Charles Peirce's The Doctrine of Necessity Examined Essay

Charles Peirce's The Doctrine of Necessity Examined - Essay Example Charles S. Peirce wonders whether we necessarily have to see or notice signal effects of some element that may have happened by pure chance so that to ascertain that real chance exists. He wonders whether there are some occurrences or effects that may have gone unnoticed or unobserved. He gives an example of how physicists claim that gas particles move about randomly, considerably as if by pure chance, and that by the assumption of probabilities, there certainly will be situations contrary to the second law of thermodynamics whereby concentrations of heat in the gases lead to explosive mixtures, which must at the time have tremendous effects. He claims this assumption could be false because it has never happened like that. â€Å"What we are, that only can we see† (Dickinson). This is a popular quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson from his publication, Nature. Emerson believed in facts. Emersonian philosophy seemingly emphasized on seeing, and perception. Emerson would, therefore, prob ably support Charles on this argument, because Charles insists that he cannot support or believed in things that allegedly happened without any evidence or that have never happened. Another argument of Charles S. Peirce about this issue is that he is not of the belief that there is any person who can ascertain that the precise, universal compliance of facts to natural law is proved evidently, or depicted particularly possible, by any observations made so far. He noted that those in support of the doctrine of exact regularity used hypotheses other than proven experimental result of facts to support their arguments. He, therefore, dismissed this notion as it shows high levels of poor reasoning. Charles affirms that, sometimes people cannot help to believe a given proposition. However, he noted that this was of collective thinking which is wrong. Some people conclude a proposition to be true while others look at it as â€Å"we† instead of â€Å"I†. This leads to the propo sition being true to certain people and wrong to others depending on their levels of ignorance, or the evidence they have. He calls this problem â€Å"inability to conceive† and claims that every man passes through this stage with respect to the number of beliefs they have. The mind of man is sometime subjected to this blind coercion, but it is cast off as time goes through rigorous thinking. As a result, Charles confirms that, the things that are not conceivable today will turn out to be indisputable in future. This is supported by the countercultural philosophy of Emerson whereby he lobbied to create a structure of a form of life that will go past the status quo expectations and thinking models. This was in favour of deeply independent and creative manifestations of universal truths. This, he argued, will also help solve the problem of inability to conceive by stating, â€Å"Every man has a form of mind peculiar to himself.† The author confirms that the principles of mechanics are indeed natural beliefs, which have been confirmed by experience. The only problem is that those that were formulated long time ago were exceedingly erroneous. As a result, they need to be continually corrected and purified from natural illusions. This process of products adapting to recognizable usefulness or ends, as seen in nature, is never quite perfect. The author, therefore, finds this argument well

Social Norms vs. Nature Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Social Norms vs. Nature - Essay Example Their inner self connects and they find what they were looking for, in each other’s souls. Annie Proulx implies in Brokeback Mountain that when Jack and Ennis shy away from their natural urges they perish. Suppressing what is natural to them causes them pain and suffering that leads to the demise of their love, on the other hand, Anton Chekhov portrays how a man (Dmitri) pursues what is natural to him and embraces his natural urges with open arms, and in the end finds his true love. In the story The Lady with the Lapdog, Chekhov creates the setting for romantic spark between the two characters Dmitri and the lady. Dmitri’s romantic yearnings are simply unquenchable. He is bored with his wife and constantly seeks the love and affection of other women but never sticks with one. He constantly hunts down â€Å"fresh romance† as the old ones get on his nerves. This might sound unromantic but this is what Dmitri feels deep down inside. He doesn’t love his wife; to Dmitri she is too stiff and boring. This is the context as intelligent readers can guess that either Dmitri will start an affair with the lady, Anna, or at least the desire to have one will burn in his heart. The nature of Dmitri and the way he has transformed into a womanizer predicts that he will look for more chances of betraying his wife. Similarly, in the story Brokeback Mountain, the romance takes place between two men, Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist, a homosexual romance which has absolutely no place in their society. It is obvious that what these two men feel, they will try to get it and in turn betray the social norms. That is how the setting of both these short stories builds a perfect setting for infidelity. However in The Lady with the Lapdog, the author plays with the pre-defined roles of characters, as when Dmitri and Anna hookup, they both fear the same thing, is the other person really interested or he is in it for the time being? This is the part where the readers predict that knowing Dmitri’s nature, he is in it for the game, he is bored as always and seeks new romance but as the story progresses things get more complicated than Dmitri’s simple urge to stay away from home and cheat on her wife, an aging seducer. In the book, The Lady with the Lapdog, the motivation for infidelity is not something that the society would look up to. Dmitri is on the verge of breaking up with his wife. He is simply frustrated by his wife’s cold nature and feels betrayed himself. He doesn’t consider it to be unjust to wander around and have flings with other women; he thinks he is taking revenge on his wife. Although there is not one motive for Dmitri’s disloyalty, however one factor that stands out is that Dmitri was not that much into his marriage from the beginning. He just stood in awe of her when they wedded but the wife’s imposing nature lingered on. She considered herself a â€Å"thinker† and used to call h er husband not by his real name but called him â€Å"Dimitri†. Dmitri probably felt emasculated by her actions, and that is why he preferred staying away from home. But the motive for infidelity in the Brokeback Mountain is in drastic contrast to Dmitri’s situation. Ennis and Jack are portrayed as characters struggling with their affectionate feeling toward each other but on the other hand, feeling afraid of being called homosexual.