Frances to Geoff and others... The power of signs to alter the mind in thought may be an objective fact, rather than merely a subjective notion. My experience in studying Peircean terms and classes and terns may indicate this. To talk of Peirce with his neologisms is to order these terms as terns and then place these words in the slots of his tridential architectonic scaffolding. Once committed to memory in mind, it then becomes almost impossible to visually think in ways other than trichotomic, because his system seems to make so much sense. The terms and slots tend to become fixed imprints in the mind. If the locus or layout of terms need be changed later, say for some warranted reason, it is then hard to change the mind. The trick of course is to get the right thing first and then get the thing right thereafter.
Geoff wrote... Words do not "do" anything. However, the reader apparently might feel something after looking at words by Emily Dickinson. The reader's mind would not likely consider Emily Dickinson's line at that precise moment without the stimulus of words on a screen or page. So, perhaps we might say that perceived and understood words lead to/elicit associations or responses, of course, mediated by our minds.
