PEIRCE, Charles Sanders.

Illustrations of the Logic of Science: The Fixation of Belief.; How to make our Ideas Clear; The Doctrine of Chances; The Probability of Induction; The Order of Nature; Deduction, Induction, and Hypothesis.

New York: D. Appelton and Company, 1877-1878. FIRST EDITIONS Illustrations of the Logic of Science.First Paper. - The Fixation of Belief.; Second Paper. - How to Make Our Ideas Clear; Third Paper. - The Doctrine of Chances; Fourth Paper. - The Probability of Induction, in The Popular Science Monthly, Volume XII, D. Appelton and Company, New York, November 1877 to April 1878. 2 blank leaves + TP + 1 leaf with portrait of Michael Servetus on verso + [1]-777 (with engraved frontis portrait preceding each month's first page) + 2 blank leaves, (Peirce's four papers appear on pp. [1]-15, 286-302, 604-615 & 705-718), Octavo. Ketner 00107, 00119, 00120 & 00121 respectively. Fifth Paper. - The Order of Nature.; Sixth Paper. - Deduction, Induction, and Hypothesis, in The Popular Science Monthly, Volume XIII, D. Appelton and Company, New York, May to October 1878. 1 blank leaf + TP + 1 leaf with portrait of Edward S. Morse on verso + [1]-776 (with engraved frontis portrait preceding each month's first page) + 1 blank leaf, (Peirce's two papers appear on pp. 203-217 & 470-482), Octavo. Ketner 00122 & 00123 respectively. Also in the first volume are Language and the English Civil Service by Alexander Bain (pp. 152-162); Evolution of Ceremonial Government in three parts by Herbert Spencer (pp. [385]-407, 545-555 and 6410-662); an article by Shaw entitled The Telephone and How it Works (pp. 559-569); Technical Education by T. H. Huxley (pp. 570-580); and Mayer's article On Edison's Talking-Machine (pp. 719-724). The second volume also contains the final three installments of Evolution of Ceremonial Government by Herbert Spencer (pp. 25-43, 146-166 and 292-302); Education as a Science in two parts by Alexander Bain (pp. 302-311 and 660-668); an excellent portrait of the young Thomas A. Edison (preceding page [385]); The Progress of Anthopology by T. H. Huxley (pp. 668-676);and Consciousness Under Chloroform by Herbert Spencer (pp. 694-698). The first two of these papers herald the birth of pragmatism while the next two expound ideas unique to Peirce and his genius. The last introduces Peirce's concept of abduction (though it is not yet called that). Any one of these extraordinary papers would have secured Peirce a place in the canon of American philosophy and logic but, taken together, they constitute on the of the great achievements in American philosophy. That Peirce published all six in the span of just ten months is breathtaking. " Peirce formulated the doubt-belief theory in 1873, but it was first published in a series of six papers in Popular Science Monthly in 1877 and 1878. These papers do not constitute a rejection of the earlier theory of cognition; rather, they elaborate the earlier theory and set it in the context of biological evolution. Any organism that is to survive, Peirce held, must develop habits of behavior that are adequate to satisfy its needs. Such habits are rules of behavior that prescribe how we should act under given conditions in order to achieve a particular experiential result. Now such habits, when thoroughly adopted, Peirce called beliefs. Since to possess beliefs is to know how to satisfy one's wants, belief is a pleasant state: doubt, or absence of belief, is an unpleasant state, since one is then uncertain how to act and is unable to attain the desired goals. The organism will then seek to escape from doubt and to find belief. The process by which the organism goes from doubt to belief Peirce defined as inquiry. Clearly, there are various methods of inquiry, and the most satisfactory method will be that which leads most surely to the establishment of stable belief - that is, to belief that will stand in the long run. From the standpoint of the inquiring organism, a belief concerning a particular object is significant because it permits the organism to predict what experiences it will have if it acts toward the object in a given way. Recalling Kant's use of the term 'pragmatic' namely, '…contingent belief, which yet forms the ground for the actual employment of means to certain action, I entitle pragmatic belief' (Critique of Pure Reason, A 824, B 852). Peirce propounded what he called the pragmatic theory of meaning, which asserts that what the concept of an object means is simply the set of all habits involving that object. This doctrine involves a major change in Peirce's thinking, and one which is directly due to the logic of relations… Pragmatism is Peirce's most famous philosophical doctrine, although it was made famous by William James rather than by Peirce. As Peirce defined it, pragmatism is purely a theory of meaning - not of truth. (EP, Volume VI, p. 73) A mismatched but compatible set: Volume XII: Contemporary half-leather with brown cloth boards, lightly scuffed. Spine with four raised bands and gilt lettering. All edges red. First few front and last few rear leaves foxed. A very strong and pretty copy. Volume XIII: Contemporary half-leather with green cloth boards, spine and corners scuffed. Spine with four raised bands and gilt lettering. All edges marbled. Binders ticket and small bookplate (Masonic Sanatarium) to inside front cover. A very strong and pretty copy. PHOTOS AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST.

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