Helmut,
I find your thinking very much to the point. I also find it very good
to be frank. And I think Peirce wasas frank as he could, too. Which did
not make him very agreeable to the establishments of his times.
By now, there is no agreement on any overview, not about this topic or
much else.
You wrote on EG's:
HELMUT: " Is it so, that the EGs are about all that can be expressed
with the
term "is", respectively by negations/exclusions and operators, that
would be existence, identity, and classification. EGs are not about
composition (parts), is that so?"
I think you are right.
Let's see what is (logically) involved in what you write,
CSP wrote: what is involved, can be evolved. Which is what I now
attempt to do.
Existential Graphs are about existence. – But about what kind of
existence? This question I'll leave on hold.
Existential Graphs consist of three parts, alfa, beta and gamma graphs.
The three first Greek alphabets. – Is it to be taken as a division (a
classification) into three, a trichotomy? - Yes.
Which part of the division is to be taken up first? – Well, Peirce gave
many options for that issue. One of them was that its best to take up
first the one which is easiest to understand AND to make understood.
Then there is the option to take up first what became historically (or
evolutionarily) first. The order of precedence, in a general sense.
The third option is offered by logical if – then relations. One should,
of course, add the third part (? ) [This choice of word is to be left on
hold, because it involves a word the question is aimed to solve. CSP
typically writes "Let's provisionally accept this or that", then later
he comes back to what has been provisionally accepted with a new
understanding, often with a new wording, just as well.] The third is of
course a chain of IF (if – then) THEN …. etc. relations.
This is sometimes called contextuality, sometimes inbeddedness,
sometimes by some other name. The logical idea remains the same. [but
a lot of muddle is brought up by so called exact (verbal) definitions].
It is good to keep in mind that all logic is about ideas, even though
some ideas persist out of 'natural causes'. For example pushing a door
open. [An example CSP used a lot, but which has lost much of its
argumentative power with automatic doors.]
With developing Existential Graphs to the (almost) perfect state, CSP,
according to my general understanding of his work as a whole, took the
easiest part first. [Do not expect any Peirce sholar to agree with
this. With this I stand alone. But CSP did express that he did not
wish to be followed by a pack of sheep, but by people who took on to
experiment on what he had written on. So I have done. ]
The existents in EG's are made visible on the sheet of assertion. They
follow each other in a certain logical order. But the sheet has a recto
and verso. [CSP did change his wordings, but not the basic ideas] . On
the sheet there may be presented negations. But there also always is the
other side.
When you or anyone else writes down, or draws up [note the English ups
and dows, in Finnish there is no such division] a sign aimed at
communicating an idea to others, the sign becomes an existent being. It
is there. Not any more only virtually, but also actually.
This is the point where all becomes difficult and confusing. Divisions
into three and classifications do not work any more.
John F Sowa has offered many examples on Greek etymology and how the
nouns originate in verbs. Greek was a very verbal language. So is
Finnish even today.
in 1990's I designed an experiment for myself. I made a rule on not
ever using the verb "is" (the Finnish counterpart, of course). For a
year or so it was very cumbersome to stop every time that word happened
to come out "from my pen", wrote CSP. I could also use the "search"
command. With this experiment I learned a lot.
I believe that by it I got rid of the last remnants of nominalistic ways
of thought. (Which is not the same as a philosophical standpoint, it
has to do with cultural issues, not individual issues, or opinions or
whatever.) The experiment lasted about three years. By then my habits
of thought had been changed, so there were no more any need for such
restrictions.
A verb, any verb presents a logical connective. Modern formal logic is
all about IS or IS NOT. Peirce brought in existential quantifier, which
came along with his theory of probability etc.
Which came along with his ideas of firstness as spontaneity etc.
Existential Graphs present all they present from the standpoint of
Secondness only. But the standpoint of Secondness allows three
perspectives. If a dialogue with others is wished for at the CSP's
times (or ours), then best start with the second perspective available
from the standpoint of Secondness.
By now the Lowell lectures are approaching the point where divisions
will break up, classifications fail.
I do not know whether this has helped you, Helmut, in any other way than
my saying that I think you are right in your ponderings.
Best wishes, Kirsti
Helmut Raulien kirjoitti 23.12.2017 18:53:
Supplement:
Kirsti, All, to be frank, I think I have lost the overview about this
whole topic a bit. I was thinking, that classification "is a kind of"
and composition "is a part of" were two completely different affairs.
But on the other hand one can say instead of "is a kind of": "is a
part of the concept of". This is all very complicated.
Is it so, tat the EGs are about all that can be expressed with the
term "is", respectively by negations/exclusions and operators, that
would be existence, identity, and classification. EGs are not about
composition (parts), is that so?
Kirsti,
is the term "part" already defined? I think, if it is defined
geometrically, then a sign does not have parts. If a sign is a
function that depends on subfunctions, which may be seen as parts,
then I think it has the parts sign itself, object, interpretant. But,
because you cannot take a sign apart in reality (the subfunctions
cannot exist alone), these parts are ideational or virtual ones. But
any way you see it, I donot see the connection with the continuum
problem (line consisting or not of points).
Best,
Helmut
22. Dezember 2017 um 06:30 Uhr
kirst...@saunalahti.fi
wrote:
Helmut,
I was not using a metaphor. Nor was I suggesting what you inferred I
did. I just posed two questions, one on sign, one on meaning. Which,
of
course, are deeply related. But how?
To my mind both questions are worth careful ponderings. Especially in
connection with this phase in the Lowell lectures.
Peirce was an experimentalist. In philosophy one does not need a
laboratory, but one needs though experiments.
I was inviting to participate in such experimenting. Writing down the
question and searching for answers which logically fit with the
question, is such an experiment.
Simplest math is recommended by CSP as starting point. To clear our
logical muddles and confusions, so I have inferred.
EGs are based on simple geometrical ideas, such as points and lines.
Which are cafefully developed into logical instruments, vehicles for
logical thinking.
Comments?
Kirsti
Helmut Raulien kirjoitti 21.12.2017 21:32:
> Gary, Kirsti, List,
> I do not agree, that the geometrical metaphor suits. "Part of",
> geometrically or spatially understood, is only one kind of being a
> part of. Kirsti suggested, that meaning is a part of a sign. But is
> meaning metaphorizable as a point on the line, with the line
> metphorizable as a sign? Ok, a common speech metaphor is "I get the
> point" for "I get the meaning". But still I think, that a
functional
> part is something completely different from a spatial, geometrical
> part, a compartment. A sign is a function, not a range with a clear
> spatial border, and there are different laws applying, which are
not
> geometrical, though there may be geometrical metaphors, but I think
> they stumble. And: Metaphorization is not analysis. It is poetry.
> Best,
> Helmut
>
> 21. Dezember 2017 um 15:39 Uhr
> g...@gnusystems.ca
> wrote:
>
> Kirsti, list,
>
> Asking whether a sign has parts is like asking whether a line has
> points. Peirce has a comment on that in one of my blog posts from
last
> month, http://gnusystems.ca/wp/2017/11/stigmata/ [1] [1]. By the
way,
> according to my sources, Aristotle used the word σημεῖον
for
> _point_ before Euclid.
>
> Gary f.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: kirst...@saunalahti.fi [mailto:kirst...@saunalahti.fi]
> Sent: 21-Dec-17 01:25
>
> Listers,
>
> Perhaps It is good to remember historical changes with names used
for
> geometrical point. Euclid introduced the word SEMEION, and defined
it
> as that which has no parts, and his followers started to that word
> instead of the earlier STIGME . - But (with latin) the Romans &
later
> Boethius changed it to PUNCTUM in their commentaries.
>
> Does a sign have parts? - How about meaning?
>
> Best, Kirsti
>
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