Jon A.S., Clark, list, I started writing this note several days ago, but I got sidetracked with other commitments.
My main interest (at the moment) is in the following slides, which I presented in 2015, and which I am now developing into a longer article: http://www.jfsowa.com/talks/ppe.pdf The issues in those slides are the focus of what I was trying to say. Jon
As I understand it, diagrams are icons, at least predominantly; but rather than its object's qualities, a diagram embodies the significant relations among its parts.
That's fine. I don't object to that way of talking about them. What I wanted to distinguish are icons derived from sensations and icons (or diagrams) constructed (or imagined) by further processing. Jon
In a sense, then, one can abstract a diagram from an image by ignoring the singular determinations of the latter that have no bearing on whatever general properties of the former are significant for one's purposes.
I agree that is one way of deriving a diagram in imagination. Clark
I think John’s point was largely orthogonal to the issue of realism/nominalism.
Yes. I prefer realism, but my ppe.pdf slides avoid that distinction. JFS
Every universal is a specification for some kind of diagram, and every particular is something we classify by relating it to some diagram ...
MG Murphey
Mr. Arthur Burks has termed the icon a "specific universal" since it is a specific thing which can stand for any member of a class ... For in constructing the icon, we do not construct one particular case under the hypothesis, we rather construct any particular case under the hypothesis.
Jon
Would you mind elaborating, perhaps including some specific examples?
There are many examples in the ppe.pdf slides: Slides 9 & 10 for icons and diagrams. Slide 20 to 31 show Euclid's diagrams (unchanged) used as diagrams in existential graphs. Slide 39 for the role that icons play in generalized existential graphs. I don't really like the terms 'universal' and 'particular', which are not Peircean terms. I discussed that issue in the article http://www.jfsowa.com/pubs/signs.pdf But following is my rationale for using those words in that note: 1. In a generalized existential graph, a diagram with appropriate indexicals (links to lines of identities) can serve as the definition of a relation. 2. since relations are often used to represent universals, an icon with N attached links (indexicals) can be considered as a representation of an N-adic relation. 3. A very simple icon, such as a patch of red, when attached to a line of identity in an existential graph, may be used to represent a monadic predicate named 'is-red'. 4. In generalized existential graphs (as I define them in ppe.pdf), an icon (or diagram or image or whatever you want to call it) together with N "pegs" (connections to lines of identity) may be used anywhere that an N-adic relation may be used. 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] . 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 .
