Let’s examine Peirce’s second example of a disjunctive term — neat, swine, sheep, deer — within the style of lattice framework we used before.

This is apparently a stock example of inductive reasoning which Peirce is borrowing from traditional discussions, so let us pass over the circumstance that modern taxonomies may classify swine as omnivores.

In view of the analogical symmetries the disjunctive term shares with the conjunctive case, we can run through this example in fairly short order.  We have an aggregate of four terms:

Suppose is the logical disjunction of the above four terms:

Figure 2 diagrams the situation before us.

Figure 2. Disjunctive Term u, Taken as Subject

Here we have a situation that is dual to the structure of the conjunctive example.  There is a gap between the logical disjunction in lattice terminology, the least upper bound (lub) of the disjoined terms, and what we might regard as the natural disjunction or natural lub of these terms, namely, cloven-hoofed.

Once again, the sheer implausibility of imagining the disjunctive term would ever be embedded exactly as such in a lattice of natural kinds leads to the evident naturalness of the induction to namely, the rule that cloven-hoofed animals are herbivorous.

Reference

• Peirce, C.S. (1866), “The Logic of Science, or, Induction and Hypothesis”, Lowell Lectures of 1866, pp. 357–504 in Writings of Charles S. Peirce : A Chronological Edition, Volume 1, 1857–1866, Peirce Edition Project, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, 1982.

Resources

• This Blog • Survey of Pragmatic Semiotic Information
• My Notes • Information = Comprehension × Extension
• C.S. Peirce • Upon Logical Comprehension and Extension

cc: Cybernetics • Ontolog Forum • Structural Modeling • Systems Science