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Charles Sanders Peirce

Charles Sanders Peirce Quotes

Philosopher

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Famous Charles Sanders Peirce Quotes

“All the followers of science are fully persuaded that the processes of investigation, if only pushed far enough, will give one certain solution to each question to which they can be applied.... This great law is embodied in the conception of truth and reality. The opinion which is fated to be ultimately agreed to by all who investigate is what we mean by the truth, and the object represented in this opinion is the real.”

IfsGivingMeanRealEnoughRealityTruthLawScienceCertainProcessOpinionObjectsSolutionsConceptionFollowersInvestigationRealismTruth And Reality
Book:Chance, love, and logic philosophical essays
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“Do you call it doubting to write down on a piece of paper that you doubt? If so, doubt has nothing to do with any serious business. But do not make believe; if pedantry has not eaten all the reality out of you, recognize, as you must, that there is much that you do not doubt, in the least. Now that which you do not at all doubt, you must and do regard as infallible, absolute truth.”

IfsWritingBelieveRealityDoubtPiecesSeriousPaperAbsolutesRegardSkepticismInfallibleMake BelieveAbsolute TruthSerious BusinessPedantry
Book:Selected Writings (Values in a Universe of Chance)
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“It has often been argued that absolute scepticism is self-contradictory; but this is a mistake: and even if it were not so, it would be no argument against the absolute sceptic, inasmuch as he does not admit that no contradictory propositions are true. Indeed, it would be impossible to move such a man, for his scepticism consists in considering every argument and never deciding upon its validity; he would, therefore, act in this way in reference to the arguments brought against him.”

IfsMenWayDoeSelfWould BeMovingMistakeImpossibleArgumentAbsolutesSkepticismConsideringPropositionsContradictoryValidityScepticismSceptic
Book:The Essential Peirce, Volume 1: Selected Philosophical Writings? (1867–1893)
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“If man were immortal he could be perfectly sure of seeing the day when everything in which he had trusted should betray his trust, and, in short, of coming eventually to hopeless misery. He would break down, at last, as every good fortune, as every dynasty, as every civilization does. In place of this we have death.”

IfsMenShouldDoeLastsDeathBreakSeeingAtheismCivilizationMiseryFortuneVery GoodImmortalHopelessDeath And DyingBetrayTrustedBreaking DownGood FortuneDying DeathDynastyDeath Coming
Book:The Essential Peirce, Volume 1: Selected Philosophical Writings? (1867–1893)
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“For example, there are numbers of chemists who occupy themselves exclusively with the study of dyestuffs. They discover facts that are useful to scientific chemistry; but they do not rank as genuine scientific men. The genuine scientific chemist cares just as much to learn about erbium-the extreme rarity of which renders it commercially unimportant-as he does about iron. He is more eager to learn about erbium if the knowledge of it would do more to complete his conception of the Periodic Law, which expresses the mutual relations of the elements.”

IfsMenDoeFactsCareLawScienceNumbersStudyExampleElementsRelationExtremesGenuineIronMutualConceptionChemistryUnimportantChemistRarity
Author:Charles Sanders Peirce
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“If we are to define science, ... it does not consist so much in knowing, nor even in "organized knowledge," as it does in diligent inquiry into truth for truth's sake, without any sort of axe to grind, nor for the sake of the delight of contemplating it, but from an impulse to penetrate into the reason of things.”

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Book:Collected Papers
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