Gary, List, Thank you, Gary, both recommending my paper and for the clear and perceptive summary and interpretation of it. When I wrote this paper in the nineteen nineties I regarded IA and AI as rival research programs: one regarding computers - like pencils, pen and ink, etc. - as tools for human thinking, the other seeking to locate thinking in the computer itself. As noted in an earlier post, I am not really up to date on current AI research, but I have come to see the two research programs as to some extent complementary, as one use of AI is to improve human-computer user interfaces.
What motivated me to write about these matters in the nineties - other than my obvious interest in Peirce’s thought - were two very practical experiences, to wit, word-processing and foreign-language translation. I found my days spent working with an MS DOS computer in the office while writing about philosophy with a Macintosh at home, and I found myself thinking differently - more easily - with the Macintosh than with the pc, as my thinking was not distracted by the requirements of the program. Around this time I also read Michael Heim’s ‘Electric Language’, published in 1990, which discussed the effects on thought of using command-based word-processing. It was actually from Heim’s book that I first heard of Engelbart, and my virtuality paper was presented at a panel headed by Heim at the 1997 Pacific Division Meeting of the APA. I have to run now, but will post a few words on foreign-language translation tomorrow. Best, Peter Sent from my iPhone > On Aug 1, 2026, at 2:58 PM, Gary Richmond <[email protected]> wrote: > > > List, > > I'd like to strongly recommend Peter Skagestad's paper, "Peirce, Virtuality, > and Semiotic," which seems remarkably prescient despite having been written > decades before today's AI systems. But perhaps more important is what it > suggests about virtuality in human semiosis. > https://www.bu.edu/wcp/Papers/Cogn/CognSkag.htm > Skagestad begins with Peirce's own definition from Baldwin's Dictionary of > Philosophy and Psychology (1902): "A virtual X ... is something, not an X, > which has the efficiency (virtus) of an X." Virtuality, in this sense, > concerns functional capability, not appearance. He then argues that this idea > is deeply embedded in Peirce's semeiotic itself: Since every Sign stands in > an irreducibly triadic relation to its Object and Interpretant, and every > Interpretant usually becomes a further Sign, semiosis is an open-ended, > developmental process. So the meaning of a sign lies not in its present > occurrence but in its possible future interpretants and interpretations. > > From this follows what Skagestad takes to be one of Peirce's most radical > insights: Thoughts are themselves signs, and because signs have their being > through their possible future interpretants, thought itself is fundamentally > virtual. As Peirce puts it, "the meaning of a thought is altogether something > virtual." Mind is not something fully present at any instant but an ongoing > developing process extending through time. > > This perspective also helps clarify Peirce's famous remark that if someone > stole his inkstand "the very thoughts would not come to me." Skagestad makes > clear that Peirce isn't saying merely that writing records thoughts. Instead, > pens, paper, diagrams, logical notation, and other symbolic media participate > in the production of thought itself. As argued in other related threads, > human intelligence has always depended upon such external symbolic > technologies, from alphabets and books to computers and, today, networks > which extend -- and I believe that List members agree, not replace -- > cognition. > > Skagestad concludes that Peirce's semeiotic offers perhaps the most promising > philosophical framework for understanding both human thought and virtual > technologies. Because thought consists of signs, and signs are essentially > virtual, and that cognition depends upon external media, then modern > computational technologies are best understood as augmentations of human > inquiry rather than as substitutes for human minds (read: Douglas Engelbart's > IA). > > I believe that Skagestad's paper deserves renewed attention. Although > written before the contemporary AI era, it anticipates many of the questions > we are now asking and does so by returning directly to Peirce's own > conception of signs, virtuality and, in my view, the growth of inquiry. > > Best, > > Gary R
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