Pragmatic maxim

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The Pragmatic Maxim is a principle that Charles S. Peirce formulated to describe an essential perspective of his philosophy. With the designation Maxime he deliberately leaned on Kant in order to clarify the normative character of his determination. The function of this maxim is to gain clarity about the meaning of a term.

The maxim is based on the idea that thinking and thus also scientific theories have the task of producing convictions and thus behavioral habits. Peirce developed this idea in the essay How To Make Our Ideas Clear (1878). “Thoughts in action have the only possible motive to bring thoughts back to calm; and what is not related to a belief is not part of the thought itself. "

Seven formulations for the pragmatic maxim

Over a period of thirty years, Peirce repeatedly reformulated his maxim in a multitude of variations. In doing so, he maintained the first variant without restriction at the end of this period. Each new variant provides additional information about the meaning that Peirce gave to his maxim.

  • The first quotation appears in a text that has the form of a lexicon entry suitable as a definition of pragmatism. The form of the maxim contained therein is identical to the classic first version in the article mentioned:
Pragmatism. The opinion that metaphysics is largely clarified by the application of the following maxim to clarify conceptions: “Consider what effects, which could conceivably have practical meaning, we ascribe to the object of our concept. Then our concept of these effects is the whole scope of our concept of the object. "
  • The second formulation is important insofar as it shows on the one hand that the maxim can also be understood as an individual recommendation. On the other hand, it emerges from it that Peirce did not change the maxim even after renaming his pragmatism to pragmatism :
Pragmaticism was originally described in the form of the following maxim: Consider what effects, which could conceivably have practical meaning, you ascribe to the object of your term. Then your concept of these effects is the whole scope of your concept of the object.
  • In the third version, the description of the practical effects is modified and Peirce's pragmatic concept of truth is also included:
Such and all justifications are based on the idea that if one strives for certain types of volitional acts, one will be subject to certain forced perceptions accordingly. This kind of consideration, especially that certain modes of behavior lead to certain types of inevitable experiences, is called practical considerations. Hence the maxim that beliefs constitute pragmatism is justified, in concrete terms: in order to ascertain the meaning of an intellectual term, one must consider what practical consequences might conceivably arise from the necessity of the truth of this term; and the sum of these consequences defines the whole meaning of the term.
  • The fourth formulation shows a clear rejection of all speculative demands on his philosophy. In the lectures on pragmatism of 1903, Peirce added the original formulation from 1878 immediately after the passage quoted here (see first quote above):
One of the mistakes you make, I believe, in me is that I am making pragmatism a mere maxim of logic, rather than a sublime principle of speculative philosophy. In order to gain a better philosophical reputation, I have endeavored to bring pragmatism, as I understand it, into the form of a philosophical theorem. I have achieved nothing better than the following: Pragmatism is the principle that every theoretical judgment that can be expressed in an indicative clause is an unclear form of thinking whose only meaning, if it has one, tends to be a corresponding practical one To reinforce a maxim that can be expressed as a conditional clause whose suffix is ​​in the imperative.
  • In the fifth quote, Peirce turns against misinterpretations and tries to clarify his maxim:
The doctrine of pragmatism seems to say that man's goal is action - a stoic axiom that the writer no longer recommends as convincingly now, at the age of sixty, as at the age of thirty. On the contrary, if we admit that action needs a goal and that that goal must be of a general nature, then the spirit of the maxim itself judges us, which demands that we look at the end result of our concepts in order to understand them correctly on something other than practical facts, namely on general ideas as the true interpreters of our thinking.
  • In the sixth source, Peirce emphasizes the methodological aspect of his maxim:
The study of philosophy, therefore, consists in reflection, and pragmatism is the method of reflection directed by a relentless look at its ends and the ends of the ideas studied, whether they end in actions or thoughts. ... It will therefore turn out that pragmatism is not a "world view" [in the original German], but a method of reflection with the aim of clarifying thoughts.
  • The seventh selected text passage is again a clarification which suggests that Peirce saw himself misunderstood over the course of time, probably by various other representations of a pragmatic philosophy that was incompatible with his view. Peirce referred to the various forms of the English word concept , the German translation of which with “concept” is often too narrow.
This five-fold use of terms derived from the Latin word “concipere” must have had a purpose at the time. In fact there were two: First, it was supposed to show that I was not talking about meaning in any other sense than in an intellectual sense. On the other hand, all possibilities should be avoided that people understand me to mean that I try to explain terms through perception, images, schemes or anything else as a term. I did not mean, therefore, to say that acts more purely singular than anything else could constitute the meaning or fully appropriate interpretation of any symbol. I have compared action to the finale of a symphony of thoughts, with conviction in it like a half-cadence . Nobody is of the opinion that the few bars at the end of a piece of music are the meaning of the piece. It may be called the result.

The origin of the maxim

In his younger years Peirce had mainly dealt with logic, philosophy of science, questions of categories and the theory of thinking as a sign process ( semiotics ) developed by him . At the beginning of the 1870s he founded a philosophical discussion group with William James at Harvard , the "Metaphysical Club". Members included Chauncey Wright and the future federal judge Oliver W. Holmes . The lawyer Nicholas St. John Green , a student of Jeremy Bentham , made the circle aware of the philosophy of Alexander Bain . From this, Peirce adopted the concept that human action follows the principle of doubt and belief. Man always strives to gain a firm conviction. When he becomes in doubt about an existing belief because of perception or thought, he seeks to remove the doubt and arrive at a new established belief. Due to the origin of his Pragmatic Maxim, Peirce later called Bain the grandfather of pragmatism.

Peirce presented and discussed his thoughts in the Metaphysical Club. As a result, he published a series of articles Illustrations of the Logic of Science in Popular Science Monthly in 1878 . The individual titles are:

  • The Fixation of Belief (12/1877, 1-15 = CP 5,358 - 387)
  • How To Make Our Ideas Clear (12/1878, 286 - 302 = CP 5.388 - 410)
  • The Doctrine of Chances (12/1878, 604 - 615 = CP 2,645 - 666)
  • The Probability of Induction (12/1878, 705 - 718 = CP 2,669 - 693)
  • The Order of Nature (13/1878, 203-217 = CP 6.395-427)
  • Deduction, Induction and Hypothesis (13/1878, 470 - 482 = CP 2.619 - 644)

William James later referred to the first two essays as the "founding documents of pragmatism". The following four essays elaborate individual aspects that support the theses of the first two essays and make clear the integration of the pragmatic maxim into the scientific logic of Peirce's framework.

The consolidation of conviction

Doubt and conviction

Peirce's question revolves primarily around an epistemological justification of knowledge. Scientific activity presupposes the experiment as well as conclusions with the methods of logic. Correct reasoning means that true conclusions are drawn from true premises. “That which determines us to draw one conclusion rather than another from given premises is a habit of the spirit, whether it is constitutional or acquired.” (CP 5.367) The conclusion is considered valid, regardless of its truth. Such a habit of thinking as the basis of a conclusion is called the “guiding principle”. In everyday, practical life, such a guiding principle does not play a role because it is not conscious and one simply follows a habit. But in unfamiliar situations it is sometimes helpful to know the guiding principle of an inference.

On closer inspection, one finds that a conclusion is often based on many facts that are taken for granted as a prerequisite. Confusion sometimes arises when concepts that are the subject of logical reflection mix with ordinary thoughts. This includes, for example, the concept of quality, which as such can never be observed. “We generally know when to ask a question and when to pronounce judgment, since there is a difference between feeling doubtful and feeling convincing.” (CP 5.370) Beliefs are guiding principles for actions, insofar as they become a habit.

Doubt is an uncomfortable state from which people always want to switch to the state of belief. “The fight begins with the doubt and ends with the cessation of the doubt. Hence, the sole aim of inquiry is to establish an opinion. We may imagine that this is not enough for us, and we are looking for not just an opinion but a true opinion. But test this idea and it turns out to be unfounded; for as soon as a certain conviction is reached, we are completely satisfied, whether the conviction is true or not. ”(CP 5.375) Doubt in this consideration is not a theoretical doubt as with Descartes. Rhetorical doubt does not help research. Theories should be based on accepted statements, but always with the expectation that they will prove to be false. It is useless to deal with questions that have already been clarified and for which there is no longer any doubt.

Methods for achieving a firm belief

Convictions are not won by simply repeating doubtful arguments over and over, ignoring critical arguments, or clinging to existing arguments. Putting your head in the sand like an ostrich is irrational. People who follow this method of perseverance for religious reasons, for example, may be satisfied. They should be allowed to go. In time, the instinct of community will overwhelm them. Because beliefs are not established in the individual, but in the community of people.

When institutions or systems that have sufficient power enforce a certain opinion by force and keep people in ignorance, that is the method of authority . There are plenty of examples of such theological or political teaching. Probably the most perfect is that of the Catholic Church. This also includes the aristocracy and the guilds. Such systems are often founded by individual leaders, thrive on camaraderie and are capable of the worst atrocities. But such systems cannot permanently suppress doubt. And doubt is what drives the disintegration of such systems.

If the general public opinion is allowed to prevail, then convictions are formed according to questions of taste and pleasing argumentation. The history of philosophy, in which the pendulum swings between materialistic and spiritualistic philosophies, is full of such unrelated assumptions. “Plato, for example, found it reasonable that the distances between the heavenly spheres are proportional to the different lengths of strings that produce harmonic chords.” (CP 5.382) Peirce also found corresponding statements in Descartes, Kant and Hegel. Induction creates opinions with random and arbitrary elements. Peirce called such a non-factual approach to obtaining beliefs the a priori method . This method is clearly preferable to that of perseverance and authority from the standpoint of reason. But it is unsatisfactory because it often does not really dispel doubts.

According to Peirce, a method will therefore be sought which will more effectively calm doubt. This method should not depend on the individual, not on the purely human, but seek the standard outside of the subject, because truth is something public. It is only when everyone's conclusions are ultimately the same that one has an objective standard and that is reality. The assumption of reality, while a hypothesis, is the only one with which the scientific method is in harmony. Doubt means that two statements contradict each other and that already assumes reality. The scientific method is the only one with which one can discover truth. This is especially true in comparison to the alternatives listed as an example. To ignore the facts, whatever such behavior, Peirce regarded as dishonest and immoral. Choosing to accept the standard of truth is like choosing a bride. “One should love and revere the genius of the logical method” (CP 5.387).

From the clarity of thought

Belief and habit

In the history of logic, talk of the clarity of a thought initially meant familiarity with a thought. By Descartes the widening criterion of distinguishability (was clara et distincta ) introduced. Leibniz went further by equating clarity with recognizability and dividing it into clarity and confusion. Leibniz tried in particular to create clarity by defining terms.

Peirce no longer saw the traditional definition of conceptual clarity as contemporary. With the concept of doubt and conviction, he saw the possibility of introducing a third level of clarity after familiarity and clarity. Doubt also concerns very simple processes such as the choice of coins when paying. Whenever a consideration takes place that leads to a belief about a possible course of action, a doubt is removed. Even studying a timetable while waiting at the train station serves to consolidate a conviction by knowing that you have understood the timetable correctly, confirming when and where your own train is leaving and being able to assess what is on the other platforms in front of you goes. "Thinking in action has as the only possible motive to bring the thinking to rest, and what does not refer to a belief is not part of the thinking itself." (CP 5.396)

The concept of belief has three properties:

  • She is aware.
  • It calms the irritation caused by doubt.
  • In our nature, it enables the establishment of a rule for actions, in short a habit of thinking and behavior .

Different beliefs differ in the different courses of action that are associated with them. The basic function of thinking is to create habits of action. Sensations that have no relation to (future) actions do not count towards thinking. A habit is determined by when and how it inspires someone to act. There is "no difference in meaning that is so subtle that it consists of something other than a possible difference in practice." (CP 5.400)

In the pragmatic maxim, the relationship between thinking, conviction, habit and action is summed up in a nutshell:

“Consider which effects, which could conceivably have practical significance, we ascribe to the subject of our term. Then our concept of these effects is the entire scope of our concept of the object. "(CP 5.402)

For Peirce, this maxim represents the third degree of clarity of a concept.

The terms force and reality as examples

Peirce explained the meaning and practical application of the maxim using the terms force and reality .

The concept of force is used to explain changes in movement. Without the application of force, bodies would maintain speed and direction. After explaining the parallelogram of forces, Peirce describes the fact that the concept of force embodies as follows: “If one resolves the current changes in movement experienced by the various parts of a body, each in its own appropriate way, then each component becomes acceleration precisely described by a certain law of nature, through which bodies receive a certain acceleration according to their current relative position, whereby the summary by geometric addition gives the acceleration of the entire body. ”(CP 5.404) The attempt to describe the concept of force as an entity is according to Peirce a nonsensical self-contradiction. “The idea that the word force triggers in our mind has no function other than to determine our actions, and these actions have no relation to force other than through its effect. So if we know the effects of force, we are familiar with every fact that has to be connected with statements about the existence of force, and there is nothing more to know. ”(CP 5.404)

The concept of reality should be viewed in a similar way. In terms of familiarity, this term is clear; because everyone knows in everyday use what is meant by it. A definition (clarity in the 2nd degree) is more difficult. How is reality to be distinguished from fictions and dreams, for example? Dreams in themselves as events in the brain have real existence, but not the dream content. A suitable definition is to designate the real as that whose properties are independent of a thought. If one uses the pragmatic maxim as an aid, the result is that the real arouses sensations that appear in consciousness as beliefs. But how can one distinguish true beliefs that relate to the real from errors (false beliefs) that relate to the fictional? Peirce saw the approach here in the verification by the scientific method.

“On the other hand, all representatives of science are carried by the joyous hope that the processes of research, if only carried forward far enough, will yield a reliable solution to every question to which they are applied. […] You may get different results at first, but when everyone perfects their methods and processes, you will find that the results steadily move towards a predetermined center. This applies to all scientific research. Different minds may start out with extremely contradicting views, but the progress of the investigation, by some external force, brings them to the same conclusion. This activity of thinking, which does not take us where we want to go but to a predetermined goal, is like a work of fate. […] The opinion that all researchers fatefully have to agree in the end is what we mean by truth, and the object that is represented by this opinion is the real. ”(CP 5.407)

Peirce advocated a “convergence theory of truth” which, at a fictional, infinitely distant point in time in the future, leads to a correspondence between thought and reality. Until then, all knowledge is fallible. For Peirce, intersubjectivity was a prerequisite for truth. The connection that Peirce often makes with a consensus theory of truth cannot be seen here. Peirce's concept of truth also differs significantly from the concept of truth that William James represented with the concept of the usefulness of truth. Peirce's truth is an objective truth measured against an independent reality.

As long as the theoretical point in time that all beliefs correspond to the truth has not yet come, man has to be content with being bound to his beliefs, which can be true but do not have to be. But by building on the method of science and not being guided by methods such as persistence, authority or the intuitive a priori, he can achieve progress in knowledge and thus a steady approach to the truth. This is ensured by the increase in the meaning of the terms and thus the increase in their conceivable possible effects.

literature

  • Peirce, CS, Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce, Vols. 1-6, Charles Hartshorne and Paul Weiss (eds.), Vols. 7-8, Arthur W. Burks (ed.), Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1931-1935, 1958. Cited as CP nm for volume n, section m.
  • Nicola Erny: Concrete reasonableness. For the conception of a pragmatic ethics in Charles S. Peirce , Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2005, ISBN 3-16-148752-4
  • Christopher Hookway: The Pragmatic Maxim. Essays on Peirce and Pragmatism . Oxford University Press, Oxford 2012, ISBN 978-0-19-958838-1
  • Klaus Oehler : Introduction, translation, commentary on: Charles S. Peirce, About the clarity of our thoughts , Frankfurt 1985
  • Elisabeth Walter: Charles Sanders Peirce. Life and work. , Agis, Baden-Baden 1989, ISBN 3-87007-035-8
  • see also the list of scriptures in the main article

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ Thought in action has for its only possible motive the attainment of thought at rest; and whatever does not refer to believe is not part of the thought itself. (1878, CP 5,396)
  2. ^ Pragmatism. The opinion that metaphysics is to be largely cleared up by the application of the following maxim for attaining clearness of apprehension: "Consider what effects, that might conceivably have practical bearings, we conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our conception of these effects is the whole of our conception of the object. (CP 5.2, 1902)
  3. ↑ Pragmaticism was originally enounced in the form of a maxim, as follows: Consider what effects that might conceivably have practical bearings you conceive the objects of your conception to have. Then, your conception of those effects is the whole of your conception of the object. (CP 5.438, 1905)
  4. ↑ Such reasonings and all reasonings turn upon the idea that if one exerts certain kinds of volition, one will undergo in return certain compulsory perceptions. Now this sort of consideration, namely that certain lines of conduct will entail certain kinds of inevitable experiences is what is called a "practical consideration". Hence is justified the maxim, belief in which constitutes pragmatism; namely: In order to ascertain the meaning of an intellectual conception one should consider what practical consequences might conceivably result by necessity from the truth of that conception; and the sum of these consequences will constitute the entire meaning of the conception. (CP 5.9, 1905)
  5. ↑ On their side, one of the faults that I think they might find with me is that I make pragmatism to be a mere maxim of logic instead of a sublime principle of speculative philosophy. In order to be admitted to better philosophical standing I have endeavored to put pragmatism as I understand it into the same form of a philosophical theorem. I have not succeeded any better than this: Pragmatism is the principle that every theoretical judgment expressible in a sentence in the indicative mood is a confused form of thought whose only meaning, if it has any, lies in its tendency to enforce a corresponding practical maxim expressible as a conditional sentence having its apodosis in the imperative mood. (CP 5.18, 1903, translation after Walther: Lectures on Pragmatism).
  6. ↑ The doctrine appears to assume that the end of man is action - a stoical axiom which, to the present writer at the age of sixty, does not recommend itself so forcibly as it did at thirty. If it be admitted, on the contrary, that action wants an end, and that end must be something of a general description, then the spirit of the maxim itself, which is that we must look to the upshot of our concepts in order rightly to apprehend them, would direct us towards something different from practical facts, namely, to general ideas, as the true interpreters of our thought. (CP 5.3, 1902, translation after Apel, Schriften II, 278).
  7. ↑ The study of philosophy consists, therefore, in reflexion, and pragmatism is that method of reflexion which is guided by constantly holding in view its purpose and the purpose of the ideas it analyzes, whether these ends be of the nature and uses of action or of thought. ... It will be seen that pragmatism is not a Weltanschauung but is a method of reflection having for its purpose to render ideas clear. (CP 5.13 note 1, 1902).
  8. ↑ This employment five times over of derivatives of concipere must then have had a purpose. In point of fact it had two. One was to show that I was speaking of meaning in no other sense than that of intellectual purport. The other was to avoid all danger of being understood as attempting to explain a concept by percepts, images, schemata, or by anything but concepts. I did not, therefore, mean to say that acts, which are more strictly singular than anything, could constitute the purport, or adequate proper interpretation, of any symbol. I compared action to the finale of the symphony of thought, belief being a demicadence. Nobody conceives that the few bars at the end of a musical movement are the purpose of the movement. They may be called its upshot. (CP 5.402 note 3, 1906).
  9. ^ The consolidation of conviction and other writings , ed .: by Elisabeth Walter, Agis, Baden-Baden 1967; Charles S. Peirce, Writings : WIII 242-375
  10. ↑ Karl-Otto Apel: The path of thought of Charles S. Peirce , Gerd Wartenberg: Logical socialism , Vittorio Hösle: The crisis of the present and the responsibility of philosophy