Editing Abductive reasoning (section)

====Pragmatism====
In 1901 Peirce wrote, "There would be no logic in imposing rules, and saying that they ought to be followed, until it is made out that the purpose of hypothesis requires them."<ref>Peirce, "On the Logic of drawing History from Ancient Documents", 1901 manuscript, ''Collected Papers'' v. 7, paragraphs 164–231, see 202, reprinted in ''Essential Peirce'' v. 2, pp. 75–114, see 95. See under "[http://www.helsinki.fi/science/commens/terms/abduction.html Abduction]" at ''Commens Dictionary of Peirce's Terms''.</ref> In 1903 Peirce called [[pragmatism]] "the logic of abduction" and said that the [[pragmatic maxim]] gives the necessary and sufficient logical rule to abduction in general.<ref name="prag" /> The pragmatic maxim is:

{{blockquote|Consider what effects, that might conceivably have practical bearings, we conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our conception of these effects is the whole of our conception of the object.}}

It is a method for fruitful clarification of conceptions by equating the meaning of a conception with the conceivable practical implications of its object's conceived effects. Peirce held that that is precisely tailored to abduction's purpose in inquiry, the forming of an idea that could conceivably shape informed conduct. In various writings in the 1900s<ref name="econ" /><ref>Peirce, "On the Logic of Drawing Ancient History from Documents", ''Essential Peirce'' v. 2, see pp. 107–9.</ref> he said that the conduct of abduction (or retroduction) is governed by considerations of economy, belonging in particular to the economics of research. He regarded economics as a normative science whose analytic portion might be part of logical methodeutic (that is, theory of inquiry).<ref>Peirce, Carnegie application, L75 (1902), Memoir 28: "On the Economics of Research", scroll down to Draft E. [http://www.cspeirce.com/menu/library/bycsp/l75/ver1/l75v1-08.htm#m28 Eprint] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110524021101/http://www.cspeirce.com/menu/library/bycsp/l75/ver1/l75v1-08.htm#m28 |date=2011-05-24 }}.</ref>