Jon AS, List, Before saying anything else, I recommend two articles in E. C. Moore & R. S. Robin, eds,,(1964) Studies in the Philosophy of C. S. Peirce: Victor Lowe, "Peirce and Whitehead as Metaphysicians"; and C. Hartshorne, "Charles Peirce's 'One Contribution to Philosophy' and his most serious mistake". Lowe shows a great deal of commonality in the views of Peirce and Whitehead. Hartshorne claims that Whitehead's Process and Reality was far better than Peirce's remarks about God and his relationship to the universe. He maintains that Peirce's mistake was his failure to recognize the importance of processes. I agree with both of them. But I suspect that Peirce himself was beginning to recognize the need for processes in his remark in L231 (NEM 3:191) where he discussed his desire to go beyond two-dimensional EGs to "stereoscopic moving images". Compared to Whitehead's book, Peirce;s comments about 'effete ,mind' just add some meaningless jargon to Schelling. Re previous notes: Did you read those slides: http://jfsowa.com/talks/natlog.pdf ? They don't show that communication by language is impossible, but they do show that the meaning of words is (a) always context dependent and (b) shifting by microsenses (small continuous amounts) from one context to another JFS: Every interpretation by anybody is always dependent on the context, which includes (1) their own background and education, (2) what they have read of Peirce's other writings and how they interpreted them, (3) Peirce's own understanding of the issues and his intentions in writing the MS being considered.on the dates he wrote it and revised it.
JAS: No one is suggesting otherwise On the contrary, you keep insisting that you are reaching some kind of definitive conclusion. You are constantly insisting on some definitive conclusion in cases where Peirce himself is tentative. Just read some of his discussions with Lady Welby, where he suggests various options tentatively. JAS: as I said before, members of the community of scholars inductively evaluate each interpretative hypothesis.... A community of scholars requires a supportive collaboration, not constant bickering. At one point, you asked why I more often take Edwina's position instead of yours. The answer is that she (and most other subscribers) have a more coilaborative attitude. But instead of trying to reach a consensus, you lash out with some attack. For example, I said that my comments were based on the issues discussed in the natlog.pdf text. That is the context for what I wrote. Did you read that before attacking what I wrote? JFS: ... nobody's context is sufficiently similar to Peirce's that they can make any claims that their interpretation is what Peirce intended for the purpose of that reader. JAS: I reject this assertion... There you go again. Instead of trying to understand the issues, you lash out with an attack. I am not claiming that it's impossible to get a useful interpretation for many purposes. But I am saying that what Peirce wrote is highly context dependent. Furthermore, his ideas were constantly developing over the years. Two MSS with the same words in different years may have very different interpretations. In some cases , (for example R699 and R670), the same words in different months may have radically different meanings. Fortunately, those texts are about mathematical issues for which the formalism is fundamental, and the words are secondary. JFS: As Peirce himself said, mathematics (which includes mathematical logic) is the only subject in which anyone who is familiar with that version of math is qualified to make definitive interpretations and corrections. JAS: For any claims about what Peirce believed, please give exact quotations On mathematical issues, no quotations are necessary. In mathematics, a student may correct a professor's mistake, and the professor will thank the student. I had done that when I was a student, and I have had students who corrected my mistakes. Those corrections are always appreciated. (or almost always). JFS: On anything written in a natural language, nobody can claim "a high degree of confidence" for other readers who have a similar level of education. JAS: This statement is self-refuting since it is written in natural language. If it were true, then nobody would be able to claim "a high degree of confidence" about what it means, let alone evaluate it as true. Since you didn't understand the context in which I intended it, that shows that I was right.. Peirce himself realized that very few people understood what he was writing. JAS: Again, the claim that all natural language is hopelessly vague and ambiguous is patently absurd There you go again. Instead of trying to understand what I meant, you add the words 'all' and 'hopelessly. And please note that Peirce himself was frustrated by the difficulty of getting anyone to understand his most important ideas. His longest and closest friend, William James, failed to understand most of what he was trying to say. Note how thankful Peirce was tp get si[[supportive comments from Lady Welby. JAS: Peirce effectively rejects it by advocating his carefully considered ethics of terminology (CP 2.219-226, EP 2:263-266, 1903), stating therein that "it is wrong to say that a good language is important to good thought, merely; for it is of the essence of it." On the contrary, he understood the difficulty very well. That is why he was constantly trying to overcome the inevitable vagueness of ordinary language by inventing new terminology and writing rules that he hoped other people would follow. If Max Fisch and his students hadn't devoted many years of hard work, none of us would be reading his writings. John
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