List: In the spin-off thread on Universes and Categories, I proposed that--analogous to the blackboard diagram--the Immediate Interpretant is a continuum of potentiality on which the Dynamic Interpretant is actualized, and the universal tendency to take habits then leads to the development of the Final Interpretant. Further contemplation of this notion led me to several other passages from Peirce's writings that together suggest what I think is an interesting synthesis.
CSP: So, then, the essence of Reason is such that its being never can have been completely perfected. It always must be in a state of incipiency, of growth ... This development of Reason consists, you will observe, in embodiment, that is, in manifestation. The creation of the universe, which did not take place during a certain busy week, in the year 4004 B.C., but is going on today and never will be done, is this very developement of Reason. I do not see how one can have a more satisfying ideal of the admirable than the development of Reason so understood. The one thing whose admirableness is not due to an ulterior reason is Reason itself comprehended in all its fullness, so far as we can comprehend it. Under this conception, the ideal of conduct will be to execute our little function in the operation of the creation by giving a hand toward rendering the world more reasonable whenever, as the slang is, it is "up to us" to do so. In logic, it will be observed that knowledge is reasonableness; and the ideal of reasoning will be to follow such methods as must develope knowledge the most speedily. (CP 1.615, EP 2.255; 1903) CSP: ... the universe is a vast representamen, a great symbol of God's purpose, working out its conclusions in living realities. Now every symbol must have, organically attached to it, its Indices of Reactions and its Icons of Qualities; and such part as these reactions and these qualities play in an argument that, they of course, play in the universe--that Universe being precisely an argument ... The Universe as an argument is necessarily a great work of art, a great poem--for every fine argument is a poem and a symphony--just as every true poem is a sound argument. (CP 5.119, EP 2.193-194; 1903) CSP: The hypothesis of God is a peculiar one, in that it supposes an infinitely incomprehensible object, although every hypothesis, as such, supposes its object to be truly conceived in the hypothesis. This leaves the hypothesis but one way of understanding itself; namely, as vague yet as true so far as it is definite, and as continually tending to define itself more and more, and without limit. The hypothesis, being thus itself inevitably subject to the law of growth, appears in its vagueness to represent God as so, albeit this is directly contradicted in the hypothesis from its very first phase. But this apparent attribution of growth to God, since it is ineradicable from the hypothesis, cannot, according to the hypothesis, be flatly false. Its implications concerning the Universes will be maintained in the hypothesis, while its implications concerning God will be partly disavowed, and yet held to be less false than their denial would be. Thus the hypothesis will lead to our thinking of features of each Universe as purposed; and this will stand or fall with the hypothesis. Yet a purpose essentially involves growth, and so cannot be attributed to God. Still it will, according to the hypothesis, be less false to speak so than to represent God as purposeless. (CP 6.466, EP 2.439-440; 1908) CSP: An *Argument* is a sign which distinctly represents the Interpretant, called its *Conclusion*, which it is intended to determine. (CP 2.95; 1902) Peirce's cosmology is ultimately less about what happened in the distant past than about what is going on *right now*. In semeiotic terms, the universe is a vast Representamen--specifically, an Argument, and therefore also a Symbol; a manifestation primarily of Thirdness, but also necessarily involving elements of Firstness (Icons of Qualities) and Secondness (Indices of Reactions). The Dynamic Object of the universe as an Argument is God Himself, infinitely incomprehensible, vague but continually becoming more and more definite without limit; and its Immediate Object is God's purpose, which is the development of Reason--this very growth of knowledge about God, as well as about the three Universes of Experience that He has created and is still creating. Finally, the Interpretant of the universe as an Argument is its Conclusion, the living realities that it is always working out--the Immediate Interpretant, as a continuum of potentiality, serving as the substrate for actualization of individual Dynamic Interpretants, and the habit-taking tendency developing some of these into Final Interpretants. Regards, Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
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