a paradisiacal world in which no false
proposition should ever have been suggested. We cannot, therefore,
say that there necessarily must be a false proposition, but only that
the existence of this proposition constitutes the certainly that a
false proposition is enunciated, although the assertion of this
proposition itself is perfectly true. This forces us to recognize the
correct and extremely important logical doctrine, namely, that every
proposition asserts two things, first whatever it is meant to assert,
and secondly, its own truth. Unless both these are true, the
proposition is false. Although, therefore, the meaning or matter of
this proposition is true, the proposition itself may be false; and it
will be so in case there is no other false proposition than itself.
Suppose however we find a piece of paper quite blank except for
these two [sic: read "three"] sentences:
|
|86| Something that the second sentence on this
paper says of the third is false.
| |
| |
Something that the third sentence on this
paper says of the first is false.
| |
| |
Something that the first sentence on this
paper says of the second is false. |
Now, disregarding the implication by the first sentence of its own
truth, is whatever it says of the second true? If so, it is false
that something that the third sentence on this paper says of the first
is false. Then whatever the third sentence says of the first is true.
Then something that the first says of the second is false, contrary to
the hypothesis. Then we are driven to assume that something that the
second sentence says of the third is true. Then, something that the
third says of the first is false. Hence, whatever the first sentence
says of the second is true, again contrary to the hypothesis. I prove
by an elaborate necessary argument that the only admissible solution
is that every proposition, even if not asserted, necessarily and
essentially involves as part of its meaning that the reality, or truth
of things, or the real universe, is truly repre|88|sented by what it says,
and that the three sentences are true in other respects, but false in
their inseparable implication that they represent any truth of being,
or the real universe in any respect. This they fail to do because,
though each refers to the others, yet together they do not represent
any real being independent of being represented.
This brings me to the examination of the matter of the hope
which we entertain concerning the matter in hand when we start any
inquiry. I find it convenient to use the term proposition to denote
that meaning of a sentence which not only remains the same in whatever
language it is expressed, but is also the same whether it be believed
or doubted, asserted (by somebody's making himself responsible for
it), or commanded (by somebody's expressing that he holds another
responsible for it), or put as a question (when somebody expresses an
attempt to induce another to make himself responsible for it). Now I
prove in a man|89|ner which will command veritable assent, that every
proposition whether it be believed, doubted, asserted, commanded, or
put interrogatively, supposed, etc. essentially represents itself to
represent an absolute reality, the very same for all propositions,
which is definite (that is, subject to the principle of contradiction)
and individual (that is, subject to the principle of excluded middle).
This reality is not in any respect constituted by being represented as
so constituted in any definite proposition or representation. That
there is such an absolute reality we hope; and in every inquiry we
hope that the proposition which is put in the interrogative mood
represents that reality. If a proposition represents that reality and
represents it rightly in whatever respect it represents it, the
proposition is true. If the proposition does not represent the
absolute reality or in any respect represents it wrongly, it is false.
|90| I further show that we hope that any inquiry which we undertake
will result in a complete settlement of opinion. We never need
abandon that hope. The representation of the reality in such destined
opinion is the reality.
It follows that the methodeutic task of logic is to find such
methods as must hasten the progress of opinion toward its ultimate
bourn.
It is plain that I cannot outline the contents of all my proposed [memoirs] as I have done this since such an outline would fill five hundred pages of manuscript. I can only say that this first memoir is not one of those which is most completely in shape.
|
From Draft A - MS L75.42-52
|
There is one point which I have so far passed over without
notice which is of great importance for the solidity of the foundation
of my method of ascertaining whether a reasoning is good or bad. My
position, in opposition to almost all the German logicians and those
who blindly worship them in this country, is that in the science of
the logic of science it will not do to rely upon our instinctive
judgments of logicality merely; it is necessary to prove that, from
the nature of things, the given method of reasoning will conduce to
the truth in the sense in which it professes to do so. But here two
questions arise: First, Have you not, after all, to rely upon the
veracity of the logical instinct in judging of the validity of this
proof? and Secondly, Where do you get the premisses from which this
proof proceeds; and how do you know they are true? Have you not to
rely upon instinct again, here? These questions are pressed by the
German and other subjectivist logicians; and their pressing them with
confidence in their unanswerable difficulty is a good example of a
characteristic of those writers; namely, that they look at everything
through the spy-glass of logical forms and metaphysical theories, and
often overlook plain facts before their faces. In order to answer
those questions, it is necessary to recognize certain very plain and
easy distinctions which the German logicians habitually overlook. In
the first place, it is necessary to distinguish between a proposition
and the assertion of it. To confound those two things is like
confounding the writing of one's name idly upon a scrap of paper,
perhaps for practice in chirography, with the attachment of one's
signature to a binding legal deed. A proposition may be stated
without being asserted. I may state it to myself and worry as to
whether I shall embrace it or reject it, being dissatisfied with the
idea of doing either. In that case, I doubt the proposition. I may
state the proposition to you and endeavor to stimulate you to advise
me whether to accept or reject it, in which case I put it
interrogatively. I may state it to myself, and be deliberately
satisfied to base my action on it whenever occasion may arise, in
which case I judge it. I may state it to you, and assume a
responsibility for it, in which case I assert it. I may impose the
responsibility of its agreeing with the truth upon you, in which case
I command it. All of these are different moods in which that same
proposition may be stated. The German word Urtheil confounds the
proposition itself with the psychological act of assenting to it.
This confusion is a part of the general refusal of idealism, which
still considerably affects almost all German thought, to acknowledge
that it is one thing to be and quite another to be represented. I use
the word belief to express any kind of holding for true or acceptance
of a representation. Belief, in this sense, is a composite thing.
Its principal element is not an affair of consciousness at all; but is
a habit established in the believer's nature, in consequence of which
he would act, should occasion present itself in certain ways.
However, not every habit is a belief. A belief is a habit with which
the believer is deliberately satisfied. This implies that he is aware
of it, and being aware of it does not struggle against it. A third
important characteristic of belief is that while other habits are
contracted by repeatedly performing the act under the conditions,
belief may be, and commonly if not invariably is contracted, by merely
imagining the situation and imagining what would be our experience and
what our conduct in such a situation; and this mere imagination at
once establishes such a habit that if the imagined case were realized
we should really behave in that way. Take, for example, the way in
which ninety-nine ordinary men, not sharps, out of every hundred would
form the belief that the sum of the angles of a triangle is two right
angles. Any one of them would probably imagine himself to be in a
field facing the north. He would imagine himself to march some
distance in that direction, turn through an angle, march again, turn
again so as to face his original position and then turn again so as to
face as he did in the first place. Then he would say, I should, in
effect, have turned through four right angles; for if I had stood at
one point or hardly moved I should have had to make a complete
rotation before the North Star would again be in front of me; and
therefore the sum of my three turnings would have been four right
angles (there would be his fallacy). Therefore the sum of the
exterior angles of a triangle is four right angles. But the sum of
exterior and interior angles at each angle is two right angles; and
since there are three angles, the sum of the sums of exterior and
interior angles is six right angles. Subtracting from these six the
four right angles equal to the sum of the exterior angles, I find two
right angles left as the sum of the interior angles of a triangle.
Thereupon, a habit would have been formed so that he would thereafter
always act on the theory that the sum of the interior angles of a
triangle is two right angles. This habit would have been the
consequence of what he imagines would be forced upon his experience in
that situation; and this imagination being due to another habit which,
like every belief, affects imagination, unless there is a special
inhibition, just as it does real conduct. If anybody says that in
this description of belief I make too much of conduct, I admit it
frankly. It will not be so in the book itself; but in the present
statement I do so in order to counteract the effect of the neglect of
a certain point the statement of which would be too long. Such, then,
roughly, is what a belief, or holding for true is. A doubt is of a
very different nature. A belief is chiefly an affair of the soul, not
of the consciousness; a doubt, on the contrary, is chiefly an affair
of consciousness. It is an uneasy feeling, a special condition of
irritation, in which the idea of two incompatible modes of conduct are
before the doubter's imagination, and nothing determines him, indeed
he feels himself forbidden, to adopt either and reject the other. Of
course it is not necessary that the degrees of dissatisfaction with
the opposite alternatives should be equal. Like irritations
generally, doubt sets up a reaction which does not cease until the
irritation is removed. If we accept this account of the matter, doubt
is not the direct negation or contrary of belief; for the two mainly
affect different parts of the man. Speaking physiologically, belief
is a state of the connections between different parts of the brain,
doubt an excitation of brain-cells. Doubt acts quite promptly to
destroy belief. Its first effect is to destroy the state of
satisfaction. Yet the belief-habit may still subsist. But
imagination so readily affects this habit, that the former believer
will soon begin to act in a half-hearted manner, and before long the
habit will be destroyed. The most important character of doubt is
that no sooner does a believer learn that another man equally well-
informed and equally competent doubts what he has believed, than he
begins by doubting it himself. Probably the first symptom of this
state of irritation will be anger at the other man. Such anger is a
virtual acknowledgment of one's own doubt; that is to say, not a
genuine doubt, or feeling of uneasiness, but a sense that it is
possible we may come to doubt it. Such doubt, at first of a purely
external nature, sets up as reaction an effort to enter into the doubt
and to comprehend it. Indeed, it is not necessary that one should
actually meet with a man who doubts; for such is the influence of
imagination in such matters that as soon as a believer can imagine
that a man, equally well-informed and equally competent with himself,
should doubt, doubt actually begins to set in, in his own state of
feeling. From this follows the important corollary that if a man does
not himself really doubt a given proposition he cannot imagine how it
can be doubted, and therefore cannot produce any argument tending to
allay such doubt. It thus appears that it is one thing to question a
proposition and quite another to doubt it. We can throw any
proposition into the interrogative mood at will; but we can no more
call up doubt than we can call up the feeling of hunger at will. What
one does not doubt one cannot doubt, and it is only accidentally that
attention can be drawn to it in a manner which suggests the idea that
there might be a doubt. Thence comes a critical attitude, and
finally, perhaps, a genuine doubt may arise. It is this critical
attitude that must be examined. I regret very much the necessity of
entering into such details; but the two questions I am preparing to
answer are of such fundamental importance in regard to the value of
the methodeutical part of my book that the briefest account of what is
to be characterized must necessarily dwell upon these matters. The
word criticism carries a meaning in philosophy which has so little
resemblance to the criticism of literature that the latter meaning
throws no light on the former. Philosophical criticism is applied to
an idea which we have already adopted, but which we remark that we
have not deliberately adopted. The mere fact that it has been
adopted, as if hastily, that is, without deliberation, though it does
not necessarily create a doubt, suggests the idea that perhaps a doubt
might arise. The critical attitude consists in reviewing the matter
to see in what manner corrections shall be made. This is what one
does when one reads over a letter one has written to see whether some
unintended meaning is suggested. The criticism is always of a
process, the process which led to the acceptance of the ideas. It
supposes that this process is subject to the control of the will; for
its whole purpose is correction, and one cannot correct what one
cannot control. Reasoning, in the proper sense of the word, is always
deliberate and, therefore, is always subject to control.
End of PART 4 of 10 of MS L75
|
Dept of
Philosophy