List,
As I remarked in the other thread, this part of Lowell 3 illustrates several significant points about definitions and terminological matters. As we all know, Peirce in his various writings provided dozens of definitions of the word "sign," and no two of them are exactly alike. Why couldn't he make do with one complete and exact definition, and simply repeat it every time he needed to insert one? First of all, "sign" is a word in common use, which entails that it gets used in a range of senses, some of them quite vague. For purposes of exact logic or semiotics, Peirce needs to narrow that range. The same goes for the term "representation"; and he gives rough-and-ready definitions of both terms in Lowell 3.13, both of which achieve that purpose to some extent. Second, the contexts in which Peirce gives a definition of "sign" vary, and I think this accounts for much of the variation in the definitions. This variation gives us no reason to doubt that all Peirce's definitions of "sign" are consistent with one another, or that they all express exactly the same concept (to the extent that a concept can be exact). But for his semiotic (i.e. scientific) purposes, Peirce also needs to make an analytical definition of the concept, one that will identify its essential elements. For that purpose he creates the technical term "representamen," which is not in common use - in fact there's no entry for it in most English dictionaries. That makes it much more suitable than "sign" for analytic purposes, although its extension is supposed to match that of "sign" as closely as possible. As a technical term, it can be defined exactly by Peirce in the act of introducing it. Then, by defining a "sign" as a representamen or a kind of representamen, he can provide an exact definition of "sign" while also retaining the ordinary-language signification of the word, which is more vague and more familiar. There is a more detailed version of this double definition, with an interesting example of the difference between "sign" and "representamen," in the "Speculative Grammar" section of the Syllabus, EP2:272-3. I devoted some commentary to that passage in Turning Signs, http://gnusystems.ca/TS/cls.htm#sunflow, which interested readers can have a look at. Gary f. From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 13-Jan-18 15:09 To: [email protected] Subject: [PEIRCE-L] Lowell Lecture 3.13 Continuing from Lowell 3.12, https://fromthepage.com/jeffdown1/c-s-peirce-manuscripts/ms-464-465-1903-low ell-lecture-iii-3rd-draught/display/13937: [540] The analysis which I have just used to give you some notion of Genuine Thirdness and its two forms of degeneracy is the merest rough blackboard sketch of the true state of things; and I must begin the examination of representations by defining representation a little more accurately. In the first place, as to my terminology, I confine the word Representation to the operation of a sign or its relation to the object for the interpreter of the representation. The concrete subject that represents I call a sign or a representamen. I use these two words, sign and representamen, differently. By a sign I mean anything which conveys any definite notion of an object in any way, as such conveyers of thought are familiarly known to us. Now I start with this familiar idea and make the best analysis I can of what is essential to a sign, and I define a representamen as being whatever that analysis applies to. If therefore I have committed an error in my analysis, part of what I say about signs will be false. For in that case a sign may not be a representamen. The analysis is certainly true of the representamen, since that is all that word means. Even if my analysis is correct, something may happen to be true of all signs, that is of everything that, antecedently to any analysis, we should be willing to regard as conveying a notion of anything, while there might be something which my analysis describes of which the same thing is not true. In particular, all signs convey notions to human minds; but I know no reason why every representamen should do so. [541] My definition of a representamen is as follows: A representamen is a subject of a triadic relation to a Second, called its Object, for a Third, called its Interpretant, this triadic relation being such that the Representamen determines its Interpretant to stand in the same triadic relation to the same Object for some Interpretant. http://gnusystems.ca/Lowell3.htm }{ Peirce's Lowell Lectures of 1903
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