The Philosophical Review/Volume 1/Summary: Richl - Beiträge zur Logik - Part 2
III. Forms of Assertion. — To obtain a view of judgment in the strict sense, we must begin with the judgment of recognition of an actual thing as such, that is, with the primitive perceptual judgment. Perception is itself the primitive existential judgment, the ultimate consciousness of reality on which all other assertions about existence must rest. When a presentation rests upon a previous perception, and when we are conscious of this relation, we have the judgment of recollection; if in addition to this a perception agreeing with the former perception arises, we have in addition the judgment of recognition. Elementary sense-judgments such as these two follow without the intervention of a thought-presentation; that is, there are some judgments without concepts, wherein the perceptual content is not brought under logical categories, such as genus and species. When in a judgment of recognition the remembered presentation is a named one or a conceptual presentation, we have the judgment of appellation, usually expressed in an impersonal sentence. Appellative judgments usually take cognizance, not of objects as such, but of qualities. A second kind of judgment arises when we take into account the so-called quantity of the assertion. It is easy to show that quantity in logic is viewed differently from quantity in mathematics. The generality of a judgment is different in origin and meaning from the generality of a conceptual thesis. Conceptual theses are of general validity, and as general validity does not admit of any increase, there are strictly no quantity distinctions among conceptual theses. The hypothetical assertion arises when there is a transition from a conceptual thesis to the corresponding judgment. The problematical assertion arises when we apply the idea of laws to reality, but, in general, negative judgments do not constitute a separate class from affirmative. IV. Kinds of Conclusion-sequence. — The well-known explanation of Aristotle: — The conclusion is that relation of the assertion, in which, when anything is posited, something else appears as that which necessarily preceded, and only so because that which was posited, is — contains still, not only the most explicit, but the best definition of consequential sequence. Its range is far greater than that which Aristotle himself gave it, in limiting it to syllogism. Two things are of importance in Aristotle's definition: first, the inference is conceived as a unified totality, just as a single construction; and, secondly, it is insisted that through the inference an actual and not merely an apparent progress in judgment is made to a new judgment which is not contained in any single assertion taken by itself. In inference a reciprocal influence of the combined assertion takes place, such that the conclusion is no less conclusive for the premises than these are for it. The syllogism could last, as the sole accredited form of reasoning, only so long as the Aristotelian metaphysical science. As to the forms of reasoning, through the combination of conceptual theses and judgments in the narrower sense we get three principal kinds of conclusive-sequence: conclusions with conceptual premises alone, conclusions through the combination of judgments with conceptual theses, and, lastly, conclusions whose premises were constituted purely out of judgments. These three forms can be shown to correspond to what Aristotle taught about the figures of the syllogism.