> On Mar 28, 2017, at 2:04 PM, Jon Awbrey <[email protected]> wrote: > > I realize that iconolatry -- just one of many forms of dyadic reductionism -- > runs too deep at present for most folks to appreciate this, but it happens > to be one of the consequences of Triadic Relation Irreducibility (TRI) that > symbols, signs that denote their objects solely by virtue of the fact that > they are interpreted to do so, are the genus of all signs, while icons and > indices are species under that genus. An icon is an icon only because it > is interpreted as an icon, by virtue of some property that is singled out > from all the possible properties that it may share with a denoted object.
Is an icon only an icon because it’s interpreted as such? I’m here thinking of natural signs in which the interpretant isn’t necessarily a human mind. This isn’t a small matter. This connection between icons & indices to symbols has huge philosophical implications. It’s why, for instance, some disagree with Derrida’s use of Peirce in On Grammatology. In particular the relations of difference and repetition (and what gets repeated) are pretty crucial in a lot of contexts. I ask because one of the more interesting facets of Peirce’s thought is his focus on objects in signs/logic rather than the interpreter as is most common. So when he speaks of signs he talks of the object determining an interpretant through a sign. The semiotics moves in a way more similar to traditional conceptions of causation rather than interpretation. This also seems important when thinking about information conveyed in a sign. What is conserved? What is lost? What is transformed? I recognize there’s a problem of language here. After all we could simply say an icon is an icon if it could be so interpreted rather than it being interpreted. Perhaps and I think some of the early texts of Peirce can move one in that direction. However in his more mature phase it seems he explicitly rejects this. A sign is a thing which is the representative, or deputy, of another thing for the purpose of affecting mind. Signs are of three kinds, 1st, the icon, which represents its object by virtue of a character which it would equally possess did the object and the interpreting mind not exist; 2nd, the index, which represents its object by virtue of a character which it would not possess did the object not exist, but which it would equally possess did the interpreting mind not operate; 3rd, the symbol, which represents its object by virtue of a character which is conferred upon it by an operation of the mind. (Peirce, MS 142.3–6 circa 1899-1900 Notes on Topical Geometry, emphasis mine) Now again this can be read in different ways. I’m clearly reading it to imply a mind-independent quality. But one could distinguish between the icon and this character of the icon. We’d then say the character would still be there whether it were an icon or not with the interpreting mind making it an icon. I think this quote though is attempting to distinguish the icon or index from the symbol in a way in which the “operation of the mind” is not king. Of course I may be completely wrong in this. So I’m curious as to what others say. It seems to me though that Peirce is considering these from a purely functional position. What’s key is that the symbol is arbitrary in a way icons and indices aren’t. Although of course, as with language, a symbol may act in an iconic or indexical function that still hinges on a certain arbitrariness of the sign.
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