Jerry, I was talking about the manifestations of first ness, not the concept of firstness, when I said that firstness has no structure. You are not talking about the manifestations of firstness if you think they have structure. You aren't talking about Peirce, here when you say things like
[John Collier] Part-whole relations and mereology in general only arise when we get to what Peirce calls existence, i.e., seconds. Part-whole relations are a deep component of one's metaphysical perspective. Basically, that is irrelevant to what I was saying, and to Peirce's views on firstness (which I take to be definitive of the notion). Unless you understand this you are going to be asking questions without an answer because the presuppositions are false. It has nothing to do with my physcalism (which is not, actually, materialism I have come to believe). The physicalism stems from the Pragmatic Maxim, which makes any difference in meaning depend on a difference in possible experience together with Quine's idea that the physical is just what we can experience. I take it that the last is also Peirce's view, and he is no materialist. Basically, you err, as I see it, in making a distinction that implies no difference in meaning, however much it might seem to. It violates Peirce's prope-positivism, which he uses to deflate a lot of metaphysics. Of course you can reject either the Pragmatic Maxim, or the notion of experience Peirce uses, or both, in order to save your distinction. But then you aren't talking about Peirce's firsts when you say they have structure. John Collier Professor Emeritus, UKZN http://web.ncf.ca/collier From: Jerry LR Chandler [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Friday, 04 December 2015 11:32 PM To: John Collier Cc: Peirce-L; Clark Goble Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] signs, correlates, and triadic relations - The union of units unify the unity. List, John: On Dec 2, 2015, at 11:39 AM, John Collier wrote: Jerry, there is some very convoluted reasoning in this, but I will try to explain. See interspersed comments. The message was only questions, with one except. What reasoning you find convoluted is of your making, not mine. I'm not quite sure why you are applying firstness to structure where structures are inherently relations and firstness is inherently a thing in itself without relations. Firstness is a term. I see no reason to infer that it is structureless. Nor, featureless. [John Collier] Part-whole relations and mereology in general only arise when we get to what Peirce calls existence, i.e., seconds. Part-whole relations are a deep component of one's metaphysical perspective. [John Collier] Following Stjernfelt's treatment of dicents, nouns are indices (qualities and predicates in general are basically iconic, though), and hence seconds at least. Stjernfelt argues that this is a consequence of grammar, construed broadly, or alternatively and equivalently, by their role in dicents. Can abstract the noun part to a quality (E.G., Platoness, or horseness), but then this removestheir grammatical role and turns them into qualities, Well... FS wrote a fine book. He is very knowledgable and articulate. But, I disagree with the basic premise of his book and many, many of his arguments. Technically, FS gives little attention to the logic concept of extension in various forms of diagrams / mereology. To me, the nature of EXTENSION is the critical distinction between CSP's view of logic and other forms / formal logics, such as the logics the physics / mathematics communities use. CSP, in the three triads, is, in my opinion, laying out nine vaguely related terms, and his definitions of the interrelated meanings of these terms. The goal, if I may use this term, is a self-consistent style of argumentation that is recursive. In other words, 8 terms are generalized (non-mathematical terms) premises for constructing consistent arguments. The index is the central term in the diagram. Qualisigns are one of the origin of indices. The construction of the logic of the rhema is critically based on logical premises intimately connected to the indices. It plays a necessary role in the system of premises. That is, any number of forms of indices can be inserted as representamen of the sin-sign into rhema The proposed self-consistency of the sentences (propositions) arise from adherences to the appropriate legisigns. Yet, the open structure of these premises is so stated that the set of legisigns can be extended as new inquiry generates new sinsigns with new qualisigns and new indices. As CSP notes in 3.420-1. In modern propositional logic, one would probably use conditional premises augmented with hybrid and sortal logics to express the meaning of these nine terms in a way that would be consistent with mathematical logic and semantics such that recursive calculations would be consistent, complete and decidable. As I have previously noted here, I have used these semantics for pragmatic purposes. Rather clumsy, to say the least! [JLRC] If a molecule is a noun, is it a "firstness"? does it inherently have a structure? Is modal logic necessary to describe the relationship between atoms and molecules? Is the inherence of "thing in itself" necessary for this relation? [John Collier] No, see my last interjection. Is a molecule divisible? Or, is it a context dependent question? [John Collier] No, for the reasons above, if I understand what you mean here by your use of 'metaphysical' which is a very broad term. I phrased this question is such a way as to be consistent in multiple symbol systems. If I understand your physical perspective, then I can easy understand why you answer in this way. Cheers Jerry John Collier Professor Emeritus, UKZN http://web.ncf.ca/collier From: Jerry LR Chandler [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, 02 December 2015 6:57 PM To: Peirce-L Cc: Clark Goble Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] signs, correlates, and triadic relations - The union of units unify the unity. List, Clark: On Dec 2, 2015, at 10:18 AM, Clark Goble wrote: I'm not quite sure why you are applying firstness to structure where structures are inherently relations and firstness is inherently a thing in itself without relations. >From my perspective, this argument, ignores the nature of nature - that is, of >part whole relationships, known as mereology in logic and philosophy and as >"scaling" in physics. [John Collier] Part-whole relations and mereology in general only arise when we get to what Peirce calls existence, i.e., seconds. A noun is what? a part of a sentence? an object? a singularity? a relative? a grammatical structure? [John Collier] Following Stjernfelt's treatment of dicents, nouns are indices (qualities and predicates in general are basically iconic, though), and hence seconds at least. Stjernfelt argues that this is a consequence of grammar, construed broadly, or alternatively and equivalently, by their role in dicents. Can abstract the noun part to a quality (E.G., Platoness, or horseness), but then this removestheir grammatical role and turns them into qualities, If an atom is a noun, does it inherently have a structure? When was the concept of the structure of an atom introduced into science? philosophy? [John Collier] If an atom is a noun then it is a second, and there is no reason why it can't have a structure. Atomness, though, is iconic, and cannot signify a structure in itself. If a molecule is a noun, is it a "firstness"? does it inherently have a structure? Is modal logic necessary to describe the relationship between atoms and molecules? Is the inherence of "thing in itself" necessary for this relation? [John Collier] No, see my last interjection. In short, does a concept of "firstness", as a "thing in itself" inherently require a metaphysical view of all nouns? [John Collier] No, for the reasons above, if I understand what you mean here by your use of 'metaphysical' which is a very broad term. If a unit is a firstness, then: The union of units unifies the unity. Is this logically True? or False? What is your reasoning for your conclusion? [John Collier] Clark will have to address this. I find it very obscure. Best, John ----------------------------- 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]<mailto:[email protected]> . To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to [email protected]<mailto:[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 .
----------------------------- 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 .
