List: I changed the subject line to reflect what Edwina evidently would like to discuss, which is not at all what I have been addressing. She *does not* understand me correctly, and has *never *understood me correctly, no matter how much I have explained myself. For one thing, she seems to have a much narrower conception of Peirce's three categories, especially 3ns.
First, they pertain to every branch of his entire system of thought and are not confined to his trichotomies for classifying signs. Most fundamentally, as discovered in phaneroscopy, they are the irreducible elements of anything that is or could be present to any mind in any way--"When you strive to get the purest conceptions you can of 1ns, 2ns, and 3ns, [you are] thinking of quality, reaction, and mediation" (CP 1.530, 1903). In his earlier writings, 3ns is *representation*, of which mediation is a generalization; and in his later writings, the "Universe of Experience" that corresponds to 3ns includes "everything which is essentially a Sign" (CP 6.455, EP 2:435, 1908). Accordingly, *all signs* are manifestations of 3ns--not just legisigns/types, but also sinsigns/tokens and qualisigns/tones; not just symbols, but also indices and icons; not just arguments/delomes, but also dicisigns/phemes and rhemes/semes. Second, 3ns is not confined to habits and laws, it is also exemplified by *continuity*--"that which is really, as I regard it, the characteristic of my doctrine, namely, that I chiefly insist upon continuity, or 3ns" (CP 6.202, 1898). It is the substrate underlying possibilities (1ns) and actualities (2ns), like the clean blackboard on which chalk marks are drawn (CP 6.203-8). As I have been saying, this applies in semeiotic, where a sign type is an inexhaustible continuum (3ns) of potential sign tokens (1ns), some of which are actualized as instances of the type (2ns); and in both ontology and cosmology, where the constitution of being is an inexhaustible continuum (3ns) of indefinite possibilities (1ns), some of which are actualized (2ns). After all, "Metaphysics consists in the results of the absolute acceptance of logical [i.e., semeiotic] principles not merely as regulatively valid, but as truths of being" (CP 1.487, c. 1896). Regards, Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA Structural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt / twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt On Thu, Nov 6, 2025 at 7:58 PM Edwina Taborsky <[email protected]> wrote: > List, JAS > > JAS wrote: > > even a "first-time" sign token is an instance of a sign type because its > (definitely significant) *form *is capable of repetition in subsequent > sign tokens, and the same is true of natural signs. In fact, anything that > we can describe using words, which as sign tokens are *always *instances > of sign types, must likewise be either a general itself or an instantiation > of a general. Only an* entirely unique* sign token would *not *be an > instance of a sign type--something brute, unrepeatable, and indescribable; > pure 2ns, with no 3ns whatsoever, which of course is impossible for > anything involved in semiosis. > > I find this a strange outline, because, it is asserting that all > triads/signs include 3ns or general habits, ie,enabling reproduction of > that type. But I note that of Peirce’s ten sign classes within semeiosis, , > four have no 3ns involved: the Qualisign, the Iconic Sinsign, the Rhematic > Indexical Sinsign, and the Dicent Sinsign. Aren’t these ‘involved in > semeiosis’? > > Furthermore, using Robert Marty’s laltice model it can be shown tha there > is an ‘accretive path’ from the sign lacking 3ns, to the inclusion of 3ns, > suggesting that the matter/mind of the world is capable of knowledge > acquisition and the generation of entirely new forms of matter/mind, where > as Marty points out, one sees a ‘process of growth or enlargement by a > gradual categorical build up”..Of course this is also briefly outlined by > Peirce in 1.413- the emergence of the universe, > > JAS’s outline, if I understand him correctly, rejects any such > evolutionary buildup and instead, posits an a priori Habit/3ns already > existent in any novel emergent Sign.Where did this general law come from? > Is there some kind of a priori bank filled with Platonic Forms waiting to > be called upon? Or-Is it purely a mutant randomness with no interaction > with its environmental realities? > > Or is the answer to the emergence of new signs a mater of semiosic > informational dynamics, with a novel instance emerging in interaction with > its environment, and when enough of these reach a critical threshold of > commonality - 3ns becomes operative within their format. > > These are two very different approaches to the question of How Does > Novelty Emerge within Semiosis. > > Edwina >
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