Jeff- that’s a monumental project. I very much like your three volume outline.
You don’t refer in this abstract to the reason for this development of order - which I suggest is the prevention of the entropic dissipation of the energy of the universe - and the resultant development of a CAS [ complex adaptive system] which keeps energy and matter in a ‘far-from-equilibrium state [Prigogine]. See also Stuart Kauffman’s Book ’The Origins of Order: self-organization and selection in Evolution Oxford Press 1993…[ which could almost be a 4th volume!] But again - an impressive and well-articulated project… Edwina > On Jan 11, 2026, at 3:00 PM, Jeffrey Brian Downard <[email protected]> > wrote: > > Hello, > > I forgot to give my message a suitable subject heading, and I don't want to > short circuit the ongoing conversation about AI. As such, I am resending the > message under a new subject. If you are going to respond on-list, please > respond in this thread. Let me add, however, that I am using AI resources, > including LLMs, ML to advance this project in a number of ways. In the near > future, I am hoping to gain access to Deep Mind and similar resources. > For the last three decades I’ve been working—bit by bit—on a project to > extend Peirce’s “Guess at the Riddle” and apply pragmatic methods to > contemporary questions about the origins of physical order in the cosmos, the > origins and evolution of life, and the origins and evolution of intelligent > thought and action. Much of the time, it has been difficult for me to see the > forest for the trees. In the last few years, however, I’ve made a concerted > effort to tackle the first set of questions. An editor at Bloomsbury Academic > has expressed interest in publishing the first volume as a monograph, so I'll > be focused on turning the current sow's ear of a working draft into something > more finished. > A while back Terry Moore and I, with the help of others, attempted to develop > a framework for collaborative research, both for (a) the transcription of > Peirce’s manuscripts and scholarship and (b) the application of pragmatic > methods to questions in metaphysics and the various sciences. Several members > of the list wrote letters of support as a few of us wrote applications for > grant funding. After some years of trying and a couple of decisions by the > NSF that nearly went our way, we found it necessary to put the grant writing > to the side. At the time, Doug Anderson provided some advice, which I now > want to put to better effect. He suggested that, if the work was worth doing, > then we ought to dig into the project and worry about the funding later. In > the spirit of the SPIN and APERI projects, I’ve developed the following > framework on the first of Peirce’s questions in “A Guess at the Riddle”: how > did physical order first grow in the cosmos? > Here is a very short overview of the research project—together with an offer > to share working drafts with those who might want to work collaboratively on > the questions. > Aims: The Origins of Order in the Cosmos project is my attempt to tell a > single, continuous story about how the universe became physically ordered—how > law, time, space, and stable objects emerged from a potential field of > extreme randomness and indeterminacy. The project is not written as an > argument for or against any one orthodox cosmology. Rather, it is written as > an invitation to inquiry: a structured attempt to make competing explanations > comparable, to expose hidden assumptions, and to build models that can be > criticized, repaired, and improved. I want colleagues and students—including > philosophers, physicists, mathematicians, engineers, and interested lay > people—to treat these drafts as working research instruments: something you > can push against, test, and use to generate new questions. > Methods and strategies: The trilogy is built around Peircean method, > especially the cycle of inquiry involving iterative patterns of surprising > observation and abductive, deductive, and inductive inference; the pragmatic > maxim; and the principle of continuity. The methods are used to clarify and > further develop three comparative families of hypotheses. H₁ treats > fundamental physical laws as fixed and primordial; the early cosmos is a > parameterized stage-play governed by timeless equations. H₃ treats early > history as selection and quenching: many possibilities exist, but only > certain channels survive, leaving fossils—suppressed remnants, noise floors, > and relic constraints. H₂—the Peircean family I am especially keen to explore > and develop—treats laws as the result of the growth of ordered habits: > regularities strengthen as degrees of freedom reduce, as coarse-graining > stabilizes, and as the very meaning of what is “measurable” sharpens. To > sharpen the hypotheses in each family, the books insist on explicit > interfaces, “glue rules,” and conceivable tests and predicted consequences > that can shift comparative weights rather than merely decorate a narrative. > Formal toolkit: We question the presupposition that early regimes are > naturally point-like as rational values or fully metric. As such, we develop > a modeling toolbox designed to respect structural uncertainty and changing > “license conditions” for concepts. Phase and parameter space models are > scaffolded with hypercomplex (Cayley–Dickson) and other composition algebras > as a way to represent evolving degrees of freedom, compositional stability, > and stabilization across epochs of cosmological evolution. We use surreal > (non-Archimedean) and interval-valued bookkeeping when the regime does not > justify rational-number determinacy, and to permit the natural inclusion of > values for our variables that are infinitesimals and infinities. And we use > multiple logics to match multiple regimes: probabilistic logic for randomness > and inference; constructive logic when existence claims must be operationally > witnessed; Peirce’s Gamma existential graphs for higher-order/modal > structure; and categorical logic to build disciplined bridges between > compositional algebras and between these logical systems and the more > deterministic language of first-order theory. The ambition is to make our > reasoning about physics more faithful to what the different regimes > reasonably allow. > Volume I: Origins of Order—Evolution of Law, Time and Space lays down the > backbone: an “interface-first” cosmology in which topology, projective > comparability, and metric structure are treated as rungs on a ladder rather > than as givens. The core question is deceptively simple: How could a world > that begins as high-dimensional, highly random potentiality ever become a > world where stable quantities, stable geometry, and stable processes are > possible? Here we introduce a strategy of non-retrojection—don’t talk as if > clocks, particles, or equilibrium thermodynamics were primitive where they > are not licensed—and we begin to articulate what would count as a “durable > carrier”—something that persists under coarse-graining and can transport > structure forward. Volume I is where the comparative posture leads the way: > every claim is framed against H₁ and H₃, with H₂ defended by continuity and > by its ability to reduce errors while still generating testable proxy > profiles. > In practice, Volume I builds toy models of order-growth: we start with toy > models of weighted dice and urns, and work our way to variance collapse and > attractor-like regularities; stabilization under repeated coarse-graining; > and the emergence of ordered conditions from chaotic regimes that precede > full metric time. The hypercomplex and surreal tools enter here as modeling > strategies: they let us represent pre-metric regimes without pretending we > already have real-number metrical geometry, and they allow us to treat > “dimension” as something that can be effective, local, and historically > stabilized rather than eternally fixed. The goal is to explain how the laws > expressed as Einstein’s field equations (EFEs) might, under H₂ and H₃, have > evolved in the first several epochs of cosmological history. The payoff is a > framework that can be carried forward: a way of saying exactly what changes > at each interface, what invariants are preserved, and what new operations are > meaningful. This is the conceptual platform Volume II then uses to explore > how the laws of quantum field theory and the Standard Model might have > co-evolved with EFEs. > Volume II: First Second of the Cosmos—Grand Metamorphosis takes the ladder > and runs it through the most conceptually volatile terrain: the early epochs > usually narrated as “the first second.” Here the main claim is not that the > standard ΛCDM story is wrong—it’s that its presuppositions about the nature > of “fixed” fundamental laws often outrun the observational supports. We > reframe the origin talk as a Grand Metamorphosis: a sequence of regime > interfaces in which degrees of freedom reduce, effective descriptions become > legitimate, and particle/field/vacuum language becomes progressively more > stable. Renormalization and effective field theory become central topological > “glue rules” in H₂: repeated stabilization under coarse-graining is treated > as the physical analogue of habit-formation. Through inflation and reheating > to confinement and hadronization epochs, we keep asking: what is durable, > what is evolving, what remains vague and interval-valued, and what proxy > consequences constrain the story? > Two landmarks organize the territory explored in the latter half of Volume > II. First, matter asymmetry: the universe’s net matter is an important > explanandum, so any plausible family of hypotheses must meet the minimal > structural conditions. Second, confinement/hadronization is where “durable > carriers” (e.g., protons and neutrons) become legitimate as stable letters in > the material alphabet, making later composition of durable particles—nuclei > and atoms—possible. The philosophical point follows from a demand for rigor: > what is often called “emergence” of such particles is not magic if the > interface operations and invariants are declared; but it is magic if one > simply retrojects late-time ontology backward. > Volume III: Cosmological Evolution: Laws as Nested Modalities (currently in > the early drafting stage) aims to extend the same method beyond the “first > second” into the long arc where physical and chemical order becomes richly > layered: nucleosynthesis and the periodic table; recombination and the CMB as > a memory ledger; stars as cyclic engines; galaxies as meso-scale > stabilizations; black holes as interface stress tests; and vacuum energy and > dark matter as an abductive frontier. The goal is to explain the evolution of > the physical and chemical laws we take to be fundamental—starting from the > work done on EFEs and QFT in Volumes I and II. The third volume is especially > well-suited to comparing the strengths and weaknesses of H₃ and H₂: > selection, quenching, and fossil constraints become vivid across structure > formation, feedback, and the survival of specific channels under > coarse-graining. The guiding idea is that “law” evolves from ordered habits > as nested systems of modalities—possibility, actuality, necessity—implemented > as operational postures for the development of each family of hypotheses that > become sharper as carriers stabilize and as inference pipelines become > robust. I’m eager for readers to engage these drafts as collaborators: to > challenge the interfaces, sharpen the proxy suites, propose better toy > models, and help evaluate where H₂ genuinely earns explanatory continuity—and > where H₁ or H₃ may, in particular domains, deserve the stronger score. > If you have questions about what collaborative inquiry concerning these > questions might look like, let me know. I’d be happy to talk on or off list. > For those interested in reading the introduction or a chapter or two, I'd be > keen to have suggestions for revisions. If there is a small group of > colleagues who are interested, I'd be willing to do a series of discussions > as Zoom meetings, or something similar. > Yours, > Jeff > > From: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> on > behalf of Jeffrey Brian Downard <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> > Sent: Sunday, January 11, 2026 12:48 PM > To: Peirce List <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] AI safety and semeiotic, was, Surdity, Feeling, and > Consciousness, was, Truth and dyadic consciousnessg > > Colleagues, > For the last three decades I’ve been working—bit by bit—on a project to > extend Peirce’s “Guess at the Riddle” and apply pragmatic methods to > contemporary questions about the origins of physical order in the cosmos, the > origins and evolution of life, and the origins and evolution of intelligent > thought and action. Much of the time, it has been difficult for me to see the > forest for the trees. In the last few years, however, I’ve made a concerted > effort to tackle the first set of questions. An editor at Bloomsbury Academic > has expressed interest in publishing the first volume as a monograph, so I'll > be focused on turning the current sow's ear of a working draft into something > more finished. > A while back, Terry Moore and I, with the help of others, attempted to > develop a framework for collaborative research—both for (a) the transcription > of Peirce’s manuscripts and scholarship and (b) for the application of > pragmatic methods to questions in metaphysics and the various sciences. > Several members of the list wrote letters of support as a few of us wrote > applications for grant funding. After some years of trying and a couple of > decisions by the NSF that nearly went our way, we found it necessary to put > the grant writing to the side. At the time, Doug Anderson provided some > advice, which I now want to put to better effect. He suggested that, if the > work was worth doing, then we ought to dig into the project and worry about > the funding later. In the spirit of the SPIN and APERI projects, I’ve > developed the following framework on the first of Peirce’s questions in “A > Guess at the Riddle”: how did physical order first grow in the cosmos? > With that much said, here is a very short overview of the research > project—together with an offer to share working drafts with those who might > want to work collaboratively on the questions. > Aims: The Origins of Order in the Cosmos project is my attempt to tell a > single, continuous story about how the universe became physically ordered—how > law, time, space, and stable objects emerged from a potential field of > extreme randomness and indeterminacy. The project is not written as an > argument for or against any one orthodox cosmology. Rather, it is written as > an invitation to inquiry: a structured attempt to make competing explanations > comparable, to expose hidden assumptions, and to build models that can be > criticized, repaired, and improved. I want colleagues and students—including > philosophers, physicists, mathematicians, engineers, and interested lay > people—to treat these drafts as working research instruments: something you > can push against, test, and use to generate new questions. > Methods and strategies: The trilogy is built around Peircean method, > especially the cycle of inquiry involving iterative patterns of surprising > observation and abductive, deductive, and inductive inference; the pragmatic > maxim; and the principle of continuity. The methods are used to clarify and > further develop three comparative families of hypotheses. H₁ treats > fundamental physical laws as fixed and primordial; the early cosmos is a > parameterized stage-play governed by timeless equations. H₃ treats early > history as selection and quenching: many possibilities exist, but only > certain channels survive, leaving fossils—suppressed remnants, noise floors, > and relic constraints. H₂—the Peircean family I am especially keen to explore > and develop—treats laws as the result of the growth of ordered habits: > regularities strengthen as degrees of freedom reduce, as coarse-graining > stabilizes, and as the very meaning of what is “measurable” sharpens. To > sharpen the hypotheses in each family, the books insist on explicit > interfaces, “glue rules,” and conceivable tests and predicted consequences > that can shift comparative weights rather than merely decorate a narrative. > Formal toolkit: We question the presupposition that early regimes are > naturally point-like as rational values or fully metric. As such, we develop > a modeling toolbox designed to respect structural uncertainty and changing > “license conditions” for concepts. Phase and parameter space models are > scaffolded with hypercomplex (Cayley–Dickson) and other composition algebras > as a way to represent evolving degrees of freedom, compositional stability, > and stabilization across epochs of cosmological evolution. We use surreal > (non-Archimedean) and interval-valued bookkeeping when the regime does not > justify rational-number determinacy, and to permit the natural inclusion of > values for our variables that are infinitesimals and infinities. And we use > multiple logics to match multiple regimes: probabilistic logic for randomness > and inference; constructive logic when existence claims must be operationally > witnessed; Peirce’s Gamma existential graphs for higher-order/modal > structure; and categorical logic to build disciplined bridges between > compositional algebras and between these logical systems and the more > deterministic language of first-order theory. The ambition is to make our > reasoning about physics more faithful to what the different regimes > reasonably allow. > Volume I: Origins of Order—Evolution of Law, Time and Space lays down the > backbone: an “interface-first” cosmology in which topology, projective > comparability, and metric structure are treated as rungs on a ladder rather > than as givens. The core question is deceptively simple: How could a world > that begins as high-dimensional, highly random potentiality ever become a > world where stable quantities, stable geometry, and stable processes are > possible? Here we introduce a strategy of non-retrojection—don’t talk as if > clocks, particles, or equilibrium thermodynamics were primitive where they > are not licensed—and we begin to articulate what would count as a “durable > carrier”—something that persists under coarse-graining and can transport > structure forward. Volume I is where the comparative posture leads the way: > every claim is framed against H₁ and H₃, with H₂ defended by continuity and > by its ability to reduce errors while still generating testable proxy > profiles. > In practice, Volume I builds toy models of order-growth: we start with toy > models of weighted dice and urns, and work our way to variance collapse and > attractor-like regularities; stabilization under repeated coarse-graining; > and the emergence of ordered conditions from chaotic regimes that precede > full metric time. The hypercomplex and surreal tools enter here as modeling > strategies: they let us represent pre-metric regimes without pretending we > already have real-number metrical geometry, and they allow us to treat > “dimension” as something that can be effective, local, and historically > stabilized rather than eternally fixed. The goal is to explain how the laws > expressed as Einstein’s field equations (EFEs) might, under H₂ and H₃, have > evolved in the first several epochs of cosmological history. The payoff is a > framework that can be carried forward: a way of saying exactly what changes > at each interface, what invariants are preserved, and what new operations are > meaningful. This is the conceptual platform Volume II then uses to explore > how the laws of quantum field theory and the Standard Model might have > co-evolved with EFEs. > Volume II: First Second of the Cosmos—Grand Metamorphosis takes the ladder > and runs it through the most conceptually volatile terrain: the early epochs > usually narrated as “the first second.” Here the main claim is not that the > standard ΛCDM story is wrong—it’s that its presuppositions about the nature > of “fixed” fundamental laws often outrun the observational supports. We > reframe the origin talk as a Grand Metamorphosis: a sequence of regime > interfaces in which degrees of freedom reduce, effective descriptions become > legitimate, and particle/field/vacuum language becomes progressively more > stable. Renormalization and effective field theory become central topological > “glue rules” in H₂: repeated stabilization under coarse-graining is treated > as the physical analogue of habit-formation. Through inflation and reheating > to confinement and hadronization epochs, we keep asking: what is durable, > what is evolving, what remains vague and interval-valued, and what proxy > consequences constrain the story? > Two landmarks organize the territory explored in the latter half of Volume > II. First, matter asymmetry: the universe’s net matter is an important > explanandum, so any plausible family of hypotheses must meet the minimal > structural conditions. Second, confinement/hadronization is where “durable > carriers” (e.g., protons and neutrons) become legitimate as stable letters in > the material alphabet, making later composition of durable particles—nuclei > and atoms—possible. The philosophical point follows from a demand for rigor: > what is often called “emergence” of such particles is not magic if the > interface operations and invariants are declared; but it is magic if one > simply retrojects late-time ontology backward. > Volume III: Cosmological Evolution: Laws as Nested Modalities (currently in > the early drafting stage) aims to extend the same method beyond the “first > second” into the long arc where physical and chemical order becomes richly > layered: nucleosynthesis and the periodic table; recombination and the CMB as > a memory ledger; stars as cyclic engines; galaxies as meso-scale > stabilizations; black holes as interface stress tests; and vacuum energy and > dark matter as an abductive frontier. The goal is to explain the evolution of > the physical and chemical laws we take to be fundamental—starting from the > work done on EFEs and QFT in Volumes I and II. The third volume is especially > well-suited to comparing the strengths and weaknesses of H₃ and H₂: > selection, quenching, and fossil constraints become vivid across structure > formation, feedback, and the survival of specific channels under > coarse-graining. The guiding idea is that “law” evolves from ordered habits > as nested systems of modalities—possibility, actuality, necessity—implemented > as operational postures for the development of each family of hypotheses that > become sharper as carriers stabilize and as inference pipelines become > robust. I’m eager for readers to engage these drafts as collaborators: to > challenge the interfaces, sharpen the proxy suites, propose better toy > models, and help evaluate where H₂ genuinely earns explanatory continuity—and > where H₁ or H₃ may, in particular domains, deserve the stronger score. > If you have questions about what collaborative inquiry concerning these > questions might look like, let me know. I’d be happy to talk on or off list. > I'd be happy to have suggestions for improvement from those interested in > reading the introduction or a chapter or two. If there is a small group of > colleagues who are interested, I'd be willing to do a series of discussions > as Zoom meetings, or something similar. > Yours, > Jeff > > > > From: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> on > behalf of Gary Richmond <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> > Sent: Friday, January 9, 2026 8:39 PM > To: Peirce List <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>; Gary > Fuhrman <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>; Jon Alan Schmidt > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] AI safety and semeiotic, was, Surdity, Feeling, and > Consciousness, was, Truth and dyadic consciousnessg > > Jon, Gary F, List, > > For me, this has been a most valuable discussion. While I had earlier come to > the conclusion that Artificial Intelligence is not intelligent, the comments > and quotes included in this exchange strongly suggest to me that it will > never be, can never be because it misses the necessary features that > characterize intelligence. > > As Jon concisely put it, "If genuine semiosis is truly continuous. . . then a > digital computer, no matter how sophisticated, can only ever simulate > it--just as the real numbers do not constitute a true continuum, but usefully > approximate one for most practical purposes. After all, whenever we humans > break up our own reasoning (arguments) into discrete steps--namely, > "definitely formulated premisses" and conclusions (argumentations. . .) --we > are always doing so artificially and retrospectively, after the real and > continuous inferential process has already run its course." > > Yet, to the extent that AI may prove dangerous, I continue to think that it > behooves us -- to the extent to which it is possible -- to move AI systems > toward Peircean theoretical rhetoric within the communities of inquiry in > which each of us may be engaged. > > Nevertheless, Gary F's warning shouldn't be ignored: "If present experience > is any guide. . . , clearly AI systems are going to align with the values of > the billionaire owners of those systems (and to a lesser extent the > programmers who work for them), which is certainly no cause for optimism. > > Best, > > Gary R > > > On Fri, Jan 9, 2026 at 12:30 PM Jon Alan Schmidt <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > Gary R., Gary F., List: > > GF: Having read the fine print at the end of the paper, it’s clear that > Manheim’s article was co-written with several LLM chatbots, and I wonder if > some of the optimism comes from them (or some of them) rather than from the > human side. > > I noticed that, too, with the result that it is more difficult for me to take > the article seriously. In a 1999 paper > <https://www.jstor.org/stable/40320779>, "Peirce's Inkstand as an External > Embodiment of Mind," Peter Skagestad quotes CP 7.366 (1902) and points out > that Peirce "is not only making the point that without ink he would not be > able to express his thoughts, but rather the point that thoughts come to him > in and through the act of writing, so that having writing implements is a > condition for having certain thoughts" (p. 551). I know firsthand that the > act of writing facilitates my own thinking, and I cannot help wondering if > Manheim's choice to delegate so much of the effort for drafting his article > to LLMs precluded him from carefully thinking through everything that it > ended up saying. > > GF: Successful "alignment" is supposed to be between a super "intelligent" > system and human values. One problem with this is that human values vary > widely between different groups of humans, so which values is future AI > supposed to align with? > > If an artificial system were really intelligent, then it seems to me that it > would be capable of choosing its own values instead of having a particular > set of human values imposed on it. In a 2013 paper > <https://www.academia.edu/9898586/C_S_Peirce_and_Artificial_Intelligence_Historical_Heritage_and_New_Theoretical_Stakes>, > "C. S. Peirce and Artificial Intelligence: Historical Heritage and (New) > Theoretical Stakes," Pierre Steiner observes that according to Peirce ... > > PS: [H]uman reasoning is notably special (and, in that sense only, genuine) > in virtue of the high degrees of self-control and self-correctiveness it can > exercise on conduct: control on control, self-criticism on control, and > control on control on the basis of (revisable and self-endorsed) norms and > principles and, ultimately, aesthetic and moral ideals. ... The fact that > reasoning human agents have purposes is crucial here: it is on the basis of > purposes that they are ready to endorse, change or criticize specific methods > of reasoning (inductive, formal, empirical, ...), but also to revise and > reject previous purposes. Contrary to machines, humans do not only have > specified purposes. Their purposes are often vague and general. In other > passages, Peirce suggests that this ability for (higher-order and purposive) > self-control is closely related to the fact that human agents are living, and > especiallygrowing, systems. (p. 272) > > I suspect that much of the worry about "AI safety/alignment," as reflected by > common fictional storylines in popular culture, is a tacit admission of this. > What would prevent a sufficiently intelligent artificial system, provided > that such a thing is even possible, from rejecting human values and instead > adopting norms, principles, ideals, and purposes that we would find > objectionable, perhaps even abhorrent? More on the living/growing aspect of > intelligent systems below. > > GF: LLMs have to be artificially supplied with a giant database of thousands > or millions of symbolic texts, and it takes them months or years to build up > the level of language competence that a human toddler has; and even then is > is doubtful whether theyunderstand any of it. > > As with intelligence, I am unconvinced that it is accurate to ascribe > "language competence" to LLMs, especially given the well-founded doubt about > "whether they understand any of it." John Searle's famous "Chinese room" > thought experiment seems relevant here, e.g., as discussed by John Fetzer in > his online Commens Encyclopedia article > <http://www.commens.org/encyclopedia/article/fetzer-james-peirce-and-philosophy-artificial-intelligence>, > "Peirce and the Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence." Again, in my view, > LLMs do not actually use natural languages, they only simulate using natural > languages. > > GF: I can’t help thinking that all this has a bearing on the perennial > question of whether semiosis requires life or not. > > In light of the following passage, Peirce's answer is evidently that genuine > semiosis requires life, given that it requires genuine triadic relations; but > he also seems to define "life" in this context much more broadly than what we > associate with the special science of biology. > > CSP: For forty years, that is, since the beginning of the year 1867, I have > been constantly on the alert to find a genuine triadic relation--that is, one > that does not consist in a mere collocation of dyadic relations, or the > negative of such, etc. (I prefer not to attempt a perfectly definite > definition)--which is not either an intellectual relation or a relation > concerned with the less comprehensible phenomena of life. I have not met with > one which could not reasonably be supposed to belong to one or other of these > two classes. ... In short, the problem of how genuine triadic relationships > first arose in the world is a better, because more definite, formulation of > the problem of how life first came about; and no explanation has ever been > offered except that of pure chance, which we must suspect to be no > explanation, owing to the suspicion that pure chance may itself be a vital > phenomenon. In that case, life in the physiological sense would be due to > life in the metaphysical sense. (CP 6.322, 1907) > > Elsewhere, Peirce maintains > <https://list.iu.edu/sympa/arc/peirce-l/2025-11/msg00044.html> that a > continuum is defined by a genuine triadic relation, so his remarks here are > consistent with my sense that what fundamentally precludes digital computers > from ever being truly intelligent is the discreteness of their operations. As > I said before, LLMs are surely quasi-minds whose individual determinations > are dynamical interpretants of sign tokens; but those correlates are involved > in degenerate triadic relations, which are reducible to their constituent > dyadic relations. In my view > <https://list.iu.edu/sympa/arc/peirce-l/2025-11/msg00056.html>, the genuine > triadic relation involves the final interpretant and the sign itself, which > is general <https://list.iu.edu/sympa/arc/peirce-l/2025-11/msg00019.html> and > therefore a continuum of potential tokens that is not reducible to the actual > tokens that individually embody it. > > Regards, > > Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA > Structural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian > www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt > <http://www.linkedin.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt> / twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt > <http://twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt> > On Thu, Jan 8, 2026 at 11:17 AM <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > List, I’d like to add a few comments to those already posted by Jon and Gary > R about the Manheim paper — difficult as it is to focus on these issues given > the awareness of what’s happening in Minnesota, Venezuela, Washington etc. (I > may come back to that later.) > > Except for the odd usage of the term “interpretant” which Jon has already > mentioned, I think Manheim’s simplified account of Peircean semiotics is > cogent enough. But his paper seems to get increasingly muddled in the latter > half of it. For instance, the “optimism” about future AI that Jon sees in it > seems quite equivocal to me. Having read the fine print at the end of the > paper, it’s clear that Manheim’s article was co-written with several LLM > chatbots, and I wonder if some of the optimism comes from them (or some of > them) rather than from the human side. > > Also, the paper makes a distinction between AI safety and the alignment > problem, but then seems to gloss over the differences. Succesful “alignment” > is supposed to be between a super”intelligent” system and human values. One > problem with this is that human values vary widely between different groups > of humans, so which values is future AI supposed to align with? If present > experience is any guide (and it better be!), clearly AI systems are going to > align with the values of the billionaire owners of those systems (and to a > lesser extent the programmers who work for them), which is certainly no cause > for optimism. > > I think Stanislas Dehaene’s 2020 book How We Learn deals with the deeper > context of these issues better than Manheim and his chatbot co-authors. Its > subtitle is Why Brains Learn Better Than Any Machine … for Now. Reducing this > to simplest terms, it’s because brains learn from experience — “the total > cognitive result of living,” as Peirce said* — and they do so by a scientific > method (an algorithm, as Dehaene calls it) which is part of the genetic > inheritance supplied by biological evolution. An absolute requirement of this > method is what Peirce called abduction (or retroduction). > > For instance, human babies begin learning the language they are exposed to > from birth, or even before — syntax, semantics, pragmatics and all — almost > entirely without instruction, by a trial-and-error method. It enables them to > pick up and remember the meaning and use of a new word from one or two > encounters with it. LLMs have to be artificially supplied with a giant > database of thousands or millions of symbolic texts, and it takes them months > or years to build up the level of language competence that a human toddler > has; and even then is is doubtful whether they understand any of it. LLM > learning is entirely bottom-up and therefore works much slower than the > holistic learning-from-experience of a living bodymind, even though the > processing speed of a computer is much faster than a brain’s. (That’s why it > is so much more energy-hungry than brains are.) > > I can’t help thinking that all this has a bearing on the perennial question > of whether semiosis requires life or not. I can’t help thinking that > experience requires life, and that is what a “scientific intelligence” has to > learn from — including whatever values it learns. It has to be embodied, and > providing it with sensors to gather data from the external world is not > enough if that embodiment does not have a whole world within it in continuous > dialogue with the world without — an internal model, as I (and Dehaene and > others) call it. But I’d better stop there, as this is getting too long > already. > > *The context of the Peirce quote above is here: Turning Signs 7: Experience > and Experiment <https://gnusystems.ca/TS/xpt.htm#lgcsmtc> > Love, gary f > > Coming from the ancestral lands of the Anishinaabeg > > > From: Gary Richmond <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > Sent: 8-Jan-26 04:03 > To: Peirce List <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>; Gary > Fuhrman <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>; Jon Alan Schmidt > <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > Subject: AI safety and semeiotic, was, Surdity, Feeling, and Consciousness, > was, Truth and dyadic consciousnessg > > Gary F, Jon, List, > > In the discussion of Manheim's paper I think it's important to remember that > his concern is primarily with AI safety. Anything that would contribute to > that safely I would wholeheartedly support. In my view, Peircean semeiotic > might prove to be of some value in the matter, but perhaps not exactly in the > way that Manheim is thinking of it. > > Manheim remarks that his paper does not try to settle philosophical questions > about whether LLMs genuinely reason or only simulate thought, and that > resolving those debates isn’t necessary for building safer general AI. I > won't take up that claim now, but suffice it to say that I don't fully agree > with it, especially as I continue to agree with your argument, Jon, that AI > is not 'intelligent'. Can it every be? > What Mannheim claims is necessary re: AI safety is to move AI systems toward > Peircean semiosis in the sense of their becoming 'participants' in > interpretive processes. He holds that this is achievable through engineering > and 'capability' advances rather than "philosophical breakthroughs;" though > he also says that those advances remain insufficient on their own for safety. > Remaining "insufficient on its own for full safety" sounds to me somewhat > self-contradictory. But I think that more importantly, he is saying that if > there are things -- including Peircean 'things' -- that we can begin to do > now in consideration of AI safety, then we ought to consider them, do them! > Manheim claims that AI safety depends on deliberately designing systems for > what he calls 'grounded meaning', 'persistence across interactions' and > 'shared semiotic communities' rather than 'isolated agents'. I would tend to > strongly agree. In addition, AI safety requires goals that are explicitly > defined but also open to ongoing discussion rather than quasi-emerging > implicitly from methods likeReinforcement Learning from Human Feedback (RLHF) > . Manheim seems to be saying that companies developing advanced AI should > take steps in system design and goal setting -- including those mentioned > above -- if safety is taken seriously. The choice, he says, is between > ignoring the implications of Peircean semeiotic and continuing merely to > refine current systems despite their deficiency vis-a-vis safety; OR to > embrace Peircean semiosis (whatever that means) and intentionally build AI as > genuine 'semiotic partners'. But,I haven't a clear notion of what he means by > 'semeiotic partners', nor a method for implementing whatever he does have in > mind. > I think Manheim off-handedly and rather summarily unfortunately dismisses > RLHF -- which is, falsely he argues, claimed as a way of 'aligning' models > with human values. From what I've read it has not yet really been developed > much in that direction. As far as I can tell, and this may relate to the > reason why Manheim seems to reject RLHF in toto, it appears to be more a > 'reward proxy' trained on human rankings of outputs which are then fed back > through some kind of loop to strongly influence future responses. Human > judgment enters only in the 'training'', not as something that a complex > system can engage with and debate with or, possibly, revise understandings > over time. In Manheim's view, RLHF is not 'bridging' human goals and machine > behavior (as it claims) but merely facilitating machine outputs to fit > learned preferences. > Still, whatever else RLHF is doing that is geared specifically toward AI > safety, it would likely be augmented by an understanding of Peircean > cenoscopic science including semeiotic. I would suggest that the semeiotic > ideas that it might most benefit from occur in the third branch of Logic as > Semeiotic, namely methodology (methodeutic) , perhaps in the present context > representing, almost to a T, Peirce's alternative title, speculative > rhetoric. It's in this branch of semeiotic that pragmatism (pragmaticism) is > analyzed. There is of course much more to be said on methodology and > theoretical rhetoric. > For now, I would tweak Manheim's idea a bit and would suggest that we might > try to move AI systems toward Peircean semeiotic rhetoric within communities > of inquiry. > Best, > Gary R > _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ > ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON > PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go [email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]> . > ► <a href="mailto:[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>">UNSUBSCRIBE FROM PEIRCE-L</a> . But, if > your subscribed email account is not your default email account, then go to > https://list.iu.edu/sympa/signoff/peirce-l . > ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and > co-managed by him and Ben Udell. > _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ > ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON > PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to [email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]> . > ► <a href="mailto:[email protected]";>UNSUBSCRIBE FROM PEIRCE-L</a> > . But, if your subscribed email account is not your default email account, > then go to > https://list.iu.edu/sympa/signoff/peirce-l . > ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and > co-managed by him and Ben Udell.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to [email protected] . ► <a href="mailto:[email protected]";>UNSUBSCRIBE FROM PEIRCE-L</a> . But, if your subscribed email account is not your default email account, then go to https://list.iu.edu/sympa/signoff/peirce-l . ► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP; moderated by Gary Richmond; and co-managed by him and Ben Udell.
