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→Excerpt 8. Peirce (CE 1, 256–257)
====Excerpt 8. Peirce (CE 1, 256–257)====
====Excerpt 8. Peirce (CE 1, 256–257)====
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<p>The first distinction we found it necessary to draw — the first set of conceptions we have to signalize — forms a triad:</p>
<p>The first distinction we found it necessary to draw — the first set of conceptions we have to signalize — forms a triad:</p>
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<p align="center">Thing Representation Form.</p>
<p>Kant you remember distinguishes in all mental representations the matter and the form. The distinction here is slightly different. In the first place, I do not use the word ''Representation'' as a translation of the German ''Vorstellung'' which is the general term for any product of the cognitive power. Representation, indeed, is not a perfect translation of that term, because it seems necessarily to imply a mediate reference to its object, which ''Vorstellung'' does not. I however would limit the term neither to that which is mediate nor to that which is mental, but would use it in its broad, usual, and etymological sense for anything which is supposed to stand for another and which might express that other to a mind which truly could understand it. Thus our whole world — that which we can comprehend — is a world of representations.</p>
<p>Kant you remember distinguishes in all mental representations the matter and the form. The distinction here is slightly different. In the first place, I do not use the word ''Representation'' as a translation of the German ''Vorstellung'' which is the general term for any product of the cognitive power. Representation, indeed, is not a perfect translation of that term, because it seems necessarily to imply a mediate reference to its object, which ''Vorstellung'' does not. I however would limit the term neither to that which is mediate nor to that which is mental, but would use it in its broad, usual, and etymological sense for anything which is supposed to stand for another and which might express that other to a mind which truly could understand it. Thus our whole world — that which we can comprehend — is a world of representations.</p>
<p>No one can deny that there are representations, for every thought is one. But with ''things'' and ''forms'' scepticism, though still unfounded, is at first possible. The ''thing'' is that for which a representation might stand prescinded from all that would constitute a relation with any representation. The ''form'' is the respect in which a representation might stand for a thing, prescinded from both thing and representation. We thus see that ''things'' and ''forms'' stand very differently with us from ''representations''. Not in being prescinded elements, for representations also are prescinded from other representations. But because we know representations absolutely, while we only know ''forms'' and ''things'' through representations. Thus scepticism is possible concerning ''them''. But for the very reason that they are known only relatively and therefore do not belong to our world, the hypothesis of ''things'' and ''forms'' introduces nothing false. For truth and falsity only apply to an object as far as it can be known. If indeed we could know things and forms in themselves, then perhaps our representations of them might contradict this knowledge. But since all that we know of them we know through representations, if our representations be consistent they have all the truth that the case admits of.</p>
<p>No one can deny that there are representations, for every thought is one. But with ''things'' and ''forms'' scepticism, though still unfounded, is at first possible. The ''thing'' is that for which a representation might stand prescinded from all that would constitute a relation with any representation. The ''form'' is the respect in which a representation might stand for a thing, prescinded from both thing and representation. We thus see that ''things'' and ''forms'' stand very differently with us from ''representations''. Not in being prescinded elements, for representations also are prescinded from other representations. But because we know representations absolutely, while we only know ''forms'' and ''things'' through representations. Thus scepticism is possible concerning ''them''. But for the very reason that they are known only relatively and therefore do not belong to our world, the hypothesis of ''things'' and ''forms'' introduces nothing false. For truth and falsity only apply to an object as far as it can be known. If indeed we could know things and forms in themselves, then perhaps our representations of them might contradict this knowledge. But since all that we know of them we know through representations, if our representations be consistent they have all the truth that the case admits of.</p>
<p>C.S. Peirce, ''Chronological Edition'', CE 1, 256–257</p>
<p align="right">C.S. Peirce, ''Chronological Edition'', CE 1, 256–257</p>
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<p>Charles Sanders Peirce, “Harvard Lectures ''On the Logic of Science''” (1865), ''Writings of Charles S. Peirce : A Chronological Edition, Volume 1, 1857–1866'', Peirce Edition Project, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, 1982.</p>
<p>Charles Sanders Peirce, “Harvard Lectures ''On the Logic of Science''” (1865), ''Writings of Charles S. Peirce : A Chronological Edition, Volume 1, 1857–1866'', Peirce Edition Project, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, 1982.</p>