Charles S.

Peirce
[On Time and Thought]
MS 215 (Robin 377): Writings 3, 68-71
March, 1873
Available at Arisbe: The Peirce Gateway, http://www.cspeirce.com/menu/library/bycsp/logic/ms215.htm
Accessed 1 May 2011

March 8. 73

Every mind which passes from doubt to belief must have ideas which
follow after one another in time. Every mind which reasons must have ideas
which not only follow after others but are caused by them. Every mind
which is capable of logical criticism of its inferences, must be aware of this
determination of its ideas by previous ideas. But is it pre-supposed in the
conception of a logical mind, that the temporal succession in its ideas is
continuous, and not by discrete steps? A continuum such as we suppose
time and space to be, is defined as something any part of which itself has
parts of the same kind. So that the point of time or the point of space is
nothing but the ideal limit towards which we approach, but which we can
never reach in dividing time or space; and consequently nothing is true of a
point which is not true of a space or a time. A discrete quantum, on the
other hand, has ultimate parts which differ from any other part of the
quantum in their absolute separation from one another. If the succession of
images in the mind is by discrete steps, time for that mind will be made up
of indivisible instants. Any one idea will be absolutely distinguished from
every other idea by its being present only in the passing moment. And the
same idea can not exist in two different moments, however similar the ideas
felt in the two different moments may, for the sake of argument, be allowed
to be. Now an idea exists only so far as the mind thinks it; and only when it
is present to the mind. An idea therefore has no characters or qualities but
what the mind thinks of it at the time when it is present to the mind. It
follows from this that if the succession of time were by separate steps, no
idea could resemble another; for these ideas if they are distinct, are present
to the mind at different times. Therefore at no time when one is present to
the mind, is the other present. Consequently the mind never compares them
nor thinks them to be alike; and consequently they are not alike; since they
are only what they are thought to be at the time when they are present. It
may be objected that though the mind does not directly think them to be
alike; yet it may think together reproductions of them, and thus think them
to be alike. This would be a valid objection were it not necessary, in the first
place, in order that one idea should be the representative of another, that it
should resemble that idea, which it could only do by means of some
representation of if again, and so on to infinity; the link which is to bind the
first two together which are to be pronounced alike, never being found. In
short the resemblance of ideas implies that some two ideas are to be
thought together which are present to the mind at different times. And this
never can be, if instants are separated from one another by absolute steps.
This conception is therefore to be abandoned, and it must be acknowledged
to be already presupposed in the conception of a logical mind that the flow
of time should be continuous. Let us consider then how we are to conceive
what is present to the mind. We are accustomed to say that nothing is
present but a fleeting instant, a point of time. But this is a wrong view of the
matter because a point differs in no respect from a space of time, except
that it is the ideal limit which, in the division of time, we never reach. It can
not therefore be that it differs from an interval of time in this respect that
what is present is only in a fleeting instant, and does not occupy a whole
interval of time, unless what is present be an ideal something which can
never be reached, and not something real. The true conception is, that ideas
which succeed one another during an interval of time, become present to
the mind through the successive presence of the ideas which occupy the
parts of that time. So that the ideas which are present in each of these parts
are more immediately present, or rather less mediately present than those
of the whole time. And this division may be carried to any extent. But you
never reach an idea which is quite immediately present to the mind, and is
not made present by the ideas which occupy the parts of the time that it
occupies. Accordingly, it takes time for ideas to be present to the mind.
They are present during a time. And they are present by means of the
presence of the ideas which are in the parts of that time. Nothing is
therefore present to the mind in an instant, but only during a time. The
events of a day are less mediately present to the mind than the events of a
year; the events of a second less mediately present than the events of a day.

It remains to show that, adopting this conception, the possibility of the

resemblance of two ideas becomes intelligible; and that therefore it is not
inconceivable that one idea should follow after another, according to a
general rule. In the first place, then, it is to be observed that under this
conception, two ideas may be both present to the mind during a longer
interval, while they are separately present in shorter intervals which make
up the longer interval. During this longer interval they are present to the
mind as different. They are thought as different. And this longer interval
embraces still shorter intervals than those hitherto considered, during
which there are ideas which agree in the respects which are defined by each
of the two ideas, which are seen to be different. During the longer interval
therefore, the ideas of these shortest intervals are thought as partly alike
and partly different. There is therefore no difficulty in the conception of the
resemblance of ideas. Let us now see what is necessary in order that ideas
should determine one another, and that the mind should be aware that they
determine one another. In order
that there should be any likeness among ideas, it is necessary, that during
an interval of time there should be some constant element in thought or
feeling. If I imagine something red, it requires a certain time for me to do so.
And if the other elements of the image vary during that time, in one part it
must be invariable, it must be constantly red. And therefore it is proper to
say that the-idea of red is present to the mind at every instant. For we are
not now saying that an idea is present to the mind in an instant in the
objectionable sense which has been referred to above, according to which
an instant would differ from an interval of time; but we are only saying that
the idea is present at an instant, in the sense that it is present in every part
of a certain interval of time; however short that part may be. The first thing
that is requisite to a logical mind, is that there should be elements of
thought which are present at instants in this sense. The second thing that is
requisite is, that what is present one instant should have an effect upon
what is present during the lapse of time which follows that instant. This
effect can only be a reproduction of a part of what was present at the
instant; because what is present at the instant, is present during an interval
of time during the whole of which the effect will be present. And therefore
since all that is present during this interval is present at each instant, it
follows that the effect of what is present at each instant is present at that
instant. So that this effect is a part of the idea which produces it. In other
words, it is merely a reproduction of a part of that idea. This effect is
memory, in its most elementary form. But something more than this is
required in order that the conclusion shall be produced from a premise;
namely, an effect produced by the succession of one idea upon another. •