Philosophy Goes Public: HabitsMarch 26th, 2013

ContentsPhilosophy Goes Public Talk....................................1What is a Habit?..............................................2Aristotle...................................................2Peirce......................................................6

The Conscious Development of Habits..........................11James’ Development of Habits...............................11Peirce (Reflection and the Ideals of Conduct)..............13

Potential Uses of Habits.....................................18

Thank you for coming tonight. I had the pleasure of giving one ofthese talks a few years ago here and I remember really enjoying it and so I was glad to be asked to come back again this year to be able to talk with you again.

The main topic that I would like to talk about is habits. The main thing that got me interested in habits was something that I heard repeated over and over again: “it’s just a bad habit.” Mostof the time when we’re talking about habits, we’re usually referring to them in the sense of bad habits, but some more recent literature has focused on the absolutely essential role that good habits play in becoming a successful person. One of themost influential books in this respect was written by Steven R. Covey called The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. He runs through

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habits of being proactive, having a view of the end product in mind, putting things in their proper order, thinking how both parties can mutually benefit from any exchange, how to try to understand before trying to be understood, focusing on positive teamwork, and then focusing on developing your own capacities through taking care of yourself. These are all important habits to develop in order to become successful, but they don’t offer much for philosophical consideration.

Instead of focusing on particular habits, I would like us to spend a little more time thinking about what a habit is and wherehabits come from. There are a lot of different components that we’ll take a look at with respect to habits, but there are two things that we’re going to look at in particular that are often neglected when we talk about habits: time and environment. The reason why I want to spend some time on these two parts of habitsin particular is because we often think of habits in terms of willpower, that is, that we have the ability to create or modify habits based on our will and we often chastise ourselves for our inability to overpower our habits with our will. I hope that by the end of this discussion it will become clear that thinking about habits in terms of willpower is a fairly destructive way ofthinking that is only likely to end up with unfortunate outcomes.So the discussion tonight will take on the following form: first,I would like to spend a bit of time talking about what a habit isand where it comes from. I’m going to be using some writing from Aristotle and the classical Pragmatists Charles S. Peirce and William James here. Second, I would like us to take a look at howwe can control our habits through a critical analysis of those habits. Peirce has written some helpful things in this regard, but so has Charles Duhigg. Third, we’re going to look at why there might be a growing importance for paying attention to our habits because the routine behaviours that we don’t really noticeabout ourselves are easily noticed by organizations that have themeans to track these habits. This last point is going to lead

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into a discussion question that I would like to ask you about at the end of the talk: if it is possible for organizations to be able to predict our purchasing choices based on our habits, is this really a bad thing?

Habit Overview Aristotle Peirce

The Development of Habits and Self-Control James Peirce

Organizational Use of Habits Charles Duhigg’s article in NY Times

What is a Habit?

AristotleOne of the best ways to begin understanding Aristotle’s habit isby situating it between another pair of concepts that relate toduration: nature and disposition. Aristotle opens Book Two of theNichomachean Ethics with a distinction between habit and nature,saying that “nothing that exists by nature can form a habitcontrary to its nature” (1103a20) and he uses the example of astone being thrown up ten thousand times in the air to illustratethis example.1 It is in the stone’s nature to fall to the earth.No amount of repeated activity can force the stone to dosomething that is not in its nature to do. Aristotle reinforcesthis in the Magna Moralia, saying that “nothing will dislodgenature” (1204a2). Perhaps, then, a working definition of naturewould be to say that a thing’s nature is such that the thingcould not do otherwise; the stone was necessitated to fall to theearth.

1 Unless otherwise noted, I will be using Ross’ translations of Aristotle in W.D. Ross,The Works of Aristotle Translated into English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1963.

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At the other end of the spectrum is disposition or diathesis. In theCategories: “By disposition, on the other hand, we mean a conditionthat is easily changed and quickly gives place to its opposite.Thus, heat, cold, disease, health, and so on are dispositions”(8b35). We can see already that, whereas nature was permanent andunchanging, a disposition involves a change that can happen in ashort period of time. I am sitting here in front of thefireplace, warm and comfortable, but when I move outside Iquickly freeze up and start shivering. My disposition quicklymoves from comfort to discomfort. A confusion arises when wethink of the word disposition as related to the way in which onecan be disposed to perform a certain activity. The latterinvolves a willingness or a readiness to behave in a certain wayshould certain conditions obtain. But this is not what Aristotlemeans by disposition. A disposition is a descriptor used tocharacterize a particular aspect of an individual’s state at aparticular moment in time with the recognition that theindividual’s state could quickly change at the next moment.

Somewhere between the two extremes of nature and disposition is habit.“Thus habit differs from disposition in this, that while thelatter is ephemeral, the former is permanent and difficult toalter” (9a7). We have to read Aristotle as saying that habits aremore permanent than dispositions, but not that habits areunchangeable in the way that nature is. “It is evident that menincline to call those conditions habits which we are of a more orless permanent type and difficult to displace” (8b30). In fact,Aristotle will go so far as to say that, once a habit is formed,it can only be dislodged by another habit (1204a2). To furtherconfuse the matter, Aristotle says that:

Habits are at the same time dispositions, but dispositionsare not necessarily habits. For those who have some specifichabit may be said also, in virtue of that habit, to be thusor thus disposed; but those who are disposed in somespecific way have not in all cases the corresponding habit(9a11-13).

Here I think we can take advantage of a rare moment of clarity inthe English language. There is a difference between a disposition

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as a description of a temporary state and being disposed tobehave in one way rather than another. For example, I am agitated(disposition) and am inclined (disposed) to behave erratically.The former involves the current moment in time whereas the latterinvolves a consideration of the future. As a summary, then, wecan say that habits are those states of character that are deeplyseeded within the individual to such an extent that they aredifficult to dislodge but not impossible to do so.

The Formation of HabitsWe just alluded to one of the ways in which a habit can be formedin an individual, that is, through the replacement of anotherhabit—ex-smokers are often seen waving a pen around as though itwere a cigarette—but we have barely touched on the ways habitsare initially formed. One of the most famous passages of theNichomachean Ethics comes near the beginning of Book II, “Thus,in one word, states of character arise out of like activities”(1103b21). This single sentence will open up and split us offinto two directions of inquiry. First, we will have to look athow repetitive activity creates habits and, second, we will haveto look at the role that reasoning does or does not play in theformation of habits.

Immediately following the previous quote, Aristotle says, “Thisis why the activities we exhibit must be of a certain kind; it isbecause the states of character correspond to the differencesbetween these” (1103b22). One cannot force oneself to have ahabit through thinking oneself to have a habit—activity isessential. Combining what we learned before, we see that therepetition of a particular activity predisposes someone toperform in a similar way in the future. If we move to a section alittle later in the Nichomachean Ethics, we can see why this isthe case. Aristotle talks about the wise man as the one whoknows, by experience, the relationship between the particularfacts and the universals under which they can be subsumed.

For these variable facts are the starting-points for theapprehension of the end, since the universals are reachedfrom particulars; of these therefore we must have

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perception, and this perception is intuitive reason(1143b3).

The phronimos is able to immediately see the role that theparticular in the achievement of a specific goal.2 Krisjanssondescribes this phenomenon: “A primary effect of habituation isthat we gradually learn to perceive things correctly through morenuanced patterns of seeing; we become more and more responsiblefor how things ‘appear’ to us as experience gives us an eye.”3

Habituation not only involves a mechanical response to theenvironment, but also prefigures the way in which we perceivethat environment. The person of practical wisdom simply does notsee the world in the same way that someone without that sametraining or habituation does.

How do we train ourselves to become habituated? Aristotle says inthe Problemata that we often experience pleasure when performingactions that have been habituated in us (928b23) and it is theresponsibility of the teacher to ensure that we experiencepleasure with respect to the right objects. A proper and uprightmoral education will teach the child to value the right objectsin the right way, to behave appropriately, and to see things inthe right way. In order to accomplish this, mere words are notenough; children do not listen to reason, but offer a child someform of pleasurable reward and one readily finds a receptiveaudience. The hope is that, at some point, the child will nolonger require the reward and perform the behaviour because ofthe inner worth of the behaviour itself. But what do we mean whenwe say ‘inner worth’? Do we not mean that we hope the child willeventually grasp the value, the rational principle thataccompanies the activity? This is the difference between habitand virtue. Habit is a repeatedly performed activity whereasvirtue involves the application of a rational principle in theright situation, “towards the right people, with the rightmotive, and in the right way” (1106b20). And yet there issomething of an application of a rational principle. In theformative stages of habit development, primarily in youth, a

2 For this to be more than mere cunning, a virtuous principle must be applied.3 Kristjan Kristjansson, Habituated Reason: Aristotle and the Paradox of Moral Education, Theory and Research in Education, Vol. 4, p. 112.

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rational principle is being applied by the teacher so that theyouth will perform the right activity. It does not become avirtuous activity until the student is aware of the rationalprinciple as such, but nevertheless the beginnings are there.

In later life, when we become our own teachers of habit, webecome both a passive and an active force. We are active in thesense that we are consciously performing an activity, but we arepassive in the sense that we are the objects that we are tryingto shape. We are able to control ourselves at the beginning ofthis activity, but not throughout.

[W]e are masters of our actions from the beginning right tothe end, if we know the particular facts, but though wecontrol the beginning of our states of character the gradualprocess is not obvious, any more than it is in illnesses;because it was in our power, however, to act in this way ornot in this way, therefore the states are voluntary(1114b30).

It is a little ambiguous as to whether Aristotle means that weare in control in the process of habit formation in the verybeginning or when we are performing the individual activity thatwe have been habituated to perform. For example, I am entirelyconscious of every move that my fingers, hands, arms, torso, andlegs make when I am training myself to shoot a free-throw. Thus,in this situation, I am controlling my activity and everyparticular aspect of it. But, when I am in a game and standing atthe free-throw line, I just perform the action without beingconscious and in control of every motion of my body.4 I don’tthink that Aristotle needs to resolve this ambiguity in order tomake sense of habituation. We can readily concede that consciousactivity is heavily involved in the formation of habits but, oncea habit is formed, the use of reason is not as heavily required—the use of the rational principle does not mean the exhaustiveuse of all of our cognitive capabilities.

There must be something that can yield to the demands of therational principle we are applying. For Aristotle, that is the4 James calls this a “reflex-arc.” Cf. William James, The Principles of Psychology, New York: Dover Publications, 1918. p. 116

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irrational part of the soul: “the irrational part of the soul isyet able to obey reason. Now we have to state in respect of whatpart of the soul we have character of this or that kind. It willbe in respect to the faculties of passion” (1220b6). The passionsare subject to the influence of the rational principle. Now, itwould appear as though Aristotle is just talking about passionsas they relate to virtue, which is a form of moral habit, but weshould dig a little deeper here. Though it is true thatcontrolling the passions is requisite for becoming virtuous, isit also the case with becoming habituated? A player is oftenpraised for his or her ability to not respond to a cheap shot inkind but rather to respond by racking up the score. But isscoring a virtuous act? It is highly valued, to be sure, but isit virtuous? When the player immediately controls his or herpassions in an effort to subsume them in a larger goal, thiscould be considered a virtuous act. But the individual stepsnecessary in order to achieve this goal are not, in and ofthemselves, virtuous acts. Thus we can see that, depending on thegoal of the activity, a habit can be virtuous but not necessarily.When the individual is performing an action that engages otherpeople, we should say that that is the spot where virtue can playa part. However, when the individual is just practicing free-throw shots on their own, this is not virtuous but merely habittraining.

So what is it that is receiving the training? What aspect of thesoul is undergoing the habit formation if it is not necessarilythe passions? Keep in mind that me learning to become a fastertypist, though perhaps for the end result of becoming a morevirtuous student, does not directly involve the passions butrather the simple movement of my fingers and hands on thekeyboard. We might have a tendency to say, with Freud, that thelibidinal drives are being sublimated into an activity that isnot for the fulfillment of those drives, but this might be goinga little too far. Or could it be the case that the passions(libidinal drives) are actually what are being tapped into inorder to achieve an end that is specifically incongruent withtheir given goal? I don’t think that Aristotle answers thisquestion.

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ConclusionThough we were only briefly able to touch on the large networkthat Aristotle’s notion of habit is embedded in, we were stillable to get a grasp on the temporal element and the formation ofhabits. We learned that habits exist somewhere on the temporalspectrum between nature, which is firm and immobile, anddispositions, which are fleeting and easily changed. Habits are aform of second nature in that they constitute how we engage withthe world around us and yet are open to modification, which meansthey dispose us to engage with the world in a particular way. Theformation of habits quickly leads into a much broader discussionpertaining to universals, particulars, and intuitive reason. Forour purposes, we learned that the habituated person is the onewho has been trained to immediately recognize the particulars aspertaining to the universal and to use those particulars in orderto achieve a certain end. Each of these ideas leads into manycomplex and interrelated problems, such as the status of theagent’s cognitive activities in the process of habituation.

PeircePart of the problem of understanding anything in Charles S.Peirce’s writings is deciding where to begin. Aside from theregular progression of any thinker’s thought that changes overtime, Peirce was under the influence of numerous editors askinghim to write in various fields of study. Peirce seemed to be fondof this approach, as it lent itself to the expression of histhought in multiple formats. Peirce variously wrote for dailypublications like The Nation and The Boston Evening Traveller, and alsofor more technical publications like The Coast Survey. It wasn’tuntil a little later in life that his philosophy began to beexpressed in journals like Mind and The American Journal of Arts andSciences. His most famous writings, however, didn’t appear in theregularly trodden paths to philosophical stardom, but rather inPopular Science Monthly in 1877 and 1878. Though he wrote numerousarticles during those years, the two most prominent ones are TheFixation of Belief (vol 12, November, 1877) and How to Make our Ideas Clear(vol 12, January, 1878). These two articles provided Peirce withthe foundational thinking that he would return to again and again

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until his death in 1914. The main concepts that he dealt withthere were doubt, inquiry, belief, and habit. For our purposes, wewill be focusing primarily on habit.

As much as I would like to focus solely on these two articles inorder to trace out what Peirce means by habit, this would be doingan injustice not only to his later writings but also to thepervasiveness of this concept. Besides, sometimes foundationalthinking requires breadth rather than depth. In light of thisdesire to see the all-encompassing nature of the concept, we willtrace habit through the majority of Peirce’s writings. We willnot look at every single expression of the concept, mostlybecause some of these expressions far exceed the capabilities ofthis author, but instead will focus on some key areas thatdemonstrate the concept of habit’s true philosophical import. Wewill look at habit in terms the stimulus-response model ofbehaviourism, consciousness and location of habits, theirontological status, and lastly the formation of habits aspertaining to understanding universals and particulars. Each ofthese areas, I hope, will help us to flesh out the concept to areasonable degree of competence.5 A more thorough study wouldinclude its relationship to Aristotle’s concept of hexis, Kant’sconcept, and contemporary takes on it, such as those of UmbertoEco, Jacques Derrida, and Gilbert Ryle. But that should really bereserved for someone who is obsessed enough to do a doctoraldissertation in the area, well beyond the scope of this paper.

For this paper, let us turn, first of all, to those two formativeessays of Peirce. In The Fixation of Belief and How to Make Our Ideas ClearPeirce gives a genetic account of the establishment of a habit.The account begins, as with every inquiry, with the irritationcaused by doubt. “A true doubt is accordingly a doubt whichreally interferes with the smooth working of the belief-habit”(5.510). When a person is unable to act, for whatever reason, afeeling of irritation takes over the person.6 “If we do not5 I beg the reader’s patience as this essay has a tendency to meander a little; the material lends itself to such a reading as we are forced into various directions in order to string together various elements from a variety of sources.6 A key not working in a lock, for example, can cause a slight irritation if no practical consequences result, but could also cause a great deal of frustration for someone rushing to catch a bus. Peirce allows for this in discussing the degrees of

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escape it by way of compulsive actions or some form ofsublimation or repression, the way out is through inquiry.”7 Atthis point thinking kicks in solely as a means of removing theirritation: “As it appeases the irritation of doubt, which is themotive for thinking, thought relaxes, and comes to rest for amoment when belief is reached” (5.397). Just as doubt is thecognitive analogue of physical irritation, so too is belief thecognitive analogue of a calm and peaceful state. Belief, then, iswhat the mind has settled on as a means to overcome theirritation and doubt associated with an inability to act. Here wecan see the influence of Bain on Peirce and Peirce on James.“Bain maintained that belief is associated with ‘a serene,satisfying, and happy tone of mind.’” 8 James would later pickthis up and describe it as the sentiment of rationality.9 Oncethat belief has become sedimented, and thought is no longernecessary to remove the irritations, we can say that a habit hasbeen formed.10

Habit is thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most precious conservative agent. (121)

The habit is a “rule of action” that allows us to respond to ourenvironment should certain conditions obtain. In this way, we canbe said to be determined to act in a particular way should aparticular situation present itself. “What the habit is dependson when and how it causes us to act. As for the when, everystimulus to action is derived from perception; as for the how,every purpose of action is to produce some sensible result”(5.400). It is important to note that the entire discussion hereis geared towards activity, to the achievement of some course ofaction. When we read the previous quote, we are left with theimpression that we exist in a causal relationship with our

irritation. See 5.394.7 Douglas R. Anderson, Strands of System, 94.8 Douglas Anderson, 93 quoting Bain, 1859, 595; cited in Fisch, 84. 9 William James, “The Sentiment of Rationality” from The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy. Dover Publications, 1956, p. 63-110.10 It is not enough that we haphazardly choose whatever belief will allow us to remove doubt, such as accepting the idea that a spaceship just passed by when it was most likely a car. Though for the most part were are primarily concerned with the removal of the irritation, whatever form that removal takes (5.410).

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environment, that is, that there is a certain stimulus in ourenvironment that causes us to behave in a particular way that isdetermined by a rule of action. This would be a purelydetermined, behaviouristic approach to human subjectivity.11 Asmuch as Peirce wants to avoid this, reading the third chapter ofseventh volume entitled “Habit” leads one towards a purelymechanical, deterministic idea of habit. Further, his discussionof habit as being a process of nerve-cell discharge alongrepeated paths does not help to rescue him from behaviourism(1.390). Christopher Hookway points out Peirce’s problem: “It ishard to be sure how far the holistic character of Peirce’spragmatism … enables this view to escape traditional objectionsto behaviourism.”12

Nevertheless, numerous commentators have tried to help Peirce inthis regard. Douglas Greenlee has defended Peirce based on thechoice of words that Peirce uses:

Even though the role of habit in interpretation occupiedmuch of Peirce’s attention, his choice of words is aloneenough to give one reason to doubt that his approach isbehaviouristic. Peirce chose to speak of ‘interpretants’rather than ‘responses.’13

This is not entirely true, as we see with his discussion ofphysiology where he specifically uses responses in reference tohabits.14 Douglas Anderson takes a different approach and saysthat Peirce’s emphasis on self-control is enough to remove himfrom the behaviourist camp.15 Further, Peirce himself weighs inon the subject:

Nay, exact conformity [between the stimulus and theresponse] would be in downright conflict with the law; sinceit would instantly crystallize thought and prevent all

11 Many have cited Peirce as an influential thinker for their own development of behavioural theory, such as Kennon A. Lattal and Joseph S. Laipple. See Pragmatism andBehaviour Analysis in Behaviour theory and Philosophy, ed. Lattal and Chase, New York:Kluwer, 2003, p. 41-61.12 Christopher Hookway, 260.13 Douglas Greenlee, 24.14 See 5.53815 Douglas Anderson, 99.

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further formation of habit. The law of mind only makes agiven feeling more likely to arise(6.23).

He further argues against determinism, saying, “Each habit of anindividual is a law; but these laws are modified so easily by theoperation of self-control, that it is one of the most patentfacts that ideals and thought generally have a very greatinfluence on human conduct”(CP 1.349). As much as I would like toside with Greenlee and Anderson, I am compelled to align myselfwith Hookway. There is not enough evidence to say that Peirce’sapproach avoids behaviourism. This might fundamentally disagreewith his idea of self-control, but nevertheless, that is what weare left with.

There is, however, another way of looking at the problem thatPeirce himself does not specifically point to. When describingthe stimulus-response model, there is a certain lack ofconsciousness that is involved in the performance of a habit. Itis not part of the subconscious in the sense of a source of anti-rationality, but it does belong to a realm that we arespecifically not conscious of. We send a message down to ourmuscles to start performing a particular action and then thehigher cortical functions sit back and wait until they arerequired again. James refers to this as the reflex arc.16 We are notin direct control of the arc of our reflex, of the specificmuscular contractions, but we are nevertheless in control of thebeginning of our activity and, moreover, of the formation of thatactivity. The discussion of behaviourism is limited to theinternal workings of an individual habit and does not apply tothe person as a whole; it describes the reflex arc once thecommand has been issued. We can exercise a certain amount ofcontrol over our habits and our habitual behaviour, especiallywhen it comes to the formation of those habits. The behaviouristcould counter that Peirce’s description of habit is strictly aresponse to the environment should certain conditions obtain, butPeirce never describes it in this way; he always refers to habitas a propensity to act towards a particular goal should certainenvironmental conditions obtain. We are not determined to act ina particular way because a particular stimulus excites us; we can16 William James, Principles, 116.

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deny the stimulus, but only if we are aware of the stimulus assuch, only if we are aware that it is eliciting a particularresponse from us. This is an interesting point, but this has moreto do with a description of the outside of habits rather than adescription of the internal mechanics of habit formation, a pointmore interesting from a philosophical point of view.

Peirce says that “the formation of a habit is an induction, andis therefore necessarily connected with attention orabstraction”(5.297).17 What we are attentive to and abstractingfrom are signs. There are three kinds of sign for Peirce:

Firstly, there are likenesses, or icons; which serve toconvey ideas of the things they represent simply byimitating them. Secondly, there are indications, or indices;which show something about things, on account of their beingphysically connected with them. … Thirdly, there aresymbols, or general signs, which have become associated withtheir meanings by usage.

There is an irreducible hierarchical relationship that existsbetween the icons, indexes, and symbols: the indexes are moreabstract than the icons and the symbols more abstract than theindexes. Symbols are the solidification of the relationshipbetween different icons and indexes; symbols represent therelationship between other elements. Symbols can “have an icon oran index incorporated into it, that is, the active law that it ismay require its interpretation to involve the calling up of animage, or a composite photograph of many images of pastexperiences” (4.447). Symbols describe/define with law-likeregularity the way in which different elements will interact witheach other. These regularities, if of the form that do notrequire much conscious interpretation, are habits. For examplePeirce says that “a habit has been established in him by whichthat word calls up a variety of attributes of Napoleon the man”(8.178). The symbol, Napoleon, necessarily brings to mind certaincharacteristics that are associated with the word “Napoleon.” Itis not the arm tucked into the coat, the white breeches, or his17 Although we are beginning to focus more on the cognitive element in Peirce, thereby neglecting the behaviourist arguments and the strictly mechanistic interpretations of habit, the mental aspects of habituation have more philosophical import and relevance.

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particular headdress, but it is the association of these iconsbetween themselves that will bring to mind the symbol ofNapoleon. When we make this association, a rule governing ourbehaviour has been established.18 The word “Napoleon” then servesto stand in the place of the individual elements that constitutehis existence. These symbols then become the foundation forfurther symbols.19 For example, under the title of Emperor ofFrance, one will most likely call to mind Napoleon, but there areother figures that could be loosely associated with this title aswell, such as the Louises. As we abstract from the particulars,we find more and more associations between symbols, creating moreand more general symbols, more and more habits of association.

Though this association of different elements is a description ofthe state of affairs external to the individual, the symbolitself only exists in the mind. “Universality is a relation of apredicate to the subjects of which it is predicated. That canexist only in the mind, wherein alone the coupling of subject andpredicate takes place” (8.18). To say that these symbols exist inthe mind, as Peirce does, is to make an ontological claimregarding the status of those symbols.

There are two ways in which a thing may be in the mind,--habitualiter and actualiter. A notion is in the mind actulaiter whenit is actually conceived; it is in the mind habitualiter whenit can directly produce a conception. It is by virtue ofmental association (we moderns should say), that things arein the mind habitualiter. (8.18)

There is a bit of a conundrum that this description reveals tous. On the one hand, a thing can be in the mind insofar as it ispresent to consciousness, this is actulaiter. On the other, athing can be in the mind despite the fact that it is neitherpresent to consciousness nor producing some direct effect on ourbodies or the external world. What is the status of this otherform? Aristotle talks about the existence of a thing inpotential, in dynamis, and refers to habits in the same way18 For a more thorough discussion of types of association, see 4.157.19 Properly speaking, if a symbol becomes associated with another symbol and thereby contained within a more general symbol, then we should say that those composite elements are now indexes rather than symbols proper.

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(Metaphysics 1019a3), but this doesn’t help us understand theontological status any better. Peirce frequently says that theword “habit” in the original sense, only means

that the person or thing that has the habit, would behave(or usually behave) in a certain way whenever a certainoccasion should arise. But if this occasion did in actualitynot arise, such habit of thought as the conditionalproposition might produce would be a nullitypragmatistically and practically. (8.380)

Combining these two notions, we see that habits exist in the mindand yet may have no practical consequences whatsoever, thusmaking them a “nullity pragmatistically and practically.”

Going back to the discussion of signs, Greenlee says that “anobject may exist as a sign although it is not actually in theprocess of being interpreted.”20 It is not necessary that thereis someone actually interpreting the object. This doesn’tperfectly square with Peirce’s idea that a sign is a triadicrelationship that conveys meaning about an object to someone.Without this conveyance, the sign does not function and therebycannot be said to be a sign proper. Nevertheless, there issomething beneficial in this comment by Greenlee, that is, if weapply the thought that direct interpretation isn’t actuallynecessary for the existence of the habit, then we can understandthat habits can exist in the mind without necessitating theiractive use. The mistake occurs when we think that possessionimplies consciousness, that in order for something to actuallyexist, a habit especially, then it needs to be currently enactedby or in front of the mind. But there is an allowance for contentof the mind to exist without actually existing, merelypotentially existing. This is, I think, what Aristotle had inmind by dynamis.

Though Aristotle’s discussion might provide a way out of theproblem, we have little time to go into the details here. We havealso strayed from our question as to how habits form.

20 Greenlee, 116

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There is not much that needs to be said about the origin ofhabits. Peirce points out that habit-changes can come aboutin three ways. They result from experiences that are forcedupon us from without; from repeated muscular activities; or,finally, from mental experiments in the inner world.21

Though I completely disagree with Fitzgerald’s claim that “notmuch needs to be said about the origin of habits,” he does helpus understand that habits are of two sorts: physical and mental.The physical involves muscular contractions and the mentalinvolves the imagination positing ways in which to react to agiven situation should those conditions come about. But we aremerely at the response stage of habit and not the formation ofhabit. Peirce says that habit is necessarily bound up withinduction:

By induction, a habit becomes established. Certainsensations, all involving one general idea, are followedeach by the same reaction; and an association becomesestablished, whereby that general idea gets to be followeduniformly by that reaction. Habit is that specialization ofthe law of mind whereby a general idea gains the power ofexciting reactions (6.145).

Although we referred to it earlier, it is the process ofassociation that is the most interesting and difficult aspect toexplain. Neither there (4.157) nor anywhere else really doesPeirce give an adequate account of how particular associationsare made, how symbols are formed, or how habits evolve. Perhaps Iam asking too much here. Perhaps it is just a matter ofrepeatedly seeing certain elements together that causes us toform an association between those elements. We could,alternatively, tend to those elements in our mind’s eye and forcean association on them as well. But there seems to be somethingmissing here: how are we able to not only form associationsbetween discreet entities but also to be able to apply thoseconcepts and symbols to particular situations in the future.There has to be a certain congruence between the experiences thatallow for us to recognize the similarities that exist between

21 Fitzgerald, 145

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previous symbols and symbols in the future. That is easy enoughto see, but there has to be something that gives us thepossibility of seeing the congruence in the first place. What isthe condition of possibility of seeing this congruence. Theproblem is no different in Kant, that of Schematism, and itemerges again here. I think that the answer lies in Aristotle’sdescription of the phronimos, the wise man who is able toimmediately see (aiesthesis) the individual as belonging to thewhole, the particular as a member of the universal. Aristotlesays that this can only come as a result of practical experience,and I think he is right, but not everyone who has practicalexperience can be said to be wise. There is something inherent tothe wise man that allows him to see things that other peoplecannot see. This is the direction that I wish to begin toinquire. But this is also a direction that takes us far beyondthe scope of this paper.

What we were after in this paper is a more thorough understandingof Peirce’s concept of habit. Despite the difficulties, I believewe have reached an adequate level of competence regarding theidea. We began by looking at the early essays that were veryformative for Peirce’s later thoughts, The Fixation of Belief and How toMake Our Ideas Clear. From these essays we pulled the idea that habitis a sedimented belief that arises out of a response to anirritation based on an inability to act. From this stimulus-response model, we looked at criticisms that called Peirce abehaviourist. This brought out the essential element ofconsciousness of habits, that we are conscious of the formationand the initial instigation of a habit, but not of the entiretyof the habituated activity. But if we are not conscious of thehabits, and we are not performing the habits themselves, thenthere is a problem regarding the ontological status of thosehabits. This problem was not resolved, but an answer was hintedat in bringing up Aristotle’s idea of dynamis. We returned onceagain to the question of the formation of habits and beganoutlining a problem that pertained to the induction involved intheir formation. Here again an answer was not given, but a we aredirected backwards to Aristotle in order to understand what rolethe wise man can play in explaining the ability to immediatelyperceive and understand the relationship between the universals

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and the particulars. This, I think, is one of the most difficultconcepts to understand in both Peirce and Aristotle. I hope toreturn to these two authors in the near future to see if we canbetter understand this process.

Though it was not strongly emphasized throughout the paper, Ithink it is best to understand Peirce’s habits as a descriptionof the flow of experience. Habits themselves, as rules of action,are specifically the way in which we are able to maintain acontinuous flow of experience without necessitating the constantjarring motion of doubt and irritation. As we build on thesehabits by constantly exposing ourselves to new situations and newsurroundings, we are constantly building up a greaterunderstanding of how to flow through the complexities of everydaylife. In a way, this is specifically an argument for the “tryanything once” approach to life as it tends to foster greatercompetency in the more mundane areas of our everyday experiences.Perhaps a “think now, flow later” motto could be adopted. Notevery situation allows for such an approach, and I do think thatboth Hegel and Deleuze are right in saying that philosophy comeslate on the scene. But there is certainly something quiterewarding that results from this reflexive, thoughtful engagementwith the world around us. It is through acting, pausing,thinking, acting again that we are able to come to betterunderstand the associations in the world around us. Peircedescribes this well and I think his understanding of habitformation through semiology can benefit both the cognitivesciences as well as cognitive-behavioural therapy approaches.When we better understand the world around us, we are in a muchbetter position to change that world around us for the better.This is, I think, one of the greatest benefits that Peirce hasbequeathed to us. This is also what I hope to come to understandin my later studies.

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The Conscious Development of Habits

James’ Development of HabitsIn the main, however, all expert opinion would agree that abrupt acquisition of the new habit is the best way, if there be a real possibility of carrying it out. We must be careful not to give the will so stiff a task as to insure its defeat at the very outset; but, provided one can stand it, a sharp period of suffering, and then a free time, is the best thing to aim at, whether in giving up a habit like that of opium, or in simply changing one’s hours of rising or of work. It is surprising how soon a desire will die of inanition if it be never fed. (124)

The great thing, then, in all education, is to make automatic and habitual, as early as possible, as many usefulactions as ice can, and to guard against the growing into ways that are likely to be disadvantageous to us, as we should guard against the plague. The more of the details of our daily life we can hand over to the infallible and effortless custody of automatism, the more our higher powersof mind will be set free for their own proper work. There isno more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision, and for whom the lighting of every cigar, the drinking of every cup, the time of rising and going to bed every day, and the beginning of every bit of work, are subjects of express volitional deliberation. Full half the time of such a man goes to the deciding, or regretting, of matters which ought to have been so thoroughly ingrained in him as practically not to exist for his consciousness at all. If there be such daily duties not yet ingrained in any one of my readers, let him begin this very day to set the matter right.

In Professor Bain's chapter on "The Moral Habits" there are some admirable practical remarks laid down. Two great maximsemerge from his treatment. The first is that in the acquisition of a new habit, or the leaving off of an old one, we must take care to launch ourselves icith as strong

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and decided an initiative as possible. Accumulate all the possible circumstances which shall re-enforce the right motives; put yourself assiduously in conditions that encourage the new way; make engagements incompatible with the old; take a public pledge, if the case allows ; in short, envelop your resolution with every aid you know. Thiswill give your new beginning such a momentum that the temptation to break down will not occur as soon as it otherwise might; and every day during which a breakdown is postponed adds to the chances of its not occurring at all.

The second maxim is: Never suffer an exception to occur tillthe new habit is securely rooted in your life. Each lapse islike the letting fall of a ball of string which one is carefully winding up; a single slip undoes more than a greatmany turns will wind again. Continuity of training is the great means of making the nervous system act infallibly right. As Professor Bain says: "The peculiarity of the moralhabits, contradistinguishing them from the intellectual acquisitions, is the presence of two hostile powers, one to be gradually raised into the ascendant over the other. It isnecessary, above all things, in such a situation, never to lose a battle. Every gain on the wrong side undoes the effect of many conquests on the right. The essential precaution, therefore, is so to regulate the two opposing powers, that the one may have a series of uninterrupted successes, until repetition has fortified it to such a degree as to enable it to cope with the opposition, under any circumstances. This is the theoretically best career of mental progress." (122-123)

A third maxim may be added to the preceding pair: Seize the very first possible opportunity to act on every resolution you make, and on every emotional prompting you may experience in the direction of the habits you aspire to gain. It is not in the moment of their forming, but in the moment of their producing motor effects, that resolves and aspirations communicate the new ‘set’ to the brain. (124)

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As a final practical maxim, relative to these habits of the will, we may, then, offer something like this: Keep the faculty of effort alive in you by a little gratuitous exercise every day. That is, be systematically ascetic or heroic in little unnecessary points, do every day or two something for no other reason than that you would rather notdo it, so that when the hour of dire need draws nigh, it mayfind you not unnerved and untrained to stand the test. Asceticism of this sort is like the insurance which a man pays on his house and goods. The tax does him no good at thetime, and possibly may never bring him a return. But if the fire does come, his having paid it will be his salvation from ruin. So with the man who has daily inured himself to habits of concentrated attention, energetic volition, and self-denial in unnecessary things. He will stand like a tower when everything rocks around him, and when his softer fellow-mortals are winnowed like chaff in the blast. (127)

Peirce (Reflection and the Ideals of Conduct)In the 1903 Lowell lectures referred to above, Peirce said thatthere are certain ideals of conduct that have been “imbibed” inus since childhood that are the “general description of conductthat befits a rational animal in his particular station in life,what most accords with his total nature and relations” (CP 1.591-2). These ideals are not the product of “any distinct acts ofthought,” but “have gradually been shaped to his personal natureand to the ideas of his circle of society” (CP 1.592). Peirceacknowledges the vagueness of the words “befit” and “accords” inthe above statement and begins to clarify. There are three waysthat the ideals of conduct recommend themselves to us: throughcontemplation of the esthetic quality of the ideals, through adesire for consistency between ideals, and through an examinationof the consequences of those ideals. In each of these situations,the contemplation of the ideals need not take place as anawareness of the contemplation of the ideal as an ideal, butrather would most likely take the form of a contemplation of aparticular behaviour and whether the agent would like to engagein that behaviour. The remainder of this section will focus on

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the movement of a passive acceptance of the ideals to an activeadoption of an ideal that is the result of deliberate reflection.This process is, in effect, the development of intelligent habitsthat contribute to the growth of concrete reasonableness—themovement from esthetics to ethics and logic and back intoesthetics.

The reflection on the ideals of conduct leads to four steps inthe process of the adoption of the ideal and five steps in thecritical assessment of whether the behaviour matched the ideal.The process of adopting an ideal begins with (i) a generalintention or desire to make our conduct conform to the ideal.22

We admire an activity, believe it to be admirable, and want tobehave in a similar way. (ii) On further reflection on theactivity, certain rules of conduct are formed that would bringour activity in accordance with the ideal. Peirce says that“Reflection upon these rules, as well as upon the general idealsbehind them, has a certain effect upon his disposition, so thatwhat he naturally inclines to do becomes modified” (CP 1.592). Byrecognizing an ideal as admirable, one will begin modifying one’sbehaviour in accordance with that ideal. By identifying aparticular behaviour, one has already begun the process of beingable to analyze the component parts of that behaviour andgenerate rules of conduct that are in accordance with the ideal.

Once the rules of conduct have been established, a resolution ismade:

he often foresees that a special occasion is going to arise;thereupon, a certain gathering of his forces will begin towork and this working of his being will cause him toconsider how he will act, and in accordance with hisdisposition, such as it now is, he is led to form a resolutionas to how he will act upon that occasion. This resolution isof the nature of a plan; or, as one might almost say, adiagram.

22 There is, of course, a step that happens before this process can occur: the ideal needs to be seen as worthy of admiration. Peirce says that this is the work of esthetics—to figure out what ideals are worthy of admiration.

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The resolution is a decision about the way in which someone willact once a certain occasion presents itself. The way that thisresolution manifests itself is as a diagram for action. A diagramfor action, says Peirce in the Prolegomena for an Apology to Pragmatism,is “what is called a General sign; that is, it denotes a generalObject.”23 The diagram is not designed to represent particulardetails, but merely the form of relation, what Peirce elsewherecalls “the meaning of a general predicate” (EP 2:303). In thesame passage, Peirce calls a diagram an “icon or a schematicimage” (EP 2:303). Unifying all of these passages, the diagram isan icon that represents not particular objects but the form ofrelation of between objects; it is designed to demonstrate howobjects are related to one another, or, to put it another way,how general objects behave with one another. When Peirce talksabout the diagram that is necessary for enacting a resolution,Peirce is talking about knowing how one should comport oneselfwhen certain situations arise. It is in this sense that theresolution to act is a further step along the process of forminga habit.

The third step (iii) involves the transformation of a resolutioninto a determination.

Being nothing more than an idea, this resolution does notnecessarily influence his conduct. But now he sits down andgoes through a process similar to that of impressing alesson upon his memory, the result of which is that theresolution, or mental formula, is converted into a determination,by which I mean a really efficient agency, such that if oneknows what its special character is, one can forecast theman's conduct on the special occasion. (CP 1.592)

The ability to see what would be necessary for the realization ofsome ideal isn’t sufficient for the realization of that ideal.One must turn that mental formula into a determination. Thedetermination is a preparedness to act in a particular way or,for short, a habit. Once the habit has been determined, then weare able to predict the behaviour that will result. Elsewhere

23 'Prolegomena for an Apology to Pragmatism', New Elements of Mathematics 4:315-316n1,c. 1906 http://www.helsinki.fi/science/commens/dictionary.html “diagram”

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Peirce calls this an “imperative command addressed to the futureself” (CP 5.477). This movement of a resolution to adetermination is the point at which the image converts to areadiness to action. Of the process of transformation of aresolution into a determination, Peirce says “We do not know bywhat machinery the conversion of a resolution into adetermination is brought about” and that it “is something hiddenin the depths of our nature” (CP 1.593). One way to ensure thatthe resolution is transformed into a determination is to ensurethat there is a “unitary conception of all that has to be doneand just when it must be done” (CP 5.479). If the agent is ableto ensure that all of the activities are thought through inadvance, then the resolution is more likely to turn into adetermination. The imagination is vitally important for bothovercoming this problem and for the formation of a habit: “abelief-habit formed in the imagination simply, as when I considerhow I ought to act under imaginary circumstances, will equallyaffect my real action should those circumstances be realized” (CP2.148).

It seems like the process of moving from a resolution to adetermination is a problem for Peirce because he thinks there isa difference between thinking about something as a preparednessfor action and being ready to act when the situation arises. Ifit is the case that there is no fundamental difference betweenthe two types of behaviour, then there is no problem transformingresolutions into determinations. We are embodied beings andmerely thinking about how we want to behave when a situationarises is often enough to prepare our body for that activity whenthat situation arises.24

Once the activity has been performed, the agent is able toreflect on whether that activity accorded with the resolutionthat the agent had expressed before the activity. This initiatesthe five step process of critical assessment that leads towardstheoretical speculation. The first step is (i) to ask ourselveswhether the activity corresponded with the resolution. Now theactivity that we are contemplating is not the activity itself buta memory of that activity. The memory of the activity Peirce24 Imagining oneself in a fight is often enough to get the blood pumping, for example.

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calls an image (CP 1.596). “To imagine is to reproduce in themind elementary sensible intuitions and to take them up in someorder so as to make an image” (W 1.353). This image is thencompared to the resolution to determine if the activity was goodor not. Accompanying this comparison is a feeling:

so in formulating the judgment that the image of our conductdoes satisfy our previous resolution we are, in the very actof formulation, aware of a certain quality of feeling, thefeeling of satisfaction — and directly afterward recognizethat that feeling was pleasurable. (CP 1.596)

Presumably the feeling of satisfaction comes as a result of theaccordance of the image with the ideal. Peirce later argues thatit is not the feeling that makes the act a good or bad one, butthe judgment that one makes about the act that determines whetherthe act was good or bad. If the activity was good then thejudgment will be felt to be pleasurable, but if the activity wasbad then the judgment will be felt to be unpleasurable.25

The second step is (ii) to ask whether the behaviour accordedwith the general intentions laid out at the beginning. “But now Imay probe deeper into my conduct, and may ask myself whether itaccorded with my general intentions. Here again there will be ajudgment and a feeling accompanying it, and directly afterward arecognition that that feeling was pleasurable or painful” (CP1.597). The feeling that accompanies such a judgment, Peircesays, “will probably afford less intense pleasure than the other;but the feeling of satisfaction which is pleasurable will bedifferent and, as we say, a deeper feeling” (CP 1.597). Thoughthe feeling will still be one of pleasure or pain, the feelingwill not be as strong but will be longer lasting than thepleasure from asking if the behaviour agreed with the resolution.

A third step can be taken (iii): one can ask if the image of theconduct is in agreement with the ideals of conduct in general: “Imay now go still further and ask how the image of my conductaccords with my ideals of conduct fitting to a man like me” (CP25 Peirce makes this argument, it seems, to avoid being misinterpreted as advocating a simple hedonism where all acts are performed for their pleasure and not for their worth independent of pleasure.

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1.598). In each of these situations, “whether the man issatisfied with himself or dissatisfied, his nature will absorbthe lesson like a sponge; and the next time he will tend to dobetter than he did before” (CP 1.598). The act of reflecting onone’s behaviour, Peirce argues, will inevitably lead to themodification of that behaviour.

In each of these steps, Peirce is moving beyond theparticularities of the situation and questioning the direction ofthe self over an extended period. This movement towardsgeneralization (which was one of the requirements of the sciencesthat Peirce described in 1898) leads to the fourth step (iv):

In addition to these three self-criticisms of single seriesof actions, a man will from time to time review his ideals.This process is not a job that a man sits down to do and hasdone with. The experience of life is continuallycontributing instances more or less illuminative. These aredigested first, not in the man's consciousness, but in thedepths of his reasonable being. The results come toconsciousness later. (CP 1.599)

Questioning the ideals is neither something that happens all thetime nor something that “a man sits down to do and has donewith”; rather, these reflections occur slowly and over the courseof one’s lifetime. The lessons learned through the “experience oflife” are slowly brought to bear on one’s reasonable being, onlyto be brought up to consciousness later. It is a long anddifficult process to evaluate one’s ideals, and this is not aprocess that happens all at once, but slowly, with constantmodifications taking place over the course of one’s lifetime.

There is a fifth and final step that one may make (v), and thisconsists in a theoretical, ethical study that examines “what thefitness of an ideal of conduct consists in, and to deduce fromsuch definition of fitness what conduct ought to be” (CP 1.600).At least in theory, there is a clear line of demarcation thatdifferentiates Ethics as a practical science from Ethics as atheoretical science. Once the Ethicist steps over into questionsof the fitness of an ideal, then the Ethicist is in the realm oftheory. Immediately, however, once the fitness of an ideal of

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conduct is examined, then there is inevitably going to be amodification of behaviour, if only a slight modification in thebeginning, but will eventually modify conduct over the long term.

With these five steps, Peirce has outlined an ethics of criticalself-evaluation. (i) First there is the examination of theaccordance between the conduct and the resolution, (ii) then theconduct and the general intentions, (iii) then the conduct andideals, (iv) then a review of the ideals themselves, and finally(v) a theoretical study of the fitness of the ideals and whatbehaviour can be deduced therefrom. When these five steps arecombined with the previous four steps of intention, rules ofconduct, resolution, and determination, then there is clearlyexplained an ethics of critical self-control and the formation ofintelligent habits.

The next move that Peirce makes in this section on the ideals ofconduct is to propose the growth of concrete reasonableness asthe ultimate ideal (CP 1.606). Peirce does this by describing aclass of inferences that not only applies for a particular case,but would apply for every analogous case as well. If theinference passes the test of being applicable to analogous cases,then the inference can be considered reasoning. He thenidentifies “certain norms, or general patterns of rightreasoning” and compares the inference with those norms in orderto see if the inference satisfies the requirements set out bythose norms. If it does satisfy those requirements then “we get afeeling of approval” and we become more certain of the inference.For Peirce, the evaluation of reasoning contains all the mainelements of moral conduct: “the general standard mentallyconceived beforehand, the efficient agency in the inward nature,the act, the subsequent comparison of the act with the standard”(CP 1.607). From there Peirce asks what “right reasoning consistsin? It consists in such reasoning as shall be conducive to ourultimate aim. What, then, is our ultimate aim?” (CP 1.611).Peirce then states that he is unsatisfied with the answers of theestheticians who argue that the ultimate aim is the beautifulwithout any reasoning for it to be so—there must be a reason forit to be beautiful. Instead, Peirce says that “The object that isadmirable per se must, no doubt, be general. Every ideal is more

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or less general. It may be a complicated state of things. But itmust be a single ideal; it must have unity, because it is anidea, and unity is essential to every idea and every ideal” (CP1.613). The admirable object is the growth of concretereasonableness.

For Peirce, reason is “something that never can have beencompletely embodied”, “actually governs individual events,”“always must be in a state of incipiency, of growth,” and is theideal of conduct that we are aiming for (CP 1.615). Peirce usesthe example of predicating “hardness” to a stone—no matter howmany times one tries, the governing law of the hardness of thestone will always dictate that the stone will be hard. Becausethe development of reason requires more individual events thancan ever occur, will never be exhausted, and is always in theprocess of growth, the growth of reason functions as the ultimateideal. Our job then becomes to embody reason in the concrete:“Under this conception, the ideal of conduct will be to executeour little function in the operation of the creation by giving ahand toward rendering the world more reasonable whenever, as theslang is, it is ‘up to us’ to do so” (CP 1.615).26

The ambiguity surrounding concrete reasonableness has confoundedmore than a few thinkers.27 Nevertheless, concrete reasonablenessis the exercise of logic “to pull to pieces our inferences, toshow whether they are good or bad, how they can be strengthened,and by what methods they ought to proceed” (W 5:328, CP 7.449).Through reflecting on our inferences, using logic to pull themapart, and critical self-control as a means of modifying ourbehaviour in accordance with the ideals of conduct and, by26 There are articles, such as those by Bent Sorenson and Ciano Aydin that purport to provide an explanation of the growth of concrete reasonableness, but in fact, concretereasonableness, despite being in the title of one and one of the central ideas of the other, was very little mentioned even though it is the central ideal that unifies Peirce’s thinking about ethics. See, Ciano Aydin “On the Significance of Ideals: Charles S. Peirce and the Good Life” in Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society, Vol. 45, No.3 (2009), 422-443 and Bent Sorenson, “The sign universe, Summum Bonum, self-control, and the normative sciences in a Peircean perspective or man ought to contribute to thegrowth in the concrete reasonableness” Semiotica. 176–1/4 (2009), 83–93.27 See, for example, Cheryl Misak’s characterization of Peirce’s concrete reasonableness as an answer to the question of what can be admired unconditionally as “rather unhelpful.” Cheryl Misak, “C.S. Peirce on Vital Matters” Cambridge Companion to Peirce ed Cheryl Misak (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 170.

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extension, the laws of reason, then we are in a position torender the world more reasonable.

The result of the reasoning process is what Vincent Colapietrohas called being deliberate and thoughtful: “Our conduct is deliberatenot because it necessarily involves stopping and deliberatingbefore we act but because our past deliberations have shaped (andoften profoundly transformed) our presently spontaneous acts.”28

This is how Colapietro describes thoughtful persons:

Thoughtful persons deliberate when circumstances allow andtend to act thoughtfully (attentively, considerately,purposefully) even when the pressures of circumstancepreclude the possibility of deliberation. In contrast,thoughtless persons squander opportunities to deliberate(like the White Rabbit, each insisting, “I’m late, I’m late,for a very important date”) and exaggerate the extent towhich extenuating circumstances rather than debilitatingchoices account for their all too characteristicthoughtlessness. At a certain point in our intellectualdevelopment, it is inadequate to excuse ourselves byinsisting that we did not think that a particular omissionwould be irritating, or an insulting utterance hurtful, oran impulsive action disastrous. In general, being trulythoughtful requires us to discern our own tendencies towardthoughtlessness; it requires us to imagine, for the purposeof self-accountability, both the contexts in which andpeople to whom our habitual responses are most likelyingrained patterns of inattention and insensitivity. Habitsof sustained thoughtfulness, sharpened attentiveness,painstaking consideration, and so on are not random resultsbut the cumulative effects of conscientious deliberation.29

Colapietro doesn’t make an explicit value judgment about the typeof life that a thoughtful, deliberate person would lead, but evenif one is not convinced that the life that Colapietro describes

28 Vincent Colapietro, “Peirce’s Guess at the Riddle of Rationality” in Classical American Pragmatism: Its Contemporary Vitality, ed by Sandra B. Rosenthal, Carl Hausman, and Douglas Anderson (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 17.29 Colapietro, “Peirce’s Guess at the Riddle of Rationality”, 17.

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is worthwhile, it at least fits well within the Peirceanframework outlined above.

Potential Uses of HabitsThe next thing that I would like us to do is to look at a contemporary take on habits and how those habits are being used for and against us. I’ll leave it up to you whether you think ourhabits are being used for or against us. Charles Duhigg wrote a book in 2012 called The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business. He’s also written for the New York Times. The article that I would like us to look at comes from the NYTimes. In this article, Duhigg talks about some conversations that he’s had witha senior habit researcher named Andrew Pole at Target, yes, that same Target that opened up recently in the south end of Guelph. Companies like Target are able to aggregate data on our spending patterns in order to predict which products we are likely to buy in the future.

Whenever possible, Target assigns each shopper a unique code—known internally as the Guest ID number—that keeps tabs on everything they buy. “If you use a credit card or a coupon, or fill out a survey, or mail in a refund, or call the customer help line, or open an e-mail we’ve sent you or visit our Web site, we’ll record it and link it to your Guest ID,” Pole said. “We want to know everything we can.”

Target is not unique in this respect. Almost every major retailerhas some sort of “predictive analytics” department that works on collected and analyzing this sort of data.

There is plenty of neuroscience that is backing up these predictive analytics departments. Duhigg talks about research that maps brain activity in rats as they develop habits for completing a maze with a chunk of chocolate at the end.

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And within their brains, something unexpected occurred: as each rat learned how to complete the maze more quickly, its mental activity decreased. As the path became more and more automatic—as it became a habit—the rats started thinking less and less.

As they ran through the maze, they began to show less and less neural activity except at the beginning of the activity and at the end of the activity. Researchers have said that this spike atthe beginning is the brain stating that a particular habit shouldbe engaged and the brain activity spike at the end completes the feedback loop and the reward signals to the rat that the behaviour should be remembered.

This process, in which the brain converts a sequence of actions into an automatic routine, is called “chunking.” There are dozens, if not hundreds of behavioral chunks we rely on every day.

Which shoe do you put on first? When do you feel like having a drink? When do you feel most anxious? How often do you go to bed because it’s “bedtime” only to lay awake in bed for hours becauseyou realize that it’s not actually time for bed? These are all activities that tend to happen at a particular point based on some sort of trigger.

Left to our own devices, the brain will try to make almost any repeated behavior into a habit, because habits allow ourminds to conserve effort.

To begin to form any one of these habits, it’s important that youremove your decision-making capacity as much as possible and offload those decisions onto our environment. If you want to start jogging in the morning, then put your shoes next to your bed so you actually have to sidestep them in order to carry on with your day. If you want to make it through a difficult task,

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then start associating some positive behaviour with the performance of that task. There’s a difficult book that you know that you need to read but are having trouble getting through it? Start rewarding yourself with a jellybean after you get through each page. Once you can perform that task simply enough, then switch it up to every other page or third page or switch out the reward to a raisin or a peanut. If that’s working well enough, then switch to tapping your finger a particular way. You’ll soon realize that the more that you engage in this activity, the more that you reward yourself for the performance of the activity, themore that you ritualize that reward, the less the specific rewardmatters and the more that the fact of the reward matters. Don’t go into the activity thinking that you’re going to switch it up to a lesser reward down the road, though, but just think about how to reward yourself for performing difficult activities. Eventually you’ll realize that the mental pat on the back is sufficient reward for any activity you want to engage in.

It’s not easy to switch up these habits or to develop new habits.In fact, there are relatively few times in our lives when we are able to replace habits on the level that we’d like. Those relatively few times do exist, however, and they mostly come during major life changes like the birth of a child, moving, switching jobs, or getting into or out of relationships. Each of these moments represents a unique opportunity to switch up some of the major habits that we’ve grown accustomed to. Why is that? Possibly because all of the routine behaviours that we’ve normally engaged in are subject to a moment of hesitation, a moment when we have to ask ourselves how we’re going to complete that task that was all too easy before this big shift. Retailers like Target have picked up on this moment and are getting more and more efficient about predicting when these shifts will take place. The main one that they focus on is the birth of a child.

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When a child is born, most of the habits that we had before, suchas shopping at multiple places to get the items that we want, arethrown out the window in the interests of conservation of time and the precious little energy that we have. If a retailer can predict when that moment is going to occur then it might be able to grab a captive customer that will likely be loyal for the nextfew years, especially if that customer can be offered benefits like coupons that are directly targeted to them. This is exactly what target does, and with startling efficiency.

That predictive analytics guy that Duhigg was referring to at thebeginning of his article has made quite a name for himself by identifying particular items that customers are likely to buy in their second trimester, that fateful period when the expectant mother is on the cusp of changing a whole slew of habits. Items that trigger that a woman is in her second trimester, things suchas particular vitamin pills, unscented toilet paper, clothes detergent, and lotion, on their own don’t mean much, but when those items are bought together and bought with a bit of frequency, are likely to signal that woman is pregnant. Target brings this information together and then starts pitching couponsat this woman, either through email or through her home address. Once in the store, the woman is then offered a free Starbucks forwhen she returns the next time. We can see this kind of reward system all over the place, such as IKEA’s dollar breakfasts to reward cards like McDonald’s stickers that you can collect and exchange for another coffee, which then gives you another sticker, thus perpetuating the cycle.

“And we found that as long as a pregnant woman thinks she hasn’t been spied on, she’ll use the coupons. She just assumes that everyone else on her block got the same mailer for diapers and cribs. As long as we don’t spook her, it works.” said Pole.

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So how does Duhigg recommend that we break out of the cycle? Simple. Follow some of the advice of Peirce for those long-term habits, but for shorter-term habits, simply pay attention to the moment when a particular desire manifests itself. Obviously doingthis with negative habits is easier than positive habits, but once we start down this path, we start to realize that most of our habits are sub-optimal to begin with. But when that desire hits, we need to ask ourselves, What exactly is happening? When is it happening? Where is it happening? What is the emotional state? Who else is around? What happened right before the desire?Once we start reflecting on the cue, then we can start thinking about the routine and the reward that is associated with a particular habit, then we’re well on our way to replacing that habit with one that is a little bit more optimal.

I’d like to spend just a few moments discussing something that Pole said and the thought that Duhigg left us with at the end of the article. There Pole said “Just wait. We’ll be sending you coupons for things you want before you even know you want them.” The difficult thing, and the more philosophical thing, would be to analyze that last statement in a little more detail. If it’s the case that Target is selling us things that are, in a sense, either manufactured or modified desires, then that becomes a little more problematic for a whole host of reasons, not the least of which includes the idea that there are primal desires that can then be tricked and sublimated into a series of different forms through advertising. Though a nice explanation, and one that removes the oft maligned personal responsibility that simply cannot stand up to the demands of a 3x4” coupon, it doesn’t give us much to work with and specifically removes the possibility of personal autonomy. I’m not arguing that it is an either or situation, that is, either being wholly duped by the corporations or the exercise of absolute autonomy, but I am stating that it is problematic to simply say that that our buyingpowers are outside our control. Back to that quote.

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Of course the article has to end with an ominous ending in order to motivate us to act, but before that point, I would like to know what you think about the target situation: if target is simply identifying our behavioural and shopping patterns and providing us with coupons for the things that we were going to buy already, then is there really a problem with their activities? We willingly give up this information all the time assoon as the nice clerk asks us for our postal code or email address, and so if it’s information that we’re willingly giving up, then is it so wrong for them to provide us with a discount for things that we were going to buy anyway?

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