Edwina, list,
Edwina wrote: "My only quibble with the title is 'How Mind Emerged from
Matter'. My own view is that neither was primary; both emerged and
function together."
I also would quibble--perhaps more than quibble--with Deacon's subtitle.
But, and following Peirce's view--objective idealism--I see mind as
primordial.
Seeing matter as primordial Peirce terms 'materialism', a view which he
rejects as "repugnant to scientific logic as to common sense; since it
requires us to suppose that a certain kind of mechanism will feel."
He also rejects the third option which you support: that the two arose
together, which was then, apparently, referred to as 'monism' but which
Peirce prefers to call 'neutralism'. He 'condemns' monism-neutralism on the
basis of "Ockham's razor": "By placing the inward and outward aspects of
substance on a par, it seems to render both primordial."
For Peirce the universe does not commence as a peculiar kind of 2ns with *the
laws* of mind and matter 'arising' together and co-equal.
CP 6.24-25 (1890) The old dualistic notion of mind and matter, so prominent
in Cartesianism, as two radically different kinds of substance, will hardly
find defenders today. Rejecting this, we are driven to some form of
hylopathy, otherwise called monism. Then the question arises whether
physical laws on the one hand and the psychical law on the other are to be
taken --
(a) as independent, a doctrine often called monism, but which I would name
neutralism; or,
(b) the psychical *law *as derived and special, the physical law alone as
primordial, which is materialism; or,
(c) the physical law as derived and special, the psychical law alone as
primordial, which is idealism.
The materialistic doctrine seems to me quite as repugnant to scientific
logic as to common sense; since it requires us to suppose that a certain
kind of mechanism will feel, which would be a hypothesis absolutely
irreducible to reason -- an ultimate, inexplicable regularity; while the
only possible justification of any theory is that it should make things
clear and reasonable.
Neutralism is sufficiently condemned by the logical maxim known as Ockham's
razor, i.e., that not more independent elements are to be supposed than
necessary. By placing the inward and outward aspects of substance on a par,
it seems to render both primordial.
The one intelligible theory of the universe is that of objective idealism,
that matter is effete mind, inveterate habits becoming physical laws. But
before this can be accepted it must show itself capable of explaining the
tridimensionality of space, the laws of motion, and the general
characteristics of the universe, with mathematical clearness and precision;
for no less should be demanded of every philosophy. (Boldface added to
emphasize that Peirce is discussing *laws* throughout.)
('Objective idealism' was recently discussed in another thread here.)
As brilliant a thinker as Deacon is, he appears to some, including me, to
be a kind of "partial Peirceian," to some I've spoken with, even a "thief
of Peirce," an expression Walker Percy used to describe his own use of
Peirce: that is, using what is useful to ones own argument and ignoring or
discarding what is not. I tend to think of him as much more the former than
the latter, for his understanding of Peircean semeiotics seems to me
partial (although he uses some of Peircean thinking well in *Incomplete
Nature*, although not very much of his semeiotic). But even if his
understanding of Peirce seems partial and 'incomplete', he appears to me to
make a good faith attempt to be true to his ownunderstanding.
This partial understanding was apparent even in consideration of his first
book, *The Symbolic Species*, and I recall discussions with several
Peirceans at an ICCS conference at the UAH in Huntsville, Alabama, a number
of years ago who found his thinking both stimulating in some regards, but
also somewhat superficial in consideration of some well-established
Peircean principles.
I will have more to say on *Incomplete Nature* (and its unfortunate
subtitle) including his novel use of 'constraint'. But I'm unexpecedly away
from my downtown desk and do not have my copy of* Incomplete Nature *with
me uptown where I am about to be entertaining out of town guests.
Best,
Gary
*Gary Richmond*
*Philosophy and Critical Thinking*
*Communication Studies*
*LaGuardia College of the City University of New York*
On Thu, Aug 1, 2019 at 7:50 AM Edwina Taborsky <[email protected]> wrote:
> Exactly- Peircean semiosis, with its three modal categories and their
> subsets [1-1, 2-2; 2-1; 3-3; 3-2; 3-1]; and the semiosic process of
> DO-IO-R-II-DI-FI, functions as a Complex Adaptive System [CAS].
>
> This is exactly as described, a self-organizing system with anticipation,
> adaptation and both stability and novelty. My only quibble with the title
> is 'How Mind Emerged from Matter'. My own view is that neither was primary;
> both emerged and function together. After all - you can't have matter
> without Mind, i.e., without an organizational pattern - even of the basic
> atom; and certainly, I reject any concept of Mind as an a priori reality
> and/or as existing without being articulated as Matter.
>
> Edwina
>
>
>
> On Thu 01/08/19 12:40 AM , Gary Richmond [email protected] sent:
>
> List,
>
> In the online 'Semiotics Research Group', Cary Campbell posted this video
> of a lecture by Terrence Deacon at the University of Tartu.
>
> The video of Terrence Deacon's (University of California, Berkeley) "The
> bridge from information theory to semiosis", 15.07.2019 available to see on
> UTTV at https://www.uttv.ee/naita?id=28688
> <https://www.uttv.ee/naita?id=28688&fbclid=IwAR3gAqtFXExboW-r9Eosbt9HknhBp1cjME4NhEPE3XyqcgYal_o4x4xBRa0>
>
>
> Several years ago Gary Fuhrman and I considered discussing on Peirce-L
> Deacon's difficult but, in our opinion, critically important book, Incomplete
> Nature: How Mind Emerged from Matter.
> [image: Blocked image]
> We finally decided that it would probably prove too challenging to discuss
> it in an online forum (considering, for example, its length, and the
> difficulties posed by some of Deacon's neologisms, terms necessary to
> characterize several concepts he introduces in the book necessary to set
> forth his argument). So while the book is deeply informed by Peircean
> semeiotics (as was his earlier book, The Symbolic Species), we dropped
> the idea of an online discussion, concluding that it would probably be of
> interest only to a very few here, such as those grounded in certain facets
> of information and systems theory in its relation to biosemiotics.
>
> The video offers, among other things, an excellent introduction to Incomplete
> Nature. Here is an excerpt from a review of it in The New York Review of
> Books:
>
> Terrence W. Deacon approaches these questions [such as the origin of life]
> with the apparatus of dynamic systems theory, which describes the
> operations of complex systems that are autonomous, self-maintaining, stable
> over time, and resistant to the tendency toward disorder called entropy.
> The model of such systems, at a primitive level, is the biological cell,
> which makes up further more complex dynamic systems such as organs and
> whole organisms. The cell maintains its integrity over time by means of an
> enclosing membrane that is selectively permeable, letting in only such
> molecules as will serve its self-preserving needs: performing basic
> metabolism and expelling waste products. It is a self-organizing unit
> (unlike a humanly constructed machine) that admits of teleological
> description—it has goals toward which its activities tend—and that contains
> the essential ingredients of life. One of its central capacities is
> counteracting the effects of the second law of thermodynamics: it creates
> order and resists chaos.
> https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/06/07/can-anything-emerge-nothing/
>
>
> Best,
>
> Gary
>
> Gary Richmond
> Philosophy and Critical Thinking
> Communication Studies
> LaGuardia College of the City University of New York
>
>
>
>
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