"We"
in my writing generally refers to "all people". Since I do not
believe anyone should do anything that is not his or her choice, my statement
that we do think in threes is an assumption not an instruction. My reasons for
coming to this are frankly the fruit of my relatively recent encounter with
Peirce. Although I would describe my thinking over time as pragmaticist, I
never thought about how we think until I was exposed to the triadic thinking of
Peirce. Quite simply it seemed utterly obvious that it made a difference if you
think in twos or in threes. If you think in twos you see one side or another.
Binary. If you think in threes you have always a third possibility and
triangles can be iterated infinitely.
Now
at what point did I also come to think that we do think in threes? I have been
at this for only a short time, perhaps three years. I inferred that this is the
case from a look at history. It is those who have found a third way that have
made progress. That is certainly one element on the contention. You could call
it as Niebuhr did our capacity for transcendence.
As
to logic - I believe that triadic thinking is conscious thinking and that
everyone should think in threes, but that the number who consistently do is at
present small and difficult to determine. I certainly do not think that
everyone should be made to think thus.
I
do not think, incidentally, that logic is about what we must do. I think logic
is about what makes the most sense.
Triadic
thinking is entirely an optional process and it involves, for me at least,
thinking about more than three particular matters or terms. What makes the
method triadic is that it encloses its stages in three related terms which I
call the root triad - reality, ethics, aesthetics. To get through a conscious
process using this triad, I would consider a sign and the word that expresses
it and then an index of values of which there are four and then an action or
expression which I relate to a linked term truth-beauty or beauty-truth. The
whole process is a meditational or musement-like exercise grounded in the
assumed efficacy of its elements to produce positive results.
Finally,
it seems to me that what I am trying to do is not to specify what constitutes
the optimal means of resolving philosophical questions or indeed any other
question that depends on an extended articulation of categories. My effort is
the modest one of seeking to provide to the ordinary person a viaticum on a
journey to truth and beauty, to reiterate a phrase from Kenneth Burke. Is this
pragmatic? I would not dare claim it since as I have indicated I am not seeking
to abide by the pragmatic maxim's limitations. I am trying to arrive at a
measurable means of proving out the power of memorial maxims to positively
affect the course of history.
