Category Archives: Inference

Selection 1 opens with Peirce proposing, “The information of a term is the measure of its superfluous comprehension”, and it closes with his offering the following promise. I am going, next, to show that inference is symbolization and that the … Continue reading →

Peirce now turns to his example of a conjunctive term, which he uses to show the connection between iconic reference and abductive inference. A similar line of thought may be gone through in reference to hypothesis.  In this case we … Continue reading →

Selection 3 showed how it was possible to combine symbols in such a way as to end up with species of representation outside the class of genuine symbols and introduced the concepts of conjunctive terms and disjunctive terms to describe … Continue reading →

Selection 3 opens with Peirce remarking a critical property of genuine symbols — the class of symbols is not closed under combinations.  In particular, there are logical conjunctions of symbols and logical disjunctions of symbols which are not themselves genuine … Continue reading →

Over the course of Selection 1 Peirce introduces the ideas he needs to answer stubborn questions about the validity of scientific inference.  Briefly put, the validity of scientific inference depends on the ability of symbols to express superfluous comprehension, the … Continue reading →

Our first text comes from Peirce’s Lowell Lectures of 1866, titled “The Logic of Science, or, Induction and Hypothesis”.  I still remember the first time I read these words and the light that lit up the page and my mind. … Continue reading →

Eight summers ago I hit on what struck me as a new insight into one of the most recalcitrant problems in Peirce’s semiotics and logic of science, namely, the relation between “the manner in which different representations stand for their … Continue reading →