(article) the development of peirce's philosophy by murray g. murphey

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The Development of Peirce's Philosophy by Murray G. MurpheyReview by: W. H. F. BarnesThe Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 13, No. 53 (Oct., 1963), pp. 361-366Published by: Wiley for The Philosophical QuarterlyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2955531 .

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361

CRITICAL STUDYThe Development of Peirce's Philosophy. By MURRAYG. MURPHEY. (Cam-

bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. London: O.U.P. 1961.Pp. ix + 432. Price 60s).

It must be over thirty years since the day when, as an undergraduate,I came across volume I of the Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peircein the college library. The name was familiar. There already existed aselection of Peirce's writings entitled Chance Love and Logic (edited byMorris Cohen), though I had not then read it. I can still recall the growingexcitement with which I browsed through the pages of the first volume ofpapers. What an extraordinary range of mind! What assurance, not tosay arrogance ! Yet how curiously ingratiating the arrogance, as if it servedonly as a disguise for a genuine modesty. Here were profound and hardtruths about the universe stated persuasively and defended ingeniously.Here were the beliefs-or prejudices ?-of common sense, worked over withlogic and science, till they burgeoned into philosophical truths of the highestdegree of sophistication. Here was a mind that thought always in terms ofa system of philosophy. And yet, alas, everything was so fragmentary thatthe system eluded one. Did it really exist ?In his new book on Peirce, The Development of Peirce's Philosophy,Mr. Murray G. Murphey attempts to answer this question. His book is adetailed, scholarly account of its subject. He has used not only the volumesof published papers but has also made extensive use of unpublished Peircemanuscripts in the Houghton Library at Harvard University. It is un-fortunately not an exciting book, which is a pity, since Peirce is an excitingphilosopher. (Or is it that he was exciting when there were no books abouthim, before he was "sullied o'er with the pale cast " of other people'sthought ?). Exciting or not, any one who is really interested to see howPeirce developed his ideas will have to read this book. What will he findin it ? In his Introduction, after saying that "even to-day there is littleagreement as to the nature of his (C. S. Peirce's) philosophy ", the authorcontinues : " I have therefore set myself the task of discovering the under-lying principles upon which his work was based and of showing that thoseprinciples bring order to the mass of fragmentary manuscripts which re-mains to us " (p. 1). Any one familiar with the mass of manuscripts mustregard this as a very considerable claim. Mr. Murphey is convinced thatPeirce regarded himself " as a systematic philosopher " and he is at pains torefute what he considers to be a wrong impression created by a statement ofPeirce with which the editors preface Volume II (The Elements of Logic)of his Collected Papers :" All that you can find in print of my work on logic is simply scattered

out-croppings here and there of a rich vein which remains unpub-

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362 CRITICAL STUDYlished. Most of it I suppose has been written down; but no humanbeing could ever put together the fragments. I could not myselfdo so " (p. xii).After admitting that this " suggests that Peirce was not systematic " (p. 1)Mr. Murphey gives us the context in which this remark was made, in adraft of the Lowell Lectures of 1903, when Peirce was 63. In it Peirce goeson to say that he could make a new presentation of the logic, given five orsix years' hard work. Mr. Murphey concludes that " it is obvious that thisis an appeal for money, not a considered judgment of his own work " (p. 1).I think it may well have been an appeal for support. Peirce more than onceoffered to produce a series of logical treatises-there was a Grand Logic,and a Minute Logic at different times-if only some one would financethem. He was certainly also inclined to claim, and no doubt to believe,that, given time and money, he could produce a systematic work on logic.But I see no evidence in the passage Mr. Murphey quotes to suggest thatPeirce thought he had produced it. Mr. Murpheyis concernedto play downthe implication of this passage that Peirce was not a systematic philosopherwith its corollary that any attempt to treat him systematically (of whichhis own book is an example) is ill-advised.After this opening the reader naturally expects to find an expositionof a Peircean system of philosophy. What he will actually find is different.Mr. Murphey sees there is no Peircean system but writes as if Peirce ex-pounded in succession a number of different philosophical systems. But itis with having a philosophical system, as with giving up smoking : the moreoften it is done, the less it seems to have been done at all. Mr. Murphey

goes some way towards recognizing this when he compares Peirce's phil-osophy to a house that is being continually rebuilt from within. Even thisgives too favourable a picture of Peirce's " system ". It is a partly builthouse, whose plans exist only in the architect's mind. The entrance hall isalways being reconstructed and each time occupies more of the floor space.The west wing has been several times rebuilt. The east wing has often beentalked of but it does not as yet exist and it is difficult to see how it canpossibly be fitted on to the main building. And, in fact, it cannot.The book is too detailed for a reviewer to discuss its particular theses.All I can do is to say something about its arrangement, drawing attentionto particularly interesting discussions. It is divided into four parts, dealingmore or less in temporal sequence with the succession and revision of" systems ".In Part I Mr. Murphey gives an account of what he calls the first twosystems, covering respectively the years 1859-1861 and 1862-1867. The" First System " is really an attempt by Peirce, on the basis of his earlystudy of Kant, to devise a set of categories. (Mr.Murpheyhas used a numberof unpublished papers to good effect here). It is interesting to see that atdifferent points of one of these papers (1861) Peirce defined metaphysics as"the philosophy of primal truths " and " the analysis of conceptions ".Peirce was able to think of these as one and the same thing because he heldthat every cognition is a kind of inference and there must be some a priori



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W. H. F. BAILNES : THE DEVELOPMENT OF PEIRCE'S PHILOSOPHY 363first principles not derived from experience in the mind to form the ultimatepremises of knowledge. Peirce concluded that these primal truths must beaccepted on faith, since he thought that there could be no other way thanKant's " transcendental " method of justifying them and that this methodin fact was a failure. At the same time he held a form of uncritical realismto the effect that we do apprehend things in themselves. Metaphysics,then, is concerned with things in themselves: but it rests on faith andhence is limited to the analysis of concepts. (This comes pretty near tothe position of those modern philosophers who are ready to analyse, forexample, religious beliefs, though they regard them as based not on reasonbut on authority).In the earliest writings (as Mr. Murphey has revealed) Peirce laid downthat there were three basic categories: and, in spite of many changes ofopinion in later life about the nature of the fundamental categories, he neverwavered in his belief that they were three in number. At one point hedefended himself against a possible accusation of triadomany. As formu-lated at first the categories are said to be 'I ', ' Thou ' and 'It' (the worldof abstractions, the world of mind and the world of sense). In his laterwritings these emerge, much transformed, as Firstness, Secondness andThirdness. Mr. Murphey explains the somewhat tortuous processes bywhich Peirce claimed to derive his three categories from reflection uponKant.Peirce was led to what Mr. Murphey calls his " second system " becausehe came to doubt the formal logic on which Kant based his doctrine ofcategories. And he turned to scholastic logic for light. Under the influenceof Duns Scotus he aimed to derive the different propositional forms fromthe forms of inference-a procedurewhich reversed that of Kant. He cameto the conclusion that the relation between subject and predicate is essen-tially the same as that between premiss and conclusion; and he assumedthat the subject-predicate form was fundamental.Part II deals with the years 1867-1880. In the 1868 papers, which weredirected ostensibly against Cartesianism, Peirce denied both intuition ofexternal objects and introspection of internal facts. The internal, he argued,is inferred from the external : self-consciousness, and the notion of the selfinvolved in it, is a hypothesis to explain ignorance and error. He also arguedthat all the natural transitions based on association of ideas are reallyinferences. The picture is of a continuous developing inference nowhereanchored to any unquestionable fact. In a review of Fraser's edition ofBerkeley in 1870 Peirce introduced the notion that "generals" (as hecalls universals) are present in the mind as habits. Henceforth the notionof habit was to remain a key concept for him. He was convinced-and thediscovery of " pragmatism " in the seventies did nothing to alter his mind-that the controversy between scholastic realism and nominalism was nomere academic dispute but an issue determining one's whole outlook.Realism, he thought, was not only implied in science but also allowedreligion the proper place which nominalism denied to it.These developments are well described by Mr.Murphey. In an important



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364 ORITICAL STUDYdiscussion (pp. 136-142) he points out a difference between these earlyviews of Peirce and views he later came to hold on the way in which ourthought refers to objects, a difference obscured by the use of the sameterminology. In 1867 Peirce still believed that one could refer to an objectonly througha concept. Hence, although he used the term index he was notthen using it to mean a term that directly indicates (or refers to) the object,as he did later. Consistently with this view, he also held that "the real "is what is thought in a true cognition, and since every cognition refers aquality to an object, there are real objects.Mr. Murphey concludes that by 1871 Peirce had failed to prove eitherthe reality of objects or his realism of universals. In the years following,Peirce read widely in Aristotle and the scholastics, took up and developedthe calculus of relations in De Morgan's work and, extending the notionthat a general law was analogous to a habit, concluded that the essence ofany object consisted in a number of general laws connecting the conditionsof perception with the occurrence of certain sensible experiences. Thesegeneral laws are not mere regularities but essential connexions manifestedin the regularities (though Peirce had difficulties and wavered over this).Closely related to this doctrine is Peirce's account of belief. The lawsgoverning the behaviour of objects act as rules for action, and when adopted,become habits. Such a habit is a belief. (I do not find that Mr. Murpheyhas altogether elucidated this strange doctrine). Peirce argues that, in spiteof the relativity (to the percipient) of sensations, reasoning, if pursued longenough, will reveal how things really are. But he now recognized that thereality of things cannot be proved by any theory about the nature of thought.It consists in what would be thought if agreement were ultimately reached.This highly conditional view of reality is criticised by Mr. Murphey inan interesting passage (pp. 169-171). He points out that at times Peirceconceived all properties of objects as dispositional, and real even when nottested or manifested. But at other times he rejected, e.g. the notion thatthe hardness of a diamond that is formed and perishes without being mani-fested is real. He was attempting unsuccessfully to combine his originalscholastic realism with his new-found phenomenalism. But, as Mr. Murpheysums the matter up: " Peirce appears to be on the horns of a true dilemma:if a possibility is not actualized, it cannot be cognized; if it is actualized itis no longera mere possibility " (p. 169). The synthesis is supposedly effectedby the doctrine of the infinite future. Through this the inexhaustibility ofthe possible and the limitations of the actual are combined.At the time when these views were being expressedin papersin the PopularScience Monthly Peirce was adapting his categories so that thirdness shouldbe an analogue of relation (to which the logic of relations had given a newprominence) and also somehow do justice to continuity, a notion whichgrew increasingly prominent in his later thought.He also took a further step towards a synthesis, or at least a harmony,of science and religion in laying more stress on the relationship betweenmind and the community. Since only ignorance and error distinguish oneman's mind from another, the elimination of these would mean the merging



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W. H. F. BARNES: THE DEVELOPMENT OF PEIRCE'S PHILOSOPHY 365of all minds. Hence the progress of knowledge tends towards, and requiresfor its own furtherance, just those moral and quasi-religious disciplineswhich unite men into a community. (It is astonishing that Peirce shouldseem to have overlooked-or overridden-the obvious fact that minds,error and ignorance apart, " belong " to different persons or different bodies,and cannot, for this reason, be other than separate. This is one of manyexamples to show how Peirce's realism was nourished on the self-same hillfrom which idealism dominated the surrounding countryside).Part III deals with Peirce's adventures in mathematics-geometry andnumbers. It is technical and the average reader, like myself, will find ithard going. Its conclusion about Peirce's view of mathematics is that whileveering at times to the Intuitionist school, his sympathies and approachwere fundamentally with the Logistic school. He emerged from his pro-longed wrestling with mathematics with a conviction that continuity wasthe all-important concept in philosophy. In his later years he used the term'synechism' for his philosophy as a whole so as to stress this fact.In Part IV Mr. Murphey concludes with an account of Peirce's lastphilosophical adventures after his dismissal from his post at Johns HopkinsUniversity in 1887. From that date he philosophized on his own withoutthe stimulus (which he did not need) and without the criticism (which hedid not covet) of an academic community. In these later years the streakof extravagance, which even the most devoted admirers of Peirce (amongstwhom I count myself) would not deny to their hero's thought-processes,became more marked. " The philosophy of continuity is peculiar in leadingunequivocally to Christian sentiments " (quoted by Mr. Murphey, p. 295)is a fair example. But, although he laboured on this visionary metaphysicsof what might be called " continuity and the Cross", he made solid contri-butions at a more humble level.One of the fruitful developments of this late period is the recognitionthat some terms are not concepts but refer directly to the object, termsto which he gives the name 'index'. This marks the end of the doctrinethat the real is what will ultimately be agreed upon in thought. But thisparticular change is, of course, part of a much greater development in thedoctrine of the three basic categories-Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness.In these later writings the categories are presented as three sorts of logicalrelation-monadic, dyadic and triadic. Mr. Murphey gives an admirableaccount of this latest doctrine, arising out of the logic of relations, of whichthe chief features are: (1) genuine dyadic relations are irreducible to mon-adic and genuine triadic relations are irreducible to monadic or dyadicrelations; (2) there are degenerate dyadic relations in which the relativeproperties derived from the relation can be possessed monadically, i.e. inthe absence of the other term. A degenerate triad, similarly, is one in whichthe relative properties of the pair remain, if one of the three terms is re-moved; a doubly degenerate triad one in which the relative propertiesremain if any two terms are removed.The main philosophical interest of these classifications lies in their

application by Peirce to the sign relation. The relation between sign and



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366 CRITICAL STUDYobject requires a third term, the interpretant (as Peirce called it): therelation between the interpretant and the object is made by the sign: therelation between the sign and the interpretant exists only through the object.If the sign relation is doubly degenerate, the sign is an icon or picturesign: it signifies by means of charactersit possesses in any case. If the signrelation is singly degenerate, it is an index or pointing sign: it signifies byvirtue of a real (dyadic) relation to its object. If the sign relation isgenuinely triadic, it is a symbol.In this stage of his philosophy, Peirce accepted the Kantian positionthat, while the logical form of knowledge could be known a priori, its con-tent must come through sensory experience. Hence the categories have aformal aspect in which they concernonly the logical classificationof relationsand a material aspect in which they deal with the classification of experience.Whereas in his earlier writings Firstness was quality conceived as anabstraction, now it is thought of as pure sensation-as the quality belongingto the single impression created by a percept which has not yet disclosedits structure and elements to the observer. To be known it must be experi-enced, and it cannot be analysed or explained. Similarly, Secondness suffersa sea change in these later writings. Earlier it had included the conceptsof denotation and the object-but the object was not immediately known.' This ' is now interpreted as a sign with the power to designate an individualobject. Thisness, or haecceity,is experienced as shock or resistance. It iswhat gives existence to the object and is not a predicate. It is the materialaspect of Secondness and involves a genuine dyadic relation.Thirdness is rationality. Meaning is wholly an affair of thirdness. Inan interesting discussion (pp. 313-317) Mr. Murphey points out that theinterpretant is not to be taken as the meaning of the sign of which it isthe interpretant : it is another sign having the same meaning. The meaningof a statement is the habit which is implied by believingthat statement. Byapplying the pragmatic principle we translate a statement into a conditionalstatement about what observable results would follow if certain actions weredone. This conditional formula expresses the habit.I have no space to discuss Mr. Murphey's account of the synechisticphilosophy which Peirce tried to build. It was to predict the general charac-ter which the future of the cosmos would possess, but like his previousattempts at system it failed. Mr. Murphey concludes his book with thesentence :" The magnificent synthesis which the theory of continuity seemed

to promise somehow always eluded him, and the shining vision ofthe great system always remained a castle in the air " (p. 407).Mr. Murphey's book is handsomely produced, well-bound and well-printed. I have noted only one misprint and that is on page 75 where, inthe quotation from Peirce, the word 'term ' in line 5 should be 'termed'.The book has no bibliography. W. H. F. BARNES

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