Table of Contents

Foreword by Nathan Houser

Preface

Acknowledgments

1
Peirce's Cosmogonic Philosophy

2
Mind

3
Signs

4
Belief, Reality, and Truth

5
Esthetics, Ethics, and Logic

6
Philosophical Sentimentalism

Notes

Index

Promotional Information

A clear and succinct exposition of Charles S. Peirce's theory of everything.

About the Author

JOHN K. SHERIFF is Ernest E. Leisy Professor of English at Bethel College. He is the author of The Fate of Meaning: Charles Peirce, Structuralism, and Literature; The Good-Natured Man: The Evolution of a Moral Ideal, 1660–1800; and articles on semiotics and literary theory.

Reviews

Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) is today best known as the propounder of a theory of meaning made famous by William James and known as pragmatism. Peirce's corpus, however, covers almost all fields of philosophy, including logic, mathematics, metaphysics, cosmology, ontology, semiotics, ethics, and aesthetics. For the heading in a draft of a book that would give a comprehensive overview of his thinking, Peirce wrote "A Guess at the Riddle" and included a reference to the Sphinx as pondering the meaning and purpose of human existence. Sheriff (English, Bethel Coll.) here tries to give us Peirce's answer to that riddle, but he is clearly not up to the job. He quotes from Peirce's admittedly difficult writing, but his explanations do not really explain, and the reader of this book will come away as puzzled about Peirce's answer as he was before reading it. Not recommended.-Leon H. Brody, U.S. Office of Personnel Management Lib., Washington, D.C.