Dear John, list - There are several issues here with which I do not agree.
1) I do not think it makes any sense to say that sun and earth communicate. There is a large-scale interaction of different physical processes between the two. But there is arguably physical interaction between any two particles in the cosmos. To me it generalizes the notion of communication into insignificance to make it so wide. And what is more, it does not add anything to our understanding of the sun-earth relationship to call it communication, signs, etc. 2) The existing interaction between sun and earth is not a dyadic relation only. To Peirce (but not only to him), all physical processes are to some degree governed by law - which is thirdness. So the identification of physics with secondness is less than obvious. 3) I think cognition is broader than communication. Cognition, I would say, requires one organism and an environment. Communication at least two organisms and an enviorment - and the ability to cognize what is communicated to you. To speak about cognition and communication without organisms seem empty and gratuitous to me. 4) In a special sense you can say there are signs and communication in the physical world. For biology is but one tiny, very special subset of the physical world. And that subset is semiotic. So semiotics lies as a possibility in the physical world. But so do bubble gum, presidents and fundamentalism. So it is not a very strong ontological claim. Best F Den 07/09/2014 kl. 14.30 skrev Frederik Stjernfelt <stj...@hum.ku.dk<mailto:stj...@hum.ku.dk>> : Den 05/09/2014 kl. 04.59 skrev "Deely, John N." <jnde...@stthom.edu<mailto:jnde...@stthom.edu>>: Sun and earth do communicate, but resulting directly dyadic rather than triadic relations, and with no involvement of cognition. The point can be generalized: communication is broader than cognition.
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