By all means, Sung - that's your understanding and that of Claudio Guerri.
But that doesn't mean that your understanding is correct. Read Peirce and
you might find a different analysis. I will not cherry-pick quotes; I
suggest you read 2.254 and on for the ten classes of signs. There you will
find that 'redness' does NOT 'need a word'; it needs nothing other than
itself; that's why it is, in itself, a triadic Sign. And it most certainly
does exist in itself as Firstness - otherwise, it (and Firstness) would have
no chance of affecting the world so, it does not 'need' Secondness. But -
it's entirely your choice to read Peirce or to remain reading only secondary
sources.
Edwina
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sungchul Ji" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, August 10, 2014 3:56 PM
Subject: [PEIRCE-L] Re: [biosemiotics:6418] Re: biosemiotics is the basis
for
Edwina wrote:
"Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness are not (6418-1)
'different aspects of the same entity'. A sign,
which is an entity, can exist within only one or
two or all three of the categorical modes. . . . "
Claudio Guerri wrote ( 8/10/2014, PEIRECE-L):
". . . all signs have to be considered in its triadic (6418-2)
aspects: Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness. But,
Firstness can not be considered in its own, but related
to the other two aspects. Considering a very abstract
sign, Firstness can be a feeling and a Qualisign: redness...
But 'redness' needs a word, so it involves Thirdness, and
it can not exist without the experienced "brute force"
of lots of red objects, so Secondness is also present. . . . "
My understanding of Peirce is consistent with (6418-2) but not with
(6418-2).
With all the best.
Sung
No, Sung, Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness are not 'different aspects
of the same entity'. A sign, which is an entity, can exist within only
one
or two or all three of the categorical modes. And these are not different
aspects - which is trivial (gas and liquid) but have different
fundamental
roles. Firstness enables novelty; Secondness enables particularity;
Thirdness enables continuity.
I am now beginning to wonder whether you and Howard are indeed dualists,
but
rather, materialists, for 'Mind' seems to be absent from your analytic
frames.
The Platonic model of Form and Matter IS dualistic, as is the Cartesian,
for
in this analytic frame, 'Form' plays the role of Mind, or, the organizing
principle. Howard's 'symbols' seem to play this role in his analysis but,
from what I can gather, they seem to be, like your Form, material.
Therefore, one wonders what is the functionality of two different
'material
aspects of the same material entity'? At least in the dualistic model,
there
IS a function and it is not a material - that of Mind.
To insist on the requirement of 'measurement' (or interaction with an
Other)
for both the wave and particle puts the wave into a mode of existential
particularity. To declare that 'something exists' without interaction is
Platonic idealism (his Form). The objective idealist analytic frame
instead
declares that the wave or 'potentiality' CAN NEVER EXIST per se; it is
potentiality not actuality and therefore is REAL but not EXISTENTIAL.
Aristotle most certainly was NOT a 'complementarian' as you describe
yourself (and as Howard describes himself) for his analysis of the
difference between the potential and the actual never reduced the
former -
as you and Howard do - to the material. Oh- and I'm not into 'argument ad
populum'; there's no need to assert your own position by claiming that
many
others agree with you. The argument has to stand on its own merits.
Edwina
----- Original Message -----
From: "Sungchul Ji" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, August 10, 2014 2:48 PM
Subject: [biosemiotics:6414] Re: biosemiotics is the basis for
Edwina wrote:
"I don't see that there is any way to resolve the (6410-1)
conflict between the complementary model (which I
consider dualistic) of Form and Matter (held by
Howard and Sung) with the Peircean model which
rejects such an analysis.
You are mis-understanding my view of complementarity (and most likely
that
of Howard). I am not a dualist as you assume in that I do not separate
waves and particles in quantum objects (or Form and Matter in ordinary
objects) but consider them as different aspects of the same entity (as
Peirce considered Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness as three basic
aspects of all phemonena). Physicists often refer to quantum objects
'quons' [1] or 'wavicles'. It is my understanding that Bohm (1917-1992)
believed that quons possessed wave and particle properties both before
and
after measurement (as did de Broglie, Einstein, and Schoredinger) while
Bohr (1885-1962) believed that quons are neither particles nor waves
before measurement and exhibited one of these behaviors only upon
measurement. My impression is that no experimental data nor theories
now
exist in physics that can discriminate between these two models of
quons.
This almost a century-old conundrum in physics may be attribute to the
"Unreasonable Arbitrariness of Mathematics" (UAM) (for which I have
further evidence to be posted later), or the "unreasonable
arbitrariness
of languages" (UAL) in general embodied in the well-known concepts of
ineffability, the unknowable, etc.
If I may correct your mis-undertanding of my philosophical position, I
would like to call myself a "complementarian", not a dualist, nor a
monist. I think Laozi, Aristotle, Spinoza, Merleau-Ponty, Bohr,
and
Pattee (and probably many others, including some members on this list)
belong to the category of complementarians.
With all the best
Sung
___________________________________________________
Sungchul Ji, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy
Rutgers University
Piscataway, N.J. 08855
732-445-4701
www.conformon.net
References:
[1] Herbert, N. (1985). Quantum Reality: Beyond New Physics, an
Excursion int6o Metaphysics. Anchor Books, New York. P. 64:
Edwina,
From: Edwina Taborsky [mailto:[email protected]]
I'm not sure that solving the problem of the origin of life is a
requirement
for solving the problem of the evolution of cognition. Aren't these two
very
different issues?
GF: Yes, they are, but both issues are to be addressed semiotically -
that
is, both Pattee and Stjernfelt consider their work on these different
issues to be part of semiotics. Of course it could be that Stjernfelt's
Peircean "semiotic" is very different from Pattee's "semiotic" (or
"biosemiotic"), but I wouldn't want to make that call just yet.
I don't think that solving the problem of the origin of life is a
requirement for solving the problem of the evolution of cognition,
partly
because the origin of life happened in the distant past, while
cognition
is
still evolving as we speak, and is therefore more open to observation.
If
anything, the logical dependence is the other way round, because
Peirce's
"doctrine of dicisigns" has implications for the logic of inquiry, i.e.
how we do science. We could say that Peircean semiotic is more of a
metascience than 'special sciences' such as psychology and physics.
Equally, I don't see that there is any way to resolve the conflict
between
the complementary model (which I consider dualistic) of Form and Matter
(held by Howard and Sung) with the Peircean model which rejects such an
analysis. And this complementary model effectively states that 'matter
is
the only reality' - ignoring the reality (not individual
existentiality)
of Mind. These are two polar opposite analyses and I think we simply
have
to acknowledge that if you accept one -you do not accept the other -
and
persuasion is of limited success to make a change.
Edwina
GF: Peirce does appeal to a kind of form/matter complementarity,
notably
in his "New Elements" essay
(http://www.gnusystems.ca/KainaStoicheia.htm),
but he makes it clear and explicit that his usage of these terms is
Aristotelian. I would agree that Howard's and Sung's usage is quite
different, as they are working with a physical ontology while Peirce is
enunciating a semiotic ontology.
gary f.
} Now we never can know precisely what we mean by any description
whatever.
[Peirce, CP 7.119] {
<http://www.gnusystems.ca/gnoxic.htm> www.gnusystems.ca/gnoxic.htm }{
gnoxics
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