## Charles
Sanders
Peirce
and
the
Abduction
of Einstein: On
the
Comprehensibility
of
the
World 1
Cornelis
de
Waal cdwaal@iupui.edu
## Abstract
Einstein
was
deeply
puzzled
by
the
success
of
natural
science,
and
thought
that
we
would never
be
able
to
explain
it.
He
came
to
this
conclusion
on
the
ground
that
we
cannot
extract the
basic
laws
of
physics
from
experience
using
induction
or
deduction,
and
he
took
this
to mean
that
they
cannot
be
arrived
at
in
a
logical
manner
at
all.
In
this
paper
I
use
Charles Peirce's
logic
of
abduction,
a
third
mode
of
reasoning
different
from
deduction
and induction,
and
show
that
it
can
be
used
to
explain
how
laws
in
physics
are
arrived
at, thereby
addressing
Einstein's
puzzle
about
the
incomprehensible
comprehensibility
of
the universe.
Interpreting
Einstein's
reflections
in
terms
of
Peirce's
abduction
also
sheds
light on
abduction
itself,
by
seeing
it
applied
in
an
area
where
our
common
sense,
and
with
that our
intuitions,
give
us
little
or
no
guidance,
and
is
even
prone
to
lead
us
astray.
Einstein
was
deeply
puzzled
by
the
success
of
natural
science
and
thought
that
we would
never
be
able
to
explain
it.
'The
eternally
incomprehensible
thing
about
the world,'
he
famously
quipped,
'is
its
comprehensibility.' 2
Unable
to
account
for
this, Einstein
dubbed
it
a
miracle
( Wunder )
and
remarked
that
it
instilled
in
him
a 'cosmic
religious
feeling.' 3
Moreover,
he
added,
the
more
we
learn
about
the universe,
the
more
incomprehensible
it
becomes
that
we
can
draw
the
conclusions
1
An
earlier
version
of
this
paper
was
read
at
the
Congress.
Charles
S.
Peirce
2014
Centennial
Lowell,
Mass.,
July
16-19,
2014.
I
would
like
to
thank
the
members
of
the audience
for
their
valuable
criticisms
and
suggestions.
2
Albert
Einstein,
Ideas
and
Opinions
Ideas
and
Opinions
(New
York:
Bonanza
Books,
1954),
292.
,
39.
we
do. 4
Einstein's
notion
of
comprehension
is
a
modest
one;
it
is
merely
'the production
of
some
sort
of
order
among
sense
impressions.' 5 In
part,
Einstein's
view
that
the
comprehensibility
of
the
world
is
an
'eternal secret,' 6
is
the
result
of
his
take
on
how
natural
science,
especially
physics,
works.
In this
presentation
I
will
address
Einstein's
puzzlement
by
utilizing
Charles
Peirce's logic
of
abduction.
My
argument
runs
roughly
as
follows.
First,
I
discuss
Einstein's views
on
the
aim
of
physics
and
his
resultant
criticisms
of
phenomenological
and empiricist
approaches
to
physics.
A
consequence
of
this
approach
is
that
basic physical
laws
cannot
be
extracted
from
experience
using
induction
or
deduction, and
for
Einstein
this
means
that
they
cannot
be
arrived
at
in
a
logical
manner
at
all. Peirce,
as
is
well
known,
also
distinguished
a
third
mode
of
reasoning,
which
he termed
abduction
or
retroduction.
This
raises
the
question
whether
this
third
mode of
reasoning
can
be
used
to
adequately
capture
how
in
Einstein's
view
we
arrive
at these
basic
laws.
If
so,
then
we
can
establish
that
how
these
laws
are
being
arrived at
is
a
logical
process
after
all,
and
Peirce's
justification
of
abduction
as
a
mode
of reasoning
can
be
used
to
address
Einstein's
puzzle
as
to
the
incomprehensible comprehensibility
of
the
world.
Interpreting
Einstein's
reflections
in
terms
of Peirce's
abduction
also
sheds
light
on
abduction
itself
by
seeing
it
applied
in
an
area where
our
common
sense,
and
with
that
our
intuitions,
give
us
little
or
no
guidance and
is
even
prone
to
lead
us
astray.
## 1.
The
Aim
and
Method
of
Physics
For
Einstein,
the
aim
of
science
is
'to
make
the
chaotic
diversity
of
our
sense-experience
correspond
to
a
logically
uniform
system
of
thought.' 7
In
doing
this,
the ideal
is
cover
as
much
of
our
sense
experiences
as
possible,
while
reducing
the number
of
primary
concepts
and
primary
relations
to
a
minimum.
In
line
with
this, Einstein
writes
in
his
1933
Herbert
Spencer
lecture
that
'a
complete
system
of
4
30
March
1952
letter
to
Maurice
Solovine;
reproduced
in
Albert
Einstein,
Solovine
(New
York:
Philosophical
Library,
1987).
Ideas
and
Opinions
6
Ibid.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
292.
,
323.
Letters
to theoretical
physics
is
made
up
of
[three
things:]
concepts,
fundamental
laws
which are
supposed
to
be
valid
for
those
concepts,
and
conclusions
to
be
reached
by
logical deduction.' 8 This
way
of
looking
at
science
is
reminiscent
of
the
view
Heinrich
Hertz developed
earlier
in
his Principles
of
Mechanics . 9
Hertz's
description
of
classical mechanics
may
serve
as
an
example.
Hertz
listed
four
primary
concepts
(space, time,
force,
and
mass)
and
four
primary
relations,
or
fundamental
laws,
to
connect them
(Newton's
three
laws
of
motion
and
d'Alembert's
principle).
Once
these primary
concepts
and
relations
are
given,
Hertz
argued,
everything
else
is
just
a matter
of
deductive
inference. 10
What
makes
those
concepts
and
relations
primary is
that
they
cannot
be
justified
by
the
theory
in
which
they
feature;
from
the perspective
of
the
theory
they
are
purely
given
and
non--justifiable.
Hertz
next presented
three
criteria
for
evaluating
such
axiomatic
systems
of
primary
concepts and
relations:
consistency,
correctness,
and
appropriateness.
The
axiomatic
systems should
be
logically
permissible,
not
contradict
observations,
and
in
cases
where multiple
theories
meet
both
demands,
represent
more
of
the
relations
we
deem important
and
less
relations
that
lack
any
counterpart
in
our
observations. With
regard
to
theoretic
structures
thus
conceived,
Einstein
argued
that
one should
opt
for
theories
with
primary
principles
and
concepts
that
are
simple,
few
in number,
and
where
the
coordination
with
sense
experience
is
both
unique
and convincing. 11
Moreover,
the
coordination
should
be
with
sense
impressions in
their totality rather
than
be
restricted
to
a
certain
predetermined
subset.
Put
differently, Einstein
is
looking
for
a
single,
global
theory,
not
for
a
bunch
of
separate
theories that
are
logically
independent
of
one
another. 12
A
comparison
of
Kepler's
laws
with Newton's
theory
of
gravitation
can
function
as
an
example.
Kepler's
three
laws
(that the
orbit
of
a
planet
is
an
ellipse
with
the
Sun
at
one
of
its
foci;
that
a
line
joining
a planet
and
the
sun
sweeps
out
equal
areas
during
equal
intervals
of
time;
and
that
Ideas
and
Opinions
9
Heinrich
Hertz,
,
272.
Principles
of
Mechanics
10
Op.
cit.,
4-5.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
323.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
293.
(London:
Macmillan,
1899),
see
esp.
1-4.
the
square
of
the
orbital
period
of
a
planet
is
proportional
to
the
cube
of
its
mean distance
to
the
sun)
are
three
brilliant
empirical
generalizations
that
paint
a
pretty complete
picture
of
the
motions
of
the
planets,
but
they
are
logically
independent. What
Newton
brings
to
the
table,
in
Einstein's
view,
is
one
single
theory
that
brings the
three
laws
together
by
proving
them
theorems
of
that
theory,
as
here
all physical
events,
including
the
movements
of
the
planets,
are
put
in
terms
of
masses that
are
subject
to
Newton's
laws
of
motion. 13
As
Einstein
observes,
this
move toward
greater
logical
unification
comes
at
a
cost.
The
more
comprehensive
the framework
becomes,
the
further
its
primary
concepts
and
relations
are
removed from
the
sense
experience
that
inspired
them
and
forms
their
touchstone.
This
is clearly
the
case
here,
where
we
move
from
Kepler's
geometrical
description
of
the motion
of
the
planet
Mars,
which
applies
to
the
other
planets
also,
to
the
highly abstract
ideas
of
force
and
mass
that
are
defined
contextually
in
terms
of
the theory's
other
primary
elements.
Einstein's
own
theory
of
relativity
takes
a
step further
in
this
direction. 14
In
the
end,
Einstein
writes,
we
get
'a
system
of
the greatest
conceivable
unity,
and
of
the
greatest
poverty
of
concepts
of
the
logical foundations.' 15
Hence,
rather
than
an
inference
to
a
plausible
hypothesis
(as
Peirce does)
or
an
inference
to
the
best
explanation
(as
Harman
and
Lipton
do),
the
search for
primary
concepts
and
principles
is
best
described
as
an
inference
to
the
greatest comprehension.
## 2.
The
Quest
for
Primary
Concepts
and
Primary
Principles
In
his
discussion
of
mechanics,
Hertz
said
precariously
little
about
how
we
find these
primary
concepts
and
principles
from
which
all
else
is
supposed
to
follow deductively. 16
The
task
at
hand
is
to
specify
a
small
number
of
logically
independent
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
257.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
349.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
294.
16
Admittedly,
Hertz
was
primarily
concerned
with
the
question
what
justifies
us
in maintaining
certain
systems,
and
not
in
the
question
how
its
primary
concepts
and
relations
were
discovered.
As
Hertz
well
knew,
how
the
primary
concepts
and relations
were
discovered
is
immaterial
to
the
system's
justification.
conceptual
elements
in
terms
of
which
all
our
sense
experience
can
be
ordered;
that is,
to
find
elements
that
are
simple
and
can
be
considered
basic.
For
instance,
in Newtonian
mechanics
velocity
is
not
a
logically
independent
concept,
as
it
is
a function
of
space
and
time.
Now
how
do
we
find
such
basic
elements?
One possibility
is
that
we
extract
them
from
experience.
This
is
in
essence
the empiricist's
answer.
Einstein
ascribes
this
view
to
Newton
whom
in
Einstein's
view 'still
believed
that
the
basic
concepts
and
laws
of
his
system
could
be
…
deduced from
experience
by
'abstraction'-that
is
to
say,
by
logical
means.' 17
For
instance, we
would
derive
the
primary
concept
of
space
a
posteriori
by
mentally
removing
all content
from
our
experience,
thus
creating
the
conception
of
empty
space.
By making
it
a logical derivation,
the
empiricist
further
implies
that
the
concepts
and principles
arrived
at
are
uniquely
determined
( eindeutig
Bestimmt )
by
our perception
of
the
external
world. Einstein
rejected
the
first
answer.
In
fact,
he
rejected
that
the
process
is
a
logical one
at
all,
whether
deductive
or
inductive,
and
he
denied
that
the
result
is
uniquely determined.
Observing
that
abstraction
and
generalization
require
us
to
make choices,
the
process
cannot
be
a
logical
one
and,
moreover,
allows
for
alternatives. Consequently,
the
most
we
can
say
is
that
our
sense
impressions
inspire,
or
hint
at, certain
concepts
and
principles.
In
Einstein's
view,
this
element
of
choice
suffices
to make
the
resulting
conceptions
free
creations
of
the
human
mind. 18
To
this
we
can further
add,
as
was
said
before,
that
when
our
theories
become
more comprehensive,
like
with
the
shift
from
Kepler
to
Newton,
the
primary
principles and
concepts
become
further
and
further
removed
from
our
sense
impressions,
and as
a
result
the
claim
that
we
get
them
the
way
empiricists
claim
we
do
becomes
less and
less
credible. A
second
answer
to
the
question
of
how
we
find
these
elements
is
that
they
are
a product
of
pure
reason-that
they
are
a
priori.
This
view
goes
back
at
least
to
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
273.
18
Albert
Einstein
and
Leopold
Infeld,
The
Evolution
of
Physics:
The
Growth
of
Ideas
From
Early
Concepts
to
Relativity
and
Quanta
33;
see
also
(New
York:
Simon
and
Schuster,
1942),
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
272.
Galileo
who
believed
that
keen
insight-what
he
called il
lume
naturale -supplemented
by
a
few
observations
and
experiments,
quickly
yields
them.
Galileo's great
successes
in
dynamics
gave
him
cause
to
be
optimistic,
and
writing
when
he did,
he
could
still
rely
on
a
rather
robust
notion
of
God
as
the
rational
creator
of
the universe
who
in
the
process
created
us
unto
his
own
image.
The
situation
Einstein found
himself
in
is
very
different.
The
notion
of
God
Galileo
relied
upon
was
no longer
plausible
and
the
role
of
choice
in
selecting
primary
principles
and
concepts had
become
much
more
pronounced,
especially
after
the
development
of
non-Euclidean
geometries
and
alternative
algebras.
Again,
the
result
is
a
view
where
the fundamental
concepts
and
postulates
of
physics
are
in
the
logical
sense
free inventions
of
the
human
mind,
and
they
are
so
without
a
plausible
backstory
on
why or
how
the
mind
can
come
to
comprehend
the
world
that
is
external
to
it. 19
Not
only does
this
mean
that
the
primary
principles
and
concepts
are
fictitious,
but
also
that any
attempt
to
deduce
them
logically
from
our
sense
experiences
is,
in
Einstein's words,
'doomed
to
failure.' 20
That
we
can
comprehend
the
world
appears
on
this view
indeed
utterly
incomprehensible.
3.
Abduction
When
calling
a
derivation
logical,
Einstein
is
purely
thinking
in
terms
of
deduction and
induction.
Since
neither
applies
to
the
process
by
which
we
obtain
the
primary principles
and
concepts,
how
we
do
obtain
them
can
thus
only
be
non--logical.
'The scientist,'
he
writes
'has
to
worm
[them]
out
of
nature
by
perceiving
in comprehensive
complexes
of
empirical
facts
certain
general
features
which
permit of
precise
formulation.' 21
For
Einstein,
the
primary
principles
and
concepts
are 'freely
chosen
conventions' 22
or
constructions
that
are
the
product
of
a
free
play
in the
imagination,
and
as
there
are
different
ways
of
doing
so,
they
are
'to
a
large
19
The
first
principles
and
concepts
are
a
priori,
but
not
in
the
old
sense
of
being necessary
or
analytic;
they
are
a
priori
only
relative
to
a
theory.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
274.
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
221.
22
Albert
Einstein,
'Autobiographical
Notes,'
in
Paul
Arthur
Schilpp
(ed.)
Einstein:
Philosopher-Scientist,
Albert
2
vols.
(New
York:
Harper
Torchbook,
1959),
1:13.
extent
arbitrary.' 23
Our
intuition
plays
a
central
role
here:
'only
intuition,
resting
on systematic
understanding
of
experience,
can
reach
them.' 24
As
such,
Einstein remarks,
they
do
not
sprout
from
a
'deliberate
intention
or
program,'
but
come 'straight
from
the
heart.' 25
Elsewhere
he
describes
'pure
thinking'
in
terms
of playing
the
violin
and
of
smoking
a
pipe
while
lounging
in
an
armchair. 26 This
all
being
said,
Einstein
does
give
some
general
guides
on
how
to
go
about finding
them,
and The
Evolution
of
Physics ,
a
book
he
wrote
with
Leopold
Infeld,
is
in part
an
attempt
to
gain
more
clarity
in
this
matter.
The
suggestion
that
there
might be
rules
raises
the
question
whether
this
decidedly
non--logical
process
that
Einstein grounded
in
our
intuition
could
be
recast
in
terms
of
abduction,
the
third
mode
of reasoning
Peirce
distinguished
besides
deduction
and
abduction,
and
if
so
where that
leaves
us.
So
let
us
thus
turn
our
eye
to
Peirce. For
Peirce,
logic
is
a
normative
science:
It
studies
deliberate
thinking
with
the aim
of
distinguishing
good
reasoning
from
bad
reasoning.
Peirce
further
added
that 'to
say
that
any
thinking
is
deliberate
is
to
imply
that
it
is
[self--]controlled
with
a view
to
making
it
conform
to
a
purpose
or
ideal.' 27
For
logic,
this
purpose
is
to
attain correct
representations,
which
is
in
line
with
Einstein's
ideas
about
the
purpose
of physics
discussed
earlier.
Peirce
further
maintained
a
naturalistic
account
of reasoning,
arguing
that
it
is
grounded
in
our
problem--solving
activity
and
the problem--solving
activity
of
many
more
generations
than
that
our
species
is
old. From
this
we
obtained
a
large
toolbox
of
practices
that
serve
us
very
well
in
our day--to--day
affairs.
It
is
this
toolbox
that
subsequently
becomes
the
subject
of
logic, conceived
as
the
study
of
how
we should reason
as
opposed
to
how
we
actually
do reason.
Now,
since
reasoning
developed
out
of
our
practical
dealings
with
the
world, it
is
far
from
clear
how
well
it
fares
when
applied
to
subjects
that
are
far
removed from
this,
as,
for
instance,
in
theoretical
physics,
where
our
common
sense
or
Ideas
and
Opinions
,
300.
Ideas
and
Opinions
25
Ibid.
26
Einstein
and
Infeld,
op.
cit.,
4f.
27
Peirce
Edition
Project
(ed.),
University
Press,
1998),
376.
The
Essential
Peirce,
,
227.
Vol.
2
(Bloomington:
Indiana intuition
often
fails
us.
Consequently,
it
is
in
such
areas
that
the
study
of
logic becomes
of
preeminent
importance. In
its
most
general
form,
abduction
can
be
captured
as
follows:
Some
surprising fact B is
observed.
If A were
true,
B
would
be
explicable
as
a
matter
of
course.
So
it
is at
least
plausible
that
A
is
true.
For
instance,
if
we
find
a
bag
of
beans
and
a
cup
of the
same
beans
beside
it,
it
is
reasonable
to
assume
that
the
beans
in
the
cup
came from
the
bag.
Similarly,
the
surprising
fact
of
the
retrograde
motion
of
Mars becomes
a
matter
of
course
once
we
assume
that
Mars
and
Earth
each
orbit
in
an ellipse
that
has
the
sun
at
one
of
its
foci.
In
that
sense
an
abductive
argument
takes the
surprise
out
of
a
surprizing
experience
by
raising
a
plausible
hypothesis
from which
the
experience
follows
as
a
matter
of
course.
As
both
examples
suggest, abduction
is
here
envisioned
in
a
way
that
remains
close
to
the
world
of
sensory observations
and
the
laws
that
can
be
abstracted
from
them,
such
as
Kepler's
first law,
which
is
a
favourite
example
of
Peirce. 28
Consequently,
it
is
not
immediately clear
whether
abduction
would
apply
also
to
the
kind
of
situations
that
Einstein
is talking
of. Even
though
Peirce
explicitly
admitted
that
abduction
'is
very
little
hampered
by logical
rules,' 29 he
still
considered
it
a
type
of
reasoning.
He
did
so
in
part
because
it is
one
of
three
ways
of
combining
rule,
case,
and
result
(deduction
and
induction being
the
other
two)
and
in
part
because
it
is
a
self--controlled
deliberate
process
in which
one
tries
to
gain
a
correct
or
at
least
a
plausible
representation,
or,
to
use Einstein's
term,
comprehension.
Peirce
further
used
the
three
ways
of
reasoning
to develop
a
general
recipe
for
science
that
resembles
Einstein's
portrayal
of theoretical
physics:
we
use
abduction
to
establish
an
explanatory
hypothesis,
then use
deduction
to
extract
as
many
consequences
of
it
as
possible,
and
finally
use induction
to
see
whether
these
consequences
match
our
sense
experiences.
28
See
e.g.
Peirce
Cornelis
de
Waal
(ed.),
The
Illustrations
of
the
Logic
of
Science
by
Charles
S.
(Chicago,
Open
Court,
2014).
29
Charles
Hartshorne
and
Paul
Weiss
(eds.),
The
Collected
Papers
of
Charles
Peirce,
Vol.
5
(Cambridge:
Harvard
University
Press,
1934),
sect.
188.
Before
exploring
whether
abduction
can
be
used
to
capture
how
Einstein's primary
principles
and
concepts
are
obtained,
we
should
see
why
we
are
so
good
at what
in
essence
comes
down
to
educated
guessing.
Peirce's
answer
is
that
we possess
an
instinct
for
it,
and
he
gives
an
evolutionary
explanation
for
why
this
is
so. He
writes
as
follows:
'if
the
universe
conforms,
with
any
approach
to
accuracy,
to certain
highly
pervasive
laws
or,
in
Einstein's
words,
if
the
universe
is comprehensible],
and
if
man's
mind
has
been
developed
under
the
influence
of those
laws,
it
is
to
be
expected
that
he
should
have
a natural
light, or light
of
nature , or instinctive
insight ,
or
genius,
tending
to
make
him
guess
those
laws
aright,
or nearly
aright.' 30
In
short,
we
possess
reason
because
the
world
does.
From
Peirce's view,
what
makes
the
comprehensibility
of
the
world
incomprehensible
to
Einstein is
that,
like
Galileo,
Einstein
makes
reason
into
something
that
is
independent,
even alien
to
the
world,
and
it
is
this
that
makes
the
successful
application
of
reasoning
to that
world
a
miracle,
especially
when
we
are
reasoning
a
priori. 31
For
Peirce,
in contrast,
abduction
is
possible
because
our
reason
is
the
internalization,
however limited
and
deficient,
of
the
comprehensibility
of
the
universe
itself,
and
accordingly it
becomes
the
task
of
logic
to
make
this
explicit
with
the
aim
of
distinguishing
good from
bad
abductions,
as
we
are
very
good
at
the
latter
too.
Peirce's
account
also suggests
that
abduction
is
more
reliable
when
it
remains
close
to
common
sense
and experience,
as
it
is
within
that
context
that
we
honed
our
talent
for
abduction.
This also
means
that
abduction
might
be
less
trustworthy
when
used
for
the
kind
of
task Einstein
is
talking
of,
especially
given
Peirce's
admission
that
abduction
'is
very little
hampered
by
logical
rules.' So
far
I
described
abduction
as
a
self--controlled
deliberate
process.
In
Peirce's view
this
is
not
all
there
is
to
it,
far
from
it.
In
common
perception
we
find
a tremendous
reduction
of
sensory
experience
that
follows
the
logic
of
abduction,
30
Op.
cit.,
sect.
604.
31
It
is
easier
for
Galileo
to
get
away
with
this
then
it
is
for
us
today.
Galileo
could conceive
of
reasoning
as
something
divine
or
supernatural,
while
maintaining
that
we-having
been
created
in
His
image-also
partake
in
this
divine
aspect,
even
if
in a
most
deficient
manner;
the
latter
because
our
limitations
as
mortals
and
the
various
ways
in
which
our
non--rational
elements
impede
and
distort
our
reasoning.
even
if
this
reduction
is
largely
if
not
entirely
unconscious. 32
So
perhaps
we
should say
that
abduction,
conceived
as
a deliberate process,
is
a
special
case
of
a
non-deliberate
process
that
is
far
more
pervasive
and
that
is
the
product
of
the concordant
development
of
mind
and
world.
It
also
means
that
a
situation
where
we arrive
at
a
conclusion
without
knowing
how
we
got
there
can
still
be
an
abductive and
hence
a logical process,
and
this
may
include
the
process
through
which
we
find successful
primary
principles
and
concepts
while
playing
the
violin
or
messing
with our
pipe-that
is,
by
very
deliberately not thinking
about
it.
Moreover,
the justification
of
this
process
lies
entirely
in
how
well
its
products
succeed,
not
in
the method
through
which
they
were
obtained. So
what,
then,
do
we
achieve
by
calling
it
a logical rather
than
a
non--logical process?
For
one
thing,
the
Peircean
way
of
looking
at
it
makes
the comprehensibility
of
the
world
again
comprehensible.
Moreover,
subjecting
it
to
the normative
science
of
logic
makes
it
a
process
that
can
be
inquired
into,
at
least
in principle,
and
thereby
it
avoids
the
charge
of
blocking
the
road
of
inquiry,
a
charge to
which
Einstein's
view
is
most
certainly
open.
Thirdly,
it
allows
for
the
formation of
rules,
or
guides,
and
means
for
evaluating
processes. One
might
object
that
by
subjecting
the
process
of
discovery
to
logic
one
is putting
constraints
on
what
should
be
a
free
flow
of
creativity.
There
are
at
least
two responses
to
this.
First,
as
Peirce
remarks,
abduction
is
'very
little
hampered
by logical
rules,'
and
second,
scientists
already
reject
many
fights
of
the
imagination.
If we
cannot
fall
back
on
logic,
as
defined
by
Peirce,
to
determine
which
flights
of
the imagination
are
to
be
taken
seriously
and
which
are
not,
it
seems
we
are
left
with the
intuitions
of
defenders
and
detractors,
prematurely
applied
preconceived notions
(including
those
of
funding
agencies),
existing
power
relations,
and
the
like. Another
objection,
already
hinted
at,
is
that
the
Peircean
notion
of
abduction remains
too
close
to
experience
to
be
truly
applicable
to
the
type
of
situation
32
There
is
even,
Peirce
writes
in
1908,
'some
dose
of
surprise
in
every
perception.'
Sheet
9
of
an
unpublished
manuscript
held
in
the
Houghton
Library
at
Harvard
University,
numbered
224
by
Richard
Robin
in
his of
Charles
S.
Peirce
Annotated
Catalogue
of
the
Papers
(Amherst:
University
of
Massachusetts
Press,
1967).
Einstein
is
talking
about,
which
is
far
removed
from
the
daily
observations
that
have shaped
our
instinct
for
guessing
right.
In
other
words,
to
treat
the
formation
of hypotheses
as
abductive
is
not
only
too
restrictive,
as
was
first
objected,
but
is
also prone
to
send
us
in
the
wrong
direction
by
suggesting
that
the
entire
universe
must somehow
resemble
the
world
that
we
routinely
experience.
To
this
objection
one may
counter
that
if
our
epistemological
faculty
is
a
function
of
the
comprehensibility of
the
universe,
and
if
it
this
development
took
place
not
just
during
the
age
of science
but
during
the
entire
history
of
our
species
and
all
its
forebears
down
to
its most
primitive
ancestors,
this
faculty
is
more
likely
to
be
reflective
of
the
inner
logic of
the
world
than
to
be
restricted
solely
to
what
can
be
surmised
through
our surface
interactions
with
that
world
through
those
most
remarkable
abductive machines
that
we
have
come
to
call
our
senses. To
conclude,
Peirce's
conception
of
abduction
can
provide
us
with
an
account
of the
comprehensibility
of
the
universe,
and
it
does
so
in
a
naturalistic
way
that avoids
blocking
the
road
of
inquiry.
The
logic
of
abduction
gives
us
a
framework
for deliberately
second--guessing
our
guessing
instinct
with
the
aim
of
developing guides
for
the
formation
of
new
hypotheses,
including
those
Einsteinian
primary principles
and
concepts
that
give
us
dynamic
a
priori
frameworks
in
terms
of
which our
sense
experiences
could
be
understood.