subject:"RE\: \[PEIRCE\-L\] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing"

Charles, List:

No, the *action *of uttering a Sign is at the level of 2ns.  As an *Instance
*of the Sign, it is an *occurrence* in which a Sign-*Replica *determines
some Quasi-mind to a *Dynamic *Interpretant--an *actual *feeling, exertion,
or further Sign-Replica.  Any language consists of such Tokens--again, at
the level of 2ns--which is why words uttered in *different *languages can
be Replicas of the *same *Sign (Type).  Only the latter is at the level of
3ns, being *embodied *in particular Existents but never *acting *on, *reacting
*to, or *interacting *with them.

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 4:02 PM, Charles Pyle 
wrote:

> When one performs a speech act, in the sense used by Austin, such as
> promising, or asserting, is that not action at the level of thirdness?
> Isn't the essence of the doing of something in language an act?
>

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Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

John S., List:

JFS:  Unless anyone can find later evidence that Peirce switched back to
'tone', I would consider 'mark' to be his final choice.


It might depend on exactly which date in late December 1908 we assign to EP
2:488-489, where Peirce used "Mark" twice.  The preceding *written *date is
the 25th (EP 2:484), just two days after his *very first* comment that he
was *considering *"Mark" as a replacement for "Tone" (EP 2:480).  The next
written date is the 28th (EP 2:490).  Is there any *conclusive *basis for
thinking that the intervening text was *not *all written during the same
day?

I just discovered that in the Logic Notebook (R 339), there is an entry
explicitly dated "1908 Dec. 27" that begins, "Let the first of a triad of
numbers be 1 for a Tone, 2 for a Token, 3 for a Type."  Since EP 2:488-489
comes *before *the page dated the 28th, the *latest *that it could have
been written is *also *the 27th; and again, the *only *previous date in
that manuscript itself was the 25th, two days *earlier*.  Does this count
as "later evidence that Peirce switched back to 'tone'"?

https://rs.cms.hu-berlin.de/peircearchive/pages/preview.php?ref=13405

Rather than "Mark" being "his final choice," it seems much more likely to
me that during those several days, Peirce was merely *experimenting *with
"Mark" as a *possible *substitute for "Tone."  His reversion to "Tone" in
this private context suggests that he had by no means made up his mind that
"Mark" was *definitively *preferable.

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 10:22 PM, John F Sowa  wrote:

> Gary F and Jon AS,
>
> Thanks for the comments.  They're consistent with what I said
> in my previous note.
>
> Gary
>
>> the earliest text I’ve found where Peirce uses the term “token”:
>>
>
> CSP, late 1904 (EP2:326)
>
>> including under the term “sign” every picture, diagram, natural cry,
>> pointing finger, wink, knot in one’s handkerchief, memory, dream,
>> fancy, concept, indication, token, symptom, letter, numeral, word,
>> sentence, chapter, book, library, and in short whatever, be it in
>> the physical universe, be it in the world of thought, that, whether
>> embodying an idea of any kind...
>>
>
> In this quotation, Peirce is using the word 'token' as an example
> on the same level as picture, diagram, natural cry...
>
> That confirms my claim that in the earlier quotation (EP 2:303)
> he had not yet chosen the word 'token' as a technical term in
> his system.   The quotation from 1906 (CP 4.537) is the most
> widely quoted source for the triad Tone/Token/Type.
>
> In any case, these examples show why we need complete, searchable
> transcriptions of all of Peirce's MSS organized in chronological
> order.  But given the current sources, we can say
>
>  1. The 1904 quotations are from an early stage of Peirce's semiotic,
> and they should not be considered definitive.  The sentence
> "A sign is not a real thing" from 1904 is not a reliable basis
> for drawing firm conclusions about Peirce's complete system.
>
>  2. By 1906, he had developed his triad of tone/token/type.  It
> would be interesting to find any MSS that showed how, when,
> and why he first chose those words.
>
>  3. Also in 1906, his research on modal logic led him to write
> about the three "universes" of possibility, actuality, and
> "the necessitated".
>
>  4. By combining modal logic with his system of signs, he coined
> the triad Potisign/Actisign/Famisign.  But in 1908, he said
> that he preferred his earlier triad of more common words,
> Tone/Token/Type.  But he had some doubts about 'Tone', as
> he said on 23 Dec 1908.  See the attached EP2_480.jpg.
>
>  5. A few days later, he decided that 'Mark' was preferable
> to 'Tone'.
>
> Jon
>
>> I believe that Lady Welby's reply to Peirce's letter of December 23,
>> 1908 asking her about Tone vs. Mark was the one dated January 21,
>> 1909 (SS 86ff).  Consequently, it came several weeks after he wrote
>> the other drafts of that letter.
>>
>
> Yes, but note that Lady W's reason was the same example that Peirce
> gave in 1906 (CP 4.537):
>
> Jon
>
>> if I remember right... she found Tone preferable because a tone
>> of voice is a paradigmatic example.
>>
>
> If Peirce was not satisfied with the word 'tone', the fact that
> Lady W repeated his own example would not be convincing.
>
> Furthermore, 'mark' is a common English word that can be used
> for marks in any of the senses (as Peirce called them, Optical,
> Tactile, and Acoustic).  But 'tone' is limited to Acoustic.
>
> Unless anyone can find later evidence that Peirce switched back
> to 'tone', I would consider 'mark' to be his final choice.
>
> Jon
>
>> My suggestion is that for the sake of greater clarity, we should
>> more carefully draw an explicit distinction between Signs as

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Gary Richmond

John, List,

I too agree with Gary f and JAS that choosing 'mark' rather than 'tone' is
a judgment call.

A number of weeks (months?) ago when this was first discussed on the list I
also mentioned that there was perhaps some pedagogical value in having
three 't's': tone/token/type.

But of much great significance, in discussions with the linguist, Michael
Shapiro (a member of this list and a Peirce-oriented linguist) I've become
familiar with the importance of the concept of 'markedness' in linguistics.
'Mark' having established a decided meaning in that discipline is perhaps
yet another reason to prefer 'tone' to 'mark' in semeiotics.

In linguistics, *markedness* refers to the way words are changed or added
to give a special meaning. The *unmarked choice* is just the normal
meaning. For example, the present tense is unmarked for English verbs. If I
just say "walk" that refers to the present tense. But if I add something to
"walk" (marking it), such as adding ‘ed’ to the end, I can indicate the
past: "walked".

http://www.analytictech.com/mb119/markedne.htm

Other parts of this brief article from which this quotation is taken
perhaps bear on this discussion as well. For example:

Outside of linguistics, markedness refers more generally to a choice that
has meaning. If I meet you on campus and say "Hi, how are you?" you may or
may not even answer the question. But if I say "Hi, how’s your dad?" this
is special. You are likely to think of the question as actually asking how
your dad is.

A good short introduction to linguistic markedness can be found here:
https://www.thoughtco.com/markedness-language-term-1691302

Best,

Gary R

*Gary Richmond*
*Philosophy and Critical Thinking*
*Communication Studies*
*LaGuardia College of the City University of New York*

*718 482-5690*

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 4:52 PM Jon Alan Schmidt 
wrote:

> John S., List:
>
> JFS:  Unless anyone can find a later version, his 1908 choice of 'mark'
> must be considered definitive.
>
>
> I am inclined to agree with Gary F. that this is a judgment call.  In
> fact, given my current concern with emphasizing that (strictly speaking)
> every Sign is a Type, the fact that "mark" has an etymological sense
> overlapping with "sign" is actually an argument *against *using it when
> referring to the significant characters of Sign-Replicas.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
> Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
>
> On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 2:09 PM, John F Sowa  wrote:
>
>> Gary and Edwina,
>>
>> GF
>>
>>> I think it’s important to recognize your preference for “mark”
>>> over “tone” as a term in semiotics or ontology is a strictly
>>> personal preference (rather than a logical principle or a fact
>>> of Peircean usage).
>>>
>>
>> Peirce never changed his terminology without serious reasons.
>> He chose 'tone' in 1906.  In 1908, he expressed concerns about
>> that choice.  When he presented his final classification of
>> signs, he deliberately replaced 'tone' with 'mark'.
>>
>> GF
>>
>>> I don’t recall ever hearing “mark” as a reference to sound, touch,
>>> taste, or indeed any sensory modality other than the visual.
>>>
>>
>> The word 'mark' has a much broader range of senses than 'tone'.
>> For the definitions and examples of usage, compare the entries
>> for both words on the M-W site:  https://www.merriam-webster.com/
>>
>> For Peirce's definitions and examples, see the Century Dictionary.
>> He did not write a definition for 'tone'.  For 'mark', note his
>> definition 4 and his choice of examples by Shakespeare, Milton,
>> and Kant.  See the attached mark_4.jpg.
>>
>> Also note Peirce's comment immediately after the etymology of
>> 'mark' and before definition 1:
>>
>>> The sense 'boundary' is older as recorded, though the sense 'sign'
>>> seems logically precedent.  The two groups may indeed be from
>>> entirely different groups.
>>>
>>
>> This discussion of etymology shows that Peirce considered the word
>> 'mark' to have two distinct "groups" of word senses.  Whether his
>> speculation is correct is less important than the fact that he
>> considered the sense of 'sign' to be "logically precedent".
>>
>> It's also significant that Peirce chose to write the definition
>> of 'mark' and not the definition of 'tone'.  Although his work on
>> the Century Dictionary was about two decades before he considered
>> the choice between 'tone' and 'mark', his definitions show his
>> background knowledge of the subject and his ways of thinking.
>>
>> For the record, note the definition of 'tone' in the Century
>> Dictionary.  The range of senses and examples is much narrower
>> than 'mark' and quite similar to the entry in M-W.
>>
>> ET
>>
>>> It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names for
>>> the concepts he was trying to communicate, and often changed his
>>> mind; and I think that is a more significant fact than the

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Charles Pyle


On August 14, 2018 at 3:41 PM Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

When one performs a speech act, in the sense used by Austin, such as promising, 
or asserting, is that not action at the level of thirdness? Isn't the essence 
of the doing of something in language an act?

> 
> 
> John, list
> 
> There's a difference between technical terminology and natural language.
> 
> When we use words - and this includes references to Peirce's work - we 
> don't always mean the technical term but the natural term.
> 
> That, for example, is my concern over being 'forbidden' to use the word 
> 'action' when referring to Thirdness.  When I use the word 'action' I am not 
> using it in Peirce's technical sense in a dyadic framework, but in the 
> natural sense of 'something is actively going on'.
> 
> It is in this sense that I am concerned about limitations being put on 
> the use of natural language when the same word is also a technical term in 
> Peirce's vocabulary.
> 
> As for his 'final term' vs an earlier term - I acknowledge that I am not 
> overly concerned about this; I am cautious about an intense focus on 
> terminology - but, perhaps that 'just me'.
> 
> Edwina
> 
> 
>  
> 
> On Tue 14/08/18 3:09 PM , John F Sowa s...@bestweb.net sent:
> 
> > > Gary and Edwina,
> > 
> > GF
> > > I think it’s important to recognize your preference for “mark”
> > > over “tone” as a term in semiotics or ontology is a strictly
> > > personal preference (rather than a logical principle or a fact
> > > of Peircean usage).
> > 
> > Peirce never changed his terminology without serious reasons.
> > He chose 'tone' in 1906. In 1908, he expressed concerns about
> > that choice. When he presented his final classification of
> > signs, he deliberately replaced 'tone' with 'mark'.
> > 
> > GF
> > > I don’t recall ever hearing “mark” as a reference to sound, touch,
> > > taste, or indeed any sensory modality other than the visual.
> > 
> > The word 'mark' has a much broader range of senses than 'tone'.
> > For the definitions and examples of usage, compare the entries
> > for both words on the M-W site: https://www.merriam-webster.com/
> > 
> > For Peirce's definitions and examples, see the Century Dictionary.
> > He did not write a definition for 'tone'. For 'mark', note his
> > definition 4 and his choice of examples by Shakespeare, Milton,
> > and Kant. See the attached mark_4.jpg.
> > 
> > Also note Peirce's comment immediately after the etymology of
> > 'mark' and before definition 1:
> > > The sense 'boundary' is older as recorded, though the sense 'sign'
> > > seems logically precedent. The two groups may indeed be from
> > > entirely different groups.
> > 
> > This discussion of etymology shows that Peirce considered the word
> > 'mark' to have two distinct "groups" of word senses. Whether his
> > speculation is correct is less important than the fact that he
> > considered the sense of 'sign' to be "logically precedent".
> > 
> > It's also significant that Peirce chose to write the definition
> > of 'mark' and not the definition of 'tone'. Although his work on
> > the Century Dictionary was about two decades before he considered
> > the choice between 'tone' and 'mark', his definitions show his
> > background knowledge of the subject and his ways of thinking.
> > 
> > For the record, note the definition of 'tone' in the Century
> > Dictionary. The range of senses and examples is much narrower
> > than 'mark' and quite similar to the entry in M-W.
> > 
> > ET
> > > It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names for
> > > the concepts he was trying to communicate, and often changed his
> > > mind; and I think that is a more significant fact than the fact
> > > of which choice of name he might have made in his last change
> > > of mind."
> > 
> > That's true. We have to look at all the evidence and the context
> > of each version. That's why we need conveniently searchable
> > transcriptions of *all* his MSS.
> > 
> > But note that the word 'mark' in both the M-W and the Century
> > dictionaries has a closer overlap with 'sign' than 'tone' has.
> > According to Peirce's own criteria for choosing terms, that is
> > an important consideration.
> > 
> > Also note that his classification of signs at the end of 1908
> > is widely cited as definitive. After thinking and reviewing
> > all the issues, he chose 'mark' as the word to include in his
> > final classification. That is not a casual change of mind.
> > 
> > I realize that more publications about Peirce use

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

John S., List:

JFS:  Unless anyone can find a later version, his 1908 choice of 'mark'
must be considered definitive.


I am inclined to agree with Gary F. that this is a judgment call.  In fact,
given my current concern with emphasizing that (strictly speaking) every
Sign is a Type, the fact that "mark" has an etymological sense overlapping
with "sign" is actually an argument *against *using it when referring to
the significant characters of Sign-Replicas.

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 2:09 PM, John F Sowa  wrote:

> Gary and Edwina,
>
> GF
>
>> I think it’s important to recognize your preference for “mark”
>> over “tone” as a term in semiotics or ontology is a strictly
>> personal preference (rather than a logical principle or a fact
>> of Peircean usage).
>>
>
> Peirce never changed his terminology without serious reasons.
> He chose 'tone' in 1906.  In 1908, he expressed concerns about
> that choice.  When he presented his final classification of
> signs, he deliberately replaced 'tone' with 'mark'.
>
> GF
>
>> I don’t recall ever hearing “mark” as a reference to sound, touch,
>> taste, or indeed any sensory modality other than the visual.
>>
>
> The word 'mark' has a much broader range of senses than 'tone'.
> For the definitions and examples of usage, compare the entries
> for both words on the M-W site:  https://www.merriam-webster.com/
>
> For Peirce's definitions and examples, see the Century Dictionary.
> He did not write a definition for 'tone'.  For 'mark', note his
> definition 4 and his choice of examples by Shakespeare, Milton,
> and Kant.  See the attached mark_4.jpg.
>
> Also note Peirce's comment immediately after the etymology of
> 'mark' and before definition 1:
>
>> The sense 'boundary' is older as recorded, though the sense 'sign'
>> seems logically precedent.  The two groups may indeed be from
>> entirely different groups.
>>
>
> This discussion of etymology shows that Peirce considered the word
> 'mark' to have two distinct "groups" of word senses.  Whether his
> speculation is correct is less important than the fact that he
> considered the sense of 'sign' to be "logically precedent".
>
> It's also significant that Peirce chose to write the definition
> of 'mark' and not the definition of 'tone'.  Although his work on
> the Century Dictionary was about two decades before he considered
> the choice between 'tone' and 'mark', his definitions show his
> background knowledge of the subject and his ways of thinking.
>
> For the record, note the definition of 'tone' in the Century
> Dictionary.  The range of senses and examples is much narrower
> than 'mark' and quite similar to the entry in M-W.
>
> ET
>
>> It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names for
>> the concepts he was trying to communicate, and often changed his
>> mind; and I think that is a more significant fact than the fact
>> of which choice of name he might have made in his last change
>> of mind."
>>
>
> That's true.  We have to look at all the evidence and the context
> of each version.  That's why we need conveniently searchable
> transcriptions of *all* his MSS.
>
> But note that the word 'mark' in both the M-W and the Century
> dictionaries has a closer overlap with 'sign' than 'tone' has.
> According to Peirce's own criteria for choosing terms, that is
> an important consideration.
>
> Also note that his classification of signs at the end of 1908
> is widely cited as definitive.  After thinking and reviewing
> all the issues, he chose 'mark' as the word to include in his
> final classification.  That is not a casual change of mind.
>
> I realize that more publications about Peirce use the word
> 'tone' -- but that is primarily because his 1906 choice has
> been cited and recited for decades.  For his final and most
> complete classification, his deliberate choice should have
> very high priority.  Unless anyone can find a later version,
> his 1908 choice of 'mark' must be considered definitive.
>
> John

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RE: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread gnox

John,

I’m always happy to trade findings with a fellow searcher of etymological 
dictionaries! Just a couple of comments:

JS: The word 'mark' has a much broader range of senses than 'tone'.

GF: I agree that, in judging the appropriateness of a terminological choice for 
semiotics, the range of senses is a more important consideration than the 
sensory modality to which a word appeals. But I don’t think that ‘broader is 
better’ in that respect. Also, it’s interesting that CD sense 1 of “mark” is 
almost identical to the root meaning of the Greek word τύπος, source of English 
“type” (and the most common sense of it in English until the mid-19th century). 
Symbols grow … By the way, Peirce did not contribute an entry on “type” to the 
CD either.

 

JS: For his final and most complete classification, his deliberate choice 
should have very high priority.

GF: As you said yourself, all his choices were “deliberate,” and some of them 
reversed earlier deliberate choices. Anyway, as F. Bellucci pointed out, his 
most complete classification was the one in the 1903 Syllabus; and Peirce quite 
deliberately marked his 1908 classification as unfinished, tentative and in 
some respects quite unclear. I don’t think I need to provide quotations to 
demonstrate that.

Finally — one dictionary you didn’t mention is Baldwin’s of 1901-2, to which 
Peirce contributed this:

[[ Mark [AS. mearc, a bound]: Ger. Merkmal; Fr. marque, attribut; Ital. segno 
(contrassegno), nota. To say that a term or thing has a mark is to say that of 
whatever it can be predicated something else (the mark) can be predicated; and 
to say that two terms or things have the same mark is simply to say that one 
term (the mark) can be predicated of whatever either of these terms or things 
can be predicated. 

The word translates the Latin nota. It has many practical synonyms, such as 
quality, mode, attribute, predicate, character, property, determination, 
consequent, sign. Most of these words are sometimes used in special senses; and 
even when they are used in a general sense, they may suggest somewhat different 
points of view from mark.   (C.S.P., C.L.F. 
<http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Baldwin/Dictionary/defs/colls.htm#clf> ) 

A great oversight which had vitiated the entire discourse of logicians about 
marks, and had prevented them from fully understanding what marks are, was 
corrected by Augustus de Morgan when he observed that any collection whatever 
of individuals has some mark common and peculiar to them. That it is so will 
appear when we consider that nothing prevents a list of all the things in that 
collection from being drawn up. Now, the mere being upon that list, although it 
has not actually been drawn up, constitutes a common and peculiar mark of those 
individuals. Of course, if anybody tries to specify a number of individuals 
that have no common and peculiar mark, this very specification confers upon 
their common and peculiar mark a new degree of actuality. 

On the other hand, if two marks are common and peculiar to precisely the same 
collection of things, they may, for the ordinary purposes of formal logic, be 
looked upon as the same mark. For it is indifferent to formal logic how objects 
are marked, whether in a simpler or more complex way. We may, therefore, regard 
the two marks as constituting together a single mark. Marks, after all, are not 
the object of logical study; they are only fictitious aids to thought.   
(C.S.P.) ]] 

Gary f.

 

-Original Message-
From: John F Sowa  
Sent: 14-Aug-18 15:10
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

 

Gary and Edwina,

 

GF

> I think it’s important to recognize your preference for “mark”

> over “tone” as a term in semiotics or ontology is a strictly personal 

> preference (rather than a logical principle or a fact of Peircean 

> usage).

 

Peirce never changed his terminology without serious reasons.

He chose 'tone' in 1906.  In 1908, he expressed concerns about that choice.  
When he presented his final classification of signs, he deliberately replaced 
'tone' with 'mark'.

 

GF

> I don’t recall ever hearing “mark” as a reference to sound, touch, 

> taste, or indeed any sensory modality other than the visual.

 

The word 'mark' has a much broader range of senses than 'tone'.

For the definitions and examples of usage, compare the entries for both words 
on the M-W site:   <https://www.merriam-webster.com/> 
https://www.merriam-webster.com/

 

For Peirce's definitions and examples, see the Century Dictionary.

He did not write a definition for 'tone'.  For 'mark', note his definition 4 
and his choice of examples by Shakespeare, Milton, and Kant.  See the attached 
mark_4.jpg.

 

Also note Peirce's comment immediately after the etymology of 'mark' and before 
definition 1:

> The sense 'boundary' is older as recorded, though the sense 'sign'

> seems logically precedent

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Gary F., List:

GF:   But evidently you are not testing it in that way, but rather “trying
it out” as a proposed *improvement over* Peirce’s actual usage, in the
sense that it offers greater clarity and thus facilitates the systematic
explication of what is going on whenever an event of concrete semiosis
occurs.

Yes, that seems like an accurate summary of what I am attempting to
accomplish with my interpretative hypothesis.  I have called it that
because I believe that understanding all Signs as Types whose Replicas are
Tokens recognizable as such by their Tones (or Marks) sheds considerable
light on Peirce's late semeiotic as a systematic whole.  It certainly has
done so for me personally.

While he generally did not make the *specific *terminological distinction
that I am advocating, as I already mentioned, he did clearly distinguish
the third Universe of Signs from the second Universe of Brute Actuality and
the first Universe of Ideas.  I see this as a development from his 1904
description of a Sign as an Entelechy (3ns) vs. objects as Matter (2ns) vs.
qualities/characters as Form (1ns).

GF:  ... it seems to me that every “event of concrete semiosis” involves a
measure of actuality that Types in themselves do not have.

I strongly agree; any event or occurrence is something actual (2ns), and an
"event of concrete semiosis" is precisely what Peirce called an *Instance *of
the Sign.

GF:   If the Final Interpretant is “that toward which the actual tends,” as
Peirce says, there is no way to approach it, or learn what that tendency
is, except by way of actual Dynamic Interpretants determined by Actisigns,
i.e. Tokens acting as signs in an ongoing dialogue.

Again, I agree; we can (and do) increase our Experiential Information, but
never achieve the ideal of Substantial Information.  However, I would
change the last part to "Tokens *embodying *Signs in an ongoing dialogue";
we utter the Sign to produce the Sign-Instance (Replica), just as we scribe
the Graph to produce the Graph-Instance.

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Tue, Aug 14, 2018 at 9:11 AM,  wrote:

> Jon,
>
> OK, I think I’ve been misunderstanding the purpose of your “hypothesis.”
> I’ve been treating it as an inductively testable hypothesis *about
> Peirce’s use of terms*. But evidently you are not testing it in that way,
> but rather “trying it out” as a proposed *improvement over* Peirce’s
> actual usage, in the sense that it offers greater clarity and thus
> facilitates the systematic explication of what is going on whenever an
> event of concrete semiosis occurs.
>
> Personally I don’t find it clearer than Peirce’s late (post-1904) usage in
> that respect, but that’s a judgment call which every user of your
> “improved” terminology will have to make. So the only way of “testing” it
> would be to tally up the number of opinions on each side of the clarity
> question. I put “testing” in quote marks because I don’t think such a
> tallying up would count as inductive reasoning as Peirce defines it in the
> Lowell lectures; and I put “hypothesis” in quotes for the same reason.
>
> Regarding your belief that Peirce’s reference to Tokens as Signs “was a
> form of shorthand,” I think that too is a judgment call. In terms of Peirce
> oft-used onion metaphor, you are saying that referring to Tokens as Signs
> is the “skin” or outer layer of the onion, and if we take that skin off we
> get closer to the core reality of the Sign. But as Peirce says, it’s layers
> all the way down; and it seems to me that every “event of concrete
> semiosis” involves a measure of actuality that Types in themselves do not
> have. If the Final Interpretant is “that toward which the actual tends,” as
> Peirce says, there is no way to approach it, or learn what that tendency
> is, except by way of actual Dynamic Interpretants determined by Actisigns,
> i.e. Tokens acting as signs in an ongoing dialogue.
>
> Gary f.
>

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Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Edwina Taborsky

 

 BODY { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12px; }
 John, list

There's a difference between technical terminology and natural
language.

When we use words - and this includes references to Peirce's work -
we don't always mean the technical term but the natural term.

That, for example, is my concern over being 'forbidden' to use the
word 'action' when referring to Thirdness.  When I use the word
'action' I am not using it in Peirce's technical sense in a dyadic
framework, but in the natural sense of 'something is actively going
on'. 

It is in this sense that I am concerned about limitations being put
on the use of natural language when the same word is also a technical
term in Peirce's vocabulary.

As for his 'final term' vs an earlier term - I acknowledge that I am
not overly concerned about this; I am cautious about an intense focus
on terminology - but, perhaps that 'just me'.

Edwina
 On Tue 14/08/18  3:09 PM , John F Sowa s...@bestweb.net sent:
 Gary and Edwina, 
 GF 
 > I think it’s important to recognize your preference for
“mark” 
 > over “tone” as a term in semiotics or ontology is a strictly 
 > personal preference (rather than a logical principle or a fact 
 > of Peircean usage). 
 Peirce never changed his terminology without serious reasons. 
 He chose 'tone' in 1906.  In 1908, he expressed concerns about 
 that choice.  When he presented his final classification of 
 signs, he deliberately replaced 'tone' with 'mark'. 
 GF 
 > I don’t recall ever hearing “mark” as a reference to sound,
touch, 
 > taste, or indeed any sensory modality other than the visual. 
 The word 'mark' has a much broader range of senses than 'tone'. 
 For the definitions and examples of usage, compare the entries 
 for both words on the M-W site:  https://www.merriam-webster.com/
[1] 
 For Peirce's definitions and examples, see the Century Dictionary. 
 He did not write a definition for 'tone'.  For 'mark', note his 
 definition 4 and his choice of examples by Shakespeare, Milton, 
 and Kant.  See the attached mark_4.jpg. 
 Also note Peirce's comment immediately after the etymology of 
 'mark' and before definition 1: 
 > The sense 'boundary' is older as recorded, though the sense 'sign'

 > seems logically precedent.  The two groups may indeed be from 
 > entirely different groups. 
 This discussion of etymology shows that Peirce considered the word 
 'mark' to have two distinct "groups" of word senses.  Whether his 
 speculation is correct is less important than the fact that he 
 considered the sense of 'sign' to be "logically precedent". 
 It's also significant that Peirce chose to write the definition 
 of 'mark' and not the definition of 'tone'.  Although his work on 
 the Century Dictionary was about two decades before he considered 
 the choice between 'tone' and 'mark', his definitions show his 
 background knowledge of the subject and his ways of thinking. 
 For the record, note the definition of 'tone' in the Century 
 Dictionary.  The range of senses and examples is much narrower 
 than 'mark' and quite similar to the entry in M-W. 
 ET 
 > It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names
for 
 > the concepts he was trying to communicate, and often changed his 
 > mind; and I think that is a more significant fact than the fact 
 > of which choice of name he might have made in his last change 
 > of mind." 
 That's true.  We have to look at all the evidence and the context 
 of each version.  That's why we need conveniently searchable 
 transcriptions of *all* his MSS. 
 But note that the word 'mark' in both the M-W and the Century 
 dictionaries has a closer overlap with 'sign' than 'tone' has. 
 According to Peirce's own criteria for choosing terms, that is 
 an important consideration. 
 Also note that his classification of signs at the end of 1908 
 is widely cited as definitive.  After thinking and reviewing 
 all the issues, he chose 'mark' as the word to include in his 
 final classification.  That is not a casual change of mind. 
 I realize that more publications about Peirce use the word 
 'tone' -- but that is primarily because his 1906 choice has 
 been cited and recited for decades.  For his final and most 
 complete classification, his deliberate choice should have 
 very high priority.  Unless anyone can find a later version, 
 his 1908 choice of 'mark' must be considered definitive. 
 John 


Links:
--
[1]
http://webmail.primus.ca/parse.php?redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.merriam-webster.com%2F

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Re: RE: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Edwina Taborsky

 

Gary F, list

This is a  really excellent post. I especially commend Gary F's two
paragraphs:

"It seems to me that the terminological lesson we should learn from
Peirce is that no single word can be used to denote a class of signs,
or a phenomenological “category” or “element”, without being
misleading to some degree to some interpreter of some context. If we
don’t bear in mind, at least as a background understanding, that
such concepts can have valid names other than those we are currently
using, I think we are ignoring an important feature of language —
and yes, I do think it’s a feature and not a bug. 

It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names for
the concepts he was trying to communicate, and often changed his
mind; and I think that is a more significant fact than the fact of
which choice of name he might have made in his last change of mind."

-

The point is - that terminology must be interpreted - and 'can have
valid names other than those we are currently using'...andthese
terms are not 'fixed in stone'.

Edwina
 On Tue 14/08/18  9:16 AM , g...@gnusystems.ca sent:
John, I’m in agreement with everything you say here, but I think
it’s important to recognize your preference for “mark” over
“tone” as a term in semiotics or ontology is a strictly personal
preference (rather than a logical principle or a fact of Peircean
usage).  

In the first place, the preference for “mark” reflects a
preference for the visual among sensory modalities. It is more
restrictive in that sense than “tone,” because “tone” is
often used in reference to colors or to the rhetorical qualities of a
text, and thus to matters other than sound, but I don’t recall ever
hearing “mark” as a reference to sound, touch, taste, or indeed
any sensory modality other than the visual. 

It seems to me that the terminological lesson we should learn from
Peirce is that no single word can be used to denote a class of signs,
or a phenomenological “category” or “element”, without being
misleading to some degree to some interpreter of some context. If we
don’t bear in mind, at least as a background understanding, that
such concepts can have valid names other than those we are currently
using, I think we are ignoring an important feature of language —
and yes, I do think it’s a feature and not a bug. 

It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names for
the concepts he was trying to communicate, and often changed his
mind; and I think that is a more significant fact than the fact of
which choice of name he might have made in his last change of mind.

 Gary f.
-Original Message-
 From: John F Sowa  
 Sent: 13-Aug-18 23:22
 To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
 Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing
 Gary F and Jon AS,
Thanks for the comments.  They're consistent with what I said in my
previous note.
Gary

> the earliest text I’ve found where Peirce uses the term
“token”: 
CSP, late 1904 (EP2:326)

> including under the term “sign” every picture, diagram,
natural cry, 

> pointing finger, wink, knot in one’s handkerchief, memory,
dream, 

> fancy, concept, indication, token, symptom, letter, numeral, word,
 

> sentence, chapter, book, library, and in short whatever, be it in
the 

> physical universe, be it in the world of thought, that, whether 

> embodying an idea of any kind...
In this quotation, Peirce is using the word 'token' as an example on
the same level as picture, diagram, natural cry... 
That confirms my claim that in the earlier quotation (EP 2:303) he
had not yet chosen the word 'token' as a technical term in

his system.   The quotation from 1906 (CP 4.537) is the most

widely quoted source for the triad Tone/Token/Type. 
In any case, these examples show why we need complete, searchable
transcriptions of all of Peirce's MSS organized in chronological
order.  But given the current sources, we can say
  1. The 1904 quotations are from an early stage of Peirce's
semiotic, 

 and they should not be considered definitive.  The sentence

 "A sign is not a real thing" from 1904 is not a reliable basis

 for drawing firm conclusions about Peirce's complete system.
   2. By 1906, he had developed his triad of tone/token/type.  It

 would be interesting to find any MSS that showed how, when,

 and why he first chose those words.
  3. Also in 1906, his research on modal logic led him to write 

 about the three "universes" of possibility, actuality, and

 "the necessitated".
  4. By combining modal logic with his system of signs, he coined

RE: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread gnox

Jon,

OK, I think I’ve been misunderstanding the purpose of your “hypothesis.” I’ve 
been treating it as an inductively testable hypothesis about Peirce’s use of 
terms. But evidently you are not testing it in that way, but rather “trying it 
out” as a proposed improvement over Peirce’s actual usage, in the sense that it 
offers greater clarity and thus facilitates the systematic explication of what 
is going on whenever an event of concrete semiosis occurs.

Personally I don’t find it clearer than Peirce’s late (post-1904) usage in that 
respect, but that’s a judgment call which every user of your “improved” 
terminology will have to make. So the only way of “testing” it would be to 
tally up the number of opinions on each side of the clarity question. I put 
“testing” in quote marks because I don’t think such a tallying up would count 
as inductive reasoning as Peirce defines it in the Lowell lectures; and I put 
“hypothesis” in quotes for the same reason.

Regarding your belief that Peirce’s reference to Tokens as Signs “was a form of 
shorthand,” I think that too is a judgment call. In terms of Peirce oft-used 
onion metaphor, you are saying that referring to Tokens as Signs is the “skin” 
or outer layer of the onion, and if we take that skin off we get closer to the 
core reality of the Sign. But as Peirce says, it’s layers all the way down; and 
it seems to me that every “event of concrete semiosis” involves a measure of 
actuality that Types in themselves do not have. If the Final Interpretant is 
“that toward which the actual tends,” as Peirce says, there is no way to 
approach it, or learn what that tendency is, except by way of actual Dynamic 
Interpretants determined by Actisigns, i.e. Tokens acting as signs in an 
ongoing dialogue.

Gary f.

 

From: Jon Alan Schmidt  
Sent: 13-Aug-18 22:49
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

 

Gary F., List:

 

Peirce indeed referred repeatedly to Tokens as Signs, but I believe that this 
was a form of shorthand.  Just like he acknowledged using "word" in two 
different senses, he also used "Sign" in two different senses.  Just like 
embodying a Graph (Type) in a Graph-Instance (Token) is scribing the Graph (not 
the Instance), embodying a Sign (Type) in a Replica (Token) is uttering the 
Sign (not the Replica).

 

My suggestion is that for the sake of greater clarity, we should more carefully 
draw an explicit distinction between Signs as Types and their Replicas as 
Tokens, as well as the significant characters of the latter as Tones.  My post 
earlier today spelled out how I see this facilitating a systematic explication 
of what is going on whenever an event of concrete semiosis occurs.

 

In any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set of characters) by 
which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the Sign-Replica to be an 
individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the system of Signs (Essential 
Information) is necessary and sufficient for this.  It is analogous to the role 
of the Immediate Object as that by which the interpreting Quasi-mind identifies 
the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for which Collateral Experience (Experiential 
Information) is necessary and sufficient (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).

 

As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its peculiar 
Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent, the Token is 
what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is experienced in each act 
of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the Type has a Final 
Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which every Interpreter is 
destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently considered," which corresponds to 
the ideal Habit of Interpretation (Substantial Information).  In other words, 
"The Immediate Interpretant is an abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The 
Dynamical Interpretant is a single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that 
toward which the actual tends" (SS 111; 1909).

 

As for EP 2:326, "token" clearly did not yet carry the very specific technical 
meaning that Peirce attributed to it in "Prolegomena."  Moreover, he went on to 
state that "signs by themselves can exert no brute force," which is another way 
of saying that "a sign is not a real thing"; that which can exert brute 
force--i.e., any actual Thing--is not a Sign.  These are, after all, 
constituents of two different Universes of Experience (CP 6.455, EP 2:435; 
1908).

 

Regards,




Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA


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RE: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread gnox

John, I’m in agreement with everything you say here, but I think it’s important 
to recognize your preference for “mark” over “tone” as a term in semiotics or 
ontology is a strictly personal preference (rather than a logical principle or 
a fact of Peircean usage). 

In the first place, the preference for “mark” reflects a preference for the 
visual among sensory modalities. It is more restrictive in that sense than 
“tone,” because “tone” is often used in reference to colors or to the 
rhetorical qualities of a text, and thus to matters other than sound, but I 
don’t recall ever hearing “mark” as a reference to sound, touch, taste, or 
indeed any sensory modality other than the visual.

It seems to me that the terminological lesson we should learn from Peirce is 
that no single word can be used to denote a class of signs, or a 
phenomenological “category” or “element”, without being misleading to some 
degree to some interpreter of some context. If we don’t bear in mind, at least 
as a background understanding, that such concepts can have valid names other 
than those we are currently using, I think we are ignoring an important feature 
of language — and yes, I do think it’s a feature and not a bug.

It’s a fact that Peirce struggled with finding the best names for the concepts 
he was trying to communicate, and often changed his mind; and I think that is a 
more significant fact than the fact of which choice of name he might have made 
in his last change of mind.

Gary f.

 

-Original Message-
From: John F Sowa  
Sent: 13-Aug-18 23:22
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

 

Gary F and Jon AS,

 

Thanks for the comments.  They're consistent with what I said in my previous 
note.

 

Gary

> the earliest text I’ve found where Peirce uses the term “token”:

 

CSP, late 1904 (EP2:326)

> including under the term “sign” every picture, diagram, natural cry, 

> pointing finger, wink, knot in one’s handkerchief, memory, dream, 

> fancy, concept, indication, token, symptom, letter, numeral, word, 

> sentence, chapter, book, library, and in short whatever, be it in the 

> physical universe, be it in the world of thought, that, whether 

> embodying an idea of any kind...

 

In this quotation, Peirce is using the word 'token' as an example on the same 
level as picture, diagram, natural cry...

 

That confirms my claim that in the earlier quotation (EP 2:303) he had not yet 
chosen the word 'token' as a technical term in

his system.   The quotation from 1906 (CP 4.537) is the most

widely quoted source for the triad Tone/Token/Type.

 

In any case, these examples show why we need complete, searchable 
transcriptions of all of Peirce's MSS organized in chronological order.  But 
given the current sources, we can say

 

  1. The 1904 quotations are from an early stage of Peirce's semiotic,

 and they should not be considered definitive.  The sentence

 "A sign is not a real thing" from 1904 is not a reliable basis

 for drawing firm conclusions about Peirce's complete system.

 

  2. By 1906, he had developed his triad of tone/token/type.  It

 would be interesting to find any MSS that showed how, when,

 and why he first chose those words.

 

  3. Also in 1906, his research on modal logic led him to write

 about the three "universes" of possibility, actuality, and

 "the necessitated".

 

  4. By combining modal logic with his system of signs, he coined

 the triad Potisign/Actisign/Famisign.  But in 1908, he said

 that he preferred his earlier triad of more common words,

 Tone/Token/Type.  But he had some doubts about 'Tone', as

 he said on 23 Dec 1908.  See the attached EP2_480.jpg.

 

  5. A few days later, he decided that 'Mark' was preferable

 to 'Tone'.

 

Jon

> I believe that Lady Welby's reply to Peirce's letter of December 23,

> 1908 asking her about Tone vs. Mark was the one dated January 21,

> 1909 (SS 86ff).  Consequently, it came several weeks after he wrote 

> the other drafts of that letter.

 

Yes, but note that Lady W's reason was the same example that Peirce gave in 
1906 (CP 4.537):

 

Jon

> if I remember right... she found Tone preferable because a tone of 

> voice is a paradigmatic example.

 

If Peirce was not satisfied with the word 'tone', the fact that Lady W repeated 
his own example would not be convincing.

 

Furthermore, 'mark' is a common English word that can be used for marks in any 
of the senses (as Peirce called them, Optical, Tactile, and Acoustic).  But 
'tone' is limited to Acoustic.

 

Unless anyone can find later evidence that Peirce switched back to 'tone', I 
would consider 'mark' to be his final choice.

 

Jon

> My suggestion is that for the sake of greater clarity, we should more 

> carefully draw an explicit distinction between Signs as Types and 

> the

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Daniel L Everett

Edwina

This isn’t a matter of suggestions. There is a massive, technical literature on 
the evolution of writing systems. And yes like ALL inventions Seqouia’s emerged 
from a cultural context. His syllabary is in fact demonstrably superior in ease 
of acquistion to either Chinese logographic or English alfabetic systems. aand 
simce he had no exposure (nor did AngloAmericans) to syllabic systems, his 
invention is unparalled. 

Dan

Sent from my iPhone

> On Aug 14, 2018, at 08:46, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
> 
> Dan, list
> 
> I suggest that Sequoia's development of a syllabary in the 19th c, for 
> Cherokee - was quite different from the other written language and mnemonic 
> methods used by large populations in earlier times. Sequoia was aware of the 
> written language used by settlers - and developed one for his language.
> 
> I'd suggest that the other written forms emerged as communal efforts but 
> that's as far as one can go with any certainty. The point is, it isn't needed 
> in small populations and only needed in large settled [some form of 
> agriculture] societies.
> 
> As you say - it only emerged a few times in world history - among peoples 
> separate from each other; i.e., no diffusion - and I feel that it is related 
> to the need for some kind of mnemonic device and a different perspective on 
> history - and authority.
> 
> Edwina
> 
>  
> 
> On Tue 14/08/18 4:36 AM , Daniel L Everett danleveret...@gmail.com sent:
> 
> Written language has only been invented a handful of times in world history. 
> It was never invented for English, for example, but adapted from a 
> pre-existing system invented by others. 
> 
> It was invented separately by Sequoia, for his language - Cheokee. Not a 
> large civilization. Sequoia’s syllabary was an intellectual breakthrough of 
> the first rank. 
> 
> Dan
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
> On Aug 13, 2018, at 21:27, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
> 
>> List
>> 
>> I certainly don't want to promote or support Derrida, - I could never stand 
>> him, and much preferred Mikhail Bakhtin's focus on language - back when I 
>> was myself studying language and the nature of oral and literate cultures. 
>> BUT - I think it's a huge misunderstanding to think that Derrida's promoting 
>> of Writing meant that he placed writing as emerging prior to the spoken 
>> language! 
>> 
>> Even if one were not referring to a phonetic language but instead to a 
>> non-phonetic one, such as Chinese - even then, It is illogical to suppose 
>> that the written form preceded the spoken form. Even if one refers to the 
>> written form for the numbers of one, two, three in Chinese [one horizontal 
>> line, two lines, three lines].
>> 
>> At any rate, written language, to my understanding, only emerges in large 
>> settled populations, i.e., ones that use some form of agriculture and 
>> require some kind of mnemonic device. And that -, i.e., large agricultural 
>> populations - only emerged about 10,000 years ago.
>> 
>> What I think Derrida is referring to - in his dense, mystical writings - is 
>> that writing represents the structure of the Sign in its orignary, 
>> essentialist nature - in its most Truthful nature [akin to the Final 
>> Interpretant?] and that the articulated Sign [Saussurian: signifier and 
>> signified] 'fight' with each other in Writing; they have a relationship of 
>> difference,[ Though he does reference Peirce ] But that Writing sets up a 
>> conflict between the signifier and signified [Object and Interpretant] such 
>> that they cannot reconcile. How does one arrive at Truth - only be 
>> deconstructing this 'differerance'...
>> 
>> And that's as far as I'll go since I could never stand himMy only point 
>> here is that it's a misunderstanding to think that he thought that writing 
>> preceded speech!
>> 
>> Edwina
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> On Mon 13/08/18 3:46 PM , Eugene Halton eugene.w.halto...@nd.edu sent:
>> 
>> I also agree. To twist Ernst Haeckel's saying: ontology does not 
>> recapitulate philology, contra Derrida.
>>  Gene H 
>> 
>>> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018, 3:20 PM Mary Libertin  wrote:
>>> I agree. With you, and with my interpretation of Sternfeldt.
>>> 
>>> 
 On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 3:18 PM Daniel L Everett  
 wrote:
 Derrida is completely wrong. Both phylogenetically and ontogenetically. 
 Besides doing field research on Amazonian languages that lack any form of 
 writing, I have written extensively on language evolution. I have heard 
 Derrida’s unfortunate claim before. 
 https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307386120/ref=dbs_a_w_dp_0307386120
 
 https://www.amazon.com/How-Language-Began-Humanitys-Invention/dp/0871407957
 
 Dan Everett
 Sent from my iPhone
 
 On Aug 13, 2018, at 16:40, Mary Libertin  wrote:
 
> Jon A S and list,
> 
> I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just some 
> observations for possible discussion.
> 
> Peirce in EP 2:488, as

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Edwina Taborsky

 

Dan, list

I suggest that Sequoia's development of a syllabary in the 19th c,
for Cherokee - was quite different from the other written language
and mnemonic methods used by large populations in earlier times.
Sequoia was aware of the written language used by settlers - and
developed one for his language. 

I'd suggest that the other written forms emerged as communal efforts
but that's as far as one can go with any certainty. The point is, it
isn't needed in small populations and only needed in large settled
[some form of agriculture] societies.

As you say - it only emerged a few times in world history - among
peoples separate from each other; i.e., no diffusion - and I feel
that it is related to the need for some kind of mnemonic device and a
different perspective on history - and authority.

Edwina
 On Tue 14/08/18  4:36 AM , Daniel L Everett danleveret...@gmail.com
sent:
 Written language has only been invented a handful of times in world
history. It was never invented for English, for example, but adapted
from a pre-existing system invented by others. 
 It was invented separately by Sequoia, for his language - Cheokee.
Not a large civilization. Sequoia’s syllabary was an intellectual
breakthrough of the first rank.  
 Dan
 Sent from my iPhone
 On Aug 13, 2018, at 21:27, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
 BODY { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12px;
}List

I certainly don't want to promote or support Derrida, - I could
never stand him, and much preferred Mikhail Bakhtin's focus on
language - back when I was myself studying language and the nature of
oral and literate cultures. BUT - I think it's a huge misunderstanding
to think that Derrida's promoting of Writing meant that he placed
writing as emerging prior to the spoken language! 

 Even if one were not referring to a phonetic language but instead
to a non-phonetic one, such as Chinese - even then, It is illogical
to suppose that the written form preceded the spoken form. Even if
one refers to the written form for the numbers of one, two, three in
Chinese [one horizontal line, two lines, three lines].

At any rate, written language, to my understanding, only emerges in
large settled populations, i.e., ones that use some form of
agriculture and require some kind of mnemonic device. And that -,
i.e., large agricultural populations - only emerged about 10,000
years ago. 

What I think Derrida is referring to - in his dense, mystical
writings - is that writing represents the structure of the Sign in
its orignary, essentialist nature - in its most Truthful nature [akin
to the Final Interpretant?] and that the articulated Sign [Saussurian:
signifier and signified] 'fight' with each other in Writing; they have
a relationship of difference,[ Though he does reference Peirce ] But
that Writing sets up a conflict between the signifier and signified
[Object and Interpretant] such that they cannot reconcile. How does
one arrive at Truth - only be deconstructing this 'differerance'... 

And that's as far as I'll go since I could never stand himMy
only point here is that it's a misunderstanding to think that he
thought that writing preceded speech!

Edwina
 On Mon 13/08/18  3:46 PM , Eugene Halton eugene.w.halto...@nd.edu
[2] sent:
 I also agree. To twist Ernst Haeckel's saying: ontology does not
recapitulate philology, contra Derrida. Gene H 
 On Mon, Aug 13, 2018, 3:20 PM Mary Libertin  wrote:
 I agree. With you, and with my interpretation of Sternfeldt. 
 On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 3:18 PM Daniel L Everett  wrote:
 Derrida is completely wrong. Both phylogenetically and
ontogenetically. Besides doing field research on Amazonian languages
that lack any form of writing, I have written extensively on language
evolution. I have heard Derrida’s unfortunate claim before. 
 https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307386120/ref=dbs_a_w_dp_0307386120
[3]

https://www.amazon.com/How-Language-Began-Humanitys-Invention/dp/0871407957
[4]
 Dan Everett
  Sent from my iPhone
 On Aug 13, 2018, at 16:40, Mary Libertin  wrote:
 Jon A S and list,
 I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just
some observations for possible discussion.
  Peirce in EP 2:488, as previously quoted, writes that the
tinge/tone/mark precedes the token/type. Are three senses possibly
being alluded to: sight, sound, and touch? 
  In regard to the sound and touch, I recall Peirce’s use of the
utterer and the graphist. 
 The latter two suggest more agency. Saussure discussed the
signifier/signified relation in terms of the phoneme and speech, and
rarely the grapheme and writing.  Speech can not be removed or
erased, and it assumes permanence with quote marks.  
 Derrida argued the grapheme preceded the phoneme, the written vs the
spoken. How relevant that is remains to be seen. Frederick Sternfelt
in the title of his insightful book _Diagrammatology_ makes implicit
reference to

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-14 Thread Daniel L Everett

Written language has only been invented a handful of times in world history. It 
was never invented for English, for example, but adapted from a pre-existing 
system invented by others. 

It was invented separately by Sequoia, for his language - Cheokee. Not a large 
civilization. Sequoia’s syllabary was an intellectual breakthrough of the first 
rank. 

Dan

Sent from my iPhone

> On Aug 13, 2018, at 21:27, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
> 
> List
> 
> I certainly don't want to promote or support Derrida, - I could never stand 
> him, and much preferred Mikhail Bakhtin's focus on language - back when I was 
> myself studying language and the nature of oral and literate cultures. BUT - 
> I think it's a huge misunderstanding to think that Derrida's promoting of 
> Writing meant that he placed writing as emerging prior to the spoken 
> language! 
> 
> Even if one were not referring to a phonetic language but instead to a 
> non-phonetic one, such as Chinese - even then, It is illogical to suppose 
> that the written form preceded the spoken form. Even if one refers to the 
> written form for the numbers of one, two, three in Chinese [one horizontal 
> line, two lines, three lines].
> 
> At any rate, written language, to my understanding, only emerges in large 
> settled populations, i.e., ones that use some form of agriculture and require 
> some kind of mnemonic device. And that -, i.e., large agricultural 
> populations - only emerged about 10,000 years ago.
> 
> What I think Derrida is referring to - in his dense, mystical writings - is 
> that writing represents the structure of the Sign in its orignary, 
> essentialist nature - in its most Truthful nature [akin to the Final 
> Interpretant?] and that the articulated Sign [Saussurian: signifier and 
> signified] 'fight' with each other in Writing; they have a relationship of 
> difference,[ Though he does reference Peirce ] But that Writing sets up a 
> conflict between the signifier and signified [Object and Interpretant] such 
> that they cannot reconcile. How does one arrive at Truth - only be 
> deconstructing this 'differerance'...
> 
> And that's as far as I'll go since I could never stand himMy only point 
> here is that it's a misunderstanding to think that he thought that writing 
> preceded speech!
> 
> Edwina
> 
>  
> 
> On Mon 13/08/18 3:46 PM , Eugene Halton eugene.w.halto...@nd.edu sent:
> 
> I also agree. To twist Ernst Haeckel's saying: ontology does not recapitulate 
> philology, contra Derrida.
>  Gene H 
> 
>> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018, 3:20 PM Mary Libertin  wrote:
>> I agree. With you, and with my interpretation of Sternfeldt.
>> 
>> 
>>> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 3:18 PM Daniel L Everett  
>>> wrote:
>>> Derrida is completely wrong. Both phylogenetically and ontogenetically. 
>>> Besides doing field research on Amazonian languages that lack any form of 
>>> writing, I have written extensively on language evolution. I have heard 
>>> Derrida’s unfortunate claim before. 
>>> https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307386120/ref=dbs_a_w_dp_0307386120
>>> 
>>> https://www.amazon.com/How-Language-Began-Humanitys-Invention/dp/0871407957
>>> 
>>> Dan Everett
>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>> 
>>> On Aug 13, 2018, at 16:40, Mary Libertin  wrote:
>>> 
 Jon A S and list,

 I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just some 
 observations for possible discussion.

 Peirce in EP 2:488, as previously quoted, writes that the tinge/tone/mark 
 precedes the token/type. Are three senses possibly being alluded to: 
 sight, sound, and touch? 

  In regard to the sound and touch, I recall Peirce’s use of the utterer 
 and the graphist. 

 The latter two suggest more agency. Saussure discussed the 
 signifier/signified relation in terms of the phoneme and speech, and 
 rarely the grapheme and writing.  Speech can not be removed or erased, and 
 it assumes permanence with quote marks. 

 Derrida argued the grapheme preceded the phoneme, the written vs the 
 spoken. How relevant that is remains to be seen. Frederick Sternfelt in 
 the title of his insightful book _Diagrammatology_ makes implicit 
 reference to Derrida’s _Grammatology_, whose work is given short shrift. 
 It may be that preceed-ence is not an issue with the decisign, or not 
 relevant. 

 I do recall Peirce using tinge with regard to existential graphs, and 
 tinges perhaps served a purpose, perhaps with reference to layering and 
 juxtaposition in logic, that could not achieved with the spoken or written.

 It may be possible that Peirce ultimately chose mark rather than tinge or 
 tone because it is more permanent. 

 I apologize for lacking a thesis and any mistakes, and I look forward to 
 your responses.

 Mary Libertin

> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 1:45 PM Jon Alan Schmidt < 
> jonalanschm...@gmail.com> wrote:
>

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread John F Sowa


Gary F and Jon AS,

Thanks for the comments.  They're consistent with what I said
in my previous note.

Gary

the earliest text I’ve found where Peirce uses the term “token”:


CSP, late 1904 (EP2:326)

including under the term “sign” every picture, diagram, natural cry,
pointing finger, wink, knot in one’s handkerchief, memory, dream,
fancy, concept, indication, token, symptom, letter, numeral, word,
sentence, chapter, book, library, and in short whatever, be it in
the physical universe, be it in the world of thought, that, whether
embodying an idea of any kind... 


In this quotation, Peirce is using the word 'token' as an example
on the same level as picture, diagram, natural cry...

That confirms my claim that in the earlier quotation (EP 2:303)
he had not yet chosen the word 'token' as a technical term in
his system.   The quotation from 1906 (CP 4.537) is the most
widely quoted source for the triad Tone/Token/Type.

In any case, these examples show why we need complete, searchable
transcriptions of all of Peirce's MSS organized in chronological
order.  But given the current sources, we can say

 1. The 1904 quotations are from an early stage of Peirce's semiotic,
and they should not be considered definitive.  The sentence
"A sign is not a real thing" from 1904 is not a reliable basis
for drawing firm conclusions about Peirce's complete system.

 2. By 1906, he had developed his triad of tone/token/type.  It
would be interesting to find any MSS that showed how, when,
and why he first chose those words.

 3. Also in 1906, his research on modal logic led him to write
about the three "universes" of possibility, actuality, and
"the necessitated".

 4. By combining modal logic with his system of signs, he coined
the triad Potisign/Actisign/Famisign.  But in 1908, he said
that he preferred his earlier triad of more common words,
Tone/Token/Type.  But he had some doubts about 'Tone', as
he said on 23 Dec 1908.  See the attached EP2_480.jpg.

 5. A few days later, he decided that 'Mark' was preferable
to 'Tone'.

Jon

I believe that Lady Welby's reply to Peirce's letter of December 23,
1908 asking her about Tone vs. Mark was the one dated January 21,
1909 (SS 86ff).  Consequently, it came several weeks after he wrote
the other drafts of that letter.


Yes, but note that Lady W's reason was the same example that Peirce
gave in 1906 (CP 4.537):

Jon

if I remember right... she found Tone preferable because a tone
of voice is a paradigmatic example.


If Peirce was not satisfied with the word 'tone', the fact that
Lady W repeated his own example would not be convincing.

Furthermore, 'mark' is a common English word that can be used
for marks in any of the senses (as Peirce called them, Optical,
Tactile, and Acoustic).  But 'tone' is limited to Acoustic.

Unless anyone can find later evidence that Peirce switched back
to 'tone', I would consider 'mark' to be his final choice.

Jon

My suggestion is that for the sake of greater clarity, we should
more carefully draw an explicit distinction between Signs as Types
and their Replicas as Tokens, as well as the significant characters
of the latter as Tones.


I agree with everything up to the final word in that sentence.

When I discuss or lecture about Peirce's triads, the word 'mark'
rolls off my tongue very smoothly, and people understand what I'm
trying to say.  But the word 'tone' suggests a sound.  It doesn't
generalize to other sensory modes.

John

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Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Jon Alan Schmidt

Gary F., List:

Peirce indeed referred repeatedly to Tokens as Signs, but I believe that
this was a form of shorthand.  Just like he acknowledged using "word" in
two different senses, he also used "Sign" in two different senses.  Just
like embodying a Graph (Type) in a Graph-Instance (Token) is scribing the
Graph (not the Instance), embodying a Sign (Type) in a Replica (Token) is
uttering the Sign (not the Replica).

My suggestion is that for the sake of greater clarity, we should more
carefully draw an explicit distinction between Signs as Types and their
Replicas as Tokens, as well as the significant characters of the latter as
Tones.  My post earlier today spelled out how I see this facilitating a
systematic explication of what is going on whenever an event of concrete
semiosis occurs.

In any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set of characters)
by which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the Sign-Replica to be an
individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the system of Signs
(Essential Information) is necessary and sufficient for this.  It is
analogous to the role of the Immediate Object as that by which the
interpreting Quasi-mind identifies the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for
which Collateral Experience (Experiential Information) is necessary and
sufficient (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).

As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its
peculiar Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent,
the Token is what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is
experienced in each act of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the
Type has a Final Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which
every Interpreter is destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently
considered," which corresponds to the ideal Habit of Interpretation
(Substantial Information).  In other words, "The Immediate Interpretant is
an abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The Dynamical Interpretant is
a single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that toward which the
actual tends" (SS 111; 1909).

As for EP 2:326, "token" clearly did not yet carry the very specific
technical meaning that Peirce attributed to it in "Prolegomena."  Moreover,
he went on to state that "signs by themselves can exert no brute force,"
which is another way of saying that "a sign is not a real thing"; that
which *can* exert brute force--i.e., any *actual* Thing--is *not* a Sign.
These are, after all, constituents of two *different* Universes of
Experience (CP 6.455, EP 2:435; 1908).

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 7:41 PM,  wrote:

> Jon, John, list, Regarding the type/token/tone trichotomy:
>
> This was introduced in Peirce’s 1906 “Prolegomena”, and I think the
> paragraph in which it appears is worth another look. I’m leaving open the
> question of whether this trichotomy is conceptually identical to the 1903
> legisign/sinsign/qualisign trichotomy. But I would ask readers to notice
> that if Peirce meant in “New Elements” (1904) that *all Signs are Types*
> (and therefore Tokens are not Signs), he must have changed his mind about
> that by 1906. Here is the paragraph (CP 4.537):
>
> [[ A common mode of estimating the amount of matter in a MS. or printed
> book is to count the number of words. There will ordinarily be about
> twenty *the's* on a page, and of course they count as twenty words. In
> another sense of the word “word,” however, there is but one word “the” in
> the English language; and it is impossible that this word should lie
> visibly on a page or be heard in any voice, for the reason that it is not a
> Single thing or Single event. It does not exist; it only determines things
> that do exist. Such a definitely significant Form, I propose to term a
> *Type*. A Single event which happens once and whose identity is limited
> to that one happening or a Single object or thing which is in some single
> place at any one instant of time, such event or thing being significant
> only as occurring just when and where it does, such as this or that word on
> a single line of a single page of a single copy of a book, I will venture
> to call a *Token*. An indefinite significant character such as a tone of
> voice can neither be called a Type nor a Token. I propose to call such a
> Sign a *Tone*; In order that a Type may be used, it has to be embodied in
> a Token which shall be a sign of the Type, and thereby of the object the
> Type signifies. I propose to call such a Token of a Type an *Instance* of
> the Type. Thus, there may be twenty Instances of the Type “the” on a page.
> The term (Existential) *Graph* will be taken in the sense of a Type; and
> the act of embodying it in a *Graph-Instance* will be termed *scribing*
> the Graph (not the Instance), whether the Instance be written, drawn, or
> incised. A

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Jon Alan Schmidt

John S., List:

I agree that when Peirce wrote in 1904 that "a sign is not a real thing. It
is of such a nature as to exist in *replicas*," he was pointing toward what
he later called a Type and its Tokens, respectively.  This is the basis for
my interpretative hypothesis that every Sign is a Type, its Instances are
Tokens, and their significant characters are Tones.

I believe that Lady Welby's reply to Peirce's letter of December 23, 1908
asking her about Tone vs. Mark was the one dated January 21, 1909 (SS
86ff).  Consequently, it came several weeks *after* he wrote the other
drafts of that letter over the next several days, so his use of Mark in
those is not necessarily indicative of "his final decision."  In any case,
I continue to prefer Tone as more "qualitative" than "existential."

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 4:22 PM, John F Sowa  wrote:

> On 8/13/2018 1:45 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:
>
>> JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>>>
>>  It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the
>> point of the thread is to explicate it.
>>
>
> Oh.  I admit that the thread was so long (over 40 messages)
> that I had forgotten how it started.
>
> I copied the two relevant excerpts in the attached EP2_303.jpg
> (from 1904) and EP2_480.jpg (from 1908).  In EP 2:303, he did
> not use (or even think of) his more precise terminology of 1908.
>
> Between those two dates, Peirce (1906) began to talk about
> real possibilities, and he published his tinctured EGs with
> the three "universes" of possibility, actuality, and
> the necessitated.
>
> His correspondence with Lady Welby, which started in 1903, gave
> him an educated audience (Lady W and the Significs group) over
> a sustained period of years.  That audience was critical for
> inspiring the development of his later terminology, in particular
> the letters of December 1908 (EP 2:478-491).
>
> Note the last three sentences of EP2_480.jpg:
>
>> For a "possible" Sign I have no better designation than a _Tone_,
>> thought I am considering replacing this by "Mark."  Can you suggest
>> a really good name?  An Actual sign I call a _Token_; a Necessitant
>> Sign a _Type_.
>>
>
> If you interpret EP 2:303 in terms of EP 2:480, it seems clear
> that he was talking about the type/token distinction before he had
> chosen those words.  When he said "a sign is not a real thing", he
> was referring to the type, but he did not yet have the word "type".
> In talking about a replica, he did not yet have the word "token".
>
> JAS
>
>> In fact, less than two weeks earlier, he had asked Lady Welby
>> specifically about Tone vs. Mark (SS 83; 1908); and if I remember
>> right--I do not have a copy of her reply--she found Tone preferable
>> because a tone of voice is a paradigmatic example.  Peirce also
>> used Tone in what I think is one of his clearest passages about
>> this division of Signs (CP 4.537; 1906).
>>
>
> Note what he says in EP 2:480 (Dec 23).  At the bottom of p. 488
> (Dec 24-28) he wrote the first triad as Mark/Token/Type, and he
> continued to use the word 'Mark' on p. 489.  That appears to be
> his final decision.  He considered Lady W's point, asked for
> a "really good" term, and decided not to use 'Tone'.
>
> Also note his letter to William James on p. 502 (1909), where he
> wrote "Deduction involves the observation of a Diagram (whether
> Optical, Tactile, or Acoustic)" and then "I myself always work
> with Optical Diagrams."  That would suggest another reason why
> he would prefer Mark to Tone.
>
> John
>

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RE: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread gnox

Jon, John, list, Regarding the type/token/tone trichotomy:

This was introduced in Peirce’s 1906 “Prolegomena”, and I think the paragraph 
in which it appears is worth another look. I’m leaving open the question of 
whether this trichotomy is conceptually identical to the 1903 
legisign/sinsign/qualisign trichotomy. But I would ask readers to notice that 
if Peirce meant in “New Elements” (1904) that all Signs are Types (and 
therefore Tokens are not Signs), he must have changed his mind about that by 
1906. Here is the paragraph (CP 4.537):

[[ A common mode of estimating the amount of matter in a MS. or printed book is 
to count the number of words. There will ordinarily be about twenty the's on a 
page, and of course they count as twenty words. In another sense of the word 
“word,” however, there is but one word “the” in the English language; and it is 
impossible that this word should lie visibly on a page or be heard in any 
voice, for the reason that it is not a Single thing or Single event. It does 
not exist; it only determines things that do exist. Such a definitely 
significant Form, I propose to term a Type. A Single event which happens once 
and whose identity is limited to that one happening or a Single object or thing 
which is in some single place at any one instant of time, such event or thing 
being significant only as occurring just when and where it does, such as this 
or that word on a single line of a single page of a single copy of a book, I 
will venture to call a Token. An indefinite significant character such as a 
tone of voice can neither be called a Type nor a Token. I propose to call such 
a Sign a Tone; In order that a Type may be used, it has to be embodied in a 
Token which shall be a sign of the Type, and thereby of the object the Type 
signifies. I propose to call such a Token of a Type an Instance of the Type. 
Thus, there may be twenty Instances of the Type “the” on a page. The term 
(Existential) Graph will be taken in the sense of a Type; and the act of 
embodying it in a Graph-Instance will be termed scribing the Graph (not the 
Instance), whether the Instance be written, drawn, or incised. A mere blank 
place is a Graph-Instance, and the Blank per se is a Graph; but I shall ask you 
to assume that it has the peculiarity that it cannot be abolished from any Area 
on which it is scribed, as long as that Area exists. ]]

Peirce says here that a Token is “a sign of the Type, and thereby of the object 
the Type signifies.” (Notice that the Type does not denote this object but 
signifies it.) In one of the drafts of the “Prolegomena” (MS 293, “PAP”), 
Peirce had written that “it is requisite that I explain exactly what I mean by 
a Diagram, a word which I employ in a wider sense than is usual. A Diagram, in 
my sense, is in the first place a Token, or singular Object used as a Sign; for 
it is essential that it should be capable of being perceived and observed. It 
is, however, what is called a General sign; that is, it denotes a general 
Object.” Here the Token is said to be “used as a Sign.” But the earliest text 
I’ve found where Peirce uses the term “token” in direct connection with signs 
is from late 1904 (EP2:326) — not long after “New Elements” — where he says 
that he is

[[ including under the term “sign” every picture, diagram, natural cry, 
pointing finger, wink, knot in one’s handkerchief, memory, dream, fancy, 
concept, indication, token, symptom, letter, numeral, word, sentence, chapter, 
book, library, and in short whatever, be it in the physical universe, be it in 
the world of thought, that, whether embodying an idea of any kind (and permit 
us throughout to use this term to cover purposes and feelings), or being 
connected with some existing object, or referring to future events through a 
general rule, causes something else, its interpreting sign, to be determined to 
a corresponding relation to the same idea, existing thing, or law. ]]

The above instances of the word “token” used by Peirce in semiotic contexts, 
not to mention several others of later date, are hard to reconcile with the 
hypothesis that for Peirce, tokens are replicas but are not signs.

As for the word “type,” its etymology and usage history (including its role in 
Peircean semiotics) are fascinating in their own right, but I think I’ll save 
that for a blog post rather than posting about it here.

Gary f.

-Original Message-
From: John F Sowa  
Sent: 13-Aug-18 17:23
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

On 8/13/2018 1:45 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:

>> JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.

>  

> It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the point of 

> the thread is to explicate it.

Oh.  I admit that the thread was so long (over 40 messages) that I had 
forgotten how it started.

I copied the two relevant excerpts in the attached EP2_303.jpg (from 1904) and 
EP2_480

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Eugene Halton

I also agree. To twist Ernst Haeckel's saying: ontology does not
recapitulate philology, contra Derrida.
 Gene H

On Mon, Aug 13, 2018, 3:20 PM Mary Libertin  wrote:

> I agree. With you, and with my interpretation of Sternfeldt.
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 3:18 PM Daniel L Everett 
> wrote:
>
>> Derrida is completely wrong. Both phylogenetically and ontogenetically.
>> Besides doing field research on Amazonian languages that lack any form of
>> writing, I have written extensively on language evolution. I have heard
>> Derrida’s unfortunate claim before.
>> https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307386120/ref=dbs_a_w_dp_0307386120
>>
>>
>> https://www.amazon.com/How-Language-Began-Humanitys-Invention/dp/0871407957
>>
>> Dan Everett
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>> On Aug 13, 2018, at 16:40, Mary Libertin  wrote:
>>
>> Jon A S and list,
>>
>> I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just some
>> observations for possible discussion.
>>
>> Peirce in EP 2:488, as previously quoted, writes that the tinge/tone/mark
>> precedes the token/type. Are three senses possibly being alluded to: sight,
>> sound, and touch?
>>
>>  In regard to the sound and touch, I recall Peirce’s use of the utterer
>> and the graphist.
>>
>> The latter two suggest more agency. Saussure discussed the
>> signifier/signified relation in terms of the phoneme and speech, and rarely
>> the grapheme and writing.  Speech can not be removed or erased, and it
>> assumes permanence with quote marks.
>>
>> Derrida argued the grapheme preceded the phoneme, the written vs the
>> spoken. How relevant that is remains to be seen. Frederick Sternfelt in the
>> title of his insightful book _Diagrammatology_ makes implicit reference to
>> Derrida’s _Grammatology_, whose work is given short shrift. It may be that
>> preceed-ence is not an issue with the decisign, or not relevant.
>>
>> I do recall Peirce using tinge with regard to existential graphs, and
>> tinges perhaps served a purpose, perhaps with reference to layering and
>> juxtaposition in logic, that could not achieved with the spoken or written.
>>
>> It may be possible that Peirce ultimately chose mark rather than tinge or
>> tone because it is more permanent.
>>
>> I apologize for lacking a thesis and any mistakes, and I look forward to
>> your responses.
>>
>> Mary Libertin
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 1:45 PM Jon Alan Schmidt <
>> jonalanschm...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> John S., List:
>>>
>>> JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>>>
>>>
>>> It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the point of the
>>> thread is to explicate it.
>>>
>>> JFS:  Since mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or
>>> tone.
>>>
>>>
>>> In the referenced passage, Peirce stated, "I dare say some of my former
>>> names are better than those I now use" (EP 2:488; 1908).  In fact, less
>>> than two weeks earlier, he had asked Lady Welby specifically about Tone vs.
>>> Mark (SS 83; 1908); and if I remember right--I do not have a copy of her
>>> reply--she found Tone preferable because a tone of voice is a paradigmatic
>>> example.  Peirce also used Tone in what I think is one of his clearest
>>> passages about this division of Signs (CP 4.537; 1906).
>>>
>>> JFS:  General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is always
>>> a perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or quasi-mind as a
>>> token of some type.
>>>
>>>
>>> This may be a case of hair-splitting on my part, but I would suggest
>>> instead that in any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set
>>> of characters) by which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the
>>> Sign-Replica to be an individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the
>>> system of Signs (Essential Information) is necessary and sufficient for
>>> this.  It is analogous to the role of the Immediate Object as that by which
>>> the interpreting Quasi-mind identifies the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for
>>> which Collateral Experience (Experiential Information) is necessary and
>>> sufficient (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).
>>>
>>> As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its
>>> peculiar Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent,
>>> the Token is what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is
>>> experienced in each act of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the
>>> Type has a Final Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which
>>> every Interpreter is destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently
>>> considered," which corresponds to the correct Habit of Interpretation
>>> (Substantial Information).  In other words, "The Immediate Interpretant is
>>> an abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The Dynamical Interpretant is
>>> a single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that toward which the
>>> actual tends" (SS 111; 1909).
>>>
>>> JFS:  In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real
>>> actualities.
>>>

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Mary Libertin

I agree. With you, and with my interpretation of Sternfeldt.


On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 3:18 PM Daniel L Everett 
wrote:

> Derrida is completely wrong. Both phylogenetically and ontogenetically.
> Besides doing field research on Amazonian languages that lack any form of
> writing, I have written extensively on language evolution. I have heard
> Derrida’s unfortunate claim before.
> https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307386120/ref=dbs_a_w_dp_0307386120
>
> https://www.amazon.com/How-Language-Began-Humanitys-Invention/dp/0871407957
>
> Dan Everett
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Aug 13, 2018, at 16:40, Mary Libertin  wrote:
>
> Jon A S and list,
>
> I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just some
> observations for possible discussion.
>
> Peirce in EP 2:488, as previously quoted, writes that the tinge/tone/mark
> precedes the token/type. Are three senses possibly being alluded to: sight,
> sound, and touch?
>
>  In regard to the sound and touch, I recall Peirce’s use of the utterer
> and the graphist.
>
> The latter two suggest more agency. Saussure discussed the
> signifier/signified relation in terms of the phoneme and speech, and rarely
> the grapheme and writing.  Speech can not be removed or erased, and it
> assumes permanence with quote marks.
>
> Derrida argued the grapheme preceded the phoneme, the written vs the
> spoken. How relevant that is remains to be seen. Frederick Sternfelt in the
> title of his insightful book _Diagrammatology_ makes implicit reference to
> Derrida’s _Grammatology_, whose work is given short shrift. It may be that
> preceed-ence is not an issue with the decisign, or not relevant.
>
> I do recall Peirce using tinge with regard to existential graphs, and
> tinges perhaps served a purpose, perhaps with reference to layering and
> juxtaposition in logic, that could not achieved with the spoken or written.
>
> It may be possible that Peirce ultimately chose mark rather than tinge or
> tone because it is more permanent.
>
> I apologize for lacking a thesis and any mistakes, and I look forward to
> your responses.
>
> Mary Libertin
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 1:45 PM Jon Alan Schmidt 
> wrote:
>
>> John S., List:
>>
>> JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>>
>>
>> It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the point of the
>> thread is to explicate it.
>>
>> JFS:  Since mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or
>> tone.
>>
>>
>> In the referenced passage, Peirce stated, "I dare say some of my former
>> names are better than those I now use" (EP 2:488; 1908).  In fact, less
>> than two weeks earlier, he had asked Lady Welby specifically about Tone vs.
>> Mark (SS 83; 1908); and if I remember right--I do not have a copy of her
>> reply--she found Tone preferable because a tone of voice is a paradigmatic
>> example.  Peirce also used Tone in what I think is one of his clearest
>> passages about this division of Signs (CP 4.537; 1906).
>>
>> JFS:  General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is always
>> a perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or quasi-mind as a
>> token of some type.
>>
>>
>> This may be a case of hair-splitting on my part, but I would suggest
>> instead that in any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set
>> of characters) by which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the
>> Sign-Replica to be an individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the
>> system of Signs (Essential Information) is necessary and sufficient for
>> this.  It is analogous to the role of the Immediate Object as that by which
>> the interpreting Quasi-mind identifies the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for
>> which Collateral Experience (Experiential Information) is necessary and
>> sufficient (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).
>>
>> As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its
>> peculiar Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent,
>> the Token is what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is
>> experienced in each act of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the
>> Type has a Final Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which
>> every Interpreter is destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently
>> considered," which corresponds to the correct Habit of Interpretation
>> (Substantial Information).  In other words, "The Immediate Interpretant is
>> an abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The Dynamical Interpretant is
>> a single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that toward which the
>> actual tends" (SS 111; 1909).
>>
>> JFS:  In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real actualities.
>>
>>
>> I agree, and would add that semiosis also governs Real actualities in
>> accordance with Real regularities.
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
>> Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
>> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
>>
>> On Fri,

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Daniel L Everett

Derrida is completely wrong. Both phylogenetically and ontogenetically. Besides 
doing field research on Amazonian languages that lack any form of writing, I 
have written extensively on language evolution. I have heard Derrida’s 
unfortunate claim before. 
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0307386120/ref=dbs_a_w_dp_0307386120

https://www.amazon.com/How-Language-Began-Humanitys-Invention/dp/0871407957

Dan Everett
Sent from my iPhone

> On Aug 13, 2018, at 16:40, Mary Libertin  wrote:
> 
> Jon A S and list,
> 
> I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just some 
> observations for possible discussion.
> 
> Peirce in EP 2:488, as previously quoted, writes that the tinge/tone/mark 
> precedes the token/type. Are three senses possibly being alluded to: sight, 
> sound, and touch? 
> 
>  In regard to the sound and touch, I recall Peirce’s use of the utterer and 
> the graphist. 
> 
> The latter two suggest more agency. Saussure discussed the 
> signifier/signified relation in terms of the phoneme and speech, and rarely 
> the grapheme and writing.  Speech can not be removed or erased, and it 
> assumes permanence with quote marks. 
> 
> Derrida argued the grapheme preceded the phoneme, the written vs the spoken. 
> How relevant that is remains to be seen. Frederick Sternfelt in the title of 
> his insightful book _Diagrammatology_ makes implicit reference to Derrida’s 
> _Grammatology_, whose work is given short shrift. It may be that preceed-ence 
> is not an issue with the decisign, or not relevant. 
> 
> I do recall Peirce using tinge with regard to existential graphs, and tinges 
> perhaps served a purpose, perhaps with reference to layering and 
> juxtaposition in logic, that could not achieved with the spoken or written.
> 
> It may be possible that Peirce ultimately chose mark rather than tinge or 
> tone because it is more permanent. 
> 
> I apologize for lacking a thesis and any mistakes, and I look forward to your 
> responses.
> 
> Mary Libertin
> 
> 
>> On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 1:45 PM Jon Alan Schmidt  
>> wrote:
>> John S., List:
>> 
>> JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>> 
>> It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the point of the 
>> thread is to explicate it.
>> 
>> JFS:  Since mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or tone.
>> 
>> In the referenced passage, Peirce stated, "I dare say some of my former 
>> names are better than those I now use" (EP 2:488; 1908).  In fact, less than 
>> two weeks earlier, he had asked Lady Welby specifically about Tone vs. Mark 
>> (SS 83; 1908); and if I remember right--I do not have a copy of her 
>> reply--she found Tone preferable because a tone of voice is a paradigmatic 
>> example.  Peirce also used Tone in what I think is one of his clearest 
>> passages about this division of Signs (CP 4.537; 1906).
>> 
>> JFS:  General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is always a 
>> perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or quasi-mind as a token 
>> of some type.
>> 
>> This may be a case of hair-splitting on my part, but I would suggest instead 
>> that in any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set of 
>> characters) by which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the Sign-Replica 
>> to be an individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the system of 
>> Signs (Essential Information) is necessary and sufficient for this.  It is 
>> analogous to the role of the Immediate Object as that by which the 
>> interpreting Quasi-mind identifies the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for which 
>> Collateral Experience (Experiential Information) is necessary and sufficient 
>> (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).
>> 
>> As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its 
>> peculiar Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent, 
>> the Token is what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is 
>> experienced in each act of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the Type 
>> has a Final Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which every 
>> Interpreter is destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently considered," 
>> which corresponds to the correct Habit of Interpretation (Substantial 
>> Information).  In other words, "The Immediate Interpretant is an 
>> abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The Dynamical Interpretant is a 
>> single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that toward which the actual 
>> tends" (SS 111; 1909).
>> 
>> JFS:  In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real actualities.
>> 
>> I agree, and would add that semiosis also governs Real actualities in 
>> accordance with Real regularities.
>> 
>> Regards,
>> 
>> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
>> Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
>> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
>> 
>>> On Fri, Aug 10, 2018 at 1:15 AM, John F Sowa  wrote:
>>> I believe that the subject

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Mary Libertin

Jon A S and list,

I find this discussion interesting. I have no thesis, instead just some
observations for possible discussion.

Peirce in EP 2:488, as previously quoted, writes that the tinge/tone/mark
precedes the token/type. Are three senses possibly being alluded to: sight,
sound, and touch?

 In regard to the sound and touch, I recall Peirce’s use of the utterer and
the graphist.

The latter two suggest more agency. Saussure discussed the
signifier/signified relation in terms of the phoneme and speech, and rarely
the grapheme and writing.  Speech can not be removed or erased, and it
assumes permanence with quote marks.

Derrida argued the grapheme preceded the phoneme, the written vs the
spoken. How relevant that is remains to be seen. Frederick Sternfelt in the
title of his insightful book _Diagrammatology_ makes implicit reference to
Derrida’s _Grammatology_, whose work is given short shrift. It may be that
preceed-ence is not an issue with the decisign, or not relevant.

I do recall Peirce using tinge with regard to existential graphs, and
tinges perhaps served a purpose, perhaps with reference to layering and
juxtaposition in logic, that could not achieved with the spoken or written.

It may be possible that Peirce ultimately chose mark rather than tinge or
tone because it is more permanent.

I apologize for lacking a thesis and any mistakes, and I look forward to
your responses.

Mary Libertin


On Mon, Aug 13, 2018 at 1:45 PM Jon Alan Schmidt 
wrote:

> John S., List:
>
> JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>
>
> It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the point of the
> thread is to explicate it.
>
> JFS:  Since mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or
> tone.
>
>
> In the referenced passage, Peirce stated, "I dare say some of my former
> names are better than those I now use" (EP 2:488; 1908).  In fact, less
> than two weeks earlier, he had asked Lady Welby specifically about Tone vs.
> Mark (SS 83; 1908); and if I remember right--I do not have a copy of her
> reply--she found Tone preferable because a tone of voice is a paradigmatic
> example.  Peirce also used Tone in what I think is one of his clearest
> passages about this division of Signs (CP 4.537; 1906).
>
> JFS:  General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is always a
> perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or quasi-mind as a token
> of some type.
>
>
> This may be a case of hair-splitting on my part, but I would suggest
> instead that in any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set
> of characters) by which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the
> Sign-Replica to be an individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the
> system of Signs (Essential Information) is necessary and sufficient for
> this.  It is analogous to the role of the Immediate Object as that by which
> the interpreting Quasi-mind identifies the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for
> which Collateral Experience (Experiential Information) is necessary and
> sufficient (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).
>
> As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its
> peculiar Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent,
> the Token is what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is
> experienced in each act of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the
> Type has a Final Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which
> every Interpreter is destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently
> considered," which corresponds to the correct Habit of Interpretation
> (Substantial Information).  In other words, "The Immediate Interpretant is
> an abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The Dynamical Interpretant is
> a single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that toward which the
> actual tends" (SS 111; 1909).
>
> JFS:  In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real actualities.
>
>
> I agree, and would add that semiosis also governs Real actualities in
> accordance with Real regularities.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
> Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
>
> On Fri, Aug 10, 2018 at 1:15 AM, John F Sowa  wrote:
>
>> I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>>
>> In various writings over the years, Peirce wrote about
>> real possibilities.  He also wrote about laws as real.
>>
>> In writing about modality, he distinguished three universes:
>> the possible, the actual, and the necessitated.  Actual
>> existence is just one of the three ways of being real.
>>
>> He also distinguished logical possibility and necessity
>> from real possibility and necessity.  A theory is logically
>> possible if it's consistent by itself.  It's a real possibility
>> if it's also consistent with the laws of nature.
>>
>> Given the above, apply the principles to signs.  For that,
>> consider Peirce's Letters to

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-13 Thread Jon Alan Schmidt

John S., List:

JFS:  I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.

It is a direct quote from Peirce (EP 2:303; 1904), and the point of the
thread is to explicate it.

JFS:  Since mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or
tone.

In the referenced passage, Peirce stated, "I dare say some of my former
names are better than those I now use" (EP 2:488; 1908).  In fact, less
than two weeks earlier, he had asked Lady Welby specifically about Tone vs.
Mark (SS 83; 1908); and if I remember right--I do not have a copy of her
reply--she found Tone preferable because a tone of voice is a paradigmatic
example.  Peirce also used Tone in what I think is one of his clearest
passages about this division of Signs (CP 4.537; 1906).

JFS:  General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is always a
perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or quasi-mind as a token
of some type.

This may be a case of hair-splitting on my part, but I would suggest
instead that in any Instance of a Sign, the Tone is the character (or set
of characters) by which the interpreting Quasi-mind recognizes the
Sign-Replica to be an individual Token of the Type.  Acquaintance with the
system of Signs (Essential Information) is necessary and sufficient for
this.  It is analogous to the role of the Immediate Object as that by which
the interpreting Quasi-mind identifies the Dynamic Object of the Sign, for
which Collateral Experience (Experiential Information) is necessary and
sufficient (cf. CP 8.179, EP 2:494; 1909).

As a Possible, the Tone can only have an Immediate Interpretant--"its
peculiar Interpretability before it gets any Interpreter."  As an Existent,
the Token is what produces the Dynamic Interpretant--"that which is
experienced in each act of Interpretation."  As a Necessitant, only the
Type has a Final Interpretant--"the one Interpretative result to which
every Interpreter is destined to come if the Sign is sufficiently
considered," which corresponds to the correct Habit of Interpretation
(Substantial Information).  In other words, "The Immediate Interpretant is
an abstraction, consisting in a Possibility. The Dynamical Interpretant is
a single actual event. The Final Interpretant is that toward which the
actual tends" (SS 111; 1909).

JFS:  In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real actualities.

I agree, and would add that semiosis also governs Real actualities in
accordance with Real regularities.

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Fri, Aug 10, 2018 at 1:15 AM, John F Sowa  wrote:

> I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.
>
> In various writings over the years, Peirce wrote about
> real possibilities.  He also wrote about laws as real.
>
> In writing about modality, he distinguished three universes:
> the possible, the actual, and the necessitated.  Actual
> existence is just one of the three ways of being real.
>
> He also distinguished logical possibility and necessity
> from real possibility and necessity.  A theory is logically
> possible if it's consistent by itself.  It's a real possibility
> if it's also consistent with the laws of nature.
>
> Given the above, apply the principles to signs.  For that,
> consider Peirce's Letters to Lady Welby in 1908, in which
> he wrote about signs and the three universes (EP 2:478-480).
>
> In EP 2:488, he wrote that the triad Potisign (possible sign) /
> actisign (sign in act) / and famisign (familiar or general sign)
> might be called (tinge or tone or mark) / token / type.  Since
> mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or tone.
>
> General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is
> always a perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or
> quasi-mind as a token of some type.
>
> Prior to semiosis, the perceptible thing exists in actuality.
> But it's only a possible mark.  It doesn't become an actual mark
> until it is sensed by some mind or quasi-mind.  Then as soon as
> it's recognized, the actual mark becomes an actual token of some type.
>
> In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real actualities.
>
> John

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Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-10 Thread Martin Kettelhut

It also includes the consciousness (interpretant / 3n) which says, ‘That 
rockfall appears to be accidental,’ until further study accounts for it.

Martin W. Kettelhut, PhD
ListeningIsTheKey.com
303 747 4449

[cid:AE1F85A5-73CE-47F9-B178-3A6DEC85D9B0@hsd1.co.comcast.net]

On Aug 10, 2018, at 11:04 AM, Edwina Taborsky 
mailto:tabor...@primus.ca>> wrote:


Martin- yes - I agree. That means that the interaction between two individual 
entities functions within both 2ns and 3ns. Sometimes it is only within 2ns, as 
an accidental rock-fall but even that, includes 3ns as to how the grass that 
the rock fell on - interprets/reacts to the falling rocks.

Edwina



On Fri 10/08/18 12:53 PM , Martin Kettelhut 
mkettel...@msn.com sent:

What sets Peirce apart from analytic philosophy is his acknowledgment that the 
INTERaction (of individual actualities) is general/lawful, and it is real.

Martin W. Kettelhut, PhD
303 747 4449


On Aug 9, 2018, at 12:46 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:


JAS, list

What is going on here, is a situation where two people are using the same word 
- each with a different usage. So- we are talking past each other, and that's 
hardly productive.

I use the term 'interact' to mean that two or more forces act on and have an 
effect on each other. But a key point:  I do not confine the nature of these 
forces to actualities and so, I include the effect that a law can have on a 
particular object.

I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an action between 
two actualities, two existent 'things'.

Again, Jon, your quotes that you provided do not, in my view, contradict my use 
of the term  'interact'. I have always acknowledged that the general, the law, 
has no separate actuality in itself but is 'embodied' in an individual 
morphology.  This is basic Peirce [and Aristotle]. BUT, I consider that the 
general, the law, as embedded,  does act as a genuine informational force,  and 
so it as itself, as its generality, acts, interacts...with individual 
morphologies. And this is not simply an act of constraint, but, in my view, of 
actual generative formation. That enables the increase of complexity - a basic 
conclusion for Peirce.

This is something about which we have a basic disagreement.

Edwina



On Thu 09/08/18 2:28 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:

Edwina, List:

The point is that according to Peirce, as demonstrated by those quotations, 
only existential particulars can interact, and only with other existential 
particulars.  A general cannot interact with anything as a general, so it does 
not interact with existential particulars; instead, it  governs them.

CSP:  But a law necessarily governs, or "is embodied in" individuals, and 
prescribes some of their qualities. (CP 2.293, EP 2:274; 1903)

CSP:  By a proposition, as something which can be repeated over and over again, 
translated into another language, embodied in a logical graph or algebraical 
formula, and still be one and the same proposition, we do not mean any existing 
individual object but a type, a general, which does not exist but governs 
existents, to which individuals conform. (CP 8.313; 1905)

Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 12:06 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

JAS, list

I'm not sure of the point of your post. I suggested that we'd simply have to 
agree-to-disagree. Providing lists of quotations, all of which I fully agree 
with, doesn't change my view [and none contradict my view] - which I'll repeat 
below:

" I don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from its Tokens'. 
My view is that both are informationally functional and interact 
informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate individual existence for 
each. Informational action between information encoded as a general and 
information encoded as a particular is, in my view, quite possible."

That is - Reality, which functions as a generality, DOES, in my view, interact 
with the existential particular.

Edwina

On Thu 09/08/18 12:52 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:

Edwina, List:

Any word with "act" as its root implies actuality, which is 2ns.

CSP:   Let us begin with considering actuality, and try to make out just what 
it consists in.  If I ask you what the actuality of an event consists in, you 
will tell me that it consists in its happening  then and there. The 
specifications  then and there  involve all its relations to other existents. 
The actuality of the event seems to lie in its relations to the universe of 
existents ... We have a two-sided consciousness of effort and resistance, which 
seems to me to come tolerably near to a pure sense of actuality. On the whole, 
I think we have here a mode of being of one thing which consists in how a 
second object is. I call that Secondness. (CP 1.24; 1903)

CSP:  That conception of Aristotle which is embodied for us in the cognate 
origin of the terms actuality and

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-10 Thread Edwina Taborsky

 

Martin- yes - I agree. That means that the interaction between two
individual entities functions within both 2ns and 3ns. Sometimes it
is only within 2ns, as an accidental rock-fall but even that,
includes 3ns as to how the grass that the rock fell on -
interprets/reacts to the falling rocks. 

Edwina
 On Fri 10/08/18 12:53 PM , Martin Kettelhut mkettel...@msn.com sent:
What sets Peirce apart from analytic philosophy is his
acknowledgment that the INTERaction (of individual actualities) is
general/lawful, and it is real. 
   Martin W. Kettelhut, PhD  303 747 4449 
  On Aug 9, 2018, at 12:46 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote: 
 JAS, list 

 What is going on here, is a situation where two people are using
the same word - each with a different usage. So- we are talking past
each other, and that's hardly productive. 

 I use the term 'interact' to mean that two or more forces act on
and have an effect on each other. But a key point:  I do not confine
the nature of these forces to actualities and so, I include the
effect that a law can have on a particular object. 

 I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an
action between two actualities, two existent 'things'. 

 Again, Jon, your quotes that you provided do not, in my view,
contradict my use of the term  'interact'. I have always acknowledged
that the general, the law, has no separate actuality in itself but is
'embodied' in an individual morphology.  This is basic  Peirce [and
Aristotle]. BUT, I consider that the general, the law, as embedded, 
does act as a genuine informational force,  and so it as itself, as
its generality, acts, interacts...with individual morphologies. And
this is not simply an act of constraint,  but, in my view, of actual
generative formation. That enables the increase of complexity - a
basic conclusion for Peirce. 

 This is something about which we have a basic disagreement. 

 Edwina
 On Thu 09/08/18 2:28 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com
[2] sent:
   Edwina, List: 
  The point is that according to Peirce, as demonstrated by those
quotations, only existential particulars can interact, and only with 
other existential particulars.  A general cannot interact with
anything as a general, so it does not interact with existential 
particulars; instead, it  governs them. 
   CSP:  But a law necessarily governs, or "is embodied in"
individuals, and prescribes some of their qualities. (CP 2.293, EP
2:274; 1903) 
CSP:  By a proposition, as something which can be repeated over
and over again, translated into another language, embodied in a
logical graph or algebraical formula, and still be one and the same
proposition, we do not mean any existing individual  object but a
type, a general, which does not exist but governs existents, to which
individuals conform. (CP 8.313; 1905)  
  Regards, 
  Jon S.   
 On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 12:06 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
JAS, list 

I'm not sure of the point of your post. I suggested that we'd simply
have to agree-to-disagree. Providing lists of quotations, all of which
I fully agree with, doesn't change my view [and none contradict my
view] - which I'll repeat below:  

" I don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from its
Tokens'. My view is that both are informationally functional and
interact informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate
individual existence for each. Informational action  between
information encoded as a general and information encoded as a
particular is, in my view, quite possible."  

That is - Reality, which functions as a generality, DOES, in my
view, interact with the existential particular. 

Edwina 

On Thu 09/08/18 12:52 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com
[4] sent:
   Edwina, List: 
  Any word with "act" as its root implies actuality, which is 2ns. 
   CSP:   Let us begin with  considering actuality, and try to make
out just what it consists in.  If  I ask you what the actuality of an
event consists in, you will tell me that it consists in its happening 
then and there. The  specifications  then and there  involve  all its
relations to other existents. The actuality of the event seems to lie
in its relations to the universe of existents ... We have a  two-sided
consciousness of effort and resistance, which seems to me to come
tolerably near to a pure sense of actuality. On the whole, I think we
have here a mode of being of one thing which consists in how a second
object is. I call that Secondness. (CP 1.24;  1903)   
  CSP:  That conception of Aristotle which is embodied for us in the
cognate origin of the terms actuality and activity is  one of the
most deeply illuminating products of Greek thinking. Activity implies
a generalization of effort; and effort is a two-sided idea, effort and
resistance  being inseparable, and therefore the idea of Actuality has
also a dyadic form.

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-10 Thread Martin Kettelhut

What sets Peirce apart from analytic philosophy is his acknowledgment that the 
INTERaction (of individual actualities) is general/lawful, and it is real.

Martin W. Kettelhut, PhD
303 747 4449


On Aug 9, 2018, at 12:46 PM, Edwina Taborsky 
mailto:tabor...@primus.ca>> wrote:


JAS, list

What is going on here, is a situation where two people are using the same word 
- each with a different usage. So- we are talking past each other, and that's 
hardly productive.

I use the term 'interact' to mean that two or more forces act on and have an 
effect on each other. But a key point:  I do not confine the nature of these 
forces to actualities and so, I include the effect that a law can have on a 
particular object.

I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an action between 
two actualities, two existent 'things'.

Again, Jon, your quotes that you provided do not, in my view, contradict my use 
of the term  'interact'. I have always acknowledged that the general, the law, 
has no separate actuality in itself but is 'embodied' in an individual 
morphology.  This is basic Peirce [and Aristotle]. BUT, I consider that the 
general, the law, as embedded,  does act as a genuine informational force,  and 
so it as itself, as its generality, acts, interacts...with individual 
morphologies. And this is not simply an act of constraint, but, in my view, of 
actual generative formation. That enables the increase of complexity - a basic 
conclusion for Peirce.

This is something about which we have a basic disagreement.

Edwina



On Thu 09/08/18 2:28 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt 
jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:

Edwina, List:

The point is that according to Peirce, as demonstrated by those quotations, 
only existential particulars can interact, and only with other existential 
particulars.  A general cannot interact with anything as a general, so it does 
not interact with existential particulars; instead, it  governs them.

CSP:  But a law necessarily governs, or "is embodied in" individuals, and 
prescribes some of their qualities. (CP 2.293, EP 2:274; 1903)

CSP:  By a proposition, as something which can be repeated over and over again, 
translated into another language, embodied in a logical graph or algebraical 
formula, and still be one and the same proposition, we do not mean any existing 
individual object but a type, a general, which does not exist but governs 
existents, to which individuals conform. (CP 8.313; 1905)

Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 12:06 PM, Edwina Taborsky 
mailto:tabor...@primus.ca>> wrote:

JAS, list

I'm not sure of the point of your post. I suggested that we'd simply have to 
agree-to-disagree. Providing lists of quotations, all of which I fully agree 
with, doesn't change my view [and none contradict my view] - which I'll repeat 
below:

" I don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from its Tokens'. 
My view is that both are informationally functional and interact 
informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate individual existence for 
each. Informational action between information encoded as a general and 
information encoded as a particular is, in my view, quite possible."

That is - Reality, which functions as a generality, DOES, in my view, interact 
with the existential particular.

Edwina

On Thu 09/08/18 12:52 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt 
jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:

Edwina, List:

Any word with "act" as its root implies actuality, which is 2ns.

CSP:   Let us begin with considering actuality, and try to make out just what 
it consists in.  If I ask you what the actuality of an event consists in, you 
will tell me that it consists in its happening  then and there. The 
specifications  then and there  involve all its relations to other existents. 
The actuality of the event seems to lie in its relations to the universe of 
existents ... We have a two-sided consciousness of effort and resistance, which 
seems to me to come tolerably near to a pure sense of actuality. On the whole, 
I think we have here a mode of being of one thing which consists in how a 
second object is. I call that Secondness. (CP 1.24; 1903)

CSP:  That conception of Aristotle which is embodied for us in the cognate 
origin of the terms actuality and activity is one of the most deeply 
illuminating products of Greek thinking. Activity implies a generalization of 
effort; and effort is a two-sided idea, effort and resistance being 
inseparable, and therefore the idea of Actuality has also a dyadic form. (CP 
4.542; 1906)

CSP:  The second Universe is that of the Brute Actuality of things and facts. I 
am confident that their Being consists in reactions against Brute forces ... 
(CP 6.455, EP 2:435; 1908)

CSP:  Another Universe is that of, first, Objects whose Being consists in their 
Brute reactions, and of, second, the facts (reactions, events, qualities, etc.) 
concerning those Objects, all of which facts, in

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-10 Thread Jon Alan Schmidt

Mike, List:

I understand your point.  In fact, I used to treat "Sign-action" as a
synonym for semiosis, before discovering that Peirce *never *used that
particular term, at which point I stopped doing so.  Since you mentioned
"triadic action," I wondered if Peirce ever used *that *term; and as it
turns out, he did in two places.

CSP:  The action of a sign calls for a little closer attention. Let me
remind you of the distinction referred to above between dynamical, or
dyadic, action; and intelligent, or triadic action. An event, A, may, by
brute force, produce an event, B; and then the event, B, may in its turn
produce a third event, C. The fact that the event, C, is about to be
produced by B has no influence at all upon the production of B by A. It is
impossible that it should, since the action of B in producing C is a
contingent future event at the time B is produced. Such is dyadic action,
which is so called because each step of it concerns a pair of objects.

But now when a microscopist is in doubt whether a motion of an animalcule
is guided by intelligence, of however low an order, the test he always used
to apply when I went to school, and I suppose he does so still, is to
ascertain whether event, A, produces a second event, B, *as a means* to the
production of a third event, C, or not. That is, he asks whether B will be
produced if it will produce or is likely to produce C in its turn, but will
not be produced if it will not produce C in its turn nor is likely to do
so. (CP 5.472-473; 1907)


Here it does not seem to be the nature of the *actions *themselves that is
distinguished, but the *relation *between the corresponding *events*; and
any event (or occurrence) is always a matter of 2ns, not 3ns.  Of course,
no one disputes the propriety of talking about triadic *relations*--whether
genuine (irreducible), like I take DO-S-FI to be, or degenerate (composed
of dyadic relations), like I take DO-SR-DI = DO-SR + SR-DI to be.

CSP:  That whatever action is brute, unintelligent, and unconcerned with
the result of it is purely dyadic is either demonstrable or is too evident
to be demonstrable. But in case that dyadic action is merely a member of a
triadic action, then so far from its furnishing the least shade of
presumption that all the action in the physical universe is dyadic, on the
contrary, the entire and triadic action justifies a guess that there may be
other and more marked examples in the universe of the triadic pattern. (CP
6.332; c. 1909)


Here it is likewise clear that any triadic action has "members" that are
dyadic actions.  As Peirce stated in the immediately preceding paragraph,
"Every triadic relationship involves three dyadic relationships ... "  So
we can perhaps say that actions are *involved *in 3ns, even though they
themselves belong to 2ns--just as Tokens are involved in Types, Indices are
involved in Symbols, and Dicisigns are involved in Arguments.  And in the
paragraph right before that ...

CSP:  Any dynamic action--say, the attraction by one particle of
another--is in itself *dyadic*. It is governed by a law; but that law no
more furnishes a correlate to the relation than the vote of a legislator
which insures a bill's becoming a statute makes him a participator in the
blow of the swordsman who, in obedience to the warrant issued after
conviction according to that statute, strikes off the head of a condemned
man. In the law, *per se*, there is no physical force nor other compulsion.
It is nothing but a formula, a maxim. The particles follow the law simply
because, being sprung from the stock of reason, they naturally incline to
obey reason. It is true that the attraction of one particle for another
acts through continuous Time and Space, both of which are of triadic
constitution. Yes; but this continuous Time and Space merely serve to weld
together (while imparting form to the welded whole) instantaneous impulses
in which there is neither continuous Time, Space, nor any third correlate;
and it is such instantaneous impulse that I say is dyadic. However, the
dyadic action is not the whole action; and the whole action is, in a way,
triadic. (CP 6.330; c. 1909)


Law as 3ns *governs *dynamic/dyadic action as 2ns, and *continuous *space-time
is the *medium *in which such action occurs.  However, neither law nor
space-time is a third *Correlate *that acts on, reacts to, or interacts
with the two attracting particles.  Likewise, Signs *as Real generals *do
not act on, react to, or interact with anything; only their Instances or
Replicas *as Existent individuals* do so, each producing a *Dynamic
*Interpretant
by *actually *determining some Quasi-mind to a feeling, to an exertion, or
to another Sign-Replica.

This exchange illustrates my general approach to List discussions.  When
someone posts something that seems inconsistent with how I understand
Peirce's writings, I look for relevant passages in them, and usually end up
quoting them in my response.  As Gary F. noted recently,

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-10 Thread John F Sowa


I believe that the subject line blurs too many issues.

In various writings over the years, Peirce wrote about
real possibilities.  He also wrote about laws as real.

In writing about modality, he distinguished three universes:
the possible, the actual, and the necessitated.  Actual
existence is just one of the three ways of being real.

He also distinguished logical possibility and necessity
from real possibility and necessity.  A theory is logically
possible if it's consistent by itself.  It's a real possibility
if it's also consistent with the laws of nature.

Given the above, apply the principles to signs.  For that,
consider Peirce's Letters to Lady Welby in 1908, in which
he wrote about signs and the three universes (EP 2:478-480).

In EP 2:488, he wrote that the triad Potisign (possible sign) /
actisign (sign in act) / and famisign (familiar or general sign)
might be called (tinge or tone or mark) / token / type.  Since
mark is his final choice, I'll use mark instead of tinge or tone.

General principle:  In any occurrence of semiosis, there is
always a perceptible mark that is interpreted by some mind or
quasi-mind as a token of some type.

Prior to semiosis, the perceptible thing exists in actuality.
But it's only a possible mark.  It doesn't become an actual mark
until it is sensed by some mind or quasi-mind.  Then as soon as
it's recognized, the actual mark becomes an actual token of some type.

In summary, semiosis turns real possibilities into real actualities.

John

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Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-09 Thread Gary Richmond

Mike, Jon, Edwina, List,

Mike wrote: "Are not 'binding' and 'sense' expressions of action, both
Peirce's words for Thirdness? There are many ways to interpret natural
language, including what is meant by the word 'action'."

Please offer some context and some textual support for your notion that
'binding' and 'sense' are employed as expressions of action in any of
Peirce's discussion of 3ns. I think that this is not only highly unlikely,
but actually would contradict most everything he had to say about not only
3ns but also 2ns.

Whatever you might mean by "natural language" in the present context, we
are concerned here with technical scientific terminology, specifically
Peirce's in consideration of his three universal categories.
Action-Reaction and Interaction are concepts clearly connected in Peirce's
phenomenology and semeiotic to 2ns, so that it seems peculiarly obdurate to
suggest that they are not, that they may be associated in any integral way
with 3ns. You will certainly have to offer more support for your comment
than your mere assertion that it is so.

Best,

Gary



*Gary Richmond*
*Philosophy and Critical Thinking*
*Communication Studies*
*LaGuardia College of the City University of New York*

*718 482-5690*

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 7:41 PM, Mike Bergman  wrote:

> Jon, Edwina, List,
>
> Are not 'binding' and 'sense' expressions of action, both Peirce's words
> for Thirdness? There are many ways to interpret natural language, including
> what is meant by the word 'action'.
>
> Mike
>
> On 8/9/2018 6:08 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:
>
> Edwina, List:
>
> ET:  And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as an action.
> Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a passive consciousness [which
> is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8
>
>
> No, he did not; at least, certainly not in the cited passage.  In fact,
> this is a blatantly inaccurate paraphrase of it, so I will quote it in full.
>
> CSP:  It seems, then, that the true categories of consciousness are:
> first, feeling, the consciousness which can be included with an instant of
> time, passive consciousness of quality, without recognition or analysis;
> second, consciousness of an interruption into the field of consciousness,
> sense of resistance, of an external fact, of another something; third,
> synthetic consciousness, binding time together, sense of learning, thought.
>
> If we accept these [as] the fundamental elementary modes of consciousness,
> they afford a psychological explanation of the three logical conceptions of
> quality, relation, and synthesis or mediation. The conception of quality,
> which is absolutely simple in itself and yet viewed in its relations is
> seen to be full of variety, would arise whenever feeling or the singular
> consciousness becomes prominent. The conception of relation comes from the
> dual consciousness or sense of action and reaction. The conception of
> mediation springs out of the plural consciousness or sense of learning. (CP
> 1.377-378; 1887-1888)
>
>
> Peirce here *did not* characterize mediation as "active," or even
> directly contrast "passive consciousness" (1ns) with "synthetic
> consciousness" (3ns) so as to *imply *that the latter is active.  On the
> contrary, he also mentioned "consciousness of an interruption" (2ns), and
> then went on to call it "dual consciousness or sense of action and
> reaction."  In other words, it is clearly the latter type of consciousness
> (2ns), rather than synthetic consciousness (3ns), that is properly
> described as *active*.
>
> ET:  Thirdness is in my understanding of Peirce a dynamic process, which
> is to say, an action.
>
>
> No.  For Peirce, anything "dynamic" is associated with 2ns, not 3ns.  This
> is intrinsic to his analysis of a Sign as having a *Dynamic *Object and
> producing *Dynamic *Interpretants by means of its *actual *Instances.
>
> ET:  As such, it mediates, it synthesizes, it generalizes. These are all
> actions - powerful actions.
>
>
> Again, no.  For Peirce, mediating, synthesizing, and generalizing are
> indeed powerful, but they are *not *actions.  They are manifestations of
> 3ns, while actions are *always and only* manifestations of 2ns.  As Gary
> R. already pointed out, *in Peirce's terminology*, molding reactions is
> *not* an action; imparting a quality to reactions is *not* an action; and
> bringing things into relation with each other is *not *an action.
>
> CSP:  It is to be observed that a sign has its being in the *power *to
> bring about a determination of a Matter to a Form, not in an *act *of
> bringing it about. There are several good arguments to show that this is
> the case. Perhaps none of them is more conclusive than the circumstance
> that there is no such act. For an act has a Matter as its subject. It is
> the union of Matter and Form. But a sign is not Matter. An act is
> individual. The sign only exists in replicas. (NEM 4:300; 1904)
>
>
> Finally, in my opinion--and, I believe, in Peirce's--someone who is

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-09 Thread Mike Bergman


  
  
Jon,

On 8/9/2018 7:11 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:

  
  Mike, List:


Natural language indeed exhibits a lot of
  flexibility--again, all general Signs are indeterminate to
  some degree.  That is precisely why I advocate carefully
  selecting and defining the technical terms that we
  use in collaborative inquiry; and on the Peirce List, it seems
  to me that we should strive to do so in accordance with his
  usage as much as possible.  He clearly did not consider
  "binding" and "sense" as descriptions of 3ns to be
  "expressions of action," since the latter would be
  descriptions of 2ns.
  


Bingo, and this is the crux of it. The restriction that 'action'
must be in 2ns is a dyadic view. Granted, most actions are
kinesthetic or can be framed in a dyadic action-reaction mode, but
the genius of Peirce's embracing of Thirdness is, in part, to
acknowledge signs (which are triadic) and mediating actions, such as
thought, generalization, continuity, or A gives B to C. I would
think that viewing 'action' solely through a dyadic lens is likely
to lead to difficulties in truly understanding semiosis (which is,
by definition according to my understanding, a triadic action).

In my humble view, thinking deeply about what I just said is the
beginning of beginning to understand Peirce, an understanding I am
not claiming to have achieved.

Mike


  


Regards,


Jon S.



  On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 6:41 PM, Mike
Bergman 
wrote:

  
Jon, Edwina, List,
Are not 'binding' and 'sense' expressions of
action, both Peirce's words for Thirdness? There are
many ways to interpret natural language, including
what is meant by the word 'action'.

Mike

  

   
On
  8/9/2018 6:08 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:


  Edwina, List:



  ET:  And Peirce referred to cognition, to
Thirdness, as an action. Synthetic
consciousness, mediation, is not a passive
consciousness [which is 1ns] but is active.
1.377/8



No, he did not; at least, certainly not in
  the cited passage.  In fact, this is a
  blatantly inaccurate paraphrase of it, so I
  will quote it in full.



  CSP:  It seems, then, that the true
categories of consciousness are: first,
feeling, the consciousness which can be
included with an instant of time, passive
consciousness of quality, without
recognition or analysis; second,
consciousness of an interruption into the
field of consciousness, sense of resistance,
of an external fact, of another something;
third, synthetic consciousness, binding time
together, sense of learning, thought.


  If we accept these [as] the fundamental
elementary modes of consciousness, they
afford a psychological explanation of the
three logical conceptions of quality,
relation, and synthesis or mediation. The
conception of quality, which is absolutely
simple in itself and yet viewed in its
relations is seen to be full of variety,
would arise whenever feeling or the singular
consciousness becomes prominent. The
conception of relation comes from the dual
consciousness or sense of action and
reaction. The conception of mediation
springs out of the plural consciousness or
sense of learning. (CP 1.377-378; 1887-1888)

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Mike, List:

Natural language indeed exhibits a lot of flexibility--again, all general
Signs are indeterminate to some degree.  That is precisely why I advocate
carefully selecting and defining the *technical *terms that we use in
collaborative inquiry; and on the Peirce List, it seems to me that we
should strive to do so in accordance with *his *usage as much as possible.
He clearly did not consider "binding" and "sense" as descriptions of 3ns to
be "expressions of action," since the latter would be descriptions of 2ns.

Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 6:41 PM, Mike Bergman  wrote:

> Jon, Edwina, List,
>
> Are not 'binding' and 'sense' expressions of action, both Peirce's words
> for Thirdness? There are many ways to interpret natural language, including
> what is meant by the word 'action'.
>
> Mike
>
> On 8/9/2018 6:08 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:
>
> Edwina, List:
>
> ET:  And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as an action.
> Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a passive consciousness [which
> is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8
>
>
> No, he did not; at least, certainly not in the cited passage.  In fact,
> this is a blatantly inaccurate paraphrase of it, so I will quote it in full.
>
> CSP:  It seems, then, that the true categories of consciousness are:
> first, feeling, the consciousness which can be included with an instant of
> time, passive consciousness of quality, without recognition or analysis;
> second, consciousness of an interruption into the field of consciousness,
> sense of resistance, of an external fact, of another something; third,
> synthetic consciousness, binding time together, sense of learning, thought.
>
> If we accept these [as] the fundamental elementary modes of consciousness,
> they afford a psychological explanation of the three logical conceptions of
> quality, relation, and synthesis or mediation. The conception of quality,
> which is absolutely simple in itself and yet viewed in its relations is
> seen to be full of variety, would arise whenever feeling or the singular
> consciousness becomes prominent. The conception of relation comes from the
> dual consciousness or sense of action and reaction. The conception of
> mediation springs out of the plural consciousness or sense of learning. (CP
> 1.377-378; 1887-1888)
>
>
> Peirce here *did not* characterize mediation as "active," or even
> directly contrast "passive consciousness" (1ns) with "synthetic
> consciousness" (3ns) so as to *imply *that the latter is active.  On the
> contrary, he also mentioned "consciousness of an interruption" (2ns), and
> then went on to call it "dual consciousness or sense of action and
> reaction."  In other words, it is clearly the latter type of consciousness
> (2ns), rather than synthetic consciousness (3ns), that is properly
> described as *active*.
>
> ET:  Thirdness is in my understanding of Peirce a dynamic process, which
> is to say, an action.
>
>
> No.  For Peirce, anything "dynamic" is associated with 2ns, not 3ns.  This
> is intrinsic to his analysis of a Sign as having a *Dynamic *Object and
> producing *Dynamic *Interpretants by means of its *actual *Instances.
>
> ET:  As such, it mediates, it synthesizes, it generalizes. These are all
> actions - powerful actions.
>
>
> Again, no.  For Peirce, mediating, synthesizing, and generalizing are
> indeed powerful, but they are *not *actions.  They are manifestations of
> 3ns, while actions are *always and only* manifestations of 2ns.  As Gary
> R. already pointed out, *in Peirce's terminology*, molding reactions is
> *not* an action; imparting a quality to reactions is *not* an action; and
> bringing things into relation with each other is *not *an action.
>
> CSP:  It is to be observed that a sign has its being in the *power *to
> bring about a determination of a Matter to a Form, not in an *act *of
> bringing it about. There are several good arguments to show that this is
> the case. Perhaps none of them is more conclusive than the circumstance
> that there is no such act. For an act has a Matter as its subject. It is
> the union of Matter and Form. But a sign is not Matter. An act is
> individual. The sign only exists in replicas. (NEM 4:300; 1904)
>
>
> Finally, in my opinion--and, I believe, in Peirce's--someone who is not
> interested in terminology is evidently not interested in *making our
> ideas clear*.  Carefully selecting and defining the terms that we use to
> describe what is going on is not merely an academic exercise for the
> seminar room, but *pragmatically critical *for understanding and
> discussing what is actually happening in the real world.
>
> CSP:  Suffice it to say once more that pragmatism is, in itself ... merely
> a method of ascertaining the meanings of hard words and of abstract
> concepts. All pragmatists of whatsoever stripe will cordially assent to
> that statement. (CP 5.464, EP 2:400; 1907)
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
> Professional Engineer,

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-09 Thread Jerry Rhee

Dear list,

Logic is rooted in the social principle.

Women were expected to have weak opinions; but the great safeguard of
society and of domestic life was, that opinions were not acted on.  Sane
people did what their neighbors did, so that if any lunatics were at large,
one might know and avoid them. ~George Eliot

This is man:

Again, no.  For Peirce, mediating, synthesizing, and generalizing are
indeed powerful, but they are *not *actions.  ..actions are *always and
only *manifestations of 2ns..

Finally, in my opinion--and, I believe, in Peirce's--someone who is not
interested in terminology is evidently not interested in *making our ideas
clear*.  Carefully selecting and defining the terms that we use to describe
what is going on is not merely an academic exercise for the seminar room,
but *pragmatically critical *for understanding and discussing what is
actually happening in the real world.

“Thus, under color of the fiction (necessary though it be on the given
premises) that the acts of the state embody the real will of all the
people, certain powerful groups are enabled to impose, by force or by
threat of force, their will and interest upon their fellows.

Over against these individual wills is placed a higher will of the state,
to restrain them, combat them, and keep them within bounds.

This higher will of the state is assumed to be the general or social will;
not the will of all the members, for no such entity can possibly exist, but
the will which *purposes* the general good..

.. it certainly seems as though groups which acted with disinterested
benevolence were rare.  ” ~ Randall, *The Problem of Group Responsibility
to Society*

The elements of every concept enter into logical thought at the gate of
perception and make their exit at the gate of *purposive action*; and
whatever cannot show its passports at both those two gates is to be
arrested as unauthorized by reason.

With best wishes,

Jerry R

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 6:08 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt 
wrote:

> Edwina, List:
>
> ET:  And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as an action.
> Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a passive consciousness [which
> is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8
>
>
> No, he did not; at least, certainly not in the cited passage.  In fact,
> this is a blatantly inaccurate paraphrase of it, so I will quote it in full.
>
> CSP:  It seems, then, that the true categories of consciousness are:
> first, feeling, the consciousness which can be included with an instant of
> time, passive consciousness of quality, without recognition or analysis;
> second, consciousness of an interruption into the field of consciousness,
> sense of resistance, of an external fact, of another something; third,
> synthetic consciousness, binding time together, sense of learning, thought.
>
> If we accept these [as] the fundamental elementary modes of consciousness,
> they afford a psychological explanation of the three logical conceptions of
> quality, relation, and synthesis or mediation. The conception of quality,
> which is absolutely simple in itself and yet viewed in its relations is
> seen to be full of variety, would arise whenever feeling or the singular
> consciousness becomes prominent. The conception of relation comes from the
> dual consciousness or sense of action and reaction. The conception of
> mediation springs out of the plural consciousness or sense of learning. (CP
> 1.377-378; 1887-1888)
>
>
> Peirce here *did not* characterize mediation as "active," or even
> directly contrast "passive consciousness" (1ns) with "synthetic
> consciousness" (3ns) so as to *imply *that the latter is active.  On the
> contrary, he also mentioned "consciousness of an interruption" (2ns), and
> then went on to call it "dual consciousness or sense of action and
> reaction."  In other words, it is clearly the latter type of consciousness
> (2ns), rather than synthetic consciousness (3ns), that is properly
> described as *active*.
>
> ET:  Thirdness is in my understanding of Peirce a dynamic process, which
> is to say, an action.
>
>
> No.  For Peirce, anything "dynamic" is associated with 2ns, not 3ns.  This
> is intrinsic to his analysis of a Sign as having a *Dynamic *Object and
> producing *Dynamic *Interpretants by means of its *actual *Instances.
>
> ET:  As such, it mediates, it synthesizes, it generalizes. These are all
> actions - powerful actions.
>
>
> Again, no.  For Peirce, mediating, synthesizing, and generalizing are
> indeed powerful, but they are *not *actions.  They are manifestations of
> 3ns, while actions are *always and only* manifestations of 2ns.  As Gary
> R. already pointed out, *in Peirce's terminology*, molding reactions is
> *not* an action; imparting a quality to reactions is *not* an action; and
> bringing things into relation with each other is *not *an action.
>
> CSP:  It is to be observed that a sign has its being in the *power *to
> bring about a determination of a Matter to a

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-09 Thread Mike Bergman


  
  
Jon, Edwina, List,
Are not 'binding' and 'sense' expressions of action, both
Peirce's words for Thirdness? There are many ways to interpret
natural language, including what is meant by the word 'action'.
Mike


On 8/9/2018 6:08 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt
  wrote:


  
  Edwina, List:



  ET:  And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as
an action. Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a
passive consciousness [which is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8



No, he did not; at least, certainly not in the cited
  passage.  In fact, this is a blatantly inaccurate paraphrase
  of it, so I will quote it in full.



  CSP:  It seems, then, that the true categories of
consciousness are: first, feeling, the consciousness which
can be included with an instant of time, passive
consciousness of quality, without recognition or analysis;
second, consciousness of an interruption into the field of
consciousness, sense of resistance, of an external fact, of
another something; third, synthetic consciousness, binding
time together, sense of learning, thought.


  If we accept these [as] the fundamental elementary modes
of consciousness, they afford a psychological explanation of
the three logical conceptions of quality, relation, and
synthesis or mediation. The conception of quality, which is
absolutely simple in itself and yet viewed in its relations
is seen to be full of variety, would arise whenever feeling
or the singular consciousness becomes prominent. The
conception of relation comes from the dual consciousness or
sense of action and reaction. The conception of mediation
springs out of the plural consciousness or sense of
learning. (CP 1.377-378; 1887-1888)



Peirce here did not characterize mediation as
  "active," or even directly contrast "passive consciousness"
  (1ns) with "synthetic consciousness" (3ns) so as to imply
  that the latter is active.  On the contrary, he also
  mentioned "consciousness of an interruption" (2ns), and then
  went on to call it "dual consciousness or sense of action and
  reaction."  In other words, it is clearly the latter type of
  consciousness (2ns), rather than synthetic consciousness
  (3ns), that is properly described as active.



  ET:  Thirdness is in my understanding of Peirce a dynamic
process, which is to say, an action.



No.  For Peirce, anything "dynamic" is associated with 2ns,
  not 3ns.  This is intrinsic to his analysis of a Sign as
  having a Dynamic Object and producing Dynamic Interpretants
  by means of its actual Instances.



  ET:  As such, it mediates, it synthesizes, it
generalizes. These are all actions - powerful actions.



Again, no.  For Peirce, mediating, synthesizing, and
  generalizing are indeed powerful, but they are not actions. 
  They are manifestations of 3ns, while actions are always
and only manifestations of 2ns.  As Gary R. already
  pointed out, in Peirce's terminology, molding
  reactions is not an action; imparting a quality to
  reactions is not an action; and bringing things into
  relation with each other is not an action.



  CSP:  It is to be observed that a sign has its being in
the power to bring about a determination of a
Matter to a Form, not in an act of bringing it
about. There are several good arguments to show that this is
the case. Perhaps none of them is more conclusive than the
circumstance that there is no such act. For an act has a
Matter as its subject. It is the union of Matter and Form.
But a sign is not Matter. An act is individual. The sign
only exists in replicas. (NEM 4:300; 1904)



Finally, in my opinion--and, I believe, in
  Peirce's--someone who is not interested in terminology is
  evidently not interested in making our ideas clear. 
  Carefully selecting and defining the terms that we use to
  describe what is going on is not merely an academic exercise
  for the seminar room, but pragmatically critical for
  understanding and discussing what is actually happening in the
  real world.



  CSP:  Suffice it to say

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Edwina, List:

ET:  And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as an action.
Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a passive consciousness [which
is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8

No, he did not; at least, certainly not in the cited passage.  In fact,
this is a blatantly inaccurate paraphrase of it, so I will quote it in full.

CSP:  It seems, then, that the true categories of consciousness are: first,
feeling, the consciousness which can be included with an instant of time,
passive consciousness of quality, without recognition or analysis; second,
consciousness of an interruption into the field of consciousness, sense of
resistance, of an external fact, of another something; third, synthetic
consciousness, binding time together, sense of learning, thought.

If we accept these [as] the fundamental elementary modes of consciousness,
they afford a psychological explanation of the three logical conceptions of
quality, relation, and synthesis or mediation. The conception of quality,
which is absolutely simple in itself and yet viewed in its relations is
seen to be full of variety, would arise whenever feeling or the singular
consciousness becomes prominent. The conception of relation comes from the
dual consciousness or sense of action and reaction. The conception of
mediation springs out of the plural consciousness or sense of learning. (CP
1.377-378; 1887-1888)

Peirce here *did not* characterize mediation as "active," or even directly
contrast "passive consciousness" (1ns) with "synthetic consciousness" (3ns)
so as to *imply *that the latter is active.  On the contrary, he also
mentioned "consciousness of an interruption" (2ns), and then went on to
call it "dual consciousness or sense of action and reaction."  In other
words, it is clearly the latter type of consciousness (2ns), rather than
synthetic consciousness (3ns), that is properly described as *active*.

ET:  Thirdness is in my understanding of Peirce a dynamic process, which is
to say, an action.

No.  For Peirce, anything "dynamic" is associated with 2ns, not 3ns.  This
is intrinsic to his analysis of a Sign as having a *Dynamic *Object and
producing *Dynamic *Interpretants by means of its *actual *Instances.

ET:  As such, it mediates, it synthesizes, it generalizes. These are all
actions - powerful actions.

Again, no.  For Peirce, mediating, synthesizing, and generalizing are
indeed powerful, but they are *not *actions.  They are manifestations of
3ns, while actions are *always and only* manifestations of 2ns.  As Gary R.
already pointed out, *in Peirce's terminology*, molding reactions is *not*
an action; imparting a quality to reactions is *not* an action; and
bringing things into relation with each other is *not *an action.

CSP:  It is to be observed that a sign has its being in the *power *to
bring about a determination of a Matter to a Form, not in an *act *of
bringing it about. There are several good arguments to show that this is
the case. Perhaps none of them is more conclusive than the circumstance
that there is no such act. For an act has a Matter as its subject. It is
the union of Matter and Form. But a sign is not Matter. An act is
individual. The sign only exists in replicas. (NEM 4:300; 1904)

Finally, in my opinion--and, I believe, in Peirce's--someone who is not
interested in terminology is evidently not interested in *making our ideas
clear*.  Carefully selecting and defining the terms that we use to describe
what is going on is not merely an academic exercise for the seminar room,
but *pragmatically critical *for understanding and discussing what is
actually happening in the real world.

CSP:  Suffice it to say once more that pragmatism is, in itself ... merely
a method of ascertaining the meanings of hard words and of abstract
concepts. All pragmatists of whatsoever stripe will cordially assent to
that statement. (CP 5.464, EP 2:400; 1907)

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 3:17 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

> JAS, list
>
> And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as an action.
> Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a passive consciousness [which
> is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8
>
> That is, semiosis as a process does not confine action to dyadic act-react
> kinesis between two existential things. Thirdness is in my understanding of
> Peirce a dynamic process, which is to say, an action. As such, it mediates,
> it synthesizes, it generalizes. These are all actions - powerful actions.
>
> "Not only will meaning always, more or less, in the long run mould
> reactions to itself, but it is only in doing so that its own being cosists.
> For this reason I call this element of the phenomenon or object of thought
> the element of Thirdness. It is that which is what it is by virtue of
> imparting a quality to reactions in the future" 1.343.
>
>

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-09 Thread Gary Richmond

Jon, Edwina, list,

Jon wrote in his messaged posted just prior to this:

JAS: My concern has been and remains to be faithful to Peirce's usage of
terminology as we proceed with such efforts.


As difficult as being "faithful to Peirce's usage of terminology" is given
his tendency to modify it over time, over the past few months I would say
that Jon has done an admirable job, never claiming too much, offering
reservations and qualifications in certain instances, questioning his very
own notion when it seemed prudent to do so, and characteristically offering
considerable textual support for his terminological points. I have no idea
why Edwina finds especially the latter problematic as I personally always
peruse the Peirce quotations he provides to support his view and find that
in a number of cases which I've considered closely that they do indeed
support Jon's view of how Peirce uses some terms.

I do not always agree with Jon, and tend to agree with Gary f, that Jon's
view that some late terminological variant or experiment in terminology
ought to be accepted more generally, that is, out of the context of its use
in the material in which it is found, is sound. In my view, even the very
hypotheses of Peirce which might seem to require his novel, often
neologistic terminology, need to be intensely examined rather that
accepting the variant terminology out of some specific experimental
contest. In other words, it is my sense that some of Peirce's late views
represent experiments to be tested, not conclusions of validated
hypotheses, and that the acceptance of the variant terminology is dependent
upon the results of further inquiry into the matters he took up late in
life.

In the present question of the Peirce's use of "interaction,"
"action-reaction," etc. Jon has provided exemplary textual support. This
seems to be one use of terminology from which Peirce never varied, at least
in distinguishing the three categories: 2ns *is* the category of
action-reaction. In such a specific context (e.g., distinguishing the
categories), if one uses such unambiguous terminology in some other way
than Peirce *consistently* did, it is my sense that such alternative use of
these terms is not helpful and can be confusing, perhaps most especially to
students of Peirce's semeiotics, notably those fairly new to Peirce
studies. No one can stop one from doing so, but then others are within
their rights to question one's usage.

So, in a word, I think it is a service to the list for Jon to be trying to
clarify the terminology that Peirce consistently uses in certain semeiotic
contexts. Further, it is my considered opinion that it behooves us to use
Peirce's terminology when it's clear enough and consistent enough,
especially if we want to facilitate our joint inquiries, not only in
semeiotic, but also in phenomenology and metaphysics.

Of course some of Jon's other researches, such as his recent "interpretive
hypothesis" formed in part in consideration of Peirce's comment that a sign
is not "a Real thing," are a whole other matter and, in my opinion, ought
to be challenged especially to the extent to which they appear 'novel'. And
I find that certain members of the list are do just that. In the past I too
have argued against certain of Jon's analyses and hypotheses, and have
noted that he seems always to welcome such challenges and occasionally
invites them.

I expect that these comments will be taken in the spirit in which I hope
they are clearly intended--to support his clear and consistent terminology
in discussing Peirce's semeiotics (and his science more generally) when it
is that: clear and consistent. Where it is not clear and consistent, there
is an even great challenge.

As I was completing this message Edwina sent another post which included
this Peirce quote (I corrected two minor typos):

"Not only will meaning always, more or less, in the long run mold reactions
to itself, but it is only in doing so that its own being consists. For this
reason I call this element of the phenomenon or object of thought the
element of Thirdness. It is that which is what it is by virtue of imparting
a quality to reactions in the future" 1.343.


I will only say for now that for 3ns to "mold reactions to itself" is in no
way to say that it 'interacts' with 2ns. Again, 2ns is that which
acts/reacts, while 3ns is that which it is "by virtue of imparting a
quality to reactions in the future,"  a very different matter. Ignoring
this one will tend to conflate the natures of 3ns and 2ns and, say, not
distinguish between law (3ns, habit, etc.) and lawfulness (2ns, force, that
"molding" of reactions within the existential world).

1904 [c.] | Draft of Nichols Review [C] | MS [R] 1476:10

…the essence of law consists in its being a conditional truth about the
indefinite future, and never can become matter of actual fact. Or we may
say it is such a truth that upon the knowledge of it a perpetual or
indefinitely lasting conditional expectation may

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

 

 BODY { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12px;
}JAS, list

And Peirce referred to cognition, to Thirdness, as an action.
Synthetic consciousness, mediation, is not a passive consciousness
[which is 1ns] but is active. 1.377/8

That is, semiosis as a process does not confine action to dyadic
act-react kinesis between two existential things. Thirdness is in my
understanding of Peirce a dynamic process, which is to say, an
action. As such, it mediates, it synthesizes, it generalizes. These
are all actions - powerful actions. 

"Not only will meaning always, more or less, in the long run mould
reactions to itself, but it is only in doing so that its own being
cosists. For this reason I call this element of the phenomenon or
object of thought the element of Thirdness. It is that which is what
it is by virtue of imparting a quality to reactions in the future"
1.343.

"The third is that which is what it is owing to things between which
it mediates and which it brings into relation to each other" 1.356

This action, of bringing things into mutual relationships is a
frequent description by Peirce, of Thirdness. 

Now - to me, such is an action... A plural interaction mediating and
generating the commonalities among separate things

I am not sure if we should continue this discussion, since we both
hold to different views and are probably boring the list.

Edwina
 On Thu 09/08/18  3:18 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com
sent:
 Edwina, List:
 ET:  I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an
action between two actualities, two existent 'things'.
 Yes, and why is that?  Because Peirce used the term "interact," as
well as "act" and "react," to refer only to an action between two
actualities, two existent "Things";  especially when he was being
careful to differentiate the three Categories or Universes.  Again,
that has been my only point throughout this particular exchange.
 Regards,
 Jon S. 
 On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 1:46 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
JAS, list

What is going on here, is a situation where two people are using the
same word - each with a different usage. So- we are talking past each
other, and that's hardly productive. 

I use the term 'interact' to mean that two or more forces act on and
have an effect on each other. But a key point:  I do not confine the
nature of these forces to actualities and so, I include the effect
that a law can have on a particular object.

I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an action
between two actualities, two existent 'things'.  

Again, Jon, your quotes that you provided do not, in my view,
contradict my use of the term  'interact'. I have always acknowledged
that the general, the law, has no separate actuality in itself but is
'embodied' in an individual morphology.  This is basic Peirce [and
Aristotle]. BUT, I consider that the general, the law, as embedded, 
does act as a genuine informational force,  and so it as itself, as
its generality, acts, interacts...with individual morphologies. And
this is not simply an act of constraint, but, in my view, of actual
generative formation. That enables the increase of complexity - a
basic conclusion for Peirce. 

This is something about which we have a basic disagreement. 

Edwina
 On Thu 09/08/18  2:28 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com
[2] sent:
 Edwina, List:
 The point is that according to Peirce, as demonstrated by those
quotations, only existential particulars can interact, and only with
other existential particulars.  A general cannot interact with
anything as a general, so it does not interact with existential
particulars; instead, it  governs them.
 CSP:  But a law necessarily governs, or "is embodied in"
individuals, and prescribes some of their qualities. (CP 2.293, EP
2:274; 1903)
 CSP:  By a proposition, as something which can be repeated over and
over again, translated into another language, embodied in a logical
graph or algebraical formula, and still be one and the same
proposition, we do not mean any existing individual object but a
type, a general, which does not exist but governs existents, to which
individuals conform. (CP 8.313; 1905) 
 Regards,
 Jon S. 
 On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 12:06 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:
JAS, list

I'm not sure of the point of your post. I suggested that we'd simply
have to agree-to-disagree. Providing lists of quotations, all of which
I fully agree with, doesn't change my view [and none contradict my
view] - which I'll repeat below:

" I don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from its
Tokens'. My view is that both are informationally functional and
interact informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate
individual existence for each. Informational action between
information encoded as a general and information encoded as a

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Edwina, List:

ET:  I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an action
between two actualities, two existent 'things'.


Yes, and why is that?  Because *Peirce* used the term "interact," as well
as "act" and "react," to refer only to an action between two actualities,
two existent "Things"; especially when he was being careful to *differentiate
*the three Categories or Universes.  Again, that has been my only point
throughout this particular exchange.

Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 1:46 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

> JAS, list
>
> What is going on here, is a situation where two people are using the same
> word - each with a different usage. So- we are talking past each other, and
> that's hardly productive.
>
> I use the term 'interact' to mean that two or more forces act on and have
> an effect on each other. But a key point:  I do not confine the nature of
> these forces to actualities and so, I include the effect that a law can
> have on a particular object.
>
> I think that JAS uses the term 'interact' to refer only to an action
> between two actualities, two existent 'things'.
>
> Again, Jon, your quotes that you provided do not, in my view, contradict
> my use of the term  'interact'. I have always acknowledged that the
> general, the law, has no separate actuality in itself but is 'embodied' in
> an individual morphology.  This is basic Peirce [and Aristotle]. BUT, I
> consider that the general, the law, as embedded,  does act as a genuine
> informational force,  and so it as itself, as its generality, acts,
> interacts...with individual morphologies. And this is not simply an act of
> constraint, but, in my view, of actual generative formation. That enables
> the increase of complexity - a basic conclusion for Peirce.
>
> This is something about which we have a basic disagreement.
>
> Edwina
>
> On Thu 09/08/18 2:28 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:
>
> Edwina, List:
>
> The point is that according to Peirce, as demonstrated by those
> quotations, only existential particulars can interact, and only with
> other existential particulars.  A general cannot interact with anything as
> a general, so it does not interact with existential particulars; instead,
> it  governs them.
>
> CSP:  But a law necessarily governs, or "is embodied in" individuals, and
> prescribes some of their qualities. (CP 2.293, EP 2:274; 1903)
>
> CSP:  By a proposition, as something which can be repeated over and over
> again, translated into another language, embodied in a logical graph or
> algebraical formula, and still be one and the same proposition, we do not
> mean any existing individual object but a type, a general, which does not
> exist but governs existents, to which individuals conform. (CP 8.313; 1905)
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon S.
>
> On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 12:06 PM, Edwina Taborsky 
> wrote:
>
>> JAS, list
>>
>> I'm not sure of the point of your post. I suggested that we'd simply have
>> to agree-to-disagree. Providing lists of quotations, all of which I fully
>> agree with, doesn't change my view [and none contradict my view] - which
>> I'll repeat below:
>>
>> " I don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from
>> its Tokens'. My view is that both are informationally functional and
>> interact informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate individual
>> existence for each. Informational action between information encoded as a
>> general and information encoded as a particular is, in my view, quite
>> possible."
>>
>> That is - Reality, which functions as a generality, DOES, in my view,
>> interact with the existential particular.
>>
>> Edwina
>>
>> On Thu 09/08/18 12:52 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com
>> sent:
>>
>> Edwina, List:
>>
>> Any word with "act" as its root implies actuality, which is 2ns.
>>
>> CSP:   Let us begin with considering actuality, and try to make out just
>> what it consists in.  If I ask you what the actuality of an event
>> consists in, you will tell me that it consists in its happening  then
>>  and there. The specifications  then and there  involve all its
>> relations to other existents. The actuality of the event seems to lie in
>> its relations to the universe of existents ... We have a two-sided
>> consciousness of effort and resistance, which seems to me to come tolerably
>> near to a pure sense of actuality. On the whole, I think we have here a
>> mode of being of one thing which consists in how a second object is. I call
>> that Secondness. (CP 1.24; 1903)
>>
>>
>> CSP:  That conception of Aristotle which is embodied for us in the
>> cognate origin of the terms actuality and activity is one of the most
>> deeply illuminating products of Greek thinking. Activity implies a
>> generalization of effort; and effort is a two-sided idea, effort and
>> resistance being inseparable, and therefore the idea of Actuality has also
>> a dyadic form. (CP 4.542; 1906)
>>
>> CSP:  The second Universe is that of the

Re: Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Edwina, List:

ET:  I acknowledge your specification of terms - though I continue to
differentiate, terminologically, between the Sign [IO-R-II] and the
Representamen and think it a rather important distinction.


Understood, although we should also acknowledge that this is not a
distinction that Peirce ever made in that specific way.

ET:  ... what actually happens when a DI is in a mode of 1ns, or 2ns, or
3ns - never mind the term - I want to know the actual pragmatic result.


According to Peirce (cf. CP 4.536; 1906), the DI is the *actual *effect
that an *individual *Instance of a Sign produces by determining an
interpreting Quasi-mind to a feeling (1ns), to an exertion (2ns), or to
another Sign-Replica (3ns).

ET:  What kind of existential actuality is there - when some thing is
functioning without any 3ns, or without any 2ns or even - pure 1ns?


Nothing ever *actually *functions without exhibiting aspects of all three
Categories.  We can only distinguish them *analytically*, and must always
do so for a particular *purpose*.  Since our purposes are different, it is
not surprising that our analyses are different.  My concern has been and
remains to be faithful to Peirce's usage of terminology as we proceed with
such efforts.

Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 1:32 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

> JAS, list
>
> I acknowledge your specification of terms - though I continue to
> differentiate, terminologically, between the Sign [IO-R-II] and the
> Representamen and think it a rather important distinction.
>
> But I don't think that providing specific names to these interactions is
> where I want to go in my analysis of semiosis. My focus of interest is what
> pragmatically happens within each interaction and for that, I focus on the
> actual result of the categorical modes rather than the term. I want to
> know, morphologically and informationally, what actually happens when a DI
> is in a mode of 1ns, or 2ns, or 3ns - never mind the term - I want to know
> the actual pragmatic result. What kind of existential actuality is there -
> when some thing is functioning without any 3ns, or without any 2ns or even
> - pure 1ns? And so on.
>
> Edwina
>
> On Thu 09/08/18 2:00 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:
>
> Edwina, List:
>
> There can be no Relation where there are no Correlates; by definition, a
> Correlate is simply that which has a Relation with at least one other 
> Correlate.
> A dyadic Relation is one that has two Correlates, and a triadic Relation
> is one that has three Correlates.
>
> No one disputes that the Sign has Relations with its Dynamic Object,
> Dynamic Interpretant, and Final Interpretant, and can be classified
> accordingly.  The problem is conflating these divisions with those for
> the Correlates themselves, which must be distinguished just as Jeff did
> below.
>
>- The ontological nature (Mode of Being) of the DO is one trichotomy
>(Abstractive/Concretive/Collective), and the dyadic Relation of the
>Sign to its DO is another (Icon/Index/Symbol).
>- The ontological nature (Mode of Being) of the DI is one trichotomy
>(Feeling/Exertion/Sign or Sympathetic/Percussive/Usual), and the dyadic
>Relation of the Sign to its DI is another (Presented/Urged/Submitted or
>Suggestive/Imperative/Indicative).
>- The normative nature (purpose) of the FI is one trichotomy
>(Gratific/Actuous/Temperative or to produce Feeling/Action/Self-Control),
>and the dyadic Relation of the Sign to its FI is another
>(Rheme/Dicent/Argument or Seme/Pheme/Delome).
>- The Sign's genuine triadic Relation to the DO and FI is yet another
>trichotomy (Abducent/Inducent/Deducent or assurance of
>Instinct/Experience/Form).
>
> Of course, the 1903 ten-Sign classification included only two of these
> seven trichotomies--the ones for the S-DO and S-FI Relations--along with
> the one for the Sign itself.  The phenomenological nature (Mode of
> Presentation) of the Immediate Object (Descriptive/Designative/Copulative)
> and Immediate Interpretant (Hypothetic/Categorical/Relative) are the
> remaining trichotomies in the 1908 66-Sign classification; there are no
> distinct Relation trichotomies for these because they are both  internal to
> the Sign.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
> Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
>
> On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 11:59 AM, Edwina Taborsky 
> wrote:
>
>> Jeff, list
>>
>> A very interesting post - I have time now for only a few perhaps
>> sidelining comments.
>>
>> 1] I'm pleased that you refer to both the representamen and the
>> relation between it and the DO, and between it and the
>> interpretants. Peirce himself uses the term of 'relation' [see 8.335,
>> 337] - and I use the term though I've often been chastised on this list for
>> so doing, as I've been told that there is ''no such thing and the correct
>>

Re: Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

let me make a quick
reply to the general suggestion that only representamens that are
symbolic are really signs, because all signs must be related to their
dynamical objects via  some general rule that governs the relation.
Consider cases involving what might be called an "accidental index."
Here is one that I have fabricated. Suppose a person is walking down
the sidewalk and a bird dropping lands on his right shoulder. As he
stops  to see what has happened, he notices a bicyclist veering out
of control and he sees that the bicyclist has just missed him--and
only because he had stopped to take a look. To the extent that the
bird's dropping did draw his attention to his good fortune in 
stopping just in time to be missed by the bike, is it an accidental
indexical sign? 
Let's take the example a step further and suppose that the fortunate
event had such an impact on this fellow that in future instances when
a bird dropping landed on his shoulder,  he would stop and look for
bicyclists--even if only to chuckle for a moment in memory of his
past good luck. Is the bird dropping now something of an indexical
legisign (a general type of sign) for this fellow, even if it is an
erroneous sign in some respects? 
I raise this somewhat fanciful example because Peirce clearly holds
that most of the relations that hold between the facts in this world
are, to some degree, accidental in  character. This is true even if
there is much that is governed by general laws. As such, I'm
wondering about the role of accidents in the semiotic
theory--especially when it comes to noticing surprising phenomena
that are more accidental in character. 
Yours, 
Jeff  
Jeffrey Downard
 Associate Professor
 Department of Philosophy
 Northern Arizona University
 (o) 928 523-8354   
-
 From: Jon Alan Schmidt 
 Sent: Wednesday, August 8, 2018 6:08 PM
 To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu [9]
 Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing Gary R.,
List: 
   GR:   ... imagining that the word 'the' was once first spoken  (or
written, but more likely I think, spoken), what was the type that that
first spoken "the" was  token of, where does one locate its reality?  
  Where does one "locate" the Reality of any general Type?  Every
Instance of the word "the"--first, last, and each one in between--is
a Replica of the same Sign.  The Type is not dependent on its
Tokens--past, present, or future--any more than the hardness of a
diamond is dependent on its ever actually being scratched.  Such is
the nature of a Real "would-be." 
  GR:   Yes, symbols grow, but what is the soil upon which they are
rooted?
  What does it mean in this context to say that "symbols grow"?  In
order for them to get "larger," we must have a way to "measure" their
size.  Conveniently, Peirce provided one with the concept of
Information as  "area"--the product of a Sign's Logical Breadth and
Depth.  I am reminded again of Eco's comment that I quoted last
week--"from interpretant to interpretant, the sign is more and more
determined both in its breadth and in its  depth."  In other words,
although every Sign (as a general) is indeterminate to some degree,
it can "grow"--i.e., approach (however distantly) the ideal state of
Substantial Information--by becoming more determinate. 
   CSP:  If we are to explain the universe, we must assume that there
was in the beginning a state of things in which there was nothing ...
Not determinately nothing ... Utter  indetermination. But a symbol
alone is indeterminate. Therefore, Nothing, the indeterminate of the
absolute beginning, is a symbol. That is the way in which the
beginning of things can alone be understood. What logically follows?
...  A symbol is essentially a purpose, that is to say, is a
representation that seeks to make itself definite, or seeks to
produce an interpretant more definite than itself ...
... the interpretant aims at the object more than at the original
replica and may be truer and fuller than the latter. The very
entelechy of being lies in being representable ... A symbol is an
embryonic reality  endowed with power of growth into the very truth,
the very entelechy of reality. (EP 2:322-324; 1904)  
  Regards,
  Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA Professional Engineer,
Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt -  twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt 

 On Wed, Aug 8, 2018 at 3:32 PM, Gary Richmond   wrote:
   Jon AS, Gary f, 
  Jon wrote:  
   JAS: I am currently adopting the specific point of view that all
Signs are Types and seeing how far I can get with that interpretative
hypothesis.  
  I am tending to find myself more and more disposed toward your line
of thinking, Jon, especially as articulated in your last several
posts.  
  However, some questions remain for me. For example, imagining that
the word 'the' was once firs

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Edwina, List:

The point is that according to Peirce, as demonstrated by those
quotations, *only
*existential particulars can interact, and *only *with other existential
particulars.  A general cannot interact with anything *as a general*, so it
does not interact with existential particulars; instead, it  *governs* them.

CSP:  But a law necessarily governs, or "is embodied in" individuals, and
prescribes some of their qualities. (CP 2.293, EP 2:274; 1903)

CSP:  By a proposition, as something which can be repeated over and over
again, translated into another language, embodied in a logical graph or
algebraical formula, and still be one and the same proposition, we do not
mean any existing individual object but a type, a general, which does not
exist but governs existents, to which individuals conform. (CP 8.313; 1905)


Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 12:06 PM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

> JAS, list
>
> I'm not sure of the point of your post. I suggested that we'd simply have
> to agree-to-disagree. Providing lists of quotations, all of which I fully
> agree with, doesn't change my view [and none contradict my view] - which
> I'll repeat below:
>
> " I don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from
> its Tokens'. My view is that both are informationally functional and
> interact informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate individual
> existence for each. Informational action between information encoded as a
> general and information encoded as a particular is, in my view, quite
> possible."
>
> That is - Reality, which functions as a generality, DOES, in my view,
> interact with the existential particular.
>
> Edwina
>
> On Thu 09/08/18 12:52 PM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:
>
> Edwina, List:
>
> Any word with "act" as its root implies actuality, which is 2ns.
>
> CSP:   Let us begin with considering actuality, and try to make out just
> what it consists in. If I ask you what the actuality of an event consists
> in, you will tell me that it consists in its happening  then and there. The
> specifications  then and there  involve all its relations to other
> existents. The actuality of the event seems to lie in its relations to the
> universe of existents ... We have a two-sided consciousness of effort and
> resistance, which seems to me to come tolerably near to a pure sense of
> actuality. On the whole, I think we have here a mode of being of one thing
> which consists in how a second object is. I call that Secondness. (CP 1.24;
> 1903)
>
>
> CSP:  That conception of Aristotle which is embodied for us in the cognate
> origin of the terms actuality and activity is one of the most deeply
> illuminating products of Greek thinking. Activity implies a generalization
> of effort; and effort is a two-sided idea, effort and resistance being
> inseparable, and therefore the idea of Actuality has also a dyadic form.
> (CP 4.542; 1906)
>
> CSP:  The second Universe is that of the Brute Actuality of things and
> facts. I am confident that their Being consists in reactions against Brute
> forces ... (CP 6.455, EP 2:435; 1908)
>
> CSP:  Another Universe is that of, first, Objects whose Being consists in
> their Brute reactions, and of, second, the facts (reactions, events,
> qualities, etc.) concerning those Objects, all of which facts, in the last
> analysis, consist in their reactions. I call the Objects, Things, or more
> unambiguously, Existents, and the facts about them I call Facts. (EP
> 2:479; 1908)
>
>
> Only Existents (2ns)--including Tokens--act, react, or interact; and they
> do so only on/with other Existents.  For Peirce, this was literally the 
> defining
> attribute of existence.
>
> CSP:  The modern philosophers ... recognize but one mode of being, the
> being of an individual thing or fact, the being which consists in the
> object’s crowding out a place for itself in the universe, so to speak, and
> reacting by brute force of fact, against all other things. I call that
> Existence. (CP 1.21; 1903)
>
> CSP:  The existent is that which reacts against other things. (CP 8.191;
> c. 1904)
>
>
> CSP:  Whatever exists, ex-sists, that is, really acts upon other
> existents, so obtains a self-identity, and is definitely individual. (CP
> 5.429, EP 2:342; 1905)
>
> CSP:  ... I myself always use exist in its strict philosophical sense of
> "react with the other like things in the environment." (CP 6.495; c. 1906)
>
>
> From such a standpoint, strictly speaking, Possibles (1ns) and
> Necessitants (3ns)--including Tones and Types, respectively--do not act,
> react, or interact on/with anything.  That is why any Dynamic Interpretant
> (Experiential Information)--an actual feeling, effort, or further
> Sign-Replica--is always the result of a "then-and-there" Instance of the
> Sign (Token), while the Final Interpretant (Substantial Information)
> pertains to the non-temporal/non-spatial Sign itself (Type), and the Immediate
> Interpretant (Essential Information)

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

trol and he sees that the
> bicyclist has just missed him--and only because he had stopped to take a
> look. To the extent that the bird's dropping did draw his attention to his
> good fortune in stopping just in time to be missed by the bike, is it an
> accidental indexical sign?
>
>
> Let's take the example a step further and suppose that the fortunate event
> had such an impact on this fellow that in future instances when a bird
> dropping landed on his shoulder, he would stop and look for
> bicyclists--even if only to chuckle for a moment in memory of his past good
> luck. Is the bird dropping now something of an indexical legisign (a
> general type of sign) for this fellow, even if it is an erroneous sign in
> some respects?
>
>
> I raise this somewhat fanciful example because Peirce clearly holds that
> most of the relations that hold between the facts in this world are, to
> some degree, accidental in character. This is true even if there is much
> that is governed by general laws. As such, I'm wondering about the role of
> accidents in the semiotic theory--especially when it comes to noticing
> surprising phenomena that are more accidental in character.
>
>
> Yours,
>
>
> Jeff
>
>
>
> Jeffrey Downard
> Associate Professor
> Department of Philosophy
> Northern Arizona University
> (o) 928 523-8354
>
>
> --
> From: Jon Alan Schmidt
> Sent: Wednesday, August 8, 2018 6:08 PM
> To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
> Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing
>
> Gary R., List:
>
> GR:   ... imagining that the word 'the' was once first spoken (or
> written, but more likely I think, spoken), what was the type that that
> first spoken "the" was token of, where does one locate its reality?
>
>
> Where does one "locate" the Reality of any general Type?  Every Instance
> of the word "the"--first, last, and each one in between--is a Replica of
> the same Sign.  The Type is not dependent on its Tokens--past, present,
> or future--any more than the hardness of a diamond is dependent on its ever 
> actually
> being scratched.  Such is the nature of a Real "would-be."
>
> GR:   Yes, symbols grow, but what is the soil upon which they are rooted?
>
>
> What does it mean in this context to say that "symbols grow"?  In order
> for them to get "larger," we must have a way to "measure" their size.
> Conveniently, Peirce provided one with the concept of Information as
> "area"--the product of a Sign's Logical Breadth and Depth.  I am reminded
> again of Eco's comment that I quoted last week--"from interpretant to
> interpretant, the sign is more and more determined both in its breadth and
> in its depth."  In other words, although every Sign (as a general) is
> indeterminate to some degree, it can "grow"--i.e., approach (however
> distantly) the ideal state of Substantial Information--by becoming more
> determinate.
>
> CSP:  If we are to explain the universe, we must assume that there was in
> the beginning a state of things in which there was nothing ... Not
> determinately nothing ... Utter indetermination. But a symbol alone is
> indeterminate. Therefore, Nothing, the indeterminate of the absolute
> beginning, is a symbol. That is the way in which the beginning of things
> can alone be understood. What logically follows? ...
> A symbol is essentially a purpose, that is to say, is a representation
> that seeks to make itself definite, or seeks to produce an interpretant
> more definite than itself ...
>
> ... the interpretant aims at the object more than at the original replica
> and may be truer and fuller than the latter. The very entelechy of being
> lies in being representable ... A symbol is an embryonic reality endowed
> with power of growth into the very truth, the very entelechy of
> reality. (EP 2:322-324; 1904)
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
> Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
> www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
>
> On Wed, Aug 8, 2018 at 3:32 PM, Gary Richmond 
> wrote:
>
>> Jon AS, Gary f,
>>
>> Jon wrote:
>>
>> JAS: I am currently adopting the specific point of view that all Signs
>> are Types and seeing how far I can get with that interpretative hypothesis.
>>
>>
>> I am tending to find myself more and more disposed toward your line of
>> thinking, Jon, especially as articulated in your last several posts.
>>
>> However, some questions remain for me. For example, imagining that the
>> word 'the' was once first spoken (or written, but m

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Jeff, List:

My interpretative hypothesis is not intended to have any effect on Sign
classification, other than a particular understanding of the one trichotomy
that corresponds to the Sign itself.  I am proposing that it is best
conceived as a division according to the (phenomenological) "Mode of
Apprehension" or "Mode of Presentation" of the Sign, as Peirce stated in *some
*of his late 1908 draft letters to Lady Welby--*not *the (ontological)
"Mode of Being" of the the Sign, as Peirce stated in *other* drafts and
most of his previous writings about it, going back to 1903 when he first
introduced it.  The other nine trichotomies, including Icon/Index/Symbol,
remain in place such that there would still potentially be 66 classes of
Signs.

As for your fanciful (but plausible) scenario, I am not sure how to parse
it analytically into various Signs, their Replicas, and their Dynamic
Interpretants.  As I have said before, such an exercise is always somewhat
arbitrary, since Real semiosis is continuous.  Is it the Sign itself that
is "erroneous," or its Replicas, or the man's Habits of
Interpretation--e.g., misidentifying the Dynamic Object because of his
unique Collateral Experience?

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 11:38 AM, Jeffrey Brian Downard <
jeffrey.down...@nau.edu> wrote:

> Jon S, Gary R, Gary F, List,
>
> It appears that I may be missing something when it comes to understanding
> the suggestion Jon S is making with respect to interpreting the claim that "a
> sign is not a real thing" (EP 2:303; 1904). As such, let me raise some
> straightforward questions about the thesis that Peirce revised his
> definition of the sign in the hopes of getting clearer about the
> suggestion. For the sake of generalizing the point, let's state it in the
> following way:  "all signs have the character of a general rule, and only
> things that have the character of a general rule are signs."
>
> 1.  Is the interpretative hypothesis being restricted only to the
> classification of signs based on the manner of the apprehension of the sign
> itself? That is, does it apply only to representamens that are apprehended
> as general types?
>
> 2. Or, should one go further and say that the interpretative hypothesis
> applies to other ways of classifying signs, including:
>
> (a) the nature of the dynamical object,
>
> (b) the nature of the dynamical interpretant,
>
> (c) the relation that holds between the representamen and the dynamical
> object,
>
> (d) the relation that holds between the representamen and the final
> interpretant.
>
> If the interpretative hypothesis is applied across the board to the 10
> respects in which signs are being classified in the mature theory (circa
> the later letters to Lady Welby), then it would appear that there is really
> only one class of signs, all of which have the following character:
> copulative, relative, collective, type, usual, indicative, logical,
> symbolic, argument, form. This is at odds with Peirce's general approach in
> his later writings in semiotics, which is to provide a classification of 66
> different natural classes of signs.
>
> If the interpretative hypothesis is restricted in some way, such as to the
> manner in which the representamen is apprehended and to the relation that
> holds between the representamen and the dynamical object, then all signs
> are symbolic types, but (admittedly) there would be several classes of such
> signs. I don't see a reason to restrict the application of the
> interpretative hypothesis to these two respects without making it seem like
> an arbitrary restriction. What is more, the number of different classes of
> signs--while larger than one--still seems unduly restricted as an
> interpretation of Peirce's late writings in semiotics.
>
> Having raised these questions about the apparent lack of fit between the
> interpretative hypothesis and the character of Peirce's mature
> classification of 66 different classes of signs, let me make a quick reply
> to the general suggestion that only representamens that are symbolic are
> really signs, because all signs must be related to their dynamical
> objects via some general rule that governs the relation. Consider cases
> involving what might be called an "accidental index." Here is one that I
> have fabricated. Suppose a person is walking down the sidewalk and a bird
> dropping lands on his right shoulder. As he stops to see what has happened,
> he notices a bicyclist veering out of control and he sees that the
> bicyclist has just missed him--and only because he had stopped to take a
> look. To the extent that the bird's dropping did draw his attention to his
> good fortune in stopping just in time to be missed by the bike, is it an
> accidental indexical sign?
>
> Let's take the example a step further and suppose that the

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

k for
bicyclists--even if only to chuckle for a moment in memory of his
past good luck. Is the bird dropping now something of an indexical
legisign (a general type of sign) for this fellow, even if it is an
erroneous sign in some respects? 
I raise this somewhat fanciful example because Peirce clearly holds
that most of the relations that hold between the facts in this world
are, to some degree, accidental in  character. This is true even if
there is much that is governed by general laws. As such, I'm
wondering about the role of accidents in the semiotic
theory--especially when it comes to noticing surprising phenomena
that are more accidental in character. 
Yours, 
Jeff  
Jeffrey Downard
 Associate Professor
 Department of Philosophy
 Northern Arizona University
 (o) 928 523-8354   
-
 From: Jon Alan Schmidt 
 Sent: Wednesday, August 8, 2018 6:08 PM
 To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
 Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing Gary R.,
List: 
   GR:   ... imagining that the word 'the' was once first spoken  (or
written, but more likely I think, spoken), what was the type that that
first spoken "the" was  token of, where does one locate its reality?  
  Where does one "locate" the Reality of any general Type?  Every
Instance of the word "the"--first, last, and each one in between--is
a Replica of the same Sign.  The Type is not dependent on its
Tokens--past, present, or future--any more than the hardness of a
diamond is dependent on its ever actually being scratched.  Such is
the nature of a Real "would-be." 
  GR:   Yes, symbols grow, but what is the soil upon which they are
rooted?
  What does it mean in this context to say that "symbols grow"?  In
order for them to get "larger," we must have a way to "measure" their
size.  Conveniently, Peirce provided one with the concept of
Information as  "area"--the product of a Sign's Logical Breadth and
Depth.  I am reminded again of Eco's comment that I quoted last
week--"from interpretant to interpretant, the sign is more and more
determined both in its breadth and in its  depth."  In other words,
although every Sign (as a general) is indeterminate to some degree,
it can "grow"--i.e., approach (however distantly) the ideal state of
Substantial Information--by becoming more determinate. 
   CSP:  If we are to explain the universe, we must assume that there
was in the beginning a state of things in which there was nothing ...
Not determinately nothing ... Utter  indetermination. But a symbol
alone is indeterminate. Therefore, Nothing, the indeterminate of the
absolute beginning, is a symbol. That is the way in which the
beginning of things can alone be understood. What logically follows?
...  A symbol is essentially a purpose, that is to say, is a
representation that seeks to make itself definite, or seeks to
produce an interpretant more definite than itself ...
... the interpretant aims at the object more than at the original
replica and may be truer and fuller than the latter. The very
entelechy of being lies in being representable ... A symbol is an
embryonic reality  endowed with power of growth into the very truth,
the very entelechy of reality. (EP 2:322-324; 1904)  
  Regards,
  Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA Professional Engineer,
Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt -  twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt 

 On Wed, Aug 8, 2018 at 3:32 PM, Gary Richmond   wrote:
   Jon AS, Gary f, 
  Jon wrote:  
   JAS: I am currently adopting the specific point of view that all
Signs are Types and seeing how far I can get with that interpretative
hypothesis.  
  I am tending to find myself more and more disposed toward your line
of thinking, Jon, especially as articulated in your last several
posts.  
  However, some questions remain for me. For example, imagining that
the word 'the' was once first spoken (or written, but more likely I
think, spoken), what was the type that that first spoken "the" was
token of, where does one locate its reality? 
  Despite this and a few other reservations which I'll comment on
below, I found your argument refuting Gary f's examples of what he
saw as signs which were not types rather convincing. As you
summarized your position near the end of your post: 
   JS: No one ever actually speaks, writes, hears, reads, or thinks a
word (the Sign itself); we only actually speak,  write, hear, read,
and think Instances thereof.  . . . when we do [such things], we
usually say that we speak, write, hear, read, or think the word/Sign
(not the Instance).  This is the problematic inconsistency, in my 
view--not so much a criticism of Peirce as of our everyday colloquial
usage of such terminology.  I am basically advocating greater
precision in logical/semeiotic inquiry by carefully distinguishing
(individual) Instances of Signs from (general) Si

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Edwina, List:

Any word with "act" as its root implies *actuality*, which is 2ns.

CSP:   Let us begin with considering actuality, and try to make out just
what it consists in. If I ask you what the actuality of an event consists
in, you will tell me that it consists in its happening *then* and *there*. The
specifications *then* and *there* involve all its relations to other
existents. The actuality of the event seems to lie in its relations to the
universe of existents ... We have a two-sided consciousness of effort and
resistance, which seems to me to come tolerably near to a pure sense of
actuality. On the whole, I think we have here a mode of being of one thing
which consists in how a second object is. I call that Secondness. (CP 1.24;
1903)

CSP:  That conception of Aristotle which is embodied for us in the cognate
origin of the terms *actuality *and *activity* is one of the most deeply
illuminating products of Greek thinking. Activity implies a generalization
of *effort*; and effort is a two-sided idea, effort and resistance being
inseparable, and therefore the idea of Actuality has also a dyadic form.
(CP 4.542; 1906)

CSP:  The second Universe is that of the Brute Actuality of things and
facts. I am confident that their Being consists in reactions against Brute
forces ... (CP 6.455, EP 2:435; 1908)

CSP:  Another Universe is that of, first, Objects whose Being consists in
their Brute reactions, and of, second, the facts (reactions, events,
qualities, etc.) concerning those Objects, all of which facts, in the last
analysis, consist in their reactions. I call the Objects, Things, or more
unambiguously, *Existents*, and the facts about them I call *Facts*. (EP
2:479; 1908)

*Only *Existents (2ns)--including Tokens--act, react, or interact; and they
do so *only *on/with other Existents.  For Peirce, this was literally
the *defining
attribute *of existence.

CSP:  The modern philosophers ... recognize but one mode of being, the
being of an individual thing or fact, the being which consists in the
object’s crowding out a place for itself in the universe, so to speak, and
reacting by brute force of fact, against all other things. I call that
Existence. (CP 1.21; 1903)

CSP:  The *existent *is that which reacts against other things. (CP 8.191;
c. 1904)

CSP:  Whatever exists, *ex-sists*, that is, really acts upon other
existents, so obtains a self-identity, and is definitely individual. (CP
5.429, EP 2:342; 1905)

CSP:  ... I myself always use *exist *in its strict philosophical sense of
"react with the other like things in the environment." (CP 6.495; c. 1906)

>From such a standpoint, strictly speaking, Possibles (1ns) and Necessitants
(3ns)--including Tones and Types, respectively--*do not* act, react, or
interact on/with *anything*.  That is why any *Dynamic *Interpretant
(Experiential Information)--an *actual *feeling, effort, or further
Sign-Replica--is always the result of a "then-and-there" Instance of the
Sign (Token), while the *Final *Interpretant (Substantial Information)
pertains to the non-temporal/non-spatial Sign itself (Type), and the *Immediate
*Interpretant (Essential Information) pertains to the qualities/characters
of its expression within a given system of Signs (Tone).  Consequently, I
do not see how anything except Tokens could "interact informationally" or
engage in "informational action."

Regards,

Jon S.

On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 8:26 AM, Edwina Taborsky  wrote:

> JAS, list
>
> I wasn't referring at all to the difference between reality and existence
> - and as I said in my post, I was indeed talking about Thirdness as
> mediation in a Legisign role. Obviously, then, I agree that the
> Representamen in a mode of Thirdness within the triadic semiosic process
> does not 'exist but governs existents'So- I'm unsure of the reason for
> your comment.
>
> With reference to your problem with my use of the word 'interaction',
> which you confine to a mode of Secondness - I guess we'll just have to each
> agree to differ in our use of the word. I don't agree that it implies that
> the "Type exists apart from its Tokens'. My view is that both are
> informationally functional and interact informationally - and this doesn't
> imply a separate individual existence for each. Informational action
> between information encoded as a general and information encoded as a
> particular is, in my view, quite possible.
>
> Edwina
>
> On Thu 09/08/18 9:11 AM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com sent:
>
> Edwina, List:
>
> I suppose we can say that a Type depends on its Tokens for its existence,
> but certainly not for its Reality, because the mode of Being of a Type is
> not reaction (2ns) but mediation (3ns).  Consequently, I still think we
> should avoid saying that a Type "interacts" with its Tokens, because this
> implies that the Type exists apart from its Tokens, such that it can react
> with them.  As the quote below from Peirce states, a Type "does not exist
> but governs

Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

2018-08-09 Thread Jeffrey Brian Downard

Jon S, Gary R, Gary F, List,


It appears that I may be missing something when it comes to understanding the 
suggestion Jon S is making with respect to interpreting the claim that "a sign 
is not a real thing" (EP 2:303; 1904). As such, let me raise some 
straightforward questions about the thesis that Peirce revised his definition 
of the sign in the hopes of getting clearer about the suggestion. For the sake 
of generalizing the point, let's state it in the following way:  "all signs 
have the character of a general rule, and only things that have the character 
of a general rule are signs."


1.  Is the interpretative hypothesis being restricted only to the 
classification of signs based on the manner of the apprehension of the sign 
itself? That is, does it apply only to representamens that are apprehended as 
general types?


2. Or, should one go further and say that the interpretative hypothesis applies 
to other ways of classifying signs, including:

(a) the nature of the dynamical object,

(b) the nature of the dynamical interpretant,

(c) the relation that holds between the representamen and the dynamical object,

(d) the relation that holds between the representamen and the final 
interpretant.


If the interpretative hypothesis is applied across the board to the 10 respects 
in which signs are being classified in the mature theory (circa the later 
letters to Lady Welby), then it would appear that there is really only one 
class of signs, all of which have the following character:  copulative, 
relative, collective, type, usual, indicative, logical, symbolic, argument, 
form. This is at odds with Peirce's general approach in his later writings in 
semiotics, which is to provide a classification of 66 different natural classes 
of signs.


If the interpretative hypothesis is restricted in some way, such as to the 
manner in which the representamen is apprehended and to the relation that holds 
between the representamen and the dynamical object, then all signs are symbolic 
types, but (admittedly) there would be several classes of such signs. I don't 
see a reason to restrict the application of the interpretative hypothesis to 
these two respects without making it seem like an arbitrary restriction. What 
is more, the number of different classes of signs--while larger than one--still 
seems unduly restricted as an interpretation of Peirce's late writings in 
semiotics.


Having raised these questions about the apparent lack of fit between the 
interpretative hypothesis and the character of Peirce's mature classification 
of 66 different classes of signs, let me make a quick reply to the general 
suggestion that only representamens that are symbolic are really signs, because 
all signs must be related to their dynamical objects via some general rule that 
governs the relation. Consider cases involving what might be called an 
"accidental index." Here is one that I have fabricated. Suppose a person is 
walking down the sidewalk and a bird dropping lands on his right shoulder. As 
he stops to see what has happened, he notices a bicyclist veering out of 
control and he sees that the bicyclist has just missed him--and only because he 
had stopped to take a look. To the extent that the bird's dropping did draw his 
attention to his good fortune in stopping just in time to be missed by the 
bike, is it an accidental indexical sign?


Let's take the example a step further and suppose that the fortunate event had 
such an impact on this fellow that in future instances when a bird dropping 
landed on his shoulder, he would stop and look for bicyclists--even if only to 
chuckle for a moment in memory of his past good luck. Is the bird dropping now 
something of an indexical legisign (a general type of sign) for this fellow, 
even if it is an erroneous sign in some respects?


I raise this somewhat fanciful example because Peirce clearly holds that most 
of the relations that hold between the facts in this world are, to some degree, 
accidental in character. This is true even if there is much that is governed by 
general laws. As such, I'm wondering about the role of accidents in the 
semiotic theory--especially when it comes to noticing surprising phenomena that 
are more accidental in character.


Yours,


Jeff



Jeffrey Downard
Associate Professor
Department of Philosophy
Northern Arizona University
(o) 928 523-8354



From: Jon Alan Schmidt 
Sent: Wednesday, August 8, 2018 6:08 PM
To: peirce-l@list.iupui.edu
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

Gary R., List:

GR:   ... imagining that the word 'the' was once first spoken (or written, but 
more likely I think, spoken), what was the type that that first spoken "the" 
was token of, where does one locate its reality?

Where does one "locate" the Reality of any general Type?  Every Instance of the 
word "the"--first, last, and each one in between

Re: Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing

BODY { font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12px;
}JAS, list

I wasn't referring at all to the difference between reality and
existence - and as I said in my post, I was indeed talking about
Thirdness as mediation in a Legisign role. Obviously, then, I agree
that the Representamen in a mode of Thirdness within the triadic
semiosic process does not 'exist but governs existents'So- I'm
unsure of the reason for your comment.

With reference to your problem with my use of the word
'interaction', which you confine to a mode of Secondness - I guess
we'll just have to each agree to differ in our use of the word. I
don't agree that it implies that the "Type exists apart from its
Tokens'. My view is that both are informationally functional and
interact informationally - and this doesn't imply a separate
individual existence for each. Informational action between
information encoded as a general and information encoded as a
particular is, in my view, quite possible.

Edwina
On Thu 09/08/18 9:11 AM , Jon Alan Schmidt jonalanschm...@gmail.com
sent:
Edwina, List:
I suppose we can say that a Type depends on its Tokens for its
existence, but certainly not for its Reality, because the mode of
Being of a Type is not reaction (2ns) but mediation (3ns).
Consequently, I still think we should avoid saying that a Type
"interacts" with its Tokens, because this implies that the Type
exists apart from its Tokens, such that it can react with them. As
the quote below from Peirce states, a Type "does not exist but
governs existents" (CP 8.313; 1905, emphasis added); the Sign's
unchanging ideal Final Interpretant logically/semiotically determines
(constrains) its various actual Dynamic Interpretants, not the other
way around.
Regards,
Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USAProfessional Engineer, Amateur
Philosopher, Lutheran Layman www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt [1] -
twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt [2]
On Wed, Aug 8, 2018 at 8:39 PM, Edwina Taborsky wrote:
Gary R, JAS, list

1] I question the claim that "The Type is not dependent on its
Tokens--past, present, or future--any more than the hardness of a
diamond is dependent on its ever actually being scratched. Such is
the nature of a Real "would-be."

My view is that the Type - which I understand as a general, as laws,
is most certainly dependent on being articulated as a Token, for
generals do not exist except as articulated within/as the particular.
And it is the experiences of the particular instantiation that can
affect the Types and enable adaptation and evolution of the
general/laws.since, as we know, growth and increasing complexity is
'the rule' [can't remember section..]

"I do not mean any existing individual object, but a type, a
general, which does not exist but governs existents, to which
individuals conform" 8.313.

That is - I think the relation between the law/general and the
instantiation is intimate and interactive [there's that terrible word
again!].

2] Symbols grow' - which to me, means that they become more complex
in their laws and their networked connections with other Signs. But I
will also suggest that symbols must have the capacity to implode as
well!

Edwina

Links:
--
[1] http://www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt
[2] http://twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
[3]
http://webmail.primus.ca/javascript:top.opencompose(\'tabor...@primus.ca\',\'\',\'\',\'\')

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Re: [PEIRCE-L] A Sign Is Not a Real Thing