MS 425 (1902) - Minute Logic - Chapter I

ReadAboutContentsHelp
Intended Characters of This Treatise

Pages

21
Needs Review

21

{Upper left margin: "Logic 21"}

of logicality as often to reason ill, and unless he held the distinction between reasoning well and reasoning ill was that the former w̶a̶s is conducive to the knowledge of the t͟r͟u͟t͟h͟, and the latter not so, and that by the truth is meant something not dependent upon how we feel or think if [d?] be. Upon Sigwart's {Refers to Cristoph von Sigwart (1789-1844)} principle the distinction would be a mere distinction of taste, or the satisfaction of a subjective feeling. This harmonizes only two well with the practice of German university professors, whose r̶e̶a̶s̶o̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ opinions are mainly founded on subjective feeling and upon fashion. In the beginning of the next chapter we shall consider the argument by which Sigwart supports his opinion; and the reader will then be led clearly to understand how, without denying the existence of the ̶s̶e̶n̶s̶e̶ logical sense, ̶a̶n̶d̶ nor its intervention in all thought, I can maintain that it is extremely fallible

Last edit over 6 years ago by TommasoTempestini
22
Needs Review

22

and that no appeal need or ought to be made to it in establishing the truths of logic. Judges by English standards and those which the present work aims to establish, Sigwart's teaching is calculated to undermine the vigor of reasoning, by a sort of phagedemic ulcera tion. So it would seem a priori; and a the impression made upon me by young reasoners who have been the most diligent students of Sigwart is that of debility and helplessness in thought. 2nd=. Since it must be nearly forty years since I read La Lagique of the Abbe Gratry, a writer of subtlety and exactitude of thought as weel as of elevation of reason, my account of his doctrine may not be accurate in its details. I insert it here because after feeling it seems natural to place proposed method of basing logical principles upon direct individual experience. Now since these principles are general, only a mystical expe

Margin: Logic 22 On Revolution

Last edit about 6 years ago by ebezjian
23
Complete

23

since could give them I cannot now assurw myself that Gentry did so base any logical principles; but I know remember that he considers every act of inductive reasoning in which one passes from the finite to the infinite - particularly every inference which, from abservation which includes that there us a continuity which cannot be directly observed, in certain objects of observation - to be due to a direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Were that granted, however consistency would require us to grant that the admission of a logical principle, which covers an infinity of possible inferences is also a mystical experience. Were I merely asked to grant that the anticipations of experience involved with (more accurately than 'in') inductions cannot be accounted for except by the ancient hypothesis that man has been made in the image of his Maker, so far as his Reason goes, I

Last edit about 6 years ago by guest_user
24
Complete

24

should be compelled to admit this, for reasons which will be developed in good time. But Gratry's doctrine is essentially different from that. Today, while I was putting my mare into her stable, in the dusk of the evening, I noticed a black streak upon the floor which I at first took for a shadow. But upon closer inspection (for my eyes are not as good as they once were) I saw rhat it was a large black-snake. I experienced a certain shock strong enough to enable me to percieve what that shock consisted in, namely, in a sense, that the snake was there in spite of me. Now, evenif I had anticipated seeing the snake, and even if, anticipating it, i had wished to see it, still, when I did come to see it, I should have experienced something of that same sense of being compelled to see it. Such a sense of being compelled to see it. Such a sense of compulsion, of a struggle between something within and something without, accompanies

Last edit about 6 years ago by guest_user
25
Complete

25

every experience whatever. How else can I distinguish between an experience and a play of fancy of extreme vividness, than by the sense of compulsion in the forever sense. And how can there be compulsion without resistance? Were Gratry right, then, every inductive reasoning which passes from observation of the finite and the discrete to belief in the infinite ot the continuous, ought to be accompanied by the sense that that belief was forced on me, whether I will or no. That result however , is, I believe, is contradicted by observation instead of experiencing any such complusion and struggle, I feel rather a sort of sympathy with nature which makes me sure that the continuity fundamentally is there, somewhat as I felt sure I understood the particular state of mind in my mare at the time I was putting her up. 3rdly, the opinion just now referred to, that logical principles are known by an inward light of

Last edit about 6 years ago by guest_user
Displaying pages 21 - 25 of 359 in total