Conclusion

Abstract

This study brings together bits of Peirce’s biography that reflect his mathematical cast of mind, some important outcomes of his work as an applied mathematician at the US Coast and Geodetic Survey, his interpretations of Kant’s critical philosophy, and some of the major themes in his philosophy of mathematics pertaining to diagrammatic reasoning. Such admixture of data, as unrelated as they prima facie might seem, is, in fact, more than appropriate to the case. Peirce was a highly original individual and a polymath who applied himself in many areas. By Peirce’s own admission, mathematics played a unifying role in that it served as a keystone holding together different parts of his overall theoretical edifice and, at the same time, provided useful hints as to how some of his idiosyncrasies and personality traits are relevant to his idea of what it means to be a mathematician. He used mathematical statistics to explain the nature of genius and took his own mathematical mindset and his personal aptitude for visual representation to be responsible for certain traits of his own personality and his practical scientific accomplishments. With all this in mind, the principal assumption of the current study is that finding patterns of interconnection between life, armchair philosophical speculation, and real scientific practice can help us better understand Peirce the mathematician and tell us something important about the role of vision in mathematical reasoning in general.