Michael, lists,
I would appreciate receiving a PDF copy of your article mentioned above.
(1) By 'deep structure' in the title of my previous post, I meant
specifically the regularities of the genetic systems that are revealed
through the mathematics of tensor algebra, i.e., the overlapping of the
64-element matrix generated from the tensor products of the (2*2)-matrices
of Watson-Crick nucleotides, A, C, G and T/U with the 64-codon table
determined experimentally (see Row 4 in Table 2 in my previous post). As we
all know, this 'structure' has been invariant over 3.7x10^9 years and
across about 9x10^6 species. Hence there is no doubt that there are the
'structures' or the 'regularities' in living systems that remain
'invariant' despite the continuous variations of living structures
resulting from the biological evolution. For the lack of a better term, we
may refer to this fact as the "variation with invariance" (VWI) or as the
less paradoxical-sounding "evolution with invariance" (EWI).
(*2*) The content of my previous post is consistent with the triadic model
of language that I proposed in [1] which suggests *waves *as the mechanism
of EWI, in agreement with the Petoukhov hypothesis that *resonant waves*
play fundamental roles in organisms [2] and with my conclusion that the
wave-particle duality operates through the Universe, from atoms to the
cell, the brain and the cosmos [3]:
*Cosmese*
(Quantum waves)
/\
/ \
/____\
*Humanese* *Cellese*
(Sound waves) (Concentration
waves)
* Figure 1.* The postulated Irreducible Triadic Relation
(ITR) among three languages -- Cosmic language (Cosmese), Human language
(Humanese) and Cell language (Cellese). Rerproduced from [1].
(*3*) Figure 1 above can be re-expressed using the ITR template that I
discussed on these lists on numerous occasions. Figure 2 also depicts the
triadic model of the world discussed by Burgin and others [4].
f
g
*Cosmese * ------------> *Cellese*
-------------> * Humanese*
(World of Structures) (Physical world)
(Mental world)
|
^
|
|
|____________________________________|
h
*Figure 2. *'Isomorphism' between the triadic model of languages and the
triadic model of the World. Please note that the characters of the nodes
can vary but Peirce's ITR remains invariant and hence, Figure 2 exemplifies
EWI (Evolution with invariance). f = biogenesis; g = glottogenesis; h =
information flow
If Figure 2 is right, it may embody the principle of EWI, since Processes f
and g can be viewed as evolutionary processes with invariance (which may be
identified with what mathematicians call "structure-preserving mappings")
so that Process f can, in effect, "transfer" information from the Universe
to the human mind, just as the curvature of spacetime, in effect,
"transfers' gravitational force (or gravitons) from one body to another
across space. Welch and Smith in [5, 6] applied the language of the
relativity physics to account for the organization of cell metabolism in
space and time. Largely influenced by Welch and Smith [5, 6], I was led to
postulate the existence of the cell force inside the cell (mediated by the
so-called *'cyton*' [7] in analogy to the *graviton *mediating the motions
of macroscopic objects in space and time) that are responsible for the
spatiotemporal organizations of the chemical reactions occurring inside the
living cell that underlie the phenomenon we call life.
Finally, I wonder if Figure 2 can contribute to integrating the seemingly
irreconcilable language theories that have been proposed by equally
competent linguists on both sides of the opposing camps over the past half
a century or so.
With all the best.
Sung
References:
[1] Ji, S. (2012). *Molecular Theory of the Living Cell: Concepts,
Molecular Mechanisms, and Biomedical Applications*. Springer, New York.
See Table 2.13 on p. 44. PDF at http://www.conformon.net under
Publications > Book Chapters.
[2] Petoukhov, S. V. (2015). The system-resonance appraoch in modeling
genetic structures. *BioSystems *(in press).
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/aip/03032647 .
[3] Ji, S. (2015). Planckian distributions in molecular machines, living
cells, and brains: The wave-particle duality in biomedical sciences.
In: *Proceedings
of the International Conference on Biology and Biomedical Engineering*.
Vienna, March 15-17, 2015. Pp. 115-137.
[4] Burgin, M. (2010). *Theory of Information: Fundamentality,
Diversity and Unification.* World Scientific, New Jersey. P. 60.
[5] Welch, G. R. and Smith, H. A. (1990). On the Field Structure of
Metabolic Space-Time. In: *Molecular and Biological Physics of Living
Systems*, R. K. Mishra (ed.), Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, pp.
53-85.
[6] Smith, H. A. and Welch, G. R. (1991). Cytosociology: A
Field-Theoretic View of Cell Metabolism. Welch, G. R. and Smith, H. A.
(1990). On the Field Structure of Metabolic Space-Time. In: *Molecular
Theories of Cell Life and Death. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick.
Pp. 282-323. *
[7] Ji, S. (1991). Manifolds, Fractals, Fiber Bundles, and Gauge
Fields: The Role of Genetic Information in the Theory of the Cell Force.
In: *Molecular Theories of Cell Life and Death. Rutgers University Press,
New Brunswick. *Pp. 90-119.
On Sun, Nov 22, 2015 at 12:33 PM, Michael Shapiro <[email protected]>
wrote:
> Dear Peirce-Listers,
>
>
> I'm posting below some material from the second edition (currently in
> progress) of my book* The Speaking Self: Language Lore and English Usage *in
> case anybody is interested in a conception of language structure that
> repudiates the Chomskyan model and asserts one that is strictly anchored to
> Peircean pragmaticism (prominently including his semeiotic).This material
> is also part of my paper "Paradox: Theme and Semiotic Variations," which
> recently appeared in *Semiotics 2014: The Semiotics of Paradox*, ed. J.
> Pelkey et al., 1-28. (SSA Yearbook, 2. Ottawa: Legas, 2015). I'll be glad
> to send you a PDF of the latter upon request.
>
> Michael
>
>
> P. S. Many years ago, in a publication I can't now remember, Chomsky
> stated, when asked who his favorite philosopher was, that it was Peirce. In
> my opinion, whatever reading of Peirce's rationalism there is that can be
> attributed to Chomsky, none of it that can be called accurate is compatible
> with generative grammar.
>
> *5.29 Semeiotic Neostructuralism and Language*
>
>
>
> *GLOSSARY*
>
>
>
> *cortex*, n.: outer layer of neural tissue in humans and other mammals
>
> *postbiotic, *adj.: pertaining to the period following the appearance of
> life
>
> *pragmaticism*, n.: the pragmatic philosophy of C. S. Peirce
>
> *semeiotic*, adj. < *semeiosis*, n.: the process whereby something
> functions as a sign
>
> *teleology*, n.: a metaphysical doctrine explaining phenomena and events
> by final causes
>
>
>
> Readers of this book who have an interest in the conceptual
> underpinnings of its vignettes may benefit from being reminded of some of
> the main points in which the doctrine christened “semeiotic
> neostructuralism” (in the spirit of C. S. Peirce’s pragmaticism) by the
> author differs fundamentally from the dominant paradigm of contemporary
> linguistics, which is nominally identified with Chomsky and his
> followers––regardless, nota bene, whether these latter-day practitioners
> have renamed their particular enterprise (e. g., “Optimality Theory” or
> “Cognitive Linguistics;” ALL linguistics is necessarily ‘cognitive’, hence
> CL is a pleonasm) so as to differentiate it from what was originally called
> “tranformational” or “generative” grammar.
>
> Chomsky has a rather mechanistic/mechanicalist view of
> language, for all that he understands that the freedom to compose sentences
> that are original, unpredictable, and yet intelligible is different from
> the unoriginal, predictable products of strictly mechanical action. His
> view is mechanistic nonetheless because he simply posits underlying
> structures by which sentences are to be generated. Possibly in a wider
> perspective, Chomsky is no more reductively mechanistic than a semeiotic
> neostructuralist, in a wider perspective, is a phenomenalist. For he no
> doubt admits (or would admit) that the linguistic universals in our brains
> are not just there, period, but evolved, with the brain’s evolution, as
> chance variants that were ‘selected’ by the principle of reproductive
> success. Similarly, the intentions or needs or felt urgencies to speak or
> to achieve certain outcomes might explain––but only in a context wider than
> Chomskyan linguistics––why language’s generative mechanisms are used in
> this way rather than in that.
>
> But if we focus simply on the linguist’s study, as diversely
> conceived by Chomsky and the semeiotic neostructuralist, then there is
> this difference: for the one, the teleology of language is excluded from
> linguistic explanation, while for the other it is the very stuff of
> explanation. For the one, linguistic phenomena conform to a describable
> structure of highly abstract laws, while for the other linguistic phenomena
> exhibit an intelligible if less abstract, more complicated structure. For
> the one, the system is a given, and any changes in it are accidental, while
> for the other development is essential to language––development is more the
> reality than is any one system of rules––and that development is also
> intelligible and not merely given.
>
> That is the conflict. The reason the semeiotic
> neostructuralist approach is, if it is successful, superior is that it can
> be used to explain the very evolution of the brain-mechanism or linguistic
> capacities and universals that Chomsky can at best describe. That is, given
> creatures somewhat sociable, exchanging signs as their way of life, then
> the survival value of their communicating more elaborate and precise
> diagrams would explain the retention of those fortuitous variations, say,
> in brain structure that promote exactly such powers of expressible
> diagrammatization. That is, the principle of this evolution will be itself
> linguistic, and continuous with the principles of postbiotic, strictly
> linguistic evolution.
>
> The thought here is not unlike that which refuses to
> postulate linguistic intentions separate from the capacity to exercise
> those intentions. Just as there could be no desire to speak without an
> ability to speak, so also there could be no evolution of linguistic
> capacities––even, or especially, at the physiological level––except among
> those who, already speaking to one another, will more likely survive as a
> species if they speak more effectively. Thus, instead of a
> neurophysiological explanation of language, we have a linguistic
> explanation of the higher cortex––and probably not just the speech centers
> either, since so many of our capacities for sensation and action would be
> bootless without our capacities for speech.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -----------------------------
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> .
>
>
>
>
>
>
--
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
-----------------------------
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