6.220 is from the Logic of Events, 1898- and that section refers, as John was talking about, to the nature of potentiality.
- ----- Original Message -----
- From: Clark Goble
- To: Peirce-L
- Sent: Thursday, July 31, 2014 7:27 PM
- Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] [biosemiotics:6231] Re: biosemiotics is the basis for
- On Jul 31, 2014, at 5:08 PM, Edwina Taborsky <tabor...@primus.ca> wrote:
- I agree that the laws are generals and not material; they couldn't be general AND material, for materiality is existentially local and particular. However, following Aristotle, I consider that the general law (Form) is embedded within the particular instantiation, even though, in itself, it is not a material form.
- Ive not read too many arguments on how Aristotilean Peirce is here. As I recall I was curious a few months back of how to distinguish say Armstrongs view of universals from Peirces view of generals here. That is if the general is a habit to what degree is it tied to the matter. Which is what I think John was getting at. Sadly I just dont have time to get into that. Im far from convinced theres a simple answer in Peirce though. I think there are places where he seems to distinguish qualities from matter. The question ends up being whether generals as generals are just habits or whether they also relate to possibility as possibility. The quote I gave earlier from CP 6.220 touches on that. I forget the exact date of that document but off the top of my head I think it was in the 1870s. So a debate of the evolution of Peirces thought seems quite relevant as well.
- EDWINA: Yes - I'm aware of the fuzziness of the term postmodernism; a more modern term is 'constructivism', I think; but the point remains - that it views the world through the individual human agent's eyes.
- Well as a side tangent Im not sure Id agree the important figures under the postmodern rubric are constructivists. Many are, of course. Some major figures like Heidegger or Derrida can easily be read in very realist ways. That is they emphasize construction in order to get at the Other of construction. One could argue the so-called theological turn in French theology also is because of this kind of realism. Interesting this gets one to the parallels with Plotinus emanation theory. Is the Other the pure One of Plotinus or is the Other the pure privation or Matter of Plotinus. The logic tends to work either way, I think.
- I dont want to go down that tangent right now, but I do think some of the issues are quite relevant in Peirce as well.
- EDWINA: I would consider Sung a nominalist - but not John. A general signifying a general is only one class of sign: the pure Argument, where all three - the Object-Representamen-Interpretant are in a mode of Thirdness. Such a sign is, in my view, both aspatial and atemporal, and thus, purely conceptual. It might be carried by words - but, in itself, it is 'purely mental.
--- snip ---
Edwina, Clark, List,
I am probably as close to a nominalist as you can get without being a nominalist. This comes out most clearly in ON THE NECESSITY OF NATURAL KINDS, Peter Riggs, ed. Natural Kinds, Laws of Nature and Scientific Reasoning (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1996), but also permeates my work on causation. The notion of necessity is distinctly not a nominalist one. The paper also hints at my views on possibility (perhaps more than hints, but implies), and I spell this out in my information-theoretic accounts of causal connection. I am either a materialist or a neutral monist, depending on what you mean by 'materialist'. In any case, a major difference I have with Peirce is scepticism about a universal mind and the fundamental nature of the phaneron. This is a big difference, and has consequences for a number of things in Peirce's philosophy, some of which I have addressed recently. I say this by way of clarification; perhaps I should cite what I take to be Peirce's mature view in its most (objective) idealist form, how I differ, and why I differ.
I agree with Peirce on scientific and metaphysical realism (verificationists like Putnam and Brian Ellis see the two as incompatible), the rejection of arguments for nominalism, and the pragmatic principle (which given my views applies to all signs).
John
John
Professor John Collier colli...@ukzn.ac.za
Philosophy and Ethics, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 4041 South Africa
T: +27 (31) 260 3248 / 260 2292 F: +27 (31) 260 3031
Http://web.ncf.ca/collier
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