Clark, list -
1) You write that 'chance isn't separate from Thirdness'. I think it
is. Chance/Firstness is a basic modal category; it's not part of
Thirdness.
2) I don't read Peirce's view as Neoplatonism ..i.e., that the
first principle is 'the One'. I see Peirce's first principle as Mind.
Peirce does consider all three categories as universal [5.43 and
on]..and considers that they are 'simple and irreducible..and real
constituents of the universe. 5.82. He considers that all three are
each 'irreducible and unanalyzable conceptions' ..5.88. 5.91-92. That
is, Firstness can be separate from Thirdness.
"What is required for the idea of a genuine Thirdness is an
independent solid Secondness and not a Secondness that is a mere
corollary of an unfounded and inconceivable Thirdness; and a similar
remark may be made in reference to Firstness. 5.91.
Edwina
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On Fri 07/04/17 4:23 PM , Clark Goble cl...@lextek.com sent:
On Apr 7, 2017, at 2:05 PM, Edwina Taborsky wrote:
"We are brought, then, to this: conformity to law exists only
within a limited range of events and even there is not perfect, for
an element of pure spontaneity or lawless originality mingles, or at
least must be supposed to mingle, with law everywhere. Moreover,
conformity with law is a fact requiring to be explained; and since
Law in general cannot be explained by any law in particular, the
explanation must consist in showing how law is developed out of pure
chance, irregularity, and indeterminacy . (“A Guess at the
Riddle”,
My reading of the above is that all three modes are primordial.
Chance or Firstness 'mingles' with Thirdness because all three modes
are primordial [in my view] but this correlation doesn't mean that
Chance CAUSES Thirdness. It co-exists with it and enables new laws to
emerge and develop. I don’t quite understand that reading I confess.
Chance isn’t separate from thirdness. This is really explicit in the
other quotes I gave from Peirce’s cosmology. Again, I don’t think
we have to agree with Peirce there. I have my doubts. But I’m not
quite sure I see how to read him as asserting what you are claiming.
Particularly when he explains the origin of firstness, secondness and
thirdness out of “the womb of indeterminacy.”
If law were primordial it wouldn’t need to be explained whereas
Peirce is explicit that it must be explained. Now I’m more with you
in that I’m not sure I buy Peirce’s neoplatonism here. I’d much
rather favor the three be primordial and irreducible. That makes far
more sense to me. But that doesn’t appear to be Peirce’s
position.
Links:
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