Jeff, Thanks for drawing attention to the very important point that understanding any one of Peirce's distinctions has to involve understanding his reasons for making them in the first place. This is a major virtue of Bellucci's book on speculative grammar, which follows his development chronologically.
The question of how the immediate object of a sign in Peirce's late speculative grammar is related to the "immediate object of thought" in Peirce's 1871 review is an interesting one. Certainly the "doctrine of immediate perception" is crucial to his early realism, and is closely related to his concept of "direct experience" which I posted about in the message that started this thread. Bellucci throws some light on the terminology by quoting this bit from Peirce's Logic Notebook: "I use the terms immediate and direct, not according to their etymologies but so that to say that A is immediate to B means that it is present in B" (R 339 DDR 243v). The question then is: What's the connection - and the difference - between "being in the mind" and being in the sign, or being part of the sign, as Peirce's immediate object definitely is (in a way that the dynamic object is not). In the light of all this I've been taking a critical look at the way I dealt with these philosophical issues in Turning Signs; as usual, I'm finding that a closer look at how Peirce deals with them is very helpful for that purpose. But at this point I don't think i have anything new to contribute to Peirce scholarship on these issues; and as for my book, it speaks for itself. Gary f. From: Jeffrey Brian Downard <[email protected]> Sent: 23-Jun-18 01:16 To: Peirce-L <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Direct experience and immediate object Hello, Thus far in this ongoing discussion about the nature of immediate object, considerable attention has been paid to the question of what passages support one or another interpretation of Peirce's account and how those passages ought to be read. I'm wondering if we might make some progress by also considering the reasons that seemed to be guiding Peirce when he developed the distinctions between the two different kinds of objects and the three different kinds of interpretants. If we pay attention to the reasons that seemed to be controlling in the development of the distinctions, can an argument be given--for or against--one or another line of interpretation? Or, can an argument be given for or against one or another way of developing and interpreting these conceptions within the context of the semiotic theory? The aim of a theory of critical logic is to explain what is essential for abductive, deductive and inductive arguments to be valid. The aim of a speculative grammar is to explain what is essential for any kind of sign to have a significant character. Taking these two related aims in mind, why is the conception of the immediate object essential for the further development--by Peirce or by us--of a pragmatically oriented semiotic theory? Peirce is not the kind of philosopher who theorizes in a vacuum. Rather, he sees a need to develop hypothetical explanations that engage with other leading theorists on disputed questions. So, consider what he says in his review of Fraser's edition of the works of Berkeley: This realistic theory is thus a highly practical and common-sense position. Wherever universal agreement prevails, the realist will not be the one to disturb the general belief by idle and fictitious doubts. For according to him it is a consensus or common confession which constitutes reality. What he wants, therefore, is to see questions put to rest. And if a general belief, which is perfectly stable and immovable, can in any way be produced, though it be by the fagot and the rack, to talk of any error in such belief is utterly absurd. The realist will hold that the very same objects which are immediately present in our minds in experience really exist just as they are experienced out of the mind; that is, he will maintain a doctrine of immediate perception. He will not, therefore, sunder existence out of the mind and being in the mind as two wholly improportionable modes. When a thing is in such relation to the individual mind that that mind cognizes it, it is in the mind; and its being so in the mind will not in the least diminish its external existence. For he does not think of the mind as a receptacle, which if a thing is in, it ceases to be out of. To make a distinction between the true conception of a thing and the thing itself is, he will say, only to regard one and the same thing from two different points of view; for the immediate object of thought in a true judgment is the reality. The realist will, therefore, believe in the objectivity of all necessary conceptions, space, time, relation, cause, and the like. (bold and underlined are my emphasis) Peirce is responding here to a number of the main positions that were taken in the debates between the empiricists and rationalists-especially as those took shape in the arguments and positions of Kant and Hume. He claims that this formulation of realism may be more "definitely" expressed than has been done before. As such, he seems to think that this formulation involves some kind of clarification of what the dispute is really over. We should keep in mind that the position "involves a phenomenalism", but it is one that is inspired considerable more by the arguments of Kant than those of Hume. Indeed, he says, "what Kant called his Copernican step was precisely the passage from the nominalistic to the realistic view of reality." (CP, 8.15) As such, Peirce appears to be further developing this Copernican turn-or perhaps shifting it in a more pragmaticist direction. The key idea, I take it, is that this pragmatic theory of cognition is being shaped within a realist framework that endorses a doctrine of immediate perception. This framework conceives of what is in mind and what is out of mind in a manner that differs in important respects from the way that distinction was made by the likes of Hume and his followers. Drawing on these sorts of considerations, I tend to think the conception of the immediate object was well established within the debates of the modern and medieval philosophers, and that Peirce is simply refining that conception for the sake of offering what he thinks are better explanations of the differences between such things as (a) what it is for a thing to be within mind or without it, and (b) what it is for an assertion to be true and false. If we take this conception of the immediate object of thought and then generalize on it, where should we draw the line in terms of the kinds of signs that might have such immediate objects? Do all classes of signs have such objects, or do only those signs that have the character of a dicisign have such objects? Since we all seem to agree that propositions expressed symbolically have immediate objects, what follows from that? The inference I am tempted to draw is that any sign-even a rhematic iconic qualisign--that might be thought or expressed as part of a symbolic proposition has, in some sense, an immediate object--at least as a possible object if not as a existent or as a necessitant. My argument for this claim is that the meaning of an immediate perception of, say, a green cushion on a yellow chair seems to involve the following: (1) elements of firstness that are connected in particular ways in the percept, (2) a visual percept of a chair with a definite spatial shape, (3) a direct perception of the differences between the connectives involved in having a percept of a yellow chair with a green cushion versus that of a green chair with a yellow cushion, (4) a perception of the opposition between the two objects that involves (5) a double awareness. (see CP 7.625). So, what difference does it make-for the sake of what we trying to explain in this theory of cognition-in holding that the rhematic iconic qualisigns or the rhematic indexical sinsigns involved in the immediate perception of a green cushion on a yellow chair each have their immediate objects or in claiming that only the dicisign expressed in the perceptual judgment has such an object? For my part, I tend to think that is natural to explain the character of the immediate object that is involved in the perceptual judgment and the relation it has to the dynamical object and to the various signs and their interpretants by appealing to the immediate objects-possible if not actual--of the rhematic signs that are involved in such dicisigns. After all, within the context of this theory of semiotics, it is natural to conceive of rhematic signs as limited cases of dicisigns, just as it is natural to conceive of dicisigns as limiting cases of inferences. If these conceptions pick out natural and not arbitrary classes of things, then there is a continuous shading between the classes and not a sharp line. The lack of a sharp line leads me to think such explanations should be forthcoming. I may be wrong to think that such explanations will really serve to explain anything, but that, at least, is my interpretative conjecture about how we might interpret Peirce's position as well as my substantive conjecture about the nature of the immediate object. While this is a hypothesis that I currently find attractive, I do not at this point have compelling reasons to reject other competing explanations. Yours, Jeff Jeffrey Downard Associate Professor Department of Philosophy Northern Arizona University
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