Editing Idea (section)

===Charles Sanders Peirce===
[[Charles Sanders Peirce|C. S. Peirce]] published the first full statement of [[pragmatism]] in his important works "[[s:How to Make Our Ideas Clear|How to Make Our Ideas Clear]]" (1878) and "[[s:The Fixation of Belief|The Fixation of Belief]]" (1877).<ref>[[Charles Sanders Peirce#Pragmatism|Peirce's pragmatism]]</ref> In "How to Make Our Ideas Clear" he proposed that a ''clear idea'' (in his study he uses [[concept]] and ''idea'' as synonymic) is defined as one, when it is apprehended such as it will be recognized wherever it is met, and no other will be mistaken for it. If it fails of this clearness, it is said to be obscure. He argued that to understand an idea clearly we should ask ourselves what difference its application would make to our evaluation of a proposed solution to the problem at hand. [[Pragmatism]] (a term he appropriated for use in this context), he defended, was a method for ascertaining the meaning of terms (as a theory of meaning). The originality of his ideas is in their rejection of what was accepted as a view and understanding of knowledge as impersonal facts which had been accepted by scientists for some 250 years. Peirce contended that we acquire knowledge as ''participants'', not as ''spectators''. He felt "the real", sooner or later, is composed of information that has been acquired through ideas and knowledge and ordered by the application of logical reasoning.  The rational distinction of the empirical object is not prior to its perception by a knowledgeable subject, in other words. He also published many papers on logic in relation to ''ideas''.