more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
I think that what is First is ipso facto sentient.
Gist of Idea
Whatever is First must be sentient
Source
Charles Sanders Peirce (Reasoning and the Logic of Things [1898], VIII)
Book Ref
Peirce,Charles Sanders: 'Reasoning and the Logic of Things', ed/tr. Ketner,K.L. [Harvard 1992], p.260
A Reaction
He doesn't mention Leibniz's monads, but that looks like the ancestor of Peirce's idea. He doesn't make clear (here) how far he would take the idea. I would just say that whatever is 'First' must be active rather than passive.
| 22765 | Wisdom and thought are shared by all things [Empedocles] |
| 5711 | The earth is and always has been an insentient being [Lucretius] |
| 5712 | Particles may have sensation, but eggs turning into chicks suggests otherwise [Lucretius] |
| 23224 | That all matter thinks is absurd, and would make each part of our bodies a distinct self-consciousness [Bentley] |
| 12698 | Every body contains a kind of sense and appetite, or a soul [Leibniz] |
| 12760 | Something rather like souls (though not intelligent) could be found everywhere [Leibniz] |
| 5510 | Leibniz has a panpsychist view that physical points are spiritual [Leibniz, by Martin/Barresi] |
| 23230 | Nature contains a fundamental force of thought [Fichte] |
| 19257 | Whatever is First must be sentient [Peirce] |
| 2966 | Can phenomenal qualities exist unsensed? [Lockwood] |
| 2543 | Brains aren't made of anything special, suggesting panpsychism [McGinn] |
| 2424 | It is odd if experience is a very recent development [Chalmers] |