Gary R., Gary F., List, The first occurrence of first, second third that shows up in the index of the Chronological Writings is in Lowell Lecture IX, of 1866 (pg. 486):
It is important to ask of a theory of logic whether it presents a systematic and homogeneous whole, for thought it may do this and still be faulty from omissions or positive errors, yet as the whole end of logic is to make things intelligible, that is to reduce them to unity.... Now such a unity is found in great perfection in the system to which we have been led. ... Moreover, each of these divisions springs directly from the three references to ground, correlate and interpretant which are little if anything more than the notions of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. Before he was using this terminology in the Lowell Lectures, he was already talking about the character of the monad in 1864: "Every subject is an incarnation of a predicate, which is an abstraction,... Subjects are either monads or collective subjects or universal subjects." For a little diversion from these textual matters, you might take a look at the following short and simple discussion of the Pythagorean way of thinking about the philosophical implications of the geometric conceptions of the monad, dyad and triad: http://jwilson.coe.uga.edu/EMAT6680Fa06/Hobgood/Pythagoras.html (see the diagrams on the first two pages). My hunch is that, given the fact that Peirce was studying Greek as a student for so many years, in which monad, dyad and triad are the words for one, two and three, and given the fact that he studied Euclid's Elements as part of his early and ongoing education in mathematics, he may very well have had these kinds of diagrams in mind from quite an early point in his thinking about the relations between numbers and geometric figures--and the philosophical lessons we can learn from such formal ways of thinking. --Jeff Jeff Downard Associate Professor Department of Philosophy NAU (o) 523-8354 ________________________________________ From: [email protected] [[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, October 28, 2015 1:03 PM To: 'Peirce-L' Subject: RE: [PEIRCE-L] Re: Peirce's categories Gary R, You raise a question that I got interested in last year, so I have some parts of an answer on hand: Peirce started writing about the categories of “First”, “Second” and “Third” (capitalized) as early as 1885 (W5:236), using them as nouns rather than adjectives, and not to denote an ordering of things. The first addition of the “-ness” suffix that I’ve found is from 1886: “firstness” and “secondness” on W5:300 (1886) and “thirdness” on the next page. Both forms occur in the “Guess at the Riddle”. So he was using both forms simultaneously, and i’d say there’s no precise time when he switched from the one to the other. Gary f. } The old order changeth and lasts like the first. [Finnegans Wake 486] { http://gnusystems.ca/wp/ }{ Turning Signs gateway From: Gary Richmond [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 28-Oct-15 14:34 To: Peirce-L <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] RE: [biosemiotics:8918] Re: Peirce's categories Gary F. list, I agree with this analysis, Gary, and those in your earlier notes on the topic. I think that another interesting research project might be to sort out how and when and where Peirce uses first, second, and third to refer to his categories rather than these words merely referring to 'entities'. Although early in his career he sometimes uses first, second, and third to refer to categories with no suffix -ness added, is there a moment when he clearly switches over to the from with the -ness suffix? In the Commens examples of Thirdness one sees him using 'Third' to refer to his third category as late as 1888 in 'A Guess at the Riddle', while with the 1894 'The List of Categories: A Second Essay' (CP 1.328) he first (among these excerpts) uses Thirdness to refer to his third category. Had there been any process intervening between the causal act and the effect, this would have been a medial, or third, element. Thirdness, in the sense of the category, is the same as mediation. In all the following examples at Commens. 'Thirdness' is used to identify the category. I should, however, add that in the 1903 Harvard Lectures he uses the expression 'Category the Third' as well as Thirdness, and in several subsequent entries, having identified the category as 'Thirdness', he goes on to discuss firsts, seconds, and thirds in a context where there can be no question as to their representing the categories (however, this seems rare). In any event, this could make for an interesting--and useful--chapter in a dissertation. Best, Gary R
----------------------------- 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 .
