Edwina, you appear to be assuming that the object of a metaphorical sign cannot be real. I don’t subscribe to that assumption.
For Peirce’s explanation of this point, see the passage I cited from Peirce’s Harvard Lecture 4, EP2:193-4. Since you don’t seem to use EP2, and this passage was apparently omitted from CP, I’ll copy it here: [[ I hear you say: “This smacks too much of an anthropomorphic conception.” I reply that every scientific explanation of a natural phenomenon is a hypothesis that there is something in nature to which the human reason is analogous; and that it really is so all the successes of science in its applications to human convenience are witnesses. They proclaim that truth over the length and breadth of the modern world. In the light of the successes of science to my mind there is a degree of baseness in denying our birthright as children of God and in shamefacedly slinking away from anthropomorphic conceptions of the universe. Therefore, if you ask me what part Qualities can play in the economy of the Universe, I shall reply that 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. In the little bit that you or I can make out of this huge demonstration, our perceptual judgments are the premisses for us and these perceptual judgments have icons as their predicates, in which icons Qualities are immediately presented. But what is first for us is not first in nature. The premisses of Nature's own process are all the independent uncaused elements of facts that go to make up the variety of nature which the necessitarian supposes to have been all in existence from the foundation of the world, but which the Tychist supposes are continually receiving new accretions. Those premisses of nature, however, though they are not the perceptual facts that are premisses to us, nevertheless must resemble them in being premisses. We can only imagine what they are by comparing them with the premisses for us. As premisses they must involve Qualities. ]] Gary F. From: Edwina Taborsky [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 7-Apr-17 09:53 To: [email protected]; [email protected] Subject: Re: RE: [PEIRCE-L] Laws of Nature as Signs Gary F - I don't quite understand your statement: "These are clearly symbols, though not conventional, and (as constituents of an argument) take the form of propositions. I think John is right to call them metaphorical, as our primary experience of these symbols is anthropomorphic" As Peirce wrote: "A law is in itself nothing but a general formula or symbol" 5.107. I don't understand how a symbol is ALSO metaphorical because WE experience them in an anthropomorphic way. My view is that our experience of them is not relevant. What is relevant is how these laws form individual instantiations of matter - and I don't see this as metaphorical but as real. Edwina -- This message is virus free, protected by Primus - Canada's largest alternative telecommunications provider. http://www.primus.ca On Fri 07/04/17 9:25 AM , <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected] sent: Jon A.S., John S., I agree with John on this point — but see further my insertion below. Gary F. From: Jon Alan Schmidt [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 6-Apr-17 17:52 John S., List: JFS: In summary, I believe that the term 'law of nature' is a metaphor for aspects of nature that we can only describe. Again, I am asking about those aspects of nature themselves, not our linguistic or mathematical descriptions of them. What class of Signs are they? Obviously, in posing this question I am presupposing that general laws of nature are real, and that our existing universe consists of Signs all the way down; i.e., "all this universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs." [GF: ] This quote is very often taken out of the context which specifies what Peirce is referring to as “this universe”: “It seems a strange thing, when one comes to ponder over it, that a sign should leave its interpreter to supply a part of its meaning; but the explanation of the phenomenon lies in the fact that the entire universe,— not merely the universe of existents, but all that wider universe, embracing the universe of existents as a part, the universe which we are all accustomed to refer to as ‘the truth,’— that all this universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs” (EP2:394). Now, “that Universe being precisely an argument” (EP2:194), the laws of nature would have to be the “leading principles” which are “working out its conclusions in living realities” (EP2:193). These are clearly symbols, though not conventional, and (as constituents of an argument) take the form of propositions. I think John is right to call them metaphorical, as our primary experience of these symbols is anthropomorphic (EP2:193). We ascribe these forms to the greater Universe just as we do with “facts”: “What we call a ‘fact’ is something having the structure of a proposition, but supposed to be an element of the very universe itself. The purpose of every sign is to express “fact,” and by being joined with other signs, to approach as nearly as possible to determining an interpretant which would be the perfect Truth, the absolute Truth, and as such (at least, we may use this language) would be the very Universe” (EP2:304). To me, this implies the most straightforward answer to your question, although it may not use the language you are looking for. Gary f.
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