402.14 Prof. Osborn,] Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935), American paleontologist. Osborn's letter to the New York Times appeared on Sunday, 6 April 1890, on p. 13, cols. 1 and 2, under the title "The Spencerian Biology, the Philosopher's Standing as a Biologist--The Soundness of His Views Tested by Time."

402.22-25 As Prof. Osborn . . . its external relations."] H. F. Osborn, ibid., col. 2.

403.1-3 "all the processes . . . minimized."] Ibid.

403.4-5 "perhaps a large class . . . of Spencer, "] Ibid.

403.6 "has never claimed to be a practical investigator."] Ibid., col. 1.

403.7-8 "every great leader . . . inspiration,"] Ibid., col. 2.

403.8-10 "all permanent advances . . . the field."] Ibid.

403.11-13 "The sum of several works . . . value."] Ibid., col. 1.

403.13-14 "It appears now . . . evolution theory."] Ibid., col. 2.

403.13 Weismann's] August Friedrich Leopold Weismann (1834-1914), German biologist who developed a "germ plasm" theory of heredity, according to which hereditary elements are carried by sex cells. Cf. EP1:359-60 (1893).

403.14-15 Weismann contends . . . transmitted] The relevant work of Weismann prior to 1890 consists of his Studien zur Descendenz-Theorie (1875), and of articles of which some appeared in English translation in Essays on Heredity (1889), just one year prior to the present controversy over Spencer.

403.15-17 "it is perfectly evident . . . the ground."] H. F. Osborn, ibid., col. 2:

What the issue will be is the present bone of contention between the Lamarckians, Darwinians, and Neo-Darwinians, the latter school holding that there is absolutely no transmission of acquired characters, and it is perfectly evident that if they demonstrate this proposition one great section of Spencer's system falls to the ground!

The 'they' in Peirce's quotation thus refers to Osborn's Neo-Darwinians. Osborn distinguishes Darwinians who allow that the transmission of acquired characteristics may be one factor among many in evolution, from Neo-Darwinians who do not admit this mechanism, and make natural selection the sole mechanism of evolution. Osborn uses the term "Neo-Darwinian" because in The Origin of Species Darwin took a hard line against Lamarckian evolution, a view which he later softened, in light of possible evidence for the heritability of acquired characteristics.

403.18 Lamarck] Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet de Lamarck (1744-1829), French naturalist who proposed an evolutionary theory according to which acquired characteristics are heritable.

403.19-21 "many of . . . discoveries,"] H. F. Osborn, ibid., col. 2. After "confirmed" Osborn had added "or are apparently in accordance with," which Peirce omits.

403.21-24 Sedgwick writes . . . appeared."] Quoted by H. F. Osborn, ibid., col. 2. As Osborn intimates in his letter to the New York Times, the English zoologist Adam Sedgwick (1854-1913) was the favorite pupil of the British embryologist Francis Maitland Balfour, who died unexpectedly in 1883. Sedgwick continued Balfour's work in the same laboratory. In 1880, Balfour had published a paper in which he refuted Spencer's view of the formation of the nervous system. Balfour's own explanation of this process was shown to be incorrect by Sedgwick five years later (and not eight as Osborn contends), in a paper entitled "On the Fertilised Ovum and Formation of the Layers of the South African Peripatus" (Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 39/240 [1885]: 239-44). The quoted concession to Spencer is found on its last page.

403.28 H. J. Messenger] Hiram John Messenger (1855-1913), mathematics professor and social statistician. Messenger's letter to the New York Times appeared Sunday, 30 March 1890, p. 13, col. 4, under the title "Two Points Fairly Met, Mr. Spencer Relies on Acknowledged Specialists--The Soundness of His Conclusions Attested."

403.31-33 He gives as a reason . . . orthodox.] H. J. Messenger, ibid., col. 4:

Another point should be borne in mind when considering the reason why Mr. Spencer has not been covered with the honors which the learned societies generally shower upon many other men who have not done one-tenth as much for the progress of science. Every one knows that Mr. Spencer is one of the boldest and most original of thinkers. As a natural result, he has arrived at, and given expression to, conclusions which have brought upon him the hostility of the orthodox element, and nearly every learned society has an orthodox element large enough and hostile enough to prevent it from giving the great philosopher a single honor, and so he, like all great reformers, will have to be content with being called infidel, atheist, materialist, godless, in his own lifetime, and will have to wait for the next generation to sing his praises.

403.35-404.7 Chancing today . . . infidel!] Transactions of the Royal Society 35 (1890): 1118-19. Huxley and Haeckel do appear in the respective lists. Peirce cites the number of foreign fellows as thirty-six, but this was the limit on the number of foreign fellows allowed. In 1890 there were only thirty-four elected foreign fellows.

404.4 Huxley,] Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895), English biologist and advocate of Darwinian evolutionary theory.

404.7 Haeckel,] Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Haeckel (1834-1919), German biologist who was greatly influenced by Darwin's Origin of Species, a book he used both to attack entrenched religious dogma and to build his own cosmology.

404.14-23 Mr. Messenger is so good . . . bear out.] H. J. Messenger, New York Times, 30 March 1890, p. 13, col. 4:

The first volume of Mr. Spencer's biology, written some twenty-five years ago, deals very largely in the introductory chapters with the subject of organic chemistry. The professor of chemistry in one of our leading medical colleges, who was reading the volume last year, recently said to me that the one thing in the book which particularly impressed him was the very large number of correct conclusions drawn, and the very large number of possibilities and probabilities hinted at in the chapters referred to, which were not known when the book was written, but which recent work in the chemical laboratory has shown to be true.

404.27-30 Mr. Messenger declares . . . pointed out.] Ibid., col. 4

404.30-31 I thought I had already pointed out] Sel. 45, 399.14-32.

405.5-7 "All these phenomena, . . . of force."] This is the beginning of cardinal principle no. 15 given by Spencer in his preface to Collins's An Epitome, p. xi. Spencer's sentence, after "force," finished with the words "under its forms of matter and motion." Compare with First Principles, pt. II, ch. 18, "The Interpretation of Evolution," § 147: "In other words, the phenomena of Evolution have to be deduced from the Persistence of Force." The conception of "evolution" is developed in chapters 12 to 17 and is eventually defined as "an integration of matter and concomitant dissipation of motion; during which the matter passes from a relatively indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a relatively definite, coherent heterogeneity and during which the retained motion undergoes a parallel transformation" (pt. II, ch. 17, § 145).

405.17 Edgar R. Dawson,] Dawson's first letter to the editor of the New York Times appeared on Sunday, 6 April 1890, p. 13, cols. 2 and 3, under the title "Asking Too Much, 'Outsider' Should Accept as True Those Things about Which Everybody Is Agreed--Space and Time." After Peirce's reply of 13 April, another letter from Dawson appeared on April 20 under the title "As to 'Reversed Velocities.' Some Illustrations of 'Outsider's' Hypothesis of a Universe Moving Backward."

405.19-20 "Is it necessary . . . chemistry?"] Dawson, New York Times, 6 April 1890, p. 13, col. 2.

405.24-27 "state any . . . ignorant."] Ibid., col. 2. Peirce's "than in adopting from all beliefs" replaces Dawsons's "than in deducing from all experiences."

406.6-7 "astrology . . . exact science."] Ibid., col. 2: "For it must be remembered that Mr. Spencer proposes only to apply this to cases that exact science does not reach, and can astrology be said to have had an existence since the rise of exact science?" Dawson's "this" refers to Spencer's method of obtaining first principles in areas where we lack scientific knowledge by finding the core of common opinion on a given topic. In his first article Peirce had pointed out that the Spencerian consensus method would not so long ago have led to the inclusion of general astrological opinions among the first principles. Dawson replies that this would not have been the case because the method is only applied to subjects that "exact science does not reach," while the subject-matter of astrology is properly scientific--and hence, Peirce did not understand the purpose of the consensus method. Peirce, however, said in his first article that Spencer's method was meant to arrive at principles that "rank next in certainty" to the results of exact science, which indicates that Peirce understood that the consensus method did not apply to scientific topics.

406.8 Hipparchus] Hipparchus (fl. 146-127 B.C.), Greek astronomer and mathematician, believed to be the author of the first catalogue of stars, on which Ptolemy's based his catalogue in the Almagest.

406.10-12 "Does 'Outsider' . . . necessary truths?"] Dawson, ibid., col. 3.

406.25-27 I had said that . . . dynamics,] See sel. 45, 399.14-32, and ann. 404.30-31.

406.28-29 "that thereafter . . . resistance?"] Dawson, ibid., col. 3. On the idea that motion must follow the "line of least resistance," see Spencer's First Principles, pt. II, ch. 9.

406.36 "Carl Opperg,"] This letter appeared in the New York Times, Sunday, 6 April 1890, p. 13, cols. 3-4, under the title "Experience and Intuition. A Dissenter from Spencer's Theory of the Source of Knowledge as Explained by 'Kappa'."

407.1-2 “W. H. B.” . . . heavens,] W. H. B.'s letter appeared in the New York Times on Sunday 6 April 1890, p. 13, col. 4, under the title “A Philosophical Critic. He Goes Pretty Deeply into the Subject of Matter, Space, and the Unknowable.” Peirce alludes to the following sentence: “Instead of making matter revolve around force the need of the times is for some Copernicus to recentre Mr. Spencer's system and call matter the sun and place him on the throne of the intellectual heavens.” W. H. B. wrote a second letter which appeared in the 20 April 1890 issue of the newspaper, p. 13, col. 3. According to Christopher R. Versen in his 2006 doctoral dissertation titled “Optimistic Liberals: Herbert Spencer, the Brooklyn Ethical Association, and the Integration of Moral Philosophy and Evolution in the Victorian Trans-Atlantic Community” (Florida State University), p. 238, W. H. B. is probably William Herbert Boughton (1838–1897), a partner in the law firm of Chambers & Boughton in New York City and a member of the Brooklyn Ethical Association, a society famous for its lectures and essays. See for instance Boughton’s brief discussion of John W. Chadwick’s lecture on “Charles Robert Darwin” in Evolution (Boston, James H. West, 1889), pp. 49–50, or again of Benjamin P. Underwood’s lecture on Herbert Spencer’s Synthetic Philosophy, in Evolution in Science, Philosophy, and Art (New York, D. Appleton, 1891), pp. 118–19.

407.3-6 “R. G. E.” . . . of Spencer.] R. G. E.'s letter appeared in the New York Times on Sunday, 30 March 1890, p. 13, cols. 2-4 as “A Call for Specifications. Opponents of Spencer's Philosophy Must Point Out its Imperfections--Countless Prophecies Have Been Based on It.” Peirce is alluding to a sentence in col. 2: “Had 'Outsider' waited until his last paper appeared before writing that Mr. Spencer 'is one of those who build Babel systems to scale the heights of knowledge' we might have looked upon him as a candid disbeliever. But when he makes such a statement at the outset, without giving a single reason for the assertion, the analogy of a noisy barker that does no biting forces itself upon us.” R. G. E. wrote a second letter which appeared in the 20 April 1890 issue of the newspaper, cols. 1-2, under the title “Force and Life. A Mechanical Theory of Evolution and of Life the Only Possible—Spencer and the Learned Societies.” R. G. E. was likely Dr. Robert G. Eccles (1848–1934), also a member of the Brooklyn Ethical Association (a vice-president of it for four years) as well as president of the New York Pharmaceutical Association and the first dean of the Brooklyn College of Pharmacy. Eccles was an extensive writer on scientific, philosophical, and industrial subjects; he is credited with the discovery of several alkaloids.

407.14 “Kappa,”] Kappa's letter to the editor was the first reply printed in the New York Times on Sunday, 30 March 1890, p. 13, cols. 1-2, under the title “Flaws in ‘Outsider’s’ Reasoning. His Attention Called to the Fixed Line between the Knowable and the Unknowable—Experience and Intuition.” Christopher R. Versen reports in his doctoral dissertation (supra, p. 237 n. 123) that Donald C. Bellomy, biographer of William Graham Sumner and author of “‘Social Darwinism’: Revisited,” suspected that Kappa was John Fiske (well known to Peirce and an honorary corresponding member of the Brooklyn Ethical Association).

407.17-18 "'Outsider' doubtless . . . philosopher."] Ibid., col. 1.

407.27 Prof. Cope, whose book is famous,] Edward Drinker Cope (1840-1897), American paleontologist and advocate of Lamarckian evolution. The book is probably Cope's The Origin of the Fittest, Essays on Evolution (New York: Macmillan, 1887).

407.29 Prof. J. P. Cooke,] Josiah Parsons Cooke (1827-1894), American chemist, and professor at Harvard University (1850-94). He was Charles Peirce's chemistry teacher at the Lawrence Scientific School.

408.1-2 "purely . . . logical or not--"] Kappa, ibid., col. 1; 'purely' for 'surely.'

408.4-5 282 systems . . . to the world,] It is unclear where this estimate comes from, if it is not purely fanciful. In a two-page unfinished fragment entitled "How many Philosophies have there been?" (R 1573:10-11), Peirce distinguishes seventy-two philosophies from that of Thales to that of Victor Cousin (1792-1867).

409.10-12 The cognition-theory . . . intended.] In his letter (col. 1), Kappa refers Outsider to the second volume of Spencer's Principles of Psychology for the best account of space available (vol. II, pt. 6, ch. 14, "The Perception of Space").

409.16-21 Finally, "Kappa" . . . cannot be explained."] Kappa, New York Times, 30 March 1890, p. 13, col. 2. Kappa takes a sort of Kantian view of scientific explanation as the explanation of events that occur within phenomenal experience. Space is a condition of possibility of experience; as such we do not experience it as something that "changes in our experience," and thus we cannot have a scientific explanation of space. Kappa writes:

Since knowledge is limited by experience, and the reason for the existence of a thing involves the predication of a change in its state or condition within experience, it follows that that which has never changed in our experience or in the experience of our long line of ancestors beginning, say, with the jelly fish, cannot be explained by our mental organization. As our organism has never experienced an environment containing a different number of dimensions, antecedent to the space in which we live, we are therefore, and shall ever be, unable to explain the whyness of this thusness; we might as well attempt to lift ourselves by our boot straps, or explain why two and two make four.

409.30-32 Spencer, . . . nebula,] This refers to Spencer's "The Nebular Hypothesis," reprinted in vol. 1 of his Essays, Scientific, Political and Speculative (1858).