Peirce's Nominalist-Realist Distinction, an Untenable Dualism

For Peirce there seem to be only two options. Nominalism and realism represent, for him, the only two possible alternative interpretations of the hypothesis that there is a reality;2 reality here understood as what is independent of what you or I or anyone in particular thinks of it, or, as he also puts it, thinks it to be.3 Here I will argue that this nominalism/realism dichotomy is false. By combining Peirce's notions of reality and externality, I will show that there are three options, not the two Peirce distinguishes. The recognition that there are more options besides nominalism and realism implies that Peirce's basic argument from exclusion realism must be right because nominalism is proven to be wrong no longer works. This negative defense of realism is of special significance since it reveals valuable information about what realism stands for. This is important, not only because Peirce remains rather vague about what realism is,4 but also because the so-called irreconcilable facts which the alternatives hit upon and because of which they have to be discarded will tell us what kind of theory realism is to be (cf. CP 4.35, 1893; CP 4.1, 1898). Here I will show not only that such a negative defense of realism can still be maintained, albeit in a slightly more complex fashion, but also that to do so in this triadic setting will leave us with a better picture of what realism entails than Peirce's original dichotomy. The discovery that the long standing debate between nominalists and realists is intrinsically connected with the notion of reality is made by Peirce in his 1871 review of Berkeley's Works} After noting that the nominalist-realist debate revolves around the question whether