To clarify the start of my previous post, the 4th paragraph I mention is Peirce’s 4th paragraph. Rather than retype it here, I’ll just point to it: “There is nothing to prevent ...” Please reread it and Peirce’s surrounding paragraphs. Thanks.
On Tue, Nov 21, 2017 at 11:48 AM Mary Libertin <[email protected]> wrote: > I am interested in the 4th paragraph below. I am presenting the following > as an attempt to continue this interesting discussion. Peirce In para 4 > states that the first use should be in bold to designate it as the first. > This is similar in some ways to the type/token distinction, and designating > the first a type whenever a second appears is useful (and even necessary in > law, as his example suggests). But there is often no first. In perception, > for one example ... one knows there is a (type) only after gradually coming > to an awareness that two or more constitute a type. This awareness may take > a lifetime to establish or may never occur. Peirce is being very particular > theoretically, establishing a blackboard and a grapheous and graphist, and > may I pause to say Peirce somewhere states that any given word example he > is using (the mark once it is formed by an interpreter?) is neither written > nor spoken. This makes sense since it is a discussion of existentiality / > existential graphs. > > This paragraph I’ve written above raises so many possible problems and > questions. Is the blot that he discusses earlier in his Harvard lecture a > way to begin an enactment of the play of musement or process of semiosis at > an elemental level — In perception? Or, how is Peirce’s above paragraph > related to nominalism? I know the thanksgiving-hiatus ensues and provides > us a time to give and receive the harvest. > > Enjoy... > > Mary Libertin > > On Tue, Nov 21, 2017 at 10:10 AM <[email protected]> w > >> Continuing from Lowell 2.12: >> >> >> https://fromthepage.com/jeffdown1/c-s-peirce-manuscripts/ms-455-456-1903-lowell-lecture-ii/display/13617 >> >> >> >> I now pass to the beta part of the system of existential graphs. It is >> far more interesting and important than the alpha part but incomparably >> less so than the gamma part. >> >> >> >> When one hears a proper name mentioned for the first time, one generally >> learns of the individual person or thing denoted by that name that it >> exists. It may, of course, be identified with a subject of force already >> well-known; but that will be exceptional. It will frequently be apparent >> that it is a thing quite different from any hitherto mutually recognized. >> In this case, it will make an addition to the universe of discourse, >> brought about by means of the assertion of a real relation of it to an >> object previously recognized. Sometimes, it will be doubtful whether it is >> one of the recognized subjects of force or not. But what I want to focus >> your attention upon is that at the first mention of a proper name, apart >> from any special information about its subject that may then be conveyed, >> the name merely tells us that *something exists*, that is, is a factor >> of the entire complexus of forces that we partly have known by experience. >> But at any *subsequent* mention of the proper name, though this >> assertion of existence is reiterated, yet that being know[n] already is of >> no importance. The importance of the name at all occurrences after the >> first is that it *identifies* what is mentioned with something we had >> heard of before. >> >> >> >> If you bear in mind these characteristics of proper names, you will >> perceive that when lawyers and others use the letters A, B, C as a sort of >> improved relative pronouns, saying for example that if A owes B money and C >> owes A money, then B may “trustee” C for the debt (as you say in >> Massachusetts), these letters differ from new proper names only in the >> accidental circumstance that they are first introduced in the antecedent of >> a conditional proposition while proper names are first introduced in >> positive assertions. I call such improvised proper names *selectives*. >> >> >> >> There is nothing to prevent our using the capital letters as such >> individual names, provided we distinguish the *first replica* by >> scribing it heavily or otherwise. I cannot say that this is a bad way; it >> serves the purpose of putting out of view confusing [trifles?]. But I do >> say that it requires rather complicated rules, and from every other point >> of view except that of putting unimportant circumstances out of view and >> convenience in printing, is usually inferior to another way of fulfilling >> the same purpose, which I proceed to describe. >> >> >> >> Since the blackboard, or the *sheet of assertion*, represents the >> universe of discourse, and since this universe is a collection of >> individuals, it seems reasonable that any decidedly marked point of the >> sheet should stand for a single individual; so that • should mean >> “something exists.” We cannot make this • • to mean that two things exist, >> since this would conflict with our convention that graphs on different >> parts of the sheet shall have each the same meaning as if each stood alone, >> so that consequently the second point merely *reiterates* that something >> exists. >> >> >> >> >> >> http://gnusystems.ca/Lowells.htm }{ Peirce’s Lowell Lectures of 1903 >> >> >> https://fromthepage.com/jeffdown1/c-s-peirce-manuscripts/ms-455-456-1903-lowell-lecture-ii >> >> >> > -- > null > -- null
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