PEIRCE & PLATO’s CAVE
Philosophy 020E/1
September 21, 1999
Who was Charles Sanders Peirce?
1839-1914
Born in Cambridge MA
Father taught math at Harvard
Graduated from Harvard in 1859
Taught John Dewey
Divorced & married French Canadian woman & died in poverty
Peirce’s philosophy
Thought is inquiry
To remove irritation of doubt
Meaning is practical effect
Object is hard means won’t bend or scratch
Belief is true means it can be relied on
Pragmatic definition of truth
Continuous inquiry by community will tend to result in acceptance
Serious inquiry & belief
Serious inquiry is caused by irritation of
Doubt or uncertainty
State of belief removes doubt & uncertainty
Belief is a habit that works for us
Belief is the end of inquiry
Four methods for conducting inquiry
Tenacity
Authority
A priori
Science
The method of tenacity
Stick with what we like best
Treat threats with contempt & hatred
Ostrich, head in sand method
Kind of wish fulfillment
If settling of opinion is sole end of inquiry
Why not settle for answer we like best
Problems with tenacity
The Social Impulse is against this method
Only hermits could use it
We must make our beliefs jibe with others
Truth is a social concept
We need method that fixes beliefs
For the community
Not just for the individual
The method of authority
Acting on social impulse
We let will of community decide
People who reject established beliefs are
Terrified into silence
Method involves cruelties & atrocities
No better method for mass of mankind
Problems with authority
Wider social impulse works against it
People in other cultures have different beliefs
Beliefs must withstand critical scrutiny
This method will always govern masses
Because of pressure to conform
Bucking authority entails conflict
The a priori method
This is Plato’s method
Accept as true what
is agreeable to reason
seems intuitively right
fits in well with what we think
Problems with a priori method
Makes inquiry similar to acquiring taste
But taste is a matter of fashion
Pendulum swings back & forth between
More materialistic &
More spiritualistic
Philosophy
Rests on no fact in the world
The method of science
Only one that doesn’t conflict with facts
For reliable beliefs we need method where
Beliefs are caused by nothing human but by
Something our thinking does not affect
Also in line with truth as public
Although our experiences are all different
Ultimate community conclusion is the same
Mystic’s insights don’t count as knowledge
Fundamental idea of method of science
There are real things whose character
Is independent of what we think about them
These real things affect our senses
According to regular laws
So we can learn by perception
How things really are
Everyone led to same conclusion
With enough experience & time to reason
How we can know about reality
Method in line with facts
We can’t doubt that there are realities
Doubt would not irritate if we didn’t think so
So social impulse will not work against it
We use scientific method whenever we can
Has had great success in settling opinions
Plato’s Cave
We are like
Like prisoners in a cave
Chained by legs & neck
Can only see what is in front of us
A world of shadows
We think our words refer to the shadows
If a prisoner were set free
He would learn that what he has seen before
Was meaningless illusion
When he looked at the sun
He could contemplate its true nature
Not its reflections
The prisoner’s return to the cave
He would be laughed at
They would kill him
For trying to set them free
What the allegory means
The cave is the world of the senses
Ascent from the cave means
Acquiring more intelligence
The final sight of the sun is
Awareness of what is good
True education is getting us to see
What is good