MS 1343 (1902) - Of the Classification of the Sciences

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Second Paper. Of the Practical Sciences.

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and exhaustive inquiries as to what inquiries are, as a matter of fact, pursued with such devotion and intelligence that they can properly be considered to be specific sciences. These efforts will not be relaxed needlessly, and it is hoped that publication may lead to the discovery of the majority of the remaining errors, of which every subscriber of the book shall be duly informed. Meantime, the general picture of science which the list presents cannot be far from correct. Classification is one of the subjects of which Logic has to treat. We must here confine ourselves to such considerations as are almost axiomatic and are indispensible for framing a natural classification of the sciences. Every class is constituted and held together by a concept or idea expressed in its definition. Every arrangement of ideas is itself an idea. Consequently, every classification whatever is governed by an idea,

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however loose and incongruous it may be. A natural classification, that is to say, a birth-al classification, is a classification whose governing idea coincides with the idea which determines the things classified to exist. An idea, so far as it has any relation to life, is a possible purpose. Therefore the spirit of this work requires us here to regard a natural classification as a classification that conforms to the purpose, or quasi-purpose, of the existence of the objects classified. In case we know what that purpose is, as we should, for example, if we were drawing up a classification of vehicles, it will be a comparatively easy thing,—though none too easy even in that case,—to ascertain approximately the natural classification. Should there be no human purpose, there may, nevertheless, be an evolutionary agency that acts like a purpose, or there may [be] a principle similar to such agency except that it is related, not to a temporal, but to a logical sequence of results. If a natural classi-

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fication is to be possible, something of that description there must be. Our comprehension of such a principle will be imperfect. It will suffice to enable us to begin a sketch of a natural classification, but not to carry it out. Where such comprehension of the origins of the species to be classified abandons us, we can often derive important aid from the doctrine of probabilities, which teaches us how fortuitous, that is, unintended, characters distribute themselves. It will be demonstrated in the chapter on classification that two closely related natural classes are not, in general, separated by sharp lines of demarcation, so that there will be forms any one of which might, as far as the essential characters of those classes serve to discriminate them, belong either to the one or to the other of the two natural classes. But in such cases it will often be found upon investigation that there are other characters, more or less accidental, which may aid

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us in referring the forms to their true classes. For example, Prof. Petrie found in the town of Naucratis some hundred and eighty standard weights. The calculus of probabilities applied to their weight-values proves that they were intended to conform to five different quasi-prototypes; but many of the weights, owing to the imperfection of their manufacture, have intermediate values, so that, as far as this governing intended character goes, it would be impossible to say to which standard any one such intermediate weight was intended to conform. But if we take into consideration their shapes, their material, and the perfection of their execution, characters in regard to which there was no distinctive intention, much may be done toward assigning the individual weights to their intended classes.

Every purpose, although it relates to action upon an individual subject is in itself general. In the inception of its first fulfillment, whether in reality or in ima-

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gination, it is broadly general and simple. But in the process of working itself out, it necessarily becomes successively more and more definite and complex, and each of these determinations may usually take one or other of several forms. Thus, when primitive man first found that he needed clothing in winter, his original and principal purpose may have been to keep warm. But when he came to cut his garment, it may have occurred to him that its appearance would make some impression on those who saw him; and then he might adopt as a secondary purpose that of attracting his friends or that of scaring his enemies. Moreover, the attainment of a purpose usually involves the solution of a problem. There are conditions that have to be fulfilled; and the fulfillment of these becomes a subordinate purpose. When we come to study the matter more closely, we shall find that there are several different categories of secondary and subordinate purpose.

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