[6.6.] Tychism.[1]

 

Peirce closes “The Architecture of Theories” with the following summary of his view of the evolution of the universe:

 

… in the beginning—infinitely remote—there was a chaos of unpersonalized feeling, which being without connection or regularity would properly be without existence. This feeling, sporting here and there in pure arbitrariness, would have started the germ of a generalizing tendency. Its other sportings would be evanescent, but this would have a growing virtue. Thus, the tendency to habit would be started; and from this, with the other principles of evolution, all the regularities of the universe would be evolved. At any time, however, an element of pure chance survives and will remain until the world becomes an absolutely perfect, rational, and symmetrical system, in which mind is at last crystallized in the infinitely distant future. (EP 1:297, CP 6.33, emphasis added)

 

In the second Peirce’s cosmological papers, “The Doctrine of Necessity Examined” (EP 1:298-311, 1892), he discusses this “pure chance” at greater length.

[Additional reading for this topic: “Design and Chance” (EP 1:215-224, 1883-4); “One, Two, Three: Kantian Categories” (EP 1:242-244, 1886).]

 

 

[6.6.1.] Explaining the Theory.

 

In this paper Peirce defends

 

tychism (df.): the view that there is real chance in the universe; not all events are causally determined to happen the way they do by preceding events; some events happen without being caused to happen.

 

When Peirce asserts the reality of chance, he does not mean “ordinary” chance, the sort of chance involved in games like dice...

 

ordinary chance  = chance “relative to the causes that are taken into account.” (EP1:219, 1883-4) For example, the act of my throwing a pair of dice, considered on its own, does not determine exactly which number will come up. The exact number is determined not just by my throw, but by causes other than the throw itself.

 

Ordinarily, when we say that the roll of dice involves chance, we mean simply that the factors that together determine how the dice will land (their weight and shape; their position as they leave my hand; their speed; wind resistance; the density, texture, etc. of the surface on which they land; etc.) are simply too complicated for us to take all of them into account. This is why we cannot predict accurately how they will land. How they will land is a matter of “chance” only in that it is not completely determined by the limited set of influences we do take into account.

 

If ordinary chance is the only sort of chance there is, then, by taking into account all of the influences on the dice, how they will land is not a matter of chance at all—it is completely determined.

 

Peirce’s tychism asserts something other than the reality of ordinary chance; it asserts the reality of what Peirce calls

 

absolute chance  = a real violation of a law of nature.[2]

 

So Peirce’s tychism implies that determinism is false:

 

determinism (a.k.a. causal determinism) (df.): the view that everything that happens is causally determined to happen exactly the way that it does by preceding events and the laws of nature that govern those events.

 

As Peirce puts it, determinism (or as he calls it “the doctrine of necessity” or necessitarianism) is the view that

 

the state of things existing at any time, together with certain immutable laws, completely determine the state of things at every other time (for a limitation to future time is indefensible). Thus, given the state of the universe in the original nebula, and given the laws of mechanics, a sufficiently powerful mind could deduce from these data the precise form of every curlicue of every letter I am now writing. (“The Doctrine of Necessity Examined,” 1892, EP 1:299, CP 6.37)[3]

 

Determinism implies that the universe is like a giant clock: given the state of things in the clock at one time (call it time 1), and given the laws of physics that mandate how physical objects always behave, there is one and only one way things can be in the clock at the very next moment (time 2).

 

If determinism is true, then everything that currently happens, or ever will happen, was determined to happen at the very beginning of the universe. Your presence in this classroom right now (or in front of a computer screen reading these words) is an unavoidable consequence of the original physical state of things (paired with the unchanging laws of nature that govern all physical events).

 

If determinism is true, it poses a serious threat to the belief that people have free will. A great deal of energy has been spent in the modern period, and especially in the 20^th c., arguing either about whether free will is compatible with determinism, and if so, how.

 

On Peirce’s view, at least some things that happen are not completely determined to happen just as they do by preceding events and natural laws. There is an element of absolute chance at work in the world. In other words, not all events are governed by laws. Natural law is not active everywhere and in all circumstances.

 

But violations of laws of nature are not common or obvious. They happen only on “rare sporadic occasions,” and laws are “violated in some infinitesimal degree.” (EP 1:219, 1883-4)

 

 

[6.6.2.] Against Determinism.

 

Peirce considers and rejects a number of arguments in support of determinism:

 

1. Determinism is a “postulate” or “presupposition” of scientific reasoning. (EP 1:300, CP 6.39). In other words, scientists in fact assume that determinism is true and do so as a basis of their scientific inquiry.

 

Peirce’s first response: The fact that a claim is postulated (assumed to be true) by people engaged in scientific inquiry

 

does not make it true, nor so much as afford the slightest rational motive for yielding it any credence. It is as if a man should come to borrow money, and when asked for his security, should reply he “postulated” the loan. To “postulate” a proposition is no more than to hope it is true. (EP 1:300, CP 6.39)

 

Peirce’s second response: in fact, science does not presuppose the truth of determinism:

 

Considering, too, that the conclusions of science make no pretence to being more than probable, and considering that a probable inference can at most only suppose something to be most frequently, or otherwise approximately, true, but never that anything is precisely true without exception throughout the universe, we see how far this proposition in truth is from being so postulated. (EP 1:300, 6.39)

 

 

2. Necessitarianism is shown to be, if not true, then probable, by observation of nature.

 

“The essence of the necessitarian position is that certain continuous quantities have certain exact values.” (EP1:303, CP 6.44) And it is impossible to determine by way of observation the value of a continuous quantity “with a probable error of absolutely nil” (EP 1:303, CP 6.44). So “any statement to the effect that a certain continuous quantity has a certain exact value, if well-founded at all, must be founded on something other than observation.” (EP 1:304, CP 6.44))

 

Observations that are typically cited as evidence of “mechanical causation” show only that “there is an element of regularity in nature.” They imply nothing as to whether that regularity is exact and universal, as determinism requires.

 

And in fact, says Peirce, our actual observations are opposed to determinism’s claim that everything happens according to exact laws:

 

Nay, in regard to this exactitude, all observation is directly opposed to it; and the most that can be said is that a good deal of this observation can be explained away. Try to verify any law of nature, and you will find that the more precise your observations, the more certain they will be to show irregular departures from the law. We are accustomed to ascribe these, and I do not say wrongly, to errors of observation; yet we cannot usually account for such errors in any antecedently probable way. Trace their causes back far enough and you will be forced to admit they are always due to arbitrary determination, or chance. (EP 1:304-305, CP 6.46)

 

 

Stopping point for Monday October 8. For next time, finish reading “The Doctrine of Necessity Examined” (EP 1:305-11).