  Now, no one familiar with Hegel can escape the obvious comparison: we have in Peirce an essentially idealist theory that is similar to the idealism that Hegel puts forward in the Phaenomenologie des Geistes. Furthermore, both Hegel and Peirce make the whole evolutionary interpretation of the evolving phaneron to be a process that is said to be logical, the “action” of logic itself. Of course there are differences between the two philosophers. For example, what exactly Hegel’s logic is has been shrouded in mystery for every Hegelian after Hegel himself (and some philosophers, for example Popper, would say for every Hegelian including Hegel). By contrast Peirce’s logic is reasonably clear, and he takes great pains to work it out in intricate detail; basically Peirce’s logic is the whole logical apparatus of the physical and social sciences.