> On Sep 11, 2014, at 6:41 PM, Sungchul Ji <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> I agree. Z stands for X for Y would be an example of smiosis. A
> concrete example of this would be
>
>
> DNA stands for phenotypes for living cells. (091114-1)
If I understand him correctly, I don’t think that would count as an example.
While I don’t want to speak for Frederik, I suspect he’d say properly that is
DNA stands for (phenotypes of living cells) for people
So there’d be indexical relationships between phenotypes and parts of DNA but
that stands for would be on the human side. (Assuming I have your example
correct - apologies if I’m misreading you)
I think he wants something more like
Mice have eyes to see
There we could break that down as
eyes -> seeing for mice
What Frederik is getting at is that “for mice” or “to mice” is possible in
biology but there’s nothing equivalent in physics. The “for” is always “for
humans” or more accurately “for physicists thinking about this." Now as I
quibbled I think observers play an abstract role in both QM and GR. As such
it’s quite possible to treat observers as a general (in the Peircean sense)
that allows the phenomena to change. (Collapse of the wave function not being
tied merely to human observers, for example) However I think nearly all
physicists see that as an artifact. That is most see it as at best an
embarrassment of the way we speak about it and at worse an highly unlikely
interpretation.
I do think that this distinction between “what’s really going on” and “what
scientists think about it” leads to problems. (It’s an ambiguity that I think
frequently plagues philosophy of science - especially naive discussions of
physicalism) However ignoring that much more subtle issue I raised in my last
post, I have to concede Frederick’s point. At best I think it possible physics
will change in the future.
I’m actually very sympathetic to getting rid of observer talk out of physics -
I think it’s often a remnant of the neo-kantian approach to science from the
early 20th century. Theory is often cast in an epistemological framework rather
than an ontological/physical one. However I’m also quite open to it being
impossible to get rid of - especially given my Peircean commitments regarding
the universe being filled with mind.
-----------------------------
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 .
