Re: [port-peer-review] reviews

Peirce: CP 2.105 Cross-Ref:††
§5. SPECULATIVE RHETORIC †1

   105. All this brings us close to Methodeutic, or Speculative Rhetoric. The practical want of a good treatment of this subject is acute. It is not expected that any general doctrine shall teach men much about methods of solving problems that are familiar to them. But in problems a little remote from those to which they are accustomed, it is remarkable how not merely common minds, but those of the very highest order, stumble about helplessly. No class of thinkers can by anybody be rated higher in heuretic genius than the mathematicians; and yet see how they have boggled over comparatively simple problems of unfamiliar kinds, such as Fermat's theorems, Steiner's theorems, the problem of map-coloring, the theory of knots.
Peirce: CP 2.106 Cross-Ref:††
   106. Many persons will think that there are other ways of acquiring skill in the art of inquiry which will be more instructive than the logical study of the theory of inquiry. That may be; I shall not dispute it; for it would carry me far beyond the confines of my province. I only claim that however much one may learn in other ways of the method of attacking an unfamiliar problem, something may be added to that knowledge by considering the general theory of how research must be performed. At the same time, it is this theory itself, for itself, which will here be the principal object.
Peirce: CP 2.107 Cross-Ref:††
   107. In coming to Speculative Rhetoric, after the main conceptions of logic have been well settled, there can be no serious objection to relaxing the severity of our rule of excluding psychological matter, observations of how we think, and the like. The regulation has served its end; why should it be allowed now to hamper our endeavors to make methodeutic practically useful? But while the justice of this must be admitted, it is also to be borne in mind that there is a purely logical doctrine of how discovery must take place, which, however great or little is its importance, it is my plain task and duty here to explore. In addition to this, there may be a psychological account of the matter, of the utmost importance and ever so extensive. With this, it is not my business here to meddle; although I may here and there make such use of it as I can in aid of my own doctrine.
Peirce: CP 2.108 Cross-Ref:††
   108. Time was when a theorem could constitute a considerable contribution to mathematical science. But now new theorems are turned out wholesale. A single treatise will contain hundreds of them. Nowadays methods alone can arrest attention strongly; and these are coming in such flocks that the next step will surely be to find a method of discovering methods.†1 This can only come from a theory of the method of discovery. In order to cover every possibility, this should be founded on a general doctrine of methods of attaining purposes, in general; and this, in turn, should spring from a still more general doctrine of the nature of teleological action, in general.†2
Peirce: CP 2.109 Cross-Ref:††
   109. Although the number of works upon Methodeutic since Bacon's Novum Organum has been large, none has been greatly illuminative. Bacon's work was a total failure, eloquently pointing out some obvious sources of error, and to some minds stimulating, but affording no real help to an earnest inquirer. THE book on this subject remains to be written; and what I am chiefly concerned to do is to make the writing of it more possible.
Peirce: CP 2.110 Cross-Ref:††
   110. I do not claim that the part of the present volume which deals with Speculative Rhetoric will approach that ideal. As to the other parts of my book, this prefatory chapter commits me to producing a work of great importance or to being set down a drawler of nonsense.