802 LOGIC
units which are themselves highly complex products, only to be formed by a kind of thought not recognized among logical processes.[1]
36. Formal logic, then, in the ordinary acceptation of that term, does not appear to furnish any adequate representation of the real process and method of thought. Any logical theory must of necessity be formal, i.e., abstract or general, for it can consider only the general elements of thought, not specific knowledge in which are involved the finite, limited relations of one fact or class of facts to another. The distinction between logic and the sciences is therefore precisely that between philosophy in general and the sciences. Attempts have been made to include in logical analysis the treatment of scientific method, i.e., to discuss as matter of logic the varied processes by which scientific results have been attained. It is true that logical consideration must extend to the notions through which scientific experience, like any other, becomes intelligible, and, in so far as scientific method is but the application of the laws of knowledge as a whole, it is a possible, nay necessary, object of logical treatment. But to include scientific methodology in particular, the consideration of the mechanical devices by which we strive to bring experience into conformity with our ideal of cognition, the discussion of methods of experiment and observation, under the one head logic is an error in principle, whether we view logic in its theoretical aspect or in reference to a special propædeutic aim. Generalizations on such topics are well-nigh worthless; they can have vitality and importance only when drawn in closest conjunction with actual scientific work. The theory of scientific method is either doctrine of knowledge treated freely or else the application of thought in connexion with actual research and the ascertainment of the principles therein employed. In either case it is not susceptible of abstraction and isolated treatment.
37. There remains only, of the possible views noted, that which identified logic with the theory of knowledge, but which so defined theory of knowledge as to distinguish it from metaphysics. The designation of logic as theory of knowledge is one to which in words there can be no possible objection. It brings into the foreground what it has been the object of this article, by an historico-critical survey, to establish, that so-called logical laws, forms, and problems are hardly capable of statement, certainly incapable of satisfactory treatment, except in the most intimate connexion with the principles of a theory of knowledge. To include, however, in the signification of this latter term a peculiar conception of the relation between thinking (knowing) and reality is at once to restrict the scope of logic and to place an arbitrary and, one would say, an ill-founded restriction on the kind of treatment to which logical problems may be subjected. If it be really the function of logic to trace the forms and laws of knowledge, that function is all-comprehensive, and must embrace in its scope all the fundamental characteristics of experience as known. But no characteristic of experience is more palpable than the distinction, drawn within conscious experience, between knowledge and reality. It is impossible then for a theory of knowledge to start with the assumption that these two exist separately, constituted each after its special fashion, but with a certain parallelism between them. In words one may refer for justification of the assumption to metaphysics, or to psychology, but, in fact, the problem so relegated to some other discipline is essentially a logical question, and the method of its solution exactly that which must be applied in the treatment of subordinate logical questions. Practical convenience alone can lead to any separation of the problems which under this view are referred in part to theory of knowledge and in part to metaphysics. Other and more serious difficulties of the view have been already commented on.[2]
38. In sum, then, the problems and the methods which compose logic in the strictest sense of that term seem to be one with the problems and methods of the critical theory of knowledge. No other title describes so appropriately as that of "logical" the analysis of knowledge as such, its significance and constitution, in opposition to the quasi-historical or genetic account for which the title psychological should be retained. The researches to which we would here assign the title "logical" undoubtedly include all that can supply the place of the older metaphysic, but in aim and method are so distinct that the same title cannot be borne by both. To assign so extensive a range to logical investigations enables us to see that the criteria by which at one time or another a narrower province was determined for logic are but partial expressions of the whole truth. The analysis of knowledge as such, the complete theory of the intelligible elements in conscious experience, does hold a special relation to all other subordinate branches of human thinking, whether philosophic in the ordinary sense of that term or scientific. According as one or other aspect of this relation is made prominent, there comes forward one or other of the various modes for settling the province of logic; but these partial conceptions prove their inadequacy when development is attempted from them, and within the systems constructed in accordance with them there is of necessity continuous reference to inquiries lying beyond the prescribed limits.
A certain analysis of some methods of ordinary thinking, based to a very large extent on language, and resembling in many respects grammatical study, has long been current in educational practice as logic, and to those whose conception of the subject has been formed from acquaintance with this imperfect body of rules and formula; it may appear a violent and unnecessary extension of the term to apply it to the all-comprehensive theory of knowledge. The reasons, however, are imperative; and, as these would lead one to deny the right of this elementary practical discipline to the possession of the title, it is desirable to conclude by offering a single remark on the place and function of this currently designated logic.
Not much trouble is required in order to see that the ordinary school or formal logic can lay no claim to scientific completeness. Its principles are imperfect, dubious, and most variously conceived; it possesses no method by which development from these principles is possible; it has no criterion by which to test the adequacy of its abstract forms as representations of the laws of concrete thinking. Accordingly it is handled, in whole and in detail, in the most distractingly various fashion, and were it indeed entitled to the honourable designation of logic the prospects of that science might well be despaired of. But in fact the school logic discharges a function for which exhaustiveness of logical analysis is not a requisite. It has a raison d'être in the circumstance that training to abstract methods must needs be a graduated process, and that, whether as a means towards the prosecution of philosophic study in especial, or as instrument of general educational value, practice in dealing with abstract thoughts must have value. Such elementary practice naturally bases itself on the kinds of distinction apparent in the concrete thinking of those to whom it is applied, and for this reason school logic not only connects itself with and is in a sense the development of grammar and grammatical analysis and synthesis, but may, to a limited extent, include reference to some of the simpler processes of scientific method. In all probability the discord observable among the ordinary treatises on school logic is due to the want of recognition of the true place which can thus be assigned to the subject treated. The doctrine has a propædeutic but not a scientific value.
NOTE A.
Histories of Logic. – No complete history of logic, apart from philosophy in general, exists; but of the Aristotelian logic, in its system and in its development throughout the ancient and mediæval epochs we possess a most adequate history in Prantl's Geschichte der Logik im Abendlande (i., 1855; ii., 1861; iii., 1867; iv., 1870), extending to the close of the mediæval period.
The following are some of the more important contributions towards a history of logic, whether in independent works or in portions of systematic treatises; most of them, indeed, of small value: – Ramus, Scholæ Dialecticæ, bk. i. chaps. 1-8; Keckermann, Systema Logicæ, 1598; Gassendi, Opera, i. 35-66; Fabricius, Specimen elenchicum historiæ logicæ, 1699; Walch, Parerga Academica (1721), pp. 453-848; Darjes, Via ad Veritatem, appendix, 1755; Buhle, in Commentat. Soc. Getting., vol. x.; Fulleborn, Beiträge z. Gesch. d. Phil. (1794), pt. iv. pp. 160-80; Eberstein, Gesch. d. Logik u. Metaphysik bei den Deutschen von Leibnitz bis auf gegenwärtige Zeit (2d ed., 1794), useful as a survey of the Wolffian logics; Calker, Denklehre (1822), pp. 12-198; Bachmann, System, der Logik (1828), pp. 569-644; Mussmann, De Logicæ ac Dialecticæ notione historica, 1828; Troxler, Logik (1830), vol. iii.;Sigwart, De historia logicæ inter Græcos usque ad Socratem, 1832; St Hilaire, De la Logique d'Aristote (1838), ii. pp. 93-312; Franck, Esquisse d'une histoire de la logique, 1838; Reiffenberg, Principes de logique, 1839 (with bibliography); Trendelenburg, Gesch. d. Kateqorienlehre, 1846; Blakey, History of Logic, and Essay on Logic (2d ed., 1848), with bibliographical appendix; Hoffmann, Grundzüge einer Geschichte der Begriff der Logik in Deutschland von Kant bis Baader, 1851; K. Fischer, Logik u. Metaphysik (2d ed., 1865), pp. 16-182, a valuable critique of some modern doctrines; Rabus, Logik und Metaphysik (1868), i. pp. 123-242, excellent; Ueberweg, System der Logik (4th ed., 1874), pp. 15-66, excellent critical account; Ragnisco, Storia critica delle Kategorie, 1871, 2 vols.; Rabus, Die neuesten Bestrebungen auf dem Gebiete der Logik bei den Deutschen, 1880; Harms, Geschichte der Logik, 1881; Venn, Symbolic Logic, 1881 (introduction, and pp. 405-444), a valuable contribution to the history and bibliography of the application of symbolic methods in logic. The only good bibliography of logic is that given by Rabus in his Logik u. Metaphysik, i. pp. 453-518. Some of the older lexicons, e.g., Lipenius, Bibliotheca Realis (1685), s. vv. "Logica," "Organon," "Dialectica," contain great store of bibliographical references. A complete bibliography is a desideratum.
NOTE B.
Hindu Systems of Logic. – In almost all the Hindu systems of philosophy, as these are classified by the most recent authorities, indications are to be found of a more or less developed analysis of the process or method of reasoning, and therefore of a certain amount of logical theory. In two systems in particular the logical element is the most prominent feature. The Nyâya, or logical doctrine of Gotama, is in a very special sense the Hindu logic, while in the Vaiseschika, or Atomist system of Kanada, there are many expansions of or additions to the Nyâya, though the prevailing interest is not logical.
The most accessible sources of information regarding the Hindu logic, Colebrooke's Essays, and Professor M. Müller's abstract (in the appendix to Archbishop Thomson's Laws of Thought), tend to mingle in an undesirable fashion what is special to the Nyâya doctrine, and what is added by Kanada and his followers. In order to appreciate the extent to which the analysis of reasoning has been carried in these early systems, it is advisable to restrict attention to the original exposition of the Nyâya.
The aim of Nyâya is the attainment of perfection, of bliss, through knowledge. But, to have knowledge in a systematic and complete fashion, it is requisite that the individual should know (or should be capable of organizing
