Gary,
FYSMI, because when I was pondering that portion of the Syllabus I was going to
remark that I considered it an exemplary text -- exemplary of a style that gives
me a headache! -- and that the only excuse I could make for it would be that it
read like an English paraphrase of some Existential Graph that we might hope to
chance on somewhere in his Nachlass someday.
Regards,
Jon
Gary Fuhrman wrote:
Lists,
I've been trying to come up with a diagram to iconize the syntax of the
Dicisign, and attached is what I've come up with so far. It's meant to
accompany the following part of the Peirce text that I posted the other day;
but I think it would take a series of diagrams (maybe an animated feature!)
to illustrate the whole text. But maybe some of you who are handier with
graphics than I can improve on this.
gary f.
The readiest characteristic test showing whether a sign is a Dicisign or
not, is that a Dicisign is either true or false, but does not directly
furnish reasons for its being so. This shows that a Dicisign must profess to
refer or relate to something as having a real being independently of the
representation of it as such, and further that this reference or relation
must not be shown as rational, but must appear as a blind Secondness. But
the only kind of sign whose object is necessarily existent is the genuine
Index. This Index might, indeed, be a part of a Symbol; but in that case the
relation would appear as rational. Consequently a Dicisign necessarily
represents itself to be a genuine Index, and to be nothing more. At this
point let us discard all other considerations, and see what sort of sign a
sign must be that in any way represents itself to be a genuine Index of its
Object, and nothing more. Substituting for "represents _______ to be" a
clearer interpretation, the statement is that the Dicisign's Interpretant
represents an identity of the Dicisign with a genuine Index of the
Dicisign's real Object. That is, the Interpretant represents a real
existential relation or genuine Secondness, as subsisting between the
Dicisign and its real Object. But the Interpretant of a Sign can represent
no other Object than that of the Sign itself. Hence this same existential
relation must be an Object of the Dicisign, if the latter have any real
Object. This represented existential relation, in being an Object of the
Dicisign, makes that real Object, which is correlate of this relation, also
an Object of the Dicisign. This latter Object may be distinguished as the
Primary Object, the other being termed the Secondary Object. The Dicisign,
in so far as it is the relate of the existential relation which is the
Secondary Object of the Dicisign, can evidently not be the entire Dicisign.
It is at once a part of the Object and a part of the Interpretant of the
Dicisign. Since the Dicisign is represented in its Interpretant to be an
Index of a complexus as such, it must be represented in that same
Interpretant to be composed of two parts, corresponding respectively to its
Object and to itself [the Dicisign]. That is to say, in order to understand
the Dicisign, it must be regarded as composed of two such parts whether it
be in itself so composed or not. It is difficult to see how this can be,
unless it really have two such parts; but perhaps this may be possible. Let
us consider these two represented parts separately. The part which is
represented to represent the Primary Object, since the Dicisign is
represented to be an Index of its Object, must be represented as an Index,
or some representamen of an Index, of the Primary Object. The part which is
represented to represent a part of the Dicisign is represented as at once
part of the Interpretant and part of the Object. It must, therefore, be
represented as such a sort of Representamen (or to represent such a sort) as
can have its Object and its Interpretant the same. Now, a Symbol cannot even
have itself as its Object; for it is a law governing its Object. For
example, if I say, "This proposition conveys information about itself," or
"Let the term 'sphinx' be a general term to denote anything of the nature of
a symbol that is applicable to every 'sphinx' and to nothing else," I shall
talk unadulterated nonsense. But a Representamen mediates between its
Interpretant and its Object, and that which cannot be the object of the
Representamen cannot be the Object of the Interpretant. Hence, a fortiori,
it is impossible that a Symbol should have its Object as its Interpretant.
An Index can very well represent itself. Thus, every number has a double;
and thus the entire collection of even numbers is an Index of the entire
collection of numbers, and so this collection of even numbers contains an
Index of itself. But it is impossible for an Index to be its own
Interpretant, since an Index is nothing but an individual existence in a
Secondness with something; and it only becomes an Index by being capable of
being represented by some Representamen as being in that relation. Could
this Interpretant be itself there would be no difference between an Index
and a Second. An Icon, however, is strictly a possibility, involving a
possibility, and thus the possibility of its being represented as a
possibility is the possibility of the involved possibility. In this kind of
Representamen alone, then, the Interpretant may be the Object. Consequently,
that constituent of the Dicisign, which is represented in the Interpretant
as being a part of the Object, must be represented by an Icon or by a
Representamen of an Icon. The Dicisign, as it must be understood in order to
be understood at all, must contain those two parts. But the Dicisign is
represented to be an Index of the Object, in that the latter involves
something corresponding to these parts; and it is this Secondness that the
Dicisign is represented to be the Index of. Hence the Dicisign must exhibit
a connection between these parts of itself, and must represent this
connection to correspond to a connection in the object between the Secundal
Primary Object and the Firstness indicated by the part corresponding to the
Dicisign.
--
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