Abstract
This article traces the evolution of C. S. Peirce’s notion of abduction and proposes an interpretation of this evolution in light of the philosopher’s own theory of categories. It shows the shift from the inferential and propositional model developed in On a New List of Categories in 1867 and Some Consequences of Four Incapacities in 1868, focused on the category of Firstness (quality) to the post-1890 evenemential model. In this post-1890 model, Firstnesses, events expressed by the verb of the proposition, are generated in their opposition to other Firstnesses (the relation of Secondnesses) from a tendency to action or general habit, Thirdness. Parallel to this, the article also shows the shift from the first formulation of the notion of abduction, which replaced the multiplicity of qualities with a comprehensive predicate that implied all of them to the discovery of the diagrammatic reasoning and Logic of Relatives, which confers greater importance to the category of Thirdness and transforms the abductive movement into a transductive one.
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