Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-03T19:07:22.565Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

8 - Peirce's Pragmatic account of Perception

Issues and Implications

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2006

Cheryl Misak
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
Get access

Summary

Peirce's understanding of perception is crucial in situating his philosophy within a broad range of issues. Yet a cursory reading of Peirce seems to indicate that what he says about perception is both incomplete and inconsistent, leading both to an early neglect of his account of perception and to widely varying interpretations of his claims, as interest in them began to grow. The following analysis of Peirce's view of perception will try to resolve the ambiguities by bringing into focus the systematic completeness of Peirce's understanding of the process of perceiving and the object of perception, at the same time showing its relevance for a range of contemporary issues.

Peirce holds that the scientific method is the only genuine method of fixing belief, for it is the only method by which beliefs must be tested and corrected by what experience presents (CP 5.384). And the very first stage of scientific inquiry requires human creativity. Peirce calls the process of creative hypothesis formation ‘abduction’ to distinguish it from the inductive process of data collection. He rejects the claims of British Empiricism, that knowledge begins with first impressions of sense. He also rejects the claims, such as that put forth by Descartes, that it begins with immediate cognitions or indubitable intuitions. All knowledge begins with perception, but perception is not the having of brute givens. Rather, there is a creative element in perceptual awareness, an interpretive creativity brought by the perceiver.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2004

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×