Gary R., List:
GR: However, you also quoted Peirce to the effect that God is creating
this Universe continuously, that the world was not created on some
particularly busy day several thousands of years ago, as Genesis (and,
mutatis mutandis, the Whiteboard metaphor) would have it, but is happening
now and will be happening until the World's end.
I believe that remark by Peirce was mainly intended to *broaden *the notion
of "creation" *beyond *its usual reference to a one-time event in the
distant past, whether understood as having happened "during a certain busy
week, in the year 4004 B.C." (CP 1.615, EP 2:255; 1903), or billions of
years ago as the singularity that is popularly known as "the Big Bang."
After all, in the same passage he equated "the creation of the universe"
with "this very development of Reason," which "consists, you will observe,
in embodiment, that is, in manifestation" such that it "is going on today
and never will be done" (*ibid*). In other words, he was emphasizing
the *continuity
*of creation as a *process*.
With that in mind, I see no incompatibility with the blackboard
illustration--which, it is important to note, Peirce *did not* characterize
as a *metaphor*. On the contrary, he explicitly referred to "the clean
blackboard" as "a sort of diagram," and stated that "the clue to which I
trust to guide us through the maze ... consists in making our thought
diagrammatic and mathematical, by treating generality from the point of
view of geometrical continuity, and by experimenting upon the diagram" (CP
6.203-204; 1898). I am pointing this out because of how he elsewhere
distinguished between the different kinds of *hypoicons*.
CSP: Hypoicons may roughly [be] divided according to the mode of Firstness
which they partake. Those which partake the simple qualities, or First
Firstnesses, are *images*; those which represent the relations, mainly
dyadic, or so regarded, of the parts of one thing by analogous relations in
their own parts, are *diagrams*; those which represent the representative
character of a representamen by representing a parallelism in something
else, are *metaphors*. (EP 2:274; 1903)
What makes a Sign a diagram is that it embodies the *relations *among
the *parts
*of its Object. Peirce was thus primarily calling attention to the *relations
*among the "ur-continuity" (3ns), various "Platonic worlds" (1ns), and our
"actual universe of existence" (2ns) by representing them respectively as a
clean blackboard, melded groups of white marks on it (my "whiteboards"),
and a discontinuous mark on one of those. I have taken the additional step
of observing that marks do not simply *appear *on blackboards as somehow
self-generating--instead, *someone has to draw them*; and based on that
*relation*, I understand that person to represent God. As such, there is
nothing stopping Him from *continuing *to draw *additional *white marks on
the blackboard (new possibilities) and *additional *discontinuous marks on
the whiteboard (new existents).
GR: It seems to me that in consideration of the ur-Continuity of the
Blackboard from which God selected those Platonic characters ('Platonic' is
Peirce's word in this context) which would be inscribed on 'our'
Whiteboard, that that Person is, if I understand you correctly, the
semeiotic Object of this Universe, the Creator of the vast evolving Symbol
which is *this* Cosmos, our Universe.
Indeed, what I just outlined corresponds to Peirce's description of "a *perfect
*sign" as "perpetually being acted upon by its object, from which it is
perpetually receiving the accretions of new signs, which bring it fresh
energy, and also kindle energy that it already had, but which had lain
dormant"; and also never ceasing "to undergo changes of the kind we rather
drolly call spontaneous, that is, they happen *sua sponte* but not by
*its *will"
(EP 2:545n25; 1906). If these changes do not occur by a perfect Sign's *own
*will--whatever that might mean--then *whose *will brings them about? In
my view, spontaneity in this sense is not *randomness*, but (divine)
*freedom*. "Thus, when I speak of chance, I only employ a mathematical
term to express with accuracy the characteristics of freedom or
spontaneity" (CP 6.201; 1898).
GR: But, in consideration of the continuous creation occurring *now*, it
seems to me that if God the Father is not immanent in this Universe then
that continuous creation must be the ongoing work of *He who is God with
the Father *but who is not the Father, that is, Christ.
Again, note the *relations *that Peirce's diagram embodies. Surely we can
agree that the person who draws the chalk marks is *not *immanent in the
blackboard, let alone in the marks themselves; he is *entirely outside *them,
yet still able to *act upon *them. Likewise, I see no reason why it would
be necessary for God to be immanent in the Universe in order to be its
continuous Creator. I suppose that we could speculate on whether and where
Christ *might *fit into this picture. Is He the man drawing the marks on
behalf of the Father? The hand that holds the chalk? The piece of chalk
itself? The blackboard as the *Logos *(John 1) in Whom "all things hold
together" (Colossians 1:17)? Obviously none of these are fully compatible
with the *traditional *doctrine of the Trinity--for one thing, where is the
Holy Spirit?--but the last one might loosely fit the concept of "the Cosmic
Christ."
GR: Of course, Peirce was generally opposed to theology (although not to
religious metaphysics, the distinction not yet clear to me); and, indeed,
religious experience doesn't require theology.
It seems more accurate to say that Peirce was generally opposed to
*theologians*, because he did not consider them to be practicing a genuine
*science*. Instead, he viewed them as relying primarily on the methods of
tenacity and authority to enforce allegedly infallible dogmas, as reflected
in his assertion that "the principal business of theologians is to make men
feel the enormity of the slightest departure from the metaphysics they
assume to be connected with the standard faith" (CP 6.3; 1898). He also
had misgivings about religious *institutions*, since "the
Church requires subscription to a platform--a Creed. And how has that
platform been made? With strict party regularity, no doubt" (CP 6.450; c.
1895). Of course, I do not share his negative opinions about such things.
Regards,
Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt - twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt
On Wed, May 29, 2019 at 2:55 PM Gary Richmond <[email protected]>
wrote:
> Jon, List,
>
> In an earlier message in this thread I suggested that in order to avoid
> confusion, when speaking of *trinity *without explicit religious
> underpinnings that we type the 't' lowercase, but that we capitalize it
> when referring to *the Trinity* of theology. In my message below, Trinity
> is almost always capitalized since it means to relate to Peirce's religious
> metaphysics in conjunction with his cosmological views, not entirely
> separate as I see it. In any case, those who are adverse to theology might
> consider skipping reading this post.
>
> I'm going to be traveling abroad with perhaps limited Internet access
> beginning this weekend through the 12th of June, but before I left, I did
> want to ask a question that came to mind again regarding Peirce's religious
> metaphysics (his cosmological theology, if I may so phrase it). I hinted at
> it earlier, but now would like to deepen the question.
>
> It seems to me that, on the one hand, Peirce suggested, and you have
> argued in your Signs paper, Jon (as suggested by the Blackboard metaphor in
> the last of the 1898 lectures) that 'before' this Universe came into being,
> 'before' there was anything Existent (so 'before' Time, 'before' the
> so-called Big Bang), that God, from *all* the Platonic possibilities,
> that is, from all imaginable and unimaginable essential Platonic forms
> which might possibly be involved in the creation of *some* Universe (the
> Blackboard metaphor, if I finally have it right), that on a kind of subset
> of that Blackboard of ur-continuity--so upon a kind of Whiteboard--He
> scribed those potential qualities and characters which *would* factor in
> the creation of this Universe. (Btw, as I understand Peirce, this is not
> the only possible universe the Scriber might create, and Peirce hints at a
> kind of multiverse theory, one which seems to me quite different from most
> modern versions of such theories.)
>
> However, you also quoted Peirce to the effect that God is
> creating this Universe continuously, that the world was *not* created on
> some particularly busy day several thousands of years ago, as Genesis (and,
> mutatis mutandis, the Whiteboard metaphor) would have it, but is happening
> now and will be happening until the World's end.
>
> It seems to me that in consideration of the ur-Continuity of the
> Blackboard from which God selected those Platonic characters ('Platonic' is
> Peirce's word in this context) which would be inscribed on 'our'
> Whiteboard, that that Person is, if I understand you correctly, the
> semeiotic Object of this Universe, the Creator of the vast evolving Symbol
> which is *this* Cosmos, our Universe.
>
> But, in consideration of the continuous creation occurring *now*, it
> seems to me that if God the Father is not immanent in this Universe then
> that continuous creation must be the ongoing work of *He who is God with
> the Father *but who is not the Father, that is, Christ. And this is one
> of the reasons that I introduced this thread on trinity (there are, of
> course, others).
>
> [Note: I have already pointed to some thinkers having a trinitarian view
> of the cosmos which is not specifically Christian or even, for that matter,
> necessarily religious (although, personally, I don't see how a trinitarian
> view of the cosmos wouldn't lead to a Trinitarian and, so, religious one,
> while the religion need not be Christianity according to some advocates of
> trinitarian thinking).]
>
> For now this problematic of *both* an *ur-creation* leading to the
> putative 'Big Bang' *and* an ongoing *continuous creation* is resolved in
> my mind in imagining that while the First Person of the Trinity (God the
> Father) is not immanent in the Universe, is *not* Himself actively and
> continuously creating it, that the Second Person *is* (whom some, notably
> Matthew Fox and Richard Rohr, have referred to as the Cosmic Christ), and
> that this is the consequence of the communication between the First and
> Second Persons via the Third, viz., the Holy Spirit. I understand this to
> be expression of the (evolutionary) Love of all three Persons of the
> Trinity for God's creation and for humankind, Man having been made in His
> image.
>
> It seems to me that Peirce analyses this trichotomically (i.e.,
> tri-categorially) *and* semiotically. However, I'm now suggesting that
> his pure categorial analysis speaks to the ur-creation (where there are 'as
> yet' no signs as such) while the semeiotic analysis concerns itself
> specifically with the on-going creation. In this regard, it also comes to
> mind, perhaps not completely irrelevantly, that in Peirce's Classification
> of Sciences that Phenomenology (yielding the three Universal Categories)
> precedes Logic as Semeiotic, and that Pure Mathematics precedes them both.
>
> Now you've already noted that this way of thinking--that is, imagining
> God, as the Second Person of the Trinity, that is Christ, immanent in and
> continuing God, as the First Person, the Father's creation, and in
> communion with Him through the Holy Spirit--is something you really haven't
> (or, really, even want to) entertain given your conservative Christian
> views. But I do not see how God can be both completely 'apart' from His
> Creation and yet also 'continuously creating' it. So, again, for me seeing
> God as Three-in-One and distinguishing the 'roles' (so to speak) of the
> three Persons provides something of an answer to the question I've posed.
>
> I was introduced to the notion of the Cosmic Christ decades ago while
> reading Meister Eckhart's writings and sermons which led me to Fox's work,
> especially, *The Coming of the Cosmic Christ*. I 'rediscovered' the
> concept and had it reinforced in the past few years through Rohr's ongoing
> work. I hope it's clear that I see it as an uniquely powerful idea,
> especially within the context of Peirce cosmological musings. Peirce, as I
> understand him, was not a conservative Christian. It seems to me, then,
> that his positing Three Universal Categories and Three Universes of
> Experience might have made the idea of God the Creator of this Universe
> offering to it His Son, the Cosmic Christ at work today, plausible to him.
> It also helps reconcile, at least for me, his proto-cosmic thinking in the
> 1898 Cambridge House lectures with the several semeiotic analyses you've
> been considering and from which you've been extensively quoting, and helps
> answer the question of how God can be both apart from His creation and yet
> continually creating it.
>
> Of course, Peirce was generally opposed to theology (although not to
> religious metaphysics, the distinction not yet clear to me); and, indeed,
> religious experience doesn't require theology.
>
> As I noted in an early post in this thread, despite what I just wrote as a
> Christian, I do not myself see the trinity idea as limited to Christian
> theology and, in fact, imagine that it might prove valuable in helping
> bridge the divide between religion and science, Peirce's desideratum. I
> hope to take up that more general view of trinity in future posts.
>
> For now I'd be interested in what thoughts you might have on this view of
> the Trinity.
>
> Best,
>
> Gary R
>
> *Gary Richmond*
> *Philosophy and Critical Thinking*
> *Communication Studies*
> *LaGuardia College of the City University of New York*
>
>>
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