Now I understand better wath Jon meant with the following
JAS: the generality of the Object *itself *(Abstractive/Concretive/Collective)
has absolutely no bearing on the nature of its *relation *to the Sign
(Icon/Index/Symbol), since these correspond to *different *trichotomies for
classifying Signs.
He meant that the fact that an object is general does not imply that the
sign is a symbol. If with "general" it is meant "whatever possesses certain
characters", this is obviosuly and patently false:
CSP: "There are three kinds of representamens, or signs: icons, or images;
indices; and symbols, or general signs" (R 492, 1903)
CSP: "All general, or definable, Words, whether in the sense of Types or of
Tokens, are certainly Symbols. That is to say, they denote the objects that
they do by virtue only of there being a habit that associates their
signification with them." (Prolegomena, 1906)
"Deduction involves the analysis of the meanings of general signs, i.e. of
symbols", CSP to F. A. Woods, R L 477 (1913).
Best
Francesco
On Wed, Sep 5, 2018 at 10:26 PM, Francesco Bellucci <bellucci.francesco@
googlemail.com> wrote:
> Jon, List
>>
>> JAS: As I understand it, the subject of a proposition is a Rheme whose
>> Object is also an Object of the proposition. Should we understand the
>> Immediate Object of a proposition to be a Sign?
>>
>
> If one agrees that the subject of a proposition is its imemdiate object,
> of course yes, the immediate object of the proposition is a sign (usually,
> a rhematic index).
>
>>
>> FB: The statue is an Actisign, but its object is general, and thus is a
>> Symbol. But according to the rules, a Symbol cannot be an Actisign. The
>> problem is already here.
>>
>>
>> JAS: The second sentence here is true, but the first sentence is false;
>> the generality of the Object *itself *(Abstractive/Concretive/Collective)
>> has absolutely no bearing on the nature of its *relation *to the Sign
>> (Icon/Index/Symbol), since these correspond to *different *trichotomies
>> for classifying Signs. A Collective Actisign Icon is perfectly consistent
>> with Peirce's later taxonomies.
>>
>
> Is the generality of the object itself still a fourth kind of generality?
> Where does Peirce speaks of a general dynamic object in itself? As I see
> it, when a sign has a general dynamic object, that sign is a symbol.
> Talking of abstractive, concretive and collective in this context only
> confuses things I think. Unless you use "general" in the sense of
> "necessitant" (see below).
>
> Also, to say that a given combination is perfectly consistent would mean
> that the order of the ten trichotomies has been determined, which Peirce
> was far from having done. I guess many of your comments depend on such
> ordering, but since Peirce did not provide a definitive ordering, I wonder
> whether we are going beyond exegesis.
>
>
>>
>> JAS: he thus classified a particular proposition ("Some *S* is *P*") as
>> a Descriptive Symbol, which is *impossible*; all Symbols, and therefore
>> all propositions, are Copulatives. Even if we treat it as a
>> Sinsign/Actisign serving as a Replica, it could only be either a
>> Designative or a Copulative.
>>
>
> In order for a descriptive symbol to be impossible, the trichotomy
> descriptives, designative, and copulants has to precede in order the
> trichotomy icon, index, symbol. Do you have any evidence that Peirce
> established such ordering?
>
> Also, and more importantly, you say that "all Symbols, and therefore all
> propositions, are Copulatives". Leaving aside whether it is true that they
> are copulatives. From your use of "therefore" I infer that you think that
> propositions can only be symbolic. Do you exclude the possibility of
> indexical propositions?
>
>
>>
>> FB: Also, I don't understand whether you are using "general object" in
>> the sense of the object of a symbol or in the sense of distributive
>> generality, or in neither sense.
>>
>>
>> JAS: By "General Object" I mean basically what Peirce called the Dynamic
>> Object of a Collective Sign.
>>
>
> Peirce says "For a Sign whose Dynamoid Object is a Necessitant, I have at
> present no better designation than a Collective" (EP 2: 480). Are you using
> general in the sense of necessitant? And if yes, what's the purpose of
> doing this, given that three other kinds of semiotic generality are around?
>
> Francesco
>
> On Wed, Sep 5, 2018 at 12:14 PM, Francesco Bellucci <
>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> Jon, List
>>>
>>> thanks for these observations. My comments are interspersed below.
>>>
>>> On Wed, Sep 5, 2018 at 5:39 PM, Jon Alan Schmidt <
>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Francesco, List:
>>>>
>>>> I need to digest your latest reply before responding, but it seems to
>>>> move on to more fundamental issues than the quantification aspect of the
>>>> Immediate Object, and I wanted to offer a few more comments about the
>>>> latter.
>>>>
>>>
>>> I beg you to notice that my posts have all been about the immediate
>>> object intended as the subject of a proposition
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Consistent with his earlier division of the Immediate Object into
>>>> vague/singular/general, Peirce in 1908 explicitly characterized particular
>>>> and universal propositions as Descriptives and Copulatives, respectively,
>>>> while discussing the example of the many statues of Civil War soldiers that
>>>> one could find throughout the northern United States in the early 20th
>>>> century.
>>>>
>>>> CSP: That statue is one piece of granite, and not a Famisign. Yet it
>>>> is what we call a "General" sign, meaning that it is *applicable *to
>>>> many singulars. It is not *itself* General: it is its Object which is
>>>> taken to be General. And yet this Object is not truly Universal, in the
>>>> sense of implying a truth of the kind of "Any *S* is *P*"; it only
>>>> expresses "Some *S* is *P*." This makes it *not *a //*Copulant*/
>>>> *Copulative*// but only a *Descriptive*. (EP 2:486)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> As an actual piece of granite, the statue is obviously an Actisign;
>>>> i.e., an individual Instance (Token) of a general Sign (Type). Peirce here
>>>> further classified it as a Descriptive, because he held that the equivalent
>>>> proposition would be particular, rather than singular or universal;
>>>> presumably "*S*" corresponds to "Civil War soldier" and "*P*" to "a
>>>> person who looked like this." However, that conflicts with what he went on
>>>> to say later in the very same manuscript.
>>>>
>>>
>>> The statue is an Actisign, but its object is general, and thus is a
>>> Symbol. But according to the rules, a Symbol cannot be an Actisign. The
>>> problem is already here. Perhaps the solution is that a Symbol cannot be a
>>> "normal" Actisign but it can be an Actisign which is a replica of a
>>> Famisign. The distinction between standard Sinsigns and Replicas comes from
>>> the Syllabus.
>>>
>>>>
>>>> CSP: But an Actual Occurrence always determines the Possibility of its
>>>> character; whence no Descriptive can be a Famisign ... As an example of
>>>> this, no number of Descriptive propositions of the type "Some *S* is
>>>> *P*" can ever determine the truth of a Copulative Proposition "Any *S*
>>>> is *P*." It is, if possible, still more obvious that Possibility can
>>>> never determine Actuality and therefore *a Descriptive cannot be an
>>>> Actisign* ... (EP 2:488; bold added)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I am a strong proponent of the principle of charity, seeking to
>>>> harmonize any author's writings as much as possible; but Peirce clearly
>>>> must have been incorrect in one or the other of these passages,
>>>> because they are directly contradictory. The latter one is fully
>>>> consistent with the order of determination for the semeiotic Correlates as
>>>> spelled out in something that he wrote no more than a few days earlier (EP
>>>> 2:481), so my judgment is that he was wrong to classify the statue--and,
>>>> for that matter, a particular proposition--as a Descriptive.
>>>>
>>>
>>> I think he was not wrong to classify particular propositions as
>>> Descriptives, the passage clearly shows that with "Descriptive" he means
>>> "Some S is P". Since he says that a Descriptive cannot be an Actisign, in
>>> order for this to be an instance of the furst rule (R1, a first determines
>>> only a first) the trichotomy Descriptive/Designative/Copulant has to
>>> precede the trichotomy Potisign/Actisign/Famisign.
>>>
>>>
>>>> Again, my current proposal is that instead we treat quantification as
>>>> the aspect of a proposition's *Immediate *Object that converts the
>>>> Sign's *General *Object into the Replica's *Dynamic *Object.
>>>>
>>>
>>> If quantification really were an aspect of a proposition's immediate
>>> object, while didn't Peirce say, in all his writings on the classification
>>> of signs, that the vague/singular/general division does not exhaust the
>>> immediate object of propositions, and is inapplicable to non-propositional
>>> signs. Also, I don't understand whether you are using "general object" in
>>> the sense of the object of a symbol or in the sense of distributive
>>> generality, or in neither sense. If you use "general object" in neither
>>> sense, I think your use is unPeircean.
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Every proposition in itself, as a Symbol and therefore a general Sign,
>>>> must be a Copulative. As with "Any man is mortal," the continuous
>>>> predicate in this case is "_____ possesses the character of _____," where
>>>> the two blanks correspond to a Designative as the subject ("*S*" with
>>>> a quantifier) and a Descriptive as the predicate ("*P*"). The subject
>>>> of each *Replica *of the proposition must have an *individual *Dynamic
>>>> Object, which is why a quantifier--which Peirce sometimes tellingly called
>>>> a "Selective"--is necessary; it indicates whether the *choice* of that
>>>> individual from the Sign's (collective or continuous) General Object is
>>>> left up to the Utterer ("Some *S*"), the Interpreter ("Any *S*"), or
>>>> neither ("This *S*").
>>>>
>>>> CSP: A sign (under which designation I place every kind of thought,
>>>> and not alone external signs) that is in any respect objectively
>>>> indeterminate (i.e., whose object is undetermined by the sign itself) is
>>>> objectively *general *in so far as it extends to the interpreter the
>>>> privilege of carrying its determination further ... A sign that is
>>>> objectively indeterminate in any respect is objectively *vague *in so
>>>> far as it reserves further determination to be made in some other
>>>> conceivable sign, or at least does not appoint the interpreter as its
>>>> deputy in this office ... Every utterance naturally leaves the right of
>>>> further exposition in the utterer; and therefore, in so far as a sign is
>>>> indeterminate, it is vague, unless it is expressly or by a well-understood
>>>> convention rendered general. (CP 5.447, EP 2:350-351; 1906)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Peirce's 1908 example could perhaps be taken either way. On the one
>>>> hand, each statue is vague/particular ("Some *S* is *P*") in the sense
>>>> that the sculptor as the Utterer determined the specific appearance of the
>>>> person depicted by it, which might or might not correspond to an actual
>>>> person. On the other hand, each statue is general/universal ("Any *S*
>>>> is *P*") in the sense that for many different local families as the
>>>> Interpreters, "that very realistic statue represents the mourned one who
>>>> fell in the war" (EP 2:486).
>>>>
>>>
>>> I beg you to notice that in the first passage that you quote "general
>>> object" has to be taken in the sense of "object of a symbol". For he says:
>>> "It is not itself General: it is its Object which is taken to be General",
>>> i.e. is not a legisign/famisign, but is a symbol. Cf.: "Of course, I always
>>> use ‘general’ in the usual sense of general as is its object. If I wish to
>>> say that a sign is general as to its matter, I call it a Type, or Typical."
>>> (R 293). It seems to me that you are confusing the generality of the object
>>> (dynamic object of symbol) and the distributive universality of the subject
>>> of a proposition (immediate object of a proposition).
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> Francesco
>>>
>>
>>
>> -----------------------------
>> 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 .
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
-----------------------------
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 .
