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Home > Quote from "Immortality in the Light of Synechism"

Commens
Digital Companion to C. S. Peirce
‘Synechism’ (pub. 09.03.13-10:28). Quote in M. Bergman & S. Paavola (Eds.), The Commens Dictionary: Peirce's Terms in His Own Words. New Edition. Retrieved from http://www.commens.org/dictionary/entry/quote-immortality-light-synechism.
Term: 
Synechism
Quote: 

There is a famous saying of Parmenides {esti gar einai, méden d’ ouk einai}, “being is, and not-being is nothing.” This sounds plausible; yet synechism flatly denies it, declaring that being is a matter of more or less, so as to merge insensibly into nothing. [—]

Synechism, even in its less stalwart forms, can never abide dualism, properly so called. [—] In particular, the synechist will not admit that physical and psychical phenomena are entirely distinct, – whether as belonging to different categories of substance, or as entirely separate sides of one shield, – but will insist that all phenomena are of one character, though some are more mental and spontaneous, others more material and regular. [—]

Nor must any synechist say, “I am altogether myself, and not at all you. [—]

Synechism refuses to believe that when death comes, even the carnal consciousness ceases quickly.

Source: 
Peirce, C. S. (1893). Immortality in the Light of Synechism. MS [R] 886.
References: 
EP 2:2-3
Date of Quote: 
1893
URL: 

http://www.commens.org/dictionary/entry/quote-immortality-light-synechism