Jerry R,
I hope you don’t mind if I preface my response to your post with a quote from Peirce explaining the differences between mathematics and philosophy, and between both and what Peirce called “special sciences” (such as biology). Peirce was a practitioner of all three, which deeply affected his terminology in logic and semiotic — which, being subdivisions of philosophy, are positive sciences, unlike mathematics. Here’s Peirce (1898): [[[ The true difference between the necessary logic of philosophy and mathematics is merely one of degree. It is that, in mathematics, the reasoning is frightfully intricate, while the elementary conceptions are of the last degree of familiarity; in contrast to philosophy, where the reasonings are as simple as they can be, while the elementary conceptions are abstruse and hard to get clearly apprehended. But there is another much deeper line of demarcation between the two sciences. It is that mathematics studies nothing but pure hypotheses, and is the only science which never inquires what the actual facts are; while philosophy, although it uses no microscopes or other apparatus of special observation, is really an experimental science, resting on that experience which is common to us all; so that its principal reasonings are not mathematically necessary at all, but are only necessary in the sense that all the world knows beyond all doubt those truths of experience upon which philosophy is founded. This is why the mathematician holds the reasoning of the metaphysician in supreme contempt, while he himself, when he ventures into philosophy, is apt to reason fantastically and not solidly, because he does not recognize that he is upon ground where elaborate deduction is of no more avail than it is in chemistry or biology. ]]] —CP 3.560 From this point on my responses are interleaved. From: Jerry Rhee [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 9-Apr-16 22:28 Hi list, I assert that you can simply translate all the difficult language above regarding causation/determination/etc., through consideration of a real example of an ideal inquiry that utilizes signs, objects and interpretants. That is, give good reasons for phi spiral abduction: Promoting convergence: the phi spiral in abduction of mouse corneal behaviors. One advantage is that you don't have to look to Peirce for answers. You can discover them on your own. Gf: It’s not clear to me what question you are referring to, or what it would mean to “look to Peirce for answers.” The questions I’m trying to answer in my own work (including the bits of it that I post here now and then because they are about Peirce) are essentially philosophical. A central question for me is how meaning works. In the early stages of writing Turning Signs, I found it necessary to introduce some of Peirce’s terms. But I soon found that in order to use Peirce’s terms honestly and ethically (see Peirce’s “Ethics of Terminology” in EP2), I needed a deep understanding of the way Peirce himself used them in his semiotic and his philosophy as a whole. After a dozen years or so of fairly intensive study, I’m still learning more about Peirce’s philosophy and, not incidentally, his exacting usage of logical and semiotic terms. And sometimes writing up what I discover in Peirce, while also trying to be as exacting in my use of terms as he was. Some writers are comfortable lifting Peircean terms out of their context and using them for their own purposes (with little regard for Peirce’s), but I’m not one of those. Since my main concerns are philosophical, my work refers mostly to “that experience which is common to us all.” But since I also have a generalist interest in several sciences, I’ve incorporated what I’ve learned from them into my book too. So there’s quite a bit of biology, and neuroscience in particular, in my book, as you can see if you peruse my reference list. But I take it that you, as a biologist, are “asserting” that some complex questions about semiotic and philosophical terminology can be settled by a study of mouse corneal behaviors, or a study of that study. I have to say that I find this highly implausible. That simply is not the kind of information that philosophy can draw from special sciences like biology. Examples, yes; essential concepts such as causation and determination, no. Jon Awbrey, in contrast to both of us, thinks that the only viable approach to understanding Peirce (and understanding inquiry) is by way of mathematical formalisms, with little or no reference to the common experience of semiosis. Now, I think that both mathematicians and biologists have something to offer to the study of Peirce, just as I think that Peirce had a lot to offer to both mathematics and biosemiotics (as we call it now). But since my own interest in Peirce is philosophical, “resting on that experience which is common to us all,” I don’t always have time to venture into what would be (for me) detours from the main road of inquiry. Gary: I just discovered your website. Very nice! Gf:Thanks! Also, this is a very earnest question: Why did you choose pictures of fractal spirals on your webpage? Gf: An honest answer: I’ve had many fractal images (some of which happen to include spirals) on my hard drive for years because I used to enjoy playing with free fractal generating software and ‘zooming in’ on the Mandelbrot set. I saved the images that I found most esthetically appealing, and have been using them ever since on my desktops. There is a conceptual connection with Turning Signs because the basic algorithms used to generate those images are recursive, and because I associate the idea of fractal dimensions with Peirce’s concept of continuity. But mainly I use them just because I like them and (not being a very visual person) I don’t have many images on my hard drive, and very few that I made myself. So, it’s not because of a special interest in spirals. :) Gary f. Thanks! Jerry Rhee
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