On a New List of Categories
Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences 7 (1868), 287-298.
Charles S. Peirce
Sec. 1. This paper is based
upon the theory already established, that the function of conceptions is to
reduce the manifold of sensuous impressions to unity, and that the validity of
a conception consists in the impossibility of reducing the content of
consciousness to unity without the introduction of it.
Sec. 2. This theory gives
rise to a conception of gradation among those conceptions which are universal.
For one such conception may unite the manifold of sense and yet another may be
required to unite the conception and the manifold to which it is applied; and
so on.
Sec. 3. That universal
conception which is nearest to sense is that of the present, in general. This
is a conception, because it is universal. But as the act of attention has no
connotation at all, but is the pure denotative power of the mind, that is to
say, the power which directs the mind to an object, in contradistinction to the
power of thinking any predicate of that object, — so the conception of what is
present in general, which is nothing but the general recognition of what is
contained in attention, has no connotation, and therefore no proper unity. This
conception of the present in general, of IT in general, is rendered in
philosophical language by the word “substance” in one of its meanings. Before
any comparison or discrimination can be made between what is present, what is
present must have been recognized as such, as it, and subsequently the
metaphysical parts which are recognized by abstraction are attributed to this
it, but the it cannot itself be made a predicate. This it is thus neither
predicated of a subject, nor in a subject, and accordingly is identical with
the conception of substance.
Sec. 4. The unity to which
the understanding reduces impressions is the unity of a proposition. This unity
consists in the connection of the predicate with the subject; and, therefore,
that which is implied in the copula, or the conception of being, is that which
completes the work of conceptions of reducing the manifold to unity. The copula
(or rather the verb which is copula in one of its senses) means either actually
is or would be, as in the two propositions, “There is no griffin,” and “A
griffin is a winged quadruped.” The conception of being contains only that
junction of predicate to subject wherein these two verbs agree. The conception
of being, therefore, plainly has no content.
If we say “The stove is
black,” the stove is the substance, from which its blackness has not been
differentiated, and the is, while it leaves the substance just as it was seen,
explains its confusedness, by the application to it of blackness as a
predicate.
Though being does not affect the subject, it implies an indefinite
determinability of the predicate. For if one could know the copula and
predicate of any proposition, as “. . . is a tailed-man,” he would know the
predicate to be applicable to something supposable, at least. Accordingly, we
have propositions whose subjects are entirely indefinite, as “There is a beautiful
ellipse,” where the subject is merely something actual or potential; but
we have no propositions whose predicate is entirely indeterminate, for it would
be quite senseless to say, “A has the common characters of all things,”
inasmuch as there are no such common characters.
Thus substance and being
are the beginning and end of all conception. Substance is inapplicable to a
predicate, and being is equally so to a subject.
Sec. 5. The terms “prescision”
and “abstraction,” which were formerly applied to every kind of separation, are
now limited, not merely to mental separation, but to that which arises from
attention to one element and neglect of the other. Exclusive attention consists
in a definite conception or supposition of one part of an object, without any
supposition of the other. Abstraction or prescision ought to be carefully
distinguished from two other modes of mental separation, which may be termed
discrimination and dissociation. Discrimination has to do merely with the
senses of terms, and only draws a distinction in meaning. Dissociation is that
separation which, in the absence of a constant association, is permitted by the
law of association of images. It is the consciousness of one thing, without
the necessary simultaneous consciousness of the other. Abstraction or
prescision, therefore, supposes a greater separation than discrimination, but a
less separation than dissociation. Thus I can discriminate red from blue, space
from color, and color from space, but not red from color. I can prescind red
from blue, and space from color (as is manifest from the fact that I actually
believe there is an uncolored space between my face and the wall); but I cannot
prescind color from space, nor red from color. I can dissociate red from blue,
but not space from color, color from space, nor red from color.
Prescision is not a
reciprocal process. It is frequently the case, that, while A cannot be
prescinded from B, B can be prescinded from A. This circumstance is accounted
for as follows. Elementary conceptions only arise upon the occasion of
experience; that is, they are produced for the first time according to a
general law, the condition of which is the existence of certain impressions.
Now if a conception does not reduce the impressions upon which it follows to
unity, it is a mere arbitrary addition to these latter; and elementary
conceptions do not arise thus arbitrarily. But if the impressions could be
definitely comprehended without the conception, this latter would not reduce
them to unity. Hence, the impressions (or more immediate conceptions) cannot be
definitely conceived or attended to, to the neglect of an elementary conception
which reduces them to unity. On the other hand, when such a conception has once
been obtained, there is, in general, no reason why the premisses which have
occasioned it should not be neglected, and therefore the explaining conception
may frequently be prescinded from the more immediate ones and from the
impressions.
Sec. 6. The facts now
collected afford the basis for a systematic method of searching out whatever
universal elementary conceptions there may be intermediate between the manifold
of substance and the unity of being. It has been shown that the occasion of the
introduction of a universal elementary conception is either the reduction of
the manifold of substance to unity, or else the conjunction to substance of
another conception. And it has further been shown that the elements conjoined
cannot be supposed without the conception, whereas the conception can generally
be supposed without these elements. Now, empirical psychology discovers the
occasion of the introduction of a conception, and we have only to ascertain
what conception already lies in the data which is united to that of substance
by the first conception, but which cannot be supposed without this first
conception, to have the next conception in order in passing from being to
substance.
It may be noticed that,
throughout this process, introspection is not resorted to. Nothing is assumed
respecting the subjective elements of consciousness which cannot be securely
inferred from the objective elements.
Sec. 7. The conception of
being arises upon the formation of a proposition. A proposition always has,
besides a term to express the substance, another to express the quality of that
substance; and the function of the conception of being is to unite the quality
to the substance. Quality, therefore, in its very widest sense, is the first
conception in order in passing from being to substance.
Quality seems at first
sight to be given in the impression. Such results of introspection are
untrustworthy. A proposition asserts the applicability of a mediate conception
to a more immediate one. Since this is asserted, the more mediate conception is
clearly regarded independently of this circumstance, for otherwise the two
conceptions would not be distinguished, but one would be thought through the
other, without this latter being an object of thought, at all. The mediate
conception, then, in order to be asserted to be applicable to the other, must
first be considered without regard to this circumstance, and taken immediately.
But, taken immediately, it transcends what is given (the more immediate conception),
and its applicability to the latter is hypothetical. Take, for example, the
proposition, “This stove is black.” Here the conception of this stove is the
more immediate, that of black the more mediate, which latter, to be predicated
of the former, must be discriminated from it and considered in itself, not as
applied to an object, but simply as embodying a quality, blackness. Now this
blackness is a pure species or abstraction, and its application to this stove
is entirely hypothetical. The same thing is meant by “the stove is black,” as
by “there is blackness in the stove.” Embodying blackness is the equivalent of
black. The proof is this. These conceptions are applied indifferently to
precisely the same facts. If, therefore, they were different, the one which was
first applied would fulfil every function of the other; so that one of them
would be superfluous. Now a superfluous conception is an arbitrary fiction,
whereas elementary conceptions arise only upon the requirement of experience;
so that a superfluous elementary conception is impossible. Moreover, the
conception of a pure abstraction is indispensable, because we cannot comprehend
an agreement of two things, except as an agreement in some respect, and this
respect is such a pure abstraction as blackness. Such a pure abstraction,
reference to which constitutes a quality or general attribute, may be termed a
ground.
Reference to a ground
cannot be prescinded from being, but being can be prescinded from it.
Sec. 8. Empirical psychology has
established the fact that we can know a quality only by means of its contrast
with or similarity to another. By contrast and agreement a thing is referred to
a correlate, if this term may be used in a wider sense than usual. The occasion
of the introduction of the conception of reference to a ground is the reference
to a correlate, and this is, therefore, the next conception in order.
Reference to a correlate
cannot be prescinded from reference to a ground; but reference to a ground may
be prescinded from reference to a correlate.
Sec. 9. The occasion of
reference to a correlate is obviously by comparison. This act has not been
sufficiently studied by the psychologists, and it will, therefore, be necessary
to adduce some examples to show in what it consists. Suppose we wish to compare
the letters p and b. We may imagine one of them to be turned over on the line
of writing as an axis, then laid upon the other, and finally to become
transparent so that the other can be seen through it. In this way we shall form
a new image which mediates between the images of the two letters, inasmuch as
it represents one of them to be (when turned over) the likeness of the other.
Again, suppose we think of a murderer as being in relation to a murdered person;
in this case we conceive the act of the murder, and in this conception it is
represented that corresponding to every murderer (as well as to every murder)
there is a murdered person; and thus we resort again to a mediating
representation which represents the relate as standing for a correlate with
which the mediating representation is itself in relation. Again, suppose we
look up the word homme in a French dictionary; we shall find opposite to it the
word man, which, so placed, represents homme as representing the same
two-legged creature which man itself represents. By a further accumulation of
instances, it would be found that every comparison requires, besides the
related thing, the ground, and the correlate, also a mediating representation
which represents the relate to be a representation of the same correlate which
this mediating representation itself represents. Such a mediating
representation may be termed an interpretant, because it fulfils the office of
an interpreter, who says that a foreigner says the same thing which he himself
says. The term “representation” is here to be understood in a very extended
sense, which can be explained by instances better than by a definition. In this
sense, a word represents a thing to the conception in the mind of the hearer, a
portrait represents the person for whom it is intended to the conception of
recognition, a weathercock represents the direction of the wind to the
conception of him who understands it, a barrister represents his client to the
judge and jury whom he influences.
Every reference to a
correlate, then, conjoins to the substance the conception of a reference to an
interpretant; and this is, therefore, the next conception in order in passing
from being to substance.
Reference to an
interpretant cannot be prescinded from reference to a correlate; but the latter
can be prescinded from the former.
Sec. 10. Reference to an
interpretant is rendered possible and justified by that which renders possible
and justifies comparison. But that is clearly the diversity of impressions. If
we had but one impression, it would not require to be reduced to unity, and
would therefore not need to be thought of as referred to an interpretant, and
the conception of reference to an interpretant would not arise. But since there
is a manifold of impressions, we have a feeling of complication or confusion,
which leads us to differentiate this impression from that, and then, having
been differentiated, they require to be brought to unity. Now they are not
brought to unity until we conceive them together as being ours, that is, until
we refer them to a conception as their interpretant. Thus, the reference to an
interpretant arises upon the holding together of diverse impressions, and
therefore it does not join a conception to the substance, as the other two
references do, but unites directly the manifold of the substance itself. It is,
therefore, the last conception in order in passing from being to substance.
Sec. 11. The five conceptions thus
obtained, for reasons which will be sufficiently obvious, may be termed
categories. That is,
BEING
Quality (Reference to a
Ground),
Relation (Reference to a
Correlate),
Representation (Reference to
an Interpretant),
SUBSTANCE
The three intermediate
conceptions may be termed accidents.
Sec. 12. This passage from
the many to the one is numerical. The conception of a third is that of an
object which is so related to two others, that one of these must be related to
the other in the same way in which the third is related to that other. Now this
coincides with the conception of an interpretant. An other is plainly
equivalent to a correlate. The conception of second differs from that of other,
in implying the possibility of a third. In the same way, the conception of self
implies the possibility of an other. The Ground is the self abstracted from the
concreteness which implies the possibility of an other.
Sec. 13. Since no one of
the categories can be prescinded from those above it, the list of supposable
objects which they afford is,
What is.
Quale—that which refers to a
ground,
Relate—that which refers to
ground and correlate,
Representamen—that which refers
to ground, correlate, and interpretant.
It.
Sec. 14. A quality may have
a special determination which prevents its being prescinded from reference to a
correlate. Hence there are two kinds of relation.
First. That of relates whose
reference to a ground is a prescindible or internal quality.
Second. That of relates whose
reference to a ground is an unprescindible or relative quality.
In the former case, the
relation is a mere concurrence of the correlates in one character, and the
relate and correlate are not distinguished. In the latter case the correlate is
set over against the relate, and there is in some sense an opposition.
Relates of the first kind
are brought into relation simply by their agreement. But mere disagreement
(unrecognized) does not constitute relation, and therefore relates of the
second kind are only brought into relation by correspondence in fact.
A reference to a ground may
also be such that it cannot be prescinded from a reference to an interpretant.
In this case it may be termed an imputed quality. If the reference of a relate
to its ground can be prescinded from reference to an interpretant, its relation
to its correlate is a mere concurrence or community in the possession of a
quality, and therefore the reference to a correlate can be prescinded from
reference to an interpretant. It follows that there are three kinds of
representations.
First. Those whose relation
to their objects is a mere community in some quality, and these representations
may be termed Likenesses.
Second. Those whose
relation to their objects consists in a correspondence in fact, and these may
be termed Indices or Signs.
Third. Those the ground of
whose relation to their objects is an imputed character, which are the same as
general signs, and these may be termed Symbols.
Sec. 15. I shall now show
how the three conceptions of reference to a ground, reference to an object, and
reference to an interpretant are the fundamental ones of at least one universal
science, that of logic. Logic is said to treat of second intentions as applied
to first. It would lead me too far away from the matter in hand to discuss the
truth of this statement; I shall simply adopt it as one which seems to me to
afford a good definition of the subject-genus of this science. Now, second
intentions are the objects of the understanding considered as representations,
and the first intentions to which they apply are the objects of those representations.
The objects of the understanding, considered as representations, are symbols,
that is, signs which are at least potentially general. But the rules of logic
hold good of any symbols, of those which are written or spoken as well as of
those which are thought. They have no immediate application to likenesses or
indices, because no arguments can be constructed of these alone, but do apply
to all symbols. All symbols, indeed, are in one sense relative to the
understanding, but only in the sense in which also all things are relative to
the understanding. On this account, therefore, the relation to the
understanding need not be expressed in the definition of the sphere of logic,
since it determines no limitation of that sphere. But a distinction can be made
between concepts which are supposed to have no existence except so far as they
are actually present to the understanding, and external symbols which still
retain their character of symbols so long as they are only capable of being
understood. And as the rules of logic apply to these latter as much as to the
former (and though only through the former, yet this character, since it
belongs to all things, is no limitation), it follows that logic has for its
subject-genus all symbols and not merely concepts. We come, therefore, to this,
that logic treats of the reference of symbols in general to their objects. In
this view it is one of a trivium of conceivable sciences. The first would treat
of the formal conditions of symbols having meaning, that is of the reference of
symbols in general to their grounds or imputed characters, and this might be
called formal grammar; the second, logic, would treat of the formal conditions
of the truth of symbols; and the third would treat of the formal conditions of
the force of symbols, or their power of appealing to a mind, that is, of their
reference in general to interpretants, and this might be called formal
rhetoric.
There would be a general
division of symbols, common to all these sciences; namely, into
1) Symbols which directly
determine only their grounds or imputed qualities, and are thus but sums of
marks or terms;
2) Symbols which also
independently determine their objects by means of other term or terms, and
thus, expressing their own objective validity, become capable of truth or
falsehood, that is, are propositions; and,
3) Symbols which also
independently determine their interpretants, and thus the minds to which they
appeal, by premissing a proposition or propositions which such a mind is to
admit. These are arguments.
And it is remarkable that,
among all the definitions of the proposition, for example, as the oratio
indicativa, as the subsumption of an object under a concept, as the expression
of the relation of two concepts, and as the indication of the mutable ground of
appearance, there is, perhaps, not one in which the conception of reference to
an object or correlate is not the important one. In the same way, the
conception of reference to an interpretant or third, is always prominent in the
definitions of argument.
In a proposition, the term
which separately indicates the object of the symbol is termed the subject, and
that which indicates the ground is termed the predicate. The objects indicated
by the subject (which are always potentially a plurality — at least, of phases
or appearances) are therefore stated by the proposition to be related to one
another on the ground of the character indicated by the predicate. Now this
relation may be either a concurrence or an opposition. Propositions of
concurrence are those which are usually considered in logic; but I have shown
in a paper upon the classification of arguments that it is also necessary to
consider separately propositions of opposition, if we are to take account of
such arguments as the following: —
Whatever is the half of
anything is less than that of which it is the half:
A is half of B:
A is less than B.
The subject of such a
proposition is separated into two terms, a “subject nominative” and an
“object accusative.”
In an argument, the
premisses form a representation of the conclusion, because they indicate the
interpretant of the argument, or representation representing it to represent
its object. The premisses may afford a likeness, index, or symbol of the
conclusion. In deductive argument, the conclusion is represented by the
premisses as by a general sign under which it is contained. In hypotheses,
something like the conclusion is proved, that is, the premisses form a likeness
of the conclusion. Take, for example, the following argument:
M is, for instance, P’, P’’,
P’’’, and P’’’’;
S is P’, P’’, P’’’, and P’’’’:
[Ergo,] S is M.
Here the first premiss amounts to
this, that “P’, P’’, P’’’, and P’’” is a likeness of M, and thus the premisses
are or represent a likeness of the conclusion. That it is different with
induction another example will show.
S’, S’’, S’’’, and S’’’’ are
taken as samples of the collection M;
S’, S’’, S’’’, and S’’’’ are P:
[Ergo,] All M is P.
Hence the first premiss
amounts to saying that “S’, S’’, S’’’, and S’’” is an index of M. Hence the
premisses are an index of the conclusion.
The other divisions of
terms, propositions, and arguments arise (W2.59) from the distinction of
extension and comprehension. I propose to treat this subject in a subsequent
paper. But I will so far anticipate that as to say that there is, first, the
direct reference of a symbol to its objects, or its denotation; second, the
reference of the symbol to its ground, through its object, that is, its
reference to the common characters of its objects, or its connotation; and
third, its reference to its interpretants through its object, that is, its
reference to all the synthetical propositions in which its objects in common
are subject or predicate, and this I term the information it embodies. And as every
addition to what it denotes, or to what it connotes, is effected by means of a
distinct proposition of this kind, it follows that the extension and
comprehension of a term are in an inverse relation, as long as the information
remains the same, and that every increase of information is accompanied by an
increase of one or other of these two quantities. It may be observed that
extension and comprehension are very often taken in other senses in which this
last proposition is not true.
This is an imperfect view
of the application which the conceptions which, according to our analysis, are
the most fundamental ones find in the sphere of logic. It is believed,
however, that it is sufficient to show that at least something may be usefully
suggested by considering this science in this light.
NOTES
1. This agrees with the
author of De Generibus et Speciebus, Ouvrages Inédits d’Abélard,
p. 528.
2. Herbart says: “Unsre
sämmtlichen Gedanken lassen sich von zwei Seiten betrachten; theils als
Thätigkeiten unseres Geistes, theils in Hinsicht dessen, was durch sie gedacht
wird. In letzterer Beziehung heissen sie Begriffe, welches Wort, indem es das
Begriffene bezeichnet, zu abstrahiren gebietet von der Art und Weise, wie wir
den Gedanken empfangen, produciren, oder reproduciren mögen.” But the whole
difference between a concept and an external sign lies in these respects which
logic ought, according to Herbart, to abstract from.