Peirce's Scientific Metaphysics: The Philosophy of Chance, Law, and Evolution

Table of Contents

Contents Texts and Abbreviations ix Acknowledgments xi Introduction 1 1 Scientific and Philosophical Background 5 Naturphilosophie, Evolution, and the Law of Large Numbers 5 Agnosticism, Necessitarianism, and the Mechanical Philosophy 7 Synechism, Tychism, and Agapism 10 Motivations for a Cosmology 13 What Is a Hypothesis? 14 Synechism 17 Objective Idealism 18 A Summary Statement of the Cosmology 23 Summary 25 2 Irreversibility in Physics 26 Nineteenth-Century Physics 27 The Laws of Motion 28 The Law of Vis Viva 30 The Conservation of Energy Principle 32 The Doctrine of the Conservation of Energy 37 Conditions for Reversibility 39 The Second Law of Thermodynamics, the Kinetic Theory of Gases, and the Law of Large Numbers 41 Summary 47 viii Peirce’s Scientific Metaphysics 3 Irreversibility in Psychics 49 The Law of Mind 49 Causation and Mental Activity 54 Teleology and the Action of Mind 57 The Problem of Mind–Matter Reductionism 59 What Is Time? 64 Summary 75 4 Irreversibility in Physiology and Evolution 76 Physiology 77 The Molecular Theory of Protoplasm 77 Protoplasm, Habit, and Nutrition 81 Evolution 97 The Influence of Darwin 97 Peirce’s Classification of Evolutionary Philosophies 106 Summary 108 5 Cosmology and Synechism 110 Order Out of Chaos 113 Variation and the Law of Large Numbers 118 Agapasm and the Law of Large Numbers 121 Rival Cosmologies 124 Elliptic Philosophy 125 Parabolic Philosophy 126 Hyperbolic Philosophy 130 Peirce’s Acquaintance with Modern Physics 137 6 Chance and Law 142 What Is Chance? 143 The Laws of Chance 157 The Law of Habit 159 The Redundancy Problem 161 The Incompatibility Problem 162 Peirce and Prigogine 173 7 Conclusion 176 Notes 185 Bibliography 213 Index 223 ...