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Home > Quote from "Topics: Chapter I. Singular Systems"

Commens
Digital Companion to C. S. Peirce
‘General’ (pub. 21.08.17-14:22). 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-topics-chapter-i-singular-systems-1.
Term: 
General
Quote: 

It is essential clearly to discriminate between vagueness and generality. As applied to assertions, this distinction is very easy. Namely, an assertion is comprehensive in so far as it extends the person to whom it is addressed a certain latitude in the interpretation of it; it is vague in so far as it reserves to the utterer of it a similar latitude.

Source: 
Peirce, C. S. (1903 [c.]). Topics. Chapter I. Singular Systems. MS [R] 151.
References: 
MS [R] 151
Date of Quote: 
1903 [c.]
Editorial Annotations: 

Peirce has replaced the word "general" with "comprehensive" in this passage

URL: 

http://www.commens.org/dictionary/entry/quote-topics-chapter-i-singular-systems-1