Jon, list,
I dip in for a moment, then vanish. I wanted to reply to posts by Edwina,
Robert, and Ulysses but got busy as I do these days. I hope I'll get to those.
Jon, you wrote,
What an infinite community *would* affirm after infinite investigation is
precisely how Peirce explicates the meaning of *truth* in practical
terms--those beliefs whose corresponding habits of conduct *would* never be
confounded by any *possible* future experience.
I think Peirce seldom if ever wrote about the result of "infinite" inquiry. He said that inquiry pushed far enough or for long enough will reach the truth - sooner or later - but still inevitably. The inquiry that continues indefinitely, by an indefinite community of inquirers, will attain, sooner or later, definite increase of knowledge. Each increase in actual knowledge occurs, as I understand it, at a finite remove from the inquiry's beginning, while you sound like you're discussing an actual infinity - e.g., an infinity of years or an infinity of one year's achieved subdivisions (sounds like it would get infinitely hot) - after which the truth is reached. I remember over 10 or 15 years ago discussing on peirce-l with Clark Gobel the idea of an inquiry into the full meaning of one's wife, not just one's wife as a sign of this or that or the weather today, but as one's wife per se, as representing everything that one's wife may represent. I thought that such an inquiry
was so open-ended that maybe it _would_ require an eternity of inquiry, like the final entelechy of the universe (or whatever Peirce called it) maybe because a real example of "full meaning" is somehow too 2nd-order semiosic, to be dealt with finitely. Well, Clark seemed not to like that idea, while I was thinking vaguely (indeed as I'm no expert) of Turing oracles and the like.
I ought to note that, as to the reality of undiscovered legisigns, Peirce himself seemed
reluctant to assert the reality of things in pure mathematics - discovered or
undiscovered. I've long much leaned in favor of it - maths as discovered, not invented.
The mathematician Kronecker split the difference, saying that God created the integers,
all the rest is the work of man. As I recall, Peirce had doubts about the reality of
things in mathematics, but he thought that some of those things imposed themselves on the
mind with a forcefulness very like that of the real. Unfortunately I lost the email
drafts where I kept the quotes. Maybe one will need to allow of "grades" of
realness. I have no idea how to do that in a non-handwaving way.
Best, Ben
On 12/1/2025 7:16 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote:
List:
Peirce's semeiotic studies *all* signs, not just concrete sinsigns/tokens; and
in accordance with his thoroughgoing synechism (see that thread
https://list.iu.edu/sympa/arc/peirce-l/2025-11/msg00084.html), each of those is
an individual replica/instance of a general legisign/type. Human minds do not
*construct* such representations, they are *real*--they are as they are
regardless of what anyone thinks about them, including whether humans happen to
have invented *linguistic* legisigns/types for them.
What an infinite community *would* affirm after infinite investigation is
precisely how Peirce explicates the meaning of *truth* in practical
terms--those beliefs whose corresponding habits of conduct *would* never be
confounded by any *possible* future experience. Again, this is a regulative
principle and an intellectual hope, not an actual achievement. Denying it is
rejecting scholastic realism and thus pragmaticism, i.e., straightforwardly
disagreeing with Peirce himself.
Medically unexplained symptoms are still *symptoms* and therefore indexical
sinsigns/tokens that are replicas/instances of legisigns/types. The fact that
they are currently *unexplained*--we do not yet know what underlying conditions
are their dynamical objects--does not entail that they are *inexplicable*; and
according to Peirce, logic forbids us to *assume *that they are inexplicable.
After all, the medical profession presumably has not given up on explaining
them *eventually*.
Regards,
Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Structural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt / twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
On Sat, Nov 29, 2025 at 4:17 AM robert marty <[email protected]> wrote:
Jon, List,
Jon, I couldn't get back to you sooner for personal reasons. Admittedly, Gemini
3 and ChatGPT 4 are not on the list, but neither is Charles Sanders Peirce,
which is a pity. His semiotics is not built for infinity. It studies signs that
are concrete objects, so it presupposes a world with objects and human minds
that construct representations by establishing connections between objects
according to particular modalities. There must also be a human community that
seeks and establishes revisable laws, held to be accurate until proven
otherwise, which govern these objects and their relations. If, in the future, a
world without objects or humans comes into being, there will be no more
semiotics unless there remains a world populated by robots endowed with
quasi-minds that allow it to continue in a degenerate form.
Admittedly, the current scientific consensus recognizes that there is no proof
that the laws of nature are eternal. However, they appear to be stable and
universal within the limits of our observations, without ruling out the
possibility that they may have been different in the past or may become
different in the future. For this to be the case, there must be observations,
i.e., objects and human beings to observe. To evoke an infinite community and
an infinite number of investigations is pure speculation with no practical
consequences. Eternity is a concept that, by definition, cannot be measured
experimentally. We are therefore not going to stop doing semiotics while we
wait for the end of eternity. Personally, I am not in that situation.
I am not aware of any reservations you have regarding LLMs. I do not read all
of your writings, just as you do not read all of mine. To support such a claim,
one usually cites at least one reference. Indeed, your reservations are only of
interest if they are shared by a large part of the community that is constantly
discussing them.
With regard to qualia, it is incorrect to say that *"human scientists have indeed already
formulated the laws that govern our sensations of* colors, smells, pain, etc." Scientists have
not formulated any universal laws about qualia. They have established robust correlations between
brain activity and subjective experiences, and have proposed explanatory theories, but the mystery
of their nature remains. No law in the universe explains how an electrical signal becomes the color
"Red." The challenge remains to understand how and why the brain produces these conscious
experiences, and whether a unified theory is possible.
As for a "*specific *example of an iconic sinsign/token that is associated with the sensation
of red and is *not *a replica/instance of an iconic legisign/type," there is nothing better
than asking ChatGPT (despite your reservations). Here are some examples from the medical field,
many of which are familiar to everyone. These are "medically unexplained symptoms (MUS) or
functional symptoms. These are real, observable, and sometimes measurable symptoms, but no known
disease, structural abnormality, or laboratory explanation has been identified despite
evaluation."
But you asked for an example of the sensation of redness. So I asked ChatGPT if,
among MUS, some in the dermatological field were involved in skin redness. Here is
its response: "Several *dermatological symptoms*, including *skin redness*, can
be part of *MUS (Medically Unexplained Symptoms)* or conditions known as
*functional* or *idiopathic*. Here is the first of the seven most recognized cases:
*1. Intermittent facial erythema (flushing) with no identified cause: *sudden
redness of the face or neck, often accompanied by heat.
1. No identifiable rosacea
2. No allergies or food intolerances
3. Thyroid function, carcinoid, mast cell, menopause, etc., normal
This type of "idiopathic flushing" is relatively common in MUS.
*Summary: "Several forms of skin redness can be considered medically unexplained
symptoms, particularly intermittent flushing, functional neurovascular redness, certain
idiopathic erythemas, and manifestations related to dysautonomia."*
*Regards,*
*Robert Marty*
Honorary Professor ; PhD Mathematics ; PhD Philosophy
fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Marty
*https://martyrobert.academia.edu/ <https://martyrobert.academia.edu/>*
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