Re: [PEIRCE-L] Possible Article of Interest - CSP's "Mindset" from AI perspective

[Mike Bergman]

Hi Jon, On 2/10/2017 9:47 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote: Mike, List: Briefly ... MB:  The "idea of a unicorn" is real ... I find this more plausible than the notion that unicorns themselves are real, but I am curious--in this context, do you mean "idea" as "the substance of an actual unitary thought or fancy," or as "that whose Being consists in its mere capacity for getting fully represented, regardless of any person's faculty or impotence to represent it" (CP 6.452; 1908)? Hmm, the "unitary thought or fancy" is an interesting case, but my first reaction is to treat it as a possibility and not an instantiation. Fruitful example . . .   To use distinctions CSP sometimes used himself, one might say there is both the objective real, which is the sense in CP 6.452, but also the subjective real, such as the unicorn. Now, the subjective real can also be a belief of nearly everyone, such as I know what you mean when you refer to "unicorn", or by only a few or one, such as my own reality is the only true one. Thanks, Mike Thanks, Jon S. On Fri, Feb 10, 2017 at 7:53 PM, Mike Bergman <m...@mkbergman.com> wrote: Hi Jon, Not to carry this thread beyond some useful threshold, see below: On 2/10/2017 7:18 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt wrote: Mike, List: I suspect that the questions of whether all generals are real and whether the fictional is real are connected.  If some generals are fictional, and nothing fictional is real, then some generals are not real.  As an example, "unicorn" is a general term for something that is fictional, and most people would probably say that "a unicorn has one horn" is a true proposition.  Does this mean that unicorns are real?  Most people would presumably deny this. I keep coming back to Peirce's definitions of "real" and "fictive" that I quoted previously.  The distinction is whether the characters of the object in question depend on what a person or finite group of people thinks about them.  A unicorn has one horn only because people have agreed to this as part of the definition for a certain kind of imaginary (i.e., non-existent) thing.  By contrast, an Indian rhinoceros has one horn regardless of what anyone thinks about it.  People having thoughts about unicorns does not make them real, and the Indian rhinoceros would be real even if no one ever actually had any thoughts about it. Unicorns are the perfect case! We have never actually seen one. But, we can describe one, perhaps write long, learned articles about them, render them so their icon is clear, and even discuss them in this thread. That is real. Now, the character of this unicorn thing is that it has many characteristics of cloved mammals, but also has a nasal horn, perhaps twisted, and lives in the forest. And, oh, by the way, this thing is not actual or has not been known to tangibly exist. In short, we can call this character either fictive or imaginary. The way to break through this understanding is to see the term "unicorn" as the mere token, or "unicorns" as the type. The "idea of a unicorn" is real, perhaps in a related way to why the "idea of gravity" is real. The habitual aspect of gravity may be stronger than unicorns, but a lot of consensus has gone into deciding what all of this means. That strikes me as real, and if I asked CSP about it he would agree, but he would also point out subtleties that I glaringly missed. I might smile or not in reaction. As for fallibility, our current inability to be absolutely certain about the reality of something has no bearing on whether it is, in fact, real. Sorry, I probably was not clear. I was bringing up the question of fallibility in terms of the "some generals are not real" discussion, not as you refer. I'm happy to let this thread dye. Thanks for your input! Mike Thanks for the additional comments on indexicals; again, interesting stuff! Regards, Jon S. -- __________________________________________ Michael K. Bergman CEO Cognonto and Structured Dynamics 319.621.5225 skype:michaelkbergman http://cognonto.com http://structureddynamics.com http://mkbergman.com http://www.linkedin.com/in/mkbergman __________________________________________ -- __________________________________________ Michael K. Bergman CEO Cognonto and Structured Dynamics 319.621.5225 skype:michaelkbergman http://cognonto.com http://structureddynamics.com http://mkbergman.com http://www.linkedin.com/in/mkbergman __________________________________________

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