Frances, I liked it. Boris Shoshensky ---------- Original Message ---------- From: "Frances Kelly" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Subject: RE: Thought always precedes speech Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:07:58 -0400
Frances to imago Asthetik and others... Any ordinary object is a sign if it represents some other object for its self or for some other object as a signer to some effect. All objects are fated by representation to be signs and to determine signs, and further to be assigned or reassigned as iconic or indexic or symbolic signs of other objects, all by the evolutionary process of telic design. The agent of design however is not some mystical entity like a god, but is a dispositional tendency for evolving objects to act innately or habitually in certain ways that sign situations demand of them. Any ordinary object found or held to be a sign of art is an extraordinary work that has the "power" in its form to reflect worthy aesthetic values and to evoke intense aesthetic responses of an emotional or practical or intellectual kind that are worthwhile both individually and communally. If the substantive form of the work is empowered in this reflective and evocative way, then the work "has" an aesthetic form and "is" an aesthetic object. The agent of design driving an object to be a sign of art and a work of art is therefore some formal enforced empowerment. imago Asthetik partly writes... I was under the impression that a reasonable definition stated the necessary and sufficient conditions for the use of a term (For example, "X is a sign if and only if conditions a, b, c, etc are met" where 'a,' 'b,' and 'c' identify necessary properties of the definiendum). She fails to provide a definition. Further, if she has a specific notion in mind, it should not be difficult to provide a definition, rather refer us to an unspecified set of texts (angoamerican realist pragmatism). In fact, it would be far more helpful to have a list of texts to consult, or a philosopher's name (other than Peirce, who was not strictly speaking a pragmatist).
