Ulysses, Gary, Jon, List,
thanks, Ulysses, that is a very good example. I too have posted an example ("press") in my initial post, but the first two posts got lost somehow in this thread, so I now have restored them (see very below). But please note, that I have revised some aspects later: Not the whole BO is "dismantled and destroyed" by an antagonistic subsystem, but the union-part of its (what I called "common object") is weakened, and the division-part is strengthened.
I think, the division-part of a BO is due to different connotations. These can appear not only between different persons or social groups, but also with e.g. just one person, in different contexts.
The object, which is not a BO, but a common object, and requires an absolutely undivided society, is just a thought-experiment. I doubt, that such a shared object exists.
Now I want to compare two differences: First, there is the difference between Peircean semiotics and BO-theory / systems theory: In Peircean semiotics, objects don´t change, but are, as I metaphorized, reborn (With this I exactly meant the same as Jon´s and Gary´s analysis). A better term perhaps is "replaced". Replacement means discrete steps. In systems theory though, an object (like Gary´s example: An institution) gradually changes.
This difference I want to compare with the dimming of a lamp in thermodynamics and in quantum theory. In thermodynamics, dimming is a gradual process. In quantum theory, photons are discrete packages of energy. For example, on a shone-on piece of paper, you first have the light intensity of a million photons per square inch and nanosecond, and two nanoseconds later, this light intensity is replaced by a new light intensity: A million minus one photons per square inch and nanosecond.
This comparison though is flawed, as a change of light intensity is about quantity, and a change of object is about quality. But I think, it illustrates what I mean: Both the system-theory´s concept of "object", and the Peircean concept, are not contradicting, good tools for analysis. But a translation between them is necessary, or you always have to say first, which theory you are applying at the moment. Or not even that, as thermodynamics and quantum theory too may be combined: It just is so, that in a small-scale-analysis (Peirce) you can see the steps or replacements, and in a big-scale-analysis (systems theory), you don´t.
Best,
Helmut
26. September 2026 um 00:34
Ulysses <[email protected]>
wrote:My understanding of a boundary object is something that means slightly different but partially overlapping things for different communities and thus can bring groups together but does not truly unite them.
The example I am familiar with is a taxidermic specimen at a museum. For biologists it might be a token exemplar of a species. For museum administrators it might be valuable because of the relative rarity of species and how it aligns with the museum’s mission. In this case it would be sign of reputation or some social/normative value. For taxidermists themselves, the very same specimen might be a sign of specific techniques of animal preservation.
I think examples like this bring about a few questions for Peircean semiotics. While colloquially we say it is the same object, is the object of the sign really the same in each of these cases? What is the sign in each of these cases, and does it include what Peirce sometimes terms collateral experience/collateral observation? For example do the different rational communities bring different experiences to bear on the object (based on their training) and form different composite signs (specimen + collateral experience) which form the basis of different interpretants?
It seems like each group is picking up on different iconic and indexical qualities that coexist in the same object. Colloquially I would say they form different interpretations of the same thing. The way I would normally talk about it would include how individual acts of deliberation are consciously choosing to focus on different aspects of the object. I am not exactly sure how to square this with a language of interpretants where interpretants are always the product of previous steps in process because it seems like there are interpretative acts being made that single out what qualities in the object are being attended to before the object is even considered as a sign.
My hunch would be that, through different training, people habituate their individual minds to form different percepts when in contact with the same object and this becomes the foundation of different perceptual judgements, leading to different chains of semiosis. In this case it’s not that the interpretant formed is reaching back in time and selecting the qualities in the object but rather a long running chain of previous semiosis is already forming different intermediate signs which become the inputs to the different interpretants.
On Fri, Sep 25, 2026 at 12:01 pm, Gary Richmond <[email protected]> wrote:
Jon, Helmut, List,
Jon, your distinction between the dynamical object of a particular sign and the object of a subsequent sign helps clarify what I think Helmut is getting at. The interpretant does not turn back and determine the dynamical object of the sign that produced it, but it may become a further sign, and so it may also affect what people expect and do such that their actions can change the situation in which further semiosis takes place. Parker’s account of a world that includes each new sign seems helpful here.
Helmut, I take your question about what happens after an interpretant is formed to concern how interpretation can lead to changes in the world. Shared expectations affect what people do: their actions may change a social situation and that changed situation may give rise to further signs and interpretations. Is that the process you have in mind?
I also understand your hesitancy regarding 'habit'. In ordinary usage it may suggest, for example, a personal routine not reflected on. For Peirce, however, a habit is a disposition to respond in certain ways under certain circumstances. It can be shared, reflected upon, and potentially changed. Your phrase “shared expectations” tends toward that idea, I think.
Finally, I would hesitate to place social structure in 2ns rather than 3ns. Actual encounters, resistances, and changes involve 2ns. Shared expectations, insofar as they guide how people would respond on future occasions, involve 3ns. An interesting question is how those expectations are sustained and changed through actual encounters.
Best,
Gary R.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _On Thu, Sep 24, 2026 at 6:17 PM Jon Alan Schmidt <[email protected]> wrote:_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _Helmut, List:As I have said before, it seems to me that an interpreter's expectation is a determination of that individual quasi-mind by previous signs; hence, it indeed pertains to the object of any sign that is currently determining that quasi-mind, not the interpretant of that particular sign. However, according to Peirce ...Therefore, every sign's dynamical object is likewise external to its interpretant, independent of it, and unaffected by it; so, it is not the case that "the interpretant then determines the dynamical object." However, the dynamical object of that interpretant (as another sign) now includes the very sign of which it is the interpretant, and the dynamical object of any subsequent interpretant (as yet another sign) includes that previous interpretant, and so on. Kelly A. Parker summarizes this nicely in his 1992 book, The Continuity of Peirce's Thought.
- Semiosis always and only proceeds in one direction, from the object through the sign toward the interpretant.
- Every sign determines its interpretant to stand in the same triadic relation to its object as that sign itself does.
- By definition, every sign's dynamical object is external to that sign, independent of it, and unaffected by it.
KAP: The dynamical object in each successive representation in the process is necessarily different from that of its predecessor. The dynamical object of the first representation is the real universe at that time, and the immediate object is an abstraction consisting of some aspects of this reality. The next representation, however, cannot have exactly the same dynamical object. The real universe is at that point populated by at least one additional entity--the first representamen itself. Every successive representation in the semeiotic process thus has as its dynamical object not just the universe which the first representamen represented, but that universe plus the first representamen itself. (p. 148)I add my usual disclaimer that whenever we discuss seemingly discrete objects, signs, and interpretants, we are referring to artifacts of analysis that we have prescinded from the real and continuous process of semiosis.Regards,Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USAStructural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian
On Thu, Sep 24, 2026 at 3:04 AM Helmut Raulien <[email protected]> wrote:Gary, List,I think, you are right. I like yout first mentioned term "shared expectations" better, than "habits of interpretation", though both terms I find correct. But I suspect the term "habit" to have a pseudo-explanatory, and too generalizing, quality, or at least to me it seems so. I admit, that this feeling may be caused by the common-sense understanding of "habit" to be a not reflected piece of personal grounds of behavior.Some weeks before, I have come to my conclusion, that expectations (now I´d say, especially shared ones too) are a part of the dynamical object. So then, in a semiosis, not only the interpretant, and with it the following signs, is affected, influenced, determined, but via the interpretant the dynamical object as well.I now suspect (maybe though due to not enough knowledge of mine), that Perircean semiotics thoroughly analyses the determination path from the object to the sign and then to the interpretant, but not enough what happens afterwards. I guess, the interpretant then determines the dynamical object, or at least its change. The new dynamical object then determines the new sign,So, the interpretant not only is an interpretation, but as well a structure-changing agent. The structure of a semiotic system is situated in the dynamkical objects. So, structure is secondness, and not, as I had thought some time before, thirdness. This I think is in accord with Peirces concept of "Altersense", which, I think, includes memory, and Luhmann, for whom the structure of a social system is the expectations and the expectations of expectations.Best,Helmut------------------------------Restored first two posts:24. September 2026 um 07:28"Gary Richmond" <[email protected]>wrote:Helmut, List,
I wonder whether the boundary object in your example is less the press/media itself than the practice of reporting, that is, the shared expectation that claims about events can be checked, challenged, corrected, etc. From the standpoint of semeiotic, “lying press” is a sign whose interpretant may be a habit of dismissing reports before considering their evidence. Repeated often enough, one can imagine that it can weaken a practice through which people with very different views might still inquire together.
Of course, a particular report may deserve criticism. However, the blanket accusation of "lying' does something else: it makes the source’s affiliation with the press sufficient grounds for rejecting whatever it reports. So perhaps the essential question is: What habits of interpretation does this accusation produce? And, further, what are the societal effects of these habits?
Best,
Gary R
On Wed, Sep 23, 2026 at 10:12 AM Helmut Raulien <[email protected]> wrote:List,recently I´ve come across the term "boundary object". Copy-paste-quote from Wikipedia:"The concept was introduced by Susan Leigh Star and James R. Griesemer in a 1989 publication (p. 393):[2][3]
Boundary objects are objects which are both plastic enough to adapt to local needs and constraints of the several parties employing them, yet robust enough to maintain a common identity across sites. They are weakly structured in common use, and become strongly structured in individual-site use. They may be abstract or concrete. They have different meanings in different social worlds but their structure is common enough to more than one world to make them recognizable, a means of translation. The creation and management of boundary objects is key in developing and maintaining coherence across intersecting social worlds.
".So, boundary objects are valuable for bridging or coupling systems with each other. A first thought of mine now is, that an antagonistic subsystem, in order to define and establish its boundary, may strive to dismantle and destroy boundary objects. Example:"The press" had been defined by its main function: To report. A report obviously tells facts, so "a report" should be close to the truth. The antagonistic subsystem in this case is the group of conspiracy-believers. With their term "lying press", its absurd lump-sum nature, that group strives to dismantle and destroy the boundary object "press". They do that with other BOs too, such as "scientists" or "politicians", by not refraining from extremely absurd insinuations, such as cannibalism (Qanon), or ultimative, extraterrestrial strangeness ("reptiloids"). Now, this group usually refers to its own so-called analysis based on "Who does it benefit?". But this analysis of BOs shows, that the said group itself benefits from destroying BOs, to establish a boundary, and thus become a system with competence to act, first of all, by dividing society.Now I wonder: How can acts-on-objects be peircelized?Best regards,Helmut
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