Kees, Gary, Jerry, List -
Thank you for your very rich responses. I will continue to study
them. Respecting time pressures alluded to in Kees' post, I hope I
will be forgiven for taking the helpful replies in hand to extend my
queries a little.
First I emphasize Smyth's appreciation of the point Jerry alludes to
in speaking of the "intimacy of mind-body" or of Gary's observation
that a person is ""dividual" in the sense of being more like a cluster
of personalities that a single personality". I take it that Kees has
a similar view, since he did not contest the idea I tried to float in
response to "Science Beyond the Self" pp. 159-60, following CP 5.421,
that Peirce's person can be thought of as a "tightly compacted supra-
individual institution". Smyth also recognizes Gary's ""individual"
in strictly logical terms [which] exists instantaneously". Smyth
calls a person in the first sense a vague particular, and in the
second an absolutely determinate concrete individual. The distinction
depends on whether or not the law of excluded middle holds. Of a
vague as opposed to a determinate individual it can be true that the
person is mental or physical without it following that the person is
mental or that the person is physical. (RPR,154,167)
Second I should take more care representing Smyth 's view of a
person's unification and causal efficacy through relationship with
physical particulars. A vague particular is unified through
_indirect_ relationships with physical particulars, by means of
"material qualities" that are not the person's in the person's being
as a sign.(RPR, 162ff) I take it that the vague particular's unity
turns on how its associated absolutely determinate individuals are
related to other concrete particulars. In related fashion the vague
particular person does not act on the physical realm directly through
efficient causation but "indirectly through the body and acts through
the body by affecting the rule or the habit which is exemplified in
bodily behavior". (165-66) I take it that the exemplification in
behavior is again, in part, a matter of direct relations involving the
person as an absolutely determinate concrete particular, in relation
for example to the stuffy room's window.
For me, Smyth's account highlights questions about the relation
between the person as vague particular and the person as concrete
individual. He compares it to the relation between a legisign and its
sinsigns. (RPR 166-67) My query is how to better comprehend this
semiotic relationship. It touches upon Peirce's theories of
continuity and final causation, but in accordance with his
classification of the sciences we should turn for understanding toward
the normative sciences, mathematics and ultimately phenomenology.
Smyth pursues this course in "Peirce's Normative Science Revisited",
cited by Kees. (_Transactions_, 38, 1/2, 2002, pp. 283-306)
Smyth confronts the "paradox that, while the rewards of inquiry may go
to the community, the obligations of inquiry fall on specific
individuals ... beings in the ... category of secondness". (NSR,288)
I take it that the deepest problem here is in making contact between
such beings in the category of secondness (individuals strictly
speaking) and beings in the category of thirdness ("obligations of
inquiry"). After examining the paradox in terms of normative science
and mathemetics, Smyth comes ultimately to phenomenology, to Peirce's
aim to achieve contact between the two categories as part of his
effort to motivate individuals to be logical, and by trusting the
rhetorical effectiveness of his appeal to a perfect example, which
will cause an ultimate ideal to reveal itself. (302) The ultimate
ideal is of course concrete reasonableness, and it manifests the
connection between secondness and thirdness that we are asking about.
Smyth suggests that the perfect example is the individual inquirer
"isolated from others by the necessity of taking personal
responsibility for his or her individuating scientific acts" (290) and
that the hoped-for response to Peirce's rhetoric is "our realization
of what these individuals are sacrificing in the way of achieving
their ends ... not even allowed to console themselves with the thought
that at least they know they are doing their duty". (304) Smyth makes
all this part of the story he tells about "Fixation of Belief".(304)
I would appreciate any response to flaws in what I say here, in its
relation to Peirce or to Smyth or both. I would especially welcome
comments from other students of Smyth's work, including some recent
contributors to the list, who are much more conversant than I with his
thought. I again appreciate making some contact with Kees' ideas on
these matters, and the responses from Jerry and Gary F., and hope they
will consider saying a bit more.
Again, the links to Kees' "Science Beyond the Self"
http://revistas.pucsp.br/index.php/cognitiofilosofia/article/view/13591
and Smyth's _Reading Peirce Reading_ http://web.eecs.utk.edu/~tmoore/docs/smyth/RPR-24Aug96.pdf
:
All best,
Charles Murray
-----------------------------
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] . To
UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected] with the
line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the BODY of the message. More at
http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm .
