Pierce Charles Sanders is an American philosopher, logician, mathematician and scientist, whom some call the "father of pragmatism". He was educated as a chemist and worked as a scientist for 30 years. He is valued for his enormous contributions to logic, mathematics, philosophy and semiotics. Also, the American scientist is popular for putting forward the main provisions of the philosophical trend - pragmatism.
Recognition
Charles Pierce is an innovator in mathematics, statistics, philosophy, as well as in some research methodologies in various sciences. Peirce considered himself primarily a logician. He made a great contribution to this science. At the same time, logic opened the way for him to new discoveries and conclusions. He saw logic as a formal branch of semiotics, of which he became the founder. In addition, Charles Peirce defined the concepts of abductive reasoning, as well as rigorously formulated mathematical inductive and deductive reasoning. As early as 1886, he saw that logical operations could be performedelectrical switching circuits. The same idea was used decades later to make digital computers.
What is pragmatism?
Pragmatism is a philosophical movement that originated in the United States of America in 1870. Pragmatism considers thoughts as a tool for predicting and solving problems and actions, and also rejects the idea that the human function of thought is associated with metaphysics and similar abstract things, as a parallel reality and the influence of a higher mind on destiny. Pragmatists argue that the truth is only that which gives practical useful results. The pragmatism of Charles Peirce describes a "changing universe", while the idealists, realists and Thomists (followers of Catholic thought) hold the view of an "unchanging universe". Pragmatism is a philosophy that contradicts all attempts to explain metaphysics and redefines any truth of a certain direction into a temporary consensus among people in the field under study.
What is semiotics?
Semiotics is the study of the meaning formation of signal processes. This includes the study of signs of semiotic processes, their indication, designation, similarity, analogy, allegory, metaphor and symbolism. This science explores the study of signs and symbols as part of communications. Unlike linguistics, semiotics also studies non-linguistic sign systems.
Semiotics of Professor Charles S. Pierce
The semiotics of Charles Pierce highlights a number of key concepts (the concepts of signs, theirvalues and sign relation). He perfectly understood that this area of research should be a single science - semiotics. Therefore, Peirce defined the basic concepts of semiotics, here is its classification:
- Signs-icons: figurative signs in which a meaningful and signifying object have a single semantic validity. An example is the warning sign "Caution: children", which depicts running children. This road sign encourages you to slow down on the road and is installed near secondary schools, kindergartens, youth sports sections (or creative), etc.
- Signs-indexes: signified and signifying objects (or actions) are related to each other in proportion to the distance in time or space. An example is road signs that give the traveler information about the name, direction, and distance to the next settlement. Also, pictorial signs that illustrate, for example, frowned eyebrows, are considered an index sign, because the emotional background of a person is conveyed here (in this case, anger).
- Signs-symbols: the signified and the signifier have a single character under the prism of a certain convection (we are talking about a preliminary convention). Here you can take as an example a road sign that illustrates an "inverted" triangle. The conveyed meaning of the sign is “give way”, but its designation itself has nothing to do with the motivating action, because it is just an inverted triangle. National symbols fall under the same prism, where the depicted object is rhetorical for everyone. Symbols can be all words from existing languages, but imitation words (such as “croak”, “meow”, “grunt”, “rumble” and the like) fall into the list of exceptions.
Charles Pierce: biography
Born September 10, 1839 in Cambridge (Massachusetts) in the family of the famous American mathematician and astronomer Benjamin Pierce. Charles led an early life of privilege: parents refused to discipline and educate their children for fear of suppressing their individuality. In addition, the academic and intellectual atmosphere of the family home, which was often visited by highly spiritual and important dignitaries, did not allow Peirce to choose a path other than scientific. Among the guests were often prominent mathematicians and scientists, poets, lawyers and politicians. In this environment, the young Charles Pierce managed to remain comfortable and interested.
Pierce was the second of five children in the family. He had four talented brothers, who also partly connected their lives with science and high ranks. James Mills Pierce (older brother) followed his father to Harvard University, where he began to study mathematics in depth.
Another brother, Herbert Henry Pierce, had a distinguished career in the Foreign Intelligence Service. The younger brother, Benjamin Mills Pierce, studied to be an engineer and was successful in this area, but he died young. The talent of the brothers, especially Charles, is largely due to the colossal intellect and influence of their father, as well as to the general lifeintellectual atmosphere that surrounded them all the time.
Charles Pierce: books, scientific papers
Pearce's popularity and reputation is largely based on his number of scientific papers published in American scientific journals. His writings have been reviewed in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, in the National Academy of Sciences in Popular Science Monthly, a speculative philosophy journal. The scientific works of Charles Pierce Sanders on mathematics and philosophy are divided into two stages: published during his lifetime and after death.
Pearce's books in his lifetime
- Book "Photometric Research" 1878. 181-page monograph on the application of spectrographic methods in astronomy.
- Book "Research in Logic at the Johns Hopkins Institute" 1883. Collection of scientific papers of graduate students and doctors, including Charles Pierce himself, in the field of logic.
Major posthumous publications
Harvard University received many documents from Pierce's wife after his death (1914). About 1,650 unpublished manuscripts with a total of 100,000 pages were found in his office. Peirce's first published anthology of papers was a one-volume book titled Chance, Love, and Logic: A Philosophical Essay. The work was reprinted under the editorship of Morris Raphael Cohen in 1923. Later, other anthologies began to appear, the publications of which were in 1940, 1957, 1958, 1972, 1994 and 2009.
Most of Peirce's manuscripts have already been published, but there aresome copies that the world does not know due to the unsatisfactory condition of the documents.
- 1931-58: Collected Papers by Charles Pierce Sanders, 8 volumes. All of his works from 1860 to 1913 are collected here. However, the most extensive and fruitful work begins in 1893. Initially, the articles were not structured and varied in size, so for a more correct look, the editor's hand was required. Volumes one through six were edited by Charles Hartshorne, and volumes seven and eight were edited by Arthur Burke.
- 1975-87: "Charles Sanders Pierce: Contribution to the Nation" - 4 volumes. This collection contains more than 300 reviews and articles by Peirce, which were partially published during his lifetime between 1869 and 1908. The collection of scientific papers was published under the editors of Kenneth Lane Keener and James Edward Cook.
- 1976 - present: "New Elements of Mathematics by Charles S. Pierce" - 5 volumes. Peirce's most productive works in the field of mathematics are published here. Edited by Carolyn Eisele. The status of the project remains "in development" today.
- 1977-present: Correspondence between C. S. Pierce and Victoria Welby from 1903 to 1912.
- 1982 - Present: The Writings of Charles S. Pierce - Chronological Edition. The first publication of the project was in 2010, but the work continues to this day. The first published 6 volumes cover the scientist's life from 1859 to 1889.
- 1985–Present: Peirce's History of Science Perspective: A History of Science - 2 vols. Edited by Carolyn Eisele.
- 1992 - to the present: "Discourse on the logic of things" - lectures by Professor Pierce for the year 1898. Editing: Kenneth Laine Kinnear with commentary by Hilary Putnam.
- 1992-98: Essential Peirce - 2 vols. Important examples of the philosophical writings of Charles Peirce. Edited by Nathan Hauser (Vol. 1) and Christian Clausel (Vol. 2).
- 1997 - to the present: "Pragmatism as a principle and method of correct thinking." A collection of Pierce's lectures on pragmatism at Harvard University in the form of a short educational edition. Editing: Patricia Ann Turisi.
- 2010 – present: Philosophy of Mathematics: Selected Works. Exclusive, previously unpublished, works of Peirce in the field of mathematics. Editing: Matthew Moore.
The contribution of the great scientist to science
Charles S. Pierce made some amazing discoveries in formal logic, fundamental mathematics. Also, the American scientist is the founder of pragmatism and semiotics. Most of his scientific works were highly appreciated only after his death. The scientist died on April 19, 1914.
